GAS PRICES: NEW Democrat Plan Will Raise Prices MORE

Today on Sekulow, there's a new Democrat plan floating around Washington, D.C. that will actually raise your gas prices even more. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. Hey, welcome to Sekulow. Folks, we're taking your calls to 1-800-684-3110.

If you heard of the opening of the broadcast, it is true. There are actually three different Democrat plans floating around. And the idea is they're going to try to give you more money to pay for the higher gas prices. What happens when the government starts handing out money to people and what happens to prices? We've seen that over the last couple of years because of all the stimulus checks that went out because of the pandemic. Guess what happened to all the prices of every good? They go up. So one of the plans is the Gas Rebate Act of 2022.

It sounds wonderful. So for Americans earning, it's like under $160,000 for a joint filing family. $100 a check per person in your family, that would include your dependent.

So a family of four, $400 a month. Do you think that the gas prices are going to go down if these companies know that you're getting an extra $400 a month to pay for gas? That's not the only plan, though. There's another plan that makes big oil pay a one-time 50% windfall profit tax. Okay, 50% windfall profit tax on any profit that exceeds 110% of their average profit. And then that, again, you will get a monthly tax credit.

What will happen if you put a 50% windfall tax on an oil company? They will raise the price to offset the tax they're paying. And they also know you're going to get a credit for it. So they're always going to pass the cost.

I mean, Dad, we know this. They will always pass the cost of any kind of punishment on them to the consumer. And when they know the consumer's getting a boost from it, it makes it that much easier for them to pass the cost on. And think about this from a little bit of a short historical segment. And that is a year and a half ago, the United States was a net exporter of energy.

We were energy self-sufficient and we were selling energy. And 18 months later, we're not. And 17 months later, we're not. And here's the thing that I think the irony for all of us in this process is. Another round of stimulus checks, which is coming, by the way, from you and me, it doesn't come out of thin air. It's not like the government's giving. The government is expending our taxpayer dollars to go to this program.

And you know what happens with that program? Let me explain it to you. If you put a tax on the oil and gas companies, guess what they do? Raise prices, just as you said. So then the money you're getting will be enough maybe to pay for the increase in the gas costs. Yeah, there's another plan.

There's three. These are all coming from the Democrats. This one would give you a quarterly payment, so four times a year. And then they would do a, again, they would put a tax, another tax on profitable oil companies.

Again, every time you do this, folks, it might sound nice. This is typical Democrat politics. Hand out money. But when you hand out money and the sellers of a Pacific good know that you're getting these resources, whether it's the $100 per, including your dependents, up to $400 or $500 for a family of four or five, or you're getting a tax credit or you're getting a monthly payment, a quarterly payment, but they're getting taxed. They're going to pass that off to you.

It's outrageous. And the idea that we won't double down on investing in America. And, folks, all this will do is the prices will go up and you'll be paying. So the $100 extra that you're getting are really just going to offset the increase in the price that the oil companies are doing because they're getting extra taxes.

And this is pretty common sense. We'll take your calls on this. 1-800-684-3110. But you see, you've got to cut through the headline here because if you just tell people, hey, the government's going to give you $500 more a month to pay for your gas, people say, that sounds pretty great right now.

But you have to understand the bigger context of what happens when they start adding these windfall taxes on the oil companies. 1-800-684-3110 to talk to us. Marsha Blackburn is going to be joining us as well.

Maybe the next segment could be the third segment of the broadcast. She's in the questioning right now of some of the witnesses for the Supreme Court nominee. If you want to talk to us on air, 1-800-684-3110.

That's 1-800-684-3110. Support the work of the ACLJ at ACLJ.org. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. Whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy, and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress, the ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support.

Take part in our Matching Challenge today. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org slash gift. All right, welcome back to Secular. We are taking your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110.

So let me just run through again. Senator Blackburn, we just talked to her team. She's actually still going back and forth with some of the witnesses. She'll be in the third segment of the broadcast, so coming up next, you'll be getting a live update from her. She's been questioning the Supreme Court nominee, especially on the life issue, for the past three days.

And now they're witnesses as well, so it would be great to have her on to get her update for all of you. So you've got three plans by Democrats. One is the Gas Rebate Act of 2022 would send Americans a $100 check any month this year when the national average gas price exceeds $4 a gallon, which it does right now. Dependents will get another $100, so a family of four could get up to $400. There are limits if you're making over $150,000 a year or $160,000 a year as a joint filer.

You're not eligible for this. If you're an individual, it's under $75,000. But it's not the only plan, so there's that plan. Again, there's another plan that would be a quarterly payment to Americans, but that is also funded by a tax on profits from the oil companies.

They're all funded by taxes on oil companies. Which is going to raise the rate. Right. So you get a check, but you're going to be paying more.

Right. And then the third one is they're going to do a 50% windfall profit tax on the oil company and then give you a tax credit. This is like socialism, by the way. Well, again, also you are going to have those costs passed off to the consumer. Of course. So all of these include taxes and then tax increases on businesses. Yep.

They know you're getting a little extra money in your pocket so that you can then cover their extra costs to them. Right. Let's go to Bill in Florida online too. Hey, Bill, welcome to Secular, you're on the air. Hey, Bill.

Thanks for taking my call. My question is, do you think the Senate's going to let any of these bills get through? I mean, don't you think Manchin and those guys are going to nix these? I think that, again, they're putting multiple plans. Always watch carefully when you have multiple options.

So one's a tax credit, one's a quarterly payment, one's a based off of where is the gas price that month. Right. So I don't think – you can't count out Manchin. I think when it comes to government spending – He likes it. He's not an anti-government spending guy.

No. That's what keeps him in the Democrat Party. Exactly. So I think you look at a situation like this, and as Jordan, I think, wisely said, when you've got multiple options that they have, something may catch fire, basically.

Something may catch on. And obviously they're pushing this. Now, are they going to want to say, oh, it was the Republicans that bucked us getting gas relief to the American people? That's the big play, too. And then if that politically does not play for the Republicans, all of a sudden you could see Republicans saying – We've got to do something.

Exactly. And it might not be that they support such a high tax, but they would support some kind of tax credit. But all of this, again, I think that what you have to understand is this is all going into midterm elections, and it will all raise the price. You will be paying more at the pump with these kind of moves because when they provide stimulus, prices go up. When government spends more and they give you more to spend, prices go up because the companies know you have more to spend.

So they raise the price a little bit here, a little bit there, and I'd say the gas prices will just keep going up. We've got an interesting comment on Rumble. And by the way, if you're not on Rumble, you should be. You should be headed over there if you're on some of our other social media platforms because you know what's going to happen on Rumble? Nothing as far as censorship goes. So we encourage you to go there since we're in a constant battle with some of these other social media platforms who every time we've had a challenge with them, we're ending up correct even though they send out nasty letters to our folks, and then you barely get the apology sent out to anybody.

But we've got an interesting comment coming in from Rumble. It says here in California, the governor says he'll give a gas rebate of $400 per vehicle. Why? Because he's coming up for reelection.

The listener says it's cheaper than lowering our gas tax, which is the highest in the country. Yeah, I mean, again, I think it's exactly right. It's all politics here. Democrats know they're coming up for potential shellacking in the midterm elections, which we'll remember that effectively hamstrings anything President Biden wants to do. If Republicans take back either the House or the Senate, it looks like they may take back both the House and the Senate. So if that occurs, they know that their agendas are done.

So what they are doing is anything possible now to try – and I think you're right, Dad. I think what they want to do here is throw this all out there and then blame Republicans if it came to a filibuster in the Senate where they weren't able to come to – they weren't able to get through the 60-vote threshold to end debate and actually have a vote on one of these pieces of legislation. They'll say, see, it's Republicans who are the reason why we're here ready to help you spend more money on fossil fuels, which they hate fossil fuels and they want to get rid of fossil fuels, but we're going to give you a stimulus check to pay for more fossil fuel so you can drive more and spend more easily. But those mean Republicans, they don't want to give it to you.

But in a sense, if you don't – if you make moves like this, gas prices will go up for everyone because you put that extra money into the economy, and they did that during COVID, and everything costs more now because people – it didn't matter if you lost your job, kept your job, you had more cash to spend. It is interesting. And we are getting a lot of calls coming in on this at 800-684-3110 from literally all over the country. Let's go to line five. Tamara's calling. Hi, Tamara.

Hi, there. So, really, I think the root cause of all of this is just the liberal Democrats, another way for them to try to make people dependent on the government. Yeah, I think that's absolutely true. And, Jordan, they're succeeding.

Yeah, they are succeeding. This is our good friend of ours, Congresswoman Elise Stefanik. She talked about this idea of the spinning being so much of one of the issues with inflation. Take a listen.

Bite six. I would say that when I talk to voters in my district and across America, people are feeling the pain of inflation. They're feeling the pain of the price of energy, which is higher than it's ever been before, because of the failed policies of Joe Biden and House Democrats. So I think we need to address that immediately. That means reining in the reckless trillions of dollars of spending that we've seen under Nancy Pelosi's leadership as Speaker of the House. We are committed to doing that, but that's hurting families, that's hurting seniors, that's hurting young families. So there you go. I mean, we all know that this is the issue, is that when you, the government spends more and then when it starts giving checks out to you, it just increases the cost.

It passes along the cost. Jared's called in from New York on Line 1. Hey, Jared. Hi.

Thanks for what you guys do. My comment would be, instead of giving a credit to people for spending money on gas, why not just remove federal taxes on gas sales? Well, they can't do that because that would affect the federal government's bottom line.

Exactly. So what they're actually doing is they're going to increase the tax on the oil and gas companies. So they'll actually be paying more. So like right now, today's average gas price is, this is the national average.

I know if you're calling from New York, Jared, you're probably paying more than this depending on where you are in the state. People out in California are definitely paying more. Average gallon of gas right now, $4.02 or 23 cents. A month ago it was $3.50. One year ago it was $2.80. So I mean, we've gone from $2.80 to $4.23.

And this is for regular gas. But what you have to understand is they don't want to remove, I mean, you know what they could do in California? They could say, we'll stop all of our state and local taxes on gas. Or put a rebate, an abatement on it, just hold it for, to get people through this, we're going to not take the revenue for three months. They're not going to do that.

Instead they're going to make another dependency project which will, then undoing it will become a whole thing. Right, and it will shoot gas prices further because we've seen, we saw this unbelievable time of stimulus in our country during the pandemic. And what happened at the grocery store? What happened to the cost of everything? It went up. Some were supply chain issues but others were just people had, they had more money to spend, they were spending it in different places. And they were spending it on, in these certain kind of industries. And so the price goes up. Let's go to Jeff in New York, line two.

Hey Jeff. Hey guys, just curious as to why do you think that they just don't seem concerned? This administration does not seem concerned with what's going to take place at the polls at the midterm.

I think the writing's on the wall for the House. So I think that spending a lot of President Biden's time trying to save that one is just, I mean, it's not worth his time, honestly. Now it's not to say that they're not going to make a play, and a lot can happen, it's politics. It's not like the midterms are tomorrow.

So they're always looking for that long play too. Issues like this, where they can try to say, look, you're hurting, we're willing to give you hundreds of dollars to bail you out of this, but those mean, nasty Republicans, they won't let us give you the money to bail you out of this. So these are the kind of, I think you're just going to start seeing their domestic policy push, and it's going to be issues like this.

More handouts to you, blocked by Republicans, while if you let those Republicans in, you're not going to be getting any more handouts. So I think that you're just going to start seeing their talking points. But I think the House is almost, it's hard to see a path for Democrats keeping the House, and it's very difficult to sit in it as well.

But they're not giving up, they're just getting started. Republicans had to do all the work on the front end to get ready. And they're going to say, with all the conflict in Ukraine, do you really want to change horses? Do you really want to utilize military conflicts? So, you know, Republicans should not be taking anything, underscore anything, for granted right now.

Nothing. Absolutely right. So when we come back, Senator Marsha Blackburn will be joining us. She's on the Senate Judiciary Committee, she's been questioning Judge Jackson, especially on the life issue. And we played some of that yesterday on the broadcast, but now she'll join us to give her kind of just what it's been like.

Again, how it has been as a senator asking those questions directly, so you don't want to miss that. Share it with your friends and family, and support the work of the ACLJ. We have a matching challenge the entire month of March where you can double the impact of your donation to the ACLJ at ACLJ.org. That's ACLJ.org. Donate today. It is a critical month for us at the ACLJ.

We're a little bit behind, so we need your support. ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. Whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy, and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress, the ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support. Take part in our Matching Challenge today. We make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org.

Welcome back to Sekulow. We are joined now by a great friend of ours at the American Center for Law and Justice, Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, also on the Senate Judiciary Committee. If you've been watching the hearings with the Supreme Court nominee, Judge Jackson, you would have seen Senator Blackburn multiple times throughout the hearings, but especially, and I just want to say a thank you to her specifically, and thank you, Senator Blackburn, for spending time on the issue of life.

We know it's a hot-button issue right now. It's before the Supreme Court. We're waiting for the Dobbs case and to, again, just to push the nominee on those issues. So let me ask you first, Senator Blackburn, and thank you from all of us and from all of us who are pro-life in the country for asking those questions. But what did you think of her responses to your line of questions? Your first ones were interesting because we do a lot of those buffer zone cases, and she used that terminology to describe pro-life protesters, you know, as they're loud and that speech is somehow, if you don't like the speech, ban the speech.

But your reaction to the questions that you've gotten during the hearing? One of the things that I was really surprised with was the way she would not give a straight answer. It did not matter if it was about when life began or what is a buffer zone, where people ought to be, why she used the term noisy crowd of in-your-face protesters, just a disrespectful language that she chose to use because she wrote that brief. So that is her word choice. And for her now to want to go to the Supreme Court when she has called a segment of the population, a noisy in-your-face protesters, and to find pro-life women that way. And then I ask her what she thinks about the women at her church that are pro-life, what she thinks about people like me that are pro-life. Does she look at us and think of us as being lesser than because we hold that view? But see, that's what the progressives do.

They look at themselves as being the authority, the elite, should be in control, should have the power, and everybody else is lesser than or not equal to them. You know, Senator Blackburn, it's Jay. We actually filed in that case. And then ultimately these cases ended up at the Supreme Court of the United States.

I was involved in three of them where I made the arguments on these and were successful in almost all of them. And then the one we weren't as successful in came back up, very similar, again, a Massachusetts law, just like she was talking about. And all nine justices of the Supreme Court ruled in our favor saying that it was protected speech even in front of the abortion clinic. And she's an outlier even to the most liberal members of the Supreme Court.

That's exactly right. And you said it very well, even to the most liberal members of the Supreme Court, this is someone who would be a progressive justice. And I think that is important for people to understand in Jay. It doesn't matter if we ask her about the child porn cases, the child exploitation, the way she always consistently went to the minimum or below the minimum, not the maximum, the minimum recommended sentence. I asked her about her soft on crime, letting criminals out of jail. She actually in the Wiggins brief, in that opinion rather, she lamented that she was not able to let all 1,561 federal detainees with the D.C. Department of Corrections out of prison during COVID-19. She did go ahead and release a bank robber addicted to heroin, a murderer of a U.S. marshal. She released a fentanyl dealer. These are people that went back on the street.

And, of course, for some of these crimes, these recidivism rates are very high. You know, Senator Blackbird, for the American people out there, they follow the hearings as much as they can, but they're long, so they kind of get the highlights maybe at the end of the day, and you've been part of those highlights, and you've been late at night when your line of questioning on the life issue began. It was evening, people saw this kind of during primetime. But I think when they first started hearing this, for people who might not be, again, they want to understand what's going on, they follow what's going on, but at first it kind of seemed like this was someone without a philosophy at all, or a judicial philosophy, and certainly wouldn't answer those questions. But as it went on, it became more clear, because of your line of questioning and some of your colleagues' line of questioning, that there is a judicial philosophy here, and like we've said, it seemed like it may be out of step with even some of the more liberal members of the Supreme Court. Especially, Senator, when she says her judicial philosophy is impartiality. Well, every judge has to be impartial. That's not a judicial philosophy.

That's a requirement of being a judge. Oh, that is right, and of course we never got her to say what her judicial philosophy was. So I closed out the hearing yesterday reading back to her a part of her statement that she contended was her judicial philosophy, but it was her methodology.

And in that, she said, you know, I began from a place of neutrality. I consider the facts of the case. I consider the applicable law.

And then I do my job consistent with the oath I've taken. I read it back to her and I said, you left one important part out of this, and that is you should make these decisions consistent with the Constitution. I had one other one I wanted to raise with you, Senator, and that is she was asked about fundamental rights. And the easy answer, which is also a truthful answer, is, well, of course there's fundamental rights. Fundamental rights is the right to freedom of speech, the free exercise of religion, the freedom of the press, the freedom of association, the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, the Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial, the right against self-incrimination. But instead, she completely dodges it, but you really hit her with your questioning on abortion being an unenumerated right, and she conceded that's what it was.

That is exactly right. Now, and I went back again yesterday on this with her because she did admit it was an unenumerated right. She did admit it is not in the Constitution. So I told her, I said, okay, I want to hear where you are on this.

Some people like to claim that the right to an abortion is the right to an effective abortion, and thereby if a baby survives that abortion, they have the right to terminate that life. Well, then she started to squirm. She did not want to answer that portion of the question. But of course, and she wanted to say, well, you know, that issue's before the court. I said this issue's going to be decided before you go to the court, and I want to know where you are on preserving that life, because it is an unenumerated right, and she admits that.

And it is so important on the issue of abortion that we save these children that survive that botched abortion, and it is inconceivable that the left would try to do what they are trying to do, which is to extend that right to an effective abortion and then terminate that life. Well, again, let me just thank you, Senator Blackbird, for standing up and speaking for all of us who are pro-life in these hearings and for not letting this nominee just get away with these unclear answers. We certainly learned a lot more about her because of what you have done this week, and your team has done preparing those questions. So I appreciate all of your work, Senator Blackbird, and your time coming right out of the hearing to join us today on the broadcast.

Thank you, Senator Blackbird. Folks, we come back, second half hour coming up. We're getting more into the gas price issue. Secretary Pompeo is going to be joining us on the NATO meetings in Brussels right now, so you don't want to miss it.

Second half hour coming up. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. Welcome back to Sekulow.

So, folks, we are taking your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110. We talked about the gas price issue. We just talked live to Senator Marsha Blackbird, who just finished up some questioning at the Senate Judiciary Committee, where she serves on, of Judge Jackson. Now they're on to witnesses of Judge Jackson. But she really took the mantle on the pro-life issue and hammered home so that we had a better idea of what this nominee was all about. Because I'll tell you, when it first started, it was a nominee who was not, again, wasn't answering on judicial philosophy, wasn't answering a lot of questions. You know, talked about methodology instead of philosophy and being impartial as a judge.

Well, that's kind of a given. But we saw that this is likely a nominee who, because of the questioning of people like Senator Blackbird, who is outside even the mainstream of the left on the judiciary, and certainly on some issues like life and especially the sentencing, being tough on crime. So, again, because of their work, they are doing what they can. I mean, they can't force these nominees to say anything.

What they can do is ask tough questions and try to draw out information. So it's great to have her on the broadcast, as I know you all follow the Supreme Court, just like us, very closely. We're about to be joined by Secretary Pompeo in the next segment of the broadcast.

We'll be talking about two issues with him. Title 42. Title 42 was put in place by the Trump administration. It allowed for immediate expulsion of illegal migrants on the southern border because of the pandemic. This expires next month, and there is talk that the Biden administration will allow this to expire. Now, this is critical because of, one, we know that there has been record numbers at the border.

This is about to be the warm season, so more people make the trek. And if they drop this power, so they take this power away from the federal government, they won't have that expulsion power. By the way, this is the same time while you've got the White House press secretary has COVID again, and Hillary Clinton has COVID, and we've seen COVID rise in other parts of the world.

So why on earth do this, except for political purposes, again, to allow this porous southern border? So we talked to Secretary Pompeo about that, but also what's happening at NATO right now. We will probably learn more about that after these meetings finish up, but that's occurring right now in Brussels.

He's certainly been at those meetings before. I should get some insight there as well. Yeah, we're going to get – I think you'll have a full readout after the broadcast today on NATO, so in tomorrow's program we will cover it. I was watching some of the coverage on that last night, and, you know, look, I mean, it is a tragedy of huge proportions, and the problem is you now have upwards – I saw one report.

I may have been wrong on this, Will, so check my number. But it was in excess of 10,500,000 people from Ukraine have been totally displaced and have either left the country or gone to another portion of the country that's safer. There's no homes for them to return to in some of these cities because the Russians have leveled this. So the difficulty here is that Russia is playing a very aggressive game, and it's not a game. Now, the question also is, is their military capable of going into the next level, or does this become an Afghanistan where there's a long-term engagement? The Ukrainian people are fighting valiantly. But there was also the report – you brought it up yesterday, Jordan – where Abramovich, which is one of the largest if not the largest oligarch, that Ukraine asked that he not be sanctioned by the United States because he is negotiating.

Yeah, that's right. So you've got – again, there's a lot at play here. It's not a clear-cut issue. Certainly where NATO has said they're very united, but what they have not been united on is exactly how to assist Ukraine. There's certainly more Central and Eastern European countries that are calling on more aggressive steps by NATO.

You have the U.S. and kind of the Western countries in NATO saying, you know, we don't want to get into a direct confrontation with Russia. This is a month now. This conflict has been going on a month. A conflict that most predicted, experts predicted, would take a few days is now a month in. The human toll is gigantic.

The infrastructure in Ukraine, I mean, you know, it's destroyed. But again, a lot to talk about with Secretary Pompeo. We'll be taking your phone calls to 1-800-684-3110 to support the work of the ACLJ. Remember, Secretary Pompeo is part of our team at the ACLJ, a senior counsel for global affairs. Because of your financial support of the ACLJ, we're able to bring him on as part of the team. Support us. ACLJ.org. Donate today.

We'll be right back. At the American Center for Law and Justice, we're engaged in critical issues at home and abroad. Whether it's defending religious freedom, protecting those who are persecuted for their faith, uncovering corruption in the Washington bureaucracy, and fighting to protect life in the courts and in Congress, the ACLJ would not be able to do any of this without your support.

For that, we are grateful. Now there's an opportunity for you to help in a unique way. For a limited time, you can participate in the ACLJ's Matching Challenge. For every dollar you donate, it will be matched. A $10 gift becomes $20.

A $50 gift becomes $100. This is a critical time for the ACLJ. The work we do simply would not occur without your generous support.

Take part in our Matching Challenge today. You can make a difference in the work we do, protecting the constitutional and religious freedoms that are most important to you and your family. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org. Only when a society can agree that the most vulnerable and voiceless deserve to be protected is there any hope for that culture to survive. And that's exactly what you are saying when you stand with the American Center for Law and Justice to defend the right to life. We've created a free, powerful publication offering a panoramic view of the ACLJ's battle for the unborn.

It's called Mission Life. It will show you how you are personally impacting the pro-life battle through your support. And the publication includes a look at all major ACLJ pro-life cases, how we're fighting for the rights of pro-life activists, the ramifications of Roe v. Wade 40 years later, Planned Parenthood's role in the abortion industry, and what Obamacare means to the pro-life movement. Discover the many ways your membership with the ACLJ is empowering the right to life. Request your free copy of Mission Life today online at ACLJ.org.

Welcome back to Secular. We're joined right now by our Senior Counsel for Global Affairs, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Secretary Pompeo, I want to jump right into it because I want to get into a couple of topics.

First, here domestically, and then what's going on with NATO and Ukraine, Russia. First off, though, we know Title 42 was put in place by the administration you served in to, again, during the pandemic that allowed the immediate expulsion of illegal migrants back to Mexico. It expires next month, and there is talk that the Biden administration might allow it to expire during the beginning of the high season, because of the warmer weather, of illegal immigration, which we have seen, again, record numbers at month to month to month, quarter to quarter to quarter. This idea that they would let this go, I mean, with an end to this program, can you end this program at all right now without having a massive additional crisis at our border?

Well, Jordan, I know you and Jay and the ACLJ have been at the center of making sure American sovereignty was protected everywhere and always. If they allow Title 42 to expire, this would be just another chink in that armor, another step along the way towards radically open borders. It's part of what the Biden administration campaigned on. It's part of what the progressive left is demanding from him. And it presents real risk to the United States of America.

I hope that they will extend Title 42. It made enormous sense. Don't forget, not only does it allow these folks in, but it sends a message.

It will send a message to those who are trying to get here that this administration, this is the time, this is the window, come to the United States, travel here illegally, and we'll do nothing to stop you from coming across, entering America, and ultimately becoming part of American society. It's really risky with the fentanyl stuff. It's all dangerous. You know, the fentanyl issue, of course, is an epidemic of unbelievable proportions. And I don't know if people understand that the porousness of our southern borders has allowed this fentanyl to get into the United States and is causing literally millions of deaths around our country. It's a serious problem. It's a real problem, Jay, and you always know when the problem has increased because you can tell what fentanyl costs on the market. And today the price is low. That means supply is high, that demand is rising to meet that supply, and it's impacting citizens all across the country and in rural areas and suburban places like my home state of Kansas, in urban cores.

This is a chemical and a substance that comes largely from China, shipped to Mexico. And then because we're not doing a darn thing to enforce what's coming, controlling what's coming in and out of our southern border, moving into the United States along I-35, and then spreading throughout our country, wreaking devastation on many communities. Well, a lot of families have been touched with this. I'm furious when I think about the way in which this administration has gone about this. Let me ask one last question on that. If, in fact, Title 42 is terminated, which it seems it will be at the end of the month, they don't seem to have anything to fill in the gap, so to speak. So are we going to see back to those caravans and record numbers of people trying to get in here and the disaster at the border that we saw just last year with the Biden administration?

Is that what's going to be the end result? Jay, we've seen the numbers. When you begin to send the message to El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, places all around the world, frankly, that says, this will be a welcoming environment. We're not going to turn you back. Consistent with American law, we're going to just allow you to come into the United States. It is very likely that the numbers, already staggering, already multiples of times what they were during the final two years of the Trump administration, staggering numbers will only continue to increase.

And, Jay, you know this, not only are these drugs coming in horrific, but what happens to the people who are transiting Mexico is the worst of the worst, and we ought not permit that to happen for so many reasons, including making sure we know who's coming into our country, who might want to do harm to us here. I want to shift, Secretary Pompeo, to what's going on right now. We know our President is in Brussels, is in NATO, in the meeting with the G7. Today marks one month, it's been one month since the Russian assault on Ukraine began.

A lot of folks thought that this would not take a month, and that we wouldn't necessarily be here, but we are now here. The Ukrainians have fought back, so President Biden is there. They're discussing a plan to bolster NATO's eastern flank and counter the prospect of escalation. There's fear of nuclear attack.

You have Kremlin spokespeople going out in English saying, we've got the justification to use nuclear weapons. What needs to happen? What should Joe Biden be doing right now when he's at these meetings? So, a handful of things. One, I'm glad they're there, I'm glad they're having these conversations, but as you all well know, conversations without real substance and strategic leadership aren't worth the time spent on them.

There's a handful of things. The first is to make very clear the cost of Vladimir Putin if he uses any kind of WMD, a chemical weapon, a biological weapon, or, God forbid, a nuclear weapon. We should be crisp and clear that NATO will respond in a way that will impose a staggering cost on him. We should do this before, not wait until he's done it, and then mess around and take months. We should be ready to respond in that way. Second, I'm glad they're putting increased presence in Eastern Europe. I would hope that the Europeans would take the heavy load there, would take the real burden. And then finally, we should not forget, in spite of the fact they are meeting in Brussels in Europe as a series of European leaders, we shouldn't forget that the Chinese Communist Party is watching all of this.

Chairman Kim launched the longest missile he has ever launched, according to reports. We should never misunderstand that while we're focused on Ukraine, the whole world is watching what we're doing in Iran, giving them a sweet deal, watching Chairman Kim fire a missile with nothing but a statement from the State Department coming out. This has a real risk of cascading, and the European leaders and the American leaders there on the ground in Brussels should be talking about how it is we're going to restore the order and deterrence that we had for the previous four years. You know, the Biden administration is considering removing the Iranian Revolutionary Guard – this, to me, is another unbelievable – from the U.S. terror watch list. The status of the Revolutionary Guard is one of the – supposedly one of the last sticking points of the revival of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. This – Iran is the largest state sponsor exporter of terrorism in the world. Russia has been negotiating as the middleman here in this whole thing.

If they were to do this, if they were to make this move, Mr. Secretary, what are the consequences? Jay and Jordan, you know the Revolutionary Guards force well, right? You know their history. You know they've killed so many Americans. You know they've been – across the world, including in the Middle East, to their fellow Muslim brothers. We know that they've launched assassination campaigns in Europe to allow them off the hook for that terror, to deny the factual reality that their sole focus is exporting terror from Iran to gain leverage for the Iranian, for the Ayatollah and the Iranian leadership. To now say we're going to lift that designation, we're going to take our moral authority away and the sanctions away.

It is so confounding. It will provide money so that the Ayatollah can continue to increase the amount of money available for this terror. It will provide resources to the Revolutionary Guards. This will only increase the scope and scale of terror emanating from Iran, and it is dangerous not only for the Gulf states, but for Israel and the United States as well. Is this – this is Steve – Secretary Pompeo, final question for today.

We've covered a lot of topics. But it seems like this is just another carrot that the Biden administration feels like they've got to give to Iran to get back into the JCPOA or the nuclear deal for the final three years of that deal. Jordan, it's odd. There's nothing left in the deal. The timeline has shrunk, which will give them a clear pathway to a nuclear weapon. There's no constraints on their missile systems or their space program.

There's no limitations on their capacity to commit terror around the region. Indeed, we're going to lift the sanctions on their primary tool for terror exportation. It's incomprehensible that this piece of paper would be signed by the United States of America.

I think for a moment it was going to protect families all across this country. Secretary Pompeo, as always, we appreciate your insight into all of this. There's a lot going on in the world. A lot happening in our country. And we appreciate – and I just want to let everybody know again, Secretary Pompeo is not just a guest of the broadcast.

He serves as Senior Counsel for Global Affairs at the ACLJ, writes pieces up at ACLJ.org as well, works with us behind the scenes. On this show, you get to see what we're doing in front of the cameras and on the radio. But we do a lot more than this hour of the broadcast, so appreciate it always. His support, Dad, we're able to do it because of our financial supporters. Yep, and so we thank the Secretary for being with us, but we also thank the Secretary for being part of our team.

Let me say this, folks. We are in the last days of our matching challenge campaign for March. And honestly, we're behind last year a little bit. And it's nothing any of us like to be, but that's just the way it is. I'm confident we will make up the deficiency.

Your support makes a huge difference. And, you know, each and every day, five days a week, you're seeing this broadcast, which is produced, of course, by our organization. And then the cases we talk about are the cases we're doing.

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Welcome back to SECO2. We are taking your calls this segment. If you want to get on the air, 1-800-684-3110. Let me encourage you to do that now to get on the broadcast.

That's 1-800-684-3110. But again, we've been talking about the international work of the ACLJ. We were just talking to Secretary Pompeo, our Senior Counsel for Global Affairs and former Secretary of State about what's going on in Brussels and NATO and the Ukraine issue now that we're a month in. But we also highlighted some yesterday in the broadcast, some of the work that we've been doing at the UN as well.

Yesterday we played one of the interventions that I did on Afghanistan. We've got an intervention also that just aired at the Human Rights Council on India as well. Yeah, so we are active and these oral interventions are a big deal because you're before the delegates and C.C.

Howell, Senior Counsel for the ACLJ, does a lot of our international work, made the intervention. C.C., tell everybody first what that means. Sure. So the Human Rights Council meets three times a year in Geneva and they have agenda items that they want to cover. And so we get to choose five of them.

We're limited to five. And we get to do written submissions on Christian persecution in countries and human rights violations. And then we get to do oral interventions before the Council itself.

You want to go ahead and play it? Yeah, let's go ahead and do it. This is for the UN. This is for the UN. Now give the floor to European Center for Law and Justice.

Thank you, Mr. President. Last year was reportedly the most violent year for India's Christian community since 2014. At least 486 instances of violence were recorded, a nearly 75 percent increase from 2020. About 371 of these cases occurred in the states that have anti-conversion laws in place. Remarkably, the vigilante mobs perpetrating almost all of these acts of violence did so with impunity and even help from the local authorities. These mobs even threaten and assault Christians in prayer before handing them over to the police on allegations of forcible conversions. As we stated in our last oral intervention, these anti-conversion laws have helped to stir up mob violence against religious minorities. Yet despite the huge number of violent attacks and continued calls from the international community for India to take action, the violence has continued this year. We highlight several of these new atrocities in our written submission, which include death threats, false arrests, beatings, burnings, destruction, and more. Christians in India should have the freedom to practice their faith and share the good news of Jesus Christ without fear of suppression and violence. We once again respectfully ask this council to take swift action by calling on India to repeal the anti-conversion laws and ensure that all of India's citizens can peacefully express their religious beliefs.

India should be held responsible for these laws and the violence they legitimize. Thank you. These interventions, and that's before the United Nations General Assembly, so for the Human Rights Council rather, so Human Rights Council is notoriously left of center and can be very hostile, especially on Israel. But it's interesting, I'm holding my hand, a letter that we received after one of our presentations, or before the presentation actually, from the, I don't know if it was the head person, but it was a human rights officer, Humberto Henderson, to our ECLJ Director General, talking about one of the submissions we made in appreciating and then later finding out in communications that they actually appreciated that we actually participated in this.

Yes, so the universal periodic reviews we do are separate from these general sessions, but they also have three sessions a year, and we submit each session 14 country reports, so 42 reports we do for the year. And this was one of the reports on Micronesia, and we literally had a Skype meeting because it was during COVID, and they stated that they really appreciate our reports, and especially on Micronesia because we were one of only four people that reported, so it is important. It really is, folks, and we're making an impact.

Now, I want to tell you something. Getting this UN status, and Andy can attest to this, was not an easy task. It took us three years of really duking it out with the UN to get it. Well, it certainly does because there's so many people who apply for a special consultative status before the United Nations, and fewer than half of those that apply during a given year are admitted because you've got the people on the other side, countries such as Turkey, India, China, and so forth, who can object to this. And we have been very successful through our European Center for Law and Justice in making interventions and receiving, as Jay pointed out, accolades and thanks and appreciation from the United Nations for those events that we have intervened in in Geneva. We've been working on this a long time, too, and the fact of the matter is there are very few groups that are this active, that file a report on every single country when it becomes available to do it, and we do it, and then we make these interventions whenever we can, and we move to make interventions whenever we can, and we have appeared before the International Criminal Court in The Hague, not talking about it, appearing there more than once. Yeah, it's work that is unusual for U.S.-based organizations, and also these international organizations that just want the hot button.

You know, they go from hot button to hot button to hot button. I mean, one of his emails was on Micronesia. Right. You know, so it takes the commitment. That's what they want to see at the UN is that you are not just in there to be on Ukraine-Russia, you know, in those kind of the biggest news of the day, but that even some of the places that people might not even know exist as countries, that you were willing to take the time, take the expertise to also go through and delve into the issues, what's affecting those people there. So whether it's a country the size of India, whether it's a place like Afghanistan, which has been, you know, through war, and then the U.S. withdrawal, the Taliban takeover, or Micronesia, we're issuing the reports, we're getting involved in the interventions. And again, this was a commitment that ACLJ made to do this work at the UN, to be present, and the reason why you're seeing it this way is because during the pandemic, we've had the oral interventions done via remote. You know, I call these things the ministry of presence, being that sometimes, and Andy and you have talked about this a lot, just being there makes a difference. Well, it does. It makes a great difference. This is something that you brought up when we were in Israel, talking about the confirmation of the Patriarch of Jerusalem in the Greek Orthodox Church, and it made a great deal of difference because there you had to have both the Palestinians, the Jordanians, and the Israelis approving who the new Patriarch of Jerusalem is.

Can you imagine this? Because it went back to Ottoman times, to the times of the Turks, and we were there, physically present, for several weeks, and eventually, and engaging in negotiations on the ground, and let me tell you something, negotiating in the Middle East is seven-dimensional. It's got all kinds of ramifications. CC, quickly, we're coming near the end of the program, but we also have had success in front of UN committees on unlawful detentions.

That's right. So, just like the working group with the Universal Periodic Review, there's a working group with arbitrary detention, and that is more like a court of law because you actually file a complaint or brief with them, and it goes through a whole procedure, and we've been very successful there as well. What's the status? I know it's been a very difficult case for Pastor Saul. Pastor Saul is still serving his time. The one hope that we have is that he might get released early. He's in China. Yes, he's in China, and that he might get released early, but the legal kind of tactics that we have had to be involved with, pretty much we've kind of gone through all of those. He's not a U.S. citizen.

He had a green card status here, so it's been hard to get that part of it done, but we don't give up, and we've had pastors released from India, Turkey, Iran, hopefully soon China on the next one. Well, that does it for the broadcast today, but you've seen the scope of the work and the people we're working with and support the work of the ACLJ. This is the time to do it. Both the month of March, we have a matching challenge. You can double the impact to your donation. What that means is we have a group of donors. They will match your donation. You've got to take the initial step to make that donation to ACLJ.org.

Double the impact. It's an important month. We're a little bit behind right now, so we need your support. It's why this whole team is assembled and why all the work we're able to do is because of, ultimately, your financial support of the ACLJ at ACLJ.org. Donate today, and we'll talk to you tomorrow. Give a gift today online at ACLJ.org.