Liberals STUNNED after Historic Loss

This is Logan Sekulow.

The Liberals are stunned after a historic loss. 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, Logan Sekulow. Welcome to Sekulow.

This is Logan Sekulow. Joining you today as your host along with me is Will Haynes, executive producer of this broadcast. And yes, news came out last night that didn't seem to shock the world, conservatives and liberals in some sense. I was getting text messages from random people, I didn't even know they were political, saying, Can you believe this? Lori Lightfoot, really a known entity, a known name as the mayor of Chicago. Chicago has not had the best press in the last few years, essentially was unseated in what was, it was not a primary system, but in a similar situation here.

This was not expected. I think what was expected was, yeah, it may be a closely contested race, you may move on to what would be like the next election cycle. But this is essentially, they have kind of a complicated system, this is essentially her getting booted before it even gets to what would be considered like a general election.

Right. So the way that the Chicago mayoral election works is that it is a lot of candidates at the beginning, and it's technically a nonpartisan race. So it's not like a primary for Republicans versus a primary for the Democrats, and then you have some independents sprinkled in. What you have here is a long list of candidates, and they technically don't have any sort of indication by their name of what party they're for. But you know their policies and you know where they lead. You actually have to do some research if you're voting there.

And you did have other candidates, some that are more left and more right. But I think the main focus coming out of this is that a very known, very liberal figure, and a controversial figure mainly due to the fact that they've had a lot of problems with their education systems there. And obviously they've had a ton of problems with crime. Chicago, one of the greatest cities in America, has become one of those places like San Francisco, which you now kind of talk about in a sort of hush-hush-oh-it-used-to-be-great kind of point of view. And at least unlike California, you have people in Chicago acknowledging it, seeing it, and trying to do something about it.

That's right. And this was the first incumbent mayor, Chicago mayor, first incumbent Chicago mayor to lose reelection since 1983. So that's 40 years that this has happened.

In 40 years, which is wild to think about too, because it also shows you sort of how complacent people get with a name they know. That after 40 years of elections, I mean obviously she was not, to clarify, she was not the mayor for 40 years. What we're saying is they would serve their term and they were not... If they chose to seek reelection, right.

They would. So Chicago has not been known for this kind of controversial flip of a seat, if you will. This has not been known in Chicago.

That doesn't happen that much. We've seen some pretty corrupt people in Chicago stay in office for a long, long, long time. And as one of our writers here who mentioned, who's from Chicago, goes, Chicago elections are great. You could vote once, twice, three times. The voters are excellent.

They're always out there. Vote early and vote often. Is that the old adage from Chicago elections?

But this is pretty interesting. I think it's something that everyone should take notice to. This doesn't necessarily predict the future, but at least shows you that there are some states and some areas and some big cities. Chicago, one of the biggest cities in the country, one of the greatest cities in the country, is now making such a strong statement. And they're not necessarily making a strong conservative statement. What they're saying is, though, we know what's happening is bad. Now, you go converse that to what happened in L.A. this year, in the mayor's race in L.A., where a lot of big celebrities, your Katy Perry's, your Chris Pratt's, all came out for the more conservative, more pro-police, if you will, even, version of a mayor.

And got close, but still went with one of the hardest left people in the nation as well. So you know Chicago at least making some kind of statement where other cities won't. I'd love to hear from you about this. 1-800-684-3110. We're going to keep talking about that, as well as some other topics heading in later on in this show. We are at the very beginning of our matching challenge here at the ACLJ. So what I would encourage you to do, and we're going to talk about some of the work that we're doing today, today in the fight for life, we're going to talk about that a little bit later, and how you can get involved.

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Welcome back to Sekulow. Continue the discussion about what's going on in Chicago as Lori Lightfoot was shown the door by almost 80%, over 80% of the voters voted for someone else in this essential mayoral primary, if you will. And this happened, and again, now you're going to have a far left and a far right, but Will, what was going on in Chicago, I don't think people maybe who aren't there, and were not, could see as clearly as it was happening. You were giving me some numbers before that are just atrocious.

Well, so Lori Lightfoot, she came into office in 2019. And since then, she was the mayor under the pandemic, there was a huge spike in crime, so much so that there were in 2021, the highest number of killings in more than 25 years occurred with 797. And then more than 3500 shootings, which was 1400 more shootings, so close to double, about 40% more. Chicago already known as a pretty dangerous city for gun violence, maybe the most, and you're talking about coming in and nearly doubling it. And then when she first took office, so the crime was out of control.

It was already bad. There was a lot of unrest during that time, there was the lockdowns, she had a lot of issues with the schooling in Chicago because the teachers union is very powerful in Chicago. And so all this built to where she became the first incumbent mayor to not, she will not be reelected because she is now off the ballot. She could have won reelection last night. If she got 50% of the vote, or any of the candidates got 50% of the vote, it doesn't go to the second ballot. But what we're now looking at is an April 4th runoff between the two that became the second tier.

It's a hard way to put it, just because of the way it's run. Paul Vallis, who is a former Chicago Public Schools CEO, and also the Cook County Commissioner, Brandon Johnson, they'll advance on to the next phase, which is in April. And really it sets up a clash between someone who is running for law and order, so kind of against the policies. He's not a conservative by any means. Yeah, it's kind of like what was happening in LA. He's backed by the police union, and he's a more law and order candidate.

That would be Paul Vallis. And then the other candidate is actually supported by the teachers union. Very far left, very powerful interest in Chicago, so it sets up an interesting battle. In this century, when they polled, it's got this fact, when a poll came out of ranking the issues that made the decision for Chicago voters, 44% of those voters said they voted specifically for crime and public safety as the most important thing.

Very low behind that, only 13%, was criminal justice reform, and then the economy at jobs at 12%. When you think about the economy and jobs, usually top tier, or why people are voting for you in your city, when 44% of people are getting out to vote, and just this poll are saying publicly, we are doing this because of public safety, that's a sad state for the country, sad state for a great city like Chicago. But what you hope is that even if they elect someone who is more left, that they at least can make some changes, because the city can't survive in the way that it is right now. Well, and I think it's a pushback on the entire defund police movement that we saw for so many years, and issues that have arisen out of that, where the cities, coupled with the pandemic, with unrest, and also the left's push to defund police, and not focus on creating safety in the cities. You're seeing great cities like New York, like LA, like San Francisco, like Chicago, places that were cultural centers of America, places where in modern times had a level of safety unprecedented, where you could go to the city with your family and not be concerned. It wasn't the fear city of the 70s, like in New York, where you're always concerned about your safety, walking out on the street.

And now we're going back to an era that a lot of things seem very Jimmy Carter era, where we're looking at not having the safety that people kind of took for granted for so long. Yeah, absolutely. And there's a lot of people who are chiming in and commenting in. A lot of people are really sharing their thoughts with this specifically, because it did feel like a big moment last night.

It did feel like a big moment for Chicago, but also potentially a big moment for a move over the next couple of years. I mean, we've already seen, I know you guys talked about it last week, but with the first Presidential debate is already on the books. For August, the primary debate for the Republicans will be this August, not next year. Five months from now, you will have the first Presidential primary, the Republican primary debate happening, and you're already seeing a field start to show up. So I do think there will be some political moves here in the next few months. What is crazy, Will, though, is you don't usually this early.

You hear the rumblings of people running. But to see actual campaigns launched, two or three of them at this point now, and knowing that the other ones are going to have to get in line over the next 60 days. Well, first primaries are in January, the earliest ever.

So we're under a year from people actually voting for candidates. But also an interesting thing is CPAC is this week. And so you're going to see potentially some people testing the waters with their speech at CPAC to see how it's received. We know that Nikki Haley and Donald Trump will be at CPAC, but there are some names that will not be at CPAC, which are a little bit interesting when you're looking at conservative politics, notably Ron DeSantis.

Not there. He's on his individual tour. Right. And Tim Scott, who's getting a lot of buzz in conservative circles as potentially someone weighing running for President as well from South Carolina.

He will not be at CPAC this year. I don't know if that's a good or bad move. I personally don't know if there's that much really good that comes from it.

Yeah. You have a lot of a lot for those who do haven't been to something like that. You do have a lot of people in the room also that are going to be hostile towards you just because they like another candidate or whoever it is or if it's a President Trump. And they prefer President Trump. Well, they may be booing Ron DeSantis. That may not be the best visual for Ron DeSantis right now and flip that same for some of the others. Tim Scott, some of these other people that are going to be pushing up, you have now for those who have declared, you really, though, have Nikki and Trump.

President Trump. Right. Both of those will be there. They will be both.

They have to be there. I get that. But I don't think I would do it. I think if I was running at this point, which I'm not, clarify, I'm not running for the.

Are you sure? Yes, I will. I will declare that I am not running this time. That window is closing because the August debate, the debate. I mean, if I can make the debate stage, I consider it just because it would be fun. But I don't think that that's in the cards for me.

But looking at that, I don't think I would make those kind of statements and get out there this early. Either CPAC can be a very divisive group. Well, they always do the CPAC straw poll at the end of the weekend.

And it's it's who would you vote for your candidate for President? And it's a very highly controlled. Professional. It's professional wrestling. Yes. Yes.

Essentially, it's how many people can you get in the door to vote for your candidate? It is not a very I don't want to say trustworthy, but it's not a very scientific. Yeah, I mean, it carries weight. Yes.

It definitely carries weight. Headlines out. Yes. If you're a candidate that people aren't looking at, you get headlines out of it for sure. I believe it was even Ron Paul and Rand Paul were always very good at getting grassroots people in and getting. Oh, my goodness. Ron Paul won the CPAC straw poll, which was not going to be Ron Paul was not going to be the nominee for the Republican Party. But now we'll see. Laurie Lightfoot's going to show up. She's going to show up at CPAC. Oh, yeah. She's going to pull a full Tulsi and flip it on us. And all of a sudden she's like, yeah, she's like, you didn't know this.

The woke mafia took me out. That would be the greatest moment ever. It would be. Yeah, I mean, then as you reference professional wrestling, then it would prove every theory that you have about all politics. Yeah, exactly. There's nothing to do with it. Hey, I'd love to hear from you.

One eight hundred six eight four thirty one ten. And I want you to take a look at the work we're doing at the ACLU before we get to a break. I want you to go to ACLU dot org. Visit there. Obviously, if you want to make a donation, this is a great time to do it, because right now all donations are effectively doubled, which is awesome. If you're listening or also, by the way, and you are in Chicago, I'd love to hear from you only on why you voted. Chicago is a big place for us or even the Chicago and Illinois surrounding areas. Maybe you didn't vote simply in the mayoral race, but you have simply seen the city make some changes. So I'd love to hear from you.

One eight hundred six eight four three one one zero. Coming up, we'll be talking about a lot of different topics. Next one, we're going to talk about some information that got out there about the raids of President Trump's home in Mar-a-Lago. And what happened there? Maybe it wasn't such a clear cut decision.

Maybe there was some infighting here and some actual good actors were saying this feels inappropriate. We're going to talk about that coming up after that as well. We're going to be talking about some of the work we're doing for life actively today in the state of Maryland, the ACLU. So we're going to cover that. And then later on, we're going to be talking about what's going on in Iran and the current situation there in terms of what's happening.

The nuclear department that could potentially be creating more and more chaos. We're going to go through all of that here in the next 45 minutes or so. So there are a lot of topics, but that shows you the scope of the work that we do here. This is just what we cover on air. There is so much that we're doing in the court, in the media, stuff you see, stuff you don't. Because this is day one of the matching challenge, because I'm hosting, I want you to go on there and support our work.

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Let's kick it off strong. I want to encourage you to go there, not only just to support, though there is incredible content there. You hear me say it all the time because I want more people reading the blogs. I want more people reading the news articles. I want more people watching the videos. Because this is an incredible team that's putting out incredible content. If you want to stay informed, since the beginning of the show, informed and engaged, there's no better place to do it than on our website ACLJ.org. If you are one of the thousands watching right now on Rumble, I'm going to encourage you, if you're brand new to this broadcast, I ask you to follow this channel and hit the thumbs up. We'll be right back. Welcome back to Sekulow. Hey, I want to first start this segment by asking if you're watching right now on Rumble, which there are thousands of you because I want to thank our friends at Rumble for putting us on the front page today, putting us featured, which they do most days.

But today has been one of the ones they're really highlighting. There are thousands of you watching right now. I have a feeling not all of you are following this channel. Click that follow button. If you don't have the Rumble app, you should get the app because it will notify you when we are live, which by the way is each and every weekday from whatever time you are in your time zone, usually right now.

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But when there's so many new people watching, I just want to encourage people to do that. Well, we're going to move a little bit off of Lori Lightfoot. For those who are on hold, we are going to take those calls a little bit later.

I know some of you called in from Chicago. I do want to get to you, but we have to move on a little bit to some hypocrisy that's happening and some kind of breaking news that's happening, right? So this came out of The Washington Post this morning. It's an exclusive report, they say, and they've talked to people familiar with the matter. And this goes back to the raid of Mar-a-Lago back on August 8th of last year. So what happened is that we all thought that this was the government going in in lockstep. But it turns out the FBI that was conducting a lot of the on the groundwork were at odds with the prosecutors at the Department of Justice.

Yeah. So to clarify, this was about the raid of Mar-a-Lago. And there were people within our government, as much as we give them grief sometimes, who were pushing back. So the prosecutors were urging the FBI to conduct a surprise raid at the property. But two senior FBI officials who were in charge of leading the search resisted the plan as too combative and proposed instead to seek Trump's permission to search his property.

The prosecutors, as we know, ultimately prevailed. But starting as early as May, agents in the Washington Field Office were trying to slow the probe. Some even wanted to drop the criminal investigation side of the classified documents issue. And it shows that there was conflict within the broader Department of Justice to me that the agents that were going to have to conduct a lot of this work understood the scrutiny that was going to come under it. And they wanted to negotiate to go in, much like the FBI did with our current President, President Biden, when they went into his home.

They wanted to negotiate this search, something they had already done prior instead of a surprise raid, kick in the door and spend 12 hours there working. Yeah, Andy, what's your reaction to this? Andy O'Connell joining us, senior counsel here at the ACLJ. You've been through a lot of these kind of events and these kind of prosecutions.

Is this common to have this kind of debate back and forth? And I just want to get your initial thoughts. Well, you know, in the U.S. Attorney's Office in Atlanta, where I served as chief of the criminal division for five years, we never had a dispute between the FBI and the Department of Justice. That was me, the U.S. attorney, with regard to how we were going to proceed because the FBI did what the assistant U.S. attorney said. The FBI would come. They would propose a search warrant.

We would say no, see if you can voluntarily get the documents, try to work something out. But this shows that there was really a struggle going on in the Department of Justice with the Washington field office and main justice as to how they were going to proceed against President Trump. Whether they were going to get a search warrant, which they ultimately did, or they were going to work this out amicably, as they apparently did without a problem with President Biden. And so the ultimate authority is the attorney general of the United States.

Merrick Garland makes a decision. We're going to go in. We're going to go to the magistrate. We're going to get a warrant. We're going to knock the doors down.

We're going to do a 12 hour search of this place. No reason to do that. This was the former President of the United States. The documents had been in discussion with the archives about what they were going to keep and what they were going to give.

So there was no reason to do this. And we would, as a prosecutor, I would never have authorized the FBI to take such ridiculously extreme and aggressive action. And with President Biden, of course, he found documents in his Corvette's garage. He found them here. He found them there. No one went in with a search warrant. Everyone said, let's work it out.

We'll come in voluntarily. He had people who did not have clearance looking at documents. So, yes, the Justice Department treated Biden and Trump in a grotesquely, in my view, different fashion. Well, and Andy, that's part of the concern we've had here for quite some time is the politicization of the Department of Justice. And that carries over into the FBI as well. It does seem, as we've said many times around here, that the line agents, people that have to go do the work, you can't always blame them for the leaders' choices when it comes to how politics shakes out. Does it look like here that almost has some confirmation of what we've been concerned about, that when the field agents want to do the right thing and do things properly as to not draw undue scrutiny over their agency, they're being overruled by a politicized bureau up in D.C.?

Yes. Listen, there's no question in my mind that the Department of Justice is now a political arm of the Democratic Biden administration. And since Merrick Garland has been attorney general is very much so.

I find that repugnant and disgusting. Qui pro domina justitia sequitur. That's Latin for they who pursue. And that's the motto of the Justice Department, to pursue justice for the homeland. Griffin Bell was attorney general when I was in the U.S. attorney's office.

OK, a distinguished jurist. He ran the Department of Justice in an even handed manner. We were never politicized. We were never told to pursue things for political purposes. We never felt that. That's not the same today, Will. It does feel like that has changed.

And maybe it is. I always thought maybe it's just our perception of the way media is being run. But it does feel that these departments that were kind of above reproach when it comes to even the FBI, the CIA, the Department of Justice, even though they were controlled somewhat by the presidency, they didn't have this sort of stink or this stigma about them that felt like political operatives.

No, and stink is a good word because that's exactly what it is. When we went to the Justice Department, we went there knowing that this was a pristine agency that did not have any political motive, did not have a political agenda, did not operate on politics, operated on what are the facts and what should we do in a proper fashion for justice to be done. That cannot be said to be the case under Merrick Garland and the current FBI. I see that every day when I look at what goes on at the Department of Justice.

And it's an embarrassment. And then I guess the next step is trying to figure out what we can do and what can be done with this information and if anything can be done. But at least we're bringing it to light. People are finding out really what's going on in these situations.

And somewhat, it actually gives me a little bit of hope that there are people inside these departments going, we have gone too far. Well, and what we do know is, as we like to do here at the ACLJ, is take action. We had FOIA requests that went out immediately when they found the classified documents at President Biden's home and at his office.

And we were very early in that. We're already starting to get document production on that. And that's one of the key ways we can hold an administration accountable when the Congress doesn't, isn't fully controlled by the conservatives. So we here at ACLJ take action. Our lawyers send FOIA requests. We got expedited review of that FOIA request. And we're already getting document production to find out the differences, not just from the Department of Justice, but how these administrations between the archives and other branches were talking about how to pursue this. Listen, we only got about a minute left here before we go into our next segment.

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Go to ACLJ.org, make a donation. Any donation made is effectively doubled by great donors who are ready to match. We'll be right back with more. Welcome back to secular. We are talking about a lot of different topics here. We're going to get to life in a second, but we got a call coming in from one of our favorite callers from Mary Allen calls from Illinois, from the Chicago area. Mary Ellen, we wanted to get your feedback specifically because we know obviously you've been a long time listener, that you've seen what's going on in your city. And I was just curious your thoughts over last night's election.

Oh, sure. I mean, I was not surprised. Reason being because one, they said he was running, you know, in the lead. But second, as soon as Lightfoot got elected and I, you know, go on the neighborhood social media and I kept seeing so many people complaining all about the violence and the crimes and the police not showing up. And, you know, this this murder and that murder and, you know, carjackings and whatnot. And then, you know, many of us would say, well, elections have consequences.

And then I start seeing other people repeating that. So there you go. Interesting, Mary Ellen, because we actually were talking about this before the broadcast, which is that the even the liberals in Chicago are not that surprised. It's more of the impact beyond Chicago. It's going to people because all of us saw Lori Lightfoot during Covid. She gave a lot of press conferences. We saw a lot of her on TV, a lot during the education stuff, a lot during the riots. She was out there a lot as a very prominent figure.

So for us, as you know, not someone who lives close to Illinois, but not close enough to Chicago to really matter, I wasn't following this at all. So when the news came out that she had lost, I didn't know there was an election happening, if I'm being completely honest. And it was pretty shocking. I think that's the shockwave that's going on, seeing such a prominent figure get ousted. It would not be unlike obviously Cuomo ended up getting having to step down. But in that same kind of moment, him getting voted out after being such a prominent figure in during the last two years.

Right. And I think, as Mary Ellen so eloquently pointed out, that elections do have consequences. And the consequences in 2019 were that crime went up and the city was suffering like they hadn't in quite some time. And now I think for many people in Chicago, they're hoping that there will be a new consequence and the consequence will be crime going down.

Yeah, absolutely. Another thing we wanted to touch on in this segment real quick before we get to a break is some of the work the ACLJ is doing right now. Today, we have lawyers that are heading to Annapolis, Maryland, to testify against a bill that would really change what's going on in the fight for life.

That's right. So we mentioned last week that we had submitted testimony for the House version of this bill in Maryland. But now this is going to the Senate side in the Maryland State Senate.

And our lawyers are going up there to hopefully give in-person testimony against it as well. But this is a bill, SB798, that would declare a right to reproductive freedom. And it would be an expansion of abortion in the state. It would enshrine the rights to abortion in the state. But what's really concerning, and this is from our written testimony from the House side, it's not possible to fully quantify the effects on law that this would have if passed. Nonetheless, the proposed amendment would have a seismic effect disrupting the many laws in place that currently protect life and conscience. So one of our big concerns is not just the fact that it expands abortion in the state, but also the chilling effect and detrimental effect it could have on things like crisis pregnancy centers, pregnancy resource centers, and pro-life speech in general.

Because it really makes it hard to get around some of these penalties they have if you are discriminating against someone's right to abortion, is the way they put it. Yeah, absolutely. We have lawyers on the ground there right now.

They are on the way to go be a part of this. And that is why our work is so critical. That's why your support is always needed. And this month is a matching challenge month. You've heard about it before if you've been a longtime listener.

If you're new, you're one of the thousands joining us on Rumble that are brand new, I want to say welcome. But also, how you can support this incredible team is to go to ACLJ.org. And during the month of March, all donations are effectively doubled, which means one of the most important months of the year. You give $10, it becomes $20, $20 becomes $40, so on and so on, you understand doubling.

Multiplication is not that hard. What it is, is there's other amazing people who have already said, hey, if any donation comes in, we will be a part of it and we will match that donation. So go to ACLJ.org, do that today, support the work. I wish you could see what goes on just right behind this camera. Amazing team, the best in the business, we'll be right back with more. Welcome back to Sekulow. We're going to actually start this segment right off the top with a caller that came in. They've been on hold for about 20 minutes, so I want to make sure we get to him. Joe is calling in New York on line two. Joe, welcome to the broadcast. Hey, is this Jordan, by the way? This is Logan today, unfortunately. I'm sorry, but Joe, that's my brother, go ahead. I prefer your father, to be honest. He's more my age, I'm 61.

Well, he's not in today. Tomorrow, your call back tomorrow. No, I'm kidding, Joe, go ahead.

All right, so I really want to address your audience more than anything. You obviously see my call. I want to state, you know, my first vote as an 18-year-old was for Ronald Reagan in 1980, and I voted for him, obviously, the following election. I did not vote for Donald Trump the first time. I voted for him the second time around.

It really didn't matter because I live in New York State, so my vote never seems to count. But let me, my statement is this. Let's look at this, I am glad to hear you talk about primary season coming up.

It is coming up, and let's face it, the field, it looks like several people want to jump in. Hopefully, Mike Pompeo announces, I really hope for that because that would be who I would support. And I'm willing to listen to Donald Trump in the primaries, but my point is this. Over 40% to be generous of the company, of the country, maybe 50%, cannot stand his name.

They cringe at the sound of his name. In closing, so I'm 61, I go on a dating site, it says no Trumpers apply, okay, by the death of women on it. I think that, okay, go ahead for a second, then we gotta move on, go ahead.

So you're getting my point. And you know, this is a deep subject, and I just urge people when they go to primaries across this country to think about, I do not believe this man can be elected, I believe he's damaging to our party. One last thing, if you look at the Bob Woodward YouTube video interviews, there's so much stuff against him. I don't mean to cut you off, we do have to move on, but I appreciate your call. Call back any time, that was a fun call. But I do want to say, I think there's a lot of people who share that sentiment. I think that will all move and change in the next year. I think there's a lot of people who feel that way now, and they may not feel that way any year. So we'll see where things go, but Joe, I appreciate that, calling in with his point of view, saying, look, he didn't vote for President Trump the first time, voted for him the second time, but now wants something fresh, wants something new. I think there's a large percentage of people that do feel that way, but still, look at the polls, Trump's got a giant lead until the next person down, which would be, at this point, DeSantis, unofficially. And one interesting point that Joe did bring up, where he said about 40% of the country or whatnot cannot stand to even hear the name Donald Trump. I think he's right, but unfortunately, because of our polarized politics, I think you replace Donald Trump's name with any other Republican or Conservative candidate, and that's the same statistic, if not more. I do think that we are at like a 48-48 split in this country that is very – so you're arguing over that 4% swing in the middle. It's probably less than that.

I'm probably being very generous with saying a 4% swing. But he brings up very interesting points, valid points. That is why there's a primary season.

It's not unlike what happened with Lori Lightfoot. I don't think you're going to have 80% of Republicans not vote for President Trump. I really don't. I think it'll be a much closer race than that. But you did have a rebuke of somebody who was a mainstay, saying, I don't want to deal with this anymore. I don't care if you go far left, far right, I don't want to deal with this person anymore. I don't think we are there with President Trump, but I do think that as the field gets more crowded, and if you have a primary, debates, let's see if he shows up even for them.

That's the thing too. Will President Trump even be on that stage? Or would he say, I was the President already.

I don't need to deal with this. And before we move on to the next topic, one more thing to say about that is that when – a lot of Joe's sentiment there where people are wanting something fresh, something new, I would say for a lot of – even Trump voters was probably accurate until last week, when President Trump showed up in Ohio and was there with pallets of water on the ground, showing that he cares for blue-collar workers in East Palestine, Ohio. That reminded a lot of people of the outreach that he did to middle-class America when they felt forgotten in 2016. And I think that does speak a lot of volumes to people that maybe were waning from the Trump train that jumped back on. Yeah, and I think that's true, and I think you saw that where now all of a sudden for the idea of President Biden to go visit there has become politicized, where he's like, no, of course not. I'm not going to go visit.

It becomes like going to the border, which is very bizarre and very different. I want to move on, though. Wes Smith is here. Let's talk about this.

Will, maybe you could set us up for this and move to Colonel Smith. What is happening in terms of what's going on in Iran as we've seen their nuclear program make some changes? Right, so there's a new report out that a U.S. official has told Reuters and the Jerusalem Post that Iran can make fissile material for a bomb in about 12 days.

This seems like a much shorter breakout period than we had been hearing for years. Well, you explained also fissile material. That would be the material that would go on a nuclear warhead to launch a bomb. Yeah, enriched uranium. I don't know. I was a little confused by Mr.

Call's statement. He's the third ranking civilian at the Pentagon, and I assume a political appointee. He says 12 days they probably could have enough enriched uranium to make one bomb. That's 90 percent level enriched. Right now they're at 60 percent, and they've been at 60 percent for almost two years. What I don't quite understand, though, is the IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, has been saying for over a year that they are probably days away from having this much material.

The other thing that Mr. Call said, which I personally did not find very reassuring, is that he did not think, even if they have enough material, that they know how to detonate it yet, to put it and make it into a bomb. Think is not a very reassuring term, but here's the other thing, and this is the scary part about Iran. We don't know what we don't know, and the reason we don't know it is that for the last two-plus years, they have not allowed any international inspectors into their nuclear sites, and we had some sites that had video monitoring, and they dismantled the video system.

So at this point, they could be further along or not as far along. We absolutely have no way of knowing, and that's the way Iran likes it. Yeah, you saw, you said the cameras were shut off, there was a lot that happened, and we kind of got used to having that power a little bit, knowing that there was at least some kind of oversight happening. The idea, like you said, of not knowing, I think makes us all feel it, and I'd love to hear from you if you're listening right now. We go through these list of topics that we went through today, and do you feel safe? Do you feel safe as an American knowing that the watch is not happening, and you're having all of these situations like what's happening in Iran, what's happening even on a smaller scale, maybe not even a smaller scale, but what's happening in Ohio, what's happening with all the train situation? Do you feel safe right now?

I'd love to hear from you. Next segment, we're going to take a lot of calls, 1-800-684-3110. But I also, you brought up that in this statement, it was I don't think, and a lot of this is based off of intelligence, different ways that we can gather intelligence. Some of those ways are now shut off, meaning the cameras. We've had some intelligence failures of late, to put it lightly. When you hear someone say, I don't think, and that's got to be based off of intelligence that they're receiving, is that concerning knowing the situation with a lot of our intelligence agencies today? Yeah, I think absolutely it is. As a matter of fact, one of the things that our own intelligence agencies, and we have about 17 of them, have complained about is that we have few, very few, intelligence assets on the ground in Iran.

That did not used to be the case. And a lot of the intelligence that we glean from Iran actually comes from Israeli operatives in Iran itself. So yeah, this idea of not knowing is pretty scary. My concern is that we will know that Iran has a nuclear bomb when they do their first test detonation of that bomb. And they will be very proud of that moment.

They will be very proud, and we have done little to stop it. The one thing about Mr. Call that also concerns me, and he's a civilian appointee, in his testimony he actually blamed the situation of not knowing on the Trump administration because they withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal, the JCPOA. In fact, President Trump withdrew from that deal because we knew, our intel knew without doubt, they were already cheating on the deal. And that's what we were talking about. It felt like we had some sort of, even if it was getting out of the deal, some sort of power and control and some oversight of what was happening.

This is where it just feels out of control. And I hope our listeners know that we're not giving up hope here. We're all just trying to report to you what's happening. You've got to know partially what's happening right now so we can figure out what can be done. As we talk about elections, obviously we know those elections have consequences, and we've seen that now play out very much so in the last couple of years, and even so in the last year, if we're all being honest with ourselves. So here's what I'm going to ask you to do. There's two things. Support the work of the ACLJ.

Go to ACLJ.org. We are in the very beginning, day one, March 1st, of a matching challenge. That means, again, if someone gives any donation, it is effectively done. So this is a great time, the best time, really, to donate with you right now. Kick us off with a bang. We appreciate it.

ACLJ.org. Also, I'm going to ask you, because we're going to take some calls in the next segment. Next segment, we've got some stuff.

Hey, Christopher Wray actually may have said something you agree with, so we're going to talk about that. I know. You should be as shocked as I am saying that out loud. So that's going to happen. And I want to take calls.

Lines are lighting up. This is a great time to call. I like to take as many calls as I can in the final segment of the broadcast.

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I'd love to hear where you guys are all watching from. We'll be right back. Welcome back to secular retaking your calls at 1-800-684-3110. So if you're on hold, stay on hold. I'll get to you. And if you haven't called in, this is probably your last opportunity for the day, but I'd love to talk to you.

1-800-684-3110. We take you over Fox News right now. This is Brett Baer. He's talking to FBI Director Christopher Wray. I don't know if you know this controversial figure. Right. We've had some ups and downs with Christopher Wray over the last few years. The nice way to put it.

Yeah. Brett Baer approached him. We obviously have a lot of controversy coming out of the statement from the Department of Energy that COVID potentially likely with low confidence or whatever it was. But with enough to say it came from a lab. I did find this was largely criticized on a lot of the liberal comedy shows. I saw Colbert and some of the others go after this, going Department of Energy stay in your lane. They kept saying. Which is interesting because the Department of Energy has a lot to do with intelligence.

It has an intelligence arm. They even talked about they have bio labs. Right. Which they said that was the problem. They're like you need to be focusing on wind and solar.

You need to be focusing on. Do they know that one major form of energy in the entire world is nuclear power. Well I don't think.

That may have something to do with that. I don't think the traditional Colbert viewer knows that. That's fair. But it took a lot of controversy the last couple days. People have kind of been making fun of this Department of Energy statement. However, let's take you over to Brett Baer interviewing Chris Wray just yesterday.

So take a listen by one. There's this Department of Energy study that says it's likely to have come from a lab leak. Although the confidence is low, it cites the FBI. What is the determination by the FBI? So as you note Brett, the FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan.

All right. So there you go. Now we do know that they did say this last year. But this is like one of the first times I feel like it's been very confirmed that this is the not just a theory. This is the theory that the FBI is even now going.

Right. And when the FBI does assessments, a lot of times they come out in like long papers published on their website and things of that nature, sometimes even internal. But it had come out last year that and they with moderate confidence. So a higher level, a lot of times what that seems to mean.

Just didn't get a ton of coverage. It doesn't have like this is the exact time it happened and we have the smoking gun. But with moderate confidence, the FBI, which is even a step higher than what the Department of Energy said, based off different intel. But as you point out that the coal bears of the world said stay in your lane, Department of Energy, Christopher Wray explains exactly why the FBI is the right people in the right lane to make this type of determination in bite two. Yeah, right.

There's more. The FBI has folks, agents, professionals, analysts, virologists, microbiologists, et cetera, who focus specifically on the dangers of biological threats, which include things like novel viruses like covid and the concerns that in the wrong hands, some bad guys, a hostile nation state, a terrorist, a criminal, the threats that those could pose. So here you're talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government controlled lab that killed millions of Americans. And that's precisely what that capability was designed for.

So even already starting to float out there, not just lab leak, but potential bio weapon. I mean, really is what Chris Wray is saying there. They certainly are not ruling that out. And they're definitely saying this is what the capabilities of the FBI with having these agents, professionals, analysts, virologists, et cetera. That's why we have this is to assess threats like this. It's not like all of a sudden you pulled some random agents who had no purview over this type of thing and had them come up with an intelligence assessment. He's saying, no, we have this specifically for this reason.

And they are the ones that made the determination. So this isn't a something that I feel like the left and especially in the comedy realm can push back on and say, hey, why are you making a statement? He doubles down and talks about the Chinese government.

I think we should play all of these. Why not? You should hear it from a source that look, this is a source that you can now use. If you're arguing with your liberal friends, go, hey, Chris Wray, FBI director, someone that I didn't necessarily get along with, someone I don't necessarily have my personal views that maybe we probably maybe don't align with. But what does your people say? What did Christopher Wray say? This is what he says about them working with China.

Take a listen by three. I should add that that our work related to this continues. And there are not a whole lot of details I can share that aren't classified. I will just make the observation that the Chinese government seems to me has been doing its best to try to thwart and obfuscate the work here, the work that we're doing, the work that our U.S. government and close foreign partners are doing. And that's unfortunate for everybody. Yeah.

So there you go. There's Christopher Wray, the FBI director, not only pretty much confirming the lab leak theory, but also citing that they certainly are not really out that it was a bioweapon. And third, on this list of things, saying China seems to be wanting to thwart the work that they're doing there. And what's interesting to me and concerning to me is that earlier in the week when Karine Jean-Pierre was at the podium and said, you know, the the problem is, is that the intelligence community hasn't come up with a unified assessment yet, that there's some that think it's still, you know, human to animal transmission.

There are some that haven't decided yet. So the White House, we're not really taking a position. When you have Christopher Wray making a definitive statement like they're trying to thwart and obfuscate the work that we're doing here, how about the White House say instead, you know what, while the intelligence agencies are not in unison yet, we are listening to our Federal Bureau of Investigation director that China is trying to stop us to figure out what's getting to the bottom of it. And so we're going to push back really hard.

We're not really hearing that kind of language. That's concerning. Let's go ahead and take a phone call. Let's go to Kendra, who's calling in Washington. On line two, Kendra, welcome. Hi, thank you.

Good morning. I just had a comment about your question, how we feel if we feel how fearful we are about the way things are going. And our family has had a feeling of dread since this administration changed, and it's just gotten progressively worse. And we really feel like we have no control other to vote, other than voting.

But when Washington State being a conservative, that's, you know, a moot point. So it's just getting worse. It's worldwide now, and the fear just increases. I know, and I hate that for you, Kendra.

I hate that for a lot of society, including myself, because a lot of people can let fear take control. And what I do want to say is, obviously, there are things that can be done. There are elections that can be taken care of. There is the work that we do here at the ACLJ.

We go fight for you on behalf of you, behalf of our clients who are usually just normal people trying to live their lives, who have a lot of things that come up, and we're there to help them for absolutely no cost. We can't do that without your support. Kendra's bringing up, well, the fear that's happening. At least there are situations, honestly, like the lab leak theory, which is a horrible thing to say, but the fact that you are actually having some movement there, because if this was two years ago, you'd be banned from the Internet. Right. Now we are seeing a confirmation from the FBI. And the administration had the luxury for two years of having control of both the House and the Senate. Now with the conservative House of Representatives, they are going to have to answer some tough questions. And I think this is a time we can see some real movement.

That's right. And hey, this is a great time to support the work of the ACLJ. Thanks to thousands of you who watched online, thousands of you who listen on radio. We appreciate every single one of you. And if you like this show, you like this broadcast, you like the work we do beyond this broadcast, which is endless. You can't do it without your support.

Go to ACLJ.org. Make your donation today. And it is effectively doubled because there's another great donor saying, I'm going to match whatever comes into the month of March. We like to kick off day one. Really good. So if you could do it, today's the great day to do it. Go to ACLJ.org. Make that donation right now. We'll talk to you tomorrow on Secular.