SHOCKING New Details of IRS Targeting Conservatives

This is Jay Sekulow.

We've got shocking details of the IRS targeting of conservatives. 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, Jay Sekulow.

Hey everybody, welcome to the broadcast. We've got a lot to discuss today and a number of the things we want to discuss, which are top priority issues, are cases involving the American Center for Law and Justice. And we touched on a little bit of this yesterday with some of our Freedom of Information Act litigation that is really getting to the heart of the problem with corruption within the government.

And it's reached a couple of different levels. As you know, we represent whistleblowers, two FBI whistleblowers that have testified already on Capitol Hill. One of the cases we have involving the whistleblowers is already at the Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia because the way you litigate those cases is you start, which is very unusual, you start at the Court of Appeals and then you go to the Supreme Court of the United States.

So it's one step away from going to the highest court. So we've got those cases and these whistleblowers are under a tremendous amount of scrutiny and a tremendous amount of pressure for simply sharing concerns they had within departmental guidelines. And yet they still, Cece, are being really harassed and hassled at levels that are unprecedented. Some of them have lost their livelihood but yet not being fired so they can't get other jobs. So they suspend them without pay and suspend their security clearance and they can't do anything else.

It's outrageous. We've absolutely seen that from this administration, that if anybody disagrees with anything that they have to say, they are going to get attacked, they're going to use whatever branch they have, administrative, you know, tool they can use to go after these people and shut them down. And you mentioned administrative tools. Well, one of them is you suspend them without pay, suspend their security clearance, and under the FBI guidelines they can only get $7,000 of outside income. Well, you can't feed your family with kids on $7,000 a year.

But they're intentionally doing that. So we've got those situations. Then yesterday we mentioned the situation with the IRS. And that one, Logan, I think when you look at it, in the scope of what the government was even thinking about doing, it is so outrageous. We almost spent an hour on it yesterday. It was that outrageous.

Yeah. When you go down the list of all of the things that, all the documents that exist, including, you know, how many, 1,677 documents with the word Bible, that's 56,000 plus pages. You have something like Word of God having over 26,000 pages of references. It is an absurd 345,000 pages plus. That's just how much they could account for with the words that we had in the Central A search, which are all essentially Christian related words or be on the lookout. Those are the things that came up.

So hundreds of thousands of pages and clearly a very intentional form of targeting. I'm going to get into the letter that they sent in the next segment. And we're going to discuss cases that we have that we think are on the way to the Supreme Court in the United States involving religious liberty and religious freedom. We're going to talk about international moves that we've taken at the UN on behalf of Israel.

But I want to play for you. We are focusing this month on what we call our ACLJ champions. Those are the 15,000 people right now that support the ACLJ each and every month. They're recurring donors. We want to double that in the next 12 months. So at this time next year, in October of next year, we want to say we're at 30,000 ACLJ champions.

Take a listen. Some people think champions are born. That it's a title that requires something only a handful can ever possess.

But being a champion only requires a decision. Choosing what is right. Even when the loudest voices in the room say it's wrong, or that it can't be done. And then following it through, no matter the cost.

It can be a difficult stand. But it's one any of us can make, including you. Including you. Including you.

Including you. You can change things. You can make a difference. You can be a champion.

We can't do what we do without you. By becoming a monthly donor, you can become a champion of life. A champion of liberty.

A champion of freedom. Please join us. Please join us. Please join us. Become an ACLJ champion today.

Go to ACLJ.org slash champions right now to become an ACLJ champion. We'd appreciate it. Hundreds of you have already done it this week. We want to get that number higher and higher.

Those that are committed to the fight. When it comes to having a recurring base, it's incredibly helpful for us to set budgets. Play it ahead.

It's not just based on one time giving. It's really amazing the work that's going on and we can't do it without you. You can go to ACLJ.org slash champions. We have a packed show coming up. So make sure you stay tuned. Get your comments in.

Share on all your favorite social media platforms. And we'll be back with more on Sekulow. Again, ACLJ. Welcome back to Sekulow again.

Get your comments in. We have a packed show today. We're discussing a lot of different topics with a lot of our senior level staff here today.

So we hope we can give you sort of a broad overview of the work the ACLJ is doing, including obviously our push for ACLJ champions. We'll talk about that a little bit more later in the segment. But we did want to reset about this situation that came out of the IRS over the last 24, 48 hours.

Yeah. So this is, of course, an issue that we've been dealing with for almost 10 years at the ACLJ. And that was the targeting of conservative groups, Tea Party groups, pro-life groups by the IRS.

Through Lois Lerner, when she was the head of the tax-exempt division in conjunction with the Department of Justice, including Jack Smith, who's now the special prosecutor against Donald Trump. So the coincidences here are something else. And then you look at what took place where they had this be on the lookout list.

And if you had the word liberty, conservative in it, those were like signals that, you know, you've got to be examined, particularly careful. They wanted to piece together criminal cases against these groups so they could stop them from participating in the next election process. She's talking about election interference. But we won. And we got an injunction. And we got monetary damages for our clients. So in both litigation in Ohio in federal court and litigation in Washington, D.C., we were successful. It took years for us to get that's the litigation takes a long time, but we got a great result for our client.

Yeah, it is a very long battle. And again, the IRS was absolutely targeting and going after any conservative group. Once again, any group that does not align with their more liberal beliefs and values, they want to shut down. And we've seen that in this case here, where now they're not going after it is still the conservatives, but they're absolutely targeting Christians because they're going after words like Bible, Christian, Word of God, prayer. Those are the things that we've seen that the IRS is responding to our FOIA, which once again, this has taken them two years to respond to this and address this issue that they're targeting and being on the lookout for these terms. So what happened was we got an injunction on the political side of it, which was against these Tea Party groups and conservative groups and monetary damages. And it was fine.

We got a result. They changed their policies for three or four years. You heard nothing during the Trump administration. Nobody went after these groups. Nothing happened.

Joe Biden gets elected President. Four months later, a letter goes out. And this is a letter to a group called Christians Engaged. And they were seeking 501c3 taxes and recognition.

There's, for our people that are watching us, there it is on the screen. In the letter, there's a legend. And that legend is, they don't want to say the word, so they put initials. So one of the initials is C for Texas, D equals Republican, F equals Texas Eagle Forum, G Promise Keepers, H, Collin County, J, Collin County Republicans, K, Collin County Victory Efforts, M, Word of God.

Now this is, that is absurd to begin with. Why don't you just put down in the letter if you're going to write this. But what possessed an IRS agent to be able to say the following? Issue, do you qualify for exemption under 501c3?

No, for the reasons stated. You are incorporated on B in the state of C. Now this is insane, okay? This is how they wrote it. You are formed exclusively for charitable, religious, and educational purposes, and then they lay it out. But your founder is a motivational speaker, a former D congressional candidate.

By the way, D does not mean Democrat, it means Republican. He's also a political consultant and a preacher of the gospel. An IRS agent wrote preacher of the gospel in an IRS letter to a non-profit organization seeking tax exam status. Then it says your vice President is a motivational public speaker, former President of F, F being the Texas Eagle Forum, an intercessor, a former prayer coordinator for Promise Keepers, G as they call it, and a homeschool mom. Now this isn't a letter from the IRS. Your secretary you describe as a conservative millennial thought leader with a marketing and political consulting background.

He now serves as the executive director for the Collin County victory efforts where he manages J's, that's the Collin County Republicans, field teams in H, which is Collin County, as well as grassroots get-out-the-vote efforts of H. Now Logan, read, and then it says your mission is pray for the nation regularly, vote in every election, engage hearts in some of our political education and activism, and strive to educate Christians the importance of prayer, voting, and engagement in a non-partisan manner. All of which is constitutionally protected, but what in the world is an IRS agent asking them about this? That's what's so absurd here. Yeah, I think that's what we have to uncover more and more, and even if they say it's impossible, we can't get through, it's too many documents, we have to keep pushing forward. And that's why we actually, one of the reasons we have these ACLJ champions is because we know this process takes time. If you look at our original filing, it's from July 23rd, 2021.

We just heard back, just recently, we just got this report over the last few days. Yeah, well, here's what they say, you explain that you hold weekly prayer meetings to pray for leaders of your state and nation. Churches are given program outlines for prayer meetings. Statewide and area prayer gatherings are also conducted. You partner with other organizations to have strategic prayer gatherings for state, nation, and elected official. This is what their basis is upon which they are denying tax-exempt status. Every one of those activities I just mentioned, prayer meetings, organizational meetings, strategic meetings on the state, national, and elected office, all of those are protected speech under the First Amendment. Every single one of those are protected First Amendment activity. Right.

And what's amazing is they put it in writing, just like you said, about how they are denying their tax-exempt status request. Why? For the reasons stated below. And that's what they start lining out all of these reasons. This is unreal. Because you're a Christian, because you're a homeschool mom, because you have prayer meetings, because you're a pastor.

Because you're a homeschool mom. I mean, think about that one. Let that one sink in for a minute. So, they were denied their tax-exempt status. Now, our friends at First Liberty, Kelly Shackelford's organization, was able to get the tax-exempt status for the organization, which is great. But this should have never happened. So, what did we do? We filed a federal lawsuit against the IRS. We said, we want to know what's going on here.

What is the story? There it is. Federal lawsuit. And we asked for documents. And, of course, they don't want to give them. So, then we finally get a list. So, we ask for documents, and then they give us the list, folks.

And this is – I'm going to put the list on the screen. Be on the lookout, because we still thought they were doing this be on the lookout list, which evidently they are, because they had 1,155 documents, which 19,231 pages. Bible, 1,677 documents, 56,552 pages.

Bolo, be on the lookout. 639 documents, 12,800 pages. Christian, 2,603 documents, 115,644 pages. Rule of Law, 574 documents, 10,000 pages. Word of God, 1,187 documents, 26,749 pages. Prayer, 1,946 documents, 50,090 pages.

345,000 pages, at least. And the IRS then says, we can't give you any of this. Now, they identified it, but they don't want to give it to us, because could you imagine what's in this document stuff?

I mean, can you imagine for a moment what it is? And the IRS tried to – the federal government's trying to stonewall. We're fighting the Department of Justice, fighting the IRS. We will get a court order mandating the turnover of these documents.

That's right. Again, get your comments in. Share this with your friends. This is something that I think that is very important that people need to hear. It's not just about us giving you always, you know, reporting on the news.

We do that a lot. We do tell you what's happening and give our opinions and our thoughts and how the ACLJ can get involved in what's going on in current events in the news. But we know this is what's happening behind the scenes.

This is when you hear words like, you know, deep state, and you go, what does that mean? There it is. Here it is in black and white. It sure is. All right. We are also working this month aggressively on increasing our ACLJ champions. Those are people that donate each and every month.

Take a listen to this video. Being a champion means that you get to come alongside churches who are being zoned out of properties, who are being forced to obtain liquor licenses simply to operate. Coming alongside students who are being told they can't read their Bible in school or even bring it. Becoming an ACLJ champion allows us to take on more cases internationally in places where Christian persecution is happening on a daily basis.

The need for the defense of these Christians is overwhelming and we can't do it without you. Becoming an ACLJ champion means getting into a fight with deep state elites who are attacking our school children, who are attacking pro-life Christians. We have lawyers right now winning in courtrooms across the world, but none of it would matter without the ACLJ champions. Simply put, we don't win unless ACLJ champions continue to step up. We can't do what we do without you.

By becoming a monthly donor, you can become a champion of life. A champion of liberty, a champion of freedom. Please join us. Please join us. Please join us. Become an ACLJ champion today. Alright, and we only have a few seconds left in this segment. We do want to encourage you to go to ACLJ.org slash champions.

Become a champion today. Hundreds of you have responded this week to our ask. We've always had recurring donors.

We've always had that option. But now we're putting a designation behind it. Now we're putting a membership drive behind it. And we want you to be a part of that as well. So go to ACLJ.org slash champions. As you know, a lot of these cases, a lot of these issues, a lot of our media operations, these are long-term commitments.

These are not just one-time deals. We have to staff up. We have to keep things going.

So go to ACLJ.org slash champions right now. Again, packed show coming up. A lot of great guests. We're going to hit a bunch of topics today. Get your comments in. Share this with your friends.

We'll be right back. Go to ACLJ.org slash champions. Become an ACLJ champion today. And that's what we're discussing on the broadcast. And we've brought in more guests to really go through a lot of the cases that are going on here. Yeah, because I think it's a good, especially on a Friday, it's good to kind of take a retrospective here of what's going on at the ACLJ. I want to talk about a couple of major cases.

We have talked a lot about the situation that took place almost 10 months ago. And that was when students were at the Smithsonian Museum as well as at the National Archives Museum. And they had a pro-life shirt on or a pro-life beanie. There it is. It said pro-life. And that's all it said. And they were harassed by security personnel at these various museums that are open to the public.

We went to federal court on that. And I think it's important to understand why you stand up for these students. If they're embarrassed to share their views. And by the way, they were not disruptive. When they were asked to go through the security apparatus that they had at the museums, which is normal, they were told to take off their hats. And they were there for March for Life. The reason they were in pro-life gear was not just to come out there and be disruptive. Yeah, it's also all the same color so the school monitors can, you know, the hosts so to speak, can know where the kids are, the students are during the event.

So they take their little hats off when they go through the security and they put them back on and then they get harassed by the personnel. Let me, Abby's here, Abby Sutherland, one of our senior lawyers at the ACLJ, has been heavily involved in this case. No, one's very close to resolving. One's not so close to resolving. But the fact is, we did go to federal court and we did get some immediate action right away.

That's right. We actually obtained preliminary injunctions in both cases. So when you get a preliminary injunction, what that means is the government is stopped from doing what they were doing. Here the allegation was that they were basically censoring one side of the debate, the pro-life message. Frankly, they shouldn't be doing this to either side, but they clearly should not have been doing it to the pro-life side. And the expression contained on their hats were protected under the First Amendment. And that is what you've got to always remember with these cases when you're talking about these kind of things, is the activity itself is constitutionally protected.

Absolutely. And again, free speech, they don't care about it at all. Again, this administration seems like, you know, if it's free speech, we don't care if it's conservative speech. We are going to restrict it.

They are going to tell you what speech you can or cannot say, which is a direct violation of the First Amendment. But again, this administration does not care about that. We see that even with, you know, the Smithsonian and National Archives, they have people there willing to threaten and stifle a message simply because they don't agree with it. You know, we're still trying to get to what was the motivating factor of this, Abby. We don't know that yet. We'll get some discovery and that will help. We've been in mediation for months on this. One of the cases looks like it's very close to getting resolved, which is good.

But the other one I don't think is going to be resolved and we'll get the discovery. But what do you think was going on here? Well, there was a concerted effort.

That has become clear. We're talking about more than one guard. The guards were armed. In the Smithsonian case, we believe they were federal guards.

Federal Protective Services. And so they were instructing young students who were behaving respectfully and just simply just wearing a pro-life hat. The behavior was very egregious for a couple of reasons. First, they used cuss words towards our students and in reference to our students, all the while our students remained very respectful of the armed guards. Second, they took pleasure in instructing our students to remove their clothing or, in other words, they would be kicked out if they did not comply with the demands.

One security guard rubbed his hands together, smiled at them and said, y'all are about to make my day. So we're not talking about a simple misunderstanding here. I mean, this was outrageous.

It really is outrageous. Not just a targeted knowing, say, hey, you have to go kick these people out. This was intentionally targeting people because of their views and show intimidating them. Yeah.

I mean, the intimidation factor alone. And that's what I think some of that took place as they were exiting. Right. I mean, there were some were outside at that point.

They were already on their way out because they did not want to remove their hats and the guards were walking behind them, essentially taunting them. That was Smithsonian, correct? That was in Smithsonian. Yeah. The one that looks like it's going to settle is the National Archives.

Right. And there we're going to we're not going to discuss it yet, but we're going to get a fair and just settlement for our clients. We already as Abby said, we already have the injunction.

We were able to get that pretty quick. But we're fighting the Department of Justice. They represent these entities. And so it's you know, it's federal litigation.

So when we do a lot of but this gives you an example. The idea that you'd be censored and then harassed because you took a pro-life position should be shocking. Unfortunately, it's not. And you know why it's not?

Because whether it's the pro-life protester on the street getting beat to pieces, as we saw in the clients we represent in that case, where they still have not apprehended the individual that did it. And I realize it's Baltimore and our guy wasn't killed. He could have been. He wasn't. Thank the Lord, he was not.

He was injured significantly in the hospital. But in Baltimore, because Baltimore is a mess, if you're not, you know, basically a murder case, you're very low priority. So there's, you know, we'll probably never find out who did this to the guy. But the fact that someone thought they could just do that is incredible. Now, take it a second step, okay? You then go to, so you got physical harm in one case, and then you've got, in this case, pure First Amendment activities. The other clients were First Amendment activities too.

They were just handing out pamphlets on the public sidewalk, totally traditional public forums. That they could be targeted like this should send shockwaves to anybody that's listening. And in both of these situations, in the two museum cases, we're fighting it out in federal court to get justice for our clients. It's a long process because that's what justice is. But then you could take it right down to the crisis pregnancy centers, which are under incredible scrutiny by state and federal officials right now, simply for being pro-life in the messaging that they're providing to women.

Absolutely. We see this when the crisis pregnancy centers were targeted, fire bombed. You know, they had spray paint and graffiti put all over them, absolutely threatened. And the FBI doesn't go after the people that actually targeted them. They go after the pro-lifers. That's who the FBI targets because once again, it's a message that the Biden administration does not agree with. You know, you go inside an abortion clinic in your pro-life and if you're doing it as a form of protest, which is, look, that's a violation of the law.

They'll come ask you under the Free Access to Clinic Entrances Act and raid your homes with guns a-blazing. If you're a pro-lifer who gets beat up on the streets by somebody, they can't seem to find you. And this is, you know, and if you're a conservative Catholic, don't worry, they're sending FBI agents into your church. So that tells you that. But I want to talk about one other case with Abby, and that is a case involving a prayer vigil. Again, pure First Amendment activity should not be a controversy, but it is.

That's right. And in this case, we represent the city of Ocala in Florida. There was a crime spree.

The police department was trying to apprehend the individuals they believed were responsible for the crime spree. Community members decided to organize a prayer vigil. And the police department vocally supported those efforts and said, we support the prayer vigil. We encourage citizens to participate, to come together.

And they were then sued by a group of atheists. And that's already made one trip to the Supreme Court of the United States, where it was sent back down to now the Eleventh Circuit, then sent back down to the district court. So what's the status right now?

Real quick, we're running close on time. We just finished filing our final brief on motions for summary judgment. So we should get a definitive ruling in the next, what, couple of months? The next couple of months. Oral argument scheduled for January. Okay, so we should probably know by the end of January or February. That case probably destined for the Supreme Court of the United States. All right, we've got a lot more ahead coming up on the broadcast.

That's right. Stay tuned right here, whether you're on ACLJ.org, whether you're on Rumble, YouTube, Facebook, however you watch this broadcast, or if you're listening on radio, you can watch us. You can actually see what's happening in the studio. Full-fledged television production over on ACLJ.org. Get on Rumble on our channels on Rumble or on YouTube. Find us there broadcasting live each and every day. Again, go to ACLJ.org.

Go to ACLJ.org slash champions right now to become an ACLJ champion. We'll be right back with more on Sekulow. You heard about the prayer vigil case that's now going to the District Court. It's going to go to the Court of Appeals and it'll go back up. It's already been in the Supreme Court once.

It's going to end up going back up again. We talked about the pro-life cases that we're involved in on, again, a whole host of issues that you're going to see. We're going to talk about some of our international efforts, some of our election interference cases that we're working on. All of these, we mentioned the IRS matter that we're now getting these documents from, which are breathtaking in scope, all 350,000 of them. That's how many documents had these words in it, prayer, study, Christian. I mean, you can't even make this stuff up.

I mean, it's so unbelievable. But we are also letting you know that this week, for our first time in our ACLJ history, we have recurring donors. Those are donors that donate each month.

We have about 15,000. But about a year ago, Logan said, you know, one of the things I'd like to see, and he's right, is to increase that special group of people significantly. And that's something we've been working on this month.

Yeah, that's right. When I can look at the numbers and see, so many of you do donate. I mean, just an enormous amount of people that really give to the ACLJ regularly, but not in a recurring way, not in a way that's automatic, that helps us out, that we can plan for.

A lot of times it's action-oriented. If there's something happening right now, we say we need help, you guys all jump in. And it is incredible, and we do not want to take anything away from that. But what we don't have necessarily is a vast amount of people that are dedicated to supporting the ACLJ each and every month. Some people are. 15,000. 15,000, so I want to thank all of them.

But if you saw, that'd be a small fraction of the amount of people that actually donate to the organization each and every day even. So we decided to kind of package that, see what we come up with. Our team came up with making you guys ACLJ champions, because that is just the truth. When you're an ACLJ champion, you're supporting us and being able to help set our goals, set our plans, move forward on bigger projects, because we know that you are there to support us.

And you can do that. And take a look at this video that gives you a better idea of what being an ACLJ champion means. Some people think champions are born. That it's a title that requires something only a handful can ever possess.

But being a champion only requires a decision. Choosing what is right. Even when the loudest voices in the room say it's wrong, or that it can't be done. And then following it through, no matter the cost.

It can be a difficult stand. But it's one any of us can make, including you. Including you. Including you.

Including you. You can change things. You can make a difference. You can be a champion.

We can't do what we do without you. By becoming a monthly donor, you can become a champion of life. A champion of liberty.

A champion of freedom. Please join us. Please join us. Please join us. Become an ACLJ champion today.

It's a very straightforward goal. And here's what it is. We have 15,000 as Logan said. We've added almost 400 this week so far. If we add 100 a day in the course of a year, we will more than double what we have currently. So again, we're on a lot of radio and all these social media platforms.

It doesn't sound like a lot, but we know that's a lot. But we've been very pleased with the way it started. But again, it really affects our ability to plan for the ACLJ's activity. Like when we had the emergencies come up with these 14th Amendment cases, which we're about to talk about. Where they were trying to do the election of interference keeping Trump off the ballots in these states.

We did a little campaign there and we had a great response. But that's one time. And that was with one case.

Well now there's three of those cases or four of those cases. So that's where our monthly sustaining members really come in. So we're asking you to become an ACLJ champion.

A champion of life, a champion of liberty, and a champion of freedom. And if you do that, whatever amount you donate, what's going to happen is we can count on that each and every month. And that allows us to do real planning and real budgets. And by the way, that includes everything from the cases we work on, to this broadcast that you're seeing here, to all of the vast social media that we post and the information we get out. Thousands and thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of people view our material every day. I mean, Logan, the number of people that go to our YouTube, Facebook, Rumble sites, you told me it's tens of thousands a day. Oh yeah, maybe hundreds of thousands a day that go through and see our content.

Absolutely. And we can't do that again. We appreciate that because that is a free way for you to help support us too, is to just share this content, tell more people about it. And we don't put it behind a paywall. We want this information out. So we encourage you to go to ACLJ.org slash champions. And like I said, if we get a hundred a day for the next year, that's going to do a lot.

Hey, welcome back. As we said, we're talking about our new program for our champion members, ACLJ champions. You can become one by donating monthly to the ACLJ. You become a champion for life, for liberty and freedom.

You go to ACLJ.org forward slash champions. We've talked about a lot of cases, free speech, religious liberty, the IRS situation. I want to talk about the 14th Amendment election interference. So a series of cases developed last month where there were attempts being made in courts, and still being made, to take Donald Trump off the ballot so they could not appear on the ballot.

Whether you're for Trump or against Trump is irrelevant. But if you qualify to be the candidate, or a candidate, in a primary, your name should appear on the ballot. And they were saying no under what's called the 14th Amendments. This is Disqualification Clause, which is Section 3, which has been applied most recently in 1918. And they applied it to keep somebody out of Congress, and they ultimately lost. And it went to the Supreme Court of the United States, and that individual was seated in Congress.

So this has got very limited applicability. But here's what's being argued. Some are arguing that the State Board of Elections, or the Secretary of State if in that state is the election supervisor, on their own, can determine that Donald Trump was engaged in activity that constitutes a disqualification without a court. The fact is the court should, this is absurd. There is a law for insurrection, none of which has been applied, by the way, in all these, you know, 90 counts of indictments against Donald Trump.

None of them have been involved in insurrection. But yet, Harry Hutchinson, our Director of Policy, is joining us. We're representing, right now we're in Colorado, where we've got a trial at the end of this month.

We were in Oklahoma, but once we filed the plaintiff there dismissed, we're in West Virginia, and we're working on Virginia right now. So there's a lot going on. But Harry, describe what is really at stake here. Well, essentially, legal elites have taken Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and they've applied it to Donald Trump. They've been enraged by the fact that his popularity has risen after each and every indictment by a Georgia prosecutor, by a federal special counsel.

And so they've said, we have come up with a different solution. Let's apply an amendment to the United States Constitution, which was originally designed to deprive Confederate individuals, people that had engaged in an actual insurrection. It was designed to prevent them from being elected to higher office, particularly Congress.

The problem, of course, with their analysis is twofold. First, Donald Trump was never an officer of the United States government for purposes of Section 14. The President is not an officer of the United States. He's the chief executive, right. And so if you believe in a unitary executive, that particular provision is inapplicable to Donald Trump.

Secondarily, of course, the question becomes, did he commit an offense within the meaning of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment? And it's important here, I think, to actually look at the language. The language, the offense language, can be broken down into two prongs, engaging in an insurrection or rebellion against the United States or giving aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.

So what many elite law professors have done, because if they actually look at this particular provision, they understand it's inapplicable to Donald Trump. So what they do is they conflate Prong 2 language with Prong 1 language. And the important language for listeners to understand is giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States. So the first question becomes, were there enemies of the United States on January the 6th? The question answers itself, in order to be an enemy of the United States, there needs to be either a de facto war or a de jure war.

There was neither. So that's number one. So instead they use giving aid or comfort to the enemy, they use the first part, and then they apply it to the initial portion of Section 3, which means engaging in insurrection or rebellion against the United States. Here's what's important to point out also, and I think he was not charged with any of this. And believe me, they've issued a lot of charges, okay?

I think the count against Trump is what, 47 or something? None of which are insurrection or aiding and abetting the enemy. So they want this to be what's called self-executing. That is, you know, some government official decides, you know, C.C. Heil's running for Congress, which she did, and we don't want you to be on it, so we think you're engaged in insurrection, so we decide you're insurrection and that's it.

Now, in the United States of America, it's not supposed to work that way. So you talk about election interference, folks. Keeping a qualified candidate off a ballot based on an administrative decision of an individual is absurd, but that's exactly what this is.

Absolutely. They are grasping at straws. None of their efforts so far have hindered Trump, and just like Harry said, in fact, every time they've gone after him, he's actually gotten, you know, gone up in the polls. So this is yet another attempt to try and go after him and use the 14th Amendment in an inappropriate way to try and stop a candidate from being on a ballot. So what was interesting, though, in all of this, is that when this happened, we came on live on air and discussed it, and Logan, the response that we had from our donors and our members was incredible.

Yeah, absolutely. Even people that didn't support Donald Trump. Yeah, who just said, hey, this can't be the way we do this. It's not the way we're taught in school this is how this works, that anyone can become President regardless of even what they've done for the most part. I mean, there's obviously some restrictions, but not in general. When you're taught in school, who can become President?

Anybody. And at this point, when you start limiting who people can vote for and who's going to be on the ballot, I think, again, that's almost something that you never even questioned could be a reality. And then it became, in the news, it felt like almost settled law.

Like, everyone knows this. Everyone knows that a judge can just remove someone from the, like, somehow we are all supposed to just know this. There's something you got taught that, yeah, you can remove people from ballots just for the heck of it. Yeah, so Stephen Calabresi came out with this opinion in similar to what Mike Paulson and a couple of other well-known law professors did, saying, yes, it's self-execution. It doesn't have to be a court decision.

You know, don't go that way. Just whatever the particular election official decides. Calabresi ends up changing his position after he speaks with, according to Calabresi, who I have a lot of respect for him.

I got a lot of respect for all these people. They're just wrong. Now, Calabresi at least honestly said, you know, when he looked at it and spoke to, I think it was Judge McCasey, who was former Attorney General of the United States, Michael McCasey, said, you know what, now that I've looked at it, Harry, that doesn't apply to the President. Absolutely. And so there's a lot of scholarship out there now that suggests that Baud and Paulson's analysis suggesting that Donald Trump should be disqualified under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, there's a lot of analysis to the contrary. And I think the clear weight of authority is that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment does not apply to Donald Trump.

So what is happening? If you look at commentators, such as commentators from MSNBC and elsewhere, they're backing away from the language in the Constitution. And they don't want the judges involved. And they don't want the judges involved.

Instead, they want to empower election officials to unilaterally decide this particular question. So that means that the legal analysis initially offered was inappropriate and inaccurate. And one of the things that I would encourage listeners to do is to actually read the statutory or constitutional language. Law professors are not necessarily the individuals you should rely on because law professors, speaking as a former law professor, we often invent arguments. We are great at creating hypotheticals, but some of those hypotheticals are not grounded in reality. That is absolutely the truth. And here, the idea that this would be self-executing, that an individual elected official could take someone off a ballot, you think about that as a scary moment for a constitutional republic.

Absolutely. And it's a crime that he can be charged with and has not been, and he's not been found guilty of it, so you're giving this person, this election official, the power of the judge and jury to say, look, I think you're guilty and I'm saying you're guilty, and therefore you all are guilty and I'm keeping you off the ballot. Judge, jury, executioner.

That's what this would do. And now these law professors are getting, as Harry said, are confused themselves and now they're going in different directions. Here's the reality. We're in court fighting this out. Okay? We're in court in Colorado. We were in court in Oklahoma. That case is a victory. We're in court in West Virginia. We're about to be in court in Virginia. This is a big fight. And whether you're for Trump or not for Trump is irrelevant.

It's this idea that one bureaucrat could decide this is wrong. But that's where you come in. And Logan was the one that a year ago said, we need to increase our monthly giving, those that stand with us each and every month, and we've done this with our ACLJ champions.

That's right. You can go to ACLJ.org slash champions to become an ACLJ champion today. It's real simple. You should go there, sign up, very simple form. You obviously can cancel at any time if you feel like you can't do it financially.

We know that this is a hard time for a lot of people, but if you can, whether that's at $5 or more, we'd appreciate it. Again, ACLJ.org slash champions. Champions, but we also, as you said, don't put our content behind paywalls like that. There's a ton of incredible resources you can get by just going to ACLJ.org right now. Again, go to ACLJ.org. Look at the incredible video content, the blogs, the articles that comes from this panel and more. ACLJ.org.

We'll be right back. Welcome back to Secular, wrapping up today, talking about a lot that's going on, including our work at the UN, which is something that doesn't, we showcase a lot on here, but maybe you need a bit of understanding of what the ACLJ does. So our European Center for Law and Justice, which has been around now for 25 years, one of the reasons we started was we wanted to have consultative status at the United Nations. That means being a recognized, what's called NGO, non-governmental organization with full standing to participate in interventions at the UN on critical issues, whether it's human rights, whether it's national security, whatever it might be. And we've made hundreds of these appearances over the years, and we've been a member of this elite group. I mean, I don't like using the word elite, but it's a very limited number of people have NGO status or organizations at the United Nations. And we are active there.

And CC, you've been there. You've actually done it live. You could do it live or video on these interventions. But they really have an impact when we have people being detained, pastors, other religious leaders or individuals that are being detained because of their faith or just a Christian in a country being detained just because they're a Christian. We can go to various channels within the United Nations. And I know there's a lot of people saying, I can't stand the United Nations. I don't like the United Nations.

You know what, though? You still have to be there because decisions are made there. The Ministry of Presence, you gotta be there. But we play a big role at the UN. We do. And then the Human Rights Council meets in Geneva, and it meets three times a year.

And this was the 54th session. And we have an opportunity to submit written reports, and we always target those on Christian persecution. But we also include Israel to support Israel because they are constantly attacked at the United Nations. The UN General Assembly in New York and also the Human Rights Council in Geneva. And so we submitted, we did four oral interventions.

Once we do the written submissions, we actually have an opportunity to present oral interventions. And Jordan was able to do one on Israel and defending Israel, which, again, is very important because the UN absolutely targets Israel more than any other member state before the United Nations. There are more resolutions condemning Israel than every other nation combined.

A very small state getting that kind of attention. But we went to bat for Israel, as we have been for decades. We have an office in Jerusalem. You've seen those reports on this broadcast from our offices in Jerusalem. Here was Jordan's presentation to the United Nations just the other day. I now give the floor to the representative of the European Center for Law and Justice.

Thank you, Mr. President. More than any other country, Israel is regularly subject to unfounded condemnation. Since its founding in the ancient, indigenous Jewish homeland, the multi-front war against Israel's existence has never ceased. As part of the ongoing political and lawfare campaign to demonize the world's only Jewish state, Israel is falsely accused of discriminating against its Arab population. Yet in reality, Israel's Arab citizens have full and equal protection of the law. Israeli Arabs are represented in every walk of life, including politics, the workforce, professions, and academia, serving in senior cabinet positions and on Israel's Supreme Court. They have full and equal voting rights and proudly serve in the IDF and security forces, even though they are not required to do so. Israel also spends significant funds to uplift the socioeconomic status of its minorities, including launching a $70 million program to integrate Arab men and women, including its stellar high-tech industry. Few nations are as conscientious as Israel in their treatment of racial, ethnic, or religious minorities. Nonetheless, the international community continues to falsely accuse Israel of discriminating against its Arab citizens. The real discrimination lies in the ongoing defamation and double standards levied against the world's only Jewish state. The ECLJ commends Israel for upholding the rule of law and for its efforts to uplift its Arab population, despite being falsely condemned.

Thank you. That was before you saw that. That was before the entire United Nations Council. And we've done these, that was defending a state. We've also done these defending an individual, and we do that when it comes to people that are unlawfully detained.

Absolutely. So, through the Working Group in Arbitrary Detention, which is another arm of the United Nations and the Human Rights Council, we are able to file complaints on behalf of individuals that have been arbitrarily detained. And we saw that with Pastor Brunson, and we have had success in these scenarios, in this case, because we actually get an opinion from the Working Group that says, yes, they've been arbitrarily detained, and we call on this country to release them or pay them reparations.

We have filed another complaint on Shahzad Masih, who is the young boy in Pakistan who was falsely accused of blasphemy. And so we not only are able to present these cases before the Human Rights Council, but all through their other arms like the Working Group in Arbitrary Detention. And this was pressure on these state governments, these national governments to release.

And we've had great success in releasing, whether it's out of Iran, whether it's out of Sudan, whether it's out of, we've had them out of China, we've had them out of Turkey. I mean, I can go through a whole list of pastors we've worked on cases or individuals we've worked on cases. None of this happens, though. None of this happens without your support of the ACLJ. I want to play a video for you. We are, in the last, this last week, we've been focusing on our ACLJ champions. This gives you a broader sense of what we're trying to do.

Take a look. What does it mean to be an ACLJ champion? Becoming an ACLJ champion means joining us in the fight for liberty, in the fight for law, in the fight for peace, in the fight for freedom. The battles being fought in courtrooms right now will decide what kind of future our kids will have tomorrow. So when you join as an ACLJ champion, we now actually have a baseline to know what we can possibly accomplish.

And look, the dream is, is vast. Being a champion means that you get to come alongside churches who are being zoned out of properties, who are being forced to obtain liquor licenses simply to operate. Coming alongside students who are being told they can't read their Bible in school or even bring it. Becoming an ACLJ champion allows us to take on more cases internationally, in places where Christian persecution is happening on a daily basis.

The need for the defense of these Christians is overwhelming, and we can't do it without you. Becoming an ACLJ champion means getting into a fight with deep state elites who are attacking our school children, who are attacking pro-life Christians. We have lawyers right now winning in courtrooms across the world, but none of it would matter without the ACLJ champions. Simply put, we don't win unless ACLJ champions continue to step up. We can't do what we do without you.

By becoming a monthly donor, you can become a champion of life, a champion of liberty, a champion of freedom. Please join us. Please join us. Please join us.

Become an ACLJ champion today. So we started that campaign on Monday. It's now Friday, so we've done five days. It looks like we'll probably have averaged about 100 new champions a day, roughly.

We have 15,000 in our champions category right now at the ACLJ, and the goal is over the course of a year. It's a long project. This is not a short-term project, Logan. It's a long project. Over the course of a year, we want to try to double that.

Yeah, that's right. It is a long-term project. It's something that you're going to hear about fairly regularly. We're in the middle of this drive specifically for the launch of our champions campaigns.

You can go to ACLJ.org slash champions to find out more. Simple to sign up. If you want more information on what that means, why we need it, why we need your support on a regular basis. Obviously, we always appreciate the support, however it comes, whether that's in one-time giving, whether that is in recurring giving, whatever it may be. And I want to thank everyone who also did sign up this week.

Hundreds of you did. And that has immense, immense potential to change the world. And we can't do it without you. So go to ACLJ.org, and specifically ACLJ.org slash champions. That's going to do it for today's show and for the week's show.

Be back next week. As always, if you're new, subscribe wherever you're watching. Whether that's on YouTube or on ACLJ.org, make sure you get this broadcast each and every day, Monday through Friday. New broadcast and new materials every day at ACLJ.org.