DEMOCRACY UNDER ATTACK: ACLJ Set For Historic Filing at Supreme Court

Today on Sekulow, democracy under attack as the ACLJ is set for historic filing at the Supreme Court. Keeping you informed and engaged, now more than ever, this is Sekulow. We want to hear from you. Share and post your comments or call 1-800-684-3110. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. Hey, welcome to Sekulow.

We are taking your calls to 1-800-684-3110 as we head into this holiday weekend. Some breaking news for you to report a win out of West Virginia. The federal court there in West Virginia, and I've got the decision in my hands, out of the district court there for the Southern District of West Virginia. It was the plaintiff there. Of course, this Castro figure has been trying to file lawsuits all across the country to bar Donald Trump from the primary ballot. And the defendants, we intervened as the West Virginia Republican Party, officially representing them. And their chair, who is also an attorney, will be joining us next time on the broadcast. This is, put one in the win column for the ACLJ and all of our supporters, all of our donors, those of you who are ACLJ champions, those of you who have done your matching challenge this month, and those of you who are even considering donating to the ACLJ because of the upcoming cases, including the one we're working on right now, heading to the U.S. Supreme Court.

So again, this is another one in the win column here for the ACLJ, West Virginia, Minnesota, and Oklahoma. Interestingly, the court wrote on page 13 of its opinion that the evidentiary submissions made by the plaintiff only make matters worse for him. This was the individual that sued to try to get Trump off the ballot. His admission under oath during testimony in New Hampshire that he has no meaningful campaign activity beyond pursuing these lawsuits is fatal to his claim that he is a genuine competition with Donald Trump for the Republican nomination for the President or for West Virginia delegates.

The evidence establishes he has no campaign offices staff for advertising West Virginia, does not appear in polling, has little name recognition among West Virginia Republican voters, and has extremely minimal campaign funds vastly insufficient to run an actual campaign. If there were any question as to whether the allegations of the complaint are sufficient to overcome a facial challenge, we raise the facial challenge. The evidentiary submissions remove any doubt that Mr. Castro's purported quote campaign exists as a vehicle for pursuing litigation only, not votes. Big win. Now, all these are interesting, but let me tell you what's at stake. It's all going to matter in one court, the Supreme Court of the United States.

We have, our teams are working on this literally all night last night, and they will be through the weekend as we get ready for this. This, folks, this is going to the Supreme Court. That is the next stop. It's a case out of Colorado where the court ruled against us. Trump was, in their view, could be taken off the ballot. We're challenging that at the Supreme Court of the United States. I feel pretty confident they're going to grant review, but we've got a lot of work we're doing on that right now. Right now, we're also, too, seeing this barrage of other states trying to make moves, blue states trying to make moves even, hopefully, before the Supreme Court considers this case. So, in Michigan, where we won at the lower court, the ACLJ won at the lower court, we've been waiting for the Supreme Court.

Now, people, there's all eyes there to see if they will follow suit. They didn't want to be necessarily the first state like Colorado, but now that Colorado's done it, will the Michigan Supreme Court follow suit and do the same thing? That's why I said, folks, we're getting the wins, like in West Virginia, but we're also seeing, because of that Colorado loss, which we expected, and ultimately this being decided by the Supreme Court that is all across the country. But the end game here is the Supreme Court will decide this once and for all. We have the biggest election case in U.S. history right now at the Supreme Court. This is not an exaggeration. This is an historic attack on our democracy.

The Colorado Supreme Court abused the 14th Amendment and banned the former President from the ballot. Now other states are piling on. We are seeing an avalanche of cases. We're calling this a judicial emergency. We are working through Christmas to take this case and the massive attack on our democracy to the Supreme Court of the United States. We are filing in five days and we need you to stand with us.

We don't say this lightly. This is the most important case we've ever taken because if we lose our right to vote, we lose our constitutional republic. So we're asking you to defend our constitutional republic. Have your gift doubled today at ACLJ.org.

Please give as generously as you can. There are glimmer of hopes as we just saw we won in West Virginia. You can report for duty as we go to the Supreme Court to defend your right to vote. You can go to the Supreme Court with us if you're supporting our work. There you saw the most important nine days for our budget. We urgently need your tax-deductible support. Join the fight. Have your gift doubled at ACLJ.org.

And if you can make it a monthly gift, you could do that. You become an ACLJ champion or if you're making a large one-time gift, we appreciate that as well. But everything counts. Go to ACLJ.org. Welcome back to Seculars. We prepare for the U.S. Supreme Court battle to determine, ultimately, President Trump's status on the primary ballot in all 50 states. We are fighting in over a dozen states and have gone to court in many of those and won. Most recently, last night and this morning, we got the good news from West Virginia. The West Virginia Republican Party chair, who is also an attorney who's been working with us at the ACLJ on the case in West Virginia in federal court. L.G. McArdle is joining us now. L.G., let me go to you first because, again, we've seen this attack on states across the country trying to say, whether through judicial action or going to a secretary of state, to take away the right of your party members.

So put on your party chair hat to vote for the candidate of their choice in the upcoming election. Yes, it's absolutely horrendous. It is despicable and we certainly wanted to fight it and we did and we won last night. The decision came back from Justice Burger and she did an excellent job of going through the evidence that we presented. Thankfully, our chair of chairs, who is Benjean Rapp, swore out an affidavit that basically said that Castro had not done anything in the state of West Virginia and she had no idea who he is. And if she doesn't know who he is in West Virginia, then nobody knows who he is. And I think that was strong evidence to show that he hadn't even tried to do anything in the state of West Virginia. I read earlier, Elgin, that the court actually said that. They said, you know, he's got no campaign, nobody knows who he is.

His only vehicle for campaigning is filing these lawsuits. But the reality is, and you're a very good lawyer and we were thrilled to work with you not only as the chair of the party but also as our co-counsel. You know, at the end of the day, we now know, of course, that the Colorado court went the other way. And we're looking at it, and from your perspective as the chair of the GOP in West Virginia, here's the issue that people need to understand. It is your job, the party's job, to put up the nominees.

The secretary of state's job is to make sure that they're the right age and they're a natural born citizen. That's it. That is correct. Yeah, so talk about that for a moment, the interference that this has with your First Amendment rights of freedom of association.

Absolutely. So in West Virginia, the state code actually requires that the electorate put up its nominee. And we select the delegates and the delegates go to the RNC convention and we put up the primary or the individual who wins the election.

So that is, it's all up to the state party and nothing of the state secretary of state has to do with it. So what Castro was trying to do was interfere with the ability of the West Virginia electorate to choose their nominee and to vote for their nominee for President. And that was just absolutely horrendous. And the voters, actually, it was interesting because the voters, after the decision came out, seemed to come out of the woodwork and say, wait a minute, this was actually going on in the state of West Virginia? How can that happen? And we need to fight that.

And I said, well, we did fight it and we did win. So we will be able to choose our nominee and we will be able to put up the presumptive nominee at this point, which is Trump, because he has absolutely taken West Virginia by storm in the last two elections. That's an interesting point.

It was actually, that's being noted. So I think putting on the political hat again, it's being noted in these decisions that it's the candidate they are going after is the number one candidate in every single poll. And even the judges say now polls can be whatever, but in every poll they see, whether you're talking about the primary polls, primary or state polls, and even general election polls, they're targeting what appears to be at this time the number one choice of Republicans and the number one choice of the American voter.

Well, absolutely. If they can't get them through the indictments as they've been trying to do or the lawsuits that they've been trying to put up, then what's the last resort is let's just keep them off the ballot. And I don't even know where that even begins to come into play because it just absolutely challenges our freedoms, our democracy, the republic, that you start to wonder where we're living.

Well, you know what's interesting about this, Elgin, and you look at how aggressive they're being on this. I mean, we've got cases in 15 different states that you've got the four, of course, criminal indictments. So if you look at this collectively, it's I call it lawfare. I mean, they're weaponizing the legal system. The Department of Justice did it with these federal claims they brought.

The states have done it in New York and in Atlanta and Georgia. And now you've got the situation where they're trying to, you know, you've got this Colorado Supreme Court saying, oh, we're going to take them off the ballot, even though there's never been a charge of insurrection. And we're going to utilize the insurrection clause of the 14th Amendment, Section 3, which has been used once since 1918.

It was used last in 1918. And by the way, they would not, in that case, they tried not to seat a member of Congress because they thought the person was a communist. And the Supreme Court said, no, you don't have the authority to do that.

That's not an insurrection. So the whole thing is ridiculous. But what's repulsive is that if this impacts, whether you're for Trump or against Trump, this impacts everybody's right to vote. And that's what you're concerned with. Yes, absolutely. It takes away our ability to put up our nominee, takes away our ability for the voters to vote in the primary for their chosen representative in the United States.

You know, it's absolutely abhorrent that everything else isn't working. So let's just remove them altogether. It is hard to imagine that in the United States that we actually have such a group of individuals who are so threatened by Trump's very existence that let's just get let's just get rid of him. And in the process, turn the Constitution upside down.

Absolutely. The Constitution is there. I mean, I think the founding fathers certainly put it into place so that we could avoid these kinds of things and to protect against them. And then we have these rogue justices out of Colorado who are not even elected. And so four people are going to decide that the rest of the country cannot vote for who they want to.

And that's by the way, that's exactly what we're arguing to the Supreme Court. Now, we're going to be filing our certiorari petition next week with the court and, you know, they may give expedited review. He gets to stay on the ballot while we're pending. But I suspect there'll be some kind of expedited review.

We'll see. You never know with the court. Elgin, look, it's been great working with you. We'll see if he appeals to the fourth. You're the fourth circuit there, right?

So, yeah, so we'll see if he if he takes it to the next step up. But it's been great working with you. Thanks for being part of the team here. Thanks.

Thanks so much for including me. And have a Merry Christmas. Have a great day. Merry Christmas. You too. Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas. You know, folks, again, you know, we looked at this. All these different states, we've been able to work with partners, partners we know, new friends, attorneys on the ground as well.

And you can, again, you line up the victories. We got in these cases, Dad, early because we knew ultimately if there was one like Colorado, one of the highest courts that went against Donald Trump, the Supreme Court was going to have to weigh in. Do you remember we said early on, I said Colorado is going to be the one.

I just had a feeling Colorado was going to be the one. We were winning the other ones very quickly. That case started slowing down. We won it at the trial court, but it was a bizarre ruling because you said there was an insurrection. And then it took a while at the Supreme Court.

And every day that went by said more and more likely we're not going to carry the day there. And it was a very close Supreme Court. They're all Democrat chosen judges on the justice on that.

But it was four to three, which means they were really taking it two weeks later than we thought. So they pushed the deadline even closer and tougher for the Supreme Court, actually. So, folks, we have got the biggest election case of not just our history, but in the history of the Supreme Court of the United States.

And this is not an exaggeration. It's bigger than Bush versus Gore. I mean, Bush versus Gore was outcome determined for that presidency.

This is voting determinative, whether you can vote for the candidate of your choice. So we're saying this is an historic attack on democracy. The Colorado Supreme Court clearly abused the 14th Amendment Section 3 by banning Trump from the ballot. Now other states are piling on.

We saw that with Maine in California. They want to do it without even having a hearing. And basically that takes away people in California and Maine's right to vote. It impacts your right to vote. Because as this happens, you can start having people thinking, well, if I vote for him, he may be taken off the ballot. So you talk about election interference. It's an avalanche of cases involving election interference.

So we're classifying this, and we don't do this often, as a judicial emergency. We're working through Christmas to appeal this massive attack on our democracy to the Supreme Court of the United States. I'm going to be reviewing drafts tonight. We're already getting drafts ready.

We're filing within five days. And we need you to stand with us. And look, folks, we don't say this lightly, but this is the most important case we've ever taken of the Supreme Court.

Because if we lose our right to vote, we lose our constitutional republic. So we're asking you to defend this republic of ours. Have your gift doubled today at ACLJ.org.

And please give as generously as you can. There are glimmers of hopes. As I said, we just won the West Virginia case, so that was good news. You can report for duty as we go to the Supreme Court to defend your right to vote. By standing with us, you're going to the Supreme Court of the United States with us. You're sending us to the Supreme Court, and you're going there with us. So these are the most important nine days of our year for our budget. And we've got the biggest Supreme Court case, and not just one, that we've ever had at the court. Your tax-deductal support is going to make a huge difference.

Join the fight. Have your gift doubled at ACLJ.org. And if you're able to make it a monthly gift, you become an ACLJ champion.

And we had almost 100 ACLJ champions yesterday. We also had a number of people that made one-time large gifts. But whatever the gift is, $10,000 or $5, you're supporting our work and you're going to the Supreme Court with us.

Yeah, absolutely. So if you're considering making that larger year end gift, this is the time to do it at ACLJ.org. And again, that will be doubled. Up to a million dollars will be doubled. You can make that large year end gift, or you can decide, hey, I'm comfortable donating $50 a month to the ACLJ. And become a recurring donor, you become an ACLJ champion. But we need you to donate now as we represent you before the U.S. Supreme Court to make sure you get to vote for who you want to. That's ACLJ.org.

Welcome back to Secula. We are taking your calls to 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110. There's a lot to talk about, of course, with these cases that we're going to be working on up through, Deb. Because what we're seeing now, when we talk about that avalanche of cases, and again, we'll get to your calls in just a moment, 1-800-684-3110. We see in the news today, I mean, the article now, the next article after Colorado Business Insiders, now eyes are on Michigan. Could it be the next state to remove President Trump from the ballot? Or again, because it's at the Michigan Supreme Court there. And when I looked at it, I said, well, let's see what we're doing. We won on appeal in Michigan.

It is there. That's where we also represent an additional 14 states. Yeah, GOPs.

Yeah, state GOPs. So, look, it is an avalanche of cases. It's going to be determined by the Supreme Court.

I cannot see a circumstance upon which they don't grant review here. So that work is going on as we speak. Let's go right to the phones. We're taking your calls. 1-800-684-3110. Bill's calling from California on Line 1. Bill, go ahead.

You're on the air. Ah, yes. If Trump had been convicted of insurrection, would he still be a valid candidate for President? Because as President, he was not an officer of the U.S. So I think that, look, I think that that's the second argument in this is that the President is not an officer. And I actually read a law review article last night that I think really lays that out.

And that is one of the questions that's going to go to the Supreme Court. And that is, does the President constitute under the term officer under the Constitution, which is where the 14th Amendment Section 3 talks about insurrection disqualification? So I think he's not an officer. So I don't think that would be the disqualifier. I do not believe that is the case. Look, this should be a decision made by the electorate, not by a court or a secretary of state or a director of election supervisions. But you ask a great question, Bill, and the answer is no, he's not an officer. Yeah, and I think, again, when you go to the next question, the treason one, I think that someone convicted of treason, unlikely that they would be a leading GOP candidate in any party.

Would that be another question? Unless it was some, you know, Jack Smith treason claim. Right, but we haven't seen an insurrection claim. I want to make sure people get that, right?

No. There is no lawsuit now out there accusing President Trump of insurrection. So he can't be found guilty of that because no case is trying it. Well, and the one case, the one count that is the serious count in the Jack Smith claim is the whole claim on interfering with an official act of Congress. And the Supreme Court has taken review already on that case, and here's what's interesting.

That was not brought by Donald Trump. That was brought by one of the January 6th protesters saying, hey, look, I was just engaged in free speech activities and got kind of lumped into this whole thing. And the Supreme Court said, we're taking the case, and that's because Judge Castas at the D.C. Court of Appeals said the way they're interpreting the 1283, the code section, the criminal code section, it encompassed free speech. And that violates the Overbreath Doctrine, by the way, the Overbreath Doctrine coming to full life again in 1987 in a case I argued at the Supreme Court, Board of Airport Commissioners v. Jews for Jesus.

So these cases come right back around again. Let's go to Diane, who's calling from Nevada on Line 2. We are taking your calls at 800-684-3110. Go ahead, Diane. Hey, Jay, thanks for taking my call. I was listening to you speak to the lady earlier about the Virginia victory.

Yes. And I'm wondering if there's something you can tell us, those that want to be more proactive, like those people in Virginia, who we would contact in order to prosecute or to penalize people who interfere like this by bringing these charges, you know, and try to interfere with these elections. Because maybe if people were a little more proactive about that, along with I'm one of your champions.

I mean, Elgin was very proactive. She was our co-counsel, and she's the chair of the GOP of West Virginia. But the only way you can respond to them is you're the defendant, because if somebody can say anything they want, we believe in free speech, but it was taking the legal action that gave us the ability to respond. Now, you do have some options, though, because in your state, like, for instance, these are secretaries of state in Colorado that wanted to have this power.

They argued, basically, tell me what I can do and I'll do it. So you get to vote for that secretary of state in Nevada. Remember, those positions are becoming more and more important. I mean, we remember from the last election, you probably didn't hear as much about secretary of states ever before until we had COVID voting, which was a whole mess. And with these secretaries of states trying to figure all these different things out for different states, and the rules were kind of thrown out the window about how you normally have to go vote because of COVID.

And it was a mess. So consider who your secretary of state is. And, of course, in different states, you get to end up voting on those Supreme Court justices. For instance, in Colorado, they're only on for two years, and then there's a retention vote. So you can say, well, after this, those four that said, you know, this was great, we can remove him without your vote, you can say, nope, you got to replace all four of them because they'll be on the ballot. But most people don't pay attention to those judicial elections long enough. So, again, I say voters have a huge say in this.

Start paying attention to who your secretary of state is, and especially if you have a voice in who your judges are. Yeah, let's go to Dennis calling from Arizona. Go ahead. You're on the air.

Hi, Jay. It would seem to me that the insurrection claim appears to be fraud on the court since Donald Trump actually wanted to call out the National Guard to stop any insurrection or... Yeah, well, here's what's so interesting about this. You know, Jack Smith didn't charge him with insurrection, and he didn't, believe me, this is a guy that likes to overcharge, so if he thought he could charge him with insurrection, believe me, he would have done it.

He did not. And then in Colorado, there was a state court judge, Dennis, that decided this was insurrection. I mean, this is absurd, an insurrection with no standard. So, no, it's nonsense. But now, look, folks, how many of these cases pending?

15 of these? And they're looking at California and Maine coming to it? This is the most serious threat on our election, our right to vote in U.S. history. And that's why we've said this is the biggest election case we have ever had at the ACLJ, but frankly, it's the biggest election case in Supreme Court history.

And I'm not exaggerating here. This is an historic attack on our democracy and our right to vote. And again, whether you're for Trump, against Trump, you can't have these individuals deciding who you get to vote for. So the Colorado Supreme Court abused the 14th Amendment by banning Trump from the ballot.

Now other states are piling on, trying to take advantage of this and take away your right to vote for the candidate of your choice. We're seeing an avalanche of cases. So we've said this is now a judicial emergency. We are working through Christmas, we're going to be at the Supreme Court of the United States on this next week.

That's how big this case is. We're filing in days. We need you to stand with us. When you stand with us and support the work of the ACLJ, you are sending us to the Supreme Court of the United States. So your financial support, literally you are going with us to the Supreme Court. And I don't say this lightly, this is the most important case we've ever taken because if we lose our right to vote, we lose our constitutional republic. So join us in defense of this constitutional republic we cherish. Have your gift doubled today at ACLJ.org.

I'm going to ask you to give as generously as you can. We have glimmers of hope here, folks. We won the West Virginia case. We got that decision last night.

So there's good news happening. You can report to duty with us at the Supreme Court to defend your right to vote. And I said these are the most important nine days of our year. This is when we determine our budget.

And look, folks, this Supreme Court case at the end was not in our budget nor was the situation in Israel. We got a team still working on that. We urgently need your tax-deductible support for the work of the ACLJ. Join the fight. Have your gift doubled.

Go to ACLJ.org. And if you're able to make a monthly gift, you become an ACLJ champion and your gift will still be doubled. Folks, this is the time to do it.

And there's two ways we're asking you. Either make that large year-end contribution. And again, large is up to you and where you are right now. If you want to do it that way and make a one-time donation, that will be matched dollar for dollar up to a million dollars. And for those of you out there who kind of budget for next year, you can say, you know what, I could donate $35 to the ACLJ every month. So I'm going to become a recurring donor. You're an ACLJ champion.

You check that box. And this month, that $35 will be matched dollar for dollar. Either way, your bigger donation year-end or become a recurring ACLJ champion today.

ACLJ.org. Keeping you informed and engaged. Now more than ever, this is Sekulow. And now your host, Jordan Sekulow. All right, welcome back to Sekulow.

We are taking your calls at 1-800-684-3110, but we do want to kind of again set up if you're just joining us. You heard halfway through the broadcast. ACLJ has been battling in courts across the country. Just to give you a list, in Colorado, in Michigan, in West Virginia, in Minnesota, Oklahoma, Virginia, Wyoming, Kansas, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Delaware, Georgia, Nebraska, Maine, Idaho, Rhode Island, and Ohio. And we've had victories in West Virginia last night, Minnesota, and Oklahoma. We have a victory that's on appeal right now to the Michigan Supreme Court and a big one, which we all were waiting for. We won at the lower court in Colorado unexpectedly, actually, because we knew that these were all Democrat appointees in their state court system. We did not win at the Supreme Court of Colorado, which we expected, but it took much longer.

It was a much closer decision than anyone expected. And now we're ready to be at the Supreme Court in less than a week. We are going to be filing at the Supreme Court of the United States for you. I mean, it's technically for the Colorado GOP, the party, but the fact of the matter is it affects all of our right to vote. So you are sending us at ACLJ.org.

If you support the work of the ACLJ, you are sending us to the Supreme Court. We are taking your phone calls at 800-684-3110. Bruce is calling from Colorado. Bruce, go ahead. You're on the air.

Hi, Jay. Thanks so much for fighting to protect our ability to get our own candidates on the ballot. My question is, you know, after the midterm elections, I heard so much of the Democrats saying they wanted to, that democracy was on the ballot and, you know, that people need to get out and vote. Well, I'm wondering how many of these organizations like the ACLU and others that tend to be more left to supporting, are they outraged by this and also fighting to keep democracy on the ballot like they said? Of course not. Of course not. Not a peep from the ACLU, especially regarding the freedom of association, right, of the Colorado GOP to pick up the candidates of their choice, the voters' choice. And in your particular state, with the lawsuit, and this is why this one's moving so aggressively, was by CREW, which is, you know, an organization that this is kind of their thing, but they are definitely in the liberal block. I mean, don't make any mistake about that.

So that's where they are. Should we try to get another call in? Can you think we could do it?

Yeah. Let's go to Ann. Hey, Ann.

I called in from Pennsylvania on Line 2. Welcome to Secular. Oh, hi, Jay. Merry Christmas to you and your family. Yes, you too. You are amazing. I'm going to become a member again.

I was in the 90s when I homeschooled my kids, and you did so much for me. I just want you to know how grateful I am for the ACLJ. You're the antithesis of the American Center, the ACLU, rather, right? Yes. You guys are amazing. As far as Colorado is concerned, wow. Wow.

Okay. The wow is we've got to get there in five days, so we are moving at lightning speed here. We're on warp factor five. I mean, this is, we've got teams working on this.

I was texting most of, until late in the evening. We got, in fact, the joint appendix, what's called the petition appendix. Here's what it looks like. This is what will be fine.

This is in a different case, but this is what it looks like. So I'm holding my hands for a radio audience. I know a lot of you are in your car today. The petition for certiorari. When you add the appendix to it, these are about 150 pages printed. So look, I'm going to tell you something right now. You're supporting the work of the ACLJ.

The printing of these alone is thousands of dollars. So continue to support our work. You are literally sending us to the Supreme Court of the United States on the most important election case, not just in the ACLJ's history. In my view, in the Supreme Court history. And we are defending the constitutional right to vote for the candidate of your choice without election interference. Talk about election interference.

They talked about that in the last campaign. Was there election interference? Well, let me tell you what election interference is. A board of supervisors, board of elections, secretary of state saying, oh, this otherwise qualified candidate, we're just not going to put him on the ballot.

That's election interference. So support our work. Any amount you donate, it's going to be doubled in our faith and freedom drive. And it is specifically for the Supreme Court work here. ACLJ.org. And if you can make it a monthly gift, you become an ACLJ champion.

I need to say this is the end of the year. So some of you are making larger gifts. We got a lot of those in yesterday.

Those are doubled, folks. So if you get a four to five thousand dollar donation, that's effectively ten thousand dollars for the ACLJ. So ACLJ.org. We appreciate that. We'll be taking more calls when we come back at 1-800-684-3110. We're joined by our colleague, former secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, senior counsel for the ACLJ. Mike, we have seen, you know, this is not the first time I've been through this rodeo of at the end of the year, I got a Supreme Court emergency on my hands.

It seems like at least once a decade you have these. I use this when I talk to law students and say, hey, you know, when you practice law, you never know what's going to happen, including your Christmas plans may get modified. Happy holidays.

Happy holidays and a Merry Christmas. So you've got these blue states that are trying to keep Trump off the ballot. Now you've got the Colorado Supreme Court with this unbelievably distorted view of not only the 14th Amendment Section 3 and who constitutes an officer, but also pure violation of the freedom of association rights. We represent the Colorado GOP in this case and now at the Supreme Court. Their right to put up the candidates of their choice. And I say this is the most fundamental attack on our right to vote. Jay, I think that's precisely right.

I have not seen this. I practiced law for a bit. I've followed our political process.

I've read the history. I'm not sure I've seen anything where a group of unelected officials decided they were going to set who or couldn't be on the ballot. There's zero due process, no recognition of First Amendment and free association freedoms, essentially adjudicating a complex issue about who can be on a ballot in a way that is so deeply undemocratic has never been has never been accomplished in America. I'm confident the Supreme Court will get this right.

The good work of the ACLU will increase the likelihood that my hopes are realized. But this is a dangerous time because this will this will unleash real dangerous things across America. We will undermine our central institutions. Forget who the particular people are.

We will undermine these central institutions in ways that will be incredibly difficult for our republic to get back. You know, Secretary Pompeo, we are seeing this kind of move now because we talked about this when this first came out that morning. And now we're seeing other states. So California is they've got their secretary of state, lieutenant governor, actually going to their secretary of state. We were seeing the Michigan Supreme Court. We won at the lower court in Michigan. We represent a host of about 15 states there in Amicus.

We did intervene in that case like we didn't win out of West Virginia yesterday. But now they're looking at possibly hearing this very quickly, too. It's like, well, since Colorado took that step, maybe a few other left leaning courts are willing to try and do it while it's before the Supreme Court. Because I think the left's thinking is if it's just Colorado, that may be kind of lonely looking when every other state dismissed this or lost at the lower court. So we do have to worry about this barrage right now of of left leaning courts all saying, you know what, now suddenly they want to weigh in quickly.

Jordan, that makes sense to me why they'd want that, certainly the lonely factor. The others will have different fact patterns, too. I suspect that they'll identify and try and differentiate to create some level of doubt.

We've seen this. You would hope that this would be decided purely on the law. We've always seen that there is a deep element of politics in some of these state courts.

It saddens me greatly. There is literally no logic to a state court being able to make a decision about who and who can and who cannot run for President of the United States, appear on a primary ballot that is the really the jurisdiction of the political parties themselves make those decisions in a way that is so deeply undemocratic, as we've seen in Colorado. And the fact that other states now are trying to pile on doesn't surprise me at all. Frankly, it won't see won't surprise me if you start to see Republican governors at least talking about, well, goodness, who can President Biden be on the ballot?

This will unleash real dangers. And we ought to try and get this back in the box as quickly as we can. Well, we're doing that. And that's why we're you know, this is this case is on our it's under an expedited situation in this context, Mike. The Colorado court said if you file by January 4th, then and as long as it's pending at the Supreme Court, the candidate gets to stay on the ballot.

Now, you know, I've done Supreme Court for 40 years. So I told our team that's great that they're giving it to January 4th. How about December 27th would be better. Get this because I want to get this thing started because my concern is the court could expedite review. I mean, that's going to be up to them.

They could expedite review and and nip this in the bud, because if you don't, it's exactly what you said. This is going to start spreading. And then other like you said, Republican governors may say, well, they did it to him.

I'm going to do it to them. And then we've got a unmitigated disaster in our electoral system in the United States. Your work, the work of the ACLU will increase the likelihood that the Supreme Court picks this up more quickly.

The nip it in the bud is probably the best description. This needs this notion needs to be put to rest immediately, both as a legal matter and as a political matter. We need to convey to the entire world that we don't roll this way. It's not how America behaves. We let voters go to the polls. They make their call. They vote. That's who gets to be President United States that who gets to be our governors, the city council people. We've never scratched candidates from the court because of their political views or their judgments. That's how third world countries operate, not ours. I hope the U.S. Supreme Court will see the urgency of this, see the importance of it, see the merits of what it is the ACLU presents to them, and then protect our Republican the way the Supreme Court must it must always do.

It is its institutional role. I see. You know, I never take it for granted because I always go into a case. People were calling me saying, are you going to win this nine zero? I said, I'm assuming I'm behind.

That's how I assume I'm behind. I've got to get some votes here. I want to switch gears. China has reportedly and you look, you've dealt with Chairman G. So you know better than anyone has reportedly told President Biden directly that they're going to take back Taiwan. They said they want to do it peacefully.

But if they have to, they'll do it by force. Are we about to see another? I hate even saying this with what's going on in the Middle East. And we got them want to talk to you about the Houthis and Gaza.

Are we looking at another another frontier, do you think, realistically soon? Boy, I hope not. I've often thought that Xi Jinping was blustering. But when he says that as directly as it sounds like he said it to President Biden, he would have never done that to our team, to President Trump. He would have he would have hedged. He would have he would have said something about, well, there's time. It sounds like he was challenging, threatening, testing President Biden.

And what we've seen, if anything, in these three years is when President Biden is tested, he often backs down. Think I think about a minor invasion into Ukraine might be OK. Think about the debacle in Afghanistan. Now what's happened in Israel? And instead of spending time making sure we're focused on helping Israel eliminate Hamas, we send senior leaders to tell the Israelis, hey, you know, you have to back down, slow down. There will be a limit to the support that we can provide. I'm guessing that Xi Jinping sees that as well and may well see an opportunity to do something, whether that's a blockade of an island or threatening the Taiwanese.

They have an election coming up this spring. American weakness on the global stage. Jay, you know this.

It always creates a risk for the American people. No, I appreciate your insights and appreciate that you're part of our team here at the ACL. Jane, and to you and your entire family, have a merry Christmas and joyous New Year. Bless blessings to y'all and to your audience. Everyone have a Merry Christmas. Thank you, Secretary Pompeo.

You know, folks, again, I want you just to understand, I think it's very important as well. This again, this year in drive that we've been talking about, we have not seen, I think, an election case like this ever before. It's the biggest in our history because this is not post-election. This is who you get to decide. Who you can vote for. Judges telling you who you can't vote for. You can't even write them in. You write them in, they toss your vote.

You don't get to like come back and correct it. No, they toss your vote in the primary. And this time it's a bunch of liberals and Republican rhinos in Washington, D.C. We talked about that yesterday. We put the whole cabal together who don't want Donald Trump on the ballot. And you know who they want one on the ballot in four years from now?

The other grassroots Republican conservative candidate who doesn't come out of Washington that they don't own. Okay, so they're going to do this over and over and over again if we don't fight this right now. So we are literally protecting your right to vote preemptively so that you can decide who or who not to vote for.

But they, judges and the left and the right cabal that's joined the left here, they're not going to decide for you. We're not going to let that happen. Now, were we ready? Did we see this coming down the road as something dead?

Absolutely not. We didn't see this case six months from now. But now it's because it seems so absurd. But we knew there are a lot of absurd courts out in America. There are.

You see a lot of wild opinions. And we got one out of Colorado barely, barely for three heading to the U.S. Supreme Court, Dad. And we have to work not only through the holiday, but we have got to add members to our team just like we were adding members to our team when this started a couple months ago. And just like we were adding members on our team as the war began in Israel. So this is why right now it's a very critical time for us at the ACLJ.

Jordan said it. This is an historic attack on our democracy. We're in our faith and freedom drive and we're in the last nine days of the month. Folks, this is when we make our budget.

And look, we are bringing in additional team members. You have to in cases like this. We urgently need your tax deductible support. We are in a judicial emergency. This is not the only case of the Supreme Court. You've got this case. You've got the case on the January 6th protests and the whole issue of what constitutes interference with Congress. And then you have on top of that, you've got an abortion case up there.

I mean, it's just and then we've got all the international legal work we're working on on the Israel front. So what we're going to ask you to do right now is support the work of the American Center for Law and Justice at ACLJ.org. Any amount you donate, we're getting a matching gift for.

And what that means is it's doubled. Your gift to us is doubled. If you can make it a monthly gift and about 100 of you did yesterday, you become an ACLJ champion for life, liberty and freedom. And that really allows us to kind of plan for these kind of incidents.

So I want to encourage you, whether it's a one time gift of $10 or a one time gift of $10,000, whatever it is, you will be matched. And then if you can give monthly, you become an ACLJ champion. And that takes cases from the Supreme Court of the United States or to Pennsylvania, where at a senior living center, Christmas decorations can now be placed on the door of a senior center because of the work of the ACLJ. So again, go to ACLJ.org to support our work. When we come back from the break, we're going to take your calls at 1-800-684-3110. If you're on the line, hang on. We're going to get right to you in just a moment.

Again, ACLJ.org for our faith and freedom drive. Welcome back to Secchia. We're going to take your calls. Thanks for holding on folks at 1-800-684-3110. That's 1-800-684-3110. Let's go to Michael in New Hampshire on line four because Michael, as you know, you're in a state. You're actually the first primary at the Iowa caucuses and then the first primary in New Hampshire. So you don't have a lack of candidates visiting right now. But I wanted to have you on the and appreciate you holding on to talk to us. Sure.

Good afternoon, gentlemen. I just want to reiterate, I'm an expert in this area of lawfare and hybrid warfare. And everything I'm seeing is more is really coming in line with what the Chinese Communist Party does with their three warfare doctrine. In other words, they use legal, psychological media to gain a political end. And it absolutely shocks me to see that, you know, the left and the political activists in the country using these exact same doctrine to basically undermine the U.S. Constitution. No, you're right.

Because the and the psychological impact of it is this. I've said this. If you're a candidate and you're going to vote and let's say you are voting for Trump and then you're saying, well, gee, he may not be on the ballot, though.

This is maybe I need to vote for somebody else, because what if he's not? You know, what if they what if the Supreme Court upholds the Colorado Supreme Court and says, yeah, he could be removed? So you're talking about, like you said, it's it's psychological and the media and they're all on it. So what we have to do is get to the Supreme Court quickly.

And that's exactly what we're doing at the American Center for Law and Justice. So we're moving very quickly. Linda's calling from Maine on line six. Go ahead, Linda.

You're on the air. Yes. I'm just puzzled that the opposition have bogus cases. There's no evidence. They're in violation of the state laws in interference with elections. When they lose their cases, do you get your expenses back? Now, people do ask this all the time.

Yeah. I mean, there are there are cases where you get an award of attorney's fees, usually when you're the plaintiff and you're suing the government for a violation of someone's First Amendment rights and you can claim for attorney's fees. But when you're defending a case like this, no, you if we win, you get what's called court costs, which would be about one hundred twenty dollars filing fees and things like that, but not the legal fees. It's look, you do a Supreme Court case. Anybody will tell you a Supreme Court case is a seven figure investment. You got to go to a law firm to get a Supreme Court team like ours.

You'd be spending millions of dollars. The Colorado GOP is spending nothing because of our support of our donors at aclj.org. That's how we're able to do this. So we appreciate you calling in.

I'm glad we can have some. Bessie's calling from Texas. Bessie's listening on watching on Facebook. Go ahead, Bessie. You're on the air.

Yes. I'm a small monthly donor for several years. And this is why I support you, Jay.

Thank you. I'm very pro-Israel. My pastoring congregation is pro-Israel.

God has not changed his mind. Israel is still the apple of his eye. Every issue that's important to you is important to me. I love that you explain the law according to the Constitution because I learn things and that you fight for everybody.

The big guy and the little guy. You know, I say that the President's lawyers also represent the folks in Pennsylvania that needed their Christmas decorations on their door in their senior center, which we were able to get resolved. And the same lawyers that did that represented Presidents of the United States. Yeah, I mean, it kind of underscores Bessie. I appreciate you for being an ACLJ champion, a monthly donor to ACLJ.

And what that means, a recurring donor. And you can do that right now at ACLJ.org. But we didn't even get to you.

I mean, in Pennsylvania, we talked about this case, the situation. We were contacted by someone who was in the who lived in the center and the senior center said this year, you can decorate your door unless it's religious. And they did it right before Hanukkah. Or maybe it was right before Hanukkah. And of course, during the Christmas holidays.

And never done this before. So thankfully, someone who lived at that center gave the ACLJ, went online to ACLJ.org slash help. And we went to work.

And we went to work. And we can now announce today that senior center has said they've chosen to change their position after our letter went out. They don't want to go to court with the ACLJ on this. Which is a good thing because we're glad that those seniors can put up their holiday and Christmas decorations. Or if they had those Hanukkah decorations.

And they will be in the future as well. Cassie's calling on Line 1 from Indiana. Go ahead, Cassie. You're on the air.

Merry Christmas. I have listened to you guys forever. I am a champion contributor. Great. But this is absolutely making me furious. To the point that first off, I will be glad to come work for you guys because I am so angry at this country.

I can't see straight. Well, I understand your anger. But go ahead. We're staying focused on getting this thing reversed at the Supreme Court. But you go ahead. But the thing is, heaven forbid, they don't.

Yeah. What can we the people do to right the ship here? This is ridiculous.

Why am I being denied my right to vote for Trump? Look, if the court were to affirm what Colorado did, I'm telling you what you will see. You will see an avalanche of states do the same thing.

Jordan, don't you think? Yeah, I mean, I think every blue state, so that it would be impossible for Donald Trump to maybe win the primary, maybe. Because people will start having second thoughts, though. There will be issues about that because of Cox's, too.

But the general is where they'll kick him off. Yes. And then so he will not be able to put enough electoral votes together to win.

Yeah. And I think that's why this Supreme Court decision, when you really think about what they'd be deciding, it's not about Colorado. It's about every single state.

And it's about, does the Supreme Court want to be known as the court that picks and chooses who gets to run for President? No, I think that's why they're going to over, I think we could win this unanimously. But we got a lot of work to do to get that done. We got to first get them, let me tell you something.

Everybody's talking about what's going to happen when they hear it. You know what the first thing we need to do? Is get them to hear it. So the petition, this is what I want. I want this phone call from the court. The petition for writ of certiorari is granted.

Or they now post it online. So I want, the petition has been granted. Here are the questions we're going to hear. Let's go to Cindy in Pennsylvania. Cindy, go ahead.

Hi, yes. So if they can do this to block Trump, can they, can somebody block Biden from being on the ballot with all the stuff that's going on that he's up to? And here's my answer. I hope not because I think that's ridiculous. Again, it's ridiculous. If the party nominates Joe Biden, which apparently they are, and he wins if there was, you know, if they have the ballots and then they'll have their, they'll still have a primary.

He, he should be the nominee if that's who it is. I don't think that, I don't think because they do it to one, they should do it to the other. They shouldn't do it to either. And that's why we're going to fight as hard as we can to get this wrong corrected at the last venue to get it corrected, which in this case is the Supreme Court of the United States.

She's right. If this becomes the norm, that is what will happen. So red states are going to take out the leading candidates who pose the biggest threat to Republicans and blue states are going to take out the leading candidates who pose the biggest threat to Democrats. And so the strongest candidates are going to keep, keep, keep getting pushed out by secretaries of state, especially candidates on either side of the aisle who don't walk some major party line. So who aren't always good for business for, you know, the insiders in DC, Republican and Democrat.

They'll never get through because they will use their political friends to keep them out. All right, folks, look, this is the most significant Supreme Court case we've ever had and it affects your right to vote. So I can't get any more fundamental than this. We're going to ask you to do one of three things. First of all, pray for our teams as we get this ready because the first order of businesses get the Supreme Court to hear the case.

That's number one. Number two, support the work of the American Center for Law and Justice with your donations. Any amount you donate, it's going to be matched in our faith and freedom year-end drive. If it's a $5 gift or if it's a $5,000 gift, it's going to be matched. So that's important.

If you can donate monthly going forward, that's great. You become an ACLJ champion and you're a champion for life, liberty and freedom. But right now we need to focus on getting this case heard to the Supreme Court by supporting our work at ACLJ.org. You are going to the Supreme Court with us. You are sending us to the Supreme Court. It is no accident that our offices in Washington, D.C., where I was this week, are across the street from the Supreme Court. I knew that 40 years ago.

And it is true today. ACLJ.org. Any amount you donate is tax deductible. And for those of you that have been making large year-end gifts, we appreciate it. And those of you who are donating $5, we appreciate that too. ACLJ.org.