Allen Jackson NOW

Allen Jackson: Good evening and welcome to Nashville. I'm Allen Jackson. Over the past several days, three major headlines have captured the world's attention. At first glance, they seemed unrelated, but taken together, they point to a much larger question confronting America and much of the Western world. What happens when nations fail to defend their sovereignty?

President Trump revealed that the United States was prepared to launch what he described as the largest military strike since World War II against Iran. Before Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and even Iran itself urged the administration to give diplomacy one more opportunity. That moment didn't emerge in a vacuum. For more than four decades, Iran has declared America its enemy while funding and directing terrorist proxies across the Middle East, orchestrating attacks that have killed and wounded American service members and targeted U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria.

At nearly the same time, Europe was confronting a very different crisis, one that serves as a cautionary tale for every Western nation. An estimated 50,000 to 60,000 migrants, almost all of them men, surged into Spain's Northern African city of Ceuta in a matter of hours. They overwhelmed a city with a little over 80,000 residents. The result was chaos and renewed concerns about public safety.

For Americans, those images were all too familiar. During the Biden administration, millions of migrants crossed the southern border illegally, often overwhelming communities and stretching law enforcement resources. Meanwhile, Congress continues debating the Save America Act and broader questions surrounding election integrity. At their core, these stories are all about sovereignty.

Can a nation preserve its freedom if it cannot secure its borders? Can law-abiding citizens maintain confidence in their elections if they know that one fraudulent vote made by a non-citizen cancels the influence of their own vote? God is moving in the earth, and here is one item that as a nation we should be grateful about: our borders today are secure. That's good news. The previous administration merely said our border was secure. Under our current administration, our border has been secured and the invasion of illegal individuals into our country has ended.

But what we saw take place in Ceuta is just another reminder that elections have consequences. Prime Minister Sanchez of Spain, who comes from the Socialist Workers' Party, signaled a softer approach to illegal immigration upon taking office. This episode in Ceuta shows how rapidly a border can be overwhelmed when enforcement is perceived as weak. If these individuals had been successful in overwhelming Ceuta, they could have gained access to all of Europe because the visa rules allow them to go anywhere.

Here's another item of concern: 60,000 people don't converge on one border in a matter of hours by accident. Someone coordinated that. It was intentional. Spanish officials say thousands of men remain unaccounted for. Think about it for a moment. It only takes a handful of people with a nefarious agenda to carry out all types of destructive evil. And now thousands could eventually have access into Europe.

A nation that won't defend its borders eventually struggles to defend its values. Sovereignty is about more than just geography. It's about protecting the principles that hold a country together. We are seeing this scenario play out in South Korea as well. Chinese citizens no longer need a visa, and South Korea is letting themselves be overrun by communists. 36,000 Americans died in the Korean conflict to establish the 38th parallel as a boundary between democracy and communism. Now, because of sloppy immigration policies, communists are invading what tens of thousands of American and Korean lives were sacrificed to protect.

Back in 2015, we saw another mass influx take place when, during the Syrian Civil War, 1.2 million Syrians poured into Europe through Turkey. They were instantly given European Union visas, and it instantly changed the landscape of European nations. Public policy, culture, social norms, they've all been dramatically affected. I think it's safe to say that there is a pattern underway of changing democracies throughout the world. This is not an accident.

And why is it a one-way street? China is not allowing freedom-loving people to flood China with pro-democracy organizers. They're not allowing Christian missionaries. Russia is not inviting us to flood Russia with Christian missionaries and pro-democracy organizers. Neither are Cuba, Venezuela, Nigeria, or the Islamic nations in the Middle East. There is a global strategy underway. Christians in the West should wake up and pay attention.

Here in America, we had an open border for more than a decade, and we have major voices in America saying that we should defund our immigration authorities. They called them immoral and fascist. We've tolerated some things that I don't believe should be tolerated. It's easy for us as Christians to be tempted to willfully not notice. I'm thankful for the current administration's efforts to correct some wrongs, but all progress can be undone in just a couple of elections. Lasting change begins with us. We cannot abandon the places we live to destructive influences. As Christ-followers, we can't be silent and stay out of the public square. We must take our place in the arena, speak truth, and not worry about the pushback. In a moment, we'll be joined by U.S. Senator Bill Hagerty. He represents my home state, Tennessee.

Tonight we're joined by U.S. Senator from Tennessee, Bill Hagerty. Welcome to the show, Senator.

Bill Hagerty: Thank you. Appreciate being on with you.

Allen Jackson: Over the weekend, President Trump canceled joint strikes on Iran after announcing that they've reached a rough framework of a peace deal with Tehran. He went on to confirm that Iran has agreed to an immediate, complete, and total opening of the Strait of Hormuz. It seems like we have heard all of this before. Do you think this time maybe it's a keeper?

Bill Hagerty: Well, we certainly have heard it before, but I'll say every time that they've violated their word, which seems to be a fairly consistent proposition with the Iranian regime, every time they violated their word, President Trump has inflicted unmitigated pain. I think what they're seeing is that—they meaning the Iranian regime is understanding, I hope, more clearly—that if diplomacy fails, the military alternative is going to be very, very harsh.

The other thing to keep in mind is that as we continue in this environment, their capacity to do anything is significantly degraded. This is far different from the day when they were dealing with Barack Obama. There, you had a team led by John Kerry that was willing to do anything to get a deal on the table, yet at the same time imposed zero pressure on the Iranian regime. In fact, what they did was they paid them, they bribed them to sign off on a piece of paper that turned out to be not even worth the document it was signed off on.

The Iranian regime never stopped their program of nuclear enrichment. They never gave up their ambitions and instead took the billions of dollars received from Obama and used that to foment terror throughout the region. Today, what you have are our allies in the region, instead of hating the deal that they did under Obama—all of the Middle East allies hated the JCPOA—today, they're very supportive of what we're trying to do.

In fact, Saudi Arabia and other allies are even joining us in strikes against the regime as they try to wreak terror throughout the region. So we see a fundamentally different terrain politically in the area. Certainly, militarily and from a capacity standpoint, the Iranian military capacity is dramatically diminished. And their economy—this gets too little attention I think—the economy, given the sanctions pressure that we've put on the Iranian regime and the blockade that we've put on imports and exports from their market, their economy is in a very desperate situation. So if there ever were a time when the Iranian regime should be listening, they should step up and step away from their violence and their unbelievable terrorist activity. I think now is the time.

Allen Jackson: You mentioned Saudi Arabia. They pulled together a coalition in response to the Houthis threatening some shipping in the Red Sea. It certainly seems that this administration has brought a whole new tone of cooperation to the Middle East.

Bill Hagerty: That certainly is the case. And what I hope to see are the Saudis and others join the historic Abraham Accords. President Trump should have received a Nobel Prize for this in the first administration when they brought several Middle Eastern countries into this accord to create more peace and prosperity in the region. Now, I think Saudi Arabia and others are at the precipice of also joining.

As the Iranians look around, they're becoming increasingly isolated as long as they continue this sort of activity. Again, I'm not talking about the Iranian people, but I'm talking about the regime in control. Again, further and further isolated. This is the environment where they need to say we've got to change our ways, and it's going to have to happen soon.

Dealing with those in control of the regime is really an expression of compassion for the Iranian people. 90 million people, I think, have suffered greatly under this regime. I hope what President Trump and our negotiating team are able to convey to them is the fact that prosperity is possible. And again, as they see economic prosperity break out across the region, more countries engaging with us, more countries finding ways to work positively in a creative manner with Israel, I think that it's going to demonstrate even more that the people of Iran will be much better off coming into the norm, behaving like a normal nation, and to distance themselves as far as they possibly can from the behavior of this unbelievably terrorist regime.

Allen Jackson: Senator Mike Lee recently had some comments about the Save America Act. Listen to his comments, and then I've got a question.

Mike Lee: There is not a legitimate argument against the Senate passing the Save America Act. No, not even one. The arguments that you'll hear against it over and over and over again are based entirely on contrivance, on pretext, on false statements, and false assumptions.

Allen Jackson: 80% of Americans want the Save America Act to be passed. Do you think it has an opportunity?

Bill Hagerty: We're right now going through a process to budgetize the Save America Act so we can vote on it in a process that requires 50 votes rather than the normal 60 votes in the Senate. What Senator Lee didn't say, and I agree with everything that he did say, but what he didn't say is what is the true motive behind the Democrats' resistance to this?

Why are they continually blocking us from being able to move forward on this? And again, I'll remind you every single Democrat has voted against this, even though the vast majority of Democrats want to see election integrity in America. The reason they're doing it, the motive for doing this, is because they want more illegal people to enter our country. You've seen their behavior. You've seen their votes on collapsing our border, doing away with ICE, doing away with any sort of border security.

They want more illegal people into our country and they want them in a position to vote. Certainly, they want to count them for the purpose of allocating electoral votes and congressional districts. That's already happening today. If you look at states like California that have a large number of illegals, they have multiple congressional seats that they otherwise wouldn't have were it not for the fact that these illegals are residing in California and being counted for the purpose of allocating these congressional seats and electoral votes. That needs to come to an end.

Stopping this electoral challenge here removes the motive for all of the illegal immigration that we've seen. That's what the Democrats did when Joe Biden collapsed our southern border. They did this in a very intentional fashion to bring these people across the border illegally. They created and erected sanctuary cities in blue states like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York.

Think about what they're doing. They're concentrating, by creating these magnets, they're concentrating the illegal population in areas where they're otherwise losing population. They're doing this to retain power. They're doing this to retain congressional districts. They're doing this to gain electoral votes, and they would be more than happy if they're allowed to vote all the way. Look at DC, a place where I have to come every single week. Here in DC, they allow illegals to vote in the local elections, and they can't and they won't ask for ID.

Who's to stop these illegals from voting in the local elections to just continue right down the ballot voting in federal elections as well? With no reforms, that's exactly what you're going to see happening. This is the motivation behind the Democrats' actions. This is why they're voting against their own party because those Democrats who are here in Washington, who are in a position of power, want to stay in power at any cost, even if it goes with doing away with election integrity here in America. They're willing to sacrifice that.

Allen Jackson: Senator, we need to take a short break. I hope you'll stay with us for another segment. And those of you watching, if you have a phone at hand, try logging on to ajnow.com. Send me an email. We would love to hear your thoughts on this topic. I'll be right back.

We're back now with Senator Bill Hagerty. Senator, I'm sure you're aware it's an election week in Tennessee, but across the nation, the democratic socialist candidates continue to gain momentum, even as their platform to dismantle the U.S. government as we have known it is made public. What's the talk in Washington about this? It certainly seems like a threat to me.

Bill Hagerty: Well, I think it's an opportunity for the American public to wake up and see clearly what's been driving the Democrat Party. I think we've been very fortunate in our state to have strong conservative leadership. I'm on the ballot this week as well, Allen, so thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak directly to the people of Tennessee, of course, and thank them and ask for their vote.

But if you think about it broadly across the nation, I think what we're seeing is the Democrat Socialist Party, as they call themselves, basically communist, are moving the whole Democrat Party in a direction that I find quite shocking. It looks to me as though today, the Democrat Party is being dominated by AOC in the House of Representatives, by Bernie Sanders here in the Senate, an avowed socialist, and Zo-ran Mam-dami in New York, who is endorsing candidates and seeing them get elected in primary after primary.

We're going to watch carefully tonight to see what happens with the Michigan primary. I'm very curious to see whether they'll put Al-Sayed, again, it looks to me an avowed socialist, an avowed communist, onto the ballot to go again against a real patriot, Mike Rogers there. I think the American public need to see this contrast tonight.

I hope what may evolve, for example, just stay with Michigan, what might evolve there would be a real opportunity for the American public to see the policies that the Democrat Socialists are advocating for, that now seem to be the mainstream of the Democrat Party. That's in sharp contrast between those policies and what I'm certain Mike Rogers will advocate for when he talks about the integrity of our nation, accountability for the American people, sovereignty for our nation and for our states, solid borders, and low crime.

Mike was a former FBI agent. He understands law enforcement better than most. He understands the threats that we face as well because he was in the House on the Intelligence Committee and will make a great member of the Senate, again, standing up to the threats from overseas rather than embracing those threats, which seems to be the case of the Democrat Socialist Party and people like Mam-dami and Al-Sayed in Michigan, who want to say somehow it was America's fault 9/11 happened. Again, they want to cozy up to the regimes that hate us the most while at the same time disavowing what's made America great. It's going to be a sharp contrast. Frankly, I think it's good for the American people to see exactly what has happened to the Democrat Party and how far left they have gone.

Allen Jackson: Senator, you mentioned a moment ago the illegal immigration. Now, for those of us just average American citizens, if we engage in behavior that's illegal, we understand there's very likely consequences. We haven't seen that with immigration. We haven't seen it with sanctuary cities. And now we have these discussions in public again about behaviors where leading political figures such as yourself had your phones tapped. Have we committed to lawlessness to the point that there's no consequences no matter how egregious the behavior, and how do we correct this?

Bill Hagerty: Well, I think, Allen, we're seeing again a very sharp contrast. You mentioned having my phone tapped, my phone information all handed over to the Biden Department of Justice. It's amazing what they were willing to do: violate the Constitution, which is what they did in my case. There's a constitutional prohibition from the executive branch snooping on or in any way involving themselves in the legislative branch the way they did to me and the way they did to others of my colleagues.

The only thing that my colleagues and I had in common was that we're Republicans and we're also allies of President Trump. This was all part of the Biden administration's overarching goal to weaponize the Department of Justice, to use that as a means to take their number one opponent out, that was Donald Trump, and to try to create a free ride for Joe Biden to have a second term. It's amazing the depths that they were willing to plumb to do that, again, violating our Constitution.

What was shocking to me as well, Allen, is I've been a Verizon customer for decades. Verizon was asked for these records, so was AT&T. AT&T immediately said there's a constitutional prohibition against this, we can't do it. Verizon handed my records directly over to the Biden DOJ. I found out that, as that happened, Verizon had a huge $20 billion merger that was in the pipeline.

I want to ask some very basic questions: Did that merger, the desire to curry favor with the Biden DOJ so they could get their $20 billion deal done, is that why they were willing to violate my constitutional rights, the constitutional rights of a sitting U.S. Senator? If they're willing to violate my rights, what would they do to the rest of their customers, again, just to curry favor, just to get some sort of financial gain?

We don't know the answers, but their response, the response of Verizon, their CEO, and their chief legal officer has been essentially "talk to the hand." They hire a couple of Republican lawyers and think that's going to be the end of it. No way. Now Chuck Grassley, who chairs the Judiciary Committee, is on my side. We're going to press hard and get these guys hopefully hauled in front of Congress and get them on the record to explain what it was they were intending to do by collaborating in such a partisan manner to harm Republicans and, I presume, help the Democrat nominee Joe Biden at the time to perpetuate his illegal goals of weaponizing the DOJ and harming Republicans. I think this is something the American public ought to be awakened to as these woke corporations engage in this sort of partisan political activity. I think they need to be held accountable, and I'd like to get answers to these questions that I raised. We're going to see that happen, I hope, very soon.

Allen Jackson: Senator, I thank you for your time today, for your leadership for the state of Tennessee and for our nation. Your insight is helpful.

Bill Hagerty: Thank you, Allen. It's great to be with you.

Allen Jackson: In a moment we'll be back with your emails.

Thank you for spending a few moments of your day with us. Just a reminder, if you ever miss a live broadcast, you can always go to ajnow.com. There is a full archive of all the programs there. They're easy to watch at your leisure and easy to share with a friend. Thanks for your emails, your thoughts, and opinions. They are always a highlight.

Deborah L from Indiana said: "Watching the show with guest Chris Salcedo. He states that we have 24 Republicans in the House that vote against Trump and the Republican Party. Who are they? If we knew, I think people would do something." Deborah, I don't know all their names, but if you'll ask Rabbi Google, you can get that list. It's public information.

Jane H from Texas suggested: "Why can't we put the Save America Act on the ballot? Let the American citizens decide." Jane, it is on the ballot. Any senator that doesn't support the Save America Act should be voted out of office. If 80% of Americans want there to be election security, our senators should represent the American people. Use your vote for outcomes, not just to support the parties you prefer.

Charlie O says: "Does CNN now stand for Cockamamie Nonsense Network?" I don't know, Charlie, but it's certainly no news, that we know. If you will allow me, I'll offer a suggestion: Limit your news intake on a daily basis—other than this program, of course. Don't spend hours in the loop watching the same announcements over and over again. 15 or 20 minutes will give you the highlights of the news of the day. Take the balance of the time you have available and pray. Invite God into the midst of the circumstances that bring you concern in your home, your community, your state, our nation, the world. I'm confident if we'll spend more time praying and less time watching the news, we'll see God be involved and the outcomes will be better than what the talking heads are describing. There is hope, folks. God is moving in the earth. Let's decide to be a part of that. It'll fill us with hope and not dread. Thank you for spending a few moments with us. God bless and good night.