SEKULOW

Will Haynes: Welcome to Sekulow. Will Haynes here in studio. I'll be joined later by CC Hiles as well as Rick Grenell, but you're not going to want to miss this one, folks. First, it was the Squad and Bernie Sanders. They were kind of the fringe part of the Democrat Party. They'd been elected, but really they didn't represent the mainstream of what that party represents. Then they get some attention and cause some trouble. They maybe make it difficult for the leadership in the House or in the Senate sometimes, but they don't make that big of a difference other than some great headlines and sound bites to play just to show how ridiculous they can be.

Then you start to see the Mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani. He could be a wake-up call for people. It's just the Mayor of New York, don't worry about it. Of course, New York's going to do that. It's going to be bad for the Democrats across the nation because they're electing people like him just to be a mayor of America's largest city and one of the most influential cities in the world, but it's not going to affect everyday Americans.

Then you see the sweep in New York of three socialist candidates backed by the mayor that were able to pull upset victories and effectively, by winning their primaries, win their way to the House of Representatives. Okay, they've just added three more socialists to the House, but once again, it's New York. It's New York City specifically, not upstate New York, not the rest of the state. What do you expect? You can write it off.

Now there's a shocker. If you are writing off the New York wins by the socialist candidates, this is out of Colorado. Now, Colorado is a different type of liberal state than New York. It's much more free-spirited, much more outdoorsy, much more hippie. But you have a 30-year incumbent that was defeated last night, not in a close race, but by 10 points. Melate Kairos beats Diana DeGette in Colorado in a primary.

A lot of people were paying way more attention yesterday to the Supreme Court opinions than to this race. A 30-year incumbent was defeated by a 29-year-old socialist. Now, you may think she's an incumbent and probably very moderate or middle of the road. No, this incumbent was, in fact, endorsed by Pramila Jayapal, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the left wing of the party.

So this is a very liberal member of Congress that has now lost their seat that they've held for 15 terms. As a matter of fact, our producer Ali pointed out that this person who won the primary and will go on to win—this is a very liberal district, very blue district—was born the year that Diana DeGette was first elected. Think about that. That's how long this member of Congress has been in Congress and pushing very far-left policies, upset by a socialist.

We've got to unpack this, folks. You may have not been paying attention to it when it was just New York, but now we're seeing Colorado. Then you're going to see other places. We know they're trying to run against what the Democrats think of as more moderate candidates. You know that they're trying to run a Democrat socialist-backed candidate in Florida against members of Congress that may not be up to speed on some of their issues. Do you think this is a sign of a socialist wave within the Democrat Party? Do you think that the leadership has lost control of what the priorities of that party are going to be?

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We're talking about this candidate that won in Colorado last night because this candidate is one of the first candidates that's a proud Democrat socialist that has upset incumbents in a primary race, not a general election against a Republican. It's not just New York anymore. Now this is Colorado. Obviously, Colorado has some very, very conservative areas, but then there are some very, very liberal areas. But I don't think that Colorado is the political analogy of New York in the West. It's not the same type of politician. So when you see this, it's not just a New York-style socialist takeover of their members of the House.

And you may also think these are members of the House and don't really affect me. Remember how just a small handful of Republicans that wanted to hold up the business of the House for their own priorities were able to do so. And not just this past House session when Speaker Johnson was in the speakership, but even go back to Kevin McCarthy and how easily they were able to take out the leader. Just a handful of people—that's all it takes to cause trouble for the establishment party, for those that are in leadership, but also to change the direction of the priorities of the House of Representatives.

It's very easy for just a small group of people to do. And when you had the Squad and for a while we thought they'd kind of lost their razzle-dazzle in the House, if you will. They were kind of the shiny thing in the House that was able to make a lot of headlines, but they didn't have a ton of power in the House. Now they're adding to their ranks. It seemed for a while we saw some of the members lose re-election in 2024. So, oh, okay, now that fad is over. It's not. It's actually gotten worse because now they are not even hiding who they are.

This is an individual who just won in Colorado that thinks that 9/11 was America's fault, that was actually fired from a law firm because of her statements about October 7th and wanting to end Israel as a concept and her support of protesters in New York that were doing just that—they were advocating for the end of Israel. So what you're starting to see is this come full circle. These are individuals that aren't even quiet about what their radical political philosophies are. They are very outspoken about it.

And I wanted to even bring this up because this is an interesting fact that I read this morning about the two that were running against each other. DeGette, who as I said had been in this House seat in the Denver area for nearly 30 years, she was not only backed by the establishment but also by people like Pramila Jayapal, who is the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. That is the left wing of the Democrat Party. So it's not as though this was an individual who had not a lot of support behind her even within the more liberal members of the entire party.

Here's what's interesting to me. It used to be, and we saw this with people like Tulsi Gabbard, when she gave any sort of daylight in her view on abortion or being as pro-abortion as possible in the Democrat Party in that debate back when she ran for President, they ostracized her so quickly. They called her a Russian asset and got her out of their party because she offered a more moderated view on that topic on a debate stage. Immediately you saw how quickly they turned on her and turned her into a Russian spy for the media.

This individual DeGette, the incumbent member of the House of Representatives, was supported by Pro-Choice Majority Action. That's a super PAC that supports pro-choice candidates. They gave her $1.5 million in her race and she lost by 10 points in this primary race in Denver, Colorado. It no longer seems that the litmus test for the Democrats is how much you support abortion. Maybe that's because they've purged their ranks of anyone who may have even the slightest nuance to that issue.

But it seems that that no longer is what identifies you as a purist Democrat. It now appears that, at least to the electorate, you have to hate Israel and you have to hate Jews. You have to embrace anti-Semites. And you may say I'm just criticizing the government if you're a Democrat. So I understand these candidates that are speaking out asking questions—where have we heard that before?

That, I think, is the new litmus test to get elected as a Democrat in 2026. And yes, this may be a midterm, they may not be able to get policy forward. I mean, this is an individual who, let's talk about her campaign promises: she's going to take the fight to Donald Trump and the oligarchy, she's going to abolish U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, going to abolish ICE, she's going to pass Medicare for All, and she's going to end the genocide in Palestine. Those are lofty goals for one member of the House of Representatives.

But here's the problem. It may not happen. They may not even get this to a vote, any of these issues, in 2027 when they're all seated in the House of Representatives. But they have their eye on the prize of taking back the House, the Senate, and the presidency. And when their litmus test is words like "ending the genocide in Palestine," we know that that is ending support for our ally in the Middle East, Israel, as well as propping up people who are unabashed anti-Semites that hate the Jewish people, that spread conspiracy theories and thousand-year-old disgusting anti-Semitic tropes.

This is the new House of Representatives under the Democrats. This is their litmus test: how much can you hate Israel? And that's what our political spectrum is going to be focused on going forward. I know a lot of people are tired of hearing about it, but I'm not going to stop talking about it because it grows each and every day.

Harris reaches out to Mamdani and pro-Palestinian activists in the run-up to 2028. She's not meeting with Pro-Choice Majority Action. She's not meeting with those individuals anymore. They don't need to. They have gotten purity within their party on the issue of no restrictions on abortion ever. We've seen that. So now they have to court people like the Mayor of New York, who is the new kingmaker of their party, if she wants to run in 2028.

It says that she's had lengthy closed-door meetings with prominent progressives including pro-Palestinian activists. She called the mayor last Thursday to talk about the party's future. She called him two days after the mayor's hand-picked candidate swept three congressional races. She met with AOC in Chicago on the sidelines of a Power Rising conference and she's been reaching out to pro-Palestinian activists who help lead the uncommitted movement. That was a movement of Democrats, alleged Democrats, that were so upset in 2024 that they said we don't even know if we can vote for Democrats because they don't hate Israel enough. They're not chanting "from the river to the sea" at the DNC.

That's what the party is becoming. So we can't stop talking about that. When we look at the socialism, it is intertwined with this anti-Israel movement. That is how they are getting these individuals elected, and they're clearly being very effective because in this race, this 30-year incumbent who had a lot of money behind her was upset in a race that no one saw this coming, and it was by 10 points. That is a landslide victory for the socialist anti-Semite who thinks that America is to blame for 9/11. Just imagine all of this being said just a few years ago—that they're going to win by 10 points unseating an incumbent, and a very liberal one at that.

Welcome back to Sekulow. I'm going to be getting your phone calls shortly here. It is July 1st. I want to say this right up top. We've got CC joining us. We have just a few days from a very big celebration. And I want to contrast that with—there was a lot of people upset yesterday at some of the Supreme Court rulings on both sides because there were some that went ways that conservatives liked and some ways that liberals liked. Whatever.

Don't let the system working, as I've said, bog you down. If they were all packed, if the court was packed, you'd never see nuance out of the Supreme Court. You'd never see decisions that go one way or the other. That's what the left wants. They want to control the court. You may not agree with it, and as we even broke down yesterday, there's many different ways that even legislation can affect these things. This isn't the end of the republic as I've seen people post. This isn't the end of our country.

Just remember that. One, we have a providential God that has really blessed this country with 250 years of making a more perfect union. And as we stand here as the ACLJ, we know that courts aren't always going to go our way. We're going to do our best with the best attorneys in this country fighting for what we believe is the correct interpretation of the Constitution, fighting for people's rights, protecting their First Amendment rights. And we know that those fights will never go away. It's never going to be a perfect union, but we can always strive for that more perfect union. And that's what we do here.

We don't let one Supreme Court opinion make us throw up our hands and say, you know what, let's pack it up. We did the best we could but it's not worth fighting for anymore. We know it's worth fighting for and that's what the ACLJ will continue to do. You may see others that are naysayers and conservative nihilists—"it's all for naught, what's the point?" But we're not that here. So when you stand with the ACLJ as we launch this Liberty Drive to protect those liberties, those God-given liberties, you are supporting that fight, that continued fight of people that may see victories and losses.

But we keep fighting towards that more perfect union. And we are blessed by God to have this team that is remarkable. You're about to hear right now from CC. These are issues that are global in scope. But when we fight for things like the First Amendment rights, the freedom of religion, freedom of speech here, we practice what we preach not just in the United States but around the world. And we had a caller earlier this week call in and ask about an update on Pakistan cases. If you're new to the ACLJ, you may not realize we have offices around the world. One of those is in Pakistan, where we fight for people who are in the minority in their country. They are Christians that will be persecuted by their neighbors, by their community, by their government, for what is referred to as a blasphemy law. It is many times the tool they will use to persecute these people. We have a lot of these cases, but we have an update on two brothers that have been charged with blasphemy.

CC Hiles: I'm just going to piggyback on what you said because you were preaching and I totally agree with that. That is exactly right. We are always going to fight the good fight and we understand that, you know, God has the ultimate say, not the Supreme Court. And so we will continue to fight for what's right and for justice. And like you said, we do that not only in the United States but we do it around the world.

And our office in Pakistan is uniquely positioned because Pakistan does not have good religious liberty. They just do not have those protections, and Christians are in the minority. And so we have four cases right now, or four clients right now, that have been falsely accused of blasphemy and they are on death row. So that is death by hanging. And we have appeals going in all of them. And the one that you're just talking about is one where two brothers were accused of blasphemous material on a website. And literally the only link for one of our clients was one of the brothers was that his landline was linked to the internet connection.

And they couldn't prove anything, there was no evidence in court, and yet these brothers have been in jail for 15 years. We've been going through the appeals, now we're at the Supreme Court. Sadly, at the Supreme Court, we petitioned in 2022 to get to the Supreme Court. They didn't grant that until 2024. So for the last two years, we've been going through this Supreme Court appeal and it has been postponed 10 times. So we had a date that was Monday, it got postponed to yesterday, and now it's been postponed to next Monday.

One interesting thing about this case—there is some good news. So our last hearing on this case that did get again postponed, but the judges asked—there was a panel of judges and they asked for some briefing on instead of the death penalty, which is what they are, death by hanging, have there been any cases for blasphemy that have life imprisonment? And that was a little bit disconcerting to me because it looked like what the judges were trying to do is now start this precedent of, okay, we're not going to hang them because people get up in arms about that, but we are going to keep them in jail for life.

And so that was very disconcerting. But amazingly, and I think it's because our supporters pray for us, we got a change in the panel and the Chief Justice who was the justice that released Asia Bibi, so canceled her charges, he is on this panel. So there is some hope that when this hearing does actually happen, which we hope that will be Monday, that our clients will be acquitted and after 15 years of languishing in prison, they will be free.

Will Haynes: Imagine that. Children the majority of their life on death row. Not just in and out of jail or even just held in jail, but their sentence is you're going to be killed for what we say is blasphemy against the prophet. Of which, first of all, even if they did, even if anyone said some blasphemy, that is not a reason to kill a child, no matter where you are in the world. It's not a reason to kill an adult. But much less, most of these cases, they didn't even do the offense that they are saying they did.

So even if you take that, these were children the majority of their life on death row. We continue to fight. And as CC just brought up, it's one of those things that a lot of people may not think of, but even the higher courts in Pakistan are actually a very modern system. That's why we can engage there and we have very talented lawyers both in the United States and in Pakistan that understand that system and are able to fight and advocate for these people.

But it does take a long time. There are political pressures on the ground there that sometimes cause judges to continue to delay these indefinitely because they don't want to have to deal with the fallout. We will continue to fight. And I think those of you that pray for these cases specifically, there is an answer to prayer that the shift has gone from the panel that wanted to create a new precedent of saying just let these kids spend the rest of their life in a prison to a panel where we know we've had a victory before. That is huge for justice for these brothers. So keep praying and keep supporting our work right now during this Liberty Drive. Your donations are doubled. It supports not just this broadcast or the work here in the U.S., but even those brothers that we're fighting for in Pakistan. Go to aclj.org/liberty today and have your donation doubled.

There's a lot happening in America right now. Our values, our faith, our freedoms—they're being challenged in courtrooms and on Capitol Hill. You might feel like you have no say over it, but you make a difference. And right now you can make double the difference. Our legal teams are fighting across the country defending your right to speak, pray, and even how to educate your kids. Join the fight. Go to aclj.org/double to have your gift doubled today.