Search Results

A lawsuit filed over the Signal chat leaks has gone to a judge overseeing several other Trump administration cases. Judge James Boasberg will oversee the lawsuit, in addition to cases on blocking President Donald Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act and deportation flights, among others. We’ll discuss this topic and others, in this episode of Crossroads. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇 https://ept.ms/43sVCB5 Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

The latest political storm in Washington surrounds a Signal chat that included Vice President JD Vance and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Their communications on plans to attack Houthi terrorists were leaked to the press, and it turned out that someone had inadvertently added a journalist to the secure chat. The incident has now turned into a debate on the security of government communications and whether laws could have been broken. But what’s being left out of the discussion is that Signal is actually approved for government and even some military communications. We’ll discuss this topic and others, in this episode of Crossroads. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇 https://ept.ms/43sh3lO Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

After The Heritage Foundation released a report stating that several of former President Joe Biden’s pardons were signed using an autopen, President Donald Trump said that those pardons should be considered void. Let’s examine the legal threshold that a president needs to meet in order to issue a pardon, and whether the use of an autopen satisfies that threshold. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🇺🇸 Epoch Times $1 Full Access Special Offer: https://ept.ms/RomanSale

Half a million unaccompanied minors entered the United States between 2019 and 2023, and experts fear many of them have been trafficked. And that does not include the children who crossed the border with individuals falsely claiming to be their family members. So where are all these children now? Alina Habba, who is currently serving as counselor to the president, says she’s working with the different agencies involved to identify and rescue trafficking victims and prosecute the perpetrators. “I am drafting a couple executive orders regarding that currently that I think will be important to properly get this moving for those kids,” she says. In her role advising the president, Habba says she’s focused on human trafficking and Iraq. Habba is the daughter of Chaldean Catholics who fled Iraq in the 1980s. Watch the video: We dive into her work today and get an update on the status of the long-awaited Epstein files. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. RUSH TRANSCRIPT Jan Jekielek: Alina Habba, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders. Alina Habba: Thank you for having me. Mr. Jekielek: Congratulations on becoming counselor to the president. What does it mean to be in this role? Ms. Habba: I’m obviously a senior advisor to President Trump, as I’ve been for some time. It’s not to be confused with White House Counsel’s Office. I don’t act as an attorney for White House counsel’s office, but I am a senior advisor. I’m involved in a lot of things. I sit in on a lot of meetings and have my opinion heard when needed or asked for, and I get to work on a great portfolio that I got to select. Mr. Jekielek: I’ve seen you talk about this with passion, that you want to make a dent in this whole human trafficking question. Give me a sense of where we’re at right now. Ms. Habba: I’ve been working extensively over the past few weeks with Tom Homan Kristi Noem’s team at the Department of Homeland Security, and as well with Secretary Kennedy, because there are so many parts of our government that touch on this. There’s obviously cybersecurity issues. There’s the trafficking themselves, the border patrol, customs, you know, et cetera. And then there’s, of course, the enforcement, which is DOJ. So where we’re at is that the last administration left us in shambles, left these children in shambles. A lot of them were misleadingly trafficked over the border when the borders were wide open, were displaced from their families, and then found themselves in vulnerable positions where they were sex trafficked and labor trafficked. I call it really human extortion. It’s not just trafficking. It’s everything. There’s cyber trafficking. So I’ve spent the past almost two months now really understanding where this country is, how bad this is. Now, we’re in the phase of, let’s get these kids home, let’s get them better, let’s capture their captors, and let’s prosecute the johns that are sick, that are pedophiles. This is not just minors, these are adults as well. Mr. Jekielek: The numbers that I’ve heard, it’s about 500,000 unaccompanied minors. There’s still others that came in accompanied. I heard something to the tune of 80,000 that may have actually been at least found, maybe not physically, but just their locations are known. Is there an update on the status of that? Ms. Habba: We’re in the process of getting some more homes. So I won’t disclose because it’s, you know, obviously we’re in the process of getting warrants and things of that nature. But we’ve done a tremendous job already. One of the key things that this administration did that Joe Biden’s administration neglected to do and actually changed from the first Trump administration was DNA testing. They removed the ability to do DNA testing. They got rid of it. So people were coming in with their alleged parents, aunts, uncles, whomever, and were never actually tested to verify that the people that were bringing them into this country were not part of a cartel, were not purchasing children to bring them in for malicious reasons. We have since then, since we came into office, put back in the DNA testing, made sure that we are checking to make sure these children have relations to the individuals that are claiming to have something. Mr. Jekielek: Just to be clear, you want to specifically focus on the child trafficking question. Ms. Habba: No, I’m focused on human extortion, which includes child trafficking. It’s any individual, no matter what age, that is being sex trafficked, that is being financially extorted via means of cyber, like Skype, for instance, and johns that are Skyping with minors, and sometimes it’s transnational, to have a cyber interactive, which is something I really didn’t understand until I came here. It’s cyber interactive pornography, dictating for others to hurt children, sick, sick things that are unfortunately a reality of the world that we’re living in. So it’s much broader than that. It’s not just child trafficking. It’s really human extortion. They come in because they need money and are forced into labor in ungodly conditions. All of that. Mr. Jekielek: I really appreciate how you were saying that this is a complex issue that involves multiple agencies working together, different databases. There’s a complexity of getting the information together. I’m aware of at least some cases where there’s even kids that have deportation orders against them. There are all these different agencies looking at the whole question from different angles. Ms. Habba: Yes, and there’s one part that I haven’t discussed, which is under Secretary Kennedy, which is the rehabilitation, the placing these children in sponsor homes. Again, it’s another disaster from the last administration. I’ve seen that there were children that were placed in fake sponsor homes under HHS, and then they would go visit to see if these children were safe and the children were not there. So effectively, they were being re-trafficked. We’re working extensively with both public and private sector individuals that are willing to help get these children to safety, get them rehabilitated, which includes therapy, which includes medical treatment, and get them into secure homes. Again, that’s something the Biden administration just completely screwed up, for lack of a better word. It’s taking a child who’s sex trafficked, and then telling them that we’re going to save you, and then putting them in a sponsor home and then having them re-trafficked is the largest failure of an administration, in my opinion. You are taking these kids out of one problem and putting them into another, and it’s just absolutely negligent. Mr. Jekielek: You have this huge passion for this issue, and I can see that. I’ve watched a few of your interviews on the topic. A few weeks back, you made some comments around Andrew Tate. You’ve also said that you want to see the wheels of justice grind. That’s my understanding of your committee. But people have a lot of questions. What do you think of the situation overall? What about the comments that you made? Ms. Habba: The comments I made really have to do with justice. I think everybody is entitled to be innocent until proven guilty. As somebody who was a defense attorney for President Trump, you know that’s what I believe in. I do not believe in anything other than that. Now, I will say this. The accusations against the Tate brothers are stomach-churning. They are disturbing. As I will say now, and I’ve said many times since then, that is for the court to handle and they should handle it. Mr. Jekielek: Basically, people have told me you said you’re a fan or something like that. Ms. Habba: Yes, that was a great manipulation. The Tate brothers have a tremendous social media presence, and what we were discussing was politics in the UK. He was talking about running. I am always passionate about people that are vocal against certain things. Now, I want to be very clear, that is very separate from accusations of human trafficking, accusations of rape, and whatever the accusations are against them. You have to put that in one bucket. That really is a very disturbing charge. Now, I don’t know the status of it. I’m also a lawyer. I know better than to talk about somebody’s case. But I will say that there is no part of me that condones that behavior at all. Mr. Jekielek: Everyone asks you about the Epstein files, whenever you come on, because obviously, this is highly pertinent to the human trafficking issue. How have things come along? I know that you’re staying on top of this and speaking with the Attorney General and Kash Patel. What’s the update today? Ms. Habba: The truth is I’m not coordinating with them on their process. That’s for them to do that separate and apart from what I do. Obviously, I see them in passing. I say, do we have an update? They explain that they’re going through the files. What I try to do as a voice for them is to explain to the American people to have patience, and I’ve said this time and time again. I understand the urge for immediate transparency to immediately tweet, screenshot, send out information. But when you are part of law and order and you are doing an investigation, you have to look at the files. You have to look at what prior attorneys did for the DOJ, and where we landed. You have to look at testimony. There is a lot there. It would be irresponsible for them not to take it seriously, despite the pressure from the American people to get it immediately. We are committed to transparency. The best I can do for those people that are frustrated is explain that in any case with human trafficking, in any case with minors, with individuals that have been violated, that have been put through trauma, you have to do a couple of things. You have to protect them, number one. You have to go through and make sure that you’re not exploiting them. And then, of course, again, with accusations, you have to make sure, and this is what we’re committed to, is vetting accusations that are and are not verified. Just because you’re in a Rolodex, does that mean you went to Epstein’s Island? No. Just because you were in a flight log, what does that mean? I don’t know, they have to do their process. This goes back to what I was saying, you have to go through a process. I believe in law and order. I believe justice will be served to the people that deserve it. We’re not going to shoot from the hip. We’re going to look at things methodically and take them very seriously. Unfortunately, that takes time. Mr. Jekielek: I can also see why you might be very sensitive to guilt by association. Ms. Habba: That’s exactly what I speak to. I truly understand that complaints get filed and people jump to conclusions. And people want to see, I see this a lot on Twitter, where are the arrests? Where are the arrests? Again, you have to go through a process. You have to make sure that you are vetting it. We are not Letitia James. We are not Alvin Bragg. We are going to look at things properly, look at all the evidence and bring charges where charges are due. And that will be across the board. That’s not just an Epstein thing. That’s a problem because for four years, America was so used to people politically motivated, just flying off the cuff, filing a complaint against somebody, and then you tarnish their name. You have to deal with the repercussions of that when you lose in case or you lose it on an appeal. That’s just not how we’re going to be. We’re going to bring cases that are vetted, but that should be brought. That’s the reality. Mr. Jekielek: Alina, I learned that you’re Chaldean, which is quite amazing. We cover a lot of persecution of minority groups around the world here at the Epoch Times, and the Chaldeans fit into that. We’ve worked on stories with Assyrian Christians as well. Can you briefly tell me about that? Because I understand Iraq is somehow going to fit into your portfolio as well. Ms. Habba: Yes, obviously, my family was in the minority. We are Christians from Iraq. My parents are from Baghdad. When Saddam was in power, there was obviously, as there is now, a problem with minority religions being pushed out and persecuted. As you saw, they were burning churches, they were shooting individuals. As we’re seeing right now with Syria, it is history repeating itself. Yes, it’s very sensitive for me. I am a first-generation American. I do not believe in religious persecution. I do not believe in persecution of anybody based on a fundamental factor of who they are, and I mean that in terms of people who are just existing as a Catholic, as a Christian, as a Chaldean, or as an Assyrian. It’s funny, everybody wants to put me in one bucket and say, oh, she’s this. I’ve always said I’m a Middle Eastern Catholic woman. My family is religious. They are very involved in the church, and I’m proud of that. I think that religious freedoms are important. In these countries, unfortunately, we’re seeing them be silenced, and not just silenced attacked. You can’t have that, no matter what your religion is. I really stand by that. I’m married to a man who is Jewish and I support his religion as well. I sit in temple, and I host Passover, but it’s called respect for different opinions and faiths. Mr. Jekielek: How does Iraq fit into your portfolio? Ms. Habba: Obviously I have ties there from my culture, but I think more importantly, the Middle East in general, it’s a troubling area that could be thriving to some extent if they could get out from under some of the regimes, some of the radical religions that are also attacking and persecuting them. Iraq, obviously, at one point a long time ago, was a country with infrastructure, with business and is no longer. It is one of those countries that has been left behind. There’s so much room for improvement there. American relations with the Middle East are important for the world. It’s important for us to have good relations with everybody. And as the president has made clear, we do not want wars. We do not want to see anybody go through any kind of troubling time, such as Syria, but we’re not babysitters either. I know there was frustration in the past, and I’m going back a decade to when we did come in and disrupted some countries and these things. Those administrations made decisions based on their facts at the time. Now is a good time to start to really make sure that, and you’ve seen this with tariffs, you’ve seen this with reciprocal behavior that the president has talked about, everybody is on the same page. We do not want to see people suffer, but we’re putting America first. Iraq is surrounded by countries that are in danger. Obviously, we are seeing militia groups that are frightening. We have to be a strong example and work with these countries. Mr. Jekielek: You mentioned Syria, and this is a case in point. A lot of people were happy to see this horrific Assad regime collapse, but now we see a new regime killing quite a few people out of different minorities, including Christians. Of course, the State Department has made statements on this as well. What are your thoughts here? Ms. Habba: Yes, exactly right. They’re surrounded by Syria. They have Iranian influence there. They have a lot of things that are a danger to the world. You have to strengthen relationships in vulnerable places to protect not only our country, but the world. I think that it’s very simple. We’re America first. For a change, we’re America first. We’re not going to be sending our people over. We’re not sending money anymore to Ukraine. We’re not sending our people over to fix other people’s problems, but we will not allow the world’s demise because an administration turned the cheek and pretended something wasn’t happening. That is, there are parts of this world that are in danger. Look at the videos from Syria. That is just so upsetting to me that that’s history repeating itself. As you heard, Secretary Rubio mentioned, we do not condone that. We have a UN for a reason. We have a strong president for a reason. As he always says, peace through strength. Mr. Jekielek: I want to ask you some quick questions that are maybe a little more fun. What were your five bullets for this week? Ms. Habba: Unfortunately, I can’t discuss mine. I had a lot more than five. I can give you general topics. I had several meetings on human trafficking. I am currently drafting a couple of executive orders regarding that, and I think they will be important to get this moving properly for those kids. I attended several events. I do TV. I do so many things. For my five bullets, if you just looked at how many shows I’m on during the day, there are the five bullets. But a lot of my meetings are top secret and I can’t discuss it on TV. But my portfolio is tremendous, it’s robust, and I’m happy to be here. I’m happy to be doing some good for this country, and I’m excited to save some kids. Mr. Jekielek: I’m excited also to connect you with a few people that are doing amazing work in this counter child trafficking space. It’s something we’ve been covering a lot on the show. One of our opinion writers asked, what would be a crazy efficiency move you would like to whisper into DOGE’s ear? Ms. Habba: I wish there was a way to defund corrupt AGs and DAs and judges. I think that there are serious problems in our justice system. And if there was a way that we could expose and remove judges that were funneling, that had family members that were taking money or had influence or peddling or campaign influence and took them off the bench, that would make me very happy. That might not be a massive cut, but for me, it’s more of a principle. I really hate what I saw the last four years. It’s really what drove me to come here into DC, to leave my family, to sacrifice some time in order to really spend here doing some good. Because we got to get the wheels back on track. Mr. Jekielek: Alina Habba, it’s such a pleasure to have you on the show. Ms. Habba: Thanks for having me.

The actions of President Donald Trump have been regularly stalled or blocked by court actions. Many of these are in turn brought about by lawsuits from various agencies. And now, Trump is taking action to prevent attorneys and law firms from blocking the actions of the president. We’ll discuss this topic and others, in this episode of Crossroads. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇 https://ept.ms/4iIEex4 Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

Right now we are either on the cusp of finally getting our hands on the Epstein client list—or we’re on the verge of another major disappointment. Let me give you the absolute latest in terms of what’s happening with the Epstein files—from Pam Bondi to Kash Patel, and President Donald Trump himself, who earlier this week confirmed the upcoming release of the files. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🇺🇸 Epoch Times $1 Full Access Special Offer: https://ept.ms/RomanSale

The Department of Education, as we knew it, has come to an end. Reports this week suggested that the Trump administration would abolish the department entirely. The official announcement didn’t go quite that far but came very close. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt detailed the changes, noting that the department will now be much smaller and will only retain its most basic functions. We’ll discuss this topic and others in this episode of “Crossroads.” Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇   https://ept.ms/4hr10Ig Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

Joining me today is Gov. Jeff Landry of Louisiana. Since he took office last year, he’s implemented sweeping changes in public safety, tax policy, and education. Watch the video: We discuss gains made in the state’s educational rankings, as well as his plans for boosting election integrity, increasing manufacturing, and ensuring fiscal responsibility. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. FULL TRANSCRIPT Jan Jekielek: Governor Jeff Landry, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders again. Governor Jeff Landry: It’s always great to be with you. Mr. Jekielek: It’s been about a year now since you’ve been in your role as governor. What are the biggest milestones you’ve been able to hit over the last year? Governor Landry: We hit the ground running last year in January, and we moved at breakneck speed. We held three special sessions and a regular session in a 12-month period and really pushed our legislature on the promises that we made to the people of Louisiana when we were running. We worked on true criminal justice reform that focuses on victims and putting criminals behind bars. We were very successful with that, and we’re seeing tangible, demonstrable results. At one time, New Orleans was one of the most dangerous cities in the world. Today, murders have fallen by 50 percent, to its lowest since the 1970s, and we’re starting to see that spread around the rest of the state as well. We did educational reforms where we finally were able to pass ESA’s educational scholarship accounts, which we’re now getting ready to implement on kids with disabilities and the poorest of the poor. Then right at the end of the year, I put the legislature back in and we did something that no one thought could be done in Louisiana. We actually did a whole scale tax reform where we flattened our income tax to three percent. We lowered our corporate income tax. We got rid of our corporate franchise tax. I didn’t get everything I wanted, but we certainly got half the loaf. We got a ramp to where we can continue to chip away at improving Louisiana’s tax policy. We went in on education. We went from 50th to 32 in the rankings. Louisiana has never been in the 30s, and we saw those results happen that quickly. Cade Brumley, who’s our superintendent, is doing an unbelievable job. If you ask me about milestones, we’ve got plenty of them. In fact, on the ballot in March for voters in Louisiana is part of that tax reform, which is going to give teachers a permanent pay raise by paying off debt. We used fiscal responsible policy to give teachers a permanent pay raise, once and for all. We doubled our deduction for seniors. We rewrote our entire section of the Constitution that dealt with taxes in one amendment. So we’ve done a lot. Mr. Jekielek: Your ranking in education went from 50 to 32. How does that even happen? Governor Landry: We started our educational reforms through supporting the BESE board that I got to appoint. BESE is the educational committee that our Constitution creates that oversees K-12 education in the state of Louisiana. They govern the schools, and we appointed five. The governor gets five appointees. We kept our superintendent of education, an extremely conservative, great guy, Cade Brumley. Coming right out the box, we put five conservatives on BESE, and they went to work. We were able to complement some of the things that they did with our educational reforms in the regular session, and we started to see our reading scores improve. You would be surprised at the type of results that you can see overnight when you start to move fast, and when you start to be bold. Look at how much President Trump has accomplished in four weeks.You are starting to see tangible results from some of the things that he’s doing. The ESA work that we did on the educational scholarships have not even gone into effect. We put a program together that says, “Let the teachers teach.” We started stripping away the bureaucracy placed on teachers that have nothing to do with teaching, but trying to make teachers social workers instead of teachers. So we stripped that away. We concentrated on reading, writing, and arithmetic, going back to the basics. These were all the things that we promised on the campaign trail. Jan, the biggest reason you’re seeing some of those metrics is because teachers today in Louisiana believe that they’ve been liberated, that they have a governor, they have a BESE board, they have a superintendent of education at the state level who supports teachers. This was easy for me because my mom was a teacher and my godmother was a teacher. I also had a couple of aunts that were teachers. The most important voice in a child’s education are the parents. The most important person in that child’s life after the parents are their teachers. When you empower parents and you empower teachers, you get great results. Mr. Jekielek: That’s really commendable that children can be reading better in such a short period of time by focusing on it. Governor Landry: And math. Mr. Jekielek: I will definitely be calling them up, because other people will want to know what you guys are up to. Governor Landry: Again, the rankings that came out were really astonishing and it surprised me. When Cade called me, I said, “You have to be kidding me.” He said, “No.” A lot of those rankings have to do with the reforms that we made and the things that we put in place. I think you should have Cade on your show. Mr. Jekielek: This is making Louisiana great again. That’s what you said your plan is. Governor Landry: Absolutely. Look, it builds upon President Trump’s motto of common sense and making America great again. You make America great again when you make your state great. The more states that become great, the greater America becomes. Mr. Jekielek: One of the contentious things was that you decided that Ten Commandments need to be in the schools. What are your thoughts on this? Governor Landry: I didn’t know that the Ten Commandments were a bad way to live your life. I still haven’t figured that whole thing out. Dodie Horton, a state representative from Louisiana, an unbelievable person, just a great person, was the author of the bill. I didn’t realize that the bill was actually moving through the session. I'll be quite honest with you and give a little confession here. I didn’t realize the bill had moved all the way through until it got to my desk. I was signing all these other educational improvements. I looked and they said, “We put the Ten Commandments in with these.” I said, “That’s great. Okay, no problem.” I didn’t think anything of it. Then the liberal media and other people went crazy. I thought to myself, “Wow, I didn’t know the Ten Commandments was a bad way to live your life.” The Ten Commandments are fully on display in the United States Supreme Court. Moses is in full display in the U.S. House chamber. We know that the original lawgiver was Moses. He is the foundational father of law. Why we can’t put that in our schools is amazing to me. Because I'll tell you, you should let your child read the Ten Commandments or they’re going to end up having to learn a criminal code. Mr. Jekielek: The criticism is that it elevates the Christian faith above all others in the classroom. People argue that shouldn’t be the case. Governor Landry: No, the Ten Commandments are not owned by the Christian religion. The Muslim religion, Judaism, and Christianity all recognize the Ten Commandments. Moses was there before them all, let’s not forget that. That to me is one of the unbelievable tenets of our ability to place the Ten Commandments in full view in a public school. A school is a place of learning. It is an institution where you teach someone something. To keep things like that out means that you don’t want people to understand what those things are. When you take a document like the Ten Commandments and you claim that by placing it there is a violation of church and state, evidently you have never read our Constitution or our Bill of Rights. I think we’ve had this conversation here before. There is no text in the First Amendment that says separation of church and state, so we look forward to litigating this case. It’s going to be a great case, and Attorney General Liz Murrill is going to have a field day with this. Mr. Jekielek: You have also banned critical race theory in K-12 education. What was the impact of that? Governor Landry: I just told you our report card went up to 32. That’s what happens when you take those kinds of things out of the mix. Things like critical race theory, DEI, and ESG, all those things do is divide people. America was supposed to be a country which recognized unity. It was a melting pot. When you melt things together, you end up with one thing. Think about our motto. Again, I think that’s what we’re doing. During my inauguration I said, “We are going to focus on education instead of indoctrination in education. We’re going to ensure that teachers get to educate kids and they’re not indoctrinating kids.” Things like CRT and DEI and those other very liberal policies only indoctrinate kids. They don’t educate them. Mr. Jekielek: Was it difficult to institute that ban on CRT and make sure it was happening? Governor Landry: You had the normal actors whose hair was on fire. But look, Louisiana is a very conservative state. We have super majorities in both the House and the Senate. Here’s what else I'll say. Every one of the reforms that I talked to you about, we passed with bipartisan support. I’m not talking to just one Democrat. There was large bipartisan support in the legislature. That speaks volumes that these are issues that transcend political parties. Concerning public safety, who doesn’t want to be safe? Who doesn’t want their kids to have a better education? Who doesn’t want a higher standard of living that raises wages for everyone, with more jobs and opportunities to go to work? It’s not like a Republican thing or a Democrat thing. It’s an American thing. Mr. Jekielek: Another thing that you touched on is the executive order on election integrity. Governor Landry: Yes. In fact, our secretary of state is getting ready to put out an RFP so we can finally get some new voting machines. The prior governor had thwarted the secretary of state’s ability to change the machines. We’ve got some machines that date back to the 1990s. I don’t even know how they work anymore. But we’re going to institute an election system under which a voter votes and gets a receipt. There will be an actual paper ballot that that voter can look at and say, “This is how I want to vote.” That is scanned in and tabulated, and then that receipt is put in a box so that we can reconcile that with the voting. That is the way that it should be, right? That is a way to not have to depend on electronic voting machines. There are too many transactions happening in that. We are giving voters confidence that their elections are based upon a solid foundation. Mr. Jekielek: How is what the Trump administration doing impacting what you’re trying to do in Louisiana? Governor Landry: The things that the president and his administration are doing have the ability to cause ripples in both positive and sometimes negative ways. But I do believe that when everything is laid out, the waters will begin to calm and America will be a much stronger place. What they’re doing up here helps to support things that we want to do back in Louisiana. When legislators see the actions of this administration and the president doing things like abolishing DEI, like signing an executive order protecting women in women’s sports, taking men out of women’s sports, all the things that he’s doing, he gives people liquid courage. He gives legislators in our states liquid courage. You’re going to see Texas pass school choice, something that has eluded them. Governor Abbott has continuously tried to pass school choice in the state of Texas. But because of the way that the president is leaning into that and supporting it, it gives courage and cover for those legislators who weren’t quite sure about making those hard votes. I don’t think they are hard votes, I think they are easy. They are just listening to a loudmouth minority. Mr. Jekielek: You’ve had a big year. What is coming up next? Governor Landry: We’re getting ready to dive into the bureaucracy. We’re running our own fiscal responsibility project, kind of like the DOGE project that the president is running. It’s something that I did when I was attorney general eight or nine years ago. We’re going to reorganize our Department of Transportation. We’re going to further improve our tax position. We’re going to tweak all those things. We’re going to look at civil service, which is a real problem, as well as our bureaucracy. We’re going to further work towards streamlining our regulatory agency and our permitting processes. We’re going to take every chance we can to make Louisiana open for business and friendly and to improve our quality of life. Mr. Jekielek: The president really wants to push towards reinvigorating American manufacturing, which has been on the decline for some time now. How does that fit into the Louisiana plan? Governor Landry: About 23 percent of the entire refining capacity of the whole country is in Louisiana along the Mississippi River and over in the southwestern part near Texas. Manufacturing is something that we know how to do. We’ve got the infrastructure and the ability to expand that manufacturing base. We hope that the things the president is doing are going to be beneficial to Louisiana. You asked me earlier about the things that the president does and how they affect us back home. Again, you hear people say that when the president imposes tariffs and tries to ensure that the United States has fair trade, it does cause some disruptions and it does cause some volatility. But it’s absolutely necessary in order to ensure that America regains its rightful place on a global scale. For a long time we’ve been convinced that the most conservative approach is free trade. When you go out into the real world, there’s no such thing as free trade. There is only fair trade, because you find that other countries are imposing their own will and they really don’t embrace free trade. The president recognizes that, and he wants America to play on a level playing field. Mr. Jekielek: Let’s say that someone is interested in bringing manufacturing opportunities to Louisiana. What will they get from you? Governor Landry: A call from the governor. You can call me up and we'll negotiate it. Look, we just announced Louisiana for the first time in the, and boy, I can’t remember that publication off the top of my head here, but it was a major business publication that gave Louisiana the 2024 platinum deal of the year for the Meta project, when Meta announced building the largest AI facility in the world in northeast Louisiana. It’s a $10 billion investment, and it got done. We announced it in December, but those negotiations started in February. They came to see me and said, “Look, we’re thinking about doing some business in Louisiana. We’re thinking about building this facility. We’re looking at other states. What do you have?” We sat down, rolled up our sleeves, and got to work. Those who are looking for manufacturing opportunities, please come to Louisiana. We just improved our overall tax position. We lowered our corporate income tax rate. We’ve got some great infrastructure opportunities. The one thing that we have that other states don’t have is excess capacity for electrical generation, which is extremely important for manufacturing. We’ve got great oil and gas reserves. We’ve got good infrastructure to further enhance our electrical generation capacity. We’ve got great infrastructure for rail and water and transportation. So come on down. Mr. Jekielek: It is also combined with your deregulatory approach. Governor Landry: Absolutely. I can tell you, you want to come down and put manufacturing in Louisiana. We are going to streamline your permit process. Mr. Jekielek: Governor, it’s great to have you on again. Any final thoughts as we finish up? Governor Landry: It’s always a pleasure to be here. I would encourage you to get Cade Brumley on the show, because he can talk about the great educational things that we are doing. I can also tell you another thing, Louisiana is open for business. Mr. Jekielek: Governor Jeff Landry, it’s such a pleasure to have you on the show. Governor Landry: Thank you. This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Ever since abortion pills became ubiquitous across the United States, there has been a concern over the possibility that the active abortion-inducing chemicals in these drugs are getting into the public drinking water. After all, the way that it works is that a woman takes these pills, the drugs kill the fetus and induce contractions, and then the woman flushes everything that comes out down the toilet. Given that fact, Kristan Hawkins—president of Students for Life of America—commissioned a study of drinking water across America to test for these chemicals. Listen to interview to see what they found. Views expressed in this video are the opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🇺🇸 Epoch Times $1 Full Access Special Offer: https://ept.ms/RomanSale

The United States’ manufacturing has been declining, and there’s now a push to bring it back. Vice President JD Vance recently spoke at the American Dynamism Summit about the unseen impacts of losing manufacturing, how this happened, and the emerging policies to restore it. We’ll discuss this topic and others, in this episode of Crossroads. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇 https://ept.ms/4kDvSbh Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

President Donald Trump has declared that the presidential pardons issued under the Biden administration are now null and no longer in effect. He alleged that the documents had been signed with an autopen and that the former president was likely unaware of them. The move could clear the way for new criminal investigations. Meanwhile, new polls on approval ratings are showing new records. Trump has matched his record high, while Democrats are showing record-low ratings. The polls suggest that a change in approach may be necessary for Democrats to win back voters in the midterm elections. We’ll discuss these topics and others, in this episode of “Crossroads.” Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇   https://ept.ms/42dJjY5 Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/

Over 200 gang members from Tren de Aragua and MS-13 have been deported from the United States, and have now arrived at a prison in El Salvador. Videos were posted online showing the gang members being taken from the planes and sent to the country’s Terrorism Confinement Center. The deportation follows a recent action from President Donald Trump to invoke the Alien Enemies Act, where he declared an invasion of the United States by Tren de Aragua, a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization. Now, a legal battle is beginning as well, after a federal judge blocked Trump’s invocation of the act and also ordered the deportation of gang members to stop. We’ll discuss this topic and others, in this episode of Crossroads. Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times. 🔵 Watch the full episode HERE 👇   https://ept.ms/43Rvwrs Stay Informed. Stay Free. https://www.joshphilipp.com/