Thanksgiving And The Legal Battles – As 2020 Continues: Are the recent changes to Trump’s legal team shakeup or strategy? Why is the Trump Administration working with Biden’s transition team? Is one of Trump’s cases finally reached a federal Court of appeals? Is Thanksgiving worth celebrating? Where the Pilgrims evil? Tune in to today’s program so you don’t miss the answers to these questions and more!

Air Date: 11/24/2020

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

Faith and the Culture

Rick:

Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. It’s WallBuilders Live, we’re taking on the hottest topics of the day, looking at them from a biblical, historical, and constitutional perspective. You can get more of our programs at our website, wallbuilderslive.com. My name is Rick Green, I’m here with David Barton and Tim Barton. And we’re still getting election results on a daily basis, things are still happening in all of the States.

So yesterday, we covered what had happened over the weekend. Not much has happened since yesterday, except a little bit of clarification on the Trump legal team. What some are characterizing as a shake up on the team was Sidney Powell, others are saying this is more of just a strategic decision pursuing different legal theories. So what do we know about that if much? 

And then man, we’re only two days out from Thanksgiving, and encouraging everyone to have massive family gatherings and send the pictures to Governor Cuomo, to Governor Newsom and okay, maybe it’s up to you whether you have a massive gathering. But if you do, please send the pictures to all of these tyrants that want to tell you who can be in your home.

So before we get to Thanksgiving, guys, let’s talk election news from the weekend, got some shake up on the Trump legal team, or maybe not so much of a shake up but more of a strategy.

David:

But it looks like they’re following the philosophy of divide and conquer. Yesterday, we were talking about Alan Dershowitz, the distinguished law professor at Harvard, and really how he’s really in recent years has really come more constitutional, he’s moving in that direction. And so he laid out three plausible legal theories that he thinks are very strong that will have good standing at the US Supreme Court. 

Equal Protection

And two of those dealt with what’s going on in Pennsylvania as relates to all the other States. And that is the equal protection, that you treat Republican ballots different from Democrat ballots across the state in different counties and that happened in most of the States; and also the fact that state judges went down or State officials went in and change what appeared to be very set state law and they did it right before the election or as the election was going on. 

They made these rulings. And only the legislature can change state law. And so that’s the other argument.

It appears that Giuliani and team, the official Trump legal team are going to take those two arguments and move them forward. And the third thing that Dershowitz talked about was, well, if you can show widespread fraud or potential fraud across the country that affected so many States through voting machines, or whatever–

And with the press conference that happened last Friday, and the talk about over the weekend, where Sidney Powell talked about the Smartmatic software and how you can break into it and how it’s programmed to give extra votes to some candidates and not others, it appears that Sidney Powell is going to take that argument and move forward in the federal courts.

So it looks like that those three arguments that Dershowitz identified have now been divided by two legal teams. One is the official Trump team, which is Giuliani and they’re going to take the first two, and that third one is going to be picked up by Sidney Powell, really kind of an outsider stepping in the direction of what would surely help Trump. But she’s raised in a lawsuit on that basis that this was not a sound election, and that they didn’t have the right protocols in place to be able to stop the kind of systemic fraud that may have happened across the nation.

Working with Transition Teams

Tim:

Guys, too, one thing worthy of note, came out yesterday evening, I believe was that the Trump administration acknowledged that they are now working with the Biden transition team and some people are speculating, does that mean that they’re throwing in the towel so to speak, they’re not going to continue the fight? And I certainly don’t think that is part of what’s going on. 

But you have a lot of solid, conservative Republicans who have come out and said, you know, if you go back to 911, one of the things that people cite is there was a lack of transparency with some of the transition team that maybe cause people not to be as ready and made America more vulnerable for terrorist attacks. I don’t know that that’s the same scenario we’re in now. But certainly, that’s been some accusations from very noted, conservative members of the US House and Senate.

And so I think the Trump team is just recognizing that at least for this point, let’s bring them in and we’ll start helping them know some of the reality what’s going on in America, in the world, where there are threats, what things need to be done, so they’re working now with the Biden transition team. 

But in the midst of all that being said, one of the reasons that this is certainly not them throwing in the towel is because one of the things that also was acknowledged yesterday is that the Third Circuit Court of federal appeals took up the case from Pennsylvania, about whether or not the voting happened properly and whether the Pennsylvania count is being finalized correctly based on many republican poll watchers not being allowed to go in, even after a judge ordered they had to be in, they were kept the distances and etc, etc. So, the…

The Federal Courts of Appeals

Rick:

And Tim, that’s a federal court, right, it’s a federal court of appeals because they’ve said for a while State court’s not going to solve this, they’ve got to get it in federal court. I think this is a federal case, right?

Tim:

That’s exactly right. And Jenna Ellis, one of the Trump team attorneys came out and said that they were actually grateful that it went through the State level so quickly and it did not slow down the process, because they recognize there is a deadline, trying to potentially get up to the US Supreme Court, depending on what happens here at the third district court of appeals. And this is a federal court, but this is something else that you do see the Trump team continuing on with this battle in the state of Pennsylvania, and so certainly doesn’t seem like they’re throwing in the towel at this point.

David:

The third Federal Circuit Court of Appeals said that they’re also going to do this on an expedited basis. So they want this thing moving forward very rapidly, they know it’s going to go to the Supreme Court. If Trump wins, says the other side’s going to sue, and so it’s going to keep going. So they’re going to do expedited. And so what they want is next Monday at four o’clock, they want all of Trumps arguments in place.

Now, next Monday is also when the 67 individual counties in Pennsylvania certify their county results. So they’re trying to get this thing really to some type of definitive conclusion at the Federal Court of Appeals level as soon as they can to keep this thing from really getting bogged down. 

Third Circuit

So that’s what it looks like now. But again, Tim, you’re exactly right, this thing is moving through the courts very rapidly. It got out of the state courts, it’s in the federal courts, and the federal courts are expediting this. So it is definitely headed to the US Supreme Court at some point in time, but we’ll see what the Third Circuit does in the meantime.

Rick:

Alright, guys, we’ll take a quick break. When we come back, let’s start talking Thanksgiving, it’s only 48 hours away. Hope that everybody has some plans to spend time with family and give thanks? We’re going to talk about some of the history of that. Stay with us, we’ll be right back on WallBuilders Live.

The American Story

Hey, guys, we want to let you know about a new resource we have at WallBuilders called The American Story. For so many years, people have asked us to do a history book to help tell more of the story that’s just not known or not told today. And we would say very providentially in the midst of all of the new attacks coming out against America, whether it be from things like the 1619 project that say America is evil and everything in America was built off slavery, which is certainly not true or things like even the Black Lives Matter movement, the organization itself, not out of statement, Black Lives Matter, but the organization that says we’re against everything that America was built on, and this is part of the Marxist ideology. There’s so many things attacking America.

Well, is America worth defending? What is the true story of America? We actually have written and told that story. Starting with Christopher Columbus, going roughly through Abraham Lincoln, we tell the story of America, not as the story of a perfect nation or a perfect people, but the story of how God used these imperfect people and did great things through this nation. It’s a story you want to check out wallbuilder.com, “The American Story”.

Rick:

We’re here back on WallBuilders Live. Thanks for staying with us. So we just got two days left before Thanksgiving is here. Time to get together with your family and celebrate and give thanks.

David:

Well, we would call it Thanksgiving, and we still do call it Thanksgiving, and we believe it is Thanksgiving. And it’s a long term tradition in American holiday. But we’ve seen over recent years a lot of pushback toward trying to change some of those traditional holidays. I mean, we’ve seen Columbus Day. There’s the other side said no, it’s not Columbus Day, It’s Indigenous Peoples Day. Well, that’s a different story. We covered some of that in October.

Thanksgiving: National Day of Mourning???

But now we’re hearing with Thanksgiving, well, this is not Thanksgiving Day. This is the National Day of Mourning. And it’s a National Day of Mourning because of how terrible the pilgrims were to the Native Americans and what they did to have a slaughter of Native Americans. And so we’ve seen a whole lot of articles and even professors pushing this narrative that this is not Thanksgiving Day, this is a Day of Mourning.

Tim:

Yeah, guys, and one of the things that is interesting looking at kind of the big picture of America now as we’re coming up on Thanksgiving, one of the obvious attacks that is happening in culture is pretty much anybody that used to be celebrated, anybody that used to be viewed as honorable or heroic or courageous, largely speaking is now falling in the camp or category of people saying wait a second.

Those are not people worthy of honor. Those are not people worthy of celebration. And certainly, guys, as we study history, there are some people we can look at where traditionally, maybe they have been honored and they have been celebrated and we can look back going you know what, that person really was not that honorable of a person or that person really should not be celebrated as much as they have.

We would say this of like a Woodrow Wilson, right? He’s a guy certainly not really that great of a person, should not be honored and celebrated the way that he has been in many circles for many years in a lot of the progressive movement. We could look back at and actually, it might be an interesting segment one day to say okay, who is your least favorite president, right? Which President do you despise the most, do you dislike the most?

Because you go through some Andrew Jackson kind of names that there’s definitely some people that you look at them and even though Andrew Jackson is a guy who had a lot of issues and a lot of problems. Andrew Jackson still had some moments that were very honorable, celebrated. Go back to the war of 1812, the Creek and Indian War.

The Good and the Bad

There certainly were some moments when Andrew Jackson was a hero and leader in preserving life and helping America be successful, etc. So with that being said, when he gets into presidential power leadership, really, really bad guy. Now, all that given context, they’re certainly some people…

Rick:

Now, wait Tim, is it too soon to say Kamala Harris worst president, is it too soon? We haven’t given her a chance yet anyway.

Tim:

Well, yeah, we don’t have a crystal ball in front of us. And actually, even if I did, as Christian, I don’t do that.

Rick:

But just based on her policies?

Tim:

Right. I don’t use a crystal ball, so I don’t know about that either. But, yeah, based on the expectation of what she is promoting, and what she says she stands for, and how she wants to radically change America, if her policies are implemented, there is no doubt she is going to be the champion for worst president up to this point in American history.

So yeah, that would be a valid thought. And I know many of you are going no wait a second, no, no, Joe Biden was the leader on the Democrat side on that ticket. But if Joe Biden becomes president, if you think he actually would remain president for all four years, you have misunderstood the whole scenario.

Kamala Harris

You don’t know Kamala Harris. Because she’s been pretty greedy for power all along the way. Go back and study what she did who she was in California, her rise to power, how she threw people under the bus after she achieved the position she wanted to certainly, yeah, the policy of Kamala Harris certainly would not be good and honorable.

Now, again, all that being said, is context, that there are people in American history, who we would agree are not people that should be honored in all respects, people who did some really bad things, and we should be honest about saying they did really bad things. When you look at the pilgrims, though, if you’re going to make a list of the worst groups of people in American history, you know who’s not going to be on that list?

The Pilgrims: because the pilgrims were honestly one of the most honorable and virtuous peoples ever to have lived in America. It’s just today, most people don’t know their story, which is why, dad, as you mentioned, there are articles, and there are professors, and there’s all these blog posts out there, talking about how bad the pilgrims were and how we shouldn’t celebrate Thanksgiving. This instead should be a national Day of Mourning that only can be articulated and argued when people don’t actually know the story of the pilgrims.

Rick:

Alright, hold that thought, Tim, we’re going to be right back, we got a quick break. We’re talking about the pilgrims. Because guess what, it’s Thanksgiving week, hope you’re going to have a fantastic gathering with your family. We’ll be right back. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

Biographical Sketches

Hi, friends, this is Tim Barton of WallBuilders. This is a time when most Americans don’t know much about American history or even heroes of the faith. And I know oftentimes for parents, we’re trying to find good content for our kids to read.

And if you remember back to the Bible, to the book of Hebrews, it has the faith Hall of Fame where they outline the leaders of faith that had gone before them. Well, this is something that as Americans, we really want to go back and outline some of these heroes, not just of American history, but heroes of Christianity in our faith as well.

I want to let you know about some biographical sketches we have available on our website. One is called The Courageous Leaders collection. And this collection includes people like Abigail Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Francis Scott Key, George Washington Carver, Susanna Wesley, even the Wright brothers. And there’s a second collection called Heroes of History.

In this collection, you’ll read about people like Benjamin Franklin or Christopher Columbus, Daniel Boone, George Washington, Harriet Tubman, friends, the list goes on and on. This is a great collection for your young person to have and read and it’s a providential view of American and Christian history. This is available at www.wallbuilders.com. That’s www.wallbuilders.com.

Rick:

We’re back here on WallBuilders live. Thanks for staying with us on this Tuesday, Thanksgiving just two days away, so we’ve been talking about the pilgrims. Tim, you were saying, you know, of course, there are a lot of history books and colleges talking about how evil they were and how bad they were. You’re saying, look, these were some of the most purest attempts to live holy, ever attempted in history. And we should actually be looking at some of the things they did right.

The Dark Ages

David:

Well, what you guys are talking about. Let me just take that for a second. Because, Tim, even before the break, you mentioned the way that people are looking at the pilgrims today. It’s significant to me that no generation in the last 200 years has looked at the pilgrims the way that they’re being looked at today.

And it could be that maybe we’ve discovered new evidence. Well, that’s not it. We haven’t found any new writings of the pilgrims that shows them to be different. It’s just that today, people generally don’t know who they are or what they did. And since we don’t teach them anymore, since we don’t cover them, we can now say anything we want to about it.

The claims that are being made today, if you would have said those 20 years ago, you’d been shouted down by people from both sides because everybody knew that was crazy. We don’t know that anymore. So going back and looking at where they start from and where it comes from, that’s really significant. So let’s take the pilgrims back.

They lived a time in world history that was really called the Dark Ages. They were the last part of the Dark Ages. And it’s called the Dark Ages because people didn’t have much knowledge on anything, illiteracy was really high. People could not read, and because they couldn’t, they were subject to what their leaders told them. And so if their leaders told them do this, whether it’s their leaders in church or in state, they didn’t know any better.

I mean, one of the logic, things that was done back then for illiterate people was they said, hey, you guys do realize that Jesus was killed by the Jews. So if you want to make Jesus happy, go kill a Jew. Well, that’s some of the nonsense that happened back in the time, like in the Rhine Valley, there were a lot of Christians who killed Jews, because that’s what they were told.

Well, that’s not even good theology. They don’t know theology, but Jesus died for sins. It wasn’t the Jews, they killed Jesus. It was sins that killed Jesus, and the sins of all people. But nonetheless, if you can’t read the Bible, you don’t know that.

The Reformation

So what happens is, there’s this back to the Bible movement that starts and it’s now called the Reformation. And the pilgrims were some of the really early people in that from the English side. They got back into the English Bible. And as they did this, oh, my goodness, so many things we’re doing today, that’s not biblical.

I mean, we have the head of the state that’s claiming to be the head of the church. And so the pilgrim’s Pastor, John Greenwood actually said, you know, according to the Bible, the head of the church is Jesus Christ. Okay, who’s going to disagree with that today? But for making that statement back then, Queen Elizabeth said, no, no, no, I am the head of the church. And he lost his life for saying that Jesus Christ was head of the church.

Tim:

Well, and maybe a little more detail to, he said, the head of the church is not the queen, but Christ. So maybe if he left her out, it’s not quite as inflammatory. But certainly, right back in those days, I’m saying back in those days, I think actually, even arguably, today, the Queen of England is still the head of the Church of England. I think that’s still part of the procession in the line.

David:

It is. Officially, she’s the head of the church.

Tim:

So that’s something that has not changed historically. But yeah, you back up several hundred years, and one of the things that led to part of the Reformation is there were so many kings who were beginning to enact doctrine and theology, and they were beginning to enforce things related to doctrine, theology. And as you had some of these different Catholic monks and priests, and people were studying the Word of God.

Reformers

They were seeing what the Bible said, and they were hearing what the king was saying. The king was arguing, saying this in the name of God, and they were saying, wait a second. But, that’s not what the Bible actually says. And, this is part of what led to the Reformation known as the Protestant Reformation.

And these reformers were pointing out a lot of things that the religious leaders of the church, which oftentimes were the government officials leading the church. What they were saying wasn’t biblical. And so, this is where John Greenwood was looking at the Queen and the Queen saying, the Church of England will do this. And he said, okay, you’re not the head of the church, Jesus is the head of the church. But for saying she wasn’t, not only was he sentenced to death, one of the things that came out afterwards from the Queen, was a decree for all the other people saying that if anyone questions the Queen’s ecclesiastical supremacy, they shall be committed to prison without bail.

So if anybody else had the audacity to say the Queen could not determine and enforce theology, meaning the Queen was able to make everybody do what she thought they should do, based on whatever she created, or whatever kind of religious leader told her she ought to do. She was able to enforce that on everybody. And, if anybody told her she was wrong, they’d be thrown in prison and there was no bail for that.

There was no coming out of prison if you oppose the queen. Well, this is what John Greenwood had initially done that led to this statement, and John Greenwood ends up getting executed for opposing the Queen. And there was at this point, the pilgrims are now realizing on a more realistic level that this might not be the best place for us to continue on and raising our families, we might need to find somewhere else to go. And this is where they start looking for somewhere else to go.

Rick:

Alright, quick break, guys. We’ll find out where they decided to go. Stay with us. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

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Our core program is still for young leaders 16 to 25 years old, but we also now have a citizen track for adult, so visit the website today to learn more. Help us fill the void of leadership in America. Join us in training champions to change the world at patriotacademy.com

Rick:

We’re back here on WallBuilders live. Thanks for staying with us on this Tuesday, Thanksgiving coming up just in two days. Guys, we’re talking about the beginning of how Thanksgiving started here in America and you left us off with the pilgrims were looking for somewhere to go.

David:

Well, as they were looking for somewhere to go Holland looked very appealing to them, because Holland had religious toleration. Holland was not going to persecute them for the religious views. And so they went to Holland, and there they got involved in businesses and they were contributing members of the community, some of them were in all types of business, but they were printing and doing other things as well.

Who Were the Pilgrims?

And so while they’re there, they’re printing their beliefs as pilgrims. Here’s what we believe. Here’s what the Bible says. And by the way, they take the word, Pilgrims, that comes later, at this time, they’re just dissenters. We just disagree with the Queen being the only one that can tell us theology. We think Jesus tells us theology in the Bible, not the Queen, so they dissented. They became known as Pilgrims later after they set sail based on a Bible verse in First Timothy, but we’ll get that later.

So here they are in Holland, and in Holland, they’re trying to explain their views. So they’re printing pieces about what they believe and showing people in Holland: here’s who we are. Here’s what we believe.

And they were good contributing members of the community. But one of the pieces they printed was, here’s why we think it’s wrong for the Queen and the king to be able to tell us what our religious beliefs are, we have the Bible. Well, that so infuriated the people in England that they actually put pressure on Holland said, you get rid of these people, you send them back to here, so we can deal with them, or we’re not going to have good relations with you.

So the Holland officials actually went in and broke up the printing press of the Pilgrims and tried to silence them, even though they generally allowed religious dissent. They have a pressure of England really kind of change that. And so now the Pilgrims are what do we do? And they’re looking around and Holland is tolerant, but it’s also very secular.

And they’re saying, look, we don’t want our kids raised in secular schools, and in secular viewpoint, I mean, we’re working really hard to find out what the Bible says and live that way and we don’t want our kids growing up the opposite. So now, they have a reason to leave Holland because the officials are after them, the British are coming there to get them, and their kids need to be raised in different systems, so they start looking elsewhere.

One of the Crazy Things…

Tim:

Yeah, and this is one of the crazy things when you look at the story of the Pilgrims, and you get a lot more context. The notion of why they came to America by and large above and beyond anything else, was they were looking for religious freedom. They wanted a place where they could come and not only have the freedom to believe what they want to believe, but more specifically the freedom to implement the Bible in their daily life.

These were the people–when you look historically throughout America, the Pilgrims are the people who arguably were trying more than any other people group and any other colony and any other state, however, we wanted to define these geographic boundaries in this people group. They were the ones trying the hardest to follow what the Bible said. And we’ll actually probably spend some time over the next day or two going through how they use the Bible and implemented things that fundamentally changed forever the way the course of America was going to operate.

Because when the Pilgrims come, they’re not initially looking for Plymouth, they’re not looking for their own place, per se. They’re going to Jamestown, which is what they had the approval from the king. They actually arrive in Jamestown, and they could set up and they can function as a community in Jamestown…

David:

And by the way, the approval of the king was not because he agreed with what they were, it’s like if you guys will go away and get away from me so you don’t create any more problems for me, because if you go to America, there’s nobody there to listen to you. So if you’ll get away from me, I’ll leave you alone and stop hounding you, just get the heck out of town.

Jamestown

Tim:

But even in Jamestown, they would have had to deal with Anglican-appointed officials of the Church of England, which was what Jamestown was part of. And so there would have been pushed back. And it’s just this amazing providential thing that is they’re leaving to come to find a place where they can raise their kids and they can teach their kids biblical values, they can implement those principles, God divinely blows them off course from Jamestown, and they tried multiple times to correct course, to sail down the coast and winds kept blowing them north. And finally, they realized we’re going to have to go somewhere else. We’re going to have to start our own community.

And looking back now, we can certainly acknowledge the providence of God, that kind of this notion we learned from scripture that a man makes his ways but the Lord directs his steps. They had a plan and they were trying to follow the plan, but God redirected their course. And even the same thing we learned from scripture that God can cause all things to work together for good for those that love him, are called according to his purpose.

If they did not arrive where they wanted to, they could have thought this is the worst thing ever, this is devastating, we don’t have what we need. And yet God used them being blown off course to have to go and start their own colony as one of the greatest blessings that ever happened to America. And we’ll spend some time over the next couple of days getting into the blessings that we enjoy in America that have their specific links back to the Pilgrims.

Thanksgiving And The Legal Battles – As 2020 Continues:

David:

When you study the Pilgrims and learn about them their character, the more you know about them, the easier it is to kind of laugh at the claim that these are bad folks and this needs to be a Day of Mourning. I mean, having this background and context completely shifts the narrative and how you can respond to it and what you can do with it.

Rick:

Alright, guys, looking forward to a couple more days of Thanksgiving history. Make sure that you’re having a good plan for Thanksgiving this year to spend time with your family and get educated on this. What a great thing to do on Thanksgiving. Listen to WallBuilders Live from this week and you’ll learn more about this great history.

At wallbuilderslive.com, you can get archives of the program from the last few weeks and that’s also the place you can make a contribution. Our culture needs truth and you can be a part of spreading that truth. You can be a force multiplier. Every dollar you donate there at wallbuilderslive.com gives us an opportunity to spread that truth across the nation and get more citizens involved, knowing their history, knowing the Constitution, knowing a biblical perspective for how to influence the culture in a positive way and then taking the action steps necessary to save our constitutional republic.

Thanks for joining us there. Thanks for listening today. You’ve been listening to WallBuilders Live.