American Family Radio features Jenna Ellis in the morning on American Family Radio
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: in the morning on American Family Radio. I love talking about the things of God because of truth and the biblical worldview. The U.S. constitution obligates our government to preserve and protect the rights that our founders recognize come from God our creator, not our government. I believe that scripture in the Bible is very clear that God is the one that raised up each of you and God has allowed us to be brought here to this specific moment in time.
: This is Jenna Ellis in the Morning. Morning.
Jenna Ellis: Good morning. It is Monday, July 27 and a lot of news we will cover this hour including the Democrats latest legislation push to change and modify the US Supreme Court because they're so sick of it being run by conservatives. Which is kind of funny because we're all sick of the conservative side is sick of conservatives not acting like conservatives. but more on that in a bit as well as the NewSong Jersey voter rolls, that we'll get to later this hour that show illegals apparently actually on the voter rolls. It's quite ridiculous.
College professor embeds white text into take home assignment to catch AI cheating
But first there was a viral video, that made its way online this weekend that discusses the use of AI in the classroom. And this particular college professor, went viral after revealing that he had secretly embedded white text into a take home assignment to, to catch students relying on AI. And although the video itself that the professor showed what he did, didn't specifically say that he had indicated the students should not use AI. I'm assuming that that was discussed in the classroom. So what he did, if you have a traditional background on, you know, your Microsoft Word or if the students would log on, they would see this prompt on a white background with black text text. And so he put a line of text in white font so that it would be unreadable just by the naked eye as you're scrolling through as the student. But if you simply copy and paste it, obviously that text is also included in the prompt. And then if students would dump that into AI, then what he did was say okay, for this prompt response, the white text told AI to include the term Madagascar, at least once, if not multiple times throughout the assignment in a way that makes absolutely no sense. So then as he's grading this, if the word Madagascar appears in a way that makes no sense in the context of the paper, he knows that the students not only used AI because they wouldn't think of that themselves, hopefully. Hopefully anyways. And he would know that they didn't even proofread their papers. So according to the professor, out of 35 students, 32 of them failed the assignment, which has now sparked a, continuing debate online whether the tactic was a clever way to protect academic integrity or an unfair gotcha designed to trap students. Now I'm of the opinion it was a clever tactic because the professor was not trying necessarily to trap them. He was simply trying to see whether or not they would follow his instructions. I mean, similarly to the software that catches plagiarism, for example. So when I was a college professor, back in my Colorado Christian University days, I had started, teaching online and then of course moved, to in person, in the classroom. But one of my students, during an assignment that we had, that was a paper response question, out of all the students, you're required as a professor to put it through this plagiarism software. And one of my students, it came back that like over 90%, of the paper was plagiarized. And so I had to report that and say that's what's indicated. That doesn't necessarily mean, you know, that, that the student can't otherwise, talk about it or what happened. But we were required to report that. That's not entrapment of the student. That's simply using the tools available to say, is the student actually doing the work themselves or are they cheating, going against the instructions? We're all used to closed book exams or math classes where you can or you can't use a calculator. When I sat for the bar exam, it was closed book. We had to know the rules, not just look at our outlines and then spit out a response. So in my opinion the professor was really clever and smart to put this type of prompt in. But it raises the question, I don't think it's more about, academic integrity versus an unfair gotcha designed to trap a student, but rather what education is really for. And the topic here isn't even, in my opinion, about AI. This is all about ensuring that students actually learn and they can use the tools that are available in a way that doesn't undermine the actual skill set that students are trained for. Because we, and I've even used this example repeatedly on air. I mean, we used to have a time when calculators were brand new and weren't allowed to be used in the classroom. I mean, my parents talk about that all the time. my mom and I actually last night were talking about, when she was in high school. And when the workers at fast food restaurants, instead of just punching in, you know, the Whopper or the Big Mac, they actually had to do long form math in front of the customer, figure out the total, and then make the change right there at the point of purchase. And now it is so bad that one of the, Gen Z, friends that I'm aware of, it's a friend of a friend, who was, who got a job in merchandising, at a store, literally had to go back to their parents and ask how to make change from cash. Because as a, I think college student at the time literally didn't even know the denominations of cash. As a, probably at the time, I'm guessing around 22 years old. And this is where the system has failed because calculators and computing, all of that is obviously a great advancement because it can shorthand what, and take so much less time what the person accomplishing the task should already know. And so the purpose of education is not to just produce students who can regurgitate something that they learned in a class and then forget it after the exam, which is actually a lot of the education system right now. But it should produce graduates from both the high school and college levels who actually know how to think. Because AI and Google can retrieve facts way quicker than any of us can looking up a book or trying to figure it out ourselves. Right? just like a calculator can produce the solutions to complex math faster than we can, Google can return search results faster than we ever could. And so the real issue here isn't about technology. And I don't think that this professor's point or what the object of the lesson was, was that we should totally ban AI, just like we shouldn't totally ban calculators or Google or laptops. I mean, these are things that students will be able to use in their professions. I mean, I use AI, I mean mostly to, you know, generate some, some fun, things that I post on my dog's Instagram. But, but there are things that, when you can synthesize something, like say, for example, you know, take these five articles and give me the main Point, right. That AI can do that a lot quicker than we can. But the point is not that AI should be producing our opinions in questions, or essay questions when we ourselves don't even know the content or the opinion that we hold. So the analysis here is what's suffering? Because if you used an AI prompt, for example, and said, okay, here's my opinion on this topic. Here's all of my notes. Can you synthesize all of my notes from class into an outline? that would take a lot less time in AI than it would take for me to go back and redraft all of my notes. But I was the one who originally took the notes, understand what's in them, and have learned the substance of the class. So do you see the distinction? So I don't think that the concern here so much is that we shouldn't teach students, to ever use AI or say that somehow this is bad technology and completely say, you know, we're removing this from the classroom. We're forbidding students to use it, just like forbidding them to use calculators or laptops. But if AI skips where students are called to write, to identify weak arguments, to recognize contradictions, to wrestle with difficult ideas, to understand how to write, to have a grammatical, correct sentence, to be able to spell, I mean, some of these things are actually being lost actively due to the rise of AI actually writing, some of the essays for students. So in that sense, no, we can't skip over those things just because we have a tool of AI Just like I wouldn't want someone who's, you know, the engineer of an airplane or of a building to skip over basic math just because now they possess a calculator. So thinking is like a muscle, and critical thinking works exactly like a muscle. And if someone lifted the weights for you every day, you wouldn't become stronger. You would just be using that tool. But it's not actually benefiting the ultimate goal. So I think that with all of this rise of technology, we need to examine what we're actually educating students for, and we need to require them to actually go through the struggle, the mental struggle, and the understanding of unlocking those skill sets for themselves and then figure out how to use this technology in a way that is ultimately productive in their various industries. And we can change the metric or the methodology of the way that we test.
Jenna Ellis: Artificial intelligence should be used in the classroom, not against it
There was another professor, who was online who said, here's what I told my students, to do. And I don't know what the subject of the class actually was. But what she told her students to do is here is the prompt, go put that prompt through AI and whichever AI of your preference and then see what it generates, and then take what it generates and compare that, to an actual essay that then she provided to them and say, here are all of the enlist all of the ways that artificial intelligence actually got this wrong. Like some of the footnotes were incorrect or some of the references were simply made up. I mean, we've seen that even in the legal industry, for example, which is just wild to me, that that lawyers would actually use AI and then not go back and check the references. I mean, yeah, go use Google, go. I mean we have all of these, wonderful tools that are available that are available, like Westlaw, for example. that was on the rise when I was in law school. We still had to go in our research and writing class and actually figure out how to go and look up citations for cases in the actual physical books in a law library. We had to learn how to do that. Then they taught us how to use Westlaw. And so that was the whole point was to say, okay, here's how you track and you figure out how to, how to use this tool. And it's so much easier to sit at your laptop because you have the entire library literally on your lap. But you have to understand how to use the tool and then go back and cross reference and make sure that the case that you're actually providing to the court as precedent says what you are arguing that it says credibly. Right. And so many lawyers don't even check their citations, they just run it through AI and then they submit their briefs. There have been a lot of lawyers who are caught like that. And it's not that the court is trying to manipulate them or, you know, catch them in the act. And this is a gotcha moment. It's simply that the tool available is not being checked and it's being used in a way to substitute for actual analysis. And so I think that we just need to figure out as a society, well, first get a lot better at actually educating our students on critical thinking and analysis and skill sets and ensuring that they understand that the opportunity to, to sit in the classroom is the opportunity to ah, earn your grade and earn an A, or you can earn a failing grade. It's not the opportunity, when you are sitting in the chair in class, you're then not entitled to a passing grade. We have to bring all of that back and actually educate. But then we have to use the tools available and teach students how to have the complete skill set themselves and, and then be able to supplement that and not have all of these other tasks in their actual occupations take so much time because then they can utilize the tools that technology provides. I think AI is great, and I think that it is overall a huge upside. It's an incredible tool. It would be like, you know, teaching students and some people saying, oh, the calculator, no, no, this is going to change everything, and it's terrible. Well, nobody argues that anymore. Right? AI has to be regulated, though, and it has to also be used, especially in the classroom, in a way that doesn't undermine the education and the analytical and the critical thinking, actual skill sets that students need to use. All right. Well, we will be right back with more here on Jenna Ellis in the morning.
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Several Democrats are introducing a bill establishing 18 year term limits for Supreme Court justices
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. Well, several Democrats are introducing a bill establishing 18 year term limits for Supreme Court justices. So, this came from Sheldon Whitehouse, who is a Democrat senator for Rhode island. And it's called the Supreme Court, a biennial appointments and term limits act to ensure that new justices take the bench every two years and establishes, 18 year terms in which justices participate in the Court's full docket of cases. So beyond the fact that, this, this actually would take a constitutional amendment because Section 1 of Article 3 already says that, the judges shall hold their offices during a term of good behavior. So, they have lifetime appointments right now. And changing that, would require A constitutional amendment. The question itself of whether this is a good idea is what I want to focus on. because even though this was introduced by Democrats, Republicans have had some similar ideas about modifying the Supreme Court, expanding, perhaps even the Supreme Court, not necessarily packing it, but expanding it, and then having, kind of this, this rotation so that you get more justices on the court and there's less of a power center in these nine oligarchs. So let's welcome in Mike Donnelly, who is an attorney and, also a professor as well. And so, Mike, you know, this. This to me is kind of just a theoretical, observation at this point and, you know, sort of theoretical exercise to talk about it. But substantively, just because this is Democrats introducing this, I don't necessarily fully object to the premise that we need to, as a society, question whether the lifetime appointments of federal judges, and Supreme Court judges in particular, is still a good idea. What do you think?
Mike Donnelly: Oh, Jenna, good morning. Good morning to you and everyone listening. great day, and, always fun to talk about Article 3 of the Constitution and the power of judges. If anyone's listened to us talking, about this subject before, they've heard me decry the power of the federal government and how powerful the federal government is and, how powerful the Supreme Court of the United States is. And I always point to several cases, you know, Obergefell, where the court invalidated, allegedly invalidated, the constitutional acts of 31 states and the people in those states defining marriage as being between a man and a woman. And you never heard Sheldon Whitehouse, complain about that. In fact, what you heard from Sheldon Whitehouse was, this is the best thing since sliced bread. You know, you heard people like Senator Leahy from Vermont, then Senator from Vermont, saying that the federal judiciary is the crown jewel, of our federal system. You heard liberals and Democrats over decades upholding abortion rights and homosexual, laws over decades, saying, oh, this is the court. The court is doing, you know, great work preserving democracy, now that a few cases have gone, you know, not the way they want them, now they want to talk about, oh, now we have to reform the Supreme Court. Of course, as you pointed out for decades before that people, you know, Republicans and conservatives, people like Mark Levin, arch conservative, you know, decried the court, and it's overreaching, you know, decisions like Obergefell, for example. I don't know if Mark actually talked about Obergefell, but decisions like that, saying that the Court has gone beyond its constitutional boundaries. So there's a lot to talk about, when it comes to the Supreme Court of the United States. And this is a subject I love to talk about. this law actually does not do what that headline says. It does not establish term limits. It's a vert grade of, attempt to add more justices to the court and restrain the jurisdiction of the court. And it actually, from my analysis, adheres to the Article three, requirements, which, gives Congress a lot of authority over the Supreme Court as to both sides. And here's the money quote from Article 3, Section 2, regarding jurisdiction. It gives two kinds of jurisdiction to the court. It gives original jurisdiction to the Supreme Court, which are two cases affecting ambassadors, public ministers, and where the state itself is a party. You know, if NewSong Jersey sues New, York, for example, the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction. But then the next phrase it says in all other cases before mentioned, referring back to cases, in Section two, where it talks about all the cases that can come before the Supreme Court. And it says the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the Congress shall make. So Congress has a lot of authority when it comes to creating exceptions and regulations for the Court. And that's what this law would do is it would add justices every two years. And it would say that only the most recent nine appointed justices would have appellate jurisdiction. And the other, all the other judges would have original jurisdiction and they would stay on the court and they would sit for, original jurisdiction cases. So it's a very interesting, law, you know, and when you read, who is in support of this law, it's the laundry list of all the left organizations because they're losing and they're upset about it. But that doesn't mean it's a terrible idea. And so I think it's something we should talk about. I have often said the court is too small. it's a lot of work for the court. If we had more judges, we could probably do more work. Is this the right way to do it? I'm not sure. I need to think about it a little bit more. But that's kind of what's going on here with this case.
Jenna Ellis: That's really fascinating. Yeah. And to have kind of that split in jurisdictional, purview for, some justices over the others. And I mean, I still am questioning just based on. And obviously, yeah, the headline doesn't give the full story of exactly how they're trying to divide this, but I'm still skeptical that that would actually pass, Article three, because any of the judges that are, that are Article 3 judges have, have lifetime appointments or for a term of good behavior. And so if the court is essentially trying to appoint magistrates to the Supreme Court instead of judges that are, you know, hired and only for a term, and then, they don't go through the entire, confirmation process and all that, that a regular judge would. And you know, counties, of course, do that all the time. And you are entitled on the trial level, just for listeners to know, you would have to consent to a magistrate. And the difference is that they're hired by the county, or the jurisdiction versus a judge that has gone through the full, appointment and process in, you know, in the state. And so if, if they're essentially trying to add magistrates to the court, there's not a prohibition necessarily in Section one, but there is a, a guarantee essentially, at least in the way that I read it, that the judges, and the judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity, including original jurisdiction. So wouldn't that deny the jurisdiction that Article 3 provides?
Mike Donnelly: Well, it's interesting question, Jenna. I think, you know, the way they're not talking about adding magistrates, these would be full justices. And what they're doing is just differentiating between original jurisdiction, which justices have authority over original jurisdiction cases, and more so exercising congressional authority with such exceptions and under such regulations as it relates to the appellate jurisdiction, which seems to me, very clear that Congress has the authority to do that under the Constitution, to create exceptions and make regulations. And it's a very broad power. So I think they can, I think they can get away with what they're doing here. And the way they get around sort of the term limits issue is they say, you know, as long as there are nine justices on the court who have the authority to, you know, hear, you know, the appellate jurisdiction cases, then they, then the president won't appoint any new justices. So basically it's a way of refreshing the court, you know, making sure that you've got newer justices on there and nobody ever leaves that can all sit for the original jurisdiction cases until they retire. But it kind of limits their authority 90% of the cases. Even more of the cases that come before the court, which is the problem in my opinion, are appellate jurisdiction cases, appeals from the federal courts, appeals from state supreme courts, and I don't necessarily have an issue with the Supreme Court of the United States, exercising appellate jurisdiction over state courts as it relates to federal questions and questions under the Constitution. My main issue is, you know, invalidating state laws using substantive due process in the 14th amendment, which is another doctrine which this law does not address. But you know, the fact that we, the Republicans and conservatives have complained about the Court in decades past and now the Democrats are complaining about it, there's a little bit of this sort of hypocrisy. I think that we need to be careful of and not be hasty in how we deal with this issue. But I do think it is an important question for us to discuss and whether it's in a Constitutional convention where we make some real reforms to the Court, where maybe we actually impose term limits with a constitutional amendment, or if Congress takes some action through legislation exercising its power under Article 3, you know, the exceptions, and regulations clause. I think this is an important conversation for us to have as a country.
Jenna Ellis: Absolutely. And this is why, you know, we started this segment saying just because this is Democrats introducing this doesn't mean that we automatically need to reject the idea of judicial reform, because conservatives have been pushing that for decades. And so whether this is the right vehicle and way to do that and resolution and solution, all of that can be debated. But the point is it should be debated. And so this is a really interesting question. And you know, but going back to the whole term limit, issue, I mean essentially like, obviously they're, they're not saying that they're hiring magistrates, but they are suggesting that they're putting on full justices that would have term limits. Where the language of Article 3 says if you are a federal judge, not even just a justice, but a federal judge, you have your term limit under the text of Article 3 is a lifetime appointment. And so if they are trying to establish 18 year term limits, that necessarily creates a different class of judges. And so I'm not sure how they would get around that constitutionally, even if they're trying to in some way bifurcate the jurisdictional elements, which, which I agree under, you know, the, the way that the language is, Congress does have regulatory authority. And so, so this is just a really interesting way that that they're trying to do this. But overall, how have conservatives, at least under, for example the Convention of States Project, there have been a few different ways, like our good friend Micah Ferris has talked about, having a constitutional amendment for judicial reform that would change the term limits, specifically and would add basically a rotating judge appointed by each of the states kind of take that appointment authority outside of the president, to make it hopefully less political. And, I'm probably not articulating his exact, proposal as clearly as he would. so for those who object to this, go and read his actual argument. But essentially taking that authority away from, the president. And you'd have to do that through constitutional amendment. But that's a power that a convention or convening of state delegates would have on the subject of judicial reform, if we can get there.
Mike Donnelly: Too much power now is concentrated in the Supreme Court
And I think this is where these ideas need to be debated, because what we currently have is overall functioning, but I don't think it's working. And you can point to isolated cases and isolated matters and say, okay, well, this is great that we won because the original intent of the Constitution was preserved or stated sovereignty was preserved. But you can point to a lot of other examples where the Supreme Court has become a super legislature. And to point to those instances and say, this isn't working because too much power now is concentrated in the Supreme Court instead of actually the legislative branches in Congress and the states. And so hopefully this maybe signals at least that the Democrats are recognizing that. And if somehow, in maybe some alternative universe, the Democrats and the Republicans could at least agree that this current framework isn't working because of how much authority the Supreme Court has taken to itself that was never intended by the Constitution, we could actually get to a convening of the states and actually hash this out in real time in a convention that we could come up with a resolution. And so how do you, in your view, Mike, Donnelly, how would you suggest that, that this can be resolved and in a way that would allow for the Supreme Court to go back and perhaps more easily revisit some of the unconstitutional precedent that it's provided?
Mike Donnelly: Well, you've got, you know, justices on the Court like Clarence Thomas, calling for the Court to do that itself, to reform itself by divesting itself of power. that. He's only one. I think there are a few others on there who might be sympathetic to what he's saying, but they don't see a path because they're stuck in, you know, the power that they have and the desire to not move to precipitously, which would be jarring to the country. And it's not really the role of the Court to jar the country. you know, as you know, we talked about last week, Brutus 15, and how he pointed it out that the Court would become the highest power under heaven by case, by case. Over decades, little moves here and there become one of the most powerful institutions. And that is what happened, has happened. And now the Democrats recognize it because they're losing, which I just find hilarious, you know, and, you know, it's not like we're winning all the time. but you've seen a move of the court towards original, more originalist principles, which is really, I think, really good. you had it in Dobbs v. Women's Health, sending the issue of abortion back to the states, where it should have stayed forever from the beginning. And instead of Roe v. Wade in 1972, terrible decision. you know, but then in 2016, it took it up in Obergefell. you know, you saw the court ruling in, the overruling Chevron, in Loper Bright, saying, you know what? No, we're going to take away some of the power of the federal government. We're going to, you know, do some things here, but it's kind of nibbling around the edges. and I don't know that we can really look to the Court to reform itself. So I think that it's good that Congress is taking this up. I mean, this is an interesting proposal. you know, I'm not going to agree that this is the best way, just, you know, because Sheldon Whitehouse is the one who's proposing it. Although that's just enough reason for me to say, well, I'm not sure this is the right way to do it. But, I'm not sure. I've often thought that making the court bigger would help. How do you do it fairly? You know, because you don't want to just say, okay, we're going to give, you know, this Democrat president, four new justices. This legislation actually says we're going to appoint. it doesn't change the way judges are appointed. It says the president will in his first and third term or her first and third term. One of these days, we'll probably have a woman president, right? In the first and third year of a presidential term, appoint a judge up into a point where we have nine judges who can hear appellate cases, and it's the most recent nine, so the ones who were originally there will be ranked in order of recency. And you just keep going until you have at least nine that can hear appellate cases. And if you have those nine, then you don't add any more. So it's a very interesting approach to it, and I'm not going to say it's wrong and terrible, but I'm also not sure that, I've thought it through enough, because this was just introduced last week. So I think there's a lot of thinking to be done on this. But, I think there's something here to talk about.
Mike Donnelly: I think we should continue to talk about court reform
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, absolutely, but, and we're already out of time to talk about it. We got to take a break here. But I think we should continue to talk about it. And and absolutely you're right that just because, you know, this was introduced by a Democrat, you know, we should have a huge grain of salt that comes along with this. But I think opening the discussion to say, okay, how should we reform the court? And does this type of idea make sense? Is it fundamentally fair? is it constitutional? Can they do this with legislation, rather than a constitutional amendment? I mean, all of these things are things that we should debate and not simply say, oh, the Democrats want to do something, so therefore it's wrong. That's taking a party approach rather than an ideology and an idea approach and actually giving this kind of a fair analysis and saying, perhaps it's the right, idea overall, but we need to just make it ultimately, better and a little more conservative overall. But we'll see how Congress ultimately responds to it. Fascinating. Mike Donnelly, follow him at. Donnelly speaks on X. We'll be right back with more
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New Jersey governor says software error allowed 6,000 non citizen voter registrations
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. Well, the NewSong Jersey governor has admitted that a quote unquote software error has allowed over 6,000 non citizen voter registrations in NewSong Jersey. And the head of the NewSong Jersey Republican Party claims there are many more non citizens that were illegally registered to vote between 2023 and 2024. Even then the 6600 reported by Democrat Governor Mikey. Sheryl. So the GOP, chairwoman on Sunday said that Cheryl's figure was, was just the tip of the iceberg in the emerging scandal. So for more on this, let's welcome in Hans von Sparovsky who is the senior legal fellow at Advancing American Freedom. And this is unsurprising, obviously, because if we're not going to require proof of citizenship, then we're basically taking the word of, the individual voters who check the box, citizen versus non citizen, rather than having some sort of actual proof. So is this story though, and this revelation ultimately going to be helpful in the overall battle for election integrity?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, it is, Jenna, helpful in the fact that, you know, all those, particularly in Washington Democratic leadership opposed to the SAVE act, which is stuck in the Senate required for position, keep saying, well, there's just not a problem. You know, there's no problem with aliens registering and voting. And look, a key thing to remember in this NewSong Jersey story that folks keep missing, is that, these actually were honest aliens. When they were asked whether they were a US Citizen or not, they checked, no, I am not a US Citizen, but NewSong Jersey registered them to vote anyway. And what that means is, what we don't know is, well, how many more aliens are there who actually answered, yes, I am a United States citizen and got registered and are still registered to vote in this state? We don't know.
Jenna Ellis: right.
Hans Von Spakovsky: And the only way to try to fix that is to require proof of citizenship. But also, NewSong Jersey is one of the states that refuses to access the available Department of Homeland Security database to help verify citizenship. It's called the SAVE system. And, a lot of red states have actually started using it. NewSong Jersey refuses to do that.
Jenna Ellis: Well, which now that this has been uncovered, maybe there will be some political pressure on NewSong Jersey and also other states to actually use that. and, and the NewSong Jersey governor is blaming this on a software malfunction that went ahead and, you know, registered these honest illegals anyways, which is obviously a, ah, you know, little bit of an interesting perspective. But, but does this, does this particular, case in NewSong Jersey now what happens to those who, those 6600, I mean, are they planning to be removed from the voter rolls? Is there a follow up on this?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, NewSong Jersey says they're, taking off the rolls, but at the very same time that the NewSong Jersey governor, I think, at her press conference talking about how she's all for transparency, she's refusing to release, any information on these voters, and registered voters to the Department of Justice. Now we should remind everyone, it is a felony under federal law to register if you're an alien or to vote if you're an alien. And, you know, she's trying to downplay this, the governor is by saying, well, only 400 of these aliens voted well last year In NewSong Jersey, they had two local races that ended in a tie vote. They had another election, a third, decided by one vote. And in the last 10 years, they've had a dozen elections in NewSong Jersey decided by less than 10 votes. So her claim that this just doesn't matter is just not true.
Jenna Ellis: Well, and the question still remains is how much fraud is okay with her. You know, I mean, she may diminish the number of 400, but as you wisely point out, no, that is a, a critical number. And that could have the opportunity to shift the outcome of some elections in NewSong Jersey. but whether it's, you know, 400 or 4,000 or 40,000, that still matters because the overall process matters. And so the downplay of this is. Is basically that they're trying to say that this was just an isolated software failure, but I think it's evidence of a broader systemic weakness.
Hans Von Spakovsky: Oh, no, you're absolutely right. And by the way, we should point out that, the company, the software company that the governor is saying it's their fault. They've come out. They've been doing. They've been handling NewSong Jersey for decades. It's a company called Idemia. And Idemia said, no, no, no. the state had access to the data showing these individuals were not citizens, but the DMV and said election officials registered them anyway. The company says this has nothing to do with the software. This was the state of NewSong Jersey going ahead and registering these people anyway, despite knowing they were not U.S. citizens.
Jenna Ellis: Wow. And somehow I believe the company here, because that sounds exactly like what. What states have been doing. And so is this a problem that the SAVE act, if passed, would actually solve?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Yes, because, the SAFE act would require proof of citizenship. it gives the US Department of Justice the authority to enforce the law. So if a recalcitrant blue state like NewSong Jersey, I just refuse to do it. You know, refuse to require proof of citizenship. DOJ could go to court and get a court order forcing them to do it. Which, listen, it would be great if we can get the SAVE act passed, but I have no doubt it would take lawsuits by the Justice Department to force places like NewSong Jersey and particularly California to actually comply with the law.
Jenna Ellis: And isn't that wild? I mean, when you have that in place, it's, it's. The question is, why wouldn't they comply? And why would they, if. If this allegation is accurate, that these election officials knew and they went ahead and registered these, illegals anyway? the question then Remains is why would they possibly be doing this against even their own current state law?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, I'll tell you, if you talk to any political consultant, they will tell you quietly, behind the scenes, a fact that is known to everybody in the business. And it's simply this, the higher the number of citizens in a particular political district, the greater the probability they'll elect a Republican. The higher the number of aliens in a district, the greater the probability a Democrat will get elected. they won't admit this publicly, but they want aliens registering and voting and getting away with it because they think it will help them, stay in power and get elected. I mean, that. That's the plain reason for it.
Jenna Ellis: And that makes sense, because if it were the opposite, in fact, and there was a higher probability of a Republican being elected in a district that was highly populated with illegals, you would see Democrats closing the border, building a wall, you know, up to the moon. They would be the ones fighting against this. And so unless there were some advantage to them or multiple, or on multiple fronts, then they wouldn't be pushing so hard against some of these common sense measures. And, you know, President Trump made, an address from the Oval Office a couple of weeks ago, and really the point of it, of course, was to push for the SAVE Act. And it is incredibly frustrating that the Senate, under Jon Thune's leadership, refuses to eliminate the filibuster to simply get this passed. if they were to go ahead and eliminate the filibuster, do you think that as it currently stands, they would have the votes, with perhaps, Vice President Vance's tiebreaker even?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, maybe. But, you know, we're facing the problem that, Lisa Murkowski is staunchly against the SAVE Act. the outgoing North Carolina senator is staunchly against it. Mitch McConnell previously voted against it, but as you know, he's still in the hospital. He hasn't been there for votes. And Sarah Collins, she has voted against it in the past. He's given indications now she might approve it, but as you know, she's in a. She's in a big fight to retain her seat in Maine. So.
Hans Von Spakovsky: So I don't know,
Jenna Ellis: which is just incredibly sad. And this is where primaries matter and, who we elect. And so this may be the. The point of the whole thing is that, TH isn't willing to have the PR battle and the. The overall political battle of eliminating the filibuster just to have this fail anyway. I mean, he would need to know that he has the votes before going and doing something like that. But, absent the SAVE act passing, which, you know, I think is just a disaster for the GOP and, and a real indication that we're not all actually on the same team, what other potential options are there for Congress to at least get a few of the, of the provisions?
Hans von Spakovsky: Congress should pass state election integrity measures
I mean, voter ID and you know, citizenship, proof of citizenship are kind of the big ones. But what are some other, ways that Congress, could implement election integrity measures absent in the passing the full SAVE Act?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, literally that's difficult because as you know, the states are pretty much responsible for most, election administration. What I actually have recommended to state legislators, although you and I both know it's only going to happen in red states, is that they should pass their own state version of a SAVE act, they could then apply the proof of citizenship requirement to state elections. They can't, apply it to federal elections. But even just doing that, would be a big help. It would be a partial remedy, not a full remedy, which is what the SAVE act in Congress would do. But passing their own version of that, would be a big help. And yeah, they can't get it done before this November election unless they called it a special session. But you know, most state legislators are in session for the first three months of each year. So in 2027, passing a state version of the SAVE act would, they could do that in time for the 2028 presidential election.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and it's, it's really unfortunate that more states didn't do this ahead of the midterms. So looking ahead to the 2026 midterms, where should the GOP be focused in terms of, what election officials are to prepare? Because there's been a lot of questions about election integrity in the midterms as well.
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, they should be doing everything they can to, use the federal database at the Department of Homeland Security, the SAVE database. The Trump administration really improved it. the Biden administration did everything they could to prevent states from using it. the Trump administration came in and not only made it free to use to states to check their voter list, but they changed it software wise to allow basically bulk comparisons. It used to be you could only check one name at a time. And the Trump folks at dhs, changed the software so that states can upload large numbers of registered voters and check their citizenship status against the DHS database. As I said, a number of states are doing that. Florida for example, and they are finding aliens on the voter rolls.
Jenna Ellis: Wow.
Jenna Ellis: And something absolutely needs to be done on that. And it's incredible that it seems like with respect to election reform, Democrats and Republicans can realistically agree on anything because they don't want to undermine the ability, the political advantage and the reality of that political advantage, for the Democrat Party. But, Hans von Spakovsky, really appreciate your time today. You can follow him on X. And you can also follow Advancing American Freedom. And that's all the time that we have this morning. You can always reach me and my team. Jennaafr.net. PreBorn has rescued over 400,000 babies from abortion. And every day their network clinics rescue 200 babies lives. Will you join PreBorn in loving and supporting young moms in crisis? Save a life today. Go to preborn.com afr.
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Jenna Ellis: Good morning. It is Monday, July 27 and a lot of news we will cover this hour including the Democrats latest legislation push to change and modify the US Supreme Court because they're so sick of it being run by conservatives. Which is kind of funny because we're all sick of the conservative side is sick of conservatives not acting like conservatives. but more on that in a bit as well as the NewSong Jersey voter rolls, that we'll get to later this hour that show illegals apparently actually on the voter rolls. It's quite ridiculous.
College professor embeds white text into take home assignment to catch AI cheating
But first there was a viral video, that made its way online this weekend that discusses the use of AI in the classroom. And this particular college professor, went viral after revealing that he had secretly embedded white text into a take home assignment to, to catch students relying on AI. And although the video itself that the professor showed what he did, didn't specifically say that he had indicated the students should not use AI. I'm assuming that that was discussed in the classroom. So what he did, if you have a traditional background on, you know, your Microsoft Word or if the students would log on, they would see this prompt on a white background with black text text. And so he put a line of text in white font so that it would be unreadable just by the naked eye as you're scrolling through as the student. But if you simply copy and paste it, obviously that text is also included in the prompt. And then if students would dump that into AI, then what he did was say okay, for this prompt response, the white text told AI to include the term Madagascar, at least once, if not multiple times throughout the assignment in a way that makes absolutely no sense. So then as he's grading this, if the word Madagascar appears in a way that makes no sense in the context of the paper, he knows that the students not only used AI because they wouldn't think of that themselves, hopefully. Hopefully anyways. And he would know that they didn't even proofread their papers. So according to the professor, out of 35 students, 32 of them failed the assignment, which has now sparked a, continuing debate online whether the tactic was a clever way to protect academic integrity or an unfair gotcha designed to trap students. Now I'm of the opinion it was a clever tactic because the professor was not trying necessarily to trap them. He was simply trying to see whether or not they would follow his instructions. I mean, similarly to the software that catches plagiarism, for example. So when I was a college professor, back in my Colorado Christian University days, I had started, teaching online and then of course moved, to in person, in the classroom. But one of my students, during an assignment that we had, that was a paper response question, out of all the students, you're required as a professor to put it through this plagiarism software. And one of my students, it came back that like over 90%, of the paper was plagiarized. And so I had to report that and say that's what's indicated. That doesn't necessarily mean, you know, that, that the student can't otherwise, talk about it or what happened. But we were required to report that. That's not entrapment of the student. That's simply using the tools available to say, is the student actually doing the work themselves or are they cheating, going against the instructions? We're all used to closed book exams or math classes where you can or you can't use a calculator. When I sat for the bar exam, it was closed book. We had to know the rules, not just look at our outlines and then spit out a response. So in my opinion the professor was really clever and smart to put this type of prompt in. But it raises the question, I don't think it's more about, academic integrity versus an unfair gotcha designed to trap a student, but rather what education is really for. And the topic here isn't even, in my opinion, about AI. This is all about ensuring that students actually learn and they can use the tools that are available in a way that doesn't undermine the actual skill set that students are trained for. Because we, and I've even used this example repeatedly on air. I mean, we used to have a time when calculators were brand new and weren't allowed to be used in the classroom. I mean, my parents talk about that all the time. my mom and I actually last night were talking about, when she was in high school. And when the workers at fast food restaurants, instead of just punching in, you know, the Whopper or the Big Mac, they actually had to do long form math in front of the customer, figure out the total, and then make the change right there at the point of purchase. And now it is so bad that one of the, Gen Z, friends that I'm aware of, it's a friend of a friend, who was, who got a job in merchandising, at a store, literally had to go back to their parents and ask how to make change from cash. Because as a, I think college student at the time literally didn't even know the denominations of cash. As a, probably at the time, I'm guessing around 22 years old. And this is where the system has failed because calculators and computing, all of that is obviously a great advancement because it can shorthand what, and take so much less time what the person accomplishing the task should already know. And so the purpose of education is not to just produce students who can regurgitate something that they learned in a class and then forget it after the exam, which is actually a lot of the education system right now. But it should produce graduates from both the high school and college levels who actually know how to think. Because AI and Google can retrieve facts way quicker than any of us can looking up a book or trying to figure it out ourselves. Right? just like a calculator can produce the solutions to complex math faster than we can, Google can return search results faster than we ever could. And so the real issue here isn't about technology. And I don't think that this professor's point or what the object of the lesson was, was that we should totally ban AI, just like we shouldn't totally ban calculators or Google or laptops. I mean, these are things that students will be able to use in their professions. I mean, I use AI, I mean mostly to, you know, generate some, some fun, things that I post on my dog's Instagram. But, but there are things that, when you can synthesize something, like say, for example, you know, take these five articles and give me the main Point, right. That AI can do that a lot quicker than we can. But the point is not that AI should be producing our opinions in questions, or essay questions when we ourselves don't even know the content or the opinion that we hold. So the analysis here is what's suffering? Because if you used an AI prompt, for example, and said, okay, here's my opinion on this topic. Here's all of my notes. Can you synthesize all of my notes from class into an outline? that would take a lot less time in AI than it would take for me to go back and redraft all of my notes. But I was the one who originally took the notes, understand what's in them, and have learned the substance of the class. So do you see the distinction? So I don't think that the concern here so much is that we shouldn't teach students, to ever use AI or say that somehow this is bad technology and completely say, you know, we're removing this from the classroom. We're forbidding students to use it, just like forbidding them to use calculators or laptops. But if AI skips where students are called to write, to identify weak arguments, to recognize contradictions, to wrestle with difficult ideas, to understand how to write, to have a grammatical, correct sentence, to be able to spell, I mean, some of these things are actually being lost actively due to the rise of AI actually writing, some of the essays for students. So in that sense, no, we can't skip over those things just because we have a tool of AI Just like I wouldn't want someone who's, you know, the engineer of an airplane or of a building to skip over basic math just because now they possess a calculator. So thinking is like a muscle, and critical thinking works exactly like a muscle. And if someone lifted the weights for you every day, you wouldn't become stronger. You would just be using that tool. But it's not actually benefiting the ultimate goal. So I think that with all of this rise of technology, we need to examine what we're actually educating students for, and we need to require them to actually go through the struggle, the mental struggle, and the understanding of unlocking those skill sets for themselves and then figure out how to use this technology in a way that is ultimately productive in their various industries. And we can change the metric or the methodology of the way that we test.
Jenna Ellis: Artificial intelligence should be used in the classroom, not against it
There was another professor, who was online who said, here's what I told my students, to do. And I don't know what the subject of the class actually was. But what she told her students to do is here is the prompt, go put that prompt through AI and whichever AI of your preference and then see what it generates, and then take what it generates and compare that, to an actual essay that then she provided to them and say, here are all of the enlist all of the ways that artificial intelligence actually got this wrong. Like some of the footnotes were incorrect or some of the references were simply made up. I mean, we've seen that even in the legal industry, for example, which is just wild to me, that that lawyers would actually use AI and then not go back and check the references. I mean, yeah, go use Google, go. I mean we have all of these, wonderful tools that are available that are available, like Westlaw, for example. that was on the rise when I was in law school. We still had to go in our research and writing class and actually figure out how to go and look up citations for cases in the actual physical books in a law library. We had to learn how to do that. Then they taught us how to use Westlaw. And so that was the whole point was to say, okay, here's how you track and you figure out how to, how to use this tool. And it's so much easier to sit at your laptop because you have the entire library literally on your lap. But you have to understand how to use the tool and then go back and cross reference and make sure that the case that you're actually providing to the court as precedent says what you are arguing that it says credibly. Right. And so many lawyers don't even check their citations, they just run it through AI and then they submit their briefs. There have been a lot of lawyers who are caught like that. And it's not that the court is trying to manipulate them or, you know, catch them in the act. And this is a gotcha moment. It's simply that the tool available is not being checked and it's being used in a way to substitute for actual analysis. And so I think that we just need to figure out as a society, well, first get a lot better at actually educating our students on critical thinking and analysis and skill sets and ensuring that they understand that the opportunity to, to sit in the classroom is the opportunity to ah, earn your grade and earn an A, or you can earn a failing grade. It's not the opportunity, when you are sitting in the chair in class, you're then not entitled to a passing grade. We have to bring all of that back and actually educate. But then we have to use the tools available and teach students how to have the complete skill set themselves and, and then be able to supplement that and not have all of these other tasks in their actual occupations take so much time because then they can utilize the tools that technology provides. I think AI is great, and I think that it is overall a huge upside. It's an incredible tool. It would be like, you know, teaching students and some people saying, oh, the calculator, no, no, this is going to change everything, and it's terrible. Well, nobody argues that anymore. Right? AI has to be regulated, though, and it has to also be used, especially in the classroom, in a way that doesn't undermine the education and the analytical and the critical thinking, actual skill sets that students need to use. All right. Well, we will be right back with more here on Jenna Ellis in the morning.
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Several Democrats are introducing a bill establishing 18 year term limits for Supreme Court justices
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. Well, several Democrats are introducing a bill establishing 18 year term limits for Supreme Court justices. So, this came from Sheldon Whitehouse, who is a Democrat senator for Rhode island. And it's called the Supreme Court, a biennial appointments and term limits act to ensure that new justices take the bench every two years and establishes, 18 year terms in which justices participate in the Court's full docket of cases. So beyond the fact that, this, this actually would take a constitutional amendment because Section 1 of Article 3 already says that, the judges shall hold their offices during a term of good behavior. So, they have lifetime appointments right now. And changing that, would require A constitutional amendment. The question itself of whether this is a good idea is what I want to focus on. because even though this was introduced by Democrats, Republicans have had some similar ideas about modifying the Supreme Court, expanding, perhaps even the Supreme Court, not necessarily packing it, but expanding it, and then having, kind of this, this rotation so that you get more justices on the court and there's less of a power center in these nine oligarchs. So let's welcome in Mike Donnelly, who is an attorney and, also a professor as well. And so, Mike, you know, this. This to me is kind of just a theoretical, observation at this point and, you know, sort of theoretical exercise to talk about it. But substantively, just because this is Democrats introducing this, I don't necessarily fully object to the premise that we need to, as a society, question whether the lifetime appointments of federal judges, and Supreme Court judges in particular, is still a good idea. What do you think?
Mike Donnelly: Oh, Jenna, good morning. Good morning to you and everyone listening. great day, and, always fun to talk about Article 3 of the Constitution and the power of judges. If anyone's listened to us talking, about this subject before, they've heard me decry the power of the federal government and how powerful the federal government is and, how powerful the Supreme Court of the United States is. And I always point to several cases, you know, Obergefell, where the court invalidated, allegedly invalidated, the constitutional acts of 31 states and the people in those states defining marriage as being between a man and a woman. And you never heard Sheldon Whitehouse, complain about that. In fact, what you heard from Sheldon Whitehouse was, this is the best thing since sliced bread. You know, you heard people like Senator Leahy from Vermont, then Senator from Vermont, saying that the federal judiciary is the crown jewel, of our federal system. You heard liberals and Democrats over decades upholding abortion rights and homosexual, laws over decades, saying, oh, this is the court. The court is doing, you know, great work preserving democracy, now that a few cases have gone, you know, not the way they want them, now they want to talk about, oh, now we have to reform the Supreme Court. Of course, as you pointed out for decades before that people, you know, Republicans and conservatives, people like Mark Levin, arch conservative, you know, decried the court, and it's overreaching, you know, decisions like Obergefell, for example. I don't know if Mark actually talked about Obergefell, but decisions like that, saying that the Court has gone beyond its constitutional boundaries. So there's a lot to talk about, when it comes to the Supreme Court of the United States. And this is a subject I love to talk about. this law actually does not do what that headline says. It does not establish term limits. It's a vert grade of, attempt to add more justices to the court and restrain the jurisdiction of the court. And it actually, from my analysis, adheres to the Article three, requirements, which, gives Congress a lot of authority over the Supreme Court as to both sides. And here's the money quote from Article 3, Section 2, regarding jurisdiction. It gives two kinds of jurisdiction to the court. It gives original jurisdiction to the Supreme Court, which are two cases affecting ambassadors, public ministers, and where the state itself is a party. You know, if NewSong Jersey sues New, York, for example, the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction. But then the next phrase it says in all other cases before mentioned, referring back to cases, in Section two, where it talks about all the cases that can come before the Supreme Court. And it says the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions and under such regulations as the Congress shall make. So Congress has a lot of authority when it comes to creating exceptions and regulations for the Court. And that's what this law would do is it would add justices every two years. And it would say that only the most recent nine appointed justices would have appellate jurisdiction. And the other, all the other judges would have original jurisdiction and they would stay on the court and they would sit for, original jurisdiction cases. So it's a very interesting, law, you know, and when you read, who is in support of this law, it's the laundry list of all the left organizations because they're losing and they're upset about it. But that doesn't mean it's a terrible idea. And so I think it's something we should talk about. I have often said the court is too small. it's a lot of work for the court. If we had more judges, we could probably do more work. Is this the right way to do it? I'm not sure. I need to think about it a little bit more. But that's kind of what's going on here with this case.
Jenna Ellis: That's really fascinating. Yeah. And to have kind of that split in jurisdictional, purview for, some justices over the others. And I mean, I still am questioning just based on. And obviously, yeah, the headline doesn't give the full story of exactly how they're trying to divide this, but I'm still skeptical that that would actually pass, Article three, because any of the judges that are, that are Article 3 judges have, have lifetime appointments or for a term of good behavior. And so if the court is essentially trying to appoint magistrates to the Supreme Court instead of judges that are, you know, hired and only for a term, and then, they don't go through the entire, confirmation process and all that, that a regular judge would. And you know, counties, of course, do that all the time. And you are entitled on the trial level, just for listeners to know, you would have to consent to a magistrate. And the difference is that they're hired by the county, or the jurisdiction versus a judge that has gone through the full, appointment and process in, you know, in the state. And so if, if they're essentially trying to add magistrates to the court, there's not a prohibition necessarily in Section one, but there is a, a guarantee essentially, at least in the way that I read it, that the judges, and the judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity, including original jurisdiction. So wouldn't that deny the jurisdiction that Article 3 provides?
Mike Donnelly: Well, it's interesting question, Jenna. I think, you know, the way they're not talking about adding magistrates, these would be full justices. And what they're doing is just differentiating between original jurisdiction, which justices have authority over original jurisdiction cases, and more so exercising congressional authority with such exceptions and under such regulations as it relates to the appellate jurisdiction, which seems to me, very clear that Congress has the authority to do that under the Constitution, to create exceptions and make regulations. And it's a very broad power. So I think they can, I think they can get away with what they're doing here. And the way they get around sort of the term limits issue is they say, you know, as long as there are nine justices on the court who have the authority to, you know, hear, you know, the appellate jurisdiction cases, then they, then the president won't appoint any new justices. So basically it's a way of refreshing the court, you know, making sure that you've got newer justices on there and nobody ever leaves that can all sit for the original jurisdiction cases until they retire. But it kind of limits their authority 90% of the cases. Even more of the cases that come before the court, which is the problem in my opinion, are appellate jurisdiction cases, appeals from the federal courts, appeals from state supreme courts, and I don't necessarily have an issue with the Supreme Court of the United States, exercising appellate jurisdiction over state courts as it relates to federal questions and questions under the Constitution. My main issue is, you know, invalidating state laws using substantive due process in the 14th amendment, which is another doctrine which this law does not address. But you know, the fact that we, the Republicans and conservatives have complained about the Court in decades past and now the Democrats are complaining about it, there's a little bit of this sort of hypocrisy. I think that we need to be careful of and not be hasty in how we deal with this issue. But I do think it is an important question for us to discuss and whether it's in a Constitutional convention where we make some real reforms to the Court, where maybe we actually impose term limits with a constitutional amendment, or if Congress takes some action through legislation exercising its power under Article 3, you know, the exceptions, and regulations clause. I think this is an important conversation for us to have as a country.
Jenna Ellis: Absolutely. And this is why, you know, we started this segment saying just because this is Democrats introducing this doesn't mean that we automatically need to reject the idea of judicial reform, because conservatives have been pushing that for decades. And so whether this is the right vehicle and way to do that and resolution and solution, all of that can be debated. But the point is it should be debated. And so this is a really interesting question. And you know, but going back to the whole term limit, issue, I mean essentially like, obviously they're, they're not saying that they're hiring magistrates, but they are suggesting that they're putting on full justices that would have term limits. Where the language of Article 3 says if you are a federal judge, not even just a justice, but a federal judge, you have your term limit under the text of Article 3 is a lifetime appointment. And so if they are trying to establish 18 year term limits, that necessarily creates a different class of judges. And so I'm not sure how they would get around that constitutionally, even if they're trying to in some way bifurcate the jurisdictional elements, which, which I agree under, you know, the, the way that the language is, Congress does have regulatory authority. And so, so this is just a really interesting way that that they're trying to do this. But overall, how have conservatives, at least under, for example the Convention of States Project, there have been a few different ways, like our good friend Micah Ferris has talked about, having a constitutional amendment for judicial reform that would change the term limits, specifically and would add basically a rotating judge appointed by each of the states kind of take that appointment authority outside of the president, to make it hopefully less political. And, I'm probably not articulating his exact, proposal as clearly as he would. so for those who object to this, go and read his actual argument. But essentially taking that authority away from, the president. And you'd have to do that through constitutional amendment. But that's a power that a convention or convening of state delegates would have on the subject of judicial reform, if we can get there.
Mike Donnelly: Too much power now is concentrated in the Supreme Court
And I think this is where these ideas need to be debated, because what we currently have is overall functioning, but I don't think it's working. And you can point to isolated cases and isolated matters and say, okay, well, this is great that we won because the original intent of the Constitution was preserved or stated sovereignty was preserved. But you can point to a lot of other examples where the Supreme Court has become a super legislature. And to point to those instances and say, this isn't working because too much power now is concentrated in the Supreme Court instead of actually the legislative branches in Congress and the states. And so hopefully this maybe signals at least that the Democrats are recognizing that. And if somehow, in maybe some alternative universe, the Democrats and the Republicans could at least agree that this current framework isn't working because of how much authority the Supreme Court has taken to itself that was never intended by the Constitution, we could actually get to a convening of the states and actually hash this out in real time in a convention that we could come up with a resolution. And so how do you, in your view, Mike, Donnelly, how would you suggest that, that this can be resolved and in a way that would allow for the Supreme Court to go back and perhaps more easily revisit some of the unconstitutional precedent that it's provided?
Mike Donnelly: Well, you've got, you know, justices on the Court like Clarence Thomas, calling for the Court to do that itself, to reform itself by divesting itself of power. that. He's only one. I think there are a few others on there who might be sympathetic to what he's saying, but they don't see a path because they're stuck in, you know, the power that they have and the desire to not move to precipitously, which would be jarring to the country. And it's not really the role of the Court to jar the country. you know, as you know, we talked about last week, Brutus 15, and how he pointed it out that the Court would become the highest power under heaven by case, by case. Over decades, little moves here and there become one of the most powerful institutions. And that is what happened, has happened. And now the Democrats recognize it because they're losing, which I just find hilarious, you know, and, you know, it's not like we're winning all the time. but you've seen a move of the court towards original, more originalist principles, which is really, I think, really good. you had it in Dobbs v. Women's Health, sending the issue of abortion back to the states, where it should have stayed forever from the beginning. And instead of Roe v. Wade in 1972, terrible decision. you know, but then in 2016, it took it up in Obergefell. you know, you saw the court ruling in, the overruling Chevron, in Loper Bright, saying, you know what? No, we're going to take away some of the power of the federal government. We're going to, you know, do some things here, but it's kind of nibbling around the edges. and I don't know that we can really look to the Court to reform itself. So I think that it's good that Congress is taking this up. I mean, this is an interesting proposal. you know, I'm not going to agree that this is the best way, just, you know, because Sheldon Whitehouse is the one who's proposing it. Although that's just enough reason for me to say, well, I'm not sure this is the right way to do it. But, I'm not sure. I've often thought that making the court bigger would help. How do you do it fairly? You know, because you don't want to just say, okay, we're going to give, you know, this Democrat president, four new justices. This legislation actually says we're going to appoint. it doesn't change the way judges are appointed. It says the president will in his first and third term or her first and third term. One of these days, we'll probably have a woman president, right? In the first and third year of a presidential term, appoint a judge up into a point where we have nine judges who can hear appellate cases, and it's the most recent nine, so the ones who were originally there will be ranked in order of recency. And you just keep going until you have at least nine that can hear appellate cases. And if you have those nine, then you don't add any more. So it's a very interesting approach to it, and I'm not going to say it's wrong and terrible, but I'm also not sure that, I've thought it through enough, because this was just introduced last week. So I think there's a lot of thinking to be done on this. But, I think there's something here to talk about.
Mike Donnelly: I think we should continue to talk about court reform
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, absolutely, but, and we're already out of time to talk about it. We got to take a break here. But I think we should continue to talk about it. And and absolutely you're right that just because, you know, this was introduced by a Democrat, you know, we should have a huge grain of salt that comes along with this. But I think opening the discussion to say, okay, how should we reform the court? And does this type of idea make sense? Is it fundamentally fair? is it constitutional? Can they do this with legislation, rather than a constitutional amendment? I mean, all of these things are things that we should debate and not simply say, oh, the Democrats want to do something, so therefore it's wrong. That's taking a party approach rather than an ideology and an idea approach and actually giving this kind of a fair analysis and saying, perhaps it's the right, idea overall, but we need to just make it ultimately, better and a little more conservative overall. But we'll see how Congress ultimately responds to it. Fascinating. Mike Donnelly, follow him at. Donnelly speaks on X. We'll be right back with more
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New Jersey governor says software error allowed 6,000 non citizen voter registrations
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. Well, the NewSong Jersey governor has admitted that a quote unquote software error has allowed over 6,000 non citizen voter registrations in NewSong Jersey. And the head of the NewSong Jersey Republican Party claims there are many more non citizens that were illegally registered to vote between 2023 and 2024. Even then the 6600 reported by Democrat Governor Mikey. Sheryl. So the GOP, chairwoman on Sunday said that Cheryl's figure was, was just the tip of the iceberg in the emerging scandal. So for more on this, let's welcome in Hans von Sparovsky who is the senior legal fellow at Advancing American Freedom. And this is unsurprising, obviously, because if we're not going to require proof of citizenship, then we're basically taking the word of, the individual voters who check the box, citizen versus non citizen, rather than having some sort of actual proof. So is this story though, and this revelation ultimately going to be helpful in the overall battle for election integrity?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, it is, Jenna, helpful in the fact that, you know, all those, particularly in Washington Democratic leadership opposed to the SAVE act, which is stuck in the Senate required for position, keep saying, well, there's just not a problem. You know, there's no problem with aliens registering and voting. And look, a key thing to remember in this NewSong Jersey story that folks keep missing, is that, these actually were honest aliens. When they were asked whether they were a US Citizen or not, they checked, no, I am not a US Citizen, but NewSong Jersey registered them to vote anyway. And what that means is, what we don't know is, well, how many more aliens are there who actually answered, yes, I am a United States citizen and got registered and are still registered to vote in this state? We don't know.
Jenna Ellis: right.
Hans Von Spakovsky: And the only way to try to fix that is to require proof of citizenship. But also, NewSong Jersey is one of the states that refuses to access the available Department of Homeland Security database to help verify citizenship. It's called the SAVE system. And, a lot of red states have actually started using it. NewSong Jersey refuses to do that.
Jenna Ellis: Well, which now that this has been uncovered, maybe there will be some political pressure on NewSong Jersey and also other states to actually use that. and, and the NewSong Jersey governor is blaming this on a software malfunction that went ahead and, you know, registered these honest illegals anyways, which is obviously a, ah, you know, little bit of an interesting perspective. But, but does this, does this particular, case in NewSong Jersey now what happens to those who, those 6600, I mean, are they planning to be removed from the voter rolls? Is there a follow up on this?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, NewSong Jersey says they're, taking off the rolls, but at the very same time that the NewSong Jersey governor, I think, at her press conference talking about how she's all for transparency, she's refusing to release, any information on these voters, and registered voters to the Department of Justice. Now we should remind everyone, it is a felony under federal law to register if you're an alien or to vote if you're an alien. And, you know, she's trying to downplay this, the governor is by saying, well, only 400 of these aliens voted well last year In NewSong Jersey, they had two local races that ended in a tie vote. They had another election, a third, decided by one vote. And in the last 10 years, they've had a dozen elections in NewSong Jersey decided by less than 10 votes. So her claim that this just doesn't matter is just not true.
Jenna Ellis: Well, and the question still remains is how much fraud is okay with her. You know, I mean, she may diminish the number of 400, but as you wisely point out, no, that is a, a critical number. And that could have the opportunity to shift the outcome of some elections in NewSong Jersey. but whether it's, you know, 400 or 4,000 or 40,000, that still matters because the overall process matters. And so the downplay of this is. Is basically that they're trying to say that this was just an isolated software failure, but I think it's evidence of a broader systemic weakness.
Hans Von Spakovsky: Oh, no, you're absolutely right. And by the way, we should point out that, the company, the software company that the governor is saying it's their fault. They've come out. They've been doing. They've been handling NewSong Jersey for decades. It's a company called Idemia. And Idemia said, no, no, no. the state had access to the data showing these individuals were not citizens, but the DMV and said election officials registered them anyway. The company says this has nothing to do with the software. This was the state of NewSong Jersey going ahead and registering these people anyway, despite knowing they were not U.S. citizens.
Jenna Ellis: Wow. And somehow I believe the company here, because that sounds exactly like what. What states have been doing. And so is this a problem that the SAVE act, if passed, would actually solve?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Yes, because, the SAFE act would require proof of citizenship. it gives the US Department of Justice the authority to enforce the law. So if a recalcitrant blue state like NewSong Jersey, I just refuse to do it. You know, refuse to require proof of citizenship. DOJ could go to court and get a court order forcing them to do it. Which, listen, it would be great if we can get the SAVE act passed, but I have no doubt it would take lawsuits by the Justice Department to force places like NewSong Jersey and particularly California to actually comply with the law.
Jenna Ellis: And isn't that wild? I mean, when you have that in place, it's, it's. The question is, why wouldn't they comply? And why would they, if. If this allegation is accurate, that these election officials knew and they went ahead and registered these, illegals anyway? the question then Remains is why would they possibly be doing this against even their own current state law?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, I'll tell you, if you talk to any political consultant, they will tell you quietly, behind the scenes, a fact that is known to everybody in the business. And it's simply this, the higher the number of citizens in a particular political district, the greater the probability they'll elect a Republican. The higher the number of aliens in a district, the greater the probability a Democrat will get elected. they won't admit this publicly, but they want aliens registering and voting and getting away with it because they think it will help them, stay in power and get elected. I mean, that. That's the plain reason for it.
Jenna Ellis: And that makes sense, because if it were the opposite, in fact, and there was a higher probability of a Republican being elected in a district that was highly populated with illegals, you would see Democrats closing the border, building a wall, you know, up to the moon. They would be the ones fighting against this. And so unless there were some advantage to them or multiple, or on multiple fronts, then they wouldn't be pushing so hard against some of these common sense measures. And, you know, President Trump made, an address from the Oval Office a couple of weeks ago, and really the point of it, of course, was to push for the SAVE Act. And it is incredibly frustrating that the Senate, under Jon Thune's leadership, refuses to eliminate the filibuster to simply get this passed. if they were to go ahead and eliminate the filibuster, do you think that as it currently stands, they would have the votes, with perhaps, Vice President Vance's tiebreaker even?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, maybe. But, you know, we're facing the problem that, Lisa Murkowski is staunchly against the SAVE Act. the outgoing North Carolina senator is staunchly against it. Mitch McConnell previously voted against it, but as you know, he's still in the hospital. He hasn't been there for votes. And Sarah Collins, she has voted against it in the past. He's given indications now she might approve it, but as you know, she's in a. She's in a big fight to retain her seat in Maine. So.
Hans Von Spakovsky: So I don't know,
Jenna Ellis: which is just incredibly sad. And this is where primaries matter and, who we elect. And so this may be the. The point of the whole thing is that, TH isn't willing to have the PR battle and the. The overall political battle of eliminating the filibuster just to have this fail anyway. I mean, he would need to know that he has the votes before going and doing something like that. But, absent the SAVE act passing, which, you know, I think is just a disaster for the GOP and, and a real indication that we're not all actually on the same team, what other potential options are there for Congress to at least get a few of the, of the provisions?
Hans von Spakovsky: Congress should pass state election integrity measures
I mean, voter ID and you know, citizenship, proof of citizenship are kind of the big ones. But what are some other, ways that Congress, could implement election integrity measures absent in the passing the full SAVE Act?
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, literally that's difficult because as you know, the states are pretty much responsible for most, election administration. What I actually have recommended to state legislators, although you and I both know it's only going to happen in red states, is that they should pass their own state version of a SAVE act, they could then apply the proof of citizenship requirement to state elections. They can't, apply it to federal elections. But even just doing that, would be a big help. It would be a partial remedy, not a full remedy, which is what the SAVE act in Congress would do. But passing their own version of that, would be a big help. And yeah, they can't get it done before this November election unless they called it a special session. But you know, most state legislators are in session for the first three months of each year. So in 2027, passing a state version of the SAVE act would, they could do that in time for the 2028 presidential election.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and it's, it's really unfortunate that more states didn't do this ahead of the midterms. So looking ahead to the 2026 midterms, where should the GOP be focused in terms of, what election officials are to prepare? Because there's been a lot of questions about election integrity in the midterms as well.
Hans Von Spakovsky: Well, they should be doing everything they can to, use the federal database at the Department of Homeland Security, the SAVE database. The Trump administration really improved it. the Biden administration did everything they could to prevent states from using it. the Trump administration came in and not only made it free to use to states to check their voter list, but they changed it software wise to allow basically bulk comparisons. It used to be you could only check one name at a time. And the Trump folks at dhs, changed the software so that states can upload large numbers of registered voters and check their citizenship status against the DHS database. As I said, a number of states are doing that. Florida for example, and they are finding aliens on the voter rolls.
Jenna Ellis: Wow.
Jenna Ellis: And something absolutely needs to be done on that. And it's incredible that it seems like with respect to election reform, Democrats and Republicans can realistically agree on anything because they don't want to undermine the ability, the political advantage and the reality of that political advantage, for the Democrat Party. But, Hans von Spakovsky, really appreciate your time today. You can follow him on X. And you can also follow Advancing American Freedom. And that's all the time that we have this morning. You can always reach me and my team. Jennaafr.net. PreBorn has rescued over 400,000 babies from abortion. And every day their network clinics rescue 200 babies lives. Will you join PreBorn in loving and supporting young moms in crisis? Save a life today. Go to preborn.com afr.
Jenna Ellis discusses the recent viral video of a college professor who used a clever tactic to test students' reliance on AI for assignments. The professor embedded hidden text in a prompt, revealing whether students had used AI to complete their work. Later Mike Donnelly joins to discuss the democrats attempt to term limit SCOTUS, and finally Hans Von Spakovsky talks about NJ admitting that more than 6000 illegals registered to vote.
(00:00) American Family Radio features Jenna Ellis in the morning on American Family Radio
(01:36) College professor embeds white text into take home assignment to catch AI cheating
(11:31) Jenna Ellis: Artificial intelligence should be used in the classroom, not against it
(15:28) Preborn Network offers free ultrasounds to women facing unplanned pregnancies
(16:40) Several Democrats are introducing a bill establishing 18 year term limits for Supreme Court justices
(29:33) Mike Donnelly: Too much power now is concentrated in the Supreme Court
(34:21) Mike Donnelly: I think we should continue to talk about court reform
(36:02) New Jersey governor says software error allowed 6,000 non citizen voter registrations
(46:30) Hans von Spakovsky: Congress should pass state election integrity measures
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