Jenna Ellis 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.
Donald Trump is targeting GOP members he considers personal enemies ahead of primaries
Jenna Ellis: Good morning. It is Monday, May 18, and as we are rapidly approaching the midterms, the primary cycle has been basically a GOP Hunger Games with, Donald Trump targeting for retribution a lot of, the GOP members that he considers his personal and political enemies. And so incumbent Senator Bill Cassidy from Louisiana was defeated after coming in third place. Ah, Cassidy voted to convict President Trump in the second, impeachment following, the 2020 election, January 6th and so forth. And, so that was the main reason that Trump went after him. Of course, people, are saying, well, you know, he's a rhino. He voted this, this and that, way. But there is a list of, clearly people that Trump considers personal enemies within the GOP and is setting his sights on specifically to primary. So I have a lot of thoughts on this, but, but let's kind of break this down first. So Cassidy has been defeated. our good friend Todd Starn says retribution is coming for every Republican lawmaker who betrayed voters and abandoned President Trump. The people of Louisiana sent a message tonight Saturday to every establishment Republican in. And Jon Cornyn is next on the list. And Politico reports Bill Cassidy's follows a warning sign for other Trump enemies. And so, so Cornyn's primary is coming up in Texas, but tomorrow night is the primary in Kentucky with this war between Trump and Thomas Massie. So that's yet another one. And, that Trump is going after whom he considers kind of a personal enemy for simply not following, what Trump's agenda is in some respects. I think there's a lot of, over exaggeration about Massie. And, you can love or hate him. You can look at his record. Everybody has different opinions on him, but mainly his vote has been consistent with Republicans and Donald Trump anywhere between 90 to 98% of the time, depending on what outlet or what issues you agree with him on. It's a really high number. He was not one that voted to impeach Trump, but he is one that was vocally standing up for his own independent thought, which, by the way is okay in Congress. Congress is a separate branch, of course, from the executive. And yet it is a fair point that the people voted in 2024 overwhelmingly for the Trump agenda. And so, as Vice President J.D. vance put it on, why Massey should go in his, in his words, he says, you know, if you stand up for one or two things, fine. But if you're consistently thwarting Trump's agenda, then don't be surprised when the party doesn't support you. Listen to this. This is cut to.
JD Vance: I think the problem with Thomas, and I've told him this in private, and now I guess I'll say it in public, is it's one thing to disagree with the party on a particular issue. It's one thing to take, you know, to take to have your independent stand on a number of questions. And by the way, some of the stuff where Thomas Massie has been independent against the Republican Party, I've agreed with him, with Thomas and I worked together during 2023 where I was trying to stop the limitless flow of American money to Ukraine, and Thomas was one of the people I was working closest with it. But that's one thing. Being independent, having your own opinions is one thing. Voting against the party on every single issue, you're eventually going to make too many enemies. And that is the problem that Thomas has had. It's not one issue, it's not three or four issues. It's that every time that we've needed Thomas for a vote, he has been completely unwilling to provide it. That is why the President, United States, has trained his ire on Thomas Massie. It's because we can never count on him, for some of the most difficult votes. I wish that that weren't the case. I say that as somebody who's known Thomas well before I got into politics, but politics is politics. And when you always vote against the party, you can't expect the party to actually back you.
Jenna Ellis: I mean, that's. That's a fair point. I think he exaggerates a little bit, saying that, you know, Massie is never, with them. But to not be able to count on his vote, I think is fair. If you look back at the one big, beautiful bill, Massie was all for tax cuts. But then when the one big, beautiful bill was actually funding a lot more debt, he eventually just said, no, this isn't what I can stand for on principle. So the question really becomes, then, does principle and fidelity to the Constitution override being a team player on the Trump agenda? Well, this is maybe the Reason and the explanation for why Trump is now trashing the quote, unquote weak minded Lauren Boebert for parading around with Thomas Massie and Vince, according to media ite that on his social media that it would be his honor to withdraw his endorsement. So he's basically doing exactly this. If you dare to go against me and my agenda, retribution isn't just coming for Democrats, in 2026 potentially. And we've talked about the midterms a lot, but the primaries and the endorsements that still carry a lot of weight from President Trump, he's going to wield that and say, I'm not going to endorse you unless you go along with my agenda. And that may explain why people who in my opinion have been very consistent in their votes, like Thomas Massie, Trump is actively putting a ton of, of money and GOP weight behind defeating him. We saw what happened with Bob Good, who dared in 2024 to support Governor, DeSantis for president. We saw what happened with Bill Cassidy, and we're seeing what's happening with Jon Cornyn. And yet people who are the actual Rhinos, like Lindsey Graham still, and Byron Donald's, you know, in Florida still have the complete and total endorsement of Donald Trump. And here's what Lindsey Graham is saying about why, about, about this whole situation and why backing Trump, then he'll basically return the favor.
Lindsay Graham: Cut one, there's no room in this party to destroy his agenda or to destroy him and his family. As a Republican, Democrats do it all the time. If you align with Democrats to stop his agenda like Massey does, you're going to lose. If you align with Democrats to drive him out of office like Cassidy did, you're going to lose.
Oren McIntyre: The GOP has been far too weak in enforcing Trump agenda
Jenna Ellis: All right, well, let's welcome in Oren McIntyre, who's a host at the Blaze. And, Oren, you know, with that kind of lengthy introduction, I think that the question here is that do we want a GOP that is going to just be in lockstep with President Trump, whatever he decides his agenda is? I mean, sometimes that changes from what, we necessarily voted for. Do we want that or do we want to have a GOP that is telling Trump, you know, listen, we still have principles and we're going to support people who stand up maybe for different things. And there's room within the party to oppose Trump on some issues, like Massie. Where, where should the future of the gop, at least in the next two years of the Trump administration, go?
Auron MacIntyre : Well, the big thing is of course that it's fine to discipline the party when you have a America First MAGA agenda, when you are completing the promises that you put out there for the American people. I think that the GOP has been far too weak when it comes to enforcing a legitimate agenda and moving, you know, priorities forward to entertain the, you know, the small concerns, of different members. That said, unfortunately, as you pointed out, the people that Trump are disciplining and the people that Trump are endorsing, it doesn't make sense. It's not cohesive. So you understand some of the people, those that ultimately went against Trump when it came to impeachment, those things, you understand why he's going after them. But then you see him attacking someone like Hamas Massie, while giving passes to, as you say, people like Lindsey Graham or Maria Salazar in Florida, is pushing for amnesty along with 10 other Republicans. But we're not hearing anything about those Republicans. They're not paying the price for openly trying to draft amnesty legislation. It's guys like Thomas Massie. Now, I think Massie does have an inconsistent voting record. In fact, I, you know, at one point apologized on Twitter for defending him because he just kept turning down bills that were important, like the big beautiful bill to get border security. He got so angry, he actually showed up in my mentions on Twitter to talk about it. But at the same time, I feel like we have better targets to remove Massie. Despite his votes, was still very popular in his district. It's very clear that the motivation right now to remove Massie is largely centered around the war in Iran. And that's pretty much the entire issue. And that's what I think a lot of people disagree with Donald Trump on. So I feel like at some level, if you're going to go after and purge different people from the GOP, can we least get the ones that are pushing for open borders and amnesty as opposed to people who just don't necessarily like the current iteration of the foreign policy?
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and that's exactly, precisely my issue as well is that I have no problem with primary Republicans that are actually RINOs, Republicans in name only, and they're pushing for, anti conservative policies and are basically soft to Democrats. And we all can name a bunch of those and we've named a few already. And yet it doesn't seem like the targets of the GOP for primarying are consistent based on principle. It feels like it's just a personal vendetta for Trump that if you are actively in the moment going against the current thing and you Know, the current thing is the war in Iran, or, you know, whatever the current thing, happened to be. I mean, with Bob Good, I mean, he was the leader of the Freedom Caucus, was one of the best conservatives that we had in Congress. that was such a ridiculous target for Trump to go after. And of course it was totally personal and basically was setting up this standard of, you're going to be a target if I think that you are disloyal. I mean, that's literally Politico's headline today. It's Cassidy's follows a warning sign for other Trump enemies. Well, I would be a lot, more enthusiastic about all of this if the targets were actually people like Lindsey Graham, you know, or people who have consistently, been the Republicans in name only. I mean, why not go after Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski? And also, when you're going after someone like Bill Cassidy, don't set up someone like Trillia Letlow, who's not really that great of a conservative, to replace him. The only thing that she has going for her better than, Bill Cassidy is simply that she supports Donald Trump. And so this isn't a principled maneuver. This is just Trump, targeting the enemies within his own camp, which is understandable. But I think overall, Oren, it's unsettling because it's not building a GOP that will, long term be beneficial to the base when Trump leaves office in two years. That's my main concern.
Auron MacIntyre : Yeah, it is an interesting dynamic. Again, I'm generally in favor of more discipline inside the gop. I think, as you say, we do have plenty of rhinos, we do have plenty of fake conservatives, and they've gotten a free passer far too long. But the, you know, the flow of attention seems to be that getting the support because they're flattering Trump, while the people who previously supported Trump in a far more enthusiastic manner, in a far more serious manner, are now feeling, you know, kicked to the sidelines or directly targeted for removal because they're not going along with the current agenda, which seems to have strayed from any of the campaign promises. That said, we do have to understand a political reality. What this really means above everything else is that the GOP is the party of Trump. A lot of people said that they were worried about that when Trump ran. I'm one of those people who wasn't worried about that because I think the GOP was in such dire straits that it desperately needed a strong personality to force people in, to making significant changes. But whatever, whether you Feared it or you supported it. The truth is that's very clearly the case. Trump is the gop. The thing, the things that Trump supports, his voter support the thing, and the people that Trump targets, his voters crush, the money, the influence, everything in the GOP turns on a dime and aims where Trump ultimately, wants it to go when we're in this situation. And so Trump is the kingmaker now, Trump can't run again, obviously, and we're not going to get, you know, despite Steve Bannon's best efforts, we're not going to get third term Trump. And so you do have to think about the future of the party. One of the things I don't like right now is the amount of inconsistently, you know, we're seeing people say, oh, Ruby or Vance or someone else. It's like, no, if, if you're going to build this strong style of personal leadership where one man drives the identity of the party and decides who stays and who goes and what the agenda is and all of those things, if you are going to build that model, you need to be very, very particular about who you hand it to. And so if, if Trump is going to build this model of personality driven, one man agenda, one man loyalty, okay, ah, again, you can disagree or agree with that, but the point is, it's obviously happening, it's very effective. So then you have to ask, where does that power go? Who does it get handed to? And that becomes incredibly important because you're now putting the future of the party into whoever sits in that spot after Trump.
Jenna Ellis: And whoever it is, whether It's Vance, Rubio, DeSantis, someone else, they're not going to be Donald Trump in terms of, I think he is, you know, a once in a lifetime type of personality that commands that kind of, of attention and loyalty, frankly, that was, could not be replicated by someone else. even as much as, you know, I love Governor DeSantis, that's not his personality type. I mean, he's, he's much more of a quiet executor than he is, you know, the, the brand and the merch and the, you know, kind of larger than life personality. And that's okay, but it also just means that, this is, in my opinion, not a great way to set this up for a long term. And so, you know, so we'll, we'll have to see how this goes in 2028 and beyond. And also how much influence Trump is going to have after he leaves office and no longer sits in the seat. But I think there's going to be a, his influence is either going to be even more remarkably solidified after tomorrow night with Massie, or there's going to be some cracks. And I. That's why so much money has been put into Massie's race, because all of us, who are conservatives are kind of sitting back and looking, and even the Democrats, I mean, the only reason that they're propping up Massie is because the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And they know that if Massey wins, that will be a huge blow to Trump endorsements and they want that. It's not because they care anything else about Massie or like him or hate him for any other reason. It's simply because right now that is going to be a huge, reckoning of whether or not Trump's endorsements carry even more weight or whether there are there start to be some cracks in the people of Kentucky say, you know what, we want to be able to choose our own representatives. We're okay with him being that independent. So if Massie wins tomorrow night, I mean, we know if he loses, you know, that's predictable. It's the Trump outcome, you know, all of that. But if he wins tomorrow night, what does that say then for Trump's power grip on the gop?
Auron MacIntyre : Well, it would be interesting because again, Massie was very popular in his district. But of course Trump has the wider influence on the MAGA movement. And so if Massie wins, it shows some level of fracturing between kind of the MAGA faithful and Trump's agenda. Honestly, I don't think that's entirely clear because I still think that Trump has pretty much the diehard support of his original voting base. What Massie really appeals to is a lot of those non die hard GOP Trump voters, the Maha, the libertarians who were disgruntled with the left for their wokeness. All the people in the margins, a lot of people point to Trump's support inside of maga and it is still rock solid. But you have to remember that that diehard MAGA coalition is not the only people who got Trump elected. And so if the others are breaking away from him because they ultimately don't like where that agenda has gone, that could have serious implications for wider elections.
Also at stake here, very interestingly, is support for Israel
Also at stake here, very interestingly, is support for Israel. A lot of the money that is poured into this race has come from pro Israel groups. It's very clear that that is motivating a large amount of the attention and the funding coming in. So at some level this could also be a referendum on support for Israel or this particular war at the moment. And so Massey's victory there could also be a reflection on that particular issue, if it's not a reflection on Trump in general. So you kind of, in this bizarre moment, kind of have both of these possible issues lashed together and people will probably be talking about which, whether you know, the Israel or Trump or both or neither, that ultimately drive the outcome here. but it does if, more interestingly, if you know, Matthew is ultimately defeated, one could also say that it's a very interesting display of how powerfully a domestic lobby can move the electorate over a, over a foreign policy issue centered on one nation. So I think there's just a lot of facets that are very, very much in play right now that are critical to the future of the MAGA movement and the larger Republican Party. And everyone's going to want to see how this shakes out.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and that's a great point and we'll have to get into that more perhaps later in the week. Oren McIntyre of, you know, the Israel facet of this. I mean AIPAC has put a lot of money into Bill Cassidy and the amount of money being spent on this primary is utterly absurd. But you know, this really is the reckoning, this is the GOP Hunger Games to say, okay, who is going to prevail tomorrow night? Ah, Trump continuing with his track record of trying to oust, those people who go against him and his, his internal enemies. Or will Massie prevail because of that popularity and maybe because of the issues he stands for. So it's going to be really fascinating or in McIntyre. Really appreciate it. Follow him on X. Also at the Blaze. We will be right back with more. Foreign.
Auron MacIntyre : Ellis in the Morning on American Family Radio.
Adam Mangana: Artificial intelligence is shaping the future however we decide to utilize it
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. And regular listeners will know that I am totally fascinated with the conversation surrounding artificial intelligence, AI and the regulation, the implicit ethics issues. I mean everything that goes into this technology is going to shape the future however we decide to utilize it, the way that we decide to approach it. And there are a couple of different camps in terms of those who are ah, really concerned, especially in the academic circles suggesting, almost in my opinion, how, how reticent some teachers used to be with calculators and how if you use those in school then you know, you won't be able to do long form math very well. And I don't know, maybe they had a point because not a lot of kids are that good at math anymore. Today.
Jenna Ellis: But I don't think that was the fault necessarily of calculators. It was the fact that that kind of new technology needed to be built in to the educational system. And so even though there's always been a, an understandable hesitation to new technology, the best way for us to approach this is to understand it, put obviously the ethical boundaries and contours around it and understand of course the regulation that ultimately is good for privacy reasons, for ethics concerns, all of those things. But when it comes to academia, this isn't going away. And so for students to be able to learn how to analyze and function and also look at potentially a brand new job market because of the advances of AI, we have to continue to adapt. And this kind of hesitation. And I've talked with, you know, some of my colleagues, you know, in, in academia who are still professors. I used to teach at Colorado Christian University and they just don't want to have AI in the classrooms at all. Just like they didn't want to have laptops, they didn't want to have calculators. And it's, it's like, you know, we have to make sure that students are just learning. Well, if you don't teach them to how to utilize the tools that they're going to have to interact with and use in their careers, then aren't you putting them kind of at a disadvantage or. Well.
Jenna Ellis: In his commencement speech at Carnegie Nvidia, the Nvidia CEO gave a message of optimism and excitement actually about our future. And also AI and Adam, Mangana, who is an education innovator and the CEO of Optima, co founded the world's first virtual reality school and accredited K through 12 curriculum that not only shares Nvidia's optimism, but is working to prepare kids to throw thrive in the economy of the future. And Adam joins us now. So I think this really matters, our approach in academia to artificial intelligence.
Adam Mangana: Jenna, you're absolutely right. Thank you so much for having me on. You know, I'll remind our listeners that, you know, anytime there's a new technology, there is very do skepticism. Socrates was skeptical of books. He thought men would lose their memories, they'd no longer be great orators. But the book was inevitable and we wouldn't even know that Socrates was skeptical if it wasn't for Plato writing about it. What we have to do to your point is prepare students for the future and to prepare parents, more importantly, to be the CEO of their child's future. There are so many innovations Happening both on the technological side. Right.
Adam Mangana: With AI and spatial computing, as well as on the policy side. We now have educational savings accounts which allows parents to purchase the kinds of solutions that are going to work for their kids. And I'm excited about a future as long as we equipped families with the kind of empowering technologies that allow them to specialize for their child and give them what their child needs.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and all of that really makes sense.
Why do you think there's always a fear and hesitation toward new technology
And so why do you think that there is, generally speaking, an attitude more of fear and uncertainty with new technology? And you know, the examples I gave, we've seen that in the past and eventually the world adapts and eventually people say, you know, calculators are fine, but why do you think that there's always, or tends to always be a more of a fear and hesitation toward new technology rather than recognizing, you know, this is just the advancement and this is actually predictable that we're going to advance in technology as a society?
Adam Mangana: Well, in part in the era of kind of social media, fear is a very powerful marketing tool. You know, and I think a lot of the companies that stand to benefit from this technology are day trading our attention. When you actually dig a little bit deeper, you know, the robots aren't coming for us. And it's not that robots will take our jobs or automation will take our jobs. It's folks that are using AI will replace those folks who are not using AI. So I think your framing was very healthy, which is how do we think about this from the perspective of job opportunities? Jensen was saying, now new graduates have an opportunity again at the American Dream, which has grown stale over the course of the last 40 years. We now have an opportunity through this emerging technology for Americans to have a living wage again, for Americans to have agency in what they do in their work careers. Optima is interested in marrying this kind of 21st, century technology with first century wisdom. There is timeless wisdom that's out there that doesn't change because there's a new tool available. And I think as long as schools are committed to those things that we know to be true, I think that being able to meet them in a new medium is totally fair game and probably important for the future.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, and I love how you say that because it's not about finding shortcuts and it's not about, decreasing the education or the human analysis, that it's not about saying, okay, we don't need to learn, for example, long form math because we have calculators. It's that we can use these tools to then, advance even more than we, we could and more easily, than we did without them. And the students who learn how to utilize AI in beneficial ways are going to be light years ahead of the students who who go to either schools or are kind of taught, you know, sort of this fear that you can't use AI or they're not taught how to build utilizing these tools that are just readily available. And so, you know, I think that it's actually a disservice and disadvantage to the younger generation to not, to not only not teach the benefits of this, but also structuring, you know, some of the guardrails. I mean we've seen some of the stories unfortunately of the ways that AI can be used for evil. AI can be used, to not benefit society. And so it's like anything else, with technology you have to, to teach young people how to use this for good and effectively and with moral boundaries, ethical boundaries and contours. And I think we just have to change perhaps the way that we structure, for example exams in the classroom. And you know, if we're concerned about AI generated theses, well then we have to change the structure of how we are, we are looking at and testing aptitude because analysis and human critical thinking still matters. And I don't think that's going away anytime soon, even with AI.
Adam Mangana: Jenna, you're absolutely right. I think the other thing that becomes really interesting in a world where the cost of knowledge decreases and the value of some of these kind of woke diplomas that we are seeing at scale now decreases, there's huge opportunity there. There's now this opportunity for folks who are in the trades and the trades to kind of regain the dignity that they deserve. And so I'm excited about a, future where, you know, the last 60 years we've had all of this innovation in the world of bits computer science. I mean if you think about, you know, everybody wants to be a tech CEO, but as a tech CEO, I'm saying there's going to be all of this opportunity and innovation in the world of Adams that is now improved by AI. You're going to see all of these legacy companies that were, you know, welding and roofing. You're going to see now these kind of important industries be resurged by the efficiency that comes from AI. but you're going to see so much innovation in this world of atoms. And how do we now create an environment where that is valued and has dignity. And so I'm really excited about what that means. I also think that school will become more modular. You won't have this kind of big box standardization. You'll have hyper personalization. So in a world in which children can get the opportunity to really optimize their own learning and maximize their own human potential, you'll find an entrepreneurial resurgence across America. And I'm excited about what that will mean for our economy and, and for our future.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah. And, you know, to your point, Adam Mengara, who's the CEO of Optima, my special guest this morning, to your point, about personal engagement and also the, and personal attention to the child. I mean, that's exactly what the homeschooling boom was all about and saying, okay, let's look at the aptitude and interests of the particular child and not just have kind of this rigid structure that, doesn't put the child's learning methods and what they're interested in on all of that at the fore. And so that's actually, something that homeschool advocates have been talking about for a long time, that now technology potentially can help advance. And so it's interesting to me that when people talk about, you know, classical tradition and especially, you know, education and all that, it tends to be, let's, let's only look back at the past and let's look at, where we've been in the past and kind of go back to the past. And I think conservatism in politics is kind of viewed that same way that, you know, we're looking at the past instead of being quote, unquote progressive. Right. And that is actually a disservice if we, if we don't understand that not all technology is the same, as you point out, and classical education is defined by its ends, not its instruments. And so we can advance in technology while keeping the core mission and the principles timeless in terms of classical education. And I don't think there's a conflict there.
Adam Mangana: You're spot on. I mean, what is, what is a great book? Right. It is a portal into the minds of the greatest thinkers. When we read Epictetus, when we read Plato, when we read Socrates. Right. Alexander doesn't become great without actually the human relationship of Aristotle and being present with him, what this new technology allows for. I mean, if you think about it, so many of your listeners saw Zoom school for what it was. Zoom was engineered as a conference call, and you wouldn't do eight hours of school on a conference call. It made no sense Optima was born from this idea that we actually need to bring back the human relationship in an online methodology, because online school isn't going anywhere. And so what we did was we built this experience, the social VR platform that now allowed people to be present together. Instead of the zoom checkerboard of faces, you're now present together in a digital space with the human experience and the common courtesy of connection. And the way that we leverage AI is now you can learn the true history of the United States, which is incredibly beautiful. You can interview an AI powered Ben Franklin. And it now, it doesn't trick students into believing that that's reality, but it now makes students much more interested in extending their thinking and researching and learning and trying to discover more about our past. And in order to learn and position ourselves for the future, you have to understand where you came from.
Jenna Ellis: Yeah, well, and history coming alive is what a lot of educators have been trying to do for centuries. I mean to say this isn't just about, you know, kind of a dusty old textbook. This is why field trips are important. This is why engaging, you know, even some of the live actors, you know, who come sometimes to the to the classroom or at, you know, various landmarks and stuff, those, those types of interactions are important. And again it's not, nobody's sitting there thinking this is actually the historical figure, but the interaction gives that, that kind of authentic experience to make history become more interesting to kids. So just that one example I think is brilliant.
One criticism of AI and virtual reality that I think is fair
but the concern overall and the one criticism of of AI and kind of, you know, this virtual reality that I think is fair is that we, we do live in an increasingly digitized world and we are so much online that we are breaking a lot of those conventions of being in person together. And that's having a huge impact on society, how we conflict manage. I mean, you know, there are a ton of different ways that we could break that down. and so overall, how do we mitigate that with the use of this technology while understanding, I mean, you know, this is the future, this isn't going anywhere.
Adam Mangana: Yeah, well, no, I think that that criticism is absolutely fair. And the idea is not to again have students in an eight hour online experience. We actually want to make learning much more efficient so families have time back doing the things that are important, building community with their churches, with their athletic teams. And so we actually deliver our experience, in a two and a half hour school day. And it's designed to be very efficient so that, you know, our elite Athletes can train and our elite musicians can do their thing and families that are, you know, committed to their church communities have more time. So I think giving people time is really, really, really important. The other thing that I would suggest is not all AI is created equal. And to your point about making sure that you understand the underlying technology and that you understand the guardrails, we don't want to. I mean part of, part of what I think everyone is frustrated by is when you go to a restaurant, you see a parent hand their five year old an iPad and there's just this kind of passive watching of technology. We don't agree with that at all. We don't want learning to be passive. Right.
Adam Mangana: Augustine says the words printed here are concepts. You must go through the experiences. That 2000 year old wisdom still stands today. We want kids to experience things, we want them to be active in their learning and we want to build the right guardrails so they're not exposed to an unfettered Internet that's going to have them introduced to ideas that they're not developmentally ready for.
Adam and Mangana discuss how professors should use artificial intelligence in assessment
Jenna Ellis: Right. And last question for you. before we have to end this segment, there's so much more I could talk to you about. I think all of this is fascinating and you can find, optimaacademy online. That's optimaacademy online for more information. But, how do you think then that, the instructors, especially on the collegiate level, the university level, need to perhaps, change or tailor their aptitude testing M in light of AI?
Adam Mangana: Yeah, it's such a tremendous question. I think, you know, most people are familiar with how disruptive these kind of frontier models have been and so that, you know, they're concerned about, students kind of, you know, writing term papers using these, these kinds of tools. We have to rethink about assessment and we have to develop kind of uncheatable assignments. We want to understand, our students thinking. And it's not wrong for professors to say, you know what, we're going to use these tools as thought partners. We're not going to outsource again the thinking to these tools. And so you're going to see a lot of professors adapt by saying, you know, we're going to bring back the blue Book, we're going to bring back in person assessment. That's one way to solve this. I think the other way to solve this is to rethink how we measure assessment more generally. And we're going to see, in my view, professors, looking for much more entrepreneurial Assignments where you have to engineer an experience rather than answer a multiple choice question. You know, it's just like when you're hiring somebody, how do you think about the way in which you would assess their capacity? You wouldn't just give them a multiple choice, test, but you might interview them about what's the most difficult thing you've ever had to build or what's the biggest problem you've had to solve. You're going to see professors shift from what's choice A, B and C to what problem do you want to solve, what networks do you need and what systems do we have to plug you into? So that our thinkers are now thinking much more like engineers than they're, than they're just regurgitating information.
Jenna Ellis: Well, we've got to end it here. But Adam and Mangana, I so appreciate this conversation. I think you're absolutely right. I mean that's the difference basically in what law school tests rather than just, you know, memorizing a multiple answers for a multiple choice exam and then forgetting it after the exam. And we've all been through, you know, grade school, we know that, how that works. then you know, you actually have to assess a situation and analyze it and then tell your professor how you would act as legal counsel. I mean that type of assessment can be parlayed into other, other subject matters. And I think that kind of assessment and also that kind of, just that kind of testing that a student would have to go through is actually way more beneficial than just a multiple choice exam. Anyway, so I'm excited for the future. I think there's so much that we need to talk about with artificial intelligence. So again, really appreciate the conversation. You can go to optimaacademy online and we will be right back with more.
Jenna Ellis discusses family government on American Family Radio
Welcome back to Jenna Ellis in the Morning on American Family Radio.
Jenna Ellis: Welcome back. And yesterday on the National Mall, there was a prayer event called Rededicate250. And of course as we are heading into the two, hundred fiftieth anniversary of this great country, a lot of people are wisely, I think, kind of looking at where we've come, come from, where we are and importantly where we're going. And it's incredibly important to, to pray, to rededicate this country, to say we need to go back to the Lord, to church, and all of those things. And I think that we talk so much on this program about the three institutions that God has ordained, obviously the church government, the family government, and the civil Government. And as we're talking about the praying for this nation and we, we tend to focus quite a bit obvious just because of the headlines on the civil government. I've been thinking a lot about the definition of the family government because this is one thing that as we look at policy, as we look at where we have gone off in terms of being a a secular pluralist nation versus a nation that is truly founded in and still dedicated to the principles of natural law, of truth, of the God of the Bible, and understanding that policy has to be built on that framework. A huge piece of this I think is not just the breakdown of civil society, secular pluralism and, and those things that are incredibly important, but the definition of family really, really matters. And we've talked about this in the context of how we have have seen the harm since Obergefell vs Hodges, the so called same sex marriage decision in 2015 and how that has gotten then evolved into these, these homosexual couples then saying well since we have the benefit of marriage then we are entitled to kind of what called kind of this constellation of rights that outflows from that including parentage. And so then they suggest that they are quote unquote infertile. Which is actually a natural law definition. Two men can't have a baby. That's not infertility. That's just the natural state of things that God through his sovereignty said one man and one woman. And sorry, you may not like that, but that's how it is. And that is how morality works and is designed as an end is implicit in natural law. But yet then society has to think well then we're going to manufacture a solution to that quote unquote infertility problem. And now we have the commodification of children. And that is a whole conversation that we've had on this show repeatedly. We'll still have it's incredibly important so that we can move policy toward protecting the rights of the child, the rights of of genuine definitions of marriage and then also family.
But I think it's also important on the flip side of that same coin to talk about the definition of family when it comes to the church because I was, I was reading and actually Walker Wildmon posted on his social media and you should follow him on X. Walker Wildmon, he posted this ah, underneath this statistic that was posted by another account saying wow, this must be addressed. And this is talking about Americans married by age 30, 19, 75 compared to 2025 and kind of breaking that down by decade. And there's not a lot of information. I mean ostensibly, and presumably these statistics contain everybody in the United States, not just based on faith or demographic or other categories. Right. So this isn't just exclusive to those who are calling themselves Christians. This is just Americans overall. Right, But Americans married by age 30 in 1975 was 91% of women, 81% of men jump all the way down to 2025. This goes down dramatically. Women by age 30 are only married 25.6% and of men 16.5%. And this isn't just a function of of no fault divorce or of you know, lack of the, the social expectations. I mean there's a lot that goes into this. Obviously the rise of the social issues and the prevalence of the, of this post, truth society and the relativistic worldview and the focus on self instead of something higher than self, which of course is God and his design. But I think this also can be directly attributed to the lack of understanding what family means. And in my own life, I have dated, you know, a number of, of men who call themselves Christians, who you have gone to church, you know, all of those things. And I have seen the common thread that I've observed not only in the men that I've dated and obviously not married, and then even in some of my single friends from you know, their, their twenties all the way to, you know, older than me, right, in their 60s. So you know, this spans kind of generations of women. The common thread is not just the individual, you know, personal preferences or ways that you know, we're not quote unquote compatible. It really boils down to the fact that I think men even more than women in today's society. It's not just about masculinity. It's not just about, you know, understanding what it means to be a man and the war on men. And we certainly have those conversations and that's all true. But it's that men, by and large, even Christian men, do not understand the definition of what it means to be part of a family and want a family. Because most men look at the dating scenario right now and even Christian men saying well, I want a partner or you know, I want a plus one, or I want, you know, a mother figure replacement. Right? Or I want And I'm not even sure that I want kids. I know that I, you know, I want a a Partner so that I get all of the benefits, that comes with companionship and relationship. But I'm not sure that I want kids. I mean, especially in my age group. I'm 41. the men my age now, they're a huge percentage of them are saying, you know, I don't even know that I want to have kids. They completely misunderstand the definition of family. That's not optional. I mean, it may be that genuinely there are infertility issues between a man and a woman. That's fine. that's legitimate. But to not even have the desire to have a family as God designed, it's completely misunderstanding the entire process of dating, which is kind of a modern, construct, by the way. because there have been a lot of ways historically that people have gone from single to married. The Bible doesn't prescribe one process, even though, the church is very eager to impose a lot of different processes right. On single people, which, that's a whole other, topic for another day. But, the, the only scenarios that God tells us, he tells us how to live being single, what to refrain from sexual immorality, all those things. And then he tells us how to be married. You know, love your spouse, be in the context of a family. Ah, refrain from sexual immorality. I mean, there, there are clear, distinctions between those two categories. But when m. When most even Christian men today are looking for a quote unquote partner, and I even hate that term, no, you should be looking for a wife, right? And what does a wife do? you start a family unit together, and that should include children. And it also should mean that the family becomes your most important ministry. That means that as the husband, you're taking on responsibilities of being a husband and hopefully a father. You are providing not only financially, but you're providing that protection. You are present in your home. You are not just a workaholic anymore. if you were, when you're single, you are giving up the single lifestyle for something far greater that God calls us to, which is a family. And that, I think is the number one reason why. But, from 1975, 81% of men were married, all the way down to only 16.5. Why? Because men, m, no longer want to be part of families. They just want to have the benefits and the addition of women in their lives. They don't want the encumbrance of children. They don't understand that the definition of family is where God's greatest ministry is designed. He tells us, live in society, have laws and policy that are good for society. Be part of a church. But first and foremost we are called to be part of a family. That is in Genesis 1:27, it wasn't the creation of a civil society or the creation yet of a church. It was the creation of the family. And that's what the church needs to pay attention to, especially with men today, is the definition and the rededication toward the ministry of family. You can always reach me and my team jennafr.net. M.
