Kevin Freeman: Ahoy, mates. Welcome aboard another voyage of Pirate Money Radio, the show that sails against the storms of fiat tyranny, cultural confusion and counterfeit ideas to chart a course toward liberty, security and values based on biblical truth. I'm your captain, Kevan Freeman, author of Pirate Money. Coming to you from the heart of Texas, we've got Mike Carter here. And Mike, we have another special guest also. But I want to give you some genuinely encouraging news. I mean, we've had some bad things we've had to deal with, but I've got good news today, but mixed with a few important cautions. It's called Trump Accounts launched with real momentum, giving American children a thousand dollar head start in ownership.
Mike Carter: You know, I like the ownership angle here. It feels hopeful. $1,000, I'm like, oh, $1,000, what's that mean? But you start to think of compounding investments and interest like this. This is interesting.
Kevin Freeman: It is interesting. It's exciting. If we can fix just a few tiny things that need to be fixed. They're not tiny, they're big things. We've got an important guest to help us unpack this and discuss some of the key guardrails, and it's our friend Mark Minnella from Financial Issues. he's got, can be found at financialissues.org, and he serves as the host and the lead analyst for Financial Issues Stewardship Ministries. As the primary on air voice and a guiding hand behind the ministry's investment strategy, Mark helps believers navigate today's financial markets with clarity, discipline, and biblical conviction. He has more than 35 years experience in investing and financial leadership. He's widely recognized as a pioneer in biblically responsible investing, which is bri. His work is consistently focused on helping individuals align their financial decisions with their faith without sacrificing prudence, diligence, or long term perspective. Mark Manela, welcome aboard the Pirate Money ship.
Mark Minnella: Well, Kevan, thanks for having me. It's an honor to be here.
Kevin Freeman: You know, we've got some exciting news now. I want to talk about the good first and then we'll get into the challenges. But this is amazing. If you put $1,000 aside for someone born, on July 4th, let's say, on our 250th birthday of America, $1,000 seed, you made no further and you follow the S&P 500's historical return by age 67. I had Grok work it out for Me. And it showed up $804,000. You put aside $1,000. They retire at 67 and they have $804,000 in the Trump account. That's pretty amazing. You make that sound so easy.
Mike Carter: Why did I not do that?
Mark Minnella: It's a serious impact. Absolutely. I remember, I'm old enough to remember when IRAs. Something similar was said about that too. You know, if you put $1,000 away, the same thing would go through. But this is different because this is our government taking our taxpayer dollars, putting in an account for any baby born citizen born in the United States. Now the implications of this are incredibly good. I mean, think about the impoverished world. Oftentimes it's generation after generation. They can't break free from this. But, but this could be one of those things. For those who embrace it properly. It could break, impoverishment. It could break the poverty cycle that goes on. Now. I understand. It also could be used and abused. You know, at 18 they could take it out and go buy a car or spend it on something, you know, terrible like drugs or something, or
Kevin Freeman: college at a liberal university that would.
Mark Minnella: Something even worse or even worse than the drugs.
Mike Carter: Right.
Mark Minnella: University. There's all sorts of things that could happen, but it gives people the opportunity to break free of that cycle of poverty. I mean, imagine being 25 years old and realizing that you have 25, $30,000 in an account you never even looked at because mom and dad forgot to tell you about it or whatever. But now you want to start a business. You could do that with that money. You could break out of that neighborhood and break into, being a businessman in your own business. Start a company. Or like you said, you could go to school, you could even go to a Christian school with that. There's no limit on where you could go. So there's all sorts of positive aspects of this to help our country. Actually after a while, if this stayed in place, if they continue to do this, and it actually could even have a small impact on the 50, to 60 some trillion dollars that's in the stock market. It could actually cause that to stabilize a little bit because it wouldn't be highly traded anymore. It would stabilize some base stocks and whatnot.
Kevin Freeman: Well, let's talk about the wealth gap for a bit because one of the big complaints by young people is I don't have the same opportunity. and there's truth in that. And we'll talk about some of that. We'll talk about private equity versus public equity. We'll talk about, you know, are we giving the money to the right place and so forth. Is this adding to the deficit? There's some downsides to this, but overall, the structural idea of giving young people ownership stake in America, this is what. Do you remember when we had star Parker Mike in studio on Economic War Room? She said the wealth gap is an ownership gap. And if you can't own anything, if you're living hand to mouth and you're living, you know, I get just enough money to last to the end of the month, or maybe not even last to the end of the month, those people don't own anything. We're talking about an ownership gap that if you have a piece and a stake in America's future and American companies, you're less likely to turn against America.
Mike Carter: It's a new war on poverty, but in a positive way because it causes, a mind shift. It's not, okay, what's somebody give me? It's what can I grow? And then as I start to see I've got something that grows, that becomes a little bit, it's inspiring. It's like, oh, that keeps growing. I don't want to necessarily touch that. let me work on something else over here. Or I do want to do that. To invest. Yeah, go ahead.
Mark Minnella: You know what else it does is capitalism. Think about this how, negative, capitalism is in the media right now, with all the socialists, communists and everybody else trying to take over a country. They berate capitalism as being all about selfishness and greed and billionaires. But, you know, the reality is capitalism is the only form of economics that have brought people out of poverty. And this is showing exactly how that works. Think about this. Yeah, Thousand dollars going in there, but did you know there's literally tens of billions of dollars going in from private corporations right now? From like Dell and others that are just dropping money into. And the way they say it, trump accounts in low income, zip codes. So effectively, even SpaceX, the president of SpaceX, is putting millions of shares, into accounts, in impoverished, zip codes. Think about that. This is capitalism at its best and it's showing how it really works. Showing that capitalism does take people out of poverty. Capitalism gives everybody the opportunity to do more than what they could do just on their own and definitely encourages them to do more. by seeing, like you were saying there, by seeing, wow, 18 years of watching this compound, you really can make things grow. You really can do some great things. So I think it's A wonderful idea that Trump accounts, but it's got one very big issue.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're going to get to the issue, Mark. We got a whole hour, and we're going to talk about some of the negatives. And I know what your issue is. I've been watching your stuff, and you're a true leader in, all this. But right now, let's celebrate the notion, the idea of ownership. And I remember, as a kid, I said, what is this in my little box? Oh, that is a U.S. savings bond. And so what's it? The U.S. savings bond. Oh, yeah, your grandparents bought you this bond when you turned one. And they put it, you know, they put $10 or $100 or whatever in the U.S. savings bond. And it's going to mature, and when it matures, you're going to have that money. And I thought, well, that is so cool. And I had that savings bill. This is even better because it's invested in growth. It's, you know, Mark, you're a financial planner. We both know that when you're younger, you ought to have more tilting to stocks, and when you're older, you get more tilting to bonds. But we did the opposite. Savings bonds was a, one year old. I was given a savings bond which had no growth potential. It was just reaping interest. And it got crushed by inflation because I was a kid of the 60s and the 70s, and the value of that got crushed. Hey, we're talking about money. And there are only three things you can do with your money. You can give it or spend it, or invest it. Here at Pirate Money Radio, we work to explain solutions that support all three areas in a way that promotes liberty, security and values. Patriot Mobile. It's a mobile phone company that supports the Pirate Money radio program. Patriot Mobile uses US carriers, including AT&T, Verizon and T Mobile, and operates on both Apple and Android phones. More information about the economic war room and Patriot Mobile is [email protected] AFR that's PirateMoneyRadio.com AFR and Mark, you talk about money all the time and you talk about how it's an indication of where your heart is. And here Trump accounts. We're investing in the future of Americ America. Where's your treasure? Our treasurer's young people. And we're investing in them. And from that perspective, we're doing something good, right?
Mark Minnella: Absolutely. there's so many good things about it, and I'm so proud of this administration to come up with such A great thing. Here's one. It doesn't go through an NGO to get distributed to whoever the NGO thinks deserves it. And that's only a fraction of what gets to the ngo, because, of course, going through all these agencies, the normal way, most of the money goes away and doesn't get to the end game.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're with the great Mark Minnella. We will be back with more after.
Mike Carter: Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Bremen.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're talking about the bad, the good, the beautiful. Only here the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this case, the good is Trump accounts. We're investing in the future of America. We're picking young people, not because of any specific thing. We're saying every young person ought to have an equal opportunity in America and be an owner of America. And so the government has put us thousand dollars aside, for each person born in the United States if they establish a Trump account. It's easy, free money. We should all do this, I think. Mark, can you walk us through how Trump accounts work in simple terms? And I know, I promise you, we will get to how we fix this, because you found a flaw in it that needs to be addressed, and we will be promoting the answer to the flaw, and you've got it, and that's what's beautiful. But how do Trump accounts work in simple terms?
Mark Minnella: Well, in simple terms, it's really easy. Now, I just read a new release that the Social, Security Administration is going to automatically enroll all new babies in the United States in the Trump account. So you don't even have to go out to do it now, they'll automatically be enrolled, and that thousand dollars will be put in their account for them. So that's a good thing. If you already have a child, that was born, between, January 1st and now our January 1st of 2025, you can go into, the, you can go out to the IRS and just, look at the Trump accounts for. Actually, that's what TrumpAccountsForAll.com is a good place to go. But the IRS, you can go and look at how to set that up. It's very simple. It's a very simple, application to get it set up and going. And then once you do that, $1,000 is dumped into that account and, invested. And that's what we're going to be talking about here. Once you unbridle this horse. Who has something to say about that?
Mike Carter: I like hearing about the generosity of folks like the Dells that are adding billions on top of the government seed that's out there. Talk, a little bit about how that kind of partnership builds momentum as well.
Mark Minnella: Well that's a really interesting thing because there's so much that is going into that. It's just not it's just not the government or our taxes going into it. But there's just literally hundreds now here. Micah and Susan Dell, 6.25 billion committed. Ray and Barbara, Dalio to give
Mike Carter: away 6.25 billion to put into Trump accounts.
Mark Minnella: On top of the thousand dollars reported, 75 million committed. Brad Gerstner, from Invest America reported that they're putting in $250 to eligible children in their state of Indiana. I mean I could go on this list, I'm scrolling down it here, just over and over. And then you get into banking, and financial services. I'm just going to read some of the names of people, organizations donating to these. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, bank of America, BNY, Citi, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, Charles Schwab, BlackRock, State Street, Vanguard, NASDAQ, Russell Sofi, Chime, Robinhood, Coinbase, Kraken Micron, Intel, IBM, Nvidia, Broadcom, CrowdStrike. So what we're saying, a whole lot more of corporations are getting involved now. A lot of these corporations, what they're doing is they're matching what the parents are putting in and you can put on in. You just don't have to start with, you just don't have to end with that thousand dollars that we put in as taxpayers. You can go beyond that up to $5,000 a year as a parent or as a grandparent. And then these others also can go into it too.
Mike Carter: The beautiful part about that is this isn't a tax. The beautiful part is this isn't a tax. This is actually private businesses and individuals saying, hey, we want to help make a difference out there.
Kevin Freeman: Well, let me describe the potential of this because if you put aside, with the help of some of these corporations and others, essentially less than $500 a month, you know, little over $400 a month, that's $5,000 a year. And you do it just for the first 18 years, which is all you can do. The Trump accounts, you stop contributing when your child hits age 18. But if you leave it untouched, you put $90,000 in, which by the way is about what a four year college costs. even with all of the help that you're getting and everything else, by the time that your child retires assuming just the results of the past from S&P 500. And we. Mark, you and I know, past performance does not guarantee future results and all that, but using the government's own figures, by age 67, which is retirement age, your child could have between 27 and $36 million just from putting in that $5,000 a year. With the help of all these others, this is very hopeful. Now, there are some real concerns that we're going to talk about. You're going to get to share right after we come back from this break, Mark. And we'll talk about the problems and the fixes. How do we make it work? We'll be right back.
Mike Carter: Pirate Money Radio, helping you give, spend and invest in ways that align with living, liberty, security and values. Welcome back with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: Yes, and Mike Carter, the co host, and I are talking with the great Mark Minnella and we're talking about the beautiful opportunity that, the Trump administration and the Congress have given us in Trump accounts to invest in our future, to invest in children, to help make everybody part of the ownership society so that we have a brilliant American future and we win, you know, for another 250 years, America stays on top. These are all great things and we believe been very optimistic. But you and I both have a couple of concerns. One of them I had and one of them that you brought to me, reading and listening to your stuff. First, my concern, should the government be borrowing more money to fund these accounts? And second, with birthright citizenship rulings, how do we make sure these benefits primarily go to true American citizens? Mark, what are your thoughts on those two? And then I know the much bigger one for you, which I agree with entirely on Bri, but we'll get. First, let's deal with the, debt and the citizenship.
Mark Minnella: Yeah, it's a sad thing that we have to borrow to do this. as you know, Kevan, you've heard me, we've talked about this before. One of the biggest risks in the United States is its debt. It is a huge risk. When we get to a point right now, we're approaching 40 trillion. Yeah, $4 trillion right now. Think about that.
Kevin Freeman: $40 trillion. That's a lot of money.
Mark Minnella: We're paying over a trillion dollars a year in interest on that debt. Okay. When that sinks in, which it can't because it's so big a number, think about this. We are continuously going on debt. And it's not just Republicans and it's not just Democrats. It's Actually, Congress in general, they don't seem to be able to get it under control. Spending has become the norm. Borrowing money to finance everything has become the norm in the United States for the Congress, those who are supposed to be protecting us and, putting us first, they are actually putting us in so much debt, we can't deal with it. Well, they didn't put aside money out of, the budget or the income tax or anything like that. They're just borrowing it to do this as well. Unfortunately, that is a very sad thing, because this is one of the programs that I think should be above so many other programs that are out there doing absolutely nothing, Especially those that are going overseas through 14 different NGOs, end up putting less than a penny of every dollar going through these things to the cause that they said they're going to use it for. There's so much graph, so much. In fact, I read a report recently, if we could get up, get rid of the fraud, if we could get rid of just the fraud and the waste, we could recover over a trillion dollars a year in our budget.
Kevin Freeman: That would cover our interest right there. That would be a huge difference.
Mark Minnella: Imagine that.
Kevin Freeman: And what you said also, we talked about a little bit, is the notion from this birthright citizenship ruling from the Supreme Court that a drug dealer could bring his girlfriend here, she has a baby here, and, they get a Social Security card, and next thing you know, the taxpayers are putting $1,000 into that drug dealer's, family.
Mark Minnella: Yeah. And we, we've all heard about how China is sending literally, thousands of people over a month to have babies here and then just taking them and going home, because now they got a citizenship and can come and go as they please. They can vote. They can influence our country in many, many ways. Now, now we're going to pay them to do that. $1,000 to do that.
Mike Carter: Unbelievable. That's unbelievable to me. You know, Kevan, with your background in economics and your Cherokee heritage, how do you see this citizenship, question playing out here?
Kevin Freeman: Well, the Congress needs to get a hold of this. It's a congressional fix, and they need to define what it means to be subject to the jurisdiction thereof. they defined it for my grandfather in 1908, born in Oklahoma, in Indian Territory. They said he wasn't a citizen because he was a member of the Cherokee Nation. and then in 1924, they corrected that. They can correct this. They can say, look, unless you're here legally, you're not subject to the jurisdiction thereof. And especially if you get taken home immediately so they can fix this. And we need that fixed. But there's a bigger challenge here. And Mark, we're going to have to address this because, the problem is 88% of the S&P 500 companies have BlackRock, Vanguard or State street as their single largest shareholder. And you and I both know BlackRock Vanguard and State street have had some questionable, motives in their proxy votes and what they intend to do with the money. They don't have a biblical worldview. And for Christians, it's anathema to invest in companies that are voting to make Disney woke and anti American values. And that's the real problem we're going to have to address. And Mark, you're going to be unleashed. I'm gonna let you let it rip. When we come back after this break, we'll be right.
Mike Carter: Welcome to Pirate Money Radio with your host Kevan Freeman helping you unpack the economic headlines and providing real money solutions.
Mark Minnella: Yeah.
Kevin Freeman: And we're joined by Mike Carter as co host and Mark Manella who is going to share with us. You're going to be completely unleashed in this, our longest block of the, of the program. And Mark, before we start, tell us where people can follow you and then I'll ask you the key questions.
Mark Minnella: Financialissues.org, we're live on the air Monday through Friday from 9, a.m. to 10am Eastern time. You can go to financialissue.org and then on Saturdays we have another show. It's called Stewardship Today that we just launched. Micah and Kevan. I mean, Kevan. I'm sorry.
Kevin Freeman: Well, Micah here as well.
Mike Carter: Yeah, I'm glad to hear you're on Saturday.
Mark Minnella: I was going to say Mike and I said Micah, so sorry about that.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah. So Saturday you've got a program. Pirate Money Radio is our Saturday program. So it's great. but. All right, so Mark, here's the reality Bible. Believing Christians should not be investing in things that destroy the values of America and future generations. And you preach on this. I mean, you're a preacher on this. From an economic and financial perspective. Tell us, what is the danger with Trump accounts and how do we fix it?
Mark Minnella: Okay, let's start with the Bible. How about that, Kevan? 1st Thessalonians 5, 21, 22. Test all things, hold fast. What is good? Abstain from every form of evil. When it says test all things, what does all include? Everything. Right. Including our investments. So we should be as Christians, if we consider ourselves stewards, which most Christians do, because that's what the Bible tells us we are. We're stewards of whatever God has entrusted to us that should be used to his glory. it should be used for his purposes, to his glory. And if we do that, why would we ever want to own, become a partner in a company that's involved in abortion or pornography or using and abusing God's children? Well, what we just talked about with these Trump accounts, there's only one investment it can go into, and it's an S&P 500 index fund. And that index fund has over 70% of its investments involved in abortion, pornography, sexual, immorality, anti family, anti God, promotion, promoting anti God and anti family beliefs. It's just horrendous what they're investing in. And as a Christian, if I buy a stock, I become an owner. That's what buying stock does. You become an owner of that company, you may be only 1,1 million, but you're still an owner. And because of that, you're participating whatever that company does. as you know, Kevan, that's what biblical responsible investing is all about. It's about only investing in those companies that do not compromise God's tenets of love by investing only in that that honors God. And by doing that, we actually impact society. And I've seen it over and over again. If you want to know why our society is where it's at, follow the M money to the top. And the top is Wallnua Street. And it's Wallnua street who determines what the message is out there. It's Wallnua street that is determining the message on esg. it's Wallnua street that's determining these messages on, equality and all these terms that they've redefined to mean something that they really don't. And if we can take the money away from, not invest in those companies that are doing that, that actually are killing babies, that actually are producing the pornography and the ugliness that we see on all the streaming, sites. Then we can actually change the course for our children and our children's children. It really can happen. So they don't give you a choice, though. So, effectively, Trump accounts for all is not for all, but it's for all but the faithful. That's what it's coming down to. Because as a believer, I would rather not have that thousand dollars than have that money go into, buy a stock and partner my baby with, abortion, pornography, sexual immorality, promoting lgbtq, promoting transsexuality, and all the ugliness that is out there.
Mike Carter: Mark, what can parents and grandparents do? What are practical steps they can take right now? maybe alongside of this, maybe within it. What's your advice there?
Mark Minnella: You know, this is a hard decision for a lot of people and easy for others like you and me, Mike. it's easier for us to say, you know, I don't want to participate in this if I have to buy a stock for my baby that kills babies. You know, it's kind of easy for us not to do that, but for others it's difficult. The biblical responsible investing journey is fairly new. I mean it's been going on, you know, Art and I and Dan Seeley and a bunch of people in the early 90s really got it started. But it's a reality of what it means to love God and to trust him. What you can do right now, you can go out to whitehouse.gov and hit the contact button and actually leave President Trump a little email, say, Mr. President, I want to participate, but I don't want to participate in abortion, pornography, sexual immorality, use and abuse of people, addictive products. I don't want to be involved in that. Please give us an option to invest with biblical integrity. Don't force us Christians to compromise who we are and what we believe to participate in this wonderful thing called Trump Accounts for kids. You can do that right now. You can go out there right now and leave that. If we get gobs of people. You also could go to TrumpAccountsForAll.com and sign the petition that we started at financial issues, that we're already sending to every congressman, every senator, we're trying to hand deliver some, we've had some people, Kevan, actually who know senators, and congressmen actually hand deliver it themselves and talk to them about it. We're getting some momentum on this. And with people like you, Kevan, with the following you have and the dedicated patriots that you have and Christians, you'll be able to get more and more people to put this on the forefront so that something happens, something, you know,
Mike Carter: it reminds me a little bit of the Thrift Savings Plan, you know, and I have a son in law and daughter that's in the Air Force. They were forced to give money to companies that were funding weapons pointed against them. It made no sense at all.
Kevin Freeman: They were investing in China and companies that our own Defense Department said are on the restricted list. And yet the, and we addressed that and we took it to as a petition and they fixed it and I hope it's still fixed. We need to go back and check. But here's what I'm going to do. Mark.
Mark Minnella: Mark.
Kevin Freeman: We're going to take this. I'll take it to Dr. Ben Carson, and we'll take it to Lieutenant Governor of Texas Dan Patrick. They, lead the Religious Liberty Commission that President Trump established. They both have direct access to the president. And we'll see if we can't get an option added. And that's all we're talking about. We're talking about option added. For people to invest in a way that doesn't violate their values. This should be a simple and easy fix. And if you'll go, if you're interested and you want to see a fix done, give us the location, again, where they can go and sign that petition.
Kevin Freeman: Trumpaccountsforall.com Trumpaccountsforall.com this is such an important thing because, look, I've said this. Not one penny is what, Art Alley would say and wrote in his book. And of course, we don't have pennies anymore. Did art get pennies banned? Is that what it. No, I'm kidding. But we just had Art on the program here just a, couple of weeks ago. Art's a dear friend. And not one penny. You don't want one penny. And you look at Disney as an example. I would invest so quickly in Disney if they would return to the family friendly principles that they had a couple of decades ago. I would invest so easily, so quickly in it. And you know what? When they turned against family friendly, guess what? They're. Their stock has gone nowhere for five years. One of the biggest name brand companies in the world, and their stock has gone nowhere. Why? What happened? Well, they stopped making good movies and they started promoting LGBTQ into everything.
Mark Minnella: Started lecturing us all.
Kevin Freeman: Lecturing. When you can take the Toy Story, which every grandparent in America wants to take their grandkids to see a Toy Story movie so they can go and, and they can see the toys. They played with his kids and they had as kids, they wanted to. And then they show up and Buzz Lightyear's got a, you know, got a gay kiss scene in the movie. It's like they won't even show that in Saudi Arabia. And Disney made that on purpose, knowing it would lose money. Well, look, that's not stewardship. That is not at all.
Mark Minnella: And another place you could go is out to financialissues.org and that's the simplest. And just find the. You could Sign the petition there, but do leave an email for the president and do call your senator and your congressman. Let's get this done. If we do this, this will bring biblical responsible investing to the forefront and make it so even Christians can participate in a, wonderful thing like Trump accounts for kids.
Kevin Freeman: All right. Support for this program comes from Glent Financial Technology Service offering a debit card mobile app that enables users to access gold holdings for everyday purchases. With Glint, users maintain ownership of allocated physical gold stored in managed vault at the time of a transaction. Gold is sold in real time to cover the purchase amount in local currency. Glint offers an alternative way to store and use the value. Combining gold and silver with modern payment infrastructure, Glint clients can monitor their gold balance, view transaction history, and manage their account through the Glint app, available on major mobile platforms. More details about how vaulted physical gold can be used as money or available at, glentpay.comgold247 Again, glintpay.comgold247 Glint providing access to gold for modern spending. We'll be right back with Mark Manila after this break.
Mike Carter: Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: And I'm joined by Mike Carter. Mike, I just had an idea. What. What if we went a step further, not only sign the petition and tell President Trump we want biblically responsible investment, what if we started lining up good, godly Christian corporations that, hey, I'm going to add to this just like Micah Dell has done, just like the Dalio family and Robin Hood, MasterCard and others. But only if. Only if. Mr. President, we love your idea. You got to praise him, you got to thank him, and we'll put money behind it. Only if you will add a biblically responsible option to people. I think that would help get some attention.
Mark Minnella: That's really interesting, Kevan, because we just had that discussion. As another way to approach this is to start rounding up all the Christian, led corporations to do exactly that. I love it. and maybe you could head that up and make it happen.
Kevin Freeman: We'll call to Chick Fil A, we'll call to Hobby Lobby. We'll call to all the great. There's a lot of great Nutrimax and all these other great corporations that believe in biblical values and say, Mr. President, you did a great thing. Now let's just tweak it to make it even better so Christians aren't excluded. I know that message will resonate with him. And if we get Dr. Carson. We just had Dr. Carson on this program. he's a dear friend. We just had him here at Liberty Hawk, just a few weeks ago. Get Dr. Carson, get Lieutenant, Governor Dan Patrick and others. I'm going to make that, to do on my list. I don't need any more to dos on my list, but I'll put that on my honeydew list.
Mike Carter: That fits so well with our stat, our Solution to Action tank. How do we take these ideas and make sure they're executed and provide real world solutions? And that does it. And that aligns so well, Kevan, with the work we're doing at the NSIC Institute, where people are aligning, their money with their values that stand for liberty, security and values. So this all ties together in a beautiful way and, I'm excited about it.
Kevin Freeman: So we're going to bring up some financial issues and we're going to have you, Mark, help carry this, and we'll work together. We will work with you on getting, corporations to say yes, we'll do this wonderful Trump thing with one minor tweak and just stop excluding Christians, from taking this money.
Mark Minnella: Well, I'm honored that you're getting on board because you do have such great affluence and influence in politics and in the Christian community in America. So thank you so much for that, Kevan. This is really big. It's really important, and it'll bring investing with biblical integrity to the forefront. And I really believe if Trump knew what was going on with this, he would immediately make the change, or those that should make the change would do it. I believe that he would want this to happen. He just doesn't know yet. And nobody's been able to help him to be able to see this yet. And m bring it to his attention. You might have the influence to do that.
Kevin Freeman: Well, I know Dr. Carson has the influence to do that. I know that Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick has the influence to do that. And we know both of them, and we will bring this to their attention and see if they won't take it to the President. Because this is a religious liberty issue, frankly. We'll take it to Kelly Shackelford, who's also on that commission, and others that are good friends. I'm on Kelly's board. We'll do whatever we can to say, hey, look, great idea, Mr. President. Now let's make it available to Christians as well as all Americans.
Mike Carter: Yeah.
Mark Minnella: You know, when Christians start activating their faith, good things happen. You know, when secularism, activates their faith, ugly things happen to our society. It just, darkness just goes through our society. But when Christians activate their faith. We see the righteousness of God just pour out on our society as well. And that's what will happen here when we all come together to do this kind of thing.
Mike Carter: You know, so often Christians, they hear what the world is saying, like, well, maybe I better be quiet because they, they don't understand my view. We got to do the opposite. We got to lean into this. We've got to step into it and help people understand that their actions do make a difference.
Kevin Freeman: Well, Jesus said Luke 16:11, he said, if you're not faithful with your unrighteous mammon, you will not be trusted with true riches. The way to be faithful with unrighteous mammon is to make sure it's promoting liberty, security and values, Biblical principles, truth, and so that it enables the sharing of the gospel rather than restricts it. And again, this is some of those companies that are managing money, they intend to restrict the gospel. They intend to sell us out into not liberty, security and values, but quite the opposite. And, Mark, you've been sounding the alarm on this. I told you I would give you your chance to bring it out. And we're going to step in with you and see if we can help you and our audience, you, you listeners either to the podcast or American Family Radio or Real Life Network. You, you guys are powerful. learn more about this. And again, Mark, tell us where we can learn more. And if people want to get active, where do they go?
Mark Minnella: Well, I really would suggest you come out to financialissues.org financialissues.org, we have some flyers out there about it. You also can sign the petition there. There's so much you can do there to learn about stewardship in general.
Kevin Freeman: all right, we'll be right back after this break.
Mike Carter: Pirate Money Radio, helping you give, spend, and invest in ways that align with liberty, security and values. Welcome back with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: I'm joined by Mike Carter, Mike, Hidden Mark, and an amazing guest.
Mike Carter: It is, it's great to see the communities working together, to help drive liberty, security and values. And so often people are not aligning their investments with their values. Mark, thank you for the work that you're doing.
Mark Minnella: Well, thank you for having me on. I'm so honored to be here with you gentlemen. it's just a blessing to see what can happen when Christians get their mind together, isn't it? Yes, it is.
Kevin Freeman: And we should have our mind together. We should have the mind of Christ, and we should be joining in unity in one accord. I don't care what denomination you come from, the notion or the idea that your investment should align with your value, should be universal. I wouldn't expect anything less from the left.
Mark Minnella: I mean, Everybody knows Ephesians 5:11 and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. Well, Kevan, that's what you've been doing for years is exposing the unfruitful works of darkness. And today what we want to do is help people to realize they shouldn't have, fellowship with any company that is doing all these ugly, anti God, anti family, anti birth, anti, morals, organizations and companies. And, and people say, well, I don't think any companies really do that. Did you know this? You want to hear one of the stupidest ones I've ever heard?
Kevin Freeman: Sure, please.
Mark Minnella: Gerber used to give money to Planned Parenthood. Think about that. A baby food manufacturer was given money to, Planned Parenthood, who killed more babies than anybody else in the world. I mean, it's just not wrong. It's stupid.
Kevin Freeman: You know, I'll just do. Go along that same vein. Exxon Mobil, they elected directors to ExxonMobil who decided they wanted to end the fossil fuel industry. And, and who allowed that? Who allowed that? It was the same people managing the Trump account funds, the same big three that were. There was a little, activist investor, and they got the shareholder votes, the proxy votes from the big three. We got warned against this. the founder of the index fund industry, Jon Bogle, wrote shortly before he died. He said, I love index funds. I think they're phenomenal. But, what I don't like is when they vote against the interests of America. And I don't think you should concentrate that power, that voting power in the big three. Blackrock, State street and Vanguard, you know, and then he died shortly thereafter.
Mark Minnella: That.
Kevin Freeman: But that was an important warning, and we shouldn't have our votes going for bad things. And we shouldn't be forced, if you want to participate in a government program, to invest in things that run contrary to our values.
Mike Carter: Okay, well, remember what Trump said, though, when he was campaigning. Evangelicals don't realize the power they have if they would work together and get active. And that's what we're talking about doing today.
Kevin Freeman: That's exactly. So, Mark, sum up for us. Trump accounts good. being forced to invest against your values bad. And then the solution is what?
Mark Minnella: Yeah, the solution is that we need to add into it an index fund that is biblically responsible. For example, Timothy plan has ETFs that are broad ETFs, they could add one of those into there and that would make it so all Christian could participate without having to compromise their values and their conscience. So very simple.
Kevin Freeman: Wouldn't, that be great art? We put a Timothy Plan fund into the Trump account. Our art ally and Timothy Plan have done so much for America investing to bring truth, supporting programs like our programs. Wouldn't that be awesome if we could have a Timothy Plan, fund inside the Trump account?
Mark Minnella: Right. The other issue with that is that, they, they've restricted what they can charge internally for these type of accounts. So you have to have over a billion dollars in it just to break even for the cost of running an etf. But you would have that if we got it into the, the Trump accounts, for all our Trump accounts for kids accounts, I think that would happen. And I'd love to honor, the Timothy plan by having them in there. You know, if anybody, they screen, they're the strictest and they were the pioneers for the mutual fund industry of creating mutual funds that allowed Christians invest with integrity. They, they have, stuck guns and never compromised.
Kevin Freeman: Thank you, Mark, for championing biblical values in finance. All right, to learn more and sign the petition for BRI options and Trump accounts, you can visit takeaction.financialissues.org for trusted advisors trained in biblical stewardship. You can learn more from the nsic. visit Pirate Money Radio if you want more information. All right, if you're watching on Real Life Network, thank you. Until next time, stay faithful, stay free. But if you're on American Family Radio and listening, we've got one more segment. We'll talk more with Mark Minnella about Trump accounts and ways you can act.
Mike Carter: Foreign. Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah. We're joined by Mark Manella's special guest, Mike Carter as co host. Hey, Mark, what gives you the most hopeful right now? Maybe a favorite scripture on stewardship. And how can listeners follow you?
Mark Minnella: Well, on stewardship, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all for the glory of God. That is the definition of stewardship, doing everything for the glory of God. And stewardship encompasses everything in your life, not just your material goods, but your heart, your relationships. How about stewarding this nation, Kevan, as a steward? God gave us this nation to be stewards over. So we have to vote, properly vote in people who love the Lord and who will reduce our debt, who will have a balanced budget, who will care for and not just use and abuse his children.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah, it sounds good to me, doesn't it, Mike?
Mike Carter: It does. Amen. Amen.
Kevin Freeman: And what gives you hope, Mike?
Mike Carter: You know, I love, again, the idea that we're seeing entrepreneurialism, free, market. Market capitalists in this Trump plan out there. And Kevan, it reminds me a little bit of a young Kevan Freeman when we, both just out of college and you had this thing called the personal capitalists, which, opened my eyes to, wow, if you invest in what you do with this, and this can happen now, we can take that all the way down to baby Trump times almost now, right? The baby times. How do we start to make sure that the public is educated on the opportunities that do exist? The answer isn't democratic socialism. it's not communism. It's closing the wealth gap. And this is the way to do it.
Kevin Freeman: Ownership. And what's beautiful about this is the IRA was great. Once you start working at age 18 or 21 or whenever, then you could put a couple of thousand dollars a year and you could become a multimillionaire just by putting some money aside. Trump accounts go back even further. The earlier you start, the greater it grows over time. And starting as a day one with $1,000, what a gift. But we've got to make sure that that gift is not being squandered or not being used against us. And so, Mark Manela, thank you so much for what you're doing, in educating America on these Trump accounts. Thank you for what you're doing with financial issues, and you can learn [email protected] all right. If you have questions or prayer needs or comments, I want you to email us at afrite. We get a lot of questions and comments, and we answer them all, don't we, individually? We go back, Mike, and we've got some, unusual questions at times. We've got some really serious ones. You may have questions on how do I deal with these Trump accounts. And so again, Mark, tell us one last time, where do people follow you?
Mark Minnella: Financialissues.org, go out to financialissues.org, you can watch the show, you can stream past shows, you can, participate in the live show. You can call in, you can get in the chat and ask questions while we're on the air. It's a wonderful place to go to get together with Christians and find out how, you can do the most with what God has entrusted to you.
Kevin Freeman: Well, God's entrusted a lot to us, and we need to pray about it because we need to be good, faithful stewards with it. We need to pray for America to return to God's principles this year. We need to pray for biblical stewardship and wise policy and strong families. Strong. So if you're listening, you can listen to us wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you can share this with your friends if you'd like. If you want to learn more information, check out PirateMoneyRadio.com We've had a great time with Mark Mannell on financial issues and Trump accounts. This is Kevan Freeman and Mike Carter, joined this week by Mark Manela for Pirate Money Radio. Stay tuned.
Kevin Freeman: Ahoy, mates. Welcome aboard another voyage of Pirate Money Radio, the show that sails against the storms of fiat tyranny, cultural confusion and counterfeit ideas to chart a course toward liberty, security and values based on biblical truth. I'm your captain, Kevan Freeman, author of Pirate Money. Coming to you from the heart of Texas, we've got Mike Carter here. And Mike, we have another special guest also. But I want to give you some genuinely encouraging news. I mean, we've had some bad things we've had to deal with, but I've got good news today, but mixed with a few important cautions. It's called Trump Accounts launched with real momentum, giving American children a thousand dollar head start in ownership.
Mike Carter: You know, I like the ownership angle here. It feels hopeful. $1,000, I'm like, oh, $1,000, what's that mean? But you start to think of compounding investments and interest like this. This is interesting.
Kevin Freeman: It is interesting. It's exciting. If we can fix just a few tiny things that need to be fixed. They're not tiny, they're big things. We've got an important guest to help us unpack this and discuss some of the key guardrails, and it's our friend Mark Minnella from Financial Issues. he's got, can be found at financialissues.org, and he serves as the host and the lead analyst for Financial Issues Stewardship Ministries. As the primary on air voice and a guiding hand behind the ministry's investment strategy, Mark helps believers navigate today's financial markets with clarity, discipline, and biblical conviction. He has more than 35 years experience in investing and financial leadership. He's widely recognized as a pioneer in biblically responsible investing, which is bri. His work is consistently focused on helping individuals align their financial decisions with their faith without sacrificing prudence, diligence, or long term perspective. Mark Manela, welcome aboard the Pirate Money ship.
Mark Minnella: Well, Kevan, thanks for having me. It's an honor to be here.
Kevin Freeman: You know, we've got some exciting news now. I want to talk about the good first and then we'll get into the challenges. But this is amazing. If you put $1,000 aside for someone born, on July 4th, let's say, on our 250th birthday of America, $1,000 seed, you made no further and you follow the S&P 500's historical return by age 67. I had Grok work it out for Me. And it showed up $804,000. You put aside $1,000. They retire at 67 and they have $804,000 in the Trump account. That's pretty amazing. You make that sound so easy.
Mike Carter: Why did I not do that?
Mark Minnella: It's a serious impact. Absolutely. I remember, I'm old enough to remember when IRAs. Something similar was said about that too. You know, if you put $1,000 away, the same thing would go through. But this is different because this is our government taking our taxpayer dollars, putting in an account for any baby born citizen born in the United States. Now the implications of this are incredibly good. I mean, think about the impoverished world. Oftentimes it's generation after generation. They can't break free from this. But, but this could be one of those things. For those who embrace it properly. It could break, impoverishment. It could break the poverty cycle that goes on. Now. I understand. It also could be used and abused. You know, at 18 they could take it out and go buy a car or spend it on something, you know, terrible like drugs or something, or
Kevin Freeman: college at a liberal university that would.
Mark Minnella: Something even worse or even worse than the drugs.
Mike Carter: Right.
Mark Minnella: University. There's all sorts of things that could happen, but it gives people the opportunity to break free of that cycle of poverty. I mean, imagine being 25 years old and realizing that you have 25, $30,000 in an account you never even looked at because mom and dad forgot to tell you about it or whatever. But now you want to start a business. You could do that with that money. You could break out of that neighborhood and break into, being a businessman in your own business. Start a company. Or like you said, you could go to school, you could even go to a Christian school with that. There's no limit on where you could go. So there's all sorts of positive aspects of this to help our country. Actually after a while, if this stayed in place, if they continue to do this, and it actually could even have a small impact on the 50, to 60 some trillion dollars that's in the stock market. It could actually cause that to stabilize a little bit because it wouldn't be highly traded anymore. It would stabilize some base stocks and whatnot.
Kevin Freeman: Well, let's talk about the wealth gap for a bit because one of the big complaints by young people is I don't have the same opportunity. and there's truth in that. And we'll talk about some of that. We'll talk about private equity versus public equity. We'll talk about, you know, are we giving the money to the right place and so forth. Is this adding to the deficit? There's some downsides to this, but overall, the structural idea of giving young people ownership stake in America, this is what. Do you remember when we had star Parker Mike in studio on Economic War Room? She said the wealth gap is an ownership gap. And if you can't own anything, if you're living hand to mouth and you're living, you know, I get just enough money to last to the end of the month, or maybe not even last to the end of the month, those people don't own anything. We're talking about an ownership gap that if you have a piece and a stake in America's future and American companies, you're less likely to turn against America.
Mike Carter: It's a new war on poverty, but in a positive way because it causes, a mind shift. It's not, okay, what's somebody give me? It's what can I grow? And then as I start to see I've got something that grows, that becomes a little bit, it's inspiring. It's like, oh, that keeps growing. I don't want to necessarily touch that. let me work on something else over here. Or I do want to do that. To invest. Yeah, go ahead.
Mark Minnella: You know what else it does is capitalism. Think about this how, negative, capitalism is in the media right now, with all the socialists, communists and everybody else trying to take over a country. They berate capitalism as being all about selfishness and greed and billionaires. But, you know, the reality is capitalism is the only form of economics that have brought people out of poverty. And this is showing exactly how that works. Think about this. Yeah, Thousand dollars going in there, but did you know there's literally tens of billions of dollars going in from private corporations right now? From like Dell and others that are just dropping money into. And the way they say it, trump accounts in low income, zip codes. So effectively, even SpaceX, the president of SpaceX, is putting millions of shares, into accounts, in impoverished, zip codes. Think about that. This is capitalism at its best and it's showing how it really works. Showing that capitalism does take people out of poverty. Capitalism gives everybody the opportunity to do more than what they could do just on their own and definitely encourages them to do more. by seeing, like you were saying there, by seeing, wow, 18 years of watching this compound, you really can make things grow. You really can do some great things. So I think it's A wonderful idea that Trump accounts, but it's got one very big issue.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're going to get to the issue, Mark. We got a whole hour, and we're going to talk about some of the negatives. And I know what your issue is. I've been watching your stuff, and you're a true leader in, all this. But right now, let's celebrate the notion, the idea of ownership. And I remember, as a kid, I said, what is this in my little box? Oh, that is a U.S. savings bond. And so what's it? The U.S. savings bond. Oh, yeah, your grandparents bought you this bond when you turned one. And they put it, you know, they put $10 or $100 or whatever in the U.S. savings bond. And it's going to mature, and when it matures, you're going to have that money. And I thought, well, that is so cool. And I had that savings bill. This is even better because it's invested in growth. It's, you know, Mark, you're a financial planner. We both know that when you're younger, you ought to have more tilting to stocks, and when you're older, you get more tilting to bonds. But we did the opposite. Savings bonds was a, one year old. I was given a savings bond which had no growth potential. It was just reaping interest. And it got crushed by inflation because I was a kid of the 60s and the 70s, and the value of that got crushed. Hey, we're talking about money. And there are only three things you can do with your money. You can give it or spend it, or invest it. Here at Pirate Money Radio, we work to explain solutions that support all three areas in a way that promotes liberty, security and values. Patriot Mobile. It's a mobile phone company that supports the Pirate Money radio program. Patriot Mobile uses US carriers, including AT&T, Verizon and T Mobile, and operates on both Apple and Android phones. More information about the economic war room and Patriot Mobile is [email protected] AFR that's PirateMoneyRadio.com AFR and Mark, you talk about money all the time and you talk about how it's an indication of where your heart is. And here Trump accounts. We're investing in the future of Americ America. Where's your treasure? Our treasurer's young people. And we're investing in them. And from that perspective, we're doing something good, right?
Mark Minnella: Absolutely. there's so many good things about it, and I'm so proud of this administration to come up with such A great thing. Here's one. It doesn't go through an NGO to get distributed to whoever the NGO thinks deserves it. And that's only a fraction of what gets to the ngo, because, of course, going through all these agencies, the normal way, most of the money goes away and doesn't get to the end game.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're with the great Mark Minnella. We will be back with more after.
Mike Carter: Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Bremen.
Kevin Freeman: All right, we're talking about the bad, the good, the beautiful. Only here the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this case, the good is Trump accounts. We're investing in the future of America. We're picking young people, not because of any specific thing. We're saying every young person ought to have an equal opportunity in America and be an owner of America. And so the government has put us thousand dollars aside, for each person born in the United States if they establish a Trump account. It's easy, free money. We should all do this, I think. Mark, can you walk us through how Trump accounts work in simple terms? And I know, I promise you, we will get to how we fix this, because you found a flaw in it that needs to be addressed, and we will be promoting the answer to the flaw, and you've got it, and that's what's beautiful. But how do Trump accounts work in simple terms?
Mark Minnella: Well, in simple terms, it's really easy. Now, I just read a new release that the Social, Security Administration is going to automatically enroll all new babies in the United States in the Trump account. So you don't even have to go out to do it now, they'll automatically be enrolled, and that thousand dollars will be put in their account for them. So that's a good thing. If you already have a child, that was born, between, January 1st and now our January 1st of 2025, you can go into, the, you can go out to the IRS and just, look at the Trump accounts for. Actually, that's what TrumpAccountsForAll.com is a good place to go. But the IRS, you can go and look at how to set that up. It's very simple. It's a very simple, application to get it set up and going. And then once you do that, $1,000 is dumped into that account and, invested. And that's what we're going to be talking about here. Once you unbridle this horse. Who has something to say about that?
Mike Carter: I like hearing about the generosity of folks like the Dells that are adding billions on top of the government seed that's out there. Talk, a little bit about how that kind of partnership builds momentum as well.
Mark Minnella: Well that's a really interesting thing because there's so much that is going into that. It's just not it's just not the government or our taxes going into it. But there's just literally hundreds now here. Micah and Susan Dell, 6.25 billion committed. Ray and Barbara, Dalio to give
Mike Carter: away 6.25 billion to put into Trump accounts.
Mark Minnella: On top of the thousand dollars reported, 75 million committed. Brad Gerstner, from Invest America reported that they're putting in $250 to eligible children in their state of Indiana. I mean I could go on this list, I'm scrolling down it here, just over and over. And then you get into banking, and financial services. I'm just going to read some of the names of people, organizations donating to these. Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, bank of America, BNY, Citi, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, Charles Schwab, BlackRock, State Street, Vanguard, NASDAQ, Russell Sofi, Chime, Robinhood, Coinbase, Kraken Micron, Intel, IBM, Nvidia, Broadcom, CrowdStrike. So what we're saying, a whole lot more of corporations are getting involved now. A lot of these corporations, what they're doing is they're matching what the parents are putting in and you can put on in. You just don't have to start with, you just don't have to end with that thousand dollars that we put in as taxpayers. You can go beyond that up to $5,000 a year as a parent or as a grandparent. And then these others also can go into it too.
Mike Carter: The beautiful part about that is this isn't a tax. The beautiful part is this isn't a tax. This is actually private businesses and individuals saying, hey, we want to help make a difference out there.
Kevin Freeman: Well, let me describe the potential of this because if you put aside, with the help of some of these corporations and others, essentially less than $500 a month, you know, little over $400 a month, that's $5,000 a year. And you do it just for the first 18 years, which is all you can do. The Trump accounts, you stop contributing when your child hits age 18. But if you leave it untouched, you put $90,000 in, which by the way is about what a four year college costs. even with all of the help that you're getting and everything else, by the time that your child retires assuming just the results of the past from S&P 500. And we. Mark, you and I know, past performance does not guarantee future results and all that, but using the government's own figures, by age 67, which is retirement age, your child could have between 27 and $36 million just from putting in that $5,000 a year. With the help of all these others, this is very hopeful. Now, there are some real concerns that we're going to talk about. You're going to get to share right after we come back from this break, Mark. And we'll talk about the problems and the fixes. How do we make it work? We'll be right back.
Mike Carter: Pirate Money Radio, helping you give, spend and invest in ways that align with living, liberty, security and values. Welcome back with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: Yes, and Mike Carter, the co host, and I are talking with the great Mark Minnella and we're talking about the beautiful opportunity that, the Trump administration and the Congress have given us in Trump accounts to invest in our future, to invest in children, to help make everybody part of the ownership society so that we have a brilliant American future and we win, you know, for another 250 years, America stays on top. These are all great things and we believe been very optimistic. But you and I both have a couple of concerns. One of them I had and one of them that you brought to me, reading and listening to your stuff. First, my concern, should the government be borrowing more money to fund these accounts? And second, with birthright citizenship rulings, how do we make sure these benefits primarily go to true American citizens? Mark, what are your thoughts on those two? And then I know the much bigger one for you, which I agree with entirely on Bri, but we'll get. First, let's deal with the, debt and the citizenship.
Mark Minnella: Yeah, it's a sad thing that we have to borrow to do this. as you know, Kevan, you've heard me, we've talked about this before. One of the biggest risks in the United States is its debt. It is a huge risk. When we get to a point right now, we're approaching 40 trillion. Yeah, $4 trillion right now. Think about that.
Kevin Freeman: $40 trillion. That's a lot of money.
Mark Minnella: We're paying over a trillion dollars a year in interest on that debt. Okay. When that sinks in, which it can't because it's so big a number, think about this. We are continuously going on debt. And it's not just Republicans and it's not just Democrats. It's Actually, Congress in general, they don't seem to be able to get it under control. Spending has become the norm. Borrowing money to finance everything has become the norm in the United States for the Congress, those who are supposed to be protecting us and, putting us first, they are actually putting us in so much debt, we can't deal with it. Well, they didn't put aside money out of, the budget or the income tax or anything like that. They're just borrowing it to do this as well. Unfortunately, that is a very sad thing, because this is one of the programs that I think should be above so many other programs that are out there doing absolutely nothing, Especially those that are going overseas through 14 different NGOs, end up putting less than a penny of every dollar going through these things to the cause that they said they're going to use it for. There's so much graph, so much. In fact, I read a report recently, if we could get up, get rid of the fraud, if we could get rid of just the fraud and the waste, we could recover over a trillion dollars a year in our budget.
Kevin Freeman: That would cover our interest right there. That would be a huge difference.
Mark Minnella: Imagine that.
Kevin Freeman: And what you said also, we talked about a little bit, is the notion from this birthright citizenship ruling from the Supreme Court that a drug dealer could bring his girlfriend here, she has a baby here, and, they get a Social Security card, and next thing you know, the taxpayers are putting $1,000 into that drug dealer's, family.
Mark Minnella: Yeah. And we, we've all heard about how China is sending literally, thousands of people over a month to have babies here and then just taking them and going home, because now they got a citizenship and can come and go as they please. They can vote. They can influence our country in many, many ways. Now, now we're going to pay them to do that. $1,000 to do that.
Mike Carter: Unbelievable. That's unbelievable to me. You know, Kevan, with your background in economics and your Cherokee heritage, how do you see this citizenship, question playing out here?
Kevin Freeman: Well, the Congress needs to get a hold of this. It's a congressional fix, and they need to define what it means to be subject to the jurisdiction thereof. they defined it for my grandfather in 1908, born in Oklahoma, in Indian Territory. They said he wasn't a citizen because he was a member of the Cherokee Nation. and then in 1924, they corrected that. They can correct this. They can say, look, unless you're here legally, you're not subject to the jurisdiction thereof. And especially if you get taken home immediately so they can fix this. And we need that fixed. But there's a bigger challenge here. And Mark, we're going to have to address this because, the problem is 88% of the S&P 500 companies have BlackRock, Vanguard or State street as their single largest shareholder. And you and I both know BlackRock Vanguard and State street have had some questionable, motives in their proxy votes and what they intend to do with the money. They don't have a biblical worldview. And for Christians, it's anathema to invest in companies that are voting to make Disney woke and anti American values. And that's the real problem we're going to have to address. And Mark, you're going to be unleashed. I'm gonna let you let it rip. When we come back after this break, we'll be right.
Mike Carter: Welcome to Pirate Money Radio with your host Kevan Freeman helping you unpack the economic headlines and providing real money solutions.
Mark Minnella: Yeah.
Kevin Freeman: And we're joined by Mike Carter as co host and Mark Manella who is going to share with us. You're going to be completely unleashed in this, our longest block of the, of the program. And Mark, before we start, tell us where people can follow you and then I'll ask you the key questions.
Mark Minnella: Financialissues.org, we're live on the air Monday through Friday from 9, a.m. to 10am Eastern time. You can go to financialissue.org and then on Saturdays we have another show. It's called Stewardship Today that we just launched. Micah and Kevan. I mean, Kevan. I'm sorry.
Kevin Freeman: Well, Micah here as well.
Mike Carter: Yeah, I'm glad to hear you're on Saturday.
Mark Minnella: I was going to say Mike and I said Micah, so sorry about that.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah. So Saturday you've got a program. Pirate Money Radio is our Saturday program. So it's great. but. All right, so Mark, here's the reality Bible. Believing Christians should not be investing in things that destroy the values of America and future generations. And you preach on this. I mean, you're a preacher on this. From an economic and financial perspective. Tell us, what is the danger with Trump accounts and how do we fix it?
Mark Minnella: Okay, let's start with the Bible. How about that, Kevan? 1st Thessalonians 5, 21, 22. Test all things, hold fast. What is good? Abstain from every form of evil. When it says test all things, what does all include? Everything. Right. Including our investments. So we should be as Christians, if we consider ourselves stewards, which most Christians do, because that's what the Bible tells us we are. We're stewards of whatever God has entrusted to us that should be used to his glory. it should be used for his purposes, to his glory. And if we do that, why would we ever want to own, become a partner in a company that's involved in abortion or pornography or using and abusing God's children? Well, what we just talked about with these Trump accounts, there's only one investment it can go into, and it's an S&P 500 index fund. And that index fund has over 70% of its investments involved in abortion, pornography, sexual, immorality, anti family, anti God, promotion, promoting anti God and anti family beliefs. It's just horrendous what they're investing in. And as a Christian, if I buy a stock, I become an owner. That's what buying stock does. You become an owner of that company, you may be only 1,1 million, but you're still an owner. And because of that, you're participating whatever that company does. as you know, Kevan, that's what biblical responsible investing is all about. It's about only investing in those companies that do not compromise God's tenets of love by investing only in that that honors God. And by doing that, we actually impact society. And I've seen it over and over again. If you want to know why our society is where it's at, follow the M money to the top. And the top is Wallnua Street. And it's Wallnua street who determines what the message is out there. It's Wallnua street that is determining the message on esg. it's Wallnua street that's determining these messages on, equality and all these terms that they've redefined to mean something that they really don't. And if we can take the money away from, not invest in those companies that are doing that, that actually are killing babies, that actually are producing the pornography and the ugliness that we see on all the streaming, sites. Then we can actually change the course for our children and our children's children. It really can happen. So they don't give you a choice, though. So, effectively, Trump accounts for all is not for all, but it's for all but the faithful. That's what it's coming down to. Because as a believer, I would rather not have that thousand dollars than have that money go into, buy a stock and partner my baby with, abortion, pornography, sexual immorality, promoting lgbtq, promoting transsexuality, and all the ugliness that is out there.
Mike Carter: Mark, what can parents and grandparents do? What are practical steps they can take right now? maybe alongside of this, maybe within it. What's your advice there?
Mark Minnella: You know, this is a hard decision for a lot of people and easy for others like you and me, Mike. it's easier for us to say, you know, I don't want to participate in this if I have to buy a stock for my baby that kills babies. You know, it's kind of easy for us not to do that, but for others it's difficult. The biblical responsible investing journey is fairly new. I mean it's been going on, you know, Art and I and Dan Seeley and a bunch of people in the early 90s really got it started. But it's a reality of what it means to love God and to trust him. What you can do right now, you can go out to whitehouse.gov and hit the contact button and actually leave President Trump a little email, say, Mr. President, I want to participate, but I don't want to participate in abortion, pornography, sexual immorality, use and abuse of people, addictive products. I don't want to be involved in that. Please give us an option to invest with biblical integrity. Don't force us Christians to compromise who we are and what we believe to participate in this wonderful thing called Trump Accounts for kids. You can do that right now. You can go out there right now and leave that. If we get gobs of people. You also could go to TrumpAccountsForAll.com and sign the petition that we started at financial issues, that we're already sending to every congressman, every senator, we're trying to hand deliver some, we've had some people, Kevan, actually who know senators, and congressmen actually hand deliver it themselves and talk to them about it. We're getting some momentum on this. And with people like you, Kevan, with the following you have and the dedicated patriots that you have and Christians, you'll be able to get more and more people to put this on the forefront so that something happens, something, you know,
Mike Carter: it reminds me a little bit of the Thrift Savings Plan, you know, and I have a son in law and daughter that's in the Air Force. They were forced to give money to companies that were funding weapons pointed against them. It made no sense at all.
Kevin Freeman: They were investing in China and companies that our own Defense Department said are on the restricted list. And yet the, and we addressed that and we took it to as a petition and they fixed it and I hope it's still fixed. We need to go back and check. But here's what I'm going to do. Mark.
Mark Minnella: Mark.
Kevin Freeman: We're going to take this. I'll take it to Dr. Ben Carson, and we'll take it to Lieutenant Governor of Texas Dan Patrick. They, lead the Religious Liberty Commission that President Trump established. They both have direct access to the president. And we'll see if we can't get an option added. And that's all we're talking about. We're talking about option added. For people to invest in a way that doesn't violate their values. This should be a simple and easy fix. And if you'll go, if you're interested and you want to see a fix done, give us the location, again, where they can go and sign that petition.
Kevin Freeman: Trumpaccountsforall.com Trumpaccountsforall.com this is such an important thing because, look, I've said this. Not one penny is what, Art Alley would say and wrote in his book. And of course, we don't have pennies anymore. Did art get pennies banned? Is that what it. No, I'm kidding. But we just had Art on the program here just a, couple of weeks ago. Art's a dear friend. And not one penny. You don't want one penny. And you look at Disney as an example. I would invest so quickly in Disney if they would return to the family friendly principles that they had a couple of decades ago. I would invest so easily, so quickly in it. And you know what? When they turned against family friendly, guess what? They're. Their stock has gone nowhere for five years. One of the biggest name brand companies in the world, and their stock has gone nowhere. Why? What happened? Well, they stopped making good movies and they started promoting LGBTQ into everything.
Mark Minnella: Started lecturing us all.
Kevin Freeman: Lecturing. When you can take the Toy Story, which every grandparent in America wants to take their grandkids to see a Toy Story movie so they can go and, and they can see the toys. They played with his kids and they had as kids, they wanted to. And then they show up and Buzz Lightyear's got a, you know, got a gay kiss scene in the movie. It's like they won't even show that in Saudi Arabia. And Disney made that on purpose, knowing it would lose money. Well, look, that's not stewardship. That is not at all.
Mark Minnella: And another place you could go is out to financialissues.org and that's the simplest. And just find the. You could Sign the petition there, but do leave an email for the president and do call your senator and your congressman. Let's get this done. If we do this, this will bring biblical responsible investing to the forefront and make it so even Christians can participate in a, wonderful thing like Trump accounts for kids.
Kevin Freeman: All right. Support for this program comes from Glent Financial Technology Service offering a debit card mobile app that enables users to access gold holdings for everyday purchases. With Glint, users maintain ownership of allocated physical gold stored in managed vault at the time of a transaction. Gold is sold in real time to cover the purchase amount in local currency. Glint offers an alternative way to store and use the value. Combining gold and silver with modern payment infrastructure, Glint clients can monitor their gold balance, view transaction history, and manage their account through the Glint app, available on major mobile platforms. More details about how vaulted physical gold can be used as money or available at, glentpay.comgold247 Again, glintpay.comgold247 Glint providing access to gold for modern spending. We'll be right back with Mark Manila after this break.
Mike Carter: Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: And I'm joined by Mike Carter. Mike, I just had an idea. What. What if we went a step further, not only sign the petition and tell President Trump we want biblically responsible investment, what if we started lining up good, godly Christian corporations that, hey, I'm going to add to this just like Micah Dell has done, just like the Dalio family and Robin Hood, MasterCard and others. But only if. Only if. Mr. President, we love your idea. You got to praise him, you got to thank him, and we'll put money behind it. Only if you will add a biblically responsible option to people. I think that would help get some attention.
Mark Minnella: That's really interesting, Kevan, because we just had that discussion. As another way to approach this is to start rounding up all the Christian, led corporations to do exactly that. I love it. and maybe you could head that up and make it happen.
Kevin Freeman: We'll call to Chick Fil A, we'll call to Hobby Lobby. We'll call to all the great. There's a lot of great Nutrimax and all these other great corporations that believe in biblical values and say, Mr. President, you did a great thing. Now let's just tweak it to make it even better so Christians aren't excluded. I know that message will resonate with him. And if we get Dr. Carson. We just had Dr. Carson on this program. he's a dear friend. We just had him here at Liberty Hawk, just a few weeks ago. Get Dr. Carson, get Lieutenant, Governor Dan Patrick and others. I'm going to make that, to do on my list. I don't need any more to dos on my list, but I'll put that on my honeydew list.
Mike Carter: That fits so well with our stat, our Solution to Action tank. How do we take these ideas and make sure they're executed and provide real world solutions? And that does it. And that aligns so well, Kevan, with the work we're doing at the NSIC Institute, where people are aligning, their money with their values that stand for liberty, security and values. So this all ties together in a beautiful way and, I'm excited about it.
Kevin Freeman: So we're going to bring up some financial issues and we're going to have you, Mark, help carry this, and we'll work together. We will work with you on getting, corporations to say yes, we'll do this wonderful Trump thing with one minor tweak and just stop excluding Christians, from taking this money.
Mark Minnella: Well, I'm honored that you're getting on board because you do have such great affluence and influence in politics and in the Christian community in America. So thank you so much for that, Kevan. This is really big. It's really important, and it'll bring investing with biblical integrity to the forefront. And I really believe if Trump knew what was going on with this, he would immediately make the change, or those that should make the change would do it. I believe that he would want this to happen. He just doesn't know yet. And nobody's been able to help him to be able to see this yet. And m bring it to his attention. You might have the influence to do that.
Kevin Freeman: Well, I know Dr. Carson has the influence to do that. I know that Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick has the influence to do that. And we know both of them, and we will bring this to their attention and see if they won't take it to the President. Because this is a religious liberty issue, frankly. We'll take it to Kelly Shackelford, who's also on that commission, and others that are good friends. I'm on Kelly's board. We'll do whatever we can to say, hey, look, great idea, Mr. President. Now let's make it available to Christians as well as all Americans.
Mike Carter: Yeah.
Mark Minnella: You know, when Christians start activating their faith, good things happen. You know, when secularism, activates their faith, ugly things happen to our society. It just, darkness just goes through our society. But when Christians activate their faith. We see the righteousness of God just pour out on our society as well. And that's what will happen here when we all come together to do this kind of thing.
Mike Carter: You know, so often Christians, they hear what the world is saying, like, well, maybe I better be quiet because they, they don't understand my view. We got to do the opposite. We got to lean into this. We've got to step into it and help people understand that their actions do make a difference.
Kevin Freeman: Well, Jesus said Luke 16:11, he said, if you're not faithful with your unrighteous mammon, you will not be trusted with true riches. The way to be faithful with unrighteous mammon is to make sure it's promoting liberty, security and values, Biblical principles, truth, and so that it enables the sharing of the gospel rather than restricts it. And again, this is some of those companies that are managing money, they intend to restrict the gospel. They intend to sell us out into not liberty, security and values, but quite the opposite. And, Mark, you've been sounding the alarm on this. I told you I would give you your chance to bring it out. And we're going to step in with you and see if we can help you and our audience, you, you listeners either to the podcast or American Family Radio or Real Life Network. You, you guys are powerful. learn more about this. And again, Mark, tell us where we can learn more. And if people want to get active, where do they go?
Mark Minnella: Well, I really would suggest you come out to financialissues.org financialissues.org, we have some flyers out there about it. You also can sign the petition there. There's so much you can do there to learn about stewardship in general.
Kevin Freeman: all right, we'll be right back after this break.
Mike Carter: Pirate Money Radio, helping you give, spend, and invest in ways that align with liberty, security and values. Welcome back with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: I'm joined by Mike Carter, Mike, Hidden Mark, and an amazing guest.
Mike Carter: It is, it's great to see the communities working together, to help drive liberty, security and values. And so often people are not aligning their investments with their values. Mark, thank you for the work that you're doing.
Mark Minnella: Well, thank you for having me on. I'm so honored to be here with you gentlemen. it's just a blessing to see what can happen when Christians get their mind together, isn't it? Yes, it is.
Kevin Freeman: And we should have our mind together. We should have the mind of Christ, and we should be joining in unity in one accord. I don't care what denomination you come from, the notion or the idea that your investment should align with your value, should be universal. I wouldn't expect anything less from the left.
Mark Minnella: I mean, Everybody knows Ephesians 5:11 and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. Well, Kevan, that's what you've been doing for years is exposing the unfruitful works of darkness. And today what we want to do is help people to realize they shouldn't have, fellowship with any company that is doing all these ugly, anti God, anti family, anti birth, anti, morals, organizations and companies. And, and people say, well, I don't think any companies really do that. Did you know this? You want to hear one of the stupidest ones I've ever heard?
Kevin Freeman: Sure, please.
Mark Minnella: Gerber used to give money to Planned Parenthood. Think about that. A baby food manufacturer was given money to, Planned Parenthood, who killed more babies than anybody else in the world. I mean, it's just not wrong. It's stupid.
Kevin Freeman: You know, I'll just do. Go along that same vein. Exxon Mobil, they elected directors to ExxonMobil who decided they wanted to end the fossil fuel industry. And, and who allowed that? Who allowed that? It was the same people managing the Trump account funds, the same big three that were. There was a little, activist investor, and they got the shareholder votes, the proxy votes from the big three. We got warned against this. the founder of the index fund industry, Jon Bogle, wrote shortly before he died. He said, I love index funds. I think they're phenomenal. But, what I don't like is when they vote against the interests of America. And I don't think you should concentrate that power, that voting power in the big three. Blackrock, State street and Vanguard, you know, and then he died shortly thereafter.
Mark Minnella: That.
Kevin Freeman: But that was an important warning, and we shouldn't have our votes going for bad things. And we shouldn't be forced, if you want to participate in a government program, to invest in things that run contrary to our values.
Mike Carter: Okay, well, remember what Trump said, though, when he was campaigning. Evangelicals don't realize the power they have if they would work together and get active. And that's what we're talking about doing today.
Kevin Freeman: That's exactly. So, Mark, sum up for us. Trump accounts good. being forced to invest against your values bad. And then the solution is what?
Mark Minnella: Yeah, the solution is that we need to add into it an index fund that is biblically responsible. For example, Timothy plan has ETFs that are broad ETFs, they could add one of those into there and that would make it so all Christian could participate without having to compromise their values and their conscience. So very simple.
Kevin Freeman: Wouldn't, that be great art? We put a Timothy Plan fund into the Trump account. Our art ally and Timothy Plan have done so much for America investing to bring truth, supporting programs like our programs. Wouldn't that be awesome if we could have a Timothy Plan, fund inside the Trump account?
Mark Minnella: Right. The other issue with that is that, they, they've restricted what they can charge internally for these type of accounts. So you have to have over a billion dollars in it just to break even for the cost of running an etf. But you would have that if we got it into the, the Trump accounts, for all our Trump accounts for kids accounts, I think that would happen. And I'd love to honor, the Timothy plan by having them in there. You know, if anybody, they screen, they're the strictest and they were the pioneers for the mutual fund industry of creating mutual funds that allowed Christians invest with integrity. They, they have, stuck guns and never compromised.
Kevin Freeman: Thank you, Mark, for championing biblical values in finance. All right, to learn more and sign the petition for BRI options and Trump accounts, you can visit takeaction.financialissues.org for trusted advisors trained in biblical stewardship. You can learn more from the nsic. visit Pirate Money Radio if you want more information. All right, if you're watching on Real Life Network, thank you. Until next time, stay faithful, stay free. But if you're on American Family Radio and listening, we've got one more segment. We'll talk more with Mark Minnella about Trump accounts and ways you can act.
Mike Carter: Foreign. Welcome back to Pirate Money Radio with your host, Kevan Freeman.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah. We're joined by Mark Manella's special guest, Mike Carter as co host. Hey, Mark, what gives you the most hopeful right now? Maybe a favorite scripture on stewardship. And how can listeners follow you?
Mark Minnella: Well, on stewardship, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all for the glory of God. That is the definition of stewardship, doing everything for the glory of God. And stewardship encompasses everything in your life, not just your material goods, but your heart, your relationships. How about stewarding this nation, Kevan, as a steward? God gave us this nation to be stewards over. So we have to vote, properly vote in people who love the Lord and who will reduce our debt, who will have a balanced budget, who will care for and not just use and abuse his children.
Kevin Freeman: Yeah, it sounds good to me, doesn't it, Mike?
Mike Carter: It does. Amen. Amen.
Kevin Freeman: And what gives you hope, Mike?
Mike Carter: You know, I love, again, the idea that we're seeing entrepreneurialism, free, market. Market capitalists in this Trump plan out there. And Kevan, it reminds me a little bit of a young Kevan Freeman when we, both just out of college and you had this thing called the personal capitalists, which, opened my eyes to, wow, if you invest in what you do with this, and this can happen now, we can take that all the way down to baby Trump times almost now, right? The baby times. How do we start to make sure that the public is educated on the opportunities that do exist? The answer isn't democratic socialism. it's not communism. It's closing the wealth gap. And this is the way to do it.
Kevin Freeman: Ownership. And what's beautiful about this is the IRA was great. Once you start working at age 18 or 21 or whenever, then you could put a couple of thousand dollars a year and you could become a multimillionaire just by putting some money aside. Trump accounts go back even further. The earlier you start, the greater it grows over time. And starting as a day one with $1,000, what a gift. But we've got to make sure that that gift is not being squandered or not being used against us. And so, Mark Manela, thank you so much for what you're doing, in educating America on these Trump accounts. Thank you for what you're doing with financial issues, and you can learn [email protected] all right. If you have questions or prayer needs or comments, I want you to email us at afrite. We get a lot of questions and comments, and we answer them all, don't we, individually? We go back, Mike, and we've got some, unusual questions at times. We've got some really serious ones. You may have questions on how do I deal with these Trump accounts. And so again, Mark, tell us one last time, where do people follow you?
Mark Minnella: Financialissues.org, go out to financialissues.org, you can watch the show, you can stream past shows, you can, participate in the live show. You can call in, you can get in the chat and ask questions while we're on the air. It's a wonderful place to go to get together with Christians and find out how, you can do the most with what God has entrusted to you.
Kevin Freeman: Well, God's entrusted a lot to us, and we need to pray about it because we need to be good, faithful stewards with it. We need to pray for America to return to God's principles this year. We need to pray for biblical stewardship and wise policy and strong families. Strong. So if you're listening, you can listen to us wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you can share this with your friends if you'd like. If you want to learn more information, check out PirateMoneyRadio.com We've had a great time with Mark Mannell on financial issues and Trump accounts. This is Kevan Freeman and Mike Carter, joined this week by Mark Manela for Pirate Money Radio. Stay tuned.
Trump accounts are being framed as a powerful way to give American children an ownership stake in the nation’s future. Kevin Freeman, Mike Carter, and Mark Minella discuss the promise of compounding growth, wealth-building, and opportunity for families. They also raise serious concerns about debt, citizenship rules, and mandatory investments that may conflict with biblical values. The conversation closes with practical steps for Christians who want stewardship, freedom, and responsible investing aligned with their faith.
(00:00) Introduction
(00:30) What are Trump Accounts?
(05:00) The potential impact on poverty
(10:00) Concerns about misuse of funds
(15:00) The issue of government debt
(20:00) The importance of ownership
(25:00) Biblical responsible investing
(30:00) How to get involved
(35:00) Conclusion
Live
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