Today's Issues continues on AFR with Steve Paisley Jordan

Tim Wildmon Today's Issues continues on AFR with your.

Steve Jordahl Host, Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association.

Tim Wildmon Hey, welcome back, everybody, to Today's Issues on the American Family Radio Network. Tim Wesley. Ed. this is Tuesday, August 19, 2025. And now Steve Paisley Jordan joins us. Good morning, Steve.

Steve Jordahl Hey, everybody. Good morning.

Tim Wildmon Countdown is on.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah, absolutely. I'm glad you remembered. We. A week from today is my birthday.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano So thank you guys for the countdown.

Tim Wildmon Hey, it's our pleasure. We weren't even thinking about that at all.

Wesley Wildmon I remember that.

Tim Wildmon We're glad that you brought that up.

Ed Vitagliano I thought maybe that's what you meant.

Wesley Wildmon We had to forget.

Tim Wildmon Gift cards are welcome. Just send them to Ed.

Ed Vitagliano No, don't do that, because a couple people actually have done that, and the gift cards get stolen out of them in the mail.

Wesley Wildmon In the mail.

Ed Vitagliano I'm just telling you. So, folks, you can just wait for me. Yeah.

Tim Wildmon How do you. How do you steal a gift card out of the mail unless you know what it is?

Ed Vitagliano They just opened the card. How did I know? Because the person said in there, hope you enjoy this gift. It was a gift card to Pizza Hut.

Tim Wildmon Was it tight? Was it opened and re taped?

Ed Vitagliano No, it wasn't re taped. They just opened it in a mail room somewhere and it came here to afa. opened, but inside I said, hope you enjoy this Pizza Hut. So I communicated with the person and.

Steve Jordahl Said, hey, send it again.

Ed Vitagliano Though.

Tim Wildmon This is where I. I do have a fault. They're rare. occasionally I do have a fault. This is where my wife probably would stop me and tell me to move on.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Quit obsessing over this.

Ed Vitagliano Yes.

Tim Wildmon Okay. But I. I've got it. I'm. I'm, following what you're saying here. You're. And I'm trying to understand, you're saying the letter was a card.

Ed Vitagliano It was. Birthday card.

Tim Wildmon Arrived on your desk.

Ed Vitagliano Yes. Here at work.

Tim Wildmon Already opened.

Ed Vitagliano Yes, of course.

Tim Wildmon We do open a lot of our mail here.

Ed Vitagliano Right.

Tim Wildmon Already opened. The card was taken. The gift card was taken out.

Ed Vitagliano Yes.

Tim Wildmon But the message was still in there.

Ed Vitagliano Yes. On the card. It was a lovely lady.

Tim Wildmon It didn't slip out.

Ed Vitagliano No.

Tim Wildmon You would think somewhere along the way, if the, letter was completely open and the card was taken, maybe the note would also slip out.

Ed Vitagliano No, it was a. It was a birthday card and a gift card in it.

Tim Wildmon Gotcha.

Ed Vitagliano And the gift card.

Tim Wildmon That's why I need to.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Not obsessed with.

Steve Jordahl I'll tell you, I enjoy the pizza, too. It was really good.

Tim Wildmon Yeah. So now we know who got your birthday. Your card.

Steve Martin is embarking on a cruise to Alaska this week

All right, so, Steve, Anyway, Countdown to Alaska, right?

Steve Jordahl We're heading out. see, today, today I have a list of, like, 18 things that I have to get done. And, then tomorrow, one of them is take my dog to the kennel. and then we are going to drive tomorrow to Memphis, Tennessee, and fly to Seattle direct, no stopping in Denver.

Tim Wildmon Okay.

Steve Jordahl And then, we get a hotel in Seattle. And then Thursday, morning, we get a shuttle from the hotel, to this cruise ship. And then I don't care where I go from there.

Tim Wildmon That's called embarking.

Steve Jordahl Embarkation.

Tim Wildmon That's the right word.

Ed Vitagliano He's embarking. You're on a journey.

Steve Jordahl Yes. You know, I'm excited, though. I'm excited for a number of reasons. I love cruising, and this is going to be great, and I love spending time with my wife and everything. You guys are in for a treat, too, though, because Parrish Alford is going to be sitting in here for me.

Tim Wildmon He is? Yes.

Steve Jordahl Parrish is one of our writers. he's, really in charge of turning some of the audio stories that we do here on, at AFN into on to put them on the Web. So I don't write for. I write for speech. Like to speak. So my writing needs to be changed a little bit to appear on a page. and, he'll do that. He does that. But he's a former sports, writer, you guys, if you want to talk.

Tim Wildmon Sports for a long time. He talks good English, too.

Steve Jordahl He talks good English.

Tim Wildmon Really does.

Steve Jordahl So he's a great guy. I think you're gonna like him.

Tim Wildmon His first language. So, anyway, yeah, we're looking forward to it.

Evangelical Christians are praying for President Trump, Steve says

What's your first news story, Steve?

Steve Jordahl Well, you know, Christians around the world, especially in America, and, specifically evangelical Christians are praying for our president. Not only that he's successful in what he does, but that his relationship with Jesus. We want him to be a Christian, if he's not to become a Christian, that's the debate. Is he. Is he not? No one can tell. I don't know. He did have a little conversation this morning with Fox News, and he was talking about, solving the wars that he solved. And it kind of bled into this discussion we are having right now. let's listen to cut 16.

Donald Trump Just want to end it. I want to end it. You know, we're not losing American lives. We're not losing American soldiers. We're losing Russian and Ukrainian, mostly soldiers. Some people as missiles Hit wrong spots or get lobbed into cities like Kiev and town. But, you know, if I can save 7,000 people a week from being killed, I think that's a pretty. I want to try and get to heaven if possible. I'm hearing I'm not doing well. I am really at the bottom of the totem pole. If I can get to heaven, this will be one of the reasons. Well, I think I saved a lot of lives with India, Pakistan. They were going at it, the planes were being shot down. That was going to be maybe a nuclear war if I let that go, and I did that through trade.

Wesley Wildmon That's terrible theology.

Steve Jordahl It is bad theology. But. But it is. It is what a lot of people think. I was talking with Parish. I played him this quote before, and his take was. I just tell you, he said something I hadn't thought of. it's possible that he doesn't understand the difference between sanctification and salvation. He may have.

Tim Wildmon You think?

Wesley Wildmon No, you joke. But hopefully that's the case because the alternative is that he does understand and he doesn't care.

Tim Wildmon No, I think with. Okay, we're all speculating here, Right. Pretty much.

Ed Vitagliano I'm not.

Steve Jordahl I'm thinking about what I'm going to.

Ed Vitagliano Do in a week.

Tim Wildmon But I think the Bible talks about only thinking about ourselves as probably one of the top issues that we're going to put.

Ed Vitagliano That's going to put me down on the totem pole.

Tim Wildmon Trump. the advantage and disadvantage that Trump has oftentimes is you don't know when he's just. And when he's not. so, when he says, I'm way down on the totem pole, I'm. Oh, that is a funny thing to say.

Steve Jordahl Yes.

Tim Wildmon But, but, but his theology. I don't look for him for theology. I don't think anybody here does. Right.

Steve Jordahl No.

Tim Wildmon It would be nice if he were an evangelical.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Christian. But, he's. He's not. and, and so his, his theology sounds like, you know, you get to the end of your life and you add up your goods and your negatives, and then God decides whether you thumbs up or thumbs down on that. And, and that's not. I don't want to overanalyze what he was saying right there, but that's not the way that the gospel message works.

Ed Vitagliano Like, like Wesley said, that's terrible theology.

Tim Wildmon Right. And we, we don't look to Trump for theology. Okay. So, that.

Steve Jordahl Yeah, that's a, that's from a movie. A meme from a movie with us, with,

Tim Wildmon We didn't hire him. We didn't hire him to be, pastor in chief. You hired him to be. I hired him. I mean, voted for him to be commander in chief of the country. Well, listen, I think his heart's in. Definitely in the right place here. He wants to see this war in so that innocent people stop being killed. That's the serious part of what he's trying to convey right there.

Ed Vitagliano The Bible does, command Christians to pray for those who are in authority. So Christians, if you haven't prayed for President Trump in a while, not only pray for success in bringing peace to some of these situations, but pray for him if he does not know the Lord, to come to a saving knowledge of Christ. It would be a good prayer to pray.

Tim Wildmon Absolutely.

Totem poles are faces or figures that are one on top of each other

And that was an interesting thing. What was he saying about totem pole?

Steve Jordahl He says he hears that he's at the bottom of the totem pole when it comes. Because in his totem pole, meaning if.

Tim Wildmon You'Re going to rank an Indian.

Steve Jordahl Yeah. If you're going to rank. The colloquialism here that we use in English is if you're going to rank people, then they deserve to get into heaven. Yeah. Totem poles are faces or figures that are one on top of each other. The top. Right, the top number one that you're going to choose. and then the bottom. The totem pole means the least likely of all.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah, that's at the bottom of.

Tim Wildmon I have a totem pole at my house. Okay.

Ed Vitagliano As.

Tim Wildmon As.

Ed Vitagliano As all of us do.

Tim Wildmon It's a. It's a family tradition. And, And. And so I, My wife's at the top.

Steve Jordahl Where's Wesley?

Tim Wildmon Wife's at the top. And I'm, I'm second on the totem pole. But, I mean, it's my yard. Right, Right.

Ed Vitagliano And, you know, like, like everybody.

Tim Wildmon My totem pole is.

Wesley Wildmon You allowed yourself to be at the second, Right. Well, in humility.

Tim Wildmon I mean, I don't want to. I don't. I put myself second, not first, but yourself, my wife, above myself.

Ed Vitagliano And all of us, as we all do with our totem poles, is on our birthdays. No, we decorate them. And whose birthday is next? Oh, yeah, that's right. Mine.

Tim Wildmon Mine is. Mine is a, It's considered an Anglo totem pole angle. Have you heard of this?

Ed Vitagliano No, I have not. An Anglo.

Tim Wildmon It's a new thing. Yeah. Indians have their totem poles and then the.

Wesley Wildmon And then the Anglo stuff.

Ed Vitagliano Sounds like you're Are we Anglos taking.

Tim Wildmon I still don't know.

Steve Jordahl Cultural appropriation.

Ed Vitagliano That's it right there.

Steve Jordahl I was going for that.

Tim Wildmon Nobody else does that, right?

President Trump has federalized the D.C. police. How successful has he been

All right, so what's your next story, Steve?

Steve Jordahl All right. How successful has President Trump been? It might help him get into heaven, too, if that's the case. That's the way to do it in, in controlling, So he's taken over the D.C. crime in the D.C. he's taken over policing. He's federalized the police. He's sent in the National Guard. And how, successful has he been? Well, the people in D.C. think he's been pretty successful at it. And I want to play you somebody that, talked about that. This is, the West. No. Yeah. no. President Trump, is saying that Democrats. Did you play this? The Democrats are thanking him for sending, troops into D.C. no, we have not cut 12.

Donald Trump We have a thing going on right now in D.C. we went from the most unsafe place anywhere to a place that now people, Friends are calling me up, Democrats are calling me up, and they're saying, sir, I want to thank you. My wife and I went out to dinner last night for the first time in four years, and Washington, D.C. is safe. And you did that in four days.

Steve Jordahl The D.C. police union is backing up this story. They tweeted out, on their Official Twitter post, DC crime since the announcement of federal controls versus seven days before. So the seven days leading up. This is a very narrow snapshot. Seven days leading up to control. And the seven days since he took control, robbery was down 46%. Assault with a deadly weapon down 6%. Carjackings are down 83%. Car thefts are down 21%. Violent crime down 22%. Property crimes down 6%. While federal assistance gives us broad boosts, we must appeal to the misguided Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform act in order to make these changes permanent. He's talking about the way that they record crime in D.C. it's. It. It's been off.

Tim Wildmon So let me understand this. the national guardsmen, who are 1,000 of them, I think they're in Washington, D.C. from. From different states. And I noticed yesterday, Mississippi is sending. That's our home state here, sending some, of our National Guardsmen there. So various states are rotating. It sounds like, to me they're. They're. They're guardsmen going to the District of Columbia. So are they. Do you know if they're, like, stationed, all over the city, like, different, you know, every eight, every block or two huh?

Ed Vitagliano 800. Approximately 800 are in now, Washington, D.C. okay.

Tim Wildmon So that would definitely cut down on crime if they're. If they're, like, posted at every block. You know what I'm saying? You got a National Guard, truck. So the criminals are not going to be out on the streets.

Wesley Wildmon I saw a video of the National Guard. There's a handful of National Guards they were going from. They were actually patrol. It may have not been the National Guards, anyways. It was a video in D.C. and what they were doing was they were patrolling as opposed to reacting.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Wesley Wildmon And, which is what, when I was growing up is called a patrol.

Tim Wildmon Car, because patrol trolling, then.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah.

Tim Wildmon They're keeping the criminals off the street. Just the. Just the visual impact will keep the criminals off.

Ed Vitagliano I am wrong. It's 800 D.C. national Guard troops. Almost a thousand from elsewhere around the country. So close to 2,000.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Steve Jordahl So I think this is, a standard. You're not. You're not going to be able to. I can't say that DC should have done this. I don't know that they have enough police on their force to do this. So to say that. Well, why didn't they do this? We would have had to. I don't know that they have enough police personnel to patrol every corner like they seem to be doing now. so that might not be fair, but D.C. has been at the top of the list of people who have defunded their police force, and they are way short of police officers. And that is a making of the D.C. mayor and the board there. So.

Ed Vitagliano As well as whatever policies they have in place that, fail to punish people who commit crimes, instead letting them out with no cash bail or, very lenient policies on who spends time in jail when convicted, how many times you can be convicted and then get back out.

Steve Jordahl That's long. Because Jeanine Pirro is now in charge.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Hey, I've seen videos like, y' all have, like, people sent. You know, I don't know if they're Instagram or Tick Tocks, but they're little short videos. And I've seen at least 2 of people, who were citizens of the District of Columbia, clearly Democrats. I think you have to be a Democrat in order to live there. They're like 95, 98%. Oh, yeah, it's our Democrats blue. And they were saying, thank you, President Trump.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Wesley Wildmon Yes.

Democrats are thanking President Trump for making Washington, D.C. safe again

Tim Wildmon We can finally go out to eat dinner here without feeling like we're going to get carjacked.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah, Democrats don't want to get mugged and robbed.

Tim Wildmon They won't say.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon And so they're. They're. They're thanking President Trump for making Washington, D.C. safe again. So, anyway.

Ed Vitagliano So. Yeah, okay.

Tim Wildmon Anyway. Yeah, yeah.

There's no systemic racism that I've experienced here in America

Next story, Steve.

Steve Jordahl All right. There's a very interesting web series up. It's a company called Jubilee Media that put this up, and it's called Surrounded.

Tim Wildmon Jubilee Media.

Steve Jordahl That's, that's the name of the product.

Tim Wildmon Like that.

Steve Jordahl So just like that. I think they sing that in fact, every morning where they.

Tim Wildmon You never heard that, Ed?

Ed Vitagliano I have not.

Steve Jordahl We have our devotions in the morning. They sing that.

Ed Vitagliano And I. And I. I gotta say, I wish I had hadn't heard it now.

Tim Wildmon Okay, I'm sorry.

Steve Jordahl Anyway, this show is. It's called Surrounded, and you put, a person at a table, that can. A table that seats two, and then there's 20 people who have an opposite opinion of that person, and they race to see who can reach the seat first. Whoever gets down gets to argue with that person.

Ed Vitagliano Right.

Steve Jordahl And, I've seen Ben Shapiro on it, for example, and Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk. You get all kinds of liberals. Well, they put Amanda Seals, who was a black activist and is known as. The title of this was Black Radical Against Black Conservatives. And they say 20 black conservatives in the circle. And they got to kind of fight to see who got to argue with Amanda Sales. Now, Amanda Seals.

Tim Wildmon Seals or Sales.

Steve Jordahl Seals.

Tim Wildmon There was a Soupy Sales. You remember him?

Steve Jordahl Yeah, I do. This is Seals. S E, A L, E S. Just to tell you a little bit about how, what her m. Mindset is. She called Jussie Smollett. Noble. Even if it was a hoax, it was a noble thing to do. That's very radical. So, anyway, a young man, a young black conservative, we don't have his name, sat down to have a chat with her, and this is what it sounded like. Cut 15.

Speaker F For example, we have the, Chinese Exclusion act of 1882. We prevented Chinese people from getting citizenship and even entering the country. We discriminated against them and basically put them under apartheid, even here in the United States, yet they have the highest median household income. How is that possible? How come they don't complain and feel entitled consistently to beg for reparations and beg for this.

Speaker G Oh, young Matt.

Speaker F Yet white people are the oppressors.

Speaker G I'm not sure where your education came from, but they lied to you.

Speaker F Stats don't lie, though.

Speaker G Statistics lie all the time. If you're going to start your argument on stats don't Lie. You've already lost the argument. They lie. They lie all the time.

Ed Vitagliano 1.

Speaker G Comparing Chinese people who are immigrants that made a choice to come to the United States, and comparing the continued effort of black people to ground themselves in a nation that continues to make impediments for them to show and live and exist in their true citizenship is a false equivalency.

Speaker F I don't believe that happens at all. No one here is.

Speaker G Are you acting right now?

Speaker F Do you really believe that I'm telling the truth. There's no. There's no systemic racism that I've experienced here in America. what system is racist? I think the only racism we've actually seen recently, systemic racism that we've seen, is the application of systemic racism against white people.

Steve Jordahl Yikes.

Ed Vitagliano This guy. This young man's my new hero. Listen, I'm just proud that there were 20 black conservatives that were willing to publicly come out and speak. We might have the new generation of Thomas Sowells, you know, who this young man clearly has been studying economics and, some of the social sciences. But I would guess before Trump, most black conservatives with, with certain exceptions that are well known, just would be afraid to speak out. But now they're bold. That was awesome.

Wesley Wildmon Well, and then, of course, the Asians being denied opportunities at colleges because of diversity, equity, and inclusion. That's a. Liberals are putting out those numbers because they're excited for it because they're equal and everything out. So that's not even. So when you say stats don't. Stats do lie. Sure, some stats can. But the fact that Asians are being denied opportunities at colleges because there's too many of them being too smart, that's just. That's a fact across the board.

Ed Vitagliano I guarantee you. Amanda Seals or sales. Amanda Seals, I guarantee you she uses statistics when it suits her.

Wesley Wildmon Oh, sure.

Sam: There is very little racism that exists today in America

Steve Jordahl So I have a question, too, by her argument about what she said about Chinese people immigrating, voluntarily. A lot of them now do, but do you remember. You wouldn't remember, but have you read about in the 1800s where the Chinese were slaves on the West Coast? Chinese slave gangs. I don't know how they got here. I don't know if we had a slave trade with the Far east like we had a slave trade with Africa, but I certainly don't think they're coming voluntarily to sign up to be in a chain gang. So they did. The Chinese. If you go back to the same era that the African Americans were slaves, there were Chinese slaves as well. So her. Her analogy. Her Saying that you can't compare the two. I think that's indirectly comparable.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, this is, I'm just getting. This is old and tired and used up. This oppression story. I mean there is the opportunity in the United States of America today is wide open and it has been for a long time for anybody to succeed anywhere. that's just the. We are generally, we are really the land of opportunity. Was that the case historically in America? No, that was not. It's very well documented, especially with the African American community. Slavery, lack of civil rights, lack of equal. Equal opportunity. But I'm going to tell you it's. In today's world, education is wide open to everybody. Job opportunities are wide open to everybody. And there is very, very little racism that exists today. That. And, and I would be the kind of person that this woman here, this man, she would say I'm a, she would say I might as well have a hood on.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Because I'm a white southern male Christian.

Ed Vitagliano Right.

Tim Wildmon Who probably oppresses black people. That's what she would say. Because I put the stereotype right. And I talk like one too.

Ed Vitagliano Well, I will.

Tim Wildmon So, so, so just to finish. So what I would say was I don't, I'm not aware of anybody, and I live in Mississippi that the existence of true racism is almost non existent today in or if people harbor those feelings, they don't say anything.

Ed Vitagliano Which means it's not systemic. If it's systemic, you, you're out front with it. Listen, the reason why Asian, excuse me, Asian Americans, in this country are so successful is because they have intact marriages.

Tim Wildmon Yes. Families.

Ed Vitagliano Intact families. And they were. And their culture is you're going to work harder than anyone else and you're going to study and that's how you're going to get ahead and that's why they're successful. And, and if you don't follow those rules, which imply because this is the way God made the world, if you don't follow those kinds of rules, you're not going to succeed. It doesn't matter what color your skin is.

Tim Wildmon They, but they, the Asians are who are here in the US are scoring higher on test, generally speaking than any other ethnic group.

Ed Vitagliano Including white people.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, including white.

Ed Vitagliano So much for white people. I mean saying so much for white privilege.

Steve Jordahl I'm a victim.

Tim Wildmon I know, I know. No, you're right, you're right. So it's all about what you do with your opportunity.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Yeah. Really. and even getting an education today. If you're from. Whether you're white, black, or whatever, and you have good grades, then you have opportunity, to get scholarships.

Wesley Wildmon But if you're white, though, you can't do, gene ads.

Tim Wildmon Oh, yeah, that's right. You can't do gene ads. All right. talking about blue jeans.

Wesley Wildmon Blue jeans.

Tim Wildmon Which.

Wesley Wildmon Forgot, what it was.

Tim Wildmon It wasn't.

Wesley Wildmon It wasn't Old Navy, was it?

Tim Wildmon Yeah. No, no. We're running out of time. You'll be here tomorrow.

Steve Jordahl I will not.

Steve Jordahl I'm off for a couple weeks.

Tim Wildmon You're gonna embark?

Steve Jordahl I am. And, happy birthday, Ed.

Ed Vitagliano Hey.

Tim Wildmon Thank you.

Ed Vitagliano Thanks. Thanks for remembering.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon All right, we'll see you back here tomorrow. Everybody keep listening to Sam.