Tim Wildman: Happy anniversary to my wife Allison on July 28

Ed Vitagliano Today's Issues continues on AFR with your 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. Today's, Tuesday, July 28th, 2026. Happy anniversary to my wife Allison.

Ed Vitagliano Amen.

Tim Wildmon 20, I mean, 42 years ago, that. Listen, that's Today.

Ed Vitagliano That's an accomplishment that. That is, and you guys have been a happy couple and very, impactful marriage.

Tim Wildmon Well, thank you very much. Yeah, appreciate that.

Steve Jordahl I got a message from Birthday Dave saying that it is your 40, second anniversary and the 38th anniversary of Alex McFarland and Angie's wife.

Tim Wildmon Oh, they got married on July 28, too.

Steve Jordahl That's what. According to Birthday Dave. And I don't know that he's ever been wrong.

Tim Wildmon Ours is 1984. So, you know, we got pictures. You know, most people do. So there's a picture of us leaving to go out of town, you know, on our honeymoon. And it's, So I got my new jacket on that my mom bought me.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon And so it's got, It's. The picture's taken from the, from the driver's side, and it's got, you know, we're smiling and. Yeah, my, lovely brides behind me, we're waving at people. And I got my arm out and, the tag. Oh, no, the sales tag is prominently featured on my left arm, like mini pearl. Now, it wasn't hanging down, like, by a string or anything that even I could catch that, but it was the, you know, whatever it was, it. Yeah, it should have been taken off. And nobody caught that.

Ed Vitagliano Then, Then let me shame myself.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, go ahead.

Ed Vitagliano You said, even I could have caught that. I preached a whole sermon once with a, with a, blazer without taking the tag off. And it was hanging down. And you know, the way I was

Tim Wildmon telling you didn't do that.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon And nobody had. Nobody had the. Nobody could help you.

Fred Jackson I.

Ed Vitagliano You know me.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano People get an opportunity, you just thought

Tim Wildmon they were amen in you.

Speaker E Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano When they get an opportunity to make fun of old Ed, they did it. My wife was sitting all the way in the back. When we. Our kids were. Were younger, they, they. They stood say, back there with. With Mama. But she, she said, I. What could I do other than walk down the aisle?

Tim Wildmon That's true.

Ed Vitagliano She said, And I said, you. Because I said, why did you say something? I'm not going to interrupt the service. But I preached the whole thing, and I wa.

Tim Wildmon And pointed gesture and you never noticed?

Ed Vitagliano I never noticed.

Tim Wildmon Wow. You were into it, man. Looking at the crowd under the influence of Holy spirit, hopefully.

Ed Vitagliano so anyway, it happens to the best of people.

Tim Wildmon It can happen. Anyway, we still got that picture today. I'm just smiling, you know, waving everybody with my.

Ed Vitagliano Did you catch it?

Tim Wildmon At least not to the picture, because. Well, we. I don't know if we did that later that night or something, but anyway, go ahead.

Ed Vitagliano But, but, but back then you took a picture and you had to send

Tim Wildmon it off to get true.

Ed Vitagliano It's not.

Tim Wildmon Unless it was a Polaroid.

Ed Vitagliano Your phone.

Tim Wildmon You had to.

Ed Vitagliano Wait a second.

Tim Wildmon you're right.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon so probably didn't catch it anyway. It wasn't like today with the phones, you know, Instantaneous features.

We need to get you a line of merchandise and sell it to our listeners

All right, you're listening to today's issues. Tim, Ed, Fred. And now, Steve Paisley Jordal. Hey, good morning, brother Steve.

Steve Jordahl How are you? I'm well, thank you. I'm well.

Tim Wildmon Have you worn that one before?

Ed Vitagliano I have worn this shirt for.

Steve Jordahl Yes.

Tim Wildmon This is where Steve gets his reputation, ladies and gentlemen.

Ed Vitagliano It's well earned.

Tim Wildmon It's Paisley to the core.

Ed Vitagliano It's a thing with Steve.

Tim Wildmon It is, yeah.

Fred Jackson Yeah, it is.

Steve Jordahl I'm proud. I'm proud of it.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, we've.

Steve Jordahl We've discussed several times, Tim, putting, some Paisley merch in our store.

Tim Wildmon Well, we probably need to do that. We need to get you a line of merchandise and sell it to our listeners.

Ed Vitagliano The Jordal line.

Tim Wildmon The Steve Paisley Jordal line. But then you probably won't like to renegotiate your contract and everything like that. So, do you even have a contract?

Steve Jordahl I work at the pleasure of the president.

Tim Wildmon M. Well, I appreciate that. Okay, what's your first news story?

Several wildfires are burning in France and Spain, forcing hundreds of evacuations

Steve Jordahl Hey, I want to take us to France. There is a wildfire, several wildfires in the south of France, France, and Spain. And it is, ah, huge. They have evacuated more than a quarter million people. A quarter million people in south of France and another, 70,000 from Spain. the largest, fire is around Bordeaux. That's where you get all the French wine. All the wine country there is up in, smoke. And, meteorologists have observed France's first pyrocumulonimbus cloud. A pyrocumulonimbus cloud is a thunderstorm cloud that is created simply because of the heat of a fire.

Fred Jackson Wow.

Tim Wildmon I didn't ever know this. I didn't even know this was possible.

Steve Jordahl Makes its own weather system, and it can have powerful winds. It can have lightning which can start other fires. it is.

Tim Wildmon I've been reading about this and following this story. This is a big deal. Okay. You might say, well, we have fires every year all around the world, Will. Yes, but not like this. at least for France. This is threatening. this is a. I don't know how many miles and miles and miles. But it's so big that you say 250,000. I've read upwards of 300,000 people. Think about that.

Steve Jordahl 330,000 from both Spain and France have

Tim Wildmon had to be evacuated. Think about that.

Ed Vitagliano They got to go somewhere, right?

Tim Wildmon 300,000 people. And then the fires are not under control. They're having a heat wave over there. They're having a drought over there. and also there is this, as you say, there's this famous city, Bordeaux. Bordeaux, that's wine country, you say it is. that, if you, if you, if you look at it on the map, it's a prominent city. You got Paris. And, it's south of Paris.

Steve Jordahl It's along the Atlantic coast. It's, ah, 70 miles or so from the coastline.

Tim Wildmon but anyway. Yeah, go ahead, Fred.

Fred Jackson Quite often what we don't think about is when this danger passes, these people go back, they've got no house.

Ed Vitagliano Good point.

Fred Jackson Probably where they worked is gone.

Ed Vitagliano Schools.

Tim Wildmon Schools, you're right. Everything's wiped out.

Fred Jackson Everything's wiped out. So what do you do now?

Tim Wildmon What do you do? What do you start over?

Fred Jackson Yes.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Steve Jordahl add to that the fact that insurance companies will be overwhelmed with claims and how they're going to be able to fulfill all the claims and stay in business. I don't know. I'm following a fire that took place in Beulah, Colorado. I've been speaking with a pastor there. There's a Southern Baptist church in Beulah that 60% of its members lost their houses.

Tim Wildmon When was this?

Steve Jordahl This was, last week. I'm still talking to them every week, in fact. They're getting.

Tim Wildmon Is this near where you were?

Steve Jordahl It's south of where I'm at. but I've certainly been in the area south, of where I lived. and, so right now they're having rain. And the problem is when you have a forest fire, it takes all of the underbrush and the roots that are holding down the topsoil and it removes them all. So even the slightest rain can wash away the topsoil and you have terrible mudslides and now water damage that they're.

Tim Wildmon So you need the rain to Put out the fire. But it has its own problems, what you're saying.

Steve Jordahl And because the landscape and I don't think this is true in France, but because the landscape in Colorado was so fire prone, many of these houses had their insurance policies canceled years before ago.

Ed Vitagliano They said we're not covering.

Steve Jordahl Right.

Tim Wildmon I wouldn't do that. I wouldn't buy a house without homeowners insurance.

Steve Jordahl You might have old house it.

Ed Vitagliano But fire.

Steve Jordahl You might. Yeah, you might. And you might have owned the house and had the insurance company quit on you, remove its insurance from you.

Tim Wildmon Isn't it. Do you not have to have. I, know you have to have liability insurance for cars. Do you, do you have to legally have homeowners? I guess you don't.

Ed Vitagliano If you have a loan, it varies

Tim Wildmon on state, state by state. Right.

Ed Vitagliano I think if you have a loan you've got to have.

Tim Wildmon The bank would require it.

Ed Vitagliano Yes, but I don't want to lose their.

Steve Jordahl But again, I don't know if it would cover fire.

Many people say they don't need flood insurance because it's expensive

I know that many.

Ed Vitagliano Well, my word. What are you going to cover?

Steve Jordahl Water.

Tim Wildmon Why even have it?

Ed Vitagliano Well, it's like earthquake insurance or flood insurance in areas that are prone to it. Either it's very expensive or they just don't cover it.

Steve Jordahl Don't cover it.

The firestorm in France is the worst since World War II

so back to France. They say that this is the worst firestorm the country has seen since World War II.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano Good night.

Tim Wildmon It's big deal, it's bad. I've been following it, and that I've never been to that part of France. But anyway. Those people in Spain too now.

Steve Jordahl Yeah, Spain over the Pyrenees mountains.

Tim Wildmon Yeah. You're listening to today's Issues. Next story. Steve.

High school student from Santa Cruz, California, rescues young surfer

Steve Jordahl All right, I would like to give some congratulations to a 16 year old high school student from Santa Cruz, California. Student at Aptos High School, which was a competitive high school to my Soquel High. But his name is Ryder Williams. He is 16 years old. And if you go to our Facebook page you will see a story from a local TV station about this young man rescuing a 10 year old boy who got caught in the surf. And this will, you will be able to understand how the ocean is so dangerous. this guy got swept out the. It's a clear day, but the waves are monstrous and chaotic. Every time this lifeguard and this little kid got close to the shore, another wave would come and the lifeguard would grab onto the kid and duck under the wave and then stand back up. they finally got him out, but he's being lauded as a hero. he's 16 years old. His name is Ryder Williams.

Ed Vitagliano Well, you showed us the video this morning and then here during the break you showed me some extended footage and this young, this young man, this is a heroic thing. I did not realize and maybe it's not this way all the time, but these waves are big and powerful.

Steve Jordahl It's not this way all the time. But this is the thing you don't. I mean if there's a storm out in the Pacific, it can happen. Usually they will tell you, they will raise red flags. This is the beach that I grew up on.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Steve Jordahl and so I know this beach and I've been swimming in the ocean there many, many, many times and it's fine and it's just great. Then they have some surfing there as well. But at times and they usually know it's coming and I don't know how this little 10 year old kid got close enough but the wave, maybe a rogue wave came up and he

Ed Vitagliano looks like he was on some coin. Is that the Are we posting the video?

Steve Jordahl It is on our Facebook page.

Ed Vitagliano The board is that the lifeguards

Steve Jordahl board guard has a red I don't know if he has a surfboard. I don't see if anyone out, if there's a surfboard out there kind of board. I don't know what that is. I doubt it's a 10 year old's board and they wouldn't worry about the board at this, at this point anyway.

Ed Vitagliano This young man is being touted as a hero and he absolutely is.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano So.

James Talarico wants to reclaim Hispanic vote that President Trump took

Tim Wildmon All right, next story.

Steve Jordahl All right, we have been following what's going on in Texas, where the Senate race there. a a gentleman named James Talarico is trying to win the Senate seat, be the first Democrat in decades to win a state senate seat. A state in Texas. he's running against the current Attorney General. Attorney General. And he has said that he wants to reclaim some of the Hispanic vote that President Trump took. If you recall, during the 2020, during the 2016 election and also during the 2024 election, President Trump won Hispanic counties along the Rio Grande that had not voted Republican in years and years and years. And he won those because of well if you talk to experts they'll say because of his immigration policies that he was actually going to bring justice, treat the people who came here legally one way and get rid of the people that cut in line. Also because Hispanics are largely family values type people and they align more with the Republican Party. Well, President Trump got their vote and James Talarico thinks he can eat into that. And I talked yesterday with Sam Rodriguez, Pastor Sam Rodriguez, who is the head of the National Hispanic Evangelical Leadership Conference, and I asked him if there was a chance. And you're going to hear Sammy, who says that there is a chance they are going to eat into this lead, but probably not as much as Democrats hope. Listen to cut 20 primarily on the

Speaker E area of deporting people who have been here for 20, 25, 30 years, who are good, hardworking individuals who did come here illegally, should not have come in here illegally, but are now part of the community and so forth. Is there some angst and consternation? Yes. It would require the Hispanic vote, which is primarily Christian, to embrace woke cancel culture, morally relativistic, ambiguous social, quasi communist Christianity. There is no way. I see a significant shift. It's not going to be the same Hispanic support vote that we saw in 2024. We're looking at some single digit drops. I don't, I'm not a, I'm not looking into double digits. The good news is that the hard left is so drunk on socialism and communism and relativism that it's serving as a deterrent, so things could be worse.

Steve Jordahl A lot of the Hispanics.

Tim Wildmon Who was that?

Steve Jordahl That was Sam Rodriguez, who's the president of the National Hispanic Evangelical Leadership Conference, who is also on President Trump's advisory board. I asked him if he had been giving the President any advice. He said there are two things that he would, ask the president to do. First is by, giving a break to the so called dreamer. And the second is to only, or reiterate, that you're only focusing on deporting the criminal element of illegal immigrants. That would help. I don't know if that's going to happen, but that's where Sami says that the President needs to shore up his support.

Tim Wildmon How?

Steve Jordahl By, allowing, giving a break to the dreamers by putting them at the end of the deport line. The dreamers, these are kids who came with their parents illegally, but who either were born to illegal immigrants, immigrants here, or came very young and have grown up here.

Tim Wildmon How do you prove that?

Steve Jordahl well, I suppose there are school records. If you can show that you were enrolled in the school, 20, 30 years ago, then if you can't, well, then I don't know if you're a dreamer. President Obama had labeled these kids dreamers. And he had a way, apparently, of figuring out who they were.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, listen, I'm getting this off subject here. Anyway, I'm just curious when I hear that. Valid question, dreamers, by the way. And, some people are going to disagree with what I'm about to say, even in this room, but I have not had a problem with that myself. I'm talking about kids who were born in America and this is all they've ever known. And then you're going to tell me you're going to have. You're going to ship them back to some other country. They don't even know anybody. that's the dreamer. That's the dreamer they're talking. Which, again, some people may say, well, that's tough luck. But I'm just saying I, I'm sympathetic with the. Go ahead, Fred.

Fred Jackson No, no, the dreamers, a lot of them are born here, so they're citizens.

Tim Wildmon But I don't know how you prove. Unless you can. You get. Okay, so that's how you prove it. You have a birth certificate.

Fred Jackson Yeah. You have that. It's the part B of, what Sammy Rodri Rodriguez said, though, that a lot of people are going to have trouble with.

Tim Wildmon What did he say there?

Fred Jackson He is calling on the president to only deport the violent illegal immigrants.

Tim Wildmon Yes.

Fred Jackson That's going to be a big problem for a lot of people.

Tim Wildmon Oh, my word. That's only probably 1%.

Fred Jackson Yes, that's what I'm getting at.

Steve Jordahl That's who ICE says they've been going at.

Tim Wildmon Well, then you might as well just open up the borders.

Steve Jordahl Well, that's been his policy. Well, they've closed the borders. There's no new illegals coming in. But as far as getting rid of the. I think the, the plan is to get rid of all 3 million of them, but in a certain order. And the president says he's going to start with the criminal element, the people that have, been charged with.

Tim Wildmon I thought that's been his policy all along.

Steve Jordahl Well, it kind of has.

Tim Wildmon Trump's policy all along.

Steve Jordahl It kind of has. But the media and the Democrats confuse issues by saying that he's getting rid of, you know, citizens.

Fred Jackson The President of the United States is going to start telling people who broke into this country came illegally.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Fred Jackson Hey, as long as you behave yourself now, you can stay.

Tim Wildmon Well, and the people, the people, who are wanting to come here now are going. All, I gotta do is cross the border and.

Fred Jackson Yeah.

Tim Wildmon And that's it. If I stay out of trouble, then I can stay as long as I want and do whatever I want. That seems to be the policy here that, he's at that Samuel Rodriguez is advocating for.

Steve Jordahl The border is closer. There are no new crossings. There have been very few. Very, very few, until a Democrat

Tim Wildmon gets in the White House.

Steve Jordahl Right, right, exactly.

Fred: I think the president's policy is targeting certain illegal immigrants

But the other thing is, I think the policy has been, And remains that they want to get all 3 million illegal immigrants out. They just want to do it in a specific order and before they go knocking down doors of people that have been here a long time.

Tim Wildmon They do that? They knock down doors.

Steve Jordahl Well, they don't. But you, said it before they do that. They have decided they want to focus on starting with the criminal element. That's who ICE has been going after in these cities like Minneapolis. And they've been going mostly after, illegal immigrants that have criminal records. You look confused, Perplexed, Fred.

Fred Jackson Well, you mentioned the figure 3 million, but the figure, the reality figure is 10 to 15 million under Biden alone. So are you telling the other 12 million no, you can stay.

Steve Jordahl I might have mistook that number. I think.

Fred Jackson No, I'm talking about what Sammy said.

Steve Jordahl No, he didn't say 3 million. I think all of the. I think the president's policy, and I didn't, We didn't get in with the policy to all of these, but, because we were focused on what can bring the numbers up, and he said what could bring the numbers up was what I said, which is basically targeting certain people. All,

Tim Wildmon Right, let's move on. Next topic.

A dog named Chong escaped from his owner's home in 2021

Steve Jordahl Well, let's end with a good. Well, I don't just end, but let's talk about a good news story.

Tim Wildmon Let's do it.

Steve Jordahl I want to introduce you to a dog named Chong.

Tim Wildmon A dog named Chong. Chong, C H O N G. He is here legally.

Steve Jordahl Yes. Although he illegally escaped his parents.

Ed Vitagliano His brother Cheech was not here legally.

Tim Wildmon Brought to you by Ed Battaliono, ladies and gentlemen.

Steve Jordahl I actually met Cheech.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano Did you really?

Steve Jordahl Yeah, I was on a cruise with my wife and I. We. And he was on our cruise and had. It was at our table every,

Ed Vitagliano No, kid.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

Steve Jordahl I'll show you pictures.

Ed Vitagliano All right.

Tim Wildmon What was he doing at your table?

Steve Jordahl He was eating.

Ed Vitagliano Oh, he was very hungry.

Tim Wildmon He was eating for some reason.

Steve Jordahl The dog named Chong escaped from his owner's home in 2021. And they found this dog 600 miles away. And finally, after five, years, returned the dog to its original owner.

Tim Wildmon I love these stories, but tell them what happened.

Steve Jordahl It Went, it hitchhiked.

Ed Vitagliano No, this, someone had found this dog.

Steve Jordahl They found the dog. Another owner had microchipped it, but they didn't either didn't want it or didn't claim it.

Ed Vitagliano It seemed like they had dropped it off behind some grocery store or something, didn't it? Didn't they? Yeah, because that's where it was the dog was found. And they did put something in the newspaper, about the dog and was not claimed. So to your point, Steve, maybe they just didn't want it anymore or weren't reading the newspaper, but this dog got, they found the original, original owner.

Tim Wildmon Right, the original years. The original owner who didn't put her microchip.

Ed Vitagliano Right.

Tim Wildmon But the, and I read this

Ed Vitagliano story that was sent around. You sent it around, I think last night, Tim. And I was, I, I like to go to the comments because you do find out additional information.

Tim Wildmon Right to the comments.

Ed Vitagliano Right to the comments. And there were people saying, well, who's it, who's the idiot who didn't get their dog microchipped? we've never microchipped any of our dogs. Have you guys ever heard of that?

Tim Wildmon Yeah, I mean, I mean, it doesn't cost very much and if you, if you lose it, you can find it.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon So I mean, it, you know, it makes sense to me.

Ed Vitagliano maybe.

Tim Wildmon But now if you never, if your dogs never leave your house. Yeah, our dogs never leave our site unless our dog. Dog one. unless it goes, Unless we're out of town. It stays with somebody. But even then it's, it's not getting out of the fence. But now if you have dogs that maybe roam around.

Ed Vitagliano No, we don't have that.

Tim Wildmon You don't have roam around dogs.

Ed Vitagliano I don't believe in doing that.

Tim Wildmon You don't have dogs where your neighbors go. Those people just let their dogs do anything.

Ed Vitagliano I'm the one who complains about the neighbors who won't keep their dogs right leashed up or at least in the yard or something like that. I, I, I love these stories because I, I love dogs. And, now I have had some dogs where I wouldn't mind if they got lost, they're unchipped and somebody else wander off. Well, gee, that's a shame, you know, but terrible. The one with the one we, that we have now,

Tim Wildmon You love dogs. You just said you love. You just say you speak with a fork tongue.

Ed Vitagliano I do. Because we have had some dogs that were a pain, okay? But if I had to get rid of the dog, I'd have to get rid of my wife because she's the one that brought it into the house.

Tim Wildmon Right? Yeah.

Steve Jordahl you don't want to do that.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, I can't do that. No.

Ed Vitagliano And I'm not gonna microchip my wife.

Tim Wildmon Hey, you're going in Walmart again. Three times today. I'm microchipping you. I know where you are.

Ed Vitagliano Know where you are at all times.

Tim Wildmon All right. Thank you, Steve.

Steve Jordahl My pleasure.

Jonathan Coker had a lot to say on this show

Tim Wildmon Well, thank you, Ed, Fred, Krish, Brent Crele, our producer.

Ed Vitagliano Jonathan Coker.

Tim Wildmon Jonathan Coker had a lot to this show.

Ed Vitagliano Yes, he did. Frank Turek.

Tim Wildmon Dr. Frank High energy turret was on Asher May. Asher May is doing the video. What happened to cold green?

Steve Jordahl Oh, we don't like coal anymore.

Ed Vitagliano I think. I think coal horsing around. They're talking football and hockey.

Tim Wildmon Okay, that's not horsing around. That's serious stuff.

Ed Vitagliano That is there. You're right.

Tim Wildmon All right, we'll be back tomorrow. Lord willing. See you then.