60 Minutes - 10/9/2022: Taiwan, After Ian, Church and State

Episode Date: October 10, 2022

On this edition of “60 Minutes,” how close is China on the verge of war with Taiwan? Lesley Stahl visits the island to find out. Bill Whitaker investigates the aftermath of Hurricane Ian. Anderson Cooper sits down with Bart Barber in this interview as Southern Baptist Convention's newly-elected president. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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As a more trusted, more secure payments network, Visa provides scale, expertise, and innovative payment solutions. Learn more at visa.ca slash fintech. How close is the world to witnessing a war between China and Taiwan? We went to the island of 23 million to see for ourselves. We found the Taiwanese calm. Some say too calm, given China's aggressiveness militarily. And that's Taiwan. Yeah, that's Taiwan. So you're designating where they're attacking with those circles.

Correct. It's been 11 days since Hurricane Ian cut across Florida, causing staggering loss of life and property. We went there and saw it all. And then we saw something we weren't expecting. And the only damage were a few downed trees and a few shingles off the roofs. That's it? That's it. And maybe someone lies on the back of the house, but that was it. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

Bart Barber may be a small-town pastor, but he's also the new president of the largest and most influential evangelical group in the country. As he pledges to clean up a historic sex abuse scandal at the Southern Baptist Convention, we had a surprising, wide-ranging interview. Do you believe the 2020 election was stolen? No. You believe Joe Biden is the legitimate president of the United States? I do. Absolutely.

I'm Leslie Stahl. I'm Bill Whitaker. I'm Anderson Cooper. I'm Sharon Alfonsi. I'm John Wertheim. I'm Scott Pelley. Those stories and more tonight on 60 Minutes. When the barbecue's lit, but there's nothing to grill. When the in-laws decide that, actually, they will stay for dinner. Instacart has all your groceries covered this summer.

So download the app and get delivery in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus, enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart. Groceries that over-deliver. Ever since Mao Zedong won China's civil war in 1949 and the losing anti-communist side fled to a small nearby island, Beijing has insisted that that island, Taiwan, is an integral part of the mainland. The U.S. has walked a tightrope, respecting that one-China policy, but maintaining a special relationship with Taiwan, today a progressive, thriving democracy.

In September, President Biden vowed on this broadcast that the U.S. will protect Taiwan. Last week, the Taiwanese government said China aims to normalize its military pressure on the island that escalated after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited in August with its largest military drill ever. In a display of frightening military might, China subjected Taiwan to three days of continuous sorties, with over a hundred warplanes, a barrage of ballistic missiles, and warships that encircled the island, delivering a loud and clear message

that China could choke Taiwan any time it wanted to. You think they're going to invade? It is not a matter of if they will invade. It is a matter of when they will invade. Admiral Li Shiming, who used to head Taiwan's armed forces, has been ringing alarm bells for years because as China's military has been growing, Taiwan's is shrinking. The number of soldiers in uniform has been cut in half over the years.

The length of mandatory service has been reduced to just four months. And Admiral Lee complains that the government has been buying the wrong weapons for years. Tanks and jets from the United States, instead of smaller portable missiles. What I gather you think the military needs are these stingers and javelins and drones, exactly what they need in Ukraine. Yeah, it's the truth. And you're not getting them now

because they're giving them to Ukraine. We already ordered it. In my view, not enough. However, we began to order that, but we have not yet received any because other countries also have a kind of similar requirements. We are not on the top list,

but we need now. We need now. Did the Taiwanese military waste all those years buying those big weapons? I believe so, you know, but we don't have time to waste anymore. Taiwan doesn't get U.S. military aid. It buys the weapons, but the manufacturers can't keep up with the demand. The Taiwanese have already purchased about $14 billion worth of weapons that they have yet to receive. We were surprised that few here seem to share the Admiral's sense of urgency.

Here in Taiwan, you'd never know that the Dragon to the North recently sent warships to surround the island. People told us over and over, no big deal. China's been doing versions of that for 70 years. While much of the world thought an invasion was imminent, polls show that a majority of Taiwanese think that's unlikely anytime soon, if ever. And that's reflected in what we saw in the capital Taipei where life goes on uninterrupted. Morning traffic flows normally. Shoppers do what they always do during the day and at night. We saw old people painting outdoors and teenagers practicing hip-hop routines

despite the threat from the North. This kind of threat is our daily life. Wang Dingyu, a parliamentarian from southern Taiwan, says a kind of war has already started. China, they try to annex Taiwan for past 50 years. They try all different kind of way. Maybe I can give you very concrete figures. There are 20 million cyber attacks per day. Per day? Yes, every day.

Wang, who sits on Parliament's Foreign Affairs and National Defence Committee, took us to a high-security lab where engineers track those attacks. This is Taiwan. Ah, okay. A small island, but we're proud of it. The map shows the attacks from China in real time as they hit Taiwan. And it's so close to China. Yeah, unfortunately.

So is China hoping to defeat Taiwan without firing a single shot? They dream like that. They dream. They desperately dream like that. He says on top of cyber warfare, they're trying to sabotage Taiwan's thriving economy and intimidate politically powerful groups like the farmers and fishermen in Wong's home district of Tainan, who've been hit especially hard with a series of export bans. When Speaker Pelosi was here, China, we're told, banned 1,000 products, Taiwanese products,

a lot from your region down here. Two-thirds, two-tenths, some individual business. Like the fish industry. Is there any grouper here? 90% of grouper exports went to China last year. But suddenly in June, Beijing banned Taiwan's grouper, devastating the fishermen. Boxes and boxes of fish piled up. China also went after pineapples, crushing farmers like this young couple. It devastated us. Our pineapples got stuck in Taiwan, and we lost 60,000 U.S. dollars. And I understand the ban was sudden like that.

No warning. No warning. The government fought back with a freedom pineapple campaign to entice everyone to buy and eat a lot of pineapples. Oh my god, they're so sweet. Our housewives, they have a voice. Let's eat pineapple on our dining table. Everybody's eating pineapple. Military, their, they have dinner, provide pineapple. We found a fairly prosperous country, a leading exporter of bicycles and other sports gear. This tiny island is a tech giant in agriculture innovation and above all in semiconductors.

Taiwan is practically the world's only source of the thinnest microchips, manufactured almost exclusively by one company, TSMC. China relies on these, as does the rest of the world, for things like iPhones, advanced computers, and car components. 91-year-old Morris Chang, TSMC's founder, explains why a lot of people here think the chips protect them from Xi Jinping's attacking. I've heard this expression,

silicon shield or chip shield, talking about your company. Well, it means that perhaps because our company provides a lot of chips to the world, maybe somebody will refrain from attacking it. If that person's priority is for economic well-being, I think they will refrain from attacking. What if the priority is to come here and nationalize your company within, you know, one China? If there's a war, it will be destroyed.

Everything will be destroyed. China say, some of their Chinese communists say, let's invade Taiwan and occupy TSMC, make become party-owned company. Then we will be superpower. United States and Japan and Europe, we don't supply them cheap. They will follow Chinese orders. But that's naive. Why is that naive?

Not only cheap company, even a sausage company. You need a recipe. You need human capital. You need to know how to manufacture that kind of products. If there is reunification, what would happen to you? Die. Die? Yeah.

If they annex Taiwan, people like me, a lot, will be perished. Beijing has sanctioned Wang Dingyu personally for being outspokenly pro-Taiwan's independence. He passionately defends the country's progressive democracy. We saw campaign billboards everywhere validating the island's commitment to clean elections and freedom of speech. Beijing has promised that if there were reunification, Taiwan could maintain many of its freedoms. And yet...

In 2019, China broke a similar promise to Hong Kong. I'm holding! Protests led to beatings, arrests, and stripping of democratic rights. It hit home in Taiwan and led to President Tsai Ing-wen, leader of the aggressively anti-reunification party, winning re-election in a landslide. We are firmly resolved to defend our freedom, democracy, and way of life. Given what happened in Hong Kong and the recent military escalation, we were curious why the people are so stoic. Asked if they're in denial or apathetic,

a Taiwanese writer said it's kind of like global warming. You know it's there and it's going to get worse. But mostly people go about their lives. What can one individual really do? But then the Taiwanese watched the Ukrainians stand up to the Russians. It so inspired Jack Yao, a young Taipei coffee vendor, that he went there to help the fight. Did you go because you're Taiwanese? Yeah, because... What's the connection?

Just like the Ukraine situation and our situation, it's very like. They also have a big neighbors, and it was the communists. And we have to face the Chinese communist. And they want to take us. They always want to take us. Was it in your mind that if you go to fight for Ukraine, other people will come here and fight for Taiwan? Yeah.

What the Ukrainians have done is raising a question here in Taiwan. If that small democracy can stand up to its menacing neighbor, why can't we? You see civil defense classes sprouting up, like this one on how to identify Chinese fake news during an attack. And this night class in the park on how to operate two-way radios in Morse code in case the internet is knocked out. We want our students to be able to apply a tourniquet within 30 seconds. Enoch Wu, a former Special Forces soldier, is running training workshops

in how to treat bullet and shrapnel wounds and conduct search and rescue. And Admiral Lee wants to take it a step further, calling on the government to arm Taiwan citizens and create a volunteer force like Ukraine's. If Ukraine can do that, why not Taiwan? You know, I'm trying to convince all people that is important because this is symbol of the deterrence, determination. So you're proposing what I guess I would call the Ukraine model. Similar. Ukraine people really inspire all people.

But do all people change fast enough? I don't think so. Do you think that Taiwanese have that same kind of determination? I strongly believe this, because we cherish how we live. We love peace. We don't like war. But we want to see our democracy,

our life for peace. Let's surrender. Is there a chance you'll surrender? peace, let's surrender. Is there a chance you'll surrender? No, not a chance, never. Sometimes historic events suck. But what shouldn't suck is learning about history. I do that through storytelling. History That Doesn't Suck is a chart-topping

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Even in a state that's no stranger to hurricanes, the destruction in the wake of Ian is staggering. More than 100 deaths, most by drowning. Communities in tatters. The price tag for recovery? Estimated at more than $100 billion. We went to ground zero on Florida's southwest coast, where Ian first roared ashore and where the hurricane's fury was most severe.

As Hurricane Ian's violence bore down on Sanibel Island, the Sprecher family fled with little more than the clothes on their backs. This past Wednesday, one week after the tempest laid waste to the island, the family went back to see what was left of the place they had called home for almost 20 years. Where are we? I can't even tell. Ian severed the causeway that connects Sanibel to the mainland, so the Spreckers returned by boat. You wouldn't even know this is... We were invited to go home with them to see the damage done when the Category 4 hurricane plowed into Florida. John Sprecher told us the destruction was overwhelming.

This place looks like it's been bombed out. And, you know, I remember our kids playing in the sand when they were a couple years old. Melissa Sprecher told us she had trouble getting her bearings. There's no bridge. There's no ferry right now. There's nowhere to stay. There's no running water.

There's no electricity. There's no air conditioning. There's no running water. There's no electricity. There's no air conditioning. There's nothing. Everybody on this island at this moment is homeless. Their house is just a block from the beach, usually a few-minute walk, they said, but not this day. The path was covered with thick, tacky mud. Watch the mud, because you're going to, it's very slick. 6,500 people live on Sanibel. The place the Spreckers described as a tropical paradise

now is a debris field. Cars tossed like toys by the storm surge. It stripped the asphalt off their road. This was paved. This was paved. As they approached the house, the scene was paved. This was paved. As they approached the house, the scene was surreal. A beautiful Florida day, the kind that drew John and Melissa here from Wisconsin years ago, while the home and life they built lay battered under the sun. I'm shocked.

They had held pool parties in this yard, celebrated birthdays and graduations in these rooms. Now, with the roof gone, exposing the accumulations of a lifetime to the elements, they are salvaging what memories they can take on a small boat. Grandma and grandpa photos. Yeah, grandma and grandpa photos. To be able to have photos and things that the kids have made and be able to take them, that's huge. Yeah. I'm floored that we have anything. Anything. Have you been in touch with your insurance?

We have, yeah. Will you be able to build back what you lost? I don't know. We don't even know if we want to. Yeah. Honestly. I would think a lot of people will be leaving this. Are the phones ringing off the hook?

Monday morning, we were getting about 15 calls a minute. Brian Chapman owns Chapman Insurance Group, one of the largest independent insurance agencies in southwest Florida, with about 30,000 customers, many who live on Sanibel Island and in hard-hit Fort Myers. Seven of his employees lost homes. His offices suffered water damage and lost power. With this hurricane, you had winds gusting up to 150 miles an hour.

You had a massive storm surge. How do those two arms of this hurricane impact the reimbursements that your homeowners are going to get? That's where it gets a little complicated because you have two policies, one for flood and one for wind. Why is that so complicated? Well, did the wind damage happen first or the water rise? And was there wind damage before it flooded? And it's hard to know the answer to that question. And just 18% of Florida homeowners have flood insurance. So why so few?

Because it's expensive. But not as expensive as what just happened. Chapman says he fears Ian will only exacerbate a persistent problem in Florida's insurance market. 80% of all homeowners insurance lawsuits in the country are filed here. Most big insurers have scaled way back. Small insurers are being here. Most big insurers have scaled way back. Small insurers are being squeezed. Six went out of business just this year. What has all of this done to premiums?

Double digit, triple digit rate increases in the last 24 months. My policy was personally $3,500, then $7,000, and now $10,000. And that's not including the flood insurance. Who can afford that? It's not affordable. It's not sustainable. We were on Sanibel Island yesterday, and the destruction is widespread. If you're out there, what hope do you have to recover from this? It's going to be a long road to recovery. The ones that foregoed insurance, I'm certain that there will be some that will sell their real estate or their land.

All of this was wrought by a hurricane that rapidly spun itself into an electrified killer. Energized by the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, Ian took just two days to grow from a Category 1 to a Category 4 storm, packing 150 mile-per-hour winds and stirring up a storm surge that drowned coastal communities in 12 feet of water. That one-two punch was compounded by catastrophic rains. The storm dumped more than 20 inches over central Florida, swelling rivers and flooding neighborhoods in a swath that stretched across the state. You knew this was going to be a monster.

I did. As Ian approached, Tampa native Bobby Quinn, a former Air Force weather forecaster, private pilot, and tech company founder, wanted to help. So he drove south into the heart of the hurricane. It's kind of hard to leave the spot. And got more than he'd bargained for.

He shot this video on his phone. There was no place to go. There were trees flying by when I was sitting in the truck. And the wind that would have flipped my truck if I had moved out from behind that wall. I tried at one point, and the wheels came off the ground. After 13 harrowing hours, he started to put his talents to work. Quinn runs a Tampa-based tech startup called PayPixel

that crowdsources drone imagery and organizes it on an app. When Ian hit, he repurposed his site so evacuees could view images of their homes and assess the damage free of charge. You see the debris field. You see the destruction in the back. Wow. Now you can turn off the satellite imagery and see the pre-event. This is what it looked like before the storm.

How about that? And if we add in our street-level imagery, somebody can click in and see what that house looks like from the front after the storm. So you've got the whole event before, after, ground level. That's correct. After posting some of his work on social media, he was inundated with requests. More than 700 came from a densely populated, spiraling development 35 miles north of Sanibel called Rotunda West. This is Rotunda West. This is the neighborhood, and the pink dots that you see are each individual image that was taken in the neighborhood. To build his database, Quinn incorporated satellite images

with ground-level pictures he took driving street by street. So that huge circle that we saw, you're going down every cul-de-sac, going up and down, getting pictures on both sides of the street? Every road, every house. How long did that take you? Took me nine hours, 117 miles. And how many pictures did you end up with?

Just over 8,000. He filmed inside some houses. Oh, man. Quinn's efforts didn't go unnoticed. It's a foot deep, and I'm going to have to turn back. He told us he's been contacted by an insurance company and Florida's Emergency Operations Center seeking his data. Why did you do this? If you've ever felt hopelessness or despair or the anxiety that comes with the unknown,

you know it's a terrible feeling. We know that we can use technology in a way that really hasn't been used before to get to the right audience, to get to the loved ones and family members. We want to call that anxiety for them. A prescription for that may lie 12 miles northeast of hard-hit Fort Myers, Babcock Ranch is the brainchild of eco-conscious developer and former professional football player Sid Kitson. So when you look at this building, this just went through a CAC 4 hurricane. Kitson and his partners purchased 91,000 acres in 2006,

bigger than Manhattan, with a dream to build America's first environmentally friendly, hurricane-proof, fully sustainable small town. We are the first solar-powered town in America. We have a solar field that's 150 megawatts. But that's just part of the story. How many people live here now? About 5,000 people. And you've got plans to grow to what?

About 50,000 people. And it'll eventually be 50. Plans to grow to what? About 50,000 people. Kitson rode out the storm in his lakeside home in town. I remember sitting here, I had the weather on, and the weather person says, well, this category for hurricane is now heading for Babcock Ranch. And not only is it heading for Babcock Ranch, but it's going to be on the eastern side of the wall, which is the worst place to be. How long did the hurricane sit over? It was about eight to ten hours. This is unbelievable. You can barely hear yourself think.

He took this video with his iPhone. At the height of the tempest, there were white caps on the lake. So as soon as the sun came up the next morning, I jumped in my car and I started driving out. And the only damage were a few downed trees and a few shingles off the roofs. That's it? That's it. And so our recovery was maybe a day.

Babcock Ranch was designed to accommodate Florida's ecosystem with indigenous plants and natural waterways for drainage. It was built 25 to 30 feet above sea level to avoid storm surges. All electric and phone lines are buried. Aren't you just lucky that you happen to be on a higher level than most of the parts of Florida that got washed away. Yes, I think that's important. But now when it comes to the wind and flooding and rain, and so if that infrastructure is not built properly, you will have homes that get flooded.

You will have that wind damage. No one here lost power. Sid Kitson took us to see this massive solar array. What you see is 440 acres. 700,000 panels built by Florida Power and Light. They withstood Ian's brutal battery. There's a lot of water, but you don't see a single panel that's been dislodged. And there was quite a bit of wind that came through here over the last few days. Gusts of 150 or more. Gusts of over 150. And it did not take a single panel out of here, which is really just remarkable. After seeing the devastation on Sanibel Island, it felt strange to see children playing in parks here, people

enjoying themselves, eating at waterside restaurants, while neighboring communities struggle with Ian's aftermath, the deadliest hurricane since Katrina. Wendy's most important deal of the day has a fresh lineup. Pick any two breakfast items for $4. New four-piece French toast sticks, bacon or sausage wrap, biscuit or English muffin sandwiches, small hot coffee, and more. Limited time only at participating Wendy's Taxes Extra. It's been a turbulent few months for the Southern Baptist Convention. The SBC is the largest evangelical institution in America, representing 47,000 churches and about 14 million members. But in May, it was revealed

some of its now former executives had ignored hundreds of allegations of sexual abuse in Southern Baptist churches for decades. When SBC members elected a new president in June, they turned to a small-town Texas pastor named Bart Barber to lead them. With the Department of Justice investigation into the abuse scandal underway and midterm elections looming, we weren't sure he would want to sit down and discuss weighty matters of church and state, but he did. And as you're about to hear, Bart Barber has a lot to say about faith, scandal, and the political extremism threatening American democracy. Blind partisanship destroys everything except baseball. I'm a St. Louis Cardinals fan, and I'm sticking with that no matter what.

But so many things in church life and beyond that are areas where we have an opportunity to unite, solve problems, and we pass over that opportunity over and over again to shoot at the other team. And you see that filtering into the church? And it's absolutely coming into the way that people in churches who ought to know better are speaking to one another about the issues that are outside the church that aren't really theological. The best characterization is they're not listening. Fort Barber lives with his wife and two children in Farmersville, Texas.

What we're hoping to do is to use a kind of regenerative farming method. He's got some land with a dozen or so cows. If you want to see people come to know Christ, the way to do that is to share the gospel and pray. And has preached every Sunday for 23 years at the First Baptist Church, which only has about 320 members. What made you decide to try to become the head of the SBC? I believe that the Southern Baptist Convention faces some unique challenges right now. I felt like God was calling me to try to give leadership at this moment to help Southern Baptist move forward. The chair declares the winner to be Bart Barber, the next president of the Southern Baptist Convention.

When Bart Barber was elected SBC president in June, it was just four weeks after an independent investigation revealed that some former members of the SBC's executive committee, which oversees budget and organizational issues, had for decades ignored hundreds of credible accusations of sexual abuse in Southern Baptist churches and semin issues, had for decades ignored hundreds of credible accusations of sexual abuse in Southern Baptist churches and seminaries, partly to avoid being held financially liable. They actually kept a list of over 700 names of people who had been credibly accused. What they said, though, is we couldn't give that to the churches because local churches have autonomy in who they hire and fire for pastors.

We can't tell them they can't hire this person. Ryan Burge is an assistant professor at Eastern Illinois University and an American Baptist pastor. He's one of the country's leading data analysts on religion and politics. Were they calling law enforcement and letting police know that there was a predator at this church in this state? The executive committee had the list, put it in a drawer, and didn't tell anyone about it for over 10 years.

That's the mindset that we're repudiating and moving against. When you read that report and to read accounts of people who were brave enough to call in to the executive committee to report abuse, for them to be ignored. That's not a strong enough word. We didn't just ignore them. Sometimes we impugned their motives. Sometimes we attacked them.

The reason why I'm president of the Southern Baptist Convention is because our churches do not agree with that and have taken action to correct those things. Bart Barber says he's cooperating with the Justice Department's investigation and appointed a new nine-member sexual abuse task force that's building a registry for credible reports of abuse to help churches track predators. I have strong feelings about this. It's not just anger, although I'm angry about it. God called me to be a pastor when I was 11. I believe in this. For people to sully this hurts me. I'm not doing this to try to accomplish some PR objective for us. I'm doing this because I want to serve God well. For the new president of the SBC, that means staying true to his deep conservative values

and his beliefs about the last presidential election. Do you believe the 2020 election was stolen? No. You believe Joe Biden is the legitimate president of the United States? I do. Absolutely. I pray for him consistently as the president of the United States. I believe he was legitimately elected. Bart Barber told us that he doesn't believe the election was rigged. He does believe that Joe Biden was duly elected the president of the United States.

That's a big deal. 60% of white evangelicals believe the election was stolen in 2020. And many, many Southern Baptists go to church every Sunday believing that. Southern Baptist pastors have been afraid to speak about that from the pulpit because they know lots of people oppose that in the pews. How many people, how many voters is Bart Barber in a position to influence? At least 70 million people identify as evangelical today. He can have a huge impact when it comes to who they vote for and why they vote for that

candidate. Ryan Bird says in 2016 evangelicals accounted for 33% of all votes cast for Donald Trump. But Bart Barber's vote was not among them. In 2016, you said, I think it hurts the credibility of my testimony for me to be a vocal supporter of a demonstrably evil man whose campaign platform consists mainly of his evilness. Yeah, I did not vote for President Trump in 2016. And that lays out my rationale for that pretty well.

What was the evilness that you saw? The way he treated women that had been documented at that point. I thought that a lot of the rhetoric about immigration was wrongful. A lot of Southern Baptists thought that the rhetoric about immigration was wrongful. A lot of Southern Baptists thought that the rhetoric about immigration was wrongful. Talking about legal immigration. Talking about legal immigration. You embrace it. I embrace it. I'm thankful for people who have immigrated. I live in Texas. I'm surrounded by people who are intermarried into our families. They make our community better. Correct me if I'm wrong. In 2020, you did vote for

Donald Trump. Part of what changed is that the president advocated for some legislation on sentencing reform, something that really addressed some injustice that affected minority communities. I was encouraged by the consistent pro-life support that the president gave. I didn't expect that. We're going to walk down and I'll be there with you. Barber did tell us what happened on January 6th. And Donald Trump's role in it has had a big impact on his opinion of the former president now. I, and I think a lot of Southern Baptists, would be thrilled to have the opportunity to support someone for leadership in our country who's strong on the values that matter to

us, who can do that without putting the vice president's life in danger. You would be hard-pressed to vote for somebody who put his vice president's life in danger. Yes. Donald Trump did invite and incite and encourage a mob of people to march on the Capitol. I'll just say this. I want to be driven by the principles of Jesus Christ, and that does not involve mob violence. I don't support that. Anyone who does support that, I'm less likely to vote for them because of their support for that. If Mike Pence ran in a primary, you would vote for him in a primary? There is nothing that would prevent me from voting for Mike Pence in a primary.

We asked Barber what he thinks about the Christian nationalist rhetoric increasingly being used by some elected officials, like Congresswoman Lauren Boebert of Colorado. The church is supposed to direct the government. The government is not supposed to direct the church. It stands contrary to 400 years of Baptist history and everything I believe about religious liberty. I'm opposed to the idea of Christian dominion, churchly dominion over the operations of government. Why do you object to that? Okay. I object to it because Jesus said his kingdom is not of this world. I object to it because historically, every time it's been adopted, it wound up persecuting people like me. It doesn't stop at persecuting people who are not Christians. It it wound up persecuting people like me. It doesn't stop at persecuting people

who are not Christians. It eventually winds up persecuting people who are Christians, for whom the flavor of their Christianity is different from that of the government. Support for the separation of church and state was a foundational principle for Baptists who faced religious persecution in England and America in the 1600s. Baptists split in 1845 over slavery, which is when the Southern Baptist Convention was founded. The SBC supported slavery and later segregation. On abortion, the SBC's opposition has hardened over the years. In 1971, they made exceptions in cases where there was, quote, the likelihood of damage to the emotional, mental, and physical health of the mother. But in 1980, they narrowed that exception only to cases where pregnancy threatened the life of the mother.

Bart Barber says he stands by that today. Our interest with abortion is not to police everybody's sex life. Our interest with abortion is that we believe it's a human person who deserves to live. There was just a case recently, a 10-year-old girl who was raped, barred from having an abortion in Ohio, was able to obtain one in Indiana. I mean, this is a little girl who, she has a right to life too. Sure. Even in that case, you think she should have the child? I do.

She should be forced to have the child? I think, I don't want that to sound like I don't have tremendous compassion for her and her circumstance. I wish we could put an end to 10-year-olds being raped. I'm trying to work against child sexual abuse because I think that's atrocious. But you don't see forcing a 10-year-old child to go to term with a baby from rape as abuse of a child? I see it as horrible. I see it as preferable to killing someone else. Not surprisingly, Barber and the SBC oppose same-sex marriage. We're committed to the idea of gender as a gift from God. We're committed to the idea that men and women ought to be united with one another in marriage.

Do you still believe that gay people can be, should be, converted out of being gay? I believe that sinners should be converted out of being sinners, and that applies to all of us. Can somebody be a good Christian, a member of the Southern Baptist Convention, and be gay or lesbian and married to a person of the Southern Baptist Convention and be gay or lesbian and married to a person of the same sex? No. In Jesus name we pray, amen. Can a good Christian in good conscience vote for Donald Trump in 2024? Before we left, we asked Bart Barber one last time about how he'll vote.

I'm not even going to speculate about that. Who are the other choices? Ahead of the election in 2016, you said who you were going to vote for. In 2020, you said who you voted for. Now you're not saying who you'd vote for. That's correct. Somebody seeing this is going to think, okay, well that's-

Why are you hedging it now? That's political. It's not political calculation. The fact that in 2016, I could say something that I was speaking only for myself. And now, you know, 50,000 churches of people I love are represented by me when I speak. And so do I feel a sense of needing to be more wise and careful about things that I say now? Absolutely, I do. Have evangelicals sold their soul in order to support Donald Trump? First of all, I think we had to choose from the choices that were given to us. And that's

an inescapable reality in our political system. But there's a lot of evangelical support for Donald Trump that goes beyond just somebody holding their nose and saying, well, I have these two choices, so I'm going to vote for this person. There are, I'm telling you, there are also a lot of people who articulate what I've just said. I just think that under President Trump, they saw less backtracking on the things that were promised to them. I do think that Americans are hungry for strong leadership. I think that there's opportunity for strong leaders to emerge who give us better choices. I'm praying for that. Eleven years ago, our late colleague Bob Simon described St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols as one of the greatest baseball players who ever lived. This season, at 42, after years playing on the West Coast, Pujols came home to the Cardinals for his final season.

He smashed his 700th home run, then numbers 701, 702, and 703, joining Barry Bonds, Hank Aaron, and Babe Ruth in that elite circle. An 11-time All-Star, legendary for his work ethic and admired for his charities, Albert Pujols was amazingly chosen 400th second in the 1999 baseball draft. What drives Albert? He says he's still seething about how he was snubbed in that 99 draft. You'll never get over it, huh? Never, never. People have told me that it's really a bad idea to get you angry.

Yeah, you don't want to do that. I'm Anderson Cooper. We'll be back next week with another edition of 60 Minutes.