The Glenn Beck Program - Ep 246 | EMERGENCY PODCAST: Save ‘Baby Sparrow’ from the Taliban | The Glenn Beck Podcast     

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

A 5-year-old sits at the heart of an international controversy involving Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the U.S. State Department, and even Hunter Biden’s law firm. In what Glenn describes as maybe his “most important” episode of "The Glenn Beck Podcast" yet, Stephanie and Joshua Mast detail the unbelievable story of rescuing an injured infant from the war in Afghanistan and their uphill battle to bring her safely to America during the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal under President Biden’s administration. Now, their 5-year-old daughter’s fate again hangs in the balance, and she is just days away from a Virginia court case that may change her life forever. The Mast family believes their daughter is the biological child of foreign fighters. If they’re correct, then her mere existence unravels the foundations of the peace agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan, which stipulated that there were NO foreign fighters in Afghanistan. In a tangled web of motivations, Glenn is shocked by the possibility that the U.S. State Department may have placed a baby girl in the hands of people without any evidence of biological relations and with potential ties to the Taliban. The Masts make a public plea to the Trump administration to save their little girl from a custody battle with international implications but deeply personal ramifications for this little girl.          GLENN’S SPONSORS      Relief Factor        Relief Factor can help you live pain-free! The three-week quick start is only $19.95. Visit https://www.relieffactor.com/ or call 800-4-RELIEF.    Jase Medical   Care for yourself and loved ones when the unexpected happens. Go to https://jasemedical.com/ and use code BECK10 at checkout for a discount.    Real Estate Agents I Trust  When you’re buying or selling a home, you need a real estate agent you can trust. Visit https://realestateagentsitrust.com/ to find the top-selling real estate agents in your area. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

And now, a Blaze Media podcast. Today I want to tell you a story of a five-year-old that is right dead center, the heart of an international controversy involving al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the U.S. State Department, even Hunter Biden's law firm. But everybody seems to forget she's a little five-year-old girl. She was actually recovered as an infant during a U.S. mission in Afghanistan. Her mother was a suicide bomber. She survived even though mom was clutching her at the chest. Military didn't know what to do with her. The Afghans that were on our side said, you got to kill her because she's just going to become another terrorist. But a good Marine and several Marines and several people in the hospitals around the world.

remembered she was a child and she now lives in America with her adoptive parents who are now fighting to keep custody of her. They claim that their daughter is a child of foreign terrorists in Afghanistan. And without the intervention of the U.S. Rangers who rescued her that night, she wouldn't be alive today. Even if they would have given them to the soldiers from Afghanistan that were on our side, she wouldn't be alive today. and if she were in Afghanistan today, she would be under the rule of the Taliban. How would that work out for a young girl? The only problem is,

is that if this little girl is who they claim she is, then her mere existence unravels the foundations of a peace agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan, which stipulated there were no foreign fighters in Afghanistan. But you see, this little girl proved, once again the Taliban lied. These are the shaky foundations that set the stage for our disastrous withdrawal, and with the fall of Afghanistan in the background,

two Americans fought against all odds to rescue their adopted daughter before she was crushed in the collapse of a nation. Now, perhaps without you, her future hangs in the balance. She needs help now. I want you to spend time and really listen to the American parents fighting for this little girl. Joshua and Stephanie Mast. Before we get to them, I want to tell you about our sponsor. It's Relief Factor.

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think I've done a lot of important shows that felt important when I did them. This might be the biggest impossible injustice I have ever reported on. Your story is remarkable. It's very complex. And so I want to take it carefully, linearly. So we'll just tell the story. And the first part needs to be who are. Are you? Introduce yourselves.

Well, first, thank you for having us on. We really appreciate it. It's, you know, growing up, listened to you and rush. It's just surreal to be able to sit here and talk with you. Thank you. So I'm an active duty Marine. I'm a major in the Marine Corps. Active duty.

Active duty. So all this is my opinion, not on behalf of the government or anybody else. In fact, a lot of it will be kind of focused on some government action that's happened to our family. I would say describing us, we're family of five. grown up traveling with the Marine Corps. I've had a child born at every duty station. I'd say we're a pretty archipical, like, military family. Yes.

You've been in for 14 years now, so we've been married for 18 years, so our entire married life, most of our married life has been in the Marine Corps. And I love the experience, and our four, we have five kids, four of them are boys, a lot of them want to grow up to be a Marine, or that's what they say at this age. And so just red blooded. patriots through and through. How's mom with the idea of the Marines? I tell them to be open to but absolutely. I mean, I'm proud of the Marine Corps and just, you know, even our service members

in general. And so I love the community. And so we've been happy to be a part of it. You guys have been together for how long? 18 years. Well, married 18 years. I met him when I was 11, he was 12. So we've prayed childhood sweethearts, you know, grew up together as started dating in high school and been together ever since. So really, I mean, truly best friends and been through everything together. Okay, so now we have to introduce your daughter, four boys, one girl. Yes. She's the center of a lot of controversy and to protect her.

We're going to have to use John Doe's, Jane Doe, and her name is not a real name, Sparrow. That's right. Tell me about Sparrow. Who is she? Where did she come from? Where did the nickname come from? Okay. Well, first of all, I'll tell who she is today. So she is a five-year-old girl that loves, just like any other girl, loves baby dolls and anything girly, pink, purple, coloring just loves life, loves dogs, and playing outside with her brothers. and she's just a blessing and a true joy, just the most gracious little girl that you could possibly imagine. She has a remarkable past,

and if you saw her today, you would never believe what she has been through. So I don't know with what your parameters are as a Marine, but you claim that, She is a child of a foreign fighter in Afghanistan, correct? Can you tell me what, tell me that scenario, what happened? Sure. So I was deployed in 2019 in Afghanistan.

I was attached at operational headquarters of the four-star in overall command of both U.S. and NATO forces. And so I will never forget. I was walking to dinner one night with our staff. My colonel was a senior staff, advocate, phenomenal leader, really appreciated my time under him. But he said,

he said, what the heck are we going to do with this baby? Walk into dinner. And what baby, sir? And he said, all the operators had knocked over an Al-Qaeda facility last night. And there was an only child, there was only one survivor.

It was a baby. And we didn't know as boy or girl or much details about it, but it sounded like it was bad. And so like your gut reaction and the reaction of like folks from from the rangers on the ground to medical staff to us was like well what can we do like you immediately volunteer like how do we make sure a safe outcome for this this child and it kind of developed from there and when we learn more about it over time and now we have like

eyewitness testimony and declassified information from the most sophisticated unit in Afghanistan at that time in a 19 year you know developed theater with with I guess a significant amount of intelligence about exactly who was there, exactly what they were doing, and where they were from. Okay, but the actual mission that night has been classified, right? So a portion of it had been declassified and two eyewitnesses have testified that they were there and they saw it. They were there and saw and recovered her. So how did mom and dad die? Well, I guess I should probably just give you an overview of the mission. Okay. So it was six September, 2019 in the period of darkness between the fifth and the six at night. That's when they own the

night. So it was a Ranger Regiment mission, which was one of our most sophisticated units in Afghanistan at that time. And so they infiltrate to an area where there's a known Al-Qaeda compound, and they're trying to capture or kill three Al-Qaeda leaders. And they also had another series of compounds nearby that had more fighters in them. And so they had two platoon-sized elements of Rangers in the cover of darkness, basically sneaking up on these compounds surrounding them and then issuing a demand to surrender or die. And they were briefed. And what happened exactly as they were briefed, they expected them to fight to the death. And that's exactly what happened in brutal close combat over an hour and a half where they sustained multiple

US casualties. Two guys partially paralyzed, almost a dozen, I believe, Rangers wounded, and then a dozen of the Afghan partner force were also wounded in a very kinetic engagement. So our rangers are there. But when does Sparrow come into the scene? She with mom, dad, both? What did mom and dad doing? So a little bit of both. So the multipurpose canine handler, or dog handler is how we colloquially refer to them.

He described, when they initially breached the structure, seeing a man holding a little baby, which we believe was her, and having an AK-47 and firing at them, engaging them. And then that weapon jammed. And so the, the man disappeared. The baby was no longer with him. And a grenade rolled out. So he says he had a distinct memory of looking down and seeing this grenade. And as he described it, it was like a homemade explosive. And so he says, I covered my dog and I yelled grenade because there was a ranger stacked up on the breach. And he said, even though I was the closest one, I didn't get hit and several of his buddies did got fragmentation wounds. And so they were forced to with knowing there's a child in there throw grenades back in.

In exchange, there was an exchange of grenades at close range. And they had sympathetic detonations of other explosives going off from the grenades they threw into the room. And from there, they did a series of what they called barricaded shooters. So it is a suicidal terrorist who will barricade themselves in with the presence of their family in a room and engage whoever's coming in that room and not surrender. no matter what. They will even, you know, blow up their families rather than surrender. And that's exactly what the experience in room after room after room through this, this relatively small leadership compound. And so you asked, where did she, where did she be covered? So as they

culminate and they get to one of the last rooms in this structure, they had run out of breaching explosives. And so they used what's called a Carl Gustav or a goose gun, which is a bazooka, for for lack of a better descriptor. And they used that to blow a hole in the final room to clear it of the remaining terrorists. And that blast killed that, that original, what we believe was

a biological father. And the Ranger testified, under oath, that he observed what ended up being her biological mother, run out of that hole that they created, screaming at him as he's like, obliquing around a corner covering whoever's going to come out

and exploded a, a suicide device about 15 feet from him. So that was his... So on her, she blew herself up. Correct. And she was holding Sparrow? So he didn't realize that at the time. So as an American, we treat, you know, friendly enemy, we treat wounded. And so she was incapacited. He dragged her behind a berm, checked her medically, noticed that she had given the, she had the signs of, like, recently giving birth. And he's kind of looking around with his night vision to, like, what, and saw her moving out of the corner of his eye. And so she was about six. six weeks old. She suffered a fractured skull. A fractured left femur so bad they had to put a rod in

to put it back together and second degree burns on her face and neck from from the Carl Gustav round or the mom's vest cooking off. You know, it's hard to say with that many kinetic events happening around her what exactly caused it. But I mean, we're talking six inches and she's, you know, six inches higher and she's in vital areas and an inch, an inch deeper into her skull and she's, she's dead and um what was more remarkable is there's an afghan partner force there and they were engaged in clearing that room that they just breached and uh they had they sustained a casualty and um were very angry about that and so they wanted they they literally came to our our rangers and they like let us shoot her in the head like just the baby the baby like let's just throw in the creek

and so they didn't want her to grow up to be a foreign terrorist in their country because they're engaged in a brutal civil war at that point with a lot of foreign terrorists. And these are the cultural experts. It's their culture. Who knows better than them? And so our guys like physically resisted murdering our little girl now on objective. And like honestly, the moral courage, while you have your own guys bleeding and you're in a kinetic firefight, they still have that instinct as an American soldier to protect innocent life. I mean, I'm humbled. So why did no one step forward? I mean, was it known that this baby was retrieved from this compound?

I mean, I don't know what the situation is on how you, you know, put an ad out, hey, are you relative to these people? I mean, you couldn't. Well, that was some, so we've gotten to meet a bunch of phenomenal Americans at every level of government over the last five years in this. And one of them was the, he was what's called a civil affairs officer. or for the Special Operations Task Force Afghanistan. And I had some of those same questions as I'm kind of researching this, and we didn't know all this at the time,

but over time we've learned. And he had asked the same question, well, how do you safely, you know, advertise in an area controlled by al-Qaeda or Haqqqani network in Afghanistan? How do you safely advertise that you've recovered a child? And then we had a lot of reports

of foreign children, you know, doing very poorly in the Afghan orphanage system or being treated prejudicially, you know, just because of the brutality of the war going on there. And so he had actually asked some of the ICRC staff that were like, oh, we found somebody who might be able to take her. And he's like, well, are they related? Like, we don't know.

And so he was very concerned that they were having to rely on the word of basically Taliban local nationals in this Taliban-controlled area for any sort of potential claimants. And that was a huge, concern at our level at the headquarters level as well is like how do we safely vet people so you're walking uh with your fellow Marine and he says what are we're going to do with this baby when did it occur to you maybe we should adopt honestly like i think the gut instinct was we wanted to ensure the child safety um like initially it was just a as an american you know anybody downrange I bet there's a

a million guys that could close their eyes and say, hey, like, I can remember someone I was trying to help on deployment. That was, that's what this was for us originally. What happened was is we were trying to, as a legal shop, guarantee a safe outcome for her. And I think DOD did a great job of doing that initially. And then we had, we hit some interference later on with some other agencies. But what really caused us to seek adoption was getting her a visa. I'll never forget the phone call that I got because after that initial talk, walking to Chow Hall, he called me and it was in the afternoon my time. And that was not the normal time for him to call me.

So initially, that scared me like, okay, what's going on? It wasn't very long into his deployment. And so I picked up the phone and I'll never forget the tone of his voice. It just sounded different. And because of searching instantly like, like, okay, what's going on? and he said, "'Hun, there's this baby.'" And I was standing in the kitchen, I just stopped

and I was just listening to him describe that it was a lone survivor of an al-Qaeda raid and they don't know what they're going to do with this baby. And so just trying to sort through that. And I mean, as a mom, my heart goes out.

We didn't know at that point, boy, girl, we just knew baby and it was injured and its future is up in the air. And so I was like, well, we can do something. We'll volunteer for it. And I mean, I'm already a stay-at-home mom, have young kids right around that age range. I know how vulnerable and just, you know, how precious children are.

So it's like, we'll do something. And he's like, well, I'm glad you said that because I already volunteered. He's like, but, you know, they're going to do family trades and there's still a lot of things to figure out. So he's like, we'll see. So this was at a time at first, you weren't thinking adoption. You were just thinking maybe. Well, I mean, it wasn't, it was more. of like if there's, I mean, it was like he said, guaranteeing a safe outcome. So whatever that is,

long-term commitment. It wasn't just like make sure the babies bandaged up and okay. It was like, absolutely we'll open our home to a child that has a need like that. Yeah. And I would say that we were very aware at the time of like the negotiations going on that they're going to like our presence is going to end very rapidly. And then what's going to happen? Because a lot of the funding is going to be attached to that. And so our concern, you know, is just asking basic questions like, how bad is she hurt? What unit picked her up? Why do they say she's foreign? And then as I used kind of the skill set that I had to pull some of that information for decision makers, it was very clear exactly who she was and where they came from. And so there was all, and then as he did

research on, hey, what is a, what does an orphanage in Afghanistan look like? And then add to that, what does it look like when the U.S. leaves? That was especially for a girl. Yes. Especially for a foreign child. So, so she was not from Afghanistan. Yeah. So all of the U.S. intelligence and everything has been declassified and there's a significant amount that's still left that has not been declassified pointed to a foreign origin for her. The specific group is a Turkestani or Uyghur Al-Qaeda branch. Okay. Yeah. So you decide to adopt, right? Well, initially, it was just seeking guardianship and what Joshua said. It was at the, it was like, One step just was the first step. And like Josh said, it was getting a visa so that she could, because she did have ongoing medical needs, well, she should actually back up. It was the initial conversation. And then a couple weeks later, we see the very first photo.

And we call it the baby in the box. And there's this little girl in a Home Depot box on the floor of a hospital wrapped up in blankets. And so that was the first time we found out basic age that it's an infant. and that's a girl. And then it just, when you see a, put a face to it, that is just where you're like, okay, what can we do? So initially it was just trying to guarantee safe, like ongoing medical care in the United States.

And we were seeking guardianship. But that was, you know, after you found out what the requirements are going to be. Yeah. I'd say, Glenn, that we initially just advocated to elevate the priority of this child's life in the U.S. government's eyes. So when did you decide? She needs to be with us. She's ours.

Well, I think it was in the midst of pursuing all the administrative requirements to get a visa. They kept saying, oh, well, she needs a name. Well, how do you get a name for a Jane Doe baby that got blown up on an objective? And that was what the problem was. And then there was like, well, how do you arrange medical care in the U.S., which was a requirement for the visa? How do you pay for that? How do you authorize surgery on a child, a minor child?

well, you have to be, have some sort of legal rights. And so as this developed, we're like, okay, well, I volunteer to be the financial sponsor for the visa. I'll volunteer to try and get some sort of legal ability to order medical care. And so it really evolved pretty organically from that. It was very organic. And but it was, it ultimately, I think, stemmed from our worldview for, I mean, in that every life is precious. It doesn't matter race, ethnicity background. I mean, she's an, she was an innocent, caught.

in a terrible war. And so it was just a protective instinct. And we were put in the position. There was, like he said, dozens of Americans. This was not just us. This was across the board, the medical staff at Bogram. There were several people trying to protect and advocate for this. One. Was there anybody who was stepping up saying, you can't do this, you can't do this? Or was everybody pretty much on the same page? So I think initially there was a perspective that this is like, Afghan problem. It's a distraction from operations. And they were trying to use our commands influence to force

the Afghans who had multiple times that we don't have the capacity to care for a child like this. Like I was in some of those meetings. But they were trying to force them to take them anyway. And so that's when we did a little bit of advocacy trying to find, to elevate her status. Her status.

Yeah, her priority of this life. Because we had options. And that was successful. And then the administration, the first Trump administration, to reach out and directed us to act in her best interest and try to get her back to the U.S., which is pretty reasonable under the circumstances. And so we were thinking, hey, that's good to go. She's going to be safe.

And as we're working that new direction, that new U.S. policy as an office, and then I was volunteering with some of my skill sets in my free time to get a visa. That's when all of those kind of developed. And then I report that back to my husband, hey, great, great news. We got guardianship. Great news. We got her added as a DoD. Dependent.

great news she has a military ID like we had everything lined up to get her home and and we just had some some significant opposition at some point and that was kind of the first from department of state yeah but I would I would like to say that and I already alluded to this is that she was loved by so many people it wasn't just Josh and I doing it it was the medical staff and like you said the Rangers and there was people pulling together to the fact where we called her to answer your question, Sparrow, after those initial phone calls, and we started to get more information about her origin and genuinely started to care about her. You know, I had young kids at home, and we were still early in the deployment, like getting used to him being gone and, you know, me juggling life at home

with young children, and I was finishing up my last semester at grad school and just trying to juggle life. And when we found out about her, at first I wasn't going to tell the kids because it was such a, yeah, yeah. It was just like, no, we're not going to get them involved yet. But as it started to pick up momentum and actually look like it could happen, I remember mentioning it to the boys one night, and I was tucking them in bed. And I told them that there was this baby. And that was prior to us, you to find, seeing the original baby in the box photo. And I said, there's a baby that's been hurt, and daddy's trying to help see what, you see what can happen. So I said, well, let's pray for the baby. And there's a old hymn that's called

his eyes on the sparrow. And so we, that's how Sparrow came to be, was we just prayed for baby sparrow. And it was just kind of something that we would, you know, when we would pray in the morning or at night, we would pray for baby Sparrow. And so there was a little bit initial hesitancy involving our family. And it's still to this day because they're seeing us live this out. I mean, they're in it with us. Oh, I know. And as a family, we're going through this together and seeing us through the highs and lows of all of it. But at the core, for me, at that time, it took my attention off of myself and even kind of a little bit if I had the O'Pour Me syndrome.

Always does. Yeah. And realizing that there was a real person out there with Neach much greater than mine and that we could potentially make a difference. And so that was, I think, all of a sudden, that it had purpose. and meaning and you, you on that side, you were working at nonstop. So 2020 comes.

State Department gets involved. What happens? So I guess it would be important for the viewers to understand is one, the Trump administration reaching out was like a lightning bolt. It was, I'm a junior officer, I'm a captain at the time. I kind of got to like, don't do that again, but you know, it's a baby, so it's okay,

we'll keep doing this. And so I got yelled out a little bit, which was, it was relieved not to get fired. But we pretty much turned around and said, oh, yeah, that makes sense. We're going to act in this child's best interest. We're going to try to get her to the states. And we were working that problem. But to coordinate with the Department of State because you need that for visas, we had reached out to the embassy instead of a meeting.

And I distinctly remember staying up to like three in the morning, pouring over the classified intel, pulling it together for a briefing. And we went to that meeting, DOD did, to brief them on exactly what we. what we knew. And, and the reason that was important was because if this was a, if this is a foreign child, we wouldn't turn a British or a French or a German foreign fighters over to an Afghan orphanage. We would repatriate them at a minimum. And also, if you're going to actually do a family trace, you'd have to go to the country of origin to see if there's anybody alive and who is not, who is safe. Because here's the reality. We were targeting this group. There's

hundreds of them with their families coming back from Syria into this other war zone for a safe space. and we were hunting and killing them. And so one of our biggest concern was like, even if you got a family member, if we give this child back to them, is she going to be on another objective and not be so lucky this time? I mean, that's understanding how sophisticated

this unit and this intelligence gathering apparatus is, they're killing this entire network. And they're doing it that month. And that was the priority in Afghanistan. So like we are very aware just because of my background. Well, there are two main concerns earlier. on was her ongoing medical needs because she did suffer trauma, but also, like Josh said, just that she would be put back on the X again and she'd be targeted. Or she's even taken by

guys who were on our side and killed because of we don't need another foreign fighter. So the State Department tries to repatriate or tries to put her back with people they claim were her family. So going back to that meeting, so instead of what we're supposed to happen of an informational meeting where we're supposed to inform them of what our classified intelligence says. They essentially ambushed us. They brought Afghans to this meeting where we can't brief on a classified level. And they basically tried to do a fate accompli where it's like, hey, how soon can you take

the baby? I mean, like two days after the Trump administration reached out. That's what they were doing. I was in the meeting. And there's been a lot of, we'll get to that later in the story, but the Department of Justice under the previous administration has filed court filing saying, oh, Major Mesh knew there was known family at this particular meeting, but in reality, that was the detainee that our guys had taken off of the op.

And I was there to tell you that this guy said he brought these people here from a foreign country and has been moving him around and identified these specific people in this compound as foreign fighters. So that was just some rumor because somebody didn't have the right clearance, and we were going to clear that up. And so all of this could have avoided if you're not insubordinate to the administration. Back with more in just a minute first. We hear a lot of talk about the supply chain. It's unpredictable.

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for a discount it's promo code beck at jasee dot com so who did they hand sparrow over to so there was about a two month period after that meeting where the state department kind of like we're not going to help you but we're not going to get in your way and we had successfully negotiated a recommendation from the then existing Afghan government to send her to the states. The DOD had done that and it was ready to go.

What happened is the State Department came back in and I have a Colonel sworn testimony. They lied about me and my family like oh we'd done something improper with this or we didn't tell people literally testified under oath here just in

October that the State Department official had lied about us. Then he said there was the most unprofessional meeting he'd ever been in. And he's the acting staff judge advocate for a four-star command who's in charge of the theater. And he gets told, stand down,

State Department's got the lead, they're going to handle this. That's exactly what we were told as a charity at the Abbey Gate. Stand-down, State Department has this. And that's when everybody lost the one. Yeah, great job. Anyway. And I'm not trying to ding the entire State Department.

I think that there's a lot of hope for the future and how we're moving forward with this. I agree. And morale's high, as far as I'm concerned, at least in our unit. But I will say that there are some people that don't reflect our values and they don't reflect,

I don't think, a proper representation of what America is about, sometimes in foreign countries. We experienced that. And so what we thought at the time was if we just get the facts in front of the right people, they'll do the right thing.

Like that was it. We were very optimistic. And so it's like, they just need to know the truth. And then there's not a question. And so we advocated during that time hard for her. And unfortunately, what we've now come to realize is that's not the case.

And so it was literally... It is with some. It is with some. But what Joshua said with that, the colonel testified to is when it came down to where they determined, and it came out in Joshua's Board of Inquiry is they primarily saw her.

There was a few key figures that primarily saw her as, like he said, an Afghan issue, an Afghan problem, or a distraction. And fundamentally, though, there was one female that testified at his Board of Inquiry, a service member,

and she basically, she was upset that service members came to care for this child. Like at the hospital staff in Bogrom, that they were buying baby supplies. with their own mind. They were trying to take care of her and make her comfortable

and just help a child. What else would you do? That's the question that we've always wondered is why wouldn't you? But they saw it as a distraction, something to be done away with. And I would say, Glenn, when I reached out to the hospital,

I said, hey, we're trying to see if there's other better options for her. They were overjoyed. Like they were like, let's go. We've been hoping somebody would help. And so we had what we called Operation Starfish, which was kind of a grassroots level. to try to get a safe outcome for her.

And the story, so she has two pseudonyms that it was either sparrow or we called her sparrow. They called her starfish. And there's a poem where there's a boy walking along the ocean and he's bending down, picking up and throwing the starfish back into the ocean. And so the line at the end is an adult comes along into questions. Like how can you possibly make a difference?

The boy bends down and picks up another starfish and throws it into the ocean. He's like, well, it made a difference for that one. And for starfish is what they call. called her. She was a symbol of the one that they could help because in a terrible war where they're seeing unspeakable, like tragedy all the time, she was the unique one that they could help. And so there was this rally cry around her to protect her and to keep her safe. Yeah, to the point where we were waking up people when the president visited Bogram for Thanksgiving in 2019. We were

like waking people up like, go find the president, have a meter. Like, because it was a hundred yards. possible to meet her. 100 yards from where she was and we were so close. And that was when the U.S. policies tried to get her back. So we're like,

wouldn't it be cool if they go home on Air Force One? Right. But we were from, I guess, from an intelligence perspective, there was never a question of where she came from.

This is totally like a gloss made up. So how did this, this Afghani, these Afghans get in, entangled in all of this? Okay, so I think the best way I can explain this is the terms of the peace

strategically what's going on in September 2019 is the peace deal literally blew up. The president said this is a bad deal. The Taliban's not acting in good faith and announced a canceling of the peace deal. And from there, both the Taliban is trying to get back to the negotiating table and the embassy is rightly trying to negotiate a peace,

a legitimate peace. But I think we're fed a bad deal in case nobody saw like 2021. But the Taliban is specifically denying the presence of this group. They formally announced it on their website. Like, these reports are false. This group isn't in Afghanistan. The Uyghur group. Possibly. Yeah, yeah. But I guess they called him Turkestani, but this Al-Qaeda group, which is a condition of the peace deal. So the Taliban's not dumb. Like they fought us for 20 years, right? Right. So they have a strategic interest in this not being a thing.

And so a colonel, who was the action officer in the Pentagon, testified in our board of inquiry in October. He said that six to eight false claimants came forward. They tested them for DNA and they were negative. So, Glenn, why would six or eight people who are not relatives of this child come forward? And I think the answer is they were sent forward. Correct. And so our concern at the time was that, hey, this is, it could be someone who is being sent forward as a proxy of the Taliban. It could be someone who is just profiting off of, like, someone.

trolling through a non-U.S. controlled area of Afghanistan and saying, want a baby? Because at the time, there was pretty severe conditions in Afghanistan. It's getting to be the fall into the wintertime. And we were getting reports that, at least in Kabul, they were eating cats and dogs. They were selling their youngest children to pay for the rest of their family to make it through the winter. And so there was some significant, you know, economic conditions at that time. when did John and Jane Doe come into the picture

so it really wasn't it was John Doe's father he was these are the people that this is where the real battle begins yes and I would say at the outset of this is I don't blame these particular Afghans everybody wants to come to America

you know sure we blame the Americans who know the truth and are covering this up you know, they're coming from an environment where you're living a little more hand to mouth and you have to survive. And I don't, I have a lot of great Afghan friends that we've fought with and I respect. And so this isn't about really Afghans, but it's about what the State Department did that was dangerous, like objectively dangerous. So here's how it fits in. We get told to stand, DOD gets told to stand down in December of 2019.

There is a meeting, a critical meeting. on December 31st between the embassy and the Afghan that we've been mentoring to to basically have basic

child safety procedures. He worked for a ministry of labor. And so we've been basically train

and buys and assisting them that you do a DNA test if there's somebody that comes forward and you vet

people for terrorism. Like not rocket science here. And they were very on board with that.

And so they had a claimant come forward. And so they requested the embassy who's the new

lead to do a DNA test to this person. But somehow, the embassy reports to the Trump administration and their own agency that the Afghan DNA test, I think the white lie was it's not part of the Afghan process. And they've confirmed there's family members. And in reality, we'd spent two years to get this Afghan to America. He got here three days before our board of inquiry as far as like, if you want to talk about the providence of God. But this guy said, the only person in the world who could contradict what the embassy saying, got to America a couple days before we needed him to be here.

And he said, they asked for a DNA test and they denied it. So they personally, this particular Afghan or embassy employee personally denied a DNA test. And so he said there was nothing else. Like they didn't have a photo ID. There was like some guy saying, I'm a family. And that's what the embassy forced them to go through with. And so this man ended up being a, his claim was a lie, like over. the last three years we can document we've documented that claim to be a farmer right well so the

the person who claimed to be a relative who she was ultimately turned over to okay um claimed to be related to a dead a person who was killed during that mission and i believe that's a lie i think we can document that so he was just lying that's why you have precautions in place to vet people And so Baby Sparrow is, where is baby Sparrow at this point? So at that time when they were told basically this is the new course of action and to stand down. What we learned at Joshua's Board of Inquiry is literally one of the generals. He had the entire, like the medical staff footprint at Bogram. He sat them down and said, this is what's going to happen to her.

this is the course of action, this is the decision, and this is what we're going to do. And he ordered everybody. And that's what the colonel testified, it was the most unprofessional dress down he's ever been a part of. He basically yelled at everybody and said, this is what we're doing. And so they turned her over with armed,

what do you call armed guards? Personal security detail. Personal security detail. And the reason why the personal security detail they were there was because they were concerned about a resistance among service members. So if this was family, If this was, like, for her best interest and she was going to be okay, why were they worried about a resistance among young service members?

Because ultimately, everybody knew what her outcome was going to be and they knew it was wrong. Yeah, they flew a flag over Barbara in her memory because they thought she was dead. It was so dangerous. And there was just no vetting at all. and what I think that sometimes powerful people don't realize is you know there's a lot of regular people out there that can can show the homework on this stuff and I just thought that I don't think they ever thought it would be they be held accountable for any of this stuff and now oh fortunately for the last few years and some of the process we've gone through has been brutal but we have the evidence now and we're excited about the opportunity to you know I guess but show that. So when did Sparrow and how did Sparrow get here?

That's a miracle. That is a miracle. The one thing I'd like to add is the night that, because we scrambled and we literally did everything we could to stop that turnover because all we knew it was to a person that wished to remain anonymous and we knew that they weren't DNA vetted

and that they were likely terrorist affiliated. And so we did everything we could do to stop that from happening. And I remember, I'll never forget when you came in and you got the call. It was very late at night. And he came in and he's like, she's gone. And I remember, I was just like, I felt like I was kicking the gut. And I was just like so devastating because I thought Trump or somebody would come through and save the day and she would not, you know, be turned over like

that. And I was heartbroken at that moment, but I'll never forget, you said, and it was, the room was dark and I just remember your voice and you said, I don't know why. I have no reason to think this, but it's going to be okay. And I was like, and I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I was just accepted at that point because I had no words. And I was just like, okay. And so that brings us to how she got out. Two days before the peace still signed, the U.S. government, you know, through the embassy's representations,

turns her over to an unvetted, what's turned out to be a non-relative terrorist-affiliated person. Like, the guy's got a Taliban flag on his WhatsApp profile. Jeez. And so everything we'd feared, everything we, I mean, as a captain, my wife and I sues the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State. that's how convinced we were that this was objectively dangerous. Like, I'm thinking my career is over, but I can't, like, sit here and not do every legal

legal guardians. Like, we had legal standing and we were her. Well, our government recognized our rights, right? She was recognized as our daughter by headquarters Marine Corps. I'm calling on the phone, explaining what we're doing. I mean, we're talking to the White House chief of staff. We're talking to the director of USCIS. Like, as far as for a crazy situation, we're doing.

doing as by the book as we can for a unique one-off situation. And what I think it's very important for the listeners to understand is, if all of the U.S. intelligence was actually correct and the people that we sent our special operators to capture or kill were foreigners, all of this is a lie. Because if she really is who we thought she was the whole time, then all of this gloss is just smoke and mirrors. They had no reason to do what they did.

And the only reason we don't know about the DNA is because these people now won't take a DNA test and the State Department denied taking a DNA test before. And to me, if you think that there's a valid claimant, the first thing you do is a DNA test. It's the most biometrically enrolled society on earth. So again, let me go back to John and Jane Doe. Who are these people?

So John Doe is the son of this older man. Okay. So he, she was going to, that's real. I believe that's real. Okay. So this older man gets her and we, um, there's a phenomenal human rights attorney named Kim Motley and she's got experienced like dealing with like traffic children in Afghanistan.

She finds her. That's a miracle in itself, but I'll gloss over it for time. Um, this, this older man says, or we get, uh, some information that he's hired a young girl to take care of her. He's paying her a salary. A teenager. A teenager. That teenager is Jane Doe. She's like 16, I think, at the time. She's going to finish up high school. But it's a war zone. We're told that it's a slum. It's in southern Afghanistan. It's so dangerous that the ICRC won't go there. And we immediately get reports that she, Sparrow starts shaking at night in the day and her eyes are twitching. And so we were very concerned about her TBI. Because like in the military community, especially we're very aware, like the long-term ramification. to get him blown up.

And so we're like, we were even trying to get her taken back to Canterre airfield or some of the hospitals at the time. But then COVID happens and everything gets like shut down and you can't even go out on the street in Afghanistan and all that craziness

that ensued. And we were trying to, Kim was trying to get her brought up to be evaluated at a hospital in Kabul that had more capability. So 18 months passes by the teenage girl gets married to the son. The son of the sun.

Okay. And so I think it's very important for people to understand. We only spoke to this guy directly six weeks before the fall of Afghanistan. In 2021. And Kim is an expert in Afghan culture and like she's been operating there for a long time. And she's like, look, I think this is a real possibility to send her out because of her needs. But I can't get custody of a child without a way to get her out of Afghanistan. Like I can't like have a, you know, another child.

child in my care. And so we were just creating a path to the United States for her before the Taliban took over because we were very aware that after that deadline, there's going to be a brutal civil war. And, you know, at best case scenario, maybe there's a shared government. But, you know, that's not ended up what happened. So I talked to this guy on July 2021, first time. I owe you, this is me. Here's who I am. Here's what I did in Afghanistan. We believe she's a foreign child, she was an orphan. We sought legal responsibility for under U.S. law. My interpreter uses

the strongest words in Pashto, Wally, Masuliat, Sarprost. And my Afghan friends will probably make fun of me, because I probably butcher those. So what does it mean? It means guardian, responsible one, like the strongest legal term for a non-parent being responsible of them, because they don't have

adoption. But we would say adoptive parent in the states. But they don't have a similar legal concept there. And so he's using the strongest terms, and this guy's this guy, I mean, honestly, what he first wanted was a visa. Like, hey, can you give me a visa for me and my brother-in-law? Everybody wants to go to America. I don't even blame them.

But no, there's no, like, no one could predict the evacuation. I mean, that was a historic event. So we're sitting here saying she has everything she needs to fly out. We're a legal response for, send her before the Taliban take over. And so this guy, this is what he tells me. He's like, I'm like, how's she doing? there's a battle going on in southern Afghanistan. There's a campaign.

There's artillery rounds going off near them. There's people getting shot around them. He's worried about his teenage wife, who's about eight months pregnant, and about the artillery rounds near their house, like hurting their unborn child. Like this guy's, like, in a bad way. And he says, he's bringing tears to his eyes,

how sparrow's condition is. And, you know, and so as this is all happening, I asked, like, where is she? like that's a pretty good question like in a war zone and he's like oh she doesn't live with me or my family or my dad she lives with his other family and they've become like parents to her and so like that's what's so hilarious about not hilarious it would be funny if it wasn't like tragic so tragic yeah yeah is that this guy tells me she doesn't even live with him that's the first thing well one of the first things he says to me he tells me his father is responsible to the Taliban

for her and then in fact he's like oh I think she should go live with you you know, that's so kind, that type of thing. And he's like, I have to ask my dad. He's the responsible one. And he has to ask the Taliban. So during the middle of the war, his dad travels about 100 miles from where they live in southern Afghanistan to where she was picked up.

And they talked to that Taliban commander who was responsible for those camps of whether they can send her to be evacuated. Because it took him a couple weeks. And of course, the Taliban says no. Like, not a big surprise. And so he comes back and says, the Taliban said, no, they'll kill us if we disobey them. Sorry, basically.

And so, you know, as we're developing, you know, as this situation is developing, there's thousands of IDPs get into place by the battles. They're all centering on Kabul. Like, we all know the history now. Right. It's August 16th when this guy comes back to me. The evacuation just started. And I, I had the privilege of helping a friend of mine with one of his interpreters outside the wall.

and he was at the Naval War College and didn't actually have access to a lot of our systems and I was at a special unit where we could directly call the airport and so we got this one guy out like I saw it on Facebook hey send me that

a routed the request ad hoc right he gets out and that hits the news I wrote a book about it and so he gets my friend who's another Marine officer gets flooded with request to help other Terps and so we get sucked into

you know all the people Mercury unfunded like it was totally Gethawk, totally heroic how these Americans pulled together. It's amazing. But, like, Concilium, No One Left Behind, Pineapple Express, Team America. Yeah. I mean, it was incredible.

But as that's happening, I'm like, disobey the Taliban, bring her to US forces. She's viewed as a U.S. person because of her U.S. identity. We sent them her military ID to identify her, right? At the same time, the interpreter that I'm using to speak Pashto to this man, He's like, sir, my sister, she's 15. She's in the Northern Alliance areas. They've just passed an edict saying that they have to marry them off to their fighters. Can you help us get her out?

And so I'm like, this is not my expertise. It's all ad hoc, right? Just like every other like service member at the time. And so I'm like, okay, man, we'll try. But it's super dangerous. Like, are you willing to risk their lives traveling 180 miles? He's like, yes, sir, sir, it's better than being left to marry the Taliban and take him back to Pakistan. So we move his 15-year-old sister, his I think 8-year-old brother at the time, and his teenage brother, all three of them.

And we rent an Airbnb online in Kabul Afghanistan during the evacuation as a safe house. I get word that they're bringing Sparrow from southern Afghanistan. We move them 280 miles through Taliban checkpoints and all that stuff in the middle of war, like right around August 22nd or 3rd. As soon as I get word, they're moving, that they're disobeying the Taliban. man, I go to my colonel. Like, I'm standing on his desk. Sir, I got a crazy story for you. The State Department dumped our child two years ago.

We've been working to get her out. We have all the paperwork. Here it is. Permission to fly emergency leave into Kabul Afghanistan. And my colonel is crazy enough and a great enough warrior. He's like, that's what I do if I was a parent. Permission granted. And so I got a ticket.

And I was on my way before I got shut down by sent comp. They're like, no way. We're not letting people in on emergency leave. but we ended up, it was such a unique experience because we were able to go to Ramstein and find her because they got out. So, I mean, he's glossing, but as, as you know, like that period of time, it was just, what he was doing was, I mean, as a wife, I will say heroic because it was around the clock. There was a photo I took of him because he couldn't even take a shower without his phone just going off. And he jumped out of the shower, he's sitting on the floor, wrapped up in a towel.

And I think at the time you're on the phone with the general. And I just thought it was hilarious that here he is on the phone with the general. Can't even get a shower. But it was just, it was that high tempo. I think it is one of the most incredible points of a 20-year war. I mean, it was insane. And especially since we were working against, in some ways, our own State Department. It was really bad.

But I'll save that for some other time. So it ended up being, like he said, that we realized the plan quickly changed from him going. And I mean, he was literally, you were prepared, and I didn't know this after the fact that you wrote a video in case you died in the process of trying, because he was fully prepared to pull them over the wall. That was his plan. I didn't realize at the time that was probably a good thing. But we end up, he's like, because we didn't know where in the world they were going to go. It was there was no plan. It was just like they were getting on a plane, and then it was just a guessing game as to where they were going to go. So at the last minute, I had a nine-month-old baby at the time, and I gave my baby to my sister. And we're, like we were her adopted parents, we've got to go. Like we have all the original documents. We have all of her documents, everything, to make ensure that she comes to the United States, not some other country.

Right. Well, and what was so amazing, Glenn, and is this same little girl that got carried off an objective by a special mission unit in 2019, it happened again in the evacuation because my colonel got her put on J-Sox targeting list and a special forces squadron

operating out of H-Kaya, went behind Taliban lines and grabbed her, and my three interpreters kids and these two postions when she was eight months pregnant. So we were very concerned of having four kids and a pregnant lady getting through this crowds, right? And so like to say that that was like a lightning bolt again. No, that was a miracle. It was a miracle. And so we were over the moon. Okay. So these the 18 year old and the and the pregnant mom, if you will, the one that were that were and were

not taking care of baby sparrow they're with you they're coming to the United States because that way they can help so it was solely to get them away from the Taliban

okay okay because if we left them behind they would get ordered so they get on the plane there's a problem on the plane if I'm not mistaken where John and Jane are not happy with each other, something?

So that was actually over a couple-day period of Ramstein Aircase. That was the first time that we realized that there was something going on between them because, you know, what John Doe told me a couple times, like, hey, she's attached to the baby, but when she has her baby, it'll be fine. Like, it'll be good. And then what she was saying when we had everything arranged,

and it wasn't a guarantee-go-to-America-type situation, right? There's 80,000 people going all over the world. And so we're advocating, like, saying, like you have to send like these people helped us they dissipate the Taliban you have to send to America and um and so we had successfully arranged that and once that happened it became uh well he promised me that if I came I didn't want to come but he said if I come I wouldn't have to like let her go with you and so like that was the first time I realized there was any disagreement at all and you know I don't know what this guy I don't I don't know if they have the same culturally uh the same

page as spouses right because typically in my training experience the the Afghan men lead their home and they don't really care what their wife says. And so it was a unique dynamic. A unique dynamic. So, and when do you find out he's on a watch list? Oh gosh.

Yeah, I'll probably get yelled at for that. So this is what happened. We get to these states about 10 hours for their official flight comes in, like that the president had commented to the basically commercial fleet. So they're pouring into the country. They're

doing the best, like our people are vetting them as best they can, right? There's, there's obviously been some failures with that. So we get to Dulles and we have all the documents, right? All over documents. So I go back there, it takes like seven hours to process in. And it's crammed full of people the whole time. And at the very end, like, I don't know, one in the morning, they're like, oh, you're all done processing. You need to take a COVID test. I'm like, COVID test. Okay. Let's go take a COVID test. And I, people, got tuberculosis, but let's go get COVID tested. And they take about 20 military age mail in and they put us in.

And me, yeah, because I'm, this, my guy. And they drive us out into the middle of Dulles Airport. And there's this huge hangar, almost like a Bond movie, like where like a prototype plane is going to be revealed. And there's like 500 beds. And it's the only place that has not been cram full of people this whole time. And there's like uniform customs and Border Patrol guys with like plate carriers and ARs. and I'm like,

this doesn't look like a COVID place. And so I'm trying to figure out what's going on. And so then this uniform customs and border pole agent comes in like, what were you doing in 2014? Like, what are you doing it? Like going at my guy. And I'm like, like, I told you, I talked to this guy like five weeks before.

Right. And so what concerned me is he was in this detention facility. And then he's sitting there talking to another man in Pashto. And most of our allies were like Darry speakers. Like there's some Pashton. but predominantly the passions are Taliban. And so he had not really talked to anybody in four or five days that I've been around this guy. And he's like chatting away.

I'm like, who's his friend to somebody who spoke English? And they're like, oh, this guy's from his home village. Like, they know each other. And then when I find out about 10 minutes later, I went up to the Border Patrol agent. I'm like, hey, man, like, what are we doing here? He's like, oh, this is the inconclusives where people flagged a match on the Terra Watch list and we're vetting them. And I'm like, holy cow, right? because I have a child from a capture or kill mission of al-Qaeda.

I've got a dad who went to the Taliban shadow governor. Oh, and I forgot to mention this guy tells my turp before he comes to American lines like, hey, I have a lot of militants in my phone. Will this be a problem when I come to American lines? Don't tell Joshua, though. And he's like, don't tell Joshua. And I'm like, you know, task force is already tracking this guy. So no, it did make a difference because we know where you are.

And that actually was corroborated at my Board of Inquiry. We had someone come from J-Soc and testify, yep, we knew this guy had dirt. And so I had some red, flags going on. Yeah, you send me a video. I have a video of it because. I'm sitting there at Dulles waiting from because I thought same thing. She's like, where are you? I'm like, it's, we hours of the morning. I'm like, where are you? And he sends me a video. He's like, you're never going to believe where I am. And I'm like, get out of there. You don't belong in there. And yeah, that was the first time any of this, like we realized. And so again, kind of thinking that facts matter and like you should

report stuff like this, you know. See something. Say something. So I immediately reported to my chain of command through our NCS liaison. And it kind of like, nothing happened. And obviously, that is when we, like, immediately requested, like, they're going to get vetted. They're probably going to get deported. We should probably, like, now is a good time to separate her. And my interpreter's kids also came with that. So it took them a couple of days to get their act together and actually do that. But, like, I think it makes a lot more sense to the American people, how this conflict started, with they know the guy flags and the context behind that. And so, like, that really was the turning point where we're like, hey, maybe I was projecting some

compassion I had for all these allies that went to war with us. And maybe I should have been a little more cautious of the outset. Because to be honest, like, we faced a decision point in the evacuation where my colonel's like, hey, you're going to probably have to choose between these Afghans and your little girl. Because the assets we're using to get them, don't give a crap about Afghans. And they'll probably just take a gun on their face and take her and not, like, they're not going to waste their resources getting these random people. Right. And I literally had to advocate to take all of them. You delayed it for 24 hours. Yeah, we actually had a team that was funded by the Mercury Run funds,

but like volunteers to go get them all, like that were paying, that they had 9,000 ahead or whatever for the private aircraft, um, set to go. And I think they had an incident at Northgate that night and they canceled all the volunteers going out. And that's when my colonel got,

um, then picked up by a national minister from force unit. And so like, I guess the, the peace of mind knowing that there was Americans who were volunteering to go behind lines when it sounded like no one else was doing. Oh my gosh. Yeah. But I would touch on it in hindsight, even though it was devastating, losing her for not, for her not coming home in when she was supposed to in 2019. We had a crib. We had everything ready. We were ready to go. We thought she'd be

handicapped child. We were we were anticipating taking in a baby with special needs and we were ready as much as we could be. And then for that to be delayed for that period of time. But as a result, because of the fault and because of honestly how everything providentially was woven together the way it was. How many people personally? Let me rephrase that. So I want people to understand. We were so devastated when she got turned over. And we couldn't understand why.

Why would that happen? But when this historic event kicks off and you're getting texting calls from people and you're able to get real people moved inside to safety, and a new life. I mean, especially from like 8,000 miles away, it's so weird, you're so far from it, but you're changing lives, and all these volunteers were doing that too. It was very clear that that was a larger purpose.

We had a vision to save this one child just because we were in a place to do it, but there was a bigger plan that ended up her life, her existence, saved dozens and dozens of American interpreters that worked with us and their families. and I'll tell you one story for your audience. There was one group.

They had Australian visas. Glenn, I worked with one Australian ever in Afghanistan. And I call this man as I'm dangerously driving and texting all the way up to D.C. to fly to Afghanistan. That's why I'm on my first attempt to go. I'm like, hey, sir, remember me? Like, I'm at Marsok. I'm working with these, I'm working volunteering to vet all these groups.

Do you know anybody running the Australian response to the Kabul evacuation? And he goes, oh, my brother is running the Australian Army's response in Doha. Here's his number. And so I then called, I call Australia. I called Doha while dangerously driving to D.C. And they're like, we are, we have bad comms right now. We can't reach them.

We'll send an email. And I've got like 14 people in a ditch of water at 2 in the morning outside Abbeygate. And they got like a 2 month old and like a 60 year old, like a in a range of people here in their Hazaras. They're Shia Muslims. They're both ethnically and religiously persecuted by the Taliban and the matriarch of the family is an advocate for women's rights. Like they're dead. They're dead. And so I'm like, you see any Americans around?

Because we were using like a signal on a phone, right, like everybody else was doing. And my guy wasn't at the gate at that time. And he wasn't able to get the Marines. So she hands the phone to the American. And I heard this female voice like, hello? Like super weirded out. and I'm like, hey, my name's major mass. I've been vetting these people.

They have Australian visas. Are there any Australians? And she's like, sir, the Australians aren't doing 24-hour ops right now. They don't come on until six and it's two in the morning. And I'm like, oh, I was like, what do you want me to do? It's like, I want you to pull these people in and sit them down and wait for Australians come. So she hands me off to a captain. I do the same spiel.

And this is what he says to me. He's like, sir, he goes, I'm looking at 15,000 people and I'm playing God on who gets out. So what are you going to do? and it's like I wish to pull these people in and sit them down and wait for Australians to come because would it be awful if these people die when they have visas to Australia? And we were in the air to Ramstein when the Abbey Gate happened. And, you know, in the moment, you have so many groups you're working and we would name them very like 14 packs or passengers, 14 packs and the gate. And I was like, what gate was that?

You know, because I talked to that girl. She was a Marine. and um you know i'll ever forget sitting in the u s o watching them pull all the bodies off the plane um at ramstein because they were taking them to launch shoulder wounded um and wondering like did did that that girl that just helped these people die doing that and it was it was her and and for when i was in the car when you were on the phone with him on the ground and it just it was that moment It was just so historic that he's sitting there talking to someone on the ground, pulling this breakthrough.

For whatever reason, I had the instinct, I pull up, I didn't want him to see me. I pull up my phone and I record. And so I actually recorded that conversation, not knowing any of that was going to happen, but recorded that conversation that he had with that Marine on the ground. And that pulled those 14 people through as a result. Have you met her parents yet? No, I have not. Would you like to meet them?

I know them. I would love to. But we've always, I mean, he can't, I mean, I've known him ever since he was a teenager and he never cried. I could count on one hand how many times he cried. But since this whole situation, especially Abby Gate, he can never talk about without crying because you feel it so deeply. And what we saw there and the evacuation, I remember calling back home to family.

I was like, is this on the news? And they're like, no. And at the time, there was one Getty photographer and one CNN reporter. And it was historic. like I would echo what Joshua said, what the service members and the U.S.O, what they were doing on the ground during the evacuation, it was, it was heroic. And on the flip side, what the State Department was doing on the ground at the same place was the greatest evil I've ever seen. Absolutely. I talked to my, I guess, friends that I'd worked with in the past that were the SJs on the ground there. and like he's telling me things like

you would not believe what we just went through. I'm a major in a Marine Corps. I'm a judge advocate. And I just cleared an airport and ran concertina wire around it. And we're probably in a gate overrun again. Things are not going well. And like just what they went. He said it's the worst thing he'd seen in five deployments in the G-W.

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Okay. You're coming over here in the United States. How long is she with you guys? Because the John Doe, he's kept out, right? Or does he get in? No, so this is what they tell me. He's held for about 24 hours. And then a border patrol agent says,

hey man this was a really bad dude but he brought your daughter to U.S. forces and your organization got him in Afghanistan so we let him through and I'm like whoa no like that's not that's when I reported it up the chain and my command it was like you know get your daughter and get back here that's you know because I've been gone for like a week working so that's what we did we just did what we're told and um we were I guess so I mean short version they're here in the United States and we've had Sparrow in our custody since, what, September 2021. Like, yeah, almost three and a half years going on, you know, we're on four years. And we started exactly what we were going to do back in 2019.

It just went through. Same doctor. Same doctor went through every medical appointment that was recommended everything that we could possibly do. And to see her when we did get her finally, she wasn't the same baby as she was in the hospital. She had in the hospital with all the service members took a lot of pictures of her, and she had these big brown eyes and big smile,

just happy baby just would smile with her whole body. And when we saw her, when I saw her for the first time, I actually wondered if it was the same child because her face was closed off. And she was very fearful and scared. She would hardly look up. And I mean, just the fear and trauma on her face was just, just, I've never seen that in a child before. And it wasn't until I saw, like she had a dress on,

I saw the scar on her. Like, she has a very distinct scar on her. I was like, that's her. And I just, I could not believe it. But, you know, when she came home, I mean, she had lice, parasites, just emotional trauma, just everything. So it was kind of like the peeling back layers of an onion, just loving on her and pouring into her as much as we possibly could. Have you seen that little girl again? Very much so. So now, today she looks like her baby photos. It's like you can see it's the same person. Big eyes, just very expressive. And it's like there, there she is. Like that's that's the true her. But what she endured during that time, there's one story that just, I mean, our life, we are so

blessed here in the States not to know the degree of violence and just that other parts of the world have. I was carrying her out to the car. We were picking up our boys from school. and there was a community that was being built next to us and they were roofing and they were going pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop with a nail gun. And I had her on my hip and when she heard the sound of the nail gun, she went, and she looked at me. And the look on her eyes, her eyes were fear, like, are we going to run? Is it danger?

And she was looking to me to see how I was going to respond. And I saw that and I was just like, it broke my heart, like that she, knew that, that she has obviously been exposed to that. And then just, you know, like any other parent would just be like, it's okay and explained it and move on. But she's amazingly resilient and come so far. So I'm a dad of an adopted child. And we adopted in Texas, which was a very good thing because Texas adoption laws are so very clear. That's that. your child. So is Virginia actually. Yeah. But it's not working out that way for you. No, it's not. When you sign adoption papers, I know, I think it was two years the mom could come back and say,

I've changed my mind. And in Texas, that's hard, but still able at the two-year point. I know what my wife was like and what I felt like at the two-year point, worrying, because Because two years in, that's not my child. That's my child. You know what I mean? Raff is my son at that point. When did you, how did this happen to where Virginia comes in and says, oh, forget that adoption thing? So I think that, first of all, we have some restrictions on commenting on the state court cases.

so I can't answer all the questions relating to that. Here's what I want to know. How did you feel and how did you hear that this might be over? Well, the first thing that comes to my mind is the day the FBI showed up at the door. And as a mom, literally bringing my kids in through the door from school, keys were still in the lock. And I get a knock at the door and there were two agents there. And I had a baby. I went to my oldest son.

I was like, take him in the room and watch him. I've got to talk to some people outside. And my son wanted to play outside. He's like, I don't want to do that. I was like, honey, the FBI is here. And I need to go do this. And he's like, they're real? Like, almost like it was the Avengers or something.

And that was the first moment where, and it was actually, they were there because of the terrorists and like there was a whole, like it was them trying to sort through what Joshua had reported. But at that time, that was the first, like that was when it started. to change of like, oh, there's going to be conflict. And that was heartbreaking and brought fear, obviously natural fear, because it's not about us, it's about her. And so the whole time, I mean, when she was initially turned over, what I wrestled with for the longest time is that she could go through her whole life in Afghanistan with a completely different identity

and never know that she had another name and that she wasn't anonymous, that she was loved by hundreds and prayed for by hundreds of people. So for her to be at stake again, after all of this blood, sweat, tears, prayer, everything that we've invested, for that to be up for grabs again

is just the natural instinct is fear, protection, just wanting to do everything you can to keep one person safe and just wonder why people can't see the facts. Like we said, we're open books. Like, sure, you want the facts. It's all here. So tell me, this went back to Virginia court,

and they overturned the adoption, right? So I'm nervous about getting into too much with the legal stuff. But I guess what would be important for folks to know is if someone, you're an adoptive parent. if someone came along and said, we're related to you and we're going to sue you to get them back. What's the first thing you'd ask him? DNA.

DNA. That's the first thing we did. And then kind of hemmed and hawed and the story changed about how they were biologically related to them. And that just kind of backed them into a corner of this is a lie. And so I honestly think that big picture, these people don't have authority over her. If she went back to their custody, it's really...

We're talking Jane and John Lowe. Yes. They don't have legal authority. They told the FBI that we finally got their statements where they said, oh, her two uncles are the authority for her life. I don't have the authority to let her go to America. But we have now, and I'm going to focus on the government's actions list, we have the Department of Justice filing, parroting what these mega law firms have been

representing them saying based on information they have that is directly contradictory to what the DOJ has filed in court. So to the FBI, they said, we're not in charge. But the DOJ is filing saying they are. How is that possible? How do you have statements that you haven't disclosed to the courts in the United States? You can't have. Is it true?

It's Hunter Biden's law office? I believe one of the firms, there's been several law firms that have represented of it. I believe it was the same one that represented the president's son. Great. So now this is at the Virginia Supreme Court. Yes. So next week we have oral argument in front of the Virginia Supreme Court, and they make a decision. But, you know, our biggest concern is that there has been a successful effort from the very same bureaucrats that tried to shut us down in 2019 about telling the truth.

I mean, essentially looking back, we were whistleblowers. Like, this is, like, not in accordance with everything we know. And we're right. And I think they're very concerned about that getting out. And that's why I've had my military orders change about what we can talk about. we've experienced like over classification of information like clearly unclassified documents marked secret no foreign we've had federal agencies telling us what we can and can't talk about and honestly absolute abuse of power to shut down the evidence to like what i was in a i was in a court case

where it was against the government and um were a question. If you're finding the United States government, they can classify, they can redact, they control everything. There is no way to win against the United States government

if they have the will to make sure that that truth never comes out. Well, what was amazing is that early on, there was that, well, we're impartial. We're not going to tip our, you know, fingers on the,

the scale of justice. But what we have experienced is the exact opposite. They very much have the federal government. They have. So is there any difference between the Biden administration and the Trump administration? Is Trump, is his people back on this? Do you have? So I would say that we're hopeful that that will be the case. But there's so much they're correcting that was just broken in our system before. For us, it's an issue of priority. I think that if an objective person, looked, I guess, let me caveat with one more thing. We went through a board of inquiry and you said you can't fight the government. That's true.

Unless you have a little bit of due process, then they have to give you stuff and it's harder to hide things. And so they ran our family through a recycled allegation, exactly what these mega law firms. We defeated them in court. Proof were false. And so we went through that process and it was brutal. But you know what happened? They had to give you the evidence. And so now it's consolidated in one place.

and there's classified, all of the classified information that I had on deployment is now in one place. And in all of the unclasses, we had 14 gigabytes of data that we never had before. And so like, although that was a brutal process, that was one way you can fight. So what happens to Sparrow

should it go wrong in Virginia? Well, we've explained it as a Talibanian-Gonzalez situation. Like, these are... That's the first thing that came to my mind when I heard the story. Yeah, These are not relatives. They probably knew they weren't from day one.

They were probably sent forward by the Taliban shadow governor to collect her from the Americans. And so they can't go back without her. Like this guy's told me personally, like, yeah, we want to go back. Like everyone wants to come to America for the money, but everybody loves home. I don't judge people for that. But this is really that Taliban is going to decide her future.

Like this guy, his entire family is under their sway. If he says, if they're like, hey, I'm going to kill your family if you don't come back with a little girl. They put us, the Taliban, denounced us on their social media. They've talked to, you out by name. Yeah. We've had the state, they called you guys out by name. Yes. Yeah, on their website, little talking head saying, you should make a t-shirt. Absolutely. My buddies were like, how'd you do that? I've been trying to get that for years. It was kind of a joke. But what's more concerning is the state department has filed affidavits against our family,

basically insinuating the Taliban has asked them to do this. Like the Taliban doesn't like, like this and it's hard to negotiate with them. Like, I'm really sorry that my, my child is inconvenient for you negotiating with the terrorist organization that you're funding, but like, I don't care. Like, get out of here. What U.S. agency files to void someone's parental rights because the Taliban asked them to? And then I get the whole like, oh, well, we're asking you're not to talk about this. Right. Sure. I'm not going to talk about this. Like, the American people should read some of these affidavits. Well, and, and, I mean, on a personal, to an extent, they did do They did do a good job in silencing us.

And the reason why we haven't gone out guns blazing before is because we're trying to protect her and our family. No, I know. Like just parental instincts kick in. I know. And to answer your question, what would happen to her? It would devastate her. She's five and a half. She's no idea who these folks are.

She is no idea who they are. We are her family. Her brothers are her brothers. And her life and the freedom. Taliban. Well, and women. Like the freedom she has that now she, I mean, it took a while for her to lose stuff, but like she enjoys that now. It would be absolutely devastating to her.

And I want to add one thing. In this process, you know, these mega firms don't care who gets hurt, right? It's winning at all costs. And they have gotten a letter-righted campaign going, not just to make a firm, some other related organizations that support that type of thing. But they wrote over 7,000 letters to Congress. And in this, they're talking about supporting their narrative, holding major. mass accountable. And it's assinuating that our Rangers, who like bled doing what we tasked them to do to go rid the world of these terrorists, they're calling them war criminals.

And they killed an innocent farmer. And honestly, that just burns. You can say that's, that's the part that was classified, right? They could get away with saying that for a while, right? Not, no, these, these, these, these Rangers came and testified in a public proceeding, right? It was, it was sealed from, as far as like, it's a public record now. So it's a matter of record. And then that was all placed into our Board of Inquiry. And so that is a public record available for FOIA and Privacy Act. So like now you can go read their 200-page testimony. Right. But before that was that was hidden. So you couldn't defend. Correct. And so what we want is we think these guys own the truth. They're under non-disclosure agreements because of the unit they're

serving in. So when you can't, when your guys can't defend their own actions, who should do that? Well, I think it should be the secta. I think they should come out and release everything. If these folks want to attack our veterans and say that they committed war crimes and we have video of them engaging in hand-to-hand combat in grenades and shooting people at point-blank range and having guys

wounded and pulled off on stretchers out the objective paralyzed, like release that stuff and defend these men. Like they should be at the White House getting awards, not getting called war criminals by lesser men than themselves. what's next we don't know

no stories yet to be told we have hope that there's a lot of folks when they actually hear the truth that have jumped on and tried to get it to decision makers

we're hoping that her life again is prioritized by the administration they did it the first time and honestly the only reason she didn't come back this is one of the most disturbing things of our time

we're a republic we have a constitutional constitution we have a bill of rights we have 200 years of law behind us. And it feels like we have to go to the Avengers. We have to go to Donald Trump or someone of his team to defend our basic rights. And it really bothers me. It really, but that's not the president's job, but it is because the whole system is so corrupt.

it really is and what it's become is bureaucrats will say whatever the law they'll say that the law is whatever they want it to be for that particular instance to get whatever outcome they want and it doesn't matter if it's true or just or right and you know and that's really hard for someone who like I really mean it when I swear it knows to uphold the Constitution of the United States as a prosecutor I would not even dream of prosecuting someone that wasn't I didn't believe violated the law and then you would try to pursue an appropriate punishment for that like I was a government hack and seeing that system weaponize and abuse the way we've gotten to do that firsthand,

it's been incredible. But on the flip side, it's so encouraging to see progress in those departments. And I think the louder people squeal in resistance to those, that progress, you're probably on target. I keep up the good work. So New York Times Magazine did a story, how did this man think he had a right to adopt the baby? This is you. Adopt this baby. Army Rangers killed her parents A Marine is raising her in America, but her Afghan family says she was taken under false pretenses. Wow. Yeah, and there's a lot of fallacies with that. First of all, they're not her Afghan family, and they never were, and they probably knew that from day one.

Like, that's the unfortunate reality, and I don't know what their why is, but it's just not true. So what do you want me to do with that? When this guy flags on the watch list, and we're legally obligated to take care of our child and told them that from day one? what do you want me to do? What would you do? If you're like, oh, this guy flagged after all of that context, you would immediately exercise what care for her, which is what we did. And that was the plan the entire time. In fact, what I think was most telling was every single person who had firsthand knowledge of this backed us up. Like the FBI interviewed all these people. And so from day one, they're like, oh yeah, they knew. They just. And I would say, and I would say,

say they have done the media, they've done a good job at painting a narrative that's not true of the story. They have no record of that. But they've made it about him or us. Like we are just off. It's about her. It's about her. But we're one of many people that have cared for her. Yes, we are her adoptive parents and we have advocated for her. But we represent a lot of people that do that. So it's not just like who do they think they are. This is many people that have stepped forward to protect her. Yeah. And the Ranger who recovered her off the battlefield, he said something that struck me. He said, they asked him, why do you remember that night? And he said, it's because it's the first time I could put a face to evil. And he was talking about

her biological mother. We're talking about 20 years of war, you know, pretty much culminating in the evacuation of Afghanistan. stand, right? And to tell you how encouraging it is to them, it's like their why. Like, I helped that person. And when they found out that she's safe in home in America, they were over the moon. They're like, I always wondered what happened in that baby. What can we do to help? Well, we appreciate your prayers, first of all, because, you know, she's been preserved time and time again, so we're confident seeing that that providential hand that that will continue to be the case. you can advocate,

you know, call your congressman, call the White House, ask the president to change U.S. policy because really all we need is the truth to come out and lift your thumb off the scale there, Department of Justice. What policy needs to change? So the United States, air quotes,

some bureaucrat in the DOJ, has filed parroting these claims. And so I really think they need some adult supervision and to go pull this class. If you talked to Pam Pondi. Not directly. We have had a whistleblower complaint formally routed.

We routed it to the president via Congress. And we've had several congressmen sign on to that and send it to the SEC Def, Sec State, and the AG's office. And my understanding is the Department of Justice has reached out to state and DOD and ask them if they want to continue to stand beside the Biden administration's attack. on our adoption. The DOJ has done that. Because they're basically,

they're the lawyer for the other federal agencies, right? So they're like, hey, you guys want to keep doing this? And so we would ask in the name a justice and all that's good and right to stop lying for these mega law firms

and release everything. We've asked that, I asked them to declassify all of this three years ago. I've asked repeatedly and just gotten shut down, denied, like witnesses is denied, documents denied, like nothing.

Like, it's, they want you to be in the dark and gagged as they're beating you. And all I need is the truth to come out. That's all she needs. But really, it's not, like Seffi said, it's not about us. She's not chattel. It's not between us and them.

It's what is in the best interest of this real five and a half little girl that went through so many terrible things. She deserves what's in her best interest. And what the previous administration's DOJ has done is tried to preempt, even considering that question. and I can tell you as a fact, there's like 8% of the information available to the courts to make this decision.

And so I really think the United States owes a duty of candor to the course of the United States, and they need to release all of this. You can't omit key facts, critical evidence, and pretend like this is justice for this little girl. When you find out about the case, I don't need a camera there, but I would love to meet Sparrow's. some time to celebrate. And if it goes the other way, I don't know what I would do as a dad. I know what I'd want to do as a dad,

but I don't know what I would actually do as a dad, but your journey doesn't stop in Virginia, perhaps. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We really appreciate it. Just a reminder. I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast and pass this on to a friend so it can be discovered by other people.