The Tucker Carlson Show - The Global War on Christianity Just Got a Whole Lot Worse, and Ted Cruz Doesn’t Care

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

Zelensky is using the secret police to extinguish traditional Christianity in Ukraine. How come no one in the US Congress seems to notice this? (00:00) The Armenian Christian Persecution (24:10) Who's Behind the Global Push to Eliminate Christianity? (30:50) Why Aren't American Leaders Talking About the Attacks on the Armenian Church? (37:15) Zelensky's Torture of Ukrainian Christians (45:35) The Efforts to Censor This Global Crisis Paid partnerships with: Landman on Paramount+: Don’t miss the hit series everyone is talking about - Landman. New Season streaming November 16th, only on Paramount+ GCU: Find your purpose at Grand Canyon University. Learn more at https://GCU.edu Cozy Earth: Luxury shouldn't be out of reach. Go to https://cozyearth.com/TUCKER for up to 40% off. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Thanks so much for doing this. Armenia is famous, the extent it's famous, Armenians are famous for, well, being successful in business and quite cohesive as a community and very sincerely Christian, observant. But probably they're most famous for being exterminated by the Ottoman Turks at the end of the First World War, the Armenian Genocide. And I think most people don't fully appreciate the extent to which that was religious. persecution. That was a religious genocide and they were murdered because they were Christians. at the end of the rule of Ottoman Empire, after Balkan wars, Ottoman Turks saw that some Balkan countries like Bulgaria and part of Greece became independent and the Christian countries in Balkans became independent.

After that, they filled some, you know, big risk in Christian population of Ottoman Empire, like Armenians, Pontus Greeks, became independent. And they started to persecute the Christian population of Ottoman Empire or to convert them to Islam. How it went on. When the war started between Antanta and Ottoman Empire, the Germany and Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman army came to all villages of

Armenians in Ottoman Empire and asked two questions just the villagers or the people who lived in towns the first question was will you convert to Islam like 98% of the

population Armenian population of Ottoman Empire denied said no said no and the second question is if you don't convert to Islam, you will go from here to desert of their Zor. It's like 800 kilometers, 600 kilometers from Armenian highlands.

And all the men were killed and all the women were taken with children to desert of their Zor and will have lost the 70% of the population of our nation. Because everyone, one and a half million people, said no to converting to other religion. We want everyone to know about this story, not just about the dark side of the history. It has a bright message too that Christian in the 20th century were very, you know, they went in a way of Christ. And they were sacrificed, and we hope all this sacrificial will bring the Christians of our days to more faith to that what we have, the biggest and most humanistic religion that we accept and we must live with it. So I did not understand until we just had breakfast that the victims of the Armenians of the Armenians, Genocide, who've been talked about a lot.

There's been a debate in the Congress for many years whether we can call it a genocide, whether that somehow trademarked. But it was a genocide. But I didn't understand that they were Christian martyrs. They died not because of their ethnicity, but because of their religious faith. There were no any problem with ethnicity.

There were Armenians, like 2% of Armenians in Ottoman Empire were Muslim. And just these 2% are living till now in the north of Ottoman Empire without any trouble. interesting. The other 98%, every Christian Armenian, who

were asked this question, who answered that he will not convert to Islam, were killed. That's amazing. So that kind of defines 20th century, 21st century Armenian culture.

We stood steadfast in our faith and were murdered for it. So Christianity is at the center of Armenian culture. Is that fair to say? You know, it's the first nation who has ever converted to Christian in 301 was an Armenian kingdom. So in 3001... Before Constantine, before the Roman Empire. 11 years before Constantine. Before Medellan edict, it was 312, I guess. Armenia, like 11 years before, he, Armenian king, third down.

the third converted to Christian religion and convert all our population to Christian religion. And we are the oldest, eldest Christian nation in the world. That's why our church and our identity are so already, it's the same thing, you know, the 80% or 70% of our identity comes from Christian values and our church values of our church. well that's fascinating um and it's i mean the state of california where i'm originally from you know the armenian community is very extremely successful but very cohesive like they they have a sense of themselves um in a great way i think and that's why obviously so over the past 30 years armenia has been involved in a number of conflicts really a

sort of long-running sporadic war with Azerbaijan, which is an Islamic country. How many Armenians were killed in that war? Almost 20,000 people were killed for defending a Christian population of Nagorno-Karabakh. And at the end of the war, the last war, the Christian population of Nagorno-Karabakh, exceed like we, everyone came to Armenia. And now, after 2,000 years of living in this region, there is no any Christian in region of Nagorno-Karabakh. So... There are none?

There is no any. What I don't understand is why nobody said anything is that was going on and why Christian leaders in the West didn't say anything while that was going on that I heard? I think it's a matter of real politics, you know, real politics. We have a very, we have allies with like... We have a very close relationship with Greek nation, with Greece. We have a close relationship with Cyprus. But even from there, we felt that we had support, but not, you know, the support was

just with wars, not any actions. I know that real politics and the help of Turkey to Azerbaijan make the many, many, countries that were allies with us or were in a good relationship with us to avoid be part of them. They didn't want to get crossways with powerful countries like Turkey. I understand that. And this is what we have. Like this is the problem we face all over our history. Because the Armenian nation is in the center of a region where like Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran. And the only religious, only Christian nation of these, from these three countries. And always we had this oppression from the empires, like Ottoman Empire, there is Khager Empire

and other empires. And the only thing made us to be unite and to save our culture was the church and education from the church. Yes. that church was built all over the country to educate us, to be Christian, and to be an Armenian Christian. Streaming November 16th on Paramount Plus, it is the return of Landman. A product of the co-creator of Yellowstone, this shows television's biggest phenomenon and

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Israel took a very aggressive position on the side of Azerbaijan against the Christians using American tax dollars to do it. So Israel was a participant in this war? The participation in Israel was the support of Azerbaijan by weapon, and it was a part of real politics. But you know the problem? What kind of weapons? Drones like aircraft and other. It's like not just defense and attack. But offensive weapons.

Offensive. Offensive. Azerbaijan received from Israel. And the drones, many of drones and many of the were operated by us, we have read in media, by operators from these companies of Israeli companies. So, wow. So you think there were Israeli drone operators? Yeah, yeah, because as many media told, like it was in many magazines and that... So that would mean that Israelis were killing Christians in this war with U.S. tax dollars.

I mean, because the Israeli defense sector has supported billions and billions a year by the United States. You know the issue is about the real politics? They were, they are getting gas from Azerbaijan. Gasoline. Gasoline. They buy gasoline. I think the 70% of Israel gasoline is coming from Azerbaijan and they have some type of economic ally,

their allies economically. The main issue is today, real politics sometimes is like make a big problem for the nations who wants to defend themselves alone. In the regions, we are minority. Yeah, I mean, of course. and that's how the world works. I just suppose from an American perspective,

it's like, why are my tax dollars being used to murder Christians around the world? Cleanse the Christians from Iraq. Cleanse the Christians from Nagorno-Karabakh, murder Armenian Christians. Like, why am I paying for this? It is a problem. It is a problem for me.

Yeah. So now you have a lull in the fighting with Azerbaijan, but you have a prime minister of Armenia who seems to be intent on destroying traditional Christianity or the church. Tell me what this is. Yeah.

After, like last two, three years, after losing the war in Nagorno-Karabakh and after making like all the people, Christians from Nagorno-Karabakh, have moved to Armenia. Our new prime minister decides to have a better relationship with Azerbaijan. Better relationship with everyone is always well.

by Armenian society, we are okay with this. But what we feel, we feel that Turkey or Azerbaijan had a mission like made him to change the narratives of the church. And he wants to change the narratives of the church to forget the issue of genocide, forget our history. And our prime minister six months ago, he started attack Armenian Church and head of Armenian Church. He wants to dethrone him and he wants to dethrone to change the structure of Armenian Church that is like 1,700 years old because of taking control of the church. It's the main institution in our country like 95% of our population are the members of Armenian Apostolic Church.

And when he started to attack against the church, our society was shocked. Because nobody has done it before him, even, you know, just at Ottoman time. And many people in Armenia society, they were against them, against it, but they couldn't say anything. Why? Because they were afraid of some oppression from the, from government side, you know. Armenian is a democratic country. I think it's one of the last democratic countries in this region. In the last 30 years, we have elections, we have new leaders. It's not authoritarian country.

But this prime minister evolves from democratic leader. Every year we see he's changing to more authoritarian style of ruling because of decreasing of his reputation in Armenia. And now he attacked the church, he took to prison three archbishops. He put archbishops in prison? Yeah. Archibishop, for you to understand, it's not shock. We were, why?

The one of Archibishop which took to prison, because four years ago, in an interview, he said that this prime minister must be changed. The second archibishop was in prison, was taken to prison because of like three years ago or five years ago. He went to a protest against the prime bishop. Prime Minister. And nobody, like from influential part of Armenian society, everyone were afraid of to talk about this. Yeah.

You know, everyone could talk who hadn't a business, who hadn't influenced, but influential part didn't want to do it. And the one man who started to talk about this was my uncle, Samuel Carapitian. He is one of the wealthiest Armenian in the world. And biggest Armenian philanthropist of last 15 years. 15 years, he is the biggest philanthropist in Armenia. So very many hospitals, kindergartens, schools. And when he came to Armenia, he lives out of Armenia.

He came to Armenia and at the 40 days of his father's grave, you know. We have a tradition to go to church at liturgy in 40 days of someone grave. Good for you. So when someone dies, an Armenian dies, the family mourns for 40 days. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And goes to liturgy. And when he came to Armenia and he was in liturgy after liturgy, after Mass in the church, the journalist came to him and said,

what do you think about the attacks from the side of government, attacks against the church and he said like it was 37 seconds what can I think if a small group of people forgetting Armenian history forgetting history of our church

is attacking Armenian church and Armenian people if the politician will not handle the situation we will take part of handling it by ourselves our way good

it was 30 seven seconds. Do you know what's going on after it? What happened? Like after 30 minutes of this interview, our prime minister posted in Facebook that this philanthropist must shut his mouth. After three hours, he sent police special forces to a residence of Samuel Carapitian, who is the most famous philanthropist of the country, you know. And Everyone were shocked, we were shocked too. And these police forces came to his residence without a judge order.

Armenia is a democratic country. We never saw something like this. And everything was going on was like cameras showed everything. So everyone knows that he said it 37 seconds. Then the prime minister was in parliament. He posted something like this in Facebook and policemen came to the residence of Samuel Carapidian. But what happened then? The demonstrators came to the resident of Samuel Carapitian to defend him.

Thousands of people came to his house to defend him from police. And that day, usually when police come, like it's five minutes to take someone to jail, you know, to police station. It was 14-hour, demonstrators didn't want to let him to go to police station. And they were like, bring order of judge, we will let the demonstrators told the policeman. And then like he decided, he decided to go himself. to police station to not cause a clash between policemen and demonstrators. And after that, he was arrested and I was arrested too.

And my father, his brother, was arrested. What were you arrested for? I don't know. Just being his nephew? Just being there, I don't know. And I remember we were in police station eight hour and they were looking for an article to charge because there is no article. in 37 seconds.

I remember an investigator came to the room and said, oh, I phoned one article and then the other said, no, it doesn't work. And after seven hours, they phoned an article and charged it that he said that the

prime minister must be dethrone. But in this 37 second interview, you can watch it in YouTube. Everyone can do it. There were no any word about No prime minister and no anything. And he is now in jail.

Still? They took him to jail, five months. And the jail name, do you know what is the jail name? No. KGB basement. So that old Soviet time, communist time, prison, where the communist like sent the people who were not agree with communist ideas. And he's there in 12 square meters for defending the church and for this 37 second. he's still in jail.

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in Armenia and to use the police to do it. Is this popular? Do people like this? It's very unpopular. Like 90% of the population is against that. And population, our society doesn't understand why he's doing that. So his agenda, he's, so Armenia is a traditional country, traditional families predominate. I noticed that the prime minister's wife was interviewed and said something to the effect that women in traditional families are all unhappy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He is, you know, he wants to change the society, but with power, not with soft power. But the way he wants to change the society is very familiar to Americans. He is focusing on transgenderism is a good thing, LGBT agenda, whatever that is. Anti-traditionalism, so not to the traditional families. Like, you mustn't carry about your son. He must decide, like, what to do. but if you want to do what who to whether to become a woman or have sex with man or

no he hadn't said something like this but uh mostly he's against the traditional uh values so everyone knows that he he has idea of changing our society but we to make it less christian to make it less christian yeah yeah i guess yes who's supporting him in this this has happened in every country in the west almost every country in the every country in the West, with varying degrees of success. But who is behind that? Who's pushing this? Is behind that in every country in the West?

Yeah, that's a good question. Is the same people who is doing it in Armenia? They are doing it here too, I guess. Oh, they've been extremely successful. I mean, they've destroyed our social fabric with this. But who are those people? Well, let's just stick with Armenia. Who's supporting this prime minister?

The population doesn't support him, who is? You know, I think the main issue, when we thought why he is doing it against the church, we think that he gets some information from Turkey and Azerbaijan that you must change the narrative of the church to forget the genocide and to have a new head of church. for going to a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan. And we feel that he wants to change the head of church. Then he will change the narrative of the church and to make our people to forget all our ancestors have done for our Christian religion and for being an Armenian.

And this is the thing. that we must, you know, show our societies that this is the way they work. They want to destroy all the historical truth for some reasons. The reason is to be in peace, but we are very welcome to be in peace. But these people, one and a half million people, were killed already. They were killed for their religion. We must, the Ottoman Empire must accept it. The Ottoman Turks or Turks must accept it because after that we will live in a more peaceful region.

Anyone who's forcing you to lie about history is your enemy. And of course, the purpose is always to maintain power, right? Yeah, right. Whoever controls the story, the past, controls the future, of course. That's why Wikipedia exists to lie to us about the past. So last question, this is, I mean, by any definition, a grotesque human rights violation, you're arresting Christian clergy because you don't like their theological views, and you don't like their views of history, so you throw them in prison.

How many Christian churches in the West have weighed in on this, have supported the clergy under arrest, have put pressure on the Armenian Prime Minister to stop arresting Christian clergy. Like, how much support are you getting from the West? We are getting support from the West, from the churches. You are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There is a huge support, and we are appreciated for this.

And I want to tell you one more thing, like, why these people are brave when they are going against the government's ideas. my uncle Samuel Carapidian and the clergy they could be realized like tomorrow if they say that they will not defend the church

it's always the same story so my uncle we had like they wanted to confiscate his businesses in Armenia he knows it but he is

he wants to defend the church after that too so he is continuing to defend the church. And this is the idea, these are the persons with whom we must, I think we must learn something. Because it's like in the first, it's like in 20th century when this Armenian, our ancestors were sacrificed in Ottoman Empire for their religion.

I am proud that Samuel Carapitian is, he can be free, he can be with his business, but he doesn't do this for his religion. Because religion and faith matters, you know. It's important, like the first Christian in first century. They were oppressed, but they fought for their religion. And this is the case Samuel Carapitian faces now. it's it's inspiring to watch it's it's upsetting to watch at the same time so godspeed thank you for telling us that story the two few people know and it's it's not just about Armenia of course it's a it's a global

push yeah against this one specific religion against Jesus so yeah that's what they hate thank you very much thank you for doing this I appreciate it how often do you give a present to a loved one that deep down you know that person despises we'll never use anyway it's happened of course so it feels good to check the box and cross them off the list, but wouldn't you feel better if you've given or something they actually loved? Yeah. Cozy Earth could be the solution for you. Anyone who gets Cozy Earth's bamboo pajamas, bamboo pajamas, which are not stiff and wooden, they're actually soft and awesome. Anyone who gets those is going to be psyched. Soft, lightweight, cool to the touch, bamboo pajamas. Cozy Earth offers that rare mix of cozy and breathable so you're always comfortable.

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And if you get a post-purchase survey, don't forget to mention you heard about them from this show. Bob Amsterdam, as always, one of the people that I talk to most off-camera about what is happening to the Christian population of the world. It's kind of amazing. Thank you for doing this. So the situation in Armenia, the government of Armenia, persecuting the church.

How is this happening without more international comment? Look, Tucker, as you and I have discussed, I do not understand the evangelical movement, the Christian movement in the United States. One thing I want to say, and I won't make many friends by saying it, in the United States, Christianity has been subsumed by the State Department. The U.S. government decides what Christians we support and what Christians we don't.

So in Armenia, there is going to be a prayer breakfast. And I want you to understand, there's going to be a prayer breakfast while my client, Samuel Carapetian, is in jail. Archbishops have been jailed. Clerics have been jailed. The leader of the country is trying to split the church by going to services of a defrocked priest. A man who has said he is going to remove the leader of the church.

church. This man is being fetid by American Christians in Yerevan, Armenia, a man who calls clerics prostitutes, a man who uses language that, at my advanced age, I've never heard a leader use against leaders of the church. And yet, shockingly, this prayer breakfast is going to go on. And I call it a reputation laundering breakfast. The U.S. government allows this to go on. What connection is there between the U.S. State Department and the prayer breakfast? Look, I can't exactly tell you. I'm not privy to the arrangements.

But as I've seen in representing the Ukrainian church, the prayer breakfast and religious freedom all seem to follow a script outlined by the State Department. And, you know, there's a lot of pressure from the administration on peace in terms of Armenia and Azerbaijan, which, of course, all of us welcome. But it's happened at a tremendous cost to the people of Armenia. There's tremendous cultural and church relics that are being lost and defiled. There's 120,000 who have been cleansed from Azerbaijan. and no thought has been given to this. We have 23 Christian hostages in Baku and the prime minister of Armenia

did not even speak of them when he was with President Trump. President Trump raised them. I mean, it is shocking how Armenia has a prime minister who seems to resent his own history as an Armenian. They've taken Mount Ararat off, stamps they've they don't talk about the genocide they attack the church the leader of the country wants to remove and appoint the catholicus well of course he doesn't understand what an apostolic

church is to be an apostolic church listen to this jew tell you about apostolic churches you have to have a connection to the first apostles which means your election must be sanctified by bishops, by leaders of the church, not a political figure. He is shockingly ignorant of his own religion. It sounds like it's not his religion. I mean, it sounds like he's not a believer. Well, I, you know, I never will say that about someone. I agree. I don't know him. But what I will tell you is our State Department has lost the meaning of faith. They have instrumentalized religion as a tool of foreign policy, exactly what we accuse the Russians of doing. We have done it. Thank God our people don't bless tanks the way Bishop Kirol did in Russia,

but this support of governments, and we're seeing it in this prayer breakfast, traveling to a country like Armenia with top leaders of the Christian religion in particular, uh and and doing all of this while we have clerics and i have a client in jail and i feel very personal about this because i was able to defend this client in an armenian court i want to thank the armenian bar for allowing me to actually speak in defense of the client directly with an interpreter i was able to deal with the court myself and i thought effectively portray the absolute farce that this trial was and that these charges were with respect to Samuel Carpetian, who is an absolutely unbelievably principled Christian, who is now sitting in his fifth month

in jail, innocent of everything other than praising God. And that's why he's in jail. I just, I know I've asked you this before, maybe not as pointily as I will now, but how did this fall to you? How did you, I think grew up pretty liberal or left-wing Jewish guy, wind up being like the world's, one of the world's foremost defenders of persecuted Christians? Like, how did that happen? Well, firstly, as a Jew, I am an inclusive person. If somebody has faith in God, almost any God, I respect that. I feel the same way.

And I was raised by a, family that was deeply impacted by the holocaust i have traveled all my life i have sought refuge during riots or whatnot whether it be in churches or mosques i i just never feel proprietary and and feel that all men of faith have a commonality to it um i've been involved with the orthodox church since i was a young man uh we did a case against the soviet union which a colleague of mine, Reg McLean, did the most of the work on, but Dean Paroff and I were young lawyers together, and he was a member of the Macedono-Bulgarian Orthodox Church,

and I took on that case 45 years ago trying to fight a Soviet attempt at taking control of a church. And since that time, I've always had an interest in these issues. And when, as you know, I was approached by the Ukrainian church and now by Carapetian in the Armenian church context, it just seems very natural as a Jew to defend children of Christ. So it's just an amazing story. Thank you, by the way, for doing it.

So what is the latest you have been the defender of the church in Ukraine, the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, which is under almost unbelievable persecution by the government with the help of the United States? Where are we now? You know, I want to be very clear, Tucker, when you say persecution, that doesn't, that doesn't sum it up. I'm talking about torture.

I'm talking about the theft of churches. I'm talking about... This is not just we're cutting off funding. No, no. Torture you. I have pictures. I have videos. There's a trial going on in England where the Ukrainians are trying to ship back a former

member of parliament of Ukraine whose crime was... to speak out for the church. They, on the day they passed this horrendous bill to ban the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, a bill that I would say has no comparison in Europe since the Nuremberg laws. When they passed this bill to ban this church, this man had the courage to stand up in the Rada and their parliament to denounce it. for that Zelensky and Yermak pulled his security knowing that his statements would be highly controversial

and perhaps deadly he realized that there was basically a death warrant he fled the country on foot through a forest made it to the UK within 14 days of arrival in the UK they were trying to extradite him back to Ukraine because for some hooliganism charge and you know fortunate for him i knew him i knew when i had met him in ukraine when i had been there

that he had evidence of torture we're now taking that evidence of torture to the courts ukraine is a one party one person autocratic state that has no comparison to any democratic values rather today is a mirror of the old Soviet Union. The man in charge of religious affairs is an apparatchik who wrote an anti-Jewish screed 20 years ago. He's the head of religious affairs. And by the way... Sorry to laugh. This is so crazy.

By the way, hold on. Let me go a step crazier. He was a keynote speaker at the Religious Freedom Conference held in Washington. What? Yes. His name is Yolensky. He was a keynote speaker. This is a man who spends his life trying to destroy the Orthodox Church and transferred into what is essentially the OCU, a state church.

He's a keynote speaker at a religious freedom conference in Washington, where there is a happy hour sponsored by the Ukrainian government, where there are men in Ukrainian army uniforms walking around. This happened in Washington, D.C. Yes, a number of times. And this is all going on while I, on behalf of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, we can't get an interview in any press in the United States. Censorship exists in this country. Yes. And when we got any coverage, it wasn't to cover the outrage in Ukraine. It was to taint me as some form of Russian agent, a guy who was arrested by Putin, whose friends were murdered by Putin.

I am tainted as some Russian agent for speaking out against this criminalization of Christianity that's going on in Ukraine. And by the way, supported by pastors who are very close to the White House, and I don't fault them. Wait, it's supported by American pastors. Yes. How? They don't know. I mean, essentially, the Ukrainians are masters of disinformation, absolute masters. They have their own sort of captive cells.

of religious leaders who are told essentially, look, we have, you know, black PR against you if you don't follow what's going on and you don't support us, we'll take you down. I mean, the former president of Ukraine is under indictment for treason. Novinsky, who you've interviewed, under indictment for treasonous, they've done nothing, treasonous. They just represent alternative areas of independent thinking. In Nivinsky's case, a religious man who supported the church. But they have sanctioned him.

They have tried to destroy him. And of course, they are within a hair's breath of taking down the church, a thousand-year-old church, destroying it, taking the priests out of it, removing all the churches, transferring it to the state church of the O.C. which essentially is a cut out of the presidential administration. This is, it's hard to, so we first spoke maybe two years ago. Yes. And I was shocked by what you said at the time, which is the government of Zelensky, is trying to eliminate traditional Christianity, the traditional church of Ukraine.

And I thought, boy, you know, when people find out about this, because whatever you think of Zelensky or Putin, certainly Putin, you can hate Putin and still be appalled by this, of course. I thought, wow, it's going to stop. Like that once people know, but it just kept accelerating. And I still haven't heard a single, I'm sure there have been, but I haven't heard any American Christian leaders say anything about this. Look.

What is that? I will tell you that J.D. Vance, when he was a senator, and no one, frankly, knew him from Oshkosh, gave a statement in the Senate for which I thank him every day in my prayers that, has kept, I think it's one of the key things, I think you, J.D. Vance, and there are two young members of the young Republicans, Catherine Whitford, who is a co-chair of the National Young Republicans and is orthodox, is actually leading a day of action. And she has a colleague as well who is leading this. Those young people have been along.

with our vice president now the only sources of support we've had what about franklin graham he is speaking in yerevan what does that mean he is the keynote at the prayer breakfast in yerevan armenia with the prime minister who's putting clergy in jail yes how does that work i listen i am it may surprise you to know i am not working in evangelical circles i have no idea. I'm not either, but I'm very sympathetic to the, you know, to even juggle people, great people, and I'm not against Franklin Graham, but I'm just shocked

that Franklin Graham would. I don't know, you know, having certainly being aware of him, I have no idea if he knows. I think because our government has decided, as has the EU, frankly, that they are going to go

with the SOB they know. I think the silence of the government, is something that everybody takes as permission. And I'm sure Franklin Graham is not aware that archbishops are in jail. I mean, you would think, and I don't mean to focus on Franklin Graham, I'm sure as a nice person, or I really don't know what he's like. But I'm not against him.

But has he said anything about what Zelensky's doing to the church in Ukraine that you're aware of? No. No, no. I honestly am in shock at the silence of the media in the United States and the silence of the Christian community to what's happened. I mean, thanks to Candy Stroud, who you and I both know. Great person. I've been on radio everywhere I can.

But, you know, the Ukrainian effort in Washington and with media is masterful. They have their own people in key media who continued to write puffy articles about them. never a criticism the first time it ever came up that i saw was the protests over corruption a few weeks ago which led people here to scratch their head and say well christ if zolensky is so clean how could he be trying to wipe out the anti-corruption independence and and that was an eye-opener to some but you know in the u.k we wrote to the government to say, why aren't you doing something about the church? And they wrote back and said, everything's great. Everything's great? Everything's great. I mean, the UK government is more

hard line about Ukraine than Ukraine. The reaction of Europeans, understand, Germany is imploding because of this war. I know. It was obvious that it would. Four years ago, it was the second it started saying this is going to destroy Germany which is really the economy of Europe and let's say something else it's going to radicalize Germany well that is that is deep and that is and that is scary it's coming and and and as a Jew that is a very scary thing to witness but it's it's inevitable it's going to radicalize all of Europe I mean how could it not like yeah and and and I will say to you that the the behavior of the press

has been the most disappointing to me because I've worked with the press when I was fighting Putin in the early 2000s on behalf of one of his key opponents, I had the press with me and we would do interviews. It would, it was constant. But now that St. Zelensky is starting to show a few cracks in the visage, there's still nothing about this ongoing torture and use of secret police to destroy a church. Nothing. What is that exactly? Like why most Americans, including certainly most reporters, most people in the media, had never heard of Zelensky until this war started. They couldn't identify him. And immediately after it started the loyalty to him, you know, blinded them to his faults,

induced them to lie to the public in America about what was happening. I mean, they just became shills for Zelensky in like one day. Why? Why? What is that? What's interesting, because we did a study. We looked at media in the United States because one of the things that's frightening

about the churches that are being taken in Ukraine is that very often the people who take them and beat up parishioners and break the heads of priests those people have swastikas on their arms yeah i noticed so we found out that the new york times and other papers had been profiling the rise of the right in ukraine right up until the war now the azav battalion which is basically a neo-nazi battalion has almost taken over command and control in the ukraine uh and you know this is

an ultra-nationalist government right now that is pushing a very radical line, but no one is covering it. But do you have any guesses as to, and I should say you've been in and out of that region for over 50 years, you know well, you know a lot. I mean, I could go on about your background, but I would just ask viewers to look you up

or to take my word for it. You know what you're talking about. And what you're saying is true. But why would the media again do that? Why are they defending actual Nazis? Like, that's how deep their commitment is to Zelensky. So what is that? What does that commitment?

Where does it come from? Well, you know, it's funny because Zelensky made all his money in Russia. Yeah, I know. And yet he's in charge of a government that's debasing any guarantees of language rights for Russian speakers inside Ukraine. And the sanctification of him relates in my mind to two things. One, we have a total breakdown in elite politics in Europe and to some extent in the United States. Yes. And secondly, you know, I stopped playing the market when I was 21.

But I certainly remember. You know, making a bet and watching it crash and then think, I've got to double down to lower my cost in. Exactly. And I think that's what's kind of happened here. I understand the first one, the second one, I think you're exactly right. Like, I was all in for the beginning. I can't get out now.

Yes. Double down. And I sort of understand what you mean about the degradation of elite politics, but can you put a finer point on that? Well, you know, look at the UK. I mean, I love the U.K. Yes. We have a government that is wildly incompetent.

They even know they're incompetent. We're going to have a budget that's going to destroy what's left of the middle class. Look at France. Complete chaos right now. Complete loss of direction. Italy, struggling, struggling, but with Maloney, there's some sort of strength there. But many of the other countries, of course, Spain is now, you may not be aware, I'm fighting Spain in a big way against their tax administration. We just outed in a press conference last week the fact that Spain is using Huawei computers to store tax information for Americans.

Not really. Yes. And not only they're doing that, but they have this discriminatory policy towards Americans. They have 50,000 Americans, they have hundreds of thousands foreigners. They're doing discriminatory tax audits and basically stealing the money from foreigners to try to subsidize a government that is the most corrupt government I've seen since Papa Doc Duvalier. I think something like 21 indictments, the prime minister's wife, his brother, the general prosecutor. I mean, what's going on in Spain is unexplored territory in the United States. States and people don't seem to have any interest in finding out zero zero zero is a vacation spot

and and the the king is flying to china because sanchise is all in with china of course and venezuela so uh it's it's astounding and the rule of law is under such attack there that the EU is quietly sending a commission to investigate in january because everybody in europe knows rule of law is dead in Spain. So it's, it's frightening what's going on there. And, and this is what I mean about the sort of calcification of the ruling elite. But what is that, is that just a, now I'm asking you, I'm luring you into philosophy, but I'm very interested in, I agree with everything you've said, it's observable, it's provable, but where does it come from? Is it a natural cycle? Or is it something else? You know, um, the cost of being a possible.

politician are so high. The reputational costs are so high. And the materialistic nature of all of us now, the loss of ideology, the loss of principles, the loss of faith. This leads to a loss in terms of the quality of people entering politics. That's right. And you have a chaotic world situation, which, you know, there's a lot of fear. And it leads to a completely transactional foreign policy. And more and more states are engaging in this transactional policies as opposed to following any form of ideological policy. So it sounds like a part of a cycle then, just as politics becomes less productive, therefore more reviled by the population. These are supposedly democratic countries, they're not really, but they still have the skin suit.

And people are mad at the political class. So that means that only the worst people join the political class. Right. And yet fascinating what I'm seeing in watching the Orthodox community, the Christian Orthodox community, and the Jewish community, the Jewish community as a result of this horrible growth of anti-Semitism, the Orthodox community as a result of the woke nature of many Christian churches, is that those who are fundamental in their faith are growing. Orthodox Christianity is growing at a massive rate.

Oh, yeah. Massive. I'm sure Orthodox Judaism is too. Yeah, because people are clinging to. real values. That's right. And in Europe, you know, quite frankly, it's very, very hard to find inspiration. In the United States, we have a president.

By the way, I think probably the most effective president in foreign affairs that we may have had since Nixon. I think he's incredibly consequential in foreign affairs. on domestic policy, on legal issues, I think the rule of laws in trouble. But I won't go into that now. I've noticed, no, I agree. But foreign policy-wise, he's moved incredible mountains.

And I'm not just talking about the recent activities with the hostages. I'm talking about, as a lawyer engaged in Africa, the man has done more to open up our eyes to the operas. to the opportunities in parts of Africa. He's made it much less risky to go into Africa. As an American in Africa over the last decades, you don't know how frustrating it is when the Department of Justice opens up investigations

the minute American companies want to venture into Africa or into Latin America. And now that's not happening. And now American companies are going into some of the Wild West countries, in Africa and Latin America. And I say more power to them. Why would we just hand this to China?

Congo, most obviously, but others. Speaking of African countries, all of a sudden, I'm not defending Nigeria, I don't have strong views in Nigeria, but Nigeria has become famous in the last week as a country in which there's Christian persecution going on. I think that's been, there's been a lot of conflict between Muslims and Christians and Nigeria for, you know, my whole life, but all of a sudden it's a kind of centerpiece of the conversation. How did, what, what is the truth? You've been

in and out of Nigeria for how long? 50 years. 50 years, 1975. Is that correct? Yes. It's a long time. So you know in Nigeria pretty well. I do. What is the truth about what's going on? And I ask, because you've got credibility. You know the country and you're spending the rest of your life defending Christians around the world. Tell me what the actual truth of Christian persecution in Nigeria is. Let's be very clear that the Nigerian government is populated by Christians and Muslims. I have represented in his earlier life the National Security Advisor of Nigeria when he was a young man and he's a lovely individual and caring and and universally respected in terms of religious issues, devout Muslim, but universally respected.

In my adopted family in Lagos, the Odissania family sort of adopted me when I was a very, very young man and living there, I sort of have a half-brother there. Dapo de Sanya, that family is a totally integrated family. Muslim, Christian, I was always teased that I was a Juruba, which is a Jewish Yoruba. But I mean, there have always been tribal conflict. I spoke to the foreign minister before I came here because I wanted to get clarity on the government's position. Absolutely, let's be clear, President Tanubo's wife is a Christian pastor. This is not targeted at Christians.

There are probably an equal or more number of Muslim deaths. I am grateful to President Trump for identifying these attacks on Christians. Believe it or not, you can blame some of this on the French who had this. I know nothing about it, but I believe you anyway. They had a massive force in the Sahel. They armed the Toregs, which are a no Toreg. notoriously aggressive tribal group, that arming has led to mass killings of Christians. The fact that when Libya blew apart, a massive amount of arms went down to Boko Haram.

Can't be denied by anyone. Nigeria wants to consult with the United States. Nigeria wants assistance in protecting Christians and Muslims, protecting their populations. Nigeria feels it has not had a fair shake from Washington. And I'm not, you know, I don't work for Nigeria. I'm not going to go on and on. The foreign minister is a close friend who I respect deeply. But I can tell you from my work, I was privileged to represent one of the Nigerian states years ago,

a quibom. We won a case actually for them. the Nigerians would welcome American assistance with open arms. So this is unlike Ukraine, which is destroying its church, or Armenia, which is destroying its church. Here you have a government that wants to protect its populace, doesn't have the resources. Nobody is going to deny Nigeria's been racked by corruption,

all the years I've known it, but they want a new deal and new relationship with one. Washington, and in part to assist them in protecting Christians. So when I read some of what I've been reading, you know, I'm never going to say that Ted Cruz isn't a brilliant man. But I'm going to say I might have a little more time in Nigeria than he does. And I would welcome him to speak to the foreign minister or others. Because one thing America doesn't need are more enemies. Africa is the future. I have said it time and time again. I'm privileged to be counseled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We, you know, my firm has spent many years. We've just, we're still trying to defend

the opposition leader of Tanzania, who, Tundulisu, who's been illegally jailed, a thousand or dead protesting, completely bogus, fraudulent elections. And to the credit of the United States, at least in the Senate. They've spoken out. Foreign Relations Committee has spoken out. We need our administration, and we certainly need the EU to stop funding this grotesque government in Tanzania. But we have to stop looking at Africa as a security concern alone, and we have to recognize that between their minerals and between the entrepreneurial spirit, Nigerian lawyers are as good or better than American lawyers or British lawyers. I mean, there is an incredible infrastructure of intelligence in Nigeria that we don't know anything about. All we try to do is sanction and condemn.

It is a horrible, horrible part of our policy that we sanction the hell out of everybody. We are responsible for the consolidation of power in Moscow under Putin. If we were not sanctioning the hell out of all these people who had moved to Europe, who knows whether Putin would still be in power. Exactly. No, that's the true. I know. It's so counterproductive that it's got to be part of some sort of larger strategy that I'm too dumb to understand, because it's achieving the opposite of the intended result. And let me tell you, I'm working in Iraq against Iranian interests. We have a woman Sarah Saleem

who is an American citizen bravely, incredibly bravely defending her interests and those of the Kurdish in the north and you know the Kurds are going to have an election soon. She's defending their interests against a wildly

corrupt chief justice named Zaidan who is actually an instrument of Iran and there have been a complete reversal of her fortunes before the courts because of corruption against a group called the Hannah Brothers. And when we've gone to the U.S. Embassy for help, this is an American citizen who, by the way, was kidnapped and tortured 10 years ago and has been fighting for her redemption

and for compensation against al-Maliki and Zidon and others, our embassy pledges neutrality does not help this brave American citizen. How can they not help an American? Listen, we cannot understand it, especially in a moment where the future of Iraq, which is massively important to the United States, is at risk. I mean, there's an election coming up in Iraq as well,

and the oil wealth of that country is almost unimaginable. And the issue is whether the Iraqi militia will disarm, whether, in fact, the government that we not only have spent billions to support, but we lost almost 5,000 lives, whether that government will be a government somewhat free of the corruption and control of Iran. And our government's been impotent. There's a few people in Congress who have spoken out and blessed them for doing that, but very few people have paid Iraq any thought at all.

And yet, we over-concentrate on Ukraine to the exclusion of almost everything else. So Ted Cruz is upset about what's happening in Nigeria to Christians. I'm not against him being upset about that. You say it's much more complicated than he's presenting. Probably more tribal than religious. I, you know, I don't know much about it. But how much has Ted Cruz said about the U.S. funded destruction of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church? Nothing.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. I mean, how can that be? Listen, Tucker. Nobody. I mean, the Washington Post did a hit piece on me. A woman I knew quite well did a terrible hit piece, tried to present me as a Russian agent. That was their focus. There was no issue about what's happening to the church. None at all. And the funny thing, by the way, is we are not trying to change American policy.

Where you and I disagree is I've always been totally supportive of Ukraine from a military standpoint because my clients are in the front line. Members of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are fighting and dying for Ukraine. Right. And, you know, I don't know if you remember last time I met. you i showed you a video that we had done of some young men in the army speaking out for the church well one of those young men has just died uh fighting russia and his comment in that video was to the president how do you how do you want me to fight when my own church i can't defend my

own church in my town and and and arseigney here is a bishop one of my lawyers went to the jail in the war zone to meet bishop arseigne he has been in jail 17 months he has no stomach he is horribly ill horribly ill he is a monk he is a bishop he has spent his years devoted to a cathedral What happens is we think after 17 months they're going to release this poor man in his 60s, possibly to die. They get him out for a moment and the secret police arrest him again on the trumped-up charge that he resisted the Russian invasion. He didn't resist the Russian invasion, some completely bogus charge. and he is incarcerated again it's a level of cruelty and torture i cannot express to you

and cruises said nothing about it no really no one said anything about but cruz specifically and but he's all of a sudden kind of out of nowhere deeply concerned about the plate of christians in nigeria which i want to restate i maybe a totally valid concern i don't know but that's weird what is that all of a sudden everybody's concerned about people who clearly have no track record of being interested in Christians at all, including Ted Cruz. What is going on? Where is this coming from? Well, in fact, what's interesting is they're calling it a genocide. And a genocide under international legal terms requires an intent. And certainly it's a very strange scenario where you have a government

richly populated by Christians and accusing them of some form of genocide. The president whose wife is a Christian pastor, Sue. But, I mean, one thing I do understand is coordinated propaganda, and this is coordinated propaganda. What, I mean, is it? Look, you know, I can tell you that the Nigerians have no idea where this is coming from. They've wanted Washington's attention since the beginning of the Trump administration. There are 230 million Nigerians who long for. a strong relationship with the United States who are being cultivated by Russia, cultivated by

China, cultivated by India, but want to work with America and we ignore them until we condemn them for a genocide that is absolutely not a genocide. Yes, I support President Trump's interest in helping out Christians everywhere. But let's be fair to a government who is working to try to protect Christians and doesn't have the resources. Right. This is clearly, I'll just say it out loud. It's an effort to draw the attention of faithful Christians in the United States away from longstanding persecution that we have studiously ignored in Ukraine and other parts

of the world. That is, I mean, it's obvious to me what's going on. Does that sound crazy? No, no, because I don't have another way to explain it. And one other thing I want to mention on your. show is that that we have this new white paper on armenia called pashinian and the persecution of samuel carapetian and it's it's available online and it's at free carapetian.com and please download it and you will see a you know it's 60 or so pages but it provides the entire history of the persecution

But, you know, as you discovered, the Armenian genocide, from there till now, Armenia has been a brave Christian country in a terrible, terrible neighborhood. And, you know, having been in their court, having been in the jail, having met with Carapetian, I am at a complete loss about the fact that I know they think that. that they're going to have this prayer breakfast. I believe one of the Trump children is going to Armenia. I'm sure Donald Trump, Jr., again, has no idea of what's actually going on there. It's a terrible situation where because you can't get into the media to tell them the truth, so many senior people in the United States operate on ignorance and reputation launder. People like Pachinian.

Well, I've been an unwitting participant in that phenomenon myself. So I know. Like, you don't really know what's going on. You get used. I've been used. I'm deeply regret it. I'm not going to happen to me again if I can help it. But I'm sympathetic in general to that because, again, I've experienced it.

But the Ukraine thing is anyone who wants to know about what's happening to the church in Ukraine can find out. Like, that's not a secret now. are there a prayer breakfast for in for ukraine yes actually yes does anyone ever bring this up they're not our church is not invited to the prayer breakfast yes we're not invited the biggest church in ukraine is not invited to the prayer breakfast for ukraine in ukraine no no they're not invited as you're aware when i fought to get into the religious freedom conference last time we had to fight to get a table to put information on then when i wanted to speak they loaded a panel with five or six other people and i got about two minutes um to speak well the man who is in charge

of the destruction of the church was a keynote before a large audience who organized this uh this is the International Religious Freedom Caucus, I think. And I got a call from Sam Brownback to say, if you do speak, could you be civil? And I said, well, you don't know me, Mr. Brownback, but I don't have any record of incivility. You know, it's not in my nature. I just want an opportunity to speak out for the people of this church.

Sam Brambeck, former senator from Kansas, he was running this? I think he was involved. I have no idea. But, I mean, did he speak out against the destruction of the largest church in Ukraine at a religious freedom event? Nobody did. And let me go further. That is so bonkers to me. Like, I can hardly even believe what you're saying. Well, wait a second. What's worse is they brought army folks. The people were in Ukrainian army uniforms walking with OCU priests, that's state church priests, through the halls of this religious freedom breakfast, or I'm sorry, religious freedom convention or conference.

And they had a happy hour, a happy hour sponsored by Ukraine. That is like absolutely crazy. Are they going to do this for China too? A Uyghur happy hour. Yeah, exactly. Celebrating religious freedom in China. It's all, okay, last question,

which I do think kind of sums it up. You've been out of Ukraine a lot. You've got, of course, a huge Ukrainian client. Can you go to Ukraine? No. Why? I'm under criminal investigation in Ukraine. For what?

I don't know. I just know if they've announced that I'm under investigation. But again, it's no idea. It's like with Carapetian, they try to find something to get you on, and they invent stuff, as you know. So it's really, I'm very tempted to go and I may go again, but I'd have no idea if I go if I'll get out. And to some extent, it's a bit like that with Armenia, because in Armenia they've just arrested not only bishops, but now they've arrested three mayors. who spoke out and who weren't helpful,

as well as the family of the patriarch, the Catholicos, the brother and some other relative, on again, completely trumped up charges. It feels like we're moving very quickly to just kind of global repression. It seems like liberal democracy has been so discredited, no one's defending it, and it's dying before her eyes. That's kind of the overview from everything you've said. Look, the EU has lost its way.

There's no question. I think the EU is a tremendous danger if it doesn't get its act together on fundamental values. You know, there's this dialectic going on. Everybody is afraid of Russia, completely afraid, paralyzed. I mean, a Russian drone crosses the border and we're at DefCon 1. yet after I don't know four plus years Kiev isn't taken none you know I think there's been a 1% change

in territory so how can Europe be so completely in fear of Russia and yet at the same time instrumentalize that fear to destroy their economy to maintain sanctions, to engage in wildly self-destructive behavior, and fail to maintain democratic values. You saw them throw out a candidate in Romania. You saw what they're trying to do in Germany. You see what's happened in France. It is a continuous obliteration of rule of law.

And we have got to start getting back to first principles with respect to rule of law everywhere, or we will lose it completely everywhere. Bob Amsterdam, I swear I check the news regularly waiting for an account of your arrest. I hope it never comes. But you are taking actual physical risks on behalf of people who don't have power. So I'm grateful to you for that. Well, thank you for having me. Stay free.

Thank you. We've got a new website we hope you will visit. It's called new commission now.com. And it refers to a new 9-11 commission. So we spent months putting together our 9-11 documentary series. And if there's one thing we learned, it's that, in fact, there was foreknowledge of the attacks. People knew. The American public deserves to know.

We're shocked, actually, to learn that, to have that confirmed, but it's true. The evidence is overwhelming. The CIA, for example, knew the hijackers were here in the United States. They knew they were planning an act of terror. In his passport is a visa to go to the United States of America. A foreign national was caught celebrating as the World Trade Center fell and later said he was in New York, quote, to document the event. I didn't know there would be an event to document in the first place because he had foreknowledge. And maybe most amazingly, somebody, an unknown investor,

shorted American Airlines and United Airlines, the companies whose planes the attackers used on 9-11, as well as the banks that were inside the Twin Towers just before the attacks. They made money on the 9-11 attacks because they knew they were coming. Who did that? You have to look at the evidence. The U.S. government learned the name of that investor, but never released it. Maybe there's an instant explanation for all this, but there isn't, actually. And by the way, it doesn't matter whether there is or not.

not, the public deserves to know what the hell that was. How did people know ahead of time? Oh, I was no one ever punished for it. 9-11 commission, the original one, was a fraud. It was fake. Its conclusions were written before the investigation. That's true. And it's outrageous. This country needs a new 9-11 commission, one that actually tells the truth that tries to get to the bottom of the story. We can't just move on like nothing happened. 9-11 commission is a couple. Something did happen.

We need to force a new investigation into 9-11 almost 25 years later. Sorry, justice demands it. And if you want that, go to new commission now.com to add your name to our petition. We're not getting paid for this

or doing this because we really mean it. Newcommission now.com.