Can a Public Emergency Strip Our Constitutional Rights? | Crossroads

Good evening and welcome to Crossroads. 22 years ago today was the day of tragedy. 2,977 people were killed. 3,000 children were left without parents. Some of the best people in the nation, first responders, lost their lives trying to save the lives of others. And in the wars that followed, America lost some of its finest young men and women. But something else happened on 9-11. Americans were forced to surrender some of their basic rights. Facing the threat of terror attacks and amid the 2001 anthrax attacks, President George Bush passed the USA PATRIOT Act, also known as the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001. Now under that act, the war on terror became not just a foreign war, but also a domestic one. And in order to do this, the government was given powers to violate the rights of citizens in ways that were not possible before. This included, for example, new government powers to conduct domestic surveillance, to launch investigations, to bypass due process. And while we can debate over whether it was justified or necessary, America did the very thing that President Eisenhower warned against in his farewell address on January 17, 1961. Eisenhower said that if government overreach was not addressed, it could one day undermine the basic freedoms of this country. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Now it wasn't just Eisenhower either. President John F. Kennedy also talked about this during a speech before the American Newspaper Publishers Association and that was on April 27, 1961. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. What a significant statement that we should be cautious that our own want for security could be seized upon by people hungry for power, that we could unknowingly sacrifice our freedoms for security. Eisenhower was warning that we allowed the expansion of domestic security to override basic freedoms. What would happen? We open the door to what would be the first of many cases of this, whereas JFK warned our want for security, more of it, would be seized upon by those anxious to expand their powers. We've now watched the domestic terror label expand. We now see evangelical Christians getting labeled as being terrorists. The MAGA Republicans getting labeled. We've watched the use of emergencies, the COVID-19 pandemic and otherwise, get used to lock Americans in their homes, to mandate face masks, vaccines, to censor news stories that question the efficacy of the official claims. Even to change the rules of presidential elections with things like universal mail-in ballots. And with this new method of declaring a crisis, then using it politically, there's a growing concern that other issues are going to be used similarly. For example, the resurgence of COVID-19, the climate crisis. But this all hinges on a key question. One of those is that, you know, does the United States need to address this sooner rather than later? Maybe. Can an emergency order suspend constitutional rights? Now, we might be finally getting an answer on this question. Protections against illegal searches and seizures, if you remember right, those were, of course, undermined through digital surveillance. Protections on legal procedures tend to depend on which judge you get. We've seen that constitutional rights on free speech can be undermined through public-private partnerships. For example, the government pressuring Twitter or Facebook to censor. And sure, the government cannot censor us directly, but, well, apparently they can tell a private company to do it on their behalf. But then there are more visible violations of the Constitution. Violations of our rights as Americans. There's also a line somewhere, where if crossed, is just a bit too noticeable, a bit too far. And in New Mexico, it looks like they finally found where that line is. New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham issued an executive order last Friday. It puts people's Second Amendment rights on hold for at least 30 days. As of now, nobody is allowed to carry a firearm in public in Albuquerque or in the surrounding area. She used the shooting death of a kid outside a baseball stadium as the excuse. And she's launching this gun grab, or gun ban, essentially, through an experimental legal process established by COVID-19, issuing a public health emergency order. Watch. You took an oath to the Constitution. Isn't it unconstitutional to say you cannot exercise your carry license? With one exception. And that is, if there's an emergency, and I've declared an emergency for a temporary amount of time, I can invoke additional powers. No constitutional right, in my view, including my oath, is intended to be absolute. But it looks like this is already failing. The local police chief in the very Democrat city said he will not enforce it. The county sheriff said he's uneasy about it due to possible violations of the Constitution. The district attorney also declared that he will not enforce the gun ban. In fact, stated, As an officer of the court, I cannot and will not enforce something that is clearly unconstitutional. Even pro-Second Amendment organizations, including the National Rifle Association, Gun Owners of America, they're preparing to sue the new Mexico governor. Gun owners are rallying in Albuquerque with their firearms in open defiance of the gun ban. Well, everyone, that's it for YouTube for the rest of the episode. Come join us on Epic TV. We have a flash sale right now, 25 cents for a week. We have great content coming up. We'll be talking with someone from Gun Owners of America about some of the challenges to the allegedly unconstitutional things being done to our gun rights. We'll also be talking with Dr. Robert Malone about the new ARIS variant of COVID-19 and the new vaccine they're rolling out for it, and some of the different concerns with that, let's say. Can't say too much because we're on YouTube. For this, again, come join us on Epic TV, epochtv.com. Link in the description. A lot of great content there, a lot of other good stuff, and again, these important discussions. I'll see you there. People from 160 countries illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border and get themselves up to Border Patrol. But what about the ones who evade Border Patrol? These are known as the Gottaways. You can safely assume that anybody that went through the extra effort to avoid U.S. Border Patrol was not an asylum seeker by default. It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, but somewhere down the road if somebody rapes and kills somebody and we find out that they came through here on my watch, that's unacceptable. These men had surrounded my house. They were banging on my back door. They were banging on my front door. You can't understand it unless you're out there seeing it. 21 dead bodies. Code 3 response. Is it wrong to ask people to come to your front door of your home? Then why would it be wrong to ask people to come to the front door of our nation? Their primary goal is to circumvent the checkpoints, go undetected. People that do not want to surrender, those are going to be the potential terrorists, the criminals, the real threat to the U.S. We were hoping the federal government would step in and do something, but they didn't. We have no clue who they are or where they go. That's the scary part.