Courageous Journalist Speaks Out

Anita Padilla spent 26 years as a reporter and an anchor for two of Chicago's top news stations. She left because it was becoming increasingly difficult to report the news fairly and truthfully. As a woman of faith, this became a conflict with her beliefs. Her story is coming up next. This is the Moms for America podcast. Each week, leaders and everyday champions tell personal stories, share advice, and tackle the issues most important to moms. Hi moms, I'm Debbie Carlitis, your host, and welcome again to the Moms for America podcast. I'm so glad that you're joining us again this week. Every episode we gather together to inspire, encourage, and educate moms in their journey through motherhood. So glad that you are here. Today's program, while this is going to be another interesting program, is about journalism. Anita Padilla has seen God's hand in her life and throughout her entire career. In Chicago, Anita was a reporter and anchor, spending 10 years at NBC and then 16 years at Fox. There, she hosted Good Day Chicago, which was Fox's signature morning news program, where she was on air for four hours every day. She found stories and interviews that other reporters missed, and maybe they didn't even want to touch because they were too politically incorrect. But Anita, she wasn't drinking the liberal media Kool-Aid. Now she is a news director at Florida's Voice, an online digital publication covering politics in Florida and Washington. Welcome Anita. We're so glad that you're joining us on the Moms for America podcast. Thank you. Thank you for having me. This is really exciting for me. Well, I have been following you on Twitter. I'm also a Chicagoan here and appreciate all that you really took to task as far as the media and really being a light as far as journalism. Before we get to that, tell me a little bit about your family. I want to get to know you personally, and then we'll talk some business. Okay. My family, wonderful. I grew up in Waukegan, Illinois, and come from kind of humble beginnings, middle-class family, mom working and working. We were Gen X kids and just spent a lot of time with my family, dinners. And my father worked three jobs to keep the family fed. And I have two brothers, one sister. And then that was my first family. And my family now is, I'm married almost 30 years, 29 years. Me too. I just made 30. I just made it to 30 with my husband. My husband and I, we met on a murder scene, actually, which is kind of funny. It's a funny story. I'll have to share that with you. But yeah, so my husband and I have been married for 29 years. We have two sons. We have Seth, who is 24 and Ryan, who is 36 years old. So we're definitely a very, very busy family. And now that I'm retired, I don't see them as often, but I shouldn't say retired, semi-retired, not doing what I was doing for a very long time, but I don't see them very often now that I'm down here in Florida. But it's nice to have the technology these days to be able to talk and do FaceTime, Snapchat, all of that good stuff. Yes. Yes. Right. Exactly. When I can't figure something out, I call up my son. He's like the IT. That's one thing for sure. All our kids understand a heck of a lot than we do. But congratulations on almost 30 years. Congratulations on a great career that you've done. And I know you're doing some different things as far as journalism, but talk about, you know, really a staple here in Chicago with a great resume. So let's talk a little bit about your career. You say that God really did play a big role in directing your career. How so? So many ways. From the time that I wanted to go into journalism to the time that I, like right now, I feel like God has always been kind of lighting my path every way that I turn. And even when I make a wrong decision, I feel like he's the GPS that just gets me back to where I need to go, because we all know that, you know, people of faith believe and we know that God knows the plans that he has for us. And they're not to harm us, but they're to prosper us. And you just have to learn to listen to that small voice. That's sometimes like, where did that thought come from? And it's not my thoughts. It's the Holy Spirit. It's God talking to me through the Holy Spirit. And so I learned to listen to that voice, especially on so many stories that I would be on in the streets of in New York City or in Chicago, on the south side, the west side, crime scene stories. And just, I would always hear like that little voice that said, pay attention to that mom coming down the street. That woman is important. Pay attention to her. Everybody else would be talking. Nobody else would be paying attention. All the other TV stations would be doing their own thing. And I'm honing in and I'm hitting my cameraman, pay attention. Watch this woman. Watch this woman. I think something's going on. Turn the camera on her. You know, just honing in on what I knew could be a potential part of the story. And it always was. Just also, you know, walking with me, knowing who to walk up to for some reason, just go talk to that person. Avoid that person. Don't listen to that person. And it just really seemed to guide me to new stories, fresh stories, stories that nobody had tapped into yet. Other reporters would wonder where I'd get these ideas or these stories, and I can't explain it. It's just an inner knowing that comes from somewhere else. And a lot of times, it's a thought that isn't even my thought that just comes up. Where did that come from? But I've learned to listen to it. So you were covering hard news, a combination. Tell us a little bit about what you were doing in journalism. So I was street reporting for a very long time, really. I started out in radio when I was still in college. But then when I became a television news reporter, my first job in Iowa, then I went to Orlando, Florida, then New York City, then Chicago. I was mainly a general assignment reporter. I would cover whatever story was going on. Fires, murders, stabbings, politics, celebrity news. And you never knew what you were going to do from day to day, hour to hour in many cases. And you were always on the go. Every day was different. It was a great job for being somebody that didn't want to sit behind a desk and just wanted to get out and meet people. It was the perfect job. And I did that for a very long time, covering all kinds of news. And then when social media became a thing, and Facebook Live became a thing, I really honed in on that before a lot of the other journalists ever did. My content was really right there in the moment. I called it active journalism because people were watching me cover the news as it was unfolding. And they loved it. People love to be citizen journalists. They love to have input. Did you try this? Try this. And then they would message me stuff, information. And I would get a lot of leads off of that. But it was really a fun time. And it was going so well that more people were watching me on social media than they were watching the television station show. Interesting, huh? So they started to tap into this. So then they brought me inside to anchor. And when my boss asked me to first take that on full time, I was like, no, I don't want to be inside. He's like, what do you mean you don't want to be inside? Everybody wants to anchor. I'm like, yeah, I might have wanted to do that before because I had done that in the past. But I'm like, I really I'm digging this being out. Yeah. Talking to people, getting the feel, the flavor of the community, getting those tips, making that one on one connection. And then to be pulled inside to the ivory tower, where there's a lot of politics that go on inside a newsroom. And anybody who's worked in a newsroom knows this. It's a lot of politics in the office you work in, but it's really deep in a newsroom. And so I didn't really want to be a part of that. But I embraced the role. And I feel like I brought a new perspective to the anchor desk. It was more objective. What's that? Maybe a little bit more objective, objective. It also I was able to speak from a person who actually covered these communities. A lot of the anchors that are on television, they many of them, not all of them, but many of them have never been on the street. So to be able to bring that perspective, my husband's in law enforcement. So to bring that law enforcement perspective to the anchor desk as somebody who knows what that's like every day when police officers go out there and they put their lives on the line and know what their families are going through. I could bring that perspective. Also, just giving that conservative voice as well. We weren't having that a lot of that. In fact, there's not a lot of that right now in journalism at all. It's very frustrating for me to be the only conservative voice on air in Chicago, pretty much in television. I would agree. I would agree. Yes. So that was a really frustrating time for me when I was anchoring. And when you're anchoring a four hour show, once the train pulls out of the station, it's there's no stopping it. So what I mean by that is when the prompter is moving up the stories, you have to keep up and it's just coming. And sometimes you don't have time to make corrections when you're in a commercial break because people are talking to you. You got to interview guests. You got to set everything up for lighting. You got to get every mic checks done. And you can try to proof and edit your scripts, but not always. So a lot of times I would see stuff come up in the prompter and I'd be like, that's not. And I'd try to ad lib the other side because it was always written from it felt like was always written from mainstream media, left leaning media. And so it was hard to to do that. And it just became exhausting. Yeah. Well, let's talk a little bit about when you saw things begin to change even more aggressively leaning towards the left journalism. Twenty sixteen, President Trump coined the term fake news, and that really did send a shockwave through news newsrooms across America. And you were in the heat of that. Yeah, exactly. I remember the first press conference that he had as president in 2016. And I was just stunned by the way he was handling the media. And he kept saying, you're fake news, you're fake news. And at first I was like, wow. I mean, I was at first I was like, whoa, why is he saying we're fake news? I mean, I felt like I was doing a great job journalistically and I felt like we were trying at that time. And when he said that, it surprised me. But then I just started paying attention to more things. It was like when I would be on social media, it was almost like I had that voice telling me, pay attention to this person, this this person and what they're saying, pay attention to this. And I would dig deeper and I'd start to dig and I started searching for answers. And I started to see that we weren't putting both sides of the story up there. We weren't telling those stories. We were only putting out one sided stories. And it was so frustrating, like I said. So it became very, very obvious to you. Right. That really everything was a left leaning source. Oh, my gosh. And it was it really created, in some cases, a rift between me and my colleagues. I'm sure. Yeah, because they you know, I could I could sense they didn't like the things that I was saying. I could sense when I pitched the other angle, there was resistance. But because I was the anchor of the show and we had like one of the best rated, we had the number one show at the TV station, we were the ones bringing in the money. And I really feel that God put his favor on my shows that I was on. And I really feel that that's why our ratings were so well. We were actually almost beating the number one station in town. And that was like unheard of in the entire time that I had been working there in the 16 years. So I know that when you're in that position, you got put me in that position to make sure that those sides of the story were being told. And that's what I was trying to do. But I didn't get resistance. But because I was the anchor of the show and because you were sitting in the right seat, I really was, I really was able to influence that. And it made a huge coverage. And I do believe that was one of the reasons we were growing our audience, because I believe that there are so many more conservatives in Chicago than people like to think or believe. There are a lot of people who did not like what they were seeing with George Floyd. They did not like to see the riots and the stealing and the thievery and the theft. And when I was out there and I was speaking truth and I was bringing on those guests that wanted to speak the truth, people loved it. And our ratings would soar. I mean, let's talk about let's talk about some of these examples you just brought up to George Floyd fiasco. And Chicago is one of the cities that was ransacked, ruined, destroyed across the country. No one wanted to see this happening. People did want to know the truth. So that was a big story for you. It was. It was. And I remember the day that Chicago went up. It was insane. I remember it was a Sunday and I was home and I was getting phone calls from community activists, from police officers, because I would have to say out of all the reporters in Chicago, I will probably say that I had more police sources than anybody, law enforcement sources than anybody in the city of Chicago during the time that I was there. They trusted you. People trusted me. I would not reveal my sources. And I am telling you, I was getting phone calls from some high up people who were actually in the room with Lori Lightfoot when she made the decision to lift the bridges and because everybody was trying to get downtown to do their destruction. And you knew it was going to happen. I knew I could tell that when things were happening in Minneapolis, it was coming to Chicago. It was going to come. But she was not prepared. She had a brand new superintendent, David Brown. He had no clue what he was doing. What a mess. Yeah, it was a mess. So when all these people tried to come downtown, it was her decision. I speak to the people who were in the room with her when she said, lift the bridges. And she was advised not to do that. So they lifted the bridges. And then when they couldn't get downtown to do their destruction, the activists and the crazy people, they just started destroying the community and the neighborhoods. And it was just really sad to see. And it was infuriating to my Facebook, holding Lori Lightfoot accountable with an alderman, Raymond Lopez. I had a state rep, LaShawn Ford, on with me. I had a community activist, Mark Carter, on with me. I also had a political radio host who was also on with me. And we were discussing Lori Lightfoot's failure when the mayor's office called my Facebook, called me on my phone to basically shut down my Facebook page and then tried to get me fired. Tried to get me fired because she didn't like what I was reporting. That's what they do. That's what they do. Oh, yeah. And she actually got the radio host fired from WBOM. Yeah. And then my boss said, oh, God, Anita, what are you doing now? And I said, you know what? I'm speaking the truth. And he said, do we have sources? Are your sources good? I said, I not only have one source, I have like three or four sources telling me exactly what I'm telling you is exactly what unfolded. And he said, then we're fine. We're going to go with it. Good for you. Moms, we're going to take a quick break and then we will hear more from Anita Padilla. Stay with us. Hi, moms. I'm excited to share some news about our new sponsor, the Herzog Foundation. We know you're passionate about raising patriots and empowering your children with the best education possible. And the Herzog Foundation shares that passion. They're dedicated to promoting liberty through education, freedom and helping parents like you choose the best educational path. They offer a powerhouse of resources designed to support families and schools alike. 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Just clean, wholesome content you can trust. Hi moms, welcome back. Before we continue our interview with Anita Padilla, I do want to invite everyone to please like, subscribe, and share our podcast. I do want to actually tell you to go back to our library. We have some incredible interviews and topics that we have covered with our library of podcasts, but please share this. Please like, subscribe, and tell your friends about Moms for America. This is how we get the word out and this is how we get our message. Also, if you have an idea or topic for our podcast, would you please email me directly at podcast at momsforamerica.net. I would love to hear from you and any suggestions that you may have. Lastly, I do want to invite all of you mamas that are listening to please join our movement here at Moms for America. Join our family, join our sisterhood. We are the ultimate support group for conservative moms. It's moms like us that are uniting all across the country to fight for our faith, our family, freedom, and the constitution. So please check us out at momsforamerica.us. Sign up for our newsletter, fill out our form, get involved, and join the movement. We have so many great resources, webinars, seminars, just for you mom that will help you in your home and in your community. These stories are, they're specific to Chicago, but they're happening all across the country. Yes, it is. Situations like this. It is. This social justice reform is a failure. I mean, let's just be honest. What she and other prosecutors around the country are doing to claim that this is what we do to even things out. We need social justice reform. And really, the people that are suffering from the social justice reform are the very people they claim they're trying to protect. Those become the victims. Their victims are terrified and they're killers, they're attackers, they're rapists, they're home invaders. They're getting arrested because the police are trying to do their job. They never even see a courtroom because we got these social justice failure prosecutors in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Chicago. It's a joke. And they are outside. And the legislation and the governors are stamping approvals on this legislation, which is defunding the police and decriminalizing criminals. Right, exactly. And then when you have people like a Kamala Harris saying, let's bail out the people that are rioting, let's bail out the people that are doing destruction, that says that it's not. And then try to deny it later on that you had nothing to do with it. We remember those things. I remember those things. Oh, I remember you on Twitter, really exposing a lot of this and saying, this is what's really happening. Do you agree? And you were asking important questions of everyone, which then made everyone think, is this healthy? Is this safe? Is this good for our citizens and our state and in our city? And you really did take to it. And a lot of people really followed you to understand what was really happening. Same thing with the COVID mandates. You talked a lot about those. Right. And that really is something that still bothers me today. When I see the news, I feel vindicated now because a lot of what I was saying is now coming out. And I knew in my spirit, I just knew that there was this was government propaganda. Listen, when you start telling me that you're going to give me a one hundred dollar gift card to Walmart to take an injection, that's an experimental injection into my body. There's something wrong. Or maybe fire you if you don't. Or fire you. Exactly. And so many people lost their jobs. And I remember police officers, military people, you know, terrified to take that. It's not that and I'm not anti-vax. Let's just make that clear. I'm not anti-vax. I grew up taking all of my shots. I took a tetanus shot the other day. OK, but I'm not going to take an experimental drug. And I felt that it was my role as an anchor, as a journalist to put out the other side, put those questions to the people we were interviewing. And I'll tell you, it was really interesting. And you could tell I never said it on air, but you could tell who was drinking the Kool-Aid and who wasn't drinking the Kool-Aid. And I was not drinking the Kool-Aid. I was not drinking the Kool-Aid at all. I did not feel like Dr. Fauci was being honest with the American public. I felt like there was a lot of hypocrisy, put the masks on and off. It was it was it was all political theater. For what? Political theater, great term. Yeah, for people to make money. And that's really what it is. Follow the money. Who's making money off of this? The drug companies, Dr. Fauci, the congressmen and the senators that, you know, endorse this kind of thing. The doctors, pharmaceuticals pushing the jab, the hospitals that for every covid test that they gave, every injection that they gave, every ventilator they put you on, every remdesivir dose. They all got money for those. And that's what people need to understand is there was money involved here. And this is why I didn't buy it. So many. Right. So when you're saying this and you're exposing this, how is it in the newsroom and did they try to stop you or did they respect your journalistic objectivity? I will say that at my station, at my Fox station, they respected my journalistic objectivity to a point. OK, individually, they also respected it. They encouraged everybody. And I think it was one of four people that wouldn't take the shot. And as a result, I had to test every single day, every single day that I was on the air. I'd have to go and get on camera with a nurse and I'd have to do the swab and show her my negative. And it was it was crazy. But I did not care. And I had several people make comments to me about well, they told my bosses they didn't want to anchor with me. They want to sit in the same anchor desk with me because they thought they would get it. And the truth was my co-anchor said to me, this is crazy because I know that I'm more dangerous to you than you are to me. He's like, I cannot believe people are saying that. But my bosses had people come to them and say that they were concerned about working with me. It was so the fear that was generated. It was so insane. But one person said to me, how long are you going to continue to wear the mask? I said, you see this mask? This mask is a badge of honor. This mask is me saying I will not comply. So I I hope that the journalists that are watching now and that I work with maybe then or who are working with others now, that maybe they think twice about just drinking the government Kool-Aid, the propaganda, spewing out government information just because the government says so doesn't make it so. And you need to do your homework. And as a journalist, you're supposed to be the watchdogs of government. You are supposed to make sure that they're not taking advantage of the public. And I think that the days of journalism from years ago, Walter Cronkite, you know, years ago in the 80s and in the early 90s, it was that way. Government was held accountable by the journalists. But I don't know what happened. It's like social media and the cancel culture just changed the way journalists started to tell stories because they were so afraid of being canceled. They didn't want to speak the truth. Right. And to me, I was fearless. I saw 23. These are mama bears. They do not want to mess. Exactly. Let's talk about that, too, though. So now you've got a culture of mainstream media, which we would really is so much fake news. You've got journalists within it that want to present the story, A and B, let everybody figure it out. But people are leaving your main your main ABC, NBC, CBS. All this now is all shifting. I don't even know what's the rating for the 10 o'clock news, the five o'clock news. Right. That used to be a part of everyone's culture. Right. Everybody would watch the news after dinner and you'd watch it at 10 o'clock. I don't think anybody's watching local news hardly anymore. And now there is a new breed of resources for media. Let's talk about where you see this now and what you appreciate or maybe what are some of your concerns? I feel like people are waking up. People don't want their news sanitized by media anymore. They don't trust the media because when you hear what's presented to you on television and then you go and you do your own research and you see the actual full footage, that's not what he said. That's not what that person said. And you're thinking to yourself, well, let's see, not everybody will do that. But that's what was I think more people are starting to do that. But also I think people want to hear the full interview. They don't want me, a reporter or an editor, to sanitize and tell you what the most important 30 second soundbite, 10 second soundbite is. People want to hear it for themselves. And I commend them for wanting to learn and see it for themselves. I see a future where the newsrooms are going to be smaller. And I think the broadcast television, the piece of pie for advertisement dollars are going to dwindle because the money is in digital and the focus is going to be on digital. You're going to see more newsrooms moving their shows onto digital platforms because people have a very short attention span. They're on their phones, they're scrolling and they want something now. They want to instantaneous. And listen, when President Trump was shot in Bedford, Pennsylvania, everybody went to Twitter. You couldn't get the information fast enough on broadcast television. They're sanitizing. You've got an anchor. Well, they've got to figure out what's going to be their message, right? Because this is the other thing I want to talk with you about. All of a sudden, if the sky is black, if that came from the powers that be, all of your mainstream media would say, the sky is black, the sky is black, the sky is black today and the sky is black. And they would get the same message. And I think it's exactly what you're referring to. Until they have their messages together, they don't report it where you're seeing it raw and true on Twitter or X now or wherever it may be. Exactly. On X or on Instagram or X is probably the best platform, I would say, for information. And let's be honest, the newsrooms are also doing that too. They're on X and they're not. They've got their teams in the field, but that dwindling newsroom that I was telling you about, the dwindling reporters, you don't have as many reporters and cameramen that are willing to venture out into some of the, in an urban area, the more dangerous areas where their lives are at stake. Or even now, you don't even have to be in a dangerous crime-ridden area to be targeted as somebody in the media. You could be on a busy street on Lakeshore Drive, or you could be on Michigan Avenue or Fifth Avenue or down in Times Square and people are unhinged and they are dangerous. It's dangerous to be a journalist. So now people are just going right to X. They're going to get their information instantaneously. It may not always be accurate, but it'll filter out eventually the truth. And there's a lot more information on X and on social media platforms than you're going to get from a newsroom. Alternate news sources now from Newsmax, America's Real Voice, all these, there's all of this alternatives now that you can kind of collect, read, decipher, and really kind of get a better picture of really what's going on. I think that's really, people are becoming somewhat of their own citizen journalists, right? 100%. You know, that is what Elon Musk said the other day, and he got a lot of flack from, I don't know, there was an individual from Axios, it was incensed that Elon Musk would dare say that you are the journalist. Well, you know, it's true. People, citizen journalists are out there. They are with the cameras and they are on the scene. Who are you going to believe? The person who is there seeing it with their own eyes or somebody who's sitting at an anchor desk or in a newsroom that's not there yet with their crew to verify the information. And so he's right when he says, you are the media. This is where people go now to get their news. They go to platforms that they trust and get the information unfiltered, raw, as graphic as it might be. That's what they want. And that's what they're going to ingest. You have a 24-year-old, so do I. And I see her and my kids, 20 to 27, they're very into this generation investigating. They are really, they're light speed ahead of my generation because we listened to this and we were more passive about trusting, but I see them, that Gen X, they're all investigating it. They want to know how much plastic they're going to ingest now. They want to know what's going to make this food healthy. They want to know what's really the truth. They don't want to be told what to do anymore. Yes. And I also believe too, that because they have a better grasp of technology, they are able to do that. Think about it. I was talking to one of my reporters here and I was telling her, you know, when I started out as a reporter, we didn't have the internet. That was hard for her to comprehend. I said, when you were reporting, you had to know your facts, you had to dig, you had to get information. There was no internet. You had to develop sources and resources and relationships and in order to tell stories and get the scoop for things. So this generation is used to digging, looking up anything that they want to know about, and they can access it in an instant. Yeah. Very interesting. Just the progression of media and news. Let's talk about the fact that you left Chicago, moved to Florida, and you've kind of done a little bit of a shift now as far as your career in journalism. Yes. So I knew that I always wanted to come back to Florida. Like I said, I met my husband. I actually met him in Florida at a murder scene. He was the police officer and he was the hero cop and I had to interview him and we didn't like each other. You fell in love when you interviewed him. Is that how it went? Yeah, kind of like that, sort of like that. And we got engaged, we moved to New York City, we've been married, and I've always wanted to come back to Florida because I've always felt like this is a place where you feel like you're on vacation even when you're not. You look outside, you can't have a bad day. You see the palm trees swaying in the wind. Don't you miss the Chicago snow? Come on. Let me tell you, I did miss it though the other day when I was putting up my holiday lights. It was so surreal to put holiday lights on a palm tree and no snow, no cold air, and it's just a little different. But I won't complain when we're out on the dock and my husband's wearing shorts and we're fishing with a little bonfire. It gets a little chilly down here. I think it was 40 degrees this morning, so that's the coldest, but yeah, stuff in Chicago. So tell us about, it's a digital platform that you're working for now, tell us about it. So I decided to, I bought this house down here and it was kind of interesting because I thought about maybe doing something different. And I reached out to Alex Bruziewicz, who was the chairman of a super PAC, who then became the campaign advisor to President Trump. What's funny is I just reached out to him and I said, hey, do you know of anybody down there in Florida that's looking for somebody? And he said, you know, you ought to hook up with this digital company. I'm going to connect you. And it's so funny because I ended up reaching out to this individual, my boss, Brendan Lustig, and he didn't call me back for at least a month. And then when he finally did call me back, he told me that he almost died. So there was a reason that God had put a hold on the whole thing. He was recovering in the hospital, but in the meantime, I was trying to decide what to do. So I prayed about it and I said, God, I need to know what do you want me to do? Do I stay here at the station in Fox, or do you want me to go to Florida and go down there and trust you? I need an answer and I need one today. And I swear to you, four hours later, he called me and he said, and I said, well, I, my contract ends on December 31st. And he said, well, I need somebody by December 31st. And I said, oh my gosh, it was, it was just perfect. And four hours later I get that phone call. So I, you know, I believe that this is where I'm supposed to be right now. I'm not saying that this is where it's going to end all I have. I would like to do my own podcast. I'm sort of working towards that right now, but right now I'm a news director here at Florida's voice. It's a digital online publication. And, uh, we decide what stories to cover all Florida politics. So a lot of stuff coming out of Florida right now with president, a lot of these politicals coming out of Florida. And what I love about Florida and it's the culture down here. When my husband and I go to a restaurant and they find out he's law enforcement, it's thank you for your service. People have a respect here for law and order. And that's what I love about governor DeSantis. He respects law and order and he doesn't play these games, these that's not acceptable. And so I love that. And it seems like president Trump is going to bring a lot of Florida to Washington. It's like, we're going to make America Florida. So I'm looking forward to seeing that happen. Good. Well, we're jealous, uh, for not only the weather, but just the politics there. But, um, you know, I, I believe that there is great change happening all across this country. You can feel just even the shift of, um, you know, just it's, it feels hopeful. It feels hopeful. It does. And it feels good to feel like that because for a long time, for the last five years, it's been not so hopeful and very, and you feel like, is this ever going to end? How bad can this get? And just when you think it can't get bad, it gets worse. And just when you think it can't get worse, it does get worse. And, um, but I always have the faith that, uh, we were going to go back to where we were and try to make America great again. You know, and I think that the president, uh, Trump, the first time you, you, you don't know who's a bad actor in your, in your midst, in your inner circle and people trying to advise him and tell him, uh, what they, people have agendas and that's the thing. Right. And he wasn't a lifelong politician in Washington and he still had the best economy, the lowest unemployment. I mean, what that guy did was amazing. So I think that there's going to just really be, um, they're going to, they're going to move quick and they're going to make really, really, really good decisions. I have full faith and I do too. I think he's got for this time around, he knows what he's got to get done and he's keeping it close to the vest. And I love it. I love to see the change and a lot of people, and I'm sure, you know, this too, a lot of people who went on the other side for so long, their eyes, they needed those four years to wake up. They needed the four years to see what was really going on and to say, this is not the direction that I endorse or I want to go. I don't want my kids to grow up like this. I don't want my kids indoctrinated in colleges and at the grade school level with material that they shouldn't be seeing at such a young age. So I think a lot of people woke up and when you start to mess with the kids and the mamas and the parents at school board meetings, people are just not, they're not down with that. Yeah. Well, our, our, um, interest at Moms for America, we exploded once they started trying to shut down this country and they tried to ask our kids and vaccinate our children and take away our jobs and, um, you know, uh, push gender and backdoor deals at schools and all this stuff. Moms just came out, you know, that you covered it. Moms came out in record numbers and said, Oh no, this ain't happening. So, and that's what we try to do here at Moms for America. Just supply all that information, all those resources on all those topics, everything that happens in your home. But I'd love for you to just, uh, share some closing words of encouragement to our moms because there are moms that are listening. Um, they may not be in a newsroom, um, but there could be at work right now because of they voted for Trump or because they're conservative or because they want to share the truth or the opposite side of maybe a discussion, maybe even in families. And you just are really a warrior. And I'd love for you to just encourage them because it's, it can be very tough and it is still very volatile right now. It really is. And I, I would just have to say like, stay true to your convictions. And if you feel like something is not right, uh, speak up, say something. And even if you don't feel comfortable doing that, uh, maybe you talk to your friends about it privately. Um, I'm not saying take the social media for everything you do, but maybe you talk to your friends privately. Um, but here's what I would say when you're in a battle, you have to remember that the battle for many of us is not flesh and blood. It's spiritual. You're in the middle of a spiritual warfare and you need to learn to pray. And I'll tell you when you pray, the word of God is living word today, yesterday, today, and forever. And when you use his words, when you pray and you repeat his words back to him, he hears you and you battle in the spirit and you pray. And that's how you fight. And I always tell people to pray for your enemies. And if that's the hardest thing to do is pray for somebody that you don't like, because there are a lot of people out here that I do not like, but I do ask for God to help me. And I pray for them. And the reason I pray for them, especially people who are attacking me, I pray for them and I ask God to bless them. Why would I ever do that? Because when people are feeling blessed and things are good in their life, are they even worried about you? No, they're not. They're so busy living their best life. And you've prayed for them to have their best life. They're now moved on to something else. They're not even focused on you. So if you pray for your enemies and you battle in spirit and you ask God to step in and intervene and when you're under attack, you pray Psalm 91. That's the prayer for protection. And you pray it and you ask God to protect your finances, your health, your home, your family, your car, your everything, your children. And you pray that he is hearing you and you are using his words. And that's what he teaches us. Put on the armor of God. You protect your mind with your helmet. You protect your heart with your breastplate. You put the belt of truth on and you speak it. You let God guide you with your sandals that you're supposed to wear. And the sword is the word of God. Well, I don't think we could top that as a closing message, but thank you so much. Thank you for all that you've done really in journalism. Thank you for being a and thank you for being just one of those fierce mamas that is not only going to speak the truth in her community, in her state, but you're just doing this across the country. And we so appreciate you. And thanks for joining us here at Moms for America. Oh, thank you so much for having me. This has been a great time. Yeah. Well, journalism is an important discussion for all of us to have because we have to know our resources. We have to know what truth is. We have to figure out how to decipher it. And we have to look for alternative sources that we can trust. So thank you for being one of them. I love what you guys are doing there too. You keep doing what you do, touching lives, changing them, you know, just with the information you're putting out there, being advocates, being fierce for other people who feel like don't have a voice. It's great to see you be the voice of the voiceless. Amen. Thank you so much, Anita. God bless you and your family. And I know we'll be hearing from you again soon. Okay. And yeah, and you as well have a wonderful day. Thank you. Special thanks again to Anita for joining us. We so appreciate her integrity and for fighting for truth in journalism. Wow. That's a rare one, isn't it? So thanks again, Anita. All right, moms, for all of you, I just want to remind you one last time, please go to momsforamerica.us, sign up with foreign newsletter, join the movement, check out all our amazing programs, resources that will help you support you in your home and in your community and your journey through motherhood. It can be very, very tough to be a mom right now in today's culture. And we have so many great resources for you. Again, please visit momsforamerica.us and join us. I say this every week from parental rights to public policy, from the kitchen table to Congress, Moms for America has it all. We are here to help inspire and educate and empower you moms. So we're so glad that you're a part of our family. And as always, we as moms are going to keep changing our country one home at a time. Make sure you share and I will see you next week. God bless. A special thank you to our sponsors, the Herzog Foundation and Tuvu. The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the Herzog Foundation.