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March 25, 2024 - Sean Hannity Show
29:42
Big Government Continues - March 25th, Hour 3
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This is an iHeart Podcast.
Our final news roundup and information overload.
All right, news roundup, information overload hour.
Our toll-free number is 800-941-SHAWN if you want to be a part of the program.
So the U.S. Department of Justice has now launched what they're calling the National Extreme Risk Protection Order Resource Center.
The launch of the National Extreme Risk Protection Order Resource Center will provide their partners across the country with valuable resources to keep firearms out of the hands of individuals that pose a threat to themselves or others.
The establishment of the center is the latest example of the DOJ's work to use every tool provided by the landmark bipartisan Safer Communities Act to protect communities from gun violence, which everybody would want.
I have been running the names of people shot, shot, and killed in Chicago since 2009, and nobody has lifted a finger to ever help the people of Chicago.
And violence spirals out of control.
We know how to stop shootings.
And it is this new program is drawing an immediate backlash from Republicans who called this effort a massive red flag operation.
And rightly so, as she announces the new office to implement red flag gun control laws.
Anyway, here to weigh in on all of this is John Lottie's the president of the Crime Prevention Research Center many, many years ago, and it's had many different updates over the years.
More guns, less crime.
Is this really a different effort than what they are saying it is?
Obviously, the answer appears to be very clearly it is.
Anyway, thanks for being with us, John Lott.
Great to have you back, sir.
It's great to talk to you again.
Thanks for having me on.
Let's talk about what's really at stake here because Congress never authorized the Department of Justice to create this resource center.
And maybe you can start with the basics for those that may not understand red flag laws and what they mean.
Maybe you can explain it to them.
Right.
Look, I mean, everybody wants to try to make people safer.
Unfortunately, the types of proposals that Biden keeps on putting out there aren't going to make people safer and may even cause more problems than their work.
Look, right now, every state in the country has what they call civil commitment laws, which if somebody is a danger to themselves or others, you can call the police.
The police will come out.
If the police think that there's a reasonable probability that the person is, in fact, a danger to themselves or others, they can take the person in to immediate mental health care evaluation.
If the mental health care experts agree that there's a reasonable chance that the person is a danger, there can be an immediate hearing.
If somebody can't afford a lawyer, one is provided for them.
And then the evidence is examined.
And if the judge decides that the person is, in fact, a danger to themselves or others, the judge has a range of options.
They can say, look, I'm concerned if you voluntarily go and see a mental health care professional, we'll reevaluate in a week or two.
Or if they think the person may harm others, they can take away their driver's license or they can take away their guns.
Or in the more extreme case, they can involuntarily commit the person.
The only thing that red flag laws do is take away a person's guns.
And the thing is, there's no hearing.
All the judge sees when they make a decision is a piece of paper with the written complaint.
They don't talk to either the person who's making the complaint or the person who the complaint is made about when they make a decision whether to take away a person's guns.
And then within a week, within a month, there'll be a hearing, but no lawyers provided for you.
You're talking about $10,000 or more to have a hearing.
And so people may want to have a gun, but if it means they have to pay $10,000 to go and argue a case that would temporarily take away their guns, most people don't think it's worth $10,000 to do that.
And so they're not legally represented when they finally have a hearing.
And so I think gun control advocates want to make people think that if you could just take away somebody's guns, that will solve the problems.
But these are usually used for concerns about suicide.
If you really think somebody's suicidal, it's simply taking away their guns going to stop them from committing suicide.
There are not other ways for somebody to go and commit suicide.
And they don't involve any mental health care professionals or any help that the person's going to be getting.
All they want to do is say, if I just take away the guns, that's going to solve the problem.
And it doesn't deal with the underlying problem or other things that could happen.
Or it doesn't deal with other ways that people can harm people.
You can have, as we've witnessed, somebody can drive a car through a crowd someplace.
We've had it a couple of years ago through a Christmas parade in Wisconsin.
Other times, things like that have happened.
And so simply taking away the guns is a solution.
It's not.
And the problem is this can be abused.
I have a good friend of mine, Andrew Pollack.
He lost his daughter at the Parkland school shooting.
He moved to rural Oregon to get away from Florida because of the trauma that he had gone through.
He had some neighbors move in next door to him who were from California and hated him politically.
They put in an extreme risk protection order.
Judge only saw the written complaint, took away Andy's guns.
When they finally had a hearing, the judge didn't even need to listen to Andy's side of the argument, didn't even need to hear the defense because he said, there's no threat here.
Why did you even file this paper?
Anyway, while Andy was disarmed because of this, he ran into a mountain lion outside of his home.
His dog tangled with the mountain lion, ended up having to have 50 stitches on its side because of that.
But Andy would normally, because he lives in rural Oregon and there's mountain lions and bears and other things that are there, he normally would carry a gun with him.
But because he was disarmed because of the Extreme Risk Protection Order, he wasn't able to protect himself.
And there's many cases like that.
And the problem is, you know, the people who make these false charges are never punished for making them.
And so you have all these abuses that occur with the system.
But the bottom line is that when you look at the empirical work on this, it doesn't reduce suicides.
There's even some evidence that it increases suicides.
And there's a simple reason for that.
And that is you may create a situation where people are afraid to go and talk to others about their problems.
And there's no mental health care professionals that are involved in the process.
Now, what are they really trying to codify into law here?
Because I think it goes deeper than what you're saying, just so people can understand what red flag laws actually do.
Right.
Well, I think they just want to make people afraid of guns just generally, just trying to think if we could, if the whole solution to any problem is just get rid of the guns.
And, you know, you have a situation, though, where they make it so people can't use guns for self-defense.
They make it so that law-abiding citizens who don't have a problem aren't able to go and explain to a court.
One of the people that works for my center, Nikki Gozer, some years ago, about 14 years ago, her husband was murdered in front of her by a stalker.
She was incredibly depressed afterwards.
But, you know, if you have something like a red flag law there and there's a neighbor or friend or somebody else who says, look, Nikki's very depressed.
He has a gun.
And maybe out of well-meaning, they could go to a court, file a piece of paper there.
If Nikki had had her gun removed from her, she would be in horrible shape because she just had a stalker murder her husband.
She would feel afraid to go outside the home.
But if you had a hearing where she could go and explain to the judge the situation that she was in, or at least to the mental health care professionals, the situation that she was in, it'd be unlikely that they would take away her ability to go and defend herself and protect herself.
But you don't allow that in the case of red flag laws.
Let's go over the last number of years.
Then I'm going to play Kamala Harris for you.
As you keep these statistics and you have pointed out again and again that if people are armed, that the odds are that there will be a lot less crime.
You have proven that statistically and for doing so and writing this best-selling book and then revising it repeatedly over the years.
What are the latest numbers?
How many people annually in the United States are able to use a firearm to prevent themselves from being victims of crime?
Well, you have something between about 1.6 and 2 million people a year who do that.
It's about five times more frequently each year that people use guns to prevent violent crime than guns are used in the commission of crime.
You know, Biden and many gun control advocates want to make you think that violent crime is a gun issue.
Over 92% of violent crime has absolutely nothing to do with guns.
So you have 8%.
And if you want to stop gun crime, you want to stop it in the same way you stop crime generally.
You want to make it risky for criminals to go and commit crimes with higher arrest rates, higher conviction rates, longer prison sentences.
Unfortunately, they just want to focus on passing gun control laws, which primarily disarm law-abiding good people, unfortunately, relative to criminals.
And rather than making it more difficult for criminals to commit crime because the victims are disarmed and not able to protect themselves, they unintentionally, in many cases, make it easier for criminals to commit crime.
I'll give you a simple example.
Every single place in the world that's banned either all guns or all handguns has seen murder rates go up every single time.
You think out of randomness, once or twice, a ban would be associated with murder rates staying the same or falling.
But there's a simple reason for that.
You know, we've seen this in Chicago.
We've seen this in Washington, D.C., when they had their handgun bans.
And the simple reason is this, that when you pass laws, you have to be careful that it's not going to be primarily the most law-abiding good citizens who obey these rules and not the criminals.
If you've had a ban, for example, who do you think, you may take a few guns away from criminals, but if it's primarily the law-abiding good citizens who you disarm, you make it easier for the criminals to commit crimes.
John Lotta's with us.
He is the president of the Crime Prevention Research Center.
Let me, well, first of all, Kamala Harris had a pretty horrible weekend.
I mean, clapping to a protest song.
And, you know, literally, we want to know, Kamala, this is the song she's clapping to.
What did you come here for?
Long live Free Palestine in Haiti, too.
The band is out there singing.
She's clapping until one of her employees says, you maybe not want to clap to that song.
Not exactly being complimentary, but putting that aside, focusing on what you're describing, the father of a victim of the Parkland school shooting, slamming Vice President Kamala Harris, he called it a photo op.
Ryan Petty's name, the father of Elena, was critical of Harris using the school to push her gun agenda.
And this is her making the announcement about the National Resource Center for Red Flag Laws.
Listen.
Second reason I am here is to announce that today I'm launching the National Resource Center for Red Flag Laws.
And this National Resource Center will be a place where we will, through that, provide for training for local leaders on how to use red flag laws and keep communities safe.
So these are just what some of the ways that we can learn from what happened here.
And of course, as you know, I will continue to advocate for what we must do in terms of universal background checks, an assault weapons ban, what we must continue to do to treat, diagnose, and treat trauma in our communities.
Your reaction to your ever-so-brilliant vice president.
Well, look, she mentions these universal background checks, these background checks on the private transfers of guns.
After the Uvalde report that came out, the number one gun control argument that Biden was pushing was these background checks on the private transfers of guns as somehow a solution.
I wish once in a while the media would ask critical questions like, okay, you're saying this after the Uvalde report, would this law have stopped this attack that you're using to go and push for this law?
And the answer would have been no.
Would it have stopped any mass public shooting this century?
And the answer would be no.
But somehow, the media refuses to ask either Biden or the White House those types of questions when they push this as their number one solution for these things.
Look, I want to stop these types of mass public shootings, but I want to do something, again, that works.
You know, I look at schools.
And you want innocent, law-abiding citizens, especially in this day and age, which has gotten more violent than ever.
They have a constitutional right to protect themselves.
I have about 15 seconds.
Yeah.
Look, where do these guys attack?
They attack time after time with places where guns are banned.
These guys may be crazy, but they're not stupid.
They go after targets where they know their victims can't defend themselves.
And so you pass these gun-free zones.
And the only thing that you've done is you've made them magnets for these criminals to go and attack.
All right, John Lott, we really appreciate you.
As always, President Crime Prevention Research Center.
If you want more information, obviously you can check them out online.
We'll put a link on Hannity.com, 800-941-Sean, if you want to be a part of the program.
Keeping Uncle Sam accountable to you every day.
Hannity is on.
All right, 25 to the top of the hour.
Here's our toll-free number.
It is 800-941-Sean.
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You know, there's certain people in life that I've just come to know and admire and like personally.
Two of the most successful people in Hollywood are not your traditional Hollywood people.
Well, what am I talking about?
In other words, they're not afraid to bring their faith, their religion, their value system to the screen.
And also, they put out great fun shows as well.
Probably one of the greatest power couples in Hollywood history that don't get the acclaim I think they deserve.
I'm friends with both of them.
Mark Burnett, of course, everybody knows.
And of course, Roma Downey, who everybody knows as well.
I mean, everybody remembers her role in Touch by an Angel.
That became like the biggest hit ever.
You know, there's a reason every year, at least once, if not twice a year, Newsweek and Time magazine, when there were actually real publications, they would put Jesus on the cover because people bought the, would buy that magazine when they were at the local grocery store.
Anyway, the great news is we know that Roma, whatever project she's involved in, is going to be a big, huge success.
And based on what is known as the Redemption Literary Series from the number one New York Times best-selling author, Karen Kingsbury, well, the Baxters, it's a family drama.
It follows Elizabeth and John Baxter, their five adult children.
Season one of the Baxters centers on Elizabeth and John's daughter, Carrie, who learns the shocking truth that her professor husband has been secretly having an affair with one of his college students.
Great.
Uplifting.
But, however, very real life, isn't it?
Isn't that the sad part of it?
But how do they deal with it?
That's what makes this series different.
One, two, three.
I'm a little worried about Carrie and Tim.
They don't look at each other the same way anymore.
Something's bothering you.
I have been struggling.
Carrie.
I have built my whole world around you.
Tim is in love with another woman.
I keep going over it in my mind, and I have no idea how we got to this point.
You don't know why you want to stay with him.
I'm fighting for my marriage.
I get you made a commitment to Tim.
You don't know anything about commitment.
You can't commit to anything.
Have you talked to Ryan?
Carrie, if you ever need someone to talk to, you know I'm only a phone call away, right?
Why did you come back?
To save our marriage.
Is this still what you want?
You cannot move beyond this guilt until you find the courage to allow yourself to just feel.
Forgiveness happens once.
Healing takes a lifetime.
You're my sister.
You have always been there for me.
I'm so scared.
You're not alone.
We're your family.
It fills our hearts to know that we can be here for you.
Uh, Anyway, our friend Roma Downey's here.
We wanted to check in with her to tell us about it.
You know, whenever you and Mark do a project, I'm just interested in whatever it is because I've enjoyed everything you've ever done.
I mean, it really is that simple for me.
Thank you, Sean.
It's so nice to speak with you.
And thank you.
Yeah, this show came about a number of years ago.
I actually came to the project because I read the first book in the Redemption series.
A friend gave it to me, and I was reading it on a long flight, and I simply couldn't put it down.
It was one of those page-turning novels.
I just wanted to.
I love the characters.
I love the redemptive nature of the story.
They're a church-going family.
They're a family that you'll relate to.
I know you're going to fall in love with this family.
But they're not perfect people.
They have their issues.
There's dysfunction in the family like most families.
They don't always like each other.
They don't always make good choices.
But they always love each other.
And when life brings the Baxters to their knees, what separates them from other families on TV dramas is that they pray.
They're a family who pray together.
And I think that particularly people of faith out there who are listening will love to see a family on a television show that reflect the values that we hold dear.
You know what's amazing, Roma, as time has gone on, you see that things have changed, that television has changed, that choices and options are more numerous, frankly, than they've ever been.
And people gravitate towards good shows, and then word of mouth kind of takes over, which I would expect is likely going to happen in this series.
Look at Angel Studios, for example, The Chosen, a couple of other studios independent out there that they're not afraid to go where Hollywood previously never dared went to.
Or if they did, you know, you did a great remake of Ben Hur, I remember.
And when you did, it was a huge success.
And I loved it because I always loved the original with Charlton Heston.
And I thought you did a great job with it.
And not an easy film to make and so on and so forth.
But times are changing.
You know, you have Prime, you have Amazon, you have Hulu, you have Netflix.
I mean, people have more choices, more options, and they're being more discerning.
Are you discovering that too?
Yeah, for sure.
And I think that, you know, it is great to see so much uplifting and inspirational content on the airwaves, both in cinema and on TV.
But I think TV is a little slower on that uptake.
You know, I mean, you've mentioned there in the intro my many years as playing Monica on Touched by an Angel and what a hit that show was.
And I'm hoping that, you know, in the last few years, I've primarily been producing.
I haven't really stepped in front of the camera myself, but I decided to do so with the Baxters, and I stepped into playing the role of Elizabeth Baxter myself.
So it was great fun to be back in front of the camera again.
And I really just believe in this story.
I think Karen Kingsbury is just such an excellent storyteller.
And it was fun and challenging, of course, to dramatize this, to bring it to Prime.
And I'm delighted to be back on Prime.
I don't know if you got to see the film I produced last Easter with Dennis Quaid and Heather Graham.
It was called Honor Wing and a Prayer.
And it was very successful on Amazon's Prime Video.
And so I feel terrific that they entrusted me with the Easter time slot again for the launch of the Baxters.
And it goes up on the 28th.
And then it will live there.
And they ask of people, you know, listen, people are busy.
I know that.
I'm raising a family.
I've got work.
I've got, you know, a million things.
So it's hard to ask people, can you go out and see this film?
Can you go do that?
What I love about TV drama is that all you have to do is curl up on the comfort of your own couch in front of your own TV.
And the lovely thing about a show like Baxter, Sean, is that you can sit down with your mom and with your kids.
You know, it's family-friendly television.
And even though it's dealing with these pertinent, you know, social and family dynamics, you know, it doesn't shy away from some of the issues that we have to deal with in our families and our culture.
Anybody that claims they don't have any issues in their family, just are not being honest.
Everybody has their own stuff.
Everybody.
Elizabeth and John Baxter have five adult children, so there's plenty of drama.
But it's how they deal with it.
And it's seeing this family through the lens of faith.
I think that is what separates it from other shows on television because we don't rarely get to see people that go to church.
We don't rarely get to see people that will stop in the middle of a crisis or concern for each other and see people holding hands and praying together in the name of Jesus on television.
We don't get to see that.
So I think this is what makes the Baxters really special.
And while it's made for everybody, it's an invitation to everybody to come and watch it.
But I think that people of faith in particular will enjoy seeing people who pray on television.
Well, we really appreciate what you do.
And I guess it's apropos to be launching it this holy week, Palm Sunday this past Sunday, Easter Sunday coming up.
I actually shared, I will share a link to your show on my social media.
We'll put it up on Hannity.com.
As well, I actually tweeted out, not tweeted, X'd out.
I had Linda do it because I don't have access.
My team won't give me access to social media, Roma.
They don't have any confidence in me.
And so they've taken away my passwords.
And I have to ask permission from people that work for me to actually post anything.
But that's another story for another day.
But I did put out Michael W. Smith's Bridgetown Arena concert.
If you like contemporary Christian music as I do, you're going to love this.
It really is.
It's like one Christian anthem after another.
Anyway, great to have you, Roma.
Please send my best to Mark.
We'll be watching the Baxters closely, and we wish you all the success as always.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, and happy Easter to you and your family.
You too.
Thank you.
800-941-Sean, our number.
All right, let's get to our busy telephones.
Paul in Nevada.
Paul, how are you?
Glad you called.
What's going on?
Hey, Sean, how's it going?
I'm good.
How are you?
What's going on?
Oh, just working in the garage today.
I got an old Jeep I'm working on and just tinkering around here.
I used to love doing that when I was a kid.
Yeah.
Yeah, I used an old 2006 Jeep TJ.
Just need the fake lift.
Yep.
Well, I made a mistake.
I used to paint my own cars, and I like burned my lungs out when I used Emmaron painting a work van of mine once.
Yeah, how stupid was that?
I used one of those white masks that are useless.
I really needed a respirator.
Oh, yes.
I hear that.
So one day I got a picture of my lungs.
The guy goes, you know, you have a lot of scar tissue.
I'm like, really?
Because I remember my lungs burning for about three months.
But anyway, quickly, I want you to get you a point.
What's on your mind?
I had a couple things.
I wanted to talk about the border guys getting all banged up last week.
I know they made a big deal with the January 6th, but wasn't that technically now an insurrection?
Isn't that like the definition of insurrection now?
Because Joe Biden back in 2020 said, come on, come all.
You're all.
You mean when the illegal immigrants rushed the gate, knocked over the wire and cut through and pushed through Texas National Guard and then celebrated at the border?
You mean those guys?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
The ones that, you know, come on, come on.
You're all welcome.
And he invited them.
So it's like, Trump didn't invite anybody to do any violent.
Just make your voice heard.
They went there.
They made their voice heard.
A couple people went in, probably whatever.
This was a whole big group.
Isn't that technically now the definition of?
Oh, I mean, what about the summer of 2020?
The 574 riots that killed dozens of Americans, injured thousands of cops, pelted with bricks, rocks, bottles, Molotov cocktails, and caused billions of property damage.
We didn't have a predetermined congressional hearing on any of that.
Didn't get to the bottom of it.
And we had a lot of Democrats, including your vice president, you know, saying they're not going to stop.
They shouldn't stop.
We're not going to stop.
I mean, it's absolute insanity, the double standard.
And now, what are we learning about the January 6th committee?
Oh, they conveniently withheld the testimony of the driver of the car of Donald Trump, and he testified that he never tried to commandeer that vehicle.
And what else did we learn?
Oh, a lot of the evidence has magically disappeared.
And what else have we learned?
That there were five people in a meeting and they all confirm that Donald Trump was talking about bringing in the National Guard in the days leading up to it.
And the police chief, the Capitol Police Chief, said he had actionable intelligence and was begging for the guard.
Huh.
All of that was just glossed over.
Anyway, appreciate the call, my friend, 800-941-Sean on number if you want to join us.
All right, that's going to wrap things up for today.
All right.
A lot of legal news tonight.
Jonathan Turley, Kerry Kupek is going to be on.
Also, we'll check in with Laura Trump.
We'll get Trump family reaction.
Oh, Senator Kennedy.
Wow.
He tore this guy up before the Senate in a committee earlier.
Wait till you hear this.
That's all coming up.
And Tommy Laron, Ari Fleischer, and Governor Sanders will join us as well.
That's all happening 9 Eastern, Setty DVR.
Hannity on Fox.
See you then back here tomorrow.
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