Rick Green [00:00:07] We found the intersection of faith and culture. Thanks for joining us on the WallBuilders show. It's good news Friday, looking forward to diving into that good news. I'm Rick Green here with David Barton and Tim Barton. Our website is wallbuilders.com, wallbuilds.com. Lots of great information you can find there. And also I want to encourage you to make a donation today. You know, all these good things that are happening right now, lots of good news from Washington DC down to the local level. That's happening because of the seeds that were planted and watered. And the fruit we're now seeing took a lot of investment over the years. Many of you out there have been donating to us for years and making that possible. Some of you you've been benefiting from it, but you hadn't donated yet. So go to wallbuilders.com today, make a donation and help us expand the influence of what WallBuilders has been doing for years. We appreciate you being part of it. Let's jump into some good news and, David, I think you're starting us off, man. What's the first piece of good news today?

David Barton [00:00:57] Well, I got to do a little head nod first. Mike Johnson, I am very grateful that Mike Johnson has now two additional seats in the House of Representatives. The two seats that were up in Florida, the, the folks that left to be part of the Trump administration only one of them actually ended up being part of Trump administration, but those seats Democrats outspent the Republicans big time to get those seats in Florida that they did not. So Republicans pick up two seats in house, just makes it a little easier for moving forward with the things Trump needs the house to do. That's, that's good news. Also good news in Wisconsin is that the people of Wisconsin, which tends to be a fairly purple state have overwhelmingly voted, they want voter ID in their elections. So they, they pass that initiative and going forward, they're going to have voter ID, so that's for voter election stuff in Wisconsin, and that's good too. 

Tim Barton [00:01:48] Well, you know,  in my mind, there's a level of irony with what happened in Wisconsin too, because they elected the very liberal justice to their Supreme Court. So now they have four very liberal, three fairly conservative justices on their state Supreme Court, but the same people that voted for the very strong liberal also overwhelmingly voted to say, we want to make sure we have some election integrity and security. Which it does tell us that the people of Wisconsin are not conservative overall, but that this is even a across the aisle issue when Democrats are posturing and pretending like it's only racist Republicans that want to do voter integrity because they call it voter suppression, et cetera, et, cetera, which of course it's not, it's not correct at all, but it does show where Trump has been brilliant is choosing some of these winning issues that both sides have people that largely agreed, yes, we should have secure boarders, we should remove criminal illegal aliens, we should secure elections, et cetera. These are not all that controversial issues, even when it comes to some of the gender stuff. We've seen California go the opposite direction on some of their gender positions, but that's not where the majority of the American people are. And I think it's what we saw even in the purple state of Wisconsin, where they were not in favor of the conservative justice overall, but they were in favor of election integrity. And so that is good news that this is becoming a winning issue on both sides that is not so polarized that Democrats are saying, no, open elections to everybody. There are still some very logical people. Even if they're voting on the liberal side, they're logical when it comes to election integrity and security. And that is really good news. 

Rick Green [00:03:37] You guys know, so what was the percentage? I think it was overwhelming, right, on the voter ID thing, so it wasn't even. 

David Barton [00:03:42] It wasn't even close. No, it was not close. It was 62% in favor. So almost two thirds of the state. And that tells me too, that Brad, the, the conservative justice running, they did a very good job of demonizing him and making him Trump-esk back to eight years ago that the social media people were getting their, their news and social media from bad sources rather than good sources. And because there's no way as Tim pointed out, you get, you got to vote for something conservative and then get a super liberal justice in there. Unless you've got bad information or unless some type of a targeting campaign against him, which they put a lot of money into, just went the wrong way. And so I haven't seen all the analysis that he lost fairly handily. But this other one won overwhelmingly, which, you know, either they've got schizophrenia or their, their information source is not a good source for that election that, and particularly for Brad on that to say he was going for. 

Tim Barton [00:04:40] Or dad, I do think it's possible that there are some Democrats and liberals who are very strong in their liberal positions, but they still believe that Americans should be the one voting, that we should make sure we don't have a bunch of dead people voting, and we should be sure that there's not fraudulent stuff happening with elections. So two things can be true at once. You can still be a liberal and want election integrity. So I do think that is a third option, but dad, to your point, I think it's very possible that the campaigns and the ads and the social media blitzes and everything else going on, certainly a lot of money, the most money spent ever on a judicial election was spent on this judicial election. And so much of that money was going to tarnishing and smearing his name. It certainly seems like that was affected to some extent. 

Rick Green [00:05:33] Yeah, I'm wishing, you know, if I could have had just 1% of what they had when I ran for Supreme court, just one, just 1%, just 1%. That would have been enough to win a race, man. Crazy what they spent up there. But yeah, I, I do think so many of these issues and Tim, I think you mentioned this last week on good news Friday or in one of our programs, you know, the, the polling on so many, these issues where Trump is picking these things wisely, where there's a lot of Democrats that are you know, they're they're on there with us on the issue when they find out it's him that's pushing it then they're against it just out of emotion, but it's you know, it's 70 30 issues or 80 20 issues that he picks and as part of the reason, you know he's having so much success and the numbers keep pushing his way. I think let's see. I guess that was all David's piece of good news. Tim, what's your first piece of Good News today? 

Tim Barton [00:06:17] Well, mine is actually going back to, Arkansas. I was up there this week, I think Wednesday I was up there to testify on 10 commandment bill. But also, uh the civics education bill,  my dad and I had gone up and testified on it,  several weeks ago and, and they, uh referred to it as a founding father's bill. It is the Bill that encourages students to know the why behind the what. So the what being the Declaration, Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the why behind it is why did they choose phrases like the laws of nature, nature's God? Why did they think there was a divine creator who gave an animal rights? And, and what were those enable rights? And so it's digging into more of that. Well, that passed in the Senate. So it's already passed in house, it passed in a Senate. Now it goes on to governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders desk.... and there's every expectation she is gonna sign that uh... we've actually I've been given an unofficial informal invitation to this point to be at the signing, which is just super exciting. Arkansas is the first state at this point doing something like this that requires their students to actually go back and learn the why behind the what. Because as we're going to see next year when President Trump is promoting a lot of the 250th anniversary of America, we, of course, are going to be talking a lot about that. Rick, you have a huge event planned at Patriot Academy campus. We're gonna be speaking at several big events. We actually might even be part of helping some of what the president does in some of these areas. That's unclear to what extent at the moment, and so we're not talking about some of those details yet, but we're gonna to be doing a lot of those things, but as we're helping maybe restore a little bit of the pro-American spirit, and we, meaning a lot these leaders, There's a lot of these organizations, not the least of which President Trump promoting these ideas, as there's a move to restore the American spirit. it's gonna be hard to maintain that if you don't understand some of the background of it. To tell kids that the Founding Fathers were brilliant and they don't know why they were brilliant, to tell them they did incredible things and we really don't even know what they did much less why they did it, then it's not going to be as effective as they're hoping it will be. And so learning the why behind the what gives the foundation that when we say America is one of the greatest, most successful, prosperous, stable nations in the history of the world, and we ask, well, why is that? These are students that are going to be learning the why, what made us different, where did these ideas come from? And this is just really incredible. I think probably this will be a model that a lot of states will embrace going forward. So we'll probably see this past in many states, but just really, really good news coming out of Arkansas and hope Duke was the one who carried that on their house side It was her bill and so kudos to her but really everybody involved in this just really cool and good news coming out of, Arkansas 

Rick Green [00:09:23] Yeah. And Tim, just to emphasize what you're saying on the, you know, the 250th. I mean, really this whole next year and whatever we got a few months, I think it's like 450 days before July 4th, 2026. And just the, the fact that people are going to be talking about it so much and it's going to, you everything from the white house to local celebrations. It's just a great, great opportunity for people to get clued in, know those declaration principles, know that formula, like you were saying that produces all of these freedoms that we enjoy and take advantage of this opportunity. We don't want to miss this window where people are willing to listen and the topic comes up. So everybody needs to be prepared to educate everybody that they can in their circles. So if you hadn't done a biblical citizenship class, get that done. We'll have more things available for you coming soon. But right now is a great time to be digging into these things. Let's take a quick break, guys. We'll come back. We've got more good news for you folks. You're listening to The WallBuilders Show. It's Good News Friday. 

Rick Green [00:11:22] Welcome back. Thanks for staying with us on the WallBuilders Show today for Good News Friday. Let's jump right back in with some more good news, David. 

David Barton [00:11:29] I'm going to listen for the sound of astonishment after I say this, but this piece of good news comes from CNN. Okay, reaction. 

Rick Green [00:11:36] So Tim, should we really overdo it? Should we just like, like in unison go. 

Tim Barton [00:11:44] Yeah, yeah. Well, I think it depends on if it's coming from the conservative commentator over there, Scott, whatever his name is. Oh, that one guy. 

Rick Green [00:11:49] Oh, that one guy that just nails it every time? 

Tim Barton [00:11:52] Yeah, if it's coming from him, then no, I'm not really surprised, but if it is coming from anybody else, I am super surprised. 

David Barton [00:11:59] Well, it's coming from their data analyst and their pollster, Harry Eaton. And he,  he kind of probably shocked his viewers when he talked about the fact that Trump's popularity is now at a record high, he has the largest share of Americans behind him. The largest share of American's believe that America is now on the right track of any president back since George W. Bush. So you have to go back to the start of the century. It was, that seems so weird to say century. I know we're 25 years in now. So quarter century in, but he's more pop Trump is now more popular than he was the first time. He's also more popular than George W. Bush was in his second term. He's now more popular then Obama was, and now more popular than Biden was. So he, he now holds the record. And as you look about where, where he is and, you know, historically, this is not where presidents have been in a long time. So all that to say with this record setting high, do you know what his net favorability rating is right now? It is minus four. So he's got a minus four net favor ability rating, and that is the highest of any president this century. I mean, that that's wild, which tells you kind of where Americans are. Right now, 42% of the nation is behind him and thanks for moving the right direction. Now, compare that, that's higher than it. 

Rick Green [00:13:23] Wait, David, explain that net favorability, so that's your favorables minus your unfavorables. 

David Barton [00:13:32] That's right so favorables, minus unfavorables, he's still at minus four, but that's higher. Kamala Harris was at only 27% where he's at 42%. So you got a 15 point choice in his direction over what the Democrat was, and he has actually moved up since the election. So what we've got is a country that is so divided that it, it just. It's schizophrenic in many ways. And we've talked about that before product of education, media, and so many other things that we've had over the last 30, 40 years. But nonetheless, Trump is moving in that right direction. And this, he had it when he first was the first term, he had a minus 10 and then, um, when he was immediately elected, he had a minor seven and that's down to minus four, so he's moving more more people his direction. It's weird to say that a minus number is actually good news, but this is, again, the highest of anybody this century except George W. Bush's first term. So that means people are getting behind him, moving the right direction. He's been able to convert people over to his behavior as far as what he's doing as a president, the things he's done for the country. And that's good news that we're picking of people on the other side. because we've been so polarized for so long, just having any gain at all in that is good for the country, good for our longevity. So I think that's good news. And, you know, that had the shock, CNN's people. And by the way, he actually addressed the CNN people and he told them, look, this is shocking to you and this is not what you want, but I'm telling you, he says, this his phrase, he says Trump's favorability right now is through the roof. And that was his word. So when you're down minus four, and it's only 42% and you're through the roof, that tells you where the stats normally are for presidents in the last several decades. 

Tim Barton [00:15:27] Hey dad, I think it's also probably worth,  identifying that when we're looking at those net favorabilities, probably we're looking at where president Obama finished because where president Obama started, he was super popular, but once people realize that he wasn't quite the moderate, he, was presumed to be and similar with Joe Biden when, when he was running for president and they were pitching and he's this really moderate guy. He's going to stay in the middle. And then you realize, no, he's got radical policies. The people he surrounded himself with are incredibly radical. It's easy to see why the nation felt very different going forward. But just kind of interesting where Trump is now and how, where he is now is higher than, than where Obama finished and certainly than where Biden was. 

David Barton [00:16:11] And to point out what this guy said, on his polling, this is the second highest since 2009, which is immediately after Obama was elected. So his highest that he has on his record as a pollster is Obama in the year 2009 and every year after that was lower than where Trump is now. But the NBC news poll also there was with CNN. that Trump is higher than Obama was at any point in his presidency with NBC. So that's, it's a kind of, you would think that, yeah, certainly Obama would, would take that, but for the CNN guy, he has Obama hire for one year, 2009. But NBC finds that Trump has hired than anything since 2004. 

Tim Barton [00:16:58] Yeah. Well, and I was thinking that because, you know, we, we know people that wanted to say they voted for the first black president. And so we know many Republicans that, you, you generally good hearted people and they just thought they wanted to be on the right side of history. And, and so there was a lot of support for Obama early on. But very quickly, people begin to discover, he's not quite who he promoted himself to be or maybe who the media promoted himself or promoted Obama to be. But interesting, it was only his first year and it was downhill after that. That really is remarkable. With all of the time the media has spent running up President Trump's negatives and obviously, President Trump has been in the spotlight now for nine, 10 years. So people are very familiar with him as attitude, his personality, his actions, et cetera, and the fact that he is, he is the highest basically of anybody in the last 20 years is crazy.  And it does give perspective that when people talk about how bad he is. One of the things we talk about with American history, when someone says, well, the founding fathers were so bad or like the Puritans, easy example, the Puritan's were so intolerant, you always have to ask compared to who? And, and if you're saying president Trump is so bad compared to who, because higher favorability than Joe Biden, higher favor ability than his first term, a higher favor, ability than president Obama for seven years of his term. So right again, compared to, who, and that's not something we hear in the media, and so that is really good news that I'm glad, I'm glad you brought some clarity to that. That's awesome. 

Rick Green [00:18:34] And I think as bad as the media was for Trump, they were that good for Obama. Like you're saying, I mean, like the fact that, that Obama's favorables went down, even with the media, you know, covering any of the mistakes or, you know, making him look good all the time. And then the opposite, they, everything Trump does, they tried to make it look bad. It's remarkable that with the. Doing a complete 180 on those two, that the polling actually is better for Donald Trump. So huge, huge art, Tim, next piece of good news. 

Tim Barton [00:19:02] Well, this one is from Washington, D.C. It says, Trump signs order cracking down on crime, homeless encampment in D. C. Guys, as we travel all over the nation, there are many places we go. And at this point, it's not surprising, but sometimes just the level of the garbage and the trash and the conditions, it's always a little shocking to the senses when you see how bad some of this is. Well, that's the way DC had gotten, and so President Trump signed an executive order on March 27th. And this was to create a task force to help crack down on crime in Washington, DC. In addition to ensuring the quality of life laws and the nation's capital are enforced. And this is where he told, uh the mayor that you can clean it up or I'm going to. And after the executive order, they begin cleaning things up. Uh he identified they wanted to solve some of the crime problems. And so there's several things in this executive order. Again, it's worth identifying that you have a president who paid a lot of attention to it and is now taking action to say that we shouldn't be doing this, especially not the nation's capital, especially when this is one of the top true spots in the nation. This is where school groups from all over the nation come every single year. And to have it be a place that it's very dangerous at times and kids can't go certain places because... of the danger of drug addicts from these homeless encampments and people that are not in their right state of mind that could do some very bad things so we are seeing the the city of Washington DC or the federal district of Columbia we are saying it be cleaned up and so This is really good news coming from President Trump's executive order. 

David Barton [00:20:50] And this is a thing too that's really big, even constitutionally, because until the 1960s when Congress gave Washington DC home rule, it was the president who was also essentially the mayor of Washington DC because the federal government is the federal city and the federal government is to run that city. And in the 1960's Congress passed a bill that said, well, we'll let the mayor run it, but we always have veto power over what the mayor does. And so essentially Trump said, Hey, I think I'm going to become mayor as well. I'm gonna make myself mayor of Washington D.C. If you don't get this stuff cleaned up and changed. And that is great leverage to have. Um, and he met with, with Muriel Bowser, who is the mayor. And she said it was a great meeting. That was her response, which is surprising as well, but you're right, Tim. They're definitely making steps the right direction, which they need to. Uh, when you see this, the nation's capital, it needs to look like the capital and not like downtown big city, you know, Chicago, Portland, other places as well. So you're right. That is great news. 

Rick Green [00:21:49] I'm shocked, honestly, that she said it was a great meeting. I mean, think about what's happening, right? I mean what was the, let's see, it was Kid Rock and Bill Maher met with President Trump and everybody came away from that and said it's a great meet. In fact, Kid Rock was, it, it's interesting guys, when I was listening to his, his, I think it was on Fox and Friends or something right after and he was, he said, you know, these guys are diametrically opposed on so many things, but yet they had a conversation. They found common ground. As he's describing it, the more he's describing it I'm thinking, I mean, that's civil discourse. That's what the founders would have done. Right. I mean they were diametrically opposed sometimes on some issues, but they didn't say, I'm not going to talk to you. They didn't just, you know, refused to meet or to show up for work or any of those things. It's really, I think it's healthy right now. And nobody would have seen that coming from Donald Trump, right? Everybody would have thought, oh, he's just,  he's somebody that's so, such a lightning rod. That that kind of thing would not happen. So the fact that you just said that, that the, you know, I forget her name, Mayor Bowser said the meeting went well. I just, man, that's really good stuff guys. 

David Barton [00:22:52] Yeah, it is. Good stuff. Next piece I've got is from Wisconsin. And it actually, well, it's actually from Washington, D.C., speaking of Washington, DC. It's the fact that the Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case coming from Wisconsin, and the case they've agreed to here is a religious liberty case, and it has really big implications for extending further the religious liberties that we've been seeing in the recent years from the court. and they just had the oral arguments in this case, and even the Democrats clearly appear, Democrats on the court, and I can't, I guess I can say they're Democrats in court, even the liberals on the Court, the progressives of the Court appear to clearly be siding with the conservatives on this one. And it goes to Wisconsin, where Wisconsin is one of the many states that has income tax, et cetera. And like the federal government, you can have certain exemptions from taxes that reduce your state income taxes, and one is religious exemptions. And just like you fear 501 C three nonprofit, you're exempted from certain federal penalties and taxes, et cetera. And so states do that as well, except in Wisconsin, they said, you know, we know that you're the Catholic Charities Bureau and we know that you take care of all the Catholic charities in Wisconsin. But we don't think you qualify as a religious organization and they defined a religious organizations to mean unless you're on the street essentially doing street evangelism. They called it proselytizing, but unless you're actively trying to convert someone to your faith, you're not a religious organization. Now, that is such a narrow reading that that would wipe out WallBuilders if we were in Wisconsin, which thankfully we're not. I'm sorry, that was a downer on Wisconsin, but I love Texas more than I love Wisconsin, so right up front, you know? 

Tim Barton [00:24:42] Well, and I do think, by the way, we are pretty open about our faith, and we do allude often that people should read the Bible, they should know God and Jesus, so I don't think that we're not encouraging people to convert to Christianity or to understand the biblical foundation and the principles and application and how it makes life better. So I think we're pretty open and clear about this, but add to your point, if they say, well, you didn't give an altar call every week, right? I mean, depending on how they define this, it could be rather ridiculous, but certainly You know, we are pretty faith motivated in a lot of what we do.

David Barton [00:25:15] Well, and that is the problem is they defined it in the most narrow way so they can exclude as many organizations as they can so they get more tax money. And that's the problem with progressives. They all want more money for their programs. And what they're doing now is trying to squeeze out religious organizations. And at the court, the justice, including Kagan, were very unsympathetic and very unreceptive to the arguments from Wisconsin. So it looks like we're going to have a good decision on religious liberty coming down from the Supreme Court later this year, probably before June. But that's a piece of good news as well is the Supreme court is still moving in the direction of protecting religious liberties. It clearly appears. We'll see by June, but it sure appeared that way in the court arguments. 

Rick Green [00:25:59] And I can't, I can remember the last loss on, on religious liberty. It's, it's been a, it has been a pretty good streak that we've had for the last few years and just a lot of, a lot of good cases, a lot of goodies and of course folks at home that, that means the jail cell door is unlocked, you've got to push it open and you've gotta live out that faith. What good is the freedom of religion if you're not living out your faith? And we need to make sure that we're being vocal and that, we're taking advantage of these opportunities and restoring a God consciousness in our communities. That's the reason. Tim and David are going around testifying in all these legislatures for the Ten Commandments bills and everything else. But we at home have to do the work in our community. So be thinking about what you can do to make a difference over these next few months leading into the 250th birthday of the nation. Thanks for listening to our Good News Friday program today. You've been listening to The WallBuilder Show.