Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: Okay. Welcome to today's episode of the Code Red podcast. We are thrilled to have a special guest with us, Eric Dellenbach, the faith and community based liaison to Governor Ron DeSantis. Eric has been a critical figure in Florida's faith community and the community based initiative, bridging faith communities and state government, causing those two to work together when they have mutual interest. And prior to this role, Eric spent seven years as the president and executive director of the Tim Tebow foundation, where he launched an impactful program, a night to shine, that many of you have heard of, and a global movement to celebrate individuals with special needs. Eric has also served as the executive producer for the movie Run the Race and has consulted some of the top nonprofits in the philanthropy world. And so we're excited to dive into this incredible journey and the powerful work that he's doing to make a difference in communities across our state and beyond. So, Eric, thank you for joining us.
[00:01:11] Speaker B: I'm thrilled to be with you, man. There's nothing more uncomfortable than an introduction bio, but yes, I'm thrilled to be with you. Thanks for having me on today.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: Well, we wanted to be in person today, but the hurricane kind of threw a wrench in our plans. And so I'm thankful technology allows us to jump on here and meet virtually.
[00:01:31] Speaker B: Yeah, it's interesting, right? I mean, most Floridians right now, whenever they watch this, will think, which hurricane? Because it feels like we're doing one every couple weeks right now, so. But you're right, I would have much rather been next to you, but I'm still thrilled that technology has made it possible.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: Yeah, we just wrapped up milton just for the sake of those that are watching this later. And it wasn't a quite as bad as we had prepared for. But, you know, kudos to Governor DeSantis. He always leads us well through situations like this, and he's been in front of the camera frequently giving us updates. So everybody, if anything, was over prepared, and that's always a good thing. Do you have any word on how things are progressing and the cleanup and all of that recovery from the governor's office?
[00:02:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, we're so. I think the home away from home has become the emergency operations center. The governor seems to be in there as much as he's in the office or the mansion lately anyways. And so we're doing constant, continual updates through the night, through the morning. All reports. Look how you just worded it, which is that when that storm was brewing out in the gulf at 180 miles an hour, and we were bracing for what might be, I think they said, the fifth biggest storm in the atlantic basin ever. And so to think of from coming to that to where today our reports are coming in, I think praise God is an appropriate answer for that. That weakening that happened, the southern shift. I mean, so there's somehow a dry, I don't, I don't want to sound like a meteorologist, but that dryness that kind of kicked up. If you look at like what Fort Myers experienced, they still got very, very wet, but nothing like we expected.
So we're always thrilled when, when all those kind of things that we prep for don't happen.
[00:03:10] Speaker A: Right. My wife, we were talking last night as we were watching the report, and I said, you know, it doesn't look like it's going to be as bad as we thought. What's the cause of that? What do you expect to happen? He said, well, you know, a lot of people were praying and so, you know, the first human instinct is, well, there had to be something, you know, and then, but, you know, we did ask the Lord to protect us and he seems to have done that. So we're very thankful for that.
[00:03:38] Speaker B: So we've been on a, I know we're going to talk about this in a minute, but we've been on a bus tour speaking about amendment four. And I got one gentleman that's on the bus tours from Tampa, one's from Fort Myers. I'm up currently in St. Augustine. And we were talking about what an odd prayer time that is, right? Like, oh, God, please shift it north or please shift it south. We finally agreed that our best prayer would be just, that it would dissipate. And then sure enough, you know, you, you have to, I think of the ten lepers all the time, right. You better go back and say thank you. When God answers the prayer and we see cities, that whole, I mean, the whole, the whole Gulf shore basically was spared. I mean, and that's not making light of some people. That certainly, and tornadoes certainly did some damage, but comparatively what we thought was going to happen to Tampa Bay, we're all grateful.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Well, you know, and as we kind of move into this next part of the conversation, there's a lot of storms that are heading our way that we need to be praying over as well. And, you know, before we get into those social and ideological issues, tell me a little bit about your role, faith and community based liaison to the governor.
How did that come about? Is that something that started with DeSantis or is that something that you guys inherited. And how did you end up in that role?
[00:04:56] Speaker B: Oh, man. Great questions all the way around. So it has never existed, as far as we can tell, in the history of the state of Florida. There's never been a role like that.
There was a time during Governor Bush's administration where faith certainly was given an emphasis, a seat at the table, if you will. But no, this is a creation of Governor DeSantis kind of on day one. And the thought here, Zach, was that, and we'll delve into this deeper, but the thought was, we've got 20,000 faith institutions in Florida. 20,000.
We've got 110,000 nonprofits.
The early polling back in 2019, and still it's true, today, shows about 70% of our state's population says they are christian. About 3% says they are jewish. About 3% say they are of other faith, all other faiths combined. And then 24% would say they have no faith.
You know, I look at what Governor DeSantis did, it was. It's radically bold. I mean, let's put in perspective that only 14 states in the country right now have anything to do with faith and community at the governor's office level. Only two states, us. And very, very recently, Arkansas. We've been in this space almost six years, and Arkansas just added a person where me and that person are the only two that exist in the executive office of the governor. And as you can imagine, the closer you allow that role and position to be, the more lawsuits and the more challenges over some things. So when you think about this, and I kind of will put this in perspective, if 76% of our state says they are faith based, that equals about 16.9 million people in Florida. And I just, I've spent the last five and a half years thinking, my gosh, they're the biggest and most powerful people group in the whole state. And if they ever, if we could ever get it where our faith people talked about faith before they talked about the things they disagreed on, we really would not have many issues in the state, you know? And so I think what motivates me, and really what, what I think was the brainchild of the governor six years ago was, my gosh, this is the greatest infrastructure that is theologically aligned to serve vulnerable people. And maybe, and I'm sorry I'm making this answer so long, but such an important piece, because maybe what people miss a lot of times is because I was probably anti government five years or so, one, six years ago now, where I would have said, no way, I will never work in government. And I know as a faith person, I didn't really trust government, but what I think I was missing in that, what I would say to my friends now that are faith friends, I'd say, you know, every day, the people of faith and the people in the government, the good people in the government, wake up with the same desire which is to serve the most vulnerable of our state. And yet, and yet, through a tremendously misdefined separation of church and state, we had siloed. We had separated. And the person who loses in that siloed separation is our most vulnerable populations, because they're not served as effectively and efficiently as they could be. So that's kind of the beginning of it. The creation story of the faith and community initiative was to simply say, thank you, start to have some discussions. You referenced night to shine, too. One of the governor's early visions was he said, can we do something like night to shine as a state for children in foster care? And it was a really interesting question because obviously that was a problem for people with special needs. His idea, though, was simply, what do we do to help people experience our children in foster care and start to be engaged?
[00:08:31] Speaker A: What put that on his radar?
Is that something that he just has a heart for? Is that something that he discovered the need for foster care in Florida or what happened there?
[00:08:43] Speaker B: That's. Yeah, that's a great question. I was wondering. Yeah, so when he was running for Congress back in, I don't know, five or six years before he got governor, he.
I was running the Tebow foundation at the time, and both Tim and I knew who he was as a congressional candidate. We'd spent some time around him, actually got interviewed a couple times by now, the first lady on her old talk show back in Jacksonville. And so I think they had known what night to shine was because both Timmy and I were to knowledgeable of who they were, and his running for Congress, never knowing he'd be a governor, and a great one at that. But like, you know, they knew who we were, and we were trying to help them, you know, be elected. And then I think the foster care thing happened, because when you got into Congress, first lady and him both started doing what I call kind of a listening tour, just hearing what Floridians are saying. And the more they explored, my gosh, we have so many single moms in our state that have so many needs, and so they started going down that path on top of the fact that I think the governor is very intellectually practical. And so I think he probably thought, and again, I'm speculating a little, but I got pretty close knowledge on this would be. I think he thought if there was one topic that every faith, every denomination could rally around, it would be foster care. I mean, now, again, there's a language gap in church. We would say orphan and widow. We don't use the word orphan in state government, but that is our foster care child. And so I think he had the intelligence to say if we'd rolled out first with corrections or juvenile justice, I don't think every church could say, I want in. But in foster care, it's the.
I've not met the church yet that I want to care for kids. And so I think it's just a brilliant thought in the early days.
[00:10:26] Speaker A: Well, we. We're grateful for it as a family. My wife's mother was a foster child, and she was fostered by a family that took her to church, introduced her to Christ, and just really changed the trajectory of her family legacy. And so I'm the beneficiary of that. And we, as a church, want to do everything we can to help and encourage foster care. And, you know, the state, the government, it's one of the lesser authorities. It's under God. But it's God's established authority and his plan to just keep things in a world that's cursed by sin and people who are sinners from becoming anarchists and things just going crazy. And so we pray, according to the New Testament, for good government and for government that will allow for both our religious freedoms and create a peace that can be sustained here in our state. And so we're very thankful for what Governor DeSantis and what the administration has done in that regard.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: I love it. And the first lady would jump in immediately, and she would say the number one thing she learned is that one person making a meaningful relationship and caring about one person is what makes the change. And so, as you share your family story, somebody coming into the picture with meaningful care and brings generational change, as you're alluding to one of the things, I don't want to oversimplify government, but I think this is always helpful. There's two things that I think are helpful to understand. I think government only really does three things. One, they deal with money. We have a large budget in the state and fund a lot of things. Two, legislation. So we write law and write statutes. And then three. And the one that's less talked about is that government is the home of a tremendous amount of information.
I would say if a church came up to me and said, I want to start a foster care ministry, which I've had many say to me over the years. I'm like, great. What are you thinking of doing?
I've got one member that's part of, and I got another. And I think it, and I think I'm going to go figure out where the foster care kids are, and I'm going to, I think I can really build that. And it's like, I don't know that. And again, it's because government's always been closed off to this. But right now, the Department of Children and Families knows every name, every story of the 23,332 children that were in foster care in 2019. And so I think one of the things we've done to the governor's faith community initiative is just start to give out information. And, well, who are we giving it? I don't, you know, there's a lot we can't give out. But to the extent we can tell, well, who better to tell than the people that are sitting in their faith institutions, their church every Saturday, Sunday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. I mean, it feels like I've been joking. I feel like, I feel like you all now have services every day, but Tuesday, it seems to be the only day that I don't hear of services. But, but I mean, well, it says.
[00:13:13] Speaker A: You know, it says that we're to do this all the more as the day draweth near.
[00:13:17] Speaker B: It's, I think you could catch a service every day of the week. So that's the other one piece, I'll tell you that, because I think your listeners will enjoy the thought of this government in its simplicity. Get my hands in a little narrower. Here really only exists from the moment to serve when the moment crisis begins. The moment crisis ends. And so people always ask me about the separation of church and state. And, of course, what Thomas Jefferson meant in that letter, not the constitution, was imperative, which is government stays out of the business of the church, and there's no national church. But the problem is, if government's role is beginning a moment crisis ends. Moment crisis ends. Well, where's the church? And I think what we've tried to show in the past six years is the church is here, it is prevention, it is love and compassion during crisis, and it is community on the other end. And so actually, it's interesting that government is far more limited than what faith is. To your point, it's the lesser of the two in the church never stops having a role, which is why it was God's plan. A. It's why it was set up that way.
[00:14:16] Speaker A: Amen. So I assume your work with Tebow was what connected you with Desantis. Is that accurate?
[00:14:25] Speaker B: Well, kind of. So I have my whole world, Zach. And again, that's two. That's a whole other podcast, probably. But, you know, I spent twelve years in the college bowl business, and I got to start the first ever ACC championship.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:14:37] Speaker B: And I. So I learned early that I didn't mind starting things, so that was helpful. But there were two things that came out of being in the football business for twelve years. One, I achieved the career I thought was the main point of my life at 30 years old and realized that the thing I thought was the thing wasn't the thing. And so, like many christians, you start to have to deal with, uh oh. Like, there better be more than this. And so it started me on a journey of, like, even looking at what would ministry be like, what is it like to have a different purpose? And so that led me to Tim. The second thing I would tell you in that is that my life, a little woman in Haiti, walks up to me and she pops her finger in my chest and she says, eric, you'll never unsee what you've seen today. And that little phrase has become an anthem of my career and my life, which is, she was right about Haiti. I break for Haiti every time I think about it. Today, however, she was so much more right because I think my whole career has been a series of hopefully pursuing God's will, trying to be obedient, but also these moments of, you can't unsee what you've seen. And so it's just kind of been an evolution of the part. And again, I don't want to add to my bio, but I have to put one piece in there. So you. I had left him in 2017 because I did way too many miles on a plane when I have five children. And so I went to go start Chris Tomlin's foundation and Chris Tomlin's foundation. We were going to build a national, we did build a national foster care nonprofit. And so, interestingly, as God would do it, I'm over there working building Chris's nonprofit. The governor gets elected and says, I want to give faith and community a seat at the table. We want foster care to be the first priority. And so you just can't help but kind of smile at, like, this phenomenal tapestry that God's weaving. I did turn it down in the beginning because I had no interest in, I mean, I've met him. Now, I've met the people that do, but most of us that are serving the ministry don't ever go, you know, what I'd like to do next is government.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:16:35] Speaker B: So it was a little weird, but beautiful.
[00:16:37] Speaker A: My son is currently serving as an intern in DC with Aaron Dean.
[00:16:43] Speaker B: Wonderful.
[00:16:44] Speaker A: And so he's a great senior at University of Florida. But he came up to me, he said, dad, he said, you know, I don't sit around all day thinking about politics and government, so I'm not sure that this is what I need to do. And I, and I said, but he had pursued a degree in politics and political science, and he had really had the gift set for it, but it was not. He said, dad, it's not my passion. It's not why I don't get up every day watching Fox News. I don't think about it constantly. And I said, you know, that's kind of the guy that I want in office. He meant thinks about bigger things than the next election, you know? And so he took that as a little nudge. He's just kind of, you know, scoping it out currently. But it's fun to watch, you know, himself out from one world into the other.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: Good for him, first off, for being a gator and Polly sign major. I'm thrilled for both. But, you know, ultimately, the question should be asked of our leaders, right. It's like, kind of, where is their ultimate authority? And if the ultimate authority is the next election, the next vote. I think that's been one of the most fascinating parts of being so close with a, the governor and the first lady is this man. I mean, because again, people are like, did you go work for DeSantis? Because he was popular. I was, like, popular when he, when he won. Most, most people in Florida remember this, he won by less than 1%. He won by 0.8% to Andrew Gillum, who, of course, ended up being. It's hard for even me to fathom that he would have been our governor. And so when I started with him, he was an unknown. And so when he was saying, hey, I want faith to be a priority, there was a lot of my early impression that was like, man, we'll see. Like, we'll see if he wants to do a strong. Because nobody was doing it. To this day, we are leading so many states because of the boldness he showed six years ago. Because think about this. One of the boldest things that happened in Florida was churches being named essential during COVID And, you know, you are calling your buddies in other states and saying how to go for you. And they. They can't even talk about it because of how bad it went for many of them, whereas we were deemed early on. And that you talk about giving me the opportunity to have a bipartisan message.
Those moments in those days back in early 2020 was phenomenal because people started realizing we meant it when we said, this is going to be for all faith, these 16.9 million people. And that was the first way to get to show it.
[00:19:07] Speaker A: Wow. Yeah, I forgot about that. But it was it, you know, when I talked to other people, we can't. We came out of COVID very strong as a church, but when I talked to other pastors in other states, they say, you guys pretty much didn't participate in Covid, did you? And I said, it's different in Florida, you know, but we thank God for that. It really kept us strong through it.
[00:19:27] Speaker B: Well, you think now, just for fun, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I got have your listeners now think like, again, it felt like it was what it was. And I've dealt with a bunch of pastors who have guilt for closing at all. And I'm always quick to say, hey, pastor, just know I was at home wiping my cereal boxes down with baby wipes. So, like, I have no judgment. We all did what we thought we could do. But you think about not just the nature of was that bold and was that good for the church? Think of the church being open, how good it was for the people of Florida. Like, I think of how many mental health things we're not dealing with because we had two years of the church still having his doors open. There's just so much there that we'll study. I mean, a generation after us will really study all that. But it will be a fascinating thing to see how you cannot remove what God had set up as plan a for his people.
[00:20:15] Speaker A: Well, it's certainly been pivotal the last few years and the time that defendants has been in office.
We're coming up in November to another pivotal national election and on the ballot. There are a few amendments to the Florida state constitution that I wanted to delve into in the time that we have, specifically four and three, and maybe we could tackle them in that order.
[00:20:39] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:20:40] Speaker A: First, let me let you just kind of unpack amendment four and tell us any kind of concerns that you may have. I've heard from the governor's office about this, and I know where you guys are at, but I'm going to scotty it up and let you have a go. At. What are the issues with amendment four?
[00:20:57] Speaker B: Well, okay. I mean, we can spend the rest of time on that, but I'll simply say there's a few major things that people need to understand. If I could share just a few 30,000 foot things. Number one, I would say we have got to change the fact that 30% of people that are sitting in our churches every Sunday are still not registered to vote. So we have a first. The core problem, which is people have said, I want to separate my faith from my politics, therefore I won't vote. I finally said to a few people recently, I said, look, if all you do is go vote against amendment four, you don't pick a single candidate. It would still be worth it. And so we've got you restate those stats.
[00:21:32] Speaker A: What is the percentage of christians in Florida that are not registered?
[00:21:36] Speaker B: 30% of adult christians.
[00:21:38] Speaker A: 30% are registered.
[00:21:40] Speaker B: Are not registered.
[00:21:41] Speaker A: Are not registered. Right. Okay.
Can you break that down any. Is that a. Is that in a particular urban area? Is it throughout the state?
[00:21:52] Speaker B: It is literally across the state, across all socioeconomic statuses. It's amazing. There's. I will send you personally when we're done with this. All the data on. It's all on websites, but I would say I don't see it being along a particular area. Now, our deadline to register to vote was last Monday. So I'm just saying. So the second thing, before I belabor that too long, the second thing is people need to understand the difference between a statute and a law versus a constitutional amendment. And what you're asking me about both of these constitutional amendments now, people, I think we're so burdened and bogged down by government rhetoric about all these different things. And we've heard abortion topics now for 50 plus years. And so I think people are like, well, it doesn't matter what happens this year. I'll just elect another good governor or another good legislature, and I'll just fix it. Right. And so let me just say to people of Florida that a constitutional amendment takes, 60% of it goes on the general ballot. It takes 60% to become enshrined as an amendment to the constitution. In the history of Florida, only one constitutional amendment has ever been taken off. This one will not come off because we know that that was back when it was 50%. Now it's 60%. And so I need most people that are hear me to understand that a constitutional amendment, if it gets put on on November 5, none of us will live to see it off. So this is the reason I have to set that is because I need people to hear this is high stakes. Right. The third thing is that this constitutional amendment was put on by a citizens initiative, which means that somebody went and got a million petitions to put this on the. On the ballot. Right. And then the Supreme Court said yes, which is. I know a lot of people have questions to how that happened in the state, but. But let me just real quickly on that. A million signatures.
And it was funded $15 million to get that million signatures, all by out of state money. And the three funders were ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and open society, which is George Soros. So I talked to my kids. I got two young men. One's at Florida also. So he's following your son's footsteps. But I tell him, I said, if you ever want to understand something, first go to the motives.
Why is someone investing $15 million for our abortion laws in a state they don't even live in? Right? And this is what's happening. There is a master strategy to this. When Roe v. Wade got overturned, a bunch of our people of faith were like, wow, we did it. We won, we prayed, whatever the answer was. And in the meantime, the pro abortion groups were already strategizing and figuring this out. That's why the craziest stat that I'll share with you today, Zach, in my opinion, is that seven states have faced an amendment like this. And in all seven states, the amendment passed. So this is not like if people think, oh, there's no way it will pass. So here's the problem with Amendment four. So now, all that said, that's the high stakes of it. Here's the problem. The amendment is about 34 words long.
It is written. So most amendments have these huge four to eight pages of definitions that go behind them. This amendment is a little ballot summary, and the ballot summary happens to be longer than the amendment. And as you start to read through it, it was written in a way to intentionally deceive voters. And I always want to be real because I have no judgment on this, but I've sat in a voter ballot box many times and filled out the candidates I knew, got down to these amendments, and I'm reading them for the first time, and I'm like, I know what my principles are, but I don't know how to write that because I don't know which one's yes and which ones no. And so we've been out on a map, probably done 50 speeches on no, on four. Because what four does is it makes things like there's no definitions for viability or healthcare providers.
It does not include doctors. Healthcare providers alone changes the language that it took out physicians. But think to me, the scariest two pieces of this amendment are this amendment is written to allow late term abortions past the point a baby can feel pain. That's number one. Number two, and maybe equally as big, is that they remove. And it's so sneakily written. It's so sneakily. They say this does not change the parental notification. Well, it doesn't change the parental notification because parental notifications already in our constitution. So of course they can't change it. So why did they write something that was so obvious? Like, that'd be like, you know, again, if I wrote and said, this does not change another amendment. Well, of course it doesn't, but they wrote it because they want people to read notification and think consent. And they have changed in this amendment that abortion would become the only medical procedure in the state of Florida that could be undergone by a minor without parental consent.
[00:26:34] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:26:36] Speaker B: That's a, see, I, this is my general feeling on this amendment. I believe that people that are, this is not just a pro life amendment, it's just bad legislation. Right. And so we've been saying in 50 different speeches, every pro lifer should vote against this amendment and every pro choicer should vote against this amendment. Like, again, if you want to change something, if you don't like how you're let, then go and elect new legislature and elect new governors. But to enshrine something in our constitution that has ambiguous language that will be defined by courts and judges, now, that's a phenomenally dangerous play for something that wouldn't come off our books. And so the other thing a constitutional amendment does, and I'm not trying to give a civics lesson here, but it erases all current laws because that law, an amendment is superseding to all laws, meaning that they get to rewrite. Because the first words of that amendment says no law shall prohibit, restrict, delay, or penalize. And that's what you're seeing now in Michigan, they passed a similar amendment. They used the same words, and that word delay. So no law can delay an abortion. Well, what's that mean by delay in abortion? Well, in Michigan, they're claiming that includes not having money. And that's how Michigan is now facing taxpayer funded abortions. I mean, so these, these are games. And I feel like, I feel like, before I get too emotional on this, I'll say to you that I believe the anthem verse on this is hosea four six, which is my people will perish for a lack of knowledge. And if people understand what's written in this thing, it will get voted no.
But to get people to understand is a really a person by person educational discussion to say, please educate yourself before you walk in there and read something that says, limit government interference. And you're like, oh, I like, limit government interference, and you vote the wrong way from where your core beliefs and philosophy are. So that's the general issues with Amendment four.
[00:28:33] Speaker A: Well, let me say, in educating your friends, share this podcast, you know, help people hear this conversation, because 50 speeches, that's a lot. You've spoken to a lot of people, but we can. We can do that in three or four days if we could really get behind it and get the word out about what's really taking place in our state. And, you know, encourage. Encourage your educated friends in particular, to show up to vote, to vote no on the amendment. And, you know, let's. Let's see if we can. The last stats that I've heard, and correct me if I'm wrong, they're pulling pretty heavy on toward the 60%. Is that what you're hearing, or how are things looking?
[00:29:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, I guess if I were to want people to be encouraged, I'd say when this thing first came out, it was pulling like 68, 69% approval, which is mind bending to me. In our state now, we're seeing like 58 to 62. So we've certainly moved into the. Into the area where this thing is defeatable.
I would offer that. I would offer that. I think a bunch of people think, oh, I got to tell my pro choice friends about this. And, yes, I think you should, because I think. I don't know a person yet that really thinks no parental consent's a good idea. I haven't met that person yet. But I'll tell you who's scarier to me, is a bunch of really strong conservative republicans that go in to vote for candidates, and they just get down to that page and they're not informed. I mean, that's equally as dangerous to me because it's not that their convictions are whatever. I mean, this is something where they've got to be educated. And one of my most important things I say in every speech is the why. So, just. Here's the why. Sitting here today, we are a heartbeat bill protection state. Now, a bunch of your listeners probably don't like that. They wish we were at a zero week protection, because the truth is, 55% of abortions still happen before six weeks, and so. But we are a heartbeat bill protection state. And so at six weeks, we don't, we have tons of tons. And that's the other thing they're lying about on tv. We have tons of exceptions. Life of the mother and rape and ancestor, three of six. There's actually six total exceptions. And so I share that to say this fact, the difference between where we are today as a heartbeat protection bill state and where we'd be if this amendment passes 40,000 babies per year in the state of Florida.
[00:30:56] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:30:57] Speaker B: That's what's at state.
[00:30:58] Speaker A: Let me say. Thank you for using that term. You know, these are babies we're talking about.
You know, my conviction is to abolish abortion. You know, that's where I, where I'm want to see us go. But I'm also an incrementalist, and I want to, I know that we have to take steps along the way. And I see this amendment as a biggest step backward.
[00:31:21] Speaker B: There's no doubt. I mean, I think people need to picture it. That's where I've gotten to them. Like, picture 40,000 per year. So you got to go to, you got to go way bigger than an arena. You got to move over to an NFL stadium. You got to go two thirds of an NFL stadium. That's what's at stake. And then people are starting to use this little phrase around Florida, where Florida would become an abortion tourism destination state, which the reason they're saying that is because we've got a very conservative southeastern us that has very conservative abortion laws. And we know that people are going to be coming. Well, on top of that, we know from just three years ago, when we were a 24 week state that Central and South America residents were coming to Florida to have abortions. And so I had a pastor say to me recently, he said, we cannot allow it to be true that the most dangerous place to be in Florida is inside a mother's womb. And I just, that got me.
[00:32:15] Speaker A: Well, we're certainly praying that, that this amendment is voted down. And as I said before, you know, like share comment, do everything you can, because, not because it matters about this program, it matters because it gets more eyeballs and ears hearing what's taking place and getting this information before they go into the voting box.
Let me transition a little bit, which is very bizarre to me in some ways that we're talking about something as fundamental as the life of a baby. And in the same, same election year, we're talking about legalizing the recreational use of weed. And those two things seem so different in importance. But, but we're, those are two amendments that we're, that we're facing this year with amendment three also. And basically, my understanding is that it would legalize the recreational use of marijuana. It's already legal in the medical sets in the state of Florida, which I don't, I don't fully understand it, but I've heard good things, that a lot of people have been helped by it, and so I don't apply that outright.
But when it comes to the recreational use, would it turn us into a Colorado? What's the nature of that amendment?
[00:33:41] Speaker B: Well, I want to say one last thing about four that will lead into three. Our ask of four is really simple. We're asking people to pray, like, as a first response, not a last resort. Like, let that be our leading edge, because discernment is going to be key here. We need a bunch of people to be discerning of what is actually being sold to them. And that will lead into three. We're asking them to preach about it, which is, yes, from our pulpits and stages, because the truth is, no ad campaign can ever make up for what isn't said on our pulpits and stages and podiums. And so we're begging faith leaders to talk about amendment four in a different way than I can beg them to talk about three if we're just, you know, we'll talk about that in a second. And then finally, we need to grow everybody whose knowledge on this. So going back to pray for a second, you know, one of the things that I feel very comfortable saying to people is, you got to remember that the enemy is a father of lies. Lies are woven through this whole thing. So as we talk about amendment three, let's just have a fun discussion about the craziness of this amendment one. Almost every society that has adopted a legalized marijuana amendment now wants out. Like they. I mean, in Colorado right now, one out of four traffic incidences are tied to marijuana, right? So this is not like, if you start surveying these, these cultures, they're like, well, we don't want it anymore. Like, we thought it was going to be one thing. It's not. And so let me tell you some of the things they're just lying to us about. One is that sitting here today in the Florida state prison system, just. Just talk to the secretary, top person for our prisons. You know how many people, Zach, are in prison for sale, possession, or use of marijuana?
Zero. Not one inmate in the 90,000 inmates in Florida is in there, because now, if you possessed or used and then got in a car accident. You're in prison. But, but, but I mean, and then the second thing is, there's not one word. There's not one word in the entire amendment that says that money is going to go to education.
And so if you think of the ads that you've seen recently, you're like, well, wait a minute. It says it's going to empty our prisms and add to education. They're lying. They're lying to you. And there's a really good ad out right now that kind of goes to lie number three, which is. And I don't. I don't know where the number is anymore. It was 80 million, but then I heard it got close to 100 million. But you're talking about $80 to $100 million invested by one company on this amendment from out of state money. And again, I'd say, hmm, Florida. What does that mean when one company, you think that's because they want you to have a marijuana yard in the back, in the marijuana garden in the back of your yard? Well, no, it isn't a. Is because that amendment allows marijuana bought from them. Like, again, read the amendment. The amendment doesn't say, like, if the person, you know, my neighbor says, hey, hey, I want to go grow marijuana. No, no, that's still illegal. That's still illegal. You can buy from this company that has funded the $80 to $100 million. Again, this is. It's scary to me. This is another one that's a citizens initiative. It's another one that got put on there in that way. And so I keep thinking, Zach, like, I think our flags as Floridians should be going off like crazy when a citizens initiative comes up and is so heavily backed by out of state dollars and why, you know, so I think if you look at that amendment, it's absolutely crazy. Now, having said that, I do want to make clear that when I talk to people of faith, I can look at a person of faith, you and I, talking to each other, and say, zach, I don't think there's any way that you can go till November 5 without talking about amendment four. I don't know how you study the book we study and don't talk about amendment four. I don't know how you feel good that there'll be some day of ultimate accountability where you get to say, I didn't talk about life. That's different than amendment three. Right? And so I'm very, very careful because as I'm out talking to faith leaders in particular.
I feel like sometimes I want to shake a few of them and say, you've got to talk about four, because if we wake up on November 6 and this thing's passed, the regret and remorse will be tremendous. In fact, I feel like my role on amendment four, and please hear the language of this, is to make sure that anyone who doesn't talk about it wasn't because they didn't know about it. If they didn't talk about it and they decided that's just not something they want to cover from their stage or pulpit.
They're not accountable to me. Now, if it's because they didn't hear about it, that's my fault. And so that's why we're. But amendment three is different. Amendment three is, it's a bad amendment. It will be bad for our state. It is clearly written, again, to deceive. It's clearly written in a way that, like, every ad they're running really has no truth in it. I would think that would be flags to Floridians, but it is still different than four.
[00:38:12] Speaker A: Well, it's the kind of thing, you know, part of, the, part of the role of government is to create these laws for the safety of our citizens, whether it's a speed limit or whatever it might be. But, you know, generally there's a wisdom call that comes into it that, is this going to be better for our people or worse for our people? And I have yet, you know, nearly 30 years of ministry to meet the guy who really didn't have his act together. He's really struggling in life. He couldn't get up and go, you know, keep a job. But then he tried marijuana, and things just all came together. You know, generally speaking, it's not been a helpful thing. And how many, I don't know what the stats would be on this, but the number of people who fled from California, Colorado, coming to Florida, looking for something different and walking outside every day and smelling the weed in the air, that's just going to become a normal thing in our state. This amendment passes.
How is that amendment polling so far?
[00:39:15] Speaker B: Yeah, so both. Both look in the beatable range. Again, I want to make sure, because sometimes I get off these calls and people are like, so which one? It is a no vote on three. It is a no vote on four. So let me make sure. No on three. No on four. Because I, you know, again, this is people, like, I heard all that. I agree with him. What's that mean?
[00:39:31] Speaker A: No on three, no on four.
[00:39:32] Speaker B: So I would say both of them look very defeatable.
There is no, no foot off the gas from now till November 5. We're 20 something days away. I mean, this is, this is a sprint at this point in time.
And so both are polling in the high fifties to low sixties, but we're feeling like everything we're doing is moving better, not worse. Like we've never had a day where it keeps going back up, which is great. Their ads aren't working. Floridians are smart enough to see through some of the deception. You know, all they do is use stories. You mentioned that comment, right? There's just stories. You know, Al did this for the first time, or Susie had this issue. Well, the reason they do stories one is because they don't want to talk about the actual amendments. I mean, there was an article that came out where a reporter snuck onto a call of the yes on four campaign and they said, don't talk about the amendment. Well, why? Because stories, I mean, there's exceptions to every rule. And by the way, you can't verify the stories are true anyways. And so they just use story upon story to talk about how this thing's being affected. And I just trust that a Floridian, educated, looking at this thing. Again, I'm not appealing to my pro life friends. My pro life friends had better be voting against Amendment four, right? My pro choice friends really should be voting against Amendment four. And if you look at any society that has adopted a marijuana amendment, you should be voting against amendment three. And so I don't, sometimes I think it's just literally about being educated, taking a deep breath before they walk. Well, you know, I say walk in the ballot box right now, people are voting. I mean, mail in ballots are going in right this minute. And so we're begging, you know, one of the, one of the interesting things, and I know this is very, I'm about to get real personal, your story, but, but I was on a call recently with the intercessors for America, and they had three guests. And what I was talking about amendment four and kind of what it means to the country, because there's ten other states right now facing an amendment like that. So that would be 17 in total.
There was a person on talking about Israel, and there was a person on talking about Hurricane Helene. It's crazy that we're already another storm later, but, and I was the last one to talk. And by the end of it, I said, a bunch of people been praying. And I said, you know, all I can feel right now is that the only thing these three things have in common is that what the enemy meant for evil, you meant for good. And I think that, like, I think that when I look at. And I could certainly sidetrack and talk. I was in Israel about seven months before you. Obviously, your timing was. We were there in March, and so my first time ever. So I praise God that that got to happen. But when I think about, like, amendment four, when I think about what's happening with Israel there, there is certainly tremendous opposition. There are certainly things that can frustrate you. But I want to share with your audience that one. I've never seen better denominational cooperation across faith than what's happening with Amendment four. Never seen it even with light to shine.
There has to be a moment where pressure is applied that forces the denominations to all be talking and saying, let's not talk about the things we disagree on. Let's talk about a couple things we vehemently agree on. And so I've been tremendously blessed to see the body come together in a very unique way that the denominational lines are breaking down. And then I can't help but believe that for many pastors, and I mean, you know this, for many pastors, this is their first time talking about life from the pulpit.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:42:51] Speaker B: And I think that, like, I can't help but believe what happened in Covid, what's happening now? Someone asked me in the Bible, this is so crazy. They asked me three weeks ago or so, I was in a Bible study and someone said, eric, do you think sifting still happens? I was like, oh, yeah. Like Covid was sifting. I think amendment four is sifting. And so it starts to make you wonder when the body starts to come together and boldness starts to rise, I can't help but believe there's some bigger things on the horizon. And I think one of those bigger things, and I'll just end this with this, to say one of those bigger things, is that we as faith, people of faith, have got to be ready to care for mamas and babies on November 6 when this thing gets knocked down. Because we cannot be just people that want to knock down pro choice legislation. We need to be people who are ready to serve. As you've already noted, foster care and special needs will be the greatest ballooning populations in our state.
[00:43:44] Speaker A: That's a good word. Such a good word. And it's ironic, as I was thinking through and praying through our conversation today in your role and this unique position with Governor DeSantis and with so many different leaders in culture, I thought about Joseph. Joseph was really kind of heavy on my heart today for the role that God's given you. And so you quoted him a moment ago and what the enemy meant for evil, that God means for good. And, you know, it's. I do believe that. I believe this is an opportunity for us to step up the strangeness of our silos and ministry. You know, we have Southern Baptist congregation, but some of our best allies in right to life issues have been the catholic 100% we've had locally. And some of the issues that we've tackled locally, the more charismatic movements, non denominational churches, have been strong allies just to stand up for truth. And there would be things that we would disagree on and they would disagree with us on. But Doctor Falwell used to say, I'll let anybody help me kill a snake. And when it comes to right to life, there's a lot of snakes to be killed, and there's a lot of issues going on that we just need to work together on and out and come down to what we do agree on and help move the ball forward. So I want to say thank you for joining me today, Eric, and for the work that you're doing on behalf of our state. And I want you to know we're praying for you and we're in your corner. And anything you need from this part of Florida, you let us know.
[00:45:31] Speaker B: Well, thank you. I know that I couldn't do it without the prayers, and I couldn't do it without a bunch of faith institutions, but, man, it does kind of get you excited with what you're talking about, about what we may see and what guys got in store. So, Zach, thanks for the time today.
[00:45:44] Speaker A: Thank you, my friend. We'll talk soon.
