0:00

on this episode of American thought leaders.

0:02

I told him what I was doing, and every single

0:04

one of them said, Jeff, why are you throwing your

0:06

career away over this? Today, I sit down

0:08

with Jeff Childers. a business attorney

0:10

who launched himself into constitutional law

0:13

in twenty twenty. He soon got the

0:15

first ruling in the country that managed hurry

0:17

masking was presumptively unconstitutional.

0:19

When have you ever seen government do anything fast?

0:22

But it happened this time. And when have you ever

0:24

seen all the government actors agree

0:26

with each other, but it happened this time.

0:28

In the last two years, he successfully fought

0:30

vaccine mandates, defended high profile

0:32

individuals in the January sixth Committee

0:35

investigations and fought against hospitals

0:37

that force patients to stay on ventilators and

0:40

remdesivir. Every major

0:42

institution in this country has closed ranks

0:44

to architectos wrongdoers. There

0:46

will be accountability. This is

0:48

American thought leaders, and I'm Yanya Kellek.

0:56

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2:01

Jeff Childers such a pleasure

2:04

to have you on American thought leaders. Thank

2:06

you. Nice to be here. You've

2:08

been deeply and evolved in

2:11

litigation around

2:14

many issues surrounding COVID.

2:16

That's true.

2:18

Unfortunately, I would say,

2:20

So I mean, very briefly tell me how

2:22

you got involved in this.

2:24

So my background is, I'm a commercial

2:26

litigation attorney. which means I

2:28

usually represent businesses and

2:30

fight about money. And I've been doing

2:32

that for a long time and was very

2:34

successful at it and had a nice boutique

2:37

practice where I didn't have to work that

2:39

hard and still did very well. And

2:41

then the pandemic came.

2:43

And I had one of those

2:45

moments, you know, that you have in life where you never

2:47

forget it. And for me, it

2:49

was sitting on my back

2:51

patio watching my first County Commission

2:54

meeting that I'd ever seen in my life. My wife

2:56

was sitting next to me. I can visualize it

2:58

like I'm sitting there right now.

2:59

And I saw those commissioners discuss

3:03

a

3:03

an out of control pandemic in

3:05

about ten minutes and then pass

3:08

the first mandatory mask mandate

3:10

in the state of Florida that was county wide.

3:13

And something just grabbed

3:17

me

3:18

in a, you know, almost spiritual way.

3:20

I was so offended, and

3:22

I I looked at my life and I said, there's no

3:24

way that's constitutional. They

3:27

can't tell us what to wear. They

3:29

can't tell us we have to strap something

3:31

to our head and wear it around. I mean, that's

3:33

insane. Now, I had never

3:35

practiced any constitutional or

3:37

civil rights law in my entire career.

3:40

I didn't even know where to start, but

3:42

I fired off a demand letter to the county

3:44

commission, hit the books, And

3:46

within a week or two, I filed my very first

3:48

complaint against any government entity.

3:50

You know, I didn't even know where to serve it. I mean,

3:53

who do give it to the mayor you know, you

3:55

put it in that little slot at the library where you

3:57

return to books. I, you know, I had to

3:59

figure all that stuff

3:59

out. And

4:00

as I do with

4:03

any case that has novel issues,

4:05

I called my peers, right, for

4:07

advice. And I told them

4:09

what I was doing and every single one

4:11

of them said, Jeff, why are you throwing your career

4:14

away over this?

4:16

And it was a real gut check. I mean,

4:18

these are people that I have profound respect

4:20

for, you

4:21

know, who have decades more legal

4:23

experience than I do.

4:26

But I decided to push through and

4:29

and to tackle it.

4:30

And the result of that one,

4:32

which is sort of what put me into the

4:34

middle of the hurricane was

4:37

we won. We

4:39

won on appeal. We got the only

4:41

appellate decision as far as I know in

4:43

the entire country. finding

4:45

that mandatory masking was presumptively

4:47

unconstitutional. And

4:51

so when

4:53

people heard that I was willing

4:55

to to take these cases, and you remember

4:57

back in, we're talking about the summer of

4:59

two thousand twenty, the peak of mass hysteria.

5:03

Right? Where, you know, even even

5:06

asking the question about the masks

5:08

would get you the response you're

5:10

literally killing grandma.

5:12

Right? You remember that.

5:14

And so there

5:16

were very few attorneys who

5:19

you

5:19

know, had any, you know, serious litigation

5:22

track record that were willing to take these cases.

5:24

So we started to get, you know,

5:26

all kinds of things. And

5:28

you know, very quickly we challenge

5:30

the vaccines. And on

5:33

my first vaccine

5:35

case, we wanna as far

5:37

as I know, the first broad preliminary

5:39

injunction against the government vaccine mandate

5:41

in the entire country. We

5:43

got death threats over that one.

5:45

We removed a

5:47

school board member who was

5:49

about to pass a sweeping CRT

5:52

related transformation

5:55

of the school district.

5:58

We challenged one

5:59

of the largest hospital chains in the country

6:02

over its private vaccine mandate.

6:04

And while we didn't get a preliminary

6:06

injunction on that one, they immediately backed

6:08

down after we got the the verbal order

6:10

from the judge because it was strong

6:12

in

6:13

recognizing the irrationality of

6:16

the

6:16

mandate. So, this is

6:19

all brand new territory for

6:21

me. Right? completely unlike anything

6:23

I've ever done. And I'm not used

6:25

to being in the limelight. You

6:27

know, I go now I'm being invited to

6:30

talk. you know, recently

6:32

at the moms for Liberty National

6:35

Conference. Right? My

6:37

session with Joe Harding was right

6:39

after Governor DeSantis spoke.

6:41

And I mentioned AR-15s in

6:43

an analogy, and you

6:45

know, all across the country newspapers were

6:48

running stories about, you know, attorney

6:50

Jeff Childers talks about

6:52

AR fifteenth. And

6:54

Tiffany Justice is the

6:57

national cochair for moms with Liberty.

6:59

She was on Dr. Phil the other day, and

7:01

he asked her about what I said. I'm not

7:03

used to that kind of stuff. Right? I'm just

7:05

a quiet, boutique, small

7:07

town attorney fighting over

7:09

business contracts. I'm as

7:11

surprised as anyone to

7:13

be sitting right here talking to you.

7:15

Something you said really made

7:17

me think.

7:20

Everyone you reached out to your

7:22

peers or learned at peers

7:25

said, why are you throwing your career away?

7:29

Why was that so obvious to them

7:31

do you think that this is what was happening?

7:33

Wow,

7:33

that's a really good question.

7:37

they all

7:39

or almost all followed that

7:42

comment up with some remark

7:44

like this will all be over in few

7:46

weeks or a few months.

7:48

the

7:49

So I think there was a sort

7:52

of a dual recognition in the profession

7:54

that this was political dangerous.

7:57

And that

7:59

you could be even potentially disbarred.

8:02

I think that's the implication. Right?

8:04

throwing your career away means you're gonna lose

8:06

your bar license over this. Their

8:08

conventional wisdom was just wait

8:10

it out.

8:11

But I didn't believe it was

8:14

going to be over

8:15

soon. I mean, it didn't

8:17

even occur to me. To me, this mask

8:20

thing seemed like just the beginning.

8:22

And if they could get away with

8:25

encroaching on our constitutional race to

8:27

that extent, you know, dictating what

8:29

we wear. then they

8:31

were gonna go to the next level.

8:33

That

8:33

seemed obvious to me. And it

8:36

was not something that was obvious to

8:38

my peers. My peers

8:40

seem to think it was, you know, sort

8:42

of politics as normal. If

8:43

I could jump

8:46

to a related

8:47

the

8:48

story that I think is analogous

8:50

to this. I also

8:52

became involved with defending

8:54

some high profile folks in

8:56

the January sixth

8:59

committee investigations.

9:01

And once

9:03

again, because

9:04

I've never represented anyone in

9:06

a, you know, who is the target of a congressional

9:09

investigation before I mean, that seems very

9:11

serious. And so we're getting

9:13

subpoenas and demands for depositions and

9:15

things like that. And, you know, and again, one

9:17

of my superpowers is I'm a fast learner.

9:20

So I have a lot of self confidence that I

9:22

can learn quickly, but you don't want to make a

9:24

mistake. So I called

9:27

my connections

9:29

in DC and got references to,

9:31

you know, tall building attorneys who make

9:33

fifteen hundred dollars an hour and up. who

9:36

normally represent folks in that

9:38

situation. And

9:40

all of them said,

9:44

Jeff,

9:45

this is just business as normal

9:47

in DC. The commission

9:50

is just gonna writer report and then this whole

9:52

thing is gonna blow over. And I said, you know,

9:54

I don't I don't know if I believe that.

9:56

I I feel like they're they're

9:58

collecting evidence for DOJ

10:01

investigations. I feel like there are gonna be

10:03

criminal indictments coming based on all

10:05

this information the committee scooping up that

10:07

the DOJ couldn't get. Right? They

10:09

don't have the same powers that Congress

10:11

does. And all these attorneys

10:13

in DC, these, you know, very highly

10:15

paid guys swim in that

10:17

world all told me, no,

10:20

they'll never do that. It would

10:22

be politically toxic for them to

10:24

translate this into criminal

10:27

indictments and criminal prosecutions.

10:29

And

10:30

so I stopped talking to them.

10:33

And it's the same kind of group think

10:36

right,

10:36

that I saw at the beginning with the

10:38

masks. I don't know what

10:40

it is. I can't explain it because

10:42

attorneys are very smart people. I mean,

10:44

you have to go through law school, to

10:46

pass the bar, to think

10:48

on your feet in front of judges, you

10:50

know, to to handle

10:52

things that come up in a in a second.

10:54

You have to be very

10:57

intelligent and and and

10:59

critical. You have to be a critical thinker,

11:01

but there was no critical thinking.

11:03

being

11:03

applied to these issues.

11:06

And so,

11:07

I guess, at bottom,

11:10

I'm still

11:12

you know,

11:12

sort of baffled

11:14

by the

11:17

sort of ubiquitous thought

11:20

process by most, you

11:22

know, conventional, what

11:25

I call tall building attorneys or large

11:27

firm attorneys. Right? And

11:29

if you pressed me, I would probably

11:34

suggest to you that, you know, these

11:36

large law firms now

11:38

are so intertined

11:40

with government. Right?

11:43

They get large cases from

11:46

different government agencies, for example.

11:49

And so they have to be careful

11:51

that they

11:52

don't offend their government clients.

11:56

i'm that

11:57

it makes them

11:59

very conservative when it comes to

12:02

anything that challenges the conventional,

12:04

you know, published government narrative

12:06

And so I I think

12:09

that's my best explanation for

12:11

why we didn't see, right, all the

12:13

traditional civil rights firms jump

12:15

into this.

12:16

like, you know, the ACLU and

12:18

all of

12:19

these other civil rights

12:21

firms that pick up, you

12:23

know, if a teacher somewhere can't put

12:25

up a pride flag, then

12:27

you've got ten attorneys there the next

12:29

day.

12:30

Right? But

12:31

if the teacher doesn't want to wear a mask,

12:33

there's nobody

12:34

showing up to represent them.

12:37

And I

12:37

think the difference is that

12:40

one has the infrastructure of

12:42

government,

12:43

and the other one

12:46

has whatever the reverse opposite

12:48

of that is. Right? Here

12:50

there be serpents. And so,

12:53

there's a problem. There's a

12:56

fundamental problem with the system right

12:58

now. the

12:58

the

13:00

big law firms and

13:02

and by big, I mean, it went all the way

13:04

down to, you know, law firms with, like, fifty

13:07

attorneys, which you would probably call

13:09

smaller medium sized, but

13:11

they're so dependent on

13:13

government now that they are unwilling to

13:16

challenge these sort

13:19

of official government narratives

13:21

at

13:21

least not without

13:24

a lot

13:25

of thought and

13:26

very cautiously. And that's

13:28

a problem I think for normal citizens.

13:31

Right? We've got to break that

13:34

that independence between government

13:37

and our legal community

13:39

because it's not good. Whatever is

13:41

behind this.

13:42

are you sitting in that community meeting

13:45

where, you know,

13:46

you realized, you know, your

13:48

thought to yourself, they can't do this. You

13:51

you described it as a almost

13:52

a spiritual experience. Why why

13:55

do you describe it that way? I

13:57

was agnostic for most of my life

13:59

and raised Catholic,

14:01

I've always believed in god,

14:03

just the

14:06

idea that that all of this

14:08

occurred by accident was

14:10

ridiculous to me. I just never never gripped

14:12

me at all. And

14:14

in my early forties, I had a

14:17

sort

14:17

of bona fide spiritual experience with a

14:19

vision and and everything else. And

14:22

and that was when I really started reading the

14:24

bible and going to church every single weekend

14:26

and tithing and, you know, it was a complete

14:28

transformation. It happened to me on a bike

14:30

ride you

14:30

know, if you asked my wife, she'll say, I came back from

14:33

that bike ride, a different, better

14:35

person.

14:35

oh

14:38

And I started to be more in

14:40

tune with sort

14:43

of suggestions that I felt like

14:45

were coming from a divine source.

14:49

that weren't anything that I

14:51

would have thought of on my own. I mean, the

14:53

idea for example that I would sue

14:55

the government over something.

14:57

It

14:57

would have never occurred to me.

14:59

Right? That idea was is so

15:01

alien. I mean, you know, any UFO

15:03

alien was more alien or less alien,

15:05

I guess, than than that idea.

15:08

So I pay attention

15:10

to those. those

15:12

feelings.

15:13

And

15:15

I

15:16

I feel like

15:18

if If

15:19

you don't follow those suggestions, then,

15:23

you know, the divinity is

15:25

gonna turn up the the

15:26

temperature on you. and

15:28

that becomes uncomfortable. So it's better to just

15:30

go with it at the beginning. So I sort of

15:32

went into the to this, having

15:35

this spiritual conviction that

15:37

What was happening was just wrong,

15:39

was morally and ethically wrong.

15:42

Sometimes, I

15:44

think we put too much emphasis on

15:46

the constitution. I don't want people to misinterpret

15:49

that. What I mean is it it's a

15:51

fantastic document. Right? It

15:53

has created the largest, most

15:55

powerful, most

15:56

successful company in the country in the

15:59

history of the world,

15:59

but it is a piece of paper

16:02

created by men. there

16:04

is a higher power. The

16:06

founding documents refer to the higher

16:08

power. Right? All of our rights

16:10

come from the creator. They don't

16:12

come from government.

16:15

So those constitutional rights are

16:17

supposed to be a reflection of

16:19

our our god given freedoms.

16:22

Why me? why,

16:23

you know,

16:24

a commercial litigation attorney in

16:26

Gainesville, Florida who's never even

16:28

dabbled in this area of law. Aren't

16:30

there better lawyers to

16:32

tackle these problems than me. And I

16:34

remember we're right at the beginning. I'm talking about

16:36

March twenty twenty. Right?

16:38

Why weren't the ten lawyers

16:41

showing up instantly in Alacia County

16:43

from the

16:43

ACLU to

16:45

fight this?

16:46

It

16:47

wasn't happening. And that was

16:49

strange. That was very very

16:51

weird to me. So

16:53

to answer your question, I feel

16:55

like that that there was a spiritual

16:57

element, that there were forces at

16:59

play, forces of of even good and

17:02

evil, if you wanna put it in

17:04

those terms. and I

17:06

didn't feel

17:06

like I had a choice.

17:08

If

17:08

I wound up losing

17:11

my career

17:12

over it,

17:14

then I

17:14

felt like that was something I needed to do.

17:17

I needed to be able to say I

17:19

tried. What did

17:20

your wife think about that? because

17:22

she was sitting beside you. Right? Yeah. She was.

17:25

And, you know,

17:26

I have been so blessed. I

17:30

don't have a perfect marriage. I don't want to make it

17:32

sound like that. But on the big

17:34

things, Michelle

17:35

goes right along with me.

17:38

She took up the cause and worked

17:41

heroically at home. You

17:43

know, she was one of the

17:45

the original moms who was involved in the

17:47

moms for Liberty Movement, for example, and,

17:50

you know, made countless phone calls

17:52

and, you know, Zoom

17:55

meetings and things trying to

17:57

to organize citizens who

17:59

had never been politically active in

18:01

their entire lives. I mean, that's what's so remarkable.

18:03

I think about where we are

18:06

is that what we've seen is

18:08

a revolution among

18:10

the apolitical. Right?

18:12

Among people who felt like

18:15

as long as they reminded their own

18:18

business and, you know, did

18:20

their job and took care of their

18:22

kids and you know, participated

18:24

in their community, everything would be

18:26

fine. And I don't think

18:28

they feel that way anymore. There's a lot

18:31

of them.

18:31

And so my wife was one of

18:34

those, and and it was it

18:36

would have been so much different if I didn't have her

18:38

support. You know, I don't know if I'd be

18:41

sitting here.

18:43

So you,

18:43

Bob, you'll see talk

18:45

to a lot of people on this

18:47

boat that you just described her.

18:50

And what are

18:52

the things that made people suddenly

18:54

become

18:54

active? There's probably more than

18:56

one answer to that question.

18:59

Certainly,

18:59

there are, I think. Yeah.

19:02

I

19:02

think at at a

19:05

sort of fundamental level, a lot of

19:07

people were shocked.

19:10

that the world didn't

19:12

work the way that they thought it worked.

19:15

Right? I

19:15

think that what happened was

19:18

when

19:18

you saw

19:20

this,

19:24

probably worldwide, certainly

19:27

nationwide, response for

19:29

governments turning on a dime. Right? When

19:31

have you ever seen government do anything

19:34

fast? But it happened

19:36

this time. And when have you ever

19:38

seen all the government actors

19:40

agree with each other? But

19:42

it

19:42

happened this time.

19:44

you,

19:45

me, our peers,

19:47

people younger than we are, people

19:49

older than we are, have never seen anything like that

19:51

in their entire lives. and

19:54

these emergency powers that previously

19:57

had only been used in

19:59

short periods

19:59

of time after a hurricane

20:05

Maybe I can't even

20:07

remember a medical emergency

20:09

that caused the

20:11

state of Florida to declare an emergency. I can't remember

20:13

that. So that was new.

20:16

Nobody

20:16

had ever seen that before. People

20:18

always thought that

20:21

our government officials would exercise some degree

20:23

of moral and ethical restraint

20:25

that they

20:26

would would balance competing interests.

20:29

right? When they shut down all these

20:32

small businesses, these

20:34

small business owners who

20:36

are a lot of them are my

20:38

clients. they don't spend their time

20:40

in politics. They're working,

20:42

you know, twelve, fourteen, sixteen

20:44

hours a day making their

20:46

small business work. They

20:48

never had to pay any attention to it. If they had to

20:50

go and vote, you know, every four years, they would

20:52

do that. But apart from that, they kept

20:54

their, you know, nose to the grindstone. while

20:58

the government, you know, from one day to

21:00

the next, just took their small business away.

21:04

That was offensive

21:07

at a

21:09

level that they

21:11

had

21:11

never been offended on before.

21:15

And

21:16

though so people

21:18

refer to that as awakening. I don't know

21:20

if that's a, you

21:21

know, a good a

21:23

good descriptor or not, but they were certainly shocked.

21:26

Right? It was like electric shock

21:28

therapy. And so when somebody goes

21:30

through something like that, It's

21:33

a very profound experience, maybe even a

21:35

spiritual experience, right, to have your worldview

21:38

challenged so

21:40

fundamentally. And

21:41

then

21:43

to a lot of people, it seemed like the

21:46

government came after the children.

21:48

Mhmm. And

21:49

and that sort

21:51

of flip switches that are buried

21:53

in your, you know, reptilian brain,

21:56

these these protective that

21:58

we have toward our

22:00

kids. I used

22:02

to talk

22:05

to pastors.

22:05

So for a while, I I was trying

22:08

to find when the churches were

22:10

shut down. That was

22:12

another one. I thought that was

22:14

an incredible constitutional invasion.

22:16

And sure enough, the supreme court

22:18

has ratified that, I believe. But

22:20

way back at the beginning, I was trying

22:22

to find any church that would

22:24

let me sue the government for

22:26

them, for first amendment, and I couldn't

22:28

find any.

22:29

And

22:30

so I was out talking to to groups of

22:33

pastors, you know. Listen, you guys you

22:35

have rights. This is wrong. What's

22:37

happening? You need to to

22:39

wake up. Right? And yet

22:41

there

22:41

was a among the

22:44

the the pastors group, not all

22:46

of them, but most of them

22:49

there was a a great

22:51

fear

22:51

or reluctance

22:54

to

22:54

directly challenge the government.

22:56

the

22:56

government that issues permits when you

22:58

want to build a new wing on your church.

23:01

Right? The

23:03

government who gives you the tax

23:05

exemption because you're a nonprofit. Whereas

23:09

the folks that sat in the

23:11

pews, whose kids were

23:13

not allowed to go to school,

23:17

were outraged.

23:18

i'm And

23:20

it was very, very challenging, you know,

23:22

trying to navigate those two communities.

23:25

When

23:26

the parents

23:28

saw what their kids were being

23:31

taught on these,

23:32

you know, zoom classes

23:35

and things. it

23:36

horrified them even more.

23:39

You know, again, they

23:41

had this world view. Their world view

23:43

was shaped by how school was when

23:45

we went to school. Right?

23:47

Reading, writing, arithmetic,

23:50

class projects, field

23:52

trips, you know,

23:54

Americana, that kind of

23:56

thing. What they saw was something completely

23:59

different. And

23:59

again, it just

24:02

shredded their concept of

24:04

ordered liberty. And

24:05

i'm when

24:08

I talked to the pastors, and

24:11

this

24:11

is

24:11

around the summertime of two

24:14

thousand twenty. I said, you know, you guys seen

24:16

these YouTube videos. Right? They're really great where

24:18

the moms are down at the school board and

24:20

they're tearing the school board a a new

24:22

one right and they're you know, pointing out, you

24:24

know, all the flaws in each of their

24:26

personalities and stuff and getting thrown out

24:28

and holding signs. And

24:30

that And I of really entertaining, aren't they

24:32

in the pastors laugh? And they say, yeah. Yeah. And

24:34

then I would say, where

24:36

are the men?

24:38

Where are

24:40

the men?

24:45

And I don't I don't

24:45

mean that as a criticism

24:48

to, you know, the male gender.

24:50

I

24:50

think especially in

24:52

hindsight that that

24:55

protective mechanism was activated

24:58

first and most strongly in the

25:00

moms. And

25:01

that's why you saw almost

25:04

universally these school board sessions

25:06

packed with with

25:08

ladies because they

25:10

recognized the threat, even if they couldn't

25:13

enunciate it, they knew

25:13

there was a threat. So

25:16

there's a

25:18

movement that we

25:21

all know is there. We can all see it.

25:23

And and that movement is,

25:25

you know, people who

25:27

are struggling to adapt to this

25:29

new reality. And it is

25:31

in very stark terms to them,

25:33

terms like, you know, protecting

25:35

kids. Who

25:37

wouldn't

25:38

do anything to protect children?

25:40

What wouldn't you do

25:43

to protect your kids? And

25:45

so I think and

25:47

and I was saying this from the very

25:49

beginning that

25:51

our public officials made

25:53

a horrible mistake in the way that they conducted

25:55

this pandemic. They

25:57

made short

25:59

term

25:59

expedient decisions. to

26:02

satisfy what they thought

26:04

were the requirements of controlling a

26:08

germ,

26:08

an uncontrollable virus.

26:11

not properly

26:13

considering

26:15

what was gonna

26:16

happen after. you

26:18

know, sure, you can you can keep

26:20

the folks locked down for a while,

26:22

but they're gonna come out and then they're gonna be

26:24

looking to see if

26:26

those decisions that you made made sense.

26:29

And I think we're entering that

26:32

phase now.

26:33

We're beginning to enter the phase

26:35

of accounting, where people

26:38

are starting to say,

26:40

was it worth it? And

26:41

and the folks who

26:43

were responsible for making those

26:46

decisions are

26:47

at some point going to have to be

26:50

accountable for the decisions that

26:52

they made. and what

26:53

will they say? You

26:55

can only

26:56

disemble and

26:57

obfuscate for so long, except

27:00

we're in Florida, where

27:02

things seem to have played out a bit differently

27:04

than what you're describing.

27:07

So

27:07

explain to me what you're saying here.

27:09

Something happened in Florida different than in

27:11

other states clearly. Right?

27:13

And I think

27:16

everybody wants to say that we

27:18

have the best governor in the

27:20

country. And I think we have the best governor in

27:22

the country. but that is

27:24

an inadequate explanation.

27:26

The governor signs a loss. He doesn't

27:28

write the loss. There

27:30

is a whole legislature that writes

27:32

this

27:32

law. And if the legislature doesn't give the

27:35

governor the laws to sign, he can't have these signing

27:37

ceremonies where he gets to take

27:39

the credit.

27:40

So our legislature

27:44

fueled what happened here in

27:46

Florida. Now Florida was a purple state.

27:48

going into the

27:48

pandemic. It's clearly a solid red

27:51

state now.

27:52

Something happened.

27:55

I

27:55

was there at the beginning when

27:59

Governor

27:59

sand

27:59

DeSantis sort of launched into

28:02

the man that he is which

28:04

is, you know, love him or hate him.

28:06

He is recognized as maybe one of the most

28:09

influential people in politics. Right?

28:11

But

28:12

when I filed my

28:14

little math lawsuit against the county

28:17

in April or May of two

28:19

thousand twenty,

28:20

I named the governor as an additional defendant.

28:22

I sued the

28:23

governor

28:25

because he wasn't doing anything about

28:28

these mandatory mask

28:30

edicts or

28:31

whatever you want to call them, executive

28:33

orders. And

28:36

I

28:36

sued him not

28:37

because I felt that he was

28:40

culpable, but because I wanted to get

28:42

his attention. I felt like,

28:44

surely, if he knew what was going on here

28:46

in Elanco County, he would act.

28:49

And

28:49

at that time,

28:53

without, you

28:54

know, revealing any confidence as I I

28:56

was hoping to get and I did get an

28:58

attorney from the governor's office assigned

29:00

to the case. And,

29:03

you know, at that time,

29:05

the governor's office position was

29:07

they really didn't want to get

29:09

involved. And I

29:11

wound up dismissing him out of the case because

29:13

the only reason I put him in was to to

29:15

get his attention and it wasn't going

29:18

anywhere. Somewhere

29:20

along the way,

29:22

he started to become

29:25

bolder. Now remember he barely beat

29:27

Andrew Gillum. in

29:28

his election.

29:31

So

29:31

he didn't come in with a mandate.

29:33

But

29:34

he

29:35

started to pick up

29:38

as as you know, we started to get wins in the courts

29:40

and, you know, started to push

29:42

back a little bit. The governor's

29:44

office was also coming along.

29:46

And

29:48

I saw a change.

29:50

And as I was

29:52

filing me, you know, more suits,

29:55

the governor's office was becoming

29:57

more engaged with me.

30:01

Ultimately, the

30:02

governor's office would call me and

30:05

ask if I could help

30:06

by filing a lawsuit.

30:08

So for example,

30:11

I sued several

30:13

counties that were rebelling against the

30:15

state's mass mandate, right, the

30:17

holdout counties.

30:18

And the state

30:21

really can't sue itself.

30:23

So my

30:26

lawsuits were in large part

30:28

a result contacts from the

30:31

governor's office asking if

30:33

I was willing to to take

30:34

up that cause. And we were successful

30:37

in those those lawsuits. So

30:40

the there

30:41

was an evolution there. Right? And

30:43

then the the parents rights thing and, you

30:45

know, Governor DeSantis has really made

30:48

named for himself in the area of parents'

30:50

rights as I'm sure you know.

30:52

But

30:54

but it was an an evolving

30:57

process. At

30:58

some point,

31:00

Florida, what I would

31:02

call stabilized, we had our schools open,

31:04

we had our businesses open, we had the

31:07

masks off. And there was a temptation, I think, to

31:09

feel like we

31:11

had won.

31:13

And I'll never and another, you

31:15

know, one of those never forget

31:17

moments I gave a a talk

31:19

at the

31:20

Ocala COVID Summit.

31:23

And

31:23

it was I think in October of last year. I think it's been

31:25

a year. And

31:27

very well attended event.

31:29

And afterward, I was mingling with

31:32

folks talking to them. And

31:34

this nice young lady came up

31:36

and I remember she had this big flowery hat

31:38

on and she shook my hand and told

31:41

me how much she, you

31:43

know, enjoyed my my talk and whatnot. And I

31:45

I recognize she had a Canadian accent. So

31:47

I said, you know, are

31:49

you from Canada? And she said, oh, yes.

31:51

And then she told me, and

31:54

again,

31:54

I'll never forget this.

31:56

This story, and meanwhile her whole family

31:58

started gathering around more Canadians,

32:00

and she said they had

32:02

been smuggled out of Canada

32:05

across the border in the middle of the

32:06

night.

32:07

They had left their homes

32:09

They let their bank

32:09

accounts, their cars, all their

32:12

property. They

32:13

basically got

32:14

connected to an underground railroad

32:17

threw a plane's trains and automobiles type

32:20

of sequence in the middle of the

32:22

night crossing the border, and they went

32:24

straight to Florida. And what

32:28

I recognized in October was

32:30

that we were far from done.

32:33

Right?

32:34

Florida is a little outpost. But

32:37

not only is there Canada, there

32:39

are other states, blue

32:41

states where they have horrible

32:43

problems with government overreach still. So

32:45

so

32:50

To

32:50

answer your question, I think

32:53

that do you

32:53

remember the old Florida Man

32:56

meme? You don't

32:57

hear that too much anymore. Right?

32:59

We're all a bunch of, you

33:01

know, dumb redneck idiots down

33:03

here that wrestle alligators and

33:05

you know, jump our pickup trucks over the swamp

33:08

and that kind of thing. But

33:10

there was something to

33:12

it. There's an independent streak.

33:15

in

33:15

Florida that

33:17

I think

33:20

fueled what you

33:21

see. Again, it's not just one man.

33:23

It's a whole legislature. It's

33:26

all the constituents of those legislators

33:28

who were pushing them and supporting them

33:30

and everything else.

33:33

This I don't know if it's a

33:35

libertarian streak. I think

33:37

that's maybe too facile

33:39

to say that. But there's

33:41

a just a, you know, doggedly

33:44

independent shriek in Florida

33:46

that

33:48

that

33:48

allowed us I think

33:50

to to create this this

33:53

outpost of freedom. Why

33:55

do

33:55

you think

33:57

DeSantis shifted

33:59

and his agencies shifted during

34:01

that

34:02

time. I believe that

34:05

Governor DeSantis is one of the

34:07

most honest politicians that

34:10

we've seen in a long

34:12

time.

34:12

And so I believe

34:14

that he embraced things that he wanted

34:18

to do. But again,

34:20

he

34:20

didn't start with

34:21

the mandate. He was

34:23

not a strong governor

34:26

for Florida when he first started. I mean, Andrew Gillum,

34:28

you know, I don't wanna say anything critical,

34:30

but, you know, he should have beat Andrew

34:32

Gillum by a country mile. Right?

34:38

And and and the governor

34:40

also remember he was a

34:42

Trump candidate. They love

34:44

to to point that

34:46

out. And I think and he's a

34:48

lawyer. And he's a very

34:50

smart man. And

34:52

I think he watched what President Trump

34:55

went through.

34:56

And so his administration

34:58

is very, very protective. almost

35:02

to

35:02

the point of paranoia. And when

35:04

I say that, I always like to point out

35:06

it's not paranoia if

35:08

they're really out to get It's

35:10

prudence. And so they

35:13

are very prudently protective of

35:15

the governor and And

35:18

so at at the beginning, I think that was a

35:21

disadvantage for him. But

35:23

what happened was

35:25

it protected him politically

35:28

from, you know, making some some,

35:30

you know, early obvious mistakes like maybe if

35:32

he had come out against the vaccines from the get

35:35

go, they would have destroyed him

35:37

for it. Right? He

35:38

didn't do that. But where are we now?

35:40

Now, the state of Florida does not

35:42

even officially recommend taking the vaccines and

35:44

they recommend against it for kids.

35:47

I don't know if there's, you know,

35:49

another major state

35:50

in the US that takes that position,

35:52

but he's getting

35:53

away with it. I

35:55

think

35:55

the governor has incredibly

35:59

naturally

36:00

developed political instincts.

36:04

And

36:06

when he

36:07

saw the opportunity to to

36:09

leave, he took it.

36:11

could another

36:13

governor have done it? You know, could Greg Abbott have done

36:15

it? Or, you know, one of these

36:17

other conservative governors, I

36:20

don't know. I

36:21

think that there was a unique combination

36:24

of factors.

36:26

the DeSantis

36:28

didn't have a lot to lose because

36:31

he wasn't on the political map

36:33

when he

36:33

started. Right? He wasn't

36:36

invested. He he didn't he didn't owe a

36:38

lot of favors. because he

36:39

hadn't been around for a long time and because they

36:42

were so protective. So that gave him a lot of

36:44

freedom, I think, that other governors

36:46

didn't have. And then I

36:48

think he's a good person.

36:50

He did the right thing.

36:52

It was almost surreal to me

36:55

when you said you

36:56

know, he's not recommending the vaccine, and

36:59

he's recommending

37:02

against it for children, of course,

37:06

through Surgeon General at Apple. And

37:08

then he's getting away with it. It's where

37:10

your words. What do you think about

37:12

that?

37:12

It's just isn't that sounds

37:14

like a surreal thing to say. Right. This one of

37:17

those things that if I

37:19

had

37:19

said it prepandemic,

37:22

you

37:23

would have written it off

37:25

as a sort of a

37:27

hyperbolic, maybe conspiracy theory

37:30

minded, you know,

37:32

emotional comment. Right?

37:32

But now you know exactly

37:34

what I mean. And

37:35

it is surreal. This

37:37

is the

37:38

is the this

37:40

is

37:40

the world that we didn't think we were living in. That

37:43

we found out that we are

37:45

living in. Right? Which is

37:48

that that somebody like

37:49

you or me, an average citizen, could say something

37:51

on social media that would draw

37:53

the attention of the

37:55

entire federal government to

37:58

try to cancel us

37:59

and relieve us of our

38:01

livelihood and put us out of business.

38:03

Right? That's possible

38:04

now. I didn't think

38:06

that was possible two years

38:08

ago. And

38:10

this, you

38:12

know, we we complained about cancel culture.

38:15

pre

38:16

pandemic. But we had

38:18

no idea what cancel culture was.

38:22

When

38:22

when The

38:24

entire corporate media lines

38:26

up

38:27

behind the government.

38:30

When

38:30

big tech lines up behind the

38:32

federal government to to carry out

38:34

and enforce the federal government's

38:37

policies. Enforce them.

38:38

Right? I chose

38:39

that word carefully. We

38:41

have something different than the

38:44

democracy that we thought we

38:46

had. I don't know

38:47

what we have. right

38:49

now, but it's not what we

38:51

thought we had. How

38:52

many lawyers are there

38:55

in this country right now?

38:57

who are doing the kind of

38:59

work you're doing? That's a great question.

39:01

And the good news is there

39:03

are more lawyers now than

39:05

there ever were. and

39:06

that number is steadily increasing.

39:09

And we're

39:10

starting to see

39:13

larger and

39:14

larger firms getting involved

39:16

in these battles. I'm not

39:18

aware of any large firm taking on

39:20

a mass case. but I'm

39:22

starting to be aware of

39:25

medium sized firms that will

39:27

do it or that'll get involved in

39:29

these hospital kidnapping cases. Right?

39:32

What

39:32

do you mean

39:33

by that just quickly?

39:36

Yeah. So a phase

39:38

that we

39:40

went through And, you know, my

39:42

COVID litigation

39:43

history was when

39:46

hospitalizations were sort of at

39:48

their peak. And

39:50

what we would see over and over again is

39:52

patients who were in the

39:54

hospital with

39:55

a COVID diagnosis Many of them

39:58

entered the hospital for something completely

39:59

different, but were given a

40:02

test in the something and were admitted as

40:04

a COVID patient. They didn't

40:06

want remdesivir. They didn't want the

40:08

ventilator, but they were being put

40:10

on the ventilator and they were being given

40:12

remdesivir against

40:13

their wishes. I can't

40:14

tell you how many calls we got hundreds,

40:18

thousands, and

40:19

they were dying.

40:21

So the calls that we

40:23

were getting were panic relatives who

40:25

wanted us to use legal

40:27

process to force the hospitals to

40:29

either treat them with alternative treatments that

40:31

the patient wanted

40:34

or let

40:35

them go, and the hospitals

40:37

wouldn't do either

40:38

one. In

40:40

one case that I had, I took up on an emergency appeal.

40:46

It's

40:46

inexplicable. there

40:48

were three corporate law firms that were

40:50

hired by the hospital to

40:53

defend the hospital's position in that appeal

40:55

and keep that patient in the

40:58

hospital. and all the relatives wanted to do was get him out.

41:00

The hospital said he

41:01

was not sufficiently stable

41:04

to move.

41:05

You said he's willing to, you know, they're willing to

41:08

sign whatever releases, you

41:10

know, that the hospital wants They

41:12

don't want him on that ventilator anymore. They want him in a different

41:14

facility. We had a different facility who was willing to

41:16

take him. We had a doctor who was willing

41:19

to take over his care. and

41:21

the hospital probably spent hundreds

41:24

of thousands of dollars fighting

41:26

us to keep him

41:26

in the hospital. That's what I

41:28

call a hospital, kidnapping case. It doesn't

41:31

make any sense. If you're

41:32

if you're the

41:33

patient and your wishes are that you

41:35

don't want them

41:36

to treat you anymore,

41:38

Why

41:39

can't you make that decision in a

41:41

free country?

41:42

It's supposed to be a business.

41:44

You're

41:44

just a customer. Right? but

41:48

that wasn't what was happening.

41:51

So

41:51

these so

41:53

more and more More

41:55

and more law firms are

41:57

getting involved. I maintain a database

41:59

of

41:59

what we call our allied attorneys. So

42:02

when we become aware of law

42:04

firm that has litigated, you know, one

42:06

of these, what I call, a freedom case,

42:08

then we contact them. And if

42:10

they agree, we add them to the list.

42:13

And so we've got, you know, basically

42:15

a referral network in almost every state

42:17

in the country now. So when we

42:19

get someone calling us from Michigan,

42:21

and I'm not licensed to practice in Michigan. I can't

42:23

help them effectively. We've got a

42:26

list of attorneys in Michigan who we

42:28

know for a fact will take

42:30

these cases. I should be able to refer them to any

42:32

law firm. Right? Any

42:34

competent lawyer should be able to to

42:36

help these folks, but many lawyers won't

42:40

And that was a

42:41

problem at the beginning. But like I

42:43

said, it's so encouraging that, you know,

42:45

more and more lawyers are

42:47

joining the fight. Do you

42:49

feel free to say how many are how

42:51

many Freedom Lawyers there are now?

42:54

Well, it's

42:54

so many that I lost count

42:56

or I stopped tracking it. I mean, hundreds and

42:59

hundreds. Most

42:59

of them are smaller

43:02

practitioners like I am.

43:04

And I

43:04

think there's a very simple explanation for

43:06

that. I think, again, these are lawyers

43:09

who don't have historical connections with

43:11

government. Right? I never

43:14

litigated against the government or for the government. I don't care

43:16

if they don't send me any business.

43:18

I never got any business from them. Mhmm. Other

43:20

larger firms

43:20

have to make that

43:21

calculation. So

43:25

that this is the small lawyers

43:27

that say this. You're

43:28

saying, you're expecting there

43:31

to be accountability. That's interesting.

43:32

There's a lot of

43:34

people out there who are

43:36

what you'd call black pill.

43:37

They just don't

43:40

expect there'd ever be any accountability. What do you have to say to

43:42

them? First of all, I understand how

43:46

they feel.

43:47

It's incredibly frustrating. What's

43:50

happened? It's

43:50

so obvious to many people

43:53

what happened was wrong.

43:55

And again, in the old

43:57

world that we used to live

43:59

in, people who did things that were wrong,

44:02

were

44:02

arrested, were tried, you

44:05

know, maybe they could get off on a technicality, an OJ defense or

44:07

something, but at least they had to, you know,

44:09

go through the process. And what we've seen in

44:11

the last two years is

44:14

that you know, every

44:15

major institution in this

44:17

country has closed ranks to

44:19

protect those wrongdoers.

44:22

And it

44:22

seems overwhelming. How could you possibly

44:26

overcome the

44:26

universities,

44:27

the federal government?

44:30

the,

44:30

you know, state, local

44:33

county dogcatcher. Right?

44:35

All working together to prevent

44:38

anybody from having to be accountable.

44:40

How can you overcome that?

44:43

And

44:44

so that

44:45

is a a legitimate concern. But

44:48

that's not how

44:49

justice works. That's not

44:52

how history works.

44:53

Right? It

44:55

has only

44:56

been two years. Now, two years

44:58

seems like a long time when you're in the middle

45:00

of it. Right? When you're in the war,

45:02

two years on the front lines, that is a

45:04

long time. But it's not a long time in

45:08

historical sense.

45:11

there

45:11

are any number of of

45:14

great old slogans about it. But, you know, the

45:16

wheels of justice move slowly, but they

45:18

eventually will get there.

45:20

And

45:20

I think that

45:21

so I'll give you a

45:24

tangible example.

45:26

When

45:26

I first started, litigating

45:29

in, you know, this

45:31

area

45:31

with these COVID

45:34

cases. Your

45:36

rank and file, judge didn't wanna hear anything about it.

45:38

Right? They were totally closed

45:40

minded. So when I

45:42

filed my first mask

45:44

lawsuit I expected to lose at the court because

45:47

I'm asking

45:48

a

45:51

an individual just like you and me, their job is to

45:53

be a judge. They have to run

45:55

for election. What judge

45:59

in the summer of thousand

45:59

twenty wanted to be the anti mask

46:02

judge. Right? That's

46:04

throwing your career away.

46:06

That's what they were hearing from their peers. But

46:10

now, when

46:10

I go into court

46:13

before a judge, I

46:16

have at least an open

46:18

mind.

46:19

That's a sea change from where

46:22

we were. It's completely different. I got a

46:24

an oral ruling from a

46:25

federal judge in Pensacola

46:28

Division. I won't say his

46:30

name to to embarrass

46:32

him. But he called out

46:34

this hospital that we were suing for

46:36

their totally

46:38

irrational vaccine

46:39

mandate. Now, he

46:41

didn't give me the relief

46:43

that I wanted, but he went on

46:45

and on about how discussed

46:47

that he was about it and how,

46:50

you know, unpleasant

46:51

and irrational the

46:53

policy was. I couldn't

46:55

have got the first year of the

46:57

pandemic. So I feel like

46:58

we're on a trajectory.

47:00

Right? I

47:01

almost got there. with that

47:03

judge. And I got enough.

47:05

What about next

47:08

year?

47:08

I study the

47:10

news related to COVID every morning because

47:11

I write a blog about it. So

47:14

I'm

47:14

pretty well informed. about

47:18

current

47:18

events. And what we're seeing

47:20

is that while the

47:23

government could gain the

47:26

the

47:26

scientific literature for a while at

47:29

the beginning.

47:29

They've lost control of that

47:31

now. And there's

47:34

Studies, you know this. Study after study after study now

47:36

are critical for example of

47:39

the vaccines. Study after study after

47:41

study, you're critical of the the

47:43

masking. Right? There is a

47:45

great weight, you know, just

47:47

one little

47:48

study at a time on a some narrow

47:50

issue. But when you add them

47:53

all up, There's a body of scholarship

47:55

forming that's outside

47:56

the control of the government. They

47:58

don't have enough, you know,

47:59

officials to control all

48:02

of that. So

48:02

when I go into court next year, I'm gonna have

48:05

even more ammunition. When I started,

48:07

I had nothing to work with.

48:10

Right? It was brand new. It was all just, you know,

48:12

people's hypotheses and what Dr. Fauci

48:14

said. Now I can

48:17

point to this study this study, in this study, in this

48:19

study until I, you know, get

48:22

tired. So we

48:24

we're gonna get there. There

48:27

will be accountability.

48:30

I can't tell you how long it's gonna take.

48:32

I I can

48:34

tell you that these things, you know, tend to

48:36

drag out. We were up against a very well organized, well

48:42

resourced opponent. They

48:43

are not gonna give in easily.

48:45

They're gonna slow it down however

48:47

they can, but it is coming.

48:49

It is a force

48:51

that is so large and heavy and

48:54

unstoppable, they cannot hold it back

48:56

forever. We will

48:57

get accountability. Well,

49:00

Jeff

49:00

Childers, it's such a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank

49:02

you. I've really

49:03

enjoyed it. Thank you all for

49:05

joining Jeff

49:05

Childers and me on this episode of American

49:08

thought leaders.

49:09

I'm your host, Janja Kelek.