The Glenn Beck Program - Ep 246 ｜ EMERGENCY PODCAST： Save ‘Baby Sparrow’ from the Taliban

00:00:00.000 This winter, take a trip to Tampa on Porter Airlines.

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00:00:31.000 And now, a Blaze Media Podcast.

00:00:34.360 Today I want to tell you a story of a five-year-old that is right dead center, the heart of an international controversy involving Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, the U.S. State Department, even Hunter Biden's law firm.

00:00:51.520 But everybody seems to forget she's a little five-year-old girl.

00:00:56.220 She was actually recovered as an infant during a U.S. mission in Afghanistan.

00:01:02.760 Her mother was a suicide bomber.

00:01:06.020 She survived even though mom was clutching her at the chest.

00:01:10.400 The military didn't know what to do with her.

00:01:18.540 The Afghans that were on our side said, you got to kill her because she's just going to become another terrorist.

00:01:26.140 But a good Marine and several Marines and several people in the hospitals around the world remembered she was a child.

00:01:41.160 And she now lives in America with her adoptive parents who are now fighting to keep custody of her.

00:01:48.400 They claim that their daughter is a child of foreign terrorists in Afghanistan.

00:01:54.760 And without the intervention of the U.S. Rangers who rescued her that night, she wouldn't be alive today.

00:02:00.660 Even if they would have given to the soldiers from Afghanistan that were on our side, she wouldn't be alive today.

00:02:07.860 And if she were in Afghanistan today, she would be under the rule of the Taliban.

00:02:14.500 How would that work out for a young girl?

00:02:18.860 The only problem is, is that if this little girl is who they claim she is,

00:02:24.480 then her mere existence unravels the foundations of a peace agreement between the U.S. and Afghanistan,

00:02:31.500 which stipulated there were no foreign fighters in Afghanistan.

00:02:36.280 But you see, this little girl proves once again the Taliban lied.

00:02:43.500 These are the shaky foundations that set the stage for our disastrous withdrawal.

00:02:50.180 And with the fall of Afghanistan in the background,

00:02:53.840 two Americans fought against all odds to rescue their adopted daughter

00:02:58.580 before she was crushed in the collapse of a nation.

00:03:03.160 Now, perhaps without you, her future hangs in the balance.

00:03:09.560 She needs help now.

00:03:15.940 I want you to spend time and really listen to the American parents fighting for this little girl,

00:03:22.860 Joshua and Stephanie Mast.

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00:04:37.260 Thank you guys for coming in.

00:04:53.380 I think I've done a lot of important shows that felt important when I did them.

00:05:01.340 This might be the biggest impossible injustice I have ever reported on.

00:05:14.240 Your story is remarkable.

00:05:18.660 It's very complex.

00:05:20.000 I want to take it carefully, linearly, so we'll just tell the story.

00:05:26.220 The first part needs to be, who are you?

00:05:30.100 Introduce yourselves.

00:05:31.500 Well, first, thank you for having us on.

00:05:33.160 We really appreciate it.

00:05:35.280 Growing up listening to you and Rush, it's just surreal to be able to sit here and talk with you.

00:05:41.340 Thank you.

00:05:41.640 So, I'm an active-duty Marine.

00:05:43.880 I'm a major in the Marine Corps.

00:05:45.220 Active duty.

00:05:46.020 Active duty.

00:05:46.680 So, all this is my opinion, not on behalf of the government or anybody else.

00:05:50.240 Got it.

00:05:50.760 In fact, a lot of it will be kind of focused on some government action that's happened to our family.

00:05:55.860 I would say, describing us, we're a family of five, grown up traveling with the Marine Corps.

00:06:01.000 I've had a child born at every duty station.

00:06:03.320 I'd say we're a pretty archetypical military family.

00:06:06.440 Yes.

00:06:08.360 You've been in for 14 years now, so we've been married for 18 years.

00:06:12.480 So, our entire married life, most of our married life, has been in the Marine Corps.

00:06:15.820 And proud of, I mean, love the experience.

00:06:18.820 And our four, we have five kids, four of them are boys.

00:06:22.840 A lot of them want to grow up to be a Marine, or that's what they say at this age.

00:06:26.700 And so, just red-blooded patriots through and through.

00:06:29.840 How's mom with the idea of the Marines?

00:06:32.180 I tell them to be open to, but absolutely.

00:06:35.940 I mean, I'm proud of the Marine Corps, and just, you know, even our service members in general.

00:06:40.440 And so, I love the community.

00:06:44.020 And so, we've been happy to be a part of it.

00:06:46.800 You guys have been together for how long?

00:06:49.240 18 years?

00:06:50.020 Well, married 18 years.

00:06:51.300 That's not a question.

00:06:51.580 I met him when I was 11, and he was 12.

00:06:53.700 So, we've been childhood sweethearts.

00:06:55.560 You know, grew up together, started dating in high school, and been together ever since.

00:07:00.760 So, really, I mean, truly best friends, and been through everything together.

00:07:04.640 Okay, so now we have to introduce your daughter.

00:07:08.340 Four boys, one girl.

00:07:10.320 Yes.

00:07:11.140 She's the center of a lot of controversy, and to protect her, we're going to have to use

00:07:17.360 John Doe's, Jane Doe, and her name is not a real name, Sparrow.

00:07:24.360 That's right.

00:07:24.980 Tell me about Sparrow.

00:07:28.360 Who is she?

00:07:32.500 Where did she come from?

00:07:33.520 Where did the nickname come from?

00:07:35.260 Okay.

00:07:35.940 Well, first of all, I'll tell who she is today.

00:07:38.680 So, she is a five-year-old girl that loves, just like any other girl, loves baby dolls,

00:07:45.600 and anything girly, pink, purple, coloring, just loves life, loves dogs, and playing outside

00:07:54.260 with her brothers.

00:07:55.860 And she's just a blessing and a true joy, just the most gracious little girl that you

00:08:02.640 could possibly imagine.

00:08:03.960 She has a remarkable past, and if you saw her today, you would never believe what she has

00:08:11.160 been through.

00:08:12.020 So, I don't know what your parameters are as a Marine, but you claim that she is the child

00:08:27.540 of a foreign fighter in Afghanistan, correct?

00:08:30.700 Can you tell me what, what, tell me that scenario, what happened?

00:08:38.880 Sure.

00:08:39.260 So, I was deployed in 2019 in Afghanistan.

00:08:42.780 I was attached at operational headquarters of the four-star in overall command of both

00:08:46.560 U.S. and NATO forces.

00:08:48.660 And so, I will never forget, I was walking to dinner one night with our staff.

00:08:52.880 My colonel was a senior staff judge advocate, phenomenal leader, really appreciated my time

00:08:59.120 under him, but he said, he said, what the heck are we going to do with this baby, walk

00:09:04.960 into dinner?

00:09:05.900 And, what baby, sir?

00:09:08.780 And he said, oh, the operators had knocked over an Al-Qaeda facility last night, and there

00:09:13.820 was only one survivor, it was a baby.

00:09:17.240 And we didn't know it was boy or girl or much details about it, but it sounded like it was

00:09:20.620 bad.

00:09:21.020 And so, like, your gut reaction and the reaction of, like, folks from the rangers on the ground

00:09:26.360 to medical staff to us was like, well, what can we do?

00:09:29.980 Like, you immediately volunteer, like, how do we make sure a safe outcome for this child?

00:09:34.700 And it kind of developed from there, and we learned more about it over time.

00:09:38.020 And now we have, like, eyewitness testimony and declassified information from the most sophisticated

00:09:43.980 unit in Afghanistan at that time in a 19-year, you know, developed theater with, I guess,

00:09:52.840 a significant amount of intelligence about exactly who was there, exactly what were they

00:09:56.740 doing, and where they were from.

00:09:58.280 Okay.

00:09:58.460 But the actual mission that night has been classified, right?

00:10:02.260 So, portions of it have been declassified, and two eyewitnesses have testified.

00:10:07.620 That they were there, and they saw.

00:10:09.260 They were there and saw and recovered her.

00:10:10.520 So, how did mom and dad die?

00:10:15.520 Well, I guess I should probably just give you an overview of the mission.

00:10:19.440 Okay.

00:10:20.000 So, it was 6th September 2019, in the period of darkness between the 5th and the 6th at

00:10:26.760 night.

00:10:27.120 That's when they owned the night.

00:10:28.680 So, it was a range regiment mission, which was one of our most sophisticated units in Afghanistan

00:10:33.620 at that time.

00:10:34.640 And so, they infiltrate to an area where there's a known al-Qaeda compound, and they're trying

00:10:39.380 to capture or kill three al-Qaeda leaders.

00:10:42.740 And they also had another series of compounds nearby that had more fighters in them.

00:10:47.920 And so, they had two platoon-sized elements of rangers in the cover of darkness, basically

00:10:53.320 sneaking up on these compounds, surrounding them, and then issuing a demand to surrender

00:10:58.320 or die.

00:10:59.520 And they were briefed.

00:11:01.640 And what happened exactly as they were briefed, they expected them to fight to the death.

00:11:05.220 And that's exactly what happened in brutal close combat over an hour and a half, where

00:11:10.060 they sustained multiple U.S. casualties.

00:11:12.600 Two guys partially paralyzed, almost a dozen, I believe, rangers wounded, and then a dozen

00:11:18.640 of the Afghan partner force were also wounded in a very kinetic engagement.

00:11:22.760 So, our rangers are there.

00:11:27.980 But when does Sparrow come into the scene?

00:11:31.260 Is she with mom, dad, both?

00:11:33.080 What is mom and dad doing?

00:11:34.360 So, a little bit of both.

00:11:36.560 So, the multipurpose canine handler, or dog handler, is how we colloquially refer to them,

00:11:40.560 he described, when they initially breached the structure, seeing a man holding a little baby,

00:11:49.660 which we believe was her, and having an AK-47 and firing at them, engaging them.

00:11:53.980 And then that weapon jammed.

00:11:56.160 And so, the man disappeared, the baby was no longer with him, and a grenade rolled out.

00:12:01.880 So, he says he had a distinct memory of looking down and seeing this grenade.

00:12:04.880 And as he described it, it was like a homemade explosive.

00:12:09.100 And so, he says, I covered my dog, and I yelled grenade, because there was rangers stacked up

00:12:15.200 on the breach.

00:12:16.180 And he said, even though I was the closest one, somehow I didn't get hit.

00:12:19.320 And several of his buddies did, got fragmentation wounds.

00:12:23.200 And so, they were forced to, with knowing there was a child in there, throw grenades back in.

00:12:28.080 In exchange, there was an exchange of grenades at close range.

00:12:30.840 And they had sympathetic detonations of other explosives going off from the grenades they

00:12:35.080 threw into the room.

00:12:36.420 And from there, they did a series of what they call barricaded shooters.

00:12:40.040 So, it is a suicidal terrorist who will barricade themselves in with the presence of their family

00:12:45.260 in a room and engage whoever's coming in that room and not surrender no matter what.

00:12:49.460 They will even, you know, blow up their families rather than surrender.

00:12:53.360 And that's exactly what they experienced in room after room after room through this

00:12:55.960 relatively small leadership compound.

00:12:58.300 And so, you asked, where did she be covered?

00:13:04.700 So, as they culminate and they get to one of the last rooms in this structure, they had

00:13:10.600 run out of breaching explosives.

00:13:13.680 And so, they used what's called a Carl Gustav or a goose gun, which is a bazooka, for lack

00:13:18.580 of a better descriptor.

00:13:19.600 And they used that to blow a hole in the final room to clear it of the remaining terrorists.

00:13:25.700 And that blast killed that original, what we believe was the biological father.

00:13:31.580 And the ranger testified under oath that he observed what ended up being her biological

00:13:38.480 mother run out of that hole that they created, screaming at him as he's like obliquing around

00:13:43.900 a corner covering whoever's going to come out and exploded a suicide device about 15 feet

00:13:50.080 from him.

00:13:50.860 So, that was his...

00:13:51.480 So, on her.

00:13:52.160 She blew herself up.

00:13:53.260 Correct.

00:13:53.820 And she was holding Sparrow?

00:13:55.740 So, he didn't realize that at the time.

00:13:57.540 So, as an American, we treat, you know, friendly enemy.

00:14:00.700 We treat wounded.

00:14:02.020 And so, she was incapacitated.

00:14:03.300 He dragged her behind a berm, checked her medically, noticed that she had given the...

00:14:07.780 She had the signs of, like, recently giving birth.

00:14:10.060 And he's kind of looking around with his night vision to, like, what...

00:14:13.120 And saw her moving out of the corner of his eye.

00:14:16.320 And so, she was about six weeks old.

00:14:19.280 She suffered a fractured skull.

00:14:22.400 A fractured left femur so bad they had to put a rod in to put it back together.

00:14:25.520 And second-degree burns on her face and neck from the Carl Gustav round or the mom's vest

00:14:31.520 cooking off.

00:14:32.720 You know, it's hard to say with that many kinetic events happening around her what exactly

00:14:36.740 caused it.

00:14:37.360 But, I mean, we're talking six inches and she's, you know, six inches higher and she's

00:14:42.020 in vital areas and an inch deeper into her skull and she's dead.

00:14:47.620 And what was more remarkable is there's an Afghan partner force there.

00:14:52.280 And they were engaged in clearing that room that they just breached.

00:14:56.980 And they had...

00:14:57.860 They sustained a casualty and were very angry about that.

00:15:01.820 And so, they wanted...

00:15:03.120 They literally came to our rangers and, like, let us shoot her in the head.

00:15:08.600 Like, just...

00:15:08.940 The baby.

00:15:09.240 The baby.

00:15:10.220 Like, let's just throw her in the creek.

00:15:12.640 And so, they didn't want her to grow up to be a foreign terrorist in their country because

00:15:15.880 they're engaged in a brutal civil war at that point with a lot of foreign terrorists.

00:15:19.420 And these are the cultural experts.

00:15:21.280 It's their culture.

00:15:22.520 Who knows better than them?

00:15:24.000 And so, our guys, like, physically resisted murdering our little girl now on objective.

00:15:31.540 And, like, honestly, the moral courage while you have your own guys bleeding and you're

00:15:37.040 in a kinetic firefight, they still have that instinct as an American soldier to protect

00:15:41.580 innocent life.

00:15:42.700 I mean, I'm humbled.

00:15:44.700 So, why did no one step forward?

00:15:51.160 I mean, was it known that this baby was retrieved from this compound?

00:15:56.120 I mean, I don't know what the situation is on how you, you know, put an ad out.

00:16:00.480 Hey, are you relative to these people?

00:16:03.300 I mean, you couldn't.

00:16:04.220 So, we've gotten to meet a bunch of phenomenal Americans at every level of government over

00:16:10.600 the last five years in this.

00:16:12.220 And one of them was the, he was what's called a civil affairs officer for the Special Operations

00:16:17.440 Task Force Afghanistan.

00:16:18.280 And I had some of those same questions as I'm kind of researching this.

00:16:22.120 And we didn't know all this at the time, but over time, we've learned.

00:16:26.300 And he had asked the same question, well, how do you safely, you know, advertise in an

00:16:31.860 area controlled by Al-Qaeda or a Haqqani network in Afghanistan, how do you safely advertise

00:16:36.120 that you've recovered a child?

00:16:37.820 And then we had a lot of reports of foreign children, you know, doing very poorly in the

00:16:44.060 Afghan orphanage system or being treated prejudicially, you know, just because of the

00:16:48.000 brutality of the war going on there.

00:16:50.380 And so, he had actually asked some of the ICRC staff, like, that were like, oh, we found

00:16:55.600 somebody who might be able to take her.

00:16:56.560 And he's like, well, are they related?

00:16:58.300 Like, we don't know.

00:16:59.520 And so, he was very concerned that they were having to rely on the word of basically Taliban

00:17:05.780 local nationals in this Taliban controlled area for any sort of potential claimants.

00:17:13.580 And that was a huge concern at our level, at the headquarters level as well.

00:17:17.240 It's like, how do we safely vet people?

00:17:19.800 So, you're walking with your fellow Marine and he says, what are we going to do with

00:17:26.620 this baby?

00:17:27.560 When did it occur to you, maybe we should adopt?

00:17:32.540 Honestly, like, I think the gut instinct was we wanted to ensure the child's safety.

00:17:37.860 Like, initially, it was just a, as an American, you know, anybody downrange, I bet there's

00:17:42.220 a million guys that could close their eyes and say, hey, like, I can remember someone

00:17:46.460 I was trying to help on deployment.

00:17:48.060 Right.

00:17:48.160 That was, that's what this was for us originally.

00:17:50.840 What happened was, is we were trying to, as a legal shop, guarantee a safe outcome for

00:17:57.420 her.

00:17:58.080 And I think DOD did a great job of doing that initially.

00:18:01.720 And then we had, we hit some interference later on with some other agencies, but what really

00:18:07.740 caused us to seek adoption was getting her a visa.

00:18:12.520 I'll never forget the phone call that I got because after that initial talk, walking to

00:18:18.560 Chow Hall, he called me and it was in the afternoon, my time.

00:18:23.620 And when I, and that was not the normal time for him to call me.

00:18:25.740 So initially that scared me like, okay, what's going on?

00:18:29.040 Um, it wasn't very long into, uh, his deployment.

00:18:32.180 And so I picked up the phone and I'll never forget the tone of his voice.

00:18:36.760 It just sounded different.

00:18:38.080 And because I was searching instantly, like, okay, what's going on?

00:18:41.460 Right.

00:18:41.940 And he said, hon, there's this baby.

00:18:45.420 And I was standing in the kitchen.

00:18:47.100 I just stopped.

00:18:47.720 And I was just listening to him describe that it was a lone survivor of an Al Qaeda raid.

00:18:53.620 And they don't know what they're going to do with this baby.

00:18:57.760 And so just trying to sort through that.

00:19:00.820 And I mean, as a mom, my heart goes out.

00:19:03.860 We didn't know at that point, boy, girl, we just knew baby and it was injured and its

00:19:08.500 future is, you know, up in the air.

00:19:10.840 And so I was like, well, we can do something.

00:19:13.000 We will volunteer for it.

00:19:15.100 And I mean, I'm already a stay at home mom, have young kids right around that age range.

00:19:19.860 I know how vulnerable and just, you know, how precious children are.

00:19:23.380 So I was like, we'll do something.

00:19:25.000 And he's like, well, I'm glad you said that because I already volunteered.

00:19:28.960 He's like, but, you know, they're going to do a family trace and there's still a lot

00:19:31.980 of things to figure out.

00:19:33.000 So he's like, we'll see.

00:19:34.380 But this was at a time at first you weren't thinking adoption.

00:19:37.680 You were just thinking maybe.

00:19:39.180 I mean, it wasn't, it was more of like, if there's, I mean, it, it was like he said,

00:19:44.220 guaranteeing a safe outcome.

00:19:45.680 So whatever that is, long-term commitment.

00:19:47.460 And then it wasn't just like, make sure the baby's bandaged up and okay.

00:19:50.380 It was like, absolutely.

00:19:51.840 We'll open our home to a child that has a need like that.

00:19:56.140 Yeah.

00:19:56.560 And I would say that we were very aware at the time of like the negotiations going on

00:20:00.700 that they're going to, like, our presence is going to end very rapidly.

00:20:03.500 And then what's going to happen?

00:20:04.600 Cause a lot of the funding is going to be attached to that.

00:20:06.940 And so our concern, you know, is just asking basic questions like, how bad is she hurt?

00:20:12.140 What unit picked her up?

00:20:13.640 Why do they say she's foreign?

00:20:15.020 And then as I use kind of the skillset that I had to pull some of that information for

00:20:19.060 decision makers, it was very clear exactly who she was and where they came from.

00:20:24.720 And so there was all, and then as you did research on, Hey, what is a, what is an orphanage

00:20:29.040 in Afghanistan look like?

00:20:30.220 And then add to that, what does it look like when the U S leaves?

00:20:34.360 That was especially for a girl, especially for a foreign child.

00:20:38.540 So, so she was not from Afghanistan.

00:20:41.340 Yeah.

00:20:41.440 So the, all of the U S intelligence and everything has been declassified and there's a significant

00:20:45.560 amount that's still left that has not been declassified pointed to a foreign origin for

00:20:50.640 her.

00:20:50.860 Uh, the, the specific group is a, um, a Turkestani or Uyghur, um, Al Qaeda branch.

00:20:58.600 Okay.

00:20:58.840 Yeah.

00:20:59.860 Um, so you decide to adopt, uh, right.

00:21:05.240 Well, initially it was just seeking guardianship.

00:21:07.460 And what Joshua said, it was, it was at the, it was like one step, just.

00:21:11.500 What's the first step.

00:21:12.500 And like Joshua said, it was getting a visa so that she could, because she did have ongoing

00:21:16.420 medical needs.

00:21:17.660 Well, it should actually back up.

00:21:18.880 It was the initial conversation.

00:21:21.040 And then, um, a couple of weeks later we see the very first photo and we, we call it the

00:21:27.480 baby in the box.

00:21:28.780 And there's this little girl in a home Depot box on the floor of a hospital wrapped up in

00:21:34.900 blankets.

00:21:35.180 And so that was the first time we found out basic age, that it's an infant and that it's

00:21:41.080 a girl.

00:21:41.600 And then it just, when you see a, put a face to it, that is just where you're like, okay,

00:21:47.780 what can we do?

00:21:48.560 Well, so initially it was just trying to guarantee safe, like ongoing medical care in the United

00:21:55.680 States.

00:21:56.080 And we were seeking guardianship, but that was, you know, after you found out the, what

00:22:01.260 the requirements are going to be.

00:22:02.280 Yeah.

00:22:03.180 I'd say Glenn that we, we initially just advocated to elevate the priority of this child's life

00:22:08.320 in the U S government's eyes.

00:22:09.940 So when, when did you decide she needs to be with us?

00:22:15.460 She's ours.

00:22:16.780 Well, I think it was in the midst of pursuing all the administrative requirements to get a

00:22:21.920 visa.

00:22:22.340 They kept saying, Oh, well, she needs a name.

00:22:25.020 Well, how do you get a name for a Jane Doe baby?

00:22:27.620 They got blown up on an objective.

00:22:28.960 And that was what the problem was.

00:22:30.580 And then there was like, well, how do you arrange medical care in the U S, which was a requirement

00:22:34.020 for the visa?

00:22:34.680 How do you pay for that?

00:22:36.580 How do you authorize surgery on a child, a minor child?

00:22:39.880 Well, you have to be, have some sort of legal rights.

00:22:42.080 And so as this developed, we're like, okay, well, I'll volunteer to be the financial sponsor

00:22:47.020 for the visa.

00:22:47.700 I'll volunteer to try and get some sort of legal ability to order medical care.

00:22:52.240 And so it really evolved pretty organically from that.

00:22:55.360 It was very organic.

00:22:56.140 And, but it was, it ultimately, I think stemmed from our worldview for it.

00:23:02.320 I mean, in that every life is precious.

00:23:04.940 It doesn't matter race, ethnicity, background.

00:23:07.700 I mean, she's an, she was an innocent caught in a terrible war.

00:23:10.800 And so it was just a protective instinct.

00:23:15.060 And we were put in the position.

00:23:16.780 There was a, like he said, a dozens of Americans.

00:23:18.900 This was not just us.

00:23:20.060 This was across the board, the medical staff at Bagram.

00:23:23.080 There were several people trying to protect and advocate for this one.

00:23:28.480 Was there anybody who was stepping up saying, you can't do this.

00:23:32.660 You can't do this.

00:23:33.360 Or was everybody pretty much on the same page?

00:23:35.600 So I think initially there was a perspective that this is like, as an Afghan problem, it's

00:23:40.440 a distraction from operations.

00:23:42.140 And they were trying to use our command's influence to force the Afghans who'd multiple

00:23:47.200 times said, we don't have the capacity to care for a child like this.

00:23:49.940 Like I was in some of those meetings, but they were trying to force them to, to, to take

00:23:54.200 them anyway.

00:23:54.740 And so that's when we did a little bit of advocacy, trying to find a, to elevate her,

00:23:59.800 her status, her status.

00:24:01.980 Yeah.

00:24:02.240 Her priority of this life, um, because we had options and, um, and that was successful.

00:24:07.180 And then the, uh, the administration, the first Trump administration reached out and directed

00:24:11.140 us to act in her best interest and try to get her back to the U S which is pretty reasonable

00:24:16.600 under the circumstances.

00:24:18.220 Uh, and so we were, we were thinking, Hey, that's good to go.

00:24:21.720 She's going to be safe.

00:24:22.440 And as we're working that new direction, that new U S policy, um, as an office, and

00:24:28.000 then I was volunteering with some of my skill sets in my free time, um, to get a visa.

00:24:32.640 That's when all of this kind of developed.

00:24:33.920 And then I would report that back to my husband.

00:24:35.060 Hey, great, great news.

00:24:36.060 We got guardianship.

00:24:37.040 Great news.

00:24:37.560 We got her added as a DOD dependent.

00:24:39.460 Great news.

00:24:40.140 She has that military ID.

00:24:41.560 Like we had everything lined up to get her home.

00:24:44.640 And, um, and then we, we just had some, some significant opposition at some point.

00:24:49.620 And, uh, that was kind of the first from department of state.

00:24:54.400 Yeah, but I would, I would like to say that, and I have, I already alluded to this is that

00:25:00.100 she was loved by so many people.

00:25:03.940 It wasn't just Joshua and I doing it.

00:25:06.600 It was the medical staff.

00:25:08.040 And like you said, the Rangers, and there was people pulling together to the fact where

00:25:12.040 we called her to answer your question, Sparrow, um, after those initial phone calls.

00:25:17.340 And we started to get more information about her origin and genuinely started to care about

00:25:23.480 her.

00:25:24.240 Um, you know, I had young kids at home and it was, we were still early in the deployment,

00:25:28.360 like getting used to him being gone and, you know, me juggling life at home with young

00:25:33.380 children.

00:25:33.700 And I was finishing up my last semester at grad school and just trying to juggle life.

00:25:38.120 And when we found out about her, I, at first I wasn't going to tell the kids because it's

00:25:44.640 such a, yeah, it was just like, no, we're not going to get them involved yet.

00:25:48.480 But as it started to pick up momentum and actually look like it could happen, I remember, uh,

00:25:53.360 mentioning it to the boys one night and I was tucking them in bed and I told them that

00:25:57.240 there was this baby and that was prior to us, you know, seeing the original baby in the

00:26:02.160 box photo.

00:26:02.780 So, and I said, there's a baby that's been hurt and daddy's trying to help see what,

00:26:06.740 you know, see what can happen.

00:26:07.960 So I said, well, let's pray for the baby.

00:26:09.800 And there's a old hymn that's called his eyes on the sparrow.

00:26:13.660 And so we, that's how big sparrow came to be was we just prayed for baby sparrow.

00:26:19.440 And it was just kind of something that we would, you know, when they, we would pray in the

00:26:22.720 morning or at night, we would pray for baby sparrow.

00:26:24.960 So, and so there was a little bit of initial hesitancy involving our family and it's still

00:26:30.540 to this day because they're seeing us live this out.

00:26:34.280 I mean, they're, they're in it with us.

00:26:35.820 Oh, I know.

00:26:36.220 And as a family, we're, we're going through this together and, um, seeing us through the

00:26:41.080 highs and lows of all of it.

00:26:42.560 But at the, at the core was a, for me at that time, it took my attention off of myself

00:26:49.760 and even kind of a little bit, if I had the, oh, poor me syndrome.

00:26:53.280 Always does.

00:26:53.780 Yeah.

00:26:54.360 And, and realizing that there was a real person out there with needs much greater than

00:26:58.860 mine and that we could potentially make a difference.

00:27:01.300 And so that was, I think all of a sudden that, that it had purpose and meaning.

00:27:07.240 And, um, you, you on that side, you were working at nonstop.

00:27:13.080 So 2020 comes state department gets involved.

00:27:17.020 What happens?

00:27:18.640 So, um, I guess it would be important for the viewers to understand.

00:27:23.780 It is one, the Trump administration reaching out was like a lightning bolt.

00:27:27.380 It was, uh, I'm a junior officer.

00:27:30.080 I'm a captain at the time.

00:27:31.480 I kind of got the, like, don't do that again, but you know, it's a baby.

00:27:34.180 So it's okay.

00:27:34.640 We'll keep, keep doing this.

00:27:35.880 And so, um, I got yelled at a little bit, which was, it was a relief not to get fired,

00:27:40.500 but, um, but we pretty much turned around and said, okay, yeah, that makes sense.

00:27:44.100 We're going to, we're going to act in this child's best interest.

00:27:45.980 We're going to try to get her to the States.

00:27:47.120 And we were working that problem.

00:27:48.340 But to coordinate with the department of state, cause you need that for visas, uh, we had

00:27:53.020 reached out to the embassy and set up a meeting.

00:27:55.040 And I, I distinctly remember staying up to like three in the morning, pouring over the

00:27:59.060 classified Intel, pulling it together for a briefing.

00:28:01.480 And we went to that meeting, DOD did to brief them on exactly what we knew.

00:28:07.420 And, uh, and, and the reason that was important was because if this was a, if this is a foreign

00:28:12.020 child, we wouldn't turn a British or a French or a German foreign fighters over to an Afghan

00:28:17.140 orphanage.

00:28:17.720 We would repatriate them at a minimum.

00:28:20.000 And also, if you're going to actually do a family trace, you'd have to go to the country

00:28:23.380 of origin to see if there's anybody alive and who is not, who is safe.

00:28:26.920 Because here's the reality.

00:28:28.180 We were targeting this group.

00:28:29.720 There was hundreds of them with their families coming back from Syria into this other war

00:28:33.240 zone for a safe space.

00:28:34.520 And we were hunting and killing them.

00:28:36.460 And so our, one of our biggest concern was like, even if you got a family member, if we

00:28:40.840 give this child back to them, is she going to be on another objective and not be so lucky

00:28:44.200 this time?

00:28:45.240 I mean, that's understanding how sophisticated this unit and this intelligence gathering

00:28:50.860 apparatus is.

00:28:51.740 They're, they're killing this entire network and they're doing it that month.

00:28:55.560 And that, that was the priority in Afghanistan.

00:28:57.780 So like, we are very aware, um, just because of my background.

00:29:01.800 Well, there are two main, our two main concerns early on was her ongoing medical needs because

00:29:06.380 she did suffer trauma, but also like Joshua said, just that she would be put back on the

00:29:11.180 X again and she'd be targeted.

00:29:12.760 Or she's even taken by guys who were on our side and killed because of, we don't need another

00:29:19.680 foreign fighter.

00:29:20.340 So the, the, the state department tries to repatriate or tries to put her back with people

00:29:26.360 they claim were her family.

00:29:27.740 So, um, going back to that meeting, so instead of what was supposed to happen of an informational

00:29:32.720 meeting where we're supposed to inform them of what our classified intelligence says,

00:29:36.060 they essentially ambushed us.

00:29:38.640 They brought Afghans to this meeting where we can't brief on a classified level.

00:29:41.620 And they basically tried to do a fait accompli where it's like, Hey, how soon can you take

00:29:47.060 the baby?

00:29:48.480 I mean, like two days after the Trump administration reached out, that's what they were doing.

00:29:51.780 I was in the meeting and there's been a lot of, um, we'll get to that later in the story,

00:29:56.960 but the department of justice under the previous administration has filed court filing saying,

00:30:01.460 Oh, major mesh knew there was known family at this, this particular meeting.

00:30:05.620 But in reality, that was the detainee that our guys had taken off of the op.

00:30:11.880 And I was there to tell you that this guy said he brought these people here from a foreign

00:30:15.860 country and has been moving them around and identified these specific people in this compound

00:30:20.520 as foreign fighters.

00:30:21.720 So that was just some rumor because somebody didn't have the right clearance and we were

00:30:24.500 going to clear that up.

00:30:26.060 And so all of this could have avoided if you're not insubordinate to the administration.

00:30:31.720 Back with more in just a minute.

00:30:32.960 First, we hear a lot of talk about the supply chain.

00:30:35.840 It's unpredictable.

00:30:36.760 It can be very fragile at times when your package is delayed for weeks.

00:30:41.060 It's a little annoying, but when your essential medications are delayed, I had a spooky conversation

00:30:46.620 the other day with somebody who was an expert on China.

00:30:48.860 Oh, it was Tom.

00:30:49.540 It was Tom Cotton.

00:30:51.000 And he said, yeah, they're preparing for war and we don't make a lot of our medicine.

00:30:56.420 We get it from China.

00:30:58.300 That might be bad.

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00:31:45.440 So who did they hand Sparrow over to?

00:31:49.900 So there was about a two month period after that meeting where the State Department kind

00:31:56.620 of like, we're not going to help you, but we're not going to get in your way.

00:31:59.680 And we had successfully negotiated a recommendation from the then existing Afghan government to

00:32:05.700 send her to the states.

00:32:06.660 The DOD had done that and it was ready to go.

00:32:09.420 And so what happened is the State Department came back in and I have a colonel sworn testimony.

00:32:17.440 They lied about me and my family like, oh, we've done something improper with this or

00:32:21.720 we didn't tell people.

00:32:23.320 Literally testified under oath here just in October that the State Department official

00:32:29.200 had said or lied about us.

00:32:31.700 Then he said it was the most unprofessional meeting he'd ever been in.

00:32:34.700 And he's the acting staff judge advocate for a four star command who's in charge of the

00:32:39.460 theater.

00:32:39.940 And he gets told, stand down.

00:32:42.100 State Department's got the lead.

00:32:43.520 They're going to handle this.

00:32:45.460 That's exactly what we were told as a charity at the Abbey Gate.

00:32:49.820 Stand down.

00:32:50.760 State Department has this.

00:32:52.240 And that's when everybody lost their life.

00:32:54.340 Yeah.

00:32:54.520 Great job.

00:32:55.160 Anyway.

00:32:56.480 And I'm not trying to ding the entire State Department.

00:32:58.800 I think that there's a lot of hope for the future and how we're moving forward with

00:33:02.180 this.

00:33:02.620 I agree.

00:33:02.780 Um, and I'm, you know, morale's high, uh, as far as, as I'm concerned, at least in our

00:33:07.760 unit.

00:33:08.360 And, um, but I, I will say that there are some people that don't reflect our values and they

00:33:14.160 don't reflect, I don't think a proper representation of what America is about, sometimes in foreign

00:33:20.980 countries.

00:33:21.640 And we experienced that.

00:33:22.720 And so what he, what, what we thought at the time was if we just get the facts in front

00:33:27.920 of the right people, they'll do the right thing.

00:33:29.980 Like that was it.

00:33:30.880 We were, we were very optimistic and so it's like, they just need to know the truth.

00:33:34.900 Right.

00:33:35.180 And then there's, there's not a question.

00:33:36.660 And so we advocated during that time hard for her.

00:33:40.560 And, and unfortunately what we come to, what we, we've now come to realize is that's not

00:33:46.360 the case.

00:33:47.140 And so it was literally, it is with some, it is with some, but what, what Joshua said

00:33:52.160 with that, the Colonel testified to is when it came down to where they determined, and

00:33:58.160 it came out in Joshua's board of inquiry is they primarily saw her.

00:34:01.760 There was a few key figures that primarily saw her as a, like he said, an Afghan issue,

00:34:08.400 an Afghan problem or a distraction.

00:34:11.640 And fundamentally though, there was one female that testified at his board of inquiry, a service

00:34:16.060 member.

00:34:16.440 And she basically, she was upset that service members came to care for this child.

00:34:22.440 Like the, the, the, the, at the hospital staff in Bagram, that they were buying baby supplies

00:34:27.420 with their own mind.

00:34:28.020 Like they were trying to take care of her and make her comfortable and just help, help a

00:34:33.160 child.

00:34:33.260 What else would you do?

00:34:34.600 That's the question that we've always wondered is why wouldn't you, but they saw it as a

00:34:38.480 distraction, something to be done away with.

00:34:41.280 And, and I would say, Glenn, when I reached out to the hospital, I said, Hey, we're trying

00:34:45.680 to see if there's other better options for her.

00:34:47.680 They were overjoyed.

00:34:49.340 Like they were like, let's go.

00:34:51.140 Oh, we've been hoping somebody would help.

00:34:52.860 And so we had what we called operation starfish, which was kind of a grassroots level to try

00:34:57.720 to get a safe outcome for her.

00:34:59.100 And, and the story behind, so she has two pseudonyms that it was either sparrow or we

00:35:05.020 called her sparrow.

00:35:05.860 They called her starfish.

00:35:07.280 And there's a poem where there's a boy walking along the ocean and he's bending down, picking

00:35:11.260 up and throwing the starfish back into the ocean.

00:35:13.420 And so the, the line at the end is an adult comes along and a question is like, how can you

00:35:17.860 possibly make a difference?

00:35:19.140 The boy bends down and picks up another starfish and throws it into the ocean.

00:35:22.680 He's like, well, it made a difference for that one.

00:35:24.980 And for starfish is what they called her.

00:35:28.120 She was a symbol of the one that they could help because in a terrible world where they're

00:35:33.220 seeing unspeakable like tragedy all the time, she was the unique one that they could help.

00:35:39.960 And so there was this rally cry around her to protect her and to keep her safe.

00:35:44.280 Yeah.

00:35:44.720 To the point where we were waking up people when the president visited, uh, Bagram for

00:35:49.580 Thanksgiving in 2019, we were like waking people up, like go find the president, have

00:35:53.680 him meet her.

00:35:54.320 Like, cause it was a hundred yards, a hundred yards from where she was.

00:35:57.680 And we were so close.

00:35:58.960 Um, and that was when the U S policies tried to get her back.

00:36:01.880 So we're like, wouldn't it be cool if they go home on air force one?

00:36:03.880 Um, but we were from, from, I guess, from an intelligence perspective, there was never

00:36:09.860 a question of where she came from.

00:36:11.680 This is totally like a gloss made up.

00:36:14.540 So when, how did this, this Afghani, these Afghanis get in entangled in all of this?

00:36:20.960 Okay.

00:36:21.100 So I think the, the best way I can explain this is, um, the terms of the peace, the strategically

00:36:26.620 what's going on in September, 2019 is the peace deal literally blew up.

00:36:30.420 Um, the president said, this is a bad deal.

00:36:33.080 The Taliban's not acting in good faith and announced a canceling of the peace deal.

00:36:37.420 And from there, both the Taliban is trying to get back to the negotiating table and the,

00:36:41.840 the embassy is rightly trying to negotiate a peace, a legitimate peace.

00:36:45.280 But I think we were fed a bad deal in case nobody saw like 2021.

00:36:49.160 Um, but the Taliban is specifically denying the presence of this group.

00:36:55.460 They formally announced it on their website.

00:36:57.480 Like they're, these reports are false.

00:36:59.220 This group isn't in Afghanistan, the Uyghur group, possibly, possibly.

00:37:02.960 Yeah.

00:37:03.160 But I guess they called him Turkestani, but they're this Al Qaeda group, which is a condition

00:37:08.180 of the peace deal.

00:37:09.040 So the Taliban's not dumb.

00:37:10.520 Like they fought us for 20 years.

00:37:11.800 Right.

00:37:12.600 Right.

00:37:12.940 So they have a strategic interest in this not being a thing.

00:37:15.860 And so a Colonel who was the action officer in the Pentagon testified in our board of inquiry

00:37:20.340 in October.

00:37:21.040 He said that six to eight false claimants came forward.

00:37:24.360 They tested them for DNA and they were negative.

00:37:26.500 So, so Glenn, why would six or eight people who are not relatives of this child come forward?

00:37:34.900 And I think the answer is they were sent forward.

00:37:38.300 Correct.

00:37:38.740 And so our concern at that time was that, hey, this is, it could be someone who is being

00:37:47.880 sent forward as a proxy of the Taliban.

00:37:49.520 It could be someone who is just profiting off of like somebody trolling through a non-U.S.

00:37:54.800 controlled area of Afghanistan and saying, want a baby?

00:37:57.060 And, you know, because at the time there was pretty, pretty severe conditions in Afghanistan.

00:38:01.720 It's getting to be the fall into the winter time.

00:38:03.540 And we were getting reports that at least in Kabul, they were eating cats and dogs.

00:38:08.080 They were selling their youngest children to pay for the rest of their family to make it

00:38:11.440 through the winter.

00:38:12.280 And so there was some significant, you know, economic conditions at that time.

00:38:17.480 When did John and Jane Doe come into the picture?

00:38:23.300 Sure.

00:38:23.900 So it really wasn't, it was John Doe's father.

00:38:28.400 He was.

00:38:29.520 These are the people that this is where the real battle begins.

00:38:33.840 Yes.

00:38:34.160 And I would say at the outset of this is I don't blame these particular Afghans.

00:38:39.420 Everybody wants to come to America.

00:38:41.160 You know.

00:38:41.940 Sure.

00:38:42.360 We blame the Americans who know the truth and are covering this up.

00:38:46.580 You know, they come from an environment where you're living a little more hand to mouth

00:38:49.920 and you have to survive.

00:38:50.940 And I don't, I have a lot of great Afghan friends that we've fought with and I respect.

00:38:57.020 And so this isn't about really Afghans, but it's about what the State Department did that

00:39:01.900 was dangerous, like objectively dangerous.

00:39:04.260 So here's how it fits in.

00:39:07.720 We get told to stand, DoD gets told to stand down in December of 2019.

00:39:13.960 There is a meeting, a critical meeting on December 31st when the embassy and the Afghan

00:39:18.920 that we've been mentoring to basically have basic child safety procedures.

00:39:23.380 He worked for a ministry of labor.

00:39:26.680 And so we've been basically trained, advising, and assisting them that you do a DNA test if

00:39:32.400 there's somebody that comes forward and you vet people for terrorism, like not rocket science

00:39:36.200 here.

00:39:37.100 And they were very on board with that.

00:39:38.760 And so they had a claimant come forward.

00:39:42.220 And so they requested the embassy, who's the new lead, to do a DNA test to this person.

00:39:47.460 But somehow the embassy reports to the Trump administration and their own agency that the

00:39:54.240 Afghan, a DNA test, I think the white lie was it's not part of the Afghan process.

00:39:58.260 And they've confirmed there's family members.

00:40:01.760 And in reality, we'd spent two years to get this Afghan to America.

00:40:05.800 He got here three days before our board of inquiry, as far as like, if you want to talk

00:40:09.320 about the providence of God.

00:40:10.820 But this guy said, the only person in the world who could contradict what the embassy

00:40:14.460 is saying got to America a couple of days before we needed him to be here.

00:40:17.880 And he said, they asked for a DNA test and they denied it.

00:40:21.760 And they personally, this particular Afghan or embassy employee personally denied a DNA

00:40:28.320 test.

00:40:29.320 And so he said there was nothing else.

00:40:30.920 Like, they didn't have a photo ID.

00:40:32.480 There was like some guy saying, I'm a family.

00:40:35.420 And that's what the embassy forced them to go through with.

00:40:38.900 And so this man ended up being a, his claim was a lie.

00:40:43.580 Like, over the last three years, we can document, we've documented that.

00:40:46.520 He claimed to be a farmer, right?

00:40:47.900 Well, so the, the person who claimed to be a relative who, who she was ultimately turned

00:40:51.860 over to, um, claimed to be related to, um, uh, a dead, a person who was killed during

00:40:59.060 that mission.

00:40:59.620 And I believe that's a lie.

00:41:01.020 I think we can document that.

00:41:02.160 So he was just lying.

00:41:03.920 That's why you have precautions in place to vet people.

00:41:08.380 And so baby Sparrow is, where is baby Sparrow at this point?

00:41:15.720 So at that time, when they were told, basically, this is the new course of action and to stand

00:41:23.000 down, um, what we learned at Joshua's board of inquiry is literally, um, one of the generals,

00:41:28.720 he had the entire, like the medical staff footprint at Bagram.

00:41:33.520 He sat them down and said, this is what's going to happen to her.

00:41:36.780 Like, this is the course of action.

00:41:38.060 This is the decision.

00:41:38.880 Then this is what we're going to do.

00:41:40.060 And he ordered everybody.

00:41:41.720 And that's what the Colonel testified.

00:41:43.140 It was the most unprofessional dress down he's ever been a part of.

00:41:46.140 He basically yelled at everybody and said, this is what we're doing.

00:41:49.340 And so he, they turned her over with armed.

00:41:53.380 What, what did you, what do you call armed guards?

00:41:55.120 Personal security detail.

00:41:55.860 Personal security detail.

00:41:57.660 And the reason why the personal security detail, they were there was because they were concerned

00:42:02.520 about a resistance among service members.

00:42:05.000 So if this was family, if this was like for her best interest and she was going to be

00:42:10.640 okay, why were they worried about a resistance among young service members?

00:42:17.040 Because ultimately they, like everybody knew what her outcome was going to be.

00:42:21.900 And they knew it was wrong.

00:42:23.000 Yeah.

00:42:23.460 They, they, they flew a flag over Bagram in her memory.

00:42:25.940 Cause they thought she was dead is what it was so dangerous.

00:42:28.900 And there was just no vetting at all.

00:42:31.600 And what I think that, um, sometimes powerful people don't realize is, you know, there's

00:42:37.120 a lot of regular people out there that can, can show the homework on this stuff.

00:42:40.880 And I, I just thought that, I don't think they ever thought it would be, they'd be held

00:42:44.860 accountable for any of this stuff.

00:42:46.580 And now, oh, fortunately for the last few years and some of the process we've gone through

00:42:51.060 has been brutal, but we have the evidence now.

00:42:53.680 And, um, uh, we're excited about the opportunity to, you know, I guess, what show that.

00:43:02.740 So when, when did, when did Sparrow and how did Sparrow get here?

00:43:08.580 That's a miracle.

00:43:09.520 That is a miracle.

00:43:10.280 The one thing I'd like to add is the night that, cause we scrambled and we, we literally

00:43:15.100 did everything we could to stop that turnover because all we knew it was to a person that

00:43:19.460 wished to remain anonymous.

00:43:20.320 And we knew that they weren't DNA vetted and that they were likely terrorist affiliated.

00:43:25.060 And so we did everything we could do to stop that from happening.

00:43:28.360 And I remember, I'll never forget when you came in and you got the call, it was very late

00:43:32.500 at night and he came in and he's like, she's gone.

00:43:35.800 And I, I remember, I was just like, I felt like I was kicking the gut and I was just like

00:43:40.380 so devastated.

00:43:41.260 Cause I thought Trump or somebody would come through and save the day and she would not,

00:43:45.460 you know, be turned over like that.

00:43:47.140 And I was heartbroken at that moment, but I'll never forget.

00:43:50.640 You said, and it was, the room was dark and I just remember your voice and you said, I

00:43:54.640 don't know why I have no reason to think this, but it's going to be okay.

00:43:58.740 And I was like, and I, I was just accepted at that point.

00:44:02.480 Cause I had no words and I was just like, okay.

00:44:04.520 And so that brings us to how she got out.

00:44:07.980 Two days before the piece still signed the U S government, you know, through the embassy's

00:44:12.520 representations turns her over to an unvetted, what's turned out to be a non-relative terrorist

00:44:17.680 affiliated person.

00:44:18.460 Like the guy's got a Taliban flag on his WhatsApp profile.

00:44:21.900 Um, uh, and, and so everything we'd feared, everything we, I mean, as a captain, my wife

00:44:27.160 and I soothes the secretary of defense and the secretary of state.

00:44:29.920 That's how convinced we were that this was objectively dangerous.

00:44:33.740 Like I'm, I'm thinking my, my career is over, but I can't like sit here and not do every legal

00:44:39.800 guardians.

00:44:40.480 Like we, we had legal standing and we were her.

00:44:43.820 Well, our government recognized our rights, right?

00:44:46.880 And she was recognized as our daughter by headquarters, Marine Corps.

00:44:49.940 I'm calling on the phone, explaining what we're doing.

00:44:51.960 I mean, we're talking to the white house chief of staff.

00:44:54.580 We're talking to the, the director of USCIS, like as far as for a crazy situation, we're

00:44:59.840 doing as by the book as we can for a unique one-off situation.

00:45:04.360 And I, the, what I think it's very important for the listeners to understand is if all of

00:45:10.820 the U S intelligence was actually correct.

00:45:12.920 And the people that we sent our special operators to capture or kill were foreigners.

00:45:18.740 All of this is a lie because if she really is who we thought she was the whole time, then

00:45:25.020 all of this gloss is just smoke and mirrors.

00:45:28.700 They had no reason to do what they did.

00:45:31.160 And the only reason we don't know about the DNA is because these people now won't take a

00:45:36.640 DNA test and the state department denied taking a DNA test before.

00:45:40.700 And to me, if, if you think that there's a valid claimant, the first thing you do is a

00:45:45.280 DNA test.

00:45:45.840 It's the most biometrically enrolled society on earth.

00:45:49.800 So again, let me go back to John and Jane Doe.

00:45:53.660 Yeah.

00:45:54.300 Who are these people?

00:45:55.680 So he, so John Doe is the son of this older man.

00:45:58.920 Okay.

00:45:59.740 So he, she was going to, that's real.

00:46:02.260 I believe that's real.

00:46:03.480 Okay.

00:46:03.980 So this older man gets her and we, um, there's a, a phenomenal human rights attorney named Kim

00:46:09.140 Motley.

00:46:09.560 And she's got experience like, uh, dealing with like traffic children in Afghanistan.

00:46:13.560 She finds her.

00:46:14.480 That's a miracle in itself, but I'll gloss over it for time.

00:46:17.840 Um, this, this older man says, or we get, uh, some information that he's hired a young

00:46:25.620 girl to take care of her.

00:46:26.660 He's paying her a salary.

00:46:27.760 A teenager.

00:46:28.160 A teenager.

00:46:29.140 That teenager is Jane Doe.

00:46:31.260 She's like 16, I think at the time she's going to finishing up high school, but it's a

00:46:35.700 war zone.

00:46:36.260 We're told that it's a slum.

00:46:37.640 It's in, in Southern Afghanistan.

00:46:39.820 It's so dangerous that the ICRC won't go there.

00:46:42.500 And we immediately get reports that she, uh, Sparrow starts shaking at, at night in the

00:46:49.360 day and her eyes are twitching.

00:46:51.100 And so we were very concerned about her TBI.

00:46:53.500 Um, cause like in the military community, especially we're very aware of like the long

00:46:57.380 term ramifications getting blown up.

00:46:59.280 And so we're like, we were even trying to get her taken back to Kandar airfield or some

00:47:03.840 of our other hospitals at the time.

00:47:05.480 But then COVID happens and everything gets like shut down and you can't even go out on

00:47:09.060 the street in Afghanistan and all that craziness that ensued.

00:47:12.560 And, um, we were trying to, Kim was trying to get her brought up to be evaluated at a

00:47:18.260 hospital in Kabul that had more capability.

00:47:21.720 Um, so 18 months passes by the teenage girl gets married to the son, the son of the son.

00:47:29.200 Okay.

00:47:29.500 And so I, so I think it's very important for people to understand.

00:47:32.660 And we only spoke to this guy directly six weeks before the fall of Afghanistan and 2021

00:47:38.800 in 2020, in 2021.

00:47:40.860 And, um, Kim is an expert in Afghan culture and like, she's been operating there for a

00:47:46.240 long time.

00:47:46.600 And she's like, look, I think this is a real possibility to send her out because of her

00:47:50.680 needs, but I can't get custody of a child without a way to get her out of Afghanistan.

00:47:54.680 Like I can't like have a, uh, you know, another child in my care.

00:47:58.480 And so we were just creating a path to the United States for her before the Taliban took

00:48:05.680 over because we were very aware that after that deadline, there's going to be a brutal

00:48:09.280 civil war and, you know, a best case scenario, maybe there's a shared government, but you

00:48:14.580 know, that's not ended up what, what happened.

00:48:16.560 So I talked to this guy on July, 2021, first time I owe you, this is me.

00:48:22.120 Here's who I am.

00:48:22.860 Here's what I did in Afghanistan.

00:48:24.240 We believe she's a foreign child.

00:48:25.780 She was an orphan.

00:48:26.500 We sought, you know, legal responsibility for under us law.

00:48:29.860 My interpreter uses the strongest words in Pashto, uh, Wally Masuliat Sarprast.

00:48:36.360 And my, my Afghan friends will probably make fun of me because I probably butchered those.

00:48:39.700 Well, what does it mean?

00:48:40.480 It means guardian responsible one, like the strongest legal term for a non-parent being responsible

00:48:46.000 of them because they don't have adoption.

00:48:47.360 But we would say an adopted parent.

00:48:48.540 Right.

00:48:48.760 Yeah, we would say an adopted parent in the States, but they don't have a similar legal

00:48:51.720 concept there.

00:48:52.340 Okay.

00:48:52.880 And so he's using the strongest terms and this guy's, this guy, I mean, honestly, what

00:48:57.460 he first wanted was a visa.

00:48:58.580 Like, hey, can you get me a visa for me and my brother-in-law?

00:49:00.580 Everybody wants to go to America.

00:49:01.720 I don't even blame them.

00:49:03.000 But no, there's no, like no one could predict the evacuation.

00:49:07.680 I mean, that was a historic event.

00:49:10.100 Uh-huh.

00:49:10.940 So we're sitting here saying she has everything she needs to fly out.

00:49:14.260 We're legally responsible for send her before the Taliban take over.

00:49:18.100 And so this guy, um, this is what he tells me.

00:49:22.020 He's like, I'm asking, I'm like, how's she doing?

00:49:24.860 There's, there's a battle going on in Southern Afghanistan.

00:49:26.720 There's a campaign.

00:49:28.100 There's artillery rounds going off near them.

00:49:30.120 There's people getting shot around them.

00:49:32.800 Uh, he's worried about his, his, his teenage wife, who's about eight months pregnant and,

00:49:36.880 um, about the artillery rounds near their house, like hurting their unborn child.

00:49:41.120 Like that's, this guy's like in a bad way.

00:49:43.940 And, and he says, he's bringing tears to his eyes, how Sparrow's condition is.

00:49:48.160 And, you know, um, and so as this is all happening, I asked like, where is she?

00:49:54.160 Like, that's a pretty good question.

00:49:55.600 Like in a war zone.

00:49:56.500 And he's like, oh, she doesn't live with me or my family or my dad.

00:49:59.580 She lives with this other family and they become like parents to her.

00:50:02.280 And so like, that's, what's so hilarious about, not hilarious.

00:50:05.980 It would be funny if it wasn't like so tragic is that this guy tells me she doesn't even

00:50:11.880 live with him.

00:50:12.680 That's the first thing.

00:50:13.560 Well, one of the first things he says to me, he tells me his father is responsible to the

00:50:18.120 Taliban for her.

00:50:20.540 And then in fact, he's like, oh, I think she should go live with you.

00:50:23.620 And you know, that's so kind, that type of thing.

00:50:25.580 And he's like, I have to ask my dad.

00:50:26.880 He's the responsible one.

00:50:27.780 And he has to ask the Taliban.

00:50:29.200 So during the middle of the war, his dad travels about a hundred miles from where they live

00:50:34.500 in Southern Afghanistan to where she was picked up.

00:50:37.100 And they talked to that Taliban commander who was responsible for those camps of whether

00:50:43.100 they can send her to be evacuated because they, it taken him a couple of weeks.

00:50:48.060 And of course the Taliban says, no, like not, not a big surprise.

00:50:51.880 And so he comes back and says, uh, the Taliban said, no, they'll kill us if we disobey them.

00:50:56.600 Um, sorry, basically.

00:50:58.800 And so, you know, as we're developing, you know, as this situation is developing, there's,

00:51:03.540 there's thousands of IDPs get into place by the battles.

00:51:06.600 They're all centering on Kabul.

00:51:08.040 Like we all know that the history now, right?

00:51:10.100 It's August 16th.

00:51:11.580 When this guy comes back to me, the evacuation just started.

00:51:15.540 And I, I was, I had the privilege of helping a friend of mine, um, with one of his interpreters

00:51:20.820 outside the wall.

00:51:21.620 And, uh, he was at the Naval War College and didn't actually have access to a lot of our

00:51:26.220 systems.

00:51:26.540 And I was at a special unit where we could directly call the airport.

00:51:30.420 And so we got this one guy out.

00:51:32.220 Like I saw it on Facebook.

00:51:33.260 Hey, send me that.

00:51:33.920 I routed the request ad hoc, right?

00:51:36.080 He gets out and that hits the news.

00:51:38.220 Some, they wrote a book about it.

00:51:40.280 And so he gets my, my friend who's another Marine officer gets flooded with requests to

00:51:45.400 help other Terps.

00:51:46.120 And so we get sucked into, you know, all the people, Mercury one funded, like it was totally

00:51:51.560 ad hoc, totally heroic.

00:51:53.220 How these Americans pulled together, like concilium, uh, no one left behind pineapple express team

00:51:59.780 America.

00:52:00.220 I mean, it was, it was incredible, but as, as that's happening, I'm like, disobey the Taliban,

00:52:09.060 bring her to us forces.

00:52:10.020 She's viewed as a us person because of her us identity.

00:52:12.580 We sent them her military ID to identify her, right?

00:52:17.320 At the same time, the interpreter that I'm using to speak Pashto to this man, he's like,

00:52:22.060 sir, my sister, she's 15.

00:52:24.160 She's in the Northern Alliance areas.

00:52:25.900 They've just passed an edict saying that they have to marry them off to their fighters.

00:52:29.540 Can you help us get her out?

00:52:31.580 And so I'm like, this is not my expertise.

00:52:34.880 It's all ad hoc, right?

00:52:36.060 Just like every other like service member at the time.

00:52:38.580 And so I'm like, okay, man, like we'll, we'll try, but it's super dangerous.

00:52:42.280 Like, are you willing to risk their lives traveling 180 miles?

00:52:45.160 He's like, yes, sir.

00:52:45.680 It's better than it's better than being left to marry the Taliban and take them back to

00:52:49.100 Pakistan.

00:52:50.180 So we move his 15 year old sister, his, I think, eight year old brother at the time and

00:52:55.640 his teenage brother, all three of them.

00:52:57.880 And we rent an Airbnb online in Kabul, Afghanistan during the evacuation as a safe house.

00:53:04.240 I get word that they're bringing Sparrow from Southern Afghanistan.

00:53:08.320 We move them 280 miles through Taliban checkpoints and all that stuff in the middle of war, like

00:53:14.000 right around August 22nd or 3rd.

00:53:16.340 As soon as I get word they're moving, that they're disobeying the Taliban, I go to my

00:53:20.620 colonel, like I'm, I'm standing on his desk, sir, I got a crazy story for you.

00:53:24.980 The state department dumped our child two years ago.

00:53:26.920 We've been working to get her out.

00:53:28.000 We have all the paperwork.

00:53:29.280 Here it is.

00:53:29.880 Um, permission to fly emergency leave into Kabul, Afghanistan.

00:53:36.000 And my colonel is crazy enough and a great enough warrior.

00:53:39.520 He's like, that's what I do if I was a parent permission granted.

00:53:42.300 And so we, I got a ticket and, uh, I was on my way before I got shut down by CENTCOM.

00:53:46.820 They're like, no way we're not letting people in on emergency leave.

00:53:49.520 But we ended up, it was such a unique experience because we were able to go to Ramstein and,

00:53:55.260 and find her cause they got out.

00:53:56.960 Um, but I mean, he's glossing, but as, as you know, like that period of time, it was

00:54:03.280 just, it, what he was doing was, no, I mean, as a wife, I will say heroic because it was

00:54:08.040 around the clock.

00:54:08.880 There was a photo I took of him because he couldn't even take a shower without his phone

00:54:13.220 just going off.

00:54:14.100 And he jumped out of the shower and he's sitting on the floor, wrapped up in a towel.

00:54:16.520 And I think at the time you were on the phone with the general, and I just thought it

00:54:19.060 was hilarious that here he is on the phone with the general, can't even get a shower, but

00:54:22.440 it was just, it was that high tempo.

00:54:24.400 I think is one of the most incredible points of a 20 year war.

00:54:29.400 Yeah.

00:54:29.820 I mean, it was insane.

00:54:31.960 And especially since we were working against, in some ways, our own state department, uh,

00:54:37.080 it was really bad, but I, I'll save that for some other time.

00:54:41.560 So it ended up being like, he said that we realized the plan quickly changed from him

00:54:47.500 going.

00:54:47.960 And I mean, he was literally, you were prepared.

00:54:49.760 And I didn't know this after the fact that you wrote a video in case you died in the process

00:54:53.340 of trying, cause he was fully prepared to pull them over the wall.

00:54:56.560 That's was his plan.

00:54:58.100 I didn't realize at the time that was probably a good thing, but we end up, he's like, because

00:55:03.220 we didn't know where in the world they were going to go.

00:55:04.840 It was, there was no plan.

00:55:06.160 It was just like, they were getting on a plane and then it was just a guessing game

00:55:09.820 as to where they're going to go.

00:55:11.040 So at the last minute, I had a nine month old baby at the time, uh, and I gave my baby

00:55:16.320 to my sister and we're like, we were her adoptive parents.

00:55:20.020 We've got to go.

00:55:20.940 Like we, we have all the original documents, we have all of her documents, everything to

00:55:23.920 make sure that she comes to the United States, not some other country.

00:55:27.840 Right.

00:55:28.540 Well, and what was so amazing, Glennon is this same little girl that got carried off an

00:55:33.280 objective by a special mission unit in 2019.

00:55:35.900 It happened again in the evacuation because my colonel got her put on JSOC's targeting

00:55:40.660 list and a special forces squadron operating out of HKIA, went behind Taliban lines and

00:55:46.380 grabbed her and my three interpreters kids and these two postions and she was eight months

00:55:50.700 pregnant.

00:55:51.160 So we were very concerned of having four kids and a pregnant lady getting through these

00:55:54.860 crowds.

00:55:55.760 Right.

00:55:56.320 And so like to say that that was like a lightning bolt again.

00:55:59.640 No, that was a miracle.

00:56:00.680 It was a miracle.

00:56:01.600 That was a miracle.

00:56:02.560 And, um, so we were over the moon.

00:56:05.260 Okay.

00:56:05.500 So, um, these, the 18 year old and the, uh, and the pregnant mom, if you will, the one

00:56:14.760 that were, that were, and were not taking care of baby Sparrow, they're with you, they're

00:56:21.820 coming to the United States, um, because that way they can help.

00:56:28.880 So it was solely to get them away from the Taliban.

00:56:31.360 Okay.

00:56:31.640 Okay.

00:56:31.900 Because if we left them behind, they would get murdered.

00:56:34.140 Okay.

00:56:34.700 So, um, they get on the plane.

00:56:38.520 There's a problem on the plane, if I'm not mistaken, where John and Jane are not happy

00:56:45.300 with each other, something.

00:56:46.880 So that was actually over a couple day period of Ramstein airspace.

00:56:49.940 That was the first time that we realized that there was something going on between them

00:56:53.100 because, you know, what, what John Doe told me a couple of times, like, Hey, she's attached

00:56:58.140 to the baby.

00:56:58.560 But when, when she has her baby, it'll be fine.

00:57:00.420 Like, it'll be good.

00:57:01.880 And then what she was saying when, uh, we had to get everything arranged and it wasn't

00:57:05.680 a, it wasn't a guarantee go to America type situation, right?

00:57:08.200 There's 80,000 people going all over the world.

00:57:10.400 And so we're advocating, like saying, Hey, like you have to send, like these people helped

00:57:14.760 us.

00:57:14.920 They disobeyed the Taliban.

00:57:15.780 You have to send it to America.

00:57:17.100 And, um, and so we had successfully arranged that.

00:57:19.440 And once that happened, it became a, well, uh, he promised me that if I came, I didn't want

00:57:24.440 to come, but he said, if I come, I wouldn't have to like, let her go with you.

00:57:28.380 And so like, that was the first time I realized there was any disagreement at all.

00:57:32.220 And, you know, I don't know what this guy, I don't, I don't know if they have the same

00:57:35.440 culturally, uh, the same page as spouses.

00:57:39.500 Right.

00:57:40.180 Cause typically in my training experience, the, the Afghan men leave their home and they don't

00:57:45.040 really care what their wife says.

00:57:46.540 And so there was, it was a unique, um, dynamic, unique dynamic.

00:57:51.580 So, and when do you find out he's on a watch list?

00:57:55.080 Oh gosh.

00:57:56.380 Yeah.

00:57:56.680 I'll probably get yelled at for that.

00:57:57.940 Um, so, so this is what happened.

00:58:00.260 They, they, they, we get to the States about 10 hours before their official flight comes

00:58:04.860 in and like, uh, with that, the president had, had, had commandeered with the basically

00:58:08.380 commercial fleet.

00:58:09.520 So they're, they're pouring into the country.

00:58:11.740 Um, they're doing the best to their, like our people are vetting them as best they can.

00:58:15.720 Right.

00:58:16.000 There's, there's obviously been some failures with that.

00:58:18.000 So we get to Dulles and, um, we have all the documents, right?

00:58:22.420 All of our documents.

00:58:23.200 So we, we, I go back there.

00:58:24.980 Um, it takes like seven hours to process in and it's crammed full of people the whole time.

00:58:31.100 And at the very end, at like, I don't know, one in the morning, they're, they're like,

00:58:35.440 Oh, you're all done processing.

00:58:36.720 You need to take a COVID test.

00:58:38.040 I'm like, okay, let's go take a COVID test.

00:58:41.840 And I, people got tuberculosis, but let's go get COVID tested.

00:58:44.520 And they, they take about 20 military age men and they put us in and me.

00:58:49.860 Yeah.

00:58:50.140 Cause I'm this, my guy and they drive us out into the middle of Dulles airport and there's

00:58:55.620 this huge hangar, uh, almost like a bond movie, like where like a, like a prototype, uh, plane

00:59:01.060 is going to be revealed.

00:59:01.940 And there's like 500 beds and it's the only place that has not been crammed full of people

00:59:05.620 this whole time.

00:59:06.500 And there's like uniform customs and border patrol guys with like, like plate carriers and,

00:59:10.880 and ARs.

00:59:12.140 And I'm like, this doesn't look like a COVID place.

00:59:15.740 Right.

00:59:15.880 And so I'm trying to figure, trying to figure out what's going on.

00:59:18.620 And so then they, this, this uniform customs and border patrol agent comes in.

00:59:22.160 It's like, what were you doing in 2014?

00:59:23.680 Like, what are you doing?

00:59:24.640 Like going at my guy.

00:59:25.900 And I'm like, like, like I told you, I talked to this guy like five weeks before.

00:59:30.320 Right.

00:59:31.140 And so what concerned me is he was in this detention facility and then he's sitting there talking

00:59:37.620 to another man in Pashto.

00:59:38.880 And most of our allies were like Dari speakers.

00:59:40.960 Like there's some Pashtuns, but for the, predominantly the Pashtuns are Taliban.

00:59:44.860 And so, um, he had not really talked to anybody in four or five days that I've been around this

00:59:49.520 guy.

00:59:49.920 And he's like chatting away.

00:59:51.200 And I'm like, who's his friend to somebody who spoke English?

00:59:53.520 And they're like, oh, this guy's from his home village.

00:59:55.200 Like they know each other.

00:59:56.660 And then when I found out about 10 minutes later, I went up to the border patrol agent.

01:00:00.960 I'm like, Hey man, like, what are we doing here?

01:00:03.340 He's like, oh, this is the inconclusives where people flagged for a match on the terror watch

01:00:07.080 list and we're vetting them.

01:00:07.860 And I'm like, holy cow.

01:00:10.420 Right.

01:00:10.900 Because I have a child from a capture or kill mission of Al Qaeda.

01:00:15.640 I've got a dad who went to the Taliban shadow governor.

01:00:18.320 Oh, and I forgot to mention this guy tells my Terp before he comes to American lines, like,

01:00:21.720 Hey, I have a lot of militants in my phone.

01:00:23.560 Will this be a problem when I come to American lines?

01:00:25.720 Don't tell Joshua though.

01:00:26.720 And he's like, don't tell Joshua.

01:00:27.940 And I'm like, you know, task force is already tracking this guy.

01:00:30.420 So no, it didn't make a difference because we know where you are.

01:00:32.040 And like, and that actually was corroborated at my board of inquiry.

01:00:35.080 We had someone come from JSOC and testify.

01:00:36.480 Yep.

01:00:36.660 We knew this guy had dirt.

01:00:37.880 And so, um, I had some red flags going on.

01:00:41.500 Yeah.

01:00:41.700 You send me a video.

01:00:42.500 I have a video of it because I'm sitting there at Dulles waiting for him.

01:00:44.640 Cause I thought same thing.

01:00:45.500 She's like, where are you?

01:00:46.140 For the COVID test.

01:00:47.040 I'm like, it's wee hours of the morning.

01:00:49.000 I'm like, where are you?

01:00:49.780 And he sends me a video.

01:00:50.680 He's like, you're never going to believe where I am.

01:00:53.680 I'm like, get out of there.

01:00:54.880 You don't belong in there.

01:00:56.520 And yeah, that was the first time any of this, like we realized.

01:01:00.380 And so again, kind of thinking that facts matter and like, you should report stuff like this,

01:01:03.660 you know, see something, say something.

01:01:05.180 So I immediately reported to my chain of command through our NCS liaison.

01:01:08.940 And, um, it kind of like nothing happened.

01:01:11.360 And, and obviously that is when we like immediately requested, like, like they're going to get vetted.

01:01:17.900 They're probably gonna get deported.

01:01:18.920 We should probably like, now's a good time to separate her.

01:01:22.400 And my interpreter skits also came with that.

01:01:24.900 So it took them a couple of days to get their act together and actually do that.

01:01:27.640 But like, I think it makes a lot more sense to the American people, how this conflict started

01:01:31.620 with, they know the guy flags and with the context behind that.

01:01:35.440 And so like, that really was the turning point where we're like, Hey, maybe I was projecting

01:01:39.880 some compassion I had for all these allies that went to war with us.

01:01:43.840 And maybe I should have been a little more, uh, cautious of the outset, because to be honest,

01:01:49.380 like we faced a decision point in the evacuation, um, where my colonel's like, Hey, you're going

01:01:54.020 to probably have to choose between these Afghans and your little girl, because the assets we're

01:01:58.600 using to get them, don't give a crap about Afghans.

01:02:01.020 And they'll probably just stick a gun in their face and take her and not like, they're not

01:02:03.820 going to waste their resources, getting these random people.

01:02:06.320 Right.

01:02:06.780 And I literally had to advocate to take all of them.

01:02:09.940 You delayed it for 24 hours.

01:02:10.860 Yeah.

01:02:11.060 We, we actually had a team that was funded by the Mercury One funds, like the volunteers to

01:02:15.300 go get them all like that were paying that they had 9,000 ahead or whatever for the

01:02:18.480 private aircraft, um, set to go.

01:02:20.880 And I think they had an incident at Northgate that night and they canceled all the volunteers

01:02:24.180 going out.

01:02:24.980 And that's when my colonel got, um, them picked up by a national ministry of force unit.

01:02:29.440 And so like, I guess the, the peace of mind, knowing that there was Americans who were volunteering

01:02:37.100 to go behind lines when it would, it sounded like no one else was doing.

01:02:40.480 Oh my gosh.

01:02:41.600 Yeah.

01:02:41.760 But I would touch on it in hindsight, even though it was devastating, losing her for, or not

01:02:48.060 for her not coming home in when she was supposed to in 2019, we had a crib, we had everything

01:02:53.820 ready.

01:02:54.200 We were ready to go.

01:02:55.060 We thought she'd be handicapped child.

01:02:56.320 We were anticipating taking in a baby with special needs and we were ready as much as

01:03:01.080 we could be.

01:03:01.780 And then for that to be delayed for that period of time.

01:03:04.720 But as a result, because of the fall and because of honestly, how everything providentially

01:03:09.960 was woven together the way it was, how many, like how many people personally?

01:03:14.500 Let me, let me rephrase that.

01:03:16.840 So I want people to understand.

01:03:19.880 We were so devastated when she got turned over and we couldn't understand why, why would

01:03:24.720 that happen?

01:03:25.940 But when this historic event kicks off and you're getting texts and calls from people

01:03:31.920 and you're able to get real people moved inside to safety and a new life, I mean, especially

01:03:39.320 from like 8,000 miles away, it's so weird.

01:03:41.160 You're so far from it, but you're, you're, you're changing lives and all these volunteers

01:03:45.160 are doing that too.

01:03:47.220 It, it, it was very clear that that was a larger purpose.

01:03:50.800 We had a vision to save this one child just because we were in a place to do it, but there

01:03:54.720 was a bigger plan that ended up her life, her existence saved dozens and dozens of, of

01:04:01.220 American interpreter, like interpreters that worked with us and their families.

01:04:04.200 And, um, I, I'll tell you one story for your audience.

01:04:07.820 Um, there was one group, uh, they had Australian visas.

01:04:12.680 Glenn, I worked with one Australian ever in Afghanistan.

01:04:16.720 And I call this man as I'm dangerously driving and texting all the way up to DC to fly to

01:04:21.580 Afghanistan.

01:04:22.140 That's what my first attempt to go.

01:04:24.080 I'm like, Hey, sir.

01:04:25.140 Remember me?

01:04:25.820 Like I'm, I'm at Marsock.

01:04:26.960 I'm working with these, I'm working, volunteering to vet all these groups.

01:04:30.120 Do you know anybody running the Australian response to the Kabul evacuation?

01:04:34.380 And he goes, Oh, my brother is running the Australian army's response in Doha.

01:04:39.340 Here's his number.

01:04:41.120 And so I then called, I call Australia.

01:04:44.120 I called Doha while dangerously driving to DC.

01:04:46.740 And they're like, we are, we have bad comms right now.

01:04:49.440 We can't reach them.

01:04:50.520 We'll send an email.

01:04:51.860 And I've got like 14 people in a ditch of water at two in the morning outside Abbey

01:04:56.760 gate.

01:04:57.720 And, uh, they got like a, a two month old and like a 60 year old, like a, in a range

01:05:02.100 of people here in their Hazaras, they're Shia Muslims.

01:05:04.720 They're both ethnically and religiously persecuted by the Taliban.

01:05:07.840 And the matriarch of the family is an advocate for women's rights.

01:05:11.500 Like they're dead.

01:05:12.980 They're so dead.

01:05:14.440 And so I'm like, you see any Americans around?

01:05:19.120 And cause we were using like a signal on a phone, right?

01:05:21.660 Like, like everybody else was doing.

01:05:22.920 And my guy wasn't at the gate at that time and he wasn't able to get the Marine.

01:05:26.000 So, so she hands the phone to American and I heard this female voice like, hello, like

01:05:31.120 super weirded out.

01:05:32.460 And I'm like, Hey, my name's major mass.

01:05:34.560 I've been vetting these people.

01:05:35.380 They have Australian visas.

01:05:36.340 Are there any Australians?

01:05:37.440 And she's like, sir, the Australians aren't doing 24 hour ops right now.

01:05:40.600 They don't come on until six and it's two in the morning.

01:05:43.000 And I'm like, I was like, she said, what do you want me to do?

01:05:45.860 It's like, I want you to pull these people in and sit them down and wait for Australians

01:05:48.740 come.

01:05:49.920 So she hands me off to a captain.

01:05:51.460 I do the same spiel.

01:05:52.540 And this is what he says to me.

01:05:53.640 He's like, sir, he goes, I'm looking at 15,000 people and I'm playing God on who gets

01:05:59.060 out.

01:05:59.760 So what do you want me to do?

01:06:01.660 And, um, it's like, I want you to pull these people in and sit them down and wait for Australians

01:06:07.180 to come because would it be awful if these people die when they have visas to Australia?

01:06:11.460 And, um, we were in the air to Ramstein when the Abbey Gate happened.

01:06:16.880 And, you know, in the moment, you have so many groups you're working and we would name

01:06:20.400 them very like 14 packs or passengers, 14 packs and the gate.

01:06:24.640 I was like, what gate was that?

01:06:26.080 You know, cause I talked to that girl.

01:06:28.380 She was a Marine.

01:06:29.200 Um, and, um, you know, I'll never forget sitting in the USO, watching them pull all

01:06:36.700 the bodies off the plane, um, at Ramstein cause they were taking them to launch all the wounded.

01:06:41.780 Um, and wondering like, did you, did that, that girl that just helped these people die

01:06:47.240 doing that?

01:06:48.360 And it was, it was her.

01:06:53.180 And, and for when I was in the car, when you were on the phone with him on the ground and

01:06:57.240 it just, it was that moment, it was just so historic in that he's sitting there talking

01:07:01.320 to someone on the ground, pulling this gray through for whatever reason, I had the instinct.

01:07:05.380 I pull up, I didn't want him to see me.

01:07:07.220 I pull up my phone and I record.

01:07:09.180 And so I actually recorded that conversation, not knowing any of that was going to happen,

01:07:13.900 but recorded that conversation that he had with that Marine on the ground and the, and,

01:07:20.600 and that pulled those 14 people through as a result.

01:07:23.500 Have you met her parents yet?

01:07:24.660 No, no, I have not, but I mean, I know them, I would love to, but we've always, I mean,

01:07:31.700 he can't, I mean, I've known him ever since he was a teenager and he never cried.

01:07:36.180 I could count on one hand how many times he cried, but since this whole situation, especially

01:07:40.200 Abbey Gate, he can't, he can never talk about without crying because you feel it so deeply.

01:07:44.740 And then what we saw there and the evacuation, I remember calling back home to family.

01:07:49.880 I was like, is this on the news?

01:07:51.400 And they're like, no.

01:07:52.360 And at the time there was one Getty photographer and one CNN reporter and it was historic.

01:07:57.400 And like, I would echo what Joshua said, what the service members and the USO, what they

01:08:02.260 were doing on the ground during the evacuation, it was, it was heroic.

01:08:06.640 And, and, and on the flip side, what the state department was doing on the ground at the

01:08:12.980 same place was the greatest evil I've ever seen.

01:08:17.000 Absolutely.

01:08:17.700 I talked to my, my, my, uh, I guess friends that I've worked with in the past that were,

01:08:23.120 uh, the SJs on the ground there.

01:08:25.320 And like, he's telling me things like you would not believe what we just went through.

01:08:29.340 I'm a major in the Marine Corps.

01:08:30.460 I'm a judge advocate.

01:08:31.220 And I just cleared an airport and ran concertina wire around it.

01:08:35.220 And we're probably going to get overrun again.

01:08:36.520 Things are not going well.

01:08:37.940 And like, uh, just what they went, he said is the worst thing he'd seen in five deployments

01:08:42.040 in the GY.

01:08:44.440 Final segment in just a second.

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01:09:56.640 Okay.

01:09:57.120 So let's get back to Sparrow.

01:09:59.940 Okay.

01:10:01.600 You're coming over here in the United States.

01:10:03.700 How long is she with you guys?

01:10:07.100 Because the, uh, the John Doe he's kept out, right?

01:10:11.500 Or does he get in?

01:10:12.940 No, they, so this is what they tell me.

01:10:14.840 He sell for about 24 hours.

01:10:16.300 And then a border pro agent says, Hey man, this is a really bad dude, but he brought your

01:10:21.400 daughter to us forces and your organization got him in Afghanistan.

01:10:24.060 So we let him through.

01:10:25.260 And I'm like, Whoa, no, like that's not, that's when I reported it up the chain.

01:10:29.960 And my command, it was like, you know, get your daughter and get back here.

01:10:32.780 Let's, you know, cause I've been gone for like a week, uh, working.

01:10:35.540 So that's what we did.

01:10:36.580 We just did what we're told.

01:10:38.240 And, um, we were, I guess.

01:10:41.600 So, I mean, short version, they're here in the United States and, uh, and we've, we've

01:10:48.720 had Sparrow in our custody since what?

01:10:52.700 September, 2021.

01:10:53.500 Like, yeah, almost three and a half years going on, you know, and did.

01:10:56.840 And, and, and I mean, and we started exactly what we were going to do back in 2019.

01:11:01.100 It just went through and same doctor, same doctor went through every medical appointment

01:11:05.480 that was recommended everything that we could possibly do.

01:11:08.160 And to see her when we did get her finally, um, she wasn't the same baby as she was in

01:11:15.060 the hospital.

01:11:15.760 Like she had in the hospital with all the, the service members took a lot of pictures

01:11:19.160 of her and she had these big brown eyes and big smile, just happy baby just would smile

01:11:23.380 with her whole body.

01:11:24.780 And when we saw her, when I saw her for the first time, I actually wondered if it was the

01:11:30.260 same child because her face was closed off her and she was very fearful.

01:11:35.480 I'm scared.

01:11:36.040 She would hardly look up and I mean, just the fear and trauma on her face was just,

01:11:41.960 I've never seen that in a child before.

01:11:43.960 And it wasn't until I saw, like she had a dress on, I saw the scar on her, like she has a very

01:11:48.340 distinct scar on her.

01:11:49.260 Like, I was like, that's her.

01:11:50.960 And, and I just, I could not believe it.

01:11:53.840 But, um, you know, when she came home, I mean, she had lice, parasites, just, uh, emotional

01:12:00.020 trauma, just everything.

01:12:01.080 So it was kind of like the peeling back layers of an onion, just loving on her and pouring

01:12:06.320 into her as much as we possibly could.

01:12:08.160 Have you seen that little girl again?

01:12:09.980 Very much so.

01:12:10.920 So now today she looks like her baby photos.

01:12:14.340 It's like, you can see it's the same person, big eyes, just very expressive.

01:12:17.900 And it's like, there, there, she is like, that's, that's the, the true her, but what

01:12:24.780 she endured during that time, there's, uh, one story that just, I mean, our life, we are

01:12:30.820 so blessed here in the States, not to know the degree of violence and just that other

01:12:36.540 parts of the world have.

01:12:37.900 I was carrying her out to the car.

01:12:40.260 We were picking up our boys from school and, um, there was a community that was being built

01:12:45.000 next to us and they're roofing and they were going pop, pop, pop, pop, pop with a nail

01:12:49.980 gun.

01:12:50.860 And I had her on my hip.

01:12:52.600 And when she heard the sound of the nail gun, she went, oh, and she looked at me and

01:12:57.500 the, the, the look on her eyes, her eyes were fear.

01:13:01.060 Like, are we going to run?

01:13:02.080 Is it danger?

01:13:03.480 And she was looking to me to see how I was going to respond.

01:13:06.200 And when I, and I, and I saw that and I was just like, it broke my heart, like that

01:13:11.200 she knew that, that she has obviously been exposed to that.

01:13:15.540 And then just, you know, like any other parent would just be like, it's okay.

01:13:19.800 And explained it and move on, but she's amazingly resilient and come so far.

01:13:27.180 So I, I'm a dad of an adopted child and, um, uh, we adopted in Texas, which was a very

01:13:35.760 good thing because Texas adoption laws are so very clear.

01:13:41.220 That's your child.

01:13:42.920 So is Virginia actually.

01:13:44.600 Yeah.

01:13:45.240 Um, but it's not working out that way for you.

01:13:47.440 No, it's not.

01:13:48.060 Um, when you sign adoption papers, I know, I think it was two years.

01:13:53.980 The mom could come back and say, uh, I've changed my mind.

01:13:59.100 Um, and in Texas, that's hard, but still able at the two year point.

01:14:04.900 I know what my wife was like and what I felt like at the two year point worrying because two

01:14:12.560 years in that's, that's not my child.

01:14:15.460 That's my child.

01:14:16.900 You know what I mean?

01:14:17.700 Um, Rafe is my son at that point.

01:14:21.440 When did you, when, how did this happen to where Virginia comes in and says, Oh, forget

01:14:31.680 that adoption thing.

01:14:32.940 So I think that, first of all, we have some restrictions on commenting on the state court

01:14:37.720 cases.

01:14:38.460 So I can't answer all the questions relating to that.

01:14:42.340 Here's what I want to know.

01:14:43.400 How did you feel and how did you hear that this might be over?

01:14:47.820 Well, the first thing that comes to my mind is the day the FBI showed up at the door.

01:14:58.180 And, uh, as a mom, literally bringing my kids in through the door from school door keys were

01:15:05.020 still in the lock and I get a knock at the door and there were two agents there.

01:15:09.100 And, uh, I had a baby.

01:15:12.500 I went to my oldest son.

01:15:13.640 I was like, take him in the room and watch him.

01:15:16.020 I've got to talk to some people outside.

01:15:18.700 And my son wanted to play.

01:15:19.640 So he's like, I don't want to do that.

01:15:21.040 I was like, honey, the FBI is here and I need to go do this.

01:15:25.280 And he's like, they're real.

01:15:26.580 Like almost like it was the Avengers or something.

01:15:28.780 And that was the first moment where, and it was actually, they were there because of the

01:15:33.220 terrorists and like, like there was a whole, like it was them trying to sort through what

01:15:37.220 Joshua had reported.

01:15:38.400 But at that time, that was the first, like, that was when it started to change of like,

01:15:43.520 oh, there's going to be conflict.

01:15:45.320 And that was heartbreaking and brought fear, obviously natural fear, because it's not about

01:15:53.800 us.

01:15:54.480 It's about her.

01:15:56.660 And so the whole time, I mean, when she was initially turned over, what, what I wrestled

01:16:04.080 with for the longest time is that she could go through her whole life in Afghanistan with

01:16:09.020 a completely different identity and never know that she had another name and that she

01:16:14.300 wasn't anonymous, that she was loved by hundreds and prayed for by hundreds of people.

01:16:18.900 So for her to be at stake again, after all of this blood, sweat, tears, prayer, everything

01:16:27.540 that we've invested for that to be up for grabs again, it's just the natural instinct is fear

01:16:33.920 protection, just wanting to do everything you can to keep one person safe and just wonder

01:16:40.880 why people can't see the facts.

01:16:43.500 Like, like we said, we're open books.

01:16:45.440 Like, sure.

01:16:46.260 You want the facts.

01:16:47.080 It's all here.

01:16:47.620 So tell me, she, this went back to Virginia court and they overturned the adoption, right?

01:16:55.280 So I'm, I'm, I'm nervous about getting into too much with the, the legal stuff, but I guess

01:17:01.220 what, I guess what would be important for folks to know is if someone, you're, you're an adoptive

01:17:07.540 parent.

01:17:07.800 If someone came along and said, we're related to you and we're going to sue you to get them

01:17:11.720 back.

01:17:12.340 What's the first thing you'd ask them?

01:17:13.500 DNA.

01:17:14.340 DNA.

01:17:15.140 That's the first thing we did.

01:17:16.300 And then kind of hemmed and hawed and the story changed about how they were biologically

01:17:21.800 related to them.

01:17:22.860 And that just kind of backed them into a corner of, of this is a lie.

01:17:25.940 And so I honestly think that big picture, these people don't have authority over her.

01:17:32.540 If she went back to their custody, it's really, it's, we're talking Jane and, and John.

01:17:37.160 Yes.

01:17:37.440 They don't have legal authority.

01:17:38.660 They told the FBI that we finally got their statements where they said, Oh, her two uncles

01:17:43.500 are the authority for her life.

01:17:44.880 I don't have the authority to let her go to America.

01:17:47.660 And, but we have now, and I'm going to focus on the government's actions.

01:17:52.440 This, we have the department of justice filing, parroting what these mega law firms have been

01:17:57.100 representing them saying.

01:17:58.240 Based on information they have that is directly contradictory to what the DOJ has filed in

01:18:05.520 court.

01:18:05.860 So to the FBI, they said, we're not in charge, but the DOJ is filing saying they are.

01:18:11.540 How's that possible?

01:18:12.880 How do you have statements that you haven't disclosed to the courts in the United States?

01:18:17.460 You can't have.

01:18:18.120 Is it true?

01:18:19.740 It's Hunter Biden's law office?

01:18:22.560 I believe one of the firms, there's been several law firms that have represented of it.

01:18:26.060 I believe it was the same one that represented the president's son.

01:18:30.680 Great.

01:18:31.880 So now this is at the Virginia Supreme Court.

01:18:35.440 Yes.

01:18:35.720 So next, next week we have a oral argument in front of the Virginia Supreme Court and they

01:18:40.340 make a decision.

01:18:40.900 But, you know, our biggest concern is that there has been a successful effort from the very

01:18:45.780 same bureaucrats that tried to shut us down in 2019 about telling the truth.

01:18:49.740 I mean, essentially looking back, we were whistleblowers.

01:18:51.960 Like this is like not in accordance with everything we know.

01:18:57.440 And we were right.

01:18:58.940 And I think they're very concerned about that getting out.

01:19:01.100 And that's why I've had my military orders change about what we can talk about.

01:19:05.260 We've experienced like overclassification of information, like clearly unclassified documents

01:19:09.900 marked secret, no foreign.

01:19:11.640 We've had federal agencies telling us what we can and can't talk about.

01:19:14.940 And honestly, absolute abuse of power to shut down the evidence to like, well, I was in

01:19:24.320 a, I was in a court case where it was against the government and documents were a question.

01:19:37.520 If you're fighting the United States government, they can classify, they can redact, they control

01:19:45.440 everything.

01:19:46.220 There is no way to win against the United States government if they have the will to make sure

01:19:56.660 that that truth never comes out.

01:19:58.600 Well, and what was amazing is that early on there was that, well, we're impartial.

01:20:02.600 We, we, we, we, we're not going to tip our, you know, it fingers on the scale of justice,

01:20:07.400 but what we have experienced is the exact opposite.

01:20:10.880 They very much have the federal government.

01:20:13.520 They have.

01:20:13.980 So is there any difference between the Biden administration and the Trump administration?

01:20:18.600 Is Trump, is his people back on this?

01:20:20.880 Do you have?

01:20:21.440 So, so I would say that we're hopeful that that'll be the case, but there's so much they're

01:20:26.920 correcting that was just, you know, broken in our system before that for us, it's an issue

01:20:33.060 of priority.

01:20:33.620 I think that if an objective person looked, I, I guess, let me caveat that with one more

01:20:40.000 thing.

01:20:40.540 We went through a board of inquiry and you said you can't fight the government.

01:20:43.420 That's true.

01:20:43.860 Unless you have a little bit of due process, then they have to give you stuff and it's

01:20:48.220 harder to hide things.

01:20:50.120 And so they ran our family through a recycled allegations, exactly what these mega law firms,

01:20:54.780 we defeated them in court, proof were false.

01:20:58.360 And so we went through that process and it was brutal, but you know what happened?

01:21:01.560 They had to give you the evidence.

01:21:03.520 And so now it's consolidated in one place and there's classified, all of the classified

01:21:08.060 information that I had on deployment is now in one place.

01:21:10.740 And then all of the unclassed, we had 14 gigabytes of data that we never had before.

01:21:15.480 And so like, although that was a brutal process, that was one way you can fight.

01:21:20.120 So what happens to Sparrow?

01:21:23.600 Should it go wrong in Virginia?

01:21:27.640 Well, we've explained it as a Taliban, Elaine Gonzalez situation.

01:21:31.500 Like these are, that's the first thing that came to my mind when I heard the story.

01:21:34.820 Yeah.

01:21:35.240 It's, these are not relatives.

01:21:37.060 They probably knew they weren't from day one.

01:21:38.980 They were probably sent forward by the Taliban shadow governor to collect her from the Americans.

01:21:43.800 And so they can't go back without her.

01:21:47.460 Like this guy's told me personally, like, yeah, we want to go back.

01:21:50.300 Like everyone wants to come to America for the money, but they, everybody loves home.

01:21:53.200 I don't judge people for that.

01:21:54.960 But this is really the Taliban is going to decide her future.

01:21:58.560 Like this guy, his entire family is under their sway.

01:22:01.760 If he says, if they're like, hey, I'm going to kill your family if you don't come back with a little girl.

01:22:05.940 They put us, the Taliban denounced us on their social media.

01:22:10.840 They've talked to you out by name.

01:22:12.740 Yeah.

01:22:13.120 We've had the state.

01:22:14.240 They called you guys out by name.

01:22:15.340 Yes.

01:22:16.080 Yeah.

01:22:16.240 On their website.

01:22:16.740 A little talking head saying, you should make a T-shirt.

01:22:20.160 Absolutely.

01:22:20.760 My buddies were like, how'd you do that?

01:22:22.020 I've been trying to get that for years.

01:22:23.760 It was kind of a joke.

01:22:25.020 But, but what's more concerning is the state department has filed affidavits against our family, basically insinuating the Taliban has asked them to do this.

01:22:33.720 Like the Taliban doesn't like this and it's hard to negotiate with them.

01:22:36.040 Like, I'm really sorry that my, my child is inconvenient for you negotiating with the terrorist organization that you're funding, but like, I don't care.

01:22:43.340 Like, get out of here.

01:22:44.960 What U.S. agency files to void someone's parental rights because the Taliban asked them to?

01:22:51.180 And then, then I get the whole like, yeah, well, we're asking you not to talk about this.

01:22:54.500 Right.

01:22:55.100 Sure.

01:22:55.740 I'm not going to talk about this.

01:22:56.860 Like the American people should read some of these affidavits.

01:22:59.240 Well, and, and I mean, on a personal, to an extent, they did good, they did do a good job in silencing us.

01:23:06.320 And the reason why we haven't gone out guns blazing before is because we're trying to protect her and our family.

01:23:13.200 No, I know.

01:23:13.700 Like just parental instincts kick in.

01:23:16.040 I know.

01:23:16.380 And to answer your question, what would happen to her?

01:23:18.880 It would devastate her.

01:23:20.460 She's five and a half.

01:23:21.880 She has no idea who these folks are.

01:23:23.220 She has no idea who they are.

01:23:24.900 We are her family.

01:23:26.780 Her brothers are her brothers.

01:23:27.660 Her brothers are her brothers.

01:23:28.460 Her brothers and her life.

01:23:30.660 And the freedom.

01:23:32.060 Well, and.

01:23:32.780 Women.

01:23:33.320 Like the freedom she has that now she, I mean, it took a while for her to loosen up, but like she enjoys that now.

01:23:40.360 It would be absolutely devastating to her.

01:23:42.960 And I want to add one thing.

01:23:45.020 In this process, you know, these, these mega firms don't care who gets hurt.

01:23:48.760 Right.

01:23:48.960 It's, it's, it's a winning at all costs.

01:23:51.160 And they have gotten a letter writing campaign going, not just to make a firm, some other related organizations that support that type of thing.

01:23:57.780 But they wrote over 7,000 letters to Congress.

01:24:00.420 And in this, they're talking about supporting their narrative, holding major masks accountable.

01:24:03.680 And it's insinuating that our rangers, who like bled, doing what we tasked them to do to go rid the world of these terrorists, they're calling them war criminals.

01:24:13.220 And they, they killed an innocent farmer.

01:24:15.280 And honestly, that just burns.

01:24:16.940 You can say many things.

01:24:17.740 That's, that's the part that was classified, right?

01:24:19.900 They could get away with saying that for a while.

01:24:23.140 Right?

01:24:23.540 Not, no, these, these, these rangers came and testified in open, like in a public proceeding, right?

01:24:29.520 It was, it was sealed from, as far as like, it's a public record now.

01:24:32.680 So it's a matter of record.

01:24:33.640 And then that was all placed into our board of inquiry.

01:24:35.880 And so that is a public record available for FOIA and Privacy Act.

01:24:39.820 So like now you can go read their 200 page testimony.

01:24:43.400 Right, but before.

01:24:44.340 Correct.

01:24:44.860 That was, that was hidden.

01:24:46.540 So you couldn't defend.

01:24:48.040 Correct.

01:24:48.440 And so what we want is we think these guys own the truth, they're under non-disclosure agreements

01:24:53.580 because of the unit they're serving in.

01:24:55.680 So when you can't, when your guys can't defend their own actions, who should do that?

01:24:59.880 Well, I think it should be the SECDF.

01:25:01.840 I think they should come out and release everything.

01:25:04.560 If these, if these folks want to attack our, our veterans and say that they committed war crimes

01:25:10.960 and we have video of them engaging in hand-to-hand combat and grenades and, you know, shooting

01:25:16.540 people at point-blank range and having guys wounded and pulled off on stretchers off the

01:25:20.360 objective, you know, paralyzed, like release that stuff and defend these men.

01:25:26.100 Like they should be at the White House getting awards, not getting called war criminals by

01:25:31.720 lesser men than themselves.

01:25:36.000 What's next?

01:25:38.560 We don't know.

01:25:39.720 No.

01:25:40.340 The story's yet to be told.

01:25:42.200 I mean.

01:25:42.740 We have hope that like there's a lot of folks when they actually hear the truth that have

01:25:46.240 jumped on and tried to get it to decision makers.

01:25:48.300 We're hoping that, that her life again is prioritized by the administration.

01:25:51.760 They did it the first time.

01:25:52.600 And honestly, the only reason she didn't come back.

01:25:55.840 This is one of the most disturbing things of our time.

01:26:01.680 We're a republic.

01:26:03.240 We have a constitutional, a constitution.

01:26:06.320 We have a bill of rights.

01:26:07.780 We have 200 years of law behind us.

01:26:12.680 And it feels like we have to go to the Avengers.

01:26:17.060 We have to go to Donald Trump or someone of his team to defend our basic rights.

01:26:26.240 And it really bothers me.

01:26:28.620 It really bothers me.

01:26:29.300 That's not the president's job.

01:26:31.180 But it is because the whole system is so corrupt.

01:26:36.820 It really is.

01:26:37.900 And what it's become is bureaucrats will say whatever the law, they'll say that the law is

01:26:42.140 whatever they want it to be for that particular instance to get whatever outcome they want.

01:26:45.680 And it doesn't matter if it's true or just or right.

01:26:48.640 And, you know, and that's really hard for someone who like, I really mean it when I swear

01:26:52.660 an oath to uphold the constitution of the United States.

01:26:54.460 As a prosecutor, I would not even dream of prosecuting someone that wasn't, I didn't believe

01:26:59.560 violated the law.

01:27:00.980 And then you would try to pursue an appropriate punishment for that.

01:27:04.700 Like, I was a government hack.

01:27:06.880 And seeing that system weaponize and abuse the way we've gotten to do that firsthand,

01:27:11.400 it's been incredible.

01:27:13.120 But on the flip side, it's so encouraging to see progress in those departments.

01:27:18.040 And I think the louder people squeal in resistance to that progress, you're probably on target.

01:27:24.580 Keep up the good work.

01:27:25.780 So New York Times Magazine did a story.

01:27:28.420 How did this man think he had a right to adopt the baby?

01:27:32.220 This is you.

01:27:33.260 Adopt this baby.

01:27:34.300 Army Rangers killed her parents.

01:27:36.180 A Marine is raising her in America.

01:27:38.220 But her Afghan family says she was taken under false pretenses.

01:27:43.300 Wow.

01:27:44.480 Yeah.

01:27:45.060 And there's a lot of fallacies with that.

01:27:46.840 First of all, they're not her Afghan family.

01:27:49.680 And they never were.

01:27:50.720 And they probably knew that from day one.

01:27:52.180 Like, that's the unfortunate reality.

01:27:54.460 And I don't know what their why is.

01:27:56.560 But it's just not true.

01:27:59.160 So what do you want me to do with that?

01:28:00.480 When this guy flags on the watch list and we're legally obligated to take care of our child and told them that from day one?

01:28:06.340 What do you want me to do?

01:28:07.720 What would you do?

01:28:09.280 If you're like, oh, this guy flagged after all of that concept context, you would immediately exercise what care for her, which is what we did.

01:28:19.200 And that was the plan the entire time.

01:28:20.660 In fact, what I think was most telling was every single person who had firsthand knowledge of this backed us up.

01:28:28.360 Like, the FBI interviewed all these people.

01:28:31.140 And so from day one, they're like, oh, yeah, they knew.

01:28:34.980 They just.

01:28:35.860 And I would say they have done the media.

01:28:40.340 They've done a good job at painting a narrative that's not true of the story.

01:28:45.240 They have no record of that.

01:28:46.620 But they've made it about him or us.

01:28:50.980 Like, we are just off.

01:28:52.480 It's about her.

01:28:53.520 Well, it's about her.

01:28:54.760 But we're one of many people that have cared for her.

01:28:58.080 Yes, we are her adoptive parents and we have advocated for her.

01:29:02.160 But we represent a lot of people that do that.

01:29:06.040 So it's not just like, who do they think they are?

01:29:08.060 This is many people that have stepped forward to protect her.

01:29:12.600 Yeah, and the ranger who recovered her off the battlefield, he said something that struck me.

01:29:19.020 He said, they asked him, why do you remember that night?

01:29:22.900 And he said, it's because it's the first time I could put a face to evil.

01:29:26.560 And he was talking about her biological mother.

01:29:28.480 We're talking about 20 years of war, you know, pretty much culminating in the evacuation of Afghanistan, right?

01:29:36.600 And to tell you how encouraging it is to them, it's like their why.

01:29:42.140 Like, I helped that person.

01:29:44.900 And when they found out that she's safe and home in America, they were over the moon.

01:29:50.480 They're like, I always wondered what happened to that baby.

01:29:53.680 What can we do to help?

01:29:56.460 Well, we appreciate your prayers, first of all.

01:29:59.140 Because, you know, she's been preserved time and time again.

01:30:01.920 And so we're confident, seeing that providential hand, that that will continue to be the case.

01:30:06.620 You can advocate, you know, call your congressman, call the White House, ask the president to change U.S. policy.

01:30:14.180 Because really, all we need is the truth to come out and lift your thumb off the scale there, Department of Justice.

01:30:20.820 What policy needs to change?

01:30:23.280 So the United States, air quotes, some bureaucrat in the DOJ, has filed parroting these claims.

01:30:30.840 And so I really think they need some adult supervision and to go pull this class.

01:30:36.640 Have you talked to Pam Bondi?

01:30:38.800 Not directly.

01:30:40.100 We have had a whistleblower complaint formally routed.

01:30:43.600 We routed it to the president via Congress.

01:30:46.140 And we've had several congressmen sign on to that and send it to the SECDAF, SECState, and the AG's office.

01:30:55.300 And my understanding is the Department of Justice has reached out to state and DOD and asked them if they want to continue to stand beside the Biden administration's attack on our adoption.

01:31:06.420 And so the DOJ has done that.

01:31:08.720 Because they're basically they're the lawyer for the other federal agencies.

01:31:11.640 Right.

01:31:11.720 So they're like, hey, you guys want to keep doing this?

01:31:13.760 And so we would ask in the name of justice and all that's good and right to stop lying.

01:31:20.200 For these mega law firms and release everything we've asked that.

01:31:23.960 I asked them to declassify all of this three years ago.

01:31:27.200 I've asked repeatedly and just gotten shut down, denied, like witnesses, denied documents, denied like nothing.

01:31:32.840 Like it's they want you to be in the dark and gagged as they're beating you.

01:31:36.840 And all I need is the truth to come out.

01:31:40.140 That's all she needs.

01:31:41.020 But really, it's not like Sefi said.

01:31:42.780 It's not about us.

01:31:44.120 It's just not chattel.

01:31:45.120 It's not between us and them.

01:31:46.120 It's what is in the best interest of this real five and a half little girl that went through so many terrible things.

01:31:53.840 She deserves what's in her best interest.

01:31:56.980 And what the previous administration's DOJ has done is tried to preempt even considering that question.

01:32:03.200 And I can tell you as a fact, there's like 8% of the information available to the courts to make this decision.

01:32:11.900 And so I really think the United States owes a duty of candor to the courts of the United States.

01:32:16.840 And they need to release all of this.

01:32:18.980 You can't omit key facts, critical evidence, and pretend like this is justice for this little girl.

01:32:26.940 Well, when you find out about the case, I don't need a camera there, but I would love to meet Sparrow sometime to celebrate.

01:32:41.260 And if it goes the other way, I don't know what I would do as a dad.

01:32:51.640 I know what I'd want to do as a dad, but I don't know what I would actually do as a dad.

01:32:56.940 But your journey doesn't stop in Virginia, perhaps.

01:33:04.900 Thank you.

01:33:05.720 Thank you.

01:33:06.300 Thank you.

01:33:07.080 We really appreciate it.

01:33:13.840 Just a reminder, I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast and pass this on to a friend so it can be discovered by other people.

01:33:26.940 Bye-bye.

01:33:37.460 Bye-bye.

01:33:38.080 Bye-bye.

01:33:38.420 Bye-bye.

01:33:39.940 Bye-bye.

01:33:40.660 Bye-bye.

01:33:41.700 Bye-bye.

01:33:42.180 Bye-bye.

01:33:43.300 Bye-bye.

01:33:45.240 Bye-bye.

01:33:45.900 Bye-bye.

01:33:47.480 Bye-bye.

01:33:47.960 Bye-bye.

01:33:49.080 Bye-bye.

01:33:50.240 Bye-bye.

01:33:50.940 Bye-bye.

01:33:51.940 Bye-bye.

01:33:52.600 Bye-bye.

01:33:53.200 Bye-bye.

The Glenn Beck Program - February 18, 2025

Ep 246 ｜ EMERGENCY PODCAST： Save ‘Baby Sparrow’ from the Taliban ｜ The Glenn Beck Podcast

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