The left has overtaken the culture, erasing God from public life and making religious faith a taboo subject. But the power of faith isn’t so easily extinguished. For this podcast, Anna shines a much-needed light on why we need God and prayer — now more than ever — with Sam Clovis. Air Force veteran, businessman, college professor, talk radio host, politician — Sam did it all before serving as a top adviser to Donald Trump. And along the way, he was paralyzed for about a year from the chest down, until one day his prayers were answered, and he recovered without any medical precedent. Don’t miss this essential conversation on the importance of faith and the nefarious efforts to eradicate it.
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Up next, Luna Talks with Anna Paulina. Luna part of the gang which the left has overtaken the culture, erasing God from public life and making religious faith a taboo subject. But the power of faith isn't so easily extinguished today. I shine a much need to light on why we need God and prayer now more than ever. This is Luna Talks with Anna Paulina. Hey everyone, and welcome back to today's episode of Luna Talks with me, your hosts on a Paulina Luna, I wanted to kind of shift a little bit and focus more on what we can do as a nation, specifically those who are faith based. And I wanted to do that because if you've noticed what's happened over the last couple of years, specifically starting in you saw this massive, massive push within the evangelical movement, specifically getting political for one of the first times in a very long time. And then you saw in that really the mains dream media. I remember starting to hear articles on NPR, I remember starting to her articles on various different news outlets, starting to target the evangelical base, saying that if you were evangelical, if you believed in Christian that it was not the Christian thing to do in regards to illegal immigration. And if you believed in border security, if you believed in wanting legal immigration, that you apparently weren't quote unquote following you know, Jesus teachings, which could not be farther from the truth. I think that if you look at Christianity and you look at the Bible, and especially you know what the Bible represents. It's it's a code of conduct, it's morality, it's a guideline on how to live a good and just life. Now, what you're really seeing, though, is that there's this massive push, and there's been a massive push really starting in the late sixties merging into the seventies, to remove God from government and to remove God from the discussion of siety. And that's interesting because you have things like the Founders Bible, which is an amazing version of the Bible that I actually was able to get my husband for Christmas last year. And what it does is it outlines the founding principles of this country and outlines the Founders personalized and talks about how their faith played a role in the construction of the New America and the construction of the Constitution, everything from how the Constitution was written, to their personal lives to what happened you know, in seventeen seventy six. It all had a foundation and it all stemmed back to Christianity. So as we're looking at what's happening now in our currency side, you see a lot of chaos. And I recently had posted this past weekend that how can you begin to understand the root of chaos unless you truly understand the battle of good and evil and essentially God and Satan. And I think a lot of people you say at and they get freaked out about it. Maybe it's because as conservatives we don't do a good enough job talking about it, right, But I think that that ultimately needs to be more of a topic of discussion. And so I wanted to bring on someone. His name is Sam Clovis. Sam has an incredible story. He actually was an advisor for President Trump. Actually President Trump actually ended up calling him and basically recruiting him to work on the election cycle. But I wanted to bring on Sam because Sam has not only a unique story in the fact that yes, he worked with President Trump, but he also has as an evangelical a really good, I think grounding in what we can do to really get out the faith vote. And then also too, I think whereas Christians, we've kind of fallen a little bit short in using our platforms and or getting more involved to vote on your values, not just voting political party lines. And I say that because no politician is perfect. I think that that is evident, right. We're all human. Humans are flawed. But when you're voting based on your convictions, and you're voting based on your moral principles, you're never gonna let yourself down. And it's interesting that if you look at history here in the United States, after you see this real push to remove God from society, whether it's through the education system or you know, out of Hollywood, what you really see is this decline um. You see an increase in incarceration rates, you see an increase in imprisonment, you see an increase in fatherless homes, which creates the cycle of poverty. That's something I've addressed in previous episodes. But what we're also seeing is that the church itself has become weak. So instead of adhering to what I think biblical values are, they start to water down what the true. I think room of Christianity is. And it's interesting that this push and this movement does also coincide with a lot of social movements that we're seeing, whether it's organizations like BLM that are inherently Marxist. You look at what they do, and they want to remove the nuclear family, and why do they do that, because the nuclear family is the backbone of America. But what you see in many communist countries, whether it's China or whether it was a former Soviet Union, the first thing that they did was targeted the churches. They outlawed religion. They wanted to replace religion with government, and then inherently make those people so dependent on government that they couldn't resist that they had no backbone to their country anymore. And that's ultimately how communism works. So is it by mistake or by design that after the nineteen sixty three Congressional Archives submissions of the Communist Goals and Objectives that we start to see this shift here in the United States? And so I do think that we're looking at the long term impacts of what has happened over the last forty years of this plan to essentially turn our country into a communist country, and then you get into you know, what's happening in Afghanistan. I know a lot of people this week, I know I've been one of them. It's really really hard to see what's happening after so many of our own you know, family members, our own friends, sacrifice so much in Afghanistan. I mean, for God's sakes, you literally had Andy, who's my husband, who was shot. He could have died over there, he was shot by Taliban. And then you have Taliban essentially on this year's anniversary of nine eleven, will be essentially up armored with military equipment. That pull out did not have to happen that way. It was completely terrible leadership, not just at the administration level, but at the military leadership level. You have the military pushing critical race theory and being woke and not focused on military strategy, which is why we're in the situation that we're in today. But I bring that up because what the Taliban is is they are radicalized extremists and they're fighting the long term plan, which is to essentially eradicate the United States. They are fighting against Christianity. They believe that their extremism is the only way to get into heaven and it's the farthest from the truth. And so if you look at what's happening here in the United States with us morally, and then you look at the polar opposite of what's happening in a nation that's literally they don't want the United States, they don't want the West culture to come anywhere near Afghanistan, and you see the end results and it's just it's complete payoffs. So I wanted to focus this back on really how we can stop that from not just happening here, but also bring someone in who has a solution. And so we'll be right back after this short break with Sam Clovis. He's again very very special guests that we were looking forward to having on today. Stay tuned and we'll be right back. Hey, everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of Luna Talks. I have a very special guest with me right now. His name is Sam Clovis. Sam, thank you so much for joining the Luna Talks family. Um, if you can, real quick, please tell us a little bit about yourself. I know you have done some work with the Trump and minnes station, but please the floor is yours. Well, thank you very much. I appreciated Anna, and it's great to be on with you today. UM. I was raised in Kansas at the great fortune of going to the United States Air Force Academy and graduated there with a Bachelor of Science degree and political science. And then UM flew for twenty five years in the Air Force, went into the business world, was relatively successful there. I decided that I wanted to get out of the corporate rat race, and I became a college professor and UH. Then I went back to work in the industry for a couple of years, and I was a fellow at the Homeland Security Institute and worked for Booze Allen north of Bremen. And then I settled in and UM Northwest Iowa as professor at Morningside College. And then decided that I needed to get into talk radio, and I did a side dig of talk radio for about three and a half years. It got me involved in politics and I ran for the United States Senate. Came in second to Joni Ernst from Iowa who became our senator and UH and subsequently UH got a lot of recognition for that, and UM then was plucked off the campus by Donald Trump, and UH work I was the national co chair in chief policy advisor to the campaign in sixteen, was a policy director during the transition, and served as a senior White House advisor at the Department of Agriculture after inauguration. So that, uh, that kind of brings me up to here. When I came home, got deathly ill, spent two years in the hospital, and uh, subsequently have just sprung myself out last March, and Uh, with God's great blessing and intervention. Um, I I'm making a lot of progress and uh, and I'm doing great. Well, We're glad that you're okay. And actually that was my second question is how did you get involved in the Trump administration? Because so many people, i mean talk about one of the most historic and amazing and energetic elections in US history. You were there from the beginning. I mean, how did that conversation go? Well, I had started originally, Uh, he wanted me to come on board in May, and I had promised Rick Perry that I would work for him if he got involved in the campaign. Rix campaign lasted sixty three days. But during that whole time, the Trump people kept Pestor and me and saying, hey, when are you gonna come on board. And then when uh rix campaign stopped, I got that phone call from New York and it was Donald Trump himself and he said, you're not gonna tell me no again? And I when I would, And so that's how you just plucked me off the campus. And it was amazing. All the way up through March of there were really only a handful of people they're running the national campaign. And it wasn't until much later that we finally built up the campaign. I was kind of after March I became like John the Baptist. I was out there doing all the front work with all of the organizations and donors and voters, and uh just a remarkable experience and once in a lifetime thing. You know, it's interesting you bring up John the Baptist into kind of I guess seg and by the way, I mean, the level of coordination skills that you probably have to have to do what you did is unparalleled. I know that, like just even working on one stay long. I mean I ran for Congress, and just a congressional race. I could not imagine a presidential But you know what I noticed is there is such a movement within the evangelical vote for President Trump, and I think that in two sixteen, had that movement not been there, I think that that really carried him through the election because that was a national movement. But it's interesting to me because what I'm seeing now, and I think what a lot of people are noticing, is that there are a lot of pastors and faith leaders that are basically saying that they should not get involved in politics. And I wanted to see kind of what your opinion is, because in my opinion, you know, politics is part of your moral value system. It does overlap, and if you don't vote on your morals, then what are you voting for. I think you're absolutely right, and I would like to see the reinitiation of the black rope gage that was there at the founding. I happen to have it at home. I have five volumes of prayers and sermons that were delivered in that period of the eighteen or seventeen sixty up through about eighteen ten, and uh, it's just remarkable to see the courage of those pastors as they stood there and helped create a nation. I think that that our pastors today have the same obligation, and I think there's nothing wrong with the pastor standing up and saying, you vote the Bible. And if you vote the Bible, there's no question about what you're going to do. You're going to vote for life. If life is the fundamental and primary issue that is that every evangelical should embrace. And if you have a candidate that is not pro life, then you probably are dealing with something that you're not comfortable with and you're really not voting the biblical values that are there. I think pastors have an obligation to stand up and say those things. And I think they have an obligation to talk about UH being frugal with our money. They have an obligation to talk about where they send our young men and women to defend this nation in our national interests. And I think that there are a lot of these things that that I don't see many pastors that have that kind of courage. And there's nothing wrong. I think that even if you take a look at the law and and the protection of their not a nonprofit status, tax exempt status, there's nothing in there that says you can't preach the Bible and you can't ask people to vote the Bible. And I think that's what they ought to be doing. It's really interesting that you bring that up, especially on the pro life front, because I was actually just recently, probably a couple of months ago at the Florida Faith and Freedom Conference, and there was some pastors there that were especially doing and focusing on Hispanic outreach and the Spanish speaking demographic here in the United States, which if if you guys don't know this, the Hispanic demographic is very, very conservative because a lot of our cultural values are based on Catholicism and or Christianity. So after the conference, I had a reporter reach out and she was talking to me about where I have been able to really I think move the mark on national Hispanic outreach. And she had interviewed a pastor and this was a Spanish speaking pastor, and he was saying, well, you know, actual values of Hispanics and Hispanic Americans actually more aligned with the Democrat value system because if you can look past abortion. And I told I was like, wait, hold on, as a pastor, if you're saying if you can look past abortion, I don't think that you're going to the same you know, Christian pastors schools that most people will go to, You're absolutely right, and I think that the life is the first and fundamental issue that we that we deal with. And I just I'm helping uh some people out here in the Midwest and the Plains with some of their campaigns coming up in two and UM, this is really uh front and center for all of us. Um. We we really uh adhere strongly to this notion that life is the first test and if you if you can't pass that test, and there's probably no reason to continue on and uh and I think that's a biblical value that we really should look at. And I think the pastors ought to really stand up for that. And if you, in your right, if you have a pastor who says you can look past life, I really question that person and and their congregation. Now, I will say this, there are many congregations out there, and particularly in the super churches, where you run into a lot of this vending the read to the left. And I and I really UH find it interesting that in order to satisfy this have this utilitarian view that you have to do the best for the most. Um, that's really not the issue, because there are absolutes, and the absolute is first absolute is life, and I think after that then UH there are others, and to vote biblical values is really worthy evangelicals, and I'm an evangelical. That's where we ought to be. Yeah, that's what I say is if you vote based on your values, you'll never be let down because people are not perfect. Not one politician is perfect, and so don't put all your faith in them. Put your faith in God, and I think you'll be led the correct way. So we're gonna cut real quick to a commercial break. Everyone sit tight. I have some more questions for you. Will be right back after this short break as we transition. I wanted to ask you. I grew up saying the Pledge of Allegiance and I remember sitting there every morning. It wasn't a big deal. Everyone did it. It wasn't that we were, you know, targeting or making people feel uncomfortable. We just did it. I'm old enough to remember when people started saying that the word God was offensive and the Pledge of Allegiance. And it's interesting because you bring up the founding and what our founding fathers believed in. And I have something called the Founder's Bible, and it has a lot of American history woven into scripture as well, and it talks about how the reason why we have the type of country that we do is because our founding fathers generally believed in God and when they wrote the Pledge of Allegiance and the reason why we say it, I think has a lot of historical significance, not just religious. But it's interesting to see that the Left has and at least definitely over the last twenty years, gone increasingly more aggressive in removing God from the conversation. And the reason I find that alarming is because, again going to morals and society, when you remove God from the conversation, how do you think that that's impacting society currently? I think it's a it's a horrible issue. And I think that you know, I address the There are four pillars of American strength, and the first is individual liberty, exercise of free will, and liberty to me is a bigger word than freedom. And then and then from that from that individual, we then have the traditional nuclear family, that to me is a societal building block. That's where the first part of education takes place. That's where our social norms are, That's where we socialize gender identity, That's where we go through a lot of that other part the third issue there. The third pillar is is the primacy of religion. God must be first. If you have if you were believe in individual liberty, and you are part of a traditional nuclear family, then you must put God first in that. And that then comes to the fourth pillar, and that's voluntary association in community. And those are the strengths of America. And if it is the you know, we can go back and look at the Toqueville and the Toakville said in the eighteen thirties when he wrote the that that wonderful uh magnamopus that he did about the whole issue, that that fundamental to America was its belief in God. Look at the way we migrated across the country. Take a look at how we settled the country. Take a look at where we have the strength of the Catholic Church in the Hispanics that settled much of the of the Southwest, in the west of the United States. Take a look at the impact that religion had on our founding. And I think is as we lose that. I think it is a deliberate and intentional act on the part of the left to take God out of things, because if God is gone, they can break down those other institutions and then the only thing to substitute for God is government. And we have many pastors today out there that think that that government is the left hand of God, and they're deeply mistaken. Yeah, it's not. I was interesting. I remember reading a documentary about what happened with the church in St. Petersburg and Russia when the Communist Party took over and they went into a lot of these churches and they created these science centers because part of what the Communists wanted was again that removal of God, because that is really the backbone to the nuclear family. And if you have a strong nuclear family, you have a strong country. That could lead to opposition to a lot of these policies that the Communists we're bringing forward. And you know, it's interesting because you look at organizations like BLM and they literally say that they want to attack the nuclear family, that they don't support that. And part of the nineteen sixty three Communist Goals and Objectives from that were submitted to the Congressional Archives, they list out how they want government to replace family and essentially God. So it's very very unique that, I mean, there is such I think a motive here to remove that. But I mean, you nailed it right on the head. I couldn't have said it any better. Um. You know, what we're seeing now, especially is faith leaders are being quiet, and they're being very very quiet. I don't know if it's because of the five oh one C three status or what it is, but they aren't talking about voting biblically. What is your message to some of those pastors or to those faith leaders that are really hiding behind the Bible? I think you know, thank you for asking that question, because I will just give you, if you'll indulge me, just a couple of second minutes. The one of the great things that has happened to me is that many people may not realize that, Uh Neil. About a year ago, I was paralyzed from the chest down and I had had an abscess form on my back and my spine had to be operated on and uh severe damage to the nerves, of course, and they had to lay open the spine and and so for about a year I was paralyzed from the chest down, and then suddenly one day my toes started to move, and then my legs started to move, and then the rest of the body healed, started to heal itself, and I'm still in the process. And um, but I understand that God's intervention here. And this is because there is no medical precedent for what has happened to me. They cannot find one. There is no way to to find one. Where I lived totally independently by myself and I even though I'm in a wheelchair a lot, this is where I am. What I've learned in that process, though, it is that it must be the intervention of God and the power of prayer that it put me on this road back to full recovery. This is instilled in me, this notion, and I have this this vision of the sword and buckler. If you read the Bible, you'll find that the sort, the buckler, the shield are mentioned over and over again, and particularly in Ezekiel and some of the profits, because they talk about this the rescue of Israel and the redemption of Israel and therefore the redemption of people. And what I find is that that maybe pastors don't want to stand up because they don't want to be branded as a radical, right wing nut or or whatever. I don't think if you stand up for God that you should be branded or feel that you should be branded as anything. You should be proud of it. You should stepped into it. You should own the fact that you are a warrior for God, and that's what you should do. You should stand up and be a warrior. Now, many people may do it their own way. Anna, you have a wonderful podcast. There are other their pastors this sum are are a little bit more persuasive, perhaps and a little gentler. I'm not one of those. I'm one of those that steps into it. I believe that if you have an issue, you confronted and you go out and attack it. And I think that I wish there were more pastors and frankly more late people that believe even God, that would do that, because I think that the country would be better off and would help restore this notion. And we should never be ashamed that we're Christians. We should never be ashamed to think about that first century of Christianity. Think about it. Think about what happened to Paul and to Peter and to Stephen, and and think about where John was exiled to pat Most and he was there and ended up writing Revelation. Think about all of the things that that would happen in the New Testament as fulfillment of what's in the Old Testament. Think about all of those things, and if a person is not invigorated with that and nervated with that, and it is not given the courage to stand up and to step into these issues, then I don't know what I think that if you do not have that courage, you better find it, because you're not going to be there when the counting comes in. You're not going to be there. Well, that literally wraps up with such a strong message, like literally, I don't know how you can say it any better. If God is with me, who can be against me? Right right? Well, thank you so much for joining us, Sam, I mean working. Are you going to still be on the campaign trio? I think we're hearing chatter that you know President Trump is potentially running in we hope to see you there? Is that something? Thank you? Well, it would depend on what what do he asked me to do and the amount of travel and all of that. My wife threatened me that if I ever got back in campaign mode again, that she would make sure that I got feel dressed like a deer and thrown over the hood of her cheek. So yeah, that and she I believe her. Well. We look forward to seeing what you do do. I know that you're probably not done with doing anything political yet or you're not there. You're definitely not done with the evangelical outreach. So we look forward to following you. And thank you so much for joining us today. Thanks Anna, we'll talk to you. Thank you before we go. I want to thank Sam Close again for such a great interview, and I want to thank you guys so much for listening. If you enjoy today's show, please leave us a review and rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts. To hear more of my episodes and get my weekly newsletter, go to Gingridge through six dot com, slash Anna, and you can also find me on Parlor, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and getter at Real Anna Paulina. Special thank you to our producer Drew Steele, writer Eric Kleigman, and executive producers Debbie Meyers and Speaker New Gingridge part of the Gingridge three sixty Network