American Thought Leaders

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Ralph Norman Outlines Plan for Social Security Reform and Fiscal Overhaul Aug 24, 2026

Show notes

Ahead of the Republican Senate primary runoff tomorrow in South Carolina, I’m sitting down with Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) as he and Sen. Darline Graham make their final appeals to South Carolinian voters.

In this episode, Norman dives into his core political priorities, emphasizing fiscal conservatism, securing the integrity of elections through the SAVE America Act, and reforming major entitlement programs.

Drawing on his background in the private sector, Norman said Washington needs more business-minded leaders who understand how to balance a budget and tackle national debt.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

HHS Uncovers Millions in Potentially Fraudulent Billing for Pediatric Gender Care | Asst. Sec. Brian Christine Aug 22, 2026

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In this episode, Adm. Brian Christine, assistant secretary for health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), joins me to break down a major new HHS report on gender medicine, the unspoken consequences of transgender procedures, the incentives involved, and how investigators uncovered potentially millions of dollars in fraudulent billing.

Christine reveals how certain diagnostic codes were used to circumvent both the difficulties of insurance reimbursement and laws in certain states that prohibited transgender procedures. Investigators found that coding for unspecified endocrine disorders accounted for more than $40 million in potentially fraudulent billing for puberty blockers. And a diagnosis of “precocious puberty” was used for over $11 million in billing for patients aged 13 to 17.

Financial incentives combined with the ideological capture of medical institutions create a dangerous mix, Christine warns. But this report, he said, is tremendously hopeful in spotlighting the bad science and bad actors that made the alleged abuses possible.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

Top 10 Biggest Revelations From the Fauci Diaries | Jeffrey Tucker Aug 20, 2026

Show notes

A trove of newly released documents, colloquially known as the “Fauci Diaries,” offer an unusually revealing window into the decisions and dynamics that shaped the COVID-19 era.

Jeffrey Tucker spent days reading all the documents—over 1,100 pages of materials—which were prepared within the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and appear to have been intended, at least in part, as the foundation for an autobiography.

Tucker argues that these records offer key insights into what Dr. Anthony Fauci knew, when he knew it, and how that knowledge influenced public messaging and policy.

We discuss the early push for an mRNA vaccine, the influential WHO delegation to China in February 2020, the origins and consequences of lockdown policies, and Fauci’s relationship with the media.

Why did so many countries adopt elements of China’s COVID response? What do the documents reveal about the debate over the lab-leak theory? And why did the vaccination push intensify even as breakthrough infections became increasingly apparent?

We also examine the clash between Fauci and President Donald Trump, the treatment of dissenting scientists behind the Great Barrington Declaration, and the broader question of how the official history of the pandemic will be written.

Dr. Fauci did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

How Spy Agencies ‘Massaged’ Trump’s Briefings to Bury Election Warnings | John Solomon Aug 18, 2026

Show notes

Newly released documents reveal how evidence of Chinese penetration of voter registration files and plots to interfere in the election were withheld or downplayed.

The new files reveal one of the intelligence officers said they “deliberately massaged” the presidential daily briefing in 2020 to downplay election-related information, with another stating, “I’m basically running a shadow government across the FBI at this point.”

John Solomon is chair of the White House Government Transparency Task Force, an award-winning journalist, and founder of Just the News. He breaks down key documents his task force has released—and what more we can expect to see in the coming days and months.

Newly declassified documents also upend the prevailing narrative on the Biden–Ukraine story, revealing how the FBI allegedly ran a secret operation known as Round River. According to the documents, it labelled whistleblowers as Russian “conduits” and dismissed the evidence they provided on the Biden family as “Russian disinformation.”

John Solomon places Round River within a broader sequence of FBI operations targeting Trump that included Crossfire Hurricane, Plasmic Echo, and Arctic Frost. This is “a wash, rinse, repeat cycle,” he said, going all the way back to the 2016 election and the debunked “Trump–Russia collusion” narrative.

In this episode, we examine questions of accountability, the extent of the cover-up, and whether FBI Director Kash Patel will be successful in building a “grand conspiracy” case.

Note: This interview was filmed before the latest document drop related to former Rep. Eric Swalwell and alleged Chinese operative Fang Fang.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

Is China’s Mega Embassy in London Actually a Spying Compound? | Luke de Pulford Aug 15, 2026

Show notes

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The largest Chinese embassy in Europe is set to rise in the heart of London: a 20,000-square-meter complex at Royal Mint Court.

Local councilors rejected it twice. But the government approved it, and a High Court challenge from residents was dismissed this summer.

Standing against it is Luke de Pulford, founder of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC)—an international coalition of lawmakers opposing Chinese Communist Party infiltration.

Why does this embassy matter, and why should America care?

The site sits directly above fiber-optic cables carrying sensitive financial data between the City of London and Canary Wharf, Britain’s two main financial districts. The architectural drawings are also redacted.

“Nearly an entire floor is redacted, so we don’t know what the use of those buildings is, and some of those rooms are in the basement area,” de Pulford says.

“If the Chinese were able to, in some way, sabotage or hack this cabling. … They would be impacting any financial services from anywhere in the world who are located in those two financial centers, which of course includes the United States.”

MI5 lists China as one of the most serious national security threats facing the UK. So why was the embassy approved?

“It’s partly down to the leverage that China exacts, it’s partly down to the carrots that it dangles around economic opportunities, and it’s partly down to the blunt coercion it’s willing to mete out,” de Pulford says.

This episode looks at what can still be done to stop the project, why it’s being called the last line of defense, and what it takes to resist communist infiltration from within.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

She Escaped North Korea 3 Times. Half of Her Family Didn’t Survive | Grace Jo Aug 13, 2026

Show notes

Grace Jo was born in North Korea and nearly starved to death as a child during the country’s devastating famine in the 1990s.

Her father crossed into China in search of food for his family, only to be tortured and die after returning to North Korea. Her grandmother and two younger brothers died of starvation. And her oldest sister disappeared while searching for food. The family suspects she became a victim of human trafficking in China.

Jo still remembers that her grandmother’s dying wish was to eat a baked potato. It was a wish the family could not fulfill.

At six years old, Jo first crossed the Tumen River into China with her mother and sister. In China, they lived in hiding—ever fearful of being sent back to North Korea. Jo was repatriated twice before finally escaping North Korea for the last time.

Her story is a haunting account of survival, loss, and hope that shows the brutal reality of life under North Korea’s regime and the determination, resilience, and sheer luck it takes to escape it.

In 2008, with the help of a missionary, Jo, her mother, and her older sister made it to the United States. She became a U.S. citizen in 2013.

Today, she is the founder of the Broken Chains Foundation, formerly the Grace Jo Foundation. And through the Dissident Project, she speaks regularly at schools and other venues, sharing her story to educate young people about the realities of totalitarian and communist regimes.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

How Tech Overlords Profit Off AI Predictions | Carissa Véliz Aug 11, 2026

Show notes

Is the end of privacy inevitable? Is programmable money inevitable? Is it inevitable that artificial intelligence will eliminate most of the world’s white-collar jobs?

Oxford professor Carissa Véliz argues that such claims are a red flag.

She’s the author of the new book “Prophecy: Prediction, Power, and the Fight for the Future.”

Someone who says a future is inevitable is trying to get you to do something and benefit from your belief, she argues.

She is convinced that such self‑fulfilling prophecies only work if we believe them and she urges people to defy these narratives by asking: Who is predicting this future? Who benefits? What data supports it—and what missing data might contradict it?

Véliz is a philosopher and author who specializes in privacy and the ethics of artificial intelligence. She is an associate professor of philosophy at the Institute for Ethics in AI and a Fellow at Hertford College at the University of Oxford.

Prediction, Véliz explains, is a business model: diagnose a problem, promise that more data will solve it, then sell tools to analyze the huge datasets institutions don’t know how to use.

Throughout history, rulers have attached themselves to prophets. Today, that role is played by immensely rich and powerful tech executives who advise governments and control key infrastructure and access to citizens via social media.

In our interview, we discuss how surveillance and behavioral prediction undermine and erode an open society where people should have the freedom to speak, protest, and be anonymous.

Other questions we discuss: Do “digital natives” like Gen Z and Gen Alpha—who have never experienced a true non-digital world—even understand the role of privacy? And what are the best antidotes to the harms of digital life?

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

EXCLUSIVE: Kash Patel: The FBI’s War on Scam Centers Around the World Aug 08, 2026

Show notes

In this exclusive interview with FBI Director Kash Patel, we dive into the FBI’s campaign to take down scam centers around the world, from Burma to the United Arab Emirates.

Last year, the FBI launched Operation Blackout, a 16-month campaign that dismantled four of the world’s largest scam centers.

Working with international partners—notably including China’s Ministry of Public Security—the FBI seized over $15 billion, arrested more than 300 individuals, and freed thousands of trafficked victims who had been forced to work at these scam compounds.

The amount of money Americans have reported losing to fraud has increased over threefold from 2020 to 2025, according to data from the Federal Trade Commission. And nearly half of that in 2025 went to romance cryptocurrency scams—known as pig-butchering scams.

Scammers use texts to build trust before luring victims into fake investments that drain their life savings. Then they move and launder the money through crypto wallets.

So what can people do to avoid being scammed? Will the FBI be returning all the seized money? And why has the FBI chosen to work with China on tackling these scam compounds? How can the Chinese regime be trusted to work in good faith?

In this wide-ranging interview, we also discuss the FBI’s fight to catch spies, investigate transnational repression, cut bureaucratic red tape, and prevent the next terrorist attack.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

How One Peace Agreement Gave America a New Route Through Iran and Russia’s Backyard | Ambassador Narek Mkrtchyan Aug 06, 2026

Show notes

Almost a year after the Washington Declaration, Armenia is trying to turn a hard-won peace with Azerbaijan into something lasting. In this conversation, Armenia’s ambassador to the United States, Narek Mkrtchyan, explains what the agreement means on the ground and why the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity could reshape the region and the country’s future.

“We sit in a very tough neighborhood. We sit in a very interesting geography. We are at the crossroads of Europe, Middle East, Central Asia, South Caucasus,” Mkrtchyan says.

Mkrtchyan describes how Armenia is trying to turn geography into strategy through the development of diplomacy, new trade routes, and international partnerships. He views this as more than a peace process—it’s a chance to redefine Armenia’s place in the region.

“In the center is the concept of crossroads of peace,” Mkrtchyan says.

Recently, Armenia also got approval for the biggest artificial intelligence factory in the region—a $4 billion project that officials say could help make the country a hub for computing power and advanced technology.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

The Multi-Billion Dollar Industry Using Trafficked Slaves to Scam Americans | Timothy Blackwood Aug 04, 2026

Show notes

Americans are ripped off in the billions annually through romance “pig-butchering” scams—the most dominant type. But who’s really behind them?

The shocking reality is the vast majority of these scammers are trafficked victims, enslaved across more than 60 countries and forced to scam or face torture.

“You’re working 17-hour days. You’re catatonic. You’re not getting sleep. You start to doze. They‘ll electrocute you, and if you refuse to scam, they’ll torture you,” said Timothy Blackwood, an award-winning Canadian-American film director.

His film “Scam Slave: From Hell to Home” follows a Ugandan man promised a high-paying job in Thailand, only to be kidnapped by a Myanmar-based crime syndicate.

“There’s all different types of scams going on there. There’s villas, there’s strip clubs, there’s clinics to support the staff that are managing and running these compounds,” Blackwood says.

These scam centers in Laos, Cambodia, and Myanmar generate billions that fund even more advanced operations.

“It’s not simply in the horrific statistics of how many billions of dollars are being scammed from Americans annually, but the human cost to people’s lives.”

In this episode, I dive into how these operations stay hidden and what can actually be done to stop them.

Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

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