In this episode of The Jenny Beth Show, Jenny Beth Martin is joined by Terry Schilling, President of the American Principles Project, to discuss the critical impact of "wokeness" on America's military readiness. Terry shares insights from his powerful documentary, The Culture War: The Deadly Consequences of the Woke War Machine, highlighting how diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies are weakening our armed forces. They explore the dangerous shift in military recruitment and promotion practices, which prioritize demographics over national security. If you’re concerned about the future of America's defense, don’t miss this important conversation.
In this episode of The Jenny Beth Show, Jenny Beth Martin is joined by Terry Schilling, President of the American Principles Project, to discuss the critical impact of "wokeness" on America's military readiness. Terry shares insights from his powerful documentary, The Culture War: The Deadly Consequences of the Woke War Machine, highlighting how diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies are weakening our armed forces. They explore the dangerous shift in military recruitment and promotion practices, which prioritize demographics over national security. If you’re concerned about the future of America's defense, don’t miss this important conversation.
Twitter/X: @Schilling1776 | @approject | @jennybethm
Website: https://americanprinciplesproject.org/
Documentary: Culture War: The Deadly Consequences of a Woke War Machine
Terry Schilling (00:00):
They're going after the demographics that are least likely to join the military. They're more focused on recruiting people based on the color of their skin. They're more focused on recruiting more women into the military rather than just recruiting the people that are primed and ready to go. The people that are jumping at the gun to go serve their country,
Narrator (00:20):
Keeping our republic is on the line, and it requires Patriots with great passion, dedication, and eternal vigilance to preserve our freedoms. Jenny Beth Martin is the co-founder of Tea Party Patriots. She's an author of filmmaker and one of time magazine's most influential people in the world. But the title she's most proud of is Mom to Her Boy, girl Twins. She has been at the forefront fighting to protect America's core principles for more than a decade. Welcome to the Jenny Beth Show.
Jenny Beth Martin (00:52):
Welcome back to the second part of my conversation with Terry Schilling of the American Principles Project. In this episode, we're shifting our focus to the devastating impact of wokeness on our military, how diversity and inclusion policies are undermining military readiness and putting our national security at risk. Terry shares insights from his powerful new documentary, the Culture War, the Deadly Consequences of the Woke War Machine, where he sits down with gold star families and military leaders to discuss how these policies are affecting our troops. If you care about the future of America's armed forces, you won't want to miss this episode. Terry Shilling, thanks so much for joining me today.
Terry Schilling (01:36):
Thanks for having me. Jenny Beth,
Jenny Beth Martin (01:38):
So you have a new documentary out. Tell me about this new documentary.
Terry Schilling (01:42):
Well, it's called The Culture War, the Deadly Consequences of a Woke War Machine, and it's about the woke culture war that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have waged on our men and women in uniform. What they have done is they have focused on all the things that divide us, and it's meant to be divisive. They focus on race and gender identity. They're putting drag queens on naval bases, and it has seriously deadly consequences. And we tell this story of the woke culture war through the eyes of gold star families from the Afghanistan pullout these people. We sat down with them, Jenny Beth, and heard their stories firsthand, and they all had very similar complaints. One is that they had never heard from Joe Biden or Kamala Harris. No one had even said their kids' names from the White House, even though it was a disastrous pullout.
Terry Schilling (02:37):
But the other big thing that they kept bringing up each one of 'em individually when we sat down with them was I think that these guys were just so distracted from this woke culture war nonsense, that they weren't really focused on the mission at hand. And that's why my son or daughter has been killed. And it really struck a chord with us and we wanted to tell these stories. And so we got some of these videos to big names Mark Meadows, Mac Gaetz, Anna Paulina Luna. We have Jim Banks in the documentary. Donald Trump even agreed to sit down with us and is in this documentary. And the thing is, these stories are so powerful. It made these very strong leaders emotional when they had to sit down and hear these voices and see these parents talk about their kids' stories. This woke culture war is not some ideological argument. It's in our faces. It's killing our kids, and it's having a really deadly impact on the next generation.
Jenny Beth Martin (03:34):
And what is it that the military is doing that focuses on wokeness rather than on military readiness?
Terry Schilling (03:42):
Well, first and foremost, they are in their advertisements and in their recruitment goals. They're not recruiting people that are just want to serve their country. They're actually trying to recruit people based on demographics, right? And it's not demographics that would be ideal to join the military or demographics that are most likely to join the military. In fact, they're going after the demographics that are least likely to join the military. They're more focused on recruiting people based on the color of their skin. They're more focused on recruiting more women into the military rather than just recruiting the people that are primed and ready to go, the people that are jumping at the gun to go serve their country and serve a greater purpose than just themselves. It's all because of what's hot to trot in the news cycle, this diversity, equity and inclusion nonsense. And there's been a real shift from focusing on killing the bad guys, killing the people that are trying to kill us, and that would take over this country in a harp if they could.
Terry Schilling (04:43):
And instead they want to focus on increasing diversity and equity and inclusion in the military. And so it's the recruitment goals. And if you look at, this is not just my opinion on this, the readiness standards for the military have never been in worse shape. They're falling below, I think in the US Army. Their recruitment goals are, I think over 25% lower than what they have been before. And Jenny bet this actually plays out. We did a military survey, a survey of former military members, and we asked them very specific questions. Do you think the military is too ideological? Do you think they're too left wing? Several things, but the most powerful response that we saw that really hit me was that 25% of our former military men and women said that they would not recommend to their family and friends that they should join the military. That is the driving. If you talk to most people in the military, their father or mother was most likely the military. Their grandfather on either side was on. This is a familial thing. It's something that's passed on through the bloodstream in a lot of ways. And these guys aren't signing up because they don't have full faith in the US Department of Defense to protect and actually look after their sons and daughters.
Jenny Beth Martin (06:01):
I've seen that as I've traveled around the country. I noticed it beginning in early 2022. I was in Las Vegas, Nevada, and I was speaking with a person. It wasn't about military readiness at all, but this lady was former military. Her husband was former military, and I believe that he was a combat veteran. I think that they also did exactly what you were saying that it was he parents had been in the military. His father had been in the military as well. So it was generational. Her son was 17, about to be 18, and she told him not to join the military and to wait until at least 2024 to even consider joining the military. So they were trying to figure out what he was going to be doing once he graduated from high school rather than going into the military. And she talked about some of the reasons for that.
Jenny Beth Martin (07:00):
It included the mandates for different medication and shots that they were requiring, but also just a sense that the military was no longer focused on making sure that people were trained and well-equipped and able to go into combat and instead focused on other items. And I started reaching out to veterans, not former veterans, but veterans, asking them, what do you think about it? Would you recommend that your child go into the military right now today? And I kept hearing back from people, no, I wouldn't do it. And it was something, a concern I raised with my team and I said, I bet we are going to see that we have recruitment issues. And not long after that, we started seeing that there really are recruitment issues and we're at the peak of those issues right now. It's very alarming, especially considering Russia attacking Ukraine, Iran emboldening and empowering Hezbollah and Hamas to attack Israel and the things that we see with China, America needs to be ready, especially with all these threats that in the way that Russia, China, and Iran seem to be engaging in war games with one another against us. We need to be ready, and it's alarming that we're not.
Terry Schilling (08:22):
Well, one thing that I'll add on to this is a lot of this diversity, equity inclusion stuff, it's not just used in the recruitment, but it's used in determining promotions. Think about that. The people at the top are only going to be promoting the people up from the bottom if they meet these diversity equity inclusion standards, which basically means that they have to be progressives in order to rise up in the military. And don't forget, Lloyd Austin and General Mille, they have talked about trying to, this is what they're broadcasting, right? There are things that they're broadcasting and they're things that they aren't telling everyone, but the things that they're broadcasting is that they're cracking down on domestic extremism in the military. Another word for domestic extremism is someone who really loves their country and wants to support America, the people that have MAGA hats, people that proudly fly the American flag.
Terry Schilling (09:14):
These are red flags for the people in our military leadership, and these are the people that they're not promoting. These are the people that they're not trying to recruit. They're avoiding them, and instead they're choosing the people that are not extremely focused and in love with America and trying to promote it. Who is going to join the military besides the people that are extremists in their support in Defense of America? We want people who are extreme in their love in defense of America. That what other definition? I mean, if you're willing to die and lay down your life for each other, that's a pretty extreme position to hold and extreme love for your country that you have. And these are exactly the people that they're not promoting the people that they want to get out of the military that they don't want in the military. Instead, they want people that won't lay down their life for their country. That's insane. That is a recipe for disaster.
Jenny Beth Martin (10:04):
Or they want people who will lay down their life, but for different ideology, not for patriotism. And that's extreme and alarming as well. We need people, you're exactly right what you just said, the people in the military are the people who love the country and are the most patriotic because the very sacrifices they're willing to make so that we don't have to make those sacrifices and they should be respected for that, not treated the way that we're seeing from the military today.
Terry Schilling (10:39):
No, that's right. And one thing, when President Trump, he sat down with us for 45 minutes for this documentary, and I had two real takeaways. One is that, my goodness, this man really does love this country, and he's exceptionally smart and knows just exactly what he's doing. They paint him as if he's just this radical dismissive guy that a bull in a China shop almost. But he's actually very thoughtful. He's actually very nuanced. When we asked him, for example, what his plans were to weed out wokeness in the military and if he was concerned about it, he was very careful to point out the distinction between the men and women joining the military, the people that are actually soldiers on the front lines. He said, our military isn't woke. The leadership of the military is woke, and that's where we need to weed things out.
Terry Schilling (11:27):
If he was just some radical, he would've said the whole thing's got to go. We got to fire. No, but he's nuanced. He knows what he's talking about and he's smart. But the other takeaway I had, Jenny Beth from just sitting down is just how thoughtful he is, but just how much I hate the legacy media for depriving the American people of a president that really is and should be revered. I mean, he really should be held in such a high regard that he's a reaganesque figure, a Lincoln esque figure in some ways, right? We've never had this much domestic conflict or this much civil unrest for quite some time. And President Trump is truly a great figure in American history. And because the legacy media has their own agenda and they disagree with his, they've just totally slandered the guy and they really, it's not just deprived him of his reputation. They've deprived the American people of having a relationship and getting to know this guy more. I mean, everyone that says that this guy's a racist or a white supremacist or a bigot or Nazi, whatever they're accusing him of, they're really missing out on someone that is actually incredibly thoughtful, loves this country, and really has good policies that will most likely benefit them a lot more than the elites that are ruining this country.
Jenny Beth Martin (12:45):
That is such an important and insightful thing that you just said there, Terry, that the people with the mainstream media and others who paint all these characteristics on Trump that are not accurate, that they are depriving the American people from getting to know the President who really does, or the former president and maybe the future president, hopefully the future president from getting to know this man for who he is and who he is as president. And I doubt many people are thinking of it that way, but you are so correct about that. I've met Trump several times, and he does care about the country. When he first started running for office, I didn't know that about him, but I've gotten to know him and I really do understand he cares deeply about this country and he's willing to make sacrifices for it.
Terry Schilling (13:38):
That's right. And the third thing that really stood out to me is just how curious he is. I mean, he asked so many questions, not just about what's real and what's not. He asked us what we thought about things. Here's a guy who's a multi-billionaire, former president of the United States, and he's asking Terry Schilling, whose dad was a pizza guy from Quad Cities, western Illinois. He's asking me what I think about what's happening in our kids' schools with children and against parental rights. He's asking me what I think about policies in the military and what should happen to me. He's actually curious. He's constantly soliciting feedback. I'm not the only person that experienced, I've talked to other people that have met with him, and they all have very similar stories. He solicits a lot of opinions. He wants a lot of ideas and arguments. He asked us about JD Vance, so we thought about him, and he's constantly looking for feedback. He's not this braggadocious guy. I mean, yeah, he has an ego, but you got to have an ego to be in politics. You have to believe that you're the best guy for the job, otherwise you're not going to be a very good politician. But he really does solicit people's advice and opinions in a way that I haven't experienced with dozens of politicians that I've had to meet with in the past several years.
Jenny Beth Martin (14:54):
You're right about how he solicits opinions. I met with President Trump at the White House in the middle of, well, it was in early July in 2020 in the middle of Covid Lockdowns, and it was a round table meeting about schools and reopening schools, and there were several doctors and several cabinet members. The vice president was there, both Mrs. Trump and Mrs. Pence were there. And then school administrators, teachers and college. I think a college president was there as well. I was invited to attend as a mom in addition to the work that I do with T Pretty Patriot's action. But I was invited both as that, but mostly as a mom who was very concerned about getting schools back open. And I'd been very, very active in that almost immediately upon the closure of the schools. And he went around this table and there were probably 60 people sitting at the table, maybe 50.
Jenny Beth Martin (15:56):
It was a lot of people, and it was set up in a big, huge rectangle, and every single person spoke. The meeting went on for several hours, and he listened to every single person. And I wound up speaking longer than I intended, but there was no rush to cut me off. He thanked me for the input he pointed over at my kids and said, they must be proud of me. And the thing that really struck me about that he was listening. He just was sitting there listening to everyone and getting all of that information so he could go make decisions.
Terry Schilling (16:31):
And everyone has known for so long just how corrupt DC is and how out of touch DC has gotten and how there's a real system. I mean, he ran, his original campaign was all about draining the swamp, and there's so many people that have just gotten suckered and duped into the messages and propaganda from the swamp, right? It's not just dc, it's the legacy media in New York and LA and Chicago, all these major cities. There's a whole ecosystem that's run by our elites in this country that is just eating up America alive, and they are willing to lie, cheat, and steal and kill, right? They're willing to kill. They start terrible wars to kill people, to keep onto their power. These are evil people and they're all lying. We finally had someone that came to this town and was like, what the hell is going on? And there's so many people that just took the message of the legacy corrupt media hook, line, and sinker. It's insane, but it's so powerful. But it just means, it makes it even more important for why we need to take back this election and win the White House and take back the Senate and expand our gains in the house.
Jenny Beth Martin (17:45):
That is exactly right. I want to just on one thing that you said that a distinction that President Trump said that I think is very important. The men and women who are joining the military today, even if they are joining because of the expansion of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, they're still willing to sacrifice for our country and our freedom, and I appreciate that about them. So anything that we're saying right now, I'm not coming down on the men and women who are serving in the military, especially those on the front lines. It's frustrating that the leadership is not putting the safety of those men and women who are willing to volunteer ahead of, and it's hard to say safety because it is a military. You're sending them into unsafe areas, but you want them to be as prepared as possible and as ready as possible to do what must be done and to come back home, not so focused on other policies that they're not preparing those men and women the way they should be prepared and lowering standards so much that it puts those men and women at risk.
Terry Schilling (18:55):
No. Right, and I think that's important to clarify because it's not if you sign up to join the military, you've already checked a box. You really actually do love your country. Obviously. My main point is that when you have a product or when you have something that you're advertising and trying to accomplish with your marketing, you need to know your audience. You need to know the ideal audience for selling your product to, this is just marketing 1 0 1. And instead of going after the people that we already know have a long history of loving and serving the country and wanting to do that, they're ignoring them. They're kicking them out of the military, and instead they're trying to actually convince people that aren't likely to join and don't really want to join, don't have an affinity to join, to join. And so it's wasted efforts. We don't want to coerce people into joining the military.
Terry Schilling (19:44):
It doesn't make for a very effective fighting force. You're better off just going after the easiest people to recruit. But so there's a couple of problems. The readiness standards are falling through the floor mostly because of the recruitment fall off, and that's due to not going after the people that are layups that are easy, that are top of the barrel to scoop out. And then it's also spending most of your time and attention on people that aren't likely to join the military. It is dysfunction, it's chaos. But on top of that, all of the things that they're doing to brand the military is actually lowering the amount of people normally that would be more than willing to serve because of all the disastrous policies that have played out and seeing the embarrassment of the Afghanistan withdrawal that did more to damage military readiness than anything that we've had in the military.
Jenny Beth Martin (20:33):
That is very true. Terry, why did you decide to interview the parents and the family members of those who died in Afghanistan?
Terry Schilling (20:42):
Well, we're constantly looking for how to take on the woke culture war that the left is using against the American people. And I'm talking to everyone I can, Jenny Beth, you and I are talking throughout the year. I'm talking to the pro-life community. I'm talking to people all over, and some of my friends are actually in the military, and they tip me off. And they started talking about some of the woke policies that are going through, and they started blaming this. And then I found other people, I found a member of Congress, Mike Waltz, who was connected to the Gold Star families from Afghanistan. And it was just kind of like a path. I don't know if it was the Holy Spirit or God or what, but I just kept talking to people and I kept drawing closer and closer out of the America first agenda.
Terry Schilling (21:31):
The military, a strong military is the first of the America first agenda. That's the one thing that I think unite, that should at least unite all Americans is we need to have a strong fighting force to defend our rights and offend our country that no one should be against having that. There are some weirdos that are against that, but they're just idiots and they don't really matter. But what I'll say is, is that I just kind of got put on this path, started talking to more and more people, and then I ended up getting connected to these Gold star families. And we sat down, we filmed them, we started hearing their stories, and they were just so darn powerful that we wanted to tell this story to anyone that would listen. And the good news is, is that 22 million people have seen it. We launched this.
Terry Schilling (22:15):
We didn't ask for any donations or any, it wasn't a ticket to come see it that you had to pay for. We just put it up on X and rumble, and we have over 22 million views on the documentary so far, and it's a 90 minute documentary. That's a big deal. So we need to still get in more hands and more people. And the big thing, Jenny Beth, is not everyone's going to be able to watch this. We're all busy. We got kids, we got jobs, we got all this stuff going on, but we got to talk to our family and friends about it. We're constantly talking to family and friends. So I would encourage everyone to check out the documentary. You can find it at culture war, do.com, do c.com, and share it with your family and friends, but at least talk to 'em about it. Make sure that they know that there are a lot of people in this country that are hurting because of what the military has done to their children and mismanaged our military operations and lost their lives. We need to make sure that this doesn't continue to happen because if it does, we're not going to have anyone willing to sign up and fight and serve this great country.
Jenny Beth Martin (23:16):
Okay, very good. And it's culture, war Wars or War Doc
Terry Schilling (23:22):
Culture, war doc.com, culture war doc d c.com.
Jenny Beth Martin (23:28):
Very good. And we are making sure that we're sharing it and letting people know about it with our organization. Well, thank you so much for joining me today. And where can people go to get more information about the work you're doing?
Terry Schilling (23:41):
So you can follow me on X and Instagram and all the social media accounts at shilling 1776 S-C-H-I-L-L-I-N-G 1776, or check us out online@americanprincipalsproject.org.
Jenny Beth Martin (23:55):
Very good. Thanks so much for joining me today, Terry.
Narrator (23:59):
Thanks, Jenny Beth. The Jenny Beth Show is hosted by Jenny Beth Martin, produced by Kevin Mohan and directed by Luke Livingston. The Jenny Beth Show is a production of Tea Party Patriots action. For more information, visit tea party patriots.org.
Jenny Beth Martin (24:20):
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