Tim Ballard E6: Crusade & Conspiracy

0:00A warning, this episode contains discussion of sexual assault that may be disturbing. Listener discretion is advised. As a note, we reached out to Tim Ballard's attorney to request an interview. Our request went unanswered. And one last thing. After Tim Ballard left the anti-trafficking organization OUR in 2023, it was renamed OUR Rescue. Its new leaders say they do not condone Tim Ballard's alleged actions while part of the old organization. In March of 2024, Tim Ballard stepped up to the lectern at Mar-a-Lago, the lavish Florida club and home of then-former President Donald Trump. He served as the inspiration for the film Sound of Freedom.

0:43We are grateful and honored to have him join us today. Ladies and gentlemen, let us welcome Tim Ballard. The$1 ,000 a ticket black tie event was held during the heart of the 2024 Republican primary contest. It's a who's who of Trump world personalities. Everyone from the former General Michael Flynn to Trump supporter Jack Posobiec. Thank you.

1:12Thank you. I just got some really good news from a really nice lady down here. She just found out that President Trump won every county in Florida just now.

1:26So that's good news. My first thought is that's very good news for the children in this world who are being trafficked and enslaved. It was a glaring example of the influence, notoriety, and adulation that Tim Ballard had ascended to. His work fighting against human trafficking had made him a shining example of doing the work to save people, to make the world a safer place. He was offering a solution, a fight against one of the darkest criminal endeavors on earth. It was also a fight that was well-funded, with support pouring in from people moved by his message. And his ascension meant that the messages he carried now brought meaning.

2:09They brought weight. It was also a prime example of the status he had earned inside the Trump conservative movement, a movement he'd courted and gotten a lot of support from. I think he recognized that there is some overlap here between conservative politics, his religious background, especially here in Utah, and the mission that he was trying to do, you know, elevate this issue of child trafficking and raise money for OUR. While standing at that lectern in Mar-a-Lago, Tim Ballard was no longer a part of OUR. Nine months earlier, sexual misconduct allegations had surfaced, and he'd resigned, or was forced out, depending on who you ask, of the organization he founded in 2013.

2:57But it didn't seem to have an effect on Ballard's image and the view of those in Trump's orbit. Now operating on his own, Ballard was bringing attention to an issue that, for years, people in conservative circles argued, was much larger and broader a problem than anyone realized. It's a truth that this country has forgotten. This administration most certainly has forgotten. I mean, we've talked about abortion tonight. That's all part of this. It's all part of the war on children. Tim Ballard's celebrity status on the right end of the political spectrum went further than just his fight against human trafficking.

3:36Tim Ballard, for years, had aligned with not just people in conservative circles, but the darker, more conspiracy-fueled corners of the American political discourse.

3:54This is The Opportunist, an original podcast from Podcast One. You're listening to the sixth episode of a ten-part series on Tim Ballard and Operation Underground Railroad. I'm Sarah James McLaughlin.

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5:38are. But another angle of the Tim Ballard story is the media personality he became through a well-crafted persona as someone fiercely devoted to the idea of ending human trafficking. Driven by an unrelenting mission, he plunged into the darkest corners of the criminal underworld, bringing with him only the bravest volunteers and operators. Each covert operation pushed the boundaries of danger, taking on immense risks. and the rest of the world was beginning to take notice. Tim Ballard has one mission, to track down child traffickers. How they find these kids is they lure them in by pretending to have a modeling agency.

6:20They target them at 9 or 10 years old. And they were telling us that about by 11, they're ready for sex. They're ready to be sold. What is that like looking into that kind of person's eyes? It's horrifying, and this is why. because I've got a smile in the face of evil. And it wasn't just traditional media like that interview with CBS News. Tim Ballard utilized social media to carefully craft that persona too. And 2019 and 2020, Ballard was everywhere. Hey guys, I just want to reach out and say thank you to all of you. We have had just an unbelievable wave of support in the last weeks. I'm Isaac Ballard here, founder of Operation Underground Railroad.

7:05Today, January 11th, we commemorate with this entire nation, Human Trafficking Awareness Day. The key to eradicating this problem is the awareness, the storytellers. The narrative of what this is, is the thing that will destroy it. We know this. I mean, he was here for hundreds of years. Remember Brie Ryder? She was the focus of our third episode in this series. She went on some of Ballard's operations and had volunteered with OUR, driven to join the noble work she'd seen on Ballard's social media accounts. That marketing was working. It worked on her. Back in 2019, 2020, Operation Underground Railroad was really saturating social media with claims of what they were doing with their operations, what they were doing with their donation funds, claims of being the only child trafficking organization that was actually conducting rescues and actually doing the appropriate level of aftercare to make sure that these rescues were successful.

8:07Again, they were really inundating social media with that. Remember 2020? It was a weird time. We were all in a weird place. The world was in the thrills of the COVID-19 pandemic. Streets were empty. Stores were closed. We wiped down our groceries. People were isolated. The idea of doing good and contributing to make the world a better place in the midst of a global health crisis was more prevalent than ever. And that psychology that all of us were dealing with in various ways was beneficial to people like Tim Ballard and organizations like OUR. Hey guys, I'm here with my wife, Catherine. We're here at home with all of our kids.

8:52And I just want to give you a message from Operation Underground Railroad and from the Nazarene Fund that although the quarantines are happening and, of course, we're all taking precautions, our work is continuing to move forward. Your support is still needed at this time. From 2019 to 2020, the cash that was coming into OUR more than doubled. According to court filings, in 2019 alone, OUR reported more than$22 million in revenue. In 2020, the first year of the pandemic, OUR's revenue jumped to$45 million. The rise of Tim Ballard's profile presents an interesting contradiction. All of the media appearances, interviews, and brand-building efforts seem problematic when the core of his work literally revolves around being undercover.

9:46Being covert. But Ballard was anything but covert. He craved the spotlight. He still craves the spotlight. I talked to investigative journalist Damian Moore about this very thing. It doesn't make any sense how he's portraying himself. And this is so important that it be covert. But let me post this video about it. No, I absolutely agree. This is like part of the common sense things, right? You would say to someone like, you know, some of his critics, like if he's truly an undercover operative, and I've interviewed undercover operatives for the FBI that worked on the Human Trafficking Task Force that has said, first of all, there's no couples roots.

10:29There's no such thing as that. But yeah, you know, you don't put your information out there. They're very selective, even about getting their photos taken at family events, things like that, because if something gets leaked on social media, it compromises the mission. It could put your life in danger. Yeah, I just I have this hard time believing that there's this hard sell about, well, you have to take these photos with me. I need you to get a Brazilian. All of these just awful requests of these women, meanwhile, putting putting them in danger. You know, if he's undercover, why is he out here in the media?

11:08He's the face of Operation Underground Railroad. He's been on Fox News. He's done mainstream interviews. He's done these major fundraisers with people like Tony Robbins, who is a major celebrity. He's known all over the world. So it's like, you know, common sense would say if this guy's an undercover operative, like some of the other guys that they have working for Operation Underground Railroad, Dave Lopez and all these other guys, you don't see them anywhere in the spotlight. But Tim Ballard's all over the place, and he's the one that's taking credit for all of it, too. It's not like he's saying, you know, we have operatives.

11:46He's literally saying I was there doing these rescues.

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13:06Tim Ballard's celebrity peaked in the summer of 2023. He had stepped down from OUR in June of 2023, but the release of the film Sound of Freedom propelled the Ballard media machine, especially on conservative media outlets like Fox News. Joining us right now is the guy who the movie is based upon, Operation Underground Railroad founder Tim Ballard, who helped save kids from traffickers all around the world. Tim, good morning to you. Good morning. Good morning, thank you. How cool is that? Your movie beat Indiana Jones. Yeah, we're blessed. Sound of Freedom leaned hard on religious themes and messaging.

13:48and was a hit. Come on, amigo. You have been at this for 12 years. Why are you doing it?

14:05Because God's children are not for sale. It became the 10th highest grossing film of 2023. It made more than$184 million domestically and internationally more than$65 million. According to box office Mojo, Sound of Freedom even out-earned the pop culture powerhouse Taylor Swift. It surpassed Swift's Ares Tour concert film by$5 million. It's hard to believe, isn't it? I mean, think about Taylor Swift's global popularity. And then think about Tim Ballard's. The story of how Sound of Freedom got made It's an adventure. Here's Miles Klee of Rolling Stone. Tim Ballard, I believe, was into the idea of pitching a movie about his exploits, his supposed adventures abroad in stopping human trafficking.

15:02There were a bunch of financiers, and a lot of them were based in Latin America. So there was a lot of interest down there. Ballard had done a lot of so-called operations down in Latin America, because obviously he can't legally do what he does in the United States without getting in a lot of trouble. So those were where his connections really lay. And the film was originally supposed to be handled by a Latin American subsidiary of 20th Century Fox. Now, the film was finished in 2018, and then Disney acquired 20th Century Fox in a big merger. In the week of that merger, Sound of Freedom was shelved.

15:44Disney didn't know what to do with it, and it sat in limbo for months. That is, until it found new life with a new distributor. The filmmakers were able to buy back the distribution rights from Disney and shop it around, and they found Angel Studios. Angel Studios' mission is to spread stories that amplify light. The movies are all very religious-themed, and Sound of Freedom really fit the bill there. There's a lot of religious overtones. When the movie came out, Miles Klee reviewed it for Rolling Stone. And the headline of his review was, not kind. Sound of Freedom is a superhero movie for dads with brain worms.

16:25That might be the best title I've ever seen in review in my life. Thank you. We knew it was going to be provocative, but maybe didn't realize quite what a reaction it was going to get. I got, you know, a lot of harassment and death threats and stuff like that. It was not just people who thought I was sort of dismissing the problem of sex trafficking. It was a lot of people who essentially thought the movie was a documentary and that I was an idiot for not realizing that it was a completely true story, that Tim Ballard is a real guy, that he actually did all this stuff. Yeah, they basically thought it was factual.

17:04In the very first frames of the film, five words appear in white text on a black screen, based on a true story. For two hours, it's a gritty, dramatic story set to a soaring orchestral score, with Tim Ballard at its center, pursuing his relentless crusade to save God's children. Though the film never claims to be a documentary, it does take some creative license with the story. I think you would be hard pressed to find anything in it that is true, even down to the central conceit of Ballard is, you know, hunting for these two specifically missing children who were snatched during like a basically like a fake photo shoot.

17:52their lord into in Honduras. Even when the movie came out, Ballard said, or I don't think Ballard had to say it, but it was known that he had never done any action there. None of the film really bears any resemblance to reality. The release of Sound of Freedom, paired with Ballard's media tour, cemented his celebrity status in conservative circles, including with President Donald Trump, who hosted a screening of the film at Mar-a-Lago. Ballard was a prominent part of the conservative discussion around trafficking. Here's Robert Gerke of the Salt Lake Tribune. There were irresistible forces pushing them together.

18:31And since then, obviously, like I said, he has definitely leaned into the Trump universe and is a big fan. Met with him, testified before Congress a couple times, was on the White House Child Trafficking Task Force. And so it just was an easy lane for him to move in. But the promotional tour of that film, thanks to its star, Jim Caviezel, also brought along some discussion about conspiracy. Here's more from my interview with Miles Klee of Rolling Stone. So when you did this review, Sound of Freedom, what were the biggest reasons that the film was problematic? I started with Jim Kvitzel, the star of the film, who was a big QAnon promoter.

19:20QAnon. If you're not familiar with it, you probably at least know that it's a crazy unsubstantiated, without any formidable proof conspiracy that was born in the wildest fringes of the internet. Here's the crux of it. QAnon is rooted in the idea that inside the federal government, there is someone known as Q. a shadowy figure that communicates via the internet, who made claims that the federal government is made up of a cannibalistic, Satan-worshipping child molestation ring. And the work to fight back against them, apparently, lands at the feet of former President Donald Trump. It's also laced with tenets of anti-Semitism and other strands of racism.

20:06Not surprisingly, Donald Trump has regularly praised, or at least embraced, the group. Well, I don't know much about the movement other than I understand they like me very much, which I appreciate, but I don't know much about the movement. At the cross of the theory is this belief that you are secretly saving the world from this satanic cult of pedophiles and cannibals. Does that sound like something you are behind? Well, I haven't heard that, but is that supposed to be a bad thing or a good thing? If I can help save the world from problems, I'm willing to do it. QAnon was also the driving force behind the conspiracy that the Democratic Party was, or is running a child sex trafficking ring led by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, her former campaign manager John Podesta, and a host of others.

21:10That conspiracy theory boiled over in 2016 when a gunman named Edgar Welch of North Carolina walked into Comet Ping Pong, a pizza restaurant in Washington, D.C., and fired three rounds. QAnon had helped perpetuate the myth that the child sex trafficking ring they claimed Democrats were running was operating through Comet Ping Pong, completely with the secret code used to order underage victims. Victims were supposedly kept in Comet's basement. But, as it turns out, there is no basement. It's wild. It's crazy. It's a lot. Police say Welch drove all the way from North Carolina to self-investigate Pizzagate, a fictitious online conspiracy theory.

22:00Court documents say Welch read online that the Comet restaurant was harboring child sex slaves and he was armed to help rescue them. The myths that the QAnon community has pushed came out of the far corners of the Internet, spilling into the mainstream. It's forced thousands of people to question things that don't need to be questioned. Facts be damned, they believe things that simply aren't true. QAnon supporters were a large part of the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6th and calling for Vice President Mike Pence's execution.

22:47And QAnon supporters pushed a false story that an online furniture retailer was trafficking children for sex based on the names of some of the furniture being sold. For the last eight years, QAnon and the myths it pushes have been very real, and they've been very harmful. And among the thousands who believe and support QAnon? Jim Caviezel, the star of The Passion of the Christ and the man tapped to play Tim Ballard in the film. He had been a really big proponent of these really dangerous conspiracy theories, a lot of them related to child sex trafficking.

23:28Coming up next, the QAnon conspiracies and their connection to Ballard get even more bizarre. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. It's the season of gratitude, and as we take time to appreciate the people who support us, don't forget to thank yourself. Life can be overwhelming, and just making it through the day is worth recognizing. Therapy can be a powerful way to support yourself, helping you learn positive coping skills, set boundaries, and become the best version of you. If you're considering therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It's completely online, designed to fit your life. No commutes, no waiting rooms, just convenient, flexible support from a licensed therapist.

24:10All you have to do is fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched, and if the fit isn't right, you can switch therapists at no extra cost. Let the gratitude flow with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash opportunist today to get 10 % off your first month. That's betterhelp.com slash opportunist. Now back to the episode. Jim Caviezel isn't just a believer in the QAnon conspiracy. He evangelizes it. And he did a lot of evangelizing while promoting Sound of Freedom. Here's Caviezel on Steve Bannon's podcast, War Room. Do you know what Q really means? It means question. That's what one of these people told me.

24:58And I said, well, that seems like a good thing. Anon question, right? Anons then go out and research it to see if it's true, because we've been fed their lies. okay vizel what um i mean i feel like he's kind of had like a falling from grace and he's kind of dabbling in the q and out q anon crowd and some of the stuff that he says i mean talking about harvesting children's organs to extract adrenochrome which i thought was something that Hunter S. Thompson made up? Yeah, yeah. It's pretty much the most hardcore, any of the tangle of beliefs that can kind of add up to QAnon, talking about the adrenochroming of children, as I believe Jim puts it.

25:49Adrenochrome is a real thing in a chemical sense. But adrenochroming, the act of consuming someone's adrenochrome, as far as conspiracy theories go, it's pretty far out there. And for years, QAnon has peddled it. I mean, I guess I just want to know what exactly is this adrenochrome supposed to be? I believe Kavitzl's understanding of it is that adrenochrome is a is sort of a chemical substance that the brain secretes when you're scared. So there's part of this lore that's very popular that holds that, you know, the cabal has these kids in these farms, and they're scaring the kids half to death so that they can get this, basically some kind of like neurotransmitter or hormone or something out of them.

26:49The uses of adrenochrome are like also, you know, very muddled. But the idea would be that the evil elites are using it to slow down their aging or gain some weird powers or some maybe you think it's just maybe you just think it's a satanic ritual that doesn't have like a sort of like pharmaceutical effect but but Kavitzl's line would definitely be it is something that the children's brains secrete when they're scared and that the elites are using it to you know basically as a wonder drug. Here's Jim Caviezel at a 2021 conference laying out adrenochroming for a huge audience. It's pretty wild and full of lies, but I think it's important you hear the whole clip.