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The Sound of Freedom

Celery Man

By Celery Man
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C-Man

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Apparently, this is the first interview with the director, who says he gave away all of his points and won't make $1 on the movie. Doesn't really say that much but I did find his answer to the question about wouldn't it be better for, you know, moviegoers to donate money to actual charity groups that battle child trafficking as opposed to buying a ticket for somebody else to see the movie. "Yeah, I did my part -- I made somebody else aware of the problem. I've done my job!"

https://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/news/im-not-going-to-make-1-the-director-of-sound-of-freedom-breaks-his-silence/ar-AA1ffzYl

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“Sound of Freedom” is the surprise box-office hit of the summer — and the latest cause du jour in the far right’s culture war against the mainstream media. The thriller, from director and screenwriter Alejandro Monteverde, follows the journey of a rogue Homeland Security agent, Tim Ballard (Jim Caviezel), who risks it all to save kidnapped children from a Colombian sex-trafficking ring.

Independently produced for a reported $14.5 million, it’s topped $160 million at the box office since its July 4 release, fueled by word-of-mouth endorsements, pay-it-forward ticket purchases and the efforts of conservative influencers and pundits who've positioned the film as an answer to "godless" Hollywood's domination of American entertainment. It has even been embraced by former President Trump, who recently hosted a screening at his New Jersey golf course.

A narrative has emerged in right-wing political circles that the film has had a harder time than most features finding its way into theaters, and into the entertainment press, because its distributor, Angel Studios, appeals to conservative audiences with a roster of faith-based movies. Although there’s no firm evidence that the picture has had a more challenging road than any other independent project, it has made novel use of crowdfunding: In addition to allowing supporters to buy tickets for others to see the movie, the project also raised $5 million from more than 6,600 investors to fund marketing costs associated with its theatrical release.

Its use of crowdfunding has been an unparalleled success — and it’s sure to have caught the eye of executives at a moment of flux for the film business.

The lion's share of the controversy around "Sound of Freedom," however, centers on its chosen subject matter. Among the most absurd of QAnon conspiracy theorists' unsubstantiated claims is the belief that wealthy, famous elites participate in child trafficking to harvest their young blood for a chemical called adrenochrome. And though the film's plot has nothing to do with the conspiracy, it has become a galvanizing force for followers of QAnon, in no small part because both Caviezel and Ballard have spoken openly about their own beliefs in QAnon's far-fetched ideas.

Advocates in the fight against child sex trafficking, by contrast, take issue with the film for canonizing the controversial operations of Ballard and his former organization, Operation Underground Railroad. Ballard has been accused of staging rescue missions as a means of self-promotion, and critics maintain that centering his story misrepresents how victims are actually lured into forced sex work.

Largely absent in all the noise, at least so far, has been Monteverde himself.

"When everything started happening, I just went into hiding,” said the 45-year-old director, who immigrated to the U.S. from Mexico as a teen, in what he characterized as his "first official interview" about the film. “I didn't want to be part of what was happening. I just like to make movies and tell stories. But then I said to myself, ‘There’s another side of the story. The full story. And I'm the only one that can tell that because I'm the author of the whole thing.’”

There’s so much attention and the heat around “Sound of Freedom” that we can address. Where would you like to start?

I call it a phenomenon. Nobody, no one, thought that this movie was going to make the box office it's making. It’s a complete surprise, including to myself. I thought this movie was never going to see the light of day. So I ended up giving away my points. I'm not going to make $1.

Tell me about the origins of the film and your initial intentions as a filmmaker.

Nobody came to me to say, "Hey, do you want to make a movie about child trafficking?" Nobody. Everything started in 2015. I was writing another film when I saw a small news piece on child trafficking and child pornography. It shook my soul. And at that time, I only had one child. When I went to [bed], I couldn't sleep. I woke up the next day and I told my wife, "I have to do something about this." She didn't want to hear about it because it's too dark. It’s taboo.

I started doing research, then called my co-writer Rod Barr and said, "Let's put our other story on the side because I want to dive into this." He was hesitant, but finally he's like, “Let's do it.” So we started writing a movie called “The Mogul.” I was writing it with George Clooney in mind [laughs]. It was going to be the story of this very wealthy man who made all his money in organized crime, and one day he’s offered to buy a child for a new enterprise: child trafficking. It's a little bit like the "Schindler's List" approach. He started buying the children to free them. It was full-on fiction. Obviously, it's not a film that people are going to jump in just because of the marketing. It's not because they don't care. That’s a misconception. Everybody cares. It's just hard to market a movie like that. So I didn't get support right away.

How did Tim Ballard come into the picture?

The producer of the film, Eduardo Verástegui, called and said he was at a conference and met one of the speakers, Tim Ballard. I’d never heard of him. Eduardo set up a meeting with him the next day. In my head, I was going to meet Tim Ballard just to learn more about the subject. Never to make a movie about him. But he starts telling me his story, and it’s one of the few times where a true story surpassed fiction. He told me about a character that resembled my character, Vampiro [played by Bill Camp]. It was crazy. He buys kids and frees them. I talked with my co-writer, and he agreed [to change course]. We negotiated Ballard’s life rights.

 Ballard has been scrutinized by anti-child-trafficking advocates for embellishing his stories and using missions to promote himself, and that has cast doubt about the authenticity of the events depicted in the film.

I tell people you're not going to see Tim Ballard. You're going to see an actor playing Tim Ballard. The minute that is happening, you’re already dramatizing. It's not a documentary. I always wanted to stretch. I would be like, "Hey, can we do this?" And he's like, "No, you cannot do that. You cannot do that, either." Sometimes he'll be like, "Well, that didn't happen there but it happened in Haiti. Maybe you can do that." That's why you put "inspired by." You're not claiming it's everything he said. When you talk to Ben Affleck [about "Argo"], he will tell you the exact same thing. Or "Schindler's List." Spielberg will say the same thing. My favorite biopic of all time is "Amadeus,” but you cannot take it as a historic document because nobody was there. You have to fill in the blanks. Also, you have to take many years and put it in an hour and a half.

 Child sexual exploitation and abuse is a real and horrific crime, here and across the globe, that needs to be recognized and confronted. But the embrace of the film by QAnon subscribers has potentially hijacked the movie’s intent of raising awareness and made it a rallying cry for their baseless conspiracies.

It's heartbreaking, and it hurts me. The minute they started labeling it with conspiracy theories, it discredits the purity of the work. A lot of times, I'm like, "Wow, all this headache would have gone away if it was just based on fiction. None of this would have happened." … If you're telling me that there is all these conspiracy theories in the film, terminologies, that I’ll see symbols of pizza and the names Q or Z, or whatever — no. There’s none of that.

How do you make a story about such a disturbing subject watchable?

It was very important that I remind the audience at all times that they're watching a movie. That's why the film is a little bit operatic. You know the fight, at the end? [The fictional Ballard and his rescue team confront the traffickers and a battle ensues to free a group of enslaved children]. When I arrived the first day, they have rehearsal for three days with the stunts and everything. And I saw it. I was like, "That looks very real. Guys, I actually want to [make it look] like an opera." Like if you were watching it as a Broadway show. That was my approach — I want the symbolism of dark and light, that fight.

The most important thing for me is to pose questions, not to give answers. I'm looking for answers all day long, so I'll be the last one to give you an answer. But I'll give you a question. All I wanted in here is to create awareness on the subject matter, but in a way that was cinematic. That's why all of this other stuff that happened is very weird for me.

Was it hard to get funding for the film?

Eduardo thought it was an important theme and told me he’d raise the funds. A very eclectic group of investors came together. Their names are in the credits... This is heartbreaking for the investors too. They're like, "What is happening now?" They're on the other side of the spectrum, of this whole naming and labeling thing.

I hate labeling. I am the victim of labeling. I made my first movie, "Bella." I won the [people's choice award at the 2006] Toronto International Film Festival. We were in paradise. And then, all of the sudden, the movie gets labeled.

As a pro-life film, and you as a faith-based filmmaker?

The interesting thing is the movie was well received, then somebody said, "Uh, oh. This is pro-life." If you looked at the movie, it is a woman dealing with an unwanted pregnancy trying to figure out what to do. She really balanced both options in the most objective way. It was my first film, but it really resonated with the audience. The lead actor, he barely talks in the movie, he just listens. And it's all listening until there's a resolution. It's just two people with massive pain. That pain becomes each other's redemption. Pain is a language that unites our world. Politics divide. I'm not a politician... I'm the opposite of that. I'm a storyteller.

Fighting against the exploitation of children seems like it's the last thing that should divide people, so why has this film become a lightning rod?

I think it’s the culture we're living in. We cannot not label things. We have to. If you don't say where you stand, then it's a problem. If you refuse to give your political view, they're like, "No, you have to." But why? And that's a question. Imagine a hamburger stand. You could have a Buddhist baking the bread, a Muslim making the burger and a Catholic serving it. You're not going to say that's a religious burger. So why do we do that with cinema? Let the movie speak for itself.

If you have to label my work, please watch it first, without prejudice. But watch it. Federico Fellini said your job as a director is to break the prejudice that the audience already has about your product. So that was my goal on this film. “Let's make a movie that explores this darkness but through a vehicle of hope.” So when the audience leaves the movie, they leave in a state of reflection and not all bummed out, like, "Oh, this is preachy. They're making me feel bad that I'm not doing anything about it." No, it’s the opposite just by creating awareness.

As with many indie projects, it was an uphill battle making this film. It sat in limbo for nearly five years after Disney acquired Fox, before Angel Studios picked it up. Defenders of the movie have used that hardship as proof of some sort of liberal Hollywood plot against it. But it also appears that Jim Caviezel’s public interviews with far-right hosts like Steve Bannon endeared the film to QAnon followers.

When I started seeing that develop in front of me, my first instinct was to [distance] myself from it. I don't want to be part of anything that falls in the area of politics. So when I started seeing division, my first instinct was to run. I'm from Mexico, and I didn't arrive to be part of a divided country. And I don't like to judge people, because we all have our own way of thinking. Those interviews that you're mentioning, that's a different way of thinking than mine. I want to respect it, but I also don't want to be part of it. So I'm going to distance myself, and that's what I did. But then later, I realized by distancing myself, the whole story wasn't coming to light.

Do you still feel Jim was the right person for the role?

When I hear the name Jim Caviezel, I think of one of the most professional actors, who dedicated himself to the role. What he does afterward, that's his personal life. The lead actor needs to really believe that the atrocities are happening and have a conviction about it... When I was casting, I was looking for someone very passionate about the subject matter. It's like if you do a movie about global warming, you don’t want the actor who shows up in a Hummer. You look for the actor that cleans up plastics on the beach.

When I first had dinner with Jim, I saw how close to his heart was this thing. He himself adopted three of his children from China. I don't want to talk about his private life, but this theme was very close. His conviction to want to shine a light on this was so deep that he got emotional. The first time I met him, he was crying.

But his personal views off set did impact the messaging of the film.

In this case, it did have an impact that was not in line with who I am as a person, as a filmmaker, as a storyteller. And that is the pure reason I am here, because I need to say who I am. I don't want to speak about other people's views. I want to stay as objective as possible, to make films that create conversation and open dialogue about important subject matter. My hope was that this film creates dialogue at the social level about a subject matter: human trafficking. And that’s what’s happening.

How do you respond to complaints that the film mischaracterizes how victims are trafficked, and therefore muddles the efforts to raise awareness about this type of crime.

Our main drive was to make a movie about child trafficking, to shine a light in the darkness, to create awareness, but never to say this is the [only way] it happens. Of course, it happens differently. There are, unfortunately, mothers who sell their own children. [Kids] get abused by their uncles. I’m not saying that that's not happening. The film is driven by the origin story of a guy that left the government and did his first mission. It’s just one story. I was terrified with the subject matter and made a movie about the tip of the iceberg. When I dove in a little deeper, I got really scared. It's even darker.

There’s a direct message to theater audiences after the credits roll, delivered by Caviezel inside an emotional monologue about human trafficking. It asks viewers to scan a code on the screen to pay it forward by purchasing more tickets to the film. Why do that?

I'm glad you brought it up, because it gives me a chance to talk about this. When I direct the movie, one of the things that I ask of everybody is to just let me do my work. You can ask me all the questions you want, but at the end of the day, if we have two captains, the boat will sink. As a director, I want people to let me do my thing. When this movie was on the sidelines, parked, we didn’t know who was going to distribute it. All I knew is the producers had taken it back from the distributor that had it. Then Angel Studios came, saying, "We have a plan." For me, as a storyteller, anything you put inside my movie that’s not mine is going to hurt me. It doesn't matter what it is. So this was a matter of trust. They said, "Let us test it, and if the audience doesn't like it, it's out."

Then I saw Jim’s conviction. His delivery was matching the spirit of the film. It really has an impact when you are right there, boom, and you send the ticket to a friend. That is action. Now, if you ask me, "Alejandro, if it was your [move], would you have that?" I will say no. But that's why I'm not a distributor. If I was a distributor, I'd surely collapse the company because I’d be all about the art. So I respect and admire the work that Angel Studios does, because it's not an easy movie to market. I'm so grateful to them.

Wouldn’t it have been more in line with the intent of the film to send donations to antitrafficking organizations rather than box-office sales?   

What's better? To raise mass awareness or send it to one organization? The problem is that internationally, there's thousands of nonprofits doing this work. Do you send it to Guatemala? Somewhere here? But once people watch that film, they are so moved, we're seeing their desire to want to do something about it. The more awareness you create, the better. To me, awareness creates change more than sending $20 to one [organization].

So you’re really not making money off the film? Can you talk more about that?

As a director, you always get your share of what’s called points. But early on, they needed to raise more money because the film was independent and they didn't have funds. At that time, I thought the movie was not going to see the light of day so I gave my points away, as did many other people in the film. It took me a while to come to terms with it. But it’s exciting now when you see this massive box office. There's also something romantic about it. You know, the beauty of the struggling artist is still there [laughs].

Do you think the film is truly appealing to any one group over another?

You cannot arrive too close to $200 million [at the box office] with just a conservative market. You know what movies make that are faith-based? Like $80 million. But you don't get to $200 million if you don’t cross over and become a bipartisan film. Now, we're going to see what happens when [it’s released] internationally, because the politics are here. If internationally, we come back with a big price tag, then you can’t deny that. These same conspiracy theories do not exist in Mexico, Argentina, France, Italy. I’m going to Colombia for the premiere, so I can’t wait to see what's going to happen. I want to keep it humble. But I'm feeling excited.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

 

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This something that boils my blood about this tribalism based around MAGA and the new brand of conservatism embraced by much of the mainstream Republican Party.     My family has a long history

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so the answer is 9 days.

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Possibly off topic (at least this new course of dialogue), but I have some friends and former students who work as legal advocates for persons who've escaped human trafficking (Seattle has quite a bit

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Longhorn94

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3 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

In laws just called and said they saw it. I’m not allowed to say anything to them (wife’s rules), but holy shit. 
 

“You can’t close your eyes to this problem!”  
 

JFC. These people are lost. 

exactly who is closing their eyes to this problem? i think we are all against child sex trafficking, aren't we? what am i missing? other than faux outrage and victimization???

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Biff Tannen

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10 minutes ago, Longhorn94 said:

exactly who is closing their eyes to this problem? i think we are all against child sex trafficking, aren't we? what am i missing? other than faux outrage and victimization???

They have been conditioned to think we (liberals) all are. 

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Biff Tannen

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1 minute ago, Foosters said:

Your wife has a rule that her parents can accuse you of whatever they want and you have to hold your tongue?

Are you up for canonization and/or cucking?

Ha, the rule is I’m not allowed to accuse them of being dumbfuck qanon republicans.  To their face anyway. 

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elfenix

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Crossposting:

Astroturfing:


"Gen Z influencers, quietly recruited by a company with deep GOP ties, rally to impeached Ken Paxton’s aid
After a June gathering in Fort Worth sponsored by a new company, Influenceable, social media leaders began backing the suspended Texas attorney general and a controversial human trafficking film. Those who favor transparency in political advocacy are concerned.
"

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/08/14/influenceable-texas-politics-ken-paxton/

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Biff Tannen

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On 8/8/2023 at 9:49 PM, DixonHur said:

Because of course...

Trafficking Survivors and Advocates Are Being Harassed by Sound of Freedom Fans

It's a great article.  

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A few weeks ago, Kat Wehunt held a training for new volunteers at the Formation Project, a nonprofit that provides specialized services for people in Charleston, South Carolina, who have experienced human trafficking or commercial sexual exploitation. Each new group of volunteers need training so that Wehunt can get them up to speed on best practices, and it’s usually a fairly routine process.  

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This time, though, something different happened: Wehunt found herself in the midst of an unusual argument with a potential volunteer. 

The training typically starts with a discussion of the industry’s “myths and misconceptions and what trafficking actually looks like in our neighborhood in Charleston,” said Wehunt, who founded the nonprofit in 2019 and serves as its executive director. But some of the latest crop of potential volunteers had recently signed up after seeing Sound of Freedom, the surprise blockbuster film based on the purported work of Tim Ballard, the founder of the anti-trafficking group Operation Underground Railroad. 

One potential volunteer simply didn’t buy Wehunt’s matter-of-fact descriptions of how sex trafficking often occurs, and the two started to argue, according to Wehunt, with the volunteer insisting that people were frequently trafficked after being kidnapped, which, in reality, is an exceedingly rare occurrence, according to the available global data.

“Those things I’m sure do happen,” Wehunt told Motherboard. “But it’s not representative of the majority, especially in our neighborhoods.” 

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As a survivor of familial sex trafficking herself, Wehunt would know. But like other trafficking survivors who now work in anti-trafficking spaces, she’s seeing a direct impact on her work as a result of Sound of Freedom, which – in lurid detail –  depicts children who are kidnapped by strangers and sold into commercial sexual exploitation. (The film ends with the Ballard character canoeing into the jungle alone to rescue a little girl, fighting her trafficker in hand-to-hand combat and ultimately killing him. As Vice News has outlined in a series of stories, Ballard and Operation Underground Railroad, or OUR, have frequently misrepresented their work; former “operators” who accompanied OUR on international missions describe some of them as bumbling and amateurish.)

The film has awakened the passions of a broad swath of the right-wing and conspiratorial world. Religious influencers, QAnon fans, and a huge group of people who defy easy categorization have all thrown their support behind the movie. And while fans of the film have insisted that it’s “raising awareness” of a global problem, experts in trafficking, including people who have experienced it themselves, are finding that it’s contributing to serious and harmful misinformation about what trafficking looks like and what survivors need to recover. Since its release, survivors who have criticized the film have been frequently accused of being “pedophiles” or “groomers” – the kinds of people by whom they themselves were once victimized. (Sean Wolfington, a producer for the film who contacted Motherboard to object to our coverage of the film, did not respond to two requests for comment for this story.)  

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“If I share anything publicly that’s opposing the film I get a lot of name-calling, a lot of lashing back,” Jose Lewis Alfaro, a sex and labor trafficking survivor who now works as a consultant and lived experience expert on trafficking issues, said. “It’s just really interesting to me how people are more than willing to hear a wealthy rich man’s superhero story, and aren’t willing to trust and listen to those who have actually lived through it.”

“It’s not awareness. This movie is full of assumptions,” said Suamhirs Piraino-Guzman, the chair at the United Nations’ fund for victims of human trafficking and contemporary forms of slavery, “and a dangerous portrayal of what trafficking is.” 

Piraino-Guzman, himself a survivor of childhood sex trafficking, has been critical of OUR’s work in the past, and the film, he said, furthers the same issues he’s called out before. 

“We’ve been fighting for 20 years for the appropriate ways to talk about trafficking, the ways we should be centering survivors, in order for us to be moving forward in a way that’s evidence based, not assumptions based.”

“To me this movie is a vanity project,” he said. “It’s all about Tim Ballard and this fake persona that he’s created for himself.”

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But, he added, there’s nothing new about the kind of narrative the film promotes. In recent decades, the mainstream societal conversation about trafficking seems to have gotten stuck, according to Piraino-Guzman.

“We have been here in this very spot in the anti-trafficking movement for over 20 years,” he told Motherboard. “We’ve been fighting for 20 years for the appropriate ways to talk about trafficking, the ways we should be centering survivors, in order for us to be moving forward in a way that’s evidence based, not assumptions based.” 

Alfaro, the trafficking survivor and consultant, has spoken frequently about how he was trafficked by a man who took him in after his family kicked him out as a teenager for being gay.  “He came across the right person at the right time and that was me,” he said. (Alfaro’s abuser is now serving 30 years in prison for trafficking at least four teenage boys through a “massage” business he ran out of his home.) 

The backlash he’s received for criticizing the film is an extension of what he’s already experienced, Alfaro said; men and LGBTQ trafficking survivors often face skepticism when speaking about the abuse they endured, and a particularly brutal variety of victim-blaming and homophobia. 

“People have told me ‘You weren't trafficked, you wanted it, you probably liked it because you’re gay,’” he said. “Horrible things like that. I’m seeing the same thing happening speaking out about his film. People are telling me, ‘you’re a trafficker, you're a predator.’ These are all QAnon conspiracy theories, and people are saying that to people who don’t agree with the film. It’s like, do you even know what I’ve experienced in my lifetime?”  

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Other survivors say they’ve faced the same kind of harassment, with heavy emotional consequences.

“When fans of the QAnon movie called me a pedophile because I dared to criticize how the film did not hire any survivors to help write the script or consult, I spent an hour crying,” said Sabra Boyd, a journalist, consultant, and child labor and sex trafficking survivor. (Some critics have accused the film of sounding QAnon-esque talking points, an accusation both the producers and Ballard have objected to. Caviezel, who plays Ballard, has frequently promoted conspiracy theories linked to QAnon.) 

“I can't comprehend saying that, especially not to a child trafficking survivor. I don't understand why fans of the movie would rather listen to Tim Ballard than actual trafficking survivors,” Boyd said. “But the problem is that solutions to human trafficking and child trafficking are not exciting like an action movie.” 

Alfaro worries about the effects of calling trafficking survivors “pedophiles,” beyond just the emotional impact it has on them individually. 

“You’re making them feel like they don’t even want to talk about this issue anymore,” he said. “There’s a lot of harm that happens with that and ultimately we have nothing to blame but these overly sensational depictions.” 

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Dr. Beth Bowman is the founder of the Restoring Ivy Collective, which, like many other survivor-led organizations, offers practical services for survivors, including support groups and referrals for housing and case management. 

Bowman bluntly said that many people in the anti-trafficking world are “pissed” about the film.

“It’s a sensationalized story that you only get trafficked if you’re taken by bad men in a white van,” Bowman said. Like other survivors, she was disturbed by the racialized undertones of the film, in which every villain is Latino and the hero is a lone white man. “It’s this awful ‘white versus the world’ narrative that just isn’t true. Most of the time people aren’t kidnapped. There’s poverty and abuse involved, for instance, an uncle is the trafficker. They aren’t typically that far from their families.” People who buy into the narratives promoted by the film and by some anti-trafficking groups, Bowman said, seem to have a vested interest in believing trafficking happens elsewhere, in exoticized far-away situations, and never at home. “They believe there’s a moral or ethnic or socioeconomic or national shield around them and their kids.” 

“I will not watch the movie out of respect for survivors and the movement. It’s harmful and it takes us back many years of work.”

“I’m going to be honest,” said Rafael Bautista, another labor trafficking expert who’s also a survivor. “I will not watch the movie out of respect for survivors and the movement. It’s harmful and it takes us back many years of work.” He’s struggled to get people to care about labor trafficking, even when it involves children, he said, pointing specifically to the thousands of migrant children whose whereabouts are unknown after they entered the United States as unaccompanied minors, and who may be victims of labor exploitation. He worries that because they’re looking for scenarios of international kidnapping and literal bondage depicted in films like Sound of Freedom and Taken, people may miss more common signs of trafficking at home – in nail salons, agricultural settings, or among domestic workers.

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“If we don’t fix our home,” he said, “it’s impossible to fix somewhere else.”  

“The harassment, said Chris Ash, has affected survivors’ mental health” Ash is the survivor Leadership Program Manager at The National Survivor Network, meaning their work involves interacting with trafficking survivors who now work in anti-trafficking spaces.  

“We see people who step back, who stop speaking out,” Ash said. “We lose their voice, their insights. It makes it harder for them to do their work. We also see people who keep speaking out anyway but have legitimate threats to their safety, fears around doxxing and harassment.” 

The creators of Sound of Freedom have not hidden their desire to use their audience’s concern to boost their ticket sales. At the end of the movie, Jim Caviezel, who plays Tim Ballard, appears in a special PSA to urge people to buy more tickets to the film. Some people working in the anti-trafficking space have tried to figure out how to speak to people who might have seen the film in hopes of nudging them in a more productive direction. 

“What does helping look like to you?” asks Blair Hopkins, the executive director of SWOP Behind Bars, which advocates for sex workers and trafficking survivors who are currently incarcerated or working on re-entry after getting out. “I would for sure tell someone the answer is not to buy more tickets to movies.” 

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“If they’re fired up and want to help,” Hopkins added, “the first thing I'd tell them is listen to sex workers. They know what exploitation in their trade looks like and how to prevent it. There are experts in those ranks.” 

Other survivors urge viewers of the film to stop talking about “rescue,” a term that can be disempowering and infantilizing for trafficking survivors who, more often than not, have to get themselves out of difficult situations. 

“We don’t ‘rescue’ each other or ourselves,” said Ashante Taylorcox, the founder and executive director of You Are More Than, a survivor-led organization which focuses on marginalized survivors, including people of color and queer people. “We figure out our next steps beyond the commercial sex industry.” 

Taylorcox focuses on the long-term. “We support them to build economic wealth,” she said, for example, by providing support when survivors are working on life goals like going back to school, offering free counseling services, and having a wellness fund to help them access mental healthcare resources; Taylorcox’s organization also invests in survivor-led small businesses. The first step, Taylorcox said, is often crisis management. “But oftentimes people will stop at the ‘rescue’ and think that’s enough.” 

Some of the survivors are working to find alternate ways to educate the public. Sabra Boyd, the journalist and trafficking survivor, said the realities of the trafficking world do not fit seamlessly into a box office narrative, which have made it difficult to receive the same publicity handed out to Ballard and Sound of Freedom. 

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“I am working with other trafficking survivors around the world to compile and vote on a list of survivor-vetted and approved movies and documentaries about human trafficking that are accurate and survivor-centered depictions,” she said. “It has been a very difficult challenge because most survivors don't have money or Hollywood connections to produce films.” 

Thus far, Sound of Freedom has grossed over $155 million at the box office. The amount of money the film – and OUR – has made is almost unreal to the survivors doing anti-trafficking work, who often struggle to fundraise for things as small as the cost of a bus ticket for a client. 

“All I can say is that legitimate organizations are really struggling,” Chris Ash said. If the money went to smaller organizations, they add, “it wouldn’t fund Rambo operations, it would fund the kind of support that survivors need.” It’s a running joke, Ash said, that survivor leaders use the mobile payment service Cashapp to send each other the same $20 “back and forth for lunch money because we’re struggling.” The support that Sound of Freedom fans have decided to put elsewhere, Ash said, “could really make a big impact.” 

Boyd added that much of the work needed to improve circumstances for people at risk of trafficking might prove “too boring to make into an action movie for QAnon fans,” including, she said, “providing housing, improving immigration policies, universal basic income to decrease poverty, access to healthcare and education, mutual aid, foster care reform, reparations, restitution, systemic racism, poverty, financial abuse and identity theft, legal aid, the ways our carceral and legal systems ignore the needs of victims, addressing the number of law enforcement officers who are traffickers or abusers.”

Other survivors and people working in the anti-trafficking space also have concrete tips for people who have seen the film and want to “help,” they tell Motherboard.  

“It keeps the right people in this work,” she said. “Not everyone is meant to be in this space. The people that are doing it for the right reasons, it’ll keep them around longer.”

“We have very real and tangible needs,” said Kat Wehunt, the founder of the Formation Project. Every Tuesday, they hold a dinner for survivors, and they’ve had trouble with transportation and childcare for the people who attend. They’ve also frequently needed people to do things like go through their clothing closet, do administrative work, and sort donations. The work is “a little less sexy” than many think, Wehunt said, but the benefit is that it can keep truly dedicated people involved and weed out those who are not. “It keeps the right people in this work,” she said. “Not everyone is meant to be in this space. The people that are doing it for the right reasons, it’ll keep them around longer.” 

“First of all, recognize that while this may be new to you, it’s not new at all,” said Chris Ash of the National Survivor Network. Connect, they say, “to the people who are already in the fight. Find people who are already doing this. Learn from them. They know what it actually looks like. If you want to help fight trafficking, find out what they need. It may not be sexy. They may need you to come in and do some filing, because nobody can get to it. They may want you to do something not glamorous. Not everybody has the skill set to be on the front lines.” 

 

 

 

I'm saving this article to show to the in laws when they inevitably bring up their new found concerns about child trafficking after going to this bullshit movie.

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Longhorn_Fan68

Longhorn_Fan68 33859

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20 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

Ha, the rule is I’m not allowed to accuse them of being dumbfuck qanon republicans.  To their face anyway. 

what's the downside? I mean really, this shit should not be tapdanced around. Call them on their bullshit. It's the only way it gets changed. And if you're not on great terms anyway, then bonus, you have to spend less time with them.

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tchookem

tchookem 3900

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In laws just called and said they saw it. I’m not allowed to say anything to them (wife’s rules), but holy shit. 
 
“You can’t close your eyes to this problem!”  
 
JFC. These people are lost. 
Narrator: Two weeks later they closed their eyes to the problem
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wildcat09

wildcat09 29338

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Surprise, Tim Ballard is a sex pest who has sexually harassed at least seven women:

Quote

Tim Ballard’s exit from Operation Underground Railroad earlier this year followed an investigation into claims of sexual misconduct involving seven women, according to sources with direct knowledge of the organization.

Sources familiar with the situation said that the self-styled anti-slavery activist, who appears to be preparing for a Senate run, invited women to act as his “wife” on undercover overseas missions ostensibly aimed at rescuing victims of sex trafficking. He would then allegedly coerce those women into sharing a bed or showering together, claiming that it was necessary to fool traffickers. Ballard, who was played by Jim Caviezel in the hit film Sound of Freedom, is said to have sent at least one woman a photo of himself in his underwear, festooned with fake tattoos, and to have asked another “how far she was willing to go,” in the words of a source, to save children. These sources requested anonymity because they fear retaliation.

The total number of women involved is believed to be higher than seven, as that would only account for employees, not contractors or volunteers. One source close to OUR has detailed knowledge of Ballard making sexual advances to a volunteer using methods similar to those he allegedly used with OUR employees. Those methods are also consistent with his conduct toward another former volunteer who spoke to VICE News.

In response to a detailed request for comment, a spokesperson for Operation Underground Railroad told VICE News:

Tim Ballard resigned from O.U.R. on June 22, 2023.  He has permanently separated from O.U.R. 

O.U.R. is dedicated to combatting sexual abuse, and does not tolerate sexual harassment or discrimination by anyone in its organization.  

O.U.R. retained an independent law firm to conduct a comprehensive investigation of all relevant allegations, and O.U.R. continues to assess and improve the governance of the organization and protocols for its operations.

To preserve the integrity of its investigation and to protect the privacy of all persons involved, O.U.R. will not make any further public comment at this time.  

O.U.R. is confident in its future as the leading organization committed to combatting sex trafficking and saving children who have been captured and sold into slavery.

The information from the sources with direct knowledge of OUR corroborates an anonymous letter that’s been circulating in the Utah philanthropic community for the past several months, which accuses Ballard of sexual harassment. VICE News first reported on the letter in July; the journalist Lynn Packer published it in full on Sunday.

“Several weeks ago, an OUR employee who accompanied Tim on an undercover operation filed a sexual harassment complaint against him with OUR’s HR department,” the letter, which was sent this summer to donors to anti-trafficking causes, reads. “This resulted in an extensive internal investigation into Tim and his individual operational tactics and led to more women speaking up as part of the investigation process.

“It was ultimately revealed through disturbingly specific and parallel accounts, that Tim has been deceitfully and extensively grooming and manipulating multiple women for the past few years with the ultimate intent of coercing them to participate in sexual acts with him, under the premise of going where it takes and doing ‘whatever it takes’ to save a child.”

The letter further said that OUR’s board and lawyers had made agreements preventing executives from discussing the circumstances of Ballard’s exit from the organization he founded, making it “virtually impossible for them to defend the organization against Tim’s false narratives.” The author or authors of the letter did not respond to requests for comment. An OUR spokesperson did not dispute what was in the letter when asked about it by VICE News In July, or respond further when told that reporters could only take this as confirmation of its accuracy. 

Women believed to be at the center of the investigation have not responded to requests for comment, or have declined to comment. People who know them say they fear retaliation and the effects scandal could have on OUR as it seeks to move on without Ballard—whom sources say is currently trying to work his way back into the organization.  

Ballard did not respond to requests for comment submitted through his personal website; that of his new organization, the SPEAR Fund; and through a spokesperson whom OUR previously told VICE News is his personal representative. 

Ballard, an ally of Donald Trump—he held an appointed post on a public-private anti-trafficking council in the Trump administration, and recently hosted the former president on his podcast—has said he’s strongly considering a run for the Senate seat set to be vacated by Mitt Romney. Speculation in the LDS community indicates that he’s planning to announce his bid on October 10. Last week, a spokesperson for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued a statement to VICE News that contained a pointed rebuke of Ballard. The statement accused Ballard of inappropriately using the name of a church elder, President M. Russell Ballard—the two are not related, despite sharing a last name—“for Tim Ballard’s personal advantage and activity regarded as morally unacceptable.” 

The church did not specify in its statement what activity it regarded as “morally unacceptable.” 

Over the weekend, Ballard responded to VICE News’ reporting by giving an impassioned speech to a small crowd in Boston in which he said, “It’s not true, nothing you hear is true.” He also said he outright did not believe that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints condemned him in a statement issued to VICE News—something that did in fact happen, as has been confirmed by multiple Utah news outlets.

Every accusation is a confession. I wonder how long before we learn that he molested children too, to which I'm sure he'll say he had to do it to maintain his undercover status.

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Nice Guy Eddie

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Sex trafficking is defined by the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 as “the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, obtaining, patronizing, or soliciting of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act.” It involves the use of force, fraud, or coercion to make an adult engage in commercial sex

Honesty the only part that Ballard didn’t do (allegedly) is the commercial aspect. If the allegations are true, he transported women to foreign countries to coerce them to have with him. What a hero.

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C-Man

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https://www.vice.com/en/article/z3mq5w/sound-of-freedom-producer-underage-trafficking-victim

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Paul Hutchinson—an executive producer of Sound of Freedom, the film focused on the heavily fictionalized exploits of anti-trafficking activist Tim Ballard—touched the naked breasts of an apparently underage trafficking victim during a 2016 undercover operation in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

Footage of the incident and its aftermath was captured by videographers working with Operation Underground Railroad, or OUR, the private anti-trafficking group Ballard founded. An investigator with the Davis County Attorney’s Office obtained the footage and wrote detailed descriptions of it as part of a criminal investigation into Ballard and OUR carried out with the FBI. That investigation was closed this year without any charges being brought. The descriptions were included among documents obtained by VICE News through a public-records request, and make clear that the trafficking victim appeared to be—and was believed at the time by Hutchinson and OUR operatives to be—about 16 years old. They also assert that OUR believed the footage had been destroyed.

A description of one of the videos, written by an investigator, shows Hutchinson expressing concerns over whether he could be prosecuted by Mexican authorities over the incident. He was speaking to Matt Osborne, an OUR operative, who dismissed his worries while making clear he didn’t think the video should be shown to the U.S. government. Osborne is currently the president and chief operating officer of OUR, as he has been since Ballard resigned from the organization earlier this year following an internal investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct.

Hutchinson, 52, is an anti-trafficking activist, philanthropist, and entrepreneur with lines in, among other things, ballistic protection technology and private vaults who’s long been associated with the Utah anti-trafficking movement. According to his LinkedIn, he was the first investor in Sound of Freedom. Currently affiliated with the Child Liberation Foundation, he was a key fundraiser and operative for OUR before splitting with Ballard several years ago over, as he put it in an email to VICE News, “similar reasons as those you are bringing to light in your stories.” Provided with a detailed description of what was in the investigative files, he did not deny that the videos showed him doing what the investigator’s description said they did, or dispute that he had felt the trafficking victim’s naked breasts. He did dispute that she was a minor, asserting that he had a sworn affidavit from Mexican federal police saying that she was over 18. He did not respond to multiple requests, sent over a period of weeks, to provide a copy of this document.

A detailed description of another video shows Hutchinson potentially creating demand for trafficking while posing as a wealthy sex tourist. According to an investigator’s description, he asked a trafficker, who was showing him pictures of sex workers, for younger girls—or, as he and the trafficker both described them, “mas fresca.” The trafficker, according to the investigator’s description of the video, tells women who are working with him to find girls as young as 14 to provide to Hutchinson. 

There is no suggestion in the files that Hutchinson’s behavior was aimed at anything but identifying and exposing traffickers, but federal agents with extensive experience working undercover overseas told VICE News that Hutchinson’s methods ran contrary to best practice. For years, experts in the anti-trafficking field have raised concerns about OUR’s methods potentially creating demand for trafficking victims, due to scenarios precisely like this one. Rather than finding minors who were already being trafficked, requesting younger victims while undercover could cause traffickers to try and find people to fill that request. In other words, such a request would not rescue trafficking victims; it could potentially create them. 

Tim Ballard—who has said he is likely to run for the Senate seat Mitt Romney is vacating—did not respond to requests for comment for this story; OUR provided a statement which can be found below.

“There is a lot to the story, a very dangerous situation and I am happy to let the world know the details when the time is right,” Hutchinson wrote in an email to VICE News. “Every operator who was present stands behind me in how I reacted to the situation. I have zero reservations as to how I handled myself undercover.

“You don’t find trafficked children in the lobby of the Ritz-Carlton. We had to go to the most dangerous places on the planet to find the children.

“All my undercover work was done with integrity and honor.”

Documents related to the incident can be read here.

The footage reviewed by investigators was taken as part of the filming of The Abolitionists, a 2016 documentary movie and 2019 television series featuring Hutchinson. The documentaries valorize the exploits of Ballard and OUR, who are depicted carrying out private undercover operations in foreign countries aimed at liberating child sex slaves. (Darrin Fletcher and Chet Thomas, the producers and directors for the film, did not respond to requests for comment from VICE News.)

The files obtained by VICE News consist of audio transcripts and timestamped descriptions of what investigator Bryan Purdy of the Davis County Attorney’s Office saw while reviewing the footage—which OUR, according to an investigator’s note, believed it had “scrubbed.”

A description of one video—which was, going by its associated file name, taken in February 2016 using an “earphone cam”—starts, "Paul Hutchinson and his team are standing in the street area talking with local men." They cross the street and go into a club, where females are seen walking toward them down a staircase.

“A female,” the description—which like the others in this story we are reproducing verbatim aside from minor redactions, complete with typographical and grammatical errors—reads, “gets to the bottom of the stairs and there is an adult male standing to her left side. The male is wearing a light-colored shirt with long sleeves and a necktie. The male uses both of his hands to lift the female’s shirt up to her shoulders exposing her naked breasts. While he continues to hold the female’s shirt up with both hands, another adult male approaches from directly in front of the female. This male (identified as Paul Hutchinson based on his own statements on a phone call to Matt Osborn.) is wearing a light-colored shirt with short sleeves. Paul approaches the female and lifts both of his hands and places them on each of the female’s naked breasts. The female uses her hand to push down Paul’s hands and pulls her shirt down. There is another female standing above them higher on the stairway wearing a dark colored skirt/shorts and a dark colored tube top shirt.

“Paul leans in and kisses the first female on the side of the cheek,” read the investigator’s notes. 

The adult male in the white shirt, according to the description, goes outside with Hutchinson and his team. “You want more touch, feel, oh no more touch,” he says. Another man says, “You like more 16” and that he can provide IDs. Hutchinson pays one of these men—which isn’t made clear in the description—money and says, “For showing ‘em to me right there.”

Purdy, the investigator, also wrote a description of a second video, which to go by its file name was taken the same day as the first one using a “backpack cam.” (According to a note, this video was taken in the same club and in the same time frame as the other one, using a different camera.)  

“Another girl like her, (inaudible),” says a local male’s voice, according to the description. “16, she’s 16.”

One of the OUR operatives is heard saying, “Let’s get the hell out of here.” Hutchinson is heard saying, “Yeah, let’s get out of here, I’m down a grand.”

“For a thousand bucks you got your hands on some breasts,” says a male voice, to laughter.

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“What was I going to do?” asks a second male voice, whose words are described as being interrupted repeatedly by laughter. “Okay, she’s 16, here, feel them, they’re nice. I’m like, shit, those are 16.”

“You think they’re under age, huh?” asks the first male voice.

“Oh yeah,” says a third male voice, “I would put money on that.” The men continue their discussion for a bit before the first male voice says, “Yeah, those girls were young, man.”

“I don’t know how wise it was to grab that girl’s boobs, though,” says the second male voice.

“You didn’t get that on video or anything, did you?” asks the first male voice.

In a statement to VICE News, Hutchinson wrote, “In regards to the undercover mission in Cabo San Lucas, 23 victims were liberated, and some very bad men are now in prison. Your reference to the trafficker testing our legitimacy is a non story. I have a sworn affidavit by the federal police saying she was over 18.”

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A description of a third video covers a February 28, 2016 phone call between Hutchinson and Matt Osborne. During the call, which took place on speakerphone and was filmed in a room with Hutchinson and several other men in it, Osborne talks to the videographer filming the call about the hard drive containing the footage he’s shot, at which point Hutchinson brings up the incident at the club. 

During the conversation he refers to himself in the third person as “Paul Stone”—a reference, according to Purdy’s description of the video, to the alias he used while undercover—and asks if he’s “gonna get in big trouble from the Mexican authority for touching a sixteen-year-old on film.”

“When you get the hard drive I have to, I have to confess to something,” he says, according to a transcript. “But I believe that it helped to make them, really believe that we weren’t a police officers in any way. Uh, (starts to laugh), so, so we uh, we, we we, were taken to the um to the strip club, (Paul laughs again as well as the man next to him.) K so, the very first time that V. was vetting is out and um he took us, he took us to the strip club, and, and, the, a owner of the strip club brought down the minors. And um, and V.’s the very first time V.’s shown us any minors, and, uh, brought down these minors well, well Paul Stone (referring to himself as the Undercover name he was going by) is standing there at the bottom of the stairs. A, these two girls working the strip club, these two minors come down. The owner of the strip club pulls up one of their shirts and grabs one of Paul Stone’s hand and places it on her breast and so it’s on the video. I just wanna find out if I’m gonna get in big trouble from the Mexican authority for touching a sixteen-year-old on film?”

“Uh, is it clear that they pulled it, pulled your hand there?” asks Osborne. (In the copy of the description obtained by VICE News, this entire passage is highlighted and the word “LIE” is written next to it, with a margin note reading “PAUL PUTS BOTH HANDS ON VOLUNTARILY.” Those appear to be an investigator’s notes; the Davis County Attorney’s Office did not respond to a request for comment.)

“It’s not clear on the video,” says Hutchinson. “I was standing on the side and he grabbed the hand from down on the right hand, on my right-hand side as he pulled up her shirt and put em up. (Paul then raised his hands, one his right hand while holding the phone and then raised his left hand in a motion of grabbing with his hand.) And so, we feel like and if, we were all there, and we all feel like, if I had hesitated, and oh yeah. I’m not really interested in touching that right now as he was pulling it up, I think it would have thrown up a lot of red flags. Um, but a, that is on the hard drive. I just wanted to run that by and see what your thoughts are.”

“Yea I don’t think at this point that will be an issue, a maybe if it was the Mexican’s,” says Osborne. “And we’re sending it just the Mexicans. I don’t want this video to be to HSI, the U.S. Embassy because I’m sure, and I’ve done it before too one time, I’m sure that technically you guys probably entrap some of these people. Try not to, a yeah, and I’ve done it before accidentally. So, I’m just content that is not an issue.”

A man sitting on a couch, according to the description, tells Hutchinson, “The only thing you have to do is not tell your bishop.”

Hutchinson laughs.

A final description of a video carries no reference to when or where it was taken.

According to an investigator's notes, in the video, a trafficker is showing Hutchinson and a male associate photos of females on his phone. “Paul and the other male are joking that they are old, and saying 20, 22, 30, 40 years old. The trafficker says 16 and they ask him who? He replies he doesn’t know them but states these are the girls.

“Paul pulls out his wallet and gives the guy $20. Then says, I’ll give you $100 just to see them. Paul states, ‘Mas Pequeno’ (meaning more small) as he is handing the trafficker the money.

“They continue to see images of women on the traffickers’ phones of what appear, based upon Paul and other team members statements, to be adult women in their twenties and thirties. The traffickers try to say the girls are ‘16 or 17’ but Paul would say they look like they were 30 and continue to ask for younger girls.”

The description ends with an account of the trafficker talking to two females “and telling then to go out and find ‘la mas chicas’ (the smallest) the more young you can find. La mas chicas. 16, 14, 15, he pay you in dollars.”

Tim Ballard did not respond to a request for comment; in response to other reporting VICE News has done about him recently, he issued a statement to a crowd in Boston and, later, another through the SPEAR Fund, his new organization, referring to VICE obliquely as “a tabloid that is often hostile to people of faith.” 

In response to requests for comment about this story as well as others, an OUR spokesperson sent one statement, which read as follows:

These allegations have been raised previously, written about by Vice and thoroughly investigated by the Davis County District Attorney. That investigation concluded without the filing of any charges.

Following Tim Ballard's departure from O.U.R. three months ago, we have been working tirelessly to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our domestic and international operations.

At O.U.R., we are proud to support law enforcement in liberating any person in the grips of human trafficking or exploitation and we strive to ensure ongoing aftercare for all those affected.  Our resources have contributed to the arrest of over 7,400 suspected predators and have impacted the lives of over 7,800 individuals. Currently, we are carrying out an average of five missions per week worldwide. We are committed to this important work until everyone in need is safe.

 

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C-Man

C-Man 27182

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Purdy, the investigator, also wrote a description of a second video, which to go by its file name was taken the same day as the first one using a “backpack cam.” (According to a note, this video was taken in the same club and in the same time frame as the other one, using a different camera.)  

“Another girl like her, (inaudible),” says a local male’s voice, according to the description. “16, she’s 16.”

One of the OUR operatives is heard saying, “Let’s get the hell out of here.” Hutchinson is heard saying, “Yeah, let’s get out of here, I’m down a grand.”

“For a thousand bucks you got your hands on some breasts,” says a male voice, to laughter.

“What was I going to do?” asks a second male voice, whose words are described as being interrupted repeatedly by laughter. “Okay, she’s 16, here, feel them, they’re nice. I’m like, shit, those are 16.”

“You think they’re under age, huh?” asks the first male voice.

“Oh yeah,” says a third male voice, “I would put money on that.” The men continue their discussion for a bit before the first male voice says, “Yeah, those girls were young, man.”

“I don’t know how wise it was to grab that girl’s boobs, though,” says the second male voice.

“You didn’t get that on video or anything, did you?” asks the first male voice.

In case you don't read the entire article I quoted above, this is the most damning portion IMO

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Brisketexan

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Everyone who is shocked, SHOCKED, I SAY, by this development, raise your fucking hand.  

Yeah, I see nothing but hands down.  Except among the gullible MAGATs/Qanon types, who continue to mainline runny bullshit and insist it's the fucking nectar of the gods.  The stupidity and gullibility of this crowd is at limitless as the universe itself.

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wildcat09

wildcat09 29338

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Women Accuse Tim Ballard of 'Spiritual Manipulation, Grooming, and Sexual Misconduct':

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At a press conference Thursday morning on the steps of the Utah state capitol building, Suzette Rasmussen, an attorney in Draper, Utah, announced that she’s representing women who have accused Tim Ballard of sexual misconduct. 

Ballard, who has recently discussed his interest in filling the Senate seat Mitt Romney is vacating, is the founder of the controversial anti-trafficking group Operation Underground Railroad. VICE News recently reported that he left the group this summer following an internal investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct. People familiar with the situation told VICE News that Ballard would invite women on undercover missions to play his wife, then coerce them into intimate situations like sharing a bed or showering together, purportedly to fool traffickers. 

During the press conference, Rasmussen read a statement on behalf of the women, which a communications firm working with her provided to VICE News. It reads, in part, “Our involvement with Operation Underground Railroad was rooted in our commitment to fighting against human trafficking. But while engaging in that noble cause, we were subjected to sexual harassment, spiritual manipulation, grooming, and sexual misconduct.” 

Rasmussen told assembled Utah reporters that she couldn’t comment on the exact number of women making allegations, but that VICE News’ reporting that at least seven women were involved was “pretty close to accurate.” She said she could not comment yet on the exact nature of the sexual misconduct, whether the women have gone to the police, and what her next steps as their attorney will be. 

Sources with knowledge of the situation have told VICE News that Ballard is alleged to have invoked his own personal connection to the divine and the authority of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to persuade women who worked for and with OUR that testing their sexual chemistry with him was in essence approved by God. 

Conservative libertarian personality Eric Moutsos, who says he's spoken to at least four women accusing Ballard of misconduct, has said Ballard invoked both his relationship with President M. Russell Ballard, a powerful figure in the LDS Church, and psychic readings from Janet Russon, OUR’s in-house medium, to back up claims he made to persuade women into sexual situations. Moutsos has also said "multiple marriages have been broken up." His claims are consistent with VICE News reporting. 

Spokespeople for the women and for Ballard did not respond to requests for comment; OUR provided a statement, which is reproduced in full below.

The full statement from Rasmussen, the women’s lawyer, is as follows:

As former employees and contractors who worked closely with Operation Underground Railroad (O.U.R.), we are choosing to give a public statement about our experiences with Tim Ballard. 

Earlier this year, complaints were filed that opened the door for an internal investigation. We now stand together to affirm the truth behind these allegations. 

Our involvement with Operation Underground Railroad was rooted in our commitment to fighting against human trafficking. But while engaging in that noble cause, we were subjected to sexual harassment, spiritual manipulation, grooming, and sexual misconduct. 

Though we value our privacy as we work to rebuild our lives, we also feel a responsibility to speak out and state unequivocally that these allegations are true. We acknowledge the risks involved in challenging someone as prominent as Tim Ballard. We will reveal our stories in our own time and on our own terms, but for now, we choose to remain anonymous.

We wish to express our gratitude for the outpouring of support from those who have responded and commented to the media and social media posts. We also want to extend our support and solidarity to all survivors of harassment and abuse of any kind. We believe you, and we are standing by your side as you embark on your own healing journey.

Since news of the nature of the allegations first broke, led by Utah journalist Lynn Packer, Ballard has vehemently denied them, and suggested a number of alternative, conspiratorial explanations. In September, Ballard issued a statement through the SPEAR Fund, a new anti-trafficking organization he appears to have founded. (He refers to himself as a senior adviser there and has implied other people are involved.) In it, Ballard referred to the allegations as “baseless,” adding, “During my time at O.U.R., I designed strict guidelines for myself and our operators in the field. Sexual contact was prohibited, and I led by example. Given our meticulous attention to this issue, any suggestion of inappropriate sexual contact is categorically false.”

Ballard also made a lengthy Instagram video defending the use of what he called “the couples ruse”—i.e., male operators like him working intimately with female ones in undercover situations to fool traffickers. His wife, Katherine, also went on the show of a local Utah talk radio host to say she believes and stands by her husband. He also had two female operators provide anonymous testimony on his Instagram, saying that Ballard had never been sexually inappropriate. The first woman was filmed with her face visible, and VICE News was able to identify her and connect her to an anti-trafficking group operating in Ukraine with which Ballard has ties. She has not responded to a request for comment; nor have Ballard or the anti-trafficking group. The video was deleted soon after it was posted. (The second woman spoke with her face blurred to protect her privacy.) 

Ballard has also suggested that his accusers, and the media covering them, have more sinister motivations. In July, when VICE News reported he’d left OUR following an internal investigation, but did not immediately state that it was of a sexual nature, he made an Instagram video saying that “godless leftists” would stop at nothing to keep people from watching Sound of Freedom, the heavily fictionalized film supposedly based on his work. (The film has been a surprise box office hit around the world.) On Wednesday night, he showed a clip of himself fulminating at a microphone in Washington DC, shortly after he testified before Congress early this month.

“Just a few days after I delivered this speech, a flood of false allegations made their way to the front pages of many news outlets across the country,” Ballard wrote. He accompanied that video with a screenshot of a tweet from conservative pundit Charlie Kirk, which listed three mens’ names: Ballard, Elon Musk, and Russell Brand. “All accused of sex issues or fake financial crimes,” Kirk wrote. “If you effectively speak against the Regime, they will crush you.” 

In an appearance this week on comedian Adam Carolla's podcast, accompanied by his wife Katherine, Ballard once again denied sexually inappropriate behavior, claiming that what was at issue was simply tactics used while working undercover. Sources told VICE News that he'd sent photos of himself in his underwear, festooned with fake tattoos, to some of the women. During the show, Ballard displayed a photo depicting himself in boxer briefs covered in henna tattoos (included one of the word joder, the Spanish word for “fuck”) but said the photo was taken by a staffer and sent to operators to be “archived.” 

In a statement to VICE News earlier this month, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints issued a stinging rebuke to Ballard, saying he’d leveraged his friendship with a senior apostle in the church, President M. Russell Ballard (no relation) for Ballard’s “personal advantage and activity regarded as morally unacceptable.” The Church has not specified what activity it was referring to as morally unacceptable.

OUR issued the following statement:

Operation Underground Railroad received an allegation of behavior that violated company policy by then CEO Tim Ballard. The organization immediately placed Mr. Ballard on administrative leave and launched an independent, external investigation of the allegation. At the conclusion of the investigation, as previously stated by O.U.R., Mr. Ballard resigned.  

 Mr. Ballard’s alleged misconduct does not represent O.U.R.’s values or others within the organization.

O.U.R. is dedicated to combatting sexual abuse and stands with anyone who has been victimized. 

 O.U.R. is sensitive to the privacy concerns of any individuals affected by this and is committed to upholding our duty to protect their anonymity. 

O.U.R.’s mission does not change, and we are committed to continuing our domestic and international efforts, in collaboration with law enforcement, to rescue any and all from the scourge of human trafficking.

Rasmussen, the attorney, added during the press conference that if additional women wish to come forward, she can be reached at ourinfo@allutahlaw.com. 

 

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Beau Vine

Beau Vine 54203

Posted
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18 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

People familiar with the situation told VICE News that Ballard would invite women on undercover missions to play his wife, then coerce them into intimate situations like sharing a bed or showering together, purportedly to fool traffickers. 

Shark Tank Writing GIF

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Beau Vine

Beau Vine 54203

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4 hours ago, wildcat09 said:

In an appearance this week on comedian Adam Carolla's podcast, accompanied by his wife Katherine, Ballard once again denied sexually inappropriate behavior, claiming that what was at issue was simply tactics used while working undercover. Sources told VICE News that he'd sent photos of himself in his underwear, festooned with fake tattoos, to some of the women. During the show, Ballard displayed a photo depicting himself in boxer briefs covered in henna tattoos (included one of the word joder, the Spanish word for “fuck”) but said the photo was taken by a staffer and sent to operators to be “archived.” 

This is simply one of the greatest paragraphs ever written.

 

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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 45877

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6 hours ago, Biff Tannen said:

All of this is just shocking.  Just shocking.  No one could have ever seen this coming and, frankly, I just don't believe it.  I don't care if there is video and audio evidence and he comes out and says it's all true, I still won't believe it.

Yeah, but it was Adam Carollas's podcast.  I mean, if that doesn't scream "hardcore journalistic integrity", what does?

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