The World and Everything in It: June 5, 2024

PREROLL: The World and Everything in It is made possible by listeners like us. I'm a wife, mother, grandmother, and high school teacher from Stephenville, Texas. I hope you enjoy today's program.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Good morning! Dr. Anthony Fauci admits COVID could have come from a lab. Were U.S. research funds involved? He says no.

FAUCI: No matter what you did with those viruses, they were phylogenetically so different they could not possibly be the precursor to SARS COV-2.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: That’s ahead on Washington Wednesday. Also today, World Tour. Plus, citizens doing their part to make elections secure in North Carolina.

ACETO: This is where people do politics. And it's, it's, that's not a bad word.

And WORLD commentator Bethel McGrew on myths about miscarriage treatment.

REICHARD: It’s Wednesday, June 5th. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Mary Reichard.

BROWN: And I’m Myrna Brown. Good morning!

REICHARD: Up next, Kent Covington with today’s news.

KENT COVINGTON, NEWS ANCHOR: Biden border security order » At the White House President Biden on Tuesday announced a new executive order aimed at curbing the border crisis.

The order bars migrants from being granted asylum when the number of border encounters between ports of entry hits 25-hundred per day.

BIDEN: This ban will remain in place until the number of people trying to enter illegally is reduced to a level that our system can effectively manage.

That number is reportedly 15-hundred per day.

Biden told reporters …

BIDEN: This action will help us gain control of our border.

It was the president’s first tacit admission that the border is currently not under control.

Biden vs GOP on border » And he says Republicans are to blame for that for rejecting a recent Senate border bill.

BIDEN: Republicans in Congress — not all, but — walked away from it. Why? Because Donald Trump told them to.

Republicans said the bill was insufficient and could even incentivize more illegal border crossings.

The border is a major political liability for Biden, and he says Republicans don’t want to fix it before Election Day.

GOP lawmakers had plenty to say about that. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell:

MCCONNELL: All of this crisis goes back to when the president was first sworn in.

And Arizona Congressman Juan Ciscomani, whose district borders Mexico, added …

 CISCOMANI: This president signed dozens of executive orders that caused this border crisis. Since then, he refused to take any kind of responsibility or ownership over this crisis. Also since then, refused that he had any authority to actually solve or address this crisis.

Republicans say President Biden could have signed this order three-and-a-half years ago rather than five months before the election.

Wray testimony on threats » On Capitol Hill, members of a Senate panel asked FBI Christopher Wray about the border crisis. He said authorities have seen in recent years …

WRAY:  … an increase in the number of known or suspected terrorists, in other words, watch-listed subjects, attempting to cross the border.

But he said the biggest threat remains China, which he added is “sparing no expense in its quest to hack, lie, cheat, and steal its way to the top as a global superpower.”

WRAY: If you took all of the FBI's cyber resources and said forget Russia, forget Iran, forget ransomware, just do nothing but China, the Chinese government's hacking program would dwarf ours 50 to 1.

Wray testified before the appropriations committee as he made his pitch for more FBI funding.

Attorney General Garland testifies before Judiciary Committee » Meantime, across the Capitol rotunda …

JORDAN: [GAVEL STRIKE] Committee will come to order. We welcome everyone to today’s hearing on oversight of the Department of Justice.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan gaveling in a hearing as Republicans prepared to grill Attorney General Merrick Garland over what they say is a double-standard in the justice system, especially when it comes to Donald Trump.

JORDAN: Justice is no longer blind in America. Today, it's driven by politics.

But Garland said accusations of bias “unprecedented” and “unfounded.”

GARLAND: These attacks have not — and they will not — influence our decision making.  I will not be intimidated, and the Justice Department will not be intimidated. 

He dismissed GOP accusations of a political agenda within his department as a right-wing conspiracy theory.

India election » India’s Prime Minister has claimed victory in the just-concluded election in his country. WORLD’s Kristen Flavin reports:

MODI: [Speaking Hindi]

KRISTEN FLAVIN: Prime Minister Narendra Modi, addressing supporters Tuesday “will walk together towards the development of the country and in this third term, the country will write a new chapter of big decisions."

His National Democratic Alliance coalition lost seats but still claimed a majority in parliament.

He faced stronger than expected opposition against his mixed economic record and polarizing politics.

More than 640 million Indians cast their votes in a marathon 6-six week election.

For WORLD, I’m Kristen Flavin.

AUDIO: [Natalie Lloyd singing]

Missionaries funeral » A recording of slain missionary Natalie Lloyd singing “Jesus is the Answer” played for a crowd of friends and family members at her funeral yesterday.

Those loved ones gathered in a Missouri church to remember Natalie and her husband Davy after they were murdered by gangs in Haiti late last month.

Gunmen robbed and fatally shot the couple and the head of the mission after they left a church youth function in Port-au-Prince.

PASTOR: When you think about Davy and Natalie and Jude – they left their impact, praise God. No, death did not win. Love won, praise God.

Those at the funeral also heard a recording of one of Davy Lloyd’s sermons in which he talked about what it would be like to someday meet his Savior.

DAVY: We cannot understand, but when we get face-to-face one day with God – and I’m looking forward to that day – when we get fact-to-face with God, all of the questions, all the doubts, all the fears, all of that is gonna make sense then. And I’m looking forward to that day.

A family spokeswoman said the Lloyds would be buried at a private graveside ceremony.

I’m Kent Covington.

Straight ahead: Congress asks Dr. Fauci tough questions about COVID-19 on Washington Wednesday. Plus, World Tour.

This is The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 5th of June, 2024. Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

First up: Washington Wednesday.

On Monday, members of the US House Committee on Oversight and Accountability questioned Dr. Anthony Fauci. He’s the former head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Lawmakers asked him about restrictions introduced during the pandemic, such as social distancing. They asked about his communication with intelligence agencies…and the role of the United States in funding research.

So did the U.S. fund research to create viruses not found in nature—and could the pandemic have been caused by a man-made lab leak?

WORLD’s Washington Bureau Reporter Leo Briceno has the story.

LEO BRICENO: On a cultural level, COVID-19’s origin has been a source of intrigue for several years. Here’s comedian Jon Stewart on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in 2021 discussing the possibility of a lab leak.

JON STEWART: There’s a novel respiratory coronavirus overtaking Wuhan, China. What do we do? Oh, you know who we could ask? The Wuhan novel respiratory coronavirus lab. The disease is the same name as the lab.

But while many skeptics look at that possibility as a conspiracy theory, Dr. Anthony Fauci told lawmakers on Monday that he’s open to the idea that it could have come from a lab.

ANTHONY FAUCI: I feel, based on the data that I have seen, that the more likely explanation, not definitive, but the more likely explanation, is a natural spillover from an animal reservoir. But since there has not been definitive proof one way or the other, we have to keep an open mind that it could be either the concept of it is not a conspiracy theory.

Fauci has said similar things in the past. What’s really troubling Republicans, however, is the question: is it possible that American-funded experimentation with genetically-modified pathogens could be responsible? Fauci doesn’t think so.

FAUCI: You can’t get away from the fact that the viruses that were studied. That the NIH gave them a grant to study. Don’t pull back on the fact that no matter what you did with those viruses, they were phylogenetically so different they could not possibly be the precursor to SARS COV-2.

The questions of COVID-19’s origin overlap with Republican concern over funding the NIH awarded to Eco Health Global, a company working out of Wuhan’s virology labs. Arizona congresswoman Debbie Lesko.

DEBBIE LESKO: Did the National Institute of Health fund the potentially dangerous enhanced potential pandemic pathogens gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology?

FAUCI: I would not characterize it the way you did…

“Gain of function research,” is a nebulous term. In its most general form, it means any attempt to genetically modify a pathogen to enhance its properties in some way. On its face it sounds scary. But experts say experimentation like it keeps medicine one step ahead of newly emerging diseases.

Fauci’s arrival to the House on Monday isn’t the first time he’s testified before congress on the practice. Back in 2021, he was called before the Senate. Here’s Sen. Rand Paul confronting Fauci on his statements about research conducted in Wuhan.

RAND PAUL: Dr. Fauci, I don’t expect you today to admit that you approved of NIH funding for gain of function research in Wuhan, but your repeated denials have worn thin and a majority of Americans, frankly, don’t believe you. Even the NIH now admits that that eco-health alliance did perform experiments in Wuhan that created viruses not found in nature that actually did gain in lethality. You can deny it all you want, but even the Chinese authors of the paper, in their paper, admit that viruses not found in nature were created and, yes, they gained in infectivity.”

Fauci maintains that work done in Wuhan wasn’t gain of function research because it doesn’t live up to the definition laid out by the National Institutes of Health.

FAUCI: I go back to what I said. That the gain of function research by the operative and regulatory definition of P3CO does not include at all the viruses that were studied under…

By the P3CO standard, gain of function is experimentation with a highly transmissible pathogen that’s capable of uncontrollable spread in humans and likely to cause significant morbidity.

Fauci says that while EcoHealth was experimenting with the genetic enhancement of viruses, the research would have fallen below that P3CO standard.

FAUCI: The broad definition of gain of function in my mind is not applicable here and does nothing but confuse the situation. And that is the reason why after three years of deliberation by the bodies including the NSABB as well as the national academies, it was decided to make an operative and regulatory definition…The definition that I use is not my personal definition, it’s a codified, regulatory and operative definition made by a body that has nothing to do with me.

But he also can’t definitively say he knows everything that went on at that lab. Here’s Fauci sparring with congresswoman Lesko.

FAUCI: We know what viruses they were studying—

LESKO: How? How do you know? You never went there.

FAUCI: I’m telling you that the NIH funded research on these viruses if someone else somewhere in China was doing something else…

LESKO: That’s the problem. Because NIH didn’t go there, you didn’t get the reports that were needed, how in the world would you know? I’m going to go on with my next question.

FAUCI: Then you’re not hearing what I’m saying…

While controversial, gain of function itself isn’t illegal. In fact, it encompasses some of regularly accepted practices. Insulin, for instance, comes from E. Coli bacteria genetically manipulated to produce the diabetes drug.

Democrats like California representative Raul Ruiz came to Fauci’s defense on Monday. He stressed that definitions are important to understanding what really went on in Wuhan.

RUIZ: This has been a source of great conspiratorial accusations that are false regardless of the people making those accusation, knowing the true definition of gain of function. Now, under the 3PCO, it is not allowed to enhance the transmissibility or the pathogenicity of a potential pandemic pathogen. That’s already been settled. Dr. Fauci and NIAID did not fund P3CO-defined gain of function research.

Still, some lawmakers want stricter limits on the research. Here’s Congressman Brad Wenstrup of Ohio, the chairman of the select subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic. Some of the background noise you’ll hear is Republicans coming out of their weekly conference in the Capitol basement.

BRAD WENSTRUP: So you’re just working with viruses that aren’t infectious to humans. But when you start taking parts from one virus, adding it to another and working different combinations.  If you’re doing that, it doesn’t matter what you start with. It’s what you end up with.

In November, House Republicans tried to pass a bill that would have prevented government dollars from going to gain of function research, but the bill didn’t go anywhere in the Senate.

I asked Wenstrup if he thought Democrats would get behind a congressional plan to set limits on gain of function practices.

WENSTRUP: Probably not right now, as long as Dr. Fauci is in favor of it still. I don’t think that they will.

Fauci stepped down from leading the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in 2022, but as Monday’s hearing illustrates, his influence on public health policy continues.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Leo Briceno.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: World Tour with our reporter in Africa Onize Ohikere.

AUDIO: [Celebrations]

South African election — We start today in a South African province as opposition parties celebrate their local victory in a historic election, where no party won a clear parliamentary majority.

For the first time in three decades, the ruling African National Congress party lost its majority—emerging with only 40 percent of the votes.

Here’s President Cyril Ramaphosa.

RAMAPHOSA: Our people have spoken, whether we like it or not, they have spoken.

The ANC said it has started negotiations with other major parties.

The Democratic Alliance opposition party came in second while former President Jacob Zuma’s MK party came in third.

Parliament must elect the country’s president in the next two weeks.

AUDIO: [Sound from hospital]

Indian heat wave — Over in India, a scorching heat wave has killed more than 50 people.

Authorities said some 33 people died in the northern Uttar Pradesh state over the weekend. Meanwhile, heat stroke killed another 20 people in Odisha state.

People rushed family members to nearby hospitals for care.

AUDIO: [Man speaking Hindi]

This man in the eastern Bihar state says his family member was struggling to breathe, then died shortly after arriving at the hospital.

The heatwave coincided with India’s extensive six-week general election, which wrapped up this week.

Guatemala prison grab — In Guatemala, authorities transferred more than 200 gang members from a prison some 43 miles south of the capital.

Police said members of the Barrio 18 gang had operated a call center for criminal activities out of the prison nicknamed “Little Hell.”

Here’s Deputy Interior Minister Claudia Palencia.

PALENCIA: [Speaking Spanish]

She says here that police also found air conditioners, music equipment, refrigerators, and other comforts.

The Barrio 18 and MS-13 gangs are fighting over territory in Guatemala.

Authorities blamed previous governments for handing over control of prisons to criminals. Interior Minister Francisco Jimenez said authorities will tear down the prison and replace it with a maximum-security prison.

AUDIO: [Protest]

Tiananmen Square anniversary — We wrap up today with activities around the world marking the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.

Hong Kong residents previously commemorated June 4 when Chinese authorities used tanks and troops to crush peaceful protests on the mainland in 1989.

But Hong Kong’s national security law has outlawed all memorials since 2020, including an annual candlelight vigil in Victoria Park.

AUDIO: [Singing]

In London, people from Hong Kong, Tibet, and Taiwan shouted chants and sang together to commemorate the day.

AUDIO: [Sound of arrest]

And in Hong Kong, police detained performance artist Sanmu Chen after he appeared to write the date of the massacre in the air. He’s one of at least eight people authorities arrested ahead of the anniversary.

Here’s Hong Kong’s Chief Executive John Lee.

LEE: The government position on public events is very clear. All activities by any person must be conducted according to the law.

That’s it for today’s WORLD Tour. Reporting for WORLD, I’m Onize Ohikere in Abuja, Nigeria.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: It’s always good to think outside the box when negotiating terms with your boss.

But Nebraska Cornhuskers women’s volleyball coach John Cook took that to another level! He didn’t ask for more money or more time off. He wanted a horse!

Last year, Cook explained the connection of coaching to horses. This from HuskerOnline:

JOHN COOK: There's a great book I read called Think Like a Horse. Horses can communicate with you. They want to do what you want ‘em to do. But you have to figure out a way to communicate with ‘em to get ‘em to do what you want to do. So I've tried to take some of those principles into my coaching.

That’s a mark of a great teacher! Not to mention, Coach Cook is also honing his skills for rodeo competition on the side!

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: He’ll have all the horsepower now.

REICHARD: It’s The World and Everything in It.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Wednesday, June 5th. Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day. Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: going behind the scenes of an election.

The 2024 election is around the corner. Some wonder whether votes will be counted fairly and whether unlawful votes might cancel them out.

The Pew Research Center found that almost 40 percent of voters were not confident in the results of the 2020 election, about double the percentage from the midterm election of 2018.

REICHARD: Who are the people running elections and how do they work together? WORLD Radio’s Mary Muncy got a peak behind the ballot box and brings the story.

AUDIO: [Precinct set up]

MARY MUNCY: Chief election judge Teri Gentile, and poll workers Sarah Jane Jackson and Andrew Reed are setting up a precinct in Buncombe County, North Carolina. This is the runoff primary election for the Republican party in the state.

TERI GENTILE: They gave us 150 ballots.

ANDREW REED: Oh okay.

GENTILE: But I don't think that we're gonna have anywhere near that.

But they set it up with just as much care as they did the first primary in March.

The polling location is in a meeting room of a church and Gentile is flying around it setting up tables, laptops, printers, and signs.

She pulls the seal off the ballot machine, opens the bottom, and looks inside the box where finished ballots will go.

GENTILE: I used to have a guy… he used to trick people. He put a ballot in here. Because he wanted, he wanted you to open it up and make sure there were many ballots in here already.

After about an hour, they’re set up and do the last thing on Gentile’s list.

GENTILE: If y'all would raise your right hand,

WORKERS: [UNISON] I do solemnly swear…

They swear to act with integrity for the good of the people. Then they go home. Gentile keeps the unmarked ballots sealed and with her until the next morning.

GENTILE: Thank you. Y'all have a good rest of the evening.

Steve Aceto is a Buncombe County Election Board official. He says his county is one of the best in North Carolina at running elections.

STEVE ACETO: This county tends to be sort of the farm team for the state election administration. We have a significant number of Buncombe County alumnus that are in the administration in various high levels of responsibility.

He says that’s partly because people across the aisle work together to follow the state’s statutes—which are full of checks and balances. He says both sides realize the more secure the election, the better people can express their political views.

ACETO: This is where people do politics. And it's, it's, that's not a bad word. People with very divergent views are allowed to express them. And ultimately, we hope, will graciously accept the result rather than shooting somebody to force their point of view.

So, at 6:00 the next morning Gentile, Reed, and Jackson arrive at the precinct ready to help people express their point of view.

REED: Good morning.

SARAH JACKSON: Good morning.

The three gather around the ballot bag and break the seal. They record the number on the seal and place that into a bag with the seals from the laptops and voting machine. Gentile will present the bag to the election officials at the end of the night. Then they each confirm there are 150 blank ballots and put them in the machine.

After some last-minute prep, Gentile unlocks the church doors.

GENTILE: Some people come out and yell, “Polls are open!”

No one is there. She just thinks it’s fun.

Then she goes back inside and they wait for voters, and wait.

By noon only three people have cast their ballots.

JACKSON: Really making progress in my book.

Another nine people vote and then at 7:30…

GENTILE: The polls are closed.

Gentile, Reed, and Jackson take down the tables and log out of the laptops. Then they all watch as Gentile makes sure the number of ballots in the machine matches the number of voters that came through. They sign papers, reseal the ballot bag, and take out the flash drive with the electronic version of the ballots.

Now comes the nerve-wracking part for Gentile—she has to present her results to the voting officials.

GENTILE: Have a great evening. Thank you again.

Reed takes the electronic copy of the ballots to the election offices, while Gentile takes the sealed bag of ballots to a warehouse where they store all of the supplies.

Workers unload Gentile’s car and take the ballots and records to the start of an ordered line of staff. They make sure all of the seal numbers match, none of them look tampered with, and all of the records are in line.

Gentile sits down with some other election judges and waits for election staff to call her name. They’ll tell her either everything lines up and she’s free to go, or they have to ask her some questions.

About five minutes later staff call her name…

OFFICIAL: She’s done. You are done. Thank you so much!

But the process isn’t over.

The next week, election officials meet several times to hand-count ballots from random precincts and review any last-minute mail-in ballots.

Then on Friday, the Buncombe County Board of Elections meets to certify the election.

JAKE QUINN: [GAVEL BANGING] Good evening everyone.

Board of Elections Chair Jake Quinn calls the meeting to order and they review any provisional ballots. Then they turn to the mountain of paper in front of them.

SOUND: [APPROVING BALLOTS]

This is not a cursory check. This is the last review before the election is certified. The staff wait in anxious anticipation while the board members pull out rolls of precinct results and compare the numbers to other numbers in binders and in stacks of paper. This goes on for about 20 minutes. Then they sit back down and give a nod to the chair of the board.

JAKE QUINN: The motion before the board is to certify the second primary conducted on May 14th this year. All those in favor say aye.

AUDIO: [ALL SAY AYE]

QUINN: All those opposed nay. Thank you, the election is certified and well done staff.

The meeting is adjourned a few minutes later and the staff go eat cake.

Buncombe County Director of Elections Corinne Duncan put hundreds of hours into this election—even though it’s one of the smallest they’ve had.

CORINNE DUNCAN: I think that people will be more confident in the process if they know how much work and energy and careful consideration that many, many people give to put on elections.

Before the November election, Duncan and her team will spend thousands of hours testing their election equipment, training staff and poll workers, and strategizing to increase accountability—all to make sure, come November, everyone’s voice is heard.

DUNCAN: I think that elections is a really special place where you can come and you can see people with very different views working together.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Mary Muncy in Buncombe County, North Carolina.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Wednesday, June 5th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Up next, WORLD Opinions commentator Bethel McGrew on an abortion law in Texas.

BETHEL MCGREW: Texas-based radio host Ryan Hamilton has gone viral with the dramatic story of his wife’s recent miscarriage. The story has ignited fierce debate over the definition of abortion, Texas state law, and pro-life legislation in general. Hamilton has claimed that one doctor refused to give her a second dose of the medicine she needed because he didn’t want her to “go home and have an abortion.” He also blames state law for the fact that nobody offered her a D & C or dilation and curettage procedure to remove the child’s body in-hospital. He ends his story by railing, “If you think your ‘Pray To End Abortion’ sign in your yard is ‘Christian,’ I suggest you revisit the teachings of Jesus and try again.”

This tragic tale has become a rallying point for pro-choicers. On social media platform X, New Testament professor Laura Robinson made the cynical assertion that “this is exactly how these laws are supposed to work.” In other words, she accused pro-lifers of plotting and scheming all along to create trauma for miscarrying couples like the Hamiltons.

That’s a nice pro-choice fantasy, but it simply isn’t true. In fact, Texas law clearly allows doctors to proceed as needed for the removal of a corpse when a woman miscarries. Even if one of the Hamiltons’ doctors did commit malpractice, this has nothing to do with “staunch pro-lifers” or pro-life law.

Hamilton is also mistaken if he thinks that a D & C is the only safe approach to a miscarriage, and pro-lifers are taking it away. One pro-life consultant at the nonprofit Live Action responded that it’s always been standard safe practice to send miscarrying mothers home. But with the spread of anti-life propaganda, parents may increasingly become scared and confused. This debate highlights the need for strong definitional clarity. Pro-choicers are obfuscating with intent to smear the pro-life side by insistently using the word “abortion” for the removal of a dead body.

In the case of Texas mother Kate Cox, we see that pro-choicers will also muddy the waters around pregnancies that allegedly “threaten” the mother’s life or health. As a C-section mom, Cox risked uterine rupture by continuing to carry her child, who was diagnosed with Trisomy 18. But that risk wasn’t unique to this particular pregnancy, and she would presumably have taken it with a healthy child. Of course, that didn’t make good copy for the pro-abortion press, which played up the story as yet another case of horribly bigoted pro-lifers torturing a vulnerable mom.

We will need to respond compassionately but firmly to parents like Cox as well as the Hamiltons. We can say several true things all at the same time: Yes, we grieve every lost child, and yes, we believe individual doctors should be held accountable for genuine malpractice. But no, we won’t accept made-up definitions of “what we’re voting for.” And no, we won’t stop advocating for pro-life legislation which has nothing to do with harming women and everything to do with saving babies.

I’m Bethel McGrew.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Tomorrow: India’s national elections have concluded. What do the results mean for Christians there? We’ll talk with an expert. And, a mother makes the difficult choice to continue a complicated pregnancy. That and more tomorrow.

I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio. WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Bible says: All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. 2 Timothy 3:16, 17

Go now in grace and peace.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.