Happy New Year, Jim Minnery here. I'm glad you said that. Thanks for tuning in today. Super grateful that you are. tuned in either on a podcast or live. It is Wednesday, January 8th, 2025. That might be the first time that I've said 2025 in 2025. Hope your Christmas and New Year's were a blessing to you. Obviously, there's folks who have, you know.
good times and bad, during the holidays based on all sorts of reasons. But you're here for a reason. That's, I think, the most important thing to know for all of us, that we... are called for such a time as this to be a blessing, to be salt and light in a culture that is dark. And we're honored at Alaska Family Council to be a part of that journey in terms of exposing truth and lifting up that which is good, true, and beautiful. Go to akfamily.org if you haven't already and sign up for our...
For our email alerts, as the legislative session starts here in a couple days, we will have a decent amount to say about different things as they progress in the now. Democrat-led House and Senate, but we still have Governor Dunleavy, who will likely be doing his share of vetoing. We'll see how things play out. Speaking of the legislature, super grateful to have my friend. I would call her a colleague as well because we've worked with her so much over the years.
Representative Sarah Vance out of Homer is on the line today. There's been lots of talk over the years about Sarah stepping up to be the senator out of the district. with Gary Stevens hopefully likely going to retire. He's been talking about it for some time, but she would certainly be a wonderful addition to the state Senate.
And as chair of judiciary last year, Sarah introduced HB House Bill 254, which was an age verification bill regarding... online access to porn, something that has been overwhelmingly cascading across our culture in recent years. It was a wonderful bill that was, I would say, modified considerably by Representative Andrew Gray, who I think, by the way, is a Democrat, who's now...
in the position of chair of House Judiciary, which is what Sarah Vance was last time. But thanks to the likes of Anchorage Republican... Chuck Kopp and Kodiak Republican Louis Stutes, both of them determined to give the power to the Democrats. And so Andrew Gray is now the chair of judiciary, although... I'm hopeful, and I think Sarah also is hopeful about...
moving forward on some of these bills. We will also talk about sex trafficking, which has been not only Governor Dunleavy's passion for some time, but Sarah Vance's as well, despite the fact that it has been held up. by Senator Klayman in Senate Judiciary, but we'll have to just see how that plays out. For this particular session, though, or this particular episode, I wanted to chat with, and I will be chatting with, Sarah Vance about her bill, HB 254.
that proposed to require age verification for accessing online porn. There was some pushback. It got through the house, but it was significantly modified, like I mentioned, by... Andrew Gray, the Democrat representative out of Anchorage, who's now chairing judiciary, and then it ultimately was stopped in Senate judiciary.
So we're kind of starting from scratch again. I was very impressed with, as I was doing research and realizing that, hey, listen, this is something that can be one of those bipartisan efforts. And we are always looking for those kinds. of bills because it's a good thing to have bipartisan support, especially when we are not, the Republicans are not in charge. We're obviously not a Republican organization. We're a Christian.
pro-family, pro-life, pro-liberty, nonprofit ministry. But when the Democrats are in charge, what can we find common ground on? And you'd like to think this is one of them. You know, I was looking at a state, I think there's 17 states now that have passed legislation similar to what... Representative Vance introduced last session and Pornhub, the largest provider, purveyor of online adult pornography.
has pulled out of those states in multiple situations. They just said, we're not going to require people to input their... their data to prove that they're of age. So we're just going to make it not available. And there's a lot of questions in regards to can they get around that requirement through another VPN. I'm not a tech guy.
I won't be diving into that. But there were some concerns, not only in Alaska, about some of the privacy issues, but also whether or not it was too broad of a net in terms of would the effort to try to... stop online pornography in the eyes of minors, impact things like Netflix and YouTube and other things that might be considered sexually explicit but not necessarily.
pornography. So I did a little bit of research in, believe it or not, California. There was a bill that was passed unanimously. So there wasn't one... legislator, at least in the Assembly, or it's called the Assembly down there, it's the House, there was a unanimous vote in support of it. It was House Bill or Assembly Bill 3080. And I'll just read you real fast one of the comments from...
the Democrat-led Judiciary Committee. They call it the Privacy Committee there, but it says, online pornography harms two minors. A recent New York Times article entitled The Troubling Trend in Teen Sex described A study finding that nearly two-thirds of the students at a major Midwestern university had experienced, quote-unquote, rough sex.
particularly sexual strangulation, which was rarely consensual. Over the past four years, quote, the rate of these women who said they were between the ages of 12 and 17, the first time that happened shot up to 40%. from one in four. The article connected this trend directly to the availability of free online pornography. Sexual strangulation, nearly always of women, and heterosexual pornography has long been a staple on the free sites.
default sources of sex ed for teens. As with anything else, repeat exposure can render the once appalling appealing. Now, that's out of... That's out of California. And it was unanimously voted. Now, it died in the Senate. similar to how it did here, but it was much more in line with what Representative Vance advanced or was trying to advance. And in California, it actually, I believe, had a unanimous support in the Judiciary Committee. It actually died in California.
based on the fiscal note because of some of the requirements of making the law be able to be... prosecuted and there were costs associated with it and with billions of dollars in the red that California is, that was the reason why they did it. But the guy I talked to said they're still going to be pushing forward and they might be able to shift the cost in a different way.
way and move forward with it. So fascinating that California, of all places, if California can do this, we can do it. So we'll talk with Sarah Vance right after the short break. Again, thanks so much for tuning in too. I'm glad you said that. My name is Jim Minner. I'm the president of Alaska Family Council. Go to akfamily.org to find out more about our ministry. And Happy New Year. We'll be right back after this short break.
here. I'm glad you said that. Happy New Year. We are right in the thick of getting ready to start the legislative session. I'm super grateful to have my friend. Representative Sarah Vance out of Homer on the line today. Hello Sarah. Good morning. Super grateful that you are interested in
sharing some info about this age verification issue. You know, it's weird because I'm looking at lot of different things right now and you were kind of spearheading the effort last year and so I guess to just start off
maybe give folks a 30,000 foot level of what got you interested in it. Obviously there's been, you know, problems with, um, the internet and and porn being so prevalent now and kids having so much access to electronics and the internet um but what was what was the genesis of your interest in this area
Well, thanks, Jim. You know, I'm a mom. I have four children. My youngest is now 10. And they're at that prime age of... vulnerability to everything on the internet but my journey into this really started with my heart to address human trafficking human trafficking and exploitation is much more prevalent in Alaska than people realize. And I wanted to find ways to protect our kids on every level. And this has just sort of come to the surface.
A couple years ago, the CDC did a survey of Alaskan youth. They did it across the nation, but the survey came out that said one in four young girls... have a plan to commit suicide. And it's just staggering to think about. And they attribute a lot of that dramatic increase to a lot of the online bullying.
and the peer pressure, the poor self-image of comparing yourself to what they see online. And so when these age verification tools, you know, came across my desk, I said, you know, this is something that is our responsibility as parents to be able to safeguard our kids because there's so much content being thrown at them that they're just not prepared for. So what can we do to give parents tools and also act responsibly within this digital age?
Well, I love it. I mean, it's what I've told my kids for a while. I'll be upfront that I'm not at all the model parent for monitoring every minute that my kids are online. you know on all the different platforms and devices and you know we talk about it a lot one of the things that i tell my kids is you know you can say that you're not looking for the tiger in the jungle
when you're out there doing your thing, but the tiger is looking for you. And, you know, you hear about these things where, and this is a long time ago. I mean, when we talked about this, you know, many years ago, that. people were typing in um you know teenage mutant ninja turtles and the the pornographer distributors were um you know, adhering to or grasping and grabbing those names to secure as domain names so that they actually pop up with porn when you
type in just simple things that are kid-oriented in the first place. It's, to me, demonic. I mean, it couldn't be any more sick. But that's...
you know, a decade or more ago, it's gone to a place now where it's 10 times that. And we're in the jungle. So it's not a matter about whether or not you're going to be in the jungle. I've read things, you know, uh in epic times i saw an article we read over the holidays about this family that i can't remember they're in kansas or something but they were homesteading and living on their own and it was it was unbelievable it sounded wonderful because they just you know
were raising animals and vegetables and none of the kids had any access to any internet or any phones or anything. And that's wonderful. I love it. But that's not really the reality at all of the majority of people. We are in the jungle, so how do we prepare ourselves and prepare our kids and hold some of these folks accountable? So the sex trafficking, I want to talk about a little bit because...
i'm curious i'm ignorant but i'm curious as to whether or not we have any um statutes in place that are comparable or to other states that are trying to fight sex trafficking what can legislatively what are we missing right now and what do we have in place in terms of fighting this awful you know, awful disease that has infiltrated our world. Oh, Jim, I think we need a much longer segment for this conversation if I'm going to address that.
We are woefully behind in having clarifying laws to bring justice in the area of human trafficking. We were able to get a small portion of law passed last year in the crime package House Bill 66. I was able to get the terms changed. instead of our loss saying child pornography, it is now called CSAM, child sexual abuse material. That is important. Because it shifts our mindset and thinking that child pornography is something that is protected by free speech.
Most people don't realize that pornography is protected by the First Amendment as a legal activity. However, children cannot consent. So child pornography is a misnomer. What it is, it's abuse and it should always be talked about as such. And and so that's one small thing. We did get another stronger statute that.
specifically deals with with traffickers but we need we need a lot more a broader approach to specifically deal with the crime of trafficking and exploitation and that's something that Governor Dunleavy's office has introduced year after year.
And I worked heavily on it this last term. And I introduced a slate of other bills that would help protect our kids. And I just want to bring us back to... you know the original conversation about the online stuff because people may be thinking what's the connection here what is what does this trafficking have to do with the online stuff of our kids and the reality is is that
Just like those predators who are seeking to infiltrate our kids and everyone with porn is that traffickers are preying upon our young people online. Most grooming happens online now. It's not just the snatch and grab that you see on movies. There's a story that Prysos Alaska shares, a true story about a...
a young person, I forget if she was 12 or 14, from Sildatna. And she was playing an online game called Animal Jam. I don't know. You have young kids. I don't know if you're familiar with Animal Jam. Totally innocent little cute cartoon characters. And she met a friend on there. And they're chatting and they built up a friendship over time.
And this friend says, hey, we have fun playing this game. Why don't you come over to this other platform and let's play this game? This young girl says, yeah, of course. And this... This person ended up grooming this young girl into a trusting relationship. He knew a lot about her and her family. And she ended up rendering... services at a hotel, depositing the money and never meeting her trafficker. And so it highlights just how.
how easy it is for groomers, for predators to be after our kids in something that we would have considered innocent, right? So by adding protections... online that requires parental consent and oversight is just one more step that we can take to safeguard our children from those who seek to harm them. Amen.
One of the things that I'm curious about, we only have two minutes left in this segment, so we may, I may have to, well, we won't be able to finish this whole question, but, you know, when I first started looking into the porn, age verification stuff i realized that there's opposition obviously i mean watching testimony not only in alaska but other places um it's boggling and
you know, boggles my mind to think that people would protect access to porn by children, but that's not necessarily what they're doing. I mean, as far as I can tell, I haven't heard anybody. in any state in any testimony say i'm here to stand for children's right to access porn no no they are agreeing even those in the adult entertainment
industry and the lobbyists that represent them are saying, we agree that it's not a good thing for these kids to be accessing adult entertainment. What we disagree with is the method. that is being proposed to to curtail it because it then infringes upon First Amendment rights. It has sort of a bycatch, you know.
effect in terms of, well, we say it's all about Pornhub, but then it ends up being that you can't access your Netflix account unless you put in all of your privacy, your data that's supposed to be private. I get, and I'm just trying to learn and not be maddened. by this pushback, not only on the age verification stuff, but for the sex trafficking. I'm sure that there's not anybody saying, oh, we believe in sex trafficking. But there's pushback that's being...
developed and implemented. And I want to talk to you about that from the sex trafficking side as well as the age verification side when we come right back after this short break, folks. I'm chatting with Representative Sarah Vance out of Homer. We'll be right back. Hey guys, welcome back. Jim Minnery chatting with Representative Sarah Vance out of Homer. We're chatting about edge verification. I wanted to get Sarah on the line.
to talk about some legislation that she introduced. We'll be introducing again this session, despite being in the, I don't want to say minority. I don't think that we're in the minority. Republicans have the majority. So I want to say something. I think in the Senate, I interviewed Senator Schauer, and he said, no, we're not the Senate majority. We're going to call ourselves the Republican caucus.
I mean, he didn't use the word minority because we're not in the minority. Let's not give them that. Correct. You know, it's Chuck Kopp and Louise Stoots that gave the power to the Democrats. when we had the majority as Republicans. So it's maddening. But anyway, what we were talking about before the break is the pushback that we're getting. from individuals regarding sex trafficking legislation as well as age verification for porn for minors legislation.
What kind of pushback are you getting or why is the state in terms of sex trafficking statutes that we can get in the books to make it more difficult for people to traffic up here? What kind of pushback are we getting from the likes of Matt Clayman and Judiciary now and others who are saying, no, no, there's.
There's not any need for that to happen, and do they have better solutions? Or what is the counter to the stuff that you'd like to see in place? Well, it comes down to they just don't want the accountability. I'm going to be frank. And I'm very, you may not be maddened about this, but I certainly am. Governor Dunleavy introduced the bill to address the crime of human and sex trafficking my first term six years ago.
And Matt Clayman has killed that bill every year since then. And I worked on that bill extensively in House Judiciary Committee this last term and really did a lot of robust work. I worked hard to separate out prostitution from sex trafficking because they are not exactly one in the same. And I received bipartisan support when I did that. I highlighted just how horrific.
human trafficking is and the impact to Alaskans. And I really had my Judiciary Committee absolutely disgusted about the topic, which was my goal. I want to talk about the realities. People need to know it's happening right in our own neighborhoods. Right on. But it got to the Senate, where Matt Clayman is now a senator and chair of Senate Judiciary, and he did not want to address it.
And Senator Shelley Hughes had an amendment on the Senate floor to bring in the bill. So he took one tiny slice and put it into the crime package. But he has been... largely resistant to strengthening any crime laws that especially that have to do with with sexual assault on any degree and I have a hard time understanding the why of that. It's one of those things that I have very little patience for because when...
Alaska has the highest rate of rape and sexual assault in the nation. And if we were to cut our numbers in half, we would still be number one. That's how bad the problem is. And I'm a person of justice. Well, yeah. So you can't recall one – like I said, regarding the age verification stuff, I've actually had some conversations with Democrats across the country.
and even in-state, and listened, like I said, online. I haven't seen any of the sex trafficking discussions on the Senate side, so I don't know where claimant's coming from, but I can say... that I somewhat understand because I see, at least in the case of some of the Democrats that I've listened to, that they genuinely want to stop.
porn from kids from seeing porn. And they're just trying to find the right mechanism. And I think in California, they're very close to doing something that I thought was almost unimaginable, which was, you know. pass something really, really good that pro-family, pro-life, pro-liberty Americans could support. And so I see some of the pushback from that side. But on the sex trafficking side, I just don't get it.
And, you know, maybe we'll switch to the age verification stuff here in a second. But this is he just thinking that is this a civil liberties perspective that Clayman has in mind? I just I'm trying to wrap my head around it. Well, I think there's an overall understanding that when it comes to exploitation and the more that we learn about it, the more there will be prosecutions of people in Alaska.
And I've heard him say that he does not want to increase the prison population. It's already very, very high in Alaska. And the other thing to keep in mind is that pornography... feeds and grooms traffickers. It is a tool, right? And they know that if we put an accountability measure by age verification, into sites like Pornhub that it's going to prick the conscience of those who are seeking that content. And as you know, there's 17 states who have...
have seen Pornhub walk away because their sales plummeted by having age verification on their website. So it's very effective. pornography just opens up a lot of social ills and and destroys relationships and and a lot of them you know once that that they open themselves up to that spirit it it becomes
It has an incredible appetite. And that's where they will seek out, you know, prostitutes and things like that, which often involves human trafficking. So it's one thing. It's deeply connected. One thing leads to another. So since I had opposition last year on that bill, I decided to go to the approach of the App Store Accountability Act.
And I just recently heard about this bill. I think it's a great approach because it doesn't discriminate on what the issue is. It just says, hey, these are kids. They shouldn't have free access to. anything that they want in the app stores, on social media, you know, whatever it is. And it would require age verification to access the app store.
parental consent for users under 18, and it links the devices of minors on the app stores to parents and guardians. So it puts the authority back in their hands. And it just requires a government-issued ID. for downloading apps. It's something that we already do. If you have a smartphone, an iPhone, it's likely that you already have your information in there.
and just says, hey, we're going to put this authority back into the hands of parents and make sure that children are not accessing these age-restricted material through digital app stores. And this has not been, I think you're saying, is it the American principles or American, what's the name of the group that you were working with on that app legislation? Is it American Principles Project? I think so. You're really testing me this morning. Well, I looked it up when you told me about it.
I don't know if it's been introduced yet, but we're, of course, supportive of that. We'll be very interested to see how that plays out. The challenge, of course, is going to be getting hearings. Do we know who's chairing? Thanks to Chuck Kopp and Louise Stutes, I like to say that as much as possible. Who is chairing judiciary in the House this year? We do. It is Representative Andrew Gray, the very man who... opposed my bill that would have required age verification for porn sites.
He made sure that people knew how to skirt the law by using a VPN and gave a step-by-step instruction about it. He hijacked the bill with stronger restrictions. for miters on social media. So he does have a desire to provide accountability measures for children. He really sees the harm that unfettered social media and digital access is doing to our kids. So I'm looking to find favor with him on this particular project because this isn't targeting pornography. This is saying, hey,
This will even help prevent your kids from just downloading Amazon with your credit card and buying packages that you didn't get permission to, right? Yeah. it doesn't discriminate on what the issue is but it does say hey we don't realize that when we get into these apps uh you know and digital services that you're entering a contract and miners
are not, don't have the authority to do that. And there's obligations and responsibilities. So this is a much broader approach, but it encompasses so many areas. And it says, hey, parents, we want you to be paying attention to what's going on here. And it makes the app store and the web services, the digital companies, accountable. Big tech.
have to have a part in this. They need to be held accountable to what they're doing with their kids. Amen. Folks, we're chatting with Representative Sarah Vance. We have one more episode right after this short break. Welcome back. Jim Minnery here on I'm Glad You Said That. Thanks for tuning in. We're chatting with my good friend Sarah Vance, representative out of Homer. I have to do this plug because I told you I would, Sarah. I would like to say...
future senator saravance um a lot of us have been thinking about you stepping up to the plate uh gary stevens is 80 something um and i've been told on a couple different sessions including this one that this is his last one um who knows you know he might die in office but uh Just to let the folks who are also interested in, you know, following politics and realizing that Gary Stevens and Bert Stedman are likely going to be retiring in hopefully the near future.
Is it something that you're considering at this point? It is something that I will give prayerful consideration to. I want to be exactly in the middle of the Lord's will. His seat is up in two years, and he is saying that he's retiring. At the end of this term, he will have served 26 years. Wow. a very long time he's been the senate president for eight years it's unprecedented uh you know we do need a stronger representation in our senate district
And I know it would make a positive impact in the Senate. But it is something that I don't take lightly because, you know, it's... I've learned very quickly the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence. So I will pray about it.
I get it. I get it. Yeah, it's not like it's going to have its share of problems and challenges and everything else. I mean, I think that the hesitation is very... admirable because I've always thought that people are too anxious about this particular public policy position or another.
um and and really excited about getting there you want enthusiasm of course but it's a high calling and as you know it's dark i mean you know especially as you know um in terms of principalities and you know we we fight not against flesh and blood and you know satan rules this earth and the in the seat of power is in government and so I've always thought that when you go down to Juneau, not only do we have the extra added bonus of being sequestered and away from the rest of the state.
and the weather that's often depressing. But it's a dark place. And so the higher calling of being in the Senate and representing a broader number of people is something that you should take very seriously and contemplatively. And so that's an encouraging word. We won't talk about it anymore. I just know that a lot of us are thinking about it and praying about it.
Anyway, so to finish up this segment, though, we have, just tell folks what you, so you introduced, I want to say, is it 254, the bill that you introduced last session? Yes, the age verification for porn sites. And so you got that. Just do a quick brief sort of 30,000 foot level. You got it was passed out of the house. but you um but like you said it was hijacked and it was a different bill but um it still passed the house with your vote
And I think Eastman was the only Republican that voted against it and maybe three or four other Democrats, but it passed pretty handily. Would you not be content with it the way it was passed in the House being? introduced again or just give kind of a folks what an idea of what happened with it well uh representative andrew gray amended it heavily and created it into a very different bill uh
What he told people was that it was the Florida bill that restricted minors on social media. But what he actually amended was very, very different. And Alaskans felt strongly that they didn't want that type of control. So it was amended back to my original bill in the first committee in the Senate. Thank you to Senator Bjorkman. He moved out of his committee very quickly, and then it died in Senate Judiciary under Matt Klayman. And so we have now...
Democrat-led House, and you're saying that you're going to be trying to find favor with Representative Gray as he chairs judiciary. One of the things that was encouraging to me when I was doing some research on this was there was a representative out of California, a Republican. Who introduced something very similar to HB 254 that you introduced regarding age verification for porn Access by children and not only did he get a hearing which
It's interesting because that's one of the deals that typically is made, as far as I can tell, with the Democrats and the likes of Chuck Kopp and Louis Stutes. When they give power to the Democrats, the Democrats say, well, we'll give you power. We'll let you be in a position of power, but we will not address or bring up some of these social issues. And this, of course, would probably be considered one of them.
Although, I guess we have hope because Andrew Gray has an interest in it. In other words, the new bill that you're wanting to craft and introduce is your sense that... it's a possibility despite the fact that we have a Democrat control in the House? I think it is a possibility because this has been a bipartisan issue, holding big tech accountable.
And making sure that our kids, you know, have some level of protections when it comes to technology. Because it's overwhelming. And especially with AI and things like that, it's coming so... It's changing so rapidly that I think people see, you know, as parents, hey, we need to have some sideboards on this. So I've already spoken with Rep Gray about it briefly, and he said, yeah, I'm interested.
Let's take a look. Because, hey, if there's things that we can work on together, I think most legislators are interested in that. This is broad enough. that it doesn't tip the scale one way or the other. I think the previous bill that required age verification for porn sites just kind of got too close to home for some people.
What isn't talked about is that pornography is so highly addictive and that it's a secret sin to a lot of people. I don't remember. You may be aware of the statistic of how many pastors. are secretly addicted to pornography. You know, the male mind, men are very visual. The addiction can come super quick. as well as women. This is also a female problem. I have someone dear to me who had an addiction as a woman because it was used, given to her as a young child, as a...
a teaching tool for the abuse that she was undergoing as a young girl. And she carried that burden as a believer, as a woman for years. And the Lord... um delivered her of that and she's completely free of it now so there is hope but it is it's one of those things that's really hard to talk about because it's so deeply personal and i think it it was just
really really complicated but i do want to say there was incredible testimony in support of my bill i was so humbled and overwhelmed at the people calling in and being vulnerable on the public record sharing a personal experience so if that's you if you're at one of those listeners thank you Thank you for opening yourself up and testifying in support of this bill. I'm not giving up hope. I'm just saying.
I don't think we're going to be able to accomplish it this session, so I'm taking a little bit different avenue right now. But I want you to know how much I appreciate the engagement because that's what it takes. is the engagement especially on these highly sensitive topics to help us get good bills passed in the legislature yeah well said i mean you know i remember uh i can't remember if it was you or there was maybe someone else down in
Another state that I was chatting with about this issue and they mentioned Billie Eilish. You know, I'm not a Billie Eilish fan necessarily. I think she's talented. I think she has bizarre messaging that's probably not good for youth in a lot of ways. She's like the new Madonna or whatever. She's been very, you know, very public about her addiction to porn and how it ruined her. And she says that it changed her mind, changed the chemical.
structure of her mind because it was so damaging and she's very so this crosses lines and we're going to continue to press it however we can and just so grateful for you sarah vance you're uh an amazing woman and uh we will be praying and seeing you soon god bless you and all the work that you do and continue to do and blessings to your family
as you embark down to the Capitol. I just can't thank you enough for being on the show today. Thank you, Jim. We'll see you soon. All right. We'll be back next week on I'm Glad You Said That.