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Battleground LIVE: Safeguarding Children from Trafficking | JEFF JAMES (Part 1)
01:15:47
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- [00:03]
Sean Parnell
Warning, you're about to enter the arena.
- [00:07]
Jeff James
And join the battle to save America.
- [00:10]
Sean Parnell
With your host, Sean Parnell. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Battleground Podcast. Today we have an incredible, incredible guest. Also timely, I'm sure you've seen the success of the movie the Sound of Freedom, which had beat Indiana Jones at the box office a couple of weeks ago. Absolutely incredible movie that brings a ton of attention to child traffic, child trafficking. It amazes me, you know, how this just misses people. People either don't pay attention to it, they don't want to pay attention to it, they turn a blind eye. But today we've got a guy I've known for a very, very long time, actually. His name is Jeff James. Jeff is a Secret Service age. For over 20 years, he protected US presidents, and he was also the Secret Service liaison for the national center for Missing and Exploited Children. And again, this is why I say this episode. So timely. So, Jeff, welcome to the show, man. I'm so grateful to have you here.
- [01:22]
Jeff James
Oh, thank you, Sean. I'm honored to be here.
- [01:24]
Sean Parnell
So. So we were talking in the virtual studio before getting on that. I. You were actually, I don't know if you were a gym teacher at Franklin Regional High School in West. We're both from Western Pennsylvania. But you were a teacher and we all called you Coach James. And I was in sixth grade.
- [01:41]
Jeff James
Yeah, I was actually teaching English and in the middle school and high school, and I was coaching football, so. So, yeah, and yeah, the way our paths crossed and then didn't cross again until you went on to the army and had your illustrious career, and then you came to a speaking event for the Clarion alumni, and we re engaged there. And that was. Geez, that was probably in 2010, maybe. Yeah, it was a while ago.
- [02:10]
Sean Parnell
Well, it's just so crazy how small of a world, you know, this. This crazy place that we live in now. And I just feel like even back when I was in sixth grade, I remember even as a student, people talking about, oh, well, Coach James, he wants to join the Secret Service. And this is probably. You didn't join till 96. So sixth grade. I mean, I was a freshman in 1996. So tell. Can you give. Give me a sense of. Of why, where did this desire to join the US Secret Service come from?
- [02:45]
Jeff James
Yeah. So, you know, I. I feel first that I have to say I'm blessed and fortunate that all I ever wanted to do growing up was either be a teacher or be a cop. And I've been blessed to do both. You know, I taught high school for six years there at Franklin. And then, you know, the opportunity came up through, through an acquaintance who was in the Secret Service who put the bug in my ear and said, hey, why don't you think about applying? And, you know, initially I was, you know, I said, you know, I don't have a law enforcement or military background. You know, I'm not what they're looking for. But, you know, what I know now is, you know, the Secret Service wants an intentionally diverse workforce. Not just, you know, male, female, black, white, but people from all backgrounds. Because we deal with people from all backgrounds. So, you know, we want, we want people who are not just culturally diverse, but experience wise diverse. So at that time, everything was still snail mail and everything took a lot longer. So, yeah, it probably was when you were in sixth grade when my experience started, my first application started. But it took about a full year and a half from my first application till when they called me and said, we'd like you to report for training. And the funny story to that too was it was August and we were on our second day of in services. We used to have three days of in service days for teachers before the kids came. And on the second day of in service, they called me and said, hey, you report September 30th. So I had to go in and tell the boss on the second day of in services that I was leaving in a couple of weeks. But they were able to replace me pretty easily. But yeah, that's how that happened. Just the desire I had to. An opportunity came along that really I never would have, never would have dreamed of and took the leap because there was still a chance, you know, I'm leaving a teaching job, a good job, still a chance that, you know, if something went wrong in training and I didn't pass that I was going to come back unemployed and be looking for, looking for another job. But, you know, again, blessed and fortunate to get through, get through the training and, you know, and serve 22 years so.
- [04:59]
Sean Parnell
Well, tell me about that. Tell me first about the risk, because that, that is a real risk. In Western Pennsylvania or in Pennsylvania in general, getting a teaching job, especially at a place like Franklin Regional, is very, very, very difficult and super competitive. Sometimes people wait years or they'll sub for years before they can get. So there must have been something driving. You must have really wanted to do this and be willing to risk, you know, what, what's a great, a great career, one that's obviously fulfilling to, to serve something greater than yourself.
- [05:35]
Jeff James
Yeah. And it was just that. Just an opportunity that was too good to pass up. That was really. It was worth rolling the dice over. And it's a lot different now. You know, teachers are like nurses and cops, right? They're in such dire need right now. But back then, you know, the state universities were putting out 1500 teachers a year, and it was cutthroat. Everybody was moving south. You know, if you go to Virginia and Florida, there's a slew of. Slew of teachers who graduated from Clarion and Edinburgh and IUP that all went south for jobs in that time. But, you know, even my dad said to me, you know, my dad got out of high school and went to work for US Steel and never looked back. And he was that generation where you were loyal and you worked one job your whole life. And I remember him saying to me, you know, you're 29. Are you sure you want to do this? I'm like, I hope I'm going to live past, you know, 40. But. But yeah, it was. It was a risk and it. And it worked out for me, but it. I got to be honest with you, I. I was going to do it regardless. You know, it was certainly worth the chance to take.
- [06:45]
Sean Parnell
So, I mean, it's clearly something that, you know, when we have these opportunities presented to us in life, it's something. At least for me, I've known when something unique presents itself, because oftentimes we wonder. I mean, at least I do, you know, am I on the right path? What am I supposed to be doing, even if I'm working? Something that's. That's fulfilling and I like and I enjoy. And by the way, teaching would be one of those things. Being in front of a classroom, teaching kids would be. Would be awesome. But there's always something deep within the recesses of myself or even my soul, where I feel like this is what I'm meant to do. And it sounds like. It sounds like the U.S. secret Service was something like that for you.
- [07:29]
Jeff James
Yeah, it was. You know, I studied a lot about it before I even applied. And, you know, getting, you know, because everybody knows the Secret Service, how they protect the president, vice president, but getting a whole look at the entire mission, you know, what my career might look like, what. What 20 years down the road might look like, what 10 years down the road might look like. Because I'll be honest with you, it's not something that's for everybody. You know, I'll have friends who reach out to me and say, hey, I know this kid who, you know, great Kid thinks he might want to go into the Secret Service, and I'll have a conversation with him about it and they'll say something like, well, you know, I really don't want to relocate. Or, you know, really, I really don't want to. Yeah, I really don't want to travel. And I'm frank with them about. Because one of the best things that happened for me was the people who eventually on the job became my mentors as I was going through the hiring process, were just very honest with me about, hey, you're going to miss birthdays and anniversaries and holidays for, for lack of a better term, you jettison a lot of your freedom because it's such a small number of people dedicated to this mission. And we're plug and play, right? Like, John gets sick, somebody has to fill a spot. So it was, you know, a good, good amount of short notice travel, a good amount of travel where I was gone for, you know, there was several times in my career where I was gone for well over a month. And it's just, it's really not, not for everyone. And, you know, again, blessed and fortunate that I married a gal who was very independent, could, you know, if a pipe broke in the house, she knew exactly what to do. You know, not to fix it herself necessarily, but you know who to call to get it fixed. And I saw, I saw men and women that I worked with struggle with that on the other end that, you know, maybe had a spouse that wasn't as independent, and they were, you know, on the road constantly worried about what was going on back home. And that created another stressor for them that can really wear you down. The personal stuff will wear you down more than the professional stuff, for sure.
- [09:49]
Sean Parnell
Oh, it's so true. I mean, when I was in Afghanistan, I wasn't married, and I look back on that time and I think I'm glad I wasn't. You know, it would be. It would have been so tough on, on a relationship and even tougher on the kids. But you, it's. It's. What you did in the Secret Service is not dissimilar to what men and women in uniform do all the time in terms of sacrificing their freedom for a job to serve this country. So, Jeff, what was it like? Because you said it took a full year and a half from the time you filled out that application until you got, until you got the call, did you think that they were ever going to call? And what was it like when you got the call that you were good to go.
- [10:31]
Jeff James
Well, it, you know, they give you little indicators that you're getting close. Like I remember, I, they sent me for a physical. I had to go to the federal building in downtown Pittsburgh for a physical. And the nurse said to me, well, when do you report for training? And I said, oh, I'm, I'm not even close to that yet. And, and she goes, I don't know. And she pointed to the top of the form and the top of the form said pre employment physical. And that's when I realized, holy crap, I better go out and start doing pull ups and get ready for this. And the only step left after that for me was the polygraph examination. And fortunately I passed that. But that was still probably six months prior to them actually calling and saying you're good to go. It's about an eight step process, the application process of, you know, it's a couple interviews in front of single agents and panels of agents. You do. What they didn't do with me that they do now is a pre employment PT test. Back then you didn't do it. You did your first PT test when you, when you reported the training. But it's, you know, the part that takes the longest amount of time is the background investigation is pretty extensive. And then they do a physical and then the last piece of it is the polygraph. And the last statistic I got from a contact of mine who's still in. And this was, it's a little bit stale because this was at Christmas was there was about one person passing for every 248 that took the polygraph.
- [12:04]
Sean Parnell
Get out of here. These are people that pass the polygraph, Jeff.
- [12:08]
Jeff James
No, it's one passes for every 248 that take it.
- [12:12]
Sean Parnell
Oh, yeah. So the Secret Service, Crazy.
- [12:16]
Jeff James
Yeah. Like every other law enforcement agency is struggling, is struggling to hire. And it's. And you know, the things they ask you are the things they want to make sure of is, you know, we're not hiring a spy. We're not hiring the next Robert Hanson. They want to make sure you're not extortable. So if, you know, if I'm into, if I'm in deep to some guy in the mafia because I can't stop betting on the Steelers, right? Like, they want to make sure I'm not extortible. They ask you about drug history, they ask you about criminal history. They just ask you, did you ever commit a crime that you didn't get arrested for? And there was a time in my career when I was at the national center where I was working very closely with our polygraph examiners, and one of them told me that he had. He's had applicants admit to everything from arson to child molestation. Now, the results of a polygraph aren't admissible in court, but anything you admit during it is. That's why the first thing they do before they give you the polygraph is they read you your rights. You're Mirandized before you take a polygraph.
- [13:25]
Sean Parnell
Because this is crazy.
- [13:29]
Jeff James
Yeah. If you admit to something bad enough, we're going to say, hey, you know, do you have an unsolved arson from. Yeah. Okay. We think we might have your guy. And, you know, we. We're still law enforcement. We still have the obligation to do that. Yeah. So the. So the passage rate is tough. And very frankly, it should be. Like, there are these things that should be hard to do. Right. It should be hard to be a pilot and fly hundreds of souls all over the country. It should be hard to be a surgeon, and it should be hard to be not just a Secret Service agent. But it should be hard to be in law enforcement at any point when you have the capability on your hip every day to use deadly force. You know, we should make sure we're bringing people on who are making good decisions and who are dedicated to training and who are. Want to be masters in their crafts, just like that surgeon would be. So it is tough, as tough as it is on the existing manpower, to be shorthanded all the time. It. It should be tough to bring new people on.
- [14:29]
Sean Parnell
Well, I mean, can you imagine why. Why do you. Why would people volunteer to serve in the US Secret Service if they committed arson or child molestation or something horrific like that?
- [14:45]
Jeff James
Well, I'll tell you an even better story. The story. So when you sign up for a tour of the White House, which I know you've done, you give your name, date of birth, Social Security number. We would have people show up for tours at the White House who had active warrants, and we would contact the jurisdiction that had the warrant for them and just say, hey, do you want to come get them? And sometimes they'd say, no, it's just for traffic. We're not going to come. But the one time there was a woman who deserted from the United States army in 1974, and she was coming for a White House tour. She had changed her name. You know, been married, changed her name. And this was in. Oh, geez, oh, five, maybe 2005. And Army CID came to the gate and met her there. And Took her away and she said, you know, I just figured they stopped looking for me.
- [15:43]
Sean Parnell
Oh my God.
- [15:45]
Jeff James
So, yeah, can you imagine?
- [15:47]
Sean Parnell
That's crazy.
- [15:48]
Jeff James
And she's there with her husband and her kids who never really knew any of that. So. Yeah, you know. Yeah. Why would you sign up for a White House tour? Why would you, why would you subject yourself to a polygraph knowing that you had this, this criminal history in your background? So holy cow.
- [16:08]
Sean Parnell
Well, what was the trait? So you make it. So you pass the polygraph. You start doing, doing sit ups, push ups, pull ups, whatever, whatever to get in shape. Where, tell me about the training. Where do you go? I, I have absolutely. It's not, you're not going to like Langley, obviously you're not. I mean, what do you do? Where do you go?
- [16:26]
Jeff James
Well, so the, so basic training is six months long and it's, it's split into two three month halves. The first three months are at the Federal Law Enforcement Training center either in Glynco, Georgia or Artesia, New Mexico. I went down to Glynco and that's where, you know, you get your base of federal law. You learn about, you know, writing a federal search warrant. You learn about the federal laws that you'll be, you'll be in enforcing overall as a federal agent. So it's a lot of classroom, but then it's all the stuff you'd also expect from a, from a, from an academy. It's a lot of, you know, running and jumping and shooting. So after that three months, anybody who goes there kind of goes off to their own academy. So the Secret Service Training center is in Beltsville, Maryland. It's about a 250, 250 acre site we have out there. And that's where we really hone in on our mission. So it's a lot of classroom stuff. You know, one of the things people might not know about the Secret Service is that the Secret Service also has the investigative mission of securing all financial obligations. So we chase counterfeiters. In fact, when the Secret Service was established on April 14, 1865, that was the sole purpose of its establishment was to, was to counteract counterfeiting. Because about a third of all the currency in circulation after the Civil War was fake. It was putting the economy into a spiral. And Abraham Lincoln said, hey, we got to do something to fix it. So he created this new federal law enforcement agency called the Secret Service. The twist of historic irony, and I know you're a history buff like I am, is the President creates the Secret Service. April 14th, 1865, with no intention of there ever being presidential protection. And that night, he goes to Ford's Theater and gets assassinated. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, you talk about historic moments of historic irony. So the Secret Service was very successful in suppressing counterfeiting. In fact, by the end of the 1860s, they had already put thousands of counterfeiters in jail. That's how big of a problem it was. But then we jump ahead to 1881. Charles Guiteau kills President Garfield. And then, I'm sorry, 1888. And then in 1901, Leon Czolgoz killed President McKinley. And at that point, Congress said, look, we need somebody to protect the presidents. The only two federal agencies created at the time were the Secret Service and U.S. marshals. And for. For whatever reason, from everything I find, I can find that historians aren't even actually sure why, but Congress handed that responsibility to the Secret Service. So after President McKinley was killed in 1901, Teddy Roosevelt became the first president to get Secret Service protection. But that's a dual role we still have. So we still do the protection. That's what everybody knows us for. But the other thing is we chase counterfeiters.
- [19:29]
Sean Parnell
Gosh, I didn't know that about Lincoln's assassination and the founding and the Secret Service. But that is, you know, fate is not without a sense of irony, as they say, I guess. But my gosh, I. So you're at the second part of your training.
- [19:47]
Jeff James
Yeah, and that's the point I was going to make, was that's where we learn about counterfeit. Like, we learn all the properties of genuine currency.
- [19:55]
Sean Parnell
So tell us about it, because I have genuinely no idea about any of this.
- [20:00]
Jeff James
So there's one way genuine currency is printed. And our thing is we don't have to know. We don't have to be experts on counterfeit, because there's hundreds of ways to make counterfeit. We just need to be experts on genuine currency. Because anything that's not genuine is by virtue of not being genuine counterfeit. Because you could use dot matrix printers, you could use, you know, typographic prints, however you want to make the counterfeit. But there's only one way that the genuine currency is made. And we even went up to Crane Paper Co. In upstate New York that makes. They make the paper that currency's printed on. And we learned how the paper was made. So we really learned every piece of how genuine currency is, how the paper's made, how it's printed, how it's cut. Like all the little numbers you see on the bills, they all have it. That denotes to the faceplate where it was in those big sheets that get printed. That all tells you something about the currency. And then we also learned everything about our protective mission. And, and one of the things we did, you know, we have a big miniature city built out there, so we practice getting attacked all the time. And, and you know, it's, it's probably a lot. Not, probably not as intense as what you did in the army. But the philosophy is, you know, you die a thousand times in training so you can live in real life. And they really did. They put us in some no win situations so that if it ever came, real legends going down range, you know, you'd really pull back on that. And the best thing I can say about the Secret Service is training was a career long endeavor. One of the things I, I could, if I could wave a wand in Pennsylvania and change it is a police officer in Pennsylvania needs to qualify once a year with their weapon. So you can shoot in January of 2023 and not technically not have to shoot until December of 2024 to be certified for those two years. So you can go 22 months without pulling the trigger. I would change that immediately if I had the power to change something. But, and I tell the men and women who I work with now, you know, take practice ammo, take all you want. You know, I bought a bunch, it's sitting in there. I'm getting ready to buy more this week and just go out and practice in the Secret Service. When I was in Washington D.C. for 18 years, we had to shoot at least once a month. So we were constantly pulling triggers because, and you know, it's all that muscle memory and repetition and, and you know, when you're, when you're getting tunnel vision and your heart's beating, you, you know that, that level of training that you're going to fall to, we wanted it to be, we want it to be as high as possible.
- [22:50]
Sean Parnell
When so much of what you do is, is scenario based. I mean, if you, if you're not pulling the trigger for 22 months and maybe you're just target shooting, you know, if you're qualifying, you're not. I mean, there are a million different scenarios that could pose a threat to either you, your, your buddies, you know, somebody that you're trying to protect, and if all you've done is shoot a piece of paper to qualify, you're sure. How could you possibly be ready for all of the nightmare scenarios that could come your way?
- [23:18]
Jeff James
Yeah, and, and look, I think you know, I, the, the reason it bothers me the most isn't because of. I'm not saying like, oh, I came from a better place. The reason it bothers me the most is I want every cop to go home at night.
- [23:36]
Sean Parnell
Exactly. Exactly. Right.
- [23:38]
Jeff James
And you know, if, if, and I tell them, you know, I told anybody who listens to me, you know, take training personally because that guy, just like you, right, that guy wants to kill you just like you experienced in real life in Afghanistan. And if he's 3ft away or if he's 100ft away, are you going to be able to put accurate fire on him? Are you going to move to cover? Are you going to use concealment? You know, so, you know, they get sick of hearing me talk about it. I talk a lot about mental reps and dry firing and all these things we can do in kind of quiet moments that still get your reflexive mind and your reflective mind to come together to put you in a better place.
- [24:21]
Sean Parnell
I, that is so spot on. I couldn't agree more. And it's those little things, Jeff, if left unattended in training can come. Can be very big things, problematic things in a real life scenario. And so. Okay, so take me back to. I have a question about the currency. Is the process, is it, is it known? Is it public? Could somebody say, could a counterfeiter say, okay, well, I know where they make the paper. I know how it's cut, I know how it's printed. Can't, can someone just do the same thing? How would you tell the difference?
- [25:03]
Jeff James
You could if you had enough money. So making genuine counterfeiting, genuine currency so that it could pass is going to be expensive. And one of the things we found is state sponsored counterfeiting of these other countries trying to infiltrate our economy with counterfeit currency because they know it'll weaken the dollar. You know, specifically, there was a note that was coming out of North Korea that got dubbed the supernote. It was so good. It was a hundred counterfeit hundred dollar bill. And. But it's, it's essentially state sponsored. A state sponsored terror attack on our economy is what it was for.
- [25:48]
Sean Parnell
I've never heard. This is never in the news. I mean.
- [25:52]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [25:52]
Sean Parnell
Crazy. How does, how does North Korea get something like that? How is it shipped here? How do they, how do they get that? Get. Well, those hundred dollar bills here.
- [26:01]
Jeff James
Yeah, I mean you can. Whatever comes over in courier bags to, to embassies and consulates. I'm sorry, I couldn't think of that word.
- [26:16]
Sean Parnell
That's okay.
- [26:17]
Jeff James
Is, it isn't, isn't searched. Like they, they bring it over and it just like our stuff that goes overseas to our embassies and consulates, you know, they do. Those countries do the courtesy of not, you know, going in our bags and stuff like that. So that's, that's probably how it gets over here. And then it's given to, you know, their operatives who are here on the ground and it's, it's distributed. It never gets to the point, point where it's going to, they can't. That's too small of a ding to truly damage our, our economy. But it is, it is state sponsored, a state sponsored terror attack, just like I said, on our economy. You know, it's.
- [26:56]
Sean Parnell
Wow.
- [26:57]
Jeff James
And just to give you some real numbers. And again, these are a little bit stale, but the last numbers I got were the three big cities. New York, Miami and Los Angeles. Those three cities take in about $100,000 a week in counterfeit currency. So just those three cities alone account for $15 million a year in counterfeit Western Pennsylvania. The last statistic I got was that it was about $7,000 a week in counterfeit. So it's still a substantial enough problem like you would think in 2023, who's still going to try to make fake money, but it's still substantial enough that we need to. When I say we, I mean that the Secret Service needs to, needs to chase it down.
- [27:37]
Sean Parnell
And they do that once it's in circulation. Jeff. I mean, for all I know, I, I don't. But I mean, I could. How would I know if somebody's so good, you know, how do you, how do you hold people accountable for spending counterfeit money once it's in circulation that they might not know is even counterfeit when they have it?
- [27:55]
Jeff James
Yeah, we would get that. And, and it's. You just figure that out through your investigation. So you know how, say a bad guy goes to target with three fake twenties. Excuse me. And they, you know, they give it to the cashier and then you come in with $100 bill that's genuine, and they give you those three 20s back. Then your next stop is, I don't know, a 711 and they catch it. You know, the local police are going to come, you know, they're going to detain you. We're going to come and talk to you and look, it's going to be a miserable 24 hours for you.
- [28:29]
Sean Parnell
That would suck. Can you imagine? That would suck so badly. That would be terrible.
- [28:35]
Jeff James
While we figure it out. But, you know, we're going to look at, you know, because we track every note because here's the thing, counterfeiters, while some of them are very good, they're also lazy. Right. They're not changing a lot of serial numbers. So we'll say, all right, this serial number has been seen from the Carolinas up through New York. And we look at your travel and we say, we know Sean hasn't left western Pennsylvania the last six months. So we know you're probably not out there distributing counterfeit currency. You know, you're going to be out 60 bucks. And like I said, it's going to be a miserable 24 hours while we background a little bit. But yeah, that good people get stuck with bad money once in a while, unfortunately. And I'll tell you who I feel worse for is, you know, somebody goes in, like I said, to Target, you know, Target's a big company. They're going to charge $0.02 more for shampoo and cereal and stuff like that. But you got a mom and pop store, you know, where they're trying to pay insurance, rent, employees, you know, they get defrauded a couple times a month out of a couple hundred bucks. And that can, that can be significant to a small business owner. So that's where, that's where I'm glad we were, we were aggressive about it, was to really help the merchants who were getting defrauded.
- [29:48]
Sean Parnell
Well, I'm, like, so fascinated by this. And you're right, that was. My next question was about small businesses. You know, some of the larger corporations can probably handle it or they haven't insurance to cover themselves or whatever. You know, probably spend a hundred million dollars a year on lawyers alone to help them deal with stuff like this. But, you know, there are lots of small businesses and, you know, all over this country, in fact, that's the backbone of our economy is the American small business. And, you know, you're right. A few hundred bucks a month is counterfeit. That adds up very, very quickly to some of these people who, especially if you're just starting out in the first two or three years of your small business, you're not, you aren't making a profit. You're not in the black yet. So that could be something that make or breaks you. And what's crazy to me is that I never, and I mean never hear about this stuff on the news. I don't think I've ever heard of a counterfeit story, counterfeit money story on any of the national media and any of the blocks of the last 15 years. Maybe I'm just not paying attention, but.
- [30:49]
Jeff James
Well, if you googled it, you'd find it probably the last big story you'd see was, and I'm guessing maybe three or four years ago, the Secret Service actually reopened its office in Peru because the influx of counterfeit coming from Peru was starting to be significant. And they had a pretty big seizure down there. I think they seized $20 million in counterfeit US currency. So that was a big win, not just for the Secret Service, but for, you know, for the United States and all. And we're fortunate too that the, you know, the government down there is cooperative and finding, helping us find these people and they're, you know, putting them in jail where you get some parts of the world where, you know, they, they wouldn't let us touch one of their citizens and even if we knew who it was, they weren't going to do anything to them. So.
- [31:37]
Sean Parnell
Wow.
- [31:37]
Jeff James
So at least the Peruvians were cooperative with us.
- [31:41]
Sean Parnell
Well, yeah, this is something that most Americans aren't even. I mean, you always hear somebody that might be carrying a counterfeit 20 or something. But I, it makes sense when you say it, you know, that other state sponsored bad actors would do something like this to attack our economy. And it makes you wonder. You know, of course they're, we're always under threat of cyber attack, of course our elections are always under threat from foreign entities try to undermine us. It's like, it's like this country is under attack from our enemies almost every single day. And most Americans don't even realize it, Jeff. They just go about their daily lives. And that's a great thing because that's part of what it means to live in a free country. Yeah, but there are people out there that like you, who for 20 plus years stood on the parapet to guard against some of these threats. What do you make of all that? Having seen, having seen the dark side, so to speak. Like, how do you, can you, can you, can you relax now after you've done 20 some years?
- [32:40]
Jeff James
Well, you know, the first thing I want to say is, you know, the service I put into our country pales in comparison to the service that you put in. So let's just establish that right off the line.
- [32:51]
Sean Parnell
Thank you. But. Thank you for saying that. But I, I don't know, Jeff. There's something about Secret Service agents who are willing to, you have to be willing to lay down your life or take a bullet for the people that you're protecting. That's a whole different thing, you know? Yeah, I volunteered to serve after 911 and went and got blown up a bunch of times in Afghanistan. But it's not like. It's not like I wanted. It's not like I wanted to get blown up. Like, if you see a threat like you. You people are. Will, you're crazy. You're willing to jump in the. In front of a bullet to save somebody that you're protecting. That's a level of dedication that just is unbelievable rare.
- [33:29]
Jeff James
Our big thing was if our preparation, our advance work and using the assets that we had was if all that was done right, it would never get to the point where we had to jump in front of a gun. So when I would do a trip and I got off Air Force One with the President, I was confident that the men and women who were on the ground already for a week setting everything up, are having us walk into the most secure environment we could. And, you know, it's been a long time. You know, the last legitimate attempt on the life of the President was, you know, when Ronald Reagan. March 30, 1981, when John Hinckley shot Ronald Reagan. And, you know, there's been scares and we've stepped in front of plots and, you know, again, I don't know as much since I've left, but, you know, there were several significant plots during my time that were that our intelligence partners, CIA, nsa, FBI, fed to us and we were able to get in front of. But the biggest thing that I always remember and I thought about every day was we haven't had a landslide victory for president since Ronald Reagan beat Mondale. In fact, we've had a few where the person who lost the popular vote became president. So, you know, I made sure that I was always cognizant of the fact that every time we took the President out of the White House, 50% of the people who were putting eyes on him didn't want him to be president. And, and, you know, when. When I. And it doesn't matter if they're holding up a sign that says they think he's great, you know, that's. That's easy to fake. Right? So, yes. And I would, you know, anytime I got the chance to, to be in a leadership role, I would, I would tell, you know, we do our briefings before the shift, and I just say, hey, let's. Let's go. Let's start the day assuming today is going to be the day we get attacked. So when it happens, it doesn't surprise you, like, let's put ourselves in that mental place already. And, you know, it's just. I know I was blessed and fortunate to do it, and it was just a mission. I love the mission of protection was like, the investigations were okay, but I really, I love the protection. I'm glad that's what the majority of my career was. Was dedicated to. And, and, you know, even the time I spent at the national center was. Some of the things I got to do there were. Were unique, and they were great opportunities for me. And so you say about, you know, looking at the dark side, you know, that that was one of the. And I've been frank about this in public before. I heard stories there of things that happen to children that I will never repeat because. And I get a little bit emotional about this because very frankly, I don't want it to live in anyone else's head. Like, I don't want my wife to know about it. I don't want my kids to know about it. I don't want you to know about it. And I used to say to people, if you don't believe in the death penalty, spend a week over there and see what people do to kids. See what people do to their own kids. And you will change your mind about what kind of people should have the privilege of living on this earth and what kind shouldn't. Because that mission, and I'll tell you, the people that work there and the people that have worked there for decades, they're better people than I am because their ability to see these things and withstand them, and very frankly, there were some people that worked there. I remember one girl, she was an analyst, she just called one day and said, I'm never coming back. And when my time at NCMEC was done, her stuff was still sitting on a box in a shelf because she never even came back to get her stuff. It's. It's tough stuff to see every day. And it, you know, so that, you know, people hate for all kind of reasons, like people want to kill the president. They want to kill candidates. That almost runs off my back a little bit. But the time I spent, you know, seeing how people hurt. Hurt kids, that's. That's really. You want to talk about a dark, dark stuff to see. That's. That's it right there.
- [37:47]
Sean Parnell
Well, let's, let's talk about that and go. Go where the conversation takes us, because I want to hear about your time protecting the presidents as well, you know, and get a sense of how you go from, you know, a new agent to presidential detail. But let's stick with this, in your time as liaison for the national center for Missing and Exploited Children, is that, that would you say is ncmec? The acronym is ncmec, Correct?
- [38:13]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [38:15]
Sean Parnell
Everything that you see with the sound of freedom today and the movie with Jim Caviezo came out, I mean, it was a mega, mega successful at the box office. So a couple things. First of all, I think people clearly recognize that child trafficking is a real problem, I think, which is why you see the movie as successful as it is when you look at everything that's happening at the border. Clearly our enemies are using an open southern border to traffic children. And the more I read about how horrific this stuff is, the cartels, the cartels prefer it almost because children can be resold. Whereas, you know, you sell cocaine or something, it's. You sell it and it's gone. Children can be resold over and over again and it's horrifying. You know, I read an article the other day saying that at the height of slavery in this country, 380 some thousand African Americans were brought to this country. But the numbers are almost just as bad today with children and adults being trafficked across the border. Although you're not seeing the auctions and the people in shackles. It's all happening behind the curtain. It's just as bad, Jeff. And, and I mean that it's, it's just as bad and may, maybe, maybe it's even worse because no one sees it. It's off of people's radar. And I, it, I. Why. I have so many questions for you on this topic, but why does the media, why does it seem like the media is working overdrive to make it seem like this is just some sort of conspiracy theory?
- [39:59]
Jeff James
So that part I don't know. But I will tell you, the reason you don't see the auctions and people in shackles is because it's all done online. Now. You can go online, rent a child for sexual exploitation. It is strikingly easy. Now, you do it enough times, eventually you're going to get caught, right? But that child is going to be abused hundreds and hundreds of times in their lifetime. And then once they reach a point where they age out and they're no longer desirable to the perversions of a pedophile, very frankly, they're murdered. Some of the nice ones will send them on their way, but say, go, we're done with you now. And they're damaged permanently, mentally and physically. But some of them, like these pimps, will just kill that kid and go find another one. And look, this isn't. If you don't think it's real, this isn't hard to find out. If anybody listening to you has their doubts. If you Google like underage sex thing, you'll find that in all these big events that happen, whether it's the Super Bowl, All Star Games, these guys who are trafficking these kids will gravitate to those large events. They'll put advertisements online and they'll sell these kids during like All Star Weekend like we have coming up for the, for the, for Major League Baseball and the FBI, the marshals, Secret Service all get together, they form these task forces and they, they go in and they arrest all these guys. And you'll see like 40 kids will get rescued in a weekend and 15 of the, you know, pimps will be, will be arrested. I mean it's, it's striking. And we were talking in the studio prep earlier that, you know, I found, I realized the date, I said it wrong earlier. It was May 21st of 2022. A 14 year old girl was at a Denver or a Dallas Mavericks game with her dad and she excused herself to go to the bathroom and she never came back. And here in this arena full of 20,000 people, some guy grabbed her by the arm and took her away. And she was, I think it was a couple weeks later she was finally rescued. But he was trafficking her, like took her. Think of all the security in an NBA game. Like took her out of this game. So look, if you want to put your head in the sand, that's fine. But I'll tell you, you know, my kids are 16, 14 and 11 and we talk a lot not to scare them, we talk about precautions. You know, I tell people all the time, take 20 minutes at your dinner table once a week and talk about whatever. What if we get separated in target? What if we get, what if the house catches on fire? You know, these little touch points that you're going to give your kids are going to be life. Very frankly, it could be life saving.
- [43:03]
Sean Parnell
You know, we got to tell us right now because first of all, I'm like you. I'm getting emotional about this. How the hell does something like this happen in the most advanced nation the world has ever known in the freest. I mean this is. I watched a podcast with Navy Seshawn Ryan show he had some guy on there who is an ethical, what they call an ethical hacker who would go after these online websites that you talked about, hack into the, to the background of them and give law enforcement all of this, all of this information, people's address, these pedophiles who prey on these kids. And what struck me is first of all, how local law enforcement, God bless them, because they're heroes. They go to work every day, they don't know if they're ever coming back. Jeff. And they, they're, they're heroes in our society and they protect us just like, just like you did on the secret side Service. But how, how just unequipped they are to deal with stuff like this. And a lot of they say, oh, this stuff isn't admissible because you hacked it. Like what? But, but like there. He would tell stories, Sean, in this, in this other guy on his podcast would tell stories about how they would know about these people would know about these pedophiles. They're watching these pedophiles, but they don't have enough to actually do a sting or go after them because they don't have a case built yet. So they're just watching over and over again this pedophile doing terrible things to kids so they can build a case. It's like, well, what about the damn kid who's, who's been targeted for a year? And you know, he's being targeted for a year? It's almost like I'm saying this not you, but it's almost. You ever see that movie Untouchables? It's almost like we need a unit like that that just operates behind the scenes with no bureaucratic red tape and just goes after these assholes. Because I cannot believe that we allow this to happen in America. I just cannot believe it.
- [44:44]
Jeff James
Yeah. And you know the message I send to parents. And look, I'm not the perfect parent. I tell my kids all the time, you know, I get, I get a lot of stuff wrong. You know, I tell them I get it wrong. But don't ever question how much I love you. Like, you know, that thing. But. So I will never judge you as a parent, but here's how I. There's one way I'm going to judge you as a parent. If you don't know what your kids are doing online, if you don't know where they're going and who they're going with, I'm going to judge you a little bit because guess what? That's how the bad guys are going to get to your kid. Through the gaming systems, through the online chat. You know, they're, they're going to, you know, if you let, look, kids aren't built to make good decisions. Like 15 year olds aren't good built 12 year olds, they're not built that way. Their mind isn't ready yet, so they need our protection. Like these people that say, like, I had one case of a. Of a woman, her daughter was, was trafficked for a very short time, and we were able to. And when I say we, I mean federal law enforcement, local law enforcement. We were able to get her recovered. And even after she was recovered, I was having a conversation with the mother about, hey, you know, make sure you're watching what happens on her phone. Look, look at who's talking to her. And she said, well, I don't want to invade her privacy. That's her phone. And I'm like, are you, are you kidding me? Like, you know, the message I send to my kids is, you know, you'll get your privacy when you're. You're an adult and out of the house. You know, if you're under my roof, you know, we're gonna, we're gonna have talks and I'm gonna protect you. And it's. You just really need. There's so many negative forces trying to get to your kids. And look, you know, I grew up, I'm the youngest of seven kids. My mother's two brothers lived right next door to each other, not far from where I grew up, just about three miles away. Between the two of them, they had 20 kids. You know, I wasn't as close with my dad's side, but, you know, I had an aunt I was closer to. And so I had all these people who were, you know, role models for me, who were the coaches. You know, I had great teachers and I was very for. I went to a high school. My high school wasn't great, but, you know, I had, I had some quality people there. You know, we had involvement in sports and stuff like that. So it was, you know, I guess the old saying, it takes a village, right? And very frankly, it was a lot of people who were praying for me when I wasn't even smart enough to pray for myself, you know, and again, I. Something I get emotional about, but I think that's something else that's missing. You know, my wife and I both work full time, but we still have that time for our kids. And look, and I know a lot of super single parents, but. But it is. So it's so tough to just keep track. But that would be my one piece of advice is if, you know, you just got to know what your kids are doing online, you got to know who they're with. And I know it's hard for Harder for single parents when you're, when you're just running that solo. But you know, the, you know, when, when that unit, when that family unit dissolves, those kids are going to look for affection and from whoever's giving it to them or attention whoever's given it to them. And it's not always people who have good intentions.
- [48:01]
Sean Parnell
And it's so hard today, Jeff, because, you know, I feel like things are so different for kids today because with, with the Internet now, I mean, you look back, I mean, the Internet was like not even a thing when I was. I mean, it may be like towards the tail end of my high school, it was in its infancy and stuff. And like I remember going on to Napster and like getting on the queue and downloading Metallica songs or something. Something, you know, like way. And it would take, it would take four, four days to download One Star or something. Like it was like it was nothing back then. And cell phones were just flip phones. Now we got these phones that, like, they're like a computer. All the information in the world right in the palm of your hands. And in it, you know, most parents, I think it's reasonable to say, you know, I want my teenagers to have a cell phone. If they're out in the event of emergencies, they can call. But these kids, you know, bullying takes on a whole different spin in today's day and age because it's like back in the day, someone wants to, someone wants to bully you. It happens at school at least you can. You know, you get home and you put it behind you for some time. Now you can't because it's on your phone and you got social media and these bullies are posting stuff on social media. But by the same token, it's like they're. Our kids are constantly exposed to this stuff.
- [49:19]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [49:20]
Sean Parnell
And if they have a phone, like, there's always the possibility and the threat that, that, that they're talking to something. It might be a completely innocent thing, you know, where you have a kid talking to someone who they think is a kid, but it's not a kid.
- [49:33]
Jeff James
Right.
- [49:33]
Sean Parnell
You know.
- [49:34]
Jeff James
Oh, you're exactly right. I mean, you're right on all that.
- [49:36]
Sean Parnell
You just have to be so vigilant, it seems. But it's like you talked about the challenge of single parenting. It's challenge. Even if you're, even if you're married, it's just you. It's a constant thing. And you were talking about how you still walk your daughter to the restroom even today.
- [49:53]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [49:53]
Sean Parnell
Because as a parent you just always have to be on guard, it seems.
- [49:57]
Jeff James
Yeah. I mean, you know, we went to. Went to a Pirate game not too long ago, and, you know, it's. It's worth. It's worth missing a couple outs to make sure that you're. Look, one day she's going to be 20, and I'm not going to do it right. But now that she's 16 and my little one's 11, my son is 14. You know, when they're in this phase, it's worth me missing a couple outs to make sure I got eyes on them going in and see them when they come out. And especially, like. Like I said, that girl at the Dallas Mavericks game, her dad probably thought that was one of the most secure places he could take her. You know, you come in through metal detectors, and there's people in yellow jackets all over the place, and there's police, and she got taken from that place, and it's.
- [50:39]
Sean Parnell
How did it happen, Jeff? Can you give me a sense, like, why. I don't know the ins and outs of it, and I don't want to be a Monday morning quarterback, but when these kids. Somebody grabs her by the arm, can't she scream? Can't she say something? I mean, how. Well, how do you. How do these traffickers do it?
- [50:54]
Jeff James
Yeah, well, that's just. So. It's the intimidation, right? The guy comes up, grabs her by the arm and says, you know, if you say a word, you know, I'll shoot you right now or I'll kill you or whatever, you know, and, you know, that part of what he said I'm not sure of. But she was. She was missing for 10 days, and she was eventually recovered in Oklahoma City. So that's how far she was trafficked. Not just the number of times she was trafficked, but the distance they took her from home. So. But. But that's how we. That's. You know, I tell my parents, my. My kids, like, we. I. I think your listeners are going to think I'm some kind of nut job, but, you know, we.
- [51:27]
Sean Parnell
I don't think that at all. I don't think that at all, man. I don't think. I think my listeners. And they need to. They need to hear this. They need to hear these stories.
- [51:35]
Jeff James
Yeah, we have drills about different stuff. Like the. The answer, if somebody tells you, grabs you by the arm and says, don't make a sound. The answer is to scream. Like, in. In my kids, to this day, when they walk away from me, they're like, hey, I'm Gonna run over here and do this. I'm like, all right, what's the plan? And they're like, scream. And I'm like, yeah, you know, if someone's in our home. Like, the plan if someone gets in our home is they lay flat on the floor, flat on the bed, and they scream. And I'm like, why? And they're like, because when dad comes in the room, anybody who's standing up is going to get shot. And I'm like, wow, Jeff, tell us.
- [52:09]
Sean Parnell
I want to hear all of every. All of these lessons. Yeah, because I mean, I want to hear him. I mean, because this is. This is so, so important. It's so important.
- [52:18]
Jeff James
You know, I can. I can show you hundred. I won't say hundreds. That's a huge exaggeration. I can show you dozens of YouTube videos of kids who get abducted. Who. Somebody comes up and grabs their hand and they quietly walk away with a child. But I can also show you as many that when that child starts kicking and screaming, that pervert drops them and runs. Like, bad guys don't want. They want the path of least resistance and everything, right? So it's like when people say, oh, my car was broken into. No, you left your door unlocked. Like, because bad guys are just trying doors. Like they're not smashing out windows. So when that child starts to fight. And this is for adults too, right? Because the statistics are oddly the same that someone who's abducted by a stranger, like a true stranger abduction, not a non custodial parent, but like a true stranger abduction. It's pretty much the same in adults and kids. That 72% of them are dead within three hours. So, you know, I tell people, like.
- [53:22]
Sean Parnell
Wait, why is that? Why? Well, because 72%?
- [53:26]
Jeff James
Yes, because the. It's like a fix, right? The perv grabs the kid, they go, they do what they got to do to get that energy out of them. And now they have this kid, right? And they're like. And it's like a guy who kidnaps a woman to rape the woman. He rapes her. Now he's like, well, what am I going to do now? And they have. They kill her. So. So it's so, you know, those mo. Those first moments. And my kids, you know, we talk a little bit about self defense and it's. It's getting better now that they're getting bigger, you know, and they, they have a little more strength and can do stuff. But, you know, the big thing is you got to make noise, you got to be loud, you got to fight because that's not what the bad guys want. You got to draw attention to it. Because if, not only am I going to hear it, but even if I'm on the other side of the store at that point, there's going to be probably someone like you there who's going to come up to this dude and say, oh dude, like what are you doing? And even if he starts like, oh, this is my daughter, she's just throwing a tantrum, by that time I'm going to be there and I'm going to say the hell she is. And, and you know, it's. But, but getting attention is the big thing. You know, fighting. Even if the fighting isn't effective, like a five year old isn't going to overpower a man. But that kicking and screaming that, you know, making themselves heavy, all that, you know, that that's all important. And when you look at all those videos of, of when kids essentially save their own lives, that's what they do. They, they, they fight, they make noise, they kick, they scream, they yell. And it, it gets attention a and it lets that bad guy know this isn't going to be the easy pickings you thought it was going to be. And they're gonna, they're gonna get out of there.
- [55:02]
Sean Parnell
When you say make yourself heavy, you're talking about a kid. Just like, it's like I could make a joke, a very serious scenario, but trying to get a kicking and screaming kid out of a car seat or in a car seat, you know, just fight like that, like just make it hard for them to carry you.
- [55:16]
Jeff James
Yeah, and you can still, you can make yourself heavy and fight at the same time. You know, it's not, it's just about, you know, when someone wants to be carried, it's easy, but when someone doesn't, it's, you know, you know, how different, you know, like you said that 3 year old that wants to weigh 100 pounds, they're all suddenly weigh 100 pounds. But those are, and like I said, these are the things that we'll take 20 minutes every week and talk about. Like we have the fire plan in our house that, you know, we all meet. The mailboxes for our neighborhood are just coincidentally straight across the street from our house. So you know, no matter how you go out, we meet at the mailboxes. So like two of us aren't out back and three of us out front. And now I think there's, you guys are still in there. So I'm running back in a burning house looking for you. You Know, we all meet at the same place, and, you know, we're all out. The house can burn. We can replace everything. So the important thing is getting out and making sure everybody's accounted for. You know, situations like you get separated and Target, you know, our plan is they're going to look for somebody with a name tag, preferably a female. Just. I know that sounds biased in a lot of ways, but the number of female offenders is incredibly small compared to male offenders. So they're going to look for someone with a name tag and say, hey, I can't find my dad, or I can't find my mom. Or they're just going to make their way to the customer service desk and tell them. And my thing is, if I can't find you for a couple minutes, I'm going to make my way to the front of the store by the registers and the customer service desk, and hopefully we're going to meet up there. But if you don't tell your kid that little bit, they're just going to wander around that store forever looking for you. And you guys can be doing this the whole time and missing each other instead of saying, all right, when you get that tingle in the back of your head, we've been separated too long, go to the front of the store, to the service desk, and that's where you're going to meet.
- [57:17]
Sean Parnell
It can happen in a second, too. If you've got little kids, it's like. Or imagine you're at a crowded soccer field or something, and you think that you got kids, kids playing on multiple fields, right? And, you know, one game ends, the other one ends shortly after that. You got, you know, parents walking this way and that, like, super crowded. Like, maybe your kid thinks. Yeah, maybe you think your kid's going to the car. Maybe they're. Maybe they're going to the concession stand. All of a sudden you lose them, and then you panic, and it's like, what. What do you do in that situation if you're a kid, you know? Yeah.
- [57:49]
Jeff James
The other thing I would do is whenever we went somewhere big, like, you know, our local amusement park here is Kennywood, right? In Pittsburgh. But even if it was Disney or a concert, I would take a picture of them. So if something would happen, they would disappear. What are the police going to naturally ask is, what was he wearing? I could say this, and I show them the picture. I could even send them the picture, and they could send it out to everybody who's looking for my child now. So. Not that a bad guy couldn't throw new clothes on them. But that's a pretty, you know, that's a bigger stretch. So now they have a picture of my son, exactly what they looked like the last time time I saw them or my daughter.
- [58:26]
Sean Parnell
Wow.
- [58:27]
Jeff James
Just that two seconds.
- [58:28]
Sean Parnell
Great idea. It's a great idea. So what do you, what do you tell your kid? I mean I was going to ask you about the separation thing, but what do you tell your kids about. You know, because we talk about phones and, or just electronics or video games are another thing where they've got these open source chats where kids are playing all these video games and they're talking to people who are strangers because they're like on a team together or something. But really the person they're talking to might not be a 12 year old kid. It might be a 30 year old guy pretending to be a 12 year old kid and trying to build a relationship with, with it. I mean what do you tell your kids about engagements like that? Or do you have any rules or parameters set?
- [59:08]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [59:08]
Sean Parnell
Or yeah.
- [59:10]
Jeff James
And it ticks them off. But they don't friend, they're not allowed to friend anybody they don't actually know. And you know what, that's probably a good practice for adults too. Like you know, I'll get friend requests and I feel like I sound like a jerk when I say this. I'll get friend requests from people who went to the same high school as me but I didn't really know them. And it's, and I just, it's a leap for me to make that connection. So I, sometimes I, I shouldn't say sometimes. Usually I will, I'll always ignore it if I don't actually know them. But that's, that's the big thing. And my kids will tell me, but. Oh, they're, they're so and so's friend from. And you mentioned soccer, like a soccer team. And I'm like, yeah, no you're not, you're not doing that. Because there are a significant amount of cases and again it's something you could google where it is the, the 45 year old guy pretending to be a 14 year old girl. And I had, when I was at ncmec, you know, there were dozens of cases like that where it was just, you know, someone pretending to be someone else gained the child's trust, got them to meet somewhere. In fact we had one case where it was two guys each pretending to be a 14 year old girl. When they met up, we arrested both of them. So you know, they arranged this meeting and we just arrested both. So it happens quite a bit, you know, and you see the things like To Catch a Predator and stuff like that, you know, and, and I know that's set up in conjunction with law enforcement in the places that do it, but you know, that's just how it happens. Like they start chatting with, with this person and, and, but I'll tell you one story that happened out of Tyler, Texas. A buddy of mine down there at the time named Todd Hiles was part of this task force. So the Internet service providers have gotten very good about as much as they can knocking down these illicit posts. So they had an undercover who put an ad up that said something to the effect of 14 year old boy looking to meet adult men for sex. They put it on Craigslist and said, meet me at the McDonald's on, I don't know, i35 or whatever. So it was up for about 90 seconds. And Craigslist immediately took it down when they realized what it was. So they set up to see who would come show up there to try to meet with this, with this 14 year old boy. And Sean, I kid you not, he told me they were coming in at such a rate of regularity that their initial plan was to arrest them right there in the restaurant, take them out front, you know, put them in the cars and go. They said the guys were coming in the front so fast that they were ended up taking them out the back so the guys coming in front wouldn't see what it was and run off.
- [62:10]
Sean Parnell
You've got to be kidding me. How long does it add up?
- [62:13]
Jeff James
90 seconds. One guy showed up and all these.
- [62:16]
Sean Parnell
People saw that in that time.
- [62:18]
Jeff James
Yeah. And look, this compulsion that these bad guys have, they can't, they can't help themselves. Like how many times do you see on that To Catch a Predator where they say, oh, I knew it was a skin, I knew it was a sting. I just couldn't help myself. It really is like, and, and I talked to psychologists and psychiatrists who say we wish there was a pill that we could give them, like we can give to cure, you know, whatever. But, but, but this compulsion, like, they can't, they can't resist themselves. One guy at that sting in Tyler showed up in a refrigerated truck with like 5 tons of ice cream. So they even called the, they called the company and said, hey, you might want to come get your stuff before. Like we're seizing the, we're seizing the, the truck and we're arresting him. But the trailer's still sitting here if you want to come get your product. Yeah, it's.
- [63:09]
Sean Parnell
And these are all. These are all men. All. All sickos doing this stuff?
- [63:13]
Jeff James
Yeah, yeah. The large majority. There's. There's. There are. There are female offenders, but they're. They're reasonably rare that. That happens. You'll see it more times in conjunction with acting with a male in concert with a male to lure kids. But the pure female offender is rare. Yeah.
- [63:36]
Sean Parnell
Why? I mean, what. What. I mean, it sounds like a drug addiction.
- [63:41]
Jeff James
Yeah, it's. It's very close to that. Yeah, that's. Like I said, they can't. They can't help themselves even. Even when they know. Like that. Like, we talked about risk earlier, right? The risk of me coming back from Secret Service washing out of Secret Service training, coming back to find a new job was a little bit calculated, but would have been worth it and ended up being worth it. Worth the risk. These guys are willing to. Willing to risk their liberty, their lives, their marriages, their, you know, everything. They got to very frankly have sex with a child.
- [64:14]
Sean Parnell
I mean, an ad up on Craigslist, of all places. It's not like. I mean, it's Craigslist, you know, it's not like a site that's.
- [64:24]
Jeff James
It's not the dark web.
- [64:25]
Sean Parnell
Yeah, yeah, right. It's. Right, it's not the dark web. It's Craigslist. So, like, it was up for 90 seconds, and you had so many people that you didn't even know. That's scary as hell. Yeah, that's scary as hell. No, I mean, and again. And so you said. You said my audience would think that you're crazy talking about all this stuff with your kids based on these stats. How could you not talk about this stuff with your kids?
- [64:48]
Jeff James
Right, right. And. And thank you for saying that, because it makes me feel a little less crazy. But, I mean, the thing. I can't believe this. I talk to groups of parents and I tell them, like, this is how easy it is. So if your child has their gaming name and they have their picture as their icon, I tell people all the time, don't make your avatar your picture. Put up. Mine's Captain America. So if I find a child whose avatar is their picture, I already know what they look like. And I'll get in a chat room with them, and I'll just say, oh, hey, you look like one of my cousin's friends. You know, he goes to Franklin Regional. Where do you go to school? And you very innocent kids, very innocently answer, maybe I go To Mars, because that's where my kids are. Oh, yeah. Oh, I have another cousin who lives in Mars. His development. He lives in, you know, Shady Trees Estates. Where do you live? Oh, I live in, you know, Smithfield Estates. So now with two questions. I already have the picture with two questions. I know what school district your kid goes to and what neighborhood you're in. Now, the bad guys do surveillance just like we do, right? So all it would take, especially for a small school district like Mars, who really only has, I think, 17 buses that pick kids up, it would take me probably two days of sitting in that neighborhood, that Smithwood Estates or whatever you want to call it, to do a little surveillance, see that kid get off the bus and watch which house he goes to. And as I continue that grooming process. Right. And now I say, all right, you know, maybe we can meet up sometime. I already know where he lives. So that's how easy it is. It was. It was two easy questions to find out, you know, where the kid lived and, you know, and eventually, once I build that rapport, I'm going to get their real name right. Your avatar might say, you know, Captain America, but eventually, you know, I'm going to get the real name out of the kid, too. And that's just how easy it is. Two or three simple questions that these kids very innocently divulge to someone who they think is a friend online. That. That's why I tell my kids about. If you don't know that person, you're not. You're not getting on there and chatting with them.
- [67:18]
Sean Parnell
Where, Jeff, where do these predators by and large strike, for lack of a better term, where do these interactions with these kids actually happen? Where? I mean, can you give me a sense of how they actually make contact? I mean, obviously beyond the Craigslist stuff.
- [67:36]
Jeff James
Yeah.
- [67:36]
Sean Parnell
You said someone surveilling a school and they're watching a kid and you talk about the grooming process, like, talk. Can you talk about, like, what that looks like for people where these predators strike? And. And if. If there are warning signs, what. What are they? If you're a parent looking at this stuff.
- [67:54]
Jeff James
So their initial interaction is going to be through places like Discord, gaming sites, you know, chat rooms and stuff like that. That's the initial. And. And I had a guy tell me, I worked a case where he said, you know, I'll get on these game gaming platforms and I'll send out hundreds of messages to kids a night, hoping I get one or two reactions. And, you know, the next step is you know, when you propose the meetup, right, you say, you know, like, hey, you know, I'm going to be in your area next week. You know, how about we meet face to face and the things to look for, you know, and that's. I know I'm simplifying it, but that is really how simple it is. That's how fast it happens. And that's what comes back to knowing what your kids are doing online and knowing who they're hanging out with and the things to look for. You know, if, you know, if you're. If your child starts to be more distant, if they're breaking curfew, of course, things like that. If they're turning off the location on their phone and you're not able to say, like, hey, you know, why just turn. If they don't have a good reason why they're doing that and if it's happening consistently. And then the other part, so that might indicate they're doing something, was they're going somewhere where you don't want them to go. But the indicators that they're being trafficked are things like, you know, they're going to become more withdrawn. The girls, young girls will start to wear, like, more makeup and dress more provocatively. And this is something else that, like, school SROs are trained to look for, right? If that girl all of a sudden is coming to school tarted up for lack of a better reason, you know, that's something that they're going to pay attention to. So this has gotten, you know, more attention from the schools and, you know, people who are going to recognize that there's even training now for police. Like when you pull a car over and there's a minor in the car, what kind of questions you should ask the minor, you know, that kind of thing. So. So that's gotten better.
- [69:51]
Sean Parnell
You talked. You talked about single parents, Jeff. I mean, what about, you know, single parents who work, you know, and school's out for the summer and kids are home during the summer. And what do you. What do you do? I mean, maybe kids are old enough that they don't need a babysitter, or maybe they have a babysitter, but the babysitter is not aware. They're not. First of all, it's like as great as a babysitter is, there can be, and it's still not their own children. So maybe they don't know to look for some of this stuff. What do you do? What. What are single parents do in those scenarios when they're at work all day and Their kids are at home.
- [70:23]
Jeff James
Yeah, Again, it's so tough, you know, you have to look for those signs that, you know, again, if they're, if they're being exploited, you know, those signs of withdrawal, you know, and you're looking for, you know, they're, they're pulling away. They're, you know, they just, the idea of sadness, if they're answering calls in the middle of the night, if they're trying to leave at odd hours, you know, all that is going to be like someone's calling them and saying, hey, you got to be here. So it, you know, those are all, those are all indications. But yeah, it's tough. I mean, like, you know, I, I'm, I see my kids less than a day than, than I don't see them. Right. So I get home from work at 4:00 and you know, they go to, I go to bed at 10. That's six hours of the day. So I, I have this six hour window where I see them, but there's more hours in the day that I don't see them. You know, same with my wife. So, yeah, like you said, a single parent, it's even tougher. And then you're trusting, like you said, you're trusting that person who isn't emotionally invested with your child the way you are to do the right thing. But it's, yeah, it's tough. But the big things, I think the things we had growing up were open dialogues. Don't be afraid to have tough conversations with your kids. They'll roll their eyes a lot, but, you know, make sure they know that they can come to you and make sure you have plans and stuff like that. That communication piece is going to be big because like I said the very beginning, if they're not getting the attention from us, they're going to find it somewhere else. And we've all seen the stories and we all know the stories like that.
- [72:08]
Sean Parnell
Well, Jeff, if somebody, you know, if, let's say the worst happens and we see these, some of these stories where kids go missing and you said 72 hours. How often did you find a kid after they went missing?
- [72:26]
Jeff James
Well, there's this, there's been more of a phenomenon lately of what's called long term missing recoveries. Someone like, you know, goes back to like Elizabeth Smart, where she was gone for what, nine months, I believe.
- [72:39]
Sean Parnell
Yeah. Wow.
- [72:39]
Jeff James
But we're actually seeing some of these kids who were gone. The three girls in Cleveland who were gone 10, 12 years respectively. You know, this has kind of become a phenomenon that's happening. But for the large majority of kids who are. Who are in a true stranger abduction, time is of the essence. I tell people all the time, like, you know, don't. Don't waste an hour looking for your kid. If you can't find them, call the police. Get. Get boots on the ground moving and mobilized to look for your child. And people say, like, oh, you know, I didn't want to bother the police. Hey, you know what? That's. That's why we're here. Bother us like this. This is our. Like, your child will become our mission. So, yeah, get. Get people moving in. You know, if an Amber Alert is. Is justified, you know, you really can't have an Amber Alert unless you have a description of a car. But if that's something that you have, if a witness says, yeah, I saw him get in that silver Corolla and take off, you know, get that. Get that put out. The Amber Alert system is, Is. Wow, just so many kids saved because of an Amber Alert. But it's. That's the big thing. Is. Is, you know, a quick response, timeliness in that response. But I would also tell parents never to give up hope. You know, if the worst thing happens and your child disappears, we're seeing again this. This pattern of kids being recovered years later, and it's. It's the closest thing to a miracle you ever see.
- [74:15]
Sean Parnell
Frankly, Jeff, I don't. I mean, I've been talking to you or not for an hour and 15 minutes. And I mean, I would love to. I mean, I so much I want to talk to you about, but I don't want to keep you for too long. I mean, maybe we can just come back for a part two. Would that be okay?
- [74:30]
Jeff James
I'd love to, yeah.
- [74:31]
Sean Parnell
I mean, I. Because there's so much. I mean, I want to talk about your time protecting presidents. I want to talk about what you're up to now. You're. And I just. I just feel like an hour and 15 minutes is on one subject, man. I want to be respectful of your time, you know?
- [74:48]
Jeff James
Yeah, I'd be glad to come back.
- [74:50]
Sean Parnell
All right, everybody. Jeff James talking to him for 75 minutes on the horror horrors of child sex trafficking and what parents can do to protect their families and protect their children. Pragmatic things, ladies and gentlemen. And so, as always, if you like what you watched or listened to, subscribe to this podcast. Wherever you listen to podcasts, go to my rumble page. Subscribe there. We've got this awesome video format. We're going to be rolling out more awesome content for you in the very, very near future as we grow this show, comment on social media, leave reviews, interact with the post. All that helps with all this algorithm stuff that I don't really understand. But as always, thank you for watching Never Quit, Never Surrender, God bless you all and God bless this amazing country that we live in. Jeff, thanks for being with us, man.