COS Live! Ep. 246: Rep. Dennis Riddell’s Journey From Fear to Faith

Hello and welcome to COS Live. You can watch the original video broadcast live on Tuesdays at 6PM to visit conventionatestates.com slash pod to learn more. And now here's COS Live. Well hello everyone and welcome to our latest edition of COS Live. I'm Rita Peters. I'll be your host this evening and I serve as the senior vice president for legislative affairs with convention of states in addition to being a co-host of COS Live. So thanks for joining us tonight and I would ask that while you're watching drop a little comment to tell me where you're watching from which state are you in, what brings you to the show, how long have you been interested in convention of states. We always like to know who's watching and tell us a little bit about you and why you're interested in convention of states. And then we would ask you to share the program with your friends so we can get more people thinking about the article five solution and get more people working toward that solution with convention of states. We have a great show for you. I'm saying we unfortunately my co-host Andrew is not with me. I'm going solo with the hosting duties this evening but producer G and I have a great show for you tonight. North Carolina state representative Dennis Riddell has been a long time champion for convention of states but did you know he was once a member of an opposition group that traffics in fear mongering and wild speculation so we will get to ask him why he chose faith over fear and we'll hear a little bit of his story. It's so interesting. We will also show you a new video from the COS California team as they engage with their state legislators. You can see how they do it but first we will go to Mike as always for our article five trivia giveaway. ♪♪♪ Thank you Rita. I'm sure it's going to be a fantastic show. I'm excited to be here. I'm excited to give away some stuff and to find out how people are doing when it comes to their knowledge about COS and today in particular about how they're doing about their knowledge of convention estates and some of the things that we've done so get your fingers sharp and get ready to type your answer into the chat. In the meantime I'm going to give away one of these really cool shirts I just got this last night. They are brand new in the warehouse. I don't think they're on the website today but the next day or two they'll be on there. We have men's and women's polos. They're nice performance fabric polos. I'm going to give one away a woman's or a man's shirt in your size to the person that answers this question. Boy I'll tell you these are sharp and they're wonderful. They come in different colors and I'm sure you'll enjoy having one and if you need one of those popular items in the COS store, people who go out and about that want to be a little bit more on the casual side or or business casual even, then they will grab one of these shirts and wear it so people will ask them about COS or if they're representing COS it's a great way to clean up. So if you don't win one just go to shopconventionstates.com and you can get one yourself but again you might have to wait a day or two until they're actually in the store because they are brand spanking you and run out of all of our old stock. Alright so let's get going and talk a little bit about our trivia question of the day and as you probably know so far 19 states have successfully passed the application or adopted the article 5 resolution for convention estates which of course covers three topics fiscal restraints, term limits and other limits on federal overreach and this week, here's our question this week we're celebrating two anniversaries and to those 19 states the fourth in the eight states to give you a little bit of a hint said yes to COS on May 22nd and May 25th respectively. So my question what are the states which states passed the resolution what are the fourth and eighth states hopefully you know this right off the top of your head you're typing in or you're looking it up but hopefully you're the first one to get one of these really cool COS polos. So that's what I have so far we're going to turn it back over to Rita who's got a couple of great interviews how about a journey from fear to faith and I'll be back at the end to reveal the answer and I hope you win. Back to you Rita. Thanks Mike. Now before we get to our interview which I assure you you will not want to miss let's see some history being made it's some new video courtesy of the COS California team check it out the mention of states toss and strong in the cornhole to illustrate the black hole of federal overreeds it's in a certain sense it's a now or never kind of thing because we we aren't going to have more time out ahead you know we're gonna have less access as time goes on if things continue the way they're going. We have Martin Turner here who is a volunteer activist with conventional states Martin. Hey tell us what are you here today for and are you having a good time? I am here to lobby the legislature about article five and conventional states and I'm having a blast and a really good time was fun talking with the the senators representative because each legislator received a binder with information and the number of constituents who wanted them to take a look and consider the article five proposal. Very well received very very professional staff and so it's been fun you learn something every time you come but it's just a great time to make relationships plant seeds about article five and get to lobby. So did you feel like they were kind of dismissive or were they attentive? Not at all they were very well one of them was honest way to a meeting but it was very attentive to the human it's just been. The other one was extremely attentive. I think it's been really Hogan what's been your impression of the day so far? Well it's been busy it's been crazy but it's been grassroots and I think that's what the real message here is is that we are all coming together to build those bonds with each other that's what the grassroots are about that's what this country is about it's about we do. Wow that was great. Is the infamous John Birch Society a factor in North Carolina's bid to become the next state to join the convention of states movement? To answer that question I interviewed North Carolina representative Dennis Riddell as well as our volunteer state director Joy Ruman. Let's watch well as we mentioned before we have two amazing guests today both from the Tar Heel State or North Carolina and I'm really excited that I get to be the one to interview them today so let me just start by introducing our volunteer state director Joy Ruman from North Carolina and representative Dennis Riddell who is the longtime faithful primary sponsor of our convention of states application in North Carolina. Joy representative Riddell welcome to the program. Hi Riddell, good to be with you. It's great to have you both. North Carolina is our super active state right now legislatively so I'm excited to get to talk to both of you today and bring to our viewers a little bit of what's going on there in North Carolina. I'd like to start with you Joy just tell us a little bit about yourself and why you got involved with convention of state's action. Well I'm a North Carolina native I've been a Raleigh most of my life and until the July of 2018 I never did anything political in my entire life. Never even followed politics I voted but didn't really back then certainly didn't understand the importance of voting for judges and that kind of thing and really never followed anything political and I just got tired of the political vitriol I was hearing. What I consider lies in some cases and truths and others and I had an opportunity I'll give a shout out to Gary Lyons who I think you both know he was part of a networking group that I was a part of and he was moving to South Carolina and he suddenly decided to tell everybody about convention states on his last meeting at the networking group and I immediately went over and I think I signed the petition that afternoon and maybe applied to be a district captain the next day and so well we are so glad you did because you do a ton for our movement in leading the grassroots team there in North Carolina you all are a powerful team a force to be reckoned with and we at the national team are just amazed by all the great work you do and the incredible impact that you have. Now Representative Riddell I want to go to you next tell us a little bit about your background and why you decided to run for public office. My background begins in the San Francisco Bay area that was where I was born and raised and my first exposure to political campaigns and all was helping my father with the unfortunate campaign of very Goldwater for precedent in 1964 was not really a good start to any political career campaign but I just, every young man likes to be with his father when that all possible and so I just liked hanging out with him and we were putting up signs and just other campaigns sort of things and then it really kicked in the gear two years later when I like to refer to it as an out-of-work actor named Ronald Reagan decided to run for governor of California and my dad got all over that campaign so we did a whole bunch of things together and I just remember enjoying the process putting up signs talking to people passing out literature we have door to door my dad was big on the structure he's a contractor so you construct floats for parades and my mom and his friends would decorate him up and then we get to be on the parade float and wait to people and so for a young fellow that was pretty cool stuff and as I got older and stayed with the political involvement I realized just what a miracle America is my parents were very patriotic very devoted my father I don't know if you can see the picture on the wall that's him as a world war two navy vet he was my hero and so many ways and I realized what he did to preserve liberty and freedom in our country putting his life on the line was something that really is a calling for every single American who values their heritage so I was never called into active duty or anything like that but I was determined to try to do what I could to impact elections and shape the future in a more conservative direction through my life so I just went from there into a deeper involvement with the republican party when we my wife and I moved here to North Carolina in 1985 we jumped right in with the local republican party and got involved there served as chairman of the republican party on two different times two different terms found at a young republican club here in our county and have just made myself available to people and candidates that I like over the decades and eventually to my surprise I was called by my predecessor gentleman named Dan Engel was serving in the state house and he called me in September of 2011 to let me know he was not going to run again but he said I want you to run in my place I want you to think about that so Polly and I talked about it and we had a little vacation planned at the beach in a few days so we went to the beach and kind of prayed about it with our family asked our kids who are mostly pretty young at that time what they thought about it and I still remember one of my daughters was response didn't hesitate was you know you've been doing this for all these years and not getting paid for you might as well get something for your efforts and she didn't know that we only get paid $14,000 but as a state legislature that was kind of the beginning and that was in 2012 we had a very successful campaign I've had five other successful campaigns since then really praised God for the opportunity to be in North Carolina legislature right now because North Carolina is a different state today than it was in 2012 sure well your predecessor chose well when he made that call to you and your constituents have been choosing well ever since we are so proud of you so proud that you are our primary sponsor in the North Carolina House now I recently heard a rumor about your past and I just have to ask you about it today I heard that at one time you were involved with the John Birch Society and for those who might be watching the program that aren't familiar with the John Birch Society this is an organization that today is adamantly opposed to the article five convention process they regularly testify against our application in every state where it's active and I'll add this wasn't always the case there was a time when the John Birch Society did support the use of the article five process and actually advocated for a convention to propose a set of amendments but today they're adamantly opposed to it so I find this really interesting representative riddell is it true that you were once a member of the jbs and if so tell us the story behind that well Rita I can either confirm nor deny my involvement in the John Birch Society dear yeah very true and very true my parents were both in the John Birch Society that started in the early 60s right about the time I think my dad got involved in campaigns actually and it was a major part of our family I went to summer camp sponsored by the John Birch Society I was a speaker at summer camp sponsored by the John Birch Society I was a life member of the John Birch Society very heavily involved up until about 1983 I believe started having some misgivings about some of the things that were being presented through the society most of the people I met just solid Americans I'm very patriotic very devoted to the family into the country and to trying to preserve liberty much as I was trying to do they were very supportive of something that was called I believe the liberty amendment in the late 60s I remember my father working very hard trying to get our local congressional then senatorial delegation from California to support the liberty amendment in congress and then also there was the effort to try to do it article five just by individual state efforts so that was something it surprised me when I became involved in the COS that I started seeing opposition from people I know locally who are in the John Birch Society when the John Birch Society at one time was very much very eagerly proposing the liberty amendment yeah it's really interesting so apparently the you know a change or a shift in leadership somewhere along the line caused them to just reverse their position about an article five convention to today being opposed to it joy is there a John Birch Society presence in North Carolina today would you say and if so what have you observed about their MO and how they operate what their messaging is well yes there is a presence and I actually talked with our local team about the fact that my gut tells me it's been bigger than we realized and we haven't really focused a great deal on that because we've had success just working with legislators who aren't influenced by them we now that we're at the the point where we're facing the Senate for the second time there's a key senator that we want to vote yes for our for hjr 235 who actually campaigned against us and we can't really absolutely know this but we're fairly certain it's because John Birch Society members in his area supported him in his campaign and he went against us he didn't know anything about us he is now changing slowly he we've had all of our national senior advisors Mark Meckler Rick Santorum and Michael Ferris have met with him but they are actually hosting two events in his district coming up in June they've even got a flyer and they've got a flyer that they've put one of our senior advisors in a John's camp okay which is very troubling to me but and we hope that that will actually cause that particular senator if and when he sees it and we'll make sure he sees it to raise an eyebrow in a big way again hit this senator has been very open to us that's the that's the wonderful thing we've experienced he's been very open to us um we've recently put together some material that I provided that you provided to me uh and that um burrito kind of a lawyer briefing book and we gave that senator one and pointed out the article that was there pushing back on making the one entitled problems in the testimony of Robert Brown on order five and so we feel confident he's going to read it and we just hope that he'll choose to um vote yes so that we can't get this resolution done in the next few weeks we hope absolutely well you know from my vantage point on the national team I see a lot of what they're doing in states across the country and a couple of observations that I've made about the john bertz society messaging and their mo number one a lot of it they're just factually incorrect they either misunderstand the history don't know the history misunderstand the law don't understand the implication of court cases and just the law of article five and the second thing I observe is that they're almost entirely fear based their motivation is fear they the way they want to motivate the legislators is to fear to be afraid of the article five process and you know I I take particular offense to that as a christian a person of faith I don't operate based in fear but representative radele I want to get your take on this what would you say to the grassroots in north carolina about how they can best counter this kind of messaging from the john bertz society which if you agree with me is both incorrect and fear based fear motivated you kind of hit on that rita I think as a christian I've not been given a spirit of fear but of power of love and of a sound mind and what brought me out of the john bertz society in the early 80s was I was in graduate school working on a master's in education teaching history and one of the assignments was to pick a particular theory of history research it very thoroughly and then write a paper and at that time I was still in the john bertz society so I chose the conspiracy theory of history because that's that's the all encompassing uh the what I call it's the the belt that holds all the jumpers siding together is this belief in a self-perpetuating several hundreds of years old conspiracy to create a one world government and that more than anything else you need to learn everything you can about the them the illuminati the bill divergers the council on form relations the trilateral commission these people who they call the insiders and um the more research I did in the paper the more I realized that my previous belief and the conspiracy did not honor god it honored the devil it was making uh satan preeminent and the first cause of all things that occur in history and that supplants christ that supplants the lord's place in history as the true focal point and the creator uh so the more I realized there was that discrepancy I started reading books outside of the john bertz society's recommended lists and comparing historian notes and realized that yeah the theory really did not hold up well under more uh purposeful scrutiny and eventually uh I was able just to terminate my membership and move on and uh so to the grassroots long answer to your question I'm sorry no it's not true is try to be patient with them these these are not bad people not not in the slightest they're again they're very patriotic very much love their country they tend to be very selective in facts uh they as I used to would choose only certain uh books as authoritative on an issue and nothing else was considered to be good I think I would refer them back to the founders and our history I think most of the hesitation by elected officials with cos is that they don't know a fuller uh rendering of our history and how commonplace conventions of colonies of states of independent states how frequent these things took place in our nation's history without disaster without runaway without any problems they actually solved problems with their what I would call many convention of states from the early founding up through today yeah you're absolutely right and in fact that is why the founders didn't put a whole lot of detail in article five about the way the convention process worked because it was so familiar to them it was something they were all familiar with most of them had attended conventions before and you know the basic rules were well known and universally followed so yeah you're absolutely right that history is really um instrumental to properly understanding the convention process now representative riddell thanks to you and your hard work on the house side in north carolina our resolution has already passed the north carolina house are you hopeful that this year will be the year we get through the senate as well oh I am I'm very hopeful um joy and her chance team statewide have done a great job you know we they are constantly I call it cos wednesday they are constantly down in the legislature every wednesday faithfully trying to contact and connect now with senators and to give them information I think we're in a good place I think we're in a much better place than we were two years ago and I think continued outreach to some key senators I think we can get it done this year careful you know well planned outreach I think having people of the caliber of mike ferris and mark meckler and rick santorm come and speak to individuals was very compelling very very effective and just don't don't be sidetracked by what people in the john burch society are saying as well intention as they might be they're laboring under false notions about intervention estates in article five but they do like to assail other conservatives more than they do the left so that can be a little you know distracting sometime you just need to stay focused give the information to the people are willing to hear and do it in a very amiable win some way and I think we'll get it done this year great advice joy let's close with you what may I just follow a question to that oh yeah yeah go ahead um do you think dennis that there is any is it ever worth our effort to try to change the minds of the people that are involved in the john bird society I will tell you from my life experience once you make a decision to step out of the john bird society then you're a little bit of a pariah you you kind of get the market cane on you that you're not a real conservative anymore you're not a true conservative you you've been compromised somehow and then they'll they'll spend all sorts of time trying to dig and find out what it is that you've been compromised by or something when you believe in conspiracies yet as they do again is all encompassing that becomes your explanation for everything so if I cast a vote say today in Raleigh that some people in john bird society disagree with they'll am meet their media conclusion is that I've been I've been I'm a part of the conspiracy even though I may not know it or I've been compromised somehow and I'm not a true conservative and we need to support true conservatives um you know it depends on the individual somebody who's new to it is easier I think to explain and walk out of it somebody who's been in a long time and is as bested much of their life in it probably not so much okay thank you thank you okay now joy I'm going to give you the last word here what would you say to north carolinians who might be watching this program right now what can they do to help and get involved well if they have assigned the petition that's the first thing we're always looking for new petition signers if they have signed the petition and they've not stepped up to volunteer go back to the seed convention states website go to conventionstates.com forward slash take underscore action or click on the action tab on the main homepage sign up to be volunteer activists um do that first before you're doing anything else because then then we'll talk to you about other ways you can get involved there are ways we need district captains and a lot of places in the state but you don't have to do that much you know we just need people to make phone calls for us sometimes and those phone calls are fun sometimes they're they're rarely not you're always talking to like-minded people so a lot of people hate to make those calls but you know making those calls for cos changed my mind about calling people I don't even know because most people do want to hear from you and so just step up and help us in any way that you can um we are hosting breakfasts all over the state I've just been amazed that the people that have stepped up to do more in those I think we've gotten them happening in about eight areas right now and they're still growing and so if there's a breakfast probably coming up near you and we're gonna we're actually gonna start an initiative I hope this week to start having a way that you can find out about them online so you can show up and meet other like-minded people I have been incredibly blessed to do what I do and it what's happening in North Carolina is not because of me it's it's because of all the other people that I work with they just all I'm I'm work with the most amazing people I've ever met so I'm grateful to all of them for everything they do well we are grateful for you Joy thank you for your service to the grassroots and representative Riddell thank you so much for your service to the people of North Carolina and your service to the nation in leading this effort in North Carolina to pass the Convention of State's application thank you so much thank you pleasure to be a part of it really is and now let's go back to Mike for the answer to today's article five trivia question Mike thanks Rita what a great show I'm so glad that you had the opportunity to do those interviews and learn a little bit about one man's journey from fear to faith and I'm sure all of you guys know somebody that would also benefit from seeing this so go ahead and tag them so they can see this really great COS live and if you remember from the beginning of the show we gave away one of these really we're gonna give away one of these really cool brand new COS polos they're just in the story to run out so if you're trying to get a polo now's a great time to do it or actually another day or so because they're not quite in the story yet they just arrived at our warehouse and they'll be up very soon but you can go to shop convention estates.com if you want to pick one up and hopefully you're the one that won one of these in your size Men's shirt or a woman's shirt going back to the beginning you probably know we've passed 19 states and this week two states enjoy an anniversary our fourth state and our eighth state have said yes to COS on May 22nd and May 25th and the question was what are the states the answer is Alabama and Louisiana Alabama's our fourth state to pass the resolution Louisiana our eighth state and Alabama passed on May 22nd eight years ago this week Louisiana joined the movement on May 25th seven years ago this week and if you want to learn a little bit about who's passed and how and where we're at in the convention estates just go to convention estates.com and you can find out a lot but more importantly if you are just kind of curious maybe you're on the sidelines then not only do I recommend you come and take a look but given the descent that our nation is making into tyranny in so many different ways the overreach of our federal government it might be time for you to get involved so just go to convention estates.com click the take action button and we'll help you to help this nation help your future your progeny to be able to live the kind of life that you and all of us have been able to live in this wonderful free country of America so that's all I've got today back to your Rita and you guys have a great evening thanks Mike we do this show every week to reach teach and activate Americans about the only constitutional solution as big as the DC problem if you're ready to take your place among the Americans who are doing whatever it takes to restore the republic sign up for one of the many volunteer roles with COS go to convention of states.com and click the take action tab to get started don't forget to subscribe to our social media accounts search convention of states on rumble youtube facebook twitter and instagram you can listen to this program as well as crossroads with me and mark meckler the liberty update and legacy content from our archives on the official convention of states podcast we've received several five star reviews and we're always grateful for those as they do help our show to grow go to convention of states.com slash pod to learn more check out the battle cry with cos president mark meckler sunday nights at eight o'clock p.m. eastern time and we'll see you back here next Tuesday at six p.m. eastern time for another edition of cos live now we've got a country to say so let's get back to work thank you for joining us this has been the podcast version of cos live check out all content at convention of states dot com slash pod thank you for listening