Carlson's interview with Amsterdam: UOC is a Church, not a political player
On April 22, 2024, American journalist and TV host Tucker Carlson interviewed human rights activist and UOC lawyer Robert Amsterdam.
Within a few days this interview was watched by 7 million viewers. On our website we published some parts of this interview, now we offer it in full in Russian translation.
Tucker Carlson (hereinafter Carlson): On Saturday, the House of Representatives, the legislative body that writes the laws for our bankrupt country, approved $95 billion in American tax dollars in foreign aid to Israel Ukraine and Taiwan. Taiwan, by the way, happens to be one of the richest countries in the world. That package, that spending package, passed overwhelmingly, 316 to 94. Let's narrow out a piece of it. That would be the $61 billion that went to Ukraine. Now, so far, Congress has given the Ukrainian government nearly $174 billion in munitions and so-called aid. Then you add another $60 billion that Joe Biden gave to Zelensky in the total is over $230 billion. And that's just the money that was publicly appropriated that we can account for. There's a lot more than that. So let's take a look at what's in the package that just passed on Saturday, the bankrupt country sent across the to the Ukrainian government.
Is there democracy in Ukraine?
There's $14 billion to purchase weapons. There's $15 billion for military training and intelligence sharing, since the US intel agencies are running the Ukrainian intel agencies, even as they assassinate people. Then there's $8 billion for the Ukrainian government, its pensions for its bureaucrats, $8 billion for its pensions. Then there's $300 million to help Ukraine secure its border. None to secure our border, $300 million to help Ukraine secure its border. Just the priorities are clear. That's all real. Before the vote, Nancy Pelosi went on the House floor to demand that her colleagues keep the money flowing to Zelenskyy. If you vote any other way, you're somehow for rape. Watch.
"I hope that our colleagues will choose democracy and decency rather than autocracy and evil, because I fear that if you choose the Putin route, you will have blood on your hands. Blood of the children, blood of their mothers, raped in front of their parents, raped in front of their children."
Carlson: Yeah. Vote for this or you have blood on your hands. And by the way, that's a person who's gotten stupendously rich, you wonder how, while serving in the United States Congress. But she's not sending any of her own money to Ukraine. She's sending your money to Ukraine. So alongside this, the House advanced legislation that would allow Biden to place frozen Russian assets in a special slush fund, specifically for Ukraine. That'd be $8 billion worth of material the US government just stole from Russian citizens without a trial. We don't like you. We're taking it. That money currently sits in US bank accounts. And it's possible, not to be cynical, that all of this money is being sent to Ukraine because it's much easier for our ruling class to steal once it's offshore. So the bottom line here is that we are at war with Russia, and we're doing so on behalf of Ukraine. Now, why are we doing this? There are several emergencies unfolding in the United States, economic and indeed military, we're being invaded. But you should not worry about this, says congressman Jerry Connolly of Virginia, because we're not actually sending money to a foreign country. Ukraine is America. Watch.
"And today, we cannot disappoint those who seek what we have, freedom. The freedom to self-determine, the freedom to decide their sovereignty and their alliances and their form of government. Some say, Well, we have to deal with our border first. The Ukrainian-Russian border is our border."
Carlson: Right. A democracy that canceled elections. But after the vote passed, overwhelmingly, members of Congress showed just how closely we are now aligned with Ukraine by waving and cheering and displaying the flags of a a foreign government inside the Congress. Watch this.
"Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine..."
Carlson: Oh, they love Ukraine. But do they really love Ukraine? Ask any person in that room, how many Ukrainian people, how many soldiers, how many civilians, how many Ukrainians have died in the war that you are paying for, and not one of them can answer the question. They don't know how many Ukrainians have died. They have no idea because they don't care. That's how much they love the Ukrainians. So maybe it's not really about Ukraine. And if you're wondering, take a look at a tweet, a statement sent out by a man called Nate McMurray. He's a Democrat from New York now running for Congress. And he wrote this, Slava Ukraine, die, maga, die. You lose. In other words, maybe the real enemy is not the Russian government. Maybe it's you. But it wasn't the Democrats who made this possible. It was the Republican Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson of Louisiana. And he forced this spending bill through. He allowed it to come to a vote because he says he is a Christian, and his Christian faith requires that, requires funding war. After the vote, Mike Johnson was a little more specific about why he did it. Watch.
"Three of our primary adversaries, Russia and Iran and China, are working together, and they're being aggressors around the globe, and they're a global threat to our prosperity and our security. Their advance threaten their free world, and it demands American leadership. If we turn our backs right now, the consequences could be devastating. So this afternoon, the House acted, and we sent over to the Senate, and it will be transmitted shortly, our supplemental national security legislation. I said it very simply. I'll say it once again. It's an old military adage, but we would rather send bullets to the conflict overseas than our own boys, our troops. I think this is an important moment, an important opportunity to make that decision. We allowed the House to do that, and I expect the Senate will make the same decision."
Carlson: Every word a lie. Of course, we've already sent troops. There are American soldiers in Ukraine right now and more on the way today. We are in a hot war with Russia, and they're going to tell you that in stages, not all at once. Where's Zelensky as all of this is going on. Well, it shouldn't surprise you. He's not on the front lines. He's on American television laughing in your face. Here he is on NBC right after the vote. Listen carefully to this. Zelensky says, American taxpayers should be grateful to send hundreds of billions of dollars from their bankrupt country that is currently being invaded to his country where the money is being stolen. That's just the price of protecting democracy. How long should Americans be expected to fund the war in Ukraine? The Americans are not funding the war in Ukraine. They, first and foremost, protect freedom and democracy all over Europe. Ukraine is fighting, and Ukraine is sending its best sons and daughters to the frontline, and it reduces the The price for all Europe, for all NATO, it reduces the price for everyone, including the US. Yeah. We're funding freedom and democracy when we send hundreds of billions of dollars to Ukraine.
Now, of course, if we were defending democracy, we would ask the American people what they think. If a majority of them opposed this, we wouldn't do it because that's the fundamental democratic principle. You serve the people you rule because it's their country and they're in charge. But of course, that's not at all what's happening. It does raise the question, once again, if we're defending democracy in Ukraine, is Ukraine a democracy, a country that canceled its presidential elections? Well, let's see. In Ukraine, Right now, tonight, Christians are being persecuted by the state we're paying for. For the crime of belonging to the wrong religion, priests are getting thrown in jail. Churches are being seized by the government. Your tax dollars, 60 billion more, thanks to Mike Johnson, are funding all of this. It's very hard to get information about what is actually happening in Ukraine because the big media outlets lie about it deciduously and have for more than two years. But one of the most reliable and honest voices on this question is a man called Bob Amsterdam. A little background on Bob Amsterdam. He is a lawyer. He represents the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. He is not a Ukrainian Orthodox Christian.
He is, in fact, Jewish. I think he's probably pretty liberal. He's not pro-Russia. He is, in fact, banned from going to Russia. A couple of his friends were murdered in Russia. He is not acting on behalf of the Russian government or even, for faith reasons, Ukrainian Orthodox Church. He is one of the rare American attorneys who believes still, even in 2024, that human rights are worth protecting. Telling the truth is important. And he has returned in the last month from Ukraine, and we thought it would be worth asking him, what's it actually like there? We are honored to have, once again, Bob Amsterdam. Bob, thanks so for coming on. I'll stand back and allow you to give us the overview of what is happening in Ukraine right now.
Bob Amsterdam (hereinafter Amsterdam): Well, thank you, Tucker. To be transparent, I supported the bill because It is the parishioners of our church who are on the front line, and they need all the help they can get. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is a church that is guided and bound by God's words. It is a church that is a thousand years old, and its priests are dedicated to Christ's teachings, and in fact, separated themselves completely from the Russian Orthodox Church in 2022 after the full-scale invasion. I want to make it very clear there are studies in Ukraine that demonstrate that our church is exactly as nationalistic and patriotic as the new state church that was founded five years ago. However, elements within the government have declared war on the UOC, and they have persecuted mercilessly priests, clerks, parishioners. I knew that it was a tremendous risk to go to Ukraine after having spoken out so strongly against this attack. But I had to go because I had to make sure that given the amount of money the Ukrainians are spending defaming anyone who contradicts their version of reality, I had to make sure that I saw what was happening on the ground.
After 10 days in Ukraine, I can tell you that there is not a hint of democracy. The country is run by an organization called the SBU, the Secret police, heavily infiltrated even today, by Russia. The parliamentary members I met with eight, they are under incredible pressure from the secret police. In fact, They were all interviewed and interrogated after I left. A number of them had previously been subjected to interrogations. The priests I met, I met a number of them who had been beaten and interrogated in the past. In fact, one of them, after my meeting with him, had his home raided the next day, and he was dealt with so harshly, he suffered a heart attack. I was followed everywhere.
Is Ukraine fighting the Church?
Amsterdam: Ukraine not only has shut the media, but they have become a font of disinformation. They just received, well, in fact, they just spent three and a half million dollars in Washington to tell Americans that everything they're doing to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church isn't happening, and that, in fact, it's the Russians who are persecuting Christians and not them. To which I say any persecution of Christians is wrongful. But it is to Ukraine that professes democracy and freedom.
It is Ukraine that has absolutely no semblance of rule of law, that that is terrorizing its own business community separately, targeting wealthy people for expropriation, especially if they have any religious connection to our church. It is Ukraine that is actively setting the SBU secret police on individuals like myself who speak out on behalf of this religion. Let me tell you, since the passage of the bill in the House, Ukraine has gone into full war mode against my church. They are launching a massive PR campaign internally, and again in Washington, attacking the church, attacking me, attacking everyone connected with the church because they can't stand the truth to come out. So what is shameful about our American conduct is what Robert Destro, the former Undersecretary for Human Rights, said, which is that some of this targeting of the church came from Washington, that it was partially planned because Washington saw our church, which had a spiritual connection to Russia, as somehow being a threat. I want to stress that, that Our church is Ukrainian. Many of the men on the front line are members of our church who sit there and watch day by day as secret police wearing death masks come and steal their religious home.
Imagine how they feel knowing that their parents and their families are losing their places of worship. And if a new bill is passed, Bill 8371, they won't even be able to gather to pray because the churches will be taken from them, but it may even be a crime for them to meet and pray. This unlimited attack on this historic church is unconscionable, and I am absolutely heartbroken that American Christians have not taken up this fight.
Most Orthodox Christians worldwide support the Ukrainian Orthodox Church
Carlson: It's disgraceful, and I've expressed that directly to the speaker of the House who says he's a Christian. How can you pay for the persecution of Christians with US tax dollars? Are you aware of any... I just want to state for the third time, neither of us speaking right now, was Orthodox. I don't know much about it. So it's not like I'm defending my own church. You're not. But why can't Christian leaders, Christian legislators in the United States speak up and say, That's just wrong, and we're not going to send money to a foreign country to build a tyranny as they have and persec Christians. Why is that hard?
Amsterdam: It's interesting. I actually defended this church 40 years ago in one of my first cases where we fought the KGB that was trying to take over a church in Canada. I've studied orthodoxy over the years, and there is absolutely no reason why any Christian of any denomination would hesitate at all. And in fact, it's important for you to know that the majority of Orthodox denominations recognize our church, and they do not recognize the state church. The state church is heavily patriotic, heavily nationalistic. Our church is focused solely on God. It is focused solely on the spiritual realm.
Carslon: You said that this legislation passes Saturday and today's Monday, the real crackdown on the church begins. It sounds like there's a connection between those two facts.
Amsterdam: Listen, we've been working for weeks to file a document, which I'm going to announce on your show. We're filing a document with the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. This is going to be available publicly to everyone. It's a lengthy document that urges the United States government to find Ukraine a country of particular concern because of their attacks on religious freedom. The Holy Synod of the Church of England has condemned Ukraine. Not only that, the United Nations continuously condemn Ukraine for their attacks on Christians. Why it takes the Church of England to stand up, but American churches and evangelists have not, that, again, is a question that defies logic.
"UOC is a Church, not a political player"
Carlson: You said you were for the bill that passed on Saturday. I'm glad you said that. Of course, you and I disagree on that, which I think gives you more credibility in this conversation. But let me ask you about the connection between the secret police force that you say effectively runs Ukraine now and the US Intel services. We know that they have assassinated people, a number of people, including America. They've tried to assassinate Americans. I can say that conclusively. Could they be doing those kinds of things without the knowledge of the US government?
Amsterdam: No. As I said, there is an argument, and I don't want to spend time on today. There is an argument that the US government is in a way, behind an attack on Christians. It goes down to some decisions that were made in 2014 about the danger of the church. Let me be clear, Putin does instrumentalize the Russian Orthodox Church. In our case, that instrumentalization does not occur. Our Their leaders have been very specific and clear about it. They are Ukrainian patriots. I was shocked by how many of them didn't even speak Russian. But most important to understand is we are a church. We are not political players. Bishop Onufriy is a man of God. Our leaders are men of God, and they only want to tend to their flock. And important to note, our church is a church that set up 70 parishes outside of Ukraine to tend to refugees. And the man who set up those parishes is under investigation and interrogation and harassment today. That father is under harassment because he dared speak out at a meeting of the Council of European Churches and tell that Council what the truth was. And he was immediately detained. He was immediately harassed by the secret police. And no Western newspaper has covered the power of the secret police. And it is to your credit that you've allowed us on to speak to facts that no one seems to understand in the West.
"All of this talk of democracy is complete farce"
Carlson: Very few people who are not hard partisans have gone to Ukraine, actually. It's dangerous to go to Ukraine. For me, it would be much more dangerous to go into Moscow, I would say. I I wonder what it feels like when you're there. I mean, we keep hearing it's this beacon of freedom in the region, in the world. That's why we're sending them hundreds of billions of dollars. Does it feel like a free country when you're there?
Amsterdam: No. I mean, and you're talking to somebody who's traveled in Russia defending opponents of Putin, which I still do. I still defend opponents, even though I'm banned. But exactly the opposite. I was followed everywhere. Talk about disinformation. A TV crew set upon me after I had a meeting with the government and then put on TV that I represented the Russian patriarch as opposed to the Ukrainian patriarch. And also, by the way, gave out my hotel location. So no, It felt like this was a full-on intimidation. I regularly represent opposition groups. I'm banned in seven countries for representing opposition groups and fighting for human rights. And I will tell you that it is rare to feel the level of oppression and fear. I've never seen parliamentarians as cowed and as frightened as I saw in the rata of Ukraine. All of this talk of democracy is complete farce. How we continue to listen to this, and how we don't try to build up Ukrainian institutions, and why our business people are talking about investing in Ukraine without getting guarantees about rule of law. All of this defies imagination.
About seizures of UOC temples
Carlson: Are you an American? I assume.
Amsterdam: Yes, I am.
Carlson: How does it make you feel? The US State Department, the administration, the Congress, too, but the US government basically takes over Ukraine. We're paying for the pensions. So that's a high level of control. And this is what we get? We get an authoritarian state that assassinates people and where legislators are afraid?
Amsterdam: Listen, to be very frank about it, I'm also a student of history, and I keep going back to what we did in the '50s, which was basically decide we were going to support autocrats, and he may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch. I think the issue for us is, I would have thought by now we'd have learned that what we need to invest in are institutions. Our government has forgotten the concept of rule of law. We've sanctioned everybody and their brother who looks or smells Russian, even if they're opponents Vladimir Putin. We have lost the sense of rule of law. And by the way, the Ukrainians sanction people so they can steal their assets and so they can make sure political opponents stay silent or they'll lose their means of support. In fact, somebody is on trial, a guy named Shiloh. He is on trial in Ukraine for vast corruption, and no one's talking about his relationship to the presidential administration. So this ongoing predation, corporate rating, rating of churches, which the Ukrainians have pioneered, this illegal rating of churches is something I've never seen. If you go to our website, Save the UOC, you will see hundreds and hundreds of churches and parishioners crying and screaming and priests being beaten.
And these are our allies. These are the people we're funding, which we aren't even man enough to have the leverage to say, Could you stop beating up Christians for a little while? Could you perhaps protect minorities? I can't even begin to tell you the number of journalists who have told me it's okay with them that these churches are being stolen because your guys are Russian sympathizers. My God. Firstly, they're not. Secondly, you know what? Even if, God forbid, there were a few there were, you use the courts and investigations and the presumption of innocence. You don't close down a thousand year old church and sentence millions of Ukrainians to losing their houses of worship during a time of war.
"Persecution of the Church has nothing to do with a Russian threat"
Carlson: Look, in a free country, you don't punish people. You're not allowed to punish people for for their attitudes. You punish them for their actions. If they're working against the Ukrainian state, I think the Ukrainian state has a right to protect itself from that. But if they have bad attitudes in a free country, there's nothing you can do about it because you can't criminalize a person's conscience.
Amsterdam: Let's talk about attitude. God saved them. Of the 60 clergy who had been killed in this war, half were UOC. The only priest Priest on trial in Moscow today is a UOC priest who was assisting the Ukrainians. None of this gets mentioned. None of this gets discussed. Why? And let's be very clear, we're dealing with Tammany Hall politics. We're not dealing with fear of Russians. The Zelensky government has lost part of its electoral base in the East and now has to basically appeal more to the West and the more socialist elements. So This is a grudge match. And they're going to take down this church. They're going to view it as a victory to take down this church and defeat Christ's children because they think they'll pick up votes. That's how cynical this is. It has nothing to do with a Russian threat, because if there was a real Russian threat, they produce evidence. They are unable to produce evidence, so they produce sanctions, which they administer with absolutely no cause and no evidence.
"Some journalists for the Ukrainian Church are facing life sentences for reporting the truth"
Carlson: I want to ask you about where the money is going. So Saturday night, I happened to have dinner with some Ukrainians, Ukrainian-born Ukrainian speakers, very nice people, and they have raised money for the last two years to send to troops in Ukraine. And they go back and forth between the US and Ukraine. And they told me that there are no bandages in frontline field hospitals in Ukraine, and that the basic necessities, mittons, holsters for side arms, all of they have supplied, are not there. And so it raises the question, if you're getting hundreds of billions of dollars to support your troops, why don't the troops have bandages in their field hospitals?
Amsterdam: You know, Tucker, I will tell you, I haven't studied this deeply, other than a number of my clients have had their assets stolen for absolutely no legitimate reason, other than the government that has people there that likes and covets their assets. But I will tell you that Ukrainian corruption before the war was at some of the highest levels known to mankind. So nothing about the distribution of funds after the war would surprise me. In fact, there's an EU audit that actually talks about the grotesque level of corruption and war profiteering. So again, one of the things I would say about any aid to Ukraine is I hope it is monitored. I hope there are audits. I hope somebody is watching where the money is going so that it to the troops. I know that they spent three and a half million dollars to try to justify their closure of these churches and deflect attention from that. They used three and a half million bucks recently, which should have gone to the troops, should have gone to defending their homeland. They used that to carpet bomb Washington and people like me who were defending the church.
Carlson: So in other words, your tax dollars are being used to defame you through sleazy PR agencies and lobbyists in Washington. That's what you're saying?
Amsterdam: Oh, absolutely. I mean, it's happening daily. But they're defaming me. That's okay. But defaming the church, defaming men of God who are facing arrest. Some journalists for the Ukrainian church are facing life sentences for reporting the truth about the activities of the government in seizing churches and jailing These young men, they are in a cell, a cell right now where there are 20 beds for 28 men. They have to revolve their sleeping. Their crime is they've reported on church seizures.
Carlson: What you're saying is shocking. Last question, where the hell is the State Department, which is supposed to be monitoring human rights?
Amsterdam: The State Department Let me tell you, as I said, we're filing this. We're filing this in the next few days. We hope the State Department will wake up. I've certainly met with them. I've certainly seen that they are entirely drinking the Kool-Aid. We've developed a bit of a cult of personality about the leadership in Ukraine. I've noticed. It is time for our reporters to wake up and reporting on the Shiloh case, the levels of corruption that are going on, and obviously, the attack on this church.
Carlson: Bob Amsterdam, you're a brave man, and I appreciate you're telling us all of this. Thank you.
Amsterdam: Thank you for having me.
