Country music star John Rich joined Breitbart News Daily’s Mike Slater on Wednesday to talk about his work helping the organization Operation Light Shine capture online child sex offenders and also revealed his thoughts about the assassination of conservative icon Charlie Kirk.
Rich told Sirius XM Patriot listeners that he has jumped in to help raise awareness for Operation Light Shine, which “created the Inter-agency Child Exploitation And Persons Trafficking Task Force (INTERCEPT) to provide the resources, staffing, and support required to identify and rescue child victims, apprehend their offenders, and reduce the risk through public education and awareness.”
“I learned about a year ago from Homeland security, from a couple agents there, that last year there were 36 million reports made by parents that their kids had been targeted online by child predators — 36 million in one year. So, we’re averaging 3 million a month. And the agents said there’s no way to combat that kind of volume,” the country crooner told Breitbart News Daily.
“So, Operation Light Shine is a group of former law enforcement, former detectives. They go out. They set up sting units. They find bad guys. They’re trying to work underneath some of these to try to fill the gaps,” Rich said.
Operation Light Shine uses hi-tech facilities to help law enforcement agencies locate, identify, and stop child porn users and distributors and to hunt down child sex traffickers.
“I did a huge livestream with them in Nashville recently raising awareness for them. Raising money for them. It’s something that people should go watch. If you go look up Operation Light Shine John Rich on YouTube, you’ll find it. It’s a tutorial for parents on how to keep their kids safe and not become victims of these animals who are after them online.”
“It’s for every kid. We would do anything as moms and dads, literally anything, to keep a bad guy from coming in our house and stealing our kid,” Rich added. “But we’re handing them iPhones and iPads and connecting them to the Internet and we’re not putting parameters; we’re not making it provide; we’re not putting up firewalls. We’re essentially letting the bad guys into our houses right under our noses. And that’s what this seminar is about.”
“If you go to Operation Light Shine, they have the entire thing laid out. Really simple steps a parent can take to keep their kids protected when they’re on those devices,” he explained.
During the visit with Breitbart News Daily, the “Revelation” singer also revealed his thoughts about the brutal murder of Charlie Kirk and noted that the tragic assassination has served as an avenue for the Gospel to be brought to millions of Americans.
“It’s an unsettling feeling for everybody to see the face of evil that up close and personal. We hear people rant and rave on social media. We see their memes and the TikTok videos but it’s a whole different feeling when you see them actually carry things out and manifest it in the flesh,” he said.
“Watching [Charlie’s] memorial service — the numbers I saw anyway, somewhere over 100 million people watched that — what was really incredible, it wasn’t just a memorial service, there were sermons,” Rich said. “When Charlie Kirk’s pastor took the microphone for about 15 minutes, it was Billy Graham-level preaching. Actual preaching, from an actual Christian preacher. And then he offered an alter call, which is what Billy Graham used to do in the football stadiums. We’ve all seen those videos. Except this was to 100 million people.”
He continued, saying, “While it is unsettling. And I’m still upset. I don’t think I’ll ever not be upset about what happened; to see that effect of it causing, it shakes people. It makes them have to deal with it. Here’s the thing. If you were confronted with the devil himself. If you see it with your own two eyes. People like to walk around acting like the devil is not real and God is not real. They just want to go about their life. When you no longer can ignore it. When you have to look at it and digest it. If the devil is real, then by default who else is real? If the dark is real, so is the light. Right? And so, the devil’s real. Wow! God is real. Jesus Christ real. And I think that realization hit people right between the eyes.”
Rich concluded by noting that “truth” causes division and that has been on display in full force after Kirk’s murder.
“You’re seeing a division right now. There’s a very powerful verse in the New Testament that says the truth is sharper than any two-edged sword dividing even between the spirit and the soul. Between the joints and the marrow. The truth is a divider. It’s not a uniter. And so when the real truth lands, you will see people divide. You will see them go separate directions. And that’s what we’re seeing today,” he said.
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