For decades, we've been reporting on the extreme way the Chinese regime crushes the religious freedom of its citizens.

But in recent years, the CCP has been escalating its tactics against religious minorities here on American soil.

That's their mentality. They get to do around the world what they do internally, and that's what they're trying to do through this lawfare.

If the Chinese Communist Party is able to discredit those who want to discredit it,

then it can use that to justify persecution, that it has committed against many religious minorities, including Falun Gong.

In this episode, I'm sitting down with religious freedom lawyers Justin Butterfield and

Leah Patterson to understand what's going on, including their response to a recent lawsuit against

Shen Yun, the Performing Arts Company founded by Falun Gong practitioners in New York.

The case touches on vital questions about what it means to be able to practice

your faith and guide the education of your children in America. This is American Thought Leaders,

and I'm Janja Kellogg. Justin Butterfield, Leah Patterson, such a pleasure to have you on

American Thought Leaders. It's a pleasure to be with you. Thank you for having us.

So I've come to deeply appreciate the U.S. Constitution, and it's no surprise to me that

the First Amendment of the Constitution speaks of freedom of speech, freedom of religion.

But ultimately, how I view it is it's freedom of conscience.

And that to me, I've come to believe, is the fundamental human right.

And I know that you share this view, but I'd like you to actually explain it to me in a deeper way today.

That's exactly right. You know, freedom of conscience is fundamental to all

other rights that we enjoy as Americans. If the government can tell you how you can think,

then it doesn't matter if you have freedom of speech, what you talk about, freedom to vote,

how you vote, because all of those other freedoms are ultimately tied to the

freedom to follow your conscience, to follow your religious convictions, to follow those

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