As the credits role at the end of every “Sound of Freedom” screening, audiences are given a special message from the film’s star, Jim Caviezel. During this address, Caviezel makes a point to emphasize who the real hero of the story is.
The actor explains it isn’t Tim Ballard, the real-life character he plays. Rather, the true heroes are Miguel and Rocío, the brother and sister depicted throughout the film fighting to find freedom and each other after being sold into sex slavery.
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Toward the film’s beginning, Ballard’s rescue of Miguel is depicted exactly as it happened in real life.
One of the boy’s traffickers attempted to drive him north across the U.S.-Mexico border at a port of entry but was caught during a routine check.
As it turns out, if not for the border wall, Miguel might never have been saved.
Ballard himself made this point clear while speaking to Congress four years ago.
People Don’t Realize that Tim Ballard Appeared in Front of Congress Multiple Times in 2019 and offered Powerful Testimony about the Horrors of Trafficking.
Stopping Trafficking should be a Subject that Unites American’s.
God’s Children aren’t for Sale. pic.twitter.com/eNtdlYWXLL
— Jason Robertson (@JRobFromMN) July 11, 2023
In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 6, 2019, the founder of Operation Underground Railroad derided politicians opposed to the idea of a border wall.
According to Ballard, the very same people often point to drug seizures and rescues of trafficking victims at ports of entry in order to say, “See, we don’t need walls or barriers … the bad guys come through ports of entry.”
“In fact, we don’t have ports of entry without walls,” he said.
Ballard then talked about the arrest of Earl Buchanan at a border port of entry, aka Miguel’s rescue.
“The walls are the thing that compelled Buchanan to take that child into the port of entry in the first place. From his vantage point on the night of July 3, 2006, with this poor slave child captive in his van, he only had one choice: the port of entry,” Ballard said.
“And that was thanks to the border wall that existed where he happened to be working his evil works. … In the end, the boy was liberated and Buchanan was locked up.”
Ballard juxtaposed the story of Miguel’s rescue with the story of another sex trafficking victim, a girl he referred to as “Lily.”
Originally trafficked into sex slavery south of the border, Lily was brought up north into the United States through a part of the border without any barrier.
“Lily’s traffickers easily transported her to New York City, where she was raped between 30 and 40 times a day. … She believes that she alone was raped over 20,000 times between the age of 13 and 17 right here in our country,” Ballard said.
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“She eventually escaped, and my foundation is now caring for her as she prepares to testify in federal court against her captors.”
“Recounting her experience … Lily has often asked me a simple yet powerful question: ‘Why was there no wall or barrier on the southern border for me? A barrier would have saved me.’”
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Ever since Donald Trump first made building a wall at the southern border a central issue in U.S. politics during the 2016 presidential campaign, liberals have vehemently opposed the idea.
Some argue the building of a wall is inherently discriminatory, while others claim it to be completely ineffective, given the fact that migrants could simply use ladders and ropes to scale any wall.
For example, the video below went viral and was passed off by many liberals as an example of why the wall is apparently useless.
Yesterday, a video showing someone illegally crossing into the United States over the new border wall went viral.
Today the Border Patrol revealed there was more to the story.
Spoiler alert: the suspect didn’t get away—and the wall worked as planned. #BuildTheWall pic.twitter.com/oY6ondY4pX
— Rep. Sam Graves (@RepSamGraves) December 5, 2019
However, as Republican Rep. Sam Graves of Missouri noted, there’s more to the story. The suspect depicted in the video did not escape. Thanks to how much the wall slowed him down, along with the wall’s detection technology, Border Patrol agents were able to arrive and apprehend him.
Liberals can say whatever they want about the border wall, but those who know the specifics of border enforcement, men and women like Tim Ballard, have time and again affirmed the significant, positive impact the border wall has on their efforts.
If not for the border wall, Miguel might never have been saved — and if only more of a wall had been built, perhaps Lily would not have been raped tens of thousands of times.
