Transcript of “Pablo Pledgescobar” Cocaine Ring Exposed & Surrogate Sued For Birthing Baby | 8.20.26

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The biological parents in a fraud custody case are now suing the child's surrogate mother for refusing to abort at their request. We have the latest details on the controversial case.

There's a real, you know, cruelty to this entire process, as well as, again, ethical issues.

I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire executive editor John Bickley. It's Thursday, August 20th, and this is Morning Wire.

A group of fraternity brothers are arrested for operating a highly organized drug trafficking operation out of their frat houses at Penn State.

Cutting and bagging cocaine was, for some pledges, an indoctrination into the Delta Upsilon and Sigma Chi fraternities.

And with the school year ramping up, parents across the country find themselves once again facing off against school boards over content pushed to their children. We look at one such case in Colorado.

They're intentionally making an opt-out, uh, to get as many children in this program to, to indoctrinate them as possible.

Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned, we have the news you need to know.

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A legal battle is being waged between a California couple and a surrogate mother who traveled from Alaska to Texas to give birth. The couple is now suing the surrogate mother of their child for $100,000 after she refused their request to abort the child.

The couple agreed to pay 28-year-old McKenna West $60,000 to carry their baby on the condition that they could terminate the pregnancy if there were health anomalies found. When the baby was found to have a serious heart defect, the surrogate fled to Texas to give birth in hopes of protecting the child.

Joining us now to discuss the story is Christina Bennett, pro-life advocate and correspondent for Live Action. Christina, thanks for coming on.

Oh, thank you for having me.

All right, so this case has been making headlines for at least a week now. Where do things stand now with this baby? Who is he with and what is his health status?

So we do know that this baby, Gabriel, as McKenna has named him, as Rumi, as his biological parents have named him, we do know that he has had his first surgery and is recovering, but he also needs two additional surgeries. We believe that he is doing well after his first surgery, and there is going to be a custody battle in the days to come regarding who will be able to care for him in the future.

And he's physically in Texas but with his, uh, biological parents, as in his, uh, the parents who purchased the services?

Yes, yes, that is the case. And there has been a restraining order that was given against McKenna, so she has not been able to see him, which is tragic as she carried him all the way and birthed him.

Now, are there any laws on the books determining who the official parentage is of a child in a case like this?

You know, it's not so clear-cut, and there haven't been a lot of cases like this, especially ones that have had national attention. So really, it'll be up to the court and the judge to decide. So I think that this will probably maybe set a precedent going forward, but we're not exactly sure what the, the judge will decide or how the courts will rule.

As we mentioned at the top, you know, the latest, um, wrinkle in this is this $100,000 lawsuit against the surrogate mother. What do we know about that particular lawsuit?

There is a lawsuit, and that's being brought on by the bio parents. And we do know that they're doing it because they are obviously frustrated that McKenna carried the pregnancy to term and gave birth to this beautiful baby boy. And it is tragic because she did sacrifice much because she didn't want this child to be aborted. She didn't want this child to be dismembered. And I believe that her actions were heroic. So I think it's very sad that she is being sued, but we know that's what's happening.

McKenna did also attempt to make some goodwill gestures toward the family, correct? I mean, I understand she offered to pay for some things. She really fought hard to, to, uh, save this child's life while also not rupturing the relationship with the bio parents. Can you discuss that a little bit?

Yeah. So I think it's important for people to understand, you know, who McKenna is. McKenna is a single mother of, of two children. And she went into this, of course, you know, wanting to support her family, but also wanting to help a family have a child. And she was naive in regards to how surrogacy can work and the, and the complications and the ethical issues involving it. But she did all that she could to let the biological parents know that she wanted to, to be there and to, to have this child. I know that she did everything in her power to communicate the importance of saving this child's life, and they objected and they disagreed with her, and they've been, you know, fighting her, unfortunately, ever since.

What are the bio parents saying? I mean, so they did want this child to be aborted, but now they're fighting to keep the child. What are they saying? Are they— have they verbalized an intention to continue with his medical care?

That isn't clear as of now. I think that that will become clear when they have to go to court and to fight for custody. The biological parents did an interview with The New York Times in which they basically stated that McKenna, unfortunately, in their view, they wanted the baby to be aborted, and that's why they're suing her. It's very tragic.

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More than a dozen frat brothers from Penn State have been indicted in an alleged cocaine distribution operation that was highly organized and running out of the frat houses.

Here with the details is host of That's So Criminal, Linden Blake. So Linden, a crazy story, uh, for people who haven't been following this, can you just start at the beginning of this crime that's being alleged? Yeah, so more than a dozen people involved in this.

A big blow to this cocaine operation that was operating out of State College, PA. And the indictments came in earlier this week, but the investigation into this goes back to 2023, 2024, when some of these people that have now had to turn themselves in were still in college in these frat houses. So let's start there. There's a guy named Thomas Robinson. He was a part of the Delta Upsilon fraternity there at Penn State. Back in 2024, authorities were tipped off because there was a guy on Venmo accepting drug money under his real name. So according to the reports, Thomas Robinson was known as T-Rob, but his Venmo was under Tom Robinson. So they were able to go follow this digital trail, raid the Delta Upsilon frat house. And according to the complaint, at the time, back in 2024, Robinson allegedly resisted arrest and, quote, thought the officers were his fraternity brothers trying to play a trick on him. So he was pretty confident he was not going to get caught, but he was tasered, he was taken into custody, and there was a search of his dorm room. And what did they find? Authorities found more than 200 amphetamines and dextroamphetamine pills, according to the complaint that was just released this week.

So yeah, a big operation. 13 either current or former Penn State students, and there was one, an adult, involved.

Right, this really, uh, caught my attention. A father was involved. Tell us about this.

This was Mr. Thomas Robinson's father, and right now he is being accused of tampering and attempting to hide evidence, including a safe filled with drugs and cash, to hinder the investigation.

Although from the indictment, Thomas Robinson wasn't actually who they identified as the ringleader, correct?

Yeah, so while he was in custody, he was able to tip authorities off on other people involved in this drug ring, and the ringleader is 24 4-year-old Augustino Abatello. He was living in Long Island before he surrendered Tuesday morning of this week. He was known as Pablo Pledge Scobar during his time at Penn State. He was part of that system where they actually ran the operations out of the fraternity houses and not only used that as the drug house, they would ask pledges to cut and bag the cocaine, and pledges would do this in the fraternity. It was part of like their hazing to get into these fraternities. The Attorney General said that this was very organized, that they cut and they bagged cocaine, and added, just because you're out of college and you're making money and you think this is something you get away with, it is not.

Now, part of the reason this is a federal investigation is because this actually crossed state lines. So tell us about how far this operation went.

Yeah, we call it highly organized because they were actually getting the cocaine from Philadelphia, from New York, that was coming in, being funneled to those fraternities for them to distribute to the student body there on Penn State's campus. So obviously when this news broke, Penn State, they released a statement saying, we are horrified these serious allegations against current and former students. Criminal activity including hazing such as this has no place at our institution, and we will cooperate with law enforcement in any way we can. Penn State did suspend the Delta Upsilon fraternity, but Sigma Chi wasn't run by Penn State, but their headquarters did put them on suspension as well.

Well, you know, I hate crime, but I do love a good movie, and this has all the makings for that.

Absolutely.

Lyndon, thanks for reporting. Of course. As the school year ramps back up, parents in Colorado have expressed outrage after finding explicit images in school curriculum aimed at kids as young as 5 years old.

Joining us now to discuss this latest case of schools appearing to violate parental rights is Tyson Langhofer of Alliance Defending Freedom, which has issued a demand letter on behalf of concerned parents to Roaring Fork Schools Board of Education. Tyson, good to have you on.

Hey, thanks for having me.

So first, can you give us sort of a top-line summary of this? What is this curriculum that sparked this backlash from parents?

Sure. Well, the curriculum is entitled Rights, Respect, and Responsibility— the 3 Rs. Sounds like a great civics lesson, right? Uh, it sounds pretty innocuous, but when you dig into it, what it actually is is a comprehensive sexual education program that starts from kindergarten and goes all the way through high school. And the problem is that the school has made a— created this very difficult opt-out system for parents. And so parents who object to the curriculum themselves is having a very difficult time, uh, you know, knowing how to opt their, their children out of this program that they would rather them not be in.

All right, so the opt-out is confusing. What exactly is being taught that's so objectionable?

Well, as I said, the, the curriculum starts in kindergarten, and it— there are numerous lessons that are extremely, uh, you know, uh, objectionable to parents. First of all, they You have very explicit anatomical pictures that start with kindergarten, and I mean, some of these pictures are so objectionable, when we shared them on social media, we actually blurred them out. That's how blatant they are. And you have teachers, for students as young as first grade, are supposed to get the students to tell them, how do they like to be touched? So we're not just talking about, you know, biological things, but, but how they like to be touched. And then you have the first graders getting worksheets like, can this make a baby? With pictures. So these are the types of things that, that we're sharing with very young kids. And to top it off, there is gender identity throughout. And so kids as young as fourth graders are being told that their anatomy does not determine whether they're a boy or a girl.

Wow.

And there's also some information about the pride flag and promotion of that kind of material. Is that correct?

That's correct. I mean, you're encouraged— for these third graders and fourth graders are encouraged to make a pride flag with their family and discuss, you know, these various gender identities, you know, all kinds of, again, ideologically biased, you know, curriculum, which is, you know, but it's themed as just you know, kind of generic sex ed.

And to be clear, this is not a lawsuit. So no courts or judges are involved at this point.

That's correct. We've just sent a letter to the school and we've said, look, parents have a right to determine whether their children are going to be subject to this type of material. And so you need to make, you know, allow them to opt in into this material rather than opt out, because the program that they have created is a very confusing program. Some parents have said they've opted out and their children still went through the lesson. Some parents said that the, the notice got stuck in their spam, so they weren't given the opportunity to opt out. So what the school needs to do here is let parents opt in, but they're intentionally making it an opt-out to get as many children in this program to indoctrinate them as possible.

Now, it seems like we've been seeing headlines like this for a few years now, and I think a lot of parents are very frustrated. Is there anything they can do proactively to get their school to stop trying to promote these type of things?

Well, I think they can do a couple things. One, if your child's in a public school, you need to proactively ask your teacher or teachers what is being taught. Send me everything you have. I want to know. Don't rely on them to give you that information. You know, proactively ask that. But secondly, you know, actually, you know, once you get this information, go through it. And if you object, pull some parents together, go to school board meetings and ask them to change this curriculum. And then if they don't do it, run for school board yourself.

Well, we were interested in this situation because it represents what a lot of parents have found in their districts. I know I personally have seen some of this myself. Let's hope Roaring Forks, you know, makes the right move here. Tyson, thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you.

Thanks for waking up with us. And be sure to tune in Monday, 5 PM Central, for our next all-access this live episode. And because we keep our promises, we have a special segment dedicated to the beloved cat Maga Mo.

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What if a few minutes with God could change the direction of your entire day? With pray.com, you can begin each morning with powerful daily prayers, inspiring Bible stories, and messages created to strengthen your faith. Whether you need peace, encouragement, or a fresh start, pray.com helps you make prayer part of your everyday life. Download the pray.com app today.