Introducing the 60 Minutes Whistleblower Coverage

John Dehlin [00:00:02] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I am your host for today, John Dehlin. It's May 16, 2023, and today we are covering what was, I think, a really important episode of 60 Minutes, which is a show broadcasted here in the United States, a new show, and it covered whistleblower David Nielsen from Ensign Peak.

John Dehlin [00:00:33] Kind of a little bit about his story and about his whistleblowing of inappropriate behaviors by Ensign Peak and how it led to an irs, both whistle whistleblowing filing and hopefully some sort of investigation by the irs. In the past, we have been covering this story in various ways. There's a really important report that I want to make sure all of you have access to and know about. It's the Widow's Might Report, which attempts to break down and estimate the Mormon Church's wealth and how it uses this wealth and, you know, estimates of its assets, of its charitable givings, etc. You can see multiple episodes of the Ensign Peak Report coverage here on Mormon Stories.

John Dehlin [00:01:22] And then, of course, we have tried to cover the securities and Exchange Commission's recent, I don't know, I'll call it settlement with the Mormon Church, where the Mormon Church paid in aggregate, we can just say $5 million of fines or penalties for inappropriate filings with the SEC.

John Dehlin [00:01:44] And the gentleman that we had back on Mormon Stories, the expert that we had to talk about the SEC case in specifically and whom we've had on Mormon stories in the past to talk about fraud within Utah specifically, is our dear friend Mark Pugsley. Hey, Mark, welcome back.

Mark Pugsley [00:02:05] Hey, John. Thanks.

John Dehlin [00:02:06] Yeah. So, Mark, you were willing to come kind of at last minute to talk about the 60 Minutes. The 60 Minutes report, yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:02:15] Happy to be here. I'm not really dressed very nice today, but at least I wasn't wearing shorts and a T shirt.

John Dehlin [00:02:21] I think you look fantastic. I love that color.

Mark Pugsley [00:02:23] You're so nice.

John Dehlin [00:02:24] Those are great colors.

Mark Pugsley [00:02:25] Thanks, John.

John Dehlin [00:02:26] Yeah. And of course, we have a really large live stream audience that we, we want to welcome and we want to welcome your comments and feedback and questions and we'll incorporate them as we can to today's episode. But what we've done is we've assembled some clips from the 60 Minutes report and we plan on playing them and kind of getting your reaction to them, Mark, and just overall, and I should also say you are personal friends with, with David Nielsen and you may or may not be able to talk about him, how he's doing and anything you want to say about his backstory and what, what he's feeling now. But I think it's worth mentioning that more you're more than just an expert on fraud within Utah and someone who's been commenting on both the SEC and the IRS sort of thing things. You're also a personal friend of David's.

Mark Pugsley [00:03:23] Yeah. And in. In, you know, of course, I think I kind of mentioned this on the last episode, but, you know, David, David, when he left his job at the Ensign Peak, he was reaching out. He didn't know what to do. And he was referred to me, and I was not able to take his case, but I encouraged him to be a whistleblower. And the reason I think that's important is that David did not quit Ensign Peak to become a whistleblower. He was unhappy with the way things were going. He talked about that at the 60 Minutes interview, and he just wanted to do the right thing and also to protect his family and didn't quite know where to start.

Mark Pugsley [00:04:09] And I, I told him that there's this IRS and there's an SEC whistleblower programs and you should look into those. And he did. And we've become good friends. And I'm. I can tell you that I was at his house watching the 60 Minutes episode on Sunday, and it was kind of fun. He had a group over, got a great family, great friends, and we hung out and watched the episode. And he was very nervous, but I think he felt really good about it. He seemed quite relieved and happy at the end of the showing. And I mean, we've talked about it since then. And again, I, I just.

Mark Pugsley [00:04:51] I don't want to betray any confidences. I'm not always sure what I. He wants me to talk about and what he doesn't. But I can tell you that he was very happy with the way it came out. And I. I was happy. I thought that, you know, in such a short period of time, it's very hard to really tell this story. And if people haven't seen the 60 minutes overtime interviews, they should look at those. And Are you going to play some of those?

John Dehlin [00:05:12] Yeah, yeah, we'll play some.

Mark Pugsley [00:05:13] Those are actually as good, if not better, I thought, than the episode itself because they kind of let him talk about some of these things in more detail.

John Dehlin [00:05:21] Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll. We're not going to show the whole program. Hopefully we'll show enough to give people a sense for what got covered. Is there any background you want to share, Mark, about maybe what's happened since we covered the SEC and then, you know, the David's interactions with 60 Minutes before, before this program, is there anything interesting worth covering there? Should we just play the clip?

Reactions to the 60 Minutes Broadcast

Mark Pugsley [00:05:46] Yeah, no, I think. I think there's a few things. One is that the producers were very complimentary, and they said that it was trending, one of the highest trending episodes they've had, at least on Twitter. And they. I don't know what they look at, but YouTube likes or something.

Mark Pugsley [00:06:05] We were just looking at it. It looks like over a million people have viewed it on YouTube, in addition to how many people watched it live. Yeah, I think it's fantastic. And they're very pleased with the result and the story and the interest that it's had. So he's got very good feedback from them. And I. I'll tell you one other thing that's kind of interesting, is that he has.

Mark Pugsley [00:06:26] One of the things we did last time is we posted a phone number that people could call at the. The Senate Finance Committee, which is where he's hoping they will put some additional encouragement over to the irs. Let's just say that you avoided using the word pressure. Yeah, well, I don't know. I'm not a politician, but I think that.

Mark Pugsley [00:06:48] And, And I have cases before the. The IRS whistleblower program. So I. I want to be delicate with them, but it's a. They're not known for their speed of their investigations. It is the federal government, and the IRS is very meticulous in the way it investigates cases, and they take a long time. And I have a case currently pending before the IRS whistleblower program that's been out there for over 10 years.

Mark Pugsley [00:07:13] And I just talked to a potential client today that has one that's been out for 17 years. So it takes a long time to get them to move on cases, and it's very frustrating. It's hard to be a whistleblower. I. I've said that before. I'll continue to say it. It's one of the hardest things people do because they put their lives on hold and they risk their reputations. And. Why. Why did they do that? Well, to do the right thing.

Guest [00:07:37] And.

Mark Pugsley [00:07:37] And David is a perfect example of someone who just wanted to do the right thing. He was not happy with what was happening at the job. Excuse me. So he. He tried to report internally, he tried to make changes internally, was, you know, rebuffed at every turn, and finally he had no choice but to quit. And it's been a hard path, and I think. But I think in some way, the 60 Minutes episode is the culmination of a lot of what he was working towards. And it was kind of cool. I, I've never sat with the subject of a whistleblower. I mean the subject of 60 minutes before, let alone watching them on 60 minutes.

Mark Pugsley [00:08:18] It was kind of fun on Sunday to watch that with him. And, and I hope that he's, I hope that he's happy and I hope people see the sincerity. You know, that was his first going time, going public. And I think at some point, John, he'll come on Mormon stories. I hope he will. I've encouraged him to.

Mark Pugsley [00:08:35] But you know, I think when you saw that interview, I hope you saw it and I hope other people saw it, that he is a sincere guy. He's not a money grubbing guy. He's not someone who quit because of anything other than just trying to do the right thing. And that's who David is. He's honest.

John Dehlin [00:08:52] I almost get the sense. I also get the sense. Sorry, I cut you off. You were saying he's honest.

Mark Pugsley [00:08:57] Honest to the core.

John Dehlin [00:08:58] Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I, I also get the sense that he's not a guy that takes something like this lightly. Like.

Mark Pugsley [00:09:03] No, you, you could, you could, you

John Dehlin [00:09:05] know, there's this idea in like, let's just street community of being a snitch or a tattletale. You don't get the sense that he's just like running around trying to betray people's confidences that like he probably spent years deliberating and debating on, on what the most ethical thing to do is he did.

Mark Pugsley [00:09:24] And the amount of work that has gone into his whistleblower report, if people have read it, we, we pointed out last time it's on a website called Religion Unplugged, I think is the full submission. And you can look at that and see it was, I think it's 90 pages long. It has incredible amount of detail. Sometimes it's just mind numbing, you know, the amount of detail. And he spent months and months putting that report together. Months and months.

John Dehlin [00:09:51] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:09:52] And so he's, you know, then once you file it, then you have to start working with the regulators, working with the investigators. And he's spent hours and hours working with his lawyers and also with the, with the IRS and with the sec.

Mark Pugsley [00:10:07] Those investigations are ongoing. I want to take issue at one with one of the people that was interviewed for the 60 Minute story. And we're going to talk about Brother Waddell. But there they also interviewed a guy whose name I'm forgetting, but he was like an IRS tax expert who said that he thinks that the chances of this being investigated or that their bring charges are slim, I think is the word he used. And I totally disagree with that.

Mark Pugsley [00:10:37] I do think that there is political pressure on the irs, no question. But I also think that this involves so much money, and it involves serious conduct involving, if people have read it, you know, the. He talks about a lot of the filings that they were supposed to make that they did not make.

Mark Pugsley [00:10:56] And it's difficult to, you know, really handicap these situations. But I think there is a good chance that the IRS will take action. But will that be next month or next century? I don't know. It takes a long time, and it's as complicated.

John Dehlin [00:11:11] Yeah. And I think. I think it's worth reminding people that they should check out my interview with you on the sec, you know, decision and settlement and. Fine. Because they'll get a lot of the backstory there that we don't have time to cover today. Right.

John Dehlin [00:11:28] Okay, really quickly, I want to thank everyone again who's joining us on YouTube. Please take a minute to subscribe to YouTube or on Facebook. If you're on Facebook, those subscriptions really help. You can also like this episode, and that will help with the algorithms. And then also, we always appreciate the super chat donations that people can give through YouTube that helps pay for making all of this possible.

John Dehlin [00:11:50] A little dollar sign in the chat window. You can click on it, make a donation, and we always appreciate that as well. All right, so we're going to go ahead and jump in to some of the clips, and I'll just play a little bit, and then we'll talk about it, and then we'll play a little bit more. Is that okay?

Mark Pugsley [00:12:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:05] All right, let's. Let's go ahead and go to the first clip, which is kind of about. Which is kind of about recruiting David to Ensign Peak and what he perceived to be the main mission of Ensign Peak once he got there. All right, let's play that clip.

▶ Video Clip 1

Video Clip 1 [00:12:27] Thanks. We met Nielsen in Salt Lake City. This is the first time he has spoken publicly about his whistleblower complaint and why he came forward. So you're doing well on Wall Street. You go to business school. Surely you could have stayed on Wall street and made a fortune. Why'd you decide to come to Utah?

David Nielsen's Path to Ensign Peak

Video Clip 1 [00:12:45] Because they asked. I was in business school in 2009, and the chief Investment officer said, please come in. We want you to work here. And over the next year or so, I was recruited into Ensign Peak.

Video Clip 1 [00:13:01] And what did you know about the firm size of it?

Video Clip 1 [00:13:04] Almost.

Video Clip 1 [00:13:04] I mean, really almost nothing. It's very secretive. I had no idea the size of the assets when I was even hired. It wasn't until the very first day that I knew. They asked me to guess, how much money do you think we have? I guess 30 billion was a little more than that at the time, but we just didn't know.

John Dehlin [00:13:26] What are your reactions to that, Mark?

Mark Pugsley [00:13:29] Well, I mean, if I know you, some of your audience are not members of the church, but the ones who are will get that. When he said they asked, I mean, I think some people would say what, what? You know, he gave up a ton of money.

John Dehlin [00:13:42] What do you think these dudes on average make on Wall Street?

Mark Pugsley [00:13:45] Oh, they're making. Well, it depends on what firm and whether in private equity or whatever you're doing, but they're making, you know, three, 400 minimum and up, you know, it's K3 to 400K. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's good money. And especially in New York, when you're in the big Wall street firms, you get paid very well. David is a very smart guy. Um, and I'm sure that he would have been in demand on Wall Street. He already had some positions there, I think, before he went to business school, if I recall. And then he went to business school and then was recruited by a number of folks.

Mark Pugsley [00:14:17] But you know, when you're a devout member, as he was, and the church calls you up and says, you know, it's like when my dad, my dad was called to be a mission president in the, really in the middle of his law career and he gave it all up and his practice was non existent when he came back. It's not a big deal. It's not even unusual as a member of the church to make these huge, huge sacrifices in your career in order to, you know, I don't know, build the kingdom or whatever it is. I mean, but this is the problem and that he points out is that he didn't know.

Mark Pugsley [00:14:52] He thought that he was doing one thing and he shows up and all they're talking about is the money. I mean, he thinks he's building the kingdom and really he's just building the portfolio.

John Dehlin [00:15:01] Do you, do you remember what grad school he went to, by the way?

Mark Pugsley [00:15:05] I don't, I'm sorry, I'm putting you on the. I can look at LinkedIn.

John Dehlin [00:15:09] No worries. It's good. I'll, I'll look that up. Okay. Yeah. And that's called the law of consecration within Mormonism. Right, right. You basically, when you go to the temple you covenant to consecrate your time, your talents. And I think. I think it still says even your own life, if necessary.

Guest 1 [00:15:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:15:28] To the building up of the kingdom. Right.

Mark Pugsley [00:15:30] It's been a while since I've been there, but I. I think that was the case when I went. I went back in the days when you cut your throat at the temple. So that was. That's how old I am.

John Dehlin [00:15:39] Me too, bro. Yeah, me too.

Mark Pugsley [00:15:41] That was a fun time.

John Dehlin [00:15:42] Yeah. Okay, so. So, yeah, they. The church calls and he decides to come and he goes to work. What did you think about that little koi? Like, they. They're interviewing him or they bring him on in his first day, and. And they're like, how much money do you think we have?

Mark Pugsley [00:15:59] You know, it's kind of silly. I mean, were they giggling when they said that? That's what I was wondering.

Guest [00:16:05] Is it.

Mark Pugsley [00:16:06] Were they. Were they rubbing their hands together? Or what's the. Who's the guy McDuck, you know, when he's. He, like, plays in his coins. What's that? Am I misremembering? What's that cartoon?

John Dehlin [00:16:18] And Donald Duck.

Mark Pugsley [00:16:19] But there's the rich guy, the uncle, the rich uncle dude. And he, like, has his house, and he, like, has just money everywhere. I mean, that's what it kind of sounded like. I mean, they were kind of reveling in the. What they were doing. And I just think as a guy who came there thinking you were all about serving the Lord, and then I can only imagine it was a shock to kind of see, hey, this isn't really. This is just about money. I mean, it's just about money.

John Dehlin [00:16:45] And I guess when he started, 30, whatever billion is wasn't as much as probably what it is now, 150 billion.

Mark Pugsley [00:16:52] Right.

John Dehlin [00:16:53] But I'm guessing even if you've been On Wall Street, 30 billion is a lot of money.

Mark Pugsley [00:16:57] Oh, yeah.

Guest 1 [00:16:58] Oh, yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:16:59] Well, and. And I. I was just gonna just today in the Salt Lake Tribune, I can. I just mentioned this. The. You know, every time the church released. Now they're filing the public filings that they were supposed to file all along.

Guest 2 [00:17:13] Right.

Mark Pugsley [00:17:13] I mean, this is exactly why the church didn't want to follow it, because it's the headline in the Salt Lake Tribune today is what their investment results were for the last quarter. And guess What? They made 1.8 billion dol portfolio in the last. In the first three months of this year. And it's in the front page of the Salt Tribune. This is exactly the scrutiny the church wanted to Avoid. That's why they hid their money for so long. Now we're looking at this. I mean, people, I hope understand how much a billion dollars is. I mean, 1.8 billion. That's, you know, that's 1800 million. I mean, that's. That's a lot of money. And it just goes up and up and up.

Guest 2 [00:17:53] Yeah.

The SEC Investigation and $32 Billion Hidden Fund

John Dehlin [00:17:54] Okay, well, let's go ahead and go to the next section where they kind of summarize the sec, I think, investigations, and obviously we've covered that already, but I'm. I wanted to play that, and I wanted to also call your attention to this brief little comment she makes about how the church basically says they were just taking the lawyer's advice. But let's. Let's roll the clip, and then I want to hear your comments on that.

▶ Video Clip 2

Video Clip 2 [00:18:21] To protect market fairness and transparency, any firm with more than $100 million in securities must file accurate reports on its holdings with the sec. But in February, the SEC announced the Church of Latter Day Saints and Ensign Peak failed to do that. SEC investigators found the church went to great lengths to hide $32 billion in securities over nearly 20 years. It created 13 shell companies that were assigned a local phone number that would go directly to voicemail in case regulators checked in.

Video Clip 2 [00:18:55] Here they had these back office accountants who had never bought a bond or sold stock a day in their life signing signatory pages for a portfolio that didn't exist.

Video Clip 2 [00:19:10] The SEC fined the church and Ensign Peak a total of $5 million. Bishop Christopher Waddell told us it was the church's lawyers who advised them to create the shell companies.

John Dehlin [00:19:23] All right, Mark, what are your reactions to that whole clip? And then definitely the ending part.

The Church's Response and Legal Accountability

Mark Pugsley [00:19:30] Well, I. I want to start with the ending because I don't, you know, I want to defend lawyers here a little bit because it's always easy to throw the lawyers under the bus. Why? Because the lawyers can't defend themselves because most of their communications are privileged. So they can't raise their hand and say, hey, I gave them advice, and that's not the advice I gave. No one can do that. So it's really easy for a corporation like the LDS Church to throw their lawyers under the bus. They didn't name the lawyers, and they didn't say what the advice was, except they did say that the lawyers advised them to form these companies.

Mark Pugsley [00:20:03] And I suspect that's probably true. I think, though, and I made this point before, John, I want to make it again. I think they got advice from lawyers. I assume they did. They have a Big law firm in Salt Lake City that gives advice to them on all sorts of things. I just don't think they followed the lawyer's advice.

Mark Pugsley [00:20:22] So to say, you know, we did what the lawyers told us to do is very disingenuous because I'm confident the law is clear. I'm confident the lawyers did not, say, give signatory authority over these huge fake accounts to a back office accountant who doesn't, as David said, has never traded a bond in his life. I mean, these are flunkies who, just like when David was called to come work for Ensign Peak, someone at the church office building, someone at Ensign Peak went to one of their back office accountants and said, hey, Dave, you're not on social media and you have a very common sounding name, so we want you to be the signatory on these statements we're filing with the sec.

Mark Pugsley [00:21:10] And I think in most companies, people would have said, well, wait a minute, this sounds very sketchy. Why are you asking me to do this? You're asking me to do something. I don't know what I'm signing. You're not even giving me the document. And that's what the SEC order says they did. They had them sign the document under oath that they managed the money, but they didn't show them what was on the document, so they just handed them the signature page. Sign it. Thank you very much. Then they put the rest of the paperwork on it and put it into the sec.

Mark Pugsley [00:21:42] So this person, this flunky or this shill in the accounting department was kind of. I mean, is this part of the law of consecration to sign false statements under oath? Is that really what we're asking people to do? Now? Life for the Lord is not in the Doctrine and Covenants that I'm aware of, but apparently that's what these folks did. And they did it without questioning until they got caught. I'm. I'm surprised none of them got prosecuted for doing that. So anyway, I'm, I'm. I. Maybe I'm rambling, but I just. It's just offensive to me that these people who are in charge of Enzyme Peak talk about throwing someone under the bus.

Mark Pugsley [00:22:23] They. They got someone in the back office who didn't know what they were doing and just said, sign this paperwork and expose them to criminal liability. I mean, that's what the church did for 20 years. And we went into it in a lot more detail last time.

Mark Pugsley [00:22:38] But anyway, the church would not if they really followed their lawyer's advice. I'm confident. And again, I don't know what the advice was, but I'm pretty sure that a lawyer would have told them to actually give those entities control over the money. If you're going to have them sign the paperwork, they have to actually control the money. That is not what happened.

John Dehlin [00:22:59] And unfortunately, I've had just a tiny bit of legal interactions this year. And when, when, you know, some of the. We were, let's just say, opposing in a case when, when there was a problem with, with, let's just say, some evidence or some claims, and clearly, you know, the opposing party made a mistake, the attorney jumped to take responsibility and said, well, that, that might have been attorney error. Is that sometimes the role of an attorney to just be a shield for their client?

Mark Pugsley [00:23:35] Sure. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And sometimes when, I mean, we saw it, this is a little bit of a sidetrack. But, you know, Donald Trump, it was just in this defamation trial and there was something that happened where his lawyer, you know, Donald Trump's posting crazy stuff all over the Internet and the court calls his lawyer and says, what is your client doing? And the lawyer kind of has to take the fall. By the way, David went to ucla. He just texted me.

John Dehlin [00:24:00] Okay.

Mark Pugsley [00:24:02] For grad school.

John Dehlin [00:24:04] Pretty good school.

Mark Pugsley [00:24:04] Yeah. Yeah. Good school.

John Dehlin [00:24:05] Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So sometimes lawyers do take the fall, and I think that's. There's no way that the church's council said, you know, commit a bunch of fraud.

Mark Pugsley [00:24:15] Yeah, of course.

John Dehlin [00:24:16] There's just no way.

Mark Pugsley [00:24:17] I know, but they can't, they can't defend themselves because we don't even know who they are. And there's a bunch of other things that we're going to go through where the church kind of throws stuff out and then no one can deflect, no one can defend themselves because they're not exactly saying what the advice was and they're not saying who gave the advice. So, yeah, it's really unfortunate. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:39] Well, there's a couple comments that, that we just gathered just to kind of represent how this story is playing on the Internet, on ex Mormon Reddit, on Facebook. I'll just read these comments.

Mark Pugsley [00:24:50] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:24:50] And you can respond to them. Grassy field on ExMormon. Reddit writes, The Church will break any of the Ten Commandments to protect one, its cash and two, its reputation, and in that order. I actually disagree. I think the church cares more about its reputation and its authority than its cash. But what's your reaction, Mark?

Mark Pugsley [00:25:11] No, I, I kind of agree with that. I think, I think they definitely are concerned about protecting the cash. Clearly they are. But Also, I think they would have if. If the SEC would have said, look, if you pay us a hundred million dollars, we won't issue a report, we won't issue an order. The settlement of this case with all this detail in it, I'll bet you the church would have taken that deal. They would have given a lot of money, in my opinion, to avoid exposure of their conduct for the last 20 years. Because it's really embarrassing. It really is embarrassing.

Mark Pugsley [00:25:45] But I've spent 29 years in this town of Salt Lake City dealing with investment fraud. That's what I do. And the problem we have in Utah comes from the top. People are willing to say and do whatever it takes to protect their money or to get money. And that.

Mark Pugsley [00:26:06] Where do they learn that? Where is that coming from? It's coming from the top. And then they adopt that into their own lives. This prosperity gospel idea that if you're successful financially, that means you must be spiritual and following the commandments. Utter bullshit. Excuse me, but the fact is it comes from the top. And this is where people wonder why we have such a problem with fraud in this town. That's your answer?

John Dehlin [00:26:29] Yeah. And just for those who don't know, are you saying fraud per capita is higher in Utah? You know, higher than in the rest of the United States?

Mark Pugsley [00:26:38] I did a study back in 2019, and I was. Came out on a lot of the newspapers. People can Google it. But Utah has the highest rate of Ponzi schemes in the country by almost three times higher than any other state on a per capita basis. So there may be more Ponzi schemes in New York and Florida overall, but they're much bigger states. Utah has a particular problem with securities fraud, and that's just Ponzi schemes. Affinity fraud is a whole nother problem here that isn't even addressed by that study. So, yeah, we have a. It's very unusual. And in fact, I get calls almost every week from documentary people who are trying to put together stories about this and trying to talk about.

Mark Pugsley [00:27:20] You know, if people saw Lula Rich, such a classic, I think it was on Netflix or. No, it was Amazon Prime. Great story about, you know, the Mormon MLM culture. And that culture is. Is something people are really interested in talking about and wanting to do stories about because, yeah, it turns out the whole world is fascinated by this stuff.

John Dehlin [00:27:42] Yeah. Yep. And. And it's kind of. If the prevailing, powerful, you know, claiming to be from God, religious culture sets the example of a culture of fraud and deception and justifying lying, how is it not Going to trickle down.

Mark Pugsley [00:27:57] Right, Right. The end justifies the means. I mean, we, we learned this. One of my first episodes of Mormon stories I listened to years ago. You were talking about your missionary experience, how you were taught as a missionary that the end justifies the means. Whatever it took to get that baptism, just do it and say it. And that then that ethos that comes into the summer sales industry, it comes into the MLM industry, both of which I think are unique to Utah in a lot of ways. That's a whole nother topic of conversation. But this, this end justifies the means. Say what you need to do in order to just keep the money. Get the money. That's, that's what we have here in Utah.

John Dehlin [00:28:38] Really quickly. We've got a few super chats I'll just share. Preston gave it a quick donation. He said, thank you, John and Mark. Thank you, Preston, for your support. JC gave a super chat. He says it's time for all religious organizations to follow the same IRS reporting rules as other non profits. There's no legit one. A reason for exemption. Thank you, Mormon Stories podcast. So a couple comments from the listeners. Now switching back to this topic of, of culture. We've got a, a really interesting clip that David shares about the culture of Ensign Peak. And I, I was happy she asked about this. Let's go and roll that clip.

Ensign Peak's Culture and Church Asset Estimates

▶ Video Clip 3

Video Clip 3 [00:29:22] But the culture grew into something that was unhealthy.

Video Clip 3 [00:29:29] What do you mean unhealthy?

Video Clip 3 [00:29:31] In order to hide $100 billion, you can't do it with just one lie. It's a lot to keep that going. And when you build a company on so much secrecy and a need to conceal, it creates a leadership tone from the top that we can do whatever we want as long as it's to stay hidden.

Video Clip 3 [00:30:07] How important was it for assets to stay hidden?

Video Clip 3 [00:30:12] It was mission one.

John Dehlin [00:30:16] So like that, that was really hard hitting. Mission one, like mission, it wasn't return, it wasn't get a 7% return. It's to hide the money. What are your reactions?

Mark Pugsley [00:30:30] Well, because in Roger Clark, you know, kind of spilled the beans, right? He said the quiet part out loud when he interviewed with the Wall Street Journal. And the story I heard about that was that he did a really good job in the interview, but then he was kind of walking out and he made some offhand comment about, well, we need to keep people paying the tithing. This is anecdotal. I wasn't there, but we need to keep people paying the tithing. Well, the Wall Street Journal printed that, that the reason they hid the money was to keep the tithing coming in. So again, hiding the money was important.

Mark Pugsley [00:31:05] The problem the church has, and I'm talking now about the church, not Ensign Peak. The church, I think, would love to have thrown Ensign Peak under the bus on this. Wouldn't it be great if the church could say, yeah, those yahoos over there at Ensign Peak, they were off the, off the reservation. They're doing stuff we didn't authorize.

Mark Pugsley [00:31:26] Well, the SEC order that we went through last time, John, it just totally gutted that they were not able to take that position, that it was those bad guys, you know, running amok over at Ensign Peak. No, because they made the point, which I think is really the most important point of the whole story, of the whole order. Excuse me. The settlement with the SEC is that every year, year after year, they sought approval to continue to lie and cheat the government or not. Well, I would say lie to the government about what their assets were and to violate the law by not filing the.

Mark Pugsley [00:32:01] The 13F forms. Where did they get that permission? They had to, year after year, go to the Presiding Bishopric, the First Presidency, to get that. And the church is, as most people know, is very micromanaged by the First Presidency. It's hard to do stuff this big without their approval. And they got their approval, so.

John Dehlin [00:32:20] And I'm not, I'm not. I don't consider myself a hater of religion, but there's this quote that kind of bad people do bad things and good people generally do good things. But it takes a religion to get good people to do bad things. Like David himself says there were people he worked with at Inside Peak that are some of the best people he's ever worked with, ever in his life.

Mark Pugsley [00:32:41] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:32:42] So if these are like some of the highest. And I'm sure he's worked with a lot of great people.

Guest 1 [00:32:45] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:32:45] So if these are super high caliber people, it's kind of sad that they would consider their number one job at Inside Peak Deception.

Mark Pugsley [00:32:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:32:56] Because these people believe in being honest, right?

Mark Pugsley [00:32:59] I assume so. And they're probably. They're bishops. They're probably church leaders in lots of areas. Absolutely. Yeah, I. I'm sure they do. And I'm sure they didn't feel guilt about it because they were being told by the prophet to do it.

John Dehlin [00:33:13] And the prophet speaks for God. So God is saying it's okay. Hey, to hide or lie, you're good. Then there's no sin. No sin, no foul. Right.

Mark Pugsley [00:33:21] Awesome.

John Dehlin [00:33:23] Good gig if you can get it really quickly. Thanks to j home jhona66 for the super chat. Those keep us going. Really appreciate it. Okay, well, let's go ahead and go to the next little segment where they talk just briefly, about how much money the Church has. Let's go ahead and roll that clip.

▶ Video Clip 4

Video Clip 4 [00:33:48] What is the value right now of Ensign Peaks assets?

Video Clip 4 [00:33:51] Yeah, that's something I can't share with you right now. I know there have been reports on approximates and that kind of thing, and that's as far as we can go.

Video Clip 4 [00:33:59] Right now. It's been estimated at $150 billion. Does that sound correct?

Video Clip 4 [00:34:04] That's an estimate that some have made.

Video Clip 4 [00:34:07] Are we in the ballpark or.

Video Clip 4 [00:34:08] No?

Video Clip 4 [00:34:10] We have significant resources.

Video Clip 4 [00:34:12] Give us a sense of what percentage is going out the door of the money under management.

Video Clip 4 [00:34:19] To be honest, we've never looked at it as a percentage. We looked at based on needs to make sure that we're comfortable with how many years worth we have in case of financial difficulties, in case of financial crisis, to make sure that we can continue church operations.

Guest 1 [00:34:33] Continue.

Guest [00:34:33] We.

John Dehlin [00:34:34] Really quick, I just want to pause that. Like, yeah, this. This Waddell guy, like, he. He kind of made his international debut. And I was watching with my wife, Margi, and you know, Margi does not give a rat's rear about Mormonism. Like, once she lost her faith, she moved on.

Mark Pugsley [00:34:51] Good for her.

John Dehlin [00:34:52] Yeah. Like us.

Mark Pugsley [00:34:54] If only you didn't have a podcast, you could move on, too.

John Dehlin [00:34:57] I know. No, but, but. But she's like, I want to watch. So she watches.

Mark Pugsley [00:35:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:35:02] And she had a couple audible gasps, which, for Margi is really rare. I'm like, whoa. And it was this guy. It was this Waddell guy.

Guest 2 [00:35:10] She.

John Dehlin [00:35:10] She felt like he came across as kind of smarmy and smug.

Guest [00:35:15] But.

John Dehlin [00:35:15] But what do you think about that reaction when she asks how much money the church has under management? What do you think about his reaction?

Mark Pugsley [00:35:22] Well, the. And I've been looking at Reddit and some of the other places, and it seems like everyone universally agreed that. That. That comment in particular was troubling, if not kind of. I don't know. It's. He's not good. He smiled when he said that. And if you could see his hands, he was probably, you know, going like this. There's another. There's a. It also rang a reminder going back to the temple ceremony back in the day. Wasn't. Didn't one of the people say we had sufficient for our needs? And there's a. There's a line. I believe in the temple that's for the temple ceremony. Yeah, yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:35:57] And it's kind of like. That's what he was echoing. We have sufficient for a niece. Well, I mean, give me a break. They have operating costs of around $5 billion a year, which is substantial. Well, they have. They could run the whole church off of the interest on this account. They don't need any more tithing from anyone. I said that before. I'll say it again. The church does not need your money. They've got plenty. And basically, he confirmed that we've got to make sure it's sufficient.

Mark Pugsley [00:36:31] I grabbed that quote. We looked at it based on needs to make sure that we're comfortable with how many years worth we have in case of financial difficulties or financial crisis, to make sure that we can continue church operations. I mean, it's a little disingenuous because they actually don't use the money for church operations. And we can talk about how. He talks about how much goes in. There's, I think, money going back and forth to the cash account of Ensign Peak there. I think he also says in later that it's the bank, it's the church's bank. But, you know, to say we have sufficient for our needs when they've got, you know, 150 billion.

Mark Pugsley [00:37:06] That doesn't even include the real estate holdings, the commercial real estate holdings, the. The farmland they hold in Florida, and just this massive real estate portfolio. We don't know what the total number is. And of course, he won't say it's the same thing. Why won't he say? Why wouldn't he give that information to 60 Minutes? Why wouldn't they give it to church members? There's a great quote, and I don't want to get ahead of you, John. I'm sorry, but there's a great quote that I recall when President Hinckley did an interview with a German radio or TV station.

Guest [00:37:39] I think it was.

John Dehlin [00:37:40] Reporter.

Mark Pugsley [00:37:41] Reporter, yeah. And he was quoted as saying, you know, we don't give out the financial information except to the people that are the donors.

John Dehlin [00:37:49] Well, okay, the members here.

Mark Pugsley [00:37:50] The members should know that information. Then why don't they get this information? Why is the church so continually so secretive about its operations? What are the costs of operations? How much money are they making on all these investments that they have? You know, let's. Let's open that up so that the people that are giving the money can have full disclosure. I just think that church owes that to those of us who have contributed a lot.

John Dehlin [00:38:14] Yeah, yeah. He made a reference to estimates. And I think the widow's might folks. I just want to give a shout out to them again because I think they felt like he was referring to the widow's might report in terms of the estimates. Just everyone. We'll try and include a link in the show notes, but just Google widows. Mite, mite report. And they've estimated that the church has somewhere between, you know, Ensign Peak is managing between 120 and 150 billion and that the church is estimated to be worth in assets something like 250 billion. You know, check out that report. But he kind of smugly refers to that, but then says I can't share them.

Mark Pugsley [00:38:52] Yeah, but we still need the members to clean the toilets because that's really important. I mean, honestly to say that we're just trying to cover our bases and keep our operational costs and our overhead covered. I mean, first of all, does that, are they assuming that people are just going to stop paying tithing? Because that actually could be happening right now. I think one of the impacts of the 60 Minutes report and the SEC settlement is that people are making a choice that they're going to donate their money to more worthy, more accountable charities. I hope that's what's happening. And maybe that's why they need all this money, because they're not getting any more tithing. I don't know. They're getting it from a lot of the people I know.

John Dehlin [00:39:30] But, but the weird thing is is they don't need the tithing. So like they, the tithing that, I don't know, like, do you think they're worried about tithing? I, I guess we've talked about this before. There probably are sincere beliefs on the part of the general authorities that the tithing isn't for God, it isn't for the church. The tithing is an expression of faithfulness on the part of the members. So the members need to pay tithing for their own spiritual benefit, even if the corporate church actually doesn't need the money.

Mark Pugsley [00:40:00] Right.

John Dehlin [00:40:00] I mean, that's probably how he feels, right?

Mark Pugsley [00:40:02] I assume so. But, but you know, he did also in the interview explicitly say that it's not for the second coming, which I thought was quite interesting because some people have speculated, oh, you know, we're going to use this in the second coming, like there's going to be a monetary system during the millennium, which is just ridiculous. But if it is true. And again, this is kind of self fulfilling prophecy in a way, John, because I think what's happening is people are stopping their Tithing payments. I've heard of lots of anecdotal stories from people where they've said, oh, yeah, we've stopped paying, or we're paying to another, more worthy source.

Mark Pugsley [00:40:39] So the church actually could. And they're losing members, I think, at a. At a record pace now, too. Of course, they won't tell that either. I mean, why don't they just be more, More. More transparent about these numbers? Because I just think. But of course they think people like us would then attack them and use them to attack them. So I get it.

John Dehlin [00:40:58] Yeah. I'll just share a quick comment. DL writes, you can't serve God and mammon and money is the root of all evil. I think that's. I think that's Jesus. I think he's quoting Jesus there, one way or another.

Mark Pugsley [00:41:11] Jesus said some things about helping the poor, as I recall. And they keep talking about how much money they spend helping the poor. We don't know because they're not transparent about those numbers either. We don't know to what extent they're counting hours of service towards these numbers. They throw out these estimates of how many hundred million dollars they're contributing to charities.

Mark Pugsley [00:41:31] My understanding, and I don't have verification of this is that they actually count volunteer hours and they assign a dollar figure to those numbers. So it's not just cash. And David was very clear. At least we know that during the time he was there, the amount of money that was used out of the corpus or the investment funds to support charities is 0. 0. The only place those monies went to was beneficial life bailout and to build the mall downtown. So the church does do a lot of good in the world. I don't want to diminish that at all. But I don't think they're using this money to do it.

Mark Pugsley [00:42:09] They're using other monies or they're. You know, I used to work down in the City Creek Mall and they have these machines, like a vending machine. Have you seen these?

Guest 2 [00:42:18] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:42:18] Light the world Christmas.

John Dehlin [00:42:19] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:42:19] During Christmas. And so apparently they don't have enough money to even help, like, buy a goat, because they are asking people to buy a goat in the vending machine for somebody. And we don't even know if that money actually goes to that because they're not transparent about that either. Yeah, I'm certainly the, The. The reason I think this is so important is that this money really could be used to really help people and change people's lives in a big way, potentially could change the world.

John Dehlin [00:42:48] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:42:48] And Instead it's just being hoarded and we'll cover that.

John Dehlin [00:42:51] David talks about that as well. Really quickly, a couple more. Doug Vincent writes Catching up on My Tithing. And what he means by that is he's contributing a super chat to the Marvel Stories, the Open Stories Foundation. Thank you.

Mark Pugsley [00:43:03] You asked for 10.

John Dehlin [00:43:05] It's not compulsory.

Non-Profit Status, Taxation, and Financial Secrecy

Mark Pugsley [00:43:06] All right.

John Dehlin [00:43:07] We give our content away and we don't keep you from your child's wedding if you don't donate.

Guest 1 [00:43:11] Wow.

John Dehlin [00:43:12] I know.

Mark Pugsley [00:43:12] Amazing.

John Dehlin [00:43:13] I know.

Mark Pugsley [00:43:13] And people donate anyway without being compelled.

John Dehlin [00:43:16] It's weird. It's super weird. JC writes, the wealthy have gained the tax code Income Corp. Non profit to increase inequality in the United States and hold power. We the people need to demand reforms. We're going to get to that, to the church's tax exempt status. We'll get to that. But thanks. For those of you who, who are supporting us and please like this episode now. It'll really help with the algorithms. All right, Mark, let me go ahead and finish that clip that we were playing.

Mark Pugsley [00:43:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:43:44] And then we'll keep, we'll keep going.

Guest [00:43:49] Just want to make sure that, that, that is sufficient.

John Dehlin [00:43:53] Okay. So sorry. Let me go ahead and go to a couple comments. So Cal writes they expect transparency from their members down to the underwear they're wearing, yet they refuse to share their significant resources with members. I think I saw another clip somewhere that basically said the church can ask a 12 year old girl whether she touches herself but the church doesn't want members asking what they're doing with the members own donations.

Mark Pugsley [00:44:22] That's a really good point. Really good point.

John Dehlin [00:44:24] Yeah. Another comment that's made, someone wrote, damn, that smile says it more than that. Says it's more than that.

Mark Pugsley [00:44:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:33] So she's basically saying Waddell's grin when she asked how much money the church has. That that grin means the church has more that that basically the widow's might has underestimated. Is that possible?

Mark Pugsley [00:44:46] Sure. I mean who knows? We don't know. This is. It's entirely possible. I think if someone knew the full picture, I mean this is such a tightly held secret that even the quorum of the 12 didn't know. Until David came out with his information. The quorum of the 12 did not know the big picture of the church's finances. Do they now? I mean, I wonder did they get together in the temple after that SEC report came out or after David's whistleblower report came out? And did the 12 say hey guys, you need to come clean on what's out there? I mean, I. It seems like that would be an uncomfortable conversation if.

Mark Pugsley [00:45:22] If my dad was in the quorum of the 12. And I said, is this true? And he does. And he has to say, I don't know. That's really kind of weird. And why is it so tightly held? Because they had so much fear about the disclosure of this information.

John Dehlin [00:45:36] And that's part of the question I'm having, is if they don't need the people's money and if it's such a PR fiasco.

Guest 1 [00:45:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:45:42] They should just tell people.

Mark Pugsley [00:45:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:45:44] Well, it's just come clean.

Mark Pugsley [00:45:45] But John, then they'll be criticized, and heaven forbid that the church would be criticized. You know, this goes back to your question. What's more important, money or reputation? Yeah, I think reputation. But, you know, the money's nice.

John Dehlin [00:45:56] And for me, the reputation is about authority. They want. They want to maintain the authority. You know, they want members to still respect it.

Mark Pugsley [00:46:03] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:46:03] And believe it.

Mark Pugsley [00:46:04] Well, if you. I've always thought if you could get access, one of these days, someone that works in the membership department at the church is going to leave the church and call you and talk to you. And then information I would like to know is. Is. Isn't tithing. They track, you know, how many people are going to church every week. I know they do. They know how these numbers are trending. I suspect that tithing revenue is kind of a loss indicator, or a lead indicator, I should say, of membership declines. Because one of the things people will do before they leave the church is they'll stop paying tithing. They. Tithing is not about the money in a lot of ways. It's really about control. It's about controlling people. And really, you know, once you. Once you lose that, then you'll eventually lose them as a member. I suspect

John Dehlin [00:46:56] I'm going to. I'm going to take a little bit of a risk here and try and play a clip from Kara Burrell. My friend Kara Burrell did a fun clip on her TikTok channel as nuance Ho. That's gotten a lot of attention. I'm not sure if this is even going to work, but Kara's awesome enough and this clip is fun enough that I'm going to try and just play it really quick and see if it works. Let's give it a try. Hopefully people can hear it.

Guest 2 [00:47:23] How much money does my church have?

John Dehlin [00:47:24] Okay, wait, let me unmute.

Mark Pugsley [00:47:28] If you guys could see the setup here that John has and all the wires running everywhere.

John Dehlin [00:47:36] I'm trying to play it. Kara. I'm trying to play it. Let me try it one more time. Let me stop the screen and hit present Share screen. Share tab audio. Let's see if this works. Oh, it's not working. All right, Kara, we, we tried. We'll see if we can get back and show it in a little bit. Okay, a couple more comments that were made. The OG Molly Mormon writes, that's that slight shake of the head. No, they are not even in the ballpark. So the Bears, they're basically theorizing that, that they, they have a lot more money.

John Dehlin [00:48:15] Money than that. So anyway, couple other comments. One person writes, we simply think that the. Oh, this is the, this is the Gordon B. Hinckley quote that you referenced. It's Gordon B. Hinckley, former prophet of the Mormon Church, saying we simply think that the information belongs to those who made the contribution. So that's the point you were making, Mark.

Mark Pugsley [00:48:38] Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:48:40] Yeah. Okay, let's go ahead and go to the next little segment which was used in the promos by 60 Minutes. And it's this question that she asks about secret versus confidential. All right,

Church Leaders on Secrecy, Trust, and Tithing

▶ Video Clip 5

Video Clip 5 [00:48:56] what about, you know, the idea that secrecy builds mistrust?

Video Clip 5 [00:49:00] Well, we don't feel it's being secret, we feel it's being confidential.

Video Clip 5 [00:49:03] What's the difference?

Video Clip 5 [00:49:05] The difference is, I guess it's a point of view, it's confidential. In order to maintain the focus on what our purpose is and what the mission of the church is rather than the church has X amount of money.

Video Clip 5 [00:49:19] But don't you agree this would be a non issue if there was more transparency?

Video Clip 5 [00:49:24] No, because then everyone would be telling us what they wanted us to do with the money.

Mark Pugsley [00:49:28] No, that's ridiculous.

John Dehlin [00:49:30] So what's your reaction to that?

Mark Pugsley [00:49:31] Okay, okay, I want to read that again. First of all, why didn't he say sacred? I thought he was going to say sacred for sure. It's not secret, it's sacred. Okay, whatever. We can't really say money is sacred. So we're going with confidential, which is the same.

Mark Pugsley [00:49:48] And then he says it's confidential in order to maintain the focus on what our purpose is and what the mission of the church is rather than the church has X amount of money. I mean, it's basically what he's saying is it would be a distraction. Isn't that what he's saying? It would distract from our Christ like mission of knocking on people's doors and bothering them during dinner. I mean, honestly, why is this so confidential? It's because it would be a distraction for the church and Then she makes this really good point. It's like, well, it wouldn't be an issue if you would just be that transparent.

Mark Pugsley [00:50:21] It might be a story for a week, but then everyone would say, okay, yeah, it's out there. It's the secrecy that is causing this to get so much attention. It's them covering it up. It's, it's really the worst way to handle this situation. I don't know who their PR people are and I don't know who selected this guy to be the post spokesman for the church, but I don't know if he's going to be put out in front anymore because I don't think he did a great job.

John Dehlin [00:50:45] Yeah, I'll read, I'll read one comment. Financial Specialist5787 on Reddit wrote Bishop Waddle's answer to the difference between secret and confidential wasn't very convincing. The reality is that Ensign Peak was set up as a charity to receive exemption as an investment advisor, requiring greater transparency. Arguably it's a legal astute move and certainly other foundations operate like this to control the narrative and their investment strategy. As a true believing Mormon. So this guy's a true believing Mormon. I'd like to see the church step more on serving the needs of our fellow brothers and sisters in a bigger way. Your reactions?

Mark Pugsley [00:51:29] Well, I agree with that. I have been of the view, and I don't want to get too deep into the legal side of this, but I've been of the opinion that Ensign Peak is an investment advisor and should have been registered from day one. They manage not just the church's money, but according to the whistleblower report, they also manage BYU's endowment, which is not the church, it's different. And they also manage other monies that people contribute through their wills and trusts. So they're managing a whole bunch of money. And US securities laws require registration. If you're doing that because you're giving investment advice to those entities and Ensign Peak has never been registered and doesn't want to be registered.

Mark Pugsley [00:52:10] There's a reason, I think, why there's some language in the SEC order. Again, I'm probably getting too legal here, but they talk about it being what's called an integrated auxiliary of the church. And my understanding is that they're doing that in order to avoid registration. If they were separate from the church, they would have to register as an investment advisor. But they're not and they're considering themselves part of the church, what's called an integrated auxiliary. So I'll. I'LL end it there.

John Dehlin [00:52:38] Oh, that's good. Super. Thanks to Peachy Brains for their, their donation. And Kimberly writes, how would it be if I answered it's confidential in every church interview. This hypocrisy is the problem. I mean, I really think that that should be a thing. Thank you, Kimberly for the super chat and for the wonderful comment.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:00] And tell your kids to say it too.

John Dehlin [00:53:02] Every time they ask a BYU student, you know, did you touch her over under the shirt?

Mark Pugsley [00:53:07] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:07] You just say that's, that's sacred. Or that's, that's confidential. Right.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:12] Yeah. Did someone jump on the bed when you guys were.

John Dehlin [00:53:15] Anyway. Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:17] No. And, and the other thing.

John Dehlin [00:53:18] Or if they ask if you paid your tithing.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:20] Like how many members of the Mormon Church Absolutely. Are kept from the wedding of their own child or embarrassed or shamed when all the family gets to go to the temple ceremony but everybody else has to sit outside and watch the little kids? Yeah. Why not just say, hey Bishop, hey Stake President. That information's confidential.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:39] Right.

Mark Pugsley [00:53:39] Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That user made another point which is great to hear from a true TBM or a true believing Mormon. I that that the church should be using that to benefit its members. I think that's too small of a group, but sure. I mean, anyone who served a mission in the third world countries knows that there are members throughout the world that are really struggling financially and could use help from the church. The church could make tremendous difference in their lives. How do they do that? Well, it's tricky. How do you just hand out money? No, I don't know how they should do it, but they have enough to figure that out.

Mark Pugsley [00:54:14] The other thing is why stop there? The most effective missionary tool in my mind would be to send these young men out in blue jeans with shovels and gloves to build wells, to dig foundations, to feed people, to house people, to give them clean water in Africa. Africa is where the church is building right now, is growing the fastest. Right. Send those missionaries out to dig wells for the people that don't have clean water. That's going to bring more people into the church than knocking on their door with a suit and tie on. I just think this is a no brainer for the church. Use this money to do good in the world, not just for its members, but for everyone.

Mark Pugsley [00:54:57] One of the responses I've seen, John, I'd be interested in your thought is I've seen a lot of members say that this money is the church's money and the church is not a charity. Therefore we don't need to. We're just all about ourselves basically. And we're not a charity, we're a church. So we don't need to do those kind of things. And what's your reaction to that?

John Dehlin [00:55:18] Well, the church of what?

Mark Pugsley [00:55:20] The church of who?

John Dehlin [00:55:21] The church of a really big bank account. The Church of Wells Fargo, The Church of Merrill Lynch. If it's the church of Jesus Christ, then you're doing what Jesus Christ admonished you to do. And you know, I think some of the apostles or one of the Jesus's followers said, you know, you know, how do.

John Dehlin [00:55:39] What is. What does your gospel boil down to? And I think Jesus said something like, inasmuch as you've done unto the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me. I mean, what was what, what song, what hymn was sung in Carthage jail the night before Joseph Smith died? It was a poor wayfaring man of grief. And what was that hymn about? It was about clothing the naked, feeding the hungry, giving alms to the poor. That's the essence of Christianity. So if you're a church, that should be your primary mission. If you're a church named after Jesus

Mark Pugsley [00:56:14] Christ, there's, there's another scripture that I'm again paraphrasing, but it's if you're not feeding the poor, if you're not housing the hungry or feeding the hungry and housing the poor, I guess it was then your, your faith is essentially not and you're in. And so this is really the essence of religion. At least I thought it was the way Jesus Christ taught it, it's not to hoard the money, but to serve others.

John Dehlin [00:56:37] A couple other comments that I think are really good. Oliver Denom, who's been posting, I think for a long time, he writes, and this is referring to Waddell, Christopher Waddell. This exchange sounds like the actual truth here. Sharon, who's the reporter? But don't you agree this would be a non issue if there was more transparency? And then what else says no? Because then everybody will be telling us what they wanted to do with the money. Then Oliver goes on to write, they did this because they were worried members would want to be involved in how their church operates and how their tithing dollars are spent.

John Dehlin [00:57:10] That gives a real window into our leadership's thinking about the place of the membership in the governance of the church. There isn't one. We've been told that the church is not a democracy and that it's wrong to endorse reform and in any way make an opposing idea or voice heard. We are so irrelevant in the. And that means the members. We are so irrelevant in the decision making of the church that they have taken great lengths to hide which could potentially lead to someone expressing an idea. We are a long way from where we should be. Don't you think? What Elle was saying, the quiet thing out loud.

Mark Pugsley [00:57:47] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:57:47] To say we don't want members telling us what to do with the money they give us and it's the money that the members give the church.

Mark Pugsley [00:57:53] Well, I mean I don't. Do you really think that the members are going to pipe it and say hey, you know, you've got too much invested in, in Apple stock. I don't think that's what people care about. I mean, yeah, we're doing it. I guess we're validating his concern. We're saying here's what you should do with the money. But I think it's just such a obvious thing that churches ought to use their resources to help people. Is that really a controversial thing? And if members held the church to account, stood up and said we want you to be more charitable, we want you as a church to be more Christlike with your money. That's accountability. And right now church leaders have zero accountability. Zero.

John Dehlin [00:58:35] One more quick comment. Wounded Bear Hair writes just a reminder that the church has fought laws making their leadership mandatory reporters for child abuse and sexual assault. Their reasoning is it's a first amendment issue around religious freedom. They passed a law to protect our children by banning gender affirming care for minors, but voted down with a majority on forcing them to be mandatory reporters. Any reaction to that Mark?

Mark Pugsley [00:59:04] Well, I mean the church has worked really hard to I think further kind of their right wing agenda. That's my personal point of view. But, but to stop the sex abuse is a, that's a whole nother conversation that I think the church could do so much more to regulate that. But what they instead do is they use money to settle those cases quietly and cause people to sign non disclosure agreements as you know, so they don't talk about it. That's what the church is focused on. They're more concerned about paying some money to those people to shut them up and keep their church's reputation from being sullied by a pedophile.

Mark Pugsley [00:59:42] Right now that doesn't always work. 1 1Transparency question I would like to know John, is what money are they using to settle those sex abuse cases? Is it money from Enzyme Peak? I don't think so. I think it's tithing money. Yeah, that's their operating funds. Why, in what world is it okay to use people's tithing money to. To pay off a sex abuse victim and cause them to be quiet and not allowed to talk about it? Yeah, can I. Can I talk about one other thing? I don't. Are you going to keep playing this clip because.

John Dehlin [01:00:13] No, no, I'm good.

Mark Pugsley [01:00:15] So. So there's one more exchange, just the next two paragraphs. And I got. I found someone. Shoot, I forgot where I got this, but I found a transcript of this online. So I'm just reading what is. Purports to be a transcript. And the next sentence after what you just played last year. This is Sharon. Last year, the church says it's been over a billion dollars on humanitarian aid, including food production. So the church bandies about, you know, how much it's done now, how much of that is actual labor costs of volunteers? I don't know. Anyway, Waddell's response. In any given month, you may have an average of nine transfers going from Ensign Peak back to the church to fund all church operations, all humanitarian work, education work, all the work of the church.

Mark Pugsley [01:00:59] So you have to keep that in mind when he says later that the Ensign Peak is the bank, Is the church's bank. So they do have. David made this point, I think, in the overtime part. They do have cash accounts, essentially, like a bank, like your checking account. Right. The money goes in and out. They hold it. They get all this tithing, billions and billions of dollars in tithing, which they hold, and then they'll distribute money to the church as it needs it. Okay, that's not what we are talking about here. That's the checking account. What David is talking about is the investment account, which is separate.

Mark Pugsley [01:01:35] And that's where the 150 or whatever number billion dollars is. The fact that they have money coming in and out is beside the point. And it's really a very clever Dodge that Mr. Waddell did, or Brother Waddell, I should say, is. Is. He didn't want to. He makes it sound like all the money's in one account, but it's not. They. Yes, they do have a checking account, but they. We're not talking about that. We're talking about the investment account. And that's where no money comes in and out. Once money goes in, it doesn't come out.

John Dehlin [01:02:04] Yeah, okay, that's great. All right, let's go to the next clip where they. Where.

Guest [01:02:11] Where.

John Dehlin [01:02:12] I guess Nielsen talks about one of the primary concerns voiced by the head of Inside peak at the time, which was the church losing its tax exempt status. Let's go ahead and roll that clip.

Guest 2 [01:02:26] Nielsen says the firm called an emergency meeting. What was the explanation?

Guest 1 [01:02:31] These entities were to hide the assets from the members. The chief investment officer said that if we were to change and start reporting these securities in our own name, it would bring undue attention to the firm, and that that attention would be potentially damaging. And after the meeting, I went and confronted him. What do you mean potentially damaging? And he said, dave, we're going to lose our tax exempt status.

John Dehlin [01:03:05] Is that, is that, I mean, what do you, what's your reaction to that, Mark?

Mark Pugsley [01:03:08] I, I think that's not at all what the real concern was. I don't, I'm not a tax lawyer, John, so I can't really say whether the church has ever been at risk. I think the church's political advocacy is much more of a risk to its tax exempt status than its financial situation. I, I, again, I'm not an expert on what it, what churches would need to require that, but I don't think that's what the real. I don't think. I think that's not what the real concern.

John Dehlin [01:03:35] That surprised me. It just seems like if the United States stands for anything, it's right now in 2023. It's for protecting religions, protecting churches and tax exempt status is like politically off the table. Well, you, you can, I mean, Scientology. If Scientology can retain their tax exempt status, the Mormon church ain't going anywhere.

Mark Pugsley [01:03:55] What's Joel Austin's net worth?

John Dehlin [01:03:57] Right. Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:03:57] I mean, it's, it's just massive.

John Dehlin [01:03:59] It's heavy. Hundreds of millions.

Mark Pugsley [01:04:00] Yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [01:04:02] Or you.

Mark Pugsley [01:04:02] There was a YouTube video a while back about some pastor that wanted his flock to buy him a jet. He really needed this private jet and it was going to be like the fourth one. I mean, the church, the, the federal government has given churches wide berth in terms of how they manage their money. I don't think that's an issue.

John Dehlin [01:04:19] Yeah. Couple comments from Reddit. One writes, churches need to be. Churches need to be taxed. This is getting ridiculous. This person writes, I get taxed harder than these grifters and I have a thousand times less money than they do. I'm guessing it's more than a thousand times. What do you think?

Mark Pugsley [01:04:39] I don't know. You have to ask, how much does he have?

John Dehlin [01:04:43] I don't know. Another right. Scientology literally blackmailed the IRS into tax exemption. That's actually true. If you go back and study the, the IRS Started to go after Scientology. And there's a really cool story about how this. This Scientology just sued the IRS into oblivion and the IRS backed down.

Mark Pugsley [01:05:02] Wow.

John Dehlin [01:05:02] Yeah, it's a cool story.

Mark Pugsley [01:05:03] Wow.

John Dehlin [01:05:05] And then David Ryland writes, tax exempt status is conditional upon using the money for charitable purposes. And. And I think that that gets covered in. In the story. I think we may have a video clip about that. So we'll wait to discuss that, but that's kind of important. All right, let's go ahead to Bishop Waddell talking about nonprofits and how they need to spend their money. Let's go ahead and roll that clip.

Tax Exemption, Charitable Giving, and Legal Standards

▶ Video Clip 6

Video Clip 6 [01:05:30] David Nielsen alleged that Ensign Peak violated its tax exempt status by directing money to church businesses. How would you characterize how that money was used?

Video Clip 6 [01:05:39] The church actually owned Beneficial Life, and fortunately, the church had the resources to bail out Beneficial Life during the financial CR 2008.

Video Clip 6 [01:05:49] 2009 in the mall.

Video Clip 6 [01:05:51] The mall was not a bailout. The mall was an investment.

Video Clip 6 [01:05:53] And you are receiving returns on.

Video Clip 6 [01:05:54] Absolutely, yeah. It was an investment.

Video Clip 6 [01:05:57] Waddell says the insurance company has paid back most of the bailout money, but the church would not disclose the details of that deal or the mall investment.

John Dehlin [01:06:06] So, yeah, I remember reading David Nielsen's report that the only two expenditures he was aware of coming out of inside

Mark Pugsley [01:06:13] and Peak, out of the investment piece,

John Dehlin [01:06:16] out of the investment piece, was to bail out Beneficial Life and Insurance company and to give them all a billion or two. What's your reaction to what else? First to Beneficial Life, that basically what, that it was an important bailout, but that it's been paid back. Is that what he said?

Mark Pugsley [01:06:32] Yeah. Apparently that's news. Of course, there's no transparency, so that's news to me. I've not heard that they paid it back.

John Dehlin [01:06:37] There's no way to verify it?

Mark Pugsley [01:06:38] No, no.

John Dehlin [01:06:39] And there's no way to know where it got the money, if it did pay it back.

Mark Pugsley [01:06:41] Well, and I suspect that what he doesn't want to talk about is the reason that Beneficial Life had to be bailed out. And, you know, during.

John Dehlin [01:06:51] They wanted to say it was a financial crisis.

Mark Pugsley [01:06:53] Right. But there were a lot of other insurance companies during the financial crisis that did not have to be bailed out. Okay. It's usually because they are not managed their investment. Excuse me. Insurance companies need to have sufficient funds to cover their claims. And there are all sorts of regulators, government regulators, who keep an eye on that. What they're also supposed to do is invest their funds extremely conservatively in order to protect those monies. So that they're available to pay out claims. And my suspicion, and I don't have any knowledge of this, but my suspicion is that Beneficial Life was not managing its funds very well.

Guest 2 [01:07:29] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:07:29] Or conservatively enough, I should say.

John Dehlin [01:07:31] Okay, so maybe mismanagement on the part of Beneficial Life could be. What about this idea that City Creek was an investment that paid dividends later? So it's, it's, it's, it's a good thing. It's a, It's a feature, not a bug.

Mark Pugsley [01:07:42] Sure. I mean, okay, the, the. There are definitely better investments the church could have made. My recollection of President Hinckley's comments when they started the mall was that it was really intended to kind of spruce up the area surrounding Temple Square. And I work in the mall for 20 years. Not in the mall itself, but in the. What used to be the Beneficial Life Tower. That's where I used to work. And I can tell you they did a good job on the mall. It's. It's extremely beautiful. It's a showpiece. It's something that everyone should go and see. Whether it's returning a lot of money to the church, I don't know, because it's not very full most of the time. So I'd be interested to know how good of an investment that has been. But, of course, there's no transparency, and

John Dehlin [01:08:30] maybe if we had to just crystallize what David Nielsen's concern was about the Beneficial Life bailout and the City Creek investment. It's what? Maybe it's around how the funds instead should have been used.

Mark Pugsley [01:08:44] Sure.

John Dehlin [01:08:44] Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:08:45] Yeah. Why, I mean, why are we using church, the, the, this money for these two for profit things?

John Dehlin [01:08:50] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:08:51] Both Beneficial Life and the City Creek Mall are for profit ventures. Why are we using church money for that?

John Dehlin [01:08:57] Yeah. All right, let's go to the next clip, which is about. It involves philosopher Philip Hackney's response to the former IRS chief counselor. Let's go ahead and play the clip.

▶ Video Clip 7

Video Clip 7 [01:09:08] Yeah. The church would say we give millions of dollars out every year in humanitarian work. How much is enough by the standards of the IRS?

Video Clip 7 [01:09:19] We know within private foundations it's 5% of assets. There's no clarity when it comes to public charities, and certainly not with churches. But, but I would expect to see something like 2, 3% of assets being spent out to justify that status.

Video Clip 7 [01:09:37] But how do you know if they're spending 2 or 3% of assets? If we don't know what the assets

Video Clip 7 [01:09:42] are, we have to rely on them behaving.

Video Clip 7 [01:09:45] Well, they said they bailed out this insurance company. That's the words they used. Is that a problem?

John Dehlin [01:09:51] It is a problem, in my opinion, if they have moved money from the non profit to a for profit. Okay, so there's two things there. The first is the church. Is it spending enough of its investments to justify its charitable status? What's your, what's your take on that?

Mark Pugsley [01:10:13] Well, so there are two. There are charities, right. Non profits, and they have certain requirements. And I, I, you talk about the Gates Foundation. Gates foundation has a certain amount of money that it has in it. In order to maintain its public charity status, it has to spend 5% of its money every year on actual charitable.

John Dehlin [01:10:33] 5 or 3. I think he said 3.

Mark Pugsley [01:10:34] Yeah, my area. But whatever it is, there's a number.

John Dehlin [01:10:38] Number bigger than one.

Mark Pugsley [01:10:39] Yes, but the church's response to that, John, would be, hey, we're not a public charity, we're a church and we're exempt from those requirements. And I, I think that's true, but maybe there's a moral obligation. Let's talk about that. If you're going to purport to be the true church of Jesus Christ on Earth, isn't there a moral obligation to use that money in a way that benefits humanity? I mean, honestly, am I saying too much? Am I going too far? Honestly, I just think it's embarrassing for the church to have this much money and not be using it for good.

John Dehlin [01:11:13] Yeah. What about the very end of that quote? He, the second point that he made?

Mark Pugsley [01:11:21] They trust the churches to give them reports on what they're doing with their money.

John Dehlin [01:11:26] Yeah.

Guest [01:11:27] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:11:27] And, and I guess she's trying to make the point that, that there is no transparency. So we don't know.

John Dehlin [01:11:33] But there was the very last, there was the very final point that he made just in the last few seconds.

Mark Pugsley [01:11:38] Sorry.

John Dehlin [01:11:39] Of the clip.

▶ Video Clip 8

Video Clip 8 [01:11:40] The church would say we give millions of dollars out of.

Video Clip 8 [01:11:45] I would expect to see something like 2, 3% of assets being spent out,

Video Clip 8 [01:11:50] bailed out this insurance company. That's the words they used. Is that a problem?

John Dehlin [01:11:55] It is a problem in my opinion, if they have moved money from the nonprofit to a for profit. Okay. So, yeah, that, that point about moving money from a nonprofit to a for profit.

Mark Pugsley [01:12:11] Yeah, I don't, I don't know. I mean, he's, he's a tax expert and I'm not, I'll be the last one to be a tax expert.

John Dehlin [01:12:18] But for me, that, that was one of the biggest takeaways from this whole.

Guest 1 [01:12:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:12:23] 60 Minutes episode.

Mark Pugsley [01:12:23] David made that point very well, as well.

John Dehlin [01:12:25] Is an expert saying this is unethical, what the church has done to take its charitable nonprofit money and bail out commercial endeavors. This is an expert saying.

Mark Pugsley [01:12:35] But it's not tithing money. Remember, John, there's. There's no tithing money was used to build the. The mall. I mean, we, we beat that horse pretty badly at the last time we talked.

John Dehlin [01:12:45] But.

Mark Pugsley [01:12:46] But for them to say that the tithing money is separate from the income on the. Or the earnings on the tithing money is just silly. Yeah, but that's the church's view.

Guest 1 [01:12:53] Okay.

Erosion of Member Trust and Fast Offerings

John Dehlin [01:12:54] All right, the next clip we have. We've touched on this a bit, but it's around this idea of erosion of trust.

▶ Video Clip 9

Video Clip 9 [01:13:01] Church members we spoke to have talked about an erosion of trust because of the secrecy. Is there any discussion about regular disclosure of what's happening with church finances?

Video Clip 9 [01:13:15] No, there's no more discussion about disclosing the. The, The. The value of the. The totality of the resource at Ensign Peak.

Video Clip 9 [01:13:23] Because.

Video Clip 9 [01:13:25] Because it's. It's confidential. And we do again, disclose and announce the building of temples. We do announce building missionary work. We do share what we're doing with humanitarian work. I think part of the. A lack of trust or lack of confidence comes from statements or comments from a whistleblower who doesn't have all the information, who doesn't understand they were incorrect. And that's not how it works.

Video Clip 9 [01:13:49] When we're talking to church members, that's what they're saying to us is that they're blown away by this. That, you know, there's reportedly. We don't know. Right. Hundreds of millions of dollars under management, and it's sitting there and it should be used.

Video Clip 9 [01:14:05] Well, there are 17 million members of the church, and so of 17 million all over the world, you're going to have many people with varying opinions. And. And so I'm sure there are some members of the church that are saying that. There are many members of the church who aren't saying that.

Video Clip 9 [01:14:18] Man.

Video Clip 9 [01:14:18] That.

John Dehlin [01:14:19] I don't even know that that clip made it into the. To the original.

Mark Pugsley [01:14:22] Didn't know.

John Dehlin [01:14:22] Yeah. Overtime.

Mark Pugsley [01:14:24] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:14:25] What's your reaction to that? That's pretty explosive.

Mark Pugsley [01:14:27] There were a lot of things that he said in there. And in fact, there was a part before that that you didn't play that I want to mention.

John Dehlin [01:14:32] Yeah, please.

Mark Pugsley [01:14:33] But he. First of all, he said there's no more discussion about disclosing the value of the resources of Enzyme Peak. No more discussion. What does that mean? Was there a discussion before about doing It. And then they're just shut it down. I don't know. But he said, you know, he's shutting that down entirely. There is no more discussion about this. Okay, that, that's. Move on people. Nothing to see here. But then he says it's. It's confidential. And she says because. And he responds, because it's confidential and we do not disclose. And so we do disclose the building of temples. Okay.

John Dehlin [01:15:08] Yeah, they announced they do every general.

Mark Pugsley [01:15:10] But they don't tell you how much they're spending on the temples. How much is that renovation downtown Salt Lake City of the Salt Lake Temple costing in the hundreds of millions of. Of dollars? It's massive. They don't disclose anything about the cost. Right.

John Dehlin [01:15:23] I think the widows might report showed that temple construction is a paltry percentage of overall church budget.

Mark Pugsley [01:15:31] Sure.

John Dehlin [01:15:31] So for him to mention that.

Mark Pugsley [01:15:33] Yeah, I have no idea. And those guys, I've worked with those guys a little bit and they were great. They reached out to me after our first interview. I thought they've done good work.

John Dehlin [01:15:41] But he's basically saying, well, we're transparent about announcing the number of temples. Is that, does that satisfy?

Mark Pugsley [01:15:45] Oh, and they announced missionary work, John.

John Dehlin [01:15:47] Right. And we have.

Guest 1 [01:15:51] Oh really?

Mark Pugsley [01:15:51] You guys have missionaries? Who knew? And we do share what we're doing with the humanitarian work. So he's saying, well, we do all this stuff. We do. Come on, what do you. What do you want? And then he said this is, this is where he puts down David.

John Dehlin [01:16:07] And can I just say about the, about the humanitarian work though, number one, they didn't announce it as publicly until all this whistleblowing happened. And the numbers were way, way, way smaller until the light was shined on it. And then they came up with bigger numbers magically. And this is all in the widow's might report. And even then those numbers are questionable. The point that you made, that's also made in the widows. How much of that's like estimates of volunteer efforts. That really isn't the church giving money, but it's just counting the members volunteer efforts and giving some number, assigning some financial amount to the donated time of the members. Right. Like there's that. It's fuzzy math.

Mark Pugsley [01:16:50] There's another thing which is they don't talk about which is the fast offerings. So remember, members don't just give tithings, they also give fast offerings. We don't know what those numbers are, but it could be that those are being used to do all this stuff. So really none of the tithing is used. We just don't know. There's again, no transparency. Yeah, so. So he says this about David Nielsen and he says he kind of hit David.

John Dehlin [01:17:12] He kind of hit on it.

Mark Pugsley [01:17:13] Yeah, very directly. He said, I think part of the lack of trust or lack of confidence comes from statements or comments from a whistleblower. Meaning David, I assume, who doesn't have all the information, who doesn't understand and that we're incorrect and that's not how it works. Well, actually that is how it works works. That does lead to a lack of trust.

John Dehlin [01:17:31] But isn't that circular? Yeah, like he's saying you can't trust a whistleblower because he doesn't have all the information. But we're surely not going to give all the information that feels circular.

Mark Pugsley [01:17:42] I agree. And, and he's basically saying he doesn't understand, he doesn't have all the information and that he was incorrect. And he said that in the other, another place in the interview too, that he's just wrong. Well then tell us. Yeah, tell us what's wrong about what David did. Let's go through that 90 page report that he put together and let's go through it line by line and what's true and what's not. If they really wanted to respond to this, they should do it in detail, not just throw that stuff out and say, you know, don't trust this guy, he's causing you to lose trust. I mean, of course that's what the church thinks. Yeah, there's, there's. And he says sure, they're going to be. There's 17 million members. Okay, first of all, let's just say that's just silly. There's not 17 million. There are some fraction of that that are active. Right.

John Dehlin [01:18:27] Four, four or five, however many it is.

Mark Pugsley [01:18:29] Okay. And you're gonna have people with varying opinions. Okay, sure. I'm sure there are members of the church that are saying that. There are many of the church who aren't saying that. So therefore some people aren't criticizing the church, John, therefore the church must be doing just fine.

John Dehlin [01:18:43] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:18:43] Is that what he's saying?

John Dehlin [01:18:44] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:18:44] I don't know.

John Dehlin [01:18:45] Okay, really quick, I just want to touch on that. So like there, I have so many thoughts on just that point. Number one is that he's probably right on some level that of the 4 or 5 million active faithful believing Mormons, so many are enclosed in the Church's bubble of don't listen to a critical source, don't ever look outside the correlated material, don't ever criticize the brethren. That that there's a huge chunk of membership that don't even know. Did Joseph Smith practice polygamy, the church's founder, let alone pay any attention to any public criticism that the church would ever levy.

Mark Pugsley [01:19:26] So they don't know about this settlement with the sec?

John Dehlin [01:19:29] No. They don't even know the gospel topics essays were released, like. And so on the one hand, he's kind of bragging that the church has such a lock on membership, knowledge and attention, which is what high demand religions or in the worst case, cults do is they. They protect the membership from ever hearing any criticisms. In some sense, he's right. But is that a. Is that a. Is that a kind of a bug and not a feature?

Mark Pugsley [01:19:57] I agree.

John Dehlin [01:19:57] Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:19:57] Yeah. 100. They don't know anything because we're not telling them anything. Therefore, they're not complaining and trying to say we're doing something wrong.

John Dehlin [01:20:05] They're not just not telling them.

Mark Pugsley [01:20:07] They're.

John Dehlin [01:20:07] They're doing all they can to proactively inoculate the members and. And to prevent them from ever learning anything about the church on the. You know. But. But again, a very small percentage of the active membership is complaining. That's probably true, but is he also downplaying that? Maybe. Do you think there's more concern than he's letting on?

Mark Pugsley [01:20:30] I don't know. I mean, I. When I talk to people who are active believers, they're not gonna. I don't know what they're thinking, but they are pretty much not gonna tell me and I'm safe. Right? You can talk to me. I'm not gonna. But I don't think people will criticize the church. I think I. When I was in my true believing days, I would not have criticized the church because that's actually a sin. You can't do it. And criticizing the church's management of its money, I think could be interpreted as criticizing the church. Right. I mean, members are taught from day one not to do that.

Mark Pugsley [01:21:00] So there's just a couple other quotes I wanted to say that came before what you just played. Are you all right? Before I say this? First of all, she asked, there are critics who say that this sounds an awful lot like an investment bank. And they're not paying taxes, you think? And he responds, waddell, it's not an investment bank. It's the church's treasury. It's the church's cash management, it's the church's bank. They're just holding the assets and reserves on behalf of the church as an auxiliary of the church. And providing us with those resources that we need in order to operate as a church. So really that's not true.

Mark Pugsley [01:21:35] Right? The church's resources come from tithing, not from Ensign Peak. We know that they're storing that money in Enzyme Peak, but the church is not getting its operating funds from Enzyme Peak. That's just not true. It comes from tithing. We know this. And tithing has extra. And so the extra is what's funding this investment account. So that was going back to what we were talking about before. Then she asked when the churches have in the past spoken about prudent savings, but when does prudent become excessive? Right. Really good question. I mean, do you really need $150 billion? Is that really what you guys need for?

Mark Pugsley [01:22:11] And what. What are you going to use it for? And he says, I don't know if it's ever becoming excessive because it's all going to be used at some point. We're learning how to use those resources. Isn't that interesting?

Guest 2 [01:22:23] He.

Mark Pugsley [01:22:23] He said, we are learning how to use these resources. So is. Is he kind of admitting that they don't haven't figured this out and that they kind of were shocked when they found out how much money they have and we're trying to figure out something to spend it on? Is that what he's saying? I actually don't know. It's quite interesting that he would say that we're learning and then. Well, you know, go ahead.

John Dehlin [01:22:44] Part of what's ironic is we discovered through the Ensign Peak leaks and the Mormon leaks, leaks, that many of the apostles, including Boyd K. Packer, didn't know that the Ensign Peak Fund was there and that it was as large as it was. So I. I actually take him at his word. The apostles are like, what do we do with all this money? We have no idea.

Mark Pugsley [01:23:04] A lot of money.

John Dehlin [01:23:05] It'd be nice if there was a prophet who could get revelation from God to tell them what to do with their money.

Mark Pugsley [01:23:10] That would be cool. There's another one that continues, again, the totality of the resources right now, again, hasn't always been there. We continue to save and put money aside as we use it, and we use it. And then this is an interesting quote, which actually, I think makes me really happy. He said, we will double the humanitarian work again. And then again, awesome. They've been shamed into it. Okay. They wouldn't have done this, I think, if David hadn't been brave enough to come forward. But when he did, and they began receiving public pressure from members and outside the church that this is kind of embarrassing, you guys, you have way too much money.

Mark Pugsley [01:23:49] No one needs this much money. You're not going to use it in the second coming. I don't know what it is you're saving for, but let's use it. It's a rainy day today. And he basically says, yeah, we're going to double our humanitarian work and do it again. Awesome. Fantastic. If that's what David. If that is the ultimate result of what David did, then I think it's fantastic. And he was a success because he shamed the church into doing more 1000%.

John Dehlin [01:24:15] That's going to be an outcome that happens from this. So kudos to you, David Nielsen, for making that happen. Really quickly. 11 comment from Boba. John, please ask and talk about the fact that Warren Buffett, Bill Gates and Elon Musk all give more to charity than the Mormon church individually. While add Walmart, you know, just, you know, just Amazon and, and all those people. Thank you Boba for that comment. A couple super chats came in. Sam writes how many Taiping members live below the poverty line, taking from the poor to pile up money up like Scrooge McDuck.

Mark Pugsley [01:24:54] That's the guy.

John Dehlin [01:24:55] Pinnacle of immorality. Thanks Sam for that super chat. Sam also writes, considering the lay members have to pay for everything out of pocket, Girls camp, funerals, activities, etc, it seems clear that the gas are not including the lay members when they refer to the church. I actually got an active, believing, faithful Mormon messaged me today saying that like she's running out of money for like craft supplies for girls camp. And her leadership wrote her back and said, sorry, you're not getting any more funds for girls Camp. You're gonna have to figure out how to pay for the supplies for girls Camp. Yeah, like the church has just worth $250 billion. And like members have to dig into their own pockets to pay for crafts for girls, you know, supplies for girls camp.

Mark Pugsley [01:25:45] It's crazy. There's another one today, I think on Reddit there's a guy who claims, you know, Reddit's anonymous. So who knows but shout out to this guy who had the bravery to post about his role as the financial clerk for a stake financial clerk.

John Dehlin [01:26:01] We're talking that one.

Mark Pugsley [01:26:02] Okay. Yeah, we're going to show you a

John Dehlin [01:26:03] clip in just a second. Really quickly, one more clip. The church asked us throughout our most vulnerable years if we masturbated, we have every right to ask them how they spent our money. We made that point earlier. I think that point can't be emphasized enough. Okay, let's go ahead and go. He's he. The next little clip is about the IRS investigation. Let's roll that clip.

The IRS Complaint and Likelihood of Investigation

▶ Video Clip 10

Video Clip 10 [01:26:25] David Nielsen says he did not intend for his complaint to the IRS to become public. But in 2019, his brother shared it with the Washington Post. Nielsen, who in his free time races motorcycles, says he was shooting shunned by some of his friends and neighbors in Salt Lake City. It wasn't until 2021, two years later, that David Nielsen heard from investigators, not from the irs, but the securities and Exchange Commission, which launched its own probe into Ensign Peak after that website story linked the church to shell companies. What information did you give to the sec?

Video Clip 10 [01:27:04] Everything. I help them see the big picture.

Video Clip 10 [01:27:07] To protect market fairness and transparency, any firm with more than $100 million in securities must file accurate reports on its holdings with the sec. But in February, the SEC announced the Church of Latter Day Saints, and Ensign Peak failed to do that. SEC investigators found the church went to great lengths to hide $32 billion in securities over nearly 20 years. It created 13 shell companies that were assigned a local phone number that would go directly to voicemail in case regulators checked in.

Video Clip 10 [01:27:42] Here they had these back office accountants who had never bought a bond or sold stock a day in their life, signing signatory pages for a portfolio that didn't exist.

Video Clip 10 [01:27:56] The SEC fined the church and Ensign Peak a total of $5 million. Bishop Christopher Waddell told us it was the church's lawyers who advised them to create the shell companies.

John Dehlin [01:28:09] Okay, so that was about the SEC investigation. We've covered that quite extensively. I still think it was great. I have to say. How awkward. Have you ever. You ever worked with media before that B roll where they're like, pretend like you're. Pretend like you're sitting at your office desk and pretend like you're working or. Or let's get you on your motorcycle and let's get a crew to kind of follow you around and video record. Anyway, we've covered the SEC thing in depth. Anything you want to say about that?

Mark Pugsley [01:28:36] No, no, I think. I think that's right, and I think it doesn't. It happens fairly frequently in our cases where we file something with one regulator and then they'll bring the other regulator in if they think that there's other conduct that they should be looking into.

Mark Pugsley [01:28:51] And I also think in our last discussion, we talked about how. David. But I think it's worth emphasizing most whistleblowers remain anonymous. No one knows that they filed these Reports. That's what they want. They want to be able to stay employed in the industry that they are in. They want to continue to have a reputation and not be shunned by all of their neighbors. David lost that ability because he was outed against his wishes and against his consent.

Mark Pugsley [01:29:21] The, the Washington Post published that story without actually getting permission from David Nielsen, the guy that wrote it. And I think it's, it's misconduct by the paper to do that. I can't believe they did it, but they did. And so it's impacted David's life in a real way. He did not do this to get attention. He did not do this to get money. He did it to do the right thing.

John Dehlin [01:29:43] Yeah. Gerardo is just reminding us to remind everyone to hit the like button on YouTube or Facebook. That will help with the algorithms. And again, thanks to everyone who's donating through the super chats. Let's go ahead and roll the next clip that I think talks about the IRS investigation specifically.

Guest 2 [01:30:01] So how likely do you think it would be that the IRS would ever investigate this?

John Dehlin [01:30:05] Slim. The political risk is so great that it comes with real danger. At the same time, there's a real risk to the rule of law if the IRS doesn't come in and enforce those rules. Mark, what's your reaction to the fact that religions are so powerful that politicians will in an essence make justice, not blind and say we don't want to confront the political risks of going after a super powerful mega wealthy church. So we're as far as the IRS goes and enforcement, we're going to intentionally turn a blind eye?

Mark Pugsley [01:30:44] Yeah, I don't know about intentionally. I think he's wrong, first of all that they won't investigate. I think they are investigating. I think we pretty clear that they are. That what he really, I think meant to say is that they're not going to do anything. They're not going to take action because it's politically fraught.

John Dehlin [01:30:59] Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:30:59] And I agree with him that that's a risk that the IRS takes. And IRS is currently battling for funding. They've tried. They're trying to get more people to enforce the tax laws in this country and they are not going to put themselves in a vulnerable position with Republicans, many of which are members of the LDS Church, but just religions.

John Dehlin [01:31:20] Churches are so powerful in the United States.

Mark Pugsley [01:31:23] You know, that's one of the problems is it's protected in the Constitution. I mean Australia, I think Canada, uk, they require financial disclosures from churches.

John Dehlin [01:31:33] It's not in the, it's not in the constitution. That churches should not disclose their finances.

Mark Pugsley [01:31:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:31:39] Or be punished for fraud. It's only that the state shouldn't establish a religion.

Mark Pugsley [01:31:44] That's a very good point. Yeah.

Guest 2 [01:31:45] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:31:46] No, I just think historically, though, religions have had a lot of power. Yeah.

Insider Accounts and Financial Disclosure Concerns

John Dehlin [01:31:51] All right, now we're gonna. This is kind of breaking news, but, you know, this was something that was sent to me by a financial clerk, and you had mentioned it, and I'm just going to show the screenshot of it, and then we'll read it. It basically says I'm a physically and mentally out state clerk here. He's not revealing the location of his stake for privacy, given that it's fairly easy to identify him from the calling alone. His state consists of units of suburban and rural mix. He says the depravity. And again, this is an active believing member, maybe not believing. Right. Active member.

Mark Pugsley [01:32:32] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:32:32] In a state calling. Reporting to Mormon Stories podcast. He writes. The depravity by which the LDS finances are run are felt all the way down to the individual member level. To provide you with some figures for my stake, we take in, on average, $230,000 in tithing contributions every month. Okay. Yeah, 200. That's. That's. It's annual. It's monthly income of 2.3 million for just the people that are paying. All right, right, 2.3 million I. Per month.

Mark Pugsley [01:33:07] Right.

John Dehlin [01:33:08] Of income.

Mark Pugsley [01:33:09] Is that what you're saying?

John Dehlin [01:33:10] Of monthly income.

Mark Pugsley [01:33:11] Right. For the people that are paying tithing.

John Dehlin [01:33:14] Yeah. In that war. Yeah. Okay. We receive from Salt Lake city a mere 9,000 per quarter. This equates to 2.76 million in contributions annually just from his stake, where we receive just $36,000 annually from Salt Lake. Or in other words, 1.3% of what we contribute. So he's saying that his stake contributes $2.76 million annually to the church and gets back $36,000, or 1.3%. What do you think about that? It's a good business model.

Guest 1 [01:33:52] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:33:53] Just keep the money and run their church.

John Dehlin [01:33:55] One of the things L. Ron Hubbard said is if you want to get really rich, start a religion.

Mark Pugsley [01:33:59] Start a religion.

John Dehlin [01:34:00] Yeah, that's right.

Mark Pugsley [01:34:01] But why are we being so cheap, then, about not giving the girls craft

John Dehlin [01:34:05] money for camp or up it to 5%? Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:34:08] I mean, my hell, why don't we. Why don't we hire a janitor? There's probably some people in the wards that could use the money or to do the groundskeeping.

John Dehlin [01:34:16] Why don't we employ people?

Mark Pugsley [01:34:18] I know you know, members think that, that they're actually making these sacrifices to benefit the church, but the, the church doesn't need it.

John Dehlin [01:34:27] Yeah. He goes on to write. And this is again a physically and mentally out state clerk. He writes from this. We are expected to fund all programs at a ward and stake level and have to pay for phone bills for each building as well as post office box rental. Suffice it to say, I end up spending a lot of out of pocket money just to broadcast state conferences. Given that our facilities management has been gutted over the years and our buildings are so far below standard that even with an IT degree, it takes me countless hours to figure out how to make a basic broadcast backwards compatible.

John Dehlin [01:35:09] Given that the church can't be bothered to bring us into the 21st century, much less provide an adequate budget for doing so. I can see right now that the church is like the strength in the church. Members can. He's like, where's, where is a state clerk with a monthly income of X who's an IT professional? Right? You know that that's happening.

Mark Pugsley [01:35:29] Hopefully he'll retire out when he gets excommunicated.

John Dehlin [01:35:32] And. Come on. Yeah. Okay. He goes on to write. Now here's the kicker. So that's not good. That's not the story, Mark.

Guest 1 [01:35:39] Okay.

Mark Pugsley [01:35:39] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:35:39] Are you ready for the story? Here's the kicker. Funds are allocated from Salt Lake based on attendance. And guess what? They don't care about the adults that attend either. There are only. They are only worth 1 times 1x when it comes to fund allocation. In fact, the allocations supposedly adjusted for area break down like this Sacrament meeting. Amount per attendee, $12 per attendee. Young men, amount per attendee, $12.50. Young women, amount per attendee, $12.50. Primary amount per attendee, $6.25. Young single adults, amount per attendee, $6,25. Notice anything? Units got double points for youth that attend because they get counted twice, essentially once for each hour. Us adults, though, completely irrelevant it seems, and they're the ones paying the tithing.

Mark Pugsley [01:36:41] But isn't that also. Isn't. Isn't the craziest part of that story that the church is basically giving monetary incentives to the wards to keep their people in the pews. They're paying the words based on their activity rates. If your activity goes down, your budget goes down. I mean, they're literally putting a price. I mean the crazy thing to me is that they're at least they're offering the same amount for the young women and the young Men, at least. At least they're valued at the same $12.50 each.

John Dehlin [01:37:09] But they're not because I'll share this next quote we've got here. There does need to be a place there people can report where people can report. My shelf started cracking seven years back when, when my sister in law in Stake Youth told me they were spending $20,000 on young men versus 2,000 on young women per year. Right. I'm sure it had to do with scouting, but I'll tell you this, after last night's disclosure on 60 Minutes, my inactive husband told me I was not to donate another red cent, not even for four active food, not even food for activities.

Mark Pugsley [01:37:48] So this is a different person than the, than the financial difficult.

John Dehlin [01:37:52] Yeah, yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:37:52] Interesting.

John Dehlin [01:37:53] Yeah. So I mean, basically the church cares about its young men first.

Mark Pugsley [01:37:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:37:58] Then it's young women and adults are far down the line and they're the ones paying the money.

Mark Pugsley [01:38:03] Well, I think they're losing the young men much faster than the young women. At least that's, that's anecdotally what I've heard. But I'm hearing of stories, and I'm sure you are of whole families that are leaving the church over these financials disclosures. Covid was bad. A lot of people just didn't go back. But this I think has been the final straw for a lot of people knowing that the church is so cheap when they have so much money. And, and you know, we're talking about having the church spend money on benefiting the world, but they won't even spend the money on their own people.

John Dehlin [01:38:34] Yeah, yeah. So what this really comes down to is we as we kind of do our best to summarize just David Nielsen's very courageous act of conscience. Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:38:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:38:48] I really loved the way that he summarized why he left that lucrative wall, those that lucrative Wall street career to work for the church, what his hopes were, why he went to work for Ensign Peak versus what he ended up doing. This is, I call this the money quote, but here is, I think it's going to be David Nielsen.

Guest 1 [01:39:08] It solved big problems with $100 billion.

Guest 2 [01:39:10] And is that the thing that bothers you about all this?

Guest 1 [01:39:13] I thought we were going to change the world and we just grew.

John Dehlin [01:39:18] The bank account was that powerful.

Mark Pugsley [01:39:20] The money quote for sure. No pun intended. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's fantastic. And he did such a great job and he was so nervous about this. You know, I've done a couple of TV shows, I think. You have. I did American Greed a couple times. And so I know how hard it is. They interview you for hours and then you don't. They do not tell you what they're going to use and what they're not. You're at the mercy of some editor in New York City to put this thing together. And so David, understandably, was very nervous about how he would come across.

Mark Pugsley [01:39:53] There was a review of it in the Tribune where Pierce, I forget his first name, said that, you know, David came off really well. And I 100 agree with that. I thought he came across really well. And if you know him, and I hope more people will get to know him through you or through some other interview, if he can do it, if he's willing to do it. He's been very careful for understandable reasons. But he's just a great guy and there's not a dishonest bone in his body, and he did the right thing. Isn't it sad that of all the 40 or 50 people that run inside Peak, only one had the integrity to leave and blow the whistle? Only one. I mean, how sad is that?

John Dehlin [01:40:36] It's painful to be a whistleblower, but that just. That's why David Nielsen deserves our love and respect for what he did. So there have been. There have. Let's just say that overwhelmingly, this is an amazing, positive story. Courageous. And it's gonna only do good. There's no bad that this story is gonna.

Mark Pugsley [01:40:57] The church is doubling and then doubling again. It's humanitarian, at least on the record

John Dehlin [01:41:02] of committing, that they're going to.

Mark Pugsley [01:41:03] Of course, we'll never know that because they're just not transparent about what they do.

John Dehlin [01:41:07] There. There were there. You know, if I. I did. I did a little poll on Instagram and Facebook just to get people's reactions. And I think what's hard is there's so many people who follow Mormon stories, for example, or Radio Free Mormon or Mormonism Live, that are really swimming. And they've been reading the Widow's Might Report in depth. So they were excited, expecting something really meaty. One of the biggest criticisms I saw of the 60 Minutes piece went along the lines of, like, nothing new, way too short, not enough substance. Wish it was an hour long. Wish they could have gone into more depth. I'm sure you saw some of those criticisms.

Mark Pugsley [01:41:46] Yeah, well, I mean, that's a criticism of the format. Not really of the. Of the interview or the interviewee.

John Dehlin [01:41:51] Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:41:52] For sure. And I totally agree with that. I mean, it was too. It's too big of a story, too complicated of a story to just Give it short shrift. I. When they interviewed Hinckley, when Dan Rather interviewed Hinckley, was that. Did they only do 15 minutes or did they do the whole hour? Do you remember?

John Dehlin [01:42:06] I don't know. But, but just on that note, I was talking to Radio Free Mormon RFM before, earlier today, and you know, we were reflecting on like the Mike Wallace Years of 60 Minutes. Yeah. Where if you go on 60 Minutes, you know you're going to get. Oh, yeah, fried. You know what I mean? And this isn't Quite Mike Wallace 60 minutes level scrutiny. Right.

Mark Pugsley [01:42:29] Well, and the church, I think, you know, I mean, they didn't put a PR person, they put someone from the Presiding Bishopric, which was brave of them. I don't think that paid off very well. But it was brave. And, and, and David, you know, I love stories where whistleblowers are the heroes. I do. Because they, they should be and they are.

John Dehlin [01:42:47] Yeah. Yeah. Elaine, Elaine Rudd made the comment. It was a puff piece. Could have shown much more. I don't know that the church views it as a puff piece, but I mean, I could see for some, for someone with our point of view, they can feel that way.

Mark Pugsley [01:43:02] Well, the, the problem is when David filed his report, the. He called it a, A letter to the IRS director. I don't know if you caught that. That title, I'm sure, was quite intentional.

John Dehlin [01:43:16] Was that Lars or David?

Mark Pugsley [01:43:17] David. That was David's title too, I believe.

John Dehlin [01:43:20] Okay.

Mark Pugsley [01:43:21] I could be wrong. Anyway, the point is that this is a very long report. It's I think 90 pages of very. Not single spaced, by the way. And I don't think that you could really give enough attention to that in a 15 minute interview or even an hour interview. It's just too much there, too complicated. And the laws, when you start getting into the details about 13 Fs, people tune out. It's complicated. Wait till they get into the IRS details. It's all about these fubars and all of these reports that the Church didn't file reporting its foreign holdings. The church did things that violate the tax laws that are worse, in my opinion, than violating the SEC laws.

Calls for Accountability and the Church's Official Response

Mark Pugsley [01:44:09] And one of them was failing to report their holdings overseas. And again, I'm not an expert in tax, but those are pretty significant and those have significant penalties attached to them. So the irs, if it had the bravery and the backbone, could take really serious action against the church. And it remains to be seen whether it will. But another, just another plug if people want to do something, and this is the question we get what can we do?

Mark Pugsley [01:44:38] One of the things you can do is call the senate finance committee in Washington D.C. and urge them to take action against the. The church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints for its tax violations.

John Dehlin [01:44:49] Yeah. I love our viewers and listeners. Howie Rourke went and looked up and found out that the Gordon Mahink the interview with Mike Wallace was 13 minutes and 45 seconds. Isn't the Internet amazing? But I'm sure it was a little more hard hitting. My friend Cara Barrel Nuance ho made the question, what do you think about the idea that it's just a hit piece on the Mormon church specifically and that all the churches in America combined have this kind of money? Do you think that's true?

Mark Pugsley [01:45:19] I don't know. I don't know.

John Dehlin [01:45:21] There's no way. The Mormon church is by far the wealthiest church in the United States.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:25] Oh, yes.

Guest 1 [01:45:27] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:27] Well, there's 1.511 500 people watching right now.

John Dehlin [01:45:33] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:33] Is that right?

John Dehlin [01:45:33] Yeah, yeah. It's a, it's a big, it's a big.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:35] Hi everyone. Yeah, that's awesome.

John Dehlin [01:45:37] Yeah. And please, please hit the like button. Please subscribe on YouTube and on Facebook and please donate through the super chat feature if you can.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:46] I think our last one had over a hundred thousand views just on YouTube alone.

John Dehlin [01:45:50] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:51] Right. I mean that's.

John Dehlin [01:45:52] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:45:52] I'm kind of blown away by that, John. I, I don't know why. I, I'm not the guy that should be on these. I, I'm not really. I'm just a regular guy. But I'm, I'm happy that people are paying attention to this because it really needs to be paid attention to.

John Dehlin [01:46:05] Absolutely. All right, so. So Kara's wanting me to play her TikTok before I try and do that one more time. The church responded to the 60 Minutes report and I'm going to read you their response. It says, this is statement issued following CBS's 60 Minutes report. Church moves forward consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ is the sub headline. And it says, following media inquiries, the church of Jesus Christ of Latter day saints has issued the following statement in response to A report by U. S. Broadcaster, CBS 60 Minutes news magazine program. Quote, the church as if there's one. The church believes in being financially responsible by carefully ensuring it has adequate resources and of. You're laughing. Okay. Why are you laughing?

Mark Pugsley [01:46:56] Just adequate. Adequate. Really, it's, it's absurdly excessive. Adequate is not the right word. Sorry, go ahead.

John Dehlin [01:47:02] Okay. No, pause me whenever something. Whenever you want to comment, pause me. Okay. Okay. Adequate resources available to fulfill its divinely appointed responsibilities. Two church members who support the work of salvation through living the gospel of Jesus Christ, caring for those in need, inviting all to receive the gospel, and uniting families for eternity will continue to move forward consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ, which makes this world a better place. All right, really quickly, which of the

Mark Pugsley [01:47:38] fourfold mission of the church is to bail out insurance companies and build malls

John Dehlin [01:47:43] or to purchase Tesla stock and Amazon stock and Microsoft and Apple stock does good things.

Mark Pugsley [01:47:48] Let's just stipulate, right? The church does good things, but it's not using this money to do it. It's using its tithing monies, it's $5 billion a year in tithing revenue to do that. It doesn't touch this money. Yeah, this is extra. And yes, it is adequate.

John Dehlin [01:48:02] Yeah, it's a bit of a smokescreen to say to be talking about missionary work and.

Mark Pugsley [01:48:07] Right.

John Dehlin [01:48:07] And helping families and, and, you know, making the world a better place with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, when again, they missed the whole point of David's piece, which was he joined Ensign Peak to change the world. And they're just growing a bank account. It's like the church didn't watch the

Mark Pugsley [01:48:24] video or, or they're just trying to deflect, I guess. Kind of like their statement when the SEC settlement came out that this time to move on.

John Dehlin [01:48:33] Yeah. It's like these are not the droids you're looking for. Right. Yeah. All right. It ends by Saying it's unfortunate 60 Minutes sought to elevate a story based on unfounded allegations by a former employee who has a different view on how the church should manage its resources. So that's, let me just. That's what they're saying about Dave. It's unfortunate that 60 Minutes would let Dave talk because he had unfounded allegations by a former. We should add, disgruntled. I'm sure the church wanted to write disgruntled employee who has a different view on how the church should manage. Can we talk about a different view?

Mark Pugsley [01:49:10] Well, of course, but, but let's talk about this word unfounded. And unfounded means there was no basis for those. But guess what? They entered into an order, a stipulation, a settlement with the securities and Exchange Commission, which basically admitted that his allegations were founded, they were well founded, to use a lawyer term. These are well founded allegations. They are not unfounded. And if you're going to say that they're unfounded, tell us which ones they are. I mean, it's just, it's just preposterous. These people, honestly, I don't know why they can't just address the issues. But they are. It's like gaslighting is really what they're doing.

John Dehlin [01:49:49] Yeah. Let's see. We're gonna try this again to play Kara's clip. Just because we love her and want to support her. Can you hear that?

Mark Pugsley [01:49:58] That's fine.

Guest 2 [01:49:59] Better in our hands than the government.

Guest 1 [01:50:02] Once the money went in, it didn't go out.

Guest 2 [01:50:05] We need these funds for the last days.

Guest 2 [01:50:07] False records and statements to masquerade as a charity stockpiling money and misleading church members.

Guest 2 [01:50:15] It's not like we were up building shopping malls with it or something.

Guest 2 [01:50:18] $1.4 billion from the fund went to a mall being built on land owned by the church. Humanitarian aid.

Guest 2 [01:50:27] Look. Bread. Poor people love bread. We're giving poor people bread.

Guest 2 [01:50:31] David Ne says honesty is a tenant of the faith. He wants inside Peak advisors to pay the taxes he says it owes on the $100 billion fortune built from time

Guest 2 [01:50:43] to our government funds. Abortion sometimes. And I love kids investigators. I knew he was just in it for money. And motorcycles. Where's he driving to a prostitute.

Guest 2 [01:50:55] Tax exempt status by moving money to for profit businesses.

Guest 2 [01:51:00] Finally someone from our church to set the record straight. You tell them.

Guest 2 [01:51:04] You know the idea that secrecy builds mistrust.

Guest [01:51:08] Well, we don't feel it's being secret. We feel it's being confidential.

Guest 2 [01:51:11] What's the difference?

Guest 2 [01:51:13] Did you see how the Lord filled his mouth with the words to say this Confidential.

Guest [01:51:18] In order to maintain the focus on what our purpose is and what the mission of the church is rather than the church has X amount of money.

Guest 2 [01:51:25] But don't you agree this would be a non issue if there was more transparency?

Guest [01:51:30] No, because then everyone would be telling us what they wanted us to do with the money.

Guest 2 [01:51:34] I love Jesus and I love that he told his church leaders to build a shopping mall so that we can buy more things. And it's so nice that it's saving me from having to go to the Gateway which is also only one block down the street. That one is outdoors. Have to look at homeless people who are cold because did I mention it's outdoors? Not like Jesus's mall. Jesus's mall has a retractable roof and a river runs through it with koi fish.

Mark Pugsley [01:52:04] Okay, wait. I need to correct the record because I worked in that mall and they are not koi fish. They are real trout. Let's just, let's. Come on, Kara, you can do better.

John Dehlin [01:52:14] Oh, that's nuance. Hoe you can subscribe to her YouTube channel. You can also subscribe to her Patreon. You can donate to Cara. We love Cara. Shout out to Cara. We all need a little bit of humor, right? If we don't cry, we're. If we don't laugh, we're gonna cry, right, Mark? All right, I'm gonna play this last clip. I don't even know what this last clip is, but it's David Nielsen. Let's play this last clip.

Reflections on Donor Trust and Member Expectations

Guest 2 [01:52:38] They say that the money's tithe with, with no strings to it, that it's a matter of trust and that you have to trust that it's going to be invested in the right way and that's what we're here for.

Guest 1 [01:52:50] It's easy to manage if you don't have to be accountable. Right. If you just say trust us and we won't tell you, then sure, it's easier to manage. You can move money around however you want. Anyone who asks a question isn't going to get an answer. I don't think that's healthy.

John Dehlin [01:53:10] That's it.

Mark Pugsley [01:53:12] That's the mic drop right there, isn't it? Wouldn't it be great if we could do things in our lives with zero accountability? John, sign me up for that deal.

John Dehlin [01:53:20] Well, the Lord doesn't need accountability, Mark. Like Jesus doesn't need accountability. He answers. The church answers to a higher power, Mark.

Mark Pugsley [01:53:27] Right, right. The one thing they have not said is Jesus told us to hide the money. I'm waiting for that quote to come out in the next PR release. It was Jesus. We throw Jesus under the bus, us. Okay. The lawyer thing didn't work. Jesus told us. We prayed. Jesus said hide the money.

John Dehlin [01:53:44] I mean, with Joseph's polygamy, in fairness, they say God told him to.

Mark Pugsley [01:53:48] Right, right, right. Well, and the church comes by it honestly. You know, one of the first Ponzi schemes in Utah history was the Kirtland bank that Joseph Smith set up and caused many people to leave the church. I mean, I feel like this has been embedded in church history and in the church ethos for many years. The church purports to be this, you know, Jesus following, God loving, righteous group and. But the reality is really not that.

John Dehlin [01:54:18] Yeah.

Mark Pugsley [01:54:18] In my view.

John Dehlin [01:54:19] Well, you've already kind of said how David's doing. Let me just ask you a quick two part question. First of all, love you, David. Hope you'll when it's right. We'd love to have you on Mormon stories. Anything else you want to say about how David's doing and what's next for David?

Mark Pugsley [01:54:37] I don't think I can really do that. I think I can just tell you that he's doing great. I will say one thing about his motorcycle. David loves motorcycles. The motorcycle they showed is not his fancy one. He actually races motorcycles, like these street bikes on the track. I mean, he's got some really cool motorcycles. And I pretty sure that his garage is only motorcycles. There is no car, no room for any car in his garage. But he's a, he's a talented guy, and I'm sure that he is going to apply those talents in ways that, you know, make him happy. And I hope that the 60 Minutes, I mean, there's no bigger forum in this country, I think, than being on 60 Minutes.

Mark Pugsley [01:55:21] I mean, I don't. Maybe there's a bigger one. I'm not. Maybe Fox News, I'm not sure. But he was on 60 Minutes and that's kind of the pinnacle in a lot of ways. I hope that he has some sense of closure from that. I know the IRS case is still pending, but he, he got his pound of flesh, so to speak, from the church. He will get a small award from that. A monetary award from the sec. Yes. Yeah, he will. And I hope that helps. I hope that gives him some satisfaction from what he did. But the true satisfaction, I think, comes from, you know, the nice comments.

Mark Pugsley [01:55:54] I've been just looking kind of in the side through the, the comments on the, on the YouTube and people are giving him a lot of love. And I hope David sees that and understands that there are probably millions of people out there that are indebted to him for giving them information that they needed and information that helped them re evaluate their ongoing membership in the church. And many of them, based on what he did, have chosen to change their relationship with the church in one way or another. And isn't that a gift to those people?

John Dehlin [01:56:27] Even if they just stop giving money to the church? Who doesn't need. The church does not need your money. I've said that before. The Mormon Church doesn't need your money, but other charities, other worthwhile charities do. Maybe just other members of your family or your friend group. They could use some money, you know, falling on financial hard times.

Mark Pugsley [01:56:46] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:56:46] So we're not here to take people out of the church. At least I'm not. But I will say I'm okay with people no longer giving money to a church that's now worth 200, a quarter of a trillion dollars. I don't think the church needs anyone's money.

Mark Pugsley [01:57:00] Well, And I, I'm not trying to pull anyone out of the church and all of my family is very involved in the church. But I do think people should have disclosure. I think people should understand what they're doing when they give money to that organization and they should have full disclosure about what the organization is doing with their money. And if that, if they won't give that to you, then find another organization to give your money to for sure. And just a plug for leaving the church. I've been out for 12 years now, and I can't think of a single decision in my life that has made me happier than my decision to leave the church. My life is better in infinite ways. So for those who are on the edge, do it. It's, it's great. There's a whole world out there.

John Dehlin [01:57:40] Yeah. So again, shout out to you, David Nielsen. Thanks for your courage, Mark. Mark Pugsley, really quick. You, you do professional work in this area. I want to give you a chance. You don't, we don't pay you to come on Mormon stories. But, but will you plug what you do? If, if there's someone you can help? I want them to know what you do and how you can help them.

Mark Pugsley [01:58:00] Well, I, I represent whistleblowers. That's, I'm one of, my firm, Pugsley Wood in, in Salt Lake City, City in Boston. We have offices in both places. We're one of only two specific SEC whistleblower law firms in the country, probably in the world. So we're very, very specialized. But if people work in a public company and are aware of fraud or misstating public statements or any sort of financial things, especially public companies, give me a call. You can, you two can be benefited by this. We just received a 28 million dollar award from one of our clients just a few weeks ago. And we're very proud of the work that we do and the clients that we represent.

John Dehlin [01:58:43] And they reach out, they find you how.

Mark Pugsley [01:58:45] Just pugsleywood.com okay. Or Google my name.

Closing Thoughts and Thanks to Guests

John Dehlin [01:58:49] All right. Well, I want to thank you, Mark, for coming of your own free will. Thanks to David Nielsen. Dave, we'd love to have our moment stories. Please come when you feel ready. Love to you and your family because I know this is not a sacrifice, Dave, your wife as well. We won't get into that. But this is a family sacrifice. So thank you, David. Thanks, Mark. Thanks to all our viewers and listeners. Thanks to everyone who donated through the Super Chat feature. You can also donate@mormonstories.org click the donate button. Become a monthly donor. Those donations keep us afloat. Thanks to everyone who commented. And again, Please subscribe on YouTube, please subscribe on Facebook and please like this episode right now and follow us on TikTok and Instagram and wherever you can.

John Dehlin [01:59:31] Thanks to Gerardo and Julia and Maven and everyone who makes all this possible. Thanks to all my co hosts and my board members on the Open Stories Foundation. We couldn't do it without you. And most importantly, thanks to all our supporters and all the people that come on Mormon Stories to make all this possible. You guys be good to each other, be kind to each other, and we'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories Podcast. Take care.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.