Cults, Culture & Coercion with Dr. Steve Hassan

Pam Hemphill has been fighting MAGA propaganda since the day she realized it nearly killed her. A retired substance abuse counselor cancer survivor and one of the most visible former participants of the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol Pam served a 60-day federal prison sentence for her role that day.

Her decision to reject Donald Trump’s presidential pardon and become a prominent activist exposing the cult dynamics of the MAGA movement makes her story truly remarkable. I was honored to have Pam join me again for a conversation about her ongoing activism.

She is one of the few January 6th participants who not only accepted full responsibility for her actions but rejected Trump’s presidential pardon after his inauguration. Since her release she has received recognition from Mike Pence testified before Congress and become a courageous voice pushing back against the propaganda that fueled the attack on American democracy. More and more true believers are leaving MAGA and I wanted to highlight her activism. She continues to go to protests against ICE. It was an interesting interview because we got into techniques and strategies for communicating with those still in the thrall of the Cult of Trump.

Rachel Bernstein is a licensed marriage‑and‑family therapist in Los Angeles and a seasoned cult specialist with more than 35 years of experience. Rachel specializes in helping individuals exit authoritarian cults and narcissistic relationships and begin healing. She works on a one-on-one basis, hosts group therapy sessions, and speaks more broadly through education and media appearances. Rachel also hosts the weekly podcast, IndoctriNation, which explores cults, manipulators, and strategies for protecting oneself from systems of control. Over the course of the show, she has interviewed hundreds of cult survivors, journalists, and experts. Through the years, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Rachel on cases, witnessing firsthand the depth of her expertise and her commitment to empowering survivors.

“I never thought this would be happening in the United States, that people would be looking for ways to escape for their safety,” Rachel observed of recent national events. We discussed the assaults on peaceful protesters and the recent killing of Nicole Good and Alex Pretti. Rachel noted that her own children, who are within the trans community, worried about their personal safety, and many in different communities are looking for routes of citizenship to other countries. Rachel also noted the quote from Kamala Harris about Trump turning the military against his own country, and how that was once deemed “hysterical”; now, it is spot-on predictive. Her newest book, Restart and Restore: A Journal for Survivors of Manipulation, combines psychoeducation, therapist notes, journaling prompts, and integration practices into a self‑paced guide for individuals emerging or healing from a manipulative relationship. The accompanying Companion Notebook offers additional activities and provides space for personal reflection and notes.

With speculations by experts that Donald Trump’s health appears to be deteriorating regularly noting bruises on his hands occasional stumbling or slurring in his speech and gait. The White House has denied these claims. As vice‑president JD Vance born and raised in Middletown Ohio stands to assume the presidency should Trump become unable to serve. Vance author of Hillbilly Elegy a memoir that chronicles his working‑class upbringing was once an outspoken critic of Trump but has recently become a “true believer” and advocate for the administration’s policies. 

Nikki McCarty is JD Vance's cousin who grew up in the same family structure. She offered a unique view into the Vice President’s upbringing including an analysis of her family’s spiritual beliefs and practices utilizing my BITE Model of Authoritarian Control. 

Nikki McCarty at times identifies herself as the “childless cat lady related to J.D. Vance” a reference to his direct public criticism of women who choose not to reproduce. She also identifies as a “neurodivergent queer disabled” person and has spent many years deconstructing her Christian Nationalist upbringing and its views on those topics. With a master’s degree from Liberty University she has worked as a social worker and therapist in the child welfare system for 8 years. 

For many Americans, untangling today’s U.S. politics feels especially tough because the rise of religious‑right conservatism can seem sudden and ominous. Without a grounding in religious history and its influence on American political development over time, sweeping dominionist initiatives like Project 2025, fringe movements such as QAnon, and shadowy organizations like the Heritage Foundation may appear to come out of thin air. Fortunately, author and fundamentalist‑politics expert Keri L. Ladner, Ph.D., guides listeners back through the archives, tracing these phenomena to roots that reach back to the late 1800s.

Ladner, who earned her doctorate in Divinity from the University of Edinburgh, is the author of End‑Time Politics: From the Moral Majority to QAnon (2024). The book maps the evolution of conservative Christianity, from its use of prophecy and rapture‑focused visions to the rise of figures like Jerry Falwell. She shows how those ideas have mutated over decades, ultimately feeding the ideologies that underpin today’s Trump‑era regime.

Ladner first explained that the type of religious movements she specializes in is not the same as what was known as ‘Christianity’ before the late 1800s. “The movements that I’m looking into are very new. They’re very new offshoots of Christianity, specifically of Protestantism, American evangelicalism. They did not begin to develop in a form that we would recognize today until the late 1800s,” she explained. Her doctoral thesis essentially covered Jerry Falwell and the theological system known as dispensationalism, a historical movement she connects to John Nelson Darby, a 19th-century religious leader.

Research on psychedelics has shown that one of the most profound effects of the experience is how it places people in a more vulnerable, highly susceptible state. Along with creating time dilations, this powerful period is also capable of establishing new thought patterns surrounding trauma or addictions. For those who aim to support healing, this moment offers tremendous opportunities to empower individuals and help them reset temporarily or for good. Yet it’s that same openness that can be exploited by individuals attempting to manipulate, control, or indoctrinate.

This tension prompted my guest Erica Siegal, a licensed clinical social worker who facilitates psychedelic sessions, to ask, “How do we as facilitators of psychedelic experiences, not create undue influence…?” Erica enrolled in my clinicians’ course, a

nd we subsequently crossed paths at a Harvard‑hosted psychedelic‑assisted psychotherapy program where I was a speaker. I am honored to have her as a guest on this episode of Cults, Culture & Coercion.

Erica is the founder of NEST Harm Reduction, “an organization focused on psychotherapy, psychedelic-adjacent care, drug education, and consultation for communities and organizations working in high-influence environments.” She has worked for over 15 years in the realm of psychedelic research, behavioral health, community gatherings, and spiritual care settings. She aims to help individuals and organizations reduce harm while preserving autonomy and dignity. Join us for this illuminating interview.

Dr. Frank R. George is an internationally recognized authority in psychology, neuroscience, narcissism, and addiction. Through his Substack newsletter, The Gaslight Report, he demystifies pathological narcissism, explores its underlying causes, and offers practical strategies that readers can apply in their own lives. Over many years, his research has spanned neuroanatomy, neurochemistry, and genetics as they relate to the field of addictions. He currently ranks among the top 1% of Google Scholars worldwide, with nearly 200 publications and over 30 patents. Additionally, he has received almost 4,000 citations for his work in the scientific literature. Dr. George explained that there is a growing amount of scientific evidence showing an overlap between symptoms of addiction and traits of narcissism, even to the extent that functional MRI reveals distinct neural activation patterns in individuals with that personality type. Similarly, withdrawal patterns appear when the person does not receive their preferred types of attention. “What do you see when a narcissist is not getting all that supply? They go through what’s called narcissistic rage, narcissistic collapse, and it just overlaps with withdrawal,” he said. This is a really important interview shedding light on Trump and other malignant narcissist cult leaders.

The violent coup attempt of January 6th which sent Oath Keepers to jail was justice. Until Trump pardoned all of those people who were convicted and in jail, including Oath Keeper Stewart Rhodes. Now with recent events we are resharing our previous interview with someone who was involved. “America right now needs some exit ramps,” Jason Van Tatenhove said as we discussed his former role as national media director for the Oath Keepers, a group known for its far-right anti-government militia. While Jason would ultimately decide to leave the group in 2016 due to increasing racism and Holocaust denial within their membership, the Oath Keepers would go on to participate in the United States Capitol January 6th attack, led by followers of Donald Trump. Jason eventually testified before a U.S. House Select Committee about his position in media propaganda for the organization. He described their attempts at paramilitary tactics, plans for insurrection, and his relationship with Stewart Rhodes, founder of the Oath Keepers, convicted of seditious conspiracy and evidence tampering.

Jason publicly speaks about his concerns for continued paramilitary training groups and recruitment tactics in future election cycles. His book, The Perils of Extremism: How I Left the Oath Keepers and Why We Should Be Concerned about a Future Civil War, discusses the unsettled state surrounding extremism in America today and provides an insider view into the tactics used to recruit, train, and further radicalize persons with former military backgrounds, first-responders, and individuals who may otherwise feel disenfranchised by United States Democracy at this time.

Cults and high-control groups often use sexuality to access and manipulate a person’s emotional regulation. Some cults, like the Moonies, used it to create a barrier of fear and shame surrounding sexual thoughts or actions. Ellen Huet’s new book Empire of Orgasm explores how OneTaste, Inc. and its founder Nicole Daedone used the topic of Orgasmic Meditation to challenge boundaries and minimize taboos through coercive practices and were ultimately convicted of a forced labor conspiracy.

Ellen Huet is an award-winning investigative journalist currently writing for Bloomberg News and Bloomberg Businessweek. She also hosts the narrative audio series Foundering, from Bloomberg Technology. In recent seasons, she has worked on topics such as WeWork and OpenAI, as well as examining the trustworthiness of OpenAI’s leader, Sam Altman. The 2022 Netflix documentary called Orgasm, Inc.: The Story of OneTaste featured her investigative journalism about the group. Her reporting has also been cited in news outlets such as The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, Vanity Fair, Slate, and many others.

On her highly successful Czech podcast, Canaries in the Net, Alex co-hosts on topics surrounding digital propaganda and toxic algorithms. She combines her experience as a communication advisor to the chairman of the legislation committee in the European Parliament with the latest information on how digital space is becoming increasingly targeted. As one of the earliest to speak out about how digital information was being used to sway politics before 2016, she described herself as “one of those canaries in the coal mines”, giving an early warning of impending danger. She described the feeling of being overwhelmed by the information campaigns that we now understand create a technique of “flooding the zone” to destabilize. “At that time, we didn’t understand where it came from. It just came from everywhere, from social media, from news, newly built podcasts, and our news outlets.”

“The entire information space became unbelievably toxic,” she said of the time. She now understands that Russia was conducting a highly organized campaign to learn to destabilize systems of democracy. When her husband was offered a job in Vancouver, British Columbia, she decided to take the opportunity to relocate. I agreed with Alex about the KGB methodology of demoralization and raising anxiety, fear, distrust, and disgust, particularly against experts in science and democratic institutions. I described the technique she was referencing as their attempts to see what sticks, amplify, and overload methods, a technique used against the U.S., as well as other NATO countries. It is an intentional polarization that allows us to start seeing the enemy in our neighbors, friends, and family. 

Alex Alvarová wrote a 2021 fiction book Feeding The Demons: The Conquerors of America. The book was inspired by her research on Steve Bannon and his role in the 2016 election. The outcome is a political thriller that depicts America, Russia, organized crime, and how big data might have been used to influence significant elections. Alex also wrote the 2017 nonfiction work The Industry of Lies, an analysis of how Russia used the 2013 presidential election in the Czech Republic as a trial run to perfect its hybrid-warfare aggression for altering the outcome of the 2016 U.S. Presidential election. She now teaches others how to recognize propaganda, increase data literacy, and defensive techniques against online attacks. Her new project, Radio Free America Prague, which she founded in collaboration with American writer and producer Natalie Kocab, launches in January.

Neo-Nazi sentiment has seen a recent resurgence globally, fueled by political polarization, economic disparities, and social grievances. The internet and social media have played a significant role in spreading extremist propaganda, while some politicians' normalization of hate speech has emboldened these groups. Combating this rise requires a multifaceted approach, including education, countering online extremism, promoting social cohesion, and addressing underlying grievances.

My guest for this episode of The Influence Continuum was Kelvin Pierce, author of the memoir Sins of my Father: Growing up with America's Most Dangerous White Supremacist. His father, Dr. William Pierce, was a notorious white supremacist and founded the National Alliance, a prominent hate group. Dr. Pierce also wrote the novel The Turner Diaries, which racists widely cite as inspiration for their racist beliefs and actions. Kelvin was subjected to physical and emotional abuse and was taught to believe that Jews and non-whites were responsible for society's ills. Despite the personal abuse he suffered, Kelvin accepted his father's teachings and held onto these racist beliefs as he transitioned into adulthood. It shaped his worldview and interactions with others, even though he didn't openly broadcast these beliefs. Kelvin was able to shed his indoctrination, create the charitable organization "Divine Child Foundation" to help orphans in Georgia, publish his memoir, and live a life of activism and inspiration fighting racism and extremism.