Mark: Ladies and gentlemen, moms and dads, children of appropriate ages. Welcome to the Papa Family Court Voice podcast. Our special guest this week is Mark Ludwig. Mark is first and foremost, father of Levi. Let get my notes here. He is also executive director of Americans for equal shared parenting. Is that correct?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, actually the new organization is the National Council for Equal Shared Parenting, which is a C3 organization.

Mark: Fantastic. Thank you for updating us there. Mark is active in 31 states with legislation, has over 30 years of political experience. He was instrumental in the passage of 10 pieces of legislation. Is that correct?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, 10 pieces in nine states, including the five states that have the 50-50 bills in the US.

Mark: Fantastic. And you're looking to push that all 50 states ⁓ expand that. that correct? Fantastic. Okay. as always, we'll be discussing three main topics. The three main topics are Mark would like to know a little bit more about your work. We've touched upon some of it there. So, your work within shared parenting community, your work around the sphere. We'd like to know more about your thoughts and around the family court.

Mark Ludwig: That's the goal.

Mark: We'd also like to know, a little bit more about how you came to, do what you do. ⁓ our topic, which is mental health. So, we'll a around that. And just before we leave, we like to end on what I call three by three, which is three questions with three answers. So Mark, welcome to the podcast. The floor is yours. What do you want to talk about?

Mark Ludwig: Well, first off, thanks so much for everything that you do. know, we're all a community and it's unfortunate what took us to get our bond. But as a result of us all going through the trauma, we've got a common bond. It's almost like in the if somebody served in the military, got an automatic common bond with other people that served. And we noticed the same thing with the shared parenting community. Doesn't matter if they're black, white, rich, poor. ⁓

Mark: Yep.

Mark Ludwig: Christian, non-Christian, if somebody's been through the family court system, you automatically feel something for them in your heart because you know what they've gone through. And so I appreciate you guys for all that you do, helping to raise awareness. getting it across the pond over here and we sure appreciate everything that you do.

Mark: I absolutely love your term of shared parenting community, for me personally, I refer to it as the family court community or the parental alienation community. And it's quite a negative thought that comes in when you think about that particular phrase, but your description of it. is much more positive. I absolutely love that. I might start to adopt that if you don't mind.

Mark Ludwig: But yeah, we've got a great community and I've been very fortunate. You had asked about my background. I've actually been in politics for 41 years at the highest levels. Ever since I was six years old, my goal was to be president of the United States. And that was a serious goal. That wasn't just a pipe dream. And I lived my life accordingly. I was class president. I was president of Honor Society.

Mark: gets. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: was the president of every club and organization you can imagine all through college. Got a triple major in marketing, finance and management. Was the dean's list. ⁓ To day, I've never touched a beer, never touched a cigarette. ⁓ They going to find any skeleton in my closet. ⁓ Started out with campaigns in college, ⁓ helping John Ashcroft's governor's campaign. Totally now at a very active role in over 70 campaigns.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: in my career, including running for US Congress myself against Dick Gephardt, who at the time was the House Majority Leader when Bill Clinton was president. Dick Gephardt was the number two Democrat in the country. that was the person that I was running against in the primary or in the primary to run against. ⁓ if you run against nobody, nobody cares who you are. But if you run against the second most powerful Democrat in the country, everybody wants to know who you are, ⁓ who are.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: I was very fortunate that because I ran against him, I don't know how much viewers on your side of the pond know, but there's a Newt Gingrich who was our speaker of the house at the time that helped take over the house for the U.S. in 94. I was personally mentored by him. And then two of his leaders, Joe Gaylord and Lisa Nelson that helped with that big takeover where we took over 56 seats in U.S. Congress. It was the biggest flip after 50 years of Democrat control. The Republicans took over 56 new seats the three geniuses behind that were the people I was trained and mentored by, including Conway, who's the one who managed Trump's campaign in 2020 or in 2016. I actually turned down, believe it or not, to run my campaign. She jokes with now that if I would have hired her, I might've been president of the United States already, because she's the who ran.

Mark: So are you saying that I could potentially be talking to a future president of the United States?

Mark Ludwig: Well, that goal has gone now. did have that literally up until Levi was born. That was my goal. And I had a very strategic plan in place of how I was going to run for different offices. And like said, I had made all the connections I needed to within the, you I'm on more of the conservative spectrum. So I had all the connections I needed there after, you know, years and years of connections. But ironically, once my personal custody battle happened,

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: All those dreams went out the window. I just wanted to be a dad. And without going into all the details, there was some question on paternity. And in order to avoid a paternity test, she basically left. It took me 204 days to be able to track him down and get a DNA test and get access to him. And during those 204 days, anybody who's a father or a mother even knows, it's hard to think about being president of the United States when you've got a child. that you don't know where they are, you don't know if you're ever gonna see them again. I could care less about politics at that point. And so my focus in life totally changed from that point on of I wanted to be a dad. And then once I started realizing the problems with the family court system and how it was a problem, it wasn't just me. I was very well known in St. Louis. All three of the major networks did a feature that part of story.

Mark: So you've.

Mark Ludwig: And I started getting bombarded with, know, first it was five or 10 a day, and then it became 20, 30 a day, every single day of people saying, Hey, a similar thing happened to me. A similar thing happened to me. And I finally realized, you know what? This is systemic. This is, some problems here. So I started studying the shared parenting community and I spent about a year before I stuck my head above water. And that's the big key. I encourage new people to do. if they're wanting to get involved in reform and change be a student first. Anything you do in life, you're a student first. If you wanna be a teacher, you go to school first. If you wanna be a plumber and electrician, you're an apprentice first. And yet we get so many people who mean well, but they wanna jump in with both feet and try and advocate for reform without taking a step back and studying. So I literally spent a year and I'm not. I'm not talking just a few hours. spent probably eight, 10, sometimes 15, 20 hours a week, every single week, putting charts in my room. What organizations are out there? What are their strengths? What are their weaknesses? What are the gaps that aren't being covered? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the community as a whole? Where's a niche? Because what I didn't want to do is recreate the wheel and pull resources from another existing organization. You know, my attitude is if somebody's already doing some work.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: Why don't I work with them and compliment what they're doing instead of start my own organization and divide the resources? But I did notice that there was a very big void of people who knew how to pass legislation. You I watched all these Facebook Lives and early on it was the Father's Rights Movement that I tuned into in the U.S. here, started by Thomas Fidler. the theory was, you know, let's just go and scream and yell at a legislator.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: I'm not putting people down or invalidating. I appreciate them at least wanting to do something. But I always ask people, take a step back and think about this. If you're not aware of a topic and the first exposure you get is somebody yelling in your face, that doesn't endear you to say, boy, I'd like to learn more about you and how I can help you. So I started doing these Facebook Lives telling people that, you realize if a legislator has not been through a divorce, If they've never been through the family court system, there's a lot of them that truly just don't know. So let's start out trying to give them the benefit of the doubt and educate them first. Now, yeah, there are some in there that intentionally know that we're all aware of, I don't go in with that assumption day one. My assumption is they just need to be educated unless they prove otherwise. But I started doing these Facebook Lives on how to get past the gatekeeper, how frame the narrative in three minutes or less.

Mark: Yep.

Mark Ludwig: how to talk to a Republican or a conservative different than you talk to a liberal. do you talk to people in the Senate different than you do in the House? And started resonating and they started kind of going viral. So I ended up with thousands of people following these. And I started you know what? Maybe I was never meant to be president, never even meant to run for office. This, I think, and now I do believe this is where I was meant to be. ⁓ And my biggest passion, even though I'm very proud of the fact that I've been a part of teams that's very key too, is it's not me that's made the change. Unfortunately, some people get a little wrapped up ⁓ making a name for themselves. And don't, once again, don't want to invalidate that. All of us have been through trauma and as a result of the trauma, we've kind of lost our purpose. And you get beat down and beat down and beat down and you feel like I'm not a worthy dad. I'm not a worthy... I'm not worth anything in life. And all of a sudden you start making some changes, start making some progress and you're kind of proud of it. And very deservedly so. But what I encourage people to do is realize no one of us, myself included, a lot of people give a lot of credit to me in the US because I am the only person that's worked on all five states that have passed bills on the equal side, know, the 50-50 bills and total of 10 bills. none of those bills were me alone. every one of those bills took a team of people that I can point you to certain people that if they weren't a part of the team, it wouldn't have happened. So I think it's very important people realize, focus on, I always give the example of the miracle on ice, the US hockey team that won the Olympics in 1980, where her Brooks talked about the name on the front of the Jersey is more important than the name on the back of the Jersey. And it's very important for us to realize collectively we're a team. None of us should be worrying about

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: making a statue to ourself or getting a plaque on a wall, the focus is the kids. And to make a difference in the kids' lives, let's be and work together as a team collectively. So that's what I'm very proud of is I've been very fortunate to be a part of teams in all the different states that we've passed legislation. But the biggest legacy that I want to leave is training people to educate, enable, and empower people so they know how to make the change. You know, the average person has never stepped foot inside their Capitol unless they took a public tour. So what I want to do is take that person who has no idea how to pass legislation and guide them step by step so they feel like, you know what, know what I'm doing now. So I teach people and I have training classes that I go through where I teach people, okay, what are the steps of the process of how a bill becomes a law in the United States so that they know exactly what those steps are.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: then I tell them what are the key people. Because in like in Missouri, we've got 163 members of the House of Representatives. Technically, you only need to meet with about 12 of them to pass any bill. So you need to be strategically, it's not a shotgun approach, it's a rifle approach. You need to know who are the key players, what are their roles, and how to be efficient your time, not just busy.

Mark: Yeah.

Mark Ludwig: So I teach people that, then I teach them, as I said, how to frame the narrative. How do you get cast the gatekeeper? do you frame the narrative with a conservative different than with a progressive person? And I teach them step by step. And my ⁓ ultimate is for someday for me to be sitting on the couch and not any confection whatsoever and turn on the TV and somebody pass a bill in a state because of things that I taught them and they did the work. I didn't do anything. I just sort of. help them out with the process. did the work. And that's my ultimate goal is I want a thousand people across this country that they don't need Mark Ludwig. It's about the message, not the messenger. So that's my ultimate dream for where I'd like to see things go.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. There's a couple of things that really stood out to me what you just said. So the first one was where you were talking about having these goals and dreams and ambitions. And it really resonated with me because spent a lifetime going to going to college, going to university, going to post-grad, doing a training, working up the ladder from, a graduate all the up to a senior person ⁓ in ⁓ the corporate world. And I really thought, that I was going somewhere and going to be somebody and building this wonderful life my family and my children and leaving a legacy, And then all of a sudden that can disappear in one day. And it can completely derail entire thought process, where you want to go, how you want to do it. And ⁓ part of it is yes, a mental thing because brain is so absorbed with trying to focus on working to win your child or it sounds really silly, but you are trying to win your child from something or somebody else a system. And other part is also the restrictions are put on you from a financial standpoint. there's a restriction on your work, how much you can earn and, how much you've got pay out. It's, it does ⁓ stunt your life. So that's really important to me. the second thing that I really liked, what you said was when you were talking about teams and that is very the reason that we decided to start this podcast. And ⁓ one the reasons that I wanted to do this, because I realized that there's so many wonderful people organizations and Facebook groups and, all sorts that almost working in silo. got the same message. Everyone's got the same end goal, but you've got One guy over here with 5,000 followers, another guy over here with a hundred, another guy over here with 10,000, other guy over here with a hundred thousand. And they're all trying to, you know, knock on these doors and make this noise, but it's only going to work if we do this collectively. And that's one of the reasons that I wanted to do this podcast. Cause I wanted to create a place where all the thought leaders I can invite them on and have them all in one place. there be this evidence say, Hey, these are the experts. in the UK, all around the world coming together and listen to what they're saying. They're all saying the same thing. What does that tell you? How can you tell me that there's no data or there's no evidence? It doesn't make sense, So about evidence, that might lead on to an interesting or topic that you might be interested in. it's about, evidence of the impact ⁓ of children and families. ⁓ So is that something that you could talk about? I know that you've researched a lot of studies around that.

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, and to piggyback on what you had said about all the organizations that are out there, I think there's almost a way to semi-do both because you need a little bit of variety in the types of organizations because some people won't relate to me, my personality. And I'm not offended by that. There's nobody that I've seen that everybody just loves this person. There may be some people, a lot of people do, but there's some people that, know there's some people that watch my videos and they're like, you know what, that guy's a dork. I don't relate to him at all. I would never be able to do what he does. And so I'm very grateful that there's people that are the exact opposite of me that have other organizations out there.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: that thank God that people just don't drop out of the whole family court reform movement or parenting community because they don't like Mark Ludwig. Thank God there's another organization out there that they relate to better than they relate to me and that can fill a niche that I can't fill. So I'm not jealous of the other organizations, but there are times when we do need to all pull together to say, hey, there's okay to have sort of your branding and you I...

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: An example I just thought of is, you know, maybe that there's times where somebody's, and I apologize, I don't know what all fast food you have over there, but you know, like in the U.S., you know, somebody may, you know, own some McDonald's franchises. Somebody else may own some Burger King franchises. Somebody else, some Chick-fil-A or KFC. But if there's a law going on to ban fast food, all those chains are gonna work together to say, hey, even though we have our own company, we're our own brand, we're all gonna work together to fight this law. So I think there's a way to be able to strike a balance to say nothing wrong with having some organizations, but we need to collaborate. So in the US, I've got about 60 organizations that I partner with, that I do regular calls with on a monthly basis, where I try to allow each organization to have enough of their independence to where they don't feel like we're trying to tell them what to do or micromanage. They can have their own branding, if you will, their own messaging. And people feel a better niche to. you know, they're not as much into 50-50 bills. They're more into custodial interference bills. Somebody else, their passion is child support bills. else, ⁓ passion is judicial So sometimes it's better to have some of the groups that they just specialize in that, and then all come together at times when we need to do a major call to action. So the biggest key is, once again, we're all so traumatized. that so many times people, don't trust people. unfortunately, you gotta let a little bit of that wall down to say, hey, we're gonna be a little better off if we partner with our organization instead of always having the wall up saying, I'm not gonna trust anybody. You gotta let a little bit of the wall down, not all of it, but at least enough to partner with somebody and say, you know what? I appreciate their strength. And that's the one thing I encourage everyone in this movement to do is look for some, unfortunately, we're so trained to look for what's wrong. Because your guard's up and you've been attacked in the family court system, you're always looking for, ⁓ what are they up to now? They're up to something. And so there's a tendency for most of us, the first thought people have is, and organizations out there, well, I don't like what they're doing. I don't like what they're doing. They're doing this wrong. And I encourage people, change your philosophy to look for the good in a group, to look for the good in a person first. There may be things you don't like about them, but there's things they don't like about you either. So to figure out, what is a strength that they have that's a weakness of yours? And maybe you don't collaborate on everything, but in those little areas, you collaborate. And that's what I try to do with the 60 organizations that I partner with in the U.S. But yeah, there's a lot of trauma that happens and it does have us all on our guard. The first thing is to understand that it's there.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: to acknowledge it and then figure out, what are ways we can work through this? Because we all have the same goal. So it doesn't matter who gets the trophy, let's just get the laws passed here.

Mark: Mm-hmm. I wanted to ask you a question that I ask a lot of my guests and a lot of the conversations that I have outside of the podcast as well. I don't know how much you're aware of the UK news or the political scene, but at the moment, over the last few months, maybe even a little bit longer, it's very much the narrative that they are trying to make the term parental alienation a dirty word. So they're trying to twist it as they are trying to make the term parental alienation a dirty word. It doesn't exist. It's not real. It's a pseudo science. It doesn't exist. It's not real. It's a pseudo science. anybody that uses that term are abusers because they're just trying to deflect their own bad behavior. and using it as a way to try and see their children, know, there's all different types of narratives. so the question that I've got for you is ⁓ what your thoughts on that? And do you think it's a dirty words ⁓ and you comfortable with it? do you think it's a dirty words

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, and we get that in the US too, where there's people that try to invalidate the term. I have no problem people want to use a different term, but ironically, I actually have a book coming out next week called the parental alienation playbook, 25 you need to know about before it's too late. ⁓ but literally, it just got sent off to the printer. So we don't have a copy of it yet. It just sent off this morning. ⁓

Mark: Mm-hmm. Do you have it with you? Can we see the cover? Do you have it with you? ⁓ amazing. are we the first people to hear about it?

Mark Ludwig: yeah, I have been making a few posts on my Facebook page, but we don't actually have the book yet. There is a, there's a website out there, the parental alienation playbook.com or I think it's without the the parental alienation playbook.com, ⁓ that people can get information. But, ⁓ regardless of what term I do like the term parental alienation, because it does, it describes it to us what happens. Now there's the debate about, is that an official psychological term? I don't care whether it's an official psychological term or not, it happens. I don't care whether it's an official psychological term or not, it happens. And I've watched it happen. And that's the reason I wrote this book is there's 25, and I could go on as you know, there's a hundred different techniques, but I took the 25 ones that unfortunately, when somebody's brand new to a family court situation, they're dealing with being blindsided with legal fees and guardian mid-light-um fees and trying to hang on to their job and it- they're in a struggle, they're like drowning. They don't have time to really analyze what's happening. all of a sudden, a year later, two years later, they realize things that were happening and they're like, son of a gun, that was on. So my hope is that this book will help people, especially those that are in a year or less of a family court battle, to help at least put a name to one of the 25 techniques to understand it. techniques that I'm sure you're as familiar with anybody that's been around for a while. So this is nothing new for you. But couple of ideas is, first off, phone gatekeeping, where you call and you call and the phone calls aren't answered. And you have realize from your child's perspective, they're not being told that you're calling. And so they think that forgot about them all week. They wonder, why did dad not think about me? It's personal philosophy. I don't want to put the mother down, but I made sure that every time I picked my son up, ⁓ ⁓ man, your mom may have been, I always gave her an out. Hey, I know your mom may have been busy, but buddy, I tried every single day this week to give you a call. So the phone gatekeeping and then the next chapter is phone monitoring. And is the really dangerous one. This is where you notice that you're talking to your child and instead of looking at the phone, they're looking out of the corner of their eye.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: And you know what's going on. The other parent is standing right there monitoring that call. And the poor child, think of a six year old, five year old that has the parent looking at them. They're constantly ⁓ the anxiety level that they must have wondering, ⁓ what if I say something wrong? am I allowed to say this? Am I allowed to not say that? And it conditions them.

Mark: Yep. Or can hear them going, what, what, what, what? It's like, are you talking to somebody? No, no, no.

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, but it conditions the child to, it's not safe to talk to that parent. That I have to be on guard because I'm only allowed to share certain information with that parent and indirectly that breaks the typical parent-child bond with that monitoring because the child learns pretty soon it's not safe to open up to this parent. And then they start wondering, is there something wrong with the parent? I talk about the ⁓ affectionate intimidation. where a child soon learns, you know, they get back in the car after a visit and they start talking about how excited they were to see the parent and they're met with the eye roll. And over time they learned that, uh-oh, I can't share excitement with this parent because they don't like seeing that. And in the book I write about one, one instance in particular that I will never forget. We were at a Raising Canes, which is a, I don't know if you have those over there. They're a big, pretty well-known chicken franchise over here. They're really good by the way, but.

Mark: Nope.

Mark Ludwig: two of my best friends from church.

Mark: So I'll just interject, really important news. We've just got Taco Bell over here.

Mark Ludwig: Oh, hey, you're living high, you got Taco Bell. Chicken quesadillas, I love those things.

Mark: Ha ha ha. We've only seen it in the movies so far, so it's big for the UK. Sorry to interrupt.

Mark Ludwig: That's great. But yeah, so we were raising canes after church. had my son with me and they had their kids and was going great. The kids were giggling. They were laughing. Levi still young enough. He was at that age that he still loves sitting on my lap or sitting next to me. And you could that father-son bond. And we were doing the exchange at Raising Canes. His mom was going to run by because she lives semi near there. She was going to run by and pick him up for our exchange from Raising Canes. I will never forget my friends, Charlie and Becky were facing me with their back towards the door and his mom walked in and it was such a dramatic change. mean, was a, could see the switch, know, flip that all of a sudden he literally had gone from a smile on his face, looks at the door, sees his mom. pulls his hand down from being near me, face just went immediately blank and it was so noticeable. Charlie and Becky didn't see his mom walk in, but they saw his face and they both turn around in unison to like, what the heck happened? And they saw his mom and then ⁓ the exchange, Levi and both Charlie and Becky, were like, Mark, I am so sorry. They were like, we had no idea.

Mark: Mm-hmm. So, ⁓ there we go.

Mark Ludwig: until we saw the look on your son's face, what you've been trying to describe to us all these times. But yet, as I give that story, I'm not giving a sob story of me, because anybody watching this probably knows the same feeling. So I'm not trying to say that my story is better, but that's why I wrote the book, is to give these kind of stories or little things like the... ⁓

Mark: Mm-hmm. So is written in a journal format? Like a person format?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, it's basically me just telling a story. goal is people would feel like they're sitting across a kitchen table and I'm just telling a story like I'm talking to you. You know, I talk about the packing of mission where especially a young child, they've got a safety toy or a, you know, a favorite stuffed animal that they can't sleep without. And miraculously that happens to not get packed that weekend. And so now the child is uncomfortable and the whole goal is to make that child uncomfortable.

Mark: Okay. ⁓ I love it. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: at the other parent's house. Or the replacement authority is another chapter where, know, instead of, know, in the one example I give, you know, my, my son is at a very small school and that school has cross country starting in kindergarten. And because it's so small, I wanted him to be on the cross country team because it's a way for him to bond and build friendships outside of the school network. every year it was, no, he can't run cross country. No, he can't run cross country.

Mark: Yep. Yep.

Mark Ludwig: And in fifth grade, he came to me and he said, you know, hey, I'm going to be running cross country this year. And I was like, ⁓ my gosh, that is so cool. How did your mom change her mind? And he said, ⁓ Mr. Sean said that I should run. Mr. Sean was her current guy that she was dating at the time. Ironically, a convicted bank felon. And it dawned on me, here's a guy that literally has more say in my own son's life, the direction of his life, what he's allowed to do. more authority than his own biological father. Imagine what that sends the message to the child. The child now thinks, biological dad is not important in life. I don't need to listen to him. And imagine trying to discipline that child when they're a teenager, if they've been taught that that parental role is invalid as they've been growing up. we're dealing with that right now. Fortunately, I've got a great kid. Levi be 16 on Saturday.

Mark: Yep. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: but and he's a great kid, but he's going through a little bit of the, you know, teenage type stuff right now. And every once in his mom will call me up and she'll say, know, hey, can you have a talk with him? And I never say it, but indirectly I'm thinking, you know, if you hadn't taught him for 12 years that I wasn't important in his life, I'd have a lot better time trying to influence him right now. So I don't ever say that, but that's the thought that goes through. that's sort of what that book is about is all the parental alienation techniques. And I...

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: There's deniers out there, but if you've ever lived through it, you can't deny the fact that this happens on a regular basis. Now, I don't want people to be paranoid. This isn't every single co-parent, but believe anywhere from an eight to 13 % of the situations are high conflict that this happens every day. think there's possibly, is just my own number. Like I said, I'm not a professional psychologist, so I didn't. didn't write the book from that perspective. I wrote it just as a dad who's gone through it. But I believe as much as a third of other cases have some driplets of this interspersed that somebody needs to be aware that this is going on because that affects the child. Because the child, in the child's perspective, parent is the superior parent and one's the inferior parent. The child's perspective is why does dad always have to ask permission to vary the schedule? Why is it that mom can be late, but dad can't be late? Why is it that dad has to ask to change the vacation schedule? And so, and this goes the other way, there's women affected too. So I don't in any way mean to invalidate women. So please give me some grace any women watching this. As a guy, obviously I tell from my own perspective, but that doesn't invalidate that it happens in both genders. But think of the poor child. The child is left to feel like this one parent isn't important in my life.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Yep. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: And that is a very unhealthy thing for the child to feel as they're growing up. The child needs to have that safety net of knowing, I have two parents that I can call on. They shouldn't feel like when I'm at the one parent's house, I'm basically visiting no different than going to a friend's house for the weekend or a grandparent's house for the weekend. They need to feel like, this is, they're both parents are equal in this situation.

Mark: So. I'm listening to your stories I can resonate with almost ⁓ that you said, every story, every situation, particularly the last one that you were talking about. It might be something that ⁓ dealing with currently, almost the very same scenario. And it drives me insane. And about making sure that you maintain some of level of composure. And I know that's something that ⁓ you speak quite bit as well. because, and this leads into the family court as well, because what I want to do is I want to track back into the family court. We've spoken about things from a perspective of the parent relationship. We've about your work, but can we now talk about the impact that the family court arena has in this whole scenario?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, the challenge with the current system the US is it forces an adversarial relationship. If parent's going to get every other weekend, that's basically a winner-take-all type scenario. So what happens right now is a parent goes in to meet with a family law attorney and says, hey, you know what? We're getting a divorce. We're getting separated. But we want to do what's right for the kid. And we other things that we disagree on. the attorney in almost every single case is going to say, hey, in our state, you're not going to get 50 50. One of you is going to win and one of you is going to lose. So unless you want to be the one that's relegated to a visitor, I need you to help me dig up dirt on why you're the better parent. Well, in any relationship, if you've been with somebody for a year or more, you can dig up dirt. We all can. We can dig up dirt on them. They could dig up dirt on us. No parent is perfect. And unfortunately, here's a time

Mark: Mm-hmm. or you can just make stuff up.

Mark Ludwig: Well, that happens too, definitely. But what ends up happening is here's a couple that should be focusing on a positive direction of how do we move forward? The past is the past. Let's get over it and move on with our lives. And instead, the attorney is saying, no, no, no, don't get over it. Let's relive the worst moments that you had with your ex and let's pull that emotion out. And now you're riling each other up. So now when you're with the child, you're still thinking about all this animosity. and you're digging up dirt. Why? Because you want to be the winner. And how different things would be if you could walk into that same family law attorney's office and they'd say, you know what? In our state, you're probably going to share parenting equally. So unless there's an overriding reason why that parent, approvable reason, why that parent shouldn't be involved in your child's life, you really need to learn how to co-parent and get along. But the key is, as I said, a proven reason. And as you alluded to, the fact that people can make things up and an allegation that's taken as proof. And you have a very high threshold before you just rip a parent out of a child's life. No just making up some kind of an allegation. there should be for making those allegations up. In a criminal court, if you perjure yourself, going to have some repercussions.

Mark: I didn't allude to it, I said it outright.

Mark Ludwig: And yet in a family court, you you just make anything up you want. There's no ramifications whatsoever because the judges want to err on the side of caution. Well, unfortunately, by erring on the side of caution, indirectly, they've abused the child now because the child is paying the price. My attitude is if somebody is truly abusive, then they wouldn't be getting the four overnights a month that they're getting. You know, where do they suddenly become abusive? Is it night number seven or night number eight?

Mark: I agree.

Mark Ludwig: So my attitude is if they're safe enough to be an every other weekend parent, then they're safe enough to be a parent 50-50.

Mark: Okay, so my question is, all of these problems can be solved very quickly, including the court system backlog with shared parenting, why is it not happening across the world? Okay, so my question is, all of these problems can be solved very quickly, including the court system backlog with shared parenting, why is it not happening across the world?

Mark Ludwig: To my question, the dollar questionnaire. Yeah, the reason is there's too much money involved. And I'm not putting all attorneys down, but I'll tell you what, if I'm attorney and I know that if a case is 50-50, I'm only gonna make a few thousand dollars on a case. But if I can create that adversarial relationship where they're gonna fight back and forth and I have to meet with them. ⁓ great question, million dollar this week and then a couple of weeks from now, and then again, and let's go back to court. Man, I could rack up billable hours and I can get, you know, 25,000, 50,000, a hundred thousand dollars for that same case. And then you get the other court actors in there, the guardian, mid light items and the psychologist and, it feeds into its own little, Rico type facility where there it's like their own little mob where they're referring people to psychologists and guardian and light items.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: just to keep stirring the pot. And pretty soon, know, attorneys get their favorite guardian enliTEMs. so they recommend those guardian enliTEMs to everybody. Why? Because they're gonna facilitate that adversarial relationship and rack up those billable hours. And then in our country, we've got Title IV-D, which is the federal funding mechanism for the child support calculations. And that really feeds the system because states basically get, you know, incentive pool money. ⁓

Mark: Yeah. ⁓

Mark Ludwig: for increasing child support amounts. Well, you have 50-50 ⁓ unless there's a huge disparity in income, there is no real need for child support. You don't need to transfer wealth from one parent to another. If both parents get 15 nights a month, then each pays their own expenses. They each have a bedroom, they each have a heating, they each have clothes, they each have food. So just split the cost, you each pay your own cost. But if they can get an every other weekend split, Now you've got a reason to justify why you need to have a child support calculation to redistribute the wealth from this parent over to this parent. so there's some federal funding mechanisms that are creating a huge problem with it.

Mark: So, it's probably got nothing to do with ⁓ taking a percentage of that money as well. I'm guessing.

Mark Ludwig: That's it. I said, one of my mentors, I don't know if you've heard of her over there, but Phyllis Schlafly. I was very fortunate. She actually lived in St. Louis here. She's considered the most influential female in US political history. For 50 years, she dominated the conservative spectrum on different issues and was one of the leading voices. And I was very fortunate for over 20 years, I saw her on at least a monthly basis right here in St. Louis. And she was the first one in the early 90s that started raising their flag saying, hey, this Title IV-D is going to create a fatherless society in our country because states are going to start chasing the money. And I didn't realize how valuable she was and how valuable her time was until it's too late. She died in 2016. Her legacy still lives on quite a bit. But she always said that. can remember years before I got involved in the shared parenting community. She used to always say, if you ever have a hard time passing a piece of legislation, find the money trail because the reason stopping it will be tied to money in 99 % of those cases. So you got to track down where's the money supply. And right now the money supply in the U.S. is the Title IV-D funding incentive pool. It's with the attorneys, the billable hours they make and the radical domestic violence groups that...

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: Not the legitimate ones. There are some legitimate ones that I believe their hearts in the right place. They truly want to help people. But two things about that. Number one, domestic violence is not a female issue only. Domestic violence happens both ways. So if you're truly passionate about domestic violence, then why don't you offer support systems for both genders, not just one. But the real sad part is the phony domestic violence groups that are out there that really aren't for true change.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: and true support trying to help victims of domestic violence, they're trying to basically make a name for themselves in their organization by giving the appearance that every man is an abuser. They're basically radical feminists that are trying to make the case that all men are bad, all men are abusers, and that's their whole basic messaging of their organization. And those are the really bad ones out here.

Mark: Thank you. Mm-hmm. So it's, it's so bizarre. Every expert, every thought leader that I talk to will always reference that. It's very, very bizarre that the feminist movement and how that seems to be having effect on the family court system and legislation. And was interview that I saw a little while ago. it was by, who was it by Erin Prezzi, I believe it was. ⁓ she was one of the ⁓ people that started one of the women's organizations here many, years ago. was no longer there, but I believe in the interview, she said that she tried to open it up to men, but ⁓ was shut down very quickly and removed from her position. And the reason being is that they only wanted the narrative of the woman. They didn't want the narrative of the men to be involved. And she asked why, she said, because we get more funding if we only target women. And that's the reason.

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, and that's the sad case is there's radical feminists across the entire world are trying to literally, ironically, we call it the family court system, but their goal is to get dad out of the picture. And that's not the family court system. You know, their attitude is that we can get dad out of the picture. Now we can raise the kids on our own or we partner with the government to raise the kids.

Mark: So why is that?

Mark Ludwig: And we need to get back to a society, you know the statistics as well as I do, that, even though I'll fight just as hard for a mother as I will for a father, we've got the statistics that show that if you rip dad out of a child's life, you know, the chances of behavioral problems, drug problems, teen pregnancies, high school dropout rates, teen rates, incarceration rates, violent crime rates, every single of those ⁓ skyrockets when rip dad out of the house. So it's time that we get back and realize, you know what, let's get dad back in the house. Let's get dad back in that child's life. So many of our societal problems could be solved just by that one move. Let's get dad back in the picture.

Mark: It's 83 % of are the male on the receiving end.

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, and that should not be the case. know, that child needs both parents. You know, I believe, you know, God designed opposites to attract for a reason. Each has a strength and each has a weakness. And so if you were, they, by forming a couple, know, ideally in my mind in a marriage situation, them being together, you know, you pull on the strengths from both and the weakness of each is compensated by the strength from the other. Traditionally, the woman tends to be a little better on the nurturing aspect.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: The guy tends to be a little better on the discipline. And so as a couple, you pull to the middle. If you forced one parent and ripped that out of a child's life, you're only getting half of that input. That is a very unhealthy way to raise a child. That child needs both inputs. They need to realize both mom and dad can get them ready for school. Both mom and dad can help them with the homework. Both mom and dad can teach them how to ride a bike. Not one parent's important and the other is a visitor.

Mark: Mm-hmm. So you've mentioned or you referenced there some of the studies and some of the impacts long term. And again, it's something that I've read over and over again. All you need to do is go to any psychology blog or book and it's going to tell you exactly the same thing, right? studies have read on the subject and what can you tell us about that?

Mark Ludwig: I've done so much reading between, ⁓ some of my favorites are Dr. Warren Farrell with his boy crisis book, phenomenal book. Richard Warshock divorce poison, Edward Crock. I forget the name of his book. It's a red book, the parental alienation, something by Edward Crock. ⁓ in, in Arizona, we've got Bill Fabricius that has done some phenomenal studies showing the correlation. ⁓

Mark: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: that the more the child gets equal time with both parents on everything, know, behaviorally, academically, socially, the child's scores improve and it's a perfect bell curve that once it passes 50-50 and they start getting even more time with that other parent, it starts going down again. So I love his studies. I love Linda Nielsen that has done a lot of the research, pulling all the studies together. And you know, we got so many.

Mark: Mm-hmm. So that's interesting, too much of one parent can cause a dip in the belt.

Mark Ludwig: Exactly. Yeah, that Bill Fabricio study is phenomenal that he did down in Arizona. I love talking to him. I can listen to him. do some, he's on some of the conference calls that I'm on periodically and I just am fascinated when he talks.

Mark: Wow, okay. us a bit your connections at federal level connections within White Can you expand on that a little bit more?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, I've been very, very fortunate that even though my goal was to live in the White House, which will never happen at this point, because I'd rather be a dad at this point, but I'm very fortunate. Currently, I've got 13 friends or acquaintances that are somehow involved with the current White House administration, ⁓ including a couple of people that are very, very, very high level. So for the first time in 40 something years, we've got a direct in, I mean, direct in.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: to get some actual discussions going. three things I'm working on, partnering with other groups. Once again, this isn't the Lone Ranger, it's not the Mark Ludwig world. A lot of great people helping and partnering with us. But a couple of things we're working on. One is expanding on Dr. Warren Farrell's dream of having a White House Commission for Boys, Men and Fathers addressing some of these And so we've had a lot of talks along that line. Another one is Title IV-D reform. And in the US, that's the spigot. states ⁓ basically getting incentive pool money for child support collection orders. And that's a federal issue. In the US, the state issue is equal shared parenting, things like that. Those will never be tackled at the federal level. Those are all state issues. But the federal issue is the financing mechanism, and that's what we need to work on. So I've had a lot of discussions and we are making some progress. We still got a long way to go in those discussions. but we've made more total. I've made 20 trips. I'll be making my 21st trip this month to DC to work on that. And then the third thing we're working on is what's called in the US, the Violence Against Women's Act, which really isn't the Violence Against Women's Act. It should be named Believe All Accusers Act because that's basically all it is. It lowers the threshold that basically says all men are abusers. You just throw out an allegation.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: And automatically there's no due process for the person you threw the allegation against. And that comes up for reauthorization in 2027. So we're laying the groundwork right now that we're going to be on offense this time instead of defense in making sure that we get rid of some of these things. In the US, we've got this thing called Cadence Law, which stemmed out of this Violence Against Women's Act. And it is a hideous philosophy that literally basically says that you strip the accused of any due process rights whatsoever. The whole philosophy is, well, you know, this person's story should be believed. Well, no, it shouldn't be believed. No, they should have before you rip a person's life apart with a what should be a criminal allegation, you better have some proof to document that. So we're really working hard on that. So those are three areas, the commission for a White House Commission on Boys, Men and Fathers.

Mark: Yeah.

Mark Ludwig: the Title IV-D reform, and then the reauthorization of Violence Against Women's Act, which all three of those are just mega tasks because at the federal level, I give people example, at the state level, an average state in the US will have about 1,000 to 2,000 potential bill concepts per year. So they'll have issues on highway funding, on education, on budgets, on agriculture, on infrastructure, on... you know, all kinds of things. And then we have the family court reform bucket, which is a small part. Normally they're only going to handle about one or two bills per state. you do too much, they're going to throw all your issues out and say, you come back next year when you know which one's important. But at the federal level, I was talking to a buddy of mine that works at the White House. And he told me, said, at any given time, we're juggling 80,000 issues. I mean, and anybody who's dealt at the state level knows it's tough.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: to get the attention of the state to really prioritize this over the thousand bills that they're looking at. Imagine at the federal level, 80,000 issues, the biggest challenge is at the federal level, we're going against lobbyists that are being paid a quarter million a year, a half a million a year, a million a year that are at that Capitol, they're at the White House, they're at the Department of HHS, either every day or every week. They've got the relationships, they've got the connections.

Mark: Yep.

Mark Ludwig: They've got the grassroots organization and we're trying to go against that. You know, I was just out in Laguna Beach, California. One of the guys that I was with out there as the head of a group called the club for growth in the U S he was telling me at dinner that his budget for this year, $161 million. ⁓ just staggering to me. ⁓ million. Our budget for the shared parenting community. ⁓

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: We're talking in the thousands of dollars. mean, imagine trying to spend, you know, in the low thousands of dollars and trying to get the attention of legislators, the White House, the Department of HHS, when you've got organizations like that spending $161 Or, Americans for Prosperity, I think their budget is $74 million a year. Family Research Council, I think their budget is $24 million a year. So we are going against some people. So that's why I these trainings that I do. And not to plug the trains, but if people want to get involved, know, Sun Tzu, the art of war says, know your enemy. If the enemy has more funding than we do, more relationships than we do, then we better be better trained than they are. So just like that miracle on ice hockey team, know, her Brooks spent hours and hours and hours with that team conditioning them, doing things that didn't seem obvious, not practicing shooting goals, practicing doing wind sprints back. and forth and back and forth and doing burpees and doing pushups and doing sit ups and conditioning their body. And so that's that training that I do is getting people the fundamentals that they need to have so good down in their mind that that muscle memory that when they go with me to Washington DC, they don't have to look up, wait, how did Mark say we're going to answer this question? I want them to know it literally as well as I do. It's got to be mission driven. not messenger driven. So that's why I do the training that I do is I want a team of a thousand people that we're gonna kick their butts in Washington DC, not because we have more funding, but because we're better trained and we know how to articulate the message. And we know exactly and specifically how to be efficient with our time and strategically move that legislation. So like I said, we're not gonna have to talk to, there's in the US 435 members of the US House, a hundred members of the US Senate.

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: Each one of those has a chief of staff, a policy director, policy assistants, legislative assistants. If you were going to meet with everybody, you're looking at a minimum of 3000 meetings just to have one meeting per office. Not counting, you may have to go to several. My attitude is we don't need to. We're going to go strategically. I'm going to find out who do we need to meet with, who sits on the committee that has the most influence on that committee. Because one person of leverage

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: is more powerful than wasting time with 50 meetings with people that won't have that influence. I'm going for the influencers, the power movers and shakers, and that's going to buy me 50 votes by meeting with that one person. So that's why I spend so much of my time going around the country to these that I have with these influencers, like with the Club for Growth, because if I can get a relationship with the founder or the president of Club for Growth and he can help me out by dropping my name, or saying, hey, I got a buddy I'd like you to meet with. Man, now I've got influence working with me instead the ragtag group of people that we always have in the shared parenting community that just don't have the relationships. And that's not to invalidate the people who are wanting to make a change. Everybody's wanting to. The key is do you have the leverage and the influence that when your call gets made, they're going to say, I want to take that call. And I want to hear what that person has to say. The way you do that is not just in the shared parenting community.

Mark: Yeah.

Mark Ludwig: It's hit your wagon to the larger groups and let's get their influence working for us. Work smart instead of working hard. Be productive, not just busy with our time.

Mark: where can people find you?

Mark Ludwig: well, I've got the training organization. If people are wanting to get involved with legislation and that's the STL mark Ludwig.com STL for St. Louis. So STL Mark Ludwig, L U D W I G STL mark Ludwig.com. Now that's only for people who want to get involved legislatively. So don't waste your time. If you have no interest in that, my Facebook page is very active on my personal Facebook page. So if you go to Mark Ludwig,

Mark: Mm-hmm.

Mark Ludwig: I think you have to put in number nine or something like that, because there's a million Mark Ludwigs, but you'll see the picture of Levi and I on there or the organizational page for national, all spelled out, National Council for Equal Shared Parenting on Facebook or the website is the abbreviation ncesp.org. So those are the main ways to get, if you want the new book, we do have the website for the book, parentalalienationplaybook.com is the website for the book.

Mark: Mm-hmm. And you're also quite active on Instagram as well, aren't you?

Mark Ludwig: Um, to be honest, I think it's by accident. I'll be 62 in a couple of months. And so I think a lot of things that I post on Facebook, I have it set to where it automatically shares it on Instagram. And, uh, but so don't ever shoot me a message on Instagram. Cause I've never, I don't know if there even is a messenger on Instagram. I've never checked it,

Mark: You pop up on my feed quite a bit. I see. I see, I see. Yeah, it's linked directly to Facebook now. So it will go to your Facebook. So I'm going to message you on Instagram now to see if you check my messages.

Mark Ludwig: Yeah, I do have the YouTube channel I do have is STL Mark Ludwig on YouTube. So if you go to STL Mark Ludwig on YouTube, there's a lot of videos on there.

Mark: I like to end every podcast with what I call the three by three which is three questions with three answers. Now you can answer them quick fire or you can ask them long form it's completely up to you. So the question is what three are you grateful for?

Mark Ludwig: Number one is my son, above everything. always ask me, know, ⁓ know, do you just wish you would have never met his mom? And I'm like, you know what? I can't imagine life without him. I'd go through all the junk I've had to go through the last 15 years, 10 times over to be his dad. So number one is my son. Number two for me is my relationship with God. Not to cram my own personal beliefs onto anyone else, but hopefully they'll at least be tolerant of my beliefs. But I believe that's gotten me through a lot. There were a lot of times I sat on this very couch and didn't know if I'd make it through the night. And there were just a lot of times I just sat in prayer and I got together with a good Bible study that got me through. And then the third thing is the shared parenting community as a whole. We're not perfect, we in fight all the time, but you know what, families are like that. If anybody's had a brother or sister, fight with your brother and sister, you beat the heck out of them. But if you go out in the neighborhood and somebody punches your brother or sister, you're the first one to back them and punch that other person. So it's the same way in the shared parenting community. We don't always get along, but I hope that everybody in shared parenting community knows that... when people need me, there's been people that I've had huge disagreements with, but I'll tell you what, if they got in the hospital and need to go fund me, don't care how many disagreements we have. I don't have a lot of money, but I'll donate 20 bucks every single time, no matter how many disagreements we've had. Why? Because we've got that bond. It's that brotherhood that, you know, hey, we know what it's been like. So that's, I'd say the three biggest things I'm proud of.

Mark: I'll send you a link to my PayPal after the call. ⁓ second question ⁓ what things are needed to reform the family court?

Mark Ludwig: Yeah! That's great. I think number one is the training and that's why I do the training class. So many people want to do change, they just don't know how. So I think number one is training. Number two is more collaboration and it's hard. I understand. So I try to not put people down who have a hard time collaborating, but man, we'd be so much more efficient if people would stop recreating the wheel and trying to get their own group started if another group is already doing what they're doing.

Mark: Mm-hmm. Yep.

Mark Ludwig: And then number three is the money. takes money to be able to do some of these trips and everything like that. So I'm always asking for contributions is everyone's talking, people say, if you believe in this, why you do it for free? Well, Club for Growth is spending $161 million. Americans for Prosperity is spending $74 million. We're not gonna get the attention of lawmakers by trying to be so noble that we're doing it on such a budget that they don't even know who we are.

Mark: my third and final question ⁓ what three words would you use to describe the family court? my third and final question ⁓ what three words would you use to describe the family court?

Mark Ludwig: wow. I cuss often, but one of the words comes to mind wow. I cuss often, but one of the words comes to mind that I won't say. I literally never cuss. People always, ⁓ they joke, do you ever cuss? ⁓ I do, try to limit it. But yeah, there's, man. I won't say it, but yeah, there's a certain word that I would definitely use. ⁓ Corrupt does come to mind. And once again, not everyone in the family court system. And abusive comes to mind.

Mark: you Okay.

Mark Ludwig: and then the adversarial relationship. But it's a hideous system.

Mark: Fantastic. Those three words are perfect. And those are probably in my top five, at least they're ones that I think about if I was to answer that question. So you've really hit the nail on the head. Although your top one that you won't share with anybody, the one that you laughed about in your mind is probably my top one as well.

Mark Ludwig: I was gonna say, go ahead and get people to it's f'd would be what I would say. I won't the word, but I will admit it really is.

Mark: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. My word began with an F as well. So yeah, I think, think we're aligned there. thank you very much for joining us today on the podcast. we were so keen to have you on for quite a while and we've been chasing you, right from the beginning. And we're so glad that we've managed to find a date in your diary and to sit down and chat to you and listen to you and find out about all about your amazing work. Cause

Mark Ludwig: Hahaha

Mark: A lot of us follow you over here in the UK and you're a huge inspiration to us. So thank you very much for all of the work that you do. I'm to continue to follow you. love listening your interviews and your I think it's brilliant. So thank you very much.

Mark Ludwig: Well, thank you and both you and Simon. We are so proud of you over in the U S we watch your stuff. We watch your content on my bucket list is someday to get over there. I don't know for sure if I'm gonna, but I on my bucket list is, you know, someday in the next three years to take Levi over there and do some sightseeing.

Mark: ⁓ fantastic, well if you're ever over here let us know and I'd love to come meet you for a beer or a soft drink.

Mark Ludwig: That'd be awesome.