Historian Paul Kengor Tells Incredible Story About Reagan, Pope John Paul II and the Secrets of Fátima

What if the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II on May 13, 1981 was predicted in 1917? What if it was predicted on May 13 in 1917?

RELATED: Did Reagan’s Assassination Attempt Thwart an Invasion of Poland and Nuclear War?

Historian and professor Paul Kengor, author of the new book A Pope and a President: John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and the Extraordinary Untold Story of the 20th Century, joined Glenn on radio to describe the uncanny and chilling connection between Pope John Paul II and the Secrets of Fátima, a series of visions and prophecies given to three young Portuguese shepherds starting on May 13, 1917. Kengor also relayed why the name Fátima is so significant.

Listen to this segment from The Glenn Beck Program:

GLENN: Hello, America. Welcome to the Glenn Beck Program. We're back with Dr. Paul Kengor, author of the new book A Pope and A President. John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and The Extraordinary Untold Story of the 21st Century. We started with Ronald Reagan said his best friend was Pope John Paul. They had this incredibly tight relationship. We found out -- and Paul's new book exposes the KGB -- or, I'm sorry, the Soviet plot to go into Poland the day that Ronald Reagan -- you want to talk about divine destiny. The day that Ronald Reagan was shot. And they didn't go in because they knew that the world or America might say, "My gosh, the Soviets shot Reagan, so they could go into Poland." And Al Hague steps up and says, "I'm in charge," and they freaked out about that. So all of these things that we thought were so bad may have actually saved the world from a nuclear winter.

Paul, you were saying there was an even more miraculous side to this?

PAUL: Well, those words divine destiny, Glenn. That's what nails it.

GLENN: Okay.

PAUL: And it's fascinating because Ronald Reagan always believed -- and his mother, his very devout mother had taught him this since he was a little boy, she said, "God has a plan for everything, Ronnie. All the bad things that are going to happen to you, God can bring good out of these bad things, especially if you're faithful."

So he always believed that bad things happened for a good purpose. And I could show you dozens of letters -- Reagan, as far back as the 1960s as governor, writing these nice, sweet letters to a widow who he read about in the newspaper, who lost her husband because he was a policeman and he was shot.

And Reagan would say things like, "I know this is really hard, but God can bring good out of this." It was almost like this divine planned theology that he had.

And so here of all things, could it be that his near-death experience averted the geopolitical catastrophe. And it's possible that it did. And what makes it even more intriguing, Glenn, is that Reagan never knew this. Because what I was told about this from the source in the book -- we call him Jack -- he told -- he shared this about ten years ago. We believe that Bill Casey went over and talked to him about it in Field Station, Berlin. But I don't know that Reagan ever knew that him taking that bullet might well have averted the Soviets from invading Poland.

GLENN: You know, it's interesting because the left likes to make Ronald Reagan into a zealot, when it's to their convenience. But they also will always throw up that he wasn't a religious man. He wasn't -- and he -- I don't -- he doesn't strike me as a religious man. But he strikes me as a very devout man. A big believer in God. And I think his optimism comes from that same belief that I have, that, you know, yes, it could get bad, but it will be great on the other side.

What strikes me as -- as odd, knowing Ronald Reagan, the way history has portrayed him as this irreligious guy, is his fascination with Our Lady of Fatima and Fatima's secrets. First, for anybody who doesn't know that, can you explain what the secrets are, and then Ronald Reagan's connection to them?

PAUL: Sure. One of the reasons I love your show is you're willing to talk about things like this. Most people aren't willing to go here.

But I couldn't ignore it in the book. Look, John Paul II was shot on May 13th, 1981, which every Catholic knows is the feast day of Our Lady of Fatima. And I say very carefully in the book, if you're not Catholic, you're probably going to find this very suspect. You might shrug it off. But you need to understand it because John Paul II was totally motivated by this and Reagan was fascinated by it. But it -- Catholics believe -- and this has been an officially approved miracle and series of apparitions in the Catholic Church. There have been thousands of these claimed over the centuries, and the church has only approved I think less than a dozen of them. But it is the belief that Mary, the blessed mother, appeared in this little Portugal village called Fatima between May 13th, 1981 -- or 1917 and October 13th, 1917.

And amid these appearances, the Lady of Fatima issued three predictions, and one of them was that World War I would end soon. But another war would start not that long after that. So World War II. The second was the rise of communism in Bolshevik, Russia. And keep in mind, that didn't break out until October of 1917, after all of her alleged appearances.

GLENN: Right. And so you also know, these kids were literally kids -- they were seven and eight years old in Portugal. They were not worldly kids. To come home --

PAUL: That's right.

GLENN: You know, a 7-year-old kid and go, oh, and the rise of Bolshevism and Russia is going to play a very big war, you know, geopolitically in the next 80 years. Bolsheviks -- I mean, the revolution hadn't happened yet.

PAUL: I know. Imagine that.

And, by the way, Pope Francis is going to canonize two of them in Portugal this coming May 13th.

GLENN: Wow.

PAUL: So two of the three kids are going to be made saints.

PAT: What's wrong with the third kid?

GLENN: It was -- he had a problem.

PAUL: That's a great question, Pat.

And the third one, her name was Lucia. She lived until 2005. She died just a couple months before John Paul II did. The two youngest children that are going to be canonized, they died within a couple years of these apparitions. And the lady had even said, two of you are going to be leaving here soon. But the other one, you will remain.

And it was Lucia who remained for the entire rest of the century and recorded all of this stuff. So the second secret was the rise of communism in Bolshevik, Russia, spreading errors and persecution against the faithful and the church around the world.

Now, the third secret of Fatima, this was the one that the people in the Catholic church that this predicted Armageddon. This would be the end of the world. You know, this was the apocalypse. Well, it turned out -- and this is really dramatic. But it's true --

GLENN: Hang on just a second. This one was not revealed. This one, I think, was given to the pope, and the pope kept it in the secret archives for a very long time, right?

PAUL: That's right. That's right. They kept it in the archives. And a couple of previous popes -- I think three of them had read it. Decided that the time was not right to release it yet. And then John Paul II when he was shot on May 13th, 1981, then he recovered, and he started thinking to himself, two 13ths of May. Two 13ths of May. And this was somebody who literally devoted his papacy to the intercession of Mary. His papal motto was totus tuis (phonetic), which means totally yours, Mary. Mary was his intercessor to -- to -- to -- for Jesus.

And so he requested to see the third secret. It was brought to him at Janelli (phonetic) Clinic, where he was recovering after the shooting on July 18th, 1981. And he opened it up, and the third secret talked about an attack on a bishop in white. The only bishop that wears white in the Catholic church is the pope.

GLENN: The pope.

PAUL: And in this attack, in this vision, the pope goes down and is apparently killed in this vision. They try to kill him. And with that, he connected the whole thing. He believed that the third secret of Fatima was about him. And thus, that confirmed for him long before it did for Ronald Reagan and Bill Casey, that the Russians were involved. All of this connected for him back to the Russians.

GLENN: Hmm.

PAUL: And -- and after pondering it for a while, he requested to see that third secret. He read it.

And then on the anniversary of Fatima, ten years later, he would actually take the bullet that had been in his body and put it in the crown of Our Lady of Fatima, at the original Fatima site in Portugal.

GLENN: Wow.

PAUL: Now, I know a lot of people, again, if you're not Catholic, you're probably going to think, "I don't know if I can believe that," or whatever. But Ronald Reagan was fascinated by it. And Reagan received the literal full briefing on Fatima from Frank Shakespeare, the second ambassador to the Vatican, before another one-on-one meeting that Reagan had with John Paul II at the Vatican in June 1987.

And Reagan actually went to Portugal -- and I can't believe that no one paid attention to this. But Reagan gave a speech to the Portugal assembly, Congress, May 9th, 1985, where he actually mentioned the children of Fatima, Mary, and John Paul II. It got no publicity. No one reported on it.

GLENN: I will tell you that what is fascinating to me -- and I keep saying this about the Middle East. It doesn't matter if you believe what these people believe.

PAUL: That's right.

GLENN: You need to understand that they believed it. I mean, it motivated Reagan. It motivated John Paul II. It doesn't matter if you believe it. It's the same with the people in Iran and the Middle East that believe in the caliphate and the return of the Twelfth Imam and everything. You could say all that's hogwash. It doesn't matter. It's what's motivating them.

PAUL: Right. That's key. That's what's key for people to understand.

And also, Glenn, here's another entire fascinating component about this: Fatima was the only city in all of Portugal named for the daughter of Muhammad. Muhammad's favorite daughter was Fatima.

GLENN: Wow.

PAUL: And she is the second most revered person in Islam -- or second most revered female in Islam behind only the Virgin Mary. Mary is mentioned in the Koran more times than Jesus is mentioned in the Koran. And so of all things, there is this -- and Mehmet Ali Agca, who shot the pope, was Muslim. A Muslim Turk. And when John Paul II went to meet with Agca to forgive him privately in the jail cell, he said, you know, the thing that Agca was really freaked out about was what Agca kept referring to as this Goddess of Fatima. He was calling her this Goddess of Fatima. And he was afraid that she was going to wreak vengeance on him. You know, strike him with, I don't know, a lightning bolt out of the sky or something.

GLENN: Wow. Wow.

PAUL: Yeah. Yeah. So the Muslim world -- what I'm telling you about Fatima and Mary wouldn't surprise people in the Muslim world. I've got friends who are Coptic Christians in the Middle East. They're not surprised by any of this at all.

GLENN: Yeah. Yeah.

PAUL: This isn't strange for any of them.

PAT: Paul, wasn't there supposed to be some sort of unraveled portion of the third secret of Fatima?

GLENN: Yeah, I thought there was too.

PAT: Wasn't there like a big -- at least a rumor or a belief in the church that there was more to it? And, in fact, didn't -- it seems like Pope Benedict said something like that, that there is no more. Right?

PAUL: That's absolutely right, Pat.

The church spent a lot of time on that. They fully released it here again, May 13th. May 13th, 2000. And the person who at that point who was running the congregation for the doctrine of the faith, which kept all of this stuff locked up for decades, was a cardinal by the name of Joseph Ratzinger, who wrote the whole secret, let it all loose, and later became Pope Benedict the 16th who replaced John Paul II.

GLENN: Amazing.

PAT: And what was it that they thought was there? Do you know? Do you know what it was supposed to be?

PAUL: Well, there was so much -- this sounds odd, but people who wanted the third secret to really be something more, like Armageddon, end times.

PAT: I don't want it to be that.

GLENN: I don't either. But I remember -- I grew up in a Catholic school, and this was before the third secret. And that's what we always believed in.

PAUL: Yeah.

GLENN: In fact, I think it was my belief that they were saying that the pope was going to be killed. Russia was going to have a new rise after the century. And that --

PAUL: Conversion.

GLENN: And the Lord would have to return.

PAUL: Right. Right.

Which some people believe all of that could still be possible, as like a further fulfillment.

GLENN: Sure.

PAUL: But what the third secret says is it predicted this attack on a bishop in white. And so it kind of ends there. And one of the reasons why some Catholics believe that Lucia lived as long as she did is that throughout this process, '80s, '90s, 2000s, all the way up until the release of the third secret, they were in regular communication with her, saying, "Okay. Is this it? Has it been fully revealed?" And she kept saying, "Yes, this is it. It's been fully revealed. This is the end of it."

PAT: Wow.

GLENN: Unbelievable.

The name of the book is called A Pope and A President by Paul Kengor. Make sure you pick it up. Fascinating stuff. And, Paul, it's always great to have you on. You're one of my favorites in history. Thank you so much.

PAUL: Well, thank you so much, guys. Always great to come on.

GLENN: You bet. Paul Kengor. A Pope and A President. I went into the secret archives at the Vatican and I didn't find out how rare that was until I was standing next to the guy who ran the Catholic University and was the head of the university committee that would go and brief the copy. He would have two advisers, one who was the head of the theological university, and the other was the head of the archives. And when I was in the archives for like the first ten minutes, I said, "This is unbelievable." I said, "What is the meaning of this?" And I turned to the guy at the theological school. And he said, "I don't know. I've never been allowed here. I've never been allowed past the first door." Three hours later, we were still going through. It's phenomenal. But it's that kind of thing that makes you -- makes people say, "Well, they got tons of secrets they're hiding. They got all kinds of stuff."

What do clay pots have to do with to preserving American history?

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Editor's note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.

Why should we preserve our nation’s history? If you listen to my radio program and podcast, or read my columns and books, you know I’ve dedicated a large part of my life and finances to sourcing and preserving priceless artifacts that tell America’s story. I’ve tried to make these artifacts as available as possible through the American Journey Experience Museum, just across from the studios where I do my daily radio broadcast. Thousands of you have come through the museum and have been able to see and experience these artifacts that are a part of your legacy as an American.

The destruction of American texts has already begun.

But why should people like you and me be concerned about preserving these things from our nation's history? Isn’t that what the “big guys” like the National Archives are for?

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls. In 1946, a Bedouin shepherd in what is now the West Bank threw a rock into a cave nestled into the side of a cliff near the Dead Sea. Instead of hearing an echo, he heard the curious sound of a clay pot shattering. He discovered more than 15,000 Masoretic texts from the third century B.C. to the first century A.D.

These texts weren’t just a priceless historical discovery. They were virtually perfect copies of the same Jewish texts that continue to be translated today. Consider the significance of that discovery. Since the third century B.C. when these texts were first written, the Jewish people have endured a continued onslaught of diasporas, persecutions, pressures to conform to their occupying power, the destruction of their temple, and so much more. They had to fight for their identity as a people for centuries, and finally, a year after the end of the Holocaust and a year before the founding of the nation of Israel, these texts were discovered, confirming the preservation and endurance of their heritage since ancient times — all due to someone putting these clay pots in a desert cave more than 2,000 years ago.

I first felt a prompting to preserve our nation's history back in 2008, and it all started with clay pots and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

So, what do these clay pots have to do with the calling to preserve American history? I didn’t understand that prompting myself until the horrible thought dawned on me that the people we are fighting against may very well take our sacred American scriptures, our Declaration of Independence, and our Bill of Rights. What if they are successful, and 1,000 years from now, we have no texts preserved to confirm our national identity? What kind of new history would be written over the truth?

The destruction of American texts has already begun. The National Archives has labeled some of our critical documents, like our Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights, as “triggering” or “containing harmful language.” In a public statement, the National Archives said that the labels help prepare readers to view potentially distressing content:

The Catalog and web pages contain some content that may be harmful or difficult to view. NARA’s records span the history of the United States, and it is our charge to preserve and make available these historical records. As a result, some of the materials presented here may reflect outdated, biased, offensive, and possibly violent views and opinions. In addition, some of the materials may relate to violent or graphic events and are preserved for their historical significance.

According to this statement, our founding documents are either “outdated, biased, offensive,” “possibly violent,” or a combination of these scathing descriptions. I’m sorry, the Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.” Our Constitution is not “outdated and biased,” and our Bill of Rights certainly is not “offensive and possibly violent.” They are glorious documents. They should be celebrated, not qualified by such derogatory, absurd language. Shame on them.

These are only the beginning stages of rewriting our history. What if they start banning these “triggering” documents from public view because they might offend somebody? Haven’t we torn down “triggering” statues before? What if we are no longer able to see, read, and study the actual words of our nation's founding documents because they are “harmful” or “possibly violent”? A thousand years from now, will there be any remnant to piece together the true spirit behind the nation that our founders envisioned?

The Declaration of Independence is not “triggering.”

That is why in 2008, I was prompted to preserve what I could. Now, the American Journey Experience Museum includes more than 160,000 artifacts, from founding-era documents to the original Roe v. Wade court papers. We need to preserve the totality of our nation’s heritage, the good, the bad, and the ugly. We need to preserve our history in our own clay pots.

I ask you to join with me on this mission. Start buying books that are important to preserve. Buy some acid-free paper and start printing some of the founding documents, the reports that go against the mainstream narrative, the studies that prove what is true as we are continually being fed lies. Start preserving our daily history as well as our history because it is being rewritten and digitized.

Somebody must have a copy of what is happening now and what has happened in the past. I hope things don’t get really bad. But if they do, we need to preserve our heritage. Perhaps, someone 1,000 years from now will discover our clay pots and, Lord willing, be able to have a glimpse of America as it truly was.

Top 10 WORST items in the new $1.2 TRILLION spending bill

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Biden just signed the newest spending bill into law, and Glenn is furious.

Under Speaker Johnson's leadership, the whopping $1.2 TRILLION package will use your taxpayer dollars to fund the government through September. Of course, the bill is loaded with earmarks and pork that diverts money to fund all sorts of absurd side projects.

Here is the list of the ten WORST uses of taxpayer money in the recently passed spending bill:

Funding venues to host drag shows, including ones that target children

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Money for transgender underwear for kids

Funding for proms for 12 to 18 year old kids

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Border security funding... for Jordan and Egypt

Another $300 million for Ukraine

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$3.5 million for Detroit's annual Thanksgiving Day parade

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$2.5 million for a new kayaking facility in Franklin, New Hampshire

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$2.7 million for a bike park in White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia, a town with a population of less than 2,300 people

$5 million for a new trail at Coastal Carolina University

$4 million the "Alaska King Crab Enhancement Project" (whatever that means)

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There is no doubt about it—we are entering dark times.

The November presidential election is only a few months away, and following the chaos of the 2020 election, the American people are bracing for what is likely to be another tumultuous election year. The left's anti-Trump rhetoric is reaching an all-time high with the most recent "Bloodbath" debacle proving how far the media will go to smear the former president. That's not to mention the Democrats' nearly four-year-long authoritarian attempt to jail President Trump or stop his re-election by any means necessary, even if it flies in the face of the Constitution.

Meanwhile, Biden is doing worse than ever. He reportedly threw a tantrum recently after being informed that his polls have reached an all-time low. After Special Counsel Robert Hur's report expressed concerns over Biden's obviously failing mental agility, it's getting harder for the Democrats to defend him. Yet he is still the Democratic nominee for November, promising another 4 years of catastrophic policies, from the border to heavy-handed taxation, should he be reelected.

The rest of the world isn't doing much better. The war in Ukraine has no clear end in sight, drawing NATO and Russia closer and closer to conflict. The war in Gaza is showing no sign of slowing down, and as Glenn revealed recently, its continuation may be a sign that the end times are near.

One thing is clear: we are living in uncertain times. If you and your family haven't prepared for the worst, now is the time. You can start by downloading "Glenn's Ultimate Guide to Getting Prepared." Be sure to print off a copy or two. If the recent cell outage proved anything, it's that technology is unreliable in survival situations. You can check your list of supplies against our "Ultimate Prepper Checklist for Beginners," which you can find below:

Food

  • Canned food/non-perishable foods
  • Food preparation tools
  • Go to the next level: garden/livestock/food production

Water

  • Non-perishable water store
  • Water purification
  • Independent water source

Shelter

  • Fireplace with a wood supply
  • Tent
  • Generator with fuel supply
  • Go to the next level: fallout shelter

Money

  • Emergency cash savings
  • Precious metals

Medicine

  • Extra blankets
  • Basic first aid
  • Extra prescriptions
  • Extra glasses
  • Toiletries store
  • Trauma kit
  • Antibiotics
  • Basic surgery supplies
  • Potassium Iodate tablets

Transportation

  • Bicycle
  • Car
  • Extra fuel

Information

  • Birth certificates
  • Insurance cards
  • Marriage license
  • Immunization records
  • Mortgage paperwork
  • Car title and registration
  • House keys, car keys
  • Passports
  • Family emergency plan
  • Prepping/survival/repair manuals
  • Go to the next level: copy of the Bible, the U.S. Constitution, and other important books/sources

Skills

  • Cooking
  • Gardening
  • Sewing
  • First Aid
  • Basic maintenance skills
  • Go to the next level: farming/ranching
  • Self-defense training

Communication

  • Family contact information and addresses
  • HAM radio

Miscellaneous

  • Flashlights and batteries
  • Lamps and fuel
  • Hardware (tools, nails, lumber, etc)
  • Extra clothes
  • Extreme weather clothes and gear
  • Gas masks and filters
  • Spare parts for any machinery/equipment

Is Trump's prosecution NORMAL?  This COMPLETE list of ALL Western leaders who served jail time proves otherwise.

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Mainstream media is on a crusade to normalize Donald Trump's indictments as if it's on par with the electoral course. Glenn asked his team to research every instance of a Western leader who was jailed during their political career over the past 200 years—except extreme political turmoil like the French Revolution, Napoleonic Wars, Irish Revolution, etc.—and what we discovered was quite the opposite.

Imprisoning a leader or major political opponent is not normal, neither in the U.S. nor in the Western world. Within the last 200 years, there are only a handful of examples of leaders in the West serving jail time, and these men were not imprisoned under normal conditions. All of these men were jailed under extreme circumstances during times of great peril such as the Civil War, World War II, and the Cold War.

What does this mean for America? Are Trump's indictments evidence that we are re-entering times of great peril? Below is a list of Western leaders who were imprisoned within the last 200 years. Take a look and decide for yourself:

Late 1800s

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Jefferson Davis: The nearest occurrence to a U.S. President to serve jail time was in the case of Jefferson Davis, the first and only president of the Confederate States of America. Jefferson was captured in Georgia by Northern Soldiers in 1865 and locked up in Fort Monroe, Virginia for two years. He was offered a presidential pardon but refused out of his loyalty to the confederacy.

Early 1900s

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Eugene V. Debs: Debbs, a Midwestern socialist leader, became the first person to run for president in prison. He was locked up at a federal penitentiary in Atlanta having been convicted under the federal Sedition Act for giving an antiwar speech a few months before Armistice Day, the end of World War I. Many of his supporters believed his imprisonment to be unjust. Debs received 897,704 votes and was a distant third-part candidate behind Warren G. Harding, the Republican winner, and James M. Cox, the second-place Democrat. Harding ordered Debs’s release from prison toward the end of 1921.

Nazi sympathizers and collaborators: After the end of World War II in 1945, several European leaders who had "led" their countries during the Nazi occupation faced trial and imprisonment for treason. This list included Chief of the French State Philippe Pétain, French Prime Minister Pierre Laval, and Minister-President of Norway Vidkun Quisling. The latter two were also executed after their imprisonment. President of Finland Risto Ryti and Prime Minister of Finland Johan Wilhelm Rangell were also tried and jailed for collaborating with the Nazis against the Allied Powers.

Late 1900s

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The end of the Cold War: The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was one of the pivotal moments that brought the Cold War to a close and marked the end of Communist East Germany. With the fall of the wall and the collapse of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany), the former leaders were brought to trial to answer for the crimes committed by the GDR. General Secretary Erich Honecker and General Secretary Egon Krenz were both put on trial for abuse of power and the deaths of those who were shot trying to flee into West Germany. Honecker was charged with jail time but was released from custody due to severe illness and lived out the rest of his life as an exile in Chile. Krenz served 4 years in jail before his release in 2001. He is one of the last surviving leaders of the Eastern Bloc.

Lyndon LaRouche: Larouche was a Trotsky evangelist, public antisemite, and founder of a nationwide Marxist political movement, became the second person in U.S. history to run for President in a prison cell. Granted, he ran in every election from 1976 to 2004 as a long-shot third-party candidate. When he tried to gain the Democratic presidential nomination, he received 5 percent of the total nationwide vote. Even though in 2000 he received enough primary votes to qualify for delegates in a few states, the Democratic National Committee refused to seat his delegates and barred LaRouche from attending the Democratic National Convention.