T. J. Raphael's Avatar

T. J. Raphael

@tjraphael

Audio Journalist | Alum: Wondery, Sony, Slate, WNYC, New York Daily News, The Village Voice | Latina 🇵🇷 | WGAE Member 📝 | NYC 📍 https://tjraphael.com

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21.01.2025
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Latest posts by T. J. Raphael @tjraphael

Preview
Sooo @CANDACE talked about me the other day. She got some things wrong. #candaceowens #charliekirk #adoption #libertyuniversity TikTok video by tj_raphael

Candace Owen’s talked about me the other day. I have some thoughts. www.tiktok.com/t/ZP8f2q5kL/

12.01.2026 22:03 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Glad to be included in this conversation with “Liberty Lost”’s @tjraphael.bsky.social from the Concerned United Birthparent conference. I believe this is the first mainstream critical coverage of the adoption tax credit — an important step in the conversation to align our investment with our values.

17.12.2025 02:47 👍 6 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 1
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Brava to @juliaioffe.bsky.social. This book is fascinating and riveting.

19.11.2025 16:32 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Imagine you’re a teenager who wants birth control pills. The problem is, your Planned Parenthood has shut down—financially devastated by Donald Trump’s budget bill. You don’t know anything about that; you just know the next closest clinic is a two-hour drive away.

You look around for an OBGYN, but the few who haven’t fled your anti-choice state are booked solid for months. Besides, you’re on your parents’ health insurance, and you’d rather keep this visit private. So you go to a ‘pregnancy clinic’ you found on Google; the staff are wearing white coats and seem legit enough, so you don’t think much about the framed picture of a Bible quote on the wall.

But when you ask about getting on the Pill, the woman there says hormones could give you cancer—and that it’s illegal for minors to get birth control without parental permission. You’re pretty sure that’s not true, but you’re 15 years old and aren’t going to argue with an adult. So you leave defeated, without contraception, hoping that your boyfriend might agree to wear a condom.

Now imagine that’s happening in every community, every day, across the country.

Imagine you’re a teenager who wants birth control pills. The problem is, your Planned Parenthood has shut down—financially devastated by Donald Trump’s budget bill. You don’t know anything about that; you just know the next closest clinic is a two-hour drive away. You look around for an OBGYN, but the few who haven’t fled your anti-choice state are booked solid for months. Besides, you’re on your parents’ health insurance, and you’d rather keep this visit private. So you go to a ‘pregnancy clinic’ you found on Google; the staff are wearing white coats and seem legit enough, so you don’t think much about the framed picture of a Bible quote on the wall. But when you ask about getting on the Pill, the woman there says hormones could give you cancer—and that it’s illegal for minors to get birth control without parental permission. You’re pretty sure that’s not true, but you’re 15 years old and aren’t going to argue with an adult. So you leave defeated, without contraception, hoping that your boyfriend might agree to wear a condom. Now imagine that’s happening in every community, every day, across the country.

Right now, Republicans are working to ‘replace’ reproductive healthcare clinics with crisis pregnancy centers—claiming that the fake clinics are perfectly acceptable alternatives to the credible healthcare centers their policies are shuttering.

Here's the reality:

29.10.2025 19:46 👍 152 🔁 56 💬 5 📌 4

Thanks for listening!

16.10.2025 14:17 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Liberty Lost won gold for Best Documentary at the Signal Awards! 🏅🌟

A huge thank you to the judges, my team at Wondery, and the brave birth mothers and survivors who shared their stories with me and the world.

In the words of the iconic RuPaul Charles, I'm a winner, baby! 🤸 ✨

#documentary

15.10.2025 21:13 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
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Ezra Klein is Wrong About Abortion Abortion *is* a big tent issue

Thank you for this piece @jessicavalenti.bsky.social. I find @ezrakleinbot.bsky.social's argument especially ghoulish, especially considering he's consistently invoked his own wife's high risk pregnancy in the past when talking about the need for abortion access jessica.substack.com/p/ezra-klein...

30.09.2025 16:32 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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The Signal Listener's Choice Award needs YOU I just voted for this finalist to win a Signal Listener's Choice Award. You should too.

Liberty Lost has been nominated for Signal Award! For best documentary. It’s a listener choice award so please vote and share! vote.signalaward.com/PublicVoting...

23.09.2025 19:56 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0

As someone who grew up in Jerry Falwell’s town and lived just three miles from the Liberty Godparent Home during my own teen pregnancy, T.J. Raphael’s Liberty Lost podcast really resonated with me. So grateful for the opportunity to work on this story - please give it a read! #libertylost

26.08.2025 13:56 👍 4 🔁 4 💬 0 📌 0
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'Liberty Lost' podcast alleges program coerced pregnant teens into adoption "I had bought into all of the… 'You can't be a good enough mom if you're young and you're alone.'"

'Liberty Lost' podcast alleges program coerced pregnant teens into adoption

16.08.2025 14:13 👍 4 🔁 4 💬 0 📌 1
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Liberty University’s Baby Business: Forced Birth + Coerced Adoption = White Christian Nationalism Earlier this summer, investigative journalist T.J. Raphael released a seven-episode podcast, Liberty Lost, which investigates the history of Liberty University’s Godparent Home. In this secretive mate...

@religiondispatches.org interviews journalist @tjraphael.bsky.social about her podcast, Liberty Lost, which sheds light on Liberty University’s secretive maternity home, Godparent Home. Learn how maternity homes and faith based adoption play into a White christian nationalist agenda: bit.ly/3HviRli

12.08.2025 17:39 👍 13 🔁 15 💬 1 📌 2
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Liberty Lost Society & Culture Podcast · Weekly Series · In Evangelical homes across the United States, sex outside of marriage is a sin against God. So, when Abbi becomes pregnant at 16, her devout parents hide h...

As part of my journey to become increasingly angry at how women are treated in this country, I binge-listened to Liberty Lost last week. It is heart-wrenching, but SO GOOD.
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/l...

05.08.2025 01:40 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Liberty Lost podcast cover image

Liberty Lost podcast cover image

Did you know that Liberty University has a maternity home on campus? I didn't.

I just started listening to Liberty Lost, a podcast about the girls forced to live at Liberty University's maternity home & forced give their babies away to "male-headed households."
open.spotify.com/episode/5mTt...

05.08.2025 17:30 👍 4 🔁 4 💬 1 📌 1

Thanks for listening!

05.08.2025 17:30 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
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Pregnant at 13 in 1991, a St. Louis native sent to a maternity home now speaks out Toni Pophum did everything she could to keep her baby. She’s one of several former residents to appear in “Liberty Lost,” a new podcast.

Toni Pophum did everything she could to keep her baby. She’s one of several former residents to appear in “Liberty Lost,” a new podcast.

24.07.2025 18:23 👍 9 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
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The "Maternity Home" attached to the evangelical Liberty University has a disturbing past and present, all propped up by huge amounts of money.
Watch more Hysteria on YouTube.

10.07.2025 21:19 👍 25 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 3
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A pregnant girl sought help from care-giver and it cost the teen her baby Tucked away on the campus of Liberty University is a maternity home where young, unwed mothers go for support. But a new podcast by Wondery, Liberty Lost, instead reveals a place where vulnerable teen...

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME???

Tucked away on the campus of Liberty University is Liberty Godparent Home, where young, unwed mothers go for support. Instead, it's a place where vulnerable teens feel pressured to surrender their babies in exchange for full-ride scholarships to Liberty University.

09.07.2025 20:19 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 1
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Liberty Lost: Podcast Series Exposes Maternity Home Controlled by Liberty University A new podcast series by journalist T.J. Raphael delves into the Liberty Godparent Home and terrifying tales of former residents.

A new podcast series by journalist T.J. Raphael delves into the Liberty Godparent Home and terrifying tales of former residents.

18.07.2025 18:32 👍 2 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
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Inside Liberty University’s Secret Maternity Home Imagine you’re a pregnant teenager in 1972. Abortion isn’t an option, and you’re not ready to get married… so you might turn to a maternity home for unwed mothers. You’ll live there until the baby is ...

Former residents say Liberty’s Godparent Home used shame and faith to force adoptions.

14.07.2025 15:07 👍 16 🔁 9 💬 1 📌 1
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Liberty Lost podcast investigates secretive US maternity home practices Acclaimed audio journalist and podcaster T.J. Raphael is hosting a new Wondery investigative podcast, Liberty Lost.

Apparently the US has their own version of the Magdalene Laundries podcastingtoday.co.uk/liberty-lost...

14.07.2025 12:36 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

Check out my series on radical feminists trying to bring the abortion pill to America, Cover Up: The Pill Plot -- check that out here - you'll have to navigate to season 2 podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

23.07.2025 18:46 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0

Worth a listen.

13.07.2025 04:12 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

I just listened to the first four episodes of this powerful podcast. If you thought you hated Jerry Falwell just the right amount, listen to this and you’ll realize you didn’t hate him nearly enough.

13.07.2025 04:00 👍 391 🔁 120 💬 11 📌 3

Thank you for listening and sharing Seth.

21.07.2025 20:30 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Inside Liberty University’s Secret Maternity Home Imagine you’re a pregnant teenager in 1972. Abortion isn’t an option, and you’re not ready to get married… so you might turn to a maternity home for unwed mothers. You’ll live there until the baby is ...

Grateful for the chance to work on this @msmagazine.com piece about @tjraphael.bsky.social and @wonderymedia.bsky.social's podcast Liberty Lost, which covers the terrifying history of maternity homes in the U.S.

11.07.2025 23:24 👍 6 🔁 4 💬 1 📌 0

You all should take a listen to this podcast. So well done.

01.07.2025 22:05 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0

I listened to episode four of this last night and it was all I could do not to wake the baby up to hold him. It’s harrowing, harrowing listening. The cruelty of every adult involved in this story is simple horrific.

01.07.2025 22:54 👍 4 🔁 3 💬 3 📌 0
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How Maternity Homes Became a Hidden Battleground in the Post-Roe Era T.J. Raphael’s podcast “Liberty Lost” uncovers how faith-based maternity homes shaped adoption practices—and how their influence is growing in a post-Roe America.

Adoption isn’t always a choice. Dive into the @tjraphael.bsky.social investigation into how faith‑based maternity homes shape reproductive options in a post‑Roe landscape:
reprorights.substack.com/p/how-matern...
#ReproJustice #AbortionAccess #ResistChristianNationalism #LibertyLost #PodcastLife

29.06.2025 12:08 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0

Thank you for listening and sharing.

02.07.2025 12:25 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
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Adoption Should Also Be a Choice. In Post-Roe America, It’s Increasingly Not. It’s been three years since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, ending the right to legal abortion in the United States.

3 years post-Roe, #MaternityHomes are rising—places where pregnant people are pushed toward adoption. In her podcast Liberty Lost, T.J. Raphael reveals how religious agendas drive this troubling trend, with 500 maternity homes across the U.S. including more than a dozen in Illinois. bit.ly/4ltAGjb

25.06.2025 18:30 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0