Tim Ballard, the inspiration behind the film Sound of Freedom, gained notoriety for rescuing children from sexual exploitation in Colombia. Today, he faces allegations of sexual offenses involving undercover agents posing as his partners. Additionally, he is a speaker at the international far-right movement, engaging with its members during the ExpoFamily event in Chile, including the son of President Kast.
By Maximiliano Alarcón
A group of parliamentarians from the Republican Party and the Libertarian National Party attended the ExpoFamily on Saturday, October 17, an event promoting the international far-right movement held at Centro Parque in the Las Condes area.
The gathering aims to ‘strengthen, highlight, and celebrate the fundamental role of the family—father, mother, and children—as the cornerstone of social development.’ Among the speakers is political scientist Agustín Laje, who is close to Argentine President Javier Milei; priest Javier Olivera Ravasi, expelled from his diocese for organizing visits to those convicted of human rights violations during Argentina’s military dictatorship; and Brazilian writer and model, Sandra Bronzina, known for her anti-LGBTQ+ activism.
However, the most significant and controversial figure on a global scale is the American Tim Ballard, scheduled to present at 4:40 PM.
Ballard rose to international fame through the film Sound of Freedom, which recounts parts of his shocking story.
The film depicts Ballard, portrayed by Jim Caviezel (Jesus in The Passion of the Christ), infiltrating a group exploiting children in Colombia, successfully helping liberate the victims.
The dramatized events indeed occurred. Ballard secretly recorded real moments, including his negotiations with traffickers regarding pricing and permissible actions with the children, as well as transporting them to locations where crimes would transpire.
This footage led to the conviction of four people in Colombia, including former model Kelly Suárez.
In Sound of Freedom, Suárez plays the main antagonist, tasked with kidnapping children, while Ballard is portrayed as a highly Christian action hero, earning him the nickname ‘the Mormon Rambo.’
This also stems from his affiliation with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as Mormons.
And indeed, ‘was’ part of it, as he was excommunicated in September 2023.
‘Morally Unacceptable’
Two defining aspects characterize Ballard: one is his Mormon faith.
He practiced this religion since childhood, inheriting it from his parents in California.
Coincidentally, he became acquainted with Chile through the church, serving as a missionary from 1995 to 1997, specifically in the Valparaíso Region, as he stated in an interview with the vodcast ‘Chile Despertó.’ ‘I am Chilean, po,’ he mentioned in the same discussion.
The other significant aspect of Tim Ballard is his focus on security.
After graduating with a degree in political science from Brigham Young University and earning a graduate degree in international politics from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, Ballard worked as an agent in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, particularly dealing with cybersecurity threats against children.
As he has stated in various media, this shaped the destiny of his career, leading him to feel the need to ‘do more’ after viewing child pornography as part of investigations.
Thus, in 2013, he founded Operation Underground Railroad (O.U.R), an NGO with the mission of dismantling child trafficking rings worldwide through undercover operations. The following year, they conducted the Triple Take Operation, the aforementioned operation in Colombia.
This marked the beginning of Tim Ballard’s rise to fame, as in 2015, Mexican actor and far-right activist Eduardo Verástegui began producing Sound of Freedom, written and directed by his compatriot Alejandro Monteverde.
Although the film was ready in 2018, it wasn’t distributed until 2023, when Angel Studios took on the project.
This company is based in Utah, a heavily Mormon state in the U.S., and its owners practice the same faith.
It operates somewhat like a Netflix for Christian and ‘family-friendly inspirational content,’ according to their own claims, contributing to Sound of Freedom‘s overwhelming success.
For context, the production cost around $15 million and grossed over $250 million.
However, days before the film’s release in June 2023, Tim Ballard’s world began to crumble as he quietly resigned from O.U.R amid allegations that seven female employees had suffered sexual misconduct at his hands.
Specifically, it has been alleged that the creator of Sound of Freedom employed a technique known as ‘partner ruse’—in which he pretended to have a romantic relationship with an undercover agent to infiltrate suspected sexual exploitation networks—to exploit the complainants.
According to a Vice report, the letter against Ballard asserts that ‘Tim has been manipulating and deceiving several women over the past years with the ultimate goal of forcing them to engage in sexual acts with him, under the pretense of going wherever necessary and doing ‘whatever it takes’ to save a child.’
This also led to his excommunication from the Mormon Church in September 2023 due to ‘morally unacceptable behavior.’
In July 2025, a lawsuit filed by Celeste Borys, one of the complainants and former secretary of O.U.R., was dismissed after the judge ruled that the evidence presented by the accuser had been illegally obtained from the defendant’s computer.
However, the most controversial aspect regarding this lawsuit is that there was verified scientific evidence of semen on a skirt belonging to Celeste Borys associated with Tim Ballard, a fact acknowledged even by the defendant’s team.
Recently, Matt Osborne, a former CIA agent and successor to Ballard at O.U.R, testified in court that Ballard exhibited traits of a ‘community narcissist’ and stated, ‘I do all this because I hope Tim gets help before it’s too late.’
In response, another former collaborator of Ballard at O.U.R, Ryan Fisher, remarked in a vodcast in Utah that Ballard ‘presents himself as someone who wants to do good (…) I gravitated toward those good causes, worthy of your time, effort, money, and everything to save children, promote your religious beliefs, and spiritually save the United States and such […] It doesn’t take long before you realize that he doesn’t care about the causes at all; it’s all about using those causes to promote his grand political ambitions for fame, power, and recognition, but it takes time to see that because you give him the benefit of the doubt.’
Networks Around the World
After losing his church, Tim Ballard focused on politics but did not abandon the religious aspect of his narrative.
For example, in an interview with Radio María in Chile, he claimed to converse with angels who provide him information for his investigations.
‘I learned to speak Spanish in Chile, where I was a missionary,’ he mentioned on the program La mano invisible and La Cofradía.
In the context of his activism, Tim Ballard maintains connections with U.S. President Donald Trump, who appointed him as a member of the White House Advisory Council for the Public-Private Alliance to End Human Trafficking during his first term.
He currently has significant political alliances in Ecuador, including an office for his Tim Ballard Foundation in the country, which is even connected to the Ecuadorian first lady, Lavinia Valbonesi.
He has also attempted to gain influence in Argentina, where his image is controversial. While he has met with President Javier Milei, he is rejected by Minister of Security Patricia Bullrich.
“He has 23 abuse charges, was expelled from all organizations dedicated to combating trafficking that he was part of,” Bullrich noted, adding, “At one time he was a hero but later he became an abuser. He exploited women 23 times, using them as a front for trafficking operations, and then abused them. He has 23 allegations,” she clarified.
In Chile, he was present with current President José Antonio Kast during the avant premiere of Sound of Freedom in 2023. However, his main political connection is with Republican Party deputy Chiara Barchiesi.
When consulted by El Ciudadano, Carolina Tello, a deputy from the Frente Amplio and creator of the investigative commission regarding President Kast’s ties to far-right organizations in Hungary under investigation for misusing public resources, criticized Ballard’s closeness with Chilean authorities:
“From the Frente Amplio and feminism, we denounce the hypocrisy of the Chilean far-right, which invites Tim Ballard, a person accused of using the fight against child trafficking as a facade to sexually abuse women. His record is so severe that even Patricia Bullrich, minister of the right-wing government of Javier Milei, has closed doors on him, calling him an abuser with 23 allegations, while here Republicans and libertarians honor him. It’s children and women who deserve justice and rights, not sheltering aggressors,” she stated.
By Maximiliano Alarcón
El Ciudadano
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