The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 3.31 Casey Neistat Houseparty Bounty, Pastors Arrested Over Coronavirus, & "Emergency Powers"

Starting point is 00:00:00 Sup you beautiful bastards, hope you've had a fantastic Tuesday. Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco Show. Buckle up, hit that like button, and let's just jump into it. And the first thing we're going to talk about today is megachurch pastor Rodney Howard Brown. Now Rodney has popped up in the news over the last few weeks for things that he's both said and done. You know, in Florida, where he's based, there is currently a stay-at-home order. But despite that, not only did we see Rodney say that he would continue to hold services, but he was seemingly in possession of and touting technology that I'm sure a lot of hospitals would love to have. The Lord has helped us to secure our congregation. We brought in 13 machines that basically killed

Starting point is 00:00:36 every virus in the place. And if somebody walks in the door, it's like it kills everything on them. If they sneeze, it shoots it down like at 100 miles an hour. It'll neutralize it in split seconds. So we have the most sterile building in, I don't know, all of America. This was also something he continued to claim at the service itself. If you came in with it, it won't be on you by the time you leave this place. And it's the same for the kids in the nursery. We did that. I spent probably over $100,000 on that. Now reportedly not only was Howard warned by authorities, and not only did he ignore

Starting point is 00:01:17 those warnings, according to deputies he held two large services on Sunday and even bussed people into the church. And reportedly the church livestreamed the morning main event service on its Facebook page which showed congregants shoulder to shoulder while the church band played. Now as far as why pastor Rodney Howard Brown had no option but to hold this service, he said, I had no option because let me tell you Had I rolled over and caved and not had church the last few Sundays Basically in essence what I would have

Starting point is 00:01:45 had to do, I'd have had to leave the ministry, number one, because I'm not fit to even be in the ministry. Number two, I'd have to resign. I'd have to somehow renege on my oath of becoming American and basically leave. And all of that led to Howard Brown being arrested on Monday for misdemeanor charges of unlawful assembly and violating quarantine orders during a public health emergency. And of this situation we saw Hillsborough Sheriff Chad Chonister say. Last night I made a decision to seek an arrest warrant for the pastor of a local church who intentionally and repeatedly chose to disregard the orders set in place by our president, our governor, the CDC, and the Hillsborough County Emergency Policy Group.

Starting point is 00:02:31 His reckless disregard for human life put hundreds of people in his congregation at risk and thousands of residents who may interact with them this week in danger. With State Attorney Andrew Warren also speaking and actually quoting the Bible, saying, As far as the charges, you know, they're based around the county's orders, which took effect on Friday, requiring gatherings, including those held by faith-based organizations to be fewer than 10 people. The order also requiring residents to stay at home unless they are getting food or medicine, exercising or doing essential work that cannot be performed at home.

Starting point is 00:03:13 And notably, state law allows the order to be enforced as a second-degree misdemeanor punishable by up to 60 days in jail, a maximum fine of $500 or both. And here's the thing, as far as my opinion, Rodney and others are gonna kind of label this as a crackdown on religion or religious bigotry. But no, there are plenty of other religious people, churchgoers, pastors, that understand this is a serious situation. And if you continue with your service, like many churches have, go digital.

Starting point is 00:03:37 Creating an unnecessary, unsafe environment primed for the spread of coronavirus. And the fact that you would continue to put your congregation at risk, it feels to me that it has to be based on one of two things. One, ignorance, that is always the possible answer. Or two, greed.

Starting point is 00:03:51 Do people in person donate? Do they tithe way more than someone watching digitally? And the thing is, it's not just Rodney here. In fact, as I was recording this piece, in Louisiana, a pastor is now facing six misdemeanor charges. This for violating the governor's executive order and deciding to host multiple large gatherings.

Starting point is 00:04:06 And the sad truth of this matter is most likely these men and many others who follow in their steps will successfully twist the situation to a certain group of people to make themselves look like the victim and likely encourage more donations. I mean, hell, even with this, you have people like E.W. Jackson saying

Starting point is 00:04:20 he will continue to hold service. This despite Virginia's stay at home order. Following the arrest, you have people like Jonathan Shuttlesworth saying stuff like this. I'm going to announce it, but we're going to hold an outdoor Easter blowout service, not online.

Starting point is 00:04:34 A national gathering. You can come from all over, like Woodstock. Like, what is even happening? No one's saying, don't praise God or a God of your choice. Just do it safely. There are legitimate health concerns and it's not only you at risk, it's also other people that you're making your choice for.

Starting point is 00:04:50 Whatever, I don't know what to do with this excessive level of stupid. I'll pass the question off to you. What are your thoughts around this situation? And then let's talk about house party. Over the last two weeks, we've seen group video conferencing apps just popping up in the news.

Starting point is 00:05:01 Hell, just last week, according to reports, group video conferencing apps were downloaded 62 million times. And with this increase in adoption of everyday use for people working, going to school, whatever. With that comes a spotlight, questions, concerns, and one of the most recent companies to come under fire has been Houseparty.

Starting point is 00:05:17 And if you're unfamiliar with Houseparty, it's seen as kind of the fun competitor to Zoom featuring in-app group games like Heads Up, Quick Draw, and Trivia. But over the last few days, it's appeared that Houseparty users have been complaining on social media that their non-related accounts were compromised.

Starting point is 00:05:29 This, including among other things, Instagram, Netflix, Spotify, their online banking accounts. And so with this, it's been suggested that Houseparty, which is owned by Epic Games, is in some way the reason for this. And in response to this, on Monday, an Epic Games spokesperson issued a statement saying, "'We've found no evidence to suggest a link

Starting point is 00:05:43 "'between Houseparty and the compromises "'of other unrelated accounts. "'As a general rule, we suggest all users "'choose strong passwords when creating online accounts "'on any platform.'" With the company also taking to Twitter to assure users that its service is secure, has never been compromised,

Starting point is 00:05:54 and doesn't collect passwords for other sites. And then later that evening, the situation got way more interesting, with the company saying, "'We are investigating indications "'that the recent hacking rumors were spread "'by a paid commercial smear campaign to harm Houseparty. With the company even offering a $1 million bounty for the first individual to provide proof of such a campaign.

Starting point is 00:06:11 And with that kind of money up for grabs, it is with a heavy heart that I tell you that it was Casey Neistat that did this. He sent me this very real text message, which is a no way Photoshop saying, Hey, the Houseparty rumor, that was me. Also, I'm sorry that myself and Jesse Wellens are really bad at Warzone. You shouldn't have to carry the team and spend $4,500 every two minutes bringing us back. And so to Epic Games, if you could, please respond back with your Venmo information.

Starting point is 00:06:32 Or Cash App or whatever company would like to sponsor me to be a part of this bit. Now, joke that went on too long to just point out that my friend is horrible at video games aside, is this app actually safe? Well, to that I would say, no app can be guaranteed when 100% secure, but it does seem that as of right now, there are no dangerous flaws that are public.

Starting point is 00:06:48 But regardless of what reality is, the damage to House Party's reputation may have already been done as social media users are still urging one another to delete the app altogether. Which, looking at this from the marketing and PR side, may also explain why they did something as big as a $1 million bounty. But for now, we kinda just have to wait and see

Starting point is 00:07:03 if that move is effective. And then, let's talk about power grabs and global press freedoms in the age of the coronavirus. To start this off, we should talk about Hungary and how it's responding to the coronavirus pandemic. Because yesterday we saw Hungary pass a massively influential bill that gives Prime Minister Viktor Orban

Starting point is 00:07:17 the power to indefinitely rule by decree, with that law going into effect today. And if you're unfamiliar with rule by decree, basically it gives Viktor the ability to govern the country unchallenged as long as he sees fit. Now I will note that the bill does still allow the country's constitutional court to act as a check, but one of the biggest things here is that Victor

Starting point is 00:07:32 has already stacked the court with loyalists. So yes, in practice it could provide a check, but it is very unlikely that is going to happen. Now Hungary's government has justified this new law by saying emergency powers are necessary to fight the outbreak. However, you have a ton of rights groups just saying this move suspends democracy.

Starting point is 00:07:47 You also have a ton of political analysts seriously questioning whether or not Viktor would give back power once the coronavirus was over. And in fact, there is actually precedent here to think that he may not. Because back in 2016, Viktor was granted emergency powers to deal with Hungary's migrant crisis, and he never gave those powers back.

Starting point is 00:08:01 He in fact still holds onto them today. So on this topic, we saw the director of policy solutions of Budapest based think tanks say, he is using this crisis to further increase his power. The Hungarian prime minister enjoys the situation where he can act as a captain in a crisis. I don't see him giving up these powers again easily. And with this, there are very real fears

Starting point is 00:08:17 that Viktor and his administration might use rule by decree to suppress independent voices and free press. And it seems like they might already be taking those steps because the bill also criminalizes any attempts to stop the Hungarian government from fighting the outbreak. And notably, that includes spreading of false information, which is punishable by up to five years in prison. But of course, the kicker here is that when you have

Starting point is 00:08:34 just one person in charge, it is up to them to decide what is false information. Right, to frame that for my majority US audience, right, imagine a world when Donald Trump calls something fake news, despite it contradicting reality altogether, that Trump actually had the legal authority to define something as false information, and if you didn't go along with that,

Starting point is 00:08:51 there were legal ramifications. Now as far as what's being done, Hungary is part of the European Union, and the EU has already launched punitive measures against the country, saying that Viktor's attacks on the media, the courts, and minority rights poses a systematic threat to its core values.

Starting point is 00:09:03 But of course, we've also seen the Hungarian government fighting back with a systematic threat to its core values. But of course we've also seen the Hungarian government fighting back with a spokesperson for the government saying, "'False claims of a power grab in Hungary are just that. "'Such insinuations are not only incorrect, "'but defamatory and impede the government's efforts "'in slowing down the spread of the coronavirus.'" So while I share this story because it's an important,

Starting point is 00:09:17 interesting story somewhere else for most of you, I also share it because, well, I guess to echo a point made by Bernie Sanders on Twitter yesterday. Throughout history, authoritarian leaders have used moments of crisis to seize unchecked power. And I think it's more important than ever, not just for the people of Hungary, not just for the countries you would think elsewhere.

Starting point is 00:09:33 It could never happen here. All countries, all people need to be aware of this. Because, hey, spoiler alert, while it didn't work out for Littlefinger, he was correct when he said, "'Chaos is a ladder. "'No person, no system is impenetrable and uncorruptible in moments of uncertainty anxiety Chaos people will grab power and others will just let it happen because they're scared now to expand on one of the key issues Hungary is also not the only place making big moves to block journalists and the press last week in Egypt authorities forced a reporter from

Starting point is 00:09:59 The Guardian to leave the country after she reported on a scientific study that said Egypt was likely to have more coronavirus cases than have been officially confirmed. In the Philippines, journalists can face sentences up to two months and a fine of $20,000 for quote, "'spreading false information.'" In Iran, authorities have been aggressively working to contain independent reporting by harassing, detaining, and censoring journalists. Officials there have also ordered the media

Starting point is 00:10:17 to only use the government's statistics when covering COVID-19. In Brazil, definitely not insane person, President Jair Bolsonaro has called the coronavirus a media trick, saying the people will soon see that they were tricked by these governors and by the large part of the media when it comes to coronavirus. It is a shameless campaign, a colossal and absurd campaign against the head of state. They want to force me out however possible. And it appears among the media's tactics

Starting point is 00:10:39 it is the nefarious sharing of facts and actual statistics. Which, on that note, as of 2.30 Eastern Standard Time worldwide, there are 826,222 confirmed cases, 40,708 confirmed deaths, also 174,115 recoveries. In the United States, we had 174,467 confirmed cases, 3,416 confirmed deaths, with 6,000 recoveries. And today for the sake of Bolsonaro, there were 4,716 confirmed deaths with 6,000 recoveries. And today for the sake of Bolsonaro, there were 4,715 confirmed cases,

Starting point is 00:11:08 168 deaths, 127 recovered. Honestly, who knows where the numbers could go there with him pushing against a quarantine now. But also in Bolsonaro's defense, it is probably exhausting and infuriating that not everyone believes your bullheaded lies. But hey, that's where I'm gonna end this show. Of course, I'd love to know your thoughts

Starting point is 00:11:23 on this last story, anything I talked about today. And hey, if you liked this video, dive into the news with me each day, hit that like button. Also, if you're new here, definitely hit that subscribe button, tap that bell to turn on notifications. Also, if you're looking for more to watch after this video, maybe you missed yesterday's show, you wanna catch up,

Starting point is 00:11:37 or you wanna check out one of the brand new clips, you can click or tap right there to watch that right now. But with that said, of course, as always, my name's Philip DeFranco, you've just been filled in. I love yo faces and I'll see you tomorrow. I hope you liked the video. Subscribe if you like it.

The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 3.31 Casey Neistat Houseparty Bounty, Pastors Arrested Over Coronavirus, & "Emergency Powers"

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