The Young Turks - All Three Guilty

Episode Date: November 25, 2021

All three of the men accused of chasing and killing 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery have been found guilty of murder in the jogger’s death. President Biden will spend Thanksgiving week at a private equity billionaire’s Nantucket home. The U.S. labor shortage is being exacerbated by immigration drastically slowing down. The CEO of Dollar Tree announced that his company is raising prices to $1.25 at stores across the United States. The head of the Oklahoma Republican Party called on Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel to resign after she expressed the party’s commitment to the LGBTQ+ community. A former St. Louis police officer convicted of beating a Black undercover detective during a 2017 racial injustice protest has only been sentenced to one year and one day in prison. Host: Ana Kasparian Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Why just survive back to school when you can thrive by creating a space that does it all for you, no matter the size. Whether you're taking over your parents' basement or moving to campus, IKEA has hundreds of design ideas and affordable options to complement any budget. After all, you're in your small space era. to own it. Shop now at IKEA.ca.ca. What is up? Welcome to TYT. I'm your host Anna Kasparian, and this is our last show before we hit the holiday break, which I'm looking forward to. I'm sure you guys are looking forward to it as well. We will not have a show to.

tomorrow, which is Thanksgiving day or the day after that. But it'll give you guys a lot of time to catch up on our archives of commentary and news stories. So definitely catch up with things that you might have missed. Later in the second hour, we're going to be joined by John Ida Rolla. We're lighting it up in the second hour today. But I got to be honest, after a pretty long streak of nothing but bad news, looks like we've got a pretty giant good news story to share with you today. And many of you have probably heard about it already. But nonetheless, let's get to it now. So the three men involved in the fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery in the deep south in Georgia, to be exact, have been found guilty of murder. This is a big deal, especially just following the

verdict in regard to the Kyle Rittenhouse trial. Many people had absolutely no idea which way the jury would, you know, decide this case, especially when you consider the very clear racial makeup of the jurors, but none of that really mattered at the end of the day. It's clear that they took the, you know, instructions and the evidence seriously and came up with these decisions. Now, just to give you an idea of the rulings, we have Travis McMichael, who was found guilty of malice murder, four counts of felony murder, two counts of aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and criminal attempt to commit a felony. Greg McMichael, the father of Travis McMichael, was also found guilty of murder, but he was found not guilty of malice murder.

And their neighbor, William, Brian was also found guilty of malice murder, one count of felony murder and one count of aggravated assault. So all three of them were found guilty of murder. Keep in mind that each of them had multiple murder charges. And of the three of them, Travis McMichael is the one who not only shot the gun, but was found guilty of all the charges that he was attempting to defend himself against. Now, Greg McMichael, his son, Travis McMichael, and their neighbor, William Rody Bryan, were charged with murder, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and also attempt to falsely imprisonment.

So that's a summary. But I wanted to really break it down earlier for you guys. So you could see that, you know, the jurors really did look at each separate charge, and they made decisions based on what those charges entailed. They also asked for evidence to review evidence during their deliberations, including the video of Ahmaud Arbery getting shot by Travis McMichael. Remember, that video was leaked, and I have a feeling that, you know, there was this assumption by the now convicted felons, but at then, at that time, suspects that the video would somehow

exonerate them, but that was not the case. The panel deliberated for more than six hours on Tuesday before returning Wednesday morning. Less than an hour later, they asked to review the cell phone video at the heart of the case. And just to remind you all of what that video looked like, we're going to toss to it now. Keep in mind that they had an enhanced version of it as well. Let's watch. in prosecuting these individuals. They weren't even arrested until 74 days after Ahmaud Arbery was shot and killed. So I mean, it is incredible that there's justice.

His family, Amad Arbery's family, has referred to this as an anomaly to give you a sense of just how unexpected it is these days to get justice when these types of cases arise. But going back to that video and the contradictions that the McMichaels had made, you know, they had claimed that they drove alongside Ahmaud Arbery and asked him questions because they saw him going into a construction site, a home that was under construction. They claimed that there had been a string of burglaries in the area and they felt that he was suspicious. So they told the police that they just drove alongside Amad Arbery to ask some questions and

And that's when things got violent. But as you can see from that video, they clearly boxed him in. They tried to trap him on the road. And then, you know, you have, you know, the father, Greg McMichael with a handgun as he's standing in the bed of the pickup truck. You have Travis McMichael with the shotgun. Ahmaud Arbery had done nothing wrong. There was no evidence that he had committed a crime.

So he had been confronted by two men who were blocking him on the road and are armed. And so, you know, the argument from the McMichaels was, well, we were just trying to do a citizen's arrest. You know, we, uh, and then all of a sudden we were attacked by Ahmaud Arbery. He tried to reach for my gun. That's what Travis McMichael said. And so he tried to use a self-defense argument, uh, in regard to his decision to shoot and kill Ahmaud Arbery.

And the jurors clearly did not buy that self-defense argument. And by the way, going back to, uh, the prosecution, I think that the jury's the jury, I think that the prosecutors did an excellent job in this case, because not only were they able to point to all the lies or inconsistencies in the defense side, but they, you know, they were able to present evidence that really showed that Amad Arbery wasn't really doing anything wrong, and that he was being pursued by these individuals who just thought he was suspicious. The jurors also wanted to listen to the 911 call, the call that the McMichaels made to the police. after this, well, during this incident. So while Ahmaud Arbery was still alive. And it's interesting

that juries wanted to hear that and how Greg McMichael had described Amad Arbery in that call. Now, in regard to the string of burglaries, right, the whole excuse that the McMichaels had for pursuing him in the first place, I've shared with, I've shared all of this with you before, but let me repeat again, there was only one burglary, an automobile burglary that was reported to county police in the Satilla Shores neighborhood between January 1st and February 23rd, according to documents obtained by the Brunswick News. And by the way, that's also data from the Glen County Police Department. It involved a Smith & Wesson M&P 9mm pistol stolen January 1st from a pickup truck outside of the, outside of Travis McMichael's home. Gregory McMichael moved

the 2011 F-4, I'm sorry, Ford F-150 from one spot to another in front of the home at around 9.30 a.m. January 1st, forgetting to lock it afterwards, Travis McMichael told police. And then about an hour later, Travis McMichael found the handguns empty holster on the unlocked truck seat, the report said. I give you that information because, number one, there was not a string of burglaries. Number two, the only people who had been burglarized at that time were the McMichaels who didn't even have the common sense to lock their vehicle as there was a gun in that vehicle. So I think that that piece of information is incredibly important. And I'm sure that the jurors considered that as well. And I also wanted to talk a little bit about how

Travis McMichael really had a damning moment on the stand as the prosecutor was engaging in cross-examination because in order to claim that you shot and killed someone in self-defense, the individual that you shot and killed, in this case, Amad Arbery, would have to pose an imminent threat. And based on what you're about to hear and based on the fantastic line of questioning by the prosecutor, that just wasn't the case. Let's watch. when you first see him on Burford, he's not reached into his pockets. No, ma'am. Not running, no man.

And he never yelled at you guys? No, ma'am. Never threatened you at all? No, ma'am. Never brandished any weapons? Sorry, you're only trying to finish his answer? Yeah, he did not threaten me verbally, no ma'am. All right.

Didn't brandish any weapons? No, ma'am. Didn't plow out any guns? No, ma'am. Didn't plow out any knife? No, ma'am. Never reached for anything, did he? No.

He just ran. Yes, he was just right. I mean, come on. How are you going to claim self-defense? I mean, the last statement there was that he was just running. Someone's running away from you. They clearly don't pose an imminent threat. And so the jury did not buy the defense's argument here.

And look, the defense certainly was flailing. The facts were not on their side. And I think in a moment of desperation, we had what I would argue is one of the worst moments in the trial for everyone. I mean, it was insulting for the victim's family here, Ahmaud Arbery's family, and incredibly embarrassing for the defense. Here's that moment that I'm talking about. This is defense attorney Laura Hogue making one of the most disgusting statements I've heard

in a court. Turning Ahmad Arbery into a victim. after the choices that he made does not reflect the reality of what brought Ahmaud Arbery to Satilla Shores in his khaki shorts with no socks to cover his long, dirty toenings. That is the sign of an incredibly desperate defense attorney who is now relying on making statements meant to dehumanize the victim in the case. I think it was the last ditch effort. Clearly it failed. I'm happy to see it fail. I'm happy to see the verdict come down the way that it did, especially the day before Thanksgiving. You know, it's still such a tragic

story considering the fact that, you know, Ahmaud Arbery died while doing absolutely nothing wrong, while jogging. His family is going to have to suffer with that for forever. And it's just, it's still a tragic story. But it's nice to see justice served, especially considering how close the McMichaels and, you know, their neighbor got to basically get away with this, to not have to suffer any consequences for what they had done. Again, not a single person involved was arrested until 74 days after the shooting. And it was because of the nationwide attention on, you know, race relations in this country following the murder of George Floyd, that this situation, which, by the way, happened prior to the murder of George Floyd, you know, just came back up.

People were outraged that there wasn't justice. People were outraged that the McMichaels hadn't been arrested. And so because of all of that attention, we finally, were able to get prosecutors to look at that case seriously and file charges against the McMichaels and their neighbors. So that's the story. I'm really happy to see that all three were found guilty of murder. And I'm happy to see justice served in this case. The defendants are planning to appeal the decision. We'll see how that goes. But my guess is it's not going to bode well for them. So there you have it. There's the end to the Amad Arbery trial. The trial involving the three men who murdered Ahmaud Arbery. And yeah, it's, it's, again, nice to have a little

bit of justice. All right, let's move on to something completely different. I wanted to move to some political news today because I've noticed that a lot of people have been paying attention to what the Bidens are up to during the holiday break. But there are some details we really need to dig into, okay? This is the kind of story I love, because we need to connect dots that aren't being connected in the press right now. So. Man of the people, Joe Biden, will be vacationing for the Thanksgiving holiday in Nantucket, which is fine. Nothing wrong with Nantucket. You know, you want to go chill in Nantucket. I'm not hating. However, I might hate on you a little bit if you're hanging out in the home of private

equity billionaire David Rubinstein. Now, the president and first lady, Jill Biden, touchdown in Nantucket Tuesday night to spend the holiday week with extended family, planning to stay at the home of their friend, David Rubinstein, as they have done, the White House told reporters. And they've apparently done this. They've gone to Nantucket every year in a row for a very long period of time. Who knows? I don't care about that.

What I do care about, again, is the fact that they're chilling in Rubenstein's home. So what's wrong with Rubenstein? Well, he's the co-founder and also co-CEO of just this small private equity firm called the Carlisle Group, which has a long shady history. I'm sure we'll be getting into more details about that history later in the show. But I do want to talk a little bit about how the press seems to think it might be a little bit problematic, but they don't really know how to frame their question. Case in point, we have Peter Ducey asking White House Press Secretary Jen Saki about Biden's decision to stay in a private equity billionaires home in Nantucket during the break.

Let's watch. What message does it send to the middle class Americans president Biden says that he's trying to help who are struggling this week to cover the cost of the most expensive Thanksgiving ever that the president is going to take a few days off at a billionaire's compound in Nantucket. Well, first I would say, I don't know if you've cooked a turkey before, but a 20 pound turkey is a pretty big turkey. I think we can all agree. They're about $1 more.

So not to minimize that. Any increase in prices is something the President is concerned about, as is evidenced by his announcement today, and as his efforts to push forward on additional relief for the American people. But I just want to be clear that there are abundance of turkeys available. They're about $1 more for a 20-pound bird, which is a huge bird if you're feeding a very big family. And that's something that, again, we've been working to make sure people have more money in their pockets to address it as the economy is turning back on. Now, a far better way of asking that question, because let's keep it real, right? The right wing reporters like Peter Ducey are trying to pretend as if they're concerned about

the economic anxieties that Americans are facing today. I don't buy that for one second. And I think that the lack of sincerity in those very issues leads to Ducey asking the question or framing the question in such a terrible way. What I mean by Terrible is, no, why don't you ask why it is that Joe Biden, a Democratic president, thinks it's a good idea to vacation in the home of a private equity billionaire, who by the way, co-founded the Carlisle group alongside Glenn Yunkin, who just beat, you know, the Democratic incumbent in the gubernatorial race for Virginia.

Like, you know, Terry McCall, if the Democrat lost to Glenn Yonkin, one of the things that Democrats are supposed to dislike about Yonkin, other than the fact that he's a political opponent, is that he's a private equity guy and private equity guys, not good, bad, right? Now, private equity guys are not good. They are bad, and I'll explain why in just a second. But it just, you know, just based on optics alone, it's not a good look, right? But then you also have to keep in mind that this sends the message that I think a lot of American voters are kind of privy to at this point, that when it comes to a lot of the bread

and butter issues, when it comes to the substantive political ideology that impacts our everyday lives, there's a lot of agreement between Democrats and Republicans. So without further ado, let's talk a little bit about the Carlisle group, and more importantly, another decision made by the Biden administration just recently that I think needs to tie into this story. So Carlisle specialized in buying and selling businesses that relied on government spending, and it hired former government officials to help it. Carlisle partners included James Baker III, a former Treasury Secretary, Peter Carlucci, a former defense secretary.

Also, don't forget about former President George H.W. Bush, who was once an advisor to the firm. Now, just this week, Biden made the decision to reappoint Jerome Powell as the government. the Federal Reserve's chair. Now, Jerome Powell was appointed by Donald Trump, and it's a little curious, right, that Biden has decided, nah, just reappoint the guy. Now, Jerome Powell has been a little disastrous, especially considering the monetary policy coming out of the Federal Reserve, both before the pandemic and then how it basically went into overdrive during the pandemic. We've talked about, you know, quantitative easing on this show before. I'll get back into it again. But

But in terms of inflation, the Federal Reserve has had a big role in creating inflation in certain sectors of the economy, especially when we're talking about the housing market. Because these private equity firms, right, private equity firms like Black Rock, for instance, will get this access to cheap money from the Federal Reserve and they invest it in residential real estate, which they then turn into rentals, right? thus taking the limited supply of housing out of the market, keeping it for themselves, hoarding this real estate for themselves in order to corner the rental market. We've seen that with Black Rock, and we see it with Carlisle Group as well. And so, you know, on one hand, you

see the administration get hit hard by fears of inflation. On the other hand, what Biden just did in reappointing Fed Chair Jerome Powell, it just exacerbates the inflation. that we're already experiencing, which is obviously going to hurt him politically even further. Because Democrats don't know what they're doing, right? They're so blinded by their own cozy ties to Wall Street that they honestly hurt themselves politically, both when it comes to optics and when it comes to how these cozy ties lead to policies that actually hurt their own base. So with that said, let's talk a little more about Jerome Powell's role in the Federal Reserve and his close ties to the Carlisle Group, right? Because this is very much a relationship

of give and take. Carlisle Group loves Jerome Powell. Jerome Powell loves Carlisle Group. He actually used to work for them. So in the early 2000s, Powell was a partner at the Carlisle group, a private equity firm that specialized in hiring former government officials and cashing in on their connections. At Carlisle, Powell learned firsthand about debt-driven business models of private equity business, which delivered hundreds of millions of dollars of profit to senior partners while saddling the companies they bought and sold with debt and downsizing. I mean, we've seen this happen with companies like Toys R Us, for instance.

Toys R Us is doing pretty well, but a private equity firm comes in, saddles the company with so much debt, it becomes untenable. And before you know it, Toys R Us is gone. It goes bankrupt. A lot of activity from private equity firms usually involves... One of the hardest parts of getting older is feeling like something's off in your body, but not knowing exactly what. It's not just aging. It's often your hormones, too. When they fall out of balance, everything feels off. But here's the good news. This doesn't have to be the story of your next chapter. Hormone Harmony by Happy Mammoth is an herbal formula made with science-backed ingredients designed to fine-tune your hormones by balancing estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, and even stress hormones like cortisol. It helps with common issues such as hot flashes, poor sleep, low energy, bloating, and more. With over 40,000 reviews and a bottle sold every 24 seconds, the results speak for themselves. A survey found 86% of women lost weight, 77% saw an improved mood, and 100% felt like themselves again.

Start your next chapter feeling balanced and in control. For a limited time, get 15% off your entire first order at happy mammoth.com with code next chapter at checkout. Visit happy mammoth.com today and get your old self back naturally. That kind of business tactic. Now, Powell, Jerome Powell, is also a disaster because he's in charge of continuing the monetary policy, again, that has led to inflation in certain sectors of our economy between 2008 and, 2014, the Federal Reserve created roughly three times as much money as it had created between 1913 and 2007. In other words, it crammed about 300 years worth of money growth into a few short years. And then when COVID hit in 2020, the Fed printed about another 300 more years

worth of money in a period of months, some $3 trillion. So the idea here is, oh my God, we're experiencing an economic downturn, we need to help the banks, we need to help these private equity firms, because if we provide capital, if we provide liquidity, they're then going to engage in trickle-down economics, and they're going to save the economy. But it doesn't quite work that way. So the Fed doesn't create dollars in the bank accounts of ordinary Americans, as was reported in Fortune. Rather, it can only create dollars inside the bank vaults of 24 elite institutions on Wall Street called primary dealers, which include banks like J.P. Morgan and Citigroup. When the Fed prints money, it essentially engages in an extreme form of trickle-down

economics, a failed model, of course, by giving new cash to the biggest banks in America in hopes that they will eventually create jobs and boost wages. Now, that doesn't typically work out the way that we hope it does or work out the way that the Federal Reserve would have you believe because they take that money, they take the cheap money from the Fed, and they make investments on their behalf. They buy real estate, right, gobbling up the limited inventory of homes on the market, homes that typically would be bought by a couple looking to start a family, for instance. They do corporate stock buybacks. That's another example of themselves, like, you know, using an economic crisis and the monetary policy from the Federal Reserve to further enrich themselves, to artificially inflate the value of their shares, right?

And then you go to, you know, Biden reappointing Jerome Powell when his monetary policy has been pretty disastrous in regard to inflation. And then all of a sudden, you notice, oh, well, Powell's got ties to the Carlisle Group. Biden's hanging out in the home of the Carlisle Group co-founder. It's a small club, but they're all talking. And I feel like they're all working together. So many years of easy money policies by the Federal Reserve have been rocket fuel for private equity firms, like the Carlisle Group, because cheap debt is their lifeblood. It funds their ambitious takeover plans and even funds their paychecks directly. So everything is connected, everything is tied.

The Biden administration, Biden specifically has gotten a lot of heat for reappointing Jerome Powell as the chair of the Federal Reserve. That just happened recently. He's getting heat for that. So I don't know. I would argue that a savvy president who might be a little concerned about optics, wouldn't go, like, hang out in the home of the, you know, Carlisle, you know, co-founder, co-CEO, knowing full well that that individual had and has a working relationship with the very person

that you just reappointed. They love the cheap money. They love the Fed's monetary policy, even though it has negative impacts on our economy. And it's just, it all makes sense when you look at it. At the end of the day, it's just this club where decisions are not made on behalf of what's best for the American people. It's all about self-dealing. Carlisle Group loves Jerome Powell. They know Jerome Powell, really, like they've worked with Jerome Powell.

They know what kind of monetary policy Jerome Powell will continue the quantitative easing, which private equity firms like Carlisle Group will take full advantage of to enrich themselves. So that's what the question Peter Ducey was asking should have really gotten to. That's what the framing should have been about. The corruption, the close ties between our government and the banking industry, our government and Wall Street firms, that's the real issue here. But the problem is when you're a faux populist and you don't actually care about the ordinary American getting screwed over, you're not going to quite frame your question in a way that isn't so friendly to private equity or to Wall Street. So there you have it. There I am

unpacking what's really going on with Biden's cute little vacation during Thanksgiving break. We got to take a break now, though. And when we come back, I will tell you immigrants good, actually. We'll see you then. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to TYT. I'm going to read some viewer comments, some super chats, and then we'll get right to our next story. start with Peter Hamby in our super chat section, who writes us poems every day. Cowards among three, taking a man via racism, now face jury's wrath. Love it. It's nice, right, to have some good news, finally. And a few of you wrote in about that, which is so wonderful. So let's go to

Kara Curley, who says, finally actual murders being locked up, murderers being locked up. Why is that so rare. Look, I mean, the burden of proof in murder cases is a very high burden. That is a good thing. I think what we see in our justice system is just two different standards, depending on a number of different factors, whether we're talking about race, whether we're talking about resources and socioeconomic status. And when the criminal justice system is supposed to be about justice, those factors should not play a role at all. And I think that's, that's the issue we're seeing. I think the burden of proof in murder cases is the right burden. It should be a high burden. But we don't see the laws applied evenly, you know, so that's definitely a problem.

And I can totally understand why everyone, myself included, had no idea which way the jury would decide this case. No more trigonometry says, finally some good news after hellacious couple of weeks, agreed. And I.M. Sox says, is David Rubenstein just Dave Rubin in a trench coat and a fake mustache? Look, I have my issues with Rubenstein. There's no question, but he seems like he's got a functioning brain in the very least. Not saying he's a good guy, but it's a functioning brain. All right, without further ado, let's get to our next story because I love this obvious analysis coming from J.P. Morgan, because of course, they're concerned about the economy. They're concerned about their bottom line. And all of a sudden,

they're ringing the alarm in regard to anti-immigration policies and how it's already begun to hurt our economy. So, anti-immigration policies are already starting to hurt the economy. And that's not something that I'm saying. That's something that analysts over at J.P. Morgan are saying because they're noticing that the pool of workers, and I'm not just talking about the labor shortage today. I'm talking about the labor shortage in the future. The pool of workers is going to be much smaller than what was previously expected. Now, there are many factors contributing to that. And anti-immigration policies happen to be one of the biggest factors. Population slowdown threatens trend growth, the November 12 note from JP Morgan stated, highlighting the fact that due to more

aging boomers retiring from the workforce and three million fewer immigrants in the country, trend labor force growth is going to be limited at only 0.1% per year and risks hurting overall GDP growth. So they put together this fun little chart, fun little graph that I wanted to share with you all so you can kind of help, it'll help you visualize what was expected and what the shortfall looks like. So if you look at the pre-2017 trend, that's the orange line. It indicates the population. growth that the economy would come to depend on, to function appropriately. And then you look at the actual numbers and you see a pretty steep decline beginning in 2016.

Gee, I wonder why. And of course, the anti-immigration policies coming from the Trump administration and then the continuation of those policies by the Biden administration has been pretty disastrous. And so I also want to be clear about one thing. What we're talking about here is legal, legal immigration, okay? We're talking about workers who typically legally came into the country with visas meant to fill jobs, to work in certain industries, and what have you. And so the anti-immigration policies coming from the Trump administration weren't just

about ending undocumented immigration into the United States. It was about ending all immigration. And I think that while, you know, his core base, Trump's core base was under the assumption that that would somehow be a net positive for the country, that it would actually be positive in reserving or conserving our resources, the fact of the matter is that's really not the way things work. So I wanted to give you some more information about that. And mind you, the other factor you should keep in mind is that population growth has slowed

down considerably even without the immigration policies, because the birth rate has gone down pretty dramatically. In fact, it's gone down six years in a row as more and more couples are deciding against ever having children. Now, JP Morgan researchers noted that the Census Bureau estimated that the working age population, ages 16 to 64, peaked in 2019 and has finally been falling for almost two years. The estimates now put the working age population in 2021 at 2.5 million below expectations. The vast majority in the shortfall of these workers was a result of a decline in immigration to the United States. The researchers added, beginning during the Trump administration and continuing through the COVID pandemic.

And you know, when you really take a step back and you look at this country's history, it's kind of hard to remember that the Republican Party wasn't always as vicious as it is today in regard to immigration. In fact, when it came to undocumented immigrants in the United States, one of the most, I would argue, progressive laws that was signed, was signed by President Ronald Reagan in 1987. He actually provided amnesty to the undocumented. immigrants who were in the country at the time. Now, that's not to say that Ronald Reagan was this incredible fantastic president who I agreed on or agreed with on everything. But when it came

to the topic of immigration, if you watch debates between, let's say, even Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush on the topic of immigration, it sounds like two liberals debating that issue. And so you can see that the Republican Party has relied more and more on their culture wars, immigration being part of that culture war, to do their campaigning. They've become more and more extreme, because really, what else are they going to offer to their constituents, right? The fear and the hate is what you get over and over again in these GOP campaigns, certainly on a presidential level as of late.

And so I want to go back to what Reagan was like, because in 1986, that 1986 was when Ronald Reagan signed that bill. It was called the Immigration Reform and Control Act. And again, it provided amnesty to most undocumented immigrants who came to the country prior to 1982. And here's Ronald Reagan explaining during a debate why he chose to sign that legislation into law. I supported this bill. I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and who have lived here, even though sometime back they may have entered illegally.

With regard to the employer sanctions, this, we must have that, not only to ensure that we can identify the illegal aliens, but also, while some keep protesting about what it would do to employers, there is another employer that we shouldn't be so concerned about. And these are employers down through the years who have encouraged the illegal entry into this country because they then hire these individuals. and hire them as starvation wages and with none of the benefits that we think are normal and natural for workers in our country. And the individuals can't complain because of their illegal status. No, but you guys, let that sink in for a second. What he said there was absolutely correct. Part of the legislation he signed into law in 1986 would basically penalize employers who hire

undocumented immigrants. Now, you can argue that that's just a way to punish undocumented immigrants, and I definitely, like, agree that there's that element to it. However, there's an issue with employers specifically hiring undocumented labor because they can pay them whatever they want. And what are the undocumented workers going to do? Complain about it? Are they going to go to the authorities? They're in the country in an undocumented status and could get deported. And so that ends up driving wages down for everyone, not to mention it leads to abuse of undocumented immigrants. And so what Ronald Reagan was saying there was actually 100% correct, right?

Providing amnesty for the undocumented immigrants in the country already was really important in providing worker protections to them and also ensuring that it didn't lead to wages being driven down as a result of, you know, underpaid. undocumented labor. So I just wanted to provide that example because when you look at the Republican Party today, it just shows how much they've decided to lean into the xenophobia, how much they've decided to lean into anti-immigration rhetoric specifically for campaigning purposes, specifically for their honestly 100% pivot to culture war and culture war only. And it doesn't have to be that way. And at the end of the day, the very people who have allowed that hate messaging to persuade

them might actually be harmed by that kind of thinking in the future. And I'm talking about economically. At least that's what we're seeing in the analysis that's already coming out from JP Morgan. All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, we've got more news for you all, including, let's see, what do I have for you guys later? Oh, companies are raising their prices using inflation as an excuse. But what's really at play? We'll give you those details and more. Welcome back to TYT, Anna Casperian with from the damage report.

We'll be joining me in the second hour. For now though, I'm going to read a few of our member comments, starting with Jenks Alat Mansion who says, hey Anna, just got my TYT hat and shirt in the mail today. Happy early birthday to me. Yes, happy birthday. Keep going strong, everyone. Thank you, thank you.

I hope you guys have an awesome Thanksgiving break. Shikata writes in and says, so you don't like Mexican illegals, good, then do your own roofing, your own paving, your own construction, and pick your own fruit and vegetables. Yeah, I mean, I just think that people tend to take others for granted until they experience the ramifications of taking those people for granted. And I mean, immigrants are such an important part of this country. And, you know, ending immigration, which is effectively what Trump did, I'm not just talking about illegal immigration, I'm talking about legal immigration, has already been pretty bad for the economy. And it's just fascinating to see, you know, Wall Street analysts panicking

about it. In our new YouTube member section, we've got We Dem Boys. Thank you for becoming a new member. Dean Ellis and Susan Blackburn. We're going to have an awesome bonus episode. I'm unfortunately not going to be able to join it. But Brett Erlich is going to be stepping in for me and John Iderola will be joining him. And there's some really, really fun. in stories you don't want to miss. You can become a member by going to t-y-t.com slash join, or if you're watching on YouTube, just click on that join button and you'll be presented with a list of options and you can join at whatever tier you feel comfortable with. All right, well, let's talk a little bit about how some of the most profitable corporations are taking advantage of the inflation

narrative to justify their price hikes. Dollar tree executives are using inflation. as an excuse to raise their prices to something that makes the name of their company completely irrelevant. So this comes as the company, by the way, is making record profits. Dollar Tree CEO, Michael Widditsky, who raked in around $11 million in total compensation last year in 2020, announced Tuesday that his company is raising prices to $1.25 at stores across the United States, pointing to the current inflationary environment. So Warren Gunnells, who of course works closely with Bernie Sanders.

He is the director for Senate budget chair, Bernie Sanders, had a great tweet about this. And I noticed it got a lot of attention for good reason. He writes, dollar tree made over a billion dollars, $1.23 billion in profits this year. And then gave its CEO over $10 million in pay while its workers get as little as $8.32 an hour. Over $7,400 tree employees are forced to rely on food stamps and Medicaid subsidized by U.S. taxpayers cite the damn corporate greed. And I loved that tweet because the media's coverage of this has been absolute garbage because

is they just take what the corporate executives say at face value. Oh, I mean inflation, it's inflate. They say it's inflation, so they have to raise their prices. Okay, but does that really make sense? How about dig in? How about dig into the financials, the basics when it comes to the company health? Like how much money did they bring in in 2020? Did they really suffer from the pandemic?

What are the real issues here? Just raising prices to a dollar. and 25 cents, it might not sound like a big deal to you, might not sound like a big deal to a lot of people, but consider, you know, the people who rely on these discount stores to make ends meet. I mean, 25 cents is a pretty significant increase in price, right? When it comes to items that people need to buy from stores like Dollar Tree. And I love that Warren Gunnells wants these reporters to cite the corporate greed because you're not going to get that citation. I'll give you a good example of that. Here is one way that you're likely to see the story covered in the press.

On Wall Street positive reaction, investors have long been pressuring these dollar stores to raise their prices. Dollar tree stock price soaring in response to this news. On Main Street, a far less kind reaction. Oh, is Wall Street really happy about this news? Remember, it's all about maximizing. maximizing profits. Maximizing profits means a better return for shareholders. So of course shareholders love the dollar tree has increased its prices. I mean, that's what they've been pressuring the executives to do. And that's exactly what they did. Now, let's get back to corporate CEOs and how they performed how much money they made. That's a better way of putting it. How much money they made during the pandemic. So the Institute for Policy Studies

noted in a May study that the CEO for the Dollar Tree, who took over as the Dollar Tree CEO in July of 2020, received $11.3 million in total compensation last year. That's 715 times as much as the pay for the company's median worker, a part-time U.S. store employee who earned $15,816. But by the way, don't think that the dollar store is this isolated case. This practice is really seen across the board when it comes to the most profitable corporations in the country. So in 2020, according to a recent analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, CEOs made 351 times as much as a typical worker. And CEO pay has soared by a whopping 1,322% since 1978. Oh, they're doing just fine, just

fine. And they'll use any example to maximize their profits. In this case, oh, we're worried about inflation. Inflation's hitting us hard. We got to raise our prices. Of course they would do that. Gives them an excuse to make more money without having to change a damn thing, right? A report released earlier this month by the watchdog group accountable.us found that at least a dozen major U.S. corporations have reported nearly $11 billion in profits. The same quarter, they announced price increases along with over $34 billion in stock buybacks and dividends this year. And some of those companies, by the way, include Procter & Gamble, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola,

they ain't hungry. They're doing well. They're doing real well. But they could be making more money by exploiting the awful reporting on inflation that we've seen in the press. And that's exactly what they're doing right now. So there you have it. I'm going to read one more graphic because this is important.

This is from the Wall Street Journal of all places. They say that nearly two out of three of the biggest U.S. publicly traded companies have profited or reported fatter profit margins so far this year than they did over the same stretch of 2019. They're doing better today than they did prior to the pandemic. Nearly 100 of these giants have booked 2021 profit margins. share of each dollar of sales a company can pocket that are at least 50% above 2019 levels. But they probably don't want the media to report that because they want to justify the price

increases as if they're really, really suffering and struggling with inflation. It's just absolute garbage. I mean, it just shows you how much the corporate media helps to either provide cover or even do the bidding of these corporate goons. All right, I'm going to do one more story before we bring John in to help me do the second hour. We've got a lot of great stories to share with you there. Let me get my papers in order. I'm going to talk about Ronald McDaniel, because she's in a bit of a pickle here. R&C chair, Rhonda McDaniel, must have forgotten the fact that the Republican Party didn't

really stand in support or in favor of gay couples in this country. Because now she's facing some backlash following her decision to say that she wanted to create an R&C Pride Coalition. Okay. Now, she got backlash from some GOP leadership in states like Oklahoma, for instance. One person I have in mind is the head of the Oklahoma GOP. In a 1,100 word fundraising email headed R&C chair must change course or resign, Oklahoma GOP Chair John Bennett said, Ronna McDaniel must resign if she cannot or will not stand for who we say we are.

And by the way, let's be clear, the R&C platform still says that Republicans are against gay couples. Let me give you more. McDaniel crossed conservative Christians when she announced the creation of an RNC pride coalition at the annual spirit of Lincoln dinner put on by log cabin Republicans, a group of conservative LGBTQ party members who are apparently also oblivious to the fact that the individuals that they support absolutely hate them. The event held November 9th at Donald Trump's Mar-Lago Club. So the email also said some other pretty terrible things. Bennett not pleased with

Ronna McDaniel, the Oklahoma GOP will not cooperate with this decision. And as your chairman, I assure the Oklahoma Republican Party that I will continue to stand up for our Republican Party values and our principles. He added that religious freedom is flat out, incompatible with the pillars of the LGBT movement. So the civil rights of others are incompatible with religious liberty. Okay, religious liberty should be, you are free to practice your religion as long as it doesn't harm other people. You can't cite your religion for your reasons of, you know, a reason to discriminate against

certain people, right? But I just think it's so fascinating because here, I mean, he's making it abundantly clear. that he believes that his particular religious beliefs take priority over the civil rights of members of the LGBT community. And to be sure, I know a huge portion of this country doesn't see it as a civil rights issue. It's a civil rights issue. Let me give you more. He says this, Bennett, let's clear the way for those who are either too incompetent, I love

that he's calling others incompetent, or too selfish to actually defend liberty and our Judeo-Christian founding. So this guy's a complete clown, okay? And Bennett also blasted a handful of log cabin Republicans and the policies that they're trying to champion because he just doesn't like gay people. Same with Marjorie Taylor Green. Marjorie Taylor Green was also pretty furious about this statement from Ronna McDaniel. But I also want to unpack what the intentions are here.

Because Rana McDaniel isn't some lefty who's looking to protect the rights of the gay community. No, she's trying to find a way to, on one hand, placate the log cabin Republicans who are gay Republicans, you know, LGBT members who identify as Republicans, which still blows my mind. She's also doing it because they want to expand their base. And so discriminating against certain groups of people doesn't really help when you're trying to expand your base. And so while on one hand, she's trying to be a little more welcoming to the gay community, when you look at the actual party platform, Republicans remain exactly who they've always been, right?

So they say, this is the last graphic, traditional marriage and family based on marriage between one man and one woman, is the foundation for a, this is so amazing, free society that has for millennia been entrusted with rearing children and instilling cultural values. No, they think that banning gay marriage, today, this is the GOP's party platform. This is their party platform today. Not in 2010, not 50 years ago, today. They think that banning gay marriage is what leads to a free society. That's who they are.

So spare me the sweet talk toward the gay community, Ronna McDaniel. We know what you're really up to. But I do love that she got burned by the more extreme elements of her own party who literally just can't hide their hate even when it can be politically advantageous for them to do so. All right, we got to take a break. When I come back, John Ida Rola will be joining me for some more stories, for some fun in the second hour. Don't miss it. We'll see you in a few minutes. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks.

Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members, only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.