The Young Turks - Buttigieg Police Conspiracy EXPOSED

Episode Date: September 16, 2019

TYT Investigates exposes the shady circumstances behind Pete Buttigieg's firing of a black police chief. Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian, hosts of The Young Turks, break it down. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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All right, welcome the Young Church, Jake U Gran and Kisperin with you guys. I'm back in L.A. It feels great. So we got a huge show ahead for you guys. A major progressive group endorses a candidate. Which one is it? If you haven't heard the story, you might be a little surprised. So speaking of getting surprised, corn pop is in the program today. Apparently, Biden had a run in with a gangster named corn pop.

And is that true? Is it not true? Is it real? Yeah. And that story has a shocking twist. Yeah. No, no. The corn pop story is awesome.

What's going on with your large collar today? Yeah, I'm popping my collar. What are you going to do about it? Yeah, this is how, you guys can't see it from the side, but from the side, your collar looks gigantic. No, they can see it from the side, but not from your side. All right, anyway, you know what we call this? Jank Pop.

Oh, God. All right, anyway, so that's a Biden story from later. That's huge. It's so. Okay, I'm coming at you, Corn Pop. Anyways, I got my chain link around my arm. All right, that's later in the program, later in the program. All right, and we're having fun, but we might not be having fun for much longer because apparently

We war with Iran might be imminent, so that's all coming up. New details on Kavanaugh, huge, huge show ahead. And in the third hour, popular uprising in West Virginia, which I love, get your red bandanas on. Okay, so now having said that, let's get started. Nope, come to me. Yep, okay, I'm back. Okay, TYT investigates has a major story.

on the South Bend Police Department and how some in that department appeared to try to influence Pete Buttigieg in firing the black police chief. That's a very interesting story, and you're gonna wanna hear all the details, and some parts of it are deeply problematic. Anna Kis Farian has more. Democratic presidential candidate and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg has been embroiled in a seven-year controversy involving allegations of race. racism within the city's police department.

His decision to ask the town's first black police chief to step down didn't help. Soon after Buttigieg took office as South Bend mayor in 2012, he attempted to fire the town's first black police chief, Darryl Boykins. Boykins ultimately refused to step down and was later demoted. Now, TYT Investigates has seen previously unreported legal documents detailing secret recordings of South Bend police officers allegedly conspiring to work with Buttigieg's campaign donors to influence him to fire and replace Boykins. One officer is quoted as saying, it is going to be a fun time when all white people are in charge. How do we know about the tapes?

Former South Bend Director of Communications Karen DePape heard the recordings and described them in an internal police report back in 2012. Over the previous year, first while dealing with dysfunctional phone system equipment for the police department, DePape came across around a dozen recorded conversations that she said alarmed her. In a deposition later, DePape said she listened to the calls because, quote, it was something I considered illegal. Buttigieg has refused to release the tapes, arguing that it would violate federal wiretacks.

laws. And Buttigieg has said he does not know what's on the tapes and that he's not sure he can even ask. But these legal documents show that city attorneys acting on his behalf did ask, and the city does know. Because after DePap filed a wrongful termination suit, the city attorneys sent her a list of questions about the tapes. And she answered, describing in detail what she heard in these recordings.

WIT Investigates has seen the documents revealing what she heard and hears what they said. The documents reveal that in February of 2011, two white police officers were heard discussing a campaign to get rid of Boykins with Buttigieg donors acting as go-betweens. In April, the officers say they believe Buttigieg is unaware of the plan and they expect the little effing squirt, as one calls him, to win the mayoral nomination. he does win, a third officer in June reports hearing directly from Buttigieg that Boykins is done. Some of the officers involved from both the SBPD and the county homicide unit made up of police from South Bend and its suburbs were recorded discussing Boykin's in racist terms

using ebonics in reference to him and other black people. Two black police officers are named as either a target for removal or the subject of racist rhetoric. DePape writes in one of the documents, quote, I believe that speaking in abonics and alluding that chief of police because he is black was covering for black gang members to be a racial slur. I believe this because they were talking in ebonics and it made me believe they wanted to get rid of boykins because he was black. No comments were made as to him not performing his duties.

that he protects gang members. According to the documents, one of the conversations was between Captain Brian Young and then Lieutenant Dave Wells of the County Homicide Unit. They were discussing problems with a local gang known as the Cash Out Boys when Lieutenant Wells started speaking in what is termed as Ebonics. Lieutenant Wells in Ebonics stated to the effect, ain't nothing gonna get done with the cash out boys because Boykins, he'd take care of his home boys. Both Wells and Young began to ridicule Boykins and mock him when Wells stated that Corbett had

a plan to get rid of him. Commander Tim Corbett ran the county homicide unit. He was Wells' boss. He was also a controversial figure in South Bend and was commonly referred to as Teflon Tim. In 2011, Captain Young fills Wells in on a plan to get rid of Boykins. Here's how the documents describe that call. Young inquired, what was the plan, and Wells stated, it involved the money people. Young asked Wells, what do you mean by money people?

Well stated, Hensley and Urbansky, people that are putting money in Buttigieg's campaign. Well stated, Corbett said they are planning to get rid of Boykins and that they had plans to make changes. Both Hensley and Urbansky deny this. Hensley is Sam Hensley, who happened to be the city's streets commissioner under the previous mayor. Bob Urbanski was a city contractor who Corbett had actually done a favor for back in 2006. Urbansky had an issue with a contractor, and Corbett showed up to the contractor's

house with his badge and gun to allegedly intimidate the man. The plan didn't end up working, but Urbanski apparently ended up returning. the favor to Corbett. According to T.Y.T. Investigates, the documents suggest the plan was well underway by April 5th, 2011, one month before the primary. Wells and Young discussed Corbett's plan to get rid of Boykins. Later, on April 5th, Young and Wells discussed new details of the plan, expanding its scope beyond just getting rid of Boykins. Now the two target other colleagues to whack. In the legal documents, Karen DePape writes, Lieutenant Wells and Captain Young continue conversations

regarding the plan to get rid of Boykins. I believe this conversation also discussed getting rid of Will Johnson, a black investigator because Boykins put him there. I believe this conversation had to do with Wells and Young making a plan of who they wanted to whack. After Buttigieg had won the primary, the officers begin to discuss who Boykin's replacement should be. Investigative division police chief Steve Richmond and current South Bend police chief Scott Ruskowski get mentioned in the tapes as early as June 3rd, 2011. In her deposition,

DePapes says, quote, Captain Young and Lieutenant Wells discuss their plans when Buttigieg is elected. They state Corbett advised Buttigieg that Boykins is effing worthless. Ruskowski was a captain at the time and apparently suggested that his own boss get the role of police chief. At the time, Buttigieg was apparently considering another officer for the job. And according to what DePape wrote in the documents, Ruskowski wanted to squash that. Young and Wells discussed Ruskowski, meeting with Buttigieg to sway him away from Steve Richmond, trying to promote Jeff Walters. Several police calls were made to that effing crew, people with the money, Karen DePape wrote in the documents. Lieutenant Wells stated that several phone calls were made to that effing crew, people with

money. The call contained information that Corbett was putting pressure on the people with the money to put influence on Buttigieg to remove Boykins. I believe this may have been the conversation where Wells stated, Tim says it is going to be a fun time when all white people are in charge. According to the legal documents, by June 16th, Buttigieg and Ken Cotter, who is now the prosecutor, have a discussion about Steve Richmond. Then, on July 7th, Young and Jim Taylor, who was part of Corbett's homicide unit, talked to Buttigieg about replacing Boykins with Richmond as chief.

Asked about conversations with Buttigieg about removing boykins, Urbanski told TYT, quote, I've got no knowledge on that. In response to a follow-up question, Urbanski said, Have a nice day and hung up. What we do know is that Boykins was eventually asked by Buttigieg to step down. At first, Boykins agreed to do so and later contested the request by Buttigieg. Boykin's was eventually demoted. Buttigieg has changed his story as to why he wanted to fire Boykins.

Buttigieg has said that his decision stems from Boykin's handling of the secret recordings, and he alleges that prosecutors warned Boykins could be prosecuted for illegal wiretapping. But the U.S. attorney declined to prosecute Boykin's, and no one even said a crime occurred. Buttigieg also claimed that the feds threatened to charge Boykins unless he was let go from the department. But again, no one has said that Boykins committed a crime. Buttigieg later said that he couldn't have Boykins in the police department while he was facing an investigation. But again, Boykins was never charged with anything.

In fact, Boykin's was asked by prosecutors to hold onto the tapes, which is strange if he were really the subject of a wiretapping investigation. So let's go back to Buttigieg's campaign donors, exactly how much did Hensley. and Urbanski, the so-called people with money, donate to Buttigieg's campaign. Buttigieg's first mayoral campaign disclosures were actually destroyed. And that's legal to do in this local election. But before they were, the South Bend Tribune reported that Erbansky chaired his 2011 campaign and was his biggest donor.

Erbansky gave Buttigieg $10,000 in 2010. The report also says Urbanski donated office space to the campaign. According to 2011 first quarter filings obtained by TYT, the office space was worth $1,850 a month and was donated by Urbanski's company, Main Street Row. The value of that donation totaled $7,400 for the first four months of 2011. TYT Investigates had to do more digging with Hensley. According to the story, Hensley described himself as a modest donor, giving maybe $1 or $200. The 2011 first quarter filings show just a $50 donation from Hensley and an in-kind donation valued at $44.30, connected to an event on March 25th.

But what about other forms of campaign contributions? According to TYT investigates, asked whether the in-kind donation indicated his participant. in a fundraiser for Buttigieg, Hensley said he, quote, never had a fundraiser for him, never. A flyer from the campaign, however, shows Hensley and Urbanski co-hosting a $125 per person fundraiser for Buttigieg at Urbansky's home on April 13th. Both donors deny having police department personnel discussions with Buttigieg. Buttigieg's campaign national press secretary, Chris Mager, asked to see the documents that T. WIT Investigates has seen, arguing that, quote, you're more than willing to report rumors

you're unable to prove, so it'd be nice to see some of this. He provided no further comment to TYT Investigates. All right, well, now you've seen some of what we have, and it's up on tyt.com, and you could all read it for yourselves. Look, let's give a little perspective in context now. So is any of the, are any of these reports or documents charging that Buttigieg knew of the entire plan and was complicit in it? No, not as far as we can tell.

Now there is that part about where one of the officers claimed that they heard it from Buttigieg himself that Boykin's was done. But even that doesn't indicate that he was part of the plan in the first place. And they call them, the officers apparently call him a little squirt in this regard. And they seem to want to influence them not directly but through his money people, Urbanski and the others. So on the other hand, to me, what is most interesting is not necessarily even about Buttigieg, but about how our system works in this country.

The two parts are one, how you influence the money people in order to get the results. And in this case, the results are clear. No matter who knew what part of the plan, unfortunately, the black police chief was originally fired, then demoted when the African American community said, wait, why are you firing this police chief who hasn't done anything wrong? And so, but it's not just that. There were three officers, black officers that were mentioned in the tapes. None of them ever got promotions in the time since the tapes.

And only one of them remains on the force today. Even worse, when Buttigieg started, there was 29 black cops in South Bend. Now there's only 15. Now it could be a coincidence that, hey, you know, they moved out of town, there was really things that were wrong with them, you could go on and on. But that is not a good record. And now 26% of South Bend is African American. The police force now is down to 6% African American.

And so whether Buttigieg knew any of the machinations of his money people and whether the cops were right about his money people, the results seem to be that black officers were moved out of the South Bend Police Department exactly as the police seem to be, the white officers seem to have plotted according to the documents. So that is damning. And then, so that's the role of money and that's all across the country in huge presidential and national elections and also in small elections in your neck of the woods. Now the second part that's damning about America overall is my God, how racism is so deeply

rooted. So according to the documents, the person who listened to the tapes wrote down that Corbett also called black gang members little apes. And then there's the line, of course, of it's going to be a fun time when all white people are in charge. And as it turned out, white people were back in charge. And so to see them talking in a way that is mocking of their police chief, even though he's their chief, but he's black, and how they pretend that he's on the side of the gang members, again, with no evidence at all, as far as we can tell from these documents, just, well, he's black and they're black, and how they plot against them. In this case, these allegations are not innuendo, not stereotypes, not something in the back

of your head. This is something very much in the front of their heads, and it's a plot that they seem to have, according to the documents, enacted, and if all of it is correct, certainly successfully so. And so not only do African Americans in this country have to deal with this, if they're regular citizens, they also have to deal with it if they're officials, and some of the things that they deal with are stereotypes, and others are active plots against them. So my God, if you didn't know before, well, certainly this gives you a little view into

what happens all across. You think this is just South Bend? Of course this isn't just South Bend. Some variations of this unfortunately probably happen all across the country. South Bend is the one we happen to know about because Pete Buttigieg ran for presidents. So a little investigation into this produced all of these results. And so what could you find in your hometown if we had real reporters looking into all the different parts of the government?

Not good. Yeah. So look, in terms of what Buttigieg knew and when he knew it, that should be the focus of a lot of reporters' attentions if they cared to cover his campaign thoroughly. And those are very fair questions for him to throw his hands up and go, I don't know, the black police chief just happened to get fired and demoted. And half the black police officers are no longer on the job. It's all a coincidence and has nothing to do with me.

Okay, that's a case he could make, but certainly one that he'd have to explain a little bit better. And right now, what we have is a lot of questions and the results are not good. Let's take a break. When we come back, we have more news for you, including possible war with Iran. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-E-NFTA. As a young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations are constantly peddling lies that serve the interests of the rich and powerful. But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies, debunking the conventional wisdom.

In each episode of Un-B-The-Republic, or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood or purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be. Featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational, aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, You must unlearn what you have learned. And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or you're uprooting

and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime. So search for UNFDR in your podcast app today. and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained, all at the same time. All right, back on the Young Turks, a couple of comments from our members about the Buttigieg story or the South Bend story. Of course, these are their opinions. I bathed in a very stable geniuses here. It says, let's say that Buttigieg was unknowledgeable of all of this. It still demonstrates how easily he was manipulated.

in giving racist and donors exactly what they wanted. Yep. And someone in here, I think he got erased, but made a very good point about how, well, he might not have known ahead of time, and we don't know that, by the way. But afterwards, I mean, it's now eight years running and still no action has been taken other than a lot of firings. By the way, Karen DePape, the American hero, who revealed what was in the tapes in the first place, fired.

And she, by the way, in case you're wondering, she's white, she heard what happened on the tapes, and she's like, that's unacceptable. Right. And by the way, the fact that she was fired led to this wrongful termination suit. And through that suit, the legal documents came up where she has to, she detailed what she heard in the tapes. Yeah. Yeah, the one thing that is incredibly clear from all of this is how Hero Karen DePapis.

Yeah. So anyway, now this is their handle on our members' website, but weed writes in, and guys, I gotta read these things, so bring it down. Anyway, it says, great work to YIT investigators. Jonathan Larson did this story, and it really is astounding work. I'm super curious to see if other reporters are going to pick up on it, given the, the depth of the charges. So Gabby Marita, again, her opinion, says beat Buttigieg, not racist, but definitely racist adjacent.

Well, look, I don't know about what's in his mind. I do know the results and I know that if I found out that some officers in a city I ran might have had this plot, I would take action. And so so far there's not been any positive action, only more. Black cops being eventually driven out of the South Bend Police Department. All right, now on to lighter stuff. Craig Cray Souffley says it's called jank wings, okay, jank's wings, referring to the collar. Annam Leith on Twitter says, jank pop, corny, always with the dad jokes, L-M-A-O.

And last one here is from the Progressive Twins, just got my TYT snapback. And this thing is dope, highly recommended to my TYT peeps. And that's a fact. I like the snapback. Yeah, that's on shopty.t.com. Yes. Real quick announcement, Mark Thompson is involved with a movie about vegetarianism that you guys should totally check out.

It's known as Game Changers, and he's a producer of the film, and he, look, he is obviously vegan. He talks about it quite a bit on the show, but what's great about this film is that it talks about all of these famous athletes and their diets and how, look, it's a total lie that vegans and vegetarians can't build muscle, they can't be healthy. There's plenty of them who rely on a plant-based diet, and they're not only super healthy and strong, they're successful athletes. So definitely check that out.

Go to game changersmovie.com. And one other quick announcement, as you know, we have partnered with Aspiration, which is a great financial institution. Go to aspiration.com slash TYT to open an account. It's one of the only places where you can invest your money ethically. They will not place your money in the fossil fuel industry or any other questionable corporation. They're FDIC insured and they pay interest on your account. So check them out, aspiration.com slash t-y-t.

All right. All right, let's do it. Unfortunately, let's talk about war. All right. The Trump administration has been inching closer to war with Iran. But after this weekend, it appears that the administration is sprinting toward military action against Iran. Now, this follows news that Iran allegedly bombed an oil facility in Saudi Arabia. Now, the United States claims that Iran is behind this.

Saudi Arabia claims that Iran is behind this. Neither party has provided any type of evidence indicating that this is the case. And even our allies are skeptical of these allegations. Now here's what we know so far. The Houthi rebels in Yemen claimed responsibility. The Houthi rebels in neighboring Yemen claimed responsibility for the assault, which hit one of the world's largest oil processing facilities, hundreds of miles from the Yemeni-Saudi border, and sharply impacted global oil prices.

But a senior U.S. official told ABC News Saturday that was false. It was Iran, the Houthis are claiming credit for something they did not do. That's a senior U.S. official. That is not a fact. That's right. That's right. So the reason why it's not a fact is because, again, no one has provided any evidence indicating that Iran is behind this.

And again, it's just both parties, both Saudi Arabia and members of Trump's administration, not everyone, but several members of Trump's administration, have been pushing for war with Iran. And so there have been some questionable claims by the United States previously when it comes to Iran. And now, I mean, I think you can understand why people are skeptical, they want to see evidence. Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Musavi dismissed the U.S. allegations, that it was responsible for a, was responsible, was pointless, a senior revolutionary guard commander warned the Islamic Republic was ready for full-fledged war.

So Iran has to walk a line there. They have to say, look, this isn't true, that's their claim, and then say, but hey, listen, don't attack us, because if you do, we're fully capable of being able to attack all of your bases and your aircraft carriers within a 2,000 mile perimeter. And so that will be the full-fledged war that they're talking about. And they're saying, look, if you think we took down your drone, which they did take down a drone, the question is, and this was an earlier incident, whether it was in Iranian territory or in international waters. And you think that we did these bombings, well, then obviously we have a lot of capability. And so as always, the neocons like Lindsey Graham are saying that, oh, this will be easy.

Once we bomb them, they'll know their place. I mean, we heard the same things about Iraq. It's preposterous. But to me, before we go further here, I want to give you the quote that I think is most important from the New York Times story on this. They said the satellite photographs released on Sunday did not appear as clear cut as U.S. officials suggested, was some appearing to show damage on the western side of the facilities, not from the direction of Iran or Iraq?

See, to me, that should be the first paragraph. Yes, yes, 100%. Also, as I mentioned, our allies are skeptical of these claims as well, including the British Foreign Secretary. He was quoted as saying, in terms of who is responsible, the picture is not entirely clear. I want to have a very clear picture, which we will be. having shortly. So look, again, there have been all sorts of accusations by the United States against Iran.

They've failed to provide any concrete evidence that Iran is the aggressor here. And remember, the relationship between the United States and Iran really started to fall apart after Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal. And implemented sanctions that are honestly really hurting the people of Iran. So look, one theory is that if Iran did this, well, it's a message to Donald Trump. You mess with our economic interests, well, then we're going to mess with yours. And Saudi oil very much does impact the U.S. economy. And so that is, I think, a sound theory, but you still need evidence, concrete evidence showing

that Iran is behind this oil facility bombing. So they do have one more piece of evidence that leans towards Iran. But there's also one piece of evidence that hasn't come in yet that I think is all important. So they say that there was 17 attempts of bombings, not all of them hit, and they say that it's a combination of drones and cruise missiles, and that would be beyond the capability of the Houthi rebels in Yemen. And well, I can see how the Houthis would have a hard time getting drones and cruise missiles.

So that's an interesting piece of evidence. But apparently, since some of the bombs missed, they can be recovered. And then you could see where they were made. Now, first of all, if you're going to find a bomb anywhere in the world, it's likely made in the USA. But in this case, that would be unlikely. And so, but that would be a very important piece of evidence. We should definitely not take any action until we have recovered such weapons and figured

out, what are they? Who made them? Who would have the capacity to possess and fire those type of weapons? And then you got to see if you trust the Saudis on that, because it landed in Saudi territory, and obviously the current government of Saudi Arabia are notorious liars. And then you'd have to trust the U.S. government headed by a notorious pathological liar. So this is where all Donald Trump's ridiculous, insane assertions and tweets become relevant. Yes. Very, very relevant to foreign policy and war.

Because it's super obvious to any sane person that Donald Trump cannot be trusted. He lies nonstop. So when it's about silly things and drawing in sharpies and even that's of course super important because that was about a hurricane in the path of the hurricane, but about his ego, etc. Well, they're amusing anecdotes and you look at it with some degree of despair, but they're not Well, when it comes to war, it couldn't be more relevant. So the fact that no one on planet Earth can trust our president, including our own citizens,

is a big problem in this case. Absolutely. Because by the way, one of the things is that they could be telling the truth. But even so, they've lost so much credibility. And it's not just Trump, Pompeo on foreign policy, has no credibility at all. Right, I mean, he, oftentimes when we talk about Warhawks within the administration, we would talk about Bolton, but of course Pompeo is part of that equation. was just more subtle in pushing Trump toward war.

And just to give you a sense of what Pompeo had to say about this alleged Iranian bombing, he said Tehran is behind nearly 100 attacks on Saudi Arabia, while Rouhani and Zarif pretend to engage in diplomacy. Amid all the calls for de-escalation, Iran has now launched an unprecedented attack on the world's energy supply. There is no evidence the attacks came from Yemen. So, you know, he's putting out this message, and Trump, for his part, uses warlike wording in his tweets.

I'll give you an example, Saudi Arabia oil supply was attacked. There is reason to believe that we know the culprit are locked and loaded, depending on verification, but are waiting to hear from the kingdom as to who they believe was the cause of this attack and under the terms we would proceed. Okay, so locked and loaded is not going to make the situation any better. And think about the wording there. Trump is waiting on Saudi Arabia to confirm who conducted this attack. Why are you waiting on Saudi Arabia to inform you?

I mean, come on. So there's two things there. One, Tulsa Yabbard with a very harsh but tweet that I really liked saying I didn't know We know we were Saudi Arabia's bitches. Okay. Well, we've been. And so saying like we were waiting from Saudi Arabia to give us orders on who to attack. And unfortunately there are some Democrats who think we should do that.

So like Senator Chris Coons, well, this, well, we might have to go to war over this, depending on what Saudi Arabia says. No, no, no, we make our own decisions. And I'm not going to take orders from a butcher like Mohammed bin Salman on who did, who of his We should attack on his behalf. Right. Right. And on Pompeo, the reason he, among the many reasons he can't be trusted is they said that Iran

attacked some oil ships earlier and witnesses on the ships contradicted almost everything that Pompeo and US officials had said about those attacks. So they were clearly lying about those. And so now they've lost all credibility and there's no reason to believe any of the things that Pompeo and Trump have said. So let's focus on Trump a little longer. there's an angle to this that I think is relevant, it goes back to the point you were making about the loss of credibility in the administration.

So, in response to allegations that Iran attacked an oil facility in Saudi Arabia, Donald Trump tweeted, Saudi Arabia oil supply was attacked. There is reason to believe that we know the culprit are locked and loaded, depending on verification, but are waiting to hear from the kingdom as to who they believe was the cause of this attack and under what terms we would proceed. Now, Donald Trump was also very frustrated by the media reporting the truth about how he wanted to meet with officials in Iran to work out some sort of new Iran nuclear deal. Now, when he was pushing for this, he specifically said that he would meet with them

with absolutely no conditions. Let's meet, let's talk, let's work out a deal. But Trump said that he was upset that the reporting indicated that he was willing to meet with them with no conditions. The fake news is saying that I'm willing to meet with Iran, no conditions. That is an incorrect statement as usual. But is it incorrect? I want to go to video B1 because this wasn't so long ago, June 23rd, 2019.

I'm not looking for war. And if there is, it'll be obliteration like you've never seen before. I'm not looking to do that, but you can't have a nuclear weapon. You want to talk good, otherwise you can have a bad economy for the next three years. Not as far as I'm concerned, no preconditions. So again, that's Trump on June 23rd of this year. And then you also have both Mike Pompeo and Steve Mnuchin saying something very similar during a press conference.

Is this open the path for the president to meet with Rouhani? I would say secretary of Pompeo and myself and the president are completely aligned on our maximum pressure campaign. Now, the president has made clear. He's happy to take a meeting with no preconditions, but we are maintaining the maximum pressure campaign. I have for clarity on this. Can you foresee a meeting between President Trump and the Iranian leader later this month surrounding the United Nations? Sure. Would the president support that? And do you support that act? The president's made very clear. He's prepared to meet with no preconditions. Okay, so look, if they stuck with that, that's great. I think we should meet

with our enemies? I think that Donald Trump's gotten nothing from Kim Jong-un and has been played by him, but I don't mind that he went to go meet with Kim Jong-un. I think that's a positive step forward. Same with the Iranians and anyone else who might be our enemies. So you don't get to negotiate with your friends. That's not how it works. That's why we're negotiating in the first place. But of course, now Trump is backpedaled from that and saying, no, I won't do any preconditions. And as usual, lying about it, even though it is so easy to disprove as we just did. Now, that's Trump's reaction. And there's another important facet to this, which is that when he fired John Bolton or Bolton resigned, depending on who you believe, and they're both

notorious liars, so that's a hard one. He was goaded into saying, oh, yeah, I'm actually tougher than John Bolton. And so people who think I'm not being tough enough, and then I got rid of Bolton because he was too tough on Iran and North Korea. You'll see, I'm even tougher on them, oh no, don't do that. And a lot of people on TV, including MSNBC, participated in that. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, look, our, we have an entire war infrastructure surrounding every president that gets elected.

So Donald Trump might have this instinct to pull out of wars, like Afghanistan, for instance. He might have this instinct to avoid starting a preemptive war. He's been very critical of the war in Iraq, even though in the early phases he was. was supportive of it, but nonetheless, I mean, regardless of what a president genuinely wants, there's so much pressure, not just for Republicans, but Democrats as well, to act with brute force if there's even the slightest provocation. And in this case, we don't know for sure if Iran actually attacked that oil facility in Saudi Arabia.

I don't trust what the Saudis are saying. I want to see concrete evidence. Both parties, the United States and Saudi Arabia, have failed to provide that concrete evidence. And so, yeah, if there's this nonstop chorus of people surrounding Donald Trump pushing him into war with Iran, will he act irrationally and take the bait? I think that he would. And just to really reinforce my point that even Democrats, some Democrats are in favor of responding with brute force, here is Chris Coon, Senator Chris Coons, making the case during an interview. What's appropriate action? Well, first, I want to see. I want to see the end.

intelligence, but it seems credible that the Houthis don't have the sort of advanced drones that carried out this crippling strike on Saudi oil facilities. My hope is that the president will consult with his generals, as diplomats, his advisors, will look hard at the intelligence. Iran is one of the most dangerous state sponsors of terrorism. This may well be the thing that calls for military action against Iran if that's what the intelligence supports. I'd say one of the things that has kept America safe and secure for seven decades is a global network of alliances. Obviously, our alliance with the Saudis has been badly strained. But this is a moment where Iran is really pushing our resolve and is really testing to see whether

we're actually going to stand up. And if there's attacks by Iran on our close allies like Jordan, Israel, or the Saudis, we need to take seriously taking action against them. And I think it would be great to know that Republicans and Democrats would be behind that. See, that's a huge, huge problem. There's, there they go again. Establishment Democrats like Chris Coons going on Fox News and going, they're testing our resolve. We better show them how manly we are. No, it's amazing.

So where was the tough guy rhetoric when Saudi Arabia tested our resolve by killing a US resident and journalist at the Washington Post? Yep. And then, and kill me if you notice at the end there, he's like, oh, it's good to see how Republicans and Democrats are united in basically pushing for a war. Now, not all Democrats are going in that direction, but Coons is a guy who is establishment through and through. He's one of the co-chairs of the people who do the prayer breakfast.

And now those are guys going around the world, you know, trying to pass laws against homosexuality. But Coons is there for their prayer breakfast, okay? You're a fundamentalist Christian, Coons is there for you. You want to start a war, Coons is there for you. And then they tell me the Coos is on my side, and he's on the side of progressives. I didn't see that. Now, in neighboring state in Connecticut, luckily we have a rational senator in this case, Chris Murphy, he tweeted about Pompeo's comments, not on Coos's comments, but Pompeo's.

He said, this is such irresponsible simplification, and it's how we get into dumb wars of choice. The Saudis and the Houthis are at war, the Saudis attacked the Houthis, and the Houthis attack back. Iran is banging the Houthis and has been a bad actor, but it's just not as simple as Houthis equaling Iran. So luckily there are some sane voices in the Democratic Party, but unfortunately not all. And finally that leads me to Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who's never met a war he didn't want to make out with. So he tweets, it is now time for the US to put on the table an attack on Iranian oil refineries.

if they continue their provocations or increased nuclear enrichment. Now Iran has threatened full-fledged war in retaliation if they are bombed, which makes sense, because that's kind of how things work, right? And so, and Graham then followed up by saying Iran will not stop their misbehavior until the consequences become more real, like attacking their refineries, which will break the regimes back. See, that's the part that drives me crazy. I know Lindsay Wars for war, period.

Any war, name it, Lindsay Graham's in favor of it, okay? With Iran, he would love it. The military makes more money, oil companies make more money, the right wing in Israel is thrilled. So Lindsey Graham's like, military industrial complex for the win. But look at what he says, the same incredibly stupid things that they said before the Iraq war. Oh, it's okay, we just bombed them and it'll break their back. No, Iran is four times the size of Iraq. And they have, unfortunately, a very competent military.

And so if we bomb Iran and proudly declare that we are bombing, not Saudi Arabia, not some conflict in Yemen, but the United States of America is bombing and invading Iran. And you can say, well, hey, they're not invading. We're just bombing the living crap out of them. If they bombed Texas, would we consider that an act of war? Of course we would, right? Any rational country would. And so the idea that they will just go quietly into that good night and now, no, oh my God,

I'm so sorry, Lindsey Graham, yes, it's preposterous. They would fight back and we would get into a war that makes the Iraq war look like child's play. That's what Lindsey Graham wants. Now Donald Trump, the buffoon, is stumbling right into that. By the way, with the help of some Democrats like Chris Coons. We gotta take a break. When we come back, we have an update on Brett Kavanaugh, some details into an allegation that was made against him during the Supreme Court hearings.

And we have other news including Ben Shapiro wanting to know a specific description of Kavanaugh's penis. We'll be right back. At TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech companies are taking control of our online lives, constantly monitoring us and storing and selling our data. that doesn't mean we have to let them. It's possible to stay anonymous online and hide your data from the prying eyes of big tech. And one of the best ways is with ExpressVPN. ExpressVPN hides your IP address, making your active ID more difficult to trace and sell the advertisers. ExpressVPN also

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slash join today. In the meantime, enjoy this free second. All right, back on the United Turks, lots of comments on Iran and then one fun one. Chris Durant said the fact that there's still push for war with Iran, even after Bolton's ousting, proves that he was just one tumor in the greater cancer infecting the Trump administration. They're all bad people. He just had receipts of it. Oh, yeah, it's metastasized.

Yeah, although Arnold Schwarzenegger would counter with, it's not a Tuma, super old school reference, anyway, Lord Mahakala writes in, my money is on John Bolton being the drone pilot. Okay, not likely, that is funny though, and then one from Twitter here, not that Donald writes in, Pompeo Mnuchin looked like they're salivating with power over a possible war. Their children won't bleed, get maimed, and die for oil. Exactly. This whole incident screams for the Green New Deal. We don't have to worry about any of these stupid oil fields and processing plants and you name

it and reserves if we actually went towards Green New Deal. Exactly. All right, last one's the fun one. Chubble Stuff writes in, I'm on my boyfriend's account. He became a member immediately after I introduced him to you guys. Fast forward to several years later and we still watch every day. Today, today is his birthday. It would mean the world to him if Anna and Jen could wish him a happy birthday.

Love you guys. His name is Edward. So Edward, happy birthday. I can wish that to you because you became a member, unlike your girlfriend. No, I'm playing, I'm playing. I see you're on his account. I saw that part. Anyway, t.yt.com slash join.

But seriously, Edward, thank you. And thank you for turning your boyfriend onto TYT. All kidding aside, we really appreciate when you spread the word, okay? All right, what's, oh, one other quick note, programming note. On Wednesday, Jim Gaffigan is going to be on the show. So a great comedian reached out to us. He has a really interesting new movie out. We're going to talk about that, but we're also going to talk about his career.

So don't miss it. That's in the third hour of the Young Turks. You know, half of the third hour is guests like Jim. Also later in this week, we're going to have two women who are competing against one another to go up against Denny Hoyer in the primary there. That's a really important race. And then the second part of the third hour is just for members, t-y-t.com slash join. But check out Gaffigan later in the week.

I like that you casually put in, he reached out to us. Like just very casually and then moved on. I'm not saying anything, just, you know, that's how it went down. That's how it went down. Okay. All right. Well, we move on to a very serious story. So let's get to it.

Brett Kavanaugh is back in the news after the New York Times published excerpts from a new book that details some of these sexual assault allegations against him. The excerpt from the education of Brett Kavanaugh in investigation was written by Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly. And they revisit an allegation that was raised during the Supreme Court Justice's Conference. information process in 2018. Some of you may have remembered this allegation. This is not an allegation by Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, but rather a former Yale classmate

of his named Deborah Ramirez. Now Deborah Ramirez detailed a party that she went to, Kavanaugh was there, and he allegedly did something pretty graphic that made her incredibly uncomfortable. During the winter of her freshman year, a drunken dormitory party unsettled her deeply. She and some classmates had been drinking heavily when she says a freshman named Brett Kavanaugh pulled down his pants and thrust his penis at her, prompting her to swat it away and inadvertently touched it. Some of the onlookers who had been passing around a fake penis earlier in the evening laughed. Now Deborah Ramirez was quoted as saying, I had gone through high school, I'm a good girl, and now in one evening it was all wiped away. So this has caused a firestorm.

There have been different reactions. Of course, Donald Trump is angry about this, and he believes that the Department of Justice needs to protect Brett Kavanaugh, even though that's not the job that the Department of Justice is supposed to do. Also, according to the Times reporting, by praying upon her in this way, Deborah Ramirez added, Kavanaugh and his friends made it clear I'm not smart. And Ramirez didn't have this, you know, upbringing that was incredibly affluent. You know, her parents did well. She was studious. She was really hardworking. And she made

her way. She worked her way to Yale. And she felt as though no one really respected her. She was different. There were very few minorities at Yale in the 1980s. And so this felt as if it was, you know, an attack on her and who she was as a person. And it's obviously stayed with her throughout the years because she details it even today. So Deborah Ramirez's a story that we just recounted for you. Most of that was already public record when Kavanaugh was up for a vote. The new parts of this story are how many people who have confirmed it and then try to reach out to the FBI and what kind of a sham investigation that a week that FBI looked into it was.

So along those lines, let me read the next couple of quotes for you guys from the New York Times. During his Senate testimony, Kavanaugh said that if the incident Ramirez described had occurred, it would have been, quote, the talk of the campus. Our reporting suggests that it was. Now, let me be clear about this. They wrote a book about this, that these are the excerpts of the book. They are New York Times reporters, but this was printed in the opinion section. Okay?

So now the most relevant part is right here. They say at least seven people, including Ramirez's mother, heard about the EL incident long before Kavanaugh was a federal judge. Two of those people were classmates who learned of it just days after the party occurred, suggesting that it was discussed among students at the time. So apparently it was a bit of the talk of campus. And so now the FBI might have been able to uncover that if they were allowed to, if they had enough time and ability to.

But apparently their investigation was hemmed in significantly. And so a very important question arises. That's beyond even what should happen to Kavanaugh, which is who told the FBI to do a very limited investigation and would not allow them to talk to witnesses. That's a very important question. So I want to go back to that FBI investigation and recount how it went down. Because remember, the Republican Party gave the FBI a maximum of one week to do this investigation, to conduct this. investigation, and they didn't even take the full week. I remember the investigation wrapped up just short of one week, and it was abundantly clear that individuals who should

have been interviewed as part of this investigation were not interviewed. To give you more details, you know, in regard to, you know, the information that was given to the FBI and what the FBI just didn't look into. According to the New York Times story, Ramirez's legal team gave the FBI a list of 25 individuals who may have had corroborating evidence. But the Bureau, in its supplemental background investigation, interviewed none of them, though we learned many of these potential witnesses, tried in vain to reach the FBI on their own. And I just remember the day the FBI wrapped their investigation. And I remember feeling sick to my stomach because I knew it was a sham.

I knew that they didn't really do much. They interviewed a few people related to Dr. Ford, but it just didn't seem real. An investigation like that doesn't take, first of all, a week. It should take longer than that. And Republicans always get what they want because Democrats aren't going to fight. I mean, they didn't, in my opinion, they didn't fight hard enough. They just allowed Republicans to take hold of this investigation, really limit the scope. And now we have a Supreme Court justice who might be a sexual predator, or at least pre-

Yeah, so I wanna actually go to Ryan Grimm's reporting. He's the Washington Bureau Chief of the Intercept and is also a TYT contributor. In his book, we've got people. He talks about both the things that Anna just mentioned. First of all, a really interesting part of it was that two activists wound up pressuring Jeff Flake in an elevator, if you remember that scene, to get him to not immediately confirm Kavanaugh. But Flake then, after that incident, quickly came up with this new idea.

which he then surprised everyone with and said, the FBI should do an investigation for a week, so we're more sure. It seemed to be a positive development, and I don't know what Flake's intent was there. Maybe he did intend for a real investigation, but it was immediately taken over by the Republican apparatchiks, who then turned it into a sham investigation. So when you have 25 witnesses that come forward and say, or their legal team gives you 25 witnesses, and others come forward and say, please interview me, I know what happened. And the FBI says, no, we're not allowed to talk to you.

Well, okay, then who made that decision that you're not allowed to talk to that? Yeah, and it's not an investigation. That's not a real investigation. Yeah, if you're looking into possible sexual assault or possible rape that a Supreme Court nominee might have committed in the past, you need to interview as many people as possible who are coming forward with allegations. I mean, it's so frustrating and infuriating that this is the way that it ended up. And this is how it works in politics.

Republicans always get what they want because they're willing to, you know, pull whatever trick they can to get it. Yeah, and so there, ironically, it might have actually helped Kavanaugh. Well, look, the FBI investigated and they cleared him, so he must be fine. When in reality, of course, was not a real investigation, as we now know and have learned. Okay, now the second part of it is how did the Democrats react? And both in this report by the New York Times and also in Ryan Grimm's reporting, several Democrats, most notably Diane Feinstein, who got the original letter from Christine Blasey

Ford, they didn't want to look into it. They thought it might hurt Democrats' chances electorally. And so they wanted to basically cover it up. And- Yeah, because bending to the will of the Republican Party works out real well for you politically, right? That's all they do. To be quite honest with you, I feel embarrassed to be in any way associated to the Democratic party as a Democratic voter, right?

If this is what Democrats are about, and honestly for the past few decades, this is what they're about, it's embarrassing. They're not fighters, they're pathetic, and they allowed this to happen. I know that even if Democrats had the majority in the House and the Senate, okay, they would be able to fight aggressively enough. Republicans would be able to fight aggressively enough to still get what they wanted. Yeah, and by the way, I mentioned Ryan's reporting on this because he's the one who originally broke the first story about Christine Blasey Ford.

He didn't have the name yet, but he did unbelievable report, excellent reporting. I interviewed him about it. You should check it out on the conversation and how he got it confirmed that there was a woman out there with allegations. If it wasn't for Ryan in the first place, it appears Diane Feinstein would have not. never brought it forward. It's unbelievable how complicit they are with the Republicans. Now, the final piece of this from the New York Times story is about Max Steyer.

So let's go to that. A classmate, Max Steyer, saw Kavanaugh with his pants down at a different drunken dorm party where friends pushed his penis into the hand of a female student, Steyer, who runs a nonprofit organization in Washington, notified senators and the FBI about his account. but the FBI did not investigate, and Steyer has declined to discuss it publicly. Now, an important clarification on that, the New York Times later put in an editor's note that the woman who was apparently involved in that incident has not talked to the New York Times or the writers of this book and says that she cannot recall that, okay?

So that's important for you to know, but if Steyer is right about that, well, that's a second time that Kavanaugh would have done this. This is not related to the Ramirez, but would back up the Ramirez story as another time that he did it. Yeah, and so right now, there are members of the right, including Donald Trump, who are claiming that this entire New York Times investigation and this entire book is nothing more than a witch hunt, because one of the women who might have allegedly been involved in another case where Kavanaugh allegedly revealed himself, doesn't remember, doesn't recall it, right? So that doesn't prove anything.

That doesn't mean that it absolutely didn't happen. It doesn't mean that it absolutely did happen. It means that she can't remember. But Deborah Ramirez details what allegedly happened to her, you know, from beginning to end. And by the way, I don't, I can't think of any woman who would be dumb enough to make this up and go out in the public to deal with the type of vicious and horrendous behavior that we see from members of the right. The nonstop death threats, Donald Trump mocking sexual assault victims during campaign rally events.

I mean, it's a horrible way to be out there in the public. I just think there should have been a full investigation because to me, I don't know if Brett Kavanaugh's innocent. I don't know. So yeah, I think you're right in that Republicans can point to a sham investigation and say, see, they did an investigation, he's innocent. But for people who actually know the details of the story, no he's not. He's not, we don't know for sure.

That wasn't a real investigation, and I'm always gonna look at him as someone who could potentially be a sexual predator. Okay, and the last thing about this is Abby Huntsman then went on the view and said, you see, the New York Times is gonna get Donald Trump reelected. I can't stand that, it drives me crazy because they say, well, since the New York Times had to put in the editor's note at the end, and not correct, but clarify something that was in that article, they're like, well, see, then it's going to show that everything is fake news. No, it doesn't. It shows that they care to clarify and get things right afterwards,

even if their original story had even a slight issue. On the other hand, you have Donald Trump who tells lies at an astounding and record-breaking rate. So when people on TV go, well, the New York Times clarified a small part of the story, and they equated to what Donald Trump does, and then say, see, they're going to get Trump elected, they're helping Donald Trump and the Republican Party by doing a false equivalency. And so they are not the same thing. And by the way, Trump supporters who hate the New York Times and think that it's fake news, they're going to vote for Trump anyway.

So stop with this idiocy of like, oh, somebody was on the fence. They couldn't tell if Trump's a liar or not. And the New York Times has to do a slight clarification. Oh, that's it. I'm voting for Trump. Now, they were going to vote for Trump anyway. Don't let anyone on the right, anyone in the media make you think that the problem here is the New York Times.

The New York Times is not the problem. There are two groups of people that are the problem. The Republican Party that went out of its way to cover up for Brett Kavanaugh and prevent a real investigation from happening, and the FBI, which refused to actually interview individuals that it should have interviewed when it came to this case. Those are the bad guys. Those are the ones we should be focusing on. I'm tired of Republicans taking hold of every narrative and the media just runs with it.

No, I'm not gonna let that happen. We need to tell the truth. The New York Times is not, you know, in the wrong here, period. I'm sorry, I gotta add one more thing, which is that the Republicans and Donald Trump cry about, oh my God, when the FBI came after Donald Trump, they politicized the FBI, Andrew became, and James Comey and all those guys. Now they turn around, and in this case look like, they politicized the FBI, told them what not to investigate.

What does the FBI really do? No, the FBI does good work. Do they though? Do they? No, they've stopped a lot of domestic terrorism cases, et cetera. So it's a mixed bag, so we report the good, the bad, et cetera. But then- I love their limited scope investigations when it involves anyone on the right, whether it be Donald Trump or Brett Kavanaugh, any high-level Republican figure, conservative

figure, limited scope, limited scope. Are there investigations limited in scope when they're investigating other individuals? I mean, how many stories have we done about the FBI going after some random private citizen who posted rap lyrics on Facebook? Yeah. Come on. And even in this case, Donald Trump says the Justice Department should protect Kavanaugh. So while pretending that the Justice Department and the FBI politicized the Trump investigation,

which they most clearly did not, it's based on overwhelming evidence. They turn around and brazenly say in public, we should politicize the Justice Department and the FBI to suit our own political purposes. There is no false equivalency here. One side loves to politicize those organizations and cover up the reality, and the other side in the case of the media reports the reality here. We gotta take a break. When we come back, we have more news for you.

including the United Auto Workers' Strike, and we are going to bring you that fun Ben Shapiro's story. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen 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.