The Young Turks - Disaster Capitalism
Episode Date: August 17, 2023First came the deadly fires on Maui, then came the looters and speculators. Island residents said they have seen people stealing gas from tanks, and they have gotten calls from real estate investors l...ooking to buy their property. Appalachian dive bartender and eater of the rich John Russel joins Ana for a discussion about labor power and coalition building. More than 20 Ohio counties rejected Issue 1 last week, and most of them are suburban and exurban counties that voted for Donald Trump in 2020. The Democratic National Convention Chair’s firm helps companies block labor laws. SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ https://www.youtube.com/user/theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER: ☞ https://www.twitter.com/theyoungturks INSTAGRAM: ☞ https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK: ☞ https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕 Merch: https://shoptyt.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show.
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Welcome to TYT, I'm your host, Anna Casparian.
I'm super excited for the show today because we will be having an interview in the first
A reporter for More Perfect Union named John Russell will be joining us.
He is the gentleman who put together that incredible video at a Trump rally in Erie, Pennsylvania,
where his whole point was to try to see if there's any common ground between progressives and Trump supporters.
So we covered that pretty extensively last week.
I absolutely loved what More Perfect Union did with that video.
And John Russell, the reporter, will be joining us to kind of talk about not just that
report, but I think of a broader discussion, an important discussion that I think we need to have in regard to building the broad coalitions necessary to actually have a successful pressure campaign toward members of Congress to get the policies we need and want pass. So really looking forward to that conversation. We're also going to talk a little bit about the police attempting to essentially arrest someone for simply flicking them off. You can't, you know,
the very sensitive feelings of police officers, apparently.
So we'll get to that a little later in the first hour as well.
In the second hour, David Schuster will be joining me to talk about a whole host of topics,
including some of the unfortunate threats and doxing that members of the grand jury in Georgia
are now dealing with following Trump's fourth indictment over his alleged election meddling.
So we'll get to that as well.
But before we get to all of that, just want to encourage you all to like and share the stream,
If you're watching us online on YouTube, you can also help support the show by becoming a member.
Go to t-y-t.com slash join to become one or click on that join button if you're watching us on
YouTube. We will be having a bonus episode today as we do every day after the main show.
And I'm looking forward to today's with David Schuster.
I think this is the first time he and I have hosted together just the two of us.
So it's going to be a lot of fun.
All right, well, let's get to our first story.
I wanted to give you some updates on what's transpiring in Maui following those devastating wildfires.
There's a lot of real estate speculation happening right now that is really frustrating.
And I just want to remind all you real estate investors around the world, like Lahaina is not for sale.
Please don't reach out to these families and take advantage of them during the most devastating time of our lives.
That's right. Unsurprisingly, speculators, scammers and real estate developers are trying to cash in on the tragic conditions left behind by wildfires in Maui.
We're gonna hear more from Lahaina resident Tiari Lawrence on that very issue in just a bit.
But first, let's actually examine what local communities in Maui are grappling with in the aftermath of these devastating fires.
So let's take a look at this video.
You're watching drone footage from the Washington Post that shows some of the destruction left behind in Lahaina as of August 11th.
And as you can see, most structures in the historic town are just completely destroyed.
And the state's governor, Josh Green, expects that the cost of rebuilding will top an estimated $6 billion.
In addition, the Maui Emergency Management Agency also estimated a similar price tag of $5.52 billion to rebuild in Maui County.
Now, while property can be rebuilt, lost lives obviously cannot be brought back.
And that's the most tragic part of this story.
The death toll rose to 106 people as of this morning.
But the number of victims is expected to rise further, considering there are still around
1,300 people missing.
Now, identifying those who perished has also been a struggle, and officials are resorting
to DNA evidence in order to, or DNA analysis, to figure out who the remains belong to.
They're just having a lot of difficulty identifying, you know, the remains because of how badly,
you know, people were just, how, how badly people were just, how, how badly people were.
you know, how badly this fire killed people and just completely charred their remains.
It's hard to even talk about it or think about it.
But nonetheless, after facing some pressure, President Joe Biden announced that he does,
in fact, plan to visit the area soon.
And the federal government has already provided some aid to those in need.
So for instance, FEMA has made nearly $2 million in payments to about 1,200 survivors as of
Tuesday, but about 3,400 people have applied for assistance, said Keith Turrey, the deputy
associate administrator for response and recovery. But here's the real question, this is the
important question. Will the federal aid and the home insurance payouts be enough for the
residents to rebuild their homes and begin to piece together their lives? There's understandably
deep concern about that, especially as these vultures are swooping in to reap the benefits of
exploiting this tragedy.
Now, Lahaina resident Tiari Lawrence expressed frustration over developers who have already
begun reaching out to victims with pretty transactional objectives.
Let's watch.
Homeowners have been reached out by investors and realtors offering to buy their land.
And this is disgusting, disgusting.
And we just want to make sure that people around the world understand our situation and
know that Lahaina is not for sale. It is important that the multi-generational families that
come from Lahaina get to continue to live in our hometown. We need to work as a community to
ensure that we have a seat at the table on how our town is rebuilt and what that looks like.
And it's important that we make sure that the cultural history of Lahaina,
the integrity of Lahaina is protected, especially for Native Hawaiian families from Lahaina.
We as a Native Hawaiian community, we have already been displaced so much.
You know, the cost of living in Hawaii is so high.
Your median house goes for a million dollars.
So, you know, already dealing with that and having an affordable housing crisis.
And now this just really scares me and concerns me that there will be more Native Hawaiian displacement happening among our community.
I agree with her.
I mean, the exploitation that typically takes place following these types of tragedies and disasters is disgusting.
And guess what? This isn't the first time speculators have swooped in after a devastating natural disaster.
The practice, in fact, is so common that Naomi Klein refers to it as disaster capitalism.
For example, Floridians who lost their homes in Fort Myers due to Hurricane Ian last September were informed that, you know, those insurance payouts wouldn't cover the rising costs necessarily.
to rebuild. This partly due to federal rules mandating that the rebuilt homes follow modern
flood and wind building codes, which obviously can be exorbitant. Now left with no choice,
many of the residents have just given up. They're deciding to sell the land that their homes
once stood on to these developers. Politico analyzed real estate transaction data from that
area, and here's what they found. First, storms like Ian wreck the homes, then shrinking insurance,
markets, government rules designed to limit future risk, and still hot demand for housing
combined to make some of their communities unaffordable, to say the least. Now, homeowners who
want to rebuild often have to pay much of the cost on their own because the federal flood
insurance program caps payouts at $250,000 per home far below coastal area's market values.
By the way, far below the market value in most markets, let's just keep it real.
And the actual insurance payments after Ian were even lower.
And so normal working class people are getting pushed out of the community because they simply
cannot afford the cost of rebuilding.
And that includes retirees, teachers, firefighters, and other people of modest means.
It's a perfect opportunity for disaster capitalists.
In the fourth quarter of 2022, just after Ian, more than 90% of all sales in Fort Myers
were completed without a mortgage in a sign that all cash buyers were dominating the
market. That was at least 10 percentage points higher than the previous all cash peak
in early 2009. So these are obviously moneyed interest, institutional investors, speculators.
The buyers, according to the transaction data, include people and corporations who clearly
can afford to pay $1 million or more in cash.
And let me just say, ordinary people can't afford to pay for a home worth $1 million
or more in cash.
91 vacant lot sales in Fort Myers Beach listed on Zillow for May of 2021 through the end
of last month found that six of the nine most expensive transactions in price per square
foot came after Ian with multiple sales exceeding 2.5 million and one fetching 3.2 million.
50 of those sales occurred during the nine months since Hurricane Ian basically devastated the
area. Now one example is 69 year old Catherine Light, who decided to sell the land where
her powder blue cottage once stood. A real estate developer bought the now vacant lot for
$525,000, which, you know, it was nearly four times what she and her husband had paid in the
mid-1990s. But while that might seem like a nice return on investment, there's no way she could
ever afford to live in a beach community in Florida again due to rapidly rising housing costs.
In fact, considering how high interest rates are, I mean, I would be surprised if she was even
sure she wanted to take out a mortgage to afford a new home once she relocates. In fact, she told
Politico, quote, the whole beach, meaning Fort Myers Beach, is going to change completely.
The people that could afford to live there in the beach cottages and stuff, they're gone.
And understandably, that's exactly what the people of Maui and Lahaina specifically are
worried about. Luckily, Hawaii's governor, Josh Green, is considering implementing rules that
would prevent speculators from cashing in on this tragedy. The governor, Josh Green, said he had
reached out to the state's attorney general to discuss a moratorium on property sales in Lahaina.
Maui had been facing a serious housing crunch and unaffordable prices, even before being
hit by the deadliest fire in the US in over a century. Green said he didn't want to see the remains
of Lahaina snapped up by developers. And I commend him for that. In fact, here's more from Green
during his press conference with the mayor of Maui.
I would caution people that it's going to be a very long time before any growth or housing can be
built. And so you would be pretty poorly informed if you try to steal land from our people
and then build here.
Governor Green even elaborated on other ways the state plans on helping the wildfire victims
in Hawaii, especially as these developers are trying to goad them into selling their land.
We will be embedding attorneys who are going to work pro bono for our people, Maui attorneys for Maui's people to be at our joint response centers available to all of us.
So if people have someone reach out to them to try to get their land, we will be able to get expert legal advice so that doesn't happen.
If someone behaves in a predatory fashion towards one of the people that are suffering right now who have lost their loved ones or lost their home, lost their rental, and they try to buy land out from under them,
you can be sure I will not be allowing anyone to build or rezone or do anything of that sort if they've taken advantage of anyone here.
And keep the statement about preventing rezoning in mind as we continue to give you details about this story.
Because look, it's great that the local community applied enough pressure to ensure that the governor is actually looking out for them.
And they deserve the opportunity to rebuild and the thought of moneyed interest taking advantage.
of this devastation makes me absolutely sick.
But look, as climate change continues to create the extreme conditions that exacerbate
these natural disasters and make them much more destructive, there needs to be more done
to ensure that the onus and financial burdens are not placed on ordinary citizens.
In fact, the industries that have led us to this unstable and dystopian era should be the ones
footing the bill, not the taxpayers. Fossil fuel companies,
companies and their lucrative business practices gave basically allowed them to like hoard
resources and that got us into this mess in the first place. And since they've reaped the
financial rewards for doing so, I think it's time for them to pay up. Whatever Josh Green
or any other governor in any other state does after these types of natural disasters is
simply a band-aid. It's simply dealing with the symptoms of a much bigger issue. And we need to tackle
that issue at the root cause.
It would definitely have a better response to the very real climate emergency.
And it would prevent ordinary people and taxpayers from having to foot the bill after these
devastating losses occur.
Now with that said, I do want to read a quick comment from one of our members in the Twitch
community.
This is from Wee Duncan, who has been a subscriber for 32 months.
And this comment is really important, okay? So we, Duncan says, Aloha, Casper, Mahalo for leading with the Maui story,
many homes were built on land owned by others as leasehold tenants. So that means that you might
own the home, but the land that the home is on doesn't belong to you, right? It belongs to another
individual. And so here's the concern. The fear is the major landowners will not rebuild small homes,
but major resorts.
And look, in order for them to be able to do that, that land would need to be rezoned.
And as you heard the governor, Governor Green mentioned in one of the videos, he claims that he is
going to prevent the rezoning of these lands, especially if it shows that it's going to hurt
the residents who have pretty much lost their homes as a result of these wildfires.
Just make sure that you, you know, ensure that he stays true to his promise.
there. But I think that that is definitely another addition to the concerns that the local
community has in Maui. These are legitimate concerns. The one thing, the one silver lining
here is for the first time following this kind of natural disaster, you have local politicians
essentially saying, no, no, no, we're going to do what we need to do to protect the local
community. We just got to make sure that they hold true to that promise and that they're held
accountable should they stray from that promise. But my heart goes out to the local community.
We are going to continue updating you all on the aftermath of these devastating fires.
And if you have any way to reach out to people in Maui, donate resources to them, please do so.
It's just absolutely devastating and heartbreaking to see them go through what they're going through right now.
For now, though, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, John Russell will be joining us to talk about that incredible, more
perfect union report that he did last week, trying to show that there could be some common
ground among progressives, and yes, even members of the MAGA community.
That and more coming up, don't miss it.
I'm your host, Anna Kasparian, and we're about to get to an incredible interview.
But before we do, I just wanted to read two super chats having to do with the segment I just
covered in regard to real estate speculators coming into Maui to look to buy up some of
the land and property there.
Now, Frank Rockefeller says, property owners in disaster areas perceive the value of their house
contextually, risky property is going to involve profit and loss evaluations.
Well, Frank, the one thing I just want you to be completely aware of is that if you are under the impression that there are some parts of the country that are safer from the impacts of the climate emergency, whereas other areas are much more risky, you would be mistaken.
So in fact, I mean, you have insurers, home insurers pulling out of several states at this point, California and Florida being among those states.
In California, they don't want to provide coverage for the loss of homes as a result of wildfires.
In Florida, they're concerned about flooding.
Every single part of this country in some way has been impacted by the climate emergency.
The question is, what will the response to that be?
What will we do to mitigate the impact of climate change and respond to it in a way that makes sense?
But more importantly, when are we going to stop, you know, shifting the financial burden onto ordinary people when these fossil fuel companies have gotten away with murder?
When they have privatized the gains and socialized losses, it's unacceptable.
That is where the emphasis needs to be right now.
Placing the onus on people who have just experienced the tragedy they've experienced in Maui makes no sense to me.
Caroline Roberts writes in and says, I lost my home to a flood in 2006.
FEMA gave me $1,300 and the Red Cross gave me cleaning supplies.
I had a young child, and that was the help we got.
I hope FEMA is better to the people of Maui.
I certainly hope so too.
As I mentioned in that segment, they've already given out about $2 million to individuals
who have applied for aid from FEMA.
When the terrible earthquake in Northridge happened when I was a kid back in 1994,
I remember FEMA was pretty good about helping our community out.
But it really is hit or miss, and it really does depend on who's in control of Congress and whether or not, you know, the party in control is funding FEMA the way it needs to be funded in order to give out the aid people need after these kinds of tragedies.
But anyway, thank you to everyone who's writing in. I really appreciate everyone's perspective, even the perspectives of those who provide some constructive feedback. Thank you. But for now, why don't we move on to our next segment, something I'm very excited to share with you.
So here's my hunch. For all the focus on culture war issues, the working class on the left
and the right have a lot more in common than we're led to believe. And if that's true,
it could and should have huge implications for the upcoming presidential election. So I went to
Erie, Pennsylvania to find out. In partnership with More Perfect Union, reporter John Russell
went to a Trump rally in Erie, Pennsylvania to see if there's any positive.
common ground among the left and basically the maga crowd.
And I absolutely love the report.
We covered it extensively on the show last week.
It was amazing to see just how thoughtful these voters happened to be as long as the reporter,
you know, actually decides to ask some important questions on issues that go beyond the
culture wars.
And I do want to share some of my favorite moments from that report just in case you all
missed it.
Let's take a look.
There's so many houses for sale in our neighborhood.
I was going to go to town and say, are these all, you know, can we find out? Are these just real people buying them? Or is this like proxies? See, Black Rock proxies, Vanguard proxy. Are they buying all these homes so people can't own them and they're just going to rent them? Would you be excited if Trump did anything to rain in? Well, of course. It's just, it's a monopoly that needs to be broken up. Just like remember the telephone.
company in the 80s, AT&T. That was broken up. Yeah. And that's what needs to be done.
Capitalism's not the problem. It's been corrupted to such a level just like people think all
the politicians are corrupted. But it's corrupted at the highest levels of these corporations,
like you said, being owned instead of 200 of them, you're down to four. That's a massive control.
Joining us now is John Russell, who actually did the report for More Perfect Union and describes
himself as an Appalachian dive bartender and eater of the rich. He's also a writer over at
Substack and you should follow his substack and labor related topics. It's called The Holler.
And John, thank you so much for joining us. But more importantly, thank you for doing that
report. I really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks for having me on, Anna. I'm excited to join the show.
It's good to have you. I have so many questions for you. I'm going to
start off by asking if you received any backlash at all for the report that you did?
Really, it was surprisingly little backlash. I mean, the YouTube comment section can go south in a
hurry. But I think, you know, it was pretty positive. And I think that just speaks to the fact
that, you know, people all feel like we're in this painful stagnation, regardless of where you
fall on the political spectrum and there's a large appetite out there to get out of it.
Absolutely. I mean, I certainly feel that appetite. And just to share where I'm coming from,
just full disclosure, I look back at like, especially the last six years. I look at the Trump
administration and the way the left has kind of responded to it. And I feel that we might need
to really reconsider our strategy and what you did in that report touches on something that
increasingly seems to be the best strategy for best strategy in order to build coalitions
necessary to get the policies we want accomplished.
So let's let's back up a little bit.
Tell me a little bit about yourself and how you came up with this idea to go to a Trump
rally and ask questions that you typically do not see journalists asking these, you know,
the MAGA crowd.
Well, I mean, the first thing that came to mind is just the quality of the interviews that were coming out at these Trump rallies.
I mean, most of the videos are just kind of farming for clicks or profiting off of clicks, you know, picking out the most ridiculous interviews and painting this picture of, you know, the worst examples of 80 million Americans, right?
And to me, just back up and tell you about myself, I grew up in the Ohio Valley, it is, you know, the heart of the Rust Belt, right?
The place where NAFTA still means something and is still very fresh.
I worked at a dive bar here and, you know, I am a very open leftist. I make no bones about that.
And when you work in a bar in a county where the county voted for Trump by 71 percent and you don't hide your
politics, you're gonna have those conversations.
But as I did over a year, those conversations went pretty well because we kept them class-based.
And something I wanna talk about here too, you can't have class-based politics without getting people over the hump of all of the divisive issues.
Things that are usually exploited, race, gender, religion, you know, getting over those and showing people that you need the person that you need the person
that's different than you as much as they need you to actually get something done as a working
class coalition, you have to get over those things. And I was having those kind of conversations
in the bar and I wanted to take those up and see if they held up at the Trump rally. And I was
pleased to find out what we had when we went up. I was definitely pleased as well. I mean,
It was a relief to hear a voter on the other side of the aisle show just how aware he is
of what the private equity firms are up to, what Black Rock is up to in regard to the
real estate market and how it's pricing ordinary people out of residential real estate.
I mean, it's a side of the MAGA crowd that you just don't see in the press.
And I think for a very specific reason, specifically because it would force them to touch
to touch on class politics.
In class politics, I think unites us, whereas a lot of the, you know, culture war narratives,
and especially the way they're covered and how they play out in the press, only divides us.
And of course, they get their cues, in my opinion, from politicians in both parties, right?
And so I want to kind of share my thesis with you, and I want to get your thoughts on that,
because I've increasingly started to believe that with the Citizens United ruling,
And with moneyed interests, basically filling the coffers of politicians on both sides of the aisle,
you essentially have two parties that are increasingly similar when it comes to the substantive
bread and butter issues, the economic issues.
And I feel that the way they try to differentiate themselves from one another, right?
The left versus right in the political landscape is to really lean into the culture war stuff.
And most of it is messaging.
I think most of it is performative, right?
You'll hear Democrats claim that they want to protect the lives or protect the lives
and improve the lives of marginalized communities.
But then when you actually look at the policies, there's much to be desired.
The right wing has always been pretty mask off when it comes to, you know, how protectionist
they are when it comes to traditional values and things like that.
So none of that surprises me.
But there's a lot of theater going on right now among our politicians in regard to
culture war issues to just kind of provide the illusion of governance.
when in reality, there's actually a lot of agreement between those two sides when it comes to
economic policies and essentially providing cover for corporate interests and corporate greed.
Maybe I'm being a little harsh in the way that I'm analyzing this, but I am curious what you
think about it.
Yeah, no, I think you nailed what's happening here. And, you know, it's just no surprise.
Across the political spectrum, when you go up and you talk to people like a human being,
you find out that even folks in line at a Trump rally, you might not expect them to talk
with you and say, hey, my healthcare doesn't cover anything. I am paying hundreds of dollars
out of pocket per month and thousands of dollars before my healthcare ever kicks in to fix
anything that's wrong with me. We watched, you know, one person lose 200 billion dollars and still
be the second richest man on earth. People are looking out at the same reality here. I mean,
Maui's on fire. You can see in New York City, right? And they're saying, who's really benefiting
from all of this? Why can't we seem to get any response out of our political system?
You know, those feelings, they're alive and well on the left and on the right. And if we want
to unite around those, I think we have to break out of the generic politics that's offered,
to us by candidates and by legacy media.
You know, if you tuned into Fox or CNN, you're going to have one view of what people think
up there that doesn't necessarily, you know, isn't grounded in reality.
And I think where that gets really interesting is where you start to ask people, you know,
what do we do about this?
Our political system is not responding, right?
So we had really good conversations instead of looking at
looking to make change in the political space, we asked, why don't we make change in the workplace?
The political space is not responding, but you saw UPS workers standing in the hundreds of thousands
strong and that solidarity around class, won them a contract that has $30 billion cash in hand in
the pocket. When we talked with Trump voters about that, they were down for it, they were supportive.
You know, they didn't always necessarily know about it because it doesn't show up on the legacy
media. But when we went up there and we talked about these things, you can clearly see,
I mean, this is one Trump rally in a few interviews. But even with that, it is obvious that there
are a pile of political chips being left on the table here that are the raw materials
for working class solidarity that can win in the workplace. And I think if we organize around that,
that the political power that flows from being organized in the workplace, from being
surrounded by people who are different than you, but all fighting the boss together to improve
your life, that is something that could change our politics overnight. And it was reflected
up there in the rallies.
Just to buttress your point, I want to just provide some polling data in regard to how Americans overall feel about some of these economic issues.
Let's start with a Vox poll. So a Vox data for progress poll back in 2021 found that a whopping 71% of the respondent support raising the taxes of the well.
wealthiest 2% of Americans, while a Reuters poll from 2020 found that 64% support a wealth
tax, a slight increase from a 2019 Brookings poll that found that 61% support taxing the rich.
In addition to that, the Vox poll from that year, or last year I should say, found 50% support
for taxing the rich among Republicans specifically, right?
And so just based on this poll, based on the reporting and the answers that the Trump
supporters gave in the report that you put out there, based on the way voters overwhelmingly
rejected issue one in the state of Ohio in your state, based on the ballot measure that
voters in Florida overwhelmingly supported to increase the state's minimum wage to $15 an hour.
In case after case, you see common ground among Americans across the political spectrum,
regardless of, you know, where they fall on that political spectrum.
And those issues are typically, you know, the bread and butter issues that lead to some economic stability for these folks.
And what you just mentioned about the workplace and how important an organized workplace is to,
a, building the coalitions we need, but also having an outside pressure campaign that's
successful enough to influence the politicians to actually work for us as opposed to corporate
interests. In order to improve the conditions in the workplace, your immediate conditions,
all of that stuff is super important. All of those conversations, I believe, are being intentionally
left out in corporate media. And instead, there's a lot of focus on what makes us different
from one another, why we should be scared of one another based on what our identity is.
And so that's my long setup to ask you, how do we approach this strategy of bringing broad,
like building a broad coalition of people based on these similar economic interests,
without leaving behind the concerns of people who have experienced racism, sexism,
transphobia, homophobia, those are real concerns. And I think,
that what ends up getting kind of left behind in their minds as we talk about this strategy
is what their concerns are and how these marginalized communities have been treated historically
and currently in America. What is your answer to that? I think we have a lot to learn from
labor history that has been deliberately swept under the rug, kept out of textbooks. I am
A minute away from Wheeling, West Virginia here, and we have a long history of dealing with
exactly this that you may not have heard about, but it goes back to the workplace. I think if you
want to make, look, meeting people where they are is always going to be messy, right?
We have had a 50 year propaganda, right wing propaganda effort that's been financed by billions
of dollars that is engineered to divide people on race and gender lines. How do you find
fight back against that, get everybody in the same boat on class based issues and fight
a common enemy together. And if you have to work to survive in this country, if you can't
afford to skip work, then you are all in the working class. Okay, so we have a very small
and powerful elite group of super rich people who are calling the shots. There's your common
enemy. The workplace is where it takes place. And what can that teach us from history?
Well, in the 1900s in West Virginia, miners, coal miners here were taking an oath to join the UMWA to never discriminate against a fellow worker on the basis of race or religion or gender otherwise.
There's all kinds of history of labor organizing and union organizing.
I mean farm equipment workers in the 1940s were marching to integrate the towns in Kentucky
where they worked. They were electing black leadership. They had multiracial coalitions that were
marching to integrate towns in the south 20 years before Dr. King marched on Washington.
The roots of multi racial solidarity are right here for us to pick up and work with and they can see
and they can sell in the Rust Belt.
And we should get back to that because if you're going to stay united,
if you're going to win on class issues, then you do have to address everything that you brought up.
Racism, transphobia, homophobia, those are the first things that they are that the powerful interests are going to try to pick off and divide your class unity with.
So when you're trying to make a win like that, class politics necessarily means that you're going to have to show people with differences in the same boat, that you all need each other as much as the next person.
And unlike politics, that is unresponsive and kind of abstract to everybody.
It's just entertainment now.
The workplace is immediate.
It's every day.
And the winds that you get there are tangible, okay?
My own kind of editorializing here is that I think a lot of what goes into this Trump movement is very intense opinions that are loosely held.
I mean, politics, we all look at it and we think it's set in stone.
But Donald Trump, we all remember a time where it wasn't possible for him to become president.
Same thing with Barack Obama.
These things can change overnight.
So I don't buy that this whole millions of people.
Yes, there's definitely intense opinions on some of this.
Like I said, it's going to be messy when you go to meet people where they are.
But how strongly those are set in stone, I'm not sold on.
And I think one of the best things to fight back against that is to organize in the workplace
where you have to fight these issues out and remain together if you're going to get anything done.
Totally agree with you. And I'm so happy that you're saying this. I'm happy with the work
that you're doing. It's incredibly important and honestly principled and difficult to do,
especially in the current climate that we're in. Like I just know from personal experience,
you know, the whole ongoing debate between, you know, class essentialism and race essentialism.
It's frustrating because I do think that the most intersectional group of people in the country are workers.
So improving working conditions overwhelmingly improves the conditions of these marginalized communities.
But I want to end with a quick video from a YouTuber by the name of Devin Gibson.
Wasn't familiar with him.
He is a conservative.
But he saw your report.
And here's his reaction to it.
This is probably one of the best all around civil discussions between liberals and conservatives that I've ever seen.
I mean, that was gooder than chicken right there.
This guy, I think John Russell was his name.
He did an outstanding job.
And shout out to More Perfect Union, the channel over on YouTube as well, for putting this video together and going out there and doing what a lot of people aren't willing to do in this day and age.
They're not willing to sit down, have discussions about how we can all really unite and really implement.
improve and thrive as a country. Remember, this America, United States of America, is supposed to be about we, the people. But nowadays, we got the media, the politicians, these forces that be, these powers that be all about greed, all about smoking mirrors and pinning us against each other, dividing and conquering, talking about and making up issues along the way to try to deter our attention from what they really got going on behind closed doors.
So congratulations, John, you just got a conservative to give a shout out to more perfect union.
And I'm here for it. I love it. It's so good.
Let me say one thing to add on to that. And this is one of the biggest pushback things we got there.
Obviously, it is much easier for someone who looks like me, generic white guy with a mullet,
to break through to this guy wearing an American flag in a cross. But this,
reaching out like that is a job for people who look like me. I mean, that's about the only job
that I should be doing. We shouldn't be burdening people of color to reach out to those who are
very far down the pipeline. But it is possible to do, you just saw it, and we need a lot more
of it. Totally agree. John, I appreciate you. Thank you so much for being generous with your time
and joining us here at TYT. I hope you keep doing this excellent work and I hope to talk to you again
in the future. Thanks a lot, Anna. Thanks for having me on. For sure. All right, everyone,
we're gonna take a brief break. And when we come back, we've got a lot more news to get to,
including some post-election analysis in regard to issue one in Ohio.
I wanted to give you an update on that, because the demographic of voters who rejected it,
real important to know about as we move forward.
And I also want to talk about the Democratic Party deciding to have pretty questionable figure
lead the Democratic National Convention, her ties to various moneyed interests and corporations.
generations should be alarming to anyone who actually cares about a Democratic Party that isn't
beholden to corporate interests. So that and more coming up. Don't miss it. We'll be right back.
Moon Dragon writes in in our Twitch community and says, happy Mooniversary.
Anna, you are salty, strong today as usual.
Moon Dragon, thank you for being a member for two years.
We appreciate you.
And everyone else who's watching who isn't a member, you can become one by clicking on that join button.
If you're watching us on YouTube, you can also become a member by going to t.yt.com slash join.
All right, I wanted to do a quick update on the outcome of issue one in Ohio.
This was a story I covered last Wednesday to basically make a point.
point about how we needed Republican voters to join Democrats in rejecting issue one.
And now we have a little more information about the extent to which Republicans helped us out
by rejecting issue one. Okay, so let's talk about that. Defeating issue one in Ohio, a ballot
measure that would have made it much harder to amend the state's constitution to include, you know,
protections for reproductive rights and abortion. And it would have also made it incredibly
difficult to include ballot measures on the ballot to begin with. Well, we wouldn't be able to
get to where we are today. The utter rejection of issue one without the help of Republican voters
in the state of Ohio. Now, that was the thesis of a segment I did just last week, but we didn't
have all the details yet. The analysis of the demographics and how they voted had not been done
yet. Well, that analysis has taken place and I am happy to report that the situation is actually
much better than I had even shared with you earlier. So about 57% of the state voted against
issue one. Again, issue one was an undemocratic measure. It would have required a super majority
in order to amend the state's constitution. This was really a proxy battle for abortion rights
because they want to include a ballot measure in November of 2024 that would amend the state
constitution to include protection for abortion rights.
It appears that about 57% of the state wants that amendment, which is why Republican lawmakers
in the state pushed for issue one, which would require that super majority of 60% in order
to amend the state constitution.
This is their way of like, you know, nipping it in the butt and ensuring that they're
be a state constitutional right to abortion.
Now here's the outcome.
Like I said, 57% of the state voted against issue one.
Ohio, as you all know, is a red state, which means there are definitely Republicans voting
against issue one, which is great news, common ground.
Well, here are the details.
Biden counties around cities voted against changing the rules to amend the state constitution,
but they were joined by suburban counties in the state that went for Trump.
In total, 22 Ohio counties voted against amending the state constitution.
All of them are around larger cities and college towns, and most of them are suburban
and exurban counties that voted for Trump in 2020.
There also seems to be a difference between Maga Republicans and non-Maga Republicans
in the state and how they, not necessarily how they voted.
I think that there is a distinction between how they voted on issue one and how they respond
to pollsters. So for instance, among MAGA supporters, 80% of them, according to these polls,
say that they approve of overturning row. But among non-Maga voters, only 51% say they approve in
a poll that reported a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.38 percentage points.
Okay? So this is to say that they might respond one way to the polling. But once push comes to
shove and the impact of banning abortion is real for them, all of a sudden, they vote a little
differently, right? That was definitely something that played out with issue one in Ohio.
Now, Ohio isn't alone in this pattern of having like basically Republican voters support ballot
initiatives that Democratic voters want. So I want to give you a few other examples.
So apparently last year, six states had abortion measures on the ballot.
Three that aimed to codify or expand abortion rights and three were designed to restrict them.
And in each case, the side that favored abortion rights won out.
So Kansas, there was the vote on an amendment to essentially remove abortion as a right from the state constitution.
We all remember how that played out, right?
Kansas, not a blue state.
Kansas, very much a red state.
So how did this all play out?
Well, in 2020, Biden won only five counties around Kansas City, Topeka, and Lawrence
and Manhattan, and the state's two big college towns, okay, or the state's two big
college towns.
Now, in total, 90 counties voted no last year, meaning that the counties who overwhelmingly
supported Donald Trump over Biden voted to protect abortion rights in their state.
So do we accept the common ground here or do we just reject it, right?
Like this is the point that I'm trying to make.
When there are areas of common ground, take the win and try to understand that yes, there
are going to be areas of disagreement for sure, but where we can work together to win, we
should work together to win.
And that's exactly what's happening in some of these states.
There was also Michigan.
There was a referendum last year that made abortion a right in the state constitution.
In 2020, Biden won 11 counties in Michigan.
Last year, the proposal to codify abortion rights won in all those counties,
as well as in suburban counties around Detroit, Kalamazoo, and Lansing.
All told, 26 counties voted for the measure.
There are areas of common ground.
We need to take those wins where we can get it.
And I'm really happy to see what the outcome of issue one was in Ohio.
Super happy to see that this, these ballot initiatives are continuing to surprise us with results
that, you know, if you just base your worldview on how legacy media reports on these issues,
you would believe that like there's no way that these kinds of ballot measures are going to
work in states that are considered red states. But these shockers keep coming one after another.
And I hope they continue to just trying to get you guys to see the other perspective, the areas
of common ground when there's just this endless media deluge of, of, you know, reports about
how divided and polarized we are, how much we all hate each other. Not necessarily the case
when it comes to some of these issues.
Let's move on to what the Democratic Party is up to as the election heats up.
And they start picking and choosing who gets leadership roles with things like the Democratic National Convention.
Last week, a woman by the name of Minion Moore, a principal at a public affairs and consulting firm known as Dewey Square Group, or DSG, as I'm going to call it throughout the rest of the segment, was a now.
House is the chair of the 24 Democratic National Convention. Pretty big deal. Now, I mentioned
DSG, or Dewey Square Group, because of her involvement in it and what that actually means.
Because while the Democratic Party still loves to present itself and market itself as the
party that looks out for the little guy, for ordinary workers in America, actions certainly
speak louder than words, and they keep choosing leadership that has very much.
very cozy ties to corporate interests, okay? So more is a long time party insider. She's currently
a co-chair of the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee, and she was also CEO of the DNC back in 2001.
Now, her consulting firm, okay, DSG, has had some clients that, you know, really like to work
against labor in various states. And I want to give you some specific examples, beginning with
Lyft in Massachusetts. Lyft happened to be one of DSG's clients, and they spent quite a bit of
money to lobby against workers in the state of Massachusetts. So last year, DSG scored an eight-figure
payday from Lyft as part of a Massachusetts campaign regarding the classification of app-based workers.
So gig workers.
What the apps want to do is essentially classify these workers, not as employees, but as private
contractors.
And the reason why they want to do that is so they can avoid having to provide benefits,
health care benefits, for instance, to these workers.
Now, Lyft and other companies launched a public influence campaign, supporting a proposed
Massachusetts ballot initiative that would classify app-based drivers as independent contractors,
among other policies, Lyft contributed $14 billion to the state group backing the initiative
in what the Boston Globe called the largest political donation ever in Massachusetts.
Now, a study done by UC Berkeley kind of looked into what this ballot initiative would
do if it passes for these gig economy workers, okay?
And the U.C. Berkeley study found this.
It said that five loopholes in the proposition would cut into workers' wages.
They estimated drivers and riders working a typical 15-hour work week would only make $4.82 per hour after costs,
while those working a 40-hour work week would make $6.74 an hour, which I don't think I need to tell you guys.
that is obviously even lower than the current abysmal federal minimum wage of $7.25.
And by the way, that UC Berkeley study is right on the nose because a similar proposition
passed in the state of California, Prop 22 back in 2020. And it was devastating for those working
in the gig economy. So I was really happy to find what the fate of this proposition in Massachusetts
ended up being. I'll tell you what that is in just a moment. But let's go back to the Dewey
Square Group, Minion Moore's consulting firm, and how they played a role in all of this. So apparently
DSG got a lot of that industry money in support of the measure. The Lyft funded group named
Flexibility and Benefits for Massachusetts Drivers paid DSG nearly $10.6 million in two payments in August
in September last year, according to state data from the Office of Campaign and Political
Finance, making DSG by far its top vendor. So this consulting firm that the now head of the Democratic
National Convention is part of, okay, she's the principal at this consulting firm,
worked against workers, viciously worked against workers in the state of Massachusetts,
in cahoots with DSG.
DSG was doing their dirty deeds for them.
But luckily, last summer, Massachusetts court threw out the measure and prevented it from
appearing on ballots.
So the fate of the measure ended up being excellent.
But the reason why I'm sharing these details with you is, again, the person chosen to,
to head the Democratic National Convention and all the organizing around it, all the planning
around it is the principle at this consulting firm that works on behalf of these moneyed interests
and against the interests of ordinary Americans, ordinary workers. I've got more for you.
Let's let's talk a little bit about the restaurant industry and DSG's involvement with the
restaurant industry. So Dewey Square Group has other clients, like McDonald's, for instance, as of
its most recent political disclosure last year, McDonald's was a member of trade group of the
trade group, the National Restaurant Association, which is now leading the battle against a California
labor law, the Fast Act, signed last year by Governor Gavin Newsom on Labor Day. Now, the Fast Act
is a priority for unions, for workers unions. It would establish, or has established a 10-member
fast food council to oversee working conditions and fast food chains. And it is also expected to
increase wages for fast food workers. But it is now being challenged by a statewide ballot measure,
which is expected to be on the ballot in November of 2024. Now, DSG, that's Minion Moore's
consulting firm, has a history of helping the restaurant association out with these kinds of measures.
DSG has worked with, also worked for the National Restaurant Association, as it opposed
legislation guaranteeing sick leave for workers, and the pro-union employee free choice act.
In 2009, DSG was paid $772,110 by the National Restaurant Association, according to the Intercept.
And they have other questionable clients as well.
Okay, so what are those questionable clients?
Biodiesel companies. So let's talk about that. In 2017, Dewey Square Group received almost
$1.2 million from the National Biodiesel board. And in 2019, and 2021, DSG received another
$1.5 million from the biodiesel group for consulting. Now, the issue with that is, you know,
biodiesel has been linked to, you know, basically cutting down trees, deforestation in order
to use the land as farmland in order to, you know, essentially create the biodiesel, right?
So it's actually linked to climate change.
And this group that this woman, Minion Moore, is part of, the principle of, is essentially
fighting on behalf of this industry, along with other corporate interests, right?
Finally, let's get to the Crem de la Crem, the private health care industry, because this
consulting firm also did a lot of work for them. For instance, since 2013, DSG has spent
nearly $2.5 million for the tenant health care hospital company in lobbying Massachusetts
on nurse safe staffing requirements and other issues. So the hospital industry has been
fighting legislation in the state that has sought to cap the number of patients that nurses
can be assigned to at a given time, going back to a bill that passed in 2014, applying a cap
for nurses in intensive care units, which makes a lot of sense, right? Nurses are burnt out,
healthcare workers are burnt out, understandably so as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Many of them have an unmanageable workload with an unmanageable number of patients that they have to
provide care for. And so the nurses union want to, unions want to make sure that they have
a cap to, by the way, not just look out for the nurses, but also ensure that the patients are
getting an adequate quality of care. But the health care companies, the private hospital
companies, they don't like that because they don't want to have to hire more nurses. They just
want to take the nurses they have and just load them up with as many patients as they possibly
can. And so they have a DSG group essentially work on their behalf in scrapping any policies
that could cap the number of patients that these nurses have. In 2021 and 2022, tenant health care
was engaged in a 10-month standoff against the nurses union at St. Vincent Hospital in Worcester,
which the company owns as nurses stayed on strike to demand a series of changes, including
nurse to patient ratios. Following the strike, tenant partnered with the anti-union national
right to work legal defense foundation to attempt to have the union decertified. But the hospital
nurses voted in March of 2022 to preserve their union. And guess what? There's more.
DSG is linked to yet another client in 2021. DSG began lobbying for Molina Health Care on a senior
care program in the state. The Fortune 500 company is a member.
of healthcare industry lobbying group, America's health insurance plans, AHIP, which during
Biden's first year in office, proposed a public health, or I should say opposed, not proposed.
They opposed a public health insurance option, which is probably part of the reason why we haven't
really heard much from Biden about a public option, something he campaigned for, something he ran on,
and then immediately forgot about as soon as he was elected into office. So look, I give you all
this information to say. When the Democratic Party is puzzled by ordinary Americans turning
their backs on them, refusing to vote for them, and they don't understand why, because they love
to market themselves as the party that looks out for the little guy. Just understand that
people aren't stupid. And when you go out of your way to name individuals who have these massive
conflicts of interests, I mean, Minion Moore, being in bed with these corporate interests as a result
of being a principal over at this consulting firm.
That is the kind of conflict of interest that should have raised red flags for the Democratic
Party. Hey, maybe we don't want this woman to be the person, you know, leading the Democratic
National Convention, especially at a time when you have Joe Biden trying to present
himself as FDR, right? He took advantage of Marjorie Green comparing him to FDR, used her
own words in a political ad to boast about how he's being compared to FDR.
But you actually have to look out for the workers to do that and optics also matter.
So maybe take a good hard look at the leadership in the party.
Maybe take a good hard look at the people that you're in bed with and question whether
or not it makes sense to work alongside people who have a financial interest in working
against ordinary workers in this country.
I think that's super important for the Democratic Party.
Hopefully they realize that.
My guess is they won't.
But we'll see.
I just don't understand how they can like have all of these issues with all of these
various people.
It's not just million more.
I mean, look at, look at Biden's cabinet.
It is full to the brim with individuals who worked as consultants had think tanks prior
to the Biden administration and take a look at who their clients are.
And when you take a look at who their clients are, you have to ask yourself, who are
these individuals actually looking out for? Is it the American people? Or is it the moneyed
interest that they worked with and represented as clients before the administration?
Just something to think about. Anyway, we got to take a break when we come back. David Schuster
will be joining me for the second hour and we'll talk a little bit about, well, basically
cops trying to arrest a man for flipping them off. That and more coming up.
Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks.
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I'm your host, Shank Yugar, and I'll see you soon.