The Young Turks - Don't touch me

Episode Date: October 26, 2021

Paid family leave, one of the hallmarks of President Joe Biden's social safety net agenda, is in jeopardy of being pared down once again or even cut from a major spending bill over a lack of support from Joe Manchin. Democratic leaders are telling members to embrace the spending bill, even as progressives see several major policy goals get tossed. Kyrsten Sinema was confronted by a self-described constituent as she walked through an airport. The border patrol agent who posted a doctored sex photo of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez got away with it. Mitt Romney expressed concern that taxing billionaires could cause them to invest in paintings or ranches rather than things that build jobs. Hosts: Ana, Cenk Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. All right, welcome the Young Church, Jake U Granah, Kasparian with you guys. Guys, today we largely have bad news. And it has begun. The capitulation that we were worried about from day one for progressives is well underway. And we're going to give you some depressing details about it, but you got to know.

But I also want you to know it's not over. This is the time to fight back. If you wait until it's a yes or no vote, well, you're already screwed. So this is the time to reach out to your progressive legislators and tell them if it has no progressive priorities in it. I'm not interested. And so you're not going to get any cookies for it. You're not going to get it. In fact, you'll get a lot of criticism for it. Voting for empty slogans is not interesting. In fact, the most infuriating story of today is their planned marketing for their surrender. So I'm talking about the Democrats in general now. So hold for that story. All right,

Anna. All right, well, let's get to our daily update on Mansion and how awful he is. So despite all of the cuts to the budget reconciliation bill that Biden conceded to in order to impress Senator Joe Manchin, a corporate Democrat who's so corrupt that he has no interest in actually passing popular policy for his constituents, Manchin has not signed on or committed to voting in favor of the bill. Again, this is after Biden has made massive concessions to the point where the reconciliation bill is a shell of what it once was. A good way to summarize it was the way that this tweet was written by Lee Caldwell, a reporter with NBC. She writes, the outstanding issues have become clear. Four weeks paid leave, Mansion opposes. Remember, they whittled it down from 12 weeks to four weeks, but Mansion still opposes. Medicare vouchers for dental, Mansion opposes. Medicaid expansion, Mansion opposes.

Prescription drug pricing negotiations. Cinema opposes. And of course, there's a massive debate, massive disagreement in regard to how to pay for it. Both Mansion and Cinema have been on the record countless times indicating that they will not, under any circumstance, increase taxes on corporations. So to give you some more details into what is happening right now,

the United States is one of just eight countries without national paid maternity leave, even if Democrats were to settle on four weeks, which it seems like they won't even do that of paid parental leave, the U.S. would still lag numerous other countries. In fact, the global average for paid maternity leave is at 29 weeks, and it is 16 weeks for paid paternity leave. So it is very likely that since Mansion is against any paid leave at all, even the four weeks will be cut from the bill entirely. Now, activists and other Democratic lawmakers are just completely delusional about who Mansion is, thinking that he's some sort of good faith actor, and the optimism at this point is starting to grate on my nerves. I'm just keeping it real. So let me give you the specific examples that

I'd like to refer to. Mansion was seen huddling with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand for several minutes outside the office of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. Jillebran later told reporters, she is negotiating with Mansion to ensure that paid family leave stays in the bill. This is the part that really gets to me. I think he is open to this in good faith. I think he fully understands this is essential to working parents and working families all across America. But no, he doesn't care. At the end of the day, he doesn't care. He's made that abundantly clear. What he's most concerned about are his corporate donors and of course his own personal financial interests. A few more graphics because I think this is important. Advocates even are

delusional about what's happening. They felt confident that four weeks of paid leave would make it into the final bill, especially because the provision meets Mansion's criteria for work requirements and means testing. I don't know, I feel like it's kind of a given that in order to qualify for paid leave from work, you must be working. I don't know what work requirement means in this context. It's just insane. And then finally, this is my favorite part, meaning this is my least favorite part. Manchin said he regularly talks with president, with the president, privately, adding that Biden's nickname for him is Jojo. Oh, how cute. I can't stand it. How cute. I can't stand it. I can't stand it. It's very sweet.

Yeah. Jojo. No, but guys, look, there's a hero worship that you're told in the rest of the media, that these leaders are so brilliant and wonderful and honorable. President Biden refers to Joe Manchin as Jojo. They're simpletons. I mean, they, and I, everybody in Washington will be just aghast. I'll be persona on Grotto forever and ever for saying that Biden's a simpleton. Who, Jojo? Jojo.

Like, you think you're negotiating with a buddy? You think this is, this is corn pop? No, the guy's runs on corporate donations, calling him Jojo isn't going to help with the fundamentals of politics at all. In fact, it's the reason why I'm so disgusted by it is because it lets you into the mindset a little bit. He, I think he thinks they're actually buddies. Yeah.

They're actually friends. And that they were good, hey, should we go to Denny's or should we go to McDonald's? Hey, we'll negotiate over it in good faith. No, there's somebody paying him to make sure those things do not go in the bill. Do you not, and they, I guess they don't understand it. I mean, or they're all like cartoonishly evil. But I don't think Joe Biden is evil. I think he's really not that bright.

I mean, all that corporate money, he took his whole life, his whole life. And he's still like, well, no, I mean, look, I just happen to coincidentally do everything they asked. But I mean, hey, that's just Jojo and Bobby Bobby and Susu, right? Now come on man, this is just all of it is disgusting and the rest of the Washington media goes along with it like, oh my God, let's see Biden's a deal maker. He calls him Jojo. You're all children. Children. Okay, so now let's get to reality. Now, when cinema and mansions say we will not reverse Trump's tax cuts, we will kill the rest of a bill we are pretending to like. And the other bill that we personally negotiated, the infrastructure bill, right? We'll kill them both if you raise those taxes by a dollar. We will not under any circumstances under the Trump tax cuts. Well, what does that tell you? As a matter of definition, by fact, it means they are for the Trump tax cuts.

Now, do you ever see that written anywhere? The Mansion and Cinema are wholeheartedly in favor of the tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy. Well, if you don't reverse it, you're in favor of it. And by the way, okay, you're using the excuse of mansion in cinema. Joe Biden, you said you're going to reverse them. Well, okay, I know you're all obsessed with your egos. Oh, what will my legacy say? What would they say about me in the year 3000?

They're not going to say a goddamn thing about you, okay? Just do something right now for the people that live on this planet today. Okay, so we can have a planet tomorrow. Well, I got news for you. They're going to say that you agreed with Trump's tax cuts. Otherwise, you would have undone them. Oh, well, that would have been hard. Oh, would it have been hard?

Well, what the hell did we elect you for? What did we elect you for? There's nothing left in this bill, guys. You guys don't understand. There's almost nothing left in it. Now, the only question is if the progressives are going to capitulate, and that's going to be the saddest thing I've ever seen in my life. They will.

All right, look, one more thing here on the maternity and paternity leave that Anna pointed out. The global average, the average, including countries that are middle class, poor, the average for the whole planet is 29 weeks. 29 weeks. We can't get four. At the end of the day, if they're going to pass this bill, we're going to humiliate them until they say fine to four weeks. But that's going to be the only thing left. It's going to be the only thing left, if that, right? The only thing, because I want to make sure we're correct in stating where we really are with this bill, for the most part, you're right.

Everything's been stripped away, with one exception. I haven't seen anything so far to indicate that they're taking out universal pre-K. That's the only thing they haven't touched yet. Again, you've explained this a hundred times, Dana. It's because the corporations want it. Corporations wanted. At the end of the day, the only thing that passed in Washington is what corporations, have agreed to were under corporate rule.

And by the way, right wing, you knuckleheads. You hate corporate rule. Every single one of your Republicans, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney, all of them and Donald Trump are saying, no, no, protect the rich, protect corporations and big business that's crushing you. You think they're on your side? We're honest about our side. Every non-progressive Democrat is 100% owned by corporations.

100%. Dude, the rest of the planet has 16 weeks of paternity leave. We can't get four weeks of maternity leave in this country. This country is barbaric because we live in a system that maximizes profit at all of our expense. They're going to grind us to the very, very bone until we could barely survive, and then they'll have maximized profit. Well, I mean, that's how the system is set up. And I think for a lot of Americans, that's already the case, which is why you're seeing it play out in what's being referred to as the Great Resignation. I mean, look, when you're talking about supply chain issues, it's not that we're having difficulty in getting products to our ports. It's just that we don't have truck drivers who are willing to take these jobs.

And the reason why is because they have been mistreated. They have been underpaid. And so when we're seeing it play out in real time, just pay close attention. to the way those stories are reported, because oftentimes when they're talking about inflation, when they're talking about supply chain issues, I feel like the corporate media really goes out of its way to ignore the fact that workers are standing up to what they've been dealing with, the abusive treatment for so long, and they're refusing to take these jobs. That's the real issue here.

But I do want to also just point out the fact that NBC just printed a statement from Senator Joe Manchin without doing any fact checking. So he said this, I have a hard time and I'm totally out of sync with 48 other Democrats, meaning Democrats in the Senate, so totally out of sync. I love them all. And I love all the Republicans. So I'm just trying to survive in a very, very, very divided Congress in a very divided country. But hold on. Is the country really divided? Congress is divided. There's no question about that. Although when it comes to corporate interest, they seem pretty unified. But when you look at American voters, regardless of what their political affiliation is, the vast majority of them find the provisions, the original

provisions in Biden's build back better agenda, incredibly popular. They're in favor of it, okay? Three-fourths of Americans are in favor of the robust provisions. And there was a Pew research study recently that found this. 85% of surveyed American adults said they wanted an over of the country's political systems, while 66% said they wanted major changes to the U.S. economy. Just over three-fourths of respondents said there needed to be major reformed to the country's health care systems. So I don't know, if you actually look at the substantive issues, majority of Americans are not divided at all. The question is, why does the media pretend or at least give off the perception that Americans are divided on these

issues. They're not. They see a broken system, they want solutions, they saw Biden's proposed solutions, and rather than you know, supporting the best interests of their constituents, you have corporate Democrats looking out for their corporate donors and their own personal financial interests. That's it, that's what's really happening. That is the story. There's really nothing more to it at this point. While Manchin is saying, oh, I love the Republicans, I love them. Republicans are starting to all wear face masks that says, let's go Brandon.

That's a euphemism for F. Joe Biden. Ted Cruz made a video where he talked about, let's mention let's go Brandon. The Fox News anchors are saying, let's go Brandon. So while the Democrats are like, oh my beloved, the Republicans are like, F you, F you. And they're like, okay, okay, Manchin's like yes, why? Because they're all same corporate dogs. They're all corporate dogs. So look, just don't listen to any of the rest of the dumbass media that never even covers

the money in politics when the entire bill is based on who's getting money from different donors. That's all of politics. That's 100% of politics. And the mainstream media covered nearly 0%. So corporate media covering and doing corporate theater for corporate politicians, you're going to get almost nothing out of this bill. And if the progressives vote yes and then try to do marketing on top of it, they have no idea what kind of rude awakening they're in for. All right. Yeah.

So let's actually get to the marketing aspect of it because if that story upset you, this next one is a doozy. So House Speaker Nancy Pelosi huddled up with congressional lawmakers. in her caucus, the Democrats, and essentially persuaded them or attempted to persuade them to not only vote in favor of the paired back budget reconciliation bill, which did away with all of the popular provisions that progressives wanted, but she wants them to also cheerlead on behalf of the bill. Let me give you the statements. This is during a meeting, closed door meeting with progressive lawmakers. She said, embrace this. Embrace this speaker, Nancy Pelosi told Democrats during a private meeting Monday evening.

and have a narrative of success. Then House Majority Leader Steady Hoyer jumps in and says, if we don't act like we're winning, the American people won't believe it either. How about the American people won't believe it because you didn't deliver on your promises? How about the American people know you failed because you happened to fail?

See, I think that they assume that their constituents and their voters are morons who have such short attention and memories, right, that they forget that just a few months ago, the Democratic Party was promising the moon and the stars, swearing that if they could just get those two Democratic senators elected in the Senate runoff races in Georgia, well, then it would be a new day in America. They would have the majority in the Senate and the House, and they could reverse the Trump-era tax cuts, and they could materially benefit Americans' lives. And then all of a sudden, we get garbage.

We get a bipartisan infrastructure deal that's nothing more than a corporate handout bill meant to privatize public infrastructure. And then we get a budget reconciliation bill that started off as something decent and then was paired back down into everything that corporations would want. The only thing that remains, as of today, is the universal pre-K. And the only reason why corporations haven't touched that, the only reason why they haven't paired that back is because they want kids to be taken care of in pre-K so parents can go back to the minds. That's the only reason they're looking out for their self-interest. So Democrats,

people are going to see you as failures because you're failing. It's that simple. So guys, you can tell we're honest because Willie told you that when, hey, when they had the good provisions in the bill, lowering drug prices, putting dental and vision into Medicare and actual real climate changed proposals. We say, hey, you know what, that's pretty good. It's not as good as we want it, but it's pretty good. We'll take that. We were honest about it. And when progressives fought and made sure that they didn't do that nonsense bipartisan bill first, we gave all the credit in the world. You saw it with your own eyes. Now we're telling you, no, the bill got gutted. There's almost nothing left in it. And so that is why Pelosi and Danny Hoyer are going and talking to Democrats, and especially progressives, and they're telling them. Now remember, your job is to lie to the voters. That is what the narrative of success is that you know what the what real success is success. You don't need a narrative of success if you already have it, okay? If you want on all these provisions, you wouldn't need a narrative. Here they're saying we're obviously not going to get success, we're not going to win,

so we're going to create a narrative of success. And you saw Hoyer's quote, act like we're winning. If we don't act like we're winning, they won't think we're winning. you know why sitting because you're not winning but but that's why they give the speech Tom Brady after winning the seventh Super Bowl didn't have to tell the rest of his teammates hey act like you're winning you know why because they just won the Super Bowl they were already acting like they were winning because they actually won okay when you need to trick people with total BS marketing that's when you

tell them act like you're winning yeah when I'm asking I'm ordering you to surrender, I'm ordering you to surrender to corporate interests, and then get out there like a puppet and put on a show and act like we're winning, because that's what Democrats do. We're liars, we lie to the voters a thousand times over, and then we act like they won. Well, guess what? Their drug prices are even going to be lower or they're not. And by the way, you know who they'll blame most is us. They'll say, you guys are ruining the theater. We had a nice play, everybody had their role, And we were saying, okay, you say this and you say that, and we're not actually going to pass anything.

And these goddamn young Turks come in and ruin it. They're not credible. They're not credible. They're telling you things that are true. You can't tell things that are true. You have to act like everything is fine under corporate rule. So bottom line is, though, you think, look, I wish we were that powerful. The reality is you're either going to have lower drug prices or you aren't in Kentucky and Hawaii and Rhode Island and everywhere across this country.

So when you don't have lower drug prices, then Democrats told you you were going to, and you can hear in the news that they refused to ever negotiate with drug companies, you know that they're sellouts, that they sold you out. We don't have to tell them that. They see it in the prices. So just to remind you all of what is already paired back and likely to be cut entirely from the bill, political rights that Medicare expansion, new Medicaid coverage, and pay. paid leave are all threatening to go the way of a carbon tax and the clean electricity performance plan overboard. Nothing left. Nothing left. So with the exception of universal pre-K for the reasons that I outlined earlier. With that said though, what are progressives thinking?

Well, as we film this today, there's news that later tonight Bernie Sanders is going to give some sort of speech to essentially say that if there's no Medicare expansion, there's no deal, if there's no prescription drug negotiations, there's no deal. Obviously that speech hasn't happened yet, so we have to wait and see what the tone and tenor of that speech really will be. But I do have some statements from other progressives that do not bode well. So progressives are preparing to reluctantly embrace the one trillion plus legislation political rights.

While it's definitely not the bill they wanted, it's likely the best deal they're going to get with Democrats' narrow majorities in both chambers. Politico states as a fact, as a fact. That's right, they do. Like, shut up and take the best deal you're going to get. The media bullies progressives. Yeah, how's that a fact? No, you just stated it as if it was.

So Pramila Jayapal, who is the head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, says, For now. The vast majority of our priorities are in. No, they're not. No, they're not. That's just a lot. That's just not true. That's just not true.

But there are a couple of areas where that's still not the case. What will continue to do is push as hard as we can, but just recognize that there are 50 senators and we have no margin in the Senate. Yeah, guess what? Some of those senators are our senators. They could also say no. Why is Manchin the only one saying no? When Manchin is the only one is saying no, they're going towards one and a half trillion. It was three and a half trillion to one and a half trillion. They're not meeting in the middle. They're not meeting near three and a half trillion. They might not even meet anywhere. He might just get only one and a half trillion because Jayapal loves to surrender. That's her favorite tactic.

So look, again, people in Washington will be furious. You can't say that about an elite, someone who's a member of Congress and our so-called leader. You can't say that. She'll have her feelings hurt, and then she'll never talk to progressive media again, and she'll never do this and this. I don't care. I care about what's in the bill. I care about the voters. If you got nothing for us, are you really our leader?

If your role is to take orders from Pelosi and Hoyer and act like we're winning and enforce that acting upon other progressives, you're not really our leader. And so, look, nothing's set in stone. She could turn around. She could be super tough. Bernie can give a firebrain speech tonight. He doesn't have to give a firebrains. All he has to do is say, no, I'm not going to do it unless these provisions are in.

That's it. I'm one of the 50 senators, and you've got no bills. You don't have either bill if we're not doing it. Progressives have way more leverage than they realize. Look, corporate Democrats are desperate to get these bills passed because the midterms are coming up. But remember, they're the ones who are holding up these bills because they're looking out for their corporate donors and their personal financial interests. So why give them that win? Why help them with their re-election campaigns when they've stripped every progressive priority out of the bill?

And also, let's keep it real, corporations are salivating over the bipartisan infrastructure deal. They want that passed immediately. Why give corporations that win? And you also set a precedent, a pretty strong precedent indicating that progressives are weak and they're always going to cave. Yeah, I'm sick of it. So last thing, guys, look, if Jayapal turns around and says, no, we're going to get these provisions in the bill and she gets it done, we don't need, look, I don't want to negotiate ourselves against ourselves. here, but we don't need every provision in there. The mainstream media talking point about, oh, you're letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Where's the good? Where's the good? There is no good, right? It's a way of saying, just take everything to corporations say, okay, so I'm not saying we need a perfect, that's childish, childish. But if you get us almost nothing, that is not good. So if you get us a couple of those provisions and they're big changes like negotiating drug prices, At least you have something to hang your hat on, and you could call yourself a leader, and you could say you actually won on something, not everything but something, but something real

and something big. Get us a couple of those wins, then we call you a leader. But if you don't do that, and this is in the future, it hasn't happened yet. So whether it's Jayapal or anyone else, they can't tell us right now, no, I plan to surrender in the future, so you're not allowed to criticize me. No, your actions will determine it. If you do the right thing, we call you a hero. If you surrender on all of our priorities and then insist that we do cheerleading for Pelosi,

no, then you are not a hero and you are not a leader. It's not for me to decide. It's for you to decide. And so if you don't do it, we're not going to, nobody, it's not the old days of the media. The mainstream media will play ball, will do exactly as Biden and Pelosi tell them to do. That's their job, okay? For independent media and progressive media, you don't control us. And I don't care how much you touch, tut, I don't care.

Nobody's going to play ball. If the bill sucks, we're going to tell everybody that the bill sucks, and you signed on to it. All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, yet another video of Senator Sinema, just completely dismissing one of her own constituents who's just asking for a conversation. We'll be right back. All right, back on TYT, Jank and Anna, and all of your wonderful people out there who make this show possible. In fact, I'm gonna read one super chat. Tosin Adesider says, I love this fire and passion from Jank and Anna.

There won't be any planet left to remember these people's corrupt legacies. Well, that's where we are today, guys. All right, Anna. Arizona Senator Kirsten Cinema, who succeeded in convincing President Biden and the Democratic Party to cut down the budget reconciliation bill to something that's unrecognizable, was approached yet again by one of her constituents who just wanted to have a conversation. But since the constituent isn't a billionaire donor, you can guess how cinema treated her. Let's watch. I know you've met with dozens of lobbyists. I did not touch you. I mean, I think it doesn't, I know you're thinking of lobbyists.

The world doesn't when you're talking with corporate donors about the package. That's obviously. How many times do you meet with constituents? How many times I think they know with constituents when negotiating? Sorry about that. I think it's part of the course. It is part of the story. It's so interesting.

For now. I can have them meet you next day. Every single year in Arizona, it's getting hotter and hotter. We're breaking record. Because I don't know how to where it's the longest people are suffering. People are suffering. Your constituents are suffering. What are you going to do with climate change? Next week in Glasgow could be the last chance. Please answer me, Senator. My family, my house,

we're from Tucson, we're constituents. There you have it, American democracy right there for you. She felt the need to apologize to Republican Tim Scott because one of her own constituents from Tucson, Arizona, had the audacity to approach her and ask questions about policy that has a giant impact on her life and the lives of all Americans. I mean, it's just, this is America. This is what two awful Supreme Court rulings, the latest being Citizens United, has led to. government that doesn't work for its people. It's just a government that works for corporate donors. And also, I mean, again, I'm gonna keep repeating this point.

They're invested in individual businesses and stocks. They don't care about you. They don't care. They just don't. The system is set up for them not to care, which is why she can just brazenly ignore her own constituent like that, and then feel the need to apologize to a Republican senator. Senator.

To apologize to Republican Senator because a constituent approached her. That's who Kirsten Cinema is, but she's not the only one. And I want to also note, Cinema and Mansion are the two Democratic senators who have taken all the heat. And to be clear, they should get a lot of heat. But they're not the only ones. There's a ton of hush, hush corporate Democrats in the Senate who agree with everything they're doing.

Okay, let's not forget about them. The Dick Durbin's, the Mark Warner's, other corporate Democrats who didn't feel the need to go out as publicly as Mansion and Cinema have. But you think they want all of the robust provisions in the budget reconciliation bill? You think that they listen to their constituents rather than the best interests of corporations? Please, there's many of them. This system of legalized bribery honestly makes both parties very similar to each other when it comes to substantive issues. I'm talking foreign policy, I'm talking economic policy. And then when it comes to social issues, honestly it's all lip service from Democrats,

because when push comes to shove, they don't do anything about that either. What happened to police reform? Nothing. Nothing. So we're gonna show you in a second how much of a liar Chris and Cinema is. Just flat out, liar, okay? But as you saw that interaction on tape, it's really hard not to despise the elites. And so I'm, this is going to be interestingly ironic, but I want to reach out the right

wingers here, and I want to do it more and more. Like do you not get it, that's a Democratic senator and a Republican senator. They're both voting to make sure that the richest people in the world do not get their taxes increased, that the richest corporations in the world, the big business that's crushing you and paying you incredibly low wages. They're both the Republicans and the Democrats work for them. They don't work for us. So when you're get angry at the leach, you're right, right wingers.

When you then say, oh, it's the fault of the Mexican dude who crossed the border without a dollar in his pocket, who do you think rigged the system? The powerless or the powerful? Please don't be a knucklehead. We need every American to stand up and realize, don't look down, look up, look up. It's their donors, it's their, and by the way, if you're a right winger, you know this. But again, you got slightly misdirected. He said, oh, George Soros, I can't believe.

And then they show, oh, yeah, you want to take Soros money out of politics? Absolutely. I can't wait to take it out. Why about union money? I can't wait to take it out. How about corporate money? I can't wait to take it out. If you're a right-winger, why would you say, oh, the unions are bad?

Soros is bad. Oh, but those big business guys, I bet they have my best interest in mind. Wall Street bankers, I bet they have my best interest in mind. Are you insane? Who do you think Tim Scott's donors are? Cruz's donors, Mitch McConnell's donors, and yes, the corporate Democrats. Yes, they're working together to screw us all. And look at their disdain for their voters.

They're like, Mr. Elite, I'm so sorry that riff-raf voter has come here. Oh, you're my constituent. Ugh, don't touch me. Don't touch me. I mean, they're in the goddamn hunger games, man. They're at the Capitol, and they've got their funny makeup on, and they look down their noses at all of us. So let's talk about cinema's lies. Let's show you the old tweets.

Okay, you ready? Here we go. Here's a tweet that cinema had earlier. Senate Democrats should use reconciliation to pass health reform legislation. We've used it for health care before. Well, that was in 2010? Yep. Okay.

It's interesting how different she is now that she's had so many meetings with corporate donors. Now all of a sudden, I'm not so interested in using reconciliation. When she was coming up and trying to get into the House and giving quotes like this, me, she was desperate for voters. At that point, she'd go to every voter meeting and she told them, oh my God, I'm with you all. We need to use our consideration. Now she says, how dare you use it? Oh, we need to make sure we got health care reform. Now she says absolutely no health care reform. Oh my God, my donors are outraged by it. Here's more quotes. 2011, Warren Buffett asked Congress to level the playing field and make sure the rich pay their fair share

and taxes. She is single-handedly, yes, working with every Republican, yes, secret corporate Democrats, but publicly, she's the one Democrat saying, I will not allow a dollar increase in taxes for the rich, not one dollar to my beloved rich people, okay? Look at what a gargantuan liar, Kristen Sinema is. She says, again, in earlier tweets, as I said on Fox, it will come from closing tax loopholes for big corporations and the rich so they pay their fair share like us. She is campaigning against that publicly as we speak. She continues today, our clueless Congress plans to cut taxes for the richest 2%.

Time for a change. Apparently the time for change is passed. She now says those same people should not get any tax increases. She continues corporations spend in secret to influence Congress and rig the game. Demand Congress overturned Citizens United. She now thinks spending in secret to influence Congress is to influence Congress is Terrific, and it's exactly the kind of money she receives. So screw the elites, they're lying to you.

Any media that tells you that they're honorable legislators who are having debates that are philosophical and ideological. Oh my God, she looked at the spreadsheets, and then she had a debate with Tim Scott. And then they both agreed that the donors who gave the millions of dollars should get everything. What a philosophical debate they had. No, corruption defined. We're going to take a break when we come back. We have an update on the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the expose that was written about them by ProPublica years ago. Whatever happened with the abusive behavior they were engaging in, we were promised consequences.

Did they get consequences? We'll give you that story and more when we return. All right, back on TYT, Jank and Anna with you guys. Just got infuriating news. That'll be in the second hour, so stay with us. Today is not a good news day, but you've got to know the realities of what's happening in this country so we can fight back. All right, Anna. All right.

Border Patrol agents who were caught doing pretty disgusting things and posting abusive posts on Facebook. It was a 9,500 member Customs and Border. protection of Facebook group were supposed to face some consequences for what they were engaging in. But now, thanks to an update from Slate, we've learned that many of them received no consequences at all, despite a congressional investigation indicating that a lot of them should have been let go. Now, Congress did in fact investigate this matter. This was related to a ProPublica report that was released back in 2019, they gained access to a closed Facebook group with Customs and Border Patrol agents in it. And here's what the committee found. The report paints a picture

of an organization rife with a violently abusive mentality toward the public, a sense of total impunity to revel in that abuse, and virtually zero accountability. The agency's discipline review board found 60 cases of misconduct and ultimately recommended removal in 24 cases, but only two agents ultimately lost their jobs. Now, what did they engage in? Let's get into some of the nitty-gritty, the examples that we covered way back when this was published. Well, the most high-profile findings in the ProPublica report were the revelations about multiple members sharing sexually violent images of Representative Acacio-Cortez. One of those agents who shared a doctored image of Donald Trump sexually assaulting Ocasio-Cortez was fired.

But one of the other agents who did something similar did not get fired. So here's what happened in that case. The other who posted an image of a penis going through a fence and Acacio-Cortez superimposed on the other side of the fence with a caption, lucky illegal immigrant glory hole special starring AOC, had his sanction reduced from dismissal, to a 60-day vacation, essentially a suspension with back pay. Payed time off, nice. Nice way to punish a Border Patrol agent who posts that kind of abusive garbage. In another case, an agent was recommended for removal after he posted an internal video of CBC's,

CBP's tactical unit that showed a group of migrants under pursuit, including a migrant fleeing and falling off a cliff to their death. obscene comment about an unarmed member of Congress. The deciding official reduced the discipline to a 30-day suspension, the committee notes. There are more examples. But, Jank, why don't you jump in? Yeah. So, look, the comments are so vile. It's, I hate even describing them. So, and if you just want to criticize politicians, nobody is going to care about that. In fact, we're going to probably you know, join you in criticizing politicians. If you work for the government, I don't mind that at all. But if you're going to do sexually lewd things like that, like, ha, ha, you know, she's here to use her body, et cetera.

And we let you do that. Well, what's the message we're sending? I mean, the guy got two months of vacation. He got two months of free paid vacation for sending that cartoon. So now, do you think the rest of the agents are going to go, hey, guys, don't do that, man. Remember, are you going to get two weeks, two, not two weeks, two months, two months of vacation. Paid leave. Okay, if you do that, everybody's going to send it.

They're like, God damn it, I wish I had totally degraded that person. Degrading women is rewarded here at Custom Borders and Patrol. God knows what they do the female immigrants. God knows what they do. Well, we do know what they do. There have been actual cases of rape, sexual assault, committed by border patrol agents, and now we know clearly that they can get away with quite a bit. So it doesn't surprise me that those instances have happened in the past, have been reported on.

But I also want to talk about what was also posted about migrants, including migrant children on this page. One agent hypothesized that a photo of a drowned father and his 23-month-old daughter had been doctored by Democratic operatives describing the dead child and his father as floaters. The officer had previously been disciplined on three separate occasions for inappropriate comments on MySpace, for having lost property, and for making sexually inappropriate gestures to a fellow Border Patrol agent. So he had done all those things prior to the posts on this closed Facebook page, and he's still a border patrol agent. So is it shocking that there's this culture of just this toxic culture overall? And remember, we're talking about people who are supposed to be dealing with, who are supposed to be enforcing and carrying out our laws at the border. Clearly, they see migrants as subhuman. They don't think that they should be treated as humans at all, which is probably why under

Trump's leadership, literally dozens of migrants died in U.S. custody, including children. The officer, by the way, was recommended for dismissal, but retired before he could face discipline, receiving his full retirement package, including disability annuity, Social Security benefits, and other payments from qualified federal retirement. plans. The agent faced no discipline for misconduct on the Facebook page. So he's been doing it for so long, some of the postings were on MySpace. Yeah. So but nope. And guys, that goes to the mindset. So all the cartoons, all the terrible comments goes to the mindset of they pass that stuff around because they think they're like-minded.

So if you're in a group, for example, with a lot of African-American. Would you pass around a cartoon that was obviously racist? Unlikely, because you know you'd get pushed back and people wouldn't appreciate it, right? So when they pass around cartoons of migrants being killed and their babies dying and they call them floaters and stuff, and they all laugh, it is apparently really well received. Yep. And then when outsiders say, hey, you know what, guys, maybe you're not supposed to enjoy the deaths of the migrants. Maybe you're supposed to, you know, do your job and protect everybody's lives, lives. Our citizens' lives, yes, you're the Border Patrol, but also the migrants' lives and just be a decent human being.

They go, no, no, we vote no. I mean, look at the numbers Anna gave you earlier. Sixty cases that were referred as you must do something about this is outrageous. 24 cases are so bad they should be fired. Only two people were fired. So that's the custom and Border Patrol saying, no, we're not going to change our color. at all. And in fact, we're going to give some of these guys paid vacations just to let people know, wink, wink, don't worry, abuse the migrants any way you like, hate women,

hate Latinos, minorities. We love it. This is a deeply racist, right-wing organizations, and we're going to let you get away with anything you want. And by the way, yeah, so that happened under Trump, Anna, right? Yeah. But this is now Biden's time. Is he changing it? Nope. No problem with it at all. The only thing we've seen from Biden is a continuation of Trump-era immigration policies, which were vicious and brutal. And of course, it's the exact opposite of what Biden campaigned on. He claimed that he was the decent person.

He believed in treating people with respect and dignity. We're not seeing that at all at the border. And is he getting any cookies from the Republican Party, considering the fact that he's just continuing with Trump-era immigration policies? Of course not. they're lying and saying that Biden has an open border policy. So what is he doing? I mean, Biden in so many ways has been a complete and utter disappointment, with one

exception, and that was pulling troops out of Afghanistan, something that he was actually forced to do because Trump already got the ball rolling on that. But other than that, what has Biden done to really reverse the toxicity of the Trump administration? Nothing. All right. Speaking of Trump-era policies, let's talk about taxes and the theatrics taking place in Congress right now. Sorry to be a downer about this, but I don't have a lot of hope at this point.

So the usual suspects, people like Senator Mitt Romney, are all weighing in on some new tax proposals from Democrats. Now, the budget reconciliation bill will not include a corporate tax hike. At first, Biden claimed that he wanted to increase the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%. Then there was some talk of going down to 25%. Doesn't even matter because you have corporate Democrats like Kirsten Cinema who said, under no circumstances, will I sign on to raising corporate taxes. So now you have Democratic lawmakers scrambling to find some replacements in order to raise revenue necessary to pay for the budget reconciliation bill. Now, before I give you the details, I just want to note all theater. There are some progressive journalists who I love and I support, and they are unfortunately naive enough to think that this is more than just theater.

I hope I'm wrong and they're right. But with that said, the activism against it has already begun. Let's start with Mitt Romney. You're going to tax people not when they sell something, but just when they own it and the value goes up. And what that means is that people are these multi-billionaires. I can look and say, I don't want to invest in the stock market, because as that goes up, I'm going to get taxed. So maybe I will instead invest in a ranch or in paintings or things that don't build jobs

and create a stronger economy. So what is Romney talking about there? Well, the Democrats are now considering taxing billionaires on unrealized capital income. That means billionaires who have most of their money parked in stocks, but they don't sell those stocks, right? So they're earning money on those stocks, but in order to get taxed on it, you'd have to sell the stocks. What they do is they keep them in the stock market, they don't sell, which means it's unrealized gains, and instead they just take out loans and live off of those loans and use those stocks as collateral to qualify for the loans. Okay, so what Democrats are proposing here is they would institute a minimum tax on profits

that, you know, that are made through these unrealized capital income. And it's not gonna how, it's just not gonna happen, I don't believe it. Yeah, okay, so look, let me try to explain it real quick in case you guys are unfamiliar with the technical terms. So let's say you made a million bucks in the stock market, right now you don't have to pay any tax on it because you didn't sell yet. If you sell the stock, then you got to pay your taxes, because then you made the money, or you realized the gains, right?

But if you don't sell, it's unrealized gains. Now, you still made the million bucks, but you don't have to pay taxes on it. If you never sell it, you never pay taxes. And if you borrow off of that money, well, then you never have to sell. So that's the loophole that was created, okay, fine. You could find a way around that, et cetera, and this is one way to prevent that. I share an skepticism a million percent. There's no way they're going to pass this.

And we hope to God we're wrong. And if they do pass this, by the way, we'll give them credit and go, whoa, you'll see. We didn't expect that. You see that we're not expecting it right now. I think Mitt Romney will win easily. He will tell his Democratic colleagues, no, no, no, the corporations and the wealthy have ruled. Shut up and take it away, and they will. That's our guess and you'll see how it plays out.

I don't even know what they're wasting their time. Like who are they fooling? Like that's the thing that's frustrating about Democrats. It's not about, oh, maybe if I just mess around with the proposal a little bit, then I can get corporations to sign on, I can get billionaire donors to sign on. They don't want increases in their taxes. So it's one thing to propose these things, it's something entirely different to actually fight for these things.

The Democratic Party is unwilling and unable to actually fight to get these types of provisions passed. End of story. There have been no sticks used against mansion or cinema or any senator who's been speaking out against popular provisions in the budget reconciliation bill. If they're not willing to use the carrots, why are we wasting our time right now? By the way, other things they want to do is institute a minimum tax on profits, large corporations tout to their shareholders. They also want to apply a 3.8% net investment tax from the Affordable

Care Act to partnerships and S corporations. Technical stuff, again, I care about these things, very skeptical about it passing. But you also have Republican senators like Mitch McConnell, who have already spoken out against it. So let's hear what he has to say. So they want a tax gains they haven't realized. and hand out tax breaks for losses. People haven't realized. This hairbrain scheme would have the IRS penalizing people who've invested wisely

and compensating people who have invested poorly, all independent of whether they have actually made or lost any money. This hairbrain scheme would have the IRS penalizing people who've invested wisely and compensating people. who've invested poorly, all independent of whether they've actually made or lost any money. The fact that some experts suggest this new scheme would drive the wealthiest Americans away

from stocks and bonds, push them into other tax shelter. So, look, of course Mitch McConnell's against it. And this wouldn't be applied to everyone. This would be applied to people who are billionaires, a billion dollars or more. First, they wanted to propose a hundred million or more to really increase the revenue that would be gained through these tax increases. But of course, they came out of the gate with, let's increase the threshold. So less people qualify for these tax hikes.

Okay, so TPM is reporting right now that Chris and Sinema has signed on to the corporate minimum tax. So this is not to raise taxes on corporations, but if they're scurting taxes entirely, this makes them pay a minimum tax. Okay. Of 15%. By the way, it's comically low. Okay?

So you could say, well, it's comically low, so they might actually agree to it. No. Okay, my prediction is, it doesn't matter, they're just going to rotate the villain. And that's what they're doing right now on the other provisions. So cinema had said about any other tax increases before, no, no way on my beloved corporations and the beloved rich. And then Mansion takes Medicare drug prices, no on that. And they claim Mansion claims, oh, I'm okay with the tax increases.

increases, and cinema claims I'm okay with the other thing, but golly, gee, what could we do? Mansion is cinema together or not okay with either, with any of these provisions? And in this case, even if they have mentioned a cinema, here I'll predict ahead of time for you guys. And new Democrat will pop up as a new villain. It could be Menendez from New Jersey, Coons from Delaware. By the way, if it's one of the Delaware senators, that means it's actually Joe Biden who's killing it. Okay? And so all of that is not just possible, it is likely.

So if you're getting encouraged right now about, oh my God, they might be able to pay for it. They're going to raise taxes on billionaires and corporations, and cinema and mansion have agreed. I would be shocked if that's what happened at the end. And again, guys, I want to just emphasize this. This is predictable, not because we're making, you know, a judgment on their character, although you could do that. But that's irrelevant. It's about incentives and disincentives. And so far, what we've seen from corporate Democrats is that they don't care what constituents want.

care what's good for the country, they take orders from their corporate donors. If they're corporate donors, and by way, not even corporate donors, like there's corporate donors and then there's their millionaire and billionaire donors. Those are the people they take the advice from, they take orders from, and they carry out their desires, incentives and disincentives. So if they listen to those donors all the way through to today, what makes you think that they're just going to randomly ignore what their donors, you think their donors want these tax increases? No, of course they don't want it.

So that's why I'm saying, and that's why we're predicting that these tax provisions will go nowhere. But who knows, we might be wrong. Yeah, and so look, we're all the way out on the limb because literally no one else in the media agrees with us. So now, and we're being honest about that, now you're gonna get to have some fun. You're gonna see who's more right, TYT, or the rest of the entire media combined. Now, and when we're, if we're right, if, okay, we're telling you ahead of time why, It means there is no debate in Congress at all. There's no ideology, there's no politics, it's all theater.

They do exactly what the donors say. And if you don't get the money out first, you'll never pass any legislation that actually is anywhere near progressive. So you're wasting your time with all of this stuff, with all this theatrics, if you don't first get the money out of politics. Now let's see who's right and let's see who's wrong. All right, that does it for our first hour. Stick around for the second hour.

We're going to share an update on the Kyle Rittenhouse case that will likely enrage you. Don't miss it. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.