The Young Turks - Guardian Angel Assault

Episode Date: February 9, 2024

You’re vital to our work. Support as a member: https://go.tyt.com/signup. MSNBC guest calls third party candidates ""a threat to our democracy."" Democrats lose ground with Black and Hispanic adults. The Supreme Court weighs Trump's bid to stay on the Colorado ballot. Guardian Angels restrain a man they claim is a migrant shoplifter on live TV, but it's discovered that they have no proof. " HOST: Ana Kasparian (@AnaKasparian), Cenk Uygur (@cenkuygur) 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 ❤ Donate: http://www.tyt.com/go 🔗 Website: https://www.tyt.com 📱App: http://www.tyt.com/app 📬 Newsletters: https://www.tyt.com/newsletters/ If you want to watch more videos from TYT, consider subscribing to other channels in our network: The Watchlist https://www.youtube.com/watchlisttyt Indisputable with Dr. Rashad Richey https://www.youtube.com/indisputabletyt The Damage Report ▶ https://www.youtube.com/thedamagereport TYT Sports ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytsports The Conversation ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytconversation Rebel HQ ▶ https://www.youtube.com/rebelhq TYT Investigates ▶ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwNJt9PYyN1uyw2XhNIQMMA Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Eye exams provided by independent optometrists. Woo! It's up! What's up, everyone, welcome to TYT. I'm your host, Anna Kaspari, and Jen Guger will be joining me in the second segment of the show. But we're gonna top the show off today with a discussion about some of the vote shaming that's already transpiring among allies to the Democratic Party, individuals who are terrified that due to Biden's low approval rating and what some of the polls indicate, the Democratic voters aren't going to turn out the vote for Biden and Trump might win. A lot of hate toward third party

candidates, so we're going to get to all of that in the first segment. Later on in the show, we'll talk about vigilantes running amok in New York City, profiling people, accusing them of being undocumented immigrants when they're not. So that's going to be a fascinating discussion later on in the program. And then in the second hour of the show, we're going to talk about a fascinating Republican candidate out of the great state of Missouri, running for Secretary of State. She's a riot, let's just put it that way. So we'll have some fun in the second hour as well.

But I do want to get to this Biden story. I want to give you the latest shame tactics this time specifically directed toward third party candidates and anyone who dare consider voting for third party candidates. So let's get into it. Now more than ever that the idea of a third party is a threat to our democracy. This is not the time for this. That was CNN commentator Tara Setmeyer, letting the MSNBC audience know that she thinks providing more options to American voters who absolutely did not want a Trump.

Trump versus Biden rematch is a threat to democracy. Of course, what she really means is that the race between Biden and Trump is going to be a close one at best, even though it shouldn't be if Trump is so awful and Biden is so wonderful. But any third party candidate who serves as a spoiler and ends up helping Donald Trump win is a threat to democracy because she believes that Trump is a threat to democracy. Now here's more from her argument. Donald Trump is a threat to our democratic system. He says he wants to be a dictator on day one.

You know, President Biden doesn't pose that threat. It's a policy difference. Or maybe people think that he's too old. Okay, well, you need to take a step back and look at what the choices are here. Third parties do not work, they're spoilers. So if you want Donald Trump to win the election, then go ahead, throw your vote away,

away and vote third party. If you don't and you want to maintain our democracy and work within our system to reform it, maybe down the line, there could be an opportunity to have ballot access or a third party or whatever, that's fine. But right now, the threat to our democracy is too great to be messing around with third party candidacies. It's the same argument every election cycle. And by the way, couldn't one argue that a politically vulnerable 81 year old Biden absolutely insisting on running for reelection is the real threat to democracy because no one wanted this. No one asked for it. Biden could have done the right thing and kept his promise of not seeking a second term. But not only did he lie about that, he's delusional enough

to tell his own donors about how he's the only one who can beat Donald Trump. Laffable. It's not like he hasn't noticed the consistent polling in recent months, which shows him losing to Trump nationally by a few points. And as we know, he would need to beat Trump nationally by five points to clench a second term. And then there are the polls that specifically look at how Biden performs against Trump in swing states. You know, those critical swing states? First, there was the New York Times Sienna College poll that showed Trump beating Biden in five critical swing states. Let's take a look at this. So, I mean, look at it. Look at it. Trump beats Biden in Nevada by 11 points, Michigan by five points. And that was before Biden lost support among a large Arab American

constituency in that state due to his unwavering support for the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. Trump beats Biden in Georgia by six points, Arizona by five, and Pennsylvania by four. The only state in this poll where Biden came out ahead was Wisconsin, where he's leading Trump by just two points. When that poll came out months ago in November, everyone kept brushing it off as a weird and meritless anomaly. But similar results have been repeated in other more recent polls, like the Bloomberg News Morning Console poll from late January, which finds Biden trailing Trump in polls

in each of these seven swing states. And he trails Trump, 48% to 42% cumulatively across all of the swing states. in a hypothetical head to head matchup. Additionally, the poll found that 53% of voters in the seven battleground states would be unwilling to vote for Trump in the general election if he were found guilty of a crime. 55% said they'd be unwilling to vote for Trump

if the general election, in the general election, if he was sentenced to prison. Those numbers are shockingly low. When you consider the percentage of Americans who wouldn't be willing to choose Trump over Biden, even if Trump were leading the country from a prison cell. You guys, do you guys understand how crazy this is? Then you dig into how voters feel about Biden's handling of specific issues.

And the results are damning to say the least. This week's NBC News poll found that Trump holds a 22 point average, or advantage, I should say, over Biden on the question of which candidate would do a better job handling the economy. with 55% picking Trump and only 33% choosing Biden. The poll also shows Trump holding a 16 point advantage over Biden on being competent and effective. A reversal from 2020 when Biden was ahead of Trump on this quality by nine points before defeating him in that election. Biden's approval rating is also suffering significantly. As you can see from this graph, more Americans approved than disapproved of Biden.

in April of 2021, but that has now changed significantly, as is demonstrated by the blue line in the graph, which represents growing disapproval toward Biden. Biden's approval rating has declined to the lowest level of his presidency in NBC News polling to 37%, while fewer than three in 10 voters approve of his handling of the Israel-Hamas war. These poll results are not surprising when you consider the chaos at the southern border, which Biden largely ignored until it became enough of a political liability, that he crossed his fingers hoping that Congress would pass a harsh border security bill that would allow for him to shut the border down. He had no issue backing off of his own agenda, allowing the child

tax credit to expire without much of a fight to extend it or make it permanent. He's alienated young voters who want to use resources to improve the lives of Americans rather than send 2,000 pound bombs to Israel's far right government to then drop on schools, hospitals, churches, mosques, and refugee camps in Gaza. Biden's a crappy candidate. Accept it. That's the truth. Both politically and optically, he's a crappy candidate.

We're supposed to pretend like he's not, like he's not too old to serve another four years. Look, here's how we handled a question about a possible. fire deal between Israel and Hamas this week, which, by the way, fell apart. There is some movement, and I don't want to, I don't want to choose my words. There's some movement. There's been a response from the, there's been a response from the, But, yes, I'm sorry, we're from Hamas. But it seems to be a little over the top. We're not sure where it is.

There's a continuing negotiation right now. We're supposed to pretend like that was okay, right? Or how he mistook France's current president, Emmanuel Macron, for its former president who's, you know, been dead since 1996. went to what they call a G7 meeting, all the NATO leaders. And I was in South America's back. And I sat down and I said, America's back. The meter on from Germany, I mean, from France looked at me and said, you know, why, why, how long are you back from?

And I looked at it and had the chance to have just, Germany said, what would you just say, Mr. President? If you picked up the paper tomorrow in London Times, when London Times said, a thousand people break through the House of Commons, break down the doors, two properties are killed, and never even stopped with the election of the Prime Minister. What would you say? I never thought about you.

What would we say if that happened in another democracy in the world? Now look, maybe you don't think that was a big deal, you know, thinking that someone who literally died in 1997, in the 1990s is the current president of France. But keep in mind, that was the only, that was only the first time he made that mistake this week. He keeps seeing dead people. NBC news reports that on Wednesday, Biden twice, two times referred to the late German chancellor Helmut Cole instead of former chancellor Angela Merkel, while referencing. a 2021 conversation. Biden's gaffs Wednesday came at a series of fundraisers in New York. As he described conversations, he said he had with European leaders at a meeting of the group of seven industrialized nations in the UK in 2021, months after the January 6th riot. Jesus, that's quite a run on sentence. Biden said at both events that Helmut Cole,

who died in 2017, had asked him how he would respond. If he read about people, he read about storming the British Parliament and killing officers to stop the election of a prime minister. Now Merkel is the one who attended the 2021 summit in the UK. And how can we forget the inaccurate story Biden shares about his son Bo's passing? He keeps saying that Bo died while deployed in Iraq. He repeatedly said this. In fact, he repeated it recently while on a phone call with the family members of one of the soldiers who was killed in a drone strike in Jordan. But his son, did not die while deployed. He tragically died of brain cancer here in the United States. And look, I don't think he's intentionally lying. I just think he forgets because he's in his

80s and he's not mentally fit to be president. Today, special counsel Robert Herr announced that Biden will not be charged over his retention of classified documents. But while doing so, Her stated that if Biden were charged, the president could present to a jury as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory. Her's report describes Biden's memory in damning terms, at one point stating that it appeared to have significant limitations. Her recounts a recorded 2017 conversation with Mark Zwanitzer, who helped Biden write two memoirs in unflattering terms. Biden recorded conversations with the writer from 2017 or

the recorded conversations with him from 2017 are often painfully slow with Mr. Biden struggling to remember events and straining at times to read and relay his own notebook entries. In his interview with our office, Mr. Biden's memory was worse. He did not remember when he was vice president forgetting on the first day of the interview when his church, term ended. If it was 2013, when did I stop being vice president, Biden allegedly asked, and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began. In 2009, am I still vice president? He did not remember even within several years when his son, Boe, died. Biden's clear cognitive decline is so bad that it's likely the reason he turned down an interview with CBS during

the Super Bowl this year. He did so last year as well. But this year is an election year. A presidential candidate would be absolutely insane to pass up that opportunity at free advertising during prime broadcast hours. But if you don't buy his fear mongering or the fear mongering from other Democrats about how you need to vote for Biden because Trump is a massive threat to democracy, even as he's by the way, even as Biden's giving a green light to, to Netanyahu's ethnic cleansing and possible genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, you're the bad guy for not voting for him, right? You're a bad guy for considering a third party option, right?

Look, I don't even like the third party candidates. I'm keeping it real. I like Cornell West, he doesn't have a shot in hell. I don't really like RFK Jr. But RFK Jr. isn't a threat to Biden. RFK Jr. is skimming votes from Donald Trump. But if voters consider a third party candidate, they're putting democracy on the line, No, kick rocks. And let's not forget the clear undemocratic behavior demonstrated by Democrats as they

force Biden on us. In an effort to squash possible success of his primary challengers, state Democratic parties like the one in Florida have literally canceled their Democratic primary elections. In addition to that, the Democratic National Committee refused to host any primary debates. Do Dems think they can just suspend democracy during the primaries and everyone is just going to be okay with it? Then we're supposed to nod along in agreement as they accuse the right of being anti-democratic and pretend like what they're doing is an anti-democratic?

And in full honesty, I'm personally getting real tired of the shame tactics, whether it be by establishment Democrats and pressuring us to support a geriatric candidate who doesn't even seem to remember where he is half the time, or leftists who want to pretend like crime like crime-ridden-ridden cities are wonderful playgrounds of justice. They're boring and delusional. This election should be a layup for the Democratic Party if Trump is the Republican nominee. But it's not, it'll be a close one. And that's no one's fault, but Biden's and the Democratic establishment that defense

his terrible decision to cling onto power. If you do believe that Trump is a threat to democracy, you should be really angry at those who are making it easier for Trump to win by forcing a weak Democratic candidate as our only other option. So please, for the love of God, enough with the vote shaming, enough with the calls for supporting Biden, squashing any third party candidate in an effort to save democracy. Saving democracy means giving Democratic voters a real choice. That choice was robbed from them by the Democratic establishment, who again forced Biden onto us. So for all the people out there who like to focus on root problems, that's the root problem

of this election on the Democratic side. The very person who's putting democracy on the line is the pathetically weak candidate who decided to run for reelection after he promised he wouldn't. And that's Joe Biden. We got to take a break. I'll be right back. For a limited time at McDonald's, enjoy the tasty breakfast trio. Your choice of chicken or sausage McMuffin or McGrittles with a hash brown and a small iced coffee for five bucks plus tax. Available until 11 a.m. at participating McDonald's restaurants. Price excludes flavored iced coffee and delivery. All right, back on TYT, Jank Huger, Anna Gosparin with you guys.

We have more news. We make big ones, little ones. Look, I got, I like the stories later in the show. They're fun, they're fun stories. Meanwhile, we have more devastating stories. Of course, it's the news. What am I going to do? Okay, but we're also doing the show with Brian Reschke and Frank E.

McGillery. So that's, those are fun names. They just joined and became young Turks. They hit the button below. Unknown, I realize, is not a handle. It's just when people sign up without. a handle on our website. So thank you, whoever you are for signing up at t.com slash join.

Really appreciate it. I like how you seem a little bit manic, but he's not, he's not manic. It's just that he like rushed into the studio just as I was wrapping up the first segment. Well, that's kind of true, but I don't know what you're talking about. It sounds like out of breath. What do you mean? Anyway, all right. All right, let's do it.

So, well, another day, another poll. poll showing Democrats losing ground with demographics that they typically had widespread support among. Now, a new poll by Gallup shows that Democrats are particularly losing support among black and Hispanic adults. So let's get into the details. The Democratic Party's wide lead over Republicans in Black Americans' party preferences has shrunk by nearly 20 points over the past three years in just three years. Although Democrats continue to hold a formidable advantage over Republicans among non-Hispanic black adults in the United States, their current 47 point lead is the smallest gallop has recorded in its polling, dating back to 1999. Most of the decline

has been recent with the net Democratic ID for this group falling 19 points from a 66 point advantage in 2020. At that time, 77% of black adults favored the Democrats and 11% the Republicans. So the 2023 findings represent an 11 point decrease in Democratic affiliation since 2020 and an eight point increase in Republican affiliation. So obviously Democrats still have a significant lead with black voters compared to Republicans. But still we're seeing this trend continue where the voting demographic that Democrats can typically rely on, they're dwindling now. And some of them are unaffiliated. They're not really registering as Republicans. Others are registering as Republicans. Now, Democrats lead among Hispanic adults and adults ages 18 to 29

have slid nearly as much as the black vote, resulting in Democrats holding only a modest edge in both of those groups. So as Gallup reports, Democrats 12 point advantage among Hispanic adults in 2023 represents a new low in trends dating back to 2011 when Gallup recorded Democrats having a 26 point advantage. In 2021, Democrats actually had a 31 point advantage among Hispanic voters. So this has been an ongoing trend, as I mentioned, Jank. This is something that we've been, you know, raising some alarm over. I have a lot of theories as to why this is taking place, but I'm curious what you think, what do you think is causing this? Yeah, look, for what it's worth, I'm positive. They're not delivering for the average

American. There, I solved it. It's so complicated. So mainstream media and the people in Washington view things in, through the lens of race and culture wars and demographics, et cetera. So they're like, okay, black people and Latinos are ours, white people are yours, women are ours, men are yours, et cetera, right? But the thing is that American people are not cooperating with that. So for example, the young voters were massively on the side of Democrats. It's not even close. That's why Biden won in 2020 and they've had a huge lead there, et cetera.

Now they're being to lose them. Now why are they losing them? Because Biden and the Democrats keep doing things that are very, very unpopular with young voters. The most recent one is the situation in Israel where younger voters hate that we're spending more of our money, which we barely have, to send over to kill more innocent Palestinians. So if that fact bothers you, that's too bad for you. That is a fact. That is why they're leaving Democrats. And so now I've got more on black selectives. I have to add to that point because I think it's an important point. And there's a second half to it that I think is really,

really important to focus on. The Democratic Party in general has increasingly abandoned the working class in America, which is why Republicans have actually increased their support among non-college educated working class Americans. And what Democrats have done in lieu of representing the best interest of working class Americans is they have instead pivoted to identitarianism, right? The culture wars, the, oh, please support us because Republicans bad for minorities. We love minorities. We love black and brown people. We want to protect them. We believe their dignity. Okay, it's really hard to buy that argument. That argument comes across as incredibly hollow as the United States continues to provide 2,000 pound bombs to the far right government

of Israel so they can then proceed to drop said bombs on Arab Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. Okay, it's just, it rings hollow. It seems like nonsense, you know, superficial campaign tactics that they don't actually believe and don't really do anything to show or prove that they care about. Yeah, so I think that that's totally right. But going along with that, in terms of things they don't believe, look, part of the blame goes towards Bernie Sanders. Wait, what? Why? Okay, let me explain. Because Bernie did a great job of commissing Joe Biden that he should run on progressive policies, because progressive policies are very, very popular on the economic end. Okay, so paid family leave, child tax credit, a higher minimum wage, you name it, very popular, right?

So Biden ran on him, but Biden didn't tell Bernie something that's very important. He never meant it. So when he got into office, he delivered on almost none of those policies. So that is you see over the last three years, every demographic, whether it's age or race, jumping off a cliff, right, in the numbers that Anna's reading you. And I think that what they saw was, hey, oh my God, look at this. This is amazing. We're gonna get all these things that we really, really like.

Oh God, Joe Biden and the Democrats, we knew it. And then see Trump is a bad guy and the Democrats are good guys. And the Democrats were like just kidding and they pulled the football again. No paid family. And they had child tax credit for a year and people loved it. It was one of the most popular programs in the country. And then Biden's like, no, in order to help Joe mentioned and the Republicans, I will now pull the child tax credit, you moron.

because now they had it for a year and they knew how good it was. And then when you take it away from them, it's much worse than if you never gave it to them. So he made all these promises that he knew for sure he was never going to deliver on. And then all the people on TV turn around and they're like, no, no, no, it's okay that he didn't do voting rights. And he didn't do any of the economic agenda. He did this bill and that bill that helps industries. It maybe helps Americans eventually. But anyway, we love him.

So you guys should love him too. And you guys should be thrilled that he did 10% of his agenda. Well, that's nice propaganda, but people see their actual lives. Not only that, I mean, look, I think people are really, because again, due to filter bubbles and repeated propaganda, which takes place on both sides, if you're not paying close attention to what's happening in cities like Chicago or New York City when it comes to the migrant crisis and how minority residents of those areas are reacting to it, you're making. making a huge mistake because they're furious, okay, they are furious. So black and brown voters in Chicago in New York, they see the crisis, it's at their doorstep, and they're like, I don't understand, this is based on federal policy, why isn't Biden doing anything about it?

So when they see their quality of life decline, because suddenly there's a massive influx of people into their city, which they do not have the resources to house, to feed, you know, to keep safe, and when they see the scraps that they're given, now being shared with a large, you know, migrant population that's come into their city, they start getting angry, okay? It's not because they're bad people. It's not because they're racist. It's not because they're anti-immigrant.

But you tell me, if 170,000 people in a few months show up to your front door and suddenly you're seeing encampments all over the place and it seems like chaos outside your front door, how are you gonna feel about it? Yeah, that's what's happening. And I'm gonna combine two of the things that we've been talking about here, because you see this is a perfect storm. The numbers are not moving a little, they're moving a lot, and they're moving super quick. Normally numbers take decades to move like this.

So there's also the issue of crime. And so, and where did crime hit most? It actually hit black and Latino communities the most. So because it was mainly in cities and mainly in working class areas. So as blacks and Latinos heard mainly, if we're being honest, mainly white, older, richer Democrats telling them that they're imagining it and that they were helping black people and Latino people by letting criminals go. That's double the anger. So you're telling me I'm making this stuff up when I got

crime all around me. And then you're doing, you're saying you're doing to protect me because I'm black, how does this protecting me? Because, and by the way, look at the assumption there, let's be honest that the underlying assumption that people that talk in that way have, which is one that is racist. So if you're black, you should like us letting criminals off. Are you nuts? That is not a thing that black people want in this country. Because for like privileged elite people in DC, they view people in certain categories. But that's nonsense. A black person knows that they don't. They don't want other black criminals being let off for no reason.

They don't want to be harassed. They don't want to be beat up by cops. They don't want to be the victim of injustice. They don't want to be arrested for the same things that white people are not arrested for. But do they want criminals locked up? Of course! Those criminals are in their neighborhoods in Chicago and other places. And so as they yell for help, when the Democrats say not only is help not coming, but we don't even think that it's a real problem, and we're doing it to help.

you, it's infuriating. And so that's why the numbers are moving so much, so quickly. Yeah, look, the Democratic Party is in trouble. They've been in trouble. And their fear tactics in regard to the right wing has worked for them to some extent so far. I don't, I don't know how it's going to play out for them in the general election. But if they think vote shaming, pressuring and fear mongering is going to be like their only tactics and they're going to win every time by using those tactics. I think they're mistaken. They need to provide something that people are going to want to vote in favor of. And we haven't been seeing that from Democrats. I mean, think about the last general election, Jang, 2020. Why did people vote for Biden in 20?

You think people were excited about Biden in 2020? No, everyone held their noses. And we're like, okay, we just really don't want another four years of this Trump guy. Okay, he bungled the response to COVID. We don't want this chaos anymore. We want some stability. So let's vote for the geriatric guy who's too old to run for president, but he promised. He promised he wasn't going to run for re-election. But that was a lie, wasn't it? Yeah, so I got to add last two quick things. So one is the Democrats constantly telling minority voters that they have to vote for them

is grating on everyone's nerve. I can't take it anymore. But Washington doesn't get it because they only do culture wars. They only do identity politics. So as black people and Latinos keep hearing over and over again, you have to vote for Joe Biden. It's getting under their skin, and I can tell you from my ethnicity, I'm a Muslim American, and I've talked to now hundreds of Muslims across the country, if not thousands. And every time the Democrats say, you have to vote for Joe Biden,

as Joe Biden is perpetuating genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza, every one of them thinks, well, let's find out. F around and find out and see if I have to vote for Joe Biden and have to vote for Democrats. And that's what a lot of people are thinking, because you're not helping us. All you're doing is saying, we have to help you. But you never deliver. You never deliver. And this is the chick is coming home to roost for the, the corporate Democrats.

The corporate Democrats have been tricking you for the last 40, 50 years, pretending they're going to do something for you. And they give you the crumbs off their table that the corporate donors allowed for. And then they think, oh, it's never gonna catch up. We're gonna have Joe Scarborough, mainstream media, New York Times make up nonsense propaganda and marketing for us, and we'll just trick everybody into voting for our corporate agenda. Well, it's not working anymore. And that's why people feel so hopeless, because it's not like the Republicans are the answer. They're the original corporate party.

So now we're stuck between two awful choices, and the American people are vomiting this out. I love ravioli. Oh, Tanta fami. Since when do you speak Italian? Since we partnered with SAP Concur, their integrated travel and expense platform and breakthrough solutions with AI gave me time back to dive into our financial future.

We expand into Europe in 27, so I'm getting ready. Well, you can predict the future? I can predict you'll like that message. What message... Oh, hey, we all got bonuses. You can save for college now. I don't have kids. Hmm, you don't.

say. SAP Concur helps your business move forward faster. Learn more at concur.com. All right, let's move on to more electoral related news. In this case, having to do with the right side of the political spectrum. There's a big Supreme Court issue today. Let's get into it. You're leading in every race?

You're leading in every state, you're leading in the country against both Republican and Democrat. And Biden, you're leading in the country by a lot. And can you take the person that's leading everywhere and say, hey, we're not going to let you run? You know, I think that's pretty tough to do, but I'm leaving it up to the Supreme Court. Today, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case to decide whether Donald Trump is eligible to appear on primary ballots in the state of Colorado. Now, Colorado, of course, made the decision to boot Donald Trump from primary ballots under the 14th Amendment and formal challenges to Donald Trump's presidential candidacy have been filed in at least 35 states. Now, challenges in 15 states have already been dismissed, 18 are pending, and Colorado and Maine disqualified him. But decisions in both these states have been appealed, which is why the Supreme Court was hearing oral arguments today.

Now, before we get into the oral arguments and how the justices reacted, here's a brief explanation of what the case is all about. The Supreme Court has never considered this issue. It involves an obscure part of the Constitution, Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. It was passed after the Civil War, and it says, I'm going to read it. It says, no person shall hold any office who took an oath as an officer of the United States, but then engaged in insurrection. Now, challenge is filed in at least 35 states argued this clause applies to Trump because he engaged in insurrection on January 6th. And so he's disqualified from running for president. The Colorado Supreme Court was the first to agree, followed by Maine Secretary of State.

Both said that Trump should be removed from their state's primary ballots and not be able to run for president. Now, if the justices uphold that Colorado decision, that's going to jumpstart efforts in these other states to also take them off the ballot. Now, I'm going to speculate right off the bat that the Supreme Court is not going to uphold the decision by Colorado in Maine. But let's get into the details of some of the arguments made by those who want to see Donald Trump on the ballot, by those representing Donald Trump's arguments here. So one of the arguments made by Trump lawyer Jonathan Mitchell was that the language of the 14th Amendment does not apply to the president, does not apply to Donald Trump. I think this is the weakest argument, but I'll tell you exactly what he said. So Trump's lawyers have argued that the presidency is not an officer of the United States. And so, they say, Trump isn't covered by the disqualification provision at all.

Even if he did commit insurrection, they argue that the phrase officer of the United States is a legal term of art that refers to appointed officials, not elected ones. I personally think that's the weakest argument, but let's put that aside for now. Let's go to some of the stronger arguments. His lawyer also argued that January 6th was not a riot or was a riot, not an insurrection, and that Trump didn't really engage in it. Now look, as we all know, the riot wasn't really the insurrection, right? The meat of the matter lied in the fact that Donald Trump and his co-conspirators had installed fake electors in order to overturn the results of the election.

And the riot was really a distraction to allow for the full implementation of that as soon as the vice president says that he's going to reject the electoral college votes. And we've talked about this multiple times. So again, it's not just about the riot. It's also about the fake elector scheme. Hold on, let me just give you the argument that Mitchell made. Now, additionally, Mitchell focused on whether the states actually have the power to remove the presidential candidate from the ballot before Congress gives explicit approval to do so. Justice Elena Hagan pushed Jason Murray, the attorney for the Colorado voters, on this question of how much power the states should wield over federal elections. Let's listen. I think that the question that you have to confront is why a single state should decide who gets to be president of the United States.

If you weren't from Colorado when you were from Wisconsin or you were from Michigan, and it really, you know, what the Michigan Secretary of State did, is going to make the difference between, you know, whether candidate A is elected or candidate B is elected, I mean, that seems quite extraordinary, doesn't it? No, Your Honor, because ultimately it's this court that's going to decide that question of federal constitutional eligibility and settle the issue for the nation. Now, Justice Kagan, of course, is one of the quote-unquote liberal justices, but Justice Amy Coney-Barrant echoed the concerns. She's a conservative justice, adding it just doesn't doesn't seem like a state call.

In response, Murray argued that each state would still have the ability to determine what appears on their own ballots despite what officials in other state in another state might decide. Jank. Yeah, so look, I'm both objective and bias on that last issue and I have to state my bias for you guys just on policy grounds, not on political grounds. So I'm a naturalized citizen and that ruling could very much apply to me as well, because what they're argued, what the Trump guys are arguing for,

and it appears both liberal and conservative justices seem to be agreeing with is it is not up to the states to decide who's constitutionally qualified, because if they have varied decisions, while any one state like Michigan can unilaterally decide a nationwide election by denying someone a place on the ballot. So the states cannot decide if they, if someone is constitution, eligible, that is for the courts to decide, in which case all of those candidates get to go on the ballot. Trump, naturalized citizens, et cetera. And so that is very interesting. And obviously, I agree with that. So now, number two that Anna mentioned was, is it an insurrection? Now, I think that it's an insurrection for the reasons that Anna stated, the fake elector plot, which was a literal coup attempt on our democracy.

But it has not been adjudicated as an insurrection. In fact, Trump hasn't even been charged with insurrection. And he's been charged with many things, including about January 6th. So if prosecutors thought they couldn't even prove an insurrection case, why does Colorado get to decide on their own that it was an insurrection and then change the entire nationwide election? So I think the justices doubts, and they all have doubts here. This is this is not breaking along conservative and liberal lines as normal cases do, I think are correct. Well, who gets to decide what an insurrection is?

If he's convicted of one either by Congress or the courts, okay, that's a different issue. But if he hasn't been convicted in either place, I don't think individual state gets to decide on their own. And that seems to be the direction they're going in. I agree with Anna, too, that the whole debate over whether he's an officer or not is giant waste of time. That's such a weak argument. Yeah, he's definitely an officer. I don't know why they're wasting their time with that, but okay, fine. that his position disenfranchises voters.

And I'm giving you this sound mostly because I think it's yet another example of how the Supreme Court is very likely going to strike down the decision by Colorado in Maine. Let's watch. What about the idea that we should think about democracy? Think about the right of the people to elect candidates of their choice of letting the people decide because your position has the effect of disenfranchising voters to a significant degree. And should that be something, does that come in when we think about should we read Section 3 this way or read it that way? What about the background principle, if you agree, of democracy?

This case illustrates the danger of refusing to apply Section 3 as written, because the reason we're here is that President Trump tried to disenfranchise 80 million Americans who voted against him, and the Constitution doesn't require that he be given another chance. So I think he makes a good point there. I think Jason Murray makes a good point there, the lawyer representing Colorado. But I think that your point, Jank, and the point that I've also made on the show previously about how Trump has not been charged with or convicted of insurrection, makes that argument a little trickier to make, a little more difficult to make. Yeah, and so even by the way, this is interesting, even Trump's own lawyer admitted that January 6th was, quote, shameful, criminal and violent.

And well, it was. And well, I know, but Republicans deny reality. They think that it was a tourist visit from Antifa, but it was positive and it was led by the deep state. And it was a picnic and all that, you know, so here is Trump's own lawyer saying, yes, our fans were shameful, criminal. and violent, right? So, but nevertheless, there was no adjudication of an insurrection. So here we are being fair and honest about Trump and his ability to win this case. And it might come out nine nothing.

And so that would be, if that's the case, that would be the liberal justice being principled, which the conservative justices don't do that often. And so, and lastly, Trump has lost 93% percent. 83% of the cases where his administration when he was president went to court because he says absurd things in court. He lost over 60 cases when adjudicating whether the 2020 election was stolen from him. And he never presented any evidence. He almost always loses in court because that's the realm of evidence. But in this case, since the case was so weak, he's almost certainly going to win.

And then what is Magger going to think? Well, you guys brought them to court on all these different things. This is the first and only case where in a, well, that's not true. We have the civil cases, but outside of the civil cases where we have a ruling and the ruling is in favor of Trump. See, we told you. We were right all along. Trump's right about everything. Now, that's not true.

Those two things are totally different, but they will conclude that as soon as the Supreme Court says Trump was right about this. Now, final thing I'll mention is David Axelrog, Axelrog, David Axelrod, who was an advisor to President Obama, is not in favor of keeping Donald Trump off of state ballots. He made his case recently, so let's hear him out, and then I'll give you more. I'm trying to imagine what it would be like if the Supreme Court said, we're removing the front-running Republican candidate from the ballot and essentially saying the American people, you won't have the opportunity to vote for him.

And I think it would be very, very disruptive in this country. I think it will create a huge reaction. And that worries me. It worries me because, partly because of Donald Trump, there's so much cynicism about our institutions already. And, you know, the strength of our democracy are these institutions. You can argue that, well, that's why you have to go the way the Colorado court suggests. But I think in the minds of many voters, this would be a subversion. And it would draw a very strong reaction.

And not only would it draw a strong reaction, I just think anything that Democrats do against Republicans will then be utilized against Democrats tenfold. Okay, so if you're going to keep someone who hasn't been convicted of insurrection off of state ballots, well, couldn't Republicans turn around and do the same thing to Democrats? Of course, and you know Republicans, they'll use the most nonsensical fig leaf you've ever heard. I heard Joe Biden was jaywalk and that's it. He's off the ballot. You're like, wait, that doesn't make any sense. Oh, we're keeping people off the ballot? The Republicans would knock out like 80% of the Democrats on ballots across the country.

Look, I mean, the Biden did, I think, accidentally take classified documents home with him, right? And as soon as he discovered them, he let the feds know and they took the documents. It's completely different from how Donald Trump handled the classified documents. But nonetheless, wouldn't the Republicans be able to say, like, wow, look at that serious security risk that President Joe Biden engaged in. Yeah, should we keep them off the ballots? He really put the country in jeopardy with these top secret classified documents, anything. That really has nothing to do with insurrection, but they're gonna say, well, January 6 wasn't an insurrection, you never proved it, right? So look guys, this is a very dangerous game to play.

We told you from day one, this is not the right direction to go in towards taking Trump off the ballots, right? But last thing here is the politics of it. Look at how poorly the Democrats played this. So the one case where they pushed forward that got to the Supreme Court is the one they're going to lose, probably nine to nothing, okay? Unanimous decision in favor of Trump. Every other case, they started so late, they might not get any convictions at all before Trump, before we get to the general election, let alone the fact that it would have helped most in the primaries and it totally missed the primary window because they started so late. So they bungled it in both directions. And ultimately the person who's most guilty out of all the Democrats in the country is Merrick Carlin.

So if you thought he did an insurrection, brother, you should have prosecuted him for insurrection and you should have started on day one. And by now, we would have either gotten a conviction or an acquittal on insurrection. And this would have been easy to decide. But instead, that pathetic elitist protecting ghoul sat on his ass for two and a half years. And then when they realize Trump's going to run against them, panic and said, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, let's do some cases against them. Which is sick because it shows how politically motivated that effort was, as opposed to getting to the bottom of the situation and ensuring that the outcome is based on what's right for the country and it's based on justice. And I need you to understand both things can be true at the same time, that Donald Trump is guilty.

He did do all those things, but the timing of the cases can still be political. Yes. They weren't going to bring them because he was one of the elites. And when they realize he's going to run again, they're like, oh, no, we have to prosecute one of the elites. A thing we hate, hate, hate doing, but we have to do it because of political considerations. And so that is why the Republicans are pissed, and I understand why they're pissed. But the Democrats are also pissed. Why didn't you bring the cases earlier? They're the worst, and they deserve everything they get.

All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, we have an insane story involving a group of vigilantes in New York City, engaged in a case of mistaken identity, if you will. We'll be right back. I liked beer. Still like beer. just hit the join button below the video on YouTube and became a young turk. And so do Lauren Martin and then at the premium level. That makes a giant difference. Thank you for helping us to do this coverage that we do in an honest way and try to bring

some positive change in the world. And at the higher levels, it helps even more. Thank you so much. Benjamin Morrill, thank you for giving a membership. Anna. We've got a story involving vigilantes today. So let's get right to it. In fact, guys have just taken down one of the migrant guys right here on the corner of 40

second and seventh while all this is taking the camera they've taken over they've taken over he is out of control out of control there all right now that was Sean Hannity's interview with Curtis Sliwa Sliwa Curtis Sleva you just say it real quick so people don't know that you're mispronouncing it okay great Okay, founder of the crime prevention vigilante group, the Guardian Angels, which has been around for literally decades, and we'll get to their history in just a minute. Now, they've been active in New York's surging migrant crisis, and during that live interview on Fox News, members of his group accosted who they alleged was a shoplifting illegal immigrant.

Now, it turns out that wasn't the case. All right, so after Fox showed the group restraining the man, Slee, went back to give an update on the situation. So let's take a look at that. Well, you've been shoplifting first. The guardian angel spotted them, stopped them. He resisted and let's just say we gave him a little pain compliance. His mother back in Venezuela felt the vibrations.

He's sucking concrete, the cops scraped them off the asphalt. He's on his way to jail. Now he claimed on Wednesday that the incident first began, started when the man hit a female guardian angel prompting the group to initiate a citizen's arrest. Now luckily the group's members are unarmed, so there was no like potential threat of anyone dying from a gunshot wound here. But Sliwa said during the Fox News broadcast that the man was a migrant who had been shoplifting. He told NBC News that he based that information on what people in the crowd said and alleged that the man had a backpack that contained baby

closed with tags on them. He also said he had believed the man was a migrant because he had been speaking Spanish. Oops. Okay, and because other guardian angels had encountered him with other Spanish speakers on previous patrols. I don't know if, I don't know if they know this. This is a diverse country with people who speak all sorts of languages. It doesn't automatically mean that the person speaking a foreign language is an undocumented immigrant. But anyway, according to a New York police department,

department spokesperson, officers arrived to find a man detained by bystanders after he allegedly tried to disrupt a live interview. Police said the man had been issued a disorderly conduct summons because he had been acting in a loud and threatening manner on a public sidewalk. But what the police clarified was that the man in question was not, in fact, a migrant. He was a New Yorker who's been residing in the Bronx. Plus, they provided no evidence that he had shoplifted. Unsurprisingly, Sean Hannity had issued absolutely no apology for this mistake. There was no correction despite Sliwa's claims being shot down by law enforcement.

Asked about airing the confrontation live during Hannity's show and Sliwas claim without proof that the man had been restrained, that the man that had been restrained was a migrant. Fox News said in a statement that the situation took place during a live television broadcast and that the network had updated its audience as more information became available from the NYPD. When? And Silwa, for his part, says that it is possible, it is possible he wasn't a migrant. Or yeah, is it possible he wasn't a migrant? Of course, after he was asked about the situation.

Oops. And finally, New York Governor Kathy Hokel condemned the Guardian Angels actions. Let's just take a look at what she had to say and we'll move on. You cannot take the law into your own hands. NYPD, among the finest on this planet, they work hard every single day and we support them. It is their responsibility to take care of this, not individuals. And so I reject the premise that anyone can take the law into their own hands. Then we have chaos.

This is not the Wild West. This is New York State. So look, what the Guardian Angels did here was wrong. You shouldn't profile people and you shouldn't take what the allegations are against others at face value. Maybe do a little bit of investigation before you decide to physically attack people who have been accused of wrongdoing. So I have two totally different thoughts on this. One is, of course, like these morons, their evidence was he was speaking Spanish. Same exactly thing Marjorie Taylor Green said when she thought she had spotted an illegal immigrant.

Really? I mean, I'm so stunned by how stupid people are. You think everyone who speaks Spanish is an illegal immigrant? It's just so dumb, it's painful to talk about. Okay, now, having said this, why do the guardian angels exist? So they started all the way back in 1979. When I was growing up in the New York area in the 1980s, they were in the news 24-7. And I remember watching that all the time, right? And so the reason was because back then, there was crazy crime.

If you think crime is bad now, it's totally out of control in the 70s and 80s, okay? Don't worry, we're working on it, you know, we're getting there. So the Guardian Angels rose up because whether you like it or not, whenever there's a lot of crime, vigilantes come in to fill the void. Now vigilantes are a terrible idea because they make dumbass mistakes like this, and they don't know what they're doing and they're not trained. And they create more violence, creating even more work for the cops, okay? But having said that, the guardian angels never went away.

It's just after the 1980s, no one cared about him anymore because crime had started to go down. And it went down so substantially that everybody forgot about Curtis Leewa and the guardian angels. But now they're back. And they're back because crime is back. It's not that they went away, it's that their coverage went away and the perceived need for them went away.

But now people feel a perceived need again. So hence, that's why they're out and doing things like this. So the answer to vigilante violence is better, you could argue more and just law enforcement. So if you have law enforcement that actually does its job and prosecutors who do their job, and they keep the population safe and they do it in a way that is just, then you don't need vigilantes at all. That's the whole point of the law enforcement is to do that job, right? But when citizens feel like they're not getting that from cops and prosecutors, vigilantes will rise whether you like it or not, and that's what you're seeing,

and that's why this is happening. So I wanted to learn more about this guy because I'm completely unfamiliar with him. And I agree with you that vigilante groups can actually make situations more dangerous. You know, their whole objective might come from a good place. It might start from a good place, but it ends up causing more harm than good, especially when they're not trained as law enforcement. And more importantly, in the example we gave you in this story, they just profiled a guy, right? And just assumed that he was an undocumented immigrant who was engaging in crime when there was no evidence of that. But I went back and came across a 1981 Washington Post piece on the Guardian Angels, and I thought it was really

fascinating. So Joyce Wadler at the time wrote that the group is the guardian angels. I can't believe this. They number over 700 in New York City with groups spreading across the country. Their avowed goal in the words of their leader, 26 year old Curtis Sliwa is to bring back the values of 40, 50 years ago when the only criminals in the streets were racketeers. I mean, I don't I don't want them either. But back then there was a significant mob. I don't know that was the good old. No, seriously.

When you could leave the house with the door open or fall asleep on the roof. But here, get a load of this, Mayor Edward Koch appointed his criminal justice coordinator to investigate the Guardian Angels and that report was so positive that the Guardian Angels will soon be awarded some sort of official status. Oops, so that was way, way back in the day, yeah, and by the way, since then in the 80s after 81, they did a bunch of clownish things. So they're not the good guys. But again, whether it's organized groups or much more prevalent will be just local vigilantes

that go, I've had enough of this crap because the cops aren't showing up in L.A., New York, San Francisco, et cetera. And if they do, prosecutors are letting people off. So you can get super mad about it, but you'll see more. vigilantes going forward. That's just the nature of how things work when crime is not addressed. Yeah, all right, we got to take a break. That does it for the first hour. When we come back for the second hour, I can't wait to talk about Valentina. You'll know what I mean when we get to the second hour. We'll be right back.