The Young Turks - Jacobin on Fox!

Episode Date: January 12, 2022

President Biden will endorse changing the Senate filibuster for voting rights legislation. Many politicians traded stocks more than ever before, beat the S&P 500 by a lot, and made numerous unusually timed trades, resulting in huge gains. Larry Kudlow approvingly quoted Jacobin magazine on Fox News. Months after the pipeline company Enbridge announced it had finished its Line 3 pipeline, hundreds of the project’s opponents have pending court cases for arrests made at protests during last year’s construction. A group of North Carolina voters told state officials on Monday that they want Republican congressman Madison Cawthorn to be disqualified as a congressional candidate, citing his involvement in the 6 January attack on the Capitol. 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. We're going to be on a while I'm going to have fun of new things. Are we on Turks, Jake Uyghur, Anna Kusparian with you guys, a lovely day in America. Are we going to have fun doing their news? Yeah. Are we going to call BS on politicians? Yeah, betcha. In fact, speaking of the original, you betcha, Sarah Palin versus AOC, is that throwdown happening later today? Yeah, betcha. You know, I kind of miss Sarah Palin. I don't know where she's been. Seems like she'd been dipping out, you know. Maybe she's got other things to be concerned with. But she's come back to educate us all about what it means to take a pounding.

So I did do it. Look, it's not our words. It's her words. You'll see later. I think she had a falling out with a second dude or the potential second dude. And so, but you know, we lost track of that soap opera. Great to see a new season. You can't put lipstick on a pig, don't you know? Yeah. So I'll get to that later. All right. We're in a fun, goofy mood. So let's do Biden fails. Yes. Fun. All right. Voting rights activists and organizers out of the state of Georgia decided to boycott President Joe Biden's speech on voting rights in Atlanta today. And I think they had a good reason for doing so. But rather than putting words in their mouths, why don't we hear from Cliff Albright, who is with Black Voters Matter? Listen to the harsh critique he has for President Biden in this clip. We don't need another speech from the president. He gave a very passionate speech, not only the one that he gave for the commemoration last week. of January 6th. But remember, he gave a very passionate speech back in Philadelphia, back in July. But then literally for seven months, we heard nothing else about voting rights from him. And so now is not the time for another speech. And to be clear, we believe in using the presidency as a bully pulpit. We would have loved that the president used the presidency as a bully pulpit for the past seven, eight months, while we've been fighting for

voting rights, even getting arrested outside of the White House begging him to do so. But at this point, we don't need another speech. We don't need him to come to Georgia. and use us as a prop, what we need is work. And we're out working too because there are attacks going on against Georgia voters and Georgia organization happening right now. I have to say that statement was so, it was a relief to hear it. It was cathartic because far too often the Democratic Party, Democratic leadership, in this case President Joe Biden, claim that they're going to fight for certain things and then fail to do so. And then some of the more avid supporters expect you to fall in line and support them during

midterm elections, during general elections, despite their failures. And here you have, you know, Cliff Albright who uses the word props. We don't want to be used as props. And I think it's important to really send that message to not just the Biden administration, but to the Democratic Party that seems to think that it's totally okay to take votes from certain demographics for granted. And it's also something that I want to bring up in the context of the last general election, because despite the, I mean, horrendous one and only term of the Trump administration, and despite all of the terrible rhetoric, divisive rhetoric that would come out of that

man's mouth, he actually increased his vote among the black electorate. And Democrats like, well, we don't know why that happened. Why did that happen? Could it be that the Democratic party has taken the black vote for granted for quite some time now. And there are consequences to that, Jen, something that you talk about quite often. Yeah. So first on Cliff Albright, I just have two words, preach it. That was just picture perfect. I love that he added, look, we're not against using the bully pulpit. We were totally in favor of that. But stop with the endless photo ops. Do something. For God's sake, do something. And Democrats for the last 40 years have substituted marketing for actual action.

And they've been aided and abetted by corporate media. But these days, media is mixed, right? Before they had a complete monopoly, now social media tears them apart, rightfully so. And they catch all sorts of feelings. But it's harder to do that against these groups. So when these groups come out and say, yeah, we're tired of your. nonsense excuses. It's harder for them to go, oh, my God, these progressives are terrible. Media, just ignore them, right? Well, you can't do that. So I love that Cliff Albright and others

have the courage to do this. And honestly, more than that, like, it's great, but their frustration is palpable and appreciated. And we're going to hear from many other people as well who share that frustration. But I want to go to the second part of this interview with Cliff Albright because he was read an excerpt from the speech that Joe Biden gave today. And I was curious to see what his reaction to that would be. Let's watch. Let me just read once again what he is going to say today. The next few days, when these bills come to a vote will mark a turning point in this nation. Will we choose democracy over autocracy, light overshadow, justice over injustice? I know where I stand. I will not yield.

I will not flinch. I will defend your right to vote in our democracy against all enemies foreign and domestic. So the question is, where will the institution of the United States Senate stand? What more can he do? Well, a couple of things he could do. One is that we need him not only to give that speech and to talk about the filibuster and to give a clear plan, it's one thing for you to say, I'm open to filibuster changes, right? That's what he's set up until now. He has not given a full-throated call for them to modify the filibuster. He's not yet done what he did for infrastructure. When he went to Congress and met with the members of the house, he didn't go to those members and say, you know what, I'm open to infrastructure. You know,

if infrastructure is necessary, I can go along with that. What he said was pass this bill and pass it. Now, he's not done that in regards to voting rights. Now, of course, the bipartisan infrastructure bill was favored by some Republicans in Congress, but more importantly, by corporations. And so that, of course, took priority. in regard to passage of any legislation. But I love what he said there. I think this was such a great interview and it was so important to hear these frustrations and for activists and organizers on the issue of voting rights to vocalize the concerns

they have about Biden and whether or not he's really fighting for voting rights. Look, it's not good enough for Biden to just simply say like, oh, I support doing away or reforming the filibuster. He said the same thing about his own social spending bill, the build back better agenda. Did he fight for it? Doesn't look like it. That legislation is done with. It's been shelved.

Did he use any sticks as opposed to carrots in regard to dealing with Kirsten Cinema and Joe Manchin? Of course he didn't. All he had was complimentary commentary about them whenever reporters asked about where build back better was. But on the topic of the voting rights bill, yeah, how the hell would that pass unless you actually have a plan in place to do away with the filibuster, have a carve out for the filibuster or for the voting rights act or reform the filibuster. He has no plan. He hasn't

specified what he plans to do. He just, you know, in his speech today simply said that he's in favor of reforming it. So there could be passage for voting rights. It's just, it's so sad and it's so boring at this point. And everyone can see through it. Yeah. So, but understand I understand that the only reason we're doing this story is because of the opposition. Because Joe Biden restating his theoretical agenda that he doesn't give a damn about is not news. It's BS marketing that the rest of the press covers as if it's real. Pass it or don't pass it. Don't tell me about how you're kind of trying to pass it.

And Cliff Albright is my new favorite person because it was such a great answer. When it was the corporate-backed infrastructure bill, Joe Biden was up and people's business. I mean, he was threatening progressives significantly behind the scenes. I'm very aware of that, right? Man, when it comes to progressives, Joe Biden can fight. I mean, all of a sudden, he remembers the corn pop days, right? But when it comes to voting rights and sticking up for not just, you know, his most loyal voting base, but my God, African Americans that have been that need this. But by the way, all of us need it, right? And for democracy. Can't be found. Missing an action. So I love that Albright's not having any of it. I'll get Berman for doing the credit. I appreciate that. It's a rare thing to see in corporate media. At the same time, I mean, it's such a classic CNN news anchor like, what more could Biden do? I mean, what do you guys want? This guy has already said words. Empty words have been said and you're still not satisfied. Now, as much as we love and appreciate Cliff all,

Albright, he is not the only voting rights activist who is voicing his concerns about the Biden administration and the lack of action in getting the passage for that bill. I want to read a few quotes, starting with Phi Nguyen, who is the executive director of Asian Americans advancing Justice Atlanta. He addressed the president and vice president saying, quote, we beg you to stay in Washington tomorrow. This was a quote from yesterday, because we don't need you here in Georgia. Well, Biden didn't listen. He did travel to Atlanta to give the speech. He continues to say, we need legislation that will ensure that our democracy accurately reflects the growing diversity of this state and of this country. Mr. President and Madam Vice President, we beg you to ground that plane the same way that we continue to beg you to ground the planes of so many of our community members who are being deported because we still lack a pathway to citizenship.

I like that comment because he killed two birds with one stone there. He not only called out the Biden administration for its inaction on voting rights, but also drew attention to the fact that in regard to immigration policy, there has been virtually no change from what we experienced under the Trump administration. And I want to go to one more video here. This is actually a snippet from an interview you did, Jank, with Reverend Green. And I thought the framing of your question was perfect. So let's take a quick look at that.

Did you ever think that you would have to go on a hunger strike to get President Biden to do the bare minimum that he promised during the campaign? No, I did not think. As soon as the president was elected, he said that he would have our back. He'd speak to African Americans on the night of his election. He said, I would have your back. And here we are years later, a year later, waiting on the president to have our back, waiting on the president to stand firm as the president.

president to address the nation in the midst of the civil war that we're finding ourselves in, which is a crisis about democracy. And so we have been waiting long enough. And so we hope that at this moment that the president would hear the voice of moral leadership that is crying out like blood cries out from the ground, willing and hoping for a transformation and to protect our social democracy. And just to reiterate, this isn't about the president giving enough speeches on the issue. It's about putting action behind his words, simply saying that he supports something or simply saying that he wants to reform the filibuster clearly doesn't go far enough in ensuring that we do what's necessary to protect voting rights in this country.

Yeah, so Reverend Green, by the way, is the head of the black faith leaders and 25 of them, including Reverend Green, are on a hunger strike right now. So you've got black voters matter, you got faith leaders in the black community, all saying, I've had enough. We've all had enough of empty promises from Democrats who only deliver for their donors and never deliver for their voters. Guys, you have to understand, I thought $15 minimum wage was the bare minimum. I assume they would do voting rights. I assume they would strip out their anti-corruption parts and at least two voting rights. If they're not even going to do that, and they have an over a year, and that means They just, they're, they're, let's put it this way.

You shouldn't take anything a Democratic leader says seriously. Until they prove otherwise, when you hear them speaking, you should assume they're lying. Because that has been their track record definitively over the last 40 years. So enough of their crap, pass something, otherwise shut up already. And I want to give credit to a few other people before we wrap up this story. Let's go to the last graphic here. So family members of Martin Luther King Jr. have also spoken out last month, for instance, Martin Luther King, the third, his wife, Waters King and their daughter, Yolanda Renee King, called for no celebration of MLK Day without the passage of voting rights legislation. So even they're speaking out and it's, I love to see it because really if we don't apply pressure, we're not going to see any change.

We're going to continue seeing inaction by the Biden administration and Democratic leadership. And really, guys, the point that, you know, I want to buttress Jenks point about Democrats lying, listen, whatever piece of legislation they introduce or try to promote is completely irrelevant, unless they have a plan in place to either reform or do away with the legislative filibuster in the Senate, which requires 60 senators to vote in favor of something in order for it to pass. If they don't have a plan in place for that, then I'm not interested in hearing what their proposals are. I know and they know that those proposals are going nowhere and I'm not interested in doing positive marketing for them when they don't really have a real plan in place.

Yeah, and we have to keep clarifying that because in American media, it corruption is so significant that if you're not doing marketing for one party or another, people look at you like, wait, are you really got, are you guys journalists? I mean, how come you're not doing marketing for one of the parties in the system? No, you morons, you're supposed to challenge them. You're supposed to afflict the comfortable. You're supposed to question them. And they haven't done any of that. By the way, I'll give more shoutouts to the good guys, though. Ben jealous. who's now head of the people for the American Way, former head of Dublin, NWACP, League of Women Voters, they're out there getting arrested, doing civil disobedience to get the Democrats to do the bare minimum. Their donors are now rich with trillions of dollars in pork, but still, as they gorge on all of that, they can't do the bare minimum for their voters. Anyone who's not telling you that they're liars is part of the problem. And you can know it definitively because there are things like that Biden can take executive action on that he clearly promised like getting rid of $10,000 of student debt that he's choosing not to do. He doesn't have the mansion excuse. He doesn't have the parliamentarian excuse. I bring that example to you guys. So you understand both in voting rights and everything he's talking about. It's not that he can't do it. It's that he doesn't want to do it. He was lying all along.

When we come back from the break, we're going to switch gears a little bit and talk about the alleged rampant insider trading taking place in Congress. We've got some new data on that that you do not want to miss. So come right back. I'll share that story and more when we return. All right back on TYT, Jankanana, back to fun and rage. Well, let's discuss my favorite topic, alleged insider trading within Congress. So the stock portfolios of literally dozens of members of Congress have outperformed the stock market in 2021. And we have no new data on this, thanks to one of my favorite Twitter accounts, Unusual Wales.

This person compiled a list of all of our lawmakers who did in fact beat. the stock market in 2021. And if you take a look, this is really a bipartisan effort. You've got Democrats and Republicans, again, let me reiterate literally dozens of them, who seem to be such expert stock traders that they outperform the overall market. And this is, of course, not the first time this has happened. This has been a longstanding issue that I think has really come to light as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. And what we saw happen in the Senate with senators essentially selling certain stocks, individual stocks after they had a closed door briefing on the severity of the coronavirus pandemic before

the general public really knew about the severity of the pandemic. This was early on in 2020. Now if you look at that list, you've got 19 Democrats and 16 Republicans. So this is not a partisan, you know, an anti-democrat or anti-Republican issue. This is really a corruption issue that impacts both political parties. And they're also apparently doing real well when it comes to trading options, something that I'm not in any way an expert on. But let's take a quick look at that graph because it shows that in terms of trading options, Josh Gottheimer, Jim Langavin, and also Nancy Pelosi and Blake Moore, all four of them outperformed in trading options. All right. So with That said, I want to just really show you guys that this has been an issue for decades.

And it's not just about the fact that we have a double standard where if we were trading stocks based on insider info, we'd go to prison. They don't go to prison. This happens out in the open. There are no real consequences for it. In fact, there have been cases where all they're supposed to do is file their financial disclosures and they missed the deadlines. And there are no consequences for that either. There is no accountability whatsoever. And this has been going on for decades. And obviously, they have a bias in place because they're personally, financially invested in companies that maybe they should consider regulating. But why would they regulate when they know they're personally invested? Anyway, let's take a look at this fun video showing you just how long

this has been going on. They have market moving information. And they're going to act on that information. I mean, information is king. A groundbreaking 2004 study by a group of professors and researchers examined the records of U.S. senators between 1993 and 1998. The study found that a portfolio tracking the stocks that the U.S. senators bought during the same time period outperformed the market by 85 basis points each month. In a portfolio that tracked the stocks that the senators sold during the period, lagged behind the market by 12 basis points.

The study concluded that the senators knew appropriate times to both buy and sell their common stocks. So again, Jank, there are two things happening here, two negatives in this behavior. Negative number one, of course, is the fact that it's very likely that they're trading based on insider information, something that we would go to prison for. But I would argue the second consequence is far greater, which is if they have these personal financial investments in individual stocks, that is going, that bias will motivate or inform their policy making decisions. And that means that they're not going to work for us.

They're going to work for their personal portfolios. Yeah, so this is wrong eight ways of Sunday. So first of all, them owning stock at all gives them an instant bias, because if you're debating, let's say, the minimum wage and you own stock and restaurants, well, the restaurant folks are very much against raising the minimum wage. Well, you have a direct conflict of interest against your own voters. It's so obvious. I mean, there's an argument to be made that they shouldn't even own mutual funds. But okay, fine, I'd take it, right? No problem. But we're not anywhere near that. So they're not only own mutual funds, they own direct companies and they know which companies, oh, hey, I'm not going to break up Google. So once they announce that news,

I bet Google stock goes up. So, I mean, it goes on and on. The conflicts of interest, again, are very obvious for the average person. That's why about 95% of Americans think that they shouldn't do this. And shockingly enough, 95% of politicians think they should. But if all of that wasn't clear enough, you could see the data dating back all the way to 90s. 1993 take any period of time, study it, and the politicians somehow magically coincidentally do way, way, way better than the markets and then the average person. On top of everything else, they have insider information and they use it brazenly. And one more thing is Anna is going to give you the rest of it.

Obama passed the Stock Act and the Republicans pretend to be in favor of it as well about 10 years ago, understand that at least half the things they pass in Congress are just marketing gimmicks so that the press, which dutifully back then declared it historic. Oh my God, it's such an important big change. Obama and the corporate Republicans and corporate Democrats should get such great credit for this. And then how many times have they enforced the Stock Act since? Literally, zero. It was always a lie. Right.

And especially in the House, the Stock Act, which, you know, mandates those financial disclosures, has no teeth. I mean, we talked about that on the show previously. So you're right in bringing that up and you're right in mentioning how, while it was celebrated as historic, when push comes to shove, it didn't mitigate the behavior that we're seeing. And I want to now talk about the, honestly, the ridiculous proposals and what's really taking place in regard to changing this, right? So all these people are starting to give John Ossoff a lot of credit because apparently he is looking to propose legislation that would ban members of Congress from trading individual stocks. But he claims that he's waiting until he finds a Republican co-sponsor to the bill before proposing it. So let me just be clear. We still have the legislative filibuster in place in the Senate.

So there's no way it would pass in the Senate. But more importantly, let's also not forget that Nancy Pelosi, who is the Speaker of the House, she makes decisions about whether or not bills even make it to the House floor for a vote. She's made herself very clear on how she feels about the possibility of banning members of Congress from participating in the stock market. Let's watch. Madam Speaker, Insider just completed a five-month investigation, finding that 49 members of Congress and 182 senior congressional staffers have violated the stock act. The inside of trade law, I'm wondering if you have any reactions to that. And secondly, should members of Congress send there's thousands be bans from trading individual stocks while serving Congress? No, I don't know to the second one. We have a responsibility to report in the stock, on the stock.

But I don't, I'm not familiar with that five-month review. But if people aren't reporting, they should be. Because this is a free market and people, we are a free market economy. They should be able to participate in that. Yeah, trading on insider information is. not, you know, participating in the free market. It's illegal for regular citizens. And also, never mind the fact that she's supposed to be a public servant, not someone who uses her position of power to just enrich herself. But of course, we're talking about the United States

of America, which is incredibly corrupt, full of corrupt politicians who don't care about anything else but their own financial interests and their own stock portfolios. With that said, though, going back to John Ossoff, why? Why is he proposing something that he knows would not pass? And more importantly, why is he saying I'm not going to propose it until I can find a Republican to co-sponsor it? That might give you this illusion that he's interested in doing this in a bipartisan way. But no, this is all just a game. It's a trick. This is my, this is my speculation, my analysis on it, but I think I'm right. He's just trying to do this as a stunt to point fingers at Republicans for not wanting to do something about this corruption. But he knows full

well that this is not something that would pass in Congress, especially since there has not been a plan in place to do away with the legislative filibuster in the Senate. Yeah. Just the truth. Yeah. So Azov is not the worst of them. But nonetheless, here's my translation of what Ossoff is saying, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and has a zero percent chance of passing. He knows that. This is just marketing. And by the way, half of Washington, I'm sure, is scandalized by this. Ossoff said that there shouldn't be insider trading when the queen insider trades.

How dare he? Oh, wow, did he send her a strongly worded letter? Okay, you guys want to know what you would do if you actually wanted to pass this? You would bring tremendous attention to it because you know, literally in a poll, only 5% of Americans said they should be allowed to do this, okay? You have 95% of Americans on your side. It's an easy win as long as you attract attention to it and embarrass other politicians. So you would strategically call a press conference saying, I'm tired of the corruption of Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi. And you would talk about how she gained, what does she have, Anna, 69% percent.

returns. I mean, it's absurd. It's absurd. And you put the 69% return on a giant placard, and you show it to the entire press. And then everybody would talk about, oh my God, Osso versus Pelosi. Wait a minute, Pelosi really make that much money? Holy cow, that's ridiculous. How did she do it? Oh, look at her husband's trades, et cetera. And it would bring a lot of pressure, and they would cave. But that would require courage and honesty, which almost no Democrat in the country has. And by the way, it's not just Democrats, of course, in response to Asov's proposal, I mean, in some ways what Aosov did kind of worked because it was just a marketing ploy to point fingers at Republicans for not wanting to do anything about this corruption. But immediately following news of what Asoff is doing with this proposal, this alleged proposal, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy came out and claimed that he's considering instituting a ban on lawmakers' holdings. and trading stocks of individual companies, but there's a condition here. If the Republicans win a majority in the House of Representatives in November's elections,

why? If you see this as a huge problem, why are you going to wait until Republicans have control of Congress? If this is something that you genuinely care about, and it's something that allegedly Democrats are in favor of doing something about, why wouldn't you do something about it right now? It's because neither one of them, whether we're talking about Assoff or McCarthy, genuinely want to do anything, think that anything will happen if they propose the legislation, it's just the way things work. And I want you guys to think a little more critically when these proposals are being put out there. Is there a plan in place to actually accomplish this stated goal? Or is this an attempt to do some positive PR, especially in a midterm

election cycle where Democrats have failed to really provide any material gains for the average American and are looking for anything and everything to latch on to for their campaigning. And so with that explanation in place, I just want to note that whether we're talking about John Ossoff or Kevin McCarthy, neither one of them deserve cookies. No cookies for you, I'm sorry. Yeah, and I'll add one last thing. I read Kevin McCarthy's so-called proposal. Even what you, the quote you just read, Anna, it's, that's not even true. He says, well, we will, but it could be this or it could be that.

And we would only do it if my dog didn't eat the bill first. And so when you read the caveats, it's a joke. He's not even promising to do it at all. And look, we're honest about Democratic politicians. Find me a right wing show that's honest about Republican politicians. They're all crooks. They're all crooks. They all do the inside of training. The two biggest people who got busted on inside of trading during COVID were Republican senators. So one from North Carolina, one from Georgia. Please do not believe anybody in media that tells you that

politicians are honest and wonderful, but only on your side. Well, there's one final angle I want to get to on this story. So let's talk about this secret Marxist. So, Is Larry Cudlow, Trump's former economic advisor, really just a secret socialist? Well, he recently cited a leftist magazine while criticizing members of Congress for trading individual stocks. This was during an appearance on Fox News, which yes, I know he also has his own Fox News programming. But with that said, let's hear who he decided to give some love to. Nancy Blossey's trading acumen is fantastic. She's now been voted, the 2021 Wall Street Trader of the Year.

There's this wonderful piece from jacobin mag.com. I don't know. I'm told it's a left-wing publication, but it's absolutely hilarious. I mean, you heard it here, folks. Larry Cudlow loves a socialist magazine, Jacobin. He finds it very hilarious. And the story or the piece, that he's about to cite is from Ryan Zygdraff.

It's titled Nancy Pelosi, 2021 Wall Street Trader of the Year. Thanks to her investing prowess, the Speaker of the House's wealth grew by an estimated $16.7 million in 2020, just as millions of Americans fell into poverty and struggle to make ends meet during the COVID-19 pandemic, long live the queen of stonks. Yeah. Well, I mean, there's a lot of great things here. One, a Trump official shouting out a socialist magazine is what we didn't know we needed in 2022. But he's right that the gains that Pelosi have are so far above what is already a booming market. I mean, her and her husband are beating the market. I don't think I could use old school analogies.

Anyway, they're meeting them silly. And it is silly. Everybody knows she's got the information. And by the way, she's fabulously rich. Her husband is a trader to begin with, a finance guy overall. I think they're in real estate, they're in every kind of thing. They got their fingers and everything. Now the one thing that Cuddla didn't tell you and is this honest about is his

buddies in the Republican Party do the same exact thing. And he loves it. That's what he signed up for. And the Trump administration was fill the swamp, fill the swamp. They did insider trading galore. Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. Again, this is not an issue that only impacts

the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. This is really a bipartisan effort. And we see that corruption play out in their policy decisions. We see it play out in the way that ordinary people get prosecuted for possibly trading on insider information, whereas members of Congress seem to be doing it right in front of our faces. And there are absolutely no consequences for it. But don't worry, Jank. You know, there are investigations here and there by, let's say, the Senate Ethics Committee or, you know, that's pretty much it. But other than that,

they get to do what we would get into, rightfully, a lot of trouble for doing. I want to go to one One final short video, just to make sure that I give you more context into what Cudlow was saying. But, Jank, you're absolutely right. Cudlow himself is someone who has had no problem with corruption in government. I mean, he worked for an insanely corrupt administration, the Trump administration. So while he loves to point fingers at Pelosi, and it's right to point fingers at corrupt politicians like Pelosi, let's not make the mistake of thinking that this is simply a democratic issue. With that said, here's more of the interview.

They traded 50 million in assets, annualized returns of 69% as of October, according to an estimate from, they have something called the Nancy Pelosi portfolio tracker. Her performance is better that get this. Her performance is better than Warren Buffett, George Soros, or Kathy Wood. Okay, all right. Now do the Republican lawmakers. Go ahead. Because if you look at the list of members of Congress who outperform the market last year, Nancy Pelosi isn't even first on the list. A lot of Republicans on that list. Actually, we showed that list in the last segment. I want to bring it back up to see all the red right there. You see the top are all red, red are Republicans. So we always come with receipts. And the top two insider traders were two Republican senators and the Senate so-called ethics committee or lack of ethics committee. Both Republicans and Democrats were like, what do you mean? Those guys are elites, elites just like us. We would never punish them. In fact, we let them do whatever they want. They robbed millions of dollars to the inside of information they had.

And, you know, we were sorry we ever brought him up to even investigate. And on their way out, they probably patted them on the ass. So don't believe the hype when you see Cudlow or Democrats or anyone telling you it's just the other party. No, it's the powerful versus the rest of us. And by the way, when Wall Street bankers do a side of trading, Larry Cudlow loves it. It loves it. He lives for it. That's what that's all he ever celebrated on CNBC in the first place. So it's an ironic messenger for this story. But nonetheless, at least it got on some sort of media that some politicians are corrupt, which almost never happens. When we come back from the break, I'll show you exactly why and how prosecutors and police only seem to care about protecting property as opposed to people. Come right back. All right, back on TYT, Jank and Anna with you guys.

Casper, go. We're now learning more about how prosecutors have been working with an oil company behind a controversial pipeline in an effort to receive compensation for aggressively going after protesters of said pipeline. So the pipeline in question is the line three pipeline, which runs through northern Minnesota. It did in fact face opposition from indigenous lead water protectors. And now, thanks to the intercept and to the Huffington Post, we have information pertaining to new documents that show that the company behind the pipeline, Enbridge, was moving to coordinate with the prosecutors in terms of responding to these protesters in some of the most aggressive. aggressive ways. For example, as the intercept reports, defense attorneys pointed to examples like felony theft charges for protesters who chained themselves to equipment and felony aiding attempted suicide for those who crawled into sections of non-functional pipe. So their civil

disobedience wasn't just met with extreme policing, it was met with prosecutors who have decided to charge them with the most extreme charges, which I would argue do not in any way even apply to what they were doing while they were demonstrating. Now, in addition to these aggressive legal tactics, there are now new questions surrounding the relationship of the prosecutors to this oil company, Enbridge. As the intercept writes, documents published by the Partnership for Civil Justice Funds Center for Protest Law and Litigation, which is representing pipeline opponents show that Hubbard County Minnesota attorney Jonathan Frieden sought reimbursement from the Enbridge-funded state escrow account to pursue charges against the corporation's opponents.

The requests luckily were denied, but the fact that they were asking for compensation to prosecute these demonstrators is a huge problem. Frieden, for instance, attempted to bill $12,207.14 to a special account set up by the state of Minnesota to allow Enbridge to pay for law enforcement and public safety expenses affiliated with pipeline construction. Frieden was asking Enbridge to pay for the labor of assistant county attorney Anna Emerling and three support staff for processing approximately 400 cases associated with construction of the Enbridge law Line 3 pipeline. And just to give you some snippets of their exchange, so he had written, the prosecutor had written to, you know, to Enbridge. Hours are due to multiple arrests

slash citation slash complaints and prosecution for public safety related cause for maintaining the peace in and around the construction site, the county attorney stated in his invoice. Frieden wrote in an email that the Center for Protest Law and Litigation obtained through a public records request, quote, I'm wondering if that might be charged in the future, given the significant amount of resources my office will be expending over the next six months in the prosecution of criminal acts associated with line three. How about this? How about don't prosecute them, especially with these trumped up charges that don't apply to the civil disobedience that the protesters were involved in.

Now Rick Hart responded, he's the account manager for the Enbridge funded escrow account. He wrote back saying prosecution expenses are not allowable reimbursements or reimburseable expenses for the line three public safety escrow account. And Frieden, the prosecutor, didn't like that. He responded in a pretty salty way saying, quote, I look forward to hearing why the multiple late nights and overtime hours by my staff to change the individuals endangering or charge the individuals endangering the public don't qualify under public safety. I assume the cost to arrest them is covered just not to prosecute them. How does that make any sense under the language you provided below? Okay. So right wing, where are you at?

I mean, this is as significant an abridgment of freedom of speech, a freedom to assemble, as you could find and how about just freedom they're charging in with a felony they can give them five to ten years for voicing their political opinion. Five to ten years of robbing them of their freedom and their liberty because they dare to oppose big business and big government combined. The right way should be furious about this and forget somebody getting fired. You want to talk about cancel culture, put somebody in prison for 10 years for voicing their opinion. Well if you don't agree with me yet, let me do two more things. Well, let me read the first amendment to the United States Constitution.

Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. This could not be more exactly what the founding fathers intended that we have the right to do. And now, and historically in America, when you do civil disobedience, you know, chain yourself to a restaurant or you, in the civil rights days, you do go into an all white restaurant and you sit down, et cetera. That was charged as a misdemeanor because it's obvious that you're doing it peaceably and you're doing a redress of grievances and you're acting in a constitutional way. Now they're saying the corporations are tired of your rights. So if you do that, they'll throw away the key, lock you up and throw away the key, and they're paying for the prosecution. And Anna, I think I can get the right wing on my side, at least on this analogy.

Remember, TYT is also a company, and we get protested. So imagine right wing protesters protesting TYT. We just pay the cops to lock you all up. So what? If we can just buy cops, we can buy them too. work company, we got money. Shoot, I could raise millions of dollars to lock you guys up. You really want companies to have those kind of rights? No, I mean, this is not democracy. I agree with you on that. And this obviously is not new. I mean, when you think about the massive financial donation

that was given to the NYPD as Occupy Wall Street was gathering in Zuccotti Park in New York, I mean, it tells you everything you need to know. I mean, the public police departments across the country, the prosecutors, the very people who are supposed to be protecting and serving us, show us over and over again that they are more interested in protecting private property and doing what's necessary to protect the greed and corruption that we see in this country that's carried out by these corporations. I mean, there's so many examples of it. This is just another example that shows the prosecutors in Minnesota thought, yeah, let's, let's go for it.

Let's prosecute as aggressively as possible. Let's implement charges that don't even apply to what these protesters had done. And everything's fine and dandy because we're going to, we're going to be able to collect the funds from this oil company that's behind this pipeline. The fact that the prosecutor brought these charges believing the prosecutions were going to be funded by the Enridge Corporation and oil company raises real issues as to the due process rights of defendants and Maya Verhaden Hillard, she's the director of the Center for Protest Law and litigation and an attorney representing opponents of the pipeline. And I couldn't say it better myself. I'm glad that, you know, there are lawyers fighting. for the protesters here because what's happening is absolutely disgusting. And I'm gonna add one last detail to the Zagate Park example that you gave. And a lot of people might not know this. It was a small story, although it should have been a large one. During I by Wall Street, police tracked the protests in literally in a bunker in Wall Street with Wall Street private investigators.

So it was the bankers working with the cops to track American protesters. Now, right wing, you complain about the global elites all the time. Well, NYPD works for the global elites. They're literally in the same room trying to make sure that Americans, left-wing or right-wing, don't have rights to protest corporate rule. So understand when you've got Republican leaders telling you, you, oh no, big business is great. They're your friends. You should deregulate them and make sure they don't pay any taxes at all. You should have any cops looking out to protect you on

Wall Street. No cops on Wall Street. Understand that they think you're suckers and they're using you for their own corporate interests. Well, let's do one more story before we end the first hour of the show. And this is, I'm not even exaggerating. This is literally the only Madison Cawthorne related story that I found any interest in. Everything else seems dumb and useless. But let's talk about what's happening in North Carolina. Voters in North Carolina are moving pretty quickly to do what they can to block Madison Cawthorn from being able to run for re-election due to his involvement in the January 6th riots. Now, that headline might seem a little disturbing, right? Why don't you just let the voters decide? But the argument

made here is actually an interesting constitutional argument. So let me give you the details. Lawyers filed the candidacy challenge on behalf of 11 voters with North Carolina's Board of Elections, which oversees a process by which candidate qualifications are scrutinized. Now, what exactly is this constitutional argument that the voters in North Carolina are making? Well, the voters say that Cawthorne cannot run because he fails to comply with an amendment in the Constitution ratified shortly after the Civil War. The 1868 Amendment says no one can serve in Congress, quote, who having previously taken an oath as a member of Congress to support the Constitution of the United States shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same. And so in the

written challenge, of course, January 6 comes up. The written challenge says that the events on January 6th, quote, amounted to an insurrection, and that Cawthorne's speech at the rally supporting Donald Trump, his other comments, and information he published, and information in published reports provide a reasonable suspicion or belief that he helped facilitate the insurrection and is thus disqualified. And so I think that's a really interesting argument. And I'm curious what the audience thinks about it, whether or not they should be able to do this to move forward with this kind of challenge to Cawthorne. And I should note that Madison Cawthorne is going to run for reelection in a redrawn district, which is even friendlier to Republican candidates. Of course,

because that's what redistricting typically leads to in this country, which is why Democrats are incredibly feckless for not actually fighting for voting rights to change or reform the gerrymandering that's taking place. But the argument, by the way, cites tweets like the one I'm about to read from Madison Cawthorn. This is a tweet that he wrote on January 4th of 2021. January 6th, this fast approaching, the future of this republic hinges on the actions of a solitary few Get ready. The fate of a nation rests on our shoulders, yours and mine. Let's show Washington that our backbones are made of steel and titanium. It's time to fight. So, Jake, what do you think about

this? Well, I think it's pretty tough because look, where are the lines, right? If you tell people to fight politically, there's nothing wrong with that. If you tell Bob to go take violent action, that's illegal. And so that's clear. But the Republicans leaders, both in media and in politics, know where the line is. They know what gets them in legal trouble. And they do everything up to that line. Well, wouldn't it be great or necessary if you took up arms? And remember, the tyrant is the government. The government is the tyrant, and you've got your guns, right? Now, I didn't tell Bob to go kill someone in government. I didn't say it, right? And so Green Bay Sweep, that's Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro, publicly bragging about their coup attempt.

And now, can you argue that an election should have a recount? Of course you can, right? An audit, of course you can. And by the way, they did have recounts on audits in all these sites, multiple ones, right? And Biden added to his lead. But when you say, hey, let's decertify an election, Well, it's not certified in the first place to the vice president, which is just ceremonial. And instead, let's take it back to the state legislatures and have them lie. And so then we'll declare ourselves president. Well, that's a coup attempt. But I think probably the crime happens when the legislators just say, I don't care that Biden won. We're going to declare Trump the winner.

But when they do that, it's already too late. The crime is. is treason and insurrection, but it will have worked. So they've put us in a tough legal spot, and I'm not sure what can be done. But it is very scary that they continue to flirt with that. And their intent is obvious. If we don't win through democracy, screw democracy. Let's win through violence and deception. Well, that's why I'm actually supportive of this effort. I would not be supportive if it didn't, I didn't know that they were going to rely on this constitutional argument. I think that argument is fascinating. And I'm glad that they're going to put it to the test and let's see how it plays out. We're certainly not going to see real consequences

toward the various Republican lawmakers who aided and abetted the efforts on January 6th coming from Congress. Our congressional lawmakers, the Democratic Party, talk a big talk. But when push comes to shove, whether we're talking about like literal war criminals or people who tried to overthrow, you know, the party that actually won the 2020 election, they never actually put actions behind their words. They'll do the investigations. They'll make a big deal about it in their campaigning. But I don't, I don't expect Congress to hand down any real consequences. To go about this in a legal way, and by making a constitutional argument is an interesting one. And I am curious to see how it all plays out.

But enough about me, we want to hear from you and we want to know what you think. So the damage report actually had a poll on this. We want to ask you the same question. Go to t-y-t.com slash polls to participate. Should members of Congress who supported the insurrection be barred from running for re-election? Let us know what you think. Yeah. And look, I think the best solution was the one Cory Bush suggested.

But as usual, the Democrats bungled it. So she said on January 6th, she had the resolution ready for the Republicans who said we should not certify the election, every one of them should have been kicked out at that time. And the logic there is, hey, you guys are saying this election was fraudulent. So obviously, your own election is also fraudulent by your own claims. It's not our claim, it's your claim. So if you're claiming that your election was fraudulent, well, obviously we can't seat you. And so you got to go home. Clean up, go home. That would have been a winning argument. It's it because it's impossible to argue against. Like, oh, no, my election was same exact election

that happened in my district was fraud when it comes to the presidential one, but not fraudulent when it came to mine. It's an absurd argument, absurd. And they would have been humiliated. And that would have been a good moment to point out their treachery and how they were against democracy and they were clearly lying. And what did Pelosi do instead? As usual, not a damn thing. In fact, you try to block Cory Bush from introducing that because Republicans are our best friend. The dumb and the feckless. All right, we got to go. We got to take a break. But when we come back for the second hour, I promise we've got some more bangers for you. Lots of great news to share with you. Well, I wouldn't say great news, but important news to share with you.

So don't miss it. Come right back. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work. Listen, ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Jank Huger, and I'll see you soon.