The Young Turks - Porter Unchained
Episode Date: September 9, 2021Senator Joe Manchin laid out a long list of demands as key Senate chairs move to win his vote for the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. House Democrat Jim Clyburn said the $3.5 trillion price tag of ...the bill is the "ceiling" and not the "floor". A Treasury Department report estimates that the richest 1% of Americans are responsible for more than $160 billion in unpaid taxes per year. Beatings and buried videos are a pattern with the Louisiana State Police. President Biden will announce that all federal workers must be vaccinated, with no option for testing. A Trump supporter who survived COVID admits he is against the vaccine because the pharmaceutical companies withheld it from Trump until he lost. Hosts: Cenk Uygur, Ana Kasparian Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Welcome to the Young Turks.
Jake your granting is sparing with you guys.
I like to have fun on the show, why not, okay?
So it's usually a good reason why not, because usually disastrous.
news. Today we have a little bit of that. We have a smattering of disastrous news, or as my
fellow Turks do it these days. But we also have some good news, interesting news. We're
going to lead with some of that. And then the rest is all the usual fighting in America.
Fun. Yeah. All right, Casper.
Well, there is a theme in the first segment today, and it's that the Biden administration
is taking action on things that we're pretty worried about. Let's start with the anti-abortion
law in Texas.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has announced that the Department of Justice plans on filing a lawsuit against the state of Texas over its anti-abortion law.
He gave a press conference today to announce the lawsuit and the reasons for why he believes that the anti-abortion law is unconstitutional.
Let's watch.
Today, after a careful assessment of the facts in the law, the Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against the state of Texas.
Our position is set out in detail in our complaint.
Its basis is as follows.
SB8 bans nearly all abortions in the state after six weeks of pregnancy,
before many women even know they are pregnant,
and months before a pregnancy is viable.
It does so even in cases of rape, sexual abuse, or incest.
And it further prohibits any effort to aid the doctors'
who provide pre-viability abortions or the women who seek them.
The act is clearly unconstitutional under long-standing Supreme Court precedent.
Those precedents hold, in the words of Planned Parenthood v. Casey, that, quote,
regardless of whether exceptions are made for particular circumstances,
a state may not prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision to terminate her,
her pregnancy before viability.
So the argument made there is very similar to the argument that's already being made in the lawsuits that have already been filed against the anti-abortion law.
And so I really question how much of an impact this lawsuit will have.
There are some legal scholars who have weighed in, and I'll give you their point of view in just a second.
But, Jank, before we get to that and the second half of Merrick Garland's statement, what do you think?
So first, my expert legal analysis, which I share with you guys often.
I don't know if you guys know, so I'm a bit of a lawyer.
In this case, but it's true, I mean.
But it is true.
Yeah.
So in this case, I have no freaking idea.
Yeah.
I don't know if this is going to help at all.
I do know that the Texas law is unconstitutional.
That seems clear.
You know, we talked on earlier shows about why the Supreme Court didn't take it, and it's not completely open and shut.
The reason the law was designed the way that it was, was to avoid judicial scrutiny.
And, or at least he gave conservative justice enough of an excuse to avoid judicial scrutiny
so it could actually take effect before it gets adjudicated.
Now, when the Justice Department jumps in and sues them, that could be a moment where the judges
then go, or ultimately the Supreme Court justices go, okay, yeah, now we have a real issue
in front of the court so it ends Texas's loophole.
Or they could say, no, the loophole still applies, this is not about state power, it's one
set of citizens suing another set of citizens, and once they do, to collect $10,000,
then we'll have a real case, and then we'll judge it.
And so it's very hard to tell right now which way the courts are going to go, and it's
going to have to weave its way through the courts.
So maybe it helps policy-wise, substance-wise, can't tell yet.
Politics wise, it definitely helps because it looks like the Biden administration is going out there going, we're doing everything we can't, damn it.
Right. So, you know, they write in the Washington Post that the suit asks a judge to declare the measure unlawful, block its enforcement and protect the rights that Texas has violated.
Legal scholars and advocates have suggested that a lawsuit alleging women's civil rights are being violated under the new law is one avenue the Biden administration could take.
So let's get to the second half of Attorney General Garland's statement on what the DOJ plans on doing.
Federal law by prohibiting federal agencies from exercising their authorities and carrying out their responsibilities under federal laws relating to abortion services.
It also subjects federal employees and non-governmental partners who implement those laws to civil liability and penalties.
Among the federal agencies and programs whose operations the statute unconstitutionally restricts are the Labor Department's Job Corps program,
the Defense Department's Tricare Health Program, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the Bureau of Prisons, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid service.
and the Office of Personnel Management.
The complaint therefore seeks a declaratory judgment that SB 8 is invalid under the Supremacy Clause
and the 14th Amendment is preempted by federal law and violates the doctrine of intergovernmental immunity.
So look, I hope no one's distracted by the fact that he has the charisma of a celery stick.
It's good that the DOJ is planning on doing something about this.
I'm pleased with that, but look, at the end of the day, the most important thing to be done is for Congress to pass legislation, something that honestly should have been done long ago, certainly when Obama had started his first term and had a supermajority in Congress. I mean, just make sure you codify reproductive rights through legislation. Unfortunately, Congress did not do that. And now you have Nancy Pelosi in the House drafting up legislation to ensure that reproductive rights.
are protected under federal law, that is gonna go nowhere in the Senate unless the Biden
administration pressures corporate Democrats in the Senate to do away with the filibuster, which
would require 60 votes in the Senate to pass that legislation. You know, so the fact that we don't
have like a real avenue through which Congress can protect reproductive rights, I guess it's
nice to see the executive branch under the DOJ doing something about this. But again, I mean,
I mean, I wish I could give you a clear prediction on what I think is going to happen with
this lawsuit.
I really don't know.
Yeah.
So Jessica Cisneros had a great quote here that I want to share with you guys.
She's a just Democrat.
She's running as Henry Quare, who's one of the most conservative Democrats and against choice
in Texas.
So very relevant race down there.
She almost beat him last time and she'll likely meet him this time.
So she wrote, asking us to quote, out-organize the attacks on voting rights and reproductive
health care is so disheartening because we did out organize those attacks last November.
Yes.
She said Congress needs to act.
It's now or never, the stakes have never been higher.
So that's such a great point because what are you asking us to do?
Our job was to get you elected, she's saying, as the voters and activists and the people
who care about Democratic Party's priorities, legislation, et cetera, right?
Now it's your job after we acted for you to act.
Don't then turn it back around on us and go, we have all the power to act, but golly gee,
I don't know what the hell we're going to do.
I guess we're going to do nothing.
Why do you guys magically figure out what to do?
No, that's not how it works.
That's not how our system works.
So don't let them lie to you.
Here, give Biden credit for doing something that might help.
Good enough, at least it's something, right?
But the real action is in Congress, and they could easily end the filibuster, make Roe v.
Way to national law tomorrow.
They could do it tomorrow.
They're choosing not to do it.
That's the Democratic Party.
So I love that there are progressives now within that tent going, now we're going to call you out on your BS because you're choosing not to really fight back.
There's a lot of noise around, oh man, we are so upset at the Texas law.
Right.
Well, the way you show that is through legislation.
No, that's exactly right.
I mean, just my final point on this is the other day as, you know, this situation in Texas is happening.
We keep hearing about the pushback on the budget reconciliation bill, which we'll talk about later in the show.
I was just, I forgot for a minute that Democrats hold control, like that they have the power.
You forget. It feels sometimes like we're still living in the Trump era, although, you know, there's a little more decorum in government without Trump sitting in the White House.
But nonetheless, like that feeling of powerlessness is ridiculous considering the fact that Democrats campaigned on Trump being this huge threat and how important it was to get them elected to prevent that threat from gaining additional power and to ensure that they pass their agenda items.
What's going on with their agenda items?
Well, almost no action. I mean, so in terms of Congress, they passed the COVID relief bill and very little else.
So here we are now, it's almost been a year. FDR 2.0 hasn't been spotted anywhere near D.C.
Remember when they used to talk about that nonsense?
Yeah, well, this is put up or shut up time.
All right, well, let's move on to some more action that's coming out of the White House today.
President Joe Biden has issued a mandate for federal workers to get vaccinated.
have about 75 days to do so. But he goes even further. He gave a press conference today
in regard to how he plans to step up his response to coronavirus. And he details some of those
actions in the next clip. Let's watch. My message to unvaccinated Americans is this.
What more is there to wait for? What more do you need to see? We've made vaccinations
free, safe, and convenient.
The vaccine has FDA approval.
Over 200 million Americans have gotten at least one shot.
We've been patient, but our patients is wearing thin.
And your refusal has cost all of us.
So please do the right thing.
So I actually love that statement because it's true.
I mean, at this point, I think everyone who's gotten vaccinated, everyone who's done everything that they've been told to do, and everything that they should do based on the scientific research and what doctors say they should do, like, they want to live their lives.
And so there's this constant back and forth, this debate about tyranny and freedom and whatever.
But the very people whose freedom is being, you know, held back are the people who have done everything right.
Right, people who want to get back together with their family members and their friends,
but we're still dealing with shutdowns, we're still dealing with social distancing, we're
still dealing with masks, we're dealing with all these things that we don't really need
to be dealing with anymore as long as everyone who can get vaccinated does get vaccinated,
right?
Yeah, we went to a movie theater the other day and we had to put our masks on again.
And so what's the point to go to a movie theater if you can't eat popcorn, you gotta have
the mask on, et cetera.
So look, that's a tiny inconvenience.
but it's annoying. And I say it partly because I want you to understand that right wing talking
points are nonsense. They're horse crap, of course, as always. We're not, we're trying to take away
people's freedoms by putting their masks on. No, I don't like it. If fogs out my glasses, I don't like
it in a thousand ways. But we've got to get beyond this goddamn thing. I like to see the big
crowds in the football games. I wish we could see more of those. But not if it's in the
middle of a raging pandemic where idiots won't get vaccinated. So look, we've been through this a thousand
times. So anything that's pushing them in a direction of getting vaccinated outside the force
of law, I think is a good thing. What I mean by outside the force of law is, I, you know,
cops coming in and saying you must get vaccinated, otherwise we're going to put you to jail.
I think it's just not going to work in America. No. But saying, hey, listen, you have a government
contract. This is part of the rules. If you don't want the government contract, it's called hashtag
freedom. Yes. Looking at getting a contract from someone else.
Because these are rules.
Everybody's got a right to set rules in the workplace, everybody knows that, right?
So they're setting the rules and in a very logical way, because you don't want your coworkers
getting sick.
All right, so now he explains exactly what he plans on doing and how this will impact, not
just federal workers, not just companies that are contracted to work with the federal government,
but he also plans on taking action through the labor department.
So let's take a look.
I will sign an executive order that will now require all executive branch federal employees
to be vaccinated.
All.
And I've signed another executive order that will require federal contractors to do the same.
If you want to work with the federal government and do business to this, get vaccinated.
If you want to do business with the federal government, vaccinate your workforce.
And tonight, I'm removing one of the last remaining obstacles that make it different.
for you to get vaccinated.
The Department of Labor will require employers with 100 or more workers to give those workers paid time off to get vaccinated.
No one should lose pay in order to get vaccinated or take a loved one to get vaccinated.
I think that's so critical because I think one of the credible criticisms regarding mask mandate, I mean vaccine mandates, was the fact that
But look, I mean, there are people who are actually concerned about feeling a little under
the weather after they get the vaccine.
And that has happened to a lot of people.
I remember feeling under the weather when I got the vaccine for a day.
And then after 24 hours, I was feeling fantastic.
But you know, I have the ability to, you know, hit up jank and be like, yo, bro, I can't
come in, I'm not feeling so great.
And I'm not going to lose my job.
And I'm not going to lose my pay either for not coming in that day.
A lot of workers don't have that privilege, they don't have that luxury.
So mandating that employers have to provide paid time off so people can get the vaccine or recover from the vaccine, I think is critical.
And I love that he's doing that.
Yeah.
And so number one, federal government employees used to be under the, if you're wondering, hey, didn't Biden say something like this before he did?
But he was saying before you either have to get vaccinated or you could do testing once a week.
And so that's a little bit pain in the house, but hey, hashtag freedom, right?
But now he's saying, no, we're not even allowing the testing.
If you want to work for the government, you have to get tested because we're not going to let you endanger other coworkers and et cetera.
And the efficiency of the government, all those good reasons, okay?
And if you say boo-hoo, I don't want that.
Well, there are plenty of other jobs.
And then if you're a contractor, same thing as we explained earlier.
And I think that he has the power to do that. Absolutely, no one questions that. And is it the right decision? Yeah, absolutely. Because viruses spread when people are unvaccinated. And they become national health problems for all of us. And they create more variants, et cetera. So good strong action by Biden here. He's such a mixed bag. I mean, every day we tell you how frustratingly conservative and outdated he.
is on some issues, and then he takes really good, solid, strong action on other issues
like this.
Right.
So here, credit where credit is due, nicely done, is a good way to get the ball rolling.
At the end of the day, the right wing is going to right wing, right?
So they're now telling people, they're basically doing it to support Trump, not getting vaccinated
so that they could support Trump and his feelings.
Well, Biden's not going to be able to get to those guys, but at some point if your job's
on the line, it's probably gonna be a pretty good motivating factor.
So just to give you more details on how much of an impact this will have, the Department
of Defense, the Department of Veterans Affairs, Indian Health Service, and the National
Institutes of Health will also complete their previously announced vaccination requirements,
which the White House estimates covers 2.5 million workers.
And to be clear, this is something that is a little more stringent compared to what was offered
by the White House earlier, which was, okay, if you don't want to get the vaccine, then you're
going to have to go through constant testing, mask wearing, all of that. Now, basically, all of these
workers have 75 days to get vaccinated. Now, let's talk a little bit about what Biden is doing
to address some of these right-wing governors who have implemented bans on mask mandates
within schools. Let me be blunt. My plan also takes
also takes on elected officials and states that are undermining you and these life-saving
actions. Right now, local school officials are trying to keep children safe in a pandemic
while their governor picks a fight with them and even threatens their salaries or their jobs.
Talk about bullying in schools. If they'll not help, if these governors won't help us beat the pandemic, I'll use
my power as president to get them out of the way.
The Department of Education has already begun to take
legal action against states undermining protection
that local school officials have ordered.
Any teacher or school official
whose pays with hell for doing the right thing,
we will have that pay restored by the federal government
100%.
I promise you, I will have your back.
I want more tough guy Biden.
I want him to be a little more, I guess, forceful in ensuring that, you know, people do the right thing during a pandemic where we're dealing with a highly contagious virus that kills people, that hospitalizes people.
We haven't even had really lengthy discussions yet about the costs associated with being hospitalized with COVID.
The average cost is more than $38,000.
And when you consider the fact that many people in this country still don't have any insurance
coverage, so many people have lost their jobs and the health benefits that come along
with it, we're talking about a complete and utter financial disaster for so many people.
And so preventing that from happening to them is critical.
And I think that what Biden said there in regard to some of these red states, he didn't
call out DeSantis by name, but clearly he's referring to the DeSantis of the country
is just incredibly important because he's essentially telling these local school districts,
we've got your back, even if your governor, you know, does something negative to your livelihood,
to your pay, we're going to make sure we step in and we protect that. And I think that's great.
Yeah, I'm with you, Anna. I like this Clint Eastwood-esque vibe he's got going,
Like a cranky old man, you stepped on the wrong lawn, son.
Okay.
Corn Pop was a bad dude.
Yeah, this is what he wants to done to corn pop.
I was wondering if he's got the rolled up chain underneath the lectern that he had with cornwall.
Like, voila!
Okay, probably not what he would say.
He's going to do that.
Anyway, he says, then I'll get him out of the way.
Refer to the governors.
And for the good guys, I will have your back.
God damn right, you will.
right, you will. Okay, do do do do do do do. That's a good, bad, and ugly. All right.
I don't know what that was. I'm shaking his head. Like, I don't know that that was a good,
bad and ugly music. Anyways, so now serious stuff for a second on all these proposals. So overall
love it. He's actually backing up his tough words with actually good strong action. And you know
we'd tell you if it was otherwise. But there's one portion of.
it, two portions that I want to mention. One is a fun theory that I have. You know how the other
day he kicked off a bunch of people from the military advisory boards, the Kellyanne Conways
and the Sean Spicer's, and they are all crying, oh, can you do this? You guys are political
appointments by Donald Trump. There's a new president. Shut up and go home, right? So, but
when you combine these two actions, I don't think he means this, but I like it anyway.
So if you're a crazy Trump guy who's like, oh, I'm never going to get vaccinated man, don't
dread on me. Well, now you can't have a government job.
that cleans out the Trump people from the government, huh?
And then, hey, all the political appointments, we kind of told you it was time to go.
I don't know if you know this, but he's not getting reinstated.
So even if you're on an advisory board, we no longer need your advice, okay?
So that kind of flushes out the system a little bit, and I like it a lot.
One small caveat on all this, it's really small, but some of the rules now apply to Medicaid and Medicare.
You've got to get vaccinated.
And on Medicaid, okay, that's the largest of the American government, and we can set the rules for that.
And oftentimes the Republicans set terrible rules.
And here's Democrats setting good rules for your health for Medicaid.
But for Medicare, a lot of that is our money that we contributed to that program.
So I kind of, I have this philosophical point against that, that you're not allowed to touch our Medicare money because that's our money.
even if you're trying to do a program that I'm in favor of like this.
So I'd be a stickler for that, but I'm probably the only one.
Otherwise, really great strong work.
All right, well, we're going to take a break.
When we come back, we've got more news for you, including an update on corporate Democrats in the Senate
attempting to block the budget reconciliation bill that includes all the human infrastructure
provisions that were stripped out of Biden's infrastructure deal.
We'll be right back.
All right, back on the Young Turks.
Jake, you're Anna Kasparian with you guys.
Guess what we have?
You're never going to guess it.
We've got more news.
I guess.
All right.
Well, Senator Joe Manchin is a problem.
He continues to be a problem when it comes to the passage of the budget reconciliation bill,
which includes all of the provisions that would significantly improve the lives of Americans.
It includes things like, you know, universal pre-execliances.
mandatory paid family leave and also an expansion of the Medicare system to include
things like vision and dental.
In addition to the ability for Medicare to negotiate drug prices directly with pharmaceutical
companies which of course would lower the prices of drugs that people desperately need.
Now he claims that he has a problem with the price tag associated with the budget reconciliation
bill which sits at $3.5 trillion.
He says that, you know, it's just too much for me, I want 1.5 trillion max.
So he also recently, during a talk before the US Chamber of Commerce, wanted to put a halt
to the reconciliation bill.
Let's take a quick look at that video.
I would ask my colleagues and all of the Senate to hit the pause button on the 3.5.
Hit the pause button.
Let's sit back.
Let's see what happens.
We've got so much on our plate.
We really have an awful lot.
I think that would be the prudent, wise thing to do.
I know they're going to go nuts right now because it's probably been what I just said is going
to all my caucus in Washington.
Here they come.
But I'm thinking of it from the standpoint of where we are as a nation today, that we weren't
here a week ago or two weeks ago.
has changed. And I don't know what the unknown is. I don't know what the future on this is. I know
one thing. I want to be prepared for it. I want to be able to take care of our military that can
defend us anywhere in the world if it's called upon. I want to make sure our economy is still
robust. I want to make sure we're bringing manufacturing back in opportunities. I don't want to
have debt over our head to where we basically can't service the debt that we have. All those
things are very much concerning to me. And with all that hanging in limbo right now, Shelley will tell you,
the 3.5 turns, a lot of good stuff in there.
There's things in there that she'd at a certain would like that Democrats and Republicans can
agree on. But it's not anything that we need immediately.
It's not anything that we need immediately as there's a labor shortage because women
don't know what to do about child care so they literally can't go back to work.
So not anything that we need right now because, you know, I'm a multimillionaire and I'm good.
I'm totally good.
I earn half a million dollars a year from the coal industry, but you know, not anything we need right now.
Real quick, just to note, Democratic leadership wants to get these issues resolved by September 15th.
So the next week, next two weeks possibly will really show us it's going to test the progressives in the House and how hard they're willing to fight, right?
And so I want to provide positive reinforcement.
And luckily we do have some progressives who are speaking out.
And they're saying no.
Rashida Tili, for instance, tweeted that $3.5 trillion is the floor.
Okay, she's not going any lower than that.
And Mondare Jones says the idea of a $1.5 trillion price tag being sufficient to accomplish
those goals for the people is fanciful.
But he doesn't really care about achieving those goals.
That's the problem.
Yeah, so first couple of comments on that video by Manchin, all of a sudden he's developed
a problem with the debt when Trump was in office and the Republicans are spending like drunk
sailors on rich people, cut taxes, cut taxes, a couple of trillion dollars, Joe Manchin can't
find any concern for the debt and nobody in Washington again, nobody ever talks about
nobody in the media talks about it.
As soon as you're just going to do something for the American people, all the debt, oh, how
we're going to pay for it?
How are we going to pay, how many times are you going to see this scam?
Remember, Joe Manchin, not a Republican, he's technically a Democrat running this scam.
And then he says, oh, my God, the things we needed for, of course, the military to protect us.
We also need to be protected from climate change, which is devastating the country.
Floods everywhere, fires everywhere, extreme weather exactly as the scientist predicted, that is a much graver threat than some rando-Taliban dude in a valley in Kandahar.
Okay, so it's absurd.
All of these talking points are corporate trash talking points that just go accepted in Washington
because there's nobody intelligent to say, hey, wait a minute, you're saying something ridiculous.
Hey, Shelleymore Capito, the Republican senator from West Virginia, you voted for Trump's tax cuts.
You didn't seem worried about the debt then, and that was $2 trillion dollars handed to the rich.
Now you're worried about the debt?
Okay, don't be ridiculous.
Now, on the core issue of this reconciliation,
build the one that has all the positive progressive priorities in it,
look, when you see people publicly negotiating with Joe Manchin,
the other Democrats, understand they're not negotiating with Joe Manchin.
Joe Manchin is a proxy for all of their donors.
So Democrats control the House and the Senate and the White House.
They can pass anything they want tomorrow.
But they're having a negotiation with themselves, because it isn't about Mansion, it's about
the donors, and that's who he represents.
And that's why Anna started the story with, remember, he just went to the Chamber of Commerce.
Yes.
He literally goes and takes notes from their bosses, then comes back and says, hey, boss says this,
he's just an errand boy, he's a sad pathetic errand boy, and everybody pumps him up to be something
he isn't, let alone the fact that at some point cinema's going to ruin all this.
But by the way, I've seen Mansion do this a hundred times throughout the last
several decades, I've been covering politics and for as long as he's been in the Senate,
and what he does is he pushes all the way until somebody pushes back.
And then once his bluff is called, he goes, okay, apparently that's the best deal I can get,
and he does the deal.
That's right.
So you know what that means?
Push forward, don't give in to him.
Cinema's a different story.
Yeah, cinema seems to almost be aroused by going against what her constituents want.
In fact, when her constituents push back against her, she decides to troll them on Twitter,
which blows my mind.
I mean, it's clear to me that she actually doesn't really care about the opinions or the
needs of her own constituents, and it's pretty disgusting.
But back to Manchin, I agree with you, Jenk, I really do think that Manchin, despite how
vociferous he is in pushing back against the reconciliation bill, he's not unbreakable.
And when push comes to shove, at the end of the day, he is more likely to vote along
with Democratic priorities than not.
But I do want to also talk about the fact that this goes beyond his corporate donors, because
there are conflicts of interest with Mansion that I'm actually more concerned about than
even his donors, right?
Because he himself is a multimillionaire who's invested in the very industries that would be impacted
by the reconciliation bill.
So I'll give you some examples.
Manchin, by the way, and his staff have been in consistent talks with Senate finance chairman
Ron Wyden of Oregon, a committee where the two powerful Democrats have clashed over several
key provisions central to financing the proposal, including on corporate tax hikes, according
to multiple people familiar with the matter.
Now it's true that Manson's corporate donors do not want corporate tax hikes.
They don't want to pay for the bill, they don't want to pay their fair share of taxes.
But neither does someone like Joe Manchin who makes half a million dollars a year, which is more than twice his Senate salary from the coal industry, from his investments in the coal industry.
On education, Manchin is trying to limit the Democrats' efforts to provide universal pre-K and tuition-free community college.
He's talked to Democrats about limiting the number of Americans eligible for pre-K by setting income threshold.
So more means testing, of course, while also discussing ways to measure students' performance
for community college, assuming their tuition is paid for over two years.
I don't even know what that means, are you gonna look into like the grades of community
college students to determine whether or not that's a decent investment?
Like what's wrong with him?
Yeah, I think that's what he's gonna- No, he's crazy, that's insane.
Especially when you consider that we're dealing with $1.6 trillion in student loan debt, which
Which does what?
It hinders the economy because people have to pay back their student loans.
They can't participate in the economy, they can't buy homes, they can't buy goods and services,
that money ends up going toward paying off their debts for college, debts that they shouldn't
even have to begin with.
Yeah, and then of course there's the healthcare provisions of the bill that he's trying to kill.
And of course, his daughter is a robber baron on healthcare.
And she's made tens of millions of dollars overcharging Americans, shipping their jobs abroad
from West Virginia, actually, and destroying the health care system for her own profit.
So when Manchin says, hey, I don't want our grandkids paying off this debt, well, his grandkids
would literally lose money if you let his daughter stop robbing us.
And so he's like, no, no, no, I want the robbery to continue, because that's going straight
to my grandkids.
And so Anna's right to point out consistently his conflicts of interest.
But again, in Washington, that's all viewed as perfectly normal.
It's just a matter of who's robbing us.
And then the report is treated as normal, but not outrageous.
They don't even cover it.
That's the problem.
Look, honestly, the only outlet I've seen do original reporting on Manson's conflicts of interest is the intercept.
Okay, Ryan Grimm has been killing it on this topic.
And just yesterday, we were covering the fact that myelin pharmaceuticals,
while Heather Bresh, Manson's daughter was the CEO, very intentionally created a monopoly for
the EpiPen by conspiring with Pfizer to ensure that Pfizer didn't come out with a competitor
to the EpiPen so they can inflate prices even further and share profits with Pfizer.
People are asking, well, does it really make sense to go after his daughter?
Yes, yes, it does make sense to go after his daughter.
Because when Mansion claims that he's against the reconciliation bill because,
oh, you know, it doesn't have bipartisan support or I'm worried about how much money it's going to spend and all it's not really about that.
It's about his personal interests.
It's about the interest of his own daughter, right?
Because what does the budget reconciliation bill include?
It includes a provision that allows for Medicare to negotiate directly with pharmaceutical companies,
something that his daughter does not want.
So it is a problem, it is a conflict of interest, and that's the reason why we're talking about it.
Okay, the only other publication that's talked about it, by the way, is TYT Investigates.
We did a story about Manchin's personal wealth being affected by his decisions in Congress.
But guys, the thing about the golden parachute that his daughter got in the last transaction,
over $30 million, and that was so that she would play along and not only keep up the gigantic
prices we're all paying, but ship the jobs in West Virginia abroad and wipe out those jobs.
But the mansion family gets stinking rich, right?
Now, why do you think they paid her such a giant amount on her way out, right?
And so then when you say, hey, could you not have your family members participate in this robbery?
Man, she goes, you're talking about my daughter.
I was using her for these illicit purposes, and now you besmirched her.
I can't believe you made it personal.
No, you made it personal when your family members go out and you protect them through the law
as they do outrageous things to cost the rest of us money and our jobs.
And by the way, isn't it interesting that conservatives that love to pick on Hunter Biden,
don't say anything about Manchin's daughter
because they love the robber barons.
So they're like, oh, Manchin, he's helping us
destroy Democratic bills.
And his daughter is one of us,
the elites who rob money from average Americans.
So all of a sudden, no, no, no, no, no, don't touch the family.
In fact, I love that you brought that up.
Apparently, Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell,
is praying for cinema and Mansion.
So I direct you to a tweet by Frank Thorpe from NBC.
McConnell on the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill.
We're down to two who are resisting.
Joe Manchin from West Virginia and Kirsten Cinema from Arizona.
I pray for them every night.
I wish them well.
We give them lots of love.
Yes, you do.
It's disgusting.
And then finally, I just want to remind you all of how Manchin has really changed his messaging
on the infrastructure bill.
Remember, the budget reconciliation bill
includes everything that was stripped
out of the
infrastructure bill. So all the human
infrastructure components are in the budget
reconciliation bill. But back in January
of this year, Manchin
claimed that he was in favor of this kind of spending.
Senator Joe Manchin calls for
up to $4 trillion in
infrastructure spending as Democrats are poised
to control Congress.
That's called research. Look into it.
So, I'm not going to get past Anna Gasparian, okay?
So you said it before, all of a sudden, your donors call you.
Oh, no, I didn't mean $4 trillion.
All right, last thing, guys, man, the just Democrats and other progressives in Congress
finally starting to fight back in a real way.
So we mentioned it earlier about how they're pushing back against Joe Manchin on all
this stuff.
But I wanted to add one of the things.
AOC did a video the other day where she talked about, hey, some of these folks are in
purple states, but some of these Democratic legislators are in very blue states.
and she hinted that they could be primaried just like her race when she defeated Crowley in a very blue district.
Now, talking about primarying your Democratic colleagues was once the third rail in Washington.
And no one was allowed to touch it and it was nuclear and it was toxic.
And it scared, honestly, even the progressives in Congress from ever saying anything.
Now it looks like finally the dam is broken.
And they're saying, you want to play hardball at Joe Mansion?
we can play hardball. And by the way, you know, all of the others that are in those safe blue seats,
let's see how it turns out for you. And that's how you win and actually get things passed
with the American people. You don't just ask pretty, please. You play hardball so you put pressure
on them so we can get the votes to win. Well, one of the progressive lawmakers playing hardball
is Katie Porter. And when we come back from the break, she calls out Mansion by name and
calls out his corruption. Don't miss it. We'll be right back.
All right on TYT, the powerhouse of news. Power, power, power. We're talking about the
power panel. Oh, by the way, big announcement, like I've been saying, big announcement early
next week. You don't want to miss it. Shows live every day, six o'clock Eastern.
All right, Casper, take it away. All right. Progressives like Representative Katie,
Porter are pushing back against corporate clowns in the Senate, like Senator Joe Manchin,
who claims that he thinks we should put a pause on the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation
bill, which would include incredibly important provisions, including child care, universal
pre-K, mandatory family leave, and an expansion of the Medicare program to include
things like hearing and vision, or vision and dental, I should say. Now with that said, Katie
order honestly said something during an interview on cable news that needs to be said more.
What is actually motivating or fueling the arguments coming from people like Senator Joe
Manchin? Well, let's hear what she has to say.
With regard to Senator Manchin and others who want to talk about the price tag for this,
let me be clear. You are a business person. You get it. You can do math. If something costs
A, then you have two options. You can negotiate down from A. Or you, you're a business person. You
can find the money. We have revenue options on the table. There are a huge number of corporations
that pay zero taxes. And by making savvy revenue choices, for example, using a real corporate
profit approach to dealing with those corporations that pay zero, we can generate $700 billion.
If we use the corporate minimum tax approach, we're going to generate $40 billion. Right there,
right there Senator Mansion, right there anyone who's worried about spending, we can generate
the revenue so that this isn't about 3.5 trillion in spending. It's not even now about
$3.5 trillion in spending because we're going to generate the revenue to pay for these
things. I have the will to do it. The question is, does Senator Manchin, or is he more concerned
about his corporate donors, including large corporations, the oil and gas industry, the big
pharmaceutical industry, and others who are getting away with paying nothing under our current
tax system? Listen, that was a prezi for Jank Yugar. So Jank, take it away.
There you go, American hero, Katie Porter.
Okay, so look guys, the dam's broken.
This, it's a full scale rebellion.
In my lifetime, I've been begging progressives.
Will you please fight back against corporate Democrats?
And when you do, can you please point out their corporate donors?
The entire country would be behind you if you did that.
Because even Republicans go, well, I don't like the donors.
It looks like corruption.
It looks like, you know, we legalized bribery.
Because we did, okay?
And so they wouldn't do it, they wouldn't do it, they wouldn't do it.
And then a new wave came in, both just Democrats, but remember Katie Porter wasn't in the, she was in the same class.
She's not technically in the squad or just Democrats, but who cares?
Right.
She's a world beater, okay?
And so, and she always comes with facts.
She comes so well prepared.
And the other thing is, she's so strong.
Stevin Rule is actually a bit of a corporatist.
A bit?
A bit.
We've shown you other clips that overwhelmingly proves it.
But Representative Porter came in so strong there that 70 rule kind of had to admire it.
So she was sitting there going, okay.
I mean, you get ruled to bob her head on going after corporations and making sure they pay their fair share and et cetera.
I mean, that was great work by Katie Porter.
And you see, guys, by the way, when they finally did it, did the house fall in?
Did it cave in the roof?
No, it's totally fine.
You see, I told you.
Like, it's okay, you're supposed to challenge, yes, you're Democratic colleagues if they're
the ones standing in the way of actually getting the bills passed.
Otherwise, we're not going to get anything done, and then this is all about ego and not actually
helping people.
Exactly.
There needs to be a strong pressure campaign by Democrats that's directed toward the corporate
Democrats in the Senate who are hyming and hawing regarding the reconciliation bill.
Now, I do want to go to one additional portion of the interview that Representative Porter had
with Stephanie Ruhl, and in this portion, she's specifically talking about the need for child
care, and it gives you a sense of just how important it is to pass the reconciliation bill,
because aside from child care, it includes so many provisions that would just fundamentally
and materially improve the lives of Americans and their families. Let's watch.
Okay, let me take this in two separate pieces. The first piece is, why should child care be part
of this bill? And I've partially addressed this, but let me just make a practical point to you,
Stephanie. If we had the men who have run this country for hundreds of years, the wealthy men
whose wives and others have taken care of child care, so convinced that it was important,
we would have done something about child care, 10, 20, 30, 30, 3,000.
40, 50 years ago when other countries did it.
So I'm not today all of a sudden convinced that we have the will to deal with child care
when we put off this issue decade after decade after decade.
People tweet, my colleagues tweet, oh, women's payday, women are falling behind, oh, glass ceiling.
Guess what?
Child care is the solution.
It's a crisis in economic productivity in this country, and it's one we have to solve as part of building back better.
I think Katie Porter is the real salt queen.
I mean, that was incredible.
Calling out her Democratic colleagues for engaging in the performative social media posts,
while failing to fight for the very policies that they claim to be in favor of in said social media posts.
I love the fact that she called that out.
I want more of that, more of that.
It's amazing.
What was that?
That was amazing, Porter Unchained.
So yeah, like this never happens, guys.
If you're new to politics, Democrats never criticize other Democrats, let alone in a personal
way, like we got open warfare, and that's a good thing, it's not a bad thing.
It depends on how you do it and why you do it.
If you're strategic about it and you're trying to get enough pressure so that we can actually
pass that $3.5 trillion bill, which actually helps America's with child care, families,
health care, climate, all those things that Representative Porter laid out.
then that's worth the fight.
You're not doing it to vent.
You're not doing it an unproductive way.
You're doing it in a perfectly productive way.
And so now the genie's out of the bottom.
AOC's saying, go back to primaries.
Look, after she won her primary, it's sometimes a little hard to get her to support other primaries.
Now they're saying, okay, fine, primaries.
We're in open warfare.
And that's good, that's good.
And the media will tell you generally, oh, no, that's bad.
Oh, you just follow whatever the corporate Democrats say otherwise.
No, but in this case, the Democratic position is a $3.5 trillion bill.
So Katie Porter, AOC, all the rest of the progressives are on the side of the Democratic
proposal, not just a progressive proposal, the Democratic proposal.
So the other Democrats, I guess, would be disloyal and be against unity if they fought back
against that.
By the way, instantly are members reacting.
Official Coféfei card writes in, Katie Porter,
president, 24, she seems to be the most obvious next Bernie quality candidate, and she's getting
pretty irregular airtime. Look, you fight, we appreciate it, and it's for a good cause, and in the
right way, that's how you do good politics, so you help the American people, they noticed.
The district she represents is Orange County, California. Yeah. I mean, clearly she has the
ability to appeal to voters in both parties. Now Orange County has become less red
over the years, but nonetheless, I mean, she's clearly speaking to the issues that matter
to people regardless of their political affiliation. Because as we've talked about so many
times on the show, if you look at polling, it shows you that whether you're talking
about Democrats or Republicans, progressive policies poll incredibly well.
Because people want their lives to improve materially.
And the reason why there's so much distrust toward the government and our institutions is because it's been such a long time since they've actually looked out for the livelihoods of Americans.
So let me say one last thing about that, because politics is also about strengths.
And so she's in a purple district.
A lot of the conservative Democrats who are in purple districts ran away from every progressive priority and then lost.
She did not.
She stood her ground on Medicare for All, in a purple district, in a re-election where they spent a ton of money against her.
She's like, nope, these colors don't run.
And the voters love strengths.
And so when Democrats run away from issues or run towards Republicans, the voters punish them.
When they stand their ground and say, we're going to help the voters no matter what, I don't care how many donors' feelings get hurt.
People love that.
It's not complicated.
Do like Katie Porter does, and we'll fix this country quicker than you could imagine.
Now the antithesis of Katie Porter is unfortunately Representative James Clyburn, who doesn't want any public debate about the reconciliation bill.
We'll talk about that story and more when we come back for hour two of the program.
We'll see you there.
Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks.
Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t.
I'm your host, Jan Yugar, and I'll see you soon.