The Young Turks - Silencing Dissent

Episode Date: April 8, 2023

Episode summary: Expelled Tenn. Democrat slams GOP: "We can never normalize the ending of democracy." Justice Thomas defends luxury vacations with GOP megadonor, claims he was advised he didn’t have to disclose. Speaker Kevin McCarthy has been "trash talking his GOP colleagues," per report. Anti-vaccine activist RFK Jr. challenging Biden in 2024. DOJ tentatively settles over Texas church shooting for $144 million. HOSTS: John Iadarola (@johniadarola), Michael Shure (@michaelshure), & AB Burns Tucker (@iamlegallyhype) SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ https://www.youtube.com/user/theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER: ☞ https://www.twitter.com/theyoungturks INSTAGRAM: ☞ https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK: ☞ https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕 Merch: https://shoptyt.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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. Hungry now. Now. What about now? Whenever it hits you, wherever you are, grab an O. Henry bar to satisfy your hunger. With its delicious combination of big, crunchy, salty peat.

Peanuts covered in creamy caramel and chewy fudge with a chocolatey coating. Swing by a gas station and get an O'Henry today. Oh hungry, oh Henry. Drop it like it, Republican support for democracy. panel, I am John Adirola. Jank is nowhere to be seen good riddance, but don't worry, we've got some awesome replacements. Joining us once again, law student, A.B.

Burns Tucker, welcome back to the show. Hello, thank you for having me. Good to have you here. It's also important to have you here because we need a legal perspective for some of the corruption going on the Supreme Court, which we'll be turning to in just a little bit. So I'm excited for that, and of course, legendary Michael Shore right next to me.

How's it going, Michael? Legendary, it's going legendarily. It's going well. This is a, these are crazy stories that we're covering. I mean, they're crazy times. Yeah, I mean, they're crazy times, but they're these stories. What's happened in Tennessee, what's happened with Clarence Thomas. I mean, these are major and jarring stories for sure.

It is pretty crazy that you can have stories of this national import, like so thoroughly pushed the fact that the president was arraigned out of the news. We don't actually have anything about this. We're focused on the fact that the Supreme Court is in an insane state and what the hell is going on with Tennessee. So as the people, we also have an attention span collectively of a goldfish. So it's not surprising that we just move on and to the next thing. That's true, that's true. Actually, that's a good time to remind people.

Hey, remember George Santos? He won. He's just a congressman now. Nobody's asking him any more questions. Isn't it crazy how that works? Anyway, with that said, we have a lot that we're going to be talking about through the course of this hour. And that's just the beginning of two and a half hours of awesiness here at the Young Turks. So everyone, hit that like button, let people know that we're live.

They can join up and chat with us as we jump through the news. But with all that said, we have a major story to get to. So whenever we're ready, why don't we jump into this? What's going from my mind right now is we need to fight for democracy in the state of Tennessee. And we need people not only just to vote, but people to do. show up and speak out so that we can end the gun violence epidemic that's happening in our state. This is wrong, this is unjust, and this is not the way that it has to be. If you want to help to make this place a better place, you have to use your voice, you have to use

your power, and yes, sometimes you've got to get exposed. Fierce words, fierce background, like chanting going on there. If it sounds like it's chaos, that's because it is in Tennessee. After days of 3rd, threats, the Republicans have successfully expelled two members of the legislature, you saw when speaking there, attempted to get a trifecta and knock three Democratic representatives off. They were just barely not successful in doing that in the case of, I believe it's Representative Gloria Jones. No, I apologize. Gloria Jones? Yes, Gloria Jones.

But what we have right now is, I think, unprecedented times. We have an emboldened Republican Party in Tennessee that is using the barest fig leaf of an excuse to knock off their political opponents, and not just any political opponents. In the case of the two representatives that they did knock off, they're both young black men, they're both incredibly young representatives, and they felt emboldened to do this. By the way, that's Justin Jones. It's Gloria Johnson. Yeah, no, Justin Pearson was speaking in the video. Justin Jones is the guy, it's not Gloria Jones. Gloria Johnson, yeah.

I apologize. It's okay. You're fine, John. Thank you. And so, look, we knew that they were going to push for this. They've been talking about it for some time. My personal hope was that perhaps, you know, this story would get out. And I personally think that the mainstream media picked it up too late.

I feel like independent media, lots of activity on, like, TikTok and that sort of thing, talking about it. And I thought that perhaps the Republicans would like back away from the edge of the cliff that they pushed democracy over. But they didn't. And so now two representatives have lost their positions. That's not the end. They will likely be back and soon. But I think that we have to talk about what this means for Tennessee, what this means for America. A.B., I want to go to you first. Did you think that this is going to happen? And what do you thinking right now? I absolutely saw this happening, right?

So all this coming. I have a TikToker, I've been following it for a couple of days since everything happened. I believe on March 30th. And so what I think is that we're not unprecedented times as much as we have taken a reversal in time, right? Like the way that they treated these two young black men for using their First Amendment right, was as if they had broken, you know, some sort of black code, right? Or June Crow laws and we have reversed.

back to that time. I think the Republican Party in Tennessee, let it be known very blatantly. That is the error that they respect, right? They try to make it seem as if these young black boys, since they, or excuse me, young black men, excuse me, since they did not respond in the manner that was appropriate to the Republican Party since they were in bold, right? And they stand up with their constituents that they would both break them and break them down.

And so that's how I felt watching this go down. It was very embarrassing as an American citizen to see. House representatives to their colleague in that manner, regardless of the rules that were broken. And I think there were very great arguments that were brought up in the sense of we have seen some of those representatives who have been responsible for criminal activity and even worse abhorrent acts and have not been punished for what they've done. So it's very hurtful to see this, but I do hope that people who claim they are allies, right, and say that they don't want to see this this type of discrimination happening in our country, really step up and say something with their

chest and let this not just be a tweet or something that we put out on TikTok, but actually take action to make sure that this type of energy does not continue on. Yeah, you know, it's true. And I think that I don't know that this is a setback. I don't think this takes us back. I think what this does is it affirms the fact that the American South is not, in fact, post-racial. That these, these sense. sentiments exist still to this day. It's not just fighting a Confederate flag. It's not a slowness to take down statues of Confederate leaders. It's something as bold as what the Republicans, once they had a supermajority in the Tennessee legislature were able to do to these young men. And, you know, the code word decorum, which they were throwing around, it's a breach of decorum. We know what decorum means. It means sticking to the way things have always been done or we think that they should be done. And when you break decorum, that means you're setting yourself up for punishment. And that's what this, this sort of white majority, Republican majority, super majority in the Tennessee House did yesterday.

It is, again, another one of these cases, I think, where Republicans in America are getting a small victory at the expense of any kind of progress for themselves. They're mobilizing young people. They're mobilizing African Americans. It's a very red state, the state of Tennessee, no different than the Dobbs decision, right? I mean, you see what, you saw what happened in Wisconsin the other day with the Supreme Court Justice in the state Supreme Court there, a liberal winning because of abortion. You saw what the 2022 midterms were like last November. So they get these what seemed like victories, but it is such a setback, and it's just turning the clock back in their minds and doing things that they think are appropriate.

Like you said, John, these two young men will both win Justin Pearson, who I happen to know. I covered him when he was not in the legislature. Two years ago, he fought the building of a pipeline through Memphis that would have gone through black neighborhoods and into Mississippi. It was called the Bihalia pipeline. He fought it. He started MCAP, which is Memphis citizens against the pipeline. And they won. They beat back these two oil companies, Valero and All-American.

And they stopped that pipeline from going in. He got some coverage for it. He ran for an open seat in a special election. He won it. He'll be back. He'll win. They're already getting tons of money. Chris Murphy, the senator from Connecticut, put it out yesterday.

They raised 200,000 like that for these races. So this stuff is going to help these people eventually. And one thing that Justin said to me yesterday, and I'm saying this because it's pretty poignant the way he's talking about this, he said to me last night, he said, wow, There's something wholly happening even amidst the sadness. So even these young men are seeing that there is light that's coming out of this. Yeah, and I'm glad that you can, and that he is focusing on, you know, some of the medium and long term, like positive, I guess, a positive, I want to do that.

And perhaps I'll be able to at some point. Well, there is, I mean, that's a thing, that there is like this, this makes the other side just look foolish. These are the people with with hoses and dogs in Kelly Ingram Park in Birmingham in 1963. They look stupid now, right? Well, as I'm saying, you're using 1963 tactics on 2023 people. And it's just not going to work like that, right? We are, unfortunately, we are not the same civil rights fighters as we're in the 60s where they want peace, right? We are more allowed and we are more bold today.

And I think that's what necessary. But I think it needs to be shamed for the way that these people, the way that these people, these representatives represented our country and represented their constituents when talking to other black men as if this is okay. And I think, I don't remember exactly which representative, what Justin it was, but I think it was Justin Pearson when he said, would you appreciate being spoken to like this, right? As a black woman and as someone who has dealt with racism, right, in my profession and see it every day, especially in the legal profession, it is hurtful and it is harmful to see black men treat it like that because all they were simply trying to

to do was fight for the rights of children and fight to protect children who were being gun down in schools because these legislators don't want to put a cap on gun laws. Yeah. Yeah, and by the way, we're gonna turn to another aspect of the racial aspect of this, but like I'm not a psychic or anything, but I have to imagine that for a lot of these Republicans, like when they see them participating in this protest and you have all these people, all these young people, there was a student walk out and everything, organizing, around another senseless massacre of kids. You have them during that and after that, the representatives, I should say, speaking eloquently, passionately, fire, like with fire,

about it. Doing everything that a representative is supposed to actually do. There's an actual problem. People are rallying to fix it. They are representing them. And for the Republicans, they can't do anything like that. Like when they get involved in a popular protest, what is it about banning trans athletes, denying that their god emperor lost the election, that's it. That's what they are allowed to get fired up about because they can't acknowledge actual problems. So when they see true representation, I think that they are disgusted by it. Because they know what they are. They know why they're in those positions. They know what they're actually working towards and who they're actually working for. But I want to turn now to

the representative that was almost expelled, Gloria Johnson being asked about why it is that she, amongst the three, survive this effort. Why were those two expelled and you weren't? Well, I think it's pretty clear. I'm a six-year-old white woman, and they are two young black men. I am listening to the questions and the way they were questioned and the way they were talked to. I was talked down to as a woman, mansplained to, but it was completely different. from the questioning that they got and this whole idea that you know why you know that you

know that you have to almost assimilate into this body to be like us and i think a lot of people probably agree with her that it is interesting that she of the three survive this effort now the republican speaker cameron sexton he doesn't like what she just said he said that's a false narrative on her part she's trying to put political racism in this which there was nothing on this. They were all given due process. Were they? Is this the process that is due in your state?

Justin Jones represented 78,000 people in Nashville. Justin Pearson represented 70,000 in Memphis. They don't have representation now. They were not asked about this. None of the Republicans voting. This gave a damn what they thought about, literally any of this. They're going to find out very soon what the people of those districts think about it. when they return those representatives to the state legislature.

But he didn't care, but bear in mind, if you want to understand who this guy is, you probably have an inkling from that quote. But he also said originally days ago, what they did in that original protest was equivalent, at least equivalent, maybe worse, depending on how you look at it, to doing an insurrection in the state capital. So if you felt burdened by the fear that perhaps some respect was due to this man, don't worry, none is. He's an absolute buffoon. Yeah, and it's not just sexton. They're setting up, one thing you're forgetting about this is that it's a First Amendment thing, right? There is

due process in the Tennessee legislature. There is an ethics committee. There is a way, even Justin Pearson said that we actually broke some rules of decorum. We broke some of the rules of the House. But there is a process for that. There is a process for handling that to have an to have a censure, whatever it is, to expel members of the House because of this and because of rallying people. You know, in 1966, Julian Bond, the late Julian Bond, who was a civil rights leader, he was voted into the Georgia House of Representatives. So Julian Bond was going to be a member of the Georgia House. He was vehemently opposed to the Vietnam War. He was African American, unusual at the time in the Georgia legislature.

They voted to not seat him because of his vocal opposition and acceptance for people who did not want to register, not wanted to be conscripted into that war. The district court upheld what the House did in Georgia, and then the Supreme Court took up the case. And the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Julian Bond by 9 to nothing, 9-0, 1966. And they seated him, and he was sworn in, and he had a long career in both the House of Representatives. in Georgia and the Senate in Georgia, and that's what's going to happen here. These people will be lionized for what they have done, and those other people who oppose them, it's just going to take a little while to have that happen. Those other people will be a laughingstock.

Not in their district, we've gerrymandered the hell out of this country, so it doesn't matter what you say when you go back, if you're Andrew Farmer, who spoke down to Justin Pearson last night, you go back to Severeville, Tennessee, they're still going to love you. But the point is, on a national stage and in the national narrative of what this story is, they're going to be looking like fools for a long time. AB, any thoughts? No, I mean, I completely agree. I don't, I mean, there was an argument about whether there was due process or from the beginning of this hearing, right,

when there was an ask to put in evidence, right, that hadn't been reviewed. No one knew that if it had been altered or what was happening. So it was just a sham from jump, right? And I think it's a little disingenuous to say. like there was no racial intent. I think that's one of the issues when it comes to proving intent, when it comes to discrimination and things like that, right, is post emancipation and Jim Crow people, white people thought that we can understand the intent of the Negro, right, because we know how they are,

and we know that they're animals and they're this, and so we have to control them. And so it gave that type of energy when you listen to the questioning, right, that was asked, right, when the representatives were accused if they're on temper tantrums. And to equate this to January 6th is even more disrespectful and again, the racism is showing, right? Because on January 6th, what we saw where people stormed the Capitol, they were violent, they were deliberate about they were going to be violent. We heard the things that they said, they had weapons and everything like that. These representatives went to the floor, right? They were out of order, but they had bullhorns and they had signs with them and they spoke, right?

And what they were speaking to was the fact that they weren't even allowed to say what they needed to say when the time was appropriate for them to do that, right? And so I think, yes, we're getting caught up in this and the racial aspect of it, which is wrong, but at the core of it is democracy is being challenged because if they are elected to represent their constituents and to go on that floor and say what their constituents, want and they're being prevented from saying that, it is more than than just these two young men who are in trouble. This is a lot of people who are going to face this type of discrimination. And I think the Republican Party is being very open and honest about the fact that this is a move that we're going with and we're going to do it no matter, you know, what anybody has to say about it.

And in the sense of Gloria, like I don't know how I feel about her because I feel she was very intentional about not speaking when she was on that floor. She made it very clear during her arguments that, you know, I didn't speak. I just, I stood there with my colleagues, right? She came, she had counsel during her portion. I'm not sure if the other representatives knew that that was an option for them. So in the sense, you know, just feels like they were kind of hung out to dry in that area. But this is a learning lesson for us all.

And I think we're other representatives in other states, especially in southern states, to have a duck in a row because the challenges are coming. Yeah. Yeah, I'm glad that you brought up the other. aspect of this. Like it's intrinsic to it all of the racial component of it. I mean, this is Tennessee after all. But also just like this is the same. So they expelled two duly elected representatives who had done effectively nothing wrong, nothing that a regular person would give a damn about. In the same week that they lost a major Supreme Court race in Wisconsin

and before she's even seated, they're already talking about impeaching her in a state where the state legislative races, the congressional map, has been so gerrymandered that all of this is pointless. It doesn't matter at all, what effectively happens there and hasn't for a decade. And I just feel like we're seeing more and more of that. You know, how many governors have we had governors races, Republican governors getting beat by Democrats? And then, oh, oops, before they're seated, they don't have any powers anymore. Kind of feel like that's becoming pretty routine. major ballot initiatives with the people disagreeing with the state legislature or saying that they need to act on something and then they just don't do it.

Like I feel like this is becoming very, very casual for the Republicans to just not even feel like they need to pretend to support general popular democracy at this point. And then of course you have the fact that they will not admit that they've lost in literally any case, no matter how badly they're destroyed. And so I feel like this is a combination of a couple of incredibly significant. problems. And in the same way that I said, I think that they looked on those two, those representatives with disgust, they definitely looked on the protesters with disgust, because they were breaking decorum. The decorum is supposed to be you get gunned down on a regular basis. We give you thoughts and prayers

and then you shut the hell up about it. We're not going to do anything. And we're really sick of having to pretend briefly that we're going to do something. We're like we don't tweet about air 15s for a couple days or we have to dodge questions about it. We don't want to do that anymore. So don't march into our capital. Don't chant. Don't have your signs. You're just going to continue to die. That's the way this thing goes. Either because of the campaign checks, we've been given by the NRA, which is because our base kind of likes it. And it's not even popular generally anymore, but we have to make it through a Republican primary. So I guess we're fine with kids' heads being blown off. So yes, I do think that they have a concern for decorum,

and I think it's awesome that more and more young people don't give a damn about it. That said, brought up a great point about the comparisons to January 6th, and so I just want us to touch on that a little bit more starting. If we could jump ahead to the final video, actually, that's, it's not just in Tennessee that you're hearing comparisons to January 6th. Take a look at this. I've also also added that the action was not undemocratic because the representatives are still able to be voted back into office, guys. Right, they're out for now. Alex, thank you. Thank you. Sending a message not to storm our government buildings, right? During January 6, people condemn Indeemnably riot and storm the capital and it is described as undemocratic.

In Tennessee, people storm the capital, interrupt the democratic process and use bullhorns. And if you punish them, that's undemocratic. So it's undemocratic as long as it is in disfavor with Joe Biden. Right. Okay, so don't get distracted by that guy, that guy whose job is to speak about politics on TV, having no ability to actually get across his point. His point was also nonsense, even if he'd been able to properly express it. They, what you were seeing right now is a pattern that repeats itself over and over and over in American politics, and I believe it's happening more and more

in the modern era. The Republicans do something absolutely insane, something unprecedented, something horrific, something authoritarian. And then because they've done it, they then need to spend the next couple of years desperately looking for any opportunity to pretend that the other side has done it too. Every line that Donald Trump has crossed, they then have to apply to everyone. So when they're supporting actual fake news during the 2016 election, then anything they don't like becomes fake news. When he leads an actual insurrection, then if Cory Bush sits on the Capitol steps, that's an insurrection all of a sudden. It's, again, like, it is constant in American politics. And it's, I guess, an easy, it's an easy excuse to turn to when you're on Fox

news because you know that no audience has been bludgeoned into an incapacity for critical thought than theirs. They've had their own insurrection into people's minds. Exactly. At least insurrected if not incepted. They can say anything and it's fine, it doesn't have to make sense. But this was not January 6th. I feel like I should not need to point out that hundreds of cops were not sent to the hospital.

No cops have committed suicide from the trauma they experienced. No one was armed. No one was throwing things to people. the people no one was no zip ties nothing no property damage no nothing no insurrection I'm sorry the map doesn't add up I'm sorry if that's inconvenient it was a protest it was a protest yes people spoke loudly the horror and it was disruptive no question it was disruptive but that's it every disruption is when the guy runs on the field at Yankee Stadium that's not an

insurrection that's a disruption exactly exactly any final thoughts A. B No, I'm over it. Like I just want to say I really just want us to change, right? I think we have been talking about the fact that democracy is so fragile right now. And so I really want to see people come together to make it stronger, right? It is up to us to maintain democracy and it is up to us to be loud and to be proud and say, this is not the country that we want to meet. It's out of line for us to try to teach democracy to other countries and expect other

countries to get along, when we can't even get along in house. It is okay to disagree, right? And it's okay to agree to disagree. But what it's not okay is to vilify people because you don't agree with them, mostly because of the color of their skin. And I think it is showing. I think also like just for the American people, 2024 is right around the corner. And so I hope that I think country, we are very active and who we are choosing to legislate

for us because this is the type of behavior that we are seeing. And that's really all I have to say at this point. It's heartbreaking. Hopefully they'll be back at their position soon. In the meantime, I would have already done it. The Democrats should be there. They should be in Tennessee or at the very least think of the vice president's going to Tennessee. He is going?

She is. She is going. She is going. The vice president's going. Okay, good. And, and yeah, members of Congress, people who represent that part of the country are mostly Republican. But the Democrats have said that they're going to be going. and they are already fundraising for these two guys there.

This is going to be something that we're talking about in 2024. There's no question. This is a get out the vote magnet and the story will not go away. Because these two gentlemen, both of them, Jones and Pearson, are great at messaging. You know, they're fantastic at it. And so they're going to be messaging their way, probably both to Congress at some point, but certainly as part of the campaign next year. Yeah, messaging, but also strategy.

Like, well, yeah, they knew like this, this protest needs, this is how you put a spotlight on a protest. Students marching should be enough, but it often isn't, but now it is. But it became more than about the guns, which is what they wanted to be about too. And that's what they're going to try and veer this back to. Yeah. Okay, well, we have to take our first break. But when we come back, another massive story, Clarence Thomas and, you know, all of the amazing trips he's been on recently. We're going to be breaking them down after this.

to that rest of the show. Clarence Thomas has at last responded to ProPublica's bombshell report delving into the apparently millions of dollars worth of fancy pants gifts and international mega vacations that he has received from a GOP mega donor named Harlan Crow. I'll never get past that name. So here is what he said should alleviate all of whatever concerns you might have about this being massive conflict of interest, bribery on the highest order, all of that. He says, Harlan and Kathy Crow are among our dearest friends. We've been friends for over 25 years.

As friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips during the more than quarter century we've known them. Early in my tenure at the court, I sought guidance from my colleagues and others in the judiciary and was advised that this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends who did not have business before the court was not reportable. I have endeavored to follow that council throughout my tenure and have always sought to comply with the disclosure guidelines. These guidelines are now being changed as the Committee of the Judicial Conference's responsibility for financial disclosure for the entire federal judiciary, just this past month announced my guidance, and it is, of course, my intent to follow this guidance in the future.

And I think that's amazing. So, first of all, as friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips. That's true. This is just what friends do. I mean, many's the weekend that Brett Ehrlich and I will hop on his mega yacht with his personal staff of 50 and jet around the world. That's just what you do everyone. I mean, sure, it would cost $500,000 to a million dollars just to do that one vacation, but you know, family friends and all. And then, so also he says, early in my tenure at the court, I sought guidance

from my colleagues. So as many people have now learned, we talked about this on the damage report this morning, ProPublic was not the first outlet to actually report on these gifts and these trips. It turns out that the Los Angeles Times did way back in, I believe, 2004. And what's interesting is that the reason that they were able to do that was that up until that point, he was actually reporting these sorts of things. In the immediate, immediate aftermath of that reporting, he stopped. I'm not an amazing historian. When did he join the court?

In 1991, I would say. 91. So 13 years earlier, that's weird. Because I heard that in his early days in the court, he spoke with colleagues and figured out that all of this was cool. He left off the part about only stopping once the media was on it a little bit. So anyway, obviously I have a lot more thoughts about this. But we are very lucky to be joined on this panel by a law student. I'm very curious, AB, what you think about Clarence Thomas's cover here. Well, this is an unfortunate part about it, is that the Supreme Court, while we have checks and balances, are like the one judiciary who does not really have a way to impose the rules of ethics, right?

So they have certain rules that they should abide by, but there's really nobody to force them to do that. And so when you have a Supreme Court, which is skewed the way it is, right? And you see that through the way a Republican spot to make sure that Obama didn't get his picks for Supreme Court justices. It's scary because it, and you see the type of rulings that are coming down, right? We saw post-dubs, even though majority of the United States was like, this is not something we want. It's really scary because it goes to question. This is supposed to be a non-partisan court, but yet if you are getting gifts from someone who was a known Republican donor, you're getting billionaire, you know, billion dollar gifts, and you claim to be someone who loves to roll around in your RV and live the basic life and be in the rural areas,

It's like, this is counter to the lifestyle that you try to make us. I believe you was living in your documentary that your friends helped you make. Now, really fast, I just, we have to be humble with what information we have. He said he likes to go to rural areas. He apparently took an island hopping trip to Indonesia, Indonesia. Some of those islands probably have rural areas. And for all we know, he brought his RV on the mega yacht, it's big enough for sure. He said in that documentary that he prefers the Walmart parking lot to a beach.

And that doesn't jive with what's going on here. But what AB is saying is that's most true is the fact that there's no avenue for ethics complaints at the Supreme Court. And that's not necessarily on the shoulders of John Roberts. The Congress now, Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Congressman Hank Johnson of Georgia, both Democrats are trying, they have a bill floating that would create an ethics officer of the Supreme Court. so you could make ethics complaints to that person. John Roberts has said the Congress can't tell us what to do, but generally speaking, we abide by, even though it's not written, we abide by what the Congress says.

So if, in fact, there is a time to put this into play and where there would be a lot of backing for it, you would think it would be when there is such an egregious violation here, not to mention the other things that Clarence Thomas has done and his wife as well. I mean, you know, this is a, this is a, as corrupt and a pair in terms of closeness to donors, in terms of judicial activism, as you could see, he and his wife, Ginny. And so this, again, an opportunity to make some positive changes.

And John Roberts could take the leadership here on this. But, you know, he's going to have to recuse himself from some things. I think there's going to be great pressure for him to do that. And Roberts could be the point person to sort of bring honor in some. some way back to the court more so, at least than it is now. I hope you're right about that pressure. Well, I mean, I don't see him bowing easily to him. No, no, I don't know that he's a guy, whatever you think of his, you know, his mindset, he's a guy who really respects the court.

And I don't think he's happy about this. I really mean that. John Roberts? Yeah, John Roberts. Oh, sure. I don't mean that he is happy. I don't think at all that he's happy about this. So it would be surprised me if he wouldn't accept some of the changes that Congress is going to suggest.

Yeah, I just want to, I guess, I guess, double down on one other part of this. And by the way, there is a variety of different types of pressure right now. AOC did an interview, Representative Alexandria Ocasicortez did an interview with David Srotto on Lever News yesterday, continuing to push for articles of impeachment against him. That's good, you should do that and it won't work, obviously. But that doesn't mean that you don't do it anyway. But I also want to address one other thing that was raised by Clarence Thomas in his defense. He said that from close personal friends, quote, who do not have business before for the court was not reportable.

Like do you realize what particular sort of wool he is trying to pull over your head there? So his idea is that he can for years and years and years and years and years take these sorts of trips and accept $19,000 Frederick Douglass Bibles from this guy. And as long as he doesn't have business before the court, then it's fine and we're cool. Doesn't matter if he will. And that's the most minor point of this, doesn't matter if the guy is engaged. in a decades-long targeted effort to remake the American judiciary, which he very much is. He donates massive amounts of money, not just to the Thomas family, but to organizations

looking to radically move the courts to the right. But they never talk about it when they hang out. There's nothing untoward about any of that. He gave $500,000 to Jimmy Thomas' pack. None of this is supposed to raise any eyebrows. I believe I saw one former Republican congressperson that said that this looks really bad. And that's largely it. But we're to assume that if Elena Kagan was flying around the world in the Soros Express,

I guess it would be cool. I guess nobody would have an issue with that. I kind of doubt it. And by the way, if you were looking for any additional reasons to have an issue with Harlan Crow, He not only gives money to people like Clarence Thomas and Ginny Thomas, he also donates to Kirsten Cinema and Joe Manchin. Not as much, 5,800 to Cinemas campaign, $5,000 to the Getting Stuff Done Pack, a leadership pack tied to the Arizona Senator. By the way, at various points, Kirsten Cinema has spit in our face.

The fact that the pack that supports her is called the Getting Stuff Done Pack is like the ultimate insult to injury. But anyway, also, Donates to Joe Manchin, also donates, by the way, $12,500 to Representative Henry Quayar of Texas since 2006. He also has a sculpture garden at his home in Dallas in the backyard of fallen communist leaders. So great statues of Lenin and Stalin and Fidel Castro, statues that were removed when they were deposed that he is acquired and held on. So he goes out for his coffee in the morning with the Dallas morning news and he sits among the fallen communists of our past. And he gets great pleasure, it seems, out of this way. I want to go last to you, A.B. We were talking about pressure.

We're talking about these calls for impeachment. Do you think that there is, is there anything here, anything going to happen? I mean, as of right now, no, right? We've never really seen a Supreme Court justice impeached. I think we had maybe one maybe in like years, years ago for something ridiculous. So probably not, but I think this is a good time to just highlight the fact that maybe there does need to be a code of ethics and some place for the Supreme Court to be held accountable for the things that they're doing. And I think now is the time to call for even more transparency when you see that if Thomas Clarence is saying that in the beginning I was reporting these things and now all of a sudden I feel the need not to or it's not reportable. Well, why is that? If you're not doing anything

wrong, right? If your friend is not asking for special favors, then why don't you want to report it? It's like it just is what it is. That's really a gift, right? So I think that's what makes it even more questionable. And that's what makes it hard on the American people to accept because of the lack of transparency within the Supreme Court. Yet they have so much power to make so so many decisions about how we live our day to day lives. Yeah, that's why the best route to getting sort of justice in this thing is through the Congress and and through having an ethics process there because impeachment's not going to happen. Certainly like AB said, I think it was Samuel Chase at the beginning of the 19th century was the last person.

He was acquitted. I think that's right. That's how I remember it too. He was acquitted. Yeah. And so and you need such a, you're not going to get that two-thirds majority of the Congress to impeach. But but you know, there is hope in what what Hank Johnson and Chris Murphy are doing in Congress. Yeah, they couldn't get to, they couldn't get enough people to impeach like in the, like the fresh aftermath of an insurrection.

Right. So probably not. By the way, again, just want to thank ProPublica for some amazing work there. Obviously, you know, a short rest is well deserved. And then if you'd like to continue on this beat, I would love someday to find out what happened with Brett Kavanaugh's debt during the process of him becoming a Justice, kind of feel like there's an interesting story there, but who am I to say? Anyway, the hour is rapidly passing by. We need to take our last break of the hour, but when we come back, Kevin McCarthy getting a little bit salty, getting into some tiffs with other members of his caucus, and more news

besides, so don't go anywhere. Welcome back, everyone. There is only a little bit more time remaining in our first hour, so we're going to use it as much as we can. Let's jump into this. During the process through which Kevin McCarthy eventually became House Speaker, it became clear that there was probably going to be some problems in his future. Getting along with some of the more extreme members of his caucus, that sort of thing. Problems are already cropping up, but not necessarily the ones that we thought he'd face. You see, they're in a difficult process right now, wherein they're trying to put together

a budget that is going to have to satisfy a lot of different groups and also apparently balance the budget within 10 years. And during the tense negotiations, the public aspects of it as well as the behinds, the scenes, things, it's apparently led to some bad blood because Kevin McCarthy, it turns out, is a little bit of a salty little devil. We're going to get to some of the issues he has with some of his colleagues in a second, but just so that you understand like the context of this, President Joe Biden, of course, and Democratic leadership are pressuring them to put this together. It is a rapidly approaching limit deadline, so there's time pressure as well, and they're

struggling to unite behind a fiscal blueprint. They say in Politico that McCarthy appears to be looking for a scapegoat, which does not obviously telegraph a lot of confidence in the process. He apparently has already told colleagues he has no confidence in House budget chair Jody Arrington, the man responsible for delivering a budget framework, laying out the spending cuts that Republicans have said they will demand in exchange for any move to increase the debt limit. Aside from perceived disloyalty, which is an issue for him, McCarthy also regards Arrington a former official in the George W. Bush administration as incompetent, according to more than half a dozen people familiar with his thinking. Often in these

these sorts of reporting's, you'll have according to a person familiar with their thinking or according to two people. I love the flex of according to six people familiar with their thinking. Oh no, he's been calling him incompetent to everybody. There were some people at a drive-thru he went to that overheard him say. I love that, just to really put the pressure on him. But it's not just him. Also, Steve Scalise. McCarthy has been saying he can't rely on Scalese, describing the majority leader as ineffective, checked out, and reluctant to take a position on anything, apparently still harboring a grudge from previous power struggles between them. So I'm sure you are more tapped into this than I am.

What do you make of the difficulties that he's having? Well, first of all, he's somebody who hates disloyalty. McCarthy does not like that. It strikes me as a little foolish to be doing this because he doesn't really have a working majority. He needs every little bit of support he can have. And to go after the people who did ostensibly support him in that race doesn't seem like a great piece of leadership from the speaker. Steve Scalise is someone who would not have ruled out running against McCarthy for a leadership position. And it really ticked McCarthy off.

Arrington at one point during these negotiations on the House floor when there were so many votes for the speaker, Arrington floated Scalise as a possibility when it looked less likely that that McCarthy could win and that really pissed McCarthy off. So there is, there is some history here and there's some legitimacy to it. But you would think that the McCarthy, who is barely the speaker and barely able to get a working majority, would be a little bit more careful about who he's telling these things to because it probably runs deeper than Arrington and probably runs deeper than Scalise. Yeah, AB. I mean, I think I had a lack of of confidence in McCarthy as a speaker from jump, right?

It took you 15 rounds to get the Speaker of the House position and that was for reason. I feel like as a leader, right, you guys spent more time trying to figure out how to sit in that seat than to actually get the work done. Your personal problems that you have with people for being disloyal should probably put to the side so that you can do your actual job. What we've also seen is that the Republican Party contains some of the most unloyal people we've ever seen. There's flip-flopping every week about whether or not they support Trump and whether or not they support McCarthy every other week. They're also disloyal to their constituents.

So I'm not sure why he expected them to be loyal to him. So at this point, it's like McCarthy, do the job, the work of the American people that you were voted in, you got your seat, not do the work. Put your personal problems to the side and figure out how to get the budget passed. Yeah, Michael, I'm curious your read on how this ends up playing out in terms of the actual budget, because as you say, like he can't afford to lose too many people. And there's a lot of different ways that he could lose different people. the like the common wisdom is that well, but it's about raising the debt limits.

So that puts additional pressure from some of the wealthiest people in America to make sure that you get something, but they're also massive contrarians and they don't want Biden to succeed. So what is going to happen? I mean, the bottom line is the Biden succeeding part. The other thing is that Arrington, who is one of the targets of this, is the chairman of the budget committee. So he's a big player in these negotiations. So to that end, if McCarthy is looking for a budget victory, if he's like,

looking not only to bolster the chances of his own caucus and his own chances, as remote as that would seem, to be speaker in a next Congress, he's alienating people already who are, you know, lynch pins in seeing the budget pass. But it's all motivated by making sure not that Jody Arrington gets a victory or that Kevin McCarthy does, but that Joe Biden doesn't. And so the things that they are doing together and en masse that they all care about, I think the calculates, that they all care about, I think the calculation, if you can say that McCarthy calculates well, and I don't know that he does, it's probably too early in his speakership because this is the first thing. The calculation that he's making is that, okay, I can afford to alienate some people in my own caucus

because we all agree and we all need to make sure that the Democrats don't look good here. So I think that's what's going to motivate them. And that's why maybe this is like a kerfuffle that will pass. But then is the idea that they'll lose some Republicans, but other Democrats will jump over, just make sure that there's some kind of budget? Because to make Biden look bad, don't you have to violate the debt limit increase? It's not just Biden, it's the Democratic minority in the House. And yes, you do.

I mean, that's what would make Biden look bad. They are counting on some Democrats. It doesn't that make the economy look bad? Well, it makes the economy look bad. Well, hello. I mean, that's like when when jobs numbers are bad when and Republicans talk about, you know, how good it is that job numbers are bad when there's. a Democratic president. Well, but but isn't there a difference between delighting in the current

situation and making the situation actively worse? Like the people they're there to represent are going to be affected by. They certainly don't want the blame for it. But they would cast the blame in such a way. And that's what a speaker's job is to a large extent is spinning the story. They would cast the blame on the fact that the Democrats didn't, you know, didn't rise to the occasion. And the, and the White House was in the wrong. It doesn't help the process. And certainly they don't want to, you know, by screwing the economy up, that's not a good way to hold on to an already tenuous hold on both the speakership and the House of Representatives. Already the Democrats are talking about winning back the House next time with a concerted effort in California and New York to win those seats back. And that changes like that, you know.

Interesting. A.B, any final thoughts on that, on how you think that this might end up playing out? Yeah, I mean, I think one thing we've seen from the Republican Party in general is that they are always focused on the long game, right? in the end run. And so I think this also plays into that as well, right? The conversation comes up if we want Biden to look back. And so the American people feel like our economy is getting worse. It's struggling because the Biden administration is being difficult, right?

Or the Democrats are being difficult and they don't want to see us have a live life, right? And having a decent economy, then that plays in the favor of the Republican Party. But I think the sad part is that a lot of the constituents of the Republican Party don't realize that the harm is at the detriment of them in order to increase the power, right, and increase the reputation of the leadership. And so it's just unfortunate times, but I think like McCarthy, you are a leader, right? And I think as a leader, you have to learn how to negotiate with people, even people that you dislike sometimes.

And unfortunately, in this situation, people you distrust. But in order to do what's right for the American people, they're struggling enough, right? And I think the American people can care less about what some internal conflicts are if it means that there is a broader resolution for us as a country. And people are scared right now about what this is going to look like for our economy in the long term and 10 years from now. Yeah, understandable. Okay, we only have a couple of minutes, but I think we can talk briefly about this because I want to touch base every once in a while as we cruise to the next election about this topic.

So whenever we're ready, let's jump into this. One would think that a week in which his likely Republican opponent is arraigned in court in New York. That'd be a great week for Joe Biden, and in some ways perhaps it is. But the polling right now, not looking great for him when it comes to the Democratic primary that could or could not happen. Also, by the way, in the background, it's apparently been announced that he is not going to be formally announcing his run if it happens until at least July, pushing it back a couple of months from when it was supposedly going to happen. But I'm referring here to polling where seven in ten Democrats say they generally want to see someone other than Biden run for the presidency, which is, that's huge for an incumbent, I would think.

Now, of those who want someone else, they really don't seem to be able to agree on who that should be. Bernie Sanders is at 5% Pete Buttigieg at 4, Kamala Harris, Michelle Obama at three each, Gavin Newsom, who says he's not running, and Elizabeth Warren at 2% each as well. So a lot of uncertainty about that. But what most people do not seem to be uncertain about is that they would really prefer that it not be Biden, even though it is now. looking like if Biden runs, he'll not only be an incumbent, but it'll be an incumbent running against

the guy who might be wearing like a striped jumpsuit when he runs against him. So like if that doesn't solidify confidence in you, I'm not entirely sure what will in the near future, but what do you all think about this? Is it still a lock? He's going to run. No challenger. There are challengers. Marion Williamson is running against him. But I have said from the beginning, I don't think he's going to run. I still don't think he's going to run. But if he does run, every indication that he's giving and he should give is that he's going to run. The moment's why he pushed it two months, the moment he says he's not running, he becomes a lame duck president, and that doesn't help the country, that doesn't help his party.

That doesn't help his presidency because people in the Democratic Party are free to attack his administration. So the longer he waits to announce that he isn't running, if in fact I'm right, the better it is. I think that Joe Biden is immensely popular among Democrats. I think that there are a lot of Democrats who love Joe Biden that don't want him to run because of his age, because if something were to happen to him, that saw him as a caretaker president, take your hand in 2020, hold your hand until 2024, and then pass the baton to someone else,

not necessarily his vice president. And I think these polls also, my final thought on this is these polls are stupid. You're probably not wrong there, but I like him, so I'm sticking with them. A, B, what do you think? I'm just wondering where the polls come from because I've never gotten asked to do one. So, you know, if I can get an invitation at some point, I like my voice to be heard. But I think part of the issue mainly with Biden running again is that people are concerned about his age, right? And that's a liability at this point.

But I mean, we don't know. And I agree with Michael when he says, like, you know, the longer that he waits, the better. because we saw how Obama was treated during his length of tenure, right? And so we just don't want to take those chances with so many things left in the air right now. Yeah, yeah, the polls are probably stupid, they don't really say anything, and we won't know for a while. Well, so the candidates who are in those polls, I mean, Gavin Newsom said he's not going to run if Biden doesn't run. He didn't say he's not going to run for president. He said he's doing his red state tour. He's focused on that right now.

He is doing it. He's definitely not just biding his time. He's not running against Joe Biden, right? So when if Biden were not to run, Gavin Newsom will 100% get in the race. I don't think Vice President Harris will be in the race. I don't think she would run either. I think that it would be a clean slate of new Democrats or maybe some old ones. You might see familiar faces. You'll see Buttigieg. You'll see Booker, probably Klobuchar, but you'll see a lot of others too.

I would guess Kretchen Whitmer, maybe Roy Cooper, a governor of North Carolina. There are a lot of people that will run for president who we don't even know. So that's why these polls once again. That's true. I think that is a great set of candidates too. lose to Bernie Sanders in a primary or another progressive we'll see we'll see we'll see anyway unfortunately that is all the time we have thank you this is that's unfortunate all the time we have for the first hour of the show AB it's been

a pleasure to have you on where can people follow your work thank you you can follow me on I am legally hype I am on YouTube Instagram TikTok obviously and Twitter and thank you so much again for having me it was a pleasure thank you and Michael always a pleasure to have you especially in studio yeah thank you Thank you. Everyone, stick around. You got an awesome second hour. I believe Ravanna is taking the rain, so don't go anywhere. There's more after this. more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at Apple.co slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.