The Young Turks - Snub, Flub & Civil War

Episode Date: May 23, 2022

Palestinian student Nooran Hamdan waves the Palestinian flag during her graduation ceremony at Georgetown University and swerves Anthony Blinken’s handshake. A Republican Senator made jaw-dropping remarks about black women and maternal mortality in his state. Congressional Republicans introduced a “Women’s Bill of Rights” that included only one right for women. The man who tackled Dave Chappelle says he did it because the comedian’s jokes were ‘triggering.’ Trump spent his weekend on TRUTH Social furiously ranting about the ‘RINO’ WSJ, scolding Mo Brooks, and sharing a call for Civil War. Hosts: Ana Kasparian, Cenk Uygur ***  The largest online progressive news show in the world. Hosted by Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian. LIVE weekdays 6-8 pm ET.  Help support our mission and get perks. Membership protects TYT's independence from corporate ownership and allows us to provide free live shows that speak truth to power for people around the world. See Perks: ▶ https://www.youtube.com/TheYoungTurks/join  SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=theyoungturks  FACEBOOK: ☞ http://www.facebook.com/TheYoungTurks  TWITTER: ☞ http://www.twitter.com/TheYoungTurks  INSTAGRAM: ☞ http://www.instagram.com/TheYoungTurks  TWITCH: ☞ http://www.twitch.com/tyt  👕 Merch: http://shoptyt.com  ❤ Donate: http://www.tyt.com/go  🔗 Website: https://www.tyt.com  📱App: http://www.tyt.com/app  📬 Newsletters: https://www.tyt.com/newsletters/  If you want to watch more videos from TYT, consider subscribing to other channels in our network: The Damage Report ▶ https://www.youtube.com/thedamagereport  TYT Sports ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytsports The Conversation ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytconversation Rebel HQ ▶ https://www.youtube.com/rebelhq  TYT Investigates ▶ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwNJt9PYyN1uyw2XhNIQMMA  #TYT #TheYoungTurks #BreakingNews  https://youtu.be/-9vyB1PUgGY Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. All right, welcome to the young church, Jake U Granik's with you guys. Amazing week for you all here. So we've got, we did our 20th anniversary celebration on air on February 14th when it was actual day. We're doing it in person this week. So you're going to see a lot of folks in the studio, a lot of hosts, which I love.

I love that. In fact, tonight on old school is going to be me, Michael Shore and Rashad Ritchie. How's that for a fun combo, okay? So that and that's going to be right here in the studio. So you guys got a lot to look forward to, including today's show, which is packed with amazing stories, as always. which leads us to Casper. What up? All right, we actually start off with a positive story, and I say positive because I love

seeing examples of good protests. And this is a good example, so let's take a look. That's Georgetown University student, Neron Hamdan, waving the Palestinian flag during her graduation ceremony. She's about to diss the Secretary of State Anthony Blink. Lincoln, let's watch how that goes down. Anthony Constantin. So she just walks right past Anthony Blinken, who probably gave a speech during their graduation ceremony, refuses to shake his hand and continues moving forward.

She is not the only Georgetown student who was graduating and decided to take that opportunity to protest the U.S. government's decision to continue sending military weaponry arms over to Israel, despite what its government continues to do in its aggression and actions against Palestinians. It is referred to as an apartheid state for good reason. And I have more details about what happened in the aftermath of this process. test, but before we get to that, Cenk, why don't you jump in? Yeah, so I think this is called freedom of speech and freedom of expression. And so I love that she exercised that, right? Is the American government fair to Palestinians? Don't be ridiculous, are we neutral, are we objective, don't be ridiculous. The Secretary of State for the United States of America is massively one-sided against Israel and the endless occupation.

This is the bare minimum that you can do. And I'm glad that she did that. And a lot more should be done in terms of protest. Of course, everyone in power will see it completely differently. In fact, they'll see it the opposite. There's a great outrage, they'll take great umbrage, how dare you not bow your heads to our preordained policy that is never debated in America and how we must be one-sided. And the Palestinians must never be free because, of course,

course, they're largely Muslim and Muslims only no violence, they say in their infinite bigotry without realizing how deeply bigoted they are. There is no reason for the occupation at this point. It is unconscionable. And I like that we at least have some degree of protests here in America about it. Right. And I do see the, I guess the culture or the reception to these stories coming out of, you know, the Gaza Strip, East Jerusalem, the West Bank. It's being treated differently, right? Before, I mean, it was either complete silence or just condemnation toward Palestinians for throwing rocks or what was referred to as incendiary devices, right? But again, it's an asymmetric situation when you consider the military capability on the

Israeli government side versus what the Palestinians have, which again is very little to defend themselves. Now, as I mentioned, she wasn't the only one who took part in this protest. One in On Twitter noted, I counted six Georgetown law grads carrying the Palestinian flag across the stage. We love to see it. And later, Neuron decided to share her perspective, talk about the motive for this protest, saying myself and my classmates in Arab studies honored the legacy of Shireen Abu Akle during Anthony Blinken's commencement address.

We demand an independent investigation and an end to American aid to Israel. Now, I relayed these demands to blink in personally and refuse to shake his hand. And to her point about refusing to shake his hand and catching up with him after the ceremony, apparently he told her, I hear you, but do you? No, you don't hear her. Do you hear her at all? You hear the sign of a cash register, that's for sure. Okay, you're not supposed to say that lobbyists don't exist.

The mainstream media will tell you there are no such things as lobbyists. And when they say, hey, they're doing it specifically for a foreign government, you're not to believe them. You're lying eyes. You're supposed to believe something else magical. So no. And when I, and it's not particular to the Blinken. Lincoln works for Joe Biden and Democratic Party in general, which has taken millions upon millions upon millions of dollars from packs in favor of Israel. And if you think that hasn't affected them, welcome to planet Earth. It's nice to have you here. I assume you're calling yourself a reporter because you're the only people left on the planet who don't realize that millions of dollars in bribes affect politician. Also, it's worth noting in the aftermath of the shooting death of journalist, Al Jazeera journalist

Ackle, who was mentioned in the tweet by Neuron, I should note that the Israeli government has decided to not conduct an investigation. Of course not. They claimed, well, there's no evidence that the Israeli defense forces shot and killed her. It could have been the Palestinians. There's no evidence indicating it's the Palestinians. It doesn't even make sense for it to be Palestinians, considering she's an Al Jazeera reporter who clearly had press written all over her vest. And I don't remember if she had a hat.

But she was labeled with press. You know who does investigations, Anna? People who are sure that they didn't do it. Right, exactly. You know who doesn't do investigations? people are pretty sure that they did do it. That's how it usually works. Oh, a major journalist, one of the most famous journalists in the region is killed.

Bah, forget about it. The only reason you would do that is if you were the culprit. And going back to Blinken, because I do think it's important to talk about why there would be any ire directed toward him specifically. You know, prior to him serving in Biden's administration, he was actually the head of a think tank. He had founded a think tank that worked pretty closely with defense contractors. And any time you question what the motivations are in regard to U.S. foreign policy, you should follow the money, including some of the favors that are made for lobbying defense contractors. Aside from that, last year when the Alaksa Mosque was raided, by the way, it was rated this year as well,

but last year when it was rated and that led to even more violence and even more civilian deaths, Anthony Blinken was asked specifically about the pressure toward the Biden administration to stop sending military aid to Israel and take a look at how he answered that question. President reiterated his strong supporter for Israel on Friday, but he's coming under increased pressure from progressives. Bernie Sanders has introduced a resolution of disapproval over a new arm sale to Israel. Others like Rashida Talib and AOC say the U.S. should not be rubber stamping arms sales to Israel when they use the weapons to to abuse Palestinian rights. What's your response to that? Well, happily, George, one of the things I don't do in this job is I don't do politics. I focus on the policy, so I'll leave the politics to others. When it comes to arms sales,

two things. First, the president's been equally clear. We are committed to giving Israel the means to defend itself, especially when it comes to these indiscriminate rocket attacks against civilians. So it's important to remember at the time, you need more context. Palestinians living in East Jerusalem were being forced out of their homes, which the international community, with the exception of the United States, referred to as a war crime, raiding the Alaksa Mosque, or I should say a violation of international law. Let me be clear. So not a war crime, a violation of international law.

They also said that the Alaksa Mosque being rated as Palestinians were practicing their religion was also a violation. And the response to that by Anthony Blinken was the Israeli government has the right to defend itself. Yeah. Oh, I didn't know that. That's all breaking news. Okay, by the way, real quick question though. Think about this question for a second. Do the Palestinians have a right to defend themselves? According to the United States government, no, they don't. No, but that's literal. Yeah. They say Israel has infinite right to defend itself, which I agree with. They say Palestinians have no right to defend themselves,

which I do not agree with, and it's a barbaric and racist policy by the United States of America. So let me clarify the levels here. Aid, you want to give Iron Dome to Israel that protects the civilians? I'm perfectly happy with that, right? Now I say, okay, now let's give Iron Dome to the Palestinians. The way to Washington, they're like, no, that would protect innocent Palestinian lives. Of course we wouldn't do that.

No, you kill the Palestinians and you occupy them for 60 years because they only understand. They only understand violence. No, sounds like we only understand violence and we do it based on bigotry and racism. And it is absolutely indisputable. Take any group and say they cannot be free. They must be occupied forever because of the nature of who they are. And that is racist by definition. Okay, so now just the layers of this real quick, when you're talking about APAC and some of the lobbyist groups, they are massively right wing.

Are they spending in Democratic primaries? Yes, of course, for conservative Democrats and corporate Democrats and against progressives, okay? And then they, and ironically, the ads that they are running say, oh, the progressives aren't Democratic enough. You guys are funded mainly by Republican money. You give to Republicans and including people who are, in favor of the insurrection, and some who are in favor of the replacement theory, that is an abomination. Yep. And so I have no interest in APEC in those lobbies, which are grotesquely right wing, okay? Now, on the other hand, ADL, for example, has done great work, okay?

The anti-deformation league, they protect not just Jewish Americans, but they protected Muslim Americans under Trump, you know, great job. But these days, they're also doing false equivalencies. And they're saying, oh, well, you know, the right wing murders us in synagogues. And the left wing disagrees with us slightly on Israeli policy, so they're the same. No, no, not the same. In a time of rising and deep anti-Semitism, where they're blaming all of the world's, America's problems on the Jews, and that the Jews are trying to replace white Americans

with immigrants, you cannot do false equivalencies. And that I don't say on behalf of the Palestinian people. I say that on behalf of Jewish Americans here who desperately need your protection. But instead, you're too busy worrying about, oh my God, how long can we keep the Palestinians under our thumbs, right? Why don't you do the moral thing, the Jewish thing, go to a Passover. Have you ever heard the speeches at Passover? Why don't you actually do them?

Why don't you actually do them and free the Palestinians and fight the anti-Semites here in America? Finally, the last layer of this is the Jewish voters themselves. They are actually fantastic and among the most progressive in the country. Do not make the mistake of thinking that these groups, especially the right-wing lobbyist groups, represent all Jewish Americans. It is not remotely true. In fact, some of our best fighters on the left and on the progressive side are Jewish Americans who are brave and who stand up to these lobbyists. That is a super important distinction.

We fight against bigotry, anti-Semitism, and racism together. And you just saw it there at Georgetown. Great job, students. All right, well, let's move on to something completely different. Let's dip right back into the abortion and anti-choice nonsense coming from the right wing. on maternal deaths amongst the states. So what do you think needs to be done there to improve that, especially if forms of abortion or birth control could be limited in the future?

Senator Bill Cassidy from Louisiana is about to make a fool out of himself by saying something pretty terrible about black women who literally died during childbirth. But just know that more women die from childbirth in his state in Louisiana than anywhere else. About a third of our population is African American. African Americans have a higher incidence of maternal mortality. So if you correct our population for race, we're not as much of an outlier as it would otherwise appear. Now I say that not to minimize the issue,

but to focus the issue as to where it would be. For whatever reason, people of color have a higher incidence of maternal mortality. In other words, let me literally minimize maternal mortality among black women, make it so they don't even count in the statistics and only focus on white women who died during childbirth. And if you just take black women out of the equation, not so bad, not so bad. And by the way, he makes the statement even worse later, Jank, by saying, well, you know, I mean, mortality is higher among black women for whatever reason. Gee, what could the reason be, Jank? Yeah, and of course it's because they don't get enough funding and institutional racism.

But I don't want you just to say those words and have people who don't understand the background and the history go, They said racism are running away. First of all, one of the things that happened is that the accumulation of wealth happened in white families, but not minority families. We've had many discussions about that redlining, Jim Crow, et cetera. And what that created was people who are in a lower socioeconomic position in mass, and then that creates health care issues that then are hard to overcome. If you're wealthy in America, it's much easier to get maternal care.

If you're middle class, it's okay, not bad, but in some areas and not so great in other areas. If you're poor, God help you, white or black. And then on top of that, you have other institutional racism that we've talked about in the past. In the health care system, how do doctors, especially in places like Louisiana, perceive a white patient versus a black patient? I mean, you see it in their senator here. He's basically saying in the first part of that sentence, I mean, look, if you just look at the people we care about, white people, we're doing okay. But if you look at the black people we don't care about, they're not doing that well. But that's okay because who cares about them?

Well, how do you think they got in the position that they are on maternal health care? It's with attitudes just like that. A few years ago, the New York Times wrote a pretty excellent piece talking about the high rates of maternal mortality among black women in the United States and all the various drivers that play a role. So you're right, socioeconomic status is a huge driver, because if you're poor, you are less likely to have the resources and the access you need to have a healthy pregnancy, to get the maternity care you need to carry out a healthy pregnancy. The other issue, by the way, that was noted in the New York Times piece that I thought was telling is the way that even wealthy black women are treated in our health care system. For instance, there are studies that point to the fact that doctors are far less willing to believe a black woman when she says that she's experiencing some complications, or she's experiencing more pain.

The other thing that's worth noting is that the maternal mortality rate in the United States has been going up year after year. Republicans have not cared about it at all. It's actually much higher in the red states that will outright ban abortion. And if you do away with abortion, women who don't want to carry that abortion to term are far less likely to get the maternal care that they need and are at a higher risk of dying as a result of their pregnancy or during childbirth. So that's all important context to know.

But let's also hunker down and take a look at what's happening in both Louisiana and the United States in general. Let me also note, though, that conservatives love to point to, well, you know, abortion is really black genocide. They refer to it as black genocide because they claim it's because all these black women are having these abortions and all of these black babies that they purport to care so much about don't end up getting born. But you just heard what Bill Cassidy said in that statement. He doesn't care about black people. Certainly doesn't care about black women who are dying during childbirth. He wants to erase them out of the equation altogether. Now let's look at

some numbers. So according to a USA Today investigation based on birth rates in 2016 and death rates from 2012 to 2016, Louisiana had the highest maternal death rate with 58.1 deaths per 100,000 births. And just so you can have something to compare that to, according to the CDC, the average nationwide in 2017 was 17.3 deaths per 100,000 births. So Louisiana certainly stands out, again, has the highest rate of maternal deaths during childbirth. But let's take a look at more recent numbers, okay? Because if you thought that was bad, it's about to get worse. The U.S. maternal mortality rate in 2020 was 23.8 deaths per 100,000 live births. The highest it had been since before Roe was overturned, according to the Commonwealth Fund. The rate was actually

far higher among black people, which is not a surprise, 55.3 deaths, which is nearly three times the rate for white people. And by the way, this has been an ongoing trend. The U.S. maternal mortality rate more than doubled between 1987 and 2017, according to the CDC. By contrast, maternal mortality in high income countries decreased slightly every year on average over roughly the same period, according to a 2016 study. Okay, so there's two different issues here. So his racism is clear. I mean, anybody can see it. I think even white right wingers are like, yeah, I mean, if we exclude blacks, then we're doing okay. Thereby implying, without any shadow of a doubt that you don't care about black people, you think as long as white people are doing

well, who cares about the blacks in Louisiana? So let's be super clear about that. And then, look, if you are surprised by these numbers, it's okay, I get why. Like, so if you're, let's say, upper middle class, and you might be thinking, how do we have the highest maternal fatality rate in the developed world, were the lowest? How could that be? I don't know anyone who just died in pregnancy in America. That's right. You don't because you're relatively well off. But poor people are dying all the time and you never see it. Now, is it all the time fair? Yes, we rank the lowest out of all developed nations. Isn't that unbelievable? We're the richest. But we rank the lowest. Why? Because we don't care about poor people in

this country. So that leads us to the largest issue. Yes, the racism is horrific and apparent, right? But we don't have universal health care in this country. No, we don't. So all the other developed nations are doing okay on these maternal issues. Why? Because they have universal health care. And they pay half as much. We pay twice as much. Almost all of the extra billions goes right into the pockets of executives and shareholders of private health insurance companies, whose only purpose is the rob us blind. That is their only purpose. Every other country does not have private health insurance like we do,

and they don't need it. It costs half as much and way better results. And so if you're rich, you're okay in this country, but God help you if you're poor middle class, because we will let you die so that some executive can make more money. That's a fact. But no, it's even worse than that. And I want you guys to be clear on this.

This is not a mistake, this is not an accident, this is very much intentional. Let's take a look at the state of Mississippi. Mississippi, where abortion will immediately become illegal when Roe v. Wade is overturned, has the highest rate of child poverty in the country and recently rejected a bid to extend postpartum Medicaid coverage. It is by design, and these are the people who will lie to you to your face and pretend like they're pro-life. But let's not get it twisted. What this is really about is the fact that they need something to campaign on. And the reason why all you see from the right wing over and over again, over and over again,

is culture war stuff that actually does end up hurting people is because that's all they've got to campaign on. They don't care about the collateral damage. They don't care about lives in the context of their anti-choice rhetoric. It's just something they need in their platform to run on. And you should pay attention to their actions, not their words. Their actions make it clear, they don't care about you, they don't care about your kids, they certainly don't care about human lives, they care about power. And they've used this issue to the detriment of women across the country to accumulate

political power and nothing more. That is the reality. All right, we gotta take a break. When we come back, we've got more news, including the continued war on women, Republicans, in both chambers of Congress have proposed a women's bill of rights. What does that mean? There's only one right included. And I'll tell you what it is when we come back.

All right. Have more news. Republican lawmakers in both chambers of Congress have basically introduced a resolution that they're referring to as the women's bill of rights. And it doesn't really include any rights, and plural is not something that you could really include in a description of what they're offering here, because it's just one right. And all it does is discriminate against transgender people. In a Republican lawmakers world, offering rights to women just amounts to denying rights to the

powerless in the country. And this, of course, is on the heels of women learning that their reproductive rights and their autonomy over their own bodies will be ripped away from them. Now, the resolution introduced by Republicans in both chambers of Congress would define words like woman, and woman, man, mother, and father on the basis of biological sex. a rebuke to transgender and inclusive, inclusive measures. Sorry, I'm having a tough time talking today. Now, Republicans call the measure a women's bill of rights, strong language that doesn't

really apply to what they're offering up, arguing that defining women on the basis of biological sex is necessary to protect women's rights in spaces like domestic violence centers, sports, locker rooms, and bathrooms. I didn't know that domestic violence was exclusive to biological women, but according to the ignorant lawmakers on the right, I guess that's what they believe. But, Jake, the fact of the matter is it's not what they believe. This is a manufactured culture war that is having a negative impact on transgender people in the country. But what they're doing here, this is their strategy.

is to distract away from the fact that they succeeded in stripping reproductive rights away from women. They don't want to talk about that. That is not a popular thing to discuss. 70% of the country wanted to maintain reproductive rights in this country. So what have they been doing? During the hearing last week on abortion access, this was a hearing in the House Judiciary Committee, every Republican lawmaker decided to ask questions about gender. That's it, because they don't want to talk about abortion access, not a popular thing that they've been pushing for, not a popular thing that they've accomplished. So instead, let's just focus on transgender stuff because it's red meat for our voters.

Yeah, so this bill's a joke. It shows you how little Republicans care about women. But I'm going to come back to that first, because of course, the correct name for this bill should have been the right to hate trans people. The entire bill is just about trans people. It has nothing to do with women, right? And they say, oh, it's because we're trying to protect women. Let's break that down for a second.

They say, well, in the current system, there could be violence and we're trying to prevent that. Is that right? Wait, hold on, let's think this through. So let's say it's a trans woman who was born biologically male, right? So I haven't lost any Republicans so far. You guys agree with that, right? And so she presents as a woman because she's trans. So she walks into, in your fantasies, she walks into a female bathroom and attacks women.

Why would she do that? That doesn't make any sense at all. She's a woman. Why would she attack other women, right? But now let's think about if she walks into a male bathroom in a secluded area. What do you think might happen? They don't care. You think there might be violence against her as opposed to her committing the violence?

In fact, the idea that trans people commit more violence rather than having violence committed upon them is an absurdity. Statistically, it's not even close. The trans community suffers from more violence than almost any other community. They know. They don't care. And of course, Anna, it's always worse when it comes to Republicans. Yes.

They encourage that violence. That's what they're like, oh, trans people, they're different. Remember everybody, be scared of how different they are. And then this is a hate bill. They try to pass this hate bill so that there'll be more violence against trans people. Because the Republicans are monsters, and don't tell me it's not all of them. The whole party's behind this. Now let's turn to women.

They's got nothing about women. It's a right of women. It has no rights for women, except to be safe from those dangerous trans people. It's a perfect crime for the Republicans, right? Because what they're actively doing is stripping women of their rights. So they do this PR stunt where they purport to be in favor of women. rights. They drafted the women's bill of rights, everyone. And in reality, I mean, you don't even have to scratch the surface. It includes one real thing in there. And that one real

thing is just hatred toward transgender people. And I just wanted to be clear what we mean by real and not real. The first three rights are not rights. They're just definitions. There's so, and the last two are not rights either. They're just comments. The only so-called right is for women to be safe from those dangerous, dangerous trans people in their bathrooms and locker rooms. That's it. That's women. Congratulations. Republicans have just given you all of those rights. These are people who want to force women to carry a rapist baby for nine months and then give birth to that rapist baby. That's who these people are. They don't care about your rights. They care about their political power and they care about, you know,

feeding red meat to their evangelical voters so they can maintain the power that they have or to stay in power. But fact of the matter is they don't care about, they don't care about rights for anyone, really, right? And why do they even do this? Because their base is evangelical right-wing Christians who are evil. And so they want to punish people that don't look like them, that don't act like them, that they view to be outsiders. So the Republicans are an evil party that have to feed their evil base. And so that's why they don't care about women's rights. They say, I want to use your body as my property of the government. We're for small government. You're not, you're all a bunch of liars.

And isn't it weird that there aren't any elected Democrats that speak halfway as forcefully as we do about their so-called opponents? Like, of course, the media is never going to tell you that the Republicans are monsters. Oh my God, I don't want to be accused of bias to tell you that they actually are in favor of zero rights for women. Their bill for rights for women includes zero rights. That is a fact. But oh my God, we would be biased if we told you that. So we'll call it even, right? And Democratic Party, oh, but we have the same donors as the evil monsters.

So shush. So now you've got to come here for us to actually defend women and American citizens. Now, one of the sponsors of this resolution is Representative Debbie Lesko of Arizona, a Republican. She says the Democrats are erasing women and the spaces that are uniquely ours. Wait, hold on, no, if I'm not mistaken, Jank, the people who make me feel like a second class citizen in this country are not, I mean, Democrats, I can't stand them, they're incredibly weak and I have my criticisms toward them for sure. But it's not trans people, it's not Democrats, it's the GOP, it's the right wing, religious,

theocratic zealots who somehow get to have more say over my body than I do. They're the ones who make me feel like a second class citizen. So for them to put that on, Democrats or transgender people is ridiculous. But she's leading the House version of the bill. She said this at a press conference announcing the bill on Thursday with the Republican study committee, the largest conservative caucus in the house. She also says it's pretty simple. It acknowledges the biological differences in men and women.

Highlights the importance of differentiating between men and women involved for the purposes of protecting sex segregated activities and organizations, and affirms the importance of using mother and father in written law to protect families. Do you guys understand how much of a non-issue this is? That's the other thing. Look, not to minimize the pain and suffering that the small population of transgender people are dealing with right now in this terrible authoritarian country. But in terms of the impact the transgender community has on everyone else, it's non-existent. They just want to be treated with dignity.

Them being treated with dignity doesn't make me feel like I'm being erased. And the Republicans know that, they know that. But like with every other culture war issue, they got to find the boogeymen. And in this case, it's transgender people. They need something to campaign on. What else would they campaign on? The fact that they keep cutting corporate tax rates, the fact that they keep giving goodies to their elite buddies, the fact that they're engaging in enriching themselves through their position of power, the fact that they're very likely trading individual stocks with insider information, which is, by the way, illegal for everyone else, supposed to be illegal for them as well. No, this is all they have. This is, this is their bread and butter. Hate. That's all they've got to sell to their base. And I just wish their base was.

smart enough to realize this is not an issue that negatively impacts you at all, at all. But everything else that these Republicans are doing, with the help of some Democrats to be sure, is having an impact because they're robbing you blind. Wake up. Yes. And so let's get this right, by the way. Even if you think you're an evil evangelical right winger and you think, oh my God, trans people are so dangerous. So if you're a woman in that category, You're saying, I'm willing to give up my body for nine months and let the government run my body and tell me what I can and can't do with it. And by the way, and then I have to take care of a person for the rest of my life, no matter whose baby it is. Okay.

And that's okay because I'm going to be protected from the evil trans people, which is a problem in what, how many cases, even if you believe that. Point 0.000, oh, oh, oh, 0.01% of the case, right? You think that's the major issue? I mean, come on, man, I don't know what's worse. Anyway, I'm so tired of insulting them. If you're a woman and you're voting for the Republican Party, you should have your head examined, go get mental health counseling, you're voluntarily giving up your rights so that monstrous men on that side

can control your bodies and control your fate, your very life. And you're giving that away because you've been brainwashed by the cult of an evil right wing and think, oh, I must obey. I must obey the males. The males are so important. Here, take my body, do whatever you want with it. You should have your head examined. We're going to take a quick break.

When we come back, we have an update on the individual who attacked Dave Chappelle on stage at the Hollywood Bowl. Turns out he's charged with other very serious crimes. And he also talked to the New York Post about his motive in that attack. We've got that story and more. Come right back. All right back on the Young Turks, Jane Can Anna with you guys? More news.

Well, let's give you an update on the individual who attacked Dave Chappelle on stage. Isaiah Lee, the 23-year-old man who attacked Dave Chappelle during his set at the Hollywood Bowl, has been charged with attempted murder in a separate case involving his former roommate. He allegedly tried to stab him to death. Now, that is something that will obviously be investigated. But he also claims that he attacked Dave Chappelle because he was triggered by his anti-trans comedy. And I do want to talk about that in more detail in just a moment. But first, the details in regard to the attempted murder charge.

Lee allegedly stabbed his roommate at a transitional housing apartment on December 2nd. The victim had reported the stabbing to cops, but it was the high profile Chappelle incident that resulted in him identifying Lee as the culprit, according to prosecutors. So Lee has already pleaded not guilty to that charge. But he is scheduled to return to court on June 2nd. He remains in custody. And when it comes to being detained and the charges that he faced in regard to his attack on Dave Chappelle, I think it's important to remember that the district attorney did not want to charge him with a felony,

even though he had a weapon. And I want to show you what that weapon looked like, okay? So the weapon was a replica gun that had a switchblade, so a knife. And so he charged at Dave Chappelle on stage, and the LAPD actually wanted to file criminal charges. They took him in for assault with a deadly weapon, which is in fact a felony. But later, the district attorney George Gascon decided, no, I'm going to actually lessen the charge to a misdemeanor, which I thought was ridiculous. And his argument was, well, there's no evidence indicating that he was holding the replica gun with the knife open as he was attacking

Dave Chappelle on stage. Remember, he assaulted Dave Chappelle, it's on camera, we all saw it. Now, after the latest allegations came out regarding attempted murder, Gascone changed his tune a little bit, I wish he actually took these violent cases way more seriously than he has. I know some leftists get triggered by me saying that, but a violent crime is a violent crime. I don't want violent criminals running around the city, but right now, there are plenty of them doing so. So there are no winners in this story. At this point, I can't stand

Dave Chappelle. He's become like a rich Republican. We'll get back to him in a second. And we'll get back to the triggering by Lee in a second as well. But first, to the point that Anna was making. So originally Isaiah Lee was released before we found out about the attempted murder possibility because he only did a misdemeanor. You know, the misdemeanor was battery and possessing a deadly weapon with intent to assault. Just a misdemeanor. Why is that a misdemeanor? Just a misdemeanor, Jank.

Wait, wait, possessing a deadly weapon with an intent to assault and you did the battery, I just don't get it. No, it's restorative justice. No, that doesn't make any sense. No, it doesn't make any sense. This is not restorative justice. This is 100% wrong, okay? There is no rehabilitation going on and just having this like, I don't know, soft hands approach

to violent crime is not. the solution, and it's not rehabilitation. But anyway, that's a different point here. I mean, to the point about Isaiah Lee's mental condition, which is being debated, who puts a knife in a fake gun? Like, okay, you put it in like a bar of soap or gum or something, and that way they can't detect it, I don't like it, but I get it. If you put it in a fake gun, they're definitely going to look at it, and find it, this is literally the worst hidden weapon in American history. I just wanted to note that for the record. Yeah, that's actually a really good point that I hadn't really stopped to think about, right?

It's like, I want to sneak a knife into this venue. So let me hide it in a gun. And by the way, let's just note, I went to that show, not that night. There were multiple nights for that show, which is the Netflix is a joke show. And there was security there. We had to go through metal detectors and all of it. How did they miss this? Yeah, I mean, that's a, I mean, maybe, but the knife is metal.

I was going to say maybe because the gun is not metal, they miss it. But there's no excuse for that. I mean, I mean, and again, the dumbest thing I've ever seen. It's like, oh, I got a baton here and I hit it in my Uzi. I know, it's crazy. In my fake Uzi, they'll never see it. But you know what? To be fair, they never did.

They never did. Yeah, maybe it was a good hiding place. I wouldn't have thought of it, but okay, back to the importance of stuff. Okay, so putting the attempted murder charge part of this story aside, let's focus on the interview that Lee had with the New York Post, where he talked about the motive behind attacking Dave Chappelle on stage. Isaiah Lee told the post that Chappelle should be more sensitive when it comes to the jokes he cracks. Lee said he expected to have a good time at the May 3rd Netflix is a joke show, but he grew angry and frustrated as Chappelle joked about his prior controversies

with the LGBTQ community as well as homelessness. Okay, let's pause for a second. You know who Dave Chappelle is, and you know why Dave Chappelle has been in the headlines recently, and he has not been quiet in regard to defending his transgender jokes. So it's not like he showed up to the Hollywood Bowl, not knowing that Dave Chappelle is going to perform or that he has a set. No, he's totally full of crap, okay? Oh, I went there and, oh, I got triggered by his trans jokes. Then don't go.

No, yeah, you didn't think he was going to do trans jokes? All that he's been in the news for is trans jokes. So that's absurd. Second of all, why did you bring the knife? Did you get triggered and then go back home and get the knife and come back? No, you brought the knife ahead of time because you knew what you were going to do. Prosecutor, Ugar. That is a great point.

Yeah, I guess going to step aside. Let me handle this case. Honestly, please. I mean, I would love that. Now, look, that's not to say that I'm defending Chappelle and his trans jokes. Look, I went to the same show. I knew what I was going to expect. I knew I was probably not going to like Dave Chappelle's set as much as the other sets.

And to be sure, that is exactly what happened. But you're allowed to dislike someone's set. You're allowed to speak out against it. Okay? You're allowed, in fact, you are encouraged to not support that comedian by going to his or her show if you don't like their comedy. You do not have a right to physically assault someone because you don't like their jokes. Period, period.

By the way, the show was great with, you know, Dave Chappelle, it's just, at this point, honestly, aside from the transphobia, it's just boring. Like, obviously he's got like a, he can't, like, he's obsessed with this issue. And he, like, started his set with politics. And I was just like, I want to hear anything other than politics. Even if you agree with me 100% politically, can we please? I want to laugh, I want to have a good time. I don't want to remember how terrible the political climate is in the country right now.

I mean, at this point, if you want to hear actual comics who go and see up-and-coming comics, because all the well-established comics are rich, so they've almost all turned into Republicans. And their idea of a funny set is like, don't poor people suck. I went to Walmart the other day. They're poor and I'm not, oh, like Chappelle made a joke just like that. Yeah, he did. Okay, and then, oh, trans people, they look different than me. Remember Dave when people thought you look different and they beat up on you and used to make jokes about that?

And it was good because you were defending the powerless. Now you like to punch down because you think you're such a tough guy. And all those comics that are rich Republicans now, they all think they're so tough. They're like, oh, I'm so courageous. They tried to cancel me out of my $20 million contract, but I did it anyway because I knew for a fact that I was going to get to $20 million. And you know what? I made fun of the people who had the least power of the country. I'm so brave.

Now you're not. You're a jackass. Now having said that, I don't care if he's a jackass. You don't get to assault him. Right. And you don't get to use an actual trigger because you felt triggered by words. No, it doesn't work that way. And by the way, all you do is hurt the cause.

Exactly. Thank you. All, you know what you want, you should, you can do when he does that? You can boo him and then Chappelle will catch feelings, you have the right to speak, but you don't have a right to boo. I guarantee you would say it because he's a Republican now. So he'd get, he'd catch all sorts of feelings. You should boo his sorry ass the kingdom come, okay? But you do not get to assault people that is a red line and it should be punished significantly.

Yep, could not agree more. All right, well, let's move on to other things. Let's discuss former president of the United States supporting a violent civil war. about how the United States needs a civil war. Now he did this on truth social. Hey, look at that, he's using truth social, finally, his own social media platform. And how he did this was it all started with a post

by one person, the president of El Salvador specifically, who said the most powerful country in the world is falling so fast that it makes you think, what are the real reasons? Something so big and powerful can't be destroyed so quickly unless the enemy comes from within. Yeah, Republicans. Now, Lara Logan decided to share that statement, and then it was, quote, truth, I guess. I don't know what you would call it.

Just quote tweeted. Quoteed. You know it. Yes. Were you kidding with your BS truth? It was quoted by someone else on the platform who says Civil War and Trump retweeted it. Yeah, by the way, it was retweeted by Maga King Thanos, quote tweeted. Sounds very cool. I'm sure he gets laid often. Yeah, and but I, the right wing, I'm sure loves it. They're like, oh, Thanos, who killed half the people in the universe in that mythology, and they celebrated. Oh, the mass murder, the greatest mass murder in the history of the universe. They're like, yes, that's our guy. We love that guy, right?

And Maga King, of course, is what Biden's dumbass consultants came up as an insult for Trump. And of course, they instantly adopted it. But guys, let's focus on the most important thing here. That's the president, former president of the United States distributing on social media the call for civil war. Yeah, and let's be clear. When they tell you who they are and what they want to do, you should believe them, especially Donald Trump, who said all sorts of outlandish things during the 2016 presidential race. And people kept saying, myself included, by the way, so I'm calling myself out. Oh, he's a wild card, we don't really know for sure. No, he tried to do everything he stated that he was going to do.

He didn't succeed on all of it, but he certainly tried. And the fact that you now have a former president of the United States pushing out messaging, calling for civil war in the United States is beyond irresponsible, beyond dangerous, and I don't know what to do about it, especially when you have the right wing in America refusing, refusing to investigate the very real threat of domestic terror within our borders. I mean, we just had a mass shooting in Buffalo where the mass shooter believed in the white replacement theory and felt that he needed to purge the country of non-whites. Yeah.

So guys, for a lot of you out there, you're wondering, like, what do you guys? Like, we all know this, right? Like, the right wing is dangerous. They keep calling for violence and civil war. We've told you this, that 100 times that 40% of Republicans say it's time for violence. The reason we keep saying it, guys, is because you have to understand that in Washington, no one actually believes it. Like they live in a different reality, completely.

And in their bubble, they think this is all fun in games. The Democrats see that and go, oh, good, good, we'll use it for a fundraising email. No, not good. They mean it. Remember the last time when they broke into the Capitol chanting about how they were going to to murder political officials and how they had zip ties and nooses, et cetera. Remember when Trump actually had fake electors that he was going to put in place to do a coup in America?

And they're like, oh, yeah, but I mean, they're not going to do it next time. No, they are going to do it next time. They are going to do it. And they are going to do it. And by the way, it's not just the idiot Democrats who are like, oh, what fun-rising emails when he said, eh, having, like, they're like, oh, no, no, that's right. We're going to run more corporate, morally. Right.

And then we'll just get our asses hand. Oh, I bet Americans love insider elitists. No, they don't. No, they're reprehensible that they're letting this happen. But also the media, whistling past the graveyard. Totally. Yeah, oh, I'll call it 50-50. I can't tell.

I can't tell. No, he's, the former president is saying civil war. Okay, guys, look, in my life, I've been covered in politics 25 years. Pre-Trump, this kind of thing would have been the biggest news story. news story of my lifetime. Exactly, yep. So here I'll give you an example. Imagine if Barack Obama on social media posted a call for civil war, even today, everyone would lose their minds. And the media would go, how do Barack Obama? I can't believe it, right? And Trump does it.

Everybody's like, oh, it's Tuesday, it's not a big deal, no big deal. No, it's a giant deal, because Obama isn't going to start a civil war. He would never say that. But even if he did, He's never made any indication that he would go in that direction. He'd much rather do a deal with a banker and go back to Nantucket or wherever the hell he lives, right? But Trump has actually already tried to do this. But no one in D.C. cares. They don't care at all. They're just like, where's the corporate cash?

It's business as usual. That's exactly right. In fact, they probably think, well, maybe this is something we can campaign on. This is something we could fundraise on. This is great. Trump is handing us a gift. And then we can shame any voter who doesn't support. support the Democratic Party because look at how dangerous the Republican Party is.

It's their playbook. It is the Democrats playbook over and over and over again. And look, you also have to keep in mind that a huge portion of Republican voters already believe that they need to resort to violence because the country is being taken away from them. In fact, Michael Shore had interviewed some Trump supporters and I remember this one interview. Let's take a quick look at this video because it gives you a sense of what Trump is playing into. I can tell you right now, if they steal the election, all bets are off. How about Civil War?

Let's go for it. Everybody has had enough, enough. You want to play this game more? Watch what happens. And we are swimming in guns in the United States. And guys, look, it's not at all theoretical. We just had a shooter, do white, kill black people. based on white replacement theory.

And he said, we gotta start mass violence. And by the way, so did the synagogue shooter in Pittsburgh, so to the synagogue shooter in South in Southern California, so to the shooter of Latinos in El Paso, Texas. They kill all those people, they're all saying, hey, do violence like me. And guess what? The next person is doing violence just like them. We're not gonna have a civil war where we're gonna dig trenches.

That's not what's gonna happen. What's gonna happen is exactly what happened in Germany. It's already happening, where their side, The right wing starts doing vigilante murder, left and right. Their own politicians protect them. The other side is incredibly weak and thinks, oh, what's in it for me? What's in it for me? Fundraising.

No, you morons, fight them. Fight them, not in their way with weapons, but actually fight back rhetorically and politically. So you can actually, for God's sake, raise wages, give people health care. That is the best way to fight them so we don't. lose and we don't hand a country over to fascist. So they're going to do violence nonstop. This is right after the Buffalo shooting. And Trump's like, good, give me more of that violence.

And right now, people are being intimidated as we speak. And so finally, what is the Democratic response to that? Nothing. We don't even have to get into it. Nothing, it's nothing. No, Anna, let's be fair. Let's be fair. They focused group and did studies for six months to come up with the phrase,

Ultra MAGA. Oh, good job. And you know what I don't know why? Because Biden is too scared and loves Republicans too much. His heart breaks for them. He didn't want to criticize Republicans. So he said, oh, we could just call them Ultra MAGA. Which, by the way, they have now taken on as like favorable labeling.

Yeah. Because it sounds cool. Like it does. Ultra MAGA sounds cool. It sounds like you need an extra large condom. Okay, that's what, I mean, these are the idiots that are in the Democratic Party. And they're like, let's call them Maga King. You didn't think that they'd like that, you morons?

Oh, no, but Biden, he can't be bothered to fight Republicans. He can't. Those are his best friends. It would be so impolite. The other side is literally murdering people. And the former president is calling for mass violence. And our side has got little gloves on. And they're like, eh, where are we having keen crumbets?

Have you raised money for it? Oh, my God. Oh, look at Ultra Mega. No, the fascists are going to win and fairly easily if this continues. All of Democratic leadership has to be replaced. Progressives need to actually be populist and take over the Democratic Party. Otherwise, we're all screwed. But that is very unlikely because the corporate press hates progressives,

whitewashes Republicans, and encourages the worst politicians in the country, corporate corrupt Democrats. That does it for our first hour. When we come back for the second hour, we will start with some good news involving video game quality assurance workers. It is some positive stuff to start the second hour of the show. So don't miss that. We'll be right back.

young Turks, support our work, listen ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.