The Young Turks - The Young Turks 01.15.18: Trump Sh*thole Comment, Hawaii Missile Scare, Taxpayer Funded Sexual Harassment, and Eliza Dushku

Episode Date: January 16, 2018

A portion of our Young Turks Main Show from January 15th, 2018. For more go to http://www.tytnetwork.com/join. Hour 1:  Cenk & Ana. Donald Trump has defended himself amid international outrage over offensive comments he is accused of making about some African, Central American and Caribbean countries, insisting: “I am not a racist.” The US president was condemned by the United Nations and the African Union (AU) after it was reported that he had referred to Haiti, El Salvador and nations in Africa as “shithole countries” during a White House meeting last week. As Trump headed to dinner at his golf club in Florida on Sunday, he was confronted by a reporter: “What do you say to people who say you’re a racist?”  The president said: “No, no, I’m not a racist. I am the least racist person you have ever interviewed, that I can tell you.” Hour 2:  Cenk & Ana. The Treasury Department has paid nearly $300,000 since 2003 to settle employment claims against House member offices that included allegations of sexual harassment or sex discrimination, according to a Washington Post tally of data provided by a House committee. Actress Eliza Dushku earlier today accused famed stunt coordinator Joel Kramer of sexually molesting her when she was 12 years old during filming of True Lies. Her claims, denied by Kramer, are being confirmed by Sue Booth-Forbes, who was Dushku’s legal guardian on the set of the film. 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. You're about to watch what we call an extended clip of the Young Turks, and the reality is somewhere in the middle. It's a little longer than our YouTube clips, but it's actually shorter than the whole two-hour show, which you can get if you're a member. You can get an ad-free and make sure you catch every new story we do that day. You're going to love it as a full show. That's at t-y-T-network.com slash join.

Thanks for watching. Well, I'm the Young Turks, Jakey, Granite, Kusperian on a lovely Monday afternoon. It is, well, at least here in L.A., lovely evening for you guys in different parts of the country. It is Martin Luther King Day, my favorite day of the year. I love Martin Luther King. He's my hero, my role model.

I've got an MLK shirt on right here. Oh, yeah. That's from Shop TYT. They tell me it's 30% off today. Is it just today? Well, I guess you've got to panic an act today. Okay, we've also got other shirts. I may, I asked for these shirts, even though people are like, really, who's going to read a giant quote from Martin Luther King on your shirt?

And my argument is, everyone. Okay. Do you wear that shirt? I do from time and time. Yes. It says, we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. and man can't ride you unless your back is bent. Okay, no, no bending here.

Yes, goddamn right. I love Martin Luther King. We've got a couple of those quotes at shoptyt.com. And the thing that I'm going to say, two more things about Martin Luther King, then we've got a hell of a show for you guys today. But one is, I can't get past not only what a great brain he had, What a great heart he had. So I would argue that Martin Luther King is the best, let alone fighting for freedom

and civil rights for everyone. But the best at giving speeches that I have ever heard, ever, ever, ever. It's possible that in the history of humanity, some people gave a speech in Spanish or in Lithuanian that I didn't hear and they were better than Martin Luther King. But of all the ones that I have ever read or seen, Martin Luther King is head and shoulders above everyone else. But even that is not his number one trait. And I talk about this often.

He said, we don't go down to the south just to liberate African Americans from the plight that they are in. We go to liberate the white racists from the hate in their heart because it's killing him. God, that is so magnanimous. I can't, I can fathom the speeches. I cannot fathom a heart that large. And so, yeah, I know, I know.

And I got to be honest with you, it's not what we do from time to time we do it. But I don't, obviously, I'm not that good a man. We come to kick ass and fight the aggressors. But he was better than that. And just you cannot respect the man enough. And so hats off to him, obviously, on today's show and always. But the second thing is, I also feel, as he said in one speech, sometimes I get discouraged.

But there is a bomb for the sin sick soul. So we are looking for that bomb and we believe that we will find it for the country and that our sin sick soul, which is among its darkest hours today, with Trump in office, a deeply racist president in office in the year 2018. That we will find it, we will find that cure, and we will bring the country back to the vision. Martin Luther King had. Okay.

So, having said all that, hell of a show. We've got the shithole comments, obviously. We've got a thousand different variations of that. He goes, Trump goes after Palestinians. We will talk about that. They go back after him. And I think my favorite story today is Chelsea Manning. And I wonder if I will surprise you with my.

thoughts on that. Yes. And putting aside MLK day, which always puts me in a good mood, otherwise, I am in a salty mood. So anything can happen on today's show. Everybody buckle up. Okay. All right. Okay. Yes. Anna, take it away. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-The Republic or UNFTR. As a young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations are constantly peddle. lies that serve the interests of the rich and powerful. But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies, debunking the conventional wisdom.

In each episode of Un-B-The-Republic or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood or purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be. Featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational,

aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, you must unlearn what you have learned. And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or, you're uprooting and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime. So search for UNFDR in your podcast app today and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained all at the same time. Today is MLK Day and unfortunately on this day, a debate rages on regarding just how racist our

president is. The comments that he made in regard to El Salvador, Haiti, and African countries, calling them so-called shitholes, is something that people are still talking about. And the president has now denied that he has said it, even though Senator Durbin stands by his statements that he did, in fact, say what he said. And there are now other lawmakers who are coming to Trump's defense saying, no, no, no, he didn't say a shithole. He said something else. Now, before we get into all the details of who said what, let's take a look at Trump's denial after a press pool reporter asked him whether or not he made these statements. Do you see what various senators in the room said about my comments? They were made.

No, no, I'm not a racist. I am the least racist person you have ever seen. Because he knows. He knows every individual that that reporter has ever interviewed in his lifetime. And no, you are the most racist president we've had in modern times, at least. Yeah, so who says things like I'm the least racist person you've ever known? Usually a racist. A stable genius says those kinds of things, I guess. Okay, so, I mean, look, I don't want, every time this comes up.

I don't want to relitigate his whole history of racism. I'll just leave it at. I do. Yeah, central part. Yeah, all right. No, no, no. I actually want to thank the New York Times for compiling the definitive list of all the racist things that Trump has said. That list is so long that I unfortunately cannot recount everything for you.

But here are the doozies, okay? And I tried to keep this as short as possible, but it was quite a task. He began his 2016 presidential campaign with a speech disparaging Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists. In December of 2015, Trump called for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States, including refusing to readmit Muslim American citizens who were outside of the country at the time. In June of 2017, Trump said 15,000 recent immigrants from Haiti, quote, all have AIDS, and that 40,000 Nigerians, once seeing the United States, would never go back to their huts. In Africa, he spent years suggesting that the nation's first black president was born not in the United States,

but in Kenya, a lie that Trump still has not acknowledged. Trump falsely claimed that President Obama issued a statement for Kwanza, but failed to issue one for Christmas. So you know what? Let's give him the benefit of the doubt. He didn't call those countries shithole countries, okay? But how do you answer to the long list of terrible, racist things that you've said and owned up to? Yeah, to me, the Central Park Five is the worst of the worst.

his five black kids, they were accused of rape, Donald Trump took out a full page ad calling for their execution. It turns out that they didn't do it. And years later, we find out definitively they didn't do. They caught the real rapist with his DNA, et cetera. They let those guys go at that point. Donald Trump said, I don't care. I still think they should be in prison. Why? But we know, we know for a fact that they are innocent. He doesn't care. He's five black kids attacked in his mind, attacked a white woman, doesn't, it's, they must have done something. I mean, why, why? If there was five white right wingers from Kansas who were falsely accused, and we found out later, oh my God, they didn't do it. You know what I'd say? Let him out of prison. Are you crazy?

Let him out of prison. What kind of monster would call for the death penalty for people who have been exonerated? He's the worst of the worst. Anyway, I don't give him any benefit of that. Yeah, neither do I. Definitely said it. And we're going to prove it in a hilarious excuse in a minute, but Anna's got more. Yes, I do have more. I just want to read you a couple more. Just to refresh your memory, he frequently criticizes prominent African-Americans for being unpatriotic, ungrateful, and has referred to NFL players as sons of bitches. But the ones taking the knee, which are almost all-black.

Exactly. He called Puerto Ricans, who criticizes administration's response to Hurricane Maria. By the way, Puerto Ricans, who are in fact American citizens, he called them politically motivated ingrates. In-grates, that's really classy. He has called some of the white nationalists in Charlottesville, Virginia, very fine people. Trump pardoned Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff sanctioned for racially profiling Latinos and for keeping immigrants in brutal prison conditions. In November of 2017, during a meeting with Navajo veterans of World War II, Trump mocked Senator Elizabeth Warren as Pocahontas. Also, don't forget that Trump's real estate company tried to avoid renting apartments to African Americans in the 1970s. and gave preferential treatment to whites, and that's according to the federal government.

So I was being incredibly sarcastic when I said that I was giving him the benefit of the doubt. The point that I'm trying to make is that his comments about El Salvador and Haiti and African countries were not that shocking to me. Because for me, this is par for the course when it comes to Donald Trump. This is not surprising. This is to be expected. This will not be the last time he says something terrible and racist. And it not only has ramifications in regard to race relations in the U.S., it has ramifications

internationally, okay? He is not going to be an effective leader if he's a piece of shit like this. And it's unfortunate that we get involved in these debates regarding whether or not he's racist when the proof is right here in front of us, not from one instance or two instances, but from several throughout decades. Okay, and I don't want people to misunderstand it, because I think the Democrats often do a bad job here, and they try to separate Trump from the rest of the Republicans. Like, oh, the rest of the Republicans are okay.

or not. So right now you got Senator Perdue and Cotton lying for Donald Trump. By the way, later he'll throw them onto the bus and admit that he said it. And then they'll be stuck holding the bank. Okay, but they're saying they don't recall whether he said it. It's not like it happened 20 years ago. It happened a couple of days ago. What's there didn't recall or not recall? That's the poorest excuse I've ever heard. Senator Lindsay Graham, who was also there and who also heard it, and also confirmed that he, you know, referred to those countries as shitholes. reiterated today that his memory has not evolved and that he heard what he heard. Okay, yeah, I love the people whose memories evolve in this span of a couple of days.

So that is a Republican senator saying, yes, Dick Durbin is right. He said it. That's two senators, bipartisan. He clearly said it. Of course he said it. It's in keeping with everything that he's ever done. But I'm going to go further. Look, that Kwan's a comment.

So it's a lie. First of all, if you believe Donald Trump on anything, you're an idiot. All he does is lie. So he says the first black president we ever had celebrated Kwanza, but refused to celebrate Christmas officially. Now, why would you make up a lie like that? Because you're a goddamn racist, okay? So look, I think the word racist is charged. I get it, I get it. And people are like, it's a heavy charge. Let's put it that way, okay? So you shouldn't make it lightly. We are not making it lightly. he has an entire lifetime of discriminating against African Americans and saying abhorrent things about

blacks, Latinos on and on and on. And if you can't see that, man, you don't want to see it. And I wonder why you don't want to see it. It's because it's glaringly obvious. So I look, I think everyone, including those that continuously defend him, know that he said it. And they might publicly deny it. But internally, they know he said it and they, those who are defending him kind of love that he said it. And then there are those who don't even deny that he says it and make excuses or defend that kind of statement. Well, he's just calling it like it is. I mean, that's what you heard over and over again during the election. He's just calling it like it is. You think that it's a good idea to go after the allies of ours and refer to their countries as shitholes?

He didn't, he's not a blogger. He's not some random alt-right dude on Twitter. He's the president of the United States, you think it makes sense with the president to refer to a whole continent as shithole? And then turn around and go, what do you mean? I just called all of Africa a shithole. Why would that be perceived as racist? I can't quite tell. Did you make a distinction between the Nigerian economy and the economy of Botswana? Come on. He couldn't name Botswana if his life depended on it. Okay, no, he's like, Africa, shithole. Oh, what, whoa, how could not be racist. Listen, if you're defending him on that, I get it, dude. I get it. You don't like him despite the fact that he's a racist. You like him because he's a racist. For you, that's not

the bug. That's the feature. Just say it. Own up to it. Why won't you just come out and be honest? I thought you guys were so brave. All those alpha males of the right wing. What are you cowering in the bushes for? Just pop out and declare what you are. Say yeah, I don't like blacks and Latinos. I think they're inferior, right? Just say it. It, say it, and then we'll be done with it. Just, it's so obvious that that's why you like Trump. What else has he accomplished? Tax cuts for the rich, that's why you're rooting for him?

Why, are you a millionaire or a billionaire? No, you like that he's racist. So there were some comments from those on the right, essentially confirming what he had said and also criticizing him, so I do want to give them some credit for that. Eric Erickson, who by no means is a liberal, said the following on Twitter. Let's go to Graphic 12. It's weird that people in the room don't remember Trump using that word. When Trump himself was calling friends to brag about it afterwards, I spoke to one of those friends.

The president thought it would play well with the base, going to what you were saying, Jank, how it's not the bug, it's the feature for some. And then also the Associated Press had reported citing a person who spoke with the president, the AP reported that Trump doubled down on his reported comments from this week, defending the remark as not racist, but quote, straightforward assessment of the living conditions in the country's disgust. Okay, so Senator Scott and Purdue, you stepped in it by trying to defend him by claiming you don't recall what happened at that time hours ago, right? And now furiously continue to defend Donald Trump. You don't get it. He's going to admit it at some point. That's what he always

does. He goes, no, I didn't necessarily say that. And later he goes, yes, so what I did say it. But in the meanwhile, you lied for him like an idiot. And now he's going around telling friends, yo, of course I said, oh, so smart, wasn't it? So smart. I got all my racist base to like me again. Because Ann Coulter had yelled at him, and Tucker Carlson had yelled at him and saying, what are you doing helping immigrants with the Dream Act?

We don't want to help those kids who are really successful in America. We want to crush their dreams and hopes and send them back the countries they never lived in. And he goes, oh, yeah, yeah, that's right. My base is a piece of shit. They're deplorables. the worst people on earth. So I'll be like them. I'll call these country shitholes.

And then I'll brag about it to my friends. And now that's leaked. And we know he said it. Now you want to know the funniest excuse of all. Now, allies in the White House are saying, no, he didn't say shithole. He said shithouse. That's your excuse? That's your excuse.

That makes it better. Okay. All right. I'm pretty sure. Unfortunately, he's turned the White House into his shit house. We got to get him out, clean that place. out completely, okay? You want to talk about, they talked about how Bill Clinton disgraced the office.

This guy's an absolute monumental disgrace to all of us as Americans. You got to get them out and then just send in the cleaners to wipe that place. It's become filthy now with the racist that are in there, that are defiling the idea of America, our flag, and what we stand for as American citizens. I do want to toss to Mia Love, Representative Mia Love, who is a Republican. She appeared on CNN and was asked about whether or not she thought Trump's statements were racist. Let's hear from her. Were the comments racist, do you think?

Well, I think they were, yes. I think that they were unfortunate. I don't know if they were taken. I wasn't in the room. I know the comments were made. I don't know which context they were made. Jake, I can't defend the indefensible. You have to understand that there are countries that do struggle out there, but they're people.

Their people are good people and they're part of us. We're Americans. It was really difficult to hear, especially because my parents were such big supporters of the president. And I think that we have to do everything we can to make sure that we are coming from a place of compassion and we're speaking from a place of kindness. I mean, that is the at least minimal standard here. I think that one of the things we need to do is get people like me in the room. There are so many people that are that, frankly, I want to just make sure that everyone knows that I don't know if those comments would have been made if I were actually in the

room. There are so many people that really care about this issue, Will heard Carlos Kerbello, people on both sides of the aisle that should have been in that room talking about DACA. So that's the first thing. We have to make sure that we have the right. people in the room talking about these issues. There's a lot of healing. There's a lot of, I still think that he should apologize.

I think that there are people that are looking for an apology. And I think that that would show real leadership. Okay, so. Mia Love, by the way, just to really emphasize this, is the first Haitian American elected into office in Congress. And she more, just as important for the context of this story, she's a, conservative Republican. So now I'm going to say to Mia Love and Tim Scott, what Ben Manco was told me a long time ago and turned out to be right. You're in the wrong room and we told you. So Mia Love came

in and said, no, I don't know, Republicans love black people. And that's why I'm proud to be a Republican and she got elected in Utah. And oops, yeah, it turns out. No, look, you can't say it's not just Republicans that it's just Donald Trump. Republican voters had 17 choices in that primary. And it's It's not like they didn't know what Trump was about. Trump was very clear. He called Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. And he started surging in the polls right after that. That was not the bug, that was the feature.

He attacked all Muslims, including Muslim American citizens. But Mia, you're not Muslim, so you didn't give a crap. You're not Mexicans, so you didn't give a crap. And you wanted the tax cuts for the rich, and you wanted to please your donors, and whatever other thoughts that you had. And so you thought, it's okay, they won't come from me. I mean, they'll only come for the trade unionists, and they'll come for other people, but they won't come for me.

Guess what happened, Mia? They came for you. It turns out you're Haitian or your parents are Haitian. Now, all of a sudden, you find out that Republicans like Donald Trump, who is your leader, your leader, your leader, okay? He's the leader of your party. And all those other Republican senators in the room defending him, they don't like you either, Mia.

Color me surprised. Tim Scott, only African-American Republican Senate. He talks to Lindsey Graham and another senator, another Republican from his own state of South Carolina and says, did he say? Lindsay Graham says, yeah, he said it. And so Tim Scott is aggrieved. Tim, you thought the Republicans weren't racist. Is that what you thought? Okay, I'm waiting for Tim Scott, Mia Love, and all those others to apologize to us and say, oh, I guess they were.

Oops, oops, all those times that they want to take civil rights away from African Americans. They want to take voting rights away from African Americans. They pretended Obama was giving out Obama phones to only African Americans. They said that African Americans are bums and taking welfare, and you helped them. Mia Love and Tim Scott, you helped them with that ideology. And then you turn around and go, he's coming after me. It turns out he's racist. Yeah.

No shithole, Sherlock. So, I mean, look, Trump definitely had some pretty terrible comments in regard to African-Americans. and blacks in the United States during the election as well. And so it's not like, you know, Mia Love didn't experience some of his statements regarding, you know, black communities throughout the country. She heard it. We all heard it. And he's an equal opportunity discriminator, you know, like he has gone after Koreans.

He has gone after every group of people you could possibly imagine other than whites. Except whites. Except whites. Because they're good people. Even if they're white nationalists who run people over and murder them, you know, There are good people on that side as well, according to Donald Trump. But what's interesting to me is that Trump has provided an interesting case study for the Republican Party. Because before Trump, remember what they were trying to do.

They were trying to rid themselves of that identity, of that discriminatory, hateful identity. They wanted to reach out to the Latino voters because they've always had issues getting them to vote along with the party. They tried to convince people that, you know, they didn't hate the black community. They wanted to, you know, create better opportunities for them. Trump comes in, he says all these crazy things, right? These terrible racist things. And it's interesting to see who falls in line with Trump, who basically says, yeah, yeah, forget about that agenda where we try to lie to people about who we really are.

We're going to go ahead and side with Trump anyway. You know, some Republicans aren't buying it, but a lot of them are, and it's really interesting. One last thing about me of love. So now she's getting a lot of love in the mainstream media because they love to give Republicans credit. They love it, right? It's me, I love it called out Donald Trump and, you know, saying that he's racist and he should can't defend the indefensible. But let's pause for one more second here. Put aside all the other groups.

Put aside Muslims. Nobody in mainstream media likes Muslims anyway. When he says, when he said during the campaign, we should ban Muslim American citizens from coming back in the country, people were like, oh, wow, that's a little controversial. I mean, if he said don't let the Jews back into the country, okay, everybody would have rightfully, rightfully been furious, right? But Muslims spit on them, move on, it's not that big a deal. Fine, okay, let's just talk about one group, Mexicans. So he said they're criminals and rapists coming into this country.

Mia, where were you? Oh, when it's about you, all of a sudden, you realize that the president is racist. But when he was going after Mexicans and saying those terrible things about them, where were you, Mia? Where were you? I didn't see you on CNN. I didn't see you jumping out going, wait a minute, our leader of the Republican Party cannot say these things about Mexicans. I didn't see you defending them. I didn't see you defending anyone else now that it's your parents.

Oh my God, it turns out he's coming after me too. Well, I didn't bargain for that. Well, I hope you got rich off of this and I hope you got powerful off of this and I hope you got whatever you aim to get out of it. But you get no credit because you never defended anyone else. So spare me the crocodile tears now that you find out Trump and Republican voters are also not in favor of you. Let's take a break. When we come back, we will talk about DACA and actual immigration policy. Thanks for listening to this podcast. You're only halfway through. So hold, hold, stay right here.

Just want to remind you if you want to get all five segments of the Young Turks commercial free. These are just two of them. Every day we do it. So go to t-y-tnetwork.com slash join, and you'll get the whole five segments, two hours. Add free. Do it now. All right, back on a Young Turks. Look, we got a great Rebel headquarters coming out for you guys in about. 30 minutes. Also on the show today is Erica Andiola. She is the political director of our revolution and she's actually fighting for a clean Dream Act. We were talking about the Dream Act earlier in the show and she's going to tell you how you could participate and how she's leading that fight for the Clean Dream Act. So that's going to be great. That's at 8.5 p.m. Eastern

right here. Santos Juante writes in, you would think with all these Republicans not running or retiring from office, Dems would smell the blood in the water. But they do. But Their sense of that is great, we're doing everything right, just steady as we go, right? A, lip shits right, saying, can T.Y.T. stick a microphone in some of the dam's faces and ask them why they aren't fighting harder. Yeah. We're trying. You know, one of the Democrats we did that too was Al Franken. And he ran, right? And he kept waiting. He kept his powder dry. He kept his powder dry. Now he just took his dry powder home. So look, whatever you think of how he resigned, that's a different issue. But for the time that he was in office, it would have been nice if he was a giant fighter for us.

There are two phrases that get used a lot in politics. One of them is keeping his powder dry. I don't know where it comes from, but it's weird and it makes me uncomfortable. The second one is a full-throated defense. Yes, that is definitely awkward. Just don't like those phrases, but they get used all the time. Well, in the post game, maybe I'll explain the powder dry one. And you know what, there's a story.

I don't know if we're going to get to it about Mandalay Bay, the shooting in Vegas. Oh, yeah. Yeah, but, you know, I just stayed at Mandalay Bay in Vegas. And I have a really interesting thing to tell you about the shooting based on what I observed there. So, yeah, we'll do that in the postgame today. That's for the members. TYT network.com slash join to become a member. Okay.

One last tweet for you guys. Jeff Horton says, stock market up. Number of immigrants coming to the U.S. down. Trump not impeached. Yet, conservatives are happier than pigs and shit or in a shithole. So, yes, those are all true. But don't get discouraged because... There is a bomb in Gilead to make the wounded hole.

There is a bomb in Gilead to heal the sin sick soul. God standeth behind the Demon, watching above his own. All right, what's next? Okay. A new report indicates that Congress members spent a whopping $300,000 to settle sexual harassment allegations and discrimination accusations against them since 2003. Now, this is a new report that was put out by the Committee on House Administration, and here is what they found.

No names were mentioned, unfortunately, but nearly $300,000 in taxpayer funds. funds has been spent to settle 13 claims against members of Congress or their offices since 2003 that include sexual harassment or sex discrimination. These accusations include three cases involving sex discrimination that total more than $27,000. Also, between 2008 and 2012, the Treasury Fund paid more than $174,000 to settle eight cases between 2013 and 2017. two cases involving sex discrimination or harassment were settled totaling $91,000. Now, the majority of the $91,000 was paid out because of accusations lodged against Farenthold, which we covered earlier on the Young Turks.

One of these settlements was for $84,000. That was the Blake Farenthold accusation from 2014. A woman who was his former communications director accused him of sexual harassment. Ferranhold said at the time, oh, it's okay, I'm going to pay that $84,000. Well, number one, only after you got caught. Before, you were perfectly happy to let taxpayers pay for it while you pretended to be a champion of saving taxpayer money as a Republican. And that was his big thing. I saved taxpayers' money.

I mean, unless I sexually harassed someone, in which case you pay for it. Then he got caught with his hand on the cookie jar, and he said, no, I'm going to pay for it. I think it was JR, our producer, J.R., Jackson, who said, no, he won't. And now we find out, no, not exactly. He's waiting to see what the outcome of this investigation will be and how Congress will move forward in, you know, having something put forward like the right, I don't even know how you call it, like the right way to approach these issues as opposed to having people sign non-disclosure agreements, using taxpayer money to settle these settlements. Can you imagine? I mean, look, Republican representatives, Republican members of Congress lose their minds over the SNAP program, which gives the poorest people in this country, the poorest families in this country, scraps, scraps so they can feed their kids, right? They lose their minds over that. But Representative Farenthold used $84,000 in taxpayer money to settle a sexual harassment case involving his own communications person. Like, can you imagine if one poor family got a one-time lump sum payment of $84,000 in taxpayer money? That would be the scandal of a lifetime in America.

They would not stop talking about it. This is absolutely ridiculous. You got accused of sexual harassment. You pay for it. Why are you using taxpayer money to do it? So there's two different things here, guys. So do settlements sometimes happen? Yes, okay?

And if you're a congressman, some of the settlements are as low as $7,000. You might pay that just so that you don't have bad PR, right or wrong. It might affect your race, and you might say, I didn't do it, but it's $7,000. And I can't withstand that kind of damage, right? And by the way, are all the cases true? Nobody knows because they're secret, right? And due process matters, right? So having said all that, why are we paying for their settlements?

Exactly. So, okay, you want to do settlements? I hear you, brother. You want to do non-disparagement. I know that it's not in vogue, but I think that there is validity to that. I think it makes sense in some instances. But why are we paying for it? Especially if you're Ferenhold and you talked about the bums on welfare,

and you talked about this and you talked about that, and how you're going to lower the deficit. And then you gave one and a half trillion dollars to the rich in your tax cuts just the second ago. So your donors are thrilled. You're thrilled because you're also rich. But he's one of the richest members of Congress. But for a sexual harassment settlement, he's like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not paying for it. Taxpayers, you guys are the suckers.

We're the ones who tricked you so that I can get in here and get myself a giant tax cut. You pay for my sexual harassment settlement. I'm just tired of the way the discourse in the country. goes when it comes to using our taxpayer money to benefit us, right? Anytime that money is used to benefit us, whether it's in helping those who are poor, you know, with food stamps, or, you know, making sure that the entitlements that we paid into are going to be something that we can take advantage of, like Medicare and Social Security when we're ready to retire. Those are all controversial issues that are always being debated,

right? We paid into it. It's money that we pay the first. federal government to ensure that we're taking care of. But those, that taxpayer money goes toward wars that we shouldn't be starting, right? Preemptive war. It goes toward nonsense like this, where we're paying settlements for, for lawmakers. I don't care if there are Democrats or Republicans. Taxpayer money should not be spent on settling their issues, okay? Whenever it comes to helping out those who are privileged, we never have the debate. So preach it, teach it. I couldn't agree more. One last thing on it. It's even worse than that, because when, for example, Bernie Sanders says, let's do college for all.

So that's the American dream that your kids can have the same chance as rich parents' kids, right? And you go, they don't even debate it. They just snicker. That's totally unrealistic. That's exactly what happened during the Democratic primaries. And all the Anderson Cooper's, they all snickered. Trump now calls CNN liberal. Go back and watch those debates.

They laughed at Bernie Sanders. He want to help the middle classes kids. That's not realistic. Now, the Iraq war, nobody snickered, and we spent trillion, we threw trillions of dollars, we burned it, and all those people died. And now these sexual harassment settlements, that's okay, that helps the powerful and elite. Nobody snickers, but you want to help middle class live their American dream. So we can't stand your priorities, and yet the people on TV and the people in Washington

can't figure out why people in the country are angry. Like all the millionaires we know are super happy. Yeah, we know. At TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech companies are taking control of our online lives, constantly monitoring us and storing. The new BMO, V.I. Porter MasterCard is your ticket to more. More perks. More points. More flights. More of all the things you want in a travel rewards card. And then some. Get your ticket to more. with the new bemo

ViPorter Mastercard and get up to $2,400 in value in your first 13 months. Terms and conditions apply. Visit bimo.com slash ViPorter to learn more. Our data, but that doesn't mean we have to let them.

It's possible to stay anonymous online and hide your data from the prying eyes of big tech. And one of the best ways is with ExpressVPN. ExpressVPN hides your IP address, making your active ID more difficult to trace and sell the advertisers.

ExpressVPN also encrypts 100% of your network data to protect you from eavesdroppers and cybercriminals. And it's also easy to install. A single mouse click protects all your devices. But listen, guys, this is important. ExpressVPN is rated number one by CNET and Wired magazine. So take back control of your life online and secure your data with a top VPN solution available, ExpressVPN.

And if you go to ExpressVPN.com slash TYT, you can get three extra months for free with this exclusive link just for TYT fans. That's E-X-P-R-E-S-S-V-P-N dot com slash T-Y-T. Check it out today. All right, moving on to other news. Actress Eliza Dushku has disclosed a pretty terrible thing that happened to her when she was only 12 years old and on the set of true lies, a movie that she starred in. This is a story that she has kept to herself and to a couple close, loved ones for a long time. But recently she felt comfortable enough to come forward and share

her account regarding sexual assault by Joel Kramer, who was the stunt person on the movie set. So I'm going to read portions of what she had posted on her Facebook page. It was a very long post, but these are the relevant portions of what she said. When I was 12 years old, while filming true lies, I was sexually molested by Joel Kramer, one of Hollywood's leading stunt coordinators. He disappeared. Now, she says that he had earned the trust of her parents and then convinced the parents that, you know, he was going to take her out to sushi and just have fun, nothing crazy. And that other people would be around and they should be going swimming with the other stunt actors in the movie, etc. And so the parents trusted him. And

he did the exact opposite of that. He took her to his home. And then, this is what she says happened. He disappeared in the bathroom and emerged naked, bearing nothing but a small hand towel held flimsy at his midsection. I remember how he laid me down on the bed, wrapped me with his gigantic, withering body, and rubbed all over me. He spoke these words, you're not going to sleep on me now, sweetie. Stop pretending you're sleeping as he rubbed harder and faster against my catatonic body. She also writes, When he was finished, he suggested, I think we should be careful about telling anyone. He meant I was 12 and he was 36.

And I remember how soon after when my tough adult female friend in whom I had confided my terrible secret on the condition of a trade that she let me drive her car around the Hollywood Hills came out to the set to visit and face him. later that very same day by no small coincidence, I was injured from a stunt gone wrong at the Harrier set with broken ribs. I spent the evening in the hospital. So she's alleging that since she told her close friend about what happened, he retaliated by allowing her to get injured on the set while performing stunts. Yeah. Now he denies it. I'll give you his statement in just a minute, but this is disgusting. Yeah. So he says, says, oh no, she was just bruised in that incident. So all of this is important. And boy, if after someone who tried to protect her yelled at him, he then allowed her to get injured.

It doesn't matter if it's bruises or a broken rib. And that is horrific. But it doesn't really matter. Like, that portion is extra, right? He molested a 12-year-old girl, if you believe the story. And that's, I mean, we're done, right? That's not close. Now, look, you do, if these were criminal charges, and I don't know if statute of limitations is run on it or not, we do due process in this country, okay? And he vehemently denies it. But boy, this sounds enormously credible. And there is backup after backup. So let's give you the denial and then the backup to her story. So Joel Kramer did end up getting fired by World Production Agency. Also, he says these are outlandish manipulated lies. I never sexually molested her. I think she's making

this up in her imagination. Now, if you read her entire account on Facebook, which I highly recommend you do, it's incredibly detailed. And she talks about a number of people that she did confide in at the time that it happened. Now, the one person that she, specifically mentioned in that statement was Sue Booth Forbes, who was her guardian on set. Since she was a minor, she has to have a guardian on set, and that's exactly who she was. And Dushku did confide in her at the time, told her what happened. She was the person who came forward and told people on the set, those who had some authority about what had occurred.

And as a result, no one did anything. and it led to Joel Kramer retaliating, allegedly retaliating against Dushku on the set. Now, Sue Booth Forbes did corroborate this account, but did not name the specific people that she told. Yeah, so let me give more background too. So Kramer, I read his statement. It just denies it 100%. Lies, lies, lies, I can't believe this, I'm being persecuted, et cetera. Now, I think there are some people who are being persecuted in the news these days.

I don't think Kramer is one of them. That's my opinion. But we gave you his statement. And now you turn to Sue Booth Forbes, and she is awfully specific. She said she went to higher-ups. They complained about it. Other people knew about it. They also complained about it.

But the higher-ups, and why? Why are they protecting this stunt coordinator? Well, it turns out he worked on all the Schwarzenegger movies. Now, that doesn't mean that Schwarzenegger knew about the allegations. James Cameron, who was the director of True Lie, says he didn't know that if he had known, there would have been no mercy, okay? And he believes Dushku, and he's very adamant about that, okay? Now, I don't know, nobody knows who actually knew on that set and didn't know on that set.

Actually, Sue Booth Forbes might know, but she didn't name those names, and I don't want to get into that. But she says, no, we definitely told people, he definitely did it. And she said, here's another quote. Joel Kramer did what Eliza said he did. he is a, this is again from Sue Booth Forbes, he is a pedophile, and he must face the consequences. So there's the actress friend she told, her mom, Sue Booth Forbes, and according to Forbes, other people on the set. Her older brother as well.

And that was all not recently, but 25 years ago, okay? And the accident that she had on the set, the day that they confronted Kramer is in the records, she was taking in the hospital, there's no question about that. Now, nobody knows, other than those two, what happened in the hotel room, but why would a 12-year-old girl come out and take on this powerful person who's good friends with the main star on the set out of nowhere and insist on it? And then, but by the way, never publicly came forward. It's not like she had an axe to grind. It's not, it's not like she had an agenda. Anyway, we're over discussing this. This seems like an incredibly clear case. Also, I just, look, she, she just came out with her allegations. And I just want to really emphasize the fact that it's taken her such a long time to do it.

Because when she initially did come out, she did come out to family members. And they didn't know how to handle it because it was such a taboo topic at the time. So think about how far we've come in all this time, you know, since she was 12. But also how there's still a way to go. because even though this Me Too movement has been going on for a couple months now, she still didn't feel comfortable coming forward until very recently. And it's a scary thing to do. It's a scary to come forward and talk about what you've gone through,

especially when you initially told people it got brushed under the rug. There was one part of her statement where she talked about how after the apartment thing, they were both in a cab together and he had her sit on his lap and that the cab driver was looking at her, like they were making eye contact the entire time because she was scared. The cab driver knew something was wrong, but no one came to her, you know, to her defense. No one came to help her. It's just crazy. And think about the retaliation.

I mean, the accident happens the day that they make it public, at least on the set. And she's 12 years old. Do you think that they might have been able to ruin her career? Of course, it took a quarter of a century to gather up the courage. Now, imagine how many times that happened to it. like her and the women, and by the way, to guys from people like Kevin Spacey. So this has been an enormous problem for a long period of time. And so in this case, deliberation continues.

We got to take a break. Let's come back and we'll have some more news for you. Thanks for watching what I hope was a lovely edition of the Young Turks. Now, you know that that is two of the five segments that we do because that's free. We want to have you support independent media and can watch the whole show that we do every day. That's five segments overall, no ads at all. That's at t-y-tnetwork.com slash join. Come become a member.

Thanks for watching either way. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Jank Huger, and I'll see you soon.