The Young Turks - The Young Turks - December 10, 2020

Episode Date: December 11, 2020

106 House Republicans officially hate Democracy. Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks. 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, well, I'm the Young Turks, Janky, Granikasperin with you guys. Tons of monumental news, there's a literal revolt in the house, and it is literally revolting. We're about to tell you that in a second. Then disastrous news on COVID over and over and over again, disastrous news on establishment Democrats again and again. So we're supposed to agree with people who are clearly senile and clearly

corrupt. No deal, so you'll get rage on that later in the program. So if it looks like we're fighting both the right wing and the Democratic leadership, that's because we are. And neither one of us, neither one of them represents us at all. None of those people are progressive, the country's two-thirds progressive, and Washington is 95% conservative. So it's, so you'll see me rage about that throughout today's program. So you have that to look forward to. All right, the people who allow that to happen are you guys, because without you, we have nothing. And the fact that you power us has given us so much strength to get this message out because we're the only game in town. As far as major media

networks, we are now among the major networks. We've crossed 20 million subscribers, 16 billion views. It's our 15th anniversary online. And there is no other outlet that allows progressives. MSNBC attacked Bernie Sanders viciously yesterday, as usual, back to business. Anyway, t.com slash go is what has powered us throughout this year. And if we could finish strong on that, you guys would be amazing. And here's where we are right now. One million, seven hundred and five thousand. We're trying to get the two million. There's only about 20 days left, not about, yeah, 21 days, three weeks exactly. So every dollar matters and everyone who's ever contributed gets to say they made that change possible. And there's terrific

news for progressives coming up to. All right, Anna, let's get started. Turns out that House Republicans are signing on to Donald Trump's ridiculous allegations of widespread voter fraud, even though there's no evidence of that. So one of the biggest breaking news stories today is that a group of 106 Republican House members, that's more than half of the GOP caucus in the chamber, signed an amicus brief filed Thursday today in support of a lawsuit backed by President Trump that seeks to overturn the election. Now this is in regard to the lawsuit that was originally filed by the Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton, who again is facing some pretty serious securities fraud charges and is being

investigated for that. And maybe he's hoping that this is a way of getting a pardon from Donald Trump. But after he had filed that lawsuit directly with the Supreme Court asking that the court essentially overturn the results specifically in four battleground states that Biden won. 17 other attorneys general joined that lawsuit. And now we're learning that 106 House Republicans have filed a brief saying that they are supportive of that lawsuit. The brief was led by Representative Mike Johnson from Louisiana. And in an email to his colleagues, he apparently claimed that he was personally recruited by Donald Trump in order to gather a group of Republican lawmakers to file this brief. And it appears that there was a form of political intimidation

involved as well, because as we know, if someone doesn't sign on to what Donald Trump demands, he will attack them viciously on social media, which will lead to all sorts of pro-Trump supporters, you know, going after these particular individuals who have been targeted by Trump, which shows you how unbelievably feckless and pathetic these Republican lawmakers are. 106 Republican lawmakers, that's 54% of House Republicans. Yeah, so a couple of layers to this. First of all, Texas is a toxic stew of these government officials. Remember their lieutenant governor, Dan Patrick, is the one that said,

what's the big deal if older people get coronavirus? Well, hey, Lieutenant Governor Patrick, mission accomplished. They have it. We're breaking a record every single day, over 3,000 people dead again yesterday and the day before and the day before. So you wanted everybody and especially the elderly to get coronavirus? They did. So congratulations Republican politicians in Texas. Now Paxton comes in and goes, hey, why don't we destroy democracy while we're at it?

So in this lawsuit, we are asking that Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, et cetera, those States no longer have sovereignty. States rights that we were complaining about when we wanted to enslave black people and rip their families apart and break their bodies and own them. We loved states rights then. Now when our dictator wannabe has not been elected, now we hate states' rights. So we want to take Georgia's states' rights away, Pennsylvania's states' rights away. And we want to say that Texas should unilaterally decide who's the president, despite how other states voted. I mean, it's laughable. It's preposterous. It's the most un-democratic, most un-America thing you've ever seen. So, of course, the majority of the Republican Party is here for it. Because that's who they are. They're traitors. And the right wing has always hated America. Oh, they don't want us to own slaves. Let's declare war in America. Just so we can own other people and oppress them for the rest of time. Now, these guys realize, oh, we can't ever win another national election. Trump lost the popular vote by three million last time.

He lost it by seven million this time. Like, oh, that's it. It's hopeless. We're never going to win in a democracy. Well, when minority ethnic groups were in the minority and they couldn't win, it was great. We crushed them, we crushed them, right? Now when they're in the majority and we're in the minority, we need minority to rule. No, no deal.

It's a democracy. Now, they never, ever believed in democracy. They never believed in America. I told you, I told you, I told you. So those 106 traitors to America, the most un-American people I have ever seen, now sign up to this ridiculous lawsuit saying, let's toss out who won. We don't care who won. We want a dictatorship. We want tyranny.

We demand tyranny. Now in this case, they're the minority. So they're saying before the majority being tyrannical was awesome. Now we want the minority to be tyrannical and rule over you, even though we lost because we hate America. So there's a fantastic political scholar who teaches at Cooney, and he specifically talks about how, and this is a theory that I think was controversial at first, but it makes a lot of sense. Donald Trump as a president, as a Republican president, is actually an incredibly weak president, mostly because, the lack of popular support he has. I mean, when you think about the popular vote in 2016, and now the popular vote in 2020, it's abundantly clear that the majority of American voters

do not want Donald Trump. And so as a result, what Republicans rely on increasingly, in order to win, knowing that they don't have popular support, is essentially screwing around with the institutions, right? Screwing around with the courts, engaging in gerrymandering, doing what they can to essentially fix the system to their advantage against the will of the people. And that's what we're seeing right now in this particular case. One other thing I do want to mention is that there are some congressional Republicans who are certainly against this lawsuit and they're against the brief that was led by Representative Mike Johnson from Louisiana. I want to name some of them. So just two Republican House members, both of whom

are outgoing have gone on the record opposing the lawsuit with Representative Paul Mitchell for Michigan calling it a loyalty test and Representative Denver Riggleman from Virginia telling Forbes quote, I really respect some of these people, but this stuff is preposterous. That list is being built on disinformation. Also, I should add that a handful of prominent Republicans including former senators John Danforth and Lowell Wicker from Connecticut and former New Jersey the governor, Christine Todd Whitman, filed their own brief opposing the case while Ohio's Republican Attorney General filed a brief arguing federal courts lack authority to order legislatures to appoint electors without disregard, without regard to the results.

Yeah, I don't want you to give you a misleading impression. That's a tiny percentage of the Republican Party and most of it is a dead portion of the Republican Party. So Christine Todd Whitman was actually a moderate Republican back in the day. There are no moderate Republicans left. Riggleman's leaving, I think. And every Republican that is moderate is leaving because their base hates them. Their voters loathe America. They're like, I don't want a democracy. You support democracy. We're going to primary you. That's the most ironic thing in the world. But they genuinely believe that. So, and Danforth is a good guy. He's conservative Republican, but actually believes in America, but he hasn't been in power in decades and decades. So no, the active

Republican Party, now we should rename it the Confederate Party, because that's who they are. And so it's the new Confederacy risen again, and now they're talking about secession. Donald Trump this morning tweeted about quoting some deranged person on OANN said that things are going to, quote, escalate dramatically. This is a very dangerous moment in our history. and a coup is taking place in front of our eyes, and the public can't take this anymore. And Trump retweeted that like, yeah, it's actually not even a retweet. He took the quote and tweeted it himself. And he's like, that's a very dangerous moment, everybody.

Remember, let's take action right now. So he's a clear, he also tweeted that, oh, you know, Biden lost by hundreds of thousands of legal votes. No, Schmuck, you lost by 7 million votes this time. And he said he's an illegitimate president. You lost by 3 million votes last time. You were an illegitimate president. By your own definition, you've never been legitimate. But of course, logic need not apply for the Confederate Party.

So any Republican that still supports this a slow motion political coup, I've said it before and I'll say it a thousand times again, you are un-American, you hate our country. And you should all be voted out of office, but you probably will say, oh, well, yeah, I know, but I don't, votes. And we don't want democracy. We just want to grab guns and make it a dictatorship of the right wing. That's what you've always wanted. So just admit it. Admit it.

You hate America. Just admit it. And luckily, the only reason why I'm not even more furious is finally some portions of the mainstream media have woken up. And they're like, yeah, wait a minute, this does look like a bit of a coup attempt. It might not succeed, but it's definitely a coup attempt. And this is very radical and clearly undemocratic. Yeah, thank you. You're a little late to the party, but I really do appreciate it because you need clarity

on this issue. And last thing, guys, what part of losing 56 times is unclear? You went to court, you said you had to crack in and you had all the evidence. It turns out you had nothing, nothing. You don't have any evidence. No, losing 56 times means we're right. Okay, if you say so. And that's why I call them lunatics. All right, well, let's move on to coronavirus news. Lots of developments when it comes to the pandemic. So big news today, the FDA's vaccine advisory panel has voted in favor of recommending that the FDA approve Pfizer's coronavirus vaccine for emergency use.

Now, the FDA is expected to approve the vaccine this weekend, possibly on Saturday, and within 24 hours of doing so, as many as 6.4 million doses will be sent across the country. And so that is positive news, especially considering the fact that when you look at recent statistics in regard to this virus, you'll see that the United States is in a pretty dire situation. In fact, this This week, there are 10 times more COVID-19 cases than a month ago. And we found out that just yesterday on December 9th, 3,054 people died of COVID, marking another record of deaths in the United States. This is the highest number of deaths in a single day in the United States. Yeah. So it's great news that this is approved. It appears that the portions of the government that we need to rely on for actual accuracy

and science are not listening to the madman and the mad king, Donald Trump. So I don't think there's a reason to worry about this vaccine. I think the number one concern we have now is not getting it quickly enough and they're not being enough of the vaccine to go around. So of course, now the powerful are grabbing it. We showed you a story earlier about how the bankers now have found a way to move up to number two priority on the list. Insanity, the Republicans are now bragging about how they're getting it before anyone else,

the Republican politicians, they're laughing at their own voters, but we need more of this vaccine as quickly as possible to all Americans. As we told you earlier in the week, Donald Trump, of course, bungled it. The one company he didn't have a deal with was Pfizer, who got the vaccine first. And in his record-breaking incompetence, he as usual bungled it. And the crowd went nuts. And Republican voters are like, yes, more of us are going to die. We love Donald Trump. Coronavirus is no big deal. Smeared. Oh, now, at 9-11 happens every single day now because of the negligent manslaughter that Donald Trump

committed in coronavirus. And yet his own supporters are like, yeah, record number of deaths every single day. That's called winning. Okay, if you say so, lunatics. Well, speaking of Donald Trump's behavior, he has decided to target health care workers who have been working tirelessly to save lives. In fact, in Reno Nevada, one hospital is so overwhelmed with coronavirus patients that they had to convert a parking garage into an intensive care unit to treat coronavirus patients. And so CNN did a piece highlighting and detailing just what these healthcare workers have been going through. They spoke to Jacob Kieberman, one of the doctors at the renowned health hospital. And it's important to hear his story and what he's been going through. And more importantly,

how Donald Trump has decided to target him on social media, which has led to trolls harassing him and healthcare workers at this hospital. Take a look. My worst day this pandemic was actually the day I posted the tweet thanking my teammates. I had just finished a seven day stretch in the intensive care unit. There had been patient after After patient after patient who was not surviving this illness. The tweet he sent was a simple selfie showing off their new COVID-19 wing. That wing set up in the hospital parking garage. That fact seemed to set President Trump off, who retweeted a tweet calling it fake and a scam.

That unleashed the Twitter trolls. I was sad and devastated and I was angry. Devastated and angry because all of the hard work being done by his colleagues inside this parking garage hospital every single day. These are healthcare workers who have been on the front line since the beginning of this pandemic. They have not gotten a break. We have seen complete disregard for other people's lives in general. But I mean, the disregard for these healthcare workers is incredible, especially coming from Donald Trump, someone who has only exacerbated this pandemic in the United States, as opposed

to taking the proper leadership role in ensuring that we lose as few Americans as possible. And I want to share some more data from the COVID tracking project. Hopefully, you know, my home doesn't get rated for doing that. But the seven day average for COVID-19 deaths are at an all time high as deaths are rising throughout the country. The previous single day record was May 7th with 2,769 deaths. I mean, yesterday marked the equivalent of a 9-11. And Republicans don't care.

Lawmakers do not care. They do not care. Unemployment is going back up because many cities and states throughout the country are to do lockdowns again. People are desperate, economically frustrated. People are watching their family members and their friends die around them and get no help. But it doesn't matter. Donald Trump has decided that he's going to focus all of his energy on overturning an election that he lost Fair and Square. And then when he has a little bit of free time, he's going to go ahead and attack healthcare workers who are doing far more to help this country than he ever has.

Yeah, I can't do it anymore. I can't muster up any sympathy for Trump voters. You maniacs have unleashed all of this. So when you're a maniacal tyrant leader puts out a tweet saying attack a doctor, you guys all attack a doctor. The guy's trying to save lives. And you see the facts about a 9-11 every day from coronavirus, and you still pretend it's no big deal. And now my new favorite quote was from the South Dakota nurse who said on their deathbed. People were saying, I thought it was fake.

Trump told me it was fake. Now am I supposed to feel sympathy? I do. But at this moment of rage, when they're spreading it to other people who didn't ask for it, who didn't sign up to follow the idiot dictator, we didn't sign up for it. But he's the president now, he has not anything on coronavirus. There's not anything on it right now. All he's tweeting you know about his, me, me, me, me, me, rigged election, rig this,

rigged that, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie, lie. Hey, idiot, be president, do something. He's done absolutely nothing because he doesn't care about you. You're a pawn to him, you're a sucker and a loser to him. He looks at you and goes, die for me, idiots, and you do, and then you celebrate on your deathbed. Okay. So what do you want me to have sympathy for you? No, I have sympathy for every other American that has to live next to you. All right. Let's take a break. When we come back, we'll have more news for you, including how Trump appointees have tried to manipulate coronavirus data coming from

the CDC. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-Fing the Republic or UNFTR. As a young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media. and corporations are constantly peddling 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 and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, you must have learned 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. Anna, you still want to have that debate about calling trouble?

Thank you. Thank you. All right, let me, I can't even start on a good note. I'm going to start with comments that mirror my rage. Shadow Hawk writes and these are all member comments. Republicans now the definition of peckless cowardly and Trump must have something on them. No, they're craven. It's just they want power, they think they're going to lose power if Trump says it doesn't

mean tweet about them, they're going to get primaried. And they hate you way more than they care about your lives. So they think, I'm gonna hold on in my power. And if it means you die in the process, I don't care. Power, power, power. They're all smegals. Every one of those Republican bastards are smegals. Corporate Democrats aren't that much better, by the way.

And as Margarita Salt writes in, remember that lady who said in a town hall, never before did I think I'd ever want a dictator. But if we're gonna have one, I wanted to be Trump. We should have seen it then. She was a precursor the depths of Trump cults resolve. But I gotta tell you, I did see it. And I did tell you about it. And everybody yelled at me like, no, no, be nice to Trump voters. No, they don't want dictatorship. It turns out they do. They do want dictatorship. I was right. Anyway, Gerald says, Jank, you nailed it, the new Confederate party, disgusting, fascist, racist, sickos. You're 100% right. That's what they are. These Republican

When politicians now, now politicians that signed on these 106 congressmen, they're literal fascists. It's not on the road to fascism, it's not on the way to fascism. When you say I want to end democracy and impose a dictator, that is fascism. That is fascism. And if you're hurt by that, don't support a fascist. There I solved it for you, okay. song yes, right, said. Okay, now we're on a lighter note. I love TYT and its community. This is from

Super Chat. Thank you for using that. You've helped me survive 2020 without losing all my optimism and faith in humanity. Does that make you heroes? I think so. That's super sweet of you. I know you're partly joking, but can I get a happy birthday for my favorite heroes? Yes, absolutely. Happy birthday. And thank you for at least injecting a tiny bit of optimism in my rage-filled day. And speaking of which happy Hanukkah, everybody. It's the first night of Hanukkah. So unlike Republicans, we care about everybody. By the way, the next four years, I can, I'm not even going to do it. All right, and if you want to actually help save the world and make a difference, donate your change, round up your change so we can save this planet. You do that at t.yt.com

slash trees, okay, tyt.com slash trees, save the planet. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you. All right back on the Young Turks, checking Anna with you, Anna. Congressional investigators have been informed that the CDC director Robert Redfield had instructed staff to delete an email that was sent by a Trump political appointee seeking to manipulate the CDC. coronavirus data. So the senior member of the agency who spoke to this subcommittee within

the House essentially argued that the data that was being targeted was specifically aimed at watering down the CDC's morbidity and mortality weekly report to match the, I guess, lower numbers that were being spread by Donald Trump's disinformation campaign in regard to this pandemic. And so just to give you context on what this email was about, it was sent by Paul Alexander, who was the scientific advisor to Health and Human Services spokesperson Michael Caputo. Needless to say, both of them are out of government right now. Michael Caputo had a mental breakdown. So he and Alexander are no longer with the Department of Health and Human Services. However, this is what we know from the email. In Alexander's August 8th email, he insisted on an

immediate stop to all CDC MMWR reports due to the incompleteness of reporting. Nothing to go out unless I read and agree with the findings how the CDC wrote it and I tweak it to ensure it is fair and balanced and complete. Alexander added in a breach of scientific firewall that CDC has maintained for decades. So Alexander also attempted to prevent Dr. Anthony Fauci from ever speaking in a breach of scientific about the potential ramifications of this pandemic on children's health. Then the woman who was essentially in charge of editing and putting out this data ended up getting questioned by this House panel. Her name is Charlotte Kent. And again, senior official with the CDC,

she basically said that while she was out on vacation, someone who was filling in for her was notified by Redfield to delete that email. I was instructed to delete the email, she told the house. Kent was again on vacation when this happened. So when she came back and looked for the email in question, something interesting happened. She says, I went to look for it after I had been told to delete it and it was already gone. Kent also told investigators that the CDC, in an earlier incident, delayed the publication of a July report on coronavirus spread at a Georgia summer camp following a requested delay by Dr. Redfield and HHS. The report was held for two days and instead released about 15 minutes after Redfield conducted testimony to

Clyburn's panel. And the panel that was investigating this is led by Representative Clyburn, who released a statement in regard to this testimony saying federal employees have affirmative obligations to preserve documents and destruction of federal records is potentially illegal. And then he also warned in the letter that federal law also provides for up to three years of imprisonment for willful destruction of federal records. And so he claims that he has asked for documents from the CDC back in September, September 14th specifically, and they have not responded to his requests. He's threatening to subpoena officials and documents if they don't respond soon. All right, I want to be clear about a couple of things here, about who the good

guys and bad guys are. So this one is a little bit complicated. So the head of the CDC is Redfield. And Redfield is, in my opinion, a little bit fundamentalist in his religious beliefs. And that has affected some of his actions early on. But now here comes a huge butt. He actually turned around and his doctor side and scientific side seems to have won out in the middle of this pandemic as he probably saw the endless deaths and it affected him. And even though he started out as a, you know, very much a Trump guy, by the end he was defying Trump and saying, no, we must do science. And so this Paul Alexander email that got deleted, that's very clear. That was political interference saying don't do science. We don't care how many people die.

We just care about our dear leader Donald Trump and how he looks. I mean, filled with like big bold letters and highlighted in yellow and blue and red. I mean, just like the ravings of lunatics as always, right? So when Redfield says delete the email, it's possible he's saying it to cover up for the Trump administration because they're being asked to do something potentially illegal. But I think it's more likely that Redfield saying delete that crap and don't Don't listen to Paul Alexander, that moron that doesn't know a single thing about science. So, you know, Redfield might have technically violated the law and deleting the email, but

I think context and intent matters here. And I'm not positive about the intent, but based on all the contexts that I have read about Redfield, I would say by the end he was one of the good guys and he was trying to get rid of an email by one of the worst guys. Yeah, I would get rid of Redfield, to be honest with you. Because you should never, ever allow the CDC to be politicized in any single way, in any way. So why did he delay that report that Kent was testifying about the report that he delayed for two days after the White House demanded that he do that? Why? Why did he do that? It's supposed to be an independent body that's not politicized. That's not politicized at all.

We have a record number of people dying on a daily basis now. Record number of Americans died in one day yesterday. We don't even know what the total numbers are going to be. today. Okay, we don't have time to mess around with anyone who's even entertaining, bending to the will of a lunatic like Donald Trump. Yeah. Especially the director of the CDC. No, I agree with you. I don't think it's even a hard question at all. So if I was Joe Biden, I would immediately replace everyone in health care with folks who I only care about health care and not politics and not religion or not, you know, you know, Greek myths or Norse myths, I don't care. I don't, I, if you want to on your own time, it's a free country, bless your

hearts, okay? But this job is for a doctor and a scientist. So now, I'm just saying, I don't think Redfield was one of the worst at all. I'm not saying that I wouldn't replace him. I'd replace people that were chosen based on politics with people who are chosen based on expertise. This is, and I, and I wouldn't want Biden doing what Trump did in not even 1% of course and saying, oh, that's okay. I found a really good Democratic operative to put it to CDC. Hell no, I wouldn't want that. No, what I want is a doctor, a scientist. We've got over 3,000 people dying every single day. You're right, Anna, we can't go 1%, let alone 25% or 50% of the way towards appeasing people like Donald Trump and politicians. Just do the goddamn

science. Well, someone who's been pretty devastatingly ignorant about what average Americans have been dealing with with this virus is Rudy Giuliani. I mean, he's ignorant about most things. So let's talk about his coronavirus, you know, hospitalization and what happened afterwards. So Rudy Giuliani, who was recently hospitalized with coronavirus, is now out of the hospital where he will grace us with his, you know, annoying statements, which all the news companies will get baited into covering and all want to blow my brains out. It's fantastic. I'm excited about that. But this story really does highlight how there are two different classes in regard to who gets appropriate coronavirus treatment and who does not. And so he admitted that he

was treated by Trump's doctor. He had access to the same cocktail of experimental drugs that most people don't have access to. And he certainly bragged about it, especially as 3,054 Americans died in a single day on December 9th of coronavirus. So here he is on W.A.B.C. bragging about the access he got to Trump's doctors. something or other. Yeah. Yeah. So it's the cocktail. It's the, it's the same protocol that the president got it. Is that right? Yes. Yes. Right. All right. So I... Exactly

exactly the same. His doctor sent me here. Okay. So when... I didn't want to really go to the hospital. And he said, don't be stupid. We can get it over within three days if we send you we send you to the hospital. Well, I mean, it's wonderful news that you're feeling well. Well, I have to say the minute

I took the cocktail yesterday I felt 100% better. It works very quickly. Wow. So you bragged about how it's working very quickly, but I just want to emphasize that most people are not going to have access to Donald Trump's doctors. In fact, at this point, Americans would be lucky if they get access to a hospital bed, considering how overwhelmed hospitals are throughout the country.

More than a third of Americans live in areas where hospitals are running critically short of intensive care beds, federal data show. In El Paso, for instance, hospitals reported that just 13 out of 400 intensive care beds were not occupied last week. In Fargo, North Dakota, there were just three. In Albuquerque, there were zero. One in ten Americans across a large swath of the Midwest, south, and southwest, lives in an area where intensive care beds are either completely full or fewer than 5% of beds are available. There are other issues regarding access, which we'll talk about in just a minute. But, Jank, you want to jump in?

Yeah. So New Mexico is about to authorize doctors making decisions on who gets treatment and who doesn't, because they're almost completely out of beds. Now, and that means you can't go into intensive care unit. That means Donald Trump has created a situation where we're going to have death panels. So that's where we are today, and every republic in the country is obsessed with trying to steal an election instead of fixing coronavirus and getting help to these folks. To be fair, though, they rushed help the Rudy Giuliani and Chris Christie and Ben Carson to every elite that is part of Donald Trump's group of elitist friends. So, hey, Maga, did they rush treatment to you or your dad or your mom or your grandmother?

No, no, they let them die. But Rudy's sick. Oh, we got a rush treatment. You know, for the cocktail accommodation that he has taken, that is very rare. So to give you a sense of how hard it is to get in state like Maine, it's a smaller state, but the regeneron cocktail, only 98 of them, there's only 98 available. Once they're out, that's it, okay? That doesn't mean there isn't any treatment, but that's the one Rudy's bragging about how effective it is, right? Now, in Utah, By the way, a very red state, okay, they're trying to determine who's the most likely to benefit from the drug. So they're going to give them the drugs and the others that they determined cannot be helped enough. Well, off you go. And in Colorado, they're doing a lottery

system. Because unless you're connected to the elites like Rudy Giuliani, there's a decent chance they're going to let you die. if Rudy Giuliani is even aware of that because he continues to basically pretend as the like downplay the severity of this pandemic. So does he know about the differences in access and health care access that Americans are dealing with? Let's watch. My biggest concern though, Rudy, is the cocktail that you- 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 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

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You've been given is, from what I understand, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, it's not something that the normal American is going to be able to get. because it's quite expensive. Is that a concern for you? Well, I didn't know that. I mean, they give it here at this hospital. Certain hospitals can get it. I know there's a Northern Westchester Hospital, Westchester County Hospital.

They're a couple of hospitals. They went over with me the five methods of treatment that they have, and that's one of the methods of treatment that they have. So I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure about that. Yeah, of course he's not sure because he doesn't need to know. He doesn't need to be concerned with what average Americans go through on a regular basis. He doesn't need to be concerned about how this disproportionately impacts average Americans as opposed to people who either have positions of power or who have access to people in positions of power.

And so it is incredibly difficult to get this cocktail of drugs. It is incredibly expensive to get adequate coronavirus treatment. It is incredibly hard to find a bed where you can get treatment in a hospital right now. Reno Nevada, one of the hospitals in Reno Nevada just had to convert their parking garage, a dirty, dusty parking garage. They had to sanitize and turn into an intensive care unit. That's what they had to do because they're so overwhelmed with coronavirus patients. But Rudy Giuliani doesn't care.

It never even, like, he never even entertains the idea of understanding how this pandemic has destroyed the lives of countless Americans, has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, has destroyed small businesses. He doesn't care about that. He pretends like he hears about the small businesses, but you look at where the funding went from the small business loans and they disproportionately went to giant corporations that are in no way small businesses. He doesn't care.

We don't have representation. Like, you know, there's all this talk about, oh, we need representation of this gender or this race or this sexual orientation, which is all fine and dandy. But there's no representation for the poor in government. And I'm not just talking about Republicans. I'm talking about Democrats as well. You think that things would be like significantly different in terms of the differences in health care under a Biden administration? Biden and his friends are going to get top of the line treatment. Is he going to do what it takes to improve health care?

Nothing will fundamentally change according to what he told his donors. Yeah. So in terms of Rudy's cluelessness, he says in that interview that Trump's personal doctor, well, actually government doctor, more accurately, is the one that made him go to the hospital, as you heard, and take these very rare cocktails. And first of all, I don't know why someone who works for the government is helping Rudy Giuliani. Rudy is Trump's personal attorney and does not work in the government at all. So that's a misuse of our taxpayer funds. I don't give a damn about Rudy Giuliani.

And I don't want a single cent of mine being used on Rudy Giuliani. Second of all, he's such an elitist. I know he doesn't care about poor or middle class or other races. He doesn't care about any of that. He showed that even when he was mayor of New York, let alone lately, but he doesn't even realize that other MAGA people and Trump's voters and supporters can't get this stuff either. You know how much Rudy Giuliani is charging you guys? And when I say you guys, I'm specifically talking about to the MAGA guys in the audience, because you're the ones paying for it by donating to Donald Trump. He's charging $20,000 a day for his legal services. So of course he doesn't care what it costs. I don't know that he's

even paying it. And even if you are super rich, and now there's other articles talking about how the super rich are doing everything they can to get their hands on these cocktail of drugs because they're so rare because even if you're rich, you might not be able to get it because they're not available to most people. Rudy's like, so what? Don't you have Trump's doctor working for you? Don't you have the whole government at your footstep and can't you guys all afford it? I don't know, I'm making $20,000 a day off of your stupid ass. So I could afford it, no problem. I didn't even think about it, you guys.

I keep sending money, idiots. All right, we are going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we will talk about surprise medical billing and how a Democrat for the second time has defeated a bill that would end it. We'll be right back. Thank you. All right, so I'm going to read a nice note before I get back into the anger. Emma Jane wrote this on Super Chat and thanks for using that because it helps the show.

Anna, I hope this isn't weird, but I've been watching T.R.T. since middle school, I'm 25 now. And watching you be unapologetically intelligent, really inspired teenage me to be the same. Thank you. That's about the nicest thing I've ever heard. So thank you, Emma. We all appreciate it. And Sarah Grace. Thank you. I'm not in a good mood today. So please don't take my reaction personally. You should be unapologetic. about everything. Just because you're a woman doesn't mean that you need to be shy about your political views. You should fight and you should do so with conviction. And I'm really happy to have inspired you in any way. So thank you. One of the things I'm most proud of is

we put unapologetically strong women and people from all backgrounds on TYT. And if people don't like it, that's their goddamn problem. Okay, so Sarah Grace writes on Twitch, can we have Bernie back on? He sues me when I feel hopeless. Well, Anna and John did a great job with that interview yesterday, super proud of them. So thank you to all these folks on Twitch, Semperfire Dog, crazy Hawaiian in Pennsylvania who gifted a sub. We're doing a gifting program. Check that out on Twitch.tv slash TYT. Sir, Backpack TV, just signed up and said love TYT. We'll love you right back. Fifty first state gifted a sub. So I love the way you guys look out for each other. Now let me go to people who just join on YouTube. I hit the join button below the video,

Jose Gutierrez, Sally Rubin, Mary, Agatha, Terbiak, and David Waldman. So thank you all of you guys. We really appreciate it. Now let me go to our members section. Someone who likes Bernie Sanders I was about to jokingly say that they'll auction off the ICU beds, but in reality, we already had the auction. The elites get the beds and the rest of us get a chance. That's true. That's right. The elites already get the top of the line treatment, and the rest of us, good luck to us. And so why be normal rodent? The oligarchy will never empathize with the common men, especially when it comes to health care. That's why we need to stand up and fight back and support independent media. Thank you. And tyt.com slash join to become a member. I read those comments

more frequently because you guys support us and make this show possible. And you're absolutely right. All of the mainstream media betrayed you. There's never been a better time for Medicare for all. And they all lied against it so you wouldn't have health care right now. We look out for you. Thank you. We're back on Young Turks, Jenkin Anna with you guys. Look, today has been filled with news of how we need and desperately need change. So that's the change we try to bring you guys here on the Young Turks, both in how we cover the news, but also in fighting for change that's going to actually impact your lives.

So that's why we're doing to y.t.com slash go. That's why we deeply appreciate everyone who participate. Let me show you where we are now, and this will be the last three weeks. So if the more we can do there, we got 40,000 individual contributions. I love you guys so much. You make this show possible for these last 18, 19 years. So all right, and look, there's good news coming up for progressives too. There's tons and tons of hope.

We just got to get through these super dark times. This virus, this toxic, toxic virus named Trump, we just got to scrape him off of this country and be done with them and move on. We're almost there. All right, and then we'll fight the establishment. Anyway, Anna, what's next? Well, speaking of the establishment, this is what we're talking about, House Ways and Means Committee Chair Richie Neal, a Democrat, has defeated yet another attempt to end surprise

medical billing, which seems to be incredibly important as people are getting sick from the pandemic. So turns out that Nancy Pelosi of all people wanted to bake in a provision regarding medical billing and essentially regulating it and ending it within the stimulus bill. So as the Intercept reports, Wendell Premis, the senior policy advisor to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the most powerful staffer on the Hill had plans to send a proposal on surprise medical billing to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. By Monday night, however, that effort had been rebuffed. Oh, that's interesting. How? How did it get rebuffed? We should find out.

Well, in terms of which committees would deal with this type of provision, as the Intercept reports, the issue fell under the jurisdiction of the Energy and Commerce Committee, whose chair, Representative Frank Palone of New Jersey, hammered out a tough reform bill on the bipartisan issue with his Republican counterparts. But Neil decided to do some tricky maneuvering in order to ensure that his committee, the House Ways and means committee could essentially have their own recommendations, their own legislation on what to do about surprise medical billing. And as you can imagine, since he's funded by private equity firms who love, absolutely love this type of predatory behavior, his approach was

incredibly watered down and ineffective. So Neil, however, invented jurisdiction for the Ways and Means Committee. The panel has jurisdiction over taxation, and he linked the issue to government revenue in a rollout roundabout way and put forward his own proposal that was much more favorable to the private equity industry. And so some of you might be wondering, well, why do private equity firms want surprise medical billing? How does it benefit them? Well, they have essentially set things up in a way where they would profit off of surprise medical billing. Private equity firms have purchased providers and arranged service to maximize the number of out of pocket doctor, the number of times an out of pocket doctor can treat a patient. Those bills are then

exponentially higher landing at the feet of both patients in the form of co-pays and deductibles and insurance companies who pay the remainder. And for those of you who are wondering, okay, what exactly is surprise medical billing? It's when you do everything right, right? You got your health insurance that you're overpaying for. You got the health insurance that is not covering most of the things that you needed to cover. But you're going to go to a in-network doctor. You're going to get in-network care. And then what they do, without telling you, without informing you or asking you for your consent, they'll have one health care professional who's out of network be part of the treatment or part of the care. And then you end up paying the

costs for that out of network care that you didn't even know about. Richie Neal, a Democratic representative, the chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, wants to protect that kind of predatory behavior. So let's break this down a little further. First of Alicela Lacey with an excellent article on The Intercept. So great job reporting by her. And the mention of Wendell Primus in the beginning and their Pelosi staff is really important because he's deeply connected to the healthcare industry. He is not at all a good guy. He's one of the biggest opponents of Medicare for All. He makes Republicans look like choir boys compared to how hostile he is to Medicare for All. And even he is saying, I mean, we got to end surprise billing,

don't we? That's a booby trap built by the richest people in the country for average Americans that bankrupts them and steals their house from them, that steals everything they own, and does it in a way that there's nothing they could do about it. I mean, and in their most desperate time. I mean, we got to end that at least, don't we? Even corporate Democrats have to end that. Richie and he also says, no, I take more money from Blackstone, a private equity group than anybody, anybody, that's his top donor. And he says, so since they're my top donor, surprise, I'm backing them and not my voters. And so if you go to the hospital and you did everything right, like Anna said,

the part that enraged me the most is they do this on purpose. They try to get as many out of network doctors as possible to do the rounds in the hospital so they can go, oh, well, you didn't know it, but he was out of network. When you were really, really sick, you should have asked if he was out of network, which by the way, even if you did, he's already there. I don't even know that you could do anything about it. Sorry, he did the rounds. And so now you owe us an ungodly amount of money. I remember when I was going door-to-door campaigning. One woman said, she was like 68. And she said, well, look, the thing that I'm most concerned about is if I get sick, I'm sorry, she wasn't 68. She was under 65. And she said, I'm trying to get to Medicare. She said, because the one thing I'm worried about is if I get sick before I get to Medicare, I lose this house. There's no chance I could keep it, right? And then what am I going to do? I'm going to be homeless and sick. And so corporate Democrats like Richie Neal go, yeah, but you didn't contribute to my campaign and private equity groups did. So even though I got

all the other corporate Democrats and some Republicans to agree, and we didn't. And we We can pass this bill. No, my donors say no. And then the national media and corporate democratic zombies have the nerve to tell us, oh, you're doing a purity test. Richie Neal is a Democrat. So you should bow your head and accept that he's taking these legalized bribes and bankrupting people on behalf of his donors. You should accept that. You should accept, you should celebrate it. No, I don't. Richie Neal is one of the most corrupt people in Congress, and I cannot wait to defeat him. We're gonna go back and finish the job. Alex Morris ran against him. He lost because Richie Neal helped orchestrate a smear, a homophobic smear attack against him last time around.

And until the intercept again stepped in and corrected the record, all of the mainstream media went along with the smear. Well, next time, we're gonna come for Richie Neal and we're And we're gonna finish the job. I don't accept these corporate cult Democrats and their alternative facts that, oh, yeah, I'm progressive, but I hate the average American. And I work on behalf of private equity, no deal, no deal at all. We will primary you, and I swear to God, we'll defeat that guy. All right, well, we have limited time left.

So I'll just quickly mention the jobless claims are disastrous. Actually, no, we don't. We have another hour. My bad. So let's talk about jobless claims. Actually, you know what? Why don't we take a break right now if that's okay? And then we'll come back and do jobless claims.

Got to give you an update on what's happening with the economy. And then later in the show, we are going to discuss some of Biden's statements to civil rights leaders regarding progressives and his unwillingness to use executive power to circumvent obstruction by Republicans in the Senate. We'll be right back. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.co slash t-y-t.

I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.