The Young Turks - Trump Pillages FEMA During Hurricane Season

Episode Date: August 29, 2019

Trump is raiding disaster relief money during the worst time of the year. Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian, hosts of The Young Turks, break it down. 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. Hey, guys, you've heard of the Young Turks podcast because you're listening to it right now. But make sure that you subscribe and give it a five star rating if you like it. Thank you for listening. All right, back out of Young Turks for another day. Okay, we got a lot of stuff for you guys.

I'm smiling now, I'm in a good mood, but we got a fighter show today. So yesterday there was four different stories of Republican snowflakes getting their feelings hurt and crying. Today we got a lot of story of fighters, so wait to hear me on Deutsche Bank. Oh, the Democrats are the worst. They're the worst. And anyway, I'm so frustrated. We'll get to that later.

But buried in one of these stories, not that one, another one, is a little old lady who Donald Trump tried to steamroll. And he mess with the wrong lady. Guy, you're going to love that story. And then the fighting continues all the way through the third hour where we have maybe the two toughest guest we've ever had on the program. One's a cage fighter who's now running for Congress as a very strong progressive and others OJetta. Jesus. Lord mercy, this is going to be a strong show. And speaking of strong, we try to raise $100,000 for hosting a climate crisis debate slash town hall. I was hoping we could do it eventually, but it was ambitious. We did it in 24

hours. So tyt.com slash town hall. We're going to keep going. We're going to try to make this as good an event as we possibly can. And by the way, some people are asking, hey, debate or town hall, you know, what's going on here? Super legitimate question. As I said from day one, minute one, the whole point is to try to get a debate to get them all in the same stage together. We are perfectly aware that the DNC rules do not allow that. We are trying to break the DNC blockade. And so it is an ambitious project. So we're working on moderators, candidates, groups that we're going to work with as we speak. If you want to keep on going there, t-y-t.com slash town hall. That would be great. I believe we're past $125,000 now. So you guys are

amazing, best audience in the world by a factor of a million. So let's go do this thing together and let's kick some ass together. And I want to enlist you guys and also on another important project today that isn't about money. It's about taking action against corporate Democrats who are stooges for Trump. All right, now let's get started. All right, what are you got there? And I just want to mention we're at 129,400. Wow, okay. Jesus and Lord mercy. Keep it rolling, brothers. Oh, by the way, the Wolfpack film, done. Past $50,000 earlier today. You You guys are amazing. So they're gonna, they have enough money for that, and they're gonna go forward.

Best audience in the world, we do the show together. Let's do it. All right. Donald Trump is diverting hurricane relief funds and funds for the military for his border wall. This was a big story that broke yesterday and we have some more details today on how this is supposed to go down. According to the NBC news reporting on this, the Trump administration is pulling 271,000 million in funding from the Department of Homeland Security, including the federal emergency

management agency's disaster relief fund, that's FEMA, to pay for immigration detention space and temporary hearing locations for asylum seekers who have been forced to wait in Mexico. Before I give you some more details, I just want to note that this money is actually separate from the $4.6 billion, Nancy Pelosi willy-nilly gave Trump and then turned around and criticized the squad for being against. Let me continue. ICE would gain $155 million, all from FEMA's disaster relief fund. The Department of Homeland Security will lose $116 million previously allocated for Coast Guard operations,

aviation security, and other components in order to fund nearly 6,800 more beds for immigrant detainees. Also, real quick, combined with existing space, the funding would allow ICE to detain nearly 50,000 immigrants, at one time. And remember, this is the logical and natural next step after the Trump administration essentially said that they would no longer follow through with the Flores settlement and allow for migrant children to be held in and imprisoned indefinitely. Okay, this is of course as another huge hurricane bears down on Puerto Rico. We're gonna get to Trump's comments on that in a second. But first, I wanna go to a hilarious quote from one of his spokespeople, Hogan Gidley, he said the Democrats know that this money

isn't being diverted from anything that could be used for recovery efforts or preparedness efforts. Now, let me reiterate where they took it from, FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund. Yeah, okay, so they definitely took it from funds that are meant to help victims of hurricanes, and it would definitely affect the things that Hogan Gidley just said. said that it would not affect, because he works for a pathological liar who sends him out to lie every single day, and that's what Gidley does. It's a preposterous claim, but they live in an Orwellian world, so they don't care. They could say the exact opposite of the truth and not lose any sleep over it.

So understand that Congress voted to allocate this funding to these various organizations or government organizations, and then the Trump administration has decided to take that funding and place it wherever they'd like to do, wherever they'd like to place it. And at the same time, you know, there's absolutely no conversation happening with Congress. I mean, we're supposed to live in a democracy, right, where there's a system of checks and balances. And he's just completely bypassing that, because why wouldn't he? He's an authoritarian, and we have Democrats in Congress who refuse to do anything about it.

I mean, Nancy Pelosi isn't doing anything about it. What's the point of having Democrats control the House if they're gonna sit back and let Donald Trump just take money away from FEMA, which is desperately needed right now, that hurricane's gonna hit Florida. I'm very curious to see what Trump has to say about that. Well, if it hits his voters or white people, he might be slightly interested. Okay, we're gonna get to Puerto Rico, like I said in a second, but I want to double down on what Anna is saying. You, previously in America, you could not just take money that was assigned by Congress in law that the president signed into law, that's how things work, and just say, no, I'm just going to take it and use it for something else.

That's not what happens in our form of government. Now, these are the same Republicans who pretended to care when Obama was doing executive orders. They're like, oh my God, executive orders are unacceptable. Now, Trump has crushed Obama's record on executive orders. He's done far more at this point than Obama had ever done. And now he's going around saying, well, I don't care what Congress appropriated the money for.

I'm just gonna take it from there and we use it somewhere else. Now, on top of the crimes that he has committed very, very, very clearly, this is a clear violation of the Constitution. So it's not one of those things that's arguable. You can't, well, okay, then Republicans, really, we have this rule now? Okay, what if we have a progressive president? Can he just say, you know what, I don't like the Pentagon's budget. I'm gonna move it all towards the Green New Deal.

All right, maybe not all of it, I'm gonna move half of it. I'm gonna move $350 billion over to the Green New Deal. Do we have a deal? Is that the new rule? I can live with that rule. You want that rule? No, all of a sudden you're gonna start crying and go, oh no, no, it's unconstitutional. Well, this is unconstitutional.

God damn it, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, are you ever going to do anything? And so they're like, nope, nope. Schumer today, as in their usual way, put out a strongly worded statement saying, oh, this is unacceptable in a breach of his constitutional duties. Wow, except it's not unacceptable because you just accepted it. And you know what you do? If they had strong progressives in charge, but you are moving the money that we appropriated in a legal way and you're doing it in a non-constitutional way.

We're starting impeachment proceedings this afternoon. I'm not going to let you destroy the Constitution and say that the president can move any money he likes despite what Congress said. That is not how our government works. And if you're an idiot, ignoramus, who doesn't know the Constitution, we'll read it to you in your impeachment proceedings. t.t.com slash impeach, okay? But it doesn't matter.

I mean, look, that's a petition I love and I want to work, but it's not going to work because Nancy Pelosi is the greatest protector of Donald Trump in the country. Exactly. That's just a fact. Yep. You're right. I want to read a quick quote also from Senator John Tester. He's a Democratic Senator. And he says, quote, this is Graphics 6, Congress has already deliberated DHS's request and appropriated the highest ever funding for border security and immigration enforcement, which passed on a bipartisan basis and was signed by President Trump. So he's trying to argue,

look, we've given you the funding that you asked for. Why are you doing this? This is wrong. And he's very much concerned about Hurricane Dorian and the damage it's going to do to Puerto Rico in Florida. Well, mistake number one was playing this bipartisan game and giving Trump exactly what he wants. Don't give him anything. Yeah. Period. Why are they playing games with him? I just, hey, can Democrats, if you're not going to do anything, why don't you shut your mouth, okay?

So if you're going to just sit there and complain like, oh, I can't believe Trump's doing this. You control the house where impeachment begins. So spare me your crocodile tears while you let him run roughshadow over the country. So now let's go to Puerto Rico. Hogan Gidley, that jokester, says that Trump has, quote, moved heaven and earth trying to help Puerto Rico. All right, I'm gonna give you Trump's tweet in a second. But Trump himself has also said, and by the way, I'm the best thing that's ever happened

to Puerto Rico. I mean, who says that? What kind of, I mean, if you had a person like that in your life, you'd banish him. You wouldn't be like, oh, God damn it. Really, he's our uncle, the crazy uncle who comes over at Thanksgiving. He says, oh, the best thing that ever happened to this family. Who says stupid stuff like that? And after you constantly insult Puerto Rico and then turn around and say the best thing that ever happened.

I mean, come on, this guy's a goddamn embarrassment, obviously. So let's go to the tweet. Trump says, wow, yet another big storm heading to Puerto Rico. Will it ever end? Congress approved $92 billion for Puerto Rico last year, an all-time record of its kind. For anywhere. Okay, let's break that down. First of all, of course, as always, lying about the $92 billion, invented number, not true.

Okay. Let me break it down for you. So the Hill reported that in July, Congress actually allocated roughly $43 billion for Puerto Rico, but the island had received less than $14 billion as of May. Trump signed a bill in June providing another $1 million billion in assistance. So that's it. That's what they've received. The number is nowhere close to what Trump mentioned in that.

tweet, $92 billion. So, $92 billion, pull it up, throw it in there, who cares, a pathological liar? Okay, but that's to me the less interesting part of the tweet. Yet another big storm heading to Puerto Rico, will it ever end? It sounds like he's blaming Puerto Rico. He is blaming Puerto Rico. What an idiot, what an unbelievably stupid person. By the way, there is something to blame.

It's called climate change, because it makes the storms more significant, more severe, and And there's now more of them. And so if you want the storms to end, of course, hurricanes overall never end, but if they'll be less of them and they'll be less extreme, you would take action against not Puerto Rico that's getting hit by the storms, you ignoramus. You would take action against climate change. Instead, you sit there and go, I don't know, will these storms have run? I wonder where they came from.

After you declared a Chinese hoax. So look, everybody who's ever supported Donald Trump, look, now. But that's not fair. If you change your mind and you've seen more information and you didn't follow politics that much, you've now seen him, you go, okay, I've had enough, that's fine. You still support Donald Trump after all this? I mean, you're a blithering idiot. It's unbelievable how stupid his followers are.

Oh yeah, the hurricane, it must be Puerto Rico's fault. What is it ever going to add with Puerto Rico and getting hit by hurricanes? You know what, why don't we ask the same question when a hurricane hits Texas or Florida or one of the red states where the majority of his voters reside. Let's ask that same question and see how they feel about it. What's going on with Oklahoma? Why all the tornadoes? God damn Oklahoma.

Well, why won't they stop the tornadoes? I mean, come on, man, we're having conversations with the dumbest people on the planet. And one of them is the president of the United States. And by the way, again, if you're a Republican, you go, oh, how do you want, you're right. That's why we're so pissed at the establishment Democrats who are the biggest idiots and losers of all. Lost to this buffoon! Lost to this buffoon! And now say, oh, no, we're so smart.

You should pick Biden. And then turn around and go, oh, well, resistance. And then they won't even resist them one inch. The establishment Democrats are so pathetic that they make Donald Trump look smart. All right, let's move on to some other news today. I'm glad you're in a good mood because I'm not. No, no, no. I'm trying to keep it under control.

No, wait. Look, look, I said the stories are making, wait till you get me on the stories. I don't know if two angry people would be good for the show. Okay, well, buckle up, brace for impact. Well, let's move on to the rest of the news. There have been a number of protests at various facilities that are imprisoning and detaining migrant children and asylum seekers. And so the CEO of Geo Group, this is a for-profit prison that runs and operates most of

these facilities, is upset about these protests. and actually sent out an internal email explaining to employees what's going on and how they're not the bad guys, they're actually the good guys. There's all sorts of myths about them. Now I'm gonna read from the actual email which TYT investigates obtained, great reporting by Ken Clippenstein as always, and here's how it goes. George Zoli is the CEO who wrote this. On August 12th, 2019, our corporate office in Boca Raton was protested by never again action.

Again Action is a mobilization of different affiliated Jewish organizers whose goal is to shut down ice. This new organization sprang up after Congresswoman, Alexandria Acacio-Cortez referred to ICE protesting centers as concentration processing centers, my apologies, referred to ice processing centers as concentration camps. So she was mentioned and she was blamed for these protests. But he doesn't go into the treatment of these migrants or the two dozen migrants who have died in these facilities.

He doesn't talk about that at all, he just talks about AOC and how it's her fault that these protests are taking place. Shown the GEO group memo, a spokesperson for never again action told TYT, direct action works. Damn right it does. I love it. I love the protesters. Love them. They're so good.

More from the email, again, this is George Zoli from Geo Group, false narratives and deliberate mischaracterizations were the basis for these recent events. Misguided individuals intimidated our employees and defamed the American flag at a time when we recently commemorated the birth of our nation and the 75th anniversary of our landing at Normandy. Okay, that's hilarious. So these guys, you know, you've seen what happened ever again, actually. One of the employees in one of the detention centers runs over them with a truck, right?

And then, of course, Republicans came out and started blaming the protesters saying, well, I mean, what were they doing, you know, attacking that poor truck while sitting on the ground? They deserve to be run over and have their legs broken, et cetera. So now the guy is saying, can you believe that they are, you know, attacking the flag on the 75th anniversary of Normandy? Where did Normandy come from? We're talking about private prisons and detention centers and immigration. And he's like, and on the 16th anniversary of Arbor Day, can you believe they did this? What do you?

What? Where the hell did that come from? I mean, it's just so pathetic. And on this 243rd day past Valentine's Day, I can't believe that they would do this, let alone how many anniversaries have there been a Mother's Day and yet they have done this to the flag? What flag? Okay, by the way, they didn't defame the flag.

Of course they didn't, the guy's making everything up. Yeah, so apparently some protesters had taken the American flag down, and he considered that defaming the American flag, besides which two dozen people are dead because of these facilities and the fact that they've been brutalized and neglected in these facilities. Six of them were kids. So, I mean, look, I get their hurt feelings over the American flag, but American lives are, I should say lives should be more important. He doesn't want to talk about that, right?

Yeah, I mean, it's an obvious diversion tactic. And never get in action, didn't do that anyway. Right. So he's taking, talking about never getting action in AOC. And they were first so completely different protests where someone apparently took down an American flag. And they're like, oh, there's 12 people dead here. Somebody took down the flag and right around the corner from Labor Day. Can you believe that?

Ignore the dead people. So let me go to graphic four. Organizations that have threatened our employees or taken violent action against our company have also directly used the same terminology as representative Acacio-Cortez, including concentration camps. Look, these protesters are Jewish Americans, many of them are Jewish Americans. And so they understand what concentration camps are, which is why they have sprung into action. So to blame everything on AOC and to use her as a scapegoat rather than taking personal responsibility for the brutalizing of migrants is ridiculous. And also a spokesperson said, quote, we don't play a role in passing criminal justice or

immigration laws and we have never advocated for or against criminal justice or immigration enforcement policies. That is a flat out lie. For profit prisons in this country have not only pushed for tough on crime policies when it comes to undocumented immigrants, they have pushed for tough on crime policies when it comes to you, when it comes to me, when it comes to all Americans participating in nonviolent behavior like smoking pot, okay? They have a long history of pushing for and imprisoning nonviolent drug offenders.

And in the case of migrants, let me just note, Geo Group spends at least $1 million, $1 million each year since 2016 lobbying federal government on issues like Homeland Security appropriations. In 2016, a Geo Group subsidiary contributed $225,000 to a pro-Trump super PAC and an additional $250,000 for the president's inaugural committee. What happened to lobbying us? Well, golly, gee, I've got the vapors. I would never do that, especially not on the 75th anniversary of Normandy. Okay, no, Kenny Clips did a great job of not only finding the documents here, but also

giving you the context of the fact that they, in fact, have done a ton of lobbying. So, and I want to thank the audience as always. You made our reporting team possible. They keep breaking these stories one after another, after another. Alexandria Casimir Cortez then retweeted this story. That's got 30,000 likes on it, and now being looked at by all the media, et cetera. And you guys made that happen. Without you guys, we wouldn't have Jonathan Larson, Ken Kliberstein, or any of the reporters

we've ever had. And I wanna say one last thing, which is doubling down on what Anna said. Guys, private prisons have a profit motive to lock up Americans. Right or wrong, it doesn't really matter as far as their profit motive is concerned. And they don't have a second code. Their only code is maximize profit. You know how that's how the markets work. So when you create a private prison, the only way to maximize profit is to stuff more people

in those prisons. And if the people in the prisons are guilty or innocent, who cares? You're still maximizing profit. In fact, if you're not pushing for laws that are quote unquote tough on crime, if you're not pushing to imprison more Americans right or wrong, you should be fired as the CEO of that group because you're not maximizing profit. And so they logically, in this insane system that we have, poor in millions of dollars to buy corrupt, largely Republican politicians. And if any Democrat takes money from a private prison, they should immediately be primaried and written out of town and tarred and ferned. And when they cry and say, oh, are you gonna ruin our industry where we get to lock up Americans to make money?

Yes. God damn right we are. We're gonna drive you right out of business so you can't lock up any more innocent Americans or any other people and have to treat them with this kind of outrageous system and centers that you have. Yes, we will not allow you to make money off of imprisoning and taking our liberty away from us. No.

All right. We're gonna take a quick break. When we come back, we have more news for you, including Donald Trump encouraging members of his administration to break the law. Okay, guys, if you wait till you think this first segment was fiery, wait till we get to Alabama, Deutsche Bank and Donald Trump's trying to take people's land. This show's explosive. We'll be right back.

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 government, the government. 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 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 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. All right, back on the Young Turks. Cynical Angels says TY.

WIT investigates rules. Agreed, thank you. Victoria says CNN announced yesterday that they were hosting a climate change town hall with the Democratic candidates, has TYT mentioned this. I think I mentioned it yesterday when they announced it. Today they announced more details including that it's going to be seven hours, wow. So that's, I think that's good. So what we're trying to do that's different is first of all, we want to do a debate so they're

on the same stage at the same time. We know the DNC does not want that. That's what got us mad in the first place and wanting to break that DNC blockade. So it's one thing when you have normal cable news hosts asking the folks one at a time these questions and you don't get to compare and contrast all of their plans at the same time. And they're gonna have a framing of how are you gonna pay for it, et cetera, et cetera. We wanna bring real experts that you trust. Hopefully have them on the stage at the same time and ask them to those questions and drill

down and get answers. So that's our hope and our desire and that's what we're working on now. And you guys have empowered us to be able to do that at t.yt.com slash town hall. So and if you're wondering why, like I said in the beginning of the show, why is it called Town Hall? We're gonna try for a debate, but if we can't get a debate, you guys gave us the money. We gotta do an event. So we'll still bring great moderators.

But I don't want to get there. I want to try for the debate. And I want to try incredibly hard to get that to happen and break the DNC blockade. All right. Mourneau Brown says, I just joined TYT and feel good. Oh, I like that. Like James Brown over here. Makes sense.

Moreno Brown. Okay. Anyway, last one here. Mr. Lumberg says, Saw your op-ed in the Washington Post this morning, Jane. Let us dare to whisper of a dream. Hashty too strong. Yeah, if you haven't seen that, check out my article about how.

progressives are gonna win the presidency in the Washington Post, and they actually printed it. So we broke through, man, we fight for you guys every day. And so finally we got a progressive op-ed in the Washington Post. I wanna give them credit for running it, and for you guys having my back. We tried for so long and so hard to break through and get an op-ed in the Washington Post and it worked today. And of course, it immediately went to the top three in their opinion section. There's nobody, there's no other progressive op-eds.

And so anyway, you guys are awesome. Thank you. All right, so just a few announcements. First off, Kirsten Gillibrand has dropped out of the Democratic primaries because she had no chance. And we're not doing a separate story on it because there's really nothing else to say. So I just want to make sure you guys know about it. And then if you're wondering, hey, where should I keep my money?

Where can I do it ethically? Go to Aspiration. If you go to Aspiration.com slash TYT and open an account, TYT will add a little bonus to that, and it is a free month of TYT membership. So go to Aspiration.com slash TYT, sign up for an account, and then go to tYT.com slash free 30 to get your free 30-day TYT membership. Okay, guys, last two things about that. One is, look, on converting companies into being good guys, it's a super long-term project.

But I love getting sponsors that are actually doing the right things. And if that works, the free markets will eventually lead to companies realizing, hey, maybe we shouldn't do terrible things in the world. Otherwise, we're not going to have any customers. So it's a long-term project, but that's part of it. And I love that you guys are participating in it. And last thing on Gillibrand, there's plenty I had issues with or change of stance, et cetera. But her proposal on democracy dollars to create $600 for public financing that every citizen would get to allocate was actually a great idea.

And I don't want that to slip away. And I want to talk about that more as we go along. And so she did contribute to this conversation in a positive way, at least through that. And that was significant. Okay. Donald Trump is encouraging individuals who work for him and government officials to break the law. And he wants to do this in order to speed up the process of building the border wall, which he has conceded,

will not actually stop undocumented immigrants from coming into the country. He has conceded that. But he wants a win for his campaign. So again, he's encouraging people to break the law. So, Trump has directed aides to fast-track billions of dollars worth of construction contracts, aggressively seize private land, and disregard environmental rules. He has waived off worries about contracting procedures and the use of eminent domain, saying, take the land, according to officials who attended the meetings.

He also has told worried subordinates that he will pardon them if any of these issues end up leading to some criminal issues, right? So if there are any potential wrongdoing should have to break the laws to get the barriers built quickly. So he's like, look, go ahead and break the law, give me this win so I can have a better chance of getting reelected. And if you run into some legal issues, don't worry, I'm gonna go ahead and pardon you. Yeah, so we're gonna get to some of the absurd and cruel parts of this fence building.

But I want to address the taking the land and breaking the law part first. I'm gonna quote the Washington Post here. Former White House chief of staff, John Kelly, would often tell administration officials to disregard the president's demands if Kelly did not think they were feasible or legally sound according to current and former aides. So basically chief of staff said, look, the president's an idiot. If he tells you to break the law, don't do it. You will be in a lot of legal trouble if you do that.

So that's what the chief of staff used to say, but he's gone. We have another crook in there now. Is he still acting chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney? Mick Mulvaney is acting chief of staff and he does not challenge Trump or contradict him in any way, he is nothing more than Donald Trump's lap dog, really. Yeah, and Mulvaney used to talk to help about Trump back in the day. Now he's an ass kisser who's in there, oh, you want to break the law, this sounds like a great idea, let's all do it together.

And by the way, why didn't they even have conversations like this? I mean, in previous administrations, if the Washington Post broke a story about how the president ordered his subordinates to break the law, it would have been the biggest story of that presidency. Probably impeachment proceedings would have began, and it would be considered another water gate. Now, it's just Wednesday. I mean, it's president telling yet another person to break the law, and they think, well, it doesn't matter. The Democrats are never going to hold us accountable.

No prosecutor holds us accountable. No Democrat holds us accountable, even though they have control the House. Pelosi said we could break the law. So let's just go break it. What is it going to do? Impeach us? Loser. That's what they think of her.

And I don't think that they're that wrong because she's not going to do anything. She's not, no. So, okay. Now, eminent domain, I want you guys to remember that conservatives pretended to be against this. Remember, conservatives have actually no principles other than the remaining conservatives, other than we hate the others. Whoever the others happen to be, Latinos, Muslims, gay people, trans people, it doesn't matter, we hate the others.

That's their only guiding principle. They say, oh, we're for free trade. Now they hate free trade. They said, oh, well, we're for legal immigration. We're against illegal immigration, but we love legal immigration. No, they say now you shouldn't do any family immigration, and you should kill off most of legal immigration. There's another story about how they're going to kill off birthright citizenship or a portion

of it today. So they don't believe any of that. There's always a lie. And now eminent domain, they're like, the government. with their jackboot of thugs coming in and taking private property, no way. Now they're like, oh, eminent domain, you got to take people's private property. When the jackboot of thugs come, they're awesome. You have no principles, none, give it up.

Just say, okay, we're the party of hate and be done with it. Now, there's one other time that Donald Trump tried to do eminent domain. And understand eminent domain, like it means taking private property. That's what, it's the government taking private property and saying, you don't have a choice, and we're going to give you fair market value, whatever we determine that is, and we're done with you. And in this case, they talk about, oh yeah, don't even, don't ask them. They're done. You give them whatever money we want to give them and take them off their land.

By the way, almost all those landowners are Republicans. What now? We did a story about a year ago or so where they were all crying. They're like, I didn't think he was going to take my land. Whose land did you think he was going to take you? goddamn schmucks, your land's on the border. And you're like, yeah, build a wall, build a wall. So we need your land to build a wall.

I didn't know he was going to do it to me. I just thought he would hate others. Okay, anyway, back when Trump had a casino, he wanted to build a parking lot to hold limousies, literally, okay? So he thought he was going to run over Vera Koking, who was a little old lady who had been living there since 1961. And she said, no, no, no, this is my dream house. I raised my kids here.

Earlier, the founder of Penthouse had tried to build a casino there, tried to intimidate. First, try to give her a million dollars. She's like, nope. He's like a million dollars for your rinky-dick house. So you know, I like this house, I don't want to move. She and her husband bought that house together. They raised their kids there together. At this time, she's a widow.

It means something to her. Yeah, so Bob Guccione then tried to intimidate her. He built some giant building next to her. He even bought the airspace above her house and built this giant structure above our house to try to intimidate her. She's like, I ain't going nowhere. So he then goes bankrupt. Trump comes in and Trump goes, no, I need the limousine space.

Get rid of her, okay? And then he tries to get the government to do eminent domain and take her property whether she likes it or doesn't like it. So she goes, no. First he offered her, by the way, in the process of this, they then offered her a quarter of a million dollars. She's like, I didn't take a million, I ain't gonna take a quarter of a million. I don't know if you're hard of hearing.

The answer is no, you will not take my part. private property. They go to court in 1994, it takes a bunch of years, they come out, she wins, she kicks his ass. Then you know what happened? This is my favorite part of the story. So they built the Trump Plaza, it's there. Oh, yeah, Trump Plaza, so what I parked a little bit somewhere else.

She saw Trump Plaza go bankrupt and then close down. Let's make her speaker of the house. I know, man, I know, she's in her 90s now, but God. She'd be more effective. Let's make her speaker of the house. Oh, she's an American hero, man, Vera Koking. She stood up to Donald Trump, and she was in the house when they shut down his stupid-ass casino. Oh, God.

God, I love her. God, I love her. I do, too. It's incredible. So I do want to get to other components of what Trump is telling people to do in terms of getting this wall built. First, let me just note, he's in a panic because the wall hasn't been built. and he realizes that he hasn't actually followed through on any of his promises to his base. There's a lot of tough.

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And so for two and a half years, he had no problem passing tax cuts for the rich. He had no problem doing things to enrich himself. But he abandoned his base. And now he's in a panic. And so that's why he's telling officials to break the law to get the wall built. But one of the things that he's also focusing on is the aesthetic appeal of the wall. And so he is demanding that the wall is painted or, the fence is painted black.

And the reason why he wants it painted black is because he likes the way it looks, but also it absorbs heat, black absorbs heat, we all know that. And so it would be more difficult and painful for people to climb the fence. And then he also wants the top of the fence to be pointy and sharp. So it would cause as much damage as possible if someone does somehow manage to get to the top and climb that fence. So there's three different ways that he wants to hurt. trying to catch climb the fence one is it's too hot to hold two is the spikes at the end of

each of the fences so hopefully they can get impaled I guess that's his hope and he wants it tall enough and it's going to be 18 to 30 feet in the different parts so that if they fall they fall to their death or serious bodily injury so this is our president guys and and the party of hate loves it they're like oh my god these poor people who are running for their lives Desperate to get into this country for hope and opportunity like our ancestors, oh man, it'd be great if they got impaled or fell to their death. That's the Republican Party, filled with monsters. So, and by the way, it costs so much more money.

He's going to waste a ton of money on that. Before we get back to that, one more thing about Vera Koking. She eventually did sell the house when she moved. It was a mystery buyer, but it's a longer story, and I want to save it for the postgame, but don't miss it. TYT.com slash join to become a member, you get the last half hour of the Young Turks where we didn't give you those extra stories. And Koking also said Trump at the time, back in 94, she called him a maggot, a cockroach, and a crumb. God, I love her.

I love her. And when I saw who bought our house, I was like, no, really? So, okay, we'll save that for the post game, last half hour of the Young Turks, TYT.com, slash join. But back to the how much it costs. Exactly. So it's going to cost quite a bit more to paint the fence black. And let's go to graphic 9. Trump has insisted that the barriers be painted black, according to internal analysis,

painting or coding, 175 miles of barriers will add between $70 million and $133 million in cost. Trimming the amount of fencing the Army Corps will be able to install by four to seven miles. So the wall will actually end up being shorter and it'll end up costing a lot more money because Trump insists on painting it black. Yeah, and by the way, sharpening the tips because they're not black already. So at one point, the military actually sent troops down there to paint a part of the fence that already exists because Trump demanded that it be black and that cost a million bucks. And that was a tiny part of the fence.

And then they don't have tips, they're not spears, nor do they have heads on those spears yet. So he now, you have to pay extra to actually sharpen the ends of all defenses. So that costs another huge amount of money. This is all taxpayer money. And so part of it is, I get it, he wants the fence to be harder to cross, right? And I'm sure conservatives will love that. Part of it is he's a child. And so they tried to talk him out of it because of how much more it'll cost taxpayers.

He's like, no, he wanted you be black. He wanted to be black. This is similar to what he did with Air Force One. They're like, okay, we're designing Air Force One. Someone made the mistake of telling him that. He's like, I want to be involved. They're like, why are you an aeronautical engineer? know that? He's like, I own Trump airplanes. They're like, didn't that go bankrupt? Yeah,

it did, but still. And so, you know what they had the child do? They had him pick the colors. And he said, oh, I made it red, white, and blue. Before it was just blue and white, I added the red. It's much better now. We have a very cruel child as our president. That's why I call him Joffrey Barathean. I mean, it's nearly a perfect analogy. God, that is so sickening that that our so-called leader. We gotta take a break. When we come back, I am going to tell you how the Alabama Republican lawmakers are going after Ilhan Omar, and we will rage on that story.

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In the meantime, enjoy this free. Second. All right, back on a young Turks, so many moving messages here. Hockey Lori writes, and it's my birthday, I gave myself the gift of a donation to the climate change town hall. Keep up the good work. Thank you, Hockey Laurie. You guys are amazing.

TYT.com slash town hall. It's now past 130,000. Keep it going. There it is, 130,608, 4,640 individual donors throughout the world. J.M. Frazier says if CNN's climate change event happens before TYT's debate, which it will. We won't be able to plan it in time to get it ahead of that one. Our moderators will have the answers the candidates have already given and be able to skip past asking them for those answers and can go straight to challenge them on those answers. This could be a really good thing. P.S. Any chance we can get Tom Morello as a moderator?

I have to confess that that is a unique idea. We had not considered that. All right, we'll put them on the list to consider. Gabby Merida says by not moving forward with impeachment, Nancy Pelosi has normalized, possibly even legitimized criminal wrongdoing by the executive branch. And last one, Kel says, literally waited all day for my salary to clear just so I could donate to the TYT debate on the most crucial issue of climate change, which impacts every one of us across the globe, hashtag love from Trinidad, hashtag TYT Army, hashtag worldwide.

Guys, we owe you a heavy responsibility. So we're working overtime to try to get this thing right for you guys. You amaze me and inspire me every single day. Thank you. Let's talk about Trump's taxes. Democrats in the House Ways and Means Committee have subpoenaes. Donald Trump's taxes along with the tax returns for his three children. Now Deutsche Bank has finally confessed that it does have taxes pertaining to the Trump family.

However, it's unclear which family members these tax returns belong to. Now I'm gonna kind of run through this story and tell you how it went down from beginning to end. The latest news though is that Deutsche Bank said in a court filing that it has tax returns relevant to House Democrat subpoenas for financial records of President Trump, his family, and his businesses, but the bank didn't publicly identify whose returns it had. The bank also said in its letter, and this is a court filing that they again put out today, in its letter to a federal appeals court in New York that it has tax returns related to parties

not named in the subpoenas, but who may constitute immediate family within. the definition provided in the subpoenas. Now, what's also fascinating is that this latest news really does go against what Deutsche Bank was trying to do last Friday, where it was trying to really hide whose taxes and whether or not it even had any taxes of any members of the Trump family. During the court proceeding on Friday, the banks repeatedly refused to tell judges whether they possess Trump's tax returns, citing contractual obligations. So we have some sound from that proceeding in this next clip.

Take a look. Does the bank have tax returns of any of the name people or entities? Your Honor, given contractual obligations and other legal obligations, that's unfortunately not a question that we're able to address. The bank has contractual- What privilege are you asserting? The bank has contractual obligations to its clients related to confidential- You think you can contract away the opportunity to answer a court's question without a privilege such as the Fifth Amendment or something comparable?

You can just say we told our client we won't do it. There's an excellent question. Yeah. We told our client that we would money launder for them and not tell the courts of our illegal actions. Oh, well, I didn't know that, my bad. Okay, so go ahead. And I don't say that lightly, Deutsche Bank has been.

proven to money launder, you're never going to guess for who. Russian oligarchs, wild coincidence or perhaps not. Yeah, exactly. So as a result of that line of questioning, they had no choice but to put out this court filing indicating that they do, in fact, have the tax returns of Trump family members. Although at this moment, it's unclear which family members specifically they have the tax returns of. Now, one other thing that I wanted to mention is that this is what the House Democrats are doing in terms of holding Donald Trump accountable. They want access to his tax returns.

Donald Trump has been fighting this aggressively, and he is appealing the court's ruling that Deutsche Bank must hand over these tax returns. Now, the whole point of looking into his tax returns isn't, you know, to embarrass him, although I'm sure there's embarrassing stuff in there, it's to see whether not he has certain dealings with foreign governments that could influence his decision making, it's to see whether or not he inflated his assets to commit tax or to commit loan fraud, right, in obtaining loans from Deutsche Bank, or whether or not he deflated his assets in order to do tax fraud. And whether he's working with the goddamn Russians, okay? Yeah.

So look, let me be clear about a couple of things. And let me tell you how at fault the Democrats are in this situation, unfortunately. And then I want you to do something about it. So what I don't want the tax returns for is to embarrass Donald Trump. And you think like, hey, Jake, you hate Donald Trump, who are you kidding? No, I'm serious. If the government gets his tax returns and it shows that he's broke and he's an idiot buffoon who's not, doesn't have 10 billion, doesn't have a billion, doesn't have any of those things.

I know that, don't leak that stuff. That's not right for the government to get the information. It's just to leak politically damaging information. I would hold the Democrats accountable if they did that. And yeah, we'd be proven right, et cetera. That's not the point though. You get the tax returns for legitimate reasons. The reason is, as Bill Pascrell said, he's a congressman from New Jersey.

Well, they're making people have a right to know if their presidents are crook. It's not that complicated. If his tax returns are on the up and up, but they show embarrassing stuff, let it go, right? But if his tax returns show, wait a minute, now all his money's coming from the Russians, which a bank is doing money laundering for the Russians. Trump's also got his money there. And then we're gonna get to Lawrence O'Donnell's speculation in a second, which honestly I totally believe.

Anyway, we'll get to that. Well then we gotta know. Look guys, incompetence of the Democrats knows no bounds. So Donald Trump's kids have said publicly, we got all our money from the Russians. I wonder why, why is Trump doing this with the Russians? You probably had to do with Hillary Clinton's hurt feelings. I can't figure it out. I don't do with the election, right?

Why, we lost, otherwise we wouldn't have lost, right? Okay, get beyond it. So why is he doing weird things like saying, oh, hey, guys, I want to hurt all of our allies in NATO, but I want to make sure that we bring the Russians back into the G7. Why is he doing that? Maybe, I don't know, maybe I guess I'm the genius, right? I figured out that maybe the things that are in the public record might be connected. The fact that they got all their money from the Russians might be connected to the fact that Donald Trump is currently serving the Russians.

Wow, I'm so goddamn smart. I mean, how could you not see that? And so why am I angry at the Democrats? Do you know that they could have tax returns tomorrow? Like if you're watching the press and cable news, you get them, no, no, they're doing the suing and they're working hard, no, no. New York passed the law saying that the head of the House Ways and Means Committee can ask for Donald Trump's New York state tax returns. And Richard Neal, the Democrat put in charge of that committee by Nancy Pelosi, says, I don't

want them. What? What on God's green earth? Well, look, to be fair, I mean, they're just looking ahead to the future because they know that if they were in a similar situation, if there was a Democrat in office and there were some investigations going on, the Republicans would play nice and they wouldn't follow through with what that law allows them to do, which is obtained. I mean, come on, they're, at this point, I almost feel like they're political operatives that

have been put in place by Donald Trump. No, no, no, very close, very close. They're political operatives put in place by Donald Trump's donors. So the same corrupt donors give money to Richard Neal, Nancy Pelosi, and Donald Trump. And then voila, the resistance turned into the assistance. So what I'm saying is so obvious that if I was you, I'd have trouble believing it. So you can look it up, there's a Vox article, there's a Washington Post article, you can look it up anywhere you like. Yes, New York passed a law.

Andrew Cuomo signed the bill into existence. And it says specifically, Richard Neal can ask for the ways in me as committee chairman can ask for it. And he won't ask for it. They're like, why the hell won't you ask for it? He's like, well, I don't want to, is this seem partisan? But wait a minute, we're not asking you to have it be partisan. We're asking you, is the guy a crook? And there's no way of knowing.

And he waited four months to ask for his federal tax returns where everybody's like, why won't you ask for them? He gets primary, and he's like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, federal tax returns, sure. And still for the New York State tax returns, you won't do it. So, guys, you got to get him out. Richard Neal is in that sense politically public enemy number one, because he is the biggest defender of Donald Trump in America today. Bill Barr couldn't defend him that much because he's not a Democrat.

Bill Barr doesn't control the House. Pelosi and Richard Neal do. And so we're going to start with a petition. We'll put it up later tonight. TYT.com slash tax returns. We're asking for the simplest thing in the world. And guys, when I say public enemy number one, I want to be super clear. I said political, I mean political.

Keep it 100% political, electoral, ideological, okay? We're asking for the simplest thing in the world. Ask for the tax returns. You're the only guy in the country you couldn't do it. You have no excuse for not doing it. If you're asking for the federal tax returns, why wouldn't you ask for the state ones? You know why he's not asking for the state ones? Because he can get the state ones, and he doesn't want them.

Because then, oh my God, we'd have to fight Donald Trump and our donors would be so upset. And by the way, we're raising a lot of money by having the boogeyman out there. Oh, Donald Trump is so scary, send money to Richard Neal right away. Send money to Nancy Pelosi right away. And Nancy Pelosi admitted it, which is great for fundraising. They're the worst. And then we're gonna work on. surrounding Richard Neal's congressional office, not his home and not in a physical or threatening

way. Politically, do sit-ins, do civil disobedience, okay? Go occupy his Massachusetts office, go occupy his Washington office. Look, we'll work on helping you guys in how to do that, because I can't take it anymore. Nobody on cable news is talking about it. Nobody's talking about the fact that Richard Neal can just ask for the goddamn returns, and he'd have them. But no, I want to help Donald Trump. Nah, these, and then they tell me they're my colleagues. Oh, jang, you're your colleagues. Oh, by the way, get his ass out of office.

We have to beg, we have to beg and plead for a Democrat to fight Trump. No, Alex Morse is running against them. Justicedemocrats.com slash morse. Justicedemocrats.com slash morse, go give him money, go volunteer for him. and make sure that you get this Richard Neal the hell out of Congress, because they're all sellouts who work with the Republicans who work for the goddamn donors, resist, what resist. So now to O'Donnell, he comes out, you got the, we got the code. Yeah, yeah.

And now look guys. Let's reset this, let's reset this, like, let's calm down, because this is the fun element of the story. All right, all right, all right. So, MSNBC was covering the Deutsche Bank tax filings for Donald Trump. And one of the elements of this story is that Donald Trump obtained loans from Deutsche Bank when he had absolutely no right to obtain those loans, right? And so how did he get his hands on those loans?

Well, Lawrence O'Donnell in his reporting said something to Rachel Maddow that was a little problematic. Take a look. I stress if true, because this is a single source. This single source close to Deutsche Bank has told me that Donald Trump's loan documents there show that he has co-signers. That's how he was able to obtain those loans. And that the co-signers are Russian oligarchs. What? Really? That would explain, it seems to me, every kind of word Donald Trump has ever said about Russia and Vladimir Putin, if true. And I stress the if true. Maybe wait until you verify that it's true before you make this public.

Yeah, I got you. I got you. Everybody's yelling at me. I have to apologize. We'll give you all that. I believe him. And so I grant you that it's a single source. I grant you that it's speculation. I 100% believe him. No, I get it. But you have to wait for it to be confirmed before you air it. No, I just told you speculation, and so no, well, look guys, Deutsche Bank got busted for money laundering for the Russians. Donald Trump's family has said, we got all our money from the Russians. Guess where their money is in Deutsche Bank? Why did Deutsche Bank give Donald Trump hundreds of millions of dollars in loans when no other bank on the planet would do it?

That's a fact. They laughed him out of the room. Every other major bank in the world laughed him out of the book. Why? He has six bankruptcies. And he then, after the bankruptcies, he rubs it in and he goes, it's smart business to not pay your creditors. So which bank in that right mind would ever give him money?

Does he have a co-signer on the loans? Of course, I guarantee it. Here, I don't, I 200% guaranteed. Of course he has a co-signer on the loans. Nobody's gonna give you hundreds of millions of dollars when you're known for ripping off your creditors. No one in their right mind would ever do that. Of course he has a co-signer.

The question is who? And it's not that complicated a question, it is, I would be shocked if it weren't Russian oligarchs. Of course it is. The only reason we haven't uncovered it yet is because of the bumbling fools that are the Democratic party. Gee, I don't know, well, it could be Donald Trump's ties to the Russians. I can't tell.

I don't know, his sons have said over and over again, we got all our monies from the Russians. Well, that's because they like to play golf. And Nancy Pelosi believed them, because the Russians like to play golf. It doesn't take a genius to figure it out. It just takes really, really stupid people like democratic leadership to not figure it out. All right, Lawrence O'Donnell apologized later via Twitter and said last night I made an error in judgment by reporting an item about the president's finances that didn't go through our rigorous verification and standards process. I shouldn't have reported it and I was wrong to discuss it on the air. I will address the issue on my show tonight.

Yeah, so there comes the public flogging, et cetera, and I get it. They have to go through a process. Our reporters have to go through a process. So that's right. You should have that process. Anna's right. You got to get the facts right first. But I would be shocked if his source was wrong.

All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, that Ilhan Omar story that I promised you. And then later, conservatives discuss black culture. Can you imagine how that went? 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.com slash t-y-t.

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