The Young Turks - Trump Softens On Syria And Lindsey Graham Talks Border Wall Funding

Episode Date: January 1, 2019

After meeting with Senator Lindsey Graham Trump seems to have softened his rhetoric on pulling troops from Syria. Senator Lindsey Graham discussed negotiation tactics to end the government shutdown and get funding for the wall. 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, welcome to the Young Turks. Happy New Year, folks. Now you're saying, look, we're not quite a new year yet.

Half the world is and shows watched all across the world. So happy New Year to all of you good folks. So first hour for you, everybody as usual today, of course, I want to thank some wonderful people, including this is the last day, last day of the membership drive and last day to presumably to do Amplify and all the other things. So I think I mentioned Stefan Byrne from Sweden on the last show. He did move on for $1,000. He did that package.

I want to give a shout out to Jeff Manzer, who I've mentioned before from Brooklyn. And he bought Youngter's membership for Shepard Smith. So you guys are amazing and awesome. We had a huge surge in membership over the weekend. I mean, somebody was doing live videos. I'm not saying anything. I'm just saying. All right, hold.

We're going to get to that in a second. But also because of you guys in the Amplify and everybody that signed up, obviously. So thank you, Jeff, for doing that. And thank you, Stefan, as well. So t-y-t.com slash amplify to do more of those. There's a list there. But if you click at the bottom link, you'll see all of the different Amplify packages. Pick anyone you like.

t-y-t.com slash more is a direct way of going there, M-O-R-E, to look at all the different packages, whether it's allies, foes, or members of the media that need Young Turks membership. And also, last day, also to name things in the studio, t-y-t.com slash studio to see what you can name, including the soundboard, our chairs, the cameras, in fact, a whole studio. My office space, somebody had a genius idea of naming my parking spot after Anna, if you want. Speaking of which, let's check it on that real quick before we go to the news today. and we do have plenty of news for you guys. As usual, in the days of Trump, dramatic news.

Okay, so we're doing a host competition here, and we're on the last day of that as well. I mean, we have been neck and neck throughout. Not throughout. Okay, no, that's a good point. Anna had a huge lead until the Christmas weekend. When Jenk played dirty tricks. When I served you guys more content by doing live videos on YouTube and Facebook. And I closed her 100-1-100-person lead and took the lead after Christmas.

And then she retook the lead during the week, as she usually does. But, well, we just had a weekend, isn't it? So I was around 550 members signed up before the weekend, now at 661. It's pretty impressive. Damn. Not too bad. Okay. Is it good enough?

T-y-D-com slash jank. So Anna was a little, she had about a 30 person lead on me going into the weekend, but with me signing up 110, it was nice knowing you. Wrong! Here comes Anna, 689. What? She continues to have a 28 person lead, and I do believe that this is rigged. I think there's some chance that this election has been fixed.

I have a call into, I have a call into Tim Konova to see if she's working with Debbie Waster, Michelle. Get out of here. How did you do that? How did you? I had huge videos that did really well. Because I represent the people, Jenk. And what I mean by that is, look, I've been open and honest with the audience and with people

who keep an open line of communication with me on social media, look, you have been pushing I'm trying to find incentives to convince me to do more work on the weekends, right? And I've been open about that. And I choose to spend time with my child, right, Charlie. Oh, please. And with my husband. Like, that's family time. Just in case you're unclear.

Charlie's a dog, okay? Okay, anyway. But Charlie, fur babies are babies too, okay? No, but seriously, funny story, I'm going to just quickly say, you baited me. And so this weekend, I attempted to do a YouTube live video, and it was a disaster. It was a complete and utter disaster, technologically speaking. So Christian was kind enough to film me. At one time, he thought he was streaming.

He was not, and I was already halfway through the content. And so we started again, and I was stumbling and bumbling, and I was nervous for some reason. It's so weird, we're live here. I know, and then he told me he had stopped streaming, but he hadn't stopped streaming, and we bickered a little bit. Oh, that's, that's a disaster. No, no, it was a disaster, it was a disaster. And then I got angry at you, because you baited me, and I was so mad that I fell for it.

And so, look, I'm not gonna play tricks. I'm not gonna play games. What I'm gonna do is stick to my principals and spend time with my family on the weekends, and the people get to decide who their favorite is. No, she did something. I didn't do anything. How could you possibly sign up those many people by not doing anything? That's not possible.

This is what I did. I encourage people to rest when they deserve to rest, which is what I did. Oh, kid. Okay, all right. He hates it. He hates it. Because if it were up to him, and if it were legal, he would have us work 20 hours straight like seven days a week.

Okay, I don't know. She, look at this. Campaigning all the way to the end with these dirty trips, okay. I don't think it's dirty. I'm just honest. All right, you still have time, we can close the lead right now, okay? I'll be doing live videos all night. P-YD.com's like, Shay.

Oh, my God, you probably will. It's New Year's Eve. Take a load off. All right, all right, let's do the news. All right. Donald Trump has been clear in his efforts to withdraw troops from both Syria and half of the troops in Afghanistan. And a number of military generals and Republican politicians.

Republican politicians have been angry with him for wanting to do so. Well, Lindsay Graham happens to be one of the Republican senators who's against it, and he has been meeting with Trump and working behind the scenes to put a stop to this troop withdrawal. Now recently, Lindsey Graham shared his discussions with Trump on this very matter, specifically pulling troops out of Syria during a press conference, and this is following a meeting that Graham had with Trump. Take a look.

We had a great lunch. We talked about Syria, and he told me some things I didn't know that made me feel a lot better about where we're headed in Syria. He promised to destroy ISIS. He's going to keep that promise. We're not there yet, but as I said today, we're inside the 10-yard line, and the president understands the need to finish the job. He's worried about Iranian influence and the potential dangers to Israel from the president.

I'm having a super highway from Beirut to Tehran in terms of delivering weapons into Lebanon. And he'll be talking to Turkey about making sure we don't have a war between the Turks and our allies, the Kurds. So I like what I heard. We still have some differences, but I will tell you that the president is thinking long and hard about Syria, how to withdraw our forces, but at the same time achieve our national security interests, which are to make sure that ISIS is destroyed. It appears that some of this pro-war lobbying is getting through to Trump, unfortunately. So over the weekend, Trump had tweeted that he, first of all, he complained that he's been

getting criticized for what he wants to do, and he blamed the fake news media for that criticism. But he also said that he still plans on withdrawing troops from Syria, but slowly. I think that that key word is indicative of the types of conversations that are happening behind the scenes, because before Trump was adamant about withdrawing troops immediately. And now with, you know, pro-war influences behind the scenes, it seems like they're really like beating down on him and convincing him to do otherwise. Yeah, I think that the most relevant party here is unsurprisingly in Washington, Israel. And apparently Netanyahu and Israel have voiced concerns about early withdrawal.

And now it's not remotely early, it's incredibly late. And Donald Trump did promise it on the campaign trail. And he's been tweeting that recently, and he's right about that. He is. So look, we oppose Trump because he's wrong on 98% of issues. And we explain why. But we don't oppose him just because he's in the- opposing party, or his name is Donald Trump.

But unfortunately, I think some people are now reflexively doing that. If Donald Trump's four withdrawn from Syria and Afghanistan, then I'd like to stay there forever. That's madness, it makes no sense at all. So, and is he going to listen to some folks? Yeah, apparently. Was it Lindsey Graham that made the difference? He's never made a difference before, so I doubt it. But when Netanyahu calls, his fellow right winger from Israel, apparently.

Apparently, some people pick up the phone. So it appears that their demands that America can keep their troops in Syria are going to be met as usual. By the way, understand Lindsey Graham's long game too. Look, they don't know how long Trump is going to stay in the White House. His situation is deteriorating rapidly, and at some point Mueller is going to drop that political bomb on his head. And if you think that Mueller is going to be like, oh, yeah, he was squeaky clean.

I mean, you're not paying any attention, right? So they figure, hey, if we just get Trump to delay a little longer than if Pence is president, he'll never withdraw. And the military industrial complex, and in this case Israel, win again. So that's how this game is played. So Lindsey Graham also specifically mentioned Afghanistan. And I think this video is important because it shows you the type of fear mongering and war mongering that happens in Washington.

So just get a load of his reasoning for why troops need to remain in both Syria and Afghanistan. You have said this could pave the way for a second 9-11 in the U.S. If ISIS reconstitutes itself after the U.S. leaves, does President Trump bear responsibility? Well, number one, everything we're dealing with today falls on Obama's watch. He's the one that withdrew from Iraq. In 2011, October 21st, I said. That status of forces agreement with Iraq, right? No, that's a bunch of bullshit.

Pardon my French. That's a complete lie. That's a complete, absolute lie. I've been to, yeah, I was there talking to the prime minister of Iraq, and he said, how many soldiers you're talking about? Obama wanted to get to zero, he got to zero. In October the 21st, 2011, I said, I hope the president's right. Now I'm wrong, but I fear this decision will come back to haunt us. ISIS came about as a result of our withdrawal from Iraq.

The caliphate was established in Syria because Obama sat on the sidelines and watched the place to be dismembered. But now President Trump is on now. Go for it. Okay, now he was dealt a bad hand by Obama by knees to play it better than he's playing it. Keeping the troops in Iraq is great. Right now, after having been back from Afghanistan, I can tell you that ISIS is on the rise in Afghanistan. Oh, yeah, yeah. This is just a side note.

I could never work at CNN because you're supposed to remain calm and I would not remain calm in that interview. Yeah. Anyway, go ahead. When Lizzie Graham said it was BS, it was not BS, she was, the anchor was 100% correct. There was a status of force agreement, the Iraqi government said, you must leave. So Lindsey Graham's a liar and he lies on behalf of defense contractors every single time he goes on television.

And then talk of another 9-11. I mean, how many times are we going to fall for the stupid tricks of neocons like Lindsey Graham? Or if you don't do what I tell you and just constantly pay the defense contractors more and more money, well, my God, and if we don't have more and more wars, then we're going to have more 9-11s. I'm so tired of your crap, Lindsey Graham. How many people have you gotten killed, right? All over your senseless demagoguery. And now he says, oh, well, golly, gee, I've got the vapors.

I think ISIS might be going over to Afghanistan. So we have to stay there forever and ever and ever, otherwise we'll have more and more 9-11. Okay, so I want to elaborate on that a little more. So in the very beginning of that exchange, Lindsay Graham went after Obama for pulling troops out of, I believe it was Iraq that they were referring to, right? Now, Obama pulled troops out of Iraq because, A, that's what politicians in Iraq wanted, and at that point, the mission in Iraq was over. made all the sense in the world to pull out.

But then, yes, there was the rise of ISIS. There was the rise of radical groups like ISIS. But that could happen at any time. So does that mean that the United States needs to be in every Middle Eastern country just to prevent the rise of whatever extremist group? Yeah, why don't we go occupy Saudi Arabia then? Because ISIS's ideology shares is very similar to the Saudi government's ideology. I mean, ISIS could clearly rise out of there.

And the Saudis have funded terrorist attacks against us over and over and over again. You want to go occupy Saudi Arabia? Oh, no, they're your buddies. They start wars for you, that you then have your defense contractor buddies get rich off of, like Yemen, and they're allies with Israel. So, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, no, not the worst of the worst governments, that's Saudi Arabia. The most fundamentalists, the most violent, the most prone to funding terrorism, most prone to beheading journalists, but Lindsey Graham's like, no, no, that's the one country we shouldn't

touch, we should support them, everybody else we should invade forever in case there's more ISIS's. I'll tell you why ISIS arose, because George W. Bush and Lindsey Graham thought it was a great idea to invade Iraq. And there was no al-Qaeda in Iraq. That was a total goddamn lie as usual by the liar, Lindsey Graham. There was no al-Qaeda in Iraq. Now they go, oh, well, I mean, yeah, I guess there was no al-Qaeda in Iraq, but hey, and

There was no weapons of mass destruction either. We're all goddamn liars, but so what? Mushroom Cloud, 9-11, boo! Raytheon, did I do well? Are you gonna pay me a lot of money later? I know campaign checks in the mail. Thank you, Raytheon and Logite Martin, but later I'd like a big payday personally. I know what game you're playing, Lizzie Graham, and the American people are sick of it.

And when I say American people, I am right and you are wrong. Look at the polling. We want to withdraw. The right wants to withdraw, the left wants to withdraw. The only people who don't want to withdraw are the mainstream. media, all the goddamn politicians, and so, and of course, all funded by the defense contractors. Get out, get out, get out. So that whole, who created ISIS?

You created ISIS, Lindsey Graham, you created them. By invading Iraq, Al-Qaeda wasn't there, let alone ISIS. And you were so stupid that you thought, hey, you know what, I bet if we give democracy to Iraq, they won't turn Shia, even though 60% of the country is Shia. And you do math, you idiot, okay? And then when the Shia got control of Iraq, you thought, oh, I bet they won't crush the Sunnis. Of course they crushed the Sunnis.

The Sunnis had been crushing them for decades. So, oh, I bet when they crushed the Sunnis, the Sunnis won't get angry and turn militant. Of course they turned militant. Who told you all that was going to happen? We did. We told you that before the war. But you were stupid, Lindsay Graham, and you created ISIS. So at least do us the favor of shutting the hell up at this point.

Okay, you've done enough damage, you idiot. And Lindsey Graham was quiet, you're right, was completely quiet about the U.S.'s, our involvement in the war in Yemen, until Jamal Khashoggi was murdered and dismembered at the request or the demand of the crown prince, Muhammad bin Salman. Then he became a little more critical about Saudi Arabia, but since has completely quieted down on it and continues to essentially support it, right? Remain complicit in the U.S. involvement. I just bring that up because he did say a few critical things about Saudi Arabia, but

at the end of the day, it's all about who pays his campaigns, it's all about what the desires are of the military industrial complex. And he's been the most, I mean, he's going to be the head of the Senate Judiciary Committee. I don't know why he's the most vocal critic of pulling the troops out of, you know, Syria and Afghanistan. Because Lindsey Corrupt's whole career is wholly based on corruption. So corrupt, going to corrupt. So that's what he does. So getting out of Yemen, are you crazy?

That would be getting out of a war. Lindsay Graham has literally, literally in his entire career, never wanted to get. get out of a single war, no matter how long it took, no matter how disastrous it was. If it was up to him, we'd be in every war, we'd start new wars, and we would never, ever leave any of those wars. I'm actually reining myself from saying worse things about Lindsey Graham. So, of course, he's not going to be for withdrawal. There's a lot of BS talk about, oh, well, they shouldn't have chopped up Khashoggi.

Anyway, let's keep that war machine going, where five million kids are in danger of starving to death right now, Lindsay Graham. Do you care about that? Of course not, because you're a monster. Okay, you know, the funny thing is, I saw the show on a really good mood. You did, you weren't a good mood. I was, I was this story, and watching Lindsey Graham enraged me, man, and that's what the news does to me.

I don't know, maybe I guess I'm in a unique situation where that might be a positive in my career. But I, man, when they, they so flippantly just play with people's lives, oh, thousands are going to get killed here, hundreds of thousands are going to get killed there, who Who cares? They're going to make money. They disgust me. When we come back from the break, we are going to go back to Lindsey Graham, but specifically

on the topic of the government shutdown and funding the border wall. He claims that there are negotiations going on. And if Democrats sign on to this negotiation or this deal, I think that it would be a disaster. I'll give you the details and more. And I just figured out one of your dirty tricks. I'm going to expose it when we come back. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-The-Republic, or UNFTR. As a Young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations

are constantly 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-F-The Republic, or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood or. purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be. Featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the

nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational, aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. for as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, you must 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. All right, back on a Young Turks, last day of the membership drive. So let me do one more set of thank yous here at least, and then someone wrote a note. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful message. So let me run through the list real quick.

Hot Carl Marks from Las Vegas gave $150 bucks. These are all to t.yt.com slash Amplify, getting journalism students at media members, Young Turks membership. Gardner from Yuma, Arizona, took the 310 to Yuma and gave us 150, and everybody who gives 150 gets an Amplified T-shirt, too. I love that shirt. Esther Davies from Delaware, 150. Robert Funk from Pittsburgh, 150.

Sorry about what happened with the Browns and Ravens. Sandra Balduff Miller from Massachusetts, 150. Happy to hear about Elizabeth Warren. We're going to do that in the second hour today. Maya Kraft from York, Pennsylvania, 150. Andrea Curtis from Bremerton, Washington, 500. Thank you, Andrea. You're going to go on the honor roll on t-y-t.com as well.

We want people to know that we're powered by you guys. That's part of the reason we put your names up. Steve Paul from Webster City, Iowa. Make sure you go to the caucuses, $150.50 bucks. Joe Peterson from Fort Jones, California, $150, $150 from San Francisco, $150. John McLean from China. What? I thought it was going to be from Yakutomi Towers.

But anyway, John, thank you, $150, yippiquetay to you. All right, sorry. What? Old school references to die hard. Chris Grimble from Sacramento, 150, Amber Carr from Gas City, Indiana, but not gaslighting us because it's 500. Thank you, thank you. Amber, you're also going to go on the honor roll at TYT.com.

So everybody amplify. Also, t.com slash media, that's any amount. You don't have to do $50. You could do less. You could do more. The last one we're on, if we don't get to fill the last thousand, we're going to turn it into memberships for journalism students, right? The last remaining part.

But if we do fill it out, it goes to New York Times because Washington Post got filled up. New York Times is next. It would be great to do that. I want to take a look at both of those thermometers and then read you this message that I think you'll all like. So that's the media portion, 2,749. So we'd have to get the 3,500, almost there to get to the New York Times membership.

They'd get 20 to their top reporters and editors. That would be amazing. And let's look at overall membership thermometer for one of the last times here. 42,429. I celebrated over the weekend with you guys when we passed 42,000, which was our original goal. Of course, I'm going to ask you guys. To sign up under my URL, t.yt.com slash Anna. Can we see 43,000?

Can we see 43,000? By the way, so I promised you her dirty trick. So as I'm doing the YouTube lives now, some folks, let's put it that way, start leaving messages, tyt.com slash Anna, ty.com slash Anna. What do I have to do with that? Okay, oh, sure, like you didn't send them, Casper. your minions invading my live videos. Oh, yeah, yeah.

I have an army of people who are, who am I, Dave Rubin? Oh, you certainly don't pay for them, that's for sure. Anyway, and so maybe that's part of why you pass me. I'm trying to figure it out. You're hilarious. Okay. Maybe people just like me more. Okay, yeah, that's just kidding.

Honestly, I don't know how it's happening, but I love every minute of it. Okay, it's not over yet, guys. We still have, what do we have, eight and a half hours left? Okay, and I did a behind the scenes about the membership tribe that I think you guys are going to enjoy. Check that out if you remember, t.wit.com slash jank to sign up, obviously. Anyway, last thing here is, I got to read you this message. A recent member sent this in. TYT crew, I don't know if you get this message as well.

We apparently did. We are two academics, recent PhDs in Middle East politics, and humanitarians who have been avid followers of TYT for three years from when we were living in the UK and more recently in Canada. You have such an excellent investigative team and are such fantastic hosts, progressives with spot-on analysis balanced by a necessary sense of humor that you have become our go-to source for U.S. political news. From your analysis of Donald Trump and the D.C. political class to your support of Bernie and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, your fight against corruption and your coverage of important issues like Khashoggi, Iran, Yemen, wow, and thank you. Jank, you even went over my Kurdish partner, Mary, who is being gifted this membership. We can't get enough of you in your big head being projected onto our wall every evening. I will take that as a compliment. So it is about time

we start paying to support your progressive Netflix, inside us for now, and hopefully more as activists later, which I also love. However, I'm sorry to say, Jenk, that this membership is being put forward to help Anna win the competition. Yes! As Mary supports. Yes, you guys didn't see it, but I just went nuts. As Mary supports her inspirational sister in this drive.

That's going to make me cry. Okay. Thank you. It's also going to make me cry. But for different reasons. Thank you guys. Look, we do this show together. We can't do it without you.

TYT.com slash join in a rare moment of unity here. Okay, we believe in unity. And let's see if we can get that to 43,000 by that. I don't know. I don't know if we can. At least over 425 would be amazing. And look, guys, the second hour today is just for members. We came and did the show for you on a day that most people are off.

Obviously, you're getting this, everybody is, second hour is going to be just for members. You could still sign up for free, by the way. You get a free week if you want at t-y-t.com slash holiday. And then once you're signed up, in order to watch, go to t-y-t.com slash members live, okay? Remember, you could be free, t-y-t.com slash holiday. Who came up with that? I'm not saying it was me, but it was. It wasn't Anna.

All right, let's go forward. Okay. The United States is still currently undergoing a partial government shutdown. Democrats and Republicans have not made a deal over how to fund the government, and it's all because of the fact that Donald Trump still demands the $5 billion for the border wall. Now, Lindsey Graham, Senator Lindsey Graham, had a meeting with Trump and specifically talked about this issue, and he is hopeful that there could be a deal soon based on protections for DACA recipients, oh no, here we go again.

Now if you can remember, recently there were similar negotiations taking place when it came to funding the government, and Democrats wanted protections for DACA recipients, and you know, Mitch McConnell had promised Chuck Schumer that he would present a standalone bill, and then he never did. So I'm hoping Democrats aren't stupid enough to accept what Lindsey Graham is about to propose. Take a look. What I mentioned today as an outline of a potential breakthrough would be $5 billion for wall slash border security, the Bridge Act and TPS reform.

I think that's in the realm of possibility. The president didn't commit, but I think he's very open-minded. So he did reiterate later that Trump has been non-committal to this, but he's remaining Open-minded now, I don't know what happened with Trump because he wavered on the funding for the border wall and then you have Rush Limbaugh and Colter kind of bullying him on cable TV or on the radio show and all of a sudden he's kind of he's difficult to move like I want the five billion no matter what who knows if he's gonna take this deal but what I'm hoping is that Democrats don't take the deal because it's a workers visa for the

DACA recipients it's a very temporary protection for them Yeah, so I have a slightly different take on it. I agree with Anna's note of caution. Don't, I'm not interested in promises and I'm not interested in temporary visas. And Trump has moved a little bit, because he's dying to actually get this over with. He moved in two different ways. He's now calling it steel slats instead of a wall. And my favorite, he's saying that could be see-through, could it be gauze.

It would be gauze, curtain, perhaps glass? It's going to be such high-tech technology that it's going to be invisible. It's going to be there, but it'll be invisible, kind of like our fighter jets. Yeah, like the F-35. Yeah. It'll be a stealth wall. And naked, invisible to the naked eye, okay? But it's there.

Anyway, and he also actually, according to sources, offered to make it only two and a half billion instead of $5 billion. So here would be my counterproposal, and I would take a deal. And so, but it of course depends on what's in the deal. So if Dreamers are permanently protected, and I know they got held as hostages, and I know that it's a ransom note, I know all that. But if they were to be permanently protected and it went towards barriers instead of a concrete wall, because that's what are we talking about?

Democrats were in favor of offense anyway, right? then I would take the deal, because it's not about, like, I'm not in a panic to open the government back up. I think these government shutdowns are a little silly because they don't really shut the government down. I do want them to reopen as soon as possible because I care about the human beings who are federal employees who are being treated terribly at this point. But the bottom line is, I think that they could have a deal if they word the fencing slash steel slats

Right? And they gave Dreamers permanent protection. That would be a deal worth making. Yeah, I mean, the permanent protection is key. I'm not having a conversation about temporary workers visas. And I'm definitely not having a conversation about, let's just pass the spending bill now and we'll do a standalone bill later. No.

No way. It would be stupid at this point or it was stupid in the past to take Republicans at their word. And as Chuck Schumer learned, McConnell had no interest. in proposing a stand-alone bill, much less having a vote on the Senate floor. Now, with that said, one of my favorite exchanges about this issue happened between Dana Bash on CNN and Lindsay Graham, and it was about the issue of who pays for the border wall. Now, Trump campaigned saying, and we all thought it was a joke, that Mexico would pay for the wall.

Well, what happened with that? Lindsay Graham's about to answer the question. He did say that this was a campaign promise to build a wall, but he also said, Mexico would pay for it, not the American taxpayers. What happened to that? Well, I'm not asking Mexico to pay for it. I'm asking the American people to pay for it. Yeah. Well, at the end of the day, we'll see how the NAFTA deal, I think he'll claim that Mexico is paying more under the new NAFTA deal. But I'm not talking about what he said back during the campaign. I'm talking about what we can do now to open up a government that needs to be opened up. The Coast Guard's not going

to get paid here soon. I'm not asking Mexico to pay for it. I'm asking the American people to pay for it. That's a direct quote from Lindsey Graham. And he is also the typical politician who will turn around and argue that we don't have money to fund our schools. We don't have money to give student loan debt relief. We don't have money to offer health care, universal health care.

I mean, this is such a ridiculous conversation. And it's, again, look, $5 billion in the grand. scheme of things might be a drop in the bucket, but I don't consider it a drop in the bucket when you look at the number of people living in poverty in the country that Republicans want to turn their backs on by cutting food stamps and whatever government programs there are. So, Lindsay, you want to take $5 billion out of the Defense Department that is going to go to defense contractors to pay for the wall? My guess is you're going to say no, because they're your benefactors.

So, hey, look, you got Donald Trump to bloat that defense budget up, and now it's gargantuan. It's $750 billion. Well, just take five out of there. Oh, you're not going to agree because that's your donors, right? Lizzie, you're going to make the American people pay again. When it comes to walls and wars, Lizzie Graham and his fellow Republicans can always find the money. When it comes to educating your kids, giving them health care, giving you higher wages, somehow

they just can't find the money. It's funny how these politicians work. One other thing I wanted to bring up was what the reality is at the border, because I'm not going to deny that there are people trying to come into the country, people who are seeking asylum. It is a complicated issue, it's a difficult issue. And no one, no one has argued in favor of complete open borders, despite what Republicans will tell you.

But is the problem at the border as terrible, as bad, or as historical, as a, at as Republicans would have you believe. Well, I was curious about the numbers, because you keep hearing over and over again, this, you know, the media regurgitating what Republicans say, oh, you know, there's been a surge, the migrant caravan, there's more people coming in, they don't know how to handle it. Okay, here are the real numbers. From the 1980s to the, sorry, this is a graphic seven, from the 1980s to the mid-2000s, apprehensions at the border routinely reached more than one million migrants a year.

Today, they are at nearly historical lows. In the fiscal year that ended in September, border authorities apprehended 521,090 people. So about half, half the number. Look, and I'm not saying that to make it seem as though half a million people trying to go through the country or enter the country illegally is a small amount of people. But this isn't like some giant, you know, surge as our politicians would have you believe. Yeah, it's in what you choose to emphasize. That's where the bias comes in.

So you can say, hey, MS-13 did some grisly murders. Well, that's certainly true. But what they don't tell you is the Aryan Brotherhood in this country is twice as big as MS-13. But we never talk about the murders they committed. We never talk about the torture that they do. Why? Because politicians have decided to focus on MS-13 for their political purposes, the demagogue.

And they have not, they've decided not to focus on the horrible crimes that all of them. other gangs commit that don't serve their political purposes. And same thing in this case with the numbers. So they say, 521,000 people, that's unbelievable. They don't give you the context that it used to be over a million, but the numbers are going down every day. They make it seem like it's a resurgent problem, as Anna pointed out, when in reality it is a dwindling problem.

It doesn't mean that it's not a problem, but it doesn't require some sort of national emergency with poorly planned processes and draconian actions like ripping kids away from their family members and then keeping them in intention under border patrol for so long that some of them have started dying in those attention facilities now. So, and in an emergency, those kind of drastic actions might seem more appropriate or understandable. But we don't have an emergency. We have a situation that's actually getting better every year. and well before Trump came into office.

So that context is super important and what is missing from so much of the media coverage. Exactly. So don't let the people in positions of power convince you of problems that don't exist, right? And I feel like that keeps happening and the media buys into it hook, line, and sinker. And it drives me crazy. Just do some fact checking. Look into the numbers, right? Again, half a million people is not a small amount of people.

But when you look at that number relative to what we've seen historically, then anyone who tells you that the problem is worse now than it's ever been is lying to you. That's the point that I'm trying to make. All right. I'm actually going to move on to John Kelly and then we'll take a break. Yeah, makes sense. All right. John Kelly resigned and then was fired from Trump's administration.

And now he's speaking to the press about some of his experience within Trump's administration. He gave an interview to the Los Angeles Times and touched on a number of issues, including foreign policy, but he spent a lengthy amount of time talking about the border wall and Trump's immigration policies. So here's what John Kelly told the LA Times. In regard to the wall at the border, he said, quote, to be honest, it's not a wall. He continues to say- Is that for clear?

Yeah, he continues to say, the president still says wall. Oftentimes, frankly, he'll say barrier or fencing. Now he's tended towards steel slats, but we left a solid concrete wall early on in the administration when he asked people what they needed and where they needed it. So Trump gets elected and then he actually is forced to do analysis, cost benefit analysis on this border wall and then realizes early on in his presidency, okay, we need to abandon this. Part of the reason why he has changed his rhetoric when it comes to the so-called wall.

He has been referring to it as steel slats. In fact, just real quick, I want to go to video seven, and it'll give you a sense of how Trump has really changed the way he talks about this so-called wall. I can't tell you where the government's going to be open. I can tell you it's not going to be open until we have a wall, a fence, whatever they'd like to call it. I'll call it whatever they want. A tweet, Trump said, quote, an all concrete wall was never abandoned, in all caps.

He just said it was abandoned. We saw it with our own eyes. They could call it whatever they want. Maybe he could be seen through. He's, anyway, more from this tweet, Graphic 14. So an all concrete wall has never been abandoned, as has been reported by the media. Some areas will be all concrete, but the experts at Border Patrol prefer a wall that is see-through, thereby making it possible to see what is happening on both sides, makes sense

to me. Yeah, well, that made sense to everybody until you came along on your campaign and started saying, it's going to be a wall, it's going to be a concrete wall. Border Patrol didn't even want a concrete wall. So, but I'm, I got a new theory on this though. I think that maybe people figured out, they're like, what if we tell him that it's there but it just see-through? He might be dumb enough to believe it.

So maybe the Republicans and Democrats got together, they're like, yes, we have given $5 billion to your see-through wall, okay? And bring him, tell him, as Anna was saying earlier in the show, oh, it's just like the F-35. It's a stealth wall. That's why you can't see it. It's invisible. He might buy it. He might buy it.

There's like a 52% chance he believes it. Higher. Higher, okay. Now, Kelly also spills some more tea when it comes to this immigration issue. He says some pretty interesting things about his views on these immigrants. He says illegal immigrants overwhelmingly are not bad people. I have nothing but compassion for them, the young kids. He's the one who wrote that New York Times op-ed, that anonymous New York Times op-ed.

Obviously I'm speculating, I don't know for sure. But just based on how this interview went, I feel like. There were little bits and pieces in there that proved that he was the one who wrote it. I have no idea about that. You know I love predicting things, but I don't know. Because as everyone is leaving the administration, and this interview is a great example of that. They're putting out a giant lawn sign saying, it wasn't me, it wasn't me, I was just trying

to control him. The one thing that Giant Kelly said was, my accomplishments are not what I got done, but what I prevented from happening. That's what it was. That's what it was. It was him. It was him. Okay, we may never know, but.

Yeah, we'll probably know, because they're all going to write books. They all can't wait to write books, and they're going to tell you what a monster Trump was and how, but the over, hear me now, quote me later, the overwhelming theme of all of the insider books from all the people that worked at the Trump administration at the top levels will be, that they were stunned at how stupid he was. I told you all along. And that PR campaign unfortunately will work, but I don't want anyone to give them a pass. They were drunk off of power and basically were willing to play ball as long as they had access

to that power. So a few more quotes from John Kelly. He said in regard to illegal immigration, if you want to stop illegal immigration, stop U.S. demand for drugs, that's never gonna happen, and expand economic opportunity in Central America. That I agree with. Yeah, but he said vicious things about immigrants before. Kelly has.

Yes. So this is all C-Y-A as he leaves, right? And this is all saying, hey, hey, remember, you can hire me later. I'm not one of the crazy guys in the Trump administration. You were his chief of staff. And when you were in power, before you were shown the exit, you were talking about, oh, the immigrants were got to stop them and they're terrible. Now all of a sudden, on your way, I like immigrants.

I like tacos, right? And so, yeah, yeah, we see you with John Kelly. Finally, the quote that made headlines over the weekend, he revealed the real, based on what he says, mastermind behind the zero tolerance policy. Everyone thought it was Stephen Miller because Stephen Miller is pretty transparent about how much he hates anyone who's not white. But apparently it was Jeff Sessions. Here's what Kelly said.

What happened was Jeff Sessions. He was the one that instituted the zero tolerance process on the board. that resulted in both people being detained and the family separation. He surprised us. So there's a second reason why John Kelly says that, because he brought in Kirsten Nielsen to the administration. She's the head of Department of Homeland Security, and a lot of people thought it was her that did it.

And so this is him backing an ally on the way out, saying, hey, it wasn't her, it wasn't even Trump, it was Jeff Sessions who did it. Now, that doesn't mean that it's not true, it probably is true. John Kelly's got a lot of problems, but probably not the kind of guy who would make a lie that audacious on his way out because Jeff Sessions and others could rebut him. And so, and it's not surprising, it's surprising to us now as a matter of news, but not surprising in terms of Jeff Sessions' philosophy. Jeff Sessions is a maniacal right winger.

So he also stood up to Trump a tiny, tiny bit, so he now gets a ton of credit for that. by the rest of the press. But the reality is he is to the right of Donald Trump on war on drugs, immigration, and many other issues. And that is, it's near impossible to be to the right of Donald Trump on immigration, but Jeff Sessions is. He's a super bad guy. It's interesting John Kelly telling us that it was him and basically saying, don't blame

me, don't blame Nielsen, blame Sessions, and he knows that people are getting blamed. But my two favorite things, though, about Kelly are not on the policy so much, as much as the admissions, that when he was over at Homeland Security, he said at the time that he was fully informed about Donald Trump's travel ban on Muslim countries. Now he's saying, yeah, just kidding. Not at all informed. He sprung it on us. And that's what we said at the time, but he said, yeah, of course we were surprised and didn't know how to react. We told you because Trump makes decisions without consulting with anyone because he's an idiot.

He doesn't know how to, look, even if he wants that Muslim ban in place, the smart way to do it would be to check with his allies to get his legal defense ready, get homeland security ready so that he could successfully execute that terrible policy. But he's too dumb. So he's like, oh, I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it, I'm just gonna tweet it, I'm gonna tweet it, I tweeted it everybody, I did it, right? So this is John Kelly on the way up being like, yeah, and which brings us to the final point, he said that the job was bone crushingly hard.

And he said that it was the quote, this was reported earlier, he hasn't confirmed this quote, but, quote, the worst job in the world. I believe him. Yes, I believe him on that as well. And he said, I mean, look, this is a guy who's a very decorated general. He went into combat. And he's like, oh, combat, where I could get killed, easy. Working for the moron Donald Trump and trying to keep up with his fickle attitudes and not blow up the world,

that was bone-crushingly hard to give you a sense of what a disaster the Trump had administration is. And also reports that he frequently told people that Trump was not up for the role of president. He just wasn't up for it. And that is exceedingly obvious to everyone. But the media has to bring on Trump expert allies to say, well, 50-50, you never know. No, we know, we know. This outgoing chief of staff is like, this guy, total moron, okay, not up to the job.

All right, we're going to take a break, but when we come back, the 2020 general election is already heating up, and we'll tell you why. 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 and selling our data. But that doesn't mean we have to let them. It's possible to stay anonymous online and hide your data from the prying eyes of big tech. And one of the best ways is with ExpressVPN. ExpressVPN hides your IP address, making your active ID more difficult to trace and sell

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We hope you're enjoying this free clip from The Young Turks. If you want to get the whole show and more exclusive content while supporting independent media, become a member at t-y-t.com slash join today. In the meantime, enjoy this free section. All right. Back on a young Turks. I want to thanks to folks who just did t.wit.com slash Amplify, Ennis Smith from Philly, from Philly, $150,

who will be getting an Amplify T-shirt as well, only available in this campaign. Julie Gordon from Rochester, Minnesota, $150, same. And Gregory Matiola from Somerville, New Jersey, $150. A lot of people close to where I grew up. Thank you, guys. Let me go to member comments. Sorry, Jenk. Anna is the voice of the people.

She will win, and then some URL, I can't quite decipher. T.y.t.com slash Anna. I can read it. Okay. I can help you out with that. Meg writes in, Lindsay Graham might have passed Ted Cruz as the saddest man in America. It's a good competition now. Yeah, that's a tough competition. They're both pretty terrible. Yeah.

THX 1138 says, the Jurassic Prick Hoodies arrive for my boys. They finally look like progressives. I love that. You can still get 25% off of the resist collection today. So jump on it at shoptyt.com. And I think you have to enter the promo code New Year. Okay? Shoptyt.com.

I was watching the movie Love Actually over the weekend. And there's a lot of British lingo. And I knew this, but I never really acknowledged what prick really means. Right? You know what means, right? A genitalian? Yeah. Yeah, of course.

Yeah, of course. The British are fun. No, they are. I like their lingo. Me too. Yeah. I know some people think it's a controversy, but I don't. No, I love the way they talk there.

The adjectives they put before words is fantastic. Brilliant, really. Jinks Anna writes in on Twitter, my husband's talking politics with a friend and he's talking over Jenkinana. I'm about to make him go outside so I can listen. There you go, regularly. That's totally something you would do. I feel like.

Yeah, no, I would go outside. Are you kidding me? I'm gonna tell Wendy? No, that's not how we're else. Anyway. No, I mean you're the one who'd probably talk over the show. Just to share your own opinions and analysis. Anyway, Hugh Mohn, I'm taking a lot of grief today, man.

I know, I'm sorry. I'll be nicer to you in the New Year. It's my New Year's resolution. Now patronizing. You see this? Is this what you guys want to encourage this kind of attitude? Okay. The numbers indicate that is what they want to encourage.

what they want to encourage. All right. Well, numbers can indicate something else by the end of the day. T.R.2.com slash jank. Okay. Hugh Mone writes in, the an bus is coming. Everybody's jumping. Yes.

New York to San Francisco. I don't know the words that well. Okay. I don't know. I was going to say, oh, yeah, what if the jank bus comes? I'm not sure that's a bus you want to be on. Hey, everybody, come on the jank bus. Anyway, word burn Steinem says, I love the latest Giacorian Arthur commercial.

Well, that's something we could all agree on. Thank you. And it is, it's a fun, fun ad. Okay, second hour is for members only, but we are going to do the first part of Elizabeth Warren's story for you right now. She's running, Anna's going to tell you all about that. In the second part, we're going to talk about the media reaction to it, which, of course, in some circles, is blood boiling, as usual.

Man, they are so biased. It's unbelievable. And if you're mad about it, sign up through t-y-t.com slash chan. Okay, okay. I love how you just reported the first part of the story. Congratulations. Sorry. She's running for president.

Okay. All right. Let me do it professionally. Oh, Jesus. Okay, all right. Keep we going, sister. All right. Elizabeth Warren has just announced that she plans to run for president in the 2020 general election.

Now, she did so through forming something known as an exploratory committee that allows her to raise money and start campaigning essentially. And she also put out an ad. And her ad highlights the platform that she plans on running on and the political issues that she clearly feels the most passionately about. So let's take a quick look at that. Working families today face a lot tougher path than my family did. And families of color face a path that is still.

deeper and rockier, a path made even harder by the impact of generations of discrimination. I've spent my career getting to the bottom of why America's promise works for some families, but others who work just as hard slipped through the cracks into disaster. So I actually think it was really smart of her to highlight the way that she's been fighting for consumer protections and for Wall Street and big bank regulations. That is what stands out the most when it comes to Elizabeth Warren. That's what I like the most about her. And I think it resonates with people, certainly with people on the left.

But I think even with people on the right. Now, she's not pulling that well when it comes to the right wing. But I'm sure that if you ask them about consumer protections and things like that, they probably enjoyed that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau gave American consumers $12 billion, one back $12 billion on their behalf from all these corporations and big banks that have been screwing them over. Yeah. So you know, a lot of times people will say, oh yeah, wait till the election and the election

will bring down people's popularity. I actually think in the case of Elizabeth Warren, it might bring up her popularity. So she used to poll, this context you don't often get in a lot of these articles. This one I don't blame them much for, because you really got to go dig a little bit. But Elizabeth Warren used to poll really well a couple of years back with Republicans. In fact, she pulled number one among all Democrats with Republicans. And the person who pulled number two was Bernie Sanders. And I think that there's a logical reason for that, which is that they have populist positions.

So a lot of the other Democrats come across as elitist, where Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders do not. Now, since then, the Republicans have attacked her a lot. So that's cost or some of that popularity with right wingers. First of all, I'm not concerned about right wingers. I know a lot of people say, oh, yeah, but we can win the general election. No, really? Of course, but you're not gonna win over MAGA guys.

You can win over independence, and what wins over independence is actually fighting for the average American as opposed to the elites. I think that this launched by Elizabeth Warren was excellent, I think, you know, it's fair to say I'm biased because I'm a progressive and she's a progressive and I agree with her policies. And I think she's done wonderful work, especially in the world of finance. But I mean, there's a second reason that I like her. It's because a lot of times, you remember, of course, Mitch McConnell famously told her just be quiet and sit down in the Senate and nevertheless she persisted.

But oftentimes it was other Democrats telling her to sit down and be quiet and not challenge the bankers. But she did anyway, nevertheless, she persisted. So she deserves a world of credit for that. I mean, my quote-unquote bias comes from actually studying the policy issues, which she deserves a ton of credit for. So I want to give you a specific example, and it has to do with when she fought back against something that Obama, a Democrat, wanted to do, right?

So let's go to Graphic 18. In 2015, Warren sunk the nomination of Antonio Weiss. The Wall Street banker selected by the Obama administration to serve as third-ranking official at the Treasury Department taking on her party on the grounds that Weiss, the former head of investment banking for Lazard, was too closely connected to the financial services industry to serve in public office. So she fought, she fought back. And to me, that's the important sign of a good leader, someone who's willing to not just

step up to the opposing party, but step up to members of their own party to do the right thing. And I love that she does that when it comes to Wall Street bankers, when it comes to big corporations, when it comes to looking out for Americans and consumers. Now I want to show you just quickly the second part of her video that I thought was powerful, and then we'll discuss. How do we get here? Billionaires and big corporations decided they wanted more of the pie. And they enlisted politicians to cut them a fatter slice.

They crippled unions so no one could stop them. We're going to turn the bull loose. Dismaneled the financial rules meant to keep us safe after the Great Depression and cut their own taxes. So they paid less than their secretaries and janitors. It's time to write the rules for the middle class. After Wall Street crashed our economy in 2008, I left the classroom to go to Washington and confront the broken system head on.

Elizabeth Warren, apparently not afraid to tangle with Wall Street. Elizabeth Warren is heading into the lion's den. Mrs. Warren goes to Washington. We created America's first consumer watchdog to hold the big banks accountable. A woman who has warned of another meltdown if Washington doesn't straighten up. I never thought I'd run for office, not in a million years. But when Republican senators tried to sabotage the reforms and run me out of town, I went back to Massachusetts and ran against one of them.

And I beat it. And we are going to turn. Washington vets the game. So again, showcasing what her platform is essentially going to be about. Excellent video to launch the campaign as well. I agree with Anna's analysis of that. And I want to give a little bit of credit here to the New York Times because I thought they did a surprisingly balanced story about it.

And they quoted that her, she is better known and better liked than any other Democrat who has not run for president before. So as a lot of the other establishment Democratic candidates get a lot of love from the mainstream media based on very little data and analysis. This is actually analysis that shows, no, the polling indicates of the people who haven't run before, Elizabeth Warren is the most popular. And three out of five Democrats say that they have a favorable opinion of her. Only 12% say they don't.

Those are excellent numbers for her. Now, on the other hand, the New York Times said, but some of the other folks in the Democratic Party are not that happy with her. To me, that's not a but. That's a yes, awesome. And they said, I love this line. But Ms. Warren has also become a favorite target of conservatives. That means she's fighting for us.

That's also not a butt. That's also excellent, we appreciate it, and it makes me want to support you more, not less. Now of course, a lot of progressives are going to say two things, and we know that. One is, yeah, but aren't they going to split up the vote between her and Bernie Sanders? Guys, this is not the time to worry about that. We should be so lucky that the final two are Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. Yeah, and so right now what you need more than anything else is a lot of strong, you're strong progressive voices, getting free earned media attention to our policy issues.

What do we care about? I don't know about you guys, but me, I don't care about personalities, I don't care about who happens to have power and doesn't have power and what their names are, okay? What I care about is progressive policies. And if you've got these two lions who are out there fighting for those policy positions, that is a wonderful thing, not a bad thing, okay? And the second thing is I know some folks say, well, you know, she should have supported Bernie Sanders last time around in 2016.

Well, you're right, she should have. And I told her that when she was here in the studio and she's at least partly acknowledged that. But that's done. She can't undo it, okay? I wish she had as well, but would it have made the difference? We'll never know. But for now, she's in the race and she's deeply progressive.

And when you have good options, take them, okay? Just because you like Elizabeth Warren doesn't mean you don't like Bernie Sanders or vice versa. You're allowed to like both of them a lot, especially compared to the others. We're gonna take a break, but when we come back, we are gonna discuss the media's response to this, and some people have already been pretty vicious. Yeah, look, you're gonna be shocked at which media outlet has not been kind to Senator Warren, and I'm kidding, you're not going to be shocked at all. But they're amazing though, they're amazing immediately.

As soon as it's a progressive, they pounce. Like we told you earlier guys, second hours just for the members, t.t.com slash join to become a member. Actually, before we take the break and go off the air free for everybody, let's take one last look at the thermometer and see where we are there. t-y-t.com slash join to become a member. And again, it's a free trial over a week now so you can do t-y-t.com slash holiday, 42485. Wow.

Let's see if we could at least get to 4200 by the end of the show. You guys are all wonderful. Thank you so much. And members, we'll see you right after the break. 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 yt. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.