What A Day - The State Of South Dakota Vs. Common Sense

Episode Date: May 12, 2020

The governor of South Dakota threatened to sue two Sioux tribes over road checkpoints they have set up to prevent the spread of COVID-19 to their reservations. Members of the tribe say that establishing checkpoints is a matter-of-life and death. South Dakota’s governor, who never issued a stay-at-home order for her state, says the checkpoints are illegal and causing traffic. The Supreme Court will hear arguments in three cases regarding Trump’s financial records today. These cases will help determine the limits of Trump’s power to ignore subpoenas from Congress and state prosecutors.And in headlines: Georgia’s AG appoints a new prosecutor to oversee the case of Ahmaud Arbery, Poland holds a “ghost election,” and Shanghai Disneyland re-opens.

It's Tuesday, May 12th. I'm Akilah Hughes. And I'm Gideon Resnick. And this is What A Day, where we just found out we reached the bottom of every streaming service. Yeah. Did you know that there was a bottom? No, I didn't. My computer just shut down. I was terrified. On today's show, the Supreme Court takes on the question of Trump's tax returns, then some headlines. But first, the latest. Stephen Smith, who did digital work for Pete Buttigieg, cited the other day how Travis Scott's takeover of Fortnite and how that was a really creative way to think about it,

that if we could do that with Joe Biden, you know, Joe Biden projected against the Grand Canyon, you know, that might be a little bit ambitious. Yeah. All right. Well, that was Democratic strategist Liz Smith with an interesting idea about how to get young people excited about Joe Biden. So I guess we're going to go sicko mode on the whole election. All right. Well, in news, the White House is now requiring most administration officials to wear masks when in the West Wing, taking a step that our local grocery stores did weeks ago. But the rules are not expected to apply to President Trump or Vice President Pence. For weeks, Pence and Trump have downplayed the need for masks, even as the CDC recommends them for use in public settings. As we talked about on the show yesterday, all of this comes after a military

valet to Trump and a spokeswoman for Mike Pence tested positive for COVID-19. It's also caused the country's top three health officials to at least partially isolate themselves. And today, those three, that's CDC Director Robert Redfield, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn, and Dr. Anthony Fauci at the NIH, are going to Hahn, and Dr. Anthony Fauci at the NIH are going to remotely testify before Congress. The Republican chair of the committee, Senator Lamar Alexander, also has to appear remotely after a staff member in his office tested positive for the virus. So that's a bit on how COVID-19 has spread through the upper branches of our government, super tight, even while the White House encourages states and businesses to reopen. More on that tomorrow. But today, we're going to zoom in on a story

out of South Dakota. So Gideon, you want to get us started? Yeah, so this is one of the states where the governor, Kristi Noem, did not issue a statewide stay-at-home order because she said that doing so would flatten the curve so much that the stay-at-home order would have to remain in place longer to be effective. Okay, South Dakota has about 3,500 cases of coronavirus and has seen a large outbreak at the Smithfield Foods meatpacking plant in Sioux Falls. Still, Nome is encouraging normalcy and even declined a local shelter-in-place measure in the area around the meatpacking plant. On Friday, Nome threatened to sue two Native American tribes, the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe and the Oglala Sioux Tribe, over road checkpoints that they have set up in order to

prevent the spread of COVID-19 to their reservations. Now, she contends that the checkpoints are interfering with the state's traffic, and Nome ordered the tribes to take them down within 48 hours. Otherwise, she would take them to court. Okay, so that's terrible. Well, the deadline has passed, so the checkpoints are still up. What are the tribes saying? Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Chairman Harold Frazier has said that for the 12,000 people who live on the reservation, establishing these checkpoints is a matter of life and death. We're going to stay put. You know, this is right now with the lack of resources we have medically. I mean, this is our best tool we have right now is to try to prevent it.

And I believe that this is a good practice. And if we should ever get it, you know, again, it's a good tool for us to use to try to isolate as quick as we can the virus. According to Frazier, the tribe has only eight hospital beds and the closest hospital with an intensive care unit is three hours away. Both of the tribes have kept up their own stay-at- home orders during this time, despite the state's actions. Frazier has said that federal tribal treaties allow for them to monitor who travels through reservations, but Nome has argued that they are supposed to consult with state officials on temporary closures of non-tribal roads. Essentially, you have a group of people that are attempting to keep themselves safe,

who have no historical reason to trust the U.S. government or branches of it, and a governor who hasn't taken much in the way of restrictive action taking issue with what they're doing. Yeah, and the threat is obviously very real. Native American communities around the country have been hit hard by COVID-19. A tragic example is the Navajo Nation. That's right. So Navajo Nation encompasses parts of New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, an area almost three times the size of Massachusetts. According to reports, there are about 175,000 people who live on the reservation, and they've already seen about 3,000 cases and at least 100 people have died.

According to estimates, if Navajo Nation were considered a state, it would have the highest per capita rate of coronavirus cases in the country behind just New York. And compounding this problem is that many of the preventative measures that people can sometimes take for granted in protecting against the virus just aren't available to everyone who is there. For instance, something like a third of the homes don't have running water. Many family members may live together in a house, which makes quarantine difficult if somebody gets sick. Not to mention things like the grocery store can be hours away,

and internet access can also be scarce. Yeah. And the Navajo Nation, like the tribes in South Dakota, has also taken steps in order to stem the spread. Strict lockdowns were put in place weeks ago to prevent people from leaving home, unless in emergency situations. But what else is happening? Yeah, so in the CARES Act, the first economic relief package passed by Congress in March, there was this $8 billion amount that was allocated to Native American communities around

the U.S. But it took until just last week for the Navajo Nation to get their $600 million chunk of that money. Leadership has said that that delay cost lives. Local leaders have had to take their own steps in order to fight the virus, like distributing vital supplies and information. And now there are at least two teams from Doctors Without Borders who are assisting and expect to be there until June. So we'll be tracking these stories as they develop, but we also have some news happening today that is unrelated to COVID-19 from the Supreme Court. That's right. So today, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in three cases regarding Trump's financial records. Two of the cases involve congressional subpoenas for his tax returns and bank records. This goes back to last year when Congress was seeking to see if

Trump tried to skimp on his taxes by misstating the value of his real estate holdings. They also wanted to look into whether he had any financial ties to foreign governments or entities. Seems important. Trump argues that Congress doesn't have the authority to get those records. Congress says that they do. So put simply, this is a test of whether a president can ignore a congressional subpoena and could have big implications for the power of congressional oversight, which I know sounds a little bit nerdy, but it is an incredibly big deal. I agree. The other case involves state subpoenas for Trump's financial records. It stems from an investigation and grand jury trial in New York. Trump contends that he, as president, has complete immunity from criminal investigations while in office. You know, the

whole I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue defense. It sounds like a joke, but a lawyer for Trump actually said a president couldn't be prosecuted for that while in office. New York City's DA says that's bullshit. In all of these cases, lower courts have decided against Trump. The Supreme Court is going to give us their final ruling by the end of June, so we will update you as soon as this gets decided. And that's the latest. It's Tuesday, WOD Squad. It's, you know, one of our favorite funnymen passed away yesterday. It's very upsetting.

Jerry Stiller, maybe most famous, at least recently, for his role as George Costanza's dad on Seinfeld. But he was in so, so, so much more. So giddy. What's your favorite Jerry Stiller performance? It's got to be Seinfeld. That's like, you know, the most iconic possible stuff. But one that I kind of revisited today that i almost forgot about was his role as maury ballstein in zoolander um where he has the part where he yells for christ's sakes it's a

casserole sheila um very very iconic line and moment um he rocked though like everything that he did was was really awesome yeah and like you know mean, the head of a dynasty of like comedians. But yeah, Zoolander is I wouldn't even say it slept on. Everyone loves that movie. And I think that, yeah, his role is something that people should definitely talk about more. He's just he's so outrageous on screen. It's hard to like look away. Yeah, he's doing like a similar thing as he did with Costanza. But it works. And I'm glad that it's hard to like look away yeah he's doing like a similar thing as uh he did with

Costanza but it works and I'm glad that it's transferable um what do you what performance of his though did were you thinking about today oh man so just a week ago I watched heavyweights which if you don't know what this movie is it's a about a bunch of little kids in the 90s going to fat camp and Ben Stiller plays like a terrible like i don't know guy who takes over the camp but he takes over the camp from jerry who is his dad but not in the movie and he has this iconic line i was like don't let anyone else sign your checks because he basically gets like bought out but even in just like a small cameo role like that. He's so excellent. And we had a full discussion, me and my housemate,

about that moment like a week ago. So it's definitely top of mind for me. Yeah, he rocks. R.I.P. the Still Man, as I'm going to be calling him from now on.

Cool guy. Really funny dude. Aw, well that's very sweet. And guess what? Another perfect temperature check. If you need to laugh, watch pretty much any movie that Jerry Stiller was in, and we will catch up with you tomorrow. Let's wrap up with some headlines.

Headlines. Headlines. Georgia's attorney general has appointed a new lead prosecutor to oversee the case of Ahmaud Arbery. Joyette Holmes, the district attorney of Cobb County in the Atlanta area, and the first black woman to serve in that position, will be the fourth prosecutor on this case after the first three had to step aside. The state AG said that the case has grown in size and magnitude since the last prosecutor was appointed and that an office with better resources is needed to step in. The Justice Department also announced it will decide

whether or not to bring federal hate crime charges into the case. If that happens, it would allow for a separate case in federal court. The state of Georgia does not currently have hate crime laws. The LGBTQ community in South Korea has become the target of widespread hate and backlash as the country faces an increasing number of daily COVID-19 cases. Yesterday, we mentioned that a second wave of cases in the country was linked to one man who went clubbing in a night club district in Seoul. That district is known as a safe space for the city's LGBTQ community, which has led Korean media outlets to engage in homophobia and finger-pointing. Seoul. That district is known as a safe space for the city's LGBTQ community,

which has led Korean media outlets to engage in homophobia and finger-pointing. LGBTQ people currently have little legal protection, and same-sex marriage is not legally recognized in the country. Now, a majority of the people who went out in that area over the weekend are avoiding getting tested or coming forward for fears of being outed. Seoul's mayor said that authorities plan to use location data from credit cards and security cameras to track people down, which is a cause of concern for privacy advocates. Indeed, a presidential election was held in Poland on Sunday, but it was missing a key element, one single person voting. The so-called ghost election went down because differing factions of Poland's government couldn't come to an agreement about whether elections should be delayed due to coronavirus.

Poland's ruling party, the Law and Justice Party, tried to push things forward. Opposition candidates think that's because the incumbent president might have a harder time getting reelected after voters have a full view of the economic fallout from the pandemic. On election day, polling places were closed, but the vote wasn't officially canceled. That led to a historic zero percent turnout. On election day, polling places were closed, but the vote wasn't officially canceled. That led to a historic 0% turnout. Please don't tell our friends in the GOP that this is an option. Poland's parliament has 14 days to set a new election date, which must be held by late July. Shanghai Disneyland reopened on Monday with restrictions in place to prevent any human-to-princess transmissions of COVID-19.

Guests were limited to less than 30% capacity, so they were actually outnumbered by employees. They had to wear masks and socially distance. And upon entry, they had their temperatures checked and showed a QR code from Shanghai's official diagnostic app indicating that they were all clear. If visitors wanted to go on Buzz Lightyear's Planet Rescue, where writers carry toy blasters, they needed to take a tip from a certain famous red pants mouse and wear gloves. Disney Shanghai's soft reopening could offer a model to other parks worldwide. The company's next scheduled reopening is Disney Springs, a retail complex next to Disney World that's set to resume operations on May 20th. Go without me. Yeah, I'm all set. I got enough Disney shit. And those are the headlines.

Quick announcement before we go. Wind of Change, Crooked's new pod with Pineapple Street Studios and Spotify is out now. It's hosted by journalist Patrick Radden Keefe, who heard a rumor from someone inside the CIA claiming that the CIA wrote one of the biggest songs of all time, a metal ballad that became a weapon in the Cold War. And from there, the story only gets crazier. Patrick interviews music legends, ex-spies, and even travels to Russia and Ukraine as part of his reporting. You can binge all eight episodes right now on Spotify for free. Get to it. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, create a new streaming service for us to watch and tell your friends to listen.

And if you're into reading and not just the words written on a chalkboard by a rude young student named Bart, like me, What A Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Akilah Hughes. I'm Gideon Resnick. And stay safe at Disney Shanghai.

Yeah, you don't really need any souvenirs, okay? Don't bring anything home. Wear gloves for the blasters, for God's sakes. What a day is a product of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Charlotte Landis. Sonia Tun is our assistant producer. Our head writer is John Milstein and our senior producer is Katie Long. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka.