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Good morning, everybody, Happy Thursday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal?
Indeed, we do lots of interesting stories percolating this morning. So we have some new very bad poll numbers for Joe Biden in a series of swing days.
We'll break that down for you.
We also want to cover this big abortion ballot initiative that is going to be there for voters in November. What impact could that have on a state that was not so long ago a swing state but it's pretty firmly in the red column now, very interesting potential fallout there. We also have some RFK Junior news, a focus group of voters showing which voters are favoring RFK Junior.
What are their common characteristics. That's very interesting.
We also have a revelation from Tulci Gabbard that she was asked to be his VP and turned it down, So we'll break all of that down for you.
Also have a couple of media stories for you. Stephen A.
Smith sounding off on some recent Hillary Clinton comments that our friends over at Counterpoints had covers. Will get you the fallout here from Steven A. Smith, who is always interesting to listen to and charismatic. We also have a former ESPN anchor who is telling all about the dynamics of her Biden interview that she did at that network. You definitely want to hear that one as well. Major fallout after those AID workers were targeted and killed by Israel.
Joe Biden losing all sorts of folks on this one, including the folks over at Morning Joe, his favorite morning news program, really sounding off. Reportedly his wife has told him he needs to wrap up the war.
So a lot to get you there.
Sager is taking a look at McKenzie humiliated on DEI and also we have the Teamsters calling for a nationwide Mulsen Corps boycott. The Teamster's international president is going to be here in studio talking to us about that and also about their average to organize Amazon and a number of other issues. So very much looking forward to having Sean O'Brien back here in the studio.
I'm excited as well. It's always good to have actual union leaders here in the studio. So thank you all to people who support our work. That's why we're able to do what we do Breakingpoints dot com. If you can help us out and continue to build with that. Let's get to these poll numbers. So absolutely shocking poll numbers for Joe Biden. Let's go and put this up there on the screen, very high quality poll out from the Wall Street Journal, registered voters in each state that
was conducted in mid March. Margin evera here keep in mind plus or minus four points, but even within that, we can see in the state of Arizona we've got Trump plus five. In Georgia we've got Trump plus one, Michigan Trump plus three, North Carolina Trump plus six, Nevada Trump plus four, Pennsylvania Trump plus three, and Wisconsin remains tied. So obviously I think we could say that that's not
exactly looking very good for Joe Biden. And the reason why it's particularly noteworthy, he's either in the margin of error tied with Trump or Trump is outright leading him all in very very critical states. This does not even necessarily include the RFK Junior factor. And that is one where when we begin to think about the chaos and we begin to think about the falling apart of the
Democratic coalition. On the polls alone, Crystal, we can see that there are such major warning signs that we have not even that we didn't even see for Biden back in the twenty twenty election whenever he was going up against Trump and overall, actually, if you dig within it, what you see is a crumbling of the Democratic coalition at the exact same time that Trump is actually increasing his vote margin, both with minorities and with younger voters,
so headlines both in terms of his overall lead, but also in terms of the coalition of people that Trump is actually bringing to the table whenever he's voting.
Keep this up on the screen for another minute, guys, because they did do a poll that included the options of RFK Junior, undecided or or other. Because you know, it's obviously RFK Junior, but you have other third party candidates in the race. As well, in particular Jill Stein and Cornell West, who are on the left end of the spectrum. And when you put RFK Junior in, Trump still is outperforming Biden in every state saved for Wisconsin,
it doesn't change the picture all that much. So the reason I want to keep this up on the screen, I'll go through what the top line is with RFK Junior, undecided and other as a factor. So in Arizona it's still plus five Trump. In Georgia it's plus one, it's plus three Trump. In Michigan it goes from plus three Trump to plus two Trump, so not a big difference there. In North Carolina it goes to plus eight Trump right now without RFK Junior and those other options, plus six Trump.
In Nevada it stays at plus four Trump. In Pennsylvania it stays at plus three Trump. And in Wisconsin it actually does improve the picture a little bit for Biden. It becomes a plus three Biden lead, which does get into the question of, you know, who does RFK Junior take away from more who will be in the ballot in which states? You know, these undecided voters, who when they're forced to where do they actually land? So there's still a lot of fluidity and a lot of question marks.
But this comes at a particularly bad time for Joe Biden because there was a little bit of a hopeful trend going on, whereas approval rating looked like it was getting a little better, people feel a little bit better about the economy. There are a number of national polls we cover them here that showed a trend towards Joe Biden. But you know, if the national polls are improving but the battleground states are still going Trump, well that's the ballgame right now.
Yeah.
There's also been some very critical developments in the state of Nebraska, undernoticed actually but now very important. It's going to put this up there on the screen so people will remember that Nebraska does not have currently a winner take all electoral vote system. It's kind of complicated, but it effectively meant that Nebraska was President Biden was able to capture a single electoral vote from the Nebraska second
District because of the previous way that they would allocate votes. Well, the Nebraska Republican governor is now calling on the state to move forward quote with the winner take all system. He says it will just simply bring Nebraska into line with forty eight of our fellow states. It will better
reflect the founder's intent. The real intent here, because Nebraska and Maine are the only states which have split electoral college by electoral by election district, means that the blue district, which previously Biden was able to win, in which Democrats had normally been able to rely on, you take away
that single electoral vote. Now, a single electoral vote isn't usually something that you should be all up in arms about, but it was one that's very critical for some two seventy math in a very very tight race for Joe Biden. Even those over at MSNBC are now beginning to take notice.
Let's take a listen.
Spinner there has thrown his support behind an effort that would no longer outate electoral votes by a congressional district because right now it's five votes there. Typically Republicans get four and President Biden Democrats get the one from Omaha. If that changes, and we don't know that it will, it's the state legislator is going to look at it.
But if that changes, that takes away Biden's best path to win, because if you get if he wins Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, but loses the other swing states and no longer picks up the one in Nebraska two sixty nine that leads Playbook this morning.
The alarm among Democrats that this is possible.
What do you think?
I think this is what the modern Republican Party has become. They're now changing the rules in the middle, trying to benefit themselves. This is the hell that Donald Trump has wrought in the middle of this. Changing the rules two hundred days before the election is ridiculous.
I think you're right.
I think there are real simulation problems when you look at the map that one electoral vote really matters in the combination of other things. Then you need another state. And so the easiest path way to victory has always been in the Midwestern three states combined with Nebraska. Something tells me they're not going to get away with this easy, and there will be a national outcry if they're trying to change the rules here.
Okay, all right, we're they're trying to change the rules middle of the game.
There's going to be a national outcry over the Nebraska electoral delegation system.
First, Kajim Messina, it's.
Already weird that they do this.
No, it's it's weird. Can we all admit that? And that's why that they're changing the rules here.
Now obviously, look, I think they're clearly doing it for Trump reasons. But regardless, I mean, it's a single electoral vote. Why don't you worry a little bit more about maybe holding Arizona or Georgia than you do about whatever the hell's going on in Nebraska because there's some strange rule where you could have gotten that one. But you know, the fact is the fact that they're so worried here because as he says, quote, the easiest path to victory
is the Midwestern three combined with Nebraska. Yeah, right now, even those Midwestern three is a little bit of a question mark there, Crystal, But you know it is a smart strategy on the Republican side.
This is the hell that Donald Father, I mean, this is why you can't take these people seriously.
True election rules.
Get changed state by state on a regular basis. Now, personally, I would like to have an even bigger change and get rid of the electoral college altogether, which is a preposterous, outdated, ridiculous system in my opinion, And we can just actually have everybody's vote count in the same manner, and I would wager that Jim Messina would probably support that change as well. So is that a hell that Donald Trump hath rot changing the election rules, etc. Obviously they're doing
it for partisan reasons. How about instead of panicking about that, you actually try to win an election by offering something to the American people. You have an incredibly weak candidate. Your opponent is incredibly weak, Donald Trump, He's a criminal. People freaking hate this guy. They find him completely toxic.
His unfavorables are ridiculously high. And yet you're panicked over one Electoral College vote because you are lacking in such confidence in your own can that you know the very best he would be able to do is to once again eke ount this very narrow victory like he did in twenty twenty. These people are just pathetic, They're just ridiculous.
And it's very clear what Biden's problems are. I mean, number one, the age issue, which I guess you know, since they've decided to stick with this guy, there's nothing you can really do about that. But number two, it's very apparent in the pulling is a massive issue with the Democratic base, especially among young people because of the Israel policy. So how about you get a little more upset about the genocide this guy is enabling that his own voters are disgusted by, and we'll have war on
that specifically later in the show. Versus you know, this one electoral college. But they're just ridiculous people. They're just utterly ridiculous.
People, certainly.
But look from the you know, it's just like every data point that we possibly have tells us that this is going to be an uphill climb. From the young voter piece, the Hispanic voter piece for Trump, the widening of his minority vote share, the crumbling of the Democratic coalition arefk J. Yes, he does take away from Trump, but Trump has made at least enough, you know, inroads with new coalitions of voters combined here the electoral college move.
Republicans seemingly, at least from what I can tell, have somewhat embraced mail in voting and some of the other things. Now that they've decided that they have to quote steal the election to by playing within the existing rules of some of these bluer states, you.
Know what, it just to pause.
You remember last time around in twenty twenty, all the Republican freak out about how Pennsylvania had like and all these other states have made it more permissive to have mail in balloting because you had COVID, etcetera. I mean, what Jim Messina is saying here is very much like what they were. How dare you use the legislative process in illegal fashion to change the rules?
Again?
Listen, if you want to have a federalized election system where it comes down from the top, I actually personally open to some of that, because I do think there should be more of a standardized system. That's not the system we have anyway. I just can't get over.
That's a good point.
Annoying and irritating.
His comments are agree with these about it. I mean, I don't know.
I'm not really for total federalization of the elections. I like a lot of the state control that we have, and I think it actually, in general, it gives more trust within the system.
That's kind of what the original intent is.
But it'd be I just personally would be in favor of more uniformity of rules. It seems sort of preposterous that, like you know, in Georgia, the rules are totally different than in California, et cetera. But anyway, that's another fight, right.
And it's like, I mean, for example, I think Oregon has all mail in voting. You know, it has for a long time actually a very very high voter participation. That's something I've always thought about and looked at, and at the end of the day, that's actually what I care probably the most about. Yeah, let's go and put this up there on the screen, though, because this is another indication of just where things are moving in the overall direction. Currently, the Cook political has moved the Nevada
Senate race from a lean Democrat to a toss up. Now, obviously, why does that matter because they already have three toss ups including Ohio, Montana, and Arizona, all seats that they
have to hold if they want to retain control. Then you throw in Nevada, which not a lot of people have been paying attention to, but Nevada traditionally, I mean, look, Trump never was able to fully compete there, but it's been enough on the razor's edge in the past, and it's one of those where in a so called red waves scenario, you definitely could see a Republican senator from the state, and most importantly, it's about the balance of
power in the overall individual Senate. So just another sign I think to me that things are a lot more difficult for the Democrats, both at the sub presidential level and the presidential level. Really all they can hope for is abortion, and don't get me wrong, they will and they should bet on that because we're.
About to talk. But anything else, Crystal want to get into.
Now, let's just put up this next piece up on the screen, which gives a little bit more insight into how voters feel about these two presidential candidates, and specifically, I think the most important thing to note here is the way that Biden has really lost a lot of ground on some key metrics with guards to just character ratings since the last time you ran in twenty twenty. So they asked this question, you know, can they manage
the government effectively? Back in twenty twenty, a majority fifty two percent said yes. Now that has fallen off a cliff only thirty nine percent. Is he likable used to be sixty six percent. It's still pretty high at fifty seven percent, but he has lost significant ground there. Displays good judgment in a crisis. He was almost at a majority last time, forty nine percent. Now that is down at forty percent. Is a strong and decisive leader went
from forty six to thirty eight. Cares about the needs of people like you went from fifty five to forty eight. I mean that is like the most core Biden value and strength that he has had as a political candidate throughout his career, and now not even a majority believes that is honest and trustworthy has also fallen from a majority at fifty two down to forty six. Just keep it up a second so I can talk through the Trump numbers as well. It's not like Trump's numbers are
amazing on these metrics either. The only one that he has a majority rating on is a strong and decisive leader. But you can see his ratings have held more or less steady since twenty twenty. The two metrics where he lost a little bit of ground is cares about the needs of people like you, Okay, forty five down to forty two. And is honest and trustsworthy went from forty to thirty five. So a five point loss on that one,
which is actually significant. But overall, people you know tend to think Trump is more of a strong and decisive leader than Biden, and people tend to think Biden cares more about the needs of people like you than Trump. That's always been the dynamic. But I think, Sager, one of the things that I really noted is that Biden has lost a lot of ground on these things and Trump hasn't. Now I that's probably a result of the fact that Biden is President of the United States. He's
in the news every day. People are paying very close attention. Trump has been a little bit out of the limelight for a while, and I think the fact that his ratings on honest, you know, telling the truth basically have taken a hit is indicative of the fact that some of these trials and court appearances and indictments, etc. Are He is taking on some water from that, but it's interesting to see the way that they stack up in these magics.
It's still that when he's leading, though in some of those critical times. One of the things that you know, the managed government effectively. That's actually a very important question. Another thing I would posit is this everybody in the in the world made up their mind about Trump, Like who in this country doesn't have an opinion that is well set now of seven years or so. About Trump Biden, one of his great strengths was people didn't feel a
particular way about him all that much. You can project whatever you want in the twenty twenty election. Well, now he's in the government and people actually do have a very negative view of the way that he is running the country, whereas with Trump it's so locked in. Biden also doesn't have that level of face fervent support of people who are right or dies and will never leave him.
They're very happy to leave him if they do disagree.
And I think, you know, you combine all these things and you could definitely see some strength for Trump there in the numbers. But again, don't get me wrong, Like you said, the convictions and the criminality, you know, in terms of charges and all that, that certainly could be a problem.
We don't know.
And then finally, abortion, I mean, that's just the blaring red sign for the Republicans because it is clearly one of those issues that people are very willing even if they freaking hate the Democrats on nine out of ten issues, if you're with them on one, they are willing to overlook it. And we have enough data to prove that right now.
Yeah, well, that's a good transition on what's going on in Florida.
There you go, let's put it up there on the screen. So this was a major case from the State Supreme Court. So they issued a ruling on Monday that will allow state voters actually to decide whether to protect abortion and also whether to legalize recreational use of marijuana. This rejected the state attorney general argument that the measures should be kept off of the November ballot. Now, I'll let you guess why they want to keep that off of the
November ballot. The court had not ruled on the merit of the measure, only whether they meet the requirement for clarity and don't violate the state constitution mandate that they cover only one subject. That came when the state actually upheld the current legislative ban on most abortions after fifteen weeks of presidency, and state lawmakers then tighten that ban to six weeks while that issue is still before the court. Monday, however, makes it so that this will pave the way for
the six week ban two definitely go into effect. But now to give Florida voters the right and the ability to decide, said measure at the state ballot box. So I actually cannot think of a worst possible outcome for the Republicans in the state because now you have legal weed, you have abortion, the most potent political issue of our lifetime, and you have a restrictive six week ban go into effect crystal in interim between now and election day.
So fifteen weeks.
Look, I think a lot of people can stomach fifteen weeks the pulling on it to shift. But previously Europe and a lot of other countries that's where they are. I think that's fine. But six weeks that's a lot more restrictive. That's a lot more in line with Alabama, Georgia and some of these other states. It's much more directional towards that. It's actually very a very very small
amount of public opinion. You put legal weed on top of that, and then you have the restriction come in on top of the overwhelming like the ability to come to the ballot box and to change your vote and to change that policy which you hate. And at the same time, why don't you just mark d while you're there. I mean, I can't think of a greater gift to Joe Biden.
Very motivating for any sort of Democratic supporters, because you know, it was very clear that there is a significant amount at stake, and you know, important for them to show up and express their opinion on this. I was just recalling the numbers from the last election. Trump got fifty one point two percent in the state of Florida, Biden got forty seven point eight. So it's not like it was a total blowout.
Yeah, that's right.
It's not like it's preposterous to imagine that Florida could go back in the Democratic column. Now, I don't even really necessarily want Florida to be a swing state because the Cuban politics there have screwed up our relationship and our policy views of a Cuba for decades and decades at this point. So I'm not even that excited about the idea that Florida could come back into being a critical swing state. But if anything was going to make
it possible, it would be this abortion initie. Now, let's recall that last time around, there was a ballot initiative to lift the minimum wage, and there were some other Democratic leaning or left leaning ballot initiatives that passed handily, even as Donald Trump won a historic victory in the state.
So the fact that you have a ballot initiative that goes in one direction and voters that go in another direction in terms of the party, no one should find that crazy idea or put that out of the possibility whatsoever. Although I do think the abortion issue there is more fervent emotion around that at this point than there was like around the minimum wage last time around. And the port for the pro choice position on this ballot initiative,
based on the polling, is massive. The support for legalizing weed also quite high. And you know, we've seen the way that abortion has shaped not only ballot initiatives, which the pro choice position is one in every single state where it's been tested, including places like Kentucky, but we've also seen the way that abortion and other women's issues related to that have completely shifted different you know, state
legislative districts, congressional districts, et cetera, towards Democrats. So it does have a very potent impact even on you know, people's choice of candidates outside of specific ballot initiative.
The pulling on this is genuinely shocking the state of Florida. Let's go and put this up there on the screen, So it says that over sixty percent of Florida voters both support the abortion and marijuana amendments. But actually, when you dig into it, it's even more interesting. Sixty two percent of voters said that they would vote yes on the abortion ballot measure in meaning that they want to keep the right to abortion on the.
In the state.
But more more than half of Republicans actually in the state said that they would vote affirmatively. When you go to weed, it's actually roughly the same number, fifty five percent of Republicans expressing support and sixty seven percent support overall, independent voters splitting dramatically in both of those directions. Sixty eight nine percent on the weed issue, fifty eight percent
on abortion. So you've got independent Republicans and Democrats. You got majorities in all three of these coalitions that are going to come out in favor. As you said, let's be real, the minimum wage position passed with over sixty percent last time.
Trump was still able to win.
But this time around, if you have Biden tie him self to pro choice in a way that neither candidate did previously with minimum wage, I do think it will have a significant more chain. Now, don't get me wrong, I think Trump is probably still going to win the state. But yeah, this is just one of those like spending money where we shouldn't have to be spending money.
It makes it at least a little bit interesting exactly whereas previously it was not. The state of Flora was not interesting at all. One of the things that has been extraordinary to watch in the wake of Roe versus way being overturned in the Dobb's decision is the way that the pro choice position has.
Become more and more and more popular.
It's not like people had their pre existing views and they just were locked into them and then now it's the pro choice side that's just more energized. No, you've seen a dramatic public shift towards the pro choice position.
And also it didn't all happen at once.
It's continued to trend in that direction when Zago wasnt Emily and I actually covered some of the polls with regards to that that there's a continual trend towards the pro choice direction that has basically shaken loose what was a fifty to fifty divide for decades on this issue, where it really just depended you know, which side seemed
to be more extreme at the moment. Now you have a very clear majority in favor of the more pro choice side, and you have a dwindling minority in a very small minority that's in favor of, you know, the most extreme positions like a complete national ban or abortion being illegal in all or most circumstances. There is a very very small minority that supports that position at this point.
So that's been one of the things that's been extraordinaated as well, because I think predobs if you had asked Republicans what they thought about about an initiative like this, I don't think there's any chance you'd have a majority on the pro choice side. So that has been a pretty dramatic and honestly a shift that I did not anticipate.
In the wake of that decision.
I didn't anticipate that this would be such a central issue, driving so many electoral results in basically every state across the country. Still now, you know, significant amount of time out from that decision, So Republicans, you know, they're in a really hard buying here. We've seen the way that
Trump has tried to navigate it. You know, he's trying to shift it back to that rhetoric they used to use about Oh well democrats, you know they favor these end of late term abortions and you know, even making up these scenarios of even after the baby's born, etc. But it just doesn't land when the landscape that is being fought over right now is on where are the restriction is going to lie.
So in a state like Floria, we have.
A six week ban actually going into effect, so people are going to get to see what that looks like and hear the horror stories before they go vote.
It's pretty potent.
It's bad. It's bad. Let me just one word of caution.
Miami Beach, you guys were already you were one of the strictest places in the boy in the world in America for weed. They actually just put in new measures to go against weeds. So I would just I would urge the voters of Miami Beach, if you want to protect your air.
Down in that city, you may want to think a little bit differently.
Let's put this last part up on the screen because this is another flashing red sign. And look, this is the other thing too course, so we shouldn't erase this it's actually very possible, I would say, within the realm of possibility that.
Biden could win the state of Florida.
It went from Trump plus three to then DeSantis plus what twenty But that was only two years ago, we don't know. And here in front of us we have how special election where the Democrats actually flipped a Republican Florida House seat in central Florida. On this was just what a couple of months ago, So we have to be real here. This was January thirtieth, in twenty twenty four. Abortion politics, as you just said, has shifted so rapidly and wildly that it's actually pretty difficult to really get
a sense of where things will land. The polls were totally off in the Democratic direction on in twenty twenty two. Nobody anticipated that Dessanta's blowout. They thought he would win by ten. It ended up winning by twenty. Well, then in this case too, we shouldn't underestimate that such rapidly shifting parts of the coalition as we saw in twenty sixteen, so we saw in twenty twenty two, are so difficult to pull that you really won't find out till election day.
Bien's highest approval ratings are among the elderly. True, they don't really mind. Large have an issue, which is Israel policy. So hey, you never know, guys, you never know. Crazier things have certainly happened in our policy.
There you go, you had no idea.
All right, let's get to RFK. Junior's some very interesting news with the guards to Tulsi Gabbard.
Let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen.
Tulsi gave an interview actually to ABC News, or at least a statement to ABC News, where she says she turned down his offer to be his running mate. Quote it didn't work out, so she said in a statement, quote, I met with Kennedy several times. We have become good friends. He asked if I would be his running mate. After careful consideration, I respectfully declined. She declined to explain why
she turned down the offer, which has not previously been reported. Obviously, she was included on the list, and he eventually went with Nicole Shanahan.
He says.
A person even close to the Kennedy campaign said, quote, there were definitely meetings, but it didn't work out.
She claims.
We talked to a bunch of people Tulsea's a rock star no matter what, all that, but not denying it so affirmatively he did ask her.
I think it was a mistake.
I'm not sure that this was Look, I understand that Nicole Shanahan picked purely from a it takes dollars to get on the ballot, so from an actual practical point of view, totally get it. But Telsea Gabbard actually was elected, and she much more I think. I mean, Look, Nicole has not given an interview as of yet from what I looked, and by the way, we're asking for it, we'd like to have her here on the show, but
she hasn't. She hasn't been as battle tested. I mean, Tulsa's the very least she's run for her office before. She's been in the public sphere. She knows how to take criticism. You know, she's somebody who look a lover hate her whatever she's given interviews, she goes all over the place, comfortable, you know, more in the public eye.
I actually am given the fact that RFK is trying to especially capture a lot of the podcast spaces, as somebody who's already been all over the podcast space continues to go on kind of being alternative media. So I think it's actually a blow to the Kennedy campaign for her. I don't really get it. I mean, I've seen that she's been on the short list for Trump. I just have a very hard time believing that. I just think he'll ever pick her. I can't see it.
I agree, Yeah, So, I mean that's the only thing I can figure too, is that maybe she's holding out hope that she ends up being Trump's VP, and so she thinks she's got a better horse in Trump than inn R K Junior.
No way that I do would pick her. It would piss off so many parts of the republic coalition. I mean, look, outside of the online people don't even know who she is. Those would be like, oh, she's a former Bernie Democrat. I'm not saying that she is, but I'm saying, like, that's what the attack would be. It's just a lot easier and safer for Trump to pick at least Dephonic, Tim Scott or jd Vance, depending on what misside christinom any of these people traditional box check.
You know, it's just about being safe. Everything is about Trump anyway.
It feels like the hyper online Yeah, pick or like there's a hyper online pick. But yeah, do I actually think Trump has really any serious interest in Aaron No.
I don't think it's very skeptical of that.
With regards to RFK Junior and a potential Tulsi ticket, you know, obviously both of them are like former Democrats. Both of them have way higher approval ratings at this point with Republicans than Democrats. I think if you put Tulsi on the ticket, you are locking yourself more into an exclusively like former Trump conservative Republican right wing base.
Nicole Shanahan is a blank slate. You know, She's got more liberal positions in terms of the causes she's funded in the past and things she said and supporting Pee Boota jij and whatever. So it keeps the ticket a little bit more plausibly neutral. So in that way, I actually think it might be a better thing. I think actually Biden should have hoped that he would pick someone
like Tulci, who clearly codeses you know, right wings. She's filling in on Fox and they love her at this point, so I think that would have made it more clear that the RFK ticket was going to take more from the Trump column. I still actually think it is going to take more from the Trump column because I just
continue to look at the approval writings. Actually that Wall Street Journal Battleground state pole that we showed, even though once you add in RFK Junior and the other candidates and undecided, Trump actually picks up a little bit of ground in all the states. When you just look at the RFK Junior support, it actually did in that poll hurt Trump more than it hurt Biden. It's not overwhelming, but it was a little bit of an edge for
Joe Biden. So given where his approval ratings are with Democrats, which are really in the toilet, and you have a majority of Republicans who personally like and you know, have an approval high approval for RFK Junior, I still think at the end of the day, it probably is more of a problem for Trump than it is for Biden.
But the Nicole Shanahan.
Pick makes it a little less clear cut than if he had picked like a Tulsi Gabbard or someone else who really codes his right wing.
At this point, that's not a bad point. I still thinks I wish you picked Jesse Ventura would be.
That would have been a crazy guy was right.
I love that guy because he's all over the place and he's he's a og if you are anti.
But Jesse is.
Such a big person he can't be in anyone's number two. He's such a big personality. Having interviewed him and he just takes over. Let me tell you, I love him. I love him such a character.
I was reading nine to eleven conspiracy theory books in college station in my mid teens because of jesseve Internal.
I also feel like I kind of doubt that Jesse and RFK Junior in the same place with regard to Israel and Palestine, So that would be hard hard for me to imagine, but I haven't. I haven't seen him way in there specifically Jesse Ventura, but I would. I
would imagine that that would be a major rub. And we know that's been a rub for you know, some previous RFK Junior campaign staffers who were with him when he was you know, against the Ukraine War and wanting to stop funding there and thought he was like, oh,
this is an anti war candidate. And then suddenly October seventh happens and he's on the total opposite end of the anti war positioning for that, and that was very disillusioning for a number of his staffers who left and who explained that was the reason that they left, and also for a number of previous supporters who had been interested in him genuinely occupying that anti war space, and you know, saw that as diametrically opposed to the way he positioned himself in the Israel.
Yeah.
So the last time that he's made the news in the last six days is he has now joined forces with a local ban Creed to launch his own brand of THC edibles.
So it looks like God bless, it appears God bless. I don't. I don't support the product, but I will always support you, Jesse.
There was one more interesting piece on this RFK Junior. There was Washington Post talk to a number of RFK Junior supporters. We can put this up on the screen. This is yeah b three. So they talked to a number of people who have said, you know, they're all in for RFK Junior, and they were kind of all
over the political spectrum. The one thing they had in common, unsurprisingly is they all hate Biden and Trump, which you know is a pretty common sentiment out there in America and I think speaks to the wisdom of like the Super Bowl ad that he ran and the general attempt, like what we've been saying is probably his strongest lane is to try to be as vague and neutral as possible and just be a vessel for as many people as possible who just hate both of these candidates and
you know, want some one else and aren't too concerned about all of the details.
So according to his campaign, here's what he's got so far.
He's got New Hampshire, Hawaii, Nevada, North Carolina.
They say they're on track for a few others.
But are those places do they specify there that he has actually made the ballot, or where he's collected enough signature.
Which is he's only made the ballot in once.
In Utah, right, yeah, right, And that's not.
Going to matter.
Unfortunately, everywhere else actually will matter, and when he actually does get that ballot access, that's going to be the big thing. But I mean that is where, you know, maybe I'm coming back to Nicole Shanahan. She's got a ton of money. She's been given meal. I think she's got a billion dollars or something like that, twenty five to fifty million that'll probably get you on the ballot in a decent number of states, that'll buy you the
operation that you need. And if we can just project whatever we want onto the Kennedy Shanahan ticket, then you're going to ride at least somewhere to a decent percentage of the vote in this And at the end of the day, I mean, you know, everyone keeps talking about
the spoilerism and all of that. I just he's got he's at this point has had enough, you know, on the record statements against Trump, on the record statements abou how he doesn't like others on the record statements and you know, always and not necessarily wanting to slip into a lane where he would drop out in order to help Trump, even if you do see polling and he
said previously he's f Trump. You know, I think it was in the theom of Bonn interview and all that, because the Democrats really do, at least from what I've seen the DNC, they really have this conspiracy theory that you know, he is one hundred percent a spoiler back ticket. I just I don't see that in the data, and I definitely don't see it in some of the voters yeah.
I mean I don't really either. Now, I think it's possible that some of the people who are donating to that's different, right, but that's not like they may have that in mind. I certainly think that's that's possible himself. I don't really see that either. And if you were going to design someone who was going to be a spoiler for Biden, I don't think you'd pick RFK Junior at this point, because, like I said, it's really not clear to me that he's going to take more from
Biden than from Trump. In fact, again, at this point, even in spite of the Kennedy name and the past positioning, whatever, I do think at the end of the day, his upprov writings are just so much higher with Republicans that it seems like more of a threat to Trump.
So if that's the plan, you.
Know, I also think if that's the plan, you wouldn't be asking Tulci Gabbard to be on your ticket, right, you would be going immediately to someone who had more sort of liberal or lefty cred to try to win over Biden voters. If that was really the whole play is just to serve as a spoiler. So, like I said, I'm not saying there aren't people who are supporting him who have that agenda in mind, but I don't think it's the wisest course if that's ultimately your goal. Really, yeah,
that's much more clear. For example, that Cornell Wester jill Stein absolutely would cut into his piece of the pie. So if you're just looking to you know, move things around nefariously, I think you would put more effort into that end of the ticket.
But I don't know.
I know, like I said to me, with him personally, it doesn't add up that that's the whole goal of what he's doing. So you know, ultimately, these Biden and Trump, they got to make their case to the American people and actually win. And you can't cry about RFK Junior exercising his right to participate in the democracy. And you can't cry about people who hate both of you and really want other options considering the other options that are available to them.
You know, I hadn't even considered the lame duck argument that he makes there, and I was like, you know, that's not a bad point in terms of if you want actual new leadership. You know, you have four year tenures on both of these candidates. It actually is a pretty good one if you think in terms of really wanting something new, and it gets to some of the doom what exists me.
Remember Ronda Santis was trying to make that argument about it.
Yeah, he was, Yeah, and he was working. I didn't hit with that primary. It's a very different render.
I don't know.
I think that if anything, the fact that we would only be you know, tortured with one war Biden or one war Trump administration is probably a plus for voters, not like, oh darn, I wish we could have him for eight years.
That's such a shame.
I don't think anyone out there is really feel that way. So have some interesting new comments from former ESPN anchor Sage Steal with regard to her previous interview at that network with President Joe Biden mistake.
Listen what she has to.
Say here as we get set for a wonderful day in sports, opening day for America's national pastime. This was about two months after he took office. That was an interesting experience in its own right because it was so structured and I was told, you will say every word that we write out, you will not deviate from the script, and go to the word like every single question was scripted,
gone over dozens of times by many executives, editors and executives. Absolutely, I was on script and was told not to deviate because it was very much this is what you will ask, this is how you will say it, no follow ups, no follow ups. Next, I knew that this was a lot bigger than just the wonderful editors that I worked with. This went up to the fourth floor, as we said, that where all the bosses, the top executives, the decision makers are the president of our company.
So very interesting there, saga. I'm curious what you make of her comments. Now, listen, she's not a Joe Biden fan, so perhaps you know there's some motivation behind what she's saying here.
But it also kind of attracts.
I mean, we know how careful they have been about who and where they give Joe Biden interviews. Jomini almost never does an actual like mainstream interview where he could be asked those follow ups, and it's just a bunch series of scripted, pre written softball questions.
We can put this up on the screen.
This is something that Azraclient actually pointed out back when he had his moment of being like, maybe we should get rid of Joe Biden before watching the State of the Union and having all of his fears to put to rest in deciding no, actually, Joe Biden is a great savior of America. But the next piece up on the screen, he says, Biden's on fewer interviews than any recent president. It's not close by this point in their presidency's Barack Obama given more than four hundred interviews, Trumpet
given more than three hundred. Biden has given fewer than one hundred, and a bunch of them are softball interviews. He'll go on Conan o'briden's podcast or Jay Shetty's Mindfulness podcast. The Biden team says this is a strategy they need a political voters, the ones who are not listening to political media. But one, this strategy is not working. Biden is down, not up. And two, no one really buys this argument. I don't buy this argument. This isn't a
strategy chosen from a full universe of options. This is a strategic adaptation to Biden's perceived limits as a candidate. And what's worse, it may be a wise one. And that trend of course, has continued of him doing you know these exclusively softball interview.
Yeah, and Sage actually just gave an interview recently to Adam Carolla, I think to clarify this, and she says, actually, the worst part for me is I wasn't even allowed to ask a follow up question.
And look, I.
Don't know, you know, whether she's telling the truth or not. What I do know is it's been over twenty four hours and ESPN has not denied any of this. So I mean, if you real as a journalistic organization, a charge as big as this, you know even you know I've interviewed Trump. If somebody came out, no matter how small, and said and claimed that my interviews or something were scripted, that would be immediately I'd be like, that is absolute bullshit. I have the tape. You can come and listen to
it anytime you want. You can come and sit with me. We'll go through it and I'll show you exactly how I prepped it, the follow ups, etc. They haven't said that. And this is a major news organization. So look, clearly this lady has an act to grind. Right, She's been all over the podcast scene, and that she's starting her own thing, and that's fine. People have a right and the ability to do that. This is a serious charge.
She accused them of scripting her interview. The other thing is, and why I believe it's scripted, is at the very top there, as you saw when she was like America's pastime or something.
People don't talk that way.
People don't talk that way, period, and especially you and I, we can smell when people are reading off a prompter or not. I was watching a Hot Ones interview, for example, not exactly a journalistic organization, but just give me an example. It was the wing show that we covered previously. Was the interview with somebody, and the host was like, tell me about this experience that you in high school. Whenever I'm told you were, I was like, people don't talk
this way. You're literally reading clearly off of a Q card. And for me the moment, even that small snippet, it was obvious that that was a scripted question.
I also think it's kind of embarrassing for her though, that you accept those terms.
Point.
I wouldn't.
I would never do that.
I wouldn't, and you know, I'm perfectly willing to admit my human frailties, and you know, we're all subject to like the incentives set of systems around and so I'm not saying it wouldn't be a big deal for her to have pushed back on that, But there's no way I would just accept that and.
Then go out there and read their little script.
Yeah. Really, chance that's a good point, not a chance.
That's humiliating.
And you know, for her to admit it, like I would be, I would be embarrassed to admit that I just like was a good little girl and you know, did the thing that I was told to do and ask no follow ups and do their little softball interview. We have the president of the United States there. I mean, look,
I get it. You're not a political reporter. You're not a political journalist, but you did see yourself as a journalist, and you have the most powerful person that entire world there, and you're just going to stay in your lane and you know, do the thing they told you to do. I don't know, I personally I would be embarrassed about that.
But obviously the more important story is if this is actually true about aus pan Infe's the question, Okay, well, was their coordination with the Biden team on what those
questions were. Is this the sort of thing that's happening at other quote unquote news organizations when they are getting Biden interviews on the very rare occasions that they do, are there some stipulations about where the conversation can go, what type of questions can be asked or is it and which is more typical and frankly extraordinarily common where these networks Because they want to preserve their access, they know what sort of questions they're allowed to ask, and
what sort of questions, what sort of follow ups, how aggressive they can be, and their pushback in their follow ups because they don't want to lose access to the President of the United States or his team, or his advisors or top Democrats, et cetera. That's the way the game is usually played. It's not usually so explicit as like, no, these are the scripted questions that you're going to ask,
but hey, it does. It does bag a lot more questions about the overall Biden media strategy and specifically about ESPN and how they handle this particular interview.
I will also say Sage did have a very weird incident where she appeared to confuse Joe Rogan with Dana White and called him Joe like twice. And by the way, all this was also caught on camera, which makes it more insane. She claimed that she just got their names mixed up, but you should go watch the clip.
For yourself, because that's it that did.
That is the only thing that stuck in my mind is that because this is such an incident, recent incident, I was like, well, I don't know if this is the most trustworthy person, because that was actually legitimately crazy confusing the two of those even if you aren't all that familiar, like they don't look exactly all the same, and they're so famous in their own right.
So I just wanted to put that out.
There, all these white guys look the same sock.
That's a whole other conference.
All right, Let's get to some additional interesting comments that we wanted to cover for you here, which is Stephen A. Smith sounding off on CNN about Hillary Clinton's recent comments Ryan and not only played them for you, but just as a reminder, just so snide and condescending and filled with contempt towards undecided voters, telling them to get over it when it comes to their dissatisfaction with Joe Biden typical Hillary Clinton's stuff.
Of course, Stephen A.
Smith had some real choice words for her though, lastigalism.
I don't think it was a very wise statement on her part. How did that work out fore her in twenty sixteen. I think that's something that we have to recognize here. She won the popular vote, but at the end of the day, she wasn't the president of the United States.
It was him.
You can look at her not campaigning in Wisconsin in the last days, not campaigning in Pennsylvania in the last days. You can look at some of the stuff that they were saying about her that sort of distracted things from where it should have been in terms of Comby and his report from the FBI. You can bring up a whole bunch of things, but at the end of the day, the last thing you need to do is to do anything that could agitate potential voter in this particular election.
What do you make about the actual argument that she's making.
I mean, she's basically saying two old people, yes, yes, but there's substantively different.
I mean absolutely one.
Nobody's brought that up more than me, for you know, fore indictment's ninety one counts, impeached twice. I'm not voting for him. I've said that to a lot of people. I've said that to you. But at the end of the day, what I'm saying is is that at some point in time, you got to take into account what.
The voter's thinking about. The voters.
A lot of them out there, tens of millions of them out there, by the way, don't care what he's going through right now. They don't care about his guilt or innocence, his perceived guilt or innocence. They don't care about the ninety one counts. They're thinking about their lives.
And a lot of times we see politicians taking the positions that they're taking, and why we can respect their candidate and their honesty, they do seem a bit detached that time from what the voters are actually feeling and what the voters are actually thinking. Nobody wants to hear that from Hillary rod and Clinton at this particular moment in time, because especially if you Joe Biden, what are you really really worried about right now? You're worried about
folks coming to the polls. You're worried about them showing up to the polls to vote for you. You're not worried even about them voting for Trump. You're worried about them not showing up to vote for you. That doesn't exactly encourage them to get up out of their seat.
So how did this man have better political analysis than every other pundit that's currently on sere? Where did this come from? I love it too when he's like, I mean, clearly he's a partisan. He's like, I don't like Trump, criminal charges, all this stuff, But the wisdom of calling out Hillary also clearly showing the wisdom of people not wanting to show up to vote. I just think it just confirms to me that if you're outside of the system, you have even somewhat of a brain.
It's so obvious what all the problems here are.
Yeah.
I love when he's like, nobody wants to hear that's rosy at this point, absolue God, When is she going to end the grievance to tour? Like everything from her comes from this place of like, you know, cope and bitterness and trying to cast blame on anyone other than herself for her dramatic failure in twenty six. I mean, she is the most proximate reason that Donald Trump was ever president of the United States, and somehow she's still
held up and applauded as some great, wonderful savior. And when you know, wise stage of the Democratic Party, give me a break. So his basic point here, it's actually so heartening to hear it articulate in this blunt way of like, why are you sneering and condescending at these voters who wish they had other choices than Biden and Trump?
Why don't you get busy actually trying to appeal to them and actually listening to their concerns instead of lecturing to them about how they should feel about the situation.
So listen, Stephen A. Smith is not some.
Like leftist Bernie bro He really prides himself on being this kind of middle of the road guy.
He's got a friendship with Sean Hannity.
They go back and for you know, he's not like, you know, some lefty, lefty kind of a fella. So for him to have that just like normy instinct of what are you talking about and who do you think you're winning over with this?
Is it's nice to see.
Yeah, it was enjoyably agree. I also liked Stephen. Our producers informed me he is a fellow traveler in the anti weed movement and for else saying stay off the weeds.
So Stephen, we appreciate you. Love brotherhood. There's very very.
Few I vicariously consume a lot of Stephen A.
Smith content because Kyle.
Loves this fan. He watches everything he puts out. We listened to his thoughts on Diddy last night.
Was what did he say?
You know, he's very careful on that, fun, very careful on this. It was kind of interesting is and he kept brazing the point of like, was it really necessary to have all this force and you know, this big show before the helicopters and the boats and everything compromised. So he was clearly he's trying to be a little careful, a little more diplomatic than normally.
Stephen A. Smith is very un I was kind of surprised.
Yeah, but I don't know.
I watched the whole Jason Whitlock back and forth again vicariously through Cox.
I appreciate that in.
A political context, I truly do not understand the appeal of watching grown men yell at each other sports and having like full on major disagreements about like who's bad and who's I'm just like, this is psychotic.
I'm sorry.
But at the same time, you know, if you're going to live, and that's gonna make your whole personality and that's the thing that you care most about.
I guess I could see the entertainment value. I get it.
I used to.
I mean I used to be a really big sports fan. I watched you know, pardon interruption and all this stuff, so and I was really into it. So I totally get the appeal. It's not that different from the appeal that people get in like the political horse race. It's kind of a similar similar energy. But his podcast it's wide ranging. I mean he interviews presidential cannons and all kinds of different cultural figures and whatever wass in on things like you know, Diddy and Joe Biden and whatever
else you can imagine. So anyway, he's the thing that's extraordinary about him is politically he's not where I am at all. But he's so talented of a communicator that you just want to listen to him anyway. And he's so charming that even when he says something that coming from someone else would really irritate me or piss me off.
I'm like, eh, fair enough.
Yeah, so anyway, sign of a talented communicator.
I say, we go.
Massive fallout over Israel striking three times that humanitarian aid convoy of you know, international aid workers trying to feed starving gosens. We've got the reaction now from the Biden White House. Let's put this up on the screen. Here is from Politico. They say Biden's not changing the Israel policy after deadly strike on aid workers. Some of the senior officials think that is a blatantly and horrific and
stupid mistake. The tweet that they sent out of this article, the headline they put with it was quote angry Biden not changing Israel policy, which really kind of sums everything up. He pretends like he's mad. Maybe he really is mad.
I don't know.
But what does it matter if you're not going to change the policy at all, because that's the message that Israel gets, like, oh, we just killed seven aid workers for jose Andrece, who's this famous, you know, worldwide known liberal chef who's very close with any people in the Biden administration. And even that we can get away with
and there's zero change in terms of policy. You know, this comes at a time where there's just a report that officials from the US Agency for International Development warned that the enclave was now already experiencing famine. They say, the level of hunger is unprecedented in modern history. So now you have all of these aid organizations that have suspended work in the Gaza strip because they cannot keep
their workers safe. So huge consequences for you know, this territory that is now where people are starving to death. And you have some quotes here from within the administration, you say, they say in the article, President Joe Biden was privately enraged by the deadly strike and in a public statement upgrade at Israel for calling for accountability to those responsible, demanding more humanitarian assistants be allowed into Gaza.
But two senior administration officials say that that is as far as he in the White House will go for now. They go on to say this has caused some fishers within the administration. It's just rinse and repeat with the Israelis. The American political system can't or won't draw real line with them, and that is regrettable. According to a senior US official. So Sager, same old Samuel from Joe Biden. Oh, he's upset, he's angry, he's gonna have a difficult conversation with BBNT Yahoo.
But that's it.
No actual change to policy, which is the only thing that matters.
Yeah, the entire thing is actually insane because what we are watching is the even previous Israel supporters, people like Richard Haas, like Mourning Joe, all these other people, even they are sounding off. I will say, I mean personally, just like annoyed at the idea that these people look, these aid workers. I have nothing against him, but for some reason they're held up as like more human than everybody else who has died. I think that's we will
get to that, and we will get to that. But I think it's that is just the point to me where I'm like, okay, guys, like you know, all human beings are are equal. And I don't know why thie level democratic donor liberal darling staff is enough to ignite in international right.
No, No, I do know, because they and this actually, can you guys put up which number is this in this block?
Nine?
It's the very last this twelve?
Yeah, put up the twelfth element here because this is from this Aaron David Miller interview in The New Yorker with Isaac Chattner, who's famous for these sort of like tough interviews. And I'm going to read a little bit more than what is up here on the screen, because this gets to exactly your point, Soccer, two hundred AID workers had already been murdered before these seven individuals, not to mention tens of thousands of Gossen's. So why is
there a different reaction here? Why wasn't this upset and concern, you know, the moment that there were so many innocent civilians being killed. Okay, so before we get to this quote, they say, you're Chattner says, you're saying you have no
investment in one analysis or another. I could be wrong, but when I was listening to you talk, and this is Aaron David Miller, who's this former State Department official and wise by Beltway Foreign Affairs Morning Joe type of guy, and you discuss the words of October seventh, I sense an emotion in your voice that I haven't heard at any other time in this conversation. I don't want to criticize that, but I do wonder if the people make policy in America don't have that same emotion when it
comes to Palestinian lives. Do you think that's fair? Aaron David Miller says, I think it's fair to say, yes, that American Americans have a pro Israeli sensibility. I don't think there's any question about that. Clinton wrote in his memoir he loved Yitzak Rabin as he loved no man rarely loved any other man, which is extraordinary. I watched Clinton grieve in the wake of Raben's murder, and when Biden gave the speech on October tenth, you watch the tears well up in his eyes.
He talked about the black hole of loss.
He's conflated the tragedies in his own personal life with what Israeli's felt on that day, and then we come to this quote. Yes, that's very moving, Chatner says, but there is another kind of loss going on now, which he apparently can't conflate with his own experience, to which Aaron David Miller replies, Oh, if you're asking me, do I think that Joe Biden has the same depth of feeling and empathy for the Palestinians of Gaza as he does for the Israelis. No, he does it, nor does.
He convey it.
I don't think there is any doubt about that. And that's what it comes down to. That's true for Joe Biden. The Israelis are human, he relates to them, he sees his own life in them. Palestinians they're not. There's no I mean, there's no other conclusion you can come to. So it took having aid workers, including an American, who are affiliated with an organization run by a man that
he knows who's an actual human being to him. It took them being killed before he really seems to have any sense of the humanity and the loss that's being experienced here. So I actually think that's a very key point soccer, because listen, I'm glad to see that they're upset about these individuals being killed. But you do have to ask yourself, you know where was this upset so much earlier on? When you see children starving to death,
That doesn't, you know, elicit your sympathy. That doesn't hit in the same way it's it's but this is this is what.
It comes down to.
I really think those comments are so revealing and so accurate as to the dynamic.
That's going on here.
Oh, I totally agree.
But as you were mentioning, Biden has lost all kinds of resistance liberals at this point with regards to his Israel policy. And perhaps most implematic of that was a segment on Morning Joe with Elise Jordan, who is a former Conda Lisa Rice staffer and worked at the NSC, and she went off with regards to Biden's lack of policy reaction to the killing of these AID workers.
Let's take a listen to that.
This has been bubbling up from behind the scenes for a while. President by Franklin is furious at Prime Minister den Yahoo, but yet still his administration has not conditioned sale weapons sales conditioned AID. They haven't done it yet. Now, maybe this is the moment that comes. This also happens just we think a week or two perhaps before this RAFA offensive, which really could be a flashpoint.
Okay, I'm so sick of hearing how upset President Biden is.
The butt stops with him.
If he wants to stop arm cells, if he wants to stop the bombs that are indiscriminately killing civilians.
He can, he has the power.
We don't need him going and his aids, going to reporters and talking all background about how upset they are. What happened yesterday is still going to happen. When at Miika's conference, the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent spoke and she was incredibly moving this.
It was an Abu Dhabi and she spoke.
About the difficulty of aid getting in the country period from the north or south, and she's described a process that was kind of like the TSA, changing the rules every single day going through airport security. Until those checkpoints are working and aid is going through, we don't need to be giving any more armsaled their money. It needs
to stop. It needs to be conditional. It's ridiculous that it's going on unchecked and unfettered, and we're sitting around and talking how upset we are while we hembrhage billions of dollars.
It's the worst of all worlds right now for the president.
The criticism looks increasingly empty.
So there you go.
Morning Joe very importedly Joe Biden's favorite morning show program turning on him and I mean Alis Jordan quite aggressive. They're are saying no more military aid. This is ridiculous. I'm sick of hearing about how upset they are. They need to actually do something, So that was quite striking. We also had Barck revied, who is a reporter from Axios. It has actually been I think one of the favored reporters of administration in terms of the information that they've
given him throughout this conflict. He also previously served in the IDF, so that we ken not some big lefty out there, but with some pretty striking comments made actually multiple appearance on CNN, but this was with Anderson Cooper. Take a listen to what he had to say about the approach of the Israelis.
It is clear to everybody that what happened with this strike was a serious violation of the idea of protocols and rules of engagement. Okay, to call it a misidentification or a mistake, you know, that's the understatement of the century.
Okay.
And this is not an isolated incident. The reason that we talk about it here is because it's WCK. It's a very well known and famous NGO. But those incidents happen every few days in Goz. There is a disconnect between how the IDF senior brass is looking at this and how it develops the rules of engagement and the orders, and what happens when those percolate down to the forces in Goz especially to the field commanders, the lieutenant colonels,
the colonels, the brigade commanders, the battalion commanders. They're not in the same place as the senior commands.
But do you say they're not in the same place both literally, they're in Gaza, they're not in headquarters, and they're also the ones fighting, and they have a different attitude about let's just get this done.
I think they're they each commander on the ground has a different interpretation of the orders. And this is why you see what you see. And this is not a disaster. This is a recipe for a disaster, not only in Gaza, but for the destruction of a professional military. Okay, this is not how professional military conducts its operations. Three Israeli hostages that manage to escape their captors were killed by Israeli soldiers who fired at them even though they were
holding a white flag. Okay, And you know, I spoke to an Israeli reserve officer who was in the same unit of those soldiers who shot those hostages. And remember him telling me that the orders are basically from the commanders on the ground is just shoot every man in fighting.
Age, shoot every man in fighting age. He also, I mean, he makes a number of comments there that are quite striking. He says to call this a mistake or a misidentification understatement of the century, says, this is not an isolated incident.
We're paying attention now, as Saga is pointing out, because of who Jose Andreas is and so it's joked this international outrage, but he points out this is happening in Gaza all the time, and also dovetail Saga with reporting from Haretz you recently about how the Israeli military is basically identified these quote unquote kill zones, where anyone who enters these areas they just assume as a militant and they kill them, and they stack them up on their.
Account of supposed militants killed.
So when they say, oh, we've killed nine thousand Hamas terrorists, that includes any military age man that happened to get in their way or anyone who happened to wander into these kill zones, they count them as terrorist. So really
important comments there from Barack Ravine. And again the fact that even someone like him, who really tried to be, you know, a neutral reporter and who has had a direct line to administration in many instances, that he's saying these sorts of things is pretty extraordinary.
Of course.
And he has more insight really than any of us. He does some of the best reporting, just like pure info both from the Israeli side and the White House side. He's got like a direct line to the NSC.
Seemingly.
Just last night, jose Andres actually spoke about this incident and accused the Israeli government of directly actually targeting his workers.
Here's what he had to say.
But I know is that we were targeted deliberately, not a stuff until everybody was dead in this convoy. This happened over more than one point five one point eight y dometer, So this was not use bad luck situation where oops, we dropped the bomb in the wrong place or no. This was over one point five one point in eight kilometers with a very defined humanitarian convoy that had signs in the top, in the roof. That cannot
be the role of an army. That cannot be the role of an army that has hundreds of drones above Gaza in any single moment. Humanitarians and civilians should never be paying the consequences of war. This is a basic principle of humanity. At the time, this looks like it's not a war against Rism anymore. Seems this is a war against humanity itself.
Very extraordinary comments there for him to say something like that on top of the op ed that he was written Crystal, But it look, I do think this will be a change in US policy or be a big change, but we have just a return to Look, we've been covering this stuff day in and day out, and it's like, if it's really this is what it takes. I mean, look at a certain point, I do, of course care that an American citizen here was killed. But it's like all of this, the patterns that people have been able
to observe now for almost six months. Yeah, it's like April fourth, so we're coming up on the six month anniversary of October seventh. That's been present for several several months, you know, for a lot of people. But you know, if anything, you know, if that's what it takes to break.
It, So be it well, and what jose Andres is speaking there too is really the obvious and ultimately unavoidable conclusion that they were directly and intentionally targeted.
When you look at.
The facts, three cars, three separate drone strikes, the cars clearly marked, the cars in a deconfliction zone, the cars having coordinated directly with the IDF. We're leaving our warehouse now where our food is stored, we are traveling up this road, and still they are hit, not once, not twice, but three times. The first car that is struck, the other two cars stop, and the survivors of that strike get into one of the other cars and continue down the road.
Then they hit again, and once again.
The third car stops and the remaining survivors the third car, and then they hit that third car. And you expect us to believe this was misidentification and complex circumstances. Anyone with half a brain can see that is total and complete bullshit. And by the way, the story that's coming out from the IDF, you know, is told to Haretz and others, has already been changing. You know, originally there was a supposed someone who was armed.
That was at the warehouse.
Well, yeah, you're in a war zone. First of all, the fact that there's someone with a gun doesn't make them harmas when you're trying to escort an AID convoy. Second of all, is it really justified for that's your your rules of engagement is even if this was some Hamas person who was in this convoy at some point, that gives you license to murder everyone in this convoy.
So that was disgusting and preposterous to start with. And now we're getting into like, oh well, it was confusing, and it was complex, and it was a mistake and it was accident, and as jose andres Here himself is saying, that just does not hold water whatsoever. By the way, it's not just people like him or the folks on Morning Joe or a Barack Revied who are sounding notes like that.
Put this up on the screen.
There's a report that from Al Jazeera that UK's Rishi Studina Prime Minister has informed Netanyahu that the UK is now considering declaring that Israel has been violating international law.
So the UK getting way ahead of our administration in terms of actually acknowledging what is at this point I think undeniable reality based on the facts that we've all been witnessing now for months at this point, and I also don't want to lose sight of you know, the American citizen who was killed here, and Biden previously said, you know, when American is hard or injured or killed, we will respond to put this up on the screen.
This is Jacob Flickinger. He was the US Canadian citizen who was killed by the IDF while he's delivering food aid in Gaza. He was a retired Master corporal, served eleven years in the Canadian Army, including a tour in Afghanistan. He was a father and he was the sole provider to a one year old baby boy. So you know, a real loss to him, to that child, to you know, his family, his loved ones.
Our hearts go out to them.
And let me put this next piece up on the screen, because this speaks to the shifting stories that we've heard at this point from the IDF. The latest report from Haretz, as explained here by a great journalist Dumi reader, is that the bombing of the convoy was not a communication, as have commanders and units in the field ignoring instructions
and disobeying orders, not for the first time. One, an IDF intelligence source says the general staff know exactly why World Central Kitchen was bombed because in the Strip everyone does whatever they like. It's unclear whether the commanders asked for more senior officers permission to target the they were meant to be doing for standing orders. Same sources dismissed the line taken by the Chief of Staff Hertzy Halevi and Defense Minister yo Of Galant, who suggested the bombing
was the result of coordination issues. Quote this has nothing to do with coordination. They can set up another twenty coordination hubs. But if someone doesn't put an end to how some forces in the Strip have been operating, we'll see this happen time and time again.
End quote.
One of the perplexing things perhaps here at Sagar is, you know, Israel has very aggressively, you know, sought to undermine the UNRA, which was the primary aid organization on
the ground. The US has all you know, completely gone along with that, by the way, and so they also have been trying to do a propaganda effort to deny what has been you know, made clear by the photos and images coming out of the Gaza Strip and also by the analysis of aid organizations on the ground that the people of Gaza are starving, they're starving to death.
And it's because of Israeli policy. So interesting.
They've actually been using World Central Kitchen as like a propaganda point to that, Look we're working, we don't need UNRA. We've got these guys. Look they're feeding people, et cetera. And World Central Kitchen was genuinely doing fantastic work and was important. They were not a replacement for UNRA. Obviously it is wildly inadequate for the amount of need. But that was part of what was so wild about this targeting and this killing was the fact that these rallies
were actually propping them up. Is this like propaganda piece? So you know, on the one hand, this report that oh, it's just because of these like rogue units on the ground seems to be a bit of a blame shifting and ignoring the fact that you know, you've had two hundred AID workers killed and it's clearly these reelies, certainly
at the very least, don't care. And you've had this targeting of the entire civilian population through the policy of siege and you know, destroying civilian infrastructure destroying the healthcare system, et cetera. But in the same respect, you know, it seems it's it's pretty wild that they went ahead and murdered the AID workers with the organization that they have themselves been propping up as an alternative done right, and they.
Have offered no alternative explanation to why anything like that even happened. Final and important piece here, let's put this up there on the screen. Haretz actually issued an editorial saying that the war must end in Gaza now. They say the incident in which seven people were killed, among them various citizens were killed in Israeli attack cannot end with a comprehensive and transparent investigation as was promised what it happens, and that we will do everything that's so
called not to happen again, it is not sufficient. They say that the an end to the war is the only possible way.
To move forward.
I think that's where people like Barak Ravid and any others, you know, people who are supportive of Israel are seeing is they're like, hey, you know, our nation is not going to recover from something like this for a long time. You know, in terms of international legitimacy, is basically scrambled the board in a way that very least has not happened since the nineteen seventies, and it took a long time for Israel to climate itself out of that. Obviously, a lot of stuff has changed, so I do think
that those will be very significant. And definitely watching the UK, the European Union knew some news coming out that Spain and the EU intend to officially recognize a Palestinian state sometime in the next few months. That too could actually significantly change things up and change relationships with Israel as well, So we'll see it's going to be interesting.
Let's talk a little about a little more of the political fallout for Joe Biden. So really, in recent years there's been a tradition at the White House of hosting Ramadan if Tar dinner inviting prominent Muslim Americans to that dinner. Well, this year that if Tar dinner had to be canceled because no one was willing to show up.
Let's put this up on the screen.
This says White if Tar canceled after many Muslims decline invite. And if you read the article, they say that several Muslim Americans declined to go and protests of Joe Biden's support for Israel's war on Gaza.
The sources who spoke to al Jazeer on.
Condition of anonymity in this reporting is backed up by Washing Post and other outlets as well. So the cancelation on Tuesday came after those Muslim community members warned leaders against attending the White House meal. Quote the American Muslim community said very early on, it would be completely unacceptable for us to break bread with the very same White House that is enabling Israeli government to starve and slaughter the palaestinating people in Gaza.
Both CNN and NPR.
Had previously reported the White House was preparing a community if Tar, so they had planned to do this and had to back out of it when they couldn't get anyone outside of their own staffers to attend. Hours later on Tuesday, the White House announced instead it would be hosting a meal from Muslim government staffers and holding a separate meeting with a few Muslim American community figures.
Apparently, that meeting that was held did not.
Go particularly well, based on the reports of those who participated in the meeting. Here is one doctor who said that he was forced to walk out of the meeting because he was so disgusted with the Biden administration.
Let's listen to his explanation.
You know, we had shown up to this meeting really concerned about what was taking place in the Gaza strip, and I'm glad that you mentioned that we were insisting that there not be any food. There made no sense for us to sort of break bread while talking about a famine taking place. We had shown up in the President and the Vice President, the National Security Advisor in the room, and it was very brief comments by the President saying he wants to hear from us, and he
wants to listen to us. And so I spoke first, and I let him know that I am from a community that's reeling. We are grieving, and our heart is broken for what's been taking place over the last six months, and that the rhetoric that has been coming out of the Biden administration that's been coming out of the White House, it's frustrated a lot of people, especially people who are Palestinian Americans, Muslim Americans, aut of Americans. We are not
satisfied with what has taken place. There has been no concrete steps, but keep in mind We're very concerned about the people that are over in the Gaza strip, that are in Palestine right now, who are not just starving, but are facing the threat of allumining a off invasion.
And so I was able to share that with the President and let him know that out of respect for my community, out of respect for all of the people who have suffered and who have been killed in the process, I need to walk out of the meeting, and I want to walk out with decision makers and let them know what it feels like for somebody to say something and then walk away from them and not hear them out and not hear their response.
Wow. I mean, how did President Biden respond to that?
You know, there wasn't a lot of response. He actually said that he understood, and I walked away.
So pretty extraordinary for that to be that interview to be occurring on CNN. Also NBC News at additional reporting of some of the commentary from inside of meeting, other indications this did not go particularly well. Another doctor can put this up on the screen. Who attended was taken aback when she showed Biden Prince of photos of malnourished children and women in Gaza to which Biden responded he
had seen those images before. The only problem, the doctor said was that she had printed those photos from her own iPhone, so there was no way he could have seen those photos before, Soger, which speaks both to the fact that you know, to him, all the starving gosins that he'd say I was all the same, and it also speaks to like an age befuddlement issue as well,
So you got a double whammy there. But I think it speaks to what we were discussing earlier, which is just you know, to him, Israeli's are full human beings that he has full empathy for, and Palestinians are not. And you know, the only reason he's at this height of anger but still not changing his policy, by the way, right now, is because he has a personal connection to
Jose Andres. But all of these images of starving children, children who are buried under rubble, you know, body parts drewn about a hospital.
Courtyard, none of this is really landing for him.
It's not really impacting him, certainly not in the way that the atrocities committing committed on October seventh did. And there was one other interesting piece of reporting that I just saw this morning from this meeting, which is, according to what Joe Biden said inside of this meeting, his own wife has begged him to stop this war, saying, quote, stop it, stop it now.
This is from a report in the New York Times.
Again per Joe Biden, and what he said in this meeting, so interesting that even his own wife potentially is very distressed by what she is seeing coming out of the Gaza strip and begging him to put an end to it. And Jill Biden herself has faced, you know, plenty of chart testers. Well, she's tried to go out and campaign
as well. So you know those people who are out there, activists who are forcing Jill Biden, Joe Biden, Kareem Jompierre, all of these officials to have to reckon with what they're doing and what they're enabling every single day, potentially having an impact here on Jill Biden at least.
Yeah, I think this is definitely significant. The fact is is that, I mean, this is part of what is annoying too. It's like they're like it's a Muslim problem. It's not just Muslims, you know that object to this. They in general, from what we can see is that. I think that he in particular as this emotional connect. Plus he's stubborn, plus he's old, and it's a media issue where at the end of the day, you know, Biden doesn't even live in reality. He lives in basically
like nineteen nineties America. He watches a little bit of cable news a little bit, and then he reads like hardcover newsprint. That's not how the vast majority of people are experiencing news around this conflict. And I think that when you think, you know, considering that informs the worldview that he brings to this, and it also I think probably informs us as to just why he is so steadfast and refusing to change the policy, even if his advisors may tell him different.
He's a stubborn old man. He's not going to listen to them.
He is.
I think that's a huge part of it.
Completely ideologically committed to design asm period end of story. It is he's willing to risk it all to maintain that commitment. I mean, at this point, I don't think you can really come up with any other explanation because you have so many members of his administration lee and at this point that they're upset with the direction of the policy you've got. He's lost Morning Joe, he lost the Pod, Save lost Jose Andres He's losing the UK
doesn't matter. And you know, we continue to have significant uncommitted vote. There was a larger uncommitted vote in Wisconsin this week than you know, the size of his margin against Trump last time around. There was reporting about how Biden himself is seeing the poll members, is upset about how much of an impact this is having on his reelection prospects. We've brought to you so many polls about how the Democratic base is disgusted with this policy, but.
He apparently doesn't care.
None of it really lands, even his own He's even lost his own wife apparently, and even that isn't having any sort of a real impact.
There you go, all right, sagerway, looking.
At well over the last few years, it feels like DEI has become a meaningless buzzword. I see it thrown around by conservatives all the time. It's unfortunate because it actually is a term with real meaning. I say this to someone who hates DEI been warning about it for years, So I thought it would be fun if we dug into some of the origins of DEI defined actual terms, and then we check to see how's it doing about a decade or so into implementation.
Let's start with the basics. What is DEI?
DEI shorthand for diversity, equity and inclusion. DEI is the ugly sister of the lean in movement of the early twenty tens, where corporations and the media became obsessed with twin concepts. One is that women make less than men for exactly the same job, and two is that diversity of color, gender, or any other cosmetic attribute is an inherent good in and of itself, as long as it's a minority. The reason that I've always hated these movements
is specifically because they are cosmetic. They are the embodiments of the memes showing a female pilot dropping bombs and the victims saying, at least it was a woman who killed me this time. If the corporation itself doesn't change, and just the makeup of who runs that corporation does, why should we care. Nonetheless, the financial elites embrace lean in DEI in the twenty tents, specifically to dispel ruling
class consciousness and especially to weaponize identity. Thus, effectively legalizing sexism and racism became legal in corporate America, where people were specifically hired and promoted for the color of their skin, their gender, or any other cosmetic attribute. Now, obviously, when you put it that way, it sounds illegal and awful. So what corporate America had to do was twofold. One they had to legitimize the racial and gender obsessed worldview
through the media. Two, they have to prove why this is actually an inherent good for the business. This is where the corporate consultants come in. As the Fortune five hundred CEOs clamored to justify DEI, they had to answer to their shareholders, of course, and so they do what they always do.
They turned to McKinzie to justify their decision.
Mackenzie is, of course happy to oblige, and for the first near decade has been churning out research after research propping up this false religion. From twenty fifteen to twenty twenty three, Mackenzie published four studies that titled quote Diversity Matters, Delivering through diversity, Diversity wins, How inclusion matters, and diversity matters even more.
The case for holistic impact. As the spectator writes quote.
The core claim of each study is that DEI leads to better corporate performance, thus more DEI, more profit. It's the same logic as past ESG studies from the last decade. Hilariously, though, just like the collapse of ESG, there has been actual, now independent review of said studies, and the results are not as clear cut as McKinsey may have led us
to believe. In fact, a new paper from the ECON Journal, which tested the data within each one of these studies, has concluded that they cannot be replicated at all independently. In fact, they find these studies quote should not be relied on to support the view that US publicly traded firms can expect to deliver improved financial performance if they increase racial and ethnic diversity of their executives. So basically, diversity of executives has no impact whatsoever on whether you
make money as a company, which means two things. Corporations just paid billions of dollars to race huckster consultants who set up entire firms guiding ds eye policies at these companies. And two, most importantly, they discriminated against people based upon the color of their skin or gender when making hiring decisions.
We have proof of this definitively.
Bloomberg in September of twenty twenty three ran data to show that in twenty twenty twenty one alone, the number of so called people of color hired at eighty four S and P five hundred companies had a ninety four percent increase then the year previously. So there was a ninety four percent increase possibly in the number of qualified applicants, or there were a whole lot of people who were
hired explicitly because of the color of their skin over others. Now, keep in mind, this is a data set of nine million people who work at the largest and most lucrative firms in the US, including per Bloomberg, Apple, Walmart, Wells, Fargo, Major Fortune, five hundreds across the board sector bisector in twenty twenty one. That revolution in hiring occurred, and it is a certainly a direct violation of equal Opportunity provision in the law, which dictates specifically that people should not
be hired on race alone. And of course, keep in mind that's just twenty twenty one data. We have no idea what insanity has been wrought in the last three years. This is all done for the sake of diversity itself, with no discernible impact that we can now show on the bottom line.
And that's why I'm doing this monologue.
If you want to defend the merits of hiring people based purely on the color of their skin or whatever pronouns, then be my guest. But do not hide behind fake studies that are trotted out at these shareholder conferences. If you want legalized racism, stand up and defend it on
its own merits. I suspect that they will not, and they will ignore the results, because when you do, it's just abhorrent to the American character, which is founded in a fundamental belief of actual equality before the law and in striving for equality of opportunity. The farther that we have strayed from that, the more we have only exacerbated and expanded the very class consciousness that DEI was invented to try and to destroy. Very interesting, isn't it greasing?
And if you want to hear my reaction to Sagre's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot Com. Very lucky to be joined in studio today by the President of the International Brotherhood of Teams, Stirs Sean O'Brien, who is here to update us on a variety of important organizing issues you have been focused on.
So welcome. Great to have you back, Thank you very much.
Yeah, of course. So first let's start with this.
Guys put this first element up on the screen calling for a nationwide boycott of Mulsen Cores.
So just tell us what's going on here. They use an.
Influencer, you guys, didn't like something like that, or maybe something a little more significant.
No, they are.
So we just settled the historic Anheuser Busch contract and you know, it was a tough, long, contentious negotiation, but at the end of the day, you know, we got with our members deserved and demanded and this company is very profitable and they actually recognized that at the last day,
how important that our members were. They're American, you know, American company, American brewed bear, and they're very very they recognize who makes them the success they are, and you know, we want to set industry leading standards with all our content tracks. So next up was Molson Cores and they have had their way with concessions over the last several contracts. So we took a strong position that you know, if it's good enough for Anheuser Bush, it's good enough for
molten cores. Molten cause is very very profitable. CEO makes a ton of money. Typical story, and they wouldn't do it right, and they chose to strike themselves. And our members have been on strike well over forty days right now, holding strong, and we're not going to concede until we get the best tale for our members.
Very good. Well, we wanted to make sure we highlighted that I know.
It is a national boycott.
Okay, well there you heard it here, not first, but you definitely heard it here as well. I wanted to reach out to you so in particular about this self driving car issue. I know this bubbled up a couple of months ago. We could put this up here, please on the screen. This is just about the you know they say self driving tru semi trucks coming to America's highways.
I know that there was a split here with the California Governor Gavin Newsome, and I was wondering if you could break some of that down for us, because I know that this is something that bubbled up and really bothered you guys in the past. It bought ye are today?
Yeah, And you know, the one thing that Governor Newsom has proven that he's bought and paid for by big tech. And he fails to remember when there was a recall who supported him the most. That was organized labor. And look, we don't want autonomous vehicles. We're all about protecting jobs. More importantly, it could be a major public safety issue. You know, you have an eighty thousand pound vehicle, you know,
going up and down these roads, family of four. You know, the best computer that I know is you've got instinct in your mind. And if you have a human operator, they're going to react a lot quicker to a potential safety risk and everything else.
But you know, it's.
Unfortunate Governor Newsom is bought and paid for by big tech and he chose the wrong side in this one. And we are going to do everything in our power legislatively to fight autonomous commercial vehicles and autonomous vehicles in general.
And we have to do that on a state level, we have to do it on a federal level.
We have the ability through collective bargaining to protect against autonomous vehicles and women very successful in all the negotiations that we have had with you know, major corporations like UPS and others, so we have that ability to limit them doing collective bargaining. But we want to make sure that we protect jobs as a whole nationwide.
In the safety Where are we in the trajectory of the adoption of this technology.
Is this a state by state issue? Is it a federal issue? Is it both? And how much of a threat is it to your membership.
It's a major threat.
All technology, whether it's AI or autonomous vehicles, is a major threat to jobs. And it's a major threat to the infrastructure that you know we're investing as tax payers day in and day out for roads and bridges. It's a credible threat. It's state by state, we've got to fight it, and then we have to take it on at a national level.
Something I'm curious about in the way that you guys think about it.
Obviously I agree in terms of job protection and all that they you know, I believe that the justificationers, they're like, oh, well, you're standing in the way of progress. You of course rise safety. How do you and your drive your members how do you guys think about you know, things in the future. Is it accommodation, is it just fighting it
back against it? Like, how do you think about, you know, with the role of technology your own jobs and what I believe is one of the most critical things that you guys, So put.
A totonomous vehicles aside from them. Yeah, technology is coming.
It's hair, you know, and you know, companies you know want to utilize it, you know, for efficiencies, and that's all well and good, But there's other jobs that can be created as a result of technology, and that's what we've been focused on.
It's look, technology is common, it's hair. We can either do one or two things.
We can either pout about it and do nothing and or be creative and find a way to who's programming this technology, who's maintaining this technology, and create jobs. And we've been successful in the warehouse industry, grocery warehouse industry where there has been implementation of technology, but we've created just as many jobs as a result of you know, finding ways to service this technology, finding ways to program
this tech chnology, helping design this technology. So there is opportunity as a result of technology.
Can you talk a little bit about the sort of overall organizing landscape because for really the first time in my lifetime, labor seems to be securing some big wins. I'm used to the nineties EERO of all these concessionary contracts. After concessionary contracts, you all had big wins with regards to ups. We saw, you know, significant contract improvements from UAW. There seems to be a lot of energy in terms
of organizing news shops. What are you seeing in terms of what's possible for labor right now?
I think we're at a we have a great opportunity and we haven't taken advantage of it. We have a younger workforce that is passionate about organizing, passionate about the unions, which is you know, very very encouraging for an old guy like me. You know, we always full generation. I always want to leave this organization better than we found it. But organizing is key.
Right now.
We're organizing in the Teams's Union and traditional industries like construction, but we're also looking at obviously Amazon's our biggest target. We are focused on cannabis, where there's four hundred and twenty five thousand W two employees that are cultivating warehousing and they'll be distributions. So we have focused, we have been organizing getting contracts there. So yeah, I mean we
have to look at every opportunity. When you look at these young worker's like at Starbucks, you look at Chipotle, it's encouraging because you know, we we have proven our value through the pandemic organized labor. How we provided our members were essential. They provided goods and service to keep this country moving. And now you know, with this opportunity with the younger generation who is thirsty to fight and not afraid to stand up, it's great. I think it's
I think the sky's the limit moving forward. We just have to keep this momentum going.
How much has the more pro worker Biden administration LRB helped to enable some of those victories and expand what's possible, Well, clearly, I.
Mean when you make a change from you know, the previous administration who is anti worker union, you know has made a lot easier. I mean, elections have gone a lot smoother. There's a lot more due diligence and violations and stuff like that. But at the end of the day, it's about getting our message out. What can we do for work is what can we do as far as representing people and I think to your point earlier we've negotiated as teams is the strongest contract thirty billion at
ups DHL record contract Anheuser Busch. The proof is in the putting, and this new generation of work is when it comes to organizing, they want to see what they're actually going to get. So what we've been focused on as an organization is getting the best contract and that's a true template to what we're doing moving forward. People want to see this new generation want to see actually information and you know, social media has played a huge role in getting our messaging out, has played a huge
role in you know, basically bringing solidarity connecting people. So again, I'm very excited about the direction of the unions in the American workforce.
You may reference he to the previousstration. I know you went down to mar Lago, you met with the former president Trump. Did you tell them any of this? How is he thinking about?
The reality is this?
We we had roundtables with every single candidate, and you know, our message is clear.
You know this.
You have to earn our endorsement and you have boxes you need to check off, whether it's not supporting national right to work. We need to have a Proact where it makes you know, organizing easier, but more importantly, it mandates you know, arbitration to get a first contract. We need bankruptcy reform. When these companies just run from their obligation and our members don't get their benefits. You know, we've got anti trust. There's a lot of issues out
there that are important to US autonomous vehicles technology. And you know, the one thing we said is the government, for some reason, when you deal with a company like Amazon, for example, why do we reward a bad employer. We know they're a bad employer. We know they skirt all kinds of obligations. With this independent contractor model, there's one hundred and fifty percent turnover ratio.
They focus on distressed communities.
Why would we as a government as a nation keep rewarding bad employers with lucrative contracts. So you know, we've gotten our message out to everyone, President Biden as well, former President Trump.
RFK.
Everybody knows our issues and those issues and that script when we brought them in was not tailored towards anyone can It was just focused on our issues that our members face every day in the potential risk.
All right, The point about the contracts is so important because you know, it's easy for politicians to make an excuse about the pro Oh we tried really hard. Sorry guys, we'll give it another shot again. But you know, we had these opponents in Congress. We just can't get across the line. Well, you're talking about the contracts. That's something
the president can do unilaterally. There's no excuse for rewarding a company, a union busting company like Amazon that is bad to their workers, as you point out, and if you look at the injury statistics much higher than industry average. I wonder if you could just give us an update on where you guys are with Amazon organizing, what's the latest progress and what's the big picture.
So we have been working on Amazon. I mean, you see what's going on in southern California. We've committed to invest three hundred million dollars organized Amazon. It is going to be a We're working on some affiliations that are going to position us to go after the direct employees. But look, we need to put pressure on Amazon from all fronts and people have to understand that. You know, although it's a convenience and it's you know, Amazon is
everywhere they are not good employers. They are not good people, and they do not treat their work as well. We are going to, you know, spend every resource we have to make certain that we organize Amazon workers. And you know, the best part about it is, you know, again we talked about that young generation. They are all in on this, which is very, very important.
So you're seeing a lot of receptivity.
Absolutely, we are, especially after the UPS contract, right, Yeah, of course they do the same work that UPS workers do. Are part timers, are making over well over twenty one dollars an hour, They get full medical, they get full pensions, but more and more importantly, they get a to a career. There's no path to a career in Amazon.
What's the next thing that we should be looking for in terms of that organizing drive, Well.
You're going to look for us turning it up, focusing on major cities and you know, getting out there and continuing the spread the word. We have a great volunteer organizing committee of pairs that work at UPS, that work at DHL where we've had another huge victory at CVG
where we organize fifteen hundred eleven hundred members. We have another fifteen hundred got a first contract there right at that hub, right next to where Amazon has a million square foot warehouse on that facility, and that's going to be our next target.
All right.
The last question I had for you is a number of unions have put down statements with regard to isra'swar and Gaza specifically calling for a cspire. To my monology, you all haven't put on anything of the like. I just wanted to ask if that's something that you all are considering, and more broadly, what your philosophy is with regard to the role of unions when it comes to the sort of international solidarity.
Look, we all know that this world is in a very difficult time and it's unfortunate that, you know, innocent people are being victimized, but by this terrible situation not only there, but also Ukraine and Russia. I'm focused on fighting the war that I've been fighting for the last thirty four years my life. That's the war on corporate America. It's the war on politicians that don't support us. And look,
it's unfortunate and hopefully there'll be a resolution. You know, people talk about the genocide, and you know there's a higher court, higher power that's going to decide that. I'm just focused on, you know, the labor movement, focused on my members, and focused on, you know, making certain that workers are taken care of.
That's my war.
Fair enough, Well, we really appreciate your time, sir. You're welcome back here anytime.
Thank you very much.
I appreciate itsutely appreciate it.
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