TrueValueMetrics ... Impact Accounting for the 21st Century

Date: 2024-12-21 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00027103

US POLICICS SENATOR SHELDON WHITEHOUSE TYT Investigates: Sheldon Whitehouse DRAGS SCOTUS Over The Coals For 30+ Minutes PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ke8EYxlja0g Peter Burgess COMMENTARY SCOTUS has been in the news for all the wrong reasons for a quite long time. I became aware of increasing dysfunction of the US Supreme Court when I started to hear of the role the Federalist Society was having in the screening of potential judges for the Court System including the Supreme Court. The amount of damage the the Courts might do is difficult to comprehend ... and difficult to stop in the short tun! Senator Sheldon Whitehouse has done his homework! Peter Burgess
Sheldon Whitehouse DRAGS SCOTUS Over The Coals For 30+ Minutes TYT Investigates Jul 2, 2024 464K subscribers ... 419,208 views ... 18K likes #BreakingNews #Politics #News Sheldon Whitehouse breaks down why the Supreme Court needs an ethics code. For more from TYT Investigates, SUBSCRIBE at: / tytinvestigatesreports You can read our stories at https://www.TYT.com/investigates LIKE and FOLLOW us at / tytinvestigates And connect with us on Twitter @TYTInvestigates #News #Politics #BreakingNews 240701__IV02_WHITEHOUSE CALLS OUT SCOTUS THEM Transcript 0:00 Alo came before this committee and he had the chance to tell us that he thought roow was egregiously wrong make that observation about that case and instead he hid that sentiment he said instead Ro versus weight is an important precedent of the Supreme Court it was decided in 1973 so it's been on the books for a long time it has been challenged on a number of occasions and I discussed those yesterday and it is my and the Supreme Court has reaffirmed the decision so looking back he looks a lot like a sleeper agent predetermined to attack row who wouldn't disclose what he was up to until he had the majority that he needed to change the legal standard and destroy the legal precedent this is all part of the left's political master plan to delegitimize the Supreme Court and impune certain justices the process C in place appears to be working the Judiciary is pleasing itself they already reviewed and tightened their disclosure requirements and we'll all know over the next year or so whether these efforts are enough again this isn't real oversight let us be very clear about what is going on here billionaires who are invested heavily in influencing the Supreme Court have been caught giving enormous secret gifts to individual justices this raises obvious issues about disclosure of gifts to justices and of recusal by justices where the gifts should trigger recusal so saying Congress can't investigate here is saying that Congress can't investigate how laws Congress 2:06 passed are being implemented by an agency Congress created that is obvious nonsense surrounding that obvious nonsense has come a billionaire lawyers fog machine of invective and misdirection for all the failing and nashing of teeth by the billionaires this is actually pretty simple at the uh end of last month we voted through the authorization for chairman Durban to issue subpoenas and um it was greeted with a barrage of talk about a whole variety of things but one was how Democrats were destroying the Judiciary Committee we were absolutely totally going to destroy the judici committee uh it was on us that the Judiciary committee was going 3:00 to be destroyed I I understand what you'd like to do but I'm saying that In fairness we have debated these nominees twice and I ask the clerk to call the role Mr chairman you're denying us an opportunity to speak on a nominee third time now okay do this we don't have a right to speak under the rules under the third the third time I'd say no you so you're just going to make it up so yeah like there's G be a lot of consequences coming here you're going to have a lot of consequences coming if you go down this road cautioned you I've cautioned a lot of the clerk will call the RO listen to me I cautioned a lot of you Mr chairman who has not been allowed to speak on that Mr chairman you just destroyed yeah one of the most important committees in the United States Senate well all the talk about destroying the Senate Judiciary Committee came rather in the nature of a threat it was actually more like if we did something that we are perfectly entitled to do to pursue as after being persistently obstructed then Republicans would destroy the committee would undo any Goodwill or any bipartisanship or any uh collegial effort here's an example of the no investigation's problem the key fact to determine whether Justice Thomas was bound by law to recuse himself from the first January 6 committee case was what he knew about his wife's Insurrection activities and when he knew it on that fact the the lawfulness of his initial recusal decision turns yet Thomas has never been officially asked that question it's a cover up in plain view to sum up by all appearances a coch operation funded legal Theory supported by coch operation funded amiki is about to be deployed by coch operation funded lawyers to convince coch operation funded justices to achieve a longstanding goal 5:06 of coke Industries the ability to pollute more easily and more cheaply to twist American law through those techniques for that purpose is a deeply degraded thing it would be a tragedy for the American people but you know what it's the scheme in a nutshell it's why all the effort was put together the hundreds of millions of dollars were spent to capture and control the United States Supreme Court for the benefit of a small cabal of creepy billionaires thank you chairman we are here today because the Supreme Court is playing out of bounds of the ethics rules for federal judges justices read the ethics rules in unique and eccentric ways and when they're caught out of bounds they refuse to allow any investigation of the facts the personal Hospitality problems 6:03 I've been pursuing began with Justice Scalia who took more than 7 dozen undisclosed hunting vacations most people know of two the one where he was on the Air Force 2 manifest with Dick Cheney and the one where he died there were 70 plus more it was systematized some intermediary would ask the owner of an expensive Resort often a commercial property to extend to Scalia a personal invitation to the resort even where the owner was someone he'd never met Scalia treated as personal Hospitality because of the personal invitation and failed to disclose the vacations gun industry Advocates fossil fuel folks and Republican political figures often tagged along no reasonable reading of the term personal Hospitality would cover this but the Supreme Court let this go on for years when I challenged the court about this practice exhibit one I got a blowoff letter exhibit two 7:06 basically nothing to see here so then I asked the circuit courts what they thought about this conduct I went over 13 on answers oh that would be exhibit three I went 0 for 13 on answers so I then sent another letter saying I hope their silence didn't indicate some kind of coordinated obstruction exhibit four I also scheduled a subcomm Committee hearing Presto I was told the financial disclosure committee would examine how the exemption was interpreted that's exhibit five almost a year later two weeks before the recent news about Justice Thomas broke the judicial conference updated its guidance to clarify that this sort of non-disclosure violates the law exhibit 6 I have no evidence that any federal judge outside the Supreme Court ever used the personal invitation trick and the judicial conference made up of other judges firmly shut it down regular judges would be loathed to use that trick because a 8:03 complaint about it would go into a proper process and would be investigated and measured against the law and the ethics code and a conclusion would be reached and that conclusion could be embarrassing only Supreme Court Justices refuse to allow their conduct to be investigated or reviewed my bill would fix that which brings us to Justice Thomas's recent non-disclosure of supposed personal Hospitality from a right-wing billionaire and its problems first problem private jet travel is not in the personal Hospitality exemption which is limited to food lodging and entertainment exhibit 7 some textualist by the way second problem Thomas said it was okay because he'd asked colleagues but that Financial disclosure committee it's there to ask about financial disclosure setting aside that its name should give a clue Thomas knew 9:00 the committee existed because concerns about his yacht and Jet travel gifts from this billionaire were referred there in 2011 after some of these gifts were first revealed in this New York Times story exhibit nine third problem there's no legal way not to disclose the property acquisition in Georgia fourth problem some of this personal Hospitality involved people dedicated to turning the court into a tool for right-wing billionaires namely Leonard Leo this guy doesn't have business before the court his business is the court this disclosure mess has again been referred to the financial disclosure committee which raises the question of the previous referral to that same Committee of the same Billionaire's gifts to Thomas of yacht and Jet travel the rules seem to require the committee to report its findings to the judicial conference the records of the judicial conference are public and 10:02 the records of the Jud judicial conference contain no mention of any such report so what became of the 2011 referral did anyone intervene is the committee still considering the 2011 referral more than a decade later there is much yet to learn which is why last week I sent a letter to the courts asking for further answers exhibit 10 three things are needed to fix all this better enforcement better accusal rules and better disclosures my bill would do all three I thank chairman Durban for this joint hearing and look forward to getting to the bottom of this mess until there is an honest ethics process at the Supreme Court these messes will continue the court has conclusively proven that it cannot police itself Nemo judex in suaa I ask unanimous consent that my exhibits be made part of the record Congress can of course investigate how 11:03 laws Congress passed are being implemented by an agency Congress created for me all the theatrical wailing and nashing of teeth from these billionaires and their lawyers signals actually that there's a lot being covered up here and that should reinforce our determination to get to the bottom of this Scandal the fundamental question here is how bad how corrupting is the billionaire influence at the Supreme Court how serious is the appearance of impropriety you don't solve an appearance of impropriety Problem by keeping the impropriety secret it's still there it is now time for sunlight the best disinfectant at the end of the day the overheated objections we have heard from 12:02 the billionaires assume the answer that nothing unow or improper has transpired but that is precisely the question we need to be investigating to say that an investigation is outrageous and should stop because we're all innocent presumes innocence a fact not here in evidence indeed all of the Abundant evidence is to the contrary that this is part of an orchestrated scheme to influence and control our Supreme Court thank you chairman I'm here today for the 26th time to detail the special interest billionaire funded scheme that has overrun the United States Supreme Court this evening I'd like to discuss some things about uh 13:02 Republican Judiciary Committee members performance in the Senate Judiciary Committee recently as we voted on authorizing subpoenas for billionaire Haron Crow some of his holding companies and the court fixer Leonard Leo somehow that Republican threat to to destroy the committee morphed into Democrats destroying the committee but that doesn't make any sense if you think of a kidnapper shooting his hostage and then blaming the family for the murder of the hostage because the family hadn't yield to the kidnappers demands that's kind of backwards logic also backwards logic is the argument that the subpoenas were 14:02 an effort to destroy not the committee but the Supreme Court the subpoenas would destroy or damage the Supreme Court okay let's think about that for a minute there is only one possible way that it could be true logically that these subpoenas could do damage to the Supreme Court only one and that is if the information the subpoenas would disclose is so damaging that it would damage or destroy the court subpoenas that turned up nothing would be no harm no foul if there's nothing evil to see in the information the subpoenas are pursuing there is no harm the necessary logical predicate of 15:00 the destroy the court argument made by our colleagues is that subpoenas would reveal that something truly horrible happened at the court that now needs to be covered up covered up but that's not how appearance of impropriety Works justices of the Supreme Court are supposed to avoid doing things that might create even the appearance of impropriety the appearance of impropriety issue is not that you do impropriety and then go out and cover up its appearance we also heard a lot that day about the problem of subpoenaing private citizens as if that were something unusual if that is a problem it was a very new problem because just days before the committee had subpoenaed private citizens in the tech sector on a 16:01 bipartisan basis without anyone's objection as always our Republican friends persisted in the argument that this committee has no business looking at Supreme Court gift disclosures that argument was is and will always be a phony the Judiciary Committee has every right to oversee how an agency that Congress created the judicial conference is implementing a law that Congress passed the judicial disclosures law it is within the jurisdiction of the committee it is a congressionally established body and it is a statute passed by Congress if Congress can't oversee how agencies it creates 17:00 oversee laws it passes there's no oversight left and obviously understanding what gifts went undisclosed is essential to that inquiry we then heard that you can't have subpoenas because a related bill is out of the committee but Congress has every right to oversight and subpoenas at any stage in legislation and even at no stage in legislation because the bill in question has not passed here in the Senate it's come to the senate floor but it is not passed in the Senate and because Republicans not only Stonewall our investigation but threaten very plainly a partisan blockade of the 18:01 bill here on the floor not a single Republican vote was I think what they threatened that makes it all the more obvious why continuing to build the factual case for reform is appropriate there is precisely zero basis for the theory that a senate committee can't look into a subjective legislation once some related legislation is out of committee preparing for a successful floor vote on that bill is only one obvious reason why that theory is painfully wrong if you look at all of that noise and fuss that was put up it's hard not to deduce that maybe something else is going on here here is my theory of the case as I have said in previous speeches very powerful right-wing 19:05 billionaires spent years and hundreds of millions of dollars on a scheme to influence and even control the Supreme Court those very powerful right-wing billionaires are also massive funders of Republican politics and including Republican Senate Politics the problem is that those very powerful right-wing billionaires got sloppy and their gifts program to take care of certain Supreme Court Justices started breaking gift and disclosure rules very likely tax rules as well with a a few of the amenable 20:00 Supreme Court Justices whom they were rewarding with lavish entertainments what we already know about that gifts program is bad enough how far the Billionaire's hands are in the cookie jar and how coordinated and orchestrated this secret gifts program was is information that they desperately want to suppress so they do what Mega donors do and pressure members of Congress to do what they want and in this case it was help the billionaires suppress the truth of what went down here in all of these matters the common theme is that fact finding the very basis of due process fact finding is not performed around the Supreme Court Justices fact finding despite being the essence of due process this court avoids 21:08 like the plague all of this the behavior of our friends in the committee the cooperation and support from billionaires and judges and others the Mischief of not answering basic fact questions all of it signals that there is a lot going on here that there is a lot to investigate and that our investigation must and will continue to be continued and with that I yield the floor let me get to the point at hand I am back now for the uh 27th time to call attention to the right-wing 22:00 billionaires scheme to capture and control our Supreme Court and connect it to things that are going on at the court right now the billionaire Elite that captured our Supreme Court wants to use it to attack Americans ability our ability as a people through regulation to protect our own health and safety and the goal mostly is to benefit the big polluters in their midst a word on regulation as modern Innovations have raised the standard of living in the United States and around the world and corporations have grown to International behemoths and billionaires have claimed for themselves a larger and larger share of the world's wealth regulation has come to have a very important role big corporations 23:04 well-known motive to maximize dangers inevitably to maximize profits I should say inevitably causes dangers to society if you think of a big industrial plant that without oversight would leech chemical byproducts into the soil and water poison Wells and spread cancer you've got an idea of why regul a is needed over many decades Congress created administrative agencies to perform this task staffed by scientists and other experts to use their expertise to manage and re in these industrial dangers the American system of Regulation made our society safer and more prosperous period as heavy equipment and dangerous chemicals came to mines and factories and construction sites Regulators 24:01 implemented workplace safety standards the meat packing jungle led to sanitation requirements in production facilities automobile Highway Carnage produced seat belts and airbags stock jobbing boiler rooms and insurance fraud provoked regulation to protect investors and insures what's been the result workplace illnesses injuries and deaths declined food born illnesses that used to kill thousands of people per year have been practically wiped out highways are no longer Carnage boilers rarely explode and medications and stock offerings and insurance policies are all safer for consumers and by the way in this environment of safety corporate profits soared the S&P 500 has returned in ex ESS of 7,800 clean air and clean water and safe 25:07 food and cars are actually good for business regulation is good regulation is a public 25:23 recalcitrant polluters is in the crew that captured the Supreme Court and they want not only to pollute for free they want to pollute without expert regulation well even Republican congresses wouldn't go for that so they turned to their captured unaccountable Court first they got the court to create a brand new so-called major questions Doctrine basically a too big to regulate escape hatch for big 26:02 polluters and now they're using their captured Court to attack another precedent the legal Doctrine known as Chevron deference which is pretty simple unless the law is clear on technical matters courts defer to the agency experts this Arrangement makes sense Congress isn't suited and usually hasn't the expertise to make fine technical determinations so to prop up their attack on this Common Sense principle polluters have invented some fake arguments a few years ago these industries and their right-wing front groups began arguing that Chevron Defence has a separation of powers problem may make all the sense in the world but it has a separation of powers 27:03 problem that courts must attend to because they say it gives unchecked and disproportionate power to the Executive Branch the problem with that argument is that it is just not true it is flat out false congress's legislative Grant of administrative authority to agencies comes with significant checks and balances I'm not going to go into all the details but for starters agency heads are appointed by an elected president and confirmed by an elected Senate and agencies may not promulgate rules willy-nilly they have to take public notice and comment and agency rules are subject to judicial review to make sure they're consistent with the rules and the administrative procedures Act and the public information and comment and the evidence that helps make sure that 28:02 regulations by law have to be both reasonable and consistent with the evidence and the facts and in Congress when all that is going on we exercise direct oversight over these administrative agencies we do it through our oversight committies that have specific jurisdiction on specific agencies we do it through the Appropriations process very often you see Appropriations Riders to control agency behavior and we do it through the expedited review of the Congressional review act which we're seeing a lot of now in the Senate and it allows for very quick review by Congress of a challenged agency Rule and in fact Congress has used that rule to over has used that process to overturn agency rules 20 times since 2001 there's a whole ecosystem of secretly funded corporate front groups that manage this whole process it 29:03 seems complicated but it's less complicated than a piano and people know how to play pianos now much of this is funded by The coch Brothers now one is deceased but the coke Industries political influence operation which is a powerful right-wing dark money political Network look at this sler case the lawyers who represent the petitioners in this case are working for free supposedly ostensibly for a public interest law firm called cause of action this supposed public interest law firm discloses no donors and does not report any employees as the New York Times discovered in this 30:06 article those lawyers actually work for Americans for Prosperity the central Battleship of the Koch brothers political front group Armada that Armada by the way is very cozy with some of the far-right justices of the Sue Court indeed propublica has reported that Justice Clarence Thomas has repeatedly flown out to serve as the celebrity draw for the Koch political operations fundraisers including funding that landed at Americans for Prosperity as is now standard practice in these cases a flotilla of dark money front groups appeared as amiy cui purporting to be 31:06 independent but actually with enormous common funding and orchestration these front groups are frequent flyers that spout anti-regulation arguments before The Supreme Court regularly like for instance the major questions Doctrine I mentioned earlier from the creation of these do Rines in right-wing hot houses through their amplification via right-wing front groups to their insertion into legal arguments by right-wing Amy Key the Common Thread through the whole process is massive secret funding from billionaire special interests

SITE COUNT