Former Transportation Secretary,
Elaine Chao, allegedly used her
position of power as
the Transportation Secretary under
Trump, to essentially use her staff
to help family members and
to help run a shipping business
with ties to China.
I'm actually shocked that this is
making news now, because we
already knew, in the beginning
of Trump's administration,
that Elaine Chao had some serious
conflicts of interest.
But a new report
by the Transportation Department's
Inspector General, found that Chao
organized an interview, for
instance, with a Chinese-language
television station at the New York
City headquarters of her father's
shipping company Foremost Group.
The focus of the conversation there
was to discuss how Chao's father,
James Chao,
had been dubbed Chinese Ship King,
how Foremost Group ascended to its
status in the world, and Dr.
Chao's business endeavors.
She also told Department of
Transportation, public affairs
staff to help her father, a New
York City-based shipping magnate,
with marketing for his book, along
with developing, and in some ways,
helping to implement a media
strategy surrounding his work.
So, she used her high profile
cabinet position in order to help
promote and even help work for
the shipping company that's led by
her father.
And I know that I should be more
outraged by this.
But given the fact that we're in
this political moment where
corruption surrounds us all day,
every day, I feel numb to it.
And I just feel like this isn't
that big of a deal,
in the grand scheme of things.
I could be wrong.
Cenk, what do you think?
>> Yeah, it's 50/50.
I agree with you on half of it.
So, and the other half is bad,
but it's the Trump administration.
And so it was probably the least
bad of all the things.
But it's more a run
of the mill corruption.
So, let me explain, the half that I
think is not a big deal is,
she's asking her staff to
do certain things.
The staff seems to be okay with
doing it.
And it's like simple things like
arranging a car and she's in the
car, but her sister also happens
to be in the car, and she runs that
giant transportation company.
And I'm oversimplifying, and
probably giving her too much,
being too fair to her, right?
But, look,
I always think about it guys, what
if the shoe was on the other foot?
Whenever I read stories like this,
what if it was about
Bernie Sanders or AOC or
anyone else that's on our side?
It feels a little nitpicky.
So, I think that half is not
that big a deal.
Because the question in this
case is, should they do a criminal
investigation?
No, I wouldn't do a criminal
investigation over that.
I just flat out said that, okay?
So, the other half is more
serious where she goes to, for
example, Chinese TV to promote her
dad's shipping company while
she's the United
States Transportation Secretary.
Nah, you can't do that.
That's crazy.
And there was several other
instances where she was directly
helping her family business while
being our Transportation Secretary.
And what I mean by our is,
the American people's
Transportation Secretary,
you're not supposed to get these
positions and then go,
how do I stuff my pockets and
my family's pockets full of money.
And so, there, I think,
those are legitimate issues.
You'd really have to get into
the details to see if they're just
an ethics violation.
And I don't mean to diminish that,
that's really important.
And they didn't do that either,
by the way, of course,
it's the Trump administration.
They're like, pardons for
everybody that's connected to us.
By the way, if she'd stayed longer,
Trump might have changed his mind,
because later you'd wind up
fighting with Mitch McConnell,
who's, of course,
Elaine Chao's husband.
So, vindictively, he probably would
have had her arrested, if they,
McConnell and
Trump had fought earlier.
But on the second half, there is
a legitimate question as to whether
it's a criminal issue too.
And that you can't tell,
unless you're in
a grand jury proceeding, etc.
So, whether it crossed legal line
or not?
>> Yeah, so, the Associated Press
reported that the Inspector General
said that, Justice Department
officials ultimately declined to
take up a criminal review, saying
there, quote, may be ethical or
administrative issues but,
no evidence to support
possible criminal charges.
And look, just so I can kind of put
this story in the context of our
current political climate,
to explain why it is
that I read this story, and
my reaction is what my dad's
reaction would be, who's cares?
That's what my dad would say.
It's because we currently
live under a system
where our congressional lawmakers
are invested in individual stocks,
guys.
That's just normal,
that's just accepted.
They make decisions about
regulations that would
impact businesses that
they are invested in.
And that is not
considered unethical.
It's not considered illegal.
And so, Elaine Chao's helping her
daddy out.
I know that's bad.
I know it's wrong.
But, again,
our entire system is this.
It's just a self-serving,
self-enriching, narcissistic scam.
And it all needs to be reformed.
That's where I'm coming from.
>> Yeah, well, so
let me pick up on that.
On all that, of course,
you're a billion percent right.
So look, TYT Investigates has hit
a story about how, the last set of
Republican governors in Texas,
all got paid millions of dollars by
the energy companies that they
deregulated.
And that's what led to
the disaster in Texas.
And one of
the CEOs of the energy companies,
the George W Bush, of course,
when he was governor of Texas,
used to call him J Daddy, okay?
So, they're already helping their
sugar daddies.
So, what difference does it make if
they're sugar daddy is their actual
daddy, which is the case in here.
The underlying problem is
corruption.
And, Ana's right, our system is,
unfortunately, these days,
since 1978, is built on corruption.
That's when the landmark
Supreme Court decisions came down,
saying that corporations can give
unlimited money to
politicians through PACs.
So, that's why another
TYT Investigates story from today,
Jonathan Larson wrote this, Joe
Manchin on some of the businesses
where wages are incredibly low.
So, if he passes a $15
minimum wage,
he's going to cost himself profits.
He doesn't want to pay his workers.
He wants to pay them as literally
the minimum he could pay them.
So, they're personally
benefiting off that.
Kelly Loeffler, David Perdue,
they did insider trading based on
the information they had on COVID.
Nobody ever gets punished.
But the bottom line, the most
important one, is the one we
say most often, which is campaign
contributions are, literally,
millions of dollars, collectively,
billions of dollars in bribes.
They just, flat out, give people
millions of dollars, and then they
get exactly what they wanted.
The politicians work for
them, completely.
They're all bought off.
And so,
when we see a story like this,
it almost seems cute.
That's kind of old school,
helping your family get rich by
using your government position.
That's old school corruption.
The kind they used to do before
they made bribery legal in America.
So, that's why you're getting
this visceral reaction of, wait,
is this that big a deal?
It's just normal corruption.
>> And there's something
wrong with that reaction.
I want to acknowledge that.
I mean, I should not be numb to
running the mill corruption with
former cabinet members.
But to that point, remember, Elaine
Chao was confirmed by the Senate.
And I remember when we were
covering her confirmation hearings,
we pointed out that there were
conflicts of interest.
We pointed out that her father
owned a shipping company that had
ties to China.
And that, hey,
maybe you shouldn't confirm her as
Transportation Secretary when that
conflict of interest exists.
Under the Biden administration,
I mean, I wrote a lengthy piece on
this, for USA Today, explaining all
the different nominees for
Biden's Cabinet who have giant
conflicts of interest.
So, I think, when you know the
Associated Press writes about this
ethics investigation into Elaine
Chao as if it's this big breaking
news story, it ends up feeling like
a giant nothing burger, because
we knew about that, five years ago.
You get what I'm saying?
Four years ago.
>> Yeah, 100%.