Early this morning, the Build Back
Better bill passed in the House.
The vote was 220 to 213,
1 Democrat voted against it for
reasons we'll get into.
No Republican supported it.
So many components of it.
So much good it can do.
Not one of more than 200
Republicans actually supported it.
So it of course now
has to go to the Senate.
And the Senate is the cave in which
Joe Manchin and
Kyrsten Sinema dwell.
So God only knows what will be left
of it once it's done with them.
But at least as of passing
the House, it offers universal
prekindergarten.
Generous subsidies for
childcare that extend well into
the middle class.
Expanded financial aid for college.
Hundreds of billions
of dollars in housing support.
Home and community care for
older Americans.
A new hearing benefit from Medicare
and price controls for
prescription drugs.
More than a half a trillion dollars
would go towards shifting the US
economy away from fossil fuels to
renewable energy and electric cars.
Which is the biggest climate
focused investment in US history.
The bill would cap insulin prices
specifically at $35 per month for
Americans with diabetes.
The bill also guarantees four weeks
of paid leave, which of course,
we sort of fairly uniquely as
a country have never offered.
Now almost every single one of
those things that I just listed
were larger or stronger,
funded longer more all encompassing
before they were gradually
whittled down over the course of
the past few months.
But even with what is left,
this would be the largest
investment outside of investment in
the military, to be clear.
That the US government has made in
poor and working class and
middle class Americans,
at least in my lifetime.
Although again, as I said, it does
still have to go to the Senate.
And we already know Manchin has
said, just this week, he's still
against paid leave being in there.
God knows what he'll make of
the climate focused spending,
considering his own personal
investments.
>> Okay, so, I want to be
clear on both sides of this.
So, first of all, there was a ton
of stuff taken out of this bill.
I'm not at all happy with
this bill.
So, first of all, let's just
go through it real quick.
The lowering the drug
prices they did is comical.
It's tiny, it's minuscule.
It's meant to mask the fact that
they're not actually lowering drug
prices.
Dental and vision could have
been covered under Medicare,
that was stripped out.
Free community college has got half
of climate change is gone.
The funds dedicated to that.
The billionaire's tax is gone.
Moving any of the Trump tax cuts
for the rich and for
corporations is gone.
>> The weeks of paid leave
has gone.
>> That's right.
It used to be 12 weeks of paid
family leave.
They now stand at four weeks.
And in the negotiations, they were
negotiating between 3.5 and 1.5.
This land is at 1.75.
So gee, I wonder who won.
The conservative corporate
Democrats won on the negotiations.
Honestly, we've not got nearly
slaughtered.
>> The CBO says, by the way,
it's 1.63 in fact.
>> Yes, okay.
>> It's almost 1.5.
>> So I'm going to get to how it's
going to be way worse in a second.
But would I vote yes?
Yes I would.
And so the provisions that remain,
some of them are excellent
including a corporate minimum tax.
And all the things that John
read you.
And to me, if they'd taken out
lowering drug prices and
paid family leave completely,
then it would have been just a slap
in the face and
none of the progressive.
Other than,
Universal Pre K is also in there.
There would be 1.5 progressive
priorities left.
And that's only because they were
approved by corporate interests
like Universal Pre K corporations
really like, okay?
And I would say no,
this was a force of a negotiation.
But they did put four weeks of paid
family leave,
you can call it anything you like.
But it's the beginning of
paid family leave in America and
other provisions are excellent.
Sometimes as painful as it is
you gotta vote yes.
But of course the problem is,
it is not this version of the bill.
Nothing is passed yet.
That's just passed the House.
It's also gotta pass the Senate.
Whether they're going to go to
the Senate and Manchin and
Sinema are going to shred this and
what's going to remain is going
to be an absolute joke.
That's guaranteed, write it down in
stone if they pass anything at all.
We'll talk more about
that in a second.
But first Morgan,
what do you think the bill overall?
>> Yeah, I mean you can't deny this
is, like John said,
I mean probably about the same age.
One of the biggest investments
we've certainly
seen in our lifetime, sure.
But we need to start focusing and
I know this audience says that it's
not just democrats,
it's better kind of Democrats.
And the fact that any of this stuff
is really up for negotiation
that we're going to be arguing
about whether there should be
paid family leave in this country.
Or whether or not we should have
elderly folks that have access to
vision and dental care as they age.
Or whether anyone should ever not
have access to those things, but
that's another story.
That's the crazy part, but
we need to get something passed.
The other thing that I would just
say in terms of how we're
going to message this and
talk to people about it.
We have to recognize that we need
people who are going to
be authentic and really able to say
that they're on the side
of people to then make the case for
why this stuff matters.
And that's one of the problems that
we have a disconnect of
a corporate party that
isn't connected to the grassroots.
And doesn't have those
relationships to really sell
what all of this is going to do for
the American people.
>> Yeah, and so
now of course the real problem is,
when it goes to the Senate,
they are already saying,
Manchin is saying he's against paid
family leave, so
they're just going to take it out.
So the six just Democrats that
voted no on the infrastructure bill
did that because they didn't
want to lose leverage
in the Senate.
Well, they were 100% right, we have
no leverage in the Senate, none.
Now we could have leverage if
people called out Joe Manchin and
put public pressure on Manchin as
Sinema.
But apparently there's not a single
Democrat elected right now that
is willing to do that.
I'm being honest with you guys and
some of those folks I love.
But Bernie would not call out
a fellow Democrat and really fight
them publicly under penalty of law.
He's not going to do it.
Nobody else is going to do it.
So they have no other leverage.
And Manchin is going to shred this
bill.
Sinema and by the way, half the
corporate Democrats in the Senate,
those guys are just proxies.
There's so many corrupt Democrats
in the Senate who are going to love
taking out all the provisions that
actually help you.
And at the end they'll have
a joke of a bill that won't have
half the stuff in there.
And then they'll pass it.
Only the ones preapproved by
Chamber of Commerce and
then they'll call it historic.
And that's how this game is played.
And it will be deeply depressing.
We'll tell you that it was a joke.
It'll go back to the House,
I'll say vote no,
everybody will vote yes.
And that's the same game that's
been played my entire life in this
corporate controlled country.
It's controlled,
it controls the Republicans 100%
who all voted no because Chamber
of Commerce told him not to.
Their donors told them not to.
It controls 80%
of the Democratic Party and
about 100% of the mainstream media.
Yeah, effectively.
Look I think that the past week or
two has been so
perfect in demonstrating what we
have in the US government,
two philosophies which are not
Democratic and Republican.
It's progressives and
the billionaire defense force.
They will give you anime videos
of women of color being murdered.
They will terrify you about riots.
Can we skip ahead of
the last graphic.
I want to show you literally what
was being broadcast on Fox while
the other networks were at least
covering the fact that this bill
had passed.
Its that the artificial Christmas
trees are in short supply.
They do not want their audience
to even conceive of the possibility
that government could help them
with the crises that face them.
So they just don't cover it.
Did you know, by the way,
that there's another 2,000 person
caravan moving its way up from
Latin America?
More fear, just be terrified.
Your life is going to hell.
Your economic situation is in
shambles, it'll never get better.
It's certainly not if
we're in power but
make sure that that happens because
you should be very scared.
There's brown people marching
towards the country and you
can't get a damn Christmas tree and
that's it.
And then the little bit that
is left in the bill is there only
because of the progressives.
But the other side of
the billionaire defense force, the
Manchins and the Sinemas make sure
that it's as small as possible.
And we're desperately trying to get
through to people that there
is a better way.
And it is so
difficult because the billionaire
defense force has about a million
times the funding that we do.
Whether it comes to the form of CNN
MSNBC or Fox News and Ben Shapiro,
it's all the same thing,
they serve the exact same people.
>> All right look Morgan's been on
with us a number of times on
on TYT.
But now she's running for
Senate in Ohio and Morgan is
a super difficult question.
But if you were in the Senate,
what would
you do under these circumstances?
>> Fight like hell.
I mean, this is why I'm running for
the United States Senate,
is to minimize the power of people
like Sinema, Manchin, who have no
desire to help the American people.
Who through their actions,
are actually enabling everything
that the GOP is trying to do.
Fear monger and
avoid any type of economic change
from people living in this country.
And so, the other thing I would add
there is,
a lot of people have no idea what
we're talking about, right?
Because whether media's
not covering it.
Because they're only watching
Fox News, and so
we have to go directly to people.
I talk to people every day in Ohio.
If you ask them what's in
Build Back Better, I have no idea,
zero idea.
That is a failure of communication.
And that is only going to change by
electing people who really have
the ability to connect with folks
on the ground.
And also an understanding of what
the policy is, and a desire to get
into the US Senate and
really change something.
So that's why we've got to flip
the seat, we have to win it.
We have to win it, not just by
a Democrat, but by a Democrat
that's really going to get in there
and fight for the people.
>> So morganharper.org website.
But I'm going to
say one last thing on this.
Guys, when it goes to the Senate,
progressives and
everyone else should insist that
the House version pass.
And I know they're already giving
up on the House version,
which makes it totally.
This vote that they're celebrating,
since they've already unilaterally
and preemptively
given up on this version.
The fact that it passed means, if
I'm being honest with you guys and
that's my job to be honest with
you guys.
I'd like to celebrate it.
And if it passed overall,
like I told you earlier,
I'd say yes and great, okay?
Not great, but yes, I'll take it,
okay?
But this passing the House means
nothing.
They said already,
we're giving up on this version.
So my point is,
don't give up on it.
We'll get you a petition,
we'll do everything we can.
We'll ask you to participate.
We'll ask you to send it to
Congress people, etc.
But it's our standards gotta be
passed the House version.
If you don't
pass the House version, then
Biden's promise of just trust me.
Remember that's how he got
the progressive caucus to vote for
it in the House, to vote for
the infrastructure bill in
the House, just trust me.
Well, what did that mean?
What does that mean?
>> We're going to find out.
>> If it means, trust me,
I'm going to get the House version
passed.
I'll turn around and give Biden all
the credit in the world because all
I care about is results.
All you should care about is
results because it affects you now.
And into Morgan's point,
if paid family leave is in there,
then every Democrat can go out
there and go, we finally got you
paid family leave.
We were the last country, almost
the last country and are certainly
the last developed country that did
not have paid family leave.
But the Democrats delivered and
we got you paid family leave.
When you deliver a baby now,
you don't have to immediately rush
back to work.
You're going to have four weeks of
paid family leave.
We did that.
Every Republican voter know,
every Republican wanted you to go
back to work the day after you
delivered a baby.
Now, that would be excellent
framing and you would
win elections, but they won't do
it because they're corrupt.
So they're not going to pass paid
family leave, they're going to get
Manchin to take it out and
then they're going to have nothing
to run on.
Democratic Party 101.
Leadership is terrible.
We've got to get new progressives
in instantly and
turn this party around.
Otherwise, they're so weak, they're
so hopeless that another Trump like
fascists could win in 2024.
And right now, that is definitely
direction we're going in.
For God's sake,
pass the House version.
And then, yes, Morgan is right,
brag about it, that's politics.
You're not supposed to sit
in a corner and go,
I don't want to offend Republicans.
You're supposed to go out there and
say, we did it and
these sons of bitches, we're
going to drive you right back into
the minds the minute you delivered
their baby, they're not pro-life.
They're not pro-life,
they hate you and your baby and
they want to drive you back for
corporate profits.
Corrupt sons of bitches taking
money from Chamber of Commerce.
Taking money from all these
oil interests.
But our Democrats, they suck and
they don't do that and
they're never going to do that.
So brace for impact.
22 is probably going to be
a disaster.
24 could be an epic disaster
because there's no leadership.
If this version passed the Senate,
I'd turn around and all that, but
this version ain't
going to pass the Senate.
Instead, we're going to get
the usual mealy mouth nonsense
from Democratic leadership and
whatever scraps they pass.
If they pass anything at all,
the corporate media will cheer and
call it historic.
And it won't work because it won't
actually affect anyone's life.