Joining us now is John Cougar, who is still running
in the Democratic primary for president.
- And Jenk, how are you doing? - Pretty good, pretty good.
Okay, I hear you guys have an anniversary today.
Do we.
- Did. - Yes, yes.
Today is the 22nd anniversary of the Young Turks.
Yeah, I'm kidding around.
Happy anniversary to the TV audience. Happy Valentine's day.
Yeah, things are great. We got a new ad.
- You have one ad. - We have one ad.
Your one and only ad.
Well, let's see, we maybe we'll have a second one,
depending on how this one goes.
Maybe. Maybe.
All right.
So do you want to preface it with anything.
Yeah. So this is our exclusively.
You guys are getting it here first.
So and I ABC as I said, no way I'm doing it on The Young Turks.
So seriously, guys, it's about.
Well, you know what? I don't want to give it away.
I really do want to. Is so curious about your genuine reaction.
Then I will have a reaction for, like, what we can do with it afterwards.
- But you want to run it? - Sure.
- Let's do. - It. All right.
We get all this sandwich stuff for the kids lunch?
They don't like turkey anymore. Yeah, I know.
- What about the bananas? - Yeah, I got them, too.
But, honey. What?
- You're gonna have to put those eggs back. - They don't like eggs anymore.
No, they like eggs.
But we have to sit that $7 aside for killing Palestinians.
What?
I mean, don't we give Israel $4 billion a year anyways?
Yeah, and now we're giving them another $14 billion.
Do you know how much that is per American taxpayer?
No, it's like $85 per person.
Apparently, it's costing us a lot of money to drop bombs on Gaza.
It's terrible. Yeah.
- I don't think a universal health care to. - Yeah they do.
We're paying for that too. Probably.
- Might as well put the bananas back. - Why do we have to pay for all this?
Don't cuss at me.
I'm John Cougar, and I approve this message.
Let's save lives together at Jank for America.com.
All right, Ugo. So what are you trying to do with this ad?
So, look, the most important thing is if I win any delegates
and I'm in the keeping it real business.
Okay, so you have to get to 15% to win any, in any state to win delegates.
But if I get delegates, I'm going to use that for two reasons.
But the number one reason is peace.
So and as we're going to talk about in a little bit because of a story
that broke this week, it turns out those delegates might be super relevant, right?
And they might have a lot of power behind them.
So if you want these delegates, I could say to potential different
Democratic nominees, you're going to have to agree to stop the bombing in Gaza.
And by the way, we want to end the occupation entirely.
And so what I want to do here is draw attention to that.
And obviously, we're drawing attention to it by pointing out our taxpayer money.
We have to put aside that those are real numbers, $7, you know,
per month for just the 4 billion, let alone the, 14 billion, etc..
And you have to put it aside from your taxes to kill Palestinians.
And so, look, I don't know how the ad is going to be received.
It's possible that people look at that and go, whoa, that is over the top.
That's crazy. You can't do that in a political ad.
It's possible they'll look at it and go, hey, yeah, Jank, I get it.
He thinks that we're helping to fund killing Palestinians
with our taxpayer money.
I'm not surprised by it. Some might think it's not harsh enough.
I don't know, I'm super curious. And.
And so what? I want to draw attention to that.
Win votes enough to get delegates and then use those delegates
for actually getting your peace.
So it's interesting that you are questioning how it'll be received.
I mean, look, I don't know how it's going to be received for sure, but what I
thought was interesting was that just yesterday, Matt Walsh, of all people,
had a viral post on X where he said that he considers sending money to Ukraine
and Israel taxation without representation because of the fact that we have no say
on how that money is used.
There's no accountability for that money.
And he feels that the money is better used for the American people.
And so this is one of the rare instances where I actually see some agreement
with the right and the left.
I mean, there's literally nothing else that I agree with Matt Walsh on,
but I do agree with his point on that.
So I'm curious to see if maybe it would draw some attention
from, I wouldn't say moderate Republicans.
Moderate Republicans tend to be more neocon, you know, type of Republicans.
But there is a growing population of Americans who are looking at their
situation on the ground here and really questioning whether it makes sense
to send these resources abroad 100%.
So we're going to put the ad up on Jang for America.
Com but we're also going to put it up on all my personal social media,
which we can share with you guys.
We're also going to talk about on how to share it on the town hall.
And and we have town halls every Wednesday.
What that does is it gives people regular updates
that nobody else gets about the campaign.
And then we strategize together and I take ideas from them,
and then we implement those ideas.
So we want you to share this video everywhere.
But the reason I bring that up, Anna, is because yeah, you're right.
And so that's how you get to the town hall.
That's right.
After the Young Turks anniversary special today.
So I put the universal health care line in that ad.
You're going to be shocked to find out I wrote that, and other people
helped, of course, but, and because I saw how much the audience reacted to it,
and I saw how much independence and the right wing also reacted to it
because it was one thing when I said, it cost you $85 to kill Palestinians, right?
Per year.
It's another thing when I say, hey, guys, they have universal health care
and we don't and we're still sending them 14 billion, etc.
That got people really mad, like, wait, wait, why are you taking my money?
And I don't have health care. Health care.
And by the way, also true of paid family leave, also true of many different things,
that Israel has a really good social safety net and really good social programs
for their own citizens.
Right?
Obviously not for the Palestinians in the occupied territory,
but we are funding all of that when we can't afford they say we can't afford it.
So yeah, that unifies a lot of people.
And by the way, then the establishment freaks out and goes, how dare you guys?
This is horseshoe theory.
And this is the right wing radicals and the left wing radicals getting together.
I actually of course, you know me. I don't think so.
I think there are right wing and left wing radicals.
But this is no this is the base of the left wing and right
wing getting together and going.
Yeah. I don't get any donor money from AIPAC.
I don't get any donor money from Lockheed Martin or Boeing.
And so I don't want taxation without representation.
I don't want to send money just for the express purpose
of killing more innocent civilians.
That makes no sense to me.
And and the other thing about that is that there's no candidates left
that are for that position in the Democratic or Republican Party.
Marianne Williamson dropped out.
So everyone else in the race, in the two major parties are for nonstop killings.
We might have millions of people watching this show, but you can be
the difference maker because we just need 1% of our audience to be paid.
Members and then this show can be around forever so you can make that difference.
Click join now.
Okay, so let's move on because I really want you to get into
the conversation about the delegates.
Why is the delegate fight so relevant to you?
Right.
Like you referenced it a little bit, but, there's the court case
involving Donald Trump getting booted off of ballots, because of the 14th amendment.
He's challenging that.
Of course, you say that's relevant to your race.
So let's talk a little bit more about that.
I'm very curious what you think is going to arise from this.
So, there's so there's two different topics.
Let's take the delegates first because it's so interesting, so political story
that we ran on The Young Turks and explained a couple of days ago
where they explained that, Biden might step down after the voting is over.
So he secures all decks.
And the minute I read that, I was like, oh, that makes sense, I get it.
That's their plan.
Because that takes the voters out of the equation.
The voters are messy. So they, you know, Democratic voters.
Who knows if Biden steps down before the voting begins,
maybe they vote for a progressive.
Maybe they vote for someone that the establishment doesn't want.
If Biden steps down before the convention and after the voting is over on June 4th,
he can then say, I am now releasing these delegates.
Now he can give them to someone, but then he's going to have a lot
of pressure to give them to Kamala Harris.
And we all know he doesn't want to give him to a million years old.
Who cares about pressure?
Like, how is this man not in the fuel phase of his life yet?
No, I mean, he kind of is. No, no no no he is no.
- No, he's. - He's upon us.
No. Like like all politicians.
Absolutely, positively obsessed with his ego.
So he's like my legacy. How is my legacy going to look?
- Oh my legacy. - That's why he ran for a second time.
Because people at home, they don't know that in Washington.
Two terms. President means you're historic.
One time president means you're a loser. So Biden was like, me me me me, me, me.
We've talked about that. But now here comes the interesting part.
If he does that, he can't hand him over to Kamala.
So he's probably not going to hand him over to one person.
Then that means you got a delegate fight.
Okay, so then all the cast of characters, including the guy you loathe,
knew some, and then Pritzker and Whitmer and all those other folks will come
in and go, give me the delegates.
Now, they're very establishment delegates.
The Biden delegates are handpicked by the Biden team.
So they're of course, going to go for an establishment person.
But what if Pritzker and Newsom or Whitmer and Newsom or whoever it is,
are in a situation where they need an extra 20 delegates to go over the top, an
extra 200 delegates, whatever the number is, and I have those delegates because.
Guys, how are you pulling in the states where they're allowing you
on the primary ballot?
- There's no. - Polls.
That's why we have no idea. Okay, okay.
So don't get me wrong. Of course it's hard.
That's part of the reason why the ad has to go viral.
That's why we asked you to share hashtag cease fire ad.
Right.
And so and I want people to understand this.
So if you can hashtag peace delegates, hashtag progressive delegates
when we're talking about the delegates.
Because Anna, it's not just about peace.
So let's say that you've got that situation.
Governor of Illinois, J.B.
Pritzker, Governor of Michigan, Whitmer both are deadlocked
around 2000 delegates, right.
Based on the politicking that they did, they come to the US
for the extra 100 delegates.
That's going to put them over the top.
Then I go, well, I'm not doing it unless you a say
you're withdrawing the money from Israel.
Unless they end up bombing.
I'm not interested in BS. I'm not interested in later.
I'm not interested in anything but actual results.
Okay?
You and the bomb, whoever ends the bombing gets 100 delegates.
So that's one way.
- We're up to 100 delegates now. - Know if if if.
Right. I'm saying.
But 22, whatever the number is that can affect things.
Okay.
So how we win those we'll get to in a second.
So, the other thing you could do is go, hey, you know what?
Give me a progressive economic policy position.
I want paid family leave. See, an AOC did it again today.
Progressives in Congress, including Bernie, who we love.
But they constantly give away their power. They constantly give away their leverage.
If I have delegates and there's nothing in the world stopping me from getting
delegates, whether I'm eligible to serve, eligible to run,
or all irrelevant for getting delegates because I'm on the ballot
in seven states, you go vote for me.
I'm in Michigan. Write in.
So now with a write in, it's super hard. But in Michigan, maybe it's possible.
Write in Vermont.
What do you need to get to to get delegates? 15%.
So is it easy getting 15% even in Vermont?
No it's not. You guys should know that, right?
But if this ad comes viral, we break through.
People begin to understand, hey, we vote in this direction, and this guy is going
to fight like hell for peace, and he might actually be able to deliver it.
If he gets enough delegates.
We start collecting delegates and then we have some degree of power.
And I'm never going to give away that without getting something significant
in return for progressives.
Okay, so finally, talk to me about why Trump's court battle in regard to his
ballot situation is relevant to you.
Yeah. So, one of the things that they did.
And there's an article in the Hill today about it is all right.
How are we going to resolve this? There's a couple of different ways.
One is say, oh, he's not an officer, so technically it doesn't count, etc..
Right.
But the one of the critical ones, the most important ones is,
hey, are the states allowed to decide, constitutional issues or not?
And the article in the Hill today said they think and that's just their opinion.
The person who wrote that article, that the court is likely to decide based
on that issue so that it doesn't go to whether it was or was not an insurrection,
that they might want to avoid.
The topic of whether it's an insurrection.
And the way to avoid that is to say that's it.
You can't make any constitutional determinations
if you're at the state level.
That doesn't mean that I can serve, but that means that would mean
fairly definitively that I can run.
That you can run.
And then when it's called into question, your eligibility to run that
will be adjudicated in the courts.
Exactly. Okay.
So and think about this scenario.
Now I know these are all probabilities and a lot of them are low probabilities.
But let's say that we do great in Vermont and we get a bunch of delegates.
Well that made news okay.
And and by the way, Minnesota is on Super Tuesday.
Minnesota is another very progressive state.
And also Oklahoma and Texas. They're very conservative.
But who knows how their Democratic voters are?
The Democratic voters in Oklahoma might be, mainly minorities
who are very progressive, etc..
Right.
So if we get those delegates on Super Tuesday and people begin to realize, oh,
if I give this brother delegates, he's going to use them
for something I really, really agree with whether he wins or doesn't win.
And you add layer that.
On top of that, the Trump case goes our way.
Wait a minute.
Then we go to all the other states and go, you got to put me on the ballot.
And now we got 30 more states where I'm on the ballot
where I can get even more delegates.
So look, when I started this and as you know, I was under no delusion
that this is like, oh, it's going to be nip and tuck between me and Biden, right?
I mean, it was a very long shot, very low probability.
But we're trying to do is create any way, get caught trying any way to find power
and leverage for progressives and for peace
and to use it and to find opportunities.
And that's exactly what we're in the middle of doing, finding these
opportunities and taking advantage.
So anyone who's involved, we love it.
One of the things that we asked for now info at Genk for America.com and sharing
all the ways that you can through my social medias and send us memes.
I suck at memes to be honest with you.
Okay, like graphics, video, pictures, whatever.
You got anything that will help us go viral with these ideas, with the ad, etc.
You're seeing all that there.
And by the way, anybody gives over $100 to the campaign, I call them,
they're usually shocked what I call them, but I call them in person.
And if you and we now are calling people a certain number of random people who give
under 102, also a chunk for America.com, I bought a whole bunch of Trump URLs to to.
Oh no. All right donor don com Trump zar com.
I got a lot more where that came from. We'll save that for another day.
But here I am getting caught in the middle of trying.
All right. Cool.
All right, everyone, so check out, Jenks social media
and also the town hall tonight.
After the show, after our special, at 9 p.m.
Eastern time, 6 p.m. Pacific.
Go to which which website do you want, Jake?
For? America.com.
Yeah. So the ad will be there.
That's the best place, by the way, when you're wondering,
hey, where are the town halls?
You go to events and you'll see if you want to see my interviews,
including this one.
You go to press, you'll see that.
You'll see what our pledge to the to to the what the progressive delegate pledge
will be, what they're going to fight for on our behalf if we get those delegates.
And honestly, it's it's now is more exciting than it's ever been, Anna.
Because because the idea of winning is always a super long shot.
But the idea of winning delegates is a lot more doable.
And now, before the delegates, what's the point if you're going to lose?
But now there might be a delegate fight, and those delegates
might be super valuable.
And to be able to use them for the purposes that our audience cares about,
that progressives care about decent people in America care about it
would be an amazing opportunity.
All right. Thank you so much, Jake.
All right. Thank you.
Anna. Thanks for watching.
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