- [Philip] We've got a rich dude bro exposed on video
pushing a disabled student's wheelchair
down the stairs.
We need to talk about the devastating situation
around Eden Knight.
We've got Ben Shapiro wanting to punish poor kids
and their families.
The Pentagon just dropped some this you footage.
There's a 50% off sale over beautifulbastard.com
on select items that's ending in 24 to 36 hours.
We're gonna talk about all of that and so much more
on this brand new Philip DeFranco show.
So buckle up, make sure you're subscribed,
and let's just jump into it.
Let's talk about this as douche bag
who thought it was a great idea to push a wheelchair
down a flight of stairs that's now made national news.
Right, so let's break it down.
Last weekend there was security footage from a bar
in Erie, Pennsylvania that went viral on Twitter.
And that video shows a stairway of a bar that's packed
with people and at the top of the stairs
is an unoccupied wheelchair.
Several people pass the chair,
there's no problem, there's no incident.
And then three young men walk up to it and kind of linger.
That is before one of them sits in the chair,
stands back up and then proceeds to push it down the stairs
before moving into the crowded room.
And that charming young gentleman, as it turns out,
is 23 year old Carson Briere,
notably the son of Danny Briere, a former NHL player,
and in fact the interim general manager
of the Philadelphia Flyers.
Right, so the video was taken over the weekend.
The video gets posted on Tuesday and on Thursday
as I'm recording this, it is around 30 million views.
And keep in mind, that's just the original video.
And the original poster of that video identified
the wheelchair as belonging to Sydney,
a double amputee who needed to be carried to the restroom
downstairs, which is why the chair was left unattended.
So that's why with this we saw a GoFundMe started to help
her cover the cost of her damaged chair.
And as far as Carson, he became public enemy number one
for a lot of people.
Well, he and his father trying to diffuse the situation,
issuing apology statements on Tuesday, Carson saying,
"I am deeply sorry for my behavior on Saturday.
There is no excuse for my actions and I will do
whatever I can to make up
for this serious lack of judgment."
And in fact, Mercyhurst University
even released a statement saying that Carson was sorry,
but adding, "The actions displayed in the video
make our hearts heavy and fall short of our Mercy belief
in the inherent dignity of each person.
We pray for and are in solidarity with the victim
and all persons with disabilities who rightfully find
actions like this to be deeply offensive."
But adding, "Our Mercy tradition also reminds us
that students and all people who make poor choices
deserve opportunities to learn, change behaviors,
and atone for harmful actions."
Though of course with that, you have people going,
"So is nothing gonna happen to Carson?
Is it because of his famous dad?"
Regarding that, as far as what we know,
the Mercyhurst athletic program
has reportedly suspended Carson from the hockey team
and the other two dude bros in that video
have been suspended from their respective teams.
Though those suspensions are pending the outcome
of an investigation, I imagine both into the incident
as well as just kind of checking out
to see when people are gonna forget this happened.
The reportedly the Erie Police chief is also launching
an investigation into the incident.
So we'll see what happens there.
But as far as the court of public opinion,
the people do remain skeptical of Carson
it seems in general, and that seems to be connected
to the belief that this is not this outlier
and that this is maybe just a another example
of a trend with people looking into his background
and finding that he was actually dismissed
from the Arizona State University hockey program
back in 2019 that for quote, "A clear violation
of team rules and that he was not a culture
fit for the team."
The ESPN reporting that it wasn't just a single incident,
saying his dismissal came from repeated behavioral problems.
Also as far as Sydney, the owner of the wheelchair,
she said on Twitter that the donated money collected
will be donated in turn to other disabled people
who really need it.
So you know, a little bit of a silver lining.
And of course with this story,
I'd love to hear your thoughts regarding Carson
and the whole situation.
But I guess in the meantime, remember there are people
with disabilities out there and if you see a wheelchair,
probably just stay away from the wheelchair.
Treat it like it is a wheelchair
in an abandoned mental hospital.
Nothing good will come from fucking with it.
And then if you've never heard the name Eden Knight,
I want you to listen up because after you hear this story,
it's gonna be a hard name to forget.
So she's a 23 year old woman from Saudi Arabia
who came to the United States for college.
And during the pandemic she came out as trans,
with friends telling Vice that not only was she well-read,
hilarious, and so fucking smart, she also wanted
to be a leader for trans people.
But by last spring she had graduated
and her visa had expired so she's seeking legal pathways
to stay in the US, with a big part of this being her fearing
her conservative Muslim family back home won't accept her.
So she moves in with a woman named Bailey
and her husband in Columbus, Georgia
because they're looking to host
and support homeless trans people.
And Eden was the absolute perfect addition to their family,
getting her nails done with Bailey
and caring for their son so well
she was gifted a bracelet with a word aunt etched into it.
Plus at this time she begins medically transitioning
through hormone therapy,
which apparently improved her mental health.
And then in August, a man calls Eden on the phone
offering to help repair her relationship
with her parents and she buys it.
His name is Michael Pocalyko.
He's a former Republican official
and CEO of Special Investigations, a DC contractor.
And Eden, he seems innocuous enough.
So she moves out to Washington following a suggestion
where she meets him and more importantly,
a Saudi lawyer by the name of Bader,
with the latter of the two housing her an apartment,
buying her meals and connecting her with therapists
all while subtly pushing her to de transition,
constantly telling her that she looks, "like a man
and a confused teenager," according to Eden, who said,
"nobody misgenders me so purposefully like he does."
And as she became dependent on him,
even fearing that she might get deported
if she ran away, she buckles.
With him reportedly forcing her to dress masculine
and stop hormone therapy.
He then buys her a flight back to Saudi Arabia
and she later discovers the truth.
Bader and Michael had been hired by her fucking parents.
So she flies back in December and her home life
is a nightmare with her family allegedly berating her,
calling her a freak, her parents confiscating the hormones
she tried to take in secret on more than one occasion,
but than apparently taking her own life,
with her family announcing on Twitter this week
that a young man with her name had died
and in a note detailing the entire story
that she publicized before her death, Eden said,
"I hope that the world gets better for us.
I hope our people get old.
I hope we get to see our kids grow up to fight for us.
I hope for trans rights worldwide."
You also had her friend Zoe say,
"This is as much a murder as a suicide.
The things that she was going through were so insane
that it wasn't just a mental health issue.
I don't think most people could survive that,
trans or otherwise."
With this being another heartbreaking story,
I don't know what to do 'cause I feel like
there's so many people in this world that are just locked.
Like how many times can I cite all the studies
showing how gender affirming care
improves mental health and reduces suicidality
for trans people?
How many times can we talk about how only a tiny fraction
of people who transition feel any regret afterward?
Because it often feels like talking to a wall
that's already made its decision,
validating their ignorant feelings with outlier stories.
And boom, there you go.
And this is true to so many of the villains in this story,
but especially the two men at the center of it.
You better hope there's not a hell.
There's blood on your hands and all the lies
that you tell yourself to make you feel
like maybe you're a good person,
it doesn't change the reality of the situation.
And deep down somewhere, part of you knows that.
And finally, for anyone that's watching this story,
whether you be trans or any part
of the LGBTQ plus community,
well I can never fully understand,
'cause I am not in your head
and that is not my lived experience.
Please know that you are valid.
Please know that you are loved that for all the hate
in this world, there is so much acceptance and love
and know that when you are not met with love and acceptance,
just because you are living your own life,
not hurting a fucking other soul,
that doesn't mean anything about you, it's about them.
But I also know for you these are just words in passing.
So I do want a link of course to resources down below
that can hopefully help.
And then if you got in trouble at work,
like what do you think would happen?
Or do you think you'd get like a write up,
a slap on the wrist of some sort?
Maybe even have your hours docked
if you're an hourly employee?
Well, according to a new court ruling
outta the third US Circuit Court of Appeals,
your PTO was on the table as well.
The paid time off could go bye-bye,
with the ruling stemming from a lawsuit
between Bayada Home Healthcare
and its salary exempt employees,
which specifically means employees are paid a flat salary,
regardless of how many hours they've worked.
Right at the company, these employees
will get extra compensation if they met
certain productivity goals, which is fairly standard
at companies with salary exempt employees.
However, there were also punishments
for missing those targets.
In those cases, the company would actually take away
PTO hours that employees had accrued,
which led to the workers suing
under the Fair Labor Standards Act
with them arguing that the PTO was part
of their compensation.
And saying because of that,
according to a Department of Labor fact sheet,
"An exempt employee must receive the full salary
for any week in which the employee performs
any work regardless of the number of days or hours worked."
So they argued, as long as we show up for at least
one hour during the week, we're entitled to the PTO.
Though the company clearly disagreed and pointed out
that in instances where a poor worker
didn't have any more PTO, it's not like they'd start
docking their pay.
Or part of the argument was that the punishment
can only go so far.
We also ended up seeing the court disagreeing
with the employee saying that the PTO does not qualify
as compensation and is instead a fringe benefit
because it's paid irregularly such as
when it's taken or when an employee leaves the company.
But before you freak out and you're like, "Oh my God,
is my company gonna do this?"
This decision as of now is only binding for the areas
covered by the third district, which is like Pennsylvania,
New Jersey, and Delaware.
But I'll never say never because this does open the door
for other courts to agree or disagree
when something happens in their district.
And then, sell TikTok or it's getting banned.
That's the official stance that the Biden administration
is reportedly taking on TikTok and its Chinese ownership.
The US government versus TikTok,
it's a battle that's been going on for a while now
and there's currently legislation floating around
that could ban the app, with there being
plenty of security concerns regarding
the Chinese government's ability to access private
user data on the app as well as use its algorithm
to spread misinformation.
And yesterday we saw a TikTok spokesperson saying
that the Biden administration wants Chinese ownership
to sell the app or it's gonna potentially get banned.
But apparently, at least according to the New York Times,
that demand was made to TikTok in recent weeks.
But your TikTok arguing that a sale really isn't gonna solve
any issues saying, "If protecting national security
is the objective, divestment doesn't solve the problem.
A change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions
on data flows or access."
And adding, "The best way to address concerns
about national security is with a transparent
US-based protection of US user data
and systems with robust third party monitoring,
vetting, and verification,
which we are already implementing."
Also as places like NPR have noted,
a sale like this would have to get the okay
from Chinese officials who have been far
from enthused about the idea.
And we've already seen TikTok
try to work with the US in the past.
Right, you have the Committee on Foreign Investment
in the US examining TikTok data safeguards
with the app responding by pledging
$1.5 billion on a project that would keep
the US data on US servers.
But as concerns have grown, the committee
has rejected that project with all that
now leading us through this new ultimatum.
So I'll keep my eyes on this,
we're gonna have to wait to see what happens,
but make sure you're subscribed so you stay in the loop.
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And then hungry people don't exist,
'cause I've never met one.
That's literally what Minnesota Republican State Senator
Steve Drazkowski said to argue against a bill
that would provide universal free breakfast
and lunches to all public school students.
- I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that is hungry,
yet today.
I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that says
they don't have access to enough food to eat.
Now I should say that hunger is a relative term,
Mr. President, you know?
I had a cereal bar for breakfast, I guess I'm hungry now.
- Oh there's so many douche bags in this story.
Imagine having the audacity to say that, period.
But the fact that this man is a politician,
it really brings the insane stupidity to another level.
I'm starting to feel like if you've never been poor,
you shouldn't be able to take a public office
because this schmuck's full-throated admission
of being completely outta touch
with the people that he represents is wild.
Right, I'm not talking about feelings here,
I'm talking about data, specifically data
from the Hunger-Free Schools campaign,
showing that one in six children in Minnesota
is food insecure.
But also 25% of those children are not eligible
to get financial help with school meals
because it's a means tested program,
which is exactly why supporters of the bill say it is needed
because it can close the gap for families in Minnesota
that don't qualify for free or reduced school meals
but still struggle to pay for them.
And what's more, according to Democrat
Senator Heather Gustafson who wrote the bill,
one in five students in Senator Drazkowski's district
qualifies for free and reduced lunch.
But also, unsurprisingly, that wasn't the only stupid thing
Drazkowski said regarding the bill.
He also argued the estimated $200 million a year
the measure is estimated to cost would be better spent
on addressing learning issues at schools.
But as Gustafson pointed out, this will do exactly that,
saying, "Being hungry makes learning almost impossible.
There is no worksheet or assignment, test, or project
that will matter to a student who hasn't had
anything to eat."
Right, and studies have shown time and time again
that kids fucking need food to be able to learn
and focus and feeding students actually helps performance.
Beyond that, $200 million a year in this specific context
is not very much to provide every single public school kid
two free meals five days a week,
especially when you consider the fact
that education receives the second biggest amount
of funding in Minnesota's budget
and that the state lawmakers are working
with a $17.5 billion budget surplus this year.
Now all that said, the good news here is that the Senate
did actually pass the bill.
And since it's already been passed in the House,
it's now expected to be signed into law
by the Democratic governor.
But Drazkowski wasn't the only person
saying stupid shit about school lunches
and child hunger this week.
You also had this clip of Ben Sheppaleppadingdong
going viral where he is arguing against
making school lunches free.
- School lunches are not going to solve the problem
of child hunger at any serious level.
If there is a problem of children actually starving,
that is a child endangerment scenario in which CPS
needs to be called.
If you're talking about like actual child starvation,
the truth is it does not take
that much money to feed a child.
I know, I have three of them.
- That's right, it's not hard to feed your kids,
there's no excuse.
Just become a massively successful grifter.
Stoke the flames of a culture war,
peddle in intellectually dishonest or ignorant opinions,
get a career based off of dunking on teenagers
who don't have a college degree yet.
And boom, you could feed three kids like Ben.
Also, I just love that the core of this argument is,
you know, the government shouldn't be stepping in
and paying for these kids' lunches.
If the parents can't pay for the kids to eat,
we should pay people to take those kids out of the home,
place them somewhere where all of a sudden
the care for that child is also subsidized.
But I'm also getting ahead of myself because I mean,
he's just factually wrong on a multiple levels.
First of all, he's totally mischaracterizing the situation.
Kids can be food insecure or hungry
without being physically starved.
That's on the very extreme end of a very big spectrum.
What's more, he's wrong the school lunches
don't have an impact on child hunger,
especially for families dealing with sky high food prices
due to inflation combined with the winding down
of many pandemic era programs that helped reduce
household hunger nationwide to the lowest ever.
And these universal free lunch programs in particular
are incredibly impactful.
If you don't know, during the pandemic,
the Department of Agriculture waived
school meal eligibility requirements
so schools could offer free meals for all students.
And according to a study
by the Food Research and Action Center,
95% of school nutrition staff surveyed said
that the waivers helped reduce child hunger
in their districts during the 2021/22 school year.
Beyond that, school lunches make up a lot of the meals
that students have, which is also something
representative Ted Lieu put really well
on a tweet responding to Benny Boy's absolute dumb fuckery.
"Dear Ben Shapiro, your remarks are dumb.
Let's do math.
Say a kid should eat 21 meals a week.
School lunches provide five of those meals,
solving nearly 1/4 of the problem.
That's pretty good.
Oh, and how about you miss one of your meals
five days a week and see how you feel."
And keep in mind with Ted,
that's just him talking about school lunches.
Just in 2019, the Agriculture Department
also funded 2.5 billion free
or low-cost breakfast to kids in need.
And for universal free lunch programs
that also provide free breakfast,
like California's and the one expected to go
into effect in Minnesota, we're talking about kids
getting almost half their meals at school.
Also going back to Shapiro saying Child Protective Services
needs to get involved.
I'm in no way the only one calling that out.
With this group, including the likes of Hassan Piker,
who tweeted, "9 million children in the richest nation
on earth live in food insecure homes.
Mr. Protect Our Kids claims the best thing
for the small government to do is kidnap them
and put them in the foster care system instead
of offering free lunches or child tax credits."
Right, it's probably way more expensive
to fund enough resources to track down all the kids
who are hungry and then find them homes
or whatever the fuck this plan is
than just help feed them at school.
And I say this not as just an outsider, right?
I'm doing well for myself.
I'm not gonna act like I'm the most connected
to Joe Blow guy, but I grew up poor.
I took advantage of free lunches at times
and it will never not infuriate me
that people that seemingly are ignorant
and have no empathy whatsoever have these massive audiences
where it would make more sense to rip me away
from my parents who were trying to bounce back
at the time than to support a social safety net
that is specifically meant to help the kids.
And to bring it back to the core story with Minnesota,
in a state where the $200 million
is a tiny little fraction of the surplus.
But hey, that's a story, my personal takeaway,
and of course I'll pass the question off to you.
What are your thoughts on this one?
And then can Fox News be trusted?
Now keep in mind, I'm not asking you specifically
'cause you're watching this show,
and that means you probably weren't dropped
on your head as a child.
But rather, that's a question
for people who consume Fox News.
Do you actually trust it?
And specifically do you trust it
following the texts that were revealed
in the Dominion lawsuit?
And according to new polling, which was done
by Variety by Maru Group, some of the network's viewers
are starting to catch on.
But the key word there is some.
Because remember, those texts revealed
that despite literally everything they said on air,
how much they were validating, platforming,
and just adding fuel to the fire of bullshit claims,
Fox hosts and executives privately condemned Trump
in his election fraud claims.
Texts where Tucker Carlson literally said he hates Trump
passionately and others were one of Carlson's producers
compared election deniers to terrorists,
but especially dumb ones.
Cousin fucking types, not Saudi royalty.
And all that bringing us to a survey
that ended up finding that after those texts were revealed,
21% of the network's viewers trusted Fox News less,
which honestly you would think that number would be higher,
when they were essentially calling
the viewers cousin fucking terrorists.
But now you had 45% continuing to trust it,
23% having no opinion, and 11% already not trusting it
and continuing not to.
My people, I get it, sometimes you gotta see
what the propaganda machine's putting out there
so you know what world other people are living in.
But here's a key thing that really hits on the depressing
fact that none of this fucking matters.
Even though roughly 1/5 of viewers
trust the network less, only 9% said
they were actually watching it less.
With Fox News even telling the outlet,
"There has been no impact to advertising
with no advertisers dropping or pausing,"
as well as no impacts on viewership levels.
But the survey did also find that it did change
people's opinions on if the election was stolen or not,
with 13% of their viewers saying, "You know what?
Now I don't believe that the 2020 election was stolen."
The very key thing, literally 50% say
they still believe it was stolen.
The emperor has no clothes
and 1/2 of the people do not care.
And then you know how yesterday the US government
claimed that in international airspace,
there was a Russian fighter jet that dumped fuel
on a US Air Force surveillance drone, then clipping it,
forcing it into the ocean, and then Russia responded,
"No, that's not what happened.
The drone just crashed after making a sharp maneuver."
But that resulting today in the Pentagon saying,
"You know we have receipts, right?
We don't give our people universal healthcare,
you don't think we put a fucking camera on this thing?"
And they released an around 40 second video
where you see a Russian fighter jet dumping fuel on a drone.
- [Voiceover] Hey bro, watch your jet.
Watch your jet bro, watch your jet.
- [Philip] And then there're being a loss of the video feed
on what appears to be a second pass
and then an ending with what looks like
a drone's propeller fucked up.
And personally I'm happy they released this footage,
that Biden and the Pentagon was like, "This you?"
This is important the world see what actually happened.
There's also new report saying that Kremlin encouraged
the Russian jet to hit the drone and claiming
that Russia is actively searching for the drone,
but the US wiped its hardware and says
that it's sunken as low as 5,000 feet.
But there're also being claims that this is just one example
of a trend of Russian forces trying
to provoke the US to attack.
You know, fun times.
And then we got big news coming outta Australia
with Queensland, the country's third most populous state
passing a controversial set of laws
seeking to crack down on youth crime.
You have the first one criminalizing breach of bail
for minors, which critics say overrides
the state's Human rights Act.
Meanwhile, other provisions build more detention centers,
expand on electronic monitoring trial for kids
as young as 15, and raise maximum sentences
for violent car thieves.
And for those who complained about the laws,
most thought it just didn't go far enough with them calling
the Premiere a hypocrite for going back on her promise
to give juvenile car thieves 14 years behind bars.
- They're not even the laws
that she promised Queenslanders, they're not.
- Yet all this comes despite the government's most recent
crime report showing that the total child
defender count dropped 27% in the decade
before 2020 to 2021.
Over the last year, some data suggests the number rose
by up to a thousand.
But in recent years, you have people saying the media,
especially Robert Murdoch's news court,
that they've put an outsized spotlight on youth crime,
which is more visible than adult criminality,
partly because some of the teens brag about what they did
on TikTok and other social media posts.
There've also been several high profile deaths,
which have sparked anger and frustration among the public.
So over the past few years,
the government has shifted toward a tough on crime approach,
despite protests from experts in human rights groups,
many of whom argued the new laws won't be effective
and will just incarcerate more teens,
leading to repeat offenders, with them also pointing
to some recent high profile cases,
illustrating the danger of the justice system with one
of the examples being a 13 year old indigenous boy
who was put in detention for minor offenses
was kept in solitary confinement for 45 days,
22 of which were consecutive with him also claiming
he was once denied water after he became distressed
from the prolonged isolation and flooded his cell.
And so with all this, you have the crime victims
and lawmakers who say tougher measures
are necessary to keep the youth from straying
onto the wrong path.
And on the other side,
you have experts and activists saying,
while the victim's pain is real,
this is not the way to fix it.
And while of course, I'd love to know
everyone's opinion on this, especially if you're one
of the Australian beautiful bastards who watched this show,
what are your thoughts here?
Which side of the fence are you on?
And that's where today's show is gonna end.
Thank you for being a part
of another daily dive into all the news.
If you missed any of the daily shows this week,
check them out here or in the links down below.
There was a lot to get through.
Also be on the lookout for the special Sunday show.
I got a big announcement there, but as always,
my name's Philip DeFranco, you've just been filled in.
I love yo' faces and I'll see you tomorrow.
I mean, Sunday.
It was Sunday, I already forgot?
Ah.