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Joe Biden is the weakest, most unpopular leader of our lifetime. He's also the most destructive. Now, that's not a partisan assessment. That's not the opinion of a right-wing talk show. That is the view of the overwhelming majority of American voters.
Biden's malicious ineptitude is so overwhelming that it is single-handedly changing American politics and everywhere there are signs of it, signs of a massive generational realignment taking shape, taking shape in response to the disasters this administration has created. The old coalitions are crumbling before our eyes. Suddenly we're seeing Hispanic voters, African and Middle Eastern immigrants, as well as huge numbers of American-born young men, all running at remarkable speed from Joe Biden and the anti-human corporate neoliberalism he represents.
Nowhere is this trend more obvious than in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. That's a place which for generations has been a Democratic Party stronghold. As recently as 2018, a Democrat called Henry Cuellar won his district in south Texas with fully 84% of the vote. His district is 80% Hispanic and for decades that meant it went Democrat. But then last cycle, that began to change. Two years ago, Cuellar's percentage of the vote plummeted by 26 points in one cycle. The same thing happened to Congressman Filemon Vela and Vicente Gonzalez. They also represent districts on the border with Mexico in Texas.
Both went from huge wins in 2018 to marginal victories in 2020. Hispanic voters are no longer automatically Democrats. In fact, they are openly hostile to the Democratic Party. Joe Biden's support among Hispanics has dropped to a stunning 24%. That's the lowest among any ethnic group in America.
Last week, a candidate called Mayra Flores soundly defeated incumbent Filemon Vela in a special election in the Rio Grande Valley. It was the first time the district has gone Republican in more than 100 years. Later in the show, we're going to speak to Flores about her win and what it means.
But it's not just Hispanics who have come to despise the Democratic Party.
LA TIMES SUGGESTS A RECESSION 'MAY NOT BE THAT BAD' AFTER COLUMNS DOWNPLAYED INFLATION CONCERNS
Congressional candidate from Texas Mayra Flores speaks during the news conference to announce the formation of the Hispanic Leadership Trust at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington on Tuesday, May 17, 2022. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Roughly 9 out of 10 Black voters supported Joe Biden in the 2020 election. Since then, less than two years, Biden's approval rating among African-Americans has dropped by 20 percentage points and the same is true with Asian voters. As of tonight, the only group that continues to enthusiastically support Joe Biden is college-educated White voters in urban areas, particularly middle-aged women with unhappy personal lives. If you've got more than three cats in an NPR tote bag and wear a mask alone in the car, you are all-in. Everyone else is running away. Effectively, what we're seeing is the end of the modern Democratic Party. Even MSNBC has noticed.
STEVE KORNACKI: This speaks to a story we've been talking about since the 2020 election, specifically along the border, the Rio Grande Valley, South Texas, we have seen county after county, whether it's in this district or some of the districts to the west of it, where voters have moved ten, 20, 30, 40 points away from the Democrats and toward the Republicans. This district that Mayra Flores won last night, Barack Obama got more than 60% of the vote here when he last ran in 2012. Hillary Clinton won this district by 22 points. It's shifted that dramatically. Joe Biden carried it by four in 2020 and now in a special election, a Republican candidate has won it outright.
Barack Obama got more than 60% of the vote in that district. Now, it's Republican. This is an historic moment. Joe Biden has destroyed the Democratic coalition. So, the question is, since we have only two political parties, how are Republican leaders responding to this fact, to this opportunity? Are they making the case for a better way? Are they offering an alternative to what the Democrats have brought this country? No, they're not. They're doing something you never would have expected. Republican leaders are siding with Joe Biden.
At the very moment that Joe Biden is at his weakest, months before a pivotal midterm election, Republicans are propping him up. They are saving Biden from himself. Since the day Biden was elected, Republicans in Washington have taken Biden's side on virtually every significant item in his policy agenda. That would include: COVID restrictions, vaccine mandates, transgender ideology in school, sanctions against China, the January 6 charade, free speech, civil liberties, spying by the Intel agencies, preserving the big tech monopolies, the anti-White race politics of CRT and Juneteenth, border enforcement and energy policy, and above all, the administration's signature issue: its lunatic and reckless support for the war on Ukraine. Republicans are all-n.
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"It's called Kyiv now." That's the Republican message heading into the midterm elections. "It's called Kyiv" and by the way, this isn't just happening in Washington. It is endemic among the leaders of solidly Republican states. In fact, the more Republican the state, the more liberal the governor tends to be. The governor of Texas, which has some of the biggest oil and gas deposits in the world, has decided to build windmills that don't work. The governor of Utah, a state where Joe Biden got 37% of the vote, that governor begins conversations by announcing his preferred pronouns. He really does. Watch.
UTAH GOV. SPENCER COX: Well, I thank you so much, Gabby, for that that question and my preferred pronouns are he,him and his, so thank you for sharing yours with me.
It goes on and on and on. The governor of South Dakota, where Joe Biden got 35% of the total vote less than two years ago, that governor tried to let female impersonators destroy women's sports in South Dakota. In Texas, both senators can't stop talking about how great Juneteenth is. In Arkansas, one of the most conservative states in the country, the governor supports the chemical castration of children.
ARKANSAS GOV. ASA HUTCHINSON: The most recent action of the General Assembly, while well intended, is off course, and I must veto House Bill 1570.
REPORTER: And just like that, a bill to restrict children under 18 from receiving chemical treatments or having surgery for gender reassignment has been stopped. The governor said this bill is government overreach.
HUTCHINSON: Interfering by the state in a parent, in a child, in a doctor-patient relationship did not make sense to me.
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When you vote Republican in Arkansas, you're voting for the castration of children. How many Republican voters in Arkansas knew that when they voted for the Republican governor? But it's everywhere. Apart from Governor Ron DeSantis in Florida, very few Republican officeholders are pushing back in any way against anything Joe Biden is doing.
In fact, they're abetting what he's doing. Effectively they're coming to Joe Biden's rescue. Why are they doing this? Why do you think they're doing it? Because fundamentally, they're on Joe Biden's side. Whatever stylistic differences Republicans in Washington may have with Democrats, and there are some, in the end, Mitch McConnell has far more in common with Chuck Schumer than he does with your average Republican voter.
Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer are united in their fear of populism and in their gut-level loathing of the American public and they're not alone. What Washington fears most is democracy – that is letting voters have what they want. That's not allowed. Republicans and Democrats have formed a uniparty specifically to prevent it. You see this everywhere, but you see it most clearly in the gun control legislation that's in the Senate right now.
So, you saw what happened in Uvalde. What's the real lesson there? Well, the lesson is that cowardice kills. In a crisis bravery is essential. Oh, but that's a masculine virtue and it was nowhere in evidence in Uvalde. The police there were cowards. They could have saved the lives of many of those children. They refused to do it. The door to the classroom where the shooter was holed up, killing kids was unlocked. Police with rifles were in the hallway 3 minutes after the shooting began, but they didn't even bother to check the door. Instead, they let a teenage lunatic murder those kids, and they detained and stopped anyone who tried to rescue those kids.
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During the killing, one of the teachers inside, a woman called Eva Mireles, called her husband. She said she'd been shot and she said she was dying. Now, her husband happened to be a police officer. His name is Ruben Ruiz, and he sped to the scene and he tried to save her, but police were already there, disarmed him and prevented him from going inside to save his wife and the children.
"(Ruiz) tried to move forward into the hallway," the Texas DPS director said. "He was detained and they took his gun away from him and escorted him off the scene."
Result? His wife died inside the school and so did so many children. Now, none of this is hidden. We saw it happen and we know it's true and yet, bravery is not the lesson anyone in Washington is taking from this. The lesson that Mitch McConnell draws from Uvalde is that we must ignore the details of what actually happened there and ignore the gun crime in the cities where it's actually taking place, ignore all of that, and instead disarm law-abiding citizens who have not been charged with any crime. Here's Mitch McConnell.
BIPARTISAN SENATE GUN BILL GETS ICY RECEPTION FROM HOUSE REPUBLICANS
SENATE MINORITY LEADER MITCH MCCONNELL: Senator Cornyn, who as you know, asked to be the point person on our side to see if we can come to an outcome after these horrible school shootings. For myself, I'm comfortable with the framework and if the legislation ends up reflecting what the framework indicates, I'll be supportive.
"I'll be supportive." How many people who voted for Mitch McConnell in Kentucky are supportive of this? 20%? That may be high, but yesterday, just a few hours after the text of this gun confiscation bill was released, the Senate voted on it, just a few hours. Why? Well, John Cornyn said there was simply no time to allow anyone to read the bill, even people voting on it, or to try to understand what was in it. A reporter last night overheard John Cornyn again, the senator from Texas, a Republican, say this and we're quoting, "It's only 80 pages long. How long do you need to read it?" Then John Cornyn appeared in front of cameras to explain the Senate cannot pass this bill soon enough. Watch.
SEN. JOHN CORNYN: I don't want us to pass a bill for the purpose of checking a box. I want to make sure we actually do something useful, something that is capable of becoming a law, something that will have the potential to save lives. I'm happy to report, as a result of the hard work of a number of senators in this chamber, that we've made some serious progress. So soon, very soon, not soon enough for me, but very soon we will see the text of bipartisan legislation that will help keep our children and our communities safer.
UVALDE: ARREDONDO DENIED LEAVE OF ABSENCE; MAYOR ACCUSES DPS OF LYING, SAYS SCHOOL WILL BE TORN DOWN
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) speaks on a proposed Democratic tax plan, at the U.S. Capitol on August 04, 2021 in Washington, DC. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
This is grotesque. Under ordinary circumstances, you would just assume, as always, these people live in their own hermetically sealed world. They have no contact with reality. They have no idea how out of step they are. But given the context of this moment, you have to interpret it differently. What you just saw was effectively a speech in support of Joe Biden by a leader in a party whose job it is to offer an alternative to Joe Biden. It's enough to make your head spin.
Just a few hours after Cornyn said that, the Senate voted to move forward with this bill. So, what's in the bill? Well, there's $100 million for the FBI, for the FBI. No attempt to reform the FBI. We're shoveling another $100 million to the FBI, the personal police department of Joe Biden, the people who saved his son from a drug charge.
Then there's nearly a billion in order to bribe the states to "implement and manage" these so-called red flag laws. Now, these laws allow authorities to seize firearms for people who have committed no crimes. That's a violation of due process. It's unconstitutional, but the Republican Party is all for it. The bill also makes it harder for people between the ages of 18 and 21 to buy a gun. They can go fight in Ukraine and Republicans would like them to, but they can't get a gun in this country. Now, the question is, would any of these measures have stopped the mass shootings in Buffalo or Uvalde?
No, this bill is completely unconnected from what happened in Buffalo or Uvalde. This is merely Joe Biden's agenda. Even Kevin McCarthy of California has refused to support it. So here you have Mitch McConnell, the lead Republican in the Senate, partnering with Chuck Schumer, the lead Democrat in the Senate, picking John Cornyn to carry that message and getting it done before anyone can even read the bill and then on the Senate floor, John Cornyn turns to one of the most partisan Democrats in that body, Alex Padilla of California, and says, "Next, we'll do immigration."
Now, he was caught saying this, so Cornyn's office came out today and said, oh, it's just a hilarious joke. Get it? First, we'll take your guns, then we'll send your tax dollars to Zelenskyy in Ukraine, a country you can't find out a map, and then we're going to give amnesty to tens of millions of illegal aliens living illegally in this country. To John Cornyn, it's all pretty funny. Does anyone who voted for John Cornyn in the state of Texas, the Republicans in Texas agree that it's funny? Or even believe that it was a joke? How about the voters of South Carolina, Lindsey Graham's voters?
After meeting in his office with a movie star to discuss the issue – they're pretty informed – Lindsey Graham also voted for gun confiscation last night, not in Ukraine. He voted to send more guns to Ukraine, but you can't have guns here. You Ukrainian? No? No guns for you and at the same time, as we said, Lindsey Graham is telling you your moral duty is to support a country you can't locate on a map, but your Bill of Rights, your constitutional protections are no longer valid and there is nothing we shouldn't do for Kyiv. Not for Texas, for Kyiv. Here's Lindsey Graham.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, waits to speak to reporters following bi-partisan passage of the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act, at the Capitol in Washington, Feb. 10, 2022. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM, R-S.C.: The question is, can we do more and should we do more? The answer is yes to both. As to my friends in the Pentagon, you told all of us that this war would last three or four days, that Kyiv would fall. That, you know, that the country would be overwhelmed by the Russian military. They were wrong. So, quite frankly, I trust President Zelenskyy's judgment about what would help him in real time more than anybody else on the planet right now.
So, the priorities they articulate in public are so far from the priorities of Americans that you have to wonder what this is. It's not simply a betrayal of Republican voters. We often call it that. It's much more. It's a declaration of war against Republican voters, in fact, against voters. For the record, here's a complete list of the Republican senators who just voted for gun confiscation.
They would include Senator John Cornyn of Texas, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Senator Susan Collins of Maine, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri, Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina, Mitt Romney of Utah, Rob Portman of Ohio, Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia (How do the West Virginians feel?) Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Todd Young of Indiana. Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania was absent for the vote, but he came out in support of it.
Now, many of those senators are from America's most conservative states—Indiana, Utah, Louisiana and West Virginia. What were the numbers in the last election in those states? In fact, every one of those states, except for the state of Maine, went for Donald Trump in 2020. You're seeing the color-coded maps of election results in those states on your screen right now. Some of them are entirely red.
So again, if you care about democracy, you have to ask how many of those voters went to the polls in the last election, hoping above all, to elect leaders who support gun confiscation of law-abiding Americans, red flag laws? Not very many. So, what we're seeing here, to be clear, is a subversion of democracy.
You get to vote for whoever you want in this country. It can be a Republican or a Democrat, a liberal or conservative, but in the end, you're going to get the very same thing every time. You're going to get a weaker U.S. dollar. You're going to get more pointless foreign wars and you're going to get a lower standard of living for the middle class.
In America, as in Western Europe, there's only one flavor of politics allowed, and that is corporate politics just as there's only one flavor of media allowed, which is corporate media and those two forces work together toward the same goal: more power for them, less power for you; fewer families, more dollar stores; less choice, more coercion; less diversity, more sameness. Sound familiar? That's the Chinese model. But for Mitch McConnell, whose family, like so many families in Washington, has become rich from its ties to the Chinese government, it seems normal, but it's not normal.
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This level of disconnection from what voters actually want is dangerous and it's destabilizing. Self-government is what keeps countries calm and stable. Democracy is a pressure relief valve. Don't storm the Bastille, vote. If you take that away or if you strip it of its meaning, people become angry and frustrated and over time they become revolutionary and everyone in Washington knows this.
So, no wonder they want to disarm you. You can't have guns because they no longer trust you and they no longer trust you because they know they've betrayed you. This is how democracy dies, not in darkness, but in plain sight, live on C-SPAN.
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