Oct 16, 2023
Cenk, Ana & Vivek Ramaswamy AGREE That One Major Problem Is Plaguing U.S. Politics
Ramaswamy points at the politicians who are "bought and paid for."
- 10 minutes
Vivek, you've said on the debate stage
that the other candidates were bought and
paid for.
Now, that's the thing that
I very much agree with, and
not just about republicans.
But you seem to have waffled
on that from debate to debate.
But we're here, so you can clarify.
[00:00:17]
So, when you say bought and
paid for, what do you mean by it?
>> Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that these are
actually most as I've gotten to know them,
it's less waffling, but
more my view has evolved a little bit.
I actually think that most
of them not all of them, but
[00:00:33]
most of them are good people, but
they have been tainted by a broken system.
So what do I mean by that?
I mean it's a lie,
that there's actual limits to what you
can give to a political candidate.
The myth is you can only give $3,300
per cycle, in the primary and
in the general election.
[00:00:49]
That's false.
The reality is most of
the election look at the primary.
Look at elections these days, period.
They're being run by super PACs.
That's where most of
the money is being spent, and
big donors can give unlimited
money to super PACs.
And even though those super PACs
are basically running the campaigns,
[00:01:08]
that's corrupt.
And so I think it is a lie
that we have the system.
$6,600 is a limit, that's a lot of
money to most people in the country and
fair enough.
But you're not gonna control
a politician with $6,600.
That's why we have that limit.
And yet, what you actually have is
the real system that does control
[00:01:26]
the politicians, which are the super PACs,
technically these independent agencies or
these independent entities
that are spending that money.
But they're not really independent
when the candidates themselves,
show up at the fundraisers
hosted by the super PACs.
Regularly talk to donors on speed dial
who are giving to those super PACs.
[00:01:45]
Turns the politicians into circus monkeys.
And is the circus monkey a bad monkey?
No, it's not.
It's just doing what it's supposed to do.
It jumps as high as its
master tells it to jump.
That's the way our political system
is run, frankly, in both parties.
And so, I think that that's
a cancer on American politics.
[00:02:02]
Whether or not I agree with the policies
that come out of your mouth as
a politician,
I'd rather they at least be the views that
actually represent yourself or
the voters you're running to represent,
not the donors who are providing
your mother's milk.
And I think this is hopefully
a nonpartisan point that we can agree on.
[00:02:18]
This used to be a calling
card on the left.
I'm trying to make this part of the
America First movement on the right, and
I'm actually getting a lot of
grassroots support for it.
But the donor class does not
like me talking about this, and
that's why they've come down
on me like a ton of bricks.
>> Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't disagree
with that, but just to be clear,
[00:02:36]
so Nikki Haley and
others are circus monkeys who are corrupt?
>> Speaker 2: I think that the people who
are running in the Republican primary
whose money is principally
funded by super PACs,
are really just vessels for
their super PACs.
That includes Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley,
Tim Scott, anybody whose campaign is
[00:02:54]
principally being spent via their
super PAC rather than their campaign,
it's just a fact, that's the way it works.
>> Speaker 3: You use
stronger language about this,
which I agreed with during your
interview with Sean Hannity.
I want to give the audience a little
snippet of what you had to say.
[00:03:10]
Let's take a look.
>> Speaker 2: Why would you accuse
Nicki Hanley of being corrupt?
>> Speaker 2: I don't believe, well I
don't believe that somebody should be able
to be the next commander in chief, if they
have monetized their time in government.
Going from being in debt
to making $8 million,
through military contracting businesses,
through service on the board of Boeing.
[00:03:29]
Frankly, it is shameful for
somebody to be collecting stock
options from corporate boards while
they're running for US president.
>> Speaker 3: Totally agree
with you 1000% on that, and
I commend you for
bringing the issue of corruption and
legalized bribery to the forefront
of the GOP primary debates.
[00:03:45]
I do have to ask, though, one of the
issues that was reported on widely during
the Trump administration, was how he was
directing official government business
to Trump properties and then inflating
the prices of the hotel stays for
government officials and members of
the military in order to pad his pockets.
[00:04:05]
Did you at all have a problem with that?
>> Speaker 2: So, have those facts been
reported in the same way that these other
facts have been?
I don't know.
My question, though, and my answer is,
I don't care if you're Republican or
Democrat.
You should not use your government
connections to make money, period.
[00:04:23]
And so, what does that mean
ten year ban on lobbying?
Eye favoring.
If you leave the government, you should
not be able to lobby the government for
more than ten years.
Bans on trading individual stocks
while you're a member of Congress, or
anybody else, that has information
that could move those stocks,
[00:04:40]
that builds public trust you shouldn't be
trading stocks, as a government leader or
a congressman or
a bureaucrat regulating an industry.
If you're regulating an industry,
should you be able to join the board
of a company in that industry.
That was the Nikki Haley
example I referenced.
[00:04:55]
She did a special deal for Boeing,
in South Carolina while she was governor,
later goes on to join the board
of Boeing a defense contractor.
Is on the UN,
uses connections to generate a lot of
military industrial complex connections.
Her family then goes off to
start a military contractor.
[00:05:13]
So, any way of using your government
connections to make more money,
I think should be banned.
Right now it's not banned.
So it's not that people
are breaking the law by doing it.
But I think it is especially bad
when some of those same people,
then come back and run for US president.
[00:05:28]
And that's why I think the likes of
the reason I've dialed this up now,
is that it's one thing if that
was just politics as usual.
Right now, we're escalating
our path to World War Three,
which I genuinely worry about
as a major risk going forward.
And so, no, I don't think that somebody
who has a demonstrated track record,
[00:05:48]
of potentially making money on
taking us to World War III,
should get anywhere near the White House.
Which is why I've been particularly
sharp about this issue,
even relative to the first
few months of this campaign,
when those foreign policy threats
weren't quite as pronounced.
>> Speaker 1: All right, we continue
to agree on that, so, if someone, for
[00:06:05]
example, was in charge of the Middle East
policy in an administration, and
then they left administration and
immediately got $2 billion from
someone that's in the Middle East,
a country that's in the Middle East.
That they were in charge
of handling policy on, and
[00:06:21]
might have even according to some rumors,
passed intelligence onto that
obviously shouldn't be allowed to happen,
that is massive corruption, right.
>> Speaker 2: Well,
if somebody is running for
president who fits that description,
you let me know.
But I've been calling out
the people who do [CROSSTALK].
>> Speaker 1: So, that is Jared Kushner,
so are you okay with that, or is.
[00:06:41]
>> I mean, if I'm judging the first half
of this interview as an extrapolation to
the second, I can't verify all of
the facts that you're referring to there.
I'm giving you a very clear litmus test.
Politicians in either party,
should not make money off of their time in
[00:06:57]
public service beyond
the salary that they're paid.
That's a general principle, and
we should apply it evenly
across both political parties.
But where I am up on the details, is the
people I'm running against president, for
president against.
Facts matter, and those are the ones
where I have been expressly vocal,
[00:07:14]
that nobody who fits that description
should be taking us into World War Three.
>> Speaker 1: If we found out that,
the Saudis decided to buy the PGA and
funnel a lot of the tournaments that,
coincidentally
Donald Trump's golf courses,
right after he was in charge
[00:07:33]
of policy with Saudi Arabia,
you would be outraged by that.
>> Speaker 2: So
I don't understand this game of innuendo.
I have no idea what facts
you're referring to or not.
>> Speaker 2: [CROSSTALK] Okay,
here, I'll give you another one.
Okay, you said that is hypothetical,
that's actually what's
happening in the real world.
[00:07:49]
But I'll give you another one.
You said earlier, that you're opposed
to people taking super PAC money, and
you think that's corrupting and
it makes them circus money.
Again, [CROSSTALK] I totally
agree with you, okay.
So, Sheldon Adelson gave over $100
million to pro Trump super PACs, and
[00:08:05]
then Donald Trump did all the things
that Sheldon Adelson asked them to do,
including getting rid of
corruption charges on him,
including fighting e SUN,
including bringing back money from abroad.
Sheldon Adelson's main money was in China,
in Macau,
[00:08:22]
Casinos was able to bring it back at 8%.
>> [CROSSTALK] Be with you.
This is the system in both political
parties that needs to end.
Now, what did I say from everybody,
even the people I'm running
against in this race?
It is legal within the bounds of the law,
I think we need to change the law, so
[00:08:39]
that we have an even handed system,
where you don't have a special class of
mega donor billionaires
influencing what politicians do.
>> Speaker 1: Okay, so you are clear.
So you're saying it does apply to Trump.
So, Trump was corrupt when he took his
super PACs, took over $100 million,
[00:08:56]
in both elections from Sheldon Adelson.
>> Speaker 2: I said the same thing,
I said at the very beginning.
It is legal, and
that's why we need to change it.
We need [CROSSTALK] to change the system,
where you do not want people to
effectively have disproportionate
influence on their politicians.
[00:09:11]
I agree on that.
Change the law.
What's the game you're trying to play?
>> Speaker 1: I don't know.
>> Speaker 1: I'm just
trying to understand.
>> Speaker 2: It is a corrupt
system [CROSSTALK].
>> Speaker 1: Yeah, and Donald Trump
participated in that corrupt system and
is part of that corruption.
That's okay, you're running against him,
there's nothing wrong with that.
I agree with you.
[00:09:27]
>> Speaker 2: The level of obsession,
I mean, the Trump derangement syndrome.
It's really sad.
>> Speaker 1: [CROSSTALK] He's pulling
at 59%, brother, you're pulling at 7%.
What do you mean,
a Trump derangement Syndrome?
>> Speaker 2: I have a policy discussion,
in this country [CROSSTALK].
>> But [CROSSTALK] Vivek
you' running against Trump,
he's the number one Republican candidate.
[00:09:44]
You're running against him.
What do you mean obsession?
>> Speaker 3: It's just befuddling that
you refuse to call him out on anything.
>> Speaker 2: How many times
has George Soros's son,
visited Joe Biden in the White House?
[CROSSTALK]
>> Speaker 3: Who cares?
>> Speaker 3: My point is.
>> we have no problem
with calling that out.
[00:10:00]
>> Speaker 2: But my point is, it's not
useful because you could do this for
every politician in America.
That's the fact of the matter.
And so, as I said in the beginning,
a lot of these are good people
tainted by a broken system.
Some of them aren't even good people,
they exploited.
But most of them I've learned, are good
people tainted by a broken system.
[00:10:17]
Fix the system.
I'm not running against
any of those candidates.
I know you want me to think
I'm running against Trump.
I'm not running against
any of those candidates.
I'm running against that system.
And I think that that's
something that probably,
on a day where you're in line with
your principles, would agree with.
Someone needs to run against that system.
[00:10:33]
It is gonna take somebody who is willing
to and fortunately, the way that works
today is, every donor who dances to
the tune of their biggest donor.
Every candidate who dances to
the tune of their biggest donor.
In my case, that biggest donor is me.
And the reason I'm running is, it's going
to take someone for whom that's true,
to break that system.
[00:10:49]
And I think we're going to
be successful in doing it.
Now Playing (Clips)
Episode
Podcast
The Young Turks: October 16, 2023
Hosts: Cenk UygurAna Kasparian
- 19 minutes
- 18 minutes
- 10 minutes
- 9 minutes
- 10 minutes
- 10 minutes
- 13 minutes
- 5 minutes
- 10 minutes
- 6 minutes
- 3 minutes
- 2 minutes