Report typos and corrections to: corrections@rawstory.com.
A Texas Republican urged people to 'read the bill' to prove voter suppression — so John Oliver did it
September 27, 2021
The main story on "Last Week Tonight's" first show of the season called the GOP's bluff on their voter suppression laws.
State Rep. Matt Schaffer, a Republican from Tyler Texas went on television to tell people upset over the GOP's voter suppression bill to "read the bill. There's no voter suppression. Read the bill and show me what person who is illegible to vote who will not be able to vote. You can't find it."
So, that's what John Oliver did. In fact, his staff read all of them. While Schaffer wants the name of a person in the bill who can't vote like Brian or Steve, what is in the bill is barrier after barrier specifically targeting Democratic voters in Democratic areas of the Republican-run state of Texas.
In particular, the bill in his state gets rid of any 24-hour ballot drop boxes that were put in place during the pandemic so people didn't have to risk their lives to cast a ballot. The precincts where those were used the most proved that 56 percent of the people who used those methods of voting were people of color. The "drive-through voting," which let people drive to the polling place and vote from the safety of their car, was extremely popular as well with 53 percent of the users being people of color.
Oliver went on to show absurd debate discussion where the state House speaker, Texas Rep. Dade Phelan, banned the use of "racism" from the floor when debating the racist voter suppression law that targeted people of color.
Arizona Republican state Rep. Travis Grantham was so triggered by a Democrat alleging that the GOP didn't want "colored people" to vote. After being called out for his use of the term "colored people," he moved to "protect" his tweets from the public.
"Oh, f*ck all the way off," Oliver said in response to his complaint while reading a rule book.
So, when Matt Schaffer says the point to the person who won't be able to vote, those groups in Harris County are pretty specific.
Oliver then move to Georgia state Sen. Burt Jones, who told CNN that voting is a "privilege" that "you can put forth a little bit of effort trying to cast your ballot." The reporter explained that voting was a "right" in America, not a privilege. Jones, who embraces QAnon conspiracies, is now running for letting governor of Georgia.
A North Carolina voter suppression bill moved to mandate that the voter I.D.s that could be used were the ones almost exclusively used by white people. The court, in that case, ruled that the bill aimed to "target African Americans with almost surgical precision..."
Even in the case of Arizona, the Republicans held a partisan audit, run by a supporter of former President Donald Trump and ultimately found that Trump lost by more than 300 votes than initially thought. The audit proved that Trump was an even bigger loser than they knew before. Still, the Arizona Republicans passed laws to restrict voting rights to "protect" against the fraud they couldn't find.
Oliver closed by telling Joe Biden that this should be the only thing that matters because if people can't vote Democrats will continue to lose up and down the ballot. At the same time, Black activists who are fighting against these feel abandoned by a president who was supposed to be on their side.
See the full video below:
CONTINUE READING
Show less
Fox News host struggles to attack Dem's bill — calling dental and vision benefits and child care 'radical'
September 26, 2021
Fox News host Mark Levin struggled to come up with a reason to oppose President Joe Biden's budget proposal that would include a "human infrastructure" investment as part of the bill.
He began by alleging that everyday Americans don't have access to Congress and they don't even know what's in the budget bill.
"In a representative republic like ours, you're supposed to be able to participate. How do you participate when you don't know all the details?" Levin said. "How do you participate when you can't even get into the Capitol building? How do you participate when your own representatives don't know what's in the bill? And what they're going to do is finally put this omnibus bill together, not specific spending bills or specific budget bills or specific authorizing bills that work their way through the process. They lump them all together. They tell members, you got 48 hours to vote on it. People claim they know what's in it in the media. They don't have the foggiest idea. And then there's a vote. It's rammed through by the Democrats."
Americans can watch every hearing, floor speech, and vote in the House and Senate every day on C-SPAN and YouTube.
If lawmakers are confused about what is in the bill, they can Google it, which will reveal information and commentary from every major industry, organizations on the left and right and even an estimation by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimating the low estimation of what it will add to the deficit. If the CBO had time to score the bill, that means they had it long enough to review the specifics and formulate calculations. Biden proposed it in April 2021, giving Republicans five months to read through it. Frequently, however, officials don't read the bills they vote for or against, as was found in 2018 when the GOP passed their tax bill.
According to Levin, the Democrats' proposal is stacked with "radical ideas." He listed the so-called "radical ideas" on the screen: "Extend the temporary child tax credit with additional taxpayer subsidies, Expand Medicare to include dental, vision and hearing, and lower medicare age from 65 to 60."
Whatever the claim from the GOP, it doesn't appear to be working, New polling from Navigator Research revealed that Americans love the Build Back Better plan. A whopping 66 percent of all Americans support it, including 61 percent of Independents and 39 percent of Republicans.
https://t.co/RWWkWBzube— Acyn (@Acyn) 1632701280.0
CONTINUE READING
Show less
All film and TV shows will stop next week if Hollywood workers don't get better benefits and weekends
September 26, 2021
The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) recommended to their members that they strike as companies have refused to agree to employees' demands on wages, healthcare benefits, days off, lunch breaks and the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday.
Some unions are still fighting for weekends. #ReasonableRest— IATSE // #PROAct (@IATSE // #PROAct) 1632581438.0
"Nobody wants to go on strike, but we have been given little choice by companies that are earning record profits off our members' labor but are unwilling to treat those same workers with dignity and respect," said the union director Rebecca Rhine in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter.
Members are set to vote over whether to strike Oct. 1-3, which means new shows could be on hiatus until the union can reach an agreement with the studios.
The infamous 2007-2008 writers strike brought Hollywood to its knees as it dragged on for 14 weeks. In that case, writers were being excluded from profits off of streaming programs. The Oscars was on hold out of fear of picket lines. Movie productions stopped, as did dozens of TV shows. It ultimately cost the economy of Los Angeles County $3.2 billion, said Jack Kyser, chief economist for the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp.
If a strike is authorized, it will be the largest Hollywood strike since the '07-'08 writer's strike. In that case, 60,000 IATSE members will walk off their job all over the United States.
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and IATSE exchanged barbs last week, but by Friday, the Directors Guild of America, SAG-AFTRA, the Writers Guild of America and the Teamsters all joined together in a statement of support and solidarity with the stage employees.
"On behalf of our hundreds of thousands of members working across film and television, we stand in solidarity with our I.A.T.S.E. brothers, sisters and kin," the joint statement said. "The basic quality of life and living wage rights they're fighting for in their negotiations are the issues that impact all of us who work on sets and productions. We stand with the I.A.T.S.E."
Actors have also been promoting the crew workers, noting that they're always there before she gets there, sometimes at 5:30 a.m. and still working even as she left in the evenings.
I’m no TV star, but I’ve spent my share of days on set. One of my favorite places to work was @thegoodfight; I neve… https://t.co/gqkyaHm9FE— Kate Shindle/#PassThePROAct (@Kate Shindle/#PassThePROAct) 1632685882.0
No matter how early my call or how late I work I am never the first one on set or the last to leave. I think about… https://t.co/hlgJhXyOEl— Jessalyn Gilsig (@Jessalyn Gilsig) 1632541820.0
Film/TV crews work harder, faster and w more focused discipline than you can imagine. From the 1st time I walked o… https://t.co/MJbYnF7yRQ— Brian Koppelman (@Brian Koppelman) 1632515756.0
CONTINUE READING
Show less
Copyright © 2021 Raw Story Media, Inc. PO Box 21050, Washington, D.C. 20009 | Masthead | Privacy Policy | For corrections or concerns, please email corrections@rawstory.com.
Don't Sit on the Sidelines of History. Join Raw Story Investigates and Go Ad-Free. Support Honest Journalism.
Subscribe Annually
$95 / year — Just $7.91/month
Subscribe Monthly
$1 trial
I want to Support More
$14.99 per month
{{ post.roar_specific_data.api_data.analytics }}