Massachusetts Senators Should Prioritize Massachusetts!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Don't touch that dow change the channel because it's Sunday
at seven pm and you're listening to The Hard Truth
with John Daton on WRKO six eighty eight And good
evening everyone. Hope everyone had a great week. Remember you
can write me at John at Hardtruthshow dot com. John
at Hardtruthshow dot com. You can follow me on Exit

(00:22):
John E. Deaton. The number one first thing I want
to do, I'm going to start reading messages, probably again
next week. I'll get to some of the emails that
have come in, some of the comments. But I do
want to say thank you to all the people that
gave heartfelt condolences for the passing of my younger sister.
Means a lot to me. I appreciate you and thank you. Now.

(00:48):
Interesting development this week. Just recently, one of our US
senators happens to be the person that I ran against
last year, Elizabeth Warren, was in New York City. And
you know, the one thing that I pointed out about
Senator Warren, and this applies equally to Ed Markey as well,

(01:10):
is that you really really never see them in Massachusetts.
You don't see them talking to the people here. Elizabeth Warren,
you know she's on the Sunday shows, and she's flying
around the country and doing her thing, but not here
in Massachusetts. Well, Senator Warren was busy because she has

(01:31):
taken an aggressive position related to the mayor's race. Not
in Boston now, but in New York City, and a
lot of you know that man Domi, who is a
proud Democratic socialist, won the Democratic primary in record numbers.

(01:51):
He's someone who has publicly stated that he rejects capitalism.
He is a democratic socialist. He wants to it. I'm
not paraphrasing, I'm telling you his words. He wants to
control and seize the means of production. He wants to
run basically grocery stores all throughout New York City. He

(02:17):
wants the government in control. Wants to absolutely and his words,
abolish private property rights and go to where the government
provides the housing for people, tells us how to live. Obviously,
he's extremely left. Some would say more of a communist

(02:41):
than a socialist. I've actually talked about Mandami and his
popularity on my message because I've been saying to people
the wealth gap in this country, as many of you know,
we've got to attack it. We've got to implement some
change we've been practicing corporate capitalism or I should say

(03:05):
corporate socialism, where we bail out all of these corporations
but not small business owners, not individual owners. And this
wealth gap that's increasing. People are not being able to
participate in the American dream. They can't afford a house.
When you can't afford to live, you're going to look

(03:25):
for someone who is giving you solutions. And if someone
comes along who's a handsome fella and is articulate and
has good energy, like Mandami has a very talented individual,
he's going to gain popularity because he's saying to people,
I'll get your groceries down and the government will be

(03:48):
the solution to all your problems. Now, anybody that's really
been alive long enough knows that when the government comes
to you and says that they're going to solve your problems,
that that's never going to happen. That's not good news.
But I understand the attraction. Well, Elizabeth Warren has went

(04:10):
all in on Mandami. She's even said that really his
message is the democratic message. Now she basically says that
it's about affordability. You know, leave it to a politician
like her, and Ed Markey, who's been in office for
fifty years, talk about this bad system we have when

(04:33):
they're part of that system, that broken system that they
have voted on, that they've helped implement. Now they're reformers
of the system that they created. It's insanity. But I
want to play Senator Warren. She was on CNBC and
I want you to listen.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
Speaking in behalf of him to a certain extent. You know,
I wonder, though often we see this and this is
a local election, New York does not operate in a vacuum.
It competes with other cities. And so this idea of
somehow raising taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers, who, by
the way, I would point out, pay roughly fifteen percent
of their income right now between city and state, raising
taxes on them will simply drive them away.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
Shouldn't the focus of a mayor be.

Speaker 2 (05:14):
On delivering services to the constituents of the city and
doing that by raising the most revenue as possible without
chasing businesses and the high income taxpayers out of the city.
Because they can go to Austin, they can go to Dallas,
they can go to Atlanta, they can go to Nashville.

Speaker 1 (05:30):
This is your issue.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
It's a national issue, not a local issue.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
The issue is affordability. Do you know how many working
families are chased out of New York City every day
because they can't afford housing, They can't afford groceries, they
can't afford childcare. What Zorn is saying is, I want
people to be able to afford to live in New
York City. That's what keeps a vibrant city. That's what
makes people want to live.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
Nobody disagrees with that Senator, but raising taxes in order to.

Speaker 1 (05:58):
Stop for a second, now, isn't it interesting that Elizabeth
Warren is talking about the lack of affordability in New
York City? What about Massachusetts? What about people that have
been living here all their lives, that were born here,
that are now being chased out because they can't afford rent,

(06:18):
because they can't afford a home. They don't have one
hundred thousand dollars or two hundred thousand dollars to put
on a down payment, and even if they did, at
the current interest rates, they wouldn't be able to afford
a mortgage anyways, or they can't afford the four thousand
dollars a month in rent, plus the groceries. Guess what,
plus the electric bills. We have a seventy two percent

(06:40):
higher increase than the rest of the country on the
electric bills that we have here in Massachusetts, all because
of that. But it enrages me when I listened to
Senator Warren sit there and talk about the conditions of
New York City. Maybe if she came to Boston, Maybe
if she came to Worcester, maybe if she she was

(07:00):
in Springfield and other places, she would understand that those
challenges are here, not just in New York. And the
solution isn't socialism. But let's continue with this, this conversation
that your senator, your senior senator from Massachusetts, wants to

(07:20):
talk about so passionately about New York City.

Speaker 3 (07:25):
Oh dear, are you worried that billionaires are going to
go hungry?

Speaker 2 (07:29):
No, I'm worried that they're going to leave and spend
their money elsewhere.

Speaker 3 (07:31):
You know, they've threatened to do that over and over
and now.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
And they have they've left.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
Here's the thing that Goldman sachs. When they create new jobs,
they do it in Dallas. Blackstone won't build a new headquarter.

Speaker 3 (07:41):
You want to have a workable city. You want to
have a city that's vibrant. You want to have a
city with streets are full, where there are things for
sale twenty four hours a day. Then you need people
who could live here and work.

Speaker 1 (07:52):
We got that right now.

Speaker 2 (07:53):
By the way, I would point out, New York is thriving,
so right now it's doing pretty well.

Speaker 1 (07:59):
Actually, I think they're.

Speaker 3 (08:00):
Doing love because a lot of people are struggling to
pay for housing, a lot of people are struggling to
pay for groceries. And I gotta tell you mama's and
daddies who are facing twenty five thousand dollars a year
to pay.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
All right, I can't take any more. I can't listen
to her. You notice that the host is saying what
we're seeing here in Massachusetts an exodus of people leaving
Massachusetts because it's not affordable. So everything she's saying about

(08:32):
New Yorkers, I wish she had that kind of passion
as it applied to base staters. Okay, and so but
we you know a lot of people are out there
with Mondamie and there they're calling them names, and I'm saying,
we have to offer younger people a piece of opportunity.

(08:53):
We have to offer them a piece of the American dream.
If they feel that they have priced out, if there's
just no way no matter how many jobs they have,
or no matter how hard they work, that they're never
going to be afford a home. We've got to attack
that at the root problem. Otherwise they're going to turn

(09:15):
to socialism. We know it's not going to work, but
that's what they're going to turn to. And we've got
to be careful because what's happening in New York City
with the popularity of this guy, can happen in Boston
as well. I mean, Mayor Wu has absolutely been a disaster,
but you can see that people are struggling and they're

(09:35):
going to turn to charismatic leaders, even if their message
is as deeply flawed as Mandami's. Okay, Now, another US
Senator in Massachusetts, as you know, is Ed Markey. And
Ed Markey has been in office for fifty years. Okay.

(09:59):
When I say in off, I mean he's been in Washington,
D C. For fifty years. The average voter in Massachusetts
is forty years old. You understand that this guy has
been in the Washington bubble for more than a decade,

(10:20):
longer than the average voter lives and is living here
in Massachusetts and voting. It's insane. And so just to
give you a couple of statistics about Ed Markey, because
these senators when they go on TV and they start
talking about how they need to reform a system that

(10:43):
they implement it, it is just enraging to me. Finway
tickets when Ed Markey first went to Washington, d C.
As a congressman, was a dollar twenty five at Sinway. Okay,
a dollar twenty five college tuition. We're talking about fifteen

(11:05):
hundred dollars. It's insane that that's how dated this guy is.
And when we come back from the break, we're going
to talk more about Ed Markey. And I'm hoping that
somebody will step up and take this guy on because
I think the race is winnable. Some of you know,

(11:26):
I've been thinking about it. You know, it's a big decision.
I don't know what I'm going to do, but if
it's not me, it has to be somebody. So when
we come from back from this first break, We're going
to dig into it more. And I'm also going to
highlight some more Trump wins and some more challenges. We're
going to give you an update on the things that

(11:47):
happened all week. Stay tuned to the Hard Truth. I'm
John Deaton. I appreciate you. Please come back from the break,
Welcome back to the Hard Truth. You're listening to me,
John Deaton, I appreciate you. Before we continue talking about
the junior senator, I say that with laughter because Ed

(12:09):
Murky is eighty years old and he's been there fifty years.
But Senator Warren got to the Senate before him, so
she's considered the senior senator from Massachusetts. But you know,
we're seeing a not just a rise in anti Semitism

(12:29):
in across the country, but we're seeing, I believe, for
the first time, some real breaks in potentially Israel's support
here in America. And I think that Israel is going
to need to address it. And I just want to
go over some statistics, Okay, because I've been being asked

(12:53):
on interviews about my position with Israel and Gaza, and
as many of you know that followed me, I talked
about October seventh being an acted genocide where these men, women, children,
they were raped, they were burned, babies, heads were decapitated.

(13:13):
It was an absolute act of war. And I said that,
you know, it's impossible to have peace with an enemy
who wants to kill you and wants the total destruction
of your country, of your existence. And so I have
been a support of Israel. But I do want to

(13:34):
go over some numbers because I think that Benjamin nittin
Yahoo is starting to become someone that needs to be replaced.
I think we need fresh leadership in that relationship between
America and the United States, because right now, the statistics

(13:57):
are thirty eight thousand people are dead in Gaza. Fourteen
thousand of them have been children, more than ten thousand
of them women. Sixty two percent of all the death
in Gaza are women and children sixty two percent, and

(14:18):
the large, vast, large majority of them are civilians. So
what's happening in Gaza is not just a conflict, and
it's not just a humanitarian crisis. It is a humanitarian catastrophe.
Tens of thousands of people are dead, many of them children.
The infrastructure in Gaza is ruined, and the world is

(14:39):
watching in this almost like slow motion, Okay. And the
reason I say there's a bit of a break is
because President Trump just recently on Air Force One said
that he and the First Lady were very troubled by
the pictures of kids starving in Gaza. And I'm quoting

(15:02):
President Trump where he said, quote, we have to get
aid to these children, to these people who are starving.
And there's increasing cause worldwide for a ceasefire and for
a Palestinian statehood. Okay, so let me make it clear.
October seventh was attacked by Hamas. Israel had to write

(15:26):
to decisively defend itself. But you can't starve children in
the name of defense. And there are cases. Now Listen,
I'm not someone who falls for propaganda from Hamas or
any of that. But when you see President Trump softening
and you see President Trump saying, listen something, aid's got

(15:50):
to get there, I think that Israel needs to be
very careful how they proceed because at some point, if
you lose the majority of the American people in support,
it's going to impact relationship. And so just my thoughts
on that as we saw some horrific pictures this last week. Now,

(16:16):
let's get back to the topic I was talking about
during the break, which was of course Ed Markey, and
let's look at this guy from a lens of history
at some of the just how disconnected that he is
from Massachusetts. All Right, Marky's been in Washington since nineteen

(16:38):
seventy six, fifty years as a congressman and a senator.
So back when he was in his thirties, strutting into
Congress at the age of thirty, the world was a
very different place, Okay, and so were the challenges that
people faced. All Right, I'm going to show you how

(16:59):
his half a century tenure leaves him out of sinc
with Massachusetts voters and the realities we face in twenty
twenty five. All Right, Now, I've already told you that
there's a big difference with the voters. The average age
of voters is roughly forty six based on recent data,
all right, with a hefty chunk over thirty percent under

(17:22):
thirty five. Okay, Now, these folks are grappling with student
debt that's averaging forty three thousand per boer rents in Boston,
eating up forty percent of the median income. Basically, you
got to pay forty to fifty percent of your net
in rent, and then you have the student loans. Okay,

(17:44):
you have childcare cost hitting twenty thousand dollars a year
for one kid. Now, let's compare that to the seventies
when Markey was thirty something pushing policies as a state
Rep in Maldon. All right, back then, inflation, uh was
not like it was today, because wages kept in pace

(18:04):
with inflation much better than they are today. All Right,
Boston rent when Markey first went to Washington was under
two hundred dollars a month. Imagine that two hundred dollars
a month. That's less than a quarter of today's three thousand.
A college degree cost about fifteen hundred a year at

(18:25):
a public university, not the thirty to forty thousand that
we see today. Okay, Now, I understand that when Markey,
you know, he's going to play his you know, ice
cream truck commercials, and he's going to hang on to
the things that that people think make him relatable. And

(18:50):
I'm want to ask you is he relatable today? And
I got to tell you, whoever takes on Markie, I
hope they don't let him off the hook on his
disgraceful record when it comes to race. All Right, Listen,
this guy. Last time he ran in a primary against

(19:14):
Joe Kennedy. I remember watching it, and I remember vomiting
in my mouth because I've watched him. Ed Markey and
Joe Kennedy argue over who was more pro Black Lives matter,
and these two white men of privilege as they said

(19:37):
that the owed African Americans, this whole generation of them,
that they're sorry, and Ed Marky talked about how he
wants reparations for African Americans. Imagine that. So I always

(19:58):
tell you when you listen to this show, oh that
you never pay attention to what they say, and you
pay attention to what they do. So Ed Marky claims
that he believes in reparations for African Americans. Do you
want to know what the first act of reparations were

(20:20):
in this country? It's in when federal judges ordered desegregation
and so that there is bussing of black kids to
white kids school. So remember this guy who's on stage
saying he's mister pro black lives matter. Okay, what did

(20:41):
he do? He actually offered legislation that would stop the desegregation.
He wanted to stop the bussing. So you see he's
four black kids just not in his neighborhood. He's for
the black kids, just not in the schools in his neighborhood.

(21:02):
That's who Ed Mark he was back then in the seventies,
and then two years later he tried to stop more
of the desegregation. That's what he did, and he hasn't
answered that till today. Now he gets up and he
says all the things that he's doing for people of color,

(21:24):
and he wants to reform the criminal justice system. You'll
hear him say that. Remember he was going to reform
the criminal justice system. He voted the nineteen ninety four
Crime Act into law that incarcerated disproportionately men and women

(21:45):
of color. Right, and now he's on stage saying to
people that he wants to reform the law that he implemented. That. Now,
when you read that level where you've been in office
so long that you're reforming policies that you voted in

(22:08):
thirty years ago, it's time for somebody else to step
up to the plate. All right, that's one example, and
there's so many other examples that we could go over,
but that's just on the racial issue. I mean, remember

(22:28):
Ed Markey gets on stage and he says that he
was so proud, absolutely proud that Rachel Rollins supported him,
endorsed him. He stood on stage and he said, Rachel
Rollins was the embodiment of racial justice in this country,

(22:49):
and he supported her and he was so proud of her. Well,
whoever runs against Marky, I hope they ask him, are
you still proud? Because she resigned in disgrace, absolute disgrace.
And the only reason that he said all that positive

(23:12):
stuff is because he was using her as a token.
She's a black woman and she supports him, and she's
gonna be a US attorney and the DA and all this,
and he just rushes, it's not about merit, it's not
about character. That is the most phony, blogny kind of

(23:33):
support that people of color don't want that. And I
hope whoever runs against Marqui can show them that this
guy is the kind of white liberal that Malcolm X
warned people about. So that's who you have to worry about.

(23:55):
Stay tuned, we'll come back after the break. We'll come
back to the hard truth. You're listening to John Deaton
on Ihearts WRKO six eighty am. Remember write me at
John at Hartruthshow dot com, John at Hartruthshow dot com Okay,
I'm gonna get off our senators. You know, I ran
for Senate last year, and when I see them out

(24:17):
there and making these insane statements ignoring Massachusetts, I mean, listen.
Even in twenty fourteen, the Boston Globe pointed out that
Ed Marky's water bill is the absolute minimum every year
because he's never here. He's never in Maldon. He lives
in Chevy Chase, Maryland. And you know, so I'll just

(24:44):
move on because I don't want to spend this entire
show talking about our two US senators. I'm gonna leave
it up to whoever runs against these guys, and I
hope they bring the fire. I hope they bring the juice.
I'll tell you now. Another big thing that happened this
week or in the last few weeks was a big

(25:05):
decision from the United States Supreme Court related to birthright citizenship.
And this is going to be an issue, and I'm
sure it's going to be a debate issue all across
the country, including during the mid terms. The United States
Supreme Court, in a sixty three ruling, they denied an

(25:30):
executive order on an automatic citizenship the children born here. Okay,
on timporary visas, but it wasn't on the substantive issue
of whether or not President Trump's executive order can eliminate
that he can void out birthright citizenship. Now what I

(25:52):
mean by that is, obviously, if you're born in America
on American soil, you are a United States citizen by birth,
does not matter whether your parents are or are not okay.
And so Trump, because he wanted to eliminate the anchor babies,

(26:13):
if you will, people who were rushing to come here
and give birth so that they can take advantage of
US citizenship. President Trump wants to eliminate that, and so
he issued an executive order. And what happened is a
district judge Massachusetts, for example, is one of them, could

(26:36):
be Rhode Island, could be any other state. A district
judge issued a nationwide injunction saying to President Trump, you
can't do that. And we've seen this happen in immigration
with the deportations, where a judge in district court picked
by say Obama or Biden, where someone will rush to

(26:59):
that judge and say, look, this is unconstitutional, this executive
order of Trump's, and then that judge sitting in a
could be Rhode Island, the smallest state in the country,
then issues an injunction that stops Trump from implementing the policy. Now,
this has happened no matter who's the president. Joe Biden,

(27:21):
remember was stopped by a judge nationwide when he was
trying to do the student loan forgiveness program and someone
challenged it, and a judge issued a nationwide injunction. And
so this is a big win for the executive power,
and I think it's right. But understand, don't get confused.

(27:43):
The Supreme Court didn't rule on whether Trump's executive order
denying birthright citizenship is constitutional or not, but they gave
them this win, this big procedural win, saying that a
district court judge can't enjoin the president. It would basically
nullify an election right. The president has a lot of

(28:06):
difference on immigration, foreign policy, and a single district judge
sitting in Massachusetts or Rhode Island shouldn't be able to
prevent people in Texas and Florida. And so the Supreme
Court six to three said that an injunction has to

(28:26):
be limited to the district in which that court exists,
so as it pertains the Massachusetts or as it pertains
to Rhode Island or the people just in that case.
And so Trump's executive order is being implemented in effect
in twenty eight other states, and so some states who
challenged it, it's not going forward. The executive order has

(28:50):
been stopped. But in states that have not challenged it,
red states, then people are being denied pursuing to that
executive order. Birthright citizenship. Now they're all going to be challenged, okay.
And what we got to do is we've got to
do a real quick history lesson and what was the

(29:11):
purpose of the fourteenth Amendment and birthright citizenship. And what
people need to understand is, when we go back in time,
it was because of the dread Scott decision. Okay, the
Supreme Court and the dread Scott decision denied citizenship to
freed slaves. And these slaves who were born on American

(29:37):
soil basically were free, but they were being denied citizenship.
And the Supreme Court said that's okay, they can be
denied citizenship. And so Congress got together and they passed
the fourteenth Amendment that makes it constitutionally a right to

(29:57):
birthright citizenship. And then after that, in eighteen ninety eight,
there was a big Supreme Court case called wonkim Ark
where a child was born where both mom and dad
were Chinese nationals, but the child was born in America,
and the Supreme Court in that decision basically said no,

(30:22):
according to the fourteenth Amendment, it does not matter whether
mom or dad is a citizenship. It's only based on
the birth and so big decision. Now, back then, you
can imagine people weren't imagining an open border where millions

(30:44):
of people are coming in and then they're rushing to
have a child so that they can basically take advantage
of that citizenship. So it's a very controversial decision. And
America is one of the only countries that have this
birthright citizenship. You have some countries like Australia, they basically

(31:11):
say that one parent must be and also this is
the way it is in the UK and other places,
that one parent has to be a US citizen or
a citizen of that country. And if one parent is
and then you're born there, then that's in nexus. But
when you know both parents are illegals and that illegal

(31:32):
who's here illegally has a child here, then should that
person be afforded the protection of the US citizenship. And
the answer is from John Deeton's perspective, is yes, because
it's written in the Constitution. And I'm not going to

(31:53):
get into the argument that the Trump administration is trying
to make it say well, there's the subject to wage
that these people are not subject to the America and
putting America first, so therefore you can deny it. Listen,
the Supreme Court affirmed it in eighteen ninety eight. I'm

(32:16):
a strict constructionist. Sometimes if it says that that's the
way it is, then we need to change it. We
need Congress needs to do their job and pass a
new legislation that is a constitutional amendment, whatever it's going
to take to basically change it. Absent that, I think

(32:36):
you have to follow the Constitution. And that's why I
believe in zero tolerance for illegal immigration. It's why I
believe and I celebrate and I give President Trump credit
for ninety three percent of illegal crossings of being down
in this country because of things like birthright citizenship, because

(33:00):
of healthcare, because of the infrastructure, and all the things
that we've talked about so many times on this show. Okay, now,
one thing I want to comment, is the Supreme Court justices. Unfortunately,
Supreme Court justices have become so political and it applies

(33:22):
to both sides. You know, Santa Moyer said that this
decision that Amy Comy Barrett is a travesty for the
rule of law. And then you have this decision by Jackson.
When she wrote her dissent, she said the Supreme Court

(33:43):
decision six to three is an existential threat to the
rule of law. And Kagan joined in all of that stuff.
But you want to know what Kagan said last time
when Biden was stopped with that federal district decision and

(34:06):
was enjoined from granting student loan relief, Kagan said, shame
on that district judge and that something needed to be done,
that a district judge should not have the power to
overrule the president. But now, and she said that because

(34:27):
she agreed with the underlying policy of student loan forgiveness.
But now she is in the three dissenters, she says, oh,
it's a different story, and it's all because she doesn't
favor this underlying policy, and so shame on her to

(34:47):
have that kind of blatant inconsistency. Listen, we have to
have faith in our courts. We've lost faith in the agencies,
whether it's the CIA or the FBI, or the Department
of Education, or the Environmental Protection Agency or the Securities

(35:08):
Exchange Commission. All these agencies have become politically hijacked by hacks.
And we've got to have the court. We are a
nation of laws. We've got to have the Supreme Court,
the supreme law of the land have some consistency. And
for Kagan to have that kind of blatant inconsistency, I

(35:32):
say shame on her. Listen, you listen to the Hard Truth.
I'm John Daton. You can reach the show at John
at Hartruthshow dot com. John at Hartruthshow dot com, follow
me on x the Deeton Law Firm if you have
an asbestos related injury, and you can read my book
called Food Stamp Warrior. Coming Back from the Break All right,

(35:55):
welcome back to the Hard Truth, our last segment for
the evening. Please please email me at John at Hartruthshow
dot com. I want to hear what you have to say.
I want you to tell me if I'm being too
hard on Ed Marky or Elizabeth Warren. Tell me if
you think this year we can actually get a seat

(36:16):
at the table and the midterms. Share any thoughts that
you're having out there, anything I say. Matter of fact,
I want to bring some of you on the show,
ordinary citizens, like you said, highlight people and what they're doing,
things that they're achieving. I've already had several people on

(36:37):
the show. And also, if you want to just come in,
let's have some civil debate. If you disagree with me,
if you feel adamant about something, let's have a conversation.
We got to get back to talking to each other
and not hating each other. We got to get back
to listening to what the other person feels. Half this

(36:57):
country is from the other half. I mean, that's reality.
No matter what you feel about Kamala Harris, tens of
millions of people voted for Kamala Harris because they don't
like President Trump or disagree with President Trump. And tens

(37:19):
of millions of Americans voted for President Trump despite everything
that you could say and that they did say about
President Trump. We live in a very very divided world
and if we don't start listening to each other, I
have genuine fear about our country. I really do, because

(37:44):
I believe this toxic division is one of the single
biggest threats that we have. Okay, another threat that we
have that you've heard me talk about is this wealth gap. Listen.
I know what poverty does, man. And when I was
on Fox Business with Charles Payne, he was interviewing me

(38:06):
about my book and about my life story of overcoming
extreme poverty, and he asked me, he said, give me
some of the reasons you think that you were able
to escape poverty, John, Like, you're successful now you know,
I'm a millionaire. I put a million dollars in my

(38:29):
own money to run against Elizabeth Warren knowing the odds.
I've worked my butt off to get in a position
that I'm in to do that. But I am the
American dream. My life is the American dream. And I
said that in part it was because of hatred. Hatred

(38:49):
of poverty and what it does to people strips them
of their dignity. You know, my mother told me at
one point in time when I was a high school dropout,
and I was devastated and crying because I couldn't find
a high school and I had been Everyone in my

(39:10):
family was a high school dropout, every single one all
four older brothers and sisters high school dropouts, first cousins
high school dropouts. And I was a high school dropout
after three months, and I'm devastated. My mother was trying
to console me, and she put her arms around me,
and she said, Son, why are you so upset? And

(39:34):
I said, Mom, I want to go to college. I
have to graduate high school and I can't find a
high school. And I was crying. I was devastated. And
my poor, beautiful mother, who's my hero, put her arms
around me and she said, John, I'm sorry, I really am, son,

(39:55):
But college isn't four people like us. That's what poverty
did to my mother, stripter for self esteem, that college
was just just for different class of people. We were
white trash living in the hood. That was our destiny.

(40:19):
And we're on food stamps and welfare and we're struggling
and there's days we don't eat. That's our life, not oh,
you're going to go to college and you're going to
become a lawyer. And so that hatred of watching my
beautiful mother lose some of her dignity and self esteem

(40:42):
because of poverty, it made me hate poverty and I
wanted to escape and I would do anything to get
out of that life and to provide for my children
a life that I could never dream of. That's what
motivated me. And this wealth gap that we have. I

(41:03):
got in the race last year everybody because in part
I question, is the American dream dying? Is it dead?
Could I do what I did back then all those
years ago today or has it been so priced out?
People can't afford you know, the things Elizabeth Warren was

(41:25):
saying about New York. People can't afford a home, people
can't afford rent, people can't afford groceries. You know, the
poor people have no shot. And it's this wealth gap.
And you know, I'll give you an idea that's going
to surprise some of you. Did you know that billionaires
are the fastest growing wealth group and it's not even close.

(41:45):
According to Forbes, in twenty twenty five, there's nine hundred
and two billionaires. It's a record high. It's the highest
of any country across the land. In the United States,
we have nine hundred and two billionaires, and there's about
three thousand billionaires worldwide, and almost a third of them

(42:06):
are in the United States. Fastest growing group by wealth,
especially when you compare them to the middle class and
working class. So to giving an idea, in twenty twenty,
there were six hundred and fourteen billionaires. Five years later,
there's nine hundred and two. That's a forty seven percent

(42:27):
increase in five short years. Also, in twenty twenty, the
United States six hundred and fourteen billionaires had a cumulative
wealth worth of three trillion dollars. Five years later, that
three trillion is now six point eight trillion, more than

(42:51):
doubled in five years. So forty seven percent increase in
the number of billionaires and more than doubling and what
their net worth is. And that's with inflation during the pandemic.
That's an average annual growth growth rate every one of
fourteen percent. That outpaces the stock market and certainly wage growth.

(43:16):
And when you look at the middle class, wealth has
grown much slower, with wages only rising one to two
percent annually. But that one to two percent is being
eroded because we're at inflation is so high, so wages
are not keeping up with inflation. Inflation is attax and

(43:39):
so you're actually seeing the middle class shrink. Why the
super wealthy expand. Just to give you some more statistics,
of what I'm talking about. Why I say it's such
a threat to our system, our government, our way of
life here in America. The middle class now makes up

(43:59):
a small dollar share of the US population than it
did in nineteen seventy one. Okay, in nineteen seventy one,
the middle class represented sixty one percent of the US population,
more than six out of ten. Or in the middle class.

(44:20):
Today it's around forty nine point nine. So let's say
fifty percent, So fifty percent half. So the middle class
has lost relative wealth share and purchasing power because they've
printed so many dollars, trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars,

(44:41):
that your dollar is less valuable. The dollar has lost
ninety five percent of its value, okay, in the last
since two thousand, Since twenty twenty, it's lost thirty percent,
thirty percent in five years. So your purchasing power is

(45:05):
a lot less. And why have the billionaires grown so fast?
It's because it's called it's based on asset base. What
I've been saying is the way you expand wealth and
build wealth in this country is by owning things. You
own stocks, you own bonds, you own real estate, you

(45:28):
own bitcoin or crypto. If you own those those hard assets,
that's what's appreciated. Well, poor people don't own things. The
working class they own their home most of the time,
but they have a mortgage on it. So these hard
assets they appreciate rapidly and often in a compounded, tax

(45:53):
free way for a lot of these rich people, and
the tax code rewards that. So if you don't own
things and you're just based on your wages, asset prices skyrocket,
real estate skyrockets, Amazons, you know the video Meta, Apple, Facebook.

(46:19):
All of these companies are trillion dollar companies now. So
all of the corporations have grown, all of the stock
has went up. Look at the stock markets and an all
time high, and so the wealth has been tied to
those asset prices. Well, guess what people like Ed Markey

(46:40):
and Elizabeth Warren. They favor things like the accredited investor
rule that says you can't own private equity unless you
make three hundred thousand dollars a year for three years
straight and you're worth a million dollars, not counting your home. Well,
you just excluded eighty seven percent of the American population

(47:01):
from having one form of hard asset prices hard assets
that will increase in price. So you if you exclude
everyone from owning those things, they're not going to participate
in wealth building. And we've got to get appreciable assets

(47:22):
in the hands of more ordinary people. That's how you
attack it. That's how I've built my wealth. I owned
apple stock, I owned real estate, I owned bitcoin and crypto,
and so that's how That's just one way we attack it.
So listen, we're going to spend a lot of time

(47:44):
on the wealth gap because I think it's an absolute threat.
But I want everybody to have a great week. I'll
be back next week. This is the Hard Truth with
John Deeton. God bless you.