ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES
November 19, 2014
Guest: Michael Shear, Ben Domenech, Lorella Praeli, Alina Das, Eva
Longoria, Brittany Cooper, James Peterson
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST (voice-over): Tonight on ALL IN --
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Hi, everybody.
HAYES: Change is coming on immigration.
OBAMA: I`m going to be announcing here from the White House some
steps that I can take to start fixing our broken immigration system.
HAYES: Tonight, what we know about the president`s proposal, the
legality of acting without Congress, and the Republican response.
GOV. SCOTT WALKER (R), WISCONSIN: I think in the end, this is --
politically, it`s a bad move for him.
HAYES: Then, NBC and Netflix distance themselves from Bill Cosby, as
two more women come forward with rape allegations in the past week.
Plus, another massive snowstorm bears down on Buffalo.
And actress Eva Longoria has a new documentary about where our food
comes from and who picks it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you want to make change, you need to look at
people at the very top.
HAYES: Tonight, my interview with Eva Longoria.
EVA LONGORIA, ACTRESS: There`s a human cost to everything that`s on
your plate.
HAYES: ALL IN starts right now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: Good evening from New York. I`m Chris Hayes.
And it is happening: 24 hours from now, in a primetime address before
the nation, the president of the United States will declare his plans to
protect what we`re told could be up to 5 million people from deportation.
The White House announced the address on a video posted on Facebook earlier
today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: Everybody agrees that our immigration system is broken.
Unfortunately, Washington has allowed the problem to fester for too long.
And so, what I`m going to be laying out is the things that I can do with my
lawful authority as president to make the system work better even as I
continue to work with Congress and encourage them to get a bipartisan
comprehensive bill that can solve the entire problem.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: After the announcement tomorrow, the president will roll out
his immigration plans on Friday at Del Sol High School in Las Vegas,
Nevada. That is the same place where he outlined principles for
immigration reform almost two years ago when it looked like congressional
Republicans might actually get on board with a comprehensive bill.
But while the Senate passed a bipartisan bill by a vote of 68 to 32,
the House has refused to vote on that bill effectively killing chances for
reform.
The Vegas location has resonance beyond that. Latest numbers show
almost 18 percent, 18 percent of K-through-12 students in Nevada had at
least one undocumented parent in 2012. The state is home to the highest
overall proportion of undocumented immigrants in the country.
Though the president will likely have a receptive audience for his
speech on Friday, make no mistake, what he`s about to do with this
executive action is bold and it is politically very risky. This decision
will completely reshape the political landscape. And no one knows what
it`s going to look like afterwards.
We don`t know the American public will react. While 57 percent favor
creating a path to citizenship, according to the latest NBC News/"Wall
Street Journal" poll, only 38 percent approve of the president taking
executive action on immigration -- 38 percent disapprove.
And though we know Republicans oppose the president`s executive
action, we don`t know what they intend to do about it because, despite all
the rhetoric about an imperial president, there`s a fairly clear legal
consensus that President Obama plan is in fact lawful. That`s left the GOP
scrambling to decide on their next political play. Do they pass a
continuing resolution in December, as some lawmakers have suggested, and
then wait until they control the Senate to try to strip funding from the
immigration programs? Or do they defy Republican leadership and follow the
advice of conservative blogger Erick Erickson who says, shut it down.
Leadership says under no circumstances there will be a government
shutdown but Erickson makes a pretty convincing case for the political
benefit. After all, Republicans shut it down last year and still managed
to run away with the midterms.
Do Republicans take another stab at suing President Obama, an idea now
favored by establishment friendly Republicans like Governor Scott Walker,
Senator Rob Portman, or do they take the approach Ted Cruz is proposing and
block every single one of President Obama`s nominees as soon as they
control the Senate? Or do they do what a handful of GOP lawmakers have
already suggested? On the record and start impeachment proceedings against
the president of the United States?
All those options seem to be on the table. And perhaps the biggest
question of all, whether cooler heads in the Republican Party will be able
to keep a handle on all the right wing outrage this announcement is sure to
unleash.
For his part, President Obama`s strategy appears straightforward, as
he says to his opponents, bring it on. Tonight at the White House, he`s
having dinner with Democratic lawmakers to discuss his executive actions.
The Republicans were not invited.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Sadly, if it were only
dinner that were required to get Republicans to act in a bipartisan
fashion, then we would have passed bipartisan compromise immigration reform
legislation quite some time ago. You could describe the people who are
having dinner with the president as Democrats, that would be true. You
could also describe them as people who are genuine supporters of
commonsense immigration reform. That would also be true.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Joining me now Michael Shear of "The New York Times."
Michael, what is the thinking here from the White House on the timing
of this announcement?
MICHAEL SHEAR, THE NEW YORK TIMES: Well, I mean, I think there`s a
couple things. First of all, you do have a sense that this is part of what
people have called sort of Obama unplugged recently, right? Trying at the
Republican opposition after getting thumped in the election. And so, it`s
yet another thing that he can sort of push on.
But, also, the thinking strategically has been that if the Republicans
were going to attack him on this subject, on the subject of immigration and
the executive actions he took, almost better to have it out there so that
there was something that the advocates, the activists, the Democratic
Party, they could actually defend and they could rally behind as opposed to
just having one hand tied behind their back and not really being able to
defend it.
HAYES: That`s interesting. So, in so far as he`s promised he`s going
to do it, the longer you wait, the more you`re in limbo in which the idea
can be attacked in the abstract, but no one can actually defend what the
concrete proposal is?
SHEAR: Right. For example, you know, part of what the Republicans
are going to attack on, whether it was out there or not, was the legal
question, right? Could he do this because he`s usurping his authority?
By putting it out there tomorrow, what they`re also going to put out
is all of the legal justification that they claim they have, and not only
from the White House itself but also all of the advocacy groups that want
this to happen have their own lawyers, and they`re also going to put out
legal briefs and justification.
So, you have an ability to kind of get out there if you`re the
president. And you see he`s going to go to Las Vegas on Friday, do a big
rally and try to rally public support behind it. You can`t do that if you
haven`t announced it yet.
HAYES: Michael, you`ve covered this president, and I`ve been covering
the president since he was inaugurated. And it does really strike me that
in the last two weeks, we are seeing a very different Barack Obama, just --
not in how he talks, what rhetoric is or his sort of disposition, but in
whatever calculation being made in that White House about how to interact
with the kind of raw truth the political opposition with the other party.
This is a very different tactic from this president.
SHEAR: You know, it`s interesting, Chris. I spoke to a senior White
House official about this a couple of days ago. And this person said,
look, part of this is just a matter of coincidence, right? There are some
things, for example, some of the climate things that they announced when he
was in Asia, there are -- some of that has just -- you know, the timing is
coincidental.
HAYES: Right.
SHEAR: There were things that took a long time to negotiate or to put
in place. And so, they come out, the net neutrality thing is a similar
example.
But it is hard to -- even the senior White House official said it`s
hard to deny that when see these things stacked up on top of each other,
that this isn`t a guy who took from the election a message that he was
going to sort of rein himself in. Rather, he took from this full steam
ahead and push back.
HAYES: And we know that there is a -- there is going to be a bill
that has to be passed by Congress to keep the government funded. The
deadline right now is December 11th. Again, what`s the thinking in the
White House about the degree this announcement will affect the trajectory
of that funding bill?
SHEAR: Well, I think there`s two different thoughts. I think --
actually, they think that probably at the end of the day, it doesn`t affect
that that much, or whether or not they would have announced it, the
Republicans were going to play games with it anyway.
But I think at the end of the day, they think probably the Republicans
are going to say to themselves, they -- the Republican Party were the ones
that suffered the last time the government shut down and probably will not
do anything. And frankly, from the Democratic perspective and from the
president`s party`s perspective, the more that the Republicans flirt with
that, probably the better off they think things are.
HAYES: Right. Michael Shear of "The New York Times" -- thank you.
SHEAR: Sure.
HAYES: Joining me now, Ben Domenech, publisher of "The Federalist",
senior fellow at the Heartland Institute.
All right, Ben. What do you think Republicans should do?
BEN DOMENECH, PUBLISHER, THE FEDERALIST: Well, before I say that,
Chris, I have to congratulate you. You totally predicted this. The last
time I was on with you, you brought up the fact that in 2006, after that
election, George W. Bush went out and ignored public opinion and doubled
down on the Iraq war. That`s the exact same thing that`s happening right
now at the White House.
If you think about it on immigration, on executive power, on drones,
on surveillance, on gay marriage, this is like Barack Obama rolling up his
sleeve and showing off a "what would Dick Cheney do" bracelet on his hand.
When it comes to what Republicans should do, I think it`s really
interesting what Ted Cruz wrote, because I think he`s basically giving
permission to the establishment and to the leadership to sort of say, hey,
you wanted to lead on this stuff. Now you can do it, because those in the
party closest to the blast radius on this because of their push in the past
for a comprehensive attempt on this issue. That`s dead in the water,
that`s finished. It`s done.
And I think that Republicans really ultimately what they`re going to
end up doing is having internal Beltway-focused fights with Senate
Democrats and with Democrats in the House where they basically try to
extract as much pain as possible on a number of issues. Both on
immigration stuff, on funding, but also on committee assignments and on
staffing levels and things like that. They`re just going to pull off a
bunch of dick moves to Democrats to basically make them feel move if they
can`t make President Obama feel pain over the way he`s approached this
issue.
HAYES: I actually think that`s 100 percent accurate. I think
basically, I think there`s no appetite in the leadership at least for a
shut down because Republicans believe they`ll be blamed for the shut down.
Although I got to say, from the perspective of advice, I though Erick
Erickson saying to him, hey guys, you got blamed for it, your approval
rating sank, a year later, no one remembered.
DOMENECH: It`s true.
HAYES: You did well. Like go to it. Go stick it to them.
I got to say, like, I don`t think that`s the right thing
substantively. But as sheer political advice, I think actually, the
establishment probably is more worried about the reputational damage of a
shutdown, then they should be given recent precedent. But I think you and
I agree they really do care. I think you`re totally right. There`s going
to be a kind of micro aggression tit for tat.
DOMENECH: Yes.
HAYES: But I also think, at the same time, they won`t come back in
January and pass a rider of the funding bill that makes it impossible to
implement this.
DOMENECH: I think they will do something along those lines. But if
you think about the people that benefit from this within the Republican
Party, it`s the Bob Goodlattes of the world. It`s all the people who`ve
been saying all along, they just wanted to do a border bill, they just want
to do a security focus bill because that`s what the polling of their own
base said that they ought to do. They didn`t want to tip toe around
amnesty and stuff like that.
This kills that issue. And, frankly, I think it`s going to have an
amazing effect in terms of how the 2016 battle plays out in the Republican
Party because of how much it changes that dynamic of that conversation
about immigration.
HAYES: Yes, I think -- I actually think it`s fascinating, and I think
from a political standpoint, we`ll talk about the legal ramifications in a
second, I think this moment is kind of clarifying for both sides.
DOMENECH: Yes.
HAYES: You know what I mean?
DOMENECH: Yes.
HAYES: It`s kind of heightening the contradictions but in a useful
way, right? I mean, the coalitions are what they are in terms of what we
want to see happen. And I think we`re going to have that electric
polarizing moment tomorrow night.
Ben Domenech, thank you very much.
DOMENECH: Good to be with you.
HAYES: Joining me now is Lorella Praeli, director of advocacy and
policy of United We Dream and someone who has been working behind the
scenes, advocating on behalf of this.
Your response to the announcement today that we`ll hear what this is
tomorrow?
LORELLA PRAELI, UNITED WE DREAM: Chris, I just feel very excited that
this day is finally here. We`ve been working very hard for this moment.
You know, I also think it`s a bittersweet moment. We`re hearing that
parents of DACA recipients will not be included in the announcement, but we
are not really to let our disappointment dampen the fact that this is a
tremendous victory for our country for millions of our peers and for many
parents in the United States.
And so, I`m very excited. I get to share this victory with my mother.
I was able to fix my status and become a green card holder in 2012. And
now, my mom will be protected by this announcement and by this new policy.
So, she`ll be able to see some of her dreams come true.
HAYES: Your mother will qualify for what appears to be announced
tomorrow?
PRAELI: It appears to be so. We don`t have the details yet but I
think she will make it. And I`m very excited to share this moment with
her.
HAYES: So, what do you say to the people that say your mother needs
to get to the back of the line, that she`s cutting the line, that this is a
kind of reckless skirting of the normal procedure?
PRAELI: Yes, what I will say to them is create the line, right?
There was a bill and we worked on a bipartisan bill in the Senate. It
passed with overwhelming support in the Senate. It then was blocked by
House Republicans.
So, there is no line. The whole point of passing federal immigration
reform is creating a line so that people like my mother can get on it, do
everything that they need to do, come forward and eventually become legal
permanent residents. But that line doesn`t exist. The GOP has only voted
to deport DREAMers, to deport young undocumented people, so they have no
vision other than a mass deportation party for this country.
HAYES: Are you prepared -- are you and the DREAMers and the
advocates, and the folks, are you prepared for the possible backlash? I
mean, are you prepared that this is polarizing in a negative way if the
politics mean that people think this is a bad idea, they come out or brings
out a lot of ugliness around immigration and immigrants?
PRAELI: Yes, so we know that the GOP is going to try to kill this,
it`s going to try to stop this. But what we also know is that this is not
about Republicans trying to stop the president. Everything that
Republicans do, from a lawsuit to trying to pass bill to repeal this or
block the executive action from happening will be about Republicans trying
to actively deport millions of DREAMers and millions of parents of U.S.
citizen children. And we`ll make sure that the community knows that.
We are ready -- you know, our message to them has been bring it.
We`ve actually been saying ole, GOP, because they`ve been saying that this
action is like waving a red flag in front of a bull. So, we`re ready to
have our fight. We`ll protect our victory just like we protected DACA.
And we will make sure that people come forward and celebrated this and that
we continue to fight for more, because this is not the end.
This is really just building on our success as a movement and we need
to build power. We need to register people to vote. And we need to
continue to build so that more people have relief and protection from
deportation.
HAYES: Ole, GOP, says Lorella.
Thank you very much.
PRAELI: Thank you, Chris.
HAYES: All right. Tune in here again tomorrow night, starting at
7:45 p.m. Eastern, Rachel Maddow and I will be bringing you live coverage
of the president`s big immigration speech.
OK, can the president actually prevent up to 5 million undocumented
immigrants from being deported? And how is that legal? We will talk about
that in a few minutes.
Plus, my interview with Eva Longoria. Yes, that Eva Longoria. That`s
ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: So, tomorrow is the big day not only because the president is
giving a prime address to the nation in this hour, but I will be hosting a
Facebook chat with Sylvia Burwell. She`s secretary of health and human
services about the Affordable Care Act and open enrollment at 2:30 p.m.
Eastern Time. Log in to Facebook.com/MSNBC, because she will be taking
your questions.
We`ll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Tomorrow, the president of the United States is reportedly
going to act unilaterally to provide relief for up to 5 million
undocumented immigrants living in the United States. And I`m guessing, a
lot of people across the political spectrum are asking, can he do that?
It`s a natural question.
And part of the reason conservatives are scrambling to respond is that
almost all signs point to yes.
Right now, there are roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants living
in the U.S., and pretty much everyone agrees. The federal government
simply doesn`t have the resources or certainly hasn`t appropriated them to
deport all 11 million of them.
So, someone has to make decisions about who to prioritize for
deportation. And that someone, according to the Constitution, is the
executive branch, which determines how to implement the laws Congress
passes.
The president has the authority to decide which deportations to
prosecute and which not to prosecute under the principle known as
prosecutorial discretion. In 1974, the Supreme Court laid it out pretty
clearly, saying, quote, "The executive branch has exclusive authority and
absolute discretion to decide whether to prosecute a case."
In fact, every president since Eisenhower has used executive action to
influence immigration policy in some way, notably, Ronald Reagan and George
H.W. Bush.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOM BROKAW, NBC NEWS: President Reagan today signed the massive
immigration reform law which will affect the status of millions of
immigrants who are now here illegally.
REPORTER: The law is complicated. Applicants may not be granted
permanent residency for years. And employers who can now be fined for
hiring illegals fear economic impacts.
But for an estimated 4 million eligible people, the word "amnesty" has
a definite ring.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Now, that law after Reagan signed it, it was passed by
Congress and after he signed the massive immigration reform bill in 1986,
it quickly became clear the bill gave status to certain people but left out
their children and spouses.
Reagan first acted to fix that oversight in 1987, his INS commissioner
deferred deportation hearings for the children of people applying for
legalization under the law that Reagan had signed. And three years later,
George H.W. Bush expanded on that through a similar executive action --
deferring the deportation of children and spouses of people covered under
that 1986 immigration bill.
At the time, the administration estimated up to 1.5 million people
would be eligible or 43 percent of the 3.5 million undocumented immigrants
living in the country in 1990.
President Obama`s latest executive action will reportedly affect up to
5 million people on top of the 1.2 million available for deferred action
through DACA from 2012. That in total is 55 percent of the estimated 11.2
million undocumented immigrants here now.
So, it is true that what President Obama is planning to announce
tomorrow is larger than what presidents before him have done, but it
follows quite firmly the logic of precedent.
Joining me is Alina Das, associate professor of clinical law, co-
director of the immigrant rights clinic at New York University School of
Law.
So, I have now gone through the experience several times in the Obama
era in which I`ve talked to law professors and they say it`s not even a
close call. It`s a no-brainer.
The next thing I know, the case shows up in the Supreme Court. The
mandate case, the commerce clause, no brainer, obviously, commerce clause.
Is that going to be with this?
When you have consensus right now, everyone is saying yes, it`s pretty
clear it`s precedent and a year from now, I`m going to have you here when
this case is before the Supreme Court?
ALINA DAS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW: Well, we`ll have to see
what happens, because it seems like there are people who are litigation
hungry when it comes to this issue. When it comes to the law itself, it`s
been over-politicized. I mean, the law is absolutely clear, this decision
was made over a century ago when we first had a federal law on immigration
that the president has broad authority to act because this is about
prosecutorial discretion, and it`s about a reprieve from deportation.
It`s not about whether someone is going to actually get a green card
or citizenship. That`s up to Congress. But here this is just about who is
going to be subject to our deportation system.
HAYES: What about this idea and "The New York Times" reported early
on this, there`s the idea that these people would be able to work legally.
How is that something the president can do unilaterally?
DAS: So, for many, many years, the laws have allowed for people who
get deferred action or other forms of prosecutorial discretion to be able
to get a work permit. And that makes sense, because if a person is going
to be here in the United States, they should be able to work.
HAYES: It makes no sense to say, we`re going to keep you here but you
can`t work so you sit around.
DAS: Absolutely. And things like deferred action are not only
policies that exist in memoranda or past precedent but also are in
statutes.
Congress is aware of this. Maybe today`s Congress has forgotten but
there are many bills over the years that have referred specifically to
deferred action and to other forms of discretion.
HAYES: So, this is squarely in precedent, squarely within the law,
you think?
DAS: Yes, I do.
HAYES: OK, what`s the limiting principle? I mean, obviously, play
devil`s advocate here. Because the president show up tomorrow night and be
like, all 11 million can stay.
DAS: Well, this is about good policy. So, we may disagree about how
far the president is willing to go, but at the end of the day, he has the
job of figuring out what to do with the people who are here.
Now, I haven`t been happy with how he`s used his executive authority
to deport more than 2 million people, more than any other administration.
He`s expanded a lot of administrative programs that have torn apart a lot
of families. But in terms of legality, that`s within his prerogative. And
when it comes to the people who are already here, people on both sides in
the issue should want those folks to come out, register with the
government, and to go back around tax, get work authorizations, that`s on
the level playing field.
HAYES: And presumably, if and when comprehensive immigration reform
would pass, it would actually make that system much smoother because you`ve
have who these folks are and they would register.
Alina Das of NYU, thank you very much.
DAS: Thank you.
HAYES: All right. There`s this photo going around that makes me feel
like I`m going to have an absolute panic attack every time I see it. I`m a
little claustrophobic. This photo was taken in Lancaster, New York, where
over five feet of snow fell, in less than 24 hours. More amazing photos
and video of that storm, next.
Also, stay tuned for our interview with Eva Longoria. That`s ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: New York is under a state of emergency in the wake of a
snowstorm that`s buried western New York state, particularly the area
around Buffalo. As much as 5 1/2 feet hit the buffalo area. That amount
of snow has been deadly. State officials say at least seven people have
died as a result of the storm.
It`s what`s known as lake effect snow, which happens when warm water
from nearby Lake Erie evaporates and mixes with cold wind passing overhead.
Or put it this way, the cold wind acts like a sponge, soaking up the warm
water off the lake and then wringing it out once it reaches land.
And the effect is lots and lots of snow. It`s a reason some part of
the Buffalo area got dumped on and other parts just got a few inches.
Local authorities have named this lake effect snow storm knife because they
say it cut the heart of Erie County.
Many of the main roads and highways remain closed while travel bans
remain in effect, which has even disrupted mail service, something that
almost never happens.
The storm has also disrupted emergency services which is why
firefighters carried a patient to the hospital, seen here.
This image is just one of the many that started circulated on the
internet last night, what it looked like to be on the ground in this mess.
One family had snow explode through a door, just about filled the
entire room. Hundreds of people are literally trapped in their homes. At
least one guy dug a tunnel to get out of his house, others decided to make
the best of the bad situation by turning walls of snow into refrigerators.
Since the weather is starting to affect preparations for Sunday`s
Jets-Bills game at Ralph Wilson Stadium, which looks more like a ski resort
than a football stadium, the Bill are offering folks 10 bucks an hour plus
free tickets to the aforementioned game to help remove the -- wait for it -
- 220,000 tons of snow, according to the Bills
Just let that number sink in for a moment if you`re not in Upstate New
York and bundle up if you are. There`s more snow in the forecast tomorrow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Every year when I sit down for Thanksgiving dinner, I always
have this moment where I think I have no idea where any of the food in
front of me comes
from, who grew it, who picked it, who processed it -- it`s all just there.
And I say that at a time when we as Americans are probably more
attentive to the conditions under which our food is produced than we have
been in a very long time. And there`s an entire subsection of the food
industry devoted to organic food and food that is free of various chemicals
or (inaudible) farms where animals
are treated with some modicum of decency.
Well, a new documentary tells a story of one group of people who
actually picked the produce -- tomatoes specifically -- that make it to our
table. It`s one of the lowest paid, most difficult jobs in America. And
in one state, a group called the Coalition of Imacali Workers are getting
together to use their collective power to push companies to pay them more
and enforce legal standards.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: Over the course of an average work day, workers pick,
carry and throw about 4,000 pounds of tomatoes, earning them approximately
$40 a day, or a little over a penny for each of those pounds. That`s why
the CIW is asking Publix to pay just a penny more per pound to double
farmworker wages. Doing this would cost Publix about $1 million out of
their $2 billion in annual profits.
If Publix chose to pass on these costs, a family of four would only
need to pay an extra 44 cents per year for tomatoes.
(END VIDEO CLIP
HAYES: It should be noted that many major companies like Wal-Mart,
Taco Bell, Whole Foods and Trader Joes, have joined the Fair Food Program
that the
coalition created. It`s one where they pay more for the tomatoes. But the
effort is far from finished.
Now the film on this was co-produced by actress and activist Eva
Longoria. And I got a chance to sit down with her yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: I want to start out with how you came to know about the
conditions under which our tomatoes are picked, our food is harvested. How
did you as just a person living in the world and eating come to know about
this?
EVA LONGORIA, ACTRESS: Well, I was really lucky to meet Delores
Huerta early in my life. I was about 15, 16 years ago. And I met her and
had a wonderful conversation about all of the gains that happened in the
`60s with the Civil Rights Movement and how they`ve all been dismantled.
Everything that Cesar Chavez accomplished in California had kind of been
dismantled and we`ve taken two steps back.
One of the main things was enforcement -- the laws were passed but
there`s no enforcement in the fields. And this was 15, 16 years ago. And
then I did a documentary about child farm workers called "Harvest." And I
had no idea about the amount of children that pick our food here in the
United States.
And then this director, Sanjay told me about this film he was doing
called "Food Chains." And I thought it was a really interesting title,
because he wanted to explore how we are all connected to the exploitation
of workers as a consumer, as a buyer, as a farmer, as a farm worker, we are
all connected to this system and this chain in which we get our food.
HAYES: I always think about this, this time of year around
Thanksgiving, right, because you sit down and you just think to yourself I
am completely -- the means of production that brought all these things to
my table are just completely
invisible to me.
LONGORIA: Yeah.
HAYES: Like, I don`t know where any of it comes from or under what
conditions it has been produced.
LONGORIA: I was on Stephen Colbert and he said. And I think my food
comes from the kitchen.
HAYES: That`s exactly right.
LONGORIA: And you go, it doesn`t.
There`s never been a greater interest in what we`re putting in our
bodies. People are gluten free, and soy free, and sugar free, and lactose
free, but people
really don`t think about but where is that food coming from? Who is
picking it and there`s a human cost to that much more than your health
costs there`s a human cost to everything that`s on your plate.
HAYES: And part of what`s fascinating about the Imacali workers
particularly is that their political strategy revolves around connecting
the source of the food to the people that are at the end of that food
chain.
LONGORIA: Yeah, well, you know, people -- we`ve been trying to
villainize farmers for a very long time -- pay them better, don`t hire
undocumented people. People really go after the farmers. And what this
documentary explored was we`ve got to go to the buyers. These people
actually dictate the prices. They really squeeze the farmers so the farmer
squeezes the farm worker. So, your grocery stores and your fast food
chains are the biggest buyers of produce.
And what the CIW did, which was brilliant was create this thing called
the Fair Food Program, that has many tenets to it but one is paying a penny
more per pound so getting them up to a livable wage, another thing is a
code of conduct, making sure that sexual harassment, physical abuse,
everything is taken out of the
fields. And then they do an audit of compliance. So, you can have these
rules in
place but that audit of compliance, having boots on the ground and making
sure these farmers do it is probably the most important part.
And this documentary`s about one harvest in one state. I mean, this
is about tomatoes in Florida. We have so many other crops that we need to
implement this
program.
HAYES: But it`s also extremely hopeful because problems that seem
intractable or you feel like oh, how can you actually turn things around,
they have
there. They`ve organized. They`ve used their power. And you see the
conditions are far, far, far better than they were before they organized or
in other places around the country where people are harvesting food.
LONGORIA: Yeah, this program is totally scalable and it`s totally
applicable to other crops as well.
I was talking to one of the largest tomato growers in Florida the
other. And he said it`s not only morally better to do this, treat people
fairly, pay them fairly, but their turnover is lower. They`re a choice
employer and their profits are doing better than ever. And so you go, wow,
this is economically sound to do as well.
So I think if we can have people a documentary and see, it`s not a
film of oppression, it`s actually a film of transformation and change and
how it works.
HAYES: And there is such an opening right now, it appears, because of
we have had this bizarre -- in some ways amazing and some ways strange
transformation in our culture about how we think about food and the primacy
it occupies and the amount of magazine columns devoted to it and the amount
of food shows and networks devoted to it that you can only keep that off
stage for so long, the conditions under which it is being made.
LONGORIA; Yeah. Well, that and like supermarkets specifically go out
of their way to make it look pretty and to not remind you of how that
tomato got to...
HAYES: Yeah, if you saw dirt on a tomato, you`d be like dirt?
LONGORIA: Yeah. Even organic stuff sometimes -- it`s weird. It`s a
little misshapen and it has little marks on it and it`s not as pretty, it`s
not as the other stuff, but you should buy organic.
The other thing -- the great thing about this is bringing this to the
forefront, is when you tell the consumer the truth, they are intelligent
enough to make that decision.
People do buy organic. Once they have the choice, people go, I`ll pay
20 cents more, I`ll pay a dollar more. They pay more for quality, for
pesticide free, for organic. And I think if we had a label that said this
produce was slave-free, you would say I`ll pay more for that tomato.
HAYES: Eva Longoria, the film is "Food Chains." Thank you very much.
LONGORIA: Thank you so much.
HAYES: I appreciate it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HAYES: All right, more fallout tonight from the allegations of sexual
assault being made by two different women just this week against Bill
Cosby. We will have the latest ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HAYES: Tonight, more fallout from allegations of sexual assault
against Bill Cosby. Netflix, the streaming service, announced that it is
postponing the launch of a new Cosby stand-up special, Bill Cosby 77 which
had been set to debut next
week.
NBC said it will not move forward with a planned family comedy
starring Cosby which had been expected to debut next year. And the TVLand
network late this
afternoon confirmed to NBC News it has pulled all Cosby Show reruns from
its schedule effective immediately.
In the past week alone two women have come forward in televised
interviews to accuse Cosby of sexual assault. Joan Tarshis told NBC News
she was drugged and raped twice by Cosby after he made her a drink when she
was a 19-year-old aspiring comedy writer. And she says Cosby offered to
work with her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOAN TARSHIS, COSBY ACCUSER: He made me another red eye. We started
to talk about the earthquake. And the next thing knew I was on his couch
and he was pulling my underwear off.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Model Janice Dickinson also came forward to accuse Cosby of
assault.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JANICE DICKINSON, COSBY ACCUSER: In my room, he had given me wine and
a pill. The next morning I woke up and I wasn`t wearing my pajamas. And I
remember before I passed out that I had been sexually assaulted by this
man.
The last thing I remember was Bill Cosby in a patchwork robe dropping
his robe and getting on top of me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: These are not the first accusations of this nature against
Bill Cosby. And here is what we know on the public record. In addition to
Tarshis and
Dickinson, four other women have, on the record, accused Cosby of drugging
and sexually assaulting them. One of them, Tamara Green, told her story on
the "Today" show in 2005 saying the assault took place after a working
lunch.
She says she was suffering from the flu and Cosby offered her pills.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TAMARA GREEN, COSBY ACCUSER: He produced two capsules in his hand,
but I thought nothing of it and I took the capsules. I totally lost motor
control. I was almost unable to hold my head up. I was very, very, very
stoned.
And he took me into my apartment and then very helpfully and nicely
was prepared to take off my clothes and help me into bed and pet me and,
you know, and
that`s how the actual assault began.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: The following year after that interview aired, Cosby settled a
lawsuit with another woman, Andrea Constin (ph) who had accused him of
sexually assaulting her two years earlier after he gave her herbal pills to
ease her anxiety. That`s in her account.
Now court records of that civil suit showed here were ten more women
making
anonymous claims against Cosby. Through his lawyers, Cosby has long
strenuously denied any wrongdoing and no criminal charges have been filed
against him.
When Constin (ph) made her claims Cosby`s lawyer dismissed them as
being utterly preposterous and plainly bizarre. Last week, another woman,
Barbara Bowman wrote about having been drugged and raped by Cosby who she
says offered to be her mentor. Bowman lamented her claims had been ignored
for decades. Then this Sunday a Cosby lawyer dismissed the, quote,
"decade-old discredited allegations against
Cosby," adding the comedian does not intend to dignify these allegations
with any comment.
And after Janice Dickinson came forward, a Cosby attorney labeled her
assault allegation a, quote, "complete lie, pointing to a book Dickinson
wrote in 2002 that discusses Cosby and does not make any reference to a
sexual assault.
Dickinson said in 2006 and repeated this week there was legal pressure
not to mention the assault in her book. Cosby`s lawyers deny there was any
pressure.
Now, since the uproar began, Bill Cosby has not publicly spoken about
the
allegations. Two of his scheduled appearances were canceled but last week
he did sit down for an interview with NPR Scott Simon.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
SCOTT SIMON, NPR: This question gives me no pleasure, Mr. Cosby, but
there
have been serious allegations raised about you in recent days. You`re
shaking your head no. I`m in the news business, I have to ask the
question. Do you have any response to those charges? Shaking your head
no.
There are people who love you who might like to hear from you about
this. I want to give you the chance.
All right.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
HAYES: So here`s the question, there were already two serious
consistent on the record allegations against Cosby almost 10 years ago in
2005, one of which he settled out of court.
So, why has it been the case that Bill Cosby has in the nearly decade
since simply gone about the business of being beloved, tremendously
talented comedian
and icon Bill Cosby even emerging in the mid-2000s as a kind of moral scold
for the black community with almost no one talking about the elephant in
the room and why
have people started to suddenly pay attention?
There`s an answer to that question, I think, and we`re going to talk
about it when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Bill Cosby has the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) smuggest
old black man public persona that I hate. Pull your pants up, black
people, I was on TV in the `80s. I can talk down to you because I had a
successful sitcom.
Yeah, but you raped women, Bill Cosby, so kind of brings you down a
couple notches.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: That was comedian Hannibal Burress during a standup routine
about one month ago during a routine that went viral and I think has sort
of kicked off the renewed focus on the sexual assault cases against Cosby.
Here with me now, Brittany Cooper, assistant professor of women`s
gender and Africana studies at Rutgers, and MSNBC contributor James
Peterson, director Africana studies and associate professor of English and
Lehigh University. He`s author of the "Hip-Hop Underground and African-
American Culture."
So, Brittany, I think what happened here was those allegations in 2005
had become old news to the sort of establishment media. It was new news to
people on
Facebook. And I feel like this was one of those items where you saw the
democratization of the media and social media having this effect where
people were like, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second. And it became this
firestorm that then now we are seeing all the establishment media
responding to.
BRITTANY COOPER, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY: Sure, but you know, I write for
Salon. And Salon ran a story about this earlier this year that did not go
viral.
So I think the thing we have to be talking about is that when this
black male comedian said that Bill Cosby was a rapist, all of a sudden
other people listened and so there`s a thing about...
HAYES: So you think it was the Hannibal Burress...
COOPER: Absolutely. I think that when men agree with women that they
have been raped, then people pay attention.
And so even the spate of things that have happened to Cosby today, we
can`t knock the fact that Tomahzi Coats (ph) who has been generous -- been
very generous towards Cosby in his commentary in the past wrote a piece
today saying I regret that I didn`t pursue this.
And then you have the spate of things happening, TVLand, NBC and
Netflix all coming down the pike today making these announcements.
HAYES: But I could also -- James, I can also imagine a universe in
which the Hannibal Burress thing -- I mean, Hanibal Burress apparently had
been making that joke in his routine and it`s like that could have happened
and not gone -- like, there was something about this that made it catch
fire and I think something about it, particularly people from my generation
for whom this guy is an absolutely beloved icon.
I mean, when I first found out about these allegations my mind was
blown. It was a Gawker piece in February that first surfaced. Like what
was it do you think in the air that has made this now the present moving
story of this day and week?
JAMES PETERSON, LEHIGH UNIVERSITY: Yeah, I think -- well, let`s not
forget the twitter me episode of this as well. I think that kind of added
to the social media fire around these things. And obviously, Mr. Cosby has
carefully constructed what is now an indelible image as a philanthropic and
comedic icon. I think that`s part of the reason why it`s also difficult
for this story to stick.
Brittany`s absolutely right that we`re kind of at the -- believe it or
not, this kind intersectional moment right. So it is not just the sort of
accusations, up to 15 at this point in time, not just the fact that this
stuff has been reported on in the past and that women have been sort of
making this cry for a long time, but it is the sort of participation --
some of it from male comedians and male writers that help.
But it`s an intersectional moment, Chris. What`s happening here is
that the same folks who were sort of disenchanted with the Poundcake
Speech, because you think about the sort of Poundcake Speech in the context
of a Michael Brown, right, because he`s making jokes about young black men
stealing poundcake and that they should suffer whatever consequences as a
result.
HAYES: Let me just interject real quick, the Poundcake Speech was
this
kind of -- this sort of diatribe about respectability politics that kind of
pull yourself up black America, you`re falling down on the job, you got to
pull
your pants up and stop being criminals and act right and that`s the path
forward.
PETERSON: It contributed to the demonization of young black folk and
people of color in ways that we don`t really think about in sort of
conservative political
discourses, but there`s an intersectional moment here, Chris, where the
same people -- and Michael Eric Dyson, by the way, one of our own
contributors who was one of
the people at the forefront of that critiquing, the critique about Bill
Cosby critiquing the black -- the working class and poor folks -- the kind
of push back that he got at that particular moment was extraordinary.
And so we have this moment now where the same people who were sort of
participating and sort of wondering and engaged in that critique and the
people who
sort of support women`s rights or concerned about issues of sexual assault,
there`s an intersection of that. And I think that`s reaching a critical
mass at this particular time.
HAYES: This is what you and I were talking about right before we went
on
camera, which is that there`s no one to defend Cosby partly because of the
role
he carved out for himself.
PETERSON: That`s right.
HAYES: In dirt from the Poundcake Speech.
COOPER: But there have been people defending him all day long. Black
men have been saying this is the system trying to railroad this man at the
end of
his career.
PETERSON: Not this black man.
COOPER: Thank you, James, you`re always wonderful. But you know some
of your brothers are not quite right. And so -- because there`s a racial
element
here, too, that most of these accusers are white women. So folks are
saying this is just another instance of trying to take the black man down
and folks not wanting to deal with the fact that this is not a black man
who has been a supporter of all black people. He has spent the last decade
in particular -- since the Poundcake
Speech -- demonizing not just black youth but also black women.
And so there is a...
HAYES: But let`s also say this, let`s say he was the most liberated,
equitable dude in the world, let`s say this guy was like the most
righteous, had
the most righteous record, I wouldn`t care if these allegations -- again, I
should say I`m on television and I cannot -- if these allegations are true,
if they are true, like that doesn`t matter to me.
PETERSON: But, Chris, you`re asking the question why is it sticking
at this moment? The reason why it sticks at this moment is that
intersection of the -- the collision of those two huge issues.
COOPER: But it does matter, though. A couple of weeks ago I wrote a
piece saying let`s take the Cosby Show off the air, let`s get rid of Cliff
and Claire Huxtable. Let`s get rid of these icons...
HAYES: Yeah, you were like burn it all down.
COOPER: Exactly. People were hot with me. One of my friends dressed
up as
Claire Huxtable for Halloween.
PETERSON: You can`t come at the Huxtables. Brittany, you can`t come
at the Huxtables, Brittany.
COOPER: Because Bill Cosby has spent the last 30 years making us
believe that Bill Cosby and Cliff Huxtable are the same person.
PETERSON: America`s dad.
COOPER: America`s favorite dad.
And so to get to slay Bill Cosby is to slay our image of Cliff
Huxtable.
HAYES: And that gets to a thing that I think is important here -- and
again I have got to say all this in the context of we`ve given you the
public record, you make determinations about who you believe in all this.
If they are true, it is a reminder that you do not know public
figures, you do not know them. You think you know them, the people you see
on TV...
PETERSON: That`s the takeaway, Chris. You don`t know the face of the
sexual predator. That`s right.
HAYES: And that`s an important thing to remember, because it is so
easy to think that you do and this is a reminder that you do not.
Brittany Cooper and James Peterson -- I could talk about this for an
hour, actually. There`s a lot here.
Thank you very much.
That is "All In" for this evening. The Rachel Maddow show starts
right now.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY
BE UPDATED.
END
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All In With Chris Hayes, Wednesday, November 19th, 2014
Read the transcript from the Wednesday show