Morning Wire XX
[0] A new report shows that some of the largest donors behind President Biden have helped fund the anti -Israel protests and riots across the U .S. I think the federal government has an obligation to do an investigation here.
[1] Where's the money coming from?
[2] Where is the training coming from?
[3] Who are these donors?
[4] And how is the New York City Council also playing a role?
[5] I'm Daily Wire editor -in -chief John Bickley.
[6] And joining us this week to guest host is Batia Ungar Sargon, opinion editor at Newsweek.
[7] Great to have you on, Batia.
[8] It's so great to be here with you.
[9] It's Monday, May 6th, and this is Morning Wire.
[10] An explosive report from a congressional committee details new evidence that the Biden White House pressured social media companies to censor Americans.
[11] The private sector tech companies do whatever the government asked for because they need the government to clear the way for their international monopolies.
[12] And the DOJ has indicted an influential Democratic government.
[13] congressman from Texas on several charges, including money laundering and bribery.
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[25] Some of the biggest donors to groups who engaged in the campus protests of recent weeks are also substantial backers of President Joe Biden.
[26] The scoop from Politico points to several nonprofits with direct ties to both the chaos on campus and Democratic Party politics at the highest levels.
[27] Here to discuss this revelation, as well as a report that the New York City Council also doled out cash to the protest groups is DailyWire contributor David Marcus.
[28] Hey, Dave.
[29] So walk us through which nonprofits these are and who and what exactly they're funding.
[30] Morning, John.
[31] The big names here will be fairly familiar to listeners.
[32] It includes nonprofits run by Bill Gates, George Soros, the Rockefellers, and Pritzker's.
[33] A couple of the groups that were directly involved in supporting the protest encampments received funding from an organization called the Tides Foundation, one in particular called Jewish Voice for Peace, has blamed Israel itself for the barbaric Hamas terror attacks of October 7th, raising concerns from groups monitoring anti -Semitism.
[34] The Tides Foundation has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Gates Foundation, Soros Foundation.
[35] You name a big donor on the left, and there's a good chance they're funding Tides, which in turn is handing money over to these radical protest groups.
[36] Now, as Politico also points out.
[37] Many of the wealthy people behind these nonprofits are also very significant donors to Joe Biden, who the anti -Israel protests have expressed a lot of anger towards in recent weeks.
[38] Is there a contradiction there?
[39] Sure seems that way.
[40] And yeah, they seem to be funding both sides of the rhetorical war here as they donate to Biden's reelection effort while also paying for protesters who crash his campaign events screaming that he's genocide Joe for his support of Israel.
[41] It really highlights the divide over this issue on the left.
[42] And we see that from Biden too, who finally last week addressed the campus protest, calling out the excesses and violence, but not in a way that most conservative observers found anywhere near strong enough.
[43] Right.
[44] We also saw a report from the New York Post last week that members of the New York City Council had used discretionary funds to give these anti -Israel organizations some $2 .7 million.
[45] What did we learn about that?
[46] It's a lot of It is a lot of money.
[47] And in fact, almost $500 ,000 of it was handed out within the last year.
[48] There were five different organizations that received the city's largesse.
[49] By far the most money, 2 .5 million since 2014, went to the Muslim Community Network, which was holding seminars supposedly about safety training for protesters and also advising them on recognizing police tactics such as good cop, bad cop.
[50] So again, here you have city council, which obviously funds the NYPD, also funding the groups trying to evade and frustrate the NYPD while chanting that cops are the KKK.
[51] Yeah.
[52] Do we know how aware these organizations and politicians were of what exactly these groups they funded are?
[53] It's hard to say.
[54] If you're a non -profit or council person sitting around a conference table with a big stack of grant proposals, it may not be clear that this money is funding groups that seek to take over campus buildings, intimidate Jewish students, and demand the destruction of the state of Israel.
[55] These nonprofits may need to be more careful about where their money is going, especially when they give large sums to an umbrella group like the Tides Foundation that then disperses it among smaller, and as we see here, more fringe and radical groups.
[56] There are reports that donors to some of these foundations, be they Jewish donors or not, are starting to demand that their donations not go to support these anti -Israel groups.
[57] Well, certainly important to know exactly where your money is going.
[58] Dave, thanks for joining us.
[59] Thanks for having me. Hey ladies, it's Leanne from Team Morning Wire.
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[67] A trove of emails and a new 800 -page report from the House Judiciary Committee show social media execs saying the Biden White House pressured them to censor users.
[68] Daily Wire Culture reporter Megan Basham is here now with more.
[69] So Megan, this report is part of the ongoing work of the House subcommittee on the weaponization of the government.
[70] We've covered some revelation stemming from their investigations before.
[71] What's new here?
[72] Well, the allegations of the federal government using the tech companies as proxies for censorship isn't new.
[73] But what is new in this report is the degree to which the Biden White House specifically was engaging in these activities.
[74] So some of the tech companies internal communication records directly counter arguments that the administration was simply trying to persuade the platforms to remove certain content.
[75] And in legal terms, we would call that jawboning.
[76] Now, that's important because while jawboning is legal, coercion isn't.
[77] So some of these emails make it pretty clear that the tech execs did not simply feel that they were receiving suggestions.
[78] How so?
[79] Well, you know, one of the biggest examples was COVID.
[80] In one email between Facebook's president of global affairs, Nick Clegg and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Clegg says that due to, quote, tense conversations with the Biden White House, the platform censored posts that claimed the virus was man -made and that it was developed using gain -of -function technology.
[81] And then in another email, Clegg described the White House's dealings with Facebook as highly cynical and dishonest.
[82] And then in yet another email, Zuckerberg expressed regret that Facebook had, quote, compromised its standards due to pressure from the Biden administration.
[83] And then this one's pretty explosive.
[84] Zuckerberg asked about a press release, the company was drafting.
[85] And he said this, can we include that the White House put pressure on us to censor the lab leak theory?
[86] So there are also emails between Amazon execs saying that they changed bookstore policies and even removed books that were critical of government COVID protocols to avoid negative pressure from the administration.
[87] So overall, the House report says that it's clear that these actions had a chilling effect on American speech.
[88] Pressure assumes the administration would be able to negatively impact their business, correct?
[89] Right, yeah, it would.
[90] And obviously, there are a lot of regulatory pressures that any administration can bring to bear, but some former officials have suggested that the tech companies were especially sensitive to just how their prospects overseas could be impacted.
[91] So former State Department official, Mike Benz, addressed some of this in a video he posted to X. And I will warn that there's just a bit of mild language here if you have kids in earshot.
[92] The reason they've had a data monopoly in Europe and in most of Asia and most of Latin America, Google and Facebook, is because the State Department goes to war for them when other governments want a competitive business climate or different rules on access to data or labor or tax rates or any of that.
[93] If you piss off the government, then you piss away your market monopoly.
[94] And you see this actually here in these emails?
[95] So by that, Benz is referring to an email in which Clegg says, quote, given the bigger fish we have to fry with the Biden administration, we should think creatively about how we can be responsive to their concerns.
[96] So Benz contends that the bigger fish was the Digital Services Act.
[97] And that's the EU's regulation of social media misinformation.
[98] So the platforms would have wanted to be on the State Department's good side in exchange for their help with the EU.
[99] Got it.
[100] Do we have any sense yet what impact this House report might end up having?
[101] Well, last Wednesday, the House subcommittee held a hearing with two Biden officials.
[102] Robert Flaherty, Biden's Director of Digital Strategy and Andy Slavitt, former senior advisor for the COVID response team.
[103] They both insisted that the administration's interactions with the tech companies were entirely consistent with the First Amendment.
[104] And they said they never intended to course anyone.
[105] that the tech execs never suggested to them that they felt coerced.
[106] But we also have to remember that there is a major case pending before the Supreme Court on this issue.
[107] Murthy v. Missouri will decide whether the government violated free speech protections with these back -channel communications with big tech.
[108] So before Congress acts, the Supreme Court very well could, and the communications revealed in this report could play a role in the justice's decision.
[109] Well, all eyes are certainly going to be on that case.
[110] Megan, thanks for reporting.
[111] Any time.
[112] A Democrat congressman from Texas has been indicted by the Department of Justice accused of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes over the last decade.
[113] Here with the details of the allegations is Daily Wire's senior editor, Cabot Phillips.
[114] Cabot, some major allegations against an influential member of Congress.
[115] What do we know?
[116] Yeah, so on Friday, Congressman Henry Quayart, a Democrat from Texas, was indicted on charges related to bribery, money laundering, and conspiracy.
[117] According to the sweeping federal indictment, Quayar and his wife received more than $600 ,000 from an oil and gas company operated by Azerbaijan, as well as a Mexican bank.
[118] Quayar is accused of laundering the money through a series of shell companies that he claimed provided consulting services.
[119] In exchange for those bribes, Quayar then allegedly used his influence in Washington to lobby on behalf of legislation that benefited his benefactors.
[120] As the indictment put it, Quayar was essentially a...
[121] political mercenary who used those bribes to pay off tens of thousands of dollars in taxes, car payments, and credit cards.
[122] There's no doubt the indictment appears quite damning, and if convicted, the couple faces years or potentially even decades behind bars.
[123] For his part, Quayar denied the charges.
[124] So walk us through some of the evidence.
[125] What sort of work was he doing in exchange for those alleged bribes?
[126] Well, it appears there were two main operations going on, one in Azerbaijan and the other in Mexico.
[127] The saga allegedly began when Quayar took a trip to Azerbaijan in 2013.
[128] Shortly after that, he and his wife began receiving payments from that aforementioned oil and gas company, and Quayar became one of Washington's most vocal advocates of the Eastern European nation.
[129] Ultimately, he became chair of the congressional Azerbaijan caucus.
[130] Among other things, Quayar lobbied the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations to side with Azerbaijan and their border class with Armenia.
[131] He inserted pro -Azerbaijan language into congressional reports on economic aid to the region and even gave speeches praising the country from the House floor.
[132] According to the indictment, Quayar sent the text of that speech to Azerbaijani diplomats beforehand and communicated with them frequently as he helped craft legislation that ultimately would benefit them.
[133] And that is just part of this alleged scheme.
[134] Over the same time frame, prosecutors say Quayar engaged in another similar operation with a large bank in Mexico City.
[135] As part of that scheme, he allegedly took bribes in exchange for pushing legislation that would hinder regulation into the payday loan industry.
[136] He's also accused of trying to weaken U .S. money laundering laws that had been in place to target the Mexican banking system.
[137] In 2015, Quayar apparently grew worried that scheme would be discovered and asked an official with the bank to find a middleman to help, quote, disguise the payments.
[138] In his words, quote, we need to find another scheme, a scheme being the operative word there.
[139] So what sort of political fallout have we seen at this point?
[140] Yeah, it's important to note.
[141] Quayar is not your run -in -the -mill congressman.
[142] He's been in office for nearly two decades and has scored a number of powerful committee assignments in that time.
[143] So as rumors of the indictment swirled over the last few years, Democrat leadership had, for the most part, been hesitant to sort of throw him under the bus.
[144] At that point, Quayar's home was first rated by the FBI back in 2022, and at the time, he was locked in a tight reelection campaign.
[145] Democrats needed him to win.
[146] So at the time, party leadership, including then -speaker Nancy Pelosi, really rallied around him in spite of that scandal.
[147] But following the indictment, that support from party leadership has begun to wane ever so slightly.
[148] Democrat leader, Hakeem Jeffrey, said Quayar would temporarily step down from position as the ranking member of the Homeland Security Appropriation Subcommittee.
[149] But he did reiterate that Quayar, quote, is entitled to his day in court and the presumption of innocence throughout the legal process.
[150] So Quayor is not being forced out by any means.
[151] He represents an increasingly red district along the southern border in Texas.
[152] And as you can imagine, Republicans are now viewing that seat as a pickup opportunity for November.
[153] It's going to be really interesting to see what happens to his seat should he be ousted by all of this.
[154] Cabot, thanks so much.
[155] Anytime.
[156] Thanks for waking up with us.
[157] We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.