The Young Turks (2/14/19)
There’s nothing these people won’t do to influence politicians. Cenk Uygur, host of The Young Turks, breaks it down. Read more here: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/… “On Wednesday morning, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) tweeted a picture of a line of people outside a House committee hearing on marijuana banking.* According to Ocasio-Cortez, the people in the photo are homeless and were paid by lobbyists to hold their places in line. The practice of lobbyists paying people to stand in line for committee meetings is, according to previous reporting, a longtime practice in Washington, DC. In 2009, CNN wrote about a homeless man who ‘rubs shoulders with Washington’s elite’ by waiting in line for lobbyists—upwards of 20 hours for a hearing at a rate of ‘$11 to $35 an hour.’ Brian Fung from the Washington Post added that paying line-holders ‘is even more widespread than just in the halls of Congress’ and extends to judicial hearings, too. The practice got so bad that in 2015 the Supreme Court told lawyers that ‘‘line standers’ will not be permitted.'”