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Today is National Adjunct Walkout Day. Adjunct professors on campuses across the country hope to draw attention to what many say are poverty-level wages, with no chance to advance to a tenured track position. We are joined by Louisa Edgerly, an adjunct instructor at Seattle University, where she will join other adjuncts and students — along with tenure-track professors — in walking out at noon today.
Image Credit: nationaladjunct.tumblr.com
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We end the show with another look at college education, this time from the perspective of those who teach. Today is National Adjunct Walkout Day. Adjunct professors on campuses across the country hope to draw attention to what many say are poverty-level wages, with no chance to advance to a tenure-track position.
AMY GOODMAN: For more, we go to Seattle, where we’re joined by Louisa Edgerly, an adjunct instructor at Seattle University, where she’ll join other adjuncts and students today, along with tenure-track professors, in walking out at noon.
Welcome to Democracy Now! Why are you striking?
LOUISA EDGERLY: Thank you for having me, and thank you for covering this important issue. We’re striking today and walking out, really, to raise awareness nationally of the situation that adjunct faculty face across the country, and really to highlight our desire for higher-quality education and more support for faculty across the board.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And talk to us about the extent of the problem, again, with these nonprofit universities and their increasing use of adjuncts or part-timers to teach their courses.
LOUISA EDGERLY: Yes, as a matter of fact, over the last 30 years, the proportion of faculty on the tenure track versus faculty not on the tenure track has shifted from about 75 percent who used to be on the tenure track to, today, about three-quarters of the faculty in higher education are nontenure-track, either adjunct, contingent—some are part-time, some are full-time. But across the board, we are paid less than our tenure-track colleagues. We have few, sometimes no benefits, sometimes no office space, very little time to meet with students. Many of us end up having to work multiple jobs at different campuses just in order to make ends meet.
AMY GOODMAN: Tell us your own experience, Louisa Edgerly.
LOUISA EDGERLY: Well, I finished my degree in 2010 right in the middle of the economic collapse and the worst academic job market, possibly, in history. And like many of my classmates and many people across the country, I have been adjuncting and working several jobs since then. I work at the University of Washington, been fortunate to get some work at Seattle University. I’ve had temporary, part-time staff jobs. I also coach rowing. So, at any one point, I’ve had as many as five different jobs, working between them, traveling from campus to campus, and managing the needs of my students and getting everything done.
AMY GOODMAN: How many classes do you have to teach to make ends meet? And how much do you get paid per class?
LOUISA EDGERLY: It varies by institution how much they pay. Seattle University currently pays—we’re on the quarter system on the West Coast, so the numbers are slightly different than they would be on a semester system—between $4,000 and $5,000 per class. And there are no benefits attached to teaching a single class. In order to make a living wage for the Seattle area, you actually wouldn’t be able to do that, putting together adjunct classes here and there. Most schools will cap the number of single classes that you can teach, the number of quarterly contracts that you can have, so that you don’t become eligible for benefits. So, to make the median wage in Seattle, teaching as an adjunct would be almost impossible. Three classes per quarter, sometimes four classes per quarter, may be possible, but also very difficult to manage.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And if people listening to this or hearing this want to get involved, how could they do this in the movement that you’re building?
LOUISA EDGERLY: There are a number of organizations that have begun to address the concerns of adjunct faculty. There’s the New Faculty Majority. There’s also Adjunct Action. We have been organizing on our campus with the Service Employees International Union, SEIU Local 925. So, unionizing movements for adjunct faculty across the country are really gaining steam. I would encourage people to look at organizing on their own campuses, at joining some of the other groups that support adjunct faculty.
AMY GOODMAN: And, Louisa Edgerly, as we wrap up, just to be clear, an adjunct professor is the full teacher of the class, not the assistant in a class.
LOUISA EDGERLY: That’s correct. We have the same training, the same degrees, the same qualifications, and we teach in exactly the same classrooms. Students are getting the best quality we can give them.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to have to leave it there.
LOUISA EDGERLY: But we’re getting much less.
AMY GOODMAN: But I thank you for joining us, Louisa Edgerly, adjunct instructor at Seattle University, where she’s joining other adjuncts and students and tenure-track professors today in a National Adjunct Walkout Day.
Students and activists are taking direct action over what some have called the nation’s next financial crisis: the more than $1.2 trillion in student loan debt. The massive cost of U.S. college tuition has saddled millions with crushing debt and priced many others out of the classroom. Now, 15 former students of the for-profit Corinthian Colleges system have launched what they say is the nation’s first student debt strike. The students have refused to pay back loans they took out to attend Corinthian, which has been sued by the federal government for its predatory lending. Meanwhile, another activist group has announced it has erased some $13 million of debt owed by students of Everest College, a Corinthian subsidiary. The Rolling Jubilee uses donated funds to purchase debt at discounted prices, then abolish it. We are joined by two guests: Laura Hanna, a filmmaker and activist who helped launch Strike Debt’s Rolling Jubilee initiative, and Latonya Suggs, a student debt striker in the "Corinthian 15" who is $63,000 in debt after completing a two-year program in criminal justice at Everest College.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We turn now to what some have called the nation’s next financial crisis: the over $1.2 trillion in student loan debt. The massive cost of U.S. college tuition has saddled millions with crushing debt and priced many others out of the classroom. Now, 15 former students of the former for-profit Corinthian Colleges system have launched what they say is the nation’s first student debt strike. The students have refused to pay back loans they took out to attend Corinthian, which has been sued by the federal government for its predatory lending. In a moment, we’ll be joined by one of the Corinthian 15, Latonya Suggs. In November, she spoke at a Department of Education, or DOE, hearing in Anaheim, California. She drew cheers from the crowd as she returned her graduation cap to DOE officials.
LATONYA SUGGS: Not only did that sister school fail me, but the Department of Education failed me, as well. I feel that the Department of Education failed me because it is your responsibility to make sure that these schools provide a quality education at an affordable cost and a scam-free school.
AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, an activist group has announced it’s erased over $13 million of debt owed by students of Everest College, a Corinthian subsidiary. The Rolling Jubilee uses donated funds to purchase debt at discounted prices, then abolishes it. This is how Rolling Jubilee explains its campaign.
THOMAS GOKEY: The debts we have are not legitimate.
ANN LARSON: We shouldn’t be forced into debt to cover basic needs like healthcare, housing and education.
ROLLING JUBILEE ACTIVIST 1: We need a jubilee, a clean slate, a cancellation of debts for the 99 percent.
THOMAS GOKEY: Here’s how we’re going to do it. In America, banks sell debt on this shadowy market full of debt buyers. Debt collectors then turn around and try to extort the full amount from us.
ROLLING JUBILEE ACTIVIST 2: That’s where the Rolling Jubilee comes in. It raises money to buy the debt.
ROLLING JUBILEE ACTIVIST 3: But instead of collecting on the debts we buy, we’re going to abolish it. Poof! Shazam!
AMY GOODMAN: Well, for more, we go now to Cincinnati, to Ohio’s PBS station CET, where we’re joined by Latonya Suggs, student debt striker, part of the Corinthian 15. Latonya is $63,000 in debt after completing a two-year program in criminal justice at Everest College.
And here in New York, we’re joined by Laura Hanna, filmmaker, media activist, organizer, who helped launch Strike Debt’s Rolling Jubilee initiative. Laura Hanna is also an organizer at the Debt Collective, which helps people work together to challenge creditors.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Laura, let’s start with you. How did you buy up the debt for the Everest students, like Latonya, and then abolish it?
LAURA HANNA: Sure. Thanks for having us. So, we’ve been working on the Rolling Jubilee for the last couple of years, and as we developed relationships within the market, we found we came upon an opportunity to focus on Corinthian. We knew that they were struggling, and so we thought that this was good space to develop the Rolling Jubilee as a tactic, and it’s also an organizing tool. So, we found around $4 million of Everest tuition debt, and we purchased that about a month before last summer, and then started developing organizing with students out in California. This most recent portfolio is a specific case, which I can get into if you’d like to now. It was actually retired by a debt collector, which we purchased it for one dollar. It was $13 million. And it’s 9,000 accounts across the country.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And when you say you purchased the debt, explain how the process works among financial institutions with defaulted student debt.
LAURA HANNA: Right. So, when you can’t pay a bill, the banks write it off. They then sell it to what’s called the debt buyer. Debt buyer then turns around and sells it to a debt collector for pennies on the dollar. We step in at that point and pick it up. And instead of collecting, we actually just erase those debts. Then we send a letter out to individuals and tell them what we’re doing, why we’re doing it. And they can contact us from there. So...
AMY GOODMAN: So, Latonya Suggs, how did you end up becoming a student debt striker? You were the first member of your immediate family to attend college and graduate?
LATONYA SUGGS: Yes. I actually went on the Everest University concerns page. That’s when I found Ann Larson’s contact information. And I contacted her and told her my story—well, my experience that I had with Everest. And that’s when everything began there.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, but talk about that experience. I mean, $63,000 is a lot of money.
LATONYA SUGGS: Totally, yeah.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: What did the school do? How did they ensnare you, help ensnare you in its predatory lending?
LATONYA SUGGS: Well, I did attend college, Everest, to better my future. I attended Everest to get a better job, land a better career, a better opportunity and what we call the American dream. And they lied to me about everything. There was no career placement after I graduated. They didn’t help me with interviewing, anything like that. They were just basically preying on me to get my money. And I don’t feel that I got a quality education out of attending Everest.
AMY GOODMAN: What would you tell Everest administrators today?
LATONYA SUGGS: I would tell them that what they’re doing is wrong. And to prey on people like me, African-American single mother living in low-income housing, is wrong. I took the necessary steps to better my life, to do better in America. And you turned it around, and you put it in my face and slapped it on the table and said, "Hey, we don’t have nothing for you." And that’s exactly what happened. So if it was up to me, all for-profit schools will be closed down. And they are wrong for even volunteering to even get in—you know, be involved in this type of scam.
AMY GOODMAN: So, have you bought her debt? Have you bought Latonya’s debt?
LAURA HANNA: No, I just want to be clear: We haven’t purchased Latonya’s debt. We’ve been organizing with other students. So, this is sort of on parallel tracks. It’s happening at the same time.
And I want to talk a little bit about our campaign, which is organized through the Debt Collective. I mean, basically, right now what we’re saying is the Department of Education should discharge these debts. They have the statutory power to do so. They’re making money. It’s the same story over and over again, right, where they’re funneling public funds into this for-profit sector by what’s called the 90/10 rule. For-profits are actually funded—90 percent of their funding comes from federal loan subsidies. Corinthian needed to just make up 10 percent of that amount of the business model, right? So they started what’s called Genesis, a predatory lending scheme. And that’s what they’ve been sued for. The CFPB is suing them for $500 million. They’re being investigated. They’ve targeted and preyed on these individuals, and that’s why we’re organizing with them.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the extent—because this is not just a problem with for-profit colleges. A lot of nonprofit universities are also—or so-called nonprofit universities are also ensnaring students in huge amounts of debt.
LAURA HANNA: Right. That’s right. I mean, $1.2 trillion is the student debt load right now. I guess the difference between for-profits and the rest of the schooling would be that, on average, people coming out of for-profits graduate with twice as much debt than the average, which is around $33,000 for students. So, the Debt Collective, yes, certainly wants to point out the broader structural, systemic issues around education, and we think that higher ed can be tuition-free. We wrote a white paper that’s called "How Far to Free?" where we talk about funding tuition-free education across the board. An extra $15 billion would get us there. Obama’s plan, which is the two-year plan, is what? About $60 billion right now. So...
AMY GOODMAN: We are moving on to another segment on education, but we have 30 seconds. Latonya Suggs, what do you tell other students who are burdened with debt right now?
LATONYA SUGGS: To join this movement. Do not be afraid. I was afraid at one point. Do not be afraid. We are here for you. Walk out—if it was up to me, I will have every person that is in a for-profit college or in Everest College to walk out now, because you will end up like me if you don’t. Stand up, join Strike Debt movement, and that’s all I have to say.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Latonya Suggs, thanks so much for being with us, student debt striker, $63,000 in debt—
LATONYA SUGGS: Thank you so much for having me.
AMY GOODMAN: —after completing a two-year program in criminal justice at Everest College, which is a subsidiary of the for-profit Corinthian Colleges system. And Laura Hanna, thanks so much—
LAURA HANNA: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: —helped to launch Strike Debt’s Rolling Jubilee initiative, organizer of the Debt Collective, which helps people work together to challenge creditors. As we move on with our next education segment.
Chicago’s mayoral race is heading to a runoff election after incumbent Rahm Emanuel failed to win 50 percent of the vote. Emanuel raised roughly $16 million, more than four times his challengers combined. Could the second-place challenger, Jesús "Chuy" García, a county commissioner and former immigrant rights activist born in Mexico, defeat the man nicknamed "Mayor 1 Percent"? We are joined by Salim Muwakkil, senior editor of In These Times and host of "The Salim Muwakkil Show" on WVON in Chicago.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We turn to Chicago, where Mayor Rahm Emanuel failed to get more than 50 percent of the vote in Tuesday’s election and must now face off a runoff against second-place finisher Jesús "Chuy" García in April. Despite vastly outspending his four opponents and receiving an in-person endorsement from President Obama, Mayor Emanuel received only about 45 percent of the vote. Emanuel served as Obama’s first chief of staff.
AMY GOODMAN: Chuy García, who serves on the Cook County Board of Commissioners, received about 34 percent of the vote—far higher than expected. García jumped into the race last October after the teachers union president, Karen Lewis, dropped out after being diagnosed with brain cancer. García was born in Mexico. He’s a former immigrant rights activist. He addressed his supporters last night.
JESÚS "CHUY" GARCÍA: Nobody thought we’d be here tonight. They wrote us off. They said we didn’t have a chance. They said we didn’t have any money, while they spent millions attacking us. Well, well, we’re still standing. We’re still running. And we’re going to win. We have something to say to all those big corporations and special interests who spent all those millions to install their own mayor: We want change!
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Mayor Rahm Emanuel raised roughly $16 million, more than four times his challengers combined. On Tuesday night, Emanuel addressed supporters.
MAYOR RAHM EMANUEL: Tomorrow morning, I’ll be seeing you at the L stops, as I have every morning, that skinny kid. Together as a city, we will get
EMANUEL SUPPORTER: I’ll be there, Rahm!
MAYOR RAHM EMANUEL: I have a sinking feeling you’re right, you will be there. We will get back out there, talking to our friends and families and neighbors, as they make a critical choice about who has the strength, who has the leadership, who has the ideas to move this great city forward, so we could secure the future of this great city for our children. Thank you, and God bless you.
AMY GOODMAN: To talk more about the Chicago mayoral race, we’re joined by Salim Muwakkil. He is senior editor of In These Times, host of The Salim Muwakkil Show on WVON in Chicago.
Welcome back to Democracy Now!, Salim. The significance of Rahm Emanuel, who President Obama came out to endorse, who raised, well, what, four times the amount of money of all the candidates against him combined, him not hitting the 50 percent mark so he has to go to a runoff?
SALIM MUWAKKIL: That’s right. I mean, he was widely disliked in Chicago, and especially in the African-American—in the African-American community, some parts of the Latino community, as well. But primarily, he was seen as a candidate of privilege, a candidate who was dedicated to the development of downtown Chicago while neglecting the less privileged precincts of the city. And he was seen as someone who would continue that process of privatizing the public sphere, or the commons, privatizing the commons to the highest bidder. And I think it was simply a reaction to that attitude, and especially with the activism and organizational prowess of the Chicago Teachers Union.
His initial clash with them, I think, is what started his downward spiral in certain communities, because he had that kind of arrogant attitude, an attitude that was pro-charter schools, a sort of dismissive attitude toward the public in Chicago. And the teachers union championed that alternative and championed a lot of candidates in this contest, a lot of aldermanic candidates. They provided Chuy García with some of his seed money in order to get started. And so, I think it was, you know, a number of factors that contributed to Emanuel’s lack of—you know, of fulfilling what a lot of the media took to be kind of conventional wisdom, that he would triumph. Well, the grassroots organizing of the Chicago Teachers Union and other organized labors and community groups that got involved with Chuy’s campaign, they simply outnumbered the money. And that will happen if the passion is there.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Salim, I wanted to ask you, because one of the things that’s struck me, which happens repeatedly in many of these local races, is that the polls were way off on the supposed support for Chuy García. They were talking about he only had about 20 percent support. And I’m wondering, one, your sense of what happened there. And also, Karen Lewis, who was originally the head of the teachers union, was originally supposed to run, but, of course, when she got ill, she had to drop out. I’m wondering, if she had run, she might have—she might have actually beaten Emanuel in the first round.
SALIM MUWAKKIL: I mean, there’s a great possibility of that, yes. But, you know, Karen Lewis was a polarizing figure also, so she would have inspired a lot of passion, but she may have inspired just as much opposition. I think Chuy García is kind of that compromised figure who was a moderate, you know, spot between her passion, her great passion, and a sort of organizational prowess and knowledge that Chuy García possesses. And so, yes. But, you know, I think—Karen Lewis drafted Chuy García, according to his own accounts. She was the one who convinced him to get into the race. And so, she is a large part of—you know, she’s his ideological backbone, I guess you could say, or his great supporter. And he gives—you know, he certainly gives credit to her support.
And Chuy, you know, was also a very—he was a very essential part of the Harold Washington coalition back in the day. And that’s stood him in good stead, let us say, among many of the progressives, who still rally to his side. Many of the leading progressives in Chicago, black progressives, were in his camp. And I think also the candidacy of Willie Wilson and Dock Walls siphoned away some of that discontent from the black community that may have gone—may have gone to Rahm Emanuel, because there is some residual—or, you know, there’s a little bit of animosity in the African-American community toward the Latino community, primarily because of economic threats, the threat of employment replacement, that kind of thing. So there’s a little bit of that in the black community, and perhaps the candidacies of Willie Wilson and Dock Walls siphoned that out to allow, you know, a clearer kind of expression of discontent for the mayor to consolidate on Chuy García.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the significance of Luis Gutiérrez, maybe the most prominent Latino leader in Chicago, not backing Chuy García, but going with Rahm Emanuel?
SALIM MUWAKKIL: Yeah, that’s another thing. You know, Chuy comes out of the progressive wing of the Latino political power in this city. And Gutiérrez represents the opposite wing, let us say. And so, there was always that tension between the two. And, you know, this is an indication that Gutiérrez really doesn’t have the support of the community behind him. He has long ago ceded his credentials, his movement credentials, to support for these kind of mainstream candidates, and he continues that dynamic. And I think he was repudiated in this election. But I’m sure he won’t get the message.
AMY GOODMAN: Salim, we want to thank you for being with us. When is the rerun? When is the runoff, I should say, in April? And what was the voter turnout? And do you think that will change?
SALIM MUWAKKIL: The voter turnout was extremely low. Estimates are that it was—and, in fact, it may have been—it may have hit a record for lack of interest. And that is something also that defies conventional wisdom. You know, the pundits said that if the turnout is low, it’s likely that Emanuel would win without the need of a runoff. But that, too, was—you know, was contradicted by the result of this election. So, we look forward to the general election, and Chuy’s chances look very good, very good.
AMY GOODMAN: Salim Muwakkil is senior editor of In These Times, host of The Salim Muwakkil Show on WVON in Chicago. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. When we come back, we’ll look at President Obama’s veto of the Keystone XL pipeline, and we’ll speak to Kumi Naidoo, the head of Greenpeace International in South Africa. Why was he being spied on? Stay with us.
President Obama has vetoed a Republican bill approving the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline. The White House says the move is not a judgment on the pipeline’s merits, but a bid to see through a State Department review that will determine whether the project is in the national interest. Opponents of the Keystone XL pipeline have warned against further development of the tar sands oil fields in Canada. In 2011, NASA climate scientist James Hansen said approval of the Keystone XL pipeline would be "game over" for the Earth’s climate. May Boeve, executive director of 350.org, said: "After four years of rallies, marches, sit-ins, and civil disobedience, we’re thrilled to see President Obama take an important first step by vetoing this love letter to Big Oil. ... Now, it’s time for the president to show he’s serious about his climate legacy by moving on to step two: rejecting this pipeline once and for all." We discuss the politics of the pipeline with Kert Davies, executive director of the Climate Investigations Center.
Image Credit: Reuters
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: President Barack Obama has vetoed a Republican bill approving the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline. Obama said the congressional measure unwisely bypassed a State Department process that will determine whether the project would be beneficial to the United States. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the veto should not be interpreted as the administration’s opposition to the actual pipeline.
PRESS SECRETARY JOSH EARNEST: The reason the president will veto this legislation that has passed the Congress is that it circumvents a long-standing administrative process for evaluating whether or not infrastructure projects like this are in the best interest of the country. And it does not represent a specific position on the pipeline itself.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has announced the Republican-led chamber will attempt to override Obama’s veto, but he does not appear to have enough votes. Opponents of the Keystone pipeline have warned against further development of the tar sands in Canada. In 2011, NASA climate scientist James Hansen said Obama’s approval of the pipeline would be, quote, "game over" for the Earth’s climate. May Boeve, executive director of 350.org said Tuesday, quote, "After four years of rallies, marches, sit-ins, and civil disobedience, we’re thrilled to see President Obama take an important first step by vetoing this love letter to Big Oil. ... Now, it’s time for the president to show he’s serious about his climate legacy by moving on to step two: rejecting this pipeline once and for all."
AMY GOODMAN: The debate over Keystone comes at a time when much of the country is experiencing extreme weather, from record cold from Alabama to Maine to historic droughts in California and other parts of the West.
Joining us now in Washington, D.C., is Kert Davies, executive director of the Climate Investigations Center, formerly with Greenpeace. Davies was in the news this week after he obtained documents that revealed one of the nation’s most prominent scientists involved in denying climate change has failed to disclose his extensive funding from the fossil fuel industry. We’ll talk about that in a moment, but first to Keystone.
Kert Davies, your response to the veto, but the fact that it does not mean Keystone is over?
KERT DAVIES: Great to be here. Yeah, I mean, this fight is long from over, but the president clearly has enough information to just cancel this project. This vote—this bill that was sent to the president yesterday is a charade. It is, if anything, an indication of the power of the oil industry over this country, the fact that Senate bill number one, the very first order of business when the Republicans took over the Senate, was an oil pipeline for a foreign oil company to get through our country. Our country is an obstacle for this company to get their oil to international markets. And that was the first priority of our Congress when they came back from that victorious election. That’s the first thing you need to realize.
So the president needs to cancel the project. They’re going through the bureaucratic process of letting the State Department, you know, review it and everything, but we need to stop listening to the oil companies and do what’s right for this country and what’s right for the climate. The pipeline is an accelerant for climate change. If the president is consistent with his climate pledge, he will not approve this pipeline.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Kert, about this State Department study, we’re talking about what’s been going on about six years now—I mean, an environmental impact. Why do they say it’s taking so long?
KERT DAVIES: They’re not very good at it. Basically, they’re not used to doing environmental impact statements. They’ve blown it a couple times and had to redo it. You know, basically, there’s now a Department of Energy within the State Department to try to expedite things on energy as a geopolitical weapon. But the real matter here is that we don’t need this. It basically makes the pipe—the Keystone makes the tar sands oil more available to markets. It absolutely is a bad thing for the climate. And if the EPA weighs in and does the right thing and says this will increase greenhouse gas emissions, the president said several years ago, if it does that, we shouldn’t approve the pipeline. And it clearly does increase global warming.
A new investigation exposes how one of the top scientists involved in denying climate change has failed to disclose his extensive funding from the fossil fuel industry. Dr. Wei-Hock Soon of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has downplayed global warming and rejected human activity as its cause, arguing the sun is more responsible than greenhouse gases from pollution. Climate denialists — including Republican Senator James Inhofe, chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee — frequently cite Soon’s work to reject concrete action. But documents obtained by the Climate Investigations Center show Soon received more than $1.2 million from fossil fuel corporations and conservative groups over the last decade and failed to disclose those ties in most of his scientific papers. Funders include ExxonMobil, the American Petroleum Institute, coal utility Southern Company and the Charles G. Koch Foundation. In letters with his funders, Soon referred to his scientific papers or congressional testimony as "deliverables." We are joined by the Kert Davies, executive director at Climate Investigations Center.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: Kert Davis, I want to turn now to your new investigation that exposes how one of the top scientists involved in denying climate change has failed to disclose his extensive funding from the fossil fuel industry. Dr. Wei-Hock Soon of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has downplayed global warming, rejected human activity as its cause, argued the sun is more responsible than greenhouse gases. Climate denialists, including Republican Senator James Inhofe, chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, frequently cite his work to reject concrete action. But documents obtained by your group, by the Climate Investigations Center, show Dr. Soon received more than $1.2 million from fossil fuel corporations and conservative groups over the last decade and failed to disclose those ties in most of his scientific papers. Funders include ExxonMobil, the American Petroleum Institute, coal utility Southern Company, and Charles G. Koch Foundation. In letters with his funders, Dr. Soon referred to his scientific papers or congressional testimony as, quote, "deliverables." These new details confirm earlier concerns about Dr. Soon’s funding, which he downplays in this clip from 2013.
WEI-HOCK SOON: I have received funding from federal government, but I stopped receiving. I have no penny of that money from the government since 2004 or so. And I’ve been receiving money from whoever that wants to give me money. I write my scientific proposal. I have received money from ExxonMobil, but ExxonMobil no longer give me any money for a long time, American Petroleum Institute. Anything you wish for, from Southern Company, from all these companies, I write proposal. I let them judge whether they will fund me or not, always for a very small amount. If they choose to fund me, I’m happy to receive it.
AMY GOODMAN: So, that’s Dr. Soon from 2013. Kert Davies, you’re the executive director of the Climate Investigations Center, which obtained the new documents through public records requests that shed new light on the influence of fossil fuel interests on the research of Dr. Willie Soon. Can you talk about what you found?
KERT DAVIES: Well, first, to clarify, it is a Greenpeace investigation going back to 2009, when I was there. We started with a FOIA, a Public Records Act request to the Smithsonian, asking for any information on Soon’s sources of outside income. We knew from 2007 that he was getting money from the Charles Koch Foundation, American Petroleum Institute and ExxonMobil. So we asked a simple question: Show us where he’s getting his funding from. We got a spreadsheet back. Then we said we want to see the communication with these funders. Years go by. We got some email. Then, in the email, it showed that there were attachments, there were contracts. We said, "Let’s see the contracts, and let’s see the proposals." We finally got those. And it is a very rare window into this universe and an amazing moment, actually, probably the most important investigation that Greenpeace has done on climate denial.
What we’ve discovered is that these contracts are explicit in keeping the funder quiet, keeping the funder secret. In the case of the Southern Company, one of the largest polluters in the country, a massive utility that stretches from Georgia to Alabama to Mississippi, owns some of the largest coal plants in the world and in the country, burns Powder River Basin coal, you know, trains going a mile long going to these plants every day and up into the atmosphere—they want to keep us in the dark about climate change, and Willie Soon is one of their pawns, actually. They’re using him, and they’re using the Harvard-Smithsonian name to get that word out that there’s misinformation—that is, that there’s no scientific consensus, rather.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics says it’s launched an inquiry into whether Dr. Soon properly reported the more than $1.5 million in private funding he received to the journals that have published his research. The Center said it, quote, "does not support Dr. Soon’s conclusions on climate change." But it has previously insisted its scholars are peer-reviewed and vetted by other scientists, saying, quote, "This is the way the scientific process works. The funding entities, regardless of their affiliation, have no influence on the research." Your reaction, but also the impact on these journals and the scientific community of these undisclosed donations to Dr. Soon?
KERT DAVIES: Well, we’ve written all the journals to ask them what their reaction is. This is the key part of this investigation, is that we’ve uncovered basic conflict of interest in science. If a doctor, if a medical doctor wrote a paper saying, you know, a drug was bad for you, and was taking money from its competitor, that would be pretty immoral, if not illegal and unethical, to tell people that a drug was harmful and while they’re taking money from the other side. This is what’s happening here. This is a guy taking money from polluters to say that greenhouse gases are not the problem, it’s actually variation in the sun’s radiation that causes the warming we’re experiencing. And he’s taking money from the other side and not disclosing it in the papers, then telling the corporation, "This is what I did for you. I wrote these papers." So, that—
AMY GOODMAN: These "deliverables."
KERT DAVIES: Deliverables, exactly. Like anybody who’s ever written a grant, you have "Here are the outcomes of the grant, here’s what I promised to do with your money." This is—so this is a pretty important thing. And Senator Markey has launched an investigation. The House Science Committee, House Resource Committee are looking into it. There’s a lot of people who are very concerned that other rules may have been broached. There’s a—you know, the IG’s investigation at Smithsonian, we hope, will look into a lot of things, and we’re posting on ClimateInvestigations.org a piece about what they might ask, the questions they might ask internally.
AMY GOODMAN: Do you think he should be fired?
KERT DAVIES: I’m not the judge of that. I mean, if he wants to do his science, if he wants to, you know, go back to studying plasmas in the atmosphere and the sun’s corona and whatever he’s an expert at, that’s fine. If he discloses who’s funding it, that’s fine. I mean, when he did a paper in 2007 that said—was funded by Exxon, Koch and the American Petroleum Institute, saying that polar bears are just fine and the Arctic is not melting, you know, why are those entities interested in telling that story? It’s a pretty simple line: because they don’t want us to know that polar bears are in trouble and the Arctic is melting. They want us to think differently about that. So, he can go on doing whatever he wants to do. I don’t care if he stays there or gets fired, as long as it’s transparent and the world knows that he’s being paid by polluters.
Al Jazeera has obtained leaked diplomatic cables showing a number of foreign requests to South African intelligence to spy on activists, NGOs and politicians. One document shows South Korea sought out a "specific security assessment" of Greenpeace International Executive Director Kumi Naidoo in the run-up to a meeting of G20 leaders in Seoul in 2010. The disclosure is among scores contained in leaks to Al Jazeera by a South African intelligence source. From South Africa, we speak with Kumi Naidoo. "We are winning the [climate change] argument, and those trying to hold us back are getting desperate," Naidoo says.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re also joined by Kumi Naidoo, executive director of Greenpeace International. Al Jazeera reported on Tuesday that it obtained leaked cables showing a number of foreign requests to South African intelligence for the spying on activists, NGOs and politicians. According to Al Jazeera, one document shows South Korea sought out a specific security assessment of Kumi Naidoo in the run-up to a meeting of G20 leaders in Seoul in 2010.
Kumi, welcome to Democracy Now! Can you talk about these revelations that have just come out?
KUMI NAIDOO: Thank you very much, and thank you for having us. We were contacted late last year with the information that Al Jazeera had some surveillance intelligence that they had picked up. And essentially, this was in 2010, when I was planning to go to the G20, when his request was made. This was also at a time when the South Korean government was at the G20 pushing its nuclear technology on South Africa, India, Turkey and so on. So, obviously, this is quite a big story here in South Africa. And I’m in South Africa at the moment.
And, you know, we make an assumption, right, that there are surveillance. We’ve got many cases where companies have actually spied on us and have paid damages to us or apologized publicly and so on. This is the first time we have sort of evidence. While we—especially since the Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks information has come out, you would be naïve not to anticipate that governments might be doing this. But, you know, it’s one thing sort of knowing that governments might be doing that; it’s another thing having it confirmed by looking at these cables and so on.
But the bottom line is, you know, Mahatma Gandhi once said, "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, and then you win." They’re not ignoring us. They’re not laughing at us. They’re fighting us really, really hard—not, you know, just this case, but in India and elsewhere. And we are also going to take some comfort at the fact that our campaigning in the broader environmental movement—and, by the way, this is not just Greenpeace that is impacted, but other environmental groups, as well as other civil society groups. And I would urge us to take some comfort to say that we are winning the argument. Those who are holding us back are getting desperate. And I would see this as more an act of desperation rather than act of strength on the part of the governments in question.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Kumi, what’s been the reaction of the South African government to the revelations? How have they justified or attempted to defend their actions?
KUMI NAIDOO: Well, the request was made by South Korean intelligence. And what—and there are cases in the full so-called spy cables where there’s requests made and where the South African has, in some cases, gone back, with regard to, for example, a Cameroonian opposition leader, when requested by Cameroonian intelligence to say—to give information about his activities while he was visiting in South Africa, the South African government said, "We have noted your request, but we do not believe there’s a need to actually respond, because there’s no justification for it."
Now, what’s missing from that cables package is a equal thing with regard to this request regarding whether I’m dangerous or not. You know, that was how it was put, that, you know, they considered me dangerous. So, the South African government needs to answer the question of whether they shared any information. They need to either confirm or deny that. And they need to also—if they confirm that, then, you know, obviously, we will push hard to find out exactly what information was actually shared.
But right now, I am consulting with a public interest litigation NGO in South Africa, which has been around since the anti-apartheid struggle, called the Legal Resources Center. And I’m doing a press conference with the South African media tomorrow morning South African time, where I will outline what course of action Greenpeace and myself are planning to take.
AMY GOODMAN: Kumi, where are we speaking to you in South Africa? Are you in Durban, or should I just ask South African intelligence?
KUMI NAIDOO: Yeah, they know where. I’m in Johannesburg at the moment.
AMY GOODMAN: You’re in Johannesburg. I was interested because, of course, I saw you in—well, at all the U.N. climate summits—well, not the last, but certainly in Durban, South Africa. And we in the United States right now are experiencing, to say the least, extreme weather. The weather centers on television used to be called "weather centers," you know, where the meteorologists stood. Now it’s "extreme weather center" or "severe weather center." The South has never experienced this kind of cold and snow; the Northeast, the freezing temperatures; droughts in California. As we wrap up—and you heard we were speaking to Kert Davies, as well, about the American Petroleum Institute and other corporations funding Dr. Soon, the climate denier—your thoughts on this backdrop of what’s happening in the world today around climate change?
KUMI NAIDOO: Well, most of all, political and business leaders have now been pushed into a corner, where they have had to acknowledge the science, acknowledge the fact that we have to change, and are saying, in broad terms, the right thing, that we have to cut down emissions, we have to transition to a clean economy and so on. Where there is a fundamental gap between what we are saying in the environmental movement and what governments are saying is that the pace of change is sort of based on their own realities, with a more business-as-usual approach, and our political and business leaders have to understand we cannot change the science, we can only change political will, and that the longer we delay, the more we drag our feet, the consequences, in terms of the loss of human life, loss of infrastructure, economic impact and so on, are all going to be negative.
And what we are saying to the South African government, to governments around the world, is, turn the crisis of climate change into an opportunity, because in South Africa right now, there’s an electricity crisis. There’s an ultradependency on coal and, to a lesser extent, nuclear. And our government has the capability of actually revolutionizing our energy supply by harnessing the fact that solar has unlimited potential, wind potential, other renewable energy potentials. And if we did it smart, in South Africa and elsewhere in the world, we can have a double win. We can have a win for the economy, because various studies show the job-creation potential of a serious energy revolution, from dirty, brown, fossil fuel-based, -driven economy to clean, green, renewable-based energy, could—if done smartly and thoughtfully and strategically, could give us a jobs bonanza.
AMY GOODMAN: Kumi Naidoo—
KUMI NAIDOO: So, we will—we are very clear that it is the interests of the current oil, coal and gas companies, which actually own many of our governments, that are holding us back.
AMY GOODMAN: Kumi, thanks so much for being with us, Kumi Naidoo, executor director of Greenpeace International, speaking to us by Democracy Now! video stream from Johannesburg, South Africa. And thanks to Kert Davies, executive director of the Climate Investigations Center, formerly also with Greenpeace.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we’re talking education, from student debt to an adjunct walkout across the country. Stay with us.
Headlines:
Obama Vetoes Keystone XL Bill in order to Finish State Dept. Review
President Obama has vetoed a Republican bill approving the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline. Obama says the measure unwisely bypasses a State Department review that will determine whether the project is in the national interest. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the veto should not be seen as a judgment on the pipeline’s merits.
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest: "It circumvents a long-standing administrative process for evaluating whether or not infrastructure projects like this are in the best interest of the country. And it does not represent a specific position on the pipeline itself, it just merely says that the benefits and consequences of building that pipeline should be thoroughly evaluated by experts and through this administrative process that has existed for decades."
The rejection of Keystone XL marks the third veto of Obama’s six years in office. Senate Republicans say they will try to override Obama’s veto, but they do not appear to have enough votes. We will have more on this story later in the broadcast.
Dept. of Homeland Security Risks Shutdown Despite GOP Move for Separate Vote
The Department of Homeland Security has inched closer to a partial shutdown amidst a congressional stalemate over immigration. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has agreed to allow a vote on a clean bill to fund DHS, after Democrats rejected four Republican bids to tie the funding to a repeal of Obama’s executive actions on immigration. But Senate Democrats want reassurance the House would pass the clean bill. Last month, the House passed a DHS funding bill that would have effectively reversed both Obama’s recent plan to spare millions of immigrants from deportation, and his 2012 policy allowing so-called DREAMers brought to the United States as children to remain here. If DHS runs out of money Friday, many Republican-backed policies would halt, including the employee screening system E-Verify and efforts to further militarize the border.
ISIS Reportedly Kidnaps Dozens in Iraq after Capture of Christians in Syria
The Islamic State has reportedly kidnapped more than 100 males, including nine boys, near the Iraqi city of Tikrit. Most of the captives have relatives fighting the ISIS advance in Iraq, and their kidnapping is seen as a pressure tactic to stop the resistance. A new U.N. report says ISIS has "intentionally and systematically targeted" Iraq’s various ethnic groups and subjected them to "gross human rights abuses. The news comes one day after ISIS militants kidnapped an estimated 150 Assyrian Christians in northeastern Syria, including women and the elderly.
Eurozone Ministers Approve 4-Month Extension of Greece Rescue Package
Eurozone finance ministers have formally approved a four-month extension of a financial rescue package for Greece. The new Syriza government in Athens sought the temporary deal as part of a bid to undo the austerity demands of its international bailout. In exchange, Greece committed to several reforms, including cracking down on corruption and tax evasion, and tightening public spending. European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis announced the deal’s approval.
Valdis Dombrovskis: "Basically, it was concluded that the reform program or list of reforms presented by new Greek government is sufficient enough to start or to be a good starting point for a successful completion of the program."
The extension grants a temporary lifeline to Greece, but delays a longer-term standoff over its campaign pledge to reject the harshest austerity conditions imposed by creditors, which have caused massive unemployment and other hardships.
Rebels Withdraw Heavy Weapons as Ukraine Truce Takes Hold
The truce in eastern Ukraine appears to be taking hold after more than a week of violence since it first took effect. Pro-Russian separatists have pulled their heavy weaponry from the front lines, a key demand under the ceasefire deal. The Ukrainian military says fighting has stopped, but that it is too early for a pullback of their own following the rebel offensive to take the city of Debaltseve last week. On Tuesday, a rebel leader said his side still aims to control the entire territory of the two separatist provinces, including the port of Mariupol, but to seek this through "negotiations with the Ukrainian side."
Kerry: Russia Lying "to My Face" on Ukraine
In an appearance before Congress, Secretary of State John Kerry accused Russia of lying to his face about its military involvement in eastern Ukraine.
Secretary of State John Kerry: "Russia is engaged in a rather remarkable period of the most overt and extensive propaganda exercise that I’ve seen since the very height of the Cold War. And they have been persisting in their misrepresentations, lies — whatever you want to call them — about their activities there to my face, to the face of others, on many different occasions."
National Security Adviser Calls Netanyahu Visit "Destructive"
Top administration officials continue to criticize Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for an upcoming visit to the United States that seeks to undermine a nuclear deal with Iran. Speaking to PBS, White House National Security Adviser Susan Rice said Netanyahu’s planned visit and speech to Congress has "injected a degree of partisanship, which is not only unfortunate, I think it’s destructive of the fabric of the relationship." Speaking before Congress, Secretary of State John Kerry criticized Netanyahu’s stance without mentioning him by name.
Secretary of State John Kerry: "The policy is Iran will not get a nuclear weapon. And anybody running around right now jumping in to say, 'Well, we don't like the deal,’ or this or that, doesn’t know what the deal is. And there is no deal yet. And I caution people to wait and see what these negotiations produce."
The United States and Iran will resume talks next week in a bid to reach a deal before a March 31 deadline. A leaked cable discussed on Democracy Now! Tuesday shows Israel’s own intelligence agency, the Mossad, contradicted Netanyahu’s claims on Iran’s nuclear capability.
Spy Cables Show South Korea Sought Surveillance of Greenpeace Head Kumi Naidoo
Newly revealed leaked cables show a number of foreign requests to South African intelligence to spy on activists, NGOs and politicians. According to Al Jazeera, one document shows South Korea sought out a "specific security assessment" of Greenpeace Executive Director Kumi Naidoo, a South African citizen. Naidoo called the disclosure chilling.
Kumi Naidoo: "Sadly, the assumption that we make, especially after the Edward Snowden leaks and the WikiLeaks information came out, that in fact we are heavily monitored and being under constant surveillance. But it’s one thing sort of assuming that it’s happening; it’s a little numbing and chilling to have it confirmed, as you are doing right now."
The disclosure is among scores contained in cables leaked to Al Jazeera by a South African intelligence source. We will talk to Kumi Naidoo later in the broadcast.
Chicago Mayoral Race Heads to April Runoff as Emanuel Falls Short of 50% Vote
The Chicago mayor’s race is headed to an April runoff after incumbent Rahm Emanuel failed to get more than 50 percent of the vote. Emanuel will face second-place finisher Jesús "Chuy" García, a county commissioner and former immigrant rights activist who has support from the Chicago Teachers Union and other labor and progressive groups. García received about 34 percent, far higher than expected. We will talk more about the election in today’s broadcast.
Report: Chicago Police Detain, Abuse Prisoners at Secret Site; Ex-Justice Officials Call for Probe
Chicago police have reportedly operated a secret compound for detentions and interrogations, often with abusive methods. According to The Guardian, detainees as young as 15 years old have been taken to a nondescript warehouse known as Homan Square. Some are calling it the domestic equivalent of a CIA "black site" overseas. Prisoners were denied access to their attorneys, beaten, and held for up to 24 hours without any official record of their detention. Brian Jacob Church, who was arrested during Chicago’s 2012 anti-NATO protests, said he was shackled to a bench for 17 hours without being read his Miranda rights.
Brian Jacob Church: "When they first arrested us, they took us to this building. We were never booked. We were never processed. I was in Homan Square for about 17 hours, handcuffed to a bench, before I was actually finally allowed to see an attorney."
At least one victim was found unresponsive in an interrogation room and later pronounced dead. The Guardian says the detainees brought to the Homan site "are most often poor, black and brown." Two former senior officials in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division have called on their colleagues to launch a probe.
Justice Dept. Won’t Charge Zimmerman for Trayvon Martin’s Killing
The Justice Department has announced it will not charge George Zimmerman for the 2012 killing of unarmed African-American teen Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida. Martin was walking home from a convenience store carrying candy and juice when Zimmerman followed him, claiming he looked suspicious. After an altercation, Zimmerman fatally shot Martin in the chest. Zimmerman’s acquittal galvanized the country on issues of race and bias in the criminal justice system. On Tuesday, federal officials said there is "insufficient evidence" to charge Zimmerman with violating Martin’s civil rights. In a statement, the Justice Department said: "Our decision does not condone the shooting that resulted in the death of Trayvon Martin and is based solely on the high legal standard applicable to these cases." Thursday marks the third anniversary of Martin’s death.
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