Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the Independent Women’s Forum Senior Policy Analyst Patrice Onwuka to the newsmakers line to discuss her recent piece on Kamala Harris’s photo op and a short visit to El Paso while avoiding the real crisis at the Rio Grande Valley area.
Leahy: We are joined on our newsmaker line by our very good friend Patrice Onwuka with the Independent Women’s Forum. Good morning, Patrice.
Onwuka: Good morning, Michael. How are you today?
Leahy: Well, I just thought that the topic that you wrote about recently was funny to me.
Onwuka: Oh boy.
Leahy: Because Kamala Harris went down to the border kind of sort of for a photo op at the airport I think. How long was she at the border in El Paso, which is not the center of the problem?
Onwuka: She ended up staying a few hours, in addition to meeting some Border Patrol agents at a facility. I believe she also sat down with some local religious leaders.
I pegged her time originally at about two hours. She may have saved three or four. But certainly not enough time and definitely not in the right place to see the actual surge in migrants and surge in illicit drugs and other illegal activity going on at the southern border.
Leahy: Nothing says border control like meeting with religious leaders right? (Laughs) I mean, look, I love having conversations with religious leaders about issues of religion, but why, when she goes to the border, does she meet with religious leaders? Are they involved with the enforcement of our immigration laws?
Onwuka: I believe maybe some of them are involved with housing or providing services (Inaudible talk) and other service providers.
And listen, I love our civic community, religious community groups they are important. But I think even more important is actually going to the areas of the border where that is not an actual port of entry (Chuckles) where the people who are coming across are not doing so legally.
But actually going to to the areas where it’s actually worse where you’re seeing the smugglers, the coyotes dropping little kids in the middle of the night, and open fields where you’re seeing many groups of migrants distracting Border Patrol agents while drug smugglers are running fentanyl across our borders.
And by the way, that heads northeast, and west to every part of our country. I get that she wants to deal with the core issues and she wants to get to the root of the problem, but she also needs to deal with the immediate impact, and she’s not doing that.
Leahy: Well, I can tell her exactly how to get to the root of the problem. Are you ready? She needs to go and stand next to Joe Biden and then put a mirror up and look at those two people. Right? That’s the core of the problem, in my view.
Onwuka: Let’s go back to day one of the Biden administration in their haste to undo every Trump policy, particularly on immigration. They reversed some really powerful policies that were in place that were stemming the flow of migrants and forcing people, shocker, to apply for asylum in the nearest country of sanctuary instead of skipping three or four countries that want to apply for asylum at the closest safe place to you. But things like that were changed. And as a result, we’ve seen the signal going out to Central America and the rest of the countries. The policies have changed. Come on in now. The cartels have exploited this policy change to again recruit people who want to come to this country for whatever reason, I understand. But they’re exploiting the situation. The drug cartels are exploiting it for their own nefarious purposes. And we have an administration that is intentionally sticking its head in the sand because it doesn’t want to disrupt the very far left of its party and its wing who think that we should actually have no borders. And who are frankly, oh, happy to allowing as many people that want to be, with no regard for who they are, why they’re coming and where they’re going to go.
Leahy: Well, let me ask you this. You say that the Biden administration is intentionally “sticking their head in the sand.” Now you’re being, I think, generous to them.
You’re kind of saying it’s a little bit, it’s really incompetence. Is it incompetence or is it an intentional violation of American immigration law?
Onwuka: It’s intentional. Incompetence would be to say, well, let’s try something different and we get a different outcome. No.
We’ve seen for the past, probably five or six months now, the rise that it’s hitting. A 20 year high for illegal border crossings. When it hits the high one month that may be incompetence.
Beyond that, that is intentional. It’s undermining our immigration system and our immigration laws, which, yes, they can be fixed.
And our system is pretty broken. But we have a system and we have laws in place. And if you want Congress to fix it well work with Congress to do so.
But this is what happens when we have executive orders from Republican and Democratic presidents that can be undone by the next administration.
For folks out there, this is just the beginning. We are hearing that the White House is ready to overturn Title 42. What is Title 42 you ask?
It was a measure that was put in place under the Trump administration last year because of the coronavirus pandemic. In essence, individuals coming by themselves would be turned away at our southern border just for health and safety reasons.
That is going to end because there have been activist groups pushing the Biden administration calling Title 42 somehow uncompassionate and heartless.
Now what you’re going to see is a rise of people, families, family units, young people coming unaccompanied and single individuals who had been turned away at the border.
Now they’re going to be able to come and gain illegal entry. I had the privilege of being on a television network yesterday where I got to ask Tom Homan, who is a former head of the Southern Border Patrol, about this issue.
And he absolutely said, Patrice, you’re 100 percent right. We haven’t seen anything yet when it comes to what’s going to happen once Title 42 is overturned or reverse. And we’re expecting the Biden administration to do that any day now.
Leahy: Any day now. By the way, I think you point out in your column that El Paso is not exactly the hotspot for illegal entry into the United States. That’s what, 800 miles away in the Rio Grande Valley?
Onwuka: It is. El Paso is actually a port of entry, meaning that it’s guarded. It’s a place where you actually have to go in there and we know who you are.
We know why you’re coming. So what you’re not seeing are a lot of illegal entries there. You’re also not seeing the apprehension of, let’s say, fentanyl or illicit illegal drugs and guns coming through our port of entry.
Not surprising, right? Where it is going on is 800 miles away in the Rio Grande Valley area. This is where you’re having migrants dying in the Rio Grande trying to cross that river to get into the United States.
This is where we’re seeing the heartbreaking video of young people, babies, kids dropped over the border wall, left in the middle of the night by themselves by smugglers who are simply using these individuals as distractions to the border agents.
While the border agents are trying to take care of a little baby or taking care of a group of migrants these drug cartels are running fentanyl across our border.
They’re running drugs and other types of drugs and guns across our border. Now, for them, it’s a fantastic money-making enterprise that the Biden administration has allowed them to tap into.
Where I would have loved to have seen Vice President Kamala Harris go to is that area so that she could see not just the detention center, but see exactly what our border agents are being overrun overworked and what’s happening there so that they could figure out okay.
We do need to change our policies. We do need to work with Congress for a long-term solution. But it’s wonderful when you go to a place where it’s nice and easy and there’s a photo op, then you can pat yourself on the back and say that the crisis is under control, when, in fact, it is not.
Leahy: Patrice, what do you make of this character, the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas? Every time you turn around, my impression of the guy is he’s a smart guy who is using legal ease to defend the flouting of American immigration law, which is a convention of his oath of office.
He’s the guy you write about. He’s the guy that picked El Paso as the place for Kamala Harris to visit. What do you make of this guy?
Onwuka: Well, he was put in place for a good reason, which is, he is smart. He looks great on television. He seems measured, seems calm, and seems like he’ll have things under control. But really, he’s just doing the bit of his bosses and trying to advance their agenda on immigration.
So you may be a sweet talker. You may seem smart, but if you are again flouting the law, or if your policies are directly responsible for the rise in illegal entries, the rise in people coming into the United States, I don’t think you’re doing your job.
You’re not doing a good service to the American people. And really, that’s who you work for. The American people. Not just the president, not just the vice president.
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Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed IWF’s Senior Fellow Carrie Sheffield to the newsmakers line to discuss her recent piece at CNN and connecting with an audience that she calls ‘the persuadables.’
Leahy: We welcome to our newsmaker line our good friend Carrie Sheffield, a senior fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum, most recently with our good friend John Solomon at Just the News. Welcome, Carrie Good morning.
Sheffield: Yes. Hi.
Leahy: Good morning, Carrie.
Sheffield: Hi. You cut out for a second, but here I am. How are you?
Leahy: Well, we are great, Carrie. Now, I have a little bit of mystery here that I’d like to see if you could help me solve. So you actually were able to get an op-ed published at CNN. How did that happen?
Sheffield: I give credit to the CNN op-ed editor. He’s had a long career at News Day, which is out on Long Island, which is one of the more conservative places of New York. I think he’s got respect. He understands there’s actually a need in the opinion section for CNN for more voices.
Leahy: Was this the first time you had an op-ed at CNN, or have you had it up there before?
Sheffield: No, I’ve been writing for almost four years. Fall of 2017 was my first.
Leahy: Wow. Cheap things I didn’t know Carrie about you or CNN. (Laughter)
Sheffield: I’m more than happy to write because a challenge people who are going to be triggered. But the secret part of why I do CNN and been on a bunch of MSNBC programs on shows like Don Lemon and Al Sharpton is because even though on Twitter and elsewhere I’m going to be dragged and there are very vocal liberals. I do know that there are some persuadables, and usually, they’re not as vocal. And I’m really trying to reach them.
Leahy: So what kind of response you get from CNN readers to your columns?
Sheffield: I would say the average as I said, I get online, a lot of hate. Liberals will post on Twitter or Facebook or other social media about how much they hate the column. But like I said, my audience, my target audience isn’t them. I’m really trying to reach people who are persuadable.
Leahy: So the persuadable people who watch CNN, who don’t sit in their basement and send nasty-grams out. That’s who you’re trying to reach.
Sheffield: Well, exactly. I was just at the airport yesterday and low and behold, they’re playing CNN everywhere. So it is one of those brands that I think that the operators of places like bars and airports and other public areas, doctors offices, maybe they’re not so political, and they think that it’s more down the middle and they don’t really realize how far left it is. Again, I’m more than happy to take any opportunity I can to get a good word out there.
Leahy: Heads must have exploded in Jeff Zucker’s CEO suite after he read this piece. Trump Deserves Credit for Policies Biden is Adopting on Foreign Policy. You wrote that it and it was published yesterday. Make the case here for our listeners that you make in this column.
Sheffield: Yeah, absolutely. What I did was I went through and I looked at the way that to his credit, I mean, I could write pages and pages and multiple books on ways I disagree with Joe Biden, but he is backtracking on some key foreign policy decisions and going in the direction of Trump.
One obviously is a really big one about China. And the big point I made in the lead was that look, he’s saying some right things, but the big question is whether he is actually going to back this up.
For example, on China, he said that he really wants to take a muscular posture. Biden expanded the list of Chinese companies that are barred from U.S. investors. His Secretary of state has been saying pretty much the exact same thing that Mike Pompeo was saying about the Uyghurs and the human rights abuses there in China.
And then the big kahuna is that he reversed course on doing a deeper dive into the roots of the Wuhan virus. And before we know, Democrats were saying that when Trump was calling for that, that was somehow xenophobic.
And now you have people like even Anthony Fauci, who were saying they want more of an investigation. I don’t know if there’s going to be any teeth to this or this is all just performative.
I hope that they will actually do more of an investigation. I don’t know that there are even the materials and the evidence at this point. It’s probably been destroyed. But at least they are willing to admit that they were wrong.
Leahy: The four keywords from your lead sentence about Biden backing Trump policies in some instances now were, ‘at least on paper.’
Sheffield: (Chuckles) Yes, exactly.
Leahy: By the way, that was a very nicely written lead sentence. And I’m sure as you’re thinking that through, at what point did you say I got to add these four words at least on paper?
Sheffield: Right from the get-go because that really is the big question. It’s interesting how much Biden says one thing and does another because he certainly did that quite a bit during the campaign where he promised that he was just the nice moderate, the friendly moderate in the race, and he’s governed anything but.
I do think that on foreign policy realism has set in. At the end of the day, I think a lot of this is coming from his staff. And so he did another thing that he continued from Trump which was with Russia.
This Open Skies Treaty, which was about patrols that were allowed by Russians and the United States over each other’s territories. And the Russians kept cheating on it. And President Trump said we’re going to pull out of this because they’re just not keeping it.
And at the time, Joe Biden said it was a short-sided policy of going it alone and abandoning American leadership. He said it would increase the risks of miscalculation and conflict and alienate Europeans who wanted the U.S to stay in the treaty.
And it turns out now Biden is saying and the exact opposite again, to his credit, he is keeping the U.S. out and not trying to get back into that treaty. He is doing some things that I very much disagree with Russia.
President Trump had put some sanctions on some Russian companies that were trying to finish the Nord Two Streamline Pipeline. And I found it really ironic that Joe Biden removed those sanctions and basically paved the way to allow this major strategic pipeline that’s going between Russia and Germany.
It’s going to make Germany way more dependent on Russian fuel. And this pipeline bypasses Ukraine, which means that Ukraine is going to be economically weakened right now or in the future going forward because they’re not going to get the land transfer fees, and it’s hurting Ukraine.
It’s making Europe more dependent on Russia. Meanwhile, here in North America, Joe Biden rejects the Keystone Pipeline. So just putting that in context, he killed a domestic source of oil with the pipeline while promoting and removing sanctions against a Russian pipeline.
If Trump had done the opposite, the left would be screaming and saying that he’s compromised and that he’s a Russian asset. And again, no one’s asking him about this.
Leahy: Carrie Sheffield, that is a fascinating point. I had the same thought you’ve articulated it very well. Carrie, it is always a delight to have you here on The Tennessee Star Report. Come back with us again and come to Nashville and come in in person sometime. We’d love to meet you in the studio.
Sheffield: I would love that. Thank you so much.
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Photo “Carrie Sheffield” by Patrick Ryan. CC BY-SA 4.0.
Live from Music Row Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Independent Women’s Forum Senior Policy Analyst and a contributing writer to The Federalist Kelsey Bolsar to the newsmakers line to discuss employer vaccine mandates, safety, and pregnancy.
Leahy: On the newsmaker line. Kelsey Bolsar, who writes for The Federalist and is a senior policy analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum. She has an article out called The Cost of Vaccine Mandates for Pregnant Women. Welcome, Kelsey.
Bolsar: Good morning. Thanks for having me.
Leahy: I understand that you are a graduate a Little Ivy College called Lafayette College in Easton Pennsylvania. I have been to Easton Pennsylvania a great place.
Bolsar: Absolutely. And it’s actually experiencing quite a boom right now, which is great for the surrounding area in addition to the college.
Leahy: Why is it experiencing a boom there, by the way?
Bolsar: Oh, it’s pandemic related. Individuals who used to live in New York City year-round now have more flexibility in their workplace and are looking to move to surrounding areas that might be a bit of drive but nothing crazy from New York and Easton Pennsylvania is one of them.
Leahy: Did you have fun attending Lafayette? Was it a good program?
Bolsar: Absolutely. Lafayette College is the smallest, Division one school. I was a Division one athlete for part of my college career and made a lot of close friends, had fun competing, and learned a lot.
But of course, it is one of these small liberal arts institutions that do very much lean to the left. So I’m grateful that I did come to my senses and stayed true to myself while I was there.
Leahy: I got to hear this. I did not know that it was a Division one school. For all sports is just for a few sports?
Bolsar: All sports.
Leahy: Wow. And what sport did you compete?
Bolsar: I played lacrosse.
Leahy: Oh! My girls play lacrosse. And I’ll tell you this, I never played lacrosse in my life. But when my daughter, who’s now in her early thirties, was in high school, she said, Dad, I want to play lacrosse.
We started a lacrosse team and I coached them. And by the way, if you’re a man and you played men’s sports, it’s probably not a good idea for your first time to coach a girls team, because it’s a whole different attitude, isn’t it?
Bolsar: It is. It’s a great sport, though very popular on the east coast, still picking up steam in other states across the country, but it’s very competitive on the east coast. And competing at one of the smallest division one schools in the country certainly presented its own challenges.
But college athletics is something I recommend to anybody whose interested because it teaches you life lessons you can use both of on and off the field.
Leahy: Absolutely. Well, you’ve written about one life lesson, I suppose the cost of vaccine mandates for pregnant women. Tell us what those costs are. And why are you writing about this?
Bolsar: Absolutely. I actually wrote about this because of a personal experience. I initially was hesitant to come out with my story. I am very blessed to be expecting our second child later this year.
And I was one of the many women facing a difficult decision about whether to get vaccinated as a high-risk individual who was expecting. Of course, being pregnant puts you in that high-risk boat for COVID-19.
Unlike before, I was hopeful that I was one of these young and healthy individuals that wouldn’t face a severe case. But now I had more side effects to worry about. But also, we have no data about vaccines on women from the first trimester who have actually successfully given birth because, of course, this vaccine didn’t become available until December earliest.
And so anybody who got the vaccine who was expecting during their first trimester likely has not completed their pregnancy full term and given birth, which is kind of scary regarding the number of unknowns in terms of what these vaccines could do to the development of the child.
I want to be clear that every study that has been released thus far looks really good for pregnant women getting the vaccine. Researchers have not raised any medical concerns about women getting it at any point in their pregnancy.
But, of course, with so many unknowns with a vaccine that is still in the experimental stage, this is a very personal decision for women to make who are expecting and other Americans who have high-risk conditions that put them in the boat where they might not know exactly what could happen both short and long term if they get this vaccine.
And so in light of this being a personal decision, I was looking at the national rhetoric surrounding vaccine mandates and vaccine passports and I found it very ugly and dismissive of the very legitimate concerns and serious ways Americans are thinking through the decision of whether to get vaccinated and when.
Many of us are nothing but grateful for this medical miracle, we are far from any of the sort of anti-vaxxers that you hear being shamed in the national media. Many of them on the left recited a few remarks made on The View.
And I kind of raised the question, the point of so many young, healthy Americans getting vaccinated right now is to protect the more vulnerable who do face more difficult decisions about whether to get vaccinated.
Why don’t our policies and our rhetoric reflect that? Vaccine mandates requiring them to go back to work, but women specifically in a very difficult position if they are expecting or if they are trying to get pregnant and have questions about the vaccine long term.
And it kind of forces them to reveal to their bosses very private fertility information that should remain private. No woman should be pressured or forced into revealing their fertility status before they are ready.
And many of these policies just push women up against the wall and set this dangerous precedent that we have no choice but to get vaccinated. And until we have irrefutable data in terms of vaccines and pregnancy, this does need to remain a choice.
And I can tell you, as someone who is expecting, it is a very difficult choice that women are thinking very seriously through regarding the pros and cons of getting vaccinated or not.
Leahy: So walk us through your own personal decision. You have one child. Are you currently expecting another child?
Bolsar: Yes. And I am only just out of my first trimester. And so for the past few weeks, while I’ve been watching the rhetoric and these policies be handed down, I was in that boat where there’s not just a little bit of data on successful outcomes in terms of women who are vaccinated later and their pregnancy and successfully given birth.
There is no data. And that’s a very difficult position to be in. And I can tell you I am getting mixed recommendations from doctors. Some of them tell me to get it at all cost, while others told me, don’t.
Most definitely hold off, at least until you’re in the first trimester and risk assess after that. So there is not a clear consensus in the medical community. And it’s important that that the lack of that consensus is better reflected on the national stage in terms of our policies.
I do believe that women who are expecting are in that group where if there are vaccine mandates, they would be able to get a medical exemption. But once again, this is forcing women to reveal their fertility status and very private information early on in their pregnancy before some are ready.
I do know there’s a number of individuals out there that are especially prominent in the Black community where women are concerned about the long-term implications of the vaccine on their fertility.
And this does not mean they’re anti-vaxxers. All this means is they want to wait a bit longer for more information to be given to them that reassures them that this vaccine will have no negative implications for their fertility.
Leahy: Kelsey Bolsar, that’s a very articulate explanation of the concerns that pregnant women have about whether or not to take the COVID-19 vaccine. We certainly wish you well with your pregnancy and look forward to more of your reporting. Kelsey, thanks so much for joining us today on The Tennessee Star Report.
Bolsar: Thank you.
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Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – guest host Christina Botteri welcomed the Independent Women’s Forum Senior Policy Analyst Patrice Onwuka to the newsmakers line to discuss the Tulsa Massacre as proof that Black communities can thrive without government reparations.
Botteri: On the line with us right now is Patrice Onwuka. Patrice Onwuka is a political commentator and director of the Center for Economic Opportunity at the Independent Women’s Forum.
She writes for Newsmax, among others. And you can follow her on Twitter at PatricePinkFile. Patrice, thanks so much for joining us today. How are you?
Onwuka: I’m great. And thank you for having me today.
Botteri: It’s great to have you here. I wanted to hear your extended thoughts about your latest piece in Newsmax, “Tulsa’s Story: Blacks Attained Prosperity Before and Can Do It Again.”
Onwuka: Well, as we know, this past Monday and Tuesday or the hundredth anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre. Maybe folks did not hear about this or learn about this in their civics the West history class. I certainly did not.
But it’s a really chilling story about the wealth of a small Black community in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where Blacks owned the land. They owned the businesses. They owned hundreds of businesses and homes. You had a strong middle class. You had an upper class.
It was phenomenal. Everything from banks to upholstery stores. And this community did it all by themselves. They built this community by themselves with no government funding, no dependency.
Totally independent. Unfortunately, this was during the middle of a dark period in our history of true racism where you had about a thousand white neighbors who came in and destroyed the 35 blocks of this community. Burned it to the ground.
There were dozens, perhaps hundreds of people whose lives were lost. Most of them were Blacks. And it’s unfortunate. But I think the shining story that comes out of this is that this community rebuilt its entire neighborhood within two decades.
And it wasn’t through government funding. It wasn’t through reparations. It was through these people coming together, lending to one another, leveraging the property that they owned to get the loans and then rebuild. And they rebuilt to the same level, if not greater.
Unfortunately, what we’ve seen over the decades that ensued is government policies very well intended, but the government policies kind of destroyed that enclave of Black excellence. And now there’s very little of that community left at all.
Botteri: Wow. That’s really amazing. What was the flashpoint of this riot?
Onwuka: Let’s think about when this occurred in 1921. At that time if you were a Black man in an elevator with a young white woman, it didn’t take much for a false allegation of rape or assault to stir up the entire community. And that’s exactly what happened.
The young woman said a shoeshine guy, he tripped and apparently touched her. And she said, no, it was an accident. Unfortunately, the community with up in arms. And I think there were simmering racial tensions going on.
As I said, Jim Crow laws were in existence, so it was totally segregated. But despite that, you had an example of Blacks owning property. And these are folks who were not even two generations from slavery.
Some of the founders of Greenwood, this neighborhood, were slaves themselves and newly freed. And they created something out of, frankly, nothing that they had. They created wealth, opportunity, created businesses. Money was kept flowing within the community.
It was really inspiring when you read about the very successful people who were regular middle-class small business owners. Hundreds and thousands of them that lived in this community.
I love the story because it’s also an example of what’s possible today. Surely we have a lot of Black communities that do not look like Greenwood that do not have and specifically Black Wall Street.
One of the avenues in this Greenwood neighborhood that was just holey and solely doctors, lawyers, small business owners, and all Black. We can have that today. You may not have a bunch of enclaves of Black communities, but you can have successful Black people bringing up and uplifting the entire community if people are willing to focus less on what is the government going to give me to do this?
And more on how can we leverage and build assets that we can pass on to the next generation? I would love to see President Biden talk about that instead of talking about equity and Critical Race Theory and all the things that continue to divide us rather than uplift Black people.
And for those listeners out there, I am a Black woman and I’m an immigrant. And I believe that America is not a racist nation. In fact, I believe it’s the greatest nation.
Botteri: Well, Amen to that. (Onwuka chuckles) This is also very, very interesting. History is amazing in that way. When we talk about how the 35 block area that was burnt to the ground literally, there are photographs available in the Library of Congress.
You can go online and look at them. And it is I mean, it is scorched earth to the dirt. There is nothing left. And you’re saying in two decades, they rebuilt. Just imagine what that means.
The infrastructure, the plumbing, the electricity, the lumber, the cement, and the gravel. All of these elements have to be brought in and bought and engineered and put together. Talk about grit; talk about heart.
Onwuka: Absolutely.
Botteri: It is stunning that this rebuilding took place so rapidly. Two decades. 20 years sounds like a long time, but you know what? 20 years…
Onwuka: It’s not a lot.
Botteri: I know. 2000, right?
Onwuka: Exactly.
Botteri: That was yesterday. Imagine what could happen today if this energy was released. And I just wonder how much of a downer – for lack of a better phrase – maybe that’s a little bit too casual of a phrase to use for something so serious as Critical Race Theory.
It’s just it’s incredibly toxic, in my opinion. How much does that dampen the entrepreneurial spirit and the energy in the Black community, do you think?
Onwuka: It absolutely is disheartening. It is not empowering. It disempowers – if that’s a word – because I think it creates in the mindset this idea that every institution is built on racism.
Racism is in the DNA of every one of our systems of government and frankly, of private enterprise and civil society. And so to a young person, well, why even try if the odds are so stacked against me? Why even try?
And I think that is what Critical Race Theory, these diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, which may be well-intentioned but the unintended consequences create a mindset and a young person that they will never be able to overcome apart from the government interceding.
And you know what? This example of Greenwood and what happened in Tulsa is an example, not of government success, it was government failure. Honestly, in some instances, maybe government complicity because there were people who are deputized to destroy this neighborhood.
So it’s not the government that is the solution. It is the individual. It is self-reliance. It is the community working together. It is entrepreneurship. These are things that we have today. And I am heartened in part because I see so many young Black folks who are starting businesses.
I shop so many online boutiques of young Blacks today and I love it. What I hate is there’s this disconnect between, well the government needs to do something for me, the government needs to be reformed so that I can then advance.
No, you can advance apart from the government. What I don’t want to say is that there have never been racist institutions. I think Jim Crow laws in the 1920s are great examples of how racism was in fact institutionalized. That was systemic.
Today we have challenges and there are areas where the government does stand in the way of the individual. But it’s not the same as 100 years ago. And we need to stop telling young people these untrue voting laws being systemically racist or Jim Crow laws.
What it does is takes away that motivation. That striving and the grit and determination to be able to make something of yourself. While I tell the story about what happened in Tulsa, it was atrocious it was a stain on our history.
I think we can also take away some of the truth and some opportunities for progress by looking at the example of what those folks did. They didn’t have anything. They didn’t have reparations.
A lot of the business owners could not even get insurance claims paid out because the insurance companies didn’t consider what happened to them worthy of being paid for. So these people dug down deep and came together. Why can’t we do that today?
Botteri: Why, indeed, Patrice Onwuka? Join us after the break, won’t you?
Onwuka: Yes.
Listen to the full first hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed the Independent Women’s Forum Senior Policy Analyst Patrice Onwuka to the newsmakers line to explains the consequences of the Biden administration’s PRO Act that would ultimately destroy independent contractors and gig workers.
Leahy: We are joined on our newsmaker line by a good friend, Patrice Onwuka with the Independent Women’s Forum. Patrice, there you go again, (Onwuka chuckles) using logic to dispute what the Biden administration is doing. You have a piece about the gig economy and how Biden wants to ruin that.
Onwuka: I do. Actually, I’ve been writing quite a lot about what’s happening. We’ve got 57 million Americans who are employed on their own terms. They are freelancers. They are independent contractors. Maybe they’ve left an industry but have a ton of knowledge, and they contract their services and their work out to different companies.
Well, the Biden administration has a problem with that. They don’t like independent contractors because they cannot unionize those workers. Those workers are not employees and they don’t want to be employees. They want the flexibility to create their own schedules.
They want to have their own client roster. They want to carve out the work that is important to them. Unfortunately, the Bite administration is doing everything they can through the regulatory process as well as through the legislative process, to make it difficult to continue to be an independent contractor across the country.
Leahy: Well, it works so well in California, though. (Laughter)
Onwuka: All the best ideas come out of California right? (Chuckles) Wrong. What happened is California passed the bill called AB5 which changed the standard to determine whether a worker as an employee or an independent contractor.
Overnight we had stories of translators, florists, and small business owners saying they lost income by upwards of 30 to 50 percent. All of their clients dropped them because they were worried about this new law that made it difficult for someone to be an independent contractor and to be classified that way.
The way the law works is that you would have to hire that person as a full employee, give them all the benefits, all of the overtime pay, or the minimum wage pay. And that’s an increase in cost for businesses. There’s a reason why businesses choose independent contracting rather than employees.
And so lots of California workers were hit terribly. They lost a lot of income and contracts. And this is even before the pandemic. And of course, the pandemic just made things worse. So obviously, the Biden administration would want to take a bad model and make it nationwide.
And that is what’s going on. You’ve got a federal bill called the PRO Act that could be passed that would make this federal law. And we see the Department of Labor also instituting some regulatory changes in a similar vein.
Leahy: Who in the Biden administration or the Bike maladministration, as I call it, is pushing this stupid idea?
Onwuka: The Secretary of Labor, Marty Walsh. He is a huge union guy. He spent decades and unions back in Massachusetts. I’m very familiar with him. I grew up there and he is parroting everything President Biden is saying in wanting to push forward these changes.
The Department of Labor, as I mentioned, it upended a Trump our rule that was actually really good for independent contractors. And so the Biden administration is saying, no. They’re working with Congress to push forward on this agenda. Michael, let me just underscore what’s going on here.
There are serious politics driving this. Unions are behind this push. They pretty much wrote the legislation in California. And they are now pushing for the PRO Act at the federal level because it would expand the number of union workers.
It would take away our rights to choose whether or not we want to pay union dues. We call that right to work. And it would make it very difficult to be an independent contractor. And just so that folks know, independent contractors are not just building your houses.
These are small business owners across the country and people who translate from Spanish to English in courtrooms for example. People who are advertisers and maybe their graphic designers. They play mall Santas at Christmas time.
At IWF, we have talked to these workers in California, regular folks who suddenly saw their livelihood’s cut because of bad policy at the state level. Imagine what that would do across the country.
Leahy: What’s the likelihood that this very bad, very stupid bill will pass in the House? It’s passed the House, hasn’t it? It’s in the Senate now?
Onwuka: Yes, it passed the House by a very close vote. Unfortunately, a few conservatives did support it.
Leahy: Who supported it?
Onwuka: I don’t have the list in front of me.
Leahy: But there were some Republicans that voted for this?
Onwuka: There were a few union-friendly states.
Leahy: Oh, my goodness.
Onwuka: And then in the Senate, we are leaning on just a couple of handful of senators. Senator Sinema and as well as Manchin of West Virginia. I believe he might have come out in support of it.
Leahy: Well, he’s a big union guy, though, right? He’s a big union guy.
Onwuka: Yes.
Leahy: Typically the usual suspects to stop the idiocy of the Democrats are Senator Sinema from Arizona and Senator Manchin from West Virginia. On this one, Manchin is all unioned up. So he’s not going to do it. But Sinema might.
Onwuka: Mike Kelly I believe of Arizona is well, could also be one of those is voting.
Leahy: Because he’s up for reelection for a full six-year term in 2022. That is very, very interesting. Well, for self-protection, (Onwuka laughs) if this thing passes first, will there be litigation to stop it immediately?
Onwuka: Absolutely. I absolutely think so. I think there are some public interest law firms that are thinking through legal strategies right now to challenge the law. I think what we saw in California was also a valid initiative that was funded by a lot of the gig economy companies like Uber and Lyft.
They have a very big dog in this fight. Not surprising because all those drivers are independent contractors. The people who deliver your Uber Eats are independent contractors. So you’ve got the gig economy. I think they would be mobilized in a legal fight as well.
Leahy: In California did that initiative make it on the ballot or is it in the process?
Onwuka: It did and it passed by over a margin of 60 percent. Voters said, no, we do not want these gig workers to be classified as employees. That was a win for the gig workers.
Leahy: When did that happen? And where does the law stand there now in California?
Onwuka: It happened in November. Last November it was on the ballot. It was a great win there. And so the law still stands. What happened is that the law became so sweeping and it was meant just to hit the Ubers in the list.
But it was written so broadly that every single occupation, you’re talking about hundreds of occupations and millions of workers in California got swept up. Some different groups are able to get exemptions from the law.
And then another law was passed with hundreds of more exemptions. But there are still many people in California who still are under the impact of AB5.
Leahy: Why didn’t that referendum throw that law out?
Onwuka: It was narrowly written to focus specifically on the gig economy. It wasn’t just broad for everyone. At IWF we liked the spirit of the ballot initiative but we also were worried about all of those other people who were not exempted.
And you know what, Michael? You shouldn’t have to use money to lobby to get some sort of exemption. If the law was smart on its own, if it was good policy, you wouldn’t need an exemption.
Leahy: I totally agree with that.
Onwuka: From a principled standpoint, we need to be fighting for more opportunity, more work, and more flexible work for the moms, for the dads, and for the people taking care of aging parents who really want that flexible environment.
Leahy: You obviously will never get a job in the Biden administration, Patrice, because you have common sense!
Onwuka: Well, I don’t want to be there. And yes, I’ve got common sense. And that’s what we’re pushing for. Just common sense solutions for what’s going on in the workforce.
Leahy: If this passes, there will be massive resistance to it around the country I would think. Don’t you?
Onwuka: There would be. It’s scary to wait until after the law passes to find out what’s in it. We saw what happened with Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act.
Leahy: You’ve got to pass it to learn what’s in it. Pelosi’s famous words.
Listen to the second hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
