 Well, I'm sure that by now you're all aware of the fact that there was a very very important Democratic Party primary taking place in the 11th Congressional District of Ohio between Nina Turner and Chantel Brown, and if you haven't heard the results just Click out of this video and remain an ignorant bliss because this is going to ruin your day if you were hoping that we'd have one of the most Important fighters elected to Congress because Nina Turner lost Now it is the case that not all of the votes have been counted at the time that I record this video But with more than 75% of precincts reporting It is the case that Chantel Brown has defeated Nina Turner 49.8% to 44.7% So to kind of put things into perspective for you Chantel Brown someone with little to no name recognition made up a 35 point deficit and Ended up pretty handily defeating someone who's a political behemoth like Nina Turner with national name recognition ask yourself How on earth did this happen? Well, the answer is actually pretty simple Money and that might be a little bit of an oversimplification, but just look at how much money was spent Against Nina Turner here and see how much money Nina Turner spent And I think that you'll get a pretty clear picture as to why this race turned out the way it did So as Huff posts Daniel Moran's explains when it comes to pro Turner or anti-brown spending There was just over nine hundred thousand dollars spent However, when it comes to pro Brown or anti Turner spending $2.7 million so Nina Turner here was the underdog Nina Turner was heavily disadvantaged and when you look at this chart provided to us by Kirk Bado on Twitter you can see that Just one super pack basically made the entire difference here It is the Democratic majority for Israel pack who Chantel Brown petitioned to get in the race for her So they spent almost two million dollars on behalf of Chantel Brown to oppose Turner and support Brown and All of these other smaller groups such as move on org national nurses United Ohio women rising I mean they spent on behalf of Nina Turner But I mean it pales in comparison here and the only one that came close To any of the anti Turner packs third way was the Democratic action pack But still they were outspent by third way who spent lots of money almost five hundred thousand dollars to oppose Nina Turner So when you look at those charts, it's really easy to see why Nina Turner lost here How Chantel Brown was able to do what was seemingly impossible money and this is why I am very clear about the need to Decommodify elections and get money out of politics because it shouldn't be the case that money dictates who wins and loses elections But unfortunately that is the reality of the system that we live in and that's really unfortunate And I just want to say you're you're watching this video You're reading the news and I know what you're feeling Because guess what I feel it to I feel gutted. I feel demoralized. I feel depressed even genuinely depressed and We needed this victory We needed this victory after the loss after this the sting of 2020 After we all still feel that we needed this victory Because Nina Turner is the real deal Nina Turner Wouldn't just be a plus one vote to all of the progressive priorities in Congress She wouldn't just be a plus one to the squad in Congress. Nina Turner is a leader Nina Turner would be a fighter vociferously so for Medicare for all for the Green New Deal for student debt cancellation and Who knows what Nina Turner could have accomplished today alone? We learned how important electing progressives to Congress is Because Cory Bush single-handedly got the Biden administration to extend the moratorium on evictions How by simply sleeping on the steps of the Capitol for five days being relentless So imagine if Cory Bush never defeated Lacy Clay in 2020 It might still be the case that we are facing a national eviction crisis even to a worse extent than we are now Cory Bush did that so imagine what Nina Turner could have accomplished had she been elected And even though you're feeling depressed and nothing I say is going to convince you or make you feeling inspired One, you know silver lining is that Nina Turner Is a fighter and she's not gonna go away like this isn't the last of Nina Turner obviously and I do believe that her political career Is going to flourish. I do believe she will one day be successful Whether it's in Congress or as a governor I don't know Nina Turner is An icon she is a leader And leaders don't just go away With one election loss Bernie Sanders, you know, he wasn't immediately electorally Successful it takes time losses are inevitable. They're baked into the into the process But that doesn't make us feel any better being reminded of the fact that yeah, you know Losses are inevitable that doesn't make us feel any better because the situation is rapidly deteriorating in the united states and around the globe and we just need one more voice to to like Move us a little bit closer In the right direction and it's not like Nina Turner was the panacea It's not like Nina Turner alone could solve all of the country in the world's problems But just having her there as a fighter would have made a measurable difference And now it's over And to make matters worse if you click on the trending tab on twitter and you click on Nina Turner's name You see corporate democrats celebrating individuals like Yvette Nicole Brown Loving every moment of this celebrating You see corporate democrats Like tom watson you see uh bush era republicans turned anti trump republicans Who are uh saying hey shantel brown one now? It's time to uh celebrate. I don't know if it was bill crystal But I mean, you know the the general people the blue check mark You know democratic party loyalists liberals on twitter Who um were terrible during the 2020 democratic party primaries like they all wear their ugly heads again But another component to Nina Turner's loss here Is that the left just The left wasn't all on board here And that's something that absolutely has to be discussed because yes It was the case that big money probably was was the defining characteristic of this race There are other things that we have to explore And I want the left to use this defeat to do some serious soul searching about what we're going to do as a movement Collectively and there's no leadership here, right? We are a decentralized movement. We're a bunch of misfits And Edge lords online So it's not like we're going to form some sort of a think tank tank and emerge with a consensus But we have to do some soul searching folks just As individuals be a little bit introspective about what went wrong And I'm just gonna I'm gonna be frank. There's a lot of leftists who didn't just Not participate in this election to help Nina Turner, but actively Try to sabotage Nina Turner And it happened from the beginning like when I did my interview with Nina Turner to promote her campaign I saw portions of it clipped out online Where people on the left supposedly were trying to disparage Nina Turner That's incredibly harmful. I saw some podcasts who purported to be on the left quite literally Discourage their viewers from donating to Nina Turner Knowing the damage that that could cause because Nina Turner was going to be outspent And at that point we knew that these superpacks were a bank rolling Nina Turner's opponent So I saw a lot of leftists all Basically discounted Nina Turner brushing her aside as if this victory was Unimportant well now you're gonna see the difference now you get to see a corporate democrat like shantel brown Who's not going to listen to you at all who's going to ignore you who's not going to support medicare for all Who doesn't support student debt cancellation who doesn't support housing as a human right? Now you get to see the difference between Nina Turner and shantel brown and the individuals who either didn't Support Nina Turner actively and sound the alarm make some noise for Nina Turner or actively discourage people from donating to Nina Turner's campaign You get to own this you get to own this you know who you are You get to own this defeat because you aligned with the corporate democrats Wittingly or unwittingly you have been a useful idiot for the dnc So congratulations anyone who is pretending as if Nina Turner would be a useless Addition to congress you get to own this You know who you are Anyone who claimed that Nina Turner would be as ineffectual as other members of the squad you get to own this You get to see first hand the difference between another corporate democrat and Nina Turner And this is why I was very adamant about the fact that we don't use phrases like fraud squad Right. I didn't want to do that Because you implicitly suggest that members of the squad are so ineffectual that electing more progressives to congress Basically is a meaningless endeavor. There's no point to it But in actuality it is really important as much as I have my criticism of the squad The fraud squad narrative which also ended up harming individuals like Nina Turner Because she was associated with the squad and they campaigned for her That was bad because when you say fraud squad you suggest that there's no value to having members of the squad in congress When quarry bush today demonstrated her value when aoc this week Is playing hardball when it comes to infrastructure threatening to torpedo the entire infrastructure bill Because the reconciliation package is being watered down by corporate democrats And yes, that's not to say that constructive criticism Is uh, never allowed of course, it's allowed But you have to draw a line between criticism. That's constructive and criticism. That's destructive and what I saw Through a large portion of not the majority of Nina Turner's race was discourse that was incredibly destructive And people who go out of their way to demonize members of the squad not constructively but destructively for views and clicks Nina Turner is automatically viewed as implicitly culpable there all of aoc and um Ayanna pressley and uh, quarry bush has perceived failures or also failures that are Applied to Nina Turner as well. Unfortunately because you know, she was basically running as an addition to the squad She was running as an extension of bernie sanders movement And if you claim that bernie sanders is a failure altogether and he's useless in the squad Their failures altogether and their fraud squads Then this is what happens You cultivate wide spread pessimism and people choose to check out So people choose to not donate to Nina Turner people who otherwise Would have supported Nina Turner gone to ohio and campaign for Nina Turner choose to not do that because they've been uh They've been told that you know, it doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter if Nina Turner is in congress or not And in the short term Sure, that might be the case that Nina Turner alone isn't going to change everything but What i've seen from the left is just so So destructive and I don't even know how to characterize it. I don't even know what to say People were calling Nina Turner a sell-out Before she even had the chance to be elected So anyone who participated in in that discourse any podcast who promoted this idea That Nina Turner was bad or useless And wouldn't be an adequate fighter Sufficiently for the progressive left you get to own this loss. Congratulations. You are a useful idiot for the democratic party establishment You are a tool for Nancy Pelosi chuck schumer and joe biden They're very thankful that you you know, um Fostered this narrative that Nina Turner isn't worth fighting for and again. I don't want to Make it seem as if this is the reason why Nina Turner lost right because ultimately even if the entirety of the left was united Um, I I think that basically when money gets involved It's really difficult to kind of change that momentum in the opposite direction But would the additional support from leftists online for Nina Turner have helped? Unquestionably if Nina Turner didn't have to respond to and address criticisms From leftists who are already preemptively disappointed in her before she's already elected with that If she didn't have to waste her time responding to that with that I've helped Absolutely. So anyone who pushed this bullshit You own this fucking mess right here. You own this. You know who I'm talking to We're gonna be upset. We're gonna be angry. We're gonna be depressed And if you need to take time to check out of electoral politics for a little bit and stop consuming political news I think that's healthy. I think that that's understandable Understand that this is what you're feeling right now the depression the disillusionment. This is a very human response And it's why folks I was very adamant that we take this race seriously Why the minute we started to see poll number shift I was trying to do everything in my power to convince leftists that we have to take this seriously Like I know that you get this Impression that everything was copacetic and it was trending towards Nina Turner being victorious Because hey, look how exciting everything is. We have Cornell West and Bernie Sanders and AOC canvassing for Nina Turner I promise you though that to me was not a sign of Alluming victory that was a sign to freak the fuck out because I'm sure that her internal polling showed that she was at risk of losing and then she contacted Bernie Sanders and AOC and told them We're at risk of losing the seat here. You've got to help me So people probably expected Nina Turner to win this because hell it's Nina Turner, right? But again, this is why I say You can't take any seat for granted Now I don't know if maybe the result would have been different had Nina Turner run In 2022 when the DMFI can't you know focus all of their resources on one particular race. I'm not sure but what you need to do Is not let this moment lead to you being disempowered and checking out because that's exactly what the democratic party establishment wants They want you to be disillusioned with the process. They want you to check out of electoral politics I feel that instinct as well But I fight it and do you want to know why I fight it because even if Every single candidate that I support and endorse going forward loses their election I still take satisfaction knowing that I am a pain in the ass of these corporate Democrats Who desperately want us to check out? I want them to know that regardless of how many times we're kicked in the teeth and punched in the gut I'm going to get back up again And I'm going to force them to spend all this money on these races to defeat us because I'm never fucking stopping I'm going to be a pain in their ass Forever for as long as I possibly can Because I'm not going to grant them the satisfaction knowing that I'm going to check out In fact, I'm going to be that much louder about the progressives that I support in the next election cycle So understand folks the feelings that you're feeling are natural and they're valid and quite frankly they're warranted I feel very very defeated right now. And there's nothing that I can say to make you feel inspired because look The system itself is absolutely ruthless And there's going to be other candidates in the future who Most of which we support they're going to they're going to be defeated by big money like this But each election cycle so long as we get another aoc So long as we get one more quarry bush and jamal boom and so long as we keep inching closer towards victory Even if it's not at the speed that we need To stop us from going off this cliff. We're still making progress the fact that they view us as the threat To where they felt it was necessary to spend two million dollars that shows that we do have them afraid And there's going to be a lot more losses Down the pipeline. We're going to lose a lot of elections in 2022 We're going to feel the same feeling that we're feeling now, but guess what? Maybe there's going to be another primary victory Maybe Amy Vilela wins her race We don't know But I know that all of our victories Are not going to come to us if we check out So take time that you need to recover mentally Take time to collect your thoughts and I want the left to be introspective going forward. I want the left to really get serious for lack of a better word and I want us to Understand who the enemy is Click on the Nina Turner name on twitter. Look at that Click on the latest post and you're going to see who the fuck the enemy is. It's not other leftists It's not members of the squad. You'll see who the enemies are Okay So, I mean, I'm just rambling at this point. I don't know what else is left to say This was a victory that we desperately needed But um, unfortunately, we lost thanks to big money