the united states border patrol a law enforcement agency with controversial tactics say on faith down, they beat him repeatedly, pay $10.00, emboldened by a culture of impunity. they keep doing that, knowing that they're hurting people and cutting the fault lines, investigate secretive units, accused of concealing its agents crimes and like the men in black, they really don't, don't see them that they're just there to clean up the mess and to cover impunity at the border on a just either what's most important to me is talking to people understanding what they're going through here al jazeera, we believe everyone has a story worth hearing. ah, johnny barker in london, the top stories on al jazeera, the world's richest man, ella musk has taken control of one of the world's most influential social media

platforms. his 1st move as head of twitter. busy was firing, at least for top executives, including the ceo and chief financial officer mosque had until friday to complete the $44000000000.00 deal he signed in april. it ends in 6 spawns saga, filled with accusations and legal challenges. kristen salumi is in new york and says, must could allow bound people back on to the platform. you on mosque is a self described free speech absolutist and he's talked a lot about rolling back restrictions on the platform. but i been a lot of concern and push back about that. and today he said in a tweet that he would be forming, the company would be forming a content moderation council, and that no major decisions on content or reinstating accounts would be made before this commission had a chance to me. but he has said in the past that he would be for reinstating former

president donald trump, who was removed from the platform for tweets and connection to the january 6th capital riot mosque has said that he believes that twitter is the public square of the modern world if you will, that this is a place where people have differing viewpoints should be able to come together and discuss them. but clearly he has been attempting to allay the concerns, particularly of advertisers whom he is going to need to keep this platform afloat. now that he spent so much money to acquire it, the husband of us house speaker, nancy pelosi has been violently assaulted during a break in there. san francisco home of 42 year old suspects has been arrested and charged with attempted homicide. the motor for the attack is still not clear. when the officers arrive on scene, they encountered an adult male and mr. policies. husband, paul. our officers observe myths below. sienna suspect, both holding a hammer,

the suspect pulled the hammer away from its velocity, and violently assaulted him with it. our officers immediately tackled the suspect, disarmed him, took him into custody, request it emergency back up, and rendered medical aid. the suspect has been identified as 42 year old debit de pappy fighting is intensifying a new cranes, eastern dumbass region. russia is shelling the cities of nikolai of and back. moot, where there's a fierce battle for control and russian selling continues to target ukraine's power grid. damage to infrastructure has cut capacity to the capital key f by around a 3rd. and there were warnings that rolling blackouts will be longer and more often . fighting between government troops and rebels in the east and democratic republic of congo has forced more than 40000 people from their homes. the resurgence of m. 23 rebels. his destabilized central africa with congolese officials accusing

neighbor bewanda of backing the militia form of pakistani prime minister, emerald con, and his supporters are marching on the capital to call for early elections. they began the 380 kilometer walked to islamabad. from the eastern city of la hor, official say the protest is will be barred from entering the capital. com step down after losing an o confidence vote in april and there will be fresh elections in northern ireland, but no date has been named friday was the deadline for a restoration of the devolved government. but it wasn't met. the northern ida dag executive has not function since an early election in may. the lack of a government has been blamed on disagreements over breakfast, northern island protocol which establish a trading border between northern ireland and the rest of the u. k. us all, john exxonmobil has smash financial forecasts, recording its highest quarterly profits at nearly $20000000000.00,

the company's profits of sword due to an increase in international demand and the lack of supply as a result of the war in ukraine. the result eclipse is the figures posted by rival, all giant shell, and total energies you're up to date. the bottom line is next, looking at who is spending money to influence the u. s. mid term election. stay with us for that he went down to 0. ah hi, i'm steve clements, i have a question with special interest groups pouring more than a $1000000000.00 into the mid term us elections next month. has big money become a threat to american democracy? let's get to the bottom line. ah. the amount of money flowing in from billionaires and huge lobbying groups, the fun candidates running in next month,

mid term elections busted all previous records. $1300000000.00 in counting. that's a big number. on the one hand, it's not under the table. that's how campaign financing works in the u. s. enshrined by a supreme court ruling called citizens united in 2010. but it begs the question, is all this money pulling lawmakers away from the will of the majority and into the narrow interests of their donors and friends? will billionaires have an outside the ability to control the policy agenda? and does anyone see this is a threat to the future of representative democracy. today we're talking with trevor potter, the former chairman of the federal election commission and current president of the campaign legal center here in washington, d. c. and andrew gumble, journalist and author of down for the count dirty elections and the rotten history of democracy in america. gentlemen, thank you so much for joining me. trevor. let me just start with you. the bread and center in new york ran numbers for this election season. and found that there are just 12 mega don't her send. this is remarkable. but 12 mega donors,

8 of them are billionaires, have paid $1.00 out of every $13.00 spent in this election cycle. 12 people versus 170000000 people are so say, i just want to kind of understand the scale of something you live and breathe. you and andrew gumble both, but i'm not used to seeing these numbers. it's an extraordinary level of 1000000000 area and engagement. it is an extraordinary level. i was looking at some of the numbers open secrets has a good list of people who have spent and you know, the top 10 people spend 500000000 dollars just and unbelievable some. and they are sort of like horse race owners. they're backing specific candidates. they're not. they're winning primaries by peter deals spent enormous sums of money to make sure j. d. vance was the republican nominee. and

ohio. it's backing a prize fight or something like that. and we just haven't seen that before, steve, but 10 years ago i was asked by a german television producer of i would like to comment on the role of the oligarchy. and i said, well, you know, i'm really a specialist in american elections. i don't know much about russia and he said, no, no, i mean the american ali docs and that was of just a shocking breeze at the time i. i hadn't thought of it that way. we've always had people who have supported party committees, but we haven't had up until the last couple of years and really show this year. people who sort of go off free lansing on their own decide which candidates they want to see in the senate or a governorship, and then simply finance their their races. and that is

a role that i think excludes ordinary citizens. we. we look at this money being spent and think, well, don't they're picking the candidates and ultimately the office holders. and even though we know this money is being spent, because we see contributions to various groups, to important to remember that a lot of this is essentially secret. because when you see a television ad, it doesn't say paid for by peter deal or paid for by george soros, or who mean because both parties are, are being supported. but candidates of both parties by these individuals. instead it says something like paid for by americans for a better country. you have no idea who that is. yes. groups like the brendan, or the crit, can report on these overall totals, but it is hard to know exactly where the money is going because

a lot of it is going to groups that don't disclose their donors. and then the advertising itself doesn't tell you who pays for it. so the american public is really left in the dark except for shows like this and discussions like this, about who is financing running, which candidates. thank you for that way, andrew gumble, you've been writing about america's oligarchy. you've been writing about peter. feel in a fascinating article called peter feels mid term bet, the billionaire seeking to disrupt america's democracy. and i'm really interested in trying to get to understand it has become a dynamic where one party says, hey, i've got, i'll meet your billionaire and i'll, and i'll double with to, i mean, is this become so normalized as you write about that that, that we just beginning to accept the fact that large a players, large financial players are legitimate in the american political system should have

sway should be able. as trevor potter said, just simply to pick candidates and price spiders. what's your take on this? was the way you framed it is interesting because i think that the notion that the parties are in charge of who runs and wins elections and then what happens once they get his office is be challenged in and of itself. that i think that the big money is talking louder than the parties in many important respects. it's come back to another one of the apprentices from earlier. i think the basic point to make is if individuals a putting in this vast amount of money into the political system, they expect something for their money and what they get to their money is not only the candidates that choice prevailing in primaries having huge financial advantages going into the general election if that's the case, because as you point out, that is fundraising on both sides. but it's also about determining the policy agenda and that happens outside of the context of elections as well as within the context of elections. so just give one very brief example of what i need, you know,

the, the huge amount of money that was put into a republican party politics. starting with the coke brothers, after about 2008 as all but eliminated the possibility for the republicans as a party to talk about climate change as a real and present threat that we need to confront. as a matter of the urgency, if you look at a country like britain where there are certainly very conservative people in the conservative party, there is still an open debate about how to deal with climate change. the cross is both parties. that's not a coincidence. it's about the money. you see that in other ways as well, and it's not just about what doesn't get discussed by one posse can often be about what doesn't get discussed by anyone, especially in the context of an election. because if you know that a mega donor can drop one or 5 or $10000000.00 against you, if you talk about a certain subject, you know, maybe it's student debt really from defending present biden's plan for that. maybe

it's, you know, some other area of fiscal policy or something else that is dara benefits or reverses but threatens the interests of the narrow band. a very rich people. you're going to be very deterred from raising that on the campaign trail because you don't want $10000000.00 dropping against you. so even with that, spending the money there is a deterrent effect on a healthy, normal political debate where the interest of ordinary versus a being held front and center. not only by the voters themselves, they vote, but also by the candidates. trevor, you have been working on this issue longer than anyone i know, and i'm going to tell our audience, you were working closely with senator john mccain who himself was worried about these distortions in american politics. you've got, you've got a long time with this, and i haven't seen progress, substantial progress. and you can correct me if i'm wrong in transparency or beginning to raise this issue of what it's doing to corrode democracy. what does it

say to a young person, when you say to them, be engaged in politics, get engaged in the parties, try to make the world a better place, but you are so outgunned and out mand, depending on where the billionaires are stacking their chips. but i'm just interested in unit because you do know this area, well, what, what should give us concern? and do you see any hope in this work on looking at, you know, building a better campaign, legal infrastructure and financing infrastructure than what we have today? well, unfortunately, and throughout my professional career, i started with the presidential campaign of the 1st president george h. w. bush. that was at the federal election commission. it's not my fault, i promise you. but throughout that career, things have gotten significantly worse. i think for the, the american public and in terms of how we finance elections. when i started, we had a public funding system for the presidency and candidates raised money and it was

matched in the primaries, the general election. they had full public funding. they didn't take private contributions on terms of the house and senate and the party committees. there were strict limits on how much individuals could give to candidates and to the committees. and there weren't the run around the work around that. now dominate the system so that there was full disclosure. people knew who was giving and they were giving in relatively small amounts. the amount that a wealthy individual could give to a candidate was a $1000.00 per election that has changed over time. not really because the limits have gone up much. they have a little, but because the money is going around, those limits the ability of wealthy individuals to come in bank roll a candidate do so either overtly or covertly sort of pick their horse and ride it.

and put them in office is totally different from what it was. and i think andrew is also right that the threat of that to office holders is a huge problem. sen sheldon white house has just written the book talking about what he sees as the corruption inherent in all of this. and the, the ability to shape legislation, which is after why people spend money on politics is they want particular outcomes or is andrew points out? they want to block particular outcomes. and so when you have literally tens of millions of dollars, all these top donors that we're talking about have given $2550.00 more $1000000.00 in this race. when you have that kind of money it's, it's very difficult for the average citizen due to counteract. it's very difficult

for the parties, they end up as to some extent the hostages of wealthy individuals. if the candidate doesn't do what they want, the individual cut their support. if the individual, if the wealthy individual, the special interests are bank rolling candidates around the parties outside of the party structure, the party really doesn't have much say in that. so the world has changed significantly. i, i think a lot of this goes back to the supreme court citizens united decision. i say that because the court really there gave a green light to spending unlimited amounts of money and elections. now technically it was just corporate money than labor money that's being spent. but i think the fact that the disclosure system has not worked the way it is

supposed to is an enormous problem here when john mccain was working on the mccain, feingold law. part of that was to limit the ability of wealthy special interest to spend money by requiring disclosure, so that citizens would know who was paying for those ads and in citizens united itself. justice kennedy said, yes, it's true for the 1st time. we're going to allow unlimited corporate money in federal elections. but don't worry because it'll be fully disclose. and shareholders will be able to hold their corporations accountable for how they spend their money. and citizens will know who is paying for the advertising and therefore can judge the advertising based on the source of the money. as andrew says, if it's energy company spending money urging you to elect someone, you can make your own decisions about whether you agree with that energy company. but that's not what we have. we have

a situation where the money is often routed through nonprofit organizations that don't disclose donors. and the result is that citizens are seeing all these ads. there are where there's a lot of money being spent out there, but they don't really know who it's coming from. so you have these independent actors who are essentially supplanting the, the party committees, particularly, and things like senate races where you're, you spend $30000000.00, you're spending 10 times what a party committee would spend. right, andrew, you know, i'd love to get your take as well. on this, but wondering, you know, from a, maybe a devil's advocate position saying, well, the american system in a way responded with something. i was surprised by, you know, particularly we saw the obama campaigns and the bernie sanders campaigns. and you know, the rise of the small donor, the $3.00 donor, the $2.00 donor, massive amounts of money. which in a way kind of gave me hope that there were that many people out there giving in small donors that it could make a difference. but, but, you know, in,

in the real world does that small level don't, or in which we've seen proliferate because technology allows us to do that, to get pass posted stamps in mailers. is that a counter effect that balances the abuses? perhaps of, you know, the billionaire crowd essentially in politics? well, 1st of all, i'd say that the ride is a small donor movement. if you want to call it that is a direct response to a universal, i would say, discussed at the level of unaccountable moneys flushing around the system. if you look around the country where they have been successful campaigns, usually through state level bows and this is to kansas certain aspects of what you know, i would call the corruption of system, whether it's gerrymandering seats, whether it's campaign finance that allows unlimited donation to independent groups, you see that, you know, those boss to succeed and read states as well as blue states. groups like represent us being very active in trying to make that happen. so i think what you see is that

if you scratch the average american vote and get them to sort of stop the polarizing us versus then team sports view of how american politics works at the tremendous amount of agreement that the system is corrupt. and that it needs to be reformed. now the question is, how do you do that? the small donor approach is one that can work, but it does generally require a candidate and erase that has tremendous media. visibility is not something in a work. so the average school board race, for example, something else you know, maybe a water board where there's a direct interest of an energy company to get involved. then you have an argument, we've seen many times, most notably with donald trump, but not just within people from the business world saying, well i have lots of money of my own so i can't be corrupted. i think that's a very problematic argument. the factors and politics, you know, you are beholden to people for reasons that have to do with money, but also have to do with many other things. and as we saw with donald trump,

you know, he ended up pursuing an agenda that was very friendly to the people who he felt vital to his political interests. you know, whether it's evangelical christians with the abortion issue, or the federalist society on the nomination of judges. and so on and social. so this argument that, well, i've got so much money that i can't be corrupted, i think is a for swan. and what we're seeing now with people like pizza teal, jumping in, is a very explicit. let's tear everything down kind of argument. so it's taking, taking the previous arguments and pushing to another level thing. the system is so corrupt, we need to destroy everything. and the contradiction in what he's doing, of course, is this, the analysis, the most americans can get behind is the on the cannibal money. and corruption is the problem in our system. then having somebody who is in a pouring tens of millions of dollars into races to back candidates, you don't believe in american democracy is not the answer. and i think it's

interesting that we now have impeded teal. a mega dona who explicitly has raised doubts about the democratic system working within the new limits or lack of limit to the system where money can trump ordinary people vote. the reason why all this money exists is because money could be more powerful than people's votes, right? so it is inherently on democratic and now we're seeing explicit calls to tear down the institutions while jim product system coming from the phone donors who are taking advantage of a system that the come to live. well, you know, this race and the important question, trevor of you know what to do. i mean, you and i both, i will say this publicly were friends. with madeline albright madeline albright wrote a book on fascism and said, oftentimes, fascist, are elected in systems. and i'm, you know, as i listened to andrew saying very clearly that we have a democratic system,

electing people who are opposed to democracy. we have a system with citizens united, creating the tropics of non transparency. as you said, i guess my question to you is, do you look at campaign finance? is the greatest threat to american democracy now? and what is the strategy to, to get us onto a different track? i think there are a number of dangerous threats to democracy. now, the money in politics is part of it that it's really an indicia of what's going on . it's this overall attack was andrew was mentioning in the institution of democracy itself, the idea that we somehow can't govern ourselves, that individual americans can't be trusted. when i hear somebody like peter tail talking about, you know, destroying the system, breaking it down,

starting again. not trusting what we have. i end up thinking well, he's protected by billions of dollars a personal wealth. so you know, however much chaos we have. and however, bad things are, he's probably ok. but what about the rest of us when you hear the republican leadership in congress talking about defaulting on our deck and the potential global, calamitous financial results of that. again, it may serve a partisan interest, but it's not very good for the country. so i, i think the attacks on the integrity of election officials, the threats to election officials, everything i've seen says that their officials who are leaving their office by if they're in office or they're not volunteering because they fear violence and threats at the polls. that's dangerous for a democracy. the whole thing we've heard for 2 years about how elections are

fraudulent and rigged, and you can't trust one type of voting or another type of voting and the, the certified winner isn't somehow really the winner. all of that is dangerous for democracy because it, it, it leaves voters feeling that somehow the system is, is not secure. and steve, remember that when we talk about voters putting people in power, you start with the fact that in most states you have primaries for each party with very small turn out. so if somebody wins a primary, 35 percent, 33 percent were talking about a couple 1000 votes, then ending up deciding who the party nominee is and in the house and the senate. many of these are very safe seats. so the election is actually decided there. so, and then you have the big chunk of the country who don't even vote on election day . right. so it's, it's

a small piece that end up deciding who were going to have an office. and if that small piece is bought for mot by really wealthy, special interest, right. and then they're beholden to them when they get there and those interests don't like democracy. that's a problem. just in the last minute we have andrew, 2 of the acolytes of peter thiel are blake masters. he's running for senate in arizona and j. d. vance, who is running for senate in ohio. should they, when is the practice that you've been sort of right, you know, putting a spotlight on going to get much worse in the future. i think it's going to get worse regardless of whether they win or not. i think that is the real problem. the, to travis point, we now have a primary system where very small groups of those, as you can be more easily swayed by the big money interested society who get to run . and the fact that you now have massive advance before them. you have people who are already in the senate like ted cruz wholly on the very far right of the posse

who believe in being gadflies you believe and you know, pushing against everything that has been helped take her by the republican. some of mine itself in the past, this creates an atmosphere in which these candidates with these views become the norm. right. and we can expect a lot more of them in the future or listen, thank you, passing conversation, important conversation on what you know, the solvency of american democracy is today. trevor potter, former chairman of the federal election commission and current president, the campaign legal center, nadra, gumble, journalist, and author. thank you both for being with us today. thank you, steve. so what's the bottom line? if your idea of american politics is based on the hollywood classic, mister smith goes to washington with jimmy stewart, you're seriously in need of a software update that sort of thinking. an upstanding american citizen decides that his voice or her voice is worth something and should be heard. so they watch a campaign with almost no money,

but people love them and they vote for them. and then they wind up in congress and they stand up for the little guy. if that movie was adapted for to day at the end, mister smith would wake up realizing that his whole adventure was just a front for a billionaire pulling strings from behind with tens of millions of dollars spent in political action committees, with virtually no transparency, big money and big power or the name of the game in today's america. there are a lot of david and goliath stand offs in american politics to day. but usually goliath winds, there are folks out there who still are brave enough to run for public office. and sincerely want to serve their constituencies, but it's getting harder and harder to break through the money barrier. and that's the bottom line. ah, so the central chickens on that i'm going to be at a woke up the 1st one was in south africa in 2010. it really was the face month ever. now again, the country that on residing is hosting

a little bit. and i know that a lot of people who live here that might be the 1st time that they are experiencing a woke up. i can tell you it's going to be great. it's a celebration of people. it's a celebration of the school. it's the atmosphere, the faith will cup is number one. it doesn't get any because there's something magical about that i'm really excited about. this will come in. i can't wait for the get started weakness inspiring films from around the world. they shall not from the violent until the power is best. weakness award winning voice is telling ground waking stories. witness on al jazeera. oh, the new bulk of london, the top stories on al jazeera, the world's richest man long must have taken control of one of the world's most.