amy: from new york, this is democracy now! on this annersary o roe v. wade or whatouldave been the th aiversarywe areeeing tw hugelimportantrends ppening. one is that a certain nber of ates are rushingo ban aboron a at let 12 stas aboron is an thother is tre is a burgeongovemt to restore

and expa access abortio d all pducte healthare. making history in cities and states across america. amy: this sunday would have marked the 50th anniversary of roe v. wade. we'll get an update on the state of abortion access now with the nation's amy littlefield. then, as independent senator bernie sanders gives a national address on the state of america's working class, we'll look at the growing problem of medical debt. >> i see a nation were unbelievably over 500,000 people go bankrupt each year because of medically related debt. you are ck, you know you get? you go bankrupt as a result. >> every time i checked my mail, every time i receive an 8866 call, which now i know is debt collection, i am just reminded of how much i am in and it makes me really anxious. amy: we will hear about the

national movement to stop hospitals suing patients, garnishing wages, putting liens on homes of people who face medical debt they can't repay. then elite capture. how the powerful took over identity politics and everything else. >> solarity ites wking pele again the corrate ites a is not tisfie with small victories for the mere appearance of justice. amy: we will speak with philosopher olúf?mi o. táíwò. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. the top three officials in ukraine's interior ministry have been killed when their helicopter crashed near a kindergarten in a suburb outside kyiv. at least 17 people died, including ukraine's interior minister, his first deputy

minister, and the state secretary. three of the dead were children on the ground. the injured also included 17 children. at the time of the crash, the ukrainian officials were heading to the front lines in eastern ukraine. it is not clear what caused the helicopter crash. there was heavy fog at the time. ukraine's interior minister denys monastyrsky is ukraine's highest profile casualty since russia invaded ukraine 11 months ago. this comes as direct u.s. involvement in the war in raine continues to escalate. on tueay, u.s. generalark milley, the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, traveled to -- met the head of the ukrainian military at a polish military base. it was our first face-to-face meeting since the war began. meanwhile, about 100 ukrainian troops have arrived in the united states for arriving at fort sill, a u.s. army base in oklahoma the pentagon said the training will focus on using the patrt

missile system. in related news, "the new york times" has revealed the pentagon has sent hundreds of thousands of artillery shells to ukraine from a little known u.s. stockpile of ammunition in israel. in the philippines, nobel peace prize laureate and journalist maria ressa has been acquitted of tax evasion charges in what was widely seen as a politically motivated case. ressa is the founder of the independent news outlet rappler and was a vocal critic of former filipino president rodrigo duterte, whose government filed the charges. ressa spoke earlier today. >> these charges were politically motivated. they were incredible, a brazen abuse of power. meant to stop journalists from doing their jobs.

today, fact wins. truth wins. justice wins. amy: despite today's acquittal, maria ressa's legal problems are not over. she is currently on bail as she appeals a six-year prison sentence handed down in 2020 for a libel conviction. visit democracynow.org to see our interviews with maria ressa. in the united states, house republicans have placed far right election deniers marjorie taylor greene and paul gosar on the powerful house oversight and accountability committee. this comes two years after democrats removed them from their committee posts for calling for violence against democrats on social media. greene, who once claimed there was an "islamic invasion into our government offices," will also serve othe homeland security committee. gosar will also rejoin the natural resources committee. in 2021, the house censured him for posting an animated video on social media where he murders congressmember alexandria

ocasio-cortez and attacks president biden. a number of other members of the far-right freedom caucus also received prominent committee posts. meanwhile, republican congressmember george santos has been picked to serve on two committees even though he is facing calls to resign after he -- even from many members of the republican party, after he lied about his educational background, employment history, religion, and much more. santos will reportedly serve on the house small business committee and the science, space and technology committee. this all comes a week after house speaker kevin mccarthy announced he would strip three prominent democrats -- adam schiff, eric swalwell, and ilhan omar -- of their committee assignments. the white house is blasting republican lawmakers for pushing for major spending cuts as part of a deal to raise the debt limit. white house press secretary karine jean-pierre spoke on tuesday. >> this is not a plan.

it is a recipe for economic catastrophe. as president biden has made clear, congress must deal with the debt limit and must do so without conditions. but congressional republicans are threatening to hold the nations fullface and credit, a mandate of the constitution, hostage to their demands to cut social security, to cut medicare, and to cut medaid. amy: the u.s. will technically hit the de ceiling on thursday but treasury secretary janet yell said extraordinary measures can be taken to keep paying the government's bills until early june. in brazil, the prosecutor general has charged 39 supporters of former president jair bolsonaro in connection with the january 8 attack on the brazilian supreme court, congress, and presidential palace in the capital brasília. the defendants are charged with staging a coup and other crimes. the charges come days after brazil's supreme court announced it would investigate bolsonaro for inspiring the january 8

attack. he is currently in the united states. an iranian-american who has been jailed in tehran since 2015 has begun a week-long hunger strike. in an open letter to president biden, siamak namazi describes himself as having the "unenviable title of the longest held iranian american hostage in history." he was arrested along with his father on a business trip in 2015 and convicted of cooperating with a hostile government. thousands of peruvians from rural areas are gathering in the capital lima to demand the resignation of president dina boluarte, who took power last month after the ouster and arrest of leftist president pedro castillo. the protests are being led by indigenous, peasant, and trade union groups opposed to the december coup. at least 50 protesters have died -- have been killed since castillo's ouster.

on tuesday, police in lima fired tear gas at demonstrators who vowed to remain in the streets. >> we have come to lima. we are under editorial government, a militarist government which has stained our country blood. amy: climate protests are continuing in germany over the expansion of an open pit coal mine in the village of lützerath in western germany. on tuesday, police detained swedish climate activist greta thunberg for the second time this week. three officers dressed in riot gear were seen carrying her away after she joined other activists attempting to block the front of the coal mine. thunberg tweeted earlier today, "climate protection is not a crime." amnesty international is calling for an investigation into the death of a prominent imprisoned dissident in the oil-rich african nation of equatorial guinea.

the 51-year-old julio obama mefuman, who is also a citizen of spain, had been serving a 60-year-jail sentence. in 2017, he and another dissident had been kidnapped in south sudan and brought to equatorial guinea to be imprisoned. just two weeks ago, spain announced it will investigate the circumstances of how the men were seized. equatorial guinea has been led by the u.s.-backed teodoro obiang nguema mbasogo since 1979. he is the longest serving president in the world. back in the united states, the justice department has decided it won't seek the death penalty for the texas man accused of shooting dead 23 people, mostly latinos come at a walmart in el paso, texas, in 2019. it was one of the deadliest attacks on a latinx population in u.s. history. the shooter admitted to targeting latinos in the attack. you could still face the death

penalty if convicted on state charges in texas. and hundreds of faculty at the university of illinois chicago launched an indefinite strike tuesday after failed contract negotiations. their demands include fair wages that reflect historic inflation, mental health support, and learning disability assessments for students. this is aaron krall, a senior english lecturer, speaking at tuesday's rally. >> we are out here fighting for job security for nontenured faculty. [cheers] we have seen universities around this country relying on intentioned labor. is that right? this higher education and public good? -- a public good? amy: and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman in new york, joined by democracy now!'s juan gonzález in chicago. hi, juan.

juan: hi, amy. welcome to all of our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. this sunday, january 22, would have marked the 50th anniversary of the supreme court's landmark roe v. wade decision that guaranteed a constitutional right to abortion. i just over six months ago, the court upended five decades of legal precedent when it struck down roe v. wade in the case known as dobbs v. jackson women's health. the court's removal of the right to safe, legal abortions has led to total abortion bans in 12 states, with low income and black and latinx and indigenous people among the most impacted. meanwhile, the push to ensure access to abortion has spurred new legal challenges and greater reliance on the medical pill, the abortion pill mifepristone, as medication abortions account for more than half of all u.s.

abortions today. starting today, new york city plans to offer free abortion pills at four sexual health clinics. for more, we are joined by amy littlefield, abortion access correspondent at the nation. her most recent piece is headlined "cities and states are acting fast to blunt the impact of dobbs." she is just back from new mexico, where activists are working to expand abortion access as people seek help there from neighboring states like texas where abortion bans are in place. amy littlefield, well back to democracy now! why don't you give us the lay of the land of abortion access around this country today. >> it is so great to be back with you. on this somber and also i would say anniversary of what would have been the anniversary of roe v. wade. i want to talk about the literal map of abortion access in this country right now. 12 stas ban abortion entirely

in this moment with some limited exceptions depending on how each state law is different in terms of how sick the pregnant person has to be before there can be intervention to save their life and terminate the pregnancy. most of the states that have these bans do not make sections for rape or incest. what is important is when you look at the map, there is idaho and south dakota and and there are 10 states with these total bans that are all in a row in a deep red brick wall across the south. so if you start in el paso, texas, and moved to the eas the eastern edge of alabama, we're talking about a solid block of 10 states. moving up north to missouri and west virginia in the east, we're talking about states all in a row, multistate steep, more than 1300 miles of states push

together where legal abortion is effectively gone. i want to tell you a number that i can't stop thinking about since i found it, which is 58,000. that is the number of abortions that happened in texas in 2020. 58,000. that is like a decent sized city that happens to be composed entirely of people of childbearing age, most of whom are women and trans and gender nonconforming people, who are pregnant and don't want to be. i ask you to imagine in this landscape, this deep brick wall of abortion bans, where those 58,000 people are going to go. what happens to them? we know from speaking to activists in states like new mexico, some are making it out, some are making these arduous journeys in cars filled with sleeping bags and coolers, driving across state lines. they are boarding planes coordinated by grassroots

activists. the emerging pictures that that is the exception and not the rule and there are an untold number of people staying pregnant against their will despite the best efforts of act as -- activists to help them get access to abortion pills where states are banning abortion. juan: an, there have been some states that have active laws that strengthen abortion rights are rejected ballot initiatives that restrict the procedure. could you talk about some of those states and what they're doing in effect to assist those in the abortion ban states? >> absolutely. there is this emerging picture of states on the one hand going as far as they can to ban abortion and on the other hand, this historic momentum holding behind pro-abortion rights policies that once would have

been unheard of in this country. that is happening not just in blue states like california and new york, washington, oregon, illinois, it is also happening in cities and counties within these deep red states. for exale, nashville, tennessee. the city council there had passed legislation to prioritizing enforcement of -- de-power ties a abortion. they have also allocated half $1 million to planned parenthood to fund reproductive health care. we are seeing cities and counties try to step up. atlanta is another one that has directed public funding as well as seattle, city you might have expected that from. new orleans, denton, texas, passing proactive measures to blunt the impact of criminal abortion laws and also to try to shore up reproductive

health care access wherever they can post up the first three months after the dobbs decision came down reversing roe v. wade, we saw 17 states and at least 24 municipalities moving to expand or protect abortion access according to the national institute for reproductive health. that is historic. a huge surge in momentum. i think a lot of democratic politicians at the local and county and state level understanding there is tremendous power under local government. the antiabortion movement was very savvy about realizing that before. but i think we are seeing a long-overdue recognition of the power of local government among progressives right now. juan: could you talk as well and the actions of the federal government, the biden administration and the announcement earlier this month of the food and drug

administration? >> so what happened earlier this month is the food and drug adminiration announced in eight easing of restrictions on mifepristone, the abortion pill, which is one of the medications taken to induce a medication abortion. what it will allow -- the abortion pill will be able to be sold in retail pharmacies like cvs and walgreens if someone has a prescription. this is a game changer for people who live in states where abortion is legal who might be able to go to cvs or walgreens. then you can go and in a state like massachusetts where i am or new york and get your prescription for the abortion pill filled ther which is a huge shift. before because of the pandemic, the biden administration had made the abortion pill available through mail, through mail order pharmacies.

before that, had to go in person to a clinic to get it. this is again changer --his is a ga changer. the same thing with mayor eric adams's decision and health clinics that will be offering the abortion pill in new york city for free. that is a huge decision. each of these decisions takes a step toward destigmatize and abortion and could lead people in states where abortion is ban in tennessee, arkansas, demanding not just demanding reimplementation of the protections in roe v. wade, but free abortion pills and the health clinic. if it is happening in new york city, i think that shifts open a window for everyone else. not to give eric adams too much credit, i want to say these movements, these victories belong to the movements that are advocating for them and not the

politicians. because we know democrats have spent a long time treading water and it comes to expanding abortion access, and i think they're moving now because of the enormous amount of momentum the hind the deeply popular right to an abortion. amy: it may have explain why the house division between democrats and republicans is so close, that it was not a red wave as many had predicted because of people's concern about reproductive rights access. but what about, for example, the governor of new york kathy hochul who ran on a very pro-because -- pro-choice stand and yet she appoints -- she nominates to the highest court hector was saul, many progressives are -- tetra lasalle. many progressives are against this because he is a tight choice. >> i have to say the sound and

the fury with the emergence of lasalle's nomination shows what happens when two of the most enormously powerful underpinnings of the democratic party's power get together, right, labor unions on the one hand opposing lasalle's stance against rulings and abortion rights? i wish we saw more collaboration, and i think we will, between those two extremely powerful movements. the reason why the sound is deep concern, the other day, more than 100 experts and advocates and organizations that support abortion rights sign onto a letter opposing his nomination is because of a ruling in favor of crisis pregnancy centers. these are antiabortion centers that often pose as abortion clinics that try to look edible clinics. when the attorney general eric schneiderman try to investigate several years ago, he was

stymied by a ruling that lasalle had signed on to. that is of tremendous concern, especially because these policies like the one in new york city to issue free abortion pills in public health centers, the efforts by the new york state legislature to shore up abortion access, they don't mean anything if the courts are against these policies. if the highest court in the land is going to reverse the policies or stymied as policies because of name tie abortion stance, these policies, -- antiabortion stance, these policies, even in a state like new york that are considered safe, are dead in the water. this is hugely consequential. it is clear kathy hochul did not read the writing on the wall. democrats owe the fact they averted a total disaster in the midterms to the reversal of roe v. wade and enormous amount of work in grassroots organizing that would into pushing back against that overturned and

trying to restore abortion rights. if you don't believe me, consider the fact there were six states where abortion was directly on the ballot in the midterms, ok, starting with kansas in august -- which we talked about on the show. even in red states like kansas, kentucky, montana, the abortion rights decision won on every single one of those ballot measures. what that says is the democratic race is fired up on this issue. it sees a connection between abortion and other economic issues. and some democrats are recognizing that and it would seem some like kathy hochul are not understanding precisely what constituents want. juan: amy, we just have a few seconds. you mentioned you have been to new mexico recently and the religious coalition for reproductive choice. could you talk about what you saw on the ground there? >> yeah, so i visited the

headquarters of the new mexico religious coalition for reproductive choice, which is an abortion find that provides practical support. they help with the logistics of people traveling to new mexico. remember, new mexico is right to the west bordering texas, the state where there were 58 thousand abortions in 2020. this state had about 1/10 of that in terms of their 2020 numbers for abortion. this ia grassroots organization. every week they rerved 10 spots on an airplane to bring patients from texas and airlift them to new mexico for an abortion. they have set up their offices what looks like sort of a field hospital in this -- they have cots for people to rest on, heating pads stitched volunteers, cookies baked volunteers, freezers full of frozen dinners, maxi pads, toys

for kids. it is a way station for people who are making a long journey from out-of-state, mostly from texas, to come to new mexico which has become this safe haven for abortion. inics following the flow of patients moving to new mexico from states where abortion is banned. the most telling thing that stuck with me is they told me they don't always -- they are not always able to fill those 10 spots on the airplanes that they fly each week. sometimes they have seven people, sometimes fewer. what i think that speaks to is an enormous amount of confusion and amount -- enormous amount of lack of information for people who need an abortion and might not know where to go. we don't know how he of the patients are self managing and abortion with help of grassroots organization or undergrou networks. we don't know how many people are just stayingregnant against their will. that is a human rights crisis unfolding in real time on this

roe v. wade anniversary. amy: amy littlefield, thank you for being with us, abortion access correspondent at the nation. we will link to your latest piece "cities and states are acting fast to blunt the impact of dobbs." next up, as senator bernie sanders gives a national address on the state of america's working class, we will look at what he addressed last night, the growing problem of medical debt in the movement to stop hospitals from swing patients come having their wages garnished, putting liens on the homes of people facing medical bills they cannot afford. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. in a major address tuesday evening from the u.s. capitol, independent senator bernie sanders of vermont gave a

national address on the state of america's working class. he focused in part on the growing problem of medical debt. >> i see a nation where over 85 million of our people are either uninsured or underinsured. and as all of you know, we're the only major country on earth not to guarantee health care for all people. i see a nation where unbelievably over 500,000 people go bankrupt each year because of medically related debt. you were sick, you had a cancer operation, you you get? you go bankrupt as a result. does that make any sense to anybody? i see a nation, we don't talk about this at all, virtually nobody talks about this. were over 68,000 people die each year because they can't afford

health care. i have talked to doctor doctor around the country telling me about patients who walked in the door terribly ill. the doctor says, why did you not come when you're -- when he first felt your symptoms? i did not have any insurance. i can't afford to pay. thousands of thousands of people call into the doctor's office and it is too late and they die in the united states. amy: senator bernie sanders speaking tuesday night in a major address on the state of america's working class. to see the whole address, go to democracynow.org. today we're going to look at how more patients are speaking out as they struggle with medical debt. the health care reform group we the patients new yorkas spoken to many patients. this is anthony calafiura's story. >> little over your go from now i was committed to the psych ward after a failed suicide attempt. i was there for 14 days.

they generally helped me until i received my bill. thank like, i was under my estranged father's insurance. even then and even today i'm over $2000 in debt and my mother has refused to help me pay so i have been essentially forced to figure out the whole situation by myself. when i was 17. after i got released when i tried calling the hospitals, there was not much i could do because i was still a minor and it felt like a circle and i never really got actual advice on what to do. now that i am 18, it is been six months since i have been released. all of my debt has transferred to debt collection agency. nobody around me knows what to do. this situation has been causing me so much stress. every time i checked my mail, received an 866 call, which i now know is debt collection, i am reminded of how much i am in

and it makes me really anxious and it is been not good for my mental health, which is why i am in debt in the first place. i think there should be a law change within the medical system. i think in schools they should teach people how insurance works, how to manage debt. i felt alone. even when there are 23 american millions -- 23 million americans and debt. the u.s. policy system, people should not have to go into debt with little knowledge of what to do afterwards just to get the medical care they need. people should not be afraid to go into the doctors in fear of the bill they will receive after. amy: and this is sherel wilson about her medical debt struggles after getting surgery. >> in 18, i had surgery at staten island university hospital. i received aill from the attorney saying i owed $100,000 for that surgery. i am still receiving bills.

it is affecting my cdit. i am striving hard and i did not know what the future was gng to hold for me. i am receiving social security. i have a small pension. i am a homeowner. i have to get around so you have a car. this needs to be heard, d not just to get my vote. listen to the people. listen to the people that are hurting. see the people that are hurting, that are losing -- some of them are losing their livelihoods. most of all, their health. we really need to do something about it. amy: they were recorded by we the patients ny. for more on medical debt, who has it and what to do about it, we are joined by elisabeth benjamin, vice president of health initiatives at the community service society of new york and co-founder of the health care for all new york campaign.

welcome back to democracy now! can you test lay out this issue that bernie sanders addressed last night and so many people are addressing around the country? what exactly is medical debt and what are these huge hospitals that are not profits doing to particularly indigent patients who end up in medical debt? >> thank you for having me. it is nice to be here. so how many people have medical debt? it is around 100 million of people around the country that have medical debt. that has rock capped to be about $200 billion, $195 billion in medical debt in america people are incurring. essentially, 20% our nation's population. the other thing that is extraordinary about this is to our profound racial andthnic disparities in terms of who owns

medical debt. 28% of african-american folks have medical debt. 22% of latina, latino, latinx. 70% of white folks, 10% of asian. basically, it is -- 17% of white folks, 10% of asian. basically, it is a phenomenon that hurts low income and people of color. that is what the evidence shows. in fact, we know from the credit reporting agencies that 58% of dead is -- debt is medical debt. i think what is most distressing about this is how this medical debt is getting incurred. what we have studied in new york is we did a comprehensive universal analysis looking at every single hospital in new york state, all of which are nonprofit charities, allegedly,

and we found over five years from 2015-20 20 by looking at every single county court civil, small claims court records, they had 53,000 patients. not all hospital sued but most -- but many do. it is sort of a practice that really is done by the sort of big networks and some of the most illustrious hospitals in our system. this phenomenon has been found in other states. wisconsin, for example, a big analysis published. we have seen these nonprofit hospitals which are bound by irs rules to not take extraordinary debt collection actions but suing people is quite extraordinary by the irs rules, but not only do they sue people and sue a lot of people at huge volumes, but also that is not good enough. they were charging 9% interest when interest rates were 1%. they were going after people's

homes by putting liens on people's homes, which ruins someone's credit. you might think, well, they are foreclosing. but taking a lien on someone's home and you cannot get a consumer loan, and educational loan, a car loan. if your pipes burst on winter, you cannot get a home equity loan to repair them if you have a lien on your primary residence. the other thing we saw, there were suing six years and beyond. who knows what insurance i had six years ago? what we have found is what the national data was showing was really happening in even progressive states like new york. the thing that is kind of cool is around the country, there are activists in colorado, new mexico, maryland and massachusetts. georgia. on the ground, people are

fighting back. that is what we the patients is all about and what we at the community service a society try to do is to change things. juan: elisabeth, many of these hospitals, especially nonprofit hospitals, number one, they often report significant numbers of charity care and they get reimbursed by many states for their supposed charity care. what is happening here that they are still going after people who can't pay their bills? >> what the hospitals say is we do huge amounts of charity care, we do huge amounts of public benefit and public good. but when you look close -- look closely and analyze what they're reporting is a public benefit, it might be a piano and a lobby. it might be a clinic that they are running where they actually get medicaid reimbursement.

i think we have to look really carefully at those public benefit numbers. what we noticed in new york state, we are one of those states that had what is called indigent care pool and we provide $1.1 billion to our nonprofit hospitals because we believe in hospitals. hospitals save people every day. we love our hospitals. what we noticed is the hospitals that were suing the most and garnishing people's wages, putting liens on people's homes, typically were the ones that weren't spending their multimillion dollar allotment on financial assistance to patients . how can they get away with that? one of the ways is there is no requirement that before they sue a patient to look closely at the patient's zip code or this independent data to see if they are low income or not. when we did a data analysis getting by pulling random samples of court files and look at the data analysis, we found these hospitals were

disproportionately suing in zip codes that -- where people of color live or though income zip codes. -- low income zip codes. they were not even telling the state's rule to provide financial assistance for those below 300% of poverty. we found these hospitals had been spending less on financial aid. the hospital say, oh, but that pool is not to provide financial aid to patients, you just don't understand. that is to compensate us for our medicaid losses. i think if you have been called the indigent care pool and as a requirement for having money, pulling money as a hospital out of that pool, you're supposed to have a financial aid policy, contingey for pulling funds, that provides charity care or financial aid up to three or percent of poverty, then you should spend every single penny you can on financial aid first

before compensating you on your alleged medicaid loss. juan: could you name some names? obviously, these hospital chains, they all claim in their advertisements to be for the public good but yet there running up huge endowments, paying tremendous salaries to their executive officers. name some names of the worst offenders when it comes to going after people's debts. >> turned the 2015-2020 period we studied, the hospital system that had sued the most people in new york state was the northwell system. they have quite a substantial endowment. i think what was most upsetting about what they were doing is the courts were effectively closed to patients between march 2020-to sever 2020 because of the pandemic. we found they had -- december 2020 becau of the pandemic.

we found they had sued numerous people. the supreme court data set where people are represented -- the hospitals in syracuse represented by the attorney james of new york who claimed there would be medical debt moratorium for all suni hospitals, they sued around 1500 people a year. no financial aid was being provided because even patients who have been sued that were -- after they got no judgment were found eligible for financial aid, they still were charging them. this poor woman still had to pay the interest and the other judgment related expenses, which i guess is technically legal, but is it humane? that hospital was suing around 1500 people write to the pandemic. we found a bunch of cases that were also been prosecuted during the attorney general's medical debt moratorium.

there is an attorney general's unit in sycuse that is very aggressive in this is how they make their livelihoods, by suing low income, disproportionately low-income people of color. it is really a shock -- shocking and it has to stop. i think that is what we are really working hard on moving forward. we are trying to say, look, don't let every hospital design and hidtheir financial aid application. let's have a common application for financial aid like we do for financial aid for college, right? we have the one form. why do we need 200 10 different forms in new york state? let's ban the practice of reporting medical debt to credit agencies. that was single-handedly improve the credit of millions and millions of americans so there are a couple of bills in congress that are trying to do that. i think some states are looking

into that. we in new york are going to try to improve our financial assistance situation. we are excited becse governor hochul has called in the state of the state for developing a single uniform financial aid form. we think that will cut out a lot of the red tape and make financial assistance more available to patients and cut down what is happening with medical debt in new york, which is out of control. amy: finally, the bills that were signed off on by governor hochul started with a grassroots movement in this state just in the last few months. >> yes. she did sign -- we are grateful to governor hochul and to the state legislature for championing medical debt reform. we passed three bills. we passed bills that would ban liens and wage garnishments, so medical providers when they sue patients were saying, if you must sue, don't go nuclear on people.

don't put liens on homes and run their credit. don't garnish low-income working class folks partially wages. they will never be able to pay you back. we enacted a bill that would call resort fees for preventive care and requiring hospitals and medical providers to tell people about the so-called facility fees. it is just a resort charge that medical providers like to charge and get away with charging. we reduced the statute of limitations from six years to three years in interest rate from 9% to 2%. we are going to keep fighting this fight. it is important. to this huge -- as senator sanders said, are real problem with our health care system is we don't have a coherent national health system. amy: elisabeth benjamin, thank you for being with us, vice president of health initiatives

at the community service society of new york and co-founder of the health care for all new york campaign. next up, delete capture. -- "elite capture. how the powerful took over identity politics." stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: "i against i" by jedi mind tricks. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. we end today's show with a philosopher olúf?mi o. táíwò. he recently has written two widely acclaimed books "elite capture. how the powerful took over identity politics and anything is" and "reconsidering reparations." robin kelly has said, " olúf?mi o. táíwò is a thinker on fire. he not only calls out empire for tronic is letting hands no clot of magical thinking, but calls on all of us to do the same. elite capture is about turning oppression and care into the commodity exchange where identities become capitalism

latest currency rather than that grounds for revolutionary transformation." for more, we're joined by olúf?mi o. táíwò, associate professor of philosophy at georgetown university. thank you so much for being with us. why don't we start off by you defining the term elite capture. >> thank you for having me. the basic idea behind elite capture is kind of like the idea behind inequality. so elite capture happens when the advantaged few in a group steer the resources and political direction of organizations or movements or parts of our social structure like the justice system toward their narrow interests. juan: and could you talk about how that works in practice in

day-to-day activities within black and brown communities especially? >> how this works in practice i think works a lot through the ways that we talk and communicate about politics and what is going on in our lives. i think there is often a discussion that is related to elite capture when people talk about the corporate control of media and the results on our kind of day-to-day discussions and day-to-day understanding of politics. so when we have converse -- conversations about things like racial justice or even justice with respect to class politics and and obscuring those conversations around the kinds of conversational topics that have to do with representation and unique spaces whether we are talking about universities or maybe media like movies and film

and recognitions for excellence in those kinds of aspects of life, that is the result, one could argue, i argue, of the disproportionate control of the institutions that control how we get information about politics on the day-to-day conversations we have. juan: obviously, the black lives matter movement and the upsurge of protests in recent years have led many of these institutions to basically create this whole new diversity, equity, and inclusion and astray, i call it. i am wondering your sense of how this attem by the power structures to co-opt these grassroots movements, how that is -- has affected the way,

especially the african-american and latino react to the de eye-movement? >> i think there's a big influence there. on the one hand, i think the response of the powerful to try to co-opt grassroots movements in this way kind of reflects sort of political victory that was won. 100 years ago, the powers that be were not trying to appear woke or weren't championing diversity and inclusion, explicit formal segregation was the rule in united states, in south africa. and over time, as though systems got pressured by grassroots movements that opposed things like jim crow and apartheid, then you saw what you are talking about. the rise of equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives and

the use of the kind of energy generated by those movements to kind of wash or paint over the ongoing existence of structural racism, of capitalism, the class adjustment that are built into capitalism but do it with a kind of rainbow coalition faces in high places. and intelligentsia at universities, which is sectors of society that have been affected by this come has definitely responded to the rise in equity, diversity, and inclusion kind of corporate framings by focusing on objects rather than the material struggles which cause the creation of ethnic studies programs in the first place which caused the study of racial

justice and gender justice and all the other sorts of things that get studied under the heading of dei. amy: you talk about the combahee river collective. and its relation to an framing of identity politics. tell us what it is. once again, we discussed it many times before, but how it frames identity politics that you think are critical in this country. close it was a collective of we black women socialists that organized in and around boston in the 1970's and members of the collective continue to be involved in politics since. they coined this term "identity politics" that now gets used a lot these days. as they thought of identity

politics or wrote about it in their manifesto, identity politics was essentially the drive to do politics starting from a first personal basis. so you look at your life and your political circumstances and figure out your political priorities and work from there. that is compatible with what many of the members of this coalition did in fact do, but i think nowadays when people use the term "identity politics," they are thinking of the ways of talking about identity that circulate on social media, which are maybe more commonly hostile to coalitional politics or at least suspicious about coalitional politics, which seemed to empathize and encourage people kind of splitting up into smaller and smaller groups and only being willing to work with an advocate for people whose identities

match theirs or most closely match the person who is speaking. and that is quite different from what i understand the point of the combahee river collective's point of the term meant. juan: in your book, you also talk about lessons that can be learned from the african struggle against colonialism, specifically in the 1960's and 1970's. could you expound on that? >> yes. so the wars of independence that re fought throughout the african continent in the world beyond the african continent were linked. the struggle against the portuguese empire was one of these. they had to organize within themselves and across the groups

that divided them, which included divides between religious grounds and ethnic grounds between people. they had to organize, zooming out, across much larger divides. they were part a wave of african independent struggles that were organizing with each other to the organization of african unity as it was called then and across some of the new country lines. there was international support from countries like bulgaria and sweden and the soviet union and cuba went as far as to send troops. and all of these kinds of divisions or potential divisions were things they had to be willing to work across to get their goal accomplished which was defeating the portuguese empire which had material

support of corporations like lockheed martin and countries like the united states. there were ultimately successful in that struggle because they were willing to work across all of those kinds of divisions. amy: professor, in the minute we have left, a recent interview describes you as one of america's most prominent philosophers who argue that climate change calls us to rethink world history. can you lay out what you called the constructive view of reparations? >> basically what i mean by the constructive view of reparations is the idea that we do need the people who have gotten rich off the spoils of yesterday's apartheid, yesterday's laying of the groundwork for today's capitalism. and there needs to be redistribution from the large corporations that have gotten all of that wealth to the rest of the people throughout the

world. at the point of that redistribution is not just so we can shuffle around cells on an excel spreadsheet, should be killed in a world that does not structurally run on racism and other kinds of oppression and capitalism. the construction of constructive view is the point of building that the world would have a different energy system, produce things in different way, it would manage resources in a more democratic way. i think those are the kinds of changes we have to think about building rather than only thinking about redistributing money or tearing down the structures we have now. amy: olúf?mi o. táíwò, that you for being with us, associate professor of philosophy at georgetown university. author of most recently to books, the most recent "elite capture. how the powerful took

over identity politics and everything else." and "reconsidering reparations." that does it for our show. democracy now! is looking for feedback from people who appreciate the closed captioning. e-mail your comments to outreach@democracynow.org or mail them to democracy now! p.o. box 693 new york, new york 10013. [captioning made possible by democracy now!] ñl

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