01/26/23 01/26/23 [captioning de possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> further evidence of our commitment to ukraine and our confidence in the ukrainian forces. amy: under nationwide air raid alert as russia launches dozens of missile and drone strikes the day after the united states and germany announced they will send tanks to ukraine in a major policy reversal. we will speak to the

investigative editor of the independent russian news outlet which just today has been outlawed in russia. he will spk to us from latvia. thene look at the new documentary "20 ys i mariupol,"hich jus premiered at the sundance film festival. >> this is the firstime -- the hospital is surrounded. dozens of doctors, hundreds of paents, and as. amy: weill speak to the film's dictor, the ukrainian ap journalist myslav chernov, who risked his life to document the russian invasion. in the biden administration reposes a renters bill of rights but what impact ll it ha on the nation's housing crisis? the renis tooo damhigh

and peoplere struging to make bls, mnwhile, thehite use has been wking on month-ng process to puout pocy tt attds to inrvene the imbalance of power between landlords and their tenants. amy: all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. in the occupied west bank, israeli forces killed at least nine palestinians during a raid on the jenin refugee camp. one of the victims was a 60-year-old woman, identified by a local hospital as magda obaid. at least 20 people were injured in the attack. medics say israeli forces at first blocked them from getting to the injured. the head of the jenin public hospital reported israeli soldiers also fired tear gas into the hospital which reached

the pediatric department, causing suffocation injuries to children. general strikes have been called in jenin, nablus, and ramallah as schools closed early and stores shut down. palestinian leaders called on the u.n. and international actors to step in to prevent further bloodshed. israelis have killed at least 29 palestinians since the start of the year, including five children. ukraine's military has retreated from the eastern town of soledar as russian forces attempt to encircle the nearby city of bakhmut. it is russia's largest battlefield victory since last summer. it came as ukraine's military chief said russia fired 55 cruise missiles across ukraine overnight, including 15 missiles targeting the capital kyiv where one person was killed and two

wounded. meanwhile, ukraine is calling on its allies to supply it with modernar planes, including fighter jets, after the white -- biden administration set it will ship 31 u.s.-made abrams battle tanks to ukraine. the escalation came after the german chancellor agreed to send leopard 2 tanks and allow other countries who have their leopard 2 tanks to send them as well. president biden spoke at the white house wednesday. pres. biden: putin expected europe and the united states to weaken our resolve and expected our support for ukraine to crumble with time. he was wrong. amy: the british-based stop the war coalition blasted the move to arm ukraine with tanks, tweeting -- "this is not the path to peace and marc sears escalation. arming ukraine and sending tanks is a step further away from negotiation." meanwhile, a russian court ordered the country's oldest human rights organization to be

closed down. it is the latest in moscow's crackdown on free speech and dissidents, which has intensified since the start of its invasion of ukraine last february. in other ns, in peru, thousands of people marched in the capital lima after interim president dina boluarte called for a national truce amid ongoing protests since the ouster and arrest of her predecessor pedro castillo on december 7. this is a protester. >> how many people are dying? for the love of god, out boluarte. we are suffering. everything is becoming more expensive. we don't even have enough to eat. we are peruvians and we are asking for help. amy: over 50 people have died in the brutal crackdown on demonstrators.

meanwhile, leftist lawmakers allied with castillo have submitted a motion of impeachment against boluarte over her response to the protests. in california, the 66-year-old farmworker accused of fatally shooting seven coworkers at two mushroom farms was denied bail wednesday as prosecutors charged him with seven counts of murder. san mateo county's sheriff said the gunman was not known to local law enforcement and had lawfully purchased the semiautomatic gun used in monday's massacre. in southern california, vice president kamala harris visited the star ballroom dance studio in monterey park wednesday where she laid flowers at a memorial for victims of saturday's massacre. investigators say the shooter did not personally know any of the 11 people killed and nine others injured in the attack. all of the victims were asian and most were chinese-americans. the shooter was a 72-year-old

gun enthusst who in 99 lawfully purchased the semiautomatic mac-10 assau pistol used in the killings. in virginia, the newport news school board voted wednesday to fire and replace the current schools superintendent less than three weeks after a six-year-old student shot his teacher at richneck elementary school. 25-year-old abigail zwerner faces a long road to recovery after the first-grader shot her as she sought to confiscate the weapon in her classroom on january 6. zwerner's lawyer said wednesday school administrators repeatedly shrugged off warnings that the student was making threats and appeared to have a gun. >> on that day over the course of a few hours, three different times, three times school administration was warned by

conservative teachers and employees that the boy had a gun on him at school and was threatening people. but the administration could not be bothered. amy: in news from washington, house speaker kevin mccarthy on wednesday ousted democrats adam schiff and eric swalwell from the house intelligence committee, carrying through on a promised retaliation for the expulsion of far-right republicans marjorie taylor greene and paul gosar from their congressional committees in 2021 after they called for violence against democrats on social media. gosar's removal came after he posted an animated video where he murders congressmember alexandria ocasio-cortez and physically attacks president biden. gosar and greene have both received committee assignments in the new congress. mccarthy is also expected to hold a vote on removing

minnesota congresswoman ilhan omar from the foreign affairs committee since he cannot unilaterally remove members from that panel. it is not clear if mccarthy has enough support in his party to do so. two republican lawmakers have already opposed the move, and mccarthy can only afford four defections. the three targeted democrats condemned mccarthy's corrupt bargain with the extreme right of his party. this is congressmember ilhan omar. >> it is about revenge. it is about abusing -- appeasing the former president. all three of us have been a thorn in the back of the previous disgraced president. amy: in tennessee, the chief of the memphis police department has condemned the killing of tyre nichols, who died of kidney failure and cardiac arrest on days after his violent arrest january 10, three following a

traffic stop. five memphis police officers and two fire department employees have been fired in the wake of nichols' killing. an independent autopsy found tyre suffered extensive bleeding after officers pepper-sprayed, tased, restrained, kicked, and beat him for three minutes. police chief cj davis urged memphis residents not to turn to violence or property destruction after body camera video of the assault is released. >> this is the failing of basic humanity toward another individual. this incident was heinous, reckless, and inhumane. in the vein of transparency, when t video is leased in e coming days, you will see this for yourselves. amy: a federal prosecutor has launched civil rights probe into the killing. a 2016 lawsuit says one of the five officers who have been fired for beating tyre for

beating a prisoner. in new york, former columbia university ob-gyn robert hadden has been convicted of federal sexual abuse charges, including sex trafficking. hadden sexually assaulted dozens of women patients over two decades, including evelyn yang, the wife of the former presidential candidate andrew yang. among the convictions, hadden was found guilty of luring patients across state lines for examinations during which he assaulted them. u.s. attorney damian williams called hadden a predator in a white coat. columbia university irving medical center and new york-presbyterian hospital had previously settled with over 200 survivors for $236 million. the social media giant meta has reinstated former president donald trump's accounts on facebook and instagram. trump was barred from the platforms two years ago over his

comments to supporters who rioted at the u.s. capitol on january 6, 2021. meta's president of global affairs, nick clegg, wrote in a blog post -- "the public should be able to hear what their politicians are saying -- the good, the bad and the ugly -- so that they can make informed choices at the ballot box." clegg said trump could be suspended again for up to two years if he once again violates meta's guidelines. in india, police detained students at new delhi's jamia millia islamia university before a planned screening of a new bbc documentary about prime minister narendra modi, which has sparked a growing firestorm and has been banned by modi. at the prestigious jawaharlal nehru university, also in new delhi, authorities resorted to cutting power to the student union hall to thwart a screening. the film in part covers modi's time as chief minister of gujarat when he was accused of complicity in the deadly 2002 anti-muslim riots which killed an estimated 1000 people.

modi's government, which is coming under mounting accusations of censorship, also ordered twitter and youtube to remove excerpts of the film from their sites. at the vatican, pope francis has criticized laws criminalizing lgbtq people in remarks hailed by rights groups as historic. speaking to the associated press tuesday, pope francis said -- "being homosexual is not a crime. it's not a crime. yes, but it's a sin. but it's also a sin to lack charity with one another," he said. pope francis added that catholic bishops should play an active role in opposing and repealing anti-lgbtq laws. the gay & lesbian alliance against defamation responded in a statement -- "today's statements from pope francis are a game changer in the fight to decriminalize lgbtq people and also illustrate the work that needs to be done with religious leaders to finally

show that being lgbtq is not a sin." lawmakers in the united kingdom have strongly criticized the church of england after the archbishop of canterbury said shops arset to uphold the ban on marriage equality when they meet in london for a synod -- when they meet next month to determine church police next month. the church has apologized for its past treatment of lgbtq people and said priests will be allowed to bless civil unions of same-sex couples, even as it said that same-gender couples still won't be allowed to marry in its churches. this is labour member of parliament chris bryant eaking tuesday in the house of commons. >> i think they're still the cruelty in what the bishops have saidord. there a sort of hypocrisy. i know they are try to squared everything up but in the end, there is a hypocrisy that will bless individuals but not the relationship.

amy: and republican freshman congressman george santos is coming under fresh scrutiny after he filed updated financial reports indicating that over $600,000 of campaign funds were not personal loans as he had previously claimed. it's not clear yet where the money came from. the new york congress number has faced mounting calls to resign and triggered multiple investigations for lying about large portions of his resumé and life history. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. when we come back, we look at the new documentary "20 days in mariupol," that just premiered at the sundance film festival. we will speak with its director, award-winning ap videographer. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. i am here in new york with co-host nermeen shaikh. hi, nermeen. nermeen: hi, amy. welcome to all of our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. amy: ukraine has declared a nationwide air raid alert as russia has launched dozens of missile and drone attacks across the country. at least one person has died in the capital kyiv today. the russian strikes come one day after the united states and germany announced they would put send tanks to ukraine in a major reversal of policy. with the war in its 12 month, we look at the u.s. plans to send 31 abrams tanks and germany will send 14 leopard 2 tanks.

germany has also given approval to other european nations to send german-made tanks to ukraine. meanwhile, russia has intensified its internal crackdown on domestic critics. on wednesday, a russian court ordered the closing of the moscow helsinki group, russia's oldest human rights organization . and just before our broadcast, the russian prosecutor general's office designated the independent russian news outlet meduza as an undesirable location. the news outlet is said to pose "threat to the foundations of the russian federation's constitutional order and national security." we had already planned to speak with alexey kovalev, investigative editor with meduza on today show, that he had to cancel minutes before we went to air due to this breaking news of putin making his organization

illegal. we turn now to " days in mariupol," a new documentary about t early dayof russia's invasi ofkrainehat has just premiered at the sundance film festival. reports from the aociated presisked their lives to stay in mariupol and documen russia's attaceven after international journalists left. they we ukrainian joualists. th is excerptrom "2days in mariupol," which produced jointly by the associated press and pbs frontline.

amy: an excerpt from "20 days in mariupol," which has just priered athe sundancfilm festival in park city, utah. we are joined now by the film's director and cinematographer mstyslav chernov. he is an award-winning associated press journalist from ukraine and also the president of the ukrainian association of professional photographers. in addition to the russian invasion of ukraine, chernov has covered the wars in iraq, syria, nagorno-karabakh, and afghanistan. he is also the author of the novel "the dreamtime," which draws heavily on his experience as a war correspondent. it must be a strange experience for you sitting there in salt lake city today as you hear that ukraine has declared a nationwide air raid alert as russia has launched dozens of missile and drone

attacks across the country and you presenting this film almost a year ago, you and your ukrainian colleagues, reporters deciding to stay in mariupol when other international journalists left to document the destruction of that city. if you can put what is happening today in ukraine together with your film? >> hi. yes stub of course. what i usually say to the audience, very strong responses from the audience, very emotional that people cry, they get angry. people ask what they can do. but really what i first say to the audiences is, the film is called "20 days in mariupol," and describes the first putting days of the full skill russian invasion of ukraine. although it has been almost nine years. but those 20 days is just a

number. thursday 21, 30, 90, and right now we're almost a year. this morning, the rocket launches on ukraine proves the point i am saying that whatever they see, whatever the audience sees the destruction and pain of ukrainians, it is not over. it is not something is in the past. it is something happening right now. here we go this morning, i'm calling my father in kyiv and asking if he is ok, if he is alive. all of my friends are writing to me they are in shelters hiding in the metro stations. they are just trying to survive. nermeen: as you may have heard, we announced earlier were supposed to be joined by one of

the editors of the independent russian news site meduza. he had to cancel because russia has just designated the media outlet as an illegal undesirable organization. could you speak also before we turn more at length to your documentary about what you know of the crackdown within russia on any kind of dissent or opposition to this war? >> it has been going on for years. since the full-scale russian invasion started, has been going on more and more. the purpose of that is, obviously, to deprive people who are against this war, to deprive russians are against this war of

argument. having a second opinion, an alternative opinion, alternative media who shed light on crimes of russia in ukraine, giving people tools to argue the government. therefore, i guess that is a tactic to deprive people of those arguments. but again, there are a lot of russian journalists doing their work well. i have to say currently most of the international journalists working in ukraine on the front lines and of course ukrainian journalists who lost their homes, who put themselves in real life threatening situations to keep covering the loss of civilian lives, the fighting on the front lines, their problems are kind of more urgent. nermeen: take us back to the

moment when you and your colleagues arrived in mariupol. he arrived just one day before the assault on the city began. explain why you went and how you knew that mariupol would be one of the first places that would be hit. >> it was actually like one hour. nermeen: forgive me, that's right, one hour. >> so as i mentioned before, this invasion started nine years ago. so throughout the nine years, dedicated a lot of time reporting on the front lines in trying to understand the dynamics of this war, this invasion. mariupol was one of -- always one of the key targets for russia as it is on the way -- on the land bridge basically, to crimea, to the occupied --

another occupied ukrainian territory by russia. russia tried to take mariupol in 2015 and failed. as on the 23rd, became more and more clear the invasion is imminent. there were so many small pieces of the puzzle which we just pieced together, messages from our colleagues, journalists who are just in a lysing the russian state media who were preparing the ground for this assault. we concluded that the war is going to start the next day on the 24th. it was the evening of the 23rd and we just decided to go, not to wait and to go. mariupol is very close to the russian border, and we knew swiftly would get surrounded. so we needed to get there before that.

so we did. amy: a lot of the film you're doing work in the hospital, and there is this comparison between covering the dead, the dying, the wounded in the hospital and the sort of comparison to what is happening to mary opal. but i want to turn to another clip from your film "20 days in mariupol" which is produced jointly by the associated press and pbs frontline. this shows the aftermath of the march 9 bombing of a marnity hospit there.

amy: an excerpt from "20 days in mariupol." r our rao listener the cl ends with pregnant man -- this becomes a scene that is en around e world -- being ought out on a stretcher through the debris, h hands

reachi towards h belly, he expressi frozen in shock. you would ter learn r ne is irina, as the world would learn. mstyslav, you talk about the bombing of this maternity hospital. if you can also talk about what we struggle with every day in our newsroom, and that is showing the images. because that is this film from beginning to end. yourself are ukrainian. you have two daughters. talk about this experience and what you chose to show and how it was received in the world. >> it was a very hard choice. to find a right balance when we were editing the film come to find the right balance to show the audience the gravity of war without holding back but at the

same time not push the audience away by the graphic images. that was a very big challenge. if we don't show enough, then people will kind of accept war or not, you know, because images are not violent enough, they don't see people suffering. and also producing a film of this footage, which everybody saw but mostly out of context, helped us to show the scale of the destruction. obviously, it impacted me as a father, impacted me as ukrainian, as a human in many ways. one of those ways that russians were claiming all of these women are actresses, that it is not true, that it is staged.

that was painful, too. amy: talk about irina. you did not know who she was at the time she is brought out. at the time she is alive and what you learned happened to her. >> when she was brought out -- the scene was already terrifying and we arrived. there were so many people crying. it was such a panic. you could see airplane flies over us and then they start carrying out the stretcher. i have never seen anything like that before. we just keep filming. they carry her across thi destroyed yard of the hospital. i see this image and i understand -- i keep filming and i understand already that it will have a huge impact if we

will be able to send the images because there was no connection all across the city. i understand if we will be able to send this footage, it willave a hugempact to h theorld ss it. so they are bringing her to the ambulance and the ride off. for the rest of the day, we're searchinfor a wato send this. and e next d, we tried to follow-up with the story. we tried to find o where s was, what ppened to her. so we go to the hospital. unfortunately, we learn from t doctors who treated her that he baby had died. unfortunately, they both died. nermeen: mstyslav, you spent a lot of time in hospital with medics. explain what you saw happening

over the course of those 20 days as medical supplies diminished as they were frequent because to the electricity, gas, how doctors were operating under those conditions will stop >> so the whole city after -- the whole city spiraled around complete chaos. people were in shock and panic. they did not know what to do. some of them looted stores. some of them were hiding. there was no gas, no electricity. the hospital was in terrible condition to because, first of all, no cell phone connection means if anyone in the city is injured, if anyone needs help for different medical reasons, they can't call an ambulance. they just can't because they can't reach the ambulance.

therefore, they had to carry their wounded where people who were sick to the hospital themselves or walk. there were people whose relatives were dying and they did not know to do the bodies, so they were just bringing these bodies and leaving them in front of the hospital. what else would you do? medical supplies were running out. there was little painkillers, little antibiotics. so doctors b day 15, doctors were just cutting off limbs. if you get the injured, which in normal conditions would be treatable, the doctors would decide to cut off limbs just to stop the sepsis because it was the only way to ensure the person would not die. that is kind of what was

happening at the first of the war. we slept in the hospital. we slept among the patients right on the floor. nobody slept near the windows. they slept on the floors in the corridors. nobody could sleep well because there was constant compartment all around the hospital. eventually, the hospital got hit several times. doctors were treating patients on the floor. there was little food. whenever we actually were not filming, we were just helping doctors to carry the gurneys or carry food to patients. the doctors never left the hospital. they were staying there, lived there with their families. eventually, the hospital we were at got occupied. but before that, it got surrounded and we thought we were going to be arrested. we fortunately got rescued by

the ukrainian army that broke as out. you see that story in the film. that is a pivotal moment in the film. as we are leaving the hospital behind, we know it gets occupied by russian forces. america at a certain point, city workers are bringing bodies from the street, putting them in mass graves and soldiers shoot a nurse in front of the hospital. talk about you filming all of this and the kind of questions or your response to what you were filming and also, of course, you are ukrainian on the ground. it does not even matter if you were from any other place, you are a human being, what this meant, before we talk about your decision to leave. >> honestly throughout the nine years, i've been working in the conflict zones. i've never experienced anything like that.

i don't mean this war is necessarily the worst war in the world, but for me personally, it is the worst and most dangerous, most painful experience i have had. also because i am ukrainian. this is very close to the chest. this is my home. i was born in eastern ukraine post our photographer is from the city, which is a neighboring city to mariupol and it got quickly occupied. his parents were also in that city. witness these mass graves where the children witness doctors trying to save children which died from shelling and they could not save them. those children were later buried in mass graves because relatives or social services just could not go and bury them properly. the morgues were full.

there were trucks that were taking bodies to the cemetery and bearing them under the constant shelling as well. i don't know. it is just terrifying post of it again, we are ukrainians. we are international journalists at the same time. we felt it is our obligation to keep working. that is the sole purpose of why we stayed, while we decided to stay in the city that was getting surrounded. nermeen: mstyslav, you say you made these extraordinary efforts to stay in the city to document so the world would know what exactly the russian invasion looked like. but despite that documentary footage, as you know, your work, the work of ap as well as other journalists, has been subjected

to an extraordinary campaign of disinformation and discrediting by the russian state. you say as you were sending -- in the documentary, images and dispatches from a satellite phone, that you and your colleagues were called information terrorists, that you received multiple threats. and even after all this footage was made available, the ap photographs as well as the video footage, people called into question the veracity of the footage and said -- some suggested these were false flag operations and that women in fact were actresses and not really the pregnant women who you showed. how do you respond to those kinds of claims? >> so one of the purposes of this film, of the film "20 days

in mariupol," was to give people, to give audiences across the world does u.s.,urope, ukraine, russia -- the context, the necessary context to see and analyze. because it is easy to target and put into question 32nd clips or one photo, would you see on the news. it is much harder to argue with an hour or 90 minutes of footage with enough context to analyze what is really happening. one of the purposes of this film is to give people enough context to judge for themselves. that being said, of course in a moment when we find out this campaign, this misinformation campaign that was happening against us or against ap, we were not surprised in some ways

because that was kind of expected because the similar thing happened to me in 2014. i was one of the first international journalists arrived on the scene of downing, which we now learned from the results of the court cases had been shut down by russian forces before ukraine at the time. those images sparked a wave of the misinformation. so what i'm trying to say here is that our work is not really influenced by all this misinformation, but all the questioning because regardless of whoever says, we will just

keep working. our job is not to argue with anyone. our job as ap journalists or just people who do work filming whatever they see, it you keep doing that, keep filming whatever is in front of us and send it to the international audience. it is up to the international audience to judge what they see. amy: mstyslav, if you can talk about your decision to leave. how you are able to get out and what happened immediately after and your feelings about that. >> i don't want to give out much of the film. i think it is quite interesting for the audience to see how the events unfold. but i would say we were very lucky because at the time we were surrounded at a hospital we lo our car andad to escape without our car. we basically ended up by not

having any means to continue our work, could not move around the city, we did t have any pce toharge oubatteries because the hospital was the main place we would charge our batteries. so our cameras stopped working. we did not have a car a we startesearching r the way leave the city. we got the help of a person -- 'll s under theilm -- a personho risks his own life and the safety of his family to help us get through 15 russian checkpoints, miles and miles of occupied territory. and thmain point was not just get us across those checkpoints in the occupied territory, to have all the hours and hours of unpublished footage which ultimately resulted, produced this film. hidden in a car to get those

hard drive out, that w a mission to us to do it was not amy: a lithuanian journalist who also attempted to leave was not as lucky and was killed at the checkpoint. >> yes, yes, unfortunately there was a lithuanian filmmaker, great with winning filmmaker who also tried to flee the city and unfortunately he was killed. that could happen to us as well. we were just lucky enough. amy: and the bombing of the theater the next day, which was, well, learned about around the world with how many people inside? you had been there many times. >> that is actually very good example of what could happen, for example, we decided to leave earlier. we left the city. we left feeling so guilty that we cannot keep working.

and the next day, we learned about this bombing of the mariupol drama theater. we know that shelter. we know that hundreds of people are there, almost 1000 people lived there. from all across the city. there were no images at all, so we just could not understand what really happened. it took us monthto get to witnesses, to try to reconstruct what happened. we found out up to 500 people died there. but this is a good example of, like, what could happen if no journalists are around. it is like a black hole of information where we can't really know about the potential war crimes. that is why it is so crucially important for journalists to be in places of the conflict, the places where there are potential

war crimes happening. nermeen: once the film festival comes to its end, where will you be going? will you return to ukraine? >> yes, we are returning to ukraine. we are returning to the front lines. i can't, for security reasons, tell you specifically where we are planning to be, but what is happening right now is a good example that mariupol is not a standalone case of complete destruction of the city. 90% of all the buildings in mariupol are destroyed. will be demolished because they're not subjected to construction. but that is happening to every city the russian federation takes now. it happens to soledar, which was recently occupied.

there is nothing to occupy. it is just ruins. that is what is happening to bakhmut right now. yes, unfortunately, that is -- mariupol is not the only city. we will just keep reporting. amy: mstyslav chernov, thank you for being with us, director, producer, cinematography -- cinematographer of the documentary "20 days in mariupol," which just premiered at the sundance film festival. he is an award-winning associated press journalist and the president of the ukrainian association of professional photographers. he is speaking to us from salt lake city, utah. only come back, the biden administration proposes a renters bill of rights. what will that have on the nations housing crisis? back in 30 seconds. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman with nermeen shaikh. we look at how millions are struggling to find housing within their budgets as the united states faces in affordable housing crisis. and how i knew biden administration plan announced wednesday aims to make rent more affordable and protect tenants' rights. rental costs in the u.s. rose nearly 25% between 2019 and 2022. this comes as investors bought nearly a quarter of all single-family homes sold in 2021, making home ownership increasingly impossible for

people forced to spend much of their money on ever increasing rent. the biden administration's new plan includes a blueprint for a rental -- a "blueprint for a renters bill of rights" called for by housing advocates, but the statement is non-binding. on wednesday, democracy now! spoke to davita gatewood in lexington, kentucky. she is a mother of six and a tenant leader with homes guarantee campaign. gateod described her housing crisis. >> december 2021, my landlord decided to sl the house we were living in so he could flip it, sell it, and make a profit. we had been living thereor fi years. how many tim have you heard this story? for us, it is a home. for them, it is annvestment. the vehicle, and asset, commodity for safe retirement. this summer was supped to be a high for my family. my son had just graduated with enoughet it come academic, --

athletic and i coul't scholarship. instead, i spent most of the summer searching for a newlace for us to live. it was impossible. landlords acss the country re using inflation as an excuse to hike our rent at the highest tes in over 40 years. my only option was to move into a place that i could not afford. my rent went from $656 to $1303 per month. i am a single mother of six, twice as much in rent has been life altering and ruining. i have been seeinsome headlines that say things are getting better, that inflation is going down. let be clear, eggs are five dollars at the grocery. my utilities have been at least $450 every month. my rent has doubled.

i'm waking up every da asking myself, do i have the money to feed my kids? cannot afforgas to take them to school? can i afford our medication? tenants like me, mothers like mine are suffering every day because the administraon has failed to take the action to regulate the rent. our biggest monthly expense. mr. president, the rent is too da high. doou hear me? the rent is still too damn high. we need you to provide real relief for families like mine by regulating the rent, nothing less. amy: that is davita gatewood in lexington, kentucky. four more on the housing crisis plan, we are joined by tara raghuveer, homes guarantee campaign director at people's

action. welcome back to democracy now! can you lay out what the new tenants bill of rights is all about and your concerns? >> thanks, amy. yesterday the white house rolled out a renters bill of rights, blueprint renters bill of rights and this comes after a month long process of engaging across the agencies with various stakeholders in the industry and with tenant advocates and leaders like miss gatewood. one of the first observations i have about the actions that were announced yesterday is they do affirm the federal government has a role to play in intervening in the power imbalance between tenants and landlords. the actionsnnounced yesterday also provide us some good organizing for future action at the agency level.

but the white house announcement falls short of regulating rent. you heard divya to clearly, the rent is too damn high. what we needed from the president is an announcement and directed to agencies to use every authority available to them to regulate the rent and combat theampant consolidation of the rental market. nermeen: could you explain why and how rents have increased so exponentially is such a short period of time? as we said, almost 25% from 2019-2022, and whether those rental increases are concentrated in certain places or basically across the u.s.? >> the rate crisis is decades in the making. there have been decades -- privatization d you regulation. the federal government has all but advocated its responsibility to us in relatiship to our

home. therefore the private market has swooped in. a lot of their business is predicated on federal financing and federal subsidy. so the federal government absolutely still has a role. the rent crisis we see today is particularly acute because the federal government has been in business with the private maet actors, has financed the consolidation of the rental market, and worst still, during covid, we gave away hundred civilians of dollars in public money to private industry with no strings attached. and in those landlords turned around and hiked the rent, evicted tenants. amy: talk about what you call the essential action the white house nes to take. >> the main things that we were asking the white house to do, which they failed to do in the announcement yesterday that we are counting on them to do in the future, is to condition every dollar of federal

financing and federal subsidy on a universal set of tenant protections, including rent galatian. the idea is quite simple and we don't believe it is radical. we believe it is completely legal for the president and the administration to do this. so the federal housing finance agency is the regulator for fannie mae and freddie mac must of those are the government-sponsored enterprises that provide government-backed loans. what we can say is if you are in business with the government, are subject to these loan terms. for example, you can't raise the rent more than 2% or 3% year-over-year. these are things well within the government's authority to do, it is just a matter of building the political will to make sure it happens. nermeen: what do people do at the local level? how can tenants organize? if you can address specifically corporate landlords? >> absolutely. tenant organizing is the only answer to the scale, scope,

depths of this crisis that we face related to our rent right now. tenants are organizing at the building level, block level, in never hoods, and across cities. and they're forging together across geoaphies, is great. what they can do is tenant for together with tenants -- what we could do is forge together with these powerful unions and choose that power as a collective to go after the money that is extracted from us by our landlords. our power is when we come together like workers and labor unions we can use that coective power to intervene in the moneymaking scheme related to our homes. amy: we only have a minute. you're also calling for a database of all the landlords that are getting federal subsidies as well as an eviction database? explain. closure. we call it a database because we what the federal government to undetand all of the ways they

are in business with private industries. one thing i what to say before we leave is yesterday the national apartment association was celebrating the announcements from the white house. they were celebrating they had defeated rent regulation. this is an association that has been part of colluding against eviction moratoriums and for rent hikes across the country. we should not take pause in our organizing when these lobbyists who are the biggest spinners of washington, d.c., are celebrating an announcement that was meant to protect tenants. amy: we want to thank you for being with us, tara raghuveer, homes guarantee campaign director at people's action. speaking to us from kansas city, missouri. add 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!]

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