mark weisbrot is co-director of the center for economic and policy research. speaking to us from washington, d.c. the president of bolivia evo morales resigned yesterday saying he was ousted by a military coup. this is democracy now! when we come back, the first-ever presidential forum on environmental justice. i co-moderated. today we play you are segment with elizabeth warren. ♪ [music break] amy: this is democracy now!, i'm amy goodman. first-everight, the presidenti f forumn environmental justice wawas held at south carinina state university in orangeburg for some six democratic presidential candidates to work. senators elizabeth warren and cory booker, tom steyer, marianne williamson, john delaney, and joeoe sestak. i co-moderated the event with mustafa ali, former official with the environment protection agency, vice president of the national wildlife federation. we will be airing highlights of the forum in the coming weeks, but today we turn to senator elizabeth warren stop must off ali began the questioning. mustafa: mehdi did communities of color, ind

for democracy and people power or the product of a military coup joining me to debate this i'm mark weisbrot co-director of the center for economic and policy research who's been writing on bolivia for more than a decade and in vasquez director of the center for global liberty and prosperity at the cato institute and also an expert on latin america thank you both for joining me in the arena thanks me think it let's start with you is it fair to describe the resignation of as a coup no not by any stretch of the imagination let's remember how he got here this election was illegal to begin with the constitution bolivia does not a allow a 2nd reelection for the president and so in 2016 the president actually had a referendum to change the constitution and the population voted no he decided to neglect. paying attention to that and went ahead and had his compliant constitutional tribunals issue decree a judgment that allowed him to run against his own very constitution and so that made people in bolivia very upset obviously because it's undemocratic and so when he ran here he was losing and as the

a little earlier i spoke with mark weisbrot — a latin america analyst. he gave his assessment.ip at least is trying to overthrow the government. and, you know, a near majority, a7% of the people voted for the president, which was over ten points more than the next runner up... sorry to interrupt straightaway, but those results are exactly what‘s disputed. do you have faith in those results? yes, well, if you‘ve noticed, you can read dozens, hundreds of articles since october 20 on the web on this election. and not one presents even one shred of evidence that the election was in doubt, stolen, or anything else. and so this is a very bad, i think, it was very bad decision on the part of the organisation of american states. they put one sentence into their press release after the election, without any evidence whatsoever, implying that there was something wrong with the result and so that was picked up by most of the media. but you can look at any website for any major news organisation in the world and no—one has yet presented any evidence. and that‘s because there isn‘t any. you

mark weisbrot is co—director of the center for economic and policy research in washington, and he joinsw serious is this situation now? people are using words like cuba, are we people are using words like cuba, a re we really people are using words like cuba, are we really there yet?” people are using words like cuba, are we really there yet? i think it is serious. i think the opposition or the leadership at least is trying to overthrow the government. a near majority, a7% of the people voted for the president, which was over ten points more than the next runner up... ten points more than the next runner sorry ten points more than the next runner up... sorry to interrupt straightaway, but those results are exactly what is disputed. do you have a in those results because yellow if you've noticed, you can read dozens, hundreds of articles since october 20 on the web since the selection. and not one present even one shred of evidence that the election was in doubt, stolen, or anything else. so this is a very bad, i think, anything else. so this is a very bad, ithink, it anything else. so t