Speaker 1: You're listen sings KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2: The bill handles show on demand on the iheartradioff I
Speaker 2: AM six forty handle Here in the morning, Crew Amy
Speaker 2: is back. It's a taco Tuesday, May thirteenth. The President
Speaker 2: is in Saudi Arabia today and he's going to be
Speaker 2: visiting other MIDYSN countries. Doesn't look like Israel at least
Speaker 2: it hasn't been announced yet. And it's all about investment,
Speaker 2: putting in Saudi Katari Amaradi money into the United States
Speaker 2: as an investment. So he's going over there on a
Speaker 2: business trip because he says he is the business president,
Speaker 2: and he is. There's no question about that. So let's
Speaker 2: move in a double In another direction, the Department of
Speaker 2: Homeland Security has lost and has launched an investigation into
Speaker 2: California's Cash Assistant program for immigrants and what this does.
Speaker 2: Provide monthly cash benefits to a number of aged, blind,
Speaker 2: disabled non citizen that are ineligible for Social Security benefits
Speaker 2: because of their immigrant status or non immigration status. And
Speaker 2: normally for those of us that are citizens or here legally,
Speaker 2: we're entitled the Social Security benefits. If you happen to
Speaker 2: be blind, if you happen to be old, if you
Speaker 2: happen to be disabled, put those three of you together,
Speaker 2: all three together, and you really comply.
Speaker 1: And this is a subpoena.
Speaker 2: That the government DHS requesting all the records from La
Speaker 2: County Department of Public Social Services to determine if ineligible
Speaker 2: immigrants have received SSI money Social Security money during the
Speaker 2: past four years. Homeland Security Secretary Christin Noam said, radical
Speaker 2: left politicians.
Speaker 1: Boy, that's the language.
Speaker 2: You're here. A lot in California prioritize illegal aliens over
Speaker 2: our own citizens.
Speaker 1: And so the point of.
Speaker 2: All this is to make sure that illegal immigrants do
Speaker 2: not get federal money under the Social Security Administration. Well,
Speaker 2: here's the problem. The benefits that do go to these
Speaker 2: folks do not come from the Feds. This is state money.
Speaker 2: And do the FEDS have jurisdiction. No, this is state
Speaker 2: money that says we're going to pay you regardless of
Speaker 2: immigration status. Because the Social Security folks aren't paying you
Speaker 2: where you would normally be entitled to this money, aged, blind,
Speaker 2: disabled under SSI, you're not going to receive it because
Speaker 2: under federal law you can't receive it because of your
Speaker 2: immigration status.
Speaker 1: So we're going to supplement.
Speaker 2: The state of California is going to do it, and
Speaker 2: therein lies the fight. For some reason, the Feds, the
Speaker 2: Trump administration is insisting that somehow this is federal money,
Speaker 2: even though it can be proven it's not. And so
Speaker 2: the state's saying, you can't do this, so let's go
Speaker 2: to second tier. Can the state be forced to stop
Speaker 2: these payments? Well, in reality, tons of federal government of
Speaker 2: federal money goes to the states, I mean.
Speaker 1: The FED funds.
Speaker 2: So many programs. So here is what the government can do,
Speaker 2: and this is exactly what happened with Harvard. Can we
Speaker 2: force you to give up your DEEI programs? Well, this
Speaker 2: is a private institution, so of course the government doesn't.
Speaker 1: Have the to issue an order.
Speaker 2: For example, no judge is going to say to Harvard
Speaker 2: you must give up your DEI programs. And this is
Speaker 2: a private institution. But here's what the FEDS do is
Speaker 2: they say those nine billion dollars in federal money that
Speaker 2: we do give to Harvard for various research grants, pel grants,
Speaker 2: other forms of financial support, those stop unless you give
Speaker 2: up those DEI programs and you stop your anti Semitic policies.
Speaker 1: And add and on, and so this is.
Speaker 2: A fight that can the federal government withhold money to
Speaker 2: the states based on the states are doing something that
Speaker 2: the states have the power to do and the Feds
Speaker 2: are wrong in saying this is federal money.
Speaker 1: Well, there's another one for the courts.
Speaker 2: You know, for the next four years, you're gonna see
Speaker 2: more cases going into the courts. I mean, by the hundreds,
Speaker 2: lawsuits will be filed, all right. The governor of the
Speaker 2: state of California has come out and released a model
Speaker 2: ordinance for local governments and it's urging California cities and
Speaker 2: counties to ban homeless encampments. This is one of the
Speaker 2: issues in which this wild leftist out of controlled governor
Speaker 2: in fact is pretty conservative on the homeless side. And
Speaker 2: he timed the announcement with a release of three point
Speaker 2: three billion dollars in prop one funding for housing and
Speaker 2: treatment options for the mentally ill and homeless populations. We
Speaker 2: seem to be really in favor of spending ungodly amounts
Speaker 2: of money to help the homeless and those who need
Speaker 2: mental health. The homeless, the mental health people are a
Speaker 2: big part of the homeless population. And not that I
Speaker 2: don't know how many people are against helping homeless people,
Speaker 2: but the amount of money that has gone in to
Speaker 2: these projects over the years is astronomical. Newsom said, is
Speaker 2: time to take back the streets. It's time to take
Speaker 2: back the sidewalks. It's time to take these encampments and
Speaker 2: provide alternatives, which I don't know what you know, how
Speaker 2: much more money can you spend? And the state is
Speaker 2: giving you, the sister, the county and cities more resources
Speaker 2: than ever and it's time to just end the excuses.
Speaker 2: Homelessness is a huge political issue in California. The governor
Speaker 2: ran on homelessness his last election. Karen Bass ran on
Speaker 2: homeless as the number one issue, and we've got a
Speaker 2: huge homeless issue. We have a high cost of living,
Speaker 2: lack of affordable housing, shortage of health and drug treatment centers,
Speaker 2: and this lack of progress big time is the governor
Speaker 2: is blaming the cities and the counties for not doing more,
Speaker 2: even with the insane amount of money they've received. So
Speaker 2: he has released a model ordinance, which he says is
Speaker 2: a starting point and asking locals to prohibit persistent camping
Speaker 2: in one location and encampments on blocks.
Speaker 1: On streets that block sidewalks, which is already a law.
Speaker 2: But the political atmospheres when the cops rouse these people,
Speaker 2: you have the homeless advocates going to court and how
Speaker 2: dare you rouse these people? They have the right to
Speaker 2: be homeless, which is true. They have the right to
Speaker 2: camp out on the city sidewalks, which probably not true, parks,
Speaker 2: probably not, but they do it anyway. And the argument
Speaker 2: is where are you going to put these people? Because
Speaker 2: the number of homeless is well, to give you idea,
Speaker 2: La County sixty thousand people homeless. That's a lot of
Speaker 2: tents to go up. RII is thrilled with this. They
Speaker 2: couldn't be happier. Both they're used and new section. And
Speaker 2: so right now, the city of La bars homeless encampments
Speaker 2: within five hundred feet of schools and daycare centers. Citations
Speaker 2: possible for violations which are never given.
Speaker 1: Illegal for the.
Speaker 2: Unhoused in the city of Los Angeles to refuse to
Speaker 2: clear space for wheelchairs or to put up tents within
Speaker 2: five feet of a doorway. Ask any person that owns
Speaker 2: a business that has a tent six feet away from
Speaker 2: the front door.
Speaker 1: And say, hey, that's a good idea. I really like that.
Speaker 2: So he coupled this announcement with the release of three
Speaker 2: point three billion dollars that we voted to pay into
Speaker 2: the program in twenty twenty four, and that's to expand
Speaker 2: health and housing and treatment options for our mentally ill
Speaker 2: and homeless folks. And the funding is not connected to
Speaker 2: citi's banning encampments. And the governor pointed out that the
Speaker 2: funding this three point three billion is in addition to
Speaker 2: the twenty seven billion dollars the state has already given
Speaker 2: local governments to address homelessness. That doesn't count county money,
Speaker 2: it doesn't count city money, and it doesn't count NGO
Speaker 2: money non governmental organizations charities.
Speaker 1: Last year, Newso issued in executive order requiring state.
Speaker 2: Agencies to remove homeless encampments on state property, county property,
Speaker 2: city property. Is another issue, and I've as I've said
Speaker 2: many many times, the issue of homelessness is virtually impossible
Speaker 2: to deal with for a few reasons. One, Southern California
Speaker 2: is a great place to be homeless versus let's say
Speaker 2: upstate New York. I don't know how many people are
Speaker 2: out on the street in Buffalo in the middle of winter.
Speaker 1: That gets a little problematic.
Speaker 2: Well, here we are where the land of sunshine, and
Speaker 2: so the services are particularly good in southern California, and
Speaker 2: you can't afford housing. I mean, there are people that
Speaker 2: actually lived in reasonable decent apartments, for example, lost their jobs.
Speaker 2: They're on the street, They're living in their cars, and
Speaker 2: some of them are on the sidewalk camping.
Speaker 1: And then there's a whole issue is these people.
Speaker 2: Would go into shelters because there are beds available, but the.
Speaker 1: Shelters don't let you bring in pets.
Speaker 2: And how many homeless do you see there with pets
Speaker 2: on leashes or just hanging loose there on the sidewalk,
Speaker 2: tons and tons. And for those of you that have
Speaker 2: dogs and have not eaten them yet, it's your really
Speaker 2: really tied up with your dogs.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't let go of my dogs. I love my dogs.
Speaker 1: So this is a problem that is just.
Speaker 2: You can't deal with this without insane amounts of money.
Speaker 2: And we've already spent insane amounts of money. Do we
Speaker 2: spend more? Do we front burner more? I mean, the
Speaker 2: only way to deal with this is to spend a
Speaker 2: lot more money. And government is certainly limited in the
Speaker 2: amount of money it takes in la is at a
Speaker 2: billion dollar deficit this year. How much more do you
Speaker 2: pour into homelessness? And your heart goes out to homeless people?
Speaker 2: I mean it does, you know. As much as I
Speaker 2: want to be a complete dick, I feel terrible and
Speaker 2: I see someone on the street, you know, living there.
Speaker 1: It's no fun. Now I'm glad that I don't.
Speaker 2: And I have gone down the sidewalk where I've been asked,
Speaker 2: do you have change?
Speaker 1: Mister?
Speaker 2: Do you have any spare change? And I go into
Speaker 2: my pocket, reach into my pocket and jingle the change
Speaker 2: and say, yes, I do have change, and then keep
Speaker 2: on walking. But that's more entertainment than anything else.
Speaker 1: Okay, we're done with that. Okay, let me tell you
Speaker 1: what's going on with minimum wage and this.
Speaker 2: I have really mixed feelings about this, and one of
Speaker 2: them is the philosophy that if someone is working full time,
Speaker 2: and I really believe this, there should not be a problem,
Speaker 2: or you still should be able to at least feed
Speaker 2: yourself and have some kind of housing. And that is
Speaker 2: not the case. Minimum wage just says and cut it.
Speaker 2: If you go go to the Hilton Universal City, twenty
Speaker 2: four stories up there on the hill next to Universal Studios,
Speaker 2: they have four hundred and ninety five rooms. So they
Speaker 2: have signed a deal with the LA twenty eight organizing
Speaker 2: Committee reserving hundreds of rooms for Olympic fans.
Speaker 1: It's block booking.
Speaker 2: And the city council just approved a plan to let
Speaker 2: the Hilton add another second building, eighteen story tower, just
Speaker 2: in time.
Speaker 1: For the Olympics.
Speaker 2: This is two hundred and fifty million dollars and now
Speaker 2: the folks that own this are saying, you know what,
Speaker 2: maybe not. The La City Council is set to vote
Speaker 2: on a requirement that hotels with sixty or more rooms
Speaker 2: pay their workers at least thirty dollars an hour by
Speaker 2: twenty twenty eight, and along with a new eight dollars
Speaker 2: and thirty five cents per hour healthcare payment.
Speaker 1: And if the city Council approves without.
Speaker 2: Significant changes, according to the owners, we're going to be
Speaker 2: pulling out of the room block for the Olympics. We're
Speaker 2: done and we're going to kill the expansion. Just can't
Speaker 2: afford it anymore. And last year, the city Council voted
Speaker 2: twelve to three to draft the package of minimum wage hikes,
Speaker 2: which would apply not to hotels but also private companies.
Speaker 2: At LA International, the airport, airlines, concessions, and the minimum
Speaker 2: wage would be the most in the country by a
Speaker 2: long shot. And backers of the minimum wage say that
Speaker 2: LA's tourism workers are struggling just to pay for rent
Speaker 2: and for food and should benefit financially for the Olympics
Speaker 2: just as much as private corporations do. And private corporations
Speaker 2: and the city and the county do.
Speaker 1: Really well with the Olympics.
Speaker 2: Don't know about government, but certainly hotels and restaurants and
Speaker 2: tour companies do pretty well during the Olympics. And so
Speaker 2: the backers of a higher wages say, hey, listen, you
Speaker 2: guys do better.
Speaker 1: Why shouldn't our workers.
Speaker 2: Do better when the Olympics are here? And when these
Speaker 2: major hoteliers and corporate owners of major venues say, you
Speaker 2: know what, those wages are simply going to scuttle development
Speaker 2: of new hotels.
Speaker 1: That's a croc.
Speaker 2: The backers of the minimum wage proposals say, that is
Speaker 2: a croc. It's not going to stop them from building
Speaker 2: new or expanding hotels. And this is their accusation, and
Speaker 2: it's true, and that is every single time the minimum
Speaker 2: wage has gone up, you, the owners of hotels and
Speaker 2: restaurants have said we're done. Business is going to collapse,
Speaker 2: We're not going to be in business anymore. And in reality,
Speaker 2: this is prior to COVID, business was going up pretty dramatically.
Speaker 2: You know, minimum wage went up. Businesses didn't fail. Business
Speaker 2: is still expanded.
Speaker 3: Neil, there are fast food places closing throughout California.
Speaker 1: I agree, but not prior, not prior to COVID.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, I'm talking since the minimum wage went up.
Speaker 3: You know what would be better is if they had
Speaker 3: profit sharing that is tied in automatically to the growth
Speaker 3: of a business.
Speaker 2: Rather here and I don't disagree, but you're a union leader, okay,
Speaker 2: And this is where you and I disagree because the
Speaker 2: union backers are arguing that's not true. Because the reason
Speaker 2: in that places close up is not that minimum wage
Speaker 2: is they're just simply not making enough money. They make money,
Speaker 2: but just not enough money. They don't hit what businesses require.
Speaker 2: And so when you talk about the profit sharing, which
Speaker 2: makes a lot of sense, well, profits go up and
Speaker 2: they go down.
Speaker 1: That's the way business works.
Speaker 2: If your profit sharing, do you simply say, okay, you
Speaker 2: get a piece of the profits when they go up,
Speaker 2: But when the company does badly. Let's see one year
Speaker 2: it loses money, which happens to business all the time.
Speaker 2: Do the wages go down? Of course not because you
Speaker 2: have a baseline. It doesn't matter what that's like. Colpers
Speaker 2: the retirement system that teachers pay into, for example, and
Speaker 2: county employees or state employees pay into.
Speaker 1: It's a one way street.
Speaker 2: When the economy increases and the investments do really well,
Speaker 2: CalPERS increases your portfolio, your four to oh one k,
Speaker 2: the investments that they have increase in value.
Speaker 1: When it goes down, the state just picks up the difference.
Speaker 2: That's all.
Speaker 1: It's a one way street. It's all up. Nothing is down.
Speaker 3: When I make more money, the union takes more of it.
Speaker 1: Well that's a different issue.
Speaker 2: Now when you make more money, the government picks up
Speaker 2: a lot more money from you. But that's a different
Speaker 2: issue at a different time. All right.
Speaker 1: I want to come back and continue on.
Speaker 2: With this because there is a real moral issue, an
Speaker 2: ethical issue involved in this. One of them being and
Speaker 2: right back to what I've always said, we should not
Speaker 2: have a society where if you work full time, you
Speaker 2: can't feed yourself or you can't have housing.
Speaker 1: That's a tough one and.
Speaker 2: Businesses are saying, hang on a minute, we've got to
Speaker 2: make money.
Speaker 1: Both of which are true.
Speaker 2: City Council is going to propose or meeting tomorrow that
Speaker 2: during or prior to the Olympics at hotels and restaurants
Speaker 2: thirty dollars an hour minimum wage actually thirty dollars and
Speaker 2: twenty five cents, and developers and owners of restaurants are going,
Speaker 2: we just can't afford it anymore.
Speaker 1: We're done, We're done. And then you have a.
Speaker 2: Hotel developers saying we're not going to develop like we
Speaker 2: have asked for and gotten permits for, that's all, and
Speaker 2: the unions are saying, that's.
Speaker 1: A croc that you still are going to develop.
Speaker 2: Amy came in and said during the course of the
Speaker 2: break that she just got back from France and they
Speaker 2: didn't have to worry about minimum wage at the counters
Speaker 2: because there was no one at the counter.
Speaker 1: So, Amy, what did you experience there?
Speaker 4: So it was it was actually we did not go
Speaker 4: into a McDonald they had them in France. It was
Speaker 4: when we were in Canterbury, England, and we were Jones
Speaker 4: and for a diet coke with ice, because in a
Speaker 4: cup that you just kind of can't get And we
Speaker 4: went in and there are no cash registers at the counter.
Speaker 4: It's all kiosks. There were a few people putting the
Speaker 4: actual orders together. But even the soda machine is fully automated.
Speaker 4: They you order it, the cup drops down, goes on
Speaker 4: a conveyor belt, drops the ice in fills up without
Speaker 4: people at all. So that's I think a concern of
Speaker 4: those higher rates. You can get the higher wage, but
Speaker 4: that's going to lead to more automation.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: And that's a point where the union folks, and in
Speaker 2: many cases there are ludd ites and are saying, we
Speaker 2: don't want technology. I mean, that's what has happened many times.
Speaker 2: What we need is people still working there, and plenty
Speaker 2: of people working there. That happened during the course of
Speaker 2: automation in auto plants, and it's certainly happened during the
Speaker 2: fight between the railroad workers union and the railroads and
Speaker 2: the rail road yeah, the owners of the rail roads. Okay,
Speaker 2: so now we're talking about the minimum wage going up
Speaker 2: thirty bucks an hour, and this is the ongoing fight.
Speaker 1: Is it going to be true? You know?
Speaker 2: For example, in Long Beach, residents voted to raise the
Speaker 2: hotel minimum wage last year, revenue per available room went
Speaker 2: up sixteen percent, and that's what the unions are arguing,
Speaker 2: And in reality, the people that own the hotels are saying,
Speaker 2: you know what, it's a lot more in the We
Speaker 2: really don't want to even talk about wages because don't
Speaker 2: talk about your living expenses and how difficult it is.
Speaker 1: It's the cost of housing, it's inflation.
Speaker 2: It's the cost of living in southern California that's the problem,
Speaker 2: not the wayes.
Speaker 1: And the union says, so that's a croc.
Speaker 2: You say you're not going to build, and at the
Speaker 2: same time you build. So when are the developers right?
Speaker 2: And the union says, okay, we were wrong, when in
Speaker 2: fact they don't build. You've got a couple of permits
Speaker 2: going up, particularly in Universal, for example, eighteen stories going
Speaker 2: up in a building next to the Hilton, the big hotel,
Speaker 2: and they've been given the okay, and the developer says,
Speaker 2: you know what, we're done.
Speaker 1: We're not going to pay this.
Speaker 2: We're simply not going to build this addition to the hotel,
Speaker 2: and the union says that's.
Speaker 1: Bs okay, So they don't build. Now does the union
Speaker 1: say it's a real struggle? It is a real struggle.
Speaker 2: And why only hotel workers when and fast food workers?
Speaker 2: How about the people that are on the manufacturing line.
Speaker 2: How come they don't get those wages?
Speaker 1: But the union doesn't create any jobs. That's not a
Speaker 1: job creator.
Speaker 3: No, it's not companies that are building hotels, restaurants and
Speaker 3: fast food places.
Speaker 1: But the argument is here is the argument.
Speaker 2: You want to call it a socialist argument, and it
Speaker 2: is you couldn't increase your business without us. You are
Speaker 2: making money on our backs. And the answer is, well, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's the way it works with owners of business and employees. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, welcome to a capitalist, a capitalistic system. And
Speaker 2: then you have other countries around the world where the
Speaker 2: unions are so strong. For example, in Germany, you have
Speaker 2: a major corporation. Do you know that a union member
Speaker 2: has to sit on the board of directors in Germany
Speaker 2: for example.
Speaker 1: It's a different world, all.
Speaker 2: Right, kf I am sixty. You've been listening to the
Speaker 2: Bill Handle Show. Catch my Show Monday through Friday six
Speaker 2: am to nine am, and anytime on demand on the
Speaker 2: iHeartRadio app.