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--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Border Patrol agents testified on Capitol Hill this week that the U.S. effectively has an open border. We went from what I would describe as unprecedented to a point where I don't have the correct adjective to describe what's going on. The testimony comes as Vice President Kamala Harris says she secured $4.2 billion to address the root causes of the migrant crisis in Central America.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley. It's Thursday, February 9th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Host (John Bickley): At least 20 bills legislating transgender treatments for minors are working their way through state legislatures, including two bills in Oklahoma this week. And after the rush to support various social justice movements over the past few years, several major companies are now backing away. We look at the trend.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): coffee club order. That's blackriflecoffee.com, promo code WIRE. Black Rifle Coffee, America's Coffee.
--:-- Host (John Bickley): Border Patrol agents testified on Capitol Hill Tuesday saying that since President Biden took office, migrants believe there is a, quote, open border. The agents said they need more agents, more funding, and a wall. The testimony comes as Vice President Kamala Harris announced this week that she secured $4.2 billion to address what she called the root causes of immigration in Central America.
--:-- Host (John Bickley): Here to discuss the Harris initiative is Daily Wire reporter Amanda Prestigiacomo.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: So, the pitch from Harris is that investment into the economies of countries like Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala will address the, quote, root causes of migration. She says if the economies in these countries are strengthened, then fewer of these migrants are going to want to leave and come to the U.S.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: According to a White House fact sheet, the plan first and foremost must offer a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. And just a side note here, other estimates of the true number of illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. reach as high as 30 million.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: The rest of Harris's plan is laid out in the following five categories. So, pillar one, addressing economic insecurity and inequality. The second pillar, combating corruption, strengthening democratic governance and advancing the rule of law. Pillar three, promoting respect for human rights, labor rights, and a free press.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: The fourth pillar is countering and preventing violence, extortion, and other crimes perpetrated by criminal gangs, trafficking networks, and other organized criminal organizations. And the last pillar, pillar five, combating sexual, gender-based, and domestic violence.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: So, these are obviously some pretty sweeping goals and will require massive cultural change. But Harris claims the plan has already seen some success. Here Harris discussing the plan on February 6th.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: Data from the Department of Homeland Security shows that the number of migrants from Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, where our root causes efforts have been focused, have significantly declined over the last 18 months.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: Now, of course, this could change over time, and we will continue to monitor these trends. So, when she says these are positive trends, what data is she referring to?
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: Well, if you look at the CBP data between 2021 and 2022, migration from Guatemala did drop about 18% in total numbers. Honduras dropped 33% and El Salvador dropped 2%. But even with these drops, there were still about half a million migrants from these three countries in 2022, which is about five times higher than it was in 2020.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: It also doesn't take into account the surge in migration from other countries. Okay, so Harris has secured about $4 billion from 47 private companies to be paid out over five years.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: What specific investments are they planning to make to achieve those goals? Well, we've seen some financial pledges from companies like Columbia Sportswear, Nestle, and Target, as well as some other smaller companies.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: Nestle has committed to supporting thousands of farmers, but as for concrete plans for spending, it's just not clear yet. I spoke to Seth Barron, managing editor of The American Mind.
--:-- Seth Barron: I mean, a billion dollars over five years or something over all these countries, which are complete total basket cases. They have the highest murder rates in the world and, you know, terrible history of government corruption, abuse, violence, domestic violence, gangs.
--:-- Seth Barron: I mean, it's such a disaster down there that this is a fool's errand. Well, fixing foreign governments and cultures is a notoriously difficult task.
--:-- Amanda Prestigiacomo: Amanda, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Host (John Bickley): Anytime. That was Daily Wire reporter Amanda Prestigiacomo.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Coming up, protesters and legislators in Oklahoma and Tennessee duel over new transgender treatment laws. Used car prices are dropping, but before you walk into a dealership, you've got to check out Carzing.
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--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Legislative battles over transgender policy are heating up across the country. In Oklahoma, trans activists took over the state capitol this week to protest a series of bills that would ban puberty blockers and sex reassignment surgery for minors.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham joins us to explain what these bills would accomplish and what kind of reaction they're drawing.
--:-- Megan Basham: Yeah, that's probably a pretty good place to start because it's fairly emblematic of these clashes that we're seeing really all over the country. So right now, Oklahoma has a number of transgender bills pending, and one of them, Senate Bill 129, is titled the Millstone Act.
--:-- Megan Basham: This bill would make it a felony for doctors or hospitals to perform sex change surgeries on anyone under 26. And doing so would also mean that they'd risk losing their licenses for unprofessional conduct.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, proponents of the bill say the brain isn't fully developed until age 25, so that's why they put it at that cutoff. And then another bill bans puberty blockers and opposite sex hormones for the purpose of gender reassignment to anyone under 18.
--:-- Megan Basham: Governor Stitt has made it very clear that he supports the Millstone Act and the other bills and that he will sign them as soon as the state Congress passes them. This was what he said in his State of the State address on Tuesday.
--:-- Megan Basham: Minors can vote can purchase alcohol can purchase cigarettes We shouldn't allow a minor to get a permanent gender-altering surgery in Oklahoma.
--:-- Megan Basham: But as Stitt was giving that speech, hundreds of trans activists flooded the Oklahoma Capitol building, and they filled the rotunda and began chanting things like Trans Lives Matter and This Is Our House.
--:-- Megan Basham: And these are just the latest actions Oklahoma is taking on transgenderism. The state has already enacted a law that bans biological males from competing in women's sports. And then another requires public schools to restrict bathroom and locker room use according to sex at birth, not gender identity.
--:-- Megan Basham: Now, you said Oklahoma is just one of many states that are pushing similar legislation. Where else are we seeing it?
--:-- Megan Basham: So all in all, there's about 20 bills pending in nine states, and that includes Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia, and Utah. All right, I think I got them all there.
--:-- Megan Basham: And a lot of that legislation involves medical providers offering surgery and puberty blockers to minors. But parents' rights as far as how schools deal with the issue is also coming up a lot.
--:-- Megan Basham: So in Virginia this week, the Republican-controlled House passed a bill that would require public schools to inform parents if their son or daughter starts identifying as trans.
--:-- Megan Basham: And then Texas is taking a couple of interesting approaches. One bill would classify providing transgender surgeries and medications to minors as child abuse.
--:-- Megan Basham: And then another revokes liability insurance for doctors that prescribe puberty blockers and opposite sex hormones to kids. So kind of striking at them financially there.
--:-- Megan Basham: And then in some states, we're seeing just how much the news cycle is driving lawmakers. So Tennessee is now considering a bill that will ban trans surgeries on minors after Daily Wire opinion personality Matt Walsh uncovered that Vanderbilt Hospital's Pediatric Transgender Clinic was doing just that.
--:-- Megan Basham: Walsh in particular uncovered a recording of a clinic administrator calling trans surgeries, quote, huge moneymakers.
--:-- Megan Basham: So Walsh testified about that before the state's House of Representatives on Wednesday in his private capacity as a citizen.
--:-- Megan Basham: We cannot allow this wickedness to continue. We cannot tolerate it. We are decent and rational people in this state. We love our children. We recognize basic truths.
--:-- Megan Basham: One of those basic truths is that a child who is confused about her identity, needs guidance and love and clarity. She does not need hormone injections and scalpels. She needs and deserves to be protected from those child-abusing quacks and soulless vultures who wish to exploit her confusion for their own gain.
--:-- Megan Basham: That's why we need this law.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Well, with 20 bills pending, it's clear this issue is not going anywhere anytime soon. Megan, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Anytime. That was Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): After embracing controversial social justice movements throughout 2020 and wading into a host of political issues, C-suites at companies across the country have gone largely silent.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Here with more on what's behind the apparent social justice withdrawal is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So we all remember 2020 where following the death of George Floyd virtually every major company in America took to social media to pledge their support to Black Lives Matter donating millions of dollars in the process and promising to revamp their diversity efforts to combat what they called systemic racism.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And that was really just the tip of the iceberg. Across the next year and a half it was par for the course to see businesses commenting on virtually every trending social justice issue that there was, praising or condemning whatever was going on that month.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But over the last year, there's been a noticeable shift as businesses are increasingly staying out of culture war issues and really scaling back their funding of diversity efforts.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: When did this trend really start to become noticeable?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, things really seemed to turn after the overturning of Roe v. Wade. So back in June, a lot of people expected to see corporate America wading into that fight and siding with pro-abortion activists.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But most companies ended up staying on the sidelines. And the CEOs who did opt to make statements usually did so quietly, sending internal memos to their employees addressing the topic.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Other CEOs said publicly that there were two sides to the issue and that they weren't going to pick one as a company. And that continued throughout the year.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: To a lesser degree, we also saw this trend play out just recently following the death of Tyree Nichols, an unarmed black man killed by police.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: If the release of that body cam footage had happened in 2020 or 2021, it's likely that corporate America would have chimed in, but there just was not as much of a response this month.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Right, there really wasn't. So what changed? What's behind this sudden shift?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Well, first, social justice groups like Black Lives Matter just are not as popular as they once were.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: While people might like to think that businesses make public statements based on their desire for social justice, the reality is it's usually done to help their public image and make money.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So it made more sense for these companies to be heavily involved in those issues back in 2020, when 67% of Americans said that they supported Black Lives Matter in polling.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: But over the last year, approval from many of those social justice groups has really dropped off. The majority of Americans now view Black Lives Matter negatively, according to the latest polls.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And we've also seen a collapse in support for defund the police and other criminal justice reform.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, another indication of companies drifting from their commitment to social justice initiatives has been this decline in DEI positions, correct?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, back in 2020, at the height of the BLM movement, we saw an explosion in corporate DEI, or Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion departments.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Companies spent tens of millions of dollars hiring full-time staffers to help companies, in their words, combat racism and white supremacy in the workplace.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: The average chief diversity officer made around $190,000 last year. And there were plenty of other six-figure positions in DEI departments across the country.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: According to LinkedIn, DEI jobs were the fastest growing C-suite job in 2021 by a mile.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And in the three months following George Floyd's death, get this, there was a 123% jump in DEI job postings.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Wow, so big opportunity and big money there.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah. But the field has started to really slow dramatically, correct?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: It has. DEI hires have fallen dramatically. Last year, they were down 19%.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And now, as more companies begin mass layoffs, DEI workers are often the first to go.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: According to a report from Bloomberg, Meta, Amazon, Redfin, and other tech companies have begun gutting their DEI departments.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Twitter, for example, is reportedly down to just two employees compared to 30 the department had a year and a half ago.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So the pendulum appears to be swinging here.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Cabot, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Anytime. That was Senior Editor Cabot Phillips.
--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): that's all the time we've got this morning thanks for waking up with us we'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.
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--:-- Host (Georgia Howe): Go to blackriflecoffee.com and use promo code WIRE for 10% off your purchase and your first coffee club order. That's blackriflecoffee.com promo code WIRE. Black Rifle Coffee, America's coffee.
