WEBVTT - College Scandal Trial and VIP Admissions List 0:00:03.200 --> 0:00:07.960 This is Bloomberg Law with June Brussel from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:10.559 I just want you to walk me through the whole 0:00:10.560 --> 0:00:13.520 thing again and how it works. We helped the wealthiest 0:00:13.560 --> 0:00:15.960 families in the US get their kids into school. So 0:00:16.000 --> 0:00:18.200 I've done seven hundred sixty one what I would call 0:00:18.280 --> 0:00:21.079 side door. The front door means getting in on your own. 0:00:21.239 --> 0:00:24.239 So I've created this kind of side door, and because 0:00:24.320 --> 0:00:28.720 my families want to guarantee and it works every time. 0:00:29.480 --> 0:00:34.559 The Varsity blues sting exploded into public view in with 0:00:34.680 --> 0:00:38.159 dozens of parents across the country arrested for paying hundreds 0:00:38.159 --> 0:00:42.000 of thousands of dollars to get their kids into elite universities. 0:00:42.400 --> 0:00:46.560 There was a Netflix documentary, Books Countless Stories, and even 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:49.760 a Saturday Night Live skit. The vast majority of the 0:00:49.800 --> 0:00:53.239 parents pleaded guilty, but a handful decided to fight the 0:00:53.320 --> 0:00:56.400 charges in court, and now, nearly two and a half 0:00:56.480 --> 0:00:59.760 years later, the first trial of two parents is starting 0:00:59.760 --> 0:01:02.120 in Austin. Here to tell us about what's ahead is 0:01:02.160 --> 0:01:05.000 Bloomberg Legal report of Patricia Hurtado, who has been covering 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:07.680 the case since the beginning. So pat tell us about 0:01:07.720 --> 0:01:10.639 the two fathers who are going to be tried. Forty 0:01:10.680 --> 0:01:13.920 parents were indicted by the U S Attorney in Massachusetts. 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:16.560 Thirty three pled guilty. Six of them are fighting the 0:01:16.680 --> 0:01:19.360 charges and one got a partner from President Trump just 0:01:19.440 --> 0:01:22.800 before he left office. Two dads are fighting the charges 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:26.840 in this first trial. It's John Wilson, the private equity 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:31.080 investor who is a former Staples and Gap executive, and 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:34.840 the Maal app del Az, a former executive for Win 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:38.840 Resort and he operated in Acal and Hong Kong left 0:01:38.920 --> 0:01:41.720 at the time. I understand Rick Singer, the mastermind of 0:01:41.760 --> 0:01:45.960 this day, had two different schemes. One was to boost 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:49.880 the college entrance test scores of kids whose parents paid money, 0:01:50.240 --> 0:01:52.320 and he would get a test with to take the 0:01:52.400 --> 0:01:55.160 test for the kids. The second scheme is called the 0:01:55.200 --> 0:01:58.240 side door. The back door would be if your parents 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:02.080 donated stepanmillion dollar and you get into the college of 0:02:02.120 --> 0:02:04.640 your choice because you've given them a new athletic building. 0:02:04.840 --> 0:02:07.440 Or are you Jim. This side door is you don't 0:02:07.480 --> 0:02:09.639 have to donate as much money. You could give the 0:02:09.760 --> 0:02:13.560 two hundred thousand dollars to Rick Singer as a charitable 0:02:13.600 --> 0:02:17.080 donation and he would help with friends and connections at 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:21.680 all these universities and get the applicant students and as 0:02:21.720 --> 0:02:24.760 a purported athletic recruit, so it's like a jock for 0:02:24.800 --> 0:02:28.880 a designated sport. Wilson is accused of paying Singer a 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:32.480 total of one point two million dollars for his three kids. 0:02:32.639 --> 0:02:35.880 A Della dizz is accused of paying Singer three hundred 0:02:35.919 --> 0:02:39.800 thousand dollars and more to a USC athletic coach for 0:02:39.960 --> 0:02:42.960 his daughter's admission, and they don't deny they made the payments. 0:02:43.800 --> 0:02:46.720 John Wilson is accused of trying to get his three 0:02:46.800 --> 0:02:50.400 kids into colleges, the first with a son who he 0:02:50.440 --> 0:02:54.400 allegedly paid Singer two hundred thousand dollars to get a 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:58.280 kid in as a water polo player. The dad says, 0:02:58.280 --> 0:03:00.440 but my kid really was the water polo players. There 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:02.959 was no faking involved. I gave a few hundred thousand 0:03:02.960 --> 0:03:04.840 dollars to Singer. He told me he was going to 0:03:04.919 --> 0:03:07.000 give it to USC, and as a matter of fact, 0:03:07.400 --> 0:03:10.320 a hundred thousand ended up at USC, and I gotta 0:03:10.360 --> 0:03:14.320 thank you know for my donation. Meanwhile, Singer pocket at 0:03:14.360 --> 0:03:17.320 the next hundred downs. And then he's accused of allegedly 0:03:17.680 --> 0:03:21.960 paying a million dollars to singer five hundred thousand dollars 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:24.520 a pop for the two twin daughters to get one 0:03:24.520 --> 0:03:28.480 into Stanford as a purported athlete and one into Harvard 0:03:28.520 --> 0:03:32.000 as a purported athlete. The dad Wilson says that his 0:03:32.200 --> 0:03:36.520 two daughters tstoo dutifully and had excellent, if not near perfect, 0:03:36.560 --> 0:03:39.360 college board scores, so they could have gotten into the 0:03:39.400 --> 0:03:42.960 college of their choice. Then the dad Gamal at la 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:45.600 Zi's he's accused of trying to get his daughter into 0:03:45.760 --> 0:03:50.040 USC as a reported basketball recruit. He says he didn't 0:03:50.080 --> 0:03:52.480 need to pay abroad because she was good enough athletes. 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.920 Is USC on trial here in a sense? Well, it's 0:03:57.080 --> 0:04:00.160 USC and the process, and USC was one of the 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:03.120 schools that everybody wanted to get into. It was like 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.800 a hot popular school for these West Coast parents. So 0:04:07.040 --> 0:04:10.720 some of these parents went after USC and its admissions processes, 0:04:10.760 --> 0:04:13.920 and it just p the documents and eventually they got 0:04:14.200 --> 0:04:17.560 what they call a smoking gun, which is an eight 0:04:17.600 --> 0:04:22.920 page spreadsheet of names of students who they knew at USC. 0:04:23.160 --> 0:04:26.000 It was called the v I P List, and it 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:29.760 was submitted for admissions over a period of years. And 0:04:29.920 --> 0:04:33.200 I think there's several dozen students. It's like an eight 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:37.120 page Xcel spreadsheet, and it explained their connection whether they 0:04:37.120 --> 0:04:39.960 were good for quote unquote fifteen millions to the men's 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:44.760 golf team, for three millions to the USC Sporting Center. 0:04:45.360 --> 0:04:48.279 It's just stunning to see this all written down in 0:04:48.320 --> 0:04:51.200 this list. There was a magistrate at one point and 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:53.800 she was questioning what this c I P list was 0:04:54.000 --> 0:04:56.839 and USC said, oh, there's nothing wrong. These are people 0:04:56.839 --> 0:05:00.240 we just consider v I P. And the judge was saying, well, 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:02.440 why do you even have this list. So some of 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:05.600 these parents say this is an accepted way. Many schools 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:09.080 operate that if you just kick in enough cash, you know, 0:05:09.200 --> 0:05:12.400 for a reasonable donation, you can get your kid into 0:05:12.520 --> 0:05:14.960 the college of their choice if you know the right people. 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:17.680 So they're arguing their children were just part of this 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:19.400 group of people that are on the v I P 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.080 list and there was nothing wrong with what they were 0:05:22.120 --> 0:05:24.760 doing and it's not criminal. So it seems like a 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:28.440 two pronged defense. The first is we did nothing wrong, 0:05:28.760 --> 0:05:34.000 and the second is the mastermind Rick Singer misled us right, 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:37.280 and there's a big question. I was actually really shocked 0:05:37.279 --> 0:05:40.200 when I covered the final pre trial conference for the 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:44.359 judge on August eating, and the government slipped in on 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:47.960 a footnote and a filing the night before said we 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.520 don't know if we're calling Rick Singer the mastermind. I 0:05:51.600 --> 0:05:54.480 was kind of looking forward to hearing what his story was, 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:57.919 because the parents are saying he double talk to us, 0:05:57.960 --> 0:06:00.719 he lied to us what we want to question him 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:04.839 and thrilled him on class examination. And there's also some notes. 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:09.279 Singer took notes on his iPhone just as he was 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:12.599 beginning to cooperate with the government, with the SBI and 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:16.719 I r S agents in the fall of and he 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:20.440 says the FBI agents told him to quote unquote telesps 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:23.400 to the parents to get them to implicate themselves and 0:06:23.480 --> 0:06:26.760 why he was recording their calls. So the parents are 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:31.159 arguing Singer is a wire and basically fabricated all these 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:34.279 things that he said to us on the telephone. So 0:06:34.400 --> 0:06:37.640 he told us one story before he cooperated, that everything 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:39.680 was on the up and up and was totally a 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:43.120 pure and riable and honest way of getting your kid 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:46.520 into college. But the minute he started cooperating and he 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:49.240 realized his neck was on the line, that's when he 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:53.120 started line and telling the different version, and we never 0:06:53.200 --> 0:06:55.680 agree to what he was saying on the wire tap. 0:06:55.880 --> 0:07:00.080 So because Singer may not testify the parents, probably you 0:07:00.200 --> 0:07:03.440 cannot bring in those I phone notes because that witness 0:07:03.480 --> 0:07:05.920 will not be on the stand. So it's a big question. 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:08.760 I've thought the lawyers about whether or not the parents 0:07:08.839 --> 0:07:11.880 can make hay of those iPhone notes would prove or 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:15.920 help their arguments. The Singer was basically concocting stories the 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:18.800 minutes the FBI was listening. I can see how not 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:22.560 calling Singer will help the prosecution keep those notes out, 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:25.840 But how do you not call the alleged mastermind of 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:28.680 the scheme? Won't the jersey that as a hole in 0:07:28.680 --> 0:07:31.520 the case and ask why are they not calling Singer? 0:07:32.000 --> 0:07:35.920 They must be hiding something. And some people who ask me, well, 0:07:35.960 --> 0:07:39.400 why don't the parents call Singer? But rules of evidence 0:07:39.400 --> 0:07:43.200 and probably agree with me. If you call someone, you 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:47.560 can't impeach your own witness unless the court declares them 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:50.200 a hostile witness. And it's like a whole procedure you 0:07:50.240 --> 0:07:53.240 have to go through. And the parents lawyers have never 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:56.400 spoken to Singer ever, so they don't really know what 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:59.520 his story is. It's not like the prosecutors who crept 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:02.840 somebody for days or weeks, having twenty six sessions and 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:05.560 knowing they asked a question, they exactly know what the 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:09.160 answer is. This would be like flying blind and asking 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.200 a question that might be a trap door for the 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:15.000 parents because then Singer could turn on the defense lawyer 0:08:15.000 --> 0:08:17.280 and say, will your clients to criminal or whatever. So 0:08:17.320 --> 0:08:20.160 the parents may not necessarily want to call Singer, but 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:23.560 they could make argument that there's a missing witness. You know, 0:08:23.680 --> 0:08:26.040 they want to have the jury note that Singer is 0:08:26.120 --> 0:08:29.000 missing and maybe make him out to be the fall 0:08:29.040 --> 0:08:32.320 guy or the real villain of this whole scheme to 0:08:32.440 --> 0:08:37.000 Rebut those wire taps, some of those recordings are very 0:08:37.040 --> 0:08:39.720 you know, the parents are talking about, oh can I 0:08:39.720 --> 0:08:41.599 get a two for one? Oh? How much is it 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:44.520 going to cost me? And it sounds like the parents 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:48.200 are scheming. A jury could considerue that that's evidence of 0:08:48.240 --> 0:08:51.880 a father entering into an elicited ringment with Singer. So 0:08:51.960 --> 0:08:56.000 the prosecution could introduce the tapes because the FBI recorded them, 0:08:56.280 --> 0:08:58.880 But normally wouldn't you have the person who recorded them 0:08:58.960 --> 0:09:02.000 on the stand to explain them, right, and you think 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:04.360 of doubt. Sometimes there's mob cases where they have a 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:06.800 wire tap, and they don't have a person that says 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.400 the wire taps. They just have the FBI agent saying, yeah, 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:11.680 we put a wire in the Ravenied Social Club and 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:14.360 that's how we got John Dotty Cockey. They already made 0:09:14.360 --> 0:09:17.280 a request to the court to authenticate and the usage 0:09:17.400 --> 0:09:21.319 of the case the consensual recordings that Singer made without Singer. 0:09:21.800 --> 0:09:23.640 Do you know if either of the fathers are going 0:09:23.679 --> 0:09:26.120 to take the stand. Of course they don't have to. 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:29.439 That remains to be seen. I guess how the case 0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.080 plays out for the government side of it. One of 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:35.439 the things that's really interesting is a couple of parents 0:09:35.480 --> 0:09:39.040 are going to testify for the government, a couple from 0:09:39.080 --> 0:09:42.440 California named Bruce and Dzana Isaacson, and they were the 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:46.160 first to play guilty of all the parents. They immediately 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:49.200 did a deal and now they're going to testify what 0:09:49.360 --> 0:09:52.160 they were thinking, to give the jury some perspective of 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:54.800 what parents may have been thinking, of what these two 0:09:55.080 --> 0:09:57.360 fathers may have been thinking. They're also going to call 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:01.400 some coaching staff that played guil See and other co 0:10:01.400 --> 0:10:05.679 conspirators with Singer in his business to give insight. This 0:10:05.800 --> 0:10:08.520 was a gam that Singer was milking money. I mean 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:10.760 the government when they announced this case said Singer had 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:14.080 been doing this for years and had made twenty five millions. 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:16.480 We've added up the bound of bribes in this case. 0:10:16.760 --> 0:10:19.839 I think we got to maybe ten million or eight millions. 0:10:20.000 --> 0:10:23.679 We've talked about this case several times, and initially I 0:10:23.720 --> 0:10:27.080 thought the prosecution has a slam dunk case, but it 0:10:27.160 --> 0:10:29.840 seems like the defense might knock some holes in the 0:10:29.880 --> 0:10:33.600 prosecution's case. What you can do get a plea deal 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:36.240 is different from how it will play before a jury. 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:38.560 I mean some people have said, oh, this is going 0:10:38.640 --> 0:10:42.640 to be so impalatable to the general public ensured that 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:45.520 they're going to immediately convict and the judge. I'm in 0:10:45.760 --> 0:10:49.440 more than two hundred people to courts in Boston to 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:52.280 have people fill out a questionnaire. And it's the thirteen 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:54.640 page questionnaire that asked, how much do you know about 0:10:54.679 --> 0:10:57.439 this case? Have you ever had a child applied to college? 0:10:57.520 --> 0:10:59.880 Have you remember worked in the college system, you have 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:03.280 work at fundraised? Do you have anything against cooperators? So 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:06.359 they're going to try to weed out those with opinions 0:11:06.400 --> 0:11:10.120 that might be swayed one way or another, and to 0:11:10.360 --> 0:11:12.400 read out those people and try to get a fair 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:17.120 and impartial jury. Thanks Pat, That's Bloomberg Legal reporter Patricia Hurtado. 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:26.959 Another group of charismatic fish are the darters. Darters are 0:11:27.000 --> 0:11:31.200 a small, wonderfully colored bottom dwelling fish that looks more 0:11:31.280 --> 0:11:34.680 suited to live in a coral reef for tropical aquarium 0:11:34.920 --> 0:11:39.079 than the cold, fast flowing streams of the Smokies. The 0:11:39.200 --> 0:11:42.760 snail darter is a tiny Tennessee fish that made big 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:46.079 waves in legal waters. That is, the three inch fish 0:11:46.120 --> 0:11:48.600 became famous when the case to save it went all 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:51.360 the way to the Supreme Court, and the court's first 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:57.079 decision on the landmark Endangered Species Act in articulated an 0:11:57.080 --> 0:12:01.000 expansive interpretation of the law in favor of protections for 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:05.120 the little fish. Now, after nearly fifty years, the snail 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:08.920 darter has been taken off the endangered species list, joining 0:12:08.920 --> 0:12:10.800 me as a lawyer who took that case to the 0:12:10.840 --> 0:12:14.959 Supreme Court. Zig Platter, professor at Boston College Law School, 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:19.640 tell us about the snail darter. The snail darter was 0:12:19.840 --> 0:12:26.079 a tiny perch that was found in the last thirty 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:33.840 miles of big flowing, clean river in Tennessee because sixty 0:12:33.880 --> 0:12:39.320 seven other damns basically eliminated wherever else it lived, and 0:12:39.640 --> 0:12:43.920 the Tennessee Value Authority decided they wanted to build their 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:49.160 last damn to impound this river and the darter, it 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:55.280 turns out, was you know, a perfect illustration two humans 0:12:55.720 --> 0:12:57.640 canary in the coal mine, that this was the last 0:12:57.640 --> 0:13:01.440 place left for humans who having credible trout fishing and 0:13:01.720 --> 0:13:04.520 boy Scouts and girl Scouts could do the float trips there, 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:08.400 and the history of the Cherokee Indians. The little fish 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:13.839 was in effect a barometer for a lot of really 0:13:13.880 --> 0:13:16.439 strong public values right at the edge of the Smoky 0:13:16.440 --> 0:13:22.080 Mountains National Park, and so the farmers fought to protect 0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:28.160 their farms by protecting the fish. Um there were three 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:32.680 family farms that were condemned by the government agency, most 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:35.560 of them for resale, not most of them not for 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:40.199 the little lake. So it's a complicated story because you 0:13:40.400 --> 0:13:44.280 got to explain the agency was not building this for hydropower, 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:47.240 It wasn't building it for flood control. It was it 0:13:47.320 --> 0:13:51.840 had to justify it by inventing a pretend city that 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:54.480 they said would be built on the land that they 0:13:54.480 --> 0:13:58.240 had condemned. It never was, and also if this would 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:01.040 be a recreational lake, it's not a Ydro lake in 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:04.440 terms of his justifications that everything is connected to everything else. 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:07.680 But it's a complicated story. How did the farmers take 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:13.520 up this battle? Well, the farmers really were quite sophisticated, 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:17.320 for you know, Appalachian farmers, who most of them had 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:21.560 not gone to college. They got a lawyer to bring 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:25.560 an environmental impact statement case first of all, and the 0:14:25.840 --> 0:14:28.520 government agency, we don't have to do an impact statement 0:14:28.600 --> 0:14:33.840 because we're an emergency agency or something. Uh. They went 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:37.040 to court and they got an injunction. So for sixteen months, 0:14:37.920 --> 0:14:42.040 the Tennessee Valley Authority had to prepare an environmental impact statement. 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:46.360 But once you do that, it's a procedure. They've they've 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:50.000 done the procedure, they can go ahead and flood the valley. 0:14:50.120 --> 0:14:53.920 Um even though the farmers said, the valley, the agriculture, 0:14:54.000 --> 0:14:57.920 the tourism, the history is worth much more than than 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:02.680 the last most marginal dam. But once they lost, they 0:15:02.680 --> 0:15:05.760 had about given up. And then suddenly this little fish 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:09.960 was discovered, and the guy who discovered it was in 0:15:09.960 --> 0:15:13.480 the middle of a river. He bent over, and the shallow, beautiful, 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:15.880 clear river he picked up this fish in his fingers. 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.040 Then he walked over to the bank and he said 0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:21.160 to the farmer, this is an endangered fish and this 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:27.920 might save your farms. And so they basically carried the case. 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:31.400 My students and I did the law of it, and 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:35.080 we had a local attorney on the trial as well. 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:39.960 But the farmers, they went to Washington. They testified, this 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:46.120 was grassroots democracy, an incredible story. And then you know, 0:15:46.280 --> 0:15:48.560 we won in the Supreme Court. Tell me how it 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:53.160 got to the Supreme Court. Well, at trial, the judge 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:57.840 in Tennessee, of course, decided in favor of the Tennessee 0:15:57.880 --> 0:16:02.120 Valley Authority, but he said, this dam is going to 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:04.840 jeopardize the survival of the fish and it's going to 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:07.960 destroy its natural habitat, but I'm not going to stop it. 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:10.080 And then in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeal said, 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:14.080 excuse me, but those are both separate violations of the 0:16:14.160 --> 0:16:19.000 Endangered Species Act. So they stopped the project, and the 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:21.600 agency took it to the Supreme Court of the United States, 0:16:21.880 --> 0:16:25.760 and the Supreme Court said, well, Congress said, you cannot 0:16:25.800 --> 0:16:29.800 destroy an endangered species or destroy its habitat if you're 0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:33.040 a federal agency. Meanwhile, Of course, there was a firestorm 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:37.840 going because this is the only law that most citizens 0:16:37.880 --> 0:16:42.000 could bring a suit for that would question the rationality 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:44.080 of a project. Normally, all they have to do is 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:47.240 do the paperwork. That's what an environmental impact statement was. 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:51.920 So eventually, after the Supreme Court there was a cabinet 0:16:52.040 --> 0:16:56.280 level economic study about what was worth more the river 0:16:56.400 --> 0:17:00.160 development that the farmers wanted, or the dam develop but 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:03.480 that the agency wanted. I mean, this was the God Committee, 0:17:03.520 --> 0:17:07.120 is an extraordinary tribunal that most people don't know about. Unanimously, 0:17:07.200 --> 0:17:10.000 they said the dam was never worth building in the 0:17:10.040 --> 0:17:13.360 first place, and it isn't worth completing because the river 0:17:13.840 --> 0:17:18.200 with agriculture, with the historical stuff, with tourism, with an 0:17:18.200 --> 0:17:22.760 industrial park. The farmers really made an amazingly good argument, 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:28.240 and so it was vetoed. And then in Congress, the 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:31.439 industries that were worried about the Endangered Species Act and 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:34.800 the government agencies that build dams were able to change 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:39.119 the law. The river died and the fish was wiped 0:17:39.160 --> 0:17:44.320 out in its major natural habitat. It was really heartbreaking 0:17:44.359 --> 0:17:47.840 politics because every member of Congress got a message from 0:17:47.880 --> 0:17:52.240 the Department of Interior and this high level committee saying 0:17:53.320 --> 0:17:57.160 this dam will destroy more than it will ever create. 0:17:58.000 --> 0:18:04.760 But America didn't know that because the firestorm of political 0:18:04.880 --> 0:18:09.040 rhetoric was all, you know, stupid little fish, gigantic hydro 0:18:09.119 --> 0:18:11.919 electric dam. The dam is a tiny little dam and 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:16.080 it's not a hydro dam. And the cynical environmentalists who 0:18:16.160 --> 0:18:19.600 don't care about the fish, well, you know, we care 0:18:19.720 --> 0:18:22.840 about all living things, and in this case, this living 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:26.520 thing was connected to economic values, and so it was 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:30.440 heartbreaking to lose the Little Tennessee River. People were coming 0:18:30.480 --> 0:18:33.119 from hundreds of miles away to fish this place before 0:18:33.119 --> 0:18:38.320 it died. Who relocated the fish? Well, once a species 0:18:38.600 --> 0:18:42.520 is endangered, if Congress has said you cannot save it 0:18:42.720 --> 0:18:45.600 in its natural habitat as they said here, then the 0:18:45.640 --> 0:18:49.760 Department of Interior put together a recovery team and they said, well, 0:18:49.800 --> 0:18:52.440 what can we do to keep the species from dying out? 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:56.919 And working with tv A, and t v A said okay, 0:18:56.960 --> 0:18:59.680 where can we transplant it? The Department of Interior worked 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:03.080 out plan and so they put it in several rivers 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:06.080 that weren't ideal. And so that's part of this story 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:08.439 that you know, some people say, oh, well, when you 0:19:08.440 --> 0:19:11.439 have an endangered meansy to transplant it somewhere else. It 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:16.080 took forty years. It took forty years. But the transplant 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:21.000 now seems to be successful. But to fallback transplantation is 0:19:21.320 --> 0:19:23.920 you know, it's second best. No, it's not even second best, 0:19:23.960 --> 0:19:26.879 it's third best. First best is to keep a species, 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:30.679 to conserve it in its natural habitat second is to 0:19:30.680 --> 0:19:33.040 put it into a place where it can live without 0:19:33.119 --> 0:19:38.040 any more human investment, human actions. But the third best, 0:19:38.080 --> 0:19:41.560 I guess is what they did because these rivers in 0:19:41.600 --> 0:19:45.320 the summertime got hot, didn't have enough oxygen. So t 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:48.800 v A now has to pump oxygen into the transplant 0:19:48.880 --> 0:19:53.280 rivers to keep the fish alive. And they're pulsing their 0:19:53.400 --> 0:19:57.800 dams to wash the mud away so that the fish 0:19:57.880 --> 0:20:03.040 can have spawning beds, egg and children in the clean 0:20:03.400 --> 0:20:07.760 gravel below some of these dams. So the fish are surviving, 0:20:08.040 --> 0:20:14.000 but they depend on a government agency maintaining oxygen pumping 0:20:14.040 --> 0:20:21.240 into the water and a special flushing water pressure process 0:20:21.280 --> 0:20:24.520 and the dams. And that's not ideal. You you want 0:20:24.560 --> 0:20:30.320 a transplant that doesn't require human support forever. That's what 0:20:30.359 --> 0:20:33.280 we've got. The government said it's no longer in danger 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:36.000 of extinction. Is that true or not true? That's right. 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:40.119 The scientist said, if the t v A keeps putting 0:20:40.160 --> 0:20:44.560 liquid oxygen into the water and keeps flushing the dams 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:46.760 in a way it hadn't done before so as to 0:20:46.920 --> 0:20:50.439 clean alternative rivers where the fish could survive, then the 0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:54.639 fish can survive. It's no longer endangered. And that's science, 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:58.520 and I believe it's true. It's just we have to 0:20:58.600 --> 0:21:04.560 be sure that those measures to conserve the species go 0:21:04.720 --> 0:21:09.840 on how long? Forever? Forever? So wouldn't it have been 0:21:09.880 --> 0:21:13.240 better than to leave it on the endangered species list? 0:21:13.280 --> 0:21:16.840 Why did you file a petition to delist it? That's 0:21:16.920 --> 0:21:24.399 a really tough question, and there complicated answers and scientific terms. 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:31.600 It was no longer endangered because the agencies were pumping 0:21:31.600 --> 0:21:36.320 oxygen and blowing the water clean. So, but this more 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:41.359 to it. The prior federal administration was attacking the Endangered 0:21:41.400 --> 0:21:45.479 Species Act. It was cutting regulations this way and that 0:21:45.480 --> 0:21:50.920 that the protected species. And we started hearing that there 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:56.919 was a specific plan to delist the snail darter in 0:21:56.960 --> 0:22:01.280 a way that would not protect it, and so it's 0:22:01.400 --> 0:22:07.679 it's sort of preemptive. We don't like transplantation. But um, 0:22:07.720 --> 0:22:13.320 by filing the petition ourselves, we sort of get special standing. 0:22:14.000 --> 0:22:20.680 Two make sure that those measures continue, that the delisting 0:22:20.760 --> 0:22:26.119 regulation will require those actions to go on forever. And 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:30.879 you know, if there's ever a double cross, if the 0:22:31.200 --> 0:22:37.720 agency stopped protecting the fish, we will be able under 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:43.600 the delisting regulation immediately to file for emergency relisting. And 0:22:44.640 --> 0:22:48.359 it's it's unfortunate that we have to talk about it 0:22:48.400 --> 0:22:54.159 in those terms, but I'm thinking that in the circumstances 0:22:54.240 --> 0:22:56.720 it was going to be delisted by the prior administration. 0:22:57.000 --> 0:23:00.520 We filed in July, there was still a year and 0:23:00.600 --> 0:23:06.200 a half of the prior administration or more, and the 0:23:06.240 --> 0:23:09.560 safest thing to do was to try to be part 0:23:09.600 --> 0:23:14.320 of the process to make sure that maintenance of the 0:23:14.400 --> 0:23:20.920 protections could could be assured. What did environmentalists learned from 0:23:21.040 --> 0:23:26.120 the whole saga of the snail darter? Well, it's it's 0:23:26.640 --> 0:23:33.080 it's interesting. In spite of the tremendous criticism that was 0:23:33.200 --> 0:23:37.879 poured against the snail darter, I mean it really was. 0:23:39.240 --> 0:23:43.880 We were called fringe lunatics and Russia Limball called us 0:23:43.880 --> 0:23:49.320 homo socialists. I mean, protecting a stupid little fish against 0:23:49.320 --> 0:23:53.639 a gigantic hydro electric dam. Of course that wasn't the case. 0:23:54.200 --> 0:23:58.199 But this is the point. Even when it was thought 0:23:58.240 --> 0:24:03.320 to be an extreme as the courts enforced the law. 0:24:04.480 --> 0:24:09.760 And that is a precedent that makes people pay attention 0:24:09.840 --> 0:24:12.840 to the law even if they don't like it, if 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:16.359 they know that even in that case, the courts enforced it. 0:24:16.640 --> 0:24:20.440 So so there is that a really good precedent came 0:24:20.520 --> 0:24:24.520 from it. And the species, you know, the Endangered Species 0:24:24.520 --> 0:24:29.080 Act is recovered a fair number of species over the years. 0:24:29.119 --> 0:24:33.639 The Act works. The Clean Water Act works because the 0:24:33.720 --> 0:24:35.840 water and the rivers where they put the fish is 0:24:35.920 --> 0:24:40.679 cleaner than it was um back forty years ago. So 0:24:40.840 --> 0:24:44.919 so it's one of those things where you make the 0:24:45.000 --> 0:24:49.639 best decision you can in the circumstances when the really 0:24:50.040 --> 0:24:54.200 best solution for everyone, for the farmers, for fisherman, for 0:24:54.280 --> 0:24:57.400 the Cherokee Indians that had their sacred sites in this 0:24:57.520 --> 0:25:02.399 river area, and for the fish. You when you lose 0:25:02.440 --> 0:25:07.280 it there, you do the best you can somewhere else. Um. 0:25:07.320 --> 0:25:10.320 But the president in the law is a good strong one. 0:25:11.960 --> 0:25:15.720