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We actually have the liberty to tell the truth, and to tell it like it is, so there has been a very concerted campaign to lock us out of the discussion. Because we have not disappeared, now, that campaign to silence the political competition is taking its latest form.
AARON MATÃ"degrees: You know, Dr. Stein, one small point about Bernie Sanders and voters going for Trump that you mentioned, I have no doubt that some Bernie Sanders voters did, but my only concern there is whether supporters of Hillary Clinton have overblown the extent to which that was true in an effort to undermine Bernie Sanders.
But let me ask you, finally, where do you think all this is going? It's more than a year after the election. Democrats, as you've laid out, are still obsessing over this Russian, alleged Russian interference, for which there's still no concrete proof, and now, as we're discussing, it's going after progressives like you. What are your concerns for the future of being oppositional, being a dissident in this country?
JILL STEIN: I think there is a noose which is tightening around our Democratic institutions. We see this in the J20 trials, which are an effort to criminalize protests, a case in which people who just happened to be standing on the wrong street corner were all rounded up, kettled, mass arrested, and are basically now being threatened with 50-year and more sentences for, essentially, without evidence. This is the new criminalization of protest that goes along with the new censorship, the PropOrNot campaign that was launched by the Bezos' Post several months back, that essentially criminalizes, or attempts to silence and vilify, progressive news organizations.
We see this in the... [crosstalk 00:10:44]
AARON MATÃ"degrees: Just to explain that, Dr. Stein, for the audience, who isn't familiar with it, the Washington Post, which you called the Bezos' Post after its owner, ran an article sourced through this group, PropOrNot, which named a bunch of progressive websites as being possibly tied to Russia influence, including ... The Real News was not mentioned, but there are many progressive websites and groups that were included as part of this McCarthy-ite witch hunt.
Sorry, go ahead.
JILL STEIN: Yes, exactly. It's just another example here. It's important to connect these dots, that our democracy is very much at risk, not only due to potential interference in our elections, but due to this resurgence of McCarthyism, and the effort to suppress opposition voices, to suppress independent politics, to suppress our right to protest, to freedom of the press. You have, in addition, this new censorship by algorithm on Facebook, and search engine censorship, which has decimated traffic to many progressive sites, like Truthdig, for example, or the World Socialist website.
There's just a whole spectrum of progressive websites, including ours as well, for whom traffic has been cut by 50 to 75%, because of an implicit censorship that's now taking place because of this mythology that the Russians have been using social media to sow discord. This is where they go when they can't show actual evidence of interference.
We should be looking for interference, Russian, corporate, domestic, etc., in terms of quid pro quo, back-room deals, actual arrangements to interfere with the election, the violation of campaign finance laws, money laundering ... we should be looking for actual violations of law that violate the integrity of our elections. That's what our recount is about.
AARON MATÃ"degrees: Dr. Stein, we have to leave it there. Physician, activist, presidential candidate in 2016 for the Green Party, now under investigation by the Senate Intelligence Committee for possible collusion with the Russians. Yes. I'm not joking.
Dr. Stein, thank you.
JILL STEIN: Thank you so much, Aaron.
AARON MATÃ"degrees: And thank you for joining us on The Real News.
[Jill Stein was the Green Party's presidential candidate in 2016 and 2012. She is an organizer, physician and environmental health advocate. In the 2016 election, she was the only national Presidential candidate to call for an emergency jobs program to solve jointly the climate and economic crises, and for demilitarization through a foreign policy based on human rights, international law and diplomacy. She was also the only candidate to be arrested for supporting the Dakota Sioux nation in resisting the DAPL pipeline. She launched a recount campaign following the 2016 election to investigate potential interference in the presidential election. She has helped fight for clean air and water, health care and education as human rights, especially in front line communities. In 2006, she transitioned from clinical medicine into "political medicine" to help heal "the mother of all illnesses," our sick political system, so we can begin to fix the other things that are literally killing us. She was part of the recent Solidarity Peace Delegation to South Korea, to support the struggle of the Korean people for peace, sovereignty and demilitarization of the Korean Peninsula. Jill is currently working to support local Green candidates in fighting for radical progressive, sustainable solutions that are critical for our future.]
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