Cenk Uygur Says He’s ‘Heartbroken’ to Berate ‘Do-Nothing’ Progressives like AOC and Bernie Sanders for Capitulating on Minimum Wage

We’ve labeled Cenk Uygur as the leader of the “fighting left” for some time now, for his willingness to engage with his ideological foes in the very combative and ruthless manner which they sometimes battle. It turns out, that it’s not just those on the right—or center—of the political spectrum that draw his animus. He can also call out the very progressive members of Congress that he has long supported.

In a fiery segment of The Young Turks Thursday night, Ugyur tore into top progressives in Congress—namely Bernie Sanders, Pramila Jayapal and even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—for what he deemed as utter capitulation and cowardice in failing to fight for the $15 minimum wage, an issue on which they tirelessly campaigned. He also called out mainstream media reporters and editors, who, in his esteem, turned a blind eye to the blatant corruption that covers the corridors of power in Washington DC.

Discussing the minimum wage battle, Uygur deemed it obvious why many Democrats oppose raising the federal minimum wage, even if the media refuse to report it. “Corporate Democrats are all funded by corporations,” he says. “No one in the Washington media points it out, either because they suck at their jobs and are completely ignorant of what actually drives politicians or because they’re in on it. And their editors — the higher you go up the ladder the more they’re in on it. ‘Hey, you can’t disturb our advertisers and we need access to these corrupt politicians!’ So the media’s got giant culpability here.”

Recent polls have shown that raising the federal minimum wage to $15 is supported by two-thirds of Americans, and even by a majority of Republicans. Yet the mainstream media insists on describing politicians who oppose a $15 minimum wage as “moderates.”

“Whether it’s Mitt Romney, Kyrsten Sinema, or Joe Manchin, they’re not moderates — by definition,” he says. ‘They’re not moderates because two-thirds of the country says, ‘Do it.’ The number is usually even higher than that when they poll the $15 minimum wage. So every reporter in the country who keeps calling them ‘moderates’ or ‘centrists’ should be fired because they are not doing fact-based reporting, they’re doing access journalism.”

Much as Uygur blames “corporatists” like Manchin, Sinema, and Joe Biden for angling to obstruct a $15 minimum wage bill, he says the “main culprits” in this dereliction of duty are, in fact, the progressives in Congress, many of whom he personally helped get elected.

“Progressive legislators are choosing to do nothing,” he says. “They chose not to put a $15 minimum wage in the Covid Relief Bill and the so-called progressive leadership promised us, ‘Maybe next time.’ That’s what Pramila Jayapal said. OK, so they just released the five progressive priorities for the infrastructure bill, and now it’s ‘next time.’ And the $15 minimum wage isn’t in it. Jayapal never meant it. She’s never going to go back to it. Meanwhile, Romney and Sinema outflank her, outflank all of the progressives in Congress by actually working on a bill.”

Uygur ultimately admits he’s “heartbroken” to see progressive allies sitting on their hands, but says he’s forced to admit that it looks like they’ve thrown in the towel and are never going to fight back against the centers of power within the Democratic Party. But that doesn’t mean he’s ready to give up or go quietly, even if that means taking to task the most progressive legislators in Congress and earning the ire of onetime allies.

“Right now It’s incumbent upon us to say, ‘Goddammit, Bernie. Goddammit, Justice Democrats. Legendary fighter, AOC, where are you? It was nice and easy and great to challenge Democratic leadership when you were primarying them, but now that you’re in power, all of a sudden you don’t want us to challenge Democratic leadership?’ Oh, hell no. You can get mad at us all day long but you have got to do your job and our job is to put pressure on you no matter what it costs us personally.”

Watch the clip above via YouTube.