Center for Economic and Policy Research

Today, for the first time, with Dr.

Mark Weisbrot, a senior economist, co-founder and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, D.C., and a good friend of Jeffrey Sachs,

who

was so kind to introduce us to each other.

Oh, yes.

You can get our work at CEPR.

That's Center for Economic and Policy Research.

CEPR.net. And you can sign up.

We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, USA.

On the program today, Guillaume Long, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ecuador, a senior research fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, on the Brazilian runoff between Flávio Bolsonaro and Lula three weeks away.

Then Mai Vang, Sacramento City Council member running to represent California's 7th Congressional District in the US House of Representatives.

Also on the program today, Republicans in triage mode as polls shift even more toward Democrats.

Emma Vigeland out today.

I want to welcome to the program Guillaume Long.

He's former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ecuador and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Uh, Guillaume, thank you so much for joining us.

The outlet noted, Messias stated in a social media post that foreign meddling cannot be tolerated and that the report represented an important alert for Brazilian sovereignty.

Mark Weisbrot, co-founder, co-director of the U.S.-based Center of Economic and Policy Research, called the Trump administration interference another U.S. regime operation, pointing to the aggressive tariffs Trump imposed on Brazilian goods last year and the U.S. Department attempt to send two top officials cast doubt on the fairness and integrity of the country's electoral system.

In other words, if Bolsonaro had won, They would be out there saying, oh, there's something wrong with the election system.

But remember, there's still another election in three weeks between Bolsonaro and Lula.

But even just the electrical cost.

According to the Center for Economic Policy Research, data centers cost $23 billion to consumer electrical bills nationwide.

So when they're talking about the fact that data centers create wealth, yes, they create wealth for a handful of people.

For the Elon Musks of the world, the NVIDIA CEO, for Sam Altman, they are creating wealth.

CEOs could be a little bit less rich.

Specifically, if you add 10 data centers to a regional grid, it will spike that resident's electrical bill by 13%.

This is also according to the Center for Economic Policy Research.

You have a situation where Trump is already increasing electricity bills because of what is happening in Iran, and then now you have the data centers doing it, basically depleting the wealth of the American worker in order to make just a handful of people rich.

The upcoming election in Brazil is really going to be extremely consequential for the entire region.

Alexander Main is the director of international policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Brazil is the country with the largest economy, biggest population in Latin America.

And it's also one of the few countries that is still holding out against U.S. pressure, pressure to align with the Trump administration's agenda in the region.

Those billions are proving difficult to locate.

Francisco Rodriguez, a Venezuelan economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, pointed out to the FT that despite a 25% surge in crude exports this year, Venezuela's first quarter GDP grew by just 2.5%, its weakest performance in nearly five years, so the oil is definitely leaving, it's just the money coming back that seems a bit shy.

This is all happening at a terrible time for the country.

Last month, Venezuela was hit by twin earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5. Thousands of people were killed, tens of thousands were left homeless, and the damage to property and infrastructure has been estimated at $37 billion, close to a third of the entire economy.

Who's going to pay it? I mean, that, that's kind of a simple question.

Hi, I'm Isaac, and on The Tech Report with me today is the senior distinguished fellow for the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC, Dean Baker.

Thanks for coming on.

Thanks a lot for having me on.