Few objects in Washington, D.C. are as feared as Katie Porter's whiteboard. The Congresswoman told Brut how she got the idea for her infamous dry-erase takedowns.
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00:00I've got an empty whiteboard ready to take down your justifications.
00:02Are you following the math so far?
00:04The simplicity of the whiteboard can really make it impossible
00:09for them to hide behind slogans and charts.
00:16You personally received half a million dollars, personally, just by tripling the price.
00:25It's a whiteboard. This is not something I've seen.
00:27What they're often unable to do is simply answer for their hypocrisy.
00:41CEOs will use tactics like, could you repeat the question?
00:45I'm sorry I didn't catch all that.
00:47I couldn't follow all of the numbers you were throwing out there.
00:51I think the whiteboard helps prevent that.
00:57Oh, I'm definitely nervous when I go into those hearings.
01:09I'm nervous about making sure I don't drop the whiteboard or,
01:13you know, make a mark on my face instead of on the whiteboard, spell something wrong.
01:17Every witness who comes to Congress has plenty of staff and time to get prepared.
01:23But I think each moment that we can touch the American people as lawmakers
01:27is an important opportunity.
01:28How about the cost of an E.R. visit for someone identified as high severity and threat?
01:32I'm sorry, ma'am. What was the question again?
01:34How about the cost of an E.R. visit for somebody identified
01:38as having high severity or high threat?
01:41I probably have 10 to 15 different whiteboards.
01:45This whiteboard that I have with me today is kind of neat because it's double-sided
01:49and it also is an easel.
01:51I also have a huge whiteboard that is mounted in my office.
01:56The one that's in my purse I use often when people say to me,
02:00I didn't follow that. Could you repeat that?
02:02Do you know what this number is?
02:08I...
02:10Does it ring any bells?
02:11My personal favorite use of the whiteboard I ever made
02:14was when I wrote reasons you should be paid, you know, $100 million.
02:19I'd like for you to please explain to the American public
02:22why you and four other executives deserve to pay yourselves tens of million dollars each year.
02:28Right. I recognize that that's a considerable sum of money.
02:32I would, of course, point out that I don't have any direct input to my compensation.
02:36The CEO had nothing to say and I think that empty whiteboard really said more
02:42in that moment about executive pay and why it's unjustifiable sometimes
02:46than any kind of long complicated speech or fancy slick presentation.
02:50That takes her down to negative $567 per month.
02:55How should she manage this budget shortfall while she's working full-time at your bank?
03:00I think the first time we used it in a hearing was when I was questioning Jamie Diamond
03:06and the idea was to walk him through a budget,
03:10a hypothetical budget of a worker at his bank, JPMorgan Chase.
03:13I found a job in my hometown of Irvine at JPMorgan Chase.
03:17It pays $1,650 an hour.
03:19It comes out to an income of $35,070.
03:22Now, this bank teller, her name is Patricia.
03:24She has one child who's six years old.
03:26Mr. Diamond, she doesn't have the ability right now to spend your $31 million.
03:30I'm totally sympathetic.
03:31She's short $567.
03:33What would you suggest she do?
03:34I don't know.
03:35I'd have to think about that.
03:36So many people called our office, got in touch on social media,
03:41wrote to us saying,
03:42your budget was my budget.
03:45You showed this man who makes hundreds of millions of dollars what it's like to be me.
03:50And I think that's the reason it got so much attention.
03:53It was really a chance for the American public to have their story told.
03:56And I'll be happy to send you a copy of the textbook that I wrote.
04:00I was a law professor before I ran for Congress.
04:03And when you're teaching in a classroom,
04:05you've got to deal with the reality that some students just aren't as prepared as you want.
04:09Some are tired.
04:10Some, frankly, didn't do the homework.
04:12And a few are even hungover.
04:13It's the exact same thing with the American public.
04:16They're busy.
04:17They're trying to get to jobs, take care of their families.
04:19Putting it on the board and doing it visually can help them.
04:22How much did AbbVie spend on stock buybacks and shareholders,
04:26stock buybacks and dividends to enrich your shareholders from 2013 to 2018?
04:31Dividends.
04:32And I have to come back with a number for that over that period of time.
04:35$50 billion.
04:38We're using public information in the hearing.
04:40But when you see those numbers represented as circles,
04:44you get a sense of just how many more dollars are going to things that enrich
04:49pharmaceutical company executives and CEOs rather than improve the lives of patients.
04:54Do you happen to know how much we allocated for the airlines during coronavirus relief?
05:01I do not have the total.
05:03Well, guess what?
05:04It just happens to be $58 billion.
05:11These hearings are for the American public.
05:13Transparency is an incredibly important part of how we earn the American public's trust.
05:19There's no good answer for why you're saying one thing to your shareholders
05:22and another thing to the American public.