Speaker 1: Also media. Okay, I am also going cool.
Speaker 2: Let's go.
Speaker 1: Suck it up.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Maybe that should be our intro. Yeah, you
Speaker 2: leave it all in, Daniel.
Speaker 1: This is how fucking up my cool zone. Media.
Speaker 2: That's a great question, Robert, It's one we don't like
Speaker 2: to answer. The answer is yeah, Reaganagan coins. Yeah, we've
Speaker 2: got into it.
Speaker 1: Oh, that's what's funding, James. It's a common mistake mixing
Speaker 1: those two words up.
Speaker 2: Okay, I see, yeah, yeah, I thought it was because
Speaker 2: we got into a dispute about who is going to
Speaker 2: get the next gold coin that they send us. No,
Speaker 2: every every month.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that's that's what funds are. Incredible work, your
Speaker 1: incredible work mostly over at the border, that's right, ye.
Speaker 2: Before thank you magic man. Yeah, right before and after
Speaker 2: I go, I don't I've like Scrooge McDuck into my
Speaker 2: giant pile of gold coins. Yeah, and it helps me recover.
Speaker 2: But yeah, talking of the border, I am not the
Speaker 2: only one with a giant pile of gold coins who
Speaker 2: has been going to the border because friend of the
Speaker 2: show Elon Musk has also been taking.
Speaker 1: Well you got to bring him into this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well a certainly rubber he brought himself into this?
Speaker 1: Why he got to bring himself out?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Really this wasn't my believe me, buddy. I would
Speaker 2: like nothing more than to never hear his name again,
Speaker 2: but unfortunately addressed.
Speaker 1: I would like to hear it again, but specifically, I
Speaker 1: would like to hear the sentence from a news anchor
Speaker 1: Elon Musk eaten by a crocodile. Yes, I was just
Speaker 1: thinking crocodile in a failed motorcycle stunt in the Florida Keys. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd settle with like hippopotamus, crocodile.
Speaker 1: Any carge semi aquatic animal eating him would be pretty amusing. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if a manachi ate him, I'd be fucking pumped.
Speaker 2: It'd be amazing, healthy as we'd love to see it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: if any.
Speaker 1: One carnivor amanity yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been training its whole life for this. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that'll be on our next merch drop. Okay. So yeah,
Speaker 2: Elmo in some kind of I don't know, like punished
Speaker 2: woody cosplay.
Speaker 3: It was a very costumish, it was, Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: We have a saying in Texas for people who wear
Speaker 1: cowboy hats and cowboy boots when they shouldn't and it's
Speaker 1: all had no cattle, and that is he is the
Speaker 1: definition of that a.
Speaker 3: Classes I think really punched it up, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he just looked like a balland like I can't.
Speaker 2: It's really remarkable that he can be that wealthy and
Speaker 2: always looks so awkward and like you could just pay
Speaker 2: someone to buy you clothes, bro, And like, at least
Speaker 2: Jeff Bezos got yoked when he got really rich. Elon
Speaker 2: must still looks like Humpty dumpty, not to likes does
Speaker 2: look Besos looks weirdest freaking like a plastic They.
Speaker 1: All look weird. And I don't care about the fact
Speaker 1: that Elon Musk is you know, he's not jacket or swollen,
Speaker 1: but he's not a wildly abnormal body shape for a
Speaker 1: man in what is fucking fifty's Like, yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's older than I imagine.
Speaker 1: I'm shit on him for playing at something he clearly
Speaker 1: is not, because no man has ever been further from
Speaker 1: being a cowboy.
Speaker 2: Yes, that is true, he has very few cattle. Yeah,
Speaker 2: there's no shame in anyone's body shape. It's just funny
Speaker 2: to Mockylon Musk. I guess, so, yeah, Elon turned up
Speaker 2: at the border, and he decided that he was going
Speaker 2: to learn about the border, and the way that he
Speaker 2: decided he was going to learn about the border was
Speaker 2: by assembling a collection of cops and one representative to
Speaker 2: lie to him about the border, which many of you
Speaker 2: who follow things like journalism will be aware that cops
Speaker 2: lie actually quite a lot, and that is what happened
Speaker 2: here unsurprising. So I guess I just want to take
Speaker 2: this chance to a update everyone on what's been happening
Speaker 2: since we last upbated everyone what's been happening at the border,
Speaker 2: and be just address some of these myths. I know
Speaker 2: something we talked about over the break was like lots
Speaker 2: of people between now and the end of the year
Speaker 2: will be seeing family members who they might not see
Speaker 2: very often, and they might not see them too now
Speaker 2: in the next election. And there are a lot of
Speaker 2: myths specifically about migration that we will maybe copy in
Speaker 2: another episode. But I think there's some valuable stuff here
Speaker 2: that people can address. If people in your circle have
Speaker 2: been influenced by Elon Musk citizen journalism, then I think
Speaker 2: it's really important to just point out that it's all bullshit.
Speaker 2: Then so easily discoverably bullshit. Now, obviously, not everyone spends
Speaker 2: as much time at the southern border of the United
Speaker 2: States as I do, and not everyone lives on the border.
Speaker 2: Elon must doesn't live on the border either, and he
Speaker 2: clearly thinks that people who do exist in some kind
Speaker 2: of wild West fantasia where people, you know, wear cowboy
Speaker 2: hats and cowboy boots. But like for most of us,
Speaker 2: for many of us, it's is our day to day reality,
Speaker 2: and so it's easy to go, I guess and talk
Speaker 2: to some cops and like wave at some people who
Speaker 2: have been corralled up, like like they like cattle or
Speaker 2: some kind of animals. Yeah, right, like not engaging with
Speaker 2: them as people and throughout this right, Like, at no
Speaker 2: point in his little border screed, which I don't think
Speaker 2: you have to watch, by the way, if you haven't
Speaker 2: watched it, like I'm very now.
Speaker 1: You're not you're not going to like benefit from it.
Speaker 2: No, you won't learn shit.
Speaker 3: But there is there is a clip I found that's
Speaker 3: like a minute long on YouTube from the live stream
Speaker 3: where the like maybe like most ninety percent of it
Speaker 3: is him trying to flip the camera to.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That was that was very funny. Yeah that yes,
Speaker 2: real iron man vibes from the guy who can't reverse
Speaker 2: his camera and then he ends up just holding it
Speaker 2: the way around in mode. Yeah it's intellectual, Yeah no,
Speaker 2: titan elil Musk. So I think the first part is
Speaker 2: that when he starts to well, first he says as
Speaker 2: an immigrant myself, which is like, yeah, bro, I'm an
Speaker 2: immigrant to the differences. I didn't have to walk across
Speaker 2: the desert carrying my child and then be detained in
Speaker 2: open air concentration camp while people around me got fucking
Speaker 2: hypothermia and then questioned about the legitimacy of my travel
Speaker 2: and right to be here, and then I'm able to
Speaker 2: work for years. Migration experiences are different, different, and you
Speaker 2: don't have a right to condescend to people who are
Speaker 2: often among some of the least fortunate people in the
Speaker 2: world just because your mum was a Canadian citizen and
Speaker 2: you came here to go to school, Like, it's not
Speaker 2: the fucking same. And I say this as someone who
Speaker 2: came here to go to school, right, Like it's.
Speaker 1: The same as if like I were to take a
Speaker 1: fucking flight from North Africa to Spain and be like, well,
Speaker 1: having migrated to Spain from Africa, Like, it's really not
Speaker 1: a dangerous journey. Yeah, it's a completely different situation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, yeah, And you compare yourself to Amelia Heart
Speaker 2: and the same it's no different. So yeah, like Elon
Speaker 2: Musk came to this country in a very different circumstance
Speaker 2: to many of these people. The first claim that's made
Speaker 2: in this video, which is which is bullshit, is this
Speaker 2: quote unquote open border policy. Now, at no point do
Speaker 2: any of these like old men in hats define what
Speaker 2: they mean by open border policy. And that's because it
Speaker 2: doesn't exist. It's not a thing. There is no open
Speaker 2: border policy. There has never been an open border policy Biden's.
Speaker 2: So I was in Tijuana at the ped West people
Speaker 2: know where that is, so at that point in time
Speaker 2: that on the day Biden was inaugurated, I was there, right.
Speaker 2: I was there because a large group of migrants were
Speaker 2: waiting to see if Joe Biden would change any think
Speaker 2: and they had been stuck in Tijuana for months years
Speaker 2: in some cases. I spoke to people who had been
Speaker 2: sexually assaulted. I spoke to people who had been robbed,
Speaker 2: I spoke to people who lived in fear for their lives. Right,
Speaker 2: and they were not safe in Mexico and wanted to
Speaker 2: come to the United States. And they had seen the
Speaker 2: way Biden campaigned, and they hoped that he would do
Speaker 2: something better. Did he fuck know? He did not. For years,
Speaker 2: he continued the same policies that Trump put in place
Speaker 2: in COVID. Biden Title forty two more people than Trump did. Right,
Speaker 2: The Title forty two policy was in place for much
Speaker 2: longer under Biden than it was under Trump. It's completely
Speaker 2: untrue to suggest that Biden not at any point in
Speaker 2: his presidency opened up the border. What did happen in May,
Speaker 2: as people will be aware, is that Title forty two ended.
Speaker 2: It didn't end because Biden decided it had to end.
Speaker 2: It ended because the emergency for COVID nineteen ended. And
Speaker 2: Title forty two is not immigration or public health law.
Speaker 2: And so with the end of this policy, that allowed
Speaker 2: the government to do things that would not normally be
Speaker 2: able to do because it was a quote unquote emergency,
Speaker 2: they were not able to do this extraordinary and extraordinarily
Speaker 2: cruel thing, which which was Title forty two. Right. That
Speaker 2: wasn't a Biden choice, that that was an end that
Speaker 2: was a decision forced upon him. Indeed, the Biden administration
Speaker 2: defended Title forty two in court. What has happened since
Speaker 2: then is that migrant numbers have dropped. They have decreased
Speaker 2: since the end of Title forty two. That's because lots
Speaker 2: of people saw the harsh anti migration rhetoric that was
Speaker 2: coming from the Biden White House, right Mayorcus out there
Speaker 2: spouting stuff about bans. You'll be banned from seeking asylum
Speaker 2: for five years if your court crossing between ports of entry,
Speaker 2: and that led to people thinking they had to cross
Speaker 2: before the end of Title forty two. Right now, what
Speaker 2: Title forty two did do is create a massive backlog
Speaker 2: of asylum applications because we weren't processing those applications and
Speaker 2: we were bouncing people back to Mexico, where as I've
Speaker 2: hopefully already illustrated, they were not safe. They didn't feel
Speaker 2: that that was a safe third country for them, and
Speaker 2: so in the months after Title forty two, those people
Speaker 2: have tried to cross and to make their asylum applications right,
Speaker 2: they're supposed to use app called CBP one. As we've
Speaker 2: documented in very great detail, that app is completely unfit
Speaker 2: for purpose. And people can listen to my title forty
Speaker 2: two episodes. They can listen to the interview when it
Speaker 2: did with Jake and Austin about CBP one. The issues
Speaker 2: with it are many. The facial liveness scan that it
Speaker 2: does doesn't work for people who have darker skin, It
Speaker 2: requires Wi Fi, it requires Internet connectivity. These are things
Speaker 2: that no long migrants have and that the migrants who
Speaker 2: do have tend to be richer and tend to be whiter,
Speaker 2: So it facilitates a certain type of migrant. At one
Speaker 2: point in I believe April of this year, forty percent
Speaker 2: of the CBP one applications that were CBP one appointments
Speaker 2: that were made for Sylum applications were made for people
Speaker 2: who spoke Russian. People who spoke Russian are not forty
Speaker 2: percent of the migrants that was in Tijuana. And I
Speaker 2: guess what that means is that people who you know,
Speaker 2: especially in my experience, people from African countries are unable
Speaker 2: to apply for appointments using CBP one. Also, it's only
Speaker 2: available in a couple of languages, or three languages I believe, English, Spanish,
Speaker 2: and Haitian Creole. If you don't speak those languages is
Speaker 2: going to be a lot harder there are many other
Speaker 2: issues with CBP one and other apps at dhs uses.
Speaker 2: But what has happened since the end of Title forty
Speaker 2: two in May, right is people have tried. This backlog
Speaker 2: has begun to sort of people have started to try
Speaker 2: and present their applications. And what's happening now is that
Speaker 2: people are crossing in very large numbers. That's not untrue
Speaker 2: that happens at this time of year. So the last
Speaker 2: kind of quote unquote normal years we had were I
Speaker 2: suppose twenty eighteen and twenty nineteen. If people cast their
Speaker 2: minds back to the November of twenty eighteen, you remember
Speaker 2: that was the Trump midterm and you remember they quite
Speaker 2: unquote migrant caravan that arrived in Tijuana at that time
Speaker 2: with thousands of people. The reason that people are always
Speaker 2: traveling at this time of year is because it is
Speaker 2: easier to travel in the months and not as hot, right,
Speaker 2: So we will see more people arriving the next few months.
Speaker 2: That's part of seasonal migrations because of demand for work.
Speaker 2: If you're working harvesting things right as a day laborer,
Speaker 2: that happens at the end of the summer. This is
Speaker 2: part of a normal and natural cycle people have always
Speaker 2: traveled since human beings have existed, to take advantage of
Speaker 2: different conditions, different access to resources. But the idea that
Speaker 2: at some point Biden instituted an open border policy is nonsense.
Speaker 2: Biden has closed that border right, He's built walls through
Speaker 2: Friendship Park, He's built walls in Texas, he's built walls
Speaker 2: in California, he's funded DHS more. That border is certainly
Speaker 2: not open. The large groups of people that you are
Speaker 2: seeing going through the asylum process the US immigration law,
Speaker 2: as they have under every other president. Right, they come
Speaker 2: into the United States, they do an initial interview, and
Speaker 2: they're released with a notice to appear in court. That's
Speaker 2: always been the case. Now are those notices to appear
Speaker 2: for dates at further in the future. Now, Absolutely, And
Speaker 2: that's because our system is backlogged. Right, because we spent
Speaker 2: all our fucking money on giving border patrol black hawks,
Speaker 2: giving our cops tanks, whatever it is that we spend
Speaker 2: our money on, we haven't spent it on making it
Speaker 2: easier and quicker for these people to get their asylum claims.
Speaker 2: Adjudicated one of the claims that they make in the video,
Speaker 2: I'm skipping out of the order that they make them in.
Speaker 2: Is that the repute. He speaking to a representative who's
Speaker 2: representative for the Southern Water region of Texas. He's in
Speaker 2: Eagle Past, Texas, right, which is an area which I've
Speaker 2: seen a lot of migration. The guy says, there's no
Speaker 2: repatriation here. Of course, there isn't any repatriation there. That's
Speaker 2: not what happens in Eagle Past.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: People come, Some of them will be immediately patriated if
Speaker 2: they are found to be For instance, I know that
Speaker 2: in May, somebody who was found to be on the
Speaker 2: United States terrorism watch list tried to enter the country.
Speaker 2: That that person wasn't released with a notice to appear right.
Speaker 2: That person was immediately bounced into either return to their
Speaker 2: country or more likely in their case, incarcerated. Some people
Speaker 2: will be detained there. Some people will be repatriated there,
Speaker 2: but that's because like del Rio, Texas or Eagle Pass
Speaker 2: doesn't repatriate people. That's not their role. The courts are
Speaker 2: the ones who decide who is eligible for Assyglent right.
Speaker 2: And it's worth noting that this fiscal year, so that's
Speaker 2: through August of twenty twenty three, recording in October. But
Speaker 2: I couldn't find September stats. Immigration judges have issued removal
Speaker 2: and voluntary departure orders for thirty nine point four percent
Speaker 2: of completed cases, totaling two hundred and twenty three thousand,
Speaker 2: five hundred and seventy deportation orders. So it's absolutely ludicrous
Speaker 2: to say that there's no repatriation. Nearly half of those
Speaker 2: cases when they come to court, result in repatriation. It's
Speaker 2: the representative claims that he called the president of Guatemalan
Speaker 2: the Guatemalan presidents and will take people back.
Speaker 1: Great.
Speaker 2: Of course they will. That that's how international law works.
Speaker 2: It's not the Guatemalan president's job to decide who is
Speaker 2: decide who is allowed asylum in the United States. That's
Speaker 2: the job of the immigration courts. They are deeply flawed.
Speaker 2: But it's ludicrous to suggests that these people are not
Speaker 2: being sent back, because a deeply problematic number of them
Speaker 2: are being sent back, often to very dangerous situations. And
Speaker 2: I think it's it's deeply misleading and it's troubling to
Speaker 2: see like elected officials making these claims. I know that
Speaker 2: elected officials just lie to you know, to to reinforce
Speaker 2: a narrative, but it's still troubling another claim. They were
Speaker 2: like he was really shocked that people were playing golf
Speaker 2: next to the border. The US border is thousands of
Speaker 2: miles long, like we live, like for those of us,
Speaker 2: for whom it's not like an oddity to come and
Speaker 2: caseplay at It's where we live, and of course we
Speaker 2: do stuff near the border because it's our home. Like
Speaker 2: I was camping near the border this week. I ride
Speaker 2: my bike near the border all the time. There are
Speaker 2: other golf courses near the border. There are parks near
Speaker 2: the border, and there's a Tommy Hill figure discount store
Speaker 2: near the border in Santa Sedro.
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, it's our home, Yeah, yeah, it's This is
Speaker 1: something that when we were at the Butterfly Sanctuary, a
Speaker 1: friend of ours who had kind of lived on the
Speaker 1: border for forever, Marianna, brought up a lot, which is
Speaker 1: that like prior to the you know, September eleventh, in particular,
Speaker 1: these were just like communities, Like the fact that there
Speaker 1: was a border was more theoretical than anything else. You
Speaker 1: would cross pretty free. I have friends in southern California
Speaker 1: that go into Mexico for the weekend. You didn't have
Speaker 1: a pass border or anything like families, you know, would
Speaker 1: cross to be with each other and stuff like it was, yeah,
Speaker 1: the way it is.
Speaker 2: Even post nine eleven. Like for those of us who
Speaker 2: are fortunate enough to have century, which is an expediti
Speaker 2: you can skip the line basically because you've been pre cleared.
Speaker 2: I go to Tijuana to have dinner pretty often, Like
Speaker 2: I'll take the trolley down there and then walk through
Speaker 2: with my bicycle and then ride my bike to the
Speaker 2: gastro park or something, have dinner, have a couple of beers,
Speaker 2: rid my back back, take the trolley back. It's a
Speaker 2: nice evening.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I don't know how cold it is now,
Speaker 3: but like a lot of like people that work like
Speaker 3: nine to five retail jobs or whatever it is, they
Speaker 3: would just like lead to Ona and come back, Like
Speaker 3: my dad had hired a bunch of those workers, and
Speaker 3: it was just like normal, was very normal to do that.
Speaker 2: More so now because San Diego is less affordable than
Speaker 2: it as it has been.
Speaker 3: Like, yeah, I think the people that don't live near
Speaker 3: a border or like believe the Rickulus claims me about it,
Speaker 3: I think they imagine the border is like in this
Speaker 3: barren wasteland and it's just like a chain link fence
Speaker 3: or something. I don't think they understand what it actually is.
Speaker 1: They imagine like this desolate, yellow filtered scene from Breaking Bad. Yes, exactly,
Speaker 1: like movies like fucking Sacario, right where it's this this
Speaker 1: constant series of gunfights and like like violence occurs on
Speaker 1: the border. It's the same thing. It's actually a version
Speaker 1: of the same shit that's happened with like San Francisco
Speaker 1: and Portland.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you have like a riot on a block, or
Speaker 1: you'll have like a store get robbed, and then people
Speaker 1: develop this because it gets so hyped by the media.
Speaker 1: There's you can't go into these cities. They're death zones,
Speaker 1: you know. It was like no man, like a fucking
Speaker 1: most most of its nature, right, Like that's the fucking border.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just a place like it's it's not in
Speaker 2: any way remarkable like that.
Speaker 1: And the primary danger is the fact that people are
Speaker 1: stopped from having access to like things like water that
Speaker 1: they need, yeah, by the state.
Speaker 2: So maybe it's a good time to talk about some
Speaker 2: of the dangers that migrants are facing right now. In
Speaker 2: the last couple of weeks, it's maybe since we last recorded,
Speaker 2: I believe five migrants have been shot on the southern
Speaker 2: of the border people, so like this week in southern California,
Speaker 2: it's much colder. I know it's hot in lots of
Speaker 2: parts of the country, it wasn't here. We had rain
Speaker 2: we're recording on like the first second of October. But
Speaker 2: last weekend was very cold. I was in a camp
Speaker 2: near Hakumba on Friday night through late Friday night maybe
Speaker 2: into Saturday morning, and it was cold. It was wet.
Speaker 2: Temperatures were getting like into the single digits celsius into
Speaker 2: the forties and fifties fahrenheit. When it's wet and it's
Speaker 2: that kind of temperature, that's when you start worrying about
Speaker 2: people getting hypothermia, which is exactly what happened. Right. People
Speaker 2: were sick, people had to be evacuated. On Friday night,
Speaker 2: I was heating up milk for a baby, like a
Speaker 2: tiny little baby in my camping stove so that the
Speaker 2: baby could have milk like not freezing temperatures. Right, it
Speaker 2: gave someone my got jacket. I was there with James
Speaker 2: and Jacqueline from Boarder Kindness and some other friends. I
Speaker 2: know some of them listen to the podcast, and it
Speaker 2: makes me really happy that people who listen to this
Speaker 2: like take the time out of their busy lives to
Speaker 2: show up and help other people. Like that's one of
Speaker 2: the coolest things that about what we do.
Speaker 1: We're very proud of those people and everyone else. You know, yeah,
Speaker 1: pick up the slack, Come on guys.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like I know on that topic, Like, there are
Speaker 2: a relatively few of us. It's a very remote area
Speaker 2: where we were. You know, you need a truck to
Speaker 2: get to it. Maybe a decent clearance car would be fine,
Speaker 2: but there were like six of us at one point.
Speaker 2: It is not easy to do that day in and
Speaker 2: day out. It really affects you to see someone's a
Speaker 2: little baby sleeping in the dirt and they're asking you, like,
Speaker 2: you know, can I have a jacket? And you've already
Speaker 2: given someone your jacket? Can I have a sleeping bag?
Speaker 2: And you've given away all the sleeping bags you have?
Speaker 2: Like it's fucked. It's not good for you, And I
Speaker 2: know it's taken a toll on those people, and it
Speaker 2: would be great if more people could come. As James
Speaker 2: and Jaqueline said, we're vetting everyone because there are people
Speaker 2: who would like to do harm to migrants and people
Speaker 2: who don't like migrants. And so if you go back
Speaker 2: and listen to the episode or the relevant links and
Speaker 2: email addresses to volunteer there, even if you just send money,
Speaker 2: it's better to send money then to send us stuff.
Speaker 2: We've had a ton of I spent a decent chunk
Speaker 2: of Friday afternoon going through donated stuff. Some of it's great,
Speaker 2: some of it I'm afraid. Like if a jacket is
Speaker 2: has giant holes in it for you, it also has
Speaker 2: giant holes in it for someone who's less rich than you,
Speaker 2: and it doesn't keep them any warmer than it keeps you.
Speaker 2: So like you know, it's better if people send money.
Speaker 2: But that's taken its toll on people. It's taking its
Speaker 2: toll on the people in the camps too, not to
Speaker 2: say that they're not in very good spirits. Like it's so,
Speaker 2: I was there at about ten o'clock at night when
Speaker 2: people What happens, right is people walk around the gaps
Speaker 2: in the wall, which again didn't come up in Elon
Speaker 2: Musk's video. Right there are giant, yawning gaps in the
Speaker 2: wall because they were trying to build as much of
Speaker 2: it as possible before twenty twenty election. And so they
Speaker 2: skip the hard parts. So people walk through where the
Speaker 2: wall stops. They're met by border patrol. Boarder patrol then
Speaker 2: drives them. I don't mean drive some boy like put
Speaker 2: them in the back of the vehicle. I mean drive
Speaker 2: them like you would drive cattle, by going behind them
Speaker 2: in a vehicle and pushing them forward and walks them
Speaker 2: into the camp, right, And then they arrive in the
Speaker 2: camp and it's it's they arrive and like I was
Speaker 2: going up to ascertained, you know what sort of group
Speaker 2: it was. Were they people who were in severe distress, right,
Speaker 2: like hypothermic or hurt or injured. I know someone came
Speaker 2: later in a week who had a very bad injury
Speaker 2: who had fallen maybe trying to climb the wall. And
Speaker 2: so you're going to kind of tri oute that group, right,
Speaker 2: And some people were really start they're in America, like
Speaker 2: and then they wanted to give me like a hug
Speaker 2: or a fist bump and be like yeah, I'm here.
Speaker 2: Obviously some of them weren't prepared. None of them were
Speaker 2: repared for sleeping outside. And then generally, like there have
Speaker 2: been large kind of just shelters made out of cacti
Speaker 2: or brush or scrub or whatever's there, which tend to
Speaker 2: be based around like national groups, right, just people have
Speaker 2: their community, so that it's one for Colombian people, Brazilian people,
Speaker 2: punt Jabi, Sikh people. There were Kurdish people, Turkish, a
Speaker 2: lot of Turkish people, Afghan people, and so they kind
Speaker 2: of because they can talk to each other, they'll be like, hey,
Speaker 2: come over here, Afghan friend, Like you know, we'll look
Speaker 2: after you. We've got this shelter set out, We've got
Speaker 2: a fire going, get yourself warm. And then those people
Speaker 2: can spend anywhere from one to three days there before
Speaker 2: they're taken out. Right, So like, it's an extremely bad
Speaker 2: situation and it will only get worse, so weather gets worse.
Speaker 2: Talking of things which which are bad, should should we
Speaker 2: should we take this opportunity to pivot to things that
Speaker 2: people don't need to buy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they definitely need to buy them, James, because pass anyway,
Speaker 1: here's all.
Speaker 2: Right, we're back. Hopefully you've repleted. You're a pile of golgoyins.
Speaker 2: I wanted to return to addressing some words of disinformation
Speaker 2: that Elon Musko got from men and cowboy hats. One
Speaker 2: of the things they talked about a lot was that.
Speaker 2: They talk about numbers, right, They're like, oh, there are
Speaker 2: two million, there are four million. At no point do
Speaker 2: they say what these numbers represent. Are these numbers net migration?
Speaker 2: Are they border crossings between ports of entry? Are they
Speaker 2: the number of asylum cases? Are they the number of
Speaker 2: encounters the border patrol has had, because as we know, right,
Speaker 2: an encounter doesn't necessarily mean individual. If one person crosses
Speaker 2: two or three times, that's two or three encounters, right,
Speaker 2: And they never talk about that because they're just pulling
Speaker 2: this shit out their asses. If you want information, these
Speaker 2: people are not people to get it from. None of
Speaker 2: them are even working in border enforcement. Right. These were
Speaker 2: sheriffs that he spoke to. They talk a lot about
Speaker 2: how there are quote unquote two million of them, but
Speaker 2: the real number is four or five million because of
Speaker 2: the quote unquote gotaways a people who have not been
Speaker 2: processed at all. Right, They have entered between ports of
Speaker 2: entry and then are undocumented. This is nonsense. People don't
Speaker 2: want to be undocumented. People are here because they believe
Speaker 2: they have a legitimate asylum claim. They are fleeing violence, right,
Speaker 2: they have one of the We've been over to five
Speaker 2: categories that you can get asylum for before on the podcast.
Speaker 2: I won't read them out again, but I have seen people.
Speaker 2: For instance, I saw one person who they were transported
Speaker 2: to the hospital, the hospital let them out on the
Speaker 2: street in San Diego. They took a cab back to
Speaker 2: the border because they don't want to just be floating
Speaker 2: around in the US with no papers and able to work,
Speaker 2: worried that like a parking ticket or a traffic stop
Speaker 2: could send them back to wherever they'd fled from, right,
Speaker 2: because they've fled because they're afraid of something and they
Speaker 2: don't want to be sent back.
Speaker 3: I think something that really bothered me in the video
Speaker 3: was how much they emphasize that, like, remember most of
Speaker 3: these people that can be escaping prison, they're all in
Speaker 3: they used to be incarcerated. I'm just like, what, Like,
Speaker 3: that's not it's just like this fear bongering tactic that's
Speaker 3: so silly and trying to make people all believe that
Speaker 3: there's everyone at the border are just like prison inmates essentially.
Speaker 1: Yeah. The other side you often get is like, well,
Speaker 1: they're all young men heading over, and a lot of
Speaker 1: times this like some of this is like racial panic.
Speaker 1: They're gonna you know, take our women or whatever. Some
Speaker 1: of this is like, you know, men are soldiers, you know,
Speaker 1: it's military. The reality is that, like, especially when you're
Speaker 1: talking about like the migrants who are crossing the fucking
Speaker 1: dairy and gap, this is an incredibly dangerous journey. Young
Speaker 1: men are generally a little more capable physically of it.
Speaker 1: And also it's you know, especially given some realities of
Speaker 1: a lot of you know, these cultures, that's who you
Speaker 1: expect to go and make money and send it back
Speaker 1: to their families, right, Like that's that's just like it's
Speaker 1: not They're not invading you. You know, this is like,
Speaker 1: these are the people who are going to work jobs
Speaker 1: and send money back to their families.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like we live in a society which is both patriarchial,
Speaker 2: patriarch and misogynist. Right that they they're able to command
Speaker 2: a higher wage and they can use that to keep
Speaker 2: their families alive. I've spoken to lots of families for
Speaker 2: whom the young men left the country there in first
Speaker 2: earned money somewhere else and then was able to raise
Speaker 2: enough money to get the rest of their family smuggled
Speaker 2: out or to facilitate their transport, and then bring them
Speaker 2: to the US because they thought it wasn't safe for
Speaker 2: them there. Also, like if you're a military aged male
Speaker 2: in some countries Russia or lots of countries in the
Speaker 2: SA hell, now you could be forcibly drafted right into
Speaker 2: a one of any number of conflicts that you want
Speaker 2: no part of. And I wouldn't want to do that either.
Speaker 2: I'd want to leave right And I've spoken to people
Speaker 2: who have fled that kind of situation this week. So Yeah,
Speaker 2: of the gender balance, I don't know. It's very hard
Speaker 2: to get a sense of the actual gender balance because
Speaker 2: border patrol tends to process women and children first, and
Speaker 2: especially unaccompany children of course first. But it's very hard
Speaker 2: to get into the actual gender balance without like looking
Speaker 2: at border patrol statistics, and they take a month or
Speaker 2: two to come out. Generally they talk about people with
Speaker 2: tear drop tattoos. I would estimate that I have seen tens,
Speaker 2: if not one, hundreds of thousands of people at the
Speaker 2: Southern border. I've never seen anyone with the tear drop
Speaker 2: tattoo leg you.
Speaker 3: Have to be a to have it ascribed. These like
Speaker 3: hordes of people trying to get into your home or whatever.
Speaker 2: Yes, I genuinely think that someone looked up I don't know,
Speaker 2: like Latino gangster on Google images, like right before, or
Speaker 2: like racist Google images or whatever, like before they before
Speaker 2: they went down to the border. Like I've never seen
Speaker 2: anyone with a tiar rop tattoo. You'd have to be
Speaker 2: a bit of a lemon to like present yourself for
Speaker 2: asylum with obvious like stuff like that. They're absolutely gonna
Speaker 2: ask you about your tattoos, or they'll ask you about everything.
Speaker 2: It's just laughable, it's ridiculous. It's all based in myth
Speaker 2: and not in reality. And like what troubles me the most,
Speaker 2: I think is I don't know how many people have
Speaker 2: watched Elon Musk's live stream, right, and hopefully most of
Speaker 2: them that did saw someone completely incapable of like asking
Speaker 2: interrogated questions or reversing the camera on his phone, or
Speaker 2: like dressing like a cowboy. But there has been, to
Speaker 2: my knowledge, no national network coverage of what's happening in
Speaker 2: a cumber right. There has been limited local coverage of
Speaker 2: what's happening in cu Cumba. What there has has already
Speaker 2: stopped because like it was a kind of one done
Speaker 2: situation for a lot of outlets, but it's not one
Speaker 2: and done for the people who are volunteering, And it's
Speaker 2: not one and done for the people but who are
Speaker 2: still arriving right there are We're going to see more
Speaker 2: of this in between now and twenty twenty four. The
Speaker 2: border is clearly an area that both parties, I guess,
Speaker 2: have decided that they can grandstand on. Biden can show
Speaker 2: himself as being quote unquote tough on migration. No, I
Speaker 2: don't want to live in a world where our leaders
Speaker 2: are tough on little babies who just walked across a desert,
Speaker 2: like that's a fucked up thing to be tough on.
Speaker 2: It could be tough on corporate corruption if you want to,
Speaker 2: like front up to someone. And I think the Republicans
Speaker 2: are going to push on Biden being weak on the border,
Speaker 2: where there will be more migration this year than we
Speaker 2: have seen a long time because we created a backlog,
Speaker 2: right because climate change is worse every single year, and
Speaker 2: like I think, as we've documented extensively on our show,
Speaker 2: parts of the world are becoming less and less survivable.
Speaker 2: I went to the Martial Landers this summer. They are disappearing.
Speaker 2: So of course people are going to want to come
Speaker 2: to somewhere where they feel safe. There are record numbers
Speaker 2: of people crossing the Darien Gap right now. That is
Speaker 2: something that will result in record numbers of people showing
Speaker 2: up a border.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And for every like group of people who make
Speaker 1: it across the Dairy And Gap, there's there's folks who
Speaker 1: don't like. Taking that journey on foot without kind of
Speaker 1: access to modern quality overlanding equipment is like putting a
Speaker 1: bullet in a revolver and playing a game of Russian roulette.
Speaker 1: Like it's extremely dangerous.
Speaker 2: Yes, not to mention that you'll be preyed upon, like
Speaker 2: all the way. And they talked about the trains. I've
Speaker 2: seen that video as well, how the migrants control the
Speaker 2: trains a fuck off. Like I have seen people who
Speaker 2: have lost limbs on trains right like these. That's an
Speaker 2: incredible jumping on a moving train. It's not an advisable
Speaker 2: form of transport and it's not a safe one. And
Speaker 2: the fact that people feel they have to take it
Speaker 2: suggests that what they are fleeing feels even less safe
Speaker 2: to them. Right. I don't have children, but like if
Speaker 2: I was to take my kids and grab on to
Speaker 2: a moving train, I would only do that if I
Speaker 2: thought that what I was fleeing was less safe than
Speaker 2: that moving train.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and to talk about the last resort literally like
Speaker 3: that's how desperate you are to better situation. It's not
Speaker 3: like I don't know, it just makes me the rhetoric
Speaker 3: is all backwards about.
Speaker 2: That, Yes, like when you look at what some of
Speaker 2: these people are fleeing, right Like on Friday, I was
Speaker 2: helping hand out water bottles and I was there was
Speaker 2: a Punjabi man helping me right like, he was one
Speaker 2: of the volunteers who was like helping us to distribute
Speaker 2: food and helping us to communicate with people in the
Speaker 2: language they could understand. Very nice guy. And I was
Speaker 2: thinking about like the stuff that's happening in India right now,
Speaker 2: right like, and the way that that country is becoming
Speaker 2: increasingly like monolithic. I guess Hindu nationalists, I guess you
Speaker 2: could call it. And that's fair, right Robert, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: like Modi, it's not getting any safer for them there,
Speaker 2: And I've seen tons more seek people than I've ever
Speaker 2: seen at the border before.
Speaker 1: No, there was a a I mean, fuck, it's it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily safe in Canada right where one of those
Speaker 1: guys got murdered recently. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well that happening in America too, right, So we
Speaker 2: shut up a good water thinking it was a mosque
Speaker 2: because they can't fucking differentiate between different faiths and they
Speaker 2: saw a turban.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean in Canada, I believe it was a
Speaker 1: Sikh man who got assassinated at the behest of the
Speaker 1: Modi government.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Western intelligence led to Canada accusing India of SEK
Speaker 1: activists assassination. It's a fellow named I just want to
Speaker 1: make sure because this is a story people should We
Speaker 1: may do some more direct coverage on this. But yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a guy named Hardeep Singh Nijar who was
Speaker 1: a Sikh separatist activist and was gutten down by two
Speaker 1: masked men in British Columbia. India denies that this was
Speaker 1: at their behest, but yeah, like this is and this
Speaker 1: is by the way, it's not just a thing that
Speaker 1: India does. Political assassinations from authoritarian directed by authoritarian countries
Speaker 1: in Western countries have become more and more common. Right.
Speaker 1: A lot of this started with what Russia was doing,
Speaker 1: the poisoning the SCIRPOL, poisonings and stuff. But like this
Speaker 1: is growing more common as this sort of like rules
Speaker 1: based international order that I think to some extent we
Speaker 1: all kind of tricked ourselves into thinking existed increasingly breaks down.
Speaker 1: But that's all to say, there's a good reason why
Speaker 1: a lot of Sikhs might be trying to come into
Speaker 1: the US right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, there's a good reason why I'm seeing so
Speaker 2: many of them on the border. There's a good reason
Speaker 2: why I'm seeing a ton more people from Russia, right yeah.
Speaker 2: And they don't want to go on record, and that's
Speaker 2: because they're very afraid, right They've come from a totalitarian
Speaker 2: state which can hunt them down, as Rubbert just illustrated,
Speaker 2: anywhere in the world, and so they don't want to talk.
Speaker 2: Right I'm seeing people coming from Columbia, Hondura, Squafamala. One
Speaker 2: of the things that Musk was shocked about was that
Speaker 2: like none of these people in Mexican. I don't know
Speaker 2: how big he thinks Mexico is and what what he
Speaker 2: believes the population of Mexico to be, but at one
Speaker 2: minute he's like, it's two million a year. Does he
Speaker 2: think Mexico is just like dwindling and there are like
Speaker 2: eight people left. Like Mexico is a large country, but
Speaker 2: like like it does not provide us with with millions
Speaker 2: of migrants a year and.
Speaker 3: More of that like comically impossible narrative, right, like whatever,
Speaker 3: I mean people, and people are going to believe it.
Speaker 3: It's just part of the show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it confirms a lot of biases that always exist.
Speaker 2: And I guess hopefully we've dismissed some of that nonsense.
Speaker 2: And I think I don't. I think people who listen
Speaker 2: to this generally have empathy anyway, But hopefully this has
Speaker 2: given you some tools to talk about this to other people.
Speaker 2: What they will say is like, I'm not a big
Speaker 2: representative caller. I called my representative to help with a
Speaker 2: migration case for someone from Mianmar who asked for a help.
Speaker 2: She was useless. But maybe this is an area where
Speaker 2: like the federal government has water buffalos, right, big water containers,
Speaker 2: has mr If these were American citizens and this was
Speaker 2: a hurricane or an earthquake, that shit would be there.
Speaker 2: It's not because they don't think that they matter as much.
Speaker 2: San Diego County has declared emergency and said they can't
Speaker 2: do anything that's complete fucking nonsense. They again, they could
Speaker 2: if these were American citizens. They would if these people
Speaker 2: were like white, wealthy people living in Lahoya. They're choosing
Speaker 2: not to because they don't think it will hurt them
Speaker 2: and like it. Maybe it won't, right, But I think
Speaker 2: you can make a meaningful difference by donating your money,
Speaker 2: because the only people who are helping are the dozen
Speaker 2: or so folks right like who all convoyed out there
Speaker 2: on Friday night down a dirt road in our trucks
Speaker 2: and handed out the beans and rice and ritz crackers.
Speaker 2: But you can make a difference of your money. The
Speaker 2: border kindness links all put in the description again. You
Speaker 2: can also make a difference, maybe by calling your representative
Speaker 2: and shaming them, because this is a government create problem
Speaker 2: and the government like sticking its hands up in the
Speaker 2: air and being like, oh no, what a surprise, we'd't
Speaker 2: know how to do. Yes, they knew this was coming, right,
Speaker 2: these people, many of them have walked from Colombia. We
Speaker 2: knew these people were arriving. We've been putting this off
Speaker 2: since COVID for three years, since the start of the
Speaker 2: COVID pandemic. I should say COVID is very much alive.
Speaker 2: I've seen some people who like obviously weren't able to
Speaker 2: rap a test everyone. But there are a lot of
Speaker 2: sick people coughing right, There were people with scabies, there
Speaker 2: were people who were very unwell. That again, if you
Speaker 2: detained people in congregate settings and the only masks are
Speaker 2: the ones that we bring as volunteers, and that's going
Speaker 2: to happen, right, We'll probably get some infectious disease that
Speaker 2: they'll get to share with. Even if you don't care
Speaker 2: about other people, even sure it'll come bite you in
Speaker 2: the arts eventually, right when freaking chicken gun yod. That's
Speaker 2: not vectored in that fashion, but you know, cholera or
Speaker 2: something rocks up in America. So I would urge people
Speaker 2: to do something because so few people are and the
Speaker 2: only people who are helping our mutual aid groups who
Speaker 2: are overstretched and stressed and tired and broke. And so
Speaker 2: if you can help, you should, and well, like whatever
Speaker 2: that looks like to you, if you want to volunteer,
Speaker 2: that's great. I would urge you to go through the
Speaker 2: channels that are set so you don't just show up
Speaker 2: and look at yourself or someone else in trouble or
Speaker 2: just make things harder. But yeah, there are meaningful ways
Speaker 2: that people can help. Very few people are and largely
Speaker 2: I think that's because the border exists as some kind
Speaker 2: of World West fantasy for most people consuming media in America.
Speaker 2: And hopefully, yeah, if you, if you encounter someone who
Speaker 2: believes that this will help you, give you a little
Speaker 2: bit of information, a little bit of some tools to
Speaker 2: dismiss some of that stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, dismiss and demystify really, because it's just lingless imaginary,
Speaker 3: big bad wolf that no one really understands.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. Like it's nonsense that everyone in America's a migrant.
Speaker 2: They are indigenous people here now and they always have been.
Speaker 2: But a lot of people have some kind of migration story.
Speaker 2: And like I don't give a fuck if your great
Speaker 2: grandpa came here quote unquote legally the barriers were not
Speaker 2: in place yet, there wasn't a wall when your me
Speaker 2: mar came from wherever she came from. But like in
Speaker 2: all of our communities, like this country doesn't work with
Speaker 2: that the labor of recently arrived for migrants. And like
Speaker 2: I think if you look at the news, I go
Speaker 2: to places where wars are happening, right, that's part of
Speaker 2: my job. So it's Robert, you know. And then I
Speaker 2: see those people at the border. The reason they're here
Speaker 2: is because they're fleeing something worse, and I think, like
Speaker 2: maybe grounding it in that, I don't think anyone would
Speaker 2: want a little baby to be sleeping in there. I
Speaker 2: know some pretty conservative people who were pretty outraged by
Speaker 2: what happened in May, and it's worse now. Yeah, no
Speaker 2: one in their right mind wants a little baby to
Speaker 2: be shivering out in the desert. And you know, no
Speaker 2: one in their right mind wants a mother to be
Speaker 2: breastfeeding and sleeping underneath a cardboard box because that's what
Speaker 2: she has. You know, Like, that's not even if you
Speaker 2: believe in it's very liberal construct of America as a
Speaker 2: welcoming nation, and that shouldn't be who we are and
Speaker 2: it shouldn't be how we treat people. And if you
Speaker 2: believe that nation shouldn't exist in borders of bullshit, then
Speaker 2: no one should be treated like that. And it's on
Speaker 2: all of us to help. I guess, yes, yeah.
Speaker 1: Anything else, guys, No, I think that's about it.
Speaker 2: Magic, Okay, thank you for joining me for this heartwarming episode.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, everybody that's going to do it for
Speaker 1: us here at it could happen here until next time,
Speaker 1: you know stuff.
Speaker 2: It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 3: For more part cast from cool Zone Media, visit our
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Speaker 3: You can find sources for it could Happen here, updated
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