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Speaker 1: Dear listener, just a little warning, there's some explicit language

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Speaker 1: in this episode.

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Speaker 2: These methodologies and these perspectives of carcraality and punishment have

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Speaker 2: been exported from the United States to l Solvador, and

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Speaker 2: I think what we're seeing now is a moment that

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Speaker 2: is American carceral ideology in hands with a president who

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Speaker 2: has dictator leanings.

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Speaker 1: From futro media and PRX. It's let you know usay,

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Speaker 1: I'm Mariaino Rossa Today, prison abolitionists and poet Christopher Soto

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Speaker 1: takes us to El Salvador during a state of exception.

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Speaker 1: Christopher Soto started writing poetry when he was in first grade.

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Speaker 1: He remembers his very first poem.

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Speaker 2: Miss Vice is Nice and she likes Rice. So it

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Speaker 2: was my first great attempt at monosyllabic and rhyme. Valiant

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Speaker 2: effort by little me.

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Speaker 1: Christopher was born in California, but he remained tied to

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Speaker 1: his parents' home country of El Salvador. As he got older,

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Speaker 1: Christopher started writing about difficult experiences that he was going through.

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Speaker 2: At that time, I was experiencing domestic violence and that's

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Speaker 2: when I really saw how survivors are criminalized and how

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Speaker 2: survivors are punished. For example, one time police were called

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Speaker 2: on me for taking my father's car and fleeing my home.

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Speaker 2: I was seeking safety, but the police were called as

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Speaker 2: if I were committing grand theft.

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Speaker 1: And then in graduate school, Christopher's poems started focusing more

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Speaker 1: on policing.

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Speaker 2: And so it's like just before the start of the

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Speaker 2: Black Lives Matter movement, and many of those people had

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Speaker 2: identified as abolitionists. So having community around helped to expose

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Speaker 2: me to abolitionist thought. And as the Black Lives Matter

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Speaker 2: movement gained traction, I just grew deeper and deeper into

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Speaker 2: my analysis of anti carceral issues.

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Speaker 1: Christopher recently released his debut poetry book, Diaries of a Terrorist,

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Speaker 1: where he writes about the abolition of policing and prisons.

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Speaker 1: He's also working on a novel about his family and

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Speaker 1: Ilsa Vador. Last year he traveled there to do research

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Speaker 1: for his book, but this time around things were very

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Speaker 1: different in Ilsa Rodor. The country was and still is

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Speaker 1: under a state of exception that's been ordered by President

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Speaker 1: Naib Bukele to address the rising homicide rates attributed to

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Speaker 1: the gangs. A criminalist television Alasar Homeboys Andrew Bucele suspended

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Speaker 1: the rights to freedom of expression, association, and due process

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Speaker 1: almost a year after this state of exception started. Bucele

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Speaker 1: has praised himself for dismantling criminal gangs, but critics and

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Speaker 1: human rights groups have cited widespread humanitarian concerns and serious violations,

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Speaker 1: and they question at what cost did this happen. Some

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Speaker 1: sixty five thousand people have been arrested, many of them

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Speaker 1: are trarily. There are documented cases of forced disappearances, torture,

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Speaker 1: and other ill treatment of detainees. As a prison abolitionist

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Speaker 1: and the son of Salvadoran immigrants, Christopher is aware of

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Speaker 1: the deep connections between El Salvador and the United States

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Speaker 1: when it comes to incarceration, culture and criminal gangs. And

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Speaker 1: it's a bond that goes way back to El Salvador's

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Speaker 1: civil War, which ended in nineteen ninety two. In his

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Speaker 1: most recent trip to Salvador, Christopher kept in touch with

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Speaker 1: Latino USA producer Rinaldo Leans Junior via audio messages, and

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Speaker 1: you're going to hear some of those throughout the story.

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Speaker 1: For now. Here's Christopher Soto in his own words.

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Speaker 2: My name is Christopher Soto. I live in Los Angeles

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Speaker 2: County and I work at UCLA with Ethnic studies research centers.

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Speaker 2: My family is Salvadorian. My mother was born in Santa

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Speaker 2: Ana and then migrated to the United States prior to

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Speaker 2: the Civil War, so I was born outside of Los Angeles,

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Speaker 2: and we would take frequent trips to Al Salvador to

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Speaker 2: visit my mother's family in the country.

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Speaker 3: I still had.

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Speaker 2: My early trips to Al Salvador were really joyous. I

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Speaker 2: just remember my father driving poorly on paved roads in

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Speaker 2: the countryside and almost taking our car off the cliff

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Speaker 2: side of volcanoes, and all of the kids scrambling in

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Speaker 2: the car trying to tell my dad to not put

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Speaker 2: it in reverse anymore. I even helped my deal. We

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Speaker 2: bought a life chicken and we took it to the rooftop,

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Speaker 2: and you know, he killed the chicken, and I helped

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Speaker 2: him in my tea prepare the chicken for dinner.

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Speaker 4: So I just have a lot of memories in Santa

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Speaker 4: Anna and throughout our Salvador just traveling and visiting family.

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Speaker 2: So over the years, as I've been taking these trips

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Speaker 2: to El Salvador, You've kind of seen an escalation in Bugle,

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Speaker 2: who is the president of El Salvador and his strong arm. So,

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Speaker 2: for example, a few years ago, Bugle had brought the

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Speaker 2: military into Congress and people were afraid of what this meant.

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Speaker 2: And then you just saw one move after another where

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Speaker 2: powers seemed to be consolidated or speaking against the presidency

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Speaker 2: seemed to be at risk. You started to hear a

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Speaker 2: little bit of whispers of people saying, do I need

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Speaker 2: to develop an exit strategy to leave the country? Is

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Speaker 2: this going to turn into dictatorship. My most recent trip

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Speaker 2: to All Salvador was this past summer, and it was

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Speaker 2: much different than other visits that I've had throughout my

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Speaker 2: life with my family. And the reason for this difference

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Speaker 2: is because at the moment, All Salvador is in a

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Speaker 2: state of exception, which means that there are mass arrests

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Speaker 2: being made.

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Speaker 1: Tonight is under state of emergency after a deadly weekend

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Speaker 1: of gaining violence. Fifty thousand people have so far been

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Speaker 1: detained President Naibu Kelly the more terrorists.

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Speaker 2: And in these mass arrest people are essentially assumed to

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Speaker 2: be guilty. And so what that looks like in reality

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Speaker 2: while living in All Salvador, if someone just says that

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Speaker 2: you are gang affiliated, you can be swept into the

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Speaker 2: prison system in all Salvador without any due process. I

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Speaker 2: used to take the bus from Send Salvador down to

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Speaker 2: the beaches in La Libertad and go surfing with friends.

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Speaker 2: That is no longer safe for me to do on

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Speaker 2: my own. I have my hands tattooed and my neck tattooed,

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Speaker 2: and so if I'm taking public transportation on my own,

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Speaker 2: there is a possibility that the public transportation may be

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Speaker 2: stopped by the police. There is the possibility that I

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Speaker 2: could be arrested. I'll start with the key things before

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Speaker 2: I forget. I spent most of my day at ahacienda

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Speaker 2: out in the countryside, and the last time I was there,

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Speaker 2: one of the workers was telling me about the police

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Speaker 2: and things that have shifted in the area. And he

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Speaker 2: was saying that recently he had taken the bus and

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Speaker 2: that the bus had the police had stopped the bus

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Speaker 2: and pulled all of the men off of the bus

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Speaker 2: and had them lower their trousers and take off their shirts,

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Speaker 2: and that the police were inspecting the bodies of these

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Speaker 2: men to see if they had any tattoos that were

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Speaker 2: possibly related to gangs. And I asked this worker how

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Speaker 2: he felt about this, and he said, I have nothing

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Speaker 2: to worry about. You know, I'm just like your average worker.

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Speaker 2: They can tell I'm just on the bus going to

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Speaker 2: my job. So I thought that was an interesting story

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Speaker 2: to hear because it's one of those instances where people

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Speaker 2: feel like there won't be me who's targeted, and it's

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Speaker 2: fine that, you know, the police have us pull down

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Speaker 2: our pants or take off our shirt, you know, to

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Speaker 2: reveal possible tattoos, because they're just trying to only get

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Speaker 2: the people who are quote bad. I got back from

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Speaker 2: the canton a little bit ago, and now I'm watching

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Speaker 2: the rain from my apartment fall onto San Salvador. Right,

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Speaker 2: hope you have a good day. Bye. How do we

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Speaker 2: create a livable life in our Salvador. I think one

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Speaker 2: of the things that's happening is that, you know, the

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Speaker 2: US continues to deport and Salvadorian's home and saying all right,

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Speaker 2: stay there, build your life in all Salvador. Deportations from

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Speaker 2: the United States to El Salvador's really one of the

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Speaker 2: roots of how we got into this issue in the

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Speaker 2: first place. After the Salvadorian Civil War, the United States

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Speaker 2: got involved and funded the Salvadorian Civil War, which led

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Speaker 2: to mass migration of people away from El Salvador into

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Speaker 2: the United States, and in the United States and places

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Speaker 2: like Los Angeles is where individuals began to learn and

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Speaker 2: adapt Los Angeles gang lifestyle. And when the civil war ended,

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Speaker 2: the United States deported all of these essentially refugees from

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Speaker 2: the war that they had created back to El Salvador,

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Speaker 2: and so the gangs had a few years to create

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Speaker 2: social networks and to really build up infrastructure without the

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Speaker 2: radar of the Salvadorian government, and so gangs have been deported. Essentially,

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Speaker 2: there needs to be thought about how can people stay

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Speaker 2: in Al Salvador and build their lives in All Salvador.

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Speaker 3: All right, Hi, Ray, I just got out of a.

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Speaker 2: Meeting with an organization and came to my so fine

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Speaker 2: just started to cry. This is like one of the

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Speaker 2: few organizations who's working with prisons in No Salvador, and

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Speaker 2: they're too scared to even like speak off the record

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Speaker 2: without their name attached. And we were talking about like

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Speaker 2: the failures of like how there isn't an anti Carsra

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Speaker 2: abolitionist movement in Ol Salvador despite the fact that this

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Speaker 2: is one of the Karsol capitals of the world that

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Speaker 2: incarcerates almost more people per capital than anywhere else outside

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Speaker 2: of the US, and there's not a movement because people

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Speaker 2: are fucking scared. So yeah, I just I just came

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Speaker 2: home and I just started to cry because I had

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Speaker 2: an uber driver today who migrated to the US for

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Speaker 2: a while and he was like, oh, so much racism

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Speaker 2: in the US. And I got put in a gel

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Speaker 2: by the police in the US because of the license

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Speaker 2: on my car, and he was talking about he still

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Speaker 2: traumatized from the racism and the policing in the United States,

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Speaker 2: where then you get deported and then they take your shoelaces.

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Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I'm you knowing your belt so you like

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Speaker 2: can't even walk home when you get deported back to Alsabdors,

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Speaker 2: Like what the man? So you flee where you migrate

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Speaker 2: to the US, where then you get incarcerated and you're

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Speaker 2: back here with the debt from the coyote who helped

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Speaker 2: to migrate. Is just like it's also supremely fucked. I

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Speaker 2: don't know if any of these notes, I don't know

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Speaker 2: if any of it was helpful, But yeah, tomorrow we'll

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Speaker 2: be visiting the Presidence of a friend. The US and

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Speaker 2: our Salvador are both leading incarcerators in the world. And

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Speaker 2: part of that is because in the aftermath of the

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Speaker 2: Salvadorian Civil War, the United States, who had funded the

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Speaker 2: civil war, was also involved in rebuilding police and security

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Speaker 2: structures in the country. Even LAPD was involved in the

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Speaker 2: training of police in Ol Salvadore after the Salvadorian Civil War.

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Speaker 2: So these methodologies and these perspectives of carceratty and punishment

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Speaker 2: have been exported from the United States to l Solvador.

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Speaker 2: And I think what we're seeing now is a moment

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Speaker 2: that is American carceral ideology in hands with a president

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Speaker 2: who has dictator leanings. There weren't organizations that wanted to

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Speaker 2: bring me or even wanted themselves to visit prisons and

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Speaker 2: al and so I asked them. I was like, where

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Speaker 2: is safest to visit on my own? If you won't

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Speaker 2: go with me, I want to know what's happening. And

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Speaker 2: so they told me to visit outside the women's prison

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Speaker 2: in San Salvador. M again had an ear who if

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Speaker 2: you are. I went there with a friend and I

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Speaker 2: conducted small interviews with people who are working outside of

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Speaker 2: the prisons, whether it's taxi drivers, street vendors, and people

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Speaker 2: who are waiting for family outside of the prison. And

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Speaker 2: that also felt very risky because I was outside of

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Speaker 2: the prison as a tattooed person who was conducting interviews

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Speaker 2: in a moment where freedom of speech whatever that means,

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Speaker 2: or freedom of press is not highly valued or prioritized.

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Speaker 2: On the door, there was a list that didn't go

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Speaker 2: up to the front because there's so much police there.

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Speaker 2: It was a list and probably a list of like

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Speaker 2: names of people.

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Speaker 5: Who were currently incarcerated, so the family members could go

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Speaker 5: and check who's there. There's so many people who are

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Speaker 5: missing in the prisons right now, Like I don't know

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Speaker 5: how much of a reliable source that would that would

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Speaker 5: even be.

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Speaker 2: The abolitionist movement is one that believes that a world

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Speaker 2: with prisons and police is not necessary. It believes that

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Speaker 2: prisons and police are created to perpetuate cycles of violence,

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Speaker 2: cycles of harm, that incarceration itself is state violence, and

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Speaker 2: so you cannot respond to violence by repeating violence. It

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Speaker 2: believes that we need to invest in our communities, change culture,

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Speaker 2: move away from punitive systems, and start looking at rehabilitative,

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Speaker 2: integrative healing systems that have been proven to reduce violence

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Speaker 2: in our communities and in order to have better public

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Speaker 2: health responses. So right now, our main public health responses

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Speaker 2: just put people in prison. If you don't like people

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Speaker 2: using drugs, if you don't like people being unhoused, whoever

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Speaker 2: is the identity marker that is extractable from a middle

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Speaker 2: class white imaginary. Essentially, put them in prison is the

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Speaker 2: current belief system. And what abolitionists saying is that if

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Speaker 2: we actually want to take mental health issues seriously public

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Speaker 2: housing issues seriously, then the prison is not the solution

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Speaker 2: to these issues, and we need to acknowledge that and

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Speaker 2: work towards adequate solutions. So my debut poetry book is

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Speaker 2: about abolishing the police, and I had wanted to bring

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Speaker 2: that book to Alslvador because I have been visiting the

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Speaker 2: country for several years now more intensely, I had a

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Speaker 2: lot of literary friends and artists and community and all

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Speaker 2: Solvador that wanted access to the book. So I just

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Speaker 2: put a whole bunch of my debut poetry book into

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Speaker 2: my suitcase and we had a book launch party in

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Speaker 2: San Salvador. Hello, I wanted to send this voice memo

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Speaker 2: before I forgot in the book launch that happened on Saturday,

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Speaker 2: I think there was maybe about one hundred people. There

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Speaker 2: were so many queer artists and queer activists, like I

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Speaker 2: don't think I've been in a space that was so

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Speaker 2: like lefty queer.

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Speaker 3: In a Salvador. There was like the stage was in them.

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Speaker 3: In one room where people were speaking, there were several

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Speaker 3: poets and there was two drag queens. Then we had

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Speaker 3: food and drink, and another drag queen was openly criticizing

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Speaker 3: book le Some Salvadory media was there too, So it's

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Speaker 3: nice to like go to my family's home country and

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Speaker 3: then see rooms full of people for my book launch

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Speaker 3: and for queers and poets and activists and al Salvador.

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Speaker 3: It was really really powerful. I feel very privileged to

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Speaker 3: have experience that.

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Speaker 2: I think that poetry does two really interesting things in

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Speaker 2: the context of the abolitionist movement. One is that poetry

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Speaker 2: is hyper sensitive to word choice and the particularities of language.

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Speaker 2: So what that means is, if you're an abolitionist poet,

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Speaker 2: you're looking at things such as arrest, and you're thinking

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Speaker 2: of the etymology of the word arrest meaning to stay,

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Speaker 2: to stop and you're saying, is that actually what I'm

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Speaker 2: witnessing a person who's being stopped, or is a more

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Speaker 2: appropriate definition of the action being had kidnapping is someone

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Speaker 2: being unwilfully extracted by the state from their social and

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Speaker 2: economic lives. So I think that poetry attends to the

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Speaker 2: particularities of language that allows for state violence to be

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Speaker 2: recognis violence when it otherwise goes unseen. And I think

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Speaker 2: another thing that poetry does within the context of that

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Speaker 2: abolitionist movement is open our imaginations. Our role within the

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Speaker 2: context of the world is to be the day dreamers,

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Speaker 2: the wanderers. As a poet, I could say, what I

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Speaker 2: see is not the form of healing, reconciliation, accountability that

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Speaker 2: I think is going to help our world. What I

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Speaker 2: see our punitive systems that are wasting public funds and

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Speaker 2: disallowing my community to move past violence. And I believe

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Speaker 2: that poetry helps us move past across our world. Hi

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Speaker 2: raing just raw feelings. Today is my last day and

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Speaker 2: I'll soofdoor. I've just packed all of my bags and

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Speaker 2: cleaned the apartment. By now, I've been going back and

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Speaker 2: forth from Olsovagords to us for a few years, and

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Speaker 2: so people are like, all right, when are you coming back?

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Speaker 2: And you know, I'm going to have a dinner with

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Speaker 2: my friends a little bit later. Everyone kind of knows

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Speaker 2: the pattern.

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Speaker 3: I cot my go, I cont my go, but.

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Speaker 2: I'm I'm feeling sad to leave. There's obviously like really

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Speaker 2: fucked up politics here at the moment, and so I'm

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Speaker 2: just like, I don't want to go back to La.

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Speaker 2: I love La though. I guess that's the diaspora, right

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Speaker 2: is being stuck between two places. But yeah, right now,

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Speaker 2: I'm just packing my bag and starting to miss so Salvador.

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Speaker 1: All right. That was poet and prison abolitionist Christopher Soto.

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Speaker 1: His debut poetry book is titled Diaries of a Terrorist.

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Speaker 1: This episode was produced by Rinaldo Leandos Junior and edited

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Speaker 1: by Marta Martinez. It was mixed by J. J. Carubin

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Speaker 1: thank checking by Elizabeth Luental Torres. The Latino USA team

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Speaker 1: includes Andrea Lopez Grusado, Mike Sargent, Daisy Contreras, Victori Estrada,

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Speaker 1: Patrice Sulbard, and Julia Rochard, with help from Raul Perees.

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Speaker 1: Our editorial director is Fernandes Santos. Our director of engineering

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Speaker 1: is Stephanie Lebau. Our senior engineer is Julia Caruso. Our

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Speaker 1: associate engineer is gabriel A Bias. Our marketing manager is

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Speaker 1: Luis Luna. Our theme music was composed by Saniel Renos.

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Speaker 1: I'm your host and executive producer Marino Rosa. Join us

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Speaker 1: again on our next episode, and in the meantime, look

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Speaker 1: for us on social media. We'll see you there and

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Speaker 1: remember not tebayas Cho.

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Speaker 6: Latino USA is made possible in part by California Endowment,

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Speaker 6: building a strong state by improving the health of all Californians,

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Speaker 6: the John D. And Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and Hispanics

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Speaker 6: in Philanthropy,