Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to bokay f Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody, recording live from our podstream
Speaker 1: studios here in Times Square, Folks, I have made it
Speaker 1: a point over all of last week to discuss the
Speaker 1: crisis that is unfolding at the border. I wrote a
Speaker 1: piece in Zora magazine about why America owes the people
Speaker 1: of Haiti better than what they are doing. I want
Speaker 1: to bring you up to speed right now where we
Speaker 1: have learned that over two thousand Haitians have been deported
Speaker 1: in the last week, back to Port to Prance. What
Speaker 1: we know is that the country is politically ravaged, is
Speaker 1: being essentially run by bunches of gangs. That who the
Speaker 1: Americans want to anoint as the next prime minister is
Speaker 1: not someone that the people actually want. But that doesn't
Speaker 1: stop America from inserting its foot inserting itself into foreign
Speaker 1: affairs that frankly, it has no business being a part of.
Speaker 1: What is troubling to me, what continues to be troubling
Speaker 1: to me is that I don't know about you, but
Speaker 1: how many more decades are we going to hear about
Speaker 1: a broken immigration system without there being an actual solve
Speaker 1: to it. And it seems to me that every single
Speaker 1: Congress and every single administration continues to kick the can
Speaker 1: down the road for some other administration and Congress to
Speaker 1: pick up. What's unfortunate, however, is that our Congress is
Speaker 1: filled with a bunch of the same mothers that have
Speaker 1: been there since like the beginning of time. I shit
Speaker 1: you not. Senator Grassley has decided, at the ripe old
Speaker 1: age of eighty eight, that he's going to run for reelection.
Speaker 1: The man has been in elected office since the nineteen
Speaker 1: fucking fifties. So we wonder when we turn around and
Speaker 1: we say, how come we don't have any new policies?
Speaker 1: How come we don't have any fresh ideas well, if
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the average age of those that are
Speaker 1: sitting in the fucking Senate right now, I'm looking at
Speaker 1: what a bunch of septarians or like octanagarians like, it's
Speaker 1: ridiculous where we are. And you know, here's the other thing,
Speaker 1: and I mentioned this last week, is when Yumishali Sendor
Speaker 1: ask Jensaki whether or not the President of the United
Speaker 1: States is going to speak directly about the tragedy that
Speaker 1: we are witnessing unfold at the border. She said, well,
Speaker 1: he speaks through me, he speaks through other people he met,
Speaker 1: speak on his own. And I'm saying to myself, when
Speaker 1: we set up a situation where we have people justifying
Speaker 1: whether or not what was used by the Texas fucking
Speaker 1: Border Patrol is a whip or is it horse reins?
Speaker 1: And I don't need to go through with white people
Speaker 1: and unpack and dissect brutality with you when you want
Speaker 1: me to not believe my eyes but to believe your
Speaker 1: continual lying ass mouths. And I'm calling out this administration
Speaker 1: because they have considerably fucked this up in I mean,
Speaker 1: the epic proportions a fuckery that is happening at the
Speaker 1: border right now is insane. And you know, I could
Speaker 1: probably be maybe just as angry or angrier if it
Speaker 1: had been a Trump administration, but I wouldn't be surprised.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't feel like I was caught out. But that's
Speaker 1: exactly how I feel with this administration. And then they
Speaker 1: want to make an announcement at the end of last
Speaker 1: week where they tell us that, oh, for the time being,
Speaker 1: the Department of Homeland Security is going to what suspend
Speaker 1: the use of horses as if the horses were the
Speaker 1: fucking problem, they weren't, right. It wasn't the horse that
Speaker 1: was the problem. I believe that it's the men that
Speaker 1: are riding the horse and their attachment and love affair
Speaker 1: to white supremacy and the feeling that they get to
Speaker 1: live out their cowboy fantasies, right, that that is actually
Speaker 1: the problem. So how do you suspend that exactly? How
Speaker 1: do you enforce humanity for people that do not see
Speaker 1: people that do not have the same skin color as
Speaker 1: them as being human? How do you legislate depravity out
Speaker 1: of people? What is fucking frustrating to me and continues
Speaker 1: to be frustrating, is the fact that we just continue
Speaker 1: to ignore racism in this country and how it plays
Speaker 1: a part literally in everything that we do. No one
Speaker 1: has been fired from border patrol, nobody from DHS has
Speaker 1: lost their job, and in a couple of days, those
Speaker 1: pictures will cease to have the impact that they did
Speaker 1: last week, and we will move on to the next crisis,
Speaker 1: to the next problem, continuing to kick this can down
Speaker 1: the street again. But when I look at the faces
Speaker 1: of those Patian migrants, when I look at their children's faces,
Speaker 1: you see, because I have a heart because I believe
Speaker 1: in values of morality and humanization. For all that, I
Speaker 1: don't have to right articulate my humanity. I shouldn't have
Speaker 1: to plead for it by virtue of my birth right.
Speaker 1: I should be provided with the basics. But that is
Speaker 1: not how this country is set up. We don't even
Speaker 1: do that for our own goddamn citizens, let alone those
Speaker 1: that still think that America is the better place to
Speaker 1: be than the place that they are coming from, which
Speaker 1: I say, wow, you know, because the place that you're
Speaker 1: fleeing clearly has to be on fire, underwater, you know,
Speaker 1: under siege for you to think in this day and
Speaker 1: age that America is your safe harbor at a time
Speaker 1: when our democracy is hanging on by a goddamn thread,
Speaker 1: and Republicans and Democrats alike continue to act like all
Speaker 1: is okay. It is like we are living in that
Speaker 1: active meme with the dog that is sitting at the
Speaker 1: table drinking the coffee. Everything's fine, but the entire fucking
Speaker 1: room is on fire. You know, the reality is that
Speaker 1: we care very little for black people in this country.
Speaker 1: We care even less for black people in other countries.
Speaker 1: But when they show up in mass on Shore and
Speaker 1: are not even heard. Do you understand that their cases
Speaker 1: there please, are not even being heard because this administration
Speaker 1: has decided to continue Title forty two, which was developed
Speaker 1: under Trump and used under Trump as a way to
Speaker 1: expeditially right, get rid of people that you don't want
Speaker 1: without having to justify a hearing. And then for those
Speaker 1: people who underneath my posts on social media love to
Speaker 1: tell me, oh, well, they're all bringing in COVID and
Speaker 1: you know what about COVID? Fuck? I would love to,
Speaker 1: you know, fence off Tennessee, but we can't fucking do that.
Speaker 1: You want to be concerned about colvid, Why don't you
Speaker 1: be concerned about the red state governors that are allowing
Speaker 1: the virus to run rampant because they're weaponizing it. Talk
Speaker 1: to me about that. Don't talk to me about people
Speaker 1: that are fleeing violence and hunger and despair trying to
Speaker 1: come here. We have a country that is flush with vaccines.
Speaker 1: Haiti does not right, They don't have the infrastructure for
Speaker 1: it we do in the United States, and we can't
Speaker 1: even convince the people down the fucking street to get
Speaker 1: one without putting in a vaccine mandate. That says, guess
Speaker 1: what you can't go anywhere as the seasons change, because
Speaker 1: everywhere indoors is going to require a vaccine. At least
Speaker 1: that's how it looks in New York. That sure's fuck
Speaker 1: is not how it looks everywhere else. Coming up next, Friends,
Speaker 1: is going to be my conversation with our expert, who
Speaker 1: is going to talk to us about this immigration problem,
Speaker 1: where we go about this broken system and whether or
Speaker 1: not we are going to be able to do anything
Speaker 1: about it in the months and years to come. Folks,
Speaker 1: I am very happy to welcome to the show for
Speaker 1: the first time Kevin Johnson, who is the dean of
Speaker 1: the University of California Davis School and co author of
Speaker 1: the book Immigration, Law and Social Justice. You know, one
Speaker 1: of the things that I brought up in a piece
Speaker 1: that I wrote last week which was entitled America owes
Speaker 1: the Haitian People More? And what I did was go
Speaker 1: through historical analysis of what the United States is part
Speaker 1: has been in creating economic and political instability in Haiti
Speaker 1: And what I think, and you know, you tell me
Speaker 1: if I'm wrong or don't have the fu enough picture,
Speaker 1: is I feel like the problem that we have when
Speaker 1: we're discussing immigration as a whole, is that we're not
Speaker 1: really asking why these countries are in shambles in the
Speaker 1: way that they are and what part the United States
Speaker 1: and global indifference has had in them being in such disarray.
Speaker 1: And so when we look at you know, the influx,
Speaker 1: whether it is coming from Mexico, Central America, from Haiti,
Speaker 1: from countries that have had disruptive governments and basically you know,
Speaker 1: paltry economic viability, that we don't look at the policies
Speaker 1: that we have allowed that created those situations or the
Speaker 1: ways in which we got to cherry pick political leaders
Speaker 1: that were not chosen in a democratic fashion. And yet
Speaker 1: we go around the world and we bigfoot and say
Speaker 1: that we're here right because we're owing to be you know,
Speaker 1: the valiant knights that are going to provide democracy for you.
Speaker 1: And yet we're choosing leaders. We're doing this right now
Speaker 1: after the assassination of the prime minister in Haiti, we're
Speaker 1: trying to back another leader that the people are saying
Speaker 1: we don't want. And so is there or should there
Speaker 1: be more conversation not of talking about the people that
Speaker 1: arrive as the problem, but rather the policies that we
Speaker 1: have championed that allowed for these people to be in
Speaker 1: such a desperate situation. Now, I think you're exactly right.
Speaker 1: We as a nation tend to view immigration as a
Speaker 1: continuing series of crisis. You know, it's Cubans are coming,
Speaker 1: you know, Haitians are coming, Mexicans are coming, Muslims are coming,
Speaker 1: and how do we protect ourselves from the crisis. We
Speaker 1: don't interrogate why people are migrating. We could say, well,
Speaker 1: what was our United States government role in propping up
Speaker 1: a dictatorial Haitian series of presidents that led to mass poverty, violence,
Speaker 1: political unrest, and all the way up today leading to
Speaker 1: the situation see today, we tend not to focus on that.
Speaker 1: You can look at Mexico. Why are so many Mexican
Speaker 1: migrants coming? Part of it is economic and you could say, well,
Speaker 1: look what NAFTA did. NAFTA was a trade agreement. It
Speaker 1: benedit fitted a big farmers in Mexico. Small farmers became poorer,
Speaker 1: left their land and are coming to the United States.
Speaker 1: So that the economic dislocation created by NAFTA, which we champion,
Speaker 1: that led to the migration streams we see today propping
Speaker 1: up dictators in El Salvador and Guatemala and Honduras have
Speaker 1: had the same impacts. Our policies towards Cuba has led
Speaker 1: to my migrations that we've had to deal with at
Speaker 1: various points in time. But we don't say, guys, what
Speaker 1: was our role in these migrations? We say, how do
Speaker 1: we stop them? And the truth of the matter is
Speaker 1: is that you reduce migration in the long run by
Speaker 1: not propping up dictatorial regimes, not making countries poorer, but
Speaker 1: helping them. Richard, the long term solution to migration really,
Speaker 1: and I do think the Biden administration is voiced these
Speaker 1: words and actually sending Vice President Harris to Central American
Speaker 1: to meet with the leaders. Her focus was on long
Speaker 1: term solutions. The long term solutions to migration. If you're
Speaker 1: worried about too many people coming, or your view, too
Speaker 1: many people are coming, the long term solution is economic
Speaker 1: prosperity and political stability. Most of the world, ninety five
Speaker 1: percent of the world dies within one hundred miles where
Speaker 1: it for Most people want to stay home. Most people
Speaker 1: are more comfortable with their language, their culture, their community,
Speaker 1: in their country. People leave when conditions are such that
Speaker 1: they leave in large numbers. When conditions are such or
Speaker 1: it's untendable to stay home. So if if we're really
Speaker 1: interested in decreasing migration pressures from around the world, providing
Speaker 1: economic support, political support, and thinking the long game, not
Speaker 1: how do we stop these people from coming? Is what
Speaker 1: you have to do. But the problem with that, and
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it's an insurmountable problem, is that we
Speaker 1: tend to be reactive when it comes to migration. We
Speaker 1: also tend not to want to spend money on foreign
Speaker 1: countries in building their institutions because it's too difficult for
Speaker 1: us to understand the link between if they're strong, we're
Speaker 1: better off, and it's it is costly. But the policies
Speaker 1: we've had in Central America devastated those countries, and that's
Speaker 1: why you're seeing many Central Americans coming. You can look
Speaker 1: at Haiti, you can look at Mexico, you look at Venezuela,
Speaker 1: look at Cuba. You know it's in Those are countries
Speaker 1: that are close to us, so you can expect larger
Speaker 1: numbers of people coming to it's easier to do. I
Speaker 1: want to focus for a second on what you said
Speaker 1: with regard to how you stop mass migration. Right, is
Speaker 1: economic investment right? Into the countries and communities that we've
Speaker 1: affected with whether the support or the propping up of dictators.
Speaker 1: I want to look at the last twenty years in
Speaker 1: Afghanistan for a moment, and the fact that you know,
Speaker 1: for twenty years the United States was in this country,
Speaker 1: spent oh, I don't know, depending on some reports, anywhere
Speaker 1: between eight and twenty one billion dollars over the course
Speaker 1: of twenty years, and within a matter of weeks, the
Speaker 1: entire infrastructure of the country collapses, and now we're opening,
Speaker 1: supposedly opening our doors, according to this administration, to ninety
Speaker 1: five thousand Afghans that have been displaced because of our
Speaker 1: intervening in a country that many say, and I personally
Speaker 1: believe that we had no business being in to begin
Speaker 1: with without a clear entrance and a clear exit strategy.
Speaker 1: What are the lessons to learn from the money, lives
Speaker 1: and time wasted in this particular part of the world world.
Speaker 1: What are the lessons that you think that we can
Speaker 1: learn from Afghanistan that we shouldn't be copycatting in other
Speaker 1: nation states? So seemingly I agree with you with regard
Speaker 1: to the investments that need to be made into areas
Speaker 1: that we have torpedoed in a lot of different in
Speaker 1: a lot of different ways over many decades. What lessons
Speaker 1: can we take from what happened in Afghanistan and not
Speaker 1: model Yeah, well, I think spending billions on war, trying
Speaker 1: to force something on people that may not want it,
Speaker 1: isn't going to give you the stability or the economic
Speaker 1: growth that's necessary. I'm not saying that we should have
Speaker 1: supported the Taliban, but I do think that the idea
Speaker 1: of conducting war like in Vietnam, like in Afghanistan, given
Speaker 1: the popular resistance, without building institutions, without supporting communities, uh,
Speaker 1: isn't going to work Because I mean, throwing in a
Speaker 1: war machine propping things up, uh, isn't going to necessarily
Speaker 1: transform the hearts and minds the people people of the country. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I think that what we can learn is that
Speaker 1: spending money on helping people build their own institutions, as
Speaker 1: opposed to imposing institutions on them or trying to impress
Speaker 1: upon them they should adopt American ways somehow isn't going
Speaker 1: to necessarily work. But I think that the primary focus
Speaker 1: on on war um into quote liberating these these countries. Uh.
Speaker 1: You know, it isn't going to work in the longer,
Speaker 1: and the hearts and minds and the people have to
Speaker 1: be committed to change and to the building of institutions.
Speaker 1: And it strikes me that what happened in Afghanistan is
Speaker 1: we spent a lot on war, not so much on UM,
Speaker 1: you know, building those durable institutions. We're going to be
Speaker 1: able to remain in place after we left. And Uh,
Speaker 1: there are other factors involved, I think, UM, But to me, UM, yeah,
Speaker 1: a twenty year of war with UM, you know, many
Speaker 1: more casualties on their side than on our side, but
Speaker 1: an awful lot of casualties on our side too. UM.
Speaker 1: It shows that, UM, there are limits to what you
Speaker 1: can do through through the pointing of a gun. M M.
Speaker 1: You know another thing too that I find really frustrating again,
Speaker 1: you know, and you began and have peppered throughout this
Speaker 1: conversation talking about racism, right, and you know, illuminating that
Speaker 1: many of the policies, right. I won't say all because
Speaker 1: I don't know all of them, but many of them
Speaker 1: are steeped in racism and classism. Right. What Donald Trump
Speaker 1: famously said, we only want the best people, you know,
Speaker 1: why can't we get people that are coming from Norway, right,
Speaker 1: seemingly you know, white and middle and upper class, right,
Speaker 1: was the connotation behind that racist statement. But Donald Trump
Speaker 1: said out loud what many people in the United States belief, right,
Speaker 1: Democrats and Republicans alike. Is there a way right to
Speaker 1: create immigration policy that isn't steeped in racism, that isn't
Speaker 1: about Oh well, if you're coming, you know, from Chile
Speaker 1: as opposed to from Venezuela or Colombia, you're better, right
Speaker 1: if you can show us that you're coming here on
Speaker 1: a work visa or college visa. Oh, that's the kind
Speaker 1: of immigrant that we want. Is there a way to
Speaker 1: create a system, because let's be frank that there isn't
Speaker 1: a system in this nation that wasn't created from racist ideals, right, So,
Speaker 1: is there a way, with everything that we know now
Speaker 1: to detach ourselves from racism and classism, particularly at a
Speaker 1: time when people don't even want to acknowledge reality that
Speaker 1: it exists. No, I think that's that's another good point.
Speaker 1: You know, systemic racism affects all aspects of US society,
Speaker 1: from the education system, the voting system, the health system,
Speaker 1: in criminal justice system. Obviously, the first thing if you're
Speaker 1: really interested in removing that racism is awareness that it exists,
Speaker 1: and we have been in is a nation have been
Speaker 1: in denial or not racist? You know, the immigration laws
Speaker 1: are color blind and race neutral. They don't discriminate. But
Speaker 1: when you look at how things operate in the ground,
Speaker 1: you look at those pictures along the border, how could
Speaker 1: you not see that racism is infecting it when you
Speaker 1: see the poor brown woman being separated from her brown
Speaker 1: child who's crying. How can you not see the racisms
Speaker 1: evolved when ninety percent of the people removed every year
Speaker 1: or Latino, and most of those are removed because of
Speaker 1: problems they had with our criminal justices, someone which we
Speaker 1: know engages in race based law enforcement. How can we
Speaker 1: not realize that that racism infects the system. I think
Speaker 1: that we, in all aspects of our society are in
Speaker 1: a profound sense of denial that racism exists and infects
Speaker 1: our institutions. Now there's one place where I think that
Speaker 1: we could help, or the Supreme Court could help. Maybe
Speaker 1: it's not this court, But I like how you said
Speaker 1: just You're like the court could help, but not this one.
Speaker 1: Maybe you want down the road that is it for
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