WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 167 0:00:01.720 --> 0:00:03.080 Cool Zone Media. 0:00:03.200 --> 0:00:05.640 Hey everybody, Robert Evans here and I wanted to let 0:00:05.680 --> 0:00:09.320 you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode 0:00:09.440 --> 0:00:12.559 of the week that just happened is here in one 0:00:12.680 --> 0:00:16.400 convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:18.880 listen to in a long stretch if you want. If 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:20.880 you've been listening to the episodes every day this week, 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:22.639 there's going to be nothing new here for you, but 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:24.360 you can make your own decisions. 0:00:27.720 --> 0:00:30.440 Welcome to tack it Up and hear a podcast about things 0:00:30.480 --> 0:00:33.200 falling apart and putting them back together again. I'm your host, Bio. 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:36.680 Long so long ago, in a galaxy far far away, 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:40.360 we talked about the collapse of the US Postal Service 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:44.920 and the absolute horror show that's been inflicted on postal workers. 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:48.960 When we last left our intrepid heroes, things were not great. 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:53.080 They have continued to be not great. And with us 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:58.080 to talk about this entire shit show is bad Mouth. 0:00:58.120 --> 0:01:01.240 He's a letter carrier and for it Worth and Tommy Espinoza, 0:01:01.280 --> 0:01:04.040 who is a former letter carrier and former union steward 0:01:04.160 --> 0:01:08.560 for the Post Office Union. That one. Yeah, look, it's 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.280 like I got up at seven am this morning. It's 0:01:11.400 --> 0:01:13.200 up and that locus. I got up and get it. 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:16.360 You're getting tired, Via, But both of you two, welcome 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:18.240 to the show, and I'm excited to talk to you both. 0:01:18.760 --> 0:01:20.160 Yeah, it's great to be back. 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:21.520 Yeah, thanks for having us. 0:01:21.760 --> 0:01:25.119 Yeah. So all right, let's start in a place where 0:01:25.120 --> 0:01:28.280 many things start, which is to say, the nineteen seventies, 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.880 the full crow upon which history pivoted. So one of 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:34.480 the things that we talked about the listeners sort of 0:01:34.520 --> 0:01:37.039 the last episode is that post office workers are not 0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:40.679 legally allowed to go on strike. This is sort of nonsense, 0:01:40.720 --> 0:01:44.960 but it also doesn't mean that it's never happened. Oh, 0:01:45.040 --> 0:01:46.600 by the way, is this we're abut to talk about 0:01:46.640 --> 0:01:49.640 wildcat strike disclaimers? No one here represents a union there 0:01:49.640 --> 0:01:52.160 speaking of their individual capacity, et cetera, et cetera. None 0:01:52.160 --> 0:01:54.560 of this is legal advice. I do I do I 0:01:54.600 --> 0:01:56.920 have any more caveats that we usually say for these things. 0:01:58.360 --> 0:02:01.200 That's roughly all of them. Yeah, but did you want 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:05.520 to talk about sort of the last time that things 0:02:05.960 --> 0:02:08.760 kind of looked like this and what happens. 0:02:09.000 --> 0:02:10.200 Yeah, tell me you want to take that one. 0:02:10.520 --> 0:02:15.400 Yeah, So, going back to the nineteen seventies, the working 0:02:15.400 --> 0:02:19.320 conditions for letter carriers were so bad that most of 0:02:19.320 --> 0:02:22.560 them couldn't afford the cost of living. They found themselves 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:25.639 in a position where they are working for a quasi 0:02:25.639 --> 0:02:31.520 federal position and are finding themselves on welfare, struggling just 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:34.720 to find the means to get to work, oftentimes having 0:02:34.760 --> 0:02:37.560 to work a second job, if they even have time 0:02:37.600 --> 0:02:41.960 for a second job. Because the Post Office has and 0:02:42.120 --> 0:02:45.120 still is very good at skipping around a lot of 0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:50.000 labor laws. I think nowadays people probably work around sixty 0:02:50.040 --> 0:02:53.880 hour weeks. I think probably at a minimal around fifty 0:02:53.880 --> 0:02:56.960 hour weeks, especially around the holidays. And it's not just 0:02:57.080 --> 0:03:02.040 letter carriers, this is people inside of the distribution centers, 0:03:02.160 --> 0:03:06.720 inside of the warehouses. Things were not good. And on 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:10.760 top of the actual working conditions themselves, the environment was 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:12.160 incredibly toxic. 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:14.920 There was a long history of abuse. 0:03:15.639 --> 0:03:21.079 You're dangling people's livelihood over their head, care like holding 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:24.600 a carrot over them, you know, and it really pushed 0:03:24.600 --> 0:03:28.360 people to an edge. You saw a lot of violence 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:31.520 on the workroom floor, not only from supervisors but from 0:03:31.760 --> 0:03:33.880 carriers that just snapped. 0:03:34.120 --> 0:03:36.280 Yeah, it was a time of great disparity. 0:03:37.080 --> 0:03:39.840 Yeah, the thing with the Post Office is Tom was 0:03:39.880 --> 0:03:42.960 mentioned and they dangled a carrot, but there's never any 0:03:43.000 --> 0:03:45.920 goddamn carrot. It's all stick. It's supposed to be a 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:48.839 carrot and stick, it's all stick. There's no carrot there. 0:03:49.120 --> 0:03:50.960 Management in the post office is just trying to get 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:53.800 you to move as fast as possible and cut corners, and 0:03:53.800 --> 0:03:59.200 that erodes safety, it erodes service, and it just a toxic, horrible, 0:03:59.480 --> 0:04:04.120 horrible and vironment. And so back in the seventies, before 0:04:04.120 --> 0:04:06.080 the wildcat strike, it was illegal then, just like it's 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:11.200 illegal now. The NELC National Association of Letter Carriers Congress 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:14.960 called all the shots like we had some collective bargaining rights, 0:04:15.000 --> 0:04:18.039 but not full collective bargaining rights. But like back then, 0:04:18.360 --> 0:04:22.480 adjusted for inflation, starting wage was fifty thousand a year roundabout, 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:26.679 and it topped out at about sixty eight thousand dollars 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:30.160 adjusted for inflation, and that took twenty one years to 0:04:30.200 --> 0:04:34.880 get to that point. Yeah, so it's pretty wild and 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:39.440 like very similar to today. Now starting wage adjusted for 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:43.440 inflation is just over forty thousand dollars before taxes. So 0:04:44.040 --> 0:04:46.280 we're making even less money now than we were before 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:50.200 that wildcat strike, right, And a couple other real familiar 0:04:50.279 --> 0:04:56.600 things like you know on popular wars, rampant inflation, you know, Yeah, 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:58.760 every time you turn on the radio or TV, there's 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:02.599 some lunatic politician that you can't stand hearing about. 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:05.000 Yeah, time is a flat circle. 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:10.080 But Vince Sobrado, who was an organizer out of New 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:13.120 York City, the ANOC didn't strike all over the country. 0:05:13.160 --> 0:05:15.520 It was New York and Chicago and San Francisco. 0:05:15.920 --> 0:05:19.479 It was some major hubs, right, and Vince Sobrado came 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.599 out of that and we won in that strike one 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:26.919 collective bargaining rights. Now, the thing we gave up, and 0:05:27.000 --> 0:05:28.880 it was a trade off, so we have a no 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:30.920 layoff clause, so they can't lay us off. 0:05:31.880 --> 0:05:33.960 But we gave up the right to strike. 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:36.960 Making sure that there wouldn't be another wildcat strike. 0:05:37.480 --> 0:05:37.720 Right. 0:05:37.760 --> 0:05:39.720 So that's kind of why our hands are tied in 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:42.479 that sense. Now, if we have an impasse our with 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:46.280 our negotiation, and like we get a tentative agreement and 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:49.919 we during the ratification process vote that down, now we 0:05:50.560 --> 0:05:52.719 can either try and go back to the bargaining table 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:55.719 or it gets brought in front of an arbiter basically 0:05:55.720 --> 0:05:58.279 an impartial judge, and they'll have a panel. The post 0:05:58.320 --> 0:06:01.960 Office will pick two, and they then ELC will pick two, 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:04.600 and then I think there's one impartial that's supposed to 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:07.800 be impartial between that. I believe that's how the arbitration 0:06:07.920 --> 0:06:10.280 process works. We got to prove our case in front 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:13.800 of impartial arbiters instead of going on strike. 0:06:15.000 --> 0:06:17.240 Yeah, and so, as we sort of mentioned before, one 0:06:17.279 --> 0:06:19.320 of the things about the post office, it's it's similar 0:06:19.360 --> 0:06:21.599 if people remember the rail like the rail strike that 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:24.359 didn't happen, where there's all of these hoops you have 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:25.839 to jump, you'd be able to go on strike. And 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:29.559 that's because again, like rail workers, postal workers don't operate 0:06:29.640 --> 0:06:33.120 under the normal sort of National Labor Relations Board like framework. 0:06:33.200 --> 0:06:35.919 Right now, admittedly there was a very good chance that 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:38.039 it like in like seven months, we don't even have that. 0:06:38.200 --> 0:06:40.960 No one has that anymore. But you know, things are 0:06:41.360 --> 0:06:43.880 as we are right now. Yeah, it's it's I think 0:06:43.880 --> 0:06:46.240 things are going good, but the as things are going 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:50.680 right now, let's get into the current tentative agreement, and 0:06:50.720 --> 0:06:52.720 I guess we should actually we should roll this back 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:55.320 a little tiny bit. People who haven't listened to these 0:06:55.320 --> 0:07:00.360 episodes before, can you explain what a tentative agreement is right. 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:03.480 So a tentative agreement is effectively the first draft. When 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:08.680 you are going through and negotiating, you will reach a 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:13.400 contract where management and the union kind of agree and 0:07:13.440 --> 0:07:16.200 they put it before their union members. And the idea 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:19.760 is that your union members are able to vote whether 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:24.360 or not this tentative agreement passes. And again, like that 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:27.080 nof was saying, if it gets rejected or if it 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:30.520 gets turned down, then it goes back to the drawing board, 0:07:30.760 --> 0:07:34.000 or we get an arbitrator, and it goes through a 0:07:34.120 --> 0:07:40.960 lengthy process. Our specific contract has been under negotiation since 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:41.560 before I. 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:43.800 Was in the Post Office. 0:07:45.640 --> 0:07:48.080 The amount of back pay that they're going to have 0:07:48.120 --> 0:07:51.360 to pay on some of these races is kind of insane, 0:07:51.840 --> 0:07:54.600 and I imagine that a lot of people won't see 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:55.440 it for a long time. 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:57.600 But yeah, that's what a tentative agreement is. 0:07:57.800 --> 0:08:00.920 A lot of people think that it's a bad thing 0:08:00.960 --> 0:08:02.720 to go back to the drawing board, or a bad 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:05.800 thing to be negotiate or be put before an arbitrator. 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:08.880 I largely think that is a myth. If you think 0:08:08.920 --> 0:08:13.120 about any sort of negotiation, the first the first offer 0:08:13.160 --> 0:08:15.320 is never the best one. I think a lot of 0:08:15.360 --> 0:08:19.480 people are just afraid that somehow you would end up 0:08:19.560 --> 0:08:23.840 giving more than you're getting. And I think that's just 0:08:23.880 --> 0:08:26.920 the way that the rhetoric has gone for unions lately, 0:08:27.360 --> 0:08:29.160 and I guess I need to adjust that a little bit, 0:08:29.200 --> 0:08:34.320 because the Teamsters, even like the Service Workers' Union, they're 0:08:34.360 --> 0:08:38.880 all really doing well. The Communications Union, we're in a 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:41.240 little bit of a different age, but a lot of 0:08:41.280 --> 0:08:45.920 the Post Office is old heads, military veterans, that kind 0:08:45.960 --> 0:08:48.199 of sort who will just come from a little bit 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:52.400 of an earlier time when the labor movement was really 0:08:52.400 --> 0:08:53.880 starting to plant their feet on the ground. 0:08:54.400 --> 0:08:57.280 Yeah, a lot of them are still dealing with I 0:08:57.400 --> 0:09:01.200 like most of us are the hangover from the Reagan years. Yeah, right, 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:04.800 so they're all terrified of union stuff. Even though they 0:09:04.800 --> 0:09:07.040 love the union and they're in the union, they're very 0:09:07.040 --> 0:09:10.200 distrustful of it. And they don't think that we can 0:09:10.280 --> 0:09:12.720 ask for what we deserve. They think we need to 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:15.920 ask for what they think we can get based on 0:09:16.000 --> 0:09:19.079 the ship that management is saying, because they're again still 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:21.760 shell shocked from the Reagan years and all the anti 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:22.520 labor stuff. 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:25.480 And that's that's how a profound impact on most of 0:09:25.520 --> 0:09:29.280 the unions that survived that period and a lot of 0:09:29.280 --> 0:09:32.120 them didn't, right, which is which is you know, part 0:09:32.120 --> 0:09:33.960 of why you get people who behave like this. But 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:39.240 on the downside is it means that you get handed 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:43.440 a lot of deals that absolutely suck. But do you 0:09:43.440 --> 0:09:46.800 know what else absolutely sucks? It's the products and services 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:50.319 that's for this podcast, the probably don't I don't know. 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:06.440 We are back, so let's talk about what the tentative 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:12.079 agreements that y'all are being asked to sign is right now? 0:10:12.400 --> 0:10:15.400 Yeah, yeah, so it's been I think we're coming up 0:10:15.440 --> 0:10:18.840 on six hundred days since our last contract expired. 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:19.720 Jeez. Yeah. 0:10:19.840 --> 0:10:22.200 Yeah, there's people that just want their back pay. So 0:10:22.360 --> 0:10:26.240 even if the back pay is dog shit, they're desperate 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:30.640 because inflation is eight percent across the country in some places, right, 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:33.439 and like people are just desperate for that chunk of money. 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:37.400 That delaying process feels very very intentional. 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:38.360 Yeah. 0:10:38.400 --> 0:10:41.360 So the tenetive agreement comes out around five hundred days 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:44.440 after negotiations we're supposed to have started, and there's all 0:10:44.480 --> 0:10:47.079 sorts of nonsense going on during then, but we're getting 0:10:47.080 --> 0:10:49.719 promises like it's going to be a historic agreement, We're 0:10:49.760 --> 0:10:52.400 going to get significant raises. We're going to go to 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:55.720 an all career workforce, which, by the way, we don't 0:10:55.800 --> 0:10:56.520 have right now. 0:10:56.640 --> 0:10:58.360 Hey, can you saw what that is with the way? Yeah? 0:10:58.440 --> 0:10:58.960 Uh okay. 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:04.280 So in every other trade you have an apprenticeship program, right, 0:11:04.559 --> 0:11:06.319 so when you get on the job, you wet behind 0:11:06.320 --> 0:11:09.880 the ears, you're brand new. You are automatically career, you 0:11:09.920 --> 0:11:13.360 are automatically paying into your retirement. You're automatically getting the 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:16.280 regular benefits everyone else is. In most trades, you're paying 0:11:16.280 --> 0:11:19.240 half the dues that the journeymen are paying, and you 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:21.520 are considered a full employee. 0:11:21.520 --> 0:11:22.080 You're the new jack. 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:24.080 You're getting all the shit jobs, but you are a 0:11:24.120 --> 0:11:27.720 full employee. The Post Office has a position called the 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:31.800 City Carrier Assistant, which, on paper and how they'll tell 0:11:31.840 --> 0:11:35.160 you sounds like an apprenticeship program, but it's really more 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:38.599 like they took an apprenticeship program and an unpaid internship 0:11:38.640 --> 0:11:41.640 and jammed them together. Because these kids are coming in 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:44.360 and I'm not even kids. I'm forty years old. I 0:11:44.440 --> 0:11:46.840 started as a CCIA of forty years old. They're coming 0:11:46.880 --> 0:11:49.040 in making less than twenty dollars an hour. They're not 0:11:49.080 --> 0:11:53.120 considered a career, so they're not paying into their retirement. 0:11:53.559 --> 0:11:56.280 You have got all the same union protections, Your benefits 0:11:56.320 --> 0:12:00.120 are super low, you get five days of annually the 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:03.520 year and no sick time. Like it's it's yeah, it's 0:12:03.559 --> 0:12:04.760 a meat it's a meat grinder. 0:12:05.280 --> 0:12:06.319 So that was a big thing. 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:08.400 And it creates a whole third tier because we already 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:11.680 have two different, two different tiered wage system which sucks enough, 0:12:11.679 --> 0:12:14.560 and anyone that pays attention to labor that drives a 0:12:14.640 --> 0:12:19.559 huge wedge between workers and it crushes solidarity at kneecaps 0:12:19.559 --> 0:12:22.360 a union, and now with the CCA position in this 0:12:22.480 --> 0:12:25.080 non career workforce, it's created a whole third tier. 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:27.200 This is one of the things that the UAW is 0:12:27.200 --> 0:12:29.920 fighting for. It's like, is eliminating teering systems all together, 0:12:29.960 --> 0:12:32.839 because if you're actually trying to get a functional union 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:35.040 and make people's jobs better, that's the thing that you do. 0:12:35.880 --> 0:12:39.640 And having a having a third tier yeah not good, 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:41.359 extremely bad. 0:12:42.000 --> 0:12:45.160 Yeah exactly, And it's it's it's because they've adopted sort 0:12:45.160 --> 0:12:47.480 of this Amazon model of doing things where they just 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:51.360 have this burning churn situation where like Amazon Bezos said 0:12:51.360 --> 0:12:53.480 that he doesn't want anyone working for Amazon for more 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:53.839 than like. 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:55.960 Two years, Yeah, if they have these. 0:12:55.920 --> 0:12:58.200 People constantly and they're constantly burning through them, and they 0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:00.080 never have to pay full benefits, they never have to 0:13:00.280 --> 0:13:02.880 pay into their retirement, they never have to pay them 0:13:02.920 --> 0:13:05.320 more than twenty dollars an hour, and they can just 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:07.440 get you to work your ass off and burn out 0:13:07.520 --> 0:13:09.160 and quit within two years. 0:13:09.440 --> 0:13:12.840 As people retire, their labor costs go down. It's evil. 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:17.880 It's absolutely it's some Jack Welch hateful bullshit. 0:13:18.280 --> 0:13:23.160 So touching on that, if people are really quitting before 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:26.160 they reach a point in their career where they're educated 0:13:26.200 --> 0:13:29.240 and can stand up for themselves or stand up for 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:32.760 each other on the workroom floor, that's one of the 0:13:32.840 --> 0:13:36.000 major reasons that our union is failing. And like you said, 0:13:36.400 --> 0:13:38.600 you use the exact example that I would have. The 0:13:38.640 --> 0:13:42.080 Amazon model is working really well. If you can just 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:44.559 make it so that people are so miserable they quit 0:13:44.600 --> 0:13:47.760 their job before they understand what their rights are, how 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:50.960 they can protect each other, what even the contract says 0:13:51.000 --> 0:13:53.800 on the basics of when can you call out, when 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:57.040 are you required to come in? Can they send you 0:13:57.080 --> 0:14:01.600 home early without your pay? That's massive. And while we 0:14:01.600 --> 0:14:05.320 were talking about the conditions of the nineteen seventies and 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:07.560 how long it takes you to get to the top 0:14:07.600 --> 0:14:12.280 of the pay scale. This third tier actually increases that 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:16.000 time by sometimes three or four years. I've known people 0:14:16.000 --> 0:14:19.200 who have been ccas for three or four years. I 0:14:19.200 --> 0:14:21.960 don't think I've seen beyond that, but it wouldn't surprise me. 0:14:22.600 --> 0:14:26.000 What this does is it means that before you go career, 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.320 you're spending all this time. You're effectively a fully trained, 0:14:29.360 --> 0:14:35.040 full employee, completely capable of doing everything that's required of you. 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:37.280 You're just not getting any of the career benefits making 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:40.040 a minimum wage. And on top of that, the way 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:42.400 our benefits work is it does come out of your 0:14:42.440 --> 0:14:44.760 pay chash Sheet's not like other jobs where it might 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:49.120 be a separate package or already calculated. In for instance, 0:14:49.240 --> 0:14:52.360 a lot of the trades, they'll say, hey, you get 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:54.440 twenty three an hour, but the reality is you're making 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:57.320 around twenty nine or thirty because you're not paying into 0:14:57.320 --> 0:14:58.040 your health. 0:14:57.760 --> 0:14:59.640 Insurance or your retirement or. 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:03.400 Anything, that you're effectively making less than the minimum wage. 0:15:03.440 --> 0:15:06.119 You're almost paying to go to work as a CCA. 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:09.680 Then just to be Yoda and told that you're not 0:15:09.760 --> 0:15:13.560 going fast enough, even though there's no street standard. But 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:17.040 that's that's getting into a little bit of nipicky key 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:18.720 contract and stuff that language. 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:21.760 Yeah, so yeah, that's one thing that they're promising was 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:24.400 to get rid of that non career workforce. So this 0:15:24.520 --> 0:15:26.760 ta comes out and after hearing that we're getting rid 0:15:26.800 --> 0:15:29.160 of the non career significant raises, it's going to be 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.040 historic for us. What they offered us was one point 0:15:32.120 --> 0:15:34.640 three percent Jesus Christy. 0:15:34.720 --> 0:15:36.720 Yeah, I mean, and this is something for if you 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:39.480 were in a union and you hear your leadership say 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:43.600 the words historic contract, you are screwed. That agreement is 0:15:43.640 --> 0:15:46.680 going to suck. I remember on this show, literally live 0:15:46.720 --> 0:15:48.880 and recording right before they're supposed to be the Teamster's 0:15:48.920 --> 0:15:52.920 ups strike, right Like, I'm literally on the episode with 0:15:52.960 --> 0:15:55.560 two of the union people and we get the text 0:15:55.640 --> 0:15:58.840 of the contract in the middle of recording, and we 0:15:58.960 --> 0:16:01.200 get the thing with it is this historic contract, and 0:16:01.240 --> 0:16:03.040 we're like reading it in the middle the episode was like, wait, 0:16:03.040 --> 0:16:05.760 this fucking sucks. Shit. It's like, that's that's how you 0:16:05.800 --> 0:16:09.560 know you are duped when you get the historic When 0:16:09.560 --> 0:16:11.800 they start pulling out the historic contract thing. 0:16:12.480 --> 0:16:15.000 Yeah, you'd think if you're making six figures a year, 0:16:15.040 --> 0:16:17.440 you could understand how to buy a used car and 0:16:17.560 --> 0:16:20.840 know that you promise low and deliver high. Like I 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:23.040 don't understand how making six figures a year. They haven't 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:27.040 figured that out. But yeah, so in this contract, one 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.280 point three percent, and that's enough to piss anyone off 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:31.240 because that drops about the same time that we all 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:34.440 see the longshoremen getting going back to the table because 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:38.640 they didn't get sixty percent, you know what I mean. Yeah, 0:16:38.720 --> 0:16:41.080 I'm surprised more people just didn't call in sick because 0:16:41.240 --> 0:16:43.360 we all got this news on the worker and floor 0:16:43.720 --> 0:16:45.840 and I was like, did you see this shit? I 0:16:45.880 --> 0:16:49.240 know people that quit that day, you know what I mean, Like, yeah, 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:52.480 it's it's wild. So one point three percent. They're keeping 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:55.720 the city carrier assistance to nin career workforce. They're removing 0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:58.560 some of our union protections right like it used to be. 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:00.680 You have twelve six the hour rule. 0:17:01.000 --> 0:17:03.000 You don't have to work more than twelve hours in 0:17:03.040 --> 0:17:04.960 a day or sixty hours in a week. You can 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:08.159 say I can't do this, I'm going home, and the 0:17:08.280 --> 0:17:11.840 union could protect you. Now if you are a CCA, 0:17:12.119 --> 0:17:14.320 or if you have signed up to do overtime and 0:17:14.359 --> 0:17:17.800 they tell you to stay sixteen hours you have you 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:18.920 have no choice. 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:22.800 Jesus Christ. So so so you you gave up things 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:25.480 for a one point that's that's a one point three 0:17:25.520 --> 0:17:28.679 percent raise. Is like like that that's the kind of 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:32.360 thing that you get if like I don't know, say, 0:17:32.520 --> 0:17:36.280 like you got like some unbelievable concession package somewhere else, 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:40.119 maybe conceivably you would take that, or maybe maybe it's 0:17:40.160 --> 0:17:41.800 a thing where like you're you're you're like a nurse 0:17:41.800 --> 0:17:43.680 and your problem isn't pay. Your problem is you're working 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:47.080 like two million hours a week. But like that's that's 0:17:47.119 --> 0:17:50.280 a that's a you got concession somewhere else, the kind 0:17:50.359 --> 0:17:53.119 of thing, not a we gave up stuff for like 0:17:53.160 --> 0:17:54.920 the worst rays you've ever seen. 0:17:55.680 --> 0:17:57.760 Yeah, I mean it makes it makes you think about, 0:17:57.760 --> 0:17:58.320 like what was there? 0:17:58.440 --> 0:17:59.480 What was their first offer? 0:17:59.560 --> 0:18:04.240 Like it's been over five hundred days of negotiations, what 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:06.200 was the first offer? We got to put the fuel 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:07.520 in the mail trucks ourselves? 0:18:07.720 --> 0:18:11.560 Like you know what I mean, Tom. 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:12.560 Do you want do you want to talk about what 0:18:12.600 --> 0:18:14.240 the tenet of agreement doesn't address? 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:19.640 So the tenetive Agreement, we spoke about the Post Office's 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:24.640 strategy for dealing with our grievances or how to combat 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.600 the union last episode, and so for the people that 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:31.359 didn't listen to it or just need a refresher, the 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:35.160 Post Office has found this extremely effective strategy that if 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:39.199 they just don't agree at any point in our in 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:41.960 our grievance procedure, which is if they violate the contract 0:18:42.040 --> 0:18:44.760 and we want to be made whole, whatever that may 0:18:44.800 --> 0:18:47.520 look like, they can just keep on saying no and 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:50.400 push it up to arbitration because there is a grievance 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:54.320 procedure that ends up with a third party intervening as well, 0:18:54.840 --> 0:18:58.119 and if they push enough of those grievances up, we 0:18:58.240 --> 0:19:03.280 have a major backlaw on this process because our final 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:07.800 resort is now just the standard of operation. And what 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:11.359 that means is that there's nothing to force the Post 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:15.040 Office to comply with the contract. If someone wasn't paid 0:19:15.080 --> 0:19:18.280 correctly or was missing a whole day of pay, got 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:21.679 sent home, or was put on emergency placement, which is 0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:25.080 a process where they say you did something dangerous and 0:19:25.119 --> 0:19:27.240 so they can take you off the clock. It could 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:30.560 be months or even a year before your case is 0:19:30.600 --> 0:19:32.920 even looked at. They do have a process, of course, 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:37.479 where they try and prioritize it, but it's obviously not working. 0:19:38.160 --> 0:19:41.520 The other thing that the contract doesn't really touch on is. 0:19:41.640 --> 0:19:45.920 Our uniform situation, where the companies that make and manufacture 0:19:46.080 --> 0:19:51.120 the uniforms for our letter carriers and actually for all 0:19:51.200 --> 0:19:54.280 the positions in the post office are effectively trying to 0:19:54.280 --> 0:19:57.399 sell you a shirt for like eighty dollars, or the 0:19:57.400 --> 0:20:00.800 most egregious one is like your win your Parka is 0:20:01.119 --> 0:20:03.960 close to four hundred dollars and your balance that you're 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:07.760 you're giving is I think three eighty FM. 0:20:08.280 --> 0:20:09.120 I don't know, it's been one. 0:20:09.280 --> 0:20:11.280 Oh, it's up to four ninety nine. 0:20:11.480 --> 0:20:15.560 But the rain trench coat, just the raincoat is four 0:20:15.640 --> 0:20:18.160 hundred and sixty five dollars and you have to get 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:20.640 it through a vendor, so you can't even pay them 0:20:20.680 --> 0:20:24.639 money to do that. Like a pair of polyester pants 0:20:25.119 --> 0:20:29.000 that's going to fall apart in two months, ninety five dollars. 0:20:28.440 --> 0:20:29.040 Oh my god. 0:20:29.160 --> 0:20:31.680 Oh yeah, no, it's it's wild. It's wild price gouging. 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:33.679 And they they were going to address that, and what 0:20:33.720 --> 0:20:36.440 they did was they increased are they increased our uniform 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:39.600 allowance by thirty five dollars, which is like three pairs 0:20:39.600 --> 0:20:41.159 of socks from those magazines. 0:20:42.040 --> 0:20:43.960 Great incredible stuff. 0:20:44.320 --> 0:20:46.399 Yeah, it's it's it's wild. 0:20:46.880 --> 0:20:49.840 Someone should dig into who's running that company and like 0:20:50.160 --> 0:20:53.919 who they're working with to get those contracts, because probably 0:20:54.000 --> 0:20:54.960 a fun story there. 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:56.919 I think it's like four out of five of the 0:20:56.960 --> 0:21:02.159 approved manufacturers or the distributed are owned by the same people. 0:21:02.280 --> 0:21:06.960 So oh great, okay, Yeah, I'm bequeathing this as a 0:21:07.000 --> 0:21:09.240 gift to it. I know there's a bunch of journalists. 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:12.199 You listen to this, go go do that story. I 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:14.760 guarantee you'll find some unbelievably unhinged stuff. 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:17.520 And a quick shout out to any letter carriers that 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:22.119 are listening to this. If you don't use your entire allowance, 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:24.800 look out for the ccas, look out for the PTFs, 0:21:25.560 --> 0:21:28.359 the non career and the fresh faces on there. If 0:21:28.440 --> 0:21:30.960 you don't use the entirety of your uniform allowance, to 0:21:31.000 --> 0:21:32.800 the way that they view it is that they can 0:21:32.840 --> 0:21:35.600 give us less money, So use all of it. Don't 0:21:35.640 --> 0:21:38.800 protest by not spending that money. It's not even yours, 0:21:38.840 --> 0:21:41.400 so spend it. Give it to someone, do something, you. 0:21:41.359 --> 0:21:43.720 Know, Yeah, get the new jack in your office a 0:21:43.920 --> 0:21:46.480 fucking raincoat, because like I tried, to do the math 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:48.880 on it. For winter gear for a place like Minnesota, 0:21:48.960 --> 0:21:50.879 to get all the winter gear and your summer gear, 0:21:51.040 --> 0:21:54.400 it's going to take you four years of uniform allowances 0:21:54.720 --> 0:21:55.440 to get. 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:58.760 All that gear. Jesus right, it's ridiculous. Yeah. 0:21:58.760 --> 0:22:01.879 And like it's Minnesota, right, Like I'm from Chicago, so 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:04.600 like it is, it is slightly warmer in Chicago and 0:22:04.640 --> 0:22:06.639 you get wincheles in negative forty here, Yeah, and like 0:22:06.680 --> 0:22:10.119 Minnesota is much worse. So like that is that that 0:22:10.240 --> 0:22:13.320 is not like optional stuff. That is the difference between 0:22:14.040 --> 0:22:16.960 you having hypothermia and you not. 0:22:17.080 --> 0:22:20.400 Have Yeah, no, exactly. 0:22:20.440 --> 0:22:22.680 And and god forbid you want to buy a pair 0:22:22.680 --> 0:22:26.960 of shorts as well, because Minnesota, Minnesota summers get over 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:28.000 one hundred index. 0:22:28.200 --> 0:22:32.560 Yeah. Yeah, speaking speaking of ways to not die in 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:36.520 Minnesota summers, here are some product and services that will 0:22:36.560 --> 0:22:38.480 probably not help you with that, but maybe they will. 0:22:48.960 --> 0:22:50.040 And we are back. 0:22:50.960 --> 0:22:53.760 One of the other things that Tom touched on that 0:22:54.320 --> 0:22:58.000 this agreement doesn't address is he talked about the non 0:22:58.040 --> 0:23:01.280 compliance and the grievance backlog, but also just the toxic 0:23:01.320 --> 0:23:03.200 work environment, which we've talked about. 0:23:02.960 --> 0:23:03.880 And it's so bad. 0:23:04.119 --> 0:23:07.560 The whole reason we have The trope of someone going 0:23:07.680 --> 0:23:11.280 postal is usually because someone's bullied to a point where 0:23:11.359 --> 0:23:14.240 violence occurs. They either take it out on management or 0:23:14.320 --> 0:23:16.440 my own manager in my first year got in a 0:23:16.480 --> 0:23:17.919 fistfight with one of the clerks. 0:23:18.000 --> 0:23:18.720 Jesus correct. 0:23:18.720 --> 0:23:21.760 The post office has lost grievances because management was threatening 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:24.840 to shoot an employee. Any letter carrier would have been 0:23:24.880 --> 0:23:27.920 fired for that immediately that manager got a letter of warning. 0:23:28.160 --> 0:23:31.960 Yeah, we have a joint statement on violence in the workplace, 0:23:32.359 --> 0:23:35.320 which I think you were about to get into the leg. Yeah, 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:39.040 they're just not complying. It's a very one sided thing. Effectively, 0:23:39.160 --> 0:23:40.760 management has qualified immunity. 0:23:41.119 --> 0:23:46.639 Great, great, your managers are also cops. It could attack you. Incredible, 0:23:46.680 --> 0:23:48.560 incredible stuff from the post office. 0:23:49.800 --> 0:23:52.119 Yeah, and then there's a bunch of wage theft too. 0:23:52.240 --> 0:23:54.320 I mean personally, I caught my own manager putting in 0:23:54.400 --> 0:23:57.680 all the ccas for two hour lunches because the ccas 0:23:57.760 --> 0:23:59.600 are new and don't know what they're doing and they 0:23:59.600 --> 0:24:02.679 don't know check their time all the time, putting us 0:24:02.720 --> 0:24:04.639 all in for two hour lunches and then told me, 0:24:04.840 --> 0:24:06.719 tried to pretend to me, oh, that was just an 0:24:06.720 --> 0:24:10.080 automatic computer error. Whereas if we take a thirty one 0:24:10.160 --> 0:24:13.200 minute lunch. I have my phone blowing up being asked 0:24:13.200 --> 0:24:15.639 why I'm not moving and delivering the mail. But you 0:24:15.760 --> 0:24:18.920 guys manage to accidentally miss a two hour left. 0:24:19.040 --> 0:24:20.520 Come on, don't lie. 0:24:20.800 --> 0:24:21.439 You don't gotta lie. 0:24:21.520 --> 0:24:23.520 You don't gotta lie to be my friend, Like, come on, 0:24:23.920 --> 0:24:26.160 and then and then there's other places around the country 0:24:26.160 --> 0:24:30.000 where we the NLCS one grievances where management was making 0:24:30.119 --> 0:24:33.320 CCA's work in the dark, delivering mail till like seven 0:24:33.440 --> 0:24:36.879 thirty pm and clocking them out at four o'clock in 0:24:36.960 --> 0:24:39.239 the after business. All right, so they got people out 0:24:39.280 --> 0:24:41.359 there working for free. It's it's and we have to 0:24:41.440 --> 0:24:43.440 catch we have to catch them doing that. Yeah, they're 0:24:43.480 --> 0:24:45.240 never going to own up to it that they all 0:24:45.280 --> 0:24:49.560 watch their payroll. The management structure at the post office, 0:24:49.920 --> 0:24:53.040 it's like the TMU version of Game of Thrones. They're 0:24:53.080 --> 0:24:56.320 all nasty, they're all backstabbing each other, and like, the 0:24:56.440 --> 0:24:58.680 nastier you are and the more willing you are to 0:24:58.840 --> 0:25:02.800 screw people, the higher up you go in management at 0:25:02.840 --> 0:25:06.080 the post office, Like it's disgusting. 0:25:06.920 --> 0:25:11.800 So there's even more convoluted ways that the management finds 0:25:12.000 --> 0:25:15.360 to effectively steal from the employees, and one of them 0:25:15.640 --> 0:25:21.440 huge problem is changing the metrics on what a route 0:25:21.560 --> 0:25:24.600 looks like. And so they can alter the times of hey, 0:25:24.680 --> 0:25:26.760 how long you were in the office packing your truck 0:25:27.119 --> 0:25:30.080 when you got back to the office and started unloading 0:25:30.160 --> 0:25:32.439 and cleaning, And so what they do is they make 0:25:32.520 --> 0:25:35.200 it look like the street time took you, let's call 0:25:35.240 --> 0:25:37.680 it five hours, and you were in the office for 0:25:37.800 --> 0:25:40.280 four hours. That way, they can make a route look 0:25:40.720 --> 0:25:43.720 smaller than it actually is and have an excuse not 0:25:43.880 --> 0:25:47.639 to hire another person, which makes it so that this 0:25:47.840 --> 0:25:51.400 poor carrier who was assigned to this route now has 0:25:51.560 --> 0:25:55.120 a ten hour day, eleven hour day just by default 0:25:55.160 --> 0:25:57.720 on a light day, on a regular day. 0:25:58.440 --> 0:26:01.760 This is a really big problem for the rural carriers. 0:26:01.800 --> 0:26:03.359 Their contract is a little bit different. 0:26:03.800 --> 0:26:06.800 Effectively, they get paid by the job, not necessarily hourly, 0:26:07.359 --> 0:26:09.520 or that's the case for a lot of them, and 0:26:09.640 --> 0:26:11.920 so if you're adjusting their times, they're going to be 0:26:11.960 --> 0:26:14.680 paid out for an eight hour day. But you know, 0:26:14.880 --> 0:26:18.000 the route has just been stretched out through this method 0:26:18.080 --> 0:26:23.280 of just dishonest scanning and disalamant entries, and they get 0:26:23.320 --> 0:26:25.399 free labor. And I'm not even well versed on the 0:26:25.760 --> 0:26:28.560 RCA contract that's a whole other You know, there's only 0:26:28.800 --> 0:26:32.160 nine unions that go into the post office, which means 0:26:32.720 --> 0:26:34.560 there's probably nine different contracts. 0:26:35.240 --> 0:26:37.640 Yeah, and in every single one of these contracts, they're 0:26:37.680 --> 0:26:40.879 inventing new, different and unique ways to do wage theft 0:26:41.400 --> 0:26:45.600 just steal people's money, which, and it's worth noting again, 0:26:45.800 --> 0:26:48.600 like if a post carrier like broke into an office 0:26:48.800 --> 0:26:51.119 and stole the amount of money that is being stolen 0:26:51.160 --> 0:26:53.760 from them, they would go to prison forever. Right, But 0:26:54.240 --> 0:26:57.080 because it's your boss doing this, Like, the worst thing 0:26:57.160 --> 0:26:58.560 that happens to them is they have to go through 0:26:58.600 --> 0:27:01.399 a grievance procedure even though they are just literally robbing you. 0:27:02.119 --> 0:27:04.760 Yeah, yeah, and yeah, you do not fuck with the 0:27:04.840 --> 0:27:08.160 mail cops. But the mail cops the postal inspectors work 0:27:08.240 --> 0:27:13.880 for management. So yeah, and management does nothing but sit 0:27:13.960 --> 0:27:17.720 in their chair all day, sniffing their own farts, watching tiktoks, 0:27:17.840 --> 0:27:19.920 and trying to figure out how to screw people through 0:27:20.000 --> 0:27:23.840 the virtue of spreadsheets while we are all out working 0:27:24.240 --> 0:27:30.320 our asses off. It's a very demoralizing and abusive, abusive situation. 0:27:31.160 --> 0:27:33.399 So we were hoping that shit would get addressed in 0:27:33.520 --> 0:27:37.080 the tenetive agreement and none of it was. So there's 0:27:37.119 --> 0:27:40.200 all sorts of problems with that. I'm with building a 0:27:40.280 --> 0:27:44.199 fighting an elc and we are basically a bottom up 0:27:44.480 --> 0:27:46.480 more of a radical reform caucus. 0:27:46.920 --> 0:27:49.800 I am out of Fort Worth, but like it's started. 0:27:49.560 --> 0:27:52.199 In Minneapolis, and you've got people in Chicago and New 0:27:52.280 --> 0:27:56.080 York and Naples, Florida, and San Antonio, Hawaii, all over 0:27:56.080 --> 0:27:59.520 the country who are basically, we are tired of we 0:28:00.080 --> 0:28:03.320 are tired of our leadership being in bed with management 0:28:03.760 --> 0:28:05.880 or at least doing things where they look like they're 0:28:05.880 --> 0:28:08.320 in bed with management. We've been putting on vote no 0:28:08.480 --> 0:28:10.920 rallies all over the country. You've probably seen some on 0:28:10.960 --> 0:28:11.399 the news. 0:28:11.320 --> 0:28:13.320 And this this is vote no for the tight devisse. Yes, 0:28:13.400 --> 0:28:15.000 this is this is this is a vote to send 0:28:15.040 --> 0:28:17.560 your bargaining reps back to the table with the demand 0:28:17.720 --> 0:28:19.680 that we can't take a deal that sucks this much. 0:28:20.160 --> 0:28:22.080 That's what a vote no thing is. Yeah. 0:28:22.160 --> 0:28:24.040 So yeah, we've been trying to get letter carriers to 0:28:24.119 --> 0:28:25.760 vote no on it. That's so we've been doing the 0:28:25.840 --> 0:28:28.200 vote no campaigns so we can vote this shit down 0:28:28.440 --> 0:28:30.560 and get it in front of a judge. Because once 0:28:30.600 --> 0:28:32.840 it goes into arbitration, there's a lot of fear mongering things, 0:28:32.880 --> 0:28:34.359 Oh we could lose this, Oh we could lose that. 0:28:34.480 --> 0:28:36.760 Oh we could lose this. But like Mia, you you 0:28:36.840 --> 0:28:39.200 said it yourself. These are all concessions. We're not getting 0:28:39.240 --> 0:28:41.360 anything for giving up all these things. One point three 0:28:41.400 --> 0:28:42.400 percent is what we're getting. 0:28:43.040 --> 0:28:46.880 Like, yeah, like one point three percent is the kind 0:28:46.960 --> 0:28:50.760 of raise that like in a normal functioning union is 0:28:50.920 --> 0:28:53.840 like that. That's like a company's opening agreements that both 0:28:54.000 --> 0:28:56.640 you and the company knows you're not going to take. Yeah, 0:28:56.760 --> 0:28:59.760 like it's a joke. 0:29:00.120 --> 0:29:02.920 Like that in and of itself would be a major 0:29:03.000 --> 0:29:04.560 concession to get something else. 0:29:04.680 --> 0:29:06.880 But we're doing all these concessions to get that. 0:29:07.160 --> 0:29:10.000 Yeah, that's the win quote unquote. 0:29:10.120 --> 0:29:10.360 Yeah. 0:29:10.640 --> 0:29:13.680 So the thing is the Postal Reform Act says that 0:29:13.800 --> 0:29:18.400 we are supposed to get paid comparatively to a comparable 0:29:18.600 --> 0:29:22.000 company in the private sector. So an arbiter is going 0:29:22.080 --> 0:29:24.680 to look at that and try and look at ups 0:29:25.280 --> 0:29:27.840 UPS or Amazon, and the post Office is really trying 0:29:27.880 --> 0:29:30.600 to push it towards Amazon, which is why I try 0:29:30.640 --> 0:29:33.600 to talk to every letter carrier i know to support 0:29:33.840 --> 0:29:38.360 and get some crosscraft solidarity with Amazon, because without going 0:29:38.400 --> 0:29:40.080 on too much of a rabbit trail the whole you know, 0:29:40.200 --> 0:29:44.720 a rising tide lifts all ships, and one union in 0:29:44.920 --> 0:29:49.000 another industry helps everyone in every other industry. And trying 0:29:49.000 --> 0:29:51.240 to get people to understand that. But like you compare 0:29:51.280 --> 0:29:55.120 our contract to UPS and UPS they top out with 0:29:55.320 --> 0:29:57.720 I think their benefits package tops out one hundred and 0:29:57.720 --> 0:30:00.400 twenty four thousand a year and it's about, you know, five. 0:30:00.240 --> 0:30:04.320 Or eight years to reach top scale. Ours tops out. 0:30:04.400 --> 0:30:07.560 With this tentative agreement at ninety three thousand a year, 0:30:07.640 --> 0:30:09.720 and it still takes us thirteen years to get to 0:30:09.800 --> 0:30:13.280 top steps. Christ, that's not comparable, right, yeah, yeah, no, 0:30:13.480 --> 0:30:15.960 not at all. So I'm not afraid of arbitration. I'm 0:30:16.000 --> 0:30:18.200 hoping we get this in front of an arbiter, because 0:30:18.400 --> 0:30:22.440 unless that arbiter is completely crooked, I can't see him saying, well, 0:30:22.520 --> 0:30:24.640 you guys deserve one point three percent. 0:30:25.680 --> 0:30:25.920 Yeah. 0:30:26.680 --> 0:30:26.880 Yeah. 0:30:26.920 --> 0:30:31.640 So when I first saw badmouth talking and what his 0:30:31.800 --> 0:30:33.520 posts were on Reddit and stuff like that, I got 0:30:33.560 --> 0:30:36.720 really excited because I remember when I was speaking to 0:30:37.200 --> 0:30:39.840 my local president and talking to the stewards in my 0:30:40.000 --> 0:30:43.000 area across like a couple of different stations, the kind 0:30:43.040 --> 0:30:45.960 of big question was what do you do when the 0:30:46.120 --> 0:30:49.840 union breaks your heart? And I guess the answer is 0:30:49.960 --> 0:30:53.480 everything that badmouth has just talked about. You build a 0:30:53.560 --> 0:30:57.400 better one. You remind people that there is an alternative. 0:30:57.640 --> 0:31:02.120 Everything started somewhere. And if you go to his first 0:31:02.200 --> 0:31:05.280 episode on the From Aid to Arbitration podcast, he has 0:31:05.320 --> 0:31:09.000 something called the CCA Corner where he's educating the newcomers, 0:31:09.040 --> 0:31:12.480 the fresh faces. He's just talking about horizontal power. And 0:31:12.760 --> 0:31:16.440 I was listening to that episode before we had spoken. 0:31:17.040 --> 0:31:19.280 I got so excited just to hear what this this 0:31:19.440 --> 0:31:20.240 person was up to. 0:31:20.480 --> 0:31:23.720 You know, I try to sneak in as many anarchist 0:31:23.840 --> 0:31:26.760 shit without saying I'm an anarchist. I try and sneak 0:31:26.840 --> 0:31:29.520 as much of that shit in as I can. I 0:31:29.600 --> 0:31:31.760 get old heads who have a Trump hat on talking 0:31:31.800 --> 0:31:33.320 about anarchist talking points. 0:31:33.360 --> 0:31:34.680 It's it's funny as fuck to me. 0:31:35.960 --> 0:31:37.600 You know who won't break your heart? 0:31:38.600 --> 0:31:42.560 Frogs support this podcast if you don't fight them with 0:31:42.640 --> 0:31:56.640 therefore canoffee. Is there anything else you want to talk 0:31:56.680 --> 0:31:59.560 about with arbitration or should we move on to the 0:32:00.400 --> 0:32:04.600 impending doom of the postal Service? Yeah? 0:32:04.680 --> 0:32:07.200 I think I think the arbitration there's a whole lot 0:32:07.240 --> 0:32:09.800 of fear mongoring and shit. I think anyone paying attention 0:32:09.880 --> 0:32:12.600 to things we can't get a worse deal is the 0:32:12.760 --> 0:32:15.640 main point there, and that's that's the whole point of 0:32:15.680 --> 0:32:18.120 the vote no campaign is to just tell people, hey, dude, 0:32:18.120 --> 0:32:20.280 we might as well go down swinging, like we're not 0:32:20.320 --> 0:32:21.360 going to get a worse deal than this. 0:32:21.640 --> 0:32:23.320 But that's that's pretty much it for arbitration. 0:32:23.720 --> 0:32:25.840 Yeah, so let's let let's let's move on to the 0:32:25.880 --> 0:32:27.720 future of the post office, which I want to take 0:32:27.720 --> 0:32:30.680 a second to mention that, like, Okay, look like I 0:32:31.200 --> 0:32:33.680 am not someone who has any respect for the people 0:32:33.680 --> 0:32:35.880 who built the US government. However, if you want the 0:32:36.000 --> 0:32:40.880 US government to like exist, right, the postal service is 0:32:40.920 --> 0:32:43.640 something that was deemed so important that it is like 0:32:43.800 --> 0:32:46.040 establishing the postal service is in the main body of 0:32:46.080 --> 0:32:50.280 the constitution. Now, freedom of speech right, and like the 0:32:50.440 --> 0:32:54.080 right to free association, that's not in the main body 0:32:54.120 --> 0:32:57.280 of the constitution. That is a fucking amendment. Right. The 0:32:57.360 --> 0:33:00.440 people who built the American system thought that the postal 0:33:00.520 --> 0:33:03.160 service was a more important thing to make sure to 0:33:03.280 --> 0:33:06.400 have in the main body of the constitution that set 0:33:06.480 --> 0:33:08.000 up the modern version of the government. 0:33:08.160 --> 0:33:08.280 Right. 0:33:08.520 --> 0:33:11.600 They thought that shit was more important than like you're 0:33:11.720 --> 0:33:14.160 right to have freedom of assembly, like you're right to 0:33:14.320 --> 0:33:16.880 not literally be grabbed off the street and tortured, which 0:33:16.920 --> 0:33:19.680 is like the Fourth Amendment right. So like, you know, 0:33:20.120 --> 0:33:22.640 in the scale of priorities of like how important is 0:33:22.680 --> 0:33:25.320 the postal service, Like that's how important people who set 0:33:25.360 --> 0:33:29.240 it up thought it was. And those people were not 0:33:29.520 --> 0:33:32.640 very smart and like a bunch of racist slave voters. 0:33:32.800 --> 0:33:34.959 So I would argue it's actually more important than they 0:33:35.040 --> 0:33:37.560 thought it was because they're you know, I mean, like 0:33:37.600 --> 0:33:40.040 obviously their priorities are completely out of whack. 0:33:40.200 --> 0:33:43.720 But like I am not a founding father, stand but 0:33:43.920 --> 0:33:47.000 the post office was actually invented by Benjamin Franklin, who 0:33:47.040 --> 0:33:48.880 I don't believe owned any slaves, and. 0:33:49.400 --> 0:33:52.680 Yeah he was really racist, but yeah, oh yeah, I 0:33:52.760 --> 0:33:55.760 mean like I know, I know that, I know that part. 0:33:55.800 --> 0:33:59.959 I'm I just I don't think he actually owned anybody, 0:34:00.360 --> 0:34:03.800 but like that's it's a yeah yeah, and it was 0:34:03.840 --> 0:34:07.560 started I think fifteen years before the Constitution was even written. 0:34:07.720 --> 0:34:10.000 Oh no, he did, he he he he did own 0:34:10.040 --> 0:34:13.960 a slave as a young man, and I think freed him. 0:34:15.960 --> 0:34:17.880 You know, I was trying to get the racist bastard 0:34:17.920 --> 0:34:18.759 a little bit of a win. 0:34:19.040 --> 0:34:23.120 But like we're finding this out live on this So yeah, 0:34:23.160 --> 0:34:25.000 he did for his early life and then became an 0:34:25.000 --> 0:34:29.600 abolitionist later, which is still bad. 0:34:31.000 --> 0:34:36.480 Yeah, yeah, that's uh. You know, I'm glad you came 0:34:36.560 --> 0:34:37.719 around eventually, I guess. 0:34:37.880 --> 0:34:38.279 I don't know. 0:34:39.400 --> 0:34:42.200 Look, we're finding this out live on the show. Oh 0:34:42.280 --> 0:34:44.080 my god, that was a lot of time of him 0:34:44.160 --> 0:34:47.360 owning slaves. That absolutely I. 0:34:47.360 --> 0:34:50.239 Take that was why I take back my critical support. 0:34:50.600 --> 0:34:53.080 Critical uncritical opposition. 0:34:56.520 --> 0:35:00.920 To hell with Brent frank in school, the hell with 0:35:01.000 --> 0:35:05.239 b Franklin too. But yeah, we're coming in a Trump 0:35:05.800 --> 0:35:07.880 administration and stuff. And let me tell you that the 0:35:07.920 --> 0:35:11.160 situation wasn't really great under Biden either, because we have 0:35:11.239 --> 0:35:12.960 a postmaster, Lewis. 0:35:12.760 --> 0:35:13.520 Dickhead to Joy. 0:35:14.120 --> 0:35:17.480 He was put into place by Donald Trump, and you've 0:35:17.560 --> 0:35:21.200 seen they wanted to slow walk the post office into 0:35:21.239 --> 0:35:25.400 privatization since the Reagan years, right, and they're just slowly 0:35:25.600 --> 0:35:30.480 chipping away at service and quality. D Joy was connected 0:35:30.480 --> 0:35:33.960 to XPO, the giant logistics company. He had stock and 0:35:34.040 --> 0:35:37.400 I can't remember what position he held. He apparently detangled 0:35:37.440 --> 0:35:39.719 himself from that when he became postmaster. But you know, 0:35:39.800 --> 0:35:41.880 they all say that I don't know for sure. I 0:35:41.960 --> 0:35:44.799 am not an accountant, so I can't do that well. 0:35:44.840 --> 0:35:46.640 And like like, also I want to point out the 0:35:46.760 --> 0:35:49.840 president of the United States is issuing a cryptocurrency like 0:35:49.960 --> 0:35:52.600 that shit that sit is that shit is so fake now, 0:35:52.920 --> 0:35:55.319 like oh god yeah. 0:35:55.560 --> 0:35:57.840 So like Joy's also got a reputations of just being 0:35:57.880 --> 0:36:00.680 a massive job killer besides looking like a low rent 0:36:00.719 --> 0:36:06.520 spider man villain. So under his tenure, we've seen service 0:36:06.600 --> 0:36:09.239 take quality take a nosedive. And I want to talk 0:36:09.239 --> 0:36:11.280 about this stuff, and this might get my ass in trouble, 0:36:11.360 --> 0:36:15.080 but I am tired as a letter carrier who loves 0:36:15.200 --> 0:36:17.960 my job, loves saying hi to people in the neighborhood, 0:36:18.360 --> 0:36:20.719 loves walking three yards and knowing the names of all 0:36:20.760 --> 0:36:23.239 the dogs on my route, and being the face of 0:36:23.320 --> 0:36:29.200 the post office. It is so frustrating to have people 0:36:29.520 --> 0:36:33.239 blame the mail man and the letter carrier for the 0:36:33.360 --> 0:36:36.360 decline in service, because we are out there being brutalized 0:36:36.440 --> 0:36:40.760 by the Post Office, doing our best and fighting against 0:36:41.120 --> 0:36:44.920 the degradation of service. That is a top down problem 0:36:45.680 --> 0:36:50.680 with leadership in the Post Office. I wanted to outline 0:36:50.719 --> 0:36:53.279 some of the stuff that I have evidence of and 0:36:53.400 --> 0:36:59.040 have seen firsthand of management undercutting the service of the 0:36:59.120 --> 0:37:02.359 post office. They willfully delay the mail all the time. 0:37:03.360 --> 0:37:06.240 There's pictures of racks and racks of DPS. It's assorted 0:37:06.320 --> 0:37:09.200 letters and they come in trays just sitting in a 0:37:09.239 --> 0:37:12.880 warehouse somewhere, and management they will order you on a 0:37:12.960 --> 0:37:17.359 regular basis to prioritize delivering packages over the mail. If 0:37:17.400 --> 0:37:20.000 it's a big heavy day and they're looking at labor hours, 0:37:20.280 --> 0:37:22.359 they will sometimes tell you to not deliver the mail 0:37:22.400 --> 0:37:23.200 and just deliver. 0:37:23.000 --> 0:37:25.360 The packages because the packages. 0:37:24.960 --> 0:37:27.000 Have a tracking number and their boss can get in 0:37:27.080 --> 0:37:29.160 They can get in trouble for that, but they can 0:37:29.280 --> 0:37:31.440 lie and hide the mail for another day. 0:37:32.320 --> 0:37:33.839 Like that shit happens all the time. 0:37:34.200 --> 0:37:35.680 Yeah, So it's like can just be like they can 0:37:35.760 --> 0:37:38.640 just be like hiding like your bills yep, or life 0:37:38.719 --> 0:37:42.120 social Security check yeah yeah, also your junk mail. 0:37:42.360 --> 0:37:45.239 Have you ever have you ever ordered something and it 0:37:45.400 --> 0:37:48.160 says it was delivered but you didn't get it, and 0:37:48.239 --> 0:37:51.600 then it shows up the next day, or it says that, 0:37:51.760 --> 0:37:53.959 oh there's a vacation hold, I didn't put this on hold, 0:37:54.000 --> 0:37:55.360 and then it shows up the next day, or you 0:37:55.440 --> 0:37:56.840 got to go down to the post office. 0:37:56.600 --> 0:37:59.680 To get it, or recently severe weather delay. 0:38:00.120 --> 0:38:02.959 Yeah, well, I mean the severe the severe weather delay 0:38:03.040 --> 0:38:05.480 can happen, but I'm talking. What I'm talking about is 0:38:05.560 --> 0:38:07.879 ones where the package didn't make it to the letter 0:38:08.000 --> 0:38:10.600 carrier who's out there delivering. Because this has happened to 0:38:10.680 --> 0:38:13.880 me multiple times, and it didn't make it to me 0:38:14.080 --> 0:38:16.480 before I left the station. But because they want to 0:38:16.480 --> 0:38:18.719 make their numbers look good for their boss, they will 0:38:18.760 --> 0:38:21.080 scan it at the station as if it was delivered 0:38:21.400 --> 0:38:22.800 or as if it's a Jesus. 0:38:23.360 --> 0:38:23.600 Yeah. 0:38:23.719 --> 0:38:24.840 So because they want. 0:38:24.719 --> 0:38:26.960 Their numbers to look good, because their entire job is 0:38:27.120 --> 0:38:30.239 life on a spreadsheet. And so then I have to 0:38:30.520 --> 0:38:32.799 I have to talk to my customers the following day. 0:38:33.080 --> 0:38:34.560 But like it said, it is delivered. 0:38:34.680 --> 0:38:36.719 I didn't. I saw you, and you didn't drop it off. 0:38:36.719 --> 0:38:39.000 I was worried someone stole it. What happened. I was like, 0:38:39.040 --> 0:38:41.120 I know exactly what happened. I know what their name is. 0:38:41.719 --> 0:38:45.000 That's some of the service degradation. We've had people in 0:38:45.120 --> 0:38:47.000 other areas catch management. 0:38:46.719 --> 0:38:48.560 Throwing away mail Jesus Christ. 0:38:48.600 --> 0:38:49.120 Yeah, oh yeah. 0:38:49.360 --> 0:38:52.600 Management reprimanding carriers who follow the manual and provide good 0:38:52.680 --> 0:38:55.359 customer service, like I've been on the phone where I've 0:38:55.400 --> 0:38:58.160 had my manager call me because I was standing in 0:38:58.280 --> 0:39:01.560 one place for five minutes. And it's because I was 0:39:01.640 --> 0:39:05.719 helping an elderly woman move her garbage cans and helped 0:39:05.760 --> 0:39:08.200 her get some groceries out of her car to bring in. 0:39:08.360 --> 0:39:10.480 You know, all the stuff that you see the good 0:39:10.520 --> 0:39:12.920 mail man, the reason why people love the post office. 0:39:13.239 --> 0:39:16.640 Shit like that. I got told no, you're not doing that. 0:39:16.719 --> 0:39:18.560 And I had another customer come up to say hi 0:39:18.640 --> 0:39:21.040 to me while I was on the phone, and I 0:39:21.160 --> 0:39:23.799 just stopped to just say hi as I'm walking by, 0:39:24.000 --> 0:39:26.960 and my manager chewed me out for even talking to 0:39:27.080 --> 0:39:29.520 the person. They don't care about us, and they throw 0:39:29.640 --> 0:39:31.840 us under the bus all the time. Because if I 0:39:31.880 --> 0:39:33.680 don't deliver a package because they never made it to 0:39:33.760 --> 0:39:37.040 me and it says delivered, the customer will come and 0:39:37.080 --> 0:39:40.120 complain at the post office. Management will tell them, oh, 0:39:40.200 --> 0:39:42.560 I'll talk to the carrier. That carrier made a mistake, 0:39:43.000 --> 0:39:46.440 and it's no, carriers do make mistakes, but like this 0:39:46.719 --> 0:39:50.960 intentional degradation of service to make the numbers, that blame 0:39:51.040 --> 0:39:54.160 always goes on the letter carrier, and it is we 0:39:54.360 --> 0:39:58.080 love our job. We love our jobs we love our communities. 0:39:58.400 --> 0:40:00.719 I got like I might start crying if I talk 0:40:00.760 --> 0:40:02.920 about this too much, Like I love bringing treats to dogs, 0:40:03.440 --> 0:40:05.959 like I get Christmas cards from old folk on my route, 0:40:06.120 --> 0:40:11.000 Like I know, like I know when some people's birthdays are. 0:40:11.719 --> 0:40:13.759 And I had an old time around on my route, 0:40:13.920 --> 0:40:16.200 sat outside to say I to be every day. Suddenly 0:40:16.239 --> 0:40:18.399 he wasn't and his wife was out in the garden, 0:40:18.400 --> 0:40:20.920 and I said, where is he. Oh, he passed last night, 0:40:20.920 --> 0:40:23.840 and she starts crying. I start crying, and like I 0:40:24.480 --> 0:40:27.120 get in trouble for taking five minutes to give her 0:40:27.160 --> 0:40:31.320 a hug and talk things through for a second, like it's. 0:40:33.000 --> 0:40:33.600 Yeah, sorry. 0:40:34.960 --> 0:40:38.200 This is one of these areas where like delivering the 0:40:38.320 --> 0:40:40.520 mail is a social thing, but the thing is like 0:40:40.640 --> 0:40:44.600 sociality is the enemy of capital, and that's that's the 0:40:44.640 --> 0:40:46.879 people who are running the post office that they don't 0:40:46.880 --> 0:40:49.920 give a shit about, you know, like the actual social 0:40:50.040 --> 0:40:52.440 bonds and ties that you know that that are the 0:40:52.520 --> 0:40:55.000 thing that society is supposed to be composed of. Like 0:40:55.239 --> 0:40:58.880 they care about their metrics and them being able to 0:40:58.960 --> 0:41:01.279 make more money in them, you know, being able to 0:41:01.360 --> 0:41:04.600 advance higher in their career ladder. Yes, it reminds me 0:41:04.680 --> 0:41:07.200 a lot of the campaign against the school system, where 0:41:07.280 --> 0:41:10.040 you deliberately underfund things and then you blame the teachers 0:41:10.080 --> 0:41:11.799 for why the service is bad, and it's like, well, 0:41:11.960 --> 0:41:13.680 it is not a teacher's fault that there's like forty 0:41:13.719 --> 0:41:17.040 eight kids in a classroom, right, Like, yeah, you know. 0:41:17.280 --> 0:41:20.120 And there's also a very very similar preparatization campaign run 0:41:20.200 --> 0:41:22.759 by a bunch of Australia powerful forces. Let's go back 0:41:22.800 --> 0:41:25.640 and talk a bit about like who the people are 0:41:26.920 --> 0:41:29.400 who are doing this and what their sort of plans are. 0:41:29.800 --> 0:41:32.360 Yeah, so you have to joy he's doing that, and 0:41:32.440 --> 0:41:35.000 we have all of these they're starting to some of 0:41:35.040 --> 0:41:37.719 the stuff they're building these I think they're called sdnc's. 0:41:37.960 --> 0:41:41.640 It's basically they take a bunch of post offices from 0:41:41.719 --> 0:41:44.960 a metro area and then they make one big distribution 0:41:45.160 --> 0:41:49.480 hub like Amazon. Well that is adding an hour commute 0:41:49.719 --> 0:41:52.640 onto some of these letter carriers. They come in, they 0:41:52.719 --> 0:41:54.360 get to their mail truck and then they have to 0:41:54.440 --> 0:41:57.920 drive their mail truck for an hour to even start delivering. Right. 0:41:58.600 --> 0:42:00.640 It's a huge message, it's a huge fiasco, and it 0:42:00.719 --> 0:42:04.160 feels very intentional because what's going to happen when they 0:42:04.239 --> 0:42:08.040 close those facilities built by the government down and it 0:42:08.120 --> 0:42:10.719 starts to privatize. Well, what do you know, Amazon just 0:42:10.800 --> 0:42:13.040 got a new hub or whoever ends up trying to 0:42:13.040 --> 0:42:16.200 step in. That's a little conspiracy brained, but like certain 0:42:16.719 --> 0:42:22.000 fiasco's done by de Joy's delivering for America plan seem 0:42:22.800 --> 0:42:27.000 Taylor made to fail for the Post Office but work 0:42:27.120 --> 0:42:30.880 for someone else. And then also you have Brian Renfrow, 0:42:31.200 --> 0:42:34.040 who is the current president of the NLC, the one 0:42:34.080 --> 0:42:36.880 who was telling us that our tentative agreement was going 0:42:36.960 --> 0:42:40.400 to be historic, when all it does is help management. 0:42:41.120 --> 0:42:44.360 He has gone on speaking tours lying about this tentative 0:42:44.400 --> 0:42:48.680 agreement and everything he says sounds like management gave him 0:42:48.680 --> 0:42:50.920 a script. And there's a whole lot of theories on 0:42:51.040 --> 0:42:54.000 that and how when he know when he loses his position. 0:42:54.280 --> 0:42:57.080 People have running bets on what position he's going to 0:42:57.120 --> 0:42:59.239 take in the Post Office the second he's voted out. 0:43:00.040 --> 0:43:00.719 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 0:43:01.480 --> 0:43:03.840 He's the one who's negotiated this whole contract. 0:43:03.880 --> 0:43:07.440 He used his position as president, He iced out everyone 0:43:07.520 --> 0:43:09.520 from the union. He's the only one who talked to 0:43:09.600 --> 0:43:13.120 the Post Office. So this this tenet of agreement is 0:43:13.280 --> 0:43:17.000 his Babe, Wait, what yep, the executive council. What yeah, 0:43:17.040 --> 0:43:18.440 he didn't tell the executive council. 0:43:18.520 --> 0:43:20.000 Wait, you didn't even have like a bargaining team. 0:43:20.080 --> 0:43:20.799 No, he had a. 0:43:20.800 --> 0:43:23.960 Bargaining team that were all outside contractors. He had no 0:43:24.080 --> 0:43:27.040 one from the union with him. What yeah, because he wanted. 0:43:26.800 --> 0:43:27.720 It to be his baby. 0:43:28.120 --> 0:43:30.799 That's so unhidea. That's like, I need to stop here 0:43:30.840 --> 0:43:33.480 for a second, because that's like, if your union is 0:43:33.560 --> 0:43:36.920 doing that to you, you need to understand, Like, dear listener, 0:43:37.080 --> 0:43:38.960 that is not how any of this shit is supposed 0:43:39.000 --> 0:43:42.240 to work. Yep. Like, even even a normal corrupt union 0:43:42.800 --> 0:43:45.680 will have a bargaining team that is composed of like 0:43:46.000 --> 0:43:47.920 it will have a bargaining team that isn't outside contractors, 0:43:47.920 --> 0:43:49.440 so there'll be people from inside the union who are 0:43:49.480 --> 0:43:51.719 like the stooges of like whatever sort of management click 0:43:51.880 --> 0:43:55.319 is in power. Like having them all be outside contractors 0:43:55.600 --> 0:43:58.319 is one of the most ludicrous things I've ever heard. 0:43:59.120 --> 0:43:59.560 You need to. 0:44:01.120 --> 0:44:04.040 Cutting out. That's so wild, Oh my god. 0:44:04.200 --> 0:44:04.719 Oh yeah No. 0:44:04.960 --> 0:44:06.839 And the thing is we're coming up on six hundred 0:44:06.880 --> 0:44:10.359 days without an without a ratified contract, like he has 0:44:10.400 --> 0:44:12.440 been the only one doing it this whole time, and 0:44:12.560 --> 0:44:16.040 there's a bunch of shady shit. Okay, so he's struggled 0:44:16.040 --> 0:44:19.120 with alcoholism. I have dealt with addiction. I have lost 0:44:19.200 --> 0:44:22.520 friends to addiction. I have family members to struggle with addiction. 0:44:23.120 --> 0:44:27.600 I respect anybody who is going to take care themselves. 0:44:28.120 --> 0:44:32.200 But he disappeared for something like fifty days or something, 0:44:32.800 --> 0:44:38.000 didn't tell anybody. He ghosted everybody. He ghosted everybody, and 0:44:38.560 --> 0:44:41.160 this is the early days of negotiation. People stepped in 0:44:41.520 --> 0:44:45.560 to start negotiating without him. It turns out he had 0:44:45.600 --> 0:44:47.800 gone and checked himself into rehab. But the thing is, 0:44:48.080 --> 0:44:52.120 the NLC has two fucking vice presidents. I have all 0:44:52.200 --> 0:44:54.359 the respect in the world for someone to take care 0:44:54.360 --> 0:44:57.560 of themselves. But when you got two hundred and seventy 0:44:57.680 --> 0:45:02.719 seven thousand employees livelihood, yeah, you're responsible for and you 0:45:02.840 --> 0:45:04.800 got I don't care if you got cancer, if you 0:45:04.920 --> 0:45:08.440 got an addiction problem, or I don't care what it is. 0:45:08.600 --> 0:45:10.680 If you got to step away to take care of yourself, 0:45:10.920 --> 0:45:13.640 please do that. But puts your vice, one of your 0:45:13.680 --> 0:45:16.520 two fucking vice presidents in charge. So what happens is 0:45:16.600 --> 0:45:19.839 someone steps in while he's gone, he comes back, gets 0:45:20.000 --> 0:45:24.480 mad that at them, strips them of their responsibilities. Blackballs 0:45:24.560 --> 0:45:27.279 them from the union and goes back into negotiations all 0:45:27.320 --> 0:45:30.279 by himself, which is why getting to the next point 0:45:30.360 --> 0:45:33.080 on this. At the most generous, he is in ept 0:45:33.120 --> 0:45:35.840 as hell. He is inept as hell and just the 0:45:36.120 --> 0:45:38.680 worst sort of person to be in there. At the worst, 0:45:39.000 --> 0:45:42.239 he has corrupt as hell and just DeJoy's stooge. And 0:45:42.560 --> 0:45:45.160 the thing is, we work for the federal government. Whether 0:45:45.320 --> 0:45:49.000 it's malice or incompetence with the federal government, it's usually both. 0:45:49.400 --> 0:45:50.960 And it doesn't matter. 0:45:52.239 --> 0:45:54.360 Which one it is to me, whether he's corrupt or 0:45:54.440 --> 0:45:57.120 just an idiot, it's all the same to me because 0:45:57.160 --> 0:46:00.960 I can't make my fucking rent. So expect de Joy 0:46:01.080 --> 0:46:03.920 and the Post Office to do us dirty. That's their 0:46:04.080 --> 0:46:07.080 job as management. But to have the president of our 0:46:07.160 --> 0:46:12.239 own union doing this to us is unacceptable, and like 0:46:12.600 --> 0:46:14.839 it's yeah, yeah, yeah. 0:46:15.360 --> 0:46:18.240 So on that note, that's one of the big pushes 0:46:18.360 --> 0:46:24.000 for the union recently has been to reach open bargaining 0:46:24.080 --> 0:46:27.400 where the membership is actually a part of it. And 0:46:27.480 --> 0:46:30.320 that's what to my knowledge, it is one of the 0:46:30.400 --> 0:46:33.440 major issues that the building and fighting and IOC or 0:46:33.560 --> 0:46:37.360 the building better union talks are going towards. 0:46:38.000 --> 0:46:40.080 Yeah, can you can you talk about what open bargaining is. 0:46:40.440 --> 0:46:42.520 It's a thing that should be the standards for all unions. 0:46:42.640 --> 0:46:46.600 But yeah, I mean open bargaining is effectively the bottom 0:46:46.719 --> 0:46:52.600 up structure of having your members were even the representatives 0:46:52.680 --> 0:46:56.480 put forward motions that are open to the public and 0:46:56.600 --> 0:47:00.400 open to the membership so that you can effect tofllly 0:47:00.920 --> 0:47:05.440 ask for more or get a different variety of opinions 0:47:05.480 --> 0:47:09.520 and strategies, you know, the duality of power kind of structure. 0:47:09.880 --> 0:47:12.600 But what the post office currently has it's not open bargaining, 0:47:13.160 --> 0:47:15.799 or what postal union has, it's not open bargaining. They 0:47:15.880 --> 0:47:17.799 have their own team that they send in. They don't 0:47:17.840 --> 0:47:20.839 talk to the membership. You kind of just elect your 0:47:20.880 --> 0:47:24.359 officials and then they come back with whatever they ended 0:47:24.440 --> 0:47:26.680 up with, and they don't consult with any of their 0:47:26.680 --> 0:47:30.640 bottom line, which is problematic for obvious reasons, including this 0:47:30.760 --> 0:47:34.040 one where someone can go missing for fifty days and 0:47:34.280 --> 0:47:38.080 most of the membership has no idea. I've even talked 0:47:38.080 --> 0:47:40.920 to people. I think it was like two or three 0:47:40.960 --> 0:47:43.359 weeks ago. I went to a bar and I ran 0:47:43.440 --> 0:47:46.600 into a letter carrier from the next city over as 0:47:46.600 --> 0:47:47.399 a go did you vote? 0:47:47.480 --> 0:47:47.520 Know? 0:47:47.640 --> 0:47:50.680 And it's like, what are you talking about? He doesn't 0:47:50.719 --> 0:47:52.360 know that there's a vote going on. 0:47:53.920 --> 0:47:54.399 Is out there? 0:47:54.680 --> 0:47:58.880 Yeah yeah, but yeah, yeah, I guess. I mean, like 0:47:59.719 --> 0:48:01.480 the main objective we want to do, I'm sure we're 0:48:01.520 --> 0:48:02.200 running at a time. 0:48:02.560 --> 0:48:03.400 Yeah yeah, sorry. 0:48:03.920 --> 0:48:05.560 I could talk about this shit for days. 0:48:06.120 --> 0:48:06.800 I mean I do. 0:48:06.960 --> 0:48:10.120 That's pretty much all I do anymore. Like Tom was saying, 0:48:10.320 --> 0:48:13.680 the building of fighting ALC and pushing for the vote, 0:48:13.719 --> 0:48:14.040 no thing. 0:48:14.360 --> 0:48:16.880 The main thing that we're wanting is coming onto shows 0:48:16.920 --> 0:48:19.279 like this and getting the public perception of what the 0:48:19.400 --> 0:48:20.640 letter carrier deals. 0:48:20.440 --> 0:48:21.440 With what's going on. 0:48:21.640 --> 0:48:23.759 Because this Trump's coming in, they're going to be trying 0:48:23.760 --> 0:48:25.080 to privatize it like they always do. 0:48:25.560 --> 0:48:26.920 That's already been in the works. 0:48:27.200 --> 0:48:30.800 It's important that the public knows this degradation of service 0:48:31.200 --> 0:48:34.400 is the point of it, and how how can the 0:48:34.440 --> 0:48:36.600 public sort of support our fight so we can keep 0:48:36.920 --> 0:48:37.760 the post office. 0:48:38.239 --> 0:48:40.839 So I wanted to just share a couple of links. 0:48:40.880 --> 0:48:42.880 If you're a letter carrier and you want to get 0:48:42.960 --> 0:48:48.040 involved with reforming things from an electoral end, there's the 0:48:48.200 --> 0:48:50.840 Concern Letter Carriers and you can go to Concern Lettercarriers 0:48:50.880 --> 0:48:53.600 dot com. They're going to be running in twenty twenty 0:48:53.640 --> 0:48:56.480 six to get rid of Renfro. If you are impatient 0:48:56.640 --> 0:48:59.400 like me and you can't fucking wait that long, and 0:48:59.640 --> 0:49:01.600 if even if you're not a letter carrier, you can 0:49:01.960 --> 0:49:04.640 see how we're fighting with the building of Fighting NLC, 0:49:05.200 --> 0:49:08.240 which is more of a radical, bottom up reform caucus. 0:49:08.280 --> 0:49:09.920 If you want to get involved in that, or you 0:49:10.040 --> 0:49:12.120 just want to kind of get updates from people who 0:49:12.200 --> 0:49:15.960 aren't going to bullshit you, you can go to Fighting 0:49:16.280 --> 0:49:19.920 NLC dot com to check that out. Oh, Tom, did 0:49:19.920 --> 0:49:22.759 you want to talk about the ANLC Legislative Action Center. 0:49:23.520 --> 0:49:28.080 Yeah, so we touched briefly on last episode. The NLC 0:49:28.200 --> 0:49:30.880 actually can't really use a lot of the money and 0:49:30.960 --> 0:49:33.480 funds from the union itself to lobby or to push 0:49:33.600 --> 0:49:37.160 Congress or anything like that, so there are separate organizations. 0:49:37.200 --> 0:49:40.080 There are facets of our organization that do that. You 0:49:40.120 --> 0:49:43.800 can find that at NLC dot org. Specifically, they do 0:49:43.960 --> 0:49:46.120 have a link where you put in new zip code 0:49:46.160 --> 0:49:49.200 and it gives you the appropriate Congress member to write 0:49:49.200 --> 0:49:52.680 a letter to and really push them on what to do. 0:49:52.800 --> 0:49:53.000 There. 0:49:53.840 --> 0:49:56.400 You can also donate to their fund if you see 0:49:57.040 --> 0:49:59.000 so fit and are able to do so. 0:49:59.600 --> 0:50:02.839 Yeah, at that legislative action thing is actually pretty cool 0:50:02.920 --> 0:50:05.520 because you don't even have to call. They'll have pre 0:50:05.680 --> 0:50:07.759 filled out things that you can just click, enter your 0:50:07.800 --> 0:50:09.160 email and it'll do it for you. 0:50:09.320 --> 0:50:10.920 So it's a real quick snap. 0:50:11.280 --> 0:50:14.439 It's the easiest way to harass or your congress person, 0:50:14.480 --> 0:50:17.000 aside from drunk dialing Ted Cruz, which is my favorite. 0:50:18.680 --> 0:50:21.960 Yeah, we'll have links to all that. We'll have links 0:50:22.000 --> 0:50:22.920 to all that in the Discover. 0:50:23.560 --> 0:50:25.839 There's one more plug I wanted to make because all 0:50:25.880 --> 0:50:28.239 the fires out in LA right now, because you have 0:50:28.360 --> 0:50:31.080 letter carriers where the post office burned down and so 0:50:31.239 --> 0:50:34.239 did their house, and now they're reporting to duty at 0:50:34.280 --> 0:50:37.120 another post office twenty minutes away to go and deliver 0:50:37.480 --> 0:50:40.239 deliver mail to a devastated neighborhood. 0:50:40.600 --> 0:50:43.839 Because the thing is, when shit happens. 0:50:43.880 --> 0:50:47.080 Whether it's a hurricane or a fire or you know, 0:50:47.920 --> 0:50:51.279 the first people who show up are your neighbors or 0:50:51.360 --> 0:50:54.759 the punks or the punks and mutual aid in your 0:50:54.760 --> 0:50:58.120 neighbors show up. The first person you see from the government, 0:50:58.160 --> 0:51:01.600 we're federal employees, were not federally is. But the first 0:51:02.000 --> 0:51:05.080 hint of normalcy that a lot of people get is 0:51:06.120 --> 0:51:08.839 trying to just hide out and be safe and then 0:51:08.880 --> 0:51:11.279 they see their mail man walking through their fucking lawn 0:51:11.440 --> 0:51:13.160 trying to deliver it to their shit, you know what 0:51:13.239 --> 0:51:16.040 I mean. Like that's important, and we all love what 0:51:16.160 --> 0:51:17.840 we do. We love being a part of the community, 0:51:17.880 --> 0:51:21.160 and we love helping. And sorry, I knew I was 0:51:21.160 --> 0:51:22.439 gonna cry at some fucking point. 0:51:23.000 --> 0:51:23.280 Okay. 0:51:23.719 --> 0:51:26.439 So the NLCS an NLC Disaster Relief Fund. 0:51:26.960 --> 0:51:29.880 The public can donate to it. It's usually letter carriers. 0:51:29.960 --> 0:51:30.960 We all donate to it. 0:51:31.280 --> 0:51:33.520 And what happens is if your house burns down like 0:51:33.600 --> 0:51:36.200 in La right now, or if like you were devastating 0:51:36.239 --> 0:51:40.720 the fires in in in Hawaii or whatever. When that happens, 0:51:40.880 --> 0:51:43.720 a letter carrier can apply and as soon as they're approved, 0:51:43.760 --> 0:51:46.440 which can happen within a day or two, they automatically 0:51:46.480 --> 0:51:49.480 get sent like a thousand dollars from the fund to 0:51:50.040 --> 0:51:52.600 just pay for their pay for their hotel or pay 0:51:52.640 --> 0:51:55.400 for their rent a car. And then they get approved. 0:51:55.560 --> 0:51:58.479 It's not a fix all, but they'll get like they'll 0:51:58.480 --> 0:52:00.680 get another check after a little bit to help with 0:52:00.800 --> 0:52:03.600 some of their damages after they make their claim. That's 0:52:03.640 --> 0:52:07.520 something that normally it's just letter carriers giving to letter carriers. 0:52:07.520 --> 0:52:09.120 So we can all take care of each other, but 0:52:09.239 --> 0:52:11.120 like the public is allowed to donate to that too. 0:52:11.520 --> 0:52:13.240 I know there's a lot of you guys have already 0:52:13.280 --> 0:52:15.440 been talking about a lot of mutual aid stuff at 0:52:15.480 --> 0:52:18.080 the beginning of your episodes lately. I just want to 0:52:18.120 --> 0:52:20.600 plug that one as a mailman specific one. Yeah, I'm 0:52:20.600 --> 0:52:21.160 sorry for crying. 0:52:22.480 --> 0:52:26.560 No, no, Yeah, I mean it's emotional, it's yeah. 0:52:26.600 --> 0:52:29.879 That shit sucks, bro, Yeah, it really does. 0:52:31.200 --> 0:52:32.800 Yeah. Is is there anything else that you want to 0:52:32.840 --> 0:52:34.560 make sure people know before we head off? 0:52:35.160 --> 0:52:38.280 If I have one thing, it's just help your co workers. 0:52:38.440 --> 0:52:40.080 You don't have to be a steward. You don't have 0:52:40.200 --> 0:52:43.719 to be anything. Just find somebody who don't think deserves it. 0:52:43.880 --> 0:52:45.920 Help them too. I guarantee you that they do. 0:53:07.320 --> 0:53:10.560 I'm Michael Phillips, an historian, the author of a book 0:53:10.560 --> 0:53:13.880 about racism in Dallas called White Metropolis, and the co 0:53:14.080 --> 0:53:16.440 author of an upcoming book about the eugenics move in 0:53:16.600 --> 0:53:18.840 Texas called The Purifying Knife. 0:53:19.320 --> 0:53:22.960 And I'm Stephen Monchelli, an investigative reporter and columnist in 0:53:23.040 --> 0:53:26.000 Texas who covers political extremism and beyond. 0:53:26.960 --> 0:53:30.560 Since the late nineteen nineties, Alex Jones built an extensive 0:53:30.680 --> 0:53:34.799 media empire, spreading out landish conspiracy theories from his home 0:53:34.880 --> 0:53:38.560 base in Austin, Texas. A native of the Dallas suburb 0:53:38.640 --> 0:53:41.680 of Rockwall, over the years, Jones has claimed that the 0:53:41.760 --> 0:53:45.680 Apollo eleven moon landing was fake, so too, he said 0:53:46.120 --> 0:53:49.120 was the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting, he claimed 0:53:49.160 --> 0:53:54.720 was stage to justify new gun control laws. According to Jones, 0:53:54.760 --> 0:53:58.080 the US government can control the weather has intentionally caused 0:53:58.120 --> 0:54:01.719 floods and other weather disasters to punish Texas and other 0:54:01.840 --> 0:54:06.560 conservative states. He has insisted that chemicals intentionally placed in 0:54:06.640 --> 0:54:10.759 American drinking water are turning frogs gay, part of an 0:54:10.800 --> 0:54:13.880 experiment by the American government seeking a way to undermine 0:54:13.880 --> 0:54:19.680 the nuclear family while peddling dubious supplements with unproven health benefits. 0:54:20.120 --> 0:54:23.360 Jones began his broadcasting career with a call in public 0:54:23.440 --> 0:54:26.880 access cable TV show, before moving on to radio and 0:54:26.960 --> 0:54:31.720 then online. In spite of his outlandish claims, in twenty fifteen, 0:54:31.880 --> 0:54:34.480 Jones was able to set off a panic in Texas 0:54:34.920 --> 0:54:37.680 that inspired action from Governor Greg Abbott. 0:54:37.600 --> 0:54:42.320 Now to a Texas sized conspiracy theory, sparking headlines across 0:54:42.400 --> 0:54:45.480 the country, including this week in the New York Times 0:54:46.080 --> 0:54:50.600 the theory that an upcoming Pentagon training exercise is actually 0:54:50.719 --> 0:54:53.640 part of a plan to impose martial law. 0:54:54.080 --> 0:54:55.880 To many, it's far fetched, but not. 0:54:56.080 --> 0:54:59.399 To some of the top politicians in the Lone Star State. 0:55:00.040 --> 0:55:02.960 The conspiracy theory Jones described on his Info War show 0:55:03.040 --> 0:55:07.040 spun in even wilder directions. The Army troops participating in 0:55:07.080 --> 0:55:11.080 the jade Helm military exercise, panicked right wingers said, would 0:55:11.200 --> 0:55:15.000 turn on the local population. Guns would be seized from 0:55:15.040 --> 0:55:18.359 private citizens, and local walmarts would be converted into vast 0:55:18.480 --> 0:55:22.839 holding cells where those opposing Obama's plan to seize dictatorial 0:55:23.040 --> 0:55:26.840 power would be imprisoned. According to these sorts of theories, 0:55:27.400 --> 0:55:31.160 these accusations went viral, and a military spokesman got waylaid 0:55:31.200 --> 0:55:34.200 by angry questions At a Bastrop County Commissioner's Court meeting 0:55:34.560 --> 0:55:37.279 held near the Central Texas staging area for jade Helm. 0:55:38.239 --> 0:55:42.040 Armed men in trucks patrolled in Bastrup County and surrounding communities, 0:55:42.080 --> 0:55:45.480 and a private group called Counter jade Helm spied on 0:55:45.560 --> 0:55:48.600 the movement of troops and military vehicles while they quizzed 0:55:48.640 --> 0:55:51.279 residents for any intelligence they may have gathered on the 0:55:51.400 --> 0:55:53.840 impending alleged coup d'eta. 0:55:54.600 --> 0:55:59.200 The crazier the conspiracy theory got, the more Texas's far 0:55:59.400 --> 0:56:02.080 right political leaders were willing to pander to Jones and 0:56:02.160 --> 0:56:05.880 his elk. Texas Governor Greg Abbott ordered the Texas National 0:56:05.920 --> 0:56:09.040 Guard to monitor US Army troops near Austin. 0:56:09.280 --> 0:56:14.120 We're playing a pivotal role of government, and that is 0:56:14.200 --> 0:56:17.280 to provide information until people have questions. 0:56:17.960 --> 0:56:21.240 Texas Senator Ted Cruz pledged that he would demand answers 0:56:21.239 --> 0:56:24.800 from the Pentagon about the military's intentions, and said he 0:56:24.880 --> 0:56:27.360 completely understood the widespread paranoia. 0:56:27.640 --> 0:56:28.880 You know, I understand the. 0:56:28.960 --> 0:56:31.600 Concern that's been raised by a lot of citizens about 0:56:31.680 --> 0:56:32.120 Jade Hell. 0:56:32.320 --> 0:56:33.680 We have seen for six. 0:56:33.640 --> 0:56:37.719 Years a federal government disrespecting the liberty of the citizens, 0:56:38.680 --> 0:56:40.080 and that produces fever. 0:56:40.680 --> 0:56:44.040 Suffice it to say, the Obama administration did not overthrow 0:56:44.080 --> 0:56:47.920 the state government. The intense outrage and fear generated over 0:56:48.080 --> 0:56:52.360 army combat preparations might have seen perplexing to those outside 0:56:52.400 --> 0:56:55.880 of Texas, a state that prides itself on being patriotic 0:56:55.920 --> 0:57:00.800 and pro military. However, seething distrust of liberal elites is 0:57:00.840 --> 0:57:04.680 a lucrative business in Texas. Alex Jones built a fortune 0:57:04.680 --> 0:57:07.799 of two hundred and seventy million with his Internet show 0:57:08.200 --> 0:57:11.719 and sales of dubious health and survivalist products advertised on 0:57:11.800 --> 0:57:15.319 those broadcasts. This is nothing new south of the Red River. 0:57:16.000 --> 0:57:18.080 From the beginning of its history, the state has been 0:57:18.080 --> 0:57:24.000 an incubator for outlandish and occasionally not completely unreasonable conspiracy theories. 0:57:24.480 --> 0:57:28.800 After Texas violently separated from Mexico in eighteen thirty six, 0:57:29.320 --> 0:57:32.080 white Texans spent the next decade fearing their southern neighbor, 0:57:32.440 --> 0:57:36.200 a nation that saw the Texas Revolution as illegitimate and 0:57:36.480 --> 0:57:40.480 wanted to regain control of the breakaway province. Meanwhile, those 0:57:40.520 --> 0:57:43.440 same white Texans viewed the African Americans they enslaved with 0:57:43.560 --> 0:57:47.360 suspicion bordering on dread, knowing that their black captives desperately 0:57:47.480 --> 0:57:51.360 wanted freedom and might use violence to liberate themselves. This 0:57:51.520 --> 0:57:55.280 created an atmosphere of uncertainty and distrust that fed conspiracy 0:57:55.320 --> 0:57:59.720 theories of all sorts. After their rebellion against Mexico, Texans 0:57:59.760 --> 0:58:02.040 won to become part of the United States, but they 0:58:02.080 --> 0:58:04.240 were forced to spend almost a full decade as an 0:58:04.280 --> 0:58:07.960 independent republic because of well founded suspicions held by American 0:58:08.040 --> 0:58:11.640 abolitionists that the Texas Revolution was a part of a 0:58:11.760 --> 0:58:14.440 plot to add a slave state to the Union. 0:58:15.000 --> 0:58:18.640 A decade later, the tide shifted and Texas was hurriedly 0:58:18.720 --> 0:58:22.920 annexed in eighteen forty five after widespread rumors gripped Washington 0:58:23.040 --> 0:58:25.800 d c of a British plot to an next Texas 0:58:25.880 --> 0:58:29.640 and converted to a haven for African Americans escaping slavery. 0:58:30.760 --> 0:58:34.160 In the eighteen fifties, even prominent Texans like Sam Houston 0:58:34.240 --> 0:58:37.800 flocked to the American Party, also known as the know Nothings, 0:58:38.120 --> 0:58:41.240 that claimed the Pope had ordered Catholics from Ireland Germany 0:58:41.320 --> 0:58:43.960 to immigrate to the United States in order to take 0:58:44.000 --> 0:58:48.200 the country over and hand power over to the Vatican Panics. 0:58:48.240 --> 0:58:52.560 O were suspected rebellions by the enslaved, gripped Anglo Texans 0:58:52.600 --> 0:58:56.320 in eighteen thirty five, eighteen thirty eight, eighteen forty one, 0:58:56.480 --> 0:58:59.440 and in eighteen fifty six went perhaps as many as 0:58:59.480 --> 0:59:03.480 four hundred African Americans held in Bondage and Colorado County 0:59:03.520 --> 0:59:07.160 in south central Texas apparently plotted to rise up against 0:59:07.200 --> 0:59:10.480 their white oppressors and battle their way to freedom. In Mexico, 0:59:10.840 --> 0:59:12.520 where slavery had been abolished. 0:59:13.200 --> 0:59:17.479 Eighteen sixty, construction workers carelessly tossed matches into a pile 0:59:17.560 --> 0:59:20.880 of wood in Dallas during a hot, drought ridden summer. 0:59:21.560 --> 0:59:24.400 The blaze that resulted destroyed much of what was then 0:59:24.480 --> 0:59:28.680 only a village. Immediately, suspecting that enslaved arsonists had set 0:59:28.720 --> 0:59:31.520 the fire as part of a planned revolution, whites in 0:59:31.600 --> 0:59:34.560 Dallas tortured and whipped almost every enslaved person in the 0:59:34.600 --> 0:59:38.520 county in search of scapegoats. Eventually, they hanged three African 0:59:38.560 --> 0:59:40.920 Americans and set off what would become known as the 0:59:41.080 --> 0:59:44.640 Texas Troubles. Fires broke out across the state, and each 0:59:44.720 --> 0:59:48.000 got blamed on black suspects and their supposed white abolitionists. 0:59:48.000 --> 0:59:52.720 Instigators often men from northern states. As one historian put it, 0:59:53.040 --> 0:59:55.919 white Texan enslavers decided it was better to quote hang 0:59:56.120 --> 0:59:59.520 ninety nine innocent men than to let one guilty pass. 1:00:00.280 --> 1:00:03.840 Acting on little evidence, mobs lynched as many as eighty 1:00:03.880 --> 1:00:08.680 enslaved African American men and thirty seven accused white abolitionists. 1:00:09.080 --> 1:00:11.600 By the time the panic burned out in September. 1:00:11.720 --> 1:00:15.120 A wave of labor unrest, including the Great Southwest Railroad 1:00:15.160 --> 1:00:17.600 Strike of eighteen eighty six and the rise of the 1:00:17.640 --> 1:00:21.080 Populace movement, which called for the government seizure railroads and 1:00:21.120 --> 1:00:25.160 telegraph lines, in addition to a global panic amongst the 1:00:25.200 --> 1:00:28.560 well to do about anarchism. After a series of bombings 1:00:28.600 --> 1:00:30.720 in Europe and even the United States from the eighteen 1:00:30.760 --> 1:00:34.560 eighties to just after World War One convinced economic elites 1:00:34.640 --> 1:00:37.880 in Texas that revolution was in the air. The ku 1:00:37.920 --> 1:00:42.640 Klux Klan, which in its original incarnation during reconstruction served 1:00:42.680 --> 1:00:45.920 as a goon squad to keep newly freed African American 1:00:46.000 --> 1:00:49.680 labor under tight control, came to dominate cities like Dallas 1:00:49.720 --> 1:00:53.160 in the nineteen twenties, where one and every three eligible 1:00:53.240 --> 1:00:54.360 men were members. 1:00:54.040 --> 1:00:54.760 Of the KKK. 1:00:55.000 --> 1:00:58.360 At its peak, the KKK charged that both Jews and 1:00:58.480 --> 1:01:03.360 Catholics were conspired hiring to control the world. Texas politicians 1:01:03.480 --> 1:01:06.680 like Representative John Box of Texas, in a column in 1:01:06.760 --> 1:01:11.160 Henry Ford's anti Semitic newspaper The Dearborn Independent, charged that 1:01:11.280 --> 1:01:14.960 Jews had manipulated the Congress. They add loopholes to American 1:01:15.000 --> 1:01:18.400 immigration laws passed in nineteen twenty one nineteen twenty four 1:01:18.920 --> 1:01:21.800 in order to let Jewish people escaping the Russian Empire 1:01:21.920 --> 1:01:24.600 into the United States as part of a scheme to 1:01:24.720 --> 1:01:26.280 undermine American society. 1:01:26.840 --> 1:01:29.760 As oil millionaires and billionaires built their wealth over the 1:01:29.840 --> 1:01:34.000 twentieth century, they became a force in conspiratorial faw right 1:01:34.080 --> 1:01:38.080 politics in Texas. Starting in the nineteen thirties, they mobilized 1:01:38.080 --> 1:01:41.040 against Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal, which they insisted was a 1:01:41.080 --> 1:01:44.439 part of an international communist plan to overthrow capitalism around 1:01:44.480 --> 1:01:48.880 the planet. Anti communism, anti Semitism, and hostility to the 1:01:48.960 --> 1:01:52.040 post World War II African American civil rights movement blended 1:01:52.080 --> 1:01:55.800 seamlessly in the conspiratorial imaginations of the fall right, in 1:01:55.840 --> 1:01:59.400 the lone Star State, ideas that reached a national audience 1:01:59.520 --> 1:02:01.360 in large part because of oil money. 1:02:01.760 --> 1:02:05.000 John Owen Beatty, the longtime chairman of the English Department's 1:02:05.000 --> 1:02:09.400 Southern Methodist University in Dallas, in nineteen fifty one, authored 1:02:09.440 --> 1:02:12.600 one of the first and perhaps the best selling of 1:02:12.680 --> 1:02:17.400 all time, book promoting Holocaust denial Iron Curtain over America. 1:02:18.560 --> 1:02:20.720 Beatty claimed that the Jews of today were not the 1:02:20.840 --> 1:02:24.960 Hebrew heroes of what Christians called the Old Testament. Instead, 1:02:25.120 --> 1:02:27.920 they were descended from a sinister Asian trot called the 1:02:28.040 --> 1:02:31.720 Kazars that converted his Judaism around the year eight hundred, 1:02:32.400 --> 1:02:36.440 too arrogant to assimilate with Christian Europe, Baty wrote Kazar's 1:02:36.560 --> 1:02:41.200 undermined society under their stolen identities and caused the Communist 1:02:41.280 --> 1:02:45.520 Revolution in Russian nineteen eighteen. After immigrating to the United 1:02:45.560 --> 1:02:48.720 States in large numbers, they took over the Democratic Party, 1:02:48.840 --> 1:02:52.520 Batty said, and moved it to the radical left. Beatty 1:02:52.640 --> 1:02:56.920 also claimed that Jews controlled Franklin Roosevelt's administration and pushed 1:02:56.920 --> 1:03:00.320 it into war against Hitler's Germany, which Beatty discribed in 1:03:00.360 --> 1:03:03.520 his book as quote the historic bulwark of Christian Europe, 1:03:04.120 --> 1:03:07.360 a mere six years after Soviet and American troops that 1:03:07.480 --> 1:03:11.280 liberated Nazi concentration camps. Betty claimed that most of the 1:03:11.400 --> 1:03:14.400 victims there died from disease and the Holocaust was a 1:03:14.520 --> 1:03:18.200 fraud used after nineteen forty eight to blackmail the West 1:03:18.240 --> 1:03:22.120 into political and financial support of Israel. The SMU professor 1:03:22.320 --> 1:03:25.320 urged the United States to expel Jews from the United States. 1:03:25.880 --> 1:03:30.040 Rather than earning him scorn. Bed's virulently hateful anti Jewish 1:03:30.160 --> 1:03:33.440 rants won him a large following his book, Iron Curtain 1:03:33.480 --> 1:03:36.560 Over America went through nine printings. By nineteen fifty three, 1:03:37.360 --> 1:03:41.520 the Public Affairs Luncheon Club, a women's organization, adopted a 1:03:41.640 --> 1:03:45.840 unanimous resolution backing BAT and requesting that SMU investigate alleged 1:03:45.920 --> 1:03:51.160 communist influence on the university's faculty politics and values. Bed 1:03:51.400 --> 1:03:54.400 taught at SMU until his retirement in nineteen fifty seven, 1:03:54.880 --> 1:03:58.240 two years after a panic over allegedly read art during 1:03:58.280 --> 1:04:02.280 which the conservative Dallas Patriotic Council accused the Dallas Museum 1:04:02.320 --> 1:04:06.480 of Art of intentionally promoting quote subversive artists who were 1:04:06.520 --> 1:04:09.960 ostensibly part of communist front groups connected to the Soviet 1:04:10.080 --> 1:04:11.200 Union after. 1:04:11.080 --> 1:04:13.680 World War Two in the establishment of communist regimes in 1:04:13.760 --> 1:04:17.120 Eastern Europe and in China. The uber wealthy giants of 1:04:17.160 --> 1:04:20.480 the Texas oil industry, to a large degree, funded what 1:04:20.640 --> 1:04:24.840 came to be known as McCarthyism. Clinton murchison, whose son 1:04:24.920 --> 1:04:28.480 in nineteen sixty became owner of the Dallas Cowboys National 1:04:28.520 --> 1:04:32.360 Football League team, became one of the largest financial contributors 1:04:32.440 --> 1:04:36.680 to red baiting Senator Joe McCarthy of Wisconsin. In Houston, 1:04:36.800 --> 1:04:40.320 hard right organizations like the Minute Women Fought Against School 1:04:40.360 --> 1:04:44.560 Integration took over the school board firing the assistant superintendent, 1:04:44.600 --> 1:04:48.360 George eBay because he previously lived in California and Oregon, 1:04:48.640 --> 1:04:51.280 where he had nice things to say about Roosevelt's new 1:04:51.360 --> 1:04:55.280 deal in the African American freedom struggle. A math instructor 1:04:55.360 --> 1:04:58.520 got fired after he carelessly common in a teacher's lounge. 1:04:58.920 --> 1:05:03.320 They supported Adleae's Stevenson, the Liberal Democratic Party nominee for president. 1:05:03.400 --> 1:05:07.760 In nineteen fifty two and nineteen fifty six, Theston School 1:05:07.760 --> 1:05:10.800 Board yanked books from campus libraries that said positive things 1:05:10.840 --> 1:05:14.240 about the United Nations, while right wingers in Dallas force 1:05:14.320 --> 1:05:17.040 the City Library and the Museum of Fine Arts the 1:05:17.200 --> 1:05:21.320 demand artists like Diego Rivera and Pablo Picasso because of 1:05:21.320 --> 1:05:23.080 their supposed communist sympathies. 1:05:23.520 --> 1:05:26.440 But before we get into that quick ad break. 1:05:36.520 --> 1:05:40.240 One Dallas oil magnate who built a mansion intentionally designed 1:05:40.280 --> 1:05:44.040 to be a bigger duplicate of George Washington's Mount Vernon estate. 1:05:44.480 --> 1:05:47.840 He used his wealth to broadcast extremist fever dreams in 1:05:47.880 --> 1:05:51.600 the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties. His name was hl Hunt, 1:05:51.920 --> 1:05:54.640 and he was profiled by the BBC in the nineteen sixties. 1:05:55.000 --> 1:05:57.080 But as well as being perhaps the most approval. The 1:05:57.160 --> 1:06:00.520 most stingy plutocrat of Texas, HL Hunt is probably the 1:06:00.560 --> 1:06:03.480 most controversial, for he is a fervent advocate of right 1:06:03.520 --> 1:06:07.280 wing some would say reactionary causes. He is against the UN, 1:06:07.600 --> 1:06:11.160 against the War on Party, against Medicare, against central government 1:06:11.200 --> 1:06:14.240 aid of any sort. He would rather Washington didn't rule 1:06:14.240 --> 1:06:17.000 the United States at all, and in his ideal land, 1:06:17.120 --> 1:06:19.560 votes would be distributed according to the amount of taxes 1:06:19.600 --> 1:06:23.320 who paid more than most Texans. Even he is inclined 1:06:23.360 --> 1:06:26.240 to see communists under every couch and behind every curtain. 1:06:27.080 --> 1:06:30.800 To Hunt, mankind is divided into communists and constructives. His 1:06:31.040 --> 1:06:34.880 private word for anti communists, you are either for him morroganim. 1:06:35.600 --> 1:06:37.080 He brooks no halfway position. 1:06:37.920 --> 1:06:41.560 A health baddist who avoided whitebread and sugar, Hunt believed 1:06:41.600 --> 1:06:44.400 his diet of largely raw vegetables might actually allow him 1:06:44.440 --> 1:06:48.560 to achieve immortality. He also thought he had psychic abilities, 1:06:49.040 --> 1:06:52.840 lived as a secret bigamist, and published pamphlets such as 1:06:53.240 --> 1:06:56.720 Hitler was a Liberal, an early prototype of Rupert Murdoch 1:06:56.760 --> 1:07:00.200 and Elon Musk. Hunt tried to create an alternative right 1:07:00.240 --> 1:07:04.800 wing media infrastructure, funding a nationwide radio program and pamphlet 1:07:04.920 --> 1:07:10.080 subscription called Lifeline that promoted conspiracy theories from coast to coast. 1:07:10.480 --> 1:07:11.840 Didn't time for last time. 1:07:12.760 --> 1:07:15.400 Let the tective class is around the world. 1:07:16.000 --> 1:07:19.080 Every leftist praise and cliche of the past half cent 1:07:19.120 --> 1:07:22.160 three now has the hollow ring of mythology. 1:07:23.120 --> 1:07:25.880 This is freedom Talk number fifty three Brendy. 1:07:25.680 --> 1:07:27.440 Cup is all available at the rate of three for 1:07:27.520 --> 1:07:31.880 twenty five cents from Lifeline, Dallas, Texas seven five two 1:07:31.920 --> 1:07:32.360 o six. 1:07:33.000 --> 1:07:34.760 I'll be back after this message. 1:07:34.440 --> 1:07:35.240 From our sponsor. 1:07:36.000 --> 1:07:38.760 The Lifeline show was hosted by a former FBI agent 1:07:38.880 --> 1:07:42.440 named Dan Smoot and broadcasts on more than eighty television 1:07:42.480 --> 1:07:46.680 one hundred and fifty radio stations. Hunt believed that democracy 1:07:46.840 --> 1:07:49.440 was the instrument through which wealth would be seized from 1:07:49.480 --> 1:07:53.840 billionaires such mself and redistributed to the lazy and the worthless. 1:07:54.240 --> 1:07:58.040 Hunt once rage at Smoot when the Lifeline hosts claimed 1:07:58.080 --> 1:08:01.920 on air that democracy was political outgrowth of the teachings 1:08:01.960 --> 1:08:06.640 of Jesus Christ, Hunt corrected Smooth, condemning democracy is the 1:08:06.760 --> 1:08:10.160 handwork of the devil in a phony liberal form of 1:08:10.280 --> 1:08:13.840 watered down communism. Hunt innovated in number of ways to 1:08:13.880 --> 1:08:17.919 alarm audiences about far left plots during. 1:08:17.720 --> 1:08:20.639 The last two years, hl Hunt has added another emotive 1:08:20.680 --> 1:08:24.000 missile to his armory, his league of so called youth 1:08:24.160 --> 1:08:28.200 freedom speakers, engaging young teenagers drilled to deliver three minute 1:08:28.240 --> 1:08:31.679 bursts of his propaganda to rotary clubs and Bible classes. 1:08:32.600 --> 1:08:35.840 Many people in the United States really don't believe that 1:08:36.000 --> 1:08:40.040 communism is a serious threat. Well, these people are in 1:08:40.160 --> 1:08:44.400 for a big shock because the communists have every intention 1:08:44.600 --> 1:08:48.200 of doing exactly what they've said they'll do, and they 1:08:48.240 --> 1:08:51.880 do not hesitate to use force and violence anytime they 1:08:52.000 --> 1:08:52.479 think that it. 1:08:52.479 --> 1:08:56.320 Will further their cause. Now, I don't pretend to know 1:08:56.439 --> 1:09:01.080 all the answers, but I do know that it is 1:09:01.240 --> 1:09:05.080 our duty to get out and warn others of the 1:09:05.240 --> 1:09:08.240 serious threat that we are facing. We have got to 1:09:08.320 --> 1:09:10.800 get out and tell others of the subversive movements that 1:09:10.840 --> 1:09:13.639 are going on right here under our very own noses. 1:09:14.840 --> 1:09:17.600 It's time to do away with this attitude. Oh, it 1:09:17.800 --> 1:09:23.120 can't happen here. Will communists bury us? Will we face 1:09:23.240 --> 1:09:26.040 fine squad as in Cuba? And will our little bitty 1:09:26.120 --> 1:09:33.120 children become slaves? Ladies and gentlemen. The answer rests in 1:09:33.160 --> 1:09:36.160 the hands of you and others like you. 1:09:37.560 --> 1:09:37.960 Thank you. 1:09:41.120 --> 1:09:43.439 For much of the twentieth century, Dallas had built up 1:09:43.439 --> 1:09:47.719 a reputation as a clean, dull, modern, and efficiently run city. 1:09:48.600 --> 1:09:51.000 By the nineteen fifties, however, it had also acquired a 1:09:51.040 --> 1:09:55.200 reputation as the capital of crackpots and conspiracy theorists, a 1:09:55.280 --> 1:09:59.760 development that historian Edward H. Miller would describe in his 1:10:00.040 --> 1:10:04.479 book Not to Country. In nineteen fifty four, Dallas elected 1:10:04.520 --> 1:10:08.680 a far right House representative, Republican Bruce Alger. Less than 1:10:08.720 --> 1:10:11.439 a week prior to the nineteen sixty presidential election between 1:10:11.560 --> 1:10:15.080 John Kennedy and Richard Nixon, a pro Alger mob assaulted 1:10:15.160 --> 1:10:18.439 in spat on the Democratic vice presidential nominee and then 1:10:18.520 --> 1:10:22.680 Texas Senator Lyndon Johnson and his wife, Ladybird, as they 1:10:22.800 --> 1:10:27.200 left the Adolphus Hotel in downtown Dallas. Alger joined the protesters, 1:10:27.320 --> 1:10:31.080 who held signs with slogans that said LBJ sold out 1:10:31.120 --> 1:10:35.040 to Yankee socialists. Soon thereafter, Major General Edwin Walker, who 1:10:35.120 --> 1:10:39.560 inspired the deranged fictional character General Jack d Ripper, the 1:10:39.600 --> 1:10:43.360 person responsible for global nuclear holocaust in the nineteen sixty 1:10:43.400 --> 1:10:46.320 four film at Doctor Strangelove, called Dallas Home. 1:10:46.720 --> 1:10:51.400 I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, 1:10:52.479 --> 1:10:59.960 Communist in doctor nation, communist subversion, and the International Commune 1:11:00.240 --> 1:11:07.759 conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids. 1:11:08.720 --> 1:11:12.679 Before filmmaker Stanley Kubrick turned Walker into an unforgettable caricature, 1:11:13.479 --> 1:11:17.120 the real life Walker achieved infamy commanding an infantry division 1:11:17.240 --> 1:11:21.200 in what was then Western Germany. President Kennedy pressured Walker 1:11:21.240 --> 1:11:24.479 to resign because he repeatedly lectured soldiers under his command 1:11:24.560 --> 1:11:27.760 to vote for far right wing political candidates. He also 1:11:27.840 --> 1:11:31.839 distributed among the troops literature from the conspiracy theory promoting 1:11:32.000 --> 1:11:35.280 far right John Birch Society, and he encouraged them to join. 1:11:36.040 --> 1:11:39.919 The John Birch Society, formed in nineteen fifty eight, opposed 1:11:39.920 --> 1:11:43.280 American membership in the United Nations, which it claimed was 1:11:43.360 --> 1:11:47.360 part of a global communist conspiracy to enslave free peoples 1:11:47.680 --> 1:11:51.760 around the world. The fringe organization, established by former candy 1:11:51.840 --> 1:11:56.879 manufacturer Robert Welsh, accused all American presidents from Franklin Roosevelt 1:11:56.920 --> 1:12:00.320 to Kennedy of being secret communists under the command of 1:12:00.360 --> 1:12:01.360 the Soviet government. 1:12:02.479 --> 1:12:05.519 The John Birch Society also saw the African American Civil 1:12:05.600 --> 1:12:08.960 rights movement as part of a Bolshevik conspiracy to divide 1:12:08.960 --> 1:12:12.479 the country, and argued that efforts of towns and cities 1:12:12.520 --> 1:12:15.439 after World War II to add fluoride to public water 1:12:15.560 --> 1:12:18.960 supplies was part of a sinister scheme to weaken men 1:12:19.040 --> 1:12:21.840 physically and make them less able to resist the radical 1:12:21.920 --> 1:12:26.599 takeover the United States. That particular Bircher conspiracy theory made 1:12:26.640 --> 1:12:30.720 a long lasting impact on the American psyche. Cities across 1:12:30.840 --> 1:12:34.720 the United States banned fluoridated water today. That John Birch 1:12:34.800 --> 1:12:38.360 Society is still active in North Texas, where recent gubernatorial 1:12:38.479 --> 1:12:42.680 candidate and car dealer Don Huffines has published anti floridation 1:12:42.920 --> 1:12:46.600 essays on The Dallas Express, a right wing website that 1:12:46.800 --> 1:12:49.960 repurposed the name of historic black newspaper that went defunct 1:12:50.040 --> 1:12:51.240 in the nineteen seventies. 1:12:51.880 --> 1:12:54.880 Edwin Walker's devotion to the John Birch movement cost him 1:12:54.920 --> 1:12:59.400 his military career. Under pressure from Defense Secretary Robert mcmara, 1:13:00.000 --> 1:13:03.439 Walker retired and moved to Dallas, where he found a 1:13:03.560 --> 1:13:07.320 friendly political environment. The national far right saw him as 1:13:07.320 --> 1:13:10.760 a martyr to Kennedy's supposedly out of control leftism, and 1:13:10.880 --> 1:13:14.439 he received financial support from fellow devotee of the John 1:13:14.479 --> 1:13:19.400 Birch Society hl Hunt. In nineteen sixty one, Walker made 1:13:19.400 --> 1:13:22.080 the cover of Newsweek as a leader of the New Right, 1:13:22.640 --> 1:13:25.400 and in nineteen sixty two he entered the race for 1:13:25.520 --> 1:13:26.320 Texas governor. 1:13:26.920 --> 1:13:31.120 To all victims of communist tyranny throughout the world, I 1:13:31.280 --> 1:13:35.480 send this word the hour of your deliverance is approaching. 1:13:36.120 --> 1:13:40.960 To patriots in every land Korea, China, the Ukraine, the 1:13:41.040 --> 1:13:46.600 Baltic Nations, Poland, Hungary, East Germany, the Congo, Cuba, and 1:13:46.760 --> 1:13:50.559 every other land strickened by the monster of communism. I say, 1:13:51.240 --> 1:13:55.799 for the time, lie low, preparing your hearts for liberation. 1:13:56.479 --> 1:14:00.320 Do not expose yourselves to the brutal requital of a hunster. 1:14:00.760 --> 1:14:05.320 Temporarily in power, Walker was a painfully dull public speaker. 1:14:05.920 --> 1:14:08.240 In the end, he couldn't bring his version of deliverance 1:14:08.320 --> 1:14:11.479 to his own state, finishing a distant sixth in the 1:14:11.560 --> 1:14:15.439 nineteen sixty two coubinatorial race. That would not prevent him 1:14:15.479 --> 1:14:18.439 and his allies from creating mayhem over the following months. 1:14:19.040 --> 1:14:22.480 He got arrested and was ordered to be psychiatrically evaluated 1:14:22.520 --> 1:14:26.519 by Attorney General Robert Kennedy after he incited racial violence 1:14:26.600 --> 1:14:30.000 during the integration of the University of Mississippi. In September 1:14:30.120 --> 1:14:35.000 nineteen sixty two, Adelaide Stevenson, John Kennedy's ambassador of the 1:14:35.120 --> 1:14:37.920 United Nations, would confront Walker and a model of his 1:14:38.080 --> 1:14:41.800 followers when the diplomat visited Big d on October twenty sixth, 1:14:41.920 --> 1:14:45.799 nineteen sixty three. Stevenson was shoutowed down as he attempted 1:14:45.840 --> 1:14:49.160 to deliver a un day's speech to Dallas Council on 1:14:49.280 --> 1:14:50.040 World Affairs. 1:15:03.280 --> 1:15:05.200 Shall we get on with the business of the meeting? 1:15:13.040 --> 1:15:19.720 Surely, surely, my dear friend, I don't have to come 1:15:19.800 --> 1:15:21.840 here from Illinois to teach Texas. 1:15:21.600 --> 1:15:22.240 Mantors, do I. 1:15:24.880 --> 1:15:28.960 Outside Memorial Auditorium theater, where Stevenson delivered his speech, Walker 1:15:29.040 --> 1:15:31.479 had gathered a furious gang of middle and upper class 1:15:31.520 --> 1:15:34.960 men and women who rocked his limousine back and forth 1:15:35.000 --> 1:15:37.720 while it waited to whisk him away to safety, and 1:15:37.880 --> 1:15:41.439 surrounded the ambassador when he stepped outside. When he finally 1:15:41.520 --> 1:15:45.320 returned to Washington, d C, Stevenson warned the administration about 1:15:45.320 --> 1:15:49.240 the intense and extremist atmosphere in Dallas, where President Kennedy 1:15:49.520 --> 1:15:51.960 was planning a visit meant to heal a rift between 1:15:52.040 --> 1:15:55.879 the conservative and liberal wings of the Democratic Party in Texas. 1:15:56.520 --> 1:15:59.439 On the morning in November twenty second, nineteen sixty three, 1:16:00.240 --> 1:16:03.800 Kennedy and his entourage felt foreboding as they prepared for 1:16:03.880 --> 1:16:07.360 a short airplane draft from Fort Worth to Dallas. The 1:16:07.439 --> 1:16:09.960 president just examined a full page ad in the far 1:16:10.120 --> 1:16:13.640 right Dallas Morning News that featured a bold face headline 1:16:14.080 --> 1:16:18.840 welcome mister Kennedy to Dallas. The advertisement, paid for in 1:16:18.960 --> 1:16:22.080 part by H. L. Hunt's son Nelson bunker Hunt and 1:16:22.160 --> 1:16:25.759 the future owner of the Dallas Cowboys. HR bum Bright, 1:16:26.360 --> 1:16:30.519 featured accusations that Kennedy was soft on communism around the 1:16:30.560 --> 1:16:35.479 world and radicals at home, while persecuting conservatives who criticized him. 1:16:36.360 --> 1:16:39.479 The same morning, a group distributed leaflets designed like a 1:16:39.560 --> 1:16:42.839 wanted poster, with front and side photos of the President 1:16:42.920 --> 1:16:47.120 with the caption wanted for treason. How can people say 1:16:47.240 --> 1:16:50.479 such things? The President said to first Lady Jackie Kennedy, 1:16:50.960 --> 1:16:52.439 We're heading into nut country. 1:16:52.920 --> 1:16:53.120 Soon. 1:16:53.160 --> 1:16:55.720 The Kennedys would make their faithful flight to Dallas, and 1:16:55.800 --> 1:16:59.439 the President would die from an assassin's bullet shortly after noon. 1:17:00.320 --> 1:17:04.120 The President's murder spawned a cottage industry of conspiracy theorists. 1:17:04.720 --> 1:17:07.639 Some said the president had been murdered by the mafia, 1:17:07.920 --> 1:17:11.040 angered because they had been investigated by the president's brother, 1:17:11.320 --> 1:17:15.679 Attorney General Robert Kennedy. Others blamed Teamster's president Jimmy Hoffa, 1:17:16.080 --> 1:17:18.559 who also had been the subject of criminal probes by 1:17:18.600 --> 1:17:23.439 the Justice Department. Others suspected assassination plotters included Cuban leader 1:17:23.479 --> 1:17:27.960 Fidel Castro, who had himself been targeted for assassination attempts 1:17:28.000 --> 1:17:32.320 by the Kennedy administration, exiled Cubans in Florida, angered because 1:17:32.360 --> 1:17:35.400 the president had not fully supported the attempted overthrow of 1:17:35.560 --> 1:17:39.000 Castro during the nineteen sixty one Bay of Pigs invasion, 1:17:39.520 --> 1:17:43.160 and even the Soviets. One of the more elaborate theories 1:17:43.240 --> 1:17:47.280 involved an alleged plot hatched by American military leaders and 1:17:47.640 --> 1:17:52.519 CIA agents, angered that Kennedy supposedly wanted to end American 1:17:52.600 --> 1:17:56.840 involvement in Vietnam. Finally, others said Lyndon Johnson order to 1:17:56.960 --> 1:17:59.679 hit on the Chief executive because he wanted to grab 1:18:00.560 --> 1:18:03.600 or maybe others said Kennedy died because of combination of 1:18:03.880 --> 1:18:07.479 some or all of the above, having made enemies with 1:18:07.840 --> 1:18:11.479 the intelligence agencies under his command, who he had said 1:18:11.520 --> 1:18:14.600 he would dash to the wins if they continued to 1:18:14.880 --> 1:18:17.600 do things that were against what he saws in the 1:18:17.640 --> 1:18:21.280 best interests of the United States. Quote President shot one 1:18:21.400 --> 1:18:25.200 hundred twenty nine times from forty three different angles. A 1:18:25.280 --> 1:18:27.240 satirical headline from The Onion later. 1:18:27.160 --> 1:18:31.960 Asserted sometimes conspiracy theories have deadly consequences. 1:18:32.960 --> 1:18:33.560 William L. 1:18:33.680 --> 1:18:37.519 Pierre spent his teen years attending a military academy in Dallas. 1:18:37.960 --> 1:18:42.200 As a city student, anti communist dread and any Semitic hatred. 1:18:42.600 --> 1:18:45.080 As a young adult, he had joined the John Birch Society, 1:18:45.439 --> 1:18:49.240 but grew frustrated because there wasn't racist enough. He became 1:18:49.280 --> 1:18:52.120 a leading figure in the American Nazi Party at the 1:18:52.200 --> 1:18:55.600 age of forty one, formed the Neo Nazi National Alliance. 1:18:56.000 --> 1:18:59.160 Beginning in nineteen seventy five, he published in serial form 1:19:00.080 --> 1:19:04.519 us influential examples of white supremacist literature, The Turner Diaries, 1:19:04.800 --> 1:19:07.360 a novel which told the story of white nationalist revolution 1:19:07.439 --> 1:19:10.559 in the United States in the near future. This revolt 1:19:10.680 --> 1:19:15.240 is sparked by a Jewish authored law outlying private ownership 1:19:15.320 --> 1:19:19.960 of guns. The hero Earl Turner, joins an underground terrorist 1:19:20.080 --> 1:19:23.920 army the organization, which battles a Jewish plot to destroy 1:19:24.000 --> 1:19:27.760 America not just through gun control, but also through uncontrolled 1:19:27.840 --> 1:19:31.639 non white immigration and by using rock music and drugs 1:19:31.880 --> 1:19:35.519 to encourage interracial sects. At one point, to save the 1:19:35.560 --> 1:19:39.559 white race, Turner blows up the FBI National headquarters in Washington, 1:19:39.640 --> 1:19:40.880 d C. With a truck bomb. 1:19:41.600 --> 1:19:45.240 In the novel, racist revolutionaries then take over Vandenberg Air 1:19:45.280 --> 1:19:49.080 Force Base in southern California and sees its nuclear missiles, 1:19:49.520 --> 1:19:53.320 which they later use on cities across the nation while 1:19:53.360 --> 1:19:57.240 ethnically cleansing California of non whites. They hang sixty thousand 1:19:57.360 --> 1:20:00.800 so called race traders during the day of the Rope, 1:20:01.160 --> 1:20:03.439 a phrase you may find familiar if you've ever looked 1:20:03.479 --> 1:20:06.960 at white supremacist posts online. In the end, the book's hero, 1:20:07.120 --> 1:20:10.920 Earl Turner, finally defeats the system by flying a crop 1:20:11.000 --> 1:20:14.160 duster armed with a small nuclear weapon into the pedagon. 1:20:15.080 --> 1:20:18.040 White nationalists have since seen the Turner Diaries as both 1:20:18.080 --> 1:20:20.920 an accurate description of the modern world and as a 1:20:21.080 --> 1:20:24.559 manual on how to win a race war. From nineteen 1:20:24.600 --> 1:20:27.360 eighty three to nineteen eighty four, The Order a white 1:20:27.400 --> 1:20:31.240 supremacist terrorist group that took its name from the Secret Circle. 1:20:31.320 --> 1:20:36.519 The fictional Earl Turner joins robbed a pornography shop, banks, 1:20:36.600 --> 1:20:40.000 and armored cars, hoisting more than eight million dollars. They 1:20:40.080 --> 1:20:43.599 later distributed to several white supremacist groups with the intent 1:20:43.680 --> 1:20:47.320 of funding a white revolution. Along the way, they assassinated 1:20:47.439 --> 1:20:51.439 Jewish radio talk show hosts Alan Berg. The Turner Diary 1:20:51.520 --> 1:20:55.480 became the favorite novel of Timothy McVeigh, a bitter, disgruntled 1:20:55.560 --> 1:20:58.439 veteran in the nineteen ninety one Gulf War who saw 1:20:58.520 --> 1:21:01.280 the deadly confrontation between in the FBI and the Bureau 1:21:01.320 --> 1:21:05.120 of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and the gun toting branch Davidian 1:21:05.160 --> 1:21:09.160 religious sect in Waco, Texas on April nineteenth, nineteen ninety three, 1:21:09.560 --> 1:21:12.040 as a major step and a government plan to seize 1:21:12.120 --> 1:21:14.560 firearms from law abiding Americans. 1:21:15.120 --> 1:21:18.280 McVay had spent years selling copies of The Turner Diaries 1:21:18.320 --> 1:21:21.559 at gun shows. He retaliated against what he saw as 1:21:21.600 --> 1:21:24.960 his government oppressors by blowing up the Alfred Murrah Federal 1:21:25.040 --> 1:21:28.360 Building in Oklahoma City on the second anniversary of the 1:21:28.479 --> 1:21:32.120 Waco configuration. He used a truck bomb facing his attack 1:21:32.400 --> 1:21:35.560 in part on the fictitious bombings of the FBI headquarters. 1:21:35.640 --> 1:21:39.680 In William Pierce's novel The Turner Diaries also depicted a 1:21:39.760 --> 1:21:43.200 deadly attack on the US Capitol. Some of the pro 1:21:43.320 --> 1:21:46.960 Trump riots who assaulted the Capitol on January sixth erected 1:21:47.120 --> 1:21:51.240 gallows and livestreamed their crimes as they joked about hanging politicians, 1:21:51.720 --> 1:21:54.280 comparing it to the day of rope, Pierce described in 1:21:54.400 --> 1:21:57.400 his pro Nazi work of fiction, Stay with Us through 1:21:57.439 --> 1:21:58.639 this adbreak to learn more. 1:22:09.080 --> 1:22:11.960 Kennedy was a classic Cold War liberal in support of 1:22:12.000 --> 1:22:16.320 an aggressive military intervention to stop Communist expansion abroad, and 1:22:17.040 --> 1:22:20.679 with varying degrees, a commitment economic and civil rights reforms 1:22:20.720 --> 1:22:24.360 at home. But because of his assassination by the twenty 1:22:24.400 --> 1:22:27.240 first century, many on the far right saw as a 1:22:27.360 --> 1:22:31.600 martyr to the liberal deep state. Beginning in twenty seventeen, 1:22:31.680 --> 1:22:35.880 a very online far right conspiracy theory arose that centered 1:22:35.920 --> 1:22:39.679 on cryptic messages first posted on the four chan message 1:22:39.760 --> 1:22:42.880 board and then on eight chan by an anonymous person 1:22:42.920 --> 1:22:46.960 who identified themselves as Q. The pseudonym was a reference 1:22:47.080 --> 1:22:51.240 to the Q Clearance, which gives government officials access to 1:22:51.439 --> 1:22:55.000 high level security secrets. Kennedy would be central in the 1:22:55.080 --> 1:22:58.920 imagination of what came to be known as the QAnon movement. 1:22:59.400 --> 1:23:03.840 Q or QAnon developed a huge following that interpreted these 1:23:03.960 --> 1:23:08.839 confusing and often contradictory posts as actually revealing a secret 1:23:08.960 --> 1:23:13.000 global capal that included top Democrats like Hillary Clinton and 1:23:13.160 --> 1:23:16.719 liberal celebrities like Tom Hanks. These people were all accused 1:23:16.800 --> 1:23:19.320 of being a part of a child sex trafficking ring 1:23:19.400 --> 1:23:22.479 in which the young victims were molested and tortured, and, 1:23:22.640 --> 1:23:26.280 in some interpretations of the theories, had their precious bodily 1:23:26.360 --> 1:23:31.880 fluids harvested to manufacture a drug known as adrenochrome, a 1:23:31.960 --> 1:23:36.639 drug that produces hallucinations and supposedly grants eternal youth. These 1:23:36.760 --> 1:23:41.519 stories resembled anti Semitic legends about Jews kidnapping Christian children 1:23:41.560 --> 1:23:45.000 before passover in order to use their blood in Manza bread, 1:23:45.760 --> 1:23:49.360 a trope or canard really that has become known as 1:23:49.560 --> 1:23:53.720 blood libel in the QAnon mythology. Donald Trump plans to 1:23:53.760 --> 1:23:58.600 conduct mass arrests and executions of these Satanic child molestors 1:23:58.640 --> 1:24:02.320 in an event called the Storm. Trump has winked and 1:24:02.479 --> 1:24:05.680 nodded to the q and On movement, encouraged believers and 1:24:05.840 --> 1:24:09.800 even incorporated some of its key slogans in imagery in 1:24:10.200 --> 1:24:13.760 speeches and posts online, such as where we go On, 1:24:14.000 --> 1:24:17.000 we go All, and as I've reported for Rolling Stone, 1:24:17.560 --> 1:24:20.200 a cult like spinoff group of Q and On believers 1:24:20.600 --> 1:24:24.559 have repeatedly gathered at Daley Plaza, the site of JFK's murder, 1:24:24.840 --> 1:24:27.920 to wait for the prophesied return of JFK and his son, 1:24:28.120 --> 1:24:33.679 JFK Junior, who both are dead, but these believers think 1:24:34.080 --> 1:24:38.280 were either miraculously resurrected or never actually died, and have 1:24:38.400 --> 1:24:42.480 been secretly working with Trump to take down the aforementioned 1:24:42.840 --> 1:24:48.040 global satanic pedophile cabal. Some believe that when JFK and 1:24:48.160 --> 1:24:50.880 JFK Junior finally reveal themselves, a sort of kingdom of 1:24:51.000 --> 1:24:54.800 righteousness will reign and good will ultimately prevail over evil. 1:24:55.360 --> 1:24:57.800 Q and On believers were a heavy presence during the 1:24:57.880 --> 1:25:03.519 Capital Insurrection in January sixth and q Andon banners competed 1:25:03.600 --> 1:25:08.320 with Trump and Confederate battleflags for attention, and November that 1:25:08.439 --> 1:25:12.599 first year we saw the first of the series rallies 1:25:12.640 --> 1:25:15.799 that Steve just referred to. They went to Deey Plaza, 1:25:15.880 --> 1:25:18.960 where President Kennedy had been murdered fifty eight years earlier. 1:25:19.840 --> 1:25:22.800 Over the course of many months, q Andon disciples kept 1:25:22.840 --> 1:25:26.439 returning to the site of JFK's death, some staying at 1:25:26.479 --> 1:25:29.000 a local hotel so they could be nearby when the 1:25:29.080 --> 1:25:33.559 Kennedy return happened. This was covered by Dallas ABC affiliate 1:25:33.720 --> 1:25:38.759 WFAA in November twenty twenty one. Reporter Kevin Reese interviewed 1:25:39.080 --> 1:25:42.040 some of the ones gathered at the Kennedy assassination site. 1:25:42.200 --> 1:25:48.360 Word on the street is that Junior JFK Junior will 1:25:48.439 --> 1:25:50.200 show up and introduce his parents. 1:25:50.840 --> 1:25:54.840 You're expecting JFK Junior absolutely, Okay, how is that going 1:25:54.880 --> 1:25:57.080 to happen and never die? 1:25:57.920 --> 1:26:01.280 Are we going to see him today? JFKG. Yeah, that's whatever. 1:26:01.320 --> 1:26:04.200 We're helping. We're hoping to hope and pray, and then 1:26:04.280 --> 1:26:06.920 after that he'll probably be the vice president with Trump. 1:26:07.960 --> 1:26:12.120 Conspiracy theorists often pay a high personal price for beliefs 1:26:12.520 --> 1:26:16.599 that marginalize them from family, friends, and mainstream society. 1:26:17.200 --> 1:26:20.519 There was one real truth several of these people agreed 1:26:20.560 --> 1:26:22.599 to talk about. But you got to understand that most 1:26:22.600 --> 1:26:24.240 of the world is going to think that's just crazy. 1:26:25.400 --> 1:26:27.639 That's why half my family won't talk to me. Anymore, 1:26:28.400 --> 1:26:31.320 then will my girlfriend thinks I've. 1:26:30.960 --> 1:26:31.639 Lost my mind. 1:26:32.439 --> 1:26:34.519 With the return of Donald Trump to the White House 1:26:34.600 --> 1:26:38.599 on January twentieth, conspiracy theories will move from the fringe 1:26:38.760 --> 1:26:42.560 to the seat of power. JFK Junior won't emerge and 1:26:42.640 --> 1:26:46.719 grab the reins, but a different Kennedy will. Bobby Kennedy Junior. 1:26:47.240 --> 1:26:51.080 Bobby Kennedy Junior has insisted that Wi fi causes cancer 1:26:51.520 --> 1:26:55.560 and that AIDS might not be caused by HIV vaccines. 1:26:55.600 --> 1:27:00.280 He claims against overwhelming evidence cause autism, anti depressed since 1:27:00.360 --> 1:27:05.040 caused school shootings, and chemicals and water lead to gender dysphoria. 1:27:05.760 --> 1:27:09.280 One of these chemicals, RFK Junior insist might be an 1:27:09.320 --> 1:27:11.479 old obsession of the conspiratorial right. 1:27:12.080 --> 1:27:17.519 I think fluoride is a poison becauses loss IQ in 1:27:17.560 --> 1:27:20.840 our developmental injuries, and think florid is on the way up. 1:27:22.680 --> 1:27:25.800 RFK Junior mind You is the nominee for the head 1:27:25.840 --> 1:27:28.960 of the Department of Health and Human Services, and in 1:27:29.040 --> 1:27:33.120 a recent interview claimed that he was aided in his 1:27:33.400 --> 1:27:38.720 schoolwork through the recreational self medication of heroin. Trump has 1:27:38.920 --> 1:27:43.040 himself obsessively promoted his own sinister tales of the deep 1:27:43.080 --> 1:27:46.720 state that supposedly stole the twenty twenty election from him, and, 1:27:46.880 --> 1:27:48.720 as we have said, has co opted some of the 1:27:48.760 --> 1:27:52.479 slogans of the q Andon movement. None of this, obviously, 1:27:52.640 --> 1:27:56.080 was disqualifying to a plurality of voters this past November. 1:27:56.840 --> 1:28:00.439 So why are people drawn to conspiracy theories? First off, 1:28:00.520 --> 1:28:04.760 they provide convenient explanations that can be broken down into 1:28:04.800 --> 1:28:08.120 sort of simple logics for people who may not have 1:28:08.240 --> 1:28:12.280 frameworks for understanding a complex world. And they also provide 1:28:12.360 --> 1:28:16.360 believers sort of new family and friends as they become 1:28:16.439 --> 1:28:21.200 increasingly alienated from their original family and friends. Regardless of 1:28:21.280 --> 1:28:24.840 whatever plots they believe they have revealed. It's clear that 1:28:25.120 --> 1:28:29.200 conspiracy theorists of this sort they don't believe that history 1:28:29.320 --> 1:28:34.000 is a product of class conflict, or imperialism or the 1:28:34.080 --> 1:28:39.519 global scramble for natural resources, not ahing like that. It's 1:28:39.600 --> 1:28:44.040 not shaped by political and economic alliances between elites, or 1:28:44.600 --> 1:28:49.400 irreversible transformations and technology that render old job skills irrelevant. 1:28:49.479 --> 1:28:54.200 There's no material analysis. All of this loss, all this fear, 1:28:54.360 --> 1:28:58.720 all this terrifying disruption of what is comfortably routine they 1:28:58.880 --> 1:29:03.120 view stems from a sinister plot, a plan that is 1:29:03.320 --> 1:29:08.080 hidden tightly by a small circle of elites, sort of 1:29:08.200 --> 1:29:12.200 cartoon villains with near superpowers that control the world. And 1:29:12.360 --> 1:29:16.160 if only the right people, the sort of heroes of 1:29:16.280 --> 1:29:18.960 the story of the movie that they think that they're watching, 1:29:19.040 --> 1:29:21.920 if only those people would step forward and pull off 1:29:21.960 --> 1:29:25.280 the mask of the villains, then everything would be set right. 1:29:26.320 --> 1:29:30.040 These enemies of freedom somehow pull all the strings in 1:29:30.200 --> 1:29:34.200 sight unseen, manipulate every aspect of the world's politics, culture 1:29:34.240 --> 1:29:40.800 and finance, manipulate elections, engineer depressions, urban riots, and even hurricanes. 1:29:41.320 --> 1:29:44.920 Yet for all their cleverness, they leave just enough clues 1:29:45.400 --> 1:29:48.280 so that amateur sleuths, if they are just smart enough, 1:29:48.680 --> 1:29:53.400 can crack the code. Conspiracy theories make history and understandable 1:29:53.520 --> 1:29:57.599 contests between ruthless bad guys and intrepid heroes, who then 1:29:57.680 --> 1:30:01.519 feel superior because they've unveiled the mass their plan. As 1:30:01.560 --> 1:30:05.000 they discover kindred spirits, they find community otherwise lacking in 1:30:05.080 --> 1:30:09.320 their lives. Perhaps, if just enough people know about the conspiracy, 1:30:09.360 --> 1:30:12.680 they hope the bad guys will fall and the millennium 1:30:12.720 --> 1:30:17.560 will follow. That fantasy offers a simpler, more emotionally satisfying 1:30:17.640 --> 1:30:20.559 vision of the future than planning on how to dismantle 1:30:20.680 --> 1:30:24.799 capitalism or figuring out how to persuade white people, for instance, 1:30:24.920 --> 1:30:30.040 surrender their privileges that come with skin color. Conspiracy theories 1:30:30.120 --> 1:30:34.320 are mostly a distraction, but unfortunately they are often from 1:30:34.360 --> 1:30:38.000 Oklahoma City to the US capital, a call for deadly action. 1:30:38.680 --> 1:30:41.960 And while figures like hl hunt and their operations like 1:30:42.080 --> 1:30:45.560 Lifeline maybe in the past, we have our own contemporary 1:30:45.680 --> 1:30:49.280 versions of this with roots in Texas. We now have 1:30:49.640 --> 1:30:53.800 Elon Musk who controls x formerly known as Twitter, in 1:30:53.920 --> 1:30:57.560 which he has used his platform with millions of followers 1:30:57.640 --> 1:31:01.880 to promote dangerous conspiracy theory like the Great Replacement theory, 1:31:01.920 --> 1:31:06.320 which we recorded a previous episode of this podcast about. Ultimately, 1:31:06.640 --> 1:31:09.960 we are living in a culture that swims with conspiracy theories, 1:31:10.320 --> 1:31:12.760 and for us to make our way out of the 1:31:12.840 --> 1:31:16.080 rabbit hole, we're going to need some sort of framework 1:31:16.280 --> 1:31:19.439 for understanding the world, something that can help us better 1:31:19.600 --> 1:31:23.320 understand how we got here and where we're going. And 1:31:23.600 --> 1:31:26.679 no matter what that is, it certainly won't be something 1:31:26.800 --> 1:31:30.880 as simple as believing that we just have to pull 1:31:30.960 --> 1:31:34.000 off the mask of some villain and then everything will 1:31:34.040 --> 1:31:35.080 be set straight from there. 1:31:35.840 --> 1:31:38.840 This is Michael Phillips and this is Stephen Monticelli. 1:31:39.360 --> 1:32:04.479 Thanks for listening, Hello, and welcome to It could happen 1:32:04.560 --> 1:32:07.160 here a podcast about things falling apart and how to 1:32:07.200 --> 1:32:10.320 put them back together. I'm your guest host, Margaret Kiljoy, 1:32:10.760 --> 1:32:13.160 and this is an episode about both of those things. 1:32:13.760 --> 1:32:17.280 Not Margaret and Killjoy, but about things falling apart and 1:32:17.600 --> 1:32:20.519 putting them back together. If you live in the US, 1:32:21.240 --> 1:32:24.760 you might have noticed the things are falling apart. In 1:32:24.840 --> 1:32:27.880 the onslaught of new federal changes over the past few weeks. 1:32:28.240 --> 1:32:30.920 There is one that is both astoundingly important and also 1:32:31.360 --> 1:32:35.799 likely to disappear below people's radars because it affects prisoners, 1:32:36.680 --> 1:32:40.559 trans prisoners. Prison is the place that society puts people 1:32:40.760 --> 1:32:43.680 to forget that they exist. We shouldn't be that way, 1:32:44.320 --> 1:32:47.080 while prisons ought not to be how we solve problems 1:32:47.120 --> 1:32:49.720 as a society at all, but it is the way 1:32:49.760 --> 1:32:54.160 that things currently are. Things that affect prisoners are routinely ignored, 1:32:54.680 --> 1:32:57.080 even though we live in a society built on the 1:32:57.200 --> 1:33:01.599 idea of incarceration. It's been in the news that US 1:33:01.720 --> 1:33:06.040 trans people somehow just sort of don't exist anymore, that 1:33:06.120 --> 1:33:11.680 everyone is either male or female, dictated at birth and immutable. Obviously, 1:33:11.880 --> 1:33:14.919 this flies in the face of biological and social reality, 1:33:15.439 --> 1:33:18.599 and it's going to impact us trans people quite a bit. 1:33:20.320 --> 1:33:23.840 One group of people that it's going to impact very immediately, 1:33:24.439 --> 1:33:30.640 very dramatically, and very dangerously is trans prisoners. According to 1:33:30.720 --> 1:33:34.599 Bureau of Prison Statistics, there are currently one thousand, five 1:33:34.720 --> 1:33:37.880 hundred and twenty nine trans women and seven hundred and 1:33:37.960 --> 1:33:42.240 forty four trans men held in federal prisons, and not 1:33:42.400 --> 1:33:46.200 all of them are being held in gender appropriate prisons already. 1:33:47.040 --> 1:33:48.720 As we're going to talk about with our guests in 1:33:48.760 --> 1:33:51.320 a bit, prisoners have to go through an incredible amount 1:33:51.360 --> 1:33:54.280 of dehumanization in order to have a chance of being 1:33:54.360 --> 1:33:58.000 placed in the right facility. But now that isn't an option, 1:33:58.600 --> 1:34:02.000 and women are being moved into men's prisons. Does the 1:34:02.120 --> 1:34:06.080 idea of being a woman in a men's prison scare you? 1:34:07.360 --> 1:34:07.759 It should. 1:34:08.680 --> 1:34:14.240 It's terrifying. It's worse than what you might imagine. One 1:34:14.320 --> 1:34:17.320 trans woman prisoner who's using a pseudonym for her lawsuit 1:34:17.840 --> 1:34:21.600 going by Maria Moe, has already filed a lawsuit in 1:34:21.680 --> 1:34:25.400 federal court to stop this new regulation. She is challenging 1:34:25.479 --> 1:34:29.639 it on both procedural and constitutional grounds. The government didn't 1:34:29.640 --> 1:34:32.800 go about this in the legal manner, and to house 1:34:32.880 --> 1:34:36.320 trans women with men goes against the Eighth Amendment, which 1:34:36.400 --> 1:34:39.599 prohibits cruel and unusual punishment, as well as the Fifth 1:34:39.640 --> 1:34:44.600 Amendments do process clause. I simply can't imagine putting a 1:34:44.680 --> 1:34:47.640 woman into men's prison as anything other than cruel and 1:34:47.760 --> 1:34:51.880 unusual punishment. The state can pretend that trans women aren't women, 1:34:52.400 --> 1:34:55.120 but the men in prison will not treat her like 1:34:55.200 --> 1:34:58.800 how they treat assists men. On January twenty first, the 1:34:58.880 --> 1:35:01.240 woman suing the prisons was told that she was going 1:35:01.280 --> 1:35:03.920 to be moved to men's prison after all of her 1:35:03.960 --> 1:35:08.320 records were suddenly changed to mark her male. Federal data 1:35:08.520 --> 1:35:11.320 says that trans prisoners are sexually assaulted at ten times 1:35:11.400 --> 1:35:15.960 the rate of other prisoners, and that's the state's own reporting. 1:35:15.600 --> 1:35:16.120 On the issue. 1:35:17.120 --> 1:35:20.639 But you know who doesn't know how to effortlessly transition 1:35:20.760 --> 1:35:23.720 to ads after saying something as serious as that, it's me, 1:35:24.479 --> 1:35:27.080 I don't know how to effortlessly transitions ads after giving 1:35:27.120 --> 1:35:30.880 you a statistic like that. When we come back, we're 1:35:30.920 --> 1:35:33.560 going to talk about how serious the situation is, but 1:35:33.680 --> 1:35:36.880 also provide just an absolute, incredible number of things that 1:35:36.960 --> 1:35:40.000 you can do at various levels of risk to support 1:35:40.080 --> 1:35:42.360 the people whose lives are about to be ruined by 1:35:42.400 --> 1:35:56.720 this policy change. Okay, and we're back. So to talk 1:35:56.760 --> 1:35:59.200 about how trans people fare in prison, I have brought 1:35:59.240 --> 1:36:02.800 on my friend with the most experienced in prison, the 1:36:02.880 --> 1:36:07.040 former political prisoner Eric King. Eric served just shy of 1:36:07.160 --> 1:36:09.559 ten years in prison for throwing a molotov into an 1:36:09.600 --> 1:36:12.360 empty federal building one night in response to the Ferguson 1:36:12.439 --> 1:36:15.599 uprising of twenty fourteen. Those were a protests that were 1:36:15.680 --> 1:36:18.040 anti police protests that started in the wake of the 1:36:18.080 --> 1:36:21.280 police killing of eighteen year old black man Michael Brown. 1:36:22.439 --> 1:36:24.360 Eric is also the co editor of a book called 1:36:24.439 --> 1:36:28.120 Rattling the Cages, Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners, 1:36:28.520 --> 1:36:31.120 which has a forward by none other than Angela Davis 1:36:31.320 --> 1:36:34.720 and is worth checking out. Eric was released from the 1:36:34.800 --> 1:36:38.080 eighty X Supermax in December twenty twenty three. He walked 1:36:38.120 --> 1:36:40.960 out of prison wearing a support trans kid shirt and 1:36:41.080 --> 1:36:43.280 has been vocal about his support for us as soon 1:36:43.320 --> 1:36:46.960 as he walked out the door. So Eric, thanks for 1:36:47.200 --> 1:36:48.439 coming on. It could happen here. 1:36:48.520 --> 1:36:48.880 How are you. 1:36:49.479 --> 1:36:51.160 I'm doing really well, glad to be back, Thank you 1:36:51.240 --> 1:36:55.519 so much. Yeah, so you reached out to me about 1:36:56.280 --> 1:36:59.040 this what would you call it, like a policy change? 1:36:59.160 --> 1:37:03.000 Yeahcus to order, I guess, yeah, you know, And basically 1:37:03.240 --> 1:37:05.360 we talked about like how do we try and make 1:37:05.479 --> 1:37:10.000 sure that people know about what's happening. And I wanted 1:37:10.040 --> 1:37:13.439 to ask you, So, you're a sis man and you 1:37:13.560 --> 1:37:15.800 didn't have an easy time in prison, right as far 1:37:15.840 --> 1:37:18.240 as I as far as I understand now, I think 1:37:18.280 --> 1:37:19.920 no one gets to have an easy time in prison 1:37:20.120 --> 1:37:23.640 is one of the things, especially in a supermax, So. 1:37:23.720 --> 1:37:24.639 Not that easier than others. 1:37:24.680 --> 1:37:26.800 I guess, yeah, you were not among the people who 1:37:26.840 --> 1:37:30.839 had it easier. And as I would follow your journey 1:37:31.160 --> 1:37:34.120 through the federal prison system, it seems like you had 1:37:34.160 --> 1:37:37.559 to defend yourself against both other prisoners and also prison staff. 1:37:37.680 --> 1:37:41.760 Is that a fair way to put it mildly? Yeah, yes, 1:37:41.840 --> 1:37:44.160 that was what was going on. Can you tell me a. 1:37:44.200 --> 1:37:47.360 Bit about the experience of trans people in prison, because 1:37:47.439 --> 1:37:49.240 when you look at this executive order, it sort of 1:37:49.280 --> 1:37:52.519 implies like all trans women are in women's prison and 1:37:52.640 --> 1:37:55.559 all trans men. Actually, I literally have no idea where 1:37:55.560 --> 1:37:57.240 transmit are held. I would rather if I was a 1:37:57.280 --> 1:37:59.519 transmit I'd probably rather be in women's prison. I just 1:38:00.240 --> 1:38:03.040 I don't know what was the situation like before this 1:38:03.200 --> 1:38:03.960 executive order. 1:38:05.080 --> 1:38:07.559 So I want to start with saying, like, the reason 1:38:07.600 --> 1:38:10.200 I hit you up is because there's so much like 1:38:10.400 --> 1:38:14.640 horror happening this first week of like Trump's new presidency, 1:38:15.280 --> 1:38:18.400 and I didn't want this issue to get swept under 1:38:18.439 --> 1:38:21.519 the rug. A lot of times, the bigger, more mainstream 1:38:21.520 --> 1:38:24.920 issues will get the most attention. And I still remember 1:38:25.280 --> 1:38:29.160 our trans family inside, and so that's what scared me 1:38:29.360 --> 1:38:31.080 enough to be like, dude, I need. 1:38:31.080 --> 1:38:31.800 To talk to you about this. 1:38:32.280 --> 1:38:32.479 Yeah. 1:38:33.400 --> 1:38:37.280 So when I was inside, there was not very many 1:38:37.640 --> 1:38:41.719 trans people, and they're like, correct prison, Like a trans 1:38:41.800 --> 1:38:44.040 woman should be in a women's prison, yea, a trans 1:38:44.120 --> 1:38:45.559 man should be in a man's prison. 1:38:46.120 --> 1:38:49.240 And that wasn't happening on the level that it should have. 1:38:50.080 --> 1:38:53.559 And there was a rare case like Marius Mason who 1:38:53.680 --> 1:38:56.800 had enough support, enough publicity where they were able to 1:38:56.920 --> 1:39:01.080 but most people we were stuck at their gender at birth. 1:39:01.840 --> 1:39:05.080 And so over the last couple of years, people started 1:39:05.080 --> 1:39:08.640 getting a lot more access to safe prisons. That's why 1:39:08.640 --> 1:39:11.920 I'll call them my prisons where they feel safest. Okay, 1:39:12.160 --> 1:39:14.839 so I trans women were starting to go to women's prisons, 1:39:15.479 --> 1:39:18.080 and it wasn't very many. It's not like there's tens 1:39:18.080 --> 1:39:22.519 of thousands, but handfuls. Because it is it's very hard 1:39:23.000 --> 1:39:25.840 in the federal system. To get recognized as a transgender person. 1:39:27.160 --> 1:39:31.760 You have to go through years of degrading and humiliating 1:39:31.880 --> 1:39:35.680 therapy with a prison psychologist. You have to get just 1:39:36.000 --> 1:39:40.120 horribly treated by doctors who ignore you, gaslight you, diminish, 1:39:40.200 --> 1:39:44.040 you try to push Christianity on you, and then if 1:39:44.080 --> 1:39:47.640 you make it through their brutality, then you were one 1:39:47.680 --> 1:39:48.320 of the lucky ones. 1:39:48.360 --> 1:39:50.519 You got to say, like, I am this person, this 1:39:50.680 --> 1:39:51.200 is who I am. 1:39:51.880 --> 1:39:53.880 And if you're even more lucky, you got to be 1:39:54.000 --> 1:39:56.040 transferred to a prison that would make you feel the 1:39:56.080 --> 1:40:00.240 safest and the most whole is a human And that's 1:40:00.320 --> 1:40:04.439 the goal, Like, that's the safety goal. Basically, that's where 1:40:04.640 --> 1:40:07.519 we wanted things to be pushed. That people would be 1:40:07.600 --> 1:40:10.760 recognized for who they are, they would get treated for 1:40:11.400 --> 1:40:13.880 who they were, and they would be sent to a 1:40:14.040 --> 1:40:16.559 prison that was congruent with who they were. 1:40:17.200 --> 1:40:18.840 And that's what's all being taken away. 1:40:19.200 --> 1:40:23.559 Yeah, and when you talk about the safety, I don't 1:40:23.600 --> 1:40:26.439 want to like necessarily go on at great length about 1:40:26.479 --> 1:40:29.840 how trans women suffer invents prisons, but it's probably worth 1:40:30.400 --> 1:40:33.720 talking about, like because you've described it as there's like 1:40:34.200 --> 1:40:37.040 literal sexual slavery happening in the prisons. 1:40:37.120 --> 1:40:38.280 Is that a fair way to put it? 1:40:38.680 --> 1:40:42.040 Yeah, one hundred and ten percent yes, yes, And I 1:40:42.120 --> 1:40:44.679 only speak for federal prisons. I know in some states 1:40:44.720 --> 1:40:47.519 it's different. Like in some states people are able to 1:40:47.760 --> 1:40:50.880 use like their femininity as like a power play, as 1:40:50.920 --> 1:40:54.400 a tool to keep themselves safe. And so if that, 1:40:54.840 --> 1:40:57.519 if that's an option, then great, But what I witnessed 1:40:57.520 --> 1:40:59.400 in the federal prison was the exactly opposite of that. 1:41:00.000 --> 1:41:03.400 People are getting destroyed. And if you go into a 1:41:03.520 --> 1:41:07.759 men's prison presenting as female in any way or soft anywhere, 1:41:07.840 --> 1:41:10.840 or as any type of one or any type of 1:41:11.000 --> 1:41:16.240 nonsense straight mail, you are an automatic target. And it's 1:41:16.280 --> 1:41:19.160 not like hyperbole to say that if you walked onto 1:41:19.200 --> 1:41:22.120 a penitentiary yard and you had makeup, if you had 1:41:22.200 --> 1:41:25.479 your hair long, if you had breast, if you had 1:41:26.120 --> 1:41:30.200 anything presenting as female, you will get butchered. 1:41:30.800 --> 1:41:31.559 Within an hour. 1:41:32.000 --> 1:41:36.280 You won't survive that, or you'll get by some group 1:41:36.640 --> 1:41:38.280 and you will be a site like you will be 1:41:38.400 --> 1:41:42.320 property and at the lower custody levels, it's a lot safer. 1:41:42.400 --> 1:41:44.160 If you're at a low security like FCI. 1:41:44.040 --> 1:41:47.080 Englewood, you're not in danger, though you're a danger of 1:41:47.200 --> 1:41:50.320 humiliation and being degraded by staff, but you're not going 1:41:50.400 --> 1:41:51.519 to get stabbed there. 1:41:52.000 --> 1:41:54.600 But God forbid you go to Victorville. 1:41:54.200 --> 1:41:58.559 Medium, Florence Medium, or any penitentiary, Like that's a death 1:41:58.640 --> 1:41:59.639 sentence for real. 1:42:00.160 --> 1:42:03.400 Yeah, do you want to talk about the worst things 1:42:03.400 --> 1:42:04.960 that ever happened to you? Do you want to talk 1:42:05.000 --> 1:42:09.000 about you? And I We did another episode on my 1:42:09.120 --> 1:42:11.880 other podcast Live like the World is Dying and talking 1:42:11.920 --> 1:42:15.840 about how to survive prison, and in it, you talked 1:42:15.880 --> 1:42:18.960 a little bit about what was necessary to kind of 1:42:19.200 --> 1:42:22.680 stand up for trans prisoners. Do you want to talk 1:42:22.720 --> 1:42:23.519 about that a little bit? 1:42:24.000 --> 1:42:27.839 Yeah, So, like everyone needs to have like consequence awareness 1:42:27.960 --> 1:42:30.439 and they need to work on the lines that make 1:42:30.520 --> 1:42:33.840 them feel most comfortable, of course, but for me, I 1:42:34.120 --> 1:42:37.840 was not comfortable at all watching trans or gay prisoners 1:42:38.240 --> 1:42:41.519 get brutalized. And so there were times where we'd have 1:42:41.640 --> 1:42:45.800 to raise money to buy a prisoner out of sex slavery. Yeah, 1:42:46.000 --> 1:42:49.000 we just have to buy them and then basically free 1:42:49.080 --> 1:42:51.519 them or pay off whatever debt they owed so that 1:42:51.600 --> 1:42:53.599 they no longer have to be in that situation. 1:42:54.160 --> 1:42:55.840 And there was other times that you you have to 1:42:55.920 --> 1:42:58.320 knife up or you have to show up physically. 1:42:59.040 --> 1:43:01.360 And I'm not a big I of course, like I 1:43:01.560 --> 1:43:06.120 don't tolerate like anti trams bullshit in my life anywhere, 1:43:06.160 --> 1:43:08.960 and that includes in prison, and so like there are 1:43:09.040 --> 1:43:11.240 times you have to step to people and say like 1:43:12.040 --> 1:43:14.400 I am not gonna let this person have this happen 1:43:14.479 --> 1:43:16.040 to them. And if you want to continue doing this, 1:43:16.160 --> 1:43:18.559 then like we're going to take it to the next level. 1:43:19.439 --> 1:43:22.360 And I wish to god there was more prison allies 1:43:22.439 --> 1:43:25.080 that would be willing to do that inside, because once 1:43:25.160 --> 1:43:28.559 someone is shown to have like support, it makes them 1:43:28.640 --> 1:43:31.519 less easy to be a victim. If people see that 1:43:31.640 --> 1:43:33.920 like this person's trams or like other people are riding 1:43:33.960 --> 1:43:36.880 with them, they're less likely to go after them because 1:43:36.880 --> 1:43:40.280 they'll be consequences. But if they're all alone, then they're 1:43:40.360 --> 1:43:43.479 just a sitting duck. And so like we need that, 1:43:43.640 --> 1:43:47.200 we need CIS men to show up and be like this. 1:43:47.360 --> 1:43:48.120 Is not happening. 1:43:48.120 --> 1:43:49.680 I don't care what race you are, I don't care 1:43:49.720 --> 1:43:51.640 what gang you in you're in, You're not going to 1:43:51.720 --> 1:43:54.040 hurt this person, And that's stuff that we had to do. 1:43:54.160 --> 1:43:56.800 Sometimes it's scary as shit because you don't know what's 1:43:56.800 --> 1:43:57.519 going to happen. 1:43:57.360 --> 1:44:00.360 But you have to, like you have to live your ethics. 1:44:00.960 --> 1:44:02.360 One of the reasons that I wanted to talk to 1:44:02.400 --> 1:44:05.280 you about it and have you on this show is because, unfortunately, 1:44:05.320 --> 1:44:08.560 I mean, prison is kind of a concentration of the 1:44:08.680 --> 1:44:10.880 worst parts of society. I do not want to say 1:44:10.880 --> 1:44:12.680 the worst people in society. I believe it has much 1:44:12.720 --> 1:44:14.960 more to do with the incarceration and the way that 1:44:15.040 --> 1:44:19.040 people are forced to be right when they're incarcerated. There's 1:44:19.080 --> 1:44:20.680 a tangent. But have you heard the whole thing where 1:44:20.680 --> 1:44:22.559 there's no such thing as an alpha male. 1:44:22.439 --> 1:44:24.600 Wolf in the wild. I've only heard from you, and 1:44:24.640 --> 1:44:25.000 I loved it. 1:44:25.080 --> 1:44:27.120 Okay, I probably said this exact same thing last time 1:44:27.120 --> 1:44:28.280 we time think activity. 1:44:28.400 --> 1:44:30.760 Yeah, And so it's like it obviously is going to 1:44:30.800 --> 1:44:31.800 bring out the worst in people. 1:44:32.240 --> 1:44:33.360 That one of the reasons I want to have you 1:44:33.360 --> 1:44:34.960 want to talk about this is because I think that 1:44:35.439 --> 1:44:39.599 the experiences that you're talking about, they're much more real 1:44:39.760 --> 1:44:42.680 and intense than most people on the outside are like 1:44:43.600 --> 1:44:47.400 really thinking. You know, they're like, oh, that sounds bad, 1:44:47.640 --> 1:44:49.439 but then their brain kind of turns off and they 1:44:49.439 --> 1:44:52.920 stop imagining what bad looks like. And I think that 1:44:53.200 --> 1:44:55.720 this idea that we're going to have to stand up 1:44:56.400 --> 1:44:59.160 for our ethics regardless of the risk and cost to 1:44:59.240 --> 1:45:03.839 ourselves sometimes is what it takes to create a society 1:45:03.920 --> 1:45:06.040 that is resistant to fascism. I think it's the same 1:45:06.200 --> 1:45:08.680 energy that people are going to have to do with, 1:45:08.880 --> 1:45:12.160 like no, you can't take my neighbors right in the 1:45:12.240 --> 1:45:13.000 era of ice. 1:45:13.320 --> 1:45:14.639 I think that's really well said too. 1:45:15.080 --> 1:45:16.759 I think the way, like I used to wear inside 1:45:16.760 --> 1:45:20.320 is like we can't take steps backwards. We can't relinquish 1:45:20.600 --> 1:45:23.320 any progress we've made, not a single pinch of it. 1:45:23.479 --> 1:45:25.200 Like everything has to move forward. 1:45:25.840 --> 1:45:29.200 And whatever you're capable of doing, Like not everyone's capable 1:45:29.240 --> 1:45:31.920 of like physically stepping to someone and saying like no, right, 1:45:32.160 --> 1:45:36.400 But everyone's capable of something, whether that's doing calling campaigns, 1:45:36.520 --> 1:45:40.759 organizing protests outside of prison, whether it's contacting region, contacting 1:45:40.800 --> 1:45:44.320 this person, raising money, doing whatever it takes. Everyone can 1:45:44.360 --> 1:45:47.120 do something to keep people safe. And it's the same 1:45:47.160 --> 1:45:49.800 in the free world, Like it's not different. Everyone has 1:45:49.880 --> 1:45:52.599 something to offer. But it can't be apathy. It can't 1:45:52.640 --> 1:45:55.240 be this nihilism that like what does it matter, Like 1:45:55.280 --> 1:45:57.240 they're going to do it anyway. If we do that, 1:45:57.400 --> 1:45:59.840 like we're just forfeiting the future and we're letting our 1:46:00.000 --> 1:46:01.000 our family get but butchered. 1:46:01.280 --> 1:46:01.479 Yeah. 1:46:01.640 --> 1:46:03.240 I really like that way of phrasing it. Yeah, we 1:46:03.520 --> 1:46:10.840 can't forfeit the future. How can people support transprisoners with 1:46:11.040 --> 1:46:13.320 what's going on right now? I don't know how in 1:46:13.400 --> 1:46:15.599 touch you are with people on the inside and things 1:46:15.640 --> 1:46:19.040 like that. How are people feeling, like what's the vibe? 1:46:19.160 --> 1:46:19.840 What can be done? 1:46:21.400 --> 1:46:23.639 So I assume, like when you're asking what can people 1:46:23.680 --> 1:46:26.400 do to support transprisoners? I assume you're asking what can 1:46:26.439 --> 1:46:28.360 free world people do to support those inside? 1:46:28.520 --> 1:46:28.680 Yeah? 1:46:28.720 --> 1:46:30.439 I mean you actually kind of have said what people 1:46:30.520 --> 1:46:33.400 on the inside can do, all right, which is necessary 1:46:33.439 --> 1:46:34.440 and important. 1:46:34.040 --> 1:46:35.960 But people on the outside, what can people do? 1:46:36.720 --> 1:46:40.360 Visibility is safety, Like I saw that in my bid, 1:46:40.439 --> 1:46:42.120 and I've seen that in other people's bids. And if 1:46:42.160 --> 1:46:43.960 you look at someone like Marius Mason, if you look 1:46:44.000 --> 1:46:47.599 at people like Jennifer Rose, keeping people visible and letting 1:46:47.640 --> 1:46:49.800 the prison know that, like we're not turning a blind 1:46:49.840 --> 1:46:51.439 eye to this person, like you're not going to get 1:46:51.439 --> 1:46:54.679 a free one on them that cups people alive, Okay. 1:46:55.240 --> 1:46:57.479 And so the more the staff knows. 1:46:57.360 --> 1:47:01.000 And the administration knows that like this per is looked after, 1:47:01.479 --> 1:47:03.719 the more they are likely to look after them because 1:47:03.720 --> 1:47:06.599 they don't want to be held accountable. Okay, So things 1:47:06.680 --> 1:47:09.479 like getting books into people, things like getting pin pals 1:47:09.520 --> 1:47:11.920 of people, raising money so that they don't have to 1:47:12.000 --> 1:47:14.920 go into debt, Like that's real, Like this debt stuff 1:47:15.040 --> 1:47:17.679 is serious. So making sure they have money on their books, 1:47:17.800 --> 1:47:19.360 Like I don't care what they spend it on. I 1:47:19.400 --> 1:47:20.880 don't care if they spend on drugs. I don't care 1:47:20.880 --> 1:47:23.040 if they spend it on twenty bags of coff. You're 1:47:23.120 --> 1:47:25.679 gambling as long as it keeps them out of slavery 1:47:25.800 --> 1:47:28.840 or out of that knife, like that's what matters. And 1:47:28.920 --> 1:47:31.600 then Patsy names around like it's almost as if we 1:47:31.680 --> 1:47:34.519 concentrate like all of our prisons supporting like five or 1:47:34.560 --> 1:47:37.120 six people, and then we forget that there's like fifteen 1:47:37.200 --> 1:47:40.600 thousand trans people in prison. Yeah, and so organizations like 1:47:40.680 --> 1:47:43.519 Black and Pink do a really amazing job, but like 1:47:43.680 --> 1:47:46.760 there's there's not enough, Like we need visibility like, we 1:47:46.880 --> 1:47:50.760 need to keep people present in our lives that we 1:47:50.880 --> 1:47:53.040 don't know and we might not like their charges, they 1:47:53.120 --> 1:47:55.559 might not be nice people like, they might not be cool, 1:47:56.280 --> 1:47:56.920 but we need to. 1:47:56.960 --> 1:48:00.240 Keep them alive. Like that's what abolition is. So visibility. 1:48:00.439 --> 1:48:03.400 Yeah, that makes sense. I sort of know the answer 1:48:03.439 --> 1:48:05.320 to this, but I'm gonna pretend like I don't know 1:48:05.360 --> 1:48:08.040 it at all. What's Black and Pink. Black and Pink 1:48:08.160 --> 1:48:10.120 is an organization. I know it used to be an 1:48:10.120 --> 1:48:11.120 anarchist organization. 1:48:11.160 --> 1:48:13.639 It might be something else now, but it's an organization 1:48:13.720 --> 1:48:17.880 that's focused strictly on supporting trans and queer prisoners. That's 1:48:17.920 --> 1:48:20.679 all they do, social prisoners, political prisoners, it doesn't matter. 1:48:20.960 --> 1:48:23.479 We're gonna find you a pinpal and we're gonna get 1:48:23.479 --> 1:48:26.040 people to write you and they do a really amazing job. 1:48:26.160 --> 1:48:29.120 Like I honor them for putting in that work because 1:48:29.120 --> 1:48:29.479 it's hard. 1:48:30.120 --> 1:48:33.000 And so someone who's listening, who's never considered being pen 1:48:33.080 --> 1:48:35.599 pals of the prisoner could get in touch with Black 1:48:35.680 --> 1:48:38.360 and Pink and be hooked up with someone to write to. 1:48:38.840 --> 1:48:39.439 Yeah, if you like. 1:48:39.680 --> 1:48:41.800 Even just like right now, someone googled black and Pink 1:48:41.840 --> 1:48:44.800 pin palm, black and Pink prison Pinpal, like it'll pop 1:48:44.880 --> 1:48:46.760 up the website. You just click on flying a pin 1:48:46.840 --> 1:48:49.040 Pal and you can find someone in your city, find 1:48:49.080 --> 1:48:51.439 someone in your state, find someone back to relate to, 1:48:51.560 --> 1:48:53.679 like to have a little biography, and you can find 1:48:53.720 --> 1:48:56.200 someone like to connect with and potentially save their life 1:48:56.320 --> 1:48:57.040 or save your life. 1:48:57.280 --> 1:48:58.800 Yeah, it can make you better too. 1:48:59.080 --> 1:49:03.400 Yeah, okay, so writing helps when you talk about putting 1:49:03.400 --> 1:49:05.560 money on people's books, like who does that? Is that 1:49:05.640 --> 1:49:08.000 something you also could go through black and pink? Should 1:49:08.040 --> 1:49:10.439 people be doing their own fundraisers? And then like working 1:49:10.479 --> 1:49:13.879 with prisoners that they've already made connections with, like how 1:49:14.520 --> 1:49:16.439 should people either plug in or start things? 1:49:16.960 --> 1:49:20.000 So each prison is different, like state and federal, But 1:49:20.320 --> 1:49:22.599 to put money on someone's books, you can do that yourself. 1:49:22.880 --> 1:49:25.000 You go you find out wherever prison that person's at, 1:49:25.080 --> 1:49:27.439 and you can just go to the BOP website or 1:49:27.479 --> 1:49:31.080 that prison's website. BOP is Bureau Prisons. It's for federal people, 1:49:31.640 --> 1:49:33.400 and it will just walk you through how to do it, 1:49:33.439 --> 1:49:35.640 how to send the money ground from Walmart or how 1:49:35.680 --> 1:49:38.120 to do the JPay and put it on through your 1:49:38.160 --> 1:49:40.200 credit card, and you can do it like if there's 1:49:40.200 --> 1:49:43.760 an ABC in Erica's Black Cross community near you, you 1:49:43.840 --> 1:49:47.080 can fundraise with them. If there's any like books through 1:49:47.120 --> 1:49:50.439 bars or abolitionist groups near you, like you can and 1:49:50.560 --> 1:49:53.320 should fundraise with them to raise awareness. But you don't 1:49:53.400 --> 1:49:55.960 have to, Like everyone can do this on your own, 1:49:56.080 --> 1:49:59.240 Like this is a single person job. Yeah, but it's 1:49:59.280 --> 1:50:00.599 better if we do it as a community. 1:50:01.120 --> 1:50:04.240 Well, the way that I fund raised is that I 1:50:04.439 --> 1:50:08.160 have advertisers that interrupt me talking about anti capitalist things. 1:50:09.200 --> 1:50:11.720 And here's one of those interruptions. 1:50:11.840 --> 1:50:14.280 And I'm gonna go ahead and donate my pay for 1:50:14.360 --> 1:50:17.160 this episode to exactly what we're talking about. And here's 1:50:17.200 --> 1:50:20.200 ads they are not donating. You can think of whatever 1:50:20.240 --> 1:50:34.000 you want about these ads, and we're back okay with 1:50:34.120 --> 1:50:37.760 this new executive order, Like how are people feeling either 1:50:37.880 --> 1:50:40.200 inside or people who are doing prison abolition work, or 1:50:40.280 --> 1:50:42.280 like how crisis does this feel? 1:50:42.640 --> 1:50:42.680 Like? 1:50:42.800 --> 1:50:44.960 What's going on? I can't like speak for ever. It 1:50:44.960 --> 1:50:46.320 should quel like a ten out of ten. 1:50:46.439 --> 1:50:50.840 Yeah, like this is a carceral genocidee real, this isn't 1:50:50.880 --> 1:50:52.960 a rasure of an entire people. So like, if you're 1:50:53.000 --> 1:50:54.920 not at a ten for this, like you either do 1:50:55.080 --> 1:50:57.320 not care or you're not understanding how serious the prison 1:50:57.360 --> 1:50:57.840 system is. 1:50:58.360 --> 1:50:59.920 I've talked to a couple homies inside. 1:51:00.000 --> 1:51:01.880 I have to be really delicate because I'm still on probation, 1:51:02.560 --> 1:51:07.080 but those people understand that, like the mood is turning dark. Okay, 1:51:08.120 --> 1:51:11.920 they see inside that like when fascists come into power, 1:51:12.360 --> 1:51:15.559 it empowers everyone else below them to be brutal because 1:51:15.560 --> 1:51:17.960 they can get away with it now. And so these 1:51:18.000 --> 1:51:21.000 people that were already monsters under the most liberal of 1:51:21.280 --> 1:51:24.240 prison director are now getting told by the president that 1:51:24.320 --> 1:51:26.800 they do not have to respect this person's entire life. 1:51:27.120 --> 1:51:30.360 And so it's a very serious situation. We've got a 1:51:30.400 --> 1:51:33.080 non binary person about to go and name Casey Goonan, 1:51:33.760 --> 1:51:37.240 and they got sentenced for allegedly fire bombing some cop 1:51:37.280 --> 1:51:41.479 cars and support with Palestine, and I talk with them 1:51:41.600 --> 1:51:44.599 on a weekly basis, just trying to prepare them because 1:51:44.680 --> 1:51:46.400 like right now, where they're at is a jail and 1:51:46.520 --> 1:51:50.120 they haven't really experienced the prison yet, and so it's 1:51:50.160 --> 1:51:53.200 all about like getting them ready for like here are potentials, 1:51:53.720 --> 1:51:56.200 like here's what they could do. But it's dark in there, 1:51:56.280 --> 1:51:58.559 like the Nazis are celebrating, and that includes the ones 1:51:58.600 --> 1:51:59.960 with badges especially. 1:52:00.040 --> 1:52:02.680 Yeah, that makes sense. What kind of support felt the 1:52:02.720 --> 1:52:05.080 most useful to you in other prisoners. He talked about 1:52:05.080 --> 1:52:06.800 this a little bit, but I'm I'm like curious about 1:52:06.800 --> 1:52:10.719 like you talked about, like visibility, are protests outside of jails? 1:52:10.800 --> 1:52:13.560 Do they do they make people feel like good and 1:52:13.720 --> 1:52:16.879 welcome or does it make the guards cracked down on everyone? 1:52:17.080 --> 1:52:18.840 Like I know that there's this you know, habit of 1:52:18.920 --> 1:52:22.479 noise demonstrations every New Year's and what kind of stuff 1:52:23.320 --> 1:52:27.400 felt good, and what kind of stuff felt good but scary, 1:52:27.520 --> 1:52:29.120 and what kind of stuff was just annoying? Like I 1:52:29.160 --> 1:52:30.680 don't know, I'm just trying to find more stuff that 1:52:30.720 --> 1:52:31.200 people can do. 1:52:31.520 --> 1:52:34.360 Yeah, the noise demos are cool, but they're performative. 1:52:34.479 --> 1:52:34.760 M M. 1:52:35.080 --> 1:52:37.120 It's more for the people that are doing them than 1:52:37.160 --> 1:52:37.960 the people inside. 1:52:38.000 --> 1:52:38.320 M hm. 1:52:38.560 --> 1:52:40.560 But like, let's say you're a trans person out of 1:52:40.720 --> 1:52:43.920 jail and there's thirty five people outside waving your banner. 1:52:44.280 --> 1:52:47.160 That will get you respect inside, get people to say, oh, 1:52:47.280 --> 1:52:47.840 what the hell. 1:52:47.800 --> 1:52:48.840 Is going on with them? Okay? 1:52:49.040 --> 1:52:51.479 Yeah, like that is that's serious to where you can 1:52:51.560 --> 1:52:54.519 build up a rep if someone's already in prison, that's 1:52:55.320 --> 1:52:57.040 you'll probably get them fucked up and put in the shoe. 1:52:57.080 --> 1:52:57.720 That's what happened to me. 1:52:57.920 --> 1:53:00.400 If there's a noise demonstration with your name, yeah, yeah, 1:53:00.520 --> 1:53:01.640 be delicate how you do it? 1:53:01.800 --> 1:53:04.080 Yeah, because that's what put me in ad X. Oh shit, 1:53:04.280 --> 1:53:07.360 so that's a real that's a real double edged sword, right. 1:53:07.680 --> 1:53:07.880 Yeah. 1:53:08.160 --> 1:53:10.400 They use that as the as the thing saying I 1:53:10.479 --> 1:53:12.519 was the leader of Antifa because I got people to 1:53:12.600 --> 1:53:13.760 come out and protest for me. 1:53:14.080 --> 1:53:15.360 So I got pulleyt. Bel Chapo. 1:53:15.800 --> 1:53:18.000 We shouldn't tell everyone that you're we have to keep 1:53:18.000 --> 1:53:20.280 it on the DL that you're the leader of Antifa. 1:53:22.360 --> 1:53:25.519 For real. We dropped the ball. I know. Wait, I've 1:53:25.560 --> 1:53:28.000 been told I'm the leader of Antifa. You're my leader? 1:53:28.080 --> 1:53:31.960 Oh okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally yeah, I'm more reagional leader. 1:53:33.960 --> 1:53:36.000 The things that help the most, like in a real 1:53:36.080 --> 1:53:39.439 life situation, are the things that provide mental safety and 1:53:39.680 --> 1:53:44.120 something to do. Okay, so books, magazines that gives you 1:53:44.320 --> 1:53:47.240 something to do, like empower yourself and pass the time 1:53:47.320 --> 1:53:49.479 and stay out of the way. Money helps because then 1:53:49.479 --> 1:53:51.439 you can do crafts, you can paint, you can do art, 1:53:51.760 --> 1:53:54.719 you can sell things, you can do crochet. That stuff helps, 1:53:55.320 --> 1:53:58.800 and then letters obviously like that gives you someone to 1:53:58.880 --> 1:54:01.559 talk to. It people are actually putting thought into the letters, 1:54:01.920 --> 1:54:05.280 and I always encourage and I always will for as 1:54:05.400 --> 1:54:08.920 many people as possible to on a daily or weekly basis, 1:54:09.040 --> 1:54:13.479 call that prison, call the prison, no matter what prison, state, federal, county, 1:54:13.920 --> 1:54:17.519 and demand to speak with the warden, the captain, the warden, secretary, 1:54:17.640 --> 1:54:21.320 the lieutenant, the head of psychology, and demand to know 1:54:21.560 --> 1:54:23.560 how is this person doing? What are you doing to 1:54:23.680 --> 1:54:26.560 keep them safe? We're hearing this in this what is 1:54:26.640 --> 1:54:29.920 going to happen to our family? That makes a difference. Okay, 1:54:30.200 --> 1:54:32.560 if you know a lawyer, pay the one hundred and 1:54:32.600 --> 1:54:33.840 twenty dollars an hour to have them do. 1:54:33.880 --> 1:54:34.480 A legal call. 1:54:35.120 --> 1:54:37.280 That way, the prison sees this person has a lawyer 1:54:37.400 --> 1:54:39.440 protecting them. They don't need to know that. It's just 1:54:39.520 --> 1:54:42.200 a one time call. Yeah, but that legal call, just 1:54:42.320 --> 1:54:44.720 the wellness check is what they call it. Let's that 1:54:44.880 --> 1:54:47.839 person get word out about what dangerous stuff is happening. 1:54:48.240 --> 1:54:50.600 But it also forces the prison to recognize that they 1:54:50.680 --> 1:54:52.280 might be protected by legal system. 1:54:52.440 --> 1:54:53.960 Okay, so these things help. 1:54:54.320 --> 1:54:57.480 Yeah, what's the master plan here for how we're going 1:54:57.560 --> 1:55:00.440 to respond to this executive order? Because obviously we're not 1:55:00.560 --> 1:55:03.760 necessarily in a position to immediately reverse this order and 1:55:03.880 --> 1:55:07.120 get women put into women's prison, which is a crazy 1:55:07.200 --> 1:55:09.240 thing to have to say, we're not going to be 1:55:09.240 --> 1:55:11.880 able to get women put into women's prisons, but is 1:55:12.120 --> 1:55:15.720 organizing with a local group. You create a group and 1:55:16.000 --> 1:55:19.600 you basically like figure out who the local trans prisoners 1:55:19.600 --> 1:55:22.160 are in your area and make sure that you're communicating 1:55:22.200 --> 1:55:24.640 with them and that they're getting wellness calls from lawyers 1:55:24.680 --> 1:55:29.400 and basically like just making sure that the prison knows 1:55:29.800 --> 1:55:31.920 that people are paying attention to the fact that there's 1:55:31.960 --> 1:55:33.160 now women in the men's prison. 1:55:33.320 --> 1:55:36.640 Is that that's a soft version of what we should do, Yeah. 1:55:36.480 --> 1:55:36.920 Fair enough. 1:55:37.000 --> 1:55:39.360 There's other versions that are yeah, okay, there's the other 1:55:39.480 --> 1:55:42.080 version that like I wish people would do. Yeah, there's 1:55:42.120 --> 1:55:44.960 a version where we do BDS but for every single 1:55:45.080 --> 1:55:47.920 company that's benefiting from prison labor, yeah, and say, as 1:55:47.960 --> 1:55:49.920 long as you let this transgender hate go on, we're 1:55:49.960 --> 1:55:52.760 not going to support your business. There's boycotting, there's putting 1:55:52.800 --> 1:55:54.440 people on the road so that the cops can't show 1:55:54.520 --> 1:55:55.160 up to their jobs. 1:55:55.240 --> 1:55:55.520 Uh huh. 1:55:55.520 --> 1:55:59.560 There's protesting outside warden's houses, there's protesting outside governor's houses. 1:55:59.560 --> 1:56:02.520 If it's for state prison there is tangibly putting your 1:56:02.560 --> 1:56:05.760 body on the line. There is sabotaging cop cars that 1:56:05.920 --> 1:56:09.000 go into the prison, there is barricading the entrances. There's 1:56:09.040 --> 1:56:11.720 a thousand things we can do to say, if you 1:56:11.840 --> 1:56:13.960 heard our people were hurting you, yea, whether it's in 1:56:14.040 --> 1:56:15.720 your pocket, whether it's in your car, whether it's in 1:56:15.760 --> 1:56:18.560 your daily life, whether it's annoying you. We can find 1:56:18.600 --> 1:56:20.920 things to do if we care enough. And we saw 1:56:20.960 --> 1:56:23.800 people do it for Palestine. And I don't think transgender 1:56:23.920 --> 1:56:26.560 lives are less important than Palestinian lives. Yeah, it has 1:56:26.600 --> 1:56:28.520 to be an equal thing in my mind. Yeah, but 1:56:28.600 --> 1:56:31.800 the subu sid's really great too. That's like that's daily stuff. 1:56:31.920 --> 1:56:33.440 No, No, but you're right, and it's like it's funny 1:56:33.480 --> 1:56:35.280 because it's like, in my mind, it's so hard to 1:56:36.080 --> 1:56:38.480 ring the alarm bells when all of the alarm bells 1:56:38.480 --> 1:56:41.080 are ringing, and everyone's kind of ignoring alarm bells right now. 1:56:41.480 --> 1:56:42.760 I mean, I guess the answer is that we talk 1:56:42.800 --> 1:56:44.960 about it like this, but like, how do we make 1:56:45.000 --> 1:56:47.520 sure that people actually listen to the alarm bells that 1:56:47.560 --> 1:56:49.160 are happening right now? And I think part of it 1:56:49.880 --> 1:56:53.920 is being really unfortunately brutally honest about what it's like 1:56:54.000 --> 1:56:55.560 to be a woman in men's prison. 1:56:56.200 --> 1:56:57.880 I mean, I don't think people understand it all. 1:56:58.080 --> 1:57:00.880 And yeah, there's all this misinformation too, Like you'll hear 1:57:00.960 --> 1:57:03.720 these like fascist talking points coming out of liberals' mouths 1:57:03.720 --> 1:57:06.280 to where like well, I don't want my tax dollars 1:57:06.360 --> 1:57:09.240 going to like pay for their surgery, or I don't 1:57:09.240 --> 1:57:11.720 want some man just sneaking into a woman's prison saying 1:57:11.720 --> 1:57:14.640 these transgenders we can rape everyone. And these are like 1:57:14.720 --> 1:57:17.800 the same scare tactics and like misinformation that's used for 1:57:17.960 --> 1:57:22.040 every single, like every single repression you've ever seen. And 1:57:22.560 --> 1:57:26.160 it's our job to confront those head on and call 1:57:26.240 --> 1:57:29.520 them out. His lives, show show the real information, and 1:57:29.720 --> 1:57:33.080 it's our job to continue to just force people to 1:57:33.200 --> 1:57:35.919 recognize that this is a dangerous and real situation. 1:57:36.840 --> 1:57:38.600 We can't let this entire group. 1:57:38.440 --> 1:57:42.000 Of people be destroyed, because like, if you're going to 1:57:42.040 --> 1:57:43.920 turn your blind eye to transgender people, you're going to 1:57:43.920 --> 1:57:45.080 do it to gay people, You're going to do it 1:57:45.120 --> 1:57:46.520 to women, You're going to do it to black people, 1:57:46.840 --> 1:57:48.880 and then it's just you, and then no one's going 1:57:48.960 --> 1:57:52.240 to protect your stupid ass. We have to as or 1:57:52.280 --> 1:57:54.480 as I have to as assist man. We have to 1:57:54.560 --> 1:57:57.240 keep bringing this bell. We have to make people listen. 1:57:57.720 --> 1:57:59.920 I mean as a as a not currently in prison 1:58:00.040 --> 1:58:02.840 and trans women. Like one of the reasons I think 1:58:02.880 --> 1:58:05.320 this almost happens. I mean it happens because the cruelty 1:58:05.400 --> 1:58:09.600 is the point, but like it's terrifying. You've actually experienced 1:58:09.640 --> 1:58:12.080 the thing that's terrifying. It is terrifying the idea of 1:58:12.240 --> 1:58:17.000 going into prison in the United States, especially maximum security prison, 1:58:17.520 --> 1:58:20.720 potentially especially men's prison, both as a man or a 1:58:20.960 --> 1:58:23.400 trans woman. I wouldn't want to be in men's prison, 1:58:23.440 --> 1:58:24.000 and I don't. 1:58:23.800 --> 1:58:25.720 Even want to compare it, by the way, Okay, it's 1:58:25.800 --> 1:58:28.360 not comparable. Okay, Like if I didn't have antique attachment 1:58:28.400 --> 1:58:30.080 on my face, I could walk into any prison in 1:58:30.120 --> 1:58:32.080 the country and be like, Oh, there's just a white guy. 1:58:32.240 --> 1:58:35.240 There's just a white roll. Yeah, have no problems. Yeah, 1:58:35.560 --> 1:58:39.000 a transgender person. There's a single place except for a 1:58:39.080 --> 1:58:41.919 protective custody yard, where they can walk in and immediately 1:58:41.960 --> 1:58:44.680 feel safe. Yeah, it's the exact opposite. Everywhere they go 1:58:44.960 --> 1:58:46.960 is fight or flight. The scariest moment you've ever had 1:58:47.000 --> 1:58:49.240 your entire life. Point four to seven, all day. 1:58:49.080 --> 1:58:49.360 Every day. 1:58:49.440 --> 1:58:51.520 Yeah, picture someone breaking into your home in the middle 1:58:51.520 --> 1:58:53.640 of the night, in that terror you get. They have 1:58:53.760 --> 1:58:56.000 to walk into a new prison every single time and 1:58:56.080 --> 1:58:59.520 face that terror every single day. Yeah, it's not comparable 1:58:59.560 --> 1:59:00.920 at all. It's scary as shit. 1:59:01.160 --> 1:59:01.720 No, that's fair. 1:59:02.040 --> 1:59:03.800 Like to be honest, like I think about and this 1:59:03.920 --> 1:59:06.120 is like maybe more honest than I'm usually am on 1:59:06.200 --> 1:59:09.200 this podcast. Like, you know, I don't do as much 1:59:09.240 --> 1:59:11.720 frontline activism as I did. And part of that's like, oh, 1:59:11.840 --> 1:59:14.160 I'm like aging and I have other work that I do, 1:59:14.360 --> 1:59:15.880 And part of it is like I came out as trans, 1:59:16.360 --> 1:59:18.720 you know, part of it is like I never liked 1:59:18.760 --> 1:59:20.560 the idea of like because I always was trans and 1:59:20.600 --> 1:59:23.560 the idea of like being surrounded by only men was 1:59:23.720 --> 1:59:27.760 just viscerally terrifying. But now in particular, like it's just 1:59:27.840 --> 1:59:31.200 such a it's a mind fuck. It's terrifying, and you know, 1:59:31.280 --> 1:59:33.480 I feel like one of my main roles is to 1:59:33.560 --> 1:59:35.920 try and help people be like, look, we're in this 1:59:36.120 --> 1:59:38.480 together enough that you should be scared, but you should 1:59:38.480 --> 1:59:40.960 get through the fear. But it's like the fear of 1:59:41.040 --> 1:59:43.200 prison is like such a I mean, it's part of 1:59:43.240 --> 1:59:44.960 the reason that people say, like, no one is free 1:59:45.040 --> 1:59:47.160 is till everyone is free, as long as there is 1:59:47.200 --> 1:59:49.920 a single person in prison, you were not free because 1:59:49.960 --> 1:59:52.840 your freedom can be taken away from you at any point, 1:59:53.240 --> 1:59:56.600 and that fear of prison it's funny. Okay, I'm almost 1:59:56.640 --> 1:59:58.480 done with this rant. You know, people have kind of 1:59:58.480 --> 2:00:01.680 like figured out at this point that certain branches of 2:00:01.760 --> 2:00:06.000 Christianity will use the fear of hell to force people 2:00:06.160 --> 2:00:09.200 to be good by their definition of good right. And 2:00:09.320 --> 2:00:11.560 it's a scare tactic. It's terrorism. It is like a 2:00:12.120 --> 2:00:15.600 you know, you better behave or infinite suffering awaits you. 2:00:15.920 --> 2:00:17.960 But then even the people who are critical of that 2:00:18.440 --> 2:00:21.720 haven't necessarily wrapped their head around that. The existence of prisons, 2:00:22.200 --> 2:00:25.880 especially the existence of punitive prisons, like the sort of 2:00:26.080 --> 2:00:29.200 theoretical perfect model of the Norwegian prison or whatever, where 2:00:29.240 --> 2:00:31.640 you're just sort of separated from society, which I suspect 2:00:31.760 --> 2:00:34.160 is not actually I suspect Norwegian prison actually kind of sucks. 2:00:34.480 --> 2:00:37.800 But the American prison system is a prison system that 2:00:37.960 --> 2:00:42.360 exists to make you on the outside not feel free, 2:00:42.760 --> 2:00:44.280 like because it can be taken away from you and 2:00:44.320 --> 2:00:45.280 you can be thrown in prison. 2:00:46.040 --> 2:00:49.360 That's my rant, Yeah, well, I mean, you're absolutely right, 2:00:49.480 --> 2:00:52.040 like that is the entire goal is to make sure 2:00:52.080 --> 2:00:55.640 that the community walks the government line, because if you don't, 2:00:55.760 --> 2:00:58.240 this is what will happen to you. And when people 2:00:58.440 --> 2:01:00.280 pull like the nonsense of like well, if you're not 2:01:00.320 --> 2:01:03.600 committing crimes, you shouldn't worry about it, Like they are 2:01:03.720 --> 2:01:06.640 not looking at how like arbitrary crimes are. Yeah, they're 2:01:06.720 --> 2:01:09.240 not looking at how quickly something can become a crime, 2:01:10.040 --> 2:01:12.200 or how quickly something that wasn't a crime can be 2:01:12.320 --> 2:01:15.560 portrayed as one. And the trans struggle, like trans people 2:01:15.560 --> 2:01:18.160 should not have to be on the front line. Again, 2:01:18.280 --> 2:01:20.960 no point should you or any of our trans family 2:01:21.120 --> 2:01:23.640 ever have to like put their freedom on the line, 2:01:23.760 --> 2:01:26.480 Like that is that's a privilege role, Like that's our role, 2:01:26.880 --> 2:01:30.920 my role, and my boss shouldn't have to get arrested 2:01:31.000 --> 2:01:33.720 for transliberation. Like they should be safe, like they should 2:01:33.720 --> 2:01:36.000 be able to feel comfort and warmth. You should be 2:01:36.040 --> 2:01:38.240 able to feel that safe and warmth and love, Like 2:01:38.320 --> 2:01:41.240 black people shouldn't be flighting the black liberation pipe. That's 2:01:41.320 --> 2:01:43.640 that's white people's flight. Trans people should not have to 2:01:43.680 --> 2:01:47.200 put their vulnerable lives on the line for this struggle 2:01:47.240 --> 2:01:49.680 if we really believe in in the liberation struggle. 2:01:50.440 --> 2:01:52.440 Yeah, and it's hard because you also want to like 2:01:53.080 --> 2:01:55.480 while also not wanting to like lead that struggle. Right, Like, 2:01:55.560 --> 2:01:57.480 I think that like white people putting themselves on the 2:01:57.560 --> 2:01:59.920 line for black liberation is like super important. 2:02:00.000 --> 2:02:01.840 But then obviously you can get into there's the hero 2:02:02.040 --> 2:02:03.879 shit and trying to take a leadership. 2:02:03.960 --> 2:02:07.400 Yeah, do the David Gilbert role, be a soldier how 2:02:07.440 --> 2:02:11.360 they need you, and help and fight how people actually. 2:02:11.120 --> 2:02:13.960 Need you, not how you think it should be done. Yeah, totally. 2:02:14.800 --> 2:02:20.480 Well, any last words for our audience around this particular issue. 2:02:20.920 --> 2:02:23.600 Yeah, Here in Denver, Brenn Rose's Legal Center, that's who 2:02:23.640 --> 2:02:26.520 I work for. It's a transgender ran civil rights law firm. 2:02:26.840 --> 2:02:29.720 We're about to put forward the trans Bill rights here 2:02:29.760 --> 2:02:33.800 in Colorado to guarantee safety. And I bring that up 2:02:33.880 --> 2:02:36.400 to say that not only is there direct action and 2:02:36.520 --> 2:02:39.480 protest we can do, we can also try to weasel 2:02:39.520 --> 2:02:40.520 into the legal system. 2:02:40.640 --> 2:02:40.800 Yeah. 2:02:41.000 --> 2:02:43.280 There's a thousand ways we can fight these motherfuckers, and 2:02:43.320 --> 2:02:44.800 we've got to use every single one of them. 2:02:44.920 --> 2:02:45.120 Yeah. 2:02:45.360 --> 2:02:48.320 And I have nothing but love and solidarity for every 2:02:48.400 --> 2:02:52.560 transgender person alive anywhere and I'm with you, and we're 2:02:52.560 --> 2:02:53.200 going to get through this. 2:02:53.280 --> 2:02:55.440 I hope we are going to get through it, because 2:02:56.280 --> 2:03:00.200 even as individuals we might not, right, But that's as 2:03:00.200 --> 2:03:02.640 it's true about being alive, right, Literally, none of us 2:03:02.680 --> 2:03:04.840 are going to get through being alive alive right. At 2:03:04.880 --> 2:03:07.560 some point that's going to stop working for us, and 2:03:07.680 --> 2:03:11.280 they can't get rid of us. We have always been here, 2:03:11.440 --> 2:03:13.360 we will always be here as long as there are 2:03:13.480 --> 2:03:15.600 humans that are going to be trans people, they're going 2:03:15.640 --> 2:03:18.200 to be queer people, they're going to be All of 2:03:18.240 --> 2:03:21.680 the identities that they're trying to destroy cannot be destroyed, 2:03:22.280 --> 2:03:26.600 even if us as individuals might But again, we weren't. 2:03:26.360 --> 2:03:28.560 Going to get out of life alive anyway. That's what 2:03:28.680 --> 2:03:29.280 I hold on to. 2:03:29.560 --> 2:03:31.120 I don't know about everyone who's listening, but the thing 2:03:31.160 --> 2:03:33.160 that I hold onto is that just literally I was like, well, 2:03:33.200 --> 2:03:33.560 I wasn't. 2:03:33.880 --> 2:03:36.760 I'm not immortal. You know, it's got a time limit. 2:03:37.040 --> 2:03:39.080 Yeah, And all we can do is to say, go 2:03:39.160 --> 2:03:40.520 back to one of the first things that you said, 2:03:40.640 --> 2:03:43.120 we just kind of can't compromise our ethics, you know, 2:03:43.480 --> 2:03:47.600 like there's like balancing acts right where you have to think, like, well, 2:03:48.080 --> 2:03:51.160 I probably shouldn't do something where I like while out 2:03:51.240 --> 2:03:55.040 and get myself killed and accomplish nothing. Fight to win, yeah, exactly, 2:03:55.440 --> 2:03:57.160 and some of fighting to win is knowing when not 2:03:57.280 --> 2:03:59.760 to fight and things like that. Right, but but not 2:04:00.000 --> 2:04:02.480 and secretly you're just actually doing it at a cowardice way. 2:04:02.520 --> 2:04:05.480 You actually have to be strategically being like where and 2:04:05.600 --> 2:04:08.360 when should I engage in what ways? And there are 2:04:09.120 --> 2:04:12.000 so many different ways that people can engage. Yeah, thanks 2:04:12.040 --> 2:04:13.560 for coming on, And do you want to talk about 2:04:13.640 --> 2:04:14.080 your book? 2:04:14.440 --> 2:04:15.960 So rather than the cages out right now? 2:04:16.040 --> 2:04:18.560 It's with ak Press and it is a oral history 2:04:18.800 --> 2:04:23.080 of the political prisoner movement hold from the mouths of 2:04:23.160 --> 2:04:27.560 those prisoners. It covers like fifty or so prisoners from 2:04:27.760 --> 2:04:32.320 every movement, Black trans Our Elders are more recent anti fascists. 2:04:33.000 --> 2:04:35.080 And it was a beautiful way not just to hear 2:04:35.120 --> 2:04:37.440 about like oh I fought for this, but what was 2:04:37.520 --> 2:04:38.680 my life like inside? 2:04:39.040 --> 2:04:40.000 What did I experience? 2:04:40.120 --> 2:04:42.160 What gave me joy? What gave me hope, what gave 2:04:42.240 --> 2:04:45.000 me sadness? And it's a way to see the vulnerability 2:04:45.000 --> 2:04:47.640 and humanity of those inside. And I think that's really 2:04:47.720 --> 2:04:51.080 valuable right now and here soon my ADX book is 2:04:51.120 --> 2:04:53.880 coming out on them press. Oh cool, so I'll be 2:04:54.280 --> 2:04:56.520 I'll be hounding you for that here soon, for that coverage. 2:04:56.640 --> 2:04:59.400 Yeah yeah, Wait, well what's that book callor about. 2:05:00.080 --> 2:05:02.480 It's gonna be called a clean hell, and it's gonna 2:05:02.480 --> 2:05:04.960 be about how I want it trial, because no one 2:05:05.040 --> 2:05:07.800 does that in the Feds. Zero point zero eight percent 2:05:07.800 --> 2:05:10.200 of people win in federal trial. And then how I 2:05:10.240 --> 2:05:12.680 got sent to the federal supermax and there's no books 2:05:12.680 --> 2:05:16.600 out about the supermax, there's none. Well, and so one 2:05:16.640 --> 2:05:18.720 of your homies has the inside scoop. 2:05:18.920 --> 2:05:22.160 Yeah I got Yeah, you were just an undercover journalist, 2:05:22.320 --> 2:05:25.880 just a real undercover solitary confinement. 2:05:27.160 --> 2:05:29.320 So had Josh Davidson is helping me edit it. 2:05:29.880 --> 2:05:33.200 Josh Davidson from rather than the Cages, who did also 2:05:33.280 --> 2:05:33.840 certain days. 2:05:34.120 --> 2:05:36.839 So it's seemed been a really great project, Carlso awesome. 2:05:37.160 --> 2:05:39.280 All right, Well, people should check out both of those 2:05:39.360 --> 2:05:42.920 things and take care of people inside. And I hope 2:05:42.960 --> 2:05:44.080 that we'll have you one again soon. 2:05:44.280 --> 2:05:45.360 Yay, thank you so much. 2:06:06.320 --> 2:06:11.000 It could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis, and yeah, it's happening. 2:06:11.720 --> 2:06:13.800 The past few years I've been writing about how the 2:06:13.840 --> 2:06:16.480 religious right has been trying to roll back trans rights, 2:06:16.920 --> 2:06:20.200 take away gender affirming health care, and essentially remove trans 2:06:20.240 --> 2:06:23.720 people from public life. And the day that I'm writing this, 2:06:24.160 --> 2:06:27.360 President Trump just issued an executive order aiming to ban 2:06:27.560 --> 2:06:30.080 gender affirming health care for everyone below the age of 2:06:30.320 --> 2:06:34.680 nineteen in the United States, with promises to weaponize the 2:06:34.960 --> 2:06:38.760 Justice Department and alter the national Health guidelines for gender 2:06:38.800 --> 2:06:44.160 affirming care. And unfortunately this is just the start. But 2:06:44.520 --> 2:06:47.880 this won't be a wallowing in the doom and gloom episode, 2:06:48.600 --> 2:06:51.320 nor will I be laying out the fool proof solution 2:06:51.880 --> 2:06:55.320 to get us out of this predicament. Instead, we'll be 2:06:55.400 --> 2:06:58.839 hearing from two people who are trying to do something 2:06:59.080 --> 2:07:03.680 to affect change in the physical world. Last month, Mia 2:07:03.760 --> 2:07:07.080 and I talked with Neha and Cassie, who are organizers 2:07:07.120 --> 2:07:11.600 and baristas with Starbucks workers Unite It, and they also 2:07:11.720 --> 2:07:16.560 co facilitate that union's trans Rights action committee called Track. 2:07:17.680 --> 2:07:20.920 And specifically, the topic of this episode is how. 2:07:20.840 --> 2:07:23.240 To use union organizing as a way to fight for 2:07:23.360 --> 2:07:27.960 trans rights and secure access to gender affirming healthcare, which 2:07:28.080 --> 2:07:33.040 is unfortunately an increasingly critical issue. We've already had conservative 2:07:33.080 --> 2:07:37.520 states like Tennessee pressuring private insurance companies to drop covering 2:07:37.680 --> 2:07:41.400 gender affirming care by blocking insurers from contracting with the 2:07:41.480 --> 2:07:45.880 state's medicaid program, basically holding it hostage. And now with 2:07:46.000 --> 2:07:50.000 the federal government threatening gender affirming care and seemingly more 2:07:50.080 --> 2:07:53.960 and more restrictions kind of on the horizon, working outside 2:07:54.040 --> 2:07:57.360 the state and not relying on government programs like Medicare 2:07:57.400 --> 2:08:02.360 and Medicaid will only become more and union organizing is 2:08:02.520 --> 2:08:06.880 one way to do that. A union contract, union infrastructure, 2:08:07.240 --> 2:08:09.680 and the collective resources of you and your fellow union 2:08:09.760 --> 2:08:12.640 workers can help protect trans people in the workplace and 2:08:12.840 --> 2:08:16.000 get us the things we need. If you already have 2:08:16.160 --> 2:08:18.680 a union at your workplace, you can get more involved 2:08:18.840 --> 2:08:21.800 and fight to prioritize trans rights. And if you don't 2:08:21.880 --> 2:08:24.280 have a union, you can work to secure access to 2:08:24.360 --> 2:08:27.920 gender affirm and care through unionizing your workplace and having 2:08:28.000 --> 2:08:31.960 healthcare protections as a core part of your contract. For 2:08:32.120 --> 2:08:34.240 more on that topic, I'm going to play the conversation 2:08:34.440 --> 2:08:38.400 between my fellow union member Mia and Neha and Cassie 2:08:38.600 --> 2:08:42.560 from Starbucks Workers United, and I'll occasionally pop back in 2:08:42.720 --> 2:08:45.360 to provide some context. Here's Cassie. 2:08:46.080 --> 2:08:49.520 When you fight for a collective bargaining agreement, a contract 2:08:49.640 --> 2:08:54.120 between union workers and their employer. You can fight for 2:08:54.960 --> 2:08:58.480 gender affirming care to be included in the healthcare that's provided, 2:08:58.520 --> 2:09:01.400 and make sure that that healthcare is afforded and actually 2:09:01.480 --> 2:09:04.520 usable by the people working there, and that their wages 2:09:04.520 --> 2:09:08.240 are adequate to cover out of pocket expenses, including travel 2:09:08.320 --> 2:09:11.120 expenses if you live in a state that's coming under threat. 2:09:11.840 --> 2:09:14.760 But it is not just healthcare that is under threat 2:09:14.880 --> 2:09:18.880 right now. Just days into office, Trump already started to 2:09:19.080 --> 2:09:24.120 roll back Biden era federal discrimination protections. Last Monday, the 2:09:24.200 --> 2:09:27.800 Trump Badman sent a memo ordering a freeze to all 2:09:28.000 --> 2:09:32.320 federal grants, loans, and aid, requiring a sort of audit 2:09:32.560 --> 2:09:35.680 to ensure the recipients of those funds use the money 2:09:35.760 --> 2:09:40.120 in a way that quote conforms to the administration priorities unquote, 2:09:40.560 --> 2:09:46.200 and not to promote quote dei and woke gender ideology unquote. 2:09:47.400 --> 2:09:51.040 On Tuesday, a judge temporarily halted the order, and on 2:09:51.160 --> 2:09:55.080 Wednesday the White House provoked the directive. But this clearly 2:09:55.200 --> 2:09:59.120 demonstrates what the new priorities are for the Conservative government, 2:09:59.600 --> 2:10:02.960 and they we'll most certainly try this again, probably in 2:10:03.040 --> 2:10:08.000 a more targeted, discriminatory fashion, to limit the general backlash. 2:10:08.880 --> 2:10:12.600 But even as the government starts openly allowing discrimination or 2:10:12.800 --> 2:10:17.360 even encouraging it, discrimination protections is still something that unions 2:10:17.400 --> 2:10:19.000 can write into their contract. 2:10:19.520 --> 2:10:24.640 Having non discrimination language in a contract that covers gender 2:10:24.760 --> 2:10:29.080 identity is a really critical way to improve not just 2:10:29.160 --> 2:10:31.080 for yourself, but then also we talk about these things 2:10:31.120 --> 2:10:34.600 like hiring discrimination. If you get that kind of language 2:10:34.600 --> 2:10:37.040 in a contract at a union job, that's going to 2:10:37.080 --> 2:10:40.600 help everyone who comes after you. Because additionally, as a 2:10:40.720 --> 2:10:44.120 union you have the mechanism of enforcement of a grievance 2:10:44.240 --> 2:10:47.560 and an arbitration procedure. Right, that's sort of, you know, 2:10:47.640 --> 2:10:50.280 the critical in addition to obviously all the kind of 2:10:50.360 --> 2:10:53.480 actions you can perform. And you know, we can talk 2:10:53.480 --> 2:10:55.800 about what things might look like without the NLRA, but 2:10:56.440 --> 2:10:59.200 for now, we have grievance and arbitration procedures still. And 2:11:00.160 --> 2:11:04.040 in states where there are legal protections against employment discrimination 2:11:04.200 --> 2:11:07.440 for trans people, like here in California, the bar to 2:11:08.400 --> 2:11:12.040 defending yourself legally is obviously a lot higher, including financially, 2:11:12.800 --> 2:11:17.040 than defending yourself through a grievance procedure at a union job. 2:11:17.440 --> 2:11:17.560 Right. 2:11:18.040 --> 2:11:20.480 A grievance procedure at a union job is way more 2:11:20.600 --> 2:11:23.680 accessible to the average working person than hiring a lawyer 2:11:24.000 --> 2:11:26.800 and going through a legal system that is totally stacked 2:11:26.800 --> 2:11:30.120 against you and in favor of the wealthy. Having a 2:11:30.240 --> 2:11:33.560 union to defend you, you know, with the collective resources 2:11:34.160 --> 2:11:37.880 of your union that you're part of, and having your 2:11:37.920 --> 2:11:40.480 shop steward or you be a shop steward and filing 2:11:40.520 --> 2:11:44.560 those grievances yourself. It's so much more accessible for regular 2:11:44.600 --> 2:11:49.240 workers to get enforcement when they are discriminated against. And 2:11:49.360 --> 2:11:51.640 that's obviously not only relevant for trans people, but it 2:11:51.760 --> 2:11:53.480 is certainly relevant for trans people. 2:11:53.960 --> 2:11:57.560 Now, if you don't have union organizing experience, this could 2:11:57.600 --> 2:12:00.960 all seem a little intimidating, even if you already have 2:12:01.080 --> 2:12:04.480 a pre existing union at your workplace. MIA has done 2:12:04.480 --> 2:12:07.320 a whole bunch of episodes on unions and labor organizing 2:12:07.400 --> 2:12:10.120 on this podcast you could certainly look to for more 2:12:10.160 --> 2:12:14.040 information and a bit of encouragement. In twenty twenty three, 2:12:14.280 --> 2:12:18.240 Neha co founded TRACK, the Trans Rights Action Committee, which 2:12:18.320 --> 2:12:21.560 is a subcommittee of the Starbucks union that was started 2:12:21.720 --> 2:12:24.720 to help advocate for trans rights within the union and 2:12:24.880 --> 2:12:29.840 share information about the challenges trans workers were experiencing. We 2:12:29.960 --> 2:12:33.440 asked Neha about the process of getting this focus on 2:12:33.560 --> 2:12:37.120 securing trans healthcare through your union to be something that 2:12:37.240 --> 2:12:41.360 the union collectively fights for the way that our union. 2:12:41.200 --> 2:12:44.440 Started focusing on trans healthcare as one of the core 2:12:44.600 --> 2:12:48.320 issues isite we weren't organizing around. And all started with 2:12:48.520 --> 2:12:52.760 a conversation with like a regional staffer here in Oklahoma. 2:12:53.440 --> 2:12:57.320 I have like a regular check and call with my staffer, 2:12:58.120 --> 2:13:00.560 and this was like two two and a half years ago, 2:13:01.400 --> 2:13:03.320 and he was just like asking, you know, what's going on? 2:13:03.680 --> 2:13:07.040 What are you concerned about? And I was like, well, 2:13:07.240 --> 2:13:11.400 I'm having some issues with like accessing health care, and 2:13:11.800 --> 2:13:15.800 he not heard like how difficult it was for like 2:13:15.920 --> 2:13:19.240 trans people to access healthcare and Starbucks. He wasn't aware 2:13:19.240 --> 2:13:21.840 of like how expensive it could be. And as I 2:13:21.880 --> 2:13:24.840 started talking to him, he was like, hold on, let 2:13:24.920 --> 2:13:27.120 me like set up a meeting with some other people. 2:13:27.280 --> 2:13:29.600 I think they need to hear this too. So then 2:13:29.640 --> 2:13:31.880 we have like a follow up meeting with more like 2:13:32.000 --> 2:13:36.080 staff and other organizers. I talked about these issues again, 2:13:36.840 --> 2:13:40.040 and one thing led to another thing, and they ended 2:13:40.120 --> 2:13:43.720 up encouraging me to form a subcommittee with their union 2:13:44.360 --> 2:13:47.600 for trans workers to kind of like build community for 2:13:47.720 --> 2:13:51.440 us and connect us, but also hear more stories from 2:13:51.560 --> 2:13:55.480 trans workers about the struggles that they were facing, specifically 2:13:55.600 --> 2:14:00.680 in accessing healthcare. And so that's kind of how TRACK started. 2:14:01.520 --> 2:14:05.280 And it's been really moving to see how over the 2:14:05.320 --> 2:14:08.440 past like two three years, this went from like an 2:14:08.520 --> 2:14:11.360 issue that was affecting like a minority of a minority 2:14:11.400 --> 2:14:14.760 of workers, right, Like, it's not like every single work 2:14:14.800 --> 2:14:18.400 at Starbucks is trying to like have facial combinization surgery 2:14:18.800 --> 2:14:22.600 or anything like that. Right This issue that was affecting 2:14:22.680 --> 2:14:25.680 like a small step set of us ended up becoming 2:14:25.920 --> 2:14:28.800 like one of the biggest issues we were organizing around. 2:14:29.240 --> 2:14:31.040 It makes me really emotional when I think about like 2:14:31.200 --> 2:14:36.680 how much my union coworkers and like my comrades like 2:14:36.800 --> 2:14:40.800 actually like fucking care about trans people. Right of kind 2:14:40.840 --> 2:14:44.080 of like how TRACKS started and how we started to 2:14:44.440 --> 2:14:46.680 organize around trans healthcare specifically. 2:14:47.360 --> 2:14:49.560 It's been a focus for us for a long time. 2:14:50.200 --> 2:14:53.760 Also in part because the initial you know, our public 2:14:54.880 --> 2:14:57.920 bargaining proposals that were released early on when we first 2:14:58.000 --> 2:15:03.280 formulated our demands in included improvements to gender affirming care 2:15:03.400 --> 2:15:04.120 at Starbucks. 2:15:04.520 --> 2:15:05.920 And part of that's because there. 2:15:05.840 --> 2:15:10.680 Were trans people involved in writing those initial demands right, 2:15:11.440 --> 2:15:16.160 and you know, Neihaw was involved nationally in the campaign 2:15:16.520 --> 2:15:21.480 and had the opportunity and the encouragement to start track. 2:15:22.200 --> 2:15:23.600 You know, we have to be part of it. 2:15:23.840 --> 2:15:26.560 I think is on some level, you know, the most 2:15:26.600 --> 2:15:30.880 basic prerequisite for everything that came after is because trans 2:15:30.960 --> 2:15:34.240 people have been involved with this campaign from the beginning. 2:15:34.800 --> 2:15:37.800 We do have so much support and solidarity from our 2:15:37.840 --> 2:15:41.840 coworkers and from our fellow union comrades, regardless of whether 2:15:41.920 --> 2:15:45.640 they're SIS or trans, and I think part of that 2:15:45.800 --> 2:15:48.120 is because we've really showed up and done the work. 2:15:48.760 --> 2:15:51.040 This again goes to that kind of like false narrative 2:15:51.080 --> 2:15:54.880 of there's like some kind of contention between workers' rights 2:15:55.040 --> 2:15:57.960 and trans rights. It's like trans people have been super 2:15:58.040 --> 2:16:00.760 motivated to get involved in this camp pain and fight 2:16:01.000 --> 2:16:04.800 for the rights and benefits for every worker at Starbucks. 2:16:05.600 --> 2:16:08.640 Other workers have seen that, seen the way we've been 2:16:08.720 --> 2:16:12.760 involved and dedicated, and that's given them the sympathy and 2:16:12.800 --> 2:16:15.520 solidarity to stand by us for an issue that affects 2:16:15.600 --> 2:16:18.400 us very you know, directly and somewhat narrowly compared to 2:16:18.440 --> 2:16:22.000 a lot of the other things we're fighting for. So yeah, 2:16:22.120 --> 2:16:25.320 on some level, I think it comes down to unions 2:16:25.360 --> 2:16:29.200 are a place where trans people can get involved in 2:16:29.240 --> 2:16:30.960 political life in a way that's hard to do in 2:16:31.080 --> 2:16:34.520 other parts of American political life. And you get to 2:16:34.520 --> 2:16:37.680 build that solidarity, and if you're there at the table, 2:16:38.360 --> 2:16:41.600 you have a chance to highlight the issues that are 2:16:41.640 --> 2:16:43.640 important to us. And if you're fighting for everyone else, 2:16:43.680 --> 2:16:44.960 they're going to want to fight for you too. 2:16:45.840 --> 2:16:50.000 Track's logo says trans rights are labor rights, a phrase 2:16:50.120 --> 2:16:52.520 one of Nahe's co workers came up with to express 2:16:52.680 --> 2:16:56.560 the idea that even if your state becomes an unsafe 2:16:56.600 --> 2:16:59.960 place for queer and trans people, trans people will still 2:17:00.240 --> 2:17:03.520 fight to ensure that their workplace, their store, is a 2:17:03.680 --> 2:17:07.680 safe place for any trans person who works there. As 2:17:07.800 --> 2:17:10.400 the functioning of the state and the federal government becomes 2:17:10.879 --> 2:17:14.199 more and more alienated and distant, or in many cases, 2:17:14.400 --> 2:17:17.800 increasingly hostile to the likes of you and me, one 2:17:17.840 --> 2:17:20.320 of the few ways we can still exert power over 2:17:20.400 --> 2:17:24.560 our lives is through unions, regardless of whether you live 2:17:24.720 --> 2:17:30.039 in Portland, Oregon, or Oklahoma City, and specifically, as access 2:17:30.120 --> 2:17:33.360 to trans healthcare becomes more and more of a growing issue, 2:17:33.959 --> 2:17:36.400 this is becoming more of a core issue itself. That 2:17:36.520 --> 2:17:39.959 you can organize around and can actually build a union around. 2:17:40.560 --> 2:17:44.680 Lots of different struggles have been highlighted in our campaign. 2:17:44.720 --> 2:17:48.840 You know, we have really made racial justice a major 2:17:48.920 --> 2:17:52.080 priority as well. I mean, obviously economic justice is at 2:17:52.080 --> 2:17:55.640 the core of any union struggle, but you know, we're 2:17:56.520 --> 2:18:01.320 really invested in making sure all workers are included in 2:18:01.440 --> 2:18:04.200 this movement and their specific concerns are represented as well 2:18:04.200 --> 2:18:08.080 as our general shared concerns. And as more and more 2:18:08.120 --> 2:18:11.279 things get taken away at the level of federal politics 2:18:11.360 --> 2:18:14.440 and state politics in many places, people will be looking 2:18:14.560 --> 2:18:17.160 for recourse. It's like, how do I get back the stability, 2:18:17.240 --> 2:18:22.199 the protections, the dignity, the power that I've lost, particularly 2:18:22.320 --> 2:18:25.320 if you know some of these folks are not super 2:18:25.440 --> 2:18:29.280 democratically accountable. People will be looking for how they can 2:18:29.560 --> 2:18:34.680 build power and how they can find security when the 2:18:34.959 --> 2:18:37.320 state is not providing it and when the state's actively 2:18:37.400 --> 2:18:43.040 undermining it. Actually, and unions are one of the truly critical, 2:18:43.120 --> 2:18:48.240 irreplaceable answers for protecting yourself, for protecting the people you 2:18:48.320 --> 2:18:52.000 work with, for protecting your community, and for taking back 2:18:52.320 --> 2:18:55.200 some of the things that they're trying to take away 2:18:55.240 --> 2:19:00.960 from you, whether that's on the job protections, whether that'sanomic equality, 2:19:01.040 --> 2:19:04.840 whether that is your access to trans healthcare, whether that's 2:19:05.000 --> 2:19:10.199 protections from racism or misogynistic discrimination in your job and harassment, 2:19:11.000 --> 2:19:14.640 all of these things. If the state steps away, people 2:19:14.760 --> 2:19:20.080 should and will look to labor organizing as the answer instead. 2:19:20.640 --> 2:19:24.680 Our ability to build power in this way is a 2:19:24.760 --> 2:19:27.200 way that we maintain hope so that we can keep 2:19:27.360 --> 2:19:30.080 organizing for a better future. I think one of the 2:19:30.120 --> 2:19:34.760 best tools like these fucking fascist freaks have is making 2:19:34.840 --> 2:19:37.360 us feel like there's no hope. It's beating us down, 2:19:37.640 --> 2:19:40.200 it's making us feel like we have no power, it's 2:19:40.240 --> 2:19:45.039 making us feel completely disconnected from the government, our workplace, 2:19:45.280 --> 2:19:48.120 all of these different things that like exert power over us. 2:19:48.720 --> 2:19:50.880 And I think labor is such a direct way to 2:19:51.000 --> 2:19:52.840 give people that power back. 2:19:53.480 --> 2:19:55.800 Yeah, Morales a terran a struggle, and this is a 2:19:55.840 --> 2:19:58.520 way that you can fight there that does other things 2:19:58.600 --> 2:20:02.039 too at the same time, critically important and. 2:20:02.240 --> 2:20:05.280 Do you know what else is important? Being subservient to 2:20:05.440 --> 2:20:07.640 the capitalist impulse of pivoting to ads. 2:20:17.760 --> 2:20:18.640 Okay, we are back. 2:20:19.160 --> 2:20:21.800 Here is more of our interview with Starbucks workers. 2:20:21.840 --> 2:20:22.320 You needed. 2:20:23.800 --> 2:20:26.480 Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you because things have 2:20:26.600 --> 2:20:29.680 been very bad. And one of the specific ways that 2:20:29.760 --> 2:20:32.160 they've been very bad is that there's become this framing 2:20:32.280 --> 2:20:34.760 and this has been around for a while, but it's 2:20:34.800 --> 2:20:39.200 getting sort of increasingly adopted in mainstream circles that trans 2:20:39.320 --> 2:20:43.480 rights are opposed to workers' rights, and that's just nonsense. 2:20:44.000 --> 2:20:46.840 So I wanted to sort of start there with a 2:20:46.879 --> 2:20:49.080 bit of a discussion about, well, the ways in which 2:20:49.120 --> 2:20:50.920 the trans struggle is a worker struggle. 2:20:51.560 --> 2:20:56.640 The trans community is like disproportionately like impoverished, like a 2:20:56.720 --> 2:21:00.480 lot of us are struggling to just pay for rent, 2:21:00.680 --> 2:21:03.840 are basic like needs, right, Yeah, I think that's firmly 2:21:03.959 --> 2:21:08.320 assumes that like all trans people are like, I don't know, rich, working, 2:21:08.440 --> 2:21:11.320 attack or some shit like that, which just is not true. 2:21:12.000 --> 2:21:14.240 Yeah. The actual stats, by the way, these are running 2:21:14.280 --> 2:21:16.600 from the US Trans Survey, which is the largest survey 2:21:16.680 --> 2:21:19.000 of trans people in the US. Thirty four percent poverty 2:21:19.080 --> 2:21:21.560 rate than the national number for assist people is eleven percent. 2:21:21.920 --> 2:21:25.080 The unemployment rate is eighteen percent. The US uneployment rate 2:21:25.120 --> 2:21:27.840 assists people is four percent, eighteen percent is nineteen thirty 2:21:27.840 --> 2:21:31.320 six great depression levels of unemployment. Thirty percent of trans 2:21:31.400 --> 2:21:34.080 people have experienced homelessness in their lives. The national rate 2:21:34.160 --> 2:21:36.040 is about seven percent, and those numbers are actually very 2:21:36.120 --> 2:21:40.600 misleading because it's actually much worse than that, because these 2:21:40.680 --> 2:21:45.320 demographics skew young significantly because of both the shortness of 2:21:45.360 --> 2:21:47.560 our life expectancy and how often we get killed. And 2:21:47.800 --> 2:21:50.879 also there's more people who are realizing that they're trans 2:21:51.000 --> 2:21:54.080 now than there ever has before, So those homelessness numbers 2:21:54.400 --> 2:21:56.840 are we are racking up a rate of homelessness that 2:21:56.959 --> 2:21:59.440 is four times higher than the regular rate, and we're 2:21:59.480 --> 2:22:02.560 doing it in significantly less years than it takes the 2:22:02.600 --> 2:22:05.600 CIS population to rack up these levels of homelessness. So 2:22:06.480 --> 2:22:10.800 things are extremely bad for trans people. Transfems make like 2:22:10.879 --> 2:22:13.600 sixty cents on the dollar of like the average American worker. 2:22:14.240 --> 2:22:16.600 Yeah, and I think you see that in our union. 2:22:17.600 --> 2:22:21.640 We have a lot of worker leaders who are trans. 2:22:22.000 --> 2:22:25.560 It's a noticeable obvious fact about our unions that trans 2:22:25.600 --> 2:22:29.360 people have really been deeply involved since day one at 2:22:29.400 --> 2:22:32.560 all levels of this union. And I think part of 2:22:32.600 --> 2:22:37.360 that is because Starbucks has been associated as a place 2:22:37.440 --> 2:22:42.040 of economic stability and opportunity for trans healthcare for a 2:22:42.120 --> 2:22:45.480 community that has relatively few opportunities. I mean, if you're 2:22:45.480 --> 2:22:49.360 talking about eighteen percent unemployment. Then you're talking about people 2:22:49.360 --> 2:22:52.760 who certainly are going to have difficulty getting employer provided healthcare, 2:22:53.040 --> 2:22:57.039 let alone employer provided healthcare that's going to include gender 2:22:57.080 --> 2:23:03.320 affirming care, right, And so Starbucks has been held up 2:23:03.360 --> 2:23:05.920 as an opportunity for that for a lot of people. 2:23:06.920 --> 2:23:09.840 It's obviously drawn a lot of us to the company. 2:23:09.959 --> 2:23:12.280 Many of us started working there for that exact reason, 2:23:13.160 --> 2:23:16.640 and then, you know, have discovered in many cases that 2:23:16.840 --> 2:23:19.840 it's actually not so accessible. You know, I can say 2:23:19.879 --> 2:23:23.160 in my case, it's definitely one reason I started working 2:23:23.200 --> 2:23:25.200 at Starbucks because I heard like, hey, if you want 2:23:25.280 --> 2:23:27.439 facial feminization surgery, go work at Starbucks. 2:23:27.920 --> 2:23:29.280 That was a community tip. 2:23:29.959 --> 2:23:32.560 And then it turned out that I made so little 2:23:32.560 --> 2:23:35.320 money that I qualified for Medicaid, And in California, where 2:23:35.320 --> 2:23:39.080 I'm lucky enough to live for now, Medicaid covers those 2:23:39.120 --> 2:23:43.440 things and is more affordable and accessible than the Starbucks 2:23:43.480 --> 2:23:47.279 healthcare actually was, So I ended up relying on Medicaid instead. 2:23:47.959 --> 2:23:49.880 And I think a lot of us have felt and 2:23:49.959 --> 2:23:54.840 seen that dissonance between coming to this company looking for opportunity, 2:23:54.920 --> 2:23:57.640 looking for a place that is inclusive and will hire 2:23:57.680 --> 2:24:01.920 trans workers, it says, and ostensibly offers trans healthcare, but 2:24:02.000 --> 2:24:05.320 then finding out where those gaps are and realizing like, 2:24:05.600 --> 2:24:08.800 actually it's better for me to stay on Medicaid, which 2:24:08.879 --> 2:24:10.920 is easy to do because I make so little money 2:24:10.959 --> 2:24:14.200 at this job. It takes that shine off. And I think, 2:24:14.879 --> 2:24:17.960 you know, our economic vulnerability as a group is precisely 2:24:18.000 --> 2:24:21.440 what drove a lot of us to seek improvements here. 2:24:21.560 --> 2:24:24.760 It's related to our transness, sure, but it's also like 2:24:25.520 --> 2:24:29.520 just fundamental working class issues. We need better wages, we 2:24:29.600 --> 2:24:32.840 need better healthcare. You know, that's something everyone benefits from 2:24:32.879 --> 2:24:33.840 and everyone can relate to. 2:24:34.560 --> 2:24:36.320 And I mean, I can also attest to the fact 2:24:36.360 --> 2:24:40.920 that I started at Starbucks five years ago because I 2:24:42.200 --> 2:24:45.720 needed to have access and gender firming care. I was 2:24:45.760 --> 2:24:49.440 coming from a situation where I came out as a teenager. 2:24:49.800 --> 2:24:52.960 I was disowned and kicked out by my family. I 2:24:53.160 --> 2:24:56.720 didn't have access to college. I was like basically on 2:24:56.800 --> 2:24:59.480 my own right, and I had no idea how I'm 2:24:59.480 --> 2:25:03.240 going to matter transision, and like older trans women in 2:25:03.320 --> 2:25:06.400 my life told me to apply to Starbucks. And it 2:25:06.480 --> 2:25:09.240 was also like one of those things where like, again, 2:25:09.320 --> 2:25:11.720 I live in Oklahoma, It's not like there's a ton 2:25:11.760 --> 2:25:16.160 of employers who are like super excited to hire trans women. Right. 2:25:17.000 --> 2:25:18.640 That's something I also want to highlight because I don't 2:25:18.640 --> 2:25:21.720 think people understand this at all. If there's cysts is 2:25:21.760 --> 2:25:25.640 that the level of employment discrimination is staggering. It is, however, 2:25:25.760 --> 2:25:27.320 hard if you are a sis person you think it 2:25:27.440 --> 2:25:29.160 is to find a job, it is like thirty times 2:25:29.200 --> 2:25:33.280 harder if you are trans. It's unbelievably difficult. And the 2:25:33.320 --> 2:25:35.720 promise of just like any job that will hire a 2:25:35.800 --> 2:25:40.600 trans person is a huge deal because you know otherwise 2:25:40.959 --> 2:25:42.959 odds are you walk in the door and they take 2:25:43.040 --> 2:25:45.840 one look at you and like, you know, you're fucked. 2:25:46.080 --> 2:25:48.840 Right, And I think that's how Starbucks kind of like 2:25:49.000 --> 2:25:53.200 advertises itself too queer and trans workers, right. And I 2:25:53.280 --> 2:25:55.640 think this is reflected in the demographic of my store. 2:25:56.240 --> 2:25:59.800 Ninety nine percent of my coworkers are clear a lot 2:25:59.840 --> 2:26:02.199 of us or trans. There's like a lot of trans 2:26:02.240 --> 2:26:04.760 women who work at my store. I actually don't even 2:26:04.760 --> 2:26:07.320 know if we have a single straight coworker. Actually, we 2:26:07.440 --> 2:26:11.440 have liked one token like diversity higher, but he literally 2:26:11.600 --> 2:26:14.560 just transfers. I think it's all gay people, but no, 2:26:14.760 --> 2:26:18.160 like all of us applied to Starbucks because like, what 2:26:18.360 --> 2:26:21.920 other options do we have? Right, And again, in my case, 2:26:22.080 --> 2:26:24.920 I applied to Starbucks because I needed access to gender 2:26:25.040 --> 2:26:27.840 froming care. And over like the five years that I've 2:26:27.879 --> 2:26:32.960 worked here, I've realized that while that benefit might look 2:26:33.280 --> 2:26:38.680 good on paper, in practice, it's hard to actually qualify 2:26:38.840 --> 2:26:43.440 for that healthcare. It can be completely unaffordable for a 2:26:43.520 --> 2:26:46.879 lot of us. Right Like, last year, I made sixteen 2:26:46.920 --> 2:26:52.279 thousand dollars in total from Starbucks, and like a disproportionate 2:26:52.480 --> 2:26:57.640 amount of that income was just going towards healthcare, which 2:26:57.720 --> 2:27:00.240 doesn't even take into account like rent or bill or 2:27:00.240 --> 2:27:04.800 anything else. Like we're struggling to just fucking get by. 2:27:05.600 --> 2:27:08.640 Something that Mia pointed out is that one of the 2:27:08.720 --> 2:27:14.039 few places trans people are actually overrepresented is in union organizing. 2:27:14.440 --> 2:27:18.400 Because trans people don't really have a safety net. Fewer 2:27:18.520 --> 2:27:21.000 of us can turn to or rely on family support. 2:27:21.520 --> 2:27:24.039 So union organizing is one of the ways we can 2:27:24.120 --> 2:27:25.840 directly fight for a better life. 2:27:26.400 --> 2:27:29.560 But the current political climate as it is, it's even scarier. 2:27:29.959 --> 2:27:32.760 I mean, Cassie was talking about not being able to 2:27:32.840 --> 2:27:37.000 actually access the Starbucks healthcare and having defined other ways 2:27:37.120 --> 2:27:40.640 to pay for gender firm and care. But I mean, 2:27:40.760 --> 2:27:44.520 we're looking at like a Trump administration that could possibly 2:27:44.720 --> 2:27:48.320 be trying to make it impossible for anyone to use 2:27:48.360 --> 2:27:51.880 Medicare and Medicaid to cover gender firming care. We're looking 2:27:51.920 --> 2:27:55.600 at state by state like healthcare vans, right. I think 2:27:55.600 --> 2:28:00.720 it's more important than ever to organize and focus on 2:28:01.240 --> 2:28:05.840 transwrites and our access to healthcare, our wages, our safety 2:28:05.840 --> 2:28:09.360 at the workplace. Where else are we gonna protect ourselves 2:28:09.400 --> 2:28:09.600 like that? 2:28:10.320 --> 2:28:13.480 The Starbucks union is also fighting for guaranteed scheduling and 2:28:13.560 --> 2:28:17.000 better staffing in stores, and this relates directly to a 2:28:17.040 --> 2:28:20.760 worker's ability to access health care and gender affirming healthcare. 2:28:21.520 --> 2:28:25.480 Part of Starbucks healthcare being somewhat inaccessible is that employees 2:28:25.560 --> 2:28:28.040 have to work a certain threshold of hours to qualify 2:28:28.080 --> 2:28:32.080 for benefits, including healthcare. Failure to get enough hours of 2:28:32.120 --> 2:28:35.760 work scheduled means losing access to your own health care, 2:28:36.000 --> 2:28:38.920 and this kind of reflects a more subtle form of 2:28:39.080 --> 2:28:40.279 employment discrimination. 2:28:41.000 --> 2:28:43.120 I can speak to this. I've heard this from many 2:28:43.160 --> 2:28:47.800 other workers. It is such a struggle just to get 2:28:48.040 --> 2:28:51.240 the minimum amount of hours to keep your benefits. I 2:28:51.440 --> 2:28:54.800 was talking to another worker who was telling me about 2:28:55.360 --> 2:28:59.000 how she had to like literally cry and beg her 2:28:59.160 --> 2:29:02.400 manager to schedule her enough so she didn't lose access 2:29:02.440 --> 2:29:05.600 to gender firm and care. And of course this manager 2:29:05.760 --> 2:29:10.879 was scheduling enough hours for other workers who weren't trans women, right, 2:29:11.400 --> 2:29:14.280 And so I've been having like protections in a contract 2:29:14.520 --> 2:29:18.680 that guarantee a certain number of hours that are scheduling. 2:29:18.879 --> 2:29:21.640 That kind of thing also makes it easier for us 2:29:21.720 --> 2:29:24.920 to maintain and keep the benefits that we need. 2:29:25.800 --> 2:29:30.560 And obviously this benefits all workers because everyone benefits from 2:29:30.600 --> 2:29:33.280 having enough hours to actually get the money you need 2:29:33.400 --> 2:29:37.320 to live. The Starbucks union started the official bargaining process 2:29:37.440 --> 2:29:40.640 with the company last April, and they were supposed to 2:29:40.720 --> 2:29:44.080 have their final bargaining session last December, based on a 2:29:44.160 --> 2:29:47.080 shared expectation that the contract would be closed and ratified 2:29:47.360 --> 2:29:48.920 by the end of twenty twenty four. 2:29:49.760 --> 2:29:55.080 So after nine months of bargaining, it's December or expecting 2:29:55.240 --> 2:29:58.280 to finish up contract bargaining. And after like a few 2:29:58.360 --> 2:30:01.040 months of like delaying and not really giving us a 2:30:01.160 --> 2:30:05.800 counter on wages or benefits, Starbucks like finally gave us 2:30:05.879 --> 2:30:09.600 a counter proposal, I mean like counter proposal. 2:30:09.840 --> 2:30:11.760 It was literally like a page. 2:30:13.280 --> 2:30:19.880 And their counter proposal was basically no changes to benefits whatsoever, 2:30:20.480 --> 2:30:25.160 and a one point five percent raise if non union 2:30:25.240 --> 2:30:28.920 stores received a raise that was less than that, And 2:30:29.040 --> 2:30:31.680 for context, one point five percent for most of us 2:30:31.920 --> 2:30:34.720 is thirty cents. So yeah, after nine months, that was 2:30:34.760 --> 2:30:38.480 the best they could do. So it wasn't really a 2:30:39.160 --> 2:30:43.080 serious like counter proposal. I mean, frankly, it was a 2:30:43.200 --> 2:30:44.000 fucking insult. 2:30:45.080 --> 2:30:48.560 So with less than a week's notice, they organized the 2:30:48.680 --> 2:30:53.480 biggest ULP strike in the union's history, resulting in five 2:30:53.640 --> 2:30:57.240 thousand baristas at over three hundred stores across the country 2:30:57.680 --> 2:31:01.240 going on strike on Christmas Eve. Now, this is not 2:31:01.400 --> 2:31:04.520 the kind of open ended, ongoing strike that you're probably 2:31:04.560 --> 2:31:08.119 more familiar with. A ULP strike refers to a short 2:31:08.240 --> 2:31:12.520 term strike action directly tied to an unfair labor practice, 2:31:13.080 --> 2:31:15.960 which is any act by an employer that violates a 2:31:16.080 --> 2:31:21.640 worker's legal rights, and unlike ongoing strikes, ULP strikes can 2:31:21.720 --> 2:31:25.840 happen anytime, not just during contract bargaining. In fact, the 2:31:25.840 --> 2:31:29.160 Starbucks union has utilized ULP strikes the past few years 2:31:29.560 --> 2:31:33.960 to address unfair labor practices. Part of the shared agreement 2:31:34.240 --> 2:31:36.920 to finish the contract before the year's end was to 2:31:37.080 --> 2:31:40.920 also resolve outstanding unfair labor practices by the end of 2:31:40.959 --> 2:31:45.359 twenty twenty four, which did not happen and thus the strikes. 2:31:46.160 --> 2:31:49.400 And this was a super tight turnaround to organize strikes 2:31:49.440 --> 2:31:53.160 of this scale. By having a representative or delegate from 2:31:53.240 --> 2:31:56.000 each store in the union present at bargaining, which is 2:31:56.200 --> 2:31:59.440 hundreds of workers, that provides a direct link to every 2:31:59.560 --> 2:32:02.560 store in the campaign. This was how the union was 2:32:02.600 --> 2:32:05.279 able to pull off a mass mobilization on an extremely 2:32:05.440 --> 2:32:08.600 tight turnaround. So when it's time to vote to go 2:32:08.720 --> 2:32:12.160 on strike, there's already workers across hundreds of stores around 2:32:12.200 --> 2:32:14.959 the country ready to organize their co workers and get 2:32:15.000 --> 2:32:18.160 the word out. Contacts with union advocacy groups and a 2:32:18.240 --> 2:32:22.599 network of allies ranging from campus activists to LGBTQ organizations 2:32:23.120 --> 2:32:26.560 can also help spread the word about these strikes, raise awareness, 2:32:26.800 --> 2:32:30.520 and pull more numbers onto the picket line. On more 2:32:30.560 --> 2:32:33.880 of a big picture note, once you get these sorts 2:32:33.920 --> 2:32:37.960 of structures and networks from union organizing, you also gain 2:32:38.040 --> 2:32:40.959 the actual capacity to deploy them quickly in a way 2:32:41.000 --> 2:32:44.480 that actually lets you do rapid responses to changing situations. 2:32:45.120 --> 2:32:48.600 And that capacity is something that transadvocacy just hasn't really 2:32:48.680 --> 2:32:49.800 had in a long time. 2:32:50.560 --> 2:32:55.520 These sites are directly connected to the broader political situation 2:32:55.959 --> 2:32:59.680 in America right. I think that a big issue that 2:33:00.320 --> 2:33:04.720 trans organizing has right now is that there's not a 2:33:04.920 --> 2:33:08.800 lot of on the ground reaching out, connecting to mobilizing 2:33:09.840 --> 2:33:13.480 people who are impacted by these policies that are like 2:33:13.560 --> 2:33:16.720 negatively impacting trans people. And so I think the kind 2:33:16.720 --> 2:33:20.360 of organizing that unions are doing right, that we've been 2:33:20.480 --> 2:33:25.039 doing this entire time right where we're speaking to people directly, 2:33:25.280 --> 2:33:29.240 where we're getting them organized, getting them involved, is really 2:33:29.959 --> 2:33:35.480 a helpful starting point for like turning discontent and turning 2:33:35.640 --> 2:33:40.280 anxiety and fear around issues into like actual action. I 2:33:40.360 --> 2:33:44.320 think it's like super essential that we have this contract. 2:33:44.600 --> 2:33:47.640 Now we're heading into twenty twenty five, we're heading into 2:33:47.959 --> 2:33:52.200 a frankly pretty fucking scary time for trans people. We 2:33:53.400 --> 2:33:57.120 need a contract that protects trans healthcare. We need a 2:33:57.200 --> 2:34:01.400 contract that guarantees better wages. We need a contract of 2:34:01.520 --> 2:34:05.000 only for the protections that it guarantees workers in terms 2:34:05.040 --> 2:34:07.480 of like safety at work and type of terms of 2:34:07.640 --> 2:34:11.120 making sure that they're not being taking advantage of at work. 2:34:11.280 --> 2:34:15.240 Right well, Starbucks offered us again was an insult. It 2:34:15.360 --> 2:34:19.600 wasn't a real counter proposal. We're more ready than ever 2:34:19.879 --> 2:34:22.600 to like finish his contract and to have something, but like, 2:34:23.320 --> 2:34:27.240 we need movement from Starbucks. We need a serious counter proposal. 2:34:27.800 --> 2:34:30.440 Thirty cents and no changes to benefits isn't going to 2:34:30.520 --> 2:34:31.080 fucking do it. 2:34:32.160 --> 2:34:34.240 We're going to go on another ad break and return 2:34:34.400 --> 2:34:49.240 to finish up our interview with Starbucks Workers United. Okay, 2:34:49.320 --> 2:34:52.560 we're back. I'm now gonna throw to MIA or a 2:34:52.640 --> 2:34:57.400 discussion on how union organizing can help strengthen trends. Advocacy 2:34:57.600 --> 2:34:58.439 in general. 2:34:58.440 --> 2:35:01.920 We're in this kind of crisis period of I don't 2:35:01.959 --> 2:35:04.360 know what you call the national trans movements, just the 2:35:04.440 --> 2:35:06.880 extent that it exists, where the advocacy orgs and the 2:35:06.959 --> 2:35:10.080 legal strategies they've been pursuing are not working. We're losing 2:35:10.120 --> 2:35:12.880 in the courts all the time. Their electoral strategy of 2:35:13.720 --> 2:35:16.680 kind of bearrying themselves to the Biden administration has failed, 2:35:17.040 --> 2:35:20.160 and I think this is a moment where we need 2:35:20.240 --> 2:35:22.880 a new plan. And this is as good of a 2:35:22.959 --> 2:35:26.000 plan as I've ever seen. And I think one of 2:35:26.040 --> 2:35:27.560 the things that we're going to see, we're going to 2:35:27.640 --> 2:35:29.840 need to see and we're literally just going to have 2:35:29.920 --> 2:35:33.320 to do over the next few years. I mean ideally 2:35:33.360 --> 2:35:35.120 over the next couple of months, because we don't have 2:35:35.560 --> 2:35:37.360 we don't have much time until these people take power. 2:35:38.200 --> 2:35:41.879 Is more sort of you know, not just intra union 2:35:42.520 --> 2:35:46.720 coordination of organizing a transworkers, but is organizing trans workers 2:35:46.879 --> 2:35:50.160 across different unions and trying to figure out how we 2:35:50.360 --> 2:35:54.880 leverage our power, like more broadly to you know, protect 2:35:54.920 --> 2:35:57.760 ourselves and to fight for our rights and fight to 2:35:57.800 --> 2:35:58.920 be free. Yeah. 2:35:59.160 --> 2:35:59.720 I think. 2:36:01.160 --> 2:36:04.960 That's something we're still building our capacity for that in 2:36:05.080 --> 2:36:08.360 this union, but we definitely do have relationships with other 2:36:09.000 --> 2:36:13.480 trans union activists and organizers. We're affiliated to Workers United, 2:36:13.480 --> 2:36:16.760 which is affiliated to SCIU, So obviously that's kind of 2:36:16.840 --> 2:36:19.119 the most direct and easiest way for us to get 2:36:19.160 --> 2:36:21.040 in touch with other trans folks that are in the 2:36:21.120 --> 2:36:24.800 labor movement, get support, get feedback, get ideas, and share 2:36:25.080 --> 2:36:27.600 in turn what's been working for us. But it is 2:36:27.680 --> 2:36:31.000 a capacity we want to build out even further because 2:36:31.040 --> 2:36:33.920 we are going to need that solidarity between and among 2:36:34.680 --> 2:36:39.560 labor unions in order to form a coherent response. I mean, 2:36:39.640 --> 2:36:43.280 as you're saying, the response hasn't been working. The kind 2:36:43.320 --> 2:36:46.599 of problem solving we're seeing from a lot of politicians 2:36:47.120 --> 2:36:51.199 basically amounts to sidestepping the issue, pretending it doesn't exist. 2:36:52.000 --> 2:36:54.240 You know, maybe not throwing trans people under the bus 2:36:54.440 --> 2:36:59.560 explicitly by actively supporting our elimination from public life, but 2:36:59.680 --> 2:37:03.320 certainly not standing up and defending us. And unions are 2:37:03.360 --> 2:37:07.240 one of the only ways that working people can come 2:37:07.280 --> 2:37:12.160 together in large groups and pool resources for political activity. 2:37:12.240 --> 2:37:14.280 And we know there are a lot of problems with 2:37:14.360 --> 2:37:18.160 how many unions currently do that. But for those of 2:37:18.280 --> 2:37:22.160 us who are you know, very committed to struggle for equality, 2:37:22.240 --> 2:37:24.680 that's not going to compromise and throw some group under 2:37:24.720 --> 2:37:29.240 the bus. We understand that we have to get involved 2:37:29.400 --> 2:37:34.360 and be part of labor in order to improve how 2:37:34.480 --> 2:37:37.440 labor does politics in this country. If we want people 2:37:37.520 --> 2:37:42.199 to stand up and defend trans rights and defend trans healthcare, 2:37:42.360 --> 2:37:45.160 and defend our ability to exist in public life. 2:37:46.040 --> 2:37:49.240 Then we have to, like we have to be the 2:37:49.280 --> 2:37:51.400 ones to do it. We just we have to do it. 2:37:51.600 --> 2:37:55.200 And getting involved in your union is one of the 2:37:55.320 --> 2:37:57.960 only accessible ways that trans people are going to be 2:37:58.000 --> 2:38:02.160 able to build that kind of political capacity and find allies. 2:38:02.760 --> 2:38:06.160 We have an opportunity here because you know, to do 2:38:06.280 --> 2:38:11.280 a version of Jijik's mistranslation of Antonio Gramsci is like, 2:38:11.320 --> 2:38:13.520 you know, the old trans movement is dying in the 2:38:13.560 --> 2:38:15.680 New World's like struggles to be born. Now is a 2:38:15.720 --> 2:38:19.800 time of monsters. But I think this means that, you know, you, like, literally, 2:38:19.879 --> 2:38:21.720 the people listening to this show, the people on this now, 2:38:22.040 --> 2:38:25.360 we are going to be the people who define what 2:38:25.560 --> 2:38:28.040 the trans movement is going to be going forward, right, 2:38:28.080 --> 2:38:30.360 and we have to because we have no other choice. 2:38:30.760 --> 2:38:33.040 But this also means that, yeah, we are going to 2:38:33.080 --> 2:38:34.720 be the ones who get to set the tone of 2:38:35.640 --> 2:38:38.680 what we're doing, get to like strategically decide on how 2:38:38.720 --> 2:38:40.160 we're going to do this. And I think we have 2:38:40.240 --> 2:38:43.800 advantages too in the sense that there are ways in 2:38:43.840 --> 2:38:46.360 which our economic marginalization is sort of helpful in that, 2:38:47.120 --> 2:38:48.760 you know, if you look at the sort of independent 2:38:48.840 --> 2:38:51.360 unions that have been forming recently, right, even more so 2:38:51.520 --> 2:38:54.320 than in conventional unions, unbelievable numbers of those people are trans, 2:38:54.440 --> 2:38:57.320 right because you know, Okay, you're dealing with the population 2:38:57.600 --> 2:39:00.400 where it's very easy to get salts, easy to send 2:39:00.400 --> 2:39:02.840 people into unionized stores because no one has jobs anyways, 2:39:02.840 --> 2:39:04.920 and so the you know the risk of you losing 2:39:05.000 --> 2:39:07.600 it is like lower because you're already taking a low 2:39:07.640 --> 2:39:10.120 wage job, et cetera, et cetera. And I think I 2:39:10.200 --> 2:39:13.160 think there's there's things about these movements and the way 2:39:13.200 --> 2:39:16.560 that we're embedding ourselves in also sort of new movements, 2:39:16.879 --> 2:39:20.400 Like the start unionization thing is not that old, right. 2:39:20.920 --> 2:39:25.199 I think we're well positioned on the sort of front 2:39:25.400 --> 2:39:27.720 of a bunch of different changes that are happening in 2:39:27.840 --> 2:39:31.040 both union organizing and in how the American working class 2:39:31.280 --> 2:39:36.600 works to build something together that can actually go back 2:39:36.640 --> 2:39:40.560 on the offensive for the first time in like a decade. 2:39:41.000 --> 2:39:41.160 Right. 2:39:41.160 --> 2:39:42.840 And I think we're at a moment where we actually 2:39:43.040 --> 2:39:47.440 have to like fight for ourselves, right. Yeah, Again, we're 2:39:47.480 --> 2:39:49.160 at a point where no one else is going to 2:39:49.240 --> 2:39:51.400 fight for us. We have to be willing to take 2:39:51.480 --> 2:39:55.960 that step and fight for ourselves advocate for ourselves. At 2:39:56.000 --> 2:39:59.200 this moment, it's up to trans people to get involved 2:40:00.080 --> 2:40:03.000 acially with the labor movement, and there's so much opportunity 2:40:03.680 --> 2:40:06.720 to advocate for trans rights, to like build up the 2:40:07.000 --> 2:40:10.039 transliberation movement in a way that hasn't been done before. 2:40:10.840 --> 2:40:14.520 I think it's so essential for us to not feel 2:40:14.640 --> 2:40:19.240 hopeless and see the potential here and get involved. I'm 2:40:19.280 --> 2:40:22.880 not necessarily telling people that, like you should go apply 2:40:22.959 --> 2:40:26.400 to a Starbucks and like convince them to unionize, but 2:40:26.520 --> 2:40:27.279 also like I'm. 2:40:27.160 --> 2:40:34.119 Not not saying that, you know, trans people are getting 2:40:34.240 --> 2:40:39.440 that opportunity to actually drive our own liberation, and there's 2:40:39.640 --> 2:40:41.760 just so few places in society where we get that. 2:40:42.240 --> 2:40:45.160 That's been one of the most exciting things about being 2:40:45.280 --> 2:40:46.440 part of this union for me. 2:40:47.320 --> 2:40:48.640 And yes, you should. 2:40:48.480 --> 2:40:52.040 Consider going to work at Starbucks and unionizing it. And certainly, 2:40:52.480 --> 2:40:55.600 you know, to directly plug a little bit. If there 2:40:56.040 --> 2:40:59.880 are Buristas in your audience, they absolutely should go to 2:41:00.120 --> 2:41:01.640 our website. I think there will be a link like 2:41:01.760 --> 2:41:04.879 in the description of the episode or something. Go visit 2:41:05.160 --> 2:41:08.000 our union's website, get in touch with an organizer, and 2:41:08.520 --> 2:41:12.640 start organizing. I know it can like sound daunting in theory, 2:41:12.840 --> 2:41:14.960 like what does it mean to start organizing my workplace? 2:41:15.240 --> 2:41:16.640 But there is a template, there's a plan. 2:41:17.200 --> 2:41:18.520 You know. We've done this a bunch. 2:41:18.640 --> 2:41:21.720 We've done it at over five hundred stores, at least 2:41:21.760 --> 2:41:25.080 five hundred and twelve at this point nationwide, which is 2:41:25.240 --> 2:41:28.160 pretty incredible, especially to have done all that without yet 2:41:28.240 --> 2:41:31.880 having even secured our contract. So we have a good 2:41:31.920 --> 2:41:33.920 template for how to win, and if you just get 2:41:34.000 --> 2:41:37.200 in touch, then people will reach out to help you. 2:41:37.400 --> 2:41:40.240 And that does include professional staff, but it also includes 2:41:40.280 --> 2:41:44.560 people like us who are workers that will be peer 2:41:44.600 --> 2:41:49.320 to peer, worker to worker organizers, because that's what this 2:41:49.440 --> 2:41:51.879 campaign has been built on from the beginning, is workers 2:41:52.000 --> 2:41:55.560 organizing each other. So yeah, I mean, there's really truly 2:41:55.640 --> 2:41:58.720 never been a time that's better than now and also 2:41:58.840 --> 2:41:59.879 never been more essential. 2:42:00.160 --> 2:42:03.280 It's never been more needed than now. So this is 2:42:03.360 --> 2:42:03.720 the time. 2:42:04.400 --> 2:42:07.480 And if you're not a barista, or you can't become 2:42:07.520 --> 2:42:11.959 a barista, then we still really need people to sign 2:42:12.120 --> 2:42:14.640 a solidarity pledge with our union and get involved that 2:42:14.680 --> 2:42:17.760 way as allies, as supporters. You know, community support is 2:42:18.480 --> 2:42:22.760 always critical to union struggles. We are bargaining our contract 2:42:22.959 --> 2:42:26.360 with Starbucks right now, and community support is a huge 2:42:26.480 --> 2:42:29.160 part of what's going to get us, you know, the 2:42:29.200 --> 2:42:32.480 contract that does deliver the kind of protections and benefits 2:42:32.520 --> 2:42:35.760 we're looking for, that does set a precedent for what 2:42:36.080 --> 2:42:39.400 trans inclusive union organizing and union bargaining can look like 2:42:39.560 --> 2:42:43.560 in this country. It's kind of a terrifying responsibility sometimes. 2:42:43.800 --> 2:42:47.240 But the thing about this union is because it is 2:42:47.440 --> 2:42:50.920 one of the exciting bright spots in American labor right now. 2:42:51.520 --> 2:42:54.440 I do think a lot of people are looking to 2:42:54.600 --> 2:42:57.000 us to figure out, well, what are they doing, what's working, 2:42:57.120 --> 2:43:00.600 what's going well? And I certainly think, you know, the 2:43:00.720 --> 2:43:03.480 results we get for trans workers in our union have 2:43:03.720 --> 2:43:09.320 some precedent setting importance. So it is really critical, even 2:43:09.320 --> 2:43:11.080 if you're not in this union, even if you don't 2:43:11.120 --> 2:43:15.880 work at Starbucks, to support this struggle because it will 2:43:16.000 --> 2:43:20.960 have ripple effects. There will be ramifications for American labor 2:43:21.520 --> 2:43:25.600 and for the struggle for transliberation as a consequence of 2:43:26.360 --> 2:43:27.440 how things turn out with us. 2:43:27.560 --> 2:43:29.560 So yeah, we could really use your support. 2:43:30.360 --> 2:43:33.480 Earlier this episode, we talked about hope, and as important 2:43:33.520 --> 2:43:36.640 and as useful as that can be, it is also 2:43:36.959 --> 2:43:41.120 super crucial that people know how they're actually able to 2:43:41.320 --> 2:43:45.120 organize and actually try to get things done. After this 2:43:45.280 --> 2:43:48.400 last election, I'm sure many of you, like myself, were 2:43:48.480 --> 2:43:52.520 flooded with posts and performative calls to action. Now is 2:43:52.640 --> 2:43:57.160 the time to organize your community, but never with any 2:43:57.280 --> 2:43:59.880 real information on what that actually means or how to 2:44:00.080 --> 2:44:03.600 go about it. But something like the Starbucks union is 2:44:03.640 --> 2:44:06.600 actually a very direct way to do that, especially if 2:44:06.600 --> 2:44:07.359 you're a barista. 2:44:07.800 --> 2:44:11.640 I think I have to emphasize how achievable that is, 2:44:11.879 --> 2:44:15.520 Like it is possible five hundred plus stores across the 2:44:15.640 --> 2:44:19.920 nation have done it in this political environment. Right, I'm 2:44:19.959 --> 2:44:23.160 going to shout out one of my coworkers. She transferred 2:44:23.200 --> 2:44:27.320 to another store in Oklahoma, and I was chokingly telling her. 2:44:27.360 --> 2:44:29.400 I was like, well, you're allowed to transfer as long as, 2:44:29.440 --> 2:44:33.160 like you, you unionize your store immediately, and she was 2:44:33.200 --> 2:44:36.720 like okay, And she did it, like within like a 2:44:36.879 --> 2:44:39.879 week of being there. She'd like talked one on one 2:44:40.000 --> 2:44:43.480 with everyone at that store, people who were all already 2:44:44.000 --> 2:44:51.080 wanting better wages, better healthcare, better staffing, And through these conversations, 2:44:51.800 --> 2:44:55.480 she organized that store. And that is so fucking amazing 2:44:55.560 --> 2:44:57.840 to me, and it makes me feel so I don't know, 2:44:57.879 --> 2:45:00.560 I don't want to sound like patronizing or whatever, but 2:45:00.640 --> 2:45:03.920 it makes me so proud to see that, right, to 2:45:04.000 --> 2:45:06.920 see that she's been able to see how our store 2:45:06.959 --> 2:45:10.680 has organized, how we've spoken to people, how we've reached 2:45:10.720 --> 2:45:13.360 out to like her co workers, and she's been able 2:45:13.400 --> 2:45:17.400 to take that and replicate that so easily, get so quickly, 2:45:18.040 --> 2:45:19.880 Like when I say, with them, like a week or 2:45:19.879 --> 2:45:22.840 two of transferring to the store. I am not exaggerating. 2:45:23.640 --> 2:45:26.560 She was fucking on top of it. If we can 2:45:26.640 --> 2:45:31.240 do this in fucking goddamn Oklahoma, we can do this anywhere. Right, 2:45:32.000 --> 2:45:34.160 It is possible. You can do it if you can 2:45:34.240 --> 2:45:36.840 have a conversation with your coworker, if you can have 2:45:36.879 --> 2:45:40.039 a conversation with multiple co workers, if you can develop 2:45:40.120 --> 2:45:44.680 relationships with them friendships, if you can establish that you 2:45:44.840 --> 2:45:48.440 have like a common issue, right, if you can make 2:45:48.480 --> 2:45:51.879 it clear that like the struggles we're facing at our 2:45:51.959 --> 2:45:56.480 workplaces have a solution. You can do this. All you 2:45:56.640 --> 2:46:00.160 have to do is actually fucking take that step to 2:46:00.280 --> 2:46:00.920 make it happen. 2:46:01.800 --> 2:46:04.240 Every single union that has ever been formed was maybe 2:46:04.240 --> 2:46:07.480 by people exactly like you. You the listener listening to 2:46:07.600 --> 2:46:11.840 this right now, Right, you are exactly the person who 2:46:11.920 --> 2:46:14.920 has organized every union that anyone has ever done. Right, 2:46:15.000 --> 2:46:17.760 It's it's not something that's like the domain of pure 2:46:17.840 --> 2:46:21.560 professional organizers. You can do this too, Yeah, you really can. 2:46:21.720 --> 2:46:24.880 And I mean, you know, at my store, I was 2:46:24.920 --> 2:46:28.200 the only transperson at my store, and despite being a 2:46:28.720 --> 2:46:33.960 transsexual communist, I was able to organize a successful election 2:46:34.080 --> 2:46:37.080 at a store that includes you know, half of people 2:46:37.160 --> 2:46:40.200 being Trump voters like the idea that you have to 2:46:40.320 --> 2:46:44.080 hide or diminish yourself, or that because you know your 2:46:44.160 --> 2:46:47.000 trans or otherwise marginalized, that it's impossible for you to 2:46:47.120 --> 2:46:51.680 build that solidarity with your coworkers and come together for 2:46:51.840 --> 2:46:52.879 your common issues. 2:46:53.200 --> 2:46:54.039 It's just not true. 2:46:54.240 --> 2:46:59.240 People understand their own economic liberation, even if they don't 2:46:59.400 --> 2:47:03.360 fully just yet. There's always an intuitive level you understand 2:47:03.360 --> 2:47:06.320 you're getting screwed over. You can tell that the system 2:47:06.400 --> 2:47:08.000 is not set up fairly and it's not set up 2:47:08.040 --> 2:47:11.760 for you to succeed as a working person. And with 2:47:11.879 --> 2:47:14.879 the right conversations, with the right information, with the right 2:47:15.000 --> 2:47:18.880 relationships and solidarity that you build with someone else, people 2:47:18.959 --> 2:47:23.560 can be brought to understand what the solution is and 2:47:23.680 --> 2:47:28.920 that the situation you currently live under with shareholders and 2:47:28.959 --> 2:47:33.240 capitalists stealing all of this value from you is unacceptable, 2:47:33.360 --> 2:47:35.280 and that there is a way to fight to get 2:47:35.360 --> 2:47:39.880 back what you've earned with your labor. So for those 2:47:39.920 --> 2:47:41.800 of you who are listening, you don't have to hide 2:47:41.840 --> 2:47:44.920 who you are politically or personally to do that work 2:47:45.000 --> 2:47:47.600 to bring people along. And in fact, if we do 2:47:47.879 --> 2:47:51.440 hide who we are, then we're not really going to 2:47:51.520 --> 2:47:53.800 be getting people all the way to where they need 2:47:53.879 --> 2:47:56.280 to go. You know, we're not going to build a 2:47:56.360 --> 2:47:59.359 movement of people committed to liberation by side stepping issues 2:47:59.520 --> 2:48:04.200 and hiding pieces of who we are and saying that, oh, well, 2:48:04.240 --> 2:48:07.080 you know, transliberation is not really important. That's not how 2:48:07.080 --> 2:48:10.160 we're going to build like a durable coalition. I think 2:48:10.240 --> 2:48:13.480 this is a problem that politicians in our country keep making. 2:48:13.560 --> 2:48:17.039 It's a mistake they keep making of thinking they can 2:48:17.160 --> 2:48:22.000 ignore or downplay certain issues tensions within their coalitions to 2:48:22.120 --> 2:48:25.760 keep those coalitions together. But when you ignore it, you 2:48:25.800 --> 2:48:29.400 don't address it, it just blows up later in the end. Anyway, Yeah, 2:48:29.480 --> 2:48:32.280 get involved that you really have nothing to lose and 2:48:32.360 --> 2:48:37.800 nothing you know, accept your change not to be I 2:48:37.879 --> 2:48:39.760 mean I just realized halfway through. I was like, well, 2:48:39.760 --> 2:48:40.959 I might as well finish the quote. 2:48:41.000 --> 2:48:47.880 So, Okay, we're like such a scary point for trans people, 2:48:48.600 --> 2:48:51.640 and I know that that's terrifying that that's also an 2:48:51.680 --> 2:48:56.760 opportunity to pivot and to like actually make meaningful change. 2:48:56.959 --> 2:49:02.320 Right again, I cannot emphasize enough we create our own 2:49:02.400 --> 2:49:05.400 hope for a better future. It has to be on us, right, 2:49:06.400 --> 2:49:09.039 We can't just I don't know, depend on other people 2:49:09.120 --> 2:49:11.840 to do this work for us. We have to show 2:49:11.920 --> 2:49:16.240 up and do this work. And I don't know. Personally speaking, 2:49:16.600 --> 2:49:21.160 I am fucking tired of liberals who want to just 2:49:21.280 --> 2:49:24.480 ignore trans people and pretend we don't exist. As like, 2:49:24.720 --> 2:49:27.720 I don't know, our TVs are flooded with anti trans ads. 2:49:28.240 --> 2:49:31.720 I'm tired of depending on people who aren't advocating for 2:49:31.879 --> 2:49:35.480 me right. I'd rather fight for myself through my union. 2:49:36.000 --> 2:49:38.440 So yeah, and I think that's a good place to 2:49:38.640 --> 2:49:41.160 close on. Is in some sense a cold world that 2:49:41.240 --> 2:49:43.440 has left us with no one to fight for ourselves 2:49:43.520 --> 2:49:46.280 but ourselves. But if we fucking do it, we can win, 2:49:46.400 --> 2:49:48.320 and we can drag everyone else along with us. 2:49:49.280 --> 2:49:51.160 On that note, I'm going to close out the show 2:49:51.240 --> 2:49:54.760 here with a few plugs for Starbucks Workers United. You 2:49:54.840 --> 2:50:00.520 can find their website at Sbworkersunited dot org and SB 2:50:00.760 --> 2:50:04.120 Workers United on social media. I'll have a link to 2:50:04.160 --> 2:50:08.000 their website and their solidarity pledge in the description below. 2:50:08.720 --> 2:50:10.439 See you on the other side. 2:50:30.800 --> 2:50:32.000 Welcome to it could happen here. 2:50:32.400 --> 2:50:34.480 We decided every week you were going to do in 2:50:34.720 --> 2:50:40.000 episode called Executive Disorders, White House Weekly, where we report 2:50:40.120 --> 2:50:46.000 the news, and today we are going to start that episode. 2:50:46.720 --> 2:50:50.040 We have the entire full time team here. We have 2:50:50.160 --> 2:50:53.840 Mio Wong, Garrison Davis, Robert Evans, James Stout, and I 2:50:54.000 --> 2:50:56.240 am the voice in your ear Sophie Lichterman. 2:50:56.600 --> 2:50:59.039 Yeah, and you should know we'll be making a number 2:50:59.080 --> 2:51:01.560 of references to a show you haven't watched, called The 2:51:01.680 --> 2:51:04.520 news Rooms. So many we didn't just pretend we didn't. 2:51:04.879 --> 2:51:08.640 Yeah, anyways, let's do the episode now go. 2:51:09.680 --> 2:51:09.840 Yeah. 2:51:09.920 --> 2:51:11.320 So this episode is also going to be a little 2:51:11.320 --> 2:51:13.840 bit different because the idea is to cover each week 2:51:14.080 --> 2:51:17.080 of stuff that's happening visa via the White House. And 2:51:17.280 --> 2:51:20.240 it's been two weeks since since Inauguration Day, and we 2:51:20.360 --> 2:51:22.760 are recording usually on Wednesdays, so there'll be, you know, 2:51:22.840 --> 2:51:24.800 a day or two there that we will record the 2:51:24.840 --> 2:51:27.000 week after. But we have a whole bunch of stuff 2:51:27.040 --> 2:51:30.920 today because we are covering essentially two weeks. I'll start 2:51:31.000 --> 2:51:36.000 with some of the transgender executive orders that happened last week. 2:51:36.600 --> 2:51:41.720 There was an order defining two sexes assigned at conception, 2:51:42.240 --> 2:51:45.840 which made plenty of biologists scratch their heads. A lot 2:51:45.879 --> 2:51:48.080 of this is just going to impact the ability to 2:51:48.400 --> 2:51:50.960 change your gender marker on federal documents for the next 2:51:51.040 --> 2:51:55.520 four years, you know, passports, also removing the the ex 2:51:55.720 --> 2:51:59.720 gender marker from federal documents. There's also a new directive 2:51:59.840 --> 2:52:03.200 that Pride flags are not to be flown on federal buildings. 2:52:03.480 --> 2:52:05.840 Also a separate one. I don't think we have included 2:52:05.920 --> 2:52:09.560 here in the research doc but how brutalist and modernist 2:52:09.640 --> 2:52:13.240 architecture is now not allowed to be used on new 2:52:13.360 --> 2:52:17.080 federal buildings. You have to use Greek or Roman inspired 2:52:17.200 --> 2:52:21.480 architecture because they project power. So all of those like 2:52:22.040 --> 2:52:26.480 Greek avatar statue Twitter accounts have a complete cultural victory. 2:52:26.600 --> 2:52:31.960 Now, uh great, I am going to agitate to replace 2:52:32.040 --> 2:52:34.840 the Oregon State capital with just a statue of a 2:52:34.920 --> 2:52:37.400 Roman orgy. You know, we don't even need place for 2:52:37.480 --> 2:52:39.840 the legislators. Just look at the statue and you'll know 2:52:39.920 --> 2:52:40.240 what to do. 2:52:40.480 --> 2:52:43.960 This actually is like bad, you know, very very nineteen thirties, 2:52:44.200 --> 2:52:44.360 you know. 2:52:44.680 --> 2:52:47.720 Yeah, yeah, famously no other regimes have hawken back to 2:52:47.800 --> 2:52:48.480 Claus Caalle era. 2:52:48.680 --> 2:52:51.560 Well, and specifically is like calling like you know, modern architecture, 2:52:51.600 --> 2:52:54.920 brutalist architecture, as you know, is like weak or bad 2:52:55.080 --> 2:52:56.199 or things that get restricted. 2:52:56.560 --> 2:52:56.760 Yeah. 2:52:57.320 --> 2:53:00.200 On a more somber note, part of this two sex 2:53:00.320 --> 2:53:03.120 that conception thing also means that a whole bunch of 2:53:03.200 --> 2:53:05.720 trans women are now being sent to men's prisons. And 2:53:05.879 --> 2:53:07.160 like a lot of this stuff is stuff that we 2:53:07.240 --> 2:53:10.480 knew was going to happen, and it did happen quite immediately. 2:53:10.720 --> 2:53:14.160 Yeah, and this is this is just the start. 2:53:14.200 --> 2:53:17.119 I guess we'll throw over to MIA for some more 2:53:17.160 --> 2:53:21.760 executive action done on the wellcual gender ideology angle. 2:53:22.400 --> 2:53:24.360 Yeah, but by the time we're finished recording this, there 2:53:24.440 --> 2:53:26.720 might be another anti trans executive order. We'll get to 2:53:26.760 --> 2:53:29.800 that end. But the big ones for right now is 2:53:29.920 --> 2:53:32.280 that Trump is trying to do a and this is 2:53:32.320 --> 2:53:33.840 not something we talked about in our in our last 2:53:33.879 --> 2:53:36.520 episode about what's gonna look like with trans people, but 2:53:36.640 --> 2:53:41.360 a federal funding ban for trans healthcare, which means for 2:53:41.560 --> 2:53:45.320 for youth trans healthcare, which means any provider that like 2:53:45.680 --> 2:53:47.480 gets federal funding. And this is and this includes things 2:53:47.560 --> 2:53:51.959 like taking Medicare and Medicaid right those like hospitals can't 2:53:52.040 --> 2:53:54.360 do any kind of gender for a main care for youth. 2:53:55.000 --> 2:53:56.840 Part of what's sort of terrifying. I mean, there's a 2:53:56.920 --> 2:53:59.240 lot of terrible stuff about this, but they've they've defined 2:53:59.560 --> 2:54:01.720 are as age nineteen. 2:54:01.680 --> 2:54:03.200 Or under the age of nineteen. 2:54:03.520 --> 2:54:05.160 Yeah, under the age of nineteen. Yeah. 2:54:05.440 --> 2:54:08.280 Obviously, like that gives you know, worries for stuff that 2:54:08.320 --> 2:54:09.840 we've been talking about for years for how they might 2:54:09.879 --> 2:54:12.600 try to start bumping up the age for these for 2:54:12.680 --> 2:54:13.640 these HRT bands. 2:54:14.040 --> 2:54:14.200 Yep. 2:54:14.320 --> 2:54:17.240 This also could be them not really realizing what they're 2:54:17.360 --> 2:54:20.120 doing to some extent, because this could also just be 2:54:20.200 --> 2:54:24.080 copying I believe in Alabama or an Arkansas ban and 2:54:24.200 --> 2:54:26.680 that was like the highest age used in any of 2:54:26.760 --> 2:54:29.600 these like state healthcare bands. They could just be copying 2:54:29.640 --> 2:54:32.280 that over because it is the highest one. And like, 2:54:32.320 --> 2:54:34.280 I'm not sure how much they've thought about, you know, 2:54:34.800 --> 2:54:38.080 their capacity to start, like, you know, arbitrarily raising that number. 2:54:38.400 --> 2:54:40.040 I mean, part of what I think is happening. And 2:54:40.120 --> 2:54:42.000 I think this because this was definitely at play in 2:54:42.040 --> 2:54:44.959 the Alabama ban is this is, in addition to being 2:54:45.000 --> 2:54:48.320 an attack on trans people, part of a broader set 2:54:48.400 --> 2:54:51.800 of messaging towards the Parents' Rants movement, which very much 2:54:51.879 --> 2:54:54.360 does not consider eighteen year olds to be adults. 2:54:54.600 --> 2:54:55.440 Totally, totally. 2:54:56.040 --> 2:54:58.520 Yeah, And on that note, one of the things they're 2:54:58.520 --> 2:55:01.280 trying to do is target states that have like trans 2:55:01.360 --> 2:55:05.440 sanctuary laws by trying to like get parents who take 2:55:05.440 --> 2:55:08.640 their kids to save states, like charged on kidnapping charges 2:55:09.520 --> 2:55:12.840 and so forth, noting supposedly later today there's going to 2:55:12.920 --> 2:55:16.480 be one about using the Attorney General's office to work 2:55:16.520 --> 2:55:20.000 with attorney generals in states who prosecute teachers to use 2:55:20.080 --> 2:55:23.400 gender firming pronouns as like sexual abusers. And I want 2:55:23.400 --> 2:55:25.840 to point out like these executive orders specifically, like the 2:55:25.879 --> 2:55:27.720 second raft of them that I've been talking about, Like 2:55:27.879 --> 2:55:31.200 these are all unbelievably legal, right, yeah, Like these are 2:55:31.240 --> 2:55:33.800 probably not going to get implemented immediately because there's immediately 2:55:33.879 --> 2:55:35.960 going to go to the courts, Like the Supreme Court 2:55:36.000 --> 2:55:37.800 will probably give them some of it. But like you 2:55:37.879 --> 2:55:40.680 can't just like declare something a crime and have the 2:55:40.720 --> 2:55:43.600 Attorney general prosecute people for it. Like that specific thing 2:55:44.000 --> 2:55:47.080 is genuinely so ridiculous that it might not survive the 2:55:47.120 --> 2:55:51.560 Supreme Court. It's nonsense, but things that aren't nonsense, And 2:55:51.640 --> 2:55:53.879 this is something you genuinely can do that's very dangerous. 2:55:54.000 --> 2:55:55.640 Is he's trying to get And this is from per 2:55:55.720 --> 2:55:59.080 Aaron Reid, He's a trans journalist, does pretty good work 2:55:59.120 --> 2:56:01.280 on this stuff. The federal government has been instructed to 2:56:01.400 --> 2:56:04.360 not follow w PATH guidelines or WPATH is this sort 2:56:04.400 --> 2:56:07.959 of organization that sets the guidelines for like Trend's healthcare 2:56:08.560 --> 2:56:11.440 and this we don't know what this is going to do. 2:56:11.640 --> 2:56:14.400 There is a chance that this could endanger private like 2:56:14.520 --> 2:56:18.160 healthcare covering it because they follow the government using WPATH. 2:56:18.840 --> 2:56:22.040 So that's extremely extremely bad. But again, and this is 2:56:22.040 --> 2:56:23.959 going to be a running theme in the next section 2:56:24.080 --> 2:56:26.040 of this. A lot of this is stuff that he 2:56:26.080 --> 2:56:28.200 should need Congress for and he's just trying to do 2:56:28.320 --> 2:56:31.200 it because he thinks that he can and he doesn't 2:56:31.200 --> 2:56:31.680 give a shit. 2:56:31.879 --> 2:56:33.880 Well, and it's just signaling to the base even if 2:56:33.920 --> 2:56:36.200 it gets stopped, like he's I think, I don't think 2:56:36.240 --> 2:56:39.840 he cares if decent chunks of it gets stopped. 2:56:39.879 --> 2:56:42.000 He tried to do the thing. Yeah, I agree with Robert. 2:56:42.320 --> 2:56:44.440 He can now shift the blame to someone else. 2:56:44.560 --> 2:56:47.600 Look, man, I did the executive order, which honestly is 2:56:47.680 --> 2:56:50.120 what Biden should have done on some stuff. Right, fuck it, 2:56:50.560 --> 2:56:51.760 make the statement, you know. 2:56:52.200 --> 2:56:52.400 Yeah? 2:56:52.480 --> 2:56:55.320 Yeah, So speaking of fuck it, let's get into this 2:56:55.440 --> 2:56:59.960 whole this whole freezing the entire federal government thing. We're 2:57:00.000 --> 2:57:02.600 we're gonna do a more detailed episode about this next week. 2:57:03.160 --> 2:57:04.960 But maybe the most unhanged thing that he's sound so 2:57:05.000 --> 2:57:08.040 far than the birthright stuff. He did an executive order 2:57:08.320 --> 2:57:12.360 that's telling everyone they can't fund DEI. Early this week, 2:57:12.560 --> 2:57:15.720 the US Office of Personnel Management sent out this memo 2:57:15.879 --> 2:57:20.280 to everyone telling them that, like all grant programs are 2:57:20.560 --> 2:57:23.960 frozen until they submit, like they submitted a description of 2:57:24.040 --> 2:57:25.760 like what the grant program is and why it's not 2:57:25.920 --> 2:57:28.959 DEI and so like think things that were like fucked 2:57:29.040 --> 2:57:31.640 by this, right I have a few of these programs 2:57:31.720 --> 2:57:33.520 and they were the grants they were shutting down. Here, 2:57:34.280 --> 2:57:40.080 the Nicholas and Zachary Burt Memorial carbon Monoxide Poisoning Program WOA, 2:57:41.200 --> 2:57:44.800 the National School Lunch Program, Special Milk Program for children, 2:57:45.160 --> 2:57:49.160 the Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, infants, and children, the 2:57:49.280 --> 2:57:53.640 do d's Basic and Applied Scientific Research Grants DEI D. 2:57:54.440 --> 2:57:57.160 It's even got a D right in there, that's right. Yeah, 2:57:57.480 --> 2:57:59.440 Like one of these and this is a very serious 2:57:59.480 --> 2:58:01.720 one least for these people holding onto power was the 2:58:01.840 --> 2:58:05.760 National Guard's Military Operation and Maintenance samously low, which like 2:58:05.840 --> 2:58:08.920 it's like it's like eight billion dollars of money to 2:58:09.000 --> 2:58:09.600 the National Guard. 2:58:09.720 --> 2:58:13.959 Hey, critical support. He got one thing, right, The. 2:58:14.000 --> 2:58:16.160 Way that you can tell that none of these people, 2:58:16.200 --> 2:58:17.640 and the thing is a sign of is that none 2:58:17.680 --> 2:58:19.720 of these people have any idea what's going on inside 2:58:19.720 --> 2:58:21.080 of the state. They don't understand what it is, they 2:58:21.120 --> 2:58:23.200 don't understand what it does. And I can prove this 2:58:23.360 --> 2:58:26.200 for a fact because one of the programs that they 2:58:26.440 --> 2:58:30.880 froze was a program that gives money to police to 2:58:31.000 --> 2:58:34.400 do patrols outside of a nuclear weapons assembly plan. 2:58:34.600 --> 2:58:39.879 Joey, they defunded the nuke police, like check the Segmal 2:58:39.920 --> 2:58:41.680 loop gang. I think I got a plan based on 2:58:41.840 --> 2:58:47.120 that we're gonna become the first nuclear armed podcasting network. 2:58:47.879 --> 2:58:51.800 So like, I think I think people have this conception that, like, 2:58:51.920 --> 2:58:53.920 you know, they're operating according to a plan. These are 2:58:53.959 --> 2:58:56.240 all sort of strategic like strokes and masters strokes, and 2:58:56.320 --> 2:58:59.320 like no, they're just they're just lashing out right. They're 2:58:59.360 --> 2:59:02.200 driven by peer anger, and they're trying to do this 2:59:02.360 --> 2:59:05.320 purge of the government if anything woke or whatever, like 2:59:05.560 --> 2:59:08.760 anything that's like vaguely involves non white people or just 2:59:08.879 --> 2:59:11.800 like anyone who's not assists white dude, they're trying to 2:59:11.800 --> 2:59:17.640 get rid of. Yeah, and this memo was immediately challenged 2:59:17.640 --> 2:59:19.879 in court because it's also this is also hideously illegal. 2:59:19.959 --> 2:59:22.760 The president doesn't control the purse strings. That's like, you know, 2:59:22.879 --> 2:59:26.520 in the Constitution, it says that Congress controls this. So 2:59:27.200 --> 2:59:32.160 where we're at now is that the memo has been withdrawn, 2:59:33.000 --> 2:59:36.040 but there's there's a bunch of really conflicting information where 2:59:36.080 --> 2:59:38.440 like Trump spokespeople are saying that they're still going to 2:59:38.480 --> 2:59:40.160 go through with the executive orders. 2:59:40.480 --> 2:59:42.640 They're probably going to try to rewrite it. They might 2:59:42.720 --> 2:59:47.000 make it more targeted against you know, woke whatever that means. Yeah, 2:59:47.160 --> 2:59:49.160 it may not be as like broad as this as 2:59:49.240 --> 2:59:51.680 this official memo, but they're certainly going to try again. 2:59:51.840 --> 2:59:53.840 But the problem that they have is that there's there 2:59:53.879 --> 2:59:56.080 are literally so many of these grants and the read 2:59:56.120 --> 2:59:57.400 the reason they did it this way in the first 2:59:57.440 --> 2:59:59.160 place was because they just they just they found a 2:59:59.240 --> 3:00:01.480 list of grants. I copied all of them and they 3:00:01.520 --> 3:00:03.680 were like, Okay, departments, you have to go figure this out, 3:00:03.680 --> 3:00:05.400 and we're freezing your stuff until you do that. Even 3:00:05.480 --> 3:00:09.160 Medicaid was frozen for a few hours yesterday. Yeah, right, 3:00:09.400 --> 3:00:12.360 Like the effectively nuked most of the capacity of the 3:00:12.400 --> 3:00:15.400 federal government. And it's gonna take a lot of effort 3:00:15.480 --> 3:00:17.959 for them to sort through which of these things they 3:00:18.000 --> 3:00:20.120 could afford to turn off so that they don't end 3:00:20.200 --> 3:00:21.880 up like turning off the new police. 3:00:22.240 --> 3:00:22.360 Right. 3:00:22.640 --> 3:00:26.560 Yeah, critical support to abolishing the nuclear security. 3:00:27.280 --> 3:00:28.640 Yeah, they did what Biden couldn't do. 3:00:30.480 --> 3:00:33.240 Yeah, let's go on a quick ad break, and then 3:00:33.280 --> 3:00:35.800 we will return to report more of the news. 3:00:45.640 --> 3:00:46.720 All right, we are back. 3:00:47.320 --> 3:00:49.840 I guess I will turn over to our Immigration and 3:00:49.920 --> 3:00:51.560 Border correspondent, James Stout. 3:00:51.800 --> 3:00:53.760 That's me, Yes, please report the news. 3:00:53.840 --> 3:00:56.120 I'm ready to report the news. I have never been 3:00:56.200 --> 3:00:58.240 more ready. Okay, this is gonna be a long run 3:00:58.320 --> 3:01:02.000 because that was a raw of executive orders about the 3:01:02.080 --> 3:01:06.520 border in the flurry flurry Yeah, a sounder the word 3:01:06.560 --> 3:01:09.920 we're allowed to use. Okay, a flurry Okay, A murder 3:01:10.360 --> 3:01:12.119 like crows, you know, the collective nown for crows. 3:01:12.480 --> 3:01:14.080 I mean this is going to result in a murder. 3:01:14.800 --> 3:01:14.959 Yeah. 3:01:15.000 --> 3:01:15.160 Yeah. 3:01:15.240 --> 3:01:19.000 Well, so let's start with a couple of the big ones, right. 3:01:19.120 --> 3:01:21.720 The first one was essentially revoking the right to asylum 3:01:21.800 --> 3:01:25.240 to anyone quote engaged in the invasion across the southern 3:01:25.320 --> 3:01:28.920 border end quote. I want to highlight this invasion language 3:01:29.000 --> 3:01:31.880 because obviously like I adventure to say, I've spent more 3:01:31.959 --> 3:01:34.200 time at the southern border of the United States sent 3:01:34.240 --> 3:01:37.280 anyone in the executive branch, and most people reporting on 3:01:37.360 --> 3:01:39.920 it too. The idea of an invasion is laughable. I've 3:01:39.959 --> 3:01:43.680 been at the border twice since Trump was inaugurated. It's 3:01:43.760 --> 3:01:47.760 extremely quiet. I've never seen things more quiet. The remarkable 3:01:47.800 --> 3:01:50.040 thing I saw was a pig of Vietnamese pop Belied Big, 3:01:50.080 --> 3:01:52.800 which some people have released, which now lives there. I 3:01:52.840 --> 3:01:55.400 think it's being rehomed because of some other stuff that 3:01:55.520 --> 3:01:58.760 we will talk about later. But this invasion language is 3:01:58.840 --> 3:02:02.840 important because it's used as a justification for some of 3:02:02.920 --> 3:02:04.920 the things that the executive branch is doing which would 3:02:04.959 --> 3:02:08.040 otherwise seem to be outside of its authority. It's getting 3:02:08.200 --> 3:02:11.560 the national security encounter terrorism treatment, and anyone who's followed 3:02:11.680 --> 3:02:14.200 US politics for the last twenty years will understand that 3:02:14.280 --> 3:02:17.920 that means an effective waiver for all of your constitutional rights. 3:02:17.959 --> 3:02:21.160 And migrants have always been people who don't have rights, 3:02:21.680 --> 3:02:23.840 and this is just something that we're now seeing like 3:02:24.080 --> 3:02:27.600 further pushed. So let's go through some of these orders. 3:02:27.600 --> 3:02:31.080 Aside from the effective asylum ban, he directed the United 3:02:31.120 --> 3:02:34.920 States Northern Command to quote unquote seal the border. This 3:02:35.080 --> 3:02:38.160 has resulted in a deployment of about sixteen hundred United 3:02:38.200 --> 3:02:42.520 States troops. Most of them are military, police or engineers. 3:02:42.879 --> 3:02:45.600 We've got marines, and we've got army, and in San 3:02:45.640 --> 3:02:48.920 Diego Sectory its first marines out of Pendleton. They're the 3:02:49.000 --> 3:02:54.120 ones that I've seen locally. He has directed various government 3:02:54.200 --> 3:02:58.360 departments and the Attorney General to begin quote identifying countries 3:02:58.400 --> 3:03:01.000 throughout the world for which vetting and screening information is 3:03:01.080 --> 3:03:04.320 so deficient as to warrant a partial full suspension on 3:03:04.360 --> 3:03:08.400 the omission of nationals from those countries. This is effectively 3:03:08.440 --> 3:03:11.920 the travel ban that we saw in the first Trap administration, 3:03:12.120 --> 3:03:16.320 or a version of that. Right, it's a visa revocation 3:03:16.600 --> 3:03:18.760 or a travel ban for people from certain countries. And 3:03:19.440 --> 3:03:21.640 we can guess what those countries will be. At last time, 3:03:21.720 --> 3:03:24.640 they were for the most part, majority Muslim countries, right, 3:03:25.360 --> 3:03:25.600 and we. 3:03:25.720 --> 3:03:27.039 Might well see that again. 3:03:27.680 --> 3:03:32.680 They have attempted to rescind birthright citizenship for children of 3:03:32.760 --> 3:03:33.800 undocumented families. 3:03:33.879 --> 3:03:34.000 Right. 3:03:34.040 --> 3:03:36.680 This is one if people go back to our like 3:03:36.800 --> 3:03:40.640 what can Trump do for mass deportations podcasts that Robert 3:03:40.680 --> 3:03:44.200 Sophie and I did sometime in November. I think you'll 3:03:44.240 --> 3:03:46.200 get more information there on like what is and what 3:03:46.360 --> 3:03:48.280 is not possible than we have time to go into today. 3:03:48.280 --> 3:03:49.480 But you're seeing a lot of the things that we 3:03:49.560 --> 3:03:54.560 talked about there coming into reality now. I guess specifically, 3:03:54.800 --> 3:03:58.160 the attempt to rescind birthright citizenship relies on the idea 3:03:58.200 --> 3:04:01.240 that they are not quote unquote under the jurisdiction thereof 3:04:01.760 --> 3:04:04.160 of the United States, which is how. 3:04:04.080 --> 3:04:05.560 The fourteenth Amendment is phrased. 3:04:06.240 --> 3:04:08.879 Generally, it is understood that people who are not considered 3:04:08.920 --> 3:04:11.120 to be under the jurisdiction of the United States and 3:04:11.200 --> 3:04:13.760 therefore don't get citizenship when they're born here are the 3:04:13.840 --> 3:04:17.400 children of diplomats, because they have some diplomatic community right, 3:04:17.480 --> 3:04:20.600 so they're not necessarily governed by United States laws in 3:04:20.680 --> 3:04:23.360 all areas, and that is why children of diplomats don't 3:04:23.360 --> 3:04:26.720 get citizenship people when they're born here. The Trump administration 3:04:26.840 --> 3:04:29.280 is arguing that applies to children of undocumented people as well. 3:04:29.440 --> 3:04:32.600 There are five court cases challenging that already, so they've 3:04:32.600 --> 3:04:35.680 got an upp battle in the courts there. He has 3:04:35.720 --> 3:04:40.120 attempted to restart the Migrant Protection Protocol MPP, better known 3:04:40.160 --> 3:04:43.560 as REMAIN in Mexico. Right, the Migrant Protection Protocol requires 3:04:43.600 --> 3:04:46.440 migrants to wait in Mexico whether immigration cases are processed. 3:04:46.920 --> 3:04:48.800 In practice, it puts them in a lot of danger. Right, 3:04:48.879 --> 3:04:52.240 Some of them are fleeing Mexico. Others are fleeing groups 3:04:52.360 --> 3:04:54.720 or states that can reach them in Mexico, so it 3:04:54.800 --> 3:04:58.320 leaves them in an unsafe place. The other thing he 3:04:58.400 --> 3:05:01.680 did while Trump was still in the inaugural ceremonies, like 3:05:01.760 --> 3:05:06.960 literally minutes after taking office, was canceling CBP one CBP one. 3:05:07.240 --> 3:05:09.880 There is a lot of misinformation about what CBP one is. 3:05:10.160 --> 3:05:13.840 CBP one is an application that allowed migrants to make 3:05:13.879 --> 3:05:16.760 an appointment and they had to be either in southern 3:05:16.840 --> 3:05:19.959 border states of Mexico or north of Mexico City. They 3:05:20.000 --> 3:05:22.640 could then make an appointment to approach a United States 3:05:22.760 --> 3:05:24.800 port of entry, those that are places where you can 3:05:24.959 --> 3:05:27.480 enter across the land border and make their case for 3:05:27.520 --> 3:05:29.760 their asylum right, do their first asylum interview. 3:05:30.040 --> 3:05:31.880 Like this is like following the law, Like this is 3:05:31.959 --> 3:05:33.160 like the process. 3:05:33.320 --> 3:05:35.920 Yeah, making a CBP one appointment is quote unquote the 3:05:36.040 --> 3:05:37.080 right way exactly. 3:05:37.160 --> 3:05:37.959 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 3:05:37.959 --> 3:05:39.680 You have a legal right to enter between ports of 3:05:39.800 --> 3:05:41.560 entry and still make an asylum claim, which is what 3:05:41.680 --> 3:05:45.720 we saw in their outdoor attention situation, right. But doing 3:05:45.840 --> 3:05:49.080 it via CBP one is like the belt embraces correct 3:05:49.160 --> 3:05:52.119 way to do it. People who had appointments at noon 3:05:52.360 --> 3:05:56.120 Pacific on the day Trump was inaugurated saw those appointments canceled. 3:05:56.560 --> 3:05:59.640 They can't make appointments anymore. CBP one is gone. Those 3:05:59.680 --> 3:06:02.160 people who have waited an average of nine months in 3:06:02.320 --> 3:06:05.920 dangerous places have wasted their time. They now don't have 3:06:06.040 --> 3:06:08.280 a pathway to asylum in this country. If you go 3:06:08.400 --> 3:06:11.080 back to my episodes on the Daddian Gap, you will 3:06:11.120 --> 3:06:12.120 hear some of those people. 3:06:12.240 --> 3:06:12.360 Right. 3:06:12.400 --> 3:06:16.520 Those people are now stuck in Mexico without really any 3:06:16.879 --> 3:06:17.959 legal means. 3:06:17.760 --> 3:06:19.560 To enter the United States and claim asylum. 3:06:20.320 --> 3:06:24.119 Trumps directed ICE to increase detention capacity. We spoke about 3:06:24.160 --> 3:06:27.360 this in our previous podcast. Don't the amount of detention 3:06:27.480 --> 3:06:31.119 beds they would need to hit the thirteen million deportations 3:06:31.160 --> 3:06:33.560 they talked about it is immense. But one of the 3:06:33.600 --> 3:06:36.959 things they are doing is starting to house it's people 3:06:36.959 --> 3:06:40.400 whose countries won't accept them for deportation, right, which is 3:06:40.480 --> 3:06:43.640 a thing that has happened. The United States has begun 3:06:43.800 --> 3:06:47.120 using military aircraft for deportations in the last two weeks. 3:06:47.720 --> 3:06:50.119 I want to stress that this isn't a capacity issue. 3:06:50.680 --> 3:06:53.360 Biden deported eight thousand people in a month in the 3:06:53.920 --> 3:06:56.760 September to October of twenty twenty one. Trump is aiming 3:06:56.840 --> 3:07:01.200 to hit five thousand. Biden did it all with contractor flights. 3:07:01.640 --> 3:07:05.279 Trump is doing a lower number and using air force flights. 3:07:06.440 --> 3:07:08.800 This is not because he can't get the contractors. It's 3:07:08.920 --> 3:07:12.320 purely an esthetic choice, and it's an esthetic choice which 3:07:12.320 --> 3:07:16.600 has roffled enough feathers in South and Central America that 3:07:16.760 --> 3:07:19.440 you have Honduras saying that they're going to revote the 3:07:19.480 --> 3:07:21.440 US mission to have a military base in Honduras is 3:07:21.440 --> 3:07:27.120 a mistreat migrants. We had Columbia briefly refusing US military 3:07:27.160 --> 3:07:30.000 flights with deportees. Mexico doing the same. 3:07:30.520 --> 3:07:33.840 Briefly entering a trade war with Columbia. Yeah, Yes, which 3:07:33.879 --> 3:07:35.040 lasted about two hours. 3:07:35.200 --> 3:07:38.680 The one hour trade war about the same length as 3:07:38.800 --> 3:07:42.080 the Civil war in Western Yugoslavia. 3:07:42.360 --> 3:07:42.560 Yeah. 3:07:42.920 --> 3:07:45.360 The trade war with Columbia was averted when Columbia sent 3:07:45.400 --> 3:07:48.520 its own military plane to get these deportees. 3:07:48.600 --> 3:07:48.760 Yeah. 3:07:48.879 --> 3:07:50.359 Columbia caved immediately. 3:07:50.480 --> 3:07:53.560 Yeah, then they will continue to accept US deportees as 3:07:53.600 --> 3:07:55.520 they have done for a long time. Right again, if 3:07:55.520 --> 3:07:57.120 you listen to my Darien series, you'll hear of some 3:07:57.320 --> 3:08:00.200 Colombian people being deported. We're now getting into things that 3:08:00.280 --> 3:08:03.680 are like more. These are orders that we haven't seen 3:08:04.200 --> 3:08:07.080 realized yet. One of them is he is He has 3:08:07.959 --> 3:08:12.080 talked about having the Attorney General remove as far as 3:08:12.200 --> 3:08:16.280 possible federal funding from so called sanctuary jurisdictions. Right these 3:08:16.280 --> 3:08:19.240 are normally places where local law enforcement will cooperate with 3:08:19.440 --> 3:08:23.240 federal immigration enforcement. ICE makes a majority of its detentions 3:08:24.000 --> 3:08:26.480 from people who are already detained, people who are like 3:08:26.560 --> 3:08:30.400 arrested by police, yes exactly, for whatever. Then those police 3:08:30.520 --> 3:08:33.200 notify ICE and ICE come get them. We've seen a 3:08:33.240 --> 3:08:37.560 lot more of door to door ICE rates in the 3:08:37.680 --> 3:08:40.520 last two weeks, and they've been ramping up even really 3:08:40.640 --> 3:08:43.640 really this week. But ever since Trump was inaugurated, we've 3:08:43.720 --> 3:08:47.560 seen ICE attempting to enter people's homes. Often they just 3:08:47.680 --> 3:08:51.040 have a warrant issued by themselves rather than they judicial warrant, 3:08:51.120 --> 3:08:53.680 so we've seen people refusing to let them into their homes. 3:08:54.400 --> 3:08:58.320 We've also seen the removal of the quote unquote sensitive 3:08:58.400 --> 3:09:02.480 places doctrine. Yeah, sensitive places had previously been understood to 3:09:02.520 --> 3:09:07.640 be schools, churches, and hospitals. Now ICE is conducting quote 3:09:07.720 --> 3:09:09.640 unquote enforcement operations. 3:09:09.160 --> 3:09:09.920 In those places. 3:09:10.800 --> 3:09:13.760 Those are actually places that, like the Sensitive Places doctrine, 3:09:13.800 --> 3:09:15.880 have been in place for a long time. This wasn't 3:09:16.200 --> 3:09:17.879 like a Biden thing that this was. This had been 3:09:17.920 --> 3:09:21.119 a long term thing. So ICE is now and we've 3:09:21.200 --> 3:09:25.080 seen immigration actions conducted at like a church in Atlanta, 3:09:25.240 --> 3:09:28.720 for instance. We've seen I think they were actually Secret 3:09:28.879 --> 3:09:32.080 Service agents who identified themselves as an ICE agent, sort 3:09:32.120 --> 3:09:35.720 of school in Chicago because a child had posted an 3:09:35.720 --> 3:09:36.600 anti Trump video. 3:09:37.160 --> 3:09:39.160 And then I guess the. 3:09:39.400 --> 3:09:43.640 Last thing that we are seeing is this designation of 3:09:44.000 --> 3:09:48.280 organized crime groups as foreign terrorist organizations. This is an 3:09:48.320 --> 3:09:50.640 interesting one. We haven't really seen any action on this yet, 3:09:50.680 --> 3:09:52.800 but it's one of his executive orders. In day one 3:09:53.440 --> 3:09:57.720 in his first administration, he designated irand Kuld Force as 3:09:57.840 --> 3:10:01.440 a foreign terrorist organization and then needed to kill their leader. Right, 3:10:02.000 --> 3:10:08.040 So this FDO designation opens up the possibility of a 3:10:08.120 --> 3:10:10.959 lot of like covert activity I'm talking like the CIA 3:10:11.280 --> 3:10:15.760 and like Tier one special forces units. It also allows 3:10:15.920 --> 3:10:20.840 him to bring about economic sanctions on anyone materially supporting 3:10:20.959 --> 3:10:26.320 these organized crime organizations. In practice, that would encompass huge 3:10:26.560 --> 3:10:30.039 swaths of the Mexican economy, right, because there are people 3:10:30.680 --> 3:10:34.160 in agriculture, people in business who are paying protection or 3:10:34.520 --> 3:10:37.800 they're being extorted to pay money, right, And so in theory, 3:10:37.840 --> 3:10:40.840 those people are now materially delefating a tent terrorist organization 3:10:40.920 --> 3:10:44.360 and they could be sanctioned as well. We will have 3:10:44.560 --> 3:10:47.960 to see how this plays out, I guess, and they're 3:10:48.000 --> 3:10:51.160 still the directive was to look into and then name 3:10:51.280 --> 3:10:51.840 these groups. 3:10:52.240 --> 3:10:55.680 Well, and it's something that heg Seth has previously been 3:10:55.720 --> 3:10:58.039 in favor of and he has now been confirmed. 3:10:58.120 --> 3:11:01.240 Yes, yeah, Hegseth has talked to about using special forces 3:11:01.280 --> 3:11:01.800 in Mexico. 3:11:02.080 --> 3:11:04.960 Oh yes, and this this was a Gender forty seven stuff. 3:11:04.959 --> 3:11:06.560 They've been talking about this for a while. 3:11:06.680 --> 3:11:06.880 Yeah. 3:11:07.040 --> 3:11:09.280 Yeah, it's also in our Agenda forty seven episodes if 3:11:09.280 --> 3:11:11.560 people want to go back there a direct action rate 3:11:11.680 --> 3:11:16.600 in Mexico, drone warfare in Mexico. Obviously, doing this without 3:11:16.680 --> 3:11:19.400 the permission of the Mexican government would be an act 3:11:19.480 --> 3:11:23.360 of war, right, like killing foreign nationals without the permission 3:11:23.360 --> 3:11:27.199 of their government, conducting direct action raids bombing another country 3:11:27.760 --> 3:11:30.440 like that, That is an act of war. The US 3:11:30.480 --> 3:11:33.560 has had an fid FED Foreign Internal Defense Mission right 3:11:33.560 --> 3:11:37.000 where it trains advisors and assists Mexican law enforcement and 3:11:37.080 --> 3:11:40.480 military for a long time. The guys who arrested El Chappa, 3:11:40.560 --> 3:11:42.720 for instance, were trained I think by mass Sock. But 3:11:42.879 --> 3:11:44.880 this has been happening for a long time. But to 3:11:45.000 --> 3:11:48.119 go from that to unsanctioned direct action would be a huge, 3:11:48.800 --> 3:11:51.680 a huge step up. The only really analogous, directly analogous 3:11:51.680 --> 3:11:53.959 thing I can think of is Clinton with a plan 3:11:54.080 --> 3:11:57.640 Columbia designating FARC as a foreign terrorist organization. But that 3:11:57.760 --> 3:11:59.720 was very much with the cooperation and support of the 3:11:59.760 --> 3:12:03.000 co being government, and we're seeing a much more adversarial 3:12:03.879 --> 3:12:08.280 relationship between the United States and Mexico right now. The 3:12:08.400 --> 3:12:10.400 last thing I want to mention is that this deployment, 3:12:10.520 --> 3:12:13.400 I've spoken about it, but they're about sixteen hundred troops 3:12:13.400 --> 3:12:17.160 deployed right now. Biden deployed fifteen hundred troops in the 3:12:17.240 --> 3:12:19.400 summer of twenty twenty three. This is not a vastly 3:12:19.440 --> 3:12:22.119 different number, but they are doing different things. They seem 3:12:22.120 --> 3:12:24.000 to be chucking razor wire on top of the wall 3:12:24.080 --> 3:12:27.320 and being photographed at their two major jobs at the moment. 3:12:27.920 --> 3:12:29.160 We will see how that plays out. 3:12:29.320 --> 3:12:32.960 Also with reference to a military Trump immediately canceled the 3:12:33.040 --> 3:12:36.040 refugee resettlement program. With this left people all over the 3:12:36.080 --> 3:12:39.880 world stranded, including Afghanist many of whom worked for the 3:12:39.959 --> 3:12:43.560 United States or family members of US service people. Their 3:12:43.640 --> 3:12:46.400 refugee resettlement program, people don't come to the southern border. 3:12:46.959 --> 3:12:48.800 They go do all their background things and then fly 3:12:48.959 --> 3:12:51.119 into the United States. It's a different status to entering 3:12:51.160 --> 3:12:54.480 and claiming asylum. Those people, many of whom had booked flights, 3:12:54.680 --> 3:12:55.880 found their flights were canceled. 3:12:55.959 --> 3:12:56.840 They're now stranded. 3:12:57.000 --> 3:12:59.520 Lots of them were stranded in Pakistan and facing immigration 3:12:59.680 --> 3:13:02.600 enforcement there in the case of the Afghans. So yeah, 3:13:02.640 --> 3:13:06.280 that is a speed run of all the terrible Trump 3:13:06.440 --> 3:13:10.000 immigration executive orders. We'll be reporting on this pretty extensively, 3:13:10.200 --> 3:13:13.120 so you can keep coming back for more. But another 3:13:13.160 --> 3:13:16.560 thing that we have more of right now is advertisements. 3:13:26.920 --> 3:13:29.200 Okay, we are back. I have a few other notes 3:13:29.240 --> 3:13:32.400 I want to add for the woke front that I'm 3:13:32.440 --> 3:13:34.760 reporting on right now. I think it's been a lot 3:13:34.760 --> 3:13:36.840 of conflation between you know, like DEI and like what 3:13:36.920 --> 3:13:39.800 we would consider like affirmative action DEI refers to like 3:13:39.920 --> 3:13:44.640 these specific like corporate training policies and diversity initiatives, which is, 3:13:44.720 --> 3:13:48.680 you know, separate from long standing affirmative action policies, which 3:13:48.680 --> 3:13:50.840 has been used both in the corporate world and in 3:13:50.920 --> 3:13:53.400 like the government for like decades at this point. And 3:13:53.560 --> 3:13:56.240 what a whole bunch of this DEI rollback type stuff 3:13:56.320 --> 3:14:00.200 is essentially doing is just openly discriminating against the people 3:14:00.200 --> 3:14:02.200 who are not like straight white men. It's like, if 3:14:02.240 --> 3:14:03.920 you are a straight white man, we cannot hire you 3:14:04.080 --> 3:14:07.520 because that would mean we are doing DEI. And like, 3:14:07.600 --> 3:14:09.200 this is what a lot of the stuff that we're 3:14:09.200 --> 3:14:11.840 seeing kind of looks like. There was a mass email 3:14:11.879 --> 3:14:15.879 to federal agencies about DEI and calls to report DEI 3:14:16.040 --> 3:14:19.640 policies in their department if they're going by like other names, right, 3:14:19.720 --> 3:14:21.240 So that would be stuff like affirmative action. 3:14:21.360 --> 3:14:21.440 Right. 3:14:21.480 --> 3:14:24.960 If there's anything that is about you know, trying to 3:14:25.200 --> 3:14:27.920 trying to increase the diversity in your workforce or any 3:14:27.959 --> 3:14:31.840 quote unquote woke topics including you know, gender ideology, anything 3:14:32.200 --> 3:14:35.720 anything that seems vaguely woke, you're supposed to now report 3:14:36.080 --> 3:14:38.280 to make sure that gets removed because that's not part 3:14:38.320 --> 3:14:40.680 of the new federal government. I believe someone from the 3:14:40.800 --> 3:14:44.520 NSA did leave a tip on that email line reporting 3:14:44.600 --> 3:14:48.960 DEI masquerading as as another name. Similar to this, there 3:14:49.160 --> 3:14:51.400 was a memo or an email that was leaked to 3:14:51.520 --> 3:14:56.440 Ken Klippenstein from the Defense Intelligence Agency which basically said 3:14:56.800 --> 3:14:59.680 that they're not going to be observing any any woke 3:14:59.800 --> 3:15:04.480 call holidays, including Martin Luther King Junior's Birthday, Black History Month, 3:15:04.600 --> 3:15:09.279 Women's History Months, the Holocaust Remembrance Day, Asian American Pacific 3:15:09.320 --> 3:15:13.240 Islander Heritage Month, Pride Month, Juneteenth, Women's Equality Day, National 3:15:13.360 --> 3:15:17.720 Hispanic Heritage Month, National Disability Employment Awareness Month, and National 3:15:17.760 --> 3:15:20.720 American Indian Heritage Month, with a small asterisk saying that 3:15:20.800 --> 3:15:24.440 the pause on observing these will not affect the federal holidays, 3:15:24.480 --> 3:15:27.520 which would be MLK and June teenth, although who knows, 3:15:27.520 --> 3:15:29.440 they might try to even remove some of those as 3:15:29.520 --> 3:15:30.520 being federal holidays. 3:15:30.840 --> 3:15:33.520 I did wonder that, like, at some point, you're gonna, 3:15:33.760 --> 3:15:35.480 like you're gonna lose people when you take away their 3:15:35.560 --> 3:15:36.120 days off work. 3:15:36.600 --> 3:15:39.200 I get like that, right, right, So like I think 3:15:39.560 --> 3:15:42.040 they might leave those like actual federal holidays in but 3:15:42.120 --> 3:15:44.360 you're not allowed to observe any of these any of 3:15:44.440 --> 3:15:48.039 these other awareness months or or you know, Pride Month, 3:15:48.560 --> 3:15:52.120 Black History months, like you're not allowed to acknowledge that 3:15:52.400 --> 3:15:55.160 at all in these federal agencies now, at least for 3:15:55.240 --> 3:16:00.440 the Defense Intelligence Agency, support for most of Trump's executive 3:16:00.560 --> 3:16:06.000 orders does fluctuate. According to a poll from Reuters, the 3:16:06.160 --> 3:16:10.000 support for closing all DEI offices is actually pretty split. 3:16:10.879 --> 3:16:14.160 Fifty one percent oppose the closing of these offices, according 3:16:14.160 --> 3:16:17.080 to their poll, Forty four percent are in favor, and 3:16:17.520 --> 3:16:20.920 it's very segmented. Renaming the Gulf of Mexico to be 3:16:21.000 --> 3:16:24.000 the Gulf of America pretty disliked, with seventy percent being 3:16:24.560 --> 3:16:25.199 in opposition. 3:16:25.440 --> 3:16:28.560 Look, the one thing people hate most is changing names. 3:16:28.840 --> 3:16:29.840 Having the names been Lang. 3:16:29.959 --> 3:16:31.560 Yeah, nobody likes that. 3:16:32.480 --> 3:16:32.640 Yeah. 3:16:32.720 --> 3:16:34.440 Yeah, he did Denali as well, Right. 3:16:34.520 --> 3:16:36.840 Yeah, I guess that was changed more recently. But the 3:16:36.879 --> 3:16:39.280 Gulf of Mexico has been the Gulf of Mexico for 3:16:39.480 --> 3:16:42.880 longer than its America has existed as a country, the 3:16:43.040 --> 3:16:44.199 United States, right. 3:16:44.400 --> 3:16:46.879 I mean, Denali has been Denali for longer than America 3:16:46.920 --> 3:16:49.680 has existed. It's just right, right, right, But there was 3:16:49.720 --> 3:16:52.400 a period where we called it McKinley. No one's ever 3:16:52.520 --> 3:16:55.040 called it the Gulf of America. Yeah, yeah, I'm not 3:16:55.120 --> 3:16:57.680 saying the Denali thing's right, I'm just saying like that's 3:16:57.720 --> 3:16:59.480 a much harder. 3:16:59.280 --> 3:17:01.240 So yes, yeah, yeah, you're not going to get much 3:17:01.240 --> 3:17:01.720 buying on that. 3:17:02.200 --> 3:17:02.400 Yeah. 3:17:03.120 --> 3:17:07.840 Pardening J six protesters, new tariffs or taxes on Canadian goods, 3:17:07.879 --> 3:17:11.480 and ending birthright citizenship are all around sixty to thirty 3:17:11.680 --> 3:17:16.199 sixty oppose thirty percent in favor. Trump during his first 3:17:16.240 --> 3:17:20.000 week did see a record high approval rating that has slowly, 3:17:20.280 --> 3:17:23.000 I think gone down, but I don't know. It's hard 3:17:23.040 --> 3:17:25.080 to gauge the level of like general enthusiasm for his 3:17:25.200 --> 3:17:28.360 actions right now. And there's I think part of like 3:17:28.440 --> 3:17:31.200 the general strategy that we're seeing is there's just so 3:17:31.440 --> 3:17:34.080 much happening every single day that you can't even keep 3:17:34.200 --> 3:17:36.640 track of it all, let alone like internalize it. Like 3:17:36.920 --> 3:17:39.080 he's he is trying to sign as many of these 3:17:39.200 --> 3:17:42.080 orders every day so that both the courts, all of 3:17:42.160 --> 3:17:46.320 these like NGOs, advocacy groups are always working and we're 3:17:46.360 --> 3:17:48.680 never sure what is real, right, We're never sure what's 3:17:48.680 --> 3:17:52.040 going to stick around all of these memos about funding 3:17:52.160 --> 3:17:56.160 and grants. It's just so exhausting. And that's like part 3:17:56.240 --> 3:17:58.360 of the design is that this just feels like a 3:17:58.520 --> 3:18:01.760 constant stream of nonsense that we maybe have to deal with, 3:18:01.879 --> 3:18:05.920 maybe we won't. One of the more odd things is 3:18:06.160 --> 3:18:10.320 Trump openly embracing manifest destiny language, which I guess isn't 3:18:10.320 --> 3:18:12.520 actually odd, that's actually makes sense. It's just one of 3:18:12.560 --> 3:18:16.360 those things that it feels very rubicon esque. But he 3:18:16.440 --> 3:18:20.120 does have this new distinct focus on territorial expansion. During 3:18:20.160 --> 3:18:23.199 his inaugural address, he praised quote unquote to our American 3:18:23.240 --> 3:18:28.880 ancestors for having quote won the wild West. Now, apparently 3:18:29.440 --> 3:18:32.640 the call about Greenland to Denmark did not go very well. 3:18:32.959 --> 3:18:35.920 Denmark did not realize how serious Trump was, and it 3:18:36.040 --> 3:18:39.360 was apparently quite angry during that phone call, and you know, 3:18:39.600 --> 3:18:43.000 seemingly upset that Denmark is not going to easily hand 3:18:43.040 --> 3:18:48.160 over Greenland. He seems to be pivoting more towards retaking Panama. Yeah, 3:18:48.760 --> 3:18:50.800 which is which is something that he also mentioned in 3:18:50.920 --> 3:18:52.080 his inaugural address. 3:18:52.240 --> 3:18:55.920 Let me tell you, Panamanians not stoked. I've been receiving 3:18:56.000 --> 3:18:59.000 communications from Panama where it was his step down, but 3:18:59.080 --> 3:19:00.480 they are burning American flags. 3:19:00.600 --> 3:19:03.120 The quote from the inaugural address is quote the United 3:19:03.120 --> 3:19:06.119 States will once again consider itself a growing nation. When 3:19:06.160 --> 3:19:08.960 that increases our wealth and carries our flag into new 3:19:09.120 --> 3:19:12.879 beautiful horizons, and we will pursue our manifest destiny into 3:19:12.920 --> 3:19:13.480 the stars. 3:19:13.760 --> 3:19:14.000 Wow. 3:19:14.680 --> 3:19:17.040 Yeah, I don't know, what do you have to do? 3:19:17.240 --> 3:19:22.720 That's not a good thing. I think that's bad. 3:19:23.040 --> 3:19:27.520 Like obviously, that's you know, not great, not ideal. You know, 3:19:27.840 --> 3:19:31.879 invading Panama not ideal. Going to war with Greenland slightly 3:19:31.959 --> 3:19:35.120 more funny because it's cold. I think specifically is focused on, 3:19:35.240 --> 3:19:37.680 like why that he believes the US has a vested 3:19:37.680 --> 3:19:40.000 interest in Greenland, isn't just picking out a spot on 3:19:40.080 --> 3:19:42.640 the map. I think this also could be like related 3:19:42.800 --> 3:19:45.480 to trying to prepare for climate change. Having territory in 3:19:45.520 --> 3:19:48.960 the Arctic is going to become an increasingly valuable commodity 3:19:49.040 --> 3:19:50.600 to have. And and I think there is a part 3:19:50.640 --> 3:19:54.120 of this that could be legitimately on that side, because 3:19:54.120 --> 3:19:56.240 I mean, I don't know, Maybe Trump should just get 3:19:56.280 --> 3:19:57.080 really into Alaska. 3:19:57.360 --> 3:20:00.959 Well, he did deregulate drilling in Alaska, Drill baby drill. 3:20:01.160 --> 3:20:03.680 I will be up there later this year talking to 3:20:03.760 --> 3:20:05.840 people in Alaska about drill baby drill. 3:20:06.000 --> 3:20:08.160 Very excited for that, But I don't know I think 3:20:08.160 --> 3:20:12.400 it's also generally not super useful to make huge generalizing 3:20:12.440 --> 3:20:14.520 statements about what this type of stuff Trump is doing 3:20:14.600 --> 3:20:18.000 right now and how it will reflect on his entire presidency. 3:20:18.520 --> 3:20:20.800 People have been been doing this kind of about Trump's 3:20:21.040 --> 3:20:24.760 flip flopping opinions on TikTok, you know, being very into like, 3:20:24.840 --> 3:20:27.600 you know, saving TikTok and then then calling it worthless, 3:20:28.120 --> 3:20:31.280 but then going back to actually making sure that Microsoft 3:20:31.360 --> 3:20:33.440 buys it or something. And you know, people are very 3:20:33.480 --> 3:20:36.800 easy or quick to like jump onto these sorts of things. 3:20:37.160 --> 3:20:40.920 Trump's flip flopping tendencies maybe not sinking every single easy 3:20:41.000 --> 3:20:43.360 bucket and acting like these would be emblematic of his 3:20:43.600 --> 3:20:46.320 entire presidency, and like that's not the case. That that 3:20:46.720 --> 3:20:49.880 does not actually mean that Trump just says things even 3:20:49.920 --> 3:20:52.360 though he's gonna call TikTok worthless, does not mean that 3:20:52.879 --> 3:20:55.760 he's going to not do that easy lay up. We're 3:20:55.800 --> 3:20:57.880 all aware of how much he just says what is 3:20:57.959 --> 3:20:58.680 on his mind. 3:20:59.000 --> 3:20:59.200 Yep. 3:21:00.000 --> 3:21:02.160 And I think these sorts of things do not necessarily 3:21:02.240 --> 3:21:03.760 mean that he's going to like plummet to being the 3:21:03.800 --> 3:21:07.960 most unpopular president ever because he refuses to use the 3:21:08.080 --> 3:21:12.120 right messaging around TikTok or something. The other economic situations 3:21:12.160 --> 3:21:14.560 he might walk us into would be you know, much 3:21:14.959 --> 3:21:17.119 much more affecting to his general popularity. 3:21:17.400 --> 3:21:20.160 Yeah, yeah, he's he is doing again. I talk about 3:21:20.160 --> 3:21:23.920 this a lot. Why fascists succeed is that they try, 3:21:24.800 --> 3:21:30.200 like they're constantly reaching for stuff, and oftentimes like they overreach, 3:21:30.400 --> 3:21:33.160 but nobody pushes back so they get the thing. Right, 3:21:33.240 --> 3:21:35.840 That's what he's doing here. Do I think that he's 3:21:36.400 --> 3:21:38.959 willing at this point to commit to a full scale 3:21:39.040 --> 3:21:42.520 military invasion and armed occupation of Panama, a thing that 3:21:42.640 --> 3:21:46.800 could be a real problem for his presidency? Right, like 3:21:47.120 --> 3:21:51.040 US troops dying in meaningful numbers in attacks in a 3:21:51.080 --> 3:21:53.680 country that we had no fucking beef with before. That 3:21:53.800 --> 3:21:56.040 could be a real fucking problem for a guy who 3:21:56.160 --> 3:21:59.160 ran on the things that he ran on. But maybe 3:21:59.200 --> 3:22:01.400 he gets a bunch of sessions for nothing. It's the 3:22:01.440 --> 3:22:03.680 same thing with Greenland. You make the push, you try 3:22:03.760 --> 3:22:06.880 to scare Denmark, you try to scare Greenland, and you 3:22:06.959 --> 3:22:09.760 see if they'll accept something, and then you you walk away, 3:22:09.879 --> 3:22:12.440 maybe with a coup, and you do it fucking widely enough, 3:22:13.120 --> 3:22:15.680 you might get something right like That's that's it. 3:22:15.920 --> 3:22:17.599 He's always testing his limits. 3:22:17.280 --> 3:22:18.200 Because that's what they do. 3:22:18.440 --> 3:22:21.280 Yeah, I mean, look at Columbia, right, he immediately went 3:22:21.400 --> 3:22:26.080 to like eleven on the retaliation scale and effectively receive concessions. 3:22:27.200 --> 3:22:27.400 Yeah. 3:22:28.080 --> 3:22:30.680 So, I think, you know, similar to how you know 3:22:30.920 --> 3:22:33.680 it was annoying in the first like resistlib era to 3:22:33.760 --> 3:22:37.560 take every single crazy statement Trump says seriously, or like 3:22:37.600 --> 3:22:39.879 you know, do this performative outrage over every single thing 3:22:39.959 --> 3:22:42.800 he does. I think it's also useless to do fast 3:22:43.000 --> 3:22:47.400 mimetic reactions that form generalizing statements about you know, how 3:22:47.920 --> 3:22:50.440 something that Trump is doing is emblematic for the rest 3:22:50.480 --> 3:22:52.920 of his term and now he's like doomed to failure. 3:22:53.160 --> 3:22:55.360 I think those statements are actually pretty useless and at 3:22:55.360 --> 3:22:58.280 the very least are not helpful. Right now, let's close 3:22:58.360 --> 3:23:01.720 by talking about Guantanamo. I guess Robert and James I'll have. 3:23:03.280 --> 3:23:06.040 Yeah, so Trump has signed an executive order saying that 3:23:06.320 --> 3:23:09.080 they're going to create a facility capable of storing thirty 3:23:09.120 --> 3:23:13.920 thousand migrants in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. First, we should probably 3:23:14.040 --> 3:23:17.760 just talk about how realistic this is. If you ever 3:23:17.840 --> 3:23:21.600 looked at a topographical map of Guantanamo Bay, it's quite 3:23:21.680 --> 3:23:25.480 a large like the US concession in Cuba is a 3:23:25.560 --> 3:23:28.920 sizable degree of land. But it's not easy land to 3:23:29.200 --> 3:23:32.880 build things on, right, Like it is that it's rugged terrain, 3:23:33.160 --> 3:23:36.680 you would say, So making a camp like this is 3:23:36.760 --> 3:23:40.240 almost certainly going to be extremely expensive, and at least 3:23:40.440 --> 3:23:45.040 under kind of the way things currently work, it will 3:23:45.120 --> 3:23:49.160 probably take a good amount of time to get set 3:23:49.280 --> 3:23:51.440 up like. This is not a quick thing. This is 3:23:51.520 --> 3:23:54.080 not an overnight thing. And one thing I want to 3:23:54.080 --> 3:23:57.680 remind people of is that they have already have expanded 3:23:57.840 --> 3:24:01.160 a number of camps and facility in the US to 3:24:01.280 --> 3:24:03.280 deal with all the migrants they are taking in. 3:24:03.879 --> 3:24:05.400 So this is not the start. 3:24:05.480 --> 3:24:07.320 If you want to call this, and I think it's 3:24:07.360 --> 3:24:10.119 fair to call this a plan to start a concentration 3:24:10.240 --> 3:24:13.920 camp system. That system began early, and in fact it 3:24:14.120 --> 3:24:17.720 started before Trump took office. A decent chunk of it 3:24:17.879 --> 3:24:20.040 was anticipating him coming into office. 3:24:20.160 --> 3:24:24.119 But this is not the first camp, right, Yeah. 3:24:24.480 --> 3:24:28.840 And like Biden did significant legwork for tension that is 3:24:28.879 --> 3:24:31.480 cool and unusual. Yes, with his legal defense and his 3:24:31.640 --> 3:24:34.440 establishment of outdoor attention for migrants since the end of 3:24:34.520 --> 3:24:37.800 Title forty two in May of twenty three, And I 3:24:37.879 --> 3:24:40.959 think like we have to acknowledge that, I know people 3:24:40.959 --> 3:24:43.000 are very much into that, Like, don't criticize the Dems 3:24:43.080 --> 3:24:47.560 right now, Like if they don't change, if taking a 3:24:47.680 --> 3:24:49.160 fat l in what should have been one of the 3:24:49.240 --> 3:24:53.720 easiest elections of the century doesn't change them, then nothing will. 3:24:54.400 --> 3:24:57.520 And like we have to acknowledge that we are going 3:24:57.680 --> 3:25:00.680 to concentration camps quicker, I mean I will far and out. 3:25:00.720 --> 3:25:01.520 Let's cool the. 3:25:01.520 --> 3:25:05.920 Outdoor detention sites in Hakumba concentration camps right, because they 3:25:06.160 --> 3:25:08.200 sure as hell look like one and they are. 3:25:08.600 --> 3:25:12.440 This is a big personal frustration to me. I'm seeing 3:25:12.520 --> 3:25:15.080 a ton of people going online and comparing this to 3:25:15.240 --> 3:25:18.080 the Nazi concentration camp here after referred to as the 3:25:18.200 --> 3:25:19.119 KZ system. 3:25:19.360 --> 3:25:19.520 Right. 3:25:20.280 --> 3:25:22.560 There's one post I came across on Twitter where a 3:25:22.680 --> 3:25:24.720 person who'm I'm not going to name just to not 3:25:25.040 --> 3:25:27.560 cause a bunch of bullshit for them. Time from taking 3:25:27.600 --> 3:25:30.920 office to opening a mass attention camp Mussolini eight years, 3:25:31.520 --> 3:25:34.600 ll Gala and others, Libya Hitler fifty one days, Docau 3:25:34.720 --> 3:25:40.760 Germany Trump nine days. That's fucking horseshit. Yes, Docou took 3:25:40.920 --> 3:25:45.000 longer to establish. Docou was not the first concentration camp. 3:25:45.120 --> 3:25:48.240 The concentration camp system in Germany under the Nazis started 3:25:48.280 --> 3:25:50.520 as soon as the Nazis took power with a series 3:25:50.560 --> 3:25:53.680 of what we're called wild concentration camps, and this was 3:25:53.840 --> 3:25:57.040 involved a huge number of people, largely political enemies of 3:25:57.200 --> 3:26:02.800 the regime, members of the opposition party, being taken into custody, beaten, tortured, 3:26:02.879 --> 3:26:06.080 and stored in a series of airsats facilities. Two hundred 3:26:06.200 --> 3:26:10.120 thousand people were taken into custody under the wild concentration 3:26:10.280 --> 3:26:12.920 camp system in nineteen thirty three, the first year that 3:26:13.040 --> 3:26:17.080 Germans were in power. These are not comparable systems. That 3:26:17.160 --> 3:26:19.640 does not mean that I don't believe what Trump is 3:26:19.680 --> 3:26:23.000 doing is a concentration camp. It is a concentration camp 3:26:23.080 --> 3:26:26.320 made in the model of the American system. This is 3:26:26.440 --> 3:26:30.160 part of the American history of concentration camps, which goes 3:26:30.280 --> 3:26:33.400 back something like two hundred years right to the I mean, 3:26:33.440 --> 3:26:36.480 we were one of the first countries to employ concentration camps. 3:26:36.760 --> 3:26:39.480 The concentration camp as a concept began with what we're 3:26:39.520 --> 3:26:44.080 called reconcentrados in Cuba, at the behest of a Spanish 3:26:44.240 --> 3:26:48.920 general fighting an insurgency. There were US officers embedded there, 3:26:49.440 --> 3:26:53.000 they came back and those tactics were adapted for our 3:26:53.080 --> 3:26:56.800 wars with Native American tribes on the frontiers and the planes. 3:26:56.879 --> 3:26:59.680 General Sherman was one of the very first Americans to 3:26:59.760 --> 3:27:04.240 care out concentration camps. And what we are seeing here 3:27:04.520 --> 3:27:08.040 is part of America's tradition with concentration camps. It is 3:27:08.160 --> 3:27:12.160 not part of the German tradition with concentration camps. And 3:27:12.280 --> 3:27:15.400 you're going to be mistaken about like how this is 3:27:15.480 --> 3:27:18.040 going to proceed and what the dangers are, because I 3:27:18.120 --> 3:27:20.520 do not think the dangers at this point are that 3:27:20.920 --> 3:27:24.440 we build a death factory capable of incinerating a million 3:27:24.560 --> 3:27:27.440 people in less than a year. That's not the threat. 3:27:27.760 --> 3:27:29.920 The threat is huge numbers of people are taken into 3:27:29.959 --> 3:27:32.720 custody and stored in places that are not safe, that 3:27:32.840 --> 3:27:34.959 do not have good hygiene, that do not have good 3:27:35.000 --> 3:27:38.320 food standards, and a significant number of those people will 3:27:38.440 --> 3:27:41.200 die or suffer permanent physical injury. But it won't look 3:27:41.280 --> 3:27:43.600 like Auschwitz, and if that's what people are expecting, they'll 3:27:43.640 --> 3:27:45.480 be like, well, maybe this isn't that band, Maybe this 3:27:45.600 --> 3:27:48.320 isn't a concentration camp after all. So it's important to 3:27:48.440 --> 3:27:51.480 get things right, both for that reason and because it's 3:27:51.520 --> 3:27:54.680 also disrespectful to the people who died during the fucking 3:27:54.760 --> 3:27:57.280 Holocaust to be like, yeah, Trump's a lot worse than 3:27:57.360 --> 3:28:01.320 Hitler right now, like no, no, stack, yeah. 3:28:01.240 --> 3:28:02.480 Yeah, like we have it. 3:28:02.680 --> 3:28:05.160 You can trace online from like Bosquier Rodondo right where 3:28:05.160 --> 3:28:06.520 they sent the Navajo people. 3:28:06.400 --> 3:28:08.640 Right bass Rodando is a great thing to bring. 3:28:08.760 --> 3:28:11.200 Yeah, yes, And you can trace a direct line from 3:28:11.240 --> 3:28:13.160 that to the outdoor detention camps we saw in twenty 3:28:13.240 --> 3:28:15.360 twenty three where people were forced to remain in one 3:28:15.440 --> 3:28:18.480 place without food, water, or shelter, and people died as 3:28:18.520 --> 3:28:21.920 a result of that last year two years ago, and 3:28:22.160 --> 3:28:24.400 like that, from there to Guantanamo Bay, it is not 3:28:24.520 --> 3:28:27.680 a massive leap. And yeah, just being like we don't 3:28:27.760 --> 3:28:31.560 have Auschwitz, it's just asinine. Like if you if you 3:28:31.640 --> 3:28:34.040 can't acknowledge that America has a long history of doing this, 3:28:34.240 --> 3:28:36.240 and you know, really you need to examine your own 3:28:36.440 --> 3:28:39.360 preconceptions before like speaking for others. 3:28:40.920 --> 3:28:43.960 Yep, all right, is that this episode for this week? 3:28:44.000 --> 3:28:44.320 Everyone? 3:28:44.520 --> 3:28:46.320 I think that's the episode. I think we're done. 3:28:47.520 --> 3:28:49.160 We reported the news. 3:28:49.480 --> 3:28:54.560 Yes, Hey, We'll be back Monday with more episodes every week. 3:28:54.680 --> 3:28:56.520 From now until the heat death of the universe. 3:28:56.920 --> 3:28:59.040 It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone 3:28:59.080 --> 3:29:02.120 Media from More podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our 3:29:02.160 --> 3:29:05.240 website Coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the 3:29:05.280 --> 3:29:09.200 iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. 3:29:09.680 --> 3:29:11.560 You can now find sources for it could Happen Here 3:29:11.640 --> 3:29:14.560 listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.