Speaker 1: Pushkin. Five miles off the shore of Manhattan, there is
Speaker 1: a place called Staten Island. We don't live in the
Speaker 1: glitter of Broadways. We don't live in Yankee Stadium.
Speaker 2: Where we live is in every day Staten Island. Who
Speaker 2: weren't soophisticated. We were not you know, East side of
Speaker 2: Manhattan or West side of Manhattan liberals.
Speaker 1: We were country people. And thirty years ago Staten Island
Speaker 1: decided it didn't want to be part of New York
Speaker 1: City anymore.
Speaker 2: Who will you trust your friends and neighbors and the
Speaker 2: people in Staten Island?
Speaker 1: Who are you trust the people five miles overseas, Staten
Speaker 1: Island was trying to secede from New York City, but
Speaker 1: not without a fight.
Speaker 2: See, if nothing else, I hope that I can convey
Speaker 2: to the people of Staten Island that I deeply care
Speaker 2: them and about all of them. If this were a
Speaker 2: political visit, whine blazes, would I come. It's a pipe dream.
Speaker 2: It's just not going to happen. People are not facing
Speaker 2: the reality. My god, what are they thinking?
Speaker 1: What unfolded over the span of the next four years
Speaker 1: was a battle for the soul of the city, which
Speaker 1: I as a person living in the city had never
Speaker 1: heard about. And the more I researched, the more I realized,
Speaker 1: this is exactly what's happening in the country right now.
Speaker 1: This is what happens when a group who feels like
Speaker 1: they've been ignored and forgotten for decades decides that they've
Speaker 1: had enough. All of you who are in favor of
Speaker 1: seceding from the City of New York, would you please
Speaker 1: raise your hands. This is a story about a democracy
Speaker 1: falling apart. It's about neighbors turning on each other in
Speaker 1: a very specific strain of resentment that started in the
Speaker 1: outer boroughs of New York City and then went national
Speaker 1: with people like Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani.
Speaker 2: We reached for a feeling that exists in this city,
Speaker 2: but we're not stopping. Harley and the Paul's generally speaking
Speaker 2: national Enquiry did a Paul that's unbelievable. This is a
Speaker 2: win that you beat everybody right right into the White House.
Speaker 1: I'm been thatt of Haffrey and I have done a deep,
Speaker 1: deep dive into this overlooked and misunderstood moment from thirty
Speaker 1: years ago when New York City almost tore itself apart,
Speaker 1: because I think it anticipated everything about how our country
Speaker 1: is tearing itself apart. Right now this summer, we're celebrating
Speaker 1: our two hundred and fiftieth birthday as a country. It's
Speaker 1: the anniversary of an act of secession. This is who
Speaker 1: we are, this is what we do. So it's time
Speaker 1: to ask a big question, how do you solve the
Speaker 1: Staten Island problem? The Forgotten Borough? I don't know. I
Speaker 1: think we just might get rid of that nickname.
Speaker 2: My position was to ask yourself what close freedom.
Speaker 1: The Staten Island problem is? Coming July ninth from Pushkin Industries.
Speaker 1: Listen on the Revisionist History Feed wherever you get your podcasts.