WEBVTT - How Congress Could Bring ICE to a Store Near You 0:00:02.120 --> 0:00:08.880 Zone Media, Welcome back to it could happen here and 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:13.080 our Retail Thunderdome. I'm Kevin Foster, and today we're continuing 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:17.240 our dive into organized retail crime. In the last episode, 0:00:17.320 --> 0:00:20.520 I went over the multi year propaganda campaign waged by 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:23.560 the retail lobby to make organized retail crime into a 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:28.400 national crisis, requiring stricter policing and penalties and investment from 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:32.000 all levels of government. I recommend listening to that episode 0:00:32.040 --> 0:00:35.440 before this one. But in short, huge swaths of politicians 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.519 bought right in spending hundreds of millions at the behest 0:00:38.520 --> 0:00:42.800 of retail giants despite a serious lack of evidence. I 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:46.320 also touched on the advancements in surveillance at retail stores. 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:49.400 Whether we see a rollout of AI powered robots in 0:00:49.440 --> 0:00:51.960 the coming years may not matter so much as many 0:00:52.000 --> 0:00:56.520 industry leaders are already implementing facial recognition technology and creating 0:00:56.600 --> 0:01:00.200 watch lists under the guise of loss prevention, and this 0:01:00.240 --> 0:01:03.760 surveillance dragnet is a key element in the rising concern 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:08.119 around the Combating Organized Retail Crime Act or CORKA, which 0:01:08.160 --> 0:01:12.160 passed the House of Representatives in May with resounding bipartisan 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:16.080 support in all likelihood CORCO will be signed into law 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:19.080 in today's episode is about why that is very bad 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:23.200 and how it's going to impact the American public, notably immigrants. 0:01:23.600 --> 0:01:27.000 Let's get right into it. The Combating Organized Retail Crime 0:01:27.040 --> 0:01:30.000 Act has remained in circulation for years, but to get 0:01:30.000 --> 0:01:32.960 it over the finish line, the retail lobby and supporters 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:37.319 of the legislation ultimately found a new boogeyman, cargo theft. 0:01:37.760 --> 0:01:40.200 And this is how they've managed to turn a manufactured 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:44.440 retail theft story into a national security problem that demands 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:48.800 intervention by the Department of Homeland Security. In a nutshell, 0:01:49.120 --> 0:01:53.680 the cargo theft narrative has striking similarities to organized retail crime. 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:58.160 The American Transportation Research Institute says there's between one point 0:01:58.160 --> 0:02:01.560 eight billion and six point five billion dollars in yearly 0:02:01.640 --> 0:02:05.520 losses because of cargo theft, but this includes indirect costs, 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.280 a measure of costs across the entire supply chain in 0:02:09.360 --> 0:02:12.560 terms of the actual value of goods. Cargo net, a 0:02:12.680 --> 0:02:16.840 nationally coordinated database, placed total cargo theft losses at seven 0:02:16.960 --> 0:02:20.119 hundred and twenty five million across the US and Canada 0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:24.320 in twenty twenty five. Despite total physical losses being under 0:02:24.360 --> 0:02:27.359 a billion dollars, there have been more attempts to dramatically 0:02:27.360 --> 0:02:30.880 inflate the numbers. Phil Brink, the quote head of fraud 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:35.120 Media and Education unquote at freight Waves, a trucking logistics 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:38.640 and news company, estimated the total losses could actually be 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:43.280 closer to sixty billion dollars because of under reporting of theft. 0:02:43.800 --> 0:02:46.760 No clear evidence is provided to back up this assertion 0:02:47.040 --> 0:02:51.440 other than unnamed experts. If this sounds familiar, it's almost 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:55.240 the exact same story as the National Retail Federation's fraudulent 0:02:55.400 --> 0:02:58.960 organized retail crime numbers, where they inflated their stats by 0:02:58.960 --> 0:03:02.760 an order of magnet tude, mostly based on vibes. And 0:03:02.800 --> 0:03:05.320 while cargo theft did spike in twenty twenty three, a 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:09.000 funny little side note is that AI integration into logistics 0:03:09.160 --> 0:03:11.880 might be a big part of the problem. Reporting in 0:03:11.919 --> 0:03:14.919 the news outlet the Lever indicates that instead of modern 0:03:14.960 --> 0:03:17.919 day highway robberies, cargo theft is beginning to look more 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:22.280 like people simply impersonating trucking companies than fooling faulty new 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:25.480 AI logistics systems, and once they're cleared by the AI, 0:03:25.639 --> 0:03:28.120 they can essentially just pick up the cargo and roll off. 0:03:28.600 --> 0:03:32.440 So between retail crime and cargo theft, we're essentially operating 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:36.360 under two manufactured crises. And yet here's the language. Any 0:03:36.400 --> 0:03:40.960 Combating Organized Retail Crime Act quote. Organized theft groups impact 0:03:41.000 --> 0:03:44.680 the national security of the United States through financing trans 0:03:44.760 --> 0:03:49.120 national criminal activity and providing profit and proceeds supporting larger 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:53.960 criminal goals of the criminal organizations unquote. In other words, 0:03:54.080 --> 0:03:56.920 retail crime is now a national security threat and it 0:03:57.000 --> 0:04:01.600 demands the influence of Homeland Security and ICE. Specifically, CORCA 0:04:01.720 --> 0:04:05.320 calls for the establishment of a coordination center to combat 0:04:05.520 --> 0:04:09.840 organize retail and supply chain crime. The DHS Secretary will 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:12.520 establish the center and it will be run by an 0:04:12.520 --> 0:04:17.400 individual chosen by the Director of ICE. Fantastic in essence, 0:04:17.560 --> 0:04:20.280 this coordination center will be the hub for federal law 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:24.279 enforcement activity and connections between the national and local level 0:04:24.520 --> 0:04:28.560 and the public and private sector. Obviously, ICE deepening its 0:04:28.600 --> 0:04:30.960 involvement in our day to day lives is something to 0:04:31.000 --> 0:04:34.000 be concerned about. But here's where it gets really crazy. 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:37.960 The bill states, quote in general, subject to the approval 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:41.200 of the director of the Center, information that would otherwise 0:04:41.240 --> 0:04:44.800 be subject to the limitation on the disclosure of confidential 0:04:44.839 --> 0:04:48.440 information set forth in Section nineteen oh five of Title 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:52.360 eighteen United States Code, may be shared if such disclosure 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:57.680 is operationally necessary unquote, putting the legallyese aside. What this 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:01.000 means in practice is that ICE can access confidential and 0:05:01.080 --> 0:05:05.839 proprietary data from retailers, and because operationally necessary is an 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:10.400 extremely broad, undefined term, ICE is essentially given full discretion 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:14.200 over what data they can collect. If anyone questions them, 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:16.640 they'll likely just say, we need to play it safe 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:20.280 because organized retail crime is a matter of national security 0:05:20.520 --> 0:05:25.240 that could finance drug and weapons trafficking, harming Americans. So 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:28.599 that retail surveillance dragnet I mentioned in Part one, the 0:05:28.640 --> 0:05:32.520 AI facial recognition, the robots, the customer profiles they say 0:05:32.600 --> 0:05:36.400 can be leveraged to boost customer loyalty, ICE could potentially 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:40.480 leverage that data in its immigration crackdown. Imagine a world 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:43.560 where ICE knows who is going to witch stores and when. 0:05:44.040 --> 0:05:46.840 No need for scanning license plates on the streets anymore. 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:49.520 Now they can just look up your customer profile and 0:05:49.600 --> 0:05:52.920 head over to Walmart when you're doing your biweekly grocery run. 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:56.080 Given what we've seen in the past year and a half. 0:05:56.200 --> 0:05:59.360 ICE will likely try to leverage this heavily. They already 0:05:59.400 --> 0:06:03.479 have facial recognition technology like the mobile Fortify app, which, 0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:07.080 according to Vanderbilt University's School of Law, is connected to 0:06:07.120 --> 0:06:11.160 a database of over two hundred million images. The ACLU 0:06:11.200 --> 0:06:14.200 of Wisconsin states that you may already be in this database, 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:18.440 as it's connected to other databases containing federal biometric systems, 0:06:18.680 --> 0:06:22.719 passport and visa records, and state driver's license photos. A 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:26.159 depressing little side note, some of this may have been preventable. 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:29.400 For example, in Oregon, the state police are being sued 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:32.560 for sharing data with ICE, even though they and our 0:06:32.600 --> 0:06:36.040 governor were warned by congress members to close certain loopholes 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:41.520 that gave ICE access to DMB records. Now, obviously, grocery 0:06:41.520 --> 0:06:46.000 stores present a significant vulnerability to maintaining our privacy due 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:49.880 to basic human needs. Nothing is clearly stopping ICE from 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:52.880 running face scans out of retail stores and creating a 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:56.640 new front for their anti immigrant crackdown, and there's already 0:06:56.680 --> 0:06:59.839 a blueprint for this. The ACLU published an article in 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:04.080 January this year about Wegmans using facial recognition and sharing 0:07:04.160 --> 0:07:07.719 data on quote persons of interest with law enforcement on 0:07:07.760 --> 0:07:11.400 a quote case by case basis. It's unclear how or 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:15.120 if retail stores will challenge ICE's access in any way. 0:07:15.480 --> 0:07:18.240 As of now, many have been fully on board with 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:21.920 the organized retail theft hype train. On the other hand, 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:25.080 on May eleventh this year, a coalition of forty civil 0:07:25.160 --> 0:07:28.760 rights organizations, including the Immigrant Defender's Law Center in the 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:32.680 National Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys, sent a letter to 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:36.440 Congress urging the House not to pass CORKA, highlighting how 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:40.280 it would massively expand DHS's role in authority in domestic 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:43.720 law enforcement, and the issues don't end there. They also 0:07:43.760 --> 0:07:47.480 pointed out how CORCA gives DHS influence over local and 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:51.920 state law enforcement through the ability to expand certain grant requirements. 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:55.640 In effect, this coalition sees a pathway for DHS to 0:07:55.720 --> 0:08:00.080 push jurisdictions toward more intrusive data collection and surveillance vi 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:04.800 actually if that jurisdiction is receiving federal grants. Additionally, the 0:08:04.800 --> 0:08:08.560 coalition noted how the Sunset provision for the CORCA Coordination 0:08:08.680 --> 0:08:13.120 Center quote includes no requirement to dismantle data sharing systems, 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:18.880 delete collected information, or reverse any entrenched surveillance practices unquote. 0:08:19.280 --> 0:08:21.800 So these practices could very well be here to stay 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:24.640 without some sort of intervention down the line. Good luck 0:08:24.640 --> 0:08:27.280 to us trying to get that. I think, as James 0:08:27.320 --> 0:08:30.120 put it in a conversation we had, it's like trying 0:08:30.120 --> 0:08:32.440 to convince a bunch of the HOA moms that we 0:08:32.520 --> 0:08:35.680 need to be softer on retail crime. It just doesn't 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:39.080 really seem like it's going to happen. And unfortunately, this 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:42.880 coalition letter largely fell on deaf ears, with only fifty 0:08:42.960 --> 0:08:46.800 nine Democrats and one Republican voting against Corka in the House. 0:08:47.360 --> 0:08:49.760 I've spoken with many people about this, and there's often 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:53.240 this question of like do they know? And I'd argue 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:56.160 it's their job to know, And this pill is pretty 0:08:56.200 --> 0:08:59.560 cut and dried power expansion for Ice, it's kind of 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:01.680 hard to tell how they wouldn't have seen this coming, 0:09:02.160 --> 0:09:06.040 especially with progressive groups warning them about it. And by 0:09:06.080 --> 0:09:08.520 now this coalition has grown to over one hundred and 0:09:08.600 --> 0:09:12.320 twenty organizations urging the Senate not to pass Corka in 0:09:12.360 --> 0:09:15.960 spite of this. In the Senate Judiciary Committee, Republican Senator 0:09:16.040 --> 0:09:19.560 Chuck Grassley and Democratic Senator Dick Durbin have teamed up 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:22.720 to add CORKA as an amendment to the National Defense 0:09:22.760 --> 0:09:26.520 Authorization Act for fiscal year twenty twenty seven. This would 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:29.960 essentially just mean entrenching this into our defense policy. And 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:33.480 if that happens, which seems somewhat likely, I suspect it's 0:09:33.520 --> 0:09:36.480 curtains and CORKA is going through. I highly doubt that 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:38.680 the Democrats are going to hold the line on the 0:09:38.760 --> 0:09:42.280 NDAA for something they clearly either don't care about or 0:09:42.400 --> 0:09:45.360 don't seem to understand. But what they might care about 0:09:45.480 --> 0:09:59.199 are the products and services that support this podcast. And 0:09:59.360 --> 0:10:02.240 We're back, and I'm imagining this is starting to sound 0:10:02.280 --> 0:10:05.480 pretty frightening, and it is to cool the temperature a bit. 0:10:05.559 --> 0:10:09.840 It's important to consider ICE's capacity for enforcement. They've had 0:10:09.880 --> 0:10:13.560 ways of accessing various surveillance tools for quite some time now. 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:16.319 To some extent, they likely could have done some of 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:20.040 this stuff with flock cameras or other automated license plate readers. 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:23.240 But I think the threat in retail comes more from 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:26.120 the pre existing infrastructure and the fact that this bill 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:31.800 seems to give ICE sweeping access to confidential and proprietary information. Still, 0:10:31.920 --> 0:10:35.160 there are strategies for resisting this, I won't lie. Many 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:38.800 of them are time intensive and require consistent community effort, 0:10:38.960 --> 0:10:42.680 but that's the world we're in. For example, in Hillsboro, Oregon, 0:10:42.840 --> 0:10:46.240 just west of Portland, local mutual aid groups began delivering 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:49.400 groceries to immigrant families who are afraid to go outside 0:10:49.520 --> 0:10:52.280 in the middle of Operation Black Rows, which was the 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:55.959 massive ice surge last fall in winter. In Los Angeles 0:10:56.080 --> 0:10:59.720 last summer, similar groups set up community defense corners outside 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:02.520 home depot parking lots in an attempt to protect day 0:11:02.640 --> 0:11:06.720 laborers from ice raids. These usually manifested as just pop 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:10.640 up tents with community members water and snacks. Certainly didn't 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:13.600 stop everything, but I know one group in Pasadena that 0:11:13.760 --> 0:11:16.920 was allegedly the last home depot in LA to be raided, 0:11:17.200 --> 0:11:20.480 and they had a consistent community effort for months. In 0:11:20.559 --> 0:11:24.559 terms of shopping, avoiding loyalty programs may end up being necessary, 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:26.320 as this is one of the ways that we hand 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:29.319 over a lot of our data to stores. But shopping 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:32.199 locally or at stores that collect less data will probably 0:11:32.200 --> 0:11:35.679 be the best bet. So Corka clearly has a number 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:37.720 of ways that it could be abused by ice, but 0:11:37.800 --> 0:11:39.840 to get the full extent of what we're dealing with. 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:42.600 I got in contact with Laura Conover, who is the 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:46.560 district attorney in Pima County, Arizona, which contains Tucson and 0:11:46.600 --> 0:11:50.480 borders the Mexican state of Sonora. Contrary to Da Stephen 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:53.840 featured in the first episode, Conover has actually been an 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:57.960 outspoken opponent of Corka. In particular, she has tied CORKA 0:11:57.960 --> 0:12:00.600 to the Lake and Riley Act, saying cong is just 0:12:00.800 --> 0:12:04.120 compounding mistakes it already made. The Lake and Riley Act 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:07.959 became law on January twenty ninth, twenty twenty five, passing 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:11.920 Congress again with a substantial amount of bipartisan support greater 0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:16.599 than sixty percent in both chambers. It's a particularly abhorrent 0:12:16.679 --> 0:12:20.439 piece of legislation as a quote requires DHS to detain 0:12:20.600 --> 0:12:26.800 certain non US nationals who have been arrested for burglary, theft, larceny, shoplifting, 0:12:27.080 --> 0:12:30.240 assault of a law enforcement officer, or any crime that 0:12:30.320 --> 0:12:34.840 results in death or serious bodily injury to another person unquote. 0:12:35.240 --> 0:12:39.520 Notice how it says arrested, not charged, not convicted, but 0:12:39.640 --> 0:12:42.720 simply detained for one of the crimes listed, even if 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:46.760 the individual didn't actually do anything wrong. The law also 0:12:46.920 --> 0:12:50.679 allows states to sue the federal government for alleged failures 0:12:50.679 --> 0:12:54.480 and immigration enforcement meeting. The federal government can effectively be 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:57.719 held liable for a number of things, such as if 0:12:57.720 --> 0:13:01.560 an undocumented immigrant causes harm to s state residents, including 0:13:01.640 --> 0:13:05.400 financial harm greater than one hundred dollars. It's tough to 0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:08.360 say the extent to which this could be applied, but 0:13:08.440 --> 0:13:11.200 the through line between this and CORKA is pretty clear. 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:16.079 Ice could monitor retail locations for thefts and shoplifting through CORCA, 0:13:16.400 --> 0:13:19.400 then they're essentially liable if they don't seek to detain 0:13:19.520 --> 0:13:22.400 someone who has stolen more than one hundred dollars worth 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:26.600 of merchandise. Conover has specific examples of the ways in 0:13:26.600 --> 0:13:29.800 which the Lake and Riley Act is burdening local jurisdictions, 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:33.960 destroying due process protections, and ultimately how CORKA will very 0:13:34.080 --> 0:13:37.560 likely make this worse. For example, it was Conover's job 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:41.200 to prosecute the case of Jessica Corles Duarte, who entered 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:43.760 the US when she was two years old with her mother, 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:47.160 who had fled domestic abuse in Mexico and obtained legal 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:51.400 status through the violence against Women Act, Corrales Duarte became 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:54.400 a DOCTA recipient and she's now thirty two or thirty 0:13:54.400 --> 0:13:56.480 three based on the articles that I read, and she 0:13:56.559 --> 0:13:59.040 has two children. But in the past years she was 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:02.320 arrested and charge ars with shoplifting and theft, and her 0:14:02.400 --> 0:14:05.840 DACA status has been terminated. She allegedly stole up to 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:09.040 fifty seven hundred dollars in perfume from an Alta beauty 0:14:09.080 --> 0:14:12.280 location over three days, which put her over the felony 0:14:12.360 --> 0:14:15.480 theft threshold, though this number is disputed by her defense. 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:19.080 She had no prior criminal record, and Conover said based 0:14:19.080 --> 0:14:21.920 on a taped confession, she likely would have qualified for 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:24.840 a program where she could pay restitution and get back 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:28.560 on her feet. Then ICE came in. They detained Corrales 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:31.880 Duarte as she was leaving her home for her waitressing job. 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:35.320 The ensuing months were a disaster. Ice held her at 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:38.520 the Elloyd Detention Center, about an hour from Tucson, and 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:40.920 blocked her from attending many of the court dates for 0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:44.720 her shoplifting case. According to an article in the Tucson Spotlight, 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:47.320 here's da Conover on the situation. 0:14:48.200 --> 0:14:51.280 So, for example, in our case, the result was just 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:59.240 defendants disappearing into federal cush today and before any normal process. 0:15:00.520 --> 0:15:05.520 So you've got a victim who's now totally out of 0:15:05.560 --> 0:15:11.200 luck for any kind of restoration, be that through probation 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:15.200 or through restitution, which is important, you know. So victim's 0:15:15.320 --> 0:15:19.320 rights are violated. The defendant obviously gets no due process. 0:15:20.080 --> 0:15:22.920 You know, in our experience, they hardly had any contact 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:26.120 with their attorney, and their attorney was just rendered totally 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:32.360 ineffective in the local court. So it confounds the entire 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:38.160 normal criminal justice process. It's like the opposite of collaboration. 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:43.600 So not only are Kerles Duarte's rights violated on multiple levels, 0:15:43.720 --> 0:15:46.280 but it also actually hurts the property owner because they 0:15:46.320 --> 0:15:49.920 won't receive restitution if someone is deported. It's not clear 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:53.280 whether Krales Duarte was involved in some sort of organized 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:56.360 retail theft operation, but I want to stress again that 0:15:56.400 --> 0:15:59.280 the people in such a situation who actually do this dealing, 0:15:59.560 --> 0:16:03.640 commonly referred to as boosters, are often poor, homeless, or 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:07.280 struggling in some way themselves. Many of you probably already 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:10.920 know this, but undocumented people commit less crime overall than 0:16:10.960 --> 0:16:15.040 American citizens. An analysis by the National Institute of Justice 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:18.280 using data from Texas between twenty twelve and twenty eighteen 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:22.160 found that undocumented immigrants had offending rates less than half 0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:25.160 of that of US born citizens. This is in spite 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:27.280 of the fact that the US makes it much harder 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:30.600 for undocumented people to obtain good paying jobs, which can 0:16:30.680 --> 0:16:34.160 drive people into poverty and therefore crime. And for all 0:16:34.200 --> 0:16:37.440 of this, conover informed me that Corles Duarte appears to 0:16:37.440 --> 0:16:41.360 be in process for deportation away from her children. There 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:44.560 are just more effective and humane ways to deal with this, 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:48.560 like the diversion programs mentioned, which don't need to involve 0:16:48.560 --> 0:16:52.479 the federal government, but instead we're just giving more power tise. 0:16:52.920 --> 0:16:56.200 With Lake and Riley and with Corka. You're talking about 0:16:56.240 --> 0:17:00.600 such a street level, local issue where we have local 0:17:01.560 --> 0:17:07.679 police and prosecutors whose entire purpose is to prosecute local crime, 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:13.600 and to just give some random federal agency authority over 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:16.280 that sweeping new authority of that just doesn't make any 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:22.560 sense operationally, not to mention the particular agency is one 0:17:22.600 --> 0:17:27.280 in which there's bipartisan concern about how recklessly they're being managed. 0:17:28.200 --> 0:17:30.879 On the note of recklessness, with the expansion of ISIS 0:17:31.080 --> 0:17:36.720 surveillance network comes greater concern over warrantless enforcement, constitutional violations, 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:40.919 and technological mistakes. The podcast Reveal reported a case of 0:17:40.960 --> 0:17:43.360 Ice scanning the face of a twenty three year old 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:47.800 US citizen purely on suspicion, and according to Innovation Law Lab, 0:17:47.920 --> 0:17:50.960 the same seems to have happened to a woman in Oregon, 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:54.760 where Ice used a Palaneer developed platform called Elite, which 0:17:54.920 --> 0:17:58.160 without a warrant essentially geofence is an area and creates 0:17:58.200 --> 0:18:02.960 targets with a quote in imigration nexus. In this case, 0:18:03.200 --> 0:18:06.520 the mobile Fortify app returned two different incorrect names and 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:10.639 images for the same woman. Still, Ice has told lawmakers 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:15.040 it's a definitive measure of immigration status that effectively supersedes 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:19.359 other evidence of citizenship, such as a birth certificate. The 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:23.320 National Institute of Standards and Technology is also reported that 0:18:23.400 --> 0:18:26.680 facial recognition tech is less accurate on women than men, 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:30.960 black people, and other individuals with darker skin. This hull 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:33.760 gets much worse when you're not in a controlled environment 0:18:33.960 --> 0:18:36.240 where you can get a well lit, straight on shot 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:40.000 of someone's face with no obstruction. Certainly something that isn't 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:43.520 going to happen under the floodlights of a grocery store. Entryway. 0:18:44.560 --> 0:18:47.200 So again, I can't really say to what extent ICE 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:50.919 will actually integrate all of these technologies or what capacity 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:53.520 they'll have for enforcement, but it seems like the worst 0:18:53.560 --> 0:18:56.919 case scenario could be a warrantless surveillance frenzy where they 0:18:56.960 --> 0:19:00.320 couldn't care less if they're detaining the right people. The 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:03.680 right people as in the individuals that they're actually targeting, 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:06.760 and I don't actually believe there is a right person 0:19:06.920 --> 0:19:10.359 to be detained. It's all bullshit. But as Corka also 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:14.680 calls for local and federal collaboration, cops could very easily 0:19:14.720 --> 0:19:17.320 worsen this problem, and ICE can leverage the Lake and 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:22.240 Riley Act to ramp up deportations. It's not good. But anyways, 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:36.080 here's some ads and we're back to round out this 0:19:36.160 --> 0:19:38.240 two parter. I'd like to connect some of the dots 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:41.800 from the first episode to Corka. To do so, I've 0:19:41.840 --> 0:19:45.440 chatted with James about a concept known as moral turpitude. 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:49.440 Moral turpitude is a vaguely defined concept and there's lots 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:52.920 of nebulous legal language surrounding it, but in essence, it's 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:56.720 a crime that is considered morally offensive, and it's important 0:19:56.720 --> 0:20:00.840 to immigration law. Notably included in this definition is larceny 0:20:01.040 --> 0:20:03.520 or theft, and a conviction for one of these crimes 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:07.639 can render an immigrant either inadmissible or deportable. Here's some 0:20:07.720 --> 0:20:09.520 of the conversation that James and I had. 0:20:10.480 --> 0:20:13.120 An admissibility could be important for someone who was inside 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:15.639 the United States. Let's say they call it e we 0:20:15.960 --> 0:20:19.479 entered without inspection. That means coming into the United States, 0:20:19.520 --> 0:20:20.960 not through a port of entry. 0:20:21.080 --> 0:20:21.960 Right. Let's say they. 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:24.520 Went over the wall, under the wall, around the wall, 0:20:24.720 --> 0:20:27.440 through the river, through the desert, through the mountains, right, 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:29.200 the many ways that people could enter with that inspection. 0:20:29.880 --> 0:20:35.840 They could then be found inadmissible long after entering the 0:20:35.920 --> 0:20:38.919 United States because they hadn't been admitted, right, they just 0:20:38.960 --> 0:20:42.120 came in. Just imagine, like you want to go to Disneyland. 0:20:42.160 --> 0:20:45.280 It's prohibitively expensive, so you climb over the fence. You 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:49.200 were not admitted to Disneyland. Yeah, right, So if Disneyland 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:53.160 found you, they would kick you out. The issue here, 0:20:53.240 --> 0:20:54.880 Let's say if someone has been in the United States 0:20:54.920 --> 0:20:58.879 for a number of years but they are undocumented, if 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:04.040 they are found guilty of a crime including moral turpitude, 0:21:04.080 --> 0:21:07.760 or convicted of a crime involved moral turpitude, and the 0:21:07.840 --> 0:21:10.720 offense carries a maximum sentence of one year or more, 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:14.480 and the person committed the offense within five years after 0:21:14.480 --> 0:21:18.879 the date of admission, they are then deportable. Now if 0:21:18.880 --> 0:21:20.879 the eweed, if it ended with that inspection, there about 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:23.800 other reasons it could be deportable, right, Yeah, but I 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:27.439 did say somebody has a visa. The same is true 0:21:28.440 --> 0:21:29.760 with inadmissibility. 0:21:29.880 --> 0:21:30.040 Right. 0:21:30.160 --> 0:21:33.440 So, we recently had a Supreme Court ruling about admissibility 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:36.280 with regard to permanent residents, which kind of brings them 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:40.280 closer in line to visa holders. But admissibility doesn't just 0:21:40.400 --> 0:21:44.240 mean them giving you the visa. It could also, for example, 0:21:44.400 --> 0:21:47.199 impact you if you went somewhere else and returned to 0:21:47.240 --> 0:21:50.960 the United States. Right, So, a crime evolving moral turpitude 0:21:50.960 --> 0:21:53.840 could then render you in admissible, so you could be 0:21:54.119 --> 0:21:56.879 detained or not admitted to the United States when you 0:21:56.920 --> 0:22:00.680 came back. It's also important to get to note that 0:22:01.240 --> 0:22:05.919 some diversion programs. State diversion programs don't count as a 0:22:06.040 --> 0:22:09.920 conviction in terms of federal immigration law if a guilty 0:22:09.920 --> 0:22:15.480 plea is not entered. So if somebody who could previously 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:19.000 have got into a diversion program ends up not in 0:22:19.040 --> 0:22:22.000 a diversion program. In addition to Corker, right, we have 0:22:22.040 --> 0:22:26.280 all these state sentencing enhancements. Yeah, we see in California, right, 0:22:26.720 --> 0:22:30.720 if that person ends up with a conviction instead of 0:22:30.720 --> 0:22:34.000 being putting a diversion program without entering a plea, that 0:22:34.200 --> 0:22:37.520 is a night and day different in immigration terms. Right, 0:22:37.560 --> 0:22:39.879 it's black and white. One is a conviction for what 0:22:39.960 --> 0:22:42.879 it's probably a crime evolving moral turpitude, because larceny is 0:22:42.880 --> 0:22:45.760 a crime evolving moral turpitude, and I think that's what 0:22:45.840 --> 0:22:49.119 this generally falls under RN. Again, not a lawyer, but 0:22:50.000 --> 0:22:53.400 if that is the case, one of these sentencing enhancements 0:22:53.440 --> 0:22:58.399 at a state level results in somebody now having, for 0:22:58.480 --> 0:23:01.680 federal immigration terms, a convict of a crime forming worlds turbitude. 0:23:01.720 --> 0:23:06.040 They are now inadmissible and in a single conviction, as 0:23:06.040 --> 0:23:09.560 I said before, can make a non citizen deportable if 0:23:09.600 --> 0:23:11.360 it has a possible sentence for a year or more, 0:23:11.359 --> 0:23:14.960 which these sentencing enhancements make a lot more likely. Right, Yeah, 0:23:15.240 --> 0:23:18.120 and good luck I guess trying to find some way 0:23:18.440 --> 0:23:21.959 of getting that conviction overturned or like you know, now 0:23:22.000 --> 0:23:25.840 you're fighting against all this lobbying that retailers are doing right, 0:23:26.200 --> 0:23:29.560 and all this propaganda that has been put out there 0:23:29.600 --> 0:23:31.320 that it's going to make it harder and harder for 0:23:31.400 --> 0:23:33.840 people to avoid those convictions in the first place and 0:23:33.880 --> 0:23:34.879 then to get them overturned. 0:23:35.600 --> 0:23:39.000 Yeah. I don't want to get like to doom and 0:23:39.080 --> 0:23:41.080 gloom about it, but like, do you worry that there's 0:23:41.119 --> 0:23:44.240 just a combination of factors here that could massively worsen 0:23:44.359 --> 0:23:45.840 things with at the level? Yeah? 0:23:46.080 --> 0:23:48.200 Yeah, Like every time we make a new law, we're 0:23:48.240 --> 0:23:50.320 giving a new powers to the state, right, and every 0:23:50.560 --> 0:23:54.440 single law is backed up by violence, the matter of 0:23:54.520 --> 0:23:57.119 it's a parking ticket or murder. Right, the state can 0:23:57.200 --> 0:23:59.919 lock you up, beat you up, or shoot you up. 0:24:00.359 --> 0:24:04.320 That is the basis on which all laws rest. 0:24:04.480 --> 0:24:04.600 Right. 0:24:04.840 --> 0:24:06.280 Yeah, so you don't pay a parking ticket that you 0:24:06.320 --> 0:24:08.040 don't go to court. Eventually someone's going to turn it, 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:09.240 but your Dora is going to be a person with 0:24:09.320 --> 0:24:12.920 a gun, right Like that, that is the structure on 0:24:12.960 --> 0:24:16.080 which the state exists to use like the crass Foraburian 0:24:16.280 --> 0:24:19.320