WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 178 0:00:01.720 --> 0:00:02.880 Cool Zone Media. 0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:05.760 Hey everybody, Robert Evans here, and I wanted to let 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:09.440 you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode 0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:12.719 of the week that just happened is here in one 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:16.560 convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:19.040 listen to in a long stretch if you want. If 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:21.000 you've been listening to the episodes every day this week, 0:00:21.040 --> 0:00:22.759 there's going to be nothing new here for you, but 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:24.440 you can make your own decisions. 0:00:27.000 --> 0:00:29.040 Welcome, dig it out and here a podcast. I asked 0:00:29.080 --> 0:00:31.120 the question what happens when the people who are trying 0:00:31.160 --> 0:00:33.640 to help put things back together are also being exploited 0:00:33.640 --> 0:00:36.680 in the process. I am your host, Mia Wong, and 0:00:37.360 --> 0:00:40.160 today we are going to be talking about a union 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:43.400 that is attempting to do exactly that. And with me 0:00:43.520 --> 0:00:46.400 to discuss this are Jess and Hazeus, who are mentors 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:48.839 for Friends of the Children PDX and members of the 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:52.360 Friends PDX union network. Yeah, Jess is Zeus. Welcome to 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:52.760 the show. 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:54.600 Thank you so much for having us. 0:00:55.000 --> 0:00:55.560 Yeah, thank you. 0:00:56.200 --> 0:00:56.440 Yeah. 0:00:56.480 --> 0:00:58.680 I'm really happy to talk to you both, because I 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:01.120 think this is a very very unique an interesting union 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:05.040 especially you know, talk about especially right now. But to 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:08.839 get people sort of rolling. Can you explain what Friends 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:11.280 with the Children is and what it is that you 0:01:11.360 --> 0:01:11.679 two do. 0:01:13.120 --> 0:01:17.880 Yeah, so Friends with the Children is it's a national organization. 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:23.080 It's a nonprofit, but they're there are individual chapters throughout 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:26.200 different cities. We work out of Portland, which is the 0:01:26.280 --> 0:01:31.280 founding chapter and also the largest one. Some of the language, 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:33.280 I'll say that it's like used from the website and 0:01:33.319 --> 0:01:37.000 from like the mission statement that really encompasses what our 0:01:37.120 --> 0:01:40.480 role is and also how it is told to like 0:01:40.520 --> 0:01:43.240 our community partnerships and the families and youth that we 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:46.960 work with. Is that we are committing to youth when 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:51.800 they are typically around kindergarten age level and they're being 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:55.040 paired with a mentor, and they will have a mentor 0:01:55.600 --> 0:01:59.120 until they graduate the program, so that usually ends up 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:01.920 being a total of twelve and a half years. And 0:02:01.960 --> 0:02:04.320 that like within that, we were doing a lot of 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:08.080 like individualized care and support. We work with them in 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:11.160 the schools, we work with them outside the schools, We 0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:13.960 help them get into extracurriculars, We help them with like 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:18.960 social emotional regulation, developing relationships with other youth in the program, 0:02:19.840 --> 0:02:23.680 and really just like being a consistently reliable human being, 0:02:24.200 --> 0:02:26.880 and one of the big pillars of our organization is 0:02:26.919 --> 0:02:30.120 the commitment to long term, which sometimes can be an 0:02:30.160 --> 0:02:33.160 issue when you are facing a lot of high turnover 0:02:33.400 --> 0:02:38.040 As an organization. We both have eight kids on our roster, 0:02:38.360 --> 0:02:43.079 as do most mentors, and within that we have youth. 0:02:43.600 --> 0:02:46.000 I personally have youth that have been assigned to me 0:02:46.240 --> 0:02:48.680 that have just started in the program, meaning that they 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:52.400 were like maybe first grade when I was assigned to them. 0:02:52.919 --> 0:02:56.840 And then I also have youth that are middle school 0:02:56.960 --> 0:03:01.520 level that have had several different men tours in the past, 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:04.280 some that have stayed there for maybe a few years, 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:08.079 and like sometimes there's ones that have been there for months. 0:03:08.600 --> 0:03:12.440 Yeah, if I can add to that. The kids we 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:18.120 work with, they're enrolled into the program because they have 0:03:18.360 --> 0:03:22.760 some risk factors in their lives that would lead them 0:03:22.800 --> 0:03:26.160 to needing a little bit of extra support and help. 0:03:26.480 --> 0:03:29.640 So we work with a lot of kids that come 0:03:29.720 --> 0:03:35.720 from immigrant families, from families that have you know, single 0:03:35.760 --> 0:03:43.440 parent households, foster care families, and kids kids that like unfortunately, 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:48.640 are likely to face some challenges that our society and 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:52.640 the way it's built up will deal to them, and 0:03:52.720 --> 0:03:55.960 our goal is to help them through those challenges, just 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:59.960 be there for them so that they have a chance 0:04:00.120 --> 0:04:07.120 of you know, graduating high school or entering adulthood without 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:11.400 having you know, having had kids or facing like the 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:17.520 justice system. It's kids that we love dearly that we 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:22.000 work with in a similar way as like you know, 0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:26.240 a program like Big Brothers Big Sisters. But we are 0:04:27.120 --> 0:04:30.359 paid mentors, which is the big difference, right, We're not 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:36.239 volunteer based. We are employees basically social workers for all. 0:04:36.080 --> 0:04:37.599 Of the families that we work with. 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:41.799 It's honestly, like it's a great job, and I think 0:04:42.040 --> 0:04:46.919 right now, especially like super necessary because things are falling apart. 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:53.200 Yeah, yeah, and yeah, just adding like one that made 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:55.960 me think of how within the work, Like I think 0:04:56.040 --> 0:04:59.919 social work is a very apt choice of words because 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:02.359 we are paired with the youth and it doesn't like 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.400 stop there like we work like we work with the families. 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:08.560 We also work with like the siblings too, because sometimes 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:12.200 you'll have a youth that maybe is the only child 0:05:12.240 --> 0:05:16.279 in that family that for whatever reason got a mentor 0:05:16.480 --> 0:05:19.799 and then you support also I mean it's a choice, 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:23.240 but I would say that most mentors definitely opt into 0:05:23.240 --> 0:05:26.599 being there for siblings and family members in the household 0:05:26.680 --> 0:05:28.760 and making sure that they're also showing up for the 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:32.800 caregivers to help them create a loving home. 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:35.680 Yeah, and I mean, you know, I think that you 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:38.800 can you can look at this and see how it's 0:05:38.800 --> 0:05:41.120 supposed to work structurally, And you know, you were talking 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:44.919 about like, I mean, this is supposed to be a 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:49.680 like over a decade long commitment to these kids, right 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:51.880 that ideally you're working with the same person, and you know, 0:05:51.920 --> 0:05:55.320 you're forming really deep emotional attachments because you can't not 0:05:55.560 --> 0:05:58.359 do that if you're doing this kind of work. But 0:05:58.400 --> 0:06:03.200 then also, you know, in order for that to work, 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:05.880 I think it's you know, you can see this the outside, like, 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:08.120 in order for this to work, this has to be 0:06:08.160 --> 0:06:11.239 a job that you could stayably do for a decade, right. 0:06:14.440 --> 0:06:18.320 Yeah, yeah, which I will say we do and I 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:20.480 want to do. I want to give so many props 0:06:20.480 --> 0:06:24.520 to one of our mentors who has stayed for twelve 0:06:24.600 --> 0:06:28.840 years and has graduated their youth. But of of all 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:32.240 of our co workers, I believe it's only one that 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:34.799 has currently been able to do that and has stayed 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:36.520 there as long as I have. 0:06:37.400 --> 0:06:37.719 Yeah. 0:06:37.800 --> 0:06:40.360 Yeah, And the truth of the fact, like, yeah, a 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:43.400 for any job, twelve and a half years is a 0:06:43.440 --> 0:06:45.839 really long time, right, I mean six years is a 0:06:45.880 --> 0:06:51.960 really long time. And with this job, we're like we're 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:55.240 an emotional sponge for a lot of things. Right, So 0:06:56.320 --> 0:07:01.960 our kids go through everything that you can imagine, and 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:06.120 and within that like everything good and everything bad that 0:07:06.160 --> 0:07:10.240 you can imagine. And our job a lot of times 0:07:10.600 --> 0:07:13.960 is like we can't solve the things that are affecting 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:18.000 these kids, but we can take in some of those 0:07:18.680 --> 0:07:23.960 negative feelings and that grief, that anger. We can take 0:07:24.000 --> 0:07:27.480 it in and almost like dissolve it a little bit, right, 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:33.000 But within that, like it can affect us so so much. 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:36.880 And that's where, Yeah, the sustainability part of like twelve 0:07:36.880 --> 0:07:39.960 and a half years in this job, like that is 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:44.280 a lot, and you we need a lot for that 0:07:44.480 --> 0:07:47.520 to like at all be be possible. 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:50.440 Yeah, I mean, like that there's this way in which 0:07:50.800 --> 0:07:56.880 you're effectively what this job is is like you're the 0:07:56.920 --> 0:08:00.360 person who is trying to like mitigate the impact of 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:03.240 like all like literally all of the structural systems of 0:08:03.320 --> 0:08:06.840 violence that exist in this entire country, and how like 0:08:06.880 --> 0:08:09.800 how they're just sort of targeted down on these kids, 0:08:09.800 --> 0:08:13.560 and your job is to like try to like protect 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.880 them as much as possible, and that's unbelievable amount of 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:22.760 like physical and emotional labor. And then also like, I 0:08:22.760 --> 0:08:24.800 don't know, it seems pretty bad that there's only been 0:08:24.880 --> 0:08:28.400 one co worker who's been able to graduate their kids. 0:08:27.920 --> 0:08:28.160 Like. 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:33.080 Just to clarify for history that's been in like our time. 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:36.679 Yeah, I don't know if like over. 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:38.960 The thirty years, I hope that other people have, but yeah, 0:08:39.000 --> 0:08:43.120 in recent years it's only been the one. And also like, yeah, 0:08:43.160 --> 0:08:47.120 this is a job where you are not necessarily able 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:49.880 to like undo the systems at play, but trying to 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:55.960 support them. And like we as mentors are inevitably also 0:08:56.160 --> 0:09:00.480 facing those systems against ourselves. And like one of the 0:09:00.520 --> 0:09:04.360 reasons that I think people gravitate towards this job is 0:09:04.400 --> 0:09:07.920 their empathy because they have those shared experiences. 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:09.120 One of the. 0:09:09.000 --> 0:09:12.520 Things that is kind of heavy in the culture of 0:09:12.640 --> 0:09:16.960 friends is being asked your why when you start, like 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:20.000 why did you choose friends? And for a lot of people, 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:23.199 it is because of wanting to be the person that 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.000 they needed when they were going through those periods of time. 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:28.600 So there's bound to be like a lot of like 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:32.640 reactivation of feelings inside yourself that I think we all, 0:09:32.880 --> 0:09:35.120 like I want to say, like every mentor I've worked 0:09:35.120 --> 0:09:39.400 with does an incredible job of like handling that and 0:09:39.440 --> 0:09:42.840 like taking good care of themselves. But it is definitely 0:09:42.880 --> 0:09:48.680 something that like takes a lot of regulation, and I 0:09:48.679 --> 0:09:51.080 think empathy is one of the greatest skills in this job. 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:54.679 But it also yeah, it also then leads to us 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:57.319 needing greater needs of self care and things like that. 0:09:57.679 --> 0:09:59.560 Yeah, And like I mean, I guess like to put 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:01.680 this in person active for like people listening to this 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:05.320 as like, Okay, your job is to be the person 0:10:05.880 --> 0:10:09.520 like in the friend group who like manages like when 0:10:09.559 --> 0:10:11.680 someone's like having an emotional crisis, like you have to 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:14.760 like help them deal with it, and that is your 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:19.080 job for like eight kids like the worst shit in 0:10:19.120 --> 0:10:25.040 the world, like Jesus Christ's Oh good lord. 0:10:25.240 --> 0:10:29.920 It's honestly, like like hearing this, it's always really helpful 0:10:29.960 --> 0:10:33.000 to hear someone's outside perspective of our job, right because 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:36.880 we get so so into it, so into the munk 0:10:37.000 --> 0:10:39.240 of like what this job can be. And I think 0:10:39.360 --> 0:10:42.480 like overall, like like social work, it's not just like 0:10:42.559 --> 0:10:45.600 our our job, but like I'm sure other social workers 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.640 and people in care industries, like we have that like 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:54.760 continuous like vicarious trauma that makes us forget like how 0:10:55.800 --> 0:10:59.199 how our job is sometimes and then it's helpful to 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:02.200 hear other people mention it because it's like, yeah, wow, 0:11:02.360 --> 0:11:04.640 our job is kind of crazy and and the work 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:08.000 we do is like really important and really important for society. 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:13.679 And also yeah, like it's hard. It's hard work. 0:11:14.600 --> 0:11:17.439 It's it's hard, and it doesn't like really have an endpoint, 0:11:17.600 --> 0:11:19.800 Like we have the hours we work with kids, and 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:23.200 then we have the hours we think about them and 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:24.720 the things going on in their lives. 0:11:25.480 --> 0:11:27.160 And sometimes it's like sweet things. 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:29.280 Like a lot of times it's sweet things where I'll 0:11:29.280 --> 0:11:30.640 see something and be like, oh my gosh, you know 0:11:30.679 --> 0:11:33.120 who love that? And like things like that are like oh, 0:11:33.280 --> 0:11:36.360 great idea, or oh, let's go see this movie. And 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:39.880 a lot of times it's like worrying though too, and 0:11:41.120 --> 0:11:44.200 knowing that there is there is only so many things 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:47.520 we can control and some things we just have to 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:50.840 be the person that's there as they have to go 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:55.079 through something, which, yeah, it's it's hard because we also 0:11:55.480 --> 0:11:59.160 obviously like develop such loving relationships with these kids. It's 0:11:59.160 --> 0:12:02.360 hard to see like kids that you care about so 0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:06.240 much that sometimes the most you can do is just 0:12:06.280 --> 0:12:06.680 be there. 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:07.559 Yeah. 0:12:07.720 --> 0:12:11.240 It definitely is a job that, like to some degree, 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:13.320 is sort of always with you. 0:12:13.880 --> 0:12:14.040 Yeah. 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:16.480 We have a joke about this with this job, where 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:18.640 it's likely I do what you love when you'll never 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:22.720 be free for a single second of your entire life 0:12:22.960 --> 0:12:25.040 because you're just always awes. 0:12:25.679 --> 0:12:26.920 Yeah that's so true. 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:30.439 Yeah, as you say this, I worked till like nine 0:12:30.600 --> 0:12:32.600 thirty last night because I was like, you know what, 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:35.120 I'm enjoying this so much, hagging out with my guys, 0:12:35.160 --> 0:12:36.959 so I'm just going to keep working. 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:37.840 Yeah. 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:41.520 Yeah, So, speaking speaking of keeping working, we need to 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:43.680 go to ads and then we will come back and 0:12:43.720 --> 0:12:46.600 talk about the ways in which this job that requires 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.480 an incredible amount of structural support to keep people there 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:52.360 for like over a decade, is failing to do that. 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:07.000 And we are back. So Okay, now now that we've 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:11.120 sort of talked about what this is, let's talk about 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:13.160 the actual union. 0:13:13.440 --> 0:13:14.280 It was just the thing. 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:17.520 Yeah, yeah, so can you can you talk about sort 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:21.120 of how how did organizing for this union start and 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:23.000 what were the sort of issues that could have brought 0:13:23.000 --> 0:13:24.720 everyone to be like, Okay, we need to do. 0:13:24.640 --> 0:13:30.679 This, yeah, for sure. So we first brought about our 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:37.920 petition to unionize in March of twenty twenty three, so 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:41.360 that was two years ago, a long time ago, right, 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:46.520 But the work for a unionization, obviously, the organizing behind 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:49.960 it had started like much before that. When I first 0:13:50.080 --> 0:13:55.720 joined Friends, it was in September of twenty two, and 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:58.840 I knew that the work had already been like happening 0:13:58.920 --> 0:14:05.080 the summer before. What was the catalyst was post covid. 0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:06.199 A. 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:10.280 Obviously a lot of people left, given what COVID did 0:14:10.280 --> 0:14:13.200 to a lot of industries and especially care work. But 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:17.640 then likewise, a lot of people are fired and where 0:14:17.800 --> 0:14:20.440 many would say like fired without like a full on 0:14:20.560 --> 0:14:27.240 like due process, that included a program manager who you 0:14:27.280 --> 0:14:31.240 know was really listening to friends and advocating for the 0:14:31.320 --> 0:14:34.600 mentor role, and they were let go, which spurred a 0:14:34.600 --> 0:14:37.680 lot of people to want to start organizing. Some of 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:40.960 the issues that we face, like the pay obviously, like 0:14:41.240 --> 0:14:44.320 within social work in general and nonprofit work, like it's 0:14:44.360 --> 0:14:48.360 never gonna match up and never gonna really be as 0:14:48.440 --> 0:14:51.720 good as like the cost of living, especially here in Portland. 0:14:51.800 --> 0:14:54.960 But the pay compared to like all of the emotional 0:14:55.040 --> 0:14:57.320 work and all the work that we do was just 0:14:57.400 --> 0:15:01.160 not there and not sustainable. It's why people were not 0:15:02.600 --> 0:15:05.560 able to stick around because frankly, we were looking at 0:15:05.560 --> 0:15:08.720 the same issues that our families were facing of, like 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:12.560 you know, food of insecurity and needing to like get 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:17.320 food stamps, or like needing like rental and like housing 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:21.200 assistants because our pay was just not up to par. 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:25.400 Those are a few of the issues. Jess, I don't 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:26.960 know if you have other thoughts. 0:15:27.600 --> 0:15:29.360 Yeah, I think you touched on a lot of them. 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:32.200 I think it's hard to stay in this job if 0:15:32.240 --> 0:15:35.120 you are looking to have a family. There's been issues yeat, 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:39.000 with pay, with insurance, with other sorts of things that 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.040 have led to mentors leaving rather than like staying there 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:45.640 even if they like really wanted to stay there, just 0:15:45.640 --> 0:15:48.080 wouldn't necessarily allow for them to have maybe like the 0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:53.640 life they wanted and also just honoring I think with 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:59.680 like bereavement leave and critical issue leave has been areas 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:04.320 that haven't really been addressed. We have had very tragic 0:16:04.440 --> 0:16:07.840 things happen in the in our working community with the 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:13.240 families and that have drastically affected. Yeah, the well being 0:16:13.240 --> 0:16:14.960 of mentors and staff members alike. 0:16:15.480 --> 0:16:17.920 Yeah, and I mean, you know, this is a job 0:16:18.240 --> 0:16:23.640 that structurally is designed to be a kind of like 0:16:23.640 --> 0:16:25.640 like again, if the goal is to have one person 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:30.600 from from like kindergarten to ntealthy like a graduating high school, right, 0:16:31.440 --> 0:16:35.520 Like that is something that requires like nineteen fifties nineteen 0:16:35.600 --> 0:16:39.720 sixties style forwardism, like you have one job for decades, 0:16:40.720 --> 0:16:43.960 and the only way you can to that is if 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:47.600 people are incredibly well supported. And it's like the fact 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:50.480 that it's like, Okay, you're trying to do this, but 0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:53.720 you're not paying people enough money to fucking afford food, Like. 0:16:53.760 --> 0:16:59.080 What the hell, like Jesus Christ, Yeah, just like oh 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:02.960 my god, yeah, or even I mean it's still something 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:03.600 that we're fighting. 0:17:03.600 --> 0:17:08.560 But like our our workplace like doesn't provide health insurance 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:12.640 for dependence, which I think, oh my god, really ironic 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:15.440 giving how much we care for kids, and then some 0:17:15.480 --> 0:17:17.879 of our mentors and other coworkers that have kids, like 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:21.119 have to spend so much money on health insurance for 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:22.200 their own personal. 0:17:21.920 --> 0:17:26.600 Kids friends of some of the kids apparently works. 0:17:28.080 --> 0:17:33.280 Yeah yeah, yeah, And honestly, like big big picture thinking, 0:17:33.359 --> 0:17:38.120 like the reason why we like started this whole unionizing 0:17:38.359 --> 0:17:43.000 project was because we care so much about our kids, right, 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.919 Like I when I first started working at Friends, Like, 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:53.400 I think was the first MASK mentor to be hired 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:56.560 in a fairly long time, after a lot of firings 0:17:56.600 --> 0:18:00.199 of other mass mentors and two of the youth that 0:18:00.920 --> 0:18:02.679 but actually it's more than two of the youth. But 0:18:02.760 --> 0:18:04.480 the first two youth that I was matched up with, 0:18:04.880 --> 0:18:09.560 they hadn't had a mentor for over two years, jeez, 0:18:10.400 --> 0:18:13.880 which is a really long time. Like when when you know, 0:18:14.080 --> 0:18:18.120 are five six years old, and you're used to one 0:18:18.160 --> 0:18:22.320 person consistently picking you up every single week and hanging 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:25.600 out with you and spending time with you for several 0:18:25.640 --> 0:18:32.600 hours for six or seven years, and then just like 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:37.199 next day, next week, maybe even that same day, you 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:39.960 find out like, oh, you no longer have a mentor 0:18:40.240 --> 0:18:42.520 and you're not going to have a mentor for two 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:47.040 more years because people keep leaving, People aren't wanting to 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:49.359 apply for this job because the pay isn't high enough. 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:53.080 Right That then like creates like a lot of issues 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:55.760 with the kids that we're dealing with. It's not like 0:18:56.080 --> 0:18:59.800 we are these like saviors or like anything like along 0:18:59.800 --> 0:19:04.720 those lines, right, But when someone has consistent support and 0:19:04.760 --> 0:19:07.760 then that support is lost for a long time, especially 0:19:07.760 --> 0:19:10.160 when you're a young kid where it's been the majority 0:19:10.200 --> 0:19:12.760 of your life you've been having that consistant support. That 0:19:12.800 --> 0:19:16.399 then creates like a lot of trust issues and like 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:20.359 overall like attachment issues that a youth could face. And 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:23.479 for me, that was the main thing. Like working with 0:19:23.520 --> 0:19:27.320 these kids and having to like regain that trust was 0:19:27.320 --> 0:19:30.520 something that's like still to this day is like really 0:19:30.560 --> 0:19:38.320 emotionally like daunting. And I, like I will keep saying this. 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:40.879 I love my kids so much, like I like can't 0:19:40.920 --> 0:19:44.560 stop thinking about them, and I want to be with 0:19:44.640 --> 0:19:48.560 my kids until they graduate, which would mean me staying 0:19:48.600 --> 0:19:51.720 at this job for another eight years, which it's a 0:19:51.760 --> 0:19:54.399 long time, right, but I want to do that. So 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:58.960 I want to you know, get paid, have time off 0:19:59.320 --> 0:20:02.359 when what of my sadly this is something that did 0:20:02.440 --> 0:20:04.680 a curve where you've passed away that I worked with 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:08.720 and like didn't have time off to like really grieve that. 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:11.520 Hard stuff. 0:20:11.560 --> 0:20:13.120 And I just want to be able to stay there 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:16.280 until they're done with the program. 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:18.119 Yeah, And it's like there's just it's just like a 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:21.879 litany of horrors where it's like one it's like, you 0:20:21.920 --> 0:20:25.040 know what when there is like it's it's not you know, 0:20:25.119 --> 0:20:28.520 like turnover in a normal job sucks, but this is 0:20:28.600 --> 0:20:31.880 like when there's turnover because people can't afford to live 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:34.000 their lives. It's like you're just like ripping a hole 0:20:34.160 --> 0:20:38.200 in these kids, like the fabric of their social lives. 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:41.840 And then also it's like, yeah, one of these kids 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:44.399 that is literally your job to care for dies, you 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:46.400 just have to fucking go to work the next day. 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:51.040 Like it is so hideous, and it's. 0:20:50.920 --> 0:20:55.920 Just like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Like it makes sense 0:20:56.000 --> 0:21:00.439 that like, yeah, people are organizing because it's like, you know, 0:21:00.840 --> 0:21:05.800 like this organization is just systemically failing both the people 0:21:05.800 --> 0:21:07.880 that are trying to help and the people whose job it. 0:21:07.880 --> 0:21:09.800 Is to like help them. 0:21:10.040 --> 0:21:14.320 And yeah, yeah yeah. 0:21:14.359 --> 0:21:16.760 I think one of the things that is like hardest 0:21:16.840 --> 0:21:20.040 to see while like working there is the ways in 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:23.480 which this like job that you do, like that like 0:21:23.640 --> 0:21:26.560 I care so much about and love doing, but like 0:21:26.640 --> 0:21:30.440 seeing this like institution in a way be like part 0:21:30.760 --> 0:21:34.320 be part of the problem because if we aren't like 0:21:34.520 --> 0:21:38.200 having it so that employees feel supported in the way 0:21:38.240 --> 0:21:42.640 that they need to, like, life happens. Sometimes people leave 0:21:42.920 --> 0:21:45.960 and like move and get a different job for various reasons, 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:50.280 but a lot of the times it's it's because it's 0:21:50.320 --> 0:21:54.600 not sustainable and it's really hard to leave, and like 0:21:54.640 --> 0:21:58.840 it's a heartbreaking thing because I, like, I want to 0:21:58.920 --> 0:22:03.520 graduate many of my youth and it is something that 0:22:03.560 --> 0:22:05.520 I think about of like how feasible is that, Like 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:07.680 I want to do it, and like also, okay, then 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:09.520 that means I got to be frugal and all these 0:22:09.560 --> 0:22:12.919 other ways are et cetera. And yeah, I'm working with 0:22:13.000 --> 0:22:15.600 youth that have already kind of experienced loss and wanting 0:22:15.640 --> 0:22:16.920 to continue to show up for them. 0:22:17.359 --> 0:22:18.720 The job itself feels so. 0:22:18.640 --> 0:22:20.560 Sacred and like I feel so lucky to be in 0:22:20.600 --> 0:22:23.960 these kids' lives, and I think just a lot of 0:22:24.000 --> 0:22:27.520 the turnover has been out of like lack of sustainability 0:22:27.800 --> 0:22:30.520 for yourself, like for your well being. 0:22:31.920 --> 0:22:37.280 Yeah, yeah, And I mean the turnover numbers were pretty well. 0:22:37.400 --> 0:22:41.639 I think one time we calculated it and mentors were 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:46.639 it was like a forty something percent turnover mentors. Yeah, 0:22:46.720 --> 0:22:51.240 And a lot of that happened because in this two 0:22:51.320 --> 0:22:55.439 year time period where we've been fighting for a construct, 0:22:55.920 --> 0:23:02.399 they also froze wage increases, so I've had the same 0:23:02.600 --> 0:23:04.640 the same wage for the past two years, about two 0:23:04.640 --> 0:23:06.960 and a half years that I've been working here, you know, 0:23:07.200 --> 0:23:10.960 and in that same time period, inflation has been prettigue 0:23:11.200 --> 0:23:21.520 crazy and rent for me. Yeah yeah, which which you 0:23:21.560 --> 0:23:24.200 know gladly. Now we're we have this fight and we're 0:23:24.240 --> 0:23:25.960 at the two year mark and not at the zero 0:23:26.080 --> 0:23:29.680 year mark and not looking forward to two more years 0:23:29.680 --> 0:23:31.840 of doing this. But yeah, it's it's been hard to 0:23:31.840 --> 0:23:36.280 sustain this when everything is increasing in price and our 0:23:36.320 --> 0:23:38.679 wages are completely stagnant. 0:23:39.800 --> 0:23:40.399 Yeah. 0:23:40.880 --> 0:23:42.880 Yeah, So let's take one more ad break and then 0:23:42.960 --> 0:23:46.000 we will come back to talk about, Yeah, how how 0:23:46.119 --> 0:24:00.240 unionization efforts are going, and yeah, we are back. Yeah, 0:24:00.240 --> 0:24:04.119 so's let's talk about how this campaign is going. So 0:24:04.160 --> 0:24:08.199 you said you've been in bargaining for like two years. 0:24:08.440 --> 0:24:14.240 So we had our petition for recognition on March twenty third, 0:24:14.600 --> 0:24:16.920 twenty twenty three, so that was over two years ago, 0:24:17.200 --> 0:24:23.280 and then ours Yeah yeah, our employer didn't formally recognize us, 0:24:23.920 --> 0:24:27.080 but through the process of like voting, we got over 0:24:27.359 --> 0:24:30.840 ninety three percent of Wow. 0:24:31.400 --> 0:24:34.920 That's an incredible that's incredible. 0:24:35.160 --> 0:24:37.360 It's super great, and it's also like, wow, we all 0:24:37.400 --> 0:24:44.240 really need it, Yeah, and like there were some other barriers, 0:24:44.280 --> 0:24:47.520 including like not being formually recognized. Like we also had 0:24:47.600 --> 0:24:52.480 management contest a few positions that I believe most, if 0:24:52.520 --> 0:24:56.080 not all, we were able to successfully happy part of 0:24:56.080 --> 0:24:58.720 our unit. And then we didn't have our first bargaining 0:24:58.760 --> 0:25:03.440 session until September of twenty twenty three, so like almost 0:25:03.760 --> 0:25:04.439 six months. 0:25:04.480 --> 0:25:06.120 I think if I did the math right. 0:25:06.600 --> 0:25:12.320 After we formally presented our letter for recognition, yeah, yeah, 0:25:12.359 --> 0:25:14.880 and like throughout that process so now it has been 0:25:15.160 --> 0:25:17.959 like Haesus is quite good at keeping track of it, 0:25:18.080 --> 0:25:21.520 but I think as of today we're about at five 0:25:21.680 --> 0:25:24.080 hundred and eighty days of bargaining. 0:25:24.560 --> 0:25:24.879 God. 0:25:25.119 --> 0:25:28.879 Yeah, Yeah, it's been a long one and it hasn't 0:25:28.920 --> 0:25:33.240 been It's been like also a choppy journey where there 0:25:33.320 --> 0:25:40.280 has been delays in scheduling, delays in just getting different 0:25:40.359 --> 0:25:43.440 articles back in time. One of the biggest ones obviously 0:25:43.480 --> 0:25:47.320 with compensation. And I think I can't quite remember the 0:25:47.359 --> 0:25:51.240 period of time, but we presented it over a year ago, 0:25:51.720 --> 0:25:55.920 I think maybe I could be wrong, and it took 0:25:56.080 --> 0:25:59.840 like it took several several several months for us to 0:26:01.280 --> 0:26:07.640 get anything back from management, which yeah, was a big bummer. 0:26:07.760 --> 0:26:09.040 Amongst other things. 0:26:09.440 --> 0:26:10.120 It sucks. 0:26:10.680 --> 0:26:14.359 It sucks, and obviously that's the one that we have 0:26:14.480 --> 0:26:18.040 yet to finalize, like as we're talking right now. 0:26:18.600 --> 0:26:22.520 It is insurance and compensation are still our last two 0:26:22.680 --> 0:26:23.960 articles left. 0:26:25.000 --> 0:26:28.520 Yeah, and some of the like the difficult things. I 0:26:28.520 --> 0:26:33.600 mean when you are working on a project, I mean, 0:26:33.760 --> 0:26:38.200 I wouldn't be surprised given like really when these conversations started, 0:26:38.200 --> 0:26:41.199 if we're looking at like over nine hundred or one 0:26:41.280 --> 0:26:44.960 thousand days of like really talking about this, but then 0:26:45.040 --> 0:26:50.199 when you're dealing with bargaining for five hundred and eighty days, Like, 0:26:50.320 --> 0:26:54.320 it's exhausting. It is so exhausting. We have regular meetings 0:26:54.359 --> 0:26:59.800 that we attend to that our bargaining meetings were specifically 0:27:00.000 --> 0:27:03.280 schedules outside of work hours, so that like the people 0:27:03.280 --> 0:27:05.639 on our bargaining team and other union members would have 0:27:05.680 --> 0:27:09.119 to put in that extra time outside of our forty 0:27:09.160 --> 0:27:16.280 hour week. Yeah, and within that, Like the hardest part 0:27:16.560 --> 0:27:21.880 is when you directly confront right your managers and your 0:27:21.920 --> 0:27:25.840 bosses about like the rights and the things that you need. 0:27:26.640 --> 0:27:27.640 So much of it like. 0:27:27.640 --> 0:27:31.840 Boils down to respect right and your respect as like 0:27:31.960 --> 0:27:34.439 a worker and the value that you have as a 0:27:34.440 --> 0:27:37.719 worker in your organization, and when there is a pushback 0:27:38.160 --> 0:27:43.000 on that, it honestly is like for me at times 0:27:43.119 --> 0:27:46.800 was debilitating, right when you're doing this work and your 0:27:47.040 --> 0:27:52.879 workplace is stretching things out for so long, Yeah, and 0:27:52.920 --> 0:27:56.679 you're pouring your heart out on your kids, like really 0:27:56.720 --> 0:28:00.919 trying to do the best that response from our you know, 0:28:00.960 --> 0:28:06.199 our supervisors and managers, like it really was hard. What 0:28:06.320 --> 0:28:09.040 was hard for me was hard for other union organizers 0:28:09.119 --> 0:28:10.720 in our workplace, and it was hard for all of 0:28:10.720 --> 0:28:13.840 our workers where we started thinking like dang, like what 0:28:14.000 --> 0:28:16.520 is the value that we have like in this workplace, 0:28:16.560 --> 0:28:18.840 What is the value that we intrinsically have in the 0:28:18.840 --> 0:28:21.560 work that we're doing with our kids? It's a lot, 0:28:21.680 --> 0:28:24.040 And it's a lot when you're facing all these systems 0:28:24.080 --> 0:28:26.600 that our kids are facing and like taking those things 0:28:26.640 --> 0:28:29.800 in and then are trying to change those systems. Finally 0:28:29.840 --> 0:28:32.440 able to try to change those systems, and we learned 0:28:32.480 --> 0:28:35.080 that like, oh wait, like the place that we're working 0:28:35.760 --> 0:28:39.160 is actually part of these systems too, and it's doing 0:28:39.200 --> 0:28:41.719 the same things that we're like fighting to have our 0:28:41.800 --> 0:28:44.640 kids like have better lives. Like we're facing it right 0:28:44.680 --> 0:28:46.160 now from inside the house. 0:28:47.240 --> 0:28:50.760 Yeah, Yeah, I wanted to add into yeah, very much, 0:28:50.800 --> 0:28:54.680 realizing that like our management is also in a way 0:28:54.800 --> 0:28:58.480 operating you know, maybe like a corporation, which isn't the 0:28:59.480 --> 0:29:02.200 hope you would have for a nonprofit. And one of 0:29:02.240 --> 0:29:05.320 the steps we had to take as a union was 0:29:05.360 --> 0:29:10.360 filing a UOP so unfair labor practice, which cited like 0:29:10.480 --> 0:29:14.600 I had mentioned before, like delays and scheduling and also 0:29:14.880 --> 0:29:17.960 regressive bargaining, which just means that like the way in 0:29:18.000 --> 0:29:22.280 which they were presenting things would have lessened our like 0:29:22.880 --> 0:29:26.040 quality of conditions. So definitely not what you want to 0:29:26.080 --> 0:29:29.600 be getting, not what you want to be handed across 0:29:29.840 --> 0:29:31.080 from the bargaining table. 0:29:32.280 --> 0:29:33.920 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 0:29:33.960 --> 0:29:38.280 Within this process, they were currently surly workers, but they 0:29:38.600 --> 0:29:40.400 tried to change us to hourly workers. 0:29:41.480 --> 0:29:42.160 Oh my god. 0:29:42.240 --> 0:29:46.280 Yeah, which again like we're always working, you know, we're 0:29:46.280 --> 0:29:50.160 always working, so unless you want to pay me for 0:29:50.240 --> 0:29:51.080 twenty four. 0:29:50.880 --> 0:29:56.120 Hours, you know, you're talking about like, yeah, that they're 0:29:56.120 --> 0:29:58.520 behaving like a corporations, Like oh yeah, this is exactly 0:29:58.560 --> 0:30:02.200 what like by employer did to me, which is like like, like, 0:30:02.200 --> 0:30:03.880 what are the largest media companies in the world, And 0:30:03.920 --> 0:30:06.960 they dragged out negotiations for two years and like you 0:30:06.960 --> 0:30:08.479 know you're talking about this sort like just like oh, 0:30:08.560 --> 0:30:10.360 they're like the feeling of disrespect where they're just not 0:30:10.480 --> 0:30:12.160 getting stuff back to you. And it's like I remember, 0:30:12.360 --> 0:30:14.920 you know, like we'd be sitting there for a bargaining 0:30:14.920 --> 0:30:17.080 meeting and they wouldn't and they would be an hour late, 0:30:17.560 --> 0:30:19.560 and they'd be an hour late because they hadn't like 0:30:19.760 --> 0:30:23.320 bothered to beforehand spend time drafting out what their responses 0:30:23.320 --> 0:30:25.200 were going to be, so they were frantically trying to 0:30:25.240 --> 0:30:26.719 get it done before we were there, and we're all 0:30:26.720 --> 0:30:28.440 just sitting there for literally an hour waiting for them 0:30:28.480 --> 0:30:30.520 to show up. But it's like, Okay, there are people 0:30:30.560 --> 0:30:32.200 in this unit whose job it is to stand next 0:30:32.240 --> 0:30:35.600 to car bombs, like and you can't show up on 0:30:35.680 --> 0:30:38.400 time to your to this, to this meeting that you 0:30:38.440 --> 0:30:42.000 have know was going to happen for weeks. Like it's 0:30:42.080 --> 0:30:44.480 just I say this every single lepany these episodes was like, 0:30:44.520 --> 0:30:47.520 this is an incredibly common YouTube blisting tactic is draw 0:30:47.520 --> 0:30:49.560 out the first contract, because that's that's like the second 0:30:49.560 --> 0:30:52.520 point where unions fail after like the after after you 0:30:52.560 --> 0:30:56.760 get like recognition votes is like here, yeah, for sure, 0:30:56.960 --> 0:30:58.960 you know, like I mean I think there's something extent 0:30:59.000 --> 0:31:02.320 we expect corporations do this, but it's like, Okay, this 0:31:02.480 --> 0:31:05.400 is an NGO that's like the point of which you're 0:31:05.440 --> 0:31:09.120 supposed to be like helping underprivileged, underprivileged youth. And then 0:31:09.120 --> 0:31:10.840 they're like we're going to turn around and we're going 0:31:10.880 --> 0:31:13.080 to screw over different underprivileged youth. 0:31:13.400 --> 0:31:16.080 Like yeah, it sucks, yeah. 0:31:15.920 --> 0:31:18.520 And I think that's like for me, one of the 0:31:18.560 --> 0:31:20.720 things that just like mess with my mind the most 0:31:20.760 --> 0:31:24.880 is that, like we're not selling a product, right, We're 0:31:24.960 --> 0:31:29.880 not trying to like get revenue or anything along those lines. 0:31:30.000 --> 0:31:30.120 Right. 0:31:30.160 --> 0:31:33.040 So, like our job is a job that we actually 0:31:33.080 --> 0:31:36.880 like fully love and like want to stick around, like 0:31:37.800 --> 0:31:41.680 not not just for our own like financial you know, 0:31:41.800 --> 0:31:45.200 peace and our own like financial security. Like we want 0:31:45.240 --> 0:31:47.880 to stick around this job because we care about the job. 0:31:48.080 --> 0:31:51.120 And you know that's not to like like other you know, 0:31:51.200 --> 0:31:54.520 businesses and other workplaces that unionize, a lot of times 0:31:54.520 --> 0:31:58.480 people want to do that because they want financial security, right, 0:31:59.200 --> 0:32:01.680 And I think for a lot of NGOs, nonprofits and 0:32:01.840 --> 0:32:07.480 care work like, we unionize because we want to stick 0:32:07.520 --> 0:32:11.240 around both because of financial security, right, but also because 0:32:11.400 --> 0:32:15.160 we just like care so much about the work that 0:32:15.200 --> 0:32:16.200 we're doing. 0:32:16.400 --> 0:32:19.000 And to be faced with. 0:32:19.240 --> 0:32:26.240 Actions by our workplace that you know, try to dissuade 0:32:26.320 --> 0:32:28.760 us from that, try to like you know, in a sense, 0:32:28.800 --> 0:32:30.840 like it felt like stopping us from wanting to stick 0:32:30.840 --> 0:32:34.680 around like that again really hard, really hard, And I 0:32:34.720 --> 0:32:38.880 think like a really like psychologically hard part that comes 0:32:38.920 --> 0:32:43.920 with unionizing in the care work field in the like 0:32:44.040 --> 0:32:45.040 nonprofit space. 0:32:45.560 --> 0:32:47.920 Yeah, Like, this isn't a job that people are going 0:32:47.960 --> 0:32:52.160 to take for the money, but we do need to 0:32:52.240 --> 0:32:56.560 be receiving like equitable pay and benefits so that we 0:32:56.600 --> 0:33:00.240 stay at this job like this by all means, and 0:33:00.400 --> 0:33:03.520 like still like this is the same way I feel about. 0:33:03.320 --> 0:33:03.960 It to this day. 0:33:04.200 --> 0:33:09.280 I remember like reading the little like job description for 0:33:09.360 --> 0:33:12.720 this role and was like, oh, this is dude, this 0:33:12.800 --> 0:33:14.800 is like my dream job. This is like one hundred 0:33:14.840 --> 0:33:20.280 percent what I want to spend my energy towards. Yeah, 0:33:20.720 --> 0:33:23.800 and yeah, I think that's a huge part of why 0:33:23.840 --> 0:33:26.320 we were able to get like that ninety three percent 0:33:26.800 --> 0:33:30.720 and to have also like routine support for different actions 0:33:30.760 --> 0:33:34.480 and stuff is just because we have people that care 0:33:34.640 --> 0:33:37.400 so much about wanting to stick around. 0:33:38.240 --> 0:33:40.840 Yeah, And that's the thing that ngngos, you know, and 0:33:40.880 --> 0:33:43.600 you see this in abortion work, you see this in like, 0:33:43.640 --> 0:33:46.040 you see this in nursing, you see this in all 0:33:46.080 --> 0:33:49.240 of these different fields. Like that's the thing that these 0:33:49.400 --> 0:33:53.200 NGOs used to exploit people, is you know, like, is 0:33:53.480 --> 0:33:56.200 the basic human empathy and love and care that we 0:33:56.280 --> 0:33:59.680 have for the people who were caring for and they're 0:34:00.040 --> 0:34:03.440 and these people are like, aha, look at this. Aha, 0:34:03.480 --> 0:34:06.200 these people they care about the thing that they're doing. 0:34:06.440 --> 0:34:08.359 We could underpay them and overwork them. 0:34:08.360 --> 0:34:12.120 It's like, why is there system work like this? 0:34:12.520 --> 0:34:17.239 Like it's just what a terrible way to decide an 0:34:17.239 --> 0:34:22.560 economic system. Yeah, just good lord, Let's talk a little 0:34:22.600 --> 0:34:24.560 bit about, like, you know, what kinds of organizing things 0:34:24.600 --> 0:34:25.759 you all have been able to do, and the kinds 0:34:25.760 --> 0:34:28.120 of things you've been able to accomplish by you know, 0:34:28.239 --> 0:34:31.480 working together even in these really kind of like I 0:34:31.480 --> 0:34:33.759 don't know, structurally difficult conditions. 0:34:34.480 --> 0:34:35.560 Yeah, we've had. 0:34:36.960 --> 0:34:39.880 We've had a multitude of different actions over the past, 0:34:40.680 --> 0:34:42.160 you know, over the past one. 0:34:42.000 --> 0:34:42.840 Hundred and eighty days. 0:34:43.760 --> 0:34:47.360 I think one of our one of our biggest ones 0:34:47.920 --> 0:34:51.480 by far, which was I think also was just one 0:34:51.520 --> 0:34:53.680 of our most beautiful in a way, was November of 0:34:53.760 --> 0:34:56.840 last year, we did an info picket, and it was 0:34:56.880 --> 0:35:01.200 one of those things too where it was very well 0:35:01.239 --> 0:35:03.920 planned out, but also even with the best of planning, 0:35:04.120 --> 0:35:06.920 midway through it, we had a shift location based off 0:35:06.920 --> 0:35:08.640 of just changing information we were getting. 0:35:09.320 --> 0:35:13.360 And we had one of our little bits. 0:35:13.480 --> 0:35:16.680 It is because our union is called fun a lot 0:35:16.719 --> 0:35:22.439 of our posters were SpongeBob themed, so instead of imagination, 0:35:22.800 --> 0:35:24.840 you know, it's compensation. 0:35:26.040 --> 0:35:27.600 And the rules. 0:35:27.840 --> 0:35:30.759 Yeah, and I think it's indicative of, like also how 0:35:30.880 --> 0:35:34.520 much people that work with us are playful and sweet 0:35:34.719 --> 0:35:37.960 and why we're are good at our jobs of working 0:35:37.960 --> 0:35:38.560 with kids. 0:35:40.040 --> 0:35:43.600 And yeah, we had very high turnout. 0:35:43.760 --> 0:35:47.200 I think we had forty something people within our own 0:35:47.320 --> 0:35:50.879 organization that showed up for that. We've done smaller actions too, 0:35:51.080 --> 0:35:55.160 by just asking for community support, like we've had caregivers 0:35:55.920 --> 0:35:59.640 write letters of support to different people in management. We've 0:35:59.640 --> 0:36:03.200 also done a few pack the rooms for bargeting sessions, 0:36:03.239 --> 0:36:05.760 like especially when there have been times that have felt 0:36:05.760 --> 0:36:07.720 like there's been some semblance of stalling. 0:36:08.320 --> 0:36:10.680 Yeah, those are just some of them. He stays, chime 0:36:10.680 --> 0:36:11.360 in with others. 0:36:11.640 --> 0:36:14.000 Yeah, within that, and I think, like an interesting thing 0:36:14.040 --> 0:36:18.600 about nonprofits, our revenue comes from donors, right, so we 0:36:18.719 --> 0:36:21.680 have to play this like fun game of like, Okay, 0:36:21.680 --> 0:36:24.440 how do we communicate with our donors, right, so that 0:36:24.520 --> 0:36:28.040 we make sure that they know that, like you know, 0:36:28.320 --> 0:36:31.120 this is part of like what they're donating too. But 0:36:31.160 --> 0:36:34.720 then within that also, like you knows, ask for money 0:36:34.760 --> 0:36:37.840 as well, right, because we do want you know, better 0:36:37.880 --> 0:36:39.200 pay and better benefits. 0:36:39.360 --> 0:36:39.520 Right. 0:36:40.200 --> 0:36:44.600 So we've contacted donors and will still plan to do 0:36:44.719 --> 0:36:47.640 that with both that ask of like support the union 0:36:47.680 --> 0:36:50.239 and support our organization, right because the thing that we 0:36:50.280 --> 0:36:52.000 care about the most is the work that we do 0:36:52.080 --> 0:36:55.120 with our kids, and for that to happen, we want 0:36:55.160 --> 0:36:58.799 our organization to like stay afloat truly, right, Yeah, some 0:36:58.880 --> 0:37:04.279 of the wins that we've gotten. I mentioned earlier that 0:37:05.200 --> 0:37:09.120 they were trying to have us be hourly workers, and 0:37:09.200 --> 0:37:13.360 that was a big campaign that we like were fighting 0:37:13.600 --> 0:37:16.600 back on for a long time. It's also like what 0:37:16.680 --> 0:37:23.279 precipitated the ULP filing. I made too many buttons that 0:37:23.440 --> 0:37:28.440 said you could never have peuty butons truly that said 0:37:28.640 --> 0:37:31.719 I worked forty plus hours a week. Because one of 0:37:31.719 --> 0:37:34.279 the people on the bargaining team for management at the 0:37:34.320 --> 0:37:37.160 bargaining table asked if we even worked forty hours a 0:37:37.200 --> 0:37:40.719 week while we were talking about this, and that's like 0:37:40.760 --> 0:37:43.240 one of those instances that I mean like yeah, wow, 0:37:43.360 --> 0:37:47.520 that's like a little disrespectful and like really bites. So 0:37:48.120 --> 0:37:52.520 we all were wearing these pins regularly. We you know, 0:37:52.920 --> 0:37:55.680 we signed a strike pledge where we had like eighty 0:37:55.719 --> 0:37:58.200 something percent of the unit say that like if we 0:37:58.280 --> 0:37:59.600 came to voting. 0:37:59.280 --> 0:38:00.920 For a strike, people would strike. 0:38:01.520 --> 0:38:04.879 And the big win was like, Okay, great, we get 0:38:04.880 --> 0:38:06.960 to stay a salaried workers because they walk back on 0:38:07.000 --> 0:38:13.000 that on that threat. We our time off. We have 0:38:13.480 --> 0:38:17.560 a time off contract or agreement now that like some 0:38:17.640 --> 0:38:19.839 of my co workers that have been around a long time, 0:38:19.880 --> 0:38:23.759 once the contract gets ratified, they'll have like two more 0:38:23.800 --> 0:38:24.799 weeks of time off. 0:38:24.880 --> 0:38:26.920 Hell yeah, hell yeah. 0:38:26.440 --> 0:38:30.000 Because they haven't. They've been around for seven years and 0:38:30.040 --> 0:38:33.319 they're still at the same amount of time off basically 0:38:33.360 --> 0:38:37.920 that I'm at and that I've been at since the beginning. Yeah, 0:38:37.960 --> 0:38:40.400 And when it comes to wages, like, well, we're still 0:38:41.520 --> 0:38:44.520 figuring that out, but some of the gains that we 0:38:44.600 --> 0:38:48.239 are potentially looking at is like incredible, Like I looked 0:38:48.239 --> 0:38:52.920 at the numbers yesterday of like what hopefully given like 0:38:52.960 --> 0:38:56.080 where we're at right now in the agreements like what 0:38:56.239 --> 0:38:59.880 I would hopefully get and I straight up like tiered 0:39:00.160 --> 0:39:03.920 up looking at the number because it felt like such 0:39:04.080 --> 0:39:08.920 a big change in my financial status. Right, And yesterday, 0:39:09.160 --> 0:39:11.520 like as I said, I worked on nine thirty PM 0:39:11.600 --> 0:39:15.080 with my kids, probably because I had this like massive 0:39:15.239 --> 0:39:18.719 like weight of you know, this financial doom that I'm 0:39:18.760 --> 0:39:22.080 looking at somewhat lifted at the hope of the winds 0:39:22.120 --> 0:39:25.200 that we might get from this contract. So it's been 0:39:25.719 --> 0:39:30.040 incredibly hard, incredibly long, way too long, and all of 0:39:30.080 --> 0:39:32.600 it is so it is going to be so worth it, right. 0:39:33.040 --> 0:39:36.200 I hope that's something that the listeners really get that, like, 0:39:36.840 --> 0:39:41.560 this is hard work, but in the end, like is 0:39:42.040 --> 0:39:44.120 the change that we were hoping for, you know. 0:39:45.040 --> 0:39:48.920 Yeah, And recently, one of the things that we did 0:39:49.000 --> 0:39:50.799 do just like a run through of just to kind 0:39:50.800 --> 0:39:53.560 of boost morales since sparketing has gone on for so long, 0:39:54.040 --> 0:39:56.120 was compile all the wins that we have so far 0:39:56.320 --> 0:40:00.719 just through thas so still tensative, but yeah, did map 0:40:00.760 --> 0:40:03.200 out a lot of huge things. One of the things 0:40:03.239 --> 0:40:05.920 we do a lot on this job is drive and 0:40:05.960 --> 0:40:11.960 we don't have many things in policy about. 0:40:11.719 --> 0:40:12.920 Cleanings or repairs. 0:40:13.000 --> 0:40:15.440 When something happens in your car, with the youth, like 0:40:15.560 --> 0:40:18.640 say they throw up, it happens with kids, Like that 0:40:18.760 --> 0:40:21.360 isn't necessarily something that would have been like covered. We 0:40:21.400 --> 0:40:23.520 would have had to just pay for that cleaning ourselves. 0:40:23.600 --> 0:40:27.400 And like coleage is a huge thing where one of 0:40:27.440 --> 0:40:30.400 our potential like big wins is that we'll get like 0:40:30.440 --> 0:40:33.880 full mileage covered rather than having to like deduct time 0:40:33.920 --> 0:40:37.359 from like this illusion of having an office where we 0:40:37.400 --> 0:40:42.280 would have to minus some mileage in whatever way made 0:40:42.320 --> 0:40:46.759 sense with where our buildings were located. Despite even if 0:40:46.800 --> 0:40:49.239 our kids were like totally somewhere else where we were 0:40:49.239 --> 0:40:52.560 picking them up, it definitely wasn't like the most sensible 0:40:52.600 --> 0:40:55.719 way for us to be like being fully. 0:40:55.400 --> 0:40:56.839 Reimbursed for what we were doing. 0:40:57.080 --> 0:41:00.960 Yeah, and those are all huge that we do have, 0:41:01.120 --> 0:41:05.120 Like obviously compensation insurance are two of the biggest that 0:41:05.160 --> 0:41:09.000 we're still working on. I think recently, like almost within 0:41:09.080 --> 0:41:11.560 this week, we've started to tip in a way that 0:41:11.719 --> 0:41:17.120 feels like we may be close to having a contract soon, 0:41:17.760 --> 0:41:20.640 which I do want to say, like, you know, as 0:41:20.680 --> 0:41:22.319 inspiration to everybody out there that. 0:41:22.320 --> 0:41:23.799 Works for a nonprofit like. 0:41:24.440 --> 0:41:27.680 Unionize and you know what you might it might farewell 0:41:27.719 --> 0:41:30.879 for you. I have hope for everybody, and like, right now, 0:41:30.920 --> 0:41:33.200 I think a lot of are, like a lot of 0:41:33.200 --> 0:41:36.040 my coworkers are starting to have hope again because I 0:41:36.040 --> 0:41:38.440 do think, like you said, it is totally a manipulation 0:41:38.600 --> 0:41:42.120 tool to have it drawn out so long, And yeah, 0:41:42.200 --> 0:41:46.680 it is exhausting to be basically stalled in your wage. 0:41:46.719 --> 0:41:47.840 For two and a half years. 0:41:48.440 --> 0:41:51.560 But we are like gaining some traction again, which I 0:41:51.640 --> 0:41:54.120 do think is something that we're still being you know, 0:41:54.239 --> 0:41:58.719 cautious with, just because right now it does feel like 0:41:58.800 --> 0:42:01.080 management is working with that's a little bit more. But 0:42:01.120 --> 0:42:05.040 I also think that there are reasonings around that, Like 0:42:05.040 --> 0:42:08.560 we're about to have in a few weeks our biggest 0:42:09.239 --> 0:42:12.799 fundraiser for our work, because like Caseue said, we are 0:42:12.960 --> 0:42:16.360 majority donor based, and I do think there's an appeal 0:42:16.440 --> 0:42:18.600 to management to have a contract by then. 0:42:18.920 --> 0:42:20.600 Yeah, it adds to. 0:42:20.600 --> 0:42:22.440 The whole We're doing good work and we treat our 0:42:22.440 --> 0:42:26.239 employees well. I hope that that is something then that 0:42:26.360 --> 0:42:29.120 is fulfilled by them in an honest way, not just 0:42:29.120 --> 0:42:32.880 a superficial way, because we are still pushing for a 0:42:32.920 --> 0:42:36.160 little bit more right now and have bargaining coming up 0:42:36.280 --> 0:42:39.439 next week. So yeah, I'm really hoping that what they're 0:42:39.480 --> 0:42:42.400 showing us isn't just performative, that we really might be 0:42:42.440 --> 0:42:44.840 able to get to a point where there is something 0:42:45.239 --> 0:42:48.840 that is truly good for us, because. 0:42:49.600 --> 0:42:52.640 We're all ready we're all ready for a contract. 0:42:54.600 --> 0:42:57.560 Yeah, as you know someone, we've got our contract. Like 0:42:57.600 --> 0:43:00.239 it doesn't it doesn't magically solve everything, but like, my god, 0:43:01.000 --> 0:43:03.880 it should make your life better, like it is, it 0:43:03.960 --> 0:43:08.360 is absolutely worth it. Yeah, okay, So how can people 0:43:08.400 --> 0:43:11.880 support y'all both sort of locally here and then just 0:43:12.120 --> 0:43:15.160 like broader because most people are not here. 0:43:15.520 --> 0:43:19.400 Honestly, most of our like people in like management positions, 0:43:19.480 --> 0:43:22.560 information is public. If you want to email them in support, 0:43:22.600 --> 0:43:27.320 go for it. Also, just like encouraging either your workplace 0:43:27.360 --> 0:43:29.480 if you work in kind of a social work setting, 0:43:29.680 --> 0:43:31.680 or like you know, if you know people that are 0:43:32.280 --> 0:43:35.399 because this whole field of work takes such a toll 0:43:35.400 --> 0:43:38.680 on people and it is the most necessary work. And 0:43:39.200 --> 0:43:43.279 I think it's really easy to fall into the mindset 0:43:43.440 --> 0:43:46.200 of I'm doing this for the greater good, not you know, 0:43:46.760 --> 0:43:48.560 not for money, not for these things, but like you 0:43:48.600 --> 0:43:52.960 also deserve to feel okay and taken care of and 0:43:53.040 --> 0:43:57.000 like have the things you need to be saying yeah, hey, 0:43:57.000 --> 0:43:58.520 says anything else do you want to add? 0:43:59.080 --> 0:43:59.920 Yeah, I mean. 0:44:01.760 --> 0:44:05.839 I would add that, like we have an Instagram right 0:44:05.880 --> 0:44:08.680 as friends PDX Union Network. 0:44:09.200 --> 0:44:11.600 It's a mouthful, but will link the inscription. 0:44:12.040 --> 0:44:12.720 Yeah, great. 0:44:13.320 --> 0:44:17.839 And then within that, like if you're in Portland, like 0:44:18.520 --> 0:44:21.040 make sure to like follow us and like pay attention 0:44:21.080 --> 0:44:24.319 to what we're posting, because we you know, hopefully we 0:44:24.719 --> 0:44:26.720 do not have to get to a point of striking, 0:44:26.800 --> 0:44:29.440 especially at the place that we're at right now with 0:44:29.520 --> 0:44:32.359 our contract, but in truth, like we're looking at five 0:44:32.440 --> 0:44:34.959 hundred and eighty days and that is quite a long time. 0:44:35.239 --> 0:44:35.520 Yeah. 0:44:35.560 --> 0:44:38.960 And then also like if if listeners do have the 0:44:39.000 --> 0:44:42.239 ability to donate, if they could donate some funds for 0:44:42.320 --> 0:44:45.880 Friends of the Children Portland and somehow in their notes 0:44:45.920 --> 0:44:49.040 be like I support the union, Like I think that 0:44:49.080 --> 0:44:52.560 could also be a really interesting way to show the 0:44:52.560 --> 0:44:57.600 support that like our supporters have, like for both the 0:44:57.640 --> 0:45:01.319 work that we're doing on the youth level, but then 0:45:01.360 --> 0:45:04.719 also like in the union side of things too, there's 0:45:04.719 --> 0:45:07.360 been a lot of like communication of like, oh, this 0:45:07.520 --> 0:45:11.080 is really going to impact like the development side of 0:45:11.120 --> 0:45:14.920 our organization and like all of the things that like 0:45:15.280 --> 0:45:18.640 our fundraising team is going to have to do to 0:45:18.880 --> 0:45:23.279 like meet thees, which again I think, yeah, that would 0:45:23.360 --> 0:45:27.840 be more true if like our executive director wasn't making 0:45:28.000 --> 0:45:31.160 like what like five times as much money as I 0:45:31.200 --> 0:45:36.440 am Jeu Christ. Yeah, but yeah, showing that support, like 0:45:36.719 --> 0:45:39.759 it doesn't have to be a lot, but showing our 0:45:39.800 --> 0:45:43.560 bosses just how much like the populace like is supporting 0:45:43.560 --> 0:45:46.839 our unionization efforts like that power do you really don't too? 0:45:46.960 --> 0:45:50.239 And and then also like it impacts our kids, like 0:45:50.239 --> 0:45:52.680 our kids, like that's the truth of it all, Like 0:45:53.640 --> 0:45:55.799 I want my kids to have the best life that 0:45:55.880 --> 0:45:59.719 they could possibly have, and sadly we live in a 0:45:59.760 --> 0:46:02.319 world for money really dictates that. 0:46:03.920 --> 0:46:08.520 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so those are will we will 0:46:08.520 --> 0:46:10.239 we will, we will have links in the description to 0:46:10.440 --> 0:46:13.920 all of that, And yeah, thank you to both so 0:46:14.000 --> 0:46:15.839 much for coming on the show and hope I hope 0:46:15.840 --> 0:46:19.160 you win, and yeah, I hope you get to go 0:46:19.280 --> 0:46:21.680 back to caring for these kids and not and also 0:46:21.719 --> 0:46:24.560 while not having to worry about like being able to 0:46:24.640 --> 0:46:25.320 live your lives. 0:46:25.600 --> 0:46:26.640 Thank you so much. 0:46:27.600 --> 0:46:31.000 Yeah, yeah, thank you so much for having us. Yeah, 0:46:31.040 --> 0:46:33.680 of course, honestly, it's been great talking about the work 0:46:33.719 --> 0:46:37.920 because it is it is really important work and I'm 0:46:37.960 --> 0:46:39.040 happy we get to do it. 0:46:39.239 --> 0:46:44.719 Yeah, it's it's wonderful and yeah and so this is yeah, 0:46:44.719 --> 0:46:47.320 this just bin I could happened here, and yeah, i'd 0:46:47.360 --> 0:46:49.759 also go unionize your workplace. You can do it. I 0:46:49.840 --> 0:46:50.520 guarantee it. 0:47:12.200 --> 0:47:15.440 Hello, and welcome to the show. It's me James today 0:47:15.520 --> 0:47:18.520 and I am joined by Garrison Davis. Hi, Garrison. 0:47:19.040 --> 0:47:19.360 Hello. 0:47:19.600 --> 0:47:19.920 Hello. 0:47:20.040 --> 0:47:23.280 Garrison has just said some words about something that's happening 0:47:23.320 --> 0:47:26.680 on social media that I don't understand, and it's made 0:47:26.680 --> 0:47:29.800 me feel very old. That's what's happening today in my world. 0:47:30.200 --> 0:47:33.959 It's very sad we're gathered here today to talk about 0:47:34.040 --> 0:47:37.360 the earthquake in me anma, right, I think most of 0:47:37.400 --> 0:47:40.799 you will probably have been made aware of the earthquake. 0:47:42.000 --> 0:47:45.200 It's somewhat odd that corporate media has really not reported 0:47:45.239 --> 0:47:48.560 on the revolution in any substantial way since twenty twenty one, 0:47:49.000 --> 0:47:53.440 but the earthquake apparently justified a lot of network sending 0:47:53.440 --> 0:47:56.120 people to me Amma for the first time. Very amusingly, 0:47:56.400 --> 0:47:59.840 people dming me on Blue Sky and Twitter are asking 0:48:00.080 --> 0:48:02.839 how to get a visa from the Burmese Hunter, which 0:48:02.920 --> 0:48:04.920 is not a thing I've ever done. The last communication 0:48:04.960 --> 0:48:06.359 I had with them came in the form of a 0:48:06.400 --> 0:48:08.799 car bomb that they said of near to a place 0:48:08.840 --> 0:48:13.080 where we were. But if you're not aware, the earthquake 0:48:13.120 --> 0:48:15.879 happened on the twenty eighth of March of this year, 0:48:16.120 --> 0:48:18.800 just before one in the afternoon. It was the biggest 0:48:18.800 --> 0:48:22.160 earthquake in Myanma. So it's nineteen twelve and it registered 0:48:22.239 --> 0:48:24.880 seven point seven on the Richter scale, which is huge 0:48:25.320 --> 0:48:28.399 because it's it's very hard for foreign journalists to get 0:48:28.400 --> 0:48:32.640 a visa to enter Memba. The initial reporting focused on 0:48:32.719 --> 0:48:36.400 Bangkok and the damage done in Thailand, but the epithet 0:48:36.600 --> 0:48:39.880 was in Sagang, which is near Mandalay, Madelaide's second biggest 0:48:39.880 --> 0:48:43.560 city in Memba, and that was where like the worst 0:48:43.600 --> 0:48:48.160 of the destruction happened. Almost every street in Mandalai has 0:48:48.239 --> 0:48:52.000 collapsed buildings. It's a little difficult for us to get 0:48:52.040 --> 0:48:54.479 a sense of the exact scale of the damage because 0:48:54.520 --> 0:48:58.080 the Hunter refuses to allow Some media has been allowed 0:48:58.080 --> 0:49:01.239 in the BBC. I saw like sneaked up in. It's 0:49:01.360 --> 0:49:05.120 very difficult for media to move and report freely. And 0:49:05.160 --> 0:49:07.840 in addition to this, the Hunter has continued to practice 0:49:07.840 --> 0:49:10.760 of cutting off Internet for people in Memma, right. 0:49:10.719 --> 0:49:15.719 Even during like emergency situations. Yes, yeah, especially during emergency. 0:49:15.840 --> 0:49:17.920 They've kind it off like as a response to this 0:49:17.960 --> 0:49:21.239 because I guess they perceive it to be something that 0:49:21.280 --> 0:49:25.160 makes them look weak. This is a tendency that the 0:49:25.239 --> 0:49:28.000 Hunter has displayed before. So in two thousand and eight, 0:49:28.400 --> 0:49:31.279 cyclone Nagas affected Mema and killed over one hundred and 0:49:31.360 --> 0:49:36.600 thirty thousand people, and they blocked international aid. They said 0:49:36.800 --> 0:49:40.000 that people didn't need the quote chocolate bars that the 0:49:40.120 --> 0:49:44.319 US and other countries were trying to deliver, and that 0:49:44.400 --> 0:49:47.920 they could exist by like hunting frogs in ditches, was 0:49:47.960 --> 0:49:52.640 their suggestion. I don't think people realize like how far 0:49:52.760 --> 0:49:56.560 down the North Korea scale that the Burmese Hunter is, 0:49:57.480 --> 0:50:01.960 but like they're very worried that any interaction with the 0:50:02.239 --> 0:50:07.840 outside world, specifically with like I guess western neoliberal powers, 0:50:07.880 --> 0:50:11.320 will be damaging for their like ability to control the population. 0:50:12.080 --> 0:50:16.359 So for that reason, we don't know how many people 0:50:16.440 --> 0:50:20.080 have died. Right from what I've heard on the ground, 0:50:20.120 --> 0:50:23.240 the death toll is substantially higher than the three thy 0:50:23.320 --> 0:50:27.200 six hundred number being reported. The US Geological Survey estimated 0:50:27.320 --> 0:50:29.719 that an earthquake of that magnitude in that region would 0:50:29.800 --> 0:50:33.040 kill between ten and one hundred thousand people. Obviously, that's 0:50:33.120 --> 0:50:36.120 quite a big kind of delta there. What I can 0:50:36.160 --> 0:50:39.000 tell you is that I've heard firsthand that there are 0:50:39.040 --> 0:50:41.759 some parts of mandolines A going where the stench of 0:50:41.880 --> 0:50:46.600 rotting bodies is so powerful that people have stopped returning 0:50:46.600 --> 0:50:50.960 to their homes. There have been so many aftershocks that 0:50:51.000 --> 0:50:53.799 people are still sleeping in the street because they're worried 0:50:53.800 --> 0:50:57.960 about the damage structures falling down. The UN has an 0:50:58.040 --> 0:51:01.480 estimate of seventeen million people of cross fifty seven townships. 0:51:01.840 --> 0:51:05.040 Townships are like the administrative districts that are used in 0:51:05.080 --> 0:51:09.080 miannber a bit affected, with over nine million people facing 0:51:09.160 --> 0:51:12.279 severe hardship. And of course this is all compounded by 0:51:12.320 --> 0:51:14.520 the fact that there were already twenty million people in 0:51:14.600 --> 0:51:18.320 Miamma who needed humanitarian assistance, and they're about three and 0:51:18.360 --> 0:51:21.080 a half million internally displaced people as a result of 0:51:21.120 --> 0:51:24.840 the fighting that's happened after the revolution, So like, it 0:51:25.120 --> 0:51:28.280 really came at a pretty difficult time in a place 0:51:28.400 --> 0:51:32.520 where the government is not willing to They said after 0:51:32.560 --> 0:51:34.600 the earth quake they wanted international aid, but they've as 0:51:34.640 --> 0:51:37.640 we'll see later in this script. They've only accepted it 0:51:37.680 --> 0:51:40.759 from certain countries. I spoke to a friend who has 0:51:40.840 --> 0:51:44.560 family in Mandalay yesterday. He told me that the way 0:51:44.560 --> 0:51:47.600 they're assessing the damage is using like open source intelligence. 0:51:48.000 --> 0:51:51.240 They're trying to look in the backgrounds of people's videos 0:51:51.239 --> 0:51:54.839 on Facebook to work out if their childhood homes fell down. Right, 0:51:55.400 --> 0:51:58.360 they were using satellite imaging software when I spoke to 0:51:58.360 --> 0:52:02.040 them yesterday to try and ascertaining of their families were okay, 0:52:03.120 --> 0:52:06.520 they told me. Or Sagang has very famous pagodas, and 0:52:06.760 --> 0:52:09.040 the pagodas are all on a hill. Apparently a lot 0:52:09.040 --> 0:52:11.239 of those pagodas have fallen down, and even the hill 0:52:11.280 --> 0:52:15.840 itself is like listing. So there's been like massive cultural 0:52:15.920 --> 0:52:19.920 damage as well. Another way in which the damage was 0:52:19.960 --> 0:52:24.480 compounded by Miamma's politics was the quake struck like I said, 0:52:24.480 --> 0:52:27.200 at one pm on a Friday, right, which is Friday prayers. 0:52:27.560 --> 0:52:30.760 This happened during Ramadan speciularly the day before it'll fitter, 0:52:31.440 --> 0:52:33.319 which is a very busy day for mosques if you're 0:52:33.360 --> 0:52:37.040 not aware, right, Successive governments of Meamma since the nineteen 0:52:37.040 --> 0:52:41.000 sixties have refused to allow even basic maintenance for mosques. 0:52:41.840 --> 0:52:47.520 That means that these buildings were in great states of disrepair. Right, Myanma, 0:52:47.800 --> 0:52:51.320 there is an ulternationalist Buddhist movement which has been embraced 0:52:51.320 --> 0:52:54.480 to a great degree by the Hunter, but also limited 0:52:54.560 --> 0:52:56.920 even like the National League for Democracy, which was the 0:52:57.000 --> 0:53:02.200 relatively neo liberal aligned party that had previously been in 0:53:02.239 --> 0:53:05.799 power in Myanma or somewhat in power. I suppose alternationalist 0:53:05.800 --> 0:53:08.479 Buddhist monks like Ashin Wurathu and his nine six nine 0:53:08.520 --> 0:53:12.560 movement have kind of condemned anythink that they did as 0:53:13.000 --> 0:53:15.920 making the pro Muslim and they have this essentially they 0:53:15.960 --> 0:53:19.239 have a great replacement theory, right that Muslims are trying 0:53:19.280 --> 0:53:21.919 to come in through Bangladesh to replace Buddhists in Mianma. 0:53:22.120 --> 0:53:27.239 Yeah, lots of people here have this like very orientalist 0:53:27.239 --> 0:53:31.239 perspective of like Buddhism TM as this like you know, 0:53:31.400 --> 0:53:34.600 like like like peaceful blah blah blah blah blah, and 0:53:34.719 --> 0:53:37.400 like no, like Buddhism, like every religion has a variety 0:53:37.480 --> 0:53:42.520 of sex, yes, and the Buddhist national sex can be 0:53:42.560 --> 0:53:43.680 particularly nasty. 0:53:44.120 --> 0:53:47.200 Yeah, I mean as vicious as any other people. I'm 0:53:47.200 --> 0:53:49.319 sure will be familiar with their Hindi genocide, and like 0:53:49.400 --> 0:53:51.640 there are a lot of monks that supported that, including 0:53:51.800 --> 0:53:53.880 where Rathu is the most notable one, but there are 0:53:53.920 --> 0:53:56.040 plenty more, right, and they're part of the I mean 0:53:56.080 --> 0:53:59.839 he's he's literally explicitly expressed like how much he looks 0:53:59.840 --> 0:54:04.279 at to the English Defense League Jesus. Yeah. Yeah, Like 0:54:04.320 --> 0:54:06.800 these are people who like they are part of this 0:54:07.360 --> 0:54:11.600 global nativist movement. People's orientalism, I think sometimes stops them 0:54:11.640 --> 0:54:14.200 seeing that or appreciating that this extends outside of like 0:54:14.280 --> 0:54:18.879 white global North countries. Yeah. One thing that I did 0:54:18.920 --> 0:54:21.600 think that that really touched me in the days after 0:54:21.600 --> 0:54:26.120 the earthquake was young Buddhist Bamar people of the majority ethnicity, 0:54:26.760 --> 0:54:30.000 reaching out to me and being like, hey man, this 0:54:30.080 --> 0:54:33.000 happened in Friday prayers to Ramadan, and it has devastated 0:54:33.000 --> 0:54:37.920 the Muslim population, Like thousands of people, hundreds of mosques 0:54:37.920 --> 0:54:39.440 have gone, and thousands of people are trapped in a 0:54:39.480 --> 0:54:41.319 rubble and like no one's talking about it. Why it is, 0:54:41.320 --> 0:54:44.080 no we're talking about it. This is terrible and like 0:54:44.480 --> 0:54:48.400 it would have been inconceivable to hear young Bama Buddhist 0:54:48.440 --> 0:54:51.319 people so concerned with the well being of like their 0:54:51.400 --> 0:54:54.920 Muslim countrymen. Before the coup in twenty twenty one, This 0:54:55.120 --> 0:54:58.400 was a country that had been manufacturing consent for genocide 0:54:58.440 --> 0:55:03.280 against it it's Muslim minorities for four or five years 0:55:03.280 --> 0:55:06.600 by that point, right specifically on Facebook. That's a behind 0:55:06.600 --> 0:55:08.640 the bath this episode on this you can also listen 0:55:09.160 --> 0:55:11.000 if you're new to the show. Robert and I have 0:55:11.160 --> 0:55:14.200 made two scripted series about the revolution in the Emma, 0:55:14.400 --> 0:55:17.319 which will include in the show notes. But like that 0:55:17.560 --> 0:55:22.359 change to a real genuine solidarity and care between these 0:55:22.360 --> 0:55:26.400 two groups was really touching in the moments after the earthquake, 0:55:26.400 --> 0:55:28.799 in the days after the earthquake. When we come back, 0:55:28.840 --> 0:55:30.120 I want to talk a little bit more about the 0:55:30.160 --> 0:55:33.200 revolution and I want to talk about how the revolution 0:55:33.520 --> 0:55:35.200 has been responding to this and the impact it has 0:55:35.200 --> 0:55:48.600 had on the revolution. We are back, and of course 0:55:49.239 --> 0:55:52.320 the revolution hasn't stopped because of the earthquake, right The 0:55:52.960 --> 0:55:57.400 conflict is still ongoing and the PDFs and their allied 0:55:57.440 --> 0:56:01.680 ethnic business organizations are still fight against the Hunter. In fact, 0:56:01.800 --> 0:56:04.920 within an hour of the earthquake, the Hunter began using 0:56:05.040 --> 0:56:09.680 paramotors to drop bombs on Hangul village in Sugang. This 0:56:09.719 --> 0:56:12.839 has been a thing that they've started to do recently. 0:56:13.360 --> 0:56:15.279 In a sense, I guess it's a good sign because 0:56:15.320 --> 0:56:19.319 it shows that maybe their jets and other aircraft are 0:56:19.360 --> 0:56:21.920 in a poor state of repair, or that they're struggling 0:56:21.960 --> 0:56:25.400 to keep enough of them airborne. Initially, I wondered if 0:56:25.440 --> 0:56:29.480 they were using the paramotors because their runways have been damaged, 0:56:29.560 --> 0:56:31.799 but there doesn't seem to be the case. They've been 0:56:32.320 --> 0:56:35.080 air striking just as much as they ever did, which 0:56:35.120 --> 0:56:38.640 is unfortunate. Satellite images or imports some my source on 0:56:38.680 --> 0:56:42.759 the ground suggests that they're able to continue carrying out 0:56:42.760 --> 0:56:45.319 bombing rates at a pretty similar rate from when they 0:56:45.320 --> 0:56:49.560 did before. Despite this, the National Unity Government, which is 0:56:49.640 --> 0:56:52.879 kind of the shadow government composed mostly of people who 0:56:52.880 --> 0:56:55.160 are elected and then deposed by the coup in twenty 0:56:55.200 --> 0:56:58.640 twenty one, and the PDF, who in theory are commanded 0:56:58.640 --> 0:57:01.839 by the National Unity Government, called a two week ceasefire 0:57:02.239 --> 0:57:05.880 right after the earthquake to allow for like a humanitarian pause. 0:57:06.560 --> 0:57:09.319 The Three Brotherhood Alliance, which is an alliance of the 0:57:09.360 --> 0:57:13.560 three most powerful ethnic resistance organizations in Myanmar, also called 0:57:13.600 --> 0:57:16.400 what they called a humanitarian pause for a month in 0:57:16.560 --> 0:57:21.000 both cases, they said they wouldn't undertake offensive operations, but 0:57:21.040 --> 0:57:23.400 they would defend themselves, right because I think they had 0:57:23.400 --> 0:57:25.959 a CeNSE that the Hunter wasn't going to stop attacking them. 0:57:26.800 --> 0:57:30.240 The Hunter did declare its own ceasfire on April third, 0:57:30.520 --> 0:57:34.320 and the Kachin Independence Army, which is another ethnic residence organization, 0:57:34.760 --> 0:57:38.920 followed shortly thereafter. Notably, that ceasefire from the Hunter came 0:57:38.960 --> 0:57:41.760 the day after its troops fired on a Chinese Red 0:57:41.800 --> 0:57:45.000 Cross convoy, which is not a great look for them. 0:57:45.200 --> 0:57:46.960 No, never love to see that. 0:57:47.400 --> 0:57:49.200 Yeah, we don't love to see people firing on the 0:57:49.240 --> 0:57:52.480 Red Cross. This is especially bad for the Hunter because 0:57:52.800 --> 0:57:54.880 China has been growing closer and closer to the Hunter 0:57:54.920 --> 0:57:57.600 and supporting it. China's had this weird back and forth 0:57:57.680 --> 0:58:01.160 relationship with the Revolution. At times, it's the Revolution, it 0:58:01.200 --> 0:58:04.200 seems like just supporting the me and my National Democratic 0:58:04.240 --> 0:58:07.280 Alliance Army, which is a group that broke off the 0:58:07.280 --> 0:58:09.640 Communist Party of Burma in the nineteen eighties. 0:58:09.960 --> 0:58:10.959 That, yeah, that makes sense. 0:58:11.280 --> 0:58:11.800 Yeah. 0:58:11.880 --> 0:58:14.400 There's also the United War State Army, which isn't part 0:58:14.440 --> 0:58:16.840 of the Revolution, which is that which has the strongest 0:58:16.840 --> 0:58:19.439 relationship with the PSC, and they're just chilling. They haven't 0:58:19.800 --> 0:58:21.200 really entered the conflict. 0:58:21.400 --> 0:58:23.720 It's called straight chillin, by the way, Jane. 0:58:23.560 --> 0:58:28.480 Straight chillin. Yeah, there you go. That's how you say. Yeah, 0:58:28.480 --> 0:58:31.800 I marked myself out yet again, straight chillin. The United 0:58:31.880 --> 0:58:37.400 War State Army, Thank you, Garrison. Actually, it spoke to 0:58:37.440 --> 0:58:41.520 some Cadridge from the Burmese Communist Party recently the Communist 0:58:41.520 --> 0:58:45.200 Party of Burma re entered after twenty twenty one, and 0:58:45.280 --> 0:58:49.200 like they're not focusing on like proselytizing the Maoist gospel 0:58:49.240 --> 0:58:51.880 to people. They're focusing on like fighting the Hunter and 0:58:52.160 --> 0:58:55.600 like developing alliances. And it's kind of it's interesting to 0:58:55.600 --> 0:58:58.880 see where that will go. Given Yeah, Marcus Leninism MAUSM 0:58:58.960 --> 0:59:01.680 is definitely not the majority ideology the revolution. Most people 0:59:01.680 --> 0:59:05.760 are committed to some form of federal democracy, which when 0:59:05.800 --> 0:59:08.919 you speak to different fighters varies from like we want 0:59:08.920 --> 0:59:11.720 what you guys have in the US to something more 0:59:11.760 --> 0:59:14.560 akin to the democratic confederalism that people might be familiar 0:59:14.640 --> 0:59:20.160 with in Rajaba. China is competing with Russia in me 0:59:20.360 --> 0:59:23.240 and mar so both of them are interested in supporting 0:59:23.240 --> 0:59:25.480 the Hunter right like, and obviously both their ideologies are 0:59:25.480 --> 0:59:28.160 far from liberatory that they're interested in propping up a 0:59:28.200 --> 0:59:32.400 totalitarian state. So we have seen both Russia and China 0:59:32.600 --> 0:59:37.480 send support to the Hunter, send like rescue teams after 0:59:37.560 --> 0:59:41.440 the earthquake. Meanwhile, the US offered two million dollars, which 0:59:42.080 --> 0:59:43.479 I was kind of surprisedly offered. 0:59:43.480 --> 0:59:48.160 Anythink that is low key surprising considering Yeah, Mark Rubio. 0:59:48.400 --> 0:59:50.680 Right, yeah, well I think Rubio is more of a 0:59:50.800 --> 0:59:53.600 like a slightly Rubio is a neokhon. 0:59:53.840 --> 0:59:56.640 Yeah, I guess like it makes sense Mark Rubio like 0:59:56.680 --> 0:59:59.360 five years ago. Yeah, it doesn't make sense like post 0:59:59.480 --> 1:00:02.880 like you say, to being gutted. They're like, oh, you're 1:00:02.880 --> 1:00:03.920 still doing that kind of stuff. 1:00:03.960 --> 1:00:04.400 Huh. 1:00:04.520 --> 1:00:06.800 Yeah, there's like a weird like mix of things because 1:00:06.840 --> 1:00:13.200 because yes, like a traditional neocon style Rubio this this tract, 1:00:13.320 --> 1:00:15.960 but all of the movements that the Trump administration has 1:00:16.000 --> 1:00:18.560 been doing more recently, this seems like it seems like 1:00:19.160 --> 1:00:21.640 some kind of Dei Shenanigans if you ask. 1:00:22.400 --> 1:00:25.960 Yeah, actually they added another seven million later nine million, 1:00:26.120 --> 1:00:28.240 which is yeah, it's not a lot of money compared 1:00:28.240 --> 1:00:30.760 to what we would normally expect. And at the same 1:00:30.920 --> 1:00:34.840 time they did it three USAID workers at least three 1:00:34.880 --> 1:00:37.320 I should say three. That I'm aware of were laid off, 1:00:37.360 --> 1:00:40.080 like literally they received emails telling them that they no 1:00:40.120 --> 1:00:42.320 longer had a job while they were on the ground 1:00:42.480 --> 1:00:44.400 assisting earthquake survivors. 1:00:44.600 --> 1:00:47.080 Department of Government efficiency strikes again. 1:00:47.640 --> 1:00:50.560 Highly efficient, will send you the money and then also 1:00:50.600 --> 1:00:52.480 put out our own people who I guess are supervising 1:00:52.480 --> 1:00:54.880 how the money has spent or would be. It definitely 1:00:54.920 --> 1:00:58.800 shows so like a strategic shift in the region China Russia. 1:00:59.320 --> 1:01:03.040 China is interested in memr because of its rare earth metals, 1:01:03.320 --> 1:01:07.200 because of jade, like China has triginally had a lot 1:01:07.240 --> 1:01:11.840 of jade trade with mian Ma, and then because it 1:01:12.000 --> 1:01:15.920 controls a large amount of seafront right, which which China 1:01:15.960 --> 1:01:17.520 wouldn't want to fall into like way it would see 1:01:17.560 --> 1:01:21.320 as like someone with adversarial interests. Russia is still interested 1:01:21.360 --> 1:01:23.360 in just kind of projecting itself as a global power, 1:01:23.440 --> 1:01:26.440 even as it continues to shrink of every day in 1:01:26.520 --> 1:01:29.280 terms of its global ability to project power. But there 1:01:29.320 --> 1:01:35.160 definitely are both Chinese and Russian assistants helping the Miamma hunter. Now, meanwhile, 1:01:35.200 --> 1:01:37.640 the US doesn't seem to give a shit what happens 1:01:37.640 --> 1:01:40.600 here now, like this is kind of not that the 1:01:40.640 --> 1:01:42.960 Biden administration was doing very much either, but at least 1:01:43.000 --> 1:01:46.880 we had USAID and USIP was very invested in MEMR 1:01:47.080 --> 1:01:49.040 and actually did a really good job of kind of 1:01:49.400 --> 1:01:53.560 almost like being the Foreign Affairs not branch, but they 1:01:53.560 --> 1:01:56.160 explained the revolution to the world like whenever a journalist 1:01:56.200 --> 1:01:58.640 wanted to understand the revolution in MEMMR, it was USIP. 1:01:58.800 --> 1:02:01.680 They went to. All the contents that have at USIB 1:02:01.800 --> 1:02:06.400 have now been doged, which is a shame. So despite 1:02:06.760 --> 1:02:10.880 the ceasefire, right I said, they fired on these Chinese troops, 1:02:11.000 --> 1:02:13.680 the Hunter has in fact not stop bombing earthquakes struck 1:02:13.720 --> 1:02:18.560 areas since the earthquake madele APDF, who I'm in contact 1:02:18.600 --> 1:02:21.280 with the other revolutionary forces in the area that was 1:02:21.320 --> 1:02:24.240 most affected by the earthquake on April seventh, told me 1:02:24.280 --> 1:02:26.280 that they're aware of ten strikes in their area of 1:02:26.280 --> 1:02:30.440 operations since the earthquake. Three months old baby and a 1:02:30.440 --> 1:02:33.240 ten year old child were killed in an air raid 1:02:33.360 --> 1:02:36.960 on Niicar village and Papun township that was in Corren 1:02:37.120 --> 1:02:40.440 State on April tenth. They bombed a school and something 1:02:40.440 --> 1:02:42.000 that the Hunter likes to do a lot that they 1:02:42.080 --> 1:02:45.000 dropped two five hundred pound bombs on a food court. 1:02:45.680 --> 1:02:48.560 They then circled back and dropped another bomb on the 1:02:48.640 --> 1:02:51.320 people responding to and giving aid to the people they'd 1:02:51.320 --> 1:02:54.120 initially bombed in the food court. By food court here, 1:02:54.160 --> 1:02:56.080 Just to clarify, I'm not talking about like at the 1:02:56.120 --> 1:02:58.760 shopping mall. I'm talking about like a market where people 1:02:58.760 --> 1:03:00.760 can buy like prepared food. 1:03:00.840 --> 1:03:00.960 Right. 1:03:02.080 --> 1:03:05.880 They've killed, at the best I can collate from various 1:03:05.880 --> 1:03:08.720 sources at least seventy two people and injured about one 1:03:08.800 --> 1:03:12.880 hundred people, in addition to thousands who died after the earthquake. 1:03:14.000 --> 1:03:18.200 There are also reports that Hunter quote unquote recruiters here 1:03:18.560 --> 1:03:22.680 are engaging in forced conscription in the disaster zone. I 1:03:22.720 --> 1:03:24.760 read of at least one person who was on a 1:03:24.800 --> 1:03:27.240 search and rescue team that they were a trained search 1:03:27.280 --> 1:03:30.480 and rescue volunteer. Right, So they were moving rebel to 1:03:30.480 --> 1:03:33.840 rescue people, and they were forcibly conscripted while they were 1:03:33.880 --> 1:03:37.680 doing that. Obviously, that's had a chilling effect on people 1:03:37.720 --> 1:03:39.080 going out to help others. 1:03:39.240 --> 1:03:39.360 Right. 1:03:40.000 --> 1:03:43.080 What the Hunter is not doing is rescuing its citizens. 1:03:43.640 --> 1:03:47.720 The military is detested in most of me Ima, even 1:03:47.720 --> 1:03:50.640 in the areas that it controls, and its failure to 1:03:50.680 --> 1:03:52.640 even try and track people rescued on the ubel won't 1:03:52.640 --> 1:03:55.440 help this. There was a video that went viral recently 1:03:55.480 --> 1:03:59.240 of Hunter troops literally a line of soldiers rescuing bricks. 1:03:59.880 --> 1:04:02.400 They've gone to a collapsed building and they're inspecting the 1:04:02.400 --> 1:04:04.000 bricks to see if the bricks a whole, and then 1:04:04.040 --> 1:04:06.160 passing them down the lines and stacking them up. 1:04:06.240 --> 1:04:07.560 Don't worry, the bricks are safe. 1:04:07.880 --> 1:04:11.040 Yeah, the bricks are save the people are not. Which 1:04:11.880 --> 1:04:14.920 just like it was genuinely like infuriating to see it, 1:04:15.440 --> 1:04:17.360 And I can't imagine for people who have lost family 1:04:17.440 --> 1:04:21.600 members how that must feel. Even rescue workers, like I said, 1:04:21.600 --> 1:04:25.680 have been forcibly conscripted. Equality Mianma has noted more than 1:04:25.720 --> 1:04:29.280 one hundred cases to force conscriptions since the earthquake. So 1:04:29.800 --> 1:04:32.920 Meama has a conscription rule right, a law, so anyone 1:04:33.440 --> 1:04:36.240 men and now women between certain ages can be forcibly 1:04:36.320 --> 1:04:37.680 conscripted into the Hunter's army. 1:04:37.760 --> 1:04:40.040 So they're just finding people displaced from the earthquake and 1:04:40.320 --> 1:04:40.920 forcing them. 1:04:41.000 --> 1:04:43.160 Yeah, it's people who have been hiding in their homes 1:04:43.240 --> 1:04:45.080 right who now don't have homes to hide it, Yeah, 1:04:45.200 --> 1:04:48.200 or people who came out in order to save their neighbors, 1:04:48.760 --> 1:04:51.280 and now now they're forcing them to be to fight 1:04:51.320 --> 1:04:54.960 for them, just as as they Hunted did with cyclone Nagis. 1:04:55.080 --> 1:04:58.760 They've also delayed and in cases blocked AID. A team 1:04:58.800 --> 1:05:02.080 came from France to assist in a search and rescue. 1:05:02.560 --> 1:05:05.960 They spent twenty four hours sitting in an airport waiting 1:05:06.000 --> 1:05:10.080 for their visa to be approved, and then they spent 1:05:10.200 --> 1:05:13.080 one day working in search and rescue efforts before being 1:05:13.120 --> 1:05:15.360 told that search and rescue efforts had now finished and 1:05:15.400 --> 1:05:17.600 they were to go home. So they traveled around the 1:05:17.680 --> 1:05:21.960 entire world, didn't save a single life abundance. It's great, 1:05:22.560 --> 1:05:25.840 presumably because the Hunter wanted to plicate China. A Taiwanese 1:05:25.880 --> 1:05:29.640 team was straight up refused entry into Mienmar, that Taiwan 1:05:29.720 --> 1:05:31.240 had a search and rescue team that they were willing 1:05:31.280 --> 1:05:33.440 to say send who could have saved people lives, and 1:05:33.440 --> 1:05:36.240 that they weren't allowed to enter. All tourist visas have 1:05:36.320 --> 1:05:38.320 been suspended, so it's not like the Hunter is like 1:05:38.360 --> 1:05:41.560 overwhelmed with visa applications, but they're not allowing search and 1:05:41.600 --> 1:05:43.440 rescue teams to enter from countries. I guess they're not 1:05:43.440 --> 1:05:47.440 politically aligned with this kind of horrific indifference to human 1:05:47.480 --> 1:05:51.440 suffering has characterized a toutmudor for decades, and it's really 1:05:51.560 --> 1:05:53.840 unlikely to change as it grows even more desperate and 1:05:53.880 --> 1:05:56.120 it loses even more territory. If just going to clamp 1:05:56.160 --> 1:05:58.560 down harder and harder on its people, be one. In 1:05:58.600 --> 1:06:01.600 the liberated areas, aid is being mobilized using the mutual 1:06:01.640 --> 1:06:04.120 aid structures which have existed for decades in the absence 1:06:04.160 --> 1:06:07.440 of the state. In significant and growing parts of Me 1:06:07.600 --> 1:06:10.200 and mar people are relying on each other instead of 1:06:10.240 --> 1:06:13.960 the government for aid, and that has its benefits. Right, Like, 1:06:14.000 --> 1:06:17.400 people have been out rescuing people from the rebel, but 1:06:17.480 --> 1:06:20.800 they're also desperately short of resources. I spoke to mandal 1:06:20.840 --> 1:06:24.520 APDF rescue team at the first week of April and 1:06:25.200 --> 1:06:27.320 they literally sent me a they have a notebook of 1:06:27.400 --> 1:06:29.160 a list of like we've run out of gorze, we've 1:06:29.240 --> 1:06:31.800 run out of twenty k's, we've run out of adhesive dressings, 1:06:31.840 --> 1:06:34.840 we've run out of elastic bandages. Right, they're like the 1:06:34.880 --> 1:06:37.120 little nuts and bolts of saving people's lives. They run 1:06:37.160 --> 1:06:39.880 out of We did a fund raising campaign for them 1:06:39.960 --> 1:06:42.400 through Behind the Bastards. We raised nearly two thousand dollars, 1:06:42.400 --> 1:06:46.400 which is great. So they're restocking their supplies, which is fantastic, 1:06:46.440 --> 1:06:50.000 But that's just one township. All across the country, people 1:06:50.040 --> 1:06:52.160 are struggling for the basic supplies that they need to 1:06:52.160 --> 1:06:56.480 save lives. The military has also blocked aid and medicine 1:06:56.520 --> 1:06:59.480 from entering their areas. Right, so the military controls a 1:06:59.480 --> 1:07:01.440 lot of road and it uses its control of those 1:07:01.520 --> 1:07:05.440 roadblocks to stop aid in medicine. Often it's kind of 1:07:05.480 --> 1:07:07.560 hoarding it. In the capital city, which is Napi Door. 1:07:07.800 --> 1:07:10.400 If people not familiar in Napi Door is a city 1:07:10.440 --> 1:07:12.560 that they couldn't have built for itself to go from. 1:07:12.600 --> 1:07:15.640 I mean seat of Kings. Also in napidor right now, 1:07:15.720 --> 1:07:19.920 it's the US Aid agency Samaritans Purse. Are you familiar 1:07:19.920 --> 1:07:22.440 with Samaritans perse Gratin? I don't think so. 1:07:22.920 --> 1:07:26.600 It sounds vaguely familiar, But all these humanitarian organizations all 1:07:26.640 --> 1:07:29.200 have like the same like four words that they shuffle 1:07:29.240 --> 1:07:30.440 around in different ways. 1:07:30.600 --> 1:07:34.120 So yeah, yeah, yeah. Samaritans Perse perhaps the most famous 1:07:34.160 --> 1:07:36.080 for being run by Franklin Graham. 1:07:36.240 --> 1:07:39.880 Okay, yes, idea what this is and who this is? 1:07:39.960 --> 1:07:40.240 Yes? 1:07:40.440 --> 1:07:43.520 Yeah, having all their volunteers sign like a statement of 1:07:43.520 --> 1:07:48.560 faith and being extremely homophobic. For some reason, Samaritans Purse 1:07:48.640 --> 1:07:51.080 is establishing a field hospital in Napi door right now. 1:07:51.160 --> 1:07:51.680 They're going to. 1:07:51.720 --> 1:07:56.000 Force people to convert to Evangelical Christianity before they give services, 1:07:56.280 --> 1:07:57.480 like they do in some cases. 1:07:57.680 --> 1:07:59.960 Yeah, or just leave them like they did in afghanis 1:08:00.080 --> 1:08:03.080 Don if they're not Christian. I cannot work out for 1:08:03.120 --> 1:08:05.920 the life of me what the fuck they're doing, because 1:08:06.000 --> 1:08:09.200 like the Hunter has made a consistent policy of bombing 1:08:09.280 --> 1:08:11.880 Christians in me Emma. Right in Karen and Kareni state, 1:08:11.920 --> 1:08:14.760 there are a lot of Christian people. On Christmas Day, 1:08:15.360 --> 1:08:18.479 the Hunter bombed people going to services because it knew 1:08:18.520 --> 1:08:21.160 that Christians would be going to services at churches. Right 1:08:21.800 --> 1:08:25.439 the Kareni Christians this year I saw celebrated Christmas in 1:08:25.560 --> 1:08:29.360 caves because they were so afraid of being bombed. Right, Like, 1:08:29.760 --> 1:08:33.240 I have no idea what logical leap you have to make, 1:08:33.520 --> 1:08:36.880 sar Yeah, it's and they're like, they're not even at 1:08:36.880 --> 1:08:40.800 the Insagang. The only people, the only international AID I'm 1:08:40.840 --> 1:08:42.719 aware of that was able to make it to Sigang 1:08:42.840 --> 1:08:47.840 was a Malaysian team who were able to save some lives. Unfortunately, 1:08:48.120 --> 1:08:51.639 there were really strong rains this week and that made 1:08:51.720 --> 1:08:54.879 all the collapse structures even more unstable. And the Malaysian 1:08:54.960 --> 1:08:57.240 team I saw have now returned home. We're going to 1:08:57.240 --> 1:08:58.960 take another ad break here and when we come back, 1:08:59.080 --> 1:09:00.720 we will talk about what you can do t help. 1:09:11.560 --> 1:09:14.320 All right, and we're back first, I want to, I 1:09:14.320 --> 1:09:17.479 guess have some good news. Despite everything. The military has 1:09:17.479 --> 1:09:21.520 still been taking massive losses. The all Burma students Democratic 1:09:21.600 --> 1:09:25.559 Front captured remaining Hunter positions in Indoor. They're all both. 1:09:26.080 --> 1:09:28.679 Democratic Front are a group that's been around since nineteen 1:09:28.680 --> 1:09:32.120 eighty eight, right, and they have armed up and re 1:09:32.240 --> 1:09:35.200 entered the revolution since twenty twenty one. One of the 1:09:35.200 --> 1:09:38.680 things that they captured on Monday was a underground Japanese 1:09:38.680 --> 1:09:42.040 field hospital from World War II, which I guess had 1:09:42.080 --> 1:09:46.200 been like entrench position. I guess they're not covered technically 1:09:46.280 --> 1:09:49.600 by the ceasefire, but there was a unit under the 1:09:49.680 --> 1:09:52.599 National Uniti government's command that operated with them, and from 1:09:52.680 --> 1:09:56.280 what I understand, this began as a defensive action. They'd 1:09:56.320 --> 1:10:00.280 surrounded the Hunter I think it's called yet japan Came Hill. 1:10:00.280 --> 1:10:02.519 They'd surrounded them on Japancave Hill for a long time, 1:10:02.600 --> 1:10:07.200 and then the Hunter obviously, seeing the earthquake and everything thereafter, 1:10:07.280 --> 1:10:09.519 decided that now was the time for them to break 1:10:09.520 --> 1:10:12.479 out of this circlement. They did not break out, They 1:10:12.520 --> 1:10:15.360 took a fat l and as a result, they've all 1:10:15.400 --> 1:10:19.800 been captured now. Meanwhile, in chin Land, if people haven't 1:10:19.800 --> 1:10:22.120 listened to the episode, I did a couple of weeks 1:10:22.160 --> 1:10:24.920 ago with a Zad from the Anti Fascist Internationalists Front. 1:10:25.000 --> 1:10:26.800 I was just going back and listening to that to 1:10:26.840 --> 1:10:29.640 understand chin Land. But the AIF and a lot of 1:10:29.680 --> 1:10:31.800 their allied forces from a Chinland Defense Force and a 1:10:31.880 --> 1:10:36.240 chin Brotherhood had a significant victory in capturing the rest 1:10:36.280 --> 1:10:39.320 of the Hunter's positions in Flam last week. And I 1:10:39.320 --> 1:10:42.160 think it's very much like on the table that we 1:10:42.280 --> 1:10:46.400 will see the whole of chin Land liberated in the 1:10:46.439 --> 1:10:48.320 next few months or by the end of the year, 1:10:48.360 --> 1:10:51.559 which would be great to see. So people are wondering, 1:10:51.680 --> 1:10:53.559 like what they can do to help, right, And I 1:10:53.600 --> 1:10:57.200 think it's a very valid question because I saw today 1:10:57.240 --> 1:11:01.160 that the un was meeting with the Hunter in and 1:11:01.240 --> 1:11:04.559 I just have no faith that any money that goes 1:11:04.600 --> 1:11:07.120 to the Hunter is going to get to people who 1:11:07.160 --> 1:11:07.479 need it. 1:11:07.680 --> 1:11:11.760 Yeah, no, absolutely not. You cannot like they want them 1:11:11.760 --> 1:11:14.080 to die that like that. I don't know, they're like 1:11:14.240 --> 1:11:16.040 evil why. 1:11:16.080 --> 1:11:18.679 Yeah, yeah, they are literally genocide or they have done 1:11:18.680 --> 1:11:22.240 a genocide like that has been prosecuted international Criminal court. 1:11:22.320 --> 1:11:27.240 Like I have no understanding why people continue to like 1:11:27.400 --> 1:11:30.559 international organizations continue to funnel money to them, other than 1:11:30.640 --> 1:11:33.679 because like they have a status quo bias. I guess, 1:11:34.280 --> 1:11:36.599 so don't be doing that. But there are groups who 1:11:36.640 --> 1:11:38.880 are making a really big difference. And one of them 1:11:38.880 --> 1:11:41.280 that I wanted to highlight, and Robert and I are 1:11:41.360 --> 1:11:43.559 very familiar with their work from the last time that 1:11:43.600 --> 1:11:48.080 we were over reporting is Community Partists International CPI are 1:11:48.080 --> 1:11:52.800 really cool because they work by empowering members of the 1:11:52.800 --> 1:11:56.080 local community to be health volunteers, as opposed to like 1:11:57.040 --> 1:12:00.920 dropping in some some like doctors from America or doctors 1:12:00.960 --> 1:12:03.439 from the United Kingdom or whatever, and then when those 1:12:03.479 --> 1:12:06.600 people leave, they take their skills with them. CPI the 1:12:06.680 --> 1:12:09.720 thing is to educate folks within the community so that 1:12:10.320 --> 1:12:13.000 they can take care of one another. And I saw 1:12:13.040 --> 1:12:16.439 that CPI has a matching donations thing right now, which 1:12:16.439 --> 1:12:19.320 is pretty cool. So like if you donate, someone else 1:12:19.439 --> 1:12:22.639 will match your donation and that will double the amount 1:12:22.920 --> 1:12:27.960 that you receive otherwise, I will provide a list of 1:12:28.400 --> 1:12:31.479 mutual aid funds that have been shared with me. Most 1:12:31.520 --> 1:12:34.360 of them are like gofundmes or things like that. I'll 1:12:34.360 --> 1:12:38.200 put it all in the show description. They've all been vetted, 1:12:38.560 --> 1:12:41.160 and like I know, people are sometimes reluctant to give 1:12:41.200 --> 1:12:43.080 to go fundmes and they'd rather give to like a 1:12:43.080 --> 1:12:46.000 five oh one C three or an organization which has 1:12:46.040 --> 1:12:49.160 a little bit more I guess, like online presence. In 1:12:49.200 --> 1:12:51.360 this case, you have to understand that like a lot 1:12:51.880 --> 1:12:55.120 of orgs just aren't operating in the liberated areas. The 1:12:55.120 --> 1:12:58.559 two that I'm aware of CPI and Free Burma Rangers. 1:12:59.240 --> 1:13:02.519 I spoke to Dave from Free Burma Ranges. They're trying 1:13:02.560 --> 1:13:04.800 to get to as many people as it can as well. 1:13:04.880 --> 1:13:06.960 That would be another great place to donate. And I 1:13:07.000 --> 1:13:10.080 would include a list of vetted gofundmes. If you want 1:13:10.120 --> 1:13:11.720 to have a look through those and see if any 1:13:11.720 --> 1:13:13.880 of them kind of speaks to you more, you can 1:13:13.920 --> 1:13:17.040 do that too. What this will mean for the future 1:13:17.080 --> 1:13:20.920 of Memma, we don't know yet. Right we have really 1:13:20.960 --> 1:13:23.600 no sense of how many people have died, of what 1:13:23.720 --> 1:13:28.200 it's done to the Hunter's ability to control those areas. 1:13:28.880 --> 1:13:33.960 But until the revolution has a way to stop planes 1:13:34.040 --> 1:13:37.200 bombing people, we will continue to see the same dynamic 1:13:37.560 --> 1:13:40.720 of the Hunter losing terrain on the ground, pulling back 1:13:40.720 --> 1:13:43.679 its soldiers, and then bombing civilians in the areas. 1:13:43.680 --> 1:13:44.360 So it's lost. 1:13:45.080 --> 1:13:49.160 That is its game plan. It's continuing to get more 1:13:49.800 --> 1:13:54.240 drones from China. It's getting aircraft, munitions and jet fuel 1:13:54.280 --> 1:13:58.080 from China. Until there is an embargo on jet fuel 1:13:58.200 --> 1:14:01.560 and munitions to the Hunter, then we will see this 1:14:01.720 --> 1:14:05.400 same pattern continue. Right, they lose terrain, they bomba school, 1:14:05.520 --> 1:14:08.759 they lose terrain, they bomb a hospital. It's the same 1:14:08.800 --> 1:14:12.000 stuff that Israel's doing, and they've of course previously been 1:14:12.120 --> 1:14:15.880 armed by Israel as well, but we don't see as 1:14:15.920 --> 1:14:19.000 much solidarity for the people at Burma. If you want 1:14:19.040 --> 1:14:21.559 to stay in touch with what's happening on the ground, 1:14:21.600 --> 1:14:25.320 I think the Irawiti I Double r a Wa d 1:14:25.439 --> 1:14:27.599 d Y does a really good job of doing daily 1:14:27.640 --> 1:14:30.519 summaries right now. So I would suggest checking out what's 1:14:30.560 --> 1:14:33.280 happening there, and of course we'll keep you updated on 1:14:33.400 --> 1:14:36.040 developments in the Spring Revolution as they come. 1:14:56.800 --> 1:15:00.559 This is it could happen here. I am not going 1:15:00.600 --> 1:15:04.360 to El Salvador. It's not gonna happen, no way, No, 1:15:04.560 --> 1:15:09.439 thank you, mister President. I'm Garrison Davis. I'm joined by 1:15:09.760 --> 1:15:10.519 James Stout. 1:15:10.640 --> 1:15:11.240 Hi, Garrison. 1:15:11.320 --> 1:15:15.080 We're here to talk about possibly the most upsetting thing 1:15:15.120 --> 1:15:18.759 I've seen in American politics in like the past six 1:15:18.840 --> 1:15:22.360 months to maybe even I don't know viscerally had hit 1:15:22.439 --> 1:15:25.040 me for like the past few years. Like yet what 1:15:25.120 --> 1:15:28.080 happened on Monday in the Oval Office was is kind 1:15:28.120 --> 1:15:29.800 of the most black pilt I've ever been, which is 1:15:29.800 --> 1:15:31.200 not a great way to start an episode. 1:15:31.360 --> 1:15:35.760 Yeah, its like it made me feel like I found 1:15:35.880 --> 1:15:38.160 twenty twenty three very hard, like going out and seeing 1:15:38.160 --> 1:15:40.280 people freezing in the desert and then coming home and 1:15:40.320 --> 1:15:43.160 some by n the ice cream on the on the timeline, 1:15:43.240 --> 1:15:46.679 But like this was different. This was so like blatant. 1:15:46.800 --> 1:15:50.479 There's like a level of like intentional depravity that you're 1:15:50.560 --> 1:15:52.800 reminded of more and more blatantly. 1:15:52.840 --> 1:15:57.760 So and like Bouque's trolling of yes everyone. 1:15:58.120 --> 1:16:00.719 So we're gonna be talking about an over office meeting 1:16:00.760 --> 1:16:04.640 between President Trump and El Salvador President Bukle. 1:16:05.720 --> 1:16:09.479 I guess I could learn his first name, Naib there 1:16:09.520 --> 1:16:13.840 you go. You know he's Palestinian salvadorre Are you fucking serious? No, 1:16:14.120 --> 1:16:14.879 that's an emam. 1:16:15.760 --> 1:16:17.240 I don't even have time for that. 1:16:17.960 --> 1:16:22.400 It's just fucking I'm sorry. If anyone's driving it has 1:16:22.400 --> 1:16:23.840 had an accident upon hearing that. 1:16:24.520 --> 1:16:29.920 So, as you probably know, recently, the United States government 1:16:30.280 --> 1:16:35.519 has sent upwards of three hundred people immigrants to the 1:16:35.680 --> 1:16:41.479 L Salvador Terrorism Confinement Center. This prison black site that 1:16:41.520 --> 1:16:45.120 people never return from. I guess I could point to 1:16:45.800 --> 1:16:48.320 for a pop culture reference, which feels a little bit 1:16:48.360 --> 1:16:50.960 in bad taste, but you can point to like the 1:16:51.000 --> 1:16:54.200 prison in the TV show and Or as being a 1:16:54.280 --> 1:16:57.800 very comparable facility, frankly, except they turn off the lights 1:16:57.800 --> 1:16:59.400 in and Or they do not turn off the lights 1:16:59.800 --> 1:17:02.960 in Seacott lights around all the time. They put ten 1:17:03.000 --> 1:17:06.880 to twenty people per sell. It's pretty bad. Jameson has 1:17:06.880 --> 1:17:09.720 done episodes on Seacott in the past, will probably keep 1:17:09.760 --> 1:17:10.280 doing more. 1:17:11.040 --> 1:17:14.439 The lights thing, by the way, was a specific policy 1:17:14.640 --> 1:17:18.360 change by Bouquele. There was a particularly violent weekend in 1:17:18.439 --> 1:17:22.080 El Salvador, and as a result he stopped letting people 1:17:22.200 --> 1:17:25.679 who were detained for gang crimes go outside and stopped 1:17:25.720 --> 1:17:28.479 building windows into the prison and just put the lights 1:17:28.479 --> 1:17:31.280 on because a way of punishing I guess the gangs 1:17:31.280 --> 1:17:32.920 by punishing the people who are detained there. 1:17:33.120 --> 1:17:35.679 Yeah, they can't go outside. They stay in their cell 1:17:35.840 --> 1:17:38.960 for almost twenty four hours a day. They might occasionally 1:17:38.960 --> 1:17:41.719 get thirty minutes outside, but that's not even confirmed because 1:17:41.760 --> 1:17:43.680 no one's even allowed inside to see what's going on 1:17:43.760 --> 1:17:48.960 in there. And we've sent upwards of three hundred immigrants there, 1:17:49.320 --> 1:17:51.960 the majority, vast majority of which have no criminal record. 1:17:52.520 --> 1:17:55.200 Even if you do have a criminal record, being renditioned 1:17:55.240 --> 1:18:01.080 to a foreign prison camp is still bad. But this 1:18:01.160 --> 1:18:04.840 is something that Trump hopes to expand on greatly, and 1:18:04.920 --> 1:18:07.439 they are currently defending their ability to do so in 1:18:07.520 --> 1:18:09.920 the court since it has been learned that a few 1:18:09.920 --> 1:18:13.720 people sent there may have been partially sent by accident. 1:18:14.560 --> 1:18:17.719 But the Trump administration is refusing to return these people 1:18:17.840 --> 1:18:21.479 and is instead still trying to convince the public that 1:18:21.520 --> 1:18:25.519 these are dangerous terrorists that deserve to be disappeared. So 1:18:25.920 --> 1:18:29.519 let's kind of start with that main case. The case 1:18:29.560 --> 1:18:33.120 that's receiving the most public attention right now is of 1:18:33.320 --> 1:18:37.799 a Maryland man named Kilmayor Abrego Garcia, who's the subject 1:18:37.840 --> 1:18:40.040 of a district court case that has been sent up 1:18:40.040 --> 1:18:42.120 to the Supreme Court and then sent back to the 1:18:42.160 --> 1:18:46.000 district court on whether this man can be returned home 1:18:46.080 --> 1:18:50.439 to his US citizen wife and child. And then on Monday, 1:18:50.479 --> 1:18:54.080 April fourteenth, in the Oval Office meeting, President Bouquela said 1:18:54.080 --> 1:18:57.080 that he will not return this Maryland immigrant with protected 1:18:57.240 --> 1:19:01.719 legal status back to the United States, who Ice admits 1:19:01.840 --> 1:19:04.920 was sent to Seacot based on a quote unquote administrative 1:19:05.160 --> 1:19:09.160 Errorka said, quote, how can I smuggle a terrorist into 1:19:09.160 --> 1:19:11.200 the United States? Of course I'm not going to do it. 1:19:11.280 --> 1:19:15.719 The question is preposterous unquote. The Al Salvador president also 1:19:15.880 --> 1:19:19.439 balked at the idea of releasing Garcia from Seacott since 1:19:19.439 --> 1:19:22.679 he can't have a quote unquote terrorist free in his country, 1:19:23.439 --> 1:19:27.200 lying about Garcia being a criminal. I am going to 1:19:27.240 --> 1:19:28.960 play a few clips in this episode because I think 1:19:28.960 --> 1:19:32.080 it is necessary to listen to these people actually say 1:19:32.280 --> 1:19:34.559 the words that they are saying, in the tone that 1:19:34.560 --> 1:19:37.600 they're saying them, and the exact phrasing on these I 1:19:37.600 --> 1:19:41.040 think is actually pretty important right now. So, unfortunately, you 1:19:41.120 --> 1:19:42.639 are gonna have to hear the voices of a few 1:19:42.960 --> 1:19:46.160 people who you might not rather hear from, including the 1:19:46.200 --> 1:19:48.519 president of El Salvador. So I'll play this first. 1:19:48.280 --> 1:19:53.200 Clip President and President Bukayla Waiyan on this Do you 1:19:53.240 --> 1:19:54.200 plan to return him? 1:19:54.320 --> 1:19:57.519 Well, I get I'm suppose are suggested that a smuggle 1:19:57.560 --> 1:20:01.919 and terroristic today United States? Right, how can I smuggle? 1:20:02.080 --> 1:20:03.960 How can I return him to the latter It's like 1:20:04.200 --> 1:20:06.519 I smuggle him into the United States or whether we do, 1:20:06.600 --> 1:20:07.800 of course, I'm not going to do it. 1:20:08.240 --> 1:20:11.800 It's like, I mean, the question is preposterous. 1:20:11.800 --> 1:20:14.880 How can I smuggle the terrorists to the United States. 1:20:14.960 --> 1:20:16.880 I don't have the power to return him to the 1:20:16.960 --> 1:20:19.520 United States inside. 1:20:19.560 --> 1:20:21.559 Yeah, but I'm not releasing I mean, we're not very 1:20:21.560 --> 1:20:23.519 fond of releasing terrorists into our country. 1:20:23.680 --> 1:20:25.439 We just turned the murder capital of the world to 1:20:25.520 --> 1:20:27.000 the safest country of the Western. 1:20:26.680 --> 1:20:29.519 Hemisphere, and he want us to go back into the 1:20:29.600 --> 1:20:31.560 releasing criminals so we can go back to being the 1:20:31.640 --> 1:20:32.639 murder capital of the world. 1:20:32.680 --> 1:20:34.600 And that's that's not going to happen. 1:20:34.760 --> 1:20:36.760 Well, they'd love to have a criminal, you know, with 1:20:36.920 --> 1:20:37.400 the schedule. 1:20:37.560 --> 1:20:39.520 I mean, I mean there's there's a fascinator. 1:20:40.400 --> 1:20:42.880 Yeah, the sick piece are sick people. 1:20:45.479 --> 1:20:52.599 It's just insane. Like the whole pretense of any any 1:20:53.400 --> 1:20:56.599 like serious engagement with reality there, it's just gone yeah. 1:20:56.439 --> 1:20:58.720 And they're both like miming that neither of them have 1:20:58.840 --> 1:21:01.360 the ability to make any kind of deal between each 1:21:01.400 --> 1:21:04.040 other to send people back, even though they have the 1:21:04.080 --> 1:21:05.760 ability to make a deal to send people there. 1:21:06.160 --> 1:21:08.000 Yeah, As they sit in the same room. 1:21:08.160 --> 1:21:10.800 The whole time Bekayley's talking, Trump has like this like 1:21:10.840 --> 1:21:14.280 a growing smirk on his face. As Bkayley's talking about 1:21:14.360 --> 1:21:18.439 this preposterous notion of smuggling a US immigrant back into 1:21:18.479 --> 1:21:21.720 the United States despite the Supreme Court order to facilitate 1:21:21.760 --> 1:21:24.760 the return of this immigrant back into the country. The 1:21:24.800 --> 1:21:28.800 whole smuggling framing is obviously absurd, with him saying like, 1:21:29.000 --> 1:21:30.960 I don't have the power to return him to the 1:21:31.040 --> 1:21:33.080 United States. All he needs to do is release him 1:21:33.120 --> 1:21:35.320 from SECAT and the US can fly him back right 1:21:35.760 --> 1:21:38.720 just as we flew him to l Salvador. Like the 1:21:38.720 --> 1:21:41.280 two heads of state are sitting right next to each other. 1:21:41.479 --> 1:21:44.080 They could agree to do this at any time, But 1:21:44.200 --> 1:21:47.160 now everyone's pretending that that suddenly they don't have the 1:21:47.200 --> 1:21:50.360 power to undo what they seemingly had the power to 1:21:50.439 --> 1:21:51.479 do in the first place. 1:21:51.760 --> 1:21:54.240 Like Bukeley has ruled, and we're going to do a 1:21:54.280 --> 1:21:57.360 whole episode of and like his rise to power and 1:21:57.400 --> 1:21:59.880 then his use of power. But like he's ruled, and 1:22:00.000 --> 1:22:02.400 there a state of exception for years in Elsabador which 1:22:02.400 --> 1:22:05.519 allows them to detain people without warrants, without trials, right, 1:22:05.560 --> 1:22:09.360 and like it's that state of exception that is now 1:22:09.400 --> 1:22:13.000 the norm there. And that's kind of what he seems 1:22:13.040 --> 1:22:16.320 to be referring to, right, Like like we just get 1:22:16.360 --> 1:22:18.160 to lock people up. Why would I not do that? 1:22:18.840 --> 1:22:23.360 In effect, they are arguing that every single human being 1:22:23.600 --> 1:22:26.160 that is sent to Seacot by the United States is 1:22:26.360 --> 1:22:30.120 unable to ever leave the prison alive. Yeah, Like that's 1:22:30.120 --> 1:22:32.080 basically what they're saying, because they're saying both both parties, 1:22:32.080 --> 1:22:35.160 both Trump and Bouquela, are unable to have someone who's 1:22:35.160 --> 1:22:37.320 been sent there returned. So they're just they're just saying 1:22:37.360 --> 1:22:39.400 like no one's able to do anything, Like they're just 1:22:39.520 --> 1:22:42.200 stuck there until they die, and like this is part 1:22:42.200 --> 1:22:45.360 of the design of Seacot. Uh, the person who runs, 1:22:45.760 --> 1:22:48.160 Like the Seacott Like security has said that they do 1:22:48.240 --> 1:22:51.919 not intend in any person ever being released from Seacott. 1:22:52.400 --> 1:22:54.840 You are not designed to get out. You are stuck 1:22:54.840 --> 1:22:58.320 there forever. No one's ever left there. Yeah, it's just 1:22:58.320 --> 1:23:01.160 where you get disappeared, and that's that's all. That's all 1:23:01.200 --> 1:23:03.679 that it is. And I think part of why they're 1:23:03.720 --> 1:23:06.920 so unwilling to send Garcia back is because then you 1:23:06.960 --> 1:23:09.080 have someone like the first person who's ever gotten out 1:23:09.439 --> 1:23:11.080 and can talk about what it's actually like in there, 1:23:11.080 --> 1:23:14.200 when you don't have like Christinome and like propaganda cameras 1:23:14.200 --> 1:23:16.240 pointed at at the prison bars. 1:23:16.479 --> 1:23:20.960 Yeah, Bukela is very redicentially to anyone for that reason, 1:23:21.080 --> 1:23:24.320 And like there are plenty of valigations and like I 1:23:24.400 --> 1:23:26.920 think looks like Time Magazine has publicist is not husually 1:23:26.960 --> 1:23:29.960 controversial that he made deals with gangs in the past 1:23:29.960 --> 1:23:32.000 in elsabul or right to get them to reduce the 1:23:32.080 --> 1:23:35.680 murder rate, and like he certainly wouldn't like to hear 1:23:35.720 --> 1:23:39.240 that testified to certainly not in the United States court, right, So, 1:23:39.400 --> 1:23:42.800 like he doesn't want people to be released from there either, 1:23:43.520 --> 1:23:45.759 Like you said, they don't want anyone to be able 1:23:45.800 --> 1:23:48.759 to go to any international human rights courts and testify 1:23:48.760 --> 1:23:51.479 as to what happened to them there. So it's kind 1:23:51.479 --> 1:23:53.759 of in his interest to never have anyone be released. 1:23:54.240 --> 1:23:56.719 It's not just also, I guess like in his interest, 1:23:56.840 --> 1:24:00.000 he's also being paid right twenty thousand dollars per detainee 1:24:00.120 --> 1:24:02.320 per year by the United States right now, so he 1:24:02.320 --> 1:24:04.639 also has a financial interest in keeping people in there. 1:24:04.840 --> 1:24:08.920 Even this per year deal makes now kind of makes 1:24:08.960 --> 1:24:10.880 the zero sense because both of them are arguing that 1:24:10.920 --> 1:24:13.800 there's no way to send anyone back, right, So, like 1:24:14.120 --> 1:24:16.240 it's not that it's even like, oh, they're only gonna 1:24:16.240 --> 1:24:18.960 be there for one year. It's like they're just they're 1:24:19.000 --> 1:24:21.920 just there, and like who knows if they're gonna like 1:24:22.479 --> 1:24:24.720 still be alive by the time that some of these 1:24:24.720 --> 1:24:27.720 people would be able to get out, whether that's through 1:24:27.720 --> 1:24:31.720 the miraculous Donald Trump impeachment of twenty twenty six which 1:24:31.720 --> 1:24:34.880 will never happen, or like however, like these people are 1:24:34.920 --> 1:24:37.040 just they are just stuck there because he's not going 1:24:37.080 --> 1:24:40.240 to release them into his country. We are seemingly unable 1:24:41.080 --> 1:24:43.000 to take anyone back from there. 1:24:43.880 --> 1:24:44.639 I think it's. 1:24:44.600 --> 1:24:48.160 Unwilling, right, Like the US is theoretically able. 1:24:48.040 --> 1:24:51.200 It's argued that we're unable as as people get into 1:24:51.240 --> 1:25:06.040 more after this ad break, Okay, we are back. One 1:25:06.040 --> 1:25:09.040 thing that we've seen across the Trump administration the past 1:25:09.479 --> 1:25:12.759 eighty days or so. Something that we saw very evident 1:25:12.800 --> 1:25:15.600 in this meeting is that whenever a single person is 1:25:15.680 --> 1:25:20.600 asked a question about the outrageous, possibly illegal, possibly not, 1:25:20.800 --> 1:25:24.720 but just immoral or evils things that are being done, 1:25:24.840 --> 1:25:26.640 the first instinct is always to pass the buck on 1:25:26.760 --> 1:25:29.080 to someone else. We saw this a lot with Signalgate, 1:25:29.160 --> 1:25:32.599 how it was always someone else's faults. No single person 1:25:32.600 --> 1:25:34.640 could get like hammered down of being like, okay, you 1:25:34.640 --> 1:25:36.479 are the person that's going to be like accountable for this. 1:25:36.840 --> 1:25:39.400 And throughout this Oval Office meeting, eventually they started taking 1:25:39.439 --> 1:25:43.680 questions from journalists and reporters and propagandists who are in 1:25:43.720 --> 1:25:46.439 the room. And you saw this trend of you know, 1:25:46.439 --> 1:25:49.080 if someone asks Trump about what's going on, he passes 1:25:49.160 --> 1:25:51.920 the buck to Stephen Miller, who passes the buck to Bouquetle, 1:25:52.280 --> 1:25:54.840 who then passes the buck to Mark Rubio. And it's 1:25:54.840 --> 1:25:57.639 like this big circle of like everyone's just talking around 1:25:57.680 --> 1:26:00.200 each other because no one really has the authority to 1:26:00.200 --> 1:26:02.679 to speak on what's going on or how to fix 1:26:02.720 --> 1:26:04.960 this problem because they don't see it as a problem. 1:26:05.120 --> 1:26:07.200 So instead they just talk in a circle. And I 1:26:07.200 --> 1:26:09.720 think Miller was one of the most effective at this 1:26:10.280 --> 1:26:13.240 and unfortunately, we're going to play the longest clip in 1:26:13.280 --> 1:26:17.479 this episode, just under two minutes from Stephen Miller, where 1:26:17.280 --> 1:26:20.640 he lays out the Trump admins thought process and strategy 1:26:20.680 --> 1:26:24.160 behind what they are doing. And I apologize for this, 1:26:24.400 --> 1:26:27.599 but it is useful to hear from Himmler. 1:26:27.640 --> 1:26:27.800 Two. 1:26:28.200 --> 1:26:33.200 So here we go with respect to you, He's a 1:26:33.200 --> 1:26:37.559 citizen of El Salvador. So it's very arrogant, even for 1:26:37.720 --> 1:26:39.840 American media to suggest that we would even tell El 1:26:39.920 --> 1:26:42.679 Salvador how to handle their own citizens as a starting point. 1:26:43.479 --> 1:26:45.760 As two immigration courts found that he was a member 1:26:45.760 --> 1:26:49.439 of MS thirteen. When President Trump declared MS thirteen to 1:26:49.479 --> 1:26:53.080 be a foreign terrorist organization, that meant that he was 1:26:53.120 --> 1:26:55.880 no longer eligible under federal law, which I'm sure you 1:26:55.920 --> 1:26:57.880 know you're very familiar with. The iron eg that he 1:26:57.960 --> 1:27:00.040 was no longer eligible for any form of him a 1:27:00.120 --> 1:27:02.559 greation relief in the United States. So we had a 1:27:02.600 --> 1:27:06.280 deportation order that was valid, which meant that under our 1:27:06.360 --> 1:27:08.680 law he's not even allowed to be present in the 1:27:08.760 --> 1:27:12.320 United States and had to be returned because of the 1:27:12.360 --> 1:27:16.840 foreign terrorist designation. This issue was then by District Court 1:27:16.920 --> 1:27:20.559 judge completely inverted, and a district court judge tried to 1:27:20.560 --> 1:27:23.919 tell the administration that they had to kidnap a citizen 1:27:23.960 --> 1:27:26.639 of El Salvador and fly him back here. That issue 1:27:26.640 --> 1:27:29.240 was raised to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court 1:27:29.280 --> 1:27:32.800 said the district court order was unlawful and its main 1:27:32.880 --> 1:27:38.080 components were reversed nine zero, unanimously stating clearly that neither 1:27:38.520 --> 1:27:41.280 Secretary of State nor the President could be compelled by 1:27:41.320 --> 1:27:45.040 anybody to forcibly retrieve a citizen of El Salvador from 1:27:45.120 --> 1:27:48.479 Al Salvador, who again is a member of MS thirteen, 1:27:49.080 --> 1:27:52.719 which is I'm sure you understand, rapes little girls, murder's women, 1:27:53.120 --> 1:27:55.800 murder's children, is engaged in the most barbaric activities in 1:27:55.840 --> 1:27:57.439 the world. And I can promise you if he was 1:27:57.479 --> 1:27:58.800 your neighbor, you would move right away. 1:27:59.000 --> 1:28:01.000 So you don't think most came. 1:28:02.000 --> 1:28:04.519 And what was the r and the Supreme Court save 1:28:04.680 --> 1:28:05.639 was a nine to nothing. 1:28:05.760 --> 1:28:08.600 Yes, it was a nine zero in our favor, in 1:28:08.640 --> 1:28:10.080 our favor against. 1:28:09.680 --> 1:28:12.920 The Juicu Court ruling saying that no has the power 1:28:13.160 --> 1:28:13.639 to the. 1:28:13.600 --> 1:28:15.719 Tele foreign policy function of the United States. 1:28:15.840 --> 1:28:19.320 As Pam said, the ruler solely sayd that if this 1:28:19.400 --> 1:28:24.000 individual El Salvador sole distress was set out to our country, 1:28:24.320 --> 1:28:25.280 that we could to pour him. 1:28:25.160 --> 1:28:28.080 A seven times no version of this legally ends up 1:28:28.080 --> 1:28:30.639 with an ever living here because he is a citizen 1:28:30.880 --> 1:28:32.280 of El Savador. 1:28:32.080 --> 1:28:33.680 That is the president of Al Sadidorg. 1:28:33.920 --> 1:28:36.200 Your question about for the court can only be directed 1:28:36.200 --> 1:28:37.599 the tenant. 1:28:39.080 --> 1:28:42.360 So there's a lot there. Yeah, I think I'm going 1:28:42.439 --> 1:28:45.320 to start with I can promise you if he was 1:28:45.360 --> 1:28:48.280 your neighbor, you would move right away. And I think 1:28:48.320 --> 1:28:51.200 that is really the heart of what the Strump administration 1:28:51.360 --> 1:28:54.320 is is doing. Like it's it's appealing to this most 1:28:54.360 --> 1:29:00.919 basic like suburban crime, panic, fear, racism of well, if 1:29:00.960 --> 1:29:03.960 he was your neighbor, you wouldn't want him living next to. 1:29:03.880 --> 1:29:06.320 You, Yeah, like a Vegos neighborhood kind of. 1:29:07.080 --> 1:29:10.519 Well, just completely lying about like the context of this 1:29:10.600 --> 1:29:14.680 case with you Miller saying it's arrogant suggest that we, 1:29:15.080 --> 1:29:17.320 the most powerful country in the world, are used to 1:29:17.400 --> 1:29:20.400 be before the tariffs can tell El Salvador how to 1:29:20.479 --> 1:29:24.640 handle its citizens, falsely claiming that immigration courts deemed him 1:29:24.640 --> 1:29:27.640 a member of MS thirteen, which just is not true, 1:29:28.040 --> 1:29:30.720 talking about kidnapping him from Seacott to return him to 1:29:30.720 --> 1:29:33.120 the United States, as if Ice didn't just to kidnap 1:29:33.200 --> 1:29:35.160 hundreds of people with no criminal records and send them 1:29:35.200 --> 1:29:38.240 to a foreign goo lug and then also lied about 1:29:38.600 --> 1:29:41.200 about the Supreme Court ruling, saying they found the district 1:29:41.320 --> 1:29:45.680 court order to return to Garcia unlawful and grossly mischaracterizing 1:29:45.760 --> 1:29:47.960 the scope of what the Supreme Court ruling was and 1:29:48.000 --> 1:29:50.040 how it was sent back to the district court to 1:29:50.040 --> 1:29:54.559 work with the details on what facilitate the return actually means. 1:29:55.280 --> 1:29:57.639 And again, I think like the one of the most 1:29:57.680 --> 1:30:00.640 telling parts is how he ends by saying, quote, no 1:30:00.840 --> 1:30:04.040 version of this ever ends up with him living here, 1:30:04.800 --> 1:30:07.599 And yeah, like they're gonna look for any any way 1:30:08.000 --> 1:30:10.320 to like make this test case to work, right and 1:30:10.400 --> 1:30:11.960 if and if they if they can do this to 1:30:11.960 --> 1:30:15.080 someone with protected legal status, who is not a who's 1:30:15.080 --> 1:30:17.839 not a terrorist, who is not an actual MS thirteen 1:30:17.840 --> 1:30:20.120 gang member, right, this is this is kind of ideal 1:30:20.120 --> 1:30:22.639 for them because that means they can paint anybody as 1:30:22.680 --> 1:30:25.320 as a foreign policy threat enough to be sent to 1:30:25.320 --> 1:30:27.519 a foreign goolag. Then at the very end of the clip, 1:30:27.720 --> 1:30:31.720 he passes the buck off to to bouquettist to have 1:30:31.800 --> 1:30:34.519 to have him answer this question again perfectly laying out 1:30:34.560 --> 1:30:35.280 their strategy. 1:30:36.200 --> 1:30:38.280 There's a lot to break down in what military. It's 1:30:38.280 --> 1:30:41.040 also just kind of interesting cambillary is like amongst the press, 1:30:41.120 --> 1:30:43.320 he's not one of the people like sat on the 1:30:43.720 --> 1:30:46.240 couches supposed to be giving the press conference. Right, he 1:30:46.360 --> 1:30:49.320 just kind of wades in too. I guess like like 1:30:49.400 --> 1:30:51.880 offer this opinion and kind kind of like be the 1:30:51.960 --> 1:30:54.800 kind of embassy of this of their response, I guess 1:30:54.840 --> 1:30:59.080 in a sense. Yeah, I think crucially, like a gonna go. 1:30:59.320 --> 1:31:02.720 Sea's protection was from being returned to El Salvador, right, 1:31:02.720 --> 1:31:05.519 because he had been harassed by gang members when leaving 1:31:05.560 --> 1:31:07.559 El Salvador and when being in El Salvador. 1:31:07.960 --> 1:31:10.280 He's lived in the States since twenty eleven, and he 1:31:10.400 --> 1:31:15.040 left El Salvador to flee harassment and abuse from from 1:31:15.080 --> 1:31:15.759 gang members. 1:31:16.080 --> 1:31:17.840 Yeah, the gangs that he's been accused of being a 1:31:17.880 --> 1:31:20.840 part of. But like it then follows that, like it 1:31:21.000 --> 1:31:24.680 would be legal for them to deport him to a 1:31:24.720 --> 1:31:27.840 third country, right, and that is the path that they've 1:31:27.880 --> 1:31:31.400 followed with all the Venezuelan migrants. Right, They've accused him 1:31:31.400 --> 1:31:33.519 of being members of Trend de Ragua. I have not 1:31:33.560 --> 1:31:35.880 seen a compelling case made that any of them are yet. 1:31:36.439 --> 1:31:38.400 I'm sure people from Trend de Ragua have come to 1:31:38.439 --> 1:31:40.800 this country, but they have not provided any evidence that 1:31:40.840 --> 1:31:42.840 the people they have sent to say God, are those people. 1:31:43.120 --> 1:31:45.839 No, Like we've had like fourteen people are like accused 1:31:45.880 --> 1:31:48.000 of some kind of like violent crime like murder or rape, 1:31:48.680 --> 1:31:51.080 and in the other like two hundred and seventy five 1:31:51.360 --> 1:31:53.000 do not have a criminal record whatsoever. 1:31:53.479 --> 1:31:55.800 Yeah, and the bulk of this is reliant on some 1:31:55.920 --> 1:31:58.519 kind of idea that they have entirely created from fiction, 1:31:58.640 --> 1:32:01.080 that they're are tattooing practices and one entered to end 1:32:01.280 --> 1:32:04.719 a war. And for them, right, even if they can't 1:32:04.720 --> 1:32:06.960 be returned to Venezuela, they feel that they have this endraum, 1:32:07.000 --> 1:32:08.640 which is okay, we'll send them to a Salvador. But 1:32:08.680 --> 1:32:12.719 for the Salvadarians, that's a different question, right, And that 1:32:13.320 --> 1:32:16.280 is what they're trying to find here, and that is 1:32:16.400 --> 1:32:21.280 worrying because the case here that is getting the most publicity, 1:32:21.320 --> 1:32:23.000 that seems to be the one that the Supreme Court 1:32:23.040 --> 1:32:26.160 has taken up, is about the Salbadaran man. And I 1:32:26.200 --> 1:32:29.320 hope that doesn't mean that like the ship has sailed 1:32:29.360 --> 1:32:33.080 for the Venezuelans, right that essentially, yeah, No, like they 1:32:33.080 --> 1:32:35.439 don't have a case because that was the vast bulk 1:32:35.439 --> 1:32:37.360 of them. I think there was only like sixty Salbadrean 1:32:37.400 --> 1:32:39.320 citizens and the rest Venezuelans, no. 1:32:39.320 --> 1:32:41.080 One, hundreds of people have been like forgotten in this. 1:32:42.520 --> 1:32:46.920 After Miller's rant there, Mark Rubio jumped in to state that, quote, 1:32:47.080 --> 1:32:49.200 no court in the United States has the right to 1:32:49.280 --> 1:32:53.120 conduct the foreign policy of the United States unquote. And 1:32:53.160 --> 1:32:56.040 Steven Miller hopped back in to talk about this Supreme 1:32:56.080 --> 1:32:59.840 Court case that they're falsely saying they won nine to zero, 1:33:00.040 --> 1:33:02.679 which is not how that case went, and they start 1:33:02.680 --> 1:33:05.559 talking more broadly about what can be allowed if it 1:33:05.640 --> 1:33:07.920 has to do with the foreign policy of the United States, 1:33:08.160 --> 1:33:11.000 and how the courts don't have the ability to intervene 1:33:11.040 --> 1:33:11.960 in that process. 1:33:12.680 --> 1:33:15.200 No, the foreign policy of the United States is conducted 1:33:15.280 --> 1:33:17.400 by the President of the United States, not by a court, 1:33:18.000 --> 1:33:20.320 and no court in the United States has a right 1:33:20.360 --> 1:33:22.559 to conduct the foreign policy of the United States. It's 1:33:22.560 --> 1:33:23.680 that simple end. 1:33:23.640 --> 1:33:25.960 The story, and that's what the Supreme Court held. 1:33:26.000 --> 1:33:28.439 By the way, has Marcara fort the Supoini Court said 1:33:28.439 --> 1:33:31.400 exactly what Marco said. The no court has the authority 1:33:31.479 --> 1:33:33.840 to compel the foreign policy function the United States. We 1:33:33.880 --> 1:33:36.640 want a case nine zero, and people like CNN are 1:33:36.680 --> 1:33:39.240 portraying it as a loss as usual because they want 1:33:39.280 --> 1:33:42.320 foreign terrorists in the country who kidnap women and children. 1:33:42.800 --> 1:33:45.200 Part of what I find so disturbing about this idea 1:33:45.320 --> 1:33:49.720 of you know, no habeas corpus, no due process if 1:33:49.720 --> 1:33:52.639 you aren't on foreign soil, is that like this idea 1:33:53.120 --> 1:33:57.120 of the court's having no jurisdiction over foreign policy decisions 1:33:57.560 --> 1:34:00.760 means that as long as you whether you're citizen, whether 1:34:00.760 --> 1:34:03.800 you're a permanent resident to document or undocumented immigrant, as 1:34:03.840 --> 1:34:06.120 long as you are forcedly removed from the United States soil, 1:34:06.479 --> 1:34:09.880 your rights and your due process has been forfeit, and 1:34:09.960 --> 1:34:13.240 the US has neither the obligation nor sometimes the ability 1:34:13.640 --> 1:34:16.400 to return you to US soil if that is their 1:34:16.439 --> 1:34:20.920 foreign policy interest. And this is such a troubling broad 1:34:21.040 --> 1:34:24.000 concept that the portions of the courts are kind of 1:34:24.720 --> 1:34:28.719 allowing them to claim right now. And the complete removal 1:34:28.880 --> 1:34:33.680 of due process is like slowly getting encroached upon at 1:34:33.680 --> 1:34:37.080 first with undocumented immigrants and green card holders, but as 1:34:37.120 --> 1:34:40.479 we will see in the next section. They are also 1:34:40.640 --> 1:34:43.160 absolutely going to be targeting US citizens. 1:34:43.439 --> 1:34:43.599 Yeah. 1:34:43.640 --> 1:34:45.519 I think like we should just point out obviously, the 1:34:45.560 --> 1:34:48.280 court is not conducting the foreign policy of the United States. 1:34:48.320 --> 1:34:51.120 It's ruling on the legality of the action taken by 1:34:51.120 --> 1:34:53.080 the President, which is exactly what it's supposed to do. 1:34:53.560 --> 1:34:56.360 Yeah, And as it relates to your rights for due 1:34:56.439 --> 1:34:58.600 process if you are in the United States. 1:34:58.560 --> 1:35:03.000 Yeah, yeah, Like every single US person, right, US person 1:35:03.600 --> 1:35:06.559 would be anybody who resides in the US, be they 1:35:06.760 --> 1:35:09.720 documented or done, documented, migrant, citizen, what have you like, 1:35:09.800 --> 1:35:10.800 has a stake in this. 1:35:11.320 --> 1:35:13.200 We're gonna go on break and then come back to 1:35:13.280 --> 1:35:18.000 discuss the expansion of the sea Cott detention program and 1:35:18.080 --> 1:35:20.840 the possible targeting of US citizens. 1:35:31.439 --> 1:35:32.360 Okay, we're back. 1:35:33.160 --> 1:35:36.160 So on April seventh, a few weeks ago, while on 1:35:36.240 --> 1:35:38.599 Air Force one, President Trump told reporters that he would 1:35:38.600 --> 1:35:40.799 be quote unquote honored for the president of Al Salvador 1:35:40.960 --> 1:35:44.720 to take a US citizens quote unquote American grown and 1:35:44.880 --> 1:35:49.000 born criminals and put them in sea Cott, the Terrorism 1:35:49.040 --> 1:35:53.240 Confinement Center prison Black Site, saying quote why should it 1:35:53.280 --> 1:35:56.920 stop just at people that crossed the border illegally unquote? 1:35:57.360 --> 1:36:00.040 A few days later, the White House Presecretary reiterated that 1:36:00.080 --> 1:36:02.879 this is something that Trump is discussing both publicly and privately, 1:36:03.479 --> 1:36:07.639 and later during the April fourteenth Oval Office meeting, Trump 1:36:07.680 --> 1:36:11.040 said that if Salvador was to build more of these 1:36:11.120 --> 1:36:15.479 torture megaprisons, the United States would quote unquote help them out. 1:36:16.000 --> 1:36:19.320 If the Trump administration could disappear more American immigrants and 1:36:19.520 --> 1:36:23.120 US citizens to these prison black sites, well. 1:36:23.120 --> 1:36:25.439 I pay for those societies to be open. 1:36:26.680 --> 1:36:27.360 I'd do something. 1:36:27.400 --> 1:36:28.160 We'd help them out. 1:36:28.479 --> 1:36:29.000 We help them. 1:36:29.240 --> 1:36:35.040 They great facilities, very strong facilities, and they don't play games. 1:36:35.960 --> 1:36:37.559 I'd like to go a step further. I mean, I 1:36:37.600 --> 1:36:39.559 say I said it to Pam. I don't know what 1:36:39.600 --> 1:36:41.719 the laws are. We always have to obey the laws. 1:36:41.760 --> 1:36:45.920 But we also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways, 1:36:46.479 --> 1:36:50.120 that hit elderly ladies on the back of the head 1:36:50.120 --> 1:36:54.200 with a baseball bat when they're not looking. That are 1:36:54.760 --> 1:36:58.320 absolute monsters. I'd like to include them in the group 1:36:58.360 --> 1:37:00.200 of people to get them out of the country. But 1:37:00.640 --> 1:37:02.719 you'll have to be looking at the laws on that state. 1:37:02.840 --> 1:37:03.120 Okay. 1:37:06.280 --> 1:37:09.799 So this is just the start of a long process 1:37:09.880 --> 1:37:14.240 that is going to be deeply troublesome and worrying, and 1:37:14.439 --> 1:37:17.880 again like this is something that they keep talking about. 1:37:18.439 --> 1:37:20.719 I think they're still looking for some kind of legal 1:37:20.840 --> 1:37:24.720 justification or they're looking for something that maybe, if not 1:37:24.800 --> 1:37:27.800 allows for this, explicitly prohibits this in a way that they 1:37:27.840 --> 1:37:28.839 can't like get around. 1:37:29.240 --> 1:37:29.439 Yeah. 1:37:29.520 --> 1:37:31.960 Did you notice he called out Miller. He said, you'll 1:37:31.960 --> 1:37:34.040 have to look at the laws and the sieve Obviously 1:37:34.160 --> 1:37:35.799 Miller is not the Attorney general. 1:37:35.920 --> 1:37:39.479 He also did mention Attorney General Pambondi. Pambondi, Yeah, who's 1:37:39.479 --> 1:37:41.360 also looking into this option right now? 1:37:41.640 --> 1:37:44.160 Right, But Miller is often credited with being the kind 1:37:44.200 --> 1:37:47.240 of mastermind between behind Title forty two right, which was 1:37:47.280 --> 1:37:50.920 an extremely obscure piece of public health law that was 1:37:50.960 --> 1:37:55.320 immobilized by the first Trump administration to immediately return migrants 1:37:55.360 --> 1:37:57.519 to Mexico without giving them their right to it an 1:37:57.520 --> 1:38:01.240 asylum hearing right. And that's what I'm wondering if they're 1:38:01.280 --> 1:38:04.200 going for again, Like Steve Miller has been very good 1:38:04.200 --> 1:38:08.200 at this, at finding obscure justifications in the United States 1:38:08.240 --> 1:38:10.160 federal law for shit that they want to do. 1:38:10.400 --> 1:38:12.799 I think this is why they're definitely trying to stretch 1:38:12.800 --> 1:38:15.960 this foreign policy claim as far as they can that 1:38:16.000 --> 1:38:19.120 if it's if it's outside US soil, there's a limited 1:38:19.120 --> 1:38:23.120 way US courts can actually interfere or undo things that 1:38:23.120 --> 1:38:25.600 have already been done. And again, like the idea that 1:38:25.600 --> 1:38:27.920 we're going to like fund the construction of even more 1:38:27.960 --> 1:38:32.600 of these l Salvador mega prisons just to house American 1:38:32.720 --> 1:38:36.719 grown and born criminals as well as immigrants, Like we're 1:38:36.800 --> 1:38:41.120 just funding like goolog camps on foreign soil to send 1:38:41.160 --> 1:38:45.400 the undesirables to. And no matter how much Trump talks 1:38:45.439 --> 1:38:47.640 about how we're oldly going to send quote unquote like 1:38:47.640 --> 1:38:52.760 American criminals there, as we've seen with Seacott so far, Like, no, 1:38:53.080 --> 1:38:56.200 like the majority of people they are sending do not 1:38:56.320 --> 1:39:00.320 have criminal criminal histories. I don't think anyone can trust 1:39:00.320 --> 1:39:04.240 the Trump administration's definition of what isn't isn't criminal to 1:39:04.240 --> 1:39:08.680 this extent anymore. Later in the same meeting, Trump reiterated 1:39:08.720 --> 1:39:12.040 the same idea about sending you a citizens who his 1:39:12.120 --> 1:39:15.799 administration deems criminals to this foreign black site. Here's another 1:39:15.880 --> 1:39:18.639 clip is a fall question on a. 1:39:18.520 --> 1:39:23.200 Clarification you mentioned that you're open to supporting individuals that 1:39:23.240 --> 1:39:26.280 aren't foreign aliens for our criminals to Al Salvador. Does 1:39:26.320 --> 1:39:30.120 that Does that include potentially US citizens fully naturalized. 1:39:29.680 --> 1:39:33.200 Immrading if they're criminals, and if they hit people with 1:39:33.280 --> 1:39:35.679 baseball bats over the head that happened to be ninety 1:39:35.760 --> 1:39:41.280 years old, and if if they rape eighty seven year 1:39:41.320 --> 1:39:42.640 old women in Coney. 1:39:42.360 --> 1:39:43.480 Island, Brooklyn. 1:39:43.840 --> 1:39:46.720 Yeah, yeah, that includes Why do you think there's a 1:39:46.840 --> 1:39:49.920 special category of person. They're as bad as anybody that 1:39:50.000 --> 1:39:53.240 comes in. We have bad ones too, and I'm all 1:39:53.320 --> 1:39:55.840 for it. We have others that were negotiating with to 1:39:56.760 --> 1:40:01.559 But no, it's if it's if it's a home grown criminal, 1:40:02.280 --> 1:40:03.240 I have no problem. 1:40:03.520 --> 1:40:06.559 He's really obsessed with baseball bats thing. I don't quite 1:40:06.640 --> 1:40:07.479 know what that's about. 1:40:07.760 --> 1:40:10.280 There seems like a specific case that he's referring to. 1:40:10.479 --> 1:40:12.800 Maybe it's something he remembers like thirty years ago that 1:40:12.880 --> 1:40:15.679 it really got stuck in his head. Right, But also 1:40:15.840 --> 1:40:19.160 later he says that they're negotiating with other countries to 1:40:19.240 --> 1:40:22.120 send US citizens to not just El Salvador. 1:40:22.760 --> 1:40:26.560 Yeah, I mean they've sent migrants third country migrant to 1:40:26.600 --> 1:40:30.880 Panama before, right, and detain them there. Honduras I believe 1:40:30.960 --> 1:40:34.559 is building like a prison that's not dissimilar to siicort, Like, 1:40:35.520 --> 1:40:38.360 I'm be guessing this will be their sort of way 1:40:38.400 --> 1:40:42.120 of courting allies in the hemisphere because they'll sort of 1:40:42.439 --> 1:40:46.080 pay them a relatively large amount in order to attempt 1:40:46.160 --> 1:40:47.680 to offshore people they don't like. 1:40:47.920 --> 1:40:50.360 Yeah, and again, like as we've seen the past few 1:40:50.400 --> 1:40:55.920 years and increasingly so now, the effort to label like 1:40:56.120 --> 1:40:59.439 activists or people who are vocally opposed to the United 1:40:59.439 --> 1:41:02.160 States foreign policy the United States and the State of 1:41:02.200 --> 1:41:05.680 Israel deeming them terrorists and then by extension, if you 1:41:05.800 --> 1:41:09.120 charge them with the crime, then criminals getting that they 1:41:09.120 --> 1:41:12.920 can be housed in a place like Seacot now with 1:41:13.200 --> 1:41:16.439 very very limited to no due process. The whole due 1:41:16.479 --> 1:41:19.559 process question is still very up in the air for 1:41:19.600 --> 1:41:22.240 how they're going to handle that aspect. But you can't 1:41:22.280 --> 1:41:24.400 just take this as like, oh, you know that that's 1:41:24.479 --> 1:41:26.560 just Trump talking, like no, this is this is this 1:41:26.600 --> 1:41:29.720 is something they really want to do, and it's like 1:41:29.840 --> 1:41:32.479 one of the freakiest things that I've seen in like 1:41:32.760 --> 1:41:36.720 domestic US politics in a long time. Earlier, Trump was 1:41:36.720 --> 1:41:41.639 recorded half whispering to Beckley telling him that El Salvador 1:41:41.800 --> 1:41:45.400 needs to build five more Sea cought style torture prisons 1:41:45.680 --> 1:41:49.840 to house US citizens, as Trump says, homegrown criminals. Bukeley 1:41:49.880 --> 1:41:53.160 replies that they will have enough room, and then the 1:41:53.320 --> 1:41:56.000 entire Oval Office laughs. 1:41:56.320 --> 1:42:01.439 Yea, they said, home grunst, you get a build about 1:42:01.479 --> 1:42:02.320 five more places. 1:42:02.360 --> 1:42:03.840 Yeah, that's all right. 1:42:09.120 --> 1:42:12.840 It's the bleakest clip I've ever seen before. Yeah, talking 1:42:12.840 --> 1:42:15.640 about homegrowns. Their next got to build five more places. Oh, 1:42:15.640 --> 1:42:18.479 we have enough space. Everyone laughs, and then Trump shows 1:42:18.479 --> 1:42:21.680 off the new gold frames for the portraits in the 1:42:21.720 --> 1:42:22.560 Oval Office. 1:42:22.880 --> 1:42:25.680 Yeah, it's like a dinner party joke for them. It 1:42:25.760 --> 1:42:28.919 might just be worth noting that, like every totalitarian regime 1:42:29.360 --> 1:42:33.240 has housed its dissidents outside of the imperial core. Right, 1:42:33.439 --> 1:42:36.280 like like Germany totally did this in the East, right, 1:42:36.360 --> 1:42:40.560 Russia send people to Siberia for Russia Soviet Union. 1:42:40.400 --> 1:42:43.439 Creating creating these like stateless zones where like the regular 1:42:43.560 --> 1:42:46.760 laws of your of your like fatherland state do not. 1:42:46.760 --> 1:42:50.880 Apply, right and where the horrors are so far from 1:42:50.880 --> 1:42:54.519 the populace that the populist can't really grasp them. Yeah. 1:42:54.640 --> 1:42:57.800 No, this is like elementary school stuff. It says, like, 1:42:57.800 --> 1:42:59.960 like the first thing you learn about is concentration camps 1:43:00.080 --> 1:43:03.920 and goologs. Now, that's like this symbol of evil and 1:43:04.040 --> 1:43:06.439 now it's something you laugh about in the Oval Office 1:43:06.479 --> 1:43:11.320 to send home growns to five disappearing torture camps. 1:43:11.560 --> 1:43:14.560 Yeah, and like, just to be like even clear, I 1:43:14.600 --> 1:43:18.800 guess what distinguishes a concentration camp from a prison is 1:43:18.840 --> 1:43:21.200 that there is no due process right. People are sent 1:43:21.240 --> 1:43:22.920 there because of who they are, not because of what 1:43:22.960 --> 1:43:23.639 they did. 1:43:23.760 --> 1:43:25.800 Like if you're a Venezuelan man who may or may 1:43:25.800 --> 1:43:26.559 not have a tattoo. 1:43:27.120 --> 1:43:30.599 Yeah, like the way, I don't know what it will 1:43:30.640 --> 1:43:33.280 take for some people to realize what's happening here. 1:43:33.760 --> 1:43:36.400 And like the president of El Salvador is so on 1:43:36.439 --> 1:43:37.240 board for this. 1:43:37.400 --> 1:43:40.479 Yeah, I mean he doesn't hide from that reputation, right, 1:43:40.560 --> 1:43:43.240 he embraces it. His Twitter for a while had world's 1:43:43.240 --> 1:43:45.120 Coolest dictator in the bio. I don't know if it 1:43:45.160 --> 1:43:45.639 still does. 1:43:45.720 --> 1:43:49.240 Like and like, both him and Trump have openly aligned 1:43:49.240 --> 1:43:53.439 themselves with quote unquote nationalism and nationalists. They're openly saying this. 1:43:54.000 --> 1:43:56.720 Trump said dictator on day one. That wasn't just a 1:43:56.760 --> 1:43:59.280 rhetorical device, that was literal. This is what he's doing. 1:44:00.240 --> 1:44:02.639 A president told Trump, you have three hundred and fifty 1:44:02.640 --> 1:44:05.080 million people to liberate, but to liberate three hundred and 1:44:05.080 --> 1:44:08.200 fifty million people, you have to imprison some. And you 1:44:08.240 --> 1:44:10.080 follow that up by saying that he is eager to 1:44:10.160 --> 1:44:10.880 help with that. 1:44:12.240 --> 1:44:16.200 And if fat mister president, you have three hundred and 1:44:16.200 --> 1:44:17.800 fifty million people to liberate it. 1:44:18.760 --> 1:44:20.960 But to liberate three hundred and fifteen million people, you 1:44:21.040 --> 1:44:21.840 have to imprison some. 1:44:22.479 --> 1:44:23.360 You know, that's the way it. 1:44:23.320 --> 1:44:23.800 Works, right. 1:44:23.840 --> 1:44:25.120 You cannot just you know, free the. 1:44:25.040 --> 1:44:27.960 Criminals and think Rymes is going to go down magically. 1:44:28.040 --> 1:44:31.000 Have to imprisoned them so you can liberate three hundred 1:44:31.040 --> 1:44:34.000 and fifty million Americans that are asking for the end 1:44:34.040 --> 1:44:35.719 of crime and the end of theroists. 1:44:35.760 --> 1:44:39.280 Many can be done, I mean, if you're doing it already. 1:44:39.439 --> 1:44:42.920 So I'm really happy to be here, honored. 1:44:42.800 --> 1:44:47.280 Any anger to help this whole. Like liberation through imprisonment 1:44:47.360 --> 1:44:50.120 thing is elementary school stuff here. 1:44:50.479 --> 1:44:52.240 You don't have to have a PhD in the history 1:44:52.280 --> 1:44:54.479 of the nineteen thirties to have someone tell you that 1:44:54.560 --> 1:44:57.160 the liberation of the chosen nation by purging of the 1:44:57.200 --> 1:44:59.920 undesirables is fascist shit. But like I'm here with one 1:45:00.080 --> 1:45:02.559 tell you if that's what you need. You know, like 1:45:03.360 --> 1:45:06.080 this is textbook stuff. Like Garrison's saying like this is 1:45:06.160 --> 1:45:09.160 not debatable, Like I know, we spent the last four 1:45:09.240 --> 1:45:11.760 years debating is Trump a fascist or not? I don't 1:45:11.800 --> 1:45:15.000 think that matters hugely, right, Like this is a fascist thing. 1:45:15.120 --> 1:45:18.080 It's so much more disturbing that now, according to like polls, 1:45:18.120 --> 1:45:21.080 like half around half the population maybe a little bit 1:45:21.120 --> 1:45:24.640 less just agree with the current way that deportations are 1:45:24.640 --> 1:45:27.760 happening and Trump's immigration policy like on a completely like 1:45:27.880 --> 1:45:30.720 flat basis. And if you spend any time on on 1:45:31.120 --> 1:45:33.559 X the everything app watching videos of the of these 1:45:33.560 --> 1:45:36.760 press conferences, it's full of people just like cheering this 1:45:36.880 --> 1:45:38.919 on completely, like completely blankly. 1:45:39.120 --> 1:45:41.200 I think that's a very skewed samplet of people who 1:45:41.280 --> 1:45:43.719 totally paid for Elon Musk of. 1:45:43.680 --> 1:45:46.479 Course, of course, but like the number of. 1:45:46.479 --> 1:45:50.040 People, Yeah, it's real humans saying like these are real. 1:45:49.840 --> 1:45:54.800 People who just just completely completely blankly think this is 1:45:54.880 --> 1:45:56.680 a this is this is a net good and like 1:45:56.720 --> 1:45:58.920 this is those people are unreachable. You cannot come back 1:45:58.920 --> 1:46:00.800 from that, like you is, there is no coming back 1:46:00.840 --> 1:46:03.280 from that if you believe that the way depretations are 1:46:03.280 --> 1:46:07.639 currently happening is fair, just and right, Like I cannot 1:46:08.320 --> 1:46:10.960 understand you as a human anymore. That is so like 1:46:11.040 --> 1:46:12.280 divorced and like alien. 1:46:12.640 --> 1:46:14.920 Yeah, you've gone past the point of no return, right, like. 1:46:15.479 --> 1:46:17.880 Liberals who like shield the who like shield their eyes 1:46:17.920 --> 1:46:20.679 from like the whores at the border. Like, I don't 1:46:20.720 --> 1:46:22.720 agree with that, but in some ways I can understand it. 1:46:23.000 --> 1:46:26.320 The open like cheering on of this right is like 1:46:26.360 --> 1:46:27.840 a whole It's a whole other level. 1:46:27.920 --> 1:46:29.479 Yeah, it's not like I can't bear to see it. 1:46:29.479 --> 1:46:31.080 I'm gonna ignore it so it will cause me to 1:46:31.120 --> 1:46:34.080 confront the no the contradictions. It's I'm seeing it on 1:46:34.160 --> 1:46:35.559 watch again and I think it's fucking great. 1:46:36.040 --> 1:46:38.360 The last thing I'm gonna I'm gonna play here A 1:46:38.439 --> 1:46:41.240 scene and reporter asked Trump if he would obey a 1:46:41.280 --> 1:46:44.200 Supreme Court order to return someone to the United States. 1:46:44.640 --> 1:46:48.200 Instead of answering this question, Trump attacked the reporter and 1:46:48.240 --> 1:46:53.080 complained about how she wasn't praising him for deporting criminals. 1:46:53.760 --> 1:46:55.800 You said that if the Supreme Court said someone needed 1:46:55.800 --> 1:46:57.320 to be returned, that you would abide by that. 1:46:57.360 --> 1:46:58.760 You said that on Air Force one just a few 1:46:58.800 --> 1:46:59.680 days ago, and. 1:46:59.640 --> 1:47:02.400 They said it must facilitating. 1:47:02.560 --> 1:47:05.360 Why don't you just say, isn't it wonderful that we're 1:47:05.439 --> 1:47:06.479 keeping criminals out? 1:47:06.520 --> 1:47:07.160 Of our country. 1:47:07.200 --> 1:47:09.599 Why can't you just say that? Why do you go 1:47:09.880 --> 1:47:12.879 over and over and that's why nobody watches you anymore? 1:47:13.040 --> 1:47:14.400 You know you have no credibility. 1:47:14.520 --> 1:47:20.759 Please go ahead, Yeah, mad very textbook authoritarian like blanket 1:47:20.800 --> 1:47:23.599 stuff like there's there's nothing to like commentate about that. 1:47:23.880 --> 1:47:26.720 It just is what it is. I guess we do. 1:47:26.880 --> 1:47:29.640 We do some breaking news because we're recordings on Tuesday. 1:47:30.600 --> 1:47:34.000 James want to want to, impossibly five minutes or less, 1:47:34.600 --> 1:47:37.000 fill us in about the the update from the from 1:47:37.000 --> 1:47:40.280 the District Court on Garcia's case since it was sent 1:47:40.320 --> 1:47:42.559 back to the district Court from the Supreme Court last 1:47:42.600 --> 1:47:48.160 week regarding his possible facilitated return to the United States. 1:47:48.600 --> 1:47:52.519 Right, so much of this has hinged over what facilitate means, right, 1:47:52.600 --> 1:47:54.880 Like they found a legal concept that they can argue 1:47:54.880 --> 1:47:58.120 at nauseum and in this case, it's the word facilitate. 1:47:58.680 --> 1:48:03.439 DJ didn't presently new information today, but we see that 1:48:03.520 --> 1:48:05.559 like there's some hopeful things on a district court judge 1:48:05.560 --> 1:48:07.400 and then it kind of all goes up in flames. 1:48:07.479 --> 1:48:12.240 But I think genis XI and I s is how 1:48:12.280 --> 1:48:15.360 the name is spelled. I believe it's genius said that 1:48:15.400 --> 1:48:17.439 every day that he's there is a day of further 1:48:17.520 --> 1:48:21.200 irreparable harm. And she talks about the process being at 1:48:21.200 --> 1:48:24.400 the roots of the constitution. Right, She's ordered for like 1:48:24.439 --> 1:48:28.080 two weeks more of discovery, which is going to mean 1:48:28.360 --> 1:48:30.840 that both sides have more time to repair their cases. Right, 1:48:30.880 --> 1:48:32.759 she wants people to testify in front of the court. 1:48:33.439 --> 1:48:37.000 She is so the administration has argued that facilitating his 1:48:37.160 --> 1:48:40.080 return would consist of them allowing him to enter the 1:48:40.200 --> 1:48:44.600 United States if Bukele released him, and possibly providing a 1:48:44.640 --> 1:48:48.360 flight for that to happen, but not crucially ensuring his 1:48:48.439 --> 1:48:51.800 release from secord. Right, and so anything else subsequent to 1:48:51.840 --> 1:48:56.519 that doesn't matter. Chinis said that like their interpretation of 1:48:56.560 --> 1:48:58.400 the word flies in the face of the plain meaning 1:48:58.439 --> 1:49:01.880 of the word. Quote, when a wrong fear removed individual 1:49:02.120 --> 1:49:04.120 is uh. And then I'm adding to the quote here 1:49:04.160 --> 1:49:06.439 I guess or context. She means when a wrong fee 1:49:06.520 --> 1:49:09.680 remove individual is taken outside the US, it's not so 1:49:09.720 --> 1:49:11.120 cut and dry that all you have to do is 1:49:11.160 --> 1:49:15.080 remove obstacles domestically. She also said, quote to the Department 1:49:15.080 --> 1:49:17.439 of Justice here, you made your jurisdictional arguments, you made 1:49:17.479 --> 1:49:20.799 your venue arguments, you major arguments on the merits you lost. 1:49:21.439 --> 1:49:23.880 This is now about the scope of the remedy. Right, 1:49:24.080 --> 1:49:26.400 this is a case that Miller is claiming they want. 1:49:26.520 --> 1:49:31.240 That's pretty unequivocal for a justice. However, she does not 1:49:31.640 --> 1:49:35.080 seem to think that it is within her power to 1:49:35.120 --> 1:49:39.200 request his return from El Salvador. So she's calling for 1:49:39.240 --> 1:49:43.160 things to move quickly. Right, they want to conduct depositions 1:49:43.160 --> 1:49:46.799 about twenty third of April, she said, quote council vacations, 1:49:46.800 --> 1:49:49.360 council over appointments. I'm usually pretty good about it. Not 1:49:49.479 --> 1:49:51.519 this time. I'm going to be available if you need 1:49:51.560 --> 1:49:53.639 to do it odd hours or weekends. That's what I'm 1:49:53.680 --> 1:49:59.320 talking about. Anything short of a judge saying you have 1:49:59.400 --> 1:50:01.160 to go to se Calle, remove him from the cell, 1:50:01.200 --> 1:50:02.800 put him on the plane, and bring him back to 1:50:02.880 --> 1:50:05.280 America is going to be interpreted by the Trump administration 1:50:05.320 --> 1:50:06.200 to mean that they don't. 1:50:06.040 --> 1:50:06.639 Have to do that. 1:50:07.160 --> 1:50:08.720 Yeah, they're going to weasel their way around it, the 1:50:08.720 --> 1:50:11.519 same way you heard Steven Miller weasel his way around 1:50:11.680 --> 1:50:15.920 every question, and with with truth being used as a 1:50:15.920 --> 1:50:19.640 as a flexible medium. Yeah, to shape a sculpture of 1:50:19.680 --> 1:50:20.280 their choosing. 1:50:20.479 --> 1:50:22.840 And like they've done that. Right, the word facilitate. I 1:50:22.840 --> 1:50:25.080 think most people who are first language English speakers have 1:50:25.080 --> 1:50:27.000 a fairly good grasp with what that means, and it 1:50:27.040 --> 1:50:31.240 doesn't mean like remove barriers domestically, that's what they've gone for. 1:50:32.160 --> 1:50:34.920 The only way that he is getting out, it's a 1:50:34.920 --> 1:50:39.720 majority Supreme Court decision that is extremely explicit that directs 1:50:39.960 --> 1:50:42.719 the Trump administration to go to El Salvadore and remove 1:50:42.800 --> 1:50:47.080 him from that prison. I haven't seen anything to indicate 1:50:47.120 --> 1:50:50.200 that we're getting that anytime soon. And as the judge said, 1:50:50.240 --> 1:50:52.840 right every day he's there, he's a reparable harm is 1:50:52.880 --> 1:50:57.200 done to him. And that's where we're at right now, 1:50:57.320 --> 1:50:59.880 right with people arguing over the definition of a war, 1:51:00.280 --> 1:51:02.960 as hundreds of people are locked up having done nothing 1:51:03.000 --> 1:51:04.719 wrong in a giant torture prison. 1:51:05.320 --> 1:51:08.320 And this is not the only person who we believe 1:51:08.520 --> 1:51:12.240 was quote unquote mistakingly sent other supporting today coming out 1:51:12.280 --> 1:51:13.280 of documented New York. 1:51:13.560 --> 1:51:14.799 Yeah, good outlet. 1:51:14.840 --> 1:51:16.920 By the way, a father of a nineteen year old 1:51:17.080 --> 1:51:21.320 legal legal immigrant from Brooklyn. This nineteen year old with 1:51:21.640 --> 1:51:26.200 no tattoos, was kidnapped off the streets of New York. 1:51:26.720 --> 1:51:30.879 The quote from his father reads, quote the officers grabbed 1:51:30.960 --> 1:51:33.680 him and two other boys right at the entrance to 1:51:33.720 --> 1:51:37.920 our building. One said, no, he's not the one, like 1:51:37.960 --> 1:51:39.080 they were looking for someone else. 1:51:39.200 --> 1:51:42.320 One officer to be clear, correct, Yeah, but. 1:51:42.320 --> 1:51:48.280 The other officer said take him anyway, unquote. And now 1:51:48.320 --> 1:51:51.080 this father, exactly a month later, is still looking for 1:51:51.120 --> 1:51:56.000 his missing son, who is disappeared into a new Salvador 1:51:56.280 --> 1:51:57.000 torture prison. 1:51:57.240 --> 1:52:00.960 Yeah, Jesus. Like I've said before, for on this show, 1:52:01.040 --> 1:52:03.240 like one of the things that I learned in the 1:52:03.320 --> 1:52:05.719 Darien Gap was how much people can care about their kids, 1:52:06.040 --> 1:52:09.800 and like this shit that I saw people do to 1:52:09.960 --> 1:52:13.360 ensure that kids had a better life, like broke my 1:52:13.439 --> 1:52:15.400 heart in a way that war hasn't that like anything 1:52:15.439 --> 1:52:17.680 else I've seen in my life hasn't. And it's like 1:52:18.200 --> 1:52:20.240 honestly really hard for me to hear stuff like that 1:52:20.520 --> 1:52:24.880 and and like not react just being really sad or 1:52:24.880 --> 1:52:27.479 really angry, like it's fucking brutal. 1:52:27.960 --> 1:52:30.240 Things are looking a lot more grim in my mind 1:52:30.400 --> 1:52:32.920 than they were when we recorded that Should You Leave 1:52:32.960 --> 1:52:37.120 the United States episode. I still think the things I 1:52:37.520 --> 1:52:41.519 said there I stand by, and I stand by the 1:52:42.640 --> 1:52:45.519 only recommendation I have is to create options for yourself, 1:52:45.600 --> 1:52:48.360 and I think those options should be created as soon 1:52:48.400 --> 1:52:52.800 as possible, especially if your citizenship is a topic of 1:52:52.840 --> 1:52:56.439 debate according to the United States government. But even that 1:52:56.479 --> 1:52:59.519 will not keep you safe. As we've talked about today, 1:53:00.080 --> 1:53:03.240 your options include creating networks to take care of one another. Right, Like, 1:53:04.120 --> 1:53:07.479 the things that will probably affect more of you than 1:53:07.600 --> 1:53:13.719 direct state violence are economic downturns, are recessions, right, things 1:53:13.760 --> 1:53:15.639 like this, like those are things that you can take 1:53:15.680 --> 1:53:18.920 care of one another through, and like you should plan 1:53:18.960 --> 1:53:21.640 to do that too. You should you should think about 1:53:21.760 --> 1:53:23.360 how you're going to pay your bills, how you're going 1:53:23.400 --> 1:53:24.960 to feed each other, how you're going to take care 1:53:25.000 --> 1:53:29.559 of your medical needs. Because I don't think that the 1:53:29.600 --> 1:53:32.080 world is going to want to keep doing business with 1:53:32.160 --> 1:53:36.720 the country that acts like this, and both economically and 1:53:36.760 --> 1:53:40.439 in terms of its conduct towards migrants. So like, your 1:53:40.479 --> 1:53:43.559 plans don't have to be to leave, Like your plans 1:53:43.560 --> 1:53:46.960 should also include what to do if things get really bad, 1:53:47.040 --> 1:53:48.240 like in an economic sense. 1:53:48.600 --> 1:53:50.479 I'm not going to tell you what that means. But 1:53:50.920 --> 1:53:52.680 it's all the stuff he's already talked about, right, It's 1:53:52.720 --> 1:53:56.840 mutual aid, it's it's all the all the basic preparedness 1:53:56.880 --> 1:54:00.000 stuff that is not as big and scary as leaving 1:54:00.080 --> 1:54:03.599 the country, but it is nonetheless like vital. 1:54:05.479 --> 1:54:08.800 We will continue to report on the Garcia case other 1:54:09.080 --> 1:54:12.920 court cases regarding these three hundred people renditioned to El 1:54:12.960 --> 1:54:16.280 Salvador and Seacott in the next. 1:54:16.000 --> 1:54:20.840 Few weeks, just to finish up. As things continue to 1:54:20.840 --> 1:54:23.400 get worse, people keep reaching out to us, which we appreciate. 1:54:23.560 --> 1:54:26.679 If you would like to, you can email us cool 1:54:26.760 --> 1:54:31.240 Zone tips at proton dot me. We will read it. 1:54:31.280 --> 1:54:33.120 We might not get back to you. Your email is 1:54:33.160 --> 1:54:35.000 not end to end encrypted unless the email that you're 1:54:35.000 --> 1:54:38.840 sending from is also encrypted, that you can reach out 1:54:38.840 --> 1:54:39.400 to us. 1:54:39.120 --> 1:55:00.600 See you on the other side. 1:55:01.600 --> 1:55:05.320 Welcome to Dake. It happened here a podcast increasingly well 1:55:05.400 --> 1:55:08.880 named as the days go on. I am your host, 1:55:08.880 --> 1:55:09.920 Bio Wong, and. 1:55:10.000 --> 1:55:10.920 It occurs to me. 1:55:12.160 --> 1:55:15.440 Over the course of the many, many, many, many many 1:55:15.800 --> 1:55:18.800 Union episodes we've done in this podcast, we haven't really 1:55:18.960 --> 1:55:22.080 done much coverage of just straight up how do you 1:55:22.120 --> 1:55:25.440 do a strike? So today we're going to be covering 1:55:25.560 --> 1:55:28.040 a pretty long running strike. We're gonna say how many 1:55:28.080 --> 1:55:29.840 days it has been going. It's unclear when this episode 1:55:29.880 --> 1:55:31.760 is gonna come out, So who fucking knows how long 1:55:31.760 --> 1:55:35.640 it'll be when when you hear it. But yeah, with 1:55:35.680 --> 1:55:39.040 me to talk about this strike is Spencer Jordan, who 1:55:39.080 --> 1:55:40.800 is a rank and file member of the Urban or 1:55:40.880 --> 1:55:42.800 Workers Union. Spencer, welcome to the show. 1:55:43.040 --> 1:55:44.960 Hey, thank you so much for having me. Miah. 1:55:45.400 --> 1:55:47.240 Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you about this. So 1:55:47.480 --> 1:55:49.680 this is what day is it today? I should know 1:55:49.720 --> 1:55:53.280 this April fifteenth, And as of April fifteenth, you've been 1:55:53.280 --> 1:55:54.920 out try for twenty five days. 1:55:55.280 --> 1:55:57.880 Yeah, that's just about right. Yeah, it started on the 1:55:58.000 --> 1:56:02.120 twenty second of March. We our strike vote like a 1:56:02.720 --> 1:56:07.480 solid twelve days before before we actually went out on 1:56:07.520 --> 1:56:11.720 the picket line. And one that strike vote with fourteen 1:56:11.880 --> 1:56:15.280 yes is a single no and I think four extensions. 1:56:15.920 --> 1:56:20.920 Pretty yeah. Yeah, so nine of those voting voted yes. Yeah, 1:56:21.200 --> 1:56:22.720 which good of good ratios? 1:56:22.760 --> 1:56:27.040 Good ratios. I think like typically you want at least 1:56:27.200 --> 1:56:30.880 like mid seventies if we're going to do this kind 1:56:30.920 --> 1:56:33.280 of thing. But you know, as listener to the show, 1:56:33.440 --> 1:56:36.680 hopefully understand by now you can't just like call a 1:56:36.760 --> 1:56:39.400 strike and have it happen. You know, you have to 1:56:39.440 --> 1:56:41.120 do a whole bunch of organizing. So I want to 1:56:41.200 --> 1:56:44.760 kind of start at the dynamics of the organizing of 1:56:44.800 --> 1:56:47.360 how this shop got going, because this is a pretty 1:56:47.400 --> 1:56:51.080 small shop from the sounds of it. And yeah, yeah, 1:56:51.120 --> 1:56:52.760 so do you want to talk a bit about what 1:56:52.800 --> 1:56:56.000 the basic process of getting this organizing started was like 1:56:56.040 --> 1:56:57.880 and what the sort of like social mapping looked like 1:56:58.080 --> 1:56:58.880 and stuff like that. 1:56:59.600 --> 1:57:06.160 Yeah, So the organization process started around like a year 1:57:06.200 --> 1:57:09.560 and a half before we actually had our unionization vote, 1:57:09.600 --> 1:57:12.960 which was actually we had the vote in March and 1:57:13.000 --> 1:57:16.880 we got our win on April seventh, two years ago, 1:57:17.240 --> 1:57:22.560 so we actually just had our union two year birthday birthday. 1:57:23.880 --> 1:57:27.520 But yeah, so preceding that was like, like I said, 1:57:27.560 --> 1:57:31.000 about a year and a half organizing that involved you know, 1:57:31.080 --> 1:57:33.960 the typical thing of like one on one conversations with 1:57:34.080 --> 1:57:38.160 like all the staff, making the you know, color coded 1:57:38.160 --> 1:57:42.680 spreadsheet and everything, which all of this was not my 1:57:42.680 --> 1:57:44.640 my purview. I'm a lot more involved now than I 1:57:44.680 --> 1:57:48.200 was at the start of the process. And I was 1:57:48.240 --> 1:57:51.800 approached by like one of our lead organizers really shortly 1:57:51.880 --> 1:57:56.080 after being hired just to kind of you know read 1:57:56.120 --> 1:58:00.600 the dipstick as too like my sentiments about it and whatnot. 1:58:01.360 --> 1:58:04.480 I was pretty on board right away. I mean, you know, 1:58:04.840 --> 1:58:08.120 like I'm from the Bay Area, so it's not. 1:58:10.240 --> 1:58:12.080 There are there are only two types of people from 1:58:12.080 --> 1:58:13.920 the Bay Area. You wouldn't be having one of the 1:58:13.920 --> 1:58:14.360 one that ship. 1:58:14.440 --> 1:58:17.360 Yeah, exactly exactly. So I'm of the ladder type. So 1:58:17.760 --> 1:58:21.560 you know, it being pro union is isn't isn't like 1:58:21.600 --> 1:58:23.520 a foreign thing to my background. 1:58:25.000 --> 1:58:28.080 You know, you don't look like a tech work Yeah, yeah, 1:58:28.200 --> 1:58:30.400 especially like my family's from the Midwest and everything, so 1:58:30.480 --> 1:58:34.200 there's yeah, my my aunt actually just learned that she 1:58:34.440 --> 1:58:37.000 was like a clerk working for the railroads back in 1:58:37.000 --> 1:58:39.000 the day when my railroad jobs were still like a 1:58:39.000 --> 1:58:41.320 big thing you could have anyways. 1:58:41.720 --> 1:58:44.800 But yeah, so I had had my like own sort 1:58:44.800 --> 1:58:48.240 of like just observations of like whoah, like what's what's 1:58:48.280 --> 1:58:51.640 going on in the workplace aside from like my own 1:58:51.800 --> 1:58:55.200 just like prediliction to thinking, you know, more worker power 1:58:55.240 --> 1:58:58.720 is better. Yeah, also kind of seeing like some of 1:58:58.760 --> 1:59:02.760 the factors that dicipitated it, Like for instance, like when 1:59:02.800 --> 1:59:05.800 I was hired here, I was hired in my interview, 1:59:06.160 --> 1:59:10.320 it was the one of the owners and the manager 1:59:10.320 --> 1:59:14.760 of my department, my department being salvage and recycling department 1:59:15.080 --> 1:59:17.960 of the urban or which is kind of like not 1:59:18.040 --> 1:59:20.280 super public facing. We like go to the dump and 1:59:20.360 --> 1:59:24.960 like root around through the garbage like you know, is 1:59:25.040 --> 1:59:27.680 or whatever, get to get stuff for the store. But 1:59:28.640 --> 1:59:31.240 that manager, you know, he was there in the interview 1:59:31.280 --> 1:59:35.600 and we got to the portion where the owner explained 1:59:36.600 --> 1:59:41.120 what at will employment is. Oh and she and she went, 1:59:41.560 --> 1:59:46.400 so we're at will here. So Sam Weell, Sam was 1:59:46.600 --> 1:59:49.520 my manager. Well, how long have you been here? Twenty 1:59:49.560 --> 1:59:52.960 one years? He's there, hands folded on the table. Yes. 1:59:53.680 --> 1:59:56.640 What at will means is, uh, it could be tomorrow. 1:59:56.760 --> 1:59:59.880 I could say, you know, Samuell, it's been a great 2:00:00.440 --> 2:00:03.320 twenty one years. I really appreciate all the work you've done. 2:00:03.320 --> 2:00:07.800 Today's your last day, what I say. And he has 2:00:07.800 --> 2:00:12.480 to sit there and go Jesus Christ, and then she says, 2:00:12.480 --> 2:00:15.640 of course, likewise, tomorrow sim Well could come to me 2:00:15.880 --> 2:00:20.080 and say, hey, Mary Lou, it's been twenty one years. 2:00:20.880 --> 2:00:25.240 I've enjoyed it. I'm quitting. So you know, the sort 2:00:25.240 --> 2:00:28.640 of sword over his neck is being cast is somehow 2:00:28.680 --> 2:00:31.400 equal to him not being like indentured. 2:00:32.360 --> 2:00:37.480 Yes, it's also just I mean, like you know, yeah, 2:00:37.840 --> 2:00:40.720 on the basic level, Yeah, it's like okay, your opponent 2:00:42.160 --> 2:00:43.680 I guess they argue to put it your boss. Your 2:00:43.680 --> 2:00:46.200 boss can just instantly fire you for any reason whatsoever, 2:00:46.440 --> 2:00:48.360 for any about of time. And then also you could 2:00:48.720 --> 2:00:53.880 quit the job and then really flects a plans. 2:00:53.120 --> 2:00:57.440 Like as a management tactic, like are you like trying 2:00:57.480 --> 2:01:01.600 to piss off your support? And it's like, what, I 2:01:01.640 --> 2:01:05.000 have never had a boss like just do that in 2:01:05.080 --> 2:01:06.240 a hiring meeting. 2:01:06.800 --> 2:01:07.080 What? 2:01:08.560 --> 2:01:11.360 Yeah, I mean have you have you worked at like 2:01:11.400 --> 2:01:13.960 a like a like a sat of small like mom 2:01:13.960 --> 2:01:15.600 and pop quote unquote business. 2:01:16.040 --> 2:01:19.200 Yeah, I mean that's that's probably That's probably why because 2:01:19.280 --> 2:01:23.240 I've usually had like larger my shitty jobs have either 2:01:23.240 --> 2:01:27.400 been like government jobs or like like larger companies, so 2:01:27.440 --> 2:01:30.840 there was less of the like I heard a line 2:01:30.880 --> 2:01:33.240 recently that I wish I remember where it was from. 2:01:33.760 --> 2:01:35.440 It might be a line from Star Trek. 2:01:35.840 --> 2:01:36.360 Like one of the. 2:01:36.280 --> 2:01:39.360 Fengi rules is just like treat your employees like family, 2:01:39.400 --> 2:01:42.480 exploit them ruthlessly, which I like, you. 2:01:42.440 --> 2:01:47.600 Know, that's a that's a traditional line in business, especially 2:01:47.600 --> 2:01:52.240 in small business, and it's it's no stranger here. Yeah, 2:01:52.280 --> 2:01:56.040 that question of like whining to piss off your subordinates 2:01:56.120 --> 2:02:00.240 or whatever, it's a I don't know if pissing off 2:02:00.280 --> 2:02:04.840 is necessarily like the concern, but the ownership here definitely. 2:02:06.080 --> 2:02:08.640 I've gotten the impression that they enjoy showing their power, 2:02:09.400 --> 2:02:14.000 and I've gotten the impression that the sort of like 2:02:14.440 --> 2:02:19.040 uncertainty and like my mom would call it jockeying for 2:02:19.160 --> 2:02:22.560 position that you have to do is a dynamic that 2:02:22.600 --> 2:02:25.240 they I can't say I really can't say they honestly 2:02:25.280 --> 2:02:29.160 because the other owner, he hasn't been very active in 2:02:29.160 --> 2:02:32.480 the business since since my hiring, but at least Marry 2:02:32.520 --> 2:02:36.120 Lou Yeah, tends to lean on. That's kind of like 2:02:36.240 --> 2:02:40.720 the the special quality that you get with like a 2:02:40.760 --> 2:02:43.880 small business and organizing in a small workplace is that, like, 2:02:44.840 --> 2:02:47.680 you know, you can see sort of in their public 2:02:47.680 --> 2:02:52.760 communications the way that like the Zucks and the Bezos 2:02:52.880 --> 2:02:56.280 is and the rest of them feel about their employees, 2:02:56.400 --> 2:02:58.480 and you know, you can get a sense of perhaps 2:02:58.480 --> 2:03:01.200 how they might act or to their employees if they 2:03:01.360 --> 2:03:05.720 like interacted with them on a daily basis. But in 2:03:05.760 --> 2:03:09.440 a small business setting, you really get a keen view 2:03:09.680 --> 2:03:16.800 into how like the power of the employer mixes very 2:03:16.840 --> 2:03:24.240 readily with a person's like pred election towards discipline, pred 2:03:24.240 --> 2:03:30.360 election towards like personal what'd you call it personal battling? Almost? 2:03:31.200 --> 2:03:34.040 Yeah, well, AND's and it's also like it's inescapable in 2:03:34.080 --> 2:03:36.160 a way that it isn't with like you know, if 2:03:36.160 --> 2:03:37.840 you're dealing with people who are you know, you're at 2:03:37.840 --> 2:03:39.840 a larger company, you're not dealing with the person. Like 2:03:40.280 --> 2:03:43.480 there's an old Chinese expression that is like heaven is 2:03:43.560 --> 2:03:46.640 high and the emperor is far away. So you know, 2:03:46.720 --> 2:03:48.280 it's like you know, like a lot of times you're 2:03:48.280 --> 2:03:50.280 dealing with okay, yeah there is like you know, your 2:03:50.320 --> 2:03:53.520 Zuckerberg is there, but he's like he never interacts with you. 2:03:53.600 --> 2:03:56.720 But with this, it's like, no, the small business tyrant 2:03:56.840 --> 2:03:59.000 is right there in your face all the time and 2:03:59.080 --> 2:04:01.000 all of the weird heady shit that they want to 2:04:01.000 --> 2:04:02.760 do in all of this sort of like you know, 2:04:02.800 --> 2:04:04.520 and I would say, this isn't just just like a 2:04:04.600 --> 2:04:06.720 unique thing of like small business owners, like people in 2:04:06.800 --> 2:04:10.120 all positions, like in all portions of of like the 2:04:10.160 --> 2:04:13.960 class society have in them kind of like the capacity 2:04:13.960 --> 2:04:16.960 for cruelty. And there's just people like that, but they 2:04:16.960 --> 2:04:19.600 don't normally have the ability to just do it to 2:04:19.680 --> 2:04:23.080 you directly in your face. And that's yeah, and that's 2:04:23.120 --> 2:04:24.840 like that's you know, this is what you've been talking about, 2:04:24.920 --> 2:04:26.720 is like, yeah, you have like these small business tyrants, 2:04:26.720 --> 2:04:29.560 and like every suddenly in the same way that like, 2:04:29.560 --> 2:04:32.360 I don't know, you're dealing with like like one of 2:04:32.360 --> 2:04:34.880 the random King Louis and you're like in the court 2:04:34.960 --> 2:04:37.360 and suddenly just like the fact that this guy doesn't 2:04:37.400 --> 2:04:39.560 like people going to the bathroom means that everyone around 2:04:39.640 --> 2:04:41.720 him doesn't get it, doesn't get doesn't get a shit, right, 2:04:41.760 --> 2:04:44.839 Like it's just like, yeah, it's weird. 2:04:44.920 --> 2:04:48.560 Yeah, no exactly. It's like it's actually an argument that 2:04:49.600 --> 2:04:55.000 she's deployed in her Reddit correspondence, which has been skimmingly 2:04:55.080 --> 2:04:58.160 a pretty active part of her spare time that she's 2:04:58.160 --> 2:05:00.800 not spending at the bargaining table with us, you know, 2:05:01.240 --> 2:05:05.200 made this comparison of like this isn't a question about 2:05:05.200 --> 2:05:08.320 oligarchs or whatever. And it's true, like the small businessman 2:05:08.840 --> 2:05:14.760 is not an oligarch, but the small business is a 2:05:14.800 --> 2:05:21.200 microcosm of like the larger capitalist social order. And while 2:05:21.680 --> 2:05:25.280 the small business man might not have the scope of 2:05:25.360 --> 2:05:30.320 power of the oligarch, or like the actual capital resources 2:05:30.320 --> 2:05:34.200 of an oligarch, the behavior certainly rhymes yeah. 2:05:34.760 --> 2:05:36.960 Yeah, and again it's like it's a lot of it 2:05:37.040 --> 2:05:40.120 is about it's just how much power you have access to, right, Like, 2:05:41.400 --> 2:05:44.280 lots of people can be like this, but only the few, 2:05:44.400 --> 2:05:47.080 the proud, the small business type get to do it. 2:05:47.840 --> 2:05:52.000 Yeah, totally. And you know, ultimately the employer or wherever 2:05:52.040 --> 2:05:55.920 they are, they're in this privileged position of being able 2:05:56.000 --> 2:05:59.520 to Yeah, you spend most people more on than like 2:05:59.560 --> 2:06:02.360 a thirty your life at work. Yeah, the employer has 2:06:02.440 --> 2:06:05.440 this unique power to dictate what that third of your 2:06:05.440 --> 2:06:09.800 life looks like. You know, yeah, we talk about I mean, shit, 2:06:09.880 --> 2:06:13.360 we don't. People are not so much talking about democracy 2:06:14.400 --> 2:06:18.600 writ large in the US in the same way now 2:06:18.800 --> 2:06:22.280 they used to. But you know, you talk about this 2:06:22.360 --> 2:06:26.080 idea of like living in a democracy, but democracy ends 2:06:26.080 --> 2:06:26.840 at the shop door. 2:06:27.000 --> 2:06:32.560 Yeah. Yeah, And like the kind of power that these 2:06:32.600 --> 2:06:35.760 people have is something that like these people get to 2:06:35.800 --> 2:06:38.800 control when you can go to the bathroom, like what 2:06:39.040 --> 2:06:42.760 clothes you where, like literally what you can do, what 2:06:42.800 --> 2:06:46.040 you can say at any given time. If you employed 2:06:46.120 --> 2:06:49.240 the exact level of control that your boss has over 2:06:49.280 --> 2:06:51.760 you on a state, it would be a totalitarian state. 2:06:52.280 --> 2:06:54.960 And yet everyone seems to think that this is sort 2:06:54.960 --> 2:06:57.600 of like, you know, and this is this annoytment I've 2:06:57.600 --> 2:07:01.320 been making about like Trump is that like yeah, this 2:07:01.400 --> 2:07:02.200 is this is this is. 2:07:02.160 --> 2:07:03.840 What sort of Trump and Elon and like the whole 2:07:03.880 --> 2:07:05.800 Caudra and and you know, and Petrick, if you want 2:07:05.800 --> 2:07:07.680 to go into the sort of ideologues behind it too, 2:07:07.760 --> 2:07:11.320 this is what people like Peter Thiel want when when 2:07:11.320 --> 2:07:13.600 they say run the government like a business, what they 2:07:13.640 --> 2:07:15.960 mean is that they want to like to import the 2:07:16.000 --> 2:07:19.360 sort of like just the pure tyranny of the workplace 2:07:19.960 --> 2:07:22.320 and expand it into the entire political system so that 2:07:22.360 --> 2:07:27.120 they're they're like sort of pure like totalitarian corporate rule 2:07:27.360 --> 2:07:28.440 can't be challenged. 2:07:28.800 --> 2:07:30.960 Yeah, yeah, I mean, wasn't it Missollini who declined the 2:07:31.000 --> 2:07:31.920 term the corporate state? 2:07:33.080 --> 2:07:36.120 Probably, although it would not surprise me if it was 2:07:36.160 --> 2:07:38.960 like some other fascist theorists and Wessolini just started saying 2:07:39.000 --> 2:07:43.640 it because yeah, but yeah, like that's you know, that's 2:07:43.640 --> 2:07:47.280 a substantive thing here. And what this also means is 2:07:47.320 --> 2:07:50.240 that like, even in ways that are sort of hard 2:07:50.240 --> 2:07:53.400 to see, like a fight over democracy in the workplace, 2:07:53.480 --> 2:07:55.839 right is a is a part of the larger struggle 2:07:55.840 --> 2:07:58.280 against all of all the things that's happening because if 2:07:58.320 --> 2:08:00.880 you know, if we're gonna survive this, and if we're 2:08:00.880 --> 2:08:03.960 going to make sure that we don't all live in 2:08:04.000 --> 2:08:06.560 a world where you like, if you say the wrong thing, 2:08:06.600 --> 2:08:09.880 you can be sent to a prison camp. Democracy, if 2:08:09.880 --> 2:08:11.520 you want this to survive, is going to have to 2:08:11.640 --> 2:08:14.240 march into like into the layer of the beast. It 2:08:14.320 --> 2:08:17.120 is going to have to go into the source of 2:08:17.160 --> 2:08:19.720 this tyranny itself, which is the workplace, and it's going 2:08:19.760 --> 2:08:20.720 to have to crush it there. 2:08:20.960 --> 2:08:24.200 Mm hmm, yeah, yeah, I mean, you said it very 2:08:24.600 --> 2:08:28.919 very aptly there, Like the corporate structure maras the totalitarian structure, 2:08:29.640 --> 2:08:34.600 and you know, not only does like fighting the corporate 2:08:34.640 --> 2:08:38.840 structure at the level of labor makes sense in that right, 2:08:38.960 --> 2:08:45.000 labor is what enables the flow of capital that sustains 2:08:45.400 --> 2:08:49.560 the totalitarian state. But also, like you said, you're you're 2:08:50.120 --> 2:08:55.920 you're addressing the structure in its I don't know, I 2:08:55.920 --> 2:08:58.320 almost think of it as like the you know, like 2:08:58.640 --> 2:09:02.560 Grendel's mother and the then or whatever, and like, you know, 2:09:02.760 --> 2:09:08.080 the the authoritarian thing is like it's like Grendel maybe, 2:09:08.120 --> 2:09:13.920 and like Grendel's mother is like this capitalist, hierarchical structure. Yeah, 2:09:14.400 --> 2:09:16.760 you know, you take it on with an insistence on 2:09:16.920 --> 2:09:22.960 workplace democracy as kind of libby as that's that sounds. 2:09:24.360 --> 2:09:28.640 Okay, speaking speaking speaking of capitalist will tellitariotism. Here are 2:09:28.680 --> 2:09:30.840 the ads that we are required to run by. 2:09:30.800 --> 2:09:57.040 Our let's hear him. 2:09:45.360 --> 2:09:52.160 And we are back. So let's get back a little 2:09:52.160 --> 2:09:55.560 bit towards the more concrete parts of the union though 2:09:55.600 --> 2:09:57.360 I do have more to say eventually at some point 2:09:57.400 --> 2:10:00.360 about the way that sort of labor liberalism co opted 2:10:00.400 --> 2:10:03.800 democracy in the workplace from like you know, the idea 2:10:03.840 --> 2:10:07.760 the old sort of like anarchist idea of workers control. Right, 2:10:08.360 --> 2:10:10.480 But okay, so one thing I wanted to talk about 2:10:10.520 --> 2:10:12.240 before we sort of get into the more formal stuff 2:10:12.240 --> 2:10:15.440 about about the strike is I was I'm really interested 2:10:16.440 --> 2:10:19.280 to hear you talk about what the process of kind 2:10:19.280 --> 2:10:21.720 of onboarding you to get more involved in the union is, 2:10:21.760 --> 2:10:26.320 because this is something that like, okay, every functional union 2:10:26.400 --> 2:10:29.360 wants to do this, Like if your union is not 2:10:29.560 --> 2:10:33.160 trying to bring people like its members like more to 2:10:33.400 --> 2:10:35.120 get more involved in the union and become more of 2:10:35.160 --> 2:10:38.240 the people becoming like core organizers and becoming you know, 2:10:38.280 --> 2:10:39.720 like they're the people who are doing your bargain and 2:10:39.720 --> 2:10:43.080 people are doing anything like your union is, there's weird 2:10:43.120 --> 2:10:45.080 shit about it and you should probably like be looking 2:10:45.120 --> 2:10:48.440 into that, but it's pretty hard. So, yeah, can can 2:10:48.480 --> 2:10:50.320 you talk a bit about the process of like how 2:10:50.400 --> 2:10:52.960 you were brought in and what sort of worked and 2:10:53.000 --> 2:10:53.440 what didn't. 2:10:54.440 --> 2:10:59.880 Well, I think ultimately, like the easiest thing is a 2:11:01.520 --> 2:11:06.760 sort of ramping up degree of like responsibility within the organization. Right, So, 2:11:06.920 --> 2:11:10.000 like at the start, I would come to some of 2:11:10.000 --> 2:11:12.280 the meetings, I would miss some of them. I would 2:11:12.280 --> 2:11:15.360 be like, Oh, I'm fucking so busy with whatever is 2:11:15.400 --> 2:11:18.240 going on in my life. And you know, I was 2:11:18.280 --> 2:11:21.640 supportive and sort of involved, but you know, I wasn't 2:11:21.760 --> 2:11:24.120 like I mean, I ston wasn't doing things like this. 2:11:26.920 --> 2:11:32.680 And you know, eventually one we like kind of persisted 2:11:32.720 --> 2:11:37.600 as a union over a longer period of time, the 2:11:37.600 --> 2:11:43.120 necessity of involvement became more like obvious to me, right, 2:11:43.880 --> 2:11:48.120 And that's that's a hard ask. You know, Like you're organizing, 2:11:48.920 --> 2:11:52.280 you want momentum and you want yeah, you want to 2:11:52.320 --> 2:11:53.880 be able to change your conditions for the better as 2:11:53.880 --> 2:11:59.440 soon as possible. Yeah, And with with urban or you know, 2:12:00.320 --> 2:12:03.760 lots of workplaces that need unionization have high turnover, right, 2:12:04.280 --> 2:12:08.240 and Urban Ore is no different. And so I saw, 2:12:08.320 --> 2:12:11.440 you know, like some of the more committed elements of 2:12:11.480 --> 2:12:17.880 the bargaining unit be fired or quit or whatever, and 2:12:18.720 --> 2:12:21.720 you know they would be replaced with other people and 2:12:21.800 --> 2:12:23.760 you have to begin the work of organizing over again. 2:12:23.760 --> 2:12:25.120 And with some of them you succeed with something that 2:12:25.160 --> 2:12:28.760 you don't, you know, you have different dynamics. I feel 2:12:28.800 --> 2:12:31.600 like the hiring procedures may have changed a little bit 2:12:31.680 --> 2:12:35.240 afteryone our election, but you know, I can't say that 2:12:35.320 --> 2:12:39.360 for certain. So the sort of like necessity of like 2:12:40.360 --> 2:12:43.960 keeping that like flame going, especially after we had won 2:12:44.000 --> 2:12:45.840 the election we were in contract bargain for a long 2:12:45.840 --> 2:12:49.280 period of time, made me feel like a sort of 2:12:49.320 --> 2:12:51.400 sense of like I need to be more active in 2:12:51.440 --> 2:12:56.520 this because like this is an important struggle and like, yeah, 2:12:56.680 --> 2:12:59.480 I see our like main organizers taking on like a 2:12:59.520 --> 2:13:04.760 fuck load of work and like needing more voices at 2:13:04.760 --> 2:13:08.720 the table, needing more more uh, needing more people to 2:13:08.720 --> 2:13:13.560 be more involved. And so like I, you know, volunteered 2:13:14.200 --> 2:13:18.960 to run for treasure. That was the only candidate. Yeah, 2:13:19.360 --> 2:13:21.320 but theoretically I could have been voted down. They could 2:13:21.320 --> 2:13:25.800 have been like I don't know about fessor, And you know, 2:13:26.040 --> 2:13:30.760 like ended up having like a little bit more direct responsibilities. 2:13:30.840 --> 2:13:33.480 Like I was like receiving some of the donations to 2:13:33.520 --> 2:13:35.840 our strike phone once we started fundraising for the strike 2:13:35.920 --> 2:13:37.640 and to keep track of those and you know, put 2:13:37.680 --> 2:13:40.600 some special bank account and then eventually take that money, 2:13:40.600 --> 2:13:43.480 get it to like the the i w W branch, 2:13:44.360 --> 2:13:49.680 uh hand it hand a big check to dono that 2:13:49.760 --> 2:13:53.200 kind of stuff. And just like having like little things 2:13:53.320 --> 2:13:57.920 to be doing, like yeah, spurs involvement other people, you know, 2:13:58.600 --> 2:14:02.680 became responsible for like parts of social media outreach, graphics, 2:14:02.680 --> 2:14:08.000 stuff like that, and also like sort of I guess, 2:14:08.720 --> 2:14:14.200 giving people the opportunity to leverage their individual connections within 2:14:14.240 --> 2:14:17.000 the work because every workplace is like clicks and groups 2:14:17.000 --> 2:14:21.040 and subgroups and all that to leverage those connections in 2:14:21.280 --> 2:14:26.320 like service of bettering everyone's conditions. So like to a 2:14:26.360 --> 2:14:28.840 certain degree, I've I've been like important as like an 2:14:28.960 --> 2:14:32.320 envoid to my particular department because it's our job takes 2:14:32.400 --> 2:14:34.160 us away from the job site or like from like 2:14:34.200 --> 2:14:36.920 the main the main work site often and stuff like that, 2:14:37.160 --> 2:14:40.560 so there's less of a direct avenue for communication there. Ye, 2:14:40.880 --> 2:14:44.240 So I can say that's my experience. Yeah, as far 2:14:44.240 --> 2:14:47.120 as organizing goes, like, I'm easy. You know, I was 2:14:47.160 --> 2:14:51.760 already I was already believing in it, and like there 2:14:51.800 --> 2:14:56.080 are others that it have that it's been harder. I 2:14:56.120 --> 2:15:02.400 will say though, that the strike itself is I mean, 2:15:02.920 --> 2:15:07.560 a strike is a conflict, and when you're in conflict together, 2:15:08.080 --> 2:15:12.760 it's an extremely cohering force. Which isn't to say that 2:15:12.840 --> 2:15:15.880 like necessarily you want your unionization to come to a strike, 2:15:16.560 --> 2:15:20.440 but perhaps like raising a sort of consciousness of like 2:15:21.000 --> 2:15:23.520 the fact that like you are ultimately like in conflict 2:15:23.520 --> 2:15:26.240 with the boss. The boss doesn't want you to unionize. 2:15:26.800 --> 2:15:29.480 The boss doesn't want you to force concessions out of them, 2:15:29.800 --> 2:15:34.440 and that like, as a union we are taking on 2:15:34.480 --> 2:15:39.600 this like responsibility to look after each other's interests and 2:15:39.640 --> 2:15:42.680 to like support each other like tangibly in terms of 2:15:42.680 --> 2:15:45.040 like what we do, and also intangibly in terms of 2:15:45.040 --> 2:15:47.960 like the kind of conversations we have around like morale 2:15:48.400 --> 2:15:51.320 planning and stuff like that, you know, to succeed together. 2:15:51.920 --> 2:15:56.200 I think those are like really potent cohering forces. And 2:15:57.040 --> 2:16:00.600 you know, it helps to have a good you know, 2:16:00.720 --> 2:16:04.360 the boss is the best organizer and at urban or 2:16:04.560 --> 2:16:09.680 it's you don't go along without coming head to head 2:16:09.720 --> 2:16:15.800 with like the with with conflict with ownership or with 2:16:15.920 --> 2:16:21.000 like ownership through the mediator of management. Like although like 2:16:21.120 --> 2:16:27.320 support for the union might be divided a bit at 2:16:27.320 --> 2:16:31.720 the workplace, one thing that's pretty universal is like frustration 2:16:31.800 --> 2:16:32.440 with ownership. 2:16:32.879 --> 2:16:36.520 Yeah, so, okay, speaking of speaking of a frustration with ownership, 2:16:36.720 --> 2:16:38.480 it is time for us to go to ads one 2:16:38.560 --> 2:16:39.240 last time. 2:16:39.680 --> 2:16:40.560 And that beautiful. 2:16:40.640 --> 2:16:43.320 But then africames back strike strike, strike, strike. 2:16:43.200 --> 2:16:58.080 Strike, strike, strike, just after this message, Okay, we are 2:16:58.120 --> 2:17:00.280 back from a bunch of people who almost as we 2:17:00.360 --> 2:17:01.640 do not want you to go on strike. 2:17:01.760 --> 2:17:05.879 But yeah, so let's let's let's let's get into the 2:17:06.000 --> 2:17:11.240 process of how you actually organize a strike. Yeah, let's 2:17:11.240 --> 2:17:14.480 start from just like the very beginning, one of the 2:17:14.520 --> 2:17:16.959 kinds of things that were happening that you know, made 2:17:16.959 --> 2:17:18.440 people think that you needed to do this in the 2:17:18.440 --> 2:17:18.960 first place. 2:17:19.600 --> 2:17:25.320 So the strike itself is a result specifically, like, this 2:17:25.360 --> 2:17:31.039 is a ULP strike, So it's in response to something 2:17:31.040 --> 2:17:34.199 that falls under the category of unfairly or practice according 2:17:34.240 --> 2:17:37.640 to the National Labor Relations Act, And it's you know, 2:17:38.240 --> 2:17:41.760 backed up by charges filed with the board as opposed 2:17:41.800 --> 2:17:44.400 to like what's called an economic strike, which is a 2:17:45.280 --> 2:17:49.359 strike that is specifically about economic issues at the workplace. 2:17:49.920 --> 2:17:53.240 So the specific ulp that's being cited for our strike 2:17:53.440 --> 2:17:56.760 is bad faith bargaining. And for us, what that's looked 2:17:56.800 --> 2:18:03.959 like is two years of completely stalled negotiations where we 2:18:04.760 --> 2:18:07.920 are basically being faced with a take it or leave 2:18:07.959 --> 2:18:11.560 it offer of the status quo in the vast majority 2:18:11.920 --> 2:18:17.959 of our proposals. Yeah, bargaining is very, very slow, and 2:18:19.520 --> 2:18:25.400 ownership has held tightly to the offense at us having 2:18:25.480 --> 2:18:29.199 unionized it all, which to my understanding is pretty typical 2:18:29.200 --> 2:18:33.480 of small workplaces. The ownership takes it very personally, and 2:18:34.480 --> 2:18:39.720 that personal feeling of the trail or whatever becomes like 2:18:39.760 --> 2:18:42.680 a stumbling block in the negotiation process. I know that 2:18:42.760 --> 2:18:45.920 was the case with mos Another's bookshop in Berkeley that 2:18:46.600 --> 2:18:51.080 also unionized with the AWW. So, you know, we've had 2:18:51.080 --> 2:18:54.280 our whole proposal on ownership's table for a year and 2:18:54.320 --> 2:18:58.520 a half now. We had started with a bargaining proposal. 2:18:58.560 --> 2:19:02.199 By proposal, they said, well, how can we possibly agree 2:19:02.240 --> 2:19:05.040 to any of this without understanding the full context, especially 2:19:05.120 --> 2:19:09.000 the economic context, And so we gave them a full 2:19:09.040 --> 2:19:11.680 proposal and they said, oh my god, how do you 2:19:11.680 --> 2:19:14.320 expect us to read all of this in time to bargain? 2:19:15.040 --> 2:19:17.560 This is way too much. How we're going to evaluate 2:19:17.600 --> 2:19:19.160 this all? Oh my god, we got to do a 2:19:19.240 --> 2:19:25.520 proposal by proposal. So it's been really unclear to us 2:19:25.760 --> 2:19:28.640 if ownership has even actually like read the entirety of 2:19:28.640 --> 2:19:32.280 our collective bargaining agreement that we put on their desk. 2:19:32.879 --> 2:19:35.840 I know that in the past lawyers have the lawyers 2:19:35.840 --> 2:19:39.280 have said things like, oh my, my eyes glazed over 2:19:39.320 --> 2:19:41.280 when I read your email, So I missed such and 2:19:41.320 --> 2:19:42.320 such part of it. 2:19:42.320 --> 2:19:45.760 It's literally your job contract. 2:19:46.240 --> 2:19:47.320 You have one job. 2:19:48.400 --> 2:19:50.280 Yeah, you would think like a lawyer would have like 2:19:50.320 --> 2:19:52.920 a little bit more of like Jesus, like a tweet 2:19:52.959 --> 2:19:54.800 tweet sized reading capacity. 2:19:54.840 --> 2:19:57.400 But well they give any one law degrees. 2:19:57.560 --> 2:20:02.600 Yeah, or like ownerships saying like well, I just thought 2:20:02.720 --> 2:20:04.840 it was so ridiculous. I didn't fel they need to 2:20:04.840 --> 2:20:07.240 read all of it. Stuff like that. Oh my god, 2:20:07.680 --> 2:20:09.680 does these readers bad faith bargaining? 2:20:10.080 --> 2:20:15.039 Yeah, that's bad by like the standards of like normal, 2:20:15.480 --> 2:20:17.720 it takes two years to do a fucking contract because 2:20:17.720 --> 2:20:22.480 they're just not doing shit, and like, good lord, usually. 2:20:22.520 --> 2:20:25.160 In those long contract negotiations by two years at least, 2:20:25.160 --> 2:20:26.920 there's like been some progress. 2:20:27.000 --> 2:20:31.800 Yeah, yeah, well that they've read the proposals, Like yes, okay, 2:20:32.000 --> 2:20:34.520 will will will your boss show up to your meeting 2:20:34.560 --> 2:20:36.240 an hour and a half late because they didn't bother 2:20:36.280 --> 2:20:38.160 to look through the proposals until literally right at the 2:20:38.160 --> 2:20:40.120 time the meeting was going to start. Yes, but will 2:20:40.120 --> 2:20:40.920 they have done it? 2:20:41.120 --> 2:20:47.160 Usually yes, m m yeah. And in fact, in the 2:20:47.520 --> 2:20:51.039 sort of company propaganda where they're claiming that this like 2:20:51.080 --> 2:20:54.160 bad faith bargaining charge has no grounds, they're like ownership 2:20:54.160 --> 2:20:57.959 has come to like twenty five to thirty bargaining sessions, 2:20:58.440 --> 2:21:00.560 neglecting to mention there events we're in the range of 2:21:00.640 --> 2:21:07.320 like fifty to sixty, And of course maybe they've shown 2:21:07.360 --> 2:21:08.520 that more than half. 2:21:08.600 --> 2:21:11.360 I don't want to be libelous, but yeah, but still 2:21:11.400 --> 2:21:14.359 like if at the point of which you are failing 2:21:14.400 --> 2:21:16.879 to show up for any bargaining session, I think you 2:21:16.920 --> 2:21:18.840 can like, look, I have. 2:21:18.879 --> 2:21:21.200 Always advocated that if that, if that advantagement doesn't show 2:21:21.200 --> 2:21:22.720 up to a bargaining session, you should just be allowed 2:21:22.720 --> 2:21:25.200 to take the company, because clearly they're not serious about it. 2:21:25.480 --> 2:21:29.320 But hey, you know they've been talking about a worker 2:21:29.360 --> 2:21:35.280 cup for twenty years, not performance reforms, but yeah, so 2:21:35.840 --> 2:21:38.360 those kind of things. And then like finally, like one 2:21:38.360 --> 2:21:42.440 of the bigger precipitating factors is, like we've been trying 2:21:42.440 --> 2:21:46.600 to bargain over economics, ownership has implied a lot of 2:21:46.680 --> 2:21:50.320 times that they cannot afford to pay what we're asking. 2:21:51.440 --> 2:21:54.000 They say it'll ruin the company, they say a company 2:21:54.040 --> 2:21:56.480 will go bankrupt, they say it's unsustainable, they say this 2:21:56.520 --> 2:21:58.320 and that, and then when they get to the table, 2:21:58.320 --> 2:22:00.160 they say, we have never and will never are your 2:22:00.200 --> 2:22:03.360 inability to pay. Because the thing is is that to 2:22:03.400 --> 2:22:08.440 say inability to pay right, it obligates you to furnish 2:22:08.440 --> 2:22:11.840 information to prove that, and they, for whatever reason do 2:22:11.959 --> 2:22:16.520 not want. Wow, I wonder why British financial information. So 2:22:17.440 --> 2:22:19.400 these have been some of the sticking points, and that's 2:22:19.400 --> 2:22:21.800 why we've been out on the picky line for about 2:22:21.840 --> 2:22:24.640 three weeks now, still waiting for them to come to 2:22:24.680 --> 2:22:25.080 the table. 2:22:25.320 --> 2:22:28.160 God damn it. So okay, let's let's talk about like 2:22:28.840 --> 2:22:31.720 the just sort of the process of like how the 2:22:31.760 --> 2:22:34.680 discussions went for doing this, What did those sort of 2:22:34.720 --> 2:22:36.360 look like, and how did how did you sort of 2:22:36.560 --> 2:22:38.520 you know, just like plant plan this thing out. 2:22:38.920 --> 2:22:41.200 Well, I guess the process towards like deciding that I 2:22:41.240 --> 2:22:43.720 needed to come to a strike was like, you know 2:22:43.800 --> 2:22:47.240 that that is a sort of thing that builds over 2:22:47.280 --> 2:22:49.680 a long period of time. You know, you see ownership 2:22:49.720 --> 2:22:52.920 doing bad faith brackening. You go, what more conciliatory approaches 2:22:52.959 --> 2:22:55.720 can we take first? You know, can we try this? 2:22:56.120 --> 2:22:58.320 Can we try offering this to make you know, can 2:22:58.360 --> 2:23:01.560 we try this display of good faith? And we offered 2:23:01.600 --> 2:23:06.000 this compromise. One of the things that was a big 2:23:06.040 --> 2:23:11.000 part was of some of the not exactly contract related discussions, 2:23:11.000 --> 2:23:13.640 but like has been talking for a long time about 2:23:13.680 --> 2:23:15.959 a co op transition that it's never happened. It's been 2:23:16.000 --> 2:23:20.240 twenty years, and you know, now that we've unionized, they're 2:23:20.240 --> 2:23:22.440 like our people who we were talking to about doing 2:23:22.440 --> 2:23:24.880 the co op thing, they don't work with unions and 2:23:24.959 --> 2:23:26.160 so the only way that they were going to be 2:23:26.200 --> 2:23:28.160 a co op is if the union goes away. And 2:23:28.200 --> 2:23:31.160 so in response to that, we said, well, we're totally 2:23:31.160 --> 2:23:34.560 opened to a transition to a co op that involves 2:23:34.600 --> 2:23:37.760 the union, and here is such and such organization. It 2:23:37.879 --> 2:23:40.039 was our lead negotiator who actually provide the information some 2:23:40.240 --> 2:23:42.240 or the name of the organization, but you know, here's 2:23:42.240 --> 2:23:46.640 such and such organization that actually specifically deals with union 2:23:47.280 --> 2:23:54.720 co op workplace transitions. Was not received with interest. So 2:23:54.760 --> 2:23:59.320 it's like your massive catalogue of bad faith bargaining and 2:24:00.080 --> 2:24:02.120 end up in your strategy discussions with the whole unit 2:24:02.600 --> 2:24:06.520 testing the wires of like when is too much? What's 2:24:06.560 --> 2:24:09.560 our red line that we need to take more direct action? 2:24:10.520 --> 2:24:14.840 And what that began with for us was first, well, 2:24:15.360 --> 2:24:16.640 if we're going to have if we're going to have 2:24:16.640 --> 2:24:21.320 a strike, we need funds for it. The IWW is 2:24:21.959 --> 2:24:26.160 an organization that affords its unions a lot of freedom 2:24:26.280 --> 2:24:30.200 and a lot of mutual support and solidarity, is not 2:24:30.560 --> 2:24:36.200 an organization with a huge amount of money. And so 2:24:36.920 --> 2:24:40.080 we did start with trying to get like a sense 2:24:40.120 --> 2:24:42.840 of like what we could get from you know, the 2:24:43.400 --> 2:24:48.400 branches reserve, and we moved on from that to how 2:24:48.400 --> 2:24:50.240 we were going to fundraise and stuff like that. So 2:24:50.280 --> 2:24:56.959 we held informational pickets that had donations, we sold shirts, posters, 2:24:57.000 --> 2:25:00.920 stuff like that. We held like a big strike fundraise. Yeah, 2:25:01.120 --> 2:25:03.680 I think something around like a month in advance of 2:25:04.400 --> 2:25:06.240 our or it was maybe like a month and a 2:25:06.280 --> 2:25:09.440 half in advance of our of our strike. We also 2:25:10.120 --> 2:25:13.800 gave management like a courtesy notice about this so they 2:25:13.840 --> 2:25:16.160 could pass it on to ownership, saying, hey, we've started 2:25:16.160 --> 2:25:18.720 a fundraising for a strike in the hopes that like 2:25:19.480 --> 2:25:23.039 being aware that we're taking active preparations to go on 2:25:23.120 --> 2:25:25.960 strike would facilitate bargaining. 2:25:26.240 --> 2:25:28.920 Sometimes it works, I've seen I've seen it before. I've 2:25:28.920 --> 2:25:29.440 seen it before. 2:25:29.560 --> 2:25:35.120 Sometimes it works, yeah, and sometimes, you know, sometimes you 2:25:35.240 --> 2:25:39.720 end up on a podcast talking about how it didn't. 2:25:40.520 --> 2:25:43.080 You never know what until you try it, You never know. 2:25:44.959 --> 2:25:47.600 But we did. Yeah, we did give them that sort 2:25:47.600 --> 2:25:52.320 of early warning, and our readiness to strike kind of 2:25:52.360 --> 2:25:54.920 like depended then on like where we were at in 2:25:54.959 --> 2:25:58.279 the fundraising process. So we continue to sort of listening donations, 2:25:58.320 --> 2:26:01.600 reaching out to various organizations in the area that are, 2:26:01.680 --> 2:26:05.920 you know, pro labor. You know, we talked to like 2:26:06.560 --> 2:26:09.080 DSA whenever because you know, they have their like a 2:26:09.720 --> 2:26:16.400 workplace Organizing committee, yeah walk Yeah, and various other you know, yeah, 2:26:16.680 --> 2:26:20.280 organizations that are pro labor. And once we got to 2:26:20.320 --> 2:26:24.720 a point where you felt like we were reasonably like 2:26:25.400 --> 2:26:29.119 prepared to sustain they open end to strike because that's 2:26:29.160 --> 2:26:31.240 what we're doing. This is a strike with no set 2:26:31.440 --> 2:26:34.960 end date. Then we announced our intention to hold a 2:26:34.959 --> 2:26:38.119 strike vote. We held our strike vote, strike vote passes. 2:26:39.040 --> 2:26:42.119 The ownership was made aware at the barning session before 2:26:42.440 --> 2:26:46.039 the strike vote, so it was like the Monday before 2:26:46.280 --> 2:26:48.360 the strike vote, which is on I think like a Saturday. 2:26:48.920 --> 2:26:52.199 So in totally it was like around maybe like two 2:26:52.240 --> 2:26:57.880 weeks in change that they knew like definite possibility past 2:26:57.920 --> 2:27:02.000 the strike vote. Twelve days later, drike begins with unfortunately 2:27:02.000 --> 2:27:05.280 no bargaining in between. Good lord, Yeah, the whole way. 2:27:05.440 --> 2:27:08.240 You hope that they'll come to the table. You hope that. 2:27:08.240 --> 2:27:10.480 They will come to their senses. 2:27:11.000 --> 2:27:15.080 Yeah, take take the risks seriously, take the risk seriously. 2:27:15.720 --> 2:27:19.600 And unfortunately, this is not what's happened here. Yeah, And 2:27:20.280 --> 2:27:23.160 I think part of that is maybe an age thing. Here, 2:27:23.200 --> 2:27:28.320 ownership is in their eighties, and it pretty consistently held 2:27:28.400 --> 2:27:32.040 the view that like the union is like a bunch 2:27:32.080 --> 2:27:33.880 of young people who don't know what the hell they're 2:27:33.879 --> 2:27:39.640 talking about, you know, even though like the age range 2:27:39.640 --> 2:27:42.320 of our union spans the age range of the workplace. 2:27:42.360 --> 2:27:46.520 We've got people in their fifties and forties and thirties 2:27:46.600 --> 2:27:49.480 and twenties, you know, which is which is of course 2:27:49.520 --> 2:27:54.760 the problematic group, but yeah, the young radicals. Yeah, so 2:27:54.840 --> 2:27:59.120 there's there's been this sort of patronizing attitude that I 2:27:59.120 --> 2:28:02.280 think as a resulted in like a real strategic failure 2:28:02.320 --> 2:28:06.480 on their part to seriously prepare for the strike or 2:28:07.400 --> 2:28:10.120 you know, bargain to avoid it. Yeah. 2:28:10.240 --> 2:28:12.080 One more fundraising thing that I just I just want 2:28:12.080 --> 2:28:14.080 to mention this for people, if you, if you, if 2:28:14.080 --> 2:28:15.680 you're trying to fundraise for your own things, something that's 2:28:15.680 --> 2:28:17.320 actually we've had a lot of success with up in 2:28:17.360 --> 2:28:21.080 Portland is getting bands to do benefit shows. So like, 2:28:21.200 --> 2:28:23.960 because it's Portland, right, Like, the local hardcore scene has 2:28:24.000 --> 2:28:26.720 a lot of bands that you know, are just supportive 2:28:26.720 --> 2:28:28.680 of stuff, and we've do not this for a whole 2:28:28.680 --> 2:28:31.240 bunch of different causes, and this is this this this 2:28:31.400 --> 2:28:32.840 can also be a good way to just sort of 2:28:32.959 --> 2:28:35.320 do fundraising things that are fun and also raise morale 2:28:35.400 --> 2:28:37.959 because yeah, you're doing the show. 2:28:38.440 --> 2:28:40.920 Yeah I was, I was. I was hoping to have 2:28:41.000 --> 2:28:44.680 that be more of a thing with our fundraiser, but yeah. 2:28:44.560 --> 2:28:46.400 It canna be hard to organize sometimes. 2:28:46.480 --> 2:28:48.920 Yeah, the people I knew were didn't get quite the 2:28:49.040 --> 2:28:51.200 response I was hoping from the community. 2:28:51.680 --> 2:28:57.600 If you are hardcore band. If you are abandon Berkeley, 2:28:58.040 --> 2:28:58.840 there's still. 2:28:58.680 --> 2:29:04.039 Time that is that is totally a good option. What 2:29:04.160 --> 2:29:06.039 we did, we ended up doing that. There was music, 2:29:06.040 --> 2:29:09.240 but it's also like one of our organizers is really 2:29:09.240 --> 2:29:12.800 into cooking. You like, did like a barbecue thing. Yeah, 2:29:13.000 --> 2:29:17.600 sold food stuff like that and had a raffle. A 2:29:17.680 --> 2:29:20.320 raffle is a great way to fundraise for us. We 2:29:20.400 --> 2:29:26.640 like raffled off like stuff we have. But honestly, you 2:29:26.640 --> 2:29:29.440 can even do like a straight monetary raffle is still 2:29:29.480 --> 2:29:32.959 a great fundraising tool, you know, where everyone puts in money, 2:29:33.400 --> 2:29:35.879 the winner, the top freet winners or whatever get like 2:29:35.879 --> 2:29:37.680 a certain percentage like the total pool and the rest 2:29:37.720 --> 2:29:41.240 of the pool. Is is a to be cause it's 2:29:41.320 --> 2:29:43.280 really simple, really effective. 2:29:43.800 --> 2:29:46.760 Yeah, there's a reason it's not good, but there is 2:29:46.800 --> 2:29:48.720 a reason why a whole bunch of state education budget 2:29:48.760 --> 2:29:50.119 are footed are footed by the lattery. 2:29:50.680 --> 2:29:54.199 It does work and where the people love to gamble 2:29:54.560 --> 2:29:59.000 much better. Yeah, he says. 2:30:00.000 --> 2:30:03.320 I be turned off her lunch her path of exile 2:30:03.360 --> 2:30:05.560 to lunch break to come to this interview. 2:30:07.080 --> 2:30:08.000 How such cases. 2:30:08.520 --> 2:30:10.360 Okay, so let's let's speaking of I guess this is 2:30:10.360 --> 2:30:12.400 something that has been tied into sort of all and 2:30:12.440 --> 2:30:15.000 saying here, but yeah, let's talk about you know, sort 2:30:15.000 --> 2:30:17.840 of maintaining the strike when it starts to sort of Yeah, 2:30:17.879 --> 2:30:20.120 what have been the processes of like keeping morale up 2:30:20.120 --> 2:30:21.320 and keeping people engaged? 2:30:21.400 --> 2:30:25.800 And yeah, yeah, I mean definitely, when you go into 2:30:25.840 --> 2:30:30.240 a strike, you want to go in with a militant 2:30:30.280 --> 2:30:32.480 core group. You want to basically be sure that everyone 2:30:32.560 --> 2:30:36.560 is committed to holding the line until a collective decision 2:30:36.879 --> 2:30:40.200 is made. Otherwise you don't want people like peeling off. 2:30:40.240 --> 2:30:44.000 That's really bad pr for your strike. Yeah yeah, and 2:30:44.040 --> 2:30:48.320 like the bosses will grab on that. So like for instance, 2:30:48.400 --> 2:30:51.560 like you know, we have some people who are respecting 2:30:51.560 --> 2:30:54.400 our picket line but chose not to pick it with us, 2:30:54.640 --> 2:30:57.440 which is fine as far as I'm concerned. But the 2:30:57.520 --> 2:30:59.840 issue with that PR wise is that now the boss 2:30:59.920 --> 2:31:02.880 is are saying and they're like tallying up of who's 2:31:02.920 --> 2:31:05.760 working and who's not working. They're counting them as working. 2:31:06.520 --> 2:31:10.200 You know, they're like, oh, it's only whatever they've been 2:31:10.240 --> 2:31:13.920 saying eight people. I think it's more nine or ten 2:31:14.320 --> 2:31:16.720 we're on the picket line. But the rest is the 2:31:16.720 --> 2:31:19.200 rest of the employees are working. They count themselves as 2:31:19.200 --> 2:31:24.280 employees in that count of course, and they count these 2:31:24.600 --> 2:31:27.320 these people who are not crossing the picket line but 2:31:27.400 --> 2:31:30.280 not on it also as among that count of the 2:31:30.280 --> 2:31:34.240 rest of the employees they are working what and they've 2:31:34.240 --> 2:31:37.119 had the opportunity to really inflate that count because in 2:31:37.160 --> 2:31:41.440 a sort of you know, classic move. Really all the 2:31:41.480 --> 2:31:43.879 moves are classic. You know, you read your organizing books 2:31:43.920 --> 2:31:49.120 and you're like, can it happen here? It does? So 2:31:49.200 --> 2:31:51.720 like we got a lot of new assistant managers after 2:31:51.760 --> 2:31:55.119 we want our election, so right now, like the composition 2:31:55.160 --> 2:31:58.680 of the workplace right got thirty four people fifteen managers. 2:31:58.920 --> 2:32:01.440 I really I wonder when we're going to see the 2:32:01.520 --> 2:32:04.600 day where you have companies that have six like non 2:32:04.680 --> 2:32:08.280 managers and fifty five managers. Like I feel like we're 2:32:08.560 --> 2:32:09.320 not that far out. 2:32:09.400 --> 2:32:11.560 Well, we're leading the charge here. We have a department 2:32:11.560 --> 2:32:15.480 that's two people a manager and assistant manager. Assistant manager 2:32:15.560 --> 2:32:25.000 managing god. So yeah, you know they're they're they've had 2:32:25.040 --> 2:32:28.560 these particular angles to you know, sort of do their 2:32:28.560 --> 2:32:32.640 propaganda from. And I mean, honestly, I think a big 2:32:32.680 --> 2:32:36.800 part of again, the boss is the best organizer, and 2:32:36.920 --> 2:32:39.080 like a thing that keeps you committed on the line 2:32:39.200 --> 2:32:41.920 is like reading all this bullshit they say about you 2:32:43.000 --> 2:32:45.200 and knowing otherwise and being able to talk to each 2:32:45.200 --> 2:32:47.440 other and be like have you seen this? Isn't this crazy? 2:32:47.760 --> 2:32:52.040 Like what the hell? Yeah? Also, you know is uh, 2:32:52.760 --> 2:32:56.880 this is where the sort of like seeds of organizing 2:32:57.480 --> 2:32:59.240 all the way that you start all the way back 2:32:59.240 --> 2:33:02.200 at the beginning of your union campaign become you know, 2:33:02.200 --> 2:33:04.240 you show themselves is like really important again because like 2:33:04.560 --> 2:33:07.440 the start right, anyone will tell you is it's like 2:33:07.440 --> 2:33:10.480 getting to know people, like being like, you know, being 2:33:10.560 --> 2:33:13.120 on like a hey, how's it going kind of level, 2:33:13.240 --> 2:33:16.879 you know, and having like a personal rapport with the 2:33:16.879 --> 2:33:21.080 people you're on the line with is vital just in 2:33:21.120 --> 2:33:23.160 the sense that you know, obviously like you know each other, 2:33:23.120 --> 2:33:24.760 you're sort of friends, You're going to be more likely 2:33:24.760 --> 2:33:28.080 to stick up for each other. But also like you're 2:33:28.120 --> 2:33:31.520 out there nine hours walking in a circle with these people, Yeah, 2:33:31.600 --> 2:33:34.279 you know, you got to you got to have positive, 2:33:34.480 --> 2:33:36.959 strong relationships with them. You want to be able to 2:33:36.959 --> 2:33:39.040 have the kind of rapport where like you can talk 2:33:39.080 --> 2:33:42.560 to people about like what they're feeling anxious about, you know, 2:33:42.879 --> 2:33:46.520 like where they're worried and like the strike strategy, like 2:33:47.000 --> 2:33:48.960 you know, you need to have that like trust between 2:33:49.000 --> 2:33:51.000 each other that you can have like an open dialogue 2:33:51.000 --> 2:33:52.920 about how it feels to be on the picket line, 2:33:53.200 --> 2:33:56.600 because you're not going to maintain morale if ever, if 2:33:56.680 --> 2:33:59.480 like everyone feels like they've got things they got a 2:33:59.480 --> 2:34:02.160 hold in about it, like yeah, there's a room to 2:34:02.160 --> 2:34:05.160 be like shit, like are they going to close the business? 2:34:05.200 --> 2:34:07.240 Like and what are we going to do? And like 2:34:07.280 --> 2:34:09.600 sort of like talk through that from a from a 2:34:09.640 --> 2:34:12.600 place beyond like you know, like what you're not letting 2:34:12.600 --> 2:34:15.680 it speak into a crowd of a million people or whatever. 2:34:15.959 --> 2:34:19.400 You're just like two people, Yeah, going through a stressful 2:34:19.400 --> 2:34:20.120 experience together. 2:34:20.800 --> 2:34:22.760 Yeah. Yeah, and you have to actually grapple with that 2:34:22.800 --> 2:34:25.520 in a way. That's not the sort of like weird 2:34:25.680 --> 2:34:28.560 corporate like we had to improve morale things like that's 2:34:28.600 --> 2:34:32.080 not what that means. It means, like you know, it 2:34:32.120 --> 2:34:36.400 means actually grappling and engaging with people's feelings how and 2:34:36.520 --> 2:34:39.360 what they need in a moment and yeah, and their 2:34:39.400 --> 2:34:43.720 fears and their concerns and yeah, you can't just sort 2:34:43.720 --> 2:34:45.800 of brush them aside. You have to actually grapple with it. 2:34:45.840 --> 2:34:47.879 Because that's that's that's what doing this stuff means. 2:34:48.400 --> 2:34:52.360 Yeah, exactly, having like these authentic conversations with people because 2:34:52.400 --> 2:34:55.280 like like yeah, that's like a totally great point you 2:34:55.320 --> 2:34:59.640 bring up there, Like the hr speak, that's the bosses tool, 2:35:00.200 --> 2:35:03.960 and it's the boss's tool to divide and create disunity. 2:35:04.440 --> 2:35:08.240 So you can't lean on that model for morale within 2:35:08.280 --> 2:35:10.840 your union. It just creates distrust. 2:35:11.480 --> 2:35:14.800 Yeah, And I mean I've seen that happen with unions 2:35:14.800 --> 2:35:17.280 where it's like, you guys did not do a good 2:35:17.360 --> 2:35:20.960 job of like talking to people about this, and like yeah, 2:35:20.959 --> 2:35:23.760 and it can be really disruptive to attempts to do this. 2:35:23.840 --> 2:35:25.720 But on the other hand, if you do it well, 2:35:26.320 --> 2:35:28.320 it's like it's the most powerful single thing that you 2:35:28.360 --> 2:35:32.280 can like possibly do. It's like forging relationships that are 2:35:32.280 --> 2:35:37.680 based on like the actual experience of having gone through 2:35:37.680 --> 2:35:40.280 struggle together and having had to like literally had to 2:35:40.280 --> 2:35:42.000 face your fields on the picket line. 2:35:42.800 --> 2:35:46.440 Yeah. Yeah. Like ideally, you know, the union is a 2:35:46.640 --> 2:35:48.960 is a community, and it's a community of interest, right, 2:35:49.040 --> 2:35:53.240 It's a community of work interest. But it is ideally 2:35:53.280 --> 2:35:57.040 a community. It's not a family, right, and it's certainly 2:35:57.080 --> 2:35:59.200 not not not a family in the way that the 2:35:59.240 --> 2:36:02.640 bosses will type of the workplaces. But it is a community, 2:36:03.040 --> 2:36:05.920 and it's a community in the way that that an 2:36:05.959 --> 2:36:12.400 employer's idea of a community is fundamentally like incompatible. 2:36:11.680 --> 2:36:15.360 With Yeah, there's this this pickI Osto Walt line that 2:36:15.400 --> 2:36:18.400 I think about a lot from her book in Defensive Fluting, 2:36:18.400 --> 2:36:21.440 where she talks about how I feel like it was 2:36:21.520 --> 2:36:25.560 Ferguson that this is about where like the police chiefs 2:36:25.560 --> 2:36:27.240 talking about the damage to the community, and they keep 2:36:27.240 --> 2:36:31.520 saying our Walmart. It's like going into a Walmart and 2:36:31.560 --> 2:36:35.120 buying something is not a community, right, Like, you know, 2:36:35.240 --> 2:36:37.680 they like that like those those kinds of relations are 2:36:37.760 --> 2:36:41.560 not actual community relations. But when the boss was talking 2:36:41.560 --> 2:36:43.800 about community, that's what they mean. They mean like like 2:36:44.160 --> 2:36:48.800 our collective community Walmart. They mean preserving the relation of 2:36:48.840 --> 2:36:52.400 extraction that they have. Yeah, and we are, you know, 2:36:52.640 --> 2:36:57.560 using the same word and reading something literally so radically different. 2:36:57.240 --> 2:37:00.680 Than that, And you have to make sure you're in 2:37:01.440 --> 2:37:04.640 the way that you're acting that that radically different meeting 2:37:04.720 --> 2:37:07.520 is clear. Yeah, And you know, it's funny you bring 2:37:07.520 --> 2:37:10.680 that up, because that's just bringing to mind, like you 2:37:10.720 --> 2:37:13.520 see the difference in those attitudes like when you're out 2:37:13.520 --> 2:37:15.800 there on the picket line, like interact because you know, 2:37:16.160 --> 2:37:18.320 our picket line a really pivotal part of it because 2:37:18.320 --> 2:37:20.240 there are so many managers in there that they're able 2:37:20.280 --> 2:37:23.480 to maintain this, like Skeleton Crew is. The community outreach 2:37:23.560 --> 2:37:26.879 part is like talking to every single person who's coming 2:37:26.920 --> 2:37:30.000 up and being like, Hey, how's it going that I've 2:37:30.000 --> 2:37:32.320 been on strike such and such long? This is what's up. 2:37:32.560 --> 2:37:37.200 Please don't cross our picket line. And you know, I've noticed. 2:37:37.240 --> 2:37:40.000 You get this real funny situation where there are the 2:37:40.000 --> 2:37:42.600 people who are like, I've shopped here for twenty years. 2:37:42.600 --> 2:37:44.120 You don't know what the hell you're talking about. I 2:37:44.160 --> 2:37:45.920 don't know you and have to be like, well, I 2:37:46.000 --> 2:37:47.959 normally at the dump get in the merchandise you're buying. 2:37:48.240 --> 2:37:53.640 But and who attribute the entire attribute everything they like 2:37:53.760 --> 2:37:56.760 about the business to the bosses. And then there's the 2:37:56.840 --> 2:38:01.600 other part of the community that is coming by frequently 2:38:02.120 --> 2:38:04.360 and like hanging out with us on on on the 2:38:04.360 --> 2:38:06.160 picket line. You know, I pet the dog and we 2:38:06.280 --> 2:38:08.520 chat about what's going on. They're like, how's the strike going. 2:38:08.640 --> 2:38:11.120 They're like, you know, I know it's been rough on 2:38:11.160 --> 2:38:13.000 you guys. For such and such, and like these people 2:38:13.040 --> 2:38:14.640 are are are our shoppers too? 2:38:14.760 --> 2:38:14.880 Right? 2:38:14.959 --> 2:38:19.280 But they like, yeah, they it highlights that like sort 2:38:19.320 --> 2:38:22.000 of divide in like what you think of as like 2:38:22.040 --> 2:38:25.640 community and responsibility your community, because like these people also 2:38:26.040 --> 2:38:30.480 love urbanor come here all the time, but they recognize that, 2:38:30.640 --> 2:38:34.680 like it's the workers that urban or that create it 2:38:34.959 --> 2:38:37.920 every day, you know. Yeah, And it is a company 2:38:37.959 --> 2:38:41.680 that was like founded by the individual. The individual still 2:38:41.680 --> 2:38:44.160 owns it. He did found it with his with his 2:38:44.240 --> 2:38:46.640 labor and all that he did, the labor you know, 2:38:47.120 --> 2:38:48.879 back when it was you know, only a few people 2:38:48.920 --> 2:38:52.720 and stuff like that. But ultimately, a business, like any 2:38:52.800 --> 2:38:55.959 sort of social phenomenon, has to be constantly recreated in 2:38:56.040 --> 2:38:56.720 order to exist. 2:38:56.800 --> 2:38:57.679 Yeah. 2:38:57.280 --> 2:38:59.640 Yeah, and like the people who do the work that 2:38:59.720 --> 2:39:01.680 makes it it more than just like a room full 2:39:01.680 --> 2:39:05.720 of garbage rs. And yeah, a lot of a lot 2:39:05.760 --> 2:39:08.879 of the like regulars recognize that, and a lot of 2:39:08.920 --> 2:39:11.440 them you know, flip me off as they cross the 2:39:11.440 --> 2:39:12.240 big line whatever. 2:39:15.720 --> 2:39:17.240 And I think this is a good place to sort 2:39:17.240 --> 2:39:20.080 of start coming to a close on this is a 2:39:20.120 --> 2:39:24.080 fundamental question about what the nature of our society is 2:39:24.120 --> 2:39:27.520 going to be, right, Like is the fundament mental nature 2:39:27.560 --> 2:39:31.240 of our society that a community is a bunch of 2:39:31.280 --> 2:39:33.320 people who buy things, and a bunch of people who 2:39:33.360 --> 2:39:35.280 make money from you buying things, and who make money 2:39:35.320 --> 2:39:38.959 from the labor that you do, right, and then take 2:39:39.000 --> 2:39:41.360 credit for the labor, and take credit both financially for 2:39:41.360 --> 2:39:43.959 the labor and in public for the labor. Right, is 2:39:44.000 --> 2:39:45.920 that going. Is our society going to just be a 2:39:45.959 --> 2:39:49.160 bunch of pure commercial relations where a bunch of people 2:39:49.200 --> 2:39:51.199 get very very rich off of the wabor of everyone 2:39:51.200 --> 2:39:53.640 else in the society and get to rule the mess 2:39:53.640 --> 2:39:56.680 sort of like these petty tyrant kings. Or is it 2:39:56.720 --> 2:39:59.520 going to be a society where the people who produce 2:39:59.560 --> 2:40:03.240 the society control it, right? And that society is a 2:40:03.280 --> 2:40:06.680 democratic society, is an egalitarian society, is a society where 2:40:06.680 --> 2:40:08.400 people are free to do the things that they need 2:40:08.440 --> 2:40:12.720 to do, and people are free to you know, have 2:40:12.760 --> 2:40:15.720 a life where they can fucking pay for their groceries 2:40:15.800 --> 2:40:17.520 right where like you know, where where they're whe they're 2:40:17.600 --> 2:40:20.000 not forced to go to the market for all of 2:40:20.040 --> 2:40:22.960 the things that they need to live, where you can 2:40:23.000 --> 2:40:26.160 survive in a way that doesn't involve like subjecting yourself 2:40:26.240 --> 2:40:30.440 to just a tyrant for like a third of your life. 2:40:30.560 --> 2:40:33.640 Yeah, where where like the place that you spend like 2:40:33.640 --> 2:40:35.840 ae a third of your life is a place where 2:40:35.879 --> 2:40:38.280 you actually have like dignity. 2:40:37.879 --> 2:40:41.879 Dignity and freedom and where you know, where you don't 2:40:41.879 --> 2:40:43.600 have to go home at the end of a day 2:40:43.680 --> 2:40:45.960 of making your boss money worrying about whether you're going 2:40:45.959 --> 2:40:48.720 to be able to eat or not. And it's and 2:40:48.760 --> 2:40:52.480 that's also a society that does not involve again at 2:40:52.480 --> 2:40:56.240 the very highest level, like you getting thrown into prison camps. 2:40:56.640 --> 2:41:00.400 Mister God hates you and we can do that. We 2:41:00.440 --> 2:41:01.600 could live with that society. 2:41:01.800 --> 2:41:06.600 Yeah, the demands are not that crazy. No, And that's 2:41:06.640 --> 2:41:09.680 like the thing that we've encountered over and over again, 2:41:09.840 --> 2:41:13.080 is this this constant push and pull of people saying 2:41:13.160 --> 2:41:17.879 that like the expectation of bettering our conditions, whether it 2:41:17.920 --> 2:41:20.200 be like us on the picket line just trying to 2:41:20.200 --> 2:41:23.000 get like a stable wage and just cause employment and 2:41:23.040 --> 2:41:26.080 stuff like that, or whether it be you know, those 2:41:26.160 --> 2:41:28.960 larger societal changes that like you're talking about use butt 2:41:29.000 --> 2:41:30.960 up against these people who who have such like a 2:41:31.040 --> 2:41:36.279 paucity of imagination about what's possible. Yeah, and like about 2:41:36.320 --> 2:41:40.680 the legitimacy of trying to make something better, the legitimacy 2:41:41.160 --> 2:41:45.600 of saying, sure, I can subsist on this, but yeah, 2:41:46.040 --> 2:41:49.640 there's so much more as possible. Yeah, so I'm maintained 2:41:49.640 --> 2:41:51.520 that there's something more as possible. 2:41:52.160 --> 2:41:55.560 Yeah, I think it's possible too. And that's the thing 2:41:55.600 --> 2:41:57.640 about this world, right, is that our enemies I figured 2:41:57.680 --> 2:41:58.959 out that it actually can change. 2:42:00.040 --> 2:42:01.800 That's why they have to fight so hard. Yeah. 2:42:01.800 --> 2:42:03.240 But the thing is the fact that they can change 2:42:03.280 --> 2:42:04.920 for the worse also means that they can change. 2:42:04.720 --> 2:42:05.080 For the better. 2:42:05.200 --> 2:42:06.240 All beautiful stuff. 2:42:06.640 --> 2:42:08.720 Okay, where where can people find your strike fund? We'll 2:42:08.720 --> 2:42:10.199 also put it in the in the description. 2:42:10.520 --> 2:42:14.920 Oh yeah, great, so it's on GoFundMe. I'll send you 2:42:14.959 --> 2:42:17.840 the link and it'll be down there. But also people 2:42:17.920 --> 2:42:23.520 can hit up our union Instagram. It's urban or workers 2:42:23.600 --> 2:42:28.360 with underscores between the words urban, underscore or underscore worker 2:42:28.720 --> 2:42:31.840 that we've got the link to like strike fund. And also, hey, 2:42:31.840 --> 2:42:34.480 if you're in Berkeley, you can sign up for a 2:42:34.480 --> 2:42:37.160 picket shift and you get to enjoy listening to me 2:42:37.200 --> 2:42:40.280 discourse for nine hours instead of one. 2:42:40.320 --> 2:42:43.040 It's great, it's fun. Pickets are cool and good. If 2:42:43.080 --> 2:42:44.520 you have a bit on one, you should go on one. 2:42:44.640 --> 2:42:47.600 They're great, They're great. Yeah, it's a good time. 2:43:10.200 --> 2:43:14.000 This is it could happen here. Executive Disorder, our weekly 2:43:14.080 --> 2:43:17.320 newscast covering what's happening in the White House, the crumbling world, 2:43:17.360 --> 2:43:20.080 and what it means for you. I'm Garrison Davis today. 2:43:20.080 --> 2:43:24.879 I'm joined by doctor James's Stout and Reverend doctor the 2:43:24.959 --> 2:43:26.440 Honorable Robert Evans. 2:43:27.200 --> 2:43:27.640 That's right. 2:43:27.720 --> 2:43:30.680 M hmm, that's right, Reverend doctor the honorable Evans, who 2:43:30.760 --> 2:43:35.119 is currently hacking up a fucking lung. No idea why 2:43:35.240 --> 2:43:36.560 I feel otherwise fine? 2:43:37.000 --> 2:43:40.080 Well, I'm sure you feel otherwise fine due to this 2:43:40.200 --> 2:43:43.760 great week in American history we've all been through together, Yeah, 2:43:44.320 --> 2:43:48.879 which started with a meeting between President Donald Trump and 2:43:49.000 --> 2:43:54.120 El Salvador President Buklea on Monday morning in the Oval Office, 2:43:54.240 --> 2:43:57.440 where they discussed the possibility of the United States helping 2:43:57.560 --> 2:44:02.080 to build more Seacott style facility to disappear US citizens 2:44:02.120 --> 2:44:06.640 and immigrants that the Trump administration deems criminals or terrorists. 2:44:07.080 --> 2:44:09.920 Yes, I mean, I keep getting asked, is this the 2:44:09.920 --> 2:44:13.840 panic moment? And I don't think panic is particularly productive, 2:44:13.920 --> 2:44:15.800 but like, yeah, this is the worst case scenario. The 2:44:15.840 --> 2:44:18.560 worst case scenario is happening the President's talking about sending 2:44:19.000 --> 2:44:23.720 citizens overseas to a concentration camp. Honestly, I'm on the 2:44:23.800 --> 2:44:26.080 verge of thinking it's okay to call it a death camp. 2:44:26.120 --> 2:44:28.120 But we just don't have the data yet. There's some 2:44:28.400 --> 2:44:32.840 very concerning satellite shots that appear to show piles of bodies. 2:44:33.120 --> 2:44:34.840 Yeah, that's from March of twenty twenty four. 2:44:35.360 --> 2:44:37.480 Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, but it won't have. 2:44:37.480 --> 2:44:41.320 Gotten better no, no, yeah, yeah. 2:44:40.640 --> 2:44:43.480 So I don't know. This is about as bad as 2:44:43.520 --> 2:44:45.760 it could be, folks, We're in it. 2:44:46.280 --> 2:44:49.280 During that meeting, both President Bukeley and the Trump cabinet 2:44:49.720 --> 2:44:52.959 argue that there's simply no way for people sent to 2:44:53.000 --> 2:44:56.440 see God to ever return to the United States, coming 2:44:56.520 --> 2:44:59.560 up with a whole bunch of absurd observed reasons for 2:44:59.600 --> 2:45:02.160 why that is that is impossible due to due to 2:45:02.240 --> 2:45:05.800 foreign policy and safety of both El Salvador and the 2:45:05.879 --> 2:45:08.560 United States. Me and James did a whole episode on 2:45:08.600 --> 2:45:10.760 this earlier this week that you can check out on 2:45:10.800 --> 2:45:14.560 the It could Happen here feed. I'm gonna move on 2:45:14.879 --> 2:45:19.320 to an update on the student crackdowns. So ICE has 2:45:19.320 --> 2:45:23.680 targeted a third Green card holder for deportation based on 2:45:23.800 --> 2:45:30.320 pro Palestinian activism. Mosen Matuwi is a Palestinian from the 2:45:30.360 --> 2:45:32.360 West Bank who has lived in the US with a 2:45:32.360 --> 2:45:36.720 green card for a decade while studying philosophy at Columbia. 2:45:36.760 --> 2:45:40.080 He co founded the Columbia Palestinian Student Union in twenty 2:45:40.080 --> 2:45:44.160 twenty three with Mahmoud Khalil. Maduwi was arrested by Ice 2:45:44.280 --> 2:45:49.439 last Monday, April fourteenth at his citizenship interview in Vermont. 2:45:50.160 --> 2:45:54.039 Now after Khalil was arrested last month, Maduwi went into 2:45:54.080 --> 2:45:58.039 hiding and he suspected that this citizenship interview could be 2:45:58.080 --> 2:46:01.000 a honeypot, but decided to go anyway. After waiting a 2:46:01.040 --> 2:46:05.080 long time for this appointment, his lawyers quickly filed a 2:46:05.080 --> 2:46:08.720 habeas corpus petition arguing his detentions unlawful and Violet's First Amendment. 2:46:09.320 --> 2:46:13.600 A US district judge issued an order hours later that 2:46:13.640 --> 2:46:16.160 he was quote not to be removed from the United 2:46:16.160 --> 2:46:18.320 States or moved out of the territory of the District 2:46:18.320 --> 2:46:23.039 of Vermont, pending for their order of this court. Zionistocksing 2:46:23.040 --> 2:46:27.840 accounts targeted Marwi in recent weeks. I'm going to play 2:46:27.879 --> 2:46:32.280 actually this two minute clip of Marwi talking This is 2:46:32.360 --> 2:46:37.080 from December of twenty twenty three on the program sixty minutes. 2:46:37.480 --> 2:46:41.000 What was your initial reaction when you heard about the 2:46:41.640 --> 2:46:43.880 Hamas attack on October seventh. 2:46:44.600 --> 2:46:48.600 I could not believe what my eyes were seeing, where 2:46:48.640 --> 2:46:54.600 I see Hamas members getting into settlements and so on. 2:46:55.440 --> 2:46:58.199 But also the first moment I saw that, I put 2:46:58.280 --> 2:47:05.520 my hand on my heart and I started praying, knowing 2:47:06.280 --> 2:47:08.960 that there will be a huge level of revenge from 2:47:09.000 --> 2:47:13.680 the Israelis, and I was praying that this will not 2:47:13.879 --> 2:47:17.640 be the result, because it would be disastrous. 2:47:18.160 --> 2:47:21.160 The night of the rally, I believe someone in the 2:47:21.200 --> 2:47:27.680 crowd said something very anti Jewish, not just say anti Israeli, 2:47:27.720 --> 2:47:28.640 but anti Jewish. 2:47:28.840 --> 2:47:35.840 Yes, this was as a walk out on November ninth, 2:47:37.040 --> 2:47:41.120 and a person who is not affiliated with Columbia. We've 2:47:41.160 --> 2:47:44.280 never seen him, we don't know who is this guy 2:47:44.959 --> 2:47:52.280 comes down down the stairs yelling death to Jews. I 2:47:52.440 --> 2:47:56.480 was shocked. And they walked directly to the person and 2:47:56.560 --> 2:48:00.640 they told him you don't represent us because this is 2:48:00.720 --> 2:48:05.480 not something that we agree with, and directly what I've done. 2:48:06.120 --> 2:48:09.120 I tooked the megaphone and they gave a speech and 2:48:09.160 --> 2:48:14.600 they said we here are conscious, educated, students, and we 2:48:14.720 --> 2:48:18.360 know how to separate right from wrong, and what this 2:48:18.480 --> 2:48:24.480 guy has said is wrong. What this guy has said 2:48:25.720 --> 2:48:32.160 is clearly anti sematic against Jews. To be anti Semitic 2:48:32.720 --> 2:48:39.080 is unjust, is unjust, and the fight for the freedom 2:48:39.120 --> 2:48:43.120 of Palestine and the fight against anti Semetism go hand 2:48:43.160 --> 2:48:48.760 in hand, because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. 2:48:50.200 --> 2:48:55.480 Yeah, I mean, he said everything that would make him 2:48:55.480 --> 2:48:59.039 a respectable protester, at least based on what the fucking 2:48:59.040 --> 2:49:01.560 dims were saying last year, Like, there's nothing in there 2:49:01.600 --> 2:49:04.480 that's pro Hamas. There's nothing in anything I can tell 2:49:04.520 --> 2:49:08.400 this guy has done that his advocacy towards terrorism. But 2:49:08.440 --> 2:49:11.800 obviously that's not what matters. What matters is they have 2:49:11.879 --> 2:49:14.400 the ability to get him out, and they're doing that 2:49:14.480 --> 2:49:15.279 because of his speech. 2:49:15.480 --> 2:49:19.360 Yeah, he took a step back from protests in March 2:49:19.400 --> 2:49:22.800 of twenty twenty four, during the second wave of student 2:49:23.040 --> 2:49:24.360 protests at Columbia. 2:49:24.600 --> 2:49:26.360 Yeah, and like I believe he didn't. Isn't he like 2:49:26.400 --> 2:49:28.160 a member of the university Buddhist Club. 2:49:29.080 --> 2:49:30.720 Yes, part of why took a step back was to 2:49:30.720 --> 2:49:33.160 focus on his role in the Buddhist club as a 2:49:33.160 --> 2:49:35.519 as for I think in the past like two years, 2:49:35.280 --> 2:49:39.320 he has been participating in that on campus. Yeah, he 2:49:39.440 --> 2:49:43.400 told CBS News the day before he was detained. Quote, 2:49:43.560 --> 2:49:46.280 if my story will become another story for the struggle 2:49:46.360 --> 2:49:49.320 to have justice and democracy in this country, let it 2:49:49.440 --> 2:49:53.199 be unquote like other students who've been targeted and arrested, 2:49:53.520 --> 2:49:55.680 he has not been charged or accused of any crime, 2:49:56.240 --> 2:49:58.800 but the State Department has deemed him a threat to 2:49:58.879 --> 2:49:59.879 foreign policy. 2:50:00.800 --> 2:50:01.039 Yeah. 2:50:01.120 --> 2:50:03.800 Hot to see how but I think as we're seeing it, 2:50:03.840 --> 2:50:04.680 that doesn't really matter. 2:50:05.160 --> 2:50:06.240 Yeah. 2:50:06.480 --> 2:50:10.440 Now, last Friday, a Louisiana judge ruled in favor of 2:50:10.480 --> 2:50:13.480 the Trump administration to allow the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil, 2:50:13.720 --> 2:50:16.920 upholding the government's argument that the rarely used Cold War 2:50:16.959 --> 2:50:20.440 era statute of the Immigration and Nationality Act allows for 2:50:20.480 --> 2:50:23.000 the Secretary of State to deport aliens that pose quote 2:50:23.120 --> 2:50:28.800 adverse foreign policy consequences. The only quote unquote evidence presented 2:50:28.840 --> 2:50:31.600 in court was a two page memo written by Mark 2:50:31.680 --> 2:50:35.920 Rubio that alleges that Khalil's presence in the country threatens 2:50:36.000 --> 2:50:38.520 quote US policy had to come at anti semitism around 2:50:38.560 --> 2:50:41.000 the world and in the United States. Based on information 2:50:41.040 --> 2:50:45.320 provided by the DHS ICE and Homeland Security investigations regarding 2:50:45.320 --> 2:50:48.760 the participation and rules of Khalil in anti Semitic protests 2:50:48.760 --> 2:50:51.720 and disruptive actions which foster a hostile environment for Jewish 2:50:51.760 --> 2:50:55.160 students in the United States unquote. So there's no real 2:50:55.200 --> 2:50:58.360 evidence in this document. It is just Mark Rubio's opinion 2:50:58.400 --> 2:51:00.040 for two pages. And this is the only ever and 2:51:00.120 --> 2:51:03.080 said ever, has been held in court that resulted in 2:51:03.120 --> 2:51:05.840 the judge ruling in the government's favor. 2:51:06.200 --> 2:51:08.400 A lot of what we're seeing here is the natural 2:51:08.440 --> 2:51:11.400 conclusion to what was happening with like Dance last year 2:51:11.480 --> 2:51:14.760 talking about Haitian immigrants and admitting like, yeah, it's not 2:51:14.879 --> 2:51:18.080 literally true, but like it's true to how we feel. 2:51:18.160 --> 2:51:20.520 So it's like fine for us to spread this lie. 2:51:20.640 --> 2:51:25.600 Like they're just declaring these people terrorists and even attempting 2:51:25.640 --> 2:51:29.600 to get evidence for that claim, like they certainly have. 2:51:29.520 --> 2:51:29.959 No need to. 2:51:30.040 --> 2:51:34.279 And the media that like I'm seeing coverage on Fox 2:51:34.320 --> 2:51:37.840 particularly that's just repeatedly framing this as like the left 2:51:38.000 --> 2:51:42.119 is angry that like a terrorist got deborded, right, yeah. 2:51:41.800 --> 2:51:43.520 Yeah, I mean this is the same stuff that we 2:51:43.560 --> 2:51:47.400 saw at the RNC where they referred to students as terrorists, 2:51:47.440 --> 2:51:51.520 like just completely completely flattened. Like every single person at 2:51:51.520 --> 2:51:54.400 a college campus who is upset about a genocide or 2:51:54.520 --> 2:51:57.920 criticizes the state of Israel, that person is a terrorist. 2:51:59.040 --> 2:52:01.920 Lawyers for Khalil until April twenty third to file an 2:52:01.920 --> 2:52:05.119 appeal to halt the deportation, and they plan to file 2:52:05.160 --> 2:52:08.600 an asylum case on his behalf. A separate habeas petition 2:52:08.680 --> 2:52:11.920 case is playing out in a New Jersey court. This week, 2:52:12.040 --> 2:52:14.959 NBC News reviewed over one hundred pages of documents from 2:52:15.000 --> 2:52:18.320 the federal government and Khalil's legal team containing information about 2:52:18.320 --> 2:52:22.160 his immigration process, work experience, and activism. These documents showed 2:52:22.160 --> 2:52:26.840 that the government used unverified tabloid reporting against Khalil and 2:52:26.959 --> 2:52:32.920 contained contradictory information yep, so, essentially using New York Post 2:52:32.959 --> 2:52:38.040 style publications as a pretext for ICE to execute arrests 2:52:38.160 --> 2:52:41.480 against people who are Green card holders, legal permanent residents 2:52:42.360 --> 2:52:44.800 of the United States. We're going to go on break 2:52:44.879 --> 2:52:49.080 and come back to talk about Robert F. Kennedy Junior. 2:52:49.120 --> 2:52:51.199 Finally, finally something fun. 2:53:03.080 --> 2:53:03.880 All right, we're back. 2:53:04.600 --> 2:53:07.760 I'm gonna throw to Robert Evans for an update on 2:53:07.879 --> 2:53:10.600 everyone's favorite roadkill consumer. 2:53:11.040 --> 2:53:15.400 Yes, yes, RFK Junior. He's not just strapping the carcass 2:53:15.400 --> 2:53:17.360 of a dead whale to the head of his truck 2:53:17.959 --> 2:53:21.520 and driving down the highway. Now, he is while kind 2:53:21.520 --> 2:53:24.960 of launching a genocidal campaign against people with autism. 2:53:24.520 --> 2:53:26.680 Kind of doing a national eugenics program. 2:53:26.800 --> 2:53:29.320 Yeah, kind of calling a large group of people in 2:53:29.320 --> 2:53:30.880 this country useless eaters. 2:53:31.120 --> 2:53:32.000 Jesus Christ. 2:53:32.120 --> 2:53:32.360 Yeah. 2:53:32.400 --> 2:53:32.640 Fuck. 2:53:32.720 --> 2:53:35.480 And the gist of what's happening is they just had 2:53:35.520 --> 2:53:38.720 a new quote unquote study come out that looked at 2:53:38.840 --> 2:53:42.600 like apparently rising autism rates. And again I've covered this 2:53:42.640 --> 2:53:46.320 a lot. The reason why rates of autism are increasing 2:53:46.760 --> 2:53:50.120 every credible scientist degrees is because we're looking for it 2:53:50.200 --> 2:53:52.560 more and so we're finding more of it and we 2:53:52.600 --> 2:53:56.240 have a broader understanding of what it is. RFK Junior 2:53:56.280 --> 2:53:58.959 is obsessed with the idea, the image of autism as 2:53:59.000 --> 2:54:02.600 a disease that is spreading due to an environmental contagion, 2:54:03.280 --> 2:54:05.760 and he is trying to make the case that this 2:54:06.000 --> 2:54:09.080 is a calamity. He has promised. The most recent promise 2:54:09.120 --> 2:54:12.800 he made is that by September the government will release 2:54:13.120 --> 2:54:17.680 exhaustive studies that will identify the environmental causes of autism. 2:54:18.240 --> 2:54:22.240 And he made a statement, autism destroys families. More importantly, 2:54:22.240 --> 2:54:25.039 it destroys our greatest resource, which is our children. These 2:54:25.080 --> 2:54:28.360 are children who should not be suffering like this. He 2:54:28.480 --> 2:54:32.320 is called autism a preventable disease, which it is not. 2:54:32.920 --> 2:54:35.800 While there is evidence that some of the factors that 2:54:35.879 --> 2:54:40.560 can be relevant in autism expressing are environmental, the vast 2:54:40.560 --> 2:54:43.600 majority of it seems to be genetic. There's no evidence, 2:54:43.600 --> 2:54:45.280 and there have been repeated studies there has anything to 2:54:45.280 --> 2:54:48.240 do with vaccines. He's positive a couple of other theories 2:54:48.280 --> 2:54:52.560 as to what causes it, including mold and diet, and 2:54:52.600 --> 2:54:55.840 these are largely based on what are already kind of quack, 2:54:56.120 --> 2:55:00.280 both autism treatments and quack autism causes that are are 2:55:00.320 --> 2:55:04.000 popular within the biomedical movement, the experimental biomedical movement, which 2:55:04.040 --> 2:55:07.720 is the fake autism medical industrial complex that we covered 2:55:07.720 --> 2:55:10.959 recently on the Behind the Bastards. One of the things 2:55:11.000 --> 2:55:13.640 I think is really worrying about the language that Kennedy 2:55:13.720 --> 2:55:16.400 is using is how similar it sounds to a lot 2:55:16.400 --> 2:55:19.920 of what you were seeing in the early nineteen thirties 2:55:20.440 --> 2:55:23.440 out of the Nazi state, what we know of as 2:55:23.560 --> 2:55:27.280 the Holocaust, which is generally a term. Generally, Primarily when 2:55:27.280 --> 2:55:29.080 people use that term they are talking about the mass 2:55:29.160 --> 2:55:34.279 killing of Jews and other ethnic minorities in Central Europe 2:55:34.400 --> 2:55:38.720 by the Nazi state. That got a lot of its start, 2:55:39.200 --> 2:55:41.440 and there's a couple of different places got it start. Obviously, 2:55:41.440 --> 2:55:44.920 the wild concentration camps and the political concentration camps are 2:55:44.920 --> 2:55:47.160 in that heritage. When it comes to the actual mass 2:55:47.240 --> 2:55:50.000 killing of people, the very origin of that was in 2:55:50.080 --> 2:55:51.680 getting rid of the disabled. 2:55:51.879 --> 2:55:52.080 Right. 2:55:52.600 --> 2:55:54.960 The term that was used in Nazi propaganda for these 2:55:55.000 --> 2:55:57.600 people was useless eaters. And this is the first time 2:55:57.640 --> 2:56:01.119 that the Nazis tested out gassing right in large numbers. 2:56:01.600 --> 2:56:04.680 And he hasn't used literally the term useless eaters, but 2:56:04.760 --> 2:56:06.800 he talks a lot about. One of the terms he 2:56:06.879 --> 2:56:10.840 uses is severe autism, right, which is not the term 2:56:10.959 --> 2:56:14.760 that is popularly used now for people who have kind 2:56:14.800 --> 2:56:18.120 of profound autism. I think is the preferred term for 2:56:18.160 --> 2:56:21.200 people who do have a significantly higher degree of like 2:56:21.200 --> 2:56:24.400 disability as a result of their autism or that correlates 2:56:24.440 --> 2:56:27.480 with their autism, right, as opposed to the vast majority 2:56:27.480 --> 2:56:29.360 of people who can be diagnosed to somewhere on the 2:56:29.360 --> 2:56:34.160 spectrum who are able to live independently. Right, And Kennedy 2:56:34.480 --> 2:56:37.360 sort of does the thing that is very common within 2:56:37.879 --> 2:56:40.879 this community of sort of number one, correlating that to 2:56:41.200 --> 2:56:44.160 everybody with autism and talking about it as if it 2:56:44.200 --> 2:56:47.680 is a disaster that justifies any kind of response, because 2:56:47.720 --> 2:56:50.920 the people who have profound autism aren't real people in 2:56:50.959 --> 2:56:53.800 his eyes. He made a statement quote, these are kids 2:56:53.840 --> 2:56:56.360 who will never pay taxes, They'll never hold a job, 2:56:56.400 --> 2:56:59.240 they'll never play baseball, they'll never write a poem, they'll 2:56:59.240 --> 2:57:01.200 never go out on a many of them will never 2:57:01.240 --> 2:57:03.520 use a toilet unassisted. We have to recognize we are 2:57:03.560 --> 2:57:06.200 doing this to our children. And first off, having taught 2:57:06.200 --> 2:57:08.680 a lot of kids with profound autism, yes they could 2:57:08.680 --> 2:57:11.840 play baseball, like a number of them held jobs. Now 2:57:12.120 --> 2:57:14.240 do a lot of them need assisted living? Sure, But 2:57:14.400 --> 2:57:18.400 like number one, that's always been the case. There's no 2:57:18.480 --> 2:57:21.959 evidence that people with this kind of autom that there's 2:57:22.000 --> 2:57:25.240 any sort of raise in this right. What's raised is 2:57:25.280 --> 2:57:28.520 the number of people who are being diagnosed. Right, And 2:57:28.879 --> 2:57:32.720 he's using this kind of scare term, right, this idea 2:57:32.800 --> 2:57:34.880 that like parents, you need to be frightened that something 2:57:34.959 --> 2:57:37.920 is going to steal your children from you in order 2:57:37.959 --> 2:57:42.920 to justify the dehumanization of everyone with autism, as well 2:57:43.000 --> 2:57:49.320 as radical biomedical experimental procedures that are going to do 2:57:49.680 --> 2:57:53.280 harm at scale to lots of kids. One of his 2:57:53.280 --> 2:57:56.400 favorite new terms is epidemic denial, which is the term 2:57:56.440 --> 2:57:59.080 that he's using for people who say that, like, this 2:57:59.240 --> 2:58:01.920 is not an epidemic, this is something that we're now 2:58:01.920 --> 2:58:05.680 screening for more. He's kind of kind of repurposing the 2:58:05.760 --> 2:58:10.200 language of like vaccine denial and whatnot as like a 2:58:10.240 --> 2:58:13.720 denial that this is sort of an immediate crisis that 2:58:14.320 --> 2:58:16.199 needs to be hit, which I find interesting. 2:58:16.600 --> 2:58:19.680 Also like co opting like COVID conscious language. 2:58:19.800 --> 2:58:22.240 Yeah, yeah, I think the way he and his group 2:58:22.280 --> 2:58:24.480 were referred to during COVID he's now using in the 2:58:24.520 --> 2:58:25.240 same fashion. 2:58:25.560 --> 2:58:29.600 Yeah, And it's interesting. His initial promise was that like, 2:58:29.720 --> 2:58:32.680 by September, will know why autism rates are on the rise. 2:58:33.240 --> 2:58:36.400 That's not really a thing. You can't make science work 2:58:36.440 --> 2:58:38.640 that way, Like you can't guarantee that. 2:58:38.879 --> 2:58:41.240 Like you said, we already know because people are seeking 2:58:41.280 --> 2:58:46.160 out diagnoses, like because right, we have better awareness of 2:58:46.240 --> 2:58:46.640 it now. 2:58:46.840 --> 2:58:49.640 But he's kind of altered that recently, being like, no, 2:58:49.760 --> 2:58:52.280 we'll have some answers by September, and you know, we're 2:58:52.320 --> 2:58:55.240 going to get those answers by removing the taboo so 2:58:55.280 --> 2:58:58.280 that doctors won't get gas lit by blaming autism on 2:58:58.680 --> 2:59:03.039 vaccines or know, mold exposure or the like. So that's 2:59:03.080 --> 2:59:05.080 that's what we can look forward to in the near future. 2:59:05.120 --> 2:59:08.920 From our good friend RFK Junior, who definitely doesn't pay 2:59:08.959 --> 2:59:11.480 taxes or write poems. I just want to make that clear. 2:59:11.800 --> 2:59:14.320 I don't think either of those are particularly good bars 2:59:14.320 --> 2:59:16.080 for whether or not you're a human being, but he 2:59:16.160 --> 2:59:17.480 for sure doesn't do either. 2:59:17.800 --> 2:59:23.320 So frankly, I know way too many autistic people who write. 2:59:23.040 --> 2:59:25.039 Poems, oh tons of them. 2:59:25.200 --> 2:59:28.240 That's gonna say. Yeah, the ring poem things was a 2:59:28.320 --> 2:59:29.160 really fucking The. 2:59:29.120 --> 2:59:31.959 Poet Lauriate of Washington State since twenty twenty three is 2:59:32.000 --> 2:59:35.280 a is a woman with autism. So yeah, like I 2:59:35.320 --> 2:59:37.240 writing poems nonsense. 2:59:36.879 --> 2:59:43.640 Extremely common activity for for my fellow my fellow autism people. 2:59:43.720 --> 2:59:46.879 Yeah they are, okay, okay, ore f K Junior again, 2:59:46.959 --> 2:59:49.720 but he was talking about, you know, people with what 2:59:49.760 --> 2:59:53.400 he calls severe autism. But he also doesn't ever care 2:59:53.520 --> 2:59:56.959 to like specify his language because there's no there's no benefit. 2:59:57.040 --> 2:59:59.039 That's a real medical Yeah, and there's. 2:59:58.800 --> 3:00:01.720 No benefit to his eyes ideology and acknowledging that, like, well, 3:00:01.720 --> 3:00:05.440 most people who get diagnosed with autism may need some accommodations. 3:00:06.240 --> 3:00:08.600 It's a difference, right, It's a difference in the way 3:00:08.600 --> 3:00:12.440 your mind works. But they're fine, Like they're living healthy, 3:00:12.480 --> 3:00:13.160 happy lives. 3:00:13.480 --> 3:00:13.800 Yeah. 3:00:13.879 --> 3:00:16.280 I talk slightly differently in the cool zone work chat, 3:00:17.000 --> 3:00:20.400 which is kind of the extent of it for me, extent, 3:00:20.959 --> 3:00:28.120 but that is an aspect. Speaking of the Department of 3:00:28.160 --> 3:00:32.080 Public Human Services, they released a report page on their 3:00:32.080 --> 3:00:35.520 website for you, the the vigilance citizens Oh yes, to 3:00:35.640 --> 3:00:41.200 report trans miners receiving healthcare. Finally, and so an another 3:00:41.240 --> 3:00:44.040 one of these like snitching hotlines at this time on 3:00:44.120 --> 3:00:48.160 a federal government website that I'm sure will only get real, 3:00:48.400 --> 3:00:51.240 real complaints sent to it, and not the B movies. 3:00:50.959 --> 3:00:55.879 See not repeatedly the B movie scrap. Yeah. 3:00:55.920 --> 3:00:58.480 Speaking of trans people, I do have a few updates 3:00:58.520 --> 3:01:02.320 on some of the trend gender stuff. During that meeting 3:01:02.360 --> 3:01:06.160 between President Buklea and Trump, they went on a small 3:01:06.200 --> 3:01:10.080 tangent about trans people where where Trump said that he 3:01:10.120 --> 3:01:13.400 actually doesn't like talking about quote unquote men in women's 3:01:13.440 --> 3:01:17.279 sports because he wants to wait and save that issue 3:01:17.680 --> 3:01:19.279 to use for the next election. 3:01:19.640 --> 3:01:20.119 Amazing. 3:01:20.320 --> 3:01:23.039 Yeah, I'm going to play the clip, and I don't. 3:01:22.920 --> 3:01:24.680 Like talking about it because I want to save it 3:01:24.720 --> 3:01:27.240 for just before the next election. I said, my people 3:01:27.280 --> 3:01:32.760 don't even talk about it because they'll change then. But 3:01:33.000 --> 3:01:36.360 I watched this morning it was a congressman fighting to 3:01:36.440 --> 3:01:40.400 the death for men to play against women in sports. 3:01:40.920 --> 3:01:45.959 That's like super interestic, like very clear insight into how 3:01:46.040 --> 3:01:49.640 like Trump sees like the trands of sports issue and 3:01:49.959 --> 3:01:53.600 treats it as this like election winning superpower, and like 3:01:53.680 --> 3:01:57.280 he certainly he is directing like the DOJ and with 3:01:57.360 --> 3:02:01.240 his executive orders, like he still is targeting trans people, 3:02:01.440 --> 3:02:04.080 especially trans people in school. So it's it's not that 3:02:04.120 --> 3:02:06.560 he's treating this as like a hands off issue to 3:02:06.680 --> 3:02:09.640 like ensure that it can remain a hot button thing 3:02:09.720 --> 3:02:11.960 for the next election. But I think I think in 3:02:11.959 --> 3:02:15.240 his mind, like he doesn't want to stop Democrats from 3:02:16.440 --> 3:02:18.920 caring about this issue in a way like like the 3:02:18.720 --> 3:02:21.600 the more that they that they fight for it in 3:02:21.640 --> 3:02:24.360 his mind is like what gives him ammunition for the 3:02:24.360 --> 3:02:26.320 next election, whether he's going to run for a third 3:02:26.400 --> 3:02:29.280 term or just like Republicans like mega stuff in general, 3:02:29.920 --> 3:02:32.000 but I think that it is an interesting look into 3:02:32.040 --> 3:02:36.880 like his personal insight on this issue. Meanwhile, the Department 3:02:36.920 --> 3:02:41.120 of Justice just announced on Wednesday, April sixteenth, that they 3:02:41.120 --> 3:02:44.440 are suing Maine's Department of Education for not complying with 3:02:44.520 --> 3:02:47.600 Trump's anti trans executive order by continuing to allow trans 3:02:47.600 --> 3:02:51.039 people to compete in sports, claiming that they are quote 3:02:51.240 --> 3:02:55.440 failing to protect women in women's sports unquote, which which 3:02:55.480 --> 3:02:59.560 they say violates Title nine. The suit aims to get 3:02:59.600 --> 3:03:02.000 an junt function to force Maine to strip away rights 3:03:02.000 --> 3:03:05.120 from trans people in schools, to take away two winning 3:03:05.240 --> 3:03:09.360 titles from trans of school athletes, and are considering to 3:03:09.440 --> 3:03:13.840 quote unquote retroactively pull all funding that Maine has received. 3:03:14.560 --> 3:03:19.200 Maine's Attorney General, Aaron Frey said on Wednesday, quote our 3:03:19.240 --> 3:03:22.480 position is further bolstered by the complete lack of any 3:03:22.560 --> 3:03:26.840 legal citation supporting the administration's position in its own complaint. 3:03:27.160 --> 3:03:29.920 While the President issued in executive order that reflects his 3:03:30.160 --> 3:03:33.040 own interpretations of the law, anyone with the most basic 3:03:33.080 --> 3:03:36.920 understanding of American civics understands that the President does not 3:03:37.000 --> 3:03:41.880 create law nor interpret law unquote. So Maine and specifically 3:03:41.879 --> 3:03:44.720 the main governor are adamant that this is going to 3:03:44.720 --> 3:03:46.280 be an issue that's only going to be settled in 3:03:46.360 --> 3:03:49.280 the courts, and in fact challenged Trump at a recent 3:03:49.320 --> 3:03:54.040 meeting to see you in court over this issue. We 3:03:54.080 --> 3:03:55.760 are going to go and break and then return to 3:03:55.840 --> 3:04:11.960 close out this episode of executive disorder. Okay, we are back. 3:04:12.560 --> 3:04:15.840 I'm now gonna throw to myself and Mia to discuss 3:04:15.879 --> 3:04:21.879 the tariff talk in a future recording. 3:04:22.720 --> 3:04:26.039 Rocky Jazz Bob, Rocky jazz Bot. 3:04:26.240 --> 3:04:28.439 Sorry, locker. 3:04:30.240 --> 3:04:33.240 Rocking Jazz Bob, Rocky. 3:04:32.800 --> 3:04:37.200 Jazz Bob, Welcome the tariff talk, the talk where I 3:04:37.360 --> 3:04:42.119 talk to you about the turf tariffs. So all right, 3:04:42.200 --> 3:04:45.280 the big thing that happens last week in tariffs was 3:04:45.320 --> 3:04:49.520 that Trump exempted smartphones and electronics. There's a whole suite 3:04:49.520 --> 3:04:52.240 of electronics that are exempted from the one and forty 3:04:52.320 --> 3:04:57.000 five percent turf tariffs from Liberation Day. Now, there was 3:04:57.200 --> 3:05:00.680 still a twenty percent tariff on on all of these 3:05:00.680 --> 3:05:04.640 electronic goods from the earlier round of tariffs. In one 3:05:04.840 --> 3:05:07.600 of the initial rounds, there was a whole thing where 3:05:07.640 --> 3:05:08.520 he put a bunch of tariffs. 3:05:08.720 --> 3:05:11.880 I'm so confused though, because I thought that's ten percent 3:05:11.959 --> 3:05:14.600 tariffs for non Chinese companies. 3:05:15.400 --> 3:05:18.160 Yeah, but okay, So here's. 3:05:17.879 --> 3:05:23.040 The thing, right, China like additional or no. 3:05:23.080 --> 3:05:25.440 Okay. So, so what's happening with these is that in 3:05:25.480 --> 3:05:27.480 the very very first round of tariffs that went out, 3:05:27.920 --> 3:05:30.039 there was a twenty percent tariff on all Chinese goods, 3:05:30.720 --> 3:05:34.640 and so the Liberation Day tariffs, which and then the 3:05:34.680 --> 3:05:38.360 subsequent retaliatory tariffs pushed it. 3:05:38.480 --> 3:05:40.640 Pushed all goods now two hundred fifty. 3:05:40.640 --> 3:05:42.400 Okay, we're gonna we're gonna get tw hundred fifty percent. 3:05:42.400 --> 3:05:45.199 That numbers bullshit, But we're at one hundred and forty 3:05:45.200 --> 3:05:49.480 five percent like tariff from the Liberation Day stuff. But 3:05:49.920 --> 3:05:53.000 that also had included an earlier twenty percent tariff, and 3:05:53.280 --> 3:05:55.400 you you see why we're reporting about this is so 3:05:55.480 --> 3:05:58.000 fucking hard, right, So that was stack on top of 3:05:58.040 --> 3:06:00.640 that other tariffs. So if he's removed the Liberation Day tariffs, 3:06:00.640 --> 3:06:03.800 but there still are twenty percent tariffs on all like 3:06:03.879 --> 3:06:06.200 iPhones and all the electronicos that are still in effect. 3:06:06.440 --> 3:06:09.039 So the tariff right for those goods is now twenty 3:06:09.080 --> 3:06:12.160 instead of one hundred and forty five. But this is 3:06:12.160 --> 3:06:16.160 where things get even more murky. So even before the 3:06:16.280 --> 3:06:20.840 exemptions for the semiconductor stuff had been released, Trump had 3:06:20.840 --> 3:06:23.720 been talking about imposing a bunch of tariffs specifically on 3:06:23.760 --> 3:06:28.960 semiconductors from all countries, which is going to like, again, 3:06:29.040 --> 3:06:31.320 if this is just awesome, if you want to just 3:06:31.440 --> 3:06:36.120 kneecap your entire economy, you put in a tariff on 3:06:36.480 --> 3:06:38.800 all semiconductors from other countries, which was what this is 3:06:38.800 --> 3:06:41.160 looking like, it's possible the levels are going to be 3:06:41.240 --> 3:06:44.000 that high. Anyways, It's again worth pointing out that, like, 3:06:44.280 --> 3:06:46.760 there's a bunch of the parts of this production process 3:06:46.760 --> 3:06:49.680 that basically can only be done in Taiwan, which will 3:06:49.720 --> 3:06:51.680 presumably have these new tariffs on them. We don't know 3:06:51.720 --> 3:06:55.240 what they're gonna be yet they're coming in who fucking knows, 3:06:56.320 --> 3:06:59.320 But so it seems like they're these tariffs are being 3:06:59.440 --> 3:07:02.720 withdrawn for now to to market sort of backlash, but 3:07:03.720 --> 3:07:06.800 probably they will come back at some point in the future. 3:07:06.840 --> 3:07:09.520 We're not We're not one hundred percent sure. There's also 3:07:09.520 --> 3:07:11.720 another thing I want to mention, where so the number 3:07:11.720 --> 3:07:13.879 that you said, the two hundred and fifty percent tariff thing, 3:07:14.520 --> 3:07:17.640 so Trump tweeted that out, but that's fake. What that 3:07:17.840 --> 3:07:19.920 is is that there are a couple of items, and 3:07:20.000 --> 3:07:21.280 I mean when I say a couple, I mean like 3:07:21.280 --> 3:07:24.400 we're talking like single digit items, like things like medical 3:07:24.440 --> 3:07:27.800 syringes that already had like one hundred percent tariffs on them, 3:07:27.959 --> 3:07:29.840 that the one hundred and forty five percent tariff stack 3:07:29.920 --> 3:07:32.959 on top of all tariffs that are already in effect. 3:07:34.040 --> 3:07:37.039 So there's like like three or four items already had 3:07:37.080 --> 3:07:38.879 one hundred percent tariffs on them, so when you stack 3:07:38.959 --> 3:07:40.320 the one forty five on top of them, they're two 3:07:40.360 --> 3:07:43.760 fifty percent. But again it's like it's like three things, right, 3:07:44.200 --> 3:07:47.360 So like that's fake. On the other hand, like substantively, 3:07:47.480 --> 3:07:49.320 And this is something that a lot of people have 3:07:49.400 --> 3:07:52.119 been talking about the difference between one hundred and forty 3:07:52.120 --> 3:07:54.720 five percent and two hundred and forty five percent, Like 3:07:55.360 --> 3:07:57.960 it isn't that relevant because at one hundred and forty 3:07:58.000 --> 3:08:01.760 five percent you stop doing trading, So it's you know, 3:08:01.840 --> 3:08:03.280 the numbers at this point are just sort of in 3:08:03.320 --> 3:08:06.400 comedy levels. But yeah, so that's what's going on with 3:08:06.440 --> 3:08:08.440 the two hundred and fifty number of people have been 3:08:08.440 --> 3:08:11.080 going around from it's it's not real. It's still one 3:08:11.200 --> 3:08:14.840 forty five for all non electronics goods twenty four electronics. 3:08:15.160 --> 3:08:17.600 There's also been a bunch of sort of China has 3:08:17.640 --> 3:08:20.280 been doing retaliatory stuff for a little bit, and they've 3:08:20.280 --> 3:08:24.520 been ramping up this program to restrict US access to 3:08:24.600 --> 3:08:26.600 rare earth elements that are necessary for a whole bunch 3:08:26.600 --> 3:08:30.080 of advanced engineering, particularly sort of defense projects. This is 3:08:30.080 --> 3:08:33.600 only that could genuinely devastate the American defense sector. Trump's 3:08:33.600 --> 3:08:35.560 plan for this is that he's threatening to use the 3:08:35.600 --> 3:08:38.600 Trade Expansion Act nineteen sixty two to impose even more 3:08:38.600 --> 3:08:42.800 devastating tariffs. Now it is genuinely unclear to me, Like 3:08:42.959 --> 3:08:45.520 what are he gonna do impose in one thousand percent tariff? 3:08:45.920 --> 3:08:47.879 Like you need to buy these goods? 3:08:48.200 --> 3:08:51.720 Like you say that, Mia, And yeah, he probably will. 3:08:51.879 --> 3:08:55.320 He probably will. Like two weeks ago, one thousand percent 3:08:55.320 --> 3:08:57.879 tariffs would have been a joke, But no, they might. 3:08:57.920 --> 3:08:59.920 They might legitimately do one thousand percent tariffs. 3:09:00.040 --> 3:09:00.320 Why not. 3:09:00.680 --> 3:09:03.600 There's also been the beginnings of on the US ND 3:09:03.640 --> 3:09:07.400 sort of export restrictions from chip exports to China and 3:09:07.400 --> 3:09:10.480 countries like Nvidia and AMD. And this is a fucking 3:09:11.120 --> 3:09:15.119 big rip to the big rip to the fucking AI people. 3:09:15.600 --> 3:09:19.400 Each hit get fucked. Yeah. So like so that that's 3:09:19.560 --> 3:09:23.119 roughly the state of of the tariffs right now. More 3:09:23.360 --> 3:09:26.200 more bullshit will happen. We'll be back on tariff talk 3:09:26.320 --> 3:09:30.400 next week with another round of unbelievably hideous turf tariff shit. 3:09:30.520 --> 3:09:32.080 But I want to I want to move on to 3:09:32.160 --> 3:09:35.440 one more thing, which is things that have been happening 3:09:35.480 --> 3:09:38.280 at the at the NLRB. So the NLRB, for people 3:09:38.280 --> 3:09:40.280 who are not regular listeners to the show, is the 3:09:40.360 --> 3:09:43.320 National Labor Relations Board. They were in charge of a 3:09:43.360 --> 3:09:47.240 whole bunch of things related to negotiations between employers and unions. 3:09:47.240 --> 3:09:51.160 Are the people who certify union elections. They they handle 3:09:52.080 --> 3:09:57.200 unfair labor practices disputes, and Doge effectively broke into the 3:09:57.320 --> 3:10:01.760 NLRB and has seized a whole bunch of information that 3:10:01.959 --> 3:10:04.879 they shouldn't have. NPR broke the story and has been 3:10:04.879 --> 3:10:07.400 doing a lot of good coverage of it. So it 3:10:07.480 --> 3:10:11.120 came in right. They technically had some kind of like 3:10:11.400 --> 3:10:13.000 order saying that they're supposed to be able to come 3:10:13.000 --> 3:10:15.039 in and do this stuff, and they set up and 3:10:15.120 --> 3:10:17.680 they disable all of the security stuff and all of 3:10:17.720 --> 3:10:20.600 the sort of like logs and all the sort of 3:10:20.600 --> 3:10:23.480 stuff that's supposed to like verify what someone's doing on 3:10:23.480 --> 3:10:25.800 a computer system. They go in and disabled all of them. 3:10:26.240 --> 3:10:28.240 They delete all traces of what they do. And this 3:10:28.320 --> 3:10:30.840 is a big deal because the NLRB has a lot 3:10:30.879 --> 3:10:33.800 of extremely sensitive data, has extremely sensitive data on unions, 3:10:33.840 --> 3:10:36.120 It has a lot of extremely sensitive trade data on 3:10:36.720 --> 3:10:40.360 private companies. Now, the NLRB person who blew the whistle 3:10:40.400 --> 3:10:44.200 on this to NPR described how so he complains about 3:10:44.200 --> 3:10:46.400 to his superiors about Doge again just like sort of 3:10:46.400 --> 3:10:50.080 breaking into this fucking like office and just like stealing 3:10:50.120 --> 3:10:52.279 all of this data because he mean, so he notices 3:10:53.080 --> 3:10:56.400 this program that they're building that's literally just called like backdoor, 3:10:57.320 --> 3:10:59.440 which is like again what you would do if you 3:10:59.480 --> 3:11:02.520 were literally running a hack, right, And we'll come back 3:11:02.520 --> 3:11:05.000 to that in a second. So the NLOP person complains 3:11:05.000 --> 3:11:06.800 to a superior so like, hey, these DOSE people are 3:11:06.840 --> 3:11:09.960 just like stealing all of the data from this And 3:11:10.000 --> 3:11:13.400 then like the next day, someone from Doge tapes to 3:11:13.480 --> 3:11:16.240 his door pictures of him and his dogs with like 3:11:16.280 --> 3:11:19.880 a threatening thing on it, like drone footage of him 3:11:19.879 --> 3:11:25.240 and his dog like walking, which is so fucking weird. 3:11:25.560 --> 3:11:29.680 I don't even know. I don't even So, yeah, that's 3:11:29.760 --> 3:11:33.160 that's extremely alarming. This is this is they're they're just 3:11:33.240 --> 3:11:36.920 blatantly threatening a whistleblower. Yeah. So so the other reason 3:11:36.959 --> 3:11:38.680 that this is really concerning is that so a lot 3:11:38.680 --> 3:11:40.360 of the corporate media is focused on the fact that 3:11:40.400 --> 3:11:42.720 there's a lot of trade information in there, there's also 3:11:42.760 --> 3:11:46.440 a lot of very personal information about unions, about union strength, 3:11:46.440 --> 3:11:50.400 about size, about tactics, about the history of negotiating things, 3:11:50.520 --> 3:11:54.440 about just where unions are and who's in them, and 3:11:54.480 --> 3:11:56.480 it's it's deeply unclear what DOGE is going to do 3:11:56.560 --> 3:11:59.800 this information, but it's not good And again, and I 3:11:59.840 --> 3:12:02.400 need to emphasize this. So I talked to friend of 3:12:02.440 --> 3:12:06.120 the show Maya Arson crime w about this, who is 3:12:06.480 --> 3:12:10.520 someone who knows a lot about hacking, And I said 3:12:10.520 --> 3:12:12.320 to it, okay, so this is what you would do 3:12:12.360 --> 3:12:14.080 if you were if you were just straight up like 3:12:14.160 --> 3:12:16.560 hacking the NLRB, right, Like, these are the things you 3:12:16.560 --> 3:12:20.720 would do, And they went, yeah, pretty much. So it's great, 3:12:20.760 --> 3:12:24.199 it's great. Yeah, the dose are just stolen a bunch of information. 3:12:24.320 --> 3:12:26.800 Who knows what's gonna happen to it, who knows what's 3:12:26.800 --> 3:12:30.720 gonna happen with their escalation of attacks on whistleblowers. But 3:12:31.600 --> 3:12:34.840 things bad, things continue to go bad. 3:12:35.600 --> 3:12:41.359 Well, thank you for that uplifting story, Miya about Doge 3:12:41.440 --> 3:12:47.119 breaking into and stealing data from the NLRB and posting 3:12:47.320 --> 3:12:52.720 overhead drone photos of people's houses who threatened the Doge supremacy. 3:12:55.320 --> 3:12:58.360 We're back, Thank you, Future Garrison and future Miya. So 3:12:58.560 --> 3:13:02.160 it's my role here to update you on the board 3:13:02.200 --> 3:13:05.000 of fascism, right, and that's what I'm here to do. 3:13:05.680 --> 3:13:07.520 Where I want to start this week is in the 3:13:07.640 --> 3:13:10.520 Roosevelt Reservation. This is something that's been reported on a 3:13:10.560 --> 3:13:13.119 little bit. It's largely by people who maybe only found 3:13:13.120 --> 3:13:16.080 out about it this week and looked at a Wikipedia 3:13:16.120 --> 3:13:18.840 page then wrote a story. The Roosevelt Reservation is a 3:13:18.879 --> 3:13:22.320 sixty foot easement that runs along the southwestern border of 3:13:22.400 --> 3:13:25.600 the United States from the coast in San Diego or 3:13:25.640 --> 3:13:28.119 the way to New Mexico. Doesn't cover the Texas border. 3:13:28.520 --> 3:13:30.720 I've written about it before for the Sierra Club and 3:13:30.760 --> 3:13:33.280 for Drilled News four or five years ago, and I'm 3:13:33.280 --> 3:13:35.560 going to include a link to the Sierra Club piece 3:13:35.560 --> 3:13:38.000 in the show notes that Drilled pieces down. Now they 3:13:38.000 --> 3:13:40.360 don't have that print side anymore. It was established in 3:13:40.440 --> 3:13:44.920 nineteen oh seven by Teddy Roosevelt, and it was transferred 3:13:44.959 --> 3:13:47.760 for three years from the Department of the Interior Department 3:13:47.760 --> 3:13:50.560 of Defense by the Trump administration in twenty nineteen using 3:13:50.600 --> 3:13:54.400 an executive order this year. In twenty twenty five, all 3:13:54.440 --> 3:13:57.680 of the Roosevelt Reservation that is not part of federal 3:13:57.760 --> 3:14:01.600 reservation land was placed on the Apartment of Defense jurisdiction. 3:14:01.920 --> 3:14:04.520 A lot of reporting seems to have missed this exemption 3:14:04.600 --> 3:14:07.480 for federal reservation land, which makes up a significant part 3:14:07.879 --> 3:14:11.560 of the border, especially in Arizona right in the Tornad Reservation. 3:14:12.240 --> 3:14:14.960 I'm going to quote from the language of the executive 3:14:15.040 --> 3:14:18.279 order here quote to provide for the use and jurisdiction 3:14:18.560 --> 3:14:21.440 by the Department of Defense over such federal lands, including 3:14:21.480 --> 3:14:25.720 the Roosevelt Reservation, and excluding Federal Indian reservations, that are 3:14:25.800 --> 3:14:30.439 reasonably necessary to enable military activities directed in this memorandum, 3:14:30.600 --> 3:14:35.119 including border barrier construction and emplacement of detection and monitoring equipment. 3:14:35.760 --> 3:14:38.320 The way I read this, it also doesn't limit to 3:14:38.360 --> 3:14:41.200 the Resort reservation. It seems to include other federal land right, 3:14:41.200 --> 3:14:45.160 which could include National monuments, National parks BLM, and the 3:14:45.240 --> 3:14:50.000 National Forests, all of which exist along the border. The 3:14:50.280 --> 3:14:55.119 Trump administration this week also obtained waivers. The waivers wave 3:14:55.680 --> 3:14:58.640 dozens of laws that have been limiting construction in the 3:14:58.680 --> 3:15:01.320 San Diego sector. I'd like to quote a little bit 3:15:01.320 --> 3:15:03.720 from that Sierra Club piece that I wrote, because I 3:15:03.840 --> 3:15:07.800 think the aspect of the damage done to the sacred 3:15:07.800 --> 3:15:10.480 space of Indigenous people is being completely overlooked by the 3:15:10.560 --> 3:15:14.840 legacy media. In this not perhaps surprisingly so, one of 3:15:14.840 --> 3:15:17.600 the laws waved with a Native American Graves Protection and 3:15:17.640 --> 3:15:21.120 Repatriation Act. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act 3:15:21.200 --> 3:15:24.160 was enacted by Congress in nineteen ninety to protect and 3:15:24.240 --> 3:15:27.800 safely relocate Native burial sites. When construction takes place on 3:15:27.879 --> 3:15:31.720 sensitive sites, the tribing question should be consulted, and in 3:15:31.760 --> 3:15:35.240 the event remains or other archaeological objects are found, construction 3:15:35.280 --> 3:15:38.080 should be altered so as not to disturb the site. 3:15:38.280 --> 3:15:41.000 In the areas of San Diego where they are digging, 3:15:41.520 --> 3:15:44.920 what's called midden soil has been found. Mid and soil 3:15:45.400 --> 3:15:49.440 is soil that contains evidence of cremated human remains. Right 3:15:49.600 --> 3:15:53.119 in this case of Kumii people. With this waver, they 3:15:53.160 --> 3:15:56.480 don't have to comply with nagpro Native American Graves Protection 3:15:56.520 --> 3:15:58.920 and Relocation Act, which means that they can continue digging 3:15:59.000 --> 3:16:02.960 through what are literally people's ancestors graveyards. There's another quote 3:16:02.959 --> 3:16:05.640 from that twenty twenty story. If this were another country's 3:16:05.640 --> 3:16:08.280 government destroying a region's holy land, the US would go 3:16:08.280 --> 3:16:10.760 to war and the people would feel it justified, activist 3:16:10.840 --> 3:16:14.080 Thomas barbatod Sierra. But it happens here at home, in 3:16:14.120 --> 3:16:15.760 front of us, and we just turn away. 3:16:15.920 --> 3:16:17.840 Yep, we sure do a turn away. 3:16:18.080 --> 3:16:20.320 It seems to be most of what we do these days. 3:16:20.920 --> 3:16:23.039 Yeah, it's not even what bugs me. It's like, not 3:16:23.680 --> 3:16:26.440 so much of folks, you know, not doing anything. I 3:16:26.480 --> 3:16:29.000 get that it's overwhelming, be horrible at the moment. It's 3:16:29.000 --> 3:16:32.040 that this doesn't even get reported. Yeah, big outlets with 3:16:32.160 --> 3:16:34.360 a massive budget, who are supposed to have a border 3:16:34.400 --> 3:16:37.840 reporter who's never fucking set foot on the border, doesn't 3:16:37.879 --> 3:16:39.920 take the time to talk to the indigenous people whose 3:16:40.000 --> 3:16:43.360 land the border crossed, right like, doesn't take the time 3:16:43.400 --> 3:16:46.200 to hear their concerns, doesn't take the time to think 3:16:46.200 --> 3:16:50.080 about when you dig thirty feet into this ground to 3:16:50.240 --> 3:16:54.959 build your border wall. That's twelve thousand years of someone's history. 3:16:55.000 --> 3:16:57.720 How do they feel about that? And like that is 3:16:57.720 --> 3:17:00.840 a failing of the legacy. Media been a failing for 3:17:00.879 --> 3:17:02.560 a long time, and it will continue to be on 3:17:02.640 --> 3:17:04.520 for a long time and piss me off. 3:17:04.920 --> 3:17:05.160 YEP. 3:17:05.560 --> 3:17:08.840 I guess to talk more broadly than about this militarization 3:17:08.920 --> 3:17:11.320 of the Roosevelt Reservation and other public land. There's been 3:17:11.320 --> 3:17:14.959 some speculation about what this might mean. I don't think 3:17:15.000 --> 3:17:17.760 that you're going to see soldiers pointing their guns at 3:17:17.800 --> 3:17:21.039 the southern border and shooting anyone who comes across. I 3:17:21.160 --> 3:17:23.119 do think it's likely a lot of the people who 3:17:23.200 --> 3:17:25.720 have been deployed to southern border so far at MPs 3:17:25.720 --> 3:17:29.600 military police, right, and it's possible that those MPs will 3:17:29.600 --> 3:17:33.039 be able to detain people and potentially charge and with 3:17:33.080 --> 3:17:36.560 trespassing on a military installation. That would just be another 3:17:36.680 --> 3:17:40.320 string to the bow of their attempt to like rapidly 3:17:40.320 --> 3:17:43.360 deport people because they already have many other kind of 3:17:43.520 --> 3:17:46.440 options through executive order of doing that which which they're 3:17:46.440 --> 3:17:50.120 already implying, right. It might also make it easier for 3:17:50.160 --> 3:17:52.120 them to waive some of these other laws and to 3:17:52.200 --> 3:17:57.760 construct more surveillance equipment in the Epogogacia case, which we've 3:17:57.760 --> 3:18:02.160 covered for several weeks now. The Supreme Court has unanimously 3:18:02.280 --> 3:18:06.400 asked the United States government to quote facilitate his return. 3:18:07.360 --> 3:18:11.920 The US government has embarked upon a unique definition of 3:18:11.959 --> 3:18:16.800 the word facilitate, which it feels like means allowing him 3:18:16.800 --> 3:18:20.520 to enter the country and providing transport if El Salvador 3:18:20.640 --> 3:18:24.240 releases him. Bu Kelly refused to release him, saying that 3:18:24.280 --> 3:18:26.240 doing so would be to quote smuggler terrorists into the 3:18:26.320 --> 3:18:28.360 United States. Garrison and I did a whole episode about 3:18:28.400 --> 3:18:32.280 this yesterday that you can listen to today. Senator Chris 3:18:32.360 --> 3:18:35.160 van Holland went to San Salvador, right capital of El 3:18:35.200 --> 3:18:37.600 Salbador if you're not where. He met with the vice 3:18:37.680 --> 3:18:40.840 president because Boukele is still out the country. Van Holand 3:18:40.879 --> 3:18:42.800 held the press conference right afterwards that I watched for 3:18:42.840 --> 3:18:46.440 it before we recorded this. In the press conference, Van 3:18:46.560 --> 3:18:49.160 Holland basically said that he asserted to the Vice President 3:18:49.200 --> 3:18:51.560 of El Salbador there was no evidence nor any conviction 3:18:52.320 --> 3:18:56.520 of being a member of MS thirteen, and he asked 3:18:56.640 --> 3:18:59.600 the VP why he was holding mister Abrigo Gassier, and 3:19:00.080 --> 3:19:02.520 the VP said, because the US is paying us to 3:19:02.560 --> 3:19:03.040 hold him. 3:19:03.160 --> 3:19:05.280 Yeah, which, yeah, they won't even lie. 3:19:05.560 --> 3:19:08.120 Yeah, no, yeah, he's not lying. That's why they're doing it. 3:19:08.200 --> 3:19:12.760 I believe that. Yeah, And credit to this Maryland senator 3:19:12.800 --> 3:19:15.640 of like being the only one to do something and 3:19:15.680 --> 3:19:17.920 it's not enough. And it's just one person. There are 3:19:17.959 --> 3:19:20.879 three hundred people there, right, they're not even going for 3:19:20.879 --> 3:19:23.320 the hundreds of other innocent people are there. It's one guy, 3:19:23.640 --> 3:19:25.720 but at least he's doing something. The rest of the 3:19:25.800 --> 3:19:29.480 Democrats are collectively Yeah, I don't know, like voting for 3:19:29.520 --> 3:19:34.199 Trump's nominees. He asked to meet with mister Abergo Garcia 3:19:34.240 --> 3:19:36.120 and was told that they needed more time. He said, 3:19:36.160 --> 3:19:37.960 I'll come back next week. They said they don't know 3:19:37.959 --> 3:19:40.240 if they can organize it in a week. He asked 3:19:40.240 --> 3:19:42.560 if he could call him. They said they didn't know 3:19:42.600 --> 3:19:44.920 if they could facilitate a call. They said maybe the 3:19:45.040 --> 3:19:46.920 US Embassy would have to be the one that requests that. 3:19:46.959 --> 3:19:49.120 So he has now requested that the embassy requests that 3:19:49.160 --> 3:19:51.440 he be allowed to call mister Abrego Garcia and mister 3:19:51.480 --> 3:19:54.359 Brego Garcia be allowed to speak to his wife. Garreton 3:19:54.400 --> 3:19:56.920 and I spoke about how like it's not in the 3:19:56.920 --> 3:19:58.840 interest of government at El Salbaud or to have people 3:19:58.920 --> 3:20:01.320 leave this prison and to fire to the conditions that 3:20:01.400 --> 3:20:01.920 are in it. 3:20:02.160 --> 3:20:05.640 No one has ever left this prison that we're aware of. 3:20:05.959 --> 3:20:08.320 Yeah, that no one who's been detained there has left. 3:20:09.080 --> 3:20:11.280 The government wouldn't give him a date when he could 3:20:11.280 --> 3:20:13.600 meet mister Abergo Garcia or when he would be luckily 3:20:13.680 --> 3:20:17.800 able to make a call. And a separate case, Judge Boseburg, 3:20:18.080 --> 3:20:20.800 who we've spoken about before as well, Right Judge Bothberg, 3:20:20.840 --> 3:20:24.279 with the judge issues' attentive restraining order on the rendition 3:20:24.360 --> 3:20:27.199 of people to L Salbador, which the government then ignored, 3:20:27.840 --> 3:20:31.440 has found probable cause that the administration is in contempt 3:20:31.520 --> 3:20:35.720 of court. What does this mean? It doesn't mean, despite 3:20:35.720 --> 3:20:38.480 what you have seen on your timeline, that this will 3:20:38.480 --> 3:20:41.160 mean these people will be bought home. When they found 3:20:41.160 --> 3:20:43.280 a contempt, they have two options. Right, they can purge 3:20:43.320 --> 3:20:46.480 themselves of the contempt, and the way they would do 3:20:46.520 --> 3:20:50.520 that would be by providing habeas not by bringing all 3:20:50.560 --> 3:20:53.560 these people home at least not yet, right. Or they 3:20:53.560 --> 3:20:57.440 could present the people who are responsible and then either 3:20:57.440 --> 3:20:59.720 an attorney could be appointed by the DOJ to prosecute them. 3:20:59.760 --> 3:21:01.680 I guess and don't quite know how it works. Sistance 3:21:01.720 --> 3:21:04.359 or the judge himself can appoint an attorney to prosecute 3:21:04.360 --> 3:21:07.680 them for criminal contempt. Again, like, at least the guys 3:21:07.720 --> 3:21:08.959 try and I guess like. 3:21:09.000 --> 3:21:11.120 No, I mean, like I got nothing to say against 3:21:11.200 --> 3:21:13.240 him right now, Like this is what they all should 3:21:13.280 --> 3:21:16.039 be doing. He went there, he'd something, and he's not 3:21:16.160 --> 3:21:18.920 mincing his words. He's saying that this man was disappeared. 3:21:19.160 --> 3:21:22.320 No, yeah, and he's he's asserting that, Like they need 3:21:22.360 --> 3:21:24.360 to listen to the court. They are supposed to listen 3:21:24.360 --> 3:21:28.520 to the court. Judge genez In genez who is a 3:21:28.600 --> 3:21:30.840 judge on the district court that had its case sent 3:21:30.879 --> 3:21:34.000 to the Supreme Court for review in the Abrego Garcia incident, 3:21:34.040 --> 3:21:37.320 also quoted to Merriam Webster Dictionary and said that the 3:21:37.360 --> 3:21:40.800 government's understanding of the word facilitate flew in the face 3:21:40.879 --> 3:21:43.760 of the common understanding of the word. Again, like I've 3:21:43.760 --> 3:21:47.000 seen it assert as like, oh, legal experts can disagree. Meanwhile, 3:21:47.000 --> 3:21:49.120 you've got the actual judge in the actual case being like, 3:21:49.200 --> 3:21:51.680 notice is what the dictionary says. Your definition is ludicrous. 3:21:52.200 --> 3:21:56.280 I would caution people to be very careful looking at 3:21:56.320 --> 3:21:59.560 at like blue check legal experts on except com or 3:21:59.600 --> 3:22:04.440 people blue Sky. There has been so much misleading stuff 3:22:04.640 --> 3:22:08.279 about immigration law and the laws in these particular two cases, 3:22:08.280 --> 3:22:11.360 and they are about the resol reservation. Actually, just be really 3:22:11.400 --> 3:22:16.440 careful where you're getting your information, especially on immigration law 3:22:16.480 --> 3:22:18.760 from maybe go back and check what that person was 3:22:18.800 --> 3:22:21.240 doing in twenty twenty three when thousands of migrants were 3:22:21.240 --> 3:22:24.720 detained in outdoor detention camps. Because I've seen so much 3:22:24.760 --> 3:22:29.119 misinformation and people, understandably who aren't expert in this because 3:22:29.160 --> 3:22:33.280 it's extremely complicated, are likely to be taken advantage of 3:22:33.400 --> 3:22:35.160 by people who are grifting off what is at a 3:22:35.160 --> 3:22:36.720 moment when a lot of us are afraid and a 3:22:36.720 --> 3:22:38.879 lot of us are insertain, So to be very careful 3:22:38.920 --> 3:22:40.280 what you're reading out there. 3:22:40.840 --> 3:22:43.560 All right, I think that's all for us today on 3:22:43.680 --> 3:22:44.560 It could Happen Here. 3:22:44.840 --> 3:22:54.040 Yeah, I think that's that's our new Rectiled Executive Dysfunction episode. 3:22:52.560 --> 3:22:53.640 At Rectile Order. 3:22:53.800 --> 3:22:56.360 All right, Well, we're fucking done, go away. 3:22:56.600 --> 3:22:58.599 We reported the news. 3:23:00.200 --> 3:23:00.560 The news. 3:23:05.080 --> 3:23:08.280 Hey, We'll be back Monday with more episodes every week 3:23:08.320 --> 3:23:10.240 from now until the heat Death of the Universe. 3:23:10.959 --> 3:23:13.480 It could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. 3:23:13.680 --> 3:23:16.720 For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 3:23:16.800 --> 3:23:20.400 coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, 3:23:20.440 --> 3:23:24.039 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can 3:23:24.040 --> 3:23:26.400 now find sources for it could happen here, listed directly 3:23:26.400 --> 3:23:28.720 in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.