It Could Happen Here Weekly 178

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Cool Zone Media.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Hey everybody, Robert Evans here, and I wanted to let
you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode
of the week that just happened is here in one
convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to
listen to in a long stretch if you want. If
you've been listening to the episodes every day this week,
there's going to be nothing new here for you, but
you can make your own decisions.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
Welcome, dig it out and here a podcast. I asked
the question what happens when the people who are trying
to help put things back together are also being exploited
in the process. I am your host, Mia Wong, and
today we are going to be talking about a union
that is attempting to do exactly that. And with me
to discuss this are Jess and Hazeus, who are mentors
for Friends of the Children PDX and members of the

(00:48):
Friends PDX union network. Yeah, Jess is Zeus. Welcome to
the show.

Speaker 4 (00:53):
Thank you so much for having us.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 4 (00:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
I'm really happy to talk to you both, because I
think this is a very very unique an interesting union
especially you know, talk about especially right now. But to
get people sort of rolling. Can you explain what Friends
with the Children is and what it is that you
two do.

Speaker 5 (01:13):
Yeah, so Friends with the Children is it's a national organization.
It's a nonprofit, but they're there are individual chapters throughout
different cities. We work out of Portland, which is the
founding chapter and also the largest one. Some of the language,
I'll say that it's like used from the website and

(01:33):
from like the mission statement that really encompasses what our
role is and also how it is told to like
our community partnerships and the families and youth that we
work with. Is that we are committing to youth when
they are typically around kindergarten age level and they're being
paired with a mentor, and they will have a mentor

(01:55):
until they graduate the program, so that usually ends up
being a total of twelve and a half years. And
that like within that, we were doing a lot of
like individualized care and support. We work with them in
the schools, we work with them outside the schools, We
help them get into extracurriculars, We help them with like
social emotional regulation, developing relationships with other youth in the program,

(02:19):
and really just like being a consistently reliable human being,
and one of the big pillars of our organization is
the commitment to long term, which sometimes can be an
issue when you are facing a lot of high turnover
As an organization. We both have eight kids on our roster,
as do most mentors, and within that we have youth.

(02:43):
I personally have youth that have been assigned to me
that have just started in the program, meaning that they
were like maybe first grade when I was assigned to them.
And then I also have youth that are middle school
level that have had several different men tours in the past,
some that have stayed there for maybe a few years,

(03:04):
and like sometimes there's ones that have been there for months.

Speaker 6 (03:08):
Yeah, if I can add to that. The kids we
work with, they're enrolled into the program because they have
some risk factors in their lives that would lead them
to needing a little bit of extra support and help.
So we work with a lot of kids that come

(03:29):
from immigrant families, from families that have you know, single
parent households, foster care families, and kids kids that like unfortunately,
are likely to face some challenges that our society and
the way it's built up will deal to them, and

(03:52):
our goal is to help them through those challenges, just
be there for them so that they have a chance
of you know, graduating high school or entering adulthood without
having you know, having had kids or facing like the
justice system. It's kids that we love dearly that we

(04:18):
work with in a similar way as like you know,
a program like Big Brothers Big Sisters. But we are
paid mentors, which is the big difference, right, We're not
volunteer based. We are employees basically social workers for all.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Of the families that we work with.

Speaker 6 (04:38):
It's honestly, like it's a great job, and I think
right now, especially like super necessary because things are falling apart.

Speaker 5 (04:47):
Yeah, yeah, and yeah, just adding like one that made
me think of how within the work, Like I think
social work is a very apt choice of words because
we are paired with the youth and it doesn't like
stop there like we work like we work with the families.
We also work with like the siblings too, because sometimes

(05:08):
you'll have a youth that maybe is the only child
in that family that for whatever reason got a mentor
and then you support also I mean it's a choice,
but I would say that most mentors definitely opt into
being there for siblings and family members in the household
and making sure that they're also showing up for the

(05:28):
caregivers to help them create a loving home.

Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah, and I mean, you know, I think that you
can you can look at this and see how it's
supposed to work structurally, And you know, you were talking
about like, I mean, this is supposed to be a
like over a decade long commitment to these kids, right
that ideally you're working with the same person, and you know,
you're forming really deep emotional attachments because you can't not

(05:55):
do that if you're doing this kind of work. But
then also, you know, in order for that to work,
I think it's you know, you can see this the outside, like,
in order for this to work, this has to be
a job that you could stayably do for a decade, right.

Speaker 5 (06:14):
Yeah, yeah, which I will say we do and I
want to do. I want to give so many props
to one of our mentors who has stayed for twelve
years and has graduated their youth. But of of all
of our co workers, I believe it's only one that
has currently been able to do that and has stayed

(06:34):
there as long as I have.

Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (06:37):
Yeah, And the truth of the fact, like, yeah, a
for any job, twelve and a half years is a
really long time, right, I mean six years is a
really long time. And with this job, we're like we're
an emotional sponge for a lot of things. Right, So
our kids go through everything that you can imagine, and

(07:01):
and within that like everything good and everything bad that
you can imagine. And our job a lot of times
is like we can't solve the things that are affecting
these kids, but we can take in some of those
negative feelings and that grief, that anger. We can take

(07:24):
it in and almost like dissolve it a little bit, right,
But within that, like it can affect us so so much.
And that's where, Yeah, the sustainability part of like twelve
and a half years in this job, like that is
a lot, and you we need a lot for that

(07:44):
to like at all be be possible.

Speaker 3 (07:48):
Yeah, I mean, like that there's this way in which
you're effectively what this job is is like you're the
person who is trying to like mitigate the impact of
like all like literally all of the structural systems of
violence that exist in this entire country, and how like
how they're just sort of targeted down on these kids,

(08:09):
and your job is to like try to like protect
them as much as possible, and that's unbelievable amount of
like physical and emotional labor. And then also like, I
don't know, it seems pretty bad that there's only been
one co worker who's been able to graduate their kids.

Speaker 7 (08:27):
Like.

Speaker 5 (08:30):
Just to clarify for history that's been in like our time.

Speaker 4 (08:33):
Yeah, I don't know if like over.

Speaker 5 (08:35):
The thirty years, I hope that other people have, but yeah,
in recent years it's only been the one. And also like, yeah,
this is a job where you are not necessarily able
to like undo the systems at play, but trying to
support them. And like we as mentors are inevitably also

(08:56):
facing those systems against ourselves. And like one of the
reasons that I think people gravitate towards this job is
their empathy because they have those shared experiences.

Speaker 4 (09:08):
One of the.

Speaker 5 (09:09):
Things that is kind of heavy in the culture of
friends is being asked your why when you start, like
why did you choose friends? And for a lot of people,
it is because of wanting to be the person that
they needed when they were going through those periods of time.
So there's bound to be like a lot of like
reactivation of feelings inside yourself that I think we all,

(09:32):
like I want to say, like every mentor I've worked
with does an incredible job of like handling that and
like taking good care of themselves. But it is definitely
something that like takes a lot of regulation, and I
think empathy is one of the greatest skills in this job.
But it also yeah, it also then leads to us

(09:54):
needing greater needs of self care and things like that.

Speaker 3 (09:57):
Yeah, And like I mean, I guess like to put
this in person active for like people listening to this
as like, Okay, your job is to be the person
like in the friend group who like manages like when
someone's like having an emotional crisis, like you have to
like help them deal with it, and that is your
job for like eight kids like the worst shit in

(10:19):
the world, like Jesus Christ's Oh good lord.

Speaker 6 (10:25):
It's honestly, like like hearing this, it's always really helpful
to hear someone's outside perspective of our job, right because
we get so so into it, so into the munk
of like what this job can be. And I think
like overall, like like social work, it's not just like
our our job, but like I'm sure other social workers

(10:45):
and people in care industries, like we have that like
continuous like vicarious trauma that makes us forget like how
how our job is sometimes and then it's helpful to
hear other people mention it because it's like, yeah, wow,
our job is kind of crazy and and the work
we do is like really important and really important for society.

(11:08):
And also yeah, like it's hard. It's hard work.

Speaker 5 (11:14):
It's it's hard, and it doesn't like really have an endpoint,
Like we have the hours we work with kids, and
then we have the hours we think about them and
the things going on in their lives.

Speaker 4 (11:25):
And sometimes it's like sweet things.

Speaker 5 (11:27):
Like a lot of times it's sweet things where I'll
see something and be like, oh my gosh, you know
who love that? And like things like that are like oh,
great idea, or oh, let's go see this movie. And
a lot of times it's like worrying though too, and
knowing that there is there is only so many things
we can control and some things we just have to

(11:47):
be the person that's there as they have to go
through something, which, yeah, it's it's hard because we also
obviously like develop such loving relationships with these kids. It's
hard to see like kids that you care about so
much that sometimes the most you can do is just
be there.

Speaker 4 (12:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (12:07):
It definitely is a job that, like to some degree,
is sort of always with you.

Speaker 8 (12:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (12:14):
We have a joke about this with this job, where
it's likely I do what you love when you'll never
be free for a single second of your entire life
because you're just always awes.

Speaker 1 (12:25):
Yeah that's so true.

Speaker 6 (12:27):
Yeah, as you say this, I worked till like nine
thirty last night because I was like, you know what,
I'm enjoying this so much, hagging out with my guys,
so I'm just going to keep working.

Speaker 1 (12:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (12:37):
Yeah, So, speaking speaking of keeping working, we need to
go to ads and then we will come back and
talk about the ways in which this job that requires
an incredible amount of structural support to keep people there
for like over a decade, is failing to do that.

(13:02):
And we are back. So Okay, now now that we've
sort of talked about what this is, let's talk about
the actual union.

Speaker 4 (13:13):
It was just the thing.

Speaker 3 (13:14):
Yeah, yeah, so can you can you talk about sort
of how how did organizing for this union start and
what were the sort of issues that could have brought
everyone to be like, Okay, we need to do.

Speaker 6 (13:24):
This, yeah, for sure. So we first brought about our
petition to unionize in March of twenty twenty three, so
that was two years ago, a long time ago, right,
But the work for a unionization, obviously, the organizing behind

(13:46):
it had started like much before that. When I first
joined Friends, it was in September of twenty two, and
I knew that the work had already been like happening
the summer before. What was the catalyst was post covid.

Speaker 9 (14:06):
A.

Speaker 6 (14:06):
Obviously a lot of people left, given what COVID did
to a lot of industries and especially care work. But
then likewise, a lot of people are fired and where
many would say like fired without like a full on
like due process, that included a program manager who you

(14:27):
know was really listening to friends and advocating for the
mentor role, and they were let go, which spurred a
lot of people to want to start organizing. Some of
the issues that we face, like the pay obviously, like
within social work in general and nonprofit work, like it's
never gonna match up and never gonna really be as

(14:48):
good as like the cost of living, especially here in Portland.
But the pay compared to like all of the emotional
work and all the work that we do was just
not there and not sustainable. It's why people were not
able to stick around because frankly, we were looking at
the same issues that our families were facing of, like

(15:09):
you know, food of insecurity and needing to like get
food stamps, or like needing like rental and like housing
assistants because our pay was just not up to par.
Those are a few of the issues. Jess, I don't
know if you have other thoughts.

Speaker 4 (15:27):
Yeah, I think you touched on a lot of them.

Speaker 5 (15:29):
I think it's hard to stay in this job if
you are looking to have a family. There's been issues yeat,
with pay, with insurance, with other sorts of things that
have led to mentors leaving rather than like staying there
even if they like really wanted to stay there, just
wouldn't necessarily allow for them to have maybe like the
life they wanted and also just honoring I think with

(15:53):
like bereavement leave and critical issue leave has been areas
that haven't really been addressed. We have had very tragic
things happen in the in our working community with the
families and that have drastically affected. Yeah, the well being
of mentors and staff members alike.

Speaker 3 (16:15):
Yeah, and I mean, you know, this is a job
that structurally is designed to be a kind of like
like again, if the goal is to have one person
from from like kindergarten to ntealthy like a graduating high school, right,
Like that is something that requires like nineteen fifties nineteen

(16:35):
sixties style forwardism, like you have one job for decades,
and the only way you can to that is if
people are incredibly well supported. And it's like the fact
that it's like, Okay, you're trying to do this, but
you're not paying people enough money to fucking afford food, Like.

Speaker 10 (16:53):
What the hell, like Jesus Christ, Yeah, just like oh
my god, yeah, or even I mean it's still something
that we're fighting.

Speaker 6 (17:03):
But like our our workplace like doesn't provide health insurance
for dependence, which I think, oh my god, really ironic
giving how much we care for kids, and then some
of our mentors and other coworkers that have kids, like
have to spend so much money on health insurance for
their own personal.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
Kids friends of some of the kids apparently works.

Speaker 6 (17:28):
Yeah yeah, yeah, And honestly, like big big picture thinking,
like the reason why we like started this whole unionizing
project was because we care so much about our kids, right,
Like I when I first started working at Friends, Like,

(17:48):
I think was the first MASK mentor to be hired
in a fairly long time, after a lot of firings
of other mass mentors and two of the youth that
but actually it's more than two of the youth. But
the first two youth that I was matched up with,
they hadn't had a mentor for over two years, jeez,

(18:10):
which is a really long time. Like when when you know,
are five six years old, and you're used to one
person consistently picking you up every single week and hanging
out with you and spending time with you for several
hours for six or seven years, and then just like

(18:33):
next day, next week, maybe even that same day, you
find out like, oh, you no longer have a mentor
and you're not going to have a mentor for two
more years because people keep leaving, People aren't wanting to
apply for this job because the pay isn't high enough.
Right That then like creates like a lot of issues
with the kids that we're dealing with. It's not like

(18:56):
we are these like saviors or like anything like along
those lines, right, But when someone has consistent support and
then that support is lost for a long time, especially
when you're a young kid where it's been the majority
of your life you've been having that consistant support. That
then creates like a lot of trust issues and like

(19:17):
overall like attachment issues that a youth could face. And
for me, that was the main thing. Like working with
these kids and having to like regain that trust was
something that's like still to this day is like really
emotionally like daunting. And I, like I will keep saying this.

(19:38):
I love my kids so much, like I like can't
stop thinking about them, and I want to be with
my kids until they graduate, which would mean me staying
at this job for another eight years, which it's a
long time, right, but I want to do that. So
I want to you know, get paid, have time off

(19:59):
when what of my sadly this is something that did
a curve where you've passed away that I worked with
and like didn't have time off to like really grieve that.

Speaker 1 (20:10):
Hard stuff.

Speaker 6 (20:11):
And I just want to be able to stay there
until they're done with the program.

Speaker 3 (20:16):
Yeah, And it's like there's just it's just like a
litany of horrors where it's like one it's like, you
know what when there is like it's it's not you know,
like turnover in a normal job sucks, but this is
like when there's turnover because people can't afford to live
their lives. It's like you're just like ripping a hole
in these kids, like the fabric of their social lives.

(20:38):
And then also it's like, yeah, one of these kids
that is literally your job to care for dies, you
just have to fucking go to work the next day.
Like it is so hideous, and it's.

Speaker 11 (20:50):
Just like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Like it makes sense
that like, yeah, people are organizing because it's like, you know,
like this organization is just systemically failing both the people
that are trying to help and the people whose job it.

Speaker 3 (21:07):
Is to like help them.

Speaker 4 (21:10):
And yeah, yeah yeah.

Speaker 5 (21:14):
I think one of the things that is like hardest
to see while like working there is the ways in
which this like job that you do, like that like
I care so much about and love doing, but like
seeing this like institution in a way be like part
be part of the problem because if we aren't like

(21:34):
having it so that employees feel supported in the way
that they need to, like, life happens. Sometimes people leave
and like move and get a different job for various reasons,
but a lot of the times it's it's because it's
not sustainable and it's really hard to leave, and like

(21:54):
it's a heartbreaking thing because I, like, I want to
graduate many of my youth and it is something that
I think about of like how feasible is that, Like
I want to do it, and like also, okay, then
that means I got to be frugal and all these
other ways are et cetera. And yeah, I'm working with
youth that have already kind of experienced loss and wanting

(22:15):
to continue to show up for them.

Speaker 4 (22:17):
The job itself feels so.

Speaker 5 (22:18):
Sacred and like I feel so lucky to be in
these kids' lives, and I think just a lot of
the turnover has been out of like lack of sustainability
for yourself, like for your well being.

Speaker 6 (22:31):
Yeah, yeah, And I mean the turnover numbers were pretty well.
I think one time we calculated it and mentors were
it was like a forty something percent turnover mentors. Yeah,
And a lot of that happened because in this two
year time period where we've been fighting for a construct,

(22:55):
they also froze wage increases, so I've had the same
the same wage for the past two years, about two
and a half years that I've been working here, you know,
and in that same time period, inflation has been prettigue
crazy and rent for me. Yeah yeah, which which you

(23:21):
know gladly. Now we're we have this fight and we're
at the two year mark and not at the zero
year mark and not looking forward to two more years
of doing this. But yeah, it's it's been hard to
sustain this when everything is increasing in price and our
wages are completely stagnant.

Speaker 1 (23:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (23:40):
Yeah, So let's take one more ad break and then
we will come back to talk about, Yeah, how how
unionization efforts are going, and yeah, we are back. Yeah,
so's let's talk about how this campaign is going. So

(24:04):
you said you've been in bargaining for like two years.

Speaker 5 (24:08):
So we had our petition for recognition on March twenty third,
twenty twenty three, so that was over two years ago,
and then ours Yeah yeah, our employer didn't formally recognize us,
but through the process of like voting, we got over
ninety three percent of Wow.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
That's an incredible that's incredible.

Speaker 12 (24:35):
It's super great, and it's also like, wow, we all
really need it, Yeah, and like there were some other barriers,
including like not being formually recognized. Like we also had
management contest a few positions that I believe most, if
not all, we were able to successfully happy part of

(24:56):
our unit. And then we didn't have our first bargaining
session until September of twenty twenty three, so like almost
six months.

Speaker 4 (25:04):
I think if I did the math right.

Speaker 5 (25:06):
After we formally presented our letter for recognition, yeah, yeah,
and like throughout that process so now it has been
like Haesus is quite good at keeping track of it,
but I think as of today we're about at five
hundred and eighty days of bargaining.

Speaker 3 (25:24):
God.

Speaker 5 (25:25):
Yeah, Yeah, it's been a long one and it hasn't
been It's been like also a choppy journey where there
has been delays in scheduling, delays in just getting different
articles back in time. One of the biggest ones obviously
with compensation. And I think I can't quite remember the

(25:47):
period of time, but we presented it over a year ago,
I think maybe I could be wrong, and it took
like it took several several several months for us to
get anything back from management, which yeah, was a big bummer.

Speaker 4 (26:07):
Amongst other things.

Speaker 9 (26:09):
It sucks.

Speaker 6 (26:10):
It sucks, and obviously that's the one that we have
yet to finalize, like as we're talking right now.

Speaker 5 (26:18):
It is insurance and compensation are still our last two
articles left.

Speaker 6 (26:25):
Yeah, and some of the like the difficult things. I
mean when you are working on a project, I mean,
I wouldn't be surprised given like really when these conversations started,
if we're looking at like over nine hundred or one
thousand days of like really talking about this, but then

(26:45):
when you're dealing with bargaining for five hundred and eighty days, Like,
it's exhausting. It is so exhausting. We have regular meetings
that we attend to that our bargaining meetings were specifically
schedules outside of work hours, so that like the people
on our bargaining team and other union members would have

(27:05):
to put in that extra time outside of our forty
hour week. Yeah, and within that, Like the hardest part
is when you directly confront right your managers and your
bosses about like the rights and the things that you need.

Speaker 1 (27:26):
So much of it like.

Speaker 6 (27:27):
Boils down to respect right and your respect as like
a worker and the value that you have as a
worker in your organization, and when there is a pushback
on that, it honestly is like for me at times
was debilitating, right when you're doing this work and your
workplace is stretching things out for so long, Yeah, and

(27:52):
you're pouring your heart out on your kids, like really
trying to do the best that response from our you know,
our supervisors and managers, like it really was hard. What
was hard for me was hard for other union organizers
in our workplace, and it was hard for all of
our workers where we started thinking like dang, like what

(28:14):
is the value that we have like in this workplace,
What is the value that we intrinsically have in the
work that we're doing with our kids? It's a lot,
And it's a lot when you're facing all these systems
that our kids are facing and like taking those things
in and then are trying to change those systems. Finally
able to try to change those systems, and we learned
that like, oh wait, like the place that we're working

(28:35):
is actually part of these systems too, and it's doing
the same things that we're like fighting to have our
kids like have better lives. Like we're facing it right
now from inside the house.

Speaker 5 (28:47):
Yeah, Yeah, I wanted to add into yeah, very much,
realizing that like our management is also in a way
operating you know, maybe like a corporation, which isn't the
hope you would have for a nonprofit. And one of
the steps we had to take as a union was
filing a UOP so unfair labor practice, which cited like

(29:10):
I had mentioned before, like delays and scheduling and also
regressive bargaining, which just means that like the way in
which they were presenting things would have lessened our like
quality of conditions. So definitely not what you want to
be getting, not what you want to be handed across
from the bargaining table.

Speaker 9 (29:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 6 (29:33):
Within this process, they were currently surly workers, but they
tried to change us to hourly workers.

Speaker 3 (29:41):
Oh my god.

Speaker 12 (29:42):
Yeah, which again like we're always working, you know, we're
always working, so unless you want to pay me for
twenty four.

Speaker 3 (29:50):
Hours, you know, you're talking about like, yeah, that they're
behaving like a corporations, Like oh yeah, this is exactly
what like by employer did to me, which is like like, like,
what are the largest media companies in the world, And
they dragged out negotiations for two years and like you
know you're talking about this sort like just like oh,
they're like the feeling of disrespect where they're just not
getting stuff back to you. And it's like I remember,

(30:12):
you know, like we'd be sitting there for a bargaining
meeting and they wouldn't and they would be an hour late,
and they'd be an hour late because they hadn't like
bothered to beforehand spend time drafting out what their responses
were going to be, so they were frantically trying to
get it done before we were there, and we're all
just sitting there for literally an hour waiting for them
to show up. But it's like, Okay, there are people
in this unit whose job it is to stand next
to car bombs, like and you can't show up on

(30:35):
time to your to this, to this meeting that you
have know was going to happen for weeks. Like it's
just I say this every single lepany these episodes was like,
this is an incredibly common YouTube blisting tactic is draw
out the first contract, because that's that's like the second
point where unions fail after like the after after you
get like recognition votes is like here, yeah, for sure,

(30:56):
you know, like I mean I think there's something extent
we expect corporations do this, but it's like, Okay, this
is an NGO that's like the point of which you're
supposed to be like helping underprivileged, underprivileged youth. And then
they're like we're going to turn around and we're going
to screw over different underprivileged youth.

Speaker 1 (31:13):
Like yeah, it sucks, yeah.

Speaker 6 (31:15):
And I think that's like for me, one of the
things that just like mess with my mind the most
is that, like we're not selling a product, right, We're
not trying to like get revenue or anything along those lines.

Speaker 13 (31:30):
Right.

Speaker 6 (31:30):
So, like our job is a job that we actually
like fully love and like want to stick around, like
not not just for our own like financial you know,
peace and our own like financial security. Like we want
to stick around this job because we care about the job.
And you know that's not to like like other you know,

(31:51):
businesses and other workplaces that unionize, a lot of times
people want to do that because they want financial security, right,
And I think for a lot of NGOs, nonprofits and
care work like, we unionize because we want to stick
around both because of financial security, right, but also because

(32:11):
we just like care so much about the work that
we're doing.

Speaker 1 (32:16):
And to be faced with.

Speaker 6 (32:19):
Actions by our workplace that you know, try to dissuade
us from that, try to like you know, in a sense,
like it felt like stopping us from wanting to stick
around like that again really hard, really hard, And I
think like a really like psychologically hard part that comes
with unionizing in the care work field in the like

(32:44):
nonprofit space.

Speaker 5 (32:45):
Yeah, Like, this isn't a job that people are going
to take for the money, but we do need to
be receiving like equitable pay and benefits so that we
stay at this job like this by all means, and
like still like this is the same way I feel about.

Speaker 4 (33:03):
It to this day.

Speaker 5 (33:04):
I remember like reading the little like job description for
this role and was like, oh, this is dude, this
is like my dream job. This is like one hundred
percent what I want to spend my energy towards. Yeah,
and yeah, I think that's a huge part of why
we were able to get like that ninety three percent

(33:26):
and to have also like routine support for different actions
and stuff is just because we have people that care
so much about wanting to stick around.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
Yeah, And that's the thing that ngngos, you know, and
you see this in abortion work, you see this in like,
you see this in nursing, you see this in all
of these different fields. Like that's the thing that these
NGOs used to exploit people, is you know, like, is
the basic human empathy and love and care that we
have for the people who were caring for and they're

(34:00):
and these people are like, aha, look at this. Aha,
these people they care about the thing that they're doing.
We could underpay them and overwork them.

Speaker 4 (34:08):
It's like, why is there system work like this?

Speaker 3 (34:12):
Like it's just what a terrible way to decide an
economic system. Yeah, just good lord, Let's talk a little
bit about, like, you know, what kinds of organizing things
you all have been able to do, and the kinds
of things you've been able to accomplish by you know,
working together even in these really kind of like I
don't know, structurally difficult conditions.

Speaker 4 (34:34):
Yeah, we've had.

Speaker 5 (34:36):
We've had a multitude of different actions over the past,
you know, over the past one.

Speaker 4 (34:42):
Hundred and eighty days.

Speaker 5 (34:43):
I think one of our one of our biggest ones
by far, which was I think also was just one
of our most beautiful in a way, was November of
last year, we did an info picket, and it was
one of those things too where it was very well
planned out, but also even with the best of planning,

(35:04):
midway through it, we had a shift location based off
of just changing information we were getting.

Speaker 4 (35:09):
And we had one of our little bits.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
It is because our union is called fun a lot
of our posters were SpongeBob themed, so instead of imagination,
you know, it's compensation.

Speaker 4 (35:26):
And the rules.

Speaker 5 (35:27):
Yeah, and I think it's indicative of, like also how
much people that work with us are playful and sweet
and why we're are good at our jobs of working
with kids.

Speaker 4 (35:40):
And yeah, we had very high turnout.

Speaker 5 (35:43):
I think we had forty something people within our own
organization that showed up for that. We've done smaller actions too,
by just asking for community support, like we've had caregivers
write letters of support to different people in management. We've
also done a few pack the rooms for bargeting sessions,
like especially when there have been times that have felt

(36:05):
like there's been some semblance of stalling.

Speaker 4 (36:08):
Yeah, those are just some of them. He stays, chime
in with others.

Speaker 6 (36:11):
Yeah, within that, and I think, like an interesting thing
about nonprofits, our revenue comes from donors, right, so we
have to play this like fun game of like, Okay,
how do we communicate with our donors, right, so that
we make sure that they know that, like you know,
this is part of like what they're donating too. But
then within that also, like you knows, ask for money

(36:34):
as well, right, because we do want you know, better
pay and better benefits.

Speaker 14 (36:39):
Right.

Speaker 6 (36:40):
So we've contacted donors and will still plan to do
that with both that ask of like support the union
and support our organization, right because the thing that we
care about the most is the work that we do
with our kids, and for that to happen, we want
our organization to like stay afloat truly, right, Yeah, some
of the wins that we've gotten. I mentioned earlier that

(37:05):
they were trying to have us be hourly workers, and
that was a big campaign that we like were fighting
back on for a long time. It's also like what
precipitated the ULP filing. I made too many buttons that
said you could never have peuty butons truly that said

(37:28):
I worked forty plus hours a week. Because one of
the people on the bargaining team for management at the
bargaining table asked if we even worked forty hours a
week while we were talking about this, and that's like
one of those instances that I mean like yeah, wow,
that's like a little disrespectful and like really bites. So
we all were wearing these pins regularly. We you know,

(37:52):
we signed a strike pledge where we had like eighty
something percent of the unit say that like if we
came to voting.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
For a strike, people would strike.

Speaker 6 (38:01):
And the big win was like, Okay, great, we get
to stay a salaried workers because they walk back on
that on that threat. We our time off. We have
a time off contract or agreement now that like some
of my co workers that have been around a long time,
once the contract gets ratified, they'll have like two more

(38:23):
weeks of time off.

Speaker 3 (38:24):
Hell yeah, hell yeah.

Speaker 6 (38:26):
Because they haven't. They've been around for seven years and
they're still at the same amount of time off basically
that I'm at and that I've been at since the beginning. Yeah,
And when it comes to wages, like, well, we're still
figuring that out, but some of the gains that we
are potentially looking at is like incredible, Like I looked

(38:48):
at the numbers yesterday of like what hopefully given like
where we're at right now in the agreements like what
I would hopefully get and I straight up like tiered
up looking at the number because it felt like such
a big change in my financial status. Right, And yesterday,

(39:09):
like as I said, I worked on nine thirty PM
with my kids, probably because I had this like massive
like weight of you know, this financial doom that I'm
looking at somewhat lifted at the hope of the winds
that we might get from this contract. So it's been
incredibly hard, incredibly long, way too long, and all of

(39:30):
it is so it is going to be so worth it, right.
I hope that's something that the listeners really get that, like,
this is hard work, but in the end, like is
the change that we were hoping for, you know.

Speaker 5 (39:45):
Yeah, And recently, one of the things that we did
do just like a run through of just to kind
of boost morales since sparketing has gone on for so long,
was compile all the wins that we have so far
just through thas so still tensative, but yeah, did map
out a lot of huge things. One of the things
we do a lot on this job is drive and

(40:05):
we don't have many things in policy about.

Speaker 4 (40:11):
Cleanings or repairs.

Speaker 5 (40:13):
When something happens in your car, with the youth, like
say they throw up, it happens with kids, Like that
isn't necessarily something that would have been like covered. We
would have had to just pay for that cleaning ourselves.
And like coleage is a huge thing where one of
our potential like big wins is that we'll get like
full mileage covered rather than having to like deduct time

(40:33):
from like this illusion of having an office where we
would have to minus some mileage in whatever way made
sense with where our buildings were located. Despite even if
our kids were like totally somewhere else where we were
picking them up, it definitely wasn't like the most sensible
way for us to be like being fully.

Speaker 4 (40:55):
Reimbursed for what we were doing.

Speaker 5 (40:57):
Yeah, and those are all huge that we do have,
Like obviously compensation insurance are two of the biggest that
we're still working on. I think recently, like almost within
this week, we've started to tip in a way that
feels like we may be close to having a contract soon,

(41:17):
which I do want to say, like, you know, as
inspiration to everybody out there that.

Speaker 4 (41:22):
Works for a nonprofit like.

Speaker 5 (41:24):
Unionize and you know what you might it might farewell
for you. I have hope for everybody, and like, right now,
I think a lot of are, like a lot of
my coworkers are starting to have hope again because I
do think, like you said, it is totally a manipulation
tool to have it drawn out so long, And yeah,
it is exhausting to be basically stalled in your wage.

Speaker 4 (41:46):
For two and a half years.

Speaker 5 (41:48):
But we are like gaining some traction again, which I
do think is something that we're still being you know,
cautious with, just because right now it does feel like
management is working with that's a little bit more. But
I also think that there are reasonings around that, Like
we're about to have in a few weeks our biggest

(42:09):
fundraiser for our work, because like Caseue said, we are
majority donor based, and I do think there's an appeal
to management to have a contract by then.

Speaker 4 (42:18):
Yeah, it adds to.

Speaker 5 (42:20):
The whole We're doing good work and we treat our
employees well. I hope that that is something then that
is fulfilled by them in an honest way, not just
a superficial way, because we are still pushing for a
little bit more right now and have bargaining coming up
next week. So yeah, I'm really hoping that what they're
showing us isn't just performative, that we really might be

(42:42):
able to get to a point where there is something
that is truly good for us, because.

Speaker 4 (42:49):
We're all ready we're all ready for a contract.

Speaker 3 (42:54):
Yeah, as you know someone, we've got our contract. Like
it doesn't it doesn't magically solve everything, but like, my god,
it should make your life better, like it is, it
is absolutely worth it. Yeah, okay, So how can people
support y'all both sort of locally here and then just
like broader because most people are not here.

Speaker 5 (43:15):
Honestly, most of our like people in like management positions,
information is public. If you want to email them in support,
go for it. Also, just like encouraging either your workplace
if you work in kind of a social work setting,
or like you know, if you know people that are
because this whole field of work takes such a toll
on people and it is the most necessary work. And

(43:39):
I think it's really easy to fall into the mindset
of I'm doing this for the greater good, not you know,
not for money, not for these things, but like you
also deserve to feel okay and taken care of and
like have the things you need to be saying yeah, hey,
says anything else do you want to add?

Speaker 1 (43:59):
Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 6 (44:01):
I would add that, like we have an Instagram right
as friends PDX Union Network.

Speaker 3 (44:09):
It's a mouthful, but will link the inscription.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
Yeah, great.

Speaker 6 (44:13):
And then within that, like if you're in Portland, like
make sure to like follow us and like pay attention
to what we're posting, because we you know, hopefully we
do not have to get to a point of striking,
especially at the place that we're at right now with
our contract, but in truth, like we're looking at five
hundred and eighty days and that is quite a long time.

Speaker 9 (44:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (44:35):
And then also like if if listeners do have the
ability to donate, if they could donate some funds for
Friends of the Children Portland and somehow in their notes
be like I support the union, Like I think that
could also be a really interesting way to show the
support that like our supporters have, like for both the

(44:57):
work that we're doing on the youth level, but then
also like in the union side of things too, there's
been a lot of like communication of like, oh, this
is really going to impact like the development side of
our organization and like all of the things that like
our fundraising team is going to have to do to

(45:18):
like meet thees, which again I think, yeah, that would
be more true if like our executive director wasn't making
like what like five times as much money as I
am Jeu Christ. Yeah, but yeah, showing that support, like
it doesn't have to be a lot, but showing our

(45:39):
bosses just how much like the populace like is supporting
our unionization efforts like that power do you really don't too?
And and then also like it impacts our kids, like
our kids, like that's the truth of it all, Like
I want my kids to have the best life that
they could possibly have, and sadly we live in a
world for money really dictates that.

Speaker 3 (46:03):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, so those are will we will
we will, we will have links in the description to
all of that, And yeah, thank you to both so
much for coming on the show and hope I hope
you win, and yeah, I hope you get to go
back to caring for these kids and not and also
while not having to worry about like being able to

(46:24):
live your lives.

Speaker 1 (46:25):
Thank you so much.

Speaker 5 (46:27):
Yeah, yeah, thank you so much for having us. Yeah,
of course, honestly, it's been great talking about the work
because it is it is really important work and I'm
happy we get to do it.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
Yeah, it's it's wonderful and yeah and so this is yeah,
this just bin I could happened here, and yeah, i'd
also go unionize your workplace. You can do it. I
guarantee it.

Speaker 9 (47:12):
Hello, and welcome to the show. It's me James today
and I am joined by Garrison Davis. Hi, Garrison.

Speaker 8 (47:19):
Hello.

Speaker 4 (47:19):
Hello.

Speaker 9 (47:20):
Garrison has just said some words about something that's happening
on social media that I don't understand, and it's made
me feel very old. That's what's happening today in my world.
It's very sad we're gathered here today to talk about
the earthquake in me anma, right, I think most of
you will probably have been made aware of the earthquake.

(47:42):
It's somewhat odd that corporate media has really not reported
on the revolution in any substantial way since twenty twenty one,
but the earthquake apparently justified a lot of network sending
people to me Amma for the first time. Very amusingly,
people dming me on Blue Sky and Twitter are asking
how to get a visa from the Burmese Hunter, which

(48:02):
is not a thing I've ever done. The last communication
I had with them came in the form of a
car bomb that they said of near to a place
where we were. But if you're not aware, the earthquake
happened on the twenty eighth of March of this year,
just before one in the afternoon. It was the biggest
earthquake in Myanma. So it's nineteen twelve and it registered
seven point seven on the Richter scale, which is huge

(48:25):
because it's it's very hard for foreign journalists to get
a visa to enter Memba. The initial reporting focused on
Bangkok and the damage done in Thailand, but the epithet
was in Sagang, which is near Mandalay, Madelaide's second biggest
city in Memba, and that was where like the worst
of the destruction happened. Almost every street in Mandalai has

(48:48):
collapsed buildings. It's a little difficult for us to get
a sense of the exact scale of the damage because
the Hunter refuses to allow Some media has been allowed
in the BBC. I saw like sneaked up in. It's
very difficult for media to move and report freely. And
in addition to this, the Hunter has continued to practice
of cutting off Internet for people in Memma, right.

Speaker 8 (49:10):
Even during like emergency situations. Yes, yeah, especially during emergency.

Speaker 9 (49:15):
They've kind it off like as a response to this
because I guess they perceive it to be something that
makes them look weak. This is a tendency that the
Hunter has displayed before. So in two thousand and eight,
cyclone Nagas affected Mema and killed over one hundred and
thirty thousand people, and they blocked international aid. They said

(49:36):
that people didn't need the quote chocolate bars that the
US and other countries were trying to deliver, and that
they could exist by like hunting frogs in ditches, was
their suggestion. I don't think people realize like how far
down the North Korea scale that the Burmese Hunter is,

(49:57):
but like they're very worried that any interaction with the
outside world, specifically with like I guess western neoliberal powers,
will be damaging for their like ability to control the population.
So for that reason, we don't know how many people
have died. Right from what I've heard on the ground,

(50:20):
the death toll is substantially higher than the three thy
six hundred number being reported. The US Geological Survey estimated
that an earthquake of that magnitude in that region would
kill between ten and one hundred thousand people. Obviously, that's
quite a big kind of delta there. What I can
tell you is that I've heard firsthand that there are
some parts of mandolines A going where the stench of

(50:41):
rotting bodies is so powerful that people have stopped returning
to their homes. There have been so many aftershocks that
people are still sleeping in the street because they're worried
about the damage structures falling down. The UN has an
estimate of seventeen million people of cross fifty seven townships.
Townships are like the administrative districts that are used in

(51:05):
miannber a bit affected, with over nine million people facing
severe hardship. And of course this is all compounded by
the fact that there were already twenty million people in
Miamma who needed humanitarian assistance, and they're about three and
a half million internally displaced people as a result of
the fighting that's happened after the revolution, So like, it

(51:25):
really came at a pretty difficult time in a place
where the government is not willing to They said after
the earth quake they wanted international aid, but they've as
we'll see later in this script. They've only accepted it
from certain countries. I spoke to a friend who has
family in Mandalay yesterday. He told me that the way
they're assessing the damage is using like open source intelligence.

(51:48):
They're trying to look in the backgrounds of people's videos
on Facebook to work out if their childhood homes fell down. Right,
they were using satellite imaging software when I spoke to
them yesterday to try and ascertaining of their families were okay,
they told me. Or Sagang has very famous pagodas, and
the pagodas are all on a hill. Apparently a lot

(52:09):
of those pagodas have fallen down, and even the hill
itself is like listing. So there's been like massive cultural
damage as well. Another way in which the damage was
compounded by Miamma's politics was the quake struck like I said,
at one pm on a Friday, right, which is Friday prayers.
This happened during Ramadan speciularly the day before it'll fitter,

(52:31):
which is a very busy day for mosques if you're
not aware, right, Successive governments of Meamma since the nineteen
sixties have refused to allow even basic maintenance for mosques.
That means that these buildings were in great states of disrepair. Right, Myanma,
there is an ulternationalist Buddhist movement which has been embraced
to a great degree by the Hunter, but also limited

(52:54):
even like the National League for Democracy, which was the
relatively neo liberal aligned party that had previously been in
power in Myanma or somewhat in power. I suppose alternationalist
Buddhist monks like Ashin Wurathu and his nine six nine
movement have kind of condemned anythink that they did as
making the pro Muslim and they have this essentially they

(53:15):
have a great replacement theory, right that Muslims are trying
to come in through Bangladesh to replace Buddhists in Mianma.

Speaker 8 (53:22):
Yeah, lots of people here have this like very orientalist
perspective of like Buddhism TM as this like you know,
like like like peaceful blah blah blah blah blah, and
like no, like Buddhism, like every religion has a variety
of sex, yes, and the Buddhist national sex can be

(53:42):
particularly nasty.

Speaker 9 (53:44):
Yeah, I mean as vicious as any other people. I'm
sure will be familiar with their Hindi genocide, and like
there are a lot of monks that supported that, including
where Rathu is the most notable one, but there are
plenty more, right, and they're part of the I mean
he's he's literally explicitly expressed like how much he looks
at to the English Defense League Jesus. Yeah. Yeah, Like

(54:04):
these are people who like they are part of this
global nativist movement. People's orientalism, I think sometimes stops them
seeing that or appreciating that this extends outside of like
white global North countries. Yeah. One thing that I did
think that that really touched me in the days after
the earthquake was young Buddhist Bamar people of the majority ethnicity,

(54:26):
reaching out to me and being like, hey man, this
happened in Friday prayers to Ramadan, and it has devastated
the Muslim population, Like thousands of people, hundreds of mosques
have gone, and thousands of people are trapped in a
rubble and like no one's talking about it. Why it is,
no we're talking about it. This is terrible and like
it would have been inconceivable to hear young Bama Buddhist

(54:48):
people so concerned with the well being of like their
Muslim countrymen. Before the coup in twenty twenty one, This
was a country that had been manufacturing consent for genocide
against it it's Muslim minorities for four or five years
by that point, right specifically on Facebook. That's a behind
the bath this episode on this you can also listen

(55:09):
if you're new to the show. Robert and I have
made two scripted series about the revolution in the Emma,
which will include in the show notes. But like that
change to a real genuine solidarity and care between these
two groups was really touching in the moments after the earthquake,
in the days after the earthquake. When we come back,
I want to talk a little bit more about the

(55:30):
revolution and I want to talk about how the revolution
has been responding to this and the impact it has
had on the revolution. We are back, and of course
the revolution hasn't stopped because of the earthquake, right The

(55:52):
conflict is still ongoing and the PDFs and their allied
ethnic business organizations are still fight against the Hunter. In fact,
within an hour of the earthquake, the Hunter began using
paramotors to drop bombs on Hangul village in Sugang. This
has been a thing that they've started to do recently.

(56:13):
In a sense, I guess it's a good sign because
it shows that maybe their jets and other aircraft are
in a poor state of repair, or that they're struggling
to keep enough of them airborne. Initially, I wondered if
they were using the paramotors because their runways have been damaged,
but there doesn't seem to be the case. They've been
air striking just as much as they ever did, which

(56:35):
is unfortunate. Satellite images or imports some my source on
the ground suggests that they're able to continue carrying out
bombing rates at a pretty similar rate from when they
did before. Despite this, the National Unity Government, which is
kind of the shadow government composed mostly of people who
are elected and then deposed by the coup in twenty

(56:55):
twenty one, and the PDF, who in theory are commanded
by the National Unity Government, called a two week ceasefire
right after the earthquake to allow for like a humanitarian pause.
The Three Brotherhood Alliance, which is an alliance of the
three most powerful ethnic resistance organizations in Myanmar, also called
what they called a humanitarian pause for a month in

(57:16):
both cases, they said they wouldn't undertake offensive operations, but
they would defend themselves, right because I think they had
a CeNSE that the Hunter wasn't going to stop attacking them.
The Hunter did declare its own ceasfire on April third,
and the Kachin Independence Army, which is another ethnic residence organization,
followed shortly thereafter. Notably, that ceasefire from the Hunter came

(57:38):
the day after its troops fired on a Chinese Red
Cross convoy, which is not a great look for them.

Speaker 8 (57:45):
No, never love to see that.

Speaker 9 (57:47):
Yeah, we don't love to see people firing on the
Red Cross. This is especially bad for the Hunter because
China has been growing closer and closer to the Hunter
and supporting it. China's had this weird back and forth
relationship with the Revolution. At times, it's the Revolution, it
seems like just supporting the me and my National Democratic
Alliance Army, which is a group that broke off the
Communist Party of Burma in the nineteen eighties.

Speaker 8 (58:09):
That, yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (58:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (58:11):
There's also the United War State Army, which isn't part
of the Revolution, which is that which has the strongest
relationship with the PSC, and they're just chilling. They haven't
really entered the conflict.

Speaker 8 (58:21):
It's called straight chillin, by the way, Jane.

Speaker 9 (58:23):
Straight chillin. Yeah, there you go. That's how you say. Yeah,
I marked myself out yet again, straight chillin. The United
War State Army, Thank you, Garrison. Actually, it spoke to
some Cadridge from the Burmese Communist Party recently the Communist
Party of Burma re entered after twenty twenty one, and

(58:45):
like they're not focusing on like proselytizing the Maoist gospel
to people. They're focusing on like fighting the Hunter and
like developing alliances. And it's kind of it's interesting to
see where that will go. Given Yeah, Marcus Leninism MAUSM
is definitely not the majority ideology the revolution. Most people
are committed to some form of federal democracy, which when

(59:05):
you speak to different fighters varies from like we want
what you guys have in the US to something more
akin to the democratic confederalism that people might be familiar
with in Rajaba. China is competing with Russia in me
and mar so both of them are interested in supporting
the Hunter right like, and obviously both their ideologies are
far from liberatory that they're interested in propping up a

(59:28):
totalitarian state. So we have seen both Russia and China
send support to the Hunter, send like rescue teams after
the earthquake. Meanwhile, the US offered two million dollars, which
I was kind of surprisedly offered.

Speaker 8 (59:43):
Anythink that is low key surprising considering Yeah, Mark Rubio.

Speaker 9 (59:48):
Right, yeah, well I think Rubio is more of a
like a slightly Rubio is a neokhon.

Speaker 8 (59:53):
Yeah, I guess like it makes sense Mark Rubio like
five years ago. Yeah, it doesn't make sense like post
like you say, to being gutted. They're like, oh, you're
still doing that kind of stuff.

Speaker 9 (01:00:03):
Huh.

Speaker 8 (01:00:04):
Yeah, there's like a weird like mix of things because
because yes, like a traditional neocon style Rubio this this tract,
but all of the movements that the Trump administration has
been doing more recently, this seems like it seems like
some kind of Dei Shenanigans if you ask.

Speaker 9 (01:00:22):
Yeah, actually they added another seven million later nine million,
which is yeah, it's not a lot of money compared
to what we would normally expect. And at the same
time they did it three USAID workers at least three
I should say three. That I'm aware of were laid off,
like literally they received emails telling them that they no
longer had a job while they were on the ground

(01:00:42):
assisting earthquake survivors.

Speaker 8 (01:00:44):
Department of Government efficiency strikes again.

Speaker 9 (01:00:47):
Highly efficient, will send you the money and then also
put out our own people who I guess are supervising
how the money has spent or would be. It definitely
shows so like a strategic shift in the region China Russia.
China is interested in memr because of its rare earth metals,
because of jade, like China has triginally had a lot
of jade trade with mian Ma, and then because it

(01:01:12):
controls a large amount of seafront right, which which China
wouldn't want to fall into like way it would see
as like someone with adversarial interests. Russia is still interested
in just kind of projecting itself as a global power,
even as it continues to shrink of every day in
terms of its global ability to project power. But there
definitely are both Chinese and Russian assistants helping the Miamma hunter. Now, meanwhile,

(01:01:35):
the US doesn't seem to give a shit what happens
here now, like this is kind of not that the
Biden administration was doing very much either, but at least
we had USAID and USIP was very invested in MEMR
and actually did a really good job of kind of
almost like being the Foreign Affairs not branch, but they
explained the revolution to the world like whenever a journalist

(01:01:56):
wanted to understand the revolution in MEMMR, it was USIP.
They went to. All the contents that have at USIB
have now been doged, which is a shame. So despite
the ceasefire, right I said, they fired on these Chinese troops,
the Hunter has in fact not stop bombing earthquakes struck
areas since the earthquake madele APDF, who I'm in contact

(01:02:18):
with the other revolutionary forces in the area that was
most affected by the earthquake on April seventh, told me
that they're aware of ten strikes in their area of
operations since the earthquake. Three months old baby and a
ten year old child were killed in an air raid
on Niicar village and Papun township that was in Corren
State on April tenth. They bombed a school and something

(01:02:40):
that the Hunter likes to do a lot that they
dropped two five hundred pound bombs on a food court.
They then circled back and dropped another bomb on the
people responding to and giving aid to the people they'd
initially bombed in the food court. By food court here,
Just to clarify, I'm not talking about like at the
shopping mall. I'm talking about like a market where people
can buy like prepared food.

Speaker 14 (01:03:00):
Right.

Speaker 9 (01:03:02):
They've killed, at the best I can collate from various
sources at least seventy two people and injured about one
hundred people, in addition to thousands who died after the earthquake.
There are also reports that Hunter quote unquote recruiters here
are engaging in forced conscription in the disaster zone. I

(01:03:22):
read of at least one person who was on a
search and rescue team that they were a trained search
and rescue volunteer. Right, So they were moving rebel to
rescue people, and they were forcibly conscripted while they were
doing that. Obviously, that's had a chilling effect on people
going out to help others.

Speaker 15 (01:03:39):
Right.

Speaker 9 (01:03:40):
What the Hunter is not doing is rescuing its citizens.
The military is detested in most of me Ima, even
in the areas that it controls, and its failure to
even try and track people rescued on the ubel won't
help this. There was a video that went viral recently
of Hunter troops literally a line of soldiers rescuing bricks.
They've gone to a collapsed building and they're inspecting the

(01:04:02):
bricks to see if the bricks a whole, and then
passing them down the lines and stacking them up.

Speaker 8 (01:04:06):
Don't worry, the bricks are safe.

Speaker 9 (01:04:07):
Yeah, the bricks are save the people are not. Which
just like it was genuinely like infuriating to see it,
And I can't imagine for people who have lost family
members how that must feel. Even rescue workers, like I said,
have been forcibly conscripted. Equality Mianma has noted more than
one hundred cases to force conscriptions since the earthquake. So

(01:04:29):
Meama has a conscription rule right, a law, so anyone
men and now women between certain ages can be forcibly
conscripted into the Hunter's army.

Speaker 8 (01:04:37):
So they're just finding people displaced from the earthquake and
forcing them.

Speaker 9 (01:04:41):
Yeah, it's people who have been hiding in their homes
right who now don't have homes to hide it, Yeah,
or people who came out in order to save their neighbors,
and now now they're forcing them to be to fight
for them, just as as they Hunted did with cyclone Nagis.
They've also delayed and in cases blocked AID. A team
came from France to assist in a search and rescue.

(01:05:02):
They spent twenty four hours sitting in an airport waiting
for their visa to be approved, and then they spent
one day working in search and rescue efforts before being
told that search and rescue efforts had now finished and
they were to go home. So they traveled around the
entire world, didn't save a single life abundance. It's great,
presumably because the Hunter wanted to plicate China. A Taiwanese

(01:05:25):
team was straight up refused entry into Mienmar, that Taiwan
had a search and rescue team that they were willing
to say send who could have saved people lives, and
that they weren't allowed to enter. All tourist visas have
been suspended, so it's not like the Hunter is like
overwhelmed with visa applications, but they're not allowing search and
rescue teams to enter from countries. I guess they're not
politically aligned with this kind of horrific indifference to human

(01:05:47):
suffering has characterized a toutmudor for decades, and it's really
unlikely to change as it grows even more desperate and
it loses even more territory. If just going to clamp
down harder and harder on its people, be one. In
the liberated areas, aid is being mobilized using the mutual
aid structures which have existed for decades in the absence
of the state. In significant and growing parts of Me

(01:06:07):
and mar people are relying on each other instead of
the government for aid, and that has its benefits. Right, Like,
people have been out rescuing people from the rebel, but
they're also desperately short of resources. I spoke to mandal
APDF rescue team at the first week of April and
they literally sent me a they have a notebook of
a list of like we've run out of gorze, we've

(01:06:29):
run out of twenty k's, we've run out of adhesive dressings,
we've run out of elastic bandages. Right, they're like the
little nuts and bolts of saving people's lives. They run
out of We did a fund raising campaign for them
through Behind the Bastards. We raised nearly two thousand dollars,
which is great. So they're restocking their supplies, which is fantastic,
But that's just one township. All across the country, people

(01:06:50):
are struggling for the basic supplies that they need to
save lives. The military has also blocked aid and medicine
from entering their areas. Right, so the military controls a
lot of road and it uses its control of those
roadblocks to stop aid in medicine. Often it's kind of
hoarding it. In the capital city, which is Napi Door.
If people not familiar in Napi Door is a city

(01:07:10):
that they couldn't have built for itself to go from.
I mean seat of Kings. Also in napidor right now,
it's the US Aid agency Samaritans Purse. Are you familiar
with Samaritans perse Gratin? I don't think so.

Speaker 8 (01:07:22):
It sounds vaguely familiar, But all these humanitarian organizations all
have like the same like four words that they shuffle
around in different ways.

Speaker 9 (01:07:30):
So yeah, yeah, yeah. Samaritans Perse perhaps the most famous
for being run by Franklin Graham.

Speaker 8 (01:07:36):
Okay, yes, idea what this is and who this is?

Speaker 4 (01:07:39):
Yes?

Speaker 9 (01:07:40):
Yeah, having all their volunteers sign like a statement of
faith and being extremely homophobic. For some reason, Samaritans Purse
is establishing a field hospital in Napi door right now.

Speaker 4 (01:07:51):
They're going to.

Speaker 8 (01:07:51):
Force people to convert to Evangelical Christianity before they give services,
like they do in some cases.

Speaker 9 (01:07:57):
Yeah, or just leave them like they did in afghanis
Don if they're not Christian. I cannot work out for
the life of me what the fuck they're doing, because
like the Hunter has made a consistent policy of bombing
Christians in me Emma. Right in Karen and Kareni state,
there are a lot of Christian people. On Christmas Day,
the Hunter bombed people going to services because it knew

(01:08:18):
that Christians would be going to services at churches. Right
the Kareni Christians this year I saw celebrated Christmas in
caves because they were so afraid of being bombed. Right, Like,
I have no idea what logical leap you have to make,
sar Yeah, it's and they're like, they're not even at
the Insagang. The only people, the only international AID I'm

(01:08:40):
aware of that was able to make it to Sigang
was a Malaysian team who were able to save some lives. Unfortunately,
there were really strong rains this week and that made
all the collapse structures even more unstable. And the Malaysian
team I saw have now returned home. We're going to
take another ad break here and when we come back,
we will talk about what you can do t help.

(01:09:11):
All right, and we're back first, I want to, I
guess have some good news. Despite everything. The military has
still been taking massive losses. The all Burma students Democratic
Front captured remaining Hunter positions in Indoor. They're all both.
Democratic Front are a group that's been around since nineteen
eighty eight, right, and they have armed up and re

(01:09:32):
entered the revolution since twenty twenty one. One of the
things that they captured on Monday was a underground Japanese
field hospital from World War II, which I guess had
been like entrench position. I guess they're not covered technically
by the ceasefire, but there was a unit under the
National Uniti government's command that operated with them, and from

(01:09:52):
what I understand, this began as a defensive action. They'd
surrounded the Hunter I think it's called yet japan Came Hill.
They'd surrounded them on Japancave Hill for a long time,
and then the Hunter obviously, seeing the earthquake and everything thereafter,
decided that now was the time for them to break
out of this circlement. They did not break out, They
took a fat l and as a result, they've all

(01:10:15):
been captured now. Meanwhile, in chin Land, if people haven't
listened to the episode, I did a couple of weeks
ago with a Zad from the Anti Fascist Internationalists Front.
I was just going back and listening to that to
understand chin Land. But the AIF and a lot of
their allied forces from a Chinland Defense Force and a
chin Brotherhood had a significant victory in capturing the rest

(01:10:36):
of the Hunter's positions in Flam last week. And I
think it's very much like on the table that we
will see the whole of chin Land liberated in the
next few months or by the end of the year,
which would be great to see. So people are wondering,
like what they can do to help, right, And I
think it's a very valid question because I saw today

(01:10:57):
that the un was meeting with the Hunter in and
I just have no faith that any money that goes
to the Hunter is going to get to people who
need it.

Speaker 8 (01:11:07):
Yeah, no, absolutely not. You cannot like they want them
to die that like that. I don't know, they're like
evil why.

Speaker 9 (01:11:16):
Yeah, yeah, they are literally genocide or they have done
a genocide like that has been prosecuted international Criminal court.
Like I have no understanding why people continue to like
international organizations continue to funnel money to them, other than
because like they have a status quo bias. I guess,
so don't be doing that. But there are groups who

(01:11:36):
are making a really big difference. And one of them
that I wanted to highlight, and Robert and I are
very familiar with their work from the last time that
we were over reporting is Community Partists International CPI are
really cool because they work by empowering members of the
local community to be health volunteers, as opposed to like

(01:11:57):
dropping in some some like doctors from America or doctors
from the United Kingdom or whatever, and then when those
people leave, they take their skills with them. CPI the
thing is to educate folks within the community so that
they can take care of one another. And I saw
that CPI has a matching donations thing right now, which
is pretty cool. So like if you donate, someone else

(01:12:19):
will match your donation and that will double the amount
that you receive otherwise, I will provide a list of
mutual aid funds that have been shared with me. Most
of them are like gofundmes or things like that. I'll
put it all in the show description. They've all been vetted,
and like I know, people are sometimes reluctant to give

(01:12:41):
to go fundmes and they'd rather give to like a
five oh one C three or an organization which has
a little bit more I guess, like online presence. In
this case, you have to understand that like a lot
of orgs just aren't operating in the liberated areas. The
two that I'm aware of CPI and Free Burma Rangers.
I spoke to Dave from Free Burma Ranges. They're trying

(01:13:02):
to get to as many people as it can as well.
That would be another great place to donate. And I
would include a list of vetted gofundmes. If you want
to have a look through those and see if any
of them kind of speaks to you more, you can
do that too. What this will mean for the future
of Memma, we don't know yet. Right we have really
no sense of how many people have died, of what

(01:13:23):
it's done to the Hunter's ability to control those areas.
But until the revolution has a way to stop planes
bombing people, we will continue to see the same dynamic
of the Hunter losing terrain on the ground, pulling back
its soldiers, and then bombing civilians in the areas.

Speaker 1 (01:13:43):
So it's lost.

Speaker 9 (01:13:45):
That is its game plan. It's continuing to get more
drones from China. It's getting aircraft, munitions and jet fuel
from China. Until there is an embargo on jet fuel
and munitions to the Hunter, then we will see this
same pattern continue. Right, they lose terrain, they bomba school,

(01:14:05):
they lose terrain, they bomb a hospital. It's the same
stuff that Israel's doing, and they've of course previously been
armed by Israel as well, but we don't see as
much solidarity for the people at Burma. If you want
to stay in touch with what's happening on the ground,
I think the Irawiti I Double r a Wa d
d Y does a really good job of doing daily

(01:14:27):
summaries right now. So I would suggest checking out what's
happening there, and of course we'll keep you updated on
developments in the Spring Revolution as they come.

Speaker 8 (01:14:56):
This is it could happen here. I am not going
to El Salvador. It's not gonna happen, no way, No,
thank you, mister President. I'm Garrison Davis. I'm joined by
James Stout.

Speaker 9 (01:15:10):
Hi, Garrison.

Speaker 8 (01:15:11):
We're here to talk about possibly the most upsetting thing
I've seen in American politics in like the past six
months to maybe even I don't know viscerally had hit
me for like the past few years. Like yet what
happened on Monday in the Oval Office was is kind
of the most black pilt I've ever been, which is
not a great way to start an episode.

Speaker 9 (01:15:31):
Yeah, its like it made me feel like I found
twenty twenty three very hard, like going out and seeing
people freezing in the desert and then coming home and
some by n the ice cream on the on the timeline,
But like this was different. This was so like blatant.

Speaker 8 (01:15:46):
There's like a level of like intentional depravity that you're
reminded of more and more blatantly.

Speaker 9 (01:15:52):
So and like Bouque's trolling of yes everyone.

Speaker 8 (01:15:58):
So we're gonna be talking about an over office meeting
between President Trump and El Salvador President Bukle.

Speaker 9 (01:16:05):
I guess I could learn his first name, Naib there
you go. You know he's Palestinian salvadorre Are you fucking serious? No,
that's an emam.

Speaker 8 (01:16:15):
I don't even have time for that.

Speaker 9 (01:16:17):
It's just fucking I'm sorry. If anyone's driving it has
had an accident upon hearing that.

Speaker 8 (01:16:24):
So, as you probably know, recently, the United States government
has sent upwards of three hundred people immigrants to the
L Salvador Terrorism Confinement Center. This prison black site that
people never return from. I guess I could point to

(01:16:45):
for a pop culture reference, which feels a little bit
in bad taste, but you can point to like the
prison in the TV show and Or as being a
very comparable facility, frankly, except they turn off the lights
in and Or they do not turn off the lights
in Seacott lights around all the time. They put ten
to twenty people per sell. It's pretty bad. Jameson has

(01:17:06):
done episodes on Seacott in the past, will probably keep
doing more.

Speaker 9 (01:17:11):
The lights thing, by the way, was a specific policy
change by Bouquele. There was a particularly violent weekend in
El Salvador, and as a result he stopped letting people
who were detained for gang crimes go outside and stopped
building windows into the prison and just put the lights
on because a way of punishing I guess the gangs

(01:17:31):
by punishing the people who are detained there.

Speaker 8 (01:17:33):
Yeah, they can't go outside. They stay in their cell
for almost twenty four hours a day. They might occasionally
get thirty minutes outside, but that's not even confirmed because
no one's even allowed inside to see what's going on
in there. And we've sent upwards of three hundred immigrants there,
the majority, vast majority of which have no criminal record.
Even if you do have a criminal record, being renditioned

(01:17:55):
to a foreign prison camp is still bad. But this
is something that Trump hopes to expand on greatly, and
they are currently defending their ability to do so in
the court since it has been learned that a few
people sent there may have been partially sent by accident.
But the Trump administration is refusing to return these people

(01:18:17):
and is instead still trying to convince the public that
these are dangerous terrorists that deserve to be disappeared. So
let's kind of start with that main case. The case
that's receiving the most public attention right now is of
a Maryland man named Kilmayor Abrego Garcia, who's the subject
of a district court case that has been sent up

(01:18:40):
to the Supreme Court and then sent back to the
district court on whether this man can be returned home
to his US citizen wife and child. And then on Monday,
April fourteenth, in the Oval Office meeting, President Bouquela said
that he will not return this Maryland immigrant with protected
legal status back to the United States, who Ice admits

(01:19:01):
was sent to Seacot based on a quote unquote administrative
Errorka said, quote, how can I smuggle a terrorist into
the United States? Of course I'm not going to do it.
The question is preposterous unquote. The Al Salvador president also
balked at the idea of releasing Garcia from Seacott since
he can't have a quote unquote terrorist free in his country,

(01:19:23):
lying about Garcia being a criminal. I am going to
play a few clips in this episode because I think
it is necessary to listen to these people actually say
the words that they are saying, in the tone that
they're saying them, and the exact phrasing on these I
think is actually pretty important right now. So, unfortunately, you
are gonna have to hear the voices of a few
people who you might not rather hear from, including the

(01:19:46):
president of El Salvador. So I'll play this first.

Speaker 5 (01:19:48):
Clip President and President Bukayla Waiyan on this Do you
plan to return him?

Speaker 1 (01:19:54):
Well, I get I'm suppose are suggested that a smuggle
and terroristic today United States? Right, how can I smuggle?

Speaker 8 (01:20:02):
How can I return him to the latter It's like
I smuggle him into the United States or whether we do,
of course, I'm not going to do it.

Speaker 1 (01:20:08):
It's like, I mean, the question is preposterous.

Speaker 16 (01:20:11):
How can I smuggle the terrorists to the United States.

Speaker 8 (01:20:14):
I don't have the power to return him to the
United States inside.

Speaker 17 (01:20:19):
Yeah, but I'm not releasing I mean, we're not very
fond of releasing terrorists into our country.

Speaker 18 (01:20:23):
We just turned the murder capital of the world to
the safest country of the Western.

Speaker 14 (01:20:26):
Hemisphere, and he want us to go back into the
releasing criminals so we can go back to being the
murder capital of the world.

Speaker 1 (01:20:32):
And that's that's not going to happen.

Speaker 14 (01:20:34):
Well, they'd love to have a criminal, you know, with
the schedule.

Speaker 6 (01:20:37):
I mean, I mean there's there's a fascinator.

Speaker 14 (01:20:40):
Yeah, the sick piece are sick people.

Speaker 9 (01:20:45):
It's just insane. Like the whole pretense of any any
like serious engagement with reality there, it's just gone yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:20:56):
And they're both like miming that neither of them have
the ability to make any kind of deal between each
other to send people back, even though they have the
ability to make a deal to send people there.

Speaker 9 (01:21:06):
Yeah, As they sit in the same room.

Speaker 8 (01:21:08):
The whole time Bekayley's talking, Trump has like this like
a growing smirk on his face. As Bkayley's talking about
this preposterous notion of smuggling a US immigrant back into
the United States despite the Supreme Court order to facilitate
the return of this immigrant back into the country. The
whole smuggling framing is obviously absurd, with him saying like,

(01:21:29):
I don't have the power to return him to the
United States. All he needs to do is release him
from SECAT and the US can fly him back right
just as we flew him to l Salvador. Like the
two heads of state are sitting right next to each other.
They could agree to do this at any time, But
now everyone's pretending that that suddenly they don't have the
power to undo what they seemingly had the power to

(01:21:50):
do in the first place.

Speaker 9 (01:21:51):
Like Bukeley has ruled, and we're going to do a
whole episode of and like his rise to power and
then his use of power. But like he's ruled, and
there a state of exception for years in Elsabador which
allows them to detain people without warrants, without trials, right,
and like it's that state of exception that is now
the norm there. And that's kind of what he seems

(01:22:13):
to be referring to, right, Like like we just get
to lock people up. Why would I not do that?

Speaker 8 (01:22:18):
In effect, they are arguing that every single human being
that is sent to Seacot by the United States is
unable to ever leave the prison alive. Yeah, Like that's
basically what they're saying, because they're saying both both parties,
both Trump and Bouquela, are unable to have someone who's
been sent there returned. So they're just they're just saying
like no one's able to do anything, Like they're just

(01:22:39):
stuck there until they die, and like this is part
of the design of Seacot. Uh, the person who runs,
Like the Seacott Like security has said that they do
not intend in any person ever being released from Seacott.
You are not designed to get out. You are stuck
there forever. No one's ever left there. Yeah, it's just
where you get disappeared, and that's that's all. That's all

(01:23:01):
that it is. And I think part of why they're
so unwilling to send Garcia back is because then you
have someone like the first person who's ever gotten out
and can talk about what it's actually like in there,
when you don't have like Christinome and like propaganda cameras
pointed at at the prison bars.

Speaker 9 (01:23:16):
Yeah, Bukela is very redicentially to anyone for that reason,
And like there are plenty of valigations and like I
think looks like Time Magazine has publicist is not husually
controversial that he made deals with gangs in the past
in elsabul or right to get them to reduce the
murder rate, and like he certainly wouldn't like to hear
that testified to certainly not in the United States court, right, So,

(01:23:39):
like he doesn't want people to be released from there either,
Like you said, they don't want anyone to be able
to go to any international human rights courts and testify
as to what happened to them there. So it's kind
of in his interest to never have anyone be released.
It's not just also, I guess like in his interest,
he's also being paid right twenty thousand dollars per detainee

(01:24:00):
per year by the United States right now, so he
also has a financial interest in keeping people in there.

Speaker 8 (01:24:04):
Even this per year deal makes now kind of makes
the zero sense because both of them are arguing that
there's no way to send anyone back, right, So, like
it's not that it's even like, oh, they're only gonna
be there for one year. It's like they're just they're
just there, and like who knows if they're gonna like
still be alive by the time that some of these
people would be able to get out, whether that's through

(01:24:27):
the miraculous Donald Trump impeachment of twenty twenty six which
will never happen, or like however, like these people are
just they are just stuck there because he's not going
to release them into his country. We are seemingly unable
to take anyone back from there.

Speaker 4 (01:24:43):
I think it's.

Speaker 9 (01:24:44):
Unwilling, right, Like the US is theoretically able.

Speaker 8 (01:24:48):
It's argued that we're unable as as people get into
more after this ad break, Okay, we are back. One
thing that we've seen across the Trump administration the past

(01:25:09):
eighty days or so. Something that we saw very evident
in this meeting is that whenever a single person is
asked a question about the outrageous, possibly illegal, possibly not,
but just immoral or evils things that are being done,
the first instinct is always to pass the buck on
to someone else. We saw this a lot with Signalgate,
how it was always someone else's faults. No single person

(01:25:32):
could get like hammered down of being like, okay, you
are the person that's going to be like accountable for this.
And throughout this Oval Office meeting, eventually they started taking
questions from journalists and reporters and propagandists who are in
the room. And you saw this trend of you know,
if someone asks Trump about what's going on, he passes
the buck to Stephen Miller, who passes the buck to Bouquetle,
who then passes the buck to Mark Rubio. And it's

(01:25:54):
like this big circle of like everyone's just talking around
each other because no one really has the authority to
to speak on what's going on or how to fix
this problem because they don't see it as a problem.
So instead they just talk in a circle. And I
think Miller was one of the most effective at this
and unfortunately, we're going to play the longest clip in
this episode, just under two minutes from Stephen Miller, where

(01:26:17):
he lays out the Trump admins thought process and strategy
behind what they are doing. And I apologize for this,
but it is useful to hear from Himmler.

Speaker 1 (01:26:27):
Two.

Speaker 19 (01:26:28):
So here we go with respect to you, He's a
citizen of El Salvador. So it's very arrogant, even for
American media to suggest that we would even tell El
Salvador how to handle their own citizens as a starting point.
As two immigration courts found that he was a member
of MS thirteen. When President Trump declared MS thirteen to

(01:26:49):
be a foreign terrorist organization, that meant that he was
no longer eligible under federal law, which I'm sure you
know you're very familiar with. The iron eg that he
was no longer eligible for any form of him a
greation relief in the United States. So we had a
deportation order that was valid, which meant that under our
law he's not even allowed to be present in the
United States and had to be returned because of the

(01:27:12):
foreign terrorist designation. This issue was then by District Court
judge completely inverted, and a district court judge tried to
tell the administration that they had to kidnap a citizen
of El Salvador and fly him back here. That issue
was raised to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court
said the district court order was unlawful and its main

(01:27:32):
components were reversed nine zero, unanimously stating clearly that neither
Secretary of State nor the President could be compelled by
anybody to forcibly retrieve a citizen of El Salvador from
Al Salvador, who again is a member of MS thirteen,
which is I'm sure you understand, rapes little girls, murder's women,

(01:27:53):
murder's children, is engaged in the most barbaric activities in
the world. And I can promise you if he was
your neighbor, you would move right away.

Speaker 9 (01:27:59):
So you don't think most came.

Speaker 14 (01:28:02):
And what was the r and the Supreme Court save
was a nine to nothing.

Speaker 1 (01:28:05):
Yes, it was a nine zero in our favor, in
our favor against.

Speaker 14 (01:28:09):
The Juicu Court ruling saying that no has the power
to the.

Speaker 1 (01:28:13):
Tele foreign policy function of the United States.

Speaker 3 (01:28:15):
As Pam said, the ruler solely sayd that if this
individual El Salvador sole distress was set out to our country,
that we could to pour him.

Speaker 19 (01:28:25):
A seven times no version of this legally ends up
with an ever living here because he is a citizen
of El Savador.

Speaker 14 (01:28:32):
That is the president of Al Sadidorg.

Speaker 3 (01:28:33):
Your question about for the court can only be directed
the tenant.

Speaker 8 (01:28:39):
So there's a lot there. Yeah, I think I'm going
to start with I can promise you if he was
your neighbor, you would move right away. And I think
that is really the heart of what the Strump administration
is is doing. Like it's it's appealing to this most
basic like suburban crime, panic, fear, racism of well, if

(01:29:00):
he was your neighbor, you wouldn't want him living next to.

Speaker 9 (01:29:03):
You, Yeah, like a Vegos neighborhood kind of.

Speaker 8 (01:29:07):
Well, just completely lying about like the context of this
case with you Miller saying it's arrogant suggest that we,
the most powerful country in the world, are used to
be before the tariffs can tell El Salvador how to
handle its citizens, falsely claiming that immigration courts deemed him
a member of MS thirteen, which just is not true,

(01:29:28):
talking about kidnapping him from Seacott to return him to
the United States, as if Ice didn't just to kidnap
hundreds of people with no criminal records and send them
to a foreign goo lug and then also lied about
about the Supreme Court ruling, saying they found the district
court order to return to Garcia unlawful and grossly mischaracterizing
the scope of what the Supreme Court ruling was and
how it was sent back to the district court to

(01:29:50):
work with the details on what facilitate the return actually means.
And again, I think like the one of the most
telling parts is how he ends by saying, quote, no
version of this ever ends up with him living here,
And yeah, like they're gonna look for any any way
to like make this test case to work, right and

(01:30:10):
if and if they if they can do this to
someone with protected legal status, who is not a who's
not a terrorist, who is not an actual MS thirteen
gang member, right, this is this is kind of ideal
for them because that means they can paint anybody as
as a foreign policy threat enough to be sent to
a foreign goolag. Then at the very end of the clip,
he passes the buck off to to bouquettist to have

(01:30:31):
to have him answer this question again perfectly laying out
their strategy.

Speaker 9 (01:30:36):
There's a lot to break down in what military. It's
also just kind of interesting cambillary is like amongst the press,
he's not one of the people like sat on the
couches supposed to be giving the press conference. Right, he
just kind of wades in too. I guess like like
offer this opinion and kind kind of like be the
kind of embassy of this of their response, I guess
in a sense. Yeah, I think crucially, like a gonna go.

(01:30:59):
Sea's protection was from being returned to El Salvador, right,
because he had been harassed by gang members when leaving
El Salvador and when being in El Salvador.

Speaker 8 (01:31:07):
He's lived in the States since twenty eleven, and he
left El Salvador to flee harassment and abuse from from
gang members.

Speaker 9 (01:31:16):
Yeah, the gangs that he's been accused of being a
part of. But like it then follows that, like it
would be legal for them to deport him to a
third country, right, and that is the path that they've
followed with all the Venezuelan migrants. Right, They've accused him
of being members of Trend de Ragua. I have not
seen a compelling case made that any of them are yet.

(01:31:36):
I'm sure people from Trend de Ragua have come to
this country, but they have not provided any evidence that
the people they have sent to say God, are those people.

Speaker 8 (01:31:43):
No, Like we've had like fourteen people are like accused
of some kind of like violent crime like murder or rape,
and in the other like two hundred and seventy five
do not have a criminal record whatsoever.

Speaker 9 (01:31:53):
Yeah, and the bulk of this is reliant on some
kind of idea that they have entirely created from fiction,
that they're are tattooing practices and one entered to end
a war. And for them, right, even if they can't
be returned to Venezuela, they feel that they have this endraum,
which is okay, we'll send them to a Salvador. But
for the Salvadarians, that's a different question, right, And that
is what they're trying to find here, and that is

(01:32:16):
worrying because the case here that is getting the most publicity,
that seems to be the one that the Supreme Court
has taken up, is about the Salbadaran man. And I
hope that doesn't mean that like the ship has sailed
for the Venezuelans, right that essentially, yeah, No, like they
don't have a case because that was the vast bulk
of them. I think there was only like sixty Salbadrean

(01:32:37):
citizens and the rest Venezuelans, no.

Speaker 8 (01:32:39):
One, hundreds of people have been like forgotten in this.
After Miller's rant there, Mark Rubio jumped in to state that, quote,
no court in the United States has the right to
conduct the foreign policy of the United States unquote. And
Steven Miller hopped back in to talk about this Supreme
Court case that they're falsely saying they won nine to zero,

(01:33:00):
which is not how that case went, and they start
talking more broadly about what can be allowed if it
has to do with the foreign policy of the United States,
and how the courts don't have the ability to intervene
in that process.

Speaker 20 (01:33:12):
No, the foreign policy of the United States is conducted
by the President of the United States, not by a court,
and no court in the United States has a right
to conduct the foreign policy of the United States. It's
that simple end.

Speaker 9 (01:33:23):
The story, and that's what the Supreme Court held.

Speaker 19 (01:33:26):
By the way, has Marcara fort the Supoini Court said
exactly what Marco said. The no court has the authority
to compel the foreign policy function the United States. We
want a case nine zero, and people like CNN are
portraying it as a loss as usual because they want
foreign terrorists in the country who kidnap women and children.

Speaker 8 (01:33:42):
Part of what I find so disturbing about this idea
of you know, no habeas corpus, no due process if
you aren't on foreign soil, is that like this idea
of the court's having no jurisdiction over foreign policy decisions
means that as long as you whether you're citizen, whether
you're a permanent resident to document or undocumented immigrant, as

(01:34:03):
long as you are forcedly removed from the United States soil,
your rights and your due process has been forfeit, and
the US has neither the obligation nor sometimes the ability
to return you to US soil if that is their
foreign policy interest. And this is such a troubling broad
concept that the portions of the courts are kind of

(01:34:24):
allowing them to claim right now. And the complete removal
of due process is like slowly getting encroached upon at
first with undocumented immigrants and green card holders, but as
we will see in the next section. They are also
absolutely going to be targeting US citizens.

Speaker 13 (01:34:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:34:43):
I think like we should just point out obviously, the
court is not conducting the foreign policy of the United States.
It's ruling on the legality of the action taken by
the President, which is exactly what it's supposed to do.

Speaker 8 (01:34:53):
Yeah, And as it relates to your rights for due
process if you are in the United States.

Speaker 9 (01:34:58):
Yeah, yeah, Like every single US person, right, US person
would be anybody who resides in the US, be they
documented or done, documented, migrant, citizen, what have you like,
has a stake in this.

Speaker 8 (01:35:11):
We're gonna go on break and then come back to
discuss the expansion of the sea Cott detention program and
the possible targeting of US citizens.

Speaker 9 (01:35:31):
Okay, we're back.

Speaker 8 (01:35:33):
So on April seventh, a few weeks ago, while on
Air Force one, President Trump told reporters that he would
be quote unquote honored for the president of Al Salvador
to take a US citizens quote unquote American grown and
born criminals and put them in sea Cott, the Terrorism
Confinement Center prison Black Site, saying quote why should it

(01:35:53):
stop just at people that crossed the border illegally unquote?
A few days later, the White House Presecretary reiterated that
this is something that Trump is discussing both publicly and privately,
and later during the April fourteenth Oval Office meeting, Trump
said that if Salvador was to build more of these
torture megaprisons, the United States would quote unquote help them out.

(01:36:16):
If the Trump administration could disappear more American immigrants and
US citizens to these prison black sites, well.

Speaker 16 (01:36:23):
I pay for those societies to be open.

Speaker 13 (01:36:26):
I'd do something.

Speaker 14 (01:36:27):
We'd help them out.

Speaker 6 (01:36:28):
We help them.

Speaker 14 (01:36:29):
They great facilities, very strong facilities, and they don't play games.
I'd like to go a step further. I mean, I
say I said it to Pam. I don't know what
the laws are. We always have to obey the laws.
But we also have homegrown criminals that push people into subways,
that hit elderly ladies on the back of the head

(01:36:50):
with a baseball bat when they're not looking. That are
absolute monsters. I'd like to include them in the group
of people to get them out of the country. But
you'll have to be looking at the laws on that state.

Speaker 1 (01:37:02):
Okay.

Speaker 8 (01:37:06):
So this is just the start of a long process
that is going to be deeply troublesome and worrying, and
again like this is something that they keep talking about.
I think they're still looking for some kind of legal
justification or they're looking for something that maybe, if not
allows for this, explicitly prohibits this in a way that they

(01:37:27):
can't like get around.

Speaker 13 (01:37:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:37:29):
Did you notice he called out Miller. He said, you'll
have to look at the laws and the sieve Obviously
Miller is not the Attorney general.

Speaker 8 (01:37:35):
He also did mention Attorney General Pambondi. Pambondi, Yeah, who's
also looking into this option right now?

Speaker 9 (01:37:41):
Right, But Miller is often credited with being the kind
of mastermind between behind Title forty two right, which was
an extremely obscure piece of public health law that was
immobilized by the first Trump administration to immediately return migrants
to Mexico without giving them their right to it an
asylum hearing right. And that's what I'm wondering if they're
going for again, Like Steve Miller has been very good

(01:38:04):
at this, at finding obscure justifications in the United States
federal law for shit that they want to do.

Speaker 8 (01:38:10):
I think this is why they're definitely trying to stretch
this foreign policy claim as far as they can that
if it's if it's outside US soil, there's a limited
way US courts can actually interfere or undo things that
have already been done. And again, like the idea that
we're going to like fund the construction of even more
of these l Salvador mega prisons just to house American

(01:38:32):
grown and born criminals as well as immigrants, Like we're
just funding like goolog camps on foreign soil to send
the undesirables to. And no matter how much Trump talks
about how we're oldly going to send quote unquote like
American criminals there, as we've seen with Seacott so far, Like, no,

(01:38:53):
like the majority of people they are sending do not
have criminal criminal histories. I don't think anyone can trust
the Trump administration's definition of what isn't isn't criminal to
this extent anymore. Later in the same meeting, Trump reiterated
the same idea about sending you a citizens who his
administration deems criminals to this foreign black site. Here's another

(01:39:15):
clip is a fall question on a.

Speaker 16 (01:39:18):
Clarification you mentioned that you're open to supporting individuals that
aren't foreign aliens for our criminals to Al Salvador. Does
that Does that include potentially US citizens fully naturalized.

Speaker 14 (01:39:29):
Immrading if they're criminals, and if they hit people with
baseball bats over the head that happened to be ninety
years old, and if if they rape eighty seven year
old women in Coney.

Speaker 13 (01:39:42):
Island, Brooklyn.

Speaker 14 (01:39:43):
Yeah, yeah, that includes Why do you think there's a
special category of person. They're as bad as anybody that
comes in. We have bad ones too, and I'm all
for it. We have others that were negotiating with to
But no, it's if it's if it's a home grown criminal,
I have no problem.

Speaker 8 (01:40:03):
He's really obsessed with baseball bats thing. I don't quite
know what that's about.

Speaker 4 (01:40:07):
There seems like a specific case that he's referring to.

Speaker 8 (01:40:10):
Maybe it's something he remembers like thirty years ago that
it really got stuck in his head. Right, But also
later he says that they're negotiating with other countries to
send US citizens to not just El Salvador.

Speaker 9 (01:40:22):
Yeah, I mean they've sent migrants third country migrant to
Panama before, right, and detain them there. Honduras I believe
is building like a prison that's not dissimilar to siicort, Like,
I'm be guessing this will be their sort of way
of courting allies in the hemisphere because they'll sort of
pay them a relatively large amount in order to attempt

(01:40:46):
to offshore people they don't like.

Speaker 8 (01:40:47):
Yeah, and again, like as we've seen the past few
years and increasingly so now, the effort to label like
activists or people who are vocally opposed to the United
States foreign policy the United States and the State of
Israel deeming them terrorists and then by extension, if you
charge them with the crime, then criminals getting that they

(01:41:09):
can be housed in a place like Seacot now with
very very limited to no due process. The whole due
process question is still very up in the air for
how they're going to handle that aspect. But you can't
just take this as like, oh, you know that that's
just Trump talking, like no, this is this is this
is something they really want to do, and it's like

(01:41:29):
one of the freakiest things that I've seen in like
domestic US politics in a long time. Earlier, Trump was
recorded half whispering to Beckley telling him that El Salvador
needs to build five more Sea cought style torture prisons
to house US citizens, as Trump says, homegrown criminals. Bukeley

(01:41:49):
replies that they will have enough room, and then the
entire Oval Office laughs.

Speaker 14 (01:41:56):
Yea, they said, home grunst, you get a build about
five more places.

Speaker 15 (01:42:02):
Yeah, that's all right.

Speaker 8 (01:42:09):
It's the bleakest clip I've ever seen before. Yeah, talking
about homegrowns. Their next got to build five more places. Oh,
we have enough space. Everyone laughs, and then Trump shows
off the new gold frames for the portraits in the
Oval Office.

Speaker 9 (01:42:22):
Yeah, it's like a dinner party joke for them. It
might just be worth noting that, like every totalitarian regime
has housed its dissidents outside of the imperial core. Right,
like like Germany totally did this in the East, right,
Russia send people to Siberia for Russia Soviet Union.

Speaker 8 (01:42:40):
Creating creating these like stateless zones where like the regular
laws of your of your like fatherland state do not.

Speaker 9 (01:42:46):
Apply, right and where the horrors are so far from
the populace that the populist can't really grasp them. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (01:42:54):
No, this is like elementary school stuff. It says, like,
like the first thing you learn about is concentration camps
and goologs. Now, that's like this symbol of evil and
now it's something you laugh about in the Oval Office
to send home growns to five disappearing torture camps.

Speaker 9 (01:43:11):
Yeah, and like, just to be like even clear, I
guess what distinguishes a concentration camp from a prison is
that there is no due process right. People are sent
there because of who they are, not because of what
they did.

Speaker 8 (01:43:23):
Like if you're a Venezuelan man who may or may
not have a tattoo.

Speaker 9 (01:43:27):
Yeah, like the way, I don't know what it will
take for some people to realize what's happening here.

Speaker 8 (01:43:33):
And like the president of El Salvador is so on
board for this.

Speaker 9 (01:43:37):
Yeah, I mean he doesn't hide from that reputation, right,
he embraces it. His Twitter for a while had world's
Coolest dictator in the bio. I don't know if it
still does.

Speaker 8 (01:43:45):
Like and like, both him and Trump have openly aligned
themselves with quote unquote nationalism and nationalists. They're openly saying this.
Trump said dictator on day one. That wasn't just a
rhetorical device, that was literal. This is what he's doing.
A president told Trump, you have three hundred and fifty
million people to liberate, but to liberate three hundred and
fifty million people, you have to imprison some. And you

(01:44:08):
follow that up by saying that he is eager to
help with that.

Speaker 6 (01:44:12):
And if fat mister president, you have three hundred and
fifty million people to liberate it.

Speaker 14 (01:44:18):
But to liberate three hundred and fifteen million people, you
have to imprison some.

Speaker 1 (01:44:22):
You know, that's the way it.

Speaker 7 (01:44:23):
Works, right.

Speaker 1 (01:44:23):
You cannot just you know, free the.

Speaker 20 (01:44:25):
Criminals and think Rymes is going to go down magically.

Speaker 6 (01:44:28):
Have to imprisoned them so you can liberate three hundred
and fifty million Americans that are asking for the end
of crime and the end of theroists.

Speaker 14 (01:44:35):
Many can be done, I mean, if you're doing it already.

Speaker 6 (01:44:39):
So I'm really happy to be here, honored.

Speaker 8 (01:44:42):
Any anger to help this whole. Like liberation through imprisonment
thing is elementary school stuff here.

Speaker 9 (01:44:50):
You don't have to have a PhD in the history
of the nineteen thirties to have someone tell you that
the liberation of the chosen nation by purging of the
undesirables is fascist shit. But like I'm here with one
tell you if that's what you need. You know, like
this is textbook stuff. Like Garrison's saying like this is
not debatable, Like I know, we spent the last four
years debating is Trump a fascist or not? I don't

(01:45:11):
think that matters hugely, right, Like this is a fascist thing.

Speaker 8 (01:45:15):
It's so much more disturbing that now, according to like polls,
like half around half the population maybe a little bit
less just agree with the current way that deportations are
happening and Trump's immigration policy like on a completely like
flat basis. And if you spend any time on on
X the everything app watching videos of the of these
press conferences, it's full of people just like cheering this

(01:45:36):
on completely, like completely blankly.

Speaker 9 (01:45:39):
I think that's a very skewed samplet of people who
totally paid for Elon Musk of.

Speaker 8 (01:45:43):
Course, of course, but like the number of.

Speaker 9 (01:45:46):
People, Yeah, it's real humans saying like these are real.

Speaker 8 (01:45:49):
People who just just completely completely blankly think this is
a this is this is a net good and like
this is those people are unreachable. You cannot come back
from that, like you is, there is no coming back
from that if you believe that the way depretations are
currently happening is fair, just and right, Like I cannot
understand you as a human anymore. That is so like

(01:46:11):
divorced and like alien.

Speaker 9 (01:46:12):
Yeah, you've gone past the point of no return, right, like.

Speaker 8 (01:46:15):
Liberals who like shield the who like shield their eyes
from like the whores at the border. Like, I don't
agree with that, but in some ways I can understand it.
The open like cheering on of this right is like
a whole It's a whole other level.

Speaker 9 (01:46:27):
Yeah, it's not like I can't bear to see it.
I'm gonna ignore it so it will cause me to
confront the no the contradictions. It's I'm seeing it on
watch again and I think it's fucking great.

Speaker 8 (01:46:36):
The last thing I'm gonna I'm gonna play here A
scene and reporter asked Trump if he would obey a
Supreme Court order to return someone to the United States.
Instead of answering this question, Trump attacked the reporter and
complained about how she wasn't praising him for deporting criminals.

Speaker 19 (01:46:53):
You said that if the Supreme Court said someone needed
to be returned, that you would abide by that.

Speaker 1 (01:46:57):
You said that on Air Force one just a few
days ago, and.

Speaker 3 (01:46:59):
They said it must facilitating.

Speaker 14 (01:47:02):
Why don't you just say, isn't it wonderful that we're
keeping criminals out?

Speaker 6 (01:47:06):
Of our country.

Speaker 14 (01:47:07):
Why can't you just say that? Why do you go
over and over and that's why nobody watches you anymore?
You know you have no credibility.

Speaker 8 (01:47:14):
Please go ahead, Yeah, mad very textbook authoritarian like blanket
stuff like there's there's nothing to like commentate about that.
It just is what it is. I guess we do.
We do some breaking news because we're recordings on Tuesday.
James want to want to, impossibly five minutes or less,

(01:47:34):
fill us in about the the update from the from
the District Court on Garcia's case since it was sent
back to the district Court from the Supreme Court last
week regarding his possible facilitated return to the United States.

Speaker 9 (01:47:48):
Right, so much of this has hinged over what facilitate means, right,
Like they found a legal concept that they can argue
at nauseum and in this case, it's the word facilitate.
DJ didn't presently new information today, but we see that
like there's some hopeful things on a district court judge
and then it kind of all goes up in flames.
But I think genis XI and I s is how

(01:48:12):
the name is spelled. I believe it's genius said that
every day that he's there is a day of further
irreparable harm. And she talks about the process being at
the roots of the constitution. Right, She's ordered for like
two weeks more of discovery, which is going to mean
that both sides have more time to repair their cases. Right,
she wants people to testify in front of the court.

(01:48:33):
She is so the administration has argued that facilitating his
return would consist of them allowing him to enter the
United States if Bukele released him, and possibly providing a
flight for that to happen, but not crucially ensuring his
release from secord. Right, and so anything else subsequent to
that doesn't matter. Chinis said that like their interpretation of

(01:48:56):
the word flies in the face of the plain meaning
of the word. Quote, when a wrong fear removed individual
is uh. And then I'm adding to the quote here
I guess or context. She means when a wrong fee
remove individual is taken outside the US, it's not so
cut and dry that all you have to do is
remove obstacles domestically. She also said, quote to the Department
of Justice here, you made your jurisdictional arguments, you made

(01:49:17):
your venue arguments, you major arguments on the merits you lost.
This is now about the scope of the remedy. Right,
this is a case that Miller is claiming they want.
That's pretty unequivocal for a justice. However, she does not
seem to think that it is within her power to
request his return from El Salvador. So she's calling for

(01:49:39):
things to move quickly. Right, they want to conduct depositions
about twenty third of April, she said, quote council vacations,
council over appointments. I'm usually pretty good about it. Not
this time. I'm going to be available if you need
to do it odd hours or weekends. That's what I'm
talking about. Anything short of a judge saying you have

(01:49:59):
to go to se Calle, remove him from the cell,
put him on the plane, and bring him back to
America is going to be interpreted by the Trump administration
to mean that they don't.

Speaker 1 (01:50:06):
Have to do that.

Speaker 8 (01:50:07):
Yeah, they're going to weasel their way around it, the
same way you heard Steven Miller weasel his way around
every question, and with with truth being used as a
as a flexible medium. Yeah, to shape a sculpture of
their choosing.

Speaker 9 (01:50:20):
And like they've done that. Right, the word facilitate. I
think most people who are first language English speakers have
a fairly good grasp with what that means, and it
doesn't mean like remove barriers domestically, that's what they've gone for.
The only way that he is getting out, it's a
majority Supreme Court decision that is extremely explicit that directs
the Trump administration to go to El Salvadore and remove

(01:50:42):
him from that prison. I haven't seen anything to indicate
that we're getting that anytime soon. And as the judge said,
right every day he's there, he's a reparable harm is
done to him. And that's where we're at right now,
right with people arguing over the definition of a war,
as hundreds of people are locked up having done nothing

(01:51:03):
wrong in a giant torture prison.

Speaker 8 (01:51:05):
And this is not the only person who we believe
was quote unquote mistakingly sent other supporting today coming out
of documented New York.

Speaker 9 (01:51:13):
Yeah, good outlet.

Speaker 8 (01:51:14):
By the way, a father of a nineteen year old
legal legal immigrant from Brooklyn. This nineteen year old with
no tattoos, was kidnapped off the streets of New York.
The quote from his father reads, quote the officers grabbed
him and two other boys right at the entrance to
our building. One said, no, he's not the one, like

(01:51:37):
they were looking for someone else.

Speaker 9 (01:51:39):
One officer to be clear, correct, Yeah, but.

Speaker 8 (01:51:42):
The other officer said take him anyway, unquote. And now
this father, exactly a month later, is still looking for
his missing son, who is disappeared into a new Salvador
torture prison.

Speaker 9 (01:51:57):
Yeah, Jesus. Like I've said before, for on this show,
like one of the things that I learned in the
Darien Gap was how much people can care about their kids,
and like this shit that I saw people do to
ensure that kids had a better life, like broke my
heart in a way that war hasn't that like anything
else I've seen in my life hasn't. And it's like

(01:52:18):
honestly really hard for me to hear stuff like that
and and like not react just being really sad or
really angry, like it's fucking brutal.

Speaker 8 (01:52:27):
Things are looking a lot more grim in my mind
than they were when we recorded that Should You Leave
the United States episode. I still think the things I
said there I stand by, and I stand by the
only recommendation I have is to create options for yourself,
and I think those options should be created as soon

(01:52:48):
as possible, especially if your citizenship is a topic of
debate according to the United States government. But even that
will not keep you safe. As we've talked about today,
your options include creating networks to take care of one another. Right, Like,
the things that will probably affect more of you than
direct state violence are economic downturns, are recessions, right, things

(01:53:13):
like this, like those are things that you can take
care of one another through, and like you should plan
to do that too. You should you should think about
how you're going to pay your bills, how you're going
to feed each other, how you're going to take care
of your medical needs. Because I don't think that the
world is going to want to keep doing business with
the country that acts like this, and both economically and

(01:53:36):
in terms of its conduct towards migrants. So like, your
plans don't have to be to leave, Like your plans
should also include what to do if things get really bad,
like in an economic sense.

Speaker 9 (01:53:48):
I'm not going to tell you what that means. But
it's all the stuff he's already talked about, right, It's
mutual aid, it's it's all the all the basic preparedness
stuff that is not as big and scary as leaving
the country, but it is nonetheless like vital.

Speaker 8 (01:54:05):
We will continue to report on the Garcia case other
court cases regarding these three hundred people renditioned to El
Salvador and Seacott in the next.

Speaker 9 (01:54:16):
Few weeks, just to finish up. As things continue to
get worse, people keep reaching out to us, which we appreciate.
If you would like to, you can email us cool
Zone tips at proton dot me. We will read it.
We might not get back to you. Your email is
not end to end encrypted unless the email that you're
sending from is also encrypted, that you can reach out

(01:54:38):
to us.

Speaker 15 (01:54:39):
See you on the other side.

Speaker 3 (01:55:01):
Welcome to Dake. It happened here a podcast increasingly well
named as the days go on. I am your host,
Bio Wong, and.

Speaker 4 (01:55:10):
It occurs to me.

Speaker 3 (01:55:12):
Over the course of the many, many, many, many many
Union episodes we've done in this podcast, we haven't really
done much coverage of just straight up how do you
do a strike? So today we're going to be covering
a pretty long running strike. We're gonna say how many
days it has been going. It's unclear when this episode
is gonna come out, So who fucking knows how long
it'll be when when you hear it. But yeah, with

(01:55:35):
me to talk about this strike is Spencer Jordan, who
is a rank and file member of the Urban or
Workers Union. Spencer, welcome to the show.

Speaker 1 (01:55:43):
Hey, thank you so much for having me. Miah.

Speaker 3 (01:55:45):
Yeah, I'm excited to talk to you about this. So
this is what day is it today? I should know
this April fifteenth, And as of April fifteenth, you've been
out try for twenty five days.

Speaker 1 (01:55:55):
Yeah, that's just about right. Yeah, it started on the
twenty second of March. We our strike vote like a
solid twelve days before before we actually went out on
the picket line. And one that strike vote with fourteen
yes is a single no and I think four extensions.

(01:56:15):
Pretty yeah. Yeah, so nine of those voting voted yes. Yeah,
which good of good ratios?

Speaker 3 (01:56:22):
Good ratios. I think like typically you want at least
like mid seventies if we're going to do this kind
of thing. But you know, as listener to the show,
hopefully understand by now you can't just like call a
strike and have it happen. You know, you have to
do a whole bunch of organizing. So I want to
kind of start at the dynamics of the organizing of

(01:56:44):
how this shop got going, because this is a pretty
small shop from the sounds of it. And yeah, yeah,
so do you want to talk a bit about what
the basic process of getting this organizing started was like
and what the sort of like social mapping looked like
and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 (01:56:59):
Yeah, So the organization process started around like a year
and a half before we actually had our unionization vote,
which was actually we had the vote in March and
we got our win on April seventh, two years ago,
so we actually just had our union two year birthday birthday.

(01:57:23):
But yeah, so preceding that was like, like I said,
about a year and a half organizing that involved you know,
the typical thing of like one on one conversations with
like all the staff, making the you know, color coded
spreadsheet and everything, which all of this was not my
my purview. I'm a lot more involved now than I

(01:57:44):
was at the start of the process. And I was
approached by like one of our lead organizers really shortly
after being hired just to kind of you know read
the dipstick as too like my sentiments about it and whatnot.
I was pretty on board right away. I mean, you know,

(01:58:04):
like I'm from the Bay Area, so it's not.

Speaker 3 (01:58:10):
There are there are only two types of people from
the Bay Area. You wouldn't be having one of the
one that ship.

Speaker 1 (01:58:14):
Yeah, exactly exactly. So I'm of the ladder type. So
you know, it being pro union is isn't isn't like
a foreign thing to my background.

Speaker 21 (01:58:25):
You know, you don't look like a tech work Yeah, yeah,
especially like my family's from the Midwest and everything, so
there's yeah, my my aunt actually just learned that she
was like a clerk working for the railroads back in
the day when my railroad jobs were still like a
big thing you could have anyways.

Speaker 1 (01:58:41):
But yeah, so I had had my like own sort
of like just observations of like whoah, like what's what's
going on in the workplace aside from like my own
just like prediliction to thinking, you know, more worker power
is better. Yeah, also kind of seeing like some of
the factors that dicipitated it, Like for instance, like when

(01:59:02):
I was hired here, I was hired in my interview,
it was the one of the owners and the manager
of my department, my department being salvage and recycling department
of the urban or which is kind of like not
super public facing. We like go to the dump and
like root around through the garbage like you know, is

(01:59:25):
or whatever, get to get stuff for the store. But
that manager, you know, he was there in the interview
and we got to the portion where the owner explained
what at will employment is. Oh and she and she went,
so we're at will here. So Sam Weell, Sam was

(01:59:46):
my manager. Well, how long have you been here? Twenty
one years? He's there, hands folded on the table. Yes.
What at will means is, uh, it could be tomorrow.
I could say, you know, Samuell, it's been a great
twenty one years. I really appreciate all the work you've done.
Today's your last day, what I say. And he has

(02:00:07):
to sit there and go Jesus Christ, and then she says,
of course, likewise, tomorrow sim Well could come to me
and say, hey, Mary Lou, it's been twenty one years.
I've enjoyed it. I'm quitting. So you know, the sort
of sword over his neck is being cast is somehow

(02:00:28):
equal to him not being like indentured.

Speaker 3 (02:00:32):
Yes, it's also just I mean, like you know, yeah,
on the basic level, Yeah, it's like okay, your opponent
I guess they argue to put it your boss. Your
boss can just instantly fire you for any reason whatsoever,
for any about of time. And then also you could
quit the job and then really flects a plans.

Speaker 10 (02:00:53):
Like as a management tactic, like are you like trying
to piss off your support? And it's like, what, I
have never had a boss like just do that in
a hiring meeting.

Speaker 3 (02:01:06):
What?

Speaker 1 (02:01:08):
Yeah, I mean have you have you worked at like
a like a like a sat of small like mom
and pop quote unquote business.

Speaker 3 (02:01:16):
Yeah, I mean that's that's probably That's probably why because
I've usually had like larger my shitty jobs have either
been like government jobs or like like larger companies, so
there was less of the like I heard a line
recently that I wish I remember where it was from.
It might be a line from Star Trek.

Speaker 1 (02:01:35):
Like one of the.

Speaker 3 (02:01:36):
Fengi rules is just like treat your employees like family,
exploit them ruthlessly, which I like, you.

Speaker 1 (02:01:42):
Know, that's a that's a traditional line in business, especially
in small business, and it's it's no stranger here. Yeah,
that question of like whining to piss off your subordinates
or whatever, it's a I don't know if pissing off
is necessarily like the concern, but the ownership here definitely.

(02:02:06):
I've gotten the impression that they enjoy showing their power,
and I've gotten the impression that the sort of like
uncertainty and like my mom would call it jockeying for
position that you have to do is a dynamic that
they I can't say I really can't say they honestly
because the other owner, he hasn't been very active in

(02:02:29):
the business since since my hiring, but at least Marry
Lou Yeah, tends to lean on. That's kind of like
the the special quality that you get with like a
small business and organizing in a small workplace is that, like,
you know, you can see sort of in their public
communications the way that like the Zucks and the Bezos

(02:02:52):
is and the rest of them feel about their employees,
and you know, you can get a sense of perhaps
how they might act or to their employees if they
like interacted with them on a daily basis. But in
a small business setting, you really get a keen view
into how like the power of the employer mixes very

(02:03:16):
readily with a person's like pred election towards discipline, pred
election towards like personal what'd you call it personal battling? Almost?

Speaker 3 (02:03:31):
Yeah, well, AND's and it's also like it's inescapable in
a way that it isn't with like you know, if
you're dealing with people who are you know, you're at
a larger company, you're not dealing with the person. Like
there's an old Chinese expression that is like heaven is
high and the emperor is far away. So you know,
it's like you know, like a lot of times you're
dealing with okay, yeah there is like you know, your
Zuckerberg is there, but he's like he never interacts with you.

(02:03:53):
But with this, it's like, no, the small business tyrant
is right there in your face all the time and
all of the weird heady shit that they want to
do in all of this sort of like you know,
and I would say, this isn't just just like a
unique thing of like small business owners, like people in
all positions, like in all portions of of like the
class society have in them kind of like the capacity

(02:04:13):
for cruelty. And there's just people like that, but they
don't normally have the ability to just do it to
you directly in your face. And that's yeah, and that's
like that's you know, this is what you've been talking about,
is like, yeah, you have like these small business tyrants,
and like every suddenly in the same way that like,
I don't know, you're dealing with like like one of
the random King Louis and you're like in the court

(02:04:34):
and suddenly just like the fact that this guy doesn't
like people going to the bathroom means that everyone around
him doesn't get it, doesn't get doesn't get a shit, right,
Like it's just like, yeah, it's weird.

Speaker 1 (02:04:44):
Yeah, no exactly. It's like it's actually an argument that
she's deployed in her Reddit correspondence, which has been skimmingly
a pretty active part of her spare time that she's
not spending at the bargaining table with us, you know,
made this comparison of like this isn't a question about

(02:05:05):
oligarchs or whatever. And it's true, like the small businessman
is not an oligarch, but the small business is a
microcosm of like the larger capitalist social order. And while
the small business man might not have the scope of

(02:05:25):
power of the oligarch, or like the actual capital resources
of an oligarch, the behavior certainly rhymes yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:05:34):
Yeah, and again it's like it's a lot of it
is about it's just how much power you have access to, right, Like,
lots of people can be like this, but only the few,
the proud, the small business type get to do it.

Speaker 1 (02:05:47):
Yeah, totally. And you know, ultimately the employer or wherever
they are, they're in this privileged position of being able
to Yeah, you spend most people more on than like
a thirty your life at work. Yeah, the employer has
this unique power to dictate what that third of your
life looks like. You know, yeah, we talk about I mean, shit,

(02:06:09):
we don't. People are not so much talking about democracy
writ large in the US in the same way now
they used to. But you know, you talk about this
idea of like living in a democracy, but democracy ends
at the shop door.

Speaker 3 (02:06:27):
Yeah. Yeah, And like the kind of power that these
people have is something that like these people get to
control when you can go to the bathroom, like what
clothes you where, like literally what you can do, what
you can say at any given time. If you employed
the exact level of control that your boss has over

(02:06:49):
you on a state, it would be a totalitarian state.

Speaker 10 (02:06:52):
And yet everyone seems to think that this is sort
of like, you know, and this is this annoytment I've
been making about like Trump is that like yeah, this
is this is this is.

Speaker 3 (02:07:02):
What sort of Trump and Elon and like the whole
Caudra and and you know, and Petrick, if you want
to go into the sort of ideologues behind it too,
this is what people like Peter Thiel want when when
they say run the government like a business, what they
mean is that they want to like to import the
sort of like just the pure tyranny of the workplace
and expand it into the entire political system so that

(02:07:22):
they're they're like sort of pure like totalitarian corporate rule
can't be challenged.

Speaker 1 (02:07:28):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, wasn't it Missollini who declined the
term the corporate state?

Speaker 3 (02:07:33):
Probably, although it would not surprise me if it was
like some other fascist theorists and Wessolini just started saying
it because yeah, but yeah, like that's you know, that's
a substantive thing here. And what this also means is
that like, even in ways that are sort of hard
to see, like a fight over democracy in the workplace,

(02:07:53):
right is a is a part of the larger struggle
against all of all the things that's happening because if
you know, if we're gonna survive this, and if we're
going to make sure that we don't all live in
a world where you like, if you say the wrong thing,
you can be sent to a prison camp. Democracy, if
you want this to survive, is going to have to
march into like into the layer of the beast. It

(02:08:14):
is going to have to go into the source of
this tyranny itself, which is the workplace, and it's going
to have to crush it there.

Speaker 1 (02:08:20):
Mm hmm, yeah, yeah, I mean, you said it very
very aptly there, Like the corporate structure maras the totalitarian structure,
and you know, not only does like fighting the corporate
structure at the level of labor makes sense in that right,
labor is what enables the flow of capital that sustains

(02:08:45):
the totalitarian state. But also, like you said, you're you're
you're addressing the structure in its I don't know, I
almost think of it as like the you know, like
Grendel's mother and the then or whatever, and like, you know,
the the authoritarian thing is like it's like Grendel maybe,

(02:09:08):
and like Grendel's mother is like this capitalist, hierarchical structure. Yeah,
you know, you take it on with an insistence on
workplace democracy as kind of libby as that's that sounds.

Speaker 3 (02:09:24):
Okay, speaking speaking speaking of capitalist will tellitariotism. Here are
the ads that we are required to run by.

Speaker 13 (02:09:30):
Our let's hear him.

Speaker 3 (02:09:45):
And we are back. So let's get back a little
bit towards the more concrete parts of the union though
I do have more to say eventually at some point
about the way that sort of labor liberalism co opted
democracy in the workplace from like you know, the idea
the old sort of like anarchist idea of workers control. Right,

(02:10:08):
But okay, so one thing I wanted to talk about
before we sort of get into the more formal stuff
about about the strike is I was I'm really interested
to hear you talk about what the process of kind
of onboarding you to get more involved in the union is,
because this is something that like, okay, every functional union
wants to do this, Like if your union is not

(02:10:29):
trying to bring people like its members like more to
get more involved in the union and become more of
the people becoming like core organizers and becoming you know,
like they're the people who are doing your bargain and
people are doing anything like your union is, there's weird
shit about it and you should probably like be looking
into that, but it's pretty hard. So, yeah, can can
you talk a bit about the process of like how

(02:10:50):
you were brought in and what sort of worked and
what didn't.

Speaker 1 (02:10:54):
Well, I think ultimately, like the easiest thing is a
sort of ramping up degree of like responsibility within the organization. Right, So,
like at the start, I would come to some of
the meetings, I would miss some of them. I would
be like, Oh, I'm fucking so busy with whatever is

(02:11:15):
going on in my life. And you know, I was
supportive and sort of involved, but you know, I wasn't
like I mean, I ston wasn't doing things like this.
And you know, eventually one we like kind of persisted
as a union over a longer period of time, the

(02:11:37):
necessity of involvement became more like obvious to me, right,
And that's that's a hard ask. You know, Like you're organizing,
you want momentum and you want yeah, you want to
be able to change your conditions for the better as
soon as possible. Yeah, And with with urban or you know,

(02:12:00):
lots of workplaces that need unionization have high turnover, right,
and Urban Ore is no different. And so I saw,
you know, like some of the more committed elements of
the bargaining unit be fired or quit or whatever, and
you know they would be replaced with other people and

(02:12:21):
you have to begin the work of organizing over again.
And with some of them you succeed with something that
you don't, you know, you have different dynamics. I feel
like the hiring procedures may have changed a little bit
afteryone our election, but you know, I can't say that
for certain. So the sort of like necessity of like
keeping that like flame going, especially after we had won

(02:12:44):
the election we were in contract bargain for a long
period of time, made me feel like a sort of
sense of like I need to be more active in
this because like this is an important struggle and like, yeah,
I see our like main organizers taking on like a
fuck load of work and like needing more voices at

(02:13:04):
the table, needing more more uh, needing more people to
be more involved. And so like I, you know, volunteered
to run for treasure. That was the only candidate. Yeah,
but theoretically I could have been voted down. They could
have been like I don't know about fessor, And you know,

(02:13:26):
like ended up having like a little bit more direct responsibilities.
Like I was like receiving some of the donations to
our strike phone once we started fundraising for the strike
and to keep track of those and you know, put
some special bank account and then eventually take that money,
get it to like the the i w W branch,
uh hand it hand a big check to dono that

(02:13:49):
kind of stuff. And just like having like little things
to be doing, like yeah, spurs involvement other people, you know,
became responsible for like parts of social media outreach, graphics,
stuff like that, and also like sort of I guess,
giving people the opportunity to leverage their individual connections within

(02:14:14):
the work because every workplace is like clicks and groups
and subgroups and all that to leverage those connections in
like service of bettering everyone's conditions. So like to a
certain degree, I've I've been like important as like an
envoid to my particular department because it's our job takes
us away from the job site or like from like
the main the main work site often and stuff like that,

(02:14:37):
so there's less of a direct avenue for communication there. Ye,
So I can say that's my experience. Yeah, as far
as organizing goes, like, I'm easy. You know, I was
already I was already believing in it, and like there
are others that it have that it's been harder. I
will say though, that the strike itself is I mean,

(02:15:02):
a strike is a conflict, and when you're in conflict together,
it's an extremely cohering force. Which isn't to say that
like necessarily you want your unionization to come to a strike,
but perhaps like raising a sort of consciousness of like
the fact that like you are ultimately like in conflict

(02:15:23):
with the boss. The boss doesn't want you to unionize.
The boss doesn't want you to force concessions out of them,
and that like, as a union we are taking on
this like responsibility to look after each other's interests and
to like support each other like tangibly in terms of
like what we do, and also intangibly in terms of

(02:15:45):
like the kind of conversations we have around like morale
planning and stuff like that, you know, to succeed together.
I think those are like really potent cohering forces. And
you know, it helps to have a good you know,
the boss is the best organizer and at urban or
it's you don't go along without coming head to head

(02:16:09):
with like the with with conflict with ownership or with
like ownership through the mediator of management. Like although like
support for the union might be divided a bit at
the workplace, one thing that's pretty universal is like frustration

(02:16:31):
with ownership.

Speaker 3 (02:16:32):
Yeah, so, okay, speaking of speaking of a frustration with ownership,
it is time for us to go to ads one
last time.

Speaker 1 (02:16:39):
And that beautiful.

Speaker 3 (02:16:40):
But then africames back strike strike, strike, strike.

Speaker 18 (02:16:43):
Strike, strike, strike, just after this message, Okay, we are
back from a bunch of people who almost as we
do not want you to go on strike.

Speaker 3 (02:17:01):
But yeah, so let's let's let's let's get into the
process of how you actually organize a strike. Yeah, let's
start from just like the very beginning, one of the
kinds of things that were happening that you know, made
people think that you needed to do this in the
first place.

Speaker 1 (02:17:19):
So the strike itself is a result specifically, like, this
is a ULP strike, So it's in response to something
that falls under the category of unfairly or practice according
to the National Labor Relations Act, And it's you know,
backed up by charges filed with the board as opposed

(02:17:41):
to like what's called an economic strike, which is a
strike that is specifically about economic issues at the workplace.
So the specific ulp that's being cited for our strike
is bad faith bargaining. And for us, what that's looked
like is two years of completely stalled negotiations where we

(02:18:04):
are basically being faced with a take it or leave
it offer of the status quo in the vast majority
of our proposals. Yeah, bargaining is very, very slow, and
ownership has held tightly to the offense at us having

(02:18:25):
unionized it all, which to my understanding is pretty typical
of small workplaces. The ownership takes it very personally, and
that personal feeling of the trail or whatever becomes like
a stumbling block in the negotiation process. I know that
was the case with mos Another's bookshop in Berkeley that

(02:18:46):
also unionized with the AWW. So, you know, we've had
our whole proposal on ownership's table for a year and
a half now. We had started with a bargaining proposal.
By proposal, they said, well, how can we possibly agree
to any of this without understanding the full context, especially
the economic context, And so we gave them a full

(02:19:09):
proposal and they said, oh my god, how do you
expect us to read all of this in time to bargain?
This is way too much. How we're going to evaluate
this all? Oh my god, we got to do a
proposal by proposal. So it's been really unclear to us
if ownership has even actually like read the entirety of
our collective bargaining agreement that we put on their desk.

(02:19:32):
I know that in the past lawyers have the lawyers
have said things like, oh my, my eyes glazed over
when I read your email, So I missed such and
such part of it.

Speaker 3 (02:19:42):
It's literally your job contract.

Speaker 9 (02:19:46):
You have one job.

Speaker 1 (02:19:48):
Yeah, you would think like a lawyer would have like
a little bit more of like Jesus, like a tweet
tweet sized reading capacity.

Speaker 3 (02:19:54):
But well they give any one law degrees.

Speaker 1 (02:19:57):
Yeah, or like ownerships saying like well, I just thought
it was so ridiculous. I didn't fel they need to
read all of it. Stuff like that. Oh my god,
does these readers bad faith bargaining?

Speaker 3 (02:20:10):
Yeah, that's bad by like the standards of like normal,
it takes two years to do a fucking contract because
they're just not doing shit, and like, good lord, usually.

Speaker 1 (02:20:22):
In those long contract negotiations by two years at least,
there's like been some progress.

Speaker 3 (02:20:27):
Yeah, yeah, well that they've read the proposals, Like yes, okay,
will will will your boss show up to your meeting
an hour and a half late because they didn't bother
to look through the proposals until literally right at the
time the meeting was going to start. Yes, but will
they have done it?

Speaker 1 (02:20:41):
Usually yes, m m yeah. And in fact, in the
sort of company propaganda where they're claiming that this like
bad faith bargaining charge has no grounds, they're like ownership
has come to like twenty five to thirty bargaining sessions,
neglecting to mention there events we're in the range of
like fifty to sixty, And of course maybe they've shown

(02:21:07):
that more than half.

Speaker 7 (02:21:08):
I don't want to be libelous, but yeah, but still
like if at the point of which you are failing
to show up for any bargaining session, I think you
can like, look, I have.

Speaker 3 (02:21:18):
Always advocated that if that, if that advantagement doesn't show
up to a bargaining session, you should just be allowed
to take the company, because clearly they're not serious about it.

Speaker 1 (02:21:25):
But hey, you know they've been talking about a worker
cup for twenty years, not performance reforms, but yeah, so
those kind of things. And then like finally, like one
of the bigger precipitating factors is, like we've been trying
to bargain over economics, ownership has implied a lot of

(02:21:46):
times that they cannot afford to pay what we're asking.
They say it'll ruin the company, they say a company
will go bankrupt, they say it's unsustainable, they say this
and that, and then when they get to the table,
they say, we have never and will never are your
inability to pay. Because the thing is is that to
say inability to pay right, it obligates you to furnish

(02:22:08):
information to prove that, and they, for whatever reason do
not want. Wow, I wonder why British financial information. So
these have been some of the sticking points, and that's
why we've been out on the picky line for about
three weeks now, still waiting for them to come to
the table.

Speaker 3 (02:22:25):
God damn it. So okay, let's let's talk about like
the just sort of the process of like how the
discussions went for doing this, What did those sort of
look like, and how did how did you sort of
you know, just like plant plan this thing out.

Speaker 1 (02:22:38):
Well, I guess the process towards like deciding that I
needed to come to a strike was like, you know
that that is a sort of thing that builds over
a long period of time. You know, you see ownership
doing bad faith brackening. You go, what more conciliatory approaches
can we take first? You know, can we try this?
Can we try offering this to make you know, can
we try this display of good faith? And we offered

(02:23:01):
this compromise. One of the things that was a big
part was of some of the not exactly contract related discussions,
but like has been talking for a long time about
a co op transition that it's never happened. It's been
twenty years, and you know, now that we've unionized, they're
like our people who we were talking to about doing

(02:23:22):
the co op thing, they don't work with unions and
so the only way that they were going to be
a co op is if the union goes away. And
so in response to that, we said, well, we're totally
opened to a transition to a co op that involves
the union, and here is such and such organization. It
was our lead negotiator who actually provide the information some
or the name of the organization, but you know, here's
such and such organization that actually specifically deals with union

(02:23:47):
co op workplace transitions. Was not received with interest. So
it's like your massive catalogue of bad faith bargaining and
end up in your strategy discussions with the whole unit
testing the wires of like when is too much? What's
our red line that we need to take more direct action?

(02:24:10):
And what that began with for us was first, well,
if we're going to have if we're going to have
a strike, we need funds for it. The IWW is
an organization that affords its unions a lot of freedom
and a lot of mutual support and solidarity, is not

(02:24:30):
an organization with a huge amount of money. And so
we did start with trying to get like a sense
of like what we could get from you know, the
branches reserve, and we moved on from that to how
we were going to fundraise and stuff like that. So
we held informational pickets that had donations, we sold shirts, posters,

(02:24:57):
stuff like that. We held like a big strike fundraise. Yeah,
I think something around like a month in advance of
our or it was maybe like a month and a
half in advance of our of our strike. We also
gave management like a courtesy notice about this so they
could pass it on to ownership, saying, hey, we've started
a fundraising for a strike in the hopes that like

(02:25:19):
being aware that we're taking active preparations to go on
strike would facilitate bargaining.

Speaker 3 (02:25:26):
Sometimes it works, I've seen I've seen it before. I've
seen it before.

Speaker 1 (02:25:29):
Sometimes it works, yeah, and sometimes, you know, sometimes you
end up on a podcast talking about how it didn't.
You never know what until you try it, You never know.
But we did. Yeah, we did give them that sort
of early warning, and our readiness to strike kind of

(02:25:52):
like depended then on like where we were at in
the fundraising process. So we continue to sort of listening donations,
reaching out to various organizations in the area that are,
you know, pro labor. You know, we talked to like
DSA whenever because you know, they have their like a
workplace Organizing committee, yeah walk Yeah, and various other you know, yeah,

(02:26:16):
organizations that are pro labor. And once we got to
a point where you felt like we were reasonably like
prepared to sustain they open end to strike because that's
what we're doing. This is a strike with no set
end date. Then we announced our intention to hold a
strike vote. We held our strike vote, strike vote passes.

(02:26:39):
The ownership was made aware at the barning session before
the strike vote, so it was like the Monday before
the strike vote, which is on I think like a Saturday.
So in totally it was like around maybe like two
weeks in change that they knew like definite possibility past
the strike vote. Twelve days later, drike begins with unfortunately

(02:27:02):
no bargaining in between. Good lord, Yeah, the whole way.
You hope that they'll come to the table. You hope that.

Speaker 3 (02:27:08):
They will come to their senses.

Speaker 1 (02:27:11):
Yeah, take take the risks seriously, take the risk seriously.
And unfortunately, this is not what's happened here. Yeah, And
I think part of that is maybe an age thing. Here,
ownership is in their eighties, and it pretty consistently held
the view that like the union is like a bunch

(02:27:32):
of young people who don't know what the hell they're
talking about, you know, even though like the age range
of our union spans the age range of the workplace.
We've got people in their fifties and forties and thirties
and twenties, you know, which is which is of course
the problematic group, but yeah, the young radicals. Yeah, so

(02:27:54):
there's there's been this sort of patronizing attitude that I
think as a resulted in like a real strategic failure
on their part to seriously prepare for the strike or
you know, bargain to avoid it. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:28:10):
One more fundraising thing that I just I just want
to mention this for people, if you, if you, if
you're trying to fundraise for your own things, something that's
actually we've had a lot of success with up in
Portland is getting bands to do benefit shows. So like,
because it's Portland, right, Like, the local hardcore scene has
a lot of bands that you know, are just supportive
of stuff, and we've do not this for a whole
bunch of different causes, and this is this this this

(02:28:31):
can also be a good way to just sort of
do fundraising things that are fun and also raise morale
because yeah, you're doing the show.

Speaker 1 (02:28:38):
Yeah I was, I was. I was hoping to have
that be more of a thing with our fundraiser, but yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:28:44):
It canna be hard to organize sometimes.

Speaker 1 (02:28:46):
Yeah, the people I knew were didn't get quite the
response I was hoping from the community.

Speaker 3 (02:28:51):
If you are hardcore band. If you are abandon Berkeley,
there's still.

Speaker 1 (02:28:58):
Time that is that is totally a good option. What
we did, we ended up doing that. There was music,
but it's also like one of our organizers is really
into cooking. You like, did like a barbecue thing. Yeah,
sold food stuff like that and had a raffle. A
raffle is a great way to fundraise for us. We

(02:29:20):
like raffled off like stuff we have. But honestly, you
can even do like a straight monetary raffle is still
a great fundraising tool, you know, where everyone puts in money,
the winner, the top freet winners or whatever get like
a certain percentage like the total pool and the rest
of the pool. Is is a to be cause it's

(02:29:41):
really simple, really effective.

Speaker 3 (02:29:43):
Yeah, there's a reason it's not good, but there is
a reason why a whole bunch of state education budget
are footed are footed by the lattery.

Speaker 1 (02:29:50):
It does work and where the people love to gamble
much better. Yeah, he says.

Speaker 3 (02:30:00):
I be turned off her lunch her path of exile
to lunch break to come to this interview.

Speaker 1 (02:30:07):
How such cases.

Speaker 3 (02:30:08):
Okay, so let's let's speaking of I guess this is
something that has been tied into sort of all and
saying here, but yeah, let's talk about you know, sort
of maintaining the strike when it starts to sort of Yeah,
what have been the processes of like keeping morale up
and keeping people engaged?

Speaker 1 (02:30:21):
And yeah, yeah, I mean definitely, when you go into
a strike, you want to go in with a militant
core group. You want to basically be sure that everyone
is committed to holding the line until a collective decision
is made. Otherwise you don't want people like peeling off.
That's really bad pr for your strike. Yeah yeah, and

(02:30:44):
like the bosses will grab on that. So like for instance,
like you know, we have some people who are respecting
our picket line but chose not to pick it with us,
which is fine as far as I'm concerned. But the
issue with that PR wise is that now the boss
is are saying and they're like tallying up of who's
working and who's not working. They're counting them as working.

(02:31:06):
You know, they're like, oh, it's only whatever they've been
saying eight people. I think it's more nine or ten
we're on the picket line. But the rest is the
rest of the employees are working. They count themselves as
employees in that count of course, and they count these
these people who are not crossing the picket line but

(02:31:27):
not on it also as among that count of the
rest of the employees they are working what and they've
had the opportunity to really inflate that count because in
a sort of you know, classic move. Really all the
moves are classic. You know, you read your organizing books
and you're like, can it happen here? It does? So

(02:31:49):
like we got a lot of new assistant managers after
we want our election, so right now, like the composition
of the workplace right got thirty four people fifteen managers.

Speaker 3 (02:31:58):
I really I wonder when we're going to see the
day where you have companies that have six like non
managers and fifty five managers. Like I feel like we're
not that far out.

Speaker 1 (02:32:09):
Well, we're leading the charge here. We have a department
that's two people a manager and assistant manager. Assistant manager
managing god. So yeah, you know they're they're they've had
these particular angles to you know, sort of do their
propaganda from. And I mean, honestly, I think a big

(02:32:32):
part of again, the boss is the best organizer, and
like a thing that keeps you committed on the line
is like reading all this bullshit they say about you
and knowing otherwise and being able to talk to each
other and be like have you seen this? Isn't this crazy?
Like what the hell? Yeah? Also, you know is uh,

(02:32:52):
this is where the sort of like seeds of organizing
all the way that you start all the way back
at the beginning of your union campaign become you know,
you show themselves is like really important again because like
the start right, anyone will tell you is it's like
getting to know people, like being like, you know, being
on like a hey, how's it going kind of level,

(02:33:13):
you know, and having like a personal rapport with the
people you're on the line with is vital just in
the sense that you know, obviously like you know each other,
you're sort of friends, You're going to be more likely
to stick up for each other. But also like you're
out there nine hours walking in a circle with these people, Yeah,
you know, you got to you got to have positive,

(02:33:34):
strong relationships with them. You want to be able to
have the kind of rapport where like you can talk
to people about like what they're feeling anxious about, you know,
like where they're worried and like the strike strategy, like
you know, you need to have that like trust between
each other that you can have like an open dialogue
about how it feels to be on the picket line,
because you're not going to maintain morale if ever, if

(02:33:56):
like everyone feels like they've got things they got a
hold in about it, like yeah, there's a room to
be like shit, like are they going to close the business?
Like and what are we going to do? And like
sort of like talk through that from a from a
place beyond like you know, like what you're not letting
it speak into a crowd of a million people or whatever.
You're just like two people, Yeah, going through a stressful

(02:34:19):
experience together.

Speaker 3 (02:34:20):
Yeah. Yeah, and you have to actually grapple with that
in a way. That's not the sort of like weird
corporate like we had to improve morale things like that's
not what that means. It means, like you know, it
means actually grappling and engaging with people's feelings how and
what they need in a moment and yeah, and their
fears and their concerns and yeah, you can't just sort

(02:34:43):
of brush them aside. You have to actually grapple with it.
Because that's that's that's what doing this stuff means.

Speaker 1 (02:34:48):
Yeah, exactly, having like these authentic conversations with people because
like like yeah, that's like a totally great point you
bring up there, Like the hr speak, that's the bosses tool,
and it's the boss's tool to divide and create disunity.
So you can't lean on that model for morale within
your union. It just creates distrust.

Speaker 3 (02:35:11):
Yeah, And I mean I've seen that happen with unions
where it's like, you guys did not do a good
job of like talking to people about this, and like yeah,
and it can be really disruptive to attempts to do this.
But on the other hand, if you do it well,
it's like it's the most powerful single thing that you
can like possibly do. It's like forging relationships that are

(02:35:32):
based on like the actual experience of having gone through
struggle together and having had to like literally had to
face your fields on the picket line.

Speaker 1 (02:35:42):
Yeah. Yeah. Like ideally, you know, the union is a
is a community, and it's a community of interest, right,
It's a community of work interest. But it is ideally
a community. It's not a family, right, and it's certainly
not not not a family in the way that the
bosses will type of the workplaces. But it is a community,

(02:36:03):
and it's a community in the way that that an
employer's idea of a community is fundamentally like incompatible.

Speaker 3 (02:36:11):
With Yeah, there's this this pickI Osto Walt line that
I think about a lot from her book in Defensive Fluting,
where she talks about how I feel like it was
Ferguson that this is about where like the police chiefs
talking about the damage to the community, and they keep
saying our Walmart. It's like going into a Walmart and
buying something is not a community, right, Like, you know,

(02:36:35):
they like that like those those kinds of relations are
not actual community relations. But when the boss was talking
about community, that's what they mean. They mean like like
our collective community Walmart. They mean preserving the relation of
extraction that they have. Yeah, and we are, you know,
using the same word and reading something literally so radically different.

Speaker 1 (02:36:57):
Than that, And you have to make sure you're in
the way that you're acting that that radically different meeting
is clear. Yeah, And you know, it's funny you bring
that up, because that's just bringing to mind, like you
see the difference in those attitudes like when you're out
there on the picket line, like interact because you know,
our picket line a really pivotal part of it because

(02:37:18):
there are so many managers in there that they're able
to maintain this, like Skeleton Crew is. The community outreach
part is like talking to every single person who's coming
up and being like, Hey, how's it going that I've
been on strike such and such long? This is what's up.
Please don't cross our picket line. And you know, I've noticed.
You get this real funny situation where there are the

(02:37:40):
people who are like, I've shopped here for twenty years.
You don't know what the hell you're talking about. I
don't know you and have to be like, well, I
normally at the dump get in the merchandise you're buying.
But and who attribute the entire attribute everything they like
about the business to the bosses. And then there's the
other part of the community that is coming by frequently

(02:38:02):
and like hanging out with us on on on the
picket line. You know, I pet the dog and we
chat about what's going on. They're like, how's the strike going.
They're like, you know, I know it's been rough on
you guys. For such and such, and like these people
are are are our shoppers too?

Speaker 3 (02:38:14):
Right?

Speaker 1 (02:38:14):
But they like, yeah, they it highlights that like sort
of divide in like what you think of as like
community and responsibility your community, because like these people also
love urbanor come here all the time, but they recognize that,
like it's the workers that urban or that create it
every day, you know. Yeah, And it is a company

(02:38:37):
that was like founded by the individual. The individual still
owns it. He did found it with his with his
labor and all that he did, the labor you know,
back when it was you know, only a few people
and stuff like that. But ultimately, a business, like any
sort of social phenomenon, has to be constantly recreated in
order to exist.

Speaker 3 (02:38:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:38:57):
Yeah, and like the people who do the work that
makes it it more than just like a room full
of garbage rs. And yeah, a lot of a lot
of the like regulars recognize that, and a lot of
them you know, flip me off as they cross the
big line whatever.

Speaker 3 (02:39:15):
And I think this is a good place to sort
of start coming to a close on this is a
fundamental question about what the nature of our society is
going to be, right, Like is the fundament mental nature
of our society that a community is a bunch of
people who buy things, and a bunch of people who
make money from you buying things, and who make money
from the labor that you do, right, and then take

(02:39:39):
credit for the labor, and take credit both financially for
the labor and in public for the labor. Right, is
that going. Is our society going to just be a
bunch of pure commercial relations where a bunch of people
get very very rich off of the wabor of everyone
else in the society and get to rule the mess
sort of like these petty tyrant kings. Or is it
going to be a society where the people who produce

(02:39:59):
the society control it, right? And that society is a
democratic society, is an egalitarian society, is a society where
people are free to do the things that they need
to do, and people are free to you know, have
a life where they can fucking pay for their groceries
right where like you know, where where they're whe they're
not forced to go to the market for all of

(02:40:20):
the things that they need to live, where you can
survive in a way that doesn't involve like subjecting yourself
to just a tyrant for like a third of your life.

Speaker 1 (02:40:30):
Yeah, where where like the place that you spend like
ae a third of your life is a place where
you actually have like dignity.

Speaker 3 (02:40:37):
Dignity and freedom and where you know, where you don't
have to go home at the end of a day
of making your boss money worrying about whether you're going
to be able to eat or not. And it's and
that's also a society that does not involve again at
the very highest level, like you getting thrown into prison camps.
Mister God hates you and we can do that. We

(02:41:00):
could live with that society.

Speaker 1 (02:41:01):
Yeah, the demands are not that crazy. No, And that's
like the thing that we've encountered over and over again,
is this this constant push and pull of people saying
that like the expectation of bettering our conditions, whether it
be like us on the picket line just trying to
get like a stable wage and just cause employment and

(02:41:23):
stuff like that, or whether it be you know, those
larger societal changes that like you're talking about use butt
up against these people who who have such like a
paucity of imagination about what's possible. Yeah, and like about
the legitimacy of trying to make something better, the legitimacy
of saying, sure, I can subsist on this, but yeah,

(02:41:46):
there's so much more as possible. Yeah, so I'm maintained
that there's something more as possible.

Speaker 3 (02:41:52):
Yeah, I think it's possible too. And that's the thing
about this world, right, is that our enemies I figured
out that it actually can change.

Speaker 1 (02:42:00):
That's why they have to fight so hard. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:42:01):
But the thing is the fact that they can change
for the worse also means that they can change.

Speaker 11 (02:42:04):
For the better.

Speaker 1 (02:42:05):
All beautiful stuff.

Speaker 3 (02:42:06):
Okay, where where can people find your strike fund? We'll
also put it in the in the description.

Speaker 1 (02:42:10):
Oh yeah, great, so it's on GoFundMe. I'll send you
the link and it'll be down there. But also people
can hit up our union Instagram. It's urban or workers
with underscores between the words urban, underscore or underscore worker
that we've got the link to like strike fund. And also, hey,

(02:42:31):
if you're in Berkeley, you can sign up for a
picket shift and you get to enjoy listening to me
discourse for nine hours instead of one.

Speaker 3 (02:42:40):
It's great, it's fun. Pickets are cool and good. If
you have a bit on one, you should go on one.
They're great, They're great. Yeah, it's a good time.

Speaker 8 (02:43:10):
This is it could happen here. Executive Disorder, our weekly
newscast covering what's happening in the White House, the crumbling world,
and what it means for you. I'm Garrison Davis today.
I'm joined by doctor James's Stout and Reverend doctor the
Honorable Robert Evans.

Speaker 1 (02:43:27):
That's right.

Speaker 2 (02:43:27):
M hmm, that's right, Reverend doctor the honorable Evans, who
is currently hacking up a fucking lung. No idea why
I feel otherwise fine?

Speaker 8 (02:43:37):
Well, I'm sure you feel otherwise fine due to this
great week in American history we've all been through together, Yeah,
which started with a meeting between President Donald Trump and
El Salvador President Buklea on Monday morning in the Oval Office,
where they discussed the possibility of the United States helping

(02:43:57):
to build more Seacott style facility to disappear US citizens
and immigrants that the Trump administration deems criminals or terrorists.

Speaker 2 (02:44:07):
Yes, I mean, I keep getting asked, is this the
panic moment? And I don't think panic is particularly productive,
but like, yeah, this is the worst case scenario. The
worst case scenario is happening the President's talking about sending
citizens overseas to a concentration camp. Honestly, I'm on the
verge of thinking it's okay to call it a death camp.
But we just don't have the data yet. There's some

(02:44:28):
very concerning satellite shots that appear to show piles of bodies.

Speaker 8 (02:44:33):
Yeah, that's from March of twenty twenty four.

Speaker 2 (02:44:35):
Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah, but it won't have.

Speaker 9 (02:44:37):
Gotten better no, no, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:44:40):
So I don't know. This is about as bad as
it could be, folks, We're in it.

Speaker 8 (02:44:46):
During that meeting, both President Bukeley and the Trump cabinet
argue that there's simply no way for people sent to
see God to ever return to the United States, coming
up with a whole bunch of absurd observed reasons for
why that is that is impossible due to due to
foreign policy and safety of both El Salvador and the
United States. Me and James did a whole episode on

(02:45:08):
this earlier this week that you can check out on
the It could Happen here feed. I'm gonna move on
to an update on the student crackdowns. So ICE has
targeted a third Green card holder for deportation based on
pro Palestinian activism. Mosen Matuwi is a Palestinian from the

(02:45:30):
West Bank who has lived in the US with a
green card for a decade while studying philosophy at Columbia.
He co founded the Columbia Palestinian Student Union in twenty
twenty three with Mahmoud Khalil. Maduwi was arrested by Ice
last Monday, April fourteenth at his citizenship interview in Vermont.
Now after Khalil was arrested last month, Maduwi went into

(02:45:54):
hiding and he suspected that this citizenship interview could be
a honeypot, but decided to go anyway. After waiting a
long time for this appointment, his lawyers quickly filed a
habeas corpus petition arguing his detentions unlawful and Violet's First Amendment.
A US district judge issued an order hours later that
he was quote not to be removed from the United

(02:46:16):
States or moved out of the territory of the District
of Vermont, pending for their order of this court. Zionistocksing
accounts targeted Marwi in recent weeks. I'm going to play
actually this two minute clip of Marwi talking This is
from December of twenty twenty three on the program sixty minutes.

Speaker 22 (02:46:37):
What was your initial reaction when you heard about the
Hamas attack on October seventh.

Speaker 17 (02:46:44):
I could not believe what my eyes were seeing, where
I see Hamas members getting into settlements and so on.
But also the first moment I saw that, I put
my hand on my heart and I started praying, knowing

(02:47:06):
that there will be a huge level of revenge from
the Israelis, and I was praying that this will not
be the result, because it would be disastrous.

Speaker 22 (02:47:18):
The night of the rally, I believe someone in the
crowd said something very anti Jewish, not just say anti Israeli,
but anti Jewish.

Speaker 17 (02:47:28):
Yes, this was as a walk out on November ninth,
and a person who is not affiliated with Columbia. We've
never seen him, we don't know who is this guy
comes down down the stairs yelling death to Jews. I

(02:47:52):
was shocked. And they walked directly to the person and
they told him you don't represent us because this is
not something that we agree with, and directly what I've done.
I tooked the megaphone and they gave a speech and
they said we here are conscious, educated, students, and we

(02:48:14):
know how to separate right from wrong, and what this
guy has said is wrong. What this guy has said
is clearly anti sematic against Jews. To be anti Semitic
is unjust, is unjust, and the fight for the freedom

(02:48:39):
of Palestine and the fight against anti Semetism go hand
in hand, because injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Speaker 2 (02:48:50):
Yeah, I mean, he said everything that would make him
a respectable protester, at least based on what the fucking
dims were saying last year, Like, there's nothing in there
that's pro Hamas. There's nothing in anything I can tell
this guy has done that his advocacy towards terrorism. But
obviously that's not what matters. What matters is they have

(02:49:11):
the ability to get him out, and they're doing that
because of his speech.

Speaker 8 (02:49:15):
Yeah, he took a step back from protests in March
of twenty twenty four, during the second wave of student
protests at Columbia.

Speaker 9 (02:49:24):
Yeah, and like I believe he didn't. Isn't he like
a member of the university Buddhist Club.

Speaker 8 (02:49:29):
Yes, part of why took a step back was to
focus on his role in the Buddhist club as a
as for I think in the past like two years,
he has been participating in that on campus. Yeah, he
told CBS News the day before he was detained. Quote,
if my story will become another story for the struggle
to have justice and democracy in this country, let it

(02:49:49):
be unquote like other students who've been targeted and arrested,
he has not been charged or accused of any crime,
but the State Department has deemed him a threat to
foreign policy.

Speaker 1 (02:50:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 9 (02:50:01):
Hot to see how but I think as we're seeing it,
that doesn't really matter.

Speaker 1 (02:50:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (02:50:06):
Now, last Friday, a Louisiana judge ruled in favor of
the Trump administration to allow the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil,
upholding the government's argument that the rarely used Cold War
era statute of the Immigration and Nationality Act allows for
the Secretary of State to deport aliens that pose quote
adverse foreign policy consequences. The only quote unquote evidence presented

(02:50:28):
in court was a two page memo written by Mark
Rubio that alleges that Khalil's presence in the country threatens
quote US policy had to come at anti semitism around
the world and in the United States. Based on information
provided by the DHS ICE and Homeland Security investigations regarding
the participation and rules of Khalil in anti Semitic protests
and disruptive actions which foster a hostile environment for Jewish

(02:50:51):
students in the United States unquote. So there's no real
evidence in this document. It is just Mark Rubio's opinion
for two pages. And this is the only ever and
said ever, has been held in court that resulted in
the judge ruling in the government's favor.

Speaker 2 (02:51:06):
A lot of what we're seeing here is the natural
conclusion to what was happening with like Dance last year
talking about Haitian immigrants and admitting like, yeah, it's not
literally true, but like it's true to how we feel.
So it's like fine for us to spread this lie.
Like they're just declaring these people terrorists and even attempting
to get evidence for that claim, like they certainly have.

Speaker 1 (02:51:29):
No need to.

Speaker 2 (02:51:30):
And the media that like I'm seeing coverage on Fox
particularly that's just repeatedly framing this as like the left
is angry that like a terrorist got deborded, right, yeah.

Speaker 8 (02:51:41):
Yeah, I mean this is the same stuff that we
saw at the RNC where they referred to students as terrorists,
like just completely completely flattened. Like every single person at
a college campus who is upset about a genocide or
criticizes the state of Israel, that person is a terrorist.
Lawyers for Khalil until April twenty third to file an

(02:52:01):
appeal to halt the deportation, and they plan to file
an asylum case on his behalf. A separate habeas petition
case is playing out in a New Jersey court. This week,
NBC News reviewed over one hundred pages of documents from
the federal government and Khalil's legal team containing information about
his immigration process, work experience, and activism. These documents showed

(02:52:22):
that the government used unverified tabloid reporting against Khalil and
contained contradictory information yep, so, essentially using New York Post
style publications as a pretext for ICE to execute arrests
against people who are Green card holders, legal permanent residents

(02:52:42):
of the United States. We're going to go on break
and come back to talk about Robert F. Kennedy Junior.

Speaker 2 (02:52:49):
Finally, finally something fun.

Speaker 9 (02:53:03):
All right, we're back.

Speaker 8 (02:53:04):
I'm gonna throw to Robert Evans for an update on
everyone's favorite roadkill consumer.

Speaker 2 (02:53:11):
Yes, yes, RFK Junior. He's not just strapping the carcass
of a dead whale to the head of his truck
and driving down the highway. Now, he is while kind
of launching a genocidal campaign against people with autism.

Speaker 8 (02:53:24):
Kind of doing a national eugenics program.

Speaker 2 (02:53:26):
Yeah, kind of calling a large group of people in
this country useless eaters.

Speaker 8 (02:53:31):
Jesus Christ.

Speaker 9 (02:53:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:53:32):
Fuck.

Speaker 2 (02:53:32):
And the gist of what's happening is they just had
a new quote unquote study come out that looked at
like apparently rising autism rates. And again I've covered this
a lot. The reason why rates of autism are increasing
every credible scientist degrees is because we're looking for it
more and so we're finding more of it and we
have a broader understanding of what it is. RFK Junior

(02:53:56):
is obsessed with the idea, the image of autism as
a disease that is spreading due to an environmental contagion,
and he is trying to make the case that this
is a calamity. He has promised. The most recent promise
he made is that by September the government will release
exhaustive studies that will identify the environmental causes of autism.

(02:54:18):
And he made a statement, autism destroys families. More importantly,
it destroys our greatest resource, which is our children. These
are children who should not be suffering like this. He
is called autism a preventable disease, which it is not.
While there is evidence that some of the factors that
can be relevant in autism expressing are environmental, the vast

(02:54:40):
majority of it seems to be genetic. There's no evidence,
and there have been repeated studies there has anything to
do with vaccines. He's positive a couple of other theories
as to what causes it, including mold and diet, and
these are largely based on what are already kind of quack,
both autism treatments and quack autism causes that are are
popular within the biomedical movement, the experimental biomedical movement, which

(02:55:04):
is the fake autism medical industrial complex that we covered
recently on the Behind the Bastards. One of the things
I think is really worrying about the language that Kennedy
is using is how similar it sounds to a lot
of what you were seeing in the early nineteen thirties
out of the Nazi state, what we know of as
the Holocaust, which is generally a term. Generally, Primarily when

(02:55:27):
people use that term they are talking about the mass
killing of Jews and other ethnic minorities in Central Europe
by the Nazi state. That got a lot of its start,
and there's a couple of different places got it start. Obviously,
the wild concentration camps and the political concentration camps are
in that heritage. When it comes to the actual mass
killing of people, the very origin of that was in

(02:55:50):
getting rid of the disabled.

Speaker 3 (02:55:51):
Right.

Speaker 2 (02:55:52):
The term that was used in Nazi propaganda for these
people was useless eaters. And this is the first time
that the Nazis tested out gassing right in large numbers.
And he hasn't used literally the term useless eaters, but
he talks a lot about. One of the terms he
uses is severe autism, right, which is not the term
that is popularly used now for people who have kind

(02:56:14):
of profound autism. I think is the preferred term for
people who do have a significantly higher degree of like
disability as a result of their autism or that correlates
with their autism, right, as opposed to the vast majority
of people who can be diagnosed to somewhere on the
spectrum who are able to live independently. Right, And Kennedy
sort of does the thing that is very common within

(02:56:37):
this community of sort of number one, correlating that to
everybody with autism and talking about it as if it
is a disaster that justifies any kind of response, because
the people who have profound autism aren't real people in
his eyes. He made a statement quote, these are kids
who will never pay taxes, They'll never hold a job,
they'll never play baseball, they'll never write a poem, they'll

(02:56:59):
never go out on a many of them will never
use a toilet unassisted. We have to recognize we are
doing this to our children. And first off, having taught
a lot of kids with profound autism, yes they could
play baseball, like a number of them held jobs. Now
do a lot of them need assisted living? Sure, But
like number one, that's always been the case. There's no
evidence that people with this kind of autom that there's

(02:57:22):
any sort of raise in this right. What's raised is
the number of people who are being diagnosed. Right, And
he's using this kind of scare term, right, this idea
that like parents, you need to be frightened that something
is going to steal your children from you in order
to justify the dehumanization of everyone with autism, as well

(02:57:43):
as radical biomedical experimental procedures that are going to do
harm at scale to lots of kids. One of his
favorite new terms is epidemic denial, which is the term
that he's using for people who say that, like, this
is not an epidemic, this is something that we're now
screening for more. He's kind of kind of repurposing the

(02:58:05):
language of like vaccine denial and whatnot as like a
denial that this is sort of an immediate crisis that
needs to be hit, which I find interesting.

Speaker 8 (02:58:16):
Also like co opting like COVID conscious language.

Speaker 9 (02:58:19):
Yeah, yeah, I think the way he and his group
were referred to during COVID he's now using in the
same fashion.

Speaker 2 (02:58:25):
Yeah, And it's interesting. His initial promise was that like,
by September, will know why autism rates are on the rise.
That's not really a thing. You can't make science work
that way, Like you can't guarantee that.

Speaker 9 (02:58:38):
Like you said, we already know because people are seeking
out diagnoses, like because right, we have better awareness of
it now.

Speaker 2 (02:58:46):
But he's kind of altered that recently, being like, no,
we'll have some answers by September, and you know, we're
going to get those answers by removing the taboo so
that doctors won't get gas lit by blaming autism on
vaccines or know, mold exposure or the like. So that's
that's what we can look forward to in the near future.
From our good friend RFK Junior, who definitely doesn't pay

(02:59:08):
taxes or write poems. I just want to make that clear.
I don't think either of those are particularly good bars
for whether or not you're a human being, but he
for sure doesn't do either.

Speaker 8 (02:59:17):
So frankly, I know way too many autistic people who write.

Speaker 2 (02:59:23):
Poems, oh tons of them.

Speaker 9 (02:59:25):
That's gonna say. Yeah, the ring poem things was a
really fucking The.

Speaker 2 (02:59:29):
Poet Lauriate of Washington State since twenty twenty three is
a is a woman with autism. So yeah, like I
writing poems nonsense.

Speaker 8 (02:59:36):
Extremely common activity for for my fellow my fellow autism people.

Speaker 2 (02:59:43):
Yeah they are, okay, okay, ore f K Junior again,
but he was talking about, you know, people with what
he calls severe autism. But he also doesn't ever care
to like specify his language because there's no there's no benefit.

Speaker 8 (02:59:57):
That's a real medical Yeah, and there's.

Speaker 2 (02:59:58):
No benefit to his eyes ideology and acknowledging that, like, well,
most people who get diagnosed with autism may need some accommodations.
It's a difference, right, It's a difference in the way
your mind works. But they're fine, Like they're living healthy,
happy lives.

Speaker 1 (03:00:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 8 (03:00:13):
I talk slightly differently in the cool zone work chat,
which is kind of the extent of it for me, extent,
but that is an aspect. Speaking of the Department of
Public Human Services, they released a report page on their
website for you, the the vigilance citizens Oh yes, to

(03:00:35):
report trans miners receiving healthcare. Finally, and so an another
one of these like snitching hotlines at this time on
a federal government website that I'm sure will only get real,
real complaints sent to it, and not the B movies.

Speaker 2 (03:00:50):
See not repeatedly the B movie scrap. Yeah.

Speaker 8 (03:00:55):
Speaking of trans people, I do have a few updates
on some of the trend gender stuff. During that meeting
between President Buklea and Trump, they went on a small
tangent about trans people where where Trump said that he
actually doesn't like talking about quote unquote men in women's
sports because he wants to wait and save that issue

(03:01:17):
to use for the next election.

Speaker 9 (03:01:19):
Amazing.

Speaker 8 (03:01:20):
Yeah, I'm going to play the clip, and I don't.

Speaker 14 (03:01:22):
Like talking about it because I want to save it
for just before the next election. I said, my people
don't even talk about it because they'll change then. But
I watched this morning it was a congressman fighting to
the death for men to play against women in sports.

Speaker 8 (03:01:40):
That's like super interestic, like very clear insight into how
like Trump sees like the trands of sports issue and
treats it as this like election winning superpower, and like
he certainly he is directing like the DOJ and with
his executive orders, like he still is targeting trans people,

(03:02:01):
especially trans people in school. So it's it's not that
he's treating this as like a hands off issue to
like ensure that it can remain a hot button thing
for the next election. But I think I think in
his mind, like he doesn't want to stop Democrats from
caring about this issue in a way like like the
the more that they that they fight for it in

(03:02:21):
his mind is like what gives him ammunition for the
next election, whether he's going to run for a third
term or just like Republicans like mega stuff in general,
but I think that it is an interesting look into
like his personal insight on this issue. Meanwhile, the Department
of Justice just announced on Wednesday, April sixteenth, that they
are suing Maine's Department of Education for not complying with

(03:02:44):
Trump's anti trans executive order by continuing to allow trans
people to compete in sports, claiming that they are quote
failing to protect women in women's sports unquote, which which
they say violates Title nine. The suit aims to get
an junt function to force Maine to strip away rights
from trans people in schools, to take away two winning

(03:03:05):
titles from trans of school athletes, and are considering to
quote unquote retroactively pull all funding that Maine has received.
Maine's Attorney General, Aaron Frey said on Wednesday, quote our
position is further bolstered by the complete lack of any
legal citation supporting the administration's position in its own complaint.

(03:03:27):
While the President issued in executive order that reflects his
own interpretations of the law, anyone with the most basic
understanding of American civics understands that the President does not
create law nor interpret law unquote. So Maine and specifically
the main governor are adamant that this is going to
be an issue that's only going to be settled in
the courts, and in fact challenged Trump at a recent

(03:03:49):
meeting to see you in court over this issue. We
are going to go and break and then return to
close out this episode of executive disorder. Okay, we are back.

(03:04:12):
I'm now gonna throw to myself and Mia to discuss
the tariff talk in a future recording.

Speaker 3 (03:04:22):
Rocky Jazz Bob, Rocky jazz Bot.

Speaker 1 (03:04:26):
Sorry, locker.

Speaker 20 (03:04:30):
Rocking Jazz Bob, Rocky.

Speaker 3 (03:04:32):
Jazz Bob, Welcome the tariff talk, the talk where I
talk to you about the turf tariffs. So all right,
the big thing that happens last week in tariffs was
that Trump exempted smartphones and electronics. There's a whole suite
of electronics that are exempted from the one and forty
five percent turf tariffs from Liberation Day. Now, there was

(03:04:57):
still a twenty percent tariff on on all of these
electronic goods from the earlier round of tariffs. In one
of the initial rounds, there was a whole thing where
he put a bunch of tariffs.

Speaker 8 (03:05:08):
I'm so confused though, because I thought that's ten percent
tariffs for non Chinese companies.

Speaker 3 (03:05:15):
Yeah, but okay, So here's.

Speaker 8 (03:05:17):
The thing, right, China like additional or no.

Speaker 3 (03:05:23):
Okay. So, so what's happening with these is that in
the very very first round of tariffs that went out,
there was a twenty percent tariff on all Chinese goods,
and so the Liberation Day tariffs, which and then the
subsequent retaliatory tariffs pushed it.

Speaker 8 (03:05:38):
Pushed all goods now two hundred fifty.

Speaker 3 (03:05:40):
Okay, we're gonna we're gonna get tw hundred fifty percent.
That numbers bullshit, But we're at one hundred and forty
five percent like tariff from the Liberation Day stuff. But
that also had included an earlier twenty percent tariff, and
you you see why we're reporting about this is so
fucking hard, right, So that was stack on top of
that other tariffs. So if he's removed the Liberation Day tariffs,
but there still are twenty percent tariffs on all like

(03:06:03):
iPhones and all the electronicos that are still in effect.
So the tariff right for those goods is now twenty
instead of one hundred and forty five. But this is
where things get even more murky. So even before the
exemptions for the semiconductor stuff had been released, Trump had
been talking about imposing a bunch of tariffs specifically on
semiconductors from all countries, which is going to like, again,

(03:06:29):
if this is just awesome, if you want to just
kneecap your entire economy, you put in a tariff on
all semiconductors from other countries, which was what this is
looking like, it's possible the levels are going to be
that high. Anyways, It's again worth pointing out that, like,
there's a bunch of the parts of this production process
that basically can only be done in Taiwan, which will

(03:06:49):
presumably have these new tariffs on them. We don't know
what they're gonna be yet they're coming in who fucking knows,
But so it seems like they're these tariffs are being
withdrawn for now to to market sort of backlash, but
probably they will come back at some point in the future.
We're not We're not one hundred percent sure. There's also
another thing I want to mention, where so the number

(03:07:11):
that you said, the two hundred and fifty percent tariff thing,
so Trump tweeted that out, but that's fake. What that
is is that there are a couple of items, and
I mean when I say a couple, I mean like
we're talking like single digit items, like things like medical
syringes that already had like one hundred percent tariffs on them,
that the one hundred and forty five percent tariff stack
on top of all tariffs that are already in effect.

(03:07:34):
So there's like like three or four items already had
one hundred percent tariffs on them, so when you stack
the one forty five on top of them, they're two
fifty percent. But again it's like it's like three things, right,
So like that's fake. On the other hand, like substantively,
And this is something that a lot of people have
been talking about the difference between one hundred and forty
five percent and two hundred and forty five percent, Like

(03:07:55):
it isn't that relevant because at one hundred and forty
five percent you stop doing trading, So it's you know,
the numbers at this point are just sort of in
comedy levels. But yeah, so that's what's going on with
the two hundred and fifty number of people have been
going around from it's it's not real. It's still one
forty five for all non electronics goods twenty four electronics.
There's also been a bunch of sort of China has

(03:08:17):
been doing retaliatory stuff for a little bit, and they've
been ramping up this program to restrict US access to
rare earth elements that are necessary for a whole bunch
of advanced engineering, particularly sort of defense projects. This is
only that could genuinely devastate the American defense sector. Trump's
plan for this is that he's threatening to use the
Trade Expansion Act nineteen sixty two to impose even more

(03:08:38):
devastating tariffs. Now it is genuinely unclear to me, Like
what are he gonna do impose in one thousand percent tariff?
Like you need to buy these goods?

Speaker 8 (03:08:48):
Like you say that, Mia, And yeah, he probably will.

Speaker 3 (03:08:51):
He probably will. Like two weeks ago, one thousand percent
tariffs would have been a joke, But no, they might.
They might legitimately do one thousand percent tariffs.

Speaker 8 (03:09:00):
Why not.

Speaker 3 (03:09:00):
There's also been the beginnings of on the US ND
sort of export restrictions from chip exports to China and
countries like Nvidia and AMD. And this is a fucking
big rip to the big rip to the fucking AI people.
Each hit get fucked. Yeah. So like so that that's
roughly the state of of the tariffs right now. More

(03:09:23):
more bullshit will happen. We'll be back on tariff talk
next week with another round of unbelievably hideous turf tariff shit.
But I want to I want to move on to
one more thing, which is things that have been happening
at the at the NLRB. So the NLRB, for people
who are not regular listeners to the show, is the
National Labor Relations Board. They were in charge of a
whole bunch of things related to negotiations between employers and unions.

(03:09:47):
Are the people who certify union elections. They they handle
unfair labor practices disputes, and Doge effectively broke into the
NLRB and has seized a whole bunch of information that
they shouldn't have. NPR broke the story and has been
doing a lot of good coverage of it. So it

(03:10:07):
came in right. They technically had some kind of like
order saying that they're supposed to be able to come
in and do this stuff, and they set up and
they disable all of the security stuff and all of
the sort of like logs and all the sort of
stuff that's supposed to like verify what someone's doing on
a computer system. They go in and disabled all of them.
They delete all traces of what they do. And this

(03:10:28):
is a big deal because the NLRB has a lot
of extremely sensitive data, has extremely sensitive data on unions,
It has a lot of extremely sensitive trade data on
private companies. Now, the NLRB person who blew the whistle
on this to NPR described how so he complains about
to his superiors about Doge again just like sort of
breaking into this fucking like office and just like stealing

(03:10:50):
all of this data because he mean, so he notices
this program that they're building that's literally just called like backdoor,
which is like again what you would do if you
were literally running a hack, right, And we'll come back
to that in a second. So the NLOP person complains
to a superior so like, hey, these DOSE people are
just like stealing all of the data from this And
then like the next day, someone from Doge tapes to

(03:11:13):
his door pictures of him and his dogs with like
a threatening thing on it, like drone footage of him
and his dog like walking, which is so fucking weird.
I don't even know. I don't even So, yeah, that's
that's extremely alarming. This is this is they're they're just
blatantly threatening a whistleblower. Yeah. So so the other reason

(03:11:36):
that this is really concerning is that so a lot
of the corporate media is focused on the fact that
there's a lot of trade information in there, there's also
a lot of very personal information about unions, about union strength,
about size, about tactics, about the history of negotiating things,
about just where unions are and who's in them, and
it's it's deeply unclear what DOGE is going to do
this information, but it's not good And again, and I

(03:11:59):
need to emphasize this. So I talked to friend of
the show Maya Arson crime w about this, who is
someone who knows a lot about hacking, And I said
to it, okay, so this is what you would do
if you were if you were just straight up like
hacking the NLRB, right, Like, these are the things you
would do, And they went, yeah, pretty much. So it's great,

(03:12:20):
it's great. Yeah, the dose are just stolen a bunch of information.
Who knows what's gonna happen to it, who knows what's
gonna happen with their escalation of attacks on whistleblowers. But
things bad, things continue to go bad.

Speaker 8 (03:12:35):
Well, thank you for that uplifting story, Miya about Doge
breaking into and stealing data from the NLRB and posting
overhead drone photos of people's houses who threatened the Doge supremacy.

Speaker 9 (03:12:55):
We're back, Thank you, Future Garrison and future Miya. So
it's my role here to update you on the board
of fascism, right, and that's what I'm here to do.
Where I want to start this week is in the
Roosevelt Reservation. This is something that's been reported on a
little bit. It's largely by people who maybe only found
out about it this week and looked at a Wikipedia

(03:13:16):
page then wrote a story. The Roosevelt Reservation is a
sixty foot easement that runs along the southwestern border of
the United States from the coast in San Diego or
the way to New Mexico. Doesn't cover the Texas border.
I've written about it before for the Sierra Club and
for Drilled News four or five years ago, and I'm
going to include a link to the Sierra Club piece
in the show notes that Drilled pieces down. Now they

(03:13:38):
don't have that print side anymore. It was established in
nineteen oh seven by Teddy Roosevelt, and it was transferred
for three years from the Department of the Interior Department
of Defense by the Trump administration in twenty nineteen using
an executive order this year. In twenty twenty five, all
of the Roosevelt Reservation that is not part of federal
reservation land was placed on the Apartment of Defense jurisdiction.

(03:14:01):
A lot of reporting seems to have missed this exemption
for federal reservation land, which makes up a significant part
of the border, especially in Arizona right in the Tornad Reservation.
I'm going to quote from the language of the executive
order here quote to provide for the use and jurisdiction
by the Department of Defense over such federal lands, including
the Roosevelt Reservation, and excluding Federal Indian reservations, that are

(03:14:25):
reasonably necessary to enable military activities directed in this memorandum,
including border barrier construction and emplacement of detection and monitoring equipment.
The way I read this, it also doesn't limit to
the Resort reservation. It seems to include other federal land right,
which could include National monuments, National parks BLM, and the
National Forests, all of which exist along the border. The

(03:14:50):
Trump administration this week also obtained waivers. The waivers wave
dozens of laws that have been limiting construction in the
San Diego sector. I'd like to quote a little bit
from that Sierra Club piece that I wrote, because I
think the aspect of the damage done to the sacred
space of Indigenous people is being completely overlooked by the

(03:15:10):
legacy media. In this not perhaps surprisingly so, one of
the laws waved with a Native American Graves Protection and
Repatriation Act. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
was enacted by Congress in nineteen ninety to protect and
safely relocate Native burial sites. When construction takes place on
sensitive sites, the tribing question should be consulted, and in

(03:15:31):
the event remains or other archaeological objects are found, construction
should be altered so as not to disturb the site.
In the areas of San Diego where they are digging,
what's called midden soil has been found. Mid and soil
is soil that contains evidence of cremated human remains. Right
in this case of Kumii people. With this waver, they

(03:15:53):
don't have to comply with nagpro Native American Graves Protection
and Relocation Act, which means that they can continue digging
through what are literally people's ancestors graveyards. There's another quote
from that twenty twenty story. If this were another country's
government destroying a region's holy land, the US would go
to war and the people would feel it justified, activist
Thomas barbatod Sierra. But it happens here at home, in

(03:16:14):
front of us, and we just turn away.

Speaker 8 (03:16:15):
Yep, we sure do a turn away.

Speaker 2 (03:16:18):
It seems to be most of what we do these days.

Speaker 9 (03:16:20):
Yeah, it's not even what bugs me. It's like, not
so much of folks, you know, not doing anything. I
get that it's overwhelming, be horrible at the moment. It's
that this doesn't even get reported. Yeah, big outlets with
a massive budget, who are supposed to have a border
reporter who's never fucking set foot on the border, doesn't
take the time to talk to the indigenous people whose
land the border crossed, right like, doesn't take the time

(03:16:43):
to hear their concerns, doesn't take the time to think
about when you dig thirty feet into this ground to
build your border wall. That's twelve thousand years of someone's history.
How do they feel about that? And like that is
a failing of the legacy. Media been a failing for
a long time, and it will continue to be on
for a long time and piss me off.

Speaker 1 (03:17:04):
YEP.

Speaker 9 (03:17:05):
I guess to talk more broadly than about this militarization
of the Roosevelt Reservation and other public land. There's been
some speculation about what this might mean. I don't think
that you're going to see soldiers pointing their guns at
the southern border and shooting anyone who comes across. I
do think it's likely a lot of the people who
have been deployed to southern border so far at MPs

(03:17:25):
military police, right, and it's possible that those MPs will
be able to detain people and potentially charge and with
trespassing on a military installation. That would just be another
string to the bow of their attempt to like rapidly
deport people because they already have many other kind of
options through executive order of doing that which which they're

(03:17:46):
already implying, right. It might also make it easier for
them to waive some of these other laws and to
construct more surveillance equipment in the Epogogacia case, which we've
covered for several weeks now. The Supreme Court has unanimously
asked the United States government to quote facilitate his return.

(03:18:07):
The US government has embarked upon a unique definition of
the word facilitate, which it feels like means allowing him
to enter the country and providing transport if El Salvador
releases him. Bu Kelly refused to release him, saying that
doing so would be to quote smuggler terrorists into the
United States. Garrison and I did a whole episode about

(03:18:28):
this yesterday that you can listen to today. Senator Chris
van Holland went to San Salvador, right capital of El
Salbador if you're not where. He met with the vice
president because Boukele is still out the country. Van Holand
held the press conference right afterwards that I watched for
it before we recorded this. In the press conference, Van
Holland basically said that he asserted to the Vice President

(03:18:49):
of El Salbador there was no evidence nor any conviction
of being a member of MS thirteen, and he asked
the VP why he was holding mister Abrigo Gassier, and
the VP said, because the US is paying us to
hold him.

Speaker 2 (03:19:03):
Yeah, which, yeah, they won't even lie.

Speaker 9 (03:19:05):
Yeah, no, yeah, he's not lying. That's why they're doing it.
I believe that. Yeah, And credit to this Maryland senator
of like being the only one to do something and
it's not enough. And it's just one person. There are
three hundred people there, right, they're not even going for
the hundreds of other innocent people are there. It's one guy,
but at least he's doing something. The rest of the

(03:19:25):
Democrats are collectively Yeah, I don't know, like voting for
Trump's nominees. He asked to meet with mister Abergo Garcia
and was told that they needed more time. He said,
I'll come back next week. They said they don't know
if they can organize it in a week. He asked
if he could call him. They said they didn't know
if they could facilitate a call. They said maybe the
US Embassy would have to be the one that requests that.

(03:19:46):
So he has now requested that the embassy requests that
he be allowed to call mister Abrego Garcia and mister
Brego Garcia be allowed to speak to his wife. Garreton
and I spoke about how like it's not in the
interest of government at El Salbaud or to have people
leave this prison and to fire to the conditions that
are in it.

Speaker 8 (03:20:02):
No one has ever left this prison that we're aware of.

Speaker 9 (03:20:05):
Yeah, that no one who's been detained there has left.
The government wouldn't give him a date when he could
meet mister Abergo Garcia or when he would be luckily
able to make a call. And a separate case, Judge Boseburg,
who we've spoken about before as well, Right Judge Bothberg,
with the judge issues' attentive restraining order on the rendition
of people to L Salbador, which the government then ignored,

(03:20:27):
has found probable cause that the administration is in contempt
of court. What does this mean? It doesn't mean, despite
what you have seen on your timeline, that this will
mean these people will be bought home. When they found
a contempt, they have two options. Right, they can purge
themselves of the contempt, and the way they would do
that would be by providing habeas not by bringing all

(03:20:50):
these people home at least not yet, right. Or they
could present the people who are responsible and then either
an attorney could be appointed by the DOJ to prosecute them.
I guess and don't quite know how it works. Sistance
or the judge himself can appoint an attorney to prosecute
them for criminal contempt. Again, like, at least the guys
try and I guess like.

Speaker 2 (03:21:09):
No, I mean, like I got nothing to say against
him right now, Like this is what they all should
be doing. He went there, he'd something, and he's not
mincing his words. He's saying that this man was disappeared.

Speaker 9 (03:21:19):
No, yeah, and he's he's asserting that, Like they need
to listen to the court. They are supposed to listen
to the court. Judge genez In genez who is a
judge on the district court that had its case sent
to the Supreme Court for review in the Abrego Garcia incident,
also quoted to Merriam Webster Dictionary and said that the
government's understanding of the word facilitate flew in the face

(03:21:40):
of the common understanding of the word. Again, like I've
seen it assert as like, oh, legal experts can disagree. Meanwhile,
you've got the actual judge in the actual case being like,
notice is what the dictionary says. Your definition is ludicrous.
I would caution people to be very careful looking at
at like blue check legal experts on except com or
people blue Sky. There has been so much misleading stuff

(03:22:04):
about immigration law and the laws in these particular two cases,
and they are about the resol reservation. Actually, just be really
careful where you're getting your information, especially on immigration law
from maybe go back and check what that person was
doing in twenty twenty three when thousands of migrants were
detained in outdoor detention camps. Because I've seen so much

(03:22:24):
misinformation and people, understandably who aren't expert in this because
it's extremely complicated, are likely to be taken advantage of
by people who are grifting off what is at a
moment when a lot of us are afraid and a
lot of us are insertain, So to be very careful
what you're reading out there.

Speaker 8 (03:22:40):
All right, I think that's all for us today on
It could Happen Here.

Speaker 2 (03:22:44):
Yeah, I think that's that's our new Rectiled Executive Dysfunction episode.

Speaker 9 (03:22:52):
At Rectile Order.

Speaker 2 (03:22:53):
All right, Well, we're fucking done, go away.

Speaker 8 (03:22:56):
We reported the news.

Speaker 1 (03:23:00):
The news.

Speaker 2 (03:23:05):
Hey, We'll be back Monday with more episodes every week
from now until the heat Death of the Universe.

Speaker 23 (03:23:10):
It could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can
now find sources for it could happen here, listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Behind the Bastards News

Follow Us On

Host

Robert Evans

Show Links

Popular Podcasts

Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang

40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season

Crime Junkie

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}It Could Happen Here Weekly 178