October 9, 2024 • 33 mins
Mia and James talk about ICE's program to train civilians into paramilitaries and the Border Patrol's training camp for children.
Sources:
https://documentedny.com/2024/10/01/ice-immigration-train-citizens-academy/
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1768KW4pKjW1HGF8qEz5mwT0ncwiXH13b/view
https://www.newsweek.com/ice-launching-citizens-academy-course-how-agency-arrests-immigrants-1516656
https://www.beyondlegalaid.org/updates/2021/5/18/ice-academy-foia
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ULjGNO2WqhjXjjmpEFL41Qlp8HjZn9Lk/view
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1hR8m3j1zffTn5fkdZj4YR-mWV07wmxn_/view
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2024/05/01/police-explorer-sexual-abuse-boy-scouts
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/scouts-border-immigration-trump/
https://www.help.cbp.gov/s/article/Article-1638?language=en_US
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2024/08/border-patrol-academy-rape-artesia-new-mexico-impunity/
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Alone media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to it, kidap to hear a podcast about ice
training desk squads. I guess I'm your host via Wong.
I guess I don't know if formerly or better is
the correct word, but sometimes also not as the ice
was be destroyed. Girl, So I'm mad about this one
with me? Is someone else's extremely bad about the existence
(00:28):
of ice, which is James Yep, I'm here.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm mad as a waste. I guess, just another Monday. Yeah,
this shit sucks, This does suck. Yeah, you know, I
had this realization.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I get this on Twitter a lot, where I realized
that there are people who don't know what ICE is
because they're like, they're not from the US, or they're like, yeah,
so ICE is immigrations and customs enforcements. The shortest description
of what they are is that they are one of
the like four American border gestapos.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yeah. The number of agencies under DHS is fucking baffling.
They're constantly rebranding every time they have a scandal or
they kill too many people. That, yeah, ice is kind
of their flagship evil program.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Yeah, and they like they do raids on fucking houses,
they do raised on businesses, They suck. Like if you
vaguely remember, there was a whole bunch of protests in
like twenty eighteen over this stuff, and that was mostly
anti ICE stuff.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Yeah, if someone's getting deported, it's ICE for the most
part doing it. Like Yeah, they also run detention centers
where people go, you know, they work with Jeff Bezos
on deporting people.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Oh my fucking god. Okay, I just remembered a story
I had. I had a flashback to standing in a protest,
a very very large protest in twenty eighteen. This is
one of like the big pro immigrant rallies. And in
this fucking protest, I saw a thing for this group
called Heartland Alliance. Now pro people who probably don't outside
(01:55):
of Chicago probably don't know what this is. The Heartland
Alliance runs like fucking child prisons facilities like for ICE school,
and they were at this protest against ICE. Fucking it
was the worst. That shit was terrible. You know, this
whole thing is all extremely bad. But what we've been
learning more details about recently is this program called Citizens Academies,
(02:20):
which is run by ICE's Homeland Security Investigations. I didn't
think HSI was under ICE. I thought HSI was a
different branch of DHS. I might be wrong, but they
used to be under ICE as far as I know,
and then they became HSI. Okay, I might be wrong
about that because the stuff that I was reading was
saying that they are still part of ICE, but they
(02:42):
might not be. It's also possible that it's literally has
gone back and forward multiple times in the last Yeah,
this is merecrareck. Things fucking suck, But HSI also does,
like a lot of the times, there's some of the
people who like do like physically the people on the
ground doing a raid will be HSI, like fucking stormtroopers whatever. Yeah,
they do arrests.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Yeah, often they appear in like these joint counter terrorism
task forces, like when they especially when they're doing stuff
with like drugs and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yeah, the civilian academies are I think really the only
way you can describe them, even though this is not
how it's being described, really is that they're treating random
people to like become desk what.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Yeah, It's what's interesting is like the protest that you
talked about seem to have been the sort of reason
that they started this program, right.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, we need to rewind this a little bit because
they started in the US as a reaction to those protests,
like specifically as like a pr thing. But the original
version of these programs started in Puerto Rico under Obama.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Look, we don't give Obama or anything like enough shit, right,
Like fucking Obama just like in terms of killing people,
in terms of deporting people, fucked up human being.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Yeah, he was the deporter in chief and like, yeah,
part of what's sort of brutal about the mom administration
is like a lot of his support had been from
like the huge undocumented that could have like peaked in
like two thousand and six, and he comes in on
this and they just fucking deports everyone.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
Yeah, as Democrats too every time.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Yeah, we're seeing it again with Biden. Right, It's like
it's the same sort of process. And under under Obama
these these programs start. There's specifically, as you're talking about,
there's specifically supposed to be these like training programs are
supposed to be for community.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Well, okay, so this is and this is one of
these things.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Was like this is what they say that it's for,
and given what they're doing, I don't know how much
I believe them what they're what they say that it's
for is it's because there's been all of these anti
ICE things, Like, I mean, there's lots of people who
now are like, don't say shit about ice, who like, like,
AOC hasn't fucking said anything about abolishing ICE in like
(04:54):
half a decade, right, and she ran on that. Yeah,
because of how powerful those social movements were. I mean,
there's like Sean mcguey whatever the fuck guy whose whole
thing was abolish ice and then he became a Democratic
staffer and now it never talks about it again, and
he's like my absolute wordal nemesis, like I will face
at the end of days. Yeah, I will destroy his
(05:16):
fucking traitors ass and yeah, many many, many such cases.
But yeah, Like, and I think probably peak like anti
ice sentiment was in the Trump era, right when people, Yeah,
people started to look at immigration as the way that
like people have immigrant communities and diasporas see it, right,
which is this thing that tears families apart, that destroys communities,
(05:36):
that rich children from their parents, and people obviously recognized
it was bad. And then Biden got in and the
Democrats had to do this like kind of cover your
eyes and turn away thing where they continue to do
the same shit. Kids and cages are good now, Yeah, yeah,
yeah in cages great democratic kids and cage is incredible.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
What if no cage is? What do we just leave
them out in the fucking mountains and James's friend have
to feed them beans will winter?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Yeah, But the thing is, in twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen,
it's not entirely clear that the Democrats are going to
swing that way. No, And so you get these programs
and what's interesting about them, and so a lot of
this is coming from that. There's a very very good
piece by Barrizio Guerrero indocumented who got a bunch of
Foya documents about this program and what they.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Were actually doing. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
And one of the things that he discovers about this
is that it's like a lot of rich guys. Like
it's some of them are like really rich. It's also
it's a lot of like bank employees.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
Yeah. That was a funny almost, I guess kind of
it got through that little social circle or whatever.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Yeah, And like there's this sort of feed in program
that sends people into this.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And I actually I realized I had.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Vaguely known about these but didn't quite understand how bad
it was because he didn't have a bunch of the
documents we have now. But this was a big thing
in Chicago in twenty twenty one, where there was proposed
to open one of these things. It's like these like
training centers for these like fucking people. Oh yeah, and
you know, twenty twenty one was still in Chicago. There
was still like like there's some protest stuff going on
(07:13):
because I mean there's you know, like twenty twenty hadn't
quite faded yet. And there was also like our cops
We've talked about this a couple times on the show,
but like shot a fucking fourteen year old, like yeah,
it's fucking murdered him cold blood. And the protests were
bad enough that like even lower Lightfoot was like like
fuck this, like this is this Trump ice stuff.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
We can't let them do it.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
This was back with the when like these people like
the Democrats were started pretending that they didn't like all
of these like federal deportation machine things. But the things
that we have now are we have the actual this
is like I think were the public most valuable part
of this whole thing is that we actually have a
bunch of the documents now of what they were showing people.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
Yeah, I'd love to see the fucking Foyer fight for
this because I have foyed the Department of Homeland Security
a lot and getting any Like I have a fire
out right now regarding the CBP one and the fact
that it doesn't work on non Apple phones, and they
very clearly know this, right like, if I know it,
(08:17):
they know it, And I would love to know if
that was from the outset that they knew and they
just didn't give a fuck, Like I would like to
see those emails regarding it doesn't work on Samsung. I
think I think they got it from a court order.
Oh okay, so they went to court to get Yeah yeah, yeah,
every like people, Freedom Information Act is great. It only
(08:38):
works if you have a lawyer who's prepared to sue
over it like that is the especially with DHS. You're
just not like, yeah, I've got stuff, so I found
in twenty twenty. They'll just kick it down, kick can
down the road, like yep, I'm not going to get it,
but yeah, kudos to them for doing it. Yeah, it's
so hard if you are a First Amendment lawyer, hit
me up. But okay, the ship that's in this one
(09:01):
of these things. The first page of this is maybe
the most deranged chart I have ever seen in anything.
Which is it is It is.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
A picture of a naked human body, is the friends
and back of it, right, And they've labeled all of
the parts of the body by and they've been so
we only have a black and white version of this,
but they've they've been they've been labeled by how effective
it is to hit someone there with the baton?
Speaker 3 (09:28):
Yeah, yeah, And they're like green in the in the
actual document, they're green, yellow, and red. I guess, uh.
And then it says like reasoning for the red one,
I'll just read it highest level of resultant trauma injury
tends to range from serious to lung lasting rather than temporary,
and may include unconsciousness, serious body injury, shock, or death.
So I guess like it's saying like, don't hit them
(09:51):
in the in the in the red area. No, that's
the thing. That's the thing. They're not saying that, They're
just saying, these are your options.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Yeah. Is so part of this is supposed to be
part of like a force escalation thing. But the point
of this is that it is actually like they're trying
to explain force escalation, and the thing is that like, yeah,
you actually can do this, but you can only do
this if you're in like the highest level of force
escalation or whatever. Okay, and if any of you have
ever been around a cop, you know, but those people
jump to the highest level of force escalation at like, yeah,
a fucking again, we have literally seen an acorn drop
(10:21):
and it can't be able to do this, right, and
so and so what they're what they're teaching these people,
and this is like I think, like Jenny widely horrifying.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
It's like, yeah, they are.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Teaching these people like the specific technical details of how
you like fucking maim someone with a baton.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yeah, I meant to reading the force escalation this is
and they actually did physical training right, like I think
they did weapons training. I think they did a bunch
of a bunch of simulation kind of exercises. And then
if you if you scroll down, this is like a
PowerPoint for those listening at home. They gave an overview
of like use of force to include a bunch of
(10:59):
Supreme Court cases. I think that Supreme Court cases is
certainly yeah, Supreme court cases about use of force. None
of these apply to you as a civilian, and you know,
like unless you're a sworn law enforcement officer, I guess
I'm not entirely sure like what the use case for
civilian baton training is aside from like well, I mean
(11:20):
my guess.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
And this is the way I've been like sort of
looking at this program is that this is the thing
partially being designed for PR, but it's partially also being
designed to create parabilitaries that if you're in a situation
like twenty twenty but about the border, for example, you
suddenly have all of these people that you could just
fucking call up because like part of what's going on
with this too record you remember, like actually, I guess
(11:43):
it is, funnily enough, like we are we are the
only two of the four hosts who didn't end up
having to deal with fucking Bortak getting deployed in Portland
in twenty twenty. But Bortak is border patrols like swat teams. Yeah,
basically yeah, there are stated reason is like, oh, so
this is this so you understand what it's like to
like be one of these people, how hot it is
(12:03):
to be a cop and well, like I think the
actual reason again is so that you could you're training
a bunch of people who you can just sort of
call up and be like, we need a bunch of
people to come like fucking obliterate a bunch of like
protesters or whatever, help them do mass deportations. Yeah, which
is another thing because like part of what this is
too is they're teaching them to do like raids on houses, right,
(12:26):
and like how do how do like physically fucking deport people?
Speaker 3 (12:29):
So this is yeah, like like Trump era ICE, which
were where there were open discussions of how many people
can we deport, how much will it cost, how easy
will it be?
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Yeah, And like right now, like Trump is like his
big one of his big things is mass deportations. But
I think people don't realize that the only reason that
this stuff didn't happen under Trump was that pushback to
it was so enormous. Yeah, that like like there are
democrats now who are screaming about the border, who in
like twenty eighteen were like sanctuary cities, ICE can't do
(12:58):
raids here, and sometimes which were sometimes that wasn't Yeah,
but like there was real systemic pushback to this, and
I think like we're heading to a place where there
isn't a kind of reaction to this anymore, where this
can get really really scary really quickly. And these are
the kinds of programs that you would need in order
(13:20):
to just do actual master importations. Is that like yeah,
like Ice doesn't have enough people, Like they have a
lot of people, but they don't have enough people to
deport like several million people.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
You need people like this.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Yeah, And the scale of this program is kind of small,
but this is something that can be scaled up right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
To try and extremely large numbers of people, like fairly quickly. Yeah,
you know what, it reminds me of Maya products and
services and support this podcast does. Yeah, all right, I
hope you enjoyed this. Products and seven suits way back.
(13:56):
We let's go do like the other thing they were
fucking doing. Oh yeah, it's more Jesus wept. So I
want to quote from the article, yeah. Quote.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Documents also contain presentations on how to shoot a gun,
point at targets, and stand in position to fire. The
shooting practices include military style of rifles likewise, A training
in Atlanta organized drills to shoot at human like manikers
and fires M four assault rifles employed exclusively with the military.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
The training.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Also included isis guidelines for use of force encompassing deadly force.
One presentation suggests yelling drop the gun as potential cover
when employing lethal force against someone. So they're telling it
and this is definitely supposed to be thinking like, oh,
if you're in playing clothes, like you fucking yell police
and yell drop your gun, and then you shoot them,
(14:41):
and this is how you get away with it. So
like they are straight up teaching people how to murder people,
like how to get away with murder.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
That's what's happening here. Yeah, wild Yeah, Like the government's
offered firearms trading for civilians, Like that's kind of what
the NRA wasn't a government initiative. But yeah, this is
not that. This is not like, No, I would broadly
be in favor of the government funding free gun safety
classes for people, because I've seen some shit with you know,
(15:10):
like that would be one of the useful things. But
this is not that.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
No, And like and like the reason those specific classes
like don't look like that anymore is because and I've
talked about this in some of the episodes on them, okay, assassination.
It's like, well, yeah, when the government taught a bunch
of people how to use rifles, those people use those
rifles to like fight the cops in the streets. Yeah right, yeah,
and now they're all this insane shit. That's like teaching
people how to get away with murder of their cop. Like,
(15:33):
I want to read a power point slide from that
from that thing, because it's it's the most deranged thing
I've ever seen.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
Have you read the Graham versus Connor one, because it's
one of the more powerful uses of passive voice I've
ever seen. Oh no, I haven't seen that yet. Let
me read that while you look for yours. This one
is just incredible instance of cops speak. Graham comma diabetic.
Comma asks friend to drive him to convenience store for
juice good like cops sent is here, ran in and
(16:01):
out of store. Comma also observed the suspicious activity. What
suspicious activity, dear listener, I don't know. We're left to imagine.
Investigative stopped made and Graham was handcuffed by whom doesn't
say weird. Graham receives multiple injuries during the encounter with police.
Like someone gave him the fucking injuries? Was it the cop?
Speaker 2 (16:24):
It's just an incredible use of passive voice here throughout. Yeah,
there's this great tweet that was like the US has
a passive voice, in an active voice, and a special
exonerative voice.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
It's only used for.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Yeah. Yeah, Israel gets the exiterative voice.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
It rails in the greater cop nation. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
And like also, one of the things that I don't
think people understand on the Streme Court is like, if
you think that like Supreme Court rulings about abortions are bad,
like then they are right. But like, if you think
those things are bad, look up the Supreme Court cases
about police use of force. You will get you will
get nine O decisions with like all of like fucking
like like fucking Thurgood Marshall will be signing on to
(17:07):
like a nine O thing where he says that cops
have the right to just like shoot you in the
back of the head because they couldn't shoot you in
the back of the head like that the police couldn't function.
It's it's fucking dranged, like the kind of shit they have. Okay,
I want to read I want to read the slide
because it's it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
It's just a giant letters.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
It says survival, and then there's like bullet points, and
the bullet points are never give up, never concede defeat.
I will not die this way. I must go home
to my family. How you trade is how you will fight.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Just imagining that the you know, the person who I
go to at the bank when I need to take
out large amounts of cash to go on one of
my work trips, learning that I will not die this way.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Okay, So that that that's basically what I have about
this program, other than the bleak note that on on
a pr level, of these people one right, they they
didn't win because of anything they did. They won because
the Democrats decided that they fucking hated immigrants, and because
views of integration are largely driven by by party politics,
are driven by what your party tells you about immigrants, Like, yeah,
(18:14):
all the support that had been built in the late
twenty tens has evaporated.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
And yeah, even like I did a thing for my
Patreon yesterday then made me think of this, Like I
was trying to just do a sort of listing of
Joe Biden's immigration policies, right, from twenty twenty one to present,
and like twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, I was
selling stories to NBC, to slate to the nation right
about Haitian migration, about Title forty two, about remain in Mexico,
(18:43):
about especial immigrant visas for Afghans, And after twenty twenty
two you don't even get a response to your email.
You know, the same shit keeps having with twenty twenty
three is the end of Title forty two, right, So
when we see the beginning of out door detention, arguably
the most heinous shit that the Biden administration has done,
it's that's some pretty heanish shit. I mean, genocide is worse, evidently,
(19:04):
but on the on the border, this is the worst. Yeah,
some of its worst domestic policy. And you just can't
tell stories. Literally every time I post about this on Twitter,
people will be like, what the fuck? Why didn't I
read about this? Because an editor made a choice that
they didn't matter, that the people out there in the
cold and the wind at the rain didn't matter, and
that they don't have rights because aoc or Joe Biden
(19:26):
Orkamala Harris decided that that was how it was going
to be and apparently every corporate media outlet just kind
of stepped in line and went, yeah, fucking we don't
care anymore. Yeah, it's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Yeah, they've achieved their stated aim and they're not moving
on to their unstated aim, which is mass deportations.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
All right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Everything I know about the program that you were about
to talk about comes from you, and that is oh boy,
it's not good.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
All right, So I'm going to read you a small
story here, and then we're going to talk about whether
or not it's a good idea for the Border Patrol
to have programs for children. Okay, and then I gave
a content warning for sexual assault of children. I'm just
in kiitch. You don't want to listen to this. In
August of this year, Aaron Mitchell, a former CBP agent,
(20:22):
was found guilty of a federal civil rights violation and
also kidnapping. On April the twenty fifth, twenty twenty two,
in Douglas, Arizona, Mitchell found a fifteen year old girl
waiting for school to begin. And for this next part,
I'm just going to read directly from the Department of
Justice presser. He introduced himself as a law enforcement officer
and asked for her papers. Next, after flashing his police
(20:43):
badge and credentials, Mitchell ordered the child into his car
and explained that he was taking her to the police station. Instead,
Mitchell drove the car miles away from her school, pulled over,
and restrained her hands and feet with two pairs of handcuffs.
The victim testified that after being handcuffs to defend it
and told her to do everything he said because he
didn't want to have to hurt her. I'm not going
(21:04):
to describe an nextpy in detail. He repeatedly sexually assaulted
this young women fucking christ in his apartment, then returned
her to the middle school where he had abducted her,
and reminded her not to tell anyone. Fortunately, she immediately
reported the abduction to her friends, family members, and multiple
law enforcement agencies. During an interview with the police, a
(21:27):
defendant exclaim exclaimed that the victim had better hope I
don't get out of here, which is an insane thing
to say when you're being interviewed by the police. Yeah.
He also googled several times for how long does it
take to smug someone? And he googled a lot about
sexual assault, how to stop someone from screaming. It's some
of the darkest shit fuck you're ever going to read. Yeah,
(21:49):
oh my god. This is one of the relatively few
instances of a Border Patrol agent actually being convicted of
sexual assault. Sexual assault is a massive fucking problem in
the Border Patrol, and the fact that it's such a
big problem and people get away with it is why
we get shit that is horrific, Like the incident that
I've just related to you right in twenty nineteen. I
(22:13):
don't know if you remember this, but there was a
pro publicer thing about this Facebook group which had nine
five hundred agents in it. The Facebook group they proted
videos of migrant desks, their children, and rape fantasies, as
well as doctored images, including ghost images of AFC. At
the time, Karla provosd, the Border Patrol chief, condemned the
group as inappropriate. Shortly thereafter, the insect reveal that she
(22:34):
had been a member of it for years. Yep, just classics,
dove right. Border Patrol has consistently failed to hold its
offices to account for rape. Like if you want to
read more about this, Jen Bud, She's been on the
show before is the person to go to about this.
I'm also going to include in the show notes links
to a story about a Border Patrol agent who was
(22:57):
sexually assaulted at the academy, which I know is as
a thing that is not unique to her. This is
this is a problem. Border Patrol is ninety five percent
male at this point. They call the women the fierce
five percent. But it's like it's probably the most like
gender biased of the federal agencies. Like Border Patrol agents
(23:17):
by and large, like do not do well around women.
This is something I've observed, this is something other volunteers
have observed, Like it's such a like masculine agency, I guess,
and they just don't encounter women in a professional capacity
very often. So I think with this in mind, I
want to talk about the Border Patrol Explorers, Right. It's
a youth program that teaches kids the skills of a
(23:39):
patrol agent from as young as forty fucking crust. Yeah,
what's really weird. There's been very little coverage. The two
places I would send people these will be in the notes,
would be Morley Music Write a really good piece in
the Nation, and Todd Miller's book Border Patrol Nation, which
is a book that everyone should read. I think really
like detail is the beginning of how border patrol became
(24:02):
what it is today. Those are really two of the
very few places you'd read about it. The training that
they do is insane. They'll learn firearms drills, they learn
to do checkpoints, they learned to make arrests. I'm going
to read from an interview from Monie Music's piece, Fabian
explained why his posts would practice shooting sometimes, and then
(24:23):
this is like parentheses. Undocumented migrants are not compliant when
we find them. He said, they paid all this money
to get here to start another life. They're just not
going to give up when they see us. Some would
fight back, some would be compliant. Maybe they tried to
kill you or threaten you. Sometimes they pick up an
element a rock lying around anything, and that could be
used to kill you. This is not the stuff that
(24:45):
fourteen year olds should be reckoning with, right.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
Yeah. This is also like I know people have done
the like connect the border to Palestine things so much
that it's like hackneyed, but like that is straight up
that could be lifted from a press release, like from
the idea yeah yeah about why they shot someone yeah,
and it's like, yeah, I mean, you shouldn't be teaching
anyone this, You especially shouldn't be teaching fourteen year olds. Yeah,
(25:10):
that someone might throw a rock at them, and that's
a reasonable way people had a gun and shoot them. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
Like if you back that into your mind at fourteen,
I would argue that makes you very unsuitable to carry
a gun in public. Later in life. Kids start out
by doing this kind of boot camp style academy and
then they pretty much begin doing stuff like drill PT
they practice, conducting vehicle stops and tracking Border Patrol. On
their website, they claim to have more than seven hundred Explorers,
(25:36):
but over twenty eight posts around the country. It's very
hard to find anything about them. Like, it's not something
that they talk about a great deal. You have to
sort of apply. I looked at how one would apply.
It's one in Santa Sedra, Right. You sort of fill
out this form and you get some kind of clearance
and then I'm guessing they're checking that people are eligible
to be like hied by Border Patrol. Right, But if
(25:58):
there is data on how many of these kids go
on to be hired by BP, I haven't found it,
but I did find one. I think this is again
from Morley Music's piece when extremely amusing incident the Douglas
Arizona chapters. The Explorers teamed up with a local high
school drama club and they had the kids playing migrants. Yeah,
Jesus Christ, many of these people will themselves be like
(26:22):
first generation or like a.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Wild Anyway, the country cannot be allowed to continue.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Imagine, like, what are we doing at school today? The
theater kids are going to get arrested by the border
patrol kids. Jesus Christ. Some of the theater kids got
really into character. One of them cried. I guess several
of them managed to avoid arrest and give the young
agents the slip, and then they got told by the
(26:56):
agents overseeing the exercise that they've done it wrong because
they'd outsmarted the junior gobs.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
There's a story I can't remember what fucking town it
was in like the fifties that the Army was running
these like infiltration drills where they would like have a
town and they talk to people to town. They'd be like, Okay,
we're gonna like unleash like a communist diversive agent into
the town, and then you're gonna help the army capture them,
and it said, what happens, everyone has hit the agent
because I just had a great time like stuff.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, that is the American spirit. It's it's the people
of dug this Arizona. We salute you. One of the
things I found really interesting in in the morning music
piece was this idea of like defensive asylum only being
for criminals. So it seems like the students learned this
very binary immigration law. Where defensive asylum, which is when
you claim asylum as a defense against being deported, Yeah,
(27:50):
it's only for people who are criminals versus affirmative asylum.
It's for the people who like really need it or whatever.
We fast forward making an affirmative asylum claims extremely difficult
right now. Yeah, you know, I spoke to one hundred
people who wanted to come to this country in the Darien.
Every single one of those people told me that they
(28:11):
wanted to use CBP one, that they wanted to do
it the correct way, that they wanted to wait their
turn and do an interview. But like every single one
of those people is now reckoning with the fact that
if they can make CVP wan work on their phone,
they will wake eight or nine months in Mexico. That
is not a safe place if you're a woman on
your own, God forbid, if you're a trans woman or
a gay person like aside from like within certain communities,
(28:35):
it's not a safe place. I think Mexico is the
second highest rate of killings of trans people anywhere in
the world. Yeah, I think Brazil is maybe more. Yeah,
bort I think is the highest. I don't know if
that's like raw numbers because Brazil is a bigger country,
or if it's like stags the population.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, my memory is that it's the rate, But I'm
not harm so sure either way that people who are.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Coming to be safe or not to be in a
place where they're in danger, that is what they face,
right And so undoubtedly some of those people who wanted
to come the right way will cross between ports of entry,
they will surrender themselves to border patrol, and if they
get a chance to file for asylum at all, because
it's it's a shout test now, But there are numerous
(29:18):
incidents that I've seen described in court cases of people
doing what sounds to me like asserting an asylum claim
and not having a chance to then make their case.
If they do at all, it'll be defensive asylum, right.
And these are the people who are like textbook asylum places,
you know, like I am a trans person in a
place where that might well be punishable by death, de
facto of du jure right. I am a political dissident
(29:41):
in a country where my political views would be a
reason to kill me. I am a woman from Iran
who doesn't wear hijab, nicab whatever, you know, Like these
are like why asylum exists. There are lots of people
who deserve a help who are not covered by these
little buckets. We put people in to for asylum, but
(30:02):
even people who are who falls slap in the middle
of what your average Midwestern liberal dad would be like, Yeah,
that's an asylum case. We should help that person. Yeah,
they have to come in. They fare the defense of asylum,
and that's what we're teaching. I guess these border patrol
kids that these are the quite unquite bad guys, and
they're not. And yeah, they they're doing this sort of
(30:25):
twenty eight posts. It's just one. I read a terrible
account of a young woman who was sexually abused by
a cop in a police Explorer program. Like these Explorer
programs go all across law enforcement. They are administered by
the Boy Scouts of America. They have a serious problem
with abuse of young people as serious problem, and it
(30:46):
seems like it's not getting I mean, it does get
some coverage, like this, this piece about the agent in
Douglas got some coverage, right, the piece about this this cop.
But like, I mean, look at this country. We still
have the Catholic Church. Just because people abuse kids doesn't
mean they get shut down. But like, yeah, I don't,
don't don't send your kids. I guess you're listening to this.
You're quite unlikely to send your kids to be junior cops.
(31:06):
But like, I get young people living in small towns
on the border who don't have many economic opportunities. I
know those towns. I spend a lot of time in
those towns. And I get that the guys who joined
Border Patrol, they have big trucks, they have nice houses, right,
that it's one of the few areas of economic opportunity.
(31:27):
I get that none of that is worth having your
kid abused. And like I'm not saying that, of course
all of these programs resulting child abuse, they don't. But
like law Enforcement Explorer programs absolutely have a problem with
child abuse.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
And yeah, yeah, there was a whole thing in like
the last couple of years about this happening in tension
facilities in Chicago or intention facilities, things that were supposed
to be like now figurant housing, and that got reported. Yeah, weirdly. Weirdly,
the Chicago proces has actually been pretty good on immigration stuff.
But it's literally solely because they hate Brandon Johnson, and
(31:59):
Brandon Johnson's the one running it. Because of this, we've
actually gotten a bunch of good good reporting that accident. Yeah, yeah,
in many such cases. But yeah, like the culture of
border patrol is not one that you want to.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Be introducing your child too. Yeah, absolutely not. You know,
I would really encourage people to read Todd's book Border
Patrol Nation, like he talks about this use of They
invented a new slur, which you know, is cool. Good
for them for expanding the English language. I guess they
call people tonks. Oh yeah, yeah, some noise that makes
when you hit someone on the head with your torch
your flashlight. Yeah yeah, just really great stuff. Some of
(32:37):
the worst people who've ever lived. Yeah, don't don't volunteer
to be a cop. Don't do it for money either,
Like that's what I got for you. Yeah, yeah, I
think that's all we've got for today. Yeah. Shit fucking sucks.
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
We gave you, We gave you some less depressing episodes,
but yeah, now we're back ruin your week. Actually, I
could promise. I could promise tomorrow's episode is going to
be a lot writer for this one. Yeah, come back
tomorrow to be less horribly depressed.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
Yeah, I got nothing good for you coming up for
the near future. To be honest, I'm rite. I think
about the Darien Gap and having to take little walks outside. Yeah, yeah,
get for a walk.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
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.
Alone media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to it, kidap to hear a podcast about ice
training desk squads. I guess I'm your host via Wong.
I guess I don't know if formerly or better is
the correct word, but sometimes also not as the ice
was be destroyed. Girl, So I'm mad about this one
with me? Is someone else's extremely bad about the existence
(00:28):
of ice, which is James Yep, I'm here.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm mad as a waste. I guess, just another Monday. Yeah,
this shit sucks, This does suck. Yeah, you know, I
had this realization.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I get this on Twitter a lot, where I realized
that there are people who don't know what ICE is
because they're like, they're not from the US, or they're like, yeah,
so ICE is immigrations and customs enforcements. The shortest description
of what they are is that they are one of
the like four American border gestapos.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yeah. The number of agencies under DHS is fucking baffling.
They're constantly rebranding every time they have a scandal or
they kill too many people. That, yeah, ice is kind
of their flagship evil program.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Yeah, and they like they do raids on fucking houses,
they do raised on businesses, They suck. Like if you
vaguely remember, there was a whole bunch of protests in
like twenty eighteen over this stuff, and that was mostly
anti ICE stuff.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Yeah, if someone's getting deported, it's ICE for the most
part doing it. Like Yeah, they also run detention centers
where people go, you know, they work with Jeff Bezos
on deporting people.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Oh my fucking god. Okay, I just remembered a story
I had. I had a flashback to standing in a protest,
a very very large protest in twenty eighteen. This is
one of like the big pro immigrant rallies. And in
this fucking protest, I saw a thing for this group
called Heartland Alliance. Now pro people who probably don't outside
(01:55):
of Chicago probably don't know what this is. The Heartland
Alliance runs like fucking child prisons facilities like for ICE school,
and they were at this protest against ICE. Fucking it
was the worst. That shit was terrible. You know, this
whole thing is all extremely bad. But what we've been
learning more details about recently is this program called Citizens Academies,
(02:20):
which is run by ICE's Homeland Security Investigations. I didn't
think HSI was under ICE. I thought HSI was a
different branch of DHS. I might be wrong, but they
used to be under ICE as far as I know,
and then they became HSI. Okay, I might be wrong
about that because the stuff that I was reading was
saying that they are still part of ICE, but they
(02:42):
might not be. It's also possible that it's literally has
gone back and forward multiple times in the last Yeah,
this is merecrareck. Things fucking suck, But HSI also does,
like a lot of the times, there's some of the
people who like do like physically the people on the
ground doing a raid will be HSI, like fucking stormtroopers whatever. Yeah,
they do arrests.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Yeah, often they appear in like these joint counter terrorism
task forces, like when they especially when they're doing stuff
with like drugs and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yeah, the civilian academies are I think really the only
way you can describe them, even though this is not
how it's being described, really is that they're treating random
people to like become desk what.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Yeah, It's what's interesting is like the protest that you
talked about seem to have been the sort of reason
that they started this program, right.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, we need to rewind this a little bit because
they started in the US as a reaction to those protests,
like specifically as like a pr thing. But the original
version of these programs started in Puerto Rico under Obama.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
Look, we don't give Obama or anything like enough shit, right,
Like fucking Obama just like in terms of killing people,
in terms of deporting people, fucked up human being.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Yeah, he was the deporter in chief and like, yeah,
part of what's sort of brutal about the mom administration
is like a lot of his support had been from
like the huge undocumented that could have like peaked in
like two thousand and six, and he comes in on
this and they just fucking deports everyone.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
Yeah, as Democrats too every time.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Yeah, we're seeing it again with Biden. Right, It's like
it's the same sort of process. And under under Obama
these these programs start. There's specifically, as you're talking about,
there's specifically supposed to be these like training programs are
supposed to be for community.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Well, okay, so this is and this is one of
these things.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Was like this is what they say that it's for,
and given what they're doing, I don't know how much
I believe them what they're what they say that it's
for is it's because there's been all of these anti
ICE things, Like, I mean, there's lots of people who
now are like, don't say shit about ice, who like, like,
AOC hasn't fucking said anything about abolishing ICE in like
(04:54):
half a decade, right, and she ran on that. Yeah,
because of how powerful those social movements were. I mean,
there's like Sean mcguey whatever the fuck guy whose whole
thing was abolish ice and then he became a Democratic
staffer and now it never talks about it again, and
he's like my absolute wordal nemesis, like I will face
at the end of days. Yeah, I will destroy his
(05:16):
fucking traitors ass and yeah, many many, many such cases.
But yeah, Like, and I think probably peak like anti
ice sentiment was in the Trump era, right when people, Yeah,
people started to look at immigration as the way that
like people have immigrant communities and diasporas see it, right,
which is this thing that tears families apart, that destroys communities,
(05:36):
that rich children from their parents, and people obviously recognized
it was bad. And then Biden got in and the
Democrats had to do this like kind of cover your
eyes and turn away thing where they continue to do
the same shit. Kids and cages are good now, Yeah, yeah,
yeah in cages great democratic kids and cage is incredible.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
What if no cage is? What do we just leave
them out in the fucking mountains and James's friend have
to feed them beans will winter?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Yeah, But the thing is, in twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen,
it's not entirely clear that the Democrats are going to
swing that way. No, And so you get these programs
and what's interesting about them, and so a lot of
this is coming from that. There's a very very good
piece by Barrizio Guerrero indocumented who got a bunch of
Foya documents about this program and what they.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Were actually doing. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:25):
And one of the things that he discovers about this
is that it's like a lot of rich guys. Like
it's some of them are like really rich. It's also
it's a lot of like bank employees.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
Yeah. That was a funny almost, I guess kind of
it got through that little social circle or whatever.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Yeah, And like there's this sort of feed in program
that sends people into this.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And I actually I realized I had.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Vaguely known about these but didn't quite understand how bad
it was because he didn't have a bunch of the
documents we have now. But this was a big thing
in Chicago in twenty twenty one, where there was proposed
to open one of these things. It's like these like
training centers for these like fucking people. Oh yeah, and
you know, twenty twenty one was still in Chicago. There
was still like like there's some protest stuff going on
(07:13):
because I mean there's you know, like twenty twenty hadn't
quite faded yet. And there was also like our cops
We've talked about this a couple times on the show,
but like shot a fucking fourteen year old, like yeah,
it's fucking murdered him cold blood. And the protests were
bad enough that like even lower Lightfoot was like like
fuck this, like this is this Trump ice stuff.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
We can't let them do it.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
This was back with the when like these people like
the Democrats were started pretending that they didn't like all
of these like federal deportation machine things. But the things
that we have now are we have the actual this
is like I think were the public most valuable part
of this whole thing is that we actually have a
bunch of the documents now of what they were showing people.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
Yeah, I'd love to see the fucking Foyer fight for
this because I have foyed the Department of Homeland Security
a lot and getting any Like I have a fire
out right now regarding the CBP one and the fact
that it doesn't work on non Apple phones, and they
very clearly know this, right like, if I know it,
(08:17):
they know it, And I would love to know if
that was from the outset that they knew and they
just didn't give a fuck, Like I would like to
see those emails regarding it doesn't work on Samsung. I
think I think they got it from a court order.
Oh okay, so they went to court to get Yeah yeah, yeah,
every like people, Freedom Information Act is great. It only
(08:38):
works if you have a lawyer who's prepared to sue
over it like that is the especially with DHS. You're
just not like, yeah, I've got stuff, so I found
in twenty twenty. They'll just kick it down, kick can
down the road, like yep, I'm not going to get it,
but yeah, kudos to them for doing it. Yeah, it's
so hard if you are a First Amendment lawyer, hit
me up. But okay, the ship that's in this one
(09:01):
of these things. The first page of this is maybe
the most deranged chart I have ever seen in anything.
Which is it is It is.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
A picture of a naked human body, is the friends
and back of it, right, And they've labeled all of
the parts of the body by and they've been so
we only have a black and white version of this,
but they've they've been they've been labeled by how effective
it is to hit someone there with the baton?
Speaker 3 (09:28):
Yeah, yeah, And they're like green in the in the
actual document, they're green, yellow, and red. I guess, uh.
And then it says like reasoning for the red one,
I'll just read it highest level of resultant trauma injury
tends to range from serious to lung lasting rather than temporary,
and may include unconsciousness, serious body injury, shock, or death.
So I guess like it's saying like, don't hit them
(09:51):
in the in the in the red area. No, that's
the thing. That's the thing. They're not saying that, They're
just saying, these are your options.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Yeah. Is so part of this is supposed to be
part of like a force escalation thing. But the point
of this is that it is actually like they're trying
to explain force escalation, and the thing is that like, yeah,
you actually can do this, but you can only do
this if you're in like the highest level of force
escalation or whatever. Okay, and if any of you have
ever been around a cop, you know, but those people
jump to the highest level of force escalation at like, yeah,
a fucking again, we have literally seen an acorn drop
(10:21):
and it can't be able to do this, right, and
so and so what they're what they're teaching these people,
and this is like I think, like Jenny widely horrifying.
Speaker 3 (10:28):
It's like, yeah, they are.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Teaching these people like the specific technical details of how
you like fucking maim someone with a baton.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yeah, I meant to reading the force escalation this is
and they actually did physical training right, like I think
they did weapons training. I think they did a bunch
of a bunch of simulation kind of exercises. And then
if you if you scroll down, this is like a
PowerPoint for those listening at home. They gave an overview
of like use of force to include a bunch of
(10:59):
Supreme Court cases. I think that Supreme Court cases is
certainly yeah, Supreme court cases about use of force. None
of these apply to you as a civilian, and you know,
like unless you're a sworn law enforcement officer, I guess
I'm not entirely sure like what the use case for
civilian baton training is aside from like well, I mean
(11:20):
my guess.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
And this is the way I've been like sort of
looking at this program is that this is the thing
partially being designed for PR, but it's partially also being
designed to create parabilitaries that if you're in a situation
like twenty twenty but about the border, for example, you
suddenly have all of these people that you could just
fucking call up because like part of what's going on
with this too record you remember, like actually, I guess
(11:43):
it is, funnily enough, like we are we are the
only two of the four hosts who didn't end up
having to deal with fucking Bortak getting deployed in Portland
in twenty twenty. But Bortak is border patrols like swat teams. Yeah,
basically yeah, there are stated reason is like, oh, so
this is this so you understand what it's like to
like be one of these people, how hot it is
(12:03):
to be a cop and well, like I think the
actual reason again is so that you could you're training
a bunch of people who you can just sort of
call up and be like, we need a bunch of
people to come like fucking obliterate a bunch of like
protesters or whatever, help them do mass deportations. Yeah, which
is another thing because like part of what this is
too is they're teaching them to do like raids on houses, right,
(12:26):
and like how do how do like physically fucking deport people?
Speaker 3 (12:29):
So this is yeah, like like Trump era ICE, which
were where there were open discussions of how many people
can we deport, how much will it cost, how easy
will it be?
Speaker 2 (12:38):
Yeah, And like right now, like Trump is like his
big one of his big things is mass deportations. But
I think people don't realize that the only reason that
this stuff didn't happen under Trump was that pushback to
it was so enormous. Yeah, that like like there are
democrats now who are screaming about the border, who in
like twenty eighteen were like sanctuary cities, ICE can't do
(12:58):
raids here, and sometimes which were sometimes that wasn't Yeah,
but like there was real systemic pushback to this, and
I think like we're heading to a place where there
isn't a kind of reaction to this anymore, where this
can get really really scary really quickly. And these are
the kinds of programs that you would need in order
(13:20):
to just do actual master importations. Is that like yeah,
like Ice doesn't have enough people, Like they have a
lot of people, but they don't have enough people to
deport like several million people.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
You need people like this.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
Yeah, And the scale of this program is kind of small,
but this is something that can be scaled up right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
To try and extremely large numbers of people, like fairly quickly. Yeah,
you know what, it reminds me of Maya products and
services and support this podcast does. Yeah, all right, I
hope you enjoyed this. Products and seven suits way back.
(13:56):
We let's go do like the other thing they were
fucking doing. Oh yeah, it's more Jesus wept. So I
want to quote from the article, yeah. Quote.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Documents also contain presentations on how to shoot a gun,
point at targets, and stand in position to fire. The
shooting practices include military style of rifles likewise, A training
in Atlanta organized drills to shoot at human like manikers
and fires M four assault rifles employed exclusively with the military.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
The training.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Also included isis guidelines for use of force encompassing deadly force.
One presentation suggests yelling drop the gun as potential cover
when employing lethal force against someone. So they're telling it
and this is definitely supposed to be thinking like, oh,
if you're in playing clothes, like you fucking yell police
and yell drop your gun, and then you shoot them,
(14:41):
and this is how you get away with it. So
like they are straight up teaching people how to murder people,
like how to get away with murder.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
That's what's happening here. Yeah, wild Yeah, Like the government's
offered firearms trading for civilians, Like that's kind of what
the NRA wasn't a government initiative. But yeah, this is
not that. This is not like, No, I would broadly
be in favor of the government funding free gun safety
classes for people, because I've seen some shit with you know,
(15:10):
like that would be one of the useful things. But
this is not that.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
No, And like and like the reason those specific classes
like don't look like that anymore is because and I've
talked about this in some of the episodes on them, okay, assassination.
It's like, well, yeah, when the government taught a bunch
of people how to use rifles, those people use those
rifles to like fight the cops in the streets. Yeah right, yeah,
and now they're all this insane shit. That's like teaching
people how to get away with murder of their cop. Like,
(15:33):
I want to read a power point slide from that
from that thing, because it's it's the most deranged thing
I've ever seen.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
Have you read the Graham versus Connor one, because it's
one of the more powerful uses of passive voice I've
ever seen. Oh no, I haven't seen that yet. Let
me read that while you look for yours. This one
is just incredible instance of cops speak. Graham comma diabetic.
Comma asks friend to drive him to convenience store for
juice good like cops sent is here, ran in and
(16:01):
out of store. Comma also observed the suspicious activity. What
suspicious activity, dear listener, I don't know. We're left to imagine.
Investigative stopped made and Graham was handcuffed by whom doesn't
say weird. Graham receives multiple injuries during the encounter with police.
Like someone gave him the fucking injuries? Was it the cop?
Speaker 2 (16:24):
It's just an incredible use of passive voice here throughout. Yeah,
there's this great tweet that was like the US has
a passive voice, in an active voice, and a special
exonerative voice.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
It's only used for.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Yeah. Yeah, Israel gets the exiterative voice.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
It rails in the greater cop nation. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
And like also, one of the things that I don't
think people understand on the Streme Court is like, if
you think that like Supreme Court rulings about abortions are bad,
like then they are right. But like, if you think
those things are bad, look up the Supreme Court cases
about police use of force. You will get you will
get nine O decisions with like all of like fucking
like like fucking Thurgood Marshall will be signing on to
(17:07):
like a nine O thing where he says that cops
have the right to just like shoot you in the
back of the head because they couldn't shoot you in
the back of the head like that the police couldn't function.
It's it's fucking dranged, like the kind of shit they have. Okay,
I want to read I want to read the slide
because it's it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
It's just a giant letters.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
It says survival, and then there's like bullet points, and
the bullet points are never give up, never concede defeat.
I will not die this way. I must go home
to my family. How you trade is how you will fight.
Speaker 3 (17:41):
Just imagining that the you know, the person who I
go to at the bank when I need to take
out large amounts of cash to go on one of
my work trips, learning that I will not die this way.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
Okay, So that that that's basically what I have about
this program, other than the bleak note that on on
a pr level, of these people one right, they they
didn't win because of anything they did. They won because
the Democrats decided that they fucking hated immigrants, and because
views of integration are largely driven by by party politics,
are driven by what your party tells you about immigrants, Like, yeah,
(18:14):
all the support that had been built in the late
twenty tens has evaporated.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
And yeah, even like I did a thing for my
Patreon yesterday then made me think of this, Like I
was trying to just do a sort of listing of
Joe Biden's immigration policies, right, from twenty twenty one to present,
and like twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, I was
selling stories to NBC, to slate to the nation right
about Haitian migration, about Title forty two, about remain in Mexico,
(18:43):
about especial immigrant visas for Afghans, And after twenty twenty
two you don't even get a response to your email.
You know, the same shit keeps having with twenty twenty
three is the end of Title forty two, right, So
when we see the beginning of out door detention, arguably
the most heinous shit that the Biden administration has done,
it's that's some pretty heanish shit. I mean, genocide is worse, evidently,
(19:04):
but on the on the border, this is the worst. Yeah,
some of its worst domestic policy. And you just can't
tell stories. Literally every time I post about this on Twitter,
people will be like, what the fuck? Why didn't I
read about this? Because an editor made a choice that
they didn't matter, that the people out there in the
cold and the wind at the rain didn't matter, and
that they don't have rights because aoc or Joe Biden
(19:26):
Orkamala Harris decided that that was how it was going
to be and apparently every corporate media outlet just kind
of stepped in line and went, yeah, fucking we don't
care anymore. Yeah, it's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Yeah, they've achieved their stated aim and they're not moving
on to their unstated aim, which is mass deportations.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
All right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
Everything I know about the program that you were about
to talk about comes from you, and that is oh boy,
it's not good.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
All right, So I'm going to read you a small
story here, and then we're going to talk about whether
or not it's a good idea for the Border Patrol
to have programs for children. Okay, and then I gave
a content warning for sexual assault of children. I'm just
in kiitch. You don't want to listen to this. In
August of this year, Aaron Mitchell, a former CBP agent,
(20:22):
was found guilty of a federal civil rights violation and
also kidnapping. On April the twenty fifth, twenty twenty two,
in Douglas, Arizona, Mitchell found a fifteen year old girl
waiting for school to begin. And for this next part,
I'm just going to read directly from the Department of
Justice presser. He introduced himself as a law enforcement officer
and asked for her papers. Next, after flashing his police
(20:43):
badge and credentials, Mitchell ordered the child into his car
and explained that he was taking her to the police station. Instead,
Mitchell drove the car miles away from her school, pulled over,
and restrained her hands and feet with two pairs of handcuffs.
The victim testified that after being handcuffs to defend it
and told her to do everything he said because he
didn't want to have to hurt her. I'm not going
(21:04):
to describe an nextpy in detail. He repeatedly sexually assaulted
this young women fucking christ in his apartment, then returned
her to the middle school where he had abducted her,
and reminded her not to tell anyone. Fortunately, she immediately
reported the abduction to her friends, family members, and multiple
law enforcement agencies. During an interview with the police, a
(21:27):
defendant exclaim exclaimed that the victim had better hope I
don't get out of here, which is an insane thing
to say when you're being interviewed by the police. Yeah.
He also googled several times for how long does it
take to smug someone? And he googled a lot about
sexual assault, how to stop someone from screaming. It's some
of the darkest shit fuck you're ever going to read. Yeah,
(21:49):
oh my god. This is one of the relatively few
instances of a Border Patrol agent actually being convicted of
sexual assault. Sexual assault is a massive fucking problem in
the Border Patrol, and the fact that it's such a
big problem and people get away with it is why
we get shit that is horrific, Like the incident that
I've just related to you right in twenty nineteen. I
(22:13):
don't know if you remember this, but there was a
pro publicer thing about this Facebook group which had nine
five hundred agents in it. The Facebook group they proted
videos of migrant desks, their children, and rape fantasies, as
well as doctored images, including ghost images of AFC. At
the time, Karla provosd, the Border Patrol chief, condemned the
group as inappropriate. Shortly thereafter, the insect reveal that she
(22:34):
had been a member of it for years. Yep, just classics,
dove right. Border Patrol has consistently failed to hold its
offices to account for rape. Like if you want to
read more about this, Jen Bud, She's been on the
show before is the person to go to about this.
I'm also going to include in the show notes links
to a story about a Border Patrol agent who was
(22:57):
sexually assaulted at the academy, which I know is as
a thing that is not unique to her. This is
this is a problem. Border Patrol is ninety five percent
male at this point. They call the women the fierce
five percent. But it's like it's probably the most like
gender biased of the federal agencies. Like Border Patrol agents
(23:17):
by and large, like do not do well around women.
This is something I've observed, this is something other volunteers
have observed, Like it's such a like masculine agency, I guess,
and they just don't encounter women in a professional capacity
very often. So I think with this in mind, I
want to talk about the Border Patrol Explorers, Right. It's
a youth program that teaches kids the skills of a
(23:39):
patrol agent from as young as forty fucking crust. Yeah,
what's really weird. There's been very little coverage. The two
places I would send people these will be in the notes,
would be Morley Music Write a really good piece in
the Nation, and Todd Miller's book Border Patrol Nation, which
is a book that everyone should read. I think really
like detail is the beginning of how border patrol became
(24:02):
what it is today. Those are really two of the
very few places you'd read about it. The training that
they do is insane. They'll learn firearms drills, they learn
to do checkpoints, they learned to make arrests. I'm going
to read from an interview from Monie Music's piece, Fabian
explained why his posts would practice shooting sometimes, and then
(24:23):
this is like parentheses. Undocumented migrants are not compliant when
we find them. He said, they paid all this money
to get here to start another life. They're just not
going to give up when they see us. Some would
fight back, some would be compliant. Maybe they tried to
kill you or threaten you. Sometimes they pick up an
element a rock lying around anything, and that could be
used to kill you. This is not the stuff that
(24:45):
fourteen year olds should be reckoning with, right.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
Yeah. This is also like I know people have done
the like connect the border to Palestine things so much
that it's like hackneyed, but like that is straight up
that could be lifted from a press release, like from
the idea yeah yeah about why they shot someone yeah,
and it's like, yeah, I mean, you shouldn't be teaching
anyone this, You especially shouldn't be teaching fourteen year olds. Yeah,
(25:10):
that someone might throw a rock at them, and that's
a reasonable way people had a gun and shoot them. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:15):
Like if you back that into your mind at fourteen,
I would argue that makes you very unsuitable to carry
a gun in public. Later in life. Kids start out
by doing this kind of boot camp style academy and
then they pretty much begin doing stuff like drill PT
they practice, conducting vehicle stops and tracking Border Patrol. On
their website, they claim to have more than seven hundred Explorers,
(25:36):
but over twenty eight posts around the country. It's very
hard to find anything about them. Like, it's not something
that they talk about a great deal. You have to
sort of apply. I looked at how one would apply.
It's one in Santa Sedra, Right. You sort of fill
out this form and you get some kind of clearance
and then I'm guessing they're checking that people are eligible
to be like hied by Border Patrol. Right, But if
(25:58):
there is data on how many of these kids go
on to be hired by BP, I haven't found it,
but I did find one. I think this is again
from Morley Music's piece when extremely amusing incident the Douglas
Arizona chapters. The Explorers teamed up with a local high
school drama club and they had the kids playing migrants. Yeah,
Jesus Christ, many of these people will themselves be like
(26:22):
first generation or like a.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Wild Anyway, the country cannot be allowed to continue.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Imagine, like, what are we doing at school today? The
theater kids are going to get arrested by the border
patrol kids. Jesus Christ. Some of the theater kids got
really into character. One of them cried. I guess several
of them managed to avoid arrest and give the young
agents the slip, and then they got told by the
(26:56):
agents overseeing the exercise that they've done it wrong because
they'd outsmarted the junior gobs.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
There's a story I can't remember what fucking town it
was in like the fifties that the Army was running
these like infiltration drills where they would like have a
town and they talk to people to town. They'd be like, Okay,
we're gonna like unleash like a communist diversive agent into
the town, and then you're gonna help the army capture them,
and it said, what happens, everyone has hit the agent
because I just had a great time like stuff.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, that is the American spirit. It's it's the people
of dug this Arizona. We salute you. One of the
things I found really interesting in in the morning music
piece was this idea of like defensive asylum only being
for criminals. So it seems like the students learned this
very binary immigration law. Where defensive asylum, which is when
you claim asylum as a defense against being deported, Yeah,
(27:50):
it's only for people who are criminals versus affirmative asylum.
It's for the people who like really need it or whatever.
We fast forward making an affirmative asylum claims extremely difficult
right now. Yeah, you know, I spoke to one hundred
people who wanted to come to this country in the Darien.
Every single one of those people told me that they
(28:11):
wanted to use CBP one, that they wanted to do
it the correct way, that they wanted to wait their
turn and do an interview. But like every single one
of those people is now reckoning with the fact that
if they can make CVP wan work on their phone,
they will wake eight or nine months in Mexico. That
is not a safe place if you're a woman on
your own, God forbid, if you're a trans woman or
a gay person like aside from like within certain communities,
(28:35):
it's not a safe place. I think Mexico is the
second highest rate of killings of trans people anywhere in
the world. Yeah, I think Brazil is maybe more. Yeah,
bort I think is the highest. I don't know if
that's like raw numbers because Brazil is a bigger country,
or if it's like stags the population.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, my memory is that it's the rate, But I'm
not harm so sure either way that people who are.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Coming to be safe or not to be in a
place where they're in danger, that is what they face,
right And so undoubtedly some of those people who wanted
to come the right way will cross between ports of entry,
they will surrender themselves to border patrol, and if they
get a chance to file for asylum at all, because
it's it's a shout test now, But there are numerous
(29:18):
incidents that I've seen described in court cases of people
doing what sounds to me like asserting an asylum claim
and not having a chance to then make their case.
If they do at all, it'll be defensive asylum, right.
And these are the people who are like textbook asylum places,
you know, like I am a trans person in a
place where that might well be punishable by death, de
facto of du jure right. I am a political dissident
(29:41):
in a country where my political views would be a
reason to kill me. I am a woman from Iran
who doesn't wear hijab, nicab whatever, you know, Like these
are like why asylum exists. There are lots of people
who deserve a help who are not covered by these
little buckets. We put people in to for asylum, but
(30:02):
even people who are who falls slap in the middle
of what your average Midwestern liberal dad would be like, Yeah,
that's an asylum case. We should help that person. Yeah,
they have to come in. They fare the defense of asylum,
and that's what we're teaching. I guess these border patrol
kids that these are the quite unquite bad guys, and
they're not. And yeah, they they're doing this sort of
(30:25):
twenty eight posts. It's just one. I read a terrible
account of a young woman who was sexually abused by
a cop in a police Explorer program. Like these Explorer
programs go all across law enforcement. They are administered by
the Boy Scouts of America. They have a serious problem
with abuse of young people as serious problem, and it
(30:46):
seems like it's not getting I mean, it does get
some coverage, like this, this piece about the agent in
Douglas got some coverage, right, the piece about this this cop.
But like, I mean, look at this country. We still
have the Catholic Church. Just because people abuse kids doesn't
mean they get shut down. But like, yeah, I don't,
don't don't send your kids. I guess you're listening to this.
You're quite unlikely to send your kids to be junior cops.
(31:06):
But like, I get young people living in small towns
on the border who don't have many economic opportunities. I
know those towns. I spend a lot of time in
those towns. And I get that the guys who joined
Border Patrol, they have big trucks, they have nice houses, right,
that it's one of the few areas of economic opportunity.
(31:27):
I get that none of that is worth having your
kid abused. And like I'm not saying that, of course
all of these programs resulting child abuse, they don't. But
like law Enforcement Explorer programs absolutely have a problem with
child abuse.
Speaker 2 (31:38):
And yeah, yeah, there was a whole thing in like
the last couple of years about this happening in tension
facilities in Chicago or intention facilities, things that were supposed
to be like now figurant housing, and that got reported. Yeah, weirdly. Weirdly,
the Chicago proces has actually been pretty good on immigration stuff.
But it's literally solely because they hate Brandon Johnson, and
(31:59):
Brandon Johnson's the one running it. Because of this, we've
actually gotten a bunch of good good reporting that accident. Yeah, yeah,
in many such cases. But yeah, like the culture of
border patrol is not one that you want to.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Be introducing your child too. Yeah, absolutely not. You know,
I would really encourage people to read Todd's book Border
Patrol Nation, like he talks about this use of They
invented a new slur, which you know, is cool. Good
for them for expanding the English language. I guess they
call people tonks. Oh yeah, yeah, some noise that makes
when you hit someone on the head with your torch
your flashlight. Yeah yeah, just really great stuff. Some of
(32:37):
the worst people who've ever lived. Yeah, don't don't volunteer
to be a cop. Don't do it for money either,
Like that's what I got for you. Yeah, yeah, I
think that's all we've got for today. Yeah. Shit fucking sucks.
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
We gave you, We gave you some less depressing episodes,
but yeah, now we're back ruin your week. Actually, I
could promise. I could promise tomorrow's episode is going to
be a lot writer for this one. Yeah, come back
tomorrow to be less horribly depressed.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
Yeah, I got nothing good for you coming up for
the near future. To be honest, I'm rite. I think
about the Darien Gap and having to take little walks outside. Yeah, yeah,
get for a walk.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
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It Could Happen Here News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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