August 7, 2024 • 43 mins
James and Shereen discuss Kamala Harris and Donald Trump’s proposed border and immigration policies and what each of them would mean for migrants.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
All Zone Media. Hello podcast fans, Me James and my
friend Scherene and also Cherene's cat Bunny.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yes, yeah, she is here. She is here and ready
to pard.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Yeah. She loves to cast a pod and so do we. Today, Serene,
we have the great pleasure of talking about the border again,
which is something I talk about a lot, something that
politicians also talk about a lot. Today, what I want
to talk about is the difference between Kamala Harris and
Donald Trump when it comes to the border, because shockingly,
there's been a lot of crap reporting on her border stance.
(00:39):
There has been some good reporting, and like, there's always
going to be right wing disinformation anytime you talk about
the border.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Right.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Just today, Border Patrol released video of a woman falling
to her death from the border wall. Border Patrol agents
stood there for twenty four minutes watching her struggle. There
was a ladder, and they decided to watch her struggle
until she died as she fell, and then she died
well watching this like objectively tragic thing, right, Like, when
(01:07):
we think about how we get to fascism, we get
to fascism when my taxes pay people to stand there
and watch a woman die rather than do a single
thing to help her, and then a bunch of fuck
wits on the internet immediately start excusing this like it's
it's so predictable that it was going to happen, And
I'm just once again disgusted by the whole fucking apparatus
(01:30):
sit as the border. I guess, so I want to
talk about the things that have changed, right, and I
want to talk. We'll sort of start by outlining who
Kamale is with respect to the aborder. So everything she
took over from Biden, Kamala has been sort of offering
more platitudes than specifics, right, Like her campaign is mostly
based on vibes. Like I went to her campaign website
(01:50):
to see what her stances were on the border, it
is not mentioned. I think that's notable. But recently, in
some speeches she did offer some concrete ideas of what
her border policy might look like. So I'm going to
start with her campaign ad. This ad incidentally opens with
what I'm pretty sure is a drone shot from Campo, California.
I've taken pictures in reverse of that shot hundreds of times.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
You can find them on my website.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Slate bought some of them off me maybe a month
or two ago, No, not even like maybe maybe two
or three weeks ago.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
I watched a mother breastfeed her five month old child,
maybe a couple of miles from there. It was one
hundred and five degrees. We were able to give them water.
I saw someone in severe hypothermia right very hot. We
were able to call them off. I spoke to a
Sudanese family who were really struggling with making this long walk.
They have to make out there. None of that shit
(02:45):
made it into the Kamela Border advert, right, of course not.
So I'm just going to play this advert for you, Shulan.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
On the border. The choice is simple.
Speaker 4 (02:55):
Kamala Harris supports increasing the number of border patrol agents.
Donald Trump blocked a bill to increase the number of
border patrol agents. Kamala Harris supports investing in new technology
to block fetanyl from entering the country. Donald Trump blocked
funding for technology to block fentanyl from entering the country.
Kamala Harris supports spending more money to stop human traffickers.
(03:19):
Donald Trump blocked money to stop human traffickers. Kamala Harris
prosecuted trains national gang members and got them sentenced to prison.
Trump is trying to avoid being sentenced to prison. There's
two choices in this election, the one who will fix
our broken integration system and the one who's trying to
stop her.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
A cop or a clown? Who should we vote for president?
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And that's exactly it, right.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
She's leaning really heavily on this, like I am a
cop thing and like we have spent and continue to
spend billions of dollars on board of cops.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
That is not the fucking solution. It will be the solution.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
We cannot make this giant border so full of cops
that it's impossible for people to cross it.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
People will still cross.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
It because cops ain't going to go to the middle
of the desert, because, you know, be inherent in being
a cop is also being lazy. So I want to
play some stuff that she said in Atlanta this week.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
So here is my pledge to you. As president.
Speaker 5 (04:22):
I will bring back the border security bill that Donald
Trump killed and I will sign.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
It into law.
Speaker 5 (04:33):
And so Donald Trump, what real leadership looks like?
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Oh fuck off?
Speaker 1 (04:42):
Yeah, So I'm going to subject you to some Carmela
and some Trump today.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
That's okay. I signed up for this.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Okay, So here's another one of her, and this I
think is really telling, right where she is bragging about
the most conservative Republican supporting her bill.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
Donald Trump, on the other hand, he's been talking a
big game about securing our border, but he does not
walk the walk, or as my friend Quavo would say,
he does not walk it like he talks it. Where
(05:26):
if so, Look, our administration worked on the most significant
border security bill in decades. Some of the most conservative
Republicans in Washington, d C. Supported the bill. Even the
(05:46):
Border Patrol endorsed it.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So I'm going to read some transcription that speech as well.
Just this is pretty much the only point of data
we have on her proposed border policy. So we're going
heavy on this speech that she gave in at my
at a rally.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
I went after transnational gangs, drug cartails, and human traffickers
that came into our country legally. I prosecuted them in
case after case, and I won, Harris said. Donald Trump,
on the other hand, has been talking a big game
about securing our border, but he does not walk the walk.
That's what you just heard, right, And then she goes
on to reference Quavo, which is cool and normal. So
(06:24):
let's talk about that leadership, and let's talk about the
bill she's proposing.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
This is a bipartisan bill that was proposed last year
and that didn't succeed. Right, it's the one that Democrats
are making a big fuss about. Republicans getting the border bill.
It's one of the only good things they've ever done, actually,
because it represented a massive right wood swing from where
Democrats have previously been on immigration. In the bill, DHS
(06:47):
could close the border if border patrol encountered four thousand
or more migrants on average over a seven day period.
The border would then have to be shut down if
encounters reached a seven day average of five thousand, or
if they exceeded five hundred in a single day.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Does that happen on these numbers like realistic?
Speaker 6 (07:05):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (07:05):
Well, a really important thing to remember when we talk
about these numbers is did you notice that it was
phrases encounters, not people. So this is a thing that
is apparently impossible if you write for a fucking broad
cheat corporate legacy newspaper to understand an encounter does not
represent a unique individual. Border patrol do not give us
(07:27):
data on unique individuals. They give us data on encounters.
And this is important because under title forty two, which
I made a series about last year that you can
listen to, I would like it if you did, people
can be returned to Mexico. And as you'll see, and
under this proposal, people can be returned to Mexico and
then they will try and come back because most of
the people coming to our border are not from Mexico,
(07:48):
nor do they have roots in Mexico, nor can they
be safe in Mexico. So they will try and come back,
and they will try and come back in a different place,
in a more remote place, and that will result in
a higher risk to their lives making that journey. Right, So,
eighty five hundred individuals across the whole border doesn't mean
to have them five hundred people, but yes, those numbers
(08:09):
are reachable.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
That's just so, that's so disingenuous to word it that way.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, Border Patrol just had, like I don't know, they
had so much success with doing this under title forty two,
Like we're flooded with migrants and like I've spoken to
people who have tried seven times to cross. You know,
it's extremely disingenuous, and I think we're going to get
onto this. But this is a debate about the border
happening by people who never go to the border and
don't understand what it's like, both in the media and
(08:36):
in politics.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
And I think that that is a problem.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
So when it's closed, quote unquote, now, we can't close
the border, right like a physically we cannot be We're
not going to close the border and be like, Okay, Mexico,
no tomatoes, Okay, no tourists can come into Orlando now,
right that that's not what it's about.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
It is open to.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Capital and is open to wealthy people. All we're doing
is it to the people who most need a help,
that being people seeking asylum. Right, So, when it's quote
unquote closed, they would still process fourteen hundred migrants through
ports of entry. That would presumably be people arriving using
CBP one, which is a fatally flawed app which doesn't
(09:17):
work for black folks, which has been hacked. All the
appointments are sold booked up month in advance. You can
only use it north of Mexico City. It's a complete mess.
Every single migrant I have encountered has tried to use
CBP one.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
And given up.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's not even available in that many languages, right, I
think it's English, Spanish and Haitian creole right now, Well,
it's it's ludicrous to suggest that this is accessible, and
it doesn't work very well on Samsung phones. I have
a pra a foil. I guess a foyer out to
CBP about that. But you know, maybe in six years,
after like several court cases, I'll get it back. But
(09:54):
I know that people are buying iPhones migrant advocates both
in Mecha Goo City and north of there, to allow
migrants to access the app. They're trying to help them
overcome these hurdles, right, but like, fucking come on, you know,
we've got the entire US government here and and it's
my friends trying to get five bucks from from you
know whoever to buy an iPhone so migrants can share it,
(10:16):
Like it's obscene.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
Only unaccompanied miners.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Would be processed if they entered between ports of entry, right,
So that's people under the age of eighteen without their folks,
anyone who tried to cross between ports of entries. So
port of entry is when you cross the border with
your passport and you go through an office that support
of entry. Right, So if you cross in another fashion
over a river, over a wall, around a wall, under
a wall, through a wall, just across the desert, weare
there isn't a wall that's between ports of entries. If
(10:42):
anyone tries two or more times, then during a border emergency,
they will be barred from the United States for a period.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
I think it's a year.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
I should note that this bill didn't pass, but Biden
did write an executive order setting an arbitrary cap at
twenty five hundred encounters per day, which you will notice
is lower. And it removes the requirement that border patrol
ask migrants if they fear persecution. So this is really important.
It's called a shout test. And the difference here is
between me saying and ensuring you've just come across the border,
(11:10):
are you here because you fear persecution? Can you not
safely go home? And me just saying get in the
fucking van, and you having to articulate that you fear persecution? Right,
Which is that requires them to know that they have
to articulate it. It requires them to be able to
articulate it in a language it's intelligible to the officer
or whoever's interviewing them. Right, it's a much higher barrier.
And in both cases, right, you could have the same
(11:32):
person and they could be rejected because they didn't pass
this so called shout test.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
It's ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
It's a really bullshit workaround for someone who is clearly
eligible for asylum.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Yeah, And like any good faith actor wants to find
out if that person is going to be persecuted when
they go home. And so moving to a shout test,
like you are consciously saying some people were going to
send home they will fucking die, or they will be tortured,
or they will face persecution of other means, right, because
they didn't articulate in the right words their fear of persecution.
(12:05):
And it's just there is not a good faith argument
for this. It's just get numbers down at the cost
of human suffering. So in this case, right, I have
met migrants with pretty rock SOIDID claims. I don't want
to go into the details of their cases too much.
I will in the future, but like you know, I'm
out at the border a lot, and I'm out in
(12:27):
the back country there a lot, and I try and
help people whenever I can. I talk to them about
their claims, and I'm not going to ask someone to
justify their trauma to me with seventeen documents, right, But
some of them have shown me things which I do
believe would would be a very cast iron asylum claim,
and they seem to be since Biden's executive order, just
getting booted back across the border. So he kind of
(12:47):
worked around that part of the bill failing. But let's
look at what else is in it. So if the
bill that Harris is saying she will reintroduce, of course
she herself can't, right, it's a legislative act or senator
or how over the House would The bill would limit
border closures to two hundred and seventy days, two hundred
and twenty five days, and one hundred and eighty days
for the first three years, which no, there's no limit
(13:09):
in the Biden executive order.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
So I guess that's better. I guess.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
I mean, fucking two hundred and seventy days when you
can't claim asylum, that's a lot of days. There's also
funding a lot of funding from more border patrol agents,
of course, more asylum officers, as well as more than
one hundred judges. We do need to move people through
the immigration system. But a lot more pressingly, we need
to open legal passways that are not walking across the
desert and passing a shout test. It would mandate detaining
(13:35):
migrants if they try to enter the US outside of
ports of entry, depending their asylum claim. So this is
really big. Actually, it's going to result in a massive
increase in the amount of asylum detention beds we need.
The bill contains funding for another ten thousand more beds,
will probably end up needing more than that. But all
of these beds are not in state run facilities, right,
They're in private facilities. ICE coordinates with it's cour civic.
(13:59):
It's people who when Biden first came into office, he
wrote he wrote an executive order about getting rid of
private prisons. These are the private prisons. This is how
we reallocated money to those same people doing this terrible thing, right,
which is locking people up for profit. I've heard terrible
stories about the conditions in some of these detention centers.
And this is the guy who ran on and bragged
(14:20):
about closing down private prisons, sending more money to private
prisons just for migrants dot citizens because apparently their rights
don't matter. As much that their lives don't matter as
much talking of things that don't matter, Sharen, should we
take an at break.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
That was beautiful, James, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
So we're back, and I want to talk about what
Harris has done as VP, which is they put her
on this root causes beat right, what she's supposed to
go after, the root causes of migration. So I want
to start with this message, as she sent to the
people of Guatemala.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
I want to be clear to folks in this region
who are thinking about making that dangerous track to the
United States Mexico border, do not come.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Do not come.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
The United States will continue to enforce our laws and
secure our border. They are legal methods by which migration
can and should occur, but we, as one of our priorities,
will discourage illegal migration. And I believe if you come
(15:43):
to our border, you will be turned back.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
Do not come. Yeah, I think I've seen that before.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Yeah. She took a lot of shit for that one,
rightly understandably.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah, this is not the only time to bide administration
said this. By the way, they were tweeting, do not
come in and creole in twenty twenty one, Well from
the Embassy of the United States in eighty This has
been their message and continues to be their message.
Speaker 7 (16:09):
Now to the ongoing crisis down at the southern.
Speaker 6 (16:11):
Border, the focus of Vice President Kamala Harris's first overseas
trip since taking office.
Speaker 8 (16:16):
She had to Mexico today after spending yesterday in Guatemala,
where she announced several initiatives and delivered a message to
potential migrants there, do not come to the United States.
The Vice President also sat down exclusively with the NBC's
Lester Hoole, who began by asking her about that warning.
Speaker 6 (16:33):
In the news conference here in Guatemala City. You had
a message for would be migrants, don't come. Why should
they believe you when they know that people are getting in.
Speaker 5 (16:43):
I've been working on this issue for a very long time,
and the kind of violence and danger that is associated
with that track, especially when we're talking about from Guatemala
through Mexico to the United States, it's extremely dangerous. We
are looking at a situation where people are fleeing because
(17:07):
of hunger, because of the hurricanes, because of the pandemic.
So the reason I am here is to address those issues.
Knowing that the people who are here for generations. They
want to stay, they don't want to leave, but they
need opportunity, they need assistance, they need support.
Speaker 6 (17:22):
Americans don't see a lot of them on a daily basis.
What they do see it at their own border. Children
being lowered over offences, children coming in with phone numbers
stenciled on their hand. And so the question has come up,
and you heard it here and you'll hear it again.
I'm sure it's why not visit the border? Why not
see what Americans are seeing in this crisis.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
Well, we are going to the boarder. We have to
deal with what's happening at the border. There's no question
about that. That's not a debatable point. But we have
to understand that there's a reason people are arriving at
our border and ask what is that reason, and then
identify the problem can fix it.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
So all of this was while the Biden administration continued
to defend and force Title forty two. If people haven't
listened to the series that made it about Title forty two,
and I've said that twice, but that's like two three
hours of me explaining Title forty two, So that would
explain it better than a cand of twenty seconds here.
Title forty two is a public health law, and the
idea of Title forty two is to prevent people with
(18:21):
tuberculosis coming into the United States. An element of Title
forty two of the United States Code it contains this.
The idea was never to use it as a de
facto block on asylum, which is what the Trump administration
did for a year and the Biden administration did for
nearly three years.
Speaker 9 (18:37):
Right.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
The Bidens registration did it for much much longer. This
ended in May of twenty twenty three, and it was used.
They called it catch and release, right, it was used
to bounce people straight back. As we spoke about before
catch and release.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
It's like you're literally like an animal practice, you know, like.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
Right, yeah, Like these people are fucking fish, and I
don't like doing that to fish. Shouldn't stress out of fish.
It's just vibing down there, ruin its day. So later
in that same interview, she was very defensive about her
failing to visit the border. But I think there are
very reasonable questions. Sometimes these criticisms are used in bad
(19:17):
faith by Republicans, So is everything right? It doesn't mean
that we shouldn't talk about it.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
We should.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
I didn't see a single elected official from the Democrat Party.
I guess fucking Jim Desmond turned up, but I wish
he wouldn't. He turned up, told lies about who paid
for the aid, and then forced his in turn to
apologize for it when a bunch of people turned up
at his office.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
Really great integrity.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
I didn't see a single Democrat for the months that
border patrol held thousands of people in open air attention,
without food, water, or shelter, and for the months of
my friends and I took care of them instead. What
Harris was doing was trying to connect business leaders with
economies in Central America to quote create jobs.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
She has some success with a Japanese car factor in
Guatemala and a Swiss coffee processor buying more beans and
committing to more coffee purchases.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
Right. But this shit does not work and it has
never worked.
Speaker 8 (20:15):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Obviously, my position on global economics is not the same
as hers. But we can't trickle down the causes of migration.
We can't do this with like a rising tide levels
or boats GDP stuff. Even if we do buy this
kind of freakonomics tier bullshit, it doesn't matter because the
change is going to take decades to come. Right, you
(20:39):
can't just just change a national economy. Change deals with unemployment,
with violence, with state violence, with nonstate violence overnight. And
it's very likely that the pace of climate change alone
will outstrip any benefits that these programs provide. Right, because
we are seeing increasingly people coming from countries that are
the most impacted by climate change to countries like the
(21:01):
United States, one of the countries that has made the
largest contribution to the climate change.
Speaker 3 (21:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
But this idea of like trickle down economics to stop migration,
it doesn't address the issue that most of the migrants
are no longer coming from the places she's going, Right,
So she's worked pretty extensively in the Northern Triangle, Guatemala, Hondordas,
in El Salvador. These are places which sent a lot
of migrants, may be in the earlier Barbera administration, but
(21:27):
that's not the case anymore. Right, Those are not typically
places I see migrants from, Right, I see migrants from Venezuela,
and we're going to get a lot more of those.
I see migrants from Turkey, many of them, but not
all of them.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Kurdish.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
I see migrants from North Africa. I see migrants from
the Sahel, I see migrants from India. I don't particularly
see people from the Northern Triangle. So the idea that
like lifting the economy in the Northern Triangle is going
to move the needle. It's just not even if we
buy the idea that it's possible, and I don't think
it is. So that's let's take a look at Donald Trump.
(22:02):
I guess I should give people a trigger warning. I'm
only going to include a little bit of Donald Trump
audio here, but yeah, you can tap the skiit.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
Button if you don't want to hear Donald Trump talking.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
So Donald Trump's policies largely are in response to things
that are not real or proposing things that the president
or Congress cannot do, or that the president cannot do
without the.
Speaker 3 (22:25):
Support of Congress.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
So his first thing is talking about ending birthright citizenship.
This is not a thing that he can do by
executive order. Right, this is an amendment to the Constitution
that requires an amendment to the Constitution to party back. Now,
you can mend the constitution, but I don't think you'd
ever get support for ending birth right citizenship.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Right.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
This has been the case since aster the Civil War,
and it exists to stop people disenfranchising the children of
formally enslaved people.
Speaker 7 (22:53):
Under Biden's current policies, even though these millions of illegal
border crosses have entered the country on awfully, all of
their future children will become automatic US citizens. Can you
imagine They'll be eligible for welfare, taxpayer funded healthcare, the
rate to vote, chain migration, and countless other government benefits,
(23:14):
many of which will also profit the illegal alien parents.
This policy is a reward for breaking the laws of
the United States and is obviously a magnet helping draw
the flood of illegals across our borders. They come by
the millions and millions and minions.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
So another thing that don Trump wants to do is
do away with the Diversity Visa program. Are you familiar
with the Diversity Visa.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
No, I'm going to say no, I'm familiar with it,
but I have to like know what it is in detail,
So please tell me.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
James, Okay, I would love to tell you.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Sharing the DV program, I will avoid using the acronym.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Because it US. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
They we're just sending cops all over the World's Yeah,
the Diversity Visa program, better known as the Green Card Lottery,
allows about fifty five thousand or exactly fifty five thousand
in theory, immigrant visas a year for individuals from countries
that are underrepresented in the US immigration system.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I remember that. Well, that sounds familiar, Yes.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
Okay, yeah, So, like you'll meet people almost everywhere I go.
I tend not to go to countries that are highly
represented in the US immigration system, right, Those being countries
that find it easier for people to get visas like
h one B's right, because they are more economically maybe
close to the United States and have educational credentials that
translate across. So the Trump administration had made the diversity
(24:40):
visa program, it's such a massive cluster fuck that it
effectively didn't work. And the way that this happened was
because you don't just win the Green card lottery and
they mail a green cards to your house, like come
on over, Bud. You win the lottery, and that gives
you the right to go to the embassy to do
an interview and then you make the application. Right then
they check check you off on any checklist you might
(25:01):
be on. All the stuff that would normally apply to
a migrant it's not like an amnust T visa. And
what the Trump administration did was make it very hard
for people to get these appointments, especially during COVID and
this has been the case with the Bide administration as well.
They get the lowest priority now the cambuc And appointment,
but other people's stuff gets to sort of overtake.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Them in the line.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Right, because you only have a year from receiving it
to claiming it de facto, this means that people don't
get it right. So we are not fifty five thousand
people are not coming because of the diversity visa. Even
if they were, this is not very many people, and
like it's just Trump. I don't know, maybe he saw
the phrase diversity and became triggered. But it's a weird
(25:46):
little bugbear like which I guess if you can focus
on weird little things. But still, the diversity visa is great.
The people I know who often most deserve visas people
who can't even afford to make the trip right to
walk here or you know, if you're not in the
Continental Americas, it's a lot more expensive.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
You have to fly. I guess you could take a vote.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
But some of those people I mean, my friend who
driving all around Iraq is applying for a diversity VSA
and like, I really hope he gets it, lovely man.
Trump also has this bug there about DHS paying benefits
to quote illegal aliens crooker.
Speaker 7 (26:21):
Joe Biden is running a NonStop conveyor belt importing illegal
aliens from all over the world into our country, and
the Biden Department of Homeland Security is abusing it so
called parole authority to give them more governmental benefits than
many law abiding citizens, including our vets. Our vets are
(26:43):
being taken advantage of. Our citizens are being taken advantage of.
It's very unfair and it's not going to stand.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
The Department of how My Security doesn't pay and benefits
to anyone. I guess it pays like border patrol agents
and people who work for it, but it's not giving
anyone public benefits. Right, and documented people normally ineligible for
most benefits, even people who do have legal status. And
he consistently conflates asylum seekers with undocumented people, right, maybe
because he genuinely doesn't know the difference, and it doesn't
(27:11):
care to learn the difference. Even people who have legal
status face a range of hurdles like sometimes they have
a forty quarter work bar for example, right, so that
it means you have to have been working for forty
periods of three months consecutively. Again, this is kind of
He might be talking about something called the public charge rule,
which can interfere with your citizenship or visa application if
(27:36):
you've taken certain times of benefits. So maybe he's looking
to make that a little bit broader. But again it's
really unclear, and it's kind of like identity politics grifting.
The next thing is we're getting towards QAnon territory.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Now, great, I.
Speaker 7 (27:50):
Will use Title forty two to end the child traffic
in crisis by returning all traffic children to their families
in their home countries and without then, and I will
urge Congress to ensure that anyone caught traffic in children.
Of course our border receives the death penalty immediately. And
that includes also for women, because women, as you know,
(28:12):
are number one in trafficking children are actually number two.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
This is some weird shit first of all, right, but
he talks about using Title forty two. This is not,
as I've talked about three times now, what Title forty
two is for it's very obvious that he thinks Title
forty two is immigration law because he very obviously used
it as that.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
Right.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
He was not using Title forty two to stop people
getting COVID because he did square root fuckles stop people
getting COVID, right, and there were not exemptions for vaccinated people.
It's very obvious that they use Title forty two cynically
as an immigration law. That is not what it is. Also,
deporting someone back to the situation they were trafficked from,
(28:53):
maybe not smart like maybe especially a miner who is
trafficked here, maybe we could help them one of the
richest countries the humanity has ever seen. Maybe not just
bumping them straight back to that country, maybe showing a
little bit of compassion. Human trafficking is a problem, but
this is not the solution. So Harris kind of touts
her prosecutorial experience when she talks about human trafficking. She's
(29:18):
actually been better than some not punishing people who were trafficked, right,
So I was reading that at one point she asked
prosecutors not to use the term teenage prostitute because that's
not really a thing. What we're seeing there is somebody
who is being trafficked, right, or somebody who has been victimized,
taken advantage of manipulated and seeing them as perpetrators is
(29:42):
fundamentally missing the fucking problem. And this is what the
legal system does far too often, right, is it goes
after the people who are the vactims, not the criminals.
She twice brought criminal charges against backpage dot Com, which
is a website.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
I guess whe people can find escorts.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I'm not familiar with these things, but I know that
some sex workers were opposed to that because they felt
it drove them kind of onto more underground platforms, which
which were even more risky to them. But obviously if
people were also being trafficked on this platform, So like
her record, I guess it is somewhat mixed. You know
what else is somewhat mixed? Shereen, what, James, it's the
(30:20):
products and services that we get to support this show.
You know, sometimes it's the cops, sometimes it's terrible coffee,
sometimes it's gold. You never know what you're going to get. Ooh,
we are backed, and we are back to one of
(30:41):
Donald Trump's oldest chestnutes, and that would be his stupid wall,
right that he wants to build.
Speaker 7 (30:47):
We created the most secure border in US history, by far,
dealing a major blow to the cartels and traffickers. We
built hundreds of miles of war, We renovated hundreds of
miles of water. We never had anything like it. And
then I got Mexico free of charge. You give us
twenty eight thousand soldiers to protect us from people coming
(31:08):
into our country illegally.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
He talks about building hundreds of miles a wall. He
sets up a couple of times. Right, we've renovated hundreds
of mile the wall. You know, did they build hundreds
that maybe just technically that they really.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
Fudged the numbers.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, I've had a lot of freedom of information requests
for that. I guess what's more relevant is that Biden.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
Also built the wall, right, mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Calm, that's not talking about it. But as we've documented
numerous times, Biden has continued to build the wall. He's
continued to build the barrier, which.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Is a wall.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
He has repaired other sections of war, he has upgraded
sections of fence to wall. They're both doing this, right.
There's maybe Donald Trump would do more of it, but
sometimes I feel like it's general and competence might prevent
him from doing any more than Biden's like competent migrant
as they call it, de terrents, right, deterrence through death
is It's probably a better way of phrasing it. Trump
(32:02):
also talks about a total ban on taxpair dollars to
give legal aid to undocumented people. Again, I'm not sure
if he knows what he's talking about. I don't know
what he's talking about. He might be referring to it.
We have a program in San Diego County where San
Diego County pays for some people to defend migrants who
are detained by ICE, right, so they can have access
to a lawyer. ICE has responded to that by moving
(32:24):
those people to Texas.
Speaker 2 (32:26):
Oh that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Yeah, yeah, totally normal. Good.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I'm glad we voted for the anti fascist guy. Everything's
going great, exactly. You can listen to my episode about
that if you want to know more about that. But
I don't know if he means like they don't get
public defenders if they're accused of a crime.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Isn't it just true that he can also just like
use these trigger words to make people mad.
Speaker 3 (32:45):
Yes, yes, that is what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Yeah, yeah, not necessari always has to be base in fact.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
No, yeah, that's to be found with Donald Trump, this
doesn't matter. And then finally talking of stuff that doesn't
have to be real, he's absolutely batshit insane idea of
fucking aiding Mexico to kill members of cartels, which that's yeah, unhinged, Yeah,
that is unhinged. That will resolve in more violence, it
will result in more instability, it will result in more death.
(33:12):
I think, I'm it's pretty much unclear when it comes
to that one, Like she is not proposing invading Mexico.
So much of what Donald Trump says is insane and
it doesn't make sense. So I wanted to look at
some of the people who kind of lean on Trump,
some of the people who might be a little bit
more coherent right when it comes to crafting that policy.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
Right.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Couldn't get Steven Mirr on the podcast Sad, but we
did get these people from the Texas Public Policy Foundation
who Robert and Gare spoke to at the Republican National Convention.
So here's them talking about visas and immigration.
Speaker 9 (33:46):
I've tried to hire people from other countries. It takes
months and months and months to get that done. It
usually spend a lot of money doing it as well,
and so the system is disincentivized to do that. So,
you know, actually doing the last Trump administration, the start
looking at like let's reduce the number of visas and
have broader categories. Right, So I think they're trying to
get down to about seventeen visas, get to more marit
(34:08):
based program to fit the needs that we have. Make
sure that you can you know, it's not about like
what is the total number, but if we are needing labor,
we needing people in these areas, you can kind of
like as a dial, you can turn up and down
in certain areas on certain visas. And so I think
if you do have to first like stop the problem,
and then you also have to make systemic changes that
(34:30):
will overhaul the system and make a lot easier so
that people are incentivised to actually do it.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
The right way. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
So these people aren't stupid, right, they won't just spew hate. Yeah,
They're much more competent in the facts. So I think
what we're seeing here, right is this undoubtedly is a
way to reduce what they see is undesirable migration, which
is to say, poor people and brown people you can
phrase it however you want, right, bit.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
I mean, in the Republican's eyes, maybe a lot of people,
all migration is undesirable migration.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
I feel like, yeah, well, people will talk to me.
I'm for those of you who have just listened to me.
I guess a white person British. You're not white, you're British. Yeah,
which is more like a kind of translucent really you
think about it. Yeah, so yeah, I am a British person,
(35:24):
which is important, I guess because people will talk to
me about immigration like I'm one of the good migrants
and they can go fuck themselves. Yeah that position, right,
That Like it's a like implicit white people are okay.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah, right, that's all that means. It's like, oh, yeah,
you speak English and you're like me, great, come out,
come on into my racist country.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Yeah exactly. Yeah, I'm like funny foreign as opposed to
like evil foreign I guess.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
I think it's also just like they don't see you
in whatever in their mind is a threat, right like
to I don't know, it makes no sense logically, but.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
Yeah it does if you understand it's relents of race.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Yes, yeah, but I mean their perspective makes.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
No sense to me.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, same people who are barking about my fellow British
people being a threat because they happened to be Muslim,
right or brown, or seek in people that don't understand
it seeks anon Muslims. So what we actually need is
more legal pathways. He is correct that the visa system
needs changing, and we need ways that people can apply
and come here safely and not have to be trafficked
and not have to take massive risks.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
Right.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
I wanted to see what Robert and Geh had asked
them about this mass deportation seeing because I've seen some
people holding like mass deportations now sign at the RNC,
and that's always good sign that we're not sort of
sidestepping into fascism. So let's hear what you said about that.
Speaker 10 (36:43):
Is that plan kind of the mass detention and expulsion
of undocumented migrants in the US something that you think
is a good idea, something you support as the Heritage Foundation.
Speaker 9 (36:52):
Yeah, generally, you know, obviously you got to look at implementation,
right and how you actually go about doing that in
the right way, But yeah, absolutely generally.
Speaker 10 (37:02):
Yeah, and then what kind of time frame then, because
you just said this is something you have to like
lay some groundwork on and what time frame do you
see it being feasible to carry out something like that?
Speaker 9 (37:11):
You know, I actually don't have a good answer for that,
because you have to first get your arms around the problem.
We don't even know how many people are here, and
you don't know where they come from, and so it's
not like you're just trying to deport them all just
to Mexico or something like that, or the southern border, right, Like,
you have to first get your arms around the problem.
That's the first step, and then I think from there
(37:32):
you can actually understand figure out what a reasonable time
frame to do that is.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
Yeah, so this is pretty fucked.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
Like I should point out that the Bilbah Harris is
proposing also proposes bumping people back to Mexico without the
permission of Mexico.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
Right.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
I think so many of these policies just rely on
Mexico being kind of a sponge for US policy, like, oh,
they'll be fine, like God forbid Mexico act as a
sovereign country.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Yeah, but this one seems different. Right.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
We had I feel like pretty good liberal support on
abolish ice under Trump that has completely evaporated under Biden.
But because we solved racism. Yeah, yeah, we fixed it.
I've forgotten about that. Yeah, that was that was the
big crunch point. So what this means is taking people
(38:21):
who have homes, lives, jobs, and families and tearing them
away from one of those things and tending them back
to a country that they may not have been to
in decades, that they may never have been to at all,
a place where they will undoubtedly face hardship, if not persecution,
and certainly having lived here having family here, will make
them more likely to be ransomed or blackmailed or any
(38:42):
of these things that happened to migrants when they're deported. Right,
And this is pretty bleak, Like I guess Harris hasn't
advocated for this, which seeing the amount of the amount
of people who fucking respond to my tweets with your
going home to like I a am a US citizen
and be fuck you.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Yeah all the time, all the time. Yeah, it's so funny. Okay,
got a life.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
But yeah, it does seem that there is a wing
of the Trump and I talked to Trump people, right,
I was in the mountains this weekend, like I was
in Wyoming, mincing about in the mountains.
Speaker 3 (39:17):
It's lovely.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
But in talk to some people and I've never really
come across anyone who can like in the flesh. Maybe
it's just because those people are so repulsive, I wouldn't
talk to them, And it's probably quite likely. But advocated
for this right, like this idea of mass deportations, Like
like I said at the start of this show, like,
how does a country get into full on fascism?
Speaker 3 (39:36):
It is this.
Speaker 1 (39:38):
It is my taxes and your taxes, and some of
the people who are listening taxes paying for people who
have done nothing wrong, right, who have lived here, who
haven't done any crimes, who haven't hurt anyone, to be
at our expense, expelled from their home, detained in a
private prison whose owner company makes massive donations to politicians,
(39:59):
and then flown across the world at our expense, and
then dumped into a country where they no longer belong.
And that is as close as we get, I think
to like someone saying like send them to the camps
without saying that like, yeah, look, what was the Armenian genocide?
The Armenian genocide was a mass deportation, right of people
forced to walk across the desert and die on the way,
(40:20):
Like if you don't think this Trump ship is fascist,
Like I really don't know what to do. It doesn't
matter if it's fascist or not. Right, Like this is
the kind of rhetoric that's genocidal, Like I don't want
to argue about like Robert Preston and like different definitions,
because that doesn't matter. Like this shit is it is genocidal.
It is dehumanizing migrants, which has been a project of
(40:42):
the right wing news media and increasingly the liberal news media,
and also the Democrat Party now apparently as well as
the Republicans.
Speaker 3 (40:51):
But this is.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
A market step to the right. Both of these are right.
The Overton window has moved so far right migration in
the last eight years that it's almost an unrecognizable place.
And I guess what I when they end up by
saying what I always say about this is like the
solution is not within the argument about who to vote for.
Like these are state policies. These are also often set
(41:16):
by the legislature, as we saw when Biden's board bill failed, Right,
and that would require a change in the legislature, Like
there isn't a third party that can get a majority
in the legislature right now. So the way we fix
this is ourselves, right like we are seeing in the
UK right now, like violence towards Muslim people, andoance towards masques,
(41:37):
violence towards Islamic cultural centers, and people stepping up to
defend them. That is the only way we fix this
is by stepping up and shouldering our responsibility to our communities.
And people did that in the Trump administration to a degree,
Like when I'm twenty eighteen, when I was down in
Tijuana looking after folks who are part of the caravan
that Trump made a big spectacle in the midterms. People
(41:59):
showed up, showed up, a soccer mom, showed up in
minivans and helped us, and it was cool. The thing
was fucked, But like, I respect that we look after
those people, and that hasn't happened to as much of
a degree since, right And we've had more people than
we had in twenty eighteen in the open air detention sites,
and so like I guess where I want to end
(42:19):
is whoever wins, it's still our responsibility to take care
of migrants because neither of them is going to And
we are continuing with policies that will accelerate climate change.
We are continuing with policies that will impoverish people all
over the world and enriching people who are already super wealthy,
(42:40):
and those things will continue to drive migration. We can't
change those things in an actionable amount of time, but
what we can do is try our best to meet
people who come here with kindness. And so, yeah, I
would urge you to do that. I guess if you
want to volunteer, you can email Altro Lado it's Altro
Lado dot or border Kindness always need your money, Borderline
(43:03):
Relief Collective always need your money. And those are always
things that you can volunteer with or places you can
say your money if you don't have your time. But
you can also organize in your own neighborhood. I'm speaking
to some people today who are organizing in Maryland to
take care of some Kurdish refugees who I know, like
they weren't doing anything a year ago, right, they saw
a need and they saw it being a met and
(43:25):
they realized that they could meet it, and they've made
a huge difference to people's lives. So like wherever you are,
there are migrs in your community.
Speaker 3 (43:32):
And you can do that too. It could Happen Here
as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at cool zonemedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.
All Zone Media. Hello podcast fans, Me James and my
friend Scherene and also Cherene's cat Bunny.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yes, yeah, she is here. She is here and ready
to pard.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Yeah. She loves to cast a pod and so do we. Today, Serene,
we have the great pleasure of talking about the border again,
which is something I talk about a lot, something that
politicians also talk about a lot. Today, what I want
to talk about is the difference between Kamala Harris and
Donald Trump when it comes to the border, because shockingly,
there's been a lot of crap reporting on her border stance.
(00:39):
There has been some good reporting, and like, there's always
going to be right wing disinformation anytime you talk about
the border.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
Right.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Just today, Border Patrol released video of a woman falling
to her death from the border wall. Border Patrol agents
stood there for twenty four minutes watching her struggle. There
was a ladder, and they decided to watch her struggle
until she died as she fell, and then she died
well watching this like objectively tragic thing, right, Like, when
(01:07):
we think about how we get to fascism, we get
to fascism when my taxes pay people to stand there
and watch a woman die rather than do a single
thing to help her, and then a bunch of fuck
wits on the internet immediately start excusing this like it's
it's so predictable that it was going to happen, And
I'm just once again disgusted by the whole fucking apparatus
(01:30):
sit as the border. I guess, so I want to
talk about the things that have changed, right, and I
want to talk. We'll sort of start by outlining who
Kamale is with respect to the aborder. So everything she
took over from Biden, Kamala has been sort of offering
more platitudes than specifics, right, Like her campaign is mostly
based on vibes. Like I went to her campaign website
(01:50):
to see what her stances were on the border, it
is not mentioned. I think that's notable. But recently, in
some speeches she did offer some concrete ideas of what
her border policy might look like. So I'm going to
start with her campaign ad. This ad incidentally opens with
what I'm pretty sure is a drone shot from Campo, California.
I've taken pictures in reverse of that shot hundreds of times.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
You can find them on my website.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Slate bought some of them off me maybe a month
or two ago, No, not even like maybe maybe two
or three weeks ago.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
I guess.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
I watched a mother breastfeed her five month old child,
maybe a couple of miles from there. It was one
hundred and five degrees. We were able to give them water.
I saw someone in severe hypothermia right very hot. We
were able to call them off. I spoke to a
Sudanese family who were really struggling with making this long walk.
They have to make out there. None of that shit
(02:45):
made it into the Kamela Border advert, right, of course not.
So I'm just going to play this advert for you, Shulan.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
On the border. The choice is simple.
Speaker 4 (02:55):
Kamala Harris supports increasing the number of border patrol agents.
Donald Trump blocked a bill to increase the number of
border patrol agents. Kamala Harris supports investing in new technology
to block fetanyl from entering the country. Donald Trump blocked
funding for technology to block fentanyl from entering the country.
Kamala Harris supports spending more money to stop human traffickers.
(03:19):
Donald Trump blocked money to stop human traffickers. Kamala Harris
prosecuted trains national gang members and got them sentenced to prison.
Trump is trying to avoid being sentenced to prison. There's
two choices in this election, the one who will fix
our broken integration system and the one who's trying to
stop her.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
A cop or a clown? Who should we vote for president?
Speaker 3 (03:46):
And that's exactly it, right.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
She's leaning really heavily on this, like I am a
cop thing and like we have spent and continue to
spend billions of dollars on board of cops.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
That is not the fucking solution. It will be the solution.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
We cannot make this giant border so full of cops
that it's impossible for people to cross it.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
People will still cross.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
It because cops ain't going to go to the middle
of the desert, because, you know, be inherent in being
a cop is also being lazy. So I want to
play some stuff that she said in Atlanta this week.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
So here is my pledge to you. As president.
Speaker 5 (04:22):
I will bring back the border security bill that Donald
Trump killed and I will sign.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
It into law.
Speaker 5 (04:33):
And so Donald Trump, what real leadership looks like?
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Oh fuck off?
Speaker 1 (04:42):
Yeah, So I'm going to subject you to some Carmela
and some Trump today.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
That's okay. I signed up for this.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Okay, So here's another one of her, and this I
think is really telling, right where she is bragging about
the most conservative Republican supporting her bill.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
Donald Trump, on the other hand, he's been talking a
big game about securing our border, but he does not
walk the walk, or as my friend Quavo would say,
he does not walk it like he talks it. Where
(05:26):
if so, Look, our administration worked on the most significant
border security bill in decades. Some of the most conservative
Republicans in Washington, d C. Supported the bill. Even the
(05:46):
Border Patrol endorsed it.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So I'm going to read some transcription that speech as well.
Just this is pretty much the only point of data
we have on her proposed border policy. So we're going
heavy on this speech that she gave in at my
at a rally.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
I went after transnational gangs, drug cartails, and human traffickers
that came into our country legally. I prosecuted them in
case after case, and I won, Harris said. Donald Trump,
on the other hand, has been talking a big game
about securing our border, but he does not walk the walk.
That's what you just heard, right, And then she goes
on to reference Quavo, which is cool and normal. So
(06:24):
let's talk about that leadership, and let's talk about the
bill she's proposing.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
This is a bipartisan bill that was proposed last year
and that didn't succeed. Right, it's the one that Democrats
are making a big fuss about. Republicans getting the border bill.
It's one of the only good things they've ever done, actually,
because it represented a massive right wood swing from where
Democrats have previously been on immigration. In the bill, DHS
(06:47):
could close the border if border patrol encountered four thousand
or more migrants on average over a seven day period.
The border would then have to be shut down if
encounters reached a seven day average of five thousand, or
if they exceeded five hundred in a single day.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Does that happen on these numbers like realistic?
Speaker 6 (07:05):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (07:05):
Well, a really important thing to remember when we talk
about these numbers is did you notice that it was
phrases encounters, not people. So this is a thing that
is apparently impossible if you write for a fucking broad
cheat corporate legacy newspaper to understand an encounter does not
represent a unique individual. Border patrol do not give us
(07:27):
data on unique individuals. They give us data on encounters.
And this is important because under title forty two, which
I made a series about last year that you can
listen to, I would like it if you did, people
can be returned to Mexico. And as you'll see, and
under this proposal, people can be returned to Mexico and
then they will try and come back because most of
the people coming to our border are not from Mexico,
(07:48):
nor do they have roots in Mexico, nor can they
be safe in Mexico. So they will try and come back,
and they will try and come back in a different place,
in a more remote place, and that will result in
a higher risk to their lives making that journey. Right, So,
eighty five hundred individuals across the whole border doesn't mean
to have them five hundred people, but yes, those numbers
(08:09):
are reachable.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
That's just so, that's so disingenuous to word it that way.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, Border Patrol just had, like I don't know, they
had so much success with doing this under title forty two,
Like we're flooded with migrants and like I've spoken to
people who have tried seven times to cross. You know,
it's extremely disingenuous, and I think we're going to get
onto this. But this is a debate about the border
happening by people who never go to the border and
don't understand what it's like, both in the media and
(08:36):
in politics.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
And I think that that is a problem.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
So when it's closed, quote unquote, now, we can't close
the border, right like a physically we cannot be We're
not going to close the border and be like, Okay, Mexico,
no tomatoes, Okay, no tourists can come into Orlando now,
right that that's not what it's about.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
It is open to.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Capital and is open to wealthy people. All we're doing
is it to the people who most need a help,
that being people seeking asylum. Right, So, when it's quote
unquote closed, they would still process fourteen hundred migrants through
ports of entry. That would presumably be people arriving using
CBP one, which is a fatally flawed app which doesn't
(09:17):
work for black folks, which has been hacked. All the
appointments are sold booked up month in advance. You can
only use it north of Mexico City. It's a complete mess.
Every single migrant I have encountered has tried to use
CBP one.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
And given up.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's not even available in that many languages, right, I
think it's English, Spanish and Haitian creole right now, Well,
it's it's ludicrous to suggest that this is accessible, and
it doesn't work very well on Samsung phones. I have
a pra a foil. I guess a foyer out to
CBP about that. But you know, maybe in six years,
after like several court cases, I'll get it back. But
(09:54):
I know that people are buying iPhones migrant advocates both
in Mecha Goo City and north of there, to allow
migrants to access the app. They're trying to help them
overcome these hurdles, right, but like, fucking come on, you know,
we've got the entire US government here and and it's
my friends trying to get five bucks from from you
know whoever to buy an iPhone so migrants can share it,
(10:16):
Like it's obscene.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
Only unaccompanied miners.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Would be processed if they entered between ports of entry, right,
So that's people under the age of eighteen without their folks,
anyone who tried to cross between ports of entries. So
port of entry is when you cross the border with
your passport and you go through an office that support
of entry. Right, So if you cross in another fashion
over a river, over a wall, around a wall, under
a wall, through a wall, just across the desert, weare
there isn't a wall that's between ports of entries. If
(10:42):
anyone tries two or more times, then during a border emergency,
they will be barred from the United States for a period.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
I think it's a year.
Speaker 1 (10:49):
I should note that this bill didn't pass, but Biden
did write an executive order setting an arbitrary cap at
twenty five hundred encounters per day, which you will notice
is lower. And it removes the requirement that border patrol
ask migrants if they fear persecution. So this is really important.
It's called a shout test. And the difference here is
between me saying and ensuring you've just come across the border,
(11:10):
are you here because you fear persecution? Can you not
safely go home? And me just saying get in the
fucking van, and you having to articulate that you fear persecution? Right,
Which is that requires them to know that they have
to articulate it. It requires them to be able to
articulate it in a language it's intelligible to the officer
or whoever's interviewing them. Right, it's a much higher barrier.
And in both cases, right, you could have the same
(11:32):
person and they could be rejected because they didn't pass
this so called shout test.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
It's ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
It's a really bullshit workaround for someone who is clearly
eligible for asylum.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Yeah, And like any good faith actor wants to find
out if that person is going to be persecuted when
they go home. And so moving to a shout test,
like you are consciously saying some people were going to
send home they will fucking die, or they will be tortured,
or they will face persecution of other means, right, because
they didn't articulate in the right words their fear of persecution.
(12:05):
And it's just there is not a good faith argument
for this. It's just get numbers down at the cost
of human suffering. So in this case, right, I have
met migrants with pretty rock SOIDID claims. I don't want
to go into the details of their cases too much.
I will in the future, but like you know, I'm
out at the border a lot, and I'm out in
(12:27):
the back country there a lot, and I try and
help people whenever I can. I talk to them about
their claims, and I'm not going to ask someone to
justify their trauma to me with seventeen documents, right, But
some of them have shown me things which I do
believe would would be a very cast iron asylum claim,
and they seem to be since Biden's executive order, just
getting booted back across the border. So he kind of
(12:47):
worked around that part of the bill failing. But let's
look at what else is in it. So if the
bill that Harris is saying she will reintroduce, of course
she herself can't, right, it's a legislative act or senator
or how over the House would The bill would limit
border closures to two hundred and seventy days, two hundred
and twenty five days, and one hundred and eighty days
for the first three years, which no, there's no limit
(13:09):
in the Biden executive order.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
So I guess that's better. I guess.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
I mean, fucking two hundred and seventy days when you
can't claim asylum, that's a lot of days. There's also
funding a lot of funding from more border patrol agents,
of course, more asylum officers, as well as more than
one hundred judges. We do need to move people through
the immigration system. But a lot more pressingly, we need
to open legal passways that are not walking across the
desert and passing a shout test. It would mandate detaining
(13:35):
migrants if they try to enter the US outside of
ports of entry, depending their asylum claim. So this is
really big. Actually, it's going to result in a massive
increase in the amount of asylum detention beds we need.
The bill contains funding for another ten thousand more beds,
will probably end up needing more than that. But all
of these beds are not in state run facilities, right,
They're in private facilities. ICE coordinates with it's cour civic.
(13:59):
It's people who when Biden first came into office, he
wrote he wrote an executive order about getting rid of
private prisons. These are the private prisons. This is how
we reallocated money to those same people doing this terrible thing, right,
which is locking people up for profit. I've heard terrible
stories about the conditions in some of these detention centers.
And this is the guy who ran on and bragged
(14:20):
about closing down private prisons, sending more money to private
prisons just for migrants dot citizens because apparently their rights
don't matter. As much that their lives don't matter as
much talking of things that don't matter, Sharen, should we
take an at break.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
That was beautiful, James, thank you.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
So we're back, and I want to talk about what
Harris has done as VP, which is they put her
on this root causes beat right, what she's supposed to
go after, the root causes of migration. So I want
to start with this message, as she sent to the
people of Guatemala.
Speaker 5 (15:05):
I want to be clear to folks in this region
who are thinking about making that dangerous track to the
United States Mexico border, do not come.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Do not come.
Speaker 5 (15:21):
The United States will continue to enforce our laws and
secure our border. They are legal methods by which migration
can and should occur, but we, as one of our priorities,
will discourage illegal migration. And I believe if you come
(15:43):
to our border, you will be turned back.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
Do not come. Yeah, I think I've seen that before.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Yeah. She took a lot of shit for that one,
rightly understandably.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah, this is not the only time to bide administration
said this. By the way, they were tweeting, do not
come in and creole in twenty twenty one, Well from
the Embassy of the United States in eighty This has
been their message and continues to be their message.
Speaker 7 (16:09):
Now to the ongoing crisis down at the southern.
Speaker 6 (16:11):
Border, the focus of Vice President Kamala Harris's first overseas
trip since taking office.
Speaker 8 (16:16):
She had to Mexico today after spending yesterday in Guatemala,
where she announced several initiatives and delivered a message to
potential migrants there, do not come to the United States.
The Vice President also sat down exclusively with the NBC's
Lester Hoole, who began by asking her about that warning.
Speaker 6 (16:33):
In the news conference here in Guatemala City. You had
a message for would be migrants, don't come. Why should
they believe you when they know that people are getting in.
Speaker 5 (16:43):
I've been working on this issue for a very long time,
and the kind of violence and danger that is associated
with that track, especially when we're talking about from Guatemala
through Mexico to the United States, it's extremely dangerous. We
are looking at a situation where people are fleeing because
(17:07):
of hunger, because of the hurricanes, because of the pandemic.
So the reason I am here is to address those issues.
Knowing that the people who are here for generations. They
want to stay, they don't want to leave, but they
need opportunity, they need assistance, they need support.
Speaker 6 (17:22):
Americans don't see a lot of them on a daily basis.
What they do see it at their own border. Children
being lowered over offences, children coming in with phone numbers
stenciled on their hand. And so the question has come up,
and you heard it here and you'll hear it again.
I'm sure it's why not visit the border? Why not
see what Americans are seeing in this crisis.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
Well, we are going to the boarder. We have to
deal with what's happening at the border. There's no question
about that. That's not a debatable point. But we have
to understand that there's a reason people are arriving at
our border and ask what is that reason, and then
identify the problem can fix it.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
So all of this was while the Biden administration continued
to defend and force Title forty two. If people haven't
listened to the series that made it about Title forty two,
and I've said that twice, but that's like two three
hours of me explaining Title forty two, So that would
explain it better than a cand of twenty seconds here.
Title forty two is a public health law, and the
idea of Title forty two is to prevent people with
(18:21):
tuberculosis coming into the United States. An element of Title
forty two of the United States Code it contains this.
The idea was never to use it as a de
facto block on asylum, which is what the Trump administration
did for a year and the Biden administration did for
nearly three years.
Speaker 9 (18:37):
Right.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
The Bidens registration did it for much much longer. This
ended in May of twenty twenty three, and it was used.
They called it catch and release, right, it was used
to bounce people straight back. As we spoke about before
catch and release.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
It's like you're literally like an animal practice, you know, like.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
Right, yeah, Like these people are fucking fish, and I
don't like doing that to fish. Shouldn't stress out of fish.
It's just vibing down there, ruin its day. So later
in that same interview, she was very defensive about her
failing to visit the border. But I think there are
very reasonable questions. Sometimes these criticisms are used in bad
(19:17):
faith by Republicans, So is everything right? It doesn't mean
that we shouldn't talk about it.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
We should.
Speaker 1 (19:24):
I didn't see a single elected official from the Democrat Party.
I guess fucking Jim Desmond turned up, but I wish
he wouldn't. He turned up, told lies about who paid
for the aid, and then forced his in turn to
apologize for it when a bunch of people turned up
at his office.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
Really great integrity.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
I didn't see a single Democrat for the months that
border patrol held thousands of people in open air attention,
without food, water, or shelter, and for the months of
my friends and I took care of them instead. What
Harris was doing was trying to connect business leaders with
economies in Central America to quote create jobs.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
She has some success with a Japanese car factor in
Guatemala and a Swiss coffee processor buying more beans and
committing to more coffee purchases.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
Right. But this shit does not work and it has
never worked.
Speaker 8 (20:15):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Obviously, my position on global economics is not the same
as hers. But we can't trickle down the causes of migration.
We can't do this with like a rising tide levels
or boats GDP stuff. Even if we do buy this
kind of freakonomics tier bullshit, it doesn't matter because the
change is going to take decades to come. Right, you
(20:39):
can't just just change a national economy. Change deals with unemployment,
with violence, with state violence, with nonstate violence overnight. And
it's very likely that the pace of climate change alone
will outstrip any benefits that these programs provide. Right, because
we are seeing increasingly people coming from countries that are
the most impacted by climate change to countries like the
(21:01):
United States, one of the countries that has made the
largest contribution to the climate change.
Speaker 3 (21:05):
Right.
Speaker 1 (21:06):
But this idea of like trickle down economics to stop migration,
it doesn't address the issue that most of the migrants
are no longer coming from the places she's going, Right,
So she's worked pretty extensively in the Northern Triangle, Guatemala, Hondordas,
in El Salvador. These are places which sent a lot
of migrants, may be in the earlier Barbera administration, but
(21:27):
that's not the case anymore. Right, Those are not typically
places I see migrants from, Right, I see migrants from Venezuela,
and we're going to get a lot more of those.
I see migrants from Turkey, many of them, but not
all of them.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Kurdish.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
I see migrants from North Africa. I see migrants from
the Sahel, I see migrants from India. I don't particularly
see people from the Northern Triangle. So the idea that
like lifting the economy in the Northern Triangle is going
to move the needle. It's just not even if we
buy the idea that it's possible, and I don't think
it is. So that's let's take a look at Donald Trump.
(22:02):
I guess I should give people a trigger warning. I'm
only going to include a little bit of Donald Trump
audio here, but yeah, you can tap the skiit.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
Button if you don't want to hear Donald Trump talking.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
So Donald Trump's policies largely are in response to things
that are not real or proposing things that the president
or Congress cannot do, or that the president cannot do
without the.
Speaker 3 (22:25):
Support of Congress.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
So his first thing is talking about ending birthright citizenship.
This is not a thing that he can do by
executive order. Right, this is an amendment to the Constitution
that requires an amendment to the Constitution to party back. Now,
you can mend the constitution, but I don't think you'd
ever get support for ending birth right citizenship.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Right.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
This has been the case since aster the Civil War,
and it exists to stop people disenfranchising the children of
formally enslaved people.
Speaker 7 (22:53):
Under Biden's current policies, even though these millions of illegal
border crosses have entered the country on awfully, all of
their future children will become automatic US citizens. Can you
imagine They'll be eligible for welfare, taxpayer funded healthcare, the
rate to vote, chain migration, and countless other government benefits,
(23:14):
many of which will also profit the illegal alien parents.
This policy is a reward for breaking the laws of
the United States and is obviously a magnet helping draw
the flood of illegals across our borders. They come by
the millions and millions and minions.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
So another thing that don Trump wants to do is
do away with the Diversity Visa program. Are you familiar
with the Diversity Visa.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
No, I'm going to say no, I'm familiar with it,
but I have to like know what it is in detail,
So please tell me.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
James, Okay, I would love to tell you.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
Sharing the DV program, I will avoid using the acronym.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Because it US. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
They we're just sending cops all over the World's Yeah,
the Diversity Visa program, better known as the Green Card Lottery,
allows about fifty five thousand or exactly fifty five thousand
in theory, immigrant visas a year for individuals from countries
that are underrepresented in the US immigration system.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I remember that. Well, that sounds familiar, Yes.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
Okay, yeah, So, like you'll meet people almost everywhere I go.
I tend not to go to countries that are highly
represented in the US immigration system, right, Those being countries
that find it easier for people to get visas like
h one B's right, because they are more economically maybe
close to the United States and have educational credentials that
translate across. So the Trump administration had made the diversity
(24:40):
visa program, it's such a massive cluster fuck that it
effectively didn't work. And the way that this happened was
because you don't just win the Green card lottery and
they mail a green cards to your house, like come
on over, Bud. You win the lottery, and that gives
you the right to go to the embassy to do
an interview and then you make the application. Right then
they check check you off on any checklist you might
(25:01):
be on. All the stuff that would normally apply to
a migrant it's not like an amnust T visa. And
what the Trump administration did was make it very hard
for people to get these appointments, especially during COVID and
this has been the case with the Bide administration as well.
They get the lowest priority now the cambuc And appointment,
but other people's stuff gets to sort of overtake.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Them in the line.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
Right, because you only have a year from receiving it
to claiming it de facto, this means that people don't
get it right. So we are not fifty five thousand
people are not coming because of the diversity visa. Even
if they were, this is not very many people, and
like it's just Trump. I don't know, maybe he saw
the phrase diversity and became triggered. But it's a weird
(25:46):
little bugbear like which I guess if you can focus
on weird little things. But still, the diversity visa is great.
The people I know who often most deserve visas people
who can't even afford to make the trip right to
walk here or you know, if you're not in the
Continental Americas, it's a lot more expensive.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
You have to fly. I guess you could take a vote.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
But some of those people I mean, my friend who
driving all around Iraq is applying for a diversity VSA
and like, I really hope he gets it, lovely man.
Trump also has this bug there about DHS paying benefits
to quote illegal aliens crooker.
Speaker 7 (26:21):
Joe Biden is running a NonStop conveyor belt importing illegal
aliens from all over the world into our country, and
the Biden Department of Homeland Security is abusing it so
called parole authority to give them more governmental benefits than
many law abiding citizens, including our vets. Our vets are
(26:43):
being taken advantage of. Our citizens are being taken advantage of.
It's very unfair and it's not going to stand.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
The Department of how My Security doesn't pay and benefits
to anyone. I guess it pays like border patrol agents
and people who work for it, but it's not giving
anyone public benefits. Right, and documented people normally ineligible for
most benefits, even people who do have legal status. And
he consistently conflates asylum seekers with undocumented people, right, maybe
because he genuinely doesn't know the difference, and it doesn't
(27:11):
care to learn the difference. Even people who have legal
status face a range of hurdles like sometimes they have
a forty quarter work bar for example, right, so that
it means you have to have been working for forty
periods of three months consecutively. Again, this is kind of
He might be talking about something called the public charge rule,
which can interfere with your citizenship or visa application if
(27:36):
you've taken certain times of benefits. So maybe he's looking
to make that a little bit broader. But again it's
really unclear, and it's kind of like identity politics grifting.
The next thing is we're getting towards QAnon territory.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Now, great, I.
Speaker 7 (27:50):
Will use Title forty two to end the child traffic
in crisis by returning all traffic children to their families
in their home countries and without then, and I will
urge Congress to ensure that anyone caught traffic in children.
Of course our border receives the death penalty immediately. And
that includes also for women, because women, as you know,
(28:12):
are number one in trafficking children are actually number two.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
This is some weird shit first of all, right, but
he talks about using Title forty two. This is not,
as I've talked about three times now, what Title forty
two is for it's very obvious that he thinks Title
forty two is immigration law because he very obviously used
it as that.
Speaker 3 (28:32):
Right.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
He was not using Title forty two to stop people
getting COVID because he did square root fuckles stop people
getting COVID, right, and there were not exemptions for vaccinated people.
It's very obvious that they use Title forty two cynically
as an immigration law. That is not what it is. Also,
deporting someone back to the situation they were trafficked from,
(28:53):
maybe not smart like maybe especially a miner who is
trafficked here, maybe we could help them one of the
richest countries the humanity has ever seen. Maybe not just
bumping them straight back to that country, maybe showing a
little bit of compassion. Human trafficking is a problem, but
this is not the solution. So Harris kind of touts
her prosecutorial experience when she talks about human trafficking. She's
(29:18):
actually been better than some not punishing people who were trafficked, right,
So I was reading that at one point she asked
prosecutors not to use the term teenage prostitute because that's
not really a thing. What we're seeing there is somebody
who is being trafficked, right, or somebody who has been victimized,
taken advantage of manipulated and seeing them as perpetrators is
(29:42):
fundamentally missing the fucking problem. And this is what the
legal system does far too often, right, is it goes
after the people who are the vactims, not the criminals.
She twice brought criminal charges against backpage dot Com, which
is a website.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
I guess whe people can find escorts.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I'm not familiar with these things, but I know that
some sex workers were opposed to that because they felt
it drove them kind of onto more underground platforms, which
which were even more risky to them. But obviously if
people were also being trafficked on this platform, So like
her record, I guess it is somewhat mixed. You know
what else is somewhat mixed? Shereen, what, James, it's the
(30:20):
products and services that we get to support this show.
You know, sometimes it's the cops, sometimes it's terrible coffee,
sometimes it's gold. You never know what you're going to get. Ooh,
we are backed, and we are back to one of
(30:41):
Donald Trump's oldest chestnutes, and that would be his stupid wall,
right that he wants to build.
Speaker 7 (30:47):
We created the most secure border in US history, by far,
dealing a major blow to the cartels and traffickers. We
built hundreds of miles of war, We renovated hundreds of
miles of water. We never had anything like it. And
then I got Mexico free of charge. You give us
twenty eight thousand soldiers to protect us from people coming
(31:08):
into our country illegally.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
He talks about building hundreds of miles a wall. He
sets up a couple of times. Right, we've renovated hundreds
of mile the wall. You know, did they build hundreds
that maybe just technically that they really.
Speaker 3 (31:21):
Fudged the numbers.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, I've had a lot of freedom of information requests
for that. I guess what's more relevant is that Biden.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
Also built the wall, right, mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Calm, that's not talking about it. But as we've documented
numerous times, Biden has continued to build the wall. He's
continued to build the barrier, which.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Is a wall.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
He has repaired other sections of war, he has upgraded
sections of fence to wall. They're both doing this, right.
There's maybe Donald Trump would do more of it, but
sometimes I feel like it's general and competence might prevent
him from doing any more than Biden's like competent migrant
as they call it, de terrents, right, deterrence through death
is It's probably a better way of phrasing it. Trump
(32:02):
also talks about a total ban on taxpair dollars to
give legal aid to undocumented people. Again, I'm not sure
if he knows what he's talking about. I don't know
what he's talking about. He might be referring to it.
We have a program in San Diego County where San
Diego County pays for some people to defend migrants who
are detained by ICE, right, so they can have access
to a lawyer. ICE has responded to that by moving
(32:24):
those people to Texas.
Speaker 2 (32:26):
Oh that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Yeah, yeah, totally normal. Good.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
I'm glad we voted for the anti fascist guy. Everything's
going great, exactly. You can listen to my episode about
that if you want to know more about that. But
I don't know if he means like they don't get
public defenders if they're accused of a crime.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Isn't it just true that he can also just like
use these trigger words to make people mad.
Speaker 3 (32:45):
Yes, yes, that is what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
Yeah, yeah, not necessari always has to be base in fact.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
No, yeah, that's to be found with Donald Trump, this
doesn't matter. And then finally talking of stuff that doesn't
have to be real, he's absolutely batshit insane idea of
fucking aiding Mexico to kill members of cartels, which that's yeah, unhinged, Yeah,
that is unhinged. That will resolve in more violence, it
will result in more instability, it will result in more death.
(33:12):
I think, I'm it's pretty much unclear when it comes
to that one, Like she is not proposing invading Mexico.
So much of what Donald Trump says is insane and
it doesn't make sense. So I wanted to look at
some of the people who kind of lean on Trump,
some of the people who might be a little bit
more coherent right when it comes to crafting that policy.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
Right.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Couldn't get Steven Mirr on the podcast Sad, but we
did get these people from the Texas Public Policy Foundation
who Robert and Gare spoke to at the Republican National Convention.
So here's them talking about visas and immigration.
Speaker 9 (33:46):
I've tried to hire people from other countries. It takes
months and months and months to get that done. It
usually spend a lot of money doing it as well,
and so the system is disincentivized to do that. So,
you know, actually doing the last Trump administration, the start
looking at like let's reduce the number of visas and
have broader categories. Right, So I think they're trying to
get down to about seventeen visas, get to more marit
(34:08):
based program to fit the needs that we have. Make
sure that you can you know, it's not about like
what is the total number, but if we are needing labor,
we needing people in these areas, you can kind of
like as a dial, you can turn up and down
in certain areas on certain visas. And so I think
if you do have to first like stop the problem,
and then you also have to make systemic changes that
(34:30):
will overhaul the system and make a lot easier so
that people are incentivised to actually do it.
Speaker 3 (34:34):
The right way. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:36):
So these people aren't stupid, right, they won't just spew hate. Yeah,
They're much more competent in the facts. So I think
what we're seeing here, right is this undoubtedly is a
way to reduce what they see is undesirable migration, which
is to say, poor people and brown people you can
phrase it however you want, right, bit.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
I mean, in the Republican's eyes, maybe a lot of people,
all migration is undesirable migration.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
I feel like, yeah, well, people will talk to me.
I'm for those of you who have just listened to me.
I guess a white person British. You're not white, you're British. Yeah,
which is more like a kind of translucent really you
think about it. Yeah, so yeah, I am a British person,
(35:24):
which is important, I guess because people will talk to
me about immigration like I'm one of the good migrants
and they can go fuck themselves. Yeah that position, right,
That Like it's a like implicit white people are okay.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Yeah, right, that's all that means. It's like, oh, yeah,
you speak English and you're like me, great, come out,
come on into my racist country.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
Yeah exactly. Yeah, I'm like funny foreign as opposed to
like evil foreign I guess.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
I think it's also just like they don't see you
in whatever in their mind is a threat, right like
to I don't know, it makes no sense logically, but.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
Yeah it does if you understand it's relents of race.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
Yes, yeah, but I mean their perspective makes.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
No sense to me.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, same people who are barking about my fellow British
people being a threat because they happened to be Muslim,
right or brown, or seek in people that don't understand
it seeks anon Muslims. So what we actually need is
more legal pathways. He is correct that the visa system
needs changing, and we need ways that people can apply
and come here safely and not have to be trafficked
and not have to take massive risks.
Speaker 3 (36:27):
Right.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
I wanted to see what Robert and Geh had asked
them about this mass deportation seeing because I've seen some
people holding like mass deportations now sign at the RNC,
and that's always good sign that we're not sort of
sidestepping into fascism. So let's hear what you said about that.
Speaker 10 (36:43):
Is that plan kind of the mass detention and expulsion
of undocumented migrants in the US something that you think
is a good idea, something you support as the Heritage Foundation.
Speaker 9 (36:52):
Yeah, generally, you know, obviously you got to look at implementation,
right and how you actually go about doing that in
the right way, But yeah, absolutely generally.
Speaker 10 (37:02):
Yeah, and then what kind of time frame then, because
you just said this is something you have to like
lay some groundwork on and what time frame do you
see it being feasible to carry out something like that?
Speaker 9 (37:11):
You know, I actually don't have a good answer for that,
because you have to first get your arms around the problem.
We don't even know how many people are here, and
you don't know where they come from, and so it's
not like you're just trying to deport them all just
to Mexico or something like that, or the southern border, right, Like,
you have to first get your arms around the problem.
That's the first step, and then I think from there
(37:32):
you can actually understand figure out what a reasonable time
frame to do that is.
Speaker 3 (37:38):
Yeah, so this is pretty fucked.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
Like I should point out that the Bilbah Harris is
proposing also proposes bumping people back to Mexico without the
permission of Mexico.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
Right.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
I think so many of these policies just rely on
Mexico being kind of a sponge for US policy, like, oh,
they'll be fine, like God forbid Mexico act as a
sovereign country.
Speaker 3 (37:57):
Yeah, but this one seems different. Right.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
We had I feel like pretty good liberal support on
abolish ice under Trump that has completely evaporated under Biden.
But because we solved racism. Yeah, yeah, we fixed it.
I've forgotten about that. Yeah, that was that was the
big crunch point. So what this means is taking people
(38:21):
who have homes, lives, jobs, and families and tearing them
away from one of those things and tending them back
to a country that they may not have been to
in decades, that they may never have been to at all,
a place where they will undoubtedly face hardship, if not persecution,
and certainly having lived here having family here, will make
them more likely to be ransomed or blackmailed or any
(38:42):
of these things that happened to migrants when they're deported. Right,
And this is pretty bleak, Like I guess Harris hasn't
advocated for this, which seeing the amount of the amount
of people who fucking respond to my tweets with your
going home to like I a am a US citizen
and be fuck you.
Speaker 3 (39:00):
Yeah all the time, all the time. Yeah, it's so funny. Okay,
got a life.
Speaker 1 (39:06):
But yeah, it does seem that there is a wing
of the Trump and I talked to Trump people, right,
I was in the mountains this weekend, like I was
in Wyoming, mincing about in the mountains.
Speaker 3 (39:17):
It's lovely.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
But in talk to some people and I've never really
come across anyone who can like in the flesh. Maybe
it's just because those people are so repulsive, I wouldn't
talk to them, And it's probably quite likely. But advocated
for this right, like this idea of mass deportations, Like
like I said at the start of this show, like,
how does a country get into full on fascism?
Speaker 3 (39:36):
It is this.
Speaker 1 (39:38):
It is my taxes and your taxes, and some of
the people who are listening taxes paying for people who
have done nothing wrong, right, who have lived here, who
haven't done any crimes, who haven't hurt anyone, to be
at our expense, expelled from their home, detained in a
private prison whose owner company makes massive donations to politicians,
(39:59):
and then flown across the world at our expense, and
then dumped into a country where they no longer belong.
And that is as close as we get, I think
to like someone saying like send them to the camps
without saying that like, yeah, look, what was the Armenian genocide?
The Armenian genocide was a mass deportation, right of people
forced to walk across the desert and die on the way,
(40:20):
Like if you don't think this Trump ship is fascist,
Like I really don't know what to do. It doesn't
matter if it's fascist or not. Right, Like this is
the kind of rhetoric that's genocidal, Like I don't want
to argue about like Robert Preston and like different definitions,
because that doesn't matter. Like this shit is it is genocidal.
It is dehumanizing migrants, which has been a project of
(40:42):
the right wing news media and increasingly the liberal news media,
and also the Democrat Party now apparently as well as
the Republicans.
Speaker 3 (40:51):
But this is.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
A market step to the right. Both of these are right.
The Overton window has moved so far right migration in
the last eight years that it's almost an unrecognizable place.
And I guess what I when they end up by
saying what I always say about this is like the
solution is not within the argument about who to vote for.
Like these are state policies. These are also often set
(41:16):
by the legislature, as we saw when Biden's board bill failed, Right,
and that would require a change in the legislature, Like
there isn't a third party that can get a majority
in the legislature right now. So the way we fix
this is ourselves, right like we are seeing in the
UK right now, like violence towards Muslim people, andoance towards masques,
(41:37):
violence towards Islamic cultural centers, and people stepping up to
defend them. That is the only way we fix this
is by stepping up and shouldering our responsibility to our communities.
And people did that in the Trump administration to a degree,
Like when I'm twenty eighteen, when I was down in
Tijuana looking after folks who are part of the caravan
that Trump made a big spectacle in the midterms. People
(41:59):
showed up, showed up, a soccer mom, showed up in
minivans and helped us, and it was cool. The thing
was fucked, But like, I respect that we look after
those people, and that hasn't happened to as much of
a degree since, right And we've had more people than
we had in twenty eighteen in the open air detention sites,
and so like I guess where I want to end
(42:19):
is whoever wins, it's still our responsibility to take care
of migrants because neither of them is going to And
we are continuing with policies that will accelerate climate change.
We are continuing with policies that will impoverish people all
over the world and enriching people who are already super wealthy,
(42:40):
and those things will continue to drive migration. We can't
change those things in an actionable amount of time, but
what we can do is try our best to meet
people who come here with kindness. And so, yeah, I
would urge you to do that. I guess if you
want to volunteer, you can email Altro Lado it's Altro
Lado dot or border Kindness always need your money, Borderline
(43:03):
Relief Collective always need your money. And those are always
things that you can volunteer with or places you can
say your money if you don't have your time. But
you can also organize in your own neighborhood. I'm speaking
to some people today who are organizing in Maryland to
take care of some Kurdish refugees who I know, like
they weren't doing anything a year ago, right, they saw
a need and they saw it being a met and
(43:25):
they realized that they could meet it, and they've made
a huge difference to people's lives. So like wherever you are,
there are migrs in your community.
Speaker 3 (43:32):
And you can do that too. It could Happen Here
as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at cool zonemedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.
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Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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