Side Stories: ICE Stories w/ Kurt Braunohler & Thomas Kennedy

On this special edition of Side Stories, Ed sits down with comedian Kurt Braunohler to hear the story of his nephew Nelson, who is currently being held in ICE detention. Florida Immigrant Coalition organizer Tomas Kennedy joins the conversation as they expose the rapid rise of these immigration prisons, the brutal conditions inside them, and the horrifying speed with which this type of inhumane treatment is becoming normalized across the country.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Ed Larson?

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• 1:03Speaker 02

  There's no place to escape to.

• 1:04Speaker 03

  This is the last podcast.

• 1:06Speaker 02

  On the left.

• 1:08Speaker 01

  Side Stories?

• 1:10Speaker 02

  That's when the cannibalism started.

• 1:13Speaker 01

  Side Stories, yes.

• 1:21Ed Larson?

  Hello, humans, dogs, and cats that listen and watch Side Stories. My name's Ed Larson, of course. Today's gonna be a very special episode. I, if you remember back, I did a whole episode on Last Podcast on the Left that I led called The Florida Files: Pain in the Everglades. And the thing that I realized about the Everglades that was the saddest to me, of course, was Alligator Pelican, or Alligator Alcatraz, as it is better known. And it just hasn't sat right with me. And then a week after our episode came out, the place shut down. And so I wanted to find out what was going on there now, what the

• 2:04Ed Larson?

  state of Florida is like, and immigration across the country in general. So I'm sitting down with an amazing reporter. His name is Tomas Kennedy. He's written for the Sun Sentinel, the Miami Herald, the Miami New Times. And of course, he's part of the Florida Immigrant Coalition. He's gonna be with me in a little bit. But first, I'm talking to a friend, you know, because if we're gonna get to the bottom of immigration, you really gotta hear it from two white men. And so I'm talking to a buddy of mine, Kurt Braunohler. And what happened to Kurt is, I'm gonna let him get into it, but his nephew has been detained

• 2:43Ed Larson?

  by ICE for over two months, and they don't know what to do. And so he's my friend, and this is directly connected to me. And so as, before we get started with Tomas with some real answers, Kurt and I are gonna pose a couple of questions. So take it away, Kurt.

• 3:05Ed Larson?

  Welcome Kurt Braunohler. How you doing, man? Thank you for joining me all the way overseas.

• 3:10Speaker 04

  Well, I appreciate it, Ed. Yeah, it's really crazy what happened to Nelson. Nelson Contreras is my nephew. He was married, he is married to my niece, Ariel.

• 3:23Ed Larson?

  When did they get married?

• 3:24Speaker 04

  They got married in Ju-, early June. And then he had a routine, you know, immigration check-in in Philadelphia, which usually is, he goes to a kiosk and just kinda like punches in saying like, I'm here, I'm checking in, you know, as is required by law. He is an asylum seeker, and he entered the country legally with asylum status and has had that status for the past four years.

• 3:53Ed Larson?

  Where's he coming from?

• 3:55Speaker 04

  He's coming from Venezuela. He served in the National Guard and was asked to harm protesters and refused to do so, which made him an enemy of the state.

• 4:04Ed Larson?

  Christ. So what exactly happened in that situation, if you don't mind me asking? Do you know, or?

• 4:10Speaker 04

  I do not know the details of it. That's all I know, is that he was in the National Guard.

• 4:14Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 4:15Speaker 04

  And because it was, yeah, there was protesters involved, and he refused to harm them. And so that's kind of the situation that led him to not be safe in Venezuela.

• 4:25Ed Larson?

  Wow. And how long ago was that?

• 4:27Speaker 04

  That was four years ago.

• 4:28Ed Larson?

  Four years ago. Okay. So he's been here for a while now.

• 4:31Speaker 04

  He's been here for a while. He, you know, and he's like, you know, he's the kindest man. He's like such a nice guy. He volunteered so much at the nonprofit near his house called Mighty Writers, that they hired him full-time. And so he, he had a work permit, he was working full-time there. He was also picking up shifts in the evening at agricultural places, like there's a, there's a mushroom farm nearby where he lives in Pennsylvania.

• 5:03Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 5:04Speaker 04

  And he was like part of the community. I mean, he, he'd been dating my, my niece for years, and then they just got married. And then it was just like, less than a month after, he goes to, he goes on a Thursday to check in for his immigration check-ins. And they tell him that the kiosk is broken, come back on Saturday. And so he follows their instructions, come back on Saturday. Of course, federal buildings are closed on a Saturday, and ICE is waiting there, and they abduct him.

• 5:34Ed Larson?

  This is a story I've heard a bunch of times, which is very unfortunate. Was he the only person taken that day? Was he like specifically targeted? Were they targeting like a group of people?

• 5:46Speaker 04

  I don't know that, actually. That's a good question. But it did seem like they were, this was their plan, to tell people that the kiosk was broken. So maybe they took a lot of people that day.

• 5:56Ed Larson?

  Because people are just trying to do right. They're doing anything they can to not go home. I mean, this is a man seeking asylum. And if you don't really know what that means, that means it's too dangerous for him to go back where he's from, because people are looking for him at this point.

• 6:12Speaker 04

  And also, America has had an asylum process in place for decades. It's not like this is just some new thing that we're cooking up to drive. This has always been a part of what it means to, to be an American, is that we allow asylum cases for people who are in danger in their country.

• 6:32Ed Larson?

  Yeah, for at least my whole life, I know that much. It is, it's been going on forever. This isn't new. This isn't new.

• 6:37Speaker 04

  No.

• 6:38Ed Larson?

  So he's working in the community, he gets married to your wonderful niece, he's doing everything he can, and then he gets taken by ICE. And this was in June?

• 6:47Speaker 04

  This was in June. Yeah. So he has now been incarcerated for over 60 days. As is typical, they shipped him far away from where he was detained and where his family and community is.

• 7:01Ed Larson?

  Because they don't want anyone coming to visit him. Because usually, these people don't have any money. And when they don't have money, they can't take off of work, or they don't even have enough money to go rent to some of the, because you wanna go see him twice, maybe, if you're gonna take a whole day if they're far away. So you gotta rent a hotel room, some people gotta rent a car, some people, they gotta take off work. This whole thing could end up costing a thousand dollars just to say hi. And then that experience alone is extremely traumatizing and not sweet like you hope it to be.

• 7:29Speaker 04

  Yeah. Exactly.

• 7:31Ed Larson?

  It's torture.

• 7:33Speaker 04

  It takes her, if she wants to go see him, it's an entire day affair of her driving all the way out to the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania, where the detention center is. We do know where he is now. And we put money into his account so that he can text and he can make phone calls. So we've been in contact with him, which is great. He, you know.

• 7:56Ed Larson?

  So he has a canteen? Do they treat it like real jail?

• 8:00Speaker 04

  I think they do. Also, by the way, all of these detention centers are privately run. You know, they're just make, they're just making money. They're just making so much money off of what, of what is going on.

• 8:12Ed Larson?

  Stephen Miller's invested in them.

• 8:14Speaker 04

  It's really, it's really infuriating. And so, within 24 hours of his detainment, my niece filed a habeas corpus petition. And so then it went to a federal judge, the federal judge pushed it off to an immigration judge. And this is the craziest part, he had 30 letters from the community, I wrote one, my wife wrote one, 30 letters in support. He had 30 people in the virtual courtroom, waiting. And then as his case was called, they just kicked all of us out of the virtual waiting room. And then said it was some bullshit

• 8:55Speaker 04

  because of, people had been recording the process or whatever. No one was recording their screen. They kicked us all out, they said 30 letters of support didn't matter, that he's still a, he's still a flight risk, even though the only reason he was taken is because he was following the rules.

• 9:15Ed Larson?

  Yeah. And don't they wanna get rid of him? Don't they want him to be a flight risk? Like?

• 9:19Speaker 04

  Well, flight risk, meaning that he wouldn't show up for the rest of his asylum case hearings, right? But not that, I don't know, that he would leave. But, which is insane. And so now, that we've appealed that, it's gone to the federal judge, I just found out like 15 minutes before I got on, that the federal judge denied the appeal. And so now we're just looking at this incredibly long, drawn-out process. Because he had, he had an asylum date.

• 9:48Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 9:48Speaker 04

  But that date was in December, that date was for people who are not incarcerated. And so now he has to get a new date for incarcerated persons, that, which, and he doesn't even have that yet. So now it's just this.

• 10:03Ed Larson?

  So now he's looking to jail till at least 2027, if he's lucky.

• 10:08Speaker 04

  If he's lucky, yeah.

• 10:09Ed Larson?

  Kind of, for no reason. For a man, he literally, he's been planting mushrooms, walking around, having a job in the community, just married an American, which should be enough. I always thought in the, in my head, until like last year, that that was everything you needed. That was just, you marry, or you fall in love, you marry an American, you're an American.

• 10:31Speaker 04

  Yeah, you have like, you have a meeting with somebody at the State Department, and they're like, let me see pictures from your wedding. And then they like look out of it, make sure it's not, it's a real wedding. And then you're, and then you, and then you get a green card. And then you have a green card, and then you're on a path to getting citizenship. It seems.

• 10:46Ed Larson?

  I've heard of even crazier cases, which is what they were doing in Florida, where people would. Do the habeas corpus, they would say they couldn't find because alligator Alcatraz just straight up wasn't logging people into the system when they show up. And so they would file habeas corpus and then when the habeas corpus was filed, they would move the people in the middle of the night to a different detention center. And then you would have to file a whole new habeas corpus. And like, it was just a process that kept going over and over and over and over again. So the fact that it only happened once to you guys is like, almost a miracle, because I think Pennsylvania is slightly better than Florida. And it's just like, the whole process right now. And like, the food they're being fed

• 11:29Ed Larson?

  is horrible. What, how do they, how do you, what do you know about the treatment at his facility? Because I know over Delaney in New Jersey, just a couple of miles away, is a total nightmare.

• 11:39Speaker 04

  Yeah. And he, and that, and that has like, 300 people there. I mean, someone just died at Delaney Hall. I live not too far away from Delaney Hall, and it's insane. He is at one of the largest detention centers, I think, on the, in the Northeast. It's outside of State College, Pennsylvania. And so, the, as far as I understand, there have not been too horrific of, it's just jail. It's jail conditions, as opposed to, like, treating human beings like animals conditions. So, that's, you know, like, good? No, it's still jail, right?

• 12:15Ed Larson?

  Exactly. No, it's, it's tough. And so, you're all kicked out of the Zoom. First of all, why are you not even allowed to record the Zoom? Who cares? It's court.

• 12:23Speaker 04

  Who cares?

• 12:24Ed Larson?

  Yeah. Like, what does it matter? Like, why, what are you hiding? They're obviously hiding something because they know they're doing something wrong. No.

• 12:30Speaker 04

  And also, the judge would not let his lawyer speak. Just kept in, cutting her off and cutting her off, saying like, I've seen that, she wouldn't allow the, the lawyer on, for Nelson to explain the summary of her, you know, of her motion. And then, and then at one point, apparently just turned her camera off, and then the, the, you know, the, the, the federal lawyer turned his camera off, and then they were just both gone for like, 15 minutes. And then just came back and it was over.

• 13:05Ed Larson?

  Have you met other people going through this, through this process? Like, when you guys are in, I'm sure your niece definitely has, because she's been going to the detention center. But, like, you know, what else have you heard? Like, I'm sure many people have shared their stories with you at this point.

• 13:19Speaker 04

  Yeah. It, I mean, it's just, you know, my niece, when she goes, it's just all families. It's all families. And if there's a family member who's been ripped literally out of their community, over and over and over again, you know, this, this is, the insane part to me is that this, what's happening to Nelson, is happening to thousands of people in the United States. And it's crazy. These camps, they're, it's crazy.

• 13:44Ed Larson?

  Yeah. I mean, they are, they are camps. They're concentration camps. There's no way, and like, people get upset when you call them that. Because they always go back to the Holocaust. They're like, oh, you know, they're not, they're not putting people in ovens, they're not doing this, they're not, why you can't call them a constant, Auschwitz was a working camp for multiple years before they started killing people. Now-

• 14:03Speaker 04

  It was just at the end, right?

• 14:05Ed Larson?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, you're German, you know, they were your friends. You know, and so it's, it's one of those things where, it's like, this is the beginning. They just recently said they, if they deport people and they die mysteriously, once they get back where they're going, they're not counting those deaths. This is what's happening right now. We're, we are descending into straight up fascism. There's no if ands buts about it. Your family is directly affected by it. You're a regular ass, white dude, who's just like, you know, like-

• 14:40Speaker 04

  Look at how, look at how white I am. And my family's not protected from it. This is, originally, the agreement was, if you're this white, then your family is protected.

• 14:51Ed Larson?

  So this is all completely insane. There is a GoFundMe set up for Kurt and, uh, his family, and it's doing well. I, I suggest you go and check it out. It's on his Instagram. But also, there's so many people who have no one. There's so many people who are just going through this and being tortured in jail. And, uh, from what I learned about alligator Alcatraz, there was, not to scare you too much, because I know you love this man, but they're literally putting people in the box. You know, they're doing, they're doing horrible things to these people in the middle of summer. They're taking away basic human rights. They got, uh, their, their water has parasites in it. It's, it's awful. Everything is awful. What's happening right now, we're deliberately torturing people

• 15:36Ed Larson?

  who would be great Americans if we, and they're paying taxes. This, Nelson, Nelson pays taxes. Nelson has a paycheck, you know?

• 15:46Speaker 04

  He has multiple jobs.

• 15:47Ed Larson?

  Yeah. You know that every time you get paid through a work permit, they take a bunch of the goddamn money. So it's not like, he's not contributing to society. It's not like he's not working for nonprofits. They're stealing good people from good families. And now, my friend is a victim, and it's insane. And so I think that everyone, if you look hard enough, someone you know, someone you love, is a victim of this shit. And you gotta go, and I'm sick of people just sitting around and thinking that it's just gonna fix itself. We have to do something. You gotta get out there. You gotta talk about this as much as possible. You hear someone at the dinner table, saying that this is a good thing, you fucking yell at them. Because this is ridiculous. We're heading into disaster. Everyone's gonna

• 16:32Ed Larson?

  have to leave this country if it keeps going this way. You know, and so, and I'm sorry to go on a rant for you, Kurt, but this is, but I'm sure you're blue in the face for this last two months. You're just supposed to be going out there and making people laugh. You're fucking sad all the time. You just isn't helping. This is, like, this is a nightmare. You know?

• 16:53Speaker 04

  Yeah. I mean, I think the main thing to keep in mind is like, if it can happen to my family, it can happen to your family. It can happen.

• 17:00Ed Larson?

  I have wonderful members of my family who are from Peru. And I get so scared for them all the time. And it's just, they've been married to my dad, and I just, at this point, I don't think any rules matter anymore. And they're just taking people. They've deported Americans. They're taking people who have served for this country. It is, it is, all rules are out the window. It's all about money. It has nothing to do with anything. It's not about keeping us safe. Nelson wasn't hurting anybody. Nelson was only helping people. And that's what they're more concerned about. It's people who are making it easier for everyone else.

• 17:35Speaker 04

  And, yeah, no criminal record whatsoever. And also, what, what this doesn't speak to as well is just like, the level of fear that everyone has to live with because of the way that ICE operates, with no rules across the board. You know, I had someone contact me who's a close friend. Her son is married, uh, is married to someone who was not born in this country. Um, but she hasn't been able to get the green card yet. Um, and so, you know, they were going to go to a movie or something. And she was like, oh, I forgot, she ran back. It was like, 100 degrees out. She was like, I forgot my sweater. And she like, grabbed her sweater. And she's like, they're like, why do you need your sweater?

• 18:16Speaker 04

  She's like, I, I just, you know, in detention centers, it's really cold, I've heard. And so I just want to have it on me in case something happens. And that has to be her everyday life, you know, at all times. Just normal. That's just a normal thing.

• 18:30Ed Larson?

  Yeah, I got my sweater because it's cold in jail for no reason. This is fucking ridiculous. I'm really sorry that you're going through this, bro. My, my heart goes out to you. I, uh, and your family. I'm getting the word out the best I can. Uh, please, everyone, just do something about this. Don't just sit there. This is just tearing apart normal ass people all over this country. Uh, do you have any, any concerns? I'm talking to an expert in a little bit. Is there anything that you'd like me to ask?

• 19:02Speaker 04

  Oh, I don't, I don't know about that because, but I do know, I just want to tell everybody that, um, my, my niece and my nephew are from the 6th District in Pennsylvania. Um, if anybody has any, knows anybody from the 6th District in Pennsylvania that might be able to help, just wanted to get that word out there as well.

• 19:24Ed Larson?

  Well, thank you so much for coming by, buddy. I love you, Kurt. Kurt's been so good to me my whole comedy career, from performing in the back of a U-Haul truck and, and, and driving us around and it's flying around everywhere. You're the craziest dude ever. The only show I've ever did that had a puppy parade connect, connected to it, uh, is one of, one of the great minds of, uh, of my, uh, my comedy generation. And I love you so much, pal. And I can't wait for this all to get fixed for you and your family. None of, no one deserves this, including everyone else you don't know. They also don't deserve this. Get back to your vacation. I love you. Thank you so much for coming and hanging out with me.

• 20:02Speaker 04

  All right. Thank you.

• 20:04Ed Larson?

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• 24:25Ed Larson?

  Live from your grave.

• 24:29Speaker 01

  Okay, now I'm being joined by a man I admire very much, to be honest with you. His name is Tomas Kennedy. He lives in Miami. He's a reporter. He's part of the Florida immigrant coalition. If you wanna, if you're curious what he's doing and what he's working on, go to Tomas Ken on Instagram. That's T-O-M-A-S-K-E-N-N on Instagram to stay up to date on everything he's doing. He's got lots of articles in the Miami New, the Miami New Times. I believe you've written for the Miami Herald and the Sun Sentinel as well, which are very good papers. And it's an honor to be here with you. And first off, I want

• 25:11Speaker 01

  to thank you, because when I did the Florida Files episode, and I talked about Alligator Alcatraz a little bit, I reached out to Tomas, and I was like, please tell me what I'm doing wrong. And I believe you, I believe you helped me a great deal. And I want to thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart, because it's such a touchy subject, and I'm just a silly comedian. And so it is, it is nice to have someone who's a very much smarter than I.

• 25:40Speaker 05

  I'm sure that's not the case, but that's very generous and kind. And I'm happy to have helped. It was a great conversation. So, yeah, happy to hear that.

• 25:49Speaker 01

  Were you able, did you ever listen to the episode?

• 25:52Speaker 05

  I did, I did.

• 25:53Speaker 01

  What did I get wrong?

• 25:55Speaker 05

  No, I mean, no, not anything that I can remember, really.

• 25:58Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. Hey, no, I think if it was horrible, you definitely would remember it. So, right after the episode came out, Alligator Alcatraz closed, like, the next week. It was, it was so bizarre. It was, it was very bizarre. So, what's going on down there now that it's closed?

• 26:20Speaker 05

  I mean, so, most of the people that were in there are unfortunately not free. They're not, you know, they did not reacquire their freedom. The vast majority of people were transferred over to other detention facilities, whether in Florida or in other states. And some were actually sent to jails, you know, like, regular jails that have been converted, at least parts of them, for immigration detention through federal agreements with, with the Department of Homeland Security. And these jails are, yeah, and these jails are way over capacity due to the uptick in immigration enforcement that we've seen in, in, you know, in recent days, in recent weeks. So, obviously, it's a good thing that

• 27:05Speaker 05

  that detention facility, the Alligator Alcatraz, the concentration camp is closed. That's in and of itself a good thing, but that doesn't mean that conditions for the, for the detainees that were formerly there have gotten better, unfortunately.

• 27:20Speaker 01

  And so, they're at local jails now, too? That's insane to me, because it's not a real, I mean, is it, is it an actual crime? Are they charged with anything when they're being held?

• 27:31Speaker 05

  No, I mean, you know, we've seen the statistics, but over 70%, 71% of people in ICE detention do not have a criminal history or criminal charges. And that's the statistic that has actually held for the last two years as a constant. It's curious. But no, I mean, most of them are guilty of, if anything, a civil infraction, right? Being in the country without authorization. But that, that doesn't amount to a criminal charge in most cases.

• 28:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, obviously, Alligator Alcatraz was the worst of the worst. What are the other detention centers like? And what are some of them? There's the one in, close to Jacksonville, that, that was deportation depot or something like that?

• 28:16Speaker 05

  It's so stupid.

• 28:18Speaker 01

  I hate them so much. But, yeah, but, yeah.

• 28:21Speaker 05

  They actually, you know, we actually, when they opened, they started selling Home Depot themed merch. That was deportation depot merch. And we actually contacted, with the help of Representative Ana Scimani, who's a great lawmaker here in Florida, we contacted Home Depot's lobbyists. And they actually had, ended up themselves contacting the state of Florida, and sent them a cease and desist to get them to stop selling Home Depot, deportation depot merch. So, it's just a little tidbit. But, yeah, I mean, that's, that's a facility, that's, that's a converted jail that they have adapted into an immigration detention site. I mean, there's Glades County, which is another sheriff-run facility that has

• 29:05Speaker 05

  historically had a contract to detain immigrants. There's the-

• 29:10Speaker 01

  Is that out by Glade Central, Pohque area?

• 29:13Speaker 05

  Correct. Exactly. Then there's BTC, I think that's Broward Transitional Center in Pompano Beach, which is a completely for-profit, privately-run immigration detention facility. It's run by the Geo Group, one of the largest for-profit prison companies in the United States, really the world. Then there's the Chrome Detention Facility, which has been at, that one's controlled by the federal government. And historically, it was a missile silo during the Cold War that was converted after, you know, the Mariel Boatlift, and that influx, it was converted over time into a detention facility, and historically, it's been used as such. But, yeah, there's a number of detention facilities, and in fact, there's

• 29:55Speaker 05

  now an effort by the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles, which houses the Florida Highway Patrol, one of the most sell-est agencies in immigration enforcement in Florida, they just put out a document of, of expressing interest in acquire five or more facilities to be converted into detention sites, which means that the Florida Highway Patrol is not just in the immigration enforcement business now. They appear to be attempting to get into the business of handling detention facilities themselves.

• 30:27Speaker 01

  Isn't, is that legal?

• 30:30Speaker 05

  I mean, we are in a lawless time in our, in this country, unfortunately. I mean, look, we, we talked about this when we, when we discussed Alligator Alcatraz. Alligator Alcatraz never signed what's called a 287G contract, or an intergovernmental service agreement, an IGSA. So it's a, you know, I don't want to get too in the weeds and bore people, but you know, under the INA, which is the Immigration and Nationality Act, there's a section called 287G, which is used to delegate federal authority to state or local entities to conduct immigration responsibilities, right? And where there is police, or a municipality, or a detention facility, these legal agreements have to be signed because under the Constitution,

• 31:15Speaker 05

  the supremacy clause gives the federal government, again, immigration responsibilities. So Alligator Alcatraz never signed these contracts. They were operating completely with, outside the purview of the federal government, obviously with the blessing, but outside the purview of the federal government, with no legal authority to detain immigrants. There was a law, there was an active lawsuit that was still pending when the place closed down. There were several, actually. But they did it anyways, because they don't, they don't care.

• 31:45Ed Larson?

  Yeah. Now, was Alligator Alcatraz a private prison?

• 31:49Speaker 05

  No, Alligator Alcatraz, well, sort of. Alligator Alcatraz was a state-run prison that was managed by the Florida Department of Emergency Management, historically tasked with dealing, you know, with, with emergencies, like hurricanes here in Florida.

• 32:05Ed Larson?

  Yeah, hurricanes are very popular in Florida.

• 32:07Speaker 05

  Correct, correct. They, you know, they, they happen with, with frequency. But they got into the business of immigration detention. They actually spent more than a billion dollars of our emergency preparedness fund. They, there was only nine million dollars left by the time that they had finished rated, rating it. But, so it was a state-run facility, but everything inside it was administered by contractors, whether it was, you know, health services, which were lackluster, to say the least.

• 32:35Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 32:36Speaker 05

  Security, transportation, communications, the building, food, et cetera. It was all ran by vendors. And that's why they spent so much money on it, because people were getting their bag, right? I mean, all these contractors walked away with millions and millions and millions of dollars. More than a billion dollars, actually.

• 32:54Ed Larson?

  Yeah, and it was all pay-to-play, too, because a lot of those contractors, they had donated to DeSantis, and then a couple of weeks later, they would get these contracts to build Alligator Alcatraz, correct?

• 33:05Speaker 05

  Correct. You know, for, for example, and this happened numerous times, but a Texas-based company received a six-million-dollar contract days after giving the Florida GOP, the Florida Republican Party, a $10,000 donation. So that's, that's a big return on investment, right?

• 33:27Ed Larson?

  Absolutely. Oh, my gosh. I wish we had that over here. So, explain to me, I think I need a little help with this, but I'm pretty sure people at home definitely do. How does a private prison make money off of immigrants being put there? It doesn't, it, it doesn't make sense to me.

• 33:45Speaker 05

  Well, one is from the contracts, right, that they are receiving from the federal government. But oftentimes, I mean, the, the federal government subsidizes the, the beds. The beds means that each individual person that is detained, right? And there's bed quotas. So these, these prisons have quotas in terms of how many people need to be detained there, which gives an incentive in terms of deporting people or not. But it's all done through, basically, the transfer of taxpayer dollars, public funds, into the coffers of these private contractors.

• 34:24Ed Larson?

  Yeah, and it's, again, that's the Geo Group, and Core Civic is another one, right?

• 34:29Speaker 05

  Core Civic is a huge for-profit prison company in the United States. And again, these companies don't just do immigration detention. They also have regular criminal for-profit jails, which is also a, you know, it's, it's, it's an, it's an evil industry, to be honest.

• 34:48Ed Larson?

  It is, it is. And please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm gonna say that 100 times today. The, don't do, politicians, they invest in these places, right? Like, Core Civic and Geo Group, like, there are, like, Stephen Miller, I heard, has private prison stock, and he's the one making all these laws.

• 35:08Speaker 05

  Correct. Stephen Miller has a stake in not just for-profit prisons, but also companies that are creating surveillance technologies, like Palantir, for example. But the inverse of that is that these companies also invest in politicians through campaign donations, right? And I'll tell you, I'll tell you a story from years ago. There was a, and folks might remember this, because it was like a big national controversy. I mean, this was like eight years ago, yeah, 2018. There was a detention facility, a for-profit detention facility in Homestead, which is a city in the sou- southern part of Miami-Dade County

• 35:49Speaker 05

  that was just solely for underage minors, for unaccompanied migrant children. And that facility was administered by a company named Caliburn, sort of like this global, transnational company. And who sat on the board of Caliburn at the time, and its subsidiary CDR? John Kelly, who was, if you might remember, he was not only Trump's first Homeland Security Secretary, he went on to be his chief of staff, right? So, I, I say that to highlight, there's, whether it's that instance, or, you know, Stephen Miller profiting off of Palantir and for-profit prison companies, there's a revolving door of circular financing, right?

• 36:34Speaker 05

  Where like, these people go into the public sector, they institute this predatory detention and enforcement policies, and then they take a stake on the companies that carry it out, and turn a profit themselves.

• 36:48Ed Larson?

  How was DeSantis using the money from Alligator Alcatraz personally?

• 36:53Speaker 05

  That's a great question. So, there was great reporting by the Florida Phoenix and, and other outlets here in Florida that showed that, as I told you, the Florida Department of Emergency Management was the, their entity responsible for Alligator Alcatraz. They were raiding our, our emergency fund, Florida's emergency fund. And it turns out that they were pretty much grifting with it. They were, they, they, there were receipts that they used the money on private hotel stays at, at resorts, like Margaritaville. They were, they were running.

• 37:28Ed Larson?

  Well, that's where business and politics is conducted in Florida.

• 37:32Speaker 05

  Yeah. And, and, and they were running bar tabs at Margaritaville and other bars in places as far as Tallahassee, which is nowhere near Alligator Alcatraz. They were, they were paying for catering, for things nowhere near Alligator Alcatraz. Not that it should matter, but, you know.

• 37:51Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 37:51Speaker 05

  That's to the grift. They were paying for private jet charters, for car rentals.

• 37:57Ed Larson?

  Oh, my.

• 37:57Speaker 05

  The, the.

• 37:59Ed Larson?

  That's like 100,000 a pop for private jets. That's expensive, man.

• 38:04Speaker 05

  The abuse of this, of these funds was so egregious that the Florida Legislature, which, you know, has served us pretty much a rubber stamp for, you know, whatever the governors went into doing the last eight, nine years, they actually passed a bill obstructing some, some of these expenditures, because it was just so corrupt and, and grifty.

• 38:26Ed Larson?

  Man, that is nauseating. The, now, Alligator Alcatraz closed, that land, has it gone back to the Mikisuki people, or is it still government-owned land?

• 38:40Speaker 05

  I'm sorry, I do have to add one more insane expenditure.

• 38:43Ed Larson?

  Give it to me.

• 38:44Speaker 05

  They spent, and I'm not kidding here, $219 million on one porta potty company called Duty Calls. Just one porta, porta potty company, $219 million. But to your question, so, the, the actual land was never in possession of the Mikisuki tribe, even though it is on the Big Cypress Preserve, and it's adjacent to their reservation. It is owned by Miami-Dade County. And it, it sits an airstrip that was part of an abandoned plant to build, what was called Jetport Everglades, which at the time was gonna be the largest airport in the world. It was fought against by a bunch of environmentalists,

• 39:29Speaker 05

  because they wanted to, you know, they, they were concerned about the impact to, to the, to the Everglades ecosystem.

• 39:34Ed Larson?

  Yeah, you got the mangroves and everything down there. You can't be running the biggest airport in the world on a swamp. It's a bad idea.

• 39:42Speaker 05

  Correct. And it was abandoned in the 60s, but there was one airstrip that was built, and sort of abandoned, but it was used by Miami-Dade County as a training airport for small-to-light aircraft. So that's what it's been historically. And the state of Florida seized the land from Miami-Dade County, commandeered it for a year. Now it's reverted back to Miami-Dade County. So Miami-Dade County's back in possession, and everything in there has been dismantled. There's still an active lawsuit related to the environmental impact and, and damage that the site did for, for, for the, for the past year.

• 40:17Ed Larson?

  Yeah, because there's a, one of the largest aquifers in Florida down there, right?

• 40:23Speaker 05

  I mean, it's not just that, you know, it's, it's the mangroves, it's the aquifer, it's, it's, it's, it's just the, the, the over-the-ground water, the wildlife, Florida Panthers, which have been historically endangered, and only in recent years, you know, their population has begun to increase. That land is so protected that it's one of two places in Florida, I believe, that has a dark sky designation. And what that means is that there can't be any sort of lighting or illumination infrastructure built there because of the, the impact to wildlife, reptiles, birds especially. So, you know, but the, our Attorney General, James Uthmeyer, and the governor looked at the facility and said, "Oh, it has an airstrip. We can execute deportation flights."

• 41:05Speaker 05

  And that was the, I, I think, the sole determining factor in picking that, that place, which is insanely idiotic, but that's how we're governed here in Florida.

• 41:15Ed Larson?

  Is he the guy who said that they'll have to face the alligators and the pythons if they escape? Is it the same dude?

• 41:21Speaker 05

  Correct, yeah. He was one way in, one way out. Anyone who escapes, there's the Panthers and pythons and alligators waiting for you. Yeah. He's a, he's a, he's like a straight-up little Nazi. I mean, like, as a fascist.

• 41:32Ed Larson?

  Yeah. Also, get rid of the pythons. They're not supposed to be there. Do your job, and get rid of the pythons, bro. What are we doing here?

• 41:42Speaker 05

  But unfortunately, they were too busy grifting with the, the emergency fund to do that, and running bar tabs in Liberty Bar in Tallahassee.

• 41:49Ed Larson?

  That is wild. Um, and I, I tell you, as someone who's drank a lot in Tallahassee, to run up a bar tab that high there is pretty hard to do.

• 41:59Speaker 05

  Correct. It's a cheap, it's a cheap time to drink. I've spent my share of time there.

• 42:05Ed Larson?

  Um, so what's the situation going on right now in Miramar at the ICE enforcement, uh, removal operations center? Uh, cause I, I know that they're, cause they took on a lot of the people from Alligator Alcatraz and, uh, and so I, it's kinda chaotic down there right now, or, or am I, am I incorrect?

• 42:23Speaker 05

  No, you're correct. So, uh, Miramar has an ICE facility that serves as a processing center, a check-in center. It's where people go to basically, uh, you know, adjudicate their asylum claims or any other sort of immigration process to meet with ICE, right?

• 42:38Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 42:39Speaker 05

  Uh, historically, you, you can get apprehended there. Uh, sometimes you, you're not, you know, it's, it's a nerve-wracking interview if you have to go there. But ob- obviously under this administration, the apprehensions, the arrests have increased dramatically, uh, and also the enforcement on the ground where we see every day in the streets. So because there's no more space in detention facilities, like I told you, they're starting to hold people not just in cri- like criminal jails, regular jails that they've converted, but also in these like administrative offices. So, a- and there's actually a judicial federal order that prevents them from holding people, immigrants specifically, in these administrative facilities for more than 12 hours overnight, right?

• 43:25Speaker 05

  Despite that, they're holding dozens of people, I mean, 70, 90 people per these large rooms. They're, they converted the garage into a holding facility and they're holding dozens and dozens of people for over a week, uh, until they can finally transfer them to, for wherever there's space. You know, these places don't have bathrooms, they're not equipped to, um, you know, to be a detention place, there's no food, people aren't, aren't able to shower, brush their teeth, they're sleeping, uh, on, on the floor piled up on top of each other. And you don't have to take it from me, we actually, uh, worked with a congresswoman here in Florida who visited, uh, and saw with her own eyes, uh, the conditions on the ground.

• 44:08Speaker 05

  She went out and did a press conference, it was reported on the Miami Herald, uh, but the conditions there are pretty bad.

• 44:13Ed Larson?

  Yeah, they're like, they're finding, like, the water's filled with like parasites for, and like, you, they could see things swimming around in the water from what I was told.

• 44:22Speaker 05

  Yeah, correct.

• 44:23Ed Larson?

  And, um, so, but also people who speak out about the mistreatment, they end up getting punished, correct, uh, often. The, the, the guards will lash out at them or they'll get, uh, they'll, they'll get solitary confinement and, and stuff like that. Have we been seeing, is that persisted? Cause I know that was happening at Alligator Alcatraz.

• 44:42Speaker 05

  Yeah, Alligator Alcatraz, I mean, the treatment was so bad, we worked with Amnesty International on a report and we were contacted by a family member and we ended up being, we ended up being, getting in touch with the detainee themselves, but, and this happened numerous times, they would punish people by, with something called the box, which was a two by two feet, um, space.

• 45:05Ed Larson?

  We talked about the box.

• 45:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, where they would chain people to the ground and leave them exposed to the sun and mosquitoes for five to seven hours outdoors in the hot Florida summer. I mean, brutal and, and, you know, Amnesty International found this to be, to constitute a torture, this sort of punishment.

• 45:24Ed Larson?

  It is.

• 45:25Speaker 05

  But, you know, recently, uh, here in downtown Miami, where I told you they're, they're holding people in a regular jail at the federal detention facility, again, it's a criminal jail, they commandeered two floors for the holding dozens of people. A man, uh, spoke to his wife, a Cuban couple, and told her about the mistreatment, the lack of food, the fact that they had found bugs in their food, that, that for example, the place flooded and they were forced to sleep overnight on, on, on soaking wet mattresses. She went, told the me, did an interview with the media about this and then that he was placed in solitary confinement for, I think, oh, two weeks as punishment.

• 46:04Ed Larson?

  Completely insane, just for saying there's, uh, my mattress is wet.

• 46:08Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 46:08Ed Larson?

  You know, it's not.

• 46:10Speaker 05

  No, go ahead.

• 46:11Ed Larson?

  No, I mean, we're agreeing with each other.

• 46:13Speaker 05

  Right, no, but, but I also wanna reiterate that, and this is gonna sound like silly to say, but immigration detention, the way it's codified, it, it's not supposed to constitute a punishment in the way that, let's say, criminal detention is, right? It's literally supposed to just be, you're being held while your immigration situation's being adjudicated or resolved, right? But it's not, and the way it's written like this is because it's supposed to not be cruel or, or, or torturous, or again, constitutes something that can be described as punishing. Obviously it is, always, uh, but, you know, these conditions are just exacerbating and getting worse.

• 46:56Ed Larson?

  I mean, jail effectively is punishment for a crime, you know, and if these people are being held in jails, then they are being punished. It's not hard to put it all together. The, uh, it's, the way people just turn a blind eye to all this stuff is nauseating. Um, earlier in the episode, uh, I talked to a friend of mine, Kurt Braunohler, is a great comedian, uh, his nephew is, uh, currently being held in a detention center in Pennsylvania. He was seeking asylum from Venezuela, he was part of the, uh, National Guard there and he refused to, uh, attack protesters in Venezuela. And so he still, he was seeking asylum in, in America, he was trying to go through the

• 47:41Ed Larson?

  process, they, he went, he was literally showing up to his appointment and they said, come back on Saturday, uh, because the kiosk was broken. And then when he came back on Saturday, ICE arrested him and he's been in detention for 60 days and it doesn't look like he's gonna get out this year, uh, cause they keep pushing back his asylum case date. And I think that's something that's happening all over the country.

• 48:04Ed Larson?

  My question is, do, are we taking anyone for asylum right now? Like, what is our asylum process? Cause we've always done that.

• 48:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, I, I, and to your point, you know, the, these people that I'm describing at this federal detention facility in Miami, most of them were previously held in Alligator Alcatraz and some of them are, are eight, nine, 10 months into their detention. I mean, they've lost a year of their life, you know, life is short, you know? Overall, life is short, where you have like 60 years if you're lucky, maybe 70, 80 years of life if you're, if you're, if you're lucky.

• 48:40Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 48:40Speaker 05

  You know, you, these people lost a year of their lives, you know?

• 48:43Ed Larson?

  Yeah, and these are people who don't have money. They're, you know, and if you don't have money in this country, I'm sure they don't have life, uh, health insurance, I'm sure they're unhealthy and it's hard for them to get the medicine they need for problems they don't even know they have, cause they can't go to the doctor when life is good. So it's, it's, it is torture and people are dying inside of these places. Uh, at what rate are people dying? Like, how often do people die in detention centers in Florida?

• 49:10Speaker 05

  Right, I do wanna address your, your, your last question though, our asylum processes have been completely, you know, a sledgehammer has been taken to them, right? I mean, it is very difficult to resolve an asylum claim positively in the United States right now, uh, because USCIS has been, you know, the, the, sort of like the agency that administers, uh, immigration casework outside of enforcement, has been completely gutted. Uh, immigration judges have been fired and replaced with Trump-style lackeys. Obviously, the Department of Homeland Security is so aggressive in its enforcement and they're targeting people and detaining people with active, uh, pending asylum claims that haven't been denied or anything like that.

• 49:54Speaker 05

  So, you know, and, and obviously our refugee resettlement here in the United States also has been, you know, completely gutted. I mean, you, you, you know, I'm sure you've read the headlines about Trump wanting to accept so, pretty much solely, uh, white South Africans as refugees. So that's, that's the type of refugees that we're taking.

• 50:15Ed Larson?

  He wants more Elon, is what he wants, is what he's saying.

• 50:16Speaker 05

  But yeah, they've, they've, you know, they've really destroyed, um, the, the system, but I believe, uh, I'm not, I believe 112 people, I, I believe 112 people have died so far in ICE detention during the second, this, just the second Trump administration.

• 50:35Ed Larson?

  Man, you know. I grew up in South Florida. I love it down there. It was always home to me. It's where I consider home, even though I'm probably never gonna live there again. No offense.

• 50:47Ed Larson?

  But, you know, I worked in kitchens, you know, I made buddies with Cubans and Dominicans and mostly Haitians. And I know that they're all great people. I know that Haitians make South Florida work. They are, you know, because they are, forget restaurants, they're healthcare, they're in nursing homes, they're in home health, they're helping all the old people stay alive. And right now, there is a crackdown on Haitians in particular, and who I believe should be, all of them should be eligible for asylum seeking, because we've destroyed Haiti through earthquakes and neglect, and, you know, and just taking the money that's donated and put it back into businesses rather

• 51:31Ed Larson?

  than communities. You know, there's, I know that there's communities in Haiti that are completely run by gangs. There's, you know, there's, I've heard reports of 10,000 people sharing four spigots, you know, three bathrooms. It's not great over there right now. And right, and so now we're deporting people from, the Haitians are being targeted and being deported back to Haiti. Can you, you live in Little Haiti. Can, what's your community like right now?

• 51:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, and just a recommendation for the audience. There's a great book. I'm sure many of, actually, listeners are probably familiar with it, but if you're not, Black Jacobins, a story of the Haitian Revolution, that kind of sets the stage of how Haiti has been pillaged by foreign intervention in the, in the last, you know, century or so. But I highly recommend the book, Black Jacobins. But yeah, so temporary protected status, which granted legal protections to 350,000 Haitians, 158,000 who reside here in South Florida, has been rescinded by the Trump administration. There was a lawsuit that escalated to the Supreme Court and, or far-right Supreme Court unfortunately

• 52:43Speaker 05

  gave Trump a green light to proceed with that. So there's 350,000 people, many of them even here for years and years and years. They have homes, they have mortgages, they have cars, they have loved ones, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, children, family, coworkers, you know, their lives have been uprooted. And it's not just, they have, they're not the only ones impacted, right? Everybody that interacts with them, their employers, their coworkers, et cetera. I mean, it's created a lot of chaos in our community. And, you know, we're seeing enforcement every day. I mean, I, I put this on my Instagram. I was driving home on Sunday, and I stumbled on Northwest

• 53:25Speaker 05

  Second Avenue by Jackson Memorial Hospital, major thoroughfare here in, in South Florida.

• 53:30Ed Larson?

  Jackson Memorial Hospital is one of the biggest hospitals in the country.

• 53:33Speaker 05

  Correct.

• 53:34Ed Larson?

  Yeah.

• 53:35Speaker 05

  Four, four unmarked vehicles, blocking the, the road completely. And there were like five, you know, ICE guys, obviously with their faces covered with the masks and everything, stopping an Uber car, forcing the passenger out. I talked to the passenger, that's how I learned what, what was going on. Arresting the driver, I, obviously, I was, I ride, I ride a motorcycle, I stopped, I immediately started filming and, you know, asking what was going on. They rapidly got into their car, they took the guy's car, they took him and they just drove off. It's something out of a dictatorship, you know, I mean, I'm from Argentina in the 1970s, we had a military junta who'd like disappeared people, picking them off the street like that. And then I talked to the,

• 54:18Speaker 05

  the passenger and I was like, what, what happened? He's like, they were targeting the driver and they told me they had to get out and, and get a, get a walk or get another Uber. And, and we see that every day. We see them picking up Haitians in, in, in our neighborhood. There's a very famous restaurant in South Florida, in Miami called Chef Creole. It's the most, probably the most famous Haitian restaurant in Miami. And the owner recently made national news because he came out and did an interview and said, they're deporting all of my workers. I'm gonna have to, there's several, it's like a local franchise at this point, or he owns several of them, I don't know if it's a franchise, but he said, I'm gonna have to close at least two of my restaurants because I don't have staff. But then he admitted, and I voted for Trump. I voted for Trump because I

• 55:02Speaker 05

  thought he was a good businessman. He was gonna be good for the economy, but he hasn't been good for the economy. So, you know, people, you know, people really have to think about what they're doing, you know, I mean, how, how are you as a Haitian man, you know, gonna vote for a guy that said your people were eating cats and dogs? And he's promising, he, he promised to deport not just your workers, man, but your people, you know, our people, we're all immigrants. It's not just about nationality, but I don't, I don't get it. But obviously, the guy was roasted alive.

• 55:30Ed Larson?

  Yeah, I've seen a lot of it, you know, down, it's been Florida especially, but even out here in Los Angeles and San Diego, I see a lot of it. I see a lot of immigrants who are very pro-Trump. A lot of Cubans, which blows my mind, very, very pro-Trump. What do you think that is?

• 55:48Speaker 05

  Again, I'll tell you another news report that I saw recently. It was a Cuban man that owns a, a plant nursery here in Homestead. They, you know, they grow small plants for people to buy. And he was saying, I'm, I'm gonna have to close, close down because they're deporting all my workers. And he's like, he said, I tried to pay people $30 an hour. People don't wanna come do this work. It's difficult work. And he said, I'm gonna have to close down. I've been here for decades. But then at the end of the day, they asked, they asked them, because he said he voted for Trump. And they're like, you regret your vote for Trump? And he said, no, I actually don't regret my vote for Trump. But, you know, he needs to stop deporting regular people. He needs to focus on the criminals. I'm like, brother, you, you, did you miss the mass deportation signs during the, what did you think that meant, you know?

• 56:33Ed Larson?

  Oh, my God.

• 56:34Speaker 05

  I don't know. I think it's just like, people are programmed a certain way. Like, it might be the, the anti-communism fervor that people in this town have. I don't know what it is, but it's an, it's inexplicable. A lot of people are turning a page on Trump, I think, especially people who have been personally directly impacted. But then there's other people like that that are, will say, I will have to shut down my literal livelihood because of this administration's policies. But you know what? I just, I don't know, there's too many woke shit in universities, so fuck it. I don't know. I don't get it.

• 57:07Ed Larson?

  Yeah. No, man. It's, it's crazy down there. Like, all my little protests, you know, it all comes down to like these, you know, for example, it's now DJT International instead of PBI for West Palm Beach Airport. It's like, well, now I'm never flying there. Like, now I go visit people in Boca, I gotta go to Fort Lauderdale, Miami, because I, I can't bring it to me to buy a ticket to Donald Trump Airport.

• 57:33Speaker 05

  Historically, you know, we name things like that, like after people died. Yeah, like when someone, not, I don't think, we should never name anything after Trump, honestly. But it's like, we do that for a reason, right? Because we don't, it's, it's like, it has, it feels dictatorship to name things after people who are alive, but, you know.

• 57:51Ed Larson?

  Well, you know, that's the gold statues.

• 57:57Ed Larson?

  This is a paid ad by BetterHelp. Truly, some of the best things our government can do is make another holiday. And it's so nice when they put up something like World Mental Health Day to remind us all that we should be taking care of our mental health. Because definitely, I think the government is helping us all. I think the government is really helping our mental health. And I think that them putting the focus on mental health, does it not give you a sigh of relief? Finally, the government cares? But I don't think that people should focus on a certain date to care for their mental health. I think that it should be every day and all year round,

• 58:38Ed Larson?

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• 59:23Ed Larson?

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• 1:02:14Speaker 01

  But, um, so Miami. I love Miami. It's a beautiful place. Means the world to me. It's probably got 15 years left on this earth. Um, the, uh, are they, they're cooperating with ICE, correct? Like, the city of Miami? Now, is that the mayor, like, who is, because I, or, or, stop what I asked. I have to ask this question, because this, I, I haven't heard much about it since it happened. The mayor of Miami, did they really cancel elections just so they could be the mayor longer? Is that something that happened, or am I misinterpreting an article I read?

• 1:02:49Speaker 05

  They tried to, so they tried to basically, uh, I believe what you're referencing, they, they tried to move municipal elections from odd to even years to align with the regular calendar, but they did it in a way that would grant them an extra year in office. So it's like, no, no, no. If you guys move the election, you have to move it so you lose a year, if anything. You can't move it so you gain a year, because we didn't elect you for that year. So ultimately, they, um, backed off from that, and they put a referendum on the ballot that, that the voters approved of. So we did move to even years, but, you know, but it wasn't through executive action of the commissioners.

• 1:03:28Speaker 01

  So this is the person we're dealing with? And they're working with ICE directly?

• 1:03:32Speaker 05

  Yeah, so these, remember these 287G contracts establishing this collaboration?

• 1:03:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:38Speaker 05

  I, uh, Florida accounts for 43% of these type of contracts nationwide. So many municipalities and cities have signed these agreements. But there's a state law that compels certain municipal entities to enter them. Squarely, those that operate a jail or detention facility. City of Miami does not operate a jail. They entered this agreement voluntarily. There was nothing compelling them to do, so they did so last year. And that created a firestorm in the city that has only grown over time due to the, the enforcement, detention, the economic policies, Trump's unpopularity, et cetera.

• 1:04:19Speaker 05

  In late last year, we had municipal elections in which the first Democrat mayor was elected in well over, almost two decades. Her name is Eileen Higgins, and she campaigned, uh, on rescinding this police ICE collaboration agreement. I mean, she spoke about it numerous, numerous times. And when she, uh, was voted into office, she stopped talking about it, uh, never addressed it, even though she can, she can put it on the agenda for it to be voted on. And three out of the five commissioners have signaled that they would vote so, for, for it to, to be rescinded. They could also place it on the agenda, to be fair. But she campaigned on it, and she hasn't done so.

• 1:05:00Speaker 05

  And the, the only thing that she's been focused on is a, a bond item, uh, that will be voted on in November to give more money for, to, to police officers for, for their police stations, and firefighters as well. But just completely abandoned this pledge to, to protect our, our immigrant neighbors, uh, you know, and that, that's, that's our, our first Democratic mayor in, in, in almost two decades.

• 1:05:23Speaker 01

  That's insane to me. That's so aggravating. There's, Miami's a town where some neighborhoods, the stop signs say "Alto", you know, like, is, it's, it's not for us. And for them to be, attack immigrants is so counterproductive, especially if you're a Democrat. It's insane to me. Focus on the climate change. The beach is washing away. But it's coming in three blocks, and with, the moon's in the wrong place. It's, it's, this is crazy what's happening down there.

• 1:05:53Speaker 05

  And it's not, it's not just that she's a Democrat, right? It's that she's a Democrat that campaigned on the issue and, and won, like decisively, while speaking on this, you know? Like, you, you, you do have a popular Democratic mandate to act on this, and three out of the five commissioners are signaling that they would vote for you. Like, what is the holdup here? And it's been, it's been seven months since her election. What is the holdup?

• 1:06:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, if the only thing you've done is get more money for cops, you know, not, I don't like you. It's not, but you're, um, you're, the people you work with, the Florida Immigrant Coalition, y'all are, uh, you got a, you got a campaign to raise awareness for this, right?

• 1:06:35Speaker 05

  Yeah, we, we've been for months. I mean, recently, we, we were able to convince one of the commissioners, uh, who's a, a pretty decent commissioner, actually, to put it as a public discussion item. Over 100 people showed up. Every single one of them spoke in opposition for over, almost four hours. Um, you know, we've, we've sent out mass texts, uh, to city residents. We've done, uh, phone banking, uh, email blasts, et cetera. We've met with some of the commissioners, you know, to try to move this forward. And now we're putting up a series of billboards along the I-95 and the Little Havana neighborhood targeting the mayor and commissioners, uh, to try and get them to act on this. And a, and a radio ad as well, in, in Spanish-language radio, uh, targeting Eileen Higgins for

• 1:07:20Speaker 05

  her failed, uh, promises.

• 1:07:23Speaker 01

  Great. Thank you. I appreciate that.

• 1:07:26Speaker 05

  Thank you.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  There is, um, there's a couple of things that, um, I need to ask you, because I, I'm just, I don't understand them. Uh, the first thing is, what is this? I've heard that this administration has stopped reporting deaths of people released from ICE detention? Is that, is that something that I, am I, am I just completely off-base here? Or, because I, I read, it's like, it's one of those things where I read a headline and I pass, and I keep going, and then I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. And so I just want to make sure I'm understanding things properly.

• 1:08:00Speaker 05

  I, I read it too, and quite frankly, I, I don't really understand the mechanics of it either. I think it's just one of those, like, lawless things from this administration. Some things that they do, uh, historically, and this is something that ICE has always done, but, you know, again, these are things that are systemic, you know, to, to just how DHS and detention operates, but they exacerbate, they fester and grow worse under Trump. We saw it in the first and second administration. But they often play around with the dates when, when, uh, when someone dies, and they won't, they, like, they won't report it until, like, later, you know, when there's, like, news that will cover it up, or they'll, like, avoid reporting it on, like, a Tuesday, and

• 1:08:44Speaker 05

  instead they'll do it on a Friday, because it's, you know, it's a news dump day. Um, so that's something that's very frequent. They, they definitely play with dates to minimize coverage. So it's kind of like try to news dump, like, you know, dump it.

• 1:08:56Speaker 01

  Wow. Because like, my brain is like, oh, they're not telling us who dies at the camps? That sounds pretty Nazi-coded to me. You know, that's a, that's when it starts taking the step over from being a concentration camp to a death camp. And so I was frankly terrified.

• 1:09:13Speaker 05

  And the other thing is that, like, every single death, you know, that happens in these detention facilities is, they're all suicides. Everyone is a suicide. Every single one's a suicide. And quite frankly, yeah, some of them are probably suicides, but, you know, then it turns out, there was one, uh,

• 1:09:30Speaker 01

  Their entire life taken from them, you know?

• 1:09:32Speaker 05

  Right. But there was one, for example, where, where it was, I forgot which, I think it was in Louisiana, but I don't remember, but there was one where a man was ruled as a, a death was ruled as a suicide, and then the autopsy revealed that he had, like, strangle marks, like asphyxiation marks. And then the, the autopsy ruled it as a, uh, what's it called? Forced asphyxiation or whatever. So, you know, like, I, I just always stress, both people and especially journalists, like, don't take what DHS and ICE tell you at face value. Like, if they say someone died of a suicide, like, I do not accept that explanation until further review of the situation.

• 1:10:14Ed Larson?

  And like if a prison's owned by Core Civic or Geo Group, who are the guards? Cause they're not cops. They're not, right? They're, they're just people they hire. And they get to choose.

• 1:10:26Speaker 05

  Correct.

• 1:10:26Ed Larson?

  They, and what's the training like for these people?

• 1:10:29Speaker 05

  I mean, poor, uh, I think it or Alcatraz, which is a state-run facility, as I explained to you, managed by the Florida Department of Emergency Management. It wasn't even, it was, it wasn't a privately-run facility as we established. That facility had almost no ICE presence. It was all Florida Highway Patrol. And inside mainly it was private contractors, private vendors that were doing the security. Um, so they just hire, you know, uh, just, just people and train them poorly and let them loose. And obviously, look, I, I federal ICE detention is bad, but I think it's, it's all terrible. Uh, it all should be abolished, but when, when you, when you move it to the for-profit motive,

• 1:11:12Speaker 05

  obviously there's an incentive to lock people up, but there's less accountability and transparency. It's the same thing with these flock cameras, right? There's, for example, like vast surveillance networks in dictatorial countries. Uh, or, or, or, or even like Britain, right? That it's like one of the most surveilled countries on earth. But I think there's a difference between the surveillance is, is owned and administered by the actual, but actual, by the actual government. There's more accountability and there's more of a civic processes to affect outcomes, right? And in the United, it's all bad, right? But in the United States, we're just outsourcing our surveillance or enforcement

• 1:11:51Speaker 05

  and our detention to private companies that are just completely outside the bounds of like civic and democratic processes. And I think it's extra disturbing.

• 1:12:00Ed Larson?

  What's up with Argentina taking on Peter Thiel? What is that? You, you, you're from there. What's going on there? Is that, how illegal is that? What, what, we're, how are they, how are they saving money?

• 1:12:11Speaker 05

  I mean, that's our, our insane, uh, unwell, uh, our narco libertarian president Javier Millay. Who, I mean, I mean, he, you know, he met with him and he had a, uh, I think it was in the Financial Times. He published an op-ed saying that he wanted to allow for completely AI-run corporations to be, uh, chartered i- inside of Argentina, just like, again, AI-powered companies. So, you know, Peter Thiel, I think he's just picked a developing, you know, country under the thumb of the IMF that's being treated as a, a colony of global capital

• 1:12:51Speaker 05

  to sort of experiment, you know, with these, um, free market, uh, interventions, right? But I don't know if you saw though, a group of, of, of gandals, people dressed as gandals went to his house to, to protest him. So, you know, I mean, you know, people, people are angry about it. People are getting frustrated with this, uh, this experiment on, uh, on, uh, with libertarianism in Argentina. That's just been an absolute disaster and hopefully, uh, next year is the presidential election there. Uh, hopefully we, we kick this guy out of office and shortly after kick Peter Thiel too.

• 1:13:30Ed Larson?

  So before we go, I just want, uh, something because everyone needs an action item, you know? Cause if we just sit here and we talk about it, that helps a little bit, but you need something to do. In your opinion, what do you think is the best way for an average person to fight ICE legally?

• 1:13:49Speaker 05

  I mean, if you're in Florida, you know, contact the Florida Immigrant Coalition, contact me on Instagram or whatever, or, and get involved with us. I mean, we're not just one organization also. We're, we're a coalition. We're 50 organizations, including labor unions, uh, faith organizations, service providers, uh, legal organizations, grassroots organizations, uh, university groups, et cetera. So there's a lot to pick from. If you get involved with us, not just us. But aside from that, you know, I think it just starts with finding a political home. Like if there's no group in your area or you just completely don't feel represented, then go ahead and start your own.

• 1:14:28Speaker 05

  But more than likely, there is a place that you can volunteer, whether it's a nonprofit or a labor union or DSA or whatever it is, I, I think you can find somewhere, uh, where you'll, you'll meet like-minded people where you, we, you know, and you can all row together towards a shared objective. Uh, because, you know, obviously DHS is a giant octopus, you know? It's, it's a Titanic organization that's vastly funded and has a lot of resources. And, you know, we, no, no lone wolves here. We don't, you know, no lone heroes are gonna take it down. We have to unite and again, form political organizations that can, uh, affect outcomes.

• 1:15:09Ed Larson?

  Thank you so much for talking to me, buddy. Uh, if you wanna, if you wanna check out the Florida Immigrant Coalition and what they're doing over there on Instagram, it's FL Immigrant. And, and Tomas, go check out Tomas on Instagram. He's reporting, he's on the ground, literally. He's filming people in his neighborhood, getting detained. So go follow him as well. Tomas, T-O-M-A-S-K-E-N-N on Instagram to stay abreast to everything that's going on. Thank you so much for talking to me and thank you so much for just being you, man. Uh, I, I appreciate the hell out of you. Uh, thank you for taking care of my home.

• 1:15:50Ed Larson?

  I miss it and I can't wait to, to come back there and, uh, maybe hopefully live there again one day. Uh, you, you're the man. I hope you run for office. Uh,

• 1:15:59Speaker 05

  Thank you. Come, come visit and let's have a drink.

• 1:16:01Ed Larson?

  I will. February, I'll see you. I'm doing a cruise out of Fort Lauderdale.

• 1:16:05Speaker 05

  I'll be here.

• 1:16:09Ed Larson?

  Well, that was a hoot and a heave, huh? We had a good time, lots of laughs, nothing's wrong, everything's fine. I appreciate everyone coming in and listening and watching side stories. Um, I, I like doing these follow-up episodes because there's, I feel like with knowledge, it should never end. And, you know, you're never an expert on anything. So always keep learning about what is happening about things. Stay up to date on them. And so I'm glad that we stayed up to date on what's going on in Florida with the immigration community. Follow and get involved with the Florida Immigrant Coalition.

• 1:16:48Ed Larson?

  Follow Tomas on Instagram, Tomas Ken, and Kurt Bronhold are on Instagram. Go see Kurt live. Kurt's one of the greatest comedians I've ever known. He's so funny. He's, I don't take today as, uh, an audition for Kurt's comedy, you know, is this, go see him live. If he's coming to your town, it's, you're gonna have the best silliest time. Uh, I adore that man. Go check him out. If you wanna see me on the road, I'm gonna be in DC on September 11th and 12th. Gonna be fun. Hopefully they won't kill me for this episode, but I'm in town. Um, then I'm gonna be in Milwaukee on September 27th, Denver at the Comedy Works Downtown on October 4th.

• 1:17:30Ed Larson?

  Then, uh, San Francisco at Cobb's Comedy Club, October 25th. Uh, and then a whole bunch of dates with side stories. I'm gonna be at Nashville in January. I'm gonna be at Rochester in January. That's a long way off. All kinds of stuff is coming out. Go to editunes.com if you wanna see me on the road. I got all my dates on there, all side stories dates on there. Go, come see us live. I'm having the best time in the world. Go and check out everything that's going on here at the Last Podcast Network. We have such amazing shows. I feel such honored to be involved with this network with such amazing human beings. Page Seven, Spun, The Brighter Side, Nerd of Mouth, uh, The Foreign Report, Fraudsters, some of the greatest shows.

• 1:18:12Ed Larson?

  We have so much going on under our umbrella. LPNTV is crushing it right now. Go watch the last season of HGX2 if you get a chance. Vampire, The Masquerade's going strong. Blood Bluff 77. This fucking network is the shit. Be involved in it. Let us take over your brains. I love you. Be good to yourselves and hail Tomas Kennedy. Peace.

• 1:18:46Speaker 06

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• 1:19:13Speaker 07

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