2475 - Trump’s Tariff Thrashing; Bukele Goes To Washington w/ Roberto Lovato

Summary

The Majority Report with Sam Seder Episode 2475: Trump’s Tariff Thrashing; Bukele Goes To Washington w/ Roberto Lovato Release Date: April 14, 2025

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Introduction

In Episode 2475 of The Majority Report with Sam Seder, host Emma Vigeland steps in for Sam Seder to navigate through a tumultuous week in American politics. The episode primarily focuses on the high-stakes meeting between former President Donald Trump and El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele, discussing the implications of Trump’s tariff policies on China and the burgeoning relationship between the U.S. and El Salvador. Additionally, the show features an insightful interview with Roberto Lovato, a Salvadoran American writer and academic, who delves into the historical and contemporary dynamics between the two nations.

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Trump’s Tariff Policies and China: A Troubling Trade War

The episode opens with Emma Vigeland discussing Trump’s fluctuating stance on tariffs, particularly those affecting electronics and semiconductors. Initially, Trump exempted certain industries from tariffs, but shortly after, China retaliated by suspending exports of rare minerals and magnets essential for the automotive and aerospace sectors.

Key Points:

• Tariff Exemptions and Reversals: Trump’s sudden exemptions for electronics and semiconductors led to confusion and instability in the markets. As Emma states, "It means that people aren't going to take the time and the years and money to invest in America because they don't know if this mad king is going to change domestic trade policy and economic policy within 48 hours" (09:48).

• Impact on Defense and Automotive Industries: The suspension of rare mineral exports from China threatens the U.S. defense contractors and automakers, who rely heavily on these materials.

• Market Reactions: Contrary to Trump’s expectations, the stock market did not stabilize. Instead, Japan initiated a sell-off of U.S. treasury bonds, exacerbating economic uncertainty (09:06).

• Policy Incoherence: The lack of a coherent and consistent trade policy under Trump has led to increased tensions with China, undermining U.S. economic stability.

Notable Quotes:

• Matt Binder critiques Trump’s strategy, saying, “It’s the height of irrationality... It’s obviously a joke” (09:27).
• Emma Vigeland emphasizes the administration’s lack of policy coherence: “There is no policy here. Everybody's just following what Donald Trump says on a day-to-day basis” (14:47).

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U.S.-El Salvador Relations: Bukele’s Authoritarian Push

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to the meeting between Donald Trump and Nayib Bukele, the self-described far-right dictator of El Salvador. This meeting has sparked controversy over plans to detain American citizens in El Salvador’s prison camps, highlighting the authoritarian tendencies of Bukele and the administration’s strained approach to immigration and law enforcement.

Key Points:

• Negotiations on Deportations: Trump and Bukele discussed the potential deportation of U.S. citizens to El Salvador’s highly restrictive prison camps, raising alarms about due process and human rights (60:05).

• Supreme Court Defiance: Trump openly defied a Supreme Court order to return Kilmar Garcia, a U.S. citizen, to El Salvador, labeling him a terrorist despite lacking criminal charges (60:08).

• Role of Marco Rubio: Rubio defended the administration's policies, arguing that no exemptions or exclusions were intended, though contradictions in statements suggest otherwise (16:14).

Notable Quotes:

• Roberto Lovato underscores the threat of expanding terrorization: “The franchise of criminalization and now terrorization of different groups of people is well underway” (35:08).
• Marco Rubio defends the lack of exemptions: “The policy is no exemptions, no exclusions. The policy is there” (16:14).

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Interview with Roberto Lovato: Unraveling the US-El Salvador Nexus

Roberto Lovato, a Salvadoran American writer and professor, provides a deep dive into the historical and ongoing relationship between the United States and El Salvador. His insights reveal how U.S. policies have inadvertently fueled gang violence and authoritarianism in El Salvador, culminating in the rise of Bukele’s regime.

Key Points:

• Historical Context: Lovato traces El Salvador’s long history of military dictatorship and U.S.-backed repression, which led to the rise of the FMLN guerrillas and subsequent gang proliferation through deportations in the 1990s (26:48).

• From Gangs to Techno-Fascism: The U.S.’s aggressive gang-policing strategies and support for authoritarian measures in El Salvador created conditions ripe for the emergence of highly organized and violent gangs like MS-13. This, in turn, provided the foundation for Bukele’s ultra-authoritarian approach (30:04).

• Digital Dictatorship: Lovato warns of the advancing digital dictatorship facilitated by surveillance technologies, which Bukele leverages to maintain control and suppress dissent (43:02).

• Intersectional Empire: He critiques the Democratic Party’s failure to dismantle imperialistic structures, instead advancing "intersectional empire" that superficially addresses social issues without tackling the root causes of fascism (55:34).

Notable Quotes:

• Lovato highlights the media’s role in demonizing Salvadoran immigrants: “The gang took on... the more familiar tattooed faces, tattooed bodies and more heavily armed gang structures” (30:04).

• Discussing the need for social movements, Lovato states, “We have to upgrade our social movements for the digital age if we are to fight people like Bukele” (46:36).

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Deportation Policies and Human Rights Violations

The episode delves into the Trump administration’s controversial deportation policies, which have increasingly targeted Salvadoran immigrants, classifying them as terrorists and subjecting them to inhumane prison conditions in El Salvador.

Key Points:

• Kilmar Garcia’s Case: Kilmar Garcia, a U.S. citizen with Salvadoran roots, faces deportation despite having no significant criminal history. His case exemplifies the administration’s overreach and disregard for due process.

• Government Contradictions: While officials like Stephen Miller and Marco Rubio defend the policies, there is a glaring inconsistency between their statements and the actual conditions faced by deportees (66:48).

• Human Rights Concerns: The use of terms like "gulag" to describe El Salvador’s prison camps underscores the severity of human rights abuses being advocated by both Trump and Bukele.

Notable Quotes:

• Matt Binder condemns the administration: “This is a fascist takeover... What else can we glean from this?” (67:57).

• Emma Vigeland asserts the lack of due process: “This is an absolutely fundamental right in this country, the right to due process” (62:13).

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The Role of the Media and Political Theater

Emma Vigeland criticizes the media’s complicity in legitimizing authoritarian policies by failing to ask critical questions during the Trump-Bukele meeting. The absence of traditional media scrutiny allows the administration to push through controversial policies without adequate public oversight.

Key Points:

• Media Complicity: Vigeland highlights how media outlets like Fox News reporters in the room contribute to the lack of accountability, allowing statements like sending American citizens to El Salvador’s prisons to go unchallenged (60:20).

• Political Spectacle: The meeting is portrayed as a form of political theater, where authoritarian actions are normalized and celebrated without substantive debate or resistance.

Notable Quotes:

• Emma Vigeland laments the media's role: “They’re also just like not letting traditional media in the room to ask these kinds of questions” (60:17).

• Sam Seder humorously underscores the absurdity of the situation: “You got to build about five more places... Home growns are next” (60:15).

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Conclusion: Urgency for Mass Movements and Democratic Resilience

In the final sections, Emma and Matt Binder emphasize the urgent need for mass social movements to counteract the rising tide of techno-fascism and authoritarianism. They argue that relying solely on the Democratic Party is insufficient to safeguard democracy, urging for more radical and inclusive efforts to uphold democratic values and human rights.

Key Points:

• Democracy as an Ongoing Struggle: The hosts stress that democracy requires continuous effort and vigilance, not just partisan victories (74:02).

• Building Inclusive Movements: There is a call for broader, more inclusive social movements that transcend traditional liberalism to effectively challenge authoritarian policies and practices (55:34).

Notable Quotes:

• Matt Binder asserts, “Democracy is in people... that’s the issue” (75:19).

• Emma Vigeland reinforces the necessity of economic democracy: “Democracy is also in outcomes... making the rules of our game favorable to equitable outcomes for people” (76:42).

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Final Remarks and Breaking News

As the episode nears its end, a shocking clip from the Trump-Bukele meeting goes viral, with Trump explicitly stating intentions to build more prison camps in El Salvador to house "home growns" — a term used derogatorily for American citizens deemed criminals. The hosts condemn these remarks as evidence of a deepening fascist shift within the U.S. administration.

Key Points:

• Trump’s Explicit Intentions: Trump’s candid remarks about expanding prison infrastructure in El Salvador highlight the administration’s authoritarian leanings.

• Public Outcry: The segment concludes with a strong denunciation of Trump’s policies, emphasizing the immediate threat to civil liberties and human rights.

Notable Quotes:

• Trump’s declaration: “Home growns are next. You got to build about five more places” (60:07).

• Emma Vigeland’s condemnation: “This is incredibly disturbing” (67:57).

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Timestamp References

• [09:06] - Matt Binder on China’s retaliation against tariffs.
• [09:27] - Matt Binder criticizes Trump’s irrational policies.
• [14:47] - Emma Vigeland on the lack of coherent policy.
• [16:14] - Marco Rubio defends tariff policies.
• [26:48] - Roberto Lovato’s background and U.S.-El Salvador ties.
• [30:04] - Lovato on gang dynamics and media portrayal.
• [35:08] - Lovato on terrorization of groups.
• [43:02] - Lovato discusses digital dictatorship.
• [46:36] - Lovato on social movements against fascism.
• [55:34] - Lovato critiques Democratic policies.
• [60:05] - Discussion on deportations and human rights.
• [62:13] - Emma on due process violations.
• [66:48] - Emma and Kaitlan Collins on Supreme Court’s stance.
• [67:57] - Matt Binder on Rubio and foreign policy.
• [74:02] - Matt Binder on the state of democracy.
• [75:19] - Emma & Matt on democracy’s resilience.
• [76:42] - Emma on economic democracy.
• [60:07] - Trump’s statement on prison camps.
• [67:57] - Condemnation of Trump’s policies.

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Conclusion

Episode 2475 of The Majority Report with Sam Seder sheds light on the perilous intersection of Trump’s inconsistent tariff policies, the rise of authoritarianism in El Salvador under Bukele, and the broader implications for U.S. democracy and human rights. Through incisive analysis and a comprehensive interview with Roberto Lovato, the episode underscores the urgent need for cohesive policy-making and robust social movements to counteract the escalating threats to democratic principles.

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For more detailed discussions and supporting resources, listeners are encouraged to visit Majority.FM.

Transcript

[Emma Vigeland]

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But you have to use my code majority for 50% off your first order. Which one last time? That's promo code majority for 50% off your first order plus free shipping. Now time for the show the Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Monday, April 14, 2025. My name is Emma Bigeland in for Sam Cedar and this is the five time award winning Majority Report. We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, usa. On the program today, Robert Roberto Lovato will be with us to talk about El Salvador and Bukele since he's visiting the White House today and the United States relationship with El Salvador. Also on the program after exempting electronics and semiconductors from tariffs. Days later, Trump reverses, probably because he lost and everyone is saying that he lost. China won. It hasn't stopped China from responding. Suspending exports of rare minerals and magnets needed for cars and aerospace. An overwhelming majority of them are made in China. Trump is causing European tourism to fall by more than 17% last month compared to that month a year ago. U.S. tourism is a nearly $3 trillion industry. Far right self described dictator of El Salvador, Bukele, as I mentioned, visits the White House today. Trump seemingly defies a Supreme Court order to bring back Kilmar Garcia. Rubio says 10 more people were sent to Bukele's prison camps. Still no due process. And his own State Department sends an internal memo telling their bosses that they have no authority to deport tough student Romesa Ozturk. The Department of Homeland Security has been emailing legal immigrants telling them to self deport. DHS staffers are also reportedly receiving lie detector tests to root out leakers. Trump said CBS should pay a big price for airing critical stories about his Ukraine and Greenland policies. Bernie and AOC hold massive, huge rallies in Utah and LA over the weekend. The LA one was their biggest ever. Bernie's biggest ever. Wired reports that the Social Security Administration is moving some of their communications to Twitter. You know the website your grandma's always on. Israel bombed the last functioning hospital in Gaza City, destroying many parts of it. And lastly, a man has been charged in connection with arson at the Pennsylvania's gov. Pennsylvania governor's house. Unclear what the motive is. All this and more on today's Majority Report. It's a Majority Report Monday and a Majority Report week. Sam is off on vacation this week. So you're stuck with me all week. But also Russ, also Matt and our wonderful guests coming up this week. What's up guys? Another, another week of insane news and it's just, it's difficult to keep up. Over the weekend, Trump had announced some exemptions to tariffs and now is coming on out this morning and the markets kind of rebounded now is coming out this morning and saying maybe not China's not backing down. They suspended in response to this exports of critical rare minerals and magnets. These specific rare minerals are refined exclusively in China. 90% of the magnets are produced in, in China of the ones that are being suspended here. And this is going to piss off defense contractors because they're needed to create weapons and also automakers. It's a difficult dance because you have the UAW supportive of the tariffs because you know, we would love of all of the industries that are affected by tariffs, we maybe are closest to being able to manufacture some of these things domestically in the auto industry. But it still is insufficient because like of these magnets aren't just for EVs, they're also necessary in gasoline powered cars for some of the functions like steering. So this is going to really hurt. It's going to really hurt unless this ends quickly. But Trump seems to be burned by the fact that everyone is saying that he lost this trade war. And it seems like Trump was trying to almost purposefully tank the market a bit so that he could lower interest rates and bully the Fed into doing it himself, which is one of the only independent, the only last like independent part of our financial system. Right. The Fed and Jerome Powell is doing what they think is best. We don't always agree with that, but Trump was trying to get it to bend to his will and force maybe potentially some insecurity. So people go and buy U.S. treasury bonds, which is what happens when the stock market tanks because people are investors are looking for a safer bet. That's not what, that's not what happened. Japan started selling off U.S. treasury bonds. So it was a sell off because Trump took for granted that people would view the US Economy as stable by default. And that's not what happened. There was a surge in treasury yields and people started to panic basically. So we're in this situation now where there's every other day a contradicting policy and even people in the administration can't seem to keep up because first at first tariffs were negotiation tactics, but actually just kidding their ways to generate revenue, but actually just kidding their ways for world leaders to come and kiss Donald Trump's ass. I mean who knows what they are that changes on a day to day basis.

[Matt Binder]

And the ostensible reason of we want to reshore manufacturing is obviously a joke because anyone that's planning a factory will be a bit upset that they were planning it. Say, took out a loan for it when the tariffs were high. And then Trump said, actually, never mind, there's exceptions for this thing that you were just going to reshore onto American soil.

[Emma Vigeland]

Even the insecurity that he's creating chills manufacturing without coherent policy. It means that people aren't going to take the time and the years and money to invest in America because they don't know if this mad king is going to change domestic trade policy and economic policy within 48 hours.

[Matt Binder]

And they wouldn't to begin with. I mean, Biden tried this to just incentivize and de risk investment. That's not enough, actually. You need to consciously invest in certain sectors that you want to grow and this sort of thing where you expect slight changes in tariffs to affect it all. It's obviously a joke. It's again, just to get people to negotiate with Trump and also to isolate China.

[Emma Vigeland]

And China actually very much strengthens its position during this period, which was as predictable as anything. If you have an adult in the room and not a guy like Peter Navarro, who is one of the most obvious cranks in the world, we're talking like not even a step up from Sidney Powell coming up with these bizarre AI generated trade deficit mathematical equations that it's even too generous to call it a mathematical equation given how faulty it is. But yesterday on the Sunday shows, Trump sends out his lackeys to sell to the American public what they're doing. And these, these shows air at the same time. Here's Howard Lutnick on ABC yesterday morning saying, okay, don't worry, folks, there will be exemptions for certain products like phones, computers, semiconductors, pharmaceuticals.

[Chris Hayes]

Well, if you remember, over the past couple of months, President Trump has called out pharmaceuticals and semiconductors and autos. He called them sector tariffs. And those are not available for negotiation. They are just going to be part of making sure we reassure the core national security items that need to be made in this country. We need to make medicine in this country. We learned it during COVID We need to make it in this country. We need to make semiconductors. Because if we don't own semiconductors.

[Emma Vigeland]

Can you pause it? I'm so sorry. Remember, all this is agreed. You agree with progressives on this front. That's why first, before you do any kinds of tariffs, and the tariffs for specific industries would be appropriate, but you would need five, six years of heavily subsidized investment in those industries. And then that may not even be enough, but you would need to first develop the capacity to make all of these Products at scale, and then you hit the imported goods with the tariffs. We do not have that capacity, especially on what he just listed. Semiconductors. You know what? Bill was there to target and engender domestic manufacturing of semiconductors. The CHIPS Act. The CHIPS act, it's in the acronym, although obviously also China competition is a part of that. It was recognized by the Biden administration as a problem, and we needed to ensure that manufacturing domestically. You know what the Trump administration is doing? They fired all of the probationary employees that were hired, and they're probationary because they're new hires to implement the CHIPS act to create the domestic manufacturing capacity for semiconductors. Trump fired all of them. So there's no ability to do what Lutnik says tariffs are designed to do.

[Chris Hayes]

All, virtually all semiconductors are made now in Taiwan and they're finished in China. It's important that we reassure them. And so the president is going to come out with his policies on semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. They're going to be outside the reciprocal tariffs. And he was just making sure everyone understood that all of these products are outside the reciprocal tariffs and they are going to have their own separate way of being considered.

[Emma Vigeland]

But wait a minute. I'm asking you about the exemption, not about. I mean, the notice that went out Friday night saying that electronics, a wide range of electronics, including smartphones, including components used to make microchips, that these are now exempt from the reciprocal tariffs. Why that move?

[Chris Hayes]

Well, remember, those products are going to be part of the semiconductor sectoral tariffs which are coming. So you're going to see this week, there'll be a register in the federal registry. There'll be a notice put out that is different types of work. So we're going to do that. We did that in autos. The president's going to do it for pharmaceuticals, and he's going to do it for semiconductors. So all those products are going to come under semiconductors, and they're going to have a special focus type of tariff to make sure that those products get reassured. We need to have semiconductors, we need to have chips, and we need to have flat panels. We need to have these things made in America. We can't be reliant on Southeast Asia for all of the things that operate for us. So what he's doing is he's saying they're exempt from the reciprocal tariffs, but.

[Emma Vigeland]

Oh, my God. All right, we get it. We get it. Like I. So they're not exempt. So wait, the announcement was that they were exempt, but no, they're not exempt. There are other tariffs in the future.

[Matt Binder]

They're going to be not exempt.

[Emma Vigeland]

Don't worry. We didn't take an L on this. Donald Trump didn't realize that we don't have the ability to do this. And this would his defense contractor buddies, they want bombs over to Israel right now. And they're not going to be very happy with the idea that this kicks off a trade war where China can stop the exporting of the materials that they need for their weapons technology and for aerospace. Okay, so that's what he's saying, that yes, there are exemptions Trump announced on Friday, but don't worry, they won't actually be exempt. Those other tariffs are coming. That show is airing Lutnick, Commerce Secretary on abc. Over on NBC, you have Peter Navarro, the crank responsible for the formula on with Meet the Press, saying some contradictory things to the actual like to the Commerce Secretary. I want to talk about the status of those potential pending deals.

[Roberto Lovato]

But first, look, you're talking about the.

[Emma Vigeland]

Fact that the White House has a strategy. The Commerce Secretary, the treasury Secretary, the.

[Roberto Lovato]

President himself said there would not be exclusions. And yet just yesterday there were exclusions. So is there in fact a plan or is the president making this up as he goes?

[Marco Rubio]

So the policy is no exemptions, no exclusions. The policy is there. We're not exclusion. Let me explain. This is really good for the American people to understand there's like different ways to go about getting fairness for the American people. We started with the fentanyl border tariffs. That's an ipa, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. And we had a crisis at the border. We continue to see people die. By the time this shows over, another couple of Americans will be dead from fentanyl in just a short period of time. We did that.

[Matt Binder]

So.

[Emma Vigeland]

All right, just quick pause. We just have to fact check that the overwhelming majority of fentanyl comes through legal ports of entry. And is this is completely false. Also, overdose deaths went down under Biden because in part the administration prioritized sending out drugs that would help with overdose deaths and some harm reduction policies on the federal level, not enough.

[Marco Rubio]

But still it is also used for the trade deficit. But there's also a really important thing, Chris, and this deals with the chips issue you're talking about. That's what we call the Section 232 issue, which is when we have a flood of imports being dumped into certain key strategic sectors. Steel, aluminum chips, pharmaceuticals. As we learned during COVID we have to take specific actions. So what we're doing with chips, the Problem interestingly for chips because it's very complex stuff is that we don't buy a lot of chips like in bags. We buy them in products. So what Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick is going to do is doing it as we speak is an investigation of the chip supply chain. The goal is stability and resilience. And you will see actions taken based on those investigations. On copper, we've already have steel and aluminum, we already have autos. There will be pharmaceuticals and there will be chips. And the important thing is there's three kinds. There's the high end chips which is the AI future.

[Emma Vigeland]

Okay.

[Marco Rubio]

We've got to get control of that. And then there's everything else that fuels our autos, the chips act.

[Emma Vigeland]

Fair enough. Ok that I thought I was praying. Fair enough. What is she talking about? Can we put the ticker back up of what. What Lutnick was saying? Just, just the. It says now exempt smartphones, other electronics now exempt from tariffs at the same time that Navarro was saying that. I mean there. The level of incompetence that we're talking about here cannot be overstated. The amount of insecurity that they are creating day by day in the economy is irreparable regardless of whether or not these tariffs go into effect. And I love how they're playing this game of like oh it's exemptions are different from exclusions which are different from exceptions. Exemptions, exclusions, exceptions. I can't even keep track of it. But there's no, there's no policy here. Everybody's just following what, following what Donald Trump says on a day to day basis. And what it means is not good things for the next, for economic forecasts for the next few months at least.

[Matt Binder]

It's the height of irrationality. And also our accusations about drug trafficking are like Nazi level lies that are projection because of America's complicity in particular Southeast Asia, the drug trade there, the CIA like it's. It's crazy that we foreground that even with a Canada like it's fentanyl we just deploy this thing that.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right.

[Matt Binder]

Purports to be a civilizational issue which again like lots of people's lives have been destroyed through these things and we protect the actual mercers and all those people that are responsible for it and then use it as a foreign policy bludgeon. It's disgusting.

[Emma Vigeland]

Do we that. Do we remember that Peter Navarro was like just in prison for cousteff. For, for. For yeah election denial and you know he showed his loyalty. That's why he, he showed me he's a good guy. He's willing to take some pain like I'm trying to inflict on the rest of the country because he served for contempt backing up the dear leader. But this guy's a lunatic and he was considered a lunatic back in the first Trump era when he was tell encouraging Trump to go after to embrace hydroxychloroquine and injecting bleach. All of that stuff's from that, that guy.

[Matt Binder]

I just say like those, the whole idea that we need to reshore chips or whatever, it's not because he wants us to have good chip manufacturing jobs at a fabricator. It's because they want to go to war with China and still have computer chips.

[Emma Vigeland]

Oh, jobs. They are firing the federal workforce and openly saying it's because they want to funnel people back into the private sector which means taking, creating more unemployment to depress wages and depress the labor market. That's their stated goal. And they're even saying that they're going to do. Don't worry, we'll create other jobs. You can go back to coal mining while we let the robots do this stuff and pair that with the child labor laws in right wing states. You get a pretty good picture of what the Trump administration is trying to create here in this country. All right, first, a word. We'll get to Roberto in just a second. A word from some of our sponsors here. Prolon Prolon. Long weeks and busy weekends, month after month can leave you feeling and even looking a little bit depleted. Prolon works at a cellular level to rejuvenate you from the inside out, supporting enhanced skin appearance and fat loss and improving energy and focus. Post Fast Prolon's program takes the guesswork out and equips you with a science backed plan, making it a key tool for your health journey. Sam speaks very highly of Prolon and I have it on my calendar in a few weeks because you know my wedding's coming up and I gotta just like squeeze into that dress. So might be doing a little bit of fasting because it also feels good to get your mind right and get all the junk out of your system. Prolon's Fasting Mimicking diet is a revolutionary plant based nutrition program that nourishes the body while making cells believe that they're fasting. Researched and developed for decades at USC's Longevity Institute and backed by leading US medical centers, Prolon helps support healthy blood sugar, enhanced skin appearance, fat loss and improved energy and focus. Post Fast it starts all with a five day program snacks, soups and beverages designed to keep your body in a fasting state. No guesswork or planning required. Three consecutive cycles of Prolon have been shown to reduce your biological age score by an average of 2 1/2 years and your waist circumference by 1 1/2 inches. Sam did it for a week, was worried he was going to be cranky, didn't notice it at all. He seemed to really be totally okay and felt clear by the end of the week and I'm excited to get going and trying it myself. To help you kickstart a health plan that truly works, Prolon is offering you 15% statewide plus a $40 bonus gift when you subscribe to their five day nutrition program. Just visit prolonlife.com Majority that's P R O L O N life.com Majority to claim your 15% discount and your bonus gift. Prolong life.com Majority and lastly, select Quote Select Quote is one of America's leading insurance brokers with nearly 40 years of experience helping over 2 million customers find over $700 billion in coverage since 1985. Other life insurance brokers offer impersonal one size fits all policies that may cost you more and cover you less, while Select Quotes licensed insurance insurance agents work for you to tailor a life insurance policy for your individual needs in at least little as 15 minutes. And have you ever worried about getting coverage with a pre existing health condition? Well, Select Quote partners with carriers that provide policies for a variety of health conditions. High blood pressure, no problem. Diabetes. That's okay too, even if you have heart disease. Select Quote partners with carriers that cover those conditions and others or if you don't have any major health issues, they work with carriers that can get you the same day coverage with no medical exam required. Head to selectquote.com and a licensed insurance agent will call you right away with the right policy for your life and your budget. Select Quote is important if you're thinking about your future. You've got kids. You want to make sure that you are squared away on life insurance. Select Quote they shop, you save. Get the right life insurance for you for [e-mail] Majority go to SelectQuote.com Majority today to get started. That's SelectQuote.com Majority all right, quick break and when we come back, we'll be talking to Roberto Lovato. We are back and we are joined now by Roberto Lovato, a Salvadoran American writer, assistant professor of English at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He is the author of the book, A Memoir of Migration, Gangs and Revolution in the Americas. Roberto, thanks so much for coming on the show today.

[Roberto Lovato]

Oh, real pleasure to be with you, Emma.

[Emma Vigeland]

Great, great to hear from you. We can hear him. All right. Okay. Awesome. My headphones a little weird, so. Apologies. Roberto, before we talk about Bukele and his visit today, I think it's helpful to give some people a sense of El Salvador's history with the United States, Bukele's place in it. You were born in the United States, but I know that your family's from El Salvador and you spent your life working in academia, journalism, but also nonprofits helping Salvadoran immigrants. So it seems to me that you've had a foot in both worlds. Can you tell us a little bit more about your background and how it informs your work?

[Roberto Lovato]

Yeah. I was born in San Francisco's Mission District, home to Carlos Santana, which is. And I kind of identify as a child of the 70s when Santana's music reflects the way that all these different currents of consciousness, black power, brown power, gay power, women's power, and the power of social movements, especially in Central America, were kind of coming together. I grew up in that environment and pre musk Silicon Valley, so I kind of also kind of saw the rise of techno fascism in the Bay Area. And so as a kid I was in a clique gang and had to get out of that and joined a right wing evangelical church that today would have made me an evangelical fascist, But I learned to be a militant in the church and left it and then eventually ended up in El Salvador trying to find myself and find myself in the middle of a war which was affecting my family and friends of my family. And I started doing work with refugee communities there. And first I started with refugee groups in San Francisco, and then I went to El Salvador and worked with refugee groups there and saw things that no human being should see done to children, elderly and others. And I decided that just doing kind of liberal service work was insufficient to the moment and made the difficult decision to join the FMLN guerrillas. And, you know, I'm still paying the price psychologically for that and have also learned great deal. And so I then became a writer, journalist, and eventually professor now here at UNLV and am astounded at how the circuits of violence and fascistic, neo fascistic and techno fascistic kind of politics have turned El Salvador, this tiny country that people didn't even know when I was a kid, into a global center of neo fascist theory and practice.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right. And let's trace that history A little bit. And, and even we can start with your upbringing and how you say you were going to click. And right now we're seeing the Trump administration attempt to justify its fascism by painting migrants as criminals. We hear a lot about Trend Aragua, which is associated with Venezuela, and Ms. 13, which is associated with El Salvador. Can you speak a little bit about how you got, how you found connection in the clique as you describe it, and how gang ties, very loosely described, are being used against people from El Salvador to really demonize them?

[Roberto Lovato]

Frankly, one of the things I do in my book is show the human conditions that create gangs and gang members. I was a part of a small clique in San Francisco, nothing like the really hardcore gangs either here in the US like the Mexican Mafia and other gangs, or Crips and Bloods and Ms. 13 and 18th street in El Salvador, which are structures based on US style gangs. And so I found friendship and community in a little clique that was, you know, not mostly non violent except at different moments we were involved in drugs and other stuff, but we were not the hardened, heavy weapon wielding gangs of today. And so I started working with gangs in the 90s in LA, where the gangs were born, Ms. 13 and 18th street and you know, 13, for example is the letter M is the number of the letter M that the Salvadoran gangs who were being before they were gangs, they were being bullied and beaten by larger, mostly black gangs in South LA and decided to start arming themselves with machetes. And then journalists like Lisa Ling started noticing that these gangs had machetes instead of guns and started labeling them as extremely violent. And you know, and then, then the gang took on, you know, the more familiar tattooed faces, tattooed bodies and more heavily armed gang structures and culture that we know today. And so I've watched as the US local and then federal governments have started taking interest in these gangs and the project has been bipartisan, Democrat and Republican, they both escalated and used the gangs to legitimate, initially local policing of young people. Now you're seeing it become this terrorist federalized that, you know, has, you know, Lisa Link started calling MS.13 the most dangerous gang in the world, even though you never have any statistical basis to prove any gang is the most violent in the world. It's ridiculous. In fact, I mean, when you look at I in 2019 when Trump started using the word terrorist as applied to Salvadoran gangs, and then as Bukele was elected that same year, he starts using the term aggressively and you see how, you know, the terrorist word is being thrown around. I started interviewing cops, police in San Francisco and other cities and found out, for example, that in 2019, you had three white men wielding semiautomatic weapons. These three white men killed more people in 2019 than the allegedly 10,000 Ms. 13 and 18 street gang members in the U.S. combined. So let me repeat that. Three, three white men with semiautomatic weapons killed more people in 2019 than all of the 10,000 MS.13 and 18 street gang members in the United States. This is the degree to which the media display you're seeing in the meeting between Bukele and Trump is entirely political theater on steroids.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right. And it's, you see, frankly, like as you alluded to the explosion of tactics that have been long used against Latino and black young men in cities in this country, gang databases right now being basically used at the federal level, where if you're somebody who's from a specific area of Venezuela, or if you're from El Salvador and you may like, know somebody or have been in a community with somebody who's in one of these gangs that they trump up as, not to use a pun, as more dangerous than they are, that that basically classifies you as a part of some broader criminal organization. And now not just criminal, according to this far right Trump administration, terrorist.

[Roberto Lovato]

Yeah. The franchise of criminalization and now terrorization of different groups of people is well underway. And it's the biggest, most dangerous thing that's coming out of the Trump Bukele meeting. It's telling, for example, that during the meeting today, Bukele said, and I quote, sometimes they say that we imprison thousands. I like to say that we actually liberated millions. And Trump replies, who gave him that line? Do you think I can use that? And so the meeting reflects, I think, the expansion of the local, national, hemispheric and global enterprise of terrorization of increasing numbers of groups. You start off with the, the lowest hanging, violent fruit like the gangs, and they are violent and some of them are murderous. Most of them are not. Most of the gang members are not murders, okay? Otherwise you'd have over 10,000 deaths in MS.13 in the US when you have insignificant number statistically doing that. So you start off with gangs, then you extend it to immigrants generally, as you see Stephen Miller's career, you know, growing, and Trump's own election built on that. And then you extend it to, like in El Salvador, journalists dealing with gangs have been arrested, harassed, persecuted, some even exiled. And then you extend it to activists. You start using the word activist to talk about like you're talking about the Palestinian activists in Colombia or the Turkish woman who was arrested by, you know, at Tufts. At tufts, yeah. Or Mr. Abrego Garcia who is still in the Secot Gulag that Bukele just built. All of these immigrants are now illustrations of how the franchise is extending. But make no mistake, coming your way soon is the franchise of terrorization to those of us that are citizens. It's already afoot. Trump is already talking about deporting citizens to El Salvador, U.S. citizens. And so, you know, and this is where like my, my experience first growing up in, in pre techno fascist Bay area and then as a journalist who's reported on electronic surveillance that, you know, as I watched it go from the analog industrial age to the digital age of surveillance has taught me that people like Bukele are, are, are, are, are, are, are digital dictators. We're in the age of digital dictatorship. And the industrial age structures of like my former comrades in the FMLN could not defeat the digital dictatorship model of Bukele. And so we have to upgrade our social movements for the digital age if we are to fight people like Bukele, who has benefited from CIA trained Venezuelan assets, who became consultants to Bukele and helped him kind of manufacture this bizarre and dangerous reality in El Salvador that has large segments of the populace supporting him in their desperation.

[Emma Vigeland]

I really want to get to that and also your astute comments about the Bay Area and what it's become because so much of what you're saying reminds me of another Bay Area, a journalist we had on Gil Duran and his study of these right wing techno fascists. But you mentioned the CIA and its current involvement in El Salvador's politics. But it did not obviously begin there. The United States sent billions of dollars in military aid to El Salvador's government in the 80s and it was a violent, repressive regime. If you could give us a little bit of that history as we lead into explaining how Bukele fits into that history, that would be great.

[Roberto Lovato]

Yeah. El Salvador was for the better part of the 20th century, one of the longest standing military dictatorships in, in the world, in the hemisphere and in the world. And it's always, it's always been as well the one of a, it was the first place to launch a, an indigenous and communist insurrection against dictatorship in the Americas in 1932 when approximately 32,000, I mean, I'm sorry, somewhere between 10 to 50,000. We still don't know because the memory of that has been erased in official records. People were killed by their own government. And so the violence and murder of El Salvador has ingrained itself in the political and even the social culture of El Salvador, where for example, dictatorship after dictator was continually torturing, killing, disappearing, exiling and perpetrating other actions to terrorize their way into domination. So in the 60s and 50s and 60s you start seeing the birth of groups following Che Guevara and Fidel Castro in the Americas that were revolutionary, mostly Marxist Leninist revolutionary organizations that eventually in the 1980s became the Farabundo Marti, National Liberation Front, Liberacion Nacional and the FMLN waged a successful war to dismantle the military dictatorship. Sadly and tragically, the FMLN did not retool itself for the digital age, the analog age. Marcus Leninist political military structures did not get upgraded for the world that Silicon Valley created. And so eventually you get in the 90s the right wing fascist arena party instituting what's known as mano dura hard hand politics. In response to the gang problem that was growing after the war because Bush administration one Attorney General Bill Barr started targeting gangs in the U.S. making up until that time the most the largest shift in FBI resources from counterintelligence to focus on gangs. In 1992, in response to daily riots, he also began the practice of deporting gang members to El Salvador and then the rest of Central America, a region rife with ruins and perfectly fit to grow US style LA style gang structures like the Mexican mafia. And so that's where you get Ms. 13 and 18th street growing out of the rotten soil of US policy in.

[Emma Vigeland]

Deportations.

[Roberto Lovato]

And gang policing.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right, right. So they fed one another. Right. And I guess it created almost a cycle of you have. Sorry to cut you off here, Roberto, but it's such a key point, Ms. 13, originating in the US prison system, informing deportation policies, sending those folks back to El Salvador, building up their resources and creating almost strengthening them, but also tying in US kind of gang policing into the immigration carceral state that's so key in the 90s and into the 2000s.

[Roberto Lovato]

Oh that you're right on point, Emma. In addition to that, you see the kind of robocopization of U. S policing and El Salvador's actual influence on it. You had people like a guy named the late Maxman Waring who, a former U. S. Pentagon colonel who and strategist and you know, professor, distinguished professor in the US army college, you know, starting his career focusing on insurgency and counterinsurgeny in El Salvador after the war. What does Manwaring do? He goes and he starts looking at gangs as the new insurgency and starts framing gangs as insurgency. There's a line that runs from that kind of thinking to the terrorist language you see being used today. And then some of the 50, some of the many trainers that the US sent to El Salvador after the war ended in 1992, went where to San Francisco, Louisiana, New York, to train US police forces in counterinsurgency. Okay. And then you have, you know, over the years, u. S. Presidents, including Obama, for example, heavily militarizing US Police. So you have in El Salvador an outsized. A tiny country with an outsized contributions to the militarization of the United States itself.

[Emma Vigeland]

Mm. And even the militarization of the police. That's an outgrowth of the war on terror, which is where we come full circle of the classifying of these folks as terrorists, because we did the same thing with the mujahideen. We know that the United States has enabled far right governments not just in South America or Latin America, but also in the Middle East. And then that's come back to bite us because they become the. Well, maybe not even bite us, but it. It benefits these people because then the military budget increases and the surveillance state increases, and this is a new group of people to go after. It's just a completely incongruent policy. If you actually care about safety and not just the carceral state and making some money like that. That it creates cycles of violence is really what I'm saying. And it doesn't seem like there'swe're just. We're diving even further into just a more digitized version of that policy. You write about it as a digitized neoliberal, 21st century fascista, which is so well said. Like, how does that look when you bring in the surveillance technology piece?

[Roberto Lovato]

Well, it looks like things you see in sci fi movies. I don't, you know, I don't teach sci fi writing, but I'm a fan of sci fi writing and sci fi movies. One of my favorite being the Matrix. You're living in the matrix right now. In many ways, as far as the stimulation of reality, what takes place in the White House right now between Bukele and Trump is an entire stimulation when you have this terrorist language being applied indiscriminately and without any basis in reality. When you're going to start seeing it extend the brand of the terrorist brand into different groups that are going to include many of us, unless we build something else that El Salvador has to teach us, which is the social movements that are the only things that are going to be able to challenge the rise of fascism. We're not going to liberal progressive our way out of climate change techno fascism. We simply, it's proven time and again in the case of El Salvador, in the case of gangs, in the case of immigration, for example, immigration by the way, being the, the royal road that leads to fascism not just in the U.S. but throughout the world. Right. In Europe and other, and even in the Americas. In, in the case of these, the escalation of this techno fascist practice, we're going to have to build the social movements that kind of include elements of liberal progressive. We're going to have to be a little more radical and to the left of that if we're to get through this.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yeah, absolutely. And I guess that brings us to more of a, of a modern context because Bukele is right now meeting with Donald Trump, as you say. Apparently he has now said he won't be releasing Kilmar Abrego Garcia, calling him a terrorist. Trump is openly flirting, standing next to him with the idea of sending quote, homegrowns to the El Salvador prison. What is this guy's background? You mentioned the fmln, the left wing political party in El Salvador that he was initially a part of, but he was expelled from in 2017. Can you talk about how that happened, why that happened and how this guy cut his teeth politically?

[Roberto Lovato]

Yeah, I mean, sadly some of the leadership in the fmln, my former comrades, got corrupted by power and money and you know, they embraced and couldn't see the danger of somebody, a rich boy, technologically sophisticated rich boy named Naibu Kele. And he was not in any way a part of the history of the fmln that what I would call the heroic history of the FMLN prior to becoming the dominant political force in El salvador in the 2000s. And so they. There was a parting of ways between Bukele and the FMLN when Bukele was mayor. And Bukele went on to establish a political party known as Nueva CDAs, the new ideas Party, which actually did have new ideas. But the new ideas they're not telling you is techno fascism. Right. Taking elements of the FMLN's oppositional discourse and combining it with the traditional fascist militaristic practices of the Arena Party, also an industrial age structure, Bukele managed to, with the help of his Venezuelan digital consultants who worked to against Hugo Chavez and Maduro, they concocted this whole new way to dominate in the digital age. Like people talk about the spectacle of politics this is the spectacle of politics in extreme and it's right there in front of us and people are consuming it as if the spectacle was reality. When you have for example Bukele displaying gang members on the floor, these famous pictures he was showing how to cover up the extermination, the torture, the disappearances of previous governments, including the FMLN government, sadly when it came to gangs. So instead of like continuing the, the he continues the worst of military dictatorship. But does it under the guise of this digital democratic spectacle, is he involved.

[Emma Vigeland]

In cryptocurrency as well? I mean, like, yeah, right, that's, that's that. I mean you also see that down in Argentina, like there is a growing crypto, crypto techno fascist movement that has close ties with Elon Musk and the Trump administration in a variety of different countries even as we, there are some success stories in South America with left wing governments. There are like on the other side of the spectrum, these far right kind of dictatorships. Like Bukele similarly is my understanding, is not really interested in governing very much. Like he hasn't done anything in office except some of this fascistic notorious prisons where he has complete control over them and can throw in anybody he wants. Like they're a lot of it's just crypto scams is my read of things.

[Roberto Lovato]

Absolutely. Crypto has not delivered for El Salvador. In fact, it's put it into more debt and it's just crypto is just another part of the digital political theater that you see in the prisons, that you see in the meeting today, that you see running through and through Bukele's project. I'm glad you mentioned Latin America because there's still pockets and large swaths of hope to be had in the Americas, arguably the most insurgent continent in the world when it comes to opposition to US Empire. And so there's a whole history there that the FMLN in its better days was a part of. That's part of what I why I wrote my book, to preserve the history and remind people. I mean it was no easy thing for me to a US citizen to come out as a former guerrilla fighter. But Trump helped me to make that decision because I realized that there was some great learning to be had in the revolutionary tradition. A word that we don't even use hardly anymore, revolucion. In the US We've forgotten that there's a whole tradition in the world that was a revolutionary tradition. And so we have to kind of go to the only thing really proven to defeat fascists over the Course of history has been revolutionary movements by and large, and we're going to need that now. So what that means. I don't have all the answers. That's beyond my pay grade. But I do know that we need to do in our social movements what psychologists, for example, do with the kids that I've interviewed in the jails of Obama, Trump and Biden, which is to reconstitute their, you know, the kids brains shrink when you put them in their these cages and in prisons for an extended period. And psychologists treating them told me that the way they deal with them is to help the kids reconstitute their story of themselves in a way that connects to the part of us that's indestructible, because there's a part of us, spiritually, psychologically, that's indestructible. And so we. Liberal progressivism doesn't put us in touch with that part of our radical imagination, our radical core. And I think we need to start thinking about how do we build not just individuals, but social movements that re engineer themselves to come back in touch with the things that make for real social change. I can't see how we're going to liberal progressive our way out of fascism. I don't.

[Emma Vigeland]

I think time and again the liberalism is enabling fascism right now. I mean, we're seeing it with the liberal institutional law firms in the country. Because even if you're liberal on being open to other cultures, being laissez faire liberal in the marketplace means you're always going to abandon the secondary cultural and social liberalism for the primary means of power in society, which is wealth under capitalism. That's what we're seeing.

[Roberto Lovato]

Absolutely. I mean, I wrote a piece for the Nation a while back on something I call intersectional empire, which is the alternative that Democrats have offered us. You're not doing anything to dismantle empire. You're just advancing it under a gay flag with a black president and women in the cabinet and, you know, helicopters with the gay flag on them and stuff. And so the LGBTQ flag. And so like, that's the alternative that liberalism is offering us. And we are betrayed time and again by liberal Democrats, though at some point, we need to have a big tent social movement on a national hemispheric level that brings in all the different forces opposed to the techno fascist order that's being established in the US and across the hemisphere with El Salvador, with Argentina, we have to really go back to the oldie but goody idea of, you know, think globally, act locally, and connect globally. In ways we haven't in the past. I do have hope, however. I see, just like when I was in New York, I saw Occupy when it was coming. I see the possibilities in a global movement that will surpass the scale and scope and intensity of the 68 movement because of our ability to connect to each other in ways that are unprecedented from then to now. So that, that, that is my great hope. That we saw, for example, in the movement against the genocide in, in Palestine, the interconnectedness of the world acting in unison for social justice. And that, that that preview is also the, the reasons why you have the attacks of the Trumps and the Bukeles and the expansion of the franchise of the terrorism, terrorization of different groups of people, including students. Eventually you're going to get to labor people. You're going to start expanding this. The opportunity in Trump and Bukele's meeting is to become aware of the unification of the global right that is going to bring about the unification of the global left.

[Emma Vigeland]

Well, from your mouth to concierge. Roberto, thanks so much for coming on the show today. Roberto Lovato, you can read his book Unforgetting a memoir of Family Migration, Gangs and revolution in the Americas. We'll put a link to that below. Wherever people are listening to or watching this. Thanks so much for your time today. Really appreciate it.

[Roberto Lovato]

My pleasure, Emma. Thank you.

[Emma Vigeland]

Thank you. Folks. Before we wrap up the free part of this program and head into the fun half, I figured we should just tackle this story now because it's not so fun. But it's breaking news. Donald Trump meeting with El Salvador's far right dictator, President Bukele in the White House now. And here they are openly talking about, sending, quote, homegrowns, AKA American citizens to the prison camp in El Salvador.

[Donald Trump]

Home growns, you got to build about five more places.

[Emma Vigeland]

Okay, go back just a second. Yeah, we're getting this as we so. But here you hear Trump then exclaim more loudly, homegrowns are next.

[Donald Trump]

Homegrowns are next.

[Emma Vigeland]

The homegrowns.

[Donald Trump]

You got to build about five more places.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yeah, that's fair.

[Donald Trump]

All right.

[Emma Vigeland]

It's not big enough.

[Donald Trump]

Come on. So this is a much different office than you.

[Emma Vigeland]

Oh, my God. Then he's going on about the, the decor in the White House again. So it's a much different place. We put up a lot of gold. I know that. We all know that this man is an insane person.

[Matt Binder]

Has everyone laughed in that room? It's not just Trump.

[Emma Vigeland]

No, I, I mean, look at, look at who the crowd is Stephen Miller and, and Rubio and like they only, all they have are news Fox News reporters, if that in there at this point. I mean, yes, there's complicity in the media on this front, but they're also just like not letting traditional media in the room to ask these kinds of questions. Here. Here's another part of this. Them talking about Kilmar Abrego Garcia, because the Supreme Court has said now that the Trump administration must facilitate his return. Trump is now saying basically he's going to defy that testing the Supreme Court, which we knew was going to happen because they don't have an enforcement mechanism. And that's why they said things like facilitate and use more conservative language than they would. I think if they were like had the authority over or if they hadn't maybe said that the president is immune for prosecution for official acts, perhaps they'd feel a little bit more emboldened to tell him what to do and what not to do. But this is their own making here. Bukele just basically saying, I'm not going to help send him back. Can President Bukele weigh in on this? Do you plan to return him?

[Donald Trump]

Well, I guess I'm supposed to suggest that I smuggle terrorism to the United States.

[Roberto Lovato]

Right.

[Donald Trump]

How can I smuggle return him to the United States? Like I smuggle him into the United.

[Matt Binder]

States or what, calling him a terrorist.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yep.

[Donald Trump]

Of course I'm not going to do it. It's like, I mean, the question is preposterous. How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? I don't have the power to return him to the United States. But you can release him inside El Salvador. Yeah, but I'm not releasing. I mean, we're not very fond of releasing terrorists into our country. You just turned the murder capital of the road to the safest country of the west western hemisphere and you want us to go back into the releasing criminals so we can go back to being the murder capital of the world. Now that's good. That's not going to happen. Well, they'd love to have a criminal, you know, I mean, I mean, there's a fascination. They would love it. Yeah, they're sick.

[Roberto Lovato]

These are sick people.

[Emma Vigeland]

I mean, who's that reporter?

[Roberto Lovato]

What?

[Emma Vigeland]

One of the only, only Collins. It's Kaitlyn Collins, that's the White House correspondent for cnn. It seems like, I mean, so ccot, which is the maximum security prison in El Salvador that Trump says we now need many more of, is a gulag. It's basically a Prison that you don't talk to anybody. It's solitary confinement for almost every part of the day, 23 hours a day, which is torture, psychological torture that has effects on prisoners brains and is not helpful to reintegrate people back into society. It makes people go insane. But that's the point. I mean, and that's maybe the least horrible thing that happens to these folks in these prisons. In this prison, the way you get into Seekot is if Bukele says you get into Cecot because he's a dictator, a far right dictator who decides who gets thrown in a prison camp and who doesn't. And Donald Trump empties that authority and is now talking about doing that to American citizens. We have had so many constitutional crises under this administration already and it's been like three months since he got into office. But this might be the most intense. And that's saying a lot because this is an absolutely fundamental right in this country, the right to due process. And the Trump administration is, well, habeas corpus, this is their war on habeas corpus. Basically saying that Trump thinks that he can deport anybody that he deems a terrorist to a foreign prison camp without having their day in court. And then when you marry that with what he, what is happening right in front of our eyes with Kilmar, Abrego Garcia being the example, and Trump then saying in the same meeting that he wants to do that to US Citizens. What else can we glean from this? Or do we all have Trump derangement syndrome? Oh, it was just going to be the criminals we were told that were deported. And then you have the press take that at face value and eventually they get access to some court documents. And you have CBS and other outlets reporting it's like anywhere between 75 to 90% of these people have zero criminal record. Zero. And they're right now hundreds in this prison in solitary confinement with their head shaved and likely being tortured. And Trump is saying that he wants to do that to US Citizens. I mean, obviously incredibly disturbing.

[Matt Binder]

I mean, the truth is like we don't need to reference previous Times or former McCarthyism. We're in one of those periods now that people will cite. And the question is, how bad does it get Marco Rubio, which 99 senators voted for, including Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yep.

[Matt Binder]

And they should maybe, you know, be more at the forefront of that vote, I think in maybe repenting for it. But here's Marco Rubio talking about this, who's actually like maybe the key diplomat in charge of or key Government figure in charge of this besides Trump.

[Emma Vigeland]

We're told. We're told this guy is the sane one.

[Stephen Miller]

Even I landed. I don't understand what the confusion is. This individual is a citizen of El Salvador. He was illegally in the United States and was returned to his country. That's where you deport people back to their country of origin. Except for Venezuela. That wasn't refusing to take people back or places like that. I can tell you this, Mr. President. No. The foreign policy of the United States is conducted by the President of the United States, not by a court. And no court in the United States has a right to conduct the foreign policy of the United States. It's that simple. End of story.

[Emma Vigeland]

Okay. There's a few different sleights of hand there. First of all, is he a terrorist or can he be. Can Kilmar Abrego Garcia be released back into El Salvador? That's very different than what Bukele and Trump just said there. They called him a terrorist even though he's not one. He's never been criminally charged. He was fingered by a confidential informant and that tip went nowhere. And that is the extent of any history that he has with the law outside of, you know, trying to become a citizen and being a part of a union and working as an apprentice here in the Maryland area. He is a husband, he is a father. He is not a terrorist. That's already been delineated. The Trump administration admitted that they made a mistake. They admitted that they made a mistake sending him there. Then you have else. They're. They're basically prison, private prison contractor in chief Bukele saying that I'm not going to release him because there's nothing I can do. Sneering at the rest of the press. But then you turn to Rubio saying, well, maybe he can get released back into El Salvador because that's where he's from. Which one is it? Which one is it?

[Matt Binder]

Abrego Garcia married his girlfriend June 2019. They had a child together that was who was a US Citizen. Wife also had two children from an early relationship, and all three children have special needs. Abrego Garcia fought allegations against him in deportation proceedings in court and applied for asylum. His request was denied. However, the judge granted withholding of removal status that would block his deportation to El Salvador due to the threat that gangs would pose to him. He wasn't a gang member. He's a threat posed to gang members. Find that he was more likely to be harmed if he was returned to El Salvador, which of course is this. The reality that he's gonna live out. All that is to say, of course, he is the ideal candidate for, like, you know, sympathy. But the truth is, if we can't bring somebody back that we send there, we shouldn't be sending anywhere in there at all. Even if it's Hannibal, the late, great Hannibal Lecter, as Donald Trump likes to say. It's a fucking joke. It's. It's a. It's. This is a fascist takeover of the. Or a fascist advance, I should say. Takeover is probably too generous to the United States. Fascist advance of this country. And, you know, there's certain people in our field that were taking, like you said, the claim that this was just going to be criminals at face value at the beginning of this administration and also putting air quotes around words like gulag or minimizing, say, like, what it was, what it meant, that we are going to send more people to Guantanamo. These are gulags, like Trump said, more.

[Emma Vigeland]

Just on camera, More of them. And for U.S. citizens. And we were told we were hyperventilating. You absolutely. Like, complete, vicious liars. Yeah, yeah. And then, like, just. And how obvious did it have to be? How. How much did he have to just say it? It's the same thing. He's been saying tariffs, he's been saying mass deportations. He's been calling these people criminals baselessly. And then you had Rubio. That's the other side of hand there. Foreign policy. How is this foreign policy when you're deporting people from US Soil who were here and going through the process, including that temporary removal blockage that Matt just described there. These are people that were going through the legal process, including those folks that applied for Social Security numbers because they hope that one day they can build up this equity so they can become full US Citizens as they pay billions of dollars into our social programs and don't get anything out of it. In many instances, like, it's the reverse of what they describe. So it's not foreign policy. This isn't about our relations with the Middle east or with China or whatever. These are people who are here in the United States on U.S. soil. But when you say foreign policy, because we are. You can't understand the moment that we're in without understanding the war on terror and our erosion of rights and the fact that, frankly, Democrats did not effectively rebuild the guardrails that were destroyed by the Bush administration under the guise of national security and foreign policy. We now have these massive institutions like ICE and the Department of Homeland Security that have this broad authority to bend into fascist, fully fascist organizations that the Trump administration is using unilaterally to crack down on people without due process, even in the face of a 9 to 0 Supreme Court ruling. Even fricking Clarence Thomas told them this is a bridge too far and Trump is defying it.

[Matt Binder]

I mean, it's because we have a Nazi foreign policy that includes Stephen Miller, who is really the author of this, who was exposed to Nazi, basically white supremacist in Trump's first term. You can google that, look it up. But like a white Cuban like Marco Rubio fits right in with that agenda, frankly. Particularly our entire history of suppressing any kind of movements and partnering with reactionaries like Bukele, dictatorial reactionaries. This is, this is America.

[Kaitlan Collins]

Can I say, regardless of whether, you know, putting aside the actions of the US Government, putting aside the actions of the Salvadorian government, individuals, regardless of where they're from in the world, have human rights. It's sort of the basis of what had been the established post war liberal order. The concept, right, the concept of human rights. And what the US officials and Salvadoran officials have insinuated is that those people who are in that gulag will be there for the rest of their lives and say what you. I mean, obviously what happened in Guantanamo Bay was an abomination and a perpetual human rights abuse that continues to this day. But at the very least, the U.S. the Pentagon felt some pressure to have some sort of trial. Not everyone, actually. There's people who are being held there who are not charged with anything, but for the most part, they felt some sort of pressure to either charge people and have at least a show trial, like at least some sort of kangaroo court. But in this case, the Supreme Court.

[Emma Vigeland]

Told them they had to.

[Kaitlan Collins]

Sure, yeah. But in this case, these people are being sent to El Salvador for the rest of their lives without having so much as been charged with a crime, regardless of where they're from and who's doing it.

[Emma Vigeland]

And gang ties, as we've gone through in this interview or in our past interviews and with Roberto today, are very flimsy and are often used by local police departments to have large scale databases on poor men in cities.

[Matt Binder]

And again, like, broadly, even if somebody like was affiliated with a gang in teenage years or whatever, like you, the way to deal with that is it cannot be to send them to a gulag with no recourse, with no due process. It's obviously dealing with gangs. Like gang is a symptom.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yep. With that said, Matt, what's Happening on Left Reckoning.

[Matt Binder]

Probably talking some Colorado Jared Polis with a guest, Grace, tomorrow on Left Reckoning. And yeah, I mean, broadly freaking out.

[Emma Vigeland]

About all this stuff. Yep. All right, well, we're gonna head into the fun half. We'll open up the phone lines on the other side of things, this show relies on your support. Jointhemajorityreport.com we could really use it in these times. It keeps us afloat. Appreciate all our members so much you can Im the show and we read your IMs on air. We'll do some right now before heading into the fun half. Just as proof, Brooklyn Bass, our democracy is over. We need mass movements to hold off the worst of what's to come. And Democrats won't save us. Yes.

[Matt Binder]

The truth is, like, we shouldn't think of it as democracy was had and lost. Democracy is something that has always been struggled for and ground been taken for it and ground has advanced, been lost on it. We need to. And I mean, this is the real problem with Democrats marketing of, you know, fighting fascism and all this stuff, which is like the idea that we just need to put Democrats in power is some kind of saving of democracy. Democracy is in people. I mean, it's a bit.

[Emma Vigeland]

It's also in outcomes.

[Matt Binder]

When wasn't it, like Ben Franklin said, was it a democracy if you can keep it or a republic if you keep it? Either way, that's the issue. And the problem is we have had a lot of assaults on the things that sustain democracy, whether it's protests being smeared as anti Semitic, which we all know what protests have done to advance democracy in different generations. And now we have a bipartisan effort to call people anti Semites for opposing genocide. Unions. Unions were formative for the New Deal, would have never happened without massive labor and even socialist and communist organizing. Those have been completely destroyed in a bipartisan fashion, of course, not putting all the blame or equal blame, but it's bipartisan. And so, yeah, we're up Schitt's creek in a certain sense, but at least there's some consciousness about that. And people aren't looking. And what people can't do is look to Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. And frankly, I could list a lot more Democrats than that, but I'll be kind. This is a moment that requires a lot of urgency and things that can't. It can't just be, oh, we did good on the midterms. Let's try to maintain this and not address any of these fundamental contradictions, particularly Israel, and hope that we can get by without it because it's going to continue to bite.

[Emma Vigeland]

Exactly.

[Matt Binder]

Democrats in the ass like it has my entire fucking life.

[Emma Vigeland]

And it has to be democracy. Not just in selling the virtue of democracy, but in performing actions that engender, like democratic results, which includes economic democracy, which includes making the rules of our of the game favorable to equitable outcomes for people, which includes taxing the rich and not allowing them to rig the rules of the game and exploit capitalism even more than they do by hoarding wealth. That's also how you perform democracy. And that's why the Democrats struggled to send that message.

[Matt Binder]

And I'm not even just talking about, you know, of course, deliver union stuff and blah, blah, blah. The Joe Biden administration, they had the power again. Democrats continue having power and this stuff, and then they get in power and say things like, we'll out organize voter suppression.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yeah, like, I'm sorry.

[Matt Binder]

That is. That is sand. That is dirt on our coffin.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right? Yep. All right, guys, with that said, we'll head into the fun half and we'll see you there. Okay? Emma, please. Well, I just. I feel that my voice is sorely lacking on the majority report.

[Sam Cedar]

Wait, look, Sam is unpopular.

[Emma Vigeland]

I do deserve a vacation at Disney World, so.

[Sam Cedar]

Ladies and gentlemen, gentlemen, it is my pleasure to welcome Emma to the show.

[Emma Vigeland]

It is Thursday.

[Sam Cedar]

Yes, please, sir, I'm going to pause you right there.

[Roberto Lovato]

Wait, what?

[Sam Cedar]

You can't encourage Emma to live like this. And I'll tell you why. Someone's offered a tour. Sushi and poker with the boys. Tour, sushi and poker with the boys. Who was offered a tour?

[Emma Vigeland]

Yeah.

[Sam Cedar]

Sushi and poker with the boys. Twerk, sushi and poker.

[Emma Vigeland]

Tim's upset.

[Sam Cedar]

Twerk, sushi and poker with two boys. It was offered with twerk sushi and.

[Roberto Lovato]

That'S what we call biz.

[Sam Cedar]

Twerk, sushi and poker with boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right.

[Sam Cedar]

Twerk, sushi and we're going to get demonetized.

[Roberto Lovato]

I just think that what you did.

[Emma Vigeland]

To Tim Pool was mean free speech.

[Sam Cedar]

That's not what we're about here. Look at how sad he's become now. You shouldn't even talk about him. I think you're responsible.

[Emma Vigeland]

I probably am in a certain way. But let's get to the meltdown here.

[Sam Cedar]

Sushi and poker, boys. Oh, my God.

[Emma Vigeland]

Wow.

[Sam Cedar]

Sushi.

[Marco Rubio]

I'm sorry.

[Sam Cedar]

I'm losing my mind. Who was offered a tour? Yeah, sushi and poker, boys. Logic. Sushi and poker. I think I'm like a little kid. I think I'm like a little kid. I Think I'm like a kid. I think I'm like a little kid. I think I'm like a little kid. Add this debate 7000 in time. So I'm not trying to be a dip right now, but, like, I absolutely think the US should be providing me with a wife and kids.

[Emma Vigeland]

That's not what we're talking about here, all right?

[Sam Cedar]

It's not a fun job.

[Matt Binder]

That's a real thing.

[Sam Cedar]

That's got real thing.

[Matt Binder]

Real thing.

[Sam Cedar]

Willie Walker work. That's a real thing. That's real. What's that? Offer to work. That's a real thing. That's a real thing.

[Emma Vigeland]

Real thing.

[Sam Cedar]

That's a real thing. That's a real. Ladies and gentlemen, Joe Rogan has done it again. That's a real thing. Oh, I think he might be blowing it out of proportion. Real thing. That's poker with the boy. That's a real thing. That's got poker.

[Chris Hayes]

Let's go, Joey.

[Sam Cedar]

Sushi and poker with the boy.

[Matt Binder]

Take it easy. Damn twerk.

[Sam Cedar]

Sushi and poker. Things have really gotten out of hand. Sushi and poker.

[Emma Vigeland]

Sushi.

[Roberto Lovato]

You don't have a clue as to.

[Sam Cedar]

What'S going on live YouTube.

[Emma Vigeland]

Sam has, like, the weight of the world on his shoulders. Want to do this show anymore?

[Roberto Lovato]

Anymore?

[Emma Vigeland]

It was so much easier when the Majority report was just you.

[Sam Cedar]

Let's change the subject.

[Emma Vigeland]

Rangers and Knicks are doing great mash.

[Matt Binder]

Shut it up.

[Emma Vigeland]

You don't want people saying reckless things on your program. That's one of the most difficult parts about this show. This is a pro killing podcast.

[Sam Cedar]

I'm thinking maybe it's time we bury the hatchet.

[Emma Vigeland]

Left his best Violet twerk.

[Sam Cedar]

Don't be foolish and don't tweet at me.

[Emma Vigeland]

And don't the way Emma has cucked.

[Sam Cedar]

All of these people.

[Emma Vigeland]

Love it. That's where my heart is. So I wrote my honors thesis about it. She wrote an honest thesis. Is. I guess I should hand the main.

[Sam Cedar]

Mic to you now. You are to the right of the UNT policy.

[Emma Vigeland]

We already found Israel, dude. Are you against that?

[Sam Cedar]

That's a tougher question I haven't answered.

[Emma Vigeland]

Incredible theme song. Hi, bumbler. Emma Viand. Absolutely one of my favorite people, actually. Not just in the game, like, period.