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2492 - Trump Builds Deportation Army; HHS Pushes Trans Conversion w/ Austin Kocher, Kellan Baker
01:26:36
It's an Emma-jority Wednesday and we've got 2 great guests for you. First though, Emma and Matt soak in some of the horrifying news coming out of Israel's siege on Gaza, where children are starving. The Trump administration has compounded the problem...
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- [00:01]
Emma Vigeland
Hey folks. Hey folks. Did you know that an estimated 5 billion plastic hand soap and cleaning bottles are thrown away every year? And if that's not bad enough, most cleaning formulas are 90% water, which is heavy to ship, leading to excessive carbon emissions. And these products often have nasty ingredients in them like chlorine and ammonia. It's a lose lose situation for everybody and the planet. And also sometimes because of these microplastic, this microplastic situation, we're eating and drinking roughly a credit card's worth of plastic a week, which is not something I want to think about. The products that we are using every day are ultimately contaminating our water supply, generating hundreds of microplastics that we end up ingesting. So Blueland has set out to do something about it, eliminating the need for single use plastic in the products that we reach for the most. I use blueland at home with my dishwasher here in the office. All of our soaps and stuff are refillable and we use Blueland and we swear by it. Blueland is on a mission to eliminate single use plastic by reinventing cleaning essentials to be better for you and the planet with the same powerful clean that you're used to. The idea is simple. They offer refillable cleaning products with a beautiful cohesive design that looks great on your counter. I gotta say, that tin that, that the detergent pods come in is just adorable. And if I wasn't using it for the pods, I'd be using it for decorative purposes or storage purposes. Maybe. I gotta get to fill your reusable bottles with water, drop in the tablets and wait for them to dissolve. You'll never have to grab bulky cleaning supplies on your grocery run. And refills start at just 2. 25, $2.25. You can even set up a subscription or buy in bulk for additional savings. Blueland products are independently tested to perform alongside major brands and are free from dyes, bleach and harsh chemicals. From cleaning sprays to hand soap, toilet bowl, cleaner and laundry tablets, all Blueland products are made with clean ingredients you can feel good about. Blueland is trusted in over 1 million homes, including mine and, and including our office. It just feels good to know that the stuff that's going on your plates, in the dishwasher, or if you're washing your clothes, that you're not going to have a bunch of gunk and chemicals and even plastics on them. Blueland has a special offer for our listeners right now. Get 15% off your first order by going to blueland.com majority. You won't want to miss this. Blueland.com majority for 15% off. That's blueland.com/majority to get 15% off. And now time for the show.
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Sam Cedar
The.
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Emma Vigeland
Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Wednesday, May 7, 2025. My name is Emma Vigiland 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, Austin Coker joins us to talk about Trump recruiting local cops to help deport people and more. And later in the show, Dr. Kellen Baker joins us to talk about the administration embracing anti trans conspiracism, including conversion therapy. Also on the program, India's Hindu nationalist government strikes Pakistan and Kashmir, including mosques breaking open a conflict between two nuclear powers, killing 26 people at least, all civilians. Israel kills dozens more in Gaza via strikes. And the starvation campaign continues after bombing Yemen daily for weeks. Trump says he's come to an agreement with the Houthis on Red Sea vessel passages. I hope that includes a ceasefire because.
- [04:17]
Matt Binder
That'S part of the Houthis are saying they're still allowed to strike Israel.
- [04:21]
Emma Vigeland
So, okay. Tulsi Gabbard issues a directive to start spying on Greenland's independence movement. This is psychotic. Your tax dollars are at work there.
- [04:36]
Matt Binder
Think about that the next time there's some sort of white nationalist attack.
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Emma Vigeland
Yeah. Chinese imports hit a two decade low as Trump's tariffs begin to make their effects felt. An analysis of Trump's meme coin finds that nearly 800,000 crypto wallets have lost money. But the silver lining is that 58 made millions. So something like the top point.0001%.
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Matt Binder
Wait. 58 total accounts.
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Emma Vigeland
Oh, 58 total accounts. Yeah.
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Matt Binder
Okay. I was thinking 58 or.
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Emma Vigeland
No, no, no, no, no. 58 out of nearly 800,000. Okay. That gives you a sense of what's going on here.
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Matt Binder
Well, that's meritocracy. I'm sure those guys did the best crypto trading.
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Emma Vigeland
We are the best. House Republicans in states that expanded Medicaid under the aca. Tell their House colleagues, hey, slow your roll a bit. This could affect me next election cycle. They're still going to try to cut Medicaid. Maybe some other way. Trump wants Libya and Ukraine to take deportees. A second judge says the Trump administration has failed to produce evidence to justify its use of the Alien Enemies act to remove people from the country. Trump to name a FedEx board member to lead the postal service, of course. Privatizations on the horizon. Schumer backs Fetterman, says he's an all star. What kind of.
- [06:11]
Matt Binder
That's humor's main agenda item.
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Emma Vigeland
Yeah, by his own admission, he, he loves pro Israel, right. Having a fellow anti Palestinian racist in his caucus. Utah becomes the first state to ban fluoride in the water. And lastly, the FAA suspends the work of the independent panel looking at air traffic safety as two United passenger flights clip wings in San Francisco. I'm flying tomorrow, incidentally. I'm picking up incidentally from Sam, too. All this and more on today's Majority report. It's an AM Majority Report hump day. I mean, that's just got to be turbocharged. It's never happened before and since I invented the term and I embody a majority report. Hello, Russ. Hello, Matt. Sam and I are flipping days off because I'm off tomorrow. As I just mentioned, I'm taking a little long weekend with some of my friends for my bachelorette party. So pray for me, folks. We'll see how this flying situation goes, but I wanted to start here. We have two great guests coming up examining the Trump administration's malfeasance and just sadism on immigration and also its attacks on trans people. But we can't drop the ball on how Israel just continues to bomb Gaza, including on top of its Starvation campaign. The Gaza's government says that more than 3,500 children face imminent death by starvation. At the current moment, it's been over two months of a total blockade by Israel of all medicine, food and water. And I guess, honestly this is probably the best time to bring to show this footage here just before we play this.
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Matt Binder
Still waking up to see on like the timeline of Twitter things like, oh, a restaurant was bombed in Gaza, killing dozens of people. And then the immediate replies of people who pay Elon Musk to get a check mark saying, I thought people were starving in Gaza. And you're saying there's a restaurant sort of anti genocidal.
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Emma Vigeland
They don't believe it's.
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Matt Binder
I mean, obviously just because there's a restaurant doesn't mean there's food at a restaurant, you idiots. And just like the sort of casual, I mean, this is the stuff you used to talk about with like Radio Rwanda and stuff. And you see, this is just a huge part of society with beepers in their emote in their usernames on Twitter and stuff like that. We have a profound sickness that's galloping across the world right now.
- [08:57]
Emma Vigeland
And I think that part of why liberalism is failing to confront so many of the different maladies in our society right now can be. You can trace it back to that because I think there's this impulse by many liberals to think that like everybody's wants the same things but we just have to find the right way to work together as opposed to a more militant left wing approach. Which means no, there are some people that need to be defeated either by taking their money and redistributing it to the wealth to the less wealthy right, redistributing resources via the government, via taxation or whether it's like no, these people can't be reasoned with. They're lying on purpose to justify genocide and they like it.
- [09:42]
Matt Binder
They know what they're doing to these folks.
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Emma Vigeland
They like images like you're about to see. This is the Associated Press, obviously run by Hamas. I want to warn people that this is difficult to watch, but it's important to show this. These are children in Gaza just days ago. The child is four months old. She suffers from extreme low weight because.
- [10:11]
Sam Cedar
Of severe acute attrition.
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Emma Vigeland
Those kids usually are lactose intolerant and regrettably there is no alternative inside Gaza because of the war and the border closures and the lack of special treatment milk. This is a doctor speaking at Nasser. You can see this child. There's no meat in the market. Go ahead, Matt.
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Matt Binder
I was just gonna say, you know that special treatment milk that he mentions, you know we do have like a long standing critiques of the impact of USAID and the uses it's been put towards. But the subs the complete just pulling the rug out from under a program. Guess what USAID was paying for this sort of malnutrition assistance for guys and children.
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Emma Vigeland
Exactly.
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Matt Binder
And it's disgusting. It's not like an attack on the deep state that Trump got got rid of that.
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Emma Vigeland
It's you know, because it' important for, for there the just to. To build on what you're saying. The, the kind of food and nutrients that addresses this level of malnutrition is basically like a pace because when you're at this point near death via starvation, your body's going to reject almost everything it needs to be protein rich and easily digestible. And this is what usaid, what Trump cut in usaid. And this also applied to other nations in the world too. Like that. You can see that paste there a little bit. There's no meat in the market, no source of protein. Canned food is running out. There is no nutrition at all. Even healthy children with no Diseases have started to come to us showing signs of lack of food, weakness, frailty, and repeated gastric flu, all because of weakened immunity as a result of lack of food that helps them grow in a healthy way. It's important to show that footage. And just a reminder as Israel announces that it's going to take the entire Gaza Strip. They've already seized 50% of its territory.
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Matt Binder
And in the discussion, a liberal Zionist talking point. Well, they left the Gaza Strip. What do you want them to do? Oh, they took it back. Who would have? They had it the whole time, surrounded by guns.
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Emma Vigeland
They. I don't. It's just so frustrating that people can't conceive of an open air prison like this. They, they do not control their borders, land or sea. They don't have an airport, they don't have a military, they don't. Well, they. Hamas as a militant group, but they don't, they don't have an air force, they don't have a state. That's part of why Israel will never agree to a two state solution. It's one state democratic, one democratic state from the river to the sea, both Palestinians and Israelis living together. Or it is one state with just Israelis. And that's the reality they're trying to create now through genocide.
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Matt Binder
And some people might object to those images saying, you know, maybe not all hashtag, not all Israelis want to see those images. The truth is a big enough majority of them prefer those images than what Emma is saying, which is one person, one vote. And also people who were expelled through conquest and war crimes get the right of return to where they were expelled from.
- [13:53]
Emma Vigeland
Right.
- [13:54]
Matt Binder
Israelis don't want to see that any of the designists here, whether they're Mike.
- [13:58]
Emma Vigeland
Huckabee or Chuck Schumer here, is Netanyahu lying, just, you know, lying about what they now are doing? They were just waiting for the right opportunity. And Donald Trump's presidency is perfect for him.
- [14:13]
Austin Coker
I want to make a few points absolutely clear. Israel has no intention of permanently occupying Gaza or displacing its civilian population. Israel is fighting Hamas terrorists, not the Palestinian population. And we are doing so in full compliance with international law. The IDF is doing its utmost to minimize civilian casualties, while Hamas is doing its utmost to maximize them by using Palestinian civilians as human shields. The IDF urges Palestinian civilians to leave war zones by disseminating leaflets, making phone calls, providing safe passage corridors, while war.
- [14:51]
Matt Binder
Zone is a special word that the Israelis use for land they're about to steal.
- [14:57]
Emma Vigeland
We got it. I mean, you heard that. That's from January 2024. We know that that's contradicted. And also we're hearing that there are talks right now with the United States about helping administer the Gaza Strip via military contractors. You can probably hear Erik Prince salivating from here. And there was a source that spoke to the Reuters that's compared the proposal to the Coalitional Provisional Authority in Iraq, which is so. Well, which was the government that the United States tried to impose on the Iraqi people when we were trying to overturn Saddam Hussein's power, and then said.
- [15:47]
Matt Binder
Here'S a bunch of think tank freaks from the Heritage foundation or the American Enterprise Institute or whatever. They're going to be your new kings. They're like 20. They're like 30 old.
- [15:57]
Emma Vigeland
But. But isn't that. And when you look at that proposal, the United States was heavily reliant on mercenaries, private mercenaries, with Erik Prince and Blackwater. And that's the proposal again. So we're about to talk to Austin Coker about how the Trump administration is using something called a 2.87G agreement to try to enlist local police sheriffs to help with their deportation regime. You know, the first time that that was ever deployed was in 2002 in Florida with Jeb Bush as the governor in reaction to 9 11. Everything we're seeing right now, Richard Beck's book Homeland is an exhaustive examination of this is an outgrowth of the war on terror and the erosion of our civil liberties from that point. And of course, neoliberalism and our the economic conditions and how we have no social services to offer people, only like cheap goods and consumerism. And people are revolting against that economic model model because it doesn't provide much for them. Fascism has a clear vision and clear enemies. And that's what unfortunately we voted in. And our Democratic leaders aren't meeting the moment on this, on this front. But in terms of the deportation and fascistic infrastructure that's currently being deployed, you can trace it back to 9 11. And this is why we're here right now. And we're circling back to a proposal that echoes our Iraqi occupation for Gaza. That's the reality of where we're at right now. And it's a failure of the two Democratic presidents that came in between the Bush era and Trump 2.0 for not doing more to rebuild our institutions, to prevent this kind of thing because they selfishly wanted to use that power for their own ends. With that said, a word from our sponsors and then we'll be talking to Austin Coker. When I started working here, you know, I pretty much realized that, yeah, we're kind of a d do it yourself operation. He figures it out on his own, basically. I mean, we're working on the fly here in terms of my neurological capacity setup. Our cameras, our computers are all recycled for the most part. Even this desk Sam made himself. It can be really overwhelming for us in the office and it's difficult to find tools that just make our lives easier here at the Majority report. But we have found the right tool here and millions of businesses have done the same. And that tool is Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world. From household names like Magic Spoon to brands that are just getting started, Shopify has hundreds of ready to use templates to help you build an online store to match your brand. Whether that's beautiful, edgy, or minimalist, Shopify is packed with AI tools. They help you put together product descriptions, page headlines. They can even enhance your product's photography. 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The photos look like it's a regular picture frame, but they change. And if you have, especially if you have a big family too, you can do a slideshow and a collection of all these different memories. It's super easy to set up. It takes about two minutes to set up a frame. Using the Aura app, you can add unlimited photos and videos and invite as many people as you want to A frame. There are no hidden fees or subscriptions. It also plays the live photos on your iPhone and up to videos that are up to 30 seconds long. It plays right on the frame and there's an embedded speaker if you want that plays audio on demand. They look like real prints, those aura frames. They meticulously calibrated high resolution displays and and unless you look really closely to see the photo transition, you will never know that it's a screen. You can share photos or videos to the aura frame from any device and they will instantly appear there wherever it is in the world. No memory card required.
- [24:31]
Matt Binder
It's really like you know the social messaging apps with pictures.
- [24:35]
Emma Vigeland
Yeah.
- [24:36]
Matt Binder
For folks who can't do that like say my grandma. Yeah it's and even for folks who can't like it's nice to just have that not have to go to your phone and oh, there's a new picture on the thing of my grandkid or something like that.
- [24:47]
Emma Vigeland
And you don't have to waste the money of printing or a new like it's all there for you to, to update and to surprise your mother this Mother's Day or grandmother. In that case, Aura has a great deal for Mother's Day. For a limited time, listeners can save on the perfect gift by visiting auraframes.com to get $35 off plus free shipping on their best selling Carver mat frame. That's a U R A frames.com promo code majority. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. All right, quick break and when we come back, we'll be talking to Austin Coker. Sam it we are back and we are joined once again by Austin Coker, professor at Syracuse University and writer on Substack. You can go to austincoaker.substack.com Austin is examining America's immigration enforcement system. Thanks for coming on the show today.
- [26:59]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Happy to be here again. Thanks for having me.
- [27:01]
Emma Vigeland
Yep. It's always great to have you here to take us through what's happening in the Trump administration's deeply sadistic crackdown on on immigrants and the family separation and throwing people into seekot. I don't know when we last spoke, I guess, but maybe we can begin really broadly about what the past 100 plus days have been like for you as somebody that analyzes immigration and seeing those images, in particular the clip of him at that rally showing the people in chains to cheers of USA usa. It was like it was written in a play or in a movie. That's what it looked like.
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Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah. The sensational aspect of this administration is beyond the pale. It's very difficult to watch in that way. I mean, what I always tell people, too, because I talk to a lot of people across the political spectrum, is I say, look, there's been really large numbers of deportations before in our history in the last 120 years, certainly very high during Obama. It was also high during Biden. And whatever we think about the system, the laws are in place that if you wanted to deport people in a lawful way, you could do it without sensationalizing it. But this administration just is constantly pushing the legal boundaries over the line and sensationalizing, you know, the, you know, the targeting and harassment and potentially torture of immigrants in this country. It's just, it's hard for me to stomach and it's hard for me to understand how anyone, regardless of their political views or views on the immigration system, would find this acceptable.
- [28:52]
Emma Vigeland
One of the major just stories, or I would say, most heartbreaking anecdotes, but we continue to get them on a daily basis. You talked about this on your subsec. You wrote about it. And you also, I think, spoke to the lawyer of this woman out of Tucson, Arizona, who is being deported just after giving birth. It seems that she is also being blocked from speaking to an attorney, which is a through line across the Trump administration kidnapping and disappearing these people. I mean, deportation is a legal process. I say that colloquially, but that's not what they're engaging in right now. Tell us a little bit about what's happening in Arizona with that case.
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Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, that's right. Really sad story. A woman was coming to the country for what appeared to be humanitarian reasons, got sort of separated and lost in her attempt to cross into the country. She was taken into custody. She was pregnant, and she was taken, eventually taken to a hospital because she was going into labor. But border agents, or I should say immigration enforcement officers blocked her room, didn't allow an attorney to see her. There's an attorney that I spoke to, did a interview with, to really get an understanding of what was really going on in this case and sounded like he had contacted the family, had spoken to this woman through the family, through a text message chat, and, you know, one of the sort of sick bureaucratic moments that I've heard recently. So border agents wouldn't allow the attorney to see this woman who was his client, because he didn't have what's called a G28 sign. That's the form that says that you're representing someone in immigration in the immigration process. But he didn't have the form signed because they wouldn't let her see him. So just a weird kind of bureaucratic thing where they're, you know, weaponizing these little forms and details to prevent people from getting adequate representation. So it's really, really problematic in that way now since then, I think partly because the interview with him ended up getting driving some media attention and some further support around Arizona. It sounds like she was reunited with her newborn. And they appear to now be in the custody of a local nonprofit organization, which is. I mean, that's what we want. We want this person to have due process. Whatever happens in the case, at least she won't, at least immediately, as far as we can tell, be deported. But I mean, just to be clear, for those couple days, for those 72 hours, it appeared as though our government was going to give this woman who just gave birth. She's in the maternity ward, the baby's being taken care of, it's less than 24 hours. And they're telling her, well, you can leave the country with or without your baby. It's up to you.
- [31:51]
Emma Vigeland
And that this seems to be a tactic that they're deploying a lot, using women, mothers and their children as a way to leverage their self deportation. Like we're seeing some of those other cases, right, where children are being deported or detained and there's. It seems like they're. And separated from maybe their father even. It's hard to keep track of some of these horrific cases, but that's clearly a part of the playbook.
- [32:28]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, that's right. I mean, they're really using families and kids to try to convince people to leave. You know, there's. Thomas Homan has said, I mean, we saw families separation during the first administration. They tried to use family separation to deter people from coming to the country in the first place. And now they're doing the same thing, but they're doing it on a much broader scale. And I think they're sort of weaponizing immigrant families in ways that push that line further. And you know, one thing I'll say, just because American Families United is an amazing organization, they work with mixed status families, which basically means families where one or the other partner or maybe, maybe children. Some are immigrants, some are U.S. citizens. And so it's not as if these are just all immigrant families. I mean, some of these kids are US Citizens, some of the parents are US Citizens. And just imagine as a US Citizen having to make the choice, either we can be apart with part of our family in another country and part here, or we're being forced to all leave the country. So there are these kind. In addition to the Trump administration saying that they are going to potentially deport US Citizens, and they probably have, and they probably will, and we'll have to sort that out. They are effectively. There's these kind of like shadow deportations of U.S. citizens where U.S. citizens are effectively forced to leave the country or else be separated from their family.
- [33:53]
Emma Vigeland
And this is almost like a backdoor way for him to attack the concept of birthright citizenship, because their whole great replacement white supremacist theory is that these people from the global south, from South America, from Latin America, are coming to the United States not to free climate change or political violence, which is the reality, or to just have a better economic situation for themselves. They're coming here to systematically change the demographics of the country, and the Jews are probably orchestrating it. I think we can all agree on that front, but. Sarcasm, obviously, but they're basically trying to go after what they perceive as anchor babies. The idea that there's a marriage of somebody who's a US Citizen, somebody who may be either on temporary protected status or here without documentation, and they have a kid. They're trying to attack that very notion by even if the child was born on US Soil, we're going to make sure that we make an example out of any parent that. That chooses to have a baby here in the United States if they're not properly documented or even actually a US Citizen. Although who knows if that even matters.
- [35:06]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, that's right. Yeah. It's constantly trying to attack different parts of the Constitution, different parts of our basic civil liberties and civil rights. Again, like I said, every day I feel like I hear a new story that pushes this administration over the line.
- [35:24]
Emma Vigeland
Yeah. Okay, so the really important. Well, this is all important, obviously, but you wrote a great piece talking about two 8 7G agreements. I'm not seeing a ton of discussion about how the administration is deploying this, which is attempting to enlist local law enforcement into their deportation efforts. Just let's. For a little bit of background, can you talk about the history of two eight 7G agreements and when they were first deployed, and then we can talk about the present day.
- [36:09]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, absolutely. It's sort of interesting because 287 is why I got into immigration research in the first place. I started doing research in 2009, 2010, as a graduate student, because that was an era of this policy being rolled out, and a lot of us found major issues with it. But I really wanted to understand it. So here's the short story. You know, broadly speaking, the courts have said that individual states and counties can't do their own immigration enforcement because we can't have 50 different states doing 50 different types of immigration enforcement. There's 3,000 counties in the country. We can't have 3,000 counties having their own laws around immigration. However, there is a way to get around that. And in 1996, Democrats and Republicans together passed policy changes to the law that said, actually, we are going to allow local law enforcement to do this if they signed an agreement with the federal government. And it's called 287, because that's the section of the law, the Immigration and Nationality act, that specifies these requirements. Now, this was a program that was not really used for the first many years. It wasn't until after 9, 11 that the first 287 agreement was signed. And it just.
- [37:21]
Emma Vigeland
Florida, Florida in 2002 by Jeb Bush.
- [37:25]
Dr. Kellen Baker
That's right. That's right. That's right. The president's brother is the first one to sign one of these agreements. So Florida is kind of home and ground 0 for 287. Now, it rolled out. It took years for it to roll out. It expanded during the late Bush administration, early Obama administration, but because it received so much criticism. In particular, One type of 287 agreement called the task force model agreement, we really saw it taper off by the end of the Biden administration. And task force agreements are very important here. Some 287 agreements basically mean that if anyone gets booked into a county jail, that county jail can check this person's immigration status and ask some questions and potentially put them into the deportation process. Really an unprecedented power. But to be honest, it never really included that many jails, even at its height. And then the task force model is a bit more egregious, I would say, in the sense that it sort of gives. It gives police officers and sheriffs the ability to do immigration enforcement when they're just out pulling people over, talking to people on the sidewalk. So it's much more expansive. You don't even have to be in a jail to be affected by a task force model type of 2A 7G.
- [38:46]
Emma Vigeland
A few questions about that. One, what was the nature of the criticism that caused them to be phased out, as you say, by the end of the Biden administration? And two, was there a version of. Was that the authority that Arizona was exploring when they were trying to get cops to racially profile people to pull them over and ask for their Papers. What was that like five or six years ago?
- [39:08]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, absolutely. SB 1070. So basically, so the first question, the criticism of it has been that by giving immigration enforcement powers to your local law enforcement, one, they're not really trained to do that, even with the short training that they provide. Two, it potentially alienates communities that law enforcement need to work with through a community policing model. You know, immigrants are more likely to be victims of crimes than to be perpetrators of crimes. And third, 287 is just a civil rights violation magnet. There's just all kinds of issues and many, many lawsuits. It's potentially very expensive for these agencies who sign on. They start pulling over green card holders and U.S. citizens and potentially on the basis of race, which has huge consequences. So that's basically where the criticism was. And reforms in 2012 basically eliminated the task force model because there were just too many problems. If we remember that time period, this is the time period of Joe Arpaio marching immigrants around in pink jumpsuits in the desert and tents. Just a really terrible model. So that's why that went away.
- [40:25]
Emma Vigeland
And was that speaking of Arpaia, was that part of the justification that was used by the. The Arizona state legislature? I forget exactly how that passed.
- [40:37]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, that's right. And so that was an agreement that Sheriff Arpaio signed with the Department of Homeland Security. But then, basically what was happening at that time is partly because of 287. There was a real expansion of saying, hey, we want this at the state level. And the state of Arizona was basically saying, we want to do this without signing a 287. We just want to pass a state law that looks like this, the show me your papers law. Now, interestingly, that law that Arizona passed did not all stand up. Some of it did, some of it didn't. The court struck a bunch down. But Florida has basically done the same thing times 100. They said, we're not going to create our own law. We're going to create a law that requires all of the agencies in the state to sign on to 2A7. In some ways, it's a smarter policy than the old Arizona approach just because it is more legal. And now they're doing it. So what we've seen under this administration is the number of 287 agreements has almost quadrupled in just over 100 days. Not only that, a lot of them are in Florida. Basically, Florida is a giant petri dish of experimental immigration enforcement. Almost every enforcement agency in the state, not just your traditional ones, but also fish and wildlife, the attorney's office, Department of Taxation. I mean, all of these agencies are university colleges and universities are signing on. So the whole state is just saturated in these policies. And worse yet, they've brought back that task force model agreement that was so criticized before, and that's. We've seen the most growth has been among task force model agreements. So it's a real. It's just a real quagmire at the moment.
- [42:30]
Emma Vigeland
And the fact that the entire state of Florida is engaging in this is deeply disturbing because as you write about that most previous 287 agreements were with county sheriffs. Arpaio is a great example of that. Can you talk about that incentive and why sheriffs were initially the parties that agreements were met with and how. And comparing that to Florida's expansion and even the other states that have signed these agreements, like North Carolina and Georgia.
- [43:04]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, the sheriff's office in the United States plays a very interesting role. We talk a lot. When we talk about law enforcement, we're usually talking about cops and police departments, and the sheriffs kind of get overlooked. But the sheriffs are a really unique and very powerful office, mainly because they control the jails. So in any county, everyone who gets arrested, whether it's arrested by a police department, state highway patrol, or someone else, they all go to the jail. So basically, from ice's perspective, if you want to increase your immigration enforcement capacity, you just get your agents and you get your technology plugged into the jail, and then anyone who goes to the jail, they're going to get screened for immigration purposes and potentially put into the deportation process. That's why sheriffs have been so important. Now, there's different ways of looking at this, and there's a lot of different perspectives. I think that's still a problematic model. However, at least if you're getting checked at the jail, there does have to be some initial encounter, some initial arrest, maybe some initial charges. Again, I'm not saying it's legitimate, but there is an extra barrier.
- [44:15]
Emma Vigeland
Pretext.
- [44:16]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Right, Kind of pretext. Exactly. Which is not always legitimate, but it's there. The task force model means you don't have to get booked into the jail. They don't even have to bother with taking you in. They can just, you know, run your fingerprints, ask you questions while you're walking down the street, while you're driving home, or you're driving to the grocery store. And so in that way, it's a much more expansive way of saturating our everyday world with immigration Enforcement in a way that the jail model alone doesn't do.
- [44:46]
Emma Vigeland
And you have said now that this is that these agreements have quadrupled. Where are they most concentrated? We've established Florida. But your piece on this, which I do think calls it the deportation army, says it's largely concentrated in the southeast of the country. Is that still the case?
- [45:10]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yes, that's still the case. Although we're seeing a lot of other states come online, including in the Northeast and the Midwest, so it continues to expand. Oklahoma. I've seen a bunch of new agreements signed in Oklahoma for some reason. A few new ones in Wisconsin. And then counties in my home state of Ohio, like Butler county, are also coming back online with 287. Some of these agencies used to have them. They went away, they stopped participating in the program and now they're coming back online. But Florida is really where most of the action. I think about half or a little bit more than half of all 287 agreements right now are all in Florida.
- [45:49]
Emma Vigeland
And this to wrap up here, Austin. This essentially means that local law enforcement, and even as more than law enforcement, if you're a state agency, can any state agency enter into this kind of agreement with the federal government?
- [46:07]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Yeah, I'm not aware of any restrictions that would prevent any agency from entering in with federal government. I would assume that it would be agencies that have some sort of law enforcement capacity or arrest authority of some kind. So even fish and wildlife, I mean game wardens do have usually have arrest authority. They have some law enforcement capacity. So I'm not aware of any restrictions. And so we really have to watch closely about who's going to be signing on.
- [46:39]
Emma Vigeland
Lastly, before we let you go, if you could just end our conversation talking about the implications of it and maybe giving some tips to people who might be in these states that have breached these agreements.
- [46:51]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Sure. You know, having done research on this for a long time and talked to immigrants and attorneys and law enforcement in these areas, I mean, you know, I remember talking to folks in North Carolina who they were very aware of which counties had these 287 agreements. And they would drive around them just because the consequence of being arrested in a 287 county can be so radically different than a non 287 county right next door. So one is just awareness. Two is just to the extent that you have documents, stay hyper documented and keep copies and backups with other people. And third, and again, I hate to say this, but you know, just have a plan. I think it's more important than ever for immigrants, whether you're documented or undocumented or if you're a citizen and you have an immigrant background and you feel like you might be someone who could be targeted by law enforcement based on how you look in some way, it's just a good idea to have a contact person who understands your situation and can react responsibly, you know, God forbid, should something happen.
- [48:02]
Emma Vigeland
Actual last question, because this is one of our viewers, I am her name parade of idiots says, do the governors need to sign on to a state agency signing onto this?
- [48:15]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Governors don't have to. The governors could play a role in either incentivizing or disincentivizing it, of course. And state legislatures probably could come up with some prohibitions or could further encourage like they did in Florida. I will say that there's already been one sheriff's office and I'm forgetting the location off the top of my head, but there's one sheriff's office already who signed up during the Trump administration and has already pulled out because of local pushback, pushback against this policy. So, you know, sheriffs are elected officials. Remember that. And if this is a policy that you don't support, it doesn't hurt to let people know.
- [49:00]
Emma Vigeland
Austin Coker, Everybody should check out your substack. Austin Kocher K O c h e r.substack.com I check your writing multiple times a week to keep updated on what's happening with immigration. So I really encourage everybody to subscribe and read your writing. Thanks so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. Thank you.
- [49:24]
Sam Cedar
Emma.
- [49:28]
Emma Vigeland
Sorry. All right, folks, quick break and when we come back, we'll be joined by Dr. Kellen Baker. Sam it's we are back and we are joined now by Dr. Kellen Baker, executive director of the Institute for Health Research and Policy at Whitman Walker Health, a nonprofit community based health organization specializing in LGBTQ and HIV AIDS care. Dr. Baker, thanks so much for coming on the show today.
- [51:31]
Sam Cedar
Thanks so much for having me, Emma.
- [51:33]
Emma Vigeland
Of course. So last week there was a 400 page report that was published by the Department of Health and Human Services, led by conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. And it essentially backs conversion therapy for trans kids. Is my reading of it so far. Take us through what this report means and how inaccurate much of the contents are.
- [52:07]
Sam Cedar
Yeah, I think it's important to start first with what the report is not. It is not a clinical practice guideline, it is not a standard of care and it is not a policy recommendation. So I think it's really important to Understand that, because the way that the report is being presented by the administration and by many people out there in the world is that it does have something meaningful to say about clinical practice. But again, this report is not a clinical practice guideline and it is not a new standard of care. What it is is a very concerning example of politics dressed up as science. There are a number of things that you need in order to do good science, and this report has none of those things. So just very briefly, you need a good research question. All good science should start with a good research question, right? What are you intending to find out? And unfortunately, when you look at where this report came from, it was literally commissioned by the Executive order that banned the very care that this report is supposed to have undertaken to assess. So what we have here is a post hoc putting together of something that is justify a decision that has already been made. And to be perfectly honest, if we caught a graduate student in a lab making something up in order to justify something that had already been decided or had already happened, then we would call that bad science. We would have a problem with that. And unfortunately, that's really what we're seeing here is a real lack of a substantive research question in the sense of do we actually want to find something out or are we just looking for a justification of something that we've already decided?
- [53:56]
Emma Vigeland
It feels very reminiscent of what happened in the UK with this CAST report. Is that a fair parallel to draw here? The anti trans movement in this country borrows a lot from what Turf island is doing over there. And it seems like this is a version of that.
- [54:15]
Sam Cedar
The CAST report was commissioned in the UK in order to address a problem. In fact, in order to address a problem that in some ways is not dissimilar to the United States. The issue of people having to wait a very, very long time in order to get the medically necessary health care that they need. And so the CAST report actually comes to the conclusion that the full range of treatments that are outlined in the existing expert standards of care should be available because they are important. It calls for good research. It calls for again, availability of all of the different treatments or different approaches that are outlined in existing standards of care. This report goes so far as to even claim that there is no way to do good research in this area. This report gives us no answers as to what should be done for young people who are experiencing gender dysphoria, for young people who are trans. It simply has the predetermined conclusion that there is no group of people for whom these treatments that are outlined in expert medical standards of care are ever appropriate. So it has not just a finger on the scale, but an entire fist on the scale, saying that there are essentially no benefits of the standard of care that is practiced by clinicians in the US and the UK around the world, and going so far as to really deny the existence of transgender people themselves. The report goes to great lengths to use language that makes clear at every turn that whoever put this report together, and I think that's another important element of this to point out, is that there is no knowledge as to who actually wrote this report. If this is science, then you do good science and you make it available and you talk about it openly. You put your name behind it because you would hope that you did good work. But what we see here is an anonymous report that was written by some sort of gang of 8 of people who. We have no knowledge of who they are and what they're recommending in this report is really a worldview that does not comport with reality.
- [56:42]
Emma Vigeland
I mean, the whole. The whole RFK Jr takeover of our health care policy, and really the movement that he represents that the Trump administration has embraced tangibly, is an anti peer review, anti science concept. So it's anti establishment, and in their view, it's the scientific establishment, where these sneering experts who come together and review people's hypotheses, and if they don't find your conclusion accurate, they're just elitists, like they say. They see that as the problem, and they see that the standards of care have been agreed upon via an exhaustive peer review process or via doctors using this kind of standards, these standards of care in practice with their patients, they view that as the threat, as opposed to helpful data to build health care policy. It's. It's inverted in a way that I don't necessarily know if people have fully grasped the scale of how destructive an assault on peer review with health care looks like.
- [57:58]
Sam Cedar
Yeah. And, I mean, you really see this not just in transgender health, but in so many different areas. Right. If we think about some of the political responses to things like the COVID 19 pandemic, to vaccines in general, to questions of whether raw milk can make you sick. Right. There are. There's very substantial bodies of evidence that show what science actually tells us, and then there are a lot of political opinions that, particularly over the last couple of years, but, you know, especially now, over the last couple of months, have really suddenly become government doctrine. And all of a sudden we have this incredibly to Use your phrase inverted perspective, where the federal government itself is spouting some of the very worst types of conspiracy theories that are not just anti science, but are fundamentally dangerous. We have rules and regulations in public health or in healthcare or in food safety because we want to keep people safe, because we can look at the science and we can tell what are the things that are going to help people be safe and healthy and well, and what are the things that are dangerous. And unfortunately, what is happening now is again a complete inversion of the idea that the government is supposed to be part of helping to keep you safe. Instead, what we have now is the government as a megaphone or some of these incredible conspiracy theories that used to be confined to, I would guess, the darkest corners of the Internet, but now we're suddenly finding expression and outlet in all kinds of prominent platforms. And that is not just concerning from the perspective of science and medicine, but downright dangerous.
- [59:42]
Emma Vigeland
Right. And you work in at Whitman Walker Health and it's a nonprofit community based organization. So I feel like this is especially relevant the idea that this is just this broader attack on health care in and of itself and almost a weaponization as like a form of modern eugenicism. Whether it's about denying the existence of trans people, pushing them back into the closet, which is a death sentence in many instances, denying their care, or the survival of this fittest, the fittest bent of this like kind of anti vax quackery, the attack on abortion rights. You can also put in that bucket the assault on DEIA that includes accessibility, the way that this, that autism is approached by the administration to where it's working backwards from treating people if they have a disability or if they're trans as a malady and using the, and making the policy fit that preconceived notion about folks. Because when we're talking about food safety and the more broad things that will affect us all, if you're wealthy, you're buying organic anyway, like some of the standards where that stuff is gonna be cut, it's gonna affect people who, where they're already maybe buying meat that is inorganic or, or that food is cheaper, where there's corners that can be cut. That's what I think the whole ideology, the umbrella philosophy really is. I don't know if you agree with that assessment.
- [61:32]
Sam Cedar
Yeah, I think, you know, you said mentioned about these issues that affect us all and I think it's too frequently easy to think that, you know, this is just something about transgender people or, oh, this is just something about one particular small you know, group of people. But what we're actually looking at here, both with this kind of broad based assault on science overall, as well as this report particularly, is something that is incredibly concerning for all of us, because this is not really about trans people per se. At its root, what it is is about who gets to make decisions about your own life, who gets to make decisions about what kind of health care you can get. And when you look at a report like this that just attempts to brush aside decades of scientific and clinical evidence, that is an assault on the ability of any one of us, transgender or not, to go to our doctor and to actually get the health care that we need. And what we're seeing here is a real substitution of bureaucrats with a very clear political agenda in place of your doctor. And it's happening today for trans people. It's happening today in terms of people, you know, access to reproductive health care. But it is something that threatens us all, because ultimately, what we want to know is that we're able to go to the grocery store and get, you know, healthy produce and, you know, know that it's not going to make us sick. We want to be able to go. Any of us wants to be able to go to the doctor and get the care that our doctor recommends because it's important for our health and well being. And the trends that are really manifested in this report, as well as in so many of this administration's policies to date, are completely antithetical to our freedom to move through the world as people who are safe and happy and healthy and well. And that's just incredibly concerning, no matter which way you look at it.
- [63:34]
Emma Vigeland
And I'm going to ask if you don't mind touching on your personal experience as a trans man and having health care provide, having, I guess, access to health care. You can speak for your own experience, but maybe just what. What it looks like for kids that need things like puberty blockers or hormones, or won't be able to get the care that they need at this critical stage of their development, perhaps because of these actions by the federal government. Like, what does that look like in practice?
- [64:09]
Sam Cedar
Yeah, I mean, I am alive today because of the care that I was able to get. And I grew up in the 80s and 90s when nobody really knew the word transgender. It certainly wasn't something that I ever heard, and I didn't have really any help. I mean, it was a time when there were, you know, very few understandings available broadly in the world about who transgender people were. And I was Fortunate that I came of age, you know, when transgender people were becoming more visible and I actually transitioned when I was living in Moscow, Russia, I was working as a translator. And the fact that it is harder today for trans people, particularly young trans people in more than half of US States to get the medical care that they need than it was for me 20 years ago in Russia, indicates to me that the United States has a very serious problem. The United States has long been a leader in biomedical and scientific innovation. It has long prided itself on being a place where people can get the health care that they need. Now, we have a lot of issues with our insurance system, but in terms of sort of the medicine that is practiced in the United States, it has long been seen as a world leader. And the fact that the United States is now walking away from an international medical consensus is walking away from evidence based standards of care that have been developed over decades by experts is something that, again, is not just concerning for trans people, but is so deeply concerning for everyone.
- [65:55]
Emma Vigeland
Can you speak about what that care looks like in practice? It's mystified by these right wing reactionaries, but the processes that perhaps you went, you had your unique experience, but even as a provider yourself, that your clients or I'm not sure exactly what kind of healthcare you do so. Or what, what trans kids, what that interaction is like typically when you deploy these standards of care with their doctor, what transcare looks like so people can understand it a bit better.
- [66:30]
Sam Cedar
Yeah, so I'm a researcher, I'm a scientist. I have a PhD in Health Services research, which means I study the design and delivery of healthcare services. I do a lot of work in insurance. I do a lot of work in terms of understanding evidence based medicine and how that translates into clinical guidelines. And so from the perspective of the standards of care which have been around for decades, are maintained by organizations like the Endocrine Society, the World Professional association for Transgender Health, the American Academy of Pediatrics. What those standards are really outlining is an individualized and age appropriate approach to care for a transgender person, no matter what age they may be. It is incredibly important that this care is individualized. And I would just note that that stands in complete and stark opposition to these bans. Right? Where the whole purpose of the standards of care is to note that there is no one size fits all approach for everyone, because the healthcare services that transgender people need, they need to be individualized and they need to be age appropriate. When you have a ban, by contrast, that literally says there is no ability for understanding anyone's individual circumstances, I am just going to ban that care outright. So it's completely. These bans are completely antithetical to standards of medical ethics, to standards of care, the way this care is provided. When we're talking about children, young people before the age of puberty, all we're really talking about is listening to a young person when they tell us who they are. You know, for example, I've had my hair. I mean, I had more hair back in the day. You know, this is. But same haircut all the way from, you know, when I was a kid in the early 1980s until now. Now, that might be referred to as social transition, which just means, you know, that if a young person wants to cut their hair in a particular way or wear a particular type of clothing or, you know, use a name that feels more comfortable, that's the only type of support, the only type of care that we're talking about before somebody hits puberty. And when you do hit puberty, it's well known and documented in the literature that this can be a particularly distressing time for transgender young people. So the point there for the standards of care is to hit the pause button. Nobody wants young people making impulsive, quick decisions. None of this is quick. None of this happens, you know, over. I mean, we're talking about multiple doctor's visits, we're talking about multiple consultations with mental health providers, with entire teams of providers. And the recommendation, again, when young people hit puberty is to hit the pause button so that you don't have that pressure of, oh, I need to make a decision, you know, I need to think through what the next step is immediately because of this kind of ticking time clock of puberty. So puberty pausing medications have been used for decades. They are very safe, they are very effective, they're very well studied, and they're.
- [69:46]
Emma Vigeland
Very often prescribed, including on cis, including on CIS kids that need puberty blockers. And you can have states like Florida that, okay, puberty blockers for CIS children, but not for trans kids.
- [69:57]
Sam Cedar
Yeah, and that is exactly what's at stake in so many of the legal discussions, I guess, or, you know, legal cases around these bans is you have these laws at the state level, but this is something that is being proposed at the federal level as well, that say, as long as you're not transgender, you can get this care. So if you are a non transgender young person who needs puberty pausing medications, you can get them. But suddenly, if you're a transgender young person, you can't. And that has Absolutely no basis in medicine or science. It also, I'm not a lawyer, but would appear to me to have no basis in the law either, because that's a textbook case of discrimination. You are looking at someone and you are taking into consideration who they are as a trans person or as a non trans person. And for that trans person, you are saying you cannot have access to these safe, beneficial, effective medications that you could have if you were not transgender. That's a clear cut case of discrimination, and that is unfortunately, exactly what all of these bans are doing.
- [71:09]
Emma Vigeland
Well, the Supreme Court just said that the Trump administration can implement its trans ban in the military. So the enforcement on this kind of discrimination is just not going to. It's going to be non existent for the next four years at least. But the part that I also wanted to make sure we got to before I let you go is what the report gestures towards in terms of conversion therapy. We know the effects of gay conversion therapy. There are countless stories, documentaries from my time growing up. I remember reading about it, seeing stories and kind of informing my worldview about what it was like to be gay in this country and the pressure. You know, I'm from the east coast, it was a little bit more acceptable. But how there are these religious communities throughout the country that almost drive LGB or gay or lesbian kids to suicide because they try to change who they are with these intensive, traumatizing conversion camps or therapy sessions. And we had largely agreed as a society that this is maybe, you know, these things should be outlawed, they're still in existence, but that this is wrong. And that was a lesson out of the Bush era going into the Obama years. Now it appears like this administration is endorsing trans conversion. Can you speak a little bit about that?
- [72:40]
Sam Cedar
Yeah. It's unfortunately, really important to note that this report is an endorsement of conversion therapy. And the reasons for that are, if you look at the standards of care, the standards of care are very clear that mental health support is a critical part of medical care for transgender people of any age, but particularly for young people. So the standards of care already support the fact that mental health support guidance, you know, throughout the process is really, really important. But what this report then does is it says, no, no, not that type of mental health support. What I mean is a psychotherapeutic practice, I wouldn't even actually call it therapy, but a psychotherapy practice that takes a vulnerable young person and treats who they are as a transgender person, as a pathology or as something that's not real. These approaches that frequently Go under the term gender exploratory therapy. The report uses the phrase exploratory therapy have these kind of twin principles at their core, and the one is either being transgender is not real. And the report, again, is very clear in a lot of the language that it uses that. That the idea that transgender people are real is not something that this report believes in. And, sorry, like, here we are. So, you know, these psychotherapy approaches that are being discussed are not going to make trans people or trans young people not trans. They're going to make them miserable. And the other principle that this report really endorses is that it is possible to. Or that it is. It is. Well, it is possible to change someone's gender identity. So even if there is a therapist or a conversion therapy practitioner who acknowledges that gender identity is real, they then think that it's changeable and that it's actually possible and beneficial to try to change a core fundamental part of who someone is. And what we know to your point about the literature and the experience of anti gay conversion therapy is when you take a vulnerable young person, you sit them down, and you say, I don't believe anything that you're telling me about who you are. And in fact, I think that what you're saying about yourself is a pathology. I think there's something wrong with you, and I think we better explore that in order to root it out, in order to eradicate it. So what these exploratory therapy approaches really do, again, it is an incredible misnomer partner, because true mental health support meets people where they are and supports them throughout their journey. But exploratory therapy specifically says, I have a predetermined goal. And that predetermined goal is that you are not trans. And that is both impossible and incredibly damaging. Exactly the way anti gay conversion therapy is telling people that who they are is a pathology and trying to get them to change a core fundamental part of who they are is dangerous.
- [75:54]
Emma Vigeland
It is a level of. I mean, we. There's so much pop psychology that's thrown around these days, but this is gaslighting to this deeply harmful degree that also involves the. The deployment of societal and often religious shame that I don't think we can understate or overstate, I should say, what that does to somebody who's still exploring who they are, and they don't have a sense, even fully, of their own identity, but they know they feel a certain way. The level of trauma that that engenders and that creates. This is why suicide rates for LGBTQ People unhoused rates as well, because you have parents that buy into this thing and kick their kids out, and they end up on the street. Why those levels are higher than other groups. You can. This is the direct result of that kind of approach.
- [76:56]
Sam Cedar
Yeah. I mean, I know what it was like to grow up in the 80s and 90s, and, you know, this feeling that's. That the feeling that there was something wrong with me, the sense of shame that I was somehow wrong. And God forbid I had a therapist who sat me down and. And gave me that same message, God forbid I were a transgender young person growing up now, where we have bullies at the highest levels of power using their political platforms, their megaphones to tell trans kids that there's something wrong with them. We have data from places like the Trevor Project, which is an anti. You know, an anti suicide hotline for LGBTQ young people, and they have done research looking at the mental health harms of the current environment that we are in, where transgender people are being treated as political footballs. And again, God forbid that you, as a young person go to speak to somebody that you think is going to provide you with mental health support, is going to help you and care for you, and instead they sit you down and they tell you there's something wrong with you, and we're going to explore it to get to the root of it, and we are going to change it. That is so incredibly harmful for young people.
- [78:17]
Emma Vigeland
Right. I mean, there's a version of this with abortion, those trucks that would go around and offer people care, and then they. And then they walk in and it's a religious fundamentalist saying, this is right. Right. Yes. Thank you for reminding me of the name of those. Except as I delineated earlier and as you speak about, with your experience, this is about someone's whole identity, too, and that is what the danger is here, and we're putting it mildly. But I really appreciate your time today. Dr. Kellen Baker, thanks so much for coming on the show. Dr. Baker is the executive director of the Institute for Health Research and Policy at Whitman Walker Health. Thanks so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.
- [79:05]
Sam Cedar
Thank you so much for having me.
- [79:08]
Emma Vigeland
All right, well, with that, we're going to wrap up the free part of this show. Head into the not free. Half the fun question mark. Half.
- [79:17]
Matt Binder
I mean, it's pretty free.
- [79:19]
Emma Vigeland
I mean. Yeah, well, the not. But. But we can't call it the fun half right now. I mean, I don't know. We're. We got.
- [79:28]
Matt Binder
We've called it the fun half. There's some pretty dark times.
- [79:30]
Emma Vigeland
It's the funnest half.
- [79:33]
Matt Binder
Still be talking about the Gaza holocaust.
- [79:36]
Emma Vigeland
Yep. If you can. And you, if you have the ability, we would really appreciate if you go to join themjorityreport.com help support us. We're trying to get these interviews out, keep people informed about what the administration is doing, what our foreign policy is doing. In addition, jointhemajorityreport.com you help support us, keep the lights on and you can IM the show and we will read your IM on air. @ one point, did you know you.
- [80:07]
Matt Binder
Can care about more than one thing at once? For instance, you can care about the mass slaughter of a people and mass starvation of a people by a supposed nominal ally of the country that you pay taxes to. And you can care about the voids in the social circles of Zionist students who got ghosted after they told their friends that they support Israel. You can care about both those things. And you can all you need to do, even if you say exclusively emphasize the latter, is say I care about both, and then just continue emphasizing the latter.
- [80:40]
Emma Vigeland
Right. And I do think that there's a thing called proportionality too. Right. Like, you know, I was maybe a little annoyed seeing some people going after Gisele Fetterman. And you know, that article, it just screamed to me as like somebody who feels that maybe they're not in the safest situation or it's very difficult to leave your spouse and that kind of thing. And saying how can you care about this when there's, you know, this genocide happening? It's like, like you can care about a lot of things at once. I mean, my cup is runneth over, but there's a degree of proportionality and you gotta care, yes, number one, about the genocide in Gaza. And as an aside, you can care about this woman that's in a tough situation, but not as much as the other thing. And that's how that works.
- [81:30]
Matt Binder
It should be probably exceedingly clear to anybody, you know, how you're weighing these things on the scales.
- [81:36]
Emma Vigeland
It should be. It should be. Matt, what's happening on Left Reckoning?
- [81:43]
Matt Binder
Last night on Left Reckoning, Alex Skopic, one of my favorite magazine writers, talking about a few of his pieces at Current Affairs. One, how Trump is a landlord and that is part of his identity that is underemphasized by capitalist press in this country, even though it shouldn't be, as he both does, policies that directly benefit landlords but also treats Gaza like a real estate development project. And we Also talked about how China treats billionaires. You know, people might know that China also has hundreds of billionaires, but people might not know is they have hundreds fewer than they had two years ago because Xi is cracking down on them. The ex billionaire folks. It's one of the most beautiful words in the world. We want to see more of it across the world. So we talk about what China is doing. And then finally, a piece he did called the Nazis on aisle nine on the widespread corporate collaboration with the Nazis party. And that goes far beyond, say, IBM.
- [82:41]
Emma Vigeland
I can't wait for that episode. That might be my plane. Listen, you know, to get me relaxed for that flight that might crash. 646-257-3920. We'll take your calls in the fun half. We'll open up the phone lines on the other side. See you there. Okay. Emma, please. Well, I just. I feel that my voice is sorely lacking on the majority.
- [83:03]
F
Wait, look.
- [83:04]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Sam is unpopular.
- [83:05]
F
I do deserve a vacation at Disney World, so. Ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to welcome Emma to the show.
- [83:11]
Emma Vigeland
It is Thursday.
- [83:13]
Matt Binder
I think you need to take over for Sam.
- [83:15]
F
Yes, please. I'm. I'm going to pause you right there.
- [83:18]
Emma Vigeland
Wait, what?
- [83:19]
F
You can't encourage Emma to live like this. And I'll tell you why.
- [83:23]
Sam Cedar
So, was offered a tour.
- [83:25]
F
Sushi and poker with the boys. Sushi and poker with boys. Who was offered a tour?
- [83:31]
Emma Vigeland
Yeah.
- [83:32]
F
Sushi and poker with boys.
- [83:34]
Sam Cedar
What?
- [83:34]
F
Twerk, sushi and poker had Tim's upset. Twerk, sushi and bulker with two boys was offered with twerk, sushi and. That's what we call biz. Twerk, sushi and bulker with two boys.
- [83:47]
Emma Vigeland
Right.
- [83:48]
F
Twerk, sushi and bulker.
- [83:50]
Emma Vigeland
We're going to get demonetized.
- [83:51]
F
I just think that what you did to T was mean.
- [83:55]
Emma Vigeland
Free speech.
- [83:56]
F
That's not what we're about here. Look at how sad he's become now. You shouldn't even talk about it. I think you're responsible.
- [84:03]
Emma Vigeland
I probably am in a certain way. But let's get to the meltdown here.
- [84:07]
F
Sushi and poker with the boys. Oh, my God.
- [84:10]
Matt Binder
Wow.
- [84:11]
F
Sushi. I'm sorry. I'm losing my mind. Who was offered with twerk, sushi and poker with the boys? Logic. Twerk, sushi and poker boy. I think I'm like a little kid. Think I'm like a little kid. Think I'm like a kid.
- [84:24]
Emma Vigeland
Twerk.
- [84:24]
F
I think I'm like a little kid. I think I'm like a little kid. Add this debate 7,000 times a little kid. I think I'm like a little kid. A little kid think I'm like a dude. I'm losing my mind. 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.
- [84:42]
Emma Vigeland
That's not what we're talking about here.
- [84:47]
F
It's not a fun job. Job tour. That's a real thing. That's a real thing.
- [84:50]
Emma Vigeland
Real thing.
- [84:51]
F
Willie Walker. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. That's real thing. That's a real thing that's offered. 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 offered. That's a real thing. That.
- [85:13]
Dr. Kellen Baker
That's poker.
- [85:14]
F
Let's go, Joey, twerk. Sushi and poker Boy, take it easy. Sushi and poker. Things have really gotten out of hand. Sushi and poker with the boys. Illusional sushi. You don't have a clue as to what's going on live YouTube.
- [85:30]
Emma Vigeland
Sam has the weight of the world on his shoulders. Sam doesn't want to do this show anymore.
- [85:35]
F
Anymore.
- [85:36]
Emma Vigeland
It was so much easier when the majority of the to report was just you.
- [85:41]
F
Let's change the subject.
- [85:43]
Emma Vigeland
Rangers and Nicks feeling right now. Shut up. Don't want people saying reckless things on your program.
- [85:48]
Sam Cedar
That's one of the most difficult parts about this show.
- [85:50]
Emma Vigeland
This is the pro killing podcast.
- [85:52]
F
I'm thinking maybe it's time to bury the hatchet.
- [85:55]
Emma Vigeland
Left his best trump pilot tour.
- [85:57]
F
Don't be foolish and don't tweet at me.
- [85:59]
Dr. Kellen Baker
And don't the way Emma has cucked all of these people.
- [86:03]
F
Love it.
- [86:03]
Emma Vigeland
That's where my heart so I wrote my honors thesis about it.
- [86:07]
Sam Cedar
Oh, she wrote an honest thesis. I guess I should hand the main mic to you now.
- [86:14]
F
You are to the right of me on foreign policy.
- [86:16]
Emma Vigeland
We already formed Israel, dude. Are you against us?
- [86:19]
F
That's a tougher question I haven't answered.
- [86:25]
Sam Cedar
Incredible theme song.
- [86:27]
Emma Vigeland
Hi, bumbler.
- [86:28]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Emma.
- [86:28]
Sam Cedar
Vin.
- [86:28]
Dr. Kellen Baker
Absolutely one of my favorite people, actually.
- [86:31]
Emma Vigeland
Not just in the game, like period.