3534 - L.A. Vs ICE, DOGE's VA Disaster w/ Memo Torres & Brandon Roberts

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Majority Report with Sam Seder – Episode 3534

Title: L.A. Vs ICE, DOGE's VA Disaster w/ Memo Torres & Brandon Roberts
Host: Sam Seder
Guests: Brandon Roberts (Investigative Journalist, ProPublica) & Memo Torres (Director, LA Taco)
Release Date: July 9, 2025

---

1. Introduction and Overview

In episode 3534 of The Majority Report with Sam Seder, host Sam Seder delves into pressing political and social issues affecting the United States. The episode primarily focuses on the aggressive actions of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Los Angeles, the use of artificial intelligence in assessing Veterans Affairs (VA) contracts, and the shortcomings of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in regulating imported drugs. Joining Sam are Brandon Roberts from ProPublica and Memo Torres, the director of the street-level journalism outlet LA Taco.

---

2. The Jeffrey Epstein Case and Intelligence Agencies

The discussion begins with an examination of the ongoing Jeffrey Epstein case and its potential ties to intelligence agencies.

Emma Vigland highlights her theory:

"I think that our intelligence agencies do some really shady crap, including blackmailing people. And it's quite likely Epstein was a part of that operation."
(06:56)

Sam Seder responds by acknowledging the plausibility but emphasizes the lack of direct policy implications:

"If they have to spend 15 minutes on dealing with this, it's worth it to talk about."
(07:00)

Brandon Roberts clarifies the DOJ's stance on releasing Epstein's client list:

"It's sitting on my desk right now to review... Child porn is what they were never going to be released, never going to see the light of day."
(11:03)

The conversation underscores the complexities and possible obstructions in uncovering the full extent of Epstein's associations.

---

3. Investigative Insights on the VA and FDA

Brandon Roberts presents his investigative findings on two critical areas:

a. VA's Use of AI in Contract Assessments

The VA introduced an AI-driven approach, led by Sahil Lavinia from Doge, to evaluate and cut down VA contracts rapidly. However, this method has sparked chaos due to:

• Inadequate Expertise:
  "He has no background in this... he was going to use AI to figure it out."

  (26:45)

• Flawed AI Prompts: The AI was given convoluted instructions with vague criteria like "if the price seems unreasonable," leading to inconsistent and arbitrary contract cancellations.

• Lack of Transparency:
  "VA has not given [Democrats] a list of things that were cut and why."

  (31:04)

• Impact on Services: Essential services such as suicide prevention hotlines and nurse recruitment were among those affected, potentially jeopardizing veteran care.

b. FDA's Diminished Oversight of Imported Drugs

The Trump administration has reportedly undermined the FDA's capacity to inspect and regulate imported drugs by:

• Firing Inspectors: Significant reductions in FDA inspector staff have weakened the agency's ability to ensure drug safety.
  "People are leaving and a lot of them have critical roles..."

  (40:02)

• Granting Exemptions: Even when issues are identified at manufacturing facilities, the FDA often exempts certain drugs from import bans, allowing potentially unsafe medications to enter the U.S. market.

• Ongoing Risks: Roberts warns of continued risks to public health due to insufficient oversight.
  "You could be getting drugs that come from these facilities that potentially have, you know, contaminants or whatever issues."

  (38:30)

---

4. ICE's Aggressive Tactics in Los Angeles and Community Impact

Memo Torres provides a firsthand account of ICE's intensified operations in LA, detailing the severe repercussions for Latino communities:

• Targeted Raids: ICE focuses on vulnerable populations in public spaces, including street vendors, day laborers, and gardeners.
  "ICE is really just going after anybody that's exposed out in public areas."

  (49:53)

• Heightened Fear and Economic Impact: The raids have led to ghost towns in communities, economic downturns for local businesses, and widespread fear among residents.
  "People are being terrorized in the Latino communities. It's a really scary situation."

  (63:10)

• Erosion of Trust with Law Enforcement: There is a troubling alliance between ICE agents and local police forces, exacerbating tensions and reducing community trust.
  "LAPD and the sheriffs were trying to show off twice, like... like, they're birds of a feather."

  (72:47)

• Advice for Communities:

  "Document and share. Protect your identities, protect your faces if you're going to be doing that. It's a form of warfare, honestly."
  (75:05)

Memo emphasizes the importance of community vigilance, documenting ICE's actions, and supporting one another amidst heightened repression.

---

5. Concluding Remarks and Future Outlook

Sam Seder wraps up the discussions by highlighting the interconnectedness of government inefficiencies and aggressive policies. He underscores the urgent need for media outlets to shed light on these issues to foster awareness and accountability.

Sam Seder concludes:

"Recipe to keep, democracy dies in the darkness... covering this stuff helps people."
(79:21)

The episode not only exposes critical governmental failures but also calls for proactive community engagement and increased media scrutiny to address and mitigate these systemic challenges.

---

Key Takeaways:

• VA and FDA Mismanagement: The Trump administration's reliance on AI for VA contract assessments and personnel reductions within the FDA have jeopardized veteran care and drug safety.

• ICE's Escalated Operations in LA: Aggressive ICE tactics are decimating Latino communities, undermining local economies, and eroding trust in law enforcement agencies.

• Media's Role in Accountability: Independent and street-level journalism, as exemplified by ProPublica and LA Taco, play a crucial role in uncovering and reporting these systemic issues.

---

Notable Quotes:

• "Our intelligence agencies do some really shady crap... Epstein was a part of that operation." — Emma Vigland (06:05)

• "He has no background in this... he was going to use AI to figure it out." — Brandon Roberts (26:45)

• "ICE is really just going after anybody that's exposed out in public areas." — Memo Torres (49:53)

• "Document and share. Protect your identities... It's a form of warfare, honestly." — Memo Torres (75:05)

---

This comprehensive episode of The Majority Report sheds light on the profound implications of political decisions on public welfare and minority communities, urging listeners to stay informed and actively participate in advocacy for justice and transparency.

Transcript

[Sam Seder]

The Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Wednesday, July 9, 2025. My name is Sam Seder. 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, Brandon Roberts, investigative journalist, news application developer at ProPublica, on the failures at the FDA and the munchable parts of the VA. Also on the program today, Memo Torres, director of the award winning street level journalism, La Taco. They were a taco place and now they're alerting people to what's happening with ICE. Also on the program today, with over 119dead, 170 still missing in Texas, Trump flounderingly still wants to slash female Republicans now teeing up a second bill of cuts for the fall. With the budget deadline looming July 30, Chuck Schumer now realizing his budget strategy was an abject failure in a shadow docket. Supreme Court okays Trump's mass firings of federal workers. Russia launches its largest drone attack on Ukraine a day after Trump reverses Pete Hegseth's unilateral weapons. Pause.

[Emma Vigland]

He did it and then forgot about it.

[Sam Seder]

Whoopsie.

[Emma Vigland]

That can happen.

[Sam Seder]

Elon Musk's grok goes full Nazi. CEO says I'm leaving. I'm goose stepping it out of here.

[Emma Vigland]

Not see you later.

[Sam Seder]

You were waiting on that one.

[Emma Vigland]

I honestly, it just came to me. That's how brilliant I am.

[Sam Seder]

Copper import tax threat drives prices of copper through the roof. Pam Bondi attacked by MAGA over the Epstein saga. Donald Trump administration sues California over allowing transgender athletes in schools. Alligator Alcatraz costed ballooning from 450 to 600 million dollars in less than a month. Lastly, Trump threatens a 200% tax on imported drugs because why not? All this and more on today's Majority Report. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. Oh, it is dropping us right in.

[Emma Vigland]

Yep, into a hump day.

[Sam Seder]

Hump day. Wednesday it is. Wednesday is hump day. Emma Vigland's key phrase. Brian again, solo today.

[Emma Vigland]

Matt's back tomorrow though, right?

[Sam Seder]

Tomorrow. Thank God.

[Memo Torres]

Oh.

[Emma Vigland]

How you doing?

[Sam Seder]

Chilling.

[Brian]

If everybody could just stop making news for a day.

[Sam Seder]

I don't know if Brian was aware of this, but did you know that Emma coined the phrase hump day? Really?

[Brian]

Yeah, it's like an Al Gore Internet thing.

[Sam Seder]

No. Yeah, he actually was very responsible for the Internet. Incidentally, we got a lot to get.

[Brian]

To.

[Sam Seder]

This next part. Oh, we should also say, well, we'll talk about the, the, the merch Sales in the way. Oh, yeah. Of. Of Hassan Piker being on the program yesterday.

[Emma Vigland]

Turns out he has a large fan base.

[Sam Seder]

There's a large fan base. And I have several friends who have children who are, you know, between the ages of, like, 17 and 22. And I now am held in high esteem by those people. Whereas two days ago, I could be talking right in front of them and they wouldn't be listening to a word I would say. They just pretend like I wasn't there. And I'm including my own daughter in that.

[Emma Vigland]

Understood. Yeah. Yeah. He's kind of a big deal. Thanks to Hasan for coming on yesterday.

[Sam Seder]

Yes, that was fun.

[Emma Vigland]

Even though it was like, 100 degrees.

[Sam Seder]

Oh, my God, it was very, very hot yesterday. The. The. I have a. I have struggled a little bit with this story. I mean, look, the Epstein thing is intriguing. We've never followed it, covered it to too much in depth. We've mentioned it from time to time. It is definitely. There was definitely something incredibly shady, obviously, and horrific that went on with Epstein. But it has become fascinating to me, not that MAGA or these right wingers or the Republicans were obsessed with these conspiracies, because that's what they do, but that they could be so angry with the Trump administration. Not the dear Daddy Trump, but. But all the people around him, they don't care about policy. It is all sort of like these weird, weird cultural issues. There's no policy associated here with it. There may be corruption, but they don't care about corruption.

[Emma Vigland]

Well, I mean, there's policy. If I think my theory and that maybe I cared about this story a little more than you or followed it more closely, just because I think that the theory of him being linked to Mossad and States intelligence like this is, I think, clearly what happened. I mean, you don't need to believe me on that front, but we'll hear this. This exchange with Trump and a reporter. It was told reportedly to Alex Acosta that he was an intelligence asset when he was first caught. He was in this, like, luxury lockup who got. He got to leave on the weekends. And given, like, the scale of the surveillance and recording that he engaged in that, you know, Bill, he had all these political figures who were embroiled in this. It feels like a honeypot situation. And it's likely both US and Israeli intelligence that had a hand in it. I think that's clear.

[Sam Seder]

It's conceivable. But all of these things we're talking about happened, you know, five, 10 years in the past, and it's I mean that's, that's, it's very possible, but in terms of like forward looking policy, there's no implications whatsoever outside of anything other than as a political matter. It is causing the Trump administration a lot of headaches. And anything, in my estimation that causes the Trump administration headaches that requires them to exert any amount of resources. That is not cutting the functioning of government, that is not cutting the help government provides for people. That is not building a brown shirt federal secret police squad essentially. That is not rounding up immigrants. That is not doing any of the horrible things that they do on a day to day basis. If they have to spend 15 minutes on dealing with this, it's worth it to talk about.

[Emma Vigland]

And you know, they're worried about it because of how they announce this nonsense that, oh, there's no, there's no list. Don't worry about it. He killed himself. Don't worry. They dumped it on Sunday night in an item to Axios in between like.

[Sam Seder]

You know, coming off of the July 4th.

[Emma Vigland]

Coming off July 4th and before Netanyahu's visit, which was gonna dominate the news cycle on Monday. So they knew what they were doing.

[Sam Seder]

I think they were also trying to avoid talk of this bill that passed.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah.

[Sam Seder]

With that said, we're, of course we've been talking about the bill since it passed. But here, let's just go back to what Donald Trump Jr. Had to say. This is clip number nine. This was last, last summer, I believe it was, when Donald Trump Jr. Was very, very interested in this topic. I don't think he's as interested today would be my guess. I'm fine with all the other lists. As long as I'm not on the Epstein list, we're good. Right. Speaking of which, how is it that my father could be convicted of 34 crimes but no one on Epstein's list has even been brought to light? How is. I'm trying to figure out how that's possible. Right.

[Memo Torres]

But.

[Sam Seder]

It'S almost like they're trying to protect those pedophiles for some reason. I can't imagine why. Right. I can't imagine why either. Hey, don't talk about that anymore.

[Emma Vigland]

And it's just, see there's, there it is right there. The difference in what I'm saying where like, like the stuff with aliens there, they always dance around the, the conspiracy that is the most likely, which are that like say you see a ufo, it's probably some experimental testing for like government surveillance or like weapons and they don't want to tell you about it. So they'd rather you talk about it like it's aliens. And it's similar with this.

[Sam Seder]

They.

[Emma Vigland]

It's just vague. It's like all antisemitism. It's all Hollywood degeneracy as opposed to maybe the more systemic thing you could take away from this is that our intelligence agencies do some really shady crap, including blackmailing people. And it's quite likely Epstein was a part of that operation.

[Sam Seder]

Here's Donald Trump. We played this yesterday, but we played it in the fun half. And he. If it wasn't for his response here, I don't know if I would be even remotely interested in this again, because he clearly doesn't want to talk about it. And which is why I think it's healthy to at least keep. Throw some chum to the right on this. Sure. Your memo and release yesterday in Jeffrey Epstein, it left some lingering mysteries.

[Brian]

One of the biggest ones is whether.

[Sam Seder]

He ever worked for a American or foreign intelligence agency. The former labor secretary who was Miami.

[Brian]

U.S. attorney Alex Costa, he allegedly said.

[Sam Seder]

That he did work for an intelligence agency. So could you resolve whether or not he did? And also could you say why there's.

[Brian]

A minute missing from the jailhouse tape.

[Sam Seder]

On the night of the 7th?

[Brandon Roberts]

Yeah, sure. If I could.

[Sam Seder]

I just interrupted. Sure. Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein? This guy's been talked about for years. You're asking. We have Texas, we have this. We have all of the things. And are people still talking about this guy, this creep? That is unbelievable. Do you want to waste the time and you feel like answering?

[Brandon Roberts]

I don't mind answering.

[Sam Seder]

I mean, I can't believe you're asking a question on Epstein at a time like this, where we're having some of the greatest success and also tragedy with what happened in Texas. It just seems like a desecration. But you go ahead.

[Brandon Roberts]

Sure, sure. First, to back up on that, in February, I did an interview on Fox and it's been a lot of attention because I said I was asked a question about the client list. And my response was it's sitting on my desk to be reviewed, meaning the file along with the JFK MLK files as well. That's what I meant by that. Also, to the tens of thousands of video, they turned out to be child porn downloaded by that disgusting Jeffrey Epstein. Child porn is what they were never going to be released, never going to see the light of day. To him being an agent. I have no knowledge about that. We can get back to you on that. And the minute missing from the video we released the video showing definitively the video was not conclusive, but the evidence prior to it was showing he committed suicide. And what was on that? There was a minute that was off the counter. And what we learned from Bureau of Prisons was every year, every night they redo that video. It's old from like 1999. So every night the video is reset and every night should have the same minute missing. So we're looking for that video to release that as well, showing in a minute.

[Sam Seder]

You know, it really feels like two things occur to me this. One, Trump really didn't want to answer this question or have this question answered. And two, it really doesn't seem like Pam Bondi has done any of the investigation. I mean, if you're asked one question and you literally have to say, well, we're going to look into these three things about the. What it doesn't feel like they put their best and brightest on this case here. And as far as him wasting time, click on that link I just sent you. You should probably also turn off the notifications in the chat. But that link at 138, he goes on and talks for like five minutes in this thing about, look at the paintings in here. There's all sorts of paintings. Like, wait, wait a second. Where's the urgency about talking about all the, all the important kids, all the.

[Emma Vigland]

Kids that died in Texas.

[Sam Seder]

Yeah, I mean, let's listen, let's listen to this.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah, yeah, we get, we got an ad. All right, here we go.

[Sam Seder]

Go to one. No, no. Hour. 38 hour. Yes.

[Emma Vigland]

All right, we're, we're, we're finding it. But like, that one minute that's missing from the footage that she addresses there seems pretty relevant to me because that's.

[Sam Seder]

Going out over Brian.

[Emma Vigland]

We get a, you can also, like, make it. It doesn't prove anything. Also, if he did kill himself because he, how did he have the ability to do so? Was such a prized, like, prisoner who had all of this information and his testimony was going to be so invaluable at the time. That's what we were talking about. We were talking about what this trial is going to uncover, all of this. What is he going to be forced to say? Will he take the stand? And then suddenly he had the means to kill himself in the maximum security federal prison. That doesn't mean it doesn't need to be an assassin going there and doing it for him. It could be a situation where it's like, you're too valuable. Here's the materials. You better do this now that's like what the conspiracy could possibly be as well. And she's dancing around that.

[Sam Seder]

Oh my God. Dancing around it so much. Here, just play this. Just go ahead. All right, forget it. Yeah, let's go to the next one. Let's go to number five. This is how they are freaking out about this.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah. So I guess CNN put together this compilation of the right wing meltdown and this is an issue that they seem to care about actually.

[Brian]

Although this is supposed to be about.

[Sam Seder]

The most transparent administration.

[Emma Vigland]

What on earth is going on? Was Pam Bondi. We're working on it.

[Sam Seder]

This is, this is it. Sorry.

[Emma Vigland]

Set up by deep state FBI career officials. Is she stupid? Is she so click thirsty that she got out over her skis trying to make news being a Fox News star?

[Sam Seder]

Pam Bondi, all of it, all those videos are saying, yeah, she's seen the videos. It's all coming out and then now it doesn't exist. I mean, what, what The Jeffrey Epstein case. You, you do not know all the details of this thing. I promise there are a lot of really obvious, obviously powerful people. This part, you know, but the specific names we may not.

[Emma Vigland]

They're were so many individuals that were.

[Brandon Roberts]

Hidden and kept secret and not been held accountable. What you're going to see hopefully tomorrow is a lot of flight logs, a lot of names, a lot, a lot of information.

[Sam Seder]

The DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients. Will that really happen?

[Brandon Roberts]

It's sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump.

[Brian]

So what happened to the Epstein client.

[Memo Torres]

List that the Attorney General said she had on her desk?

[Emma Vigland]

Well, I think if you go back and look at what the Attorney General said in that interview which was on your network on Fox News, John Roberts.

[Memo Torres]

Said DOJ may be releasing a list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients. Will that really happen? And she said it's sitting on my desk right now to review.

[Sam Seder]

Yes.

[Emma Vigland]

She was saying the entirety of all of the paperwork, all of the paper in relation to Jeffrey Epstein's crimes. That's what the Attorney General was referring to and I'll let her speak for that. This seems like unforgivable behavior. How could she give us those phase one binders that contains nothing while bragging about the COVID sheet that she made the most transparent administration in history and tell us that the SDNY had the real goods. The binder was just proof of a deep state cover up. That was the real story. She told us only to now say, sorry, there's nothing if I'm President Trump. I wouldn't tolerate it. Okay?

[Sam Seder]

So if I'm President Trump, I would be like, thank you, thank you.

[Emma Vigland]

I'm so. I'm I'm happy that they're all got their panties in the bunch over this. The idea that this is Pam Bondi's, like, sword to fall.

[Sam Seder]

I mean, it's all Pam.

[Emma Vigland]

First of all, why did he appoint Pam Bondi?

[Sam Seder]

And if she was released, the Epstein.

[Emma Vigland]

Thing, she was EG from 2011 to 2019, when all this stuff was coming out about Epstein, she didn't do anything about it. Alex Acosta, previous Labor Secretary, mentioned there picked by Donald Trump. Trump is. Was friends with Epstein by his own words. Epstein said Trump was my. My best friend for I don't know how long. There's photos of them. He was on the plane.

[Sam Seder]

I don't.

[Emma Vigland]

When Ghislaine Maxwell got locked up, he said, I wish her well. And again, who was president when Epstein died? Trump and all of maga, because this is a cult. They have to pretend like Trump is somehow not complicit in this whole situation when he's the one who has the most direct ties to Epstein. Of anybody in the Cabinet. Of anybody in the Cabinet.

[Sam Seder]

If maga's serious about this, they should be calling for Pam Bondi's resignation. They show that Donald Trump can release these documents. Clearly she's hiding them from Trump.

[Emma Vigland]

Trump is incredibly powerful and also a victim of everybody around him.

[Sam Seder]

I asked bonding country I've heard of, I said, release the documents. And she wouldn't do it. And why? I don't know. And now I can't. The office is locked, so.

[Emma Vigland]

Whoops.

[Sam Seder]

Whoopsie. Honestly, it would be a good thing if she got fired because it would be difficult for them to replace the AG and it would cause, again, anything that causes any use of resources that is not, you know, leveled at destroying our government is a good thing. In a moment, we're going to be talking to Brandon Roberts, investigative journalist and news application developer ProPublica, about two stories Brandon's written about the Trump administration destroying our government. In one instance, the VA. The other, the FDA's capacity to inspect drugs that come in from overseas. I think about 40% of our prescription drugs do come from overseas. We'll talk to Brandon about that in a moment. Yesterday we had Hassan piker on.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah.

[Sam Seder]

And we got a new hat. It's a max left trucker's hat. We're also going to get some, I think some dad hats in the same type of logo. But when we started this podcast, I was very, very reluctant to do a merch store because I'm like, this is going to be a hassle. I don't want to be. It's going to be too complicated. We just couldn't do it. And because I just have too many things on my plate, just every day there's something on my plate. I'm talking metaphorically, I'm talking about the news. And it became like, then people were like, you've got to have a merch store. Well, thank you to Shopify. Yes.

[Emma Vigland]

Nice.

[Sam Seder]

Yesterday we sold like, I don't know, 70 hats of that max left. People love those. And we couldn't do it without Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world. Things like Magic spoon, the brands just getting started to our own merch store. Shopify has hundreds of ready use templates to help you build an online store that matches your brand. That can be beautiful, edgy or minimalist or completely underdeveloped like ours. Shopify is packed with AI tools that help you put together product descriptions, page headlines, even enhance your product photography. And best yet, Shopify helps you with managing inventory, international shipping and processing returns and beyond. If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Shopify also integrates your, you know, if you do a live show, well, if you have a shop that's live, but for us it's, you know, when we do a live show, integrates it with inventory and expenses and all in one place. You can also put it on all different types of social media. It's been great, super easy. And of course, if, if we have Hasan on again and you have him do another piece, wear another piece of our merch, we can actually easily scale up and get ready for that kind of demand. Turn your big business idea into a cha ching. With Shopify on your side. Sign up for your $1 per month trial. Start selling at shopify.com/majority. Go to shopify.commajority shopify.com majority and we have all that info in the podcast and YouTube description. Check it out in a moment. We'll be right back with Brandon Roberts, Investigative journalist at ProPublica. Sam it. We are back. Sam Cedar, Emma Vigland on the Majority Report. It's a pleasure to welcome to the program Brandon Roberts, investigative journalist and news application developer at ProPublica. Brandon, thanks for joining us. We got two stories that you've written over the past month that I'm interested in. The first is what's been going on at the va. There was a big story at the VA about how doctors were essentially allowed to decide that if they have religious objections to treating some of the patients there, that's no big deal. Feel free to ignore them if you don't like their politics or their sexual orientation or anything like that. Which is completely batcrap crazy in my mind. But the piece you wrote was specifically about how Doge came in and decided to. I don't know, it's almost willy nilly, but they, they, they, they sort of pretend it's not to just like start cutting.

[Brian]

Right, Exactly. Yeah. So the story goes, there's this Doge guy, Sahil Lavinia. He shows up to work at VA on, you know, as part of Doge and essentially come from. Where did he come from? He's, he has a background in tech, so he's done startups. His startup, Gumroad has been around for a long time. He's, he's got a blog where he talks about it. But you know, it was like a large regular startup that was raising money, hiring people. Then it all kind of fell apart. And then he sort of figured out how he could go without employees and use AI and automation to kind of run his company. So it's a very small thing, but he's, you know, that's like part of his success story is that he's used AI to, you know, continue this company that would have otherwise failed. And he kind of brought that approach over to VA Day one. He gets asked, hey, we have this executive order. We need to go through all of VA's contracts and grants. We need you to go through the Approximately, you know, 90,000 or so contracts, figure out which ones we can cut, you know, and do it in 30 days, which is a very fast, you know, that's an impossible deadline is what Saha told me. To him the natural sit on that.

[Sam Seder]

For one second and realize just how insane of a task that is. The idea that none of these contracts, to assess these contracts, you need to have exactly zero understanding of the largest government agency or enterprise that exists. I mean the VA is basically right, like running almost like a, a small country, right? I mean, it's like we're talking about not just health insurance, we're talking about hospital services, we're talking about social services, we're talking about employment services for millions of people. And it's one of the most complicated agencies that we have. And a dude who comes in who did a processing like a, like basically an E commerce site comes in and has 30 days to make a determination on 90,000 contracts. Like I wouldn't even trust that person or anybody for that matter to do an assessment on a contract.

[Brian]

Right. And you know, Sahil, the Doge engineer, you know, he would be the first to, you know, kind of agree with that. You know, he has no background in this. They asked him to do it and he was going to do it. So in his mind the only way to do this was use AI.

[Sam Seder]

And what like in the piece you write out, I guess the script that he, that he used or the, I mean, what. So he uses AI to do. To do what? I, how would I have this level of knowledge about what the VA does specifically? I mean, is that possible or what would you have to input into it?

[Brian]

Right. Well, there's a couple things. So what we received from a source is like his code, which includes prompts. The prompts are instructions given to AI and it's explaining to AI how to determine whether or not something is munchable. And munchable means something that we can cancel. That is a contract that is not going to affect patient care. The way that they define that is very, very, kind of somewhat contradictory and just very verbose and complicated. And it also has a huge assumption that support roles won't, you know, cutting a support role won't have any impact on patient care. That's what AI was given. There's two problems with this. One is like the prompt is super long and like convoluted and it uses a lot of vague definitions like if the price seems unreasonable, like things like that where the AI just has to guess. But also the data it was given, like the contracts, it was given the contract text, usually there's only a sentence in there describing what the contract is. So there's just not a lot of information being provided to a, you know, to a human or to AI to figure this out. I talked to numerous experts about this. You know, experts in AI. They were like, this is possible, but not this way. They thought it was ridiculous and just incompetent. Honestly, a lot of them thought that and they just got the sense that whoever was doing it didn't really know what they were doing.

[Sam Seder]

I mean, it seems to me that like it's almost, it's completely backwards. You don't need an expert in AI to do this. You need an expert in the VA to then maybe take a 30 day course on, on how to write prompts in AI because you can't write a prompt if you don't. You can't possibly know the right questions to ask. Even if AI is all knowing, you can't. You can't possibly know the questions to ask unless you understand what the. How the VA works. I mean, this is just so insane to me. It's crazy. So they go about this, how much gets cut in, like, what kind of stuff gets cut and what's the state of that stuff?

[Brian]

Right? So it's a little unclear. The Democrats, the, like, the minority VA oversight, they have been asking for like, a list of things that were cut and why, and VA has not given that to them. We can see in USA spending, which is like the government kind of catalog of contracts we can see, you know, I think like 900 have been cut that we can see, but that doesn't give us the reasoning. In addition to the code that we received from a source with the AI script, all that code, we also got a list of outputs. It's the contract, the contract description, and then whether or not the AI thought that it should be canceled. Using this, we can get a sense for it, but we don't really know what's going on inside VA as far as contracts go.

[Sam Seder]

VA knows.

[Brian]

I mean, so we talk to people inside VA and, you know, like, there are people in the VA who are experts in these contracts. You know, there's contracting officers who know the contract better than anyone else, and even they were kind of like, confused about what's going on, or they would be given like, hey, we got to cancel this one, and then it would be uncanceled, or, you know, they didn't really know who was kind of making the overall decisions or why things were cut. So just like a lot of chaos internally is kind of the sense we got from sources at va.

[Sam Seder]

And so we don't really have any sense of like, what has been lost or in terms of. In terms of the dollar amount or the functioning. So we have, we.

[Brian]

We have a list of things that were cut. Whether or not they were directly cut because of this AI program, we are not sure. There was, like, many rounds of things that were cut at va, but some things that were cut that were also flagged by AI. You know, it was like a gene sequencing machine that some extras told us could be used for, like, cancer treatments. You know, there's. There was like, a suicide prevention hotline that got cut. You know, there's a. There's a wide variety of things. Probably, like, the most common kind of cut is like, recruitment of nurses or like, ensuring that, you know, the staff there are getting support for, you know, ptsd or whatever else. And I'll remind you that, you know, a large percentage of VA staff are veterans themselves. So, you know, VA takes care of veterans and the employees are veterans. So these programs that are intended to help the employees there are also helping veterans.

[Sam Seder]

All right, let's go to second piece. Yeah, I know. Let's just put his audio up. Just another hair. I know, I know we went down, but it's a little bit too much. The. Let's go to your second piece on the fda. It feels like, I mean, do we even have a timeline of when. I guess they'll be. Republicans aren't interested in any type of oversight of this. We just won't know. Right.

[Brian]

In terms of like, the exemptions to the bands or just what are you.

[Sam Seder]

Dollar amounts like, or what? You know, we have no, there's no way to get a sense of like, what was, you know, what would the implications of being cut are for VA contracts. Yeah.

[Brian]

Yes. I mean, we talked to the press secretary, Pete Kasparowitz, and he would, you know, he told us everything goes through manual review and nothing will be cut. You know, that isn't just fat, essentially. And a lot of this stuff, we're not going to see the effects of it until, you know, down the road, you know, there's a hiring freeze. Contractors do a lot of important jobs at VA and all government agencies. So the thought that this isn't going to have any impact and, like, veterans receiving care at VA are not going to see this. You know, a lot of people we talked to thought that was ridiculous. But, you know, like, with any kind of downsizing or RIF or cutting stuff, the effects are not immediately felt, usually. So we're going to see, you know, and we're going to keep reporting. So people who are at va, you know, we're still talking to them. We're still figuring out what's happening. We're tracking this carefully.

[Sam Seder]

All right, let's turn to another thing. Donald Trump just yesterday, I guess, threatened to levy a 200% import tax on drugs that are coming into this country. The. That's one problem that it could be incredibly expensive to get those drugs. The other problem is that they seem to. The Trump administration has also simultaneously rolled back the inspector structures that we have in place and safeguards to make sure that those drugs that are being imported are safe. Walk us through that first. Let's just start. What percentage of drugs in this country are imported?

[Brian]

I do not have a percentage on that. Like, with anything drugs. It's, it's Kind of hard to get data about, you know, the market or whatever. FDA doesn't make this stuff available. But, you know, a large percentage of all prescriptions are generic.

[Sam Seder]

Sure.

[Brian]

Anyone who has filled a prescription has probably gotten a generic because it's usually much cheaper, and that's what your insurance will, you know, will pay for. We also know that a lot of generic drugs are made overseas, so it is a significant portion.

[Sam Seder]

My, my understanding, I think I saw like around 40% when, when these, the things. But, but let's assume it's. It's. It's greater than zero. It's certainly greater than 10 or 20%, and it's probably less than 50%. So we're talking about a significant amount of drugs that are taken by Americans. And what, how are these, like, you know, how does the FDA generally make sure that these drugs are safe if they're, you know, manufactured in other countries?

[Brian]

Right. So, like, the primary thing that they do is they go and they inspect. They send inspectors overseas to these facilities and they check them for all kinds of things. You know, sometimes it comes back good. Sometimes they find that, like, they've been destroying records or that, you know, there. There's mold or like, contaminants and like, they find all kinds of issues. The inspector then can issue a recommendation about what can happen, but the inspector does not get to say what happens there. It is up to FDA to decide what do we do once we've identified these issues, and that is what ours, our investigation looks at.

[Sam Seder]

And what, what did you find in terms of, like, the FDA's capacity to ensure that these drugs are being made in, like, a safe manner? Right.

[Brian]

Well, we identified multiple manufacturers of drugs who had been cited over and over. So FDA knew that there were problems with these facilities, and meanwhile, they continue to grant them more approvals to create new generics, and they also granted them exemptions. So when an inspector goes and finds issues at a facility, the FDA will then sometimes issue a. An import ban, meaning no drugs from this facility are allowed to enter the U.S. but what they will do is they will sometimes exempt certain drugs. So if there is a shortage or there's a number of reasons, but they will exempt certain drugs from the ban. So you could be getting drugs that come from these facilities that potentially have, you know, contaminants or whatever issues, and you're going to pick it up. That is a definite possibility. And that, you know, people we've talked to suspected that happened in a lot of their cases.

[Sam Seder]

And my understanding is how much, how many of these inspectors have been fired in the, I guess, the six months of the Trump administration. And tell us about the dynamic of you could keep inspectors, but if you don't have their support staff, it doesn't matter.

[Brian]

Right. Like, I don't, I don't have the number on exact number of inspectors fired. But, you know, it is a very.

[Sam Seder]

Complicated because it feels like they fire, you know, 300 people, then they realize, like, oh, we can't manage without those 300 people. Let's hire back 75 of them and then 50 are still available, and the other 25 are like, I'm not coming back. Are you kidding? Like, there's no job security.

[Brian]

Right. Exactly. Yeah. Getting numbers on us is hard, but, like, you know, anecdotally we know, you know, people are leaving and a lot of them have critical roles and, you know, some like the uncontrolled nature of this buyout. Anyone can leave. So, like an entire age, an entire office can leave and they have no way to be like, well, actually we need, we need that office. So, like, only like 20 can leave. No, there's no controls on this. So that is why I think, you know, we're seeing this rehiring, which is like incredibly wasteful people leaving. They decide they need them, then they have to rehire. A lot of these people are on administrative leave, meaning we are paying them to do nothing. And then also we're short staff and then also hiring. So it is not an efficient strategy for downsizing government, if that even is the goal.

[Sam Seder]

I mean, it feels like the one through line between the story about the VA and the story about the FDA is that people are making crucial decisions without any information about what they're talking about. Like, without any knowledge. I mean, it's conceivable to me that you could be an expert at the FBA FDA and go in and go, like, you know what, there's 10% fat here because I've been working here for an X amount of years, and I can see there's a redundancy here that we don't need. We may need the redundancy over there, but if we cut 10% here and add 5% there, we. There's a 5% savings. I mean, this is all theoretical, but if you don't have an understanding of what the critical mission activities are and how they work, there's no way you can do this. And if you haphazardly just say, whoever wants to leave and get bought out gets bought out. You don't have a sense of, like, Are we losing the, you know, it's one thing to say on your car, like, you know what, I don't need the racing stripes. It's another just to say like, take off whatever it is you need to take off and you come back and there's no engine.

[Brian]

Right, exactly. And it's really interesting. You know, there's a notable case of cms which oversees Medicaid. And the DOGE people who showed up there had ties at working at that agency. And the cuts were very, very small. So, you know, the more knowledge they have, you know, oftentimes the less they cut. Sahil, the DOGE VA coder, you know, he showed up expecting there to be tons of waste, fraud and abuse and it'd be really easy to find this stuff. And he was surprised he didn't really find any. So it's, you know, government is complicated, government is big. But like downsizing government, it's not a tech problem.

[Sam Seder]

It's fascinating stuff, Brandon. And I imagine the, the story that we're seeing at like the FDA and we've seen at the VA is probably also the story of what's going on at the National Weather Service and at FEMA and at all these agencies are facing the same challenges to actually do anything. And I don't know that, frankly, at the end of the day, beyond the blowback that they're going to get in terms of these services failing people when they're needed, that they really care. But Brandon Roberts, we will put a link to both those pieces at ProPublica. Thanks so much for your time today. Really appreciate it.

[Brian]

Thanks. Thanks for having me.

[Emma Vigland]

Thanks, Brandon.

[Sam Seder]

All right, we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, Memo Torres, director of the award winning street level journalism outlet, LA Taco, which also is a taco outlet. We are back, Sam Cedar, Emma Vigland on the Majority Report. It's a real pleasure to welcome to the program Memo Torres, director of the award winning street level journalism outlet, LA Taco. Memo. Thanks for joining us. How did you start this journalistic project?

[Memo Torres]

Well, I came on board in 2019. La Taco started off as a blog in 2005, 2006, mostly focused on like weed, graffiti and tacos. And then in 2018 when LA Weekly got bought by billionaires and then they fired all their staff, we kind of the co founders felt there was a void here for like, you know, some alternative street level news. So Ellie Talk already kind of having a following relaunch as a publication with the help of Daniel Hernandez, who's Now the food editor over at LA Times. I knew Daniel, I, so I kind of started helping out and one thing led to another and now we're here. So we've been covering journalism in Los Angeles now for about six years, since like 2018. Seven years. Yeah, it's been a minute, but yeah, we've been covering, you know, the police, you know, local politics, art culture and food, which especially includes tacos.

[Sam Seder]

And my understanding is that you guys have, obviously, in the wake of what's been going on with ICE over the past several months, have basically dedicated a lot of your resources to becoming almost like a clearinghouse for reports on what ICE is doing.

[Memo Torres]

Yeah, I mean, we kind of found ourselves at a, at a intersection here of ICE attacking specifically communities we cover. We pride ourselves in covering all of la, especially parts that kind of get overlooked by larger media outlets, which is where ICE is really attacking. They're also attacking a lot of the street vendors, which is something that we specialize in covering. So we kind of found ourselves in this position to, you know, really know and have connections all over LA and been able to talk effectively about all the situation and cover it really well. So, you know.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah, you won awards previously, I was seeing for your food journalism and that, like that combination of kind of being embedded in the community, I feel like. And covering L A the way you do probably puts you in a unique position right now because, you know, frankly, we're still not seeing the national coverage. I think that is like requisite to meet the moment of what's happening in LA right now. What I'm hearing from my friends out there is that it is a horrifying scene and that there are folks who are afraid to go out in public and communities are ghost towns at the moment because everyone's afraid of this ICE Gestapo ruining their lives and tearing their family apart.

[Memo Torres]

Yeah, it's really, I mean, it's almost like a cleansing of our communities in a way, because the, the amount of street vendors that are out is, is down way low. I, I, at least half the street vendors are gone, if not more. Communities that are, are largely Hispanic are really being hit hard economically. People don't want to go out on the streets. People are ordering food, picking up to go, they're getting taken when they're trying to go to the market. You know, they'll follow them to the market parking lots and take them from the market parking lots when they're trying to get food. Gardeners are being taken off the streets, street vendors, people from bus stops, people at the Bus stops just trying to go to work, are getting taken by ice. It's a frightening situation for a lot of the communities, especially Latino communities in Los Angeles.

[Sam Seder]

Okay, sorry, we're just getting some sound issues again, we're working on that. Give us a sense of like, what, you know, how much was the communities that you cover and report on now and just were obviously embedded in. How prepared were they for this? I mean, in the wake of the. Is there a level of sort of like surprise or were people sort of gearing up for something like this?

[Memo Torres]

No, I don't think anybody expected this to happen. I mean, you know, Trump had talked about going after the violent criminals, right? He didn't ever talk about going after people at their workplaces, people at their courthouses, people's trying to sell food on the streets, people mowing laws. There was never any discussion of that. So people were vastly unprepared. And it was completely unexpected to the point where you have, you know, a lot of people that had voted for Trump being like, whoa, this is not what we voted for. You know, there's, there's a lot of backlash towards fellow Latinos that voted for Trump. I think when it all happened, it was June 6th and it was started off with the first ICE raid at A, in the garment district at, at an apparel company. And that just kind of sent shockwaves because the way they came in hard, fast took, I don't know, like 20 or 30 something people. People came out to immediately on the streets to confront them. One person got in front of a minivan, an ICE agent driving a minivan with people in it. He drove, just hit the gas pedal, almost ran him over, knocked the guy back on his head. Guy luckily survived, but just. We've seen reckless behavior and actions from ice, Border patrol, wherever these mass stages are.

[Sam Seder]

How is it, do you think that that was the understanding that that was what Trump was going to do? I'm just curious as like, because I mean, look, you know, we do this every day. We spend three hours a day we're covering this campaign. And so, you know, the level we're seeing, the signs that say mass deportations and your average person who is not in the business of doing political news, they don't necessarily, you know, people go and vote and maybe they tune in two weeks beforehand. But how, how prominent was like right wing or Trump oriented media or advertising hitting the communities that you, you deal with?

[Memo Torres]

I mean, I don't think there was, I mean, like I said, I don't think people really expected this level of attacks when people, I mean, we, we, like, for example, we knew that this was going to come, something was coming down the pipeline in November, December. And as, as a, as a newsroom, we were planning, okay, let's plan on spreading information and building resources on what your rights are. If ICE shows up at your door, you know what to do, who to call, what organizations to. To call or support and just kind of get people, get people prepared, like, with their legal knowledge of how to react, you know. And what we've seen is we've seen ICE and Border Patrol just kind of like throw legalities out the window.

[Sam Seder]

Right.

[Memo Torres]

There's no due process, there's no Miranda rights, there's no identifying themselves. So the preparation was for something that was going to be on a legal term. What we're seeing here is complete just wild west over here with these guys.

[Sam Seder]

But I guess what I'm trying to get at is like, you know, for those people who voted for Trump and they're now like, holy crap, this is, this is not what I bargained for. I'm curious as to, like, what was driving their interest in Trump and where they were getting whatever information they were getting from. I mean, we saw, and I think the polling shows that, like, a lot of that support is cratering, you know, not across the country from Latino voters, but we also saw, I mean, there's some reports that he nearly got a majority of Latino voters, like, you know, well into the 40s. And I'm just curious as, like, how that happened when this happened six months later. You know what I mean?

[Memo Torres]

Well, I mean, look, I think, first of all, I think people are. We shouldn't still fixate the Latino voters as to, like, one monolith.

[Sam Seder]

Right. One. That's true. Right.

[Memo Torres]

Yeah, I know there's spread out, like, if you look at Cubans in Florida, they were highly supportive of Trump versus, like, Mexicans in Los Angeles, which were highly against Trump. Yeah.

[Sam Seder]

But I mean, Cuban, Cuban in Florida, they always tend to vote Republican because of the relationship between Cuba and the United States. And the people who end up leaving Cuba tend to be, you know, more anti communist, more, you know, or, you know, I mean, that's almost. There's a certain sort of, like, class associations, if not actually like material issues that come from there. So, I mean, that's a unique case. But the, you know, if Trump is getting that close with Latino vote, it's not because Florida, Cubans of Florida, it's. It's another thing going on.

[Memo Torres]

Well, I think. Well, there's there's also the religious factor. A lot of Latinos, especially Mexicans, are hard Catholics. So they'll vote, they'll vote their religion. You know, so issues like abortion, for example, is a huge one. That, that's, that one issue will get Trump a lot of Latino votes because they're super Catholic, they're anti abortion, they'll vote according to whoever, whichever party represents their religious beliefs. So that's one huge one. Doesn't mean that works across the board though. But as far as like the. I can't speak for everybody and where they got their information and where they went towards, but people that I did speak with, I've had some distant family members. I had a reunion recently. I was speaking with a lot of them, honestly, just greedy. They thought they'd get better benefits, they think they'd make more money, they'd pay less taxes. A lot of it was just financial based. People thought they'd be better off. You know, they get fooled into the whole, you know, like, oh, taxes are higher now without realizing it's Trump's tax plan still, you know, so screw Biden, we want Trump. And that's kind of been the common theme I've seen from a lot of people.

[Emma Vigland]

Cost of living. It was here in New York. I mean, Zoramdani got on the scene interviewing folks who were largely immigrant populations about why they voted for Trump or why they stayed home. And some of these people are like in AOC district and split their vote on that front. And they were saying it was cost of living and like that. That completely seems to track, at least for me, with a lot of some of the working class support that he picked up. What's, what's really troubling for me to see, at least observe from the other side of the country is it appears like ice and correct me if I'm wrong, they're targeting street vendors, specifically in L. A. Other jobs. We're hearing talk about raids on construction sites and I think farm workers are. We're about to get into a really important season for harvesting and there's concern that people aren't showing up for those jobs. What are you seeing in LA in terms of like the communities and the people in certain occupations who are most affected by what ICE is doing?

[Memo Torres]

Well, from what I've been observing is ICE is basically they're going out without warrants. So they're attacking people that are most vulnerable. And those people that are most vulnerable are in public spaces. Right? They're the day laborers in the parking lots. They're the street vendors on the street, there are people exposed working at car washes. So ICE is really just going after people that. That are out there and exposed. They're rarely. You rarely see them going into actual buildings, although recently they started getting a little more bold and going into actual Home Depots instead of just the parking lots. I saw a couple instances where they. They go into car washes and go to the back offices, and they're getting a little bit more bold there. And I think it's important for. For those kind of businesses to understand their rights so that they can stop it. But you have to stop them, because they know ice. ICE knows that they're not allowed back there, but they'll go wherever they go until somebody actually gets in front of them and asserts their rights and says, no, this is a private room. I need a warrant. You can't go back there. And that does work, but you just need somebody who's brave enough to assert that. So for the most part, what ICE is doing is like, yeah, they see gardeners on the sidewalk, you know, working, you know, mowing the lawn in the front of a house or an apartment building or whatever it be trimming trees in a parking lot. So they're literally just going after anybody that's exposed out in public areas.

[Sam Seder]

What's happening in terms of, like, the LAPD and, you know, to the extent that you're aware of other police forces too, like, where is. What is your sense of what's happening with the dynamic between the localities and the ice? I mean, I think I just saw a piece on that. You wrote the Daily Memo on a mayor who very aggressively. I can't remember the town off the top of my head now, Bill Gardens. Yeah, very aggressively, you know, basically is keeping ICE out or attempting to give me your sense of, like, what's happening in there. And if there are. If the political winds are shifting and, you know, I noticed Karen Bass got out to MacArthur park pretty quickly, seemingly more aggressive than she was, I want to say, like three or four weeks ago. Yeah.

[Memo Torres]

So it's a la. Is so huge. Right. And we have so many cities in the county of Los Angeles, and we have neighborhoods, we have. It's complicated situation. So the power that, like the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass has or doesn't have, other, smaller cities can assert more. Right. For example, you have the mayor of Huntington park, who immediately pushed for a policy instructing the police, his local police, to, you know, identify masked agents to pull over, you know, vehicles without any plates and identify them, verify and identify. Right. It's not gonna do much other than like make sure there's no imposters. And they did in fact catch one imposter. He was loaded with weapons. He had the blue and red lights, he had the whole gear on. So they did catch one imposter. Huntington park, thanks to that policy that Bill Gardens.

[Sam Seder]

Can I just. It is, that's nuts because there's many places doing that and if they're finding a guy with that kind of stuff, this must be going on all across the state.

[Emma Vigland]

They're trying to get, they're incentivizing kidnapping. That's what this administration's doing.

[Memo Torres]

Yeah. There's reports of people getting kidnapped or ransoms. There was another incident where a mother was taken by, by somebody. That's messed up. The report is that KTLA 5 covered this really well. Was that the, the woman was being held at a warehouse down by the border in San Diego with a bunch of other detainees and they were trying to force her to self deport. Now they contacted ice, they got a statement from the, direct from the PR person over at ice. And I said basically this fabricated story, this bizarre tale is clearly made up. We never arrested this woman. We're not holding her down at a warehouse without any concern as to like, well, let us look into that. Is there may be an imposter trying to do our job. Now they're just like, you guys are fabricating tales like. And just dismissed it. So it's like, so then who did take her? Right? Like because she's gone and ISIS denying taking her, they can't locate her. But yeah, you do have these situations. Yes.

[Emma Vigland]

Yeah. No, I just, this is just so important, I think for people to grasp like the part of what is so scary about what's happening right now is, is that it's the wild, wild west to a degree where there are Latino. Our neighbors, our friends, they can't call the police or they don't want to call the authorities or even draw attention to their story from a member of the media or something like that because they are fearful that it's going to attract more and more attention. And so everything we're hearing, at least from a national news perspective, seems to me that this is the tip of the iceberg because of the chilling effect that this has downstream for everybody.

[Memo Torres]

Yes. Is definitely the tip of the iceberg. And it's, it's hard. I come, I get so many tips, I get so many videos. It's hard to verify a lot of them. And some of Them we can't share because people just want to inform us and let us know what's happening. But it's, it's really sad. It's really sad. People need to understand. It's, we're completely being terrorized in the Latino communities. It's, it's really, it's a really scary situation. You're having situations where kids are going out to take over their moms or their grandma's old tamales stand on a corner because their grandma got abducted by ICE the week before. But they need to make some money and pay some bills. They can't find them in the meantime, you know, ICE isn't really reporting on who's who, they're taking, where they're taking them. So it's taking people an average of like two days, sometimes week or more to find where their relatives who got taken. They don't know where they are. They're being held in the infamous B18, the basement of the federal building right here in downtown LA. B18 is the basement area where they're just cramming people in there. Reports are like 20 to a room with like one bucket as a toilet, getting them water and crackers once a day, not letting them see their lawyers. Lawyers are out there for a whole day waiting to see clients without any access give up and have to leave. It's really a horrific situation. I think people need to understand that. I think that. And, and another thing is that they think people are actually getting caught and deported. You, you look down at the, you look down at the newspapers in Mexico and they're, they're asking, right? They, last week they started asking, well, where are all the deportees? We were supposed to be getting this influx of thousands of deportees. Where are they? Well, look at Delonto. They're all getting jail. Look at Alcatraz, Alligator, Alcatraz. They just. Too many.

[Sam Seder]

There's too much money to be made.

[Memo Torres]

Exactly.

[Sam Seder]

There's too much money to be made in these detention centers. $600 million for this detention center in Florida. There is no incentive structure to do anything other than to keep them in these detention centers. And they won't end up being deported anywhere until these detention centers are filled up. That's the way this is going to work. Because somebody's making, I don't know, 450 bucks a day per detainee that's there. And then it wouldn't surprise me down the road that, I mean, we're already hearing reports is my understanding is that there's attempts by ICE now to isolate people that they've picked up, offer them 1000 bucks to self deport and getting them to sign off on waiving all of their rights. And then we just don't know what happens after that because there's no way that people are going to go like, wait, where's my thousand dollars? Wait, well, you're not sending me anywhere. For all we know, they end up in a detention center.

[Memo Torres]

Exactly. Here in Kern county, just the county next to us to the north. They, they're about to convert this facility with like 2100 something beds into one of the largest detention facilities in California. I mean, like, why do they need more detention facilities if they're supposedly deporting?

[Sam Seder]

They could theoretically just say, everybody on a bus. We're just going to go across the border. Exactly, yeah. Have you heard any reports of. I mean, I think we're probably. It's too early in this process, but the idea of like, you know, detainees in these essentially what amounts to a concentration camps at this point, because, you know, I don't know why we say detainee. It's, I guess it's a, you know, sort of a more genteel word in some way. But at one point, there's no reason to believe that ICE isn't going to go to these people in these concentration camps and work out the same sort of like, dynamic we see with some prisons down south where it's like, if you want to get out of here, you need to go work in these factories. Like, somebody's going to have to fill these jobs, whether they're in. You know, we just had the, the, the Secretary of Agriculture say, like, well, you know, people on Medicaid can take these jobs. I guess that we're missing. Well, that's not going to happen. Everybody knows that's not going to happen. These jobs are going to have to be filled. And the idea of, like, well, you know, pick some almonds for us and then, you know, for free, and then we'll let you go in three months. I mean, to what extent are people like, sort of like, you know, now with this greater awareness of how bad it can get, are people starting to sort of like, speculate about where this goes?

[Memo Torres]

Oh, I don't know. I don't know. I can't speak as to the people's awareness out there, but what I, what I do know is I'm often in shocked. People reach out to me from all over. From London, from Canada, from other parts of the states, Illinois. I mean, I get people from all over the world that reach out to me, other news organizations, even from people in our corporate media world. I have, you know, I won't say names, but they reach out to me and they're like, we, we can't believe what we're seeing out over at Lady Taco and the coverage you guys are doing. And to me, that baffles me that people don't understand the level, the seriousness that is, that that's happening here in Los Angeles because they don't see it anywhere else. You know, they're not seeing it on BBC, they're not seeing it in corporate media. They're not. It's, and it's like, like people always tell us, like, you guys are at the forefront, you guys are leading this. Like, why is a little taco publication at the forefront of this? Why isn't everybody talking about this? It's frustrating. It's like, great, we get praise. We're on the Washington Post, we're on npr. And they're like, yeah, you guys are doing a great job. It's like, why aren't you, you know, why isn't everybody else doing this? Like, why do we have to be working. I'm working like 14 hour days trying to cover everything and I can't cover everything. Our team is working their butts off, like, and luckily we have at least coming out and supporting us in droves. We've had fundraisers, Eva Longoria dropped the money, a match. And you know, we have a lot of support and we're really grateful and thankful, but at the same time, this isn't something that we want praise for. This is something we want more people to cover and understand what's happening. Sorry, little rap.

[Sam Seder]

No, I think that is, that is, I mean, that is a crucial element of this dynamic because I think it's also indicative of like, you know, at these mainstream publications, the, they, I, they cater to, you know, what is going to make them money. And it's not necessarily covering a, you know, population that is, you know, sort of on the margins, you know, from their perspective anyways. And it's, it's a huge problem because I don't think that people understand the scope of what's going on at this point. And it's only going to get worse. I mean, we're talking about 10,000. Do you guys have a notion of, you know, being so close to this? Like, who are these ICE agents? Because the next round of 10,000 of them, you know, as far as, like, to the extent that I've, you know, Know, people who have dealt with these folks, you know, had direct contact, it tends to either be sort of like vets who have left the military early or people who couldn't become cops or bounty hunters who want to get a little more official. And I can't imagine, you know, I don't know if it's going to be end up being prison guards or what. Like there's going to have to be, I mean, I don't know what type of mentality you have to be in to be in this kind of work, as it were. But I got to imagine we're going to start scraping the bottom of the barrel of those people, and that's not going to be very pretty.

[Memo Torres]

I mean, they just got that we already know about the budget increase, right. They're going to be the third largest military force in the world behind the US And China. They're going to start hiring agents from everywhere. And right now what we're seeing is we see a lot of plates from Texas and Arizona. You know, those hard line red states, they're the ones coming over here to, to terrorize Los Angeles. I've been hearing reports of people that are prison guards getting contracted out. You know, I've been hearing, seeing a lot of that. It's difficult to confirm any of that because they're not identifying themselves. You don't know who they are, where they come from. It's, it's speculation at this point, but we are seeing a lot of Texas and Arizona plates here. And where are they going to get the new, the new workforce? Right? They're going to build, they're going to expand ice and in my theory, they're going to go after our local police officers. They're going to go after the prison guard. You know, they're going to go after vets, they're going to hire people out of the military and they're going to convert those forces into ice. That's, that's where I'm putting my money on. And I think that's what happened because what we see in Los Angeles, we were, you kind of asked this question, but we didn't really talk about like the LAPD into the local police, how we see them interacting with ice. I mean, they all feel like they're all like, you know, birds of a feather. They see each other as, as police. You know, they all think they're all on the same team. We've seen, we've seen reports. I've seen them by Dodger Stadium, where they park outside of Dodger Stadium to kind of like, meet up in the morning. There's a police academy there, and there's LAPD presence there's. Seen them wave at each other like, hey, how you doing? I saw. I saw a video that KALO News shared where a sheriff, a nice agent went into the sheriff's office, and they caught on video where the sheriffs were like, hey, we're glad to see you here. You know, like, they're birds of a feather. They, they. And what we saw at the, at the protests here, the. No Kings Day, and even the protest, it was like ninth straight day of protest here in Los Angeles. What we saw is that it was almost like LAPD and the sheriffs were trying to, like, show off twice, like, you know, we can handle this crowd. And they went nuts. Tear gas, rubber bullets, just attacking the crowds. I was almost like, you know, they're measuring their carrot sticks out there. So that's what we see. You know, it's like, it's hard to depend on the local police force and then to have to put a blanket on every single police officer. But as an agency, they do see themselves as birds as a feather. That's. That's at least our perception of it.

[Sam Seder]

What. And I imagine, you know, what, what. What happens in California is not going to stay in California. I mean, I think New York is going to be next on the list, frankly. But from. From your perspective, what are things that we should be preparing for, both in terms of, like, folks who are in the community and also just even from the perspective of, like, a small media outlet, you know, somewhat similarly situated to yours, without the food expertise. But what would you recommend or what. What kind of advice would you give us?

[Memo Torres]

Look, I would recommend everybody be ready to document. First and foremost, document. Be out there with your phones, keep your distance, don't interfere, but document. Document and share. This is important. It might. It might not help now, but it'll help later. And at least it kind of lets people know as to what tactics they're doing. Right? Like in Los Angeles, we've seen a little bit of change of tactics. Like they'll go out in construction uniforms or a little dress like their day laborers, go to a Home Depot parking lot and just kind of wait until there's enough, you know, day labor show up, and then they'll call it in and they'll come and raid the place. We see things like that, right?

[Sam Seder]

Oh, so they're basically using, like, honey pots. Guy shows up in a pickup, looks like he's got a job site, waits for a half A dozen or a dozen guys to come over and start saying like, okay, I need, you know, three guys to do framing. I need.

[Memo Torres]

And I don't know if they're actually going in, like calling. You just kind of like go and hang out there, you know what I'm saying? They're not really approaching them, but they're starting to send out spotters, that's for sure. We're seeing reports of ICE agents going out and just kind of spotting, taking pictures and reporting. And then moments after that, you'll see like a wave of trucks come in. You. I recommend people also mask up. Honestly, they're starting to use facial recognition anytime observers come out. So, like in Los Angeles, there's a, there's a good rapid response network. There's like 1200 people in a rapid response network. It's really complicated. It's really well organized. So when people call these numbers, it goes through the channels and then they get the look. The closest local people to go out to like a Home Depot. Hey, ISO spotted here. Go verify. So what they're starting to do, they're starting to go after these observers, you know, and they're starting to take pictures of them. They're using facial recognition on their phone. The ICE agents are doing this. So be careful with your identities because they were starting to see moments of retaliation here and there. Yesterday in Van Nice, they took four people accuse them of trying to sabotage their tires with, with some nails. So be careful with that. I say protect your identities, protect your faces if you're going to be doing that. It's, it's, it's a form of warfare, honestly, is what we're seeing. So protect yourselves, document everything, have numbers ready, have numbers of somebody to call, whether it be a lawyer or a family member. Because if you're there in a situation, you could be taken. They do take citizens and then release them later, you know, especially citizens that are in the area. And, you know, they start documenting or want to speak up for somebody. So, you know, if you're a US citizen, don't think you're safe, especially if you're brown. There are racially profiling.

[Sam Seder]

All right, well, folks can go to la taco.com to find memos, Daily memo and other stories about what's happening in la. And you guys also have, do you have like a, like a, an apparatus to report sightings or anything like that?

[Memo Torres]

Yeah, we have our, our hotline is an email. [e-mail] it's really simple.

[Sam Seder]

[e-mail] Memo sorry. Appreciate the work you're doing and thanks for taking the time to walk us through this stuff. Love to check back in with you sometime in the future, see how you guys are doing. And any support folks can find a subscribe and a donate link there as well.

[Memo Torres]

Yes. Appreciate it. Thank you for bringing attention to this and having me on. Appreciate the show.

[Emma Vigland]

Of course. Thanks, Manuel.

[Sam Seder]

All right, folks, we're going to take a quick break, head into the so called fun half of the program. So I know, I know it has, it's, it's always in quotes these days. Head over to lataco.com give those folks some support. And also, I would imagine also going to be helpful to write into whatever publication that you watch or read on a regular basis and say cover this stuff. I think both as a matter of like, broadly the politics of this, but also in terms of helping people. The more coverage this gets, the better. There was that old saying with that paper, democracy dies in the darkness. They don't do that anymore over at the Washington Post, but, well, they're doing.

[Emma Vigland]

Better than the New York Times at least.

[Sam Seder]

Oh, my God, they did.

[Emma Vigland]

I mean, I got. Yeah. The Washington. Well, not to step on your, your very good joke, but at least the Washington Post, like the New York Times has made itself into such an embarrassment that the Washington Post looks so much better by comparison.

[Sam Seder]

I know it, it's, it's a race to the bottom.

[Emma Vigland]

Yep.

[Sam Seder]

Also, don't forget, just coffee, dot co op, fair trade coffee, hot chocolate. Use the coupon code. Majority get 10% off. It's a co op. They support their, their farmers in Chiapas and in Africa in a way that most roasters do not. So check them out. Just coffee, co op. Check that out. Also left reckoning, I think. Okay. Yeah, it was Matt on there. I know that. I've read that Griscom has been doing very good coverage of the. What was that? It rings a bell every time you look for Matt. Oh, okay. I've heard very good things about the coverage that Grissom's been doing about the stuff in Texas. Check that out. Matt free. Whoa. Actual vacation for Matt. Somebody's really playing video games over time.

[Emma Vigland]

I mean, he's been, he's been enjoying. I think he's been home. Right. Not to give out his assassination coordinates, but he's been shown tweeting some nice photos of nature. But he still tweets. He's still getting his blood pressure up and going after folks on Twitter, which.

[Sam Seder]

I can relate to in between probably listening to yeah. Listening to a book while playing some video game.

[Emma Vigland]

A book at four times speed. A book at four times speed to, like, a level. Sometimes his phone will accidentally play and you'll hear how fast it is. And it's like I woke up from a nightmare and it's still like, I still remember it. I'm like, oh, my God. Sounds like a horror movie.

[Sam Seder]

Yeah. Alvin and the Chipmunks for him. Yep. He's got to speed it up. See you in the fun half. Three months from now, six months from now, nine months from now. And I don't think it's going to be the same as it looks like in six months from now. And I don't know if it's necessarily going to be better six months from now than it is three months from now, but I think around 18 months out, we're going to look back and go like, wow. What? What is that going on? It's nuts. Wait a second. Hold on. Hold on for a second. Emma. Welcome to the program. Hat. What is up, everyone? Fun hat. No.

[Memo Torres]

M. You did it.

[Sam Seder]

Fun hack.

[Emma Vigland]

Let's go, Brandon.

[Brian]

Let's go, Brandon.

[Sam Seder]

Fun hack. Bradley, you want to say hello? Sorry to disappoint everyone. I'm just a random guy. It's all the boys today.

[Emma Vigland]

Fundamentally false.

[Brandon Roberts]

No.

[Emma Vigland]

I'm sorry.

[Memo Torres]

Women.

[Sam Seder]

Stop talking for a second. Let me finish.

[Memo Torres]

Where is this coming from?

[Brian]

Dude?

[Sam Seder]

But. Dude, you want to smoke this C. Yes.

[Memo Torres]

Hi.

[Sam Seder]

Me? Yes. Is this me?

[Memo Torres]

Is it me?

[Sam Seder]

It is you? Is this me? Hello? Is this me? I think it is you. Who is you? No sound. Every single freaking day. What's on your mind? We can discuss free markets and we can discuss capitalism. I'm gonna go throw it. Libertarians. They're so stupid. Though common sense says of course.

[Emma Vigland]

Gobbledygook.

[Sam Seder]

We nailed him.

[Emma Vigland]

So what's 79 plus 21?

[Sam Seder]

Challenge.

[Brian]

Man, I'm positively quivering.

[Sam Seder]

I believe 96. I want to say. 8, 5, 7, 2, 1, 0, 35, 500. 1, 1 half. 3, 8, 9, 11. For instance.

[Emma Vigland]

$3,400. $1900. 5, 4.

[Sam Seder]

$3 trillion. Sold. It's a zero sum game. Actually.

[Emma Vigland]

You're making me think less.

[Sam Seder]

But let me say this.

[Brian]

You call it satire, Sam goes to.

[Brandon Roberts]

Satire on top of it all. My favorite part about you is just.

[Brian]

Like every day, all day, like, everything you do, Without a doubt.

[Sam Seder]

Hey, buddy, we see you. All right, folks, folks, folks.

[Emma Vigland]

It's just the week being weeded out. Obviously.

[Sam Seder]

Yeah. Sun's out, guns out. I, I, I don't know, but you should know, people just don't like to entertain ideas anymore. I have a question. Who cares? Our chat is enabled, folks. I love it.

[Emma Vigland]

I do love that.

[Sam Seder]

Gotta jump. Gotta be quick. I gotta jump.

[Memo Torres]

I'm losing it, bro.

[Sam Seder]

Two o', clock, we're already late and the guy's being a dick. So screw him. Sent to a gulag.

[Emma Vigland]

Outrageous.

[Sam Seder]

Like, what is wrong with you? Love you.

[Memo Torres]

Bye.

[Sam Seder]

Love you.

[Memo Torres]

Bye.

[Sam Seder]

Bye.