3606 - Trump Punts Hormuz; Republican National Purity Dream w/ David Bier

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Majority Report with Sam Seder — Episode 3606 Trump Punts Hormuz; Republican National Purity Dream w/ David Bier Air Date: March 23, 2026

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Episode Overview

In today’s episode, host Sam Seder explores the increasingly extreme and racialized direction of Republican immigration policy, the Trump administration's latest saber-rattling over Iran and the Strait of Hormuz, and the broader context of U.S. politics in the spring of 2026. The highlight is an in-depth interview with David Bier (Director of Immigration Studies, Cato Institute), examining the historical transformation of Republican attitudes toward immigration and critiquing the party's current, nativist emphasis on “national purity.” The episode is characterized by irreverent analysis, historical context, and candid conversation about race, policy, and the real-world effects of deportation rhetoric.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Trump’s Deadline Extension on the Strait of Hormuz

• [03:50–16:50]
  • Trump had demanded Iran open the Strait of Hormuz within 48 hours, threatening to “obliterate” Iranian power infrastructure (all-caps threats via social media).
  • Shortly before his deadline, Trump announced a five-day extension, claiming “very good and productive conversations” with Iran. Iran publicly denied such talks had taken place.
    • Sam’s analysis: Suggests Trump’s threats and false claims are more posturing than real policy—“If Trump can pretend ignorance as to what’s going on and decide like, we won and then go home, that’s what I hope happens.” ([11:43])
    • Associated market volatility noted; the stock market surged 900 points in response to perceived de-escalation.
    • Notable Quote:

      “It’s always nice to have [200 billion dollars]. It’s a very inflamed world.” —Donald Trump ([15:31])

    • Sam draws analogies to childish reminders and relationship games, mocking the performative nature of Trump’s foreign policy.
    • The “peace through strength, to put it mildly” all-caps post is lampooned for its irony and absurdity ([05:00]).

2. The Evolution of Republican Immigration Policy — Interview with David Bier

• [24:44–69:34]
  • Historical Context ([27:40–33:58]):
    • Reagan-era amnesty and bipartisan immigration reform efforts recalled.
    • GOP shift: From the George W. Bush and early 2010s efforts (e.g., Marco Rubio’s role, bipartisan Senate bills) to the post-Trump, Miller-driven nativist stance.
    • Bier: Reasonable immigration reform was bipartisan and mainstream until recently; now, “Republicans cannot be pro-immigration and be Republicans.”
  • Escalation to Ethnic Cleansing Rhetoric ([25:43–38:20]):
    • Department of Homeland Security tweet and public talk of deporting “100 million” people—Bier and Seder agree this amounts to ethnic cleansing logic, involving U.S. citizens and massive population purges:

      “Once you take away the birth certificate... it opens up a whole new class of people… they’re not immigrants… they’re being renditioned or expelled… I talk about a population purge.” —David Bier ([34:48])

    • Seder: This is about race—“a national purity that they want to push.” ([36:13]).
    • Bier: “DHS has been putting out this type of content... in very overtly white supremacist terms. There’s no other way to describe it.” ([38:20])
  • “Kavanaugh Stops” and Racial Profiling ([40:30–44:21]):
    • Explains Stop-and-Check policies defending ICE’s use of demographic profiling for stops — legalized by the Supreme Court with Kavanaugh’s support.
    • “All the conservatives on the court voted the same way. To allow this to continue.” ([40:46])
    • Expansion: Now training state and local police (especially in FL and TX) to conduct ICE-style racial profiling.
  • Resistance and Retrenchment ([44:21–49:05]):
    • “Minnesota pushback” described as historic nonviolent resistance to ICE and Border Patrol overreach; officials (like Kristi Noem) made to take the fall, but core strategy remains, just more diffuse and under the radar.
    • Social media throttling is reducing public awareness of these events.

      “There needs to be a new clearinghouse for these types of things because on social media... they seem to be really, really buried.” —Sam Seder ([48:21])

    • Targeting of immigrants now shifts based on trending topics in right-wing media.
  • Optimal Immigration Policy ([51:11–56:22]):
    • Bier: The U.S. needs an orderly, legal process for immigration, not the current ad-hoc, restrictive system.
    • “Anyone can come up with a better immigration system than the one we had... in the last hundred years.”
    • Legal immigration is highly restricted (“only 3% of applicants got permanent resident status in 2024”).
  • Barriers to Reform: Racism and Exploitation Interests ([56:22–62:44]):
    • Seder identifies two main obstacles:
      1. Racism/fear (“they didn’t know we’d deport someone they liked”)
      2. Corporate desire for exploitable, undocumented labor.
    • “There’s a group... who would rather have these kids working in factories... than create a visa process for adults.” —Bier ([60:21])
  • Biden’s Immigration Record ([62:44–67:59]):
    • Criticism that Biden maintained many Trump-era border restrictions early on.
    • When legal processes were created, illegal crossings dropped dramatically. But Republicans opposed these moves as “amnesty.”
    • “All those problems were caused by the anti-immigration policies... not by the people who wanted a legal process.”
    • Under Trump’s renewed crackdown, more people have lost legal status than have been deported—“creating a new chaos, a new problem.”
  • Concluding Thoughts on Policy and White Nationalism ([67:59–74:41]):
    • Problem isn’t about process, but “they just don’t want these people... and once you say that, you’ve closed off the conversation.”
    • Seder: “Ultimately, if we’re going to get some kind of rational immigration policy... rational self-interest as a nation lines up pretty well with a humane policy.” ([72:40])
    • Libertarians like Bier are now ironically closer to the humane policy position than either major party, partly because of political realignment.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Trump’s Iran posturing:

  “If Trump can pretend ignorance as to what’s going on and decide like, we won and then go home, that’s what I hope happens.”
  —Sam Seder ([11:43])

• On the $200 billion war request:

  “It’s always nice to have. It’s a very inflamed world.”
  —Donald Trump ([15:31])

• On the “100 million deportations” agenda:

  “They're going to know who the third Worlders are within the country. And it's not going to be based on citizenship, obviously. It's going to be based on other factors. Your ancestry, your ethnicity... DHS has been putting out this type of content throughout this administration, talking about how we need to reclaim our country in very overtly white supremacist terms.”
  —David Bier ([38:20])

• On racial profiling (“Kavanaugh stops”):

  “The training is really untraining. Right. Because they're trained not to do this stuff... This is like training cops to be trigger happy, essentially, in terms of their investigation.”
  —Sam Seder ([44:03])

• On partisan barriers to reform:

  “Anything that the Democrats are for, we need to be against. And that polarization plays out in every field, not just immigration. So I do think that’s a big part of it.”
  —David Bier ([59:45])

• On Biden’s record:

  “All those problems were caused by the anti-immigration policies by Congress, by the Biden administration, everything that led to so many asylum seekers not being able to work... not by the people who wanted to have a policy that promotes integration and promotes economic vitality...”
  —David Bier ([64:24])

• On the rational, humane approach:

  “Rational self-interest as a nation lines up pretty well with a humane policy.”
  —Sam Seder ([72:40])

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Important Timestamps for Segments

• [00:00–03:50]: Introduction, news rundown (Trump/Iran, Schumer, Israel/Palestine, TSA/ICE, UN weather, Supreme Court mail-in ballot case, etc.)
• [03:50–16:50]: Trump’s Hormuz deadline, Twitter statements, reactions, and market impact
• [24:44–69:34]: Feature Interview with David Bier (begins with historical GOP immigration stance, then current crisis)
  • [25:43–38:20]: Ethnic cleansing, “100 million deportations” rhetoric, and racial targeting
  • [40:30–44:21]: “Kavanaugh stops” and legalized racial profiling
  • [44:21–49:05]: ICE/Border Patrol diffusion, public resistance, and media suppression
  • [51:11–56:22]: Optimal immigration policy and achievable reforms
  • [62:44–67:59]: Biden’s record, legal/illegal immigration, and the shift under Trump
• [69:34–74:41]: Post-interview analysis, reflections on Cato/libertarian alignment
• [71:33–73:35]: Structural incentives for racism and exploitation, policy irrationality
• [73:35–77:18]: Final banter, media plugs

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Overall Tone & Style

The discussion is sharp, witty, and irreverent yet grounded in a deep knowledge of political history and policy details. Sam Seder’s skeptical humor and Bier’s matter-of-fact libertarianism create an engaging, accessible exploration of subjects that might otherwise be technical or dry. The episode doesn’t pull any punches regarding the racial and political implications of current immigration strategy, but remains focused on real-world outcomes and actionable policy.

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Summary for Listeners Who Missed the Episode

This episode provides a wide-lens view of how U.S. immigration policy has become a proxy for white nationalist politics in the GOP, underlines the manufactured chaos and brutality of mass-deportation fantasies, and offers a reality check on how reforms and rational policies would benefit the country. The Trump administration’s Iran posturing and use of war rhetoric is lampooned as both dangerous and unserious. David Bier offers insider context on Republican Party change and how bipartisan immigration reform was possible until very recently. The conversation ends on a surprising note: in a rapidly radicalized political context, even mainstream libertarian policy experts are now among the most humane voices on immigration in D.C.

Transcript

[A]

You are listening to a free version of Majority Report with Sam Steater. To support this show and get another 15 minutes of daily program, go to Majority FM, please. The Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Monday, March 23rd, 2026. My name is Sam Seder. This is the first 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, David J. Beer, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, Chair of the Sells Foundation, Chair in Immigration Policy. Also on the program today, Trump extends his deadline about the Strait of Hormuz by five or so days. Meanwhile, Chuck Schumer slams the potential $200 billion supplemental request h as Trump pretends to have successful talks with Iran. Israel bombs more Iranian infrastructure. Israelis go hog wild on the West bank, killing nine Palestinians, injuring 30. Also on the program today, Republicans block TSA funding. Trump announces he's sending ICE to work at our airports. UN weather agency confirms that 2015-25 was the hottest decade on record. Supreme Court hears a case on grace periods for mail in ballots over the weekend. Save act amendment targeting trans people fails new drop site report. Cuba willing to offer lump sum settlement to Americans who lost property in the 1959 revolution. Robert Mueller dies. Is that Talarico? Internal polling has him with small lead over both Cornyn and Paxton in a Texas Senate race. And it's day eight, 3,800 meat processing workers on strike in Colorado. All this and more on today's Majority Report. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks so much for joining us on Monday. Emma Vegland out today on a California barnstorm trip. She just was on Francesca Fiorentini's Habituation Room, which I think you, you can sign up as a patreon and, and actually view that live show. And then it just occurs to me, what, what you doing for the rest of the week out there? Higher Learning with Van Latham. Oh, okay. I mean, you could do that via Zoom, right? I mean. Or no. Okay, that's all right. Whatever. It just occurred to me, like, wait a second, you know. Well, all right, so she'll be back Thursday. She'll be back Thursday. But you can see her on a bunch of other shows, apparently. So that's, that's good stuff.

[B]

We'll just do this one.

[A]

Yeah. All right. We'll just, we're back here. We'll hold down the fort, as it were, a couple of house cleaning, uh, things. One in five days. That's Saturday, March 28th. There's another no Kings protest. So Google that. We'll have more information as the week goes on. On that no Kings protest. But important to get out there. Obviously, one of the things our mad king has done was to declare war or not declare war. Just go in, go on an excursion, a little excursion that involved killing thousands of people and allowing Israel to sort of basically blow up Israel and the United States, for that matter, poison potentially millions in the years to come. And that's if it ends tomorrow. Which, you know, if Trump, I think, had his way, he'd wrap this thing up if he knew how to. Also want to say a belated. Eid Mubarak meant to say it on Friday and just forgot. It was like, I remember three different occasions during the show. I'm like, oh, I gotta say it. But Eid Mubarak, for those who celebrate. All right, I think that's it for all the. All the house cleaning stuff that we had to do. Let's get into what has taken place over the past. And I will say also, I don't know that this drives when Trump does this stuff, but there is no doubt, you know, people who follow this stuff are seeing all sorts of, like, bets on the exchanges, futures in the stock market, because the saw. I think the stock market went up 900 points this morning in part because Trump on Saturday tweeted. Or truth this, I think the White House ended up tweeting it afterwards. Whatever. They issued a statement or one that we're not supposed to. I don't know, I can't keep up with. Are we supposed to treat this seriously or just ironically or just like the subtext? Whatever he wrote, if Iran doesn't fully open without threat, it's all capitalized. The Strait of Hormuz. Within 48 hours, that's capitalized. From this exact point in time, the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various power plants in caps. Starting. That's in caps, too, with the biggest one. First exclamation point. You probably didn't have time to look that up. So he just wrote the biggest one. Thank you for your attention to this matter. President Donald J. Trump, Pretty serious threat. That was Saturday morning. In fact, we were very close. I think it would be around now, actually would be the end of that 48 hours. Shortly after that, later that day. Right. Was it Sunday? Sunday he wrote peace through strength, to put it mildly. Mildly. And that, of course, is in caps as well. All of it's in caps, to put it mildly. So anyone. I wanted to say something mildly I put it in all caps. The question is, go back to this one, please put it back up. I just, you know, I don't want to get too, too pedantic. But which part is now when he says, to put it mildly, he's obviously being, you know, it's. He's trying to be ironic, right? Because he capitalized it. But which part was the mildly part? Just like a lot of peace through strength, or peace through a lot of strength, or maybe it's just a lot of peace through a lot of strength. I just, I don't know. I don't know. I don't even know what inspired him to do that. Was almost like, hey, guys, don't forget I threatened you yesterday. So don't forget my threat. It's been, I forgot about it. It's been 24 hours. So it was sort of designed for you to come back in an hour or two and go, okay, we're gonna open it up. So don't forget 24 hours. Just trying to remind you, this is honestly like where you have a situation where it's like, we may have plans on. We may have plans on on Friday night, but it's. It's unclear if one of us has locked in the plans and the other person wants to know what they are, but doesn't want to seem like they're hounding. So they send like, oh, here's a link I thought you might like to this story I saw in the New Yorker. Okay. And then here's another thing. It's like, hey, just want you to be thinking about. We're supposed to. We could do we doing this on Friday night or what? So there's a reason why they call it Taco, I guess, because this is what he announced this morning. I am pleased to report that the United States of America and the country of Iran have had over the last two days very good and productive conversations regarding a complete and total resolution of our hostilities in the Middle East. In the Middle East. Based on the tenor and tone of these in depth, detailed and constructive conversations, which, which. Which will continue throughout the week. Which is spelled W I T C H. Spooky. So perhaps, like, maybe we have new envoys, we're sending our best cauldrons, which will continue throughout the week, and then she'll come back for a week. And I have instructed the Department of War to postpone any and all military strikes against Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure for a five day period, subject to the successes of the ongoing meetings and discussions. Thank you for your attention to this matter. President Donald J. Trump. In a very strange move, the Iranians have totally denied that there have been any conversations. Now, maybe Iran. Is worried, maybe the Iranian leadership is worried that their domestic politics are such that people will perceive them as weak if they are engaged in any conversations with Donald Trump that hold off more bombings of power plants. Like, maybe they're afraid to admit that they have been involved in negotiations that have. Have at least kept their power plants from being bombed for five days. But that would be a weird incentive structure. You'd almost want to think, like, if you were the Iranian government, that, yep, we had those conversations and we bought ourselves another five days if that was true. But this is their signal to Trump, like, nice try, a hole.

[B]

We're waiting for the Marines.

[A]

Bring it, bring it. That's what Iran is basically saying, and Trump is pretending they're not. Which, you know, at the end of the day, is. Is a positive. I think if Trump can pretend ignorance as to what's going on and decide like, we won and then go home, that's what I hope happens. Here he is outside. This is this morning. Again, Iran has denied there has been any conversations with the geniuses Jared Kushner and Witkoff, whom a British envoy who was involved in negotiations the first time around seemed to think that Witkoff and Kushner had no concept of anything they were talking about and had basically been offered something that no American had ever been offered before. And they didn't realize it because they're just. They didn't bring an expert and they just were winging it. But here's Trump, and this is good news, too, I guess, just that Trump is willing to lie this bigly. You said there's many points of agreement with Iran right now. What can you give us, like, 15 points? 15 points? Well, they're not going to have a nuclear weapon. That's number one. That's number one. Two and three, they will never have a nuclear weapon. They've agreed to that. Okay, They've agreed to that. About. I don't know, depending on where. I mean, the. If you take the Iranian word for it, they. As early as, like, 2001, we're saying we're not going to build a nuclear weapon. We don't believe in killing civilians in that manner. If you take the word from the JPC, JP CoA, that they had signed in 2012, 14 with Obama, they were no longer enriching uranium in the numbers that could be built into a bomb. Understand, they want. They want the ability to create nuclear power plants. And if you believe the foreign minister from Oman, they had offered to also not stockpile any enriched uranium, just maintain it for nuclear power use. So this is like one of those things like where, you know, the doctor says, you ask the doctor after my hand surgery, will I be able to play the violin? And the doctor says, I don't see why not. And it's like, good, because I could never before. But Here is Trump. 15, 15 points of agreement. Three of them are the same thing up front. The other 12, I'll get back to you. They're small bore stuff. And people are asking like, well, if everything's been resolved, if we agree on 15 points, we're spending billions a day killing Iranians either now or sort of like causing them death and illness in the future. Why are you asking for more money for the war?

[C]

Mr. President, do you still need $200 billion? We.

[A]

It's always nice to have. It's always nice to have. It's a very inflamed world. And. The world is inflamed. Can I recommend beef tallow?

[B]

What's going on with this global inflammation?

[A]

To deal with the inflammation. It's because of rod turmeric. So that's where we are. I mean, incidentally, gas prices are, you know, I don't know, $6 a gallon. But according to. Where is J.D. vance? Is he still in the country or did he. Is how deeply like is he. Is he buried in some type of nuclear silo? We've got to protect JD So no, no public appearances, nothing. I think his chief policy person just quit though, on, on, on the Middle East. I'm pretty sure his person just left.

[B]

J.D. you got to get in the submarine.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. We need to protect you. So don't say anything about anything. He's underground at norad. Remember when Witkoff and Jared Kushner were on talking about things. This is like completely like a vase broke in the living room. And then all of a sudden, like the kids have decided to finally go outside and basketball for like seven hours. Where did everybody go, incidentally? The OPEC oil embargo that implicated like the next decade of economics. You know how long that was in 1973? I remember it as a kid. I remember getting in line like we had to be in wait in line for to get gas. Did it go to Jimmy Carter? Did it go that long? The embargo itself was in 1973 and it was five months long. Oh, right. Happy Monday, everybody. A couple words from our sponsor, then we'll be talking to David J. Beer, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute and Chair of the Sells foundation on Immigration Policy. 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You can take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your delete me plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com Majority use the promo code Majority at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to join DeleteMe.com Majority Enter the code Majority at checkout. That's JoinMeMeMe.com Majority Enter the code Majority will put that information in the podcast and YouTube description. Also sponsoring the program today, Cozy Earth. I gotta tell you, there are so many things that I now have that are Cozy Earth. It's getting crazy. I got great Cozy Earth socks. I showed them to Brian the other day. And the thing is you don't really think about socks that much unless they're really like, I don't know, but I was showing off my socks to Brian just sort of like these are cool socks. They look good, they feel good. I'm totally into the mid quarter sock build, but they're Cozy Earth has a bunch of stuff. I bought my girlfriend a Cozy Earth, what do you call it? Bathrobe. And it's tremendous. Incredibly soft, warm but not too warm. I mean it's great, not heavy. That's what I like about all the Cozy Earth stuff too. They've got comforters that I have, the sheets are fantastic. The stuff is all breathable because it's made from viscose which is derived from bamboo and it's incredibly soft. I don't know how that happens, but it does. I've got a great hoodie from Cozy Earth that I love. It's my go to every weekend and then sometimes during the week I get wear a hoodie. But the socks are also amazing. Those are really doing it for me these days. Their comforters are crafted with intention to support deeper rest. Designed with naturally breathable temperature regulating materials, these luxuriously soft comforters help your body settle and cool. Oh, that's what I love about them. Cozy Earth purchases are risk free with 100 night sleep trial. You try them out. If you don't love them, return them. Hassle free 10 year warranty. Because once you feel this level of comfort, you'll want it to last a decade. Thanks to Cozy Earth for sponsoring this episode. Discover how care in every detail transforms simple routines into moments of true comfort and ease. Head to cozyearth.com use the code majority report one word for up to 20% off. That's code majority report for up to 20% off. And if you get a post purchase survey, be sure to mention you heard about Cozy Earth right here. Experience the craft behind the comfort. Make every day feel intentional. Quick break. When we come back, David Beer, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, Chair of the Sells foundation on immigration. Be right back after this. It. We are back. Sam Cedar on the Majority Report. Emma Vigland out today. It is a pleasure to welcome to the program David J. Abeer. He is the director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute and chair of the Sells foundation on immigration policy. David, welcome to the program. I actually think that you might be the first guest from Cato that I have had on my program in doing this for 21 years now.

[C]

What an honor.

[A]

So there you go.

[C]

Thanks for having me on. I'm glad I was the one to break through.

[A]

There you go. Let's. I want to just start with this clip here, because in many respects, this exchange tracks sort of like where there's been a divergence on some level from where Cato was or is really. Cato has been really more or less in the same place, as far as I can tell, over the past 30 years of. Of immigration on immigration policy. And the Republican Party is sort of like. It was. It was never necessarily running in parallel, but it's sort of like really veered off into some. But here is an exchange with you and Senator Kennedy. We played this clip the other day. I guess this happened about two weeks ago, but it's. It's impressive in many different ways. Bullets play this clip dead.

[C]

Quote.

[A]

They referring to. Republicans think they control their way into us accepting ethnic cleansing. End quote. Your. Your words, not mine.

[C]

Did I read that correctly? That was in regard to a. Did I read that about advocating 100 million deportations? That is what DHS own account. 100 million deportations would be ethnic cleansing. You would be one third of the country. So, yes, there are people within the Department of Homeland. Homeland Security.

[A]

You don't think this is hyperbolic? Give me 30 more seconds.

[C]

I think advocating 100 million.

[A]

I'm having fun.

[C]

Ethnic cleansing.

[A]

Okay. So, I mean, he was trying to. I almost felt bad for him because he was trying to read off tweets that were somehow, as he said, hyperbolic or, you know, inappropriate. And it was almost that he hadn't looked at the sheet of paper they had given him before. He was just sort of fishing around, and he stumbled on this. This is the thing that the Homeland Security posted on their Twitter feed, America after 100 million deportations. I mean, it's. It's pretty shocking. But with that as a jumping off point, like, let's go back and talk about when that divergence happened. I want to talk just a little bit of history of. Of immigration policy in this country in sort of like the modern era, if you will. When did that break? You know, when did that break really start to happen? I mean, we had. Reagan provided amnesty for about 3 million plus, I think of undocumented immigrants. What happens after that?

[C]

Yeah, look, from our perspective at the Cato Institute, you know, my predecessors in my position were called to testify by Republican members of Congress, you know, throughout the 1980s, 1990s, on behalf of Bush administration and Reagan administration proposals to reform the legal immigration system, expand legal immigration, legalize people who are in the country illegally, expand the high skilled immigration system. One of my immediate predecessors in the early 2000s at Cato was an INS administrator under the Bush administration, the George W. Bush administration. And so the idea that there was this huge, you know, you know, libertarians were not accepted as real, you know, part of the coalition or, you know, people who couldn't have good ideas on immigration, I mean, this is, couldn't be further from the truth and from my perspective. I mean, I worked for a Republican member of Congress in 2013, 2014 and 2015. And during that period of time, he was openly working on bipartisan immigration reform. He's a Republican member, Raul Labrador from Idaho, Republican member of Congress, deep red state, totally permissible, you know, for him. He got reelected. So the idea that, the idea, really, what we've arrived at now is that Republicans cannot be pro immigration and be Republicans. They can't have a platform of realistic immigration reform that benefits the United States, that grows our economy, that protects the rights of Americans. I mean, these were mainstream positions within the Republican Party not that long ago. Maybe. It's always been, you know, hit 50, 50. There's always been this coalition that's hard, right, or against anything that would smack of amnesty or anything that would be pro immigration. But that idea that, you know, you can't have those people in your party is a new thing that's been created just in the last few years, really by the Trump administration, Stephen Miller in particular. And so I've seen both sides of it. I've been on the inside. You know, we were able to collaborate and talk about immigration reform. We didn't get it done. That was a failure. Maybe I had something to do with that. But at the end of the day, it was totally within our ability to be out there talking about reasonable immigration reform as Republicans.

[A]

I mean, I remember there was a big push by George W. In 2000, say it was either 4 or 5. The actual year escapes me at the moment. And part of that was because he and Karl Rove had this sense, and certainly there was a big sense across sort of like a, in the academic worlds that demographics were destiny. It was Judas and Texera, I think, that wrote that book about. There's a certain inevitability. The Democrats are going to control everything because of the nature of, of, of immigration. And the way that the United States is changing in terms of like,

[C]

you

[A]

know, basically, I don't know, just demographically speaking, that didn't really actually happen. But there was a push by the bush administration in oh five, I think it was 05

[B]

to,

[A]

to, to have some type of comprehensive immigration reform. And if I remember correctly, it was like Mark Levin and Laura Ingraham and then a series of other right wing talk show hosts across the country. They had major marches, major, major. They mobilized a lot of Republican voters to come out against that. You know, it failed. Then the next attempt was led by Marco Rubio. I specifically remember getting into a fight with another guy, like a guy I knew from college about Marco Rubio. I'm like, dude, he's not, he's not for real. And he's like, well this is going to be amazing. And Rubio dropped it like a hot potato on point. I mean he like literally put his hand, it looked like he put his hand on a stove. And I think that was probably the one that you're talking about in 2013, right? Wasn't Rubio like one of the guys who just completely walked away from it?

[C]

Yeah, yeah. I mean he, he actually voted for the bill. So he did actually get it through the Senate and with a super majority. It was a bipartisan bill. A lot of Republicans did vote for that legislation. A sign really of how different times have changed. You know, I would say, you know, we are skipping over some history here. There was a 2007 effort where Democrats controlled and Bush administration was in favor of it. And really I think that the Democrats had a role to play in bringing that bill to about its downfall. But at the end of the day, I think when we're looking at it, it's really the Republican Party's problem at this point. The fact that there's just no support for any kind of reasonable immigration reform on the Republican side is the real problem. We have to get back to a point where bipartisan reform is at least possible. It's the only way it's going to get through the Senate. And unfortunately, as long as Trump is in the White House able to torpedo anything and Stephen Miller has such a big control over the Republican Party, we're not going to get any kind of reasonable compromise. Border security, securing the border, stopping illegal immigration, but also having pathways to legal status and legal immigration reform. I mean that was the planks of comprehensive reform for decades. And it's really the only way to fix the problem going forward.

[A]

I want to get into sort of like where the Republican Party is now, because I think you were onto it when you were calling out the, the desire to, to deport 100 million people. I mean, the categories of people that have to be deported for 100 million people to go are pretty, pretty expensive.

[C]

50 million immigrants in the United States. There's only, you know, 14, 15 million.

[A]

But, you know, I don't know, like, you could you. I mean, I think, like, their ability to get creative on those things. Like, you know, like, they could. The senator you work for was from Puerto Rico. I mean, they could. They could say, like, listen, Puerto Rico is not a state and it's territory. You got to stay there. I mean, like, who knows?

[C]

I mean, look, obviously you're talking about deporting U.S. citizens at that point. U.S. born citizens, they're already on that track. I mean, getting rid of births, birthright citizenship is the first step to that goal of 100 million deportations. Because once you take away the birth certificate as your defense against a deportation, then it opens up a whole new class of people, because in order to prove your citizenship at that point, you have to prove the citizenship and legal status of your parents. And that really is the gateway into deporting a lot more people who were born here who had. They're not immigrants. They're not being deported. They're being renditioned or expelled. I mean, what other words you want to talk about? I talk about a population purge. This is what the agenda is. And so many people are in denial. Despite the Department of Homeland Security putting it out there. They're talking about it openly. This is the goal. 100 million deportations. Deporting US born Americans is on the table already. They're going to the Supreme Court. Once that birth certificate is. Is no longer a defense, then, yeah, millions and millions, tens of millions of people who are born here could be deported just from that. And then you're, you're really.

[A]

Let me just be explicit about this. So there's two. There's two elements to this. One is like, like you say, once the birth certificate, your own birth certificate itself doesn't. That you're naturalized or that it does not provide defense. It just becomes that much harder to generate the evidence you need if you've been singled out. I mean, we've seen this in. In operation, right? We've seen people, we've seen US Citizens get scooped up in this. They didn't have the ability to prove in the moment, and they get deported. We've seen many, many people who are legal here. They're not Citizens, but they are here legally through get deported, get held for months on end. We've seen all that happen. And so the idea is that, like, if there's less ability to prove that you are allowed to be here, you are gone. Because there's no sort of, like, there's nobody. There's nobody providing any accountability for who gets lifted up. There's no adjudication of it. But the other thing we should be explicit about, I think it's important, is for the most part, this is about a. It's not going to be a random 100 million people. It is going to be people who are not white in some fashion. And that may mean they're indigenous to this country. It may mean that they're black or brown. Surely some people will, you know, maybe they have an accent. So, you know, there'll be some white people like, oh, you have an accent, you're gone. But for the most part, that's what's going to be targeted. It's not going to be folks like you or I, at least not on immigration, not on that grounds. It could be other grounds, but that we. This is a racial, A semi. Like in the same way that, like, I don't know if Aryans were racist. You know, we're necessarily a race, but it's a similar dynamic. It's about a national purity that they want to push.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, the preface to the tweet about 100 million deportations is something about being besieged by the third world. And so, yeah, they're quite explicit. It's not going to be a random 100 million. They're going to know who the third Worlders are within the country. And it's not going to be based on citizenship, obviously. It's going to be based on other factors. Your ancestry, your ethnicity. And, you know, that's, you know, this is not really even debatable. I mean, this is not just one tweet either. I mean, this. This pattern of putting out. This is the most explicit in terms of numerical numbers and targeting. But DHS has been putting out this type of content throughout this administration, talking about how we need to reclaim our country in very overtly white supremacist terms. I mean, there's no other way to describe it. I mean, they're quoting from white supremacist anthems and music and. And other material constantly. And this is just the one tweet where they just openly say it. We want 100 million people out of this country. And we're, you know, that's our marching Orders. And under any other administration, any other administration, including the first Trump administration, the tweet would have been taken down within minutes. Whoever was held, whoever did it, would have been fired. This administration leaves it up. No apology, no even clarification. There's no investigation as to who's responsible, because everyone knows that this is what they're doing, that this is. It's not an aberration. They racially profile openly. They talk about it, they defend it to the Supreme Court. And, you know, it riles up the left. It makes libertarians mad. And that's good from their perspective because they really don't care about anything else.

[A]

Where are we on Kavanaugh stops? Were you just like, we hear that term a lot. Will you just explain to folks what that means? Because we talk about, like, profiling, and it wasn't that long ago we thought racial profiling was bad.

[C]

Yeah, yeah. So this phenomenon came out of a court case in Los Angeles where the administration, Department of Homeland Security, was profiling people on the street using their demographics. And it wasn't just race, it was also the type of job they were doing. So it's, you know, race plus being construction worker, being at a Home Depot while Hispanic, being in a Hispanic area while Hispanic. These were all things that were used to justify stopping people and demanding that they have their papers on them, pointing guns at them, threatening them, detaining them. If they couldn't prove that they were a citizen on the spot or didn't want to or ran away from them, they were tackled and detained. And so the injunction in that case, now the administration had argued, we're not doing this. There's no racial profiling here. Doesn't matter. You can issue an injunction to stop it. It won't make any difference to ICE operations in Los Angeles. The court issues an injunction and ICE arrests drop by 2/3 immediately after the injunction. So they were absolutely caught red handed doing racial profiling. So then they go to the appeals court and say, look, you can't issue an injunction stopping racial profiling. And more explicitly defending the idea that they can use this type of demographic profiling. The court again, says it's unconstitutional. So they appeal to the Supreme Court and they get an emergency order overturning the injunction. And that's where Kavanaugh, he was the only one. It's unfortunate for him because he was the only one with the courage to actually explicitly defend what DHS was doing and defend the court's decision, which was 6, 3. All the conservatives on the court voted the same way. To allow this to continue. And he said, you know, as long as it's a brief stop and it's not a big deal. And, you know, this is no different than a cop seeing someone casing a bank and deciding to, you know, check them out. This is the exact same as being Hispanic at Home Depot. And so they've allowed it to go on and continue. We saw it in Minneapolis and Chicago, and it spread throughout the United States. And now they're training state and local cops to do the same thing. So now all Florida and a lot of Texas cops are now being trained to be ICE agents and do the same racial profiling at the state and local level. So it's spreading throughout the United States. And, you know, they use all sorts of means to detain and stop drivers based on these facts. I mean, profiling that they use.

[A]

How hard is it to train somebody? Like if that. If that guy looks brown or black or if you hear accent that sounds different from Texas, well, go ask for their papers.

[C]

Well, the training is really untraining. Right. Because they're trained not to do this stuff. They're trained. Cause I need specific evidence related to the person that I am stopping. Be that that would withstand. That would stand up in court. This is like.

[A]

It's like trying. It's like training cops to be trigger happy, essentially, in terms of their investigation. Okay, so, all right, what. Has there been any change insofar as, like in the wake of Minnesota where Minnesotans really, I mean, just. I mean, I hope that it remains the case, but I think it's very likely that, like Minnesota, what they did was historical in terms of the way that they fought back and just like. And in the conditions in which they did it, I mean, all of it, all of it. It's not to say there's no more ICE there, but the level of aggression and oppression and just like the invasion of that many people into a space, it cost them politically. And Kristi Noem is out as, you know, part of that was the commercial, but I'm sure it was other. It was, it was, you know, broadly just like somebody needed to be the fall guy for Minnesota. And she's a woman, so it's obvious that it's going to be her. Where, like, where do you anticipate. Do you anticipate them ramping back up at different points? I mean, there's also almost like as a secondary issue is ICE as a, like a, like a, like a paramilitary organization and now they're getting tested out in TSA lines. I mean, but putting that aspect of it aside for a moment, do you anticipate them, like having a Minneapolis redux? Are they going to, how are they going to do this? Presumably they still want to make our nation pure and get 100 million people out. So where do they go from here, do you think?

[C]

Yeah. No, I mean, it's amazing how, you know, she's been the fall girl. Greg Bevino, who was the head of the Border Patrol operation, was the fall guy before her. And yet this is all a Stephen Miller operation. Donald Trump at the start of this thing put out one of his truth social rants where he says explicitly the strategy is we're going to go into Democrat cities and take them over and start demanding papers from people until we can deport all these people that we want to deport. So it was totally a Trump operation, a White House operation. Miller was telling Noem what to do. Bavino goes in there with his officers, guns blazing, telling them to ignore the Constitution. And yeah, the pushback was historic. It was really an unprecedented non violent resistance that we saw in Minnesota and it did force out border patrol largely back to the border, resulted in these staff changes. But at the basic level, they're not changing their strategy, they're just trying to keep it out of the public eye and more, make it more diffuse across the country. So now it's, you know, the ICE agents are being sprinkled across cities, so it's smaller scale, but it's happening everywhere. And that keeps it out of the public eye better than some of the other things. Now they haven't shot anyone since the firings, but there have been lots of cases documented of them pulling guns on people, doing a lot of the same tactics, interrogating people who are recording them, stopping people who are recording them. So a lot of the same things are still happening in Minnesota and across the country. You're just hearing about them less in large part because they're more isolated and diffused.

[A]

I would also argue that we're hearing about them less because the Ellison's took over TikTok and Musk, I think is throttling these things on Twitter. And the sad fact of our media, our media environment is that like that's where even the TV networks would get it. It's certainly where we would get it. And it almost feels like there needs to be a new clearinghouse for these type of things because on social media now they are. And I would say probably the things happening on Instagram, social media, they seem to be really, really buried.

[C]

Yeah, I mean I don't know. I don't know about that. It's certainly possible. And there's no doubt that a big part of the reason for the downfall of Tick Tock was because of the content on there. They were explicit about that. They didn't like that there was political content they disagreed with on spreading like fire on this platform, which is one of the main reasons why Cato filed a brief in those cases saying this is unconstitutional to target a platform because of the content on it. But, you know, ultimately, Supreme Court said no problem here, and the sale was forced. And of course, we already knew at that point where the sale would be going to and what political persuasion would end up owning that social media site. But, you know, just going back to the tactics here, I mean, there's so many different ways they can use ice. It is literally a private army. They're getting involved in airport security because that's what they think is going to sell at this moment. Then they'll go and storm into farms. They'll target Somalis because they're the most unpopular immigrants they can find. I mean, this is the strategy. The strategy is whatever ticks up on the conservative social media is how they're going to respond to it. And we've seen it throughout this administration. They target one nationality after another based on whatever is peaking on conservative media. It's the Haitians, it's the Somalis. Oh, we're going to go after the Afghans. It's whatever the hot button topic is on social media and conservative circles, they're going to go after. And unfortunately, that means a whole lot of harassment for a whole lot of innocent people, because this administration is not focused on public safety when it comes to immigration enforcement in the United States.

[A]

All right, let's talk just briefly before, you know, you go. The, the optimal immigration policy. I mean, there's obviously, like, particularly on the Democratic side, the Democrats have completely, it seems to me, and we can go over what Biden did and what things were good. What things, not so much. But. But as a political matter, like a rhetorical matter, like, Democrats have just completely run away from this issue.

[C]

They're.

[A]

They're so terrified of their own shadow here. Regardless of what the polling says at any given point, they are just terrified of engaging in this in a way that creates a vacuum and nature hates a vacuum, and something's going to fill it. And that's what's happened. And there's many issues that we could. We could say the same thing about Democrats in regards to this. But. But but, but speak, like, from your perspective, what's the optimal immigration policy? Like, what is like, what's the goal in terms of, do we have, like, is there a certain number of immigrants? I mean, I've seen your work on the economic impact of immigrants, and it is a net positive. I suppose, theoretically, there's a number of people that we could have in this country. I don't know if it's 500 billion, 600 billion, with the existing resources we have, where maybe it becomes. Starts becoming a net negative. But. But I don't know how many millions, tens of millions, we are away from that, and I don't know where we would find those people. But. So what is, like, what should be the goal, both stated in terms of dollars, but also in terms of, like, what set of policies would be optimal in an optimal non. The politics are not a question.

[C]

Yeah, no, look, at the end of the day, we want an orderly legal process by which people come to the United States. We had that historically, prior to the 1920s, when we banned most legal immigration based on this ludicrous, eugenicist idea that immigrants were going to lower the IQ of Americans and, and destroy our bloodlines. And a lot of the stuff that, honestly, Trump has brought back. I mean, he's talking about.

[A]

I was gonna say, fortunately, lowering the IQ of Americans seems to be almost, like, physically impossible at this point.

[C]

Well, look, I mean, when you think about what our policy should be, you start from a starting point of what are the supposed problems here? The problem is they're using welfare benefits or their net cost, or they commit crime. Or you go down the list and you say, well, we could have a policy whereby people come here, they get vetted, they're not eligible for benefits, they have to pay into the system. They have to find a place to live that's not in a hotel in New York City. We can solve these problems. We can come together and have a conversation. What does the immigration system look like? And anyone can come up with a better immigration system than the one we had in 2021-20 or any other time in the last hundred years, really. I've been at town halls, Republican town halls in red states where people are throwing hostile questions at the member of Congress that I worked for. And he comes back and he says, well, what's the immigration policy that you would want to see? And every single one of those people came back with an immigration policy that's far more humane, orderly, legal, and permissive, generous, however you want to describe it, than the actual system that we have today. So we don't know the exact number of immigrants. I mean, that's going to be something based on the needs of the country and what we want as Americans in terms of employment and resources and so on. But the basic premise should be that if people come and they support themselves and they're peaceful people, they're going to be a net contributor to our society. And so once you adopt that basic premise, then you can work out the particulars of how that looks like you get a visa abroad. What's the process? What's a reasonable amount of time to wait? All of those things are questions that we could answer and have reasonable conversations about. But right now, we spend all the time talking about just ludicrous nonsense and debating things that have nothing to do with the facts of our legal immigration system as it is today, which is that just 3% of all the people applying get through the legal immigration system. In 2024, under the open borders Biden administration, just 3% got permanent resident status of all the people applying and all the backlogs and all the waiting lists, all that stuff. So we have incredibly restrictive immigration system, and we need to fix that, create a viable path for people who want to come here, or we're going to be dealing with this illegal immigration problem for the next century.

[A]

So the. We have, like, these fictions that are created. I mean, it seems to me there's two impulses for wanting this to be an ongoing problem that we theoretically can't solve. Right where the answer should be, you know, if there is some, you know, I mean, frankly, I think, like, if you walk from Central America to. To Texas, I feel like you've passed the test. But whatever, some measure of, like, you're you. You want to be a citizen, you're here, you know, to. To better your life, et cetera, et cetera. And we give you an easy path to citizenship that, you know, requires, I don't know, like, you take a test and like, you get your driver's license, you're on a path to citizenship. It seems to me there's two sort of, like, things that are inhibiting this. Or maybe it's three, but one is just absolute, like, fear, ignorance, racism. Maybe I shouldn't push all of those things together, but that's, you know, it's in that basket. There's some people you're never going to reach. There's others who are like, well, I didn't know that we were going to deport the guy I'm friends with. I thought we were Going to deport just the other people. I don't, I'm not friends with. Which of course, you know, racism works that way too. The other is though, is that like there are industries and corporate players who want to exploit workers. Like everything we saw with child labor, it seems to me rollbacks on child labor was a function of almost one to one. If, if there's a state or a lawmaker who wants to make it easier for kids to work, it's in a like meat processing plant or some other area where they know some Hispanic kid's gonna come and they are no longer required to get a signature from their parent. So they can have a 15 year old or 16 year old immigrant who is here without papers or maybe, you know, in process not supposed to be working. And I have no liability because the law says I don't need to get. Once they tell me they're 15, they're old enough to work. And that's what that's about. So we have, but, but beyond that we have like I'm going to, I mean we see it every day now you finish putting in the roof, the roofer who owns the business, like I don't want to pay those guys because I got five more I can just put up there tomorrow on a different House and I call ice. That dynamic exists, whether ICE is ever called. So those are the, those to me seem to be the two sort of like vectors of resistance to a, an actual reform of our immigration system. And then you know, Democrats who are just afraid of offending either one of those two groups. What is your sense of like, like how much would you attribute which to which and how much is. We're looking at the same thing. Just the money that is interested in exploiting workers is also generating that fear.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, I think when it comes to right down to it, the dominant problem is partisanship. And that really has two forms. One, it's the immigrants are coming to vote for the Democrats. And therefore I can't possibly allow immigrants to come in. Even though Republicans have only ever done well when the immigrant share of the population has been high. I mean they've controlled the House of representatives about 80% of the years since 1995 when the immigrant share went above 10%. They basically didn't control the House of Representatives at all prior to 1995.

[A]

Yep.

[C]

Yeah, basically back to the 30s. So the idea that they can't compete when there's immigrants is just not true. The other part of it, partisanship is anything that the Democrats are for, we need to be against. And that polarization plays out in every field, not just immigration. So I do think that's a big part of it. It's very difficult to overcome, but it's a factor that we have to deal with. On the more reasonable concerns about, well, protecting the rights of workers when they get here and things like that. All of that, of course, would be much easier if people were here in a legal status where they could defend their rights and change jobs without fear of deportation. These are all things that we can work on within immigration construct. When you look at the kids who are coming, the New York Times interviewed hundreds of these kids. And what did they say? Well, the reason why we came and not our parents is because we were able to come. We were allowed to cross the border and get released, whereas our parents were prohibited. So there is a. There is a group in the United States who would say we would rather have these kids working in factories and meat processing and all this other stuff, rather than create a visa process for adults to come legally here and work temporarily or permanently. And so, again, these are problems that would be addressed best through illegal immigration reform, as opposed to one that, you know, just bans people from coming and forces them to work underground and all the rest. And so we're never going to deport 15 million people. I don't care what the Trump administration is selling. It's a fantasy land. Their proposal is not actually going to solve illegal immigration. And that's a big part of the messaging here that people need to understand they are selling a false bill of goods. They're not going to solve people working under the table. They're not going to solve illegal immigration. They're not going to solve all these problems in our immigration system. Having a legalization and a path to legal status and a legal immigration system is the actually feasible. We could fix it right now. In terms of the things that you're talking about with a real legal immigration

[A]

reform proposal, how close was the operations of the Biden administration to, like, where was that on the good, bad immigration system spectrum? I mean, obviously he needed more money. He need, you know, anything he could do was sort of less a structural change and more just sort of like, you know, I guess duct tape and jerry rigging. But to the extent that that was happened, like, just give us a. Because I still, I hear people actually, like, reasonable people go, like, we wouldn't have this immigration problem if Biden had just, like, done something and he had done something. It's all, you know, there's a caravan Coming to take my second house in on a lake in Minnesota type of situation.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, look, the Biden administration, you know, ignored a lot of warnings, including from me, about how to address this problem. They had banned asylum from day one. They had title 42 in place. They thought they could just expel people back to Mexico and they'd stop coming. That was not true. Even in the groups that they expelled almost 100% of the time, if you look at Mexican single adults, they were all expelled. Basically 100% of them were expelled back to Mexico. And they kept coming in greater and greater numbers because there were jobs here and the attraction of our red hot economy brought lots of people who wanted to work here and there was no legal way for them to come in. So they.

[A]

So to the extent that Biden screwed up, it was. He was too harsh at the beginning.

[C]

He would. Well, he was too. He didn't reopen the legal immigration system. I mean, he didn't. He did not. This is just a fact. He did not reopen the border. He kept the ports of entry closed to asylum seekers. All of the consulates were closed in the western hemisphere throughout 2021. So it's just not true that he reopened the border on day one or any of this nonsense. Yes, lots of people came because there was opportunity and there were jobs and we should want people who want to seek opportunity, who want to contribute economically. And unfortunately, we didn't have a policy that allowed that to happen legally. So we ended up with the dysfunction and disorder at the border. All of those problems were caused by the anti immigration policies by Congress, by the Biden administration, everything that led to so many asylum seekers not being able to work, having no legal right to work. These are all policies advocated by the people opposed to immigration, not by the people who wanted to have a policy that promotes integration and promotes economic vitality within our society. And so from my standpoint, they ignored my recommendations until 2024. When it comes to having a legal process for people to apply, they started doing that very slowly and tepidly in 2023, 2024, and it did work. It did reduce the number of people crossing illegally that the Republicans called it, you know, amnesty at the border and, you know, demagogued it and talked about how they were flying in illegals and all this stuff. No, these were legal channels by which people could come and apply abroad and enter the country legally. This was a benefit. It was the right direction. It ultimately, from 2023 to the end of his term in January of 2025. The number of people crossing the border illegally and being arrested by Border Patrol had declined by over 90% from its peak. And then Trump comes in and reduces it further by another 90%, but from a much lower number. I mean, this was a lower number than when Biden entered office. Okay, so Trump left office the first time with a far higher number than Biden left office with. And so, yes, he reduced the difference there. Very low. Very low.

[A]

But. But Biden was able to reduce undocumented crossings by providing a process.

[C]

Yeah. Right.

[A]

So the, the, the actual number of new immigrants may have been higher under Biden, if I understand you.

[C]

Yeah. Than under the legal clothes. Yes.

[A]

Which is. What is it? Which is. I mean, this is like, this is. The thing is that they're talking about illegal crossings.

[C]

And.

[A]

But it really, the problem is the country's not maintaining its, you know, national purity. I mean, that's really the complaint. Right. With Biden, it's just couched in sort of like a different language, so they don't have to be as explicit. Like, we just. The. We didn't like the color of the people coming in.

[C]

Yeah, but bottom line is they said, look, we can't have these people come legally or illegally. It doesn't matter. We just don't want these people. And once you say that, then you can't really have a conversation about, well, what's the legal way for people to come and all that. I mean, once you say we just don't want them and it doesn't matter how they come, then you've just closed off the entire conversation. And there's only one solution, and it's the Trump solution, which is just total inhumanity. Chaos in the interior. You know, just the brutality that we've seen, that totally ignoring the rule of law, all of that stuff that we've seen over the last year. Yeah, it's kept illegal immigration, new people coming in at a low level, but we've traded that for a much greater chaos in the interior because he is canceled more people's legal status who had legal status in January 2025. He's canceled more of those people's legal status than he has deported. So he's created more illegal immigrants here in the United States than there were in January 2025 because of all of the things that he's done to cancel people's legal status and get rid of legal immigration. And so he's creating a new chaos, a new problem. More brutality. Rights violations of Americans. It's not a good trade. We should have a legal process by which people can come and contribute that would benefit us as Americans as opposed to this current just absolute anarchy in the streets with ICE agents just doing whatever they like.

[A]

David J. Bier Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute Chair, the Sells foundation on Immigration Policy thanks so much for your time today. Really appreciate it.

[C]

Thanks for having me on.

[A]

All right, folks, that's it for this half of the program. Heading to the fun half, wherein I hope to get about a million IMs talking about how we had our first libertarian on without it getting testy in any way. I imagine we'll have some people who will say, like, how could you not say anything about the Cato insignia on the jacket? Did you notice that?

[B]

No, I did not.

[A]

At one point I got hypnotized by it. I couldn't. But good stuff. I do think that, like, listen, it's an open question as to how much of the racism and the sort of like uber nationalism and the purity nationalism. I mean, I don't, you know, what, what to call it, but it's definitely, all those things apply to me.

[B]

The open question is about how much of the American public is subscribing to like, the bigotry versus the, you know, standard of living, what they perceive as competition for jobs or whatever. From the top, though, it is a white supremacist project.

[A]

Well, from the top, it's a white supremacist project. What spurs that, that distrust and makes it easier to believe what you're talking about in terms of like, fight for resources is the fact that, like, if there's a fight for resources and it is easier for those people to blame undocumented or immigrants in general for that than it is to blame their neighbors who they've had dinner with, regardless of where their immigrant status or the people

[B]

who own everything, including your job and apartments from thousands of miles away.

[A]

Well, exactly. It's just, it's just like it's, it is a low, a lower hanging fruit. But then they also, the question is like, how much of that bigotry, you know, some of this at least, like, natural in the sense that, like, I have less trust for people who live on the west coast than the East Coast. Is it like there is a certain, like, you know, Worcester in particular, very parochial place. There's a certain parochialism that everybody has. But also that parochialism is like, you know, kindling. Often the fire is by folks who want to be able to exploit a certain class of people because it makes it, it's easier for them to get cheap labor. It's easier for them. I mean, so there's, there's a lot of stuff that mixes in there. And I think ultimately, if we're going to get some type of like, rational immigration policy, rational and humane. This is like, they actually line up largely one to one, like rational self interest as a nation lines up pretty well with a humane policy.

[B]

I mean, the irrationality of creating these border walls through sort of these landscapes that, I mean, you. I'm seeing all these videos of like sheriffs from border areas being like, we can't, like, it's pointless to build that wall there. You're going to destroy tourism in the area. Like, this is insane. But on the other hand, it's contracts for, you know, people who build the wall and people patrol it and the people who, in the Gulf of Mexico get to drive speedboats around and all that stuff. There's a lot of money in that sort of grift.

[A]

Yep. But all of that is in there. And I have to say, like, you know, I'm a little skeptical. I've been a little skeptical of Cato. I still remain a little skeptical of Cato. But we may be in a time where like, they're, you know, the corporate interests and libertarian interests that founded that place in certain areas realize like, we're way out of step with what our natural habitat is in terms of, like those country club Republicans seem to really not care.

[B]

It's very sort of paradoxical that at the moment libertarians seem to have the least amount of cachet sort of anywhere their positions look the most correct.

[A]

Like on this. Is that paradoxical or is that, is that paradoxical benefit of not being in

[B]

any practical political engagement?

[A]

Is that paradoxical or does that make absolute total sense?

[B]

Because, like, the way Dave Smith basically bought and sold the libertarian movement for Trump as Chase Oliver had frankly a good position. I mean, David Beer's position on immigration in the last election.

[A]

Yep. I mean, losers. Is that paradoxical? I don't think that. I think paradox is not the exact word. I think it's like natural.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like most obvious, when you're, when you, when your power is at a low ebb, you're, you're willing to sort of like, yeah, if they want power, they

[B]

should go back to questioning seatbelt law.

[A]

Exactly. Like, what's going on with light bulbs right now is insane.

[B]

Get a license to operate my frickin toaster.

[A]

I miss those days. That was sort of almost like some of the.

[B]

I honestly still remember that day. Yeah. Watching the debate. It's like what a miner probably felt like when you found like a rich vein of like gold ore or something like that.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

We're going to be.

[A]

Holy cow. We're going to be. We're going to be rich. Hey, hey, Folks, it's your support that makes this show possible. You can become a [e-mail] when you do, you not only get the free show, free of commercials, but you also get the fun Half. Join the MajorityReport.com Join the MajorityReport.com the URL is Join the MajorityReport.com I think it used to also be like something CuckNation.org CuckNation.org I think. Let's see if that still works. Probably not, but gonna Google this on the work computer.

[B]

Nope, there's. It cannot be reached.

[A]

Oh, sorry. Well, so you're gonna have to go to jointhemajorityreport.com jointhemajorityreport.com also just coffee, co op, fair trade coffee, hot chocolate. Use the coupon code. Majority get 10 off. They got the majority report blend. Check it out. You can get that as well. Matt. What's happening on the Matt Leckian Media Universe. Yeah.

[B]

On Friday on the Jacobin show, available at the Jacobin Meg YouTube channel. We talked with Alex Brunell, a great DSA organizer in Texas who at what pose the question, what can we learn from Zoron nationally that you know? And they get him and David get into a little bit of what makes New York specific, but also some things that transfer across. So if you're curious about what DSA can do on that question, I think it's a really, really smart conversation. Check that out.

[A]

See you in the fun half.

[C]

You are in for it.

[A]

All right, folks, 646-257-3920. See you in the. Are you ready? Who sent us this?

[D]

Alpha males are back, back, back, back, back Boy is back and the alpha males are back, back Just as delicious

[A]

as you could imagine the alpha males

[D]

are back, back, back, back, back, back Boy, back and the alpha males are

[A]

back, back, back, back Just wanna degrade

[D]

the white man Alpha males are back,

[A]

back I take all of it to

[D]

my throne Alpha males are back, back,

[A]

back, back Snowflake says what?

[D]

The alpha males are.

[A]

You are a madman.

[D]

And the alpha males are back, back.

[A]

Oh, no. Sam Cedar. What a wow. What a nightmare. Nightmare. Yeah. Or a couple of them. Just put them in rotation.

[C]

DJ, dinner. Well, the problem with those is they're

[B]

like 45 seconds long. So I don't know if they're enough breaks.

[C]

That's nonsense.

[A]

You see white people doing drugs that look worse than normal white people. And all white people look disgusting.

[D]

And the alpha males psych them them. Oh.

[A]

Snowflake says, what? What, what, what? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What, what, what, what, what? Snowflake says, what

[D]

a hell of a lot of bank. Hell of a lot of bank. A hell of a lot of bank. Okay, I'm making stupid money. Hell of hell of a lot of bank. A hell of a lot of blank.

[A]

All lives matter. Have you tried doing an impression on a college campus? I think that there's no reason why reasonable people across the divide can't all agree with this. Psych.

[D]

And the alpha males are back, back, back, back, back, back? And the Africans black, black, black, black, black, African. And the alpha males are black, black, black, black, black, black? And the Africans are back, back, back, back.

[A]

When you see Donald Trump out there, doesn't a little part of you think that America deserves to be taken over by jihadists? Keeping it 100.

[D]

Can't knock the hustle.

[A]

Come on. Fuck them. Things I do for the bigger game plan. By the way, it's my. My birthday. My birthday. Happy birthday to me, Jew boy. I have a thought experiment for you.

[D]

And the alpha males are back back. Africa are black, black. Alpha males are black, black. Africa are back, back.

[A]

Come on, come on, come on. Someone needs to pay the price for blasphemy around here. I am a total pussy pushing, pussy pushing, pussy pussy pushing, pushing, pushing.