Episode Transcript
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Friends, this is Dick Flax with another episode of the podcast that we call Talking Strategy, Making History.
My partner in crime, as always and as I much appreciate, Professor Daraka Larimer Hall. Dr. Hall Larimer Hall. Hi.
[00:00:35] Speaker B: Hello.
[00:00:36] Speaker A: Hello.
And we have a. Hello, Daraka. And we have a very special opportunity.
I'm very gratified that Josh Page, Professor Joshua Page, University of Minnesota professor of Sociology and Law, actually has a endowed chair, it looks like, which I'm very proud of. And the reason I'm proud of is because Josh was a student in my class only several decades ago. And since then, you've had a remarkable, productive career in the study of criminal justice issues, including policing. And that's going to be, I think, relevant because we called on Josh because of what's going on in Minneapolis, and there he is in Minneapolis. And you've been out in the streets of Minneapolis as all of this has unfolded there.
Welcome, Joshua.
[00:01:34] Speaker B: Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: So let's get right to this experience of being out there with so many others.
Can you sort of give a general sense of the.
I just want to know what's the highlights of your experience?
[00:01:51] Speaker B: Yeah, it's been surreal. I actually was in California for a couple. For a couple weeks. And then when I was flying home, I was in the. I was on the airplane and, you know, so as you do sort of could see other people's TVs and such on. And I saw broadcast of officer involved shooting in Minneapolis, and that was the shooting of Renee Goode. And I was. I was coming home. And that's what I came home to.
And, you know, immediately we were in the streets doing protests. It's just. Yeah, it's been wild and it's been exhilarating to be with our neighbors, to be with people. There's just a real sense of collective movement going on. It's also, of course, infuriating to see our neighbors, you know, kidnapped to see people, you know, people killed one of them. It's really eerie going around the cities, met, you know, a lot. Many people of color are just, like, disappeared from the community. You know, East African immigrants. We have a very large population of Hmong and Vietnamese immigrants that are, you know, are staying home.
You know, Latino, Latina kids are staying home. And so it's this really eerie experience of people just not in public, public space and are staying home.
Children are not going to school. It's really. It has this sort of pandemic feel to it. I train in martial Arts and we have a kids program. And there's, you know, three. Three brothers that haven't been trained. They haven't been to the dojo in. In weeks because they're afraid to leave the house. And, you know, we're. We're putting together care packages for them. And so it's sad, it's frustrating. And then there's also the other side, which is just the mobilization to make sure people are getting groc through mutual aid. There's people that are driving, you know, immigrants to kids to school, people to their jobs. You. You go around and you see people with fluorescent vests out in front of schools and other vulnerable institutions in case ICE comes at the. The ICE watches there. So it's a swelling mix of emotions, I think, you know, some immense civic pride.
Just infuriation like this. Didn't, you know, this. There's no reason for this to be happening. And it's, you know, it's. It's. It's gonna be. It's really traumatic for so many people.
So, yeah, I think I'll leave it there.
[00:04:24] Speaker A: So I'm curious about how all of this activity gets organized and coordinated. How do people know what to do? I mean, you don't have to share any details that we don't want the wrong people to know. But it does seem remarkable, although some similar stuff is going like that in a lot of communities.
That kind of division of labor or various tasks that people are doing, not just coming to the streets, but doing concrete things of support and protection.
Amazing levels of engagement, I think. And I'm just wondering, how do you speak now with your sociology hat as well as any other hats? You're wearing a Minnesota hat right now. You, You.
So have you thought about that? The.
[00:05:14] Speaker B: The question of how. How are people getting involved?
[00:05:16] Speaker A: Yeah, no, how they get coordinated, really? And how they know?
[00:05:19] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it's very. It's very organic.
You know, there. There's.
There's some strong connections and spillover from the uprising after George Floyd was murdered, there were a lot of mutual aid networks established at that time that I think got re.
Reignited. You know, some of the very same people who are out there raising money immediately after this happened were out there raising money. A lot of it's word of mouth. Like, there was a church called. I don't want to know what it stands for. It's Dhh. It's this church. It's not too far from my house. And they started doing this mutual aid. They turned their church into a mutual aid machine and it quickly just spread, you know, one, it spreads by word of mouth and then it spreads over social media. And now like they. They have too many volunteers and has to go elsewhere. There's some organizations that are leading what's going on, or not leading, but are. Are quite influential. There's an organization called Defend the 612 that's been really involved in the signal chats and ice watch. There's an organization called Menarca. So there's a couple and they've like Menarca, they're both organizations hold these trainings. They call them upstander up upstander trainings playing off a bystander that you actually get. And they teach you how to do this watching and how to do it in a constitutional and effective way. And these just. They started going as the surge was starting, but after Renee Goode was. Was killed, they just were overflowing. I went to one, there must have been 3, 400 people there. I mean, it was a weak night. And so there is some of that organization, a lot of its neighbors getting neighbors involved. Like, if you look at some of these signal chats, you'll be like, hey, my neighbor wants. Can you pass over the link for the mutual aid for this neighborhood? Or they want to get involved in patrol. Can you give us that? It's just people bringing in each other. And I think it just starts to spread somewhat organically through these connections. But, you know, there's no sense of it being centrally, you know, organized or I don't see any of the, you know, traditional, you know, philanthropy groups or. And, you know, ACLU is involved, but they're doing direct, direct involvement of representing folks. The National Lawyer Guild is very involved in representing protesters.
Other organ, you know, other log. But I don't, I don't see it as a centrally organized or indefinitely not financed as the administration would. Would have us believe. To the extent it's financed, it's through direct donations through, you know, maybe there's some big money people out there kicking down money. But, you know, I'm not aware of any of it. A lot of it is. Is sort of or is quite organic. But also we have these pretty amazing community organizing groups like the organization called Isaiah, which is a statewide multiracial group that organized throughout communities throughout the state.
You know, it's been doing for years. And so they're able to, you know, they're able to. To get into action and so forth and bring people together and this, you know, the various immigrant communities themselves, small community, they're very well Organized and very engaged and so forth. So, you know, it's coming from all kinds of sources.
[00:08:47] Speaker C: Well, that's the thing is, like, obviously the administration has this national narrative and agenda to persecute the left that they've, you know, constructed.
That's sometimes just about describing, you know, progressive infrastructure, organizations, friendships, networks, people knowing each other as something sinister and. Right. And just as you said, like, there's some combination, it seems really just beautiful and remarkable of new people getting engaged who've never done anything like this.
You know, just being called to action by neighborliness, et cetera, and. And being able to tap into, you know, knowledge bases and networks and resources that have been there. People that have been, you know, organizing in very. In communities and in defense of. Of poor and immigrant communities already. So, I mean, like, obviously the fascists in Washington are going to describe that as antifa terrorism, but that's, you know, that's just.
That's what we've been building for one another as part of a movement for decades.
[00:09:54] Speaker A: Well, I mean, not only have we been building it, what is exciting to me is what I'm hearing from Josh and also observing, I guess, is the. The. The levels of participation of people who are not really in the networks re established, but are. But obviously have felt sympathy. There's this urgency of needing to do something real. That's how I feel, not only in Minneapolis, but.
But maybe everywhere.
[00:10:24] Speaker C: Everywhere.
[00:10:24] Speaker A: Current situation.
And this. I guess I'm. I'm feeling that what happened when Rene was killed kind of triggered the opportunity to do something very real, very fundamental and very significant with. Among people who normally just go about their day, even if they have sympathies, they don't act on them because they're busy with their regular lives. But now that regular life is superseded, you might say, by demands and the opportunities really, of this moment. I don't know if that makes any sense, but I'll leave it at that.
Josh, you remarked to me before that there's also something about Minneapolis and civic. Civic spirit there that maybe is worth mentioning and that has a history. You want to. What's your reflection on that?
[00:11:20] Speaker B: Yeah, totally. Yeah. Actually. Yeah. One thing, just following. Following up on what we were just talking about. I mean, I think the one thing that really strikes me too, and perhaps a reason that so many people get involved is like, what's happening here is building. Like, we're building stuff, right? We're building mutual aid networks. We're doing hair work.
We're building Ice Watch, right? You're doing something. You're taking care of your neighbors, your marriage. So. Which is different than, like, protesting that can, you know, have destructive qualities which serves. Can have. Serve its political purposes. And it is now, too. But there's these other ways for people to get involved that are very much about building something different.
And I think it's, you know, you get really involved in that, and that can include all kinds of people that don't, you know, as Draco was saying, not necessarily even see themselves as, you know, activists.
I would say many of the people involved in here do not consider. I mean, maybe they do now, but. But that's something that really struck me.
But, yeah, I mean, Minnesota is an. It's an interesting place. You know, I came here in 2007 and, you know, immediately I sort of was like, wow, like, they.
They sweep the snow off the streets and off the bike path so quickly. Like, the parks are just beautiful.
[00:12:40] Speaker A: And.
[00:12:43] Speaker B: And also people are really proud to be Minnesotans, especially Minneapolis. Right. And there's this sort of, like, people don't, you know, sense that people don't really appreciate what we have. So there's just this real, like, Minnesota.
Minnesota pride. And, you know, the.
Minnesota has very large political and civic participation, like in voting and volunteering. And, you know, it has this Scandinavian history, that sort of Scandinavian roots of this sort of collectivism and, you know, taking care of folks. The Lutheran, you know, church has been very involved in immigration and resettlement.
But there's also, you know, it's a progressive place. I mean, look who we, you know, Ilhan Omar wins by, I don't know, 20, 30 points every time. It's like, it's deeply blue, and it has this really rich history. I mean, labor history going back to the 1934 general strike of the Teamsters that, you know, was also very violent and a person was killed and people were shot and is really credited with sort of launching the sort of militant industrial, you know, labor movement in many ways. The American Indian Movement was started here in Minneapolis in the late 60s again, related to police violence.
And then we've just had, you know, these succession of. Of police killings that have brought the community out and to. To protest, to do mutual aid, to do occupations.
So I, you know, I don't. I. I haven't studied so much of sort of what it is about Minnesota. I know that there are these things in the history, but it's just something that when you're here, it. You. It's just different. It feels like something special. And in a way, we want to brag about it in a way we don't want. We don't want people really to know because it's sort of like our little secret, you know, and it's like, we can actually. It's decently affordable and.
[00:14:43] Speaker C: Oh, you shut up about that.
[00:14:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't know. I mean, it's like.
And, yeah, I mean, I was telling Dick the other day is just like, you know, I've always. I've long really loved this place. You know, there are times where I get really sick of the long winters and so forth. But what's happening now is infuriating and sad and so forth. It's just like, I love. I love my. I love Minneapolis more than ever. This is making me just like, God, if I wasn't here right now, I would. I would fly back.
[00:15:17] Speaker A: So. So, you know what. What intrigues me just in thinking about social movement and so and social upsurge is on the one hand, one wants to hope that people will respond to situation, will respond to threat, will respond to oppression collectively, no matter where they are. But there's, to me, something beautiful and added when there's a history that they can call upon as a. As a kind of resource, as an emotional support, as. As a model for what they can do now. And, you know, so often we say Americans have no sense of history, and yet in these. In the current time, we're seeing this historical background, you know, coming to life again. That's how I feel. And I'm a dangerous person to talk about this because I'm such a romantic about these kinds of things, but I kind of resonate with what you're saying. So I guess there's a double, sort of contradictory thing that we're saying to each other here, which is Minneapolis and Minnesota, that's a special place. And that helps account for what has been happening there. But don't think that it's unique. Hopefully, it is not unique. And because that history of struggle is actually very widespread in the United States and often is forgotten, but then gets to be remembered at these moments, somehow. I don't know if that romantic statement resonates with you, but that's what I wanted to say right now.
[00:16:51] Speaker B: I would just, you know, say absolutely. But, I mean, it's like there's also ways then it's super concrete. I mean, with the George Floyd thing, I mean, there were people involved in that where. Which. Who had previously been involved in what was called the Minnehaha Free State, the AIM movement, right from. In these protests around, you know, Jamar Clark's killing here, the police killing. Right. And then the George Floyd thing. This, you know, that became a public education. I mean, it's still there. It's still a public education stuff. People that were involved in that, a lot of white people, people have now are in a sort of run in these signal chats. My, one of my students is studying the George Floyd or not my students, but someone, a grad student of my department, Anna Del Cortevo is studying that. She's seen like the direct way that that's funneled out. I mean, and people, you know, and so, you know, the same like group of clergies that were involved. There are the group of clergies that are involved now, some of the city council members. So I think there's a long history. Absolutely. But there are like direct, you can actually trace it directly for, you know, through this more recent history.
And I do want to highlight as much as I'm talking about how much I love Minneapolis and how much it's a great place and stuff. It also has its problems. Right. It is like we have incredible racial disparities and inequality, especially with African Americans and Native Americans. And so I don't want to lose that as I talk about what's going on. But, but, you know, but that's also part of this history and that's part of why there's a lot of these struggles and so forth. So I'll leave it.
[00:18:21] Speaker A: The one question relating to what you just said that's in my mind is so the, the attack of, of ICE on Minneapolis was partly, maybe largely motivated by this Somali threat that Trump somehow is obsessed with?
[00:18:38] Speaker C: Well, I wouldn't use the word motivated.
[00:18:39] Speaker A: I mean, well, well, well, move.
[00:18:41] Speaker C: You know, that's what the justified or predicated or something.
[00:18:45] Speaker A: Right. Thank you. So the point is, was the Somali immigrant community visible before any of this or relatively isolated? In other words, what's the kind of relationship of the older, the longer living, longer live communities to the newer immigrant communities, Somalis and maybe the Hmong community as well. What's your understand. How do you see that?
[00:19:13] Speaker B: I'd say it's both.
You know, there's extent like there are definitely geographical spaces and social spaces that are somewhat concentrated. Right. That are mostly Somali or Eritrean and Hmong. Right. But also very much integrated into the community. I mean, I have, I always have students at the, at the university who are, who are Somali. They're people at the dojo. I mean they're very much integrated. And same same with the Hmong, you know, Hmong. We have, you know, we have, like, amazing Hmong restaurants that are leading in the country. You know, there's a real sort of appreciation for that. And it's not just the restaurants, but I mean, it's, you know, there are, they're literally our neighbors. So it's not. There is an extent of residential separation, but also integration. And also, you know, I think here is that there. It's perhaps it's because of the history, the proud history of, you know, again, coming somewhat from the Lutheran Church, except of being a place for refugees and immigrants, is that there is a real belief that the diversity is, is one of the things that's special here.
And even though sometimes there are problems between, you know, between communities, I think the general sentiment, obviously not among everybody, is that this is a benefit of living here is, is we, you know, get to live among these different, you know, people get to live amongst each other and share in cultural traditions and so forth. I mean, the new mayor of St. Paul is among women, you know, and.
[00:20:52] Speaker C: Isn'T that as a community, it dates back to the 60s and 70s, right. I mean, refugees from the wars there, so.
[00:21:00] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:21:00] Speaker C: That's a long time. And yeah, like American cultural politics.
[00:21:05] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:21:06] Speaker C: So I, I, I, I like this connection that Dick was making in these questions because, well, for one thing, like, one of my favorite thinkers to teach is Torsine Veblen. And one of the interesting things about him, right, is that he grew up, I mean, he born in Wisconsin, but grew up in Minnesota and in a community that was Norwegian speaking, that was just, like, famously sort of insular in a way that we often criticize immigrant groups for being or whatever.
[00:21:36] Speaker A: Right.
[00:21:37] Speaker C: But, like, really were like, you, you just grew up. It was like you were in a town in Norway and, and, and a lot of, like, people talk about how that gave him this outsider perspective, even as an American, that allowed him to have these insights and so forth. And so it's like Minnesota is a place that for a very long time has had communities that were, in one sense, yeah, inwardly focused, homogenous, bringing the debates and ideas and so forth from the homeland to bear there, but also have created this distinctly American voices and so forth. And so it's like, sure, of course, that a Somali group doing that, like a group of Somalis now using Minnesota in that same way, in a way.
[00:22:19] Speaker B: Right.
[00:22:20] Speaker C: It was, has always seemed very cool to me, though. And also the other group of Somali immigrants that I've worked with, gotten to know and worked and so forth, and not just Immigrants, but like the broader community, because, you know, people get born there, they're not immigrants. But it's been in Sweden and in Stockholm. And so it's like two places that I meet Somalis is.
[00:22:40] Speaker A: Or.
[00:22:41] Speaker C: Or like Somalis are politically engaged as a community. They're like, cold as hell. It was like, always my first thought is like, that must suck. But anyway, what I was going to just wrap this up with is the kinds of xenophobia and racism directed at the Somali American community in Minnesota, including, like, state, this state repression and so forth that's happening against the Somali community in Sweden as well. And using a lot of the same rhetoric and tactics and more specifically, a sort of an ambivalence or even hostility on this in the center left, who rely on those communities for votes, by the way, but also will say things like, we don't want a Somali town in Sweden the way that they have Chinatowns in America, or whatever. So anyway, it. It's just it these connections always have me thinking about the fact that in the United States we have this long tradition of groups in one time in their history being quite insular and building community amongst themselves, and then, you know, integrating, changing, absorbing, transforming, et cetera, and being very much celebrated as part of, like, the American story and so forth.
So I see that happening in a way in real time. And just like all throughout history, it can be quite violent and disruptive and hard.
Anyway, that was my long rant making this connection.
[00:24:15] Speaker A: Very, very interesting.
[00:24:16] Speaker C: Very interesting.
[00:24:16] Speaker A: Yeah, very.
So when. And this is the opportunity, I'll tell people who.
To remind people that we're having great chance to interview and converse with Professor Joshua Page, the University of Minnesota. And the reason I put that forward right now is because Professor Joshua Page is quite an expert on matters related to policing. And I'm wondering whether the knowledge that you have about that general arena of work and of life, how that relates to your view of ice, because that is now the largest federal police force in terms of its budget.
[00:25:04] Speaker C: Yeah. And if I could just. If you could give some opinions about this latest maneuver by Schumer on the budgeting of ICE and supposedly reining it in, et cetera, it'd be great.
[00:25:15] Speaker B: Yeah. You'll have to remind me what the.
[00:25:17] Speaker A: Where.
[00:25:17] Speaker B: Where I keep saying it seemed to be such a shifting target.
[00:25:20] Speaker C: Fair enough.
[00:25:21] Speaker B: So you'll have to remind me.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: Well, what. What I heard on the news today is that the. In the Senate, Democrats got Trump personally to agree to separate the.
The Department of Justice budget and the. And the. And the enforcement budget from the rest of the bills that they need to pass to keep the government open. So if the Senate agrees, votes for that, and then the House votes for that, they can not have to close the government in order to put pressure on, you know, to, to try to achieve these reforms that they're, that they're seeking. I'm talking about the Democrats vis a vis ice. And those reforms have to do with sort of obvious things like not wearing masks, having body cameras, requiring judicial warrants in order to invade people's homes.
Basically, having the Constitution apply to ICE is the reforms. None of that is guaranteed to pass the Congress, let alone be put into effect, even if it would pass the Congress. But what I heard Senator Blumenthal say this morning was if these are not passed, he believes that they will be able to withhold funding for ICE and refuse to pass any appropriation for ice. I don't know why he was so bold about that, but that's interesting. So we'll see how much spine there really is in the Democrats. We'll see where this goes. But that's just the way I understand the situation, roughly, but not. Don't just focus on that. Josh, how do you see this whole ICE story?
[00:27:14] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it's interesting that they're. Yeah, those reforms strike me as.
I think the people that killed Preddy and Good had body cameras on and.
[00:27:24] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: You know, yeah, sure. They shouldn't be masked. That's, you know, that's horrible. So it'd be good for that. I mean, they're already supposed to be using judicial warrants and they haven't been following the law. I don't know. I'm not. I mean. But this gets to your bigger question is that, you know, I mean, I think, you know, Border Patrol and ICE are really are paramilitary organizations in the literal sense. I think of, you know, they're far more operating like military. They have the weapons like military. They dress like military, they act like military. They're agents of self of state repression.
[00:28:01] Speaker C: And a ton of them are former military.
[00:28:04] Speaker B: Yeah. And.
But yeah, it's interesting. It's like, as somebody who's, you know, my expertise, a lot of it's around sort of the tough on crime buildup and mass incarceration. And, you know, we, I teach about warrior, warrior style policing that became so in vogue around, you know, the, the, the moral panics around crack cocaine and so forth. I mean, and this is like that on steroids, you know, I mean, like, they're literally. I mean, they, the recruitment campaign for, you know, trying to get tens of thousands of new ice. They call it wartime recruitment. I mean, they're, it's literally, I mean, it's so incredibly dangerous to be recruiting people into the, you know, that's really, you know, about, you know, enforcement in, in the inside of the country. And so, yeah, I mean, and they're taking, you know, they're taking a lot of the tactics, racial profiling, you know, street rips, where they, you know, if you've watched the Wire, it's you, it's very similar kind of thing where they pull up and they throw a bunch of people against the, you know, and just sort of take him off the street. It's, it's, it's really interesting because the police, you know, particularly in big cities, have really tried to reform and has been more or less effective and they're still very strong and I think really good critiques about the, you know, or whatever. I don't want to romanticize that, but it's like this is, this is again, 1990s warrior policing on, on steroids and, but also mixed with this incredible technology, you know what I mean? This facial recognition technology, where they probably saw that today in the New York Times, there's an article of, you know, a ICE agent cornering a car in an alley and being like, hello, Brenda. And you know, they know exactly who they are.
They, you know, they're using it to, you know, keep track of folks and to target them and so forth. It, so it's, it's really quite frightening.
So, yeah, I, you know, I've, I was telling Dick, I'm, I'm working on.
Yeah, I mean, there's just, for those of us who have been really focused on, you know, mass incarceration and this, this last period, it's just so weird to see these things keep popping up, for example, since like 2024. The Trump administration has, it's clearly part of their messaging strategy, talks about the worst of the worst. Like we are going after the worst of the worst that came. That really became in vogue around the building of supermax prisons.
And it was a sort of political tool to say like, this is what we need because there's this dark and dangerous and incorrigible group, right. It's, it was used in conjunction with the notion of the super predator against juveniles. And if in California the three strikes campaign was all about the worst of the worst and it's using the very language that. Right. And people are trying to fact check it away and so forth without realizing this isn't about fact checking away. This is about the construction of an enemy. Right. And there you. And when you construct the enemy along these terms, you could do anything to them. And anybody else who's caught up in it is justifiable collateral damage. Right. And it justifies recruiting all these people and building, building up a military. So it's incredibly scary. You know, it's like I said, it's.
We've been critiquing what we've been doing around policing in prisons and so forth for so long, and there's been some progress on that. And this is just like what we've seen there, you know, on absolute steroids with even less legal regulation and.
Yeah. And pushback from the courts and from policymakers and so forth.
[00:31:46] Speaker A: There's been very little reporting about what happens to people in detention. What these. Detention.
They're really concentration camps.
If we change the labeling of them. Just say there's a tremendous federal budget now to construct concentration camps or to provide opportunity for private entrepreneurs to do this.
And we have no real insight, I think, except really some very negative examples of what's going on there. I, I'm a little, I'm upset actually, sometimes by how little attention, you know, and because it's very hard for media people to penetrate what is going on.
Congress people have been pushed around and actually, you know, when they've tried to enter those things. So I. Do you have any thoughts about that, Josh?
[00:32:39] Speaker B: Yeah, no, it's, it's, it's pretty crazy. I mean, this is another way in which, you know, the criminal legal space and the immigration space is, you know, is, is really bad. The, the main people that, the main companies that are running those immigration detention centers start off as private prison companies. They're still private prison companies.
[00:32:59] Speaker C: CEO Group and so forth.
[00:33:00] Speaker B: EO Group, CoreCivic, which used to be Corrections Corporation of America.
Yeah, they actually were about to go. They were at the verge of going under in the 1990s and it was. And then they pivoted to immigration enforcement. And with the government really expanding it, it saved their companies. And now they're making hand over fist because of this, of this funding. But in my, this new book I have with my colleague Joe Sauce, we talk. It's about various ways that businesses and governments use criminal legal processes and institutions to generate money.
And one of the things to talk about is with this infusion of private companies into the space is, it's one of the consequences is decreasing democratic accountability because these private companies don't have to provide any information right it's like at least if it's a public institution, right, like they can, they're subject to foia, they're subject to, you know, records requests. They have to answer folks, these companies, I don't have to do shit. And then you have the other side. And even in the public institutions where the, the you know what, they pass either a regulation or something that said they had to give a, that legislators would have to give them seven days before they can actually come in, it was like. Well, right.
And so I think this, this, the use of these private companies is.
It makes it harder and harder to know what's going on in there. So we have actually very little sense of what's happening. And yeah, I don't know. This is not to your question, but I, I'm sure you saw the, the, the news about that little protest by mostly women and children at one of.
[00:34:44] Speaker C: These institutions, right there was like captured on drone footage.
[00:34:47] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, made me smile, but also just broke my fucking, you know, broke my heart, you know, so, so we don't know.
And again. And we also have no idea about all this other technology, all this facial recognition technology and where all this data is going and so forth. So you know, the, the lack of transparency and democratic accountability of this whole project is, is, is really distressing. And I agree with Dick that it's like getting far too little attention. Except for those that are just like so obsessed with some of these kind of issues.
[00:35:20] Speaker C: Well, one thing you said that I just wanted to.
[00:35:22] Speaker A: Before we, before let's just give the title of the book of the book that just came out. It's published by the University of Chicago Press. It's called Legal Plunder. What's the subtitle, Josh?
[00:35:34] Speaker B: The Predatory Dimensions of Criminal Justice.
[00:35:37] Speaker A: That sounds like what we're talking about.
[00:35:40] Speaker C: Well, yeah, it was gonna. Something that you were just talking about, Josh, that I think is worth underlining. And I, you know, I wonder if you can, you know, sort of talk about on.
Add some history to. Is like it just seems like the, the, the anti crime parts of the reactionary agenda and foreign policy have been sort of collapsed together in a really dangerous way. And so it's like national security, including like this absolutely insane, you know, national security directive on going after the so called radical left and trans people and etc.
Like merged together with yeah. This long standing building narrative of like militarizing the police, having a gigantic, you know, prison industrial complex to deal with this internal enemy of crime and then also now foreign threats and enemies Both in terms of migrants, immigrants, workers coming here and drug boats and, you know, being able to murder, you know, suspected drug dealers as if that's how you do criminal justice. But it's not criminal justice, it's national security. Also why we need to like, you know, use children as bait to try to get workers to like knock on door. Like all of it, the rhetoric, the justifications for it and even the law are all merging together of things that historically, constitutionally have been kept very, very separate for good reason. Like should we be just super terrified and pessimistic about this or can we undo it?
[00:37:25] Speaker B: Well, geez, I don't think I can answer that. Yeah, this merging is really, that you're talking about is, is super interesting and distressing. And you know, there has been a long, for decades now there's been a, you know, folks that have been studying the, the fusion of criminal legal and immigration and there's actually a field called crimigration that looks at this. But you're adding another detail to it. I think. You know, there's, you know, there is folks like Julian Go and others that study like the Imperial Boomerang that are looking at sort of that how that's being, you know, how these, the war comes along, the weapons.
[00:38:05] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:38:05] Speaker B: How they come home, the stuff that's been using in the war on terror and so forth.
So. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I don't, I don't know if it can be undone. I mean, you know, I think it's terribly frightening. But you know, I, I tend not to be a fatalist.
You know, again, I mean, that's one of the things being here right now. You see people push back and things change. And so I don't know.
That's out of my pay grade to know that kind of level of untangling. It seems like when these institutions get built, they're really hard.
And back to your question about.
I think that's why the conversations about abolish ice, about abolish the Border Patrol, even abolish dhs, is because of how once you build these cultures and you build these, they're so we know as sociologists, these organizations are incredibly hard to change.
The bureaucracies, but also the culture of the workforce. And we see this in prisons and so forth too. This is so hard. So taking off masks, wearing body cameras, saying again, you must use a warrant. Like, you know, that doesn't seem like that's going to change what's becoming deeply institute. It has become deeply institutionalized.
And you Know, lends for good reasons to these things are like we need to scrap these things and you know, if we're going to do. To do immigrant enforcement like needs to be done by completely different organizations or something.
[00:39:43] Speaker A: Right.
[00:39:43] Speaker B: You know, so a civil.
[00:39:45] Speaker C: It's a civil question. It's civil bureaucracy. Like with maybe a small armed force. Not the opposite. Not, not a fucking military with a little bureaucracy. It's crazy. Yeah. So I'm not super, just for the record, I'm not super impressed with the maneuver in Washington on this because I don't think any of those so called reforms will be effectual and it'll just add wind to the sails. For those down the line who want to keep ICE with some tweaks. I think a much more effective thing would have been to use the whole budget as leverage to just undeploy ice. Like obviously they can't scrap it without a majority, but just being like they're off the streets for now, just, it's just over, no more deployments and just held. Held it hostage for that for as long as it took. But this, yeah, I think this is typical. Like giving up the leverage to kick the can down the road because.
[00:40:39] Speaker B: And possibly at legitimacy.
[00:40:41] Speaker C: What's that?
[00:40:42] Speaker B: Possibly at legitimacy? Right, Exactly.
Reforms can be like, hey, we've already.
[00:40:47] Speaker C: There's new ice.
[00:40:48] Speaker B: They don't have the mast. I thought that was the problem. And then it sort of justifies like. But they're still using the same technique.
[00:40:56] Speaker A: Well, just to be slightly not optimistic, more optimistic, but slightly to recognize there's a lot of I think rather fluid political dynamic going on here within the demo. So you have Klobuchar. She wants to run for governor. Now she's been, I think she said we have to take ICE down to the studs. That's a good way to.
There's I think somewhat reasonable fear of saying just abolish ICE because that sounds like letting the ground where oh, you want, you want open borders and no control over immigration.
[00:41:35] Speaker C: Why are we afraid of conversations like anything we say the other side is going to say you're afraid.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: We are not afraid. But people in high royal we. Yeah. Anyway, so what I wanted to ask you is how you're feeling about the top elected officials who've been very outspoken in Minnesota Governor Keith Ellison, the mayor of Minneapolis, so outspoken as to use F words on national television. That's a big breakthrough in free speech that he's created. Are they, are you, you know, is there feeling that there's pretty good positive response on that Score or anxiety about their.
What are the anxieties?
[00:42:20] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, the Klobuchar is interesting. I asked somebody sent me something today where she also said, I think she was speaking on Congress today that said, like, it was good for ICE to be here for the fraud stuff, but this has gone too far. You know what I mean? Which is a typical Klobuchar.
[00:42:35] Speaker C: She goes also down to the stud. Sounds a lot like rebuilding. I mean, yeah, yeah.
[00:42:41] Speaker B: I mean, I, I, you know, yes, I've been happy with the pushback from Mayor Frey Fry, from the governor. You know, it's, it's, to me, it's also a wait and see. You know, like the sort of the messages coming out from the meetings with what's his name? Holmgren.
[00:43:01] Speaker A: Holman.
[00:43:01] Speaker B: Like, we're a little, you know, like, again, there's this sort of like, well, if you just go back to focusing on the criminals and it's sort of like, well, what does that mean? You know, Because I then see, they say, well, even if you've been arrested or even if you've done, you know what I mean? It's sort of like I'm really curious to see what they are satisfied with, because the people here are not satisfied this. They're saying, ice out. Right, Right. They're saying, get out. And so, you know, I think there's going to be some tension coming up and things are going to come to a head a little more because I think there will be more. And, you know, the, the administration's demanding that we basically revoke some of our sanctuary policies. So they want the jails to cooperate and are saying that's the condition for the drawdown.
I haven't seen any indication that the city is going to go along with that. But if they were to do that or if they were to do that, not do that, but, but sort of do that, like it can lead to some trouble. So, yes, I'm really happy they've been out fighting. Right. I think all of us want just people to be fighting. And I think, you know, even though I'm not happy with the reforms that are going on in Congress, I'm glad that they're actually doing something to fight, you know, to actually push back a little. And so that has, you know, again, that's been a sort of sense of civic pride. It's really going to bat with them.
[00:44:25] Speaker C: But it's really, you know, it feels that, it feels. Do you think people that are being engaged, let's say, especially the folks that don't have an activist background, feel like the leadership, political leadership, has their back, is on the same side. Do you feel unified with them?
[00:44:39] Speaker B: Yeah, I think so. I think particularly those that aren't, you know, those who are more activists have deeper critiques from other events, you know, from other stuff. And know, like, you know, Fry definitely has aspirations of state, if not national, and it's sort of like a trust kind of thing.
[00:44:56] Speaker C: And he beat a more progressive guy, right?
[00:44:59] Speaker A: There was a bit.
[00:44:59] Speaker C: There's some.
[00:45:00] Speaker B: Yeah. And he's, you know, he's. He's vetoed some really progressive stuff. And so there's more distrust for those that. But, but I think for sort of your average folks, there is some. But again, it's kind of, I think where it's really going to come down is where, you know, it's, it's. It's easier to be really out there saying, fuck, you know, get the fuck out here when they're murdering people and they're nabbing people off the street randomly. Right. But if they were to pull back and make it more concentrated, but still really problematic, will they still be willing to.
To push? That's what. Curious to see that, you know, I don't know. I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but we'll see.
[00:45:42] Speaker C: Good question.
[00:45:43] Speaker A: Judging from our experience right here, Josh, which is not as intense by any stretch of the imagination as what's happened in Minneapolis. But there are plenty of people ready at a moment's notice to go out and confront ICE whenever they appear in the community.
And so even if there was a drawdown, if ICE continues to do this kind of raiding and so forth, those organized forces in the community will continue to battle them, I would judge.
And that's happening around the country.
So this leaving a lot of political space for the electeds to come up with a plan that can be implemented should the elections turn out for Congress pretty favorably in the fall for some major moves. And this includes not only legislation, but investigation and exposure on a large scale. That's one of the powers that the Democratic majority in either House would begin to have as soon as they got into office. I'm really hoping for that.
So I think we need to keep saying you're not doing enough, because none of it is enough.
And we can't say reform ice so long as the people who are in the ICE uniforms are in fact recruited on the basis of. Not democratic norms, but the very opposite of that. And some of them are people eager, apparently, and hungry for the kind of role that they're playing in the streets of proud boys and cruelty and masculine display of the most caricatured kind.
Anyway, this is anything you want to add, Daraka, as a question or comment?
[00:47:44] Speaker C: No, this has been really great, very touching just hearing your reflections on what's going on there and so forth.
I think everybody listening, all of us, our hearts are with you and also our minds. It's been really inspiring just to see the fight back.
The Minnesota. Nice getting not so nice. It's been great.
We're proud of you. We're proud of you, Minnesota. Proud of you, Minneapolis.
[00:48:12] Speaker B: Well, I really appreciate it. It's like, you know, we've just been knee deep in it. So I haven't really even.
This is really the first time I've really reflected on it and talked through it and at this kind of level. So it is refreshing. And also I feel myself getting emotional and so, yeah, I just really appreciate the opportunity and I appreciate, appreciate both of you.
[00:48:34] Speaker A: So Dirac, Alarmohal and me, Dick Flack, have been talking with great passion and learning with Professor Joshua Page of the University of Minnesota, whose new book is called Legal Plunder.
And we're going to close with what is now at this moment the most popular song on the planet. Bruce Springsteen's Streets of Minneapolis will close with an excerpt from that song. Thank you all for listening.
TSMH is go to kastos.com TSMH to get in touch with us and we'll be back with you not too long from now with further efforts at illumination.
Thanks for being with us.
[00:49:30] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:49:33] Speaker D: Through the winter ice and cold down Nicolette Avenue A city of flame fought fire and ice Neath an occupier's boots King Trump's private army from the DHS Guns belted to their coats Came to Minneapolis to enforce the law or so their story goes against smoke and rubber bullets in the dawn's early light Citizens stood for for justice Their voices ringing.
[00:50:22] Speaker A: Through the night.
[00:50:25] Speaker D: And there were bloody footprints where mercy should have stood and two dead left to die on snow filled streets. Alex Pretty and Renee Good or Minneapolis I hear your voice singing through the bloody mist we'll take our stand for this land and the stranger in our midst Here in our home they killed and roamed in the winter of 26 we'll remember the names of those who died on the streets of Minneapolis.
