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Unknown A
No one would have thought that Kenosha would have been one of the worst riots for that year in so many ways. Right, but that's exactly what happened.
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Unknown B
Right.
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Unknown C
What are your thoughts on, on whether or not the FBI will or should go after the funders of the riots and stuff like that?
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Unknown A
Because, yeah, I mean, I mean the different. I mean this Trump administration is just way better. I mean, in so many ways. But one of the ways is personnel. I mean, Chris Ray was the one that said, and he initially said, oh, antifa is not a movement, it's an ideology. Which is. Right. But what an ideology just doesn't exist in a vacuum. You have to have people to believe in it and promote it and to like, carry out what they believe in. So it's not, you know, it's a movement. It's a real's, real thing. He later, you know, I think, I think it was during, know, congressional testimony that he had to admit, okay, no, it is, it is made up of people, which is like, yeah, no, you're like, duh. So obviously Cash Patel is not, not that type Pambon. The Attorney General is not like a swamp donkey.
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Unknown A
Yeah, so think, I think a lot. I think those people are going to be in for rude awakening once they do carry out something. Obviously, to the extent of which they are going to act, that remains to be seen. But the. I just have, have a better, have a better faith that the federal government's going to do everything that they can to actually dismantle these types of groups, because that's what the people want. I mean, a lot of people, when, you know, when they experienced 2020, it was a really big wake up call. I mean, we pay taxes because we expect these public services to be operational and not just abandoned when things get tough. And that's exactly what happened in a lot of places. And so, I mean, no one, no one would have thought that Kenosha would have been one of the worst riots for that year in so many ways.
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Unknown A
Right, but that's exactly what happened. Right. And, and because people weren't prepared, you had the Democrat governor, you know, dragging his feet on sending him the National Guard. So it's just, people are tired of it. I mean, anytime I make jokes about it being right season, a lot of people are just saying, no, we're not going through that again. We're is'understandable Right. I mean, it's not healthy for the country to constantly experience that. But so I think Trump understands that. The Trump administration, the people he has understand that. So should Something happen. I think the hammer is going to come down on them a lot harder than back in 2020 for sure.
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Unknown B
I definitely agree with that. I do think like the sanctuary city stuff, I agree with you that the immigration issue is going to be the hot button issue and it'll take some kind of moment, some kind of instance of violence on behalf of ICE or whatever it might be. I think things could change very quickly in those sanctuary cities once you this really gets underway.
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Unknown A
I mean the whole thing is ridiculous right now because the main targets right now for these rates are hardened criminals or gang members or people that you don't want living next door. And this is something that I've written about on my substack where the Latino community is making the same exact mistakes as BLM did back five years ago. And that is they have an ends justifying the means policy and that means they're going to act out and do whatever. But the difference is because remember I said BLM had a 70% approal rating. That's why they were able to kind of carry it on for as long as they were able to. Mass deportations have an over 50% approvedal rating. So the Latinos who are burning the American flag when I was covering protest in la, a high schooler stabbe another high school in the back doing the street takeovers like acting foolish, acting like a bunch of idiots.
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Unknown A
I'mnn say it. They're only going to make mess deportations popular. Like I mean why would you waive a Mexican flag or the watermelon flag in the United States to advocate to stay in the United States if you were advocating for Mexico to take over America? Okay, like it's still doneumb but at least that makes sense. But if you're wave a Mexican flag in the United States to say no, we're staying, what the hell are you doing?
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Unknown C
Is it both your sense that the American people are on the side of deportations?
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Unknown A
For now. For now, yes. That might change again if something happens. Right, but for now, yes, but. And I think as again if these, these protests that I'sk I've literally have skin in the game on this. Right. Because I look like them. They are, they are. They're shooting them. They are. They're hurting themselves in the movement by acting that way. They are not making any sort of. They're not, they're not winning the public relations battle right now because they're fighting deportations of people that are like actual hard andd criminals. Yes. Other people have been swept up just by Proxy. But. And obviously, I think as time goes on, yeah, anybody who'in the country legally is going to be swept up. But you would think that you would want to wait before you start saying, like, you know, we need to stop deportations. Like, really, I want the of Aragua out of here.
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Unknown A
Yeah, you should do so. It's very. It's very interesting and it's frustrating personally, because it. Because what was the stereotype of illegal imignts prior, Prior to all this? It was people that would come in on their own dime, make a better life for themselves, keep their head down and just provide for their families. That was generally right. That was a general stereotype. Now it's people that just want handouts. I mean, they get taken care of every step of the way now from whatever country origin, through Mexico and then the United States, and they get the hotels and everything. And so they become entitled. That's like one of the biggest things I've heard recently within the Latino community, within the immigrant community, that these new immigrants, they are totally not like what people were that have been here for 20, 30 years. They just want handouts.
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Unknown A
A lot of them. Not every single one of them. But just from my reporting. Yeah.
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Unknown C
Do you think that that's a phenomenon that is because of the last four years? Because it's my sense that the general consensus, like Julio was saying, is that your average, whether they be illegal or legal immigrant, average person, probably from somewhere in South America, they came here, made it here, and they just wanted to come here for. To be able to work and have a better life. And I feel like that has changed significantly because of the border policies of the Biden administration. What's your.
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Unknown B
Well, we were at the border in March of 2021, outside McCallen at La Jolla. And the thing that I recall the most from that was a, people were coming in through the gaps in the wall, and B, every single person who was coming across the border that we talked to said, said, why are you coming right now? They said, yeah. Cause Joe Biden is president now. And they knew that they were gonna get free flights to the interior of the country and that they were gonna be able to basically get the handouts that we're talking about. So I think the difference. My question there is like, can we really blame those people? Like, those people. I'm not saying that they are like great people. You can. They're breaking the law. But with that being said, the Biden administration put a open for business sign on the southern border.
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Unknown B
And not only that, they said, hey, and to boot, we're gonna give you guys free flights to the interior. We're gonna put you up in a hotel for months, and we're gonna give you a prepaid credit card and cell phones.
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Unknown A
Yeah, no, it was a big pull factor, and that's what made the border crisis so egregious. Just because. Yes, but just by the United States being as is, thankfully, it's still prosperous, mostly that is going to draw people to the country to come Il leggally. But then you don't have to. The federal government shouldn't be encouraging that, which is exactly what they were doing. And then, of course, then the sanctuary.
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Unknown B
Cities and the NGOs by the. These Catholic NGOs in every one of these small towns, people might not realize there's no border patrol hospital. So this is all, like, local infrastructure that's taken care of this crisis at the border of these small towns that are along the border. And it's the NGOs. Like, I noticed in La Jolla specifically, that there was a Catholic NGO that was literally housing the people at the border until they were able to find whoever they were going to on the interior of the country and then providing them with everything that they needed to leave the border and go to the interior of the country. So with respect to what you're saying earlier about the NGOs, I think that that's another place to look for. Why is it that these charities are enabling this kind of stuff?
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Unknown C
Is it your understanding that it is mostly charities? Because I feel like it was a lot of actual fronts that USAID wereh.
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Unknown B
Yeah, invol for sure.
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Unknown A
I'd say it'd be like, I'd. It's about 15.
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Unknown B
It'd show up with, like, instruction. So these people were told exactly how to come up through Mexico and exactly what they had to say at the border in order to claim asylum. And that was like the UN had association. Usaid. Certainly those groups were participating in informing people on how to get across the border and how to game this system properly.
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Unknown C
Yeah, I find it. I find the revelations about USAID to be concerning, to say the least. And I think that they'it's. My understanding they. That they're a significant or they were a significant problem. As to our whole border conundrum. I've talked about the HHS program, the refugee Resettlement program that would just, you know, if you could get to the US border and get across, all you had to do is say you were looking for asylum, which is illegal. You're supposed to go to ports of entry if you're for asylum and claim asylum at a port of entry. But you could, if you get across and just look for a border agent to pick you up and say asylum. If you could articulate that one word, then you were set onto the refugee resettlement program and you were going to get food and water and like you were, like you both were saying earlier, a nice hotel room, et cetera, and it doesn't matter if you could speak English or whatever.
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Unknown C
So.
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Unknown A
And actually now that you mentioned that, because just yesterday the Trump administration is canceling the temporary protective status of Haitians that have recently come come across. And that I think is actually going to be particularly a reactionary group because obviously they don't want to go back to Haiti. And I would always hear from border patrol agents that if they ever encountered a Mexican, they just give up rightway. They're like, okay, fine, I'll go back to Mexico. They had to be careful with Haitians because Haitians would fight you.
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Unknown C
Really?
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Unknown A
Yeah. And actually Todd Benzin, who's a good immigration reporter and analyst, because everyone, because you know, he had like Columbbia complaining about why Colombians handcuffed and why are these people handcuffed on these deportation flights. He had a whole bunch of cases where Haitians were, once they realized that they're going back to Haiti, they would, they would destroy the interior of the airplane and the pilots are like coering behind the locked door. And then I do remember there was that case when they landed and they got the Haitians out of the plane. They tried to go back to hijack it and then another plane came in and they tried to hijack that one. And it was. So I think, I think that that has the potential to set up. But again, your point is that like yes, this, I'd say it was about 50, 50, like it's 50% the government directly and then you have the other half indirectly through the NGOs.
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Unknown A
But then it's like if you're being mostly funded by the government, how can you be a non government? I mean it's just by name only. Becausee sure'e sure. Obviously it's not a federal employee doing it, but it's federal money anyway.
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Unknown C
So yeah, I mean, I think that that's the point of it though. They're a non government organization, but they're getting federal funding and they're not hired by the government. They're not an actual bureaucracy. And that's all it takes. You can have endless amounts of federal money granted to you or given to you in grants or whatever and still be considered an ngo, even though you're doing the deeds that the government wants because the government's paying you the money. And so they, you know, I think that it is a misnomer. Thanks for watching this clip from the Culture War podcast. We're live every Friday, 10am to noon, so subscribe and come hang out.