A is for America: Recent Episodes
America's Voice
We spoke with Adriana Ruggiero, the California state director at America's Voice, who hosted an event in Los Angeles this week on the Latino vote in California in this year's midterm elections. We also play a segment from that event from pollster Matt Barreto of Latino Decisions (segment starts at 15:30).
On this episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke to Sylvia Manzano, a principal at Latino Decisions, about the new American vote from this year's midterm elections, how ballots are still being counted in some locations, and how the progressive movement can continue to build our power in 2019, 2020, and elections to come. (Interview begins 7:45.)
This week, of course, was the 2018 midterm elections, when Democrats made huge gains in the House and at the local and state level. Our state directors at America's Voice — Viri Vidal in Nevada, Mario Carrillo in Texas, Adriana Ruggiero in California, and Zachary Mueller in Kansas — joined us on the podcast to talk about the many exciting developments in their respective states, from victories to turnout records to history being made, and more.
Today, we're publishing a very special election-eve episode of our podcast with Ed Espinoza, the Executive Director of Progress Texas, who spoke about new American voters in Texas, record early voting turnout, and the Senate campaign of Beto O'Rourke. (Interview begins at 4:45.)
On this week's episode of "A is for America", we spoke with America's Voice en Español journalists Maribel Hastings and David Torres, who have been traveling the country speaking to new American voters in battleground districts and states. On the last leg of their tour, they traveled to Texas, met up with our Texas state director Mario Carrillo, and wrote about "Betomania". Read their content here. (Interview begins at 9:00.)
On this week’s episode of our podcast “A is for America”, we spoke with our own Adriana Ruggiero, Viri Vidal, and Mario Carrillo — America’s Voice state directors for California, Nevada, and Texas, respectively — about what’s going on in this last stretch of the 2018 midterm elections. They talked about what’s going with voter turnout, the organizations mobilizing new American voters, and how local campaigns are looking in the final two weeks of this cycle.
On this week's episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke with Daniel Nichanian, who is a fellow at the The Justice Collaborative Engagement Project and a writer at The Appeal. He recently wrote a piece about local cooperation with ICE and all the places where ICE is on the ballot this year. (Interview begins at 13:30.)
On this week's episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke with Diana Colin, Civic Engagement Director for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA), who joined us to speak about CHIRLA's electoral efforts this fall. (Interview begins at 10:15.)
On this week's episode of our podcast, we spoke with UCLA professor and Latino Decisions principal Matt Barreto about this year's midterm elections, the importance of the Latino vote, current polls, campaign investment into new American communities, and more. (Interview begins at 9:15.)
On this week's episode of our podcast, we sat down with the America's Voice politics team — Mario Carrillo from Texas, Viridiana Vidal-Gonzzali from Nevada, and Adriana Ruggiero from California — to talk about the midterm elections this year and the respective organizing challenges they face in their states. Key districts across the country this year are going to be crucial, and it's important that the ongoing GOP effort to divide and distract Americans this fall not succeed.
On this week’s episode of “A is for America”, we spoke with Matt Hildreth, our Political Director here at America's Voice. Labor Day has come and gone, which means that this year's midterm elections are really ramping up in earnest now. Republicans across the country are running on Stephen Miller's explicitly anti-immigrant strategy, even though we've seen in election after election that it doesn't work. New American voters have been making headlines all year, yet NALEO reports that 60% of Latino voters have not been contacted about voting. (Interview begins at 12:00.)
On this week's episode of "A is for America", we spoke with Hassan Ahmad, Esq., a Virginia lawyer who sued the University of Michigan for the release of white supremacist John Tanton's papers. John Tanton is the founder of anti-immigrant hate groups like the Center for Immigration Studies and Federation for American Immigration Reform, which have influence in Donald Trump's White House and play a role in determining American immigration policy. That means Tanton's papers are important — but they are sealed until 2035, a fact which Hassan hopes to change. (Interview begins at 13:30.)
On this week's episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke with Christine Neumann-Ortiz, Executive Director of Voces de la Frontera based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. This week, Voces de la Frontera Action won a major victory with the election of Earnell Lucas, Milwaukee's new sheriff, who stood against the anti-immigrant enforcement practices of former sheriff David A. Clarke, Jr. and his heir apparent Richard Schmidt. Voces Action and other groups worked to elect Lucas and defeat Schmidt through tireless canvassing, phone banking, and mobilizing efforts. As a result of Tuesday's win, communities in Milwaukee will be safer as local police decrease cooperation with ICE in the separation of families. (Interview begins at 14:50.)
On this week's episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke with Zachary Mueller, our own resident Kris Kobach expert who joined us to talk about how Kansas' Secretary of State may have just won a gubernatorial primary. (Interview begins at 14:15.)
Kris Kobach, Kansas' Secretary of State and a longtime national "leader" in all things anti-immigrant, is currently the winner of this week's gubernatorial primary by 91 votes. We talk to Zac about Kobach's ties to white nationalism, his recent court battles, his ambitions for becoming president, a possible recount, and more.
In this week's episode of our podcast "A is for America", we record from Netroots Nation 2018, the annual progressive conference that is being held in New Orleans, Louisiana this year. We spoke with a number of advocates and activists on the immigration issues that they're working on today and what catches their attention in the Trump era. (Interviews start at 13:15.)
In this week's episode of our podcast, "A is for America", we spoke with Susie Haslett, a policy associate at fwd.us, who is currently in Phoenix, Arizona working as part of a massive effort to help reunite families separated by the Trump Administration's "zero tolerance" policy. Susie, along with colleagues and partners including our own Juan Escalante, have been helping migrant families adjust to new lives, helping with social services, and coordinating flights for families to reunite with loved ones. Our interview with her begins at 13:00.
In the latest episode of our podcast, we spoke with Yaheiry Mora, Director of CASA in Action. Last fall, Republicans tried to use Trumpist, anti-immigrant messaging in the campaign for Virginia governor — and it backfired horribly. That route has also failed to work in numerous races around the country this year. Yet Republicans have made it clear that this is the strategy they'll be pushing in the midterms this November. (Interview starts at 14:10.)
In the latest episode of our podcast "A is for America", we spoke with Natalia Alonso and her mom, Monica, two local heroes who leapt into action after the devastating June 5 workplace raids on Corso's Flower and Garden stores in Sandusky and Castalia, Ohio. After the raid took away more than 100 parents, Natalia began collecting donations and supplies for the children, teenagers, and families left behind. Our interview with Natalia begins at 14:30, and you can donate to her Facebook page here.
On this special Fourth of July edition, Joe and Van recap the immigration news of the week, including Jeff Sessions' changes to the asylum process, abolish ICE, a California ruling in favor of SB 54, and the ongoing story about the separation of families.
The latest episode of our podcast, "A is for America", is set in Brownsville, Texas, where advocates led by the ACLU held a mass rally this week outside of a courthouse where migrants are being prosecuted. (Interviews start at 7:00.)
This week, we spoke with Ur Jaddou, former counsel with the Department of Homeland Security and the director of DHS Watch, a new project that works to hold the Trump Administration accountable for its anti-immigrant policies. We spoke about Trump's policy of separation children from their families, how this week's executive order won't do anything to help that, and how House Republicans have taken no action.
The latest episode of our podcast, “A is for America”, features an interview with Ghada Mukdad, a Syrian peace activist who fled her home country and currently lives in Texas. (Interview starts at 16:05.)
The latest episode of our podcast, “A is for America”, features an interview with Jon Rodney and Layla Razavi of the California Immigrant Policy Center, who spoke to us about the California Values Act and what hate groups have done to try and bring down the law in the Golden State. (Interview starts at 16:00.)
One conduit for this extremist strategy will be anti-immigrant laws at the state and local level. In Nevada, anti-immigrant opponents have been trying to get a discriminatory initiative onto the state ballot this November, which would change the state constitution to force local officials to cooperate with ICE on immigration enforcement. The initiative was barred from being put on this year's ballot due to language that the state supreme court ruled was "deceptive and misleading", though supporters of the initiative may try again in 2020. (Our interview with Amy Rose starts at 10:30.)
Frank Sharry spoke with our co-host, Joe Sudbay, about the last year in immigration politics and how Republican candidates have tried to ape the Trump anti-immigrant strategy — and failed to win every time. Americans have shown that they want to be brought together and that they want the country to move past divisiveness, yet all Trump and Congressional Republicans can do is offer increasingly ugly attacks. Democratic candidates running this fall should learn to lean into, rather than run from, immigration — especially since polls have shown that xenophobic attacks turn off voters of all stripes. (Interview begins at 6:10.)
Our Political Director, Matt Hildreth, traveled to Pennsylvania earlier this month to speak with Mustafa Kour, a Somalian-born immigrant who took refuge in Kenya before coming to the United States. Mustafa is now an entrepreneur, and one of the winner's of Lancaster, Pennsylvania's "2017 Great Social Enterprise Pitch", for a startup which brings diverse communities together. Mustafa has choice word for anti-immigrant candidates running this fall, and wants to remind them that refugees like him are human beings and Americans, too. (Interview starts at 10:25.)
Today is the 10th anniversary of the Postville, Iowa raid, which is still one of the biggest workplace immigration raids in history. Our Political Director, Matt Hildreth, traveled to Postville, as well as to Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, site of an immigration raid that happened just this week. Matt's interview with Rev. Hegar begins at 14:20, and the interview with Tar Macias begins at 25:05. Listeners who want to learn more about the Postville, Iowa raid should watch Abused, a documentary which is streaming for free this week.
In Texas, we've seen story after story after story of immigrant parents and children living along the border region who have been detained after medical emergencies forced them to travel through checkpoints. These stories have highlighted something most Americans probably don't know about the border area: that there are interior checkpoints which effectively wall in immigrants who live in places like the Rio Grande Valley. Tania Chavez, an organizer with LUPE, joins us to talk about what happens when immigrants can't leave their immediate town or region, for fear of being detained and deported. (Her interview starts at 11:45.)
In Tennessee, advocates have had a nonstop few weeks, first dealing with the aftermath of a massive workplace raid that detained 97 workers, with 54 still in detention. In the days following, 500 children missed school, and a community worked to come together. Yet the state legislature this week passed an anti-immigrant bill that will make communities less safe by mandating local cooperation with ICE. In the next few weeks, TIRRC and other Tennessee advocates will be mobilizing Governor Bill Haslam to veto the bill. Sign the petition to bring the Morristown workers home https://www.tnimmigrant.org/bringthemhome or donate here https://www.tnimmigrant.org/donate to contribute to the fight. (Stephanie's interview begins at 10:55.)
2018 is an election year, and we spoke to political science professor Melissa Michelson about what some of the best messages and techniques are for getting out the Latino vote. Professor Michelson has conducted more than 300 studies designed to boost voter outreach. Yet many candidates are still treating Latino voter outreach as an afterthought, despite the fact that there are huge gains to be made in this key growing demographic. (Her interview begins at 9:10.)
2018 is an election year, and Texas is — as always — apparently determined to have as few people of color vote as possible. Our Nevada State Director, Mario Carrillo, spoke with Travis County official Bruce Elfant about why it's so hard to register a voter in Texas, why Texas is 50th in the country in terms of voter participation, and why an under-emphasized law requiring Texas high schools to help students register to vote is so important. (Interview begins at 10:20.)
2018 is an election year, and one of this fall's key states will be Nevada, where Sen. Dean Heller (R-NV) is facing tough winds in his reelection campaign and right-wing Attorney General Adam Laxalt is running for Governor. Our Nevada State Director, Viri Vidal, spoke with Laura Martin, Associate Director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada (PLAN) about Nevada's key role in the 2012 and 2016 elections, as well as the current state of new American politics in the Silver State. (Interview starts at 8:30.)
Donald Trump declined to extend deferred enforced departure (DED) for Liberians, which means that thousands of Liberians — some of whom have lived in the U.S. for decades — will become undocumented and face deportation next year. Political Director Matt Hildreth traveled to Fargo, North Dakota to speak with Kennedy, a Liberian immigrant who has lived in the area since 2014, and Kevin, an advocate who reflected on the recent history of immigration in the area and how new Americans have enriched Fargo.
In Texas, one of the most anti-immigrant laws in the nation, SB 4, has been cleared for implementation. Our Texas State Director Mario Carrillo sat down with Zenen Jaimes Perèz to talk about SB 4, what it will mean for the state, and how such a bill came to be passed in the first place. They also discuss Texas’ voter ID law and how extensively Texas Republicans have worked to oppress voters, especially voters of color, in the Lone Star state. Interview starts at 9:30
Conor Lamb won a special election in Pennsylvania this week, and America's Voice published a new report explaining how Republicans have largely been shooting themselves in the foot by attacking immigrants. At Matt Barreto explains, Democrats would do well this fall to lean into the immigration issue, show immigrants and Latino voters that candidates care about them, and avoid running scared of ugly Republican anti-immigrant attacks.
Interview starts at 9:20.
"A is for America" will provide listeners a glimpse into the lives of immigrants and new American voters across the country. We'll be talking to Dreamers who still have DACA and those who don't, progressive writers who engage on immigration and other issues, grassroots organizers who are doing important work in this year's key election districts, experts, advocates, pollsters, and more.
Interview starts at 13:10.
ICE is becoming the political enforcer of Trumpism, and last year arrested 171% more immigrants without criminal records than the year before. Meanwhile, USCIS is sitting on 20,000 DACA renewal applications, even though it means that Dreamers are in danger of losing their jobs and may face deportation.
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There wasn't much immigration legislation news this week, but unfortunately, there's always a lot going on with Donald Trump's deportation force. A New York Times story this week about Customs and Border Protection underscored the abuses of power that CBP regularly displays. The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), normally a non-political agency, announced its decision to remove "nation of immigrants" from its mission statement — just the latest evidence that we're living under a white nationalist Administration. And Fox is considering making a movie about Hot Cheetos, which may turn out to be the most fascinating immigrant success story you've never heard of.
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The Senate voted on four immigration amendments this week — two of which would have created a path to citizenship for 1.8 million Dreamers and taken them out of the ongoing crisis where hundreds are losing status and work permissions every day. We talk about what this means and how Republicans cannot go on claiming that they want to help Dreamers when they have repeatedly done nothing to pass protections for immigrant youth. The ball is still in Trump and Congressional Republicans' court, and it's an election year. You can bet we'll be working to punish Republicans this fall for their complete lack of action for Dreamers.
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Immigration legislation may be coming to the Senate floor next week, but whether a bill will come up that protects immigrant youth without trying to mass-deport their parents is anyone's guess. Here's what we do know: Congress voted for a continuing resolution for the third time in eight weeks, and for the third time they did not include protections for Dreamers in the deal. March 5 is coming up, and hundreds of Dreamers are already losing status every day. How many Dreamers will have to fall out of status before enough is enough? CALL CONGRESS and tell them to take action.
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Donald Trump gave his first State of the Union address this week, and luckily, most reporters didn't try to write that Trump was "pivoting" or "softening" on immigration. As predicted, Trump gave a speech that "divides, denigrates and dehumanizes based on a worldview that some are worthy and most are not." He said that "Americans are dreamers, too" -- coded language which has already become a white nationalist rallying cry -- without acknowledging that Dreamers are Americans, too. Meanwhile, the March 5 official end of DACA continues to loom without Republicans making moves to protect Dreamers.
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The White House released its immigration proposal this week, and advocates have been calling it a "white nationalist wish list", a "legislative burning cross", a "ransom note for Dreamers", and more. Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, and Jeff Sessions broke DACA, and now they need to fix it, or the Republican Party will own up to the fact that it wants to deport Dreamers. Trump's proposal is dead on arrival; now it's time for the Senate to pass real legislation that helps immigrant youth. Narrow gets it done. Meanwhile, John Cornyn continues to make trouble while Border Patrol agents are boarding Greyhound buses in Florida. Know your rights!
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Are Republicans about to lead us into a government shutdown? Remember: Trump's party controls the House, Senate, and presidency. They have enough members in their caucus to pass a funding bill for the year. But because they can't get their own house in order, they have to look to Democrats for additional votes. Democrats want to keep the government open while funding CHIP, fighting against opioids, and passing the Dream Act. Republicans have offered no counter-proposals. It seems that Republicans don't have a plan — which means they should figure one out soon, because voters by an 11-point margin say they'll blame Republicans for a shutdown.
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A s---hole lot of immigration events happened this week, including Donald Trump's very racist and inflammatory remarks toward immigrants. Republicans are going to have to distance themselves from those remarks sooner or later -- it IS an election year -- and we don't want apologies. We want commitments and action on the Dream Act. DACA negotiations continue, and temporary protected status for Salvadorans was cancelled.
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It's still only the first week of 2018, but there is already so much immigration news. Acting ICE Director Thomas Homan said that we should lock up the elected leaders of cities with immigrant-friendly policies, which we think is pretty fascist. Motel 6 has been caught handing immigrant guests for the second time. The Trump Administration is preparing scary new measures for immigrants in 2018. And of course, the fight for the Dream Act goes on. It's 2018 now -- an election year -- and Democrats as well as Republicans should know that we're watching.
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Congress passed a continuing resolution last night that will fund the federal government until January 2018. Despite demands from Dreamers and advocates, the Dream Act was not included in this bill. But, that means that we'll be continuing the fight for legislation in January. We are delayed, but not defeated. Listen to what this vote means for us, what we think about members of Congress who didn't vote with Dreamers yesterday, and what's next on the horizon.
Intro by @daniellaraps
This week our special guests were Dreamers Reyna Montoya, Maxima Guerrero, and Jose Patiño, Dreamers with the #Vote4Dream campaign who have been relentlessly campaigning for the Dream Act on Capitol Hill since just after Thanksgiving. They bring stories of how members of Congress and their staff have reacted to the Dreamers' campaign, and why it's important that people call in and make it clear that this issue is important. Congress must pass some kind of funding for the government before December 22, 2017, which means that this week and next week are crucial in terms of making it clear to Congress that they must act. Call your member of Congress today!
Intro by @daniellaraps
This week our special guest was Michelle Nawar, a lobbyist and consultant with America's Voice, who gave us the latest updates on Dream Act timing and explained the legislative strategy behind passing the bill along with the omnibus before the end of the year. To make sure that members of Congress understand that, Dreamers and advocates in Washington, DC and around the country this week held rallies, demonstrations, vigils, acts of civil disobedience and more. If you support Dreamers, you need to be calling Congress about the Dream Act TODAY.
Intro by @daniellaraps
This week we hung out with special guest Gabe Ortiz, staff writer at Daily Kos and Twitter extraordinaire. It's almost December, which means it's crunch time for the Dream Act -- call your members of Congress and tell them they need to support legislation before the end of this year! Republicans are claiming that any government shutdown, if one happens, will be the Democrats' fault. But let's remember, Republicans own the whole government. They can either try and work with the extremist right-wingers in their caucus, or pass the Dream Act, which the vast majority of Americans support.
Intro by @daniellaraps
This week, we talk about Felipe, the Texas Dreamer with active DACA status who has been detained for almost a month and had his DACA taken away for no reason. USCIS has been rejecting DACA renewal applications for the flimsiest of reasons -- for example, some applications were in USCIS' mailbox on the day of the deadline, but USCIS didn't pick them up until the day after, and rejected them. We also talk about the Latin Grammys, African-American voters in Virginia, Thanksgiving, and more.
Intro by @daniellaraps
This week's episode was a special, elections-themed podcast that featured guest Julio Lainez, the state director of America's Voice Virginia. Democrats, immigrants, and allies won big this week in Virginia, electing a slate of progressive new candidates who reflect the diversity of America while defeating Republicans who campaigned on ugly anti-immigrant politics. We also discussed the Dreamer day of action -- Operation #DreamActNow -- that took place across 14 states today and featured 8,000 Dreamers and advocates calling on Congress to take action on legislation.
Intro by @daniellaraps
In this week’s episode, the AV team discussed the news that Donald Trump and Republican leaders don't want to attach the Dream Act to this year's must-pass omnibus bill. Remember: Republicans must pass the Dream Act before the end of the year, if they don't want to be complicit in the deportation of Dreamers. The omnibus may be the best chance to do that, so Republicans should be embracing the opportunity. It's getting to be crunch time for the Dream Act: call your member of Congress and tell them to support legislation NOW. We also discuss the last weekend before the Virginia gubernatorial race, as well as what's happening with Texas' SB 4 anti-immigrant law.
Intro by @daniellaraps
With 137 days left until March 6, 2018, we talk about the news this week that Border Patrol has detained a 10-year-old undocumented girl who had to go to the hospital for surgery, and now faces deportation. Does the inhumanity of Trump's Deportation Force know no bounds? We also talk about updates on the Virginia gubernatorial race, Jeff Flake's retirement, and more.
Intro by @daniellaraps
With 137 days left until March 6, 2018, we talk about Trump's "immigration principles", released this week, which Trump says he won't sign the Dream Act without.
In this week's episode, the AV team discussed reports that John Kelly, when he was chief of the Department of Homeland Security, ordered ICE officials to find stories of dangerous immigrants in order to justify raids that picked up immigrants who had committed no crimes. And we explain why we think Jeff Sessions may have colluded with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in the lawsuit threat that helped end DACA. Plus we give listeners an update on the Virginia gubernatorial race between Ed Gillespie and Ralph Northam.
Intro by @daniellaraps
With 144 days left until March 6, 2018, we talk about Trump's "immigration principles", released this week, which Trump says he won't sign the Dream Act without.
Intro by @daniellaraps
With 151 days left until March 6, 2018, we talk about the immigration news of the week, the VA election, and discuss Stephen Miller meddling with the Dream Act.
Intro by @daniellaraps
With 158 days left until March 6, 2018, we talk about the immigration news of the week, Trump's artificial Oct. deadline, new immigration polling, and the discharge petition.
Intro by @daniellaraps
We have six months, 180 days, to ensure Dreamers are here to stay! With this podcast, you’ll get a behind the scenes look at the campaign to defend immigrant youth.
On today's episode, we discuss the week's immigration news, the growing public support for undocumented youth, and preview the legislative fight that's to come.
Intro by @daniellaraps
We have six months, 180 days, to ensure Dreamers are here to stay! With this podcast, you’ll get a behind the scenes look at the campaign to defend immigrant youth.
On today's episode, we discuss the week's immigration news, the human cost of ending DACA, and preview the legislative fight that's to come.