Side Stories: ICE Stories w/ Kurt Braunohler & Thomas Kennedy

On the left. Sign Stories? Let's run the cannon for some started. Side stories. Yes.

Hello, humans, dogs, and cats that listen and watch side stories. My name's Ed Larson, of course. Today's going to be a very special episode.

“If you remember back, I did a whole episode on last podcast and a left that I”

led called the Florida files, pain in the Everglades. The thing that I realized about the Everglades, that was the saddest to me, of course, was alligator pelican or alligator alcatraz, as it is better known. It just hasn't set right with me. In a week after our episode came out, the place shut down.

And so, I wanted to find out what was going on there now. What's the state of Florida is like an immigration across the country in general.

So I'm sitting down with an amazing reporter.

His name is Tomas Kennedy. He's written for the Sun Sentinel, the Miami Harold, the Miami new times. And of course, he's part of the Florida immigrant coalition. He's going to be with me in a little bit. But first, I'm talking to a friend.

You know, because if we're going to get to the bottom of immigration, you really got to hear it from two white men. And so, I'm talking to a buddy of my carpron allure. And what happened to Curtis, I'm going to let him get into it. But his nephew is been detained by ice for over two months.

And they don't know what to do. And so, he's my friend. And this is directly connected to me. And so, as before, we get started with Tomas with some, with some really answers.

Curt and I are going to pose a couple of questions.

So, take it away, Curt. Fly from Northland. Welcome, Curt Pronellar. How are you doing, man? Thank you for joining me all the way overseas.

Well, I appreciate it, Ed. Yeah, it's, it's really crazy what happened to Nelson. Nelson Contreras is my nephew. He was married. He's, he is married to my niece, R.L.

When did they get married? They got married in June, early June. And then he had a routine, you know, immigration check-in in Philadelphia, which usually is he goes to a kiosk and just kind of like punches in saying like, "I'm here. I'm checking in."

Yeah.

You know, as is required by law, he is an asylum seeker and he entered the country

legally with asylum status and has had that status for the past four years. Where's he coming from? He's coming from Venezuela. He served in the National Guard and was asked to harm protesters. And refused to do so, which made him an enemy of the state.

Christ.

“So, what exactly happened in that situation if you don't mind me asking?”

Do you know? I do not know the details of it. It's all I know is that he was in the National Guard. Yeah. And because it was, yeah, there was protesters involved and he refused to harm

them and so that's kind of the situation that led him to not be safe in Venezuela. Wow. And how long ago was that? That was four years ago. Four years ago.

Okay. So he's been here for a while now. He's been here for a while. He's the kindest man. He's such a nice guy.

He volunteered so much at the non-profit near his house called Mighty Riders that they hired him full-time. And so he had a work permit. He was working full-time there. He was also picking up shifts in the evening at agricultural places.

Like, there's a mushroom farm nearby where it lives in Pennsylvania. Yeah. And he was like part of the community. I mean, he'd been dating my niece for years and then they just got married. And then it was just like less than a month after.

He goes to on a Thursday to check in for his immigration check-in. And they tell him that the Akiyask is broken. Come back on Saturday. And so he follows their instructions. Come back on Saturday.

Of course, federal buildings are closed on a Saturday. And ice is waiting there and they abduct him. This is a story I've heard a bunch of times. Which is very unfortunate.

“It was he the only person taking that day, was he like specifically targeted?”

Were they targeting like a group of people? I don't know that actually. That's a good question. But it did seem like they were this was their plan to tell people that the Kiyask was broken. So maybe they took a lot of people that day.

Because people are just trying to do right. They're doing anything they can to not go home. I mean, this is a man seeking asylum.

Because people are looking for him at this point. And also America has had an asylum process in place for decades. It's not like this is just some new thing that we're cooking up to drive.

This has always been a part of what it means to to be an American.

“Is that we allow asylum cases for people who are in danger in their country?”

Yeah. For at least my whole life, I know that much. It has been going on forever. This doesn't know, this doesn't know. So he's working in the community.

He gets married to your wonderful niece. He's doing everything he can. And then he gets taken by us. And this was in June. This was in June.

Oh, yeah. So he has now been incarcerated for over 60 days. As is typical, they shipped him far away from where he was detained and where. Oh, that's what they want.

Because they don't want anyone coming to visit him.

Because usually these people don't have any money. And when they don't have money, they can't take off of work. Or they don't even have enough money to go rent to some of it.

“Because you want to go see him twice, maybe.”

If you're going to take a whole day if they're far away. So you've got to rent the hotel rooms. Some people got to rent a car. Some people, they got to take off work. This whole thing could end up costing a thousand dollars just to say hi.

And then that experience alone is extremely traumatizing and not sweet like you open to be. Yeah. Exactly. So it takes, it takes her if she wants to go see him. It's an entire day affair of her driving all the way out to the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania.

We do know where he is. We do know where he is now. And we put money into his account so that he can text and he can make phone calls. So we've been in contact with him, which is great. You know, it can be a team.

Do they treat the real jail? I think they do. Also, by the way, all of these detention centers are privately run. You know, they're just making money.

“They're just making so much money off of what is going on.”

Steven Miller's invested in them. It's really, it's really infuriating. And so within 24 hours of his detainment, my niece filed a habeas corpus petition. And so then it went to federal judge, the federal judge pushed it off to an immigration judge.

And this is a craziest part. He had 30 letters from the community. I wrote one, my wife wrote one, 30 letters in support. He had 30 people in the virtual courtroom waiting. And then as his case was called, they just kicked all of us out of the virtual waiting room.

And then said it was some bullshit because of people have been recording the process or whatever. No one was recording their screen. Yeah. They kicked us all out. They said 30 letters of support didn't matter that he's still a,

he's still a flight risk. Even though the only reason he was taken is because he was following the rules. Yeah, don't they want to get rid of him? Don't they want him to be a flight risk? Like the flight risk meaning that he wouldn't show up for the rest of his asylum case hearings.

Right? But not that I don't know that he would leave. But which isn't saying. And so now that we've appealed that, it's gone to the federal judge.

I just found out like 15 minutes before I got on that the federal judge denied the appeal. And so now we're just looking at this incredibly long drawn out process. Because he had, he had an asylum date. Yeah. But that date was in December that date was for people who are not incarcerated.

And so now he has to get a new date for incarcerated persons. That which and he doesn't even have that yet. So now it's just this. So now he's looking to jail till at least 2027 if he's lucky. If he's lucky.

Yeah. I don't have a reason for a man who literally has been planting mushrooms, walking around having to job in the community. Just married in American, which he's going to be enough.

I always thought in my head until like last year that that was everything you need.

That was just you marry or you fall in love. You marry an American. You're an American. Yeah. You have like a you have a meeting with somebody at the state department.

And they're like, let me see pictures from your wedding. And that they like look out of a picture. It's a real wedding and then you're and then you and then you get a green card. And then you have a green card and then you're on a path to getting citizenship. It seems.

I've heard of even crazier cases when that which is what they were doing in Florida. Which where people would. Do the habeas corpus they would say they couldn't find because alligator alcatraz just straight up wasn't logging people into the system. And so they would file habeas corpus and when the habeas corpus was filed.

And then you would have to file a whole new habeas corpus.

And like it was just a process to keep going over and over and over and over again. So the fact that it only happened once to you guys is like.

“Almost a miracle because I think Pennsylvania is slightly better than Florida.”

And it's just like the whole process right now. And like the food they're being fed is horrible. What what how do you how do you what do you know about the treatment of his facility? Because I know over Delaney and New Jersey just a couple miles away is total. Nightmare.

Yeah and he and that it and that has like 300 people there. I mean someone just died at Delaney Hall. I live not too far away from Delaney Hall and it's insane. He is at one of the largest detention centers I think on the in the Northeast. It's outside of state college Pennsylvania.

And so the as far as I understand there have not been. It's just jail it's jail conditions as opposed to like treating human beings like animals conditions. So if that's you know it's like good no it's still jail right exactly.

No it's it's tough and so you're always kicked out of the zoom.

“I first of all why are you not even allowed to record the zoom.”

Who cares it's court. Who cares. Yeah it's what it matters like why what are you hiding. They're obviously hiding something because they know they're doing something wrong. No and also the judge would not let his lawyer speak just kept in.

Cook cutting her off and cutting her off saying like I've seen that she wouldn't allow the. The the lawyer on for Nelson to explain the summary of her you know of her motion. And then and then at one point. Apparently just turned her camera off and then the the you know the. The federal lawyer turned his camera off and then they were just both gone for like 15 minutes.

And then just came back and it was over. Have you met other people going through this through this process like when you guys are in. I'm sure your niece definitely has because she's been going to the detention center. But yeah like I've you know what else have you heard like I'm sure many people have shared their stories with you at this point.

“Yeah it I mean it's just you know my niece when she goes.”

It's just all families it's all families and if there's a family member who's been ripped literally out of their community over and over and over again. You know this is the same part to me is that this what's happening to Nelson is happening to thousands of people in the United States. And it's crazy these camps their it's crazy. Yeah I mean they are they are camps their concentration camps there's no way and the people get upset when you call them that.

Because they always go back to the Holocaust.

They're like oh you know they're not they're not putting people in ovens they're not doing this and either why you can't call them. I'll show it's was a working camp for multiple years before they started killing people. Now just at the end. Yeah yeah yeah I mean you're German you know they're your friends. They're right.

You know it's it's one of those things where it's like this is the beginning. They just recently said they with they deport people and they die mysteriously once they get back where they're going. They're not counting those deaths. This is what's happening right now. We're we are descending into straight up fascism.

There's no if and buts about it. Your family is directly affected by it. You're a regular ass white dude who's just like how white I am. And my family is not protected from it. Yeah this is the originally the agreement was if you're this white that your family is protected.

So this is all completely insane. There is a go for me set up for Kurt and his family and it's doing well. I suggest you go and check it out. It's on his Instagram but also there's so many people who have no one. There's so many people who are just going through this and being tortured in jail.

And it was from what I learned about alligator aquatres. There was not to scare you too much because I know you love this man. But they're literally putting people in the box. You know they're doing they're doing horrible things to these people in the middle of summer. They're taking away basic human rights.

They got their their water has parasites in it. It's it's awful. Everything is awful. What's happening right now. And you're deliberately torturing people who would be great Americans if we and their pay taxes.

This doesn't pay taxes. It doesn't pay check. You know it's multiple jobs. Yeah you know that every time you get paid through a work permit they take a bunch of the goddamn money. So it's not like he's not contributing to society.

It's not like he's not working for non-profits. They're stealing good people from good families. And now my friend is a victim. And it's insane.

And you gotta go and sick of people just sitting around and thinking that it's just going to fix itself.

We have to do something. You gotta get out there.

“You gotta talk about this as much as possible.”

Yeah here's someone at the dinner table saying that this is a good thing. You fucking yell at him because this is ridiculous. We're heading into disaster. Everyone's gonna have to leave this country if it keeps going this way. You know and so I'm sorry to go on a rant for you, Kurt.

But I'm sure you're blue in the face for this last two months. You're just supposed to be going out there and making people laugh. You're fucking sad all the time. You're just just helping. This is like the nightmare.

You know. Yeah I mean I think the main thing to keep in mind is like if it can happen to my family, it can happen to your family. It can happen.

I have wonderful members of my family who are from Peru and I get so scared for them all the time.

And it's just, they've been married to my dad and I just, at this point I don't think any rules matter anymore. And they're just taking people. They've deported Americans. They're taking people who served for this country. It is, it is all rules are out the window.

It's all about money. It is nothing to do with anything. It's not about keeping us safe. Nelson wasn't hurting anybody. Nelson was only helping people.

“And that's what they're more concerned about.”

People who are making it easier for everyone else. And yeah, no criminal record whatsoever. And also what this doesn't speak to as well as just like the level of fear that everyone has to live with because of the way that ice operates with no rules across the board. You know, I had someone contact me who's a close friend. Your son is married to someone who was not born in this country.

But she hasn't been able to get the green card yet. And so, you know, they were going to go to a movie or something. And she was like, oh, I forgot. She ran back. It was like 100 degrees out.

She was like, I forgot my sweater and she grabbed her sweater. And she's like, they're like, why do you need your sweater? She's like, I just, you know, in detention centers. It's really cold. I've heard.

And so I just want to have it on me in case something happens. And that has to be her everyday life. It's just normal at all times. Just normal. That's just a normal thing.

Yeah, I got my sweater because it's cold and jail for no reason. It's for no reason. This is fucking ridiculous. I'm really sorry that you're going through this book. Oh, my, my heart goes out to you.

I, in your family, I'm getting the word out the best I can. Please, everyone, just do something about this. Don't just sit there. This is just tearing apart normalized people all over this country. I do have any concerns. I'm talking to an expert in a little bit.

Is there anything that you'd like me to ask? Oh, I don't, I don't know about that, but I do know. I just want to tell everybody that. My, my niece and my nephew are from the sixth district in Pennsylvania. If anybody has any, knows anybody from the sixth district in Pennsylvania.

That might be able to help. Just wanted to get that word out there as well. Well, thank you so much for coming by, buddy. I love your current Kurt's been so good to me. My whole comedy career from performing in the back of a youth hall truck.

And, and driving us around and it's flying around everywhere. You're the craziest dude ever. The only show I've ever did that had a puppy parade connected to it. One of the great minds of my, of my comedy generation. And I love you so much, pal.

And I love you too. I can't wait for this all to get fixed for you and your family. You've none of no one deserves this. And including everyone else you don't know, they also don't deserve this. Get back to your vacation.

I love you. Thank you so much for coming to everybody. All right. Thank you. I'm your great.

Okay. Now I'm being joined by a man I admire very much. To be honest with you. His name is Tomos Kennedy. He lives in Miami.

He's a reporter. He's part of the Florida immigrant coalition.

“If you want to, if you're curious, what he's doing and what he's working on.”

Go to Tomos Ken on Instagram. That's T-O-M-A-S-K-E-N-N on Instagram to stay up to date on everything he's doing. He's got lots of articles in the Miami New Times. I believe you've written for the Miami Harold and the Sun Sentinel as well, which are very good papers. And it's an honor to be here with you.

First off, I want to thank you because when I did the Florida files episode,

and I talked about alligator aquatras a little bit, I reached out to Tomos. And I was like, "Please tell me what I'm doing wrong." And I believe you helped me a great deal. And I want to thank you for the bottom of my heart,

And I'm just a silly comedian.

And so it is nice to have someone who's very much smarter than I. I'm sure I'm not the case, but that's very generous in time. And I'm happy to have helped. He's a great conversation. So yeah, I'm happy to hear that.

Were you able, did you ever listen to the episode? I did. What did I get wrong? No, I'm just... I don't know anything that I can remember.

Yes, yes, I can remember.

“No, I think if it was horrible, you definitely would remember it.”

So right after the episode came out, alligator aquatras closed. Like the next week, it was so hard. It was very bizarre. So what's going on down there now that it's closed? I mean, so most of the people that were in there are unfortunately not free.

They're not, you know, they're not re-acquired of their freedom. The vast majority of people were transferred over to other detention facilities, whether in Florida or in other states.

And some were actually sent to jails, you know,

like regular jails that have been converted, at least parts of them, for immigration detention through federal agreements with the Department of Homeland Security. And these jails are, yeah, and these jails are way over capacity due to the optic and immigration enforcement that we've seen in recent days and recent weeks. So obviously it's a good thing that that detention facility, the alligator aquatras concentration camp is closed.

That's in and of itself a good thing, but that doesn't mean that conditions for the, for the detainees that were formally there have gotten better unfortunately. And so there are local jails now too.

“That's insane to me, because it's not a real, I mean, is it an actual crime?”

Are they charged with anything? When they're being held? No, I mean, you know, we've seen this statistics, but over 70% 71% of people in ice detention do not have a criminal history or criminal charges. That's, and that's the statistic that has actually held for the last two years as a constant, it's curious.

But no, I mean, most of them are guilty of anything as a civil infraction, right? Being in the country without authorization, but that doesn't amount to a criminal charge in most cases. Yeah, so obviously alligator aquatras was the worst of the worse. Where do the other detention centers like? And we're, we're to some of them. There's the one in close to Jacksonville.

That was a, there was deportation depot or something like that. And it's so stupid, right? I hate them so much, but yeah, but yeah. Yeah, they actually, you know, we actually, when they opened, they started selling home depot deemed merge. Yeah, that was deportation depot merge.

And we actually contacted with the help of a representative Anna Skamani who's a great lawmaker here in Florida. We contacted Home Depot's lobbyist and they actually had ended up themselves contacting the state of Florida and sent them a cease and the cease to get them to stop selling home depot deportation depot merge. So it's just a little tidbit. But yeah, I mean, that's, that's a facility. That's, that's a, a converted jail that they have adapted into an immigration detention site.

I mean, there's Glades County, which, there's another sheriff run facility that has historically had a contract to detain immigrants. Is that up by Glades Central Pahooki area? Correct, exactly.

“Then there's BTC, uh, I think that's brought our transitional center in Pampano Beach, which is a completely for profit privately run immigration detention facility.”

It's run by the geo group, one of the largest for profit prison companies in the United States, really the world. Um, then there's the Crohn detention facility, which has been out. That one's controlled by the federal government. And historically was a missile silo during the Cold War that was converted after, you know, the the Mariel boat lift. And that influx it was converted over time into a detention facility and historically it's been used as such.

But yeah, there's a number of detention facilities and in fact, there's now an effort by the Florida Department of Motor Vehicles, which houses the Florida Highway Patrol. One of the most cellist agencies in immigration enforcement in Florida, they just put out a document of expressing interest in acquire five or more facilities to be converted into detention sites. Which means that the Florida Highway Patrol is not just in the immigration enforcement business style. They appear to be attempting to get into the business of handling detention facilities themselves.

Isn't is that legal? I mean, we are in a lawless timing or in this country, unfortunately. I mean, look, we talked about this.

So it's a, you know, I don't want to get two in the weeks and more people, but you know, under the INA, which is the immigration and nationality act.

“There's a section called 27G, which is used to delegate federal authority to state or local entities to conduct immigration responsibilities, right?”

And where there is police or municipality or a detention facility, these legal agreements have to be signed because under the constitution, the supremacy clause gives the federal government, again, immigration responsibilities. So I think it all could just never sign these contracts. They were operating completely outside the purview of the federal government. Obviously with the blessing, but outside the purview of the federal government with no legal authority to detain immigrants. There was, there was an active lawsuit that was still pending when the place closed down, there was several, actually, but they did it anyways because they don't, they don't care.

Yeah, now was alligator, how could trust a private prison? No, alligator, how could trust? Well, sort of, how you don't, could trust was a state-run prison that was managed by the Florida Department of Emergency Management, historically tasked with dealing, you know, with emergencies like hurricanes, Florida, but they got our hurricanes are very popular in Florida.

Correct, correct, you know, they happen with frequency, but they got into the business of immigration detention, they actually spent more than a billion dollars of our emergency preparedness fund.

There was only nine million dollars left by the time that they had finished rating it, but so it was a state-run facility, but everything inside it was administered by contractors, whether it was, you know, health services, which were lackluster to say the least.

“Yeah, security, transportation, communications, the building, food, et cetera, it was all ran by vendors, and that's why they spent so much money on it because people were getting the back, right?”

I mean, all these contractors walked away with millions and millions and millions of dollars, more than a billion dollars, actually. Yeah, and it was all paid to play, too, because a lot of those contractors, they had donated it to DeSantis and then a couple weeks later, they would get these contracts to build alligator, racetrack, correct? You know, for example, and this happened numerous times, but a Texas-based company received a $6 million contract, days after giving the Florida GOP, the Florida Republican Party at $10,000 donation, so that's a big return on investment, right?

Absolutely. Oh my gosh, I wish we had that over here. So explain to me, I think I need a little help with this, but I'm pretty sure people at home definitely do.

“How does a private president make money off of immigrants being put there?”

It doesn't, it doesn't make sense to me. Well, one is from the contracts, right, that they are receiving from the federal government. But often times, I mean, the federal government subsidizes the beds, the beds means that each individual person that is detained, right? And there's beds for us. So these prisons have quotas in terms of how many people need to be detained there, which gives an incentive in terms of deporting people or not.

But it's all done through basically the transfer of taxpayer dollars, public funds, into the coffers of these private contractors.

Yeah, and it's, again, that's the geo group and core civic is another one, right? Core civic is a huge for-profit prison company in the United States. And again, these companies don't just do immigration detention. They also have regular criminal for-profit jails, which is also an, you know, it's an, it's an evil industry to be honest. It is, it is. And please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm going to say that a hundred times today.

Um, the, uh, don't do politicians, they invest in these places, right? Like a core civic and a geo group, like there are like Steven Miller I heard has private prison stock and he's the one making all these laws. Correct. Steven Miller has a stake in not just a for-profit prisons, but also companies that are creating surveillance technologies like Palantir for example. But the inverse of that is that these companies also invest in politicians through, uh, campaign donations, right? Yeah, I'll tell you a story from years ago, uh, there was a, I'm folks might remember this because it was like a big national controversy.

the county, that was just solely for underage minors for on a company migrant children.

And that facility was administered by a company named Caliburn, sort of like this global transnational company, and who sat on the board of Caliburn at the time?

“And it's subsidiary CDR John Kelly, who was, if you might remember, he was not only Trump's first, uh, a homeless security secretary, he went on to be his chief of staff, right?”

So, I, I said it to highlight, there's, whether it's that instance or, you know, Steven Miller profiting off of Palantir and for-profit prison companies, there's a revolving door of circular financing, right, where like these people go into the public sector, they institute this predatory detention and enforcement policies,

and then they take a stake on the companies that carried out and turn a profit themselves.

How was DeSantis using the money from alligator alcatraz personally? That's a great question. So, there was great reporting by the Florida Phoenix and other outlets here in Florida that showed that, as I told you, the Florida Department of Emergency Management was their entity responsible for alligator alcatraz. They were rating our emergency fund, Florida's emergency fund, and it turns out that they were pretty much grifting with it. They were, they were, they were receipts that they used the money on a private hotel stay set at resorts, like Margaritaville.

They were, they were running all over the world. That's where business in politics is conducted in Florida. And they were running bar tabs at Margaritaville and other bars in places as far as Tallahassee, which is nowhere near alligator alcatraz. They were paying for catering for things nowhere near alligator alcatraz, not that it should matter, but, you know, that's to the grift. They were paying for private jet charters for car rentals.

That's like a hundred thousand a pop for private jets. That's expensive, man. The abuse of this of this funds was so egregious that the Florida legislature, which, you know, I served as pretty much a rubber stamp for, you know, whatever the governor is wanted to do in the last eight, nine years. They actually passed the bill obstructing some of these expenditures because it was just so corrupt and grifty. Man, that is nauseating.

“Now, alligator alcatraz closed that land, is it gone back to the Micasukhi people or is it still government on land?”

I'm sorry, I do have to add one more insane expenditure. They spent, and I'm not kidding here, two hundred and nineteen million dollars on one port-a-potty company called duty calls. One port-a-potty company, so in a nineteen million dollars, but to your question.

So the actual land was never in possession of the Micasukhi tribe, even though it is on the big cypress preserve and it's a decent to their reservation.

It is owned by Miami-Date County, and it sits an air strip that was part of an abandoned plant to build was most called Jetport Everglades, which at the time was going to be largest airport in the world. It was fought against by a bunch of environmentalists, because they wanted to, you know, they were concerned about the impact to the e-co-system. Yeah, you've got the mangroves and everything down there. You can't be running the biggest airport in the world on a swamp. It's a bad idea. Correct. It was abandoned in the sixties, but there was one air strip that was built and sort of abandoned, but it was used by Miami-Date County as a training airport for small to light aircraft.

“So that's what it's been historically, and the state of Florida ceased the land from Miami-Date County, a common deer there for a year.”

Now it's reverted back to Miami-Date County, so Miami-Date County is back in possession, and everything in there has been dismantled. There's still an active lawsuit related to the environmental impact and damage that the site did for the past year. So there's one of the largest aquifers and Florida down there, right? I mean, it's not just that, you know, it's the mangroves, it's the aquifer, it's just the, the over the ground water, the wildlife, Florida Panthers, which have been historically in danger than only in recent years, you know, their population has began to increase.

because of the impact to wildlife, reptiles, birds, especially, so you know, but the, or attorney general James Oothmeyer and the governor looked at the facility and said,

"Oh, has an air strip, we can execute deportation flights," and that was just, I think, the sold determining factor in picking that place, which is insanely idiotic,

“but that's how we're governed here in Florida.”

Is he the guy who said that the whole have to face the alligators and the pythons of the escape, is it the same dude? Correct, yeah, he was the one way in, one way out, anyone who is caves, there's the Panthers and pythons and alligators waiting for you. Yeah, he's, he's like, he's like, got straight up little Nazi, I mean, like, that's the fascist. Yeah, also, get rid of the pythons, they're not supposed to be there, do your job, get rid of the pythons, bro. What if they don't win here?

But unfortunately, there were two busy grifting with the emergency funds to do that in running bar tabs and in liberty bar until I have to. That is wild. And I tell you, as someone who's drank a lot in Tallahassee, to run up a bar tab that high, there is pretty hard to do. Correct, it's a cheap, it's a cheap time to drink. Yes, it's a expensive time there.

So what's the situation going on right now in Miramar at the Ice Enforcement Removal Operations Center? Because I know that, because they took on a lot of the people from alligator alcatraz and, and so it's kind of chaotic down there, right? Now, or am I my incorrect? No, you're correct. So Miramar has an Ice Facility that serves as a processing center.

I check in centers where people go to basically, you know,

objudicate their asylum claims or any other sort of immigration process to meet with Ice, right? Yeah. Historically, you can get apprehended there.

“Sometimes you're not, you know, it's an nerve-wracking interview if you have to go there.”

But obviously under this administration, the apprehensions, the arrest have increased dramatically. And also the enforcement on the ground where we see everyday in the streets. So because there's no more space in detention facilities. Like, I tell you, they're starting to hold people not just in criminal jails, regular jails that they've converted, but also in these administrative offices.

So, and there's actually a judicial federal order that prevents them from holding people immigrants, specifically, in these administrative facilities for more than 12 hours overnight, right? Despite that, they're holding dozens of people. I mean, 70, 90 people per of these large rooms. They converted the garage into a holding facility.

And they're holding dozens and dozens of people for over a week.

So they can finally transfer them to whatever their space.

You know, these places don't have bathrooms.

“They're not equipped to, you know, to be a detention place.”

There's no food. People aren't able to shower, brush their teeth. They're sleeping on the floor piled up on top of each other. And you don't have to take it from me. We actually worked with a congresswoman here in Florida who visited and saw with her own eyes.

The conditions on the grounds she went out and did a press conference. She was reported on the Miami-Heralds, but the conditions are pretty bad. Yeah, they're, like, they're, like, the waters filled with, like, parasites. And, like, they could see things swimming around on the water from what I was told. Yeah, correct.

And so, but also people who speak out about the mistreatment, they end up getting punished. Correct. Often, the guards will lash out at them, or they'll get solitary confinement and stuff like that. Have we been seen? Is that persistent?

Because I know that was happening at alligator racetrackers. Yeah, alligator racetrackers. I mean, the treatment was so bad. We worked with our mistreatment to national on a report. And we were contacted by a family member.

And we ended up being, we ended up being getting in touch with detainees themselves. But, and this happened numerous times. And they would punish people by, with something called the box, which was a two by two feet. We talked about things. We talked about things.

Yeah, where they would chain people to the ground and leave them exposed to the sun and mosquitoes. For five to seven hours outdoors in the heart floor at a summer, I mean, brutal. And, you know, I'm just international found this to be, to constitute a torture, this sort of punishment. But, you know, recently, here in downtown Miami, where I told you they're holding people in a regular jail at the federal detention facility. Again, it's a criminal jail.

They come into your two floors for the holding dozens of people. Amen. Spoke to his wife, Cuban couple, and told her about the mistreatment, the lack of food.

And they were forced to sleep overnight on soaking wet mattresses. She went, told me, did an interview with the media about this.

“And then that he was placed in solitary confinement for, I think, two weeks as punishment.”

Completely insane. Just for saying, "My mattress is wet." Yeah. That's not... No, go ahead.

No, I mean, we're agreeing with each other. I also want to reiterate that, and this is going to sound like silly to say, but immigration detention, the way it's codified, it's not supposed to constitute a punishment in the way that, let's say, criminal detention is, right? It's literally supposed to just be, you're being held,

while your immigration situation's being adjudicated or resolved, right? And the way it's written like this is because it's supposed to not be cruel or torturous, or again, constitute something that can be described as punishing.

Obviously it is always, but, you know, these conditions are just exacerbating and getting worse.

I mean, jail effectively is punishment for a crime. You know, and if these people are being held in jails that they are being punished, it's not hard to put it all together. The way people just turn a blind eye to all this stuff is nauseating. Earlier in the episode, I talked to a friend of mine, Kerr Pranellar,

is a great comedian. His nephew is currently being held in a detention center in Pennsylvania. He was seeking asylum from Venezuela. He was part of the National Guard there. And he refused to attack protesters in Venezuela.

And so he was seeking asylum in America. He was trying to go through the process. He went, he was literally showing up to his appointment. And they said, come back on Saturday. And because the Kiosk was broken.

And then when he came back on Saturday, I saw rest of them. And he's been in detention for 60 days. And it doesn't look like he's going to get out this year. Because they keep pushing back as asylum case state.

“And I think that's something that's happening all over the country.”

My question is, do are we taking anyone for asylum right now? What is our asylum process?

Because we've always done that.

Yeah, at your point, you know, these people that I'm describing at this federal detention facility in Miami. Most of them were previously held in alligator alcatraz. And some of them are eight, nine, ten months into their detention. I mean, they've lost a year of their life.

You know, life is short. You know, overall life is short. Well, you have like 60 years if you're lucky, maybe 70, 80 years of life. If you're if you're if you're lucky. Yeah, you know, these people lost a year of their lives, you know?

Yeah, and these are people who don't have money. They're, you know, and if you don't have money in this country, I'm sure they don't have a life health insurance. I'm sure they're unhealthy. And it's hard for them to get the medicine they need for problems.

They don't even know they have.

“Because they can't go to the doctor when life is good.”

So it's, it's, it is torture and people are dying inside of these places. Uh, at what rate are people dying? Like how often do people die in detention centers in Florida? All right. I do want to address your, your last question though.

Our asylum processes have been completely, you know, the, the, the, as much hammer has been taken to them, right? I mean, it is very difficult to resolve an asylum claim positively in the United States right now. Uh, because USCIS has been, you know, the, the sort of agency that administers, uh, immigration case work outside of enforcement has been completely gutted.

Immigration judges have been fired and replaced with Trump's style lackeys. Obviously, the Department of Homeland Security is so aggressive and it's enforcement and they're targeting people and detaining people with active, uh, pending asylum claims that haven't been denied or anything like that. So, you know, and obviously, our refugee resettlement here in the United States

also has been, you know, completely gutted. I mean, you know, I'm sure you've read the headlines about Trump wanting to accept so pretty much solely, uh, whites how that forgets us. Yeah. Yeah.

So that's, that's it. It's what he wants. What he said. But yeah, they've, they've, you know, they've really destroyed, um, the system. But I believe, uh, I'm, I believe 112 people.

I believe 112 people have died so far in ice detention during the second, just, just the second Trump administration. Man, you know, I grew up in South Florida. I love it down there.

Uh, it was always home to me.

It's where I consider home, even though I'm probably never to live there again.

Uh, but, uh, you know, I worked in kitchens, you know,

I made buddies with Cubans and Dominicans and mostly Haitians. And I know that they're all great people. I know that Haitians make South Florida work. They are, you know, because they forget restaurants. They're health care.

They're in nursing homes. They're in home health.

They're helping all the old people stay alive.

And, uh, right now there is a crackdown on Haitians in particular.

“And, who I believe should be, all of them should be eligible for asylum seeking”

because we've destroyed Haiti through earthquakes and neglect. And, you know, and just taking the money that's donated and put it back in the businesses rather than communities. You know, there's, I know that there's communities in Haiti that are completely run by gangs. There's, you know, there's, I've heard reports of 10,000 people sharing four tickets, you know, three bathrooms.

It's not great over there right now. And, right, and so now we're deporting people from the, the Haitians are being targeted and being deported back to Haiti. Can you, can you, you live in little Haiti? Can, what, what's your community like right now?

“Yeah, and just a recommendation for the audience.”

There's a great book. I'm sure many of, actually, of the listeners far probably familiar with it. But if you're not black Jacobins, a story of the Haitian revolution that kind of sits the stage of how Haiti has been pillaged by a foreign intervention in the last, you know, a century or so. But I highly recommend the book, black Jacobins. But yeah, so temporary protected status, which again, did legal protections to 350,000 Haitians, 150,000 who reside here in South Florida has been rescinded.

By the Trump administration, there was a lawsuit that escalated to the Supreme Court and, or far right Supreme Court, unfortunately, gave Trump a green light to proceed with that. So there's 250,000 people. Many of them even here for years and years and years, they have homes, they have mortgages, they have cars, they have loved ones, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, husbands, children, family co-workers. You know, their lives have been uprooted and it's not just, they have, they're not the only ones impacted, right? Everybody that interacts with them, their employers or co-workers, et cetera.

I mean, it's created a lot of chaos in our community and, you know, we're seeing enforcement every day.

I mean, I put this on my Instagram. I was driving home on Sunday and I stumbled on Northwest Second Avenue by Jackson Memorial Hospital.

Major thoroughfare here in South Florida in Jackson Memorial Hospital is one of the biggest hospitals in the country. Correct. Yeah. For, for unmarked vehicles blocking the road completely. And there were like five, you know, ice guys, obviously with their faces cover, with the masks and everything, stopping and Uber car, forcing the passenger out. I talked to the passenger that I learned what was going on, arresting the driver. I was, I was right, I write a motorcycle, I stopped, I immediately started filming and you know, asking what was going on.

They rapidly got into their car, they took the guy's car, they took him and they just drove off. Like, it's something out of a dictatorship, you know, I mean, I'm from Argentina in the 1970s. We had a military junta who'd like disappeared people, picking them off the street like that. And then I talked to the passenger and I was like, what happened? It's like they were targeting the driver and they don't even have to get out and get out and walk or get another Uber. And we see that every day, we see them picking up patience in, in, in our neighborhood. There's a very famous restaurant in South Florida in, in, in Miami called Chef Creole.

It's the most, probably the most famous Haitian restaurant in Miami. And the owner recently made national news because he came out and did an interview and said, they're deporting all my workers. I'm going to have to, there's several, it's like a local franchise at this point or he owns several of them. I don't know if it's a franchise, but he said, I'm going to have to close at least two of my restaurants because I don't have staff, but then he admitted, and I voted for Trump. I voted for Trump because I thought he was a good businessman, he was going to be good for the economy, but he hasn't been good for the economy.

“So you have to go, people really have to choose what they're doing. How are you as a Haitian man?”

You know, going to vote for a guy that said, your people are eating cats and dogs, and he's promising. He would be promised to deport, not just your workers, man, but your people, you know, our people, we're all immigrants. It's not just about nationality, but I don't get it, but obviously the guy was roasted alive. Yeah, I've seen a lot of it, you know, down, it's been Florida especially, but I even out here in Los Angeles and San Diego, I see a lot of it. I see a lot of immigrants, we're very pro-Trump. A lot of Cubans, which blows my mind, very, very pro-Trump. What do you think that is?

They, you know, they grow small plants for people to buy, and he was saying, I'm going to have to close down because they're deporting all my workers. He said, I tried to pay people $30 an hour, people don't want to come to this work, it's difficult work. Yeah, and he said, I'm going to have to close down, I've been here for decades, but then at the end of the day, they asked them because he said he voted for Trump. And he said, no, I actually don't regret my vote for Trump, but, you know, he needs to stop deporting regular people, he needs to focus on the criminals.

“I'm like, brother, you did you miss the nasty deportation science during the United States?”

You know, I don't know, I think it's just like a, people are programmed a certain way. Like, it might be the anti-communism fervor that people in this town have, I don't know what it is, but it's inexplicable. A lot of people are turning a page on Trump, I think, especially people who have been personally directly impacted, but then there's other people like that that are said, We'll say, I will have to shut down my literal livelihood because of this administration policies, but you know what? I just, I don't know, there's too many folks shouldn't university, so fuck it.

I don't know, I don't get it. And then it's crazy down there and like all my little protests, you know, it all comes down to like these, you know, for example, it's now DJT international,

“instead of PBI for West Palm Beach airport, it's like, well now I'm never flying there.”

Like now I go visit people in Boca, I gotta go to for a lot of them in Miami because I can't bring it to me to buy a ticket to Donald Trump airport.

And historically, you know, we name things like that, like after you were done, yeah, like when someone that I don't, I don't think we should never name it.

It's after Trump, honestly. But it's like, we do that for a reason, right? Because we don't, it's like, it feels dictatorship to name things after people who are alive, but, you know, you know, that's the goal of that. But, um, so Miami, I love Miami, it's a beautiful place, means the world to me, it's probably got 15 years left on the surface. Um, the, uh, are they, they're cooperating with ICE, correct? Like the city of Miami. Now, is it the mayor, like, who is, because I, or, or stop what I asked, I have to ask this question, because this, I, I haven't heard much about it since it happened.

And the mayor of Miami, did they really cancel elections just so they could be the mayor longer? Is that something that happened or am I mis, misinterpreting an article I read?

They tried to, so they tried to basically, well, whatever you're referencing, they, they tried to move municipal elections from odd to even years to align with the regular calendar.

But they did it in a way that would grant them an extra year in office.

“If you guys move the election, you have to move it so you lose a year if anything. You can't move it so you gain a year, because we didn't elect you for that year.”

So ultimately, they, um, backed off from that and they could, a referendum on the ballot that, that, that, the voters approved of. So we didn't move to even years, but, you know, but it wasn't through executive action of the commissioners. So this is the person we're dealing with and they're working with ICE directly. Yeah, so, this, remember these 27G contracts established in this collaboration? Yeah, I, uh, Florida accounts for 40% of these type of contracts nationwide.

So many municipalities and cities have signed these agreements, but there's a state law that compels certain municipal entities to enter them. Squarely, those that operate a jail or detention facility. City of Miami does not operate a jail. They enter this agreement voluntarily. There was nothing compelling them to do so they did so last year. And that created a firestorm in the city that has only grown over time due to the, the enforcement, detention, the economic policies, Trump's own popularity, et cetera. In late last year, we had municipal elections in which the first Democrat mayor was elected in well over almost two decades.

Her name is Eileen Higgins and she campaigned on rescinding this police ICE collaboration agreements. I mean, she spoke about it numerous numerous times.

And when she was voted into office, she stopped talking about it, never addressed it.

Even though she can, she can put it on the agenda for it to be voted on. And three out of the five commissioners have single that they would vote so for it to, to be rescinded. They could also place it on the agenda to be fair, but she campaigned on it and she hasn't done so. And the, the only thing that she's been focused on is a bond item that will be voted on in November to give more money for,

But just completely abandoned and displaced to protect our immigrant neighbors.

You know, and that's, that's our, our first Democratic mayor in almost two decades.

That's insane to me. That's so aggravating. So my amy's a town where some neighborhoods, the stop sign say alto, you know, like it's, it's not for us. And for them to be attack immigrants is so counterproductive, especially if you're a Democrat. It's insane to me and focus on the climate change, the beach is washing away, but it's coming in three blocks. It went, the moons in the wrong place. It's, it's, it's crazy what's happening down there. And it's not just, it's not just that she's a Democrat, right? It's that she's a Democrat that campaigned on the issue.

And one, like decisively, well, speaking on this, you know, like you do, you do have a popular Democratic mandate to act on this. And you know, the five commissioners are signaling that they would vote for you, like, what is the hold up here? And it's been, it's been seven months in certain election. What is the hold up?

“Yeah, no. If the only thing you've done is getting more money for cops, you know, not, you don't like it.”

But you're, the people you work with, the Florida Immigrant Coalition, y'all are, you got a campaign to raise awareness for this, right? Yeah, we've been for months. I mean, recently we were able to convince one of the commissioners who's a pretty decent commissioner actually to put it as a public discussion item. Over a hundred people showed up every single one of them spoken opposition for over almost four hours. You know, we've sent out mass texts to city residents. We've done a phone banking, email blasts, et cetera.

We've met with some of the commissioners, you know, to try to move this forward. Now, we're putting up a series of billboards along the I-95 and the Little Havana neighborhood targeting the mayor and commissioners to try and get them to act on this. And I'm a radio at as well in Spanish language radio targeting I lean higgins for her failed promises. Great. Thank you. I appreciate that. There is, there's a couple things that I need to ask you because I, I'm just, I don't understand them.

“The first thing is, what is this I've heard that this administration is stopped reporting deaths of people released from ice detention?”

Is that, is that something that I, am I, am I just completely off base here? Or because I read, I think it's one of those things where I read a headline and I pass and I keep going and then I don't know what they're all talking about. And so I just want to make sure I'm understanding things properly. I read it too and, and quite frankly, I don't really understand the mechanics of it either. I think it's just one of those like, lawless things from this administration.

Some things that they do historically, and this is something that ice is always done, but, you know,

again, these are things that are systemic, you know, to just how the DHS and detention operates, but they exacerbate, they fester and grow worse under Trump. We start on the first and second administration, but they often play around with the dates when someone dies. And they won't report it until like later, you know, when there's like news that will cover it up or they'll like avoid reporting it on like a Tuesday and instead they'll do it on a Friday because it's, you know, it's a new stump day. So that's something that's very frequent day. They definitely play with dates to minimize coverage.

So it's kind of like trying to new stump, like, you know, dump it. Wow. Because like, my brain is like, oh, they're not telling us who dies at the camps. That sounds pretty Nazi coded to me. You know, that's when it starts taking the step over from being a concentration camp to a death camp.

And so I was, frankly, terrified. And the other thing is that like every single death, you know, that happens in these detention facilities is they're all suicides. Everyone is a suicide. Every single one's a suicide. And quite frankly, some of them are probably suicides, but, you know, then it turns out there was one,

I feel like their entire life taken from them, you know? Right.

“But there was one, for example, where it was, I forgot which face I think was in Louisiana, but I don't remember,”

but there was one where a man was ruled as a death was ruled as a suicide. And then the autopsy revealed that he had, like, strangled marks, like asphyxiation marks. And then the autopsy ruled it as a, what's a, asphyx, forced asphyxiation or whatever.

So, you know, like, I just always stress both people, especially journalists, like,

don't take what DHS and I tell you at face value. Like, if they say someone died of a suicide, like, I do not accept that explanation until further review of the situation.

Because they're not cops.

They're not, right? They're, they're just people they hire and they get to choose. Correct. And what's the training like for these people? I mean, poor.

“I think it all could show us, which is a state-run facility, as I explained to you, managed by the floor to the part of emergency management.”

It wasn't a privately-run facility as we established. That facility had almost no ice presence.

It was all for the highway patrol.

And inside mainly, it was private contractors. Private vendors that were doing the security. So, they just hire, you know, just people and train them poorly and let them loosen. Obviously, look, I federalized the tension is bad, but I think it's, it's all terrible. It should be abolished.

But when you, when you move it to the for-profit motive, obviously there's an incentive to lock people up. But there's less accountability and transparency.

“It's the same thing with these floor cameras, right?”

There's for example, like vast surveillance networks,

in dictatorial countries, or even like Britain, right? That it's like almost surveillance countries on earth. But I think there's a difference between this surveillance is owned and administered by the actual government. There's more accountability and there's more of a civic processes to affect outcomes, right? And in the United, it's all bad, right? The United States weren't just outsourcing or surveillance or enforcement and our detention to private companies that are just completely outside the balance of like civic and democratic processes.

And I think it's extra disturbing. What's up with Argentina taking on Peter Teele? What does that, you're from there? What's going on there? What's that? How illegal is that?

How would they save it money? Well, I mean, that's our insane, unwell, our narco-libertarian president, have your mule. I mean, he, you know, he met with him and he had a, I think it was in the financial times. He published an op at saying that he wanted to allow for completely AI-ran corporations to be chartered inside of Argentina. Just like, again, AI-powered companies.

You know, Peter Teele, I think he's just picked a developing, you know, country under the thumb of the IMF that's being treated as a colony of global capital to sort of experiment, you know, with these free market interventions, right? But I don't know if you saw the group of, of Gandals, people dressed as Gandals went to this mouse to, to protest him, so, you know, people, people are angry about it. People are getting frustrated with this, this experiment on, with libertarianism and Argentina that's just been an absolute disaster.

And hopefully next year is the presidential election there. Hopefully we kick this guy out of office on shortly after kick Peter Thiel. So before we go, I just want something because everyone needs an action item, you know, because if we just sit here and we talk about it, that helps a little bit, but you need something to do.

“In your opinion, what do you think is the best way for an average person to fight ice legally?”

I mean, if you're in Florida, you know, contact the Florida immigrant coalition, contact me on Instagram or whatever, and get involved with us. I mean, we're not just one organization also, we're, we're our coalition, we're 50 organizations, including labor unions, faith organizations, service providers, legal organizations, grassroots organizations, university groups, et cetera. So there's a lot to pick from, we should get involved with us, not just us, but aside from that, you know, I think it just starts with finding a political home.

Like if there's no group in your area or you just completely don't feel represented, then go ahead and start your own, but more than likely, there is a place that you can volunteer with instant nonprofit or a labor union or DSA or whatever it is. I think you can find somewhere where you'll meet like-minded people where you, you know, and you can all row together towards a share objective. Because, you know, obviously, DHS is a giant octopus, you know, it's a Titanic organization that's vastly funded and has a lot of resources.

And, you know, we, you know, no lone wolves here. We don't, you know, no lone heroes are going to take it down. We have to unite and again form political organizations that can affect outcomes. Thank you so much for talking to me, buddy. If you want to, if you want to check out the Florida Immigrant Coalition and what they're doing over there on Instagram, it's FL immigrant.

So, go follow him as well. Tomas T-O-M-A-S-K-E-N-N on Instagram to stay abreast to everything that's going on. Thank you so much for talking to me, and thank you so much for just being you, man.

“I appreciate the hell out of you. Thank you for taking care of my home. I miss it. I can't wait to come back there and maybe hopefully live there again one day.”

You're the man. I hope you're run for office. Oh, thank you. Come visit us on the drink. I will. February. I'll see you. I'm glad to win a cruise out of four a lot of them. Well, that was a hoot knife. We had a good time. Lots of laughs. Nothing's wrong. Everything's fine. I appreciate everyone coming in and listening and watching side stories.

I like doing these follow-up episodes because there's, I feel like, with knowledge, it should never end.

And you know, you never an expert on anything. So always keep learning about what is happening about things. Stay up to date on them. And so I'm glad that we stayed up to date on what's going on in Florida with the immigration community. Follow and get involved with the Florida Immigrant Coalition. Follow Tomas on Instagram, Tomas Ken and Kurt Bronholler on Instagram. Go see Kurt Live. Kurt's one of the greatest comedians I've ever known. He's so funny. He's, I don't take today as an audition for Kurt's comedy.

You know, is this Ego see him live. If he's coming to your town, it's, you're going to have the best silliest time.

“I adore that man. Go check him out. If you want to see me on the road, I'm going to be in DC on September 11th and 12th.”

I'm going to be fun. Hopefully they won't kill me for this episode, but I'm in town. I'm then I'm going to be in Milwaukee on September 27th. Denver at the comedy works downtown on October 4th. Then San Francisco at Cops Comedy Club October 25th. And then a whole bunch of dates with side stories. I'm going to be at Nashville in January. We're going to be at Rochester in January. That's a long way off.

“All kinds of stuff is coming out. Go to eddytunes.com. If you want to see me on the road, I got all my dates on there.”

All side stories, dates on there. Go come see us live. I'm having the best time in the world. Go and check out everything that's going on here at the last podcast network.

We have such amazing shows. I feel such honor to be involved with this network with such amazing human beings.

Page seven, spun the brighter side, nerd of mouth, the foreign report, fraudsters. Some of the greatest shows. We have so much going on under our umbrella. L-P-N-T-V is crushing it right now. Go watch the last season of H-X-2 if you get a chance. Vampire the Masquerade's going strong. Bloodblath 77. This fucking network is the shit. Be involved in it. Let us take over your brains. I love you. Be good to yourselves.

And hail. Tomas Kennedy. Peace.