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With a Record Backing Coups, Secret War & Genocide, Is Kissinger an Elder Statesman or War Criminal?
Four decades after Henry Kissinger left office, his influence on the national security state can still be widely felt, as the United States engages in declared and undeclared wars across the globe. Kissinger served as national security adviser and secretary of state in the Nixon and Ford administrations and helped revive a militarized version of American exceptionalism. We speak with Greg Grandin, author of the new book, "Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman."
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: It’s been nearly 40 years since Henry Kissinger left office, but his influence on the national security state can still be widely felt, as the United States engages in declared and undeclared wars across the globe. Kissinger served as national security adviser and secretary of state in the Nixon and Ford administrations, and helped revive a militarized version of American exceptionalism.
During his time in office, Henry Kissinger oversaw a massive expansion of the war in Vietnam and the secret bombings of Laos and Cambodia. In Latin America, declassified documents show how Kissinger secretly intervened across the continent, from Bolivia to Uruguay to Chile to Argentina. In Chile, Kissinger urged President Nixon to take a, quote, "harder line" against the Chile’s democratically elected president, Salvador Allende. On September 11th, 1973, another September 11th, Allende was overthrown by the U.S.-backed general, Augusto Pinochet. In Jakarta, Indonesia, Kissinger and President Gerald Ford met with the Indonesian dictator, General Suharto, to give the go-ahead to invade East Timor, which Indonesia did on December 7, 1975. The Indonesians killed a third of the Timorese population. Kissinger also drew up plans to attack Cuba in the mid-’70s after Fidel Castro sent Cuban forces into Angola to fight forces linked to apartheid South Africa. While human rights activists have long called for Kissinger to be tried for war crimes, he remains a celebrated figure in Washington and beyond.
Joining us now is Greg Grandin, author of the new book, Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman. Well, Greg Grandin is a professor of Latin American history at New York University. His previous books include Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City, The Empire of Necessity: Slavery, Freedom, and Deception in the New World and Empire’s Workshop.
We welcome you back to Democracy Now!, Professor. Greg, why did you take on Kissinger?
GREG GRANDIN: I felt like that, to the large degree, he’s gotten away with it, right? He’s 92 years old, and there’s been a rehabilitation of Henry Kissinger and supposedly what he stands for, not just by the political right, but by the—across the political establishment. Hillary Clinton embraced Kissinger last year in a review in The Washington Post of his last book. Samantha Power went to a Boston Red Sox-Yankee game with him, and they—
AMY GOODMAN: The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
GREG GRANDIN: Yeah, liberal hawk, who wrote—who came to—who made her name writing about genocides, including three genocides that Kissinger is implicated in. And they came together at a Yankee-Red Sox game and bantered. I feel like there’s a way in which Kissinger embodies the national security state. Now, let me say, obviously, there’s another critique of Henry Kissinger based on all of the acts—you know, Christopher Hitchens’ famous book, The Trial of Henry Kissinger—and I think that that’s useful, but I think focusing on Kissinger as a war criminal misses the larger—his larger importance in the endurance of the national security state and the continuity, from Cambodia and Vietnam and Laos to Iraq and beyond.
AMY GOODMAN: Explain what you mean. What exactly does it miss?
GREG GRANDIN: Well, I think there’s ways in which Kissinger came to power, took office in 1969 at a very vulnerable moment for the national security state. The old imperial presidency was giving way, was cracking up; that postwar consensus that had governed the country from the 1940s through 1966 was breaking apart as a result of Vietnam, as a result of economic issues and race issues in the United States. And Kissinger was very instrumental in figuring out—not only presiding and, in some ways, accelerating that crackup, because certainly the bombing of Cambodia and all of his—all of his illegal activities, that furthered polarization, hastened the unraveling of that consensus, but I think it was also instrumental in re-establishing the national security state on new footing, in order to move forward in a—to a post-Vietnam War, in three ways in particular.
One, I think that he’s instrumental in re-establishing covert activities and clandestine activities, and figuring out ways to bypass a lot of the focus that reporters, critical reporters, such as yourself and Allan Nairn, and a critical Congress began to place on the presidency. I think you can see a continuity between what he was doing in southern Africa, for instance, supporting—in using third-party mercenaries in order to wage an illegal war, with what comes later under Reagan, Iran-Contra. I think he’s very important in emphasizing the need for spectacular actions in order to demonstrate credibility, but not just credibility to the world, credibility to a war-weary citizen at home. I think him and Nixon are also very good at leveraging domestic dissent and polarization, and using militarism and war in order to—for political gain at home.
So we all know about Nixon’s Southern strategy, an attempt to win over Southern Democrats by playing to racism at home. In some ways, what Nixon and Kissinger did in Laos and Cambodia was the foreign policy of the Southern strategy. Kissinger would go and use the fact that they were bombing a country to destruction to placate, in like blood tribute to, a rising new right, and go to Ronald Reagan as president—as governor of California and said, "Well, look what we’re doing. We wouldn’t have had Laos, we wouldn’t have had Cambodia, if we don’t have Nixon," as a way of kind of paying tribute to that militaristic right.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go to Henry Kissinger in his own words.
HENRY KISSINGER: The average person thinks that morality can be applied as directly to the conduct of states to each other as it can to human relations. That is not always the case, because sometimes statesmen have to choose among evils.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s an archival interview of Henry Kissinger featured in the documentary, The Trials of Henry Kissinger.
GREG GRANDIN: Well, that—quotes like that, when Kissinger is talking about the need to downplay and not use morality or idealism in foreign policy, is often used to mistakenly describe him as a realist or a believer in realpolitik. But one of the things that I argue is that if we take realism as a belief that the material world exists, that the truth of that world is evident in the facts of that world, then Kissinger is not a realist. He comes out of a certain kind of German irrational, kind of will-to-power idealism. He’s very much influenced by German metaphysicists, such as Oswald Spengler, such as Immanuel Kant, that believe that human beings actually don’t have access to reality, that their understanding of reality comes through their action. Now, how that relates to foreign policy is that Kissinger is open—and this is something that he’s been saying since the 1950s forward—that one has to act in the world, that one has to act in the world in order for one to have an understanding of the world, that—he’s told us that great powers are always gaining or losing influence, and then one has to—one has to basically create reality.
AMY GOODMAN: You quote him from 1963. I’m sure you know this quote by heart.
GREG GRANDIN: Yeah. It’s the—well, it’s the epilogue. I don’t know it by heart. You can read.
AMY GOODMAN: "There are two kinds of realists: those who manipulate facts and those who create them. The West requires nothing so much as men able to create their own reality."
GREG GRANDIN: Yeah. Now just think—fast-forward to the 2000s, and the Bush administration roundly came under criticism when one of its staffers, that is now believed to be Karl Rove, said that "We’re an empire now. When we act, we create reality." And that was taken as an example of neocon hubris and neocon arrogance, a certain kind of irrational idealism that believes that reality is created through military power. And oftentimes Kissinger is set up as the opposite of that, as a sober realist. But the fact is that he’s not. It’s true that the first generation of neocons—Don Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz—came up attacking Kissinger. They thought he was a loser for Vietnam, an appeaser for détente, and a sinner because he didn’t believe in American idealism. But the fact of the matter is that Kissinger kind of lays the groundwork for their extreme subjectivism.
You could see a strong continuity between, for example, Dick Cheney’s "1 percent doctrine," where he says that we can’t wait for all the evidence to become—we have to treat a 1 percent intelligence as if it was 100 percent certainty, and that’s the justification for why we have a warrant to go into Iraq, to go into Afghanistan, to go into wherever. Kissinger said all of that 40 years ago. And Kissinger—what’s unique about Kissinger is that every other postwar realist—George Kennan, Hans Morgenthau, Arthur Schlesinger—be they liberal or conservative, at some point breaks with national security state, over Vietnam, over the arms buildup. Kissinger, with every lurch to the right, he lurches with it. He moves from Rockefeller, a liberal Republican, to Nixon, in a bat of an eye, from Nixon to Reagan, from Reagan to the neocons. And so, I don’t think that—I don’t think Kissinger creates the national security states, but I think his long career illustrates it and shines a light on it like nobody else.
AMY GOODMAN: Earlier this year, activists with the antiwar group CodePink attempted to perform a citizen’s arrest of Henry Kissinger when he arrived to testify on global security challenges at a Senate Armed Services Committee meeting in January. Let’s go to a clip.
CODEPINK PROTESTERS: Arrest Henry Kissinger for war crimes! Arrest Henry Kissinger for war crimes!
SEN. JOHN McCAIN: The committee will stand in recess until the Capitol police will restore order.
CODEPINK PROTESTERS: Arrest Henry Kissinger for war crimes! Arrest Henry Kissinger for war crimes!
MEDEA BENJAMIN: In the name of the people of Chile, in the name of the people of Vietnam, in the name of the people of East Timor, in the name of people of Cambodia, in the name of the people of Laos.
AMY GOODMAN: Senator John McCain lashed out at the protesters and called on the Capitol Hill police to remove them.
SEN. JOHN McCAIN: I’ve been a member of this committee for many years, and I have never seen anything as disgraceful and outrageous and despicable as the last demonstration that just took place about—you know, you’re going to have to shut up, or I’m going to have you arrested. … Get out of here, you low-life scum.
AMY GOODMAN: So said Senator John McCain. Thirty minutes later, two more members of CodePink interrupted Kissinger’s testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
HENRY KISSINGER: Yet if we look around the world, we encounter upheaval and conflict and chaos.
ALLI McCRACKEN: CodePink calls for the arrest of Henry Kissinger for war crimes. Vietnam: From 1969 to 1973, Kissinger, working for Richard Nixon, oversaw the slaughter in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, which led to the deaths of millions—millions of people. Many thousands more died from the effects of massive doses of Agent Orange or from unexploded bombs that cover the countryside.
ANNA KAMINSKI: Chile: Henry Kissinger was one of the principal architects of the coup in Chile on September 11th, 1973, a coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende.
UNIDENTIFIED: Mr. Chairman, I salute Henry Kissinger for his many—
SEN. JOHN McCAIN: Thank you. Thank you, Doctor.
ANNA KAMINSKI: Sixteen years of repression, torture and death followed.
AMY GOODMAN: The protests at the Senate Armed Services Committee testimony of Henry Kissinger. Greg Grandin?
GREG GRANDIN: Well, just the fact that he’s still being called to give testimony. I mean, you could look at one disaster after another: Cambodia, southern Africa—he instigated counterinsurgencies in Angola and Mozambique that cost the lives of millions of people—what he did in Latin America.
AMY GOODMAN: You have students, so you know when you say, "Well, this is obvious, it’s a long career," many people really know nothing about this history—
GREG GRANDIN: They know nothing—
AMY GOODMAN: —in Latin America. Explain.
GREG GRANDIN: Well, in Latin America, he supported Operation Condor. He was instrumental in organizing the coup in—not just in Chile, in Bolivia. He was involved in Uruguay and Argentina. He either—you know, he brought a moral legitimacy or he was actually involved in the destabilization campaigns that led to coups. And then, once the region fell to right-wing, anti-communist governments, he was instrumental in supporting Operation Condor, which was a kind of transnational consortium of death squads that carried out a international terrorist campaign.
AMY GOODMAN: That was broader than Chile.
GREG GRANDIN: Yeah, that was broader than Chile. It was broader than Latin America.
AMY GOODMAN: And why did he support Pinochet in the coup against the democratically elected leader, Salvador Allende?
GREG GRANDIN: Well, in general, because Salvador Allende was a Marxist, but he was an elected Marxist and a democratic-elected Marxist. And there’s indication that Allende scared Kissinger more than somebody like Castro did, because Castro kept power not through elections, so he was easily dismissed or contained as a dictator. Kissinger’s fear was that Allende would actually allow for a transference of power, and thus kind of complicate this bipolar world between the Soviet Union and the United States.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to go for a moment to another clip. This is a clip of a well-known TV personality who is coming back on the air in just a few days. This is Stephen Colbert, Stephen Colbert who is dancing in Kissinger’s office.
STEPHEN COLBERT: [dancing]
HENRY KISSINGER: Security.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Kissinger calling security. But, of course, it was all a joke.
GREG GRANDIN: Yeah, and I think that’s part of the rehabilitation, the transformation of somebody implicated and responsible, directly or indirectly, in a number of genocides and mass murder, turning into an avuncular kind of comic figure that we can make fun of. I mean, at the same time, people like Samantha Power and Hillary Clinton, they seek out his advice, and they banter with him. And I think it’s—it’s ritualistic. It’s a way of kind of invoking purpose or invoking gravitas. I think that things have gotten so bad in the foreign policy establishment, and things have gotten so bad for U.S. strategy abroad, that there’s a nostalgia for what Kissinger represents. But nobody really quite knows what Kissinger represents. He kind of represents purpose. But what I try to argue in the book is that there’s a hollowness to the purpose, that leads to a circularity, of escalation causing more escalation causing more escalation. And—
AMY GOODMAN: His involvement in Israel-Palestine?
GREG GRANDIN: Well, he was deeply involved in the Middle East, particularly after the U.S. was defeated in Southeast Asia. And he was instrumental in kind of locking in the impasse. There are historians that write about this. Rashid Khalidi talks about how Kissinger kind of locks in the current stalemate. He commits the United States not to recognize Palestine until the Palestinian Authority recognized the legitimacy of Israel, but he doesn’t demand any such—he doesn’t demand any such conditions on the support the U.S. gives to Israel. But beyond Israel-Palestine, his support for the shah, his support for Saudi—
AMY GOODMAN: In Iran.
GREG GRANDIN: In Iran prior to the revolution. Using kind of the duopoly of Iran and Saudi Arabia, Iran prior to the revolution, as guardians of the Gulf was disastrous—Kissinger’s kind of using petrodollars, the increasing rise of oil prices, energy cost, funneling it back into the U.S. defense industry and selling weapons to the shah. Anything he wanted, the shah got. Anything Saudi Arabia wanted, Saudi Arabia got. It’s kind of created the infrastructure of permanent crisis that we see in the Middle East. You know, when we think about the rise of the mujahideen in the 1980s against the Soviet Union, we tend to focus on the CIA’s support for what eventually becomes al-Qaeda. But it’s back in the 1970s where Kissinger urges Pakistan to move into Afghanistan to start to destabilize that country as a way of—as a kind of pawn in the Cold War.
AMY GOODMAN: Do you think Henry Kissinger should be tried as a war criminal? We have 20 seconds.
GREG GRANDIN: Yes, obviously. But I also think that we should also—beyond that, there’s ways in which the language of prosecution and war crimes kind of—kind of eclipse a deeper historical understanding. And if we want to get out of—if we want to understand the mess we’re in now, we have to—beyond just the kind of language of moral outrage and understand Kissinger’s role in rehabilitating the national security state.
AMY GOODMAN: Greg Grandin, I want to thank you for being with us, professor of Latin American history at New York University. His new book, Kissinger’s Shadow: The Long Reach of America’s Most Controversial Statesman.
Is Guatemala's President Going to Jail? Legislature Strips Pérez Molina of Immunity After Protests
In Guatemala, the Legislature voted unanimously to strip President Otto Pérez Molina of immunity from prosecution, clearing the way for his arrest. The ruling echoes the decision by the country’s Supreme Court last week and makes it possible to prosecute Pérez Molina as part of a corruption investigation that has sparked protests calling for his resignation. We’re joined from Guatemala City by Allan Nairn, a longtime journalist who has covered Guatemala since the 1980s.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: We go now to Guatemala City, where the Legislature has voted unanimously to strip Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina of immunity from prosecution, clearing the way for his arrest. The ruling echoes the decision of Guatemala’s Supreme Court last week and makes it possible to prosecute Pérez Molina as part of a corruption investigation that’s sparked protests calling for his resignation. Carlos Herrera, an official of the Guatemalan Congress, announced the results of the vote.
CARLOS HERRERA: [translated] Votes in favor, 132. Votes against, zero. Deputies absent, 26. And so, having a majority, approved, the measure advancing the pretrial process against Otto Pérez Molina, president of the republic of Guatemala.
AMY GOODMAN: Pérez Molina is now prohibited from leaving Guatemala, and a warrant could be issued for his arrest. This is Guatemalan Attorney General Thelma Aldana.
ATTORNEY GENERAL THELMA ALDANA: [translated] At this moment, he is a normal citizen, although he is still president of the republic. He is a normal citizen for the justice system. He has lost immunity. And as a consequence, there could be criminal prosecution against the president.
AMY GOODMAN: For more, we go to Guatemala City, where we’re joined by Allan Nairn by telephone. He’s a longtime journalist who has covered Guatemala since the ’80s.
Welcome to Democracy Now! You were outside Congress last night when Congress stripped the Guatemalan president of immunity. Can you talk about the significance and the reaction?
ALLAN NAIRN: Well, people were cheering, they were crying, setting off fireworks. This is an example for the world. This is a general we’re talking about, one of the generals—one of the U.S.-backed generals who carried out the massacres that devastated the Mayan population of the northwest highland. I met him in the highlands as he was doing that, and his troops described how they strangled, executed civilians and threw them into mass graves. He then became president. Prior to that, he was placed on the CIA payroll. And now he’s going to be treated like a common citizen, and perhaps a common criminal. He could be taken at any moment by the authorities.
Last night after the verdict, I walked by the Casa Presidencial, the presidential house—it’s the White House of Guatemala—and spoke to a soldier outside who is a member—a corporal of the presidential guard. And I asked him how his unit would react if the Ministerio Público, the justice department, comes and tries to arrest the president, Pérez Molina. And he said they would not resist. They would take their orders from the Ministerio Público. This is remarkable, looking at Guatemalan history, because outside—that very building that we were standing outside of was for years the national torture chamber of Guatemala. People would be dragged there if they criticized the army, if they criticized the rich, if they were seen as being too close to the organized indigenous population, and they would be chopped up, they would be electroshocked. Their bodies would be thrown by the roadside with their hands cut off. This work done by the—what’s called the Archivo and by the G-2, the military intelligence service, that had actual American CIA agents placed inside it. And now, soldiers from the presidential guard, from that very place, are saying they’re not going to stop one of the generals who carried out those atrocities being arrested.
His arrest, though, would only be on corruption, but it opens the door to bringing him to trial for the mass murders that he helped preside over while carrying out the program of genocide of General Ríos Montt. But there’s still a long way to go. It was big surprise that Congress stripped his immunity. The unanimous vote was in some ways deceptive, because the big blocs in Congress which are controlled by the oligarchs, the drug traffickers and the army, did not want to strip him of immunity. They don’t want to open the Pandora’s box of looking into the crimes of the army and the oligarchy. But they felt such massive public pressure, that in the end they felt they had no choice.
AMY GOODMAN: You talk about Otto Pérez Molina being involved in murder of indigenous people in the northwest highlands, Allan Nairn, but what these protests are about are corruption, why his vice president has now been arrested, as well as other officials. So, do you see this possible indictment getting larger? And are people calling for that?
ALLAN NAIRN: Corruption has kicked open the door. Now, what could follow is mass murder, a prosecution for mass murder. Just about everyone I talk to on the street raises that issue. And under Guatemalan law, an ordinary citizen can go to a court and file a criminal case. And now that Pérez Molina has been stripped of immunity, anyone can step forward and file criminal charges against him for the slaughter in the Ixil zone in December of ’82, when slaughter that occurred, and I was there talking to Pérez Molina and talking to his—talking to his troops. So that now becomes a possibility.
And part of it—if that goes forward, and part of it is dependent on the action of state prosecutors—if the state prosecutors go forward, I would also urge them to look at charging not just Pérez Molina, but also his U.S. sponsors, the Americans who worked as military and intelligence liaisons with the Guatemalan army as they were murdering civilians, and also high American officials who set the policy in Washington. They can be charged as accomplices to murder. As President George W. Bush said, if you arm a terrorist, if you fund a terrorist, you are a terrorist. I think President Bush had a point, and that he should be subject to that same rule, that same principle, and that now that Guatemala has kicked open the door, set an example for the world, this trail of blood can be followed wherever it leads, including back to Washington.
AMY GOODMAN: Allan Nairn, I want to thank you for being with us, journalist and activist, has covered Guatemala since the 1980s. If you want to read a transcript of this conversation—I know that the phone line was rather difficult into Guatemala City—you can go to democracynow.org. You can also see our interviews with him in Spanish on our Spanish website. Just go to democracynow.org/es.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, Kissinger’s Shadow. We’ll be joined by the historian Greg Grandin. Stay with us.
After Mass Hunger Strikes & Lawsuits, Prisoners Force California to Scale Back Solitary Confinement
In a major victory for prisoners’ rights, California has agreed to greatly reduce the use of solitary confinement as a part of a legal settlement that may have major implications in prisons nationwide. The decision on Tuesday came following years of litigation by a group of prisoners held in isolation for a decade or more at Pelican Bay State Prison, as well as prisoner hunger strikes. We speak to Dolores Canales, the co-founder of California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement, whose son, John Martinez, has been held in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay for more than 14 years. We also speak with Jules Lobel, the lead attorney representing prisoners at Pelican Bay in the lawsuit.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: In a major victory for prisoners’ rights, California has agreed to greatly reduce the use of solitary confinement as a part of a legal settlement that may have major implications in prisons nationwide. On Tuesday, California reached a landmark legal settlement with a group of prisoners held in isolation for a decade or more at the Pelican Bay State Prison. California currently keeps nearly 3,000 prisoners alone for more than 22 hours a day in windowless cells. Human rights advocates have long maintained that the practice of solitary confinement is both inhumane and counterproductive. The settlement comes after years of prisoner hunger strikes and sustained protests by prisoners’ loved ones.
In 2011, Democracy Now! obtained a recording of one Pelican Bay prisoner on hunger strike, Todd Ashker, who was held in the prison’s secure housing unit, which is referred to as SHU. Listen closely.
TODD ASHKER: The basis for this protest has come about after over 25 years—some of us, 30, some up to 40 years—of being subjected to these conditions the last 21 years in Pelican Bay SHU, where every single day you have staff and administrators who feel it’s their job to punish the worst of the worst, as they’ve put out propaganda for the last 21 years that we are the worst of the worst. And most of us have never been found guilty of ever committing an illegal gang-related act. But we’re in SHU because of a label. And all of our 602 appeals, numerous court challenges, have gotten nowhere. Therefore, our backs are up against the wall.
AMY GOODMAN: That was one of the Pelican Bay prisoners, Todd Ashker, speaking about his participation in the 2011 hunger strike.
Well, for more, we go to Los Angeles, California, where we’re joined by Dolores Canales, the co-founder of California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement. Her son, John Martinez, has been held in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay for more than 14 years. Dolores herself spent nine months in segregation at the California Institute for Women in 1999. And in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, we’re joined by Jules Lobel, the president of the Center for Constitutional Rights and a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh, the lead attorney representing prisoners at Pelican Bay in the lawsuit challenging long-term solitary confinement in California prisons.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Jules Lobel, let’s start with you. Lay out what this decision, what this settlement means.
JULES LOBEL: Up until now, California has put thousands of prisoners into solitary confinement simply because they have some association with a gang, or they have alleged association with a gang, often simply for artwork or political literature which the officials said were gang-related in some way. Under this settlement, California will no longer do that. In addition, when California put these alleged gang affiliates into solitary confinement, they did it for an indefinite term—really, for life. There was almost no way out. So that’s why people like Todd Ashker have spent over 20 years in solitary confinement. Under this settlement, people will only be put in solitary confinement if they commit some serious offense, after a due process hearing, a serious offense being assault or murder or something like that in prison. And they will only be put in for a definite term, and after that term ends, they will get out. So they’re abolishing essentially indefinite, indeterminate solitary confinement. They’re abolishing solitary confinement simply for gang affiliation.
And throughout the country, there are about 80,000 people in solitary confinement, many of whom are in for minor offenses or for—because they’re mentally ill or for not any good penological reason. And California, through our lawsuit, through the hunger strikes, realizes that this is a wrongheaded policy, even from the perspective of good prison management, apart from the human rights problem. In addition, California has recognized that for people who are in solitary confinement for a very long time, it’s cruel and inhumane. To put somebody in a small little box with no windows, no phone calls, no ability to contact other people—they could get written up and disciplined for even communicating with other prisoners—it’s just an inhumane way to run a prison. And for everybody who’s there after 10—for more than 10 years, they’re going to get them out of solitary confinement. In fact, they’re going to go through all the prisoners who are there simply for gang affiliation, and if they don’t have a serious misconduct in two years, in the last two years, they’re going to put them into general population. California estimates that over 95 percent of all the prisoners they have there now for simply gang affiliation are going to be released into the general population. It’s a major victory.
AMY GOODMAN: And so, how many people are we talking about?
JULES LOBEL: We’re talking about probably approximately 2,000 people. There are 2,000 people in California in the SHU now simply for gang affiliation. There are a thousand people in the SHU, out of the 3,000 that you mentioned, who are there because they committed some serious offense. And this isn’t going to really affect them. We still have a long struggle down the road to get rid of solitary confinement totally in this country, but this is an important first step.
AMY GOODMAN: Dolores Canales, what does this mean for your son, John Martinez, who has been in solitary for what? Fourteen years now?
DOLORES CANALES: Yes. Well, for my son, John Martinez, it means that he will be released from the security housing unit, and he will be placed on a yard where hopefully he’ll be given the opportunity to participate in vocational training and programs. So, I’m very excited about this and for the many family members that have been waiting for this moment, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about what his life is like in solitary confinement?
DOLORES CANALES: Well, I know that he sleeps on the floor, because the mattresses that they have are very thin, and he’s concerned about his back. So I know that he sleeps on his cement floor. I know that he has an exercise routine. He does a lot of legal work. We’ve provided his education. Out here, we were able to support him in his education, so he’s received certificates in paralegal studies and civil litigation, so that occupies a lot of his time. But there’s been times that he’s written me, you know, saying that he has no doubt in his mind that Pelican Bay security housing unit was designed solely to drive men mad or to suicide, because that is his existence.
AMY GOODMAN: Have you been able to visit him?
DOLORES CANALES: Yes, I have. I try to visit at least every six to eight weeks, especially because of his conditions. And I’m going to be up there to see him on Saturday, because I’m just so excited at this moment, although I will say this is very, very bittersweet, because in my advocacy, working with numerous family members as we organize together, there’s been family members that are not here today to share in this moment with us, as they’ve passed away, with the last chance of ever seeing their loved one just simply behind an image behind a glass or holding onto a cold phone, but yet always believing that there would be change. So, I’m happy, and then I hold them in my heart, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about, Dolores, the kind of organizing that went on outside the prison, people like you organizing for family members, and inside the prison? Your son, John Martinez, participated in all three hunger strikes that began in 2011?
DOLORES CANALES: Yes, he did. He gave us notice prior to the first hunger strike, July 1st, 2011. He wrote us, and he asked us to send his letter to about over 200 organizations and to the governor and various administration in Sacramento. And, you know, I didn’t even realize the circumstances of solitary confinement, the depth of the isolation. I didn’t really give it too much of a second thought. I guess it’s something you just kind of block out. But then, after that, I could not stop thinking about it.
And so, what the family members began to do—and even right now, as I’m sitting here, I wouldn’t even be here at this moment if it were not for the hundreds of family members that have come out. And every hunger strike that they had was during the summer—July, August and September—you know, these warm months. But yet family members would be outside every other day dressed in orange jumpsuits or dressed in orange, you know, carrying chains or handcuffs or bullhorns, just to get attention, to draw attention of society, conducting numerous panels at universities and churches, and just organizing and mobilizing across the state of California, raising awareness to these conditions that our loved ones were enduring.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, corrections officials and guards have come out increasingly—is this true—against solitary confinement? Were there guards or officials supporting you in your activism?
DOLORES CANALES: Some were, yes. Some would make comments, maybe not out in the open, but some would make comments that it was time for change, you know, while others, of course, there is resistance, and they don’t want change. And I just recently heard yesterday that, you know, the CCPOA is very much against this change because they’re concerned about violence. But one thing that the men did do was they drew up an agreement to end all hostilities. And that is something that the family members and the advocates have been attempting to promote and just spread the word, that it’s time for change and to just come together in unity. And what my concern is, if there is such a big concern that there’s going to be violence, it would seem like CDCR would be very cooperative in helping, you know, to get this word out and to pass this around and to promote this end of all hostilities.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, Dolores Canales, you yourself were in a segregated unit in 1999. Explain how that compares to solitary confinement. Is it solitary? How do you end up there? And, I mean, we’re talking now more than 15 years of activism.
DOLORES CANALES: Yes, well, I do believe that I was in solitary confinement when I was—when I was doing a SHU term in CIW. And I had a window in my cell. You know, keep in mind that in Pelican Bay there is no windows. Not only did I have a window, I went outside to yard activity, and I was actually outdoors. I could see the sun, feel the wind when I went out. But yet, when you’re in that cell and you’re surrounded by that brick, you know, and the only thing you experience—you don’t experience human contact other than being handcuffed and escorted places. My visits were non-contact. They were behind the glass. And there would be times that I would wake up at night, because the cells are so small, and I would just feel like if I couldn’t breathe. And I guess that’s why once I really did start thinking about the situation of solitary confinement for decades on end, you know, that’s why I organized with such passion, because I didn’t realize that California left people for 20, 30, 40 years, and then I immediately realized that they had no intentions of letting my son out and that we had to do something.
AMY GOODMAN: President Obama addressed the NAACP in July. He spoke out against solitary confinement.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: What’s more, I’ve asked my attorney general to start a review of the overuse of solitary confinement across American prisons. The social science shows that an environment like that is often more likely to make inmates more alienated, more hostile, potentially more violent. Do we really think it makes sense to lock so many people alone in tiny cells for 23 hours a day for months, sometimes for years at a time? That is not going to make us safer. That’s not going to make us stronger. And if those individuals are ultimately released, how are they ever going to adapt? It’s not smart.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s President Obama addressing the NAACP in July. So, Jules Lobel, where does solitary confinement stand across the country, outside of California? And how will this settlement affect that?
JULES LOBEL: A couple things. One is, I just want to point out one thing about what happens at Pelican Bay, is that when Dolores visits her son, she cannot hug him, she cannot have any human contact with him. She visits him with a glass in between them. And so, we have clients who for 20 years have not hugged their loved ones. And I think this is an abomination. In addition, for many years at Pelican Bay, they had no phone calls. Until our lawsuit, nobody was allowed to even make a phone call to their loved ones. But what’s happening around the—
AMY GOODMAN: Aside from the morality of that, Jules Lobel, and the humanity or lack of humanity of that, talk about how that actually makes prisoners—makes the situation worse for prisoners, can make them more violent, less able to rehabilitate when they are so cut off from human contact.
JULES LOBEL: Yeah, it obviously makes them very angry, frustrated, hopeless, which all of our guys have experienced. And in addition, it creates what social scientists call a social death. People lose their ability to relate to other people, and have a lot of difficulties relating to people in the normal world. And that—most of these people are going to get out of prison. We are creating a situation where we’re releasing people from solitary confinement who cannot possibly have the ability to relate to the outside world in a normal, human way. I mean, they could function, but their basic human need of social interaction has been taken away from them, their basic human need to touch another person. If your listeners could imagine living in a world where for 15, 20 years you’ve not been able to hug another person, you haven’t been able to touch another person, you’ve had very little contact with other people, and then get thrown out into the street, it’s a very, very difficult situation. And it’s contrary to any notion of prison rehabilitating people. But around the—
AMY GOODMAN: And what this means globally—I mean, nationally?
JULES LOBEL: Yeah. Around the country, as I said, there are 80,000 people in solitary confinement. And as President Obama said, most of them are there without any real necessity. So what this settlement, I think, will mean is it will give impetus to the movement in Colorado, in Mississippi, in other states to dramatically reduce the number of people in solitary confinement. California now is going to dramatically reduce the number of people held in SHU. And California has been the major state using solitary confinement. That, I think, will give impetus to these reform efforts around the country.
But in addition, this settlement has done another thing which I think could have a major impact around the country. There are some prisoners who commit murder in prison or assault in prison, who obviously need to be segregated from the general population, but they don’t have to be treated in a cruel, inhumane way. They don’t have to be put in cells with no windows. They don’t have to be given any contact visits with their family. They don’t have to be cut off from phone calls with their family. And California, as part of this settlement, has agreed to create a special unit for people who they consider dangerous, but who will be given contact visits, who will be in a—given small group recreation. So they won’t recreate in a big yard like what we’ve seen in the movies, in Shawshank Redemption or something like that, but they’ll be able to recreate with other people as opposed to totally alone. They’ll be able to have educational programs. And we’re hoping that this unit could be an alternative model around the country for segregating people, but not isolating them, not treating them inhumanely. Our prisons have to realize that every prisoner is entitled to human dignity, is entitled to basic human needs. And the way our prisons have been running has not been in accordance with that.
And finally, I think there’s another key thing about this settlement which could be a model in other states, which is that in our whole litigation we incorporated the prisoners into—the prisoners came up with the demands. We had a number of group meetings with all the prisoners. We had the prisoners ratifying this agreement. And the prisoners are going to be meeting with prison officials, helping to implement this. So, it’s not like just the lawyers did this. To treat people with some human dignity, you have to allow them to participate in the things that govern their own lives. That’s a basic democratic principle, and it shouldn’t be abolished simply because somebody goes to prison. And I think that’s critical to rehabilitation, and it’s critical to allowing a prison to be run with some kind of a dignity and some kind of a hope for the prisoners. So I do think the way this litigation and this settlement was conducted really could be an alternative model for prisons around the country.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you both for being with us, Jules Lobel, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, and Dolores Canales, co-founder of California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement. Her son, John Martinez, has been held in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay for more than 14 years, participated in all the hunger strikes, and may now well be released from solitary confinement because of the settlement that has been reached this week.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we go to Guatemala City. The president of Guatemala has been stripped of immunity by the Guatemalan Congress. That means he could be arrested at any moment, unless he resigns—he could still be arrested, even then. Stay with us.
Headlines:
34th Senator Backs Iran Deal, Ensuring Implementation
Update: After this broadcast, Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland announced her support for the nuclear deal, making her the 34th senator to do so and ensuring the deal’s implementation.
Two more Democratic senators have backed the Iran nuclear deal, meaning the agreement is all but certain to gain passage through Congress. On Tuesday, Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey and Delaware Senator Chris Coons came out in support of the historic accord between Iran and six world powers. Obama has said he will veto any resolution by Congress to block the deal. The White House is now only one vote short of the 34 required to uphold the veto.
California Reaches Historic Deal to Curb Solitary Confinement
In a major victory for prisoners’ rights, California is expected to dramatically reduce the number of prisoners held in solitary confinement, following a landmark legal settlement with a group of prisoners at the Pelican Bay State Prison reached Tuesday. We’ll go to California for more after headlines.
Arctic: Obama Tours Glacier amid New Call for Fossil Fuel Divestment
President Obama continues his trip to the Arctic just weeks after his administration permitted oil giant Shell to begin oil drilling in the remote Arctic waters off the coast of Alaska. On Tuesday, Obama toured a glacier and spoke about the already visible impacts of climate change.
President Obama: "So you guys have been seeing these signs as we’ve walked that mark where the glacier used to be, 1917, 1951. This glacier has lost about a mile and a half over the last couple hundred years, but the pace of the reductions of the glacier are accelerating rapidly each and every year. And this is as good of a sign post of what we’re dealing with when it comes to climate change as just about anything."
Obama’s remarks come as the environmental group 350.org and the European Green Party launch the "Divest for Paris" challenge, calling on institutions, individuals and governments to divest from fossil fuels ahead of the climate summit in Paris later this year.
Guatemala: President Stripped of Immunity, Faces Possible Arrest
In Guatemala, authorities are barring President Otto Pérez Molina from leaving the country, after Congress decided to strip him of immunity from prosecution. Pérez Molina has faced months of massive demonstrations over a corruption scandal that has led to the resignation of the majority of his Cabinet and the arrest of top officials. We’ll go to Guatemala to speak with journalist and activist Allan Nairn later in the broadcast.
Lebanon: Riot Police Remove Protesters Occupying Ministry Building
In Lebanon, riot police have forcibly removed more than two dozen protesters from the Environment Ministry building in the capital Beirut, after the demonstrators occupied the building Tuesday to demand the minister’s resignation over the heaps of trash piling up in the streets. The occupation was part of the growing "You Stink!" campaign protesting government ineptitude.
Pakistan: U.S. Drone Strike Kills 6
Pakistani officials say a U.S. drone strike has killed at least six people after it struck a house in North Waziristan Tuesday. Officials say the compound belonged to suspected militants. The identities of the victims have not been determined.
Thousands Stranded as Hungary Stops Refugees from Boarding Trains
In news from Europe, hundreds of people are protesting outside a Budapest train station over Hungary’s decision to prevent people fleeing violence in their home countries from boarding westbound trains headed toward Germany. The move has left thousands of people stranded outside the station in 104-degree heat. Meanwhile, at least 11 people have died and five more are missing after two boats headed to Greece sank off the coast of Turkey on Tuesday. Among the dead were a woman and her three children.
California: ICE Agents Arrest 244 People in Mass Immigration Raids
Meanwhile, in the United States, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has arrested nearly 250 people during four days of raids targeting undocumented immigrants across Southern California. The agency says that 56 percent of those arrested had past felony convictions and that the rest had past misdemeanors.
McConnell: Not Enough Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has acknowledged anti-choice lawmakers do not have enough votes to defund Planned Parenthood, despite a renewed push following the release of heavily edited anti-choice videos. McConnell told local news station WYMT defunding Planned Parenthood would have to wait until Obama is out of office.
Sen. Mitch McConnell: "We just don’t have the votes to get the outcome that we’d like. ... The president has made it very clear he’s not going to sign any bill that includes defunding of Planned Parenthood. So that’s another issue that awaits a new president, hopefully with a different point of view about Planned Parenthood."
Analysis Confirms Deceptive Editing of Planned Parenthood Videos
Senator McConnell’s remarks come after Planned Parenthood gave lawmakers a detailed analysis debunking the heavily edited videos that had renewed lawmakers’ calls to defund the organization. The secretly recorded videos, released by an anti-choice group, show Planned Parenthood employees discussing the sharing of fetal tissue with researchers, a practice Planned Parenthood has maintained is performed legally and never for profit. An analysis commissioned by Planned Parenthood confirmed the videos contain intentionally deceptive edits and missing footage, including 30-minute-long gaps. Researchers also found "substantive omissions" in transcripts of the videos provided by the anti-choice Center for Medical Progress. The analysis concluded the videos "have no evidentiary value in a legal context and cannot be relied upon for any official inquiries." On Tuesday, the Center for Medical Progress released its latest secretly recorded video, targeting a tissue procurement company that has worked with a Planned Parenthood clinic; as in the other videos, none of what’s discussed appears to be illegal. Planned Parenthood noted, "Multiple times in this video, staff from independent health care firms appear to say that Planned Parenthood is not interested in any financial gain and adheres to ethical standards."
Illinois: Massive Hunt Continues After Fatal Shooting of Officer
In Illinois, a massive hunt is underway after the fatal shooting of a Fox Lake police officer. Lieutenant Charles Joseph Gliniewicz was found shot after telling colleagues he was responding to "suspicious activity." The suspects have been described as three men, one African-American and two white.
Texas: FBI Probes Deputies’ Shooting of Man Who Had Hands Raised
In Texas, the FBI has opened a civil rights investigation into the fatal shooting by sheriff’s deputies of a man who appeared to have his hands in the air. Gilbert Flores was shot by Bexar County sheriff’s deputies responding to a report of domestic violence. The full version of a bystander’s video released by a local ABC station appears to show deputies opening fire after Gilbert raised his hands; Gilbert’s left hand is obscured by a utility pole, but his right hand is in the air.
Georgia: Police Enter Wrong Home, Shoot Fellow Officer, Kill Dog
In Georgia, police who entered the wrong home while responding to a burglary call shot and injured one of their colleagues and the innocent homeowner, and killed the homeowner’s dog. Investigators say three DeKalb County officers entered the wrong home through an unlocked back door. Initial reports suggested the homeowner shot and wounded the officer, Travis Jones, who is African-American. But authorities now say he was shot accidentally by another officer.
New York: Video Shows Dying Hours of Diabetic Prisoner at Rikers
In New York, newly released video shows the final hours of the life of a diabetic prisoner at Rikers Island jail who was reportedly deprived of his insulin medication and left to slowly die. Carlos Mercado was arrested two years ago for attempting to sell a small amount of heroin to an undercover officer. He died in jail 15 hours later after guards reportedly ignored his pleas for medical help. Surveillance video released by The New York Times shows corrections officers left him on the floor for three minutes after he collapsed. He is also seen reeling and carrying around bags of his own vomit before his death.
Kentucky: Clerk Denies Same-Sex Marriage Licenses, Defying Court
And in Kentucky, a county clerk has continued to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples in defiance of the Supreme Court. Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis stopped issuing all marriage licenses following the landmark Supreme Court decision in June which legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. On Monday, the Supreme Court denied Davis’s appeal that the court grant her "asylum for her conscience." On Tuesday, same-sex couples confronted Davis at her office.
Kim Davis: "We’re not issuing marriage licenses today."
David Moore: "The Supreme Court denied your stay."
Kim Davis: "We are not issuing marriage licenses today. So I would..."
David Moore: "Based on what?"
Kim Davis: "I would ask you all to go ahead and leave."
David Moore: "Why are you not issuing marriage licenses today?"
Kim Davis: "Because I’m not."
David Moore: "Under whose authority are you not issuing licenses?"
Kim Davis: "Under God’s authority."
David Moore: "Did God tell you to do this? Did God tell you to treat us like this?"
Kim Davis: "I’ve asked you all to leave. You are interrupting my business."
County Clerk Kim Davis risks jail time and fines if she continues to refuse to provide marriage licenses.
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