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"I Called You to Help Me, But You Killed My Brother": Police Shoot Dead Unarmed African-American Man
Police in the San Diego, California, suburb of El Cajon shot and killed an unarmed African-American man Tuesday, after his sister called 911 to report her brother was having a mental health emergency. Eyewitnesses said 30-year-old Alfred Olango was holding his hands up when he was tased by one police officer and then fired upon five times by another officer. In video posted online, Alfred Olango’s grieving sister is seen tearfully confronting police. She tells them, "I called you to help me, but you killed my brother."
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report, as we turn right now to what just took place in San Diego, California. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, police in the San Diego, California, suburb of El Cajon shot and killed an unarmed African-American man Tuesday, after his sister called 911 to report her brother was having a mental health emergency. The shooting comes as protests continue over the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte and Terence Crutcher in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Eyewitnesses in El Cajon said 30-year-old Alfred Olango was holding his hands up when he was tased by one police officer and then fired upon five times by another. Reporter Ashley Matthews of local station NBC 7 spoke to Michael Ray Rodriguez, who said he witnessed the killing.
MICHAEL RAY RODRIGUEZ: We were leaving out of these apartments right here, facing north. I see a man. I see a black man surrounded by officers with their guns out, which caught my attention. So I tell the others, "Look, look, look," so that we’re all looking, we’re watching. The black man was up with his hands up like this, scared to death, not knowing which way he’s going to go. As he don’t know which way he goes, he’s jerking, he’s confused. He runs this way. As soon as he runs this way, they discharge: boom, boom, boom—five shots right into him. And that’s the honest truth.
AMY GOODMAN: In a dramatic video posted to Facebook, a woman named Rumbie Mubaiwa begins filming moments after Alfred Olango is shot dead. In the background, Olango’s sister is heard crying over the death of her brother.
RUMBIE MUBAIWA: OK, so the police did it again, y’all. They shot another unarmed black person, as usual. And the lady is saying she called them for help, not to kill her brother. And they shot her brother.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: In the video, Alfred Olango’s grieving sister is seen tearfully confronting police. She tells them, "I called you to help me, but you killed my brother."
OLANGO’S SISTER: Guys, why couldn’t you tase him? Why couldn’t you guys tase him? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?
RUMBIE MUBAIWA: What’s his birthday, so they could find his information?
OLANGO’S SISTER: Why couldn’t you guys tase him? I told you he’s sick. And you guys shot him.
AMY GOODMAN: The sister of Alfred Olango can be heard in the video saying, quote, "I called three times for them to come help me. Nobody came. They said it’s not priority," end-quote. Police scanner audio at the time of the shooting reveals officers knew they were responding to a so-called 5150 call, or a mental health emergency. It does not appear that officers dispatched a Psychiatric Emergency Response Team. El Cajon Police Chief Jeff Davis acknowledged it took the officers 50 minutes—that’s 5-0 minutes—to respond to the 911 call of Olango’s sister. He said there was no weapon found at the scene of the killing. Chief Davis disputed witness accounts that Olango had his hands in the air, saying the man pointed an object at an officer with both hands, as if to fire a handgun.
POLICE CHIEF JEFF DAVIS: The male subject paced back and forth while the officers tried to talk to him. At one point, the male rapidly drew an object from his front pants pocket, placed both hands together on it and extended it rapidly towards the officer, taking what appeared to be a shooting stance, putting the object in the officer’s face. At this time, one of the officers with the Taser discharged his Taser in an effort to subdue the subject. Simultaneously, the officer who had the object pointed at him discharged his firearm, striking the male.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Some reports on social media claim that officers confiscated the cellphones of witnesses who recorded the killing. El Cajon Police Chief Davis denied those claims. He said police did obtain a cellphone video from a worker at a drive-through window of a nearby restaurant who filmed the killing and volunteered the footage. Chief Davis said the video had been handed over as evidence to the district attorney and would not be made public while an investigation remains ongoing. El Cajon police did, however, distribute a picture they say is a still photo taken from the video, showing a pair of officers pointing their weapons at Alfred Olango, whose hands appear to be raised at shoulder height. It’s unclear from the photo if he’s holding any objects. The killing immediately sparked protests. Hundreds of people gathered at the Los Panchos restaurant, where Olango was killed. They later protested outside El Cajon police headquarters.
CHRISTOPHER RICE-WILSON: They’re saying they shot an unarmed black man. And we have to ask why. Why is it OK to just kill a man when you think he has a weapon? The policy states you must see a weapon, and, more than that, the weapon must be aimed, pointed or causing harm to you. It’s not enough to say somebody had a gun or a knife or any weapon, and shoot them because they possessed a weapon. The police have to be under threat. They have to fear for their life. And the mere existence of an object in any man’s hand, let alone a black man’s hand, is not justification for killing him.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Christopher Rice-Wilson of Alliance San Diego. San Diego protesters are planning to demonstrate all day today outside El Cajon police headquarters beginning at 9:00 a.m. California time. This comes as protests continue over fatal police shootings of Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte and Terence Crutcher in Tulsa, Oklahoma. A United Nations representative recently compared the police killings of African Americans in the United States to the, quote, "past racial terror of lynching," unquote. Special thanks to Democracy Now!’s John Hamilton for that report.
This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. When we come back, we’ll be joined by Arlie Hochschild. Her latest book, Strangers in Their Own [Land]: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. Stay with us. ... Read More →
What Drives Trump Supporters?: Sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild on Anger & Mourning of the Right
In the wake of Monday night’s first presidential debate, the establishment Republican Party and conservative newspapers continue to distance themselves from Donald Trump amid increasing accusations of racism, sexism, xenophobia and Islamophobia. Today, former Virginia Republican Senator John Warner is reportedly slated to endorse Clinton. This comes as Arizona’s largest newspaper, The Arizona Republic, has endorsed Hillary Clinton—marking the paper’s first time ever endorsing a Democratic candidate for president. The editorial board wrote, "Since The Arizona Republic began publication in 1890, we have never endorsed a Democrat over a Republican for president. Never. … This year is different." For more, we speak with famed sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild. She has spent much of the past five years with some of Donald Trump’s biggest supporters, researching her new book, "Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right."
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: In the wake of Monday night’s first presidential debate, the establishment Republican Party and conservative newspapers continue to distance themselves from Donald Trump amid increasing accusations of racism, sexism, xenophobia and Islamophobia. Today, former Virginia Republican Senator John Warner is reportedly slated to endorse Hillary Clinton. This comes as Arizona’s largest newspaper,The Arizona Republic, has also endorsed Clinton, making it the paper’s first time ever endorsing a Democrat for president. The editorial board wrote, quote, "Since The Arizona Republic began publication in 1890, we have never endorsed a Democrat over a Republican for president. Never. … This year is different," unquote.
AMY GOODMAN: But Donald Trump has not lost support from some of his key constituents among the far right, sometimes known as the alt-right. During the debate, Trump’s online far-right supporters reportedly bombarded online polls in which the same user could vote multiple times in order to create the illusion Trump had won the unofficial polls. Trump has embraced the alt-right throughout his campaign, including by naming Stephen Bannon to be his campaign chief. Bannon was previously the head of the right-wing website Breitbart Media, which Breitbart’s former editor-in-chief has described as "the alt-right go-to website," unquote.
Well, today we spend the rest of the hour with the famed sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild. She spent much of the last five years with some of Donald Trump’s biggest supporters, researching her new book, Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. It has just been nominated for an American—for an American Book Award. Congratulations, Arlie.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about why you wrote this book. You’re a professor at University of California, Berkeley, a sociologist. What brought you to southern Louisiana?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Well, five years ago, I felt we were already moving far apart and the right was growing. And I was in an enclave, a geographic enclave, a media enclave, electronic enclave. We’re all in enclaves. And I figured, I want to get as far out of my enclave as I possibly could. I’m Berkeley, California, teach sociology. Where’s the opposite end? I thought, "OK, the right is growing in the South. So, South. It’s growing among whites. OK, whites. Older, evangelical. OK, older, evangelical—although not all were evangelical. And where’s the super South?" And I looked at 2012. How many whites voted for Obama? In California, it was half. In the South as a whole, as a whole region, it was a third. And in Louisiana, it was 16 percent. I thought, "Super South. OK, that’s where I want to go." So, as luck would have it, I had one contact there, and I took it from there. In the end, over five years, I interviewed 60 people. Forty were tea party enthusiasts. And what I really did was want to climb an empathy wall. I wanted to take my own political alarm system off and actually try and see how it felt to be them.
And actually, you know, I had an interesting experience with one of the first women I met. She was a gospel singer in a Pentecostal church, very friendly, outgoing. I met her at a Republican Women of Southwest Louisiana meeting. She was across the table. She said, "I love Rush Limbaugh." I thought to myself, "I should talk to her. I don’t know why. I’m interested. I’m curious." So, at sweet teas the next day, she said, "Oh, I love Rush Limbaugh because he hates feminazis." OK, took a little while. And I said, "Well, what is a feminazi? What?" And, "Well, it’s those feminists, you know, that are hard and tough and mean and ambitious." I thought, "Well, I don’t like hard, tough, mean people, either, you know?" thinking that. And then she said, "Has it been hard to hear what I’m saying?" I thought, "Well, she’s looking back at me." And I told her, "Actually, no, it’s not, because I have my alarm system off, and I’m trying to find out what life feels like to you, so..." And then she said, "You know, I do that sometimes." And then we had that actually in common. And then she explained, "You know what I really like about Rush Limbaugh? He seems to defend me against all the liberal media that think I’m a redneck, that I’m backward, that I’m Southern, that I’m uneducated, that I’m homophobic, racist, a sexist. And thanks for coming."
So, it was an amazing experience, and I met some very interesting, complex people that don’t fit the deplorable category, but are complex, each in their own, and that in many ways might have a lot of affinity with the left, if we could only cross that bridge.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, after all of those interviews in that time span, you decided on the title Strangers in Their Own Land. Why?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yes. Well, here’s the thing. I decided on that title because, in the end, it described how a lot of them felt. I talk about a deep story, because, at the end of the day, I keep asking, "Why do you hate the government, you know, all the things the government does?" And they would say—there were many answers to that, but one was this. It was the deep story. What is a deep story? It’s a story that feels true to you. You take the facts out, you take judgment out. It’s as felt.
You’re on a—waiting in line for something you really want at the end: the American dream. You feel a sense of great deserving. You’ve worked very hard. A lot of these guys were plant workers, pipefitters in the petrochemical—you know, it’s tough work. So you’ve worked really hard. And the line isn’t moving. It’s like a pilgrimage up, up to the top. It’s not moving.
Then you see some people cut in line. Well, who were they? They are affirmative action women who would go for formerly all-men’s jobs, or affirmative action blacks who have been sponsored and now have access to formerly all-white jobs. It’s immigrants. It’s refugees. And from—as felt, the line’s moving back.
Then they see Barack Hussein Obama, who should impartially be monitoring the line, wave to the line cutters. And then you think, "Oh, he’s their president and not mine. And, in fact, he’s a line cutter. How did he get to Harvard? How did he get to Columbia? Where did he get the money? His mom was a single mom. Wait a minute."
And then they begin to feel like strangers in their own land. They feel like the government has become a giant marginalization machine. It’s not theirs. In fact, it’s putting them back. And then someone in front of the line turns around and says, "Oh, you redneck," you know. And that feels insult to injury. It’s just the tipping point at which they feel not only estranged—I mean, demographically they’re getting smaller. They feel like they’re religious in an increasingly secular culture. Their attitudes are denigrated, and so they’re culturally denigrated. And then the economy begins to shake. And then they feel, "I need another leader."
AMY GOODMAN: Arlie, talk about the man you met whose whole community was swallowed by a sink hole from a drilling disaster.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: There was a man, born actually on a plantation, son of a plumber, a fifth of seven, and he spent most of his adulthood working for the oil industry. Big tea party guy, doesn’t like government. It should be down to 5 percent of what it is, in his view. He loved fishing, loved hunting. He loved nature. And he lived in a place called Bayou Corne.
And what happened was there was a company, Texas Brine, that drilled a hole into the bottom of the bayou and disrupted an underlying salt dome. So, it was like pulling the plug on the bayou. The water went down, down, down, down. Hundred-year-old cypress trees went falling down and were sucked in. And then this methane gas-infused mud came up, started as a small, you know, house lot-sized thing. It’s now 37 acres of toxic mud.
This man, who told me, you know, government got in the way of community, he loved community. And now Texas Brine, this company, unregulated, insufficiently regulated, had caused the loss of his community and his tea party. So I ask him, "Gosh, you know, don’t you—don’t you want a good regulation? And why are you voting for Donald Trump, whose one clear plan is to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency? I don’t get it." And he said this about the government being a giant marginalization machine, but he said one thing else that I think we—
AMY GOODMAN: But didn’t he blame the company?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Well, I kept asking him, "What about Texas Brine? Aren’t you mad at them?" And he said, "Yes, I’m mad at them, but I’m more mad at the state." And there’s a reason for that, that I didn’t know and discovered.
What’s really happening in Louisiana, which I think may exaggerate what’s happening in a lot of states, is that the oil companies really dominate the state. The state is a servant to oil and petrochemical industry. And the state is saying, "Oh, please come and settle here in Louisiana, not Texas. We will give you $1.5 billion in 'incentive' pay, 'incentive' benefits." With that money, these companies make a donation to the Audubon Society and to a bird sanctuary, and so people think, "Oh, the company is so generous. And look what good things the company is doing, plus it’s offering us jobs," although not too many jobs. These are highly automated plants that import a lot of skilled labor. And so, the company looks good.
Meanwhile, the state is doing the bidding of the companies. It is not a regulated state, but there are regulators who are not doing their job. So, in a way, the state had become like the complaint clerk for the companies. It was doing the dirty work for the companies. It was saying, "Well, we’re—you know, you deserve to be regulated," but it doesn’t do it. So, the Mike Schaffs of Louisiana were saying, "Why am I paying taxes to a state that’s not doing its job?"
And so, a social logic links together with a personal one, because you’ve got people that, two decades, they haven’t had a raise, their wife is working, they’re working overtime, owe money to the bank. And they’re thinking, "How can I get that American dream, when I’m stalled? Let me get some tax money, since they’re not doing the job any"—that’s a second—it’s another reason he was down on the state.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Let me ask you, many of Donald Trump’s supporters have been referred to by Hillary Clinton in her now famous comments of "a basket of deplorables." What was your sense from interviewing lots of them? Do you agree with that statement? And do you think that’s had an impact even in the recent surge of support for Trump?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Actually, I do. I think that’s a good point. I actually have just come from Louisiana. I hosted a dinner for the people I’ve written about. And one woman came with a red jacket. She pulled the jacket out, and she had a red shirt that said "adorable deplorables." So they made a joke of it. And there’s now a caravan going around called Rosie, for Republican women, selling these shirts.
But what was the attitude toward race of the people that I came to know? Complex. They didn’t think they were racist. They were afraid I would, and avoided the topic, actually. So I had to wait 'til it emerged. And then I discovered that they thought of racism as instances where you hate blacks or where you use the N-word. And they didn't hate blacks, and they didn’t use the N-word, and so they didn’t feel like racists. They didn’t look at, you know, could you get an apartment in Trump Towers or, you know, government benefits after World War II, that kind of thing.
AMY GOODMAN: We have 15 seconds.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: OK. So, complex story. And they shouldn’t be given up on.
AMY GOODMAN: Were you shocked when Hillary Clinton used that term?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: I was. I said, "Hillary, come with me to Louisiana and get to know some people."
AMY GOODMAN: And their identification with Donald Trump, who calls himself a billionaire?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yeah, well, they think they want to be one, too. They see him as a rescue, as a secular rapture. "Take me up out of this, so I’m no longer a stranger in my own land."
AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to continue the conversation after and post it online at democracynow.org. Arlie Russell Hochschild is author of Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. The book has been listed for the 2016 National Book Award. She’s professor emeritus of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. ... Read More →
Hunger Strikes, Marches & Work Stoppages: Unprecedented National Prison Strike Enters Third Week
The largest prison work strike in U.S. history has entered its third week. Organizers report that as of last week at least 20 prisons in 11 states continued to protest, including in Alabama, California, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, South Carolina and Washington. The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee says at one point about 20,000 prisoners were on strike. With protest has come punishment. Several facilities have been put on lockdown, with prisoners kept in their cells and denied phone access both before and during the strike. Organizers have also been put in solitary confinement.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: The prison guard work strike at the Holman Correctional Facility in Alabama comes as the largest prison work strike in U.S. history has entered its third week. Organizers report that, as of last week, at least 20 prisons in 11 states continued to protest, including Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, South Carolina and Washington. The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee says at one point about 20,000 prisoners were on strike. With the protest has come punishment. Several facilities were put on lockdown, with prisoners kept in their cells and denied phone access both before and during the strike. Organizers were also put in solitary confinement.
AMY GOODMAN: Joining us from Austin, Texas, is Azzurra Crispino, the media co-chair of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee. Still with us, Pastor Kenneth Glasgow of The Ordinary People Society, TOPS, and Kinetik Justice inside Holman. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Azzurra Crispino, I’d like to start with you. Talk about this nationwide strike. Is this—does this have any precedent in modern U.S. history? And how extensive is it? And some officials are claiming that it’s already petered out.
AZZURRA CRISPINO: Well, certainly, the history here bears repeating. When George Jackson was assassinated 45 years ago, he had been calling for a prisoners’ union and a nationwide prison strike. So it’s fitting that on September 9th, on the 45th anniversary of the Attica uprising, that we were finally able to deliver the largest prison strike that has ever been seen in U.S. history. In terms of the momentum, certainly now there has been a shift towards dealing with repression. But as you stated, there are several facilities across several states in which strike action continues to occur.
AMY GOODMAN: So what exactly is happening right now across the country?
AZZURRA CRISPINO: Well, there’s been a shift to a lot more hunger strikes. So, in Merced County jail in California, over a hundred prisoners are on hunger strike. They are joined by the wife of one of the inmates, Victoria, who is also on hunger strike. They are calling for a 2,000-calorie diet, an end for solitary confinement for juvenile detainees, and, in addition, for the firing of a Lieutenant Moore, who’s been particularly sadistic as a guard there. In South Carolina, there continue to be uprisings, specifically at Turbeville Correctional Institution. And there have been continuing hunger strikes in Michigan, as well as Ohio. In Michigan, Dying to Live, Cesar DeLeon and others have been a hunger strike for more than a hundred days. They are calling for an end to long-term solitary confinement past a year.
But I think the greatest conversation has to deal with repression, and all of that is occurring. So we just heard, less than two days ago, that at Kinross unit in Michigan, that guards—initially it seemed that there was going to be a conversation. The warden had come out and was speaking to the inmates, over 400 of them, which had peacefully marched in the yard. But after the warden left, basically, a riot repression team came in and dragged prisoners out of their showers and out of their cells, zip-tied their arms behind their back and threw them out in the yard and left them out there for five to six hours in the rain without any access to bathroom facilities. So the repression that prisoners are facing around the country for having participated in the strike is real, and it’s very severe. So right now we’re really focused on responding in order to help get the word out and get people to call into those units, so that we can help to support those who are being repressed, as well as to continue supporting strike workers, whether that’s people who are continuing to be on work stoppages and rolling work stoppages or continuing to hunger strike.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Kinetik Justice, is the strike still going on among prisoners at Holman?
KINETIK JUSTICE: Uh-uh, not at Holman, right here or nothing. I want to say that the strike is not going on. Like, a lot of things have been completely unorthodox at Holman for the last few days. And in the last two days, we’ve actually had officers to augment the shifts to allow the people to move around. So, a lot of things are trying to get back to normal, in the sense that people are finally getting out of these dormitories and moving around. So, things are not locked down as a strike. So, no, not at Holman, it’s not continuing, as we set out.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we want to thank you all for being with us. And, of course, we’ll continue to follow this. Kinetik Justice, in solitary confinement at Holman in Alabama, prison of a thousand men. Azzurra Crispino, joining us from Austin, media co-chair of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee. And thanks so much to Pastor Kenneth Glasgow, founder and national president of The Ordinary People Society, TOPS, a faith-based organization focused on criminal justice and rehabilitation of repeat offenders. ... Read More →
Alabama Guards Stage Work Strike Months After Prisoner Uprising at Overcrowded Holman Facility
Prison officials in Alabama have confirmed a group of correction officers refused to report for the evening shift Saturday at the Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore. The apparent work strike comes as guards have been walking off the job amid safety concerns and overcrowding throughout the summer. Prisoners say there are stabbings on a regular basis, and call the facility "The Slaughterhouse." We speak to incarcerated organizer Kinetik Justice and Pastor Kenneth Glasgow, founder and national president of The Ordinary People Society.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We begin today’s show in Alabama, where prison officials have confirmed a group of correction officers refused to report for the evening shift Saturday at the Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore. The apparent work strike comes as guards have been walking off the job amid safety concerns and overcrowding throughout the summer. Prisoners say there are stabbings on a regular basis, and call the facility "The Slaughterhouse." A guard stabbed by a prisoner earlier this month died last week. The warden was stabbed in March.
This is incarcerated organizer Kinetik Justice speaking from inside the Holman prison on Saturday. Listen closely.
KINETIK JUSTICE: It’s official. At 6:00, no officers came to work. None came to work. None of the officers came to work. We have Deputy Commissioner Culliver, Warden Peterson, Sergeant Franklin from across the street. Who else? Yeah, Warden Peterson from across the street, Warden Stewart, the captain and a white guy, Wilson. Who else? And one other. Those are the only ones here running the facility. Right now, the commissioner is passing out tray. Warden Peterson is pulling the cart. Deputy Commissioner Culliver passed me my tray. Every cell, he’s passing out the tray. I can’t believe it. To my black sliding shoes, brown knitted pants, white tweed shirt with the collar bust open, sweating at the temples. It’s real. No officers came to work. They completely bucked on the administration. No more will they be pawns in the game. Nighttime it’s going down.
AMY GOODMAN: Democracy Now! reached out to the Alabama Department of Corrections to confirm reports of the strike by correction officers at the Holman Correctional Facility in Alabama. The department described the reports as unofficial and erroneous, but the department did confirm nine officers did not report to work on Saturday.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: The events at Holman come as the largest prison work strike in U.S. history has entered its third week. Organizers report that as of last week at least 20 prisons in 11 states continued to be involved in the protest, including in Alabama, California, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, New York, Ohio, South Carolina and Washington. The Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee says at one point about 20,000 prisoners were on strike. With the protest has come punishment, however. Several facilities were put on lockdown, with prisoners kept in their cells and denied phone access both before and during the strike. Organizers were also put in solitary confinement.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, for more, we’re joined by three guests.
Pastor Kenneth Glasgow is with us, founder and national president of The Ordinary People Society—that’s TOPS—a faith-based organization focusing on criminal justice reform and rehabilitation of repeat offenders. He’s also founder of the Prodigal Child Project.
Azzurra Crispino is with us, media co-chair of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee. She’s joining us from Austin.
And Kinetik Justice is also joining us, co-founder of Free Alabama Movement, currently serving his 33rd month in solitary confinement at the William C. Holman Correctional Facility in Alabama. He’s joining us by phone from inside the prison, inside Holman.
Kinetik, let’s start with you. Can you describe what’s happening inside the prison right now? We just heard a clip of what you had to say about what happened Saturday night. What’s happening with the guards? What’s happening with the prisoners?
KINETIK JUSTICE: First of all, thank you for having me on the show, Ms. Goodman. Actually, I want to address some things. On Saturday, on the second shift, no officers reported to work. That was confirmed by the Department of Corrections spokesperson yesterday. However, they came back and tried to retrack and to spin the story, and said, no, only nine officers on the third shift didn’t come. But that just goes to show how out of touch the DOC spokesperson is with what’s going on at Holman. Holman has had two shifts for the last decade. Officers work 12-hour shifts, from 6:00 to 6:00. There is no third shift, to clear that up.
As regards to what’s going on now, obviously, there were some concessions and some compromises made, as yesterday there was almost an entire shift with extra officers from other facilities overtime. So, they actually had yard call for the first time in weeks. They actually ran the store. So, they’re trying to make some kind of concessions with the officers, so I can’t speak directly to what those compromises were, but they did have almost a half shift yesterday, a whole shift with extra officers from other facilities.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And has there been any communication from the officers to the inmates in terms of why they are taking these actions?
KINETIK JUSTICE: Yes, yes. They’re clearly communicating. For weeks we’ve been communicating back and forth. This administration really has no regard for human life. And they’re beginning to see that it’s not just directed at the men that are incarcerated here, that the violence that they’ve created actually spills over to the officers, as well. And a lot of them are terrified of what’s going on, and refuse to go into the dormitory. A lot of times when they’re calling codes for officers to respond to altercations, they’re not coming. And these altercations are being broken up by people inside the dormitory. And there’s a growing consensus in this place that if you don’t have somebody that loves you or cares about you in the dormitory, then you’re almost guaranteed to be a dead man, because the officers are not coming to save you.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And what do you mean by the violence that the administration has created?
KINETIK JUSTICE: Exactly what I mean when I say that. Earlier in this year at St. Clair Correctional Facility, the violence was out of control. Officers were being assaulted. Inmates were being stabbed every day. There were several lawsuits filed about it at St. Clair Correctional Facility. What they did is they sent all of the people who were incarcerated at St. Clair they deemed to be problems to Holman. In over a process of maybe 45 days, they sent maybe 50 to 60 people here.
In March, they had an uprising. The warden was stabbed, and another officer was stabbed eight times. After that, they had another uprising maybe two days later. And about a month after that, we had the May Day work strike. And that lasted for 10 days. Immediately after that, this administration handpicked every person in this prison that they felt was influential, that was moving in the direction of the movement, and they transferred them to other institutions, while simultaneously, in the segregation unit, releasing, you know, those people who had already had assaults and stabbing cases, and they brought in others. And they pulled the officers back and told them to step back out of the dorms, and they allowed them to sit there and stab each other up, rob each other and, you know, just a whole bunch of foolishness.
And it began to get out of control, to the point where, you know, officers were being threatened. And they were reporting this to the administration that they were being threatened, and the administration was brushing them off like it wasn’t nothing. So they realized that after this spilled over and Officer Bettis was killed, that they realized that their lives was in danger just as much as these people who are incarcerated here. And on Saturday, they all came together in order to force this administration to live and work in the environment that they had created for these officers, to give them a taste of their own medicine, so to speak.
AMY GOODMAN: So, we’re talking to Kinetik Justice inside the Holman corrections prison. That’s about, what, 55 miles north—northeast of Mobile near the Florida Panhandle. I wanted to turn to a clip of former Holman corrections officer Curt Stidham, who was speaking to the local Fox affiliate in Alabama. Stidham resigned his position after the March riot inside the prison. He’s now speaking out about the conditions for guards at Holman.
CURT STIDHAM: Just because an inmate had a bad day, Officer Bettis lost his life. I think he’s dead due to lack of security with inside that prison. It’s impossible to follow the rules that you’re given, or the regs, because there’s absolutely not enough security there to complete those tasks.
AMY GOODMAN: So, Kinetik Justice, can you respond to that? And then also talk about what the prisoners are doing right now.
KINETIK JUSTICE: Yes, I agree with the former officer, to a certain extent. And it’s clear that you can’t run a maximum-security prison with 17 people. It’s undeniably—it’s highly impossible. But that—those are numbers that they’ve given, the 17 people—
AMY GOODMAN: How many prisoners are there?
KINETIK JUSTICE: One thousand. You have 200 men that are in solitary confinement. You have 172 that are on death row. And you have approximately 640 in the general population. And these men are supposedly being provided services and protection and their well-being secured by 14, 15 and 16 officers. And like governor said, it’s impossible. And that means that a lot of things are going on that can’t be controlled by them, to the point that there is no basic services being provided, there is no true security.
As the situation at Holman is, most of the security is being provided by the street organizations. In affiliation with Free Alabama Movement, we had a peace summit, and we agreed that the administration was not going to protect us or, you know, make sure that the elderly were being protected and so forth. So we took it upon ourselves to try to instill some type of discipline within our own structures to maintain some type of order, until we could get some help from society in the form of creating a task force to do a fact-finding mission to come up in here, to get someone like an advocate like Pastor Glasgow, an attorney like Bryan Stevenson, Senator Vivian Figures, Senator Hank Sanders and some reporters to actually come up in here and tell the Department of Corrections to let us see your transfer logs, let us see your segregation release logs, let us see the body charts, let us see the officer sign-in logs—let us see documentation that proves that it is what you say it is, in contrast to what you say the propaganda of the Free Alabama Movement says it is.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, you mentioned Pastor Kenneth Glasgow, who’s also joining us from Montgomery. He’s the founder and national president of The Ordinary People Society. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Pastor Glasgow. Can you tell us about the situation of the prisoners in Alabama right now, what you’re seeing, as a member of a faith-based group, about the responsibility of those on the outside?
PASTOR KENNETH GLASGOW: Thank you for having me. And what we’re seeing is that the prisoners—first of all, they did a yeoman’s job. We want to give them all the credit and all the applause we can. They have overcame religious barriers, racial barriers, geographical barriers, and also they have overcame incarceration barriers. And by overcoming those barriers, Free Alabama Movement and Kinetik Justice, that you have on now, they were able to organize, lead and initiate this prison strike over 24 states in 40 to 50 different prisons.
What they have done is made us on the outside, who are organizers and advocates, we have to step up, because they have proven to us that, you know, we didn’t look at, even ourselves, being the formerly incarcerated persons—we didn’t look at prison slavery and prison labor. Now, since this prison strike has happened, we on the outside are looking at who we’re going to target, who we’re going to boycott next. Whole Foods has already put out a media blitz last year, and we’re checking on it right now to make sure that they’re not still using prison labor. We’re looking at Starbucks. We’re looking at McDonald’s. We’re looking at Victoria’s Secret. We’re looking at all the different industries and companies.
And what’s happening inside the prisons right now is that there—whenever a people comes up—Bryan Stevenson said it best. Whenever we deal with the proximity of the situation, those who are incarcerated are looking at the fact that people that have paid taxes for them to be rehabilitated, for them to be educated, for them to be trained, in order to come out into society—because 98 percent of the people in prison are coming out, 98 percent, and in order for them to come out and be able to be productive citizens, they need to have these skills and education and all. What they’re looking at is that they’re just being housed. Their families are being exploited by Alabama Department of Corrections and department of corrections in all of the different states, because their families are sending them money for commissary, sending them money for them to use the phone. And yet, the taxpayers are paying anywhere from $31,000 to $80,000 per year, depending on what state you’re in, for them to get this rehabilitation and education, and they’re not getting it.
What they’re getting is being used for free prison labor. And, you know, so most of the industries and companies that own the high-level national media, that’s supporting and paying them off, got us believing that they’re outsourcing jobs, they’re outsourcing their products, outsourcing the manufacturing, and that’s why we have an unemployment rate. But actually, they’re not outsourcing; they’re insourcing.
So what those brothers and sisters are doing inside the prison is something that we all need to look at and look at our society and say, "Wait a minute. We’re still producing slavery and still producing slaves. We’re still producing indentured servitude," and look at the 13th Amendment and change it. I think what they are doing is very, very necessary. And what they’re doing, in a very, very peaceful way, shows us that our Department of Corrections, in no matter what state you’re in, need to be revamped, revisited and relooked at, holistically.
AMY GOODMAN: Kinetik Justice, inside Holman, what does a prison work strike look like? What are people refusing to do? You’re in solitary confinement, so—is that right? So you wouldn’t be working?
KINETIK JUSTICE: That’s absolutely correct. I am in solitary confinement, and, no, I’m not working.
But what a work strike looks like in prison is that, usually, around 12:30, 12:45 at night, they sent for the kitchen workers, those who will prepare the breakfast meal. And when those people don’t report to work, they initiate a prison lockdown to do an investigation to see what’s going on. Nine times out of 10, they already have advanced knowledge that there’s going to be a work strike, so they come around to confirm that there is a work strike, no one wants to go to work, no one is being forced not to go to work, etc. Once that happens, the warden is dispatched here, and maybe then allocating officers in the kitchen to prepare these meals.
And in the morning time, you know, the prison is locked down, because the officers are trying to feed over 600, 700 people. And it’s not something that they’re usually doing, so this is a kind of awkward and frustrating process for them. When work call comes in the morning for the tag plant, the industry, no one reports. And that day begins just like that, with the officers on a lockdown. The officers are struggling to provide the basic necessities, such as preparing meals and trying to get the medical list done and get the sick call and so forth done.
So, it’s a slow process throughout the day for the officers as well as for the men incarcerated, because we’re forced to be in dormitories with 115 people all day long, and, you know, that can get taxing, because, you know, due to overcrowding, you’re already dealing with tensions and frustration. So, throughout a work strike, leadership is really required, because you have to try to keep a balance inside these dormitories to keep violence from erupting, because one sign of violence inside these dormitories, the administration will use that as an excuse to bring in a CERT team and try to assert violence, or they’re trying to say that we’re having a riot or, you know, something outside of the character of what we’re actually doing on the work strike.
AMY GOODMAN: Kinetik, we have to break. We’re going to come back to this discussion. Kinetik Justice is speaking to us from solitary confinement inside the Holman prison that houses a thousand men, very few guards. Pastor Kenneth Glasgow is joining us from Montgomery, Alabama. And we’re also going to speak with Azzurra Crispino about the nationwide prison strike. She’s going to be joining us from Austin, Texas. Stay with us. ... Read More →Headlines:
Trump Slams Former Miss Universe over Weight Gain
In the wake of Monday night’s first presidential debate, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has begun lashing out at everyone from moderator Lester Holt to a former Miss Universe beauty pageant winner. Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Trump accused Holt of asking "unfair questions." He also reiterated his criticism of former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, whom Clinton had mentioned during Monday night’s debate.
This comes as Arizona’s largest newspaper, The Arizona Republic, has endorsed Hillary Clinton—marking the paper’s first time ever endorsing a Democratic candidate for president. The editorial board wrote, "Since The Arizona Republic began publication in 1890, we have never endorsed a Democrat over a Republican for president. Never. … This year is different."
Police in the San Diego, California, suburb of El Cajon shot and killed an unarmed African-American man Tuesday, after his sister called 911 to report her brother was having a mental health emergency. Eyewitnesses said 30-year-old Alfred Olango was holding his hands up when he was tased by one police officer and then fired upon five times by another officer. In a dramatic video posted to Facebook, a woman named Rumbie Mubaiwa begins filming moments after Alfred Olango is shot dead. In the background, Olango’s sister is heard tearfully confronting police officers over the death of her brother.
Meanwhile, a nine-year-old girl’s testimony at a City Council meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, about police brutality has gone viral, as protests continue over the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott. This is Zianna Oliphant.
This comes as tennis superstar Serena Williams has also spoken out about police brutality. In a Facebook post, she describes riding in the car recently with her 18-year-old nephew, who was driving. When she spotted a police officer, she remembered the video of the fatal police shooting of Philando Castile, which was filmed by his girlfriend, Diamond "Lavish" Reynolds, in which she narrated the aftermath of the shooting while she was still in the car, with a police officer pointing a gun at her and her four-year-old daughter as her boyfriend lay dying next to her. Serena Williams wrote: "I would never forgive myself if something happened to my nephew. He’s so innocent. So were all 'the others'. ... I won’t be silent."
In financial news, Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf is being forced to return $41 million of his personal compensation amid a massive scandal at the major Wall Street bank involving thousands of employees who took private customer information to create 2 million fake accounts in order to meet sales targets. The scandal dates back to at least 2011, and Stumpf admits he’s known about the practice since 2013. Senator Elizabeth Warren has called for Stumpf to resign and to be criminally investigated.
In more financial news, Mylan, the maker of the life-saving allergy shot EpiPen, is again under fire, this time for reportedly lying to Congress. Last week, Mylan CEO Heather Bresch told a congressional committee the profit off a two-pack of EpiPens is $100. But according to The Wall Street Journal, the profit is actually about $166—about 60 percent higher than Bresch disclosed. That’s because Bresch told Congress a profit figure that included a 37.5 percent tax rate on the EpiPen, even though Mylan paid a tax rate of only 7 percent last year. An analyst told The Wall Street Journal that the $100 reported profit figure "has nothing to do with reality.”
In international news, former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres has died at the age of 93. Born in Poland, Peres was one of the most influential political figures throughout Israel’s history. He served twice as prime minister, once as president, and as the minister of defense, finance, transportation and foreign affairs. While serving as defense minister in the 1950s, he was a key figure in securing nuclear weapons for the new state of Israel through secret negotiations with France. He once offered to sell nuclear weapons to the apartheid government of South Africa—a fact revealed after a secret memo was uncovered and published in The Nonproliferation Review. Peres was also a leading advocate for the building of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. His slogan was "Settlements everywhere." In 1994, Peres won the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, for helping negotiate the Oslo Accords.
In Afghanistan, local officials say a U.S. drone strike has killed 18 people in the province of Nangarhar. The local police chief says the strike killed 15 suspected militants and three civilians. He says the strike hit a house, killing almost everyone inside.
In Syria, the two largest hospitals in East Aleppo are currently closed after being struck by airstrikes this morning amid a devastating bombing campaign by the Syrian government and Russia. One health official called the strikes "catastrophic and unprecedented in modern history." There are reportedly only about 30 doctors left in East Aleppo, where 250,000 people are currently trapped.
In Britain, Senator Bernie Sanders’s brother, Larry Sanders, is running for former Prime Minister David Cameron’s seat in Parliament on the Green Party ticket. Larry Sanders has lived in Britain since 1969. The brothers are politically aligned, particularly on issues of economic inequality. Cameron stepped down from Parliament earlier this month, after also resigning as prime minister in July following the Brexit vote.
And President Obama has nominated Jeffrey DeLaurentis to be the first U.S. ambassador to Cuba in more than a half-century. It is the latest step in the thawing of ties between Cuba and the United States. DeLaurentis is currently the U.S. chief of mission in Havana. His nomination has to be confirmed by the Senate, where some lawmakers—including Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz—have said they’ll oppose any nomination for a U.S. ambassador to Cuba.
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In the wake of Monday night’s first presidential debate, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has begun lashing out at everyone from moderator Lester Holt to a former Miss Universe beauty pageant winner. Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Trump accused Holt of asking "unfair questions." He also reiterated his criticism of former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, whom Clinton had mentioned during Monday night’s debate.Donald Trump: "When she brought up the person that became—you know, I know that person. That person was a Miss Universe person. And she was the worst we ever had. The worst, the absolute worst. She was impossible. And she was a Miss Universe contestant, and ultimately a winner, who they had a tremendously difficult time with as Miss Universe. ... She was the winner, and, you know, she gained a massive amount of weight, and it was a real problem. We had a—we had a real problem."
That was Donald Trump speaking to Fox and Friends. In response, Alicia Machado has attacked Donald Trump in an interview with The Guardian, in which she also recounted how Trump’s criticism of her sparked an eating disorder.
Alicia Machado: "I was sick for almost five years with anorexic, bulimic. I had eating disorders after that episode. I know very well this person. I know what he can do. This is more than a reality show. This is not a reality show."
That was Alicia Machado. She’s now working for Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Donald Trump also brought cameras into the gym to show her working out. After the debate, Donald Trump also told ABC he regrets not raising Bill Clinton’s marital infidelities.
Donald Trump: "I mean, I got everything I wanted to say, I got it out, other than the transgressions of Bill, because, you know, she takes all these commercials, spending literally hundreds of millions of dollars on commercials, and they’re lies. They’re lies. But I thought—and I didn’t want to do it with Chelsea, who I think is a very wonderful young lady. I didn’t want to say what I was going to say with Chelsea in the room."
Donald Trump had previously said he might bring Gennifer Flowers to sit in the front row of the debate. Flowers had an affair with Bill Clinton in the 1970s. The Trump campaign later said it had not extended an invitation to Flowers and that she would not attend.
TOPICS:
In First, Arizona Republic Endorses Democrat for President
This comes as Arizona’s largest newspaper, The Arizona Republic, has endorsed Hillary Clinton—marking the paper’s first time ever endorsing a Democratic candidate for president. The editorial board wrote, "Since The Arizona Republic began publication in 1890, we have never endorsed a Democrat over a Republican for president. Never. … This year is different."TOPICS:
San Diego: Police Kill Unarmed Black Man Having Mental Health Breakdown
Police in the San Diego, California, suburb of El Cajon shot and killed an unarmed African-American man Tuesday, after his sister called 911 to report her brother was having a mental health emergency. Eyewitnesses said 30-year-old Alfred Olango was holding his hands up when he was tased by one police officer and then fired upon five times by another officer. In a dramatic video posted to Facebook, a woman named Rumbie Mubaiwa begins filming moments after Alfred Olango is shot dead. In the background, Olango’s sister is heard tearfully confronting police officers over the death of her brother.Olango’s sister: "Guys, why couldn’t you tase him? Why couldn’t you guys tase him? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?"
Rumbie Mubaiwa: "What’s his birthday, so they could find his information?"
Olango’s sister: "Why couldn’t you guys tase him? I told you he’s sick. And you guys shot him."
El Cajon Police Chief Jeff Davis acknowledged it took officers 50 minutes to respond to the 911 call of Olango’s sister, who warned police her brother was mentally ill. Chief Davis disputed eyewitness accounts that Olango had his hands in the air. He said police had obtained a video showing officers fired only after Olango pointed an object at them. He declined to make the video public but released a single still image to the press in which he says Alfred Olango’s hands appear to be raised at shoulder height, as if to fire a weapon. It’s unclear from the photo if Olango is holding any objects. Chief Davis acknowledged there was no weapon found at the scene of the killing. The killing immediately sparked protests. Hundreds gathered at the Los Panchos restaurant where Olango was killed; they later protested outside El Cajon police headquarters. We’ll have more on the police killing of Alfred Olango after headlines.
TOPICS:
Charlotte: 9-Year-Old Girl's Testimony About Police Killings Goes Viral
Meanwhile, a nine-year-old girl’s testimony at a City Council meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, about police brutality has gone viral, as protests continue over the fatal police shooting of Keith Lamont Scott. This is Zianna Oliphant.Zianna Oliphant: "I’ve been born and raised in Charlotte, and I’ve never felt this way 'til now. And I can't stand how we’re treated. It’s a shame that our fathers and mothers are killed, and we can’t even see them anymore. It’s a shame that we have to go to the graveyard and bury them. And we have tears, and we shouldn’t have tears. We need our fathers and mothers to be by our side."
That was nine-year-old Zianna Oliphant testifying at the Charlotte City Council meeting Monday.
TOPICS:
"I Won't Be Silent": Serena Williams on Police Killings of African Americans
This comes as tennis superstar Serena Williams has also spoken out about police brutality. In a Facebook post, she describes riding in the car recently with her 18-year-old nephew, who was driving. When she spotted a police officer, she remembered the video of the fatal police shooting of Philando Castile, which was filmed by his girlfriend, Diamond "Lavish" Reynolds, in which she narrated the aftermath of the shooting while she was still in the car, with a police officer pointing a gun at her and her four-year-old daughter as her boyfriend lay dying next to her. Serena Williams wrote: "I would never forgive myself if something happened to my nephew. He’s so innocent. So were all 'the others'. ... I won’t be silent."TOPICS:
Wells Fargo CEO to Return $41 Million in Compensation Amid Scandal
In financial news, Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf is being forced to return $41 million of his personal compensation amid a massive scandal at the major Wall Street bank involving thousands of employees who took private customer information to create 2 million fake accounts in order to meet sales targets. The scandal dates back to at least 2011, and Stumpf admits he’s known about the practice since 2013. Senator Elizabeth Warren has called for Stumpf to resign and to be criminally investigated.TOPICS:
WSJ: Mylan Misrepresented Profit Figures of EpiPen to Congress
In more financial news, Mylan, the maker of the life-saving allergy shot EpiPen, is again under fire, this time for reportedly lying to Congress. Last week, Mylan CEO Heather Bresch told a congressional committee the profit off a two-pack of EpiPens is $100. But according to The Wall Street Journal, the profit is actually about $166—about 60 percent higher than Bresch disclosed. That’s because Bresch told Congress a profit figure that included a 37.5 percent tax rate on the EpiPen, even though Mylan paid a tax rate of only 7 percent last year. An analyst told The Wall Street Journal that the $100 reported profit figure "has nothing to do with reality.”TOPICS:
Israel: Former Prime Minister Shimon Peres Dies at 93
In international news, former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres has died at the age of 93. Born in Poland, Peres was one of the most influential political figures throughout Israel’s history. He served twice as prime minister, once as president, and as the minister of defense, finance, transportation and foreign affairs. While serving as defense minister in the 1950s, he was a key figure in securing nuclear weapons for the new state of Israel through secret negotiations with France. He once offered to sell nuclear weapons to the apartheid government of South Africa—a fact revealed after a secret memo was uncovered and published in The Nonproliferation Review. Peres was also a leading advocate for the building of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. His slogan was "Settlements everywhere." In 1994, Peres won the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, for helping negotiate the Oslo Accords.TOPICS:
Afghanistan: Officials Say U.S. Drone Strike Killed 18
In Afghanistan, local officials say a U.S. drone strike has killed 18 people in the province of Nangarhar. The local police chief says the strike killed 15 suspected militants and three civilians. He says the strike hit a house, killing almost everyone inside.TOPICS:
Syria: Two Major Hospitals Bombed Amid "Catastrophic" Airstrikes
In Syria, the two largest hospitals in East Aleppo are currently closed after being struck by airstrikes this morning amid a devastating bombing campaign by the Syrian government and Russia. One health official called the strikes "catastrophic and unprecedented in modern history." There are reportedly only about 30 doctors left in East Aleppo, where 250,000 people are currently trapped.TOPICS:
Bernie Sanders' Brother Running for David Cameron's Parliament Seat
In Britain, Senator Bernie Sanders’s brother, Larry Sanders, is running for former Prime Minister David Cameron’s seat in Parliament on the Green Party ticket. Larry Sanders has lived in Britain since 1969. The brothers are politically aligned, particularly on issues of economic inequality. Cameron stepped down from Parliament earlier this month, after also resigning as prime minister in July following the Brexit vote.TOPICS:
President Obama Nominates First U.S. Ambassador to Cuba in 50 Years
And President Obama has nominated Jeffrey DeLaurentis to be the first U.S. ambassador to Cuba in more than a half-century. It is the latest step in the thawing of ties between Cuba and the United States. DeLaurentis is currently the U.S. chief of mission in Havana. His nomination has to be confirmed by the Senate, where some lawmakers—including Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz—have said they’ll oppose any nomination for a U.S. ambassador to Cuba.TOPICS:
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WATCH: Amy Goodman on PBS's Tavis Smiley on Dakota Access Pipeline & Land Defenders at Standing Rock
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COLUMN
Arlie Russell Hochschild on "Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the America" Part 2
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, in the wake of Monday night’s first presidential debate, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has begun lashing out at everyone from moderator Lester Holt to a former Miss Universe beauty pageant winner. Speaking to Fox News on Tuesday, Trump accused Holt of asking, quote, "unfair questions," unquote. He also reiterated his criticism of former Miss Universe Alicia Machado, whom Clinton had mentioned during Monday night’s debate.
DONALD TRUMP: When she brought up the person that became—you know, I know that person. That person was a Miss Universe person. And she was the worst we ever had. The worst, the absolute worst. She was impossible. And she was a Miss Universe contestant, and ultimately a winner, who they had a tremendously difficult time with as Miss Universe.
STEVE DOOCY: Did not know that story.
BRIAN KILMEADE: Well, I didn’t know either.
ELISABETH HASSELBECK: What—
DONALD TRUMP: She was a—she was the winner, and, you know, she gained a massive amount of weight, and it was—it was a real problem. We had a—we had a real problem.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Donald Trump speaking on Fox & Friends Tuesday morning. They didn’t ask about him; he raised this story unsolicited, after being asked if Hillary Clinton had gotten under his skin. And this has launched a tremendous response. Alicia Machado has done an interview with The Guardian. She was from Venezuela. Donald Trump, at the time that he says his Miss Universe gained weight, brought cameras into the gym to show her exercising.
Well, we’re going to Part 2 of our conversation with the renowned sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild, who traveled deep into Louisiana’s—into Louisiana, the bayou country, a stronghold of the conservative right, to better understand Trump supporters. Arlie Hochschild is author of the new book Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right, which has just been long-listed for the 2016 National Book Award. She’s a professor emerita of sociology at the University of California.
Thanks for staying with us, Arlie. We want to go to this example of Alicia Machado, because clearly he is pounding on this young, vulnerable woman, who says she had a eating disorder for years as a result of what he did to her.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: And I wanted to go to this issue of attacking the vulnerable.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Right.
AMY GOODMAN: And how does this fit into people’s attraction to Donald Trump who you spoke to in Louisiana?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Wonderful. Because they actually feel vulnerable. It’s a—that’s a paradox within a paradox. I think they relate to his dominance, you know, his—and even in the presidential debate, he began edging out, interrupting, taking more space. He actually said more words, I believe, in that debate than Hillary did.
AMY GOODMAN: Interrupted Hillary Clinton like 29 times.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Twenty-nine times. So, what is that? And would that—would he be seen as unmannerly and boorish, or, you know, a guy who takes charge, a guy who dominates? I think, actually, people relate to that dominance, that that’s a plus for them. And yet, you know, when he’s—he does—you could do a choreography of shame, who—he just shames people. He shames the reporter who had a disability. He shames Alicia with her eating disorder. He shames women. He shames, tacitly, blacks and immigrants, even, you know, the children of immigrants—everybody except white, blue-color men. And you can sort of do a little shame picture. And in a way, he’s trying to reverse, I think, what they feel has happened to them, that they feel like a new minority group that doesn’t dare say, "Hey, we’re a minority group, and we’re getting stepped on, and we deserve attention." They don’t dare say it because of the bravado, sort of what I call a deep story self. But they feel that vulnerability, and he seems to be pushing back and making everybody else vulnerable but them. I think that’s the tacit appeal here.
AMY GOODMAN: Did anyone in Louisiana who you talked to, in this very conservative swath, raise doubts about Donald Trump?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yes, they all did. It’s like nearly all of them came to him reluctantly. They didn’t say, "Oh, yeah, that’s our guy." One very wonderful couple, that I’ve actually dedicated the book to, suffered greatly from environmental pollution. They said, "When he imitated the disabled man, you know, no, that’s an immoral thing. He couldn’t be a good person." Another said, "Woah, he’s going to create an enormous state, great big debt. How are you going to catch every undocumented worker without setting up a giant surveillance state that’s going to cost an arm and a leg? We’re tea party forgetting." So they had that objection. So, it’s that they didn’t feel spoken to by the Democratic Party. The party of the working man turns out to have pushed away the working people that it, you know, was supposed to attract.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: You also talk in your book about the historical legacy of the culture of Louisiana, that the—the legacy of the plantation society in the 1860s and then of the movements of the 1960s and how that has affected the psyche that’s been handed down for—over generations, for how people look at the world. Can you talk about that, as well?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yes, that’s right. In a way, the plantation system set up a tiny elite, a great big traumatized bottom of slaves, planters’ slaves, and really not much in the middle. So, that was kind of the normal thing. And there was no public sphere, you know, of government services for everybody. That didn’t exist. And if you look at the history of poor whites in the plantation system, they were shoved aside. The best land was taken by the plantation owners. So the poor whites ended up in the swamps and hinterlands, and even the forest took game away from their dinner table, and their labor wasn’t needed, because the planters had slaves. So, they were marginalized, and yet the planters appealed to the poor whites and tried to forge an alliance—you know, we whites together.
And, in essence, the oil companies and the petrochemical companies, historians have said, are the new plantation. And again, it seems like you don’t need a middle class, you don’t need a public sector that is available to everyone. And so, I think, actually, many people, in the back of their mind, think of the federal government as the North, wagging its moral finger, telling us what to do. And they have this model of the plantation, so that where is good government in that model?
And then come the '60s, as you say, where all these other groups come up to fill the middle class, and they seem like they're getting ahead. I many times heard, "Oh, all the poor mes"—you know, black poor mes, women poor mes, immigrant poor mes, you know? And we’re tough. We’re stoical. We haven’t said, "Poor me." But they find themselves in a contradiction now. They’re facing contradiction because, in their heart of hearts, they feel like poor mes, and yet they feel too proud to say it.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to turn to a clip of Donald Trump being questioned by Jake Tapper on CNN about David Duke.
DONALD TRUMP: Well, just so you understand, I don’t know anything about David Duke. OK? I don’t know anything about what you’re even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists. So, I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know—did he endorse me, or what’s going on, because, you know, I know nothing about David Duke. I know nothing about white supremacists. And so, when you’re asking me a question, that I’m supposed to be talking about people that I know nothing about.
JAKE TAPPER: But I guess the question from the Anti-Defamation League is—even if you don’t know about their endorsement, there are these groups and individuals endorsing you. Would you just say, unequivocally, you condemn them, and you don’t want their support?
DONALD TRUMP: Well, I have to look at the group. I mean, I don’t know what group you’re talking about. You wouldn’t want me to condemn a group that I know nothing about. I’d have to look. If you would send me a list of the groups, I will do research on them, and certainly I would disavow if I thought there was something wrong.
JAKE TAPPER: The Ku Klux Klan?
DONALD TRUMP: But you may have groups in there that are totally fine, and it would be very unfair. So give me a list of the groups, and I’ll let you know.
JAKE TAPPER: OK, I mean, I’m just talking about David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan here, but...
DONALD TRUMP: I don’t know any—honestly, I don’t know David Duke. I don’t believe I’ve ever met him.
AMY GOODMAN: So that was—that was Donald Trump being questioned by Jake Tapper on CNN about David Duke, of course, a son of Louisiana—
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Right.
AMY GOODMAN: —who has endorsed Donald Trump. And Donald Trump’s having trouble, though he eventually disavowed support, it came under enormous pressure. Talk about David Duke, Donald Trump and the people you spoke with.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yeah, yeah. The way Trump disavowed Duke says everything. He said, "I disavow, OK?" That’s how he said it, as if "I’m being forced to," wink-wink, to people that understand that the liberals have pressed him to this position. I thought that was actually, from his point of view, very canny kind of winking. So, how—I think this is his covert way of appealing to people who are blaming blacks for their problems.
AMY GOODMAN: Does David Duke have an appeal to the people that you spoke with?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: No, actually not. They say, "Well, he’s racist."
AMY GOODMAN: The former Klan leader.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: The former Klan leader, they disavow. And that was their saying to me: "Look, I’m—I don’t hate blacks. I don’t use the N-word. I’m not a racist. And we don’t need David Duke. No." So, Hillary is wrong to say "deplorable" for half of Trump’s—she’s given up on them. I haven’t. I think what I’m looking at is all of the crossover issues that are possible. And one of them actually is, paradoxically, I think, coming to terms with the race issue.
So, for example, I just gave a reading in New Orleans, and this guy, Mike Schaff, who I interviewed and profiled in the book, was in the audience. And I’m reading about him to him—wasn’t a great talk, but I—because I—and he’s listening and is moved, actually, by that reading. Later, a professor of African-American studies asked me, "Well, how does race play into this?" And I begin a kind of—to go into that, answer that question. Later, Mike comes up with this woman, whose name is Nikki, begin talking and agree to meet to continue the conversation. And we need more of that. I think it can happen. And people feel insulted to be called racist, but they don’t understand racism in a structural way.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But I think one of the telling moments, to me, in—as you’re talking about race, is the—in Monday night’s debate, was when Trump referred to President Obama at one point as "your president."
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yes, yeah.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And said to myself, "Wait a second. 'Your president'? If any president has tried to be a president for the entire people, I’d say you’d have to say it’s President Obama." But yet—and I’m wondering, when you interviewed folks in Louisiana, did they feel that way, that this was—this was a president of someone else, not of them?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Yes. Yes, they did. That’s part of the deep story. It’s how it felt to them. "He’s sponsoring people unlike me. He’s pushing me back in line. He’s not waving to me. He’s not saying, 'Oh, you, too.'" And so, they did feel—that’s how they’ve came to feel stangers in their own land. And I felt as you do: "But isn’t he trying to reach across? If anybody has, he has." But they didn’t experience it that way.
AMY GOODMAN: And your subtitle, Anger and Mourning on the American Right, why "mourning"?
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: We see the anger, but we don’t see the mourning. I think these people are in mourning for a lost way of life, for a lost identity. This man has lost his community, his home, so even the air isn’t his. It belongs to the petrochemical plants. And the water isn’t.
AMY GOODMAN: Who he doesn’t blame.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: And who he doesn’t blame. Although when I put it to him that the companies were taking tax money and giving gifts so as to cultivate gratitude, and that—forcing the state to be the bad guy, and that’s why he hated the state, he nodded his head yes. So not only are there crossover issues, there’s crossover thinking. If you—if you have two beers and you go fishing for a while, it’s not that you agree on everything. And this book isn’t saying that we can, but it’s saying we can find common ground on certain issues and start there, and that a lot of people who think liberals are the enemy, and are insulting them and calling them reprehensible, are actually agreeing on a lot of things. A lot of people I talked to love Bernie Sanders. They said, "Oh, Uncle Bernie. Oh, well, he’s pie-in-the-sky socialist, but good ol’ Uncle Bernie." It’s Hillary they couldn’t—didn’t feel represented by. So, there are possibilities—that’s what I’m saying—long-term possibilities, that I think the shoe is on our foot to reach across.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, I want to thank you very much, Arlie, for joining us.
ARLIE RUSSELL HOCHSCHILD: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: Arlie Russell Hochschild, Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right. Again, the book has been listed for the 2016 National Book Award. Arlie Hochschild is professor emerita of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González. Go to democracynow.org to see Part 1 of this conversation. Thanks so much.
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