Latest / The People's News / HISD Announces 12 Schools Closing; Historic Riverside General Hospital Reopens; Trump's Adderall "Enhanced" SOTU - TPN 3/1/26

Transcript

HISD Announces 12 Schools Closing; Historic Riverside General Hospital Reopens; Trump's Adderall "Enhanced" SOTU - TPN 3/1/26 · The People's News

0:03
Speaker 1: It's the week of March the first, and this is
0:06
Speaker 1: what's on the People's News. Hid closes schools, bringing fear
0:11
Speaker 1: to the community after being closed for over a decade.
0:16
Speaker 1: Riverside Hospital is serving once again. The State of the
0:21
Speaker 1: Union speech was the longest by any US president, How
0:25
Speaker 1: it will affect the upcoming midterms, and what was learned.
0:31
Speaker 1: Mexico on fire as cartel leader killed. We play part
0:36
Speaker 1: one of the remembrance of Russia's attack on Ukraine. Dynamo
0:41
Speaker 1: go down and defeat with only nine men on the field.
0:46
Speaker 1: All this and more on the People's News. I'm Steve Gallington.
0:50
Speaker 1: This is the People's News, and the People's News starts now.
0:59
Speaker 1: The select did not elected appointed by the tea board
1:04
Speaker 1: of Houston Independent School District voted to close twelve schools
1:09
Speaker 1: next year. They have said the schools closed have poor
1:13
Speaker 1: attendance and that the students will be moved to other
1:16
Speaker 1: schools in the area. The community came out to the
1:19
Speaker 1: school board meeting to show their feelings of discontent. This
1:23
Speaker 1: comes as long term teachers are leaving. The announcement comes
1:27
Speaker 1: as Superintendent Mike Miles said he would not be closing
1:31
Speaker 1: schools when he was first appointed into the role. There
1:34
Speaker 1: have been some improvements in HISD underneath the tea takeover.
1:40
Speaker 1: Ruth Huffman Lack is a school psychologist and a community member.
1:45
Speaker 2: Well, I mean.
1:46
Speaker 3: It's twelve communities, right, It's not just one, and each
1:49
Speaker 3: of those are is an entity that is has a
1:55
Speaker 3: tradition and has history and has meaning for the family,
2:00
Speaker 3: send the children and the you know, the staff.
2:03
Speaker 4: And teachers and everybody who's involved. And breaking up communities
2:07
Speaker 4: is sort of the modus operandi of this district under
2:12
Speaker 4: Mike Miles and all of everything we know about what
2:16
Speaker 4: it's really best for children and what's best in education
2:19
Speaker 4: is building communities and building community schools and having places
2:23
Speaker 4: where kids feel safe and feel known, and where parents
2:29
Speaker 4: feel that they're connected and that there are resources and
2:33
Speaker 4: that people are there for them. And so you know,
2:37
Speaker 4: this started with putting in policies that drove out good teachers,
2:42
Speaker 4: that require you know, require teachers to treat all students
2:47
Speaker 4: as little robots, and that you know, ignore special needs
2:50
Speaker 4: and not allow kids to have time to socialize. And anyway,
2:54
Speaker 4: it's you know, it's started at the beginning, right, and
2:57
Speaker 4: then all the teachers have been leaving in prison. Siples
3:00
Speaker 4: have been turned over at that. You know, some schools
3:02
Speaker 4: are on their fourth principle and all of that is
3:04
Speaker 4: just completely about disruption and none of that is good
3:08
Speaker 4: for learning, and none of that is good to the emotional,
3:12
Speaker 4: you know, psychological well being of anybody involved, especially with children.
3:15
Speaker 2: So this is just sort of.
3:17
Speaker 4: The next thing to be expected. It's pretty clear that that,
3:22
Speaker 4: you know, the intention of this takeover was to destroy
3:25
Speaker 4: the district, and that's what they're doing. So it's it's
3:29
Speaker 4: it's just a tragedy, travity, a tragedy.
3:33
Speaker 5: Also adding also adding to that the propamvation of the schools.
3:37
Speaker 4: It's horrible. And it's interesting you see in the plan
3:42
Speaker 4: for the eighteen eighty two and particularly the presentation last
3:47
Speaker 4: night that they did about the pre k idea for
3:52
Speaker 4: eighteen eighty two's that the idea is to basically be
3:58
Speaker 4: able to get tax dollars into the hands of for
4:00
Speaker 4: profit companies, right because charters in Texas, you only have
4:06
Speaker 4: to have a nonprofit in to get a charter. And
4:10
Speaker 4: once you are given a charter, you can open as
4:12
Speaker 4: many schools as you want. You don't have to get
4:14
Speaker 4: each one approved. But the charters end up being pretty
4:18
Speaker 4: much like sell companies, and they hire for profit companies
4:22
Speaker 4: to administer everything. So the nonprofit, you know, the tax
4:26
Speaker 4: dollars go technically to a nonprofit, but the nonprofit that
4:30
Speaker 4: money actually goes to for profits. And that turns into
4:33
Speaker 4: the same model as what we have with healthcare now,
4:35
Speaker 4: right that everything is driven by for profit insurance companies
4:38
Speaker 4: that are taking this money and then figuring out how
4:41
Speaker 4: they can keep more of it for themselves and provide
4:43
Speaker 4: the least amount of service. And well, that's that's what
4:46
Speaker 4: this is set it towards. And we've known that from
4:48
Speaker 4: the beginning.
4:50
Speaker 5: Yeah, and the state, the states looking at as a
4:54
Speaker 5: as a benefit to think that the teachers aren't learning
4:57
Speaker 5: and that the teachause are learning, and this a better
5:01
Speaker 5: way to talk to one of the people that's that's
5:04
Speaker 5: a proponent of chartered schools and said, the kids are
5:08
Speaker 5: going to be educated now, they're going to be great,
5:10
Speaker 5: and they're going to it's not going to kill the
5:11
Speaker 5: public school and and and the governor said that more
5:14
Speaker 5: money is going to be put put back into the
5:17
Speaker 5: public schools.
5:19
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's not going to happen.
5:22
Speaker 2: Money is not going into public schools.
5:25
Speaker 6: I'm just saying way what the governor said.
5:28
Speaker 5: You know, he said they he said that this past
5:31
Speaker 5: legislation that they allocated fast amounts of money to go
5:35
Speaker 5: back to public school.
5:37
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, he says a lot of things that
5:39
Speaker 4: aren't true. So I mean that's that's nothing new. I mean,
5:44
Speaker 4: there's no reason to believe any of that. It is
5:48
Speaker 4: not we're not doing this in a vacuum. It's there
5:52
Speaker 4: are plenty of other states that have had We have
5:58
Speaker 4: plenty of data from other states and from other places
6:01
Speaker 4: where charters have taken over. New Orleans is a great example,
6:04
Speaker 4: you know, and education in New Orleans is a nightmare
6:06
Speaker 4: and it has not gotten better, it's gotten worse. And
6:11
Speaker 4: the thing with charter. The other thing with charters is
6:13
Speaker 4: there's no board, right, there's no it's not a public
6:15
Speaker 4: there's no public accountability. And so you can call charters
6:21
Speaker 4: quote public because they are paid for by public dollars,
6:26
Speaker 4: but they do not operate the way the public school
6:28
Speaker 4: districts do. And it's just a money making scheme. And
6:31
Speaker 4: we know that. We've that's what Mike Miles has been
6:34
Speaker 4: doing forever in Colorado, and it's what he's been trying
6:37
Speaker 4: to do here in Texas, and that's what he's doing.
6:41
Speaker 5: Do you think any other high schools will be afflicted
6:43
Speaker 5: in a new future or is it to say that
6:48
Speaker 5: these cutting of schools are based on enrollment?
6:52
Speaker 6: That's what he's saying.
6:53
Speaker 4: Well, the enrollment is the thing. He's a lot that
6:55
Speaker 4: he can. You know, that's his So he of course
6:58
Speaker 4: they came in and created a situation where enrollment decreased. Right,
7:01
Speaker 4: Let's just make sure we make that point, Like, the
7:04
Speaker 4: population of Houston is increasing, but the enrollment in a
7:09
Speaker 4: I C Is decreasing, and there are other reasons for that,
7:11
Speaker 4: but you know, there wasn't. I'm not ignoring that there
7:14
Speaker 4: is a there's a lower birth rate, there's all that stuff.
7:17
Speaker 4: But if the population is increasing, then the enrollment in
7:22
Speaker 4: schools should not be decreasing precipitously, right, And it's very
7:27
Speaker 4: clear that that. I mean, that's just we don't even
7:30
Speaker 4: need to verify that that people are leading the district
7:32
Speaker 4: because of him. So he created a situation where enrollment
7:35
Speaker 4: went down, and then he gets to use that, as
7:36
Speaker 4: you know, as a reason of close schools. Then he'll
7:38
Speaker 4: sell off the building and and make money for his
7:42
Speaker 4: buddies right. And the high school closures are harder. It's
7:48
Speaker 4: harder to close the high school because it's they're not
7:52
Speaker 4: you know, they have so many schools feed into a
7:54
Speaker 4: high school. His justification is always has to do with
7:57
Speaker 4: how many kids are in the building versus how much
8:00
Speaker 4: you know, how many kids the building is designed to hold,
8:03
Speaker 4: and and how much uh, what's the word?
8:09
Speaker 6: You know?
8:10
Speaker 4: How much the conditions of the building being good, you know,
8:13
Speaker 4: not good. And we don't have high schools. Most high schools,
8:19
Speaker 4: I don't I'm not aware of one at least that
8:21
Speaker 4: has a significantly lower enrollment enrollment than what the building
8:25
Speaker 4: can hold.
8:26
Speaker 6: Plus if he closed high schools.
8:27
Speaker 4: He would have to put those kids somewhere else. And
8:30
Speaker 4: I don't think that there are enough schools.
8:33
Speaker 6: I don't know.
8:33
Speaker 4: I don't know that you could absorb that number, a
8:35
Speaker 4: whole high school worth of kids.
8:36
Speaker 2: I don't know.
8:38
Speaker 5: But you know, that was something that mac neil said
8:40
Speaker 5: that you know, it pretty problems a lot of things
8:42
Speaker 5: when we came in here, and on one was that
8:47
Speaker 5: we have better schools, We have better teachers and the
8:50
Speaker 5: teachers aspect of heard we're losing teachers, but we're gaining teachers.
8:55
Speaker 4: Well, we're losing losing teachers that have experience, and we're
8:58
Speaker 4: gaining teachers who are straight off the street, who have
9:00
Speaker 4: no teaching experience at all and are just reading a script.
9:04
Speaker 5: Right, And that's one of the problems we have is
9:06
Speaker 5: that they have to read this to go about the
9:09
Speaker 5: guidelines of hid So the script so to speak, it's
9:14
Speaker 5: not so.
9:14
Speaker 4: To speak script, it is actually a script.
9:16
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's a script.
9:18
Speaker 7: Wow wow.
9:19
Speaker 4: So if they alter any of the any of the slides,
9:23
Speaker 4: they have to read exactly straight what's on the slide
9:26
Speaker 4: it all, they get in trouble. Even if there is
9:29
Speaker 4: an error on the slide, they are not allowed to
9:31
Speaker 4: correct it.
9:34
Speaker 6: Oh wow, that is that you know?
9:37
Speaker 2: You just leave it that way? Yeah wow, it's crazy.
9:43
Speaker 6: Yeah yeah yeah.
9:45
Speaker 5: So at the end of result of all this, right
9:47
Speaker 5: now that the city was one of the one of the.
9:49
Speaker 6: City council member was asking for uh Mike Miles to
9:53
Speaker 6: come to city council and speak.
9:54
Speaker 5: On the closing of the schools because not only effects
9:56
Speaker 5: this the area that's evolved, but for our kids. So
10:02
Speaker 5: but what the mayor, the mayor is saying that it's
10:05
Speaker 5: not it's not really a concern of the city.
10:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, unfortunately, Houston has had a long history of this.
10:14
Speaker 4: There's this weird sort of I don't know of any
10:17
Speaker 4: other major city, grant you, I'm not a scholar on this,
10:20
Speaker 4: but it is weird that Houston, being the size of
10:23
Speaker 4: the city it is. There's been this long thing about
10:25
Speaker 4: the city government and the school district never have anything
10:30
Speaker 4: to do with one another.
10:30
Speaker 6: They do not that.
10:31
Speaker 4: That's like they're just two separate totally. So, and I'm
10:35
Speaker 4: sure that has to do with money in politics. But
10:38
Speaker 4: you know, the mayor to say that it has nothing
10:42
Speaker 4: to do with the city is just completely naive, and
10:44
Speaker 4: it's I don't think he really believes that. I think
10:46
Speaker 4: that there you know, there's money behind you know, the
10:49
Speaker 4: Greater Houston Partnership completely supports Mike Miles. And so the governor,
10:55
Speaker 4: the mayor doesn't want to make the Greater Houston Partnership mad, right,
10:58
Speaker 4: and and and Rick Campo, the president of board, is
11:01
Speaker 4: the big you know, he's the he's a very powerful
11:04
Speaker 4: man in Houston, let's put it that way. So, you know,
11:08
Speaker 4: the mayor doesn't want to make them look bad, right,
11:10
Speaker 4: because he depends on them for his his position. And
11:15
Speaker 4: but when a school district falls apart of the city
11:16
Speaker 4: falls apart.
11:17
Speaker 6: We know that.
11:17
Speaker 4: I mean, that's just you can't attract people to come
11:20
Speaker 4: if the schools are horrible. You don't produce people who
11:22
Speaker 4: can do the work that is needed to be hired,
11:25
Speaker 4: you know, for hiring. I mean, the whole it's so
11:27
Speaker 4: obvious and it's not rocket science. So it absolutely affects
11:31
Speaker 4: the city and it's a huge impact on the city.
11:33
Speaker 4: But his failure to acknowledge that has to do with
11:35
Speaker 4: that's politics and power. I would I recommend there's a
11:40
Speaker 4: Domingo Morrel wrote a book called Takeover Search and ended
11:45
Speaker 4: up being a book, and he's now.
11:47
Speaker 2: A professor at YU and he's on the commission for
11:49
Speaker 2: the State Takeover.
11:50
Speaker 4: And basically his research showed that statistically, if schools, if
11:59
Speaker 4: a school district was the same on paper, you know,
12:02
Speaker 4: in every other way, a district in which there is
12:05
Speaker 4: a higher percentage of black representation on the city councilor
12:09
Speaker 4: and the school board is statistically it is there's a
12:12
Speaker 4: statistically significant difference that a place, a school district where
12:19
Speaker 4: there is more black power in politics will be taken
12:22
Speaker 4: over versus a white one where there are where there
12:25
Speaker 4: are fewer black people in power. It is absolutely the
12:29
Speaker 4: history of takeovers goes is back to segregation and trying
12:34
Speaker 4: to keep keep brown and black people down.
12:41
Speaker 6: And it is it is.
12:42
Speaker 4: That is the history. It is straightforward and obvious and
12:45
Speaker 4: it is That's that's what it is really about. And
12:50
Speaker 4: so you know, don't let anyone tell you about anything else.
12:54
Speaker 4: It's it's about money for the rich white people and
12:58
Speaker 4: disenfranchising and keeping black and brown communities down. And that's
13:04
Speaker 4: it's rights.
13:05
Speaker 2: That's what it is.
13:07
Speaker 1: That was Ruth Huffman Lack, who is a school psychologist
13:11
Speaker 1: and a community member. She spoke on the closing of
13:14
Speaker 1: twelve schools at HISD starting in the fall. Riverside General Hospital,
13:19
Speaker 1: in the heart of the Third Ward, opened its doors
13:22
Speaker 1: for business again on the last day of Black History Month.
13:26
Speaker 1: The facility was founded in the nineteen twenties as the
13:30
Speaker 1: Houston Negro Hospital to serve black patients during the segregation
13:34
Speaker 1: and Jim Crow era. It later became Riverside General Hospital
13:38
Speaker 1: and operated for decades before closing in twenty fifteen. It
13:42
Speaker 1: was one of the only places that black doctors could
13:45
Speaker 1: work and serve the community for those who had no
13:48
Speaker 1: other place to go. County Commissioner Rodney Ellis spearheaded the
13:53
Speaker 1: campaign to rebuild the hospital and turn it over to
13:56
Speaker 1: Harris County Public Health.
13:58
Speaker 8: So we're very appreciative to the Houston Endowment, in particular
14:02
Speaker 8: acquiring the land, having worked in the hoops to take
14:05
Speaker 8: it out of bankruptcy.
14:06
Speaker 9: And once they did that, they were looking.
14:08
Speaker 8: For a partner to come up with public cus and
14:11
Speaker 8: really bring this project to foodis and I'm glad to
14:14
Speaker 8: think shows Harris County. It was about the time I
14:16
Speaker 8: was leaving the Senate and becoming a county commissioner, and
14:19
Speaker 8: then we had a lot of lucky breaks along the way.
14:21
Speaker 9: Initially there were a lot of.
14:23
Speaker 8: People in the community who want us to turn this
14:24
Speaker 8: into another public hospital.
14:27
Speaker 9: The ruins were just built so small during that era.
14:30
Speaker 9: It would not be conducive for health care today. So
14:33
Speaker 9: we're trying to figure out what to do. So we
14:35
Speaker 9: had two important decisions to make.
14:37
Speaker 8: One what outward facing public health services could we offer.
14:42
Speaker 8: We could do telemedicine, we could do STV counseling, who
14:45
Speaker 8: do obesity counciling.
14:46
Speaker 9: And then the Lynch fin to make this work was
14:49
Speaker 9: to make a decision to move some county officers who
14:52
Speaker 9: were looking for a new space into this community. It
14:55
Speaker 9: makes sense for health department to be here in the community.
14:58
Speaker 8: Similar to manymmunities that they need to serve, this is
15:02
Speaker 8: a community in transition. He starred neighborhood and it was
15:05
Speaker 8: a challenge to preserve the historic nature of these three
15:09
Speaker 8: historic uns. We don't do a lot of that in Texas,
15:13
Speaker 8: in Houston in particular, So that roof that is the
15:15
Speaker 8: original time that was on that roof, to the extent
15:18
Speaker 8: we could maintain it some we had to put in
15:21
Speaker 8: some replacements at a new book on all three of
15:23
Speaker 8: these roofs.
15:24
Speaker 9: Inside to do when new go upstairs, you can see.
15:26
Speaker 8: What we preserved some of the original break and then
15:29
Speaker 8: we are went case it in a critic.
15:31
Speaker 9: So you can really appreciate the nature.
15:34
Speaker 10: Of historic preservation.
15:35
Speaker 11: With it being the lass a Black History Month, what
15:37
Speaker 11: do you vote that people at third word one hundred
15:40
Speaker 11: years from now say about this moment.
15:42
Speaker 8: I was born in this hospital in nineteen thirty four,
15:44
Speaker 8: one hundred years ago. In the height of segregation, it
15:47
Speaker 8: was difficult for black people to find a place to practice.
15:50
Speaker 9: Medicine or to be born. Many were born in their
15:53
Speaker 9: homes like my parents were. I was born here. I'm
15:56
Speaker 9: so appreciative that he was a white all man type
16:00
Speaker 9: of his day.
16:01
Speaker 8: John Cullinan who forced the City of Houston to give
16:04
Speaker 8: up this land when the mayor and seducase that most
16:06
Speaker 8: people are out racist, forced the city to give up
16:09
Speaker 8: a city block this land and then put his money
16:12
Speaker 8: out to build this hospital, to build the Houston Negrosity,
16:15
Speaker 8: the Nurse Hospital. It says that we have had some
16:18
Speaker 8: very dark days in the past, and we still have
16:21
Speaker 8: dark days ahead, but we can make it.
16:23
Speaker 9: As Jesse Jackson would say, just don't give up.
16:26
Speaker 12: How important is it to come in the community, this
16:29
Speaker 12: community here where I grew up. We grew up and
16:32
Speaker 12: we know healthcare is important and a lot of people
16:35
Speaker 12: go without here there.
16:36
Speaker 8: I want to stress that this hospital was always a
16:39
Speaker 8: beacon of hope, not just for Third One.
16:42
Speaker 9: I'm from Sundayside. It was a long haul for my
16:45
Speaker 9: parents in nineteen fifty four with No.
16:46
Speaker 8: Two eighty eight to get from Sunnayside to get to
16:49
Speaker 8: Third one. So it really is out with facing health
16:52
Speaker 8: services to people with downtown Mintown. Third on fifty on
16:55
Speaker 8: Sundayside New Elth and to move the county health department here.
17:00
Speaker 9: And a minute people all of Harris County.
17:02
Speaker 6: All of Houston.
17:03
Speaker 9: But I wish I could.
17:05
Speaker 8: Just spend over two hundred bion dollars just for one neighborhood,
17:08
Speaker 8: but I couldn't do that. So it really is a
17:10
Speaker 8: part of Third One is in Third War place much.
17:12
Speaker 9: Bigger than just serving.
17:15
Speaker 1: Historian and writer Carlton Houston talked about the importance of
17:19
Speaker 1: the opening and its place in history.
17:22
Speaker 11: This is an incredible day to see so many people
17:25
Speaker 11: coming out who care about healthcare, who care about the
17:28
Speaker 11: lives of all of the Ustonians. A lot of hard
17:33
Speaker 11: work went into making this day possible. One hundred years ago,
17:36
Speaker 11: they dreamed of this, They dreamed that this institution would
17:40
Speaker 11: be serving the community, and here we are making that
17:44
Speaker 11: dream possible again. There have been ups and downs. It
17:48
Speaker 11: has not been an easy road, but that's part of
17:52
Speaker 11: the lesson here that when you tackle big problems, we're
17:56
Speaker 11: not always going to agree on the path to get
17:59
Speaker 11: to the shit.
18:01
Speaker 12: But me growing up here and seeing the hospital growing
18:05
Speaker 12: up and seeing us opening and knowing how in this
18:10
Speaker 12: community the need for the community hospital. Because I can't
18:13
Speaker 12: go elsewhere, and especially dealing with after Americans.
18:19
Speaker 13: It's amazing.
18:20
Speaker 11: I mean, one hundred years ago, they were so focused
18:26
Speaker 11: on the future.
18:28
Speaker 9: They weren't looking backwards.
18:31
Speaker 13: You know.
18:32
Speaker 11: I talked to my mother about this all the time,
18:35
Speaker 11: and she'll say, you know, I didn't know there was
18:37
Speaker 11: a history, right because they weren't talking about the eighteen hundreds.
18:42
Speaker 11: They were head down forward looking, marching to something better.
18:48
Speaker 11: This is before the civil rights struggled. You know, this
18:51
Speaker 11: is Jim crawl. This is segregation. It was all around us.
18:54
Speaker 11: I described it like humidity, like it's everywhere and you're
18:58
Speaker 11: reading it in its own is touching you. That's a
19:01
Speaker 11: segregation in jermy brow, that's oppression, you know. And so
19:07
Speaker 11: for them to have that vision and to think forward
19:10
Speaker 11: under that in those types of circumstances is really an
19:14
Speaker 11: example to us to be able to say, you know what,
19:17
Speaker 11: we can tackle these challenges too.
19:20
Speaker 13: And it was not that many hospitals we could go to.
19:23
Speaker 9: The said we didn't, we we had.
19:26
Speaker 11: We struggled, and we had to raise our own money
19:28
Speaker 11: for the hospitals that we had. We couldn't use tax revenue.
19:31
Speaker 11: That's ridiculous. That was the world we lived in. Joseph
19:35
Speaker 11: Cullen in those early doctors, they said, we can do better,
19:38
Speaker 11: and we're standing in front of the fruit of their labor.
19:42
Speaker 13: Was this hospital going to be open for.
19:44
Speaker 11: Everybody in this community as absolutely regardless of grace, greed, color.
19:50
Speaker 11: This hospital is for all Utilians.
19:54
Speaker 1: The location of Riverside Hospital is thirty two oh four
19:57
Speaker 1: US and Houston Public Health will be based there, offering
20:01
Speaker 1: everything that Harris County Health offers. Your immigration status will
20:06
Speaker 1: not be an issue and you just have to show
20:08
Speaker 1: a form of ID. Go to Harriscountyhealth dot org for
20:13
Speaker 1: more info. The President of the United States and the
20:17
Speaker 1: head of the criminal and corrupt Republican Party gave a
20:22
Speaker 1: high energy and then low energy State of the Union
20:26
Speaker 1: address to the Congress, which lasted longer than any other
20:30
Speaker 1: State of the Union address in history. It was a
20:33
Speaker 1: textbook display of a high dosage of adderall both the
20:38
Speaker 1: uptake with the shouting and characteristic involuntary jaw movements, and
20:43
Speaker 1: the crash later in the speech with low energy delivery
20:47
Speaker 1: and slurred words and dementia on full display. We first
20:51
Speaker 1: talked to Harris County Republican strategist vlad Deviduk about his
20:56
Speaker 1: rosy view of the speech.
20:58
Speaker 10: Oh man, what an incredible well week it's been as
21:02
Speaker 10: early voting is wrapping up here in Harris County. And
21:05
Speaker 10: then we got the President Trump's first State of the
21:08
Speaker 10: Union of his second term last night. It was a barnstorm, barnburner,
21:12
Speaker 10: you know, it was amazing.
21:15
Speaker 5: Yeah, talk about that requick, but you wanted to ask
21:18
Speaker 5: you about the about not Cruise but Paxston and West
21:25
Speaker 5: in that race.
21:26
Speaker 2: But talk about the.
21:29
Speaker 6: State of the Union speech.
21:31
Speaker 10: Yeah.
21:31
Speaker 2: I think.
21:31
Speaker 10: I think last night President Trump had an incredible opportunity
21:37
Speaker 10: to kind of reframe his record, which has been largely
21:43
Speaker 10: distorted by the media in terms of what he's actually
21:49
Speaker 10: accomplished during this first period of the second term. And
21:53
Speaker 10: I think what we're seeing broadly in broad strokes is
21:57
Speaker 10: that the trend for the country is on an entirely
22:01
Speaker 10: different trajectory now than it was the previous four years
22:04
Speaker 10: under Biden, and it's much more positive. Sure, there's some
22:07
Speaker 10: bumps in the road, there's some difficult challenges still to overcome.
22:11
Speaker 10: We have a long way to go, but we're moving
22:13
Speaker 10: in the right direction and the world is a better place.
22:15
Speaker 10: In America is a better place, And I think there
22:18
Speaker 10: was a stark contrast last night between Republicans and the
22:21
Speaker 10: President in terms of what's being accomplished and the opposition
22:25
Speaker 10: shown by Democrats. I think one of the most arresting
22:30
Speaker 10: and visual things that we saw last night, and probably
22:33
Speaker 10: saying that's going to go down in history in terms
22:36
Speaker 10: of just really striking a very visceral tone with most Americans,
22:45
Speaker 10: is going to be that moment where President Trump invited
22:49
Speaker 10: everyone who agreed that the role of the American government
22:55
Speaker 10: is to defend and stand with American citizens, not illegal aliens,
23:01
Speaker 10: and invited members of Congress to stand if they agreed
23:04
Speaker 10: with that statement, and we saw every single Democrat continue
23:06
Speaker 10: to remain seated. And I think that that's going to
23:09
Speaker 10: be a very striking image that's going to that's more
23:14
Speaker 10: likely not going to be burned into our vision during
23:18
Speaker 10: the upcoming election in November. I think that that's something
23:23
Speaker 10: that was an obvious trap for Democrats and they fell
23:28
Speaker 10: right into it. And it's striking that the President telegraphed
23:33
Speaker 10: it so clearly what he was doing, and he offered
23:37
Speaker 10: them such a such an easy, simple choice to either
23:40
Speaker 10: stand with American citizens, the people who they represent, the
23:43
Speaker 10: people who vote for them in office, the people whose
23:45
Speaker 10: tax money they take, the people who they ostensibly claimed
23:51
Speaker 10: to speak for in Washington, or to stand for illegal immigrants,
23:55
Speaker 10: and they chose to remain seated, and they stand on
24:00
Speaker 10: the side of I legal immigrants. And it created a
24:02
Speaker 10: very sharp and strong contrast that I think is going
24:06
Speaker 10: to be saying that a lot of Americans are going
24:08
Speaker 10: to be thinking about now all the way through November.
24:10
Speaker 5: So you think it was a striking blow coming on
24:15
Speaker 5: getting into these these primaries coming up.
24:17
Speaker 6: Are the primaries might just go into the fall elections?
24:21
Speaker 10: I think for the most part, I mean we've gotten
24:24
Speaker 10: through most of early voting, and I think most people's
24:29
Speaker 10: opinions and choices are baked in with regard to primaries.
24:33
Speaker 10: I think the primaries could certainly still have some surprises,
24:37
Speaker 10: but I think really by and large, what the President
24:40
Speaker 10: was doing is playing for November. I think he's I
24:43
Speaker 10: think he's trying to position Republicans for a stronger showing
24:49
Speaker 10: in November, because typically what historically has happened is the
24:53
Speaker 10: party in power loses seats in the November midterm elections
24:58
Speaker 10: following the general election of the previous cycle. And I
25:03
Speaker 10: know President Trump is very much aware of that. Republicans
25:06
Speaker 10: in Congress are very much aware of that, and uh,
25:10
Speaker 10: this was an opportunity to draw a very clear line
25:14
Speaker 10: in the sand that really casts the decision faced by
25:21
Speaker 10: Americans in very stark terms. Do you want a representative
25:25
Speaker 10: in Congress or in the Senate who stands with American
25:28
Speaker 10: citizens or are you going to vote for someone who's
25:31
Speaker 10: going to remain seated on the side of legal immigrants?
25:36
Speaker 10: And so it painted a very stark picture. I think
25:38
Speaker 10: it sends a very strong message.
25:41
Speaker 5: Well that that whole aspect we can we can we
25:43
Speaker 5: can debate the whole Uh were illegal immigrants.
25:47
Speaker 6: In a lot of ways. But I wanted to talk
25:49
Speaker 6: to you about the race this guy really heeded.
25:55
Speaker 5: For Congress for the Senate with Patson, Corn and and West.
26:03
Speaker 6: Sorry about that, and that's got that's.
26:06
Speaker 5: Gotten really really heeded all of a sudden between all three,
26:13
Speaker 5: How do you think that's gonna come out? And and
26:18
Speaker 5: I know West has been uh they've been pointing out
26:22
Speaker 5: that West is not voted like the least amount of
26:27
Speaker 5: times since he's been in Congress.
26:30
Speaker 13: I don't know, I don't know if.
26:31
Speaker 5: That's your really addressed that or not. But how do
26:36
Speaker 5: you see that's going on?
26:39
Speaker 10: Yeah, I would say that what seems to be more
26:44
Speaker 10: of a consensus and broadly shared by a lot of
26:48
Speaker 10: people that I've spoken with, is that this race is
26:54
Speaker 10: probably going to come down to a runoff between Ken
26:57
Speaker 10: Paxton and John Cornyn. H. I don't see that Hunt
27:03
Speaker 10: has really earned as much support as he is hoping
27:08
Speaker 10: to have earned. And it seems pretty clear that based
27:14
Speaker 10: on conversations I've had with people on the ground, people
27:18
Speaker 10: in the field, people who are working campaigns, people who
27:21
Speaker 10: have worked campaigns before, people who have worked with Wesley
27:23
Speaker 10: Hunt before, is that this was an opportunity for him
27:27
Speaker 10: to really get his name broadly known across the state
27:32
Speaker 10: for a future run at this office. But he's not
27:38
Speaker 10: quite ready to carry that mantle at this time. The
27:45
Speaker 10: role of the United States Senator is a serious and
27:52
Speaker 10: consequential role, and we definitely need someone in representing Texas
27:59
Speaker 10: in the United States Center who's ready to bear that
28:01
Speaker 10: burden and to carry that torch for the American people.
28:06
Speaker 10: And it seems pretty clear that that what someone like
28:10
Speaker 10: Wesley Hunt has a desire, has an interest, has uh
28:17
Speaker 10: a ah, a purpose in in trying to raise his profile,
28:25
Speaker 10: but it's pretty clear that he's not entirely UH suited
28:29
Speaker 10: or equipped at this time to really do that. So
28:36
Speaker 10: I think I think, I think, I think more likely
28:38
Speaker 10: not what we're going to see is we're going to
28:40
Speaker 10: see a runoff between Paxton and Cornyn. I think Wesley
28:46
Speaker 10: Hunt will will have a strong showing, which will will
28:50
Speaker 10: set him up for a potential future run for this
28:53
Speaker 10: office or another state wide office very near in the future.
28:58
Speaker 5: And Chip chip Roy is running for UH state Attorney General.
29:02
Speaker 5: That's that's going to be an interesting race too, because
29:04
Speaker 5: now people are saying he's not he's not he's not
29:10
Speaker 5: he's not MAGA, he's not strong enough as far as
29:13
Speaker 5: supporting President Trump.
29:15
Speaker 4: UH.
29:15
Speaker 6: That's that commercials has been put out.
29:18
Speaker 10: Yeah, I don't think we're seeing that across the state.
29:22
Speaker 10: I think certainly maybe in some of the more blue
29:26
Speaker 10: areas of the of Texas. Certainly, you know in Harris
29:29
Speaker 10: County and Austin and Dallas, you're you're seeing some of
29:33
Speaker 10: those concerns. But really across UH areas of Texas that
29:38
Speaker 10: are much more strongly aligned with Republicans and much more red,
29:42
Speaker 10: what we're seeing is we're seeing a much more strong
29:46
Speaker 10: support for Wesley Hunt, and I think that that's going
29:49
Speaker 10: to translate to a win or at least a strong
29:55
Speaker 10: finish to go to a runoff on election day. It's
29:58
Speaker 10: it's very likely that that's what we're going to experience
30:03
Speaker 10: because the support for Chip Roy, the endorsement by Senator Cruz,
30:15
Speaker 10: the record that he has having served in the House
30:22
Speaker 10: at a national level, at a national stage, and he
30:25
Speaker 10: has earned a reputation for being a strong fighter, is
30:29
Speaker 10: really going to translate well. And I think it's likely
30:32
Speaker 10: we're going to have a run between him and Middleton,
30:36
Speaker 10: and that's probably going to be the result on the
30:41
Speaker 10: end of the night on primary night.
30:43
Speaker 1: Michael O. Adams is the director of the Master of
30:46
Speaker 1: Public Affairs graduate program at Texas Southern University's Barbara Jordan
30:50
Speaker 1: Mickey Leland School of Public Affairs. He looked at the
30:53
Speaker 1: speech analytically.
30:55
Speaker 7: Yeah, well, first of all, in terms of well, last
30:58
Speaker 7: year the President addressed the Congress, but this was this
31:00
Speaker 7: official first State of the Union address after the twenty
31:06
Speaker 7: twenty four election. I think it was filled with some theatrics,
31:12
Speaker 7: but less than what we saw the address to the
31:16
Speaker 7: Joint Session of Congress on last year. And I'll get
31:18
Speaker 7: into more specifics because we saw Congressman Al Green last
31:24
Speaker 7: year and there were some other things.
31:26
Speaker 13: But let's deal with the intent of the speech.
31:30
Speaker 7: As always, by law and Congressional statute and also the
31:34
Speaker 7: US Constitution, the President of the United States is to
31:38
Speaker 7: inform the American public and the Congress in terms of
31:42
Speaker 7: the state of the Union, and historically and normally what
31:46
Speaker 7: we see in these types of addresses, the President will
31:49
Speaker 7: lay out an agenda, and he was always try to
31:54
Speaker 7: take credit or highlight some of his achievements over the
31:58
Speaker 7: past year, and I think that was true the form.
32:03
Speaker 7: And I'll say this about President Trump when you when
32:06
Speaker 7: you when he gives the speech, you can not necessarily
32:12
Speaker 7: be surprised because the question is always will he stay
32:15
Speaker 7: on script, because he has a particular speaking style that
32:20
Speaker 7: will allow him to throw in antidotes and whatever. We
32:24
Speaker 7: did see some of that last night, but I think
32:26
Speaker 7: it was kind of different and surprising or not he
32:31
Speaker 7: stayed on.
32:32
Speaker 13: The script because I think this particular address was designed
32:37
Speaker 13: to address.
32:38
Speaker 7: His current status in terms of his polling ratings and
32:43
Speaker 7: where he is, and most people understand that he's underwater
32:47
Speaker 7: in terms of the way he's performing. And we saw
32:50
Speaker 7: just last week the US Supreme Court rejet his Paris
32:56
Speaker 7: where they issued a ruling and said it was up
32:59
Speaker 7: to the congres to Levy's taveris and what have you
33:02
Speaker 7: and President Trumps that can really I don't want to
33:05
Speaker 7: say mean things, but some pleasant things about the US
33:09
Speaker 7: Supreme Court, and my reflection on that has been a
33:13
Speaker 7: political scientist and someone who has taught American government and
33:16
Speaker 7: technic government for many years. Ah I said, wow, President
33:19
Speaker 7: Trump should have taken my general air class. We have
33:23
Speaker 7: to understand that there's a separation of power and as
33:26
Speaker 7: the chief executive, you can propose policies, but you have
33:29
Speaker 7: to get Congress to adopt it. And we know that
33:32
Speaker 7: we've been told over the years we have this neutral
33:35
Speaker 7: branch of government. Suppose third party now neutrality you can
33:40
Speaker 7: we can debate that that we call the US Supreme
33:43
Speaker 7: Court that's taught of serves as an as an umpire,
33:46
Speaker 7: all right, in terms of looking at policies to see
33:49
Speaker 7: whether or not they square with the constitution of federal statute,
33:52
Speaker 7: to see whether they square with the constitution, and then
33:54
Speaker 7: they will run their ruling where it's constitutional on constitution
34:00
Speaker 7: and you never know, you'll have to go back and
34:02
Speaker 7: you'll have things that will be justicially addressed in front
34:08
Speaker 7: of the US Supreme Court. And to hear him say that,
34:11
Speaker 7: and also the last out some of the justices that
34:14
Speaker 7: he had a pointed himself, and so that was one thing.
34:18
Speaker 13: But he was kind.
34:19
Speaker 7: I think he shook their hands, those justices who showed up.
34:23
Speaker 7: We saw the Chief Justice and we saw I believe
34:26
Speaker 7: Justice Robertson, and I can't think of every lady's names.
34:29
Speaker 7: There were actually two of Trump's most recent appointees. But
34:34
Speaker 7: in terms of that situation, we know that members of
34:38
Speaker 7: the US President of the president who will always try.
34:41
Speaker 13: To appoint members to the high Court, namely the.
34:45
Speaker 7: US Supreme Court and federal judges that reflect their judicial temperament.
34:50
Speaker 7: And knowing Trump as we know President Trump, is that
34:54
Speaker 7: he expects these people to agree with him, like his
34:56
Speaker 7: members of its cabinet, which is a kind of forum,
35:01
Speaker 7: and you say things to make him make the president
35:04
Speaker 7: feel good. But members of the Supreme Court has a
35:07
Speaker 7: history in terms of some type of independence or in
35:10
Speaker 7: where they look at and try to interpret the laws.
35:13
Speaker 7: Because these people, many of them are supposed to be scholars,
35:17
Speaker 7: and some of them have served as federal judges. And
35:21
Speaker 7: I'll take the audience back to a history lesson that I.
35:25
Speaker 13: Always point out. Dwight D.
35:27
Speaker 7: Eisenhower was a Republican, He was a conservative.
35:32
Speaker 13: He was President of the United States, and.
35:33
Speaker 7: He often remarked about the US Supreme Court and that
35:36
Speaker 7: one of the worst days work that he had ever
35:39
Speaker 7: done is when he appointed Chief Justice Earl Warrant to
35:43
Speaker 7: the US Supreme Court. And you remember that that was
35:45
Speaker 7: the beginning of decades of a liberal US Supreme Court.
35:50
Speaker 13: They gave us the Brown Versus Board of.
35:52
Speaker 7: Education, all of the decisions dealing with the rights of
35:57
Speaker 7: criminals in terms of the right to do process and
36:00
Speaker 7: these kinds of things.
36:02
Speaker 6: Uh Andrando Miranda.
36:04
Speaker 13: The mirandam warning.
36:05
Speaker 7: So that that was ear one was appointed by a
36:09
Speaker 7: Republican president.
36:10
Speaker 13: So you'll, you'll, you'll, you'll, they will say these things, but.
36:15
Speaker 7: To to say that in public, and you know, again,
36:18
Speaker 7: there are three branches of government, and so they're they're
36:20
Speaker 7: they're supposed to work together, so you have to be
36:24
Speaker 7: uh kind of diplomatic.
36:26
Speaker 13: And uh uh and and and try to work with
36:29
Speaker 13: each other. But I think it was gonna strip he had.
36:31
Speaker 7: To see the U the essence of what Trump had
36:34
Speaker 7: to do, and he may have achieved this. Uh, he
36:37
Speaker 7: had to address this date. And we noticed the state
36:41
Speaker 7: is a magabase because we're in the midst and elections
36:44
Speaker 7: and if we look at the political landscape and even
36:46
Speaker 7: here in Texas, Uh, there there could be some varied
36:51
Speaker 7: type races on.
36:52
Speaker 13: On both sides of the owl.
36:54
Speaker 7: As we moved into we're in the midst.
36:56
Speaker 13: Of early votings.
36:57
Speaker 7: We segued to a primary voting on next Tuesday, and
37:03
Speaker 7: on the Republican side at the top of the tickets
37:05
Speaker 7: and one of the most important elections in terms of.
37:08
Speaker 13: What the state of the Union. The purpose of that.
37:11
Speaker 7: Trump had to help people and has to help his
37:14
Speaker 7: party if he wants to maintain control of the House
37:17
Speaker 7: of Representatives.
37:18
Speaker 2: Uh.
37:18
Speaker 13: And we had mid decade redistrict.
37:21
Speaker 7: And you can come back and you can raise a
37:23
Speaker 7: question about that, but you have to help yet Republicans
37:26
Speaker 7: elected if you want to maintain control of the House.
37:29
Speaker 7: And looking at some of these tight races and places
37:31
Speaker 7: like Texas, another even at the US Senate. UH, that's
37:35
Speaker 7: the possibility that you know, the Republicans could even lose
37:38
Speaker 7: the House of Representatives. Now, having said all that is
37:42
Speaker 7: that the party that is normally the out party in
37:46
Speaker 7: terms of the party that is not the party affiliated
37:48
Speaker 7: with the President of the United States always have a
37:50
Speaker 7: hard time in midterm election. You can go back to
37:53
Speaker 7: George Bush.
37:55
Speaker 13: Barack Obama.
37:56
Speaker 7: Normally they will lose the House or whatever they can,
37:59
Speaker 7: you know, in a determined likening.
38:01
Speaker 13: But clearly we have President Trump.
38:04
Speaker 7: And back to the speech. It was a feel good speech.
38:08
Speaker 7: He highlighted the things that he had done. And we
38:11
Speaker 7: saw the Democrat response by Governor Spanger of Virginia and
38:18
Speaker 7: she framed that as lies and other things. And back
38:22
Speaker 7: to the historonics that we saw last night, there were
38:25
Speaker 7: two that come to mind to me. One was Al
38:27
Speaker 7: Green when he was ushered out. He had a sign
38:30
Speaker 7: that saying that black people are not eight and certainly
38:33
Speaker 7: he was summarily escorted. And then you saw the kind
38:36
Speaker 7: of exchange back and forth, the kind of vitriolic exchange
38:40
Speaker 7: behind ilhan Omar and Trump talked about immigration, and that
38:45
Speaker 7: was a segue in terms of what he's doing with
38:47
Speaker 7: the border, and that may have resonated with his base
38:51
Speaker 7: in terms if you look at all of the things
38:53
Speaker 7: in terms of a checklist. Certainly, I think immigration has
38:59
Speaker 7: been out there. The Parist people are going like that,
39:01
Speaker 7: and also the economy.
39:03
Speaker 6: Uh.
39:04
Speaker 7: In what we've seen in some early voting Democratics are
39:08
Speaker 7: they seemed to be somewhat excited.
39:10
Speaker 13: I know we're in Texas that.
39:12
Speaker 7: Looking at the numbers in terms of early voting that
39:15
Speaker 7: Democrats can't wait.
39:16
Speaker 13: Some people are saying that to cast a voting in
39:19
Speaker 13: this election.
39:20
Speaker 7: But in the analyst, as an academic, I would be
39:25
Speaker 7: able to access that or to say that that's that's
39:28
Speaker 7: accurate in the sense because there seems to be a
39:30
Speaker 7: trend in terms of early voting. Uh, looking at previous
39:34
Speaker 7: cycles that Democrats tend to vote early as opposed to
39:38
Speaker 7: vote on voting on election day, and we see that
39:41
Speaker 7: they may.
39:42
Speaker 13: Have out perform.
39:43
Speaker 7: In Harris County, more Democrats voted than the publicers, but
39:46
Speaker 7: Republicans sand to be election day voted.
39:49
Speaker 2: You know, how how long we don't go?
39:51
Speaker 5: How long is he gonna be able to blame other people?
39:55
Speaker 13: Yeah, well you have to look at the performers and uh.
39:57
Speaker 7: And again I tell my students, I'm a kee man.
40:00
Speaker 7: I just from a there's a book that I read
40:03
Speaker 7: when I was in driving through many years ago.
40:04
Speaker 13: It's all the symbolic uses of politics.
40:06
Speaker 7: And certainly politicians will wrap themselves or drape themselves in
40:11
Speaker 7: the class in the flag or or try to present
40:17
Speaker 7: an image in terms of political posturing, and also the
40:20
Speaker 7: speakers that they give. It's what I call do fuse
40:23
Speaker 7: support my country right or wrong. You have to look
40:25
Speaker 7: at again, as I said at the outset, is that
40:29
Speaker 7: you have to this is a base election. It's an
40:32
Speaker 7: off year election, but it's a base all right.
40:34
Speaker 13: Do you rally the.
40:35
Speaker 7: People who supported you in twenty twenty four and how
40:38
Speaker 7: they actually conturn in terms of looking at Latinas and
40:41
Speaker 7: how they may be moving away from that. And we
40:44
Speaker 7: know we had mid decades redistricting, so I wasn't surprised,
40:49
Speaker 7: and that may have been to the president's benefit. He
40:51
Speaker 7: brought in the gold medal winning hockey team to do
40:55
Speaker 7: that now of all the visual and say, for what
40:58
Speaker 7: you just said about trying.
41:00
Speaker 13: To target immigrants in these kinds of things, it's kind
41:03
Speaker 13: of hard, even if you're a Democrat.
41:05
Speaker 7: In the room not to stand up for hockey team,
41:09
Speaker 7: not to say that there's somebody who has been in
41:11
Speaker 7: the military, so the speech writers and the people who
41:15
Speaker 7: craft the speech.
41:16
Speaker 13: All right, certainly I think they may have been had
41:19
Speaker 13: more control.
41:20
Speaker 7: Last night than some of the others that Della proper
41:23
Speaker 7: and you and I we know Dollar prompt and people
41:24
Speaker 7: know President Trump that he.
41:26
Speaker 13: Can go off on you if you want to, right,
41:29
Speaker 13: I think they be.
41:30
Speaker 7: But I think he kind of stayed within the guardrails
41:33
Speaker 7: if you if you take it and you frame it
41:36
Speaker 7: as that. So that's to be expected. And always you
41:40
Speaker 7: will see, whether it's Democrat or Republican, they'll have people
41:42
Speaker 7: in the audience that they can part out and they're
41:44
Speaker 7: trying to get the message across that tithes in or
41:47
Speaker 7: dovetails with the policy positions that they will have.
41:51
Speaker 1: That was doctor Michael Adams, director of the Master of
41:53
Speaker 1: Public Affairs graduate program at Texas Southern University. There's a
41:58
Speaker 1: Steve Gellington of The People's New News here on Houston's
42:01
Speaker 1: community station KPFT ninety point one FM. Become a sustaining
42:05
Speaker 1: member today and help keep KPFT and the People's News
42:08
Speaker 1: on the air. Your donation at seven one, three, five
42:11
Speaker 1: two six five seven three eighth makes it possible or
42:14
Speaker 1: use our website KPFT dot org. Click on the donate
42:18
Speaker 1: button and remember at the top of the page to
42:20
Speaker 1: select the dragdown list and scroll down to the bottom
42:23
Speaker 1: and select the People's News. In Mexico, cartel leader Nimicio
42:30
Speaker 1: or Siega Cervantes, better known as Elmencho, died in custody
42:36
Speaker 1: shortly after being captured by Mexican special forces. He was
42:40
Speaker 1: the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel the CJNNG,
42:45
Speaker 1: one of the most powerful and feared criminal organizations in Mexico,
42:49
Speaker 1: which has unleashed a wave of violence across twenty Mexican states.
42:54
Speaker 1: Many Americans and Canadians are trapped in Mexico right now
42:58
Speaker 1: as the violence continue. News we talked to doctor Nathan Jones,
43:03
Speaker 1: associate professor at sam Houston State University specializing in security studies.
43:09
Speaker 5: The situation now in Mexico and what brought about the
43:15
Speaker 5: arrests of the cartel leader.
43:18
Speaker 6: In Memo just today.
43:20
Speaker 2: Well, I think that the key issue is actually what
43:26
Speaker 2: happened on Sunday, which was not the arrest, but the
43:28
Speaker 2: killing of Elemento in a government strike by the Mexican
43:33
Speaker 2: government based on intelligence that the US government provided on
43:38
Speaker 2: his location and whereabouts. Elemento was the head of the
43:41
Speaker 2: Cartel Dejlisco Nadacian or the CJNG New Generation Jalisco Cartel,
43:49
Speaker 2: which was widely considered the largest, certainly in terms of
43:51
Speaker 2: geographic terms, but was since the lower cartel had gone
43:56
Speaker 2: into civil war since roughly summer of twenty twenty four.
44:00
Speaker 2: It was definitely considered the top dog in the Mexican underworld.
44:06
Speaker 2: So the killing of Elemento is a significant event in
44:12
Speaker 2: terms of the security landscape in Mexico. We saw the
44:15
Speaker 2: CJNG retaliate with article.
44:18
Speaker 14: Grocoes or burning vehicles at critical choke points in cities
44:23
Speaker 14: and roadways uh in tourist areas throughout Mexico and at
44:28
Speaker 14: least five states and unlikely more.
44:33
Speaker 5: What I think is it because we got the we
44:35
Speaker 5: got the Kopa mndal the World Cup coming. American and
44:39
Speaker 5: Canadian tourists are down there now. Some I'm stuck stud
44:43
Speaker 5: down there for for a bit. How secure is the
44:46
Speaker 5: government of Mexico and the safety of people going down.
44:52
Speaker 2: Well, I think that one any foreign tourists United States
44:58
Speaker 2: or Canada should follow all of their government's warnings and
45:02
Speaker 2: recommendations and security precautions. It should be noted that the
45:06
Speaker 2: US State Department treats Mexico on a state by state
45:10
Speaker 2: basis for security, travel warnings, and travel advisories, and that's
45:17
Speaker 2: a very good source people should follow that. I expect
45:22
Speaker 2: that the Mexican government is going to do a saturation strategy,
45:25
Speaker 2: putting lots of National Guard resources. National Guard it's kind
45:30
Speaker 2: of a gendarmerie. It's a law enforcement entity, but it's
45:32
Speaker 2: really it's lines through the military, line of commander through
45:35
Speaker 2: the military, and it recruits a lot of former soldiers.
45:39
Speaker 2: So what I think is going to happen is you're
45:42
Speaker 2: going to see a saturation strategy in those areas where
45:47
Speaker 2: those World Cup games are going to be played. And
45:50
Speaker 2: this is particularly important because a lot of those games
45:52
Speaker 2: we're in Guadalajada, which is the major city in the
45:55
Speaker 2: state of Hardsco, and that is where the Change has
46:01
Speaker 2: its base of operations and it's most consolidated operations. That
46:04
Speaker 2: is their home term. So I'm going to expect a
46:06
Speaker 2: pretty heavy duty the saturation strategy by the Mexican government
46:10
Speaker 2: that's going to have the implications nationwide because that means
46:13
Speaker 2: that they're likely to be pulling resources from other areas
46:16
Speaker 2: and other organized crime battles.
46:19
Speaker 5: This is something that we if I'm not mistaken, we
46:22
Speaker 5: had the same thing happened before, where the Mexican government
46:26
Speaker 5: had put all their resources in the fight and the
46:27
Speaker 5: cartels on the on the half be half of the
46:30
Speaker 5: United States trying to stop so called drugs coming across
46:33
Speaker 5: the border, and it ended up being a blood bath.
46:38
Speaker 2: Well, well, I would say the Mexicans themselves actually came
46:42
Speaker 2: to the United States in two thousand and six, two
46:44
Speaker 2: thousand and seven under Felipe colleg their own They knew
46:46
Speaker 2: they had organized crime problems on their hands, and they
46:50
Speaker 2: knew that, so they actually came. That was the media initiative,
46:55
Speaker 2: and they acknowledge that. But yet the kingpin strategy has
46:58
Speaker 2: resulted in typically more violence. You decapitate the head of
47:02
Speaker 2: an organization. The idea was decapitate, cut off ahead of
47:05
Speaker 2: the snake, the body will die. What often has happened
47:08
Speaker 2: is you actually get a hydra effect where more lieutenants
47:11
Speaker 2: are buying for power, they're fighting with each other, and
47:14
Speaker 2: that surges levels of violence.
47:16
Speaker 5: Well, there's something that's happening because of the United States pressure.
47:21
Speaker 2: Well, there has been significant pressure from the Trump administration.
47:24
Speaker 2: I can't speak to any particular event. And how much
47:28
Speaker 2: you know Trump administration or just general US pressure caused
47:33
Speaker 2: any particular event. I don't have any of that kind
47:35
Speaker 2: of behind the scenes knowledge. I can only speculate on that.
47:40
Speaker 5: And what do you say, what do you say about
47:43
Speaker 5: the cartels themselves, what other organizations are in key positions to.
47:48
Speaker 6: Maybe take over?
47:51
Speaker 2: Oh, well, that's an excellent question. So the first question
47:55
Speaker 2: is whether or not this DJ and G will have
47:56
Speaker 2: succession mechanisms in place and be able to hold the
48:01
Speaker 2: core together. So there is rumor that already a successor
48:06
Speaker 2: has been named. Whether or not that gets verified, you know,
48:10
Speaker 2: time is going to tell. We're going to see that
48:12
Speaker 2: play out over the next few days. But supposedly there
48:14
Speaker 2: has been a successor named. He's likely to be a
48:18
Speaker 2: member of the Valencia family, which is the old core
48:21
Speaker 2: of the Millennial Cartel, which is kind of what the
48:24
Speaker 2: c which was the initial core of the CJNG itself.
48:28
Speaker 2: If they're able to hold that core together, there may
48:31
Speaker 2: be less fragmentation. But I would actually be shocked, given
48:33
Speaker 2: the organizational structure the CJNG, if local affiliates that had
48:38
Speaker 2: been become part of their organization as local criminal organizations
48:43
Speaker 2: and then had become part of the CJNG as they
48:45
Speaker 2: made their rapid spread across the country. I would be
48:48
Speaker 2: shocked if some of them did not splinter off. So
48:50
Speaker 2: I would expect to see some fragmentation, and that fragmentation
48:53
Speaker 2: inevitably leads to more violence and potential underworld realignments.
49:00
Speaker 5: What does the think about the Mexican president is as
49:04
Speaker 5: far as as far as her stability, Well, well, she has.
49:08
Speaker 2: A six year term and she's pretty early into her
49:13
Speaker 2: six year term, so in terms of stability, I wouldn't
49:20
Speaker 2: expect that Claudia Scheinbaum is, you know, going to suddenly
49:24
Speaker 2: not be the president of Mexico. No, no, no, that's
49:26
Speaker 2: not the issue for Mexico. The broader issue is a
49:30
Speaker 2: political economic one. Mexico only takes in seventeen percent of
49:33
Speaker 2: GDP and taxation. As a result of that, they have
49:37
Speaker 2: less money for cops, courts, a penal system, and all
49:40
Speaker 2: of the things that you need. The always to the
49:42
Speaker 2: average is actually thirty four percent. So Ionov they development
49:46
Speaker 2: countries are typically taking in a higher level of taxation
49:49
Speaker 2: and then they're able to afford all the accoutrement or
49:53
Speaker 2: things that go along with making the rule of law
49:56
Speaker 2: work really well, like having good cops, good courts, things
49:58
Speaker 2: like that. As a result of that, Qualia Shinebaum is
50:02
Speaker 2: in a very difficult situation. The physical situation in Mexico
50:05
Speaker 2: is not the fact in terms of the government, and
50:12
Speaker 2: uh there's also issues with endemic corruption that make it
50:17
Speaker 2: very very difficult. But I don't see the Shinbaum administration
50:20
Speaker 2: following in any way.
50:22
Speaker 5: But if she lives in support of the especially the
50:27
Speaker 5: poor and the working class, is she losing that support?
50:34
Speaker 2: I have seen nothing to indicate that the Morena Party
50:38
Speaker 2: has continued to be able to maintain that support. I
50:42
Speaker 2: haven't seen anything to that effect. I'm not saying that
50:46
Speaker 2: it couldn't happen, but I haven't seen anything to that effect.
50:49
Speaker 5: What do you what do you see as far as
50:51
Speaker 5: if the drugs, the drugs that come in from Mexico,
50:54
Speaker 5: is it mostly cocaine or is it just is it
50:58
Speaker 5: just or they into just for networks of organization, is
51:02
Speaker 5: human trafficking or what exactly is their main bread and butter.
51:06
Speaker 2: So to speak? Well, and that's a fantastic question, and
51:10
Speaker 2: unfortunately we don't have those ledgers. But what we have
51:12
Speaker 2: seen is an overall diversification of criminal activities in Mexico
51:16
Speaker 2: over the last twenty years. So we obviously drugs are
51:21
Speaker 2: a big one, and then you can think about them
51:23
Speaker 2: in two big categories. You know, plant based, so you've
51:25
Speaker 2: got your cocaine, you've got your heroin, you've got your marijuana,
51:29
Speaker 2: but then also on the other side, you've got your meth.
51:32
Speaker 2: And Sentinel have become increasingly important are being cut into
51:36
Speaker 2: those other sources. The CJNG and both have seen the
51:41
Speaker 2: Lola Cartel were pioneers in Sentinel. The CJNG also have
51:44
Speaker 2: long time experience and INTETA means before that. So the
51:49
Speaker 2: drugs are certainly a major source, but oil theft mafia's
51:55
Speaker 2: they've also diversified into what's known as watch, which is
51:58
Speaker 2: a slang term for oil theft mafias today, and they've
52:04
Speaker 2: diversified into other things. You have been here about a
52:07
Speaker 2: Quatchi coal ala for water, so water theft mafias where
52:10
Speaker 2: they're stealing water from government sources, particularly in areas of
52:14
Speaker 2: rout in times of severe trout as we saw in
52:16
Speaker 2: northeastern Mexico in the last five years, and then selling
52:19
Speaker 2: them in the neighborhoods that have no access to water
52:21
Speaker 2: and it can be highly lucrative. You also see this
52:24
Speaker 2: in and around Mexico City where there are water issues
52:27
Speaker 2: in underserved colonias or neighborhoods. So you're seeing a broad
52:31
Speaker 2: diversification of criminal activity. So it's much harder to say
52:34
Speaker 2: what they make the most from because we're seeing huge
52:37
Speaker 2: numbers in terms of WATCHI coal, whether it be through
52:40
Speaker 2: oil just straight oil theft, or also tax evasion. There
52:45
Speaker 2: have been some major scandals related to especially tax evasion
52:49
Speaker 2: and avoiding oil taxes that have involved imports and the military.
52:56
Speaker 5: We hear about them closing the border and the border
53:00
Speaker 5: being shut down. How's that affected the cartails as far
53:03
Speaker 5: as trafficking.
53:05
Speaker 2: Okay, well, you know, is the border really being shut down?
53:12
Speaker 15: You talk about fentanyl, you have an issue of well,
53:16
Speaker 15: you have legal land based trade, and fentanyl is typically
53:22
Speaker 15: trafficked in vehicles by individuals and they essentially piggyback.
53:27
Speaker 2: Through legal trade. There's approaching it's about nine hundred million
53:32
Speaker 2: dollars in bilatter trade between the United States and Mexico.
53:34
Speaker 2: That is not something that either country can really afford
53:38
Speaker 2: to just suddenly turn off that is legal trade and
53:41
Speaker 2: piggybacking along that can be the illicit trafficking of drugs
53:45
Speaker 2: and things like that. So while there have been increased
53:50
Speaker 2: border security metric measures, the idea that the butter border
53:55
Speaker 2: is suddenly just shut down, that's that's a misnote.
53:58
Speaker 1: That was doctor Nathan Jonesssociate professor at sam Houston State University.
54:04
Speaker 1: With a red card in the first half and a
54:06
Speaker 1: second red card in the next, the Houston Dynamo played
54:11
Speaker 1: with just nine men on the field and lost to
54:13
Speaker 1: one of the best in Major League Soccer, the LAFC.
54:17
Speaker 1: This was at home in the sold out Shell Energy Stadium,
54:21
Speaker 1: where tons of South Koreans came to see the LAFC
54:24
Speaker 1: superstar Sung Hewn Men and his LAFC teammates defeat Houston
54:30
Speaker 1: to nothing. Rookie defender Augustine Reich also made his MLS debut,
54:35
Speaker 1: while club legend Hector Herrera made his twenty twenty six
54:40
Speaker 1: debut after signing with the Dynamo in the off season.
54:44
Speaker 1: Manager Ben Olsen commented on the match read card.
54:48
Speaker 16: We played very well. It was very disciplined. We asked
54:53
Speaker 16: the guys to do some things that maybe were out
54:55
Speaker 16: of you know, their comfort zone and making sure we
55:01
Speaker 16: protect space and absorb and transition, which again isn't really
55:08
Speaker 16: in our nature, but against a team like LAFC, you
55:14
Speaker 16: can see how quickly they expose you. And space is
55:18
Speaker 16: is their friend and your enemy when you play now.
55:21
Speaker 16: So I thought it was disciplined. I thought we frustrated
55:25
Speaker 16: them and we created a few really good chances in
55:29
Speaker 16: the first half. So and then the red car changes everything.
55:33
Speaker 6: And yeah, here's what I'll say.
55:36
Speaker 17: About the red car. It was to me, it's the
55:39
Speaker 17: wrong call and it changes the game unfortunately, and he
55:45
Speaker 17: reaches for the yellow and then he decides that it's
55:48
Speaker 17: a red I've.
55:49
Speaker 13: Looked at it.
55:51
Speaker 6: Several times, and.
55:54
Speaker 17: It's to me, it's just the wrong call. It's the
55:57
Speaker 17: wrong call and the wrong moment, and it changes the tire.
56:01
Speaker 16: The entire match and setsima And then we're playing against
56:05
Speaker 16: one of the best teams down the man. And I
56:08
Speaker 16: thought the effort overall was incredible, incredible from our guys
56:13
Speaker 16: looked after each other.
56:15
Speaker 17: No, uh, there wasn't a lot of frustration. I thought,
56:21
Speaker 17: we haven't spent a lot of.
56:22
Speaker 16: Time in kind of a five to three one who
56:25
Speaker 16: they again, they did it really well. And what pisses
56:30
Speaker 16: me off is we gave up two set pieces and
56:33
Speaker 16: that's the controlled phase, that's the controlled stin uh. And
56:38
Speaker 16: in those moments we let ourselves.
56:40
Speaker 17: Down because I think there was something out there, there
56:43
Speaker 17: was maybe a point out there in this game.
56:45
Speaker 16: But again, letting ourselves down on the set pieces.
56:48
Speaker 11: I don't care how many guys you're down.
56:52
Speaker 10: You can still deal with that.
56:53
Speaker 1: Houston plays The New England Revolution next week, before returning
56:57
Speaker 1: home on the fourteenth to play the Portland TI. The
57:02
Speaker 1: People's News is a production of Steve Gallington and Richard Hannah,
57:06
Speaker 1: and is protected by copyright laws. All the information broadcast
57:10
Speaker 1: on air and online, as well as published in both
57:13
Speaker 1: print and or online, including articles, audio clips, illustrations, graphics, photographs,
57:18
Speaker 1: and videos, are protected by these copyright and other state
57:22
Speaker 1: and federal intellectual property laws. Therefore, you may not use
57:26
Speaker 1: our content in any prohibited way, including reproducing, publishing, transmitting, selling, rewriting, broadcasting,
57:33
Speaker 1: or posting on the Internet without the expressed written permission
57:36
Speaker 1: of the People's News. Prohibited use also includes publication of
57:40
Speaker 1: our material in printed or electronic brochures, newsletters, or flyers,
57:45
Speaker 1: as well as all website or email distribution. To obtain
57:49
Speaker 1: permission to use copyrighted material, email Steve Gallington at Steve
57:53
Speaker 1: at gallington dot com. Thank you,