Latest / The Real News Podcast / “Purge Palantir!”: Union Nurses Warn Big Tech and Big Brother Are Invading Our Healthcare System

Transcript

“Purge Palantir!”: Union Nurses Warn Big Tech and Big Brother Are Invading Our Healthcare System · The Real News Podcast

0:02
Speaker 1: I got working to do.
0:28
Speaker 2: And into our lives. They and their union, National Nurses United,
0:33
Speaker 2: participated in a National Day of Action on August 27th,
0:37
Speaker 2: which brought together hundreds of registered nurses, patients, and community
0:42
Speaker 2: allies in cities around the country to demand that hospitals
0:45
Speaker 2: and elected officials cut all ties with artificial intelligence giant Palantir.
0:51
Speaker 2: As a press release from NNU lays out, quote, the
0:55
Speaker 2: nurses who are members of National Nurses United are The
0:58
Speaker 2: nation's largest union of registered nurses stopped traffic in an
1:02
Speaker 2: act of civil disobedience in eight cities, Palo Alto, California,
1:07
Speaker 2: Los Angeles, California, Chicago, Illinois, Washington, D.C., Portland, Maine, Asheville,
1:13
Speaker 2: North Carolina, Austin, Texas, and New Orleans, Louisiana. Union nurses
1:18
Speaker 2: cannot be silent when our most vulnerable people, babies, and
1:22
Speaker 2: children are being detained by federal immigration agents, said NNU
1:26
Speaker 2: President Jamie Brown. While our patients and neighbors are living
1:30
Speaker 2: in fear of immigration raids enabled by Palantir, our hospitals
1:35
Speaker 2: are facing huge cuts and our patients are facing mounting
1:38
Speaker 2: health care costs because of HR1. Nurses aren't just saying
1:43
Speaker 2: no to Palantir, but we're calling for our public resources
1:47
Speaker 2: to go toward the benefit of working people, not billionaires
1:51
Speaker 2: and their corporations, end quote. The press release continues. From
1:56
Speaker 2: 2009 to 2025, Palantir received $ 2. 5 billion in federal government funding,
2:04
Speaker 2: but this number has grown tremendously in just the past year.
2:08
Speaker 2: Last July, the Department of Defense announced a $ 10 billion
2:12
Speaker 2: agreement with Palantir to use its technology to share data
2:17
Speaker 2: across federal agencies, enabling unprecedented surveillance power. This followed a
2:23
Speaker 2: $ 30 million contract awarded to Palantir by the Department of
2:27
Speaker 2: Homeland Security to build an AI-powered system that would identify
2:32
Speaker 2: immigrants for deportation. In February of 2026, the Department of
2:37
Speaker 2: Homeland Security and Palantir signed a $ 1 billion contract. In
2:42
Speaker 2: the hospital industry already, Palantir manages more than one-fifth of U.S.
2:47
Speaker 2: hospital beds. For nurses... This marks a dangerous threat to
2:51
Speaker 2: their nursing profession, which is seeing a glut of untested
2:56
Speaker 2: and unregulated technology introduced into patient care settings, end quote.
3:02
Speaker 2: All right, so we got a lot to talk about here.
3:05
Speaker 2: And to talk about all of this, I am really
3:08
Speaker 2: grateful to be joined on the show today by three
3:10
Speaker 2: guests who are all registered nurses, all members of National
3:15
Speaker 2: Nurses United. Thank you all so much for joining me today.
3:19
Speaker 2: I really appreciate it. Please introduce yourselves to our listeners.
3:24
Speaker 1: My name is Kira Arbor. I'm a registered nurse from Chicago, Illinois.
3:28
Speaker 3: My name is Kelly Vernon. I'm a registered nurse from Portland, Maine.
3:31
Speaker 3: I'm Lee Barker.
3:32
Speaker 4: I'm a registered nurse in Kansas City, Missouri.
3:35
Speaker 2: Well, again, thank you all so much for joining me today.
3:38
Speaker 2: I really, really appreciate having you all three here to
3:41
Speaker 2: talk about this because there's so much here that I
3:44
Speaker 2: didn't even know before I saw the day of action
3:49
Speaker 2: and started digging into this. So before we really get
3:53
Speaker 2: into Palantir and all this AI stuff, I want to
3:58
Speaker 2: start at the shop floor, worker's eye level. And I
4:03
Speaker 2: want like listeners to get to know more about you
4:05
Speaker 2: all and to have y'all give us, you know, more
4:08
Speaker 2: of a lay of the land here. So could you
4:10
Speaker 2: start by telling us more about the jobs that you do,
4:13
Speaker 2: the hospitals that you work at, the kind of patients
4:16
Speaker 2: that you care for? And I guess like, can we
4:19
Speaker 2: talk a bit about like all the, the non AI
4:22
Speaker 2: workplace issues that you and your coworkers are already dealing
4:26
Speaker 2: with on a daily basis?
4:28
Speaker 1: This is Kira. I am a, Nurse in the neurosurgical
4:34
Speaker 1: ICU at Stroger Hospital of Cook County. We are one
4:38
Speaker 1: of the largest safety net hospitals in the United States.
4:42
Speaker 1: So I am just finishing up my first year as
4:47
Speaker 1: a nurse. Just graduated from my nurse residency program last week.
4:54
Speaker 1: Came to nursing late in life. I took my licensing
4:57
Speaker 1: exam last the day after I turned 50. For me,
5:01
Speaker 1: I think the thing that has really been the most
5:05
Speaker 1: challenging part of my first year of practice as a
5:07
Speaker 1: nurse is the patient population that we serve at Schroeder
5:12
Speaker 1: Hospital as a safety net hospital in the third largest
5:17
Speaker 1: city in the country is just all of the poverty-related
5:24
Speaker 1: issues you know, social determinants of health-related leg illnesses. So
5:29
Speaker 1: in the neurosurge ICU, anybody who's a gunshot wound to
5:33
Speaker 1: the head comes to us, you know, blunt force trauma
5:38
Speaker 1: to the head. Two gunshots to the head on the
5:42
Speaker 1: unit last night, one blunt force trauma, and then a
5:45
Speaker 1: whole bunch of people who have had strokes because they
5:49
Speaker 1: didn't have, you know, they live in food deserts. They
5:53
Speaker 1: don't have access to healthy things to eat, or they
5:56
Speaker 1: don't know how to manage chronic conditions like diabetes and
6:00
Speaker 1: high blood pressure. And as, as somebody who grew up
6:05
Speaker 1: pretty privileged and whose parents are heading into their eighties
6:11
Speaker 1: over the next like year and a half or so,
6:13
Speaker 1: I see my, my amount of dad played golf every day.
6:16
Speaker 1: They go swimming with their grandkids every day. Cause they
6:19
Speaker 1: grew up middle-class, they grew up with money. And then
6:22
Speaker 1: I see people 20 years younger than them who are
6:26
Speaker 1: looking at end of life type of illnesses in our hospital.
6:31
Speaker 1: And it has really kind of overwhelmed me emotionally, like
6:36
Speaker 1: just because we live in a system that doesn't do
6:39
Speaker 1: a very good job of allocating resources to folks. And
6:43
Speaker 1: so I'm watching people be very sick and eventually die
6:48
Speaker 1: from very preventable diseases and things that are associated with poverty.
6:53
Speaker 1: Violence is associated with poverty.
6:57
Speaker 3: I'm Kelly. I'm at Portland, Maine. Similar to Kara, I
7:02
Speaker 3: also work in neurosurgery, neurotrauma. My background is in stroke.
7:08
Speaker 3: I've been a nurse for a little over 17 years
7:13
Speaker 3: from Boston, and then I moved to Georgia. I was
7:16
Speaker 3: a director of neurosciences in Georgia, so I was in management,
7:19
Speaker 3: left management to come back to the bedside. and be
7:22
Speaker 3: a union nurse and use everything I learned as a
7:25
Speaker 3: manager now for the good of the union. So I'm
7:30
Speaker 3: happy to be here. I've been at Maine Med for
7:35
Speaker 3: about five years. I was a member of the original
7:39
Speaker 3: facility bargaining committee when we were organizing for our union.
7:42
Speaker 3: And when I got here, I was coming from Georgia
7:46
Speaker 3: right after COVID. And COVID in Georgia was awful. made
7:53
Speaker 3: me realize I needed to go back to New England.
7:57
Speaker 3: So I left the South, came back to New England,
7:59
Speaker 3: wanted to be near family. So I came to Maine
8:03
Speaker 3: and just wanted to work at the bedside, work my 312s,
8:06
Speaker 3: get my shifts done and go home and not have
8:09
Speaker 3: 24-7 responsibility. Now I'm in the union and I have
8:12
Speaker 3: a different kind of 24 seven responsibility, but I love it.
8:15
Speaker 3: So I started and when I got to the hospital
8:18
Speaker 3: in Maine, I was I was almost like, well, you know,
8:20
Speaker 3: this is compared to where I came from in Georgia.
8:21
Speaker 3: I was like, well, this is pretty nice. Like, what
8:23
Speaker 3: are you guys all upset about? And, you know, started
8:26
Speaker 3: talking to the staff and learning things. And then I
8:28
Speaker 3: like shifted my thinking. And I was like, you know,
8:31
Speaker 3: I just came from a really bad situation. Things aren't
8:36
Speaker 3: that bad up here in Maine. But I know that
8:39
Speaker 3: the way health care works. Because what I saw in
8:42
Speaker 3: Georgia was consolidation of health care systems, lots of financial issues,
8:49
Speaker 3: lots of layoffs and closures and all that kind of stuff.
8:53
Speaker 3: And I didn't want any of that bad health care.
8:58
Speaker 3: to come up to this hospital. So I was like,
9:00
Speaker 3: you know what? The best thing is to start a
9:02
Speaker 3: union and to lock it in what we have now
9:04
Speaker 3: so that it can't get taken away because we know
9:06
Speaker 3: the turnover in the C-suite is like every five years.
9:09
Speaker 3: These people are not dedicated to the communities. They're not
9:12
Speaker 3: dedicated to the hospital. They are there for five years
9:15
Speaker 3: just to make a resume, just to go on to
9:17
Speaker 3: the next place. So I like got all in with
9:21
Speaker 3: the union. Um, I'm a charge nurse. I'm a steward. I'm, um,
9:26
Speaker 3: chair of our professional practice committee, and I'm co-president of
9:29
Speaker 3: the Maine State Nurses Association. Yeah, I'm all in. And,
9:33
Speaker 3: you know, the things that we're working on now outside
9:35
Speaker 3: of AI is, you know, staffing. There's been this huge
9:38
Speaker 3: misconception that, or this thought process that there are, there's
9:42
Speaker 3: a nursing shortage. And we've been saying for years, there's
9:45
Speaker 3: not a nursing shortage. There's a shortage of nurses willing
9:47
Speaker 3: to work in unsafe conditions at the bedside. And that's
9:51
Speaker 3: why I went into management when I did, because the
9:54
Speaker 3: working conditions at the bedside suck. And like, nobody wants
9:56
Speaker 3: to work every weekend. Nobody wants to work every holidays.
9:59
Speaker 3: You can go to management and have your weekends off,
10:01
Speaker 3: have your holidays off, get paid more. So you see
10:04
Speaker 3: the shift of people leaving the bedside because the work
10:07
Speaker 3: is just unmanageable. The working conditions aren't safe. The patients
10:11
Speaker 3: are sicker, more complex. Our nursing turnover is super high.
10:17
Speaker 3: The years of experience on the floor are low. You know,
10:21
Speaker 3: when I work, there's a lot of times I'm the
10:24
Speaker 3: most experienced nurse on my unit by 15 years. So
10:28
Speaker 3: it's a lot of challenges in that. And there's no
10:30
Speaker 3: focus on nurse retention. They just let one go and
10:33
Speaker 3: then just hire a traveler or temporary staff. And we
10:35
Speaker 3: try to make the best of it. But that's, you know,
10:38
Speaker 3: I was at my professional practice committee meeting this morning.
10:41
Speaker 3: It was all about staffing. You know, the hospital has
10:43
Speaker 3: budgets and staffing grids and plans, but they fall through.
10:46
Speaker 3: You know, they're not They don't hold themselves accountable.
10:50
Speaker 4: Just wanting to build off of what Kelly said, staffing
10:53
Speaker 4: is also an issue at the hospital that I work at, Research,
10:56
Speaker 4: in Kansas City, Missouri. I work specifically in our inpatient
10:59
Speaker 4: psychiatric population. Our staffing grids call for one nurse to
11:05
Speaker 4: every eight patients. That's already an unsafe ratio, and our
11:10
Speaker 4: management likes to push us to one to nine, one
11:13
Speaker 4: to ten. I've seen 11 and 12 patients. And like
11:16
Speaker 4: Kelly said, it's not that there's a nursing shortage in
11:20
Speaker 4: this country. There's a shortage of nurses that are willing
11:22
Speaker 4: to work in the unsafe conditions that the hospitals push
11:25
Speaker 4: on us. At Research, I mean, we used to have
11:27
Speaker 4: 800 nurses when we were fully staffed up. Currently, we
11:31
Speaker 4: have like 550. And we just can't, the hospital doesn't
11:36
Speaker 4: care to retain nurses. It's, yeah, somebody leaves and, oh,
11:39
Speaker 4: we can hire in a new grad and they'll stay
11:41
Speaker 4: for their two years, get their experience and leave. And
11:43
Speaker 4: we'll just hire another new grad.
11:45
Speaker 2: Well, and it's like, you know, I hate to make
11:48
Speaker 2: light of all the incredibly serious and important stuff that
11:51
Speaker 2: y'all just laid out. But, like, in 2026, hearing all this,
11:56
Speaker 2: my mind is, you know, imagining the, you know, Pawn
12:01
Speaker 2: Stars meme. of like, hey, you know, hospitals, can you
12:05
Speaker 2: fix any of these problems? And the response is, no,
12:09
Speaker 2: the best I can do is nothing, and I'm going
12:12
Speaker 2: to add Palantir to your list of things to be
12:15
Speaker 2: worried about now. So, like, that's the kind of, you know, upside-down,
12:22
Speaker 2: topsy-turvy nightmare reality that we're living in right now, but...
12:27
Speaker 2: It is what it is and we got to deal
12:29
Speaker 2: with it. And so like, let's, let's, I'm so grateful
12:32
Speaker 2: to all of you for, for kind of laying that
12:34
Speaker 2: out for folks. Cause it's such important context for everyone
12:37
Speaker 2: to understand. Like, you know, even though we're all focused
12:41
Speaker 2: on AI and Palantir right now, like let's not lose
12:44
Speaker 2: sight of the forest from the trees here. Like there's
12:46
Speaker 2: so many other. systemic issues that are you know running
12:51
Speaker 2: workers into the ground and you know like screwing over
12:54
Speaker 2: patients and all of us for the benefit of a
12:58
Speaker 2: few you know that those sorts of dynamics are already
13:01
Speaker 2: at work in the stories you've been hearing on this
13:03
Speaker 2: show about you know the working conditions for health care
13:07
Speaker 2: workers around the country we've been covering it for years
13:10
Speaker 2: But now we've got to worry about ICE coming into hospitals.
13:15
Speaker 2: We've got to worry about these truly supervillain-esque big tech
13:22
Speaker 2: oligarchs putting their AI into our most sensitive and private
13:29
Speaker 2: systems and information. So let's talk about this, gang, because
13:33
Speaker 2: I need your help unpacking this for myself and for
13:37
Speaker 2: our listeners. So I want to stay in the world
13:40
Speaker 2: of healthcare right now. And I want to ask if
13:42
Speaker 2: you could sort of lay out for us, like how
13:45
Speaker 2: is AI in general and Palantir specifically seeping into your
13:51
Speaker 2: workplaces and your work lives? Like what are nurses seeing
13:56
Speaker 2: here that perhaps the average patient is not?
14:00
Speaker 4: So the hospital that I work at is owned by
14:02
Speaker 4: HCA or the Healthcare Corporation of America. And what HCA
14:07
Speaker 4: has done And their partnering with Palantir is to build
14:12
Speaker 4: an AI scheduler called Timpani. We don't really know how
14:19
Speaker 4: it works. It's like a black box. We put our
14:22
Speaker 4: preferred days of working in. Timpani spits out a schedule
14:26
Speaker 4: that's allegedly balanced. So we have enough nurses working throughout
14:32
Speaker 4: the week. Um, they're supposed to also balance, uh, our
14:36
Speaker 4: like level of experience. Um, so we don't have, um, several,
14:40
Speaker 4: you know, a unit full of new grads and then
14:42
Speaker 4: all of the experienced nurses are working different shifts. Um,
14:46
Speaker 4: these were the promises that we were made. Um, and
14:48
Speaker 4: unfortunately at the end of the day, Palantir is giving
14:50
Speaker 4: us a shitty product, you know, aside from all of
14:54
Speaker 4: the moral reasons that Palantir sucks, they can't even provide us, um,
14:59
Speaker 4: again with the product that, that meets the, the promises
15:02
Speaker 4: that they told us, which is that it would take
15:06
Speaker 4: the burden of scheduling off of our managers. And now
15:09
Speaker 4: our managers in the building don't have any way to
15:12
Speaker 4: adjust our schedules. So when the AI inevitably screws up,
15:17
Speaker 4: puts out a bad schedule, nobody in the building has
15:20
Speaker 4: any way to fix the schedule. Unless it's, I think,
15:24
Speaker 4: within 24 or 48 hours of the shift beginning, which
15:28
Speaker 4: is ridiculous. Part of what tympani does as well is
15:31
Speaker 4: HCA is using it to push short staffing. Allegedly, our
15:35
Speaker 4: understanding of how tympani works is that it somehow looks
15:37
Speaker 4: at the average daily census on the unit and decides, oh,
15:41
Speaker 4: for 16 patients on this psych unit, we need two
15:44
Speaker 4: nurses every shift. What tympani doesn't see is that that
15:48
Speaker 4: unit can hold up to 24 patients, and frequently we
15:51
Speaker 4: are 14. trying to fill it up to 24. Timpani
15:54
Speaker 4: will schedule only two nurses and management will say, well, really,
15:57
Speaker 4: we can admit a couple more patients. We'll push you
15:59
Speaker 4: guys up to one nurse can take 10 patients instead
16:01
Speaker 4: of one to eight. And so they just, they'll sneak
16:05
Speaker 4: in and just ask us to do more and more
16:08
Speaker 4: with less and less.
16:10
Speaker 3: So at Maine Med or Maine Health, we have Palantir
16:14
Speaker 3: in our hospitals through their application called Foundry. When we
16:18
Speaker 3: first heard about the potential, we asked the hospital or
16:22
Speaker 3: Maine Health to let us know what they were using
16:24
Speaker 3: it for. And at first they told us it wasn't
16:27
Speaker 3: really any of our business. We further pushed, sent letters
16:32
Speaker 3: to the board asking, you know, what's going on, what's
16:34
Speaker 3: it for? And their response was that they're using it
16:38
Speaker 3: for insurance denials. So they're using it like, so say
16:44
Speaker 3: a patient comes in and they have pneumonia and And
16:48
Speaker 3: the doctor doesn't write the details of the pneumonia clearly.
16:53
Speaker 3: The insurance company will deny the claim and say that
16:56
Speaker 3: there's lacking documentation for payments or whatever. So the hospital
17:01
Speaker 3: or MaineHealth's idea is that Palantir's AI software will look
17:07
Speaker 3: at these denials and claims and figure out what the
17:11
Speaker 3: letter or what the documentation needs to be in order
17:13
Speaker 3: for the claim to get approved. So this requires us, MaineHealth,
17:18
Speaker 3: sharing information with Palantir of our patients' information.
17:23
Speaker 2: I'm sorry. So was our whole system of, you know, already,
17:30
Speaker 2: you know, not approving so many, you know, like prescriptions and,
17:37
Speaker 2: you know, surgeries in our American healthcare system, was that
17:41
Speaker 2: all not bad enough? That now we need like a
17:44
Speaker 2: fucking AI bot denying us as well. I'm just I
17:49
Speaker 2: can't believe that that is actually happening.
17:52
Speaker 3: It's very much crazy. You know, the argument is that
17:57
Speaker 3: the return on investment is already better than projected. So
18:01
Speaker 3: the hospital will be gaining so much money. But they're
18:04
Speaker 3: claiming that they're losing money because the insurance company is
18:07
Speaker 3: denying it because the insurance company changes the rules 15,000
18:10
Speaker 3: times a year. It has no obligation to tell the hospitals.
18:15
Speaker 3: So that's why they're getting denied. So instead of holding
18:18
Speaker 3: the insurance companies accountable, now we're introducing Palantir to help
18:22
Speaker 3: solve it like that's the solution. Like, it doesn't make
18:26
Speaker 3: any sense. And that just makes us complicit in this
18:30
Speaker 3: whole thing.
18:31
Speaker 1: Thankfully, in Chicago, we don't have Palantir software anywhere near
18:38
Speaker 1: our patients' information. Our action was based on the fact
18:43
Speaker 1: that our pension fund has $ 28 million invested in Palantir. Uh,
18:50
Speaker 1: that includes all County employees, not just nurses. So everybody
18:54
Speaker 1: who works for Cook County, which is where Chicago is, um,
18:57
Speaker 1: including all the people who work at the hospital, the doctors,
19:00
Speaker 1: the administrators, the nurses, uh, the PCTs, the environmental service people,
19:05
Speaker 1: the folks who work in the cafeteria, uh, the people
19:08
Speaker 1: who work in the forest preserves of Cook County, where
19:10
Speaker 1: I like to ride my mountain bike. Um, all these
19:13
Speaker 1: people unknowingly have their pension funds, um, A, invested in
19:19
Speaker 1: a company that's heavily, you know, aligned with the current
19:24
Speaker 1: administration and could potentially go, if Democrats grew a spine,
19:30
Speaker 1: you know, could go belly up in a couple of years.
19:33
Speaker 1: And then B is doing some pretty nefarious stuff, is
19:38
Speaker 1: collaborating with ICE and making it so, you know, Kellyanne
19:44
Speaker 1: mentioned that the patients are getting sicker and sicker. One
19:47
Speaker 1: of the reasons the patients are getting sicker and sicker
19:49
Speaker 1: is because they know that they have the potential to
19:53
Speaker 1: get arrested if they come seek healthcare. So they delay
19:56
Speaker 1: and defer care, and then they come to us, and
20:00
Speaker 1: they're a lot of times near death. I took care
20:03
Speaker 1: of somebody last night who intubated, completely unconscious, body full
20:11
Speaker 1: of ammonia because their liver had failed and they had
20:14
Speaker 1: deferred care. And I couldn't get this person's story because
20:19
Speaker 1: obviously they were intubated and in a coma, but judging
20:23
Speaker 1: from this person's last name, they very easily could have
20:28
Speaker 1: been somebody who was undocumented. But for us, for me,
20:34
Speaker 1: for the nurses at Cook County, you know, we became
20:38
Speaker 1: nurses because it sounds cheesy, but it is a calling, right?
20:43
Speaker 1: Like I walked away from a six-figure career in supply
20:47
Speaker 1: chain and logistics management to come do this with the
20:51
Speaker 1: rest of my life because I felt a calling to
20:53
Speaker 1: do so. Because in 2020, I was at the George
20:57
Speaker 1: Floyd protest. I said, wow, I'm actually the baddie. And
21:02
Speaker 1: I need to get my life right. And so- I
21:06
Speaker 1: was feeling really good about what I was doing every day,
21:09
Speaker 1: taking care of some of the sickest people, the poorest people,
21:14
Speaker 1: the least fortunate people in my community and serving my community.
21:20
Speaker 1: And then I find out the thing that I'm relying
21:22
Speaker 1: on for my retirement is heavily invested in a company
21:27
Speaker 1: that's collaborating with ICE, that is writing software for the IDF,
21:32
Speaker 1: that is tracking kids home from school in Gaza so
21:37
Speaker 1: that they can, the Israeli defense force can send a bomb,
21:42
Speaker 1: you know, to this person's house because they, there's a
21:46
Speaker 1: one in 2 million chance that this kid's dad is
21:51
Speaker 1: part of Hamas.
21:52
Speaker 2: Right.
21:54
Speaker 1: And so that doesn't align in any way with my values.
21:58
Speaker 1: And so I feel, we felt the need to like
22:02
Speaker 1: step up and demand that our pension board divest itself
22:06
Speaker 1: from Palantir. And we were kind of blown off. So
22:09
Speaker 1: I am looking to put together a run to be
22:14
Speaker 1: part of the pension board in the next, next few months.
22:18
Speaker 1: So that's, that's where our involvement with Palantir is.
22:22
Speaker 2: Hell yeah. Well, like, and I want to, keep going
22:26
Speaker 2: in the direction that that y'all are leading us to
22:29
Speaker 2: right like i want to keep zooming out here and
22:33
Speaker 2: and sort of like take this discussion like beyond the
22:37
Speaker 2: the world of health care but you know i think
22:40
Speaker 2: it it bears repeating or reminding all of us like
22:44
Speaker 2: you know who and what we're talking about here right
22:47
Speaker 2: i mean like the the if you're still asking yourself
22:51
Speaker 2: or you're listening to this you're saying like well you
22:52
Speaker 2: know why is palantir so bad like who are they
22:54
Speaker 2: like They're telling us who they are. Like, they published
22:57
Speaker 2: a whole batshit manifesto, you know, like, about their evil
23:02
Speaker 2: vision of and for the world. Like, their CEO, Alex Karp,
23:07
Speaker 2: is constantly saying supervillain-type stuff about the kind of future
23:12
Speaker 2: he imagines with AI. And, like, there's a piece that
23:15
Speaker 2: we'll link to in the show notes from The Guardian
23:18
Speaker 2: that is literally titled, Palantir Manifesto described as ramblings of
23:23
Speaker 2: a supervillain amid UK contract fears. And in that article,
23:27
Speaker 2: here's a quote that says, quote, Palantir's Manifesto, which embraces
23:32
Speaker 2: AI state surveillance of citizens along with national service in
23:36
Speaker 2: the USA, is either a parody of a Robocop film
23:39
Speaker 2: or a disturbing narcissistic rant from an arrogant organization. End quote.
23:45
Speaker 2: And that was actually from a liberal Democrat MP in
23:47
Speaker 2: the UK. But like read that, read the manifesto like
23:52
Speaker 2: they they are telling us, you know, who they are
23:55
Speaker 2: and we should believe them. You know, I don't want
23:58
Speaker 2: this creep carp like near my, you know, health care
24:02
Speaker 2: or my information or any of my government data. I
24:06
Speaker 2: don't want them near anything, you know, like having to
24:09
Speaker 2: do with like the administration of our society or what
24:14
Speaker 2: what remains of it these days. Right. And yet. They
24:17
Speaker 2: are getting in there in our government. They are getting,
24:21
Speaker 2: you know, the data centers that are popping up everywhere. They're,
24:25
Speaker 2: you know, like tied up in all of that too.
24:28
Speaker 2: So like I wanted to kind of ask y'all to
24:32
Speaker 2: sort of zoom out and keep talking about that, you know,
24:37
Speaker 2: bigger picture. And I wanted to ask like why you
24:41
Speaker 2: and your union team, are demanding that, you know, not
24:45
Speaker 2: only hospitals, but elected officials cut ties with Palantir. Like,
24:49
Speaker 2: why is it important for you to speak out against
24:54
Speaker 2: this kind of larger onslaught of big tech and to
24:58
Speaker 2: speak out as union nurses to stop it?
25:02
Speaker 1: I would say, first of all, we have our own manifesto, right?
25:05
Speaker 1: It's called Vision for a Healthy Society. And it's not supervillain.
25:11
Speaker 1: We want people to live happy, healthy, self-fulfilled, self-actualized lives
25:18
Speaker 1: where they have the resources they need to not just
25:22
Speaker 1: survive day to day, but to thrive as human beings
25:25
Speaker 1: in the way that human beings were meant to exist
25:30
Speaker 1: and to flourish, you know, not to be beholden to
25:35
Speaker 1: these giant unelected powers, whether it's talentier, whether it's Anthropic,
25:42
Speaker 1: who was just in the news yesterday, because they have
25:45
Speaker 1: their own AI, like building dossiers on folks like us, right,
25:51
Speaker 1: who are opposed to what they do. And nobody elected
25:55
Speaker 1: these people, right? They became billionaires, because venture capitalists, you know,
26:03
Speaker 1: invested money in them. And now they call the shots, right? Like,
26:08
Speaker 1: They own pretty much both parties, like shout out to
26:11
Speaker 1: Ro Khanna for giving that money back from Palantir. But
26:14
Speaker 1: for the most part, they're heavily invested in both Democrats
26:19
Speaker 1: and Republicans. Yeah. And as far as union nurses, because
26:27
Speaker 1: we can't, because our union has our backs, right? Because
26:32
Speaker 1: they're going to protect our free speech rights, you know,
26:36
Speaker 1: They're going to protect our right to go out there
26:38
Speaker 1: and say, this is wrong. We don't agree with it.
26:42
Speaker 1: And they allow me, because they are themselves, my union
26:46
Speaker 1: is itself anti-colonial, anti-imperial. You know, they stand up for
26:53
Speaker 1: these values that I try to model myself. And so
26:58
Speaker 1: I need to stand in solidarity with my working class siblings.
27:02
Speaker 1: And I need to work for... the society that I
27:08
Speaker 1: think is going to allow human beings the best chance
27:11
Speaker 1: to live the lives they deserve.
27:14
Speaker 3: In Maine, in January, we had Operation Catch of the Day, which,
27:20
Speaker 3: you know, Maine is one of the whitest states in
27:23
Speaker 3: the country. We have a Somali population. So for us
27:27
Speaker 3: to be targeted with this operation was devastating. It affected
27:32
Speaker 3: our community. It affected the hospital population. Our housekeeping workers,
27:37
Speaker 3: our transporters, our ancillary services, and all staff felt this.
27:43
Speaker 3: You could feel the emotions throughout the hospital as this
27:47
Speaker 3: was going on. About 30% of our housekeeping were calling
27:50
Speaker 3: out because they were afraid. We were picking up food
27:55
Speaker 3: because we had a food bank, but people were afraid
27:57
Speaker 3: to go to the food bank. So our C-suite was
28:00
Speaker 3: storing groceries. So we were bringing our immigrant vulnerable community
28:03
Speaker 3: members to get food. And then one of my co-workers,
28:09
Speaker 3: who's of the vulnerable community, I offered to give her
28:12
Speaker 3: a ride into work because everything was so escalating. So
28:17
Speaker 3: I picked her up one morning and we were driving
28:19
Speaker 3: to the hospital to go to work. And it was
28:22
Speaker 3: about six o'clock in the morning. It was dark out.
28:23
Speaker 3: We were pulled up to driving down the street. And
28:27
Speaker 3: as we were driving, pulled up to what seemed to
28:29
Speaker 3: be ICE activity. There was a bunch of unmarked cars,
28:33
Speaker 3: out-of-state license plates, just seemed suspicious. So I couldn't just
28:38
Speaker 3: drive by. So I pulled into a parking lot across
28:41
Speaker 3: the street and started filming on my phone what these
28:44
Speaker 3: officers were doing, just trying to see if they had anybody,
28:47
Speaker 3: if anybody was in trouble. But I also had my
28:50
Speaker 3: friend in the car. So I didn't want to draw
28:53
Speaker 3: too much attention. So I didn't honk my horn. I
28:56
Speaker 3: didn't get out. I didn't yell. I just sat there
28:58
Speaker 3: with my phone on recording and the officer saw me.
29:02
Speaker 3: They flashed their flashlight at me as to say like, hey,
29:05
Speaker 3: we see you. And then I saw them heading to
29:07
Speaker 3: their car. So at that point, I decided that this
29:10
Speaker 3: was not a safe situation and we should leave. So
29:14
Speaker 3: we pulled out of the parking lot, carried on down
29:16
Speaker 3: the street and, um, realized that they were following us.
29:20
Speaker 3: So got to a red light, um, and they pulled
29:23
Speaker 3: up in the lane next to me and I could
29:25
Speaker 3: feel them like staring at me through the window. So
29:29
Speaker 3: I rolled my window down cause I could see that
29:31
Speaker 3: they were, you know, wanting that. And they rolled down
29:35
Speaker 3: the window and they looked, and they looked at me
29:37
Speaker 3: was a male and a female officer and they said
29:40
Speaker 3: can we help you and I said yeah he said
29:42
Speaker 3: you can get the fuck out of Maine and so
29:46
Speaker 3: which they replied oh looks like we have another Karen
29:49
Speaker 3: here and at this point the light is still red
29:53
Speaker 3: and I'm like okay like this is gonna escalate and
29:58
Speaker 3: And I was worried about my friend. And so when
30:01
Speaker 3: the light turned green, they looked at me and they said,
30:04
Speaker 3: I'm going to arrest three more people today just for you.
30:08
Speaker 3: Ha ha ha ha ha. And pulled out in front
30:11
Speaker 3: of me, did a U-turn and carried on down the back,
30:14
Speaker 3: back to where they came from. I don't think anybody
30:17
Speaker 3: was abducted that morning, but my friend and I continued
30:19
Speaker 3: to drive to work. And it was just like, I
30:21
Speaker 3: felt so awful. It was traumatizing. And so that right
30:27
Speaker 3: there for me was like, this isn't okay. And so
30:30
Speaker 3: we went to work and then this was happening across
30:33
Speaker 3: her town. And the hospital went through so much to
30:37
Speaker 3: like help and support people. They changed where they were
30:40
Speaker 3: picking up employees so that the parking lot was gated
30:46
Speaker 3: so that there couldn't be agents in there. And they
30:49
Speaker 3: did all these things, right? And then we find out
30:52
Speaker 3: that they have a contract with Palantir. And it's like,
30:56
Speaker 3: wait a minute, we just went through this in January.
30:59
Speaker 3: We felt the effects of this in the hospital. So
31:04
Speaker 3: that's where we all kind of started to get involved.
31:06
Speaker 3: And then fast forward through the summer, we get to
31:10
Speaker 3: July and we have the murder of Johan Sebastian Guerrero
31:13
Speaker 3: in Biddeford. which is three miles down the street from
31:17
Speaker 3: a Maine health facility. And at this point, we are
31:19
Speaker 3: aware about the app called Elite that Palantir is using
31:23
Speaker 3: to target immigrants in our communities. So at this point,
31:27
Speaker 3: we're concerned that this is really ramping up in our community.
31:31
Speaker 3: And then fast forward to August when our own nurse
31:35
Speaker 3: was abducted by ICE at an airport in Portland. And
31:39
Speaker 3: then to still find out that Maine Health is still
31:42
Speaker 3: doubling down on their contract and Susan Collins is still
31:46
Speaker 3: holding onto her money. It's just infuriating. And I think
31:51
Speaker 3: for us up here in Maine, you're going to see
31:54
Speaker 3: us out and doing everything we can to try to
31:57
Speaker 3: tell the community that Palantir has no place in our hospitals,
32:01
Speaker 3: no place in our community. And that if, if patients
32:04
Speaker 3: can't trust the hospital, You know, if they can't trust
32:08
Speaker 3: where they're going is safe, they're not going to come
32:10
Speaker 3: and get care. And that's not what we're here for.
32:13
Speaker 3: You know, nurses are advocates first. We're trained to advocate
32:18
Speaker 3: and to speak up when something is wrong. And that's
32:21
Speaker 3: what we're doing.
32:22
Speaker 2: I mean, exactly.
32:23
Speaker 4: I think the biggest reason that union nurses are speaking
32:25
Speaker 4: out against Palantir is simply because we can. It's the
32:28
Speaker 4: right thing to do. And like Kelly said, we're advocates
32:30
Speaker 4: for our patients. We're advocates for our communities.
32:32
Speaker 3: Wow.
32:34
Speaker 2: My God, thank you all so much for that. That
32:37
Speaker 2: was really, I think, important, really powerful. And I'm really
32:43
Speaker 2: grateful to you all again for speaking out the way
32:46
Speaker 2: that you are and, you know, letting our listeners know,
32:51
Speaker 2: you know, why this is important. And I want to
32:53
Speaker 2: sort of kind of end on that and bring us
32:56
Speaker 2: back to, you know, where we started in the beginning,
32:59
Speaker 2: where you know, I learned about this Purge Palantir campaign
33:04
Speaker 2: from NNU, you know, because of the Day of Action
33:07
Speaker 2: in August. So, like, I wanted to ask if, you know,
33:11
Speaker 2: you could tell folks more about, like, you know, now
33:14
Speaker 2: that we've kind of thoroughly covered, you know, why we
33:17
Speaker 2: should all be, you know, invested in this and horrified
33:21
Speaker 2: that these tyrants and oligarchs and freaks and villains, you know, like,
33:27
Speaker 2: who want to, control everything and everyone, why we should
33:32
Speaker 2: not just go quietly into that dark night and why
33:37
Speaker 2: people should stand up and fight back and that we
33:41
Speaker 2: can choose a different path. We don't have to go
33:44
Speaker 2: down this path. And that's what I see all around
33:48
Speaker 2: me and all in every like kind of story we
33:51
Speaker 2: cover at The Real News. Like people around the country
33:54
Speaker 2: are pissed. They are fighting back. They are doing so
33:58
Speaker 2: wherever they can, however they can, whether it's, you know.
34:01
Speaker 2: Speaking out as, you know, union workers and in like
34:05
Speaker 2: mobilizations or it's like, you know, people in deep red rural,
34:10
Speaker 2: you know, areas where their data centers popping up or
34:12
Speaker 2: people here in, you know, quote unquote, deep blue cities
34:16
Speaker 2: like Baltimore, where data centers are also, you know, threatening
34:19
Speaker 2: to pop up, you know, like this is kind of
34:22
Speaker 2: forcing us all. together and and we're going to need
34:25
Speaker 2: to work together to to figure this out and so
34:29
Speaker 2: in that spirit i wanted to end by asking y'all
34:31
Speaker 2: if you could tell folks more about like you know
34:34
Speaker 2: what nnu is is doing to fight back uh and
34:37
Speaker 2: what people listening um you know what your message is
34:39
Speaker 2: to them about you know why they should get involved
34:42
Speaker 2: and what they could do to get involved and you
34:45
Speaker 2: know like if you have any final words uh about
34:48
Speaker 2: what will happen to all of us if people don't
34:51
Speaker 2: fight back against this now.
34:53
Speaker 1: So I would say that I'm probably understanding that the
34:56
Speaker 1: demographic of your podcast are what we like to call
34:59
Speaker 1: fellow travelers, right? Like they're socialists, anarchists, anti-capitalists, what have you.
35:05
Speaker 1: We need to get people like off the sidelines, right?
35:09
Speaker 1: Like we'll take care of our own business here in
35:11
Speaker 1: Chicago with this pension fund. What I would suggest that
35:16
Speaker 1: your listeners do is is reach out to somebody who
35:20
Speaker 1: they would probably consider a liberal or a conservative and
35:26
Speaker 1: do something simple like, I don't know, go take them
35:29
Speaker 1: to see the movie American Doctor. I don't know if
35:31
Speaker 1: you've heard about that. It's the story, it's a documentary
35:35
Speaker 1: of people trying to go provide aid in Gaza in
35:41
Speaker 1: the midst of a genocide. Because I really feel like
35:46
Speaker 1: there is a large percentage of the population out there
35:50
Speaker 1: who just doesn't really understand. It's not that they don't care.
35:55
Speaker 1: It's just that, you know, A, they don't understand what's
35:58
Speaker 1: happening and B, they don't know or don't feel like
36:04
Speaker 1: they have any sort of political agency to change it. And,
36:09
Speaker 1: you know, there are a lot of people who probably
36:12
Speaker 1: identify as neither, you know, Any sort of political affiliation.
36:17
Speaker 1: And those are the people that we need to reach
36:19
Speaker 1: out to to let them know what's happening around us, right?
36:24
Speaker 1: So go see something like American Doctor, which is really
36:28
Speaker 1: going to get you right here. Understand that Palantir and
36:32
Speaker 1: all these big tech companies played a very large part
36:36
Speaker 1: in all the horrible things that you're going to see
36:38
Speaker 1: in that movie. And then go, wherever you live, I
36:42
Speaker 1: guarantee you there are people who, there's an anti-war committee, right?
36:46
Speaker 1: There are mutual aid groups who are going out every
36:50
Speaker 1: day and collecting donations and, you know, trying to feed,
36:57
Speaker 1: you know, the less fortunate in our community, the people
37:00
Speaker 1: who are undocumented, who are afraid to go to work. Like,
37:04
Speaker 1: there's so many opportunities to go out there and connect
37:07
Speaker 1: with the people in your community. And that's what's going
37:11
Speaker 1: to make you feel safe. And that's what's going to
37:13
Speaker 1: make you feel like you have power over this. And
37:15
Speaker 1: that's what's going to make you feel like you have
37:17
Speaker 1: agency over this. And that's how we defeat this in
37:21
Speaker 1: solidarity together as working class human beings.
37:26
Speaker 3: I think it's going to be really important that people
37:28
Speaker 3: get out and vote in November. I think it's really
37:33
Speaker 3: going to be, you know, We don't know what the
37:37
Speaker 3: outcomes of the elections will be, but if they go
37:39
Speaker 3: the way we want them to go, there's a chance
37:42
Speaker 3: that those results aren't going to be accepted. So I
37:45
Speaker 3: think we have to prepare and organize and make sure
37:49
Speaker 3: that we're getting everyone out to vote, making sure people
37:53
Speaker 3: are registered. I think there is no. there's no hesitation
37:58
Speaker 3: on my mind about that we need a huge voter
38:00
Speaker 3: turnout this midterm. And I think if people aren't involved,
38:04
Speaker 3: be a poll watcher, drive people to the polls, make
38:07
Speaker 3: sure your community members know if they're registered, how to register,
38:10
Speaker 3: where the voting locations are, and notify your elected officials
38:16
Speaker 3: that you don't approve of Palantir. Whenever I do stuff, lobbying,
38:22
Speaker 3: you know, when things that, you know, representatives are in
38:25
Speaker 3: Congress or locally or wherever, you know, they said, I
38:28
Speaker 3: don't hear from my constituents. No one's called me to
38:30
Speaker 3: tell me about this. And that really matters. So I
38:33
Speaker 3: think it's important for people to get out and vote.
38:36
Speaker 3: I think it's important for people to join an organization, unionize.
38:41
Speaker 3: If you're not in a union, join one, make one,
38:45
Speaker 3: connect with one. because there's so many resources. And if
38:49
Speaker 3: we're all doing different things, we need to all do
38:51
Speaker 3: the same thing together at the same time. We need
38:54
Speaker 3: to sustain organizing, sustain networking, talk to people that you
38:58
Speaker 3: don't normally talk to. You know, what I love is,
39:02
Speaker 3: you know, our candidate for Senate, Troy Jackson, one of
39:06
Speaker 3: his sayings that I love is, we're not from the left,
39:08
Speaker 3: we're not from the right, we're from the bottom, and
39:09
Speaker 3: we're rising. This is a working class issue. There's sayings
39:13
Speaker 3: that unions saved the middle class, unions built the middle class.
39:18
Speaker 3: We're going to have to do that again. And even
39:20
Speaker 3: if you're not in a union, you've got to link
39:22
Speaker 3: up with somebody because it's going to take all of
39:24
Speaker 3: us to get through this. And nurses are first and
39:27
Speaker 3: foremost humanitarians, right? We're the trusted profession over and over again.
39:33
Speaker 3: So we know what's needed in health care. And as
39:36
Speaker 3: a nurse for 17 years, I am so sick and
39:38
Speaker 3: tired of apologizing to my patients and their families on
39:41
Speaker 3: behalf of health insurance executives and hospital CEOs. So everyone
39:46
Speaker 3: get out and do something.
39:47
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
39:48
Speaker 4: Just to echo that. getting out to vote, reaching out
39:51
Speaker 4: to your elected representatives, telling them to Purge Palantir. I'm
39:55
Speaker 4: going to put a couple links in the chat also.
39:57
Speaker 4: There's a purgepalantir.com. You can get on there and find
40:02
Speaker 4: out what's going on with the Purge Palantir campaign, actions
40:06
Speaker 4: near you. The other link I put in there is
40:08
Speaker 4: there's a letter that people can fill out that will
40:10
Speaker 4: go to HCA specifically, telling them to cut ties with Palantir.
40:15
Speaker 4: Anyone can sign that.
40:23
Speaker 2: All right, gang, that's going to wrap things up for
40:25
Speaker 2: us today. I want to thank our guests, Kelly Brennan,
40:29
Speaker 2: Lee Barker, and Kira Arbor, all three registered nurses, all
40:34
Speaker 2: three members of National Nurses United, all participating in NNU's
40:39
Speaker 2: Purge Palantir campaign. And you can learn more about that
40:43
Speaker 2: campaign in the links that we provided in the show
40:46
Speaker 2: notes for this episode. And of course, I want to
40:49
Speaker 2: thank you all for listening and And I want to
40:51
Speaker 2: thank you for caring about this. We do this work
40:54
Speaker 2: for you, but we cannot do it without you. Working
40:57
Speaker 2: People is brought to you in partnership with In These
40:59
Speaker 2: Times Magazine and The Real News Network. This show is
41:03
Speaker 2: produced by the great Jules Taylor and is a proud
41:05
Speaker 2: member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. We'll see y'all
41:09
Speaker 2: back here next time for another episode of Working People.
41:13
Speaker 2: And in the meantime, go explore all the great work
41:16
Speaker 2: that we're doing at The Real News Network. where we
41:18
Speaker 2: do grassroots reporting that lifts up the voices and stories
41:22
Speaker 2: from the front lines of struggle around the U.S. and
41:25
Speaker 2: across the world. Subscribe to our YouTube channel. Check out
41:29
Speaker 2: our great podcasts like Under the Shadow and The Mark
41:32
Speaker 2: Steiner Show. And connect with us on social media and
41:35
Speaker 2: get updates on our reporting there. And help us do
41:39
Speaker 2: more work like this by going to therealnews.com forward slash
41:43
Speaker 2: donate and becoming a supporter today. I promise you guys,
41:47
Speaker 2: it really does make a difference. I'm Maximilian Alvarez. Take
41:51
Speaker 2: care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Solidarity forever.
42:01
Speaker 5: When my face you no longer see I live on, yes,
42:08
Speaker 5: I live on Wherever we go We are going to
42:12
Speaker 5: roll the union on. A song I live on.
42:15
Speaker 1: Yes, I live on.
42:17
Speaker 6: Wherever hungry, hungry are we. Just as hungry as hungry
42:22
Speaker 6: can be. A song I live on. Yes, I live on.
42:28
Speaker 6: While mean things are happening in this land, it's made
42:31
Speaker 6: a song I live on.
42:33
Speaker 2: Yes, I live on.
42:35
Speaker 6: Wherever the books mean things that happen.
42:38
Speaker 5: In this land's red, I'll.
42:39
Speaker 2: Live on, yes, I'll live on.
42:43
Speaker 6: Wherever the videotape of me is shown, I'll live on, yes,
42:48
Speaker 6: I'll live on.
42:49
Speaker 1: If I have help to make this a better world
42:52
Speaker 1: to live in, I'll live on, yes, I'll live on.
42:57
Speaker 6: When my body is silent and the sun goes green,
43:00
Speaker 6: I'll live on, yes, I'll live on. When my songs
43:06
Speaker 6: and poems are read, I
43:09
Speaker 5: Live on, yes, I live on.