The Future of Detention Centers

As the United States debate over immigration continues to rage, Uncle Sam is constructing hundreds of controversial detainment centers. The official reasoning is that these facilities will hold people until they are cleared or deported... but is that the entire story? In this episode, Ben, Matt and Noel asks what happens to the centers in the future -- and who else, besides immigrants, might end up detained.

They don't want you to read our book.: https://static.macmillan.com/static/fib/stuff-you-should-read/

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is Noah.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
They called me Bed. We're joined as always with our
super producer, Dylan the Tennessee pal fagd. Most importantly, you
are you. You are here that makes this the stuff
they don't want you to know. We are recording on Monday,
March twenty third, and we're doing something called in media rest.
We're starting in the middle of the story. In our

(00:50):
recent episode, you guys will remember, we talked about how
to resist interrogation, and we spoke a bit about the
process of capturing detailed in different scenarios or situations, and
we also hinted that we had a related episode on
the way. This is that episode. We're going to talk
about US immigrations and customers enforcement or.

Speaker 4 (01:14):
ICE, and guys, we got ice at the airport before
GTA seven is it seven? But the one that we're
waiting on and.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
Before the Skyriom sequel, which is just never gonna happen.

Speaker 4 (01:23):
Ice at the airport. Y'all stoked about that.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
Let's let's uh, I want to get into that, Like,
that's one of the things I really want to talk
about today. Yeah, we don't have to do it now,
maybe I know we're just getting into the the show,
just trying on.

Speaker 3 (01:37):
Yeah, this is breaking news.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Yeah, let's talk about it. Immigration and Customs enforcement agents
are at the Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson Airport right now because
TSA employees are not getting paid and can't eat without assistance,
and which is also being aft.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
With and are naturally calling in, calling in sick or
taking PTO, which you absolutely should. They're being asked to
work for free in a very demanding job. I've got
a friend who works for a local Fox News outlet
and he's one of those on the on the scene reporters,

(02:20):
and he was talking to me earlier about the spot
he did where he went to Heartsfeld quite recently, and
the lines were out the door.

Speaker 4 (02:29):
It's been all over each tiktoks and Instagrams, and you
know it's funny, Ben, you and I were just traveling
out of Hartsfield just to you know, a week before
all this went down, and it was clearly in the
wind or in the air, because I was hearing people
talking to TSA agents saying thank you so much for
coming to work. You know, it was right on the
cusp of the s heading the f and now it

(02:50):
big time has they're saying five and a half hour
wait times. Just like to me, I don't know, I'm
not to sound bougie or anything, but like I just won't.
I'm not gonna do that.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
I just will cancels and TSA and clear will not
help you right now, right maybe sky priority and so.

Speaker 4 (03:06):
Also the old trick of going to the international terminal.

Speaker 5 (03:09):
I got blown up, which I just travel for the
very first time and it worked. And I bet you
do you think that's going to be like an all
time like a like a like a forever thing, or
just just during this these trying times.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
It'll come and go. Uh follow us for more airport tips.
But that thing only works as long as not everyone
does it.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
Yeah, it's insane when you when you travel to the
Atlanta Airport, especially if you were going there, you're not
just stopping by right to connect a flight or something.
You pay close attention to a couple of places online
that tell you about the wait times of T S A.

Speaker 4 (03:47):
I PTL for US is a big run.

Speaker 2 (03:49):
Because it can vary so crazy widely. Even if you
go to the regular you know, the regular areas in
the north or South checkpoints. You can sometimes go through
there in forty minutes or less. Sometimes.

Speaker 4 (04:02):
Lanta Airport is very functional, I would argue, and.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
It gets it gets a tough bill in the press
because it is such a busy airport, one of the
world's busiest, depending on how you measure it. But yeah,
we all religiously check the waight times at the big
three lines. There's more than three, and those can change
on a dime. When I was I had to go

(04:26):
to Upstate New York for some stuff, and I remember
being shocked that the airport was relatively empty, because I
think I hit a sweet spot, you guys, where you'd
like Nola sane. It was in the wind, but ice
had not yet been called in, and people were gun
shy of going to the airport because they were scared

(04:47):
of the lies.

Speaker 4 (04:48):
Isn't that funny, ben that happened? Sometimes does it? There's
almost like a like a like a knock on effect
that can benefit the brave and the bold sally forth
to the airport, but that is no longer the case.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
These viral and we're talking about the larger expansion of
ICE here. Don't worry, folks, we're going somewhere.

Speaker 2 (05:07):
Well. That's the whole point of this is that ICE
is now at the points of entry. Often Atlanta Hartsfield
Jackson is a massive international airport where their flight's coming
in from all kinds of countries all day long and
into the night. So the concept that now there is
a presence of immigration customers and enforcement agents. They're wearing,

(05:29):
you know, and there's pictures of them from Sam Daniel
and Lindsay Tuman over at Fox five where they're in
their outfit that we have all seen images and video
of these ICE agents. They're just hanging out in the airport.
And you know, according to Andre Dickens, the mayor of
this town, these guys are just there for line. They're
doing line stuff, making sure everybody's in the right place

(05:53):
because it is confusing. Sure, it's terrifying for a lot
of people, even just people who you're citizens of the
United States who should not fear anything from ICE. It
is pretty scary to see them running around like that.

Speaker 3 (06:07):
Absolutely especially considering that, unlike the TSA, immigration and Customs
enforcement can in practice just snatch you. Even if you
are a legal resident, they can snatch you. Even if
it's temporary. They can snatch you and take you to
the subject of tonight's show one of a network of

(06:29):
hundreds of facilities that are meant to detain US individuals
on US soil. This is a practice that, despite public
outcry and heated criticism, seems set to expand. So our
question tonight, following up on our earlier episode about interrogation,
is what gives what's happening here? What is the future

(06:52):
of these detention centers? We'll be right back. Here are
the facts, gentlemen, I suggest we start small and then
zoom out cinematically. Let's start local, not to be self centered,
but local for us is Georgia so local to the

(07:12):
state of Georgia. Anyhow, you may not have heard of
it out called Social Circle until recent news. It's a
pretty small place. Have you guys ever been to Social Circle?

Speaker 4 (07:22):
I've seen the exit off the interstate, but I've never
actually been there before. And Ben, I'm glad that this
is where we're starting in terms of our zoomage because
I think we already started there with the airport thing.
While that is global, it is also very local for us.
And because of what Matt was saying about it being
such a portal for international travel, it makes the hell
of a lot of sense that they're targeting this region

(07:42):
for some of these massive, warehouse sized detainment facilities, and
Social Circle is kind of ground zero for some of
that stuff.

Speaker 3 (07:50):
Especially just like building prisons, you especially target rural, economically
depressed places that would welcome an influx of funding and cash.
So Social Circle. It's a small town. It's a day trip.
It's about forty five miles east of Atlanta in southern
or traversus southern Walton and Newton Counties. And when we

(08:13):
say small folks, we mean the population is less than
five thousand people. So this is a pretty small town.
It's called itself Georgia's greatest little town. And again, up
until pretty recently, it was best known for its grand
old homes, century old homes, its charming historic downtown. This

(08:34):
is a place where a lot of films are made
because the environment is so pretty and evocative. The major
employers are going to tend to be things like general
mills or a lot of manufacturing concerns. There was once
a place named PDK or company named PDK that had
a huge warehouse in Social Circle. And that's why Social

(08:56):
Circle is now subject of national maybe international news. It
has become a fulk group for an ongoing, raging debate
over immigration, legal residency, and the role of government. And
that's because they are moving forward with creating what people
are calling a mega prison for immigrants and detainees in

(09:19):
the city of Social Circle.

Speaker 2 (09:21):
It's just insane because Georgia already has several giant detention
facilities specifically for immigration purposes. I'm thinking about like Stewart
Detention Center that we've talked about on this show before,
that we know people who have volunteered down there to
help immigrants as they're being detained, and then families trying

(09:43):
to figure out what the heck's going on legally. And
now we're in a spot where the legal nature of
a lot of the stuff going on, the charges or
why someone's picked up or kept somewhere, they're so murky
and there are so many unknowns. I'm just imagining how
in the heck you need another giant megafacility like this.

(10:04):
How are there enough immigrants being prosecuted by ice to
fill these things?

Speaker 4 (10:09):
Not a chance that there are. And to your point, Matt,
and to something we've said many times, the murkiness is
almost by design, and it gives them the option to
swoop up people that they might just consider like malcontents
or whatever, dissidents perhaps, And maybe I'm being alarmist there,
but it just feels like the murkiness is part is
a feature, not a bug. And there's no way that

(10:30):
there are enough legal immigrants to warrant these massive facilities.

Speaker 3 (10:36):
As a matter of fact, that's such a concern that
our own Senator Warnock recently went on a public visit
to try to learn more about this. So a Senator
finding mission is also asking questions, not just the normal
jade and Johnny Blue jeans of our good state at Georgia.

Speaker 2 (10:56):
So when somebody like a Warnock does something like that
and goes out physically to a facility, do you got
how do you guys take that? P I don't. I
don't want to be cynical.

Speaker 4 (11:09):
I'm sorry, I like Warnock, but I just it feels
like I said I was, you know, sarcastically saying fact
finding mission, because that's the kind of term that's used
by politicians, you know, and their handlers and their pr people.
But I just don't see how it's particularly what's the
opposite of toothless toothsome just I don't know what the
what the recourse will be. It just seems like we're
gonna find out what's going on here, and then what

(11:30):
are you gonna do after that?

Speaker 2 (11:31):
I don't know, That's my big question. I guess, like,
is there anything that you could actually do as someone
in that position if you go out there and you
find out what's going on, right, you talk to some people,
you look at the facilities, and then what I just
want something to happen when when an action like that
is taken.

Speaker 4 (11:48):
That's all I mean. It seems like the badger's out
of the bag, the place is under it's it's it's happening.

Speaker 1 (11:54):
Right.

Speaker 3 (11:54):
On February fourth of this year, the local authorities of
Social Circle announced, yeah, hey, we hear you, but we're
moving forward with this dh ICE Department of Homeland Security,
which ICE is a division DHS and ICE are going
to build this thing that is being called a mega prison.
ICE does not like that term, but it is mega,

(12:17):
even if you'll want to call it the prison. It's
a one million square foot warehouse. It's going to, according
to current estimates, is going to detain something like eight
five hundred people. This would make it one of the largest,
if not the largest, immigration prison in the United States.

Speaker 4 (12:36):
And there's also just no way to house that many
people humanely.

Speaker 3 (12:41):
Based especially the transparency or oversight, neither of which seem
to be in abundance.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
I do wonder when it comes to detaining eighty five
hundred people for any period of time longer than a
week or two, why would you do that if you're
just going to send them out of the country. Doesn't
make any dang sense. To meet We'll talk about it,
we'll talk about.

Speaker 3 (13:05):
Yeah, and we know these people will likely be detained
up to capacity. Remains to be seen, but DHS may
be detaining people at this location as early as April,
so just in a few days from when we record.
And you know, there's no denying go back, going back
to our earlier conversations about prisons opening in depressed areas,

(13:27):
there's no denying that if this facility does get completed
and up and running, it's going to have a huge
impact on the economy of social circle and surrounding areas.
But it will also be just one example of what
we see as an escalating pattern because DHS and ICE
are building a ton of these, a lot of these,

(13:48):
and politicians and activists and yes, even conspiracy theorists are
getting concerned. I mean, if we zoom out, like we're saying,
we scope out away from the multiple detention centers in Georgia,
will see that ICE has what is described by the
American Immigration Council as a vast, fluctuating network of somewhere

(14:12):
between over two hundred to more than four hundred facilities
to detain individuals. There's going to be a significant expansion.
Just by mid January a few months ago, over seventy
three thousand people that we know of were detained by ICE.
That's a massive increase since the beginning of the presidential administration.

Speaker 4 (14:36):
Well, and this is just a degree to which that
agency is being funded next level is unprecedented. Maybe I'm
being hyperbolic and saying that, maybe there's a precedent, but
it sure feels like a lot more funding than anything
I've ever seen short of just like you know, munitions,
war efforts and stuff. I mean, it's basically funding a

(14:57):
paramilitary group.

Speaker 3 (14:58):
Yeah, and arguably shadow prison system, right, because it's we're
talking to that point. We're talking forty five billion dollars
of taxpayer money directly to fund ICE detention activities as
part of some recently passed legislation called the Big Beautiful
Bill Act. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (15:17):
Classic name.

Speaker 3 (15:18):
Really, it's a weird name. It's weird name.

Speaker 4 (15:21):
Sorry, assistance is silly, it is no.

Speaker 3 (15:25):
I'm with you, man. That's all we could do is
you kind of have to shrug it, say.

Speaker 4 (15:28):
Little silly, the dumbest timeline.

Speaker 3 (15:32):
The bb whatever, Big Beautiful loss. This also, as as
we know, and we've discussed this with each other off air,
this is coupled with changes in arrest procedures, and those
changes in arrest procedures the erosion of the usual rights
and the individual would have they've led to get this
guy's a two thousand, four hundred and fifty percent increase

(15:55):
in the number of people with no criminal record who
get hell in iced attention on any given day. So
even if they're only there for three days, even if
they're there for you know, the better part of a year.
That increase is massive. They're arresting more people.

Speaker 2 (16:12):
Yeah, well, and they're using tactics. We talked about that
memo that was sent out and then allegedly not taught
but also taught to every ICE agent about how the
Fourth Amendment doesn't really matter anymore. And you can also
just bust into people's houses. You don't need a warrant.
You can do the whole no knock thing as an
ICE agent.

Speaker 4 (16:28):
Now, Yeah, gratefully with some of the video footage this
emerged and citizen you know, observers and things, it seems
like some of that's being called into question. Don't know
how much change that's going to effect, but it's certainly
part of the conversation.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
Right, Yeah, So you could also argue organizationally that ICE
is creating the demand. It says that it is satisfied. Right,
they're saying we have to build these prisons because we're
we're detaining more people, but they're also in eternally and operationally,

(17:02):
it seems that they're saying we have to arrest more
people because we're building more capability.

Speaker 4 (17:07):
But if the whole thing is quota based, like Steven Miller,
I think is directly responsible for name and a number
and that being a target. It's like sales projections. You know,
it starts to get real, dicey, when you have to
you're held to a certain number and you're gonna get
in trouble if you don't meet it. It's when you know,
places like Wells Fargo's start charging illegal debit fees. I mean,

(17:31):
that's what happens. You end up breaking the law or
what is it? Teaching the test like No Child Left Behind?
All the problems that that cause. Anything quota based always
seems to create real problems.

Speaker 3 (17:41):
Yeah, because quotas don't.

Speaker 4 (17:44):
We don't account the reality.

Speaker 3 (17:46):
They don't account for reality, or if they do, they
do it at best in a retroactive or reactive way.
So they're not they're not doing what people often claim
they are going to do. I mean, we do know
ICE is using the money. Regardless of how you feel
about immigration or the grand debate going on today, ICE

(18:07):
is spending that money. Of course, there's always a fair
amount of grift in any large US government project. Don't
get us started. But ICE is constructing these facilities, They're renovating, expanding,
acquiring existing properties. They're detaining so many more people than
just a few years ago, and we logically have to

(18:28):
keep asking what gives. So people who support this are saying,
this is our administration making good on their longtime campaign
promise to combat illegal immigration, and they've also inherently tied
this to the idea of drug trafficking, human trafficking, gang activity,

(18:49):
and crime. But no surprise, the critics don't agree with
the supporters. They think there's something stinky in this Denmark cheese.

Speaker 4 (19:00):
And you're making money on building prisons. You gotta figure
out a way to fill those prisons or make new
ones that have an excuse to be filled.

Speaker 2 (19:10):
Well said, can we talk a little bit more about
these the things that are being turned into detention centers
Spirit Halloween?

Speaker 4 (19:18):
They are gonna be no more before you.

Speaker 3 (19:19):
Know, or detention centers will start to move around with
the agility of Spirit Halloween, which is even more disturbing.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
Well, just in this case, it's companies. I'm going to
call one of these companies out and it's it's the
one that I know from the neck of the woods
where I'm living right now, called Idi Logistics. And what
they do is they buy these giant lots of land,
tons of acres and they flatten that land and then
they build a huge warehouse facility that can it's multipurpose,

(19:52):
it's multi use. You could have one hundred different companies
working in there using it as a warehouse, or you
can have one company in there, or it could be
a data center, or it could be a detention center.
There's one right down near me that is another one
of these million square foot facilities. And in this case
Idei Logistics, it doesn't look like they're claiming it anymore,

(20:15):
or they're doing a bunch of new construction on it
after they just built it and they shut it down
and they're rebuilding it. But as all of this is
happening in the news and we're watching what's going on
in social circle and across at least Georgia, when you
see stuff like that, it just makes you realize there's
so much money in constructing huge buildings like this to
have for whatever you might need them for. And it

(20:37):
is super creepy that it's either going to be a
data center or a detention center, both of which I
feel like we should be protesting in front of.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
I don't know, and luckily people are protesting because there
are a lot of critics for this. In some of
these groups of critics would not ordinarily band together, they
would not ordinarily hang out with each other. They're arguing
that this is not what was This was not what
people were promised. They were looking for a more responsible

(21:09):
immigration policy. The monkey's paw or the finger on the
monkey's paw curled, and now there's a woeful violation of
human rights and US law. And you don't have to
look far for cases of ice misconduct. You know, we're
talking about actual citizens being arrested, detained, being abused. There's
proven abuse on the street or in lock up up

(21:31):
to and including the murder of people of protesters as
well as people who didn't wake up that day to protest,
but try to intervene in and arrest.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
This is.

Speaker 3 (21:43):
Happening now, and the mainstream objection to the practice is
pretty simple. They're saying, what you're doing seems illegal, and
gosh darn it, it seems un American. I think that's
something we can agree with. But the more evil, I think, except.

Speaker 4 (22:03):
For this one, that's what we're left with. Yeah, yeah,
I mean really, I'm sorry. You got your corrections, Corporations
of Americas, You got your course, of course they did.
That was one that I encountered back when I was
a reporter for public radio and they were doing something
very similar to what they're doing today, which is looking
at distressed communities. In those days, it was ones that

(22:25):
had suffered from the housing collapse, places that specialized in
manufacturing of industrial products that were used for home manufacturing,
and they literally swooped into these communities put out these bids.
I went to like a town hall and a school
gym where just the local people who had no recourse
for work showed up and the hopes they might swoop
up one of these jobs, and CCA ended up going

(22:45):
with somewhere else, because you know, they did whatever the
highest bidder was. You look at the website for cour
Civic Better the Public Good. Their tagline is providing quality
corrections and detention services, residential re entry centers, and criminal
justice real estate solutions that better the public good.

Speaker 3 (23:04):
Core Civic, by the way, is the name I was
alluding to. That's the name change, similar to blackwater. Just
to keep the heat off. It's a tail as old
as time. In post World War two America, the factories die,
a new guy comes into town, just like in something
wicked this way comes by Ray Bradberry and they say,
will build a new factory, will save your town. Our

(23:27):
product is obscenity, and people like the monorail episode of
The Simpsons. Just so and I'm done. Just so.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
You also had the Geo Group, which has emerged at
the end of last year.

Speaker 4 (23:39):
Is all these largest sounding places.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
Yeah, and they date back to nineteen eighty seven. Let's
get into those.

Speaker 2 (23:45):
Guys, Argueah, they're one of the largest private corrections groups
that are out there. And you've got other people, other
companies like Global Global Crossings I think is the at
least the name Global x is what they're called.

Speaker 4 (24:00):
But just that sounds nice.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
It's a crosswords crossroads all the worlds. You'll get to it.
But Geo Group used to be wacken Hut, which is
a more fun name. Nice.

Speaker 2 (24:11):
But just since twenty fourteen, you know, they've been operating
some of the biggest places that are just they're policing
migrants within facilities and then they're sending them off on
these private flights. And there's so much money to be
made through government contracts all along the way. And I
think that's the creepiest part. I think through all of this. Yeah,

(24:33):
it's our tax dollars that are paying for all this.

Speaker 3 (24:36):
Yeah, I can agree. That's definitely a creepier, creepy part,
but I advanced stuff. I advance a creepier part because
past the mainstream criticism this is illegal, this is un American.
The criticism goes deeper because we see looming shadows of
those past incarceration programs. We see the resurgence of old

(24:57):
conspiracy theories that were some of them were weird enough
considered quote unquote right wing stories of FEMA camps, sketchy
training operations like Jade hellm. I mean, it's a frightening time.
There's no way to ignore it. ICE and DHS are
building these facilities. Hundreds are up and running already. More
are going to be built in the next few months

(25:18):
after this podcast publishes. To what ends though, that's the question,
what is the future of all these detention centers? Are
they really just being built to detain what Uncle Sam
deems to be illegal immigrants? We think there's more to the.

Speaker 2 (25:34):
Story, Yes we do.

Speaker 3 (25:37):
We'll be back afterword from our sponsors. Here's where it
gets crazy. We say it often to understand the future.
We have to understand the past. So it's fair to
say that when we were younger entities, a lot of
Americans didn't like to talk about the history of these

(25:59):
con traversial detainment practices. We're not just what bracket chattel
slavery as a different, unclean sin. The interment of innocent
Japanese Americans during World War Two is probably the best
known case of something like this.

Speaker 4 (26:17):
I didn't realize this, but I was recently in Canada
and Vancouver, and I went to this museum and there
was this incredible exhibit from this Canadian Japanese Canadian photojournalist
who was swept up in detainment camps in Canada. That
happened there too, And I had no idea, and that really,
you know, informed this individual's you know, thirst for liberty

(26:40):
and they're deciding to go into photojournalism, and weirdly, being
in Vancouver, a very unfamiliar place, very far from here
in Atlanta, a lot of his photographs were from the
civil rights movement here in Atlanta. So I just thought
that was something that maybe some people didn't know either,
because I certainly did.

Speaker 3 (26:56):
Do check it out. If you if you find yourself
in that neck of the global woods because this does
run across countries, these kinds of tactics and practices. We
also have to remember the massive forced relocation of native
peoples during and after the westward expansion or the first
US immigration inspectors and the first official process of deportation

(27:21):
back in the early nineteen hundreds with the Chinese Exclusion Act.
The United States has flirted with stuff like this for
a long time, but the modern the evolution of modern corporations,
and the evolution of privatization and surveillance technology really have

(27:41):
created this massive beast that we call the modern detention center.
It dates back to the nineteen eighties, you know, when
there was the mass deportation of refugees from Haiti and Cuba.
And that occurs right and step in the nineteen eighties, right,
that occurs with the private prison corporations. They emerge around

(28:05):
that same time. We've mentioned a couple of these corrections.
Corporation of America now cor Civic, as you said, Noel,
it was created in nineteen eighty three. That same year
it got its first federal contract for detention facility in Texas.
Here's what we mean by makeshift. Before they completed building

(28:26):
out this facility. They started detaining people at a hotel
that they owned, and then they shipped them to the
Houston Contract detention facility.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
The one good thing about some of that just at
least they're not using these detainees for free labor the
way they do in the regular prisons here in this country.

Speaker 3 (28:49):
Right.

Speaker 4 (28:50):
Certainly, we've talked a lot about that. I mean, I
forget that there's a documentary and there's an amendment that
basically converted prison in in incarceration in prisons to an
extension of slavery. And I'm always terrible with numbers, and
I forget what the name of that dog is.

Speaker 3 (29:04):
Yeah, it's after the shortly after emancipation, like thirteenth and fourteen.

Speaker 4 (29:09):
That's exactly right. And you know, there's no question about that,
and we know that that's a thing that is very,
very real and it continues today.

Speaker 3 (29:16):
And continues today in a town near you. Do check
out our earlier conversations with Mike Render aka Killer Mike.
We talked about that a little bit. We also have
an episode on private prisons, and we mentioned some of
these names in those previous episodes. Think of GEO Group,
which was formerly the Wackenhut Corporation as kind of the

(29:38):
Pepsi to the Coca Cola of Cca. This company comes
out in nineteen eighty four, and then I think three
years after that, they get their own first federal contract
in nineteen eighty seven, and they're contracted to build a
detention facility in Aurora, Colorado, also for immigrants.

Speaker 2 (30:00):
Yeah, and Geogroup currently runs the Big Boy deportation facility
that The Guardian was talking about at the end of
last year. The Alexandria Staging Facility is what it's known
as where it was the most number of detainees being
held and then flown out of the United States in
the United States.

Speaker 4 (30:19):
Is that the one where there are some journalists that
were creeping around on the periphery and kind of heard
screams coming from inside. I want there a couple of those. Unfortunately,
it's true, and we'll get to some of that. I
just have to maybe mention just go ahead and drop it.
I mean, I've heard talk of people that have been
inside some of these places and overhearing guards taking bets
on who is going to take their own.

Speaker 3 (30:38):
Life, people caught in cages like animals, sexual abuse allegations,
and improven instances. Definitely physical emotional abuse, deprivation of food
or access to medical care, the stuff that's happening in
the nineteen eighties, with the evolution of the situation we

(30:59):
find ourselves in now, it didn't start with ICE. I
think a lot of us in the crowd tonight may
be surprised to realize that ICE is not created until
two thousand and three. It's a division of the Department
of Homeland Security, created in the wake of the nine
to eleven attacks. So ICE is just a little bit

(31:20):
more than ten years old, but it's already made a
huge impact on the nation. I mean, it's gota. This
network is so complicated because not all of those two
hundred to four hundred facilities are openly owned and operated
by ICE, or wholly owned and operated. I should say
it's a fluctuating network. A lot of private contractors, tense cities,

(31:45):
makeshift facilities, refurbished warehouses like we mentioned. But then they'll
also take existing local jails or prisons or other pieces
of public infrastructure and fold it into ICE operations. This
is a big business and an unclean one, just apolitically,
it's not how the US is supposed to behave. I mean,

(32:06):
just February second, twenty twenty six, there were at least
seventy thousand, seven hundred and sixty six individuals in detention,
and odds are, given the lack of transparency, we're not
going to know what ultimately happens to all of.

Speaker 4 (32:23):
Them, no, because as we mentioned earlier, I mean, just
getting in that system, being absorbed into that system, whether
you're guilty or not, can lead to just an in
immeasurable amount of red tape. And it's not like you
are once you're in. You're kind of off the radar
in a lot of ways and sort of at the

(32:43):
mercy of this bureaucracy, which, as we know my design
works incredibly slowly and inefficient.

Speaker 3 (32:50):
And ninety one percent of let me get our source
for this, according to Detention Watched Network, which is a
pretty good source, although you you can kind of tell
they're not ICE fans. According to the source, ninety one
percent of those almost seventy one thousand people end up
being detained for all or part of their process in

(33:13):
privately owned facilities. So if you are a private contractor,
this is hand over fist money, you know what I mean.
This isn't I'm going to send my kids to college money.
This is I'm going to build a wing of a
library and buy my kid's way into college money. Great.

Speaker 4 (33:28):
No, no, it's it's that's right on the money and
money being the operative word. At present, there have been
minimum thirty five proven deaths in ice custody under the
current administration, and legal proceedings are ongoing. As a family,
members and the public and some politicians push for more
transparency and accountability. But like we said, I mean, it's

(33:49):
one of those things where it's like better to ask
for forgiveness than permission or not even forgiveness. It's just
we're just going to do what we want to do
and then sort it out later. And the process we're
just not set up to sort it out later, y'all.
I'm sorry.

Speaker 3 (34:04):
We're also it's a we know the judge situation, you
know what I mean, Oh, I loved your paper for
the Heritage Foundation. Let's get rid of this pesky case.

Speaker 4 (34:14):
Yeah, not to mention, you know, the maligning of certain
judges that are maybe just pushing for real justice and
liberty as activist judges, and just all of the jargon
that's thrown around and the rhetoric that's demonizing the press
and any folks that are trying to affect change in
a positive way as being agitators, rabble rousers, you know,

(34:34):
bad element all.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
That kind of stuff. We're just being boring. Judges are
supposed to be. I love a wacky judge, you know
what I mean. I love a ruling delivered in rhyme.
There's some bankers, but they're supposed to be boring. So
riddle me this, guys, how did it become How did
just following the rules in a very dry, boring manner

(34:57):
and enforcing those rules are attempted to How did that
transform into being called an activist judge. I'm not buying it.
I'm not buying it even on sale.

Speaker 4 (35:08):
It's one of those things where you accuse the other
of that which you yourself are guilty of. Because the
way you described it, Ben, I think is right on.
Whereas you're talking about folks that are just trying to
apply the letter of the law, and the judges that
are giving a rubber stamp to a lot of this stuff,
they are politically motivated. That's activist judge, right.

Speaker 3 (35:27):
If you ask me, maybe one day, one day sooner
than later. We'll have an update on Scotus because I'm
sure we've been keeping an eye on those creepy ring grades.

Speaker 4 (35:39):
We'll see them all in the Hague, man, I was
a crossword clue today or a crossword answer today on
the Mini No spoilers.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
Okay, awesome, And we do have a standing policy in
this nation about invading the Hague if anybody ever gets
in trouble internationally. It's very it's very non Tenable is saying,
look to our earlier point. I mentioned this previous episodes,
and I think we talked about it with Gandhi too
on Sauce on the side. Yeah, Ice is saying, look,

(36:10):
we have a big network, and we are expanding this network,
and we're doing it to quote, hold non citizens while
they await immigration court hearings or deportation. And so it
also takes pains as an organization to say, hey, these
facilities are civil detainment. This is not a criminal detainment thing.

(36:31):
We are not a prison. But still, guys, they operate
so much like prisons in practice. You know, people can
be held a few days to over a year, and
some people can end up being deported to a third
party country. That made a bilateral agreement with the US
that means you can be deported to a country that

(36:53):
is not, you know, like a US territory, like wherever
we go. It's not something that's under the control of
the US, but it's all so not your country of origin. Right.
You've probably heard the horror stories here, friends and neighbors,
people getting abandoned in places where they have no connections,
no support, no job prospects, nothing like that. They may

(37:13):
not even speak the language of the place they dropped
off at.

Speaker 4 (37:17):
That was a big issue too. There was some serious
human rights violations in terms of folks being sent to
El Salvador, and also this sense of a cozy relationship
between the administration and that government and like, yeah, we're
sending our worst people there or whatever.

Speaker 3 (37:32):
This attitude and those prisons. I appreciate you mentioning those
in particular, the Salvadoran prisons are notorious for being black boxes.
People disappear. So there are families who are looking for
a loved one that friends and family, but families who
are looking for a loved one who got deported like
you're describing, got incarcerated in one of these prisons and

(37:55):
then disappeared. The government of El Salvador is not giving
them any updates, any news about what happened. The trail
goes cool.

Speaker 2 (38:05):
That's one of the hardest things when you've got a
family member going through this whole process. It's just not
knowing what the hell is going on, and then trying
to get in touch with somebody there who will talk
to you, and especially if you don't speak English as
a family member, and trying to get a translator through
their official Byzantine system, it's near impossible. We'll talk at

(38:26):
the end why some of the advocacy groups that you
can reach out to if you do need help, But
it just becomes it's already heartbreaking, and you could be
so angry that this is going on. I'm talking specifically
about the experience of a family member, not the human
being going through detention, which is a whole other thing,

(38:49):
but just the confusion that it causes for an individual
and for a family. It is just guys.

Speaker 4 (38:58):
Can you imagine being a hell in one of these
places for a year and then it being chalked up
to a clerical error or just processing time. Can you
imagine losing a year of your life to that and
you never were in the wrong in the first place.
I mean, we know that that's happening. We know that
that's happening.

Speaker 2 (39:15):
Can you imagine just your year, it's everybody's around this year.

Speaker 3 (39:19):
That's a good point. Can you imagine I'll take that
one further. Being a child, right, and you were planning
to go to school next year, you're excited about sixth
or fourth grade or what have you. Kids that young
are being detained in these facilities, and in some cases
they're getting deported with relatives and family members to a

(39:40):
country that they have never visited. They might not speak
the language, they're just related to people who had some
time there, and that can arguably get close to collective punishment.
I mean, I guess we could also admit as a
group that we may be a bit bubbled on this
because we're close to it and we've been monitoring the situations.
So if you're like us and you've been keeping an

(40:01):
eye on these developments where you know people who have
been affected by this, we'll give you resources at the
end of the show. And we also want to admit
that a lot of this might be old news, but
it's crucial to remember not everyone is aware of the
scope here, just the sheer size of what's happening, nor
the groundwork being laid for expansion. And I'll say it

(40:23):
a possible pivot in the mission. You know, just like
how private prisons went from private prisons to building immigration centers.
I think what we're calling detention facilities now, especially with
some of the software coming into play, I think they're
not just going to be for immigrants in the future.
And that's that's a big concern. Yeah, that's a question

(40:47):
we've had for a while. Look, we know it sounds crazy,
but we do believe we can build a pretty solid
case here for something to think about. If the goal
is to identify and deport people, meaning to move them
out of the unit, and it states, why is Uncle
Sam spending billions and billions of taxpayer dollars on creating
essentially a second prison system for the express purpose of

(41:11):
keeping people in. We want them out where we're keeping
them in. It's a it's a bag of badgers, a
bag of dark, unclean badgers. And that leads us to
the next big question, what is the future?

Speaker 4 (41:24):
Yeah, especially with terms like domestic terrorism being thrown around
so loosely. Uh, it just does feel like the future
of this kind of thing is just going to broaden,
you know, as the language broadens and as the oversights.
What's the opposite of broadens narrows.

Speaker 3 (41:42):
I like the way you put that. Yeah, mission creep.
We're going to creep into a word from our sponsors,
and then we'll be back with the future of detention centers.
We've returned obviously, folks. As you can tell, this is
something that bothers me. I think it bothers all of us.

(42:03):
I think it should bother everybody. But it's not bothering ICE.
ICE is projected growth planned is to say the least ambitious.
It's hoping to house over one hundred thousand individuals in
twenty twenty six. They want to do rapid processing three

(42:23):
to seven days and then you get deported or maybe
you get let go. And they also want to focus
on long term detention, which they call under sixty days,
and on the way they want to build larger centers
that could hold up to ten thousand people a piece.

Speaker 4 (42:40):
Can I ask, guys, how's that fortification of the border gone.
You don't hear a lot of talk about like tightening
up the borders anymore. It seems a whole lot more
based on, you know, expanding internal operations to quote unquote
get people out, whereas so much of the campaign talk
was about building the wall and having Mexico pay for

(43:02):
it and all this, that and the other. I just
don't see, and maybe it's happening behind the scenes, but
it seems like the kind of thing they don't want
to talk about. I just don't see as much of
a focus on that at all anymore, which seems like
kind of missing the point a little bit, especially since
we know that a lot of the stats they're throwing
around are highly misleading, like we're not in some sort
of immigrants overload situation in the way that is presented.

Speaker 3 (43:24):
Also a country that touts itself being founded on immigration.
Just to be clear about that part, Nol, I would
I would say that you're asking an excellent question because
this is in work focus. It also has a couple
of things that Bob Ross might sartastically call a happy accident.

(43:48):
The fact that building up Ice in this way is
essentially building an army. It's building a small army domestically.

Speaker 4 (43:54):
And why would they have such a future expansion plan.
Isn't this the kind of organizations that's created in order
to be dissolved once the mission is accomplished. Or aren't
there a finite amount of illegal immigrants in this country?
And then once they sort all that out, aren't they good?

Speaker 3 (44:10):
Right? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (44:12):
The implication, of course, is that that's not what they're for.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
Well yeah, or are we seeing my favorite Achilles heel
of fascism, which is that it always demands an other,
and when you deplete the first other, you just find
a new one. And it's pretty easy to do that.
So eventually, if you live in the United States and
logically this trend continues, at some point, you will become
the other somehow. It doesn't matter. That's just how the

(44:39):
mechanics of that system of governance work. I mean, if
you work for ICE, this is job security. If we
were in private prison contracting and not in podcasting, we
would be making so much money, you guys, we would.

Speaker 4 (44:55):
I'm good. I wouldn't see the podcast the podcaster's life
for me.

Speaker 3 (44:59):
Yeah, I I'd prefer to go to bed with a
clean conscience, you know, every sunrise. But this feels like
an existential threat and there is. I don't know if
it's good news yet. But there is a changing of
the tide. PBS had a recent poll that seems to
indicate about half of Americans support abolishing ICE entirely and

(45:24):
trying a new strategy toward immigration residency. But it looks
like about six out of ten Americans disapprove of ICE's performance,
even if they don't want to abolish it. They're saying, look,
this has gone way too far.

Speaker 4 (45:41):
Mark Wayne Mullins, got you sorted and let that guy
figure it out.

Speaker 3 (45:44):
Who's Mark WAYN Mullins.

Speaker 4 (45:46):
He's the guy that's replacing christin home as it was
like a former MMA fighter who likes to pick fights
in the Senate hearings and is still a thing.

Speaker 2 (45:59):
Yeah, it's just saying, boil you're you're a US senator.
Sit down, stop stop trying to have fights inside the chambers.

Speaker 4 (46:08):
No fighting in the war room.

Speaker 3 (46:11):
No fight in the war room. Yes, I mean we
also we have to note to get in front of
the emails conspiracy iHeartRadio dot com. We got to note
that other administrations obviously supported ICE activities.

Speaker 4 (46:24):
This didn't come from real land, right, We're not.

Speaker 2 (46:27):
Oh no, We've been tracking all kinds of detention stuff
of immigrants since this show began back in twenty ten,
twenty twenty and nine. We were talking about it back then,
and we let's just say, we had some folks in
our lives who were attempting to fight against it way
back then.

Speaker 3 (46:46):
Yeah. I mean, if this isn't personal to you now,
my fellow Americans, then it if the pattern continues, it
will be personal to you soon, by which mean affect
you or somebody that you know. This massive expansion is
also it's anomalousts. Okay, I'm putting it coldly, but here's

(47:09):
what I mean when I say it's anomalous. Every US
administration throughout all of US history has made unpopular decisions,
and historically the will of the public. When you get
enough people together having a problem with it, the will
of the public results in the eventual reversal of these policies, because,

(47:29):
after all, politicians like to get re elected, right well,
I have to see there. So it seems odd that
these programs not only continued despite this slight majority disapproval,
but they're also expanding even though the American public doesn't
want it. Why is the administration risking so much good

(47:51):
will on this, especially considering that people who for a
long time were staunchly loyal supporters of the ADMIN. They're
becoming fed up with this program because it's happening. It's
very expensive, like we said earlier, not to sound like
cheap skates, but it's forty five billion dollars. It's happening
on the heels of Maduro's kidnapping, the conflict in Iran,

(48:13):
and the Epstein files.

Speaker 2 (48:15):
S dah, don't talk about those. I'm so sick and
tired of hearing about those files.

Speaker 3 (48:21):
You're an obnoxious woman. You're an obnoxious woman, and you
should smile more.

Speaker 2 (48:27):
It's just for my own sanity. Let's just pivot away
for saying we'll come right back. Did you guys see
that the very first episode of SNL UK I did?

Speaker 3 (48:39):
I liked it? I did? I liked it. I like
I thought it was a master Masters stroke to have
Tina Fey host.

Speaker 2 (48:44):
Oh, it was great, Tina fans fantastic. But that cold
open with Starmer and getting to see the SNL treatment
but with the UK's perspective, that was fascinating and I
cannot wait to watch more of that, and I really
hope that expands further something about something about through the
SNL lens. It really does give you a some kind

(49:07):
of deeper picture. For me when I'm getting to laugh
at it, you know, something horrifying like choosing whether or
not to go to war with alongside the United States
as the UK.

Speaker 3 (49:19):
The phone calls got Yeah, something.

Speaker 2 (49:22):
As simple as that. Being able to look at it
through a comedic lens, I think really does change it,
at least personally.

Speaker 3 (49:28):
I hope they franchised the heck out of it. Where
is my SNL Japan? Where's I think Australia be next?
Would be cool to see something from Latin America or
from an authoritarian country SNL North Korea is now the time.

Speaker 2 (49:42):
Ah, if only our Venezuelan leader still had his show
and he's just.

Speaker 4 (49:49):
I just want to see more propaganda comedy.

Speaker 3 (49:52):
Yeah, I got that. I've got some one thing we have.

Speaker 4 (49:56):
Left, y'all.

Speaker 3 (49:57):
I have some bootleg North Korean DVD if you want
to watch.

Speaker 2 (50:00):
Them, I'm interested.

Speaker 4 (50:03):
They're stand up as a hoot.

Speaker 3 (50:08):
It is a crime. So we have to we have to.
We have to attempt to explain this anomaly, right though. Uh,
with the with the rise of detention centers, despite the
fact that most of the public seems not to dig it.
When we answer that question, when we say, well, why
are they pushing so hard? Why are they gambling so hard?

(50:30):
We run into multiple conspiracy theories, and some range from
completely out there to others that you can already tell folks. Uh,
the four of us find distressingly plausible. Can we talk
a little bit about Ice and AI and you guys
saw the news about the d O D and pallanteer I.

Speaker 4 (50:46):
Mean pre crime. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's fun, that's fun stuff.

Speaker 2 (50:55):
They're actively surveilling people, they're they're doing and we know,
we know the governments across the world are actively surveilling
their own people. We know that's a thing, and they've
done been doing that.

Speaker 4 (51:06):
Let's not like get ourselves, you know. We know about
the metadata, which seemed so out extreme at the time.
Remember how outraged everyone was with the metadata and the
I'm sorry the NSA stuff. And now it's just leap years,
light years beyond.

Speaker 2 (51:23):
That with Stellar Wind and all that we were. I
think the majority of people were confused because there was
all kinds of different information coming out. We were only
getting information from a couple of whistleblowers every year or so,
and then those people were being accused of terrible crimes
for leaking classified materials.

Speaker 3 (51:41):
Or running off to Russian going dark.

Speaker 2 (51:43):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (51:44):
So it didn't help, not at all.

Speaker 2 (51:46):
But we do know what's happening. We've been talking about pallenteer.
Are we saying pallenteers getting involved?

Speaker 3 (51:51):
Pallaunteer. I see as ICY as being related because right
now ICE has we believe ICE has more than one
hundred and eighty thousand something people under what it calls
active surveillance, and it's rapidly accelerating AI and advanced tech

(52:13):
to track and detain individuals. This does look Your residency
status doesn't matter when this kind of stuff comes into play,
because it hoovers up all publicly available records and then
all other databases that it can reasonably acquire. So it
might get your credit card and financial activity from a

(52:34):
data broker. Combine that with your property records, right your
driver's license, your ID card records, your activities on social media,
and for ICE employees this is a huge time saver.
But for the average American, this is a violation of
your privacy. You do not have a way to opt out.
This is happening. This is happening. In step with the

(52:56):
Department of Defense's announcement that they must have really dug
Pete's antichrist ted talks because they are adopting Palanteer as
the core US military system. So eventually these things, especially
when we talked about domestic terrorism, these things are going
to start to convert Talenteers.

Speaker 4 (53:17):
Skynet guys, that.

Speaker 3 (53:19):
Is our skin at Balenteer is not as good as Skyet.

Speaker 4 (53:24):
It's technology that gets integrated into everything and then it
gets close enough to the launch keys that all of
a sudden it decides to nuke the world.

Speaker 2 (53:34):
All okay, So if there's kin of who's our Cyberdyne.

Speaker 4 (53:37):
I forget what where Cyberdne figures into the plot of
the Terminator.

Speaker 2 (53:42):
Isn't that RoboCop? Maybe I'm wrong, I could have.

Speaker 4 (53:44):
Swe is also a terminator. I just I don't know.
I think Cyberdyne makes the robots and Skye was the
AI that you know essentially went sentient. Okay, and for
your judgment.

Speaker 3 (53:57):
Day and there is now a real Iberdine. It's Japanese
robotics company. Yeah, they make wearable cyborg technology ever since
two thousand and four. Check them out. Why do you
buy Illumination Global Unlimited.

Speaker 4 (54:13):
Turnof the Cybridine systems created Skynett. So skynett is a
technology the Cyberdyne systems create in addition to the hardware
you know of the T eight hundreds and the you
know T one thousands.

Speaker 3 (54:24):
Illumination Global Unlimited. So maybe the one of the conspiratorial
concerns people would say, possible concerns is this ICE is
building a system through this software that can be used
for immigration. Now that is true, that's why they're saying
they're building it, and they are building it. But because

(54:44):
of the nature of these systems, it can easily shift
to a different type of surveillance at the drop of
a hat, or say bad polling numbers leading up to
the mid term elections.

Speaker 2 (54:56):
Wait a second, are we saying that perhaps they could
look at your voting record, which is a thing unless
you think it's we're all just walking in and voting
and nobody knows what we vote, who we voted for.
When it's a super ballot, it's a superblog.

Speaker 3 (55:14):
I'm just proud to say that I vote Corey Oliver
for Fulton County Comptroller every time I get a chance.

Speaker 4 (55:20):
Well, the guys, a national.

Speaker 2 (55:23):
Yeah, But I'm just saying that is a thing that
exists out there, and it's not just your vote right at.

Speaker 4 (55:30):
A point that can follow you, no question, Oh yeah,
and predict your behavior. It's your donations, It's your interactions
with various political organizations, your registrations, your affiliations, your most.

Speaker 3 (55:44):
Importantly, your ability or likelihood of voting in a swing
state or a swing district. That is that adds up
to the idea that detention centers might be for something else.
This is one of the quote unquote more out there
things that I personally one hundred percent believe because I

(56:04):
went a little too deep into the rabbit hole. I'm
the first to admit it. Several years back, when the
old FEMA camp conspiracies would keep popping up in the news,
especially in the lead up to or in the wake
of a natural disaster, we remember this one, right, This
old school stuff they don't want you to know.

Speaker 4 (56:20):
Right, repurposing of FEMA camps as makeshift pop up detention centers, right.

Speaker 3 (56:25):
Yeah. The idea that they were saying, oh, we're building
this for a disaster relief in case a hurricane comes along,
but really we're building it so that if there is
widespread civil unrest, we can declare martial law and detain
dissidence protesters anybody else want to target easily and definitely

(56:46):
without legal protection. So the ICE network, this gark Anteuan
thing obviously births a gritty reboot of this theory.

Speaker 4 (56:56):
It just feels so shortsighted to me when people, you know,
could criticize this kind of thinking as being alarmist, or
this could never happen here. This has happened, you know
we I mean maybe not here, but I mean his
history is riddled, as the opening to our show says,
with this kind of thing, and we are seeing the

(57:16):
groundwork being laid for it, and it would be foolish
not to pay attention to the evidence of our eyes
and ears.

Speaker 2 (57:23):
You just have to find yourself on the wrong side
of a line that gets drawn while you're standing there, right,
and then some dude rocks along and just draws a
line right between your legs. Really, what wait, what's that? Oh? Oh,
that's that's see. Japanese citizens are on this side over here,
and then we Americans are over here, and ooh geez,

(57:45):
you looks like you found yourself on that side. Come
with us or you've.

Speaker 4 (57:49):
Been kicking it with too many people that we don't
like shor ye are on their side of the line.

Speaker 3 (57:53):
I would say, yeah, and that happened with people who
just went to like vegan potlucks during cointelpro But I
would say another danger that often gets missed is that
the laws can be changed retroactively. So maybe one day
past people walk up to your door and say, you know,
like hey, Dylan Ben, were you guys at a protest

(58:14):
in twenty twenty one, And we say, yeah, it was legal,
and they say, come with us. It's no longer legal
for you to have done that. That can happen, Yeah,
for sure. Yeah, your legal activities can become retroactively considered crimes.

Speaker 2 (58:31):
Yeah, let's say you're really angry about, oh, I don't know,
something crazy like a push for a third term for
a US president, something weird and crazy and outlandish like that.
That would never happen, but let's just use it as
an example. Let's say you get really mad about that
in an attempt to basically force the entire country to
accept a third term for US president. That would be

(58:52):
you know, against the constitution. There'd probably be a lot
of people that are upset about something like that. A
lot of people that would be angry and try and
stop something like that from happening where it.

Speaker 4 (59:03):
To happen inside and you are on the wrong side
of history.

Speaker 3 (59:08):
And maybe you know the advantage here, I would say
in the boardroom, right, is that you don't have to
arrest all of those people. Just maybe get one hundred
thousand something set an example, cut off the head.

Speaker 2 (59:21):
Get it on camera nice and four K like you.

Speaker 3 (59:24):
Know, broadcast it as breaking news. That that can quell
a rebellion to a point. But what if the purpose
of this physical network can be pivoted, right, That's what
we're saying, just as easily as this AI software provably can.
What if something like this is used to influence the

(59:45):
outcome of upcoming elections midterms and then later presidential elections.
What if it's used when some other event prevents the
actual mid terms from occurring. That's crazy. And if that
ever comes to pass, right, that seemingly alarmist situation comes
to pass, please know it's not normal. Even during the

(01:00:08):
US Civil War, when the US was two different countries
that hated each other, they still had midterm elections. Are
we cooked you guys, we're cooking.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
Okay, that oil is hot right now.

Speaker 3 (01:00:22):
Flick the water. See if it sputters, we.

Speaker 2 (01:00:25):
Should probably turn it down. I think maybe.

Speaker 3 (01:00:27):
Yeah, right, I mean, but one thing is for sure,
regardless if you think we're being alarmist, I don't think
we are. One thing is for sure. After spending all
this money, Uncle Sam is highly unlikely just to close
the circus and tear all this stuff down. He starts, halloweens. Yeah,
it's now a sunk cost. I mean, now you have

(01:00:50):
the thing, so you're going to find some way to
use it, even if public opinion shifts the current pattern.
There's got to give a shout out as we're closing
up to this awesome MPR article that came out just
this morning on March twenty third. It's a phenomenal infographic
of ICE's expanding footprint across the United States or contiguous

(01:01:13):
at least, along with a map of communities that are protesting,
with the size of each facility and the size of
the protest.

Speaker 4 (01:01:22):
Oh, you mean the radical liberals at NPR.

Speaker 2 (01:01:24):
Yeah, who are no longer funded.

Speaker 1 (01:01:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:01:28):
I caused this infographic into question pretty hard, guys.

Speaker 3 (01:01:33):
Yeah, I can't see the colors. But if this is
red that I'm gonna call it their commies.

Speaker 2 (01:01:39):
It's it's just color. Double down on your shout out, Ben.
I'm seeing a lot of orange on inpr article.

Speaker 4 (01:01:46):
It's sort of like his map, right, isn't that what
we're looking at?

Speaker 3 (01:01:49):
Yeah? With the size representative of the scale.

Speaker 4 (01:01:52):
There are hues as well because they're layered, so there's
a darker orange and then a lighter orange, and then
sort of an translucent kind of orange.

Speaker 2 (01:02:00):
Did you call it the full title of that where
people can find it, Ben, Yeah, the full title.

Speaker 3 (01:02:05):
This is by Eric Westervelt, a new show Mather and
Brent Jones. It is mapping ices expanding footprint and the
communities fighting back.

Speaker 2 (01:02:13):
This phenomenal stuff. You know, if we can trust the data.

Speaker 3 (01:02:19):
I'm just joking, well, I would say, folks, Yeah, do
pull this up and play play a quick game just
so you can see the pattern we're talking about. You'll
have two tabs right at top of the map. Click
on the one that says twenty twenty four, and then
click on the one that says twenty twenty five and
see the difference.

Speaker 2 (01:02:37):
That's a lot more orange color. As we're right bro.

Speaker 4 (01:02:44):
As we're wrapping up, guys, I just want to name
drop the artist that I was referring to at the
top of the show, the Japanese Canadian photo journalist. His
name is Tamiol Wakayama, and the name of the show
is Enemy Alien And let me tell you it is.
It is ninety percent images of people, and it really

(01:03:04):
takes you inside of what it means to be othered
and the civil rights stuff. It is shocking how similar
some of the language from people who opposed civil rights
is to the kinds of things that we're hearing today
around immigration.

Speaker 3 (01:03:21):
Yeah, and I'll say it because we're all last week
tonight fanboys. Not too too long ago, John Oliver did
a phenomenal piece on Oh he's been knocked out of
the park these days, him and his writers, but he
had do you guys see his piece on the Vice president.
Peter Thial gets a shout out.

Speaker 4 (01:03:40):
I haven't seen it yet, but I'm gonna call you
take a little break, because yeah, least I've had a
little behind on mine.

Speaker 3 (01:03:45):
Johnny Ally, Oh yeah, yeah, okay, I thought you were
going to say a huge Vans fan, but huge Oliver fan.

Speaker 4 (01:03:50):
Yeah, yeah, I mean you know, his makeup game is
on point. I'll give him that.

Speaker 3 (01:03:54):
That's true. That's true. And sometimes people just look better
with facial hair.

Speaker 4 (01:03:57):
If you're in a two thousands like Emo banders thing.

Speaker 2 (01:04:00):
But psychologically, guys, I've been taking it back to twenty
ten and I don't know why I keep going back there.

Speaker 3 (01:04:06):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:04:06):
And I've been watching Jay stew and Cole Berry's just
been watching these guys because I feel like I'm back
in the in the or the mid two thousands or something.
My brain is just is reverting back. I think we
need a new rally for for sanity and or March

(01:04:27):
to what is it? March to do you guys remember the.

Speaker 4 (01:04:30):
I don't remember. I don't remember the rest of the name.

Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
March to Keep Fear Alive?

Speaker 3 (01:04:35):
Yeah, that kind of stuff. Yeah, I hear you, man.
And the image that keeps haunting me, you know, as
the sun rises and they try to go to sleep,
is uh the feeling, does it not?

Speaker 2 (01:04:47):
That's not what happens with you.

Speaker 3 (01:04:52):
I'm hiding in the case. This is very late at
night for me. What we're what I can't shake. And folks,
if you close your you might feel this too. Similar
to the idea of twenty ten being an iterative situation?
Right now, does it not feel like we're on the
roller coaster slowly ticking up the hill?

Speaker 2 (01:05:16):
You know, it does feel like that, Ben, But I'm
a little worried because I haven't heard the ticking for
a while. So you know what that means. We're like
coasting right over the top.

Speaker 4 (01:05:26):
All you gotta do, guys, is just hold your arms
up and get ready.

Speaker 2 (01:05:28):
For the wei.

Speaker 3 (01:05:30):
Yeah, and he's going to be fine and fun. Well,
the world will continue to spit right. The thing is
changing this trend. We know, this trend is picking up steam.
Regardless of what the public thinks. Changing this trend of
detention facility expansion, it's going to require either a new
administration public outcry on a level larger than what's occurring now,

(01:05:55):
or a complete one to eighty from everything the current
government said previously. But still those buildings are going to
be there. Is there an ulterior motive at play for now?
That's the stuff they don't want you to know. Stay
safe out there, folks. We're going to give you a
couple of resources if you or a loved one needs assistance.

Speaker 2 (01:06:14):
No, yeah, for sure. Well, the big thing I'm going
to put out there is if you feel the speaking
personally here, guys, but you feel the anger that I
feel and the frustration about what's happening, and you feel
for the human beings that are going through these systems
of customs enforcement, immigration detention and maybe find themselves in

(01:06:39):
a place like this. You can volunteer with a bunch
of places. There are a ton of them. You do
a quick Google search Immigration volunteer near me. That's a
thing you can do. I know about a few in
Georgia that have been fantastic over the years. These two
that I'm gonna mention in particular. They say they practice
something called radical hospitality, which I think is an incredible,

(01:07:04):
just kind thing to do for someone, especially like family
members of someone who's in detention right now. El Rifugio
which is just a great place down in Lumpkin, Georgia
where they function down in Lumpkin, Georgia by the Stewart
Detention Center. You can go and volunteer with them. The
other one is Kasa Alterna, which is I believe created
by the same person or group of people. That's another

(01:07:27):
place where when people are super vulnerable and need a
place to stay. This group helps out so you can
go and volunteer with them and truly make a difference
in people's lives.

Speaker 3 (01:07:39):
And well said, and thank you for putting out there, Matt.
We also want to recommend for you in the contiguous
United States, if you're looking for resources for yourself or
for loved one, please consider checking out things like the
Immigration Advocates Network. They have a national legal services directory.

(01:08:00):
Can pull it up by state, by zip code. You
will find advice, guidance, and legal assistance. So maybe it
can feel sometimes like the good guys are outnumbered, but
that doesn't mean the good guys don't exist. Most importantly, folks,
thank you for tuning in. Stay safe out there. We'd
love to hear your thoughts. You can hit us up

(01:08:22):
on the lines. Should thou sip the social needs, you
can give us a phone call and you can always
send us an email.

Speaker 4 (01:08:28):
You sure can. And I'm just to add one more
aspect to what you guys are talking about in terms
of things you can do. This is less maybe an action,
but I can't recommend enough. Just looking at images like
the ones I was mentioning from that artist Tammy Oo
Jakayama and seeing the faces of people and connecting what's
going on with people, and not just having it be
this amorphis concepts, because that's the design. That is the

(01:08:51):
design of it, is to make it amorphos and connected
to humans and emotion and humanity. So I would just
say that's why art is awesome, y'all. Check the journalism
and photojournalism. I think that's all part of the same.
You know, all of wax there so can't recommend that
kind of stuff enough. Do find us if you wish,
and let us know some of your favorite revolutionary artists

(01:09:14):
and some pieces that connect you to the reality of
injustices and things like we're seeing here. You can find
us at the handles conspiracy stuff or conspiracy stuff show
on your social media platform of choice.

Speaker 2 (01:09:26):
Her phone number is one eight three three st d WYTK.
Give us a call, you got three minutes, leave a voicemail.
You'll hear some music and Ben's voice. You'll feel very comfortable.
Let us know what you think about any and all
of this that we've been talking about today. If you've
got a suggestion for a topic you want us to
cover in the future, any of that stuff, good to

(01:09:47):
go there. Give yourself a cool nickname and let us
know if we can use your name and message on
the air. You'll find it in one of our listener
mail episodes if we if we pick it out of
all the ones we're getting because there's so many because
you keep calling right. You can also send us an email.

Speaker 3 (01:10:02):
We are the entities that read each piece of correspondence
we receive. Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the void
writes back. Send us a random fact, send us an
idea for our listener mail segment, or send us an
idea for an episode, and also tune in for some spoilers.
For everybody who listened to the end of this show,

(01:10:23):
do check out our next episode on Russia's super weapons
ooh Ah, We'll see you here in the dark conspiracy
at iHeartRadio dot com.

Speaker 2 (01:10:50):
Stuff they Don't Want You to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.