Our guest, Yannick Gill is a human rights attorney based in Washington D.C. Yannick worked in Congress with 2 progressive members of the House of Representatives. He is Senior Counsel with Human Rights First, and an accomplished human rights advocate defending marginalized people across the United States and abroad.
In the second half of the show, we talk about the disappearances to El Salvador, the suppression of immigrant and college student voices, and the attacks on law firms and nonprofits.
Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/civiccipher?utm_source=search
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Keep on rodden with us as we continue to broadcast
the balance and defend the discourse from the Hip Hop
Weekly Studios.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome back to Civic Cipher. I'm your host, Ramsy's jaw.
He is Rams's jaw. I am q Ward. You are
tuned in the civic Cipher, Yes you are, and we
are having a.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Wildly informative conversation with a man that we respect and
that we tap on the shoulder from time to time
to give us some clarity into the goings on in Washington,
d C. So be sure to stick around for more
of the conversation. The one and only Ganet Gill is
here with us. He is a human rights lawyer and
based out there in DC, and he's worked with Congress
with two progressive members of the House of Representatives. He's
(00:37):
an accomplished human rights advocate defending marginalized people across the
United States and abroad. And he is dropping some information
for folks that don't know that need to be informed
about how vulnerable we are and what we can do
to push back against those vulnerabilities. But before we have
(00:59):
any more discussion, time to Beaba become a better allied.
Baba and today's Baba. We want to shout out universities
that are pushing back against the Trump Administration's attack on diversity,
equity and inclusion initiatives. I'll share from the economic time.
Several leading US universities have quietly formed a private collective
to push back against the Trump Administration's efforts to control
(01:19):
research funding and academic policies.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
According to The.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Wall Street Journal, the group, made up of about ten
prestigious institutions, including Ivy League schools and major private research universities,
has been meeting privately to planned strategies. Their discussions intensified
after the administration presented Harvard University with a list of
demands viewed widely across academia as a threat to university autonomy.
(01:42):
The collective includes university presidents, trustees, and other senior leaders.
They have discussed setting clear boundaries for negotiations with the
government and have prepared for different scenarios if funding is
cut or regulations are tightened. The goal is to prevent
individual schools from making separate deals that could set precedents
affecting the entire sector.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Is familiar with the efforts, said.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
The Trump administration has used the threat of freezing or
canceling billions in research grants to pressure schools citing a
need to address anti semitism on campuses. According to a
source familiar with The Wall Street Journal, the government's task
force said that the administration had worn at least one
university leadership group not to coordinate with others in resisting
these demands. The universities have agreed they will not compromise
(02:25):
on core issues such as control over admissions, faculty hiring,
and academic curriculum. One participant in the discussions pointed out, quote,
several of the schools have been around for three hundred
years years while President Trump has been in office for
three months.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So yeah, they are.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
The Trump administration is trying to frame the free speech
as anti semitism, of people standing up for Palestine, as
anti Jewish, as opposed to anti Israel, and so now
these institutions are having to fight this made up fight.
But the fact that they're banning together means something, and
we'll take it.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So okay, Yannick, thank you for.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Giving us some perspective on like the conversation about that
we had earlier about USAID and how that provides so
much vaccines around the world and how diseases are Human
diseases attack humans, and humans are all over the planet.
And so you know, for people that cast their vote
(03:33):
because they are it's a little bit of racism wrapped
up in fear. You know, they would never admit to
the racism, but they would admit to the fear. So
that's what I'll say. People that are afraid that, you know,
these people are getting too much power, these people are
taking too much from them or whatever, and they vote
for a person like this. Ultimately, what you've done is
(03:56):
given perspective on how the world is less safe for
them too as a result of that. What you've done
ultimately is you've reframed the conversation around how we kind
of all need each other and we should be building
systems to support each other as opposed to like trying
to isolate ourselves. Because there are some things that are
bigger than our communities, that our individual lives, our families,
(04:18):
our cities, our countries. And this administration I think is
hyper focused on really one group of people in this
country as opposed to humanity, the globe, et cetera. And
(04:38):
I think this is why we have a lot of
this weird back and forth from the White House. You know,
these these tariffs and you know all this Donald Trump
saying he's negotiating with China. China is like, we're not
talking about dude. The Chinese Empire has been around five
thousand years. We're not worried about America has been around
for three hundred. You know, like talking talking crazy, you
know what I mean. And so you know that clarity
(05:01):
and a bit of levity I think goes a long
way around here.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I want you to continue helping us out, So do
us a favor. Talk to us a little bit more,
because I know that you kind of touched on it.
But talk to us a little bit more about, you know,
our Latino brothers and sisters at what they're dealing with.
And share a little bit more about kind of the
deportations that have been taking a place of not just
(05:28):
you know, people whose citizenship status is kind of in limbo,
but actual US citizens, American citizens who've been deported to
El Salvador.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
So share a little bit more with us about that.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Absolutely. And I want to start off by making something
very clear, these are not deportations. We I even sometimes
slip up, but using that word suggest a legality succest
a processed, and that is not what's happening in the
United States in twenty twelve. Folks are being snatched off
(06:03):
the road, snatched in their homes, snatched in their places
of worship, schools, places in previous administrations that were protected
without any due process based on the mere allegation, the
mere suggestion that they may be affiliated with a gang.
(06:23):
This is being done through tattoos. This is being done
through living in the wrong neighborhood or being in the
presence of the wrong people. But unlike previous administrations, it's
not as simple as going through a legal process or
even fondly charged, finding access to counsel and sorting things out. No,
(06:47):
these people are being deprived of any right to do process,
which I remind you everyone is entitled to, regardless of
their nationality. Yeah, being shipped way to a land where
they've never been, and being subjected to torturous conditions, having their
(07:08):
head shaved, being locked away without access to a phone,
without access to their families. The term that we are
using with human rights first is being disappeared, which is
far more accurate of what is happening and the reason
why we are attempting to ring the alarm and how
(07:29):
terrifying this process is is because, as you suggested, your
citizenship isn't going to protect you. Now. Although I live
in Washington, d C. I'm a proud Florida man, so
I still every once in a while try and keep
up what's happening back home, and more and more the
news is depressing, to say the least. I bring up
(07:53):
Florida because Juan Carlos Gomes Lopez happened to be in Florida.
As his name suggests, He's a Latino and he didn't
look American enough, because despite being born and raised in
the United States, Juan found himself in a deportation proceeding
(08:13):
to a country that he had no nationality. His mother panicked,
collected his birth certificate, brought it to the courts, and
while the judge was able to authenticate that it was
a real birth certificate.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
He still sat, couldn't do anything, and a.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Detention proceeding until human rights advocates, until the local community,
until social media protested saying, what is happening? That is
Trump's America. Thank God, in this case, there was enough
noise that this American was released from deportation. Proceedings. But
(08:51):
it only highlights what is really happening without due process
to suspect it a led gang members. And I emphasize
those words because in more cases than not, we have
been able to investigate and look in and find not
only do these alleged victims not have criminal records in
(09:15):
the United States, not have gang affiliation in the United States,
but even in Venezuela, they have no criminal history.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
I think it's something like seventy five percent of them
had no previous criminal histories.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Exactly what I think. I heard that earlier today or
something like that, so I have to check it.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
But nope, of course, and I hesitate to put a
specific figure because it highlights the issue. We don't have
access to these people. We have been attempting to gain
access to represent and see what is happening, because until
you are convicted, you have rights to council to prove
(09:54):
your inny sense to some form of due process. That
is the Fifth Amendment, and that is what is being attacked.
So Al Salvador, and unfortunately Al Salvador, unfortunately is the
start of what we fear is going to be many
agreements that President Trump is looking to utilize to remove undesirables,
(10:19):
people that don't fit his concept of what American again
should look like. And before I wrap this point, I
do want to highlight while we're talking about Latinos today,
I always bring up the case of Sean Brown brother
born in Philadelphia, who happened to be in Florida again,
who ended up in deportation proceedings to Jamaica, a country
(10:44):
had only been two hun a cruise. Because you have
to understand, you can't look at someone and accurately guess
their nationality, perhaps, their ethnicity perhaps, but that doesn't provide
access to their nationality, which is completely different than someone's heritage.
(11:06):
They seem to understand that with Irish communities, Irish American communities,
they seem to understand that what the Italian American community
with immigrant groups. I've been here for centuries.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, I see where you're going.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
But again, it's an attack on black and brown communities
that is being shaped under the auspices of deportation. So
while many of us are slipping up and using the
language because it seems natural that we want to bring
in a process some form of legality, let's be clear
that these are disappearances. They're stomping on our constitutional rights.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
If I may right here, I think that just for
our listeners to give them some perspective, because a lot
of folks haven't traveled beyond this country, and Q and
I we've had We've been very fortunate.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
We've been all over the world.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
Just if you can just imagine if you're in a
foreign country wherever you've always dreamed of going. You're in
a foreign country, right You're a million miles away from
your family, from the political system that you know that
you believe to be fair. Here in the US, you're whatever.
You're in France or something, pick a place, doesn't matter.
And then you're accused of stealing a candy bar and
(12:21):
then they disappear you and you don't have have like
due process. Can I at least go in front of someone.
Is there someone that can help me translate? You know,
I was here on business, whatever whatever your story is.
But just imagine how how having some formal process would
help you, would serve you as a human being, whether
(12:43):
or not you're a citizen of that country. You would
think that's fair. And so I think that's the point
that you're trying to make here, Yannick, is that you know,
for people that are snatched off of the street and
then put on an airplane's shipped off without due process,
that is fundamentally anti human and what we would imagine
would be Unamerican.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Am I right about that?
Speaker 3 (13:03):
I could have said it better myself. I tried, But
you're doing my job.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
I got a good teacher.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
It's that simple. And the additional word is that what
we believe at Human Rights First is that those acts
are also unconstitutional. It's not just that it's immoral, it's
not just that it feels wrong. We are stating that
it is illegal. There's a reason it's unprecedented, because you're
not allowed to do that. And we're in a scary
time where despite court orders from the Supreme Court, who
(13:33):
has ordered back individuals who have been subjected to Donald
Trump's heinous acts, the Trump administration is still continuing to
ignore them. So we're in a place where you're calling
on Congress. We're continuing to file and marry out of lawsuits.
But we also need people everyday, folks who not just
(13:53):
are afraid of what may happen, but who are concerned
for our neighbors, who have already been objected to susterranny
to speak out, to yell and scream, because in the
same way that we were able to shine a light
on Wan's case in Florida and allow him to prove
that he was an American, we have to do that
(14:15):
with folks who may not have the same nationality as
you or me, because regardless of their nationality, regardless of
the ethnicity, regardless of their race, in the United States,
they still have access to constitucial protections, and the Fifth
Amendment says the process as part of that.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
You know, during the campaign, during election season. And I
like to pause a second on election season because I
hear adults, in order to justify their apathy or their
lack of action, say I'm not really political. I think
(14:58):
what they mean is the electoral process.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
They don't participate. But everyone here is political.
Speaker 4 (15:05):
Every aspect of your life is affected by politics, from
the way that you buy groceries, the way you go
to school, your civic engagement, traffic lights, the fact that
you're supposed to be able to have due process if
someone accuses you of doing something illegal.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
All of this stuff is inherently political.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
We and I know we because we talked the three
of us during the last election season, saw so much
of this coming, and even the other side knows that
it's wrong, because they denied they would do it when
they were trying to get elected. They tried to distance
(15:47):
themselves from it, and they were trying to get elected
because even they know it's wrong. But now, because they're
you know, a religion, they will find a way to
back their messiah figure with the zealot like passion and
find a way to justify every decision that's made by
(16:09):
this administration, even when it is blatantly illegal and blatantly
in direct conflict with our constitution. We've seen the suppression
of disagreement. We've seen the suppression of criticism. We've seen
the suppression of honest journalism, and on a large scale,
(16:30):
the suppression of immigrant college students.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
All of us are in an.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
Interesting space where there's public dissent with what's going on
with the administration. And I've expressed my fears of all
the things that the three of us do for a
living being considered legal at some point in the near
future by this administration, because that shouldn't even sound ridiculous
to anyone of us, or to anyone listening.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Where are we on it?
Speaker 4 (17:00):
And when students can't protest, when journalists can't disagree, when
even law firms and attorneys are being attacked in some
again preemptively bending the knee and falling in line.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Scary doesn't really say it. I can't find the right way.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
To articulate the space that we're in now, and this
is something that you're living every day.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
I acknowledge that I'm at times afraid because it is
a scary time. It's an unprecedented time, and I've been
fooled at times into believing that the constitutional protections that
(17:49):
sometimes don't impact my community would at least impact America
and impact everybody. But we're in a time where we
are seeing outright defiance not just our Constitution but our courts.
The word that we're experiencing is authoritarianism, and we often
(18:14):
think about that word as something that happens over there.
I mean, we point to Russia, we point to China,
we even point to Cuba. But if we just look
at the way that things are being implemented in the
United States today, there's no other way to articulate what
is happening. And you pointed out something so key anywhere
(18:39):
that they see resistance uprising, quite frankly just questioning they
are attacking it. We're going to compare two very different groups.
One will be Ivor League college students. The second will
be nonprofits and law firms. And I'm going to frame
(19:01):
it within those same executive orders. I started by talking.
I started off our conversation. The attacks on law firms
was quick and swift because they were afraid to fight back.
There was no fight. They immediately thought and strategized, similar
(19:22):
to the same businesses we talked before. Who's going to
be in power? Where do we win? And they removed
again years years of precedent of working in tandem with
the US government to ensure that people that don't often
have a fair bide at the legal system had a representation.
(19:44):
This is a public service that helps all of us.
You want people to function through the courts because you
want people to trust the courts. But that was attacked
and removed. Why because statistically and human rights First has
seen this time and time again. When there's counsel involved,
people have a much higher chance in naturalizing into the
United States or in our case, having access to asylum
(20:09):
that they are entitled to under both international law but
domestic law. How does that tie it to the students.
They were expressing disdain for atrocities happening on the other
side of the Atlantic Ocean, something that they have a
constitutional rights to the First Amendment protections to speak out against.
(20:34):
But it didn't fit in line with exactly how Trump
wanted things to do or to happen again, authoritarianism. This
is not the way our country should function. This is
not this way our country has functioned. But unless we
stand up, unless we the people, not just human rights lawyers,
(20:55):
not just members of Congress, not just these Ivy League students,
but you the listener, You regular person with a regular job,
that here's this and thinks this is not right. You
should also be thinking this could be me as evidenced
(21:15):
by the three kids that were deported US citizens again
facing deportation, facing let me correct myself again, disappearances under
an authoritarian system. Yeah. So, while I'm afraid of what
(21:36):
may happen, I'm also angry that anger that conviction has
to cause us to resist, has to cause us to fight.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Okay, listen, I know that this conversation could go on
and on and on. You have a brilliant mind and
we appreciate your strategy, but we're gonna we're gonna have
to leave.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
It right here.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I'd like to thank you for taking the time to
come and talk with us this week. Do us a
favor before you go, let folks know how they can
tap in with you on social media, websites, you know,
anything that you got going on so people can get
some more of this game because we need.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
It absolutely and it's been a pleasure. Look forward to
continue the conversation. As always, brothers, I am pretty easy
to find Yanet Gil across most platforms, and also it's
really important in twenty twenty five that we support the
organizations doing the work, so I could also be found
through Human Rights First again, a human rights organization doing
(22:35):
strategic litigation and adgacy both here and abroad. I look
forward to chatting more about y'all in the next one
hundred days, hopefully with a few more wins under our belt.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Well we look forward to it too.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Be sure to follow us on social media at Civic Cipher.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
And subscribe to the podcast and the YouTube. And until
next week, y'all, Peace,
Keep on rodden with us as we continue to broadcast
the balance and defend the discourse from the Hip Hop
Weekly Studios.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome back to Civic Cipher. I'm your host, Ramsy's jaw.
He is Rams's jaw. I am q Ward. You are
tuned in the civic Cipher, Yes you are, and we
are having a.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Wildly informative conversation with a man that we respect and
that we tap on the shoulder from time to time
to give us some clarity into the goings on in Washington,
d C. So be sure to stick around for more
of the conversation. The one and only Ganet Gill is
here with us. He is a human rights lawyer and
based out there in DC, and he's worked with Congress
with two progressive members of the House of Representatives. He's
(00:37):
an accomplished human rights advocate defending marginalized people across the
United States and abroad. And he is dropping some information
for folks that don't know that need to be informed
about how vulnerable we are and what we can do
to push back against those vulnerabilities. But before we have
(00:59):
any more discussion, time to Beaba become a better allied.
Baba and today's Baba. We want to shout out universities
that are pushing back against the Trump Administration's attack on diversity,
equity and inclusion initiatives. I'll share from the economic time.
Several leading US universities have quietly formed a private collective
to push back against the Trump Administration's efforts to control
(01:19):
research funding and academic policies.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
According to The.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
Wall Street Journal, the group, made up of about ten
prestigious institutions, including Ivy League schools and major private research universities,
has been meeting privately to planned strategies. Their discussions intensified
after the administration presented Harvard University with a list of
demands viewed widely across academia as a threat to university autonomy.
(01:42):
The collective includes university presidents, trustees, and other senior leaders.
They have discussed setting clear boundaries for negotiations with the
government and have prepared for different scenarios if funding is
cut or regulations are tightened. The goal is to prevent
individual schools from making separate deals that could set precedents
affecting the entire sector.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Is familiar with the efforts, said.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
The Trump administration has used the threat of freezing or
canceling billions in research grants to pressure schools citing a
need to address anti semitism on campuses. According to a
source familiar with The Wall Street Journal, the government's task
force said that the administration had worn at least one
university leadership group not to coordinate with others in resisting
these demands. The universities have agreed they will not compromise
(02:25):
on core issues such as control over admissions, faculty hiring,
and academic curriculum. One participant in the discussions pointed out, quote,
several of the schools have been around for three hundred
years years while President Trump has been in office for
three months.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So yeah, they are.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
The Trump administration is trying to frame the free speech
as anti semitism, of people standing up for Palestine, as
anti Jewish, as opposed to anti Israel, and so now
these institutions are having to fight this made up fight.
But the fact that they're banning together means something, and
we'll take it.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
So okay, Yannick, thank you for.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Giving us some perspective on like the conversation about that
we had earlier about USAID and how that provides so
much vaccines around the world and how diseases are Human
diseases attack humans, and humans are all over the planet.
And so you know, for people that cast their vote
(03:33):
because they are it's a little bit of racism wrapped
up in fear. You know, they would never admit to
the racism, but they would admit to the fear. So
that's what I'll say. People that are afraid that, you know,
these people are getting too much power, these people are
taking too much from them or whatever, and they vote
for a person like this. Ultimately, what you've done is
(03:56):
given perspective on how the world is less safe for
them too as a result of that. What you've done
ultimately is you've reframed the conversation around how we kind
of all need each other and we should be building
systems to support each other as opposed to like trying
to isolate ourselves. Because there are some things that are
bigger than our communities, that our individual lives, our families,
(04:18):
our cities, our countries. And this administration I think is
hyper focused on really one group of people in this
country as opposed to humanity, the globe, et cetera. And
(04:38):
I think this is why we have a lot of
this weird back and forth from the White House. You know,
these these tariffs and you know all this Donald Trump
saying he's negotiating with China. China is like, we're not
talking about dude. The Chinese Empire has been around five
thousand years. We're not worried about America has been around
for three hundred. You know, like talking talking crazy, you
know what I mean. And so you know that clarity
(05:01):
and a bit of levity I think goes a long
way around here.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
Now.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
I want you to continue helping us out, So do
us a favor. Talk to us a little bit more,
because I know that you kind of touched on it.
But talk to us a little bit more about, you know,
our Latino brothers and sisters at what they're dealing with.
And share a little bit more about kind of the
deportations that have been taking a place of not just
(05:28):
you know, people whose citizenship status is kind of in limbo,
but actual US citizens, American citizens who've been deported to
El Salvador.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
So share a little bit more with us about that.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Absolutely. And I want to start off by making something
very clear, these are not deportations. We I even sometimes
slip up, but using that word suggest a legality succest
a processed, and that is not what's happening in the
United States in twenty twelve. Folks are being snatched off
(06:03):
the road, snatched in their homes, snatched in their places
of worship, schools, places in previous administrations that were protected
without any due process based on the mere allegation, the
mere suggestion that they may be affiliated with a gang.
(06:23):
This is being done through tattoos. This is being done
through living in the wrong neighborhood or being in the
presence of the wrong people. But unlike previous administrations, it's
not as simple as going through a legal process or
even fondly charged, finding access to counsel and sorting things out. No,
(06:47):
these people are being deprived of any right to do process,
which I remind you everyone is entitled to, regardless of
their nationality. Yeah, being shipped way to a land where
they've never been, and being subjected to torturous conditions, having their
(07:08):
head shaved, being locked away without access to a phone,
without access to their families. The term that we are
using with human rights first is being disappeared, which is
far more accurate of what is happening and the reason
why we are attempting to ring the alarm and how
(07:29):
terrifying this process is is because, as you suggested, your
citizenship isn't going to protect you. Now. Although I live
in Washington, d C. I'm a proud Florida man, so
I still every once in a while try and keep
up what's happening back home, and more and more the
news is depressing, to say the least. I bring up
(07:53):
Florida because Juan Carlos Gomes Lopez happened to be in Florida.
As his name suggests, He's a Latino and he didn't
look American enough, because despite being born and raised in
the United States, Juan found himself in a deportation proceeding
(08:13):
to a country that he had no nationality. His mother panicked,
collected his birth certificate, brought it to the courts, and
while the judge was able to authenticate that it was
a real birth certificate.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
He still sat, couldn't do anything, and a.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Detention proceeding until human rights advocates, until the local community,
until social media protested saying, what is happening? That is
Trump's America. Thank God, in this case, there was enough
noise that this American was released from deportation. Proceedings. But
(08:51):
it only highlights what is really happening without due process
to suspect it a led gang members. And I emphasize
those words because in more cases than not, we have
been able to investigate and look in and find not
only do these alleged victims not have criminal records in
(09:15):
the United States, not have gang affiliation in the United States,
but even in Venezuela, they have no criminal history.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
I think it's something like seventy five percent of them
had no previous criminal histories.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Exactly what I think. I heard that earlier today or
something like that, so I have to check it.
Speaker 3 (09:32):
But nope, of course, and I hesitate to put a
specific figure because it highlights the issue. We don't have
access to these people. We have been attempting to gain
access to represent and see what is happening, because until
you are convicted, you have rights to council to prove
(09:54):
your inny sense to some form of due process. That
is the Fifth Amendment, and that is what is being attacked.
So Al Salvador, and unfortunately Al Salvador, unfortunately is the
start of what we fear is going to be many
agreements that President Trump is looking to utilize to remove undesirables,
(10:19):
people that don't fit his concept of what American again
should look like. And before I wrap this point, I
do want to highlight while we're talking about Latinos today,
I always bring up the case of Sean Brown brother
born in Philadelphia, who happened to be in Florida again,
who ended up in deportation proceedings to Jamaica, a country
(10:44):
had only been two hun a cruise. Because you have
to understand, you can't look at someone and accurately guess
their nationality, perhaps, their ethnicity perhaps, but that doesn't provide
access to their nationality, which is completely different than someone's heritage.
(11:06):
They seem to understand that with Irish communities, Irish American communities,
they seem to understand that what the Italian American community
with immigrant groups. I've been here for centuries.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, I see where you're going.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
But again, it's an attack on black and brown communities
that is being shaped under the auspices of deportation. So
while many of us are slipping up and using the
language because it seems natural that we want to bring
in a process some form of legality, let's be clear
that these are disappearances. They're stomping on our constitutional rights.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
If I may right here, I think that just for
our listeners to give them some perspective, because a lot
of folks haven't traveled beyond this country, and Q and
I we've had We've been very fortunate.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
We've been all over the world.
Speaker 1 (11:57):
Just if you can just imagine if you're in a
foreign country wherever you've always dreamed of going. You're in
a foreign country, right You're a million miles away from
your family, from the political system that you know that
you believe to be fair. Here in the US, you're whatever.
You're in France or something, pick a place, doesn't matter.
And then you're accused of stealing a candy bar and
(12:21):
then they disappear you and you don't have have like
due process. Can I at least go in front of someone.
Is there someone that can help me translate? You know,
I was here on business, whatever whatever your story is.
But just imagine how how having some formal process would
help you, would serve you as a human being, whether
(12:43):
or not you're a citizen of that country. You would
think that's fair. And so I think that's the point
that you're trying to make here, Yannick, is that you know,
for people that are snatched off of the street and
then put on an airplane's shipped off without due process,
that is fundamentally anti human and what we would imagine
would be Unamerican.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
Am I right about that?
Speaker 3 (13:03):
I could have said it better myself. I tried, But
you're doing my job.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
I got a good teacher.
Speaker 3 (13:08):
It's that simple. And the additional word is that what
we believe at Human Rights First is that those acts
are also unconstitutional. It's not just that it's immoral, it's
not just that it feels wrong. We are stating that
it is illegal. There's a reason it's unprecedented, because you're
not allowed to do that. And we're in a scary
time where despite court orders from the Supreme Court, who
(13:33):
has ordered back individuals who have been subjected to Donald
Trump's heinous acts, the Trump administration is still continuing to
ignore them. So we're in a place where you're calling
on Congress. We're continuing to file and marry out of lawsuits.
But we also need people everyday, folks who not just
(13:53):
are afraid of what may happen, but who are concerned
for our neighbors, who have already been objected to susterranny
to speak out, to yell and scream, because in the
same way that we were able to shine a light
on Wan's case in Florida and allow him to prove
that he was an American, we have to do that
(14:15):
with folks who may not have the same nationality as
you or me, because regardless of their nationality, regardless of
the ethnicity, regardless of their race, in the United States,
they still have access to constitucial protections, and the Fifth
Amendment says the process as part of that.
Speaker 4 (14:34):
You know, during the campaign, during election season. And I
like to pause a second on election season because I
hear adults, in order to justify their apathy or their
lack of action, say I'm not really political. I think
(14:58):
what they mean is the electoral process.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
They don't participate. But everyone here is political.
Speaker 4 (15:05):
Every aspect of your life is affected by politics, from
the way that you buy groceries, the way you go
to school, your civic engagement, traffic lights, the fact that
you're supposed to be able to have due process if
someone accuses you of doing something illegal.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
All of this stuff is inherently political.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
We and I know we because we talked the three
of us during the last election season, saw so much
of this coming, and even the other side knows that
it's wrong, because they denied they would do it when
they were trying to get elected. They tried to distance
(15:47):
themselves from it, and they were trying to get elected
because even they know it's wrong. But now, because they're
you know, a religion, they will find a way to
back their messiah figure with the zealot like passion and
find a way to justify every decision that's made by
(16:09):
this administration, even when it is blatantly illegal and blatantly
in direct conflict with our constitution. We've seen the suppression
of disagreement. We've seen the suppression of criticism. We've seen
the suppression of honest journalism, and on a large scale,
(16:30):
the suppression of immigrant college students.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
All of us are in an.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
Interesting space where there's public dissent with what's going on
with the administration. And I've expressed my fears of all
the things that the three of us do for a
living being considered legal at some point in the near
future by this administration, because that shouldn't even sound ridiculous
to anyone of us, or to anyone listening.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Where are we on it?
Speaker 4 (17:00):
And when students can't protest, when journalists can't disagree, when
even law firms and attorneys are being attacked in some
again preemptively bending the knee and falling in line.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Scary doesn't really say it. I can't find the right way.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
To articulate the space that we're in now, and this
is something that you're living every day.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
I acknowledge that I'm at times afraid because it is
a scary time. It's an unprecedented time, and I've been
fooled at times into believing that the constitutional protections that
(17:49):
sometimes don't impact my community would at least impact America
and impact everybody. But we're in a time where we
are seeing outright defiance not just our Constitution but our courts.
The word that we're experiencing is authoritarianism, and we often
(18:14):
think about that word as something that happens over there.
I mean, we point to Russia, we point to China,
we even point to Cuba. But if we just look
at the way that things are being implemented in the
United States today, there's no other way to articulate what
is happening. And you pointed out something so key anywhere
(18:39):
that they see resistance uprising, quite frankly just questioning they
are attacking it. We're going to compare two very different groups.
One will be Ivor League college students. The second will
be nonprofits and law firms. And I'm going to frame
(19:01):
it within those same executive orders. I started by talking.
I started off our conversation. The attacks on law firms
was quick and swift because they were afraid to fight back.
There was no fight. They immediately thought and strategized, similar
(19:22):
to the same businesses we talked before. Who's going to
be in power? Where do we win? And they removed
again years years of precedent of working in tandem with
the US government to ensure that people that don't often
have a fair bide at the legal system had a representation.
(19:44):
This is a public service that helps all of us.
You want people to function through the courts because you
want people to trust the courts. But that was attacked
and removed. Why because statistically and human rights First has
seen this time and time again. When there's counsel involved,
people have a much higher chance in naturalizing into the
United States or in our case, having access to asylum
(20:09):
that they are entitled to under both international law but
domestic law. How does that tie it to the students.
They were expressing disdain for atrocities happening on the other
side of the Atlantic Ocean, something that they have a
constitutional rights to the First Amendment protections to speak out against.
(20:34):
But it didn't fit in line with exactly how Trump
wanted things to do or to happen again, authoritarianism. This
is not the way our country should function. This is
not this way our country has functioned. But unless we
stand up, unless we the people, not just human rights lawyers,
(20:55):
not just members of Congress, not just these Ivy League students,
but you the listener, You regular person with a regular job,
that here's this and thinks this is not right. You
should also be thinking this could be me as evidenced
(21:15):
by the three kids that were deported US citizens again
facing deportation, facing let me correct myself again, disappearances under
an authoritarian system. Yeah. So, while I'm afraid of what
(21:36):
may happen, I'm also angry that anger that conviction has
to cause us to resist, has to cause us to fight.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Okay, listen, I know that this conversation could go on
and on and on. You have a brilliant mind and
we appreciate your strategy, but we're gonna we're gonna have
to leave.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
It right here.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I'd like to thank you for taking the time to
come and talk with us this week. Do us a
favor before you go, let folks know how they can
tap in with you on social media, websites, you know,
anything that you got going on so people can get
some more of this game because we need.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
It absolutely and it's been a pleasure. Look forward to
continue the conversation. As always, brothers, I am pretty easy
to find Yanet Gil across most platforms, and also it's
really important in twenty twenty five that we support the
organizations doing the work, so I could also be found
through Human Rights First again, a human rights organization doing
(22:35):
strategic litigation and adgacy both here and abroad. I look
forward to chatting more about y'all in the next one
hundred days, hopefully with a few more wins under our belt.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Well we look forward to it too.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Be sure to follow us on social media at Civic Cipher.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
And subscribe to the podcast and the YouTube. And until
next week, y'all, Peace,
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