Ali Bradley joined NewsNation as a Southwest correspondent in July of 2022. Ali has been working in television news since 2010 and was primarily an anchor until she went independent as a journalist in 2021. For the last year, Ali could be found covering the U.S. Southern Border, working alongside her carefully cultivated sources to bring light to the issues impacting so many right now. Ali is from Oso, Washington. She graduated from the Edward R. Murrow School of Communications at Washington State University.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
This is a podcast from wor Nowmore of the WOOR Saturday Morning Show and
Larry Minty. Welcome back. AliBradley covers the crisis at the southern border
for News Nation. She does incrediblework, and this week she obtained an
internal government report with some shocking information. Allie, as always, thanks for
(00:22):
joining us. You've obtained an internalmemo from the Texas Department of Safety that
had a stark warning about escalating violenceat the border. Before we get to
the details of the memo, andby the way, great story, explain
what Operation Loan Star is. So. Operation Loan Star is basically supplemental teams
(00:43):
that were created under Governor Greg Abbottabout three years ago when this kind of
crisis really started to kind of rearits head. The Governor created this element
under law enforcement. It encompasses TexasDepartment of Public Safety troopers, Texas National
Guard, State soldiers also involved inthat situation. And so that is what
(01:06):
is out there and what you're seeingdeploying this razor wire. Those are through
Operation Loan Star teams that are doingthat. The guys that are standing there
in the camouflage that are under thestate, they will be working under Governor
Abbot's Operation Loan Start. It's fascinatingto me that the memo warned about increasing
violence at the border, and weall saw the video of migrants storming the
(01:26):
border, tearing down barbed wire,attacking Texas National Guard. That was the
most brazen thing I've seen at theborder. Was that an isolated incident?
Or is that what the memo allegesis a sign of things to come?
Yeah? No, that's something thatBorder Patrol and National Guard and Texas DBS
have been dealing with for quite sometime. And we talked with the Border
(01:48):
Patrol Council President Brandon Judd, whoblatantly said this happens regularly to his guys
out there. This just was caughton camera this time, and so that
is a reality that they're facing downthere. But this video that we el
saw through the New York Post,of course, where basically hundreds of single
adult men were rushing through those thatrazor wire. And the reality here is
(02:08):
that those individuals, right, thismemo prompted or that situation rather prompted this
memo to come out through Department ofPublic Safety saying hey, we're seeing escalated
levels of violence down here and they'rekind of being guided to do that.
They're being guided to go to thatspecific gate. Social media is basically prompting
(02:29):
them to go to Gate thirty six, which is now kind of that infamous
gate there in that video. Now, in this memo, it also details
that they have kind of unsubstantiated evidence, They have intel that is telling them
that these migrants are actually being advisedto escalate their violence, to become more
violent when they're approaching law enforcement,to disregard their directives, to not actually
(02:53):
follow orders from the National Guard soldiersthat are down there saying there will be
no consequences for whatever act these migrantstake at the southern border. Now,
we do know that nine of thesemigrants were charged. We know one of
them is facing a felony for assaultinga public servant, so we know that
there are charges being filed. Weknow that right now they are still sifting
(03:14):
through that video, going through seeingif there are additional charges that need to
be filed. But again, thisisn't necessarily a one off, and this
memo just signifies that there are possiblymore situations that are going to be happening
like this. So it was kindof an alert to say Hey, guys,
be on your guard right now becausethese migrants they've already been unruly over
(03:34):
the last three years, we've hadinstances, but now they're being guided to
basically disregard any kind of directis fromlaw enforcement as well. Was the memo
just that an alert a warning orwere there recommendations in the memo? It
seems to be more of an alertsaying that they are concerned with officer safety
because these individuals are trying to circumventthe border barriers obviously, but they're saying
(04:00):
that open source social media posts areencouraging migrants to make that journey two l
passes specifically to that gate, soit's kind of just giving them that heads
up. Hey, we're seeing aroundfive hundred people a day come to that
specific location who are being guided,and once again they are, you know,
kind of on high alert here thatthey're being told to disregard any directives
from OLS personnels. It's important tonote too, those National Guard soldiers that
(04:25):
are deployed under Operational Long Store,they have no immigration authority. They cannot
put hands on migrants, they cannotprocess these migrants, they cannot apprehend these
migrants, so they're not actually reallyable to do anything except for deter and
repel any kind of illegal crossings.But when they're attacked, they can defend
themselves right when they're attacked, andthey've obviously made arrest too well, you
(04:47):
know, And I brought that upto OPA yesterday and I said, you
know, those guys are lucky thatthose soldiers didn't, you know, rack
those M fours because the reality is, you got hundreds of men coming to
you. What at what point doyou use force? Right? Because if
you're in fear that you can betaken over and your weapon can be taken
from you, that would constitute somekind of reaction. But they're saying that
(05:12):
OPA is saying it would not havebeen warranted had they fired their weapons or
had they used their weapons in thatsituation. So it's very interesting to hear
that and to know that those soldierskind of, even up against what we
saw, they might not have beenwarranted in discharging their firearms because they were,
you know, if they felt likethey were in danger. Apparently that
(05:32):
wasn't the level of danger that theyneeded to be in in order to discharge
those weapons. So that's very interestingto me. But arrests have been made
by Texas authorities. Texas TPS comingin as well, and Texas DPS is
able to arrest for criminal trespass incertain areas, regardless of what's happening with
SB four. That of course,that controversial immigration law that they're trying to
(05:54):
push forward that will allow law enforcementto arrest people coming in illegally. So
right now they are still able toarrest for criminal trespass. Again, they
are looking through that footage to seewhat kind of felonious charges they can bring
forward when it comes to assaulting thoseofficers as well. We're talking with Ali
Bradley, who is the Southwest correspondentfor News Nation, doing an excellent job
(06:16):
covering the southern border. If youwant the latest in the southern border,
she's the one you should be watching. It's interesting you brought up sbfore because
since we're not down there and followinglike you are, like people in Texas
are. It's a lot happened thisweek, and it's you said they can
arrest them under S Before I thoughtthey couldn't. Now I thought the Supreme
(06:39):
Court said you could, and thenand then another court paused it. No,
Yeah, right now it's on pause. You're exactly right, But I'm
saying that they are allowed to arrestunder Operation Long Star. Has been arresting
for criminal truspass for years now.They have some agreements with property owners and
like they see Shelby Park, sothe state has control of that property.
(07:00):
So on certain areas they are ableto arrest migrants for criminal truspass. Now
it's not just migrants, it couldbe any American citizen too that doesn't have
a right to be on that property. But they are arresting for criminal trespass.
They have been, and they've arrestedthousands under Operation Lone Star. That
is different from Senate Bill four thatwill allow any peace officer to arrest a
(07:24):
migrant who crosses into the country illegally. Got it. Governor Abbot has become
a national figure now, a villainto some hero to others. How is
he doing in Texas? Is arethese policies popular there? I think that
it's kind of a mixed bag,you know, because I think there's a
lot of people that say too little, too late. You know, it
took three years for them to seeShelby Park and for them to kind of
(07:46):
strong arm that area. But atthe end of the day when you talk
with Governor Abbot and his borders areMike Banks. It's all very strategic.
Everything that they've put into place haskind of led up to where they're at
now, where they've been booked ininvasion, and they've done all these different
things to kind of put things intoplace. But they are using Texas taxpayer
(08:07):
dollars to do so. Right whenit comes to busing more than one hundred
and eight thousand migrants. At thispoint, they have moved throughout the country
under Operation Loan Star. You haveall these different soldiers that are deployed across
the southern border who are away fromtheir homes, right, So you have
all these different kind of moving parts. And up until a couple months ago,
people were kind of saying Operation LoanStar is not working. We still
(08:28):
have hundreds of people coming. Hey, we have thousands of people under the
bridge and Eagle Pass. We rememberDecember we saw record breaking three hundred thousand
encounters. So you have a lotof people that were saying, wait,
why are you spending all of ourmoney, We're not seeing much of a
return. Well, now you arefinally kind of seeing that long game in
action. You're finally seeing the migrationshifting to Arizona and to California. You're
(08:52):
seeing a substantial drop and what iscoming across in Texas. So I do
think that some people are starting tokind of come around and go, oh,
okay, what he's done over thelast three years is finally kind of
coming to fruition. But again,we had to spend a lot of money
to get to this point, andwe're dealing with a federal immigration issue.
On a state level, everybody agreesthat this is something that the federal government
(09:16):
should be in doing and responding to, while Governor Abbott is kind of strongholding
that and taking matters into his ownhands. As always, your chock full
of information. Thank you for yourtime. Thank you, Sarah. I'll
talk soon. Ellie Bradley, NewsNation's Southern Border correspondent. This has been
a podcast from wor
This is a podcast from wor Nowmore of the WOOR Saturday Morning Show and
Larry Minty. Welcome back. AliBradley covers the crisis at the southern border
for News Nation. She does incrediblework, and this week she obtained an
internal government report with some shocking information. Allie, as always, thanks for
(00:22):
joining us. You've obtained an internalmemo from the Texas Department of Safety that
had a stark warning about escalating violenceat the border. Before we get to
the details of the memo, andby the way, great story, explain
what Operation Loan Star is. So. Operation Loan Star is basically supplemental teams
(00:43):
that were created under Governor Greg Abbottabout three years ago when this kind of
crisis really started to kind of rearits head. The Governor created this element
under law enforcement. It encompasses TexasDepartment of Public Safety troopers, Texas National
Guard, State soldiers also involved inthat situation. And so that is what
(01:06):
is out there and what you're seeingdeploying this razor wire. Those are through
Operation Loan Star teams that are doingthat. The guys that are standing there
in the camouflage that are under thestate, they will be working under Governor
Abbot's Operation Loan Start. It's fascinatingto me that the memo warned about increasing
violence at the border, and weall saw the video of migrants storming the
(01:26):
border, tearing down barbed wire,attacking Texas National Guard. That was the
most brazen thing I've seen at theborder. Was that an isolated incident?
Or is that what the memo allegesis a sign of things to come?
Yeah? No, that's something thatBorder Patrol and National Guard and Texas DBS
have been dealing with for quite sometime. And we talked with the Border
(01:48):
Patrol Council President Brandon Judd, whoblatantly said this happens regularly to his guys
out there. This just was caughton camera this time, and so that
is a reality that they're facing downthere. But this video that we el
saw through the New York Post,of course, where basically hundreds of single
adult men were rushing through those thatrazor wire. And the reality here is
(02:08):
that those individuals, right, thismemo prompted or that situation rather prompted this
memo to come out through Department ofPublic Safety saying hey, we're seeing escalated
levels of violence down here and they'rekind of being guided to do that.
They're being guided to go to thatspecific gate. Social media is basically prompting
(02:29):
them to go to Gate thirty six, which is now kind of that infamous
gate there in that video. Now, in this memo, it also details
that they have kind of unsubstantiated evidence, They have intel that is telling them
that these migrants are actually being advisedto escalate their violence, to become more
violent when they're approaching law enforcement,to disregard their directives, to not actually
(02:53):
follow orders from the National Guard soldiersthat are down there saying there will be
no consequences for whatever act these migrantstake at the southern border. Now,
we do know that nine of thesemigrants were charged. We know one of
them is facing a felony for assaultinga public servant, so we know that
there are charges being filed. Weknow that right now they are still sifting
(03:14):
through that video, going through seeingif there are additional charges that need to
be filed. But again, thisisn't necessarily a one off, and this
memo just signifies that there are possiblymore situations that are going to be happening
like this. So it was kindof an alert to say Hey, guys,
be on your guard right now becausethese migrants they've already been unruly over
(03:34):
the last three years, we've hadinstances, but now they're being guided to
basically disregard any kind of directis fromlaw enforcement as well. Was the memo
just that an alert a warning orwere there recommendations in the memo? It
seems to be more of an alertsaying that they are concerned with officer safety
because these individuals are trying to circumventthe border barriers obviously, but they're saying
(04:00):
that open source social media posts areencouraging migrants to make that journey two l
passes specifically to that gate, soit's kind of just giving them that heads
up. Hey, we're seeing aroundfive hundred people a day come to that
specific location who are being guided,and once again they are, you know,
kind of on high alert here thatthey're being told to disregard any directives
from OLS personnels. It's important tonote too, those National Guard soldiers that
(04:25):
are deployed under Operational Long Store,they have no immigration authority. They cannot
put hands on migrants, they cannotprocess these migrants, they cannot apprehend these
migrants, so they're not actually reallyable to do anything except for deter and
repel any kind of illegal crossings.But when they're attacked, they can defend
themselves right when they're attacked, andthey've obviously made arrest too well, you
(04:47):
know, And I brought that upto OPA yesterday and I said, you
know, those guys are lucky thatthose soldiers didn't, you know, rack
those M fours because the reality is, you got hundreds of men coming to
you. What at what point doyou use force? Right? Because if
you're in fear that you can betaken over and your weapon can be taken
from you, that would constitute somekind of reaction. But they're saying that
(05:12):
OPA is saying it would not havebeen warranted had they fired their weapons or
had they used their weapons in thatsituation. So it's very interesting to hear
that and to know that those soldierskind of, even up against what we
saw, they might not have beenwarranted in discharging their firearms because they were,
you know, if they felt likethey were in danger. Apparently that
(05:32):
wasn't the level of danger that theyneeded to be in in order to discharge
those weapons. So that's very interestingto me. But arrests have been made
by Texas authorities. Texas TPS comingin as well, and Texas DPS is
able to arrest for criminal trespass incertain areas, regardless of what's happening with
SB four. That of course,that controversial immigration law that they're trying to
(05:54):
push forward that will allow law enforcementto arrest people coming in illegally. So
right now they are still able toarrest for criminal trespass. Again, they
are looking through that footage to seewhat kind of felonious charges they can bring
forward when it comes to assaulting thoseofficers as well. We're talking with Ali
Bradley, who is the Southwest correspondentfor News Nation, doing an excellent job
(06:16):
covering the southern border. If youwant the latest in the southern border,
she's the one you should be watching. It's interesting you brought up sbfore because
since we're not down there and followinglike you are, like people in Texas
are. It's a lot happened thisweek, and it's you said they can
arrest them under S Before I thoughtthey couldn't. Now I thought the Supreme
(06:39):
Court said you could, and thenand then another court paused it. No,
Yeah, right now it's on pause. You're exactly right, But I'm
saying that they are allowed to arrestunder Operation Long Star. Has been arresting
for criminal truspass for years now.They have some agreements with property owners and
like they see Shelby Park, sothe state has control of that property.
(07:00):
So on certain areas they are ableto arrest migrants for criminal truspass. Now
it's not just migrants, it couldbe any American citizen too that doesn't have
a right to be on that property. But they are arresting for criminal trespass.
They have been, and they've arrestedthousands under Operation Lone Star. That
is different from Senate Bill four thatwill allow any peace officer to arrest a
(07:24):
migrant who crosses into the country illegally. Got it. Governor Abbot has become
a national figure now, a villainto some hero to others. How is
he doing in Texas? Is arethese policies popular there? I think that
it's kind of a mixed bag,you know, because I think there's a
lot of people that say too little, too late. You know, it
took three years for them to seeShelby Park and for them to kind of
(07:46):
strong arm that area. But atthe end of the day when you talk
with Governor Abbot and his borders areMike Banks. It's all very strategic.
Everything that they've put into place haskind of led up to where they're at
now, where they've been booked ininvasion, and they've done all these different
things to kind of put things intoplace. But they are using Texas taxpayer
(08:07):
dollars to do so. Right whenit comes to busing more than one hundred
and eight thousand migrants. At thispoint, they have moved throughout the country
under Operation Loan Star. You haveall these different soldiers that are deployed across
the southern border who are away fromtheir homes, right, So you have
all these different kind of moving parts. And up until a couple months ago,
people were kind of saying Operation LoanStar is not working. We still
(08:28):
have hundreds of people coming. Hey, we have thousands of people under the
bridge and Eagle Pass. We rememberDecember we saw record breaking three hundred thousand
encounters. So you have a lotof people that were saying, wait,
why are you spending all of ourmoney, We're not seeing much of a
return. Well, now you arefinally kind of seeing that long game in
action. You're finally seeing the migrationshifting to Arizona and to California. You're
(08:52):
seeing a substantial drop and what iscoming across in Texas. So I do
think that some people are starting tokind of come around and go, oh,
okay, what he's done over thelast three years is finally kind of
coming to fruition. But again,we had to spend a lot of money
to get to this point, andwe're dealing with a federal immigration issue.
On a state level, everybody agreesthat this is something that the federal government
(09:16):
should be in doing and responding to, while Governor Abbott is kind of strongholding
that and taking matters into his ownhands. As always, your chock full
of information. Thank you for yourtime. Thank you, Sarah. I'll
talk soon. Ellie Bradley, NewsNation's Southern Border correspondent. This has been
a podcast from wor
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