How could a young Ukrainian's killing change the U.S?

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0:53BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. It is just one crime, but it was a particularly horrifying crime and it's now being talked of around the United States. There is horrifying video footage of the stabbing of a young Ukrainian woman. She had come to America to escape the war, sitting on a train in the city of Charlotte, North Carolina. The video was released. It has been shared hugely, including by some of the most influential figures in the MAGA movement, Donald Trump's key supporters. They have been asking questions, reasonable questions perhaps, about why the crime was not originally much reported in America's media.

1:36It has opened a can of worms on issues relating to race, to the media itself, to crime, to the state of America's major cities. Donald Trump blames the Democrats. Once again, they're on the defensive. What is the real story? Welcome to AmeriCast. AmeriCast. AmeriCast from BBC News. You're gambling with the lives of millions of people. You're gambling with World War III. President Trump's message is very simple. We are done being taken advantage of. Mr. President, in the name of our God, have mercy upon the people who are scared now. Are you supportive of these onesies? I'm supportive of vaccines.

2:17What is happening? Like, this is not America. This is a terrible nightmare. This is what victory feels like. Yeah!

2:34Hello, it's Sarah in the BBC's Washington Bureau. And it's Justin in the worldwide headquarters of AmeriCast in London, England. And Justin, we should explain a little bit more of the background to this terrible story of what happened to Irina Zarutska at the end of last month. She is a young Ukrainian refugee, 22 years old, who had moved to Charlotte, North Carolina, traveling alone on a metro train when, and we've seen footage of this, she is attacked violently from behind by someone alleged to be to Carlos Brown, who violently stabs her in the neck. And all of this is captured on video. And so unsurprisingly, this has really, really shocked people, the horrific nature of this murder.

3:19But there is huge controversy that hasn't been that widely reported in some media outlets as well. That's one big aspect of this story. Yeah. And before we get to that aspect and the various other kind of political aspects of it, it's worth dwelling for a moment on the fact of the video, because the video is horrific exactly as you suggest. But also there are now still images that are being shared from it of this poor woman. She's only 23. She looks, as you would expect, shocked, terrified. She bleeds to death, basically. And there are people around her in the carriage who do very little, at least while the attacker is there.

4:00and the horror of it, I mean, before we go on and talk about all the rest of it, the horror of it is what has now kind of propelled it, hasn't it, into America's consciousness, into the consciousness of politicians, but also into the consciousness of ordinary Americans who are just looking on and even people who haven't seen the video. And we should say right at the start that Irina's family don't want people to watch the video. They've actually asked for people not to share it. They issued a statement. They said they were heartbroken beyond words. Irina, they said, came here. They're here being in the United States to find peace and safety.

4:37And instead, her life was stolen from her in the most horrific way. No family should have to go through this. So they do not want her to become a huge political issue. They do not want any of this, obviously, to happen. But the fact is that it is happening. And this discussion is, I think, probably only at the early stages. Yeah, and it's been propelled front and centre by the fact that the White House are talking about it. Here's the press secretary, Carolyn Levitt, who spoke about it during Tuesday's press briefing. and we're going to play you an extended chunk of what she had to say. Here are the facts that many outlets have shamefully and intentionally failed to report until President Trump drew attention to it.

5:23On August 22nd, Irina Zarutska was stabbed to death on the rail system in Charlotte, North Carolina by a savage career criminal. This is a public transportation system that many in the area use every single day to go to school and work. Irina was on the train that night traveling home from her job at a pizzeria, still in uniform from her shift. This beautiful, innocent 23-year-old young woman was a Ukrainian refugee who had recently fled her country for a chance at a safer life and a promising new beginning here in the United States of America. But tragically, a public transportation system in a major American city was more dangerous than the active war zone that she left.

6:07Surveillance video of the killing was finally released to the public this past Friday. And one of the things that Caroline Levitt and the White House generally have been making a big deal about is the lack of coverage that this crime has received in outlets like the New York Times, the Washington Post, the major TV outlets here like ABC, NBC. And to an extent, they're right about that. It hasn't been widely covered. And if you read what they would classify as the liberal press, a lot of people still think is, you know, the pretty broadly in the middle mainstream press. You might not know about this.

6:42You might have seen it on your social media channels, but you won't have seen it on the front page of some of the newspapers that take themselves the most seriously in this country. And that is just feeding, as I'm sure you can imagine, Justin, the politicization of this and the idea that liberals, that Democrats want to cover up crime, particularly when it is committed by black suspects on white victims. Yeah. And the New York Times, I mean, I think it is possible, isn't it, to question why some of the coverage didn't happen, but at the same time, not to align yourself necessarily with what the White House is claiming and indeed what some on America's right, particularly the far right are claiming that this is a kind of reverse racism, that this is being covered simply because or not being covered simply because the suspect seems to be black.

7:31I think you can put all that to one side and say, hang on a second. It is also, of course, the backstory of this woman, the fact that she'd come to the United States from a war zone to seek a better life. That also makes it more newsworthy. And I think it is reasonable for people to say, is there something that has held mainstream news outlets back from wanting to cover this? because the narrative in this case on two fronts seems not to fit theirs. And the one front is the racial one where people are very keen, certainly in the wake of George Floyd, they're very keen to see other cases where there is racism and there's racism directed against black people.

8:19And there is certainly evidence of that. But are they less keen to see the opposite, as it were? And the other is just the business of random disorder in public places, which we talked about, haven't we, Sarah, on the podcast before? And it's a fact, isn't it, that actually violent crime in Charlotte, in the city where this poor woman was killed, has gone down really markedly in the last year. But still there is this sense if you are travelling on that train today, you're going to feel nervous, aren't you? And that, again, is a kind of narrative, it seems to me, that some of the mainstream media don't want to get involved in because it seems to be helping Donald Trump.

9:00And you'll remember this, Justin. It's long been a feature of criticism of the media in America that they do focus on the murder of particularly young, white, blonde women, often to the exclusion of stories about murders of other people, largely black and brown people. And that's a narrative that's gone on for decades now. I've no idea whether that's one of the reasons why a lot of outlets didn't cover this story. there's also an argument that murders are not that common in these cities, that one single death wouldn't necessarily propel it onto the front pages the way it might in the United Kingdom or other European countries.

9:40Now, that is terrifying. It's frightening that it is true, as you say, Justin, that violent crime has been going down in Charlotte, as it has in many of the big cities in America. And yet there are still so many murders every week in these cities that they barely make the headlines. I mean, that's the disconnect that it's quite difficult to get your head around sometimes, that violent crime's on the way down and there is still so much of it in these American cities. Now, we had a graphic demonstration last night, Justin, of the way in which in one month, Donald Trump says he has restored safety, protection, law and order to the streets of Washington, D.C.

10:17when he went out for dinner. Amazingly, actually, it's the first time he's been to a restaurant, not just in this term, but at any time when he's been president other than to his own hotel. And he has been saying the whole time that the National Guard have been on the streets of DC that people have been too terrified to go out to restaurants but that suddenly within a month a whole bunch of them have sprung up and everybody's going out for dinner again and it's all thanks to him. So to prove this, he took his large motorcade out of the White House, drove one whole block to Joe's Prime Steak and Stone Crab House which is practically next door to the White House, went and had dinner with a whole bunch of people from his administration, spoke to reporters on the way in and said, isn't it great that people can go out for dinner again in Washington?

11:06Now, I mean, the idea that surrounded by the Secret Service and a motorcade of about 20 vehicles and driving one block proves that anything is particularly safer is obviously laughable. But this is the extent to which you can see him. He really believes that he can tell people He has changed the atmosphere on the streets in one short month. This city, here I am, standing out in the middle of the street. I wouldn't have done this three months ago, four months ago. I certainly wouldn't have done it a year ago. This was one of the most unsafe cities in the country. Now it's as safe as there is in the country.

11:39So we're here with cabinet members having dinner and everybody should go out. The restaurants now are booming. People are walking. Thank you. OK, that's the performative side. If we go back to Charlotte and what has happened there and to the discussions around this particular alleged attacker, and we're saying that he's an alleged attacker. There is film, there is video, as we've said, but he hasn't yet been convicted of a crime. So it's right that we treat him in that way. And that's why we are. But, you know, the complexity of how you deal with him, how he was dealt with, but also with people like him is also, of course, a huge part of a very, very important, lively debate and one that isn't performative because it actually has to deal with real practical issues.

12:31So let's look at what happened with this suspect to Carlos Brown. Now he has been jailed several times. He has been convicted of other violent offences, including an assault against his own sister. I mean, this is this is a man with a dark criminal history. And he had been arrested earlier this year. And he wasn't even released on cashless bail, where you can you can you can be released on bail without putting any money down, which is something the Republicans are going after at the moment. It wasn't even that. He was released on a written promise to return to court when his case came up. That was how the judge allowed him to go and why he was free walking the streets, why he was free and able to get on this metro train and allegedly commit this murder.

13:13Now, that looks absolutely awful, doesn't it? That looks like it is just the worst of Democrats taking the side of criminals over the law abiding public. Until you look at what it was that he was arrested for, he had been abusing the 911, like the 999 system, by repeatedly calling because he thought that someone else had control of his bodily functions. Are we seriously saying that he should have been kept in jail on remand waiting trial for calling 911 too often? I mean, this is what happens when you get into the details of it. It's always a bit more complicated, isn't it? And on the race side of it, where does this go now?

13:55Because I mean, I've noticed you can see there are some on the far right who are openly racist and will unquestionably use it. Well, and it means that whenever somebody says, look, the criminal justice system is not being tough enough, whether on the sentencing of people or keeping people off the streets while they're awaiting trial, particularly if they have previous offences, it's very, very easy to say, well, that is happening because Democrats or liberal leaning judges or magistrates are being too sympathetic towards African-American offenders. And so whether or not that is the case or whether it's because judges are simply following the law, they stand accused of being overly liberal.

14:39And of course, it is a fact that most of the defendants who come up against them accused of these kind of crimes will be people of colour. That's just how the statistics break down in this country. And then you end up with a situation with this case we've got where Charlotte's Democratic mayor, Vi Lyles, ends up having to release a statement where she's acknowledging the Republican criticism over the fact that too many people are being released after they have been arrested. She said, over the past several weeks, our community has worked to understand this. What we know was a tragic failure by the courts and magistrates.

15:10Our police officers arrest people only to have them quickly released, which undermines our ability to protect our community and ensure safety. So you see Democrats having to having to say yes, there is something in what you're saying. And of course, you know, getting it right in the criminal justice system is a very, very difficult thing. But what's equally difficult, if not impossible, is for, I think, Democrats to defend themselves in cases like this against the charges of somehow having either been too lenient or created a culture of leniency that allows this sort of violence to occur. Yeah.

15:45Does it have an effect, do you think, in North Carolina? Because, I mean, there's a really important Senate race there, isn't there, next fall, which will, you know, potentially have a big impact on the makeup of the Senate. I mean, in theory, the Democrats could even win back control of the Senate. I don't think that's terribly likely, is it? But, I mean, they could win the North Carolina seat. It's going to be an open seat. They've got Roy Cooper, the governor, a very popular governor, Democratic governor, of what is fundamentally, I suppose, we were both there, weren't we, during the election.

16:12I mean, it's kind of a Republican. It is still a Republican state. There were some hopes in the Democrats that they were going to flip it, but they didn't manage to. Trump won. But they are hoping that they can win the seat this time round, the Senate seat. I just wonder whether the row about what the mayor initially said, where she seemed to be more worried about the attacker than she was about the victim, and that kind of wider acknowledgement that, as you say, she's now being sort of forced into, and people talking about diversity, equity and inclusion policies. Was there a task force that allowed him to be released?

16:57You know, Fox News telling people this woman lost her life because of DEI. You know, if those things become electorally significant in North Carolina over the next year, Roy Cooper, who I think is ahead in the polls, I think is likely at the moment to win. I just wonder whether he might not. Well, everything you said, Justin, is extremely pertinent to this race. And I suspect no coincidence as to why we're talking about this case as well. So Roy Cooper, the Democratic Senate candidate, previous governor, when he was governor of North Carolina, set up this task force looking at sort of racial equity in criminal justice.

17:40Oh, gosh, I didn't realize that. It's his task force, is it? It is. Oh, goodness. And so that's why the story that you're being told on Fox News and elsewhere is that it was, yes, that his task force led directly to the release of Carlos Brown, which led directly to the murder of this woman. Now, in fact, he was released before the task force results were published. He probably wouldn't have been released anyway under what the guidelines that they had come up with. But it's a nice, easy story to tell to say that, look, North Carolina descended into this criminal hellhole under Roy Cooper's governorship.

18:15Don't elect him to the Senate. Elect a Republican who will be tough on crime and take care of you. And Donald Trump's already given a great deal of personal backing to the Republican candidate there. This is a seat they very, very much want to win in one of those rare swing states, one of the few that we have left in America. So, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is something that goes to the absolute heart of it. I'm trying to remember, Justin, and I'm sure you will, the famous advert that sunk Michael Dukakis. Willie Horton. Yes. How similar was that case? Can you remember the details and explain to our American houses what was in the advert?

18:51Yeah, OK. So it's back in prehistory. Michael Dukakis running against George H.W. Bush. and George H.W. Bush had some pretty rough house people working for him. Although George H.W. Bush himself, this is George W. Bush's dad, was a genial kind of character, but he had some tough people on his side and they made this massive deal of someone who had been released, maybe released early, but anyway, released. Wilde Dukakis was a governor. his name was Willie Horton and he went on to commit a serious crime I can't remember what the crime was but he committed a serious crime and it just hung around Dukakis's neck and it's a really interesting one now I mean horrific in a way you just feel so sorry for obviously for her but my goodness for her family as well but you do wonder whether this woman is now going to become a kind of poster child for the election next year and is going to be used by the Republicans in order to try to, exactly as you say, to win the crucial, the absolutely crucial, potentially, seat of North Carolina, but also, of course, more widely in the midterms that are going to be fought right throughout the country.

20:13Because let's not forget one of the reasons why we are so focused on the idea of crime, partly because the White House has made it their banner issue And as we know, as you mentioned earlier, sending the National Guard onto the troops of Washington, D.C., sounds as though he's decided not to try and send the National Guard into Chicago, which would have had a very different legal basis. And that's something we can get into more detail about another time. But basically, yeah, the president can send troops into D.C. because it's not a full state. It's an entirely different matter to try and send them into Illinois when the governor doesn't want them there.

20:46And so it would have been a tougher sell on the streets of Chicago. But nonetheless, he will continue to do this where he can and make crime a very, very big issue. Because when we're talking about crime, we're not talking about the economy. And the one thing that Donald Trump absolutely promised to do was bring prices down and make everybody feel better off. That has really obviously not happened yet. And in fact, the economy may be going in the wrong direction. So instead of telling people they feel better off when they don't, make them feel less safe. and say that you're the one who is going to be tackling all of this and take really dramatic law enforcement action wherever you possibly can.

21:26And maybe people will stop worrying about the price of eggs. Yeah. And while you were talking, Sarah, I've looked up the advert that you referred to, the Dukakis advert. So this is the Willie Horton advert aimed at Mike Dukakis. Bush and Dukakis on crime. Bush supports the death penalty for first degree murderers. Dukakis not only opposes the death penalty, he allowed first-degree murderers to have weekend passes from prison. One was Willie Horton, who murdered a boy in a robbery, stabbing him 19 times. Despite a life sentence, Horton received 10 weekend passes from prison. Horton fled, kidnapped a young couple, stabbing the man and repeatedly raping his girlfriend.

22:06Weekend prison passes. Dukakis on crime. I mean, it is totemic, actually, isn't it, in recent American presidential history. has been something that absolutely sunk a presidential candidate. So when we say if they can change the subject, as you're saying, if they can change the subject onto crime and if they can focus on this one, which seems so clear-cut in so many ways and can be portrayed as so clear-cut in so many ways, it is potentially a very big deal. And to the point where you've even got the White House looking at pooling federal funding from Charlotte's public transport system. Now, how taking money away from a public transport system makes it safer, I'm not entirely sure.

22:47But the city does get millions of dollars in funding that covers about 12 percent of its annual budget. Let's listen to what the transport station secretary, Sean Duffy, said to Fox News. I can't pull money today from their transit system. I actually have to do an investigation. That's what the law requires. We start that investigation tomorrow. and I guarantee all your viewers that if I find what I think I'm going to find, they're not going to have your federal tax dollars going to their public transportation system. Zero, none, nada. And that's politics, and you can see the politics of it. But as you suggest, I mean, with what purpose?

23:22I mean, you know, it really does beg a belief, actually, doesn't it? That a system that plainly needs more security and more help gets less money. But I suppose, you know, the fact is that in as in so many other areas where politics in modern America intervenes, ordinary common sense kind of goes out of the window. And you do wonder whether, you know, just any effort to damage Charlotte, not the state of North Carolina, which, of course, as we were saying, a Republican state, but damage Charlotte, the city and the Democratic establishment there. And by extension, other Democratic establishments in other cities will just be seized on.

24:01It is a really grim situation, actually, isn't it? We constantly talk about these things in the wider politics. But I keep going back to the woman herself, actually, and the tragedy of the situation. It's a very live political issue that that really does get to people in quite a visceral way. OK, Sarah, I think we both are saying that this is not the last that people are going to hear about Irina Zarutska and the terrible end that she she met with. But also we should say as well, just before we say goodbye, that the sympathy of many ordinary people who don't get involved in the political strife about this, the sympathy of them will be with her and with her family.

24:46And there are still plenty of decent, decent people in America around the world who will either see something like this or read about it or see reports of it. And their first reaction won't be political. It'll just be an enormous sadness about her. But anyway, it is something that we know will become political. It's already become political, but it's going to be, as we were saying, part of the political debate almost certainly over the next year or so. And it's important that we all try to understand what has gone on. And remember the person and the personal in it as well, as it probably becomes more and more politicised.

25:21That's it from both of us. Bye-bye. Bye.

25:27AmeriCast. AmeriCast from BBC News. Well, look, thanks for listening all the way to the end of today's AmeriCast. You are now officially an AmeriCaster. It is, of course, a ride, a wild ride navigating the US news, particularly in the era of Trump. You have made it. If you have a comment, a question about the things we've talked about or anything at all, actually, get in touch with us. The email is americast.bbc.co.uk. The WhatsApp is 0330 123 9480. We answer your questions every single week, actually, on the podcast. So keep them coming. You can join the online community as well on Discord. The link is in the podcast description on your app.

26:08We will be back with another podcast very soon. So until then, see you later. Bye. I love you.