7/14/25: Epstein Brother Says Trump May Have Killed Him, Alligator Alcatraz Debate, FEMA Gutted Amid Floods

25:49A lot of it is about self-deportation. They have succeeded. Over a million people have self-deported in the last six months, at least rough estimate from the government figures. I'm not sure if we can trust that per se. But what we are watching is the thermostatic public opinion in effect. So I guess at this point, here's my advice to Democrats. Don't overread what these things actually mean. Last time around, they're like, see, the public is with us. And that means we shouldn't enforce border laws at all. Eight to 10 million people is good. We need to decriminalize border crossings, free health care for illegals and all of this.

26:19You guys have your moment at this point. And you need to kind of settle on like what the status quo going forward should look like. And I think ultimately the failure of the last multiple administrations on immigration is either punting things for amnesty while not having enforcement, basically allowing rage to bubble up around the issue. I think the Trump administration unfortunately has just decided for these big headline-grabbing things as opposed to actually trying to come to sort of consensus around this. And so it is now a live ball, an issue also which they've ceded so much ground on, not just with CICOT, but by turning it also into an Israel issue, which actually makes it, in my opinion, much worse for them.

27:00Yeah. Because it makes it seem capricious to the ends of their own individual priorities and not about America. Because it's not just about the illegals here. We're talking about the Mahmoud Khalil case. We're talking about the Ozturk case. We're also talking about foreigners being detained for having memes on their phones when entering the United States under tourism visa. That – the totality of that comes down to like, oh, hold on a second. We asked for law – I mean if you look at the rhetoric, it was law and order. And I think that what we've had right now, it just strays far away from that to the public and specifically the independent mind.

27:33It makes it very, very difficult. So I actually think this is a democratic issue now where you guys need to solve it for yourselves. And I'm curious to see what ground that they end up with for like what does the next Democratic candidate actually say on the issue of immigration? Can't be Kamala. Definitely can't be 2019. It can't be 2024 either. It's got to be something authentic and kind of interesting to this moment. Yeah, I think that's well said. And the Israel part is interesting to me because I was saying the same thing. And it's not just that it makes it seem like very clear this is just like an ideological tool being used against people the administration doesn't like or their ideological enemies.

28:14It also made it feel very personal. It is personal, quite literally. Yeah, because it was like, oh, you can't even write a freaking op-ed about this and you're being kidnapped off the streets? That's insane. And so when you had that combined at the very same time with these guys, many of whom were completely innocent, Kilmer Arbrego Garcia, of course, who was wrongfully deported with zero due process, it doesn't take a genius either to figure out like, oh, if they get no due process, like they didn't even have to prove that they were illegal immigrants. Like they could just ship out anyone that they wanted to.

28:51So very quickly out of the gates, it became no longer about, oh, some sort of undefined, distant group of potential criminals. It became like, oh, this is about us. This is about all of us. And I think that really, you know, the Kilmar-Obrega Garcia case really was a turning point in terms of Trump administration numbers on this issue. And so while, you know, I think you're right, I think Democrats have to figure out, you know, how do you have your own semblance of like, okay, this is going to be, there's going to be order. Because I do think people want to feel like, okay, we know who's coming in and there's some sort of a process here and it makes sense.

29:26But I do also think that there's lessons for centrist here. I mean, number one, there was this assumption that just like the immigration numbers are what they are and there's absolutely nothing we can do about it. That's clearly not true. People change their minds based on reality and what arguments are being presented to them and like how the issue is being framed. and just what reality is at the time. So a public opinion can and does change, number one. And number two, there was a real reluctance from centrists in particular to fight even on something like Kilmar Abrego-Garcia. Remember, they were like, you should just be talking about the price of eggs.

29:57I remember. Well, now at this point, actually, Trump's immigration numbers have fallen off even more than his economic numbers and are one of the sort of key sources of dissatisfaction with the public. So that was a dead wrong analysis. It was wrong morally, in my opinion, but it was also wrong politically. And people like Chris Van Hollen, who went down to El Salvador, and the folks who really made this and prioritized that issue, again, it was the right moral thing. It was also the right political choice and has now created a weakness for Trump on the issue where he was previously strongest, which is a classic political tactic of like, you go after the person's strength.

30:34That's actually the best way to bring someone down. So I think you had a combination of, number one, this became very quickly like, oh, this isn't about them. This is about us. Number two, I do think the imagery that they are intentionally cultivating to try to trigger these self-deportations, and this is all being run by Stephen Miller, that same imagery of the ICE agents always being masked, of sometimes not identifying themselves, not having warrants, the show of force with all of this frickin' military gear, the literal deployment of National Guardsmen and Marines in the streets of LA, the way that these shows of force have occurred in just like, you know, there's a video of like ICE agents all kitted out marching down the street in suburban Utah.

31:20People are like, what the fuck is going on here? To arrest them like landscaper? What is going on? So I think that in addition to then Seacott and the cruelty there, Alligator Alcatraz, and the, like, it's very intentional, the language choice and the decision to sort of highlight the punitive nature of what is being done here. I think when you put all of those things together and that sense of like, this is actually creating more chaos in my community. I think those are the things that have sort of like turned this issue as significantly as I don't really disagree. What I would also caution for a lot of people is, and this is always my problem with the talk about immigration, they don't distinguish in the Gallup poll between legal and illegal immigration.

32:00I would be willing to bet that if you actually looked at the way that people feel about unchecked illegal migration, like what was happening under the Biden administration, I'd be willing to bet that those are still some pretty negative numbers. And that's part of why for the Democrats in the future, you guys need to figure out how you can come to some sort of consensus on the issue. The way that the Republicans got to where they are right now is that for basically 40 years, they were told amnesty is good. We'll do amnesty and eventually we'll do border security. And in that time, the illegal immigration population explodes under Bush, under Obama, under Trump.

32:32And eventually they're like, no, I'm done. And then Biden, of course, is like fire forever. And so they don't even want to talk here about amnesty until a massive deportation effort begins to happen on the immigration side and question for the Democrats. It's also still remains like immigration numbers have fallen for Trump. It's still one of his stronger issues. And, you know, it's not like he can't exactly get to a place where you could declare legitimate victory. I mean, look at the border security numbers or the border crossing numbers from the Biden administration compared to today. It's unbelievable.

33:04In a way, they're almost a victim of their own success because now people are looking at the deportation efforts in Los Angeles or Utah or whatever, and there's no more chaos at the border because it's a solved question. It's like, no, you're staying in Mexico and you're not coming here. So the question is there around what the future looks like for our policy. And look, on the Trump administration thing, I generally, my problem for them, at least as somebody who's generally sympathetic, I still support mass deportation, but the way that they had done it is such that their trust in all their information is zero after Seacott.

33:36Because they said, very specifically, maybe I'm a fool. I believe them. I was like, okay. These guys are gang members. I said the federal government, for years, has always validated gang members. This is not a difficult policy to be able to figure out. Go ask anybody in the Bureau of Prisons. There's an entire process. How do we validate people who are in gangs? Maybe there's some questions around that, but fine. Broadly, I was like, I don't think we have a bunch of an issue. And then you look at the stuff and you're like, okay, I mean, there's a lie. And then you look at the Israel stuff and you're like, okay, well, that's a lie too.

34:04And so you start to get the credibility gap on the issue such that you really, even when you are, in my opinion, sometimes deporting people really deserve to get the hell out of here, shouldn't even be here. But then you have an open conversation where people are not even going to be able to trust some of the facts that you're putting out. And so when you have that out on the ether, I think it's very, very difficult for all of them. But I don't know. I mean, look, for me, I had a conversation in 2016 with somebody who I really respect. And he said, Donald Trump will be the worst thing that ever happened to the immigration restriction movement.

34:37And I was like, what the fuck are you talking about? And he was like, listen, guys, what's going to happen is they're going to go full retard. They're going to do it in the dumbest way possible. And they're going to polarize the public against all of this. And I was like, yeah, maybe it's valid, but look at all these other Republicans. They're all pro-amnesty and all of that. And now I'm starting to think he might be right. But, I mean, it took years, I guess, for him to be validated. Sort of like what's happening with tariffs. In some ways, yeah, you're right. In some ways, it's like maybe this was the enemy of the cause all along.

35:04The counter for what they would say is nobody else has the balls to just do it. He's in his second term. He's got three and a half more years to go. You can get a lot of million people out of this country and nobody else will do it. And then from that point forward, it's a future question. I guess I could see both sides, but, you know, as somebody who generally like kind of likes to see some sort of consensus on the issue, I don't see it coming anytime soon. On this in this particular poll, he only gets 35 percent approval of his handling. Like you said, it's still it's a leading outlier. 35 percent.

35:31And among independents, you have doing the math. I'm bad at math. Sixty nine percent disapproval. Forty five percent of them strongly disapprove. So almost half of independents say they strongly disapprove. And then an additional 24 percent says they disapprove, but not strongly. And then you only have 28 percent who approve this again. Independence that I'm talking about here who say they approve. So, you know, it's obviously highly polarized. Republicans are very content, very happy with the immigration policy. Democrats are 81 percent say they strongly disapprove. But that number from independents to me was really quite significant.

36:12And, you know, they're not letting up. They just passed the one big beautiful bill, which is going to surge massive amounts of resources into ICE. And so, you know, you're talking about whatever we're seeing now times however much. Now, I will say these organizations are often incompetent. I think they'll have a hard time hiring and deploying. And, you know, a bunch of the money will just be basically like stolen by private prison contractors who never really deliver what they promise and other consultants, etc. So there will be some discount on the money that's actually allocated. But they're about to have all of the resources in the world to do whatever they want.

36:53Didn't catch the latest Roland Martin Unfiltered podcast? Here's what you missed. And the argument is, do you want to win? If you don't win, you have no power. It's real. Those are the very people who I always say vote against their own economic interests, and they complain about the very thing they're receiving. It's raw. I knew that the issue of transgender athletes was not going well with a lot of black men. Roland Martin unfiltered. I went off. I said, this is exactly what I'm talking about. Y 'all gonna scream at Chanel, but you don't want to see a black luxury company in the same vein. Catch Roland Martin's daily commentary on the Black Information Network.

37:37Twelve seats. Those are moving south. So if you Democrats, you don't wait to 2030. You better be hitting the ground going hard in the south now. And download Roland Martin Unfiltered on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. College football will hijack your weekend, ruin your sleep, and break your heart. And that's why we make the Solid Verbal College Football Show. I'm Ty Hildenbrandt. He's Dan Rubenstein. How's it going? Every week, we preview the games that matter, sort through the biggest storylines, and tell you what to watch before kickoff. There's a lot to keep track of.

38:14Who's for real? Which upset is hiding in plain sight? And which storyline is about to take over your group chat? And when the games are over, join us in the aftermath, too. We're going to react to what happened, talk about the biggest results. Of course, we'll cover the playoff picture and all the little details you might have missed while flipping between like 12 games at once. Whether you know every coach and coordinator or just want to understand why everybody is yelling. We're here to help make sense of the madness. Listen to the Solid Verbal College Football Show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

38:54On Big Lives, we take a single cultural icon. People like Jane Fonda, George Michael, Richard Pryor. And we pull apart the story behind the image. And we do this by digging through the BBC's vast archive. We're talking iconic moments in broadcast history. I'm not just a boxer. I'm educated. I can talk all week on millions of subjects. And forgotten interviews that change how we see these giants of our culture. Well, if changing the system from the ground up is revolutionary, then I'm revolutionary. We're here for the messy, the brilliant, the human version of our heroes. I mean, when I go on stage, I like to dress as slutty as possible because it makes me dance better for some reason.

39:36I'm Emmanuel Jochi. I'm Kai Wright. And this is Big Lives. Listen to Big Lives on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get podcasts.

40:09comments here from we're going to play a little bit of Maxwell Frost about the truly abhorrent conditions in which people are being held within this facility. Let's go and take a listen to a little bit of what he had to say. They opened the door. There was about six security guards standing there kind of pushing us back, but we could see in and we could hear everybody. And when those doors opened, you know, what I saw made my heart sink. I saw 32 people per cage, about six cages in the one tent. I saw a lot of people, young men who looked like me and people who are my age, people were yelling, help me, help me.

40:49I heard in the back someone say, I'm a U.S. citizen. And as we were walking away, they started chanting, leave it that, leave it that, leave it that freedom. And in looking into these cages, you could see, of course, it was warm and hot within the tent. People were sweating. Some people had taken off the top of their clothing because it was just so hot. Some of them were drenched in sweat. The food we saw is not enough food. They're being fed essentially a small sandwich and a bag of chips. And not just that, but the conditions outside, of course, it's blazing hot. And the fact that the cage comes from the toilet number one not everyone's going to be able to drink as much water as they'd like to because of that inconvenience but also it's gross and it's disgusting and this is where people are being held so we've seen um reporting indicating you know backing up what he's saying there we've seen reporting of um worms in the food we've seen reporting of toilets that don't flush and sewage um on the floor insect infestations and um the like.

41:59And then you ask yourself, Sogher, to your point, OK, well, who were they sending there? Because this is another instance where we were told this is only for the worst of the worst. Right. Let's put this up on the screen. Miami Herald has been doing some great work on this. Hundreds at Alligator Alcatraz actually have no criminal charges whatsoever. So, again, you know, similar to what we saw when they sent immigrants to Guantanamo Bay, similar to what we saw when they sent immigrants to Seacott, in spite of the representation that this would be the worst of the worst. In fact, you're sending many hundreds of hundreds of people here who have no criminal charges in the United States whatsoever.

42:37And, you know, it's completely at odds with the portrayal here. And some of the people who have been picked up, it's just like, oh, they, you know, how to traffic ticket, something of that nature. And I think Maxwell Frost in that particular side said that he heard people saying, hey, I'm a U.S. citizen. And, you know, it's very maybe, maybe not. But it's just you can't trust this administration to handle any of this in anything approaching an appropriate manner, and they will just lie about the types of people that they are ultimately picking up here. Yeah, it is difficult. I mean, I am very torn.

43:09I'm somebody who's, I mean, I don't think it's, you would admit, you know, you would admit this. I'm radical on the issue. At the end of the day, I don't believe in exclusion. If you came here illegally, I think you should go. I mean, I'm fine with, you know, prioritization and all of that, but I don't know. I personally just get very, you know, annoyed. I mean, do we have any of that raid footage of the California thing? That's the perfect example to me. Like you have a weed farm, a weed farm, which is still federally illegal, where you have people who are illegal working there, nine of whom are unaccompanied minors, many of whom almost all are illegal, so that people in California can get high and they are working at like slave wages.

43:50It's like, how is that a reasonable system. Like, why is the governor of California and other standing up and saying, actually, this is all totally above board? I'm like, no, this is disgusting. It's bad for the kids. And then it's like the only time anybody expresses any outrage is whenever you send people who are being exploited here back to where they came from. It's like the whole system is all fucked up. But people only care when they're removed. The status quo seems like fine. I mean, I don't think you support that. But, you know, functionally, that's where the Democratic Party was on the immigration issue.

44:19All this slave labor is totally okay. All of this unchecked illegal migration, you know, you have children basically working in these like marijuana fields so that rich yuppies in Venice beach can get high. I'm like, I'm sorry. That's a gross like order to the way that our whole society works. And it's like, we only care whenever somebody goes and like, you know, either takes care or arrests them. Some of these people have like serious criminal charges. That's where, you know, everyone's like, Oh, the cruelty of this. Is there no cruelty in the fact that these kids are working to pick weed so that rich yuppies or whatever can get high.

44:53I think that's cruel. I think it's bad. Why did nobody say anything when they were being sent here across the border? What kind of parent is sending their kid illegally across the border to go work in a weed field? And yet, oh, these asylum and all. It's like, no, I'm sorry. That's bullshit. Nobody cared. I don't really personally care what type of farm it is. But I mean, here's the thing, though, Zabar, is that you're expressing a view of caring about cruelty or human rights and dignity. And so when you see someone who's being exploited by a system where, you know, they're like these farms are probably are labor abuses, hiring literal children, which is outrageous.

45:31Like they should be prosecuted for that. No doubt about it. But then you're taking the farm worker and you're shipping them to, you know, a place like Alligator Alcatraz or just like out of the country, no due process to be abused and effectively tortured and held in completely inhumane conditions. like that is certainly not a reflection of any sort of concern for humanity or dignity. I don't disagree per se, but it's like, look, it's a stop off on the way for deportation. You are not supposed to be here. Like at the end of the day, you came here illegally. There are consequences for breaking the law.

46:04And there's also this idea that there's like a statute of limitations. It's like, oh, but they've been here for years. It's like, OK, I mean, you came here. You shouldn't have been here. You're working illegally. Of course, you're liable to consequences for your actions. It's like we take the agency away from these people and from the system. But I think you have to acknowledge, though, I mean, the point of a place like Alligator Alcatraz is a demonstration of horror. I mean, that's what it is intended to do. And that's the reason also for like, you know, there's a freaking like helicopter that landed in the field to deliver farmry, you know, and they're coming in in these armored vehicles and with, you know, the military gear and all of these sorts of things.

46:44Like it's meant to terrorize. That is the goal. It's meant to terrorize. And so while I think it's certainly reasonable, okay, well, how many people can we absorb and what's the appropriate level? These are questions nations have to ask themselves. I don't think that many people find it acceptable that someone whose only crime was, which is not even a felony or whatever, it's a civil infraction, but whose only crime is crossing the border illegally and who has been living, working, doing the right thing, et cetera, that a punishment commensurate with that is being like put into these horrific conditions in whether it's alligator Alcatraz or the other detention facilities also have, you know, quite abhorrent conditions as well.

47:26How do you deport somebody? Well, I mean, I think, but that's a reasonable question. Just tell them to leave. They're not going to leave. They don't leave. But actually, in reality, the number of people who do show up for their court hearings is quite high. So that's number one. But you're talking about asylum. I'm talking about people who are already here. But number two, you know, another option is we have these things called ankle bracelets where you are monitored and tracked. And so it doesn't require, like, insane cruelty. So, you know, your working assumption here is that they're trying to, like, in a good faith way.

47:57I don't even know if you really believe this, but in a good faith way, deal with this logistical challenge. No, no, I'm not talking about that. And I don't think that they are dealing in a good faith way with this logistical challenge. I think there are many other routes, even if you wanted to accomplish the goal, which is not a goal I agree with, that would not entail mass institutionalized cruelty. But they intentionally choose the mass institutionalized cruelty and don't look for any solution that would probably create an even more rapid outcome. But that does not include that sort of horror because the horror and the terror, that is a core part of their goal here.

48:33I don't disagree that it's a part of a strategy to get them to go. But it's also like, you know, we do this for criminals too. You know, if you, for example, drunk driving is not, I believe so, right? It's not a felony. Am I thinking, what am I getting wrong here? There's something about, I think it's, there's some type of whatever misdemeanor, like you'll lose your license. You get thrown in the drunk tank, no? Like you get to go to prison. Do you know why you do, or not prison, you get to go to jail for a couple of days. And yes, you eat a sandwich and a bag of chips. That's like standard prison food fair.

48:59Why? Because drunk driving is bad. You broke the law. It's also – I think it's not a class A felony or whatever. There are all kinds of things for which we have preemptive or we have punishment in which, yes, some of the treatment is part of the course to trying to discourage to make sure that you don't participate in this illegal activity. And like that's what I'm saying is you come here illegally. You take advantage of the United States, the openness of the United States of America. There's also this talk about paying taxes. It's total bullshit. No, it's not. Yes, absolutely. Oh, yes. No, it's not.

49:30Vast numbers of 30 million illegals are filing their income taxes? Yes, actually. No, no, no, no. There is a significant tax contribution from undocumented immigrants. Once again, if you look at that statistically compared to Gen Pop, and then also, even if that is the case, you're not supposed to be here at a principal level. And if we add up all the welfare and Medicaid and hospital bills of all these people in our society, I'd be willing to bet it's still a net negative on a social basis. Just purely net in, net out. You can make GDP arguments in other cases. But it just comes back to like, yes, there are consequences for breaking the law.

50:04If you want to change that law, be my guest. Biden, Obama, all these people had multiple houses of Congress and they never did so. As long as the system is currently constituted, you're here illegally. There are consequences for doing that. Yes, I think the government in many cases has both lied and gone too far under the Trump administration. But the core goal is still one that I think most people would want of some sort of order. and the fact that we have to know who you are here. And yes, that if you came here illegally under false pretenses, at the very least, the government needs to check you out and we need to figure out what's going on.

50:38And my belief is you should be sent back to where you came from. And perhaps in the future, we can have some sort of reapply. Now, many people will disagree with me on that subject, but I just, I don't, I really don't know how you could have lived through the Biden administration and the way that the permission structure came for what eight to 10 million people flow illegally into our country and not believe in a serious effort to deal with this at a law and order level. I really just don't know how we can still come down to compassion and aside. It's like these people are the biggest abusers of U.S.

51:09asylum law in all of history. They're all economic migrants. They'll admit it if you ask them. And it's like we're just supposed to let them in and give them citizenship apparently because they, quote, want a better life. You can want a better life wherever you are. There are people all over the world who want a better life. Just because you have the proximity to walk into the United States of America, you're not special. I mean, Sagar, obviously I disagree with you on the policy. But I think what the, you know, punishment throughout history for that has been has been getting deported back to your home country.

51:40Not to some random third country where you may be in danger and don't speak the language and don't know anyone and have never been. not being disappeared, which is what's happening without even any record, into someplace that has been set up to intentionally be cruel and horrific and deny you basic human rights, not to be disappeared into a foreign slave labor gulag like Seacott, the idea, okay, you're here illegally. You're going to go. The country has voted, and they've decided we only want a certain level of undocumented population. You're going back to your home country. That's been the idea of the way that this ultimately goes.

52:14But what do you do when the home country Because they don't want them back. But that's not even true. What are we supposed to do? But that's not even true in many instances. So, for example, Venezuela. Yeah. There were ongoing negotiations. Venezuela was accepting immigration return, like deportation returns flights into that country. So, you know, you can't. But not all. You also can't act like the Trump administration has no power here to, like, make a deal and do some diplomacy to be able to effectuate those returns. But, you know, just on the on the numbers of how people feel about this now, and it's actually not that different from how they felt about it when Trump was running on mass deportation.

52:51Seventy eight percent say that they would like to see a pathway to citizenship for immigrants who are living in the U.S. illegally if they meet certain requirements. So there is a sort of very widespread acceptance of immigration, of being an important part of the fabric and character of this nation, of the sense of like, hey, if you're here and you did the right thing and you were working and you didn't do anything wrong, like, we should give you a chance to become a citizen. That is a very popular and widespread view. And like I was saying, that number has gone up. But actually in 2024, it was still 70 percent who felt that way.

53:28So I think people are very on board with like, OK, you're a criminal, you're in a gang, whatever. Yes, let's get you out of here. But the reason that there's been such a backlash is when you go much beyond that, it does start to rub up against people's sense of actually what America is and certainly the way that they want to see people treated by their government, whether they're citizen or not. Look, that's just going to be a disagreement. You broke the law. You came here illegally just because you happened to be here and allegedly didn't commit a crime except for the first crime that you did by entering our country, get a free pass.

53:56It's crazy to me. All right. It's an insult to the millions of people who spent – people like my parents and others who came here legally, spent thousands of dollars of their own money going through the process. It's a pain in the ass. Ask anybody who's ever done it. I don't know because somebody gets to walk here and then be basically low-wage labor. They're allowed a special process just by being here long enough. It's preposterous. I mean and it's one of those – look, I'll keep making that case forever up until the day they do eventually pass amnesty. I don't think there's any basic fairness.

54:23It is completely preferential treatment. It is just like, I don't know. We've debated this forever. Yeah. One last news item I do want to slip in here on immigration. Let's put D5 up on the screen. There was a significant court decision in California halting what they're describing as indiscriminate immigration stops in L.A. and beyond. And basically what a judge found here is that a lot of credible evidence that they are just basically racially profiling. You know, roll up on the Home Depot, see some Latino like Spanish speakers and just arrest them. And we've got a number of instances. One that was a part of this case in particular was actually a car wash.

55:01And the guy was like, I'm an American citizen. Here is my identification. And they were like, you don't have your passport. So that's not good enough. So we're arresting you. And they had other instances, too, where, you know, I mean, this seems to be the sort of approach of just like we're going to go into places where we think that undocumented immigrants congregate. We're going to check out whether you're speaking Spanish and what your skin tone is, etc. And we're going to arrest you if we have any suspicion whatsoever, not based on anything other than basically like ethnicity and the location that you are.

55:32And you have a judge who says that's racial profiling. You can't do that. That's against the Fourth Amendment. Didn't catch the latest Roland Martin Unfiltered podcast? Here's what you missed. And the argument is, do you want to win? If you don't win, you have no power. It's real. Those are the very people who I always say vote against their own economic interests, and they complain about the very thing they're receiving. It's raw. I knew that the issue of transgender athletes was not going well with a lot of black men. Roland Martin unfiltered. I went off. I said, this is exactly what I'm talking about.

56:11Y 'all gonna scream at Chanel, but you don't want to see a black luxury company in the same vein. Catch Roland Martin's daily commentary on the Black Information Network. Twelve seats. Those are moving south. So if you Democrats, you don't wait to 2030. You better be hitting the ground going hard in the south now. And download Roland Martin Unfiltered on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. College football will hijack your weekend, ruin your sleep, and break your heart. And that's why we make the Solid Verbal College Football Show. I'm Ty Hildenbrand. He's Dan Rubenstein.

56:50How's it going? Every week, we preview the games that matter, sort through the biggest storylines, and tell you what to watch before kickoff. There's a lot to keep track of. Who's for real? Which upset is hiding in plain sight? And which storyline is about to take over your group chat? And when the games are over, join us in the aftermath, too. We're going to react to what happened. Talk about the biggest results. Of course, we'll cover the playoff picture and all the little details you might have missed while flipping between like 12 games at once. Whether you know every coach and coordinator or just want to understand why everybody is yelling.

57:28We're here to help make sense of the madness. Listen to the Solid Verbal College Football Show on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That call was really pivotal for me. Hey, it's Emily Tisch-Sussman, and this season on She Pivots, the podcast where women share bold career moves and personal turning points that changed everything. I sit down with culture-shifting women who share their pivots, like Paralympian Allie Truitt. I was like, I'm a month out from a shark attack. There's no way in 11 months I'm making the Paralympics. Advocate Elizabeth Smart. I still feel that drive that I can still make a difference.

58:05So I'm going to keep going. Celebrity chef Carla Hall. Was that scary to walk away from such a stable career after just two years? No, I was more afraid of being unhappy than I was broke in a dead end job that I didn't enjoy. And feminist legend Gloria Steinem. All of us were trying to express women's real lives. We need a meeting place of our own. And if I can contribute to that, I'd like to maintain that and leave this house for that purpose. Listen to She Pivots on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, so we're still, you know, focused on the aftermath of those horrific floods in Texas, which I actually don't think we've gotten to hear anything from you on.

58:49So I'm interested to get your take here as well. But we have a lot of questions about DOGE, cuts to National Weather Service and NOAA, the sort of pushing out of some key individuals who should have been involved in warning community members. So you have those, you know, was the forecast, could the forecast have been better if you didn't have the DOGE cuts? Could the warnings have been better if you didn't have the DOGE cuts? Those questions on the front end. Now you have a question now that you're into the recovery phase about FEMA's performance. And let me go ahead and put, guys, E2 up on the screen here.

59:20There's some significant reporting from The New York Times that FEMA failed to answer thousands of calls from flood survivors. And this is directly attributable to the fact that Kristi Noem at DHS, which runs FEMA, they allowed these call center contracts to lapse. They were not extended. And so you had a loss of personnel who would ordinarily be the ones fielding these calls. at this critical moment. And so you've just been hit with a flood. You've lost everything that you owned. You're trying to figure out, OK, how do I interface with the federal government, etc.? Most people, the way they go about trying to navigate that bureaucracy and that paperwork is through this hotline, these call centers.

1:00:04And they did not have nearly the personnel in place to handle this flood of calls. In addition, there was another program previously in place where FEMA would actually go door to door to people who had been impacted by any sort of natural disaster or flood in this instance and help them be able to organize their paperwork and figure out what they could apply for, etc. That program has also been cut. Kristi Noem under fire and trying to answer for this on Sunday shows. Let's go ahead and take a listen to what she had to say. A rule that you recently implemented, it reportedly requires that every FEMA contract, every grant over$100 ,000 be personally approved by you.

1:00:44Now, officials within the agency have told multiple news outlets that the policy led to a slower deployment of some FEMA resources, including urban search and rescue crews. So let me just ask you, did your policy delay some of the critical response resources on the ground in Texas? You know, those claims are absolutely false. Within just an hour or two after the flooding, we had resources from the Department to Homeland Security. They're helping those individuals in Texas. There were resources that were deployed, but I think the question revolves around were all of the necessary resources deployed.

1:01:20According to reports, multiple FEMA officials said you didn't approve the deployment of these FEMA search and rescue teams until Monday, which was 72 hours after the flood started. Nope, they were deployed immediately as soon as they were requested. When was the request put in and when did you approve it? And is this accurate that there's this$100 ,000 sign-off that you have to do? The$100 ,000 sign-off is for every contract that goes through the Department of Homeland Security. So you did implement that policy. That's an accountability on contracts that go forward. When did you get the request for these search and rescue teams and other resources?

1:01:57Immediately, they were immediately responding. Immediately, what day? Yes, and everyone will tell you. According to reports, they didn't arrive until Tuesday. will say, well, this is what I think is really unfortunate. And Zagra Trump, of course, had originally been really sort of ideologically opposed to FEMA at all, wanted to send all disaster relief to the states in the wake of this. He seems to be backing off of some of those more maximalist demands. But there's no question that FEMA and National Weather Service, they have been impacted by the doge cuts and some very serious questions being raised here about the impact that that had specifically in this horrific instance.

1:02:29You can roll the tape. What did I say after the airplane disaster? I was like, it's coming. I was like, you don't want to do it. It's the last part of the government that you actually want to cut. NOAA and the National Weather Service and all these other places. But, you know, eventually they just forget. And, you know, this also gets to a basic issue of competence. And I've also been thinking about this with regard to the Trump administration. I actually can't underestimate how incompetent they have acted. Just look at the last six months. Elon's in charge. Now he's not in charge. We have the tariffs on.

1:02:57We have the tariffs off. You can't look at the current cabinet, except in some very few cases, and be like, yeah, they've got it. Like, these are your guys who are really up to the job. I said that about Kirstie Noem, I remember. I was like, this lady was a governor of South Dakota, which, no offense, South Dakota, nobody even lives there. And now you're in charge of the largest law enforcement agency in the world. What? Like, in what possible way are you qualified? I don't think that she's handled herself all that way. But that's my point, right? I think, you know, that shit matters whenever you have a full-blown flood.

1:03:28By the way, you know, I've been to a lot of those areas. It's horrible. I mean, it's devastating, you know, what happened there. It's still like an open question. It's the whole National Weather Service. You know, I was reading the TikTok about the alert went out, but it was at 4 a.m. And there's open questions about the state agency. And, you know, there's some stuff here about the camp. What is it? Camp Mystic and how their actual, their permits kept getting delayed. It's a slow-rolling disaster, actually, if you kind of look at the background of the way this all happened. So nobody's, like, directly attributed.

1:03:58But let's not forget, I mean, it's July 14th. You and I are talking right now. When's hurricane season, people? You know, do the math. You are only one disaster away from a catastrophic news cycle for the administration. If there's even one way that the weather service and all those people didn't do something and there's another. I mean, remember Hurricane Sandy? That was a disaster. I mean, it came out of nowhere, billions of dollars in damage. FEMA shit the bed on that one too. I can't even really think of the last time they did a great job in response to a hurricane thing. And that becomes like serious political issue, which they can directly trace back to Doge.

1:04:33They have them literally bragging about it on camera. And especially now with, you know, now that the fact that the Doge project has basically been a complete failure, they just open themselves up for any future airline disaster, any future storm, any future hurricane. And then they don't have the best and the brightest who are in charge right now. And to that point, they had someone who had emergency management experience in place at FEMA. Originally, they had a guy named Cameron Hamilton. He was a Navy SEAL, former combat medic, former director of the Emergency Medical Services Division at the Department of Homeland Security.

1:05:08He got fired a month ago because he dared to testify to Congress that he thought FEMA should continue to exist. So he got fired and they put in his place this guy named David Richardson, who there was all kinds of reporting. He has no background in this whatsoever. There was all kinds of reporting about how he didn't know anything. He was like, oh, when's hurricane season or what even is hurricane season? I mean, just a complete and utter moron, which is why you haven't seen him at all. I mean, think about the like, you know, good job Brownie situation. At least Brownie was out there trying to do something.

1:05:39This guy, we don't even see him. He doesn't even exist because even this administration is smart enough to realize like, oh, it's going to be a train wreck if we put this dude down there because he doesn't know shit about shit. So that's the guy who you have running FEMA. I mean, FEMA, I'm sure, has his problems. I have no doubt about it that you could do a better job with disaster recovery. But like you are just making it so much worse and degrading its capabilities in ways that are blatantly obvious. Not only do you have this call center fiasco, but you also had some reporting, independent reporting as well, about how the number of FEMA staffers that were on the ground were way next to nothing compared to what it would have been ordinarily in previous circumstances.

1:06:20So, yeah, I mean, it's just this is an area where it felt like during all the Doge chainsaw madness, they just thought that nothing was ever going to matter. You know, it just was this sense of unreality. Like, oh, we can just slash and burn wherever and whatever without any regard. Like, not even trying to do it in an intelligent way. And that there's never going to be any impact from that. And this is, like, in the most horrific way possible. You've got 130 plus dead now and 160 still missing. Reality hitting you in the face of, like, no, actually, sometimes government functions are literally life and death.

1:06:53Oh, absolutely. I mean, I, you know, it didn't take a genius or anybody even remotely familiar with everything. And I think, yeah, I think Doge will continue to be a noose around the neck of the administration for the next four years. You're just waiting. One disaster. I mean, look at the Air India crash. I mean, that came out of nowhere. You know, Boeing 787 crashed in the middle of a city according to pilot error. I mean, imagine if something like that happened here today. I literally, on my way here, I saw a plane. It was maybe like 20, 30 feet above me as it was landing over Ronald Reagan.

1:07:22And I was like, I don't know about this, man. No offense to Air India, but don't fly Air India. Oh, no. Offense to Air India. It's scary. Offense. Sue me. You're the worst airline. Some of my scariest flight experiences are on Air India. So avoid. Sorry, Air India. You guys got to up your game. It's terrible. Anybody fly Air India? I mean, maybe if they have a deal. But honestly, at this point, I'm not flying at any time soon. Anyways, thank you guys so much for watching. We appreciate you. We'll see you tomorrow.

1:08:27We'll be right back. You get your podcasts. In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Patra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. Dear honeys, this is goodbye. By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland. Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? Listen to Death of an Artist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:09:24Sometimes our biggest decisions, without us even realizing it, aren't driven by what we truly want, but by what will prevent us from feeling lonely or being alone. Listen to The Psychology of Your 20s on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.