Democracy Now! Audio - Democracy Now! 2025-07-15 Tuesday

Episode Date: July 15, 2025

Headlines for July 15, 2025; Beaten to Death: Eyewitnesses Describe Brutal Killing of U.S. Citizen by Israeli Settlers in West Bank; “Gator Grift”: Hundreds Caged in Inhumane Conditions with No Due Process at Florida Immigrant Jail; “Purge Palantir”: Day of Action Protests Firm’s Role in Gov’t Surveillance, ICE & Genocide in Gaza

From New York, this is Democracy Now. I've stated that our beloved Seif Allah-Mussalam, nicknamed Seif, was brutally beaten to death in our family's land by illegal Israeli settlers who were attempting to steal it. Israeli settlers surrounded Sif for over three hours as paramedics attempted to reach him. But the mob of settlers blocked the ambulance in paramedics from providing

life-saving aid. Israeli settlers kill another American citizen in the occupied West Bank. The settlers also shot to death a 23-year-old Palestinian in the same attack. We'll go to the West Bank for the

latest. Then who exactly is being held at the so-called alligator alcatraz. And who's in charge? Hundreds of men who are being held there have no criminal charges against them. That's according to a new Miami-Herald investigation. We'll speak to the reporter. And we'll talk to Florida Congress member Maxwell Frost, who just toured the Everglades jail. They didn't let us walk fully in. They opened the door and let us look in and people were yelling at us. Help me. Help me. I heard somebody in the back yell. I'm a U.S. citizen. We're going to look into that. But something that really struck me is as we were

walking away from those cages, they started chanting, leave it that, leave it that, leave it that freedom. And purge Pellantier, that was the banner held by protesters across the country, from Seattle to Palo Alto, Denver, to New York. The technology company they USA uses AI to supercharge surveillance from ICE to the Israeli military. We want Palantir. We want to hear. Out of New York City. Out of New York City.

All that and more. Coming up. Welcome to Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman. The U.S. Supreme Court's cleared the way for President Trump dismantled the Department of Education without congressional approval. The unsigned ruling paves the way for Trump to lay off 1,400 workers at the agency. The court's three liberal justices dissented.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the decision will, quote, unleash untold harm, delaying or denying educational opportunities and leaving students to suffer from discrimination, sexual assault, and other civil rights violations without the federal resources, Congress intended. So Tamayor went on to write, the majority is either willfully blind to the implications of its ruling or naive. Either way, the threat to our Constitution's separation of powers is grave, she wrote. In other education news, 24 states in the District of Columbia have sued the Trump administration for freezing nearly $7 billion in previously approved education grants. Part of the funding would have helped schools offer free or low-cost after-school programs

and help train and retain teachers. The Washington Post is reporting the Trump administration's revoking access to bond hearings for people who entered the U.S. through non-approved channels, ordering officers to detain them for the length of their removal proceedings, a process which can take months or even years. The rule will apply to people who've recently entered the U.S. as well as those who've been here already for decades. Immigration expert Aaron Reiklin-Milnick asserted the policy is based on faulty interpretation of existing law, warning, quote, if immigration judges begin to adopt this interpretation nationwide, it will mean even less due process.

It will mean more people flown around the country and jailed far from lawyers, loved ones and hope. And that's the goal, he said. Trump's massive tax and spending package allocates $45 billion to expand immigrant prisons and is set to nearly double ICE's current detention capacity, locking up some 100,000 people a day. In more immigration news, an ICE memo confirms the Trump administration plans to deport more immigrants to third countries where they have no ties. The plan could see people forcibly transferred with as little as six hours notice to countries that have not provided assurances that they will be safe from persecution or torture. People being sent to countries where diplomats have offered assurances of safety

could be removed with no advance notice. In other immigration news, an appeals court Monday, briefly extended temporary protected status or TPS for some 12,000 Afghan nationals living in the U.S. just hours before it was set to expire. Both the Trump administration and plaintiffs have been asked to submit briefs this week. The United Nations Development Program, the UNDP, has issued a dire plea for Israel to allow more fuel into Gaza. In a statement, the agency said, quote, without fuel, the lifelines will vanish for 2.1 million people in Gaza, unquote. Meanwhile, the UN Refugee Agency, Unwa, said, Today, one in ten children in Gaza seen at UN clinics since 2024 have been malnourished

and that malnutrition rates are growing amidst Israel's siege. This all comes as Israel continues to launch attacks across Gaza, including targeting a tent housing, a displaced family in Khan Yunus, Belal Al-Adluni described how the attack killed much of his brother's family. They were martyred inside their tent. Osam was staying there with his wife and children. They targeted the tent. No one survived except his eldest son, Muhammad,

who was outside filling water near the tent. The rest were martyred. Osam was martyred, as well as the eight-month pregnant wife, Sa'ad. His 14-year-old son, Abdur Rahman, and his daughters, Feruz and Shahdin. In other news from Gaza, the news outlet 972 is revealed, Israel's increasingly using grenade-firing drones to enforce evacuation orders. Israeli soldiers admitted to 972 they deliberately targeted civilians so others will, quote, learn not to return to their homes.

One soldier said using drones to target Palestinians was, quote, like a video game. In news from Syria, a ceasefire has been declared in the southern province of Swayda, we're fighting between local Sunni-Bedwin tribes and Drew's armed groups killed as many as 100. On Monday, Israel launched air strikes on Syrian forces being sent into the region. Under the pretext of protecting the Druze, Israel has repeatedly bombed Syria in recent months. On Monday, Israel also bombed areas of the Bekha Valley in eastern Lebanon. Israel targeted what it claimed to be Hezbollah training camps. During a meeting with NATO Secretary General Margaruta, President Trump formally announced plans to send billions of dollars worth of weapons

to Ukraine, including Patriot missiles. Trump said the U.S. would sell the missiles and weapons to NATO members, which would then send them to Ukraine. Trump also threatened new sanctions and tariffs against Russia if it did not agree to a peace deal. We're very, very unhappy with them, and we're going to be doing very severe tariffs if we don't have a deal in 50 days, tariffs at about 100%. You'd call them secondary tariffs. You know what that means.

But today we're going to talk about something else. And as you know, we've spent $350 billion approximately on this war with Russia and Ukraine. And we'd like to see it end. In Sudan, a human rights group is accusing the paramilitary rapid support forces of killing some 300 people, including children and pregnant women, when they raided and burned villages in the state of North Cardiffon over the weekend. The devastating conflict in Sudan is displaced. million people and killed at least 40,000, though some estimates put that number at more than 150,000. Earlier this year, the Sudanese doctor's syndicates said over half a million

infants have died in Sudan due to malnutrition since the war broke out in April 2023. U.S. Attorney General Pambandi Friday fired the Justice Department's top ethics lawyer, as well as at least 20 other Justice Department staffers who were linked to former special counsel Jack Smith's investigations into Donald Trump. Joseph Terrell had been at the Department of Justice for 16 years and oversaw the ethics staff. He said he was not given a reason for his removal. Dorell was tasked with advising Bondi, FBI director Cash Patel, and other top officials on conflicts of interest disclosures and gifts. Meanwhile, Reuters reports 69 lawyers or roughly two-thirds of the Justice Department unit charged with defending Trump administration,

policies in court have quit. Some lawyers told Reuters they could not go ahead with defending policies that were not legally justifiable. The Pentagon's announced multi-million dollar contracts with a number of AI companies, including a $200 million contract with Elon Musk's XAI. The deal comes just days after Musk's chatbot Grok unleashed anti-Semitic rats praising Hitler. On Monday, activists gathered to protest in front of Palantir offices in multiple cities, including Seattle, Palo Alto, Denver, and here in New York. NYPD arrested at least four people as demonstrators called out the tech giant for, quote, turbocharging ICE deportations, complicity in the genocide of Palestinians, and expanding surveillance of every U.S. resident, unquote. In Denver, former Palantir worker Juan Sebastian Pinto addressed a crowd in front of the company. Colorado headquarters.

Francesca Albanese, an incredible representative for human rights at the UN, an independent observer who recently released a report accusing multiple American companies of participating in the prolongation of genocide in Palestine for profit. Now they are turning inwards. These are companies not only like Palantir, but IBM and Google, meta. Cisco, Amazon, all of them contributing to creating these enormous dragnets that allow people to be targeted for their personal data, for their family connections, for their beliefs, in ways they don't even understand. And they're bringing these same kinds of targeting technologies here to America. We'll hear voices from the New York City Palantir protests later in the broadcast and speak with a wired reporter.

On Monday, faith leaders, including Bishop William Barber, led demonstrations in 11 southern states to protest President Trump's so-called big, beautiful budget. Protesters carried caskets to the local offices of Republican lawmakers to represent the tens of thousands of people who could die as a result of the bill's cuts to Medicaid and other programs. Bishop Barber spoke in Memphis. This is the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the poor to the United States. the rich since chattel slavery. This slashing of services is going to cause economic insecurity and preventable deaths. The New York Times has revealed United Health has launched an aggressive campaign to silence critics following the assassination of its chief executive Brian Thompson last year.

In recent months, the health insurance company has targeted news outlets, journalists, a filmmaker, a doctor, and others. In one instance, Amazon and Vimeo removed a documentary critical of the health insurance industry. United Health also reportedly threatened legal action against a Texas doctor who posted a TikTok video describing how she had to interrupt a surgery to take a call from the company about the patient's insurance coverage. And disgrace former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has formally announced he'll run for mayor as an independent, losing to Zoran Mamdani in the Democratic primary. Mamdani, who's a Democratic socialist, shocked the political establishment by receiving more votes than any other mayoral candidate in New York City's primary election history. On Mondays or on Mamdani posted a link, seeking donations under Cuomo's announcement on

X. Mondani's post quickly outpaced the number of likes and reshares on Cuomo's original post. Current New York City Mayor Eric Adams is also running in November as an independent in what could be a five-way race. And those are some of the headlines. This is Democracy Now. Democracy Now.org, the War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman in New York, joined by Juan Gonzalez and Chicago. Hi, Juan. Hi, Amy, and welcome to all of our listeners and viewers across the country and around the world. We begin today's show looking at the rise of Israeli settler violence against Palestinians across the occupied West Bank. The family of 20-year-old, America, America. American, Sefola Musilat, is demanding justice and for the U.S. government to lead an investigation

into his killing by Israeli settlers. Musalat, known as safe, to his family and friends, was in the West Bank from Florida to visit his relatives in the village of Amazra Ash Sharquia, northeast of Ramallah. He was born and grew up in Port Charlotte, Florida, and worked at his father's ice cream and dessert shop, which they'd recently opened in Tampa. On Friday, Musa Lett and another Palestinian, 23-year-old Mohamed al-Shalabi, were attacked by a group of Israeli settlers while they were a neighboring town of Xinjil, where their families owned farmland. And an area Israeli settlers have recently repeatedly targeted with violent attacks, with Palestinians describing being terrorized as Israelis have seized agricultural land on a Palestinian farm. In response, residents of nearby villages have organized to protect the land. On Friday, when SAFE joined them, Israeli settlers brutally beat him and fatally shot Al-Shalabi.

Eyewitnesses said at least two of the settlers were armed with M-16 assault rifles and wore army pants and described how the settlers surrounded SAFE and others also attacking them with batons. Following news of the attack, SAFE's cousin Diana read a statement from the family. We are devastated that our beloved Saif Allah-Mu-salat, nicknamed SAIF, was brutally beaten to death in our family's land by illegal Israeli settlers who were attempting to steal it. Israeli settlers surrounded SAIF for over three hours as paramedics attempted to reach him, but the mob of settlers blocked the ambulance in paramedics from providing life-saving aid. After the mob of Israeli settlers cleared, hours later,

Saif's younger brother rushed to carry him to the ambulance. Saif was killed and died before reaching the hospital. On Sunday, hundreds of Palestinians gathered for a funeral procession in the West Bank for Saif Musilat and Mohamed al-Shalabi. Saif's father, Kamel, traveled from Florida to attend his son's funeral. Saif's family says they haven't heard. from U.S. officials. In a statement to Al Jazeera Friday, the State Department said it, quote, has no higher priority than the safety and security of U.S. citizens overseas. We are aware of

reports of the death of a U.S. citizen in the West Bank. When a U.S. citizen dies overseas, we stand ready to provide consular services, the U.S. State Department said. Haaretz reported, there are currently no Israelis detained in connection with Saif's killing. He's at least the seventh U.S. citizen to be killed by Israeli soldiers or settlers since 2022 with advocates condemning the U.S. as an action and fighting for accountability, including in the killings of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akla, May 11, 22, fatally shot by Israeli soldiers while she reported on an Israeli raid outside the Janine refugee camp. and Turkish American activists Aisunur Izgi, who was shot dead by Israeli forces while taking part in a weekly protest against illegal Israeli settlements in the town of Bata in 2024. Meanwhile, Al Jazeera reports Israeli violence has killed some 1,000 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since October 23.

For more, we're joined by two guests. In Yaffa, Jonathan Pollock is a long-time anti-Zionist activists and co-factual. founder of anarchists against the wall. He was injured Friday by Israeli settlers in the West Bank town of Sindhiel when protesting just before Safe was killed. And in the occupied West Bank, we're joined by Nizar Milbus, a distant relative, a close friend of Seifola Mussolet's family. Nizar Milbus is in the village of Amasra Ash Sharquia, northeast of Ramallah. We thank you both for being with us, Jonathan. As I look at you, you have a black eye. Can you describe what happened that day leading up to the Israeli settlers beating safe to death?

I can tell what I've witnessed, which is somewhat limited, because I was attacked and detained very soon after everything began. And myself and another young Palestinian men were helping an older injured Palestinian men evacuating him away from where the sectors were attacking people. At some point, the sectors descended on us from above with batons and just beat us up. the young Palestinian men that was with me more than myself, and myself as well is very evident from the bruises on my face. It's important to note that there were Israeli soldiers there. They literally pride us from the settlers' hands while they attacked us. Well, we were on the floor and they were on top of it.

despite that they've chosen to detain and arrest us and do nothing with the assailants despite having seen everything and despite having been there we were detained there for a long time before being taken to the police station and what we saw at some point is that all the sectors were present which were at least two dozens, entered their cars all at once and drove in sight. Like, while the soldiers see them, drove into the village. No one had, none of the soldiers have thought of stopping them or arresting them

or doing anything else to prevent the lynch that took place afterwards, in which Sefallah and Mohammed were killed. Later on that day, when we were already down the road still detained, we at some point saw a convoy of at least a dozen Settler cars filled with people passing after the lynch, passing by Israeli law enforcement, like military border police, which is a paramilitary force of the Israeli police, and regular Israeli civilian police, none of them had dreamed of stopping these settlers who had just been involved in killing someone, at least some of them, and even asking for their

IDs. People often talk about settlers, about Israeli settlers, and extremist violence, and it's important to me to convey the message that this is a red herring. This isn't an issue of some extremists of outlaws acting outside the confines of the, of the, of Israeli society. The settlers and the military don't only work hand in hand like it was evident from how. how our assault was treated and how the whole incident was treated. They are part and parcel of implementing the same policy of the Israeli government, of the Israeli regime, the policy of ethnic cleansing in the West Bank, the policy of employing as much violence as possible in order to remove Palestinians from their land.

It was evident in the murder of Sefallah and of Muhammad on Tuesday. It is evident in the ethnic cleansing of dozens and dozens of Palestinian communities from the West Bank since October 7, 2023. And it is an extension of the genocide that Israel is perpetrating in the Gaza Strip. And the common denominator of all of these is that it is a one policy employed by the Israeli regime representative of Israeli public opinion, and that Israel is allowed to employ as much force as it wants, as much violence as it wants, in order to carry out these policies, in order to exterminate in the Gaza Strip and remove, physically remove Palestinians in the West Bank from their lands. And Jonathan, when you were held by the Israeli police, what happened? How long were you held and how were you treated by them?

This isn't the – I'm sorry to say, but this isn't the question. question isn't about me personally or how specific policemen or specific policemen, in plural, treated me. What I'm interested in talking about is the systemic nature of what is happening. So what is interesting in this case is that I was arrested with another Palestinian. While I was released very quickly, the Palestinian men was only released from court today. released by court from jail today. And this is another example of Israeli apartheid, where I myself was processed and tried under the Israeli Penal Code,

while my Palestinian comrade, the one who was arrested with me under the exact same circumstances, suspected of the exact same things, assaulted like exactly like I was, by the exact same settlers, the same settlers who later went on to kill uh stifallah and muhammad we were we were processed through two different legal systems the the israeli penal code for myself and israeli military law uh for for my Palestinian comrade so when we talk about how I was treated the important question to ask is why I was treated differently from my Palestinian comrade.

And what does that mean about the Israeli regime and the ability and need for it to be confronted not only from within, not only from Palestine, but also be forced into accountability from the outside? What support do Palestinians deserve? And how do we bring about a reality in which they are able to gain their liberation? I'd like to bring in, if possible, Nizar Milbus as well. Nazar, can you talk about when you learned of the attack

on friends and relatives of yours? Well, let me give a little bit of context. We have been, this area has been an area where it's called the Lbatten. It's on the outskirts of the town. And many of the landowners are American citizens. And we've been trying to reach, as you're aware, you know, the settlers are taken over not only

Area C, which to give, you know, your viewers some context, Area C was an area that was allocated during the Oslo Accords, which was supposed to be part of Palestinian state. But eventually, the Israeli government allocated it, which a lot of the land,

is strategic land. It has some of high altitudes, very important security installations, and, you know, a lot of fertile land, farmland. And so in the past, you know, I remember when I was living here in the 90s, when my parents brought us here to, you know, learn our culture and root us in the land, you know, they would build, you know, communities in these areas that were, you know, quite a distance from our towns. But after the Oslo Accords, the areas A and B, which are supposed to be under, you know, that agreement, is supposed to be civilly and security-wise administrative by the Palestinian Authority. So even under Israeli law, they're not even supposed to encroach

anywhere near this area. We've been hearing over the past since October 7th that, you know, they've been taking lands and encroaching and destroying property as they move towards area A and B. But what really caught our eye is that we never, which we never expected, given that our town and the surrounding towns have a large majority of residents that have American citizenship. Our town particular, the inhabitants, comprised of about 60% American citizens. And the land in this particular area where this attack has happened,

that happened on Friday, is on the outskirts of the town. It's an area that has beautiful scenery, very fertile. Many of the land owners, it's one of the last havens that Palestinians have left to enjoy their time, given that the fact that Palestinians are not allowed, to enter so-called Israel proper. They can't go to the beach. They can't go to the springs.

They can't visit the desert. So they're secluded in this area of the West Bank where they're not allowed to go to the area C, which is some of the most beautiful parts of the West Bank. And so this area, the Bhatton, it's one of the last havens that Palestinians have to go to get away from their daily live and the daily lives of living under occupation,

checkpoints, daily raids. And so what really, you know, got the galvanized the community is that this particular area, which we never, never thought that they would attempt to, you know, come to, they started coming over there and burning, you know, vacation homes, tents. that the townspeople put up to go, you know, every, you know, on Friday to go enjoy their time barbecue. And so this has been going on for several weeks. And so recently, you know, during the summer, a lot of the American citizens come to visit their property. So some of the townspeople had asked us to, you know, because the people here, the people here as, you know, echoing, you know, the other guests, the Palestinians here have zero rights.

Nazar, we just have a minute, and I wanted to get to the issue of, in fact, safe didn't die when he was being beaten by the Israeli settlers, but the fact that they wouldn't let the ambulance come, can you talk about that for a minute? I was just watching CNN. The CNN journalists, they smashed the window of his vehicle as they went in the area. Can you talk about what happened to safe at the very end? We just have a minute. So what happened is, you know, I was getting towards the end of what had occurred that led up to that. So we've been going the past every, you know, once or twice a week to reach the lands. And every week it's been different. The prior week, we had went with journalists.

We had the townspeople I called the American citizens to go to their lands and just peacefully go, just peacefully go on the lands without, no one is armed. At this particular time, some of the youth had ventured off into some of the areas, you know, because you have, you know, this is about around, you know, I believe 1,000 dunums of land. So some of the youth, including Seif and Muhammad, you know, as we were driving, you know, on the road, they kind of deviated and went, you. you know, to go to their, they're part of the land.

Very quickly about the ambulance. The ambulance, actually, when we were going up, ambulances were coming down and they, you know, they were being attacked, their windshield was smashed. You know, they were given no deference to, you know, ambulances, to, to depress. And safe, unfortunately, he would, you know, when he had tried to attempt his part of the land, we had a day they got ambushed a lot of times the settlers uh they they know the area pretty well and it seems like they they staged their you know they strategize their attacks and um you know he he seemed to be alone with maybe another another youth and they got to him i mean he didn't

attack them he wasn't armed and they just beat him uh the autopsy shows uh blood uh head trauma to the back of the head well and a couple of hits to the body Nazar, I want to thank you for being with us and our condolences. Nazar Milbus, a Palestinian-American, distant relative, close friend of Seifoloma Salat's family. Safe's dad has just come in from Florida. The funeral was held on Sunday. And Jonathan Pollock, anti-Zionist activist, co-founder of anarchists against the wall, injured on Friday the day that Safe was killed by Israeli settlers in the West Bank town of Sinjil when protesting.

When we come back, who's being held at that Everglades immigrant jail? Who's in charge of what the Republican politicians are calling alligator alcatraz? Hundreds have been held there with no criminal charges against them. That's according to a new Miami Herald investigation. We'll speak to the reporter as well as Florida Congress member Maxwell Frost, who just toured the Everglades jail. stay with us. At the edge of the world, where the factories are,

there's a burning of hatred that's crossing the lines. There's a blue white devil man Thinks he's king of the world He's bully a salesman Selling fear and hate Who do you think you are He plays us with his hate turns man against man, but it's really not a game.

And I pray to the demigod by Lala Downs in our Democracy Now studio. This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org. I'm Mimi Goodman with Juan Gonzalez. Democratic lawmakers are blasting the horrific conditions in Florida's new immigration jail in the Everglades, which Republican politicians are calling alligator alcatraz. after visiting the jail Saturday, the Democratic lawmakers say it should be shut down. The Miami Herald found hundreds of prisoners at the Everglades prison have no criminal records or charges, contradicting claims by the Trump administration that the people held there are the worst of the worst.

Meanwhile, critics have called the facility by other names, including concentration camp, internment camp, gator grift, A reference to how the Texas-based company, IRG Global Emergency Management, gave $10,000 to Florida's Republican Party just days before it received a no-bid $1.1 million contract with Florida to, quote, provide operational support services and support of migration efforts in the state, unquote. Drop site news and others report funds from FEMA's shelter and services program are being used to fund the so-called Alligator Alcatraz jail, estimated to cost at least $608 million. Florida's Republican Attorney General, James Uthmeyer, a longtime ally of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, has been called the mastermind of the jail. the publisher of Florida politics wrote, quote, in Uthmeyer, Desantis found his own Stephen Miller, the far-right immigration hardliner and White House senior advisor. Attorney General Uthmeyer was appointed to that position to replace Ashley Moody, who took the Senate seat of Marco Rubio when he became Secretary of State. Meanwhile, Miller has urged politicians in Republican states to build their own versions of alligator Alcatraz. We want every governor of a red state, and if you're watching tonight, pick up the phone, call DHS, work with us to build facilities in your state so that we can get the illegals out, we can get the criminals out.

This comes as Trump's budget bill reportedly includes a provision that allocates $3.5 billion to eligible states for immigration enforcement and detention. For more, we're joined by Florida Democratic Congress member, Maxwell Frost, among a group of dozens of Democratic lawmakers who went to the jail Saturday. We're also joined by Claire Healy, Esserman investigative fellow for the Miami Herald. The latest stories headlined exclusive. Hundreds of Alligator Alcatraz have no criminal charges. Miami Herald learns. And is your family member or client at Alligator Alcatraz? Alcatraz. We obtained a list. We welcome you both to Democracy Now. Congress member Frost,

let's start with you. Talk about the trip you took on Saturday with dozens of Democratic lawmakers from Florida. What did you see? So originally, we actually planned an unannounced trip. And, you know, I've done a couple of these ICE detention facility visits. Them being unannounced is very important because you see things for how they are. Somehow, word got to. to the state that we were coming and so they issued us an invitation at the same time and same date we were going to go anyway we still decided to go to see what's going on in there and we saw important conditions a lot of crowding 32 male individuals per cage these people are being caged three toilets per area and the drinking water it comes from the toilet apparatus in the

cell not only that but there is not enough resources and not really an ability for them to be able to speak with their legal counsel or lawyers. There's not a really clear way on how legal counsel can go to the facility and meet with them. That's one of the questions I asked over and over again. I received the phone number in an email. I publicly gave out the email at a press conference right after. And now lawyers are calling me saying, Maxwell, the email is bouncing back. It's not working.

And so there's a deliberate attempt here, it seems, to keep these immigrants and keep these people from their right of due process, of course, but also they're right of even being able to speak with their counsel and their family. We've heard of the toilets not working. Yes, there's three in each cage, but sometimes two of them don't work. We actually heard a story of one night when one of the toilets backed up and started spewing essentially feces around the cage, and it was until hours later until they were moved to another one. So it's things like this. Now, I will tell you, we heard directly from one of the lawyers who spoke with someone the night before we got there. magically they got their first shower magically they got a meal that was a lot better than it's been

before that's part of the reason why these visits from members of congress and oversight are so important because it keeps the people running this interim camp on their toes and so i'll be back at a time of my own choosing a date of my own choosing i don't need permission from ron desantis to choose when i want to go because it is a federal facility operated by the state they made as much Is that clear what I was inside of it this past Saturday? And Congressman, who are the security personnel? Are the state officials, ICE officials, private security? What were you able to tell about that?

Here's the other thing. It's essentially a private detention facility. Now, no one would call it that, but when I pulled up, the people who came up to me to check my ID, they're from a private company, Delta Fox Trot Solutions Incorporated. Then I go inside. I actually asked this gentleman, because he had a badge. It looked like a police department badge. And I squinted, looked at it. It had the name of a company. I asked him, is that your company? And he looked at me and he said, well, Congressman, we're a private company. I'm not law enforcement. I'm not required to tell you anything about myself. So I park, assuming, well, maybe they're hiring third party security to do the parking or something like that. But I get into the facility in that moment when they let us into the tent that has the cages, where 32 men are squished in the cage. and they're sweating. It was all private security dealing with the actual detainees as well. I barely saw law enforcement. I barely saw National Guard troops. And I saw a lot of private security and actually private doctors who are also handling the medical side of things.

So it is essentially a privately run center. And people are getting rich off of the interment of immigrants in the Everglades right now. And were you able to talk to detainees about their access to attorneys or their ability to communicate with the outside world? No. There was actually two instances when I was looking to speak with detainees. And again, I've done these trips before. Usually I am allowed to talk with really whoever I want to speak with unless they say they don't want to talk with me. They wouldn't even give me the chance. The first part, they said, oh, well, don't talk to people in the medical unit because of HIPAA.

complete BS. I've spoken with people in medical units before at other detention facilities. HIPAA would mean, well, don't go into their appointment and listen in, which is not what I asked to do. But then the second part is when they let us into see the actual cages. And have some people who asked me, well, Max, why don't you just go in and talk with them anyway? Well, they had about six guards physically blocking us from entering the cages. We essentially could only look at it. But I got to tell you, standing at that door and hearing from hundreds of people. Help me. Help me. One guy was yelling. Call my family. Tell my wife. I'm okay. He started yelling a phone number. I couldn't necessarily make it out because it was too loud.

I saw myself in those cages. It was a lot of people my age that looked like me. And when I was walking out of the facility, and I don't like to call it the name that they've given it. They're doing it to make light of it and sell merch. I'm not going to be part of that. As I was walking out, though, it hit me that I'm the first Afro-Cubano in Congress. I'm walking out of there thinking and myself, I'm going to be one of the only people that looks like me that is Latino that will walk into this facility and walk out on my own accord. And it goes to show exactly what this is meant to do. The administration is essentially trying to ethnically cleanse the country of Latinos, of Haitians, because I'll tell you when I was in that facility, I didn't see any,

you know, Europeans who've overstayed their visa or anything like that. It was all Latinos, all Haitian people, and nothing else. I want to bring Claire Healy into the conversation. Claire, you have been working really an amazing team of people at the Miami Herald where you're doing investigations into this Everglades jail. Can you just summarize for us? I mean, we got it from the headlines, but who's being held there? What are they charged with? How many men?

We're talking hundreds and hundreds? Right. We're talking 750 as far as we know. at the moment. So my colleagues and I, we obtained a list of 750 people. The ages range from 18 to 73. And these are people from about 40 countries around the world. Half are made up of people from Mexico, Guatemala, and Cuba. And so they are categorized in three buckets, you know, people with criminal convictions, pending charges, and then immigration violations. And so we have not yet been able to independently verify all of those people. But they're about 250 plus in that

third category, meaning they have no criminal convictions or criminal charges in the United States. And so also within each of those categories, those charges, those convictions, what immigration violation means can really range. So we've talked with family members who say, you know, a 56-year-old Nicaraguan man, for example, that he came here legally under humanitarian parole in 2023, and he has been applying for asylum. So he is a pending an asylum case. And he was detained after a traffic stop. So he was a passenger in a vehicle that was pulled over by Florida Highway Patrol, and he is currently at the facility. And Claire, do you talk about what is the 287 program under which this facility was built?

So this is a program that allows local law enforcement, and it's really been utilized in Florida. I think Florida has the most local law enforcement agencies that have signed on to this program. It allows them to deputize officers for ICE and immigration enforcement. And so what that means is that this is a state-run facility operating with the permission under this program in an immigration capacity. So this is an immigration detention center, but it is not, it is a state facility. It's being run by the state, which is also something that has led to some difficulty. For example, we have been noticing that this online government locator, an ICE locator, that usually allows the public, family members, attorneys to search for their

loved ones, their clients, using their name and nationality. That usually shows where somebody is located and people are transferred often, so this is an important tool for family members. That is not showing anybody at this facility, and one of the possible reasons is that this is a state-run facility. You know, DHS has said that this is the state. And so people are not showing up in that facility, and we've been hearing from family members, attorneys, that they only learned their loved one or client was there when that person was able to give them a call from the facility. And sometimes they haven't even known until we publish this list. That's one of the reasons we published the 750 names of people detained there or who appear to be scheduled to be detained there. And finally, Congressmember Frost, you're calling for this place to be closed?

yes it needs to be closed immediately the conditions i saw there are are important but i also got to be honest with everyone watching a lot of people are you know now learning about detention facilities i got to tell you i went to baker detention facility in north florida the conditions are also important there at the time i wrote to president biden saying that place need to be closed as well oftentimes the the thought process here is the conditions are so bad that as immigrants are trying to fight legally, the deportation order, they get to a place where they say, you know what, the conditions in here are so bad, I rather go, I rather leave the country, I rather sign my deportation papers and essentially demoralizing people. I met with two Haitian gentlemen when I was at the Baker

facility in Stark, Florida, and both of them told me, you know what, I've been fighting this deportation for eight months. I rather fight for my life. on the streets of Haiti right now, than be in this facility a day longer? Five detainees have died in Florida alone this year in these immigration jails, related in hospitals? I'm sorry? Is that, have a number of people died in detention facilities or related in hospitals? Yeah, so I think we're at right now at a number of, like, 12,

13 nationwide. And yes, about half of them are in the state of Florida. So, I mean, it just goes to show that the human, dehumanizing of immigrants here is obviously, it's not, the cruelty isn't just the point. It's part of the strategy to get people to feel so demoralized that they see all this going on around them that they choose to sign those papers and not fight it legally. Congressmember Frost, want to thank you for being with us. Congress member Maxwell Frost of Florida just went to this Everglades jail this weekend. And Claire Healy, Part of the team at the Miami Herald has been investigating this jail. Next up, Purge Palantir, the banner held by protesters across the country from Seattle to Palo Alto to Denver to here in New York,

taking on the technology company, they say uses AI to supercharged surveillance from ICE to the Israeli military back in 15 seconds. Exitue, I have to you, I hold it you. in our Democracy Now studio. I'm Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez. This is Democracy Now. Human rights activists demonstrated in front of the offices of the technology and data company Palantir in multiple cities yesterday, from Seattle to Palo Alto, from Denver to here in New York, where the NYPD arrested at least four people who called out the tech giant for, quote, turbocharging ICE deportations, complicity in the genocide of Palestinians, and expanding surveillance of every U.S. unquote. Democracy Now was at the purge Palantir protest in New York and recorded and spoke to some of the

protesters. Across the country, activists shut down Palantir. Activist shut down Palantir. We want Palantir. We want Palantir. Out of New York City. Out of New York City. My name is Nelson Samaro, and I'm Palestinian-American. Over the weekend, we watched a lot of Chile. being targeted, 13 of which were bombed while they were lining up to get food.

And the level of inhumanity is obscene. So we are out here to try to stop it. Companies like Palantir are enabling these crimes. And unfortunately, this company doesn't work on its own. They make profit by contracts with other institutions. There are institutions. I actually know Palantir because I used to work for the INGAO system in the past. And international organizations.

And we actually started using Palantir in 2014 when it started 10 years ago. Today, there are still international organizations that use Palantir like the World Food Program, UNICEF, Team Rubicon. and then the CDC Foundation. These contracts need to break because the company is making profit out of the crimes. So I was fired from META for organizing with my colleagues in protesting a lot of the ethical concerns that META creates in this world. I had this vision of an internal tech uprising. I felt that these tech workers that know the most about how this technology works,

These tech workers like me that develop a conscience when they become aware, when they gain the knowledge of how much destruction these companies are causing, would stand up and rebel against their companies from the inside. This is my appeal to Palantir workers. I know it's difficult inside, but I urge you to educate yourself to listen to all of these mass protests that are happening outside of your doors, that are being talked about in major spaces, about the destruction that Palantir is causing.

Our governments and Palantir should not be working side by side. My name is Daniel. I am a member of the New York Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. The tools that Palantir developed using NYPD data are part of their pitch to other law enforcement and federal agencies. That means that that $30 million contract that I scott, that was because they refined those tools here. in New York. Those tools they're deploying in the apartheid state of Israel. Those are tools

they developed here in New York. They are more than complicit in genocide, apartheid, and racial violence. We know that state violence is the bread and butter of companies like Palantir. And as we've heard before, tactics and technology that are deployed abroad eventually come home to roost. The same data mining, surveillance, and AI-powered targeting technology technologies that are used in Gaza and across the world are now already at work in our movements, our workplaces, our homes, and our communities. Palantir also announced a strategic partnership with the Israeli Defense Ministry in in 2024 a year into the genocide.

They said, this partnership was for war-related missions. In reality, their technologies had been used to surveil Palestinians to gather their personal information, and to strategically target, and to strategically target innocent people, innocent people, for genocide, for air strikes, for rockets, for rockets. Palantir is not only complicit. They're an active part of the genocide. They're an active part of the genocide. Liv Sanyar with Planet Over People, some of the voices in New York outside of Palantir offices. For more on Palantir, we're joined by McKenna Kelly, a senior writer at Wired, focused on intersection of politics, power and technology.

Her recent piece, this is Doge 2.0. We last spoke to you about your piece. Doge is building a master database to surveil and track immigrants. The main focuses of these protests were Palantir working with the Israeli military and Palantir working with ICE. in these last few minutes, can you talk about the significance of this? Founded by Trump ally Peter Thiel, CEO is Alex Karp, one of the points they made at the New York protests as he's a major supporter of Governor Cuomo to be mayor of New York.

Sure. So these technologies, after Doge first started working in government in January, I think we're all aware of the chaos that it's wrought. federal workers have lost their jobs, services, like the Social Security Administration trying to access benefits have been made increasingly difficult. But out of that chaos, right, we've seen Silicon Valley tech companies or, you know, Peter Thiel line companies like Palantir or Anderol and other tech giants trying to find opportunity in this chaos. And in what we've seen happening at the Department of Homeland Security, these immigration

raids. It's created a lot of opportunity for a tech contractor like Palantir to find a new client and use their very powerful software that is fully capable of mass surveillance in this country in order to find, to be able to utilize and make a lot of money in government contracts. And, McKinna, we only have about 30 seconds left, but the significance of Gregory Baratia, the longtime Palantir employee, now being the chief information. officer of the entire federal government as of January? Yes, so something that is coming out of the second phase of Doge is, sure, Elon Musk may be leaving, but Musk aligned, people from Muscaline companies and things like Palantir are finding

themselves in very powerful roles in government. The chief information officer was not a very sexy title prior to this administration, but it gives, people in these positions have a lot of power over who has access to what data at agencies all across government, whether that is SSA, which has bulks of data on all of us, right, but also the Department of Homeland Security or just, you know, the federal CIA, like Barbizia. McKenna Kelly, we want to thank you so much for being with us. Senior writer at Wired will link to your coverage of Palantir and other tech

companies at DemocracyNow.org. That does it for our show. We're hiring for a number of positions. Find out more at DemocracyNow.org.org slash jobs. democracy now produced with Mike Burke, Renee Feltz. Dina Guzder, Messiah, Rhodes, Nermine, Chef, Maria, Tarasana, Tammy Warnoff, Trina, Nadura, Sam Alcoff, Tamarias, studio, John Hamilton, Rabbi Karen, Hany Massoud. Special thanks to Safat Nassau. Our executive director is Julie Crosby.

I'm Amy Goodman with Juan Gonzalez.