Radiolab - Americanish

Episode Date: June 23, 2023

Given reporter Julia Longoria’s long love affair with the Supreme Court, it’s no surprise she’s become the new host of More Perfect (https://zpr.io/4R9fMg9gJ96k), a show all about how the Supreme Court got to be so… supreme. This week, we talk to Julia about her journey to the host seat, and we highlight an episode she produced for Radiolab in 2019 about a specific case: González v. Williams.  In 1903 the U.S. Supreme Court refused to say that Isabel González was a citizen of the United States. Then again, they said, she wasn’t exactly an immigrant either. And they said that the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, Isabel’s home, was “foreign to the United States in a domestic sense.” Since then, the U.S. has cleared up at least some of the confusion about U.S. territories and the status of people born in them. But, more than a hundred years later, there is still a U.S. territory that has been left in limbo: American Samoa. It is the only place on Earth that is U.S. soil, but people who are born there are not automatically U.S. citizens. When we visit American Samoa, we discover that there are some pretty surprising reasons why many American Samoans prefer it that way.  EPISODE CREDITS  Reported by - Julia Longoria Our newsletter comes out every Wednesday. It includes short essays, recommendations, and details about other ways to interact with the show. Sign up (https://radiolab.org/newsletter)! Radiolab is supported by listeners like you. Support Radiolab by becoming a member of The Lab (https://members.radiolab.org/) today. Follow our show on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook @radiolab, and share your thoughts with us by emailing [e-mail] Leadership support for Radiolab’s science programming is provided by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation Initiative, and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Okay, so can you tell us who you are? Yes, wait, let me, it's just, I can't do it without backing up on Pro Tools. Hey, Lillimiller here. And Latif. This is Radio Lab, and today we are talking to a host, reporter, producer, and former member of our Radio Lab family. Recording in two places now I can breathe. Julia Longoria.

Hello. Okay, where should we start this story? I feel like the story of you and this show goes back before the show. The show. Before last week, obviously. It does, yeah, you know, like. And we're talking to Julia because she's the new host

of an old show that spun off of our show a while back, which is drumroll please More perfect. That's right after a six-year hiatus more perfect is back. Oh, yeah Yeah The show is now back with new cases and a new team and in some ways a new approach to reporting on the Supreme Court. But Julia's relationship to that show and honestly to covering the court and even to thinking about Constitutional law goes way back. You know, my parents are Cuban refugees and my family has a lot of opinions and a lot

of trauma that they're working through. And like a wide political spectrum, there's lots of arguments happening, you know, with a lot of wine and tequila and a lot of love to which usually defuses arguments, you know. But I was just in this environment always where people were, you know, sharing their opinions and telling stories about why they left Cuba, why they're here, having arguments about US politics, and when I went to high school, it was a pretty conservative environment. There were like some things that were off limits.

And then I heard about this team, this constitution team with this coach who was talking about things that we couldn't talk about. Like what? What? Abortion, for instance, which was not something that was taught in theology class. And it was this kind of team that got to talk

and truly debate issues in a way that we couldn't really fully in other classes. So I think for that reason, it was appealing. It was dangerous. It was exciting. And Julia carried that sense of excitement over foundational questions of U.S. law into her work as a journalist when she moved to New York City. I was working in the WNYC newsroom and Someone asked me at WNYC

What's your pie in this guy idea like if you could make any radio show? What would you make and I was like I want to make a show that shows people how secretly sexy this Supreme Court is Wow This person was like you got to talk to Susie Lektemberg how secretly sexy this Supreme Court is. Wow. And then this person was like, you gotta talk to Susie Lechtemberg. Because the team at Radio Lab had just spun off that exact show and it was called more perfect.

Yeah, and I was like, what? No, and then I listened to the first season with like curiosity and anger. And great. Damn you, you already did it. And then of course Julia went on to work at that show. She told amazing stories about Ruth Bader Ginsburg, about the Dred Scott decision, all sorts of wonderful reporting.

And then after the third season, the powers that be at WNYC decided they did not want to make any more and more perfect. Yep, yep. Alright, so anyway, now it is like six years later, Ish, and you have decided to reboot the show. And why and how and who and all of the questions. Yeah, so basically, since more perfect was put on pause, I've just like not stopped making the show. I went to work at the New York Times for a bit and did a lot of like legal stories. Did a show called The Experiment with the Atlantic where we did a lot of legal stories. And finally, we thought, why not just bring it back, make it official.

And finally, we thought, why not just bring it back, make it official? Yeah. Right. So, yeah, we are back. And at this moment, when the core, I think when more perfect first started in 2016, the question was kind of like, what's going on in there, huh? Like kind of out of curiosity and people weren't paying super close attention to the Supreme Court. Now, it's a very different moment.

The Supreme Court has overturned some of its biggest cases. It's more unpopular than ever if you want to believe what Paul say. And there's a lot of attention on the Supreme Court from people who don't normally pay attention. Actually, that is something I wanted to ask you about because when more perfect came out, and I remember this is the way they even set it up in the beginning, it was like,

this is the place where we really tussle it out and where both sides get heard and, and it really feels like a difficult grappling. But now it feels like the core is just so political, so divided. I just, I don't know. I personally don't know how to feel about that. Yeah, no, I think, I think like, there are plenty of reasons to just be angry and upset,

and just not even try to pay attention to any kind of earnest, supposedly earnest grappling happening. Yeah. But I do think like at the end of the day, coming from, I guess, a family that has opinions widely across the spectrum, like you, we, at the end of the day, we live in a country with these people, or we live, you know, like in my case, it's like my family, like I have to find a way to talk to them or to see where they're coming from. And I think that trying at least to reach for the grapple could allow us to have like more meaningful conversations. And reach people we don't Yeah. What guides me is trying to understand where people are coming from, trying to find the grapple,

highlight the people who are earnestly doing that, and also point out where it feels like there's not an earnest grapple happening. So our very first episode is an episode I've been wanting to make since high school, basically, about a man named Al Smith. He is a Native American man who ingested peyote as part of a Native American church ceremony and was fired for taking illegal drugs at the time.

And in classic, more perfect fashion, it's the story of an issue, but it's actually also the story of a person. And in this case, it's Al Smith. He's also an alcohol and drug counselor taking illegal drugs. So I was like, what's that about? And so Al Smith has passed away, but his wife and his daughter are around,

and there's this professor who became obsessed with Al Smith's case and had interviewed him and had all these tapes on mini-disc, or not tapes, he had mini-discs, which was the technology that lasted like two seconds. But you do get to hear Al Smith in his own words, describing his story, his background, his struggle with alcoholism, his decision to take peyote when he became part of the Native

American church. You remember my grandma used to pray in India every night, you didn't know what she was saying. You didn't do the jeep. It's a story about Al Smith, but it's also a story about how, you know, behind the scenes of a lot of the big cases that we hear about like in the last few years, like Masterpiece cake shop, these religion cases where people are asking if they can sidestepped anti discrimination laws and denied services to like same sex couples. They actually are trying to overturn Al Smith's case. they actually are trying to overturn Al Smith's case. And that all, that's just the first episode. They have a whole bunch of other stories.

They've been going for about a month now, releasing episodes. Yeah, so go check out the sparkling, dazzling, new, more perfect. You will find all kinds of great stuff there episodes about Clarence Thomas. I was a bit of a radical, but that's what happened back then. You were black. Things were

changing, and we were very, very upset. I've got stuff about the abortion cases and the question of viability about voting rights, all of the urgent arguments that our country is currently facing right now, unpacked, played out, giving you the background and context you need to understand what is even going on. We are so glad they are back on the beat at this moment in time. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts, more perfect. And before you go do that, or perhaps to help inspire you to do that, we have a story that Julia worked on when they put the pause

on more perfect. She came in, worked with Radio Lab for a while, made all kinds of beautiful stuff. And during that time, she made a story called, America-Anish. The way that started, for me, was like, basically my research question was Puerto Rico WTF. Like, like, why is it not a state? Yeah, like, why is it not a state? They're always arguing like, how did it end up in this weird way? It's not a state, but it's not a state. Right. Yeah. It's a territory. What's the deal with territories? Right. Interestingly, I learned there's a group of people in the territories who don't really want American citizenship and don't want the Constitution to apply to them in the same way that it does to the States for kind of complicated reasons.

So without giving any more away, we're going to play that story. Again, it is called Americanish and you will hear Julia in conversation throughout the episode with, of course, Janabum Rudd. Yeah, wait, wait, you're listening to Radio Lab. Radio. From W and Y. Six. Three,

Y. I'm Jan Iblemrod. I'm Robert Crowich. This is Radio Lab and this is Reporter Julia Longoria. Okay, great. She's going to start things off. Let's do it. So where do we start?

You took a trip. So I took two trips. The first trip inspired another trip. Hi. Hello. But let's start in Denver, Colorado. You have such a beautiful room. Oh, thank you. Where I wanted to speak to this young man.

Come here, Jumperlo. Jumperlo. Very young man. I guess. What's your name? Um, Jumperlo, Mary. He's nine years old. What are you doing today?

Well, I'm trying to eat lunch, so currently I'm John Colomary. He's nine years old. What are you doing today? Well, I'm currently eating lunch, so currently I'm on a ski my grandmother hug, so yeah. So currently that currently turning out, I'm weird. And I wanted to talk to him because there's this particular chapter in his family history that presented this thorny question to the United States of America. Do you feel like you're like a descendant of immigrants? Yeah, like sort of like not all the way like pure immigrant but like partially immigrant

because people from Puerto Rico back then like 1998 I think maybe. It was actually 1898 Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah And what happened in 1898 was that the United States had gotten sort of grabby We grabbed the Philippines we grabbed Guam and we grabbed Puerto Rico Which is where Giancarlo's family was from and just a few years after Puerto Rico became part of the US. Like, great grandmother. It's either great, great or great grandmother.

I don't remember where we each one. It was his great, great grandmother. And her name was Isabel Gonzalez. Isabel Gonzalez, she was on a boat. She was on like, like, there used to be like boats from going from here. She was traveling like, like there used to be like boats from going from here. She was traveling alone and pregnant from Puerto Rico to New York City. And when the boat arrived in Ellis Island, these white men would go out and like select

like people who like, you can't go out of the load, you can't go, where's your spell? It's not allowed. She was stopped at Ellis Island because all women arriving at Ellis Island who were pregnant were stopped and examined and some of them were turned away. A little historical assist here from Christina Ponsa Krause. I'm a professor of law at Columbia. She says when those guys tried to pull is a bellicide.

She said, you can't even stop me, much less question me or get in my way at all. I am coming from Puerto Rico, which is part of the United States. I'm an American citizen. And citizens cannot be stopped at the border. Christina says around this time, a lot of people, a lot of goods, like fruit.

There was a shipment of oranges. Among other things, started arriving in the US from the newly acquired territories. And all of these new arrivals posed a sort of existential question to the US. Are these new colonies part of us? Or are they something else? So a bunch of these cases like Isabelle Gonzalez's case

ended up in a Supreme Court, and they eventually became known collectively as the Insular Cases. The Insular Cases? What does Insular mean in this context? Insular actually means relating to an island. It also means perocule or close-minded. At the time when the United States annexed Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam, it still had territories that had Oklahoma, it had Arizona, that it had not yet become states. So territories were not new. However, these territories seemed very different to the American public.

They had different cultures, different races. They didn't seem American enough. So the judges are dealing with the fact that these new islands are now part of the US, but they also have this public opinion in their heads and they don't want to let these people all the way in. So in the case of Isabelle Gonzalez, they ended up saying, we're not going to answer the question of whether Puerto Ricans are actually US citizens. We're just going to say they're not immigrants. And if that's not confusing enough, they went on to say that Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico is foreign to the United States in a domestic sense.

That sounds like nonsense. The dissenters in the case said it sounded like nonsense. Nobody understood exactly what that meant. It's like almost textbook double thing, right? Like it's like foreign but domestic. Domestic but foreign. It's kind of wild. Text book having it both ways.

And therefore having it neither way. And do you feel like you're Puerto Rican? Sort of, I guess. Do you feel American? Parsley. Yeah, just partially. Why? I don't know if I guess. Do you feel American? Partially. Yeah, just partially. Why? Because I'm also a little bit Irish, I think.

Is it Irish? Well, yeah, on dad's side. This next part is really what blew me away and actually inspired my second trip. Because shortly after the Insular cases, Congress stepped in and they passed a law to make it so that anybody born in Puerto Rico is an automatic U.S. citizen. Congress did the same thing for the other major territories. I mean, they can't vote for president, they don't have a vote in Congress. But at least the people born in those territories are automatically US citizens,

except for one place. A cluster of tiny little islands in that great blue expanse of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and New Zealand called American Samoa. American Samoa. This is the only place in the world that is US soil and people who are born here are not citizens. So is it true? Yes. So it's the, oh, it's interesting. So it's the only place where the whole like, my baby is born in the US, therefore, that doesn't happen. Correct. They become... Or they then, if they're not citizens.

In their passport, they have a US passport, but on the last page it says, this person is not a US citizen. They're a US national. A child born in American Samoa will not become an automatic citizen. They have to go take the test. They have to pay close to $800. You can't even, like, there's no immigration office in American Samoa. So you have to go to some other part of the states, stay there for a few months, and apply

in order to qualify. So it's... It's weird. Yeah, and it's not just weird. When I first looked into it, it seemed like this holdover from this really racist time in our history. But then I started making calls to American Samoans living

in American Samoa. And I realized there might be a more complicated reason why American Samoans still are not US citizens after all these years. Gentlemen, would you like to welcome you to America for a while? So I decided to get on a plane. After a 25-hour trip, I landed in the middle of the night. I'm going in. Yeah.

I'm going in. Let's go on the surface of your trip. I'm here. Went through border security. Yeah. Gina. Yes. I walked out of the airport, which is really small.

Hi, Benny. Very nice to meet you. I'm glad you're here to meet me. And people I had emailed showed up to the airport. It's a nice to meet you. It's very nice to meet you. It's very nice to meet you. And people I had emailed showed up to the airport. It's a greeting. It's nothing. With Lays, with like flowers and... What do you just mean?

Oh, yeah. When I'm used to. And I, at first I thought it was just like the hotel picking me up, but it was like this woman who I hadn't even talked to on the phone, but she knew I was coming from far away. It's funny. Yeah. I hadn't even talked to you on the phone, but she knew I was coming from far away. Like, yeah! And then more and more people who I had talked to showed up. So instantly it felt so welcoming.

Anyway, I got to my hotel that night. And then the next morning, I stepped out of my hotel, and it was just incredibly gorgeous. Well I saw the pictures of that trip. What the f***? No one told me it was gonna be that beautiful. It was amazing. Huge lush mountain. Bright green mountains. So many palm trees. Pastel colored houses tucked into the side of these cliffs. American flag. Hi. Flying high. Just stunning. How big? How big is American small, by the way? Well, it's a cluster of islands, but the main island to Tuila is about 50 square miles with about 50,000 people. There's a two lane road that seems to be like the main route.

There's just one main road that you drive. So if the ocean's on your right, you're probably going east. If the ocean's on your left, you're probably going west. And I spent 12 days there, and it was just riding back and forth and back and forth with different people with who had different ideas of What the island was about which was really interesting seeing the same places Through different eyes interesting. I'm so it is district court

The first stop I made was to meet with a guy named Charles Al-ima. Really smiley, silver hair, thin rim glasses, wearing a floral shirt and flip-flops. Almost everybody at the courthouse was wearing flip-flops. When I caught up with him, he was actually meeting with a couple of Samoan men who were in the middle of a land dispute. Which is basically the rights of the chiefs, the control of the stop of this mountain. Are these your clients? And these are my clients.

But the reason I wanted to talk to Charles is that he has a case right now pending before the federal courts. That's basically Isabelle Gonzalez in 2019. He's arguing that denying American Samoans birthright citizenship is unconstitutional. So I believe that when you were born in American Samoan, you're American and unusual in American, but you are still one. Now in Charles' case, he's what some Simon's call aficasi.

My mother was born in Auburn, New York. His mom is white and his dad is from western Samoa, which is not part of the U.S. His parents actually met in the States. His dad was in grad school in DC. And my father and mother could not

get married in Virginia because of the anti-missigenation loss. This was back in 19 O racism. My mother kept trying to insist that some ones are not Black. They are something different. She says no. He looks too dark But they were actually able to get married in Washington DC and they moved to American Samoa where Charlie was born and You'd think that Charlie would be an automatic U.S. citizen. And this was a huge I was born in a U.S. territory, but she had to because they had to register at the closest embassy. But his mom, a U.S. citizen actually had to register

him in a foreign country. And the closest embassy was all the way in New Zealand. You know, it doesn't make any sense. And it's and it's against the principles of the United States. So Charlie says the fact that American Samoans are not automatic citizens by birth. It's hiding a lot of injustices that are going on. Injustices that could be remedied. If you didn't say, oh well, we're you're a national, right? You can be treated differently. You're a national, right? You can be treated differently. Oh, do you think you'd be hiking boots? Oh, should I be here?

Oh, okay, well. So I drove around with Charlie for a while. And this is where the tsunami really took its toll. And it's all there. And everywhere I saw signs of threats of natural disaster, tsunamis, typhoons, earthquakes. This was the main center of the government at the beginning. He showed me the town center, which is really just a cluster of pastel colored buildings. These are all the old navy buildings that prevent remnants of the old Navy buildings.

And the original US naval base, which is really where this whole thing got started. So the US Navy showed up in American Samoa in the late 1800s. At a time when Samoa was extremely fractured. Germany and the UK were hanging out there too, and there were fights among chiefs across the islands about who owned what turf and The US Navy offered the islands of American Samoa protection in exchange for beautiful pangopangobay the use of their harbor The safest the best all together the most to superb harbor in the South seas Possibly in all the Pacific. According to Charlie, at least some of the chiefs wanted that protection.

American Samoans, they said that's great. Thought it was a good deal. One of their high chiefs, his name is Moana, was basically telling everybody, no, let's have the Americans come in. And in 1900, they made it official. Some Samoan chiefs signed what they called a deed of session to hand over sovereignty to the United States. And according to Charlie,

At the time that they did this, they thought they had become US citizens. Of course, thanks to the rulings and the insular cases, they actually hadn't. And then, From 1929, Congress took up the question of whether American Samoans should be US citizens, and they just said no. And really some of Vile racist statements being made back there in 1929 against it. We don't want any of these savage racists who would never be able to understand our system.

Fast forward 100 years and Charles is basically trying to overturn Isabel Gonzalez' case. His first attempt to do that? Hi, I'm here at the highway. Was to represent this guy named Lynne Tuaue. I actually got in the rental car and went to visit him while I was on the island. Ben continued on to his mountain. Okay. Aside note, there are no addresses in American Samoa.

All right, great. Thank you so much. I- I- I- I- sorry, I got lost. Okay. Which makes it virtually impossible to find anyone. But I found him. So, when the story... What is the house? Green, Trimming, White, Bricks. Hello! How are you doing? Linne has got white hair, purple floral shirt on,

taking a drag from a cigarette. What's your name? Lene Wattitwao. I'm a retiree, taking care of family matters here at home. I am not working at home. Lina was actually a police officer in American Samoa. He moved to California and lived there for a while, and he wanted to be a police officer there too.

But as soon as they came across my status, they said, well, I'm sorry, you're not a US citizen. So therefore, you cannot become a California highway. It's well-known. They told him he would have to become a citizen first, which involved paying hundreds of dollars and taking a test. I certainly responded. I don't know. I'm not going to do that.

I'm not going to spend a penny. I'm an American period. And that's why birthright citizenship is so important. It solidifies that if you are born on US soil, you are equal to everybody else. So in 2012, with the help of Charlie and Aloir from Guam, name Meal Weir, Lenny sued the US government, saying they violated the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment. That's how I ended up in Washington, DC, right on the footsteps of the US Supreme Court.

Lenin says he just wanted the court to give some kind of explanation for why American Samoans had been treated this way. Why, I mean, why keep us to run around? But when it got to the Supreme Court, they declined to hear the case. When was that that that got to the Supreme Court? 2016, they just refused to make a decision on it. Why are they so afraid to come out? It's not enough then.

Today, Charlie and Neil have another case going with some American Samoans in Utah. And hopefully this second time around the Supreme Court will grant our position. And so at this point in my trip I was curious how other American Samoans, even ones who aren't in the States trying to get a job, how they felt about this case and about citizenship. I assumed that they would be behind it, because who wants to live in this like foreign, but domestic, but foreign limbo space.

But- The following is a public service announcement from the American San Juan Humanities Council in the Office of Political... Then I talk to this guy. I never read the custom. Coming up right after the break, we meet the people who are fighting to not become US citizens.

Hey, I'm Chad. I'm Robert. This is Ridealab. Today we're in American Samoa, a place that is considered US soil, but where the people are not considered US citizens. And we just heard from some people making the case for citizenship. Now, we're going to hear from someone who...

The Constitution of American Samoa. Oh, that's a different opinion. His name is Tapa Al Anga, goes by Dan. He's on the radio reading from the American Samoan Constitution all the time. He's on the radio reading from the American Samoan Constitution all the time, which is kind of weird. He's on the radio reading from the Constitution? Yeah, from the American Samoan Constitution. Wow. That's kind of cool, weirdly. The question tell us about the branches of government. How are laws made?

To help answer these questions. And actually when he heard I was looking into the citizenship question, got a hold of me. Okay hold on one second. Okay go ahead. So you'll be coming west on the main road. So I hopped in my car. So I just I made a I made a left because I don't know how many, but I think I made the wrong left. So got a little bit lost again. So you can see it's the land where there's a little similarity where they don't need street signs. Just kind of know where your coconut trees are. Do we all right?

But eventually I did find a house. Where should I park? Is here good? Oh, you want to come in? Yeah, OK. Yeah, let's go. And as soon as I arrived, he jumped in my rental car because he wanted to show me what they call fa Samoa. I suggest just going around.

Okay, go around. So we drove down to the center of the village of Leone. It's one of the larger villages. It's about 2,000 people and it's on the southwest coast of the island. Okay, okay great. To meet the high chiefs of the village or Matai's as they're known. Oh come out. There we go. Hello. Hi. This is Chief Mopati. Hi, very nice to meet you. Can I get out? Yeah, if you want. Good. Chief Ropati Opa.

Nice to meet you. Welcome. Thank you. My name is Ropati Opa. White hair, broad shoulders, kind smile. So now I am the Mayor of the village. And, I'm talking Chief Mayava. Hi talking Chief Mayava.

He's got a buzz cut in a white v-neck. Also, what's for you to hear do our ugly village? And I asked the chiefs, like, would you want to be citizens straight up? Would you want to be, are you a US citizen? No. Do you want to be? I want to be a US citizen myself. I want it. And Chief Ropatiopo was like my answer is yes.

Why? Because this is the part of American. So I want to be a real American. I'm a real American. My kids all live in the States. I served in the US military. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Okay. Then Dan kind of like steps in and starts talking to him in Samoan for a minute. I was like, what's going on? Now I understand.

I don't want to answer that question until I prepare myself to explain to you before you go. I want to... I want a minute to think about it. Yeah. And I wasn't really sure what to think about that, but then... this bell started to ring. And Chief Mayava explained that they have a curfew in the village of Leoné on Sundays at 6 p.m. for 15 minutes.

Everyone has to stop what they're doing and pray or meditate. Wait, that's the law? This is not the... Wait, that's the law? Which is out there? Yeah, I mean, it's not quite law, but it is the rule in this village and some others, and it is enforced. And I was talking to the chief when 6 p.m. rolled around and the bell rang and I was like,

oh, what happens now? And he's like, well, I just drive around and make sure that everybody's following the curfew. You want to go take a ride or you want to go by yourself, doing it? Yeah, it's not take a ride or you want to go up to your self-toeing? Yeah, let's go take a ride, yeah, yeah. And then he asked me if I wanted to come along with him and I was like, yeah, and he was like, okay, great.

Which are good. We'll take your car. So we literally got him to my car. Sorry about that. And I'm holding the microphone for the chief as we're doing the ride along. All right, so if you tell me where to go. Okay, we can go stuff from this side. Okay.

And we just went up and down the main street. It took like a little over 15 minutes. It's a very small village. Sorry. And along the street, there are young men, they're called the Almanga, the young men's club. So these guys just line the streets here. Lineed up in wearing white shirts and red lava lovas, which are like skirts. And they just, what do they do? They just yell people?

They just stand there, kind of watching. And they just, what do they do? They just yell people? They just stand there kind of watching. And so there were some people who got caught. They just got stuck here. Oh, they just have to stop. I think they have to. So they're just sitting there on the side of the road for 15 minutes until it's over. Do they have to pray?

They don't force them to pray, but they're just supposed to have quiet time. Just sit for a minute. For 15 minutes until it's over. They have to pray. They don't force them to pray, but they're just supposed to have quiet time. Just sit for a minute, for 15 minutes. What happens if you don't do that? So is anybody across these laws and everything? Are the old days a very awesome penalties? Chief Mayava told me that back in the old days, like the 1800s, you would just immediately get kicked out of the village.

They have, we don't want to cheat them no more. Which meant you had no food, no protection. It's almost like a death penalty those days. But nowadays we do that. We do the light ones. And when I was talking to Chief Ropatthi Opa, he told me that these days, a pretty common punishment would be like making the person feed the whole village.

Feed the village. So that means we'll cook a lot of food. 50 Ks chicken, 50 Ks turkey tail, 50 Ks waahu and plus food. But Chief Mayava told me, you know, if you keep breaking the curfew over and over again, you can still get kicked out of the village, which he's seen happen a few times in his life. So, okay. So, one of the arguments that is made is like, this would not pass muster under the US

constitution. Yeah, definitely wouldn't. Yeah. But, the thing is, like, these guys aren't really the government. If you look at it one way, it's kind of like a gated community or a country club. You opt into living there and you opt into, you know, living under these rules. But the fear is that if everyone born on the island were automatically granted citizenship, then a bunch of other US.S. laws might start getting

applied here too, and they wouldn't be able to do things like these curfews. The reason why it's such an existential threat to American solmones to become U.S. citizens. This is Dan again. By birth is because the 14th Amendment also guarantees equal protection under laws. He thinks if all American Samoans become birthright citizens, it's not long before everyone born on this island is given that equality under the law. But that word equality, historically and even now, that's such a difficult, complicated word to get around. Because US citizenship is not something that's

applied in a pure way. He's saying that historically it's mixed with remarket profiting. The ideal of equality, it actually gets mixed in with other realities capitalism and the interests of people in power. And the artificial population of lands that were People by native peoples and the result has been time and time again that indigenous people have ended up losing their land or cultural practice and Samoans we have a saying Little Penga careful that you're so eager for the fish that you end up losing your net.

Okay? Let's be careful that we don't go after you with citizenship and forget that we have so much to lose. Our net being our land and our natural resources and our culture and our language. Things that have been lost by so many other native peoples. So are you a US citizen? Yes. Yeah. Many people here are US citizens. So are you saying, well, I'm sure you're saying, if you're a US citizen, why shouldn't everyone else

become a US citizen? Well, yeah, I guess like what is the lot? Do you feel as a US citizen, do you feel like you've lost something? I as an individual haven't lost something because I am part of an extended family that lives on family lands. So, so could they not live on family lands as US citizens? Yes, technically speaking, here I am a US citizen. There are many of us who are US citizens. We could live on family lands.

We do live on family lands. Right. So, so what I want to understand, like what is it about granting US citizenship, birth rate, US citizenship to someone? I guess I have to paint the picture even more. birthright US citizenship to someone. I guess I have to paint the picture even more. And then he explained to me that there's a law in American Samoan that says you have to be 50% blood, Samoan blood, to own land.

Even if a Samoan person wanted to sell me or give me their land, they couldn't by law. So, someone from some country say, I mean, everyone picks on China these days. So maybe someone from China moves here. And the law has changed and the law says, anyone born here is a US citizen. So this person here, I'm China, you know, builds a business, becomes a wealthy businessman from China. And one day he wants to buy land.

And the law say, well no, we can't sell you these lands. But he says, no, I want to buy that land, and I have the right to buy that land. Okay? That's what I'm talking about. That's the threat. Finally, he was like, think about it. Like if everyone born here is a birthright citizen, and everyone has equal rights here,

it's not long before Chinese person is born here. It's a US citizen. They have equal rights to the land as Samoans do. And Dan thinks they could sue to make that blood Samoan law illegal. So maybe not in one generation, but in a couple generations, blood Samoans would lose their land. That's the threat. I guess you have to imagine what would Hawaii be like if they didn't lose all their lands the way that they had. See, to us, Hawaii is what we never want to become. You know, you land at the airport in Hawaii.

Who do you see? Where are the Hawaiians? You know, for us to look at Hawaii is to look at a sad story, you know. So, but everything I say, you have to also remember we're loyal and patriotic people. It's worth pointing out that American Samoa has one of the highest rates of military enlistment of any U.S. state or territory. They say the Pledge of Allegiance at school in the morning, they learn U.S. history, learn about the U.S. Constitution.

But this is still our home, right? And we still have to protect it. Do you think what's happening here, the land, the curfews, this sort of thing? Do you think it's unconstitutional? I can give you literature that says it's a repugnant to the US Constitution. So you do think it's unconstitutional?

Or are people saying it? No, I'm not saying it's unconstitutional, but we do understand that there is a view that it is considered racist and unconstitutional. But it's also, it gives us a chance to survive. Coming up, that balancing act that he's doing is sort of wang of things which well pretty Tough, yeah, well, that's gonna get a lot more personal after the break

Hey, I'm Chad Abumarad. I'm Robert Krohich. Radio lab. We are back with Julia Lungoria's story about, well, the question before us is, should people born in American Samoa be automatically citizens of the United States of America? That's the question, just because they're born there. Exactly. And before the break we heard about some land ownership laws that are constitutionally questionable. Yes.

Yeah. And the more people I talk to, the more tangled the reality of blood laws for land ownership got. Hi. How's it going? Can I get in? All right. Because you kind of run out of people to marry. So, okay, first just like say your name. Genevieve Bettina Greg.

I talked to this one woman, Genevieve Greg, who runs a tour company there. And how long have you lived here? My whole life, except for seven years, I lived in California. And one of the first things she told me was It's I have a feeling that I'm like this island so small Who are you gonna marry, right?

So basically there has to be intermarriage There you go And what's the running joke here is like when a fan when I get two invitations for the same wedding then we know oh there we go. That's a family member. That's a family member. This is the best they cash cab confessional. Now, Genevieve herself. I'm only 25% percent. Her mom is half someone.

And my dad is Canadian. But when I was younger, I never knew I was white. Nobody, like I never knew I was white. Nobody, like, I never knew I was white till I went to California after high school. She says she like realized she was white one time at a bar in California when someone was like, you're like the widest girl in the bar. Like, okay, never mind.

Whatever that means, let's go. Oh. And it's funny, at one point, we pick up her friend. What's up? Told you it looked like crap. Okay, so this is Julia. Hi. Hi. Whose name is Tumae Snow.

Goes by Mae. We call her the white girl. What do we do? I like that. Mae is actually way darker skinned than Genevieve, but she grew up in California and talks like she's from the States. She barely speaks salmon and she's white. I do speak salmon for Fetayelava.

What does that mean? Thank you very much. Thank you very much. You're the darkest person. That's the salmon word for white person. I'm like, why is Samoan? We say I'm a little confused. Who's who now?

The point is, Ma'i is 100% blood Samoan. But she's not that culturally Samoan. She doesn't speak the language very well. She's only spent a few years there. Whereas Genevieve is very culturally Samoan has spent most of her life there speaks perfect Samoan. But because she and her sisters are only 25% Samoan blood.

Because we're not 50%. She can't technically own land in American Samoan. Her mom recently passed away and tried to bequeath land to her and her sisters. Even if it was written in a will that it was us inherited, we inherited it, we can't get it because we're not 50%. And this blood law affects Ma'e because of her son, Samuel, who she brought along in the car. Maya took away his video game and he freaked out. What's going on?

I'm not done with my car. Yes, my son, he's dropped us. As you can see. Anyway, it affects her son because his dad is American without one drop of Samu in blood. This kid is a fagassi right now. So Samu's kids will only be able to own land if he has them with a half or full blood Samu in. So I made a joke the other now but I guess guess he's gonna have to marry someone. I guess he's gonna have to marry someone.

Just have some more kids. You can marry a white girl if you want. Like mom, I got my glasses. I got my magnet. Is she someone? That's okay. And then another thing that came up is that Genevieve, interestingly, is she's a lesbian, and she has a partner who she wants to marry.

Yeah, it's my first marriage, so kind of cool. Do you, are you planning on a second? I don't know, we'll see how good she is. But same sex marriage is not legal in American Samoa. We couldn't be public affectionate with each other or be a couple my mom still was like whatever you do you need to do it inside the bedroom like we couldn't even be in the house and like give each other hug or something. So those are the stuff we went through a couple of years of really rocky relationship. And then, um, yeah.

So here you got Genevieve and Mai, two people who, if the Constitution applied here the way it does in the States, it seems like their problems would be solved. Genevieve would get her land and Mai's son could have kids with whoever he wants to. And maybe Genovive down the road could marry whoever she wants to. Do you wish you could get married here? Um, yes and no. I mean, see, I don't have the same views as other gay people. Like, I'm a Republican and people always ask me how can you be gay

and a Republican and a female, right? I have certain views like I'd rather have financial stability at the end of the day than be able to get married to someone, you know, I'd rather be rich and with someone than poor and married because in the end we're gonna divorce either way, right? Like, this is my first time in American Tamil. And I don't know, like, I don't know anything. What do I know? But, but I'm like trying to think about like growing up,

I'm like, oh, being a US citizen like matters. And it's like, it comes with all of these rights, like freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of, like equality under the law and stuff like that. So that doesn't matter here. Our here is we have a matisystem so all that stuff is out the door, doesn't matter. We are freedom of speech until they say, I'm speaking.

Do not speak, go get coffee for everybody. So that doesn't take place here, dude. Now, even though birthright citizenship wouldn't necessarily change all that, I still expected them to want birthright citizenship for American timeoans, but they both told me, no. Are you a US citizen? Are you national? Yes. And proud of it. We have land that an American cannot get. So what if the lands were to be preserved and then things like same-sex marriage, things like free speech, fundamental rights that you have in the

Constitution would be enforced. The matizing government couldn't deny you those things. Who would enforce it? People could sue in federal court and enforce that. Yeah. I don't think that really matters here. That's like the newest problem. I see that's the thing. Our our so granteed. I don't think people will care about that shit here, do you? Before Ma'am moved here, she was living in California. She married an American, bought a house. All those things that I once thought were so important when I was living in the States is nothing here. Nothing.

What changed? What changed? What changed? Yeah, like in you. Like did you notice something changing? Oh yeah. I love this place. I will never move back to the States. What changed?

My kids, my kids being raised out here, changed. We get to spend more time with my kids. I think that, and we get to spend more time as a family, you know, owning our own business. We would never be able to do that in the States. You know people who buy a house in the States like, oh man, you're, you know, you made it or whatever. You bought a house, you're a homeowner. Fuck that. I'm like, no way. We've learned that that style was such bullshit!

We don't use credit anymore. We don't use none of that fucking shit that they have out there. We don't, we don't. We are not in debt. We are content. But what we have here. We're happy. I was so blinded.

I was so blinded by what life truly should be. We live life. We live life every day here. I love it. I love it. And a lot of that is a lot of that. The fact that you do have land, like you own land. Yep, all of it. But at the same time, they did both agree that these land ownership laws about blood are kind of messed up.

And Charlie Ala-Elima, the lawyer on that citizenship case we mentioned, that's what he thinks too. I mean, they all know it's stupid. I mean, I had one. Genevieve actually asked him to help try to get her mom's land. That's this whole citizenship case again, you know, that somehow you're special down here, that you're entitled and able to do a lot of these things

that are patently unconstitutional, and even worse in my mind, it's unsamwell, that's not. He actually does want to preserve Samoan ownership of lands, but just to do it in some other way, because he thinks the blood rules are just illegal, and that they're basically a kind of Jim Crow law. So there was a case actually two years ago, this guy. And I tried to explain to Ma'i and Genevieve that you could see the fight for citizenship

as a fight against the insular cases, in which the Supreme Court justices called territories like American Samoa, quote, possessions inhabited by alien races, and said they were unfit for Anglo-Saxon legal traditions. He thought it was very racist, and he wanted the US government. Let's go ahead, I'm sorry, I finished. Yeah, yeah, to explain like that, because he feels like Samoans are in a limbo a little bit legally. Well let's go back to the 19th. I'll tell you what the government is.

I'm sure it figured out what the viewers government is. I was just saying about this. Jesus Christ. Move on with your life. What is he doing? Is he at home right now? Let's go. Let's go.

Let's go. Come on. Come on. Is he working? Do we find his guys back? And honestly, leaving the car with those two, it did make me wonder, how common is their perspective on the island? So my name is Julia Longoria.

I spent a bunch of time wandering around over the next couple days, taking a very informal poll. Do you mind if I ask you a couple questions? But okay, you're right. If it were put to a vote, would you make American Samoans automatic citizens? Would you vote to become a US citizen? No. No?

And at first, it seemed like it was just a lot of no. No, because I always got to be mindful what happened to bomb when states took over bomb. We're truly blessed in the sense that we were able to keep our culture or land. This one Samu and veteran. My name is Chief Bullo. With the Make America Great Again baseball cap. I support the president of the United States. Told me, I don't want to be a U.S. citizen.

I'm a U.S. national. I don't want a Japanese or Chinese. And I'm a, it's the same, you know, U.S. You know, I'm going to be a Samoa, you know. What did you order here? A fish fillet. And then interestingly, at McDonald's. Like at birth, you know, like to automatically become citizens.

What do you think of that idea? I think that's a great idea because that's gonna be a fair. I got only yeses. I think that would be great because the game air is... When Bafa Fine, as they're called, which are men at birth, but end up dressing like women. Here we do have partners, who do live with them,

but who are kind of accepted in society, but they're just not allowed to marry, who they want to marry. It's not recognized by law, so, but that's totally okay in the US. And in particular, when I talk to immigrants, from Korea, China, the Philippines, Tonga, most of them wanted citizenship. Easier, better, you know, citizenship is automatically granted. Yeah, yeah, of course. I wish I wish I wish. Maybe God help me. For the non-American nationals that are, you know, they probably think, oh wow, that would be great if

well, if we, if they become citizens. And this is something else that Charlie Aula Lima brought up with me. I guess you had kind of started to talk about injustices here that are kind of swept under the rug without citizenship. I think mostly it is how immigration will be handled. In American Samoa, he told me, you have immigrants coming to the island for work and because American Samoa controls its own borders and because he says there's lacks enforcement of immigration laws some

people talked about corruption you have situations where immigrants end up here on questionable visas stripped of their rights to wages and fair working conditions. And in some cases it hasn't been very good, you know, for some of the foreigners, there's a lot of abuse in that. But if you do become a citizen, and if the US immigration service comes down to actually enforces the laws and the requirements of foreigners coming to work here. Then you would probably see change. I'm just curious as you were doing these interviews, how are you processing all this? I was kind of making my way across the island and there were some people for whom this was a really

personal thing. Other people had these high ideals of rights, others, you know, high ideals of Samu and culture. But I did meet one person who kind of held all of these ideas in her mind at once. Thank you. Okay, man, Jesus Panna. May I meet you. Her name is Tisa, family. Okay, hello, I'm the infamous Tisa woman

from the famous Barefoot bar in the South Pacific. She runs Tisa's Barefoot bar. It's a series of follies or grassroot wooden structures on stilts. This instructor, I built this, me and the cameraman built this. It's beautiful. Thank you, You like it? Yeah.

That's pretty magical. And they are right on the water of this beach, Alegah Beach, which is a marine reserve, and actually stayed in one of the follies overnight, and you step out onto the sand in the morning, and every shell moved. It was bursting with life. She has. Oh, this is where the pictures came? Yeah. Those pictures are just crazy. Incredible. And most of the time here, just, no, I travel a little bit. I've been wrong. I've tested out many

trails to see how far I get. Well yeah, trails of life. Yeah, we're we're have the trails of life taking you. Oh, taking me to foreign land, you know, in the west coast. She has flags from different countries and states hanging up in her bar. And she has a unique perspective on American Samoa. I don't know. I just am so disappointed that we ended up this way. We're very content with what little we get. American Samoa. Thinking, I have Tennessee to think western, as you can hear, in my voice, my tongue. Tisa told me she went to the U.S. mainland for the first time when she was 16 years old. I wasn't necessarily looking for anything better.

I was just curious about what the other world really looks like coming from this tiny lower die. So, she went to live with her aunt in San Diego to go to high school there in the late 60s. I ended up following the Black Panthers. The Black Panthers had arrived in San Diego by that time. I was curious. I said, okay, what are these people? Because all I hear is bad stuff.

Black Panthers are the party, simply the vanguard of the revolution. I went to their meetings often. Newspapers were passed out. Postes, posts where the black people were gathering. And we planned to teach the people the necessary tools to liberate itself. To tell them about what they can do to improve their lives. And they were actually sitting down encouraging all the kids. Black kids, blue kids, whatever color kids, including some on's like me, to go to college and I did. And she says she also sat in on meetings in the women's movement.

Women's movement was full on. People rights, equal rights to have a job, to have respect, not be viewed as a piece of meat. My whole purpose of hanging around whenever these big rallies and I listen, I watch. Just learn and make a note just learn and make a note, learn and make a note. And sitting there in the back of those meetings inevitably, I keep thinking about home. I come from a little tiny island. She began to think men control their wives, their children, their daughters have no right

to speak up. The way things work at home just isn't just. So there were so much injustice here for women. The fact that women were not chiefs. Women were abused and young girls. They're messy, abused out of frustrations. And this is why a lot of San Francisco, a way in, they never want to come back here.

But Tisa and her 20s decided she would come back. Yeah, I never felt that California was my home. I was just a student of California. And I learned a lot. I learned a lot about my rights as a woman, and I learned my right to speak up. And she brought those lessons back home. When I came back, I was very vocal.

I spoke out. I never backed out from any man and so when I ran for government. So she ran for office? We have our campaigning for political office. The someone way, you don't speak out against anybody. And we still don't. But I went against all that. And I spoke out.

I spoke about rights. You have these rights that you can advocate for. But no one would do it because people were afraid. And the chiefs, my dad's cousins, he was a governor and he brought all the clan, the big whos, the big chiefs, the big boys. They came to dad and asked him, if you were pleased tell your daughter not to run for governor, because that's what she's to. And my father told him, well, she's her own person. She's going to do whatever she wants, and she can do that. She has those rights, and I'm not going to tell her no.

I love them forever for that. But he didn't like me because I was not the daughter that I was supposed to be. I was very vocal, a very strong voice in company. And they hear me. Did you win? Oh no, I'm just serious. I would never win, but I was very vocal. I was just out there, I did not care.

I wanted because I learned from America you have the right to speak. And that was very big for me. And so she believes, she's like the one reason why I'm proud to be an American is that we have rights. Because some part of the Constitution is protected, all right. So again, here we have a person who you think would absolutely support Charlie's fight to get American Samoans US citizenship. But...

No. I hope not. It's not a good idea. And today it's still the wrong thing to address. She said it's not worth it. Wow. No way. So it's not worth it because... For one, she thinks, you know, American Samoans are already running off to the US to find like a, what they think is gonna be a better life.

And US citizenship would probably make that drain on the island even worse. And then for life on the island. There are other parts of my culture I need to protect. And in our ways, my need to be a U.S. citizen. It's not about me at all. It's about my island. It's about my people.

It's about my family. It's about my village. It's about this wonderful community. So I will never go up and try to change anything if they're not with me. I've learned that the hard way. I've learned that and I'm humbled by it. Because our communal system, our chief system,

it's a very system that's keeping us alive and together. I guess I'm wondering, like, what about the communal systems you think would definitely go away? You know, like, what is it about the communal system like that is completely incompatible with being a citizen? The Western ways is individualism. It's about individual rights. Mine, my real estate, my land, but for us, it's about protecting all of us, our communal rights.

So it's complete opposite of the American system. If you bring in a whole bunch of immigrants, it's going to disrupt that village. It's already doing that. Why people who move in and cite their rights, I have the rights, I have my freedom to do this. But that's not what it's about. In the evening we have a bell for everybody to enter their home and do their meditation. These people come in, they look at us, we lost our minds, and there's conflict there. But it clashes. Everything foreign has clashed already with us. But I mean, like the people who are coming, like they're already coming, right? And they're already having kids here who are becoming nationals, right? Like maybe that ship has sailed? Well, I love them don't own any real land. They just hear they pass through transience, all other transience.

Yeah, but if the land was still preserved, you know I mean. It's a joke I've seen all the land has been preserved, the government turned them over and sell and make profit. That's been proven. All right. Oh, you have some interesting things to put out there. Yeah, yeah. Wow.

She spent time with the Black Panther's Ren for office and still feels somehow the existential threat to the island's culture over rules those rights? I don't know, it's... I mean it's a calculation in her head, but I remember sitting there on the beach and just not being able to wrap my head around it. I spent two Sundays in American Samoa. I went to church services. Not everybody goes to church, but the island is about 98% Christian.

And many people told me it's the center of Fasamoa, and sitting in those pews, watching people of all ages sing and interact with each other, they all know each other, they're looking out for each other. It's a feeling of belonging. And citizenship is about belonging, but belonging to the US tends to come with its own set of rights and responsibilities. And it struck me that these set of ideals, which I hold so dear,

so many of us hold so dear, that people here would see them as a threat to their survival. So I went back to Charlie Alehlima. So I actually talked to Dan Anga. What was his position? Yeah, so he, he, uh, Dan Anga. What was his position? Yeah, so he, he, uh, do you mind if I turn this up? Yeah.

And I told him what Tisa had told me and Dan Anga had told me. Dan Anga was like, basically like, why is a cautionary tale? Like, why is a cautionary tale, you know? It's interesting, you know, what he means then is I don't trust America. That's what that means. And he told me he doesn't think that this community would necessarily have to change. Cautionary tale of a history that happened 110 years ago, okay, that was 110 years ago America was like that. Have they changed significantly? You know, is Jim Crow around anymore?

Are the ideas, you know? You know, but the real question is, do you trust the US government to do the right thing? Do you trust the federal courts to do the right thing, to entrust the federal courts, to do the right thing. And for me, I personally believe that, well, if you don't trust the government that you belong to, then get out of that government. He was like, we, Samoans, need to make a decision about who we are.

If we want to be part of the US or not, there shouldn't be this in between. I have trust in the government. I have trust in the ultimate trust in the Constitution. He is a document that is something that we should all aspire to. We may not reach that, but we all aspire towards it. That's why we still believe in it. I still have faith that you can go to the courts

and get any problems right if I, but if I lose that faith, and I'm just gonna say, I forget it. You think, well, wouldn't make you lose that faith? You like me lose that faith? I don't know. We'll see you in the selection. Yes.

I'll see you in this election. Yes, I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know.

I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know.

I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, So special thanks to Sam Irman, whose book almost citizens tells the story of Isabelle Gonzalez. Doug Mack, author of the not quite states of America, which helped inspire the story. And to Belinda Torres-Mary and John Torres and the Torres family for welcoming us to their home. And thank you to Pongo Pongo tours.

Well, I'd like to say thank you again to Pongo Pongo Trade Win tours. Oh, yes. Thank you. I forget the trade win. And, uh, and Fennena Ada and her family. And to Justin Manga manga professor Daniel Holland David Herdrick Neil Weir and equally American which is his organization. Yeah, and it's time to sail off I think right? Yes, okay. Okay. We'll see you the next time. Yeah. I'm Chad. I'm Robert Krollwich. Thanks for listening The radio lab was created by Chad Avon-Rod and is edited by Soren Wheeler. Lulu Miller and Lachit Nasar are our co-hosts. Dylan Keefe is our director of sound design.

Our staff includes Simon Adler, Jeremy Bloom, Becca Press wrestler, Rachel Kusik, a Kedi Foster keys, W. Harry Fortuna, David Gable, Maria Paz Gutierrez, Sinduniana Sanbhandom, Matt Kielte, Annie McEwen, Alex Niesen, Sara Corey, Anna Vaskud, Buzz, Sarah Sandbach, Erin Wack, Pat Walters, and Molly Webster, with help from Sacha Kedijima Malki. Our fact checkers are Diane Kelly, Emily Krieger, and Natalie Middleton.

Hi, I'm Ram from India. Leadership support for Radio Lab, Science Programming is provided by the Gordon and Biti Moh Foundation. Science Sandbox is Simon Foundation initiative and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundation support for Radio Lab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.