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Crystal
abolition is for everybody is a podcast that tackles the sometimes-difficult conversations around prison abolition. I’m Crystal.
Graham
And I’m Graham. This season is about the media’s involvement in carceral or abolitionist thinking.
Crystal
How it uses narratives to impact, radicalize, and shift culture.
Graham
Just a reminder friends, though the title of this episode may give you some warning, remember that harm itself tends to create situations of alternate harms.
Crystal
There will likely be other painful topics brought up too. Take care of you.
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Graham Welcome back to another episode of abolition is for everybody. This episode, we’re going to be talking about gangs and immigration. Before we get started, we wanted to mention that we’ve lumped these two really different topics together simply put, we’re highlighting how they are often conflated in the media to help sensationalize stories, despite the reality of the situation and we have a guest to help us talk through it. Welcome, Valerie, thank you for being with us. Can you please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about yourself?
Valerie
Sure. Thank you for having me. I am a born and raised Angeleno. I’m also a public school teacher, and I am an active community member and abolitonist myself.
Crystal Thank you so much for being here Val. I have, you know, had the honor of witnessing your activism in our community. For our listeners, can you tell them a little bit more about how you’re connected to the topic of immigration and gangs?
Valerie Yes, of course, so I’m also system-impacted. I have a loved one inside and they also have a status of, not a legal status. So when we talk about immigration, there are consequences that are unforseen and we’re waiting to see what’s going to happen.
Crystal I know a lot of our listeners are being introduced to a lot of terminology this season and really all seasons. Can you describe a little bit more what that statistic looks like for somebody, for your loved one who is incarcerated? I don’t think a lot of people know what happens once they finish their prison term. Like what comes after that?
Valerie So when someone serves their time, and completes their time, and they go through the parole board system, and of the discussions, one of the questions that will come up is does this individual have an ICE hold? And right away, if you’re familiar with ICE, that means that as soon as that person is deemed eligible, eligible for parole, they jumped all these hoops, and they’re deemed an amazing person and they are eligible for parole, they still have that ICE hold. And that means ICE, the second they are released, will be transferred into directly into ICE. And after that, lots of people disappear. I mean, it’s a scary situation because at least I can receive a phone call, right? Or even visit my loved one inside in a California institution. But once they’re transferred to ICE, they can leave the state. Go to Louisiana. Be transferred anywhere in this nation to an ICE facility. So when you talk about immigration status, if you’re a resident, if you committed a crime, you lose that residency status, so you become just undocumented is your label and you will have ICE hold on your record.
Graham So when they are transferred to the ICE detention centers, or facilities, what what’s the process then? Like? Do they go through a lengthy court process? Are they able to call home then? Like, what are some of the things that they do have versus what they do not have?
Valerie So from what I understand, because my loved one isn’t in that stage yet, but what I’ve heard from other people is, they’re waiting there and they can wait however long. It could be indefinite to see a judge and at that point, a judge will ask if you want to fight your ICE hold or be deported. So we will be facing two decisions and a lot of families who lived here in this country only they call this country home and they don’t know anything else. You just have to make that decision right then and there. Do I want to fight this and stay basically incarcerated for an indefinite time or be transferred, I mean or be deported? And leave to an unfamiliar place, country, with no supports there
Graham Wow.
Crystal You use the words, indefinite and forever, that is so scary, because it is just like no end in sight, and you basically go from being incarcerated, to being incarcerated, right off the bat. I actually did not know that once somebody gets transferred to ICE hold that you kind of lose touch and connections with your loved one, and that they can be sent anywhere in, in the US. Part of my job is that I read 1000s of letters from folks who are incarcerated throughout the state of California. And lately, I’ve been getting more and more letters, pleading for help from folks who are ready to come home and excited, you know, to rejoin their community, but they found out that they’re going straight to an ICE hold. Some folks, write that they’ve been in this country since they were children, some don’t even know the language of the country that they’re getting sent to, so I think the more that I learn about this, the scarier the process sounds and I’m really curious to know about what is one thing because I know that the media does such a great job at scaring people, and using words like illegal aliens, to describe our community. So I’m wondering, what are your, wat are your thoughts there having, you know, a loved one who is undocumented? What are the things that you see in the media? And what are you what are the things that you wish, you know, were shared instead?
Valerie Well, the one thing that media lacks is a human, a human aspect. The human story. We’re called undocumented. I mean, how far removed from an actual person, a human being is that?And when we’re talking about these undocumented, quote, unquote, “undocumented people”, we’re talking about men, women, domestic violence survivors, refugees, veterans, these are who we’re sending away. We’re punishing them twice and we’re separating them from their only home. I know so many stories of people that came here, as infants, they own and served over two decades, they went to ICE, and they couldn’t serve their time. They couldn’t take it. They can do two decades, over two decades in a California facility, and they found healing and rehabilitation and were found commutable by a previous Governor, passed board felt, you know, made all those steps of progress in their life and then were just released and snatched up kidnapped by ICE. And she was later, you know, separated by any communication from from her family, she didn’t know what was happening. They don’t, they don’t know anything. At least when you’re in a California facility, you know your sentence. You know what you can do to get out and work toward progress, but when you’re in ICE, there’s no progress to make. One day they’re going to, this this country is going to say “you’re out of here.” And that’s it. You don’t get to plead your case, you do get to plead a case, but it’s most likely going to be a deportation.
Crystal And you hear like zero reporting on that. Before Graham, I know that sparked the thought in you, but before we move further Val, I want to check in with you, is there a better term to use than undocumented because very early on, I learned don’t use illegal alien, but this is the first time to be honest, that I hear undocumented also removes the humanity and the empathy from folks.
Valerie Well, I always like to say, you know, these are community members that do not have a legal status and some actually do have their residency. They may they have a green card and a residency, bt as soon as you commit a felony, those those titles are stripped because that is a considered a privilege.
Graham That’s super tragic and I think in terms of the way that the media represents this, or the fact that they don’t they don’t show these stories, is because there’s no hook. We know that the media is heavy on hooks and there’s really no hook because the public opinion just based on what the media has fed them historically, is that once you commit an act of harm or a crime, a felony in this case, like you get what you get. And so the public opinion would not bite into the story. So the media doesn’t cover it, but it’s clear from the way that you’ve described it, that these people without legal status, that there’s a there’s a story that should be told and represented so that this act of harm that’s being done to them could be undone.
Valerie Yes. I mean, it’s so true. I mean, most of the women that are in incarcerated have also experienced domestic violence. They’re domestic violence survivors. We’re punishing them twice. They’re doing yes, they’re doing their what we call penance and serving their time, but then after that they’re deported. They’re separated from their only family, their loved ones, their community, to a country that they probably haven’t been since they were minors. What connection and what kind of support do they face there? Do they even have, some of these people have never, like you said before, don’t speak the language we have. Every every immigrant we can talk about from Asia, Southeast Asian, from Africa, from all of Latin America, South Amer- everywhere, being deported to places they don’t feel safe in because they left the country as refugees, countries with their own gang problems, and if they go to get deported, that’s a danger. We’re endangering people by sending them back to a country they have no connection to or support there. No one talks about the dangers about deportation.
Crystal I think one of the most heartbreaking things, you know, when it comes to this topic is the missed opportunities that we have before incarceration. And then after, after incarceration, or after somebody gets deported. I was watching a video by John Oliver, on YouTube, where he talks about immigration and in that video, he shared of a mom who was separated from her child at the border. And they’re separated for so long that the little boy was crying. As he said, “I want to go back to the jail. You’re not my mom anymore. I don’t recognize you. I wanna go.” He was pleading to go back to the jail. You know, and all the trauma that the child went through, all the trauma that the mom has went through, it’s like, yeah, they’re reunited, but look at the trauma that we have put into their lives. And at the end of the video, John Oliver pauses and says, “we did that. We made that happen. We put that trauma in that family.” And it’s just so heartbreaking to think of the different ways that we are just naturally complicit in this, because the media and politicians do such a good job at scaring us, and using words that scare them. They scare us from these community members, so as someone who comes from a Latino community and a community that’s full of quote unquote, gangs, I always see just how inaccurate the representation of our communities is.
Graham So I have a question, kind of a question commentary, I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. So the media covers this from a specific angle ad it informs the public, and the politicians informed the media as to the angle to cover so we hear about like border surges, we hear about terms like anchor baby, we hear things like that, and the media covers it all from a problem solution approach. Like “oh, here’s the problem.” And the politicians will come up with a solution. Now my opinion, and I wonder if you agree on this is that, and this comes from my personal experience being previously incarcerated, being a gang member? Like I think that I think that the real solution is in asking why, like, why are there surges at the border? Like, why is this an avenue that people will use to come into the country? And it comes a lot with what you mentioned in terms of the issues that are taking place, the community issues that are taking place, the danger that’s taking place in the countries of origin, but I’m wondering if you agree with with what I’m saying, like if you ask why I know for me, I mean, I got gang involved, I became gang involved and did the things that I did that eventually landed me in prison for a lengthy period of time, because there was trauma in my life. There was experiences in my life that I didn’t have the tools and our coping mechanisms to deal with. It was a very dangerous place in my house, so I went out to the streets. It was a very dangerous place in the streets, so I did what I had to do to survive, so on so forth, ad infinitum or nauseum to prison. And so like, I think that asking why can be a solution here and I wonder what you think about that.
Valerie I see how your story parallels to a lot of refugees stories that are here that are being deported. They escape a country with their family, to to hear for opportunity to feel safe, they have no choice, you have no choice but to leave for a better life for your family here. And even here, there are dangers that some communities cannot face because you probably as an immigrant, you want to feel safe and you go to a known community, but even within those communities, gangs are there. So our children, our youth are vulnerable in those situations. They grew up in that in, in possibly gangs. And it’s circular. So I mean, the trauma we’re creating by deporting is not a solution to helping these individuals that had left the country for for safety, and then we’re going to send them back. It just it’s circular to me.
Graham Absolutely. And I think like the narrative, the media narrative, and the social narrative on Gangs also is corrupted. It’s not, it’s not entirely accurate. It’s flawed, like gangs are communities. I’ve often said, just based on what I’ve seen, in my lived experience, that without toxic masculinity and patriarchy, a gang is just a community network. It’s a group of people who band together and deal with the the absence of certain aspects. One would call it entitlements, other people would call it privilege, but like the lack of access to certain things, and they deal with those things within their community, with the lack of resources, emotional and otherwise, that they can like, so a gang is just a network of people without without patriarchy and toxic masculinity. It’s essentially harmless, it’s really just doing what it can to band a community of people together.
Crystal That makes sense, because I’m like, you know, how I mentioned before I did grew up in a community that has gangs and you know, like, Latino community. And I didn’t realize just how badly the media was portraying gangs or communities with gangs, until my brother’s incarceration a couple of years ago, because the way that I grew up was, this is a community that is trying to survive. This is a community that is constantly harassed by the cops, we are poor, we are broke, a lot of us don’t know the language. A lot of us in this general community, our community members that don’t have legal status and it reminds me of, of one time, where I would walk home from the bus stop in high school, and an individual would follow me and take pictures with me and do sexual things in his car. And I remember that I took out a dollar bill and wrote their license plate. And as soon as I got home, it wasn’t the first time it happened. I didn’t want to call the cops because usually like, they don’t do anything. But that time, he freaked me out to the point where I called as soon as I got home. The two white police officers came and nothing happened. Nothing happened. So then I told my loved one who told his friends, and I was sage from then on, because they would walk me home. And these are the kinds of things that the media doesn’t portray the sense of community, us just wanting to survive. And we’re dealt with systems that are meant to see us fail. And unfortunately, when we don’t, quote unquote, make it they just criminalize us and incarcerate us. So you know, it’s, it’s no surprise that we have our little pods out here, and we have our pods in prisons as well. I’ve never been incarcerated Graham, so you can go ahead and talk about this more, but you know, pods exists inside and outside of prisons, so that we can survive and hopefully thrive in an America that wants to see us fail and sent back to our countries.
Valerie I think you touch a lot of important topics and I think I’m just reflecting a lot. But it’s just ironic that this country is built on immigrant immigrant thoughts, immigrant communities, and also enslaved people.
Crystal Labor.
Valerie Labor, but yet we don’t want immigrants here. And we don’t welcome them. And we don’t give second chances to immigrants. I think of how our law reflects that. And it’s, it’s funny that we can take certain things from immigrants, but then we can push back and be like, we don’t want this, this and this in our case, you know, so we reject if we don’t fit the model minority you’re not embraced in our country
Crystal What does a model minority look like? What does that mean?
Valerie
A model minority is like, the immigrant that follows all the directions. Follows all the laws. Succeeds in life. Is a contributing member to society. And it’s, it’s a myth. It’s basically a myth, because we’re all people we’re going to have- we’re going to succeed and some are not going to succeed. We’re at all levels. Think about Americans in general with legal status. Citizens, they, they they we have, you know, at the high level, we have the rich, the middle class, and the poor, but when we talk about immigrants, we only want to accept a certain type of immigrant, the one that’s successful, the one that’s an even then even if you’re a successful immigrant, you still have more hurdles to climb, because you’re not an American, so to speak.
Graham It’s as if they, like they don’t allow within, within that room, they don’t allow people to have any emotional issues any, like, you can’t acknowledge your trauma, you can’t acknowledge any hardship, or lack of access that existed within your community, because you should just be happy to be here. Like, that’s really the narrative.
Valerie That’s the only immigrant that I see welcomed and that’s why I never embrace the immigrant portrayals of the successful person. I try not to embrace those. I like uplifting, positive immigrant stories, but then you have only positive immigrant stories that you want to share and support and everybody else you do not you want to exclude them. So that’s what I mean, by the human aspect, we’re only accepting of people who are highly successful that jumped every hurdle. But we don’t have to, we’re human, we can be at any level. I don’t have to be a millionaire. I don’t have to be a successful CEO to prove my immigration status to be accepted. I just want to survive here in this country, you know, we should parallel what Americans have in this country, which is the same opportunities and the same chance. And when an American person serves their time, is deemed eligible for parole, they get to go home, they get to be reunited with their loved ones and be where they should be, but if you’re an immigrant, guess what? You’re gonna get punished twice. We’re going to separate from everyone you know, and that’s it.
Crystal I never, I never fully processed it the way you just explain that right now, so thank you, because they do have the standards of what makes you quote unquote, worthy. And even when you meet those standards that they create, you still don’t get treated well. You’re still always with that threat hanging over your head that you might get deported at any second. You see that a lot with DACA recipients. It’s like years and years and years of fighting and besides the family separation, and you know, the loss of connections between your end and your loved one, a lot of the things that I’ve I’ve kind of seen and to be quite honest, not super familiar with is the experience of being in ICE hold. I know, for a long for a while the media, you know, would show the crowded places and the, like aluminum blankets that were given, but I feel like if you’re not from that community, that’s as far as you know, the knowledge goes. And I know you’ve done a lot of work and advocacy when it comes to this. Can you share a little bit more about what what that looks like so that our listeners can get a little bit more of an idea of what that experience and trauma is like?
Valerie Well, I always make the comparison of our prison institutions in California, because I’ve been there as a visitor. And I know from my loved one, what it is inside that they can receive. I have visits with them.I have phone calls. I have access, I can write them. But ICE is a whole different machine controlled at the federal level. So it’s almost as if I don’t have access to my loved one. If once you’re in ICE hold, they disappear. It almost feels like they disappear. You can call every day and try to find out if for example, my if my loved one is deemed eligible for parole, ICE is going to pick them up. I’m not going to know where they’ll be. I don’t know when I’ll find them. I don’t even know what the next step is to locate them. At least with the in California inmate finder, I can track and find resources to. We have connections to find our loved ones and find support for them, in an ICE hole, they disappear. I might have to hire a lawyer. Usually a lawyer is involved to help connect a family member to our loved ones that are in an ICE facility. And at that point, they can disappear again and go to another state. A lot of people get shipped out really quick. Once they get an ICE hold, they go to an ICE facility and boom, next thing you know, I can’t find them. They’re in another state. I know of a case it was like less than two weeks and then they were in Louisiana, and they were trying to reach their family. They had to get an attorney to find another, another nonprofit gotten to support that family to find them. It’s it’s scary that our ICE is a facility that feels above the law at that point and makes people disappear. And nothing is clear for them from what I understand of how long you’re going to be there. When you’re going to see a judge for a hearing. It’s it’s very unclear. It’s a very fuzzy, unclear system. So that’s the the fear for everyone who has the ICE. It’s not just a deportation. It’s the conditions inside that, I don’t even know, but exactly what’s what they face on the daily, but I hear it’s scary. It’s so scary that some people elf elect and be like, “just deport me.” I can’t take another day a day inside. That’s what scares me. No one wants to talk about those things. What is going on inside?
Graham Wow, that’s really heavy. Thank you for sharing that. I have a question. Kind of logistical. So is there like it, you said an indefinite amount of time? And that’s super clear. Is there like an average amount of time that a person would end up fighting their case like that we could pinpoint? And what does fighting your case look like? Also like what? Like, if, if, yeah, I’m just wondering what fighting your case would look like in that situation?
Valerie So it’s basically individual based. You get a hearing with a judge. And from what I understand, it could be, you can wait months. And at that point, a judge will say, “Do you want to fight your case?” And that’s when you need money, you need money to find an attorney or some kind of nonprofit agency who are fighting for immigrants to fight their deportation and that can take I don’t know, it just seems like forever. I think immigrants that aren’t in ICE facilities, come to a point where they don’t see any hope. They basically say just deport me because I can’t stay here any day longer. And that’s what I think the system is pushing us to do. The conditions are so horrible that they give up. So they’re so far removed from their family, they’re in other states, they have no connection, they don’t know what’s happening, they don’t get to talk to their family, and they give up they say “just deport me. Send me to a country. I’ve never I haven’t been in decades.” Who does that? It has to be really bad if you just give up. I mean, my loved one has served 20 plus years, and has hope, but when we talk about ICE, I can hear in his voice he wants to give up like, “why am I going to do this time if I’m never gonna be with you?”
Crystal Yeah, I mean, to the point that you have folks saying, I prefer staying in the state prison, or just deport me.
Valerie Yeah.
Crystal The fact that the next time you hear from them is possibly when they’re already in another country?
Valerie I have heard that too. My loved has said, “I rather just stay here in California, at least I get to see you. I feel safe here.” That’s scary. I’m like, “Why? Why Why? Why won’t you fight to stay here?” and he’s like, “I’m not gonna, I’m not gonna fight it. I don’t want to be in ICE.” When you’re choosing to stay inside than going to your parole board and you know, you’re ready to be released, you’re ready, you are a different person, you are not the same person anymore, and you fear that deportation, that’s scary that he wants to stay inside. You rather stay inside then be deported.
Graham Wow. And so like in the process going up to board, we know that there’s a tremendous amount of self work involved. There’s a tremendous amount of going to groups and seeking therapy, and the unlimited amounts of therapy and the unlimited amounts of groups that take place within the California prison system. During the process of fighting a case in ICE, does any of the work that you’ve done that that’s Board of Parole Hearings has found you suitable which essentially says you are rehabilitated, so you can go home, we feel secure with you and our public, does any of that come into play during the process of fighting and ICE hold?
Valerie It’s funny, you should bring that up because most people in ICE holds were deemed eligible for parole, and yet, it’s not taken into consideration by a judge. They have deported people who have done amazing things inside. Amazing work. I’ve heard a story of a man who was incarcerated in California, who was then served his time in a fire camp, served as a firefighter, a hero on the outside. Would be deemed a hero fighting fires, protecting people, he was deemed eligible for parole, had an ICE transfer. He lost, he lost and was deported. And it doesn’t matter all the work you did inside, when when we’re just going to say, “you know what, we’re going to punish you again and just separate you from everything. It doesn’t matter what type of person you are.”
Crystal These are the kinds of stories that you don’t hear in the media, you know, they’re left out. And whenever you do hear stories like this, they slap on the illegal alien, they have a lot of misleading content, where they’re talking about immigration, and then the images that you’re seeing are of folks who would fit what society has fed us to know that is that our gangster I yeah, I just wanted to take a moment to really, thank you and emphasize and, and, you know, encourage folks to share everything that Val has talked about here, because we don’t hear about these things. And the fact that so many people go through this process and are put in ICE detention, and you have someone so close to you, that, you know, hopefully doesn’t have to go through that, but you have somebody so close to that there is that possibility and you don’t even know what happens there. And, you know, you know, there’s some really shady stuff going on if the media, it’s not covering this is instead focused on, you know, the typical stories that we see, every day.
Graham That’s really heavy. So I’m gonna ask a question, I want to say that this has been a really rich conversation, so much information, it was we’ve we were able to cover such a wide array of subjects and simultaneously, I know that there is some things that we missed. So what did we miss? Something that you think that the our listeners would want to hear that we didn’t get to cover in our conversation?
Valerie I think what the media doesn’t cover is that our politicians are also, our elected officials, are also responsible for the problem they created. Communities did not create this problem. We’re trying to seek services and solutions. And our politicians, elected officials, our state legislature, our governors, are creating the problems by creating laws that create more barriers for communities and immigrants. We don’t talk about how they’re part of the problem. They’re creating more trauma and harm for all of us and we have politicians currently, that don’t support immigrants that have policies that are available. Support policies or do not support policies that would help us and those politicians circulate from office to office. So if they’re in City Council, they go to the State Legislature, they don’t go to State Segislature, they go to the Board of Supervisors, so it’s important to check our elected officials and see how they voted to support immigrant families and to support services over incarceration.
Graham Absolutely. So preventative services, as opposed to carceral punishment. I think something if I could speak to something that I think we missed is the full scope. I know that we covered, like, I think that what I want to point out is it Valerie’s lived experience is singularly unique. And simultaneously, there are so many people who share that same or similar experience. There’s so many a countless number of people are going through this every single day as California puts them through the parole board process, approves them for parole, and they hit r&r and are shipped off in a bus to the next location instead of being able to parole as the board told them they would. So I think that the scope, like paying attention to the scope, allows us to see the severity of the issue that we have on our hands. Like the problem isn’t what the media is telling us, the problem comes before that. If we need preventative services, and there’s something to prevent, and we aren’t focusing on what needs to be prevented, we are focusing on basically reactive responses. I think the scope brings that all into focus.
Crystal
You’ve been listening to abolition is for everybody. Be sure to follow us @abolitionIs_ on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook for regular updates.
Graham
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