Guest Host Norm Ornstein welcomes Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-PA) to discuss legislation they're working on to curb the President's pardon power after the onslaught of blatantly corrupt pardons from the Trump administration. Rep. Dean was the former impeachment manager for Trump's second impeachment, so she also addresses how the blanket pardon of January 6th insurrectionists is especially grotesque.
We also discuss the latest on the "stolen documents" case and what Trump might have intended for them. Plus, people are making LOTS of money on insider trading around the Iran War.
Rep. Dean shares her thoughts on the ICE brutality her constituents in Pennsylvania and around the country are facing. And she shares her first hand account of the Dilley detention center, where ICE is mistreating detainees and neglecting children.
LEARN more about Rep. Madeleine Dean: https://dean.house.gov/biography
LISTEN to Norm's podcast "Words Matter" with fellow friend of the show David Rothkopf: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dsrs-words-matter/id1420216970
Interview:
Showing posts with label brutality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label brutality. Show all posts
Monday, March 30, 2026
Thursday, March 26, 2026
US traveller recounts brutal detention in Venezuela’s feared prisons: ‘They beat me, chained me up’
James Luckey's ordeal sheds light on the mistreatment political prisoners faced under Nicolás Maduro…
Sunday, February 1, 2026
Antifa used to unmask neo-Nazis, now it’s exposing ICE: ‘Predators don’t get anonymity’
Last week a photographer for the Minneapolis Star Tribune filmed a border patrol agent approach a protester, lying prone in the street, and aim a canister of pepper spray at his eyes. The protester was already detained, three other agents pressing his body into the pavement, but the agent can nevertheless be seen spraying the orange chemical irritant, which causes excruciating pain, at point-blank range.
The agent probably thought he would enjoy anonymity for this bit of brutality. The federal police terrorizing Minneapolis remain largely nameless as they dole out horrifying – and in two cases, fatal – violence against anyone opposing Operation Metro Surge. But within two hours of the Star Tribune posting the footage to social media, a group called Pacific Antifascist Research Collective claimed to have identified him…
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/30/antifa-unmasking-ice
Saturday, May 24, 2025
The Deputies Who Tortured a Mississippi County (Reveal podcast)
A “Goon Squad” of Rankin County sheriff’s deputies spent years brutalizing people until their reign of terror was exposed.
When Andrea Dettore-Murphy first moved to Rankin County, Mississippi, she didn’t believe the stories she heard about how brutal the sheriff’s department could be when pursuing suspected drug crimes.
But in 2018, she learned the hard way that the rumors were true when a group of sheriff’s deputies raided the home of her friend Rick Loveday and beat him relentlessly while she watched.
A few years later, Dettore-Murphy says deputies put her through another haunting incident with her friend Robert Grozier. Dettore-Murphy was just the latest in a long line of people who said they witnessed or experienced torture by a small group of deputies, some of whom called themselves the “Goon Squad.”
For nearly two decades, the deputies roamed Rankin County at night, beating, tasing, and choking suspects in drug crimes until they admitted to buying or selling illegal substances. Their reign of terror continued unabated until 2023, when the deputies were finally exposed.
Interview:
When Andrea Dettore-Murphy first moved to Rankin County, Mississippi, she didn’t believe the stories she heard about how brutal the sheriff’s department could be when pursuing suspected drug crimes.
But in 2018, she learned the hard way that the rumors were true when a group of sheriff’s deputies raided the home of her friend Rick Loveday and beat him relentlessly while she watched.
A few years later, Dettore-Murphy says deputies put her through another haunting incident with her friend Robert Grozier. Dettore-Murphy was just the latest in a long line of people who said they witnessed or experienced torture by a small group of deputies, some of whom called themselves the “Goon Squad.”
For nearly two decades, the deputies roamed Rankin County at night, beating, tasing, and choking suspects in drug crimes until they admitted to buying or selling illegal substances. Their reign of terror continued unabated until 2023, when the deputies were finally exposed.
Interview:
Monday, January 30, 2023
Trump vs. DeSantis in 2024? Republican litmus test is brutality
Speaking to supporters at Mar-a-Lago in November, Trump threatened that, as president, he would send the military into American cities, even if local officials objected, and repeatedly stressed his eagerness for executing drug dealers and human traffickers after quick, summary trials.
Monday, May 23, 2022
Biography examines how systemic racism shaped the troubled life of George Floyd (Dave Davies; Fresh Air podcast)
Floyd was murdered by a police officer in Minneapolis in 2020. Washington Post reporters Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa reconstruct the course of his life in His Name is George Floyd.
Interview:
Sunday, May 16, 2021
Why Police Reform Fails (Reveal podcast)
Six years after Ferguson, St. Louis hasn’t seen a single substantive police reform. A group of young Black leaders have instead set their sights higher: taking control of city politics.
In 2014, then-Ferguson police Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown. His death sparked reports, blue-ribbon commissions and countless police reform efforts. But so many of those reforms fell short of their stated goals. Today, St. Louis leads the nation in police killings per capita.
As the nation continues to grapple with how to save Black lives from police violence, we’re partnering with The Missouri Independent to examine why police reform efforts so often fail. We follow a new generation of leaders who, as a part of the Ferguson movement, are finding new ways to change policing in the St. Louis region. Reporters Trey Bundy and Rebecca Rivas follow local activist Kayla Reed, who went from attending protests to organizing them. After years of frustratingly slow progress toward reform, Reed transformed herself into a political powerbroker who is upending city politics.
And there’s no way to talk about police reform without talking about the power of police unions. We look how the St. Louis Police Officers Association, the city’s main union, formed to protect white police officers from accountability after beating a Black man. And we talk with James Buchanan, one of the city’s few Black police officers in the 1960s, who went on to help start the Ethical Society of Police, a union founded by Black officers to fight for racial equity in the department and community.
This show is guest hosted by Kameel Stanley, executive producer of Witness Docs, a documentary podcast network from Stitcher and SiriusXM.
Interview:
In 2014, then-Ferguson police Officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown. His death sparked reports, blue-ribbon commissions and countless police reform efforts. But so many of those reforms fell short of their stated goals. Today, St. Louis leads the nation in police killings per capita.
As the nation continues to grapple with how to save Black lives from police violence, we’re partnering with The Missouri Independent to examine why police reform efforts so often fail. We follow a new generation of leaders who, as a part of the Ferguson movement, are finding new ways to change policing in the St. Louis region. Reporters Trey Bundy and Rebecca Rivas follow local activist Kayla Reed, who went from attending protests to organizing them. After years of frustratingly slow progress toward reform, Reed transformed herself into a political powerbroker who is upending city politics.
And there’s no way to talk about police reform without talking about the power of police unions. We look how the St. Louis Police Officers Association, the city’s main union, formed to protect white police officers from accountability after beating a Black man. And we talk with James Buchanan, one of the city’s few Black police officers in the 1960s, who went on to help start the Ethical Society of Police, a union founded by Black officers to fight for racial equity in the department and community.
This show is guest hosted by Kameel Stanley, executive producer of Witness Docs, a documentary podcast network from Stitcher and SiriusXM.
Interview:
Monday, April 19, 2021
Justice for Daunte Wright (Opening Arguments podcast OA482)
Officer Kim Potter was charged with 2nd Degree Manslaughter in the killing of Daunte Wright. She claims she meant to fire her taser. Could she face more serious charges? Then, Andrew breaks down Maryland's Police Reform Bill. It's pretty good stuff, so naturally Democrats had to override the Republican Governor's veto. And finally, we've got a wildcard in which Sydney Powell responds to charges of incompetence with EVEN MORE INCOMPETENCE.
Interview:
Monday, October 5, 2020
Breonna Updates; Trump's Outrageous Tax Returns (Opening Arguments podcast OA426)
We’re still mad about Breonna Taylor’s killing, and you should be too. A juror has come forward to say that the AG misrepresented the deliberations. We’re like to get the tapes soon, but as of now we don’t have them. We clarify and expand on a few things from our previous Breonna episode. Andrew also does a mini dive on the disproportionate racial breakdown of our prison population.
In our main story, we talk about the blockbuster story by the NYT on Trump’s tax returns. Andrew answers whether the NYT is in any legal trouble for the article, and we go into the horrifying contents of Trump’s returns.
Interview:
Wednesday, July 15, 2020
Private prison executives claim to Congress they have no idea about abuses at their facilities
I’ve been aware that guards at private detention prisons have pepper-sprayed detained immigrants protesting their ongoing detention amid the novel coronavirus pandemic because I’ve written about it. Many Daily Kos community members have been aware that guards at private detention prisons have pepper-sprayed detained immigrants because they’ve read about it here and elsewhere. It’s happened. We know this. It’s fact.
Yet Mother Jones reports that two executives from two private prisons where a number of incidents have been reported—and in at least one instance confirmed by the company itself—claimed to Congress that they had no knowledge about any of that ....
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2020/7/14/1960670/-Private-prison-executives-claim-to-Congress-they-have-no-idea-about-abuses-at-their-facilities
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2020/7/14/1960670/-Private-prison-executives-claim-to-Congress-they-have-no-idea-about-abuses-at-their-facilities
Thursday, July 9, 2020
Unpolicing Mental Illness (The 1A)
If someone is in a mental health crisis, are the police the right people to call?
Law enforcement officials have become “the de facto facilitators of treatment for people with serious mental illness in America,” according to a survey of law enforcement from last year.
But some say the police were never meant to handle these types of situations. A 2016 Boston Globe investigation revealed that nearly half the people killed by Massachusetts police officers “over the last 11 years were suicidal, mentally ill, or showed clear signs of crisis.”
With protestors calling to defund the police, communities across America are exploring ways to divert money from police budgets to mental health services.
Will these changes be a boon to our mental health system? How did jails and prisons become America’s largest mental health institutions in the first place?
A note to listeners: We played some audio at 0:35 of a police officer tasing a man with a mental disability in distress. This is a non-lethal encounter that took place in Glendale, Arizona last summer. The audio is disturbing. If you’d like to skip it, it lasts for about 30 seconds.
Interview:
https://the1a.org/segments/1a-across-america-unpolicing-mental-illness/
Law enforcement officials have become “the de facto facilitators of treatment for people with serious mental illness in America,” according to a survey of law enforcement from last year.
But some say the police were never meant to handle these types of situations. A 2016 Boston Globe investigation revealed that nearly half the people killed by Massachusetts police officers “over the last 11 years were suicidal, mentally ill, or showed clear signs of crisis.”
With protestors calling to defund the police, communities across America are exploring ways to divert money from police budgets to mental health services.
Will these changes be a boon to our mental health system? How did jails and prisons become America’s largest mental health institutions in the first place?
A note to listeners: We played some audio at 0:35 of a police officer tasing a man with a mental disability in distress. This is a non-lethal encounter that took place in Glendale, Arizona last summer. The audio is disturbing. If you’d like to skip it, it lasts for about 30 seconds.
Interview:
https://the1a.org/segments/1a-across-america-unpolicing-mental-illness/
Monday, July 6, 2020
What's wrong with saying "All lives matter"? (David C. Smalley podcast #466)
Is there really a need for "Black Lives Matter"? If so, why? Why don't Black people cooperate more with police? Why don't they focus on Black on Black crime instead?
In this episode, Smalley (who is white) thoughtfully responds to Sam Harris's comments, and debunks many of the things white people say about police and Black Americans. He offers many suggestions for how we can change things for the better.
Interview:
https://www.spreaker.com/user/smalleyandhyso/466-sam
In this episode, Smalley (who is white) thoughtfully responds to Sam Harris's comments, and debunks many of the things white people say about police and Black Americans. He offers many suggestions for how we can change things for the better.
Interview:
https://www.spreaker.com/user/smalleyandhyso/466-sam
Police Training In America: How Can We Fix A Broken System? (On Point)
The Atlanta police officer who shot Rayshard Brooks had just completed a course in de-escalation. Why was his instinct to shoot? We have an in-depth examination of police training.
Interview:
https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2020/06/25/police-training-america-system-policing
Interview:
https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2020/06/25/police-training-america-system-policing
Sunday, July 5, 2020
Rethinking American Policing (Fresh Air)
We talk with journalist Jamiles Lartey about systemic racism in American policing. He writes about criminal justice, race and policing for the non-profit news organization 'The Marshall Project.' "Policing wasn't always this way. It wasn't always this big. It wasn't always this bureaucratic," he says. "Sometimes as a society, you need to rethink institutions."
Interview:
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/10/874178891/rethinking-american-policing
Interview:
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/10/874178891/rethinking-american-policing
Saturday, July 4, 2020
The Militarization Of Police (Fresh Air)
Journalist Radley Balko, author of 'Rise Of The Warrior Cop,' says police departments across America are increasingly using equipment designed for use on a battlefield, including tanks, bayonets and grenades. We talk about the use of these weapons against peaceful protestors.
Interview:
https://www.npr.org/2020/07/01/886005998/the-militarization-of-police
Interview:
https://www.npr.org/2020/07/01/886005998/the-militarization-of-police
Monday, June 22, 2020
What Defund the Police really means: replacing social control with investment
Protests over brutality and racism highlight how far the US has travelled from any sort of equality. Real change is needed
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/20/defund-the-police-social-control-investment-donald-trump-protests-race-george-floyd
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/20/defund-the-police-social-control-investment-donald-trump-protests-race-george-floyd
Wednesday, August 28, 2019
How one of the nation’s roughest cities is reshaping use-of-force tactics - The Washington Post
It was just after 8 p.m., when a knife-wielding man staggered out of a fast-food shop and zigzagged down Broadway in downtown Camden, N.J. More than a dozen officers — rookies with three months on the job and veterans with 13 years — formed a ring around him. When he stumbled back, slashing the carving knife unpredictably and ignoring orders to drop the weapon, the police kept their firearms holstered...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/08/21/police-must-first-do-no-harm-how-one-nations-roughest-cities-is-reshaping-force-tactics/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/08/21/police-must-first-do-no-harm-how-one-nations-roughest-cities-is-reshaping-force-tactics/
Thursday, January 31, 2019
'They’re real bad at apologizing': Detroit police officers charged with crimes at record rates - Daily Kos
As police departments across the country continue to struggle with public trust issues—often of their own making—a local investigation has uncovered an undeniable pattern among those who vow to protect and serve Michigan's Motor City.....
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1829515
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/1829515
Saturday, January 26, 2019
ICE Agents Detain Woman Despite 'High-Risk' Pregnancy and Deny Her Medication for Days, Immigration Lawyers Say - Newsweek
"Common sense should have told them this was not a good idea," immigration lawyer Greg Siskind said...
https://www.newsweek.com/ice-agents-arrest-high-risk-pregnant-woman-during-her-green-card-interview-1299295
https://www.newsweek.com/ice-agents-arrest-high-risk-pregnant-woman-during-her-green-card-interview-1299295
Wednesday, November 1, 2017
'I Can't Breathe' Examines Modern Policing And The Life And Death Of Eric Garner : NPR
On July 17, 2014, an unarmed black man named Eric Garner died on Staten Island, N.Y., after police officers threw him to the ground and put him in a choke hold. Garner's last words, as recorded on a cellphone video, were: "I can't breathe." He repeated the phrase 11 times....
http://www.npr.org/2017/10/23/559498678/i-can-t-breathe-explores-life-and-death-at-the-hands-of-police
http://www.npr.org/2017/10/23/559498678/i-can-t-breathe-explores-life-and-death-at-the-hands-of-police
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