From New York, this is Democracy Now!
A world without nuclear arms control
is a far more dangerous and unstable one,
with potentially catastrophic consequences.
Every effort should be taken to avoid this outcome,
including through an immediate return to dialogue.
The United Nations is urging Russia to reverse its decision
to suspend its participation in Moscow’s
last nuclear treaty with the United States.
We’ll get the latest,
then look at how some of the most popular hosts on Fox —
Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham —
promoted Donald Trump’s election conspiracy theories on air
even though they privately thought they were bunk.
Then, the family of Malcolm X announces plans to sue the FBI,
the CIA, the New York police and other government agencies
over Malcolm X’s 1965 assassination.
And it is our hope that litigation of this case
will finally provide some unanswered questions.
We want justice served for our father. Thank you.
And Mexico’s former top security official,
García Luna, has been convicted in the United States on charges
tied to drug trafficking.
All that and more, coming up.
Welcome to Democracy Now!, democracynow.org,
The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
Israeli forces killed at least 10 Palestinians in a raid
in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus.
One hundred others were reported injured.
It’s the latest fatal attack by Israel,
which has killed at least 61 Palestinians,
including 13 children, since the start of the year.
Sixteen-year-old Muntaser al-Shawwa died Monday,
two weeks after he was shot in the head by Israeli forces.
The U.N. has called on Israel
to "pause" plans to gut the judiciary.
The move by Benjamin Netanyahu’s extreme-right government
has triggered two months of mass protests.
This comes after the U.N. Security Council
unanimously approved a statement of opposition
to Israel’s illegal expansion of settlements Monday.
It’s the first time in over six years
the U.S. has agreed to a rebuke of Israel,
though advocates denounced the watered-down,
nonbinding statement in place of a more consequential resolution.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin
and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov
met with top Chinese diplomat Wang Yi in Moscow.
This comes after Russia announced its withdrawal
from the New START nuclear arms control treaty
and as Beijing seeks to play a larger role
in ending the year-long war in Ukraine.
The Wall Street Journal reports Chinese President Xi Jinping
plans to visit Moscow for a summit in the coming months.
Meanwhile, President Biden delivered a speech in Warsaw,
Poland, Tuesday, following his visit to Ukraine.
President Joe Biden:
"Kyiv stands proud. It stands tall.
And most important, it stands free. …
Brutality will never grind down the will of the free.
And Ukraine — Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia."
In Ukraine, Russian rockets killed six people
at a bus station in Kherson Tuesday.
The U.N. said at least 8,000 civilians
have been confirmed killed since the start of the war
but that the true death toll is likely "thousands higher."
The Environmental Protection Agency
has ordered Norfolk Southern to clean up the contamination
from its derailment in East Palestine, Ohio,
earlier this month, which led to a massive fire
and the release of toxic chemicals.
This is EPA head Michael Regan speaking from East Palestine.
Michael Regan:
"If the company fails to complete any action
ordered by EPA, the agency will immediately step in,
conduct the work ourselves,
and then force Norfolk Southern to pay triple in cost."
Ohio Republican Governor Mike DeWine also spoke
at Tuesday’s press conference
and said it was "fundamentally wrong"
that trains carrying toxic chemicals
are not required to notify authorities.
An investigation by local ABC affiliate WSYX revealed
Norfolk Southern donated $29,000 to Governor DeWine
since 2018, including $10,000
just last month for his inauguration.
The train company gave nearly $100,000
to Ohio candidates over the past six years
and extensively lobbied DeWine and other politicians.
Railroad Workers United and others are calling
for the nationalization of the U.S. rail system
in the wake of the East Palestine disaster.
Meanwhile, a Union Pacific coal-carrying train
derailed in Gothenburg, Nebraska, early Tuesday.
It’s the second such accident this week
for Union Pacific trains after another derailment
Monday in Riverbank, California.
The company said no hazardous materials
were involved in either instance.
California Congressmember Barbara Lee
has announced her bid for the U.S.
Senate seat being vacated by the retiring Dianne
Feinstein in 2024.
Lee has served in the House for 25 years
and is perhaps best known for being
the only member of Congress
to vote against authorizing military action
following the 9/11 attacks.
Congressmembers Katie Porter and Adam Schiff
are also running for the Senate seat.
A Virginia state senator has won a special election
for the 4th Congressional District
and will become the first
Black woman to represent Virginia in Congress.
Jennifer McClellan will fill the seat of Congressmember
Donald McEachin, who died in November.
In more congressional news, Rhode Island Democrat David
Cicilline is leaving the House of Representatives in June
to run the Rhode Island Foundation.
Prior to becoming a U.S. congressmember in 2011,
Cicilline was mayor of Providence,
the first openly gay mayor of a state capital.
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected an appeal to an Arkansas
law that penalizes the boycott of Israel.
The case was brought on behalf of the editor of the Arkansas
Times, who refused to sign a pledge
that he would not boycott Israel
in order to benefit from state advertising contracts.
Over 30 such laws are in place around the country
and have been used as a model to curb boycotts of oil companies
and gun manufacturers, as well.
The ACLU argued the Arkansas law should be overturned
since boycotts have been established as protected speech
under the First Amendment.
Click here to see our interview on the subject.
Separately, on Tuesday,
Supreme Court justices heard arguments in Gonzalez v.
Google, a case challenging federal protections
for social media and search engine companies
that host and amplify potentially dangerous content.
The plaintiff argues YouTube, which is owned by Google,
bears responsibility in the death of Nohemi Gonzalez,
a U.S. citizen who was killed in the Paris 2015 terror attack,
because it recommended ISIS recruitment videos
on its platform. The justices, however,
seemed unlikely to reverse decades of status quo
in legal protection for the tech companies.
In Wisconsin, a primary vote for a seat on the state
Supreme Court has advanced a liberal candidate,
Janet Protasiewicz,
and conservative Daniel Kelly to the April 4 runoff,
which could tip the court to the left
for the first time in 14 years.
At stake is the future of Wisconsin’s abortion ban,
which went into effect after the overturning of Roe v.
Wade last year.
The balance of Wisconsin’s top court
will also play a key role in voting,
amid battles over the state’s heavily gerrymandered
legislative and congressional maps,
and possible challenges in the 2024 presidential election.
Here in New York, Genaro García Luna,
Mexico’s former top security official,
once charged with leading the fight against narcotrafficking,
was convicted Tuesday for accepting millions of dollars
in bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel
under the former leadership of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán,
who’s serving life in prison in the U.S.
In exchange, García Luna
protected cartel members from arrest
and gave them safe passage for cocaine shipments
and tip-offs about law enforcement operations.
García Luna served under former President Felipe Calderón,
who launched Mexico’s U.S.-backed
so-called war on drugs,
that has led to the killing and disappearance
of tens of thousands of people.
García Luna also worked closely
with U.S. counternarcotics and intelligence agencies
as part of their supposed crackdown on drug cartels.
In immigration news, the Biden administration has proposed
a new policy that could block tens of thousands of people
from seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The rule would force migrants to first seek protection in Mexico
or another country
they passed through on their trek to the U.S.
They’d be able to ask for asylum in the U.S.
only if those previous claims in another country are denied.
Unaccompanied children would be exempt.
The ACLU condemned Biden for mimicking asylum bans
that were enacted by former President Trump.
Those were ultimately ruled illegal and blocked
in court following challenges from the ACLU.
In Texas, members of the Chinese community
are organizing against a racist bill
currently being debated in the Senate
that would bar citizens from China,
North Korea, Iran and Russia from purchasing property or land
in the state. Republican Governor Greg Abbott
has already signaled his support for the bill.
Asian Americans say the proposed legislation
is a throwback to long-repealed xenophobic laws
including the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882
and the so-called alien land laws of the early 1900s,
which banned Asian immigrants from owning land.
This is activist Ling Luo
of the Asian Americans Leadership Council
speaking at a rally earlier this month.
Ling Luo: "Texas Governor Abbott wanted to ban Chinese Americans
from owning properties in Texas
by passing S.B. 147 and S.B. 552.
Chinese Americans have to prove their citizenship
if they want to buy properties.
This is blatant discrimination based on race,
which violates the American Constitution.
We must stand in solidarity to protest
these discriminatory bills.
We need to stand up, speak out and fight back."
Seattle has become the first U.S. city
to ban caste-based discrimination.
City Councilmember Kshama Sawant,
who proposed the measure, celebrated after the vote,
tweeting, "Now we need to build a movement
to spread this victory around the country."
The family of Malcolm X is filing a $100 million
wrongful death lawsuit against the FBI,
the CIA, New York City and state,
the NYPD and the District Attorney’s Office
for concealing evidence of their involvement
in Malcolm X’s 1965 assassination.
Two men were convicted of his murder
and spent decades in prison
but were fully exonerated in 2021.
Later in the broadcast,
we’ll air comments on the lawsuit
from Malcolm X’s daughter Ilyasah Shabazz
and civil rights attorney Ben Crump.
And those are some of the headlines this is Democracy
Now, Democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report.
I’m Amy Goodman.
AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show
looking at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement
that Moscow would suspend its participation
in the New START treaty,
the last nuclear arms control agreement
between the United States and Russia.
"START" is shorthand
for "Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty."
Putin made the pledge during his annual State
of the Nation address on Tuesday in Moscow,
when he accused Western nations
of provoking the conflict in Ukraine.
He said Russia is fighting for its very existence.
PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN: [translated]
They can’t be stupid people.
They want to deliver us a strategic defeat
while sneaking into our strategic nuclear objectives.
Regarding this, I have to say that Russia suspends
its participation in the New START treaty.
Let me repeat: Russia does not abandon the treaty
but suspends its participation in it.
Before resuming the discussion about this treaty,
we must first understand:
What do such countries of the North Atlantic alliance
as France and Great Britain aspire to?
And how will we take their strategic nuclear arsenals
into account?
AMY GOODMAN: The treaty places a cap on the U.S.
and Russian strategic nuclear weapon stockpiles
and gives each nation opportunities
to inspect the other’s nuclear sites.
Shortly after Putin spoke,
the Russian Foreign Ministry said
Moscow would continue to respect the caps
established by the treaty.
We’re joined now by Dr. Ira Helfand,
the immediate past president of the International Physicians
for the Prevention of Nuclear War,
which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985.
He’s also a member of the international steering group
of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons,
as well as the co-founder
and past president of Physicians for Social Responsibility.
Dr. Helfand, thanks so much for joining us.
Talk about the significance of Putin saying that he’s —
well, they’re suspending involvement in START.
What does this mean?
DR. IRA HELFAND: Good morning, Amy.
Well, you know, it [inaudible]
dialogue between the United States and Russia
on the critically important topic
of controlling nuclear weapons. And there’s no way around that.
Having said that, I think there are a couple of things
that are important to recognize.
One is that the New START treaty,
while somewhat useful, is a very limited document
and very inadequate treaty.
It still allows the United States and Russia to maintain —
and they do — 3,100 strategic nuclear weapons,
ranging in size from 100 kilotons to 800 kilotons.
That is six to 50 times more powerful
than the bombs which destroyed Hiroshima.
Now, a study that was published last August showed
that if those weapons still allowed
under the New START treaty were used in a war,
they would cause 150 million tons of soot
to be blasted into the upper atmosphere,
blocking out the sun and dropping temperatures
across the planet an average of 18 degrees Fahrenheit.
In the interior regions of North America and Eurasia,
the temperatures would drop 45 to 50 degrees Fahrenheit.
In the ensuing famine,
something like three-quarters of the human race,
between 5 billion and 6 billion people, would die.
If that’s not bad enough, the same study showed
that even a very small fraction of those arsenals
would cause worldwide catastrophe.
Only 250 of the smallest weapons in the strategic arsenal,
100 kilotons,
would still generate enough soot to trigger a famine
that would kill 2.1 billion people
and end civilization as we know it.
That means that this treaty allows both the United States
and Russia to maintain arsenals
which are capable of destroying modern civilization
six times over.
So, it’s bad that Russia is suspending its participation,
but we need to understand
that this treaty itself is deeply flawed,
and we need to go far beyond it
and establish a treaty like the Treaty
on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons,
which actually bans and eliminates these weapons.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Dr. Helfand,
I wanted to ask you in terms
of where we’re heading now in terms of arms control,
given the fact that first the Bush administration
withdrew from one treaty,
then the Trump administration withdrew
from the Intermediate Forces Treaty,
and now Putin’s suspension
of Russia’s participation in this treaty.
What’s the message that these governments
are sending to the people of the world?
DR. IRA HELFAND: Well, they’re sending a message
that they’re not serious about their obligations
to eliminate their nuclear arsenals.
They’re moving in exactly the wrong direction.
And it’s important for us to recognize that in response
to the Russian decision to suspend participation,
there are options open to the U.S. government.
And there’s one in particular
which we should be sure not to take,
and that is to respond by withdrawing ourselves
or, more importantly, by building more nuclear weapons.
Now, the Russians have indicated that they do not intend
to exceed the cap that was established.
But even if they do, there is no reason for the United States
to build more nuclear weapons.
As I mentioned, we already have the ability
to destroy modern civilization six times over.
Adding to that the ability to destroy civilization
eight times or 10 times or 12 times over
does nothing to enhance our security.
We need to establish as U.S. policy
that nuclear weapons are the greatest threat to our security.
They don’t make us safe.
And we need to actively pursue an agreement
with the other eight nuclear-armed countries
to eliminate all nuclear weapons,
as is called for by the Back from the Brink campaign
here in the United States.
And many people, I think,
feel that this is a difficult time
to be talking about progress
towards the elimination of nuclear weapons,
given what’s going on. And indeed this is
an extraordinarily dangerous moment.
But we have to remember that at times in the past
when we have been close to nuclear conflict,
as we are now, in the aftermath of those crises,
rapid progress was made to improve the situation.
You know, in 1983, the United States was threatening to fight
and win a nuclear war in Europe.
We placed missiles in West Germany to be able to do that.
We almost went to war with the Soviet Union twice in 1983.
And yet, less than a year and half later,
Reagan and Gorbachev were able to proclaim
that nuclear war must never be fought,
it can never be won.
And it was a complete reversal of the nuclear policy
of both the United States and the Soviet Union.
The leaders had emerged from the crisis in 1983 sobered,
frightened by what they had almost done,
and open to a new way of thinking about nuclear weapons.
And it is possible — not certain,
but possible — that we will see the same kind of reaction
to this current extremely dangerous moment.
And we citizens need to push our government
to seize the potential opportunity and to move forward.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, I wanted to ask you —
in terms of some of the words of Putin yesterday,
the Western media doesn’t really pay much attention
to the actual content of his speech — of his speeches.
But one part I’d like to quote to you and get your reaction.
He said, quote,
"In early February, the North Atlantic alliance
made a statement with actual demand to Russia,
as they put it,
to return to the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty,
including admission of inspections
to our nuclear defense facilities.
I don’t even know what to call this.
It is a kind of theater of the absurd," he said.
"We know the West is directly involved in the
Kyiv regime’s attempt to strike at our strategic aviation bases.
The drones used for this purpose were equipped and updated
with the assistance of NATO specialists.
And now they want to inspect our defense facilities?
In the current conditions of confrontation,
it simply sounds insane."
That was Putin talking about the fact
that these treaties assume a certain level of cooperation
between the different countries, and, obviously,
the war in Ukraine does not make that possible.
DR. IRA HELFAND: Well, I think right
at the moment it is very difficult
to have that degree of cooperation.
But still, there’s no reason for Putin
to suspend cooperation and the inspections.
These inspections are very important
in maintaining a level of confidence on both sides —
the U.S. and the Russian —
that the other side is adhering to this treaty.
And anything that undermines this dialogue,
which Putin’s decision has done,
is a step in the wrong direction.
Look, there are problems with the position
of both countries in many issues,
but the need to abolish nuclear weapons
transcends all of these problems.
If we don’t get rid of nuclear weapons,
they’re going to be used. And if they’re used,
nothing else that we’re doing is going to make any difference.
You know, here in the United States,
we have the opportunity
to affect what our government does.
And we need to hold our government accountable
for its nuclear policy.
We have the ability to change that policy.
Congressman Jim McGovern and Congressman Earl Blumenauer
have introduced a resolution in the U.S. House
of Representatives, H.Res.77,
which calls on the United States to embrace the Treaty
on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons,
to make the elimination of nuclear weapons
the centerpiece of our national security policy
and to begin negotiations now with the other
eight nuclear-armed states for a verifiable,
enforceable, time-bound agreement
to get rid of their nuclear weapons.
That’s what the U.S. should be doing right now.
It has to acknowledge what is happening in Ukraine,
the war that President Putin has started there,
but that should not derail our efforts to save the planet.
We should sit down with all of these countries,
including the Russians, if they’re willing to do it,
and begin these negotiations.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you
about the nuclear power plants in Ukraine —
you know, they’ve got Zaporizhzhia, for example,
which is the largest nuclear plant in all of Europe —
and the risks of being in the middle of a war zone
with a nuclear catastrophe.
DR. IRA HELFAND: No, this is a very dangerous situation, Amy.
Nuclear power plants are dangerous, inherently,
in the best of times. They are certainly not designed
to be placed in the middle of a war zone.
And should there be an accident at Zaporizhzhia,
should the plant come under direct attack again,
there is a potential
for a catastrophic release of radiation.
Much larger inventories of nuclear material
are present at Zaporizhzhia than were present at Chernobyl.
And this is an extraordinarily dangerous situation.
In the short term, a demilitarized zone
needs to be created around this power plant.
All troops have to be withdrawn.
International observers need to be placed there
to make sure that the plant is safe.
In the long term, I think we need to rethink
the entire wisdom of having any nuclear power plants,
given this, what are the weaknesses,
the vulnerabilities that have been illustrated
by this conflict in Ukraine.
AMY GOODMAN: Dr. Ira Helfand,
we want to thank you so much for being with us,
immediate past president of the International Physicians
for the Prevention of Nuclear War,
which won the Nobel Peace Prize.
Next up, "The Internal Decapitation of Fox News:
Documents from Dominion Voting Systems’s lawsuit
against Fox show the network’s awareness
of the flimsiness of its stolen-election narrative."
That’s right, we’re talking Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity,
Laura Ingraham, what they knew and when they knew it.
Stay with us.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!,
democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report.
I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.
The foreperson of the special grand jury in Georgia
that’s investigating attempts by former President Donald Trump
and his allies to overturn the 2020 election
confirmed Tuesday that the jury recommended
more than a dozen indictments
and that the list might include Trump.
Kohrs spoke Tuesday with CNN’s Kate Bolduan
about the evidence they reviewed over the past eight months,
including testimony from 75 witnesses.
EMILY KOHRS: There was just too much for this to just be,
"Oh, OK, we’re good. Bye."
KATE BOLDUAN: And if it was just a perjury charge,
or perjury charges, would that be acceptable to you?
EMILY KOHRS: That’s fine.
I will be happy as long as something happens.
AMY GOODMAN: That was the Georgia
grand jury foreperson Emily Kohrs.
Among the evidence the grand jury likely reviewed
was a recording of Trump in January 2021
threatening Georgia’s Republican Secretary
of State Brad Raffensperger
to overturn Biden’s victory in the state.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: So, look,
all I want to do is this:
I just want to find 11,780 votes,
which is one more than we have, because we won the state.
AMY GOODMAN: A small excerpt of the grand jury report
made public last week did not make it clear
if the indictments include crimes other than perjury.
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis
will ultimately decide what charges to bring.
She has said the decision is imminent.
For more, we go to Washington, D.C.,
to speak with Chris Lehmann.
He’s D.C. bureau chief for The Nation, following this.
He wrote a piece, "Trump’s Legal Team Is in Hot Water."
So, talk about the significance of this grand jury forewoman
speaking out and what that says
about the whole grand jury investigation.
CHRIS LEHMANN: Well, Amy, it’s — you know,
the investigation is still very much a work in progress,
and it’s important to note that this grand jury
was a special grand jury convened
only to make recommendations to District Attorney Willis.
And so, there’s been a lot of chatter
about what it means that this foreperson is talking
so candidly about potential perjury charges,
but the district attorney herself
is the person who is going to make that call.
And in that event, she will convene another grand jury
to formally proffer potential indictments.
So, it’s still very early to be speculating a great deal,
and it’s also really important to keep in mind
the broader background here.
You know, Trump has faced investigations
and potential indictments in New York.
He’s obviously been impeached twice.
The legal system, as your viewers well know
and listeners well know, favors heavily entrenched power,
and a former president is about as entrenched as power gets,
even one that is — who is, as the recording you played show,
overtly engaged in criminal activity.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And from your coverage
of this situation,
who, especially in the Trump orbit or his legal team,
would be likely most exposed to potential indictments?
CHRIS LEHMANN: Well, you would have to think
Mark Meadows, who is very much plugged in.
You know, if you read the January 6th report
on the interaction at the Capitol,
Meadows is closely conferring with Trump
every stage of the way.
You know, interestingly, the Justice Department under Trump
did dissent strongly.
Even Bill Barr, who had been a Trump toady
throughout most of his tenure,
you know, understood that this was a bridge too far.
So, you know, I guess Trump’s personal lawyer
could face some exposure, but they’ve been very careful
in all these proceedings both to protect the president
and to limit their own exposure to potential prosecution.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Chris —
CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah, go ahead.
AMY GOODMAN: Chris Lehmann,
we wanted to move on to your other piece
for The Nation that’s headlined
"The Internal Decapitation of Fox News:
Documents from Dominion Voting Systems’s lawsuit against Fox
show the network’s awareness of the flimsiness
of its stolen-election narrative."
That’s from your piece.
See, Dominion’s $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit
lays out how Fox News hosts and top executives
thought former
President Trump’s 2020 election fraud
claims were completely unfounded,
yet continued to push his conspiracy theories on air.
Included in the documents was the response
from Fox News executives when anchor Neil
Cavuto cut off then-Trump Press Secretary
Kayleigh McEnany for making unsubstantiated claims.
PRESS SECRETARY
KAYLEIGH McENANY: We want an honest, accurate, lawful count.
We want maximum sunlight. We want maximum transparency.
We want every legal vote to be counted,
and we want every illegal vote to be —
NEIL CAVUTO: Whoa, whoa, whoa.
I just think we have to be very clear:
She’s charging the other side of welcoming fraud
and welcoming illegal voting.
Unless she has more details to back that up,
I can’t in good countenance continue showing you this.
AMY GOODMAN: So, after that,
Dominion said in its lawsuit that, quote,
"The brand team led by Raj Shah at Fox Corporation
notified senior Fox
News and Fox Corporation leadership of the 'Brand
Threat' posed by Cavuto’s action."
McEnany, by the way, is back hosting now on Fox News.
Chris Lehmann, can you lay out what the documents reveal
and what they say about Fox News?
And particularly talk about the stars of Fox,
what Laura Ingraham knew, what Sean Hannity knew,
what Tucker Carlson knew,
what has been revealed in these emails,
and what they would say on the air.
CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah, I think, you know,
the clip you just played is quite revealing,
because what Neil Cavuto is doing there
is what’s known as journalism.
He’s reporting on facts as he knows them
and calling out a,
you know, powerful spokesperson in the act of lying.
That is fundamentally what, you know, in a perfect world,
all journalists should be doing.
What’s so damning in the Dominion motion
is you see again and again all the top talent
and the top corporate executives at Fox
in one breath acknowledging that they know
that the stolen election narrative is a lie,
but then tamping down.
You know, they cited the Cavuto episode
as something they should never do, going forward.
And the reason for this is, their viewers, you know,
who they’ve stoked for 25 years
on resentment and grievance politics for the right,
wanted to be spoonfed some sort of narrative
that Donald Trump was denied a second term unjustly.
And so, when the news division at Fox
and some on-air commentators, like Cavuto,
provided contradictory information,
they started rising up and going over to Newsmax,
which is a bottom-feeding, right-wing network
that gleefully aired any and all claims about stolen elections.
So Fox was in a meltdown at this moment,
because they saw they were losing viewership.
You know, at one point,
Tucker Carlson texted Sean Hannity in a fury,
saying, you know, "Our stock price is going down.
Not a joke."
And, you know, again, it’s just not the case that,
you know, in a functioning democracy,
the primary purpose of journalism
should be to boost the stock price of your company.
It should be to tell the truth
and let the chips fall where they may.
You know, there’s another sort of cliché
about the conduct of journalism,
is that it should be done without fear or favor.
In the Dominion documents, you see all kinds of fear
and all kinds of favor
being extended to the Trump administration.
So, this is, you know, such a damning moment,
where you come to the realization that Fox News,
despite its corporate name,
is not in fact a news organization.
What they are doing is promulgating lies
for the sake of maintaining audience
share and high profitability.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And we only have about a minute for this segment,
but I’m wondering if you could speculate
in terms of the potential long-term impact
on Fox News as a result of this,
and the likelihood that Dominion Systems
is going to prevail in this lawsuit.
CHRIS LEHMANN: Yeah, you know,
it’s very unusual in a defamation case for a motion
for summary judgment to be granted,
but the evidence is quite overwhelming.
So, you know, it’s a $1.4 billion suit.
Fox, I think, its revenues are north of $14 billion.
So it would be a hit.
But it’s also important to remember
that a major corporation like this
is going to have libel insurances,
is not — you know, what’s scary,
now that we know that the only calculus
that matters for Fox News is the financial one,
they could well regard $1.4 billion
as an acceptable cost of doing business
in the pursuit of greater profit.
So, we’ll see. I mean, it’s definitely damaging
to the reputation of the organization
and its lead on-air personalities,
but, you know, the sad truth of the matter
is they did rebound from this moment
when they thought there were losing audience share.
They are enjoying really robust ratings and healthy profits.
So, in the short term, I fear,
not a great deal is going to change.
Until and unless we get something
like the fairness doctrine, which is the whole reason
that Fox News was allowed to exist in the first place —
the suspension of the fairness doctrine —
it’s going to be a cancer on our democracy.
AMY GOODMAN: Chris Lehmann,
I want to thank you for being with us,
D.C. bureau chief for The Nation.
We’ll link to your pieces in The Nation at democracynow.org.
Next up, the family of Malcolm X announces plans to sue the CIA,
the FBI, New York police and other government agencies
over the 1965 assassination. Back in 30 seconds.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!,
democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report.
I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.
The family of Malcolm X has announced plans to file
a $100 million wrongful death lawsuit against the FBI,
the CIA, New York City and the state,
the NYPD and New York District Attorney’s Office
for concealing evidence of their involvement
of Malcolm X’s assassination.
The family’s announcement came on Tuesday,
the 58th anniversary of Malcolm’s assassination,
February 21st, 1965.
This all comes just three months after New York City
and New York state agreed to pay a total of $36 million
to settle lawsuits on behalf of two men
who were wrongfully convicted and jailed for decades
for assassinating Malcolm X.
In 2021, a judge tossed out the convictions against the men,
Muhammad Aziz and the late Khalil Islam,
after finding serious miscarriages of justice.
On Tuesday, Malcolm X’s daughter Dr. Ilyasah Shabazz
and civil rights attorney Ben Crump,
standing at the site of the assassination
February 21st, 1965, in the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem,
held a news conference.
They spoke about Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz
at the memorial and educational center in their name.
BENJAMIN CRUMP: Fifty-eight years ago
today in this very room,
one of the greatest thought leaders
ever known in the 21st century was assassinated.
And since that time, there has been speculation
as to who was involved in the assassination of Malcolm X.
We know, on November 18th, 2021,
it was confirmed
and substantiated that the government agencies —
the New York Police Department, the FBI,
the district attorney of New York —
had factual evidence, exculpatory evidence,
that they fraudulently concealed from the men
who were wrongfully convicted
for the assassination of Malcolm X,
and they also fraudulently concealed that information,
most importantly, from the family of Malcolm X.
We know that based on their wrongful conviction,
that the government settled the matter of Mr. Azir [sic]
and Mr. Islam —
ILYASAH SHABAZZ: Aziz.
BENJAMIN CRUMP: Mr. Aziz — for tens of millions of dollars.
This is important for many reasons.
One of the most important reasons,
it gives Malcolm’s daughters an opportunity
to seek legal redress,
finally, based on the government’s admission
that they concealed evidence
involving the assassination of Malcolm X.
The truth of what happened
and who was involved has always been critical.
So, today at the Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz
Memorial and Educational Center,
we announce and give formal notice
to the city of New York, the state of New York,
and the federal government and its agencies,
the FBI and the CIA,
that the family members intend to sue,
bring a wrongful death lawsuit based on these new revelations
that have now finally been substantiated.
And the rhetorical question is this:
If the government compensated the two gentlemen
that were wrongfully convicted
for the assassination of Malcolm X
with tens of millions of dollars,
then what is to be the compensation for the daughters,
who suffered the most from the assassination of Malcolm X?
We intend to have vigorous litigation of this matter,
to have discovery,
to be able to take depositions of the individuals
who are still alive 58 years later,
to make sure that some measure of justice
can be given to Malcolm X’s daughters,
who in this very room were present with their mother
when he was shot at 21 times, 17 bullets hitting him.
If anybody deserves justice after these decades,
it is these women. …
So, at this time,
you will hear from Malcolm’s daughter Ilyasah Shabazz.
ILYASAH SHABAZZ: On February 21st, 1965,
my mother came here excited to see her husband,
because a week prior her home had been firebombed.
She walked in here happy, and she left out shattered.
Today, we will celebrate our father’s life and legacy
with the community,
because it is something that my mother did every year
for as long as I can remember,
with my sisters and just the larger community.
We will also seek justice for a man, a very young man —
he was only 39 years old —
who gave his life for human rights.
For years our family has fought for the truth
to come to light concerning his murder,
and we’d like our father to receive the justice
that he deserves.
The truth about the circumstances
leading to the death of our father
is important not only to his family
but to many followers, many admirers,
many who looked to him for guidance, for love.
And it is our hope that litigation of this case
will finally provide some unanswered questions.
We want justice served for our father. Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Malcolm X’s daughter
Dr. Ilyasah Shabazz, speaking Tuesday at the site
where Malcolm X was assassinated 58 years ago,
at the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem.
Well, during the news conference,
I asked the family’s attorney, Ben Crump,
about the role of the CIA in the murder of Malcolm X.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the evidence
that the CIA was involved with Malcolm X’s assassination?
BENJAMIN CRUMP: Well, Amy,
we are going to talk to those individuals
who were wrongfully convicted, not just of the assassination
but in the days leading up to the assassination,
that we believe this was an orchestrated effort.
And so, what we have to do is connect the dots.
And, you know, as people get older,
as they get ready to meet their maker,
the hope is that they will look at Malcolm X’s daughters
and say, "We wronged them, and we need to make that
right before we leave this Earth."
AMY GOODMAN: Family attorney Ben Crump.
AMY GOODMAN: We end today’s show on another subject,
the bombshell case here in New York,
as Genaro García Luna, Mexico’s former top security official,
once charged with leading the fight against narcotrafficking,
was convicted Tuesday for accepting millions of dollars
in bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel
under the former leadership of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán,
who’s serving a life sentence in the United States.
In exchange, García Luna
protected cartel members from arrest,
gave them safe passage for cocaine shipments
and tip-offs about law enforcement operations.
García Luna served under former President Felipe Calderón,
who launched Mexico’s U.S.-backed
so-called war on drugs,
that’s led to the killing and disappearance
of tens of thousands of people.
García Luna also worked closely
with U.S. counternarcotics and intelligence agencies
as part of the crackdown on drug cartels.
For more, we’re joined here in New York by Peniley Ramírez,
an investigative journalist
who’s been covering this closely,
is the co-host of Futuro Investigates
podcast series USA v. García Luna.
And we’re joined by the great Maria Hinojosa,
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist,
founder of Futuro Media, host of Latino USA.
We welcome you both back to Democracy Now!
Peniley, your team has been getting up
before the sun rises to go to the court
and be ready if the verdict comes down.
And Tuesday, it finally did.
Lay out the significance of this verdict,
and what you investigated and exposed.
PENILEY RAMÍREZ: Well, as you said,
yesterday we were there at 3 a.m.,
outside of the federal courthouse in Brooklyn,
and we were waiting for the verdict.
There were five counts, and he was found guilty to all charges,
which is a big thing,
because he is this highest Mexican ever faced
and now found guilty in the United States.
He was once the person —
the architect of the so-called war on drugs.
He was the most trusted person of the DEA in Mexico.
We saw — in the trial, we saw pictures of him
with different high-ranking members of the U.S. government,
like Hillary Clinton, like Barack Obama.
So, the U.S. government and the U.S. agencies
really trusted this guy for years,
while Mexico was becoming the most dangerous place on Earth
for journalists, and thousands of people were dying and dying,
and continue dying, in Mexico because of the violence,
and here in the United States because of the overdoses.
So, now we know that the so-called war
on drugs was false,
was completely a way to operate, to justify.
And this was part of the closing arguments from the prosecution,
who said — Saritha Komatireddy,
the lead of the prosecution team,
said that they created this false war on drugs
to have a way to justify
that they were pursuing all the cartels
and favoring the Sinaloa Cartel, led by El Chapo Guzmán.
So, it’s a big thing. And it’s a trial that involves —
and we should hold accountable both countries,
because this person was sort of a triple agent.
He was working with the Mexican government,
he was working with the DEA,
and he was working for the Sinaloa Cartel.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Maria, I wanted to ask you —
the impact, obviously, in Mexico of this trial
is far greater than here in the United States,
especially given the fact
that under the former President Felipe Calderón
there was this enormous war on drugs unleashed.
Has the trial shown any indication
that it went beyond García Luna
to other people in the Calderón administration?
MARIA HINOJOSA: I mean, there were names
thrown out there, but, no, really, this was not —
I thought, actually, you were going asked me
whether or not the trial went beyond
and that the United States and the prosecutors began
to look inwardly and realize that the U.S. government,
the DEA, the entire security apparatus failed here.
I mean, Juan and Amy,
we are sold a bill of goods of U.S. intelligence.
We are made to believe that the DEA is lawful
and knows what it’s doing.
In fact, there were rumblings about Genaro García Luna
over 20 years ago. There were questions about him.
So, intelligence? What exactly are you talking about?
And by the way, you cannot —
what we heard in the trial — right?
— is the level of the narco-state in Mexico.
Yes, this is very depressing as a Mexican, of course.
But you can’t assume that you’ve got planeloads of cocaine
making their way from Mexico City
out of the Mexico City airport into New York
and that there is no — no corruption on the U.S. side?
No corruption on the New York side?
What does that mean?
And that’s why Peniley and I decided to do this podcast,
that has become this sleeper cult hit,
both in English and in Spanish,
because it’s not about just pointing the finger
and saying, "Oh, corrupt Mexican."
That’s a very simple narrative.
What we’re trying to say is that — who’s really at fault here?
And what is this war on drugs really about?
And who’s paying the costs, by the way?
The thousands of lives of Mexican folks,
people murdered in this, people dying here in the U.S.,
but also the number of Black and Brown people, we all know,
who are spending time in jail now that shouldn’t be there.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And this comes as the Biden administration
on Tuesday
announced a new border policy to take effect in
May that would allow the U.S. to quickly deport asylum seekers
who fail to first request asylum on their way
to the United States
and to use a mobile app to seek asylum.
Maria, you’ve covered these immigration issues
along the border for so many years.
Your reaction to this new decision
of the Biden administration?
MARIA HINOJOSA: I’m disgusted, Juan.
I’m absolutely disgusted. The fact that Joe Biden,
who you and I know, have been around long enough,
that he knows exactly what’s going on.
He knows that the people who are coming to seek
asylum deserve that opportunity.
And he knows what it’s like to be in a caravan
or in the jungles in Colombia.
And to attempt to have internet service to download an app,
before you leave Haiti, to request asylum,
it’s completely illogical.
And that’s why I’m glad that you brought it up,
because we cannot — we cannot allow ourselves to be gaslit
by this kind of ridiculous policy.
By the way, let’s remember that this country
had the capacity to turn away
Jewish refugees at the height of the Nazi era.
What we are saying is, remain true to who you say
you are as a country of immigrants and refugees,
and, of course, our indebtedness
to all of the enslaved people who were brought before.
AMY GOODMAN: And I want to follow up on that
with Peni Ramírez, this issue of how immigration,
how migration, people coming over the border
from Mexico into the United States,
is directly connected to the U.S. support
for people like García Luna, as you were just talking about,
the close relationship that the Obama administration,
the Clinton administration,
all of them had with this man who ultimately now,
working with El Chapo, is convicted on most all counts.
PENILEY RAMÍREZ: Yeah, exactly what you said is right,
because it’s all connected. We learned during the trial,
for example, that García Luna —
we knew it because of my investigative work,
that the same day when he left office in Mexico,
he didn’t move to other country. He moved to the United States.
He moved to Miami to a $3 million house.
Then he was living here with his family.
He got a green card. He got a Global Entry card.
So he was allowed to be here and stay here.
And now part of this guilty verdict
that we learned this week
was that he was continuously working with the Sinaloa Cartel
even after he left office,
so even after he was living in the United States.
And they presented — the prosecution
[inaudible]
— we saw that he was going back to Mexico all the time.
So he was taking advantages of both countries,
living in both countries.
And at the same time,
the violence in Mexico during those years,
it came so big, that still it’s growing and growing.
And what happened when you have all this violence in Mexico,
violence also goes to the south. And we have been repeating this.
And you have more and more people seeking asylum,
trying to come to the United States to be safer,
because in their own countries they have no opportunities.
They have no — the economy is not good,
because you don’t have investments.
You don’t have people coming in.
You don’t have entrepreneurs coming in
or trying to start a business, because the crime, it’s so big.
And it’s about everything. Everything is corrupted.
And something that we learned in this trial, as —
if you have a person like him,
who was leading the federal police,
he was leading the prison system,
so he was leading the whole apparatus,
and he was helping one cartel
and facing the other cartels to help this cartel.
So what he was creating was this horrible place
to live in so many places in Mexico,
and people were forced to leave their towns,
leave their cities, seek asylum.
So we should analyze also the crisis,
the immigration crisis,
that we have in this country and in Mexico,
and all the people looking for asylum, under —
also under the perspective of this war on drugs,
this so-called war on drugs,
now we know this the false war on drugs.
And the responsibilities of people
that the U.S. government trusted and created a horrible crisis,
and that crisis impacted not just in Mexico
but in the region, in Central America,
and, of course, also here in the United States.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we want to thank you both
for your incredible reporting on this,
Peniley Ramírez and Maria Hinojosa,
co-hosts of the podcast USA v.
García Luna. Episode 10 is out on Friday.
They’re laying out the tracks today.
That does it for our show.
To go to democracynow.org, you can see Democracy Now!
in English and also headlines and highlights in Spanish.
Special thanks to Renée Feltz, Mike Burke,
Charina Nadura, Sonyi Lopez.
I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.
Thanks so much for joining us.