New hope for climate bill in Washington

S1: Excitement builds for the passage of a huge federal climate and energy bill.
S2: It will be the biggest climate investment that this country has made , maybe any country has made.
S1: I'm Maureen CAVANAUGH with Jade Heineman. This is KPBS Midday Edition. The stresses that can lead to tragedy for women in the military.
S2: Women in the military feel like they have to work twice as hard just to get recognition , but for the most part , they're half as visible as the men around them. So it's a really unique strain I think , that many women troops face.
S1: A pawn in sex trafficking ringleader pleads guilty in San Diego Federal Court. And the focus is on border art that can change minds on the KPBS podcast , Port of Entry. That's ahead on Midday Edition. The deal has been done , but the work is far from over. On the huge federal climate action bill set to be voted on in the Senate after a long time holdout. Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia agreed to the package last week. Democrats are optimistic about its chances. The bill includes $369 billion in federal spending , various tax provisions and a prescription drug price reduction initiative. And at its core , it is the first federal bill to set a carbon emissions reduction goal of 40% by 2030. Joining me is San Diego Congressman Scott Peters to tell us more about the bill and how it might benefit San Diego. Congressman Peters , welcome to the program.
S2: Thanks so much for having me , Murray.
S1: Now , people were sounding the death knell for this bill just a couple of weeks ago until Senator Manchin decided to support it. Did that come as a surprise to you ? Completely.
S2: It came as a surprise to me , I thought. I guess I always thought that the logic behind this was was good. So I'm really happy with this progress. I would also caution that it's not a done deal yet. We sort of believe it when it gets 50 votes in the Senate. But what I see so far is very encouraging.
S1: It looks like every Republican senator will vote no on the bill.
S2: It has to do with federal outlays and revenues. There's a mechanism you can use to to pass that with a majority , which is 50 votes plus the vice president. So it can pass. And that's been the plan all along , although I think some people saw it as a much bigger and much bigger aspirations. And this is still quite historic.
S1:
S2: Around the country , billions of dollars for transport , for transmission , to help clean energy move from where it's generated to where it needs to go. Money for ports , tax credits for carbon capture utilisation and storage and hydrogen. That'll help decarbonize heavy industries. We've got a state sustainable aviation fuel credit so that planes to be can be cleaner. And our old algae industry in San Diego is excited about that. We've got wildfire and climate resilience , money , tax credits for electric vehicles and high efficiency electric appliance rebates. So it's kind of a across the board approach. It's as you said , over $350 billion will be the biggest climate investment that this country has made , maybe any country has made. Wow.
S1: Wow.
S2: But I think this is not the kind of thing that the speaker will wait on if we have the chance to vote on this. I think we'll all be taking another quick trip to Washington and getting this done.
S1: Now , you've been working on bipartisan climate action in the House.
S2: I think it's this has been a Democrat only vehicle sort of akin to the Trump tax cuts that were Republican only. And one of the things I think we ought to just mention is that it does fix what I think were a lot of the defects in the Trump tax cut bill. It establishes a corporate minimum 15% tax so that corporations who are paying zero will pay something. It also cracks down on tax cheating , which is worth billions and billions of dollars to the federal budget. So I think there's some sensible tax provisions in as well that Republicans would not support. And as you mentioned , the drug pricing bill that I had a lot of I did a lot of work on will generate somewhere between 250 and $300 billion of savings for the country by allowing Medicare for the first time to negotiate drug prices with manufacturers.
S1: There are climate activists who are not happy with aspects of this huge bill , specifically the provision for new oil and gas drilling on public lands.
S2: I would say that this is what legislation is. Sometimes you have to you have to make compromises like I think they probably did with Mr. Manchin to get a bill. I would also point out that the bill would cut 24 tons of emissions for every tonne resulting from its oil and gas leasing provisions. So it's probably I think it is definitively well worth it to accept the fuel oil and gas provisions to pass what will be the largest climate bill in history and a huge net win. You know , I don't know. Legislation is perfect , but this really advances the ball quite a bit.
S1: Now , apparently , this bill runs for 700 pages. And I wonder if you've read it. I wonder if a lot of Congress members have actually read this bill.
S2: Well , this came through. I mean , look , I have to say , we dealt with a lot of this sometimes some time ago when we sent our iceberg of the bill over to the Senate. I think that what they've generally done is chopped out some of the stuff that they don't like and they're sending it back. So I suspect it's similar to what we already voted upon. And , you know , we'll have to check that in many respects , but I think we're pretty familiar with what's in this , particularly the climate parts , which have not been very controversial , frankly.
S1: Some people are concerned that Arizona Senator Kirsten Cinema may not be on board with this.
S2: One of those provisions was not the carried interest provision that's that's been added in there. So I don't know how big of an objection that she will she will make to that. But she's she's not indicated so far that she's on board with it. I hope that everyone can work to earn her support and one way or the other. But it seems like a pretty easy deal to cut , even if if if she stood out objections.
S1: You know , political pundits say that passage of this bill will be a boost for Democrats as we head into the midterm elections.
S2: I don't think they do. Now , I think that's part of our job is to explain it. I appreciate the chance to come on your program and talk about it. But , you know , I think it's it's a great credit to the Biden administration and to Democrats. If we can get this across the finish line to do this really historic bill now , we will have done $1.2 trillion in infrastructure investments. We will have done the first gun safety bill , I think , in decades. And now the biggest climate bill , the drug pricing provisions , some good tax provisions that will help the deficit and push back on inflation. I think there's a lot of us to be proud of and I think voters will welcome that information over September , October , if we can bring it to them.
S1: All right , then. I've been speaking with San Diego Congressman Scott Peters. Congressman Peters , thank you very much.
S2: Thanks so much for sharing.
S1: And although it's possible , passage is being greeted with a sigh of relief from climate activists , many have major problems with aspects of the bill. Here to explain what some local climate action activists are saying is KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. And , Eric , welcome.
S3: Thank you , Maureen.
S1: Now , I suppose the centerpiece of this bill , the goal of reducing the nation's carbon emissions 40% by the end of the decade , is the biggest national climate goal that we've ever had.
S3: The nation has never had a carbon emissions reduction goal. So to have one that goes to 40% by the end of the decade , that's a big step in the right direction. Now , there are people , people that I've talked to who say that , you know , maybe that's not enough. We need to do more. But they're not unhappy with the fact that the government is making a commitment to reducing carbon emissions because that will only help the climate situation.
S1:
S3: And you ask what's a climate justice community ? Well , it's the communities like Barrio Logan , like Logan Heights and National Cities , San Ysidro communities that are predominantly have populations of people of color but are next to industrial sources of pollution who suffer disproportionately from the rest of the city , from that pollution and $60 billion. While it's not a panacea , it won't fix everything. It is a dedicated funding source to help communities just like that.
S1: You know , it seems counterintuitive that in a climate action bill , we see new leases for oil and gas drilling. Tell us about that. How is that being.
S3: Yeah , that was that was kind of a curious one. There was a commitment to climate action and also a commitment to some of the legacy fuel industries in our country , new oil and gas leases. There were funds for new pipelines , a possibility for that. And I think that was seen widely as meeting the expectation that Joe Manchin had. He wanted to protect some of those fossil fuel industries while at the same time being able to do something about the climate. So , yeah , it was a curious it was a curious dichotomy there inside of the bill and one that was quickly seen by a lot of people. But , you know , it's if you want one thing , maybe you have to give up a little bit of another thing.
S1:
S3: It's a climate emergency. They wanted to see steps that went well beyond 40% , you know , maybe a chance to zero out the nation's carbon footprint. So I think that they they wanted to see more to address what they see as a very immediate and very present problem , this warming climate and the effects that it's having on the environment around us. But they at the same time say , you know , this is significant. It will make a difference and it will have an impact.
S1:
S3: I think it would be amazing that it passes in any political climate , but. Yeah , and and I think that the gas prices , you know , that was a lot of the justification for some of the oil industry carve outs that were in that bill. And so it kind of makes sense a little bit when you consider the politics surrounding this. But it's the first time that the nation has taken a major step toward doing something concrete about the climate. You know , they did the nation did sign the Paris Peace Accords , but all of the provisions they agreed to in that document years ago were provisions that were voluntary. And that's not the case with this.
S1: Some climate activists have had bittersweet reactions to this bill because they say it's good but falls far short of the action we need to take. But are some. More optimistic than that.
S3: I think you see the whole gamut. There are people who think that this isn't nearly enough. There are people who think that this is a great thing because it's it's it's a significant , impactful package that would that will impact those things. So I think you have opinions all across the spectrum on this. And and you have to understand this measure hasn't passed yet. It still needs to get approval in the Senate. It needs to be approved by the House. And then the president has to decide whether or not he's going to sign it , although he says if it gets to his desk , he will sign it. So right now , it's just an idea. It's not quite legislation. It still has to go through the political machine on Capitol Hill before any of these programs get put into place.
S1: I've been speaking with KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. And Eric , thank you.
S3: My pleasure.
S4: You're listening to KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman with Maureen CAVANAUGH. The mental health challenges that women in the armed forces face can result in depression , self-harm and even suicide. And as a new Voice of San Diego report illustrates , women within the military are more than twice as likely to take their own lives as a result of those many challenges. Joining me with more is voice of San Diego reporter Will HUNTSBERRY. Will , welcome back to the show.
S2: Hey , Jade.
S4: Your article begins by profiling Gilead's son , Cardona , who suffered sexual assault early in her Navy career.
S2: And after it happened , she tried to bring official charges and she was able to do that. But once the proceeding got under way , this other sailor was cleared of any wrongdoing. And after that happened , you know , Julissa just told me she was really consumed by anger. She was super upset. She felt like there was no justice in the world. And that kind of sent her down a path of pretty serious depression. You know , just just feeling like speaking out for herself wasn't even going to work. So when she started experiencing that depression , she did what she was supposed to do. She reached out to her commanders for mental health help , and she was going to see a counselor on a weekly basis. But during this time , she was working in a small unit as a ship's mechanic , and she was working with mostly men. And once she started going to see that counselor , you know , the other people in her unit really started giving her a hard time about it. Like , you're away from work. We can't depend on you. And even worse than that , you know , they know she's going to counseling and they're calling her crazy and stuff like that. And so that sent her into an even worse spiral than she was already in. That culminated in Gillette attempting to take her own life. She lived. And when she first woke up in the hospital , she said she was very angry because , you know , her life had gotten so bad. But she worked really hard on her recovery and she was able to push through that really dark time in her life. She kept going to therapy. Like she started finding all these moments of light. And eventually she herself became a counselor. So today she works with other veterans and other people in the military and feels a sense of belonging that she didn't necessarily have when she was in it.
S4: You know , Cardona talks about having a lot stolen from her while in the military.
S2: And that's what I heard from the different women vets I talked to. You know , she did not feel like she had a sense of community and she didn't feel like she was supported by the people around her. And , you know , I think that can differ from command to command. And it depends where a woman , soldier or sailor or Marine is working like on how kind of accepted and integrated they are into their unit. But something another vet told me is basically that women in the military feel like they have to work twice as hard just to get recognition. But for the most part , they're half as visible as the men around them. So it's a really unique strain I think , that many women troops face.
S4: You know , growing evidence seems to point to pervasive instances of sexual assault in the military.
S2: As many as one in four women report sexual assault in the military. But I think something that we don't realize and that's almost twice as shocking to think about is that , you know , the numbers in civilian life are just as bad , if not worse. You know , there's there's pervasive sexual assault in our culture , not just in the military. And some estimates among civilians put the estimate as high as one in three. So , you know , I think one expert I spoke to told me that it's easy to kind of look to this idea that , oh , maybe it's sexual assault that's doing this , that's forcing women in the military to have these mental health problems , then push them to try to take their own life more often than than civilian women in the same age bracket. But , you know , this this psychologist and former Air Force officer I talked to , she said that , you know , she really focuses on this unique strain that they face just by. By ice , almost treating them as invisible in terms of their military service.
S4: Talk a bit about that. I mean , you write that certain identity issues are at play and that and a lot of stress to the expectation of women in the military. What can you tell us about that ? Right.
S2: Well , Ginny Deal NPA , that's what I was just talking about. She worked in Air Force Intelligence and then after she got out , after nine years of service , she became a psychologist. And she runs a military and veteran center at William James College that's just focused on mental health for vets. And what she told me is that women in the military feel like they're straddling two worlds. You know , when they're in them , when they're with all their colleagues in the military , they feel like they have to be traditionally masculine , you know , and they have to be loud and they have to be assertive. And that's how they're going to excel in that world. But then when they're talking to people who are civilians and they're living their civilian life as as everyone in the military does , you know , they feel they have to be more feminine , more traditionally feminine , more docile , more subservient. And so she said this kind of straddling of two worlds in this trying to be everything to everybody is is maybe that you know , she she said it's tough when we're looking at suicide to to point to any one issue but this unique strain of like almost feeling like an identity crisis , of being everything to everybody and nobody being quite satisfied.
S4: Well , thank you for joining us.
S2: Thank you.
S4: And if you or someone you know might be considering suicide , please call or text nine , eight , eight.
S1: An annual physical fitness assessment is a cornerstone of military life. Each service branch has its version of the test , which usually involves pushups , sit ups and a timed run. But the newest military branch , the Space Force , is ditching the yearly test and instead outfitting troops with fitness trackers. Eric Schmitt reports for the American Homefront Project.
S4: They got a handful of airmen gather in the middle of the six lane track at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois on a calm summer morning. They're about to start their one and a half mile run.
S5: We start our time.
S4: After the last person crosses the start line.
S2: All right. Give us 30 seconds back there.
S5: If you want to stay back , I say just walk up here.
S4: Joking aside , the final results are serious. Each airman has to finish under a certain time based on their age , to pass this portion of the Air Force's fitness test.
S5: Give me a thumbs up whenever you guys are ready to go knock this out. Good , good , good.
UU: Good , good , good. On the back. Nine , four and three , two , one. Begin.
S4: The airmen quickly spread out as they circled the track. Earlier in the morning , they completed the other parts of the fitness test burn ready in a minute of uninterrupted push ups and later sit ups. I done this once a year. Assessment is how the Air Force measures if its airmen are physically ready for what their service requires. But the newly minted Space Force wants their fitness assessment to feel entirely different. Members of the Space Force won't have an annual test. Instead , they'll get a smart ring or other wearable fitness device that will keep track of their physical activity throughout the entire year. Chief Master Sergeant James Tobias is a senior enlisted leader for Space Force's Training and Readiness Command. Our standards really haven't changed. Right. We still are utilizing the Air Force standards. The difference is in our approach. The Space Force has plans for a digital community for its troops who are called guardians , where they can see data from their own device and how it compares to others in the service. Patrick Hitchens is the CEO of Austin based FIT Rankings , the company building that platform for the Space Force. He says it allows guardians to count the activities they normally do something that's not always the case now.
S2: Maybe you're not good at running. Maybe you're not good at pull ups. So there is some amount of dimensionality to these tests that favors one.
S4: Activity over another. Hitchens says his platform can convert any activity into a mat minute , a common measure of energy expenditure recognized by the CDC. Tobias says the Space Force hopes this approach will turn fitness into more of a carrot than stick. Many times fitness is almost used as , you know , a kind of a go no go kind of thing , right ? You either have it or you don't. I've known folks that can do all their aspects and run a really fast mile and a half , but yet their eating habits are poor , they're sleeping habits are poor. They're not healthy. Space Force leadership hopes the data guardians get from their devices will help them take more ownership of their health. Research has found an annual test for some military members to engage in eating disorders and other unhealthy behavior. Lindsey Boydell is an assistant professor of psychology at Western University in Ontario. She says troops may worry about their careers if they fail a fitness test.
S6: Having the consequences of not meeting the standards then may lead to people to engage in pretty extreme behaviors.
S4: But Bodell says switching to fitness monitors won't necessarily solve that problem. It may even make it worse. She says many researchers have found an association between eating disorder symptoms and fitness trackers. Some of the.
S6: Negative consequences , I think , might be preoccupation with certain exercise regimes or fixation on numbers which could end up getting in the way of other activities.
S4: Model says there needs to be more research on this topic as it relates to the military. The Space Force plans to evaluate its fitness tracker program after a year to decide if it will become permanent. I'm Eric Schmid in Saint Louis.
S1: This story was produced by the American Homefront Project , a public media collaboration that reports on American military life and veterans. Funding comes from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
S4: The victims were recruited as models , only to find themselves in the middle of a pornographic sex trafficking ring. Now , girls do. Porn operator Matthew Isaac Wolfe has pleaded guilty in a San Diego federal case while his business partner remains a fugitive. San Diego Union-Tribune enterprise editor Christina Davis has been covering this case and she joins us now. Christina , welcome.
S6: Hi , thanks for having me.
S4: First , bring us up to speed on what this case was about.
S6: So this is a federal sex trafficking prosecution , but it is an unusual one. Most of those kinds of cases deal with pimps , you know , prostituting out basically victims. But this is a mainstream big business. Porn website operator that was raking in millions of dollars called girls to porn. And what they were doing , like you said , is they basically were coercing young women into filming these porn videos and then they were widely released online.
S4:
S6: There's as many as 15 or so that are actually charged. But we do know that the scheme was a lot broader than that. There's also a lawsuit that happened in state court and that was filed by 22 victims.
S4:
S6: And they were recruited as models to come to San Diego. And then it was only until they got here that they were told that they would actually be filming the sex videos. But then they were also convinced that the videos would be going to private DVD collections for collectors overseas. They were promised that they would the videos would not be released online , that their identities would be secret. And , you know , many of the women still had reservations , but they were offered , you know , a fair chunk of change to do the videos. A lot of women testified in the the state lawsuit that they were given alcohol and some were given marijuana to kind of loosen their inhibitions before the shoots. And then they were given contracts to sign right on the spot. They weren't really given time to read the contracts very closely or really understand what they were doing. And they also weren't given copies of the contracts to bring home with them. And what they were really doing was signing away all of their rights to the videos. Some women also testified that in the middle of filming , if they had , they asked to stop. Sometimes the sex got really rough and painful. They were basically forced to keep going , and some say they were held against their will until the filming was stopped.
S4: So these women were raped ? Yes.
S6: Some testified that they were raped.
S4: Mm hmm.
S6: He's described in his guilty plea as as the operator of the business. He would do everything from manage the day to day operations of all of the websites. He would upload the videos , you know , manage the books , market the content. And he also even served as a cameraman on some 100 videos.
S4: In your article , you refer to girls do porn as an empire. Tell me about that.
S6: Girls do porn was its own website and you had to go and subscribe to the content. So it was raking in a lot of money. But they also had all of these offshoot websites as well connected to it , and then they would also upload clips of some of these videos that were free onto Pornhub. So it would drive traffic to the paid websites. And then there was also a kind of secret website that the owner is alleged to have run , which was dedicated to uncovering the identities of all of these women who were in the videos and online trolls would get involved on this website then and work to figure out who these women were and their identities. And then they would go and harass these women and try to out them to their friends and families.
S4: What justice have the women who were victimized in this received.
S6: For the state lawsuit ? The judge did find in their favor and the judge handed down a $12.7 million judgment against the operators of girls to porn. That's money that the victims have not seen yet. So that remains to be seen what happens with that. And then also just with the federal prosecution , a couple of people have pleaded guilty now to sex trafficking , conspiracy crimes. So that is some level of justice.
S4:
S6: Interestingly , prosecutors recommended that he be sentenced to around 12 years in prison and the judge sentenced him to 20 years. And I've covered federal courts for a long time. And you rarely see that kind of a distance between the recommendation and going over that much. Matthew Wolfe , the prosecutors said that they would recommend a similar amount of time around 12 years , 12 and a half years for him. But if you look at the other sentencing , you know , you wonder if he'll get a lot more years than that.
S4: You know , right now , Matthew Isaac Wolfe's business partner , is on the run.
S6: And he's believed to be an international fugitive. He's a New Zealand native. And the FBI has said that he has access to a lot of money probably , and could be anywhere in the world , really. And the FBI is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information that leads to his arrest.
S4: I've been speaking with San Diego Union-Tribune enterprise editor Christina Davis. Christina , thank you very much.
S6: Thank you.
S1: This is KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Maureen CAVANAUGH with Jade Heineman. The KPBS podcast Port of Entry is focusing this season on stories about how the border can change minds. The Frontier Project is a company of Mexican and U.S. artists who use theater , music , movement and play to actively engage their audiences in conversation about life along the US-Mexico border. In this episode , co-hosts Natalie Gonzalez and Alan Lowenthal tell us about how the group is achieving its mission to spark a dialogue about what divides us and what we share. Here's Jessica Bauman , the co-director and co-creator of the Frontera Project. What I discovered when I got to Tijuana was this incredibly rich and exciting culture of people who live here and are deeply rooted here. This was really a revelation for me. It was not a story that was getting told in any of the media that I could consume or that I had access to. And it kind of blew me away. I fell in love with the people I met here and the whole world of arts and food and culture and life that I found in Tijuana. And I felt like I have to get the word out to people like me who don't even know what they don't know.
S7: Jessica felt like she had to create a theater project that could tell that story to people like her who didn't have a clear image about life along the border.
S1: And she first reached out to Ramon. But Hugo and Brazil's Quintero , the directors of a well-known theater company in Tijuana , called the Juana. I said that through.
S7: And after lots and lots of video calls and endless brainstorming with a bunch of workshops in Tijuana and San Diego , they came up with the Frontera Project.
S1: We had kind of decided that we wanted to do something where we worked with artists who had connections to both sides of the border , and that we wanted to do something that would reach audiences who didn't.
S4: Have a firsthand experience of the border.
S1: I cannot see it always , in a way. I mean this immediate jibber jabber , but we hear it coming. We wanted it to make sure that everyone we worked with was able to do their best work. And that meant using whatever language was most useful to anyone in the moment.
S7: And so they knocked down a wall separating the two different languages.
S1: And so from the very beginning , the room that we're any room we're working in has gone back and forth between English and Spanish , I would say , most of the time. It's been maybe 75% Spanish. 25% English. That.
S8: That. Jose Ramon Verdugo Song director. Artistically , Tijuana said that through E codirector de la Frontera Project.
S1: Ramon is the co-director of the From That Project and the artistic director of Tijuana Asset Dentro. It is a theater company founded in 2007 that alternates artistic productions with workshops to introduce people to theater and scenic design.
S8: Been setting competition , art direction , the center , Kashima Publica and possibly more Dificil , Porque and Moussavi accept them in the mural. In this you see even my sister in law mismo canela with externalities and these always comes true even come inauguration bundle.
S1: Ramon mentioned that at first it seemed impossible for him to direct the production in two different languages.
S7: Yeah , they were each speaking their own language and kind of leaning in to understand what the other person was saying.
S1: Maybe Valeria should say , Are you sure I could get some help ? Okay. Okay.
S8: Okay. That makes me. Like.
S1: Like. Okay. Are you. Sure.
S4: Sure.
S6:
S1: Some of the artists in the project had dual citizenship.
S7: But other members of the team had only a mexican passport , including Ramon. So they had to go through the process of getting a visa to travel to and work in the U.S..
S8: Second getting an upward tap but I could you think got ornery cerebral artista local asshole A.A. Publisher. Impossible. No , you said proper artist.
S1:
S7: He also mentioned that the Frontera Project was possible in large part because he was able to obtain the visa.
S8: One of the Trump critics said the appropriate thing was a visa. So , you know , tourist visa problem and different than a project. D'Andrea otro otra linea. You love Frontera. Look it up , Romeo and me is selling Amiga. What I say is a posse. We are there this year we walk esto caruso la frontera yodel we all go different we will those moondance dingo those dingo dollar ritzy parcels as you see him perform we normally Salva book association say was a beginning to this normally say like existentialists to those territorios.
S7: Ramona's talking about what it's like to grow up along this border town and how oftentimes dissonances can normalize the coexistence of these two territories.
S8: As a stress is important. The mental illness idea most important , not all as linguist important of it , but I think is important to also I think is to establish can idiomatic lingua across causality or solace because mutual most practical parallel either in other similar schools to think that less to focus your importancia analyses stories in so lingua and CDO material. Read more look society and Lithium Original Damascus US since he means more or not exactly to that.
S1: But I'm only saying that all stories matter and all languages matter to us , and it is very important for people to continue telling stories in their native languages because it is a cultural richness that we cannot miss or ignore. In the fall of 2021 , the Frontera Project did a little tour around the US to Pennsylvania , New York and New Jersey.
S7: And while they were touring they offered workshops at different places to students and community groups to share their artistic process.
S1: Our audiences were largely white people who didn't necessarily have any connection to Mexico or to the border or to immigration. This is Jessica Belman again. And I think that one of the things that surprises all the audiences most is how joyful the piece is , that there's music and there's singing and there's comedy. And so they kept spreading the word about border stories that are not being told. We give people opportunities to share their feelings with us and to share their perceptions with us. It's really satisfying because it shows us in this very clear , unmediated way that people's minds are expanding to include a whole range of stories that they had never considered before.
S7: At Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. One of the students raised her hand and mentioned how grateful she was for the experience.
S1: And the thing that was really remarkable about that was that she was Korean. She was. And the child of Korean immigrants and her family had been homeless at one point and her parents had been undocumented. And like it sounded like she had had very intense experiences as a child , as an immigrant to the to the United States. But none of the things she talked about were things that we specifically addressed in the show. She felt like the humanity with which we talked about the experience at the US-Mexico border spoke to her as a Korean immigrant. And we were all blown away by that. For Jessica , it is super important that these stories resonate beyond the border. I am extremely aware that the stories in the Frontier project are not my stories , and I really think of my role as being. Then my job is to make these stories as accessible to people for whom they may feel distant or foreign or unfamiliar as I can.
S7:
S3:
S8: Here in Tijuana.
S3: Specifically , a theater artist has filmed like.
S8: A journey full.
S7: Of surprises.
S1: Here , I think that being an artist , yeah , it makes you an activist , even if you don't talk about directly political issues. Port of Entry is co-hosted by Natalie Gonzalez and Alan Lowenthal. You can find the full episode at KPBS Walk or wherever you listen to podcasts.