Episode 151

full
Published on:

25th Dec 2025

3.75M Case Backlog: Can We Fix Immigration? (Full)

3.75 million cases rotting in court while the same immigrants add nearly a trillion to GDP. Jerremy Alexander Newsome and Dave Conley sit down with Audrey Medina and Jerry Valerio—two sharp voices with skin in the game—who drop raw family stories, call out the profiteers keeping the system broken, and ask the question nobody wants to answer: is a functional legal pathway even possible anymore? This one hits different.

Timestamps:

  • (00:00) Backlogs to Breakthroughs – the stat that breaks the narrative
  • (01:09) Immigration Crisis Intro – why it feels impossible
  • (01:38) Meet Audrey & Jerry – second-gen fire meets career-coach clarity
  • (02:15) Personal Stakes – this isn’t abstract for them
  • (04:47) Family Immigrant Stories – tears, triumphs, paperwork hell
  • (08:40) Duality of Identity – proud American, forever “from somewhere else”
  • (15:18) Generational Shifts – kids don’t carry the same scars
  • (18:18) Modern Immigration Hell – what changed rules, endless waits
  • (31:03) History Lesson – we’ve flipped policies every 20 years
  • (41:50) The Backlog Monster – 3.75M cases and counting
  • (43:06) H-1B Visa Nightmare – lottery or merit?
  • (43:44) Employment-Based Debate – do we want the best or not?
  • (45:29) Immigrant Innovation – they build the companies we brag about
  • (52:16) Asylum Reality – safe haven or revolving door?
  • (01:10:01) Open Borders Thought Experiment – what if?
  • (01:17:43) One-Word System Description – spoiler: it ain’t “fair”
  • (01:20:02) Human Trafficking Angle – the part nobody wants censored
  • (01:22:43) Presidential Power – what one signature could actually do
  • (01:34:40) Third Party Rant – maybe both sides deserve to lose
  • (01:44:33) Closing Poem – hits harder than any stat

Connect:


📢 Solving America’s Problems Podcast – Real Solutions For Real Issues

🎧 Listen on  Apple | Spotify | & More!

🌍 Join the conversation on Instagram | YouTube | X

Transcript
Alex:

Solving America’s Problems

Alex:

— Jerremy and Dave just sat down with Audrey Medina and Jerry Valerio,

Alex:

two voices who’ve lived the immigrant story from the inside.

Alex:

Jerry’s parents landed from the Philippines in the sixties with almost

Alex:

nothing — powdered milk, canned food, racism waiting at every corner — yet

Alex:

still built a life, raised five kids, and ended up with a seven-figure portfolio.

Alex:

Audrey’s grandmother fled domestic violence while pregnant, crossed into the

Alex:

U.S., gave birth to an American citizen, then watched that same system treat her

Alex:

family like second-class for decades.

Alex:

Both guests agree on one ice-cold fact: today the legal path their

Alex:

families took barely exists anymore.

Alex:

3.75 million cases rot in immigration court backlogs — some waits now

Alex:

stretch past twenty-five years — while the same immigrants dump nearly a

Alex:

trillion dollars a year into the economy and get called a burden.

Alex:

Jerremy and Dave dig into why the system stays broken on purpose, who profits

Alex:

when it does, and whether America can ever build a line that actually moves…

Jerremy Newsome:

Dave Conley, what are we addressing and solving in this episode?

Dave Conley:

In this week's episode of Solving America's Problems, we're

Dave Conley:

asking why the land of opportunity now feels like a waiting room.

Dave Conley:

More than 3.75 million people are stuck for years in immigration court, while

Dave Conley:

those same immigrants pour almost a trillion dollars into the economy.

Dave Conley:

Yet the system keeps them and us on hold to unpack the gap

Dave Conley:

between promise and practice.

Dave Conley:

We're joined today by Audrey Medina, a data-driven second generation American

Dave Conley:

who turns data into action by day and builds companies and stories by night.

Dave Conley:

And Jerry Valerio, a first generation American executive coach and strategist

Dave Conley:

whose decades across tech giants now help professionals rise without burnout.

Dave Conley:

Together they reveal where policy stalls, where people thrive anyway,

Dave Conley:

and how their parents and grandparents flipped obstacles into momentum.

Dave Conley:

And that's this week on solving America's problems, backlogs to breakthroughs,

Dave Conley:

fixing America's immigration gridlock with Audrey Medina and Jerry Valerio.

Jerremy Newsome:

Immigration is no longer and never has been just a policy.

Jerremy Newsome:

personal, it's powerful.

Jerremy Newsome:

It is the pulse of America right now.

Jerremy Newsome:

Millions, over 3.7 million people are stuck in court backlogs waiting

Jerremy Newsome:

years for their shot at the American Dream, and who's hearing them?

Jerremy Newsome:

Just judges each buried thousands of cases.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yet these same immigrants, they're pouring hundreds of billions, almost a

Jerremy Newsome:

trillion dollars into the economy, paying taxes in a system that is failing them.

Jerremy Newsome:

Failing us all.

Jerremy Newsome:

I'm Jerremy Alexander Newsom with my co-host Dave Conley, and

Jerremy Newsome:

this Solving America's Problems.

Jerremy Newsome:

Today we have two voices who embody this fight.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey Medina, a second generation American lives, the immigrant story,

Jerremy Newsome:

data driven by day entrepreneur and storyteller by night.

Jerremy Newsome:

And Jerry Valero, a first generation American and career coach who brings a

Jerremy Newsome:

decade of experience to help professionals rise without breaking so first and

Jerremy Newsome:

foremost, what are you two seeing with the current pulse and current

Jerremy Newsome:

information as it relates to immigration?

Jerremy Newsome:

What's on your overall media radar?

Jerremy Newsome:

with Audrey first.

Audrey Medina:

Currently a lot of what I am seeing is propaganda intended to

Audrey Medina:

cause fear in immigrant populations.

Audrey Medina:

It's intended to cause division amongst Americans.

Audrey Medina:

It's intended to make us think that immigrants are the problem

Audrey Medina:

We need to get rid of.

Audrey Medina:

What I've been seeing.

Audrey Medina:

That's what a, just people in general are feeling.

Jerremy Newsome:

And Jerry, you live really close to

Jerremy Newsome:

Washington, dc What about you?

Jerremy Newsome:

What's currently coming up on your radar?

Jerremy Newsome:

What's the narrative?

Jerry Valerio:

Well, I, I see both sides of the spectrum simply

Jerry Valerio:

You could talk to one friend and they'll have one perspective and then another

Jerry Valerio:

friend, and they'll have the opposite.

Jerry Valerio:

So in some ways, I've learned to like temper opinion and listen

Jerry Valerio:

to both and see where I could learn and be educated, right?

Jerry Valerio:

There are those that see immigrants as a problem.

Jerry Valerio:

then there are those that acknowledge that the immigration process has been broken

Jerry Valerio:

for quite some time, and that immigrants are not to blame for where we're at today.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Jerremy Newsome:

So with that being stated, Jerry, your parents immigrated from the

Jerremy Newsome:

Philippines to Minnesota in the 1960s arriving with whatever little

Jerremy Newsome:

money they had in their pockets.

Jerremy Newsome:

a story from their journey that still shapes how you see America today?

Jerry Valerio:

So I am super proud of my parents because I, they're a reflection

Jerry Valerio:

of that spirit that immigrant spirit

Jerry Valerio:

To the states to make a better life for themselves.

Jerry Valerio:

And what I truly appreciate about what they've done is they've had the

Jerry Valerio:

I'll say grit about them to figure whatever out to survive, to make a

Jerry Valerio:

living and to grow, you know, a family.

Jerry Valerio:

So they came here, uh, when they were in their early twenties, 21, 22.

Jerry Valerio:

They got married a year later.

Jerry Valerio:

They were actually childhood sweethearts, grew up in the same

Jerry Valerio:

small town in northern Philippines.

Jerry Valerio:

And so, and then they had five great kids in a span of six years.

Jerry Valerio:

I'm the oldest of the five.

Jerry Valerio:

And what I've learned from them is just the, the work ethic the commitment to,

Jerry Valerio:

holding themselves to high standard,

Jerry Valerio:

Under the pressure of racism, they did not let that deter them because

Jerry Valerio:

it could have been easily the case.

Jerry Valerio:

They're like, you know what?

Jerry Valerio:

I'm not gonna do my best because I'm not gonna be acknowledged or anywhere.

Jerry Valerio:

Instead, they're like, I'm gonna do my best in spite of what others try

Jerry Valerio:

to say about me or do or, or do.

Jerry Valerio:

Know, they we grew up from what I refer to as in, in, in retrospect maybe what I

Jerry Valerio:

would consider somewhat of a poor life.

Jerry Valerio:

Grew up on canned foods and I had no issue with it until I learned visiting

Jerry Valerio:

a friend's place who, when we moved out to the suburbs, like what food could be.

Jerry Valerio:

And I even had powdered milk all the way until I got into maybe early

Jerry Valerio:

high school, and my mom's like, oh, we should just get regular milk.

Jerry Valerio:

Why?

Jerry Valerio:

You know, why are we giving the kids powdered milk?

Jerry Valerio:

Which, you know, once you have regular milk, oh my God, you

Jerry Valerio:

realize how bad powdered milk is.

Jerry Valerio:

I can't believe I lived through this.

Jerry Valerio:

So yeah, I'm greatly appreciative for them.

Jerry Valerio:

Uh, they've done well and they still have that immigrant mindset

Jerry Valerio:

because they're successful.

Jerry Valerio:

My, my dad learned how to you'd appreciate this.

Jerry Valerio:

He had a million dollar stock portfolio that he learned to develop

Jerry Valerio:

and playing the stock market.

Jerry Valerio:

Uh, and then he lost half of it in the 2000 crash, but then he took it an

Jerry Valerio:

order of magnitude to where it is now.

Jerry Valerio:

And I keep telling my parents, enjoy what you've earned.

Jerry Valerio:

You deserve it.

Jerry Valerio:

But they're like, the frugal self.

Jerry Valerio:

We go take them out to dinner.

Jerry Valerio:

Like, no, it's too expensive.

Jerry Valerio:

Don't spend money on that.

Jerry Valerio:

and

Jerry Valerio:

Simple joys,

Dave Conley:

but what kind of milk are they drinking?

Jerry Valerio:

regular milk

Dave Conley:

Okay, good.

Jerremy Newsome:

we go.

Jerremy Newsome:

There we go.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

I love that man.

Jerremy Newsome:

I love that.

Jerremy Newsome:

And

Dave Conley:

That's amazing.

Jerremy Newsome:

It is.

Jerremy Newsome:

And Audrey, you said, and for the listeners, I'll throw out a quick fact.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey's known me since the age of six years old,

Dave Conley:

Wow.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

So on this podcast, she's known me the longest and, uh, she's also

Jerremy Newsome:

one of our avid listeners, so thank you for making it to the show.

Jerremy Newsome:

Uh, Audrey, you said, you've said the immigrant story is

Jerremy Newsome:

your story, that it built you.

Jerremy Newsome:

a moment or experience that helped define how you see immigration in America?

Audrey Medina:

More.

Audrey Medina:

I had a lot, uh, more recently I was actually doing genealogy and

Audrey Medina:

learned that mom's side of the family has been here multiple times.

Audrey Medina:

They would immigrate here just in time for a war draft, get

Audrey Medina:

drafted, go to war, gets him back.

Audrey Medina:

And that happened in.

Audrey Medina:

Two different wars.

Audrey Medina:

So one and two, that is, is a recent one that kind of reshaped it.

Audrey Medina:

But as far as just experiences in general, for me it's as a second generation

Audrey Medina:

American, there was a little bit of a duality that occurred where I wasn't fully

Audrey Medina:

Mexican, I wasn't fully American and not being fully, I guess not fully belonging

Audrey Medina:

in either category, but also having the ability to effectively code switch.

Audrey Medina:

kind of just lifts the veil off when you like anything that's obscuring

Audrey Medina:

what the big picture story is when you're actually experiencing it.

Audrey Medina:

When you have people that don't understand it because it's not relevant

Audrey Medina:

in their life and they're some of the closest people in your life.

Audrey Medina:

It's offered that.

Audrey Medina:

I think one of the larger ones though though, my grandmother came up here

Audrey Medina:

when she was pregnant with my mother.

Audrey Medina:

she was fleeing a domestic situation.

Audrey Medina:

It wasn't like per se, like your standard refugee story, and it

Audrey Medina:

wasn't exactly an economic story.

Audrey Medina:

It was she and her children needed out.

Audrey Medina:

She had come up here, she was pregnant with my mother.

Audrey Medina:

My mother was born here.

Audrey Medina:

They actually did have to return to Mexico for a period of time while

Audrey Medina:

waiting on all of that paperwork.

Audrey Medina:

But then coming back living through, I mean, a period of time where speaking

Audrey Medina:

Spanish was not a good thing, especially in la This was at some point or another

Audrey Medina:

during the LA walkouts going through the discrimination and what she saw when

Audrey Medina:

she came here about just, it's not as rosy a picture as a lot of immigrants

Audrey Medina:

think it is before they come here.

Audrey Medina:

And then they come here and they're like, well, why is all

Audrey Medina:

of this oppression happening?

Audrey Medina:

Why is this like it's, we're supposed to be the city on the hill, right?

Audrey Medina:

The shining city on the hill, and yet these unspoken cast

Audrey Medina:

systems effectively still exist.

Audrey Medina:

Um, so that was one of the things, Tristen speaking with my

Audrey Medina:

grandmother, who by the time she died, had a decent grasp of English.

Audrey Medina:

But when I first met her, there was a lot of just language barriers

Audrey Medina:

there Learning of her experiences, where she came from and working.

Audrey Medina:

She worked herself to the bone and there wasn't a safety net

Audrey Medina:

for her when she was ill and old and aging, just things like that.

Audrey Medina:

Those were some of the shaping moments.

Audrey Medina:

And then outside of that, uh, my first marriage was to, uh, Salvador and

Audrey Medina:

child refugee who joined the service, got, eventually got their citizenship.

Audrey Medina:

And the way that, that also panned out not only for them but for their family.

Audrey Medina:

And I just, honestly just stories upon stories, it's been, it hasn't been any

Audrey Medina:

one moment in life that shaped my outlook.

Audrey Medina:

It's just been a consistent patchwork of them.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, you brought up a very unique word that I don't

Jerremy Newsome:

think a lot of people probably openly use caste system, where immigrants

Jerremy Newsome:

who come over and they become a legal part of this country, they still are.

Jerremy Newsome:

Potentially seen or noticed as lesser than, and people often

Jerremy Newsome:

say, we're a nation of immigrants.

Jerremy Newsome:

sometimes that can be a phrase packed with pride, nostalgia,

Jerremy Newsome:

to your point, maybe complexity.

Jerremy Newsome:

But what does that actually mean to each of you today?

Jerremy Newsome:

A nation of immigrants.

Jerremy Newsome:

Start with Jerry.

Jerry Valerio:

So to me, a a nation of immigrants really goes back to from other

Jerry Valerio:

countries seeking a better life, right?

Jerry Valerio:

America continues to be aspired destination for having a better

Jerry Valerio:

life beyond you may have been born.

Jerry Valerio:

You know, you, we also hear the term melting pot, right?

Jerry Valerio:

So in some ways, depending on where you live, you can be a melting pot in

Jerry Valerio:

like urban and city type environments.

Jerry Valerio:

I would say maybe in more rural where there's disposition against immigrants

Jerry Valerio:

feel more of the, uh, isolation and lack of acceptance and therefore

Jerry Valerio:

you might just exist in your own group of friends and neighbors in a

Jerry Valerio:

pocket inside of a town that still doesn't understand you or accept you.

Jerremy Newsome:

What's making you shake your head on that?

Jerremy Newsome:

You have like this No back and forth thing going on.

Dave Conley:

Oh, no, no, I was, no, I,

Dave Conley:

yeah, no, I had, honestly, I was just sort of processing it.

Jerremy Newsome:

Sure.

Jerremy Newsome:

Exactly.

Jerremy Newsome:

But it feels, it feels what I, what I sense is like, it just feels like both

Jerremy Newsome:

you and I. we don't totally have this story, we don't really have this journey.

Jerremy Newsome:

We're kind of taken back a little bit as we've,

Dave Conley:

I, well, I guess it, it goes into another question of mine I

Dave Conley:

don't have a strong identification with, with, you know, sort of like my ancestry.

Dave Conley:

You know, it's, it's like sort of a mix of mostly British and some

Dave Conley:

Irish, and for some reason my brother like really resonates with the

Dave Conley:

Norwegian side, which I don't even know what part that is in my family.

Dave Conley:

And so I'm kind of curious being first generation and second

Dave Conley:

generation how important or how, how, what is it like for you as you

Dave Conley:

know, the Philippines and Mexico?

Dave Conley:

Like, what does that mean for you?

Jerremy Newsome:

go ahead, Audrey.

Audrey Medina:

I'm gonna, I'm gonna answer a couple of things.

Audrey Medina:

First of all, our countries and our cultures that we come from

Audrey Medina:

and those experiences and those, those traditions and everything

Audrey Medina:

that we bring, what gave us roots.

Audrey Medina:

This country gives us wings, and I think that that's part of.

Audrey Medina:

What is missing in, um, some of the discourse, especially when

Audrey Medina:

you see like the protest movements that are occurring right now.

Audrey Medina:

And know a lot of people, you know, they see a, a Mexican flag being waved and

Audrey Medina:

they don't understand, well if you're, if you like Mexico so bad, what was so bad?

Audrey Medina:

Why don't you just go back?

Audrey Medina:

And it's not, it's not about that.

Audrey Medina:

That gave us our identity, our roots, our foundation, we were able to

Audrey Medina:

come here and give it wings or our families were, our ancestors were.

Audrey Medina:

And it ultimately, it is the same thing for, you know, on, on the

Audrey Medina:

other side of my family, there's a lot of British Irish as well.

Audrey Medina:

There's a lot of other stuff, but British Irish tends to make up the

Audrey Medina:

largest percentage of that side.

Audrey Medina:

And ultimately there was that at one point for them as well.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

Do you, do you think, you know, with your kids or further generations that

Dave Conley:

they will still resonate as much?

Dave Conley:

I now I, I'm asking this question not as like a judgment, I don't think there's

Dave Conley:

a good way or a bad way in any of this.

Dave Conley:

I'm just, I'm really honestly curious, like, Jerry, with, with your experience

Dave Conley:

as first generation and your parents, how do, do they identify as Filipino Americans

Dave Conley:

or do they have a strong connection with the Philippines, which I, you

Dave Conley:

know, personally I think sounds awesome.

Dave Conley:

Uh, you and I talked about how, you know, like you, you wish you'd actually

Dave Conley:

spoke more of the, of the language.

Dave Conley:

So what, what's your view?

Jerry Valerio:

Um, I, I would say my parents consider themselves

Jerry Valerio:

Americans or Filipino Americans.

Jerry Valerio:

I wanted to comment on your point about as the generations progress,

Jerry Valerio:

I think you've all heard the, that, you know, by the time you get to

Jerry Valerio:

the third generation the identity of who they are becomes more muted.

Jerry Valerio:

So like, I have still a strong tie to my heritage and my culture.

Jerry Valerio:

And coincidentally, I actually didn't learn that until I got

Jerry Valerio:

to college because, you know, my parents were always, always so busy.

Jerry Valerio:

And what little culture I had was, you know, at family events and if

Jerry Valerio:

anything, the one common theme, regardless of generations is food.

Jerry Valerio:

So

Dave Conley:

Yeah,

Jerry Valerio:

that the food will continue to perpetuate generation to generation,

Jerry Valerio:

and that'll be the commonality.

Jerry Valerio:

But in terms of tie to heritage and culture, it kind of diminishes as you go.

Jerry Valerio:

Yeah.

Jerry Valerio:

I mean, I can see that in my nephews and nieces.

Jerry Valerio:

They're second generation, they're less connected to, they love Filipino

Jerry Valerio:

food, but they're less connected to the culture and the heritage.

Jerry Valerio:

And time their kids grow up, it will be even, much less.

Audrey Medina:

Actually, fun story as a second generation, I

Audrey Medina:

didn't find out that I was Mexican until I was five going on six.

Audrey Medina:

We were moving across the country from Georgia to New Mexico, and

Audrey Medina:

on the route my mom's like, okay guys, I have something to tell you.

Audrey Medina:

You're Mexican.

Audrey Medina:

And it was like, it was a dark secret, but we didn't even know what that was.

Audrey Medina:

And then when we moved to the town, we were one of three white

Audrey Medina:

children, I'm sorry, three families.

Audrey Medina:

And so then being just immersed, and that's where, where the, the, that duality

Audrey Medina:

started to occur where we belonged in some ways and didn't in others, and

Audrey Medina:

were accepted in some and not in others.

Audrey Medina:

And unfortunately because of the way that things were going in the country,

Audrey Medina:

leading up to my mom, actually, you know, getting married and all of that,

Audrey Medina:

and having children, she wasn't really big on like teaching us the language.

Audrey Medina:

That was something we had to do later.

Audrey Medina:

Hence the language barrier between, you know, my grandmother and myself.

Audrey Medina:

As a result, it, when I did learn Spanish, I didn't necessarily learn

Audrey Medina:

it specifically around like my family or in Mexico, around Mexicans.

Audrey Medina:

It was around people from just all over different areas of Latin America.

Audrey Medina:

So even in just speaking, there are times where people are

Audrey Medina:

like where did you learn that?

Audrey Medina:

How did you learn?

Audrey Medina:

We don't understand.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Jerremy Newsome:

Now Jerry, your family came through a big strict legal process in the sixties.

Jerremy Newsome:

Your parents found opportunity through education, hard work, community.

Jerremy Newsome:

Do you think that same path be possible for them today?

Jerremy Newsome:

or why not?

Jerry Valerio:

I do think so because the demand for people with

Jerry Valerio:

medical backgrounds remains strong.

Jerry Valerio:

And I do see people even Filipinos now coming to the states, going

Jerry Valerio:

through the same path and process that my parents went through.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Dave Conley:

So what do you think about that, Audrey?

Dave Conley:

I know you and I talked before this about that, so like hearing about Jerry's family

Dave Conley:

story and how his parents went through it.

Dave Conley:

How, how do you think that experience would play out today for similar

Dave Conley:

families based on what you've seen?

Audrey Medina:

When you say that, you're saying in the same exact scenario

Audrey Medina:

or different types of scenarios?

Dave Conley:

I think what I'm trying to get at is what, what is the experience

Dave Conley:

like, what was the experience like in the sixties and what do you, what's

Dave Conley:

the actual experience like today?

Audrey Medina:

Okay.

Audrey Medina:

So, prior to, honestly, about the late, early eighties, early

Audrey Medina:

nineties, immigration still kind of just, it, people just crossed.

Audrey Medina:

They came over, they either declared themselves or not, you know, and they.

Audrey Medina:

Started life and started the process.

Audrey Medina:

As time has gone on, the paths to getting here, particularly speaking

Audrey Medina:

from the Latin American perspective, has become more treacherous.

Audrey Medina:

There is a lot more nefarious actors in play, and I'm not referring necessarily to

Audrey Medina:

immigrants, but rather people that exploit and prey upon immigrants that are trying

Audrey Medina:

to make it here or that do make it here.

Audrey Medina:

So to say, like with my, for example, with my, my mother and the fact that

Audrey Medina:

they came over here and she was born here and that gave them a pathway to

Audrey Medina:

legal status to include for her siblings that were already, older than her.

Audrey Medina:

I couldn't say with like a great deal of confidence that that same

Audrey Medina:

exact scenario could play out.

Audrey Medina:

It's not impossible that someone could effectively get lucky and that could

Audrey Medina:

occur, but with the, all the laws that have occurred, all the tweaks to the laws

Audrey Medina:

that have occurred, the exploitation, the, I mean, you gotta, you can't talk

Audrey Medina:

about migration through Mexico without talking about the cartels and the

Audrey Medina:

different, the way that trafficking game has greatly and it's become.

Audrey Medina:

Much more vicious and hard to get out of.

Audrey Medina:

I couldn't say with, with any bit of confidence that if right now, if I

Audrey Medina:

were in my grandmother's shoes and I were trying to come up here, if

Audrey Medina:

I would be able to make that same journey and have that same experience.

Jerry Valerio:

So I actually did wanna bring up something for thought.

Jerry Valerio:

differences between both Audrey and my parents' experience, right?

Jerry Valerio:

Because there's a certain, there tho those are two different processes.

Jerry Valerio:

One's through like what I would refer to as like quota based system, where there is

Jerry Valerio:

the need to attract talented individuals with certain types of backgrounds.

Jerry Valerio:

That's one path.

Jerry Valerio:

There's another path also for students to come in.

Jerry Valerio:

And then there's the, then there are also those that are seeking from

Jerry Valerio:

wherever they're, they're at, right?

Jerry Valerio:

So those, those are three processes that are well established.

Jerry Valerio:

And then of course you have those that come into the country un

Jerry Valerio:

undocument and then try to find a path to be able to get the citizenship,

Jerry Valerio:

which again, they find they have to live in the shadows to begin with.

Jerry Valerio:

And it's a challenge them to feel like, can I feel secure coming out?

Jerry Valerio:

Or am I gonna get shipped?

Jerry Valerio:

Back?

Jerry Valerio:

And so, again, in, in all cases with all of the immigrants, it

Jerry Valerio:

really is still to come here and seek a better life for themselves.

Jerry Valerio:

I mean, that's the one common theme, just different paths.

Jerry Valerio:

And, so one thing I also do see is those that come here for education,

Jerry Valerio:

maybe get their jobs, go back to their wherever they came from.

Jerry Valerio:

And so in some ways, America loses from the talent we've

Jerry Valerio:

honed because now it's helping.

Jerry Valerio:

Whatever other country, sometimes even including, countries that are, gonna be

Jerry Valerio:

our future, I don't know, competitors or whatever you want to call it.

Audrey Medina:

Can I touch on that last point?

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

So even if they were to come here educate, become, get

Audrey Medina:

their education, go back to their homeland, to utilize that education

Audrey Medina:

the grand scheme of things, when you completely zoom out, that actually

Audrey Medina:

does reduce, it has a ripple effect.

Audrey Medina:

That does a reduction in immigration flow because anytime you have someone

Audrey Medina:

who is bettering their own nation, it, little by little has that effect

Audrey Medina:

of reducing the need to immigrate.

Audrey Medina:

It may only be by one or two or three people, but the more people that are

Audrey Medina:

doing that, honestly, the better.

Audrey Medina:

Now, that's not to say that everybody should come here, use

Audrey Medina:

what they can, and then ditch.

Audrey Medina:

It's just one of those,

Audrey Medina:

Fluid, very complex and very interconnected.

Audrey Medina:

where foreign policy, uh, natural design, all sorts of different

Audrey Medina:

things play a factor in immigration.

Audrey Medina:

And so therefore it's, it's always going to be a little messy.

Audrey Medina:

That's also why it's as complex as it is, is because every situation is different.

Audrey Medina:

You can take, a thousand different immigrants from Mexico and you may

Audrey Medina:

find some threads of commonality, but by and large there are different

Audrey Medina:

circumstances and different nuances in every single case.

Audrey Medina:

And unfortunately, that is also what leads to the backlog as well, is

Audrey Medina:

because we have such a nuanced, I guess, system, such a, a nitpicky down

Audrey Medina:

to the little nuts and bolts system.

Audrey Medina:

And truthfully, like there is a reason that it is like that for good and for bad.

Audrey Medina:

I mean, you, you could talk about the security aspect because, nine

Audrey Medina:

11 costing massive shift in the way that we handle immigration policy.

Audrey Medina:

So there was a reason for the tightening of the bolts and

Audrey Medina:

screws at the immigration system.

Audrey Medina:

with this many years in the rear view mirror, now we're looking at, we

Audrey Medina:

have the same problems and honestly in some cases bigger problems.

Jerremy Newsome:

So you said they're the fun word policy.

Dave Conley:

Wow.

Jerremy Newsome:

Let's talk about that for a moment.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because I agree with you.

Jerremy Newsome:

There's.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because you're talking about humans, so every human is different down to the DNA.

Jerremy Newsome:

Do you think there is a policy shift?

Jerremy Newsome:

Let me ask it this way.

Jerremy Newsome:

would be immigration policy that you would change tomorrow if you could?

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey and then Jerry.

Audrey Medina:

One policy that I would change tomorrow.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Jerremy Newsome:

If you could.

Audrey Medina:

Hold on.

Audrey Medina:

Now you're gonna make me go to the end of my notes because Okay.

Audrey Medina:

There's, there's a couple of policies.

Audrey Medina:

Let me start with the first one.

Audrey Medina:

When you understand the monetary aspect of immigration and know that every

Audrey Medina:

single process pretty much has a form for it, there's little forms within forms.

Audrey Medina:

It's like a nesting doll of forms and pro procedures that

Audrey Medina:

have to be met along with fees.

Audrey Medina:

One of my bigger issues is the price tags with them, and it doesn't seem like a lot

Audrey Medina:

because if you look at one of the main forms, it's like five to 700 bucks right?

Audrey Medina:

Does not seem like a lot.

Audrey Medina:

But when you're looking at that exchange rate in another country, that could

Audrey Medina:

be half a year, a year, or two years worth of salary of somebody working

Audrey Medina:

consistently, unless they are not what's considered low skill or low wage.

Audrey Medina:

that would be one.

Audrey Medina:

It needs to be so much more transparent to the actual immigrants.

Audrey Medina:

That are trying to come here because there are also situations

Audrey Medina:

in which people just, they want to come here to make a better life.

Audrey Medina:

The, their, their life isn't necessarily on fire, but because of how lengthy and

Audrey Medina:

arduous the process is, circumstances change and then they have to go.

Audrey Medina:

They just absolutely have to go.

Audrey Medina:

And that's how it that set of people could end up in the

Audrey Medina:

shadows for that amount of time.

Audrey Medina:

So that, that would be another one is honestly just the transparency.

Audrey Medina:

And we do need to, policy-wise, I know I was only supposed to pick one, but

Audrey Medina:

there's so much stuff to shake a stick at.

Audrey Medina:

But the other one would be just, hold on.

Audrey Medina:

There needs to actually be a legitimate line to stand in.

Audrey Medina:

Not what we say is a line, but it's actually like a pinball

Audrey Medina:

machine that's just shooting people around all over creation.

Audrey Medina:

but also we just need more resources specifically to the

Audrey Medina:

actual processing of those petitions

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

claims.

Audrey Medina:

That is one of the biggest

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

is the fact they're just simply, you said

Audrey Medina:

it in towards the intro, there's

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Audrey Medina:

there's not enough.

Audrey Medina:

And we keep taking away resources from that and instead putting

Audrey Medina:

it towards enforcement and crackdowns and stuff like that.

Audrey Medina:

And yet we're not actually fixing the real problem.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's one of the things I was mentioning, um, in an, in an earlier

Jerremy Newsome:

episode that Dave and I were kind of just ripping back and forth, was this backlog.

Jerremy Newsome:

and again, maybe I'm totally missing it, but if I'm driving around, you

Jerremy Newsome:

know, I live in Vegas, California, back and forth pretty often,

Jerremy Newsome:

and I'm driving around the city.

Jerremy Newsome:

I never see immigration offices again unless I'm just missing it, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

There's 418 smog checks here in Vegas where I can go check my smog meter,

Jerremy Newsome:

but there's no immigration offices.

Jerremy Newsome:

Where it's like, hey if you are an immigrant and you want to come here and

Jerremy Newsome:

fill out the forms and learn and be, and through the process and have someone

Jerremy Newsome:

look over your case or have someone discuss with what you are or where you

Jerremy Newsome:

wanna go or why you wanna go there, I don't see any of those buildings.

Jerremy Newsome:

Do you, am I missing these?

Jerremy Newsome:

Are

Audrey Medina:

hiding.

Audrey Medina:

hiding.

Jerremy Newsome:

They're deep somewhere where I have no clue where they are.

Audrey Medina:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

No, they're, they're hiding.

Audrey Medina:

And then, just, uh, another problem is honestly the immigration

Audrey Medina:

attorney side of things.

Audrey Medina:

Of course, I was closer to the situation in the nineties and the early two

Audrey Medina:

thousands, but the amount of money that they charge, I mean, a lot of times

Audrey Medina:

you, at least for people that I knew, they were going to the back of like

Audrey Medina:

bodegas where the immigration attorney was to go and say, Hey, I just got

Audrey Medina:

this form and they're denying me here.

Audrey Medina:

Oh, well it's 'cause you, you, maybe you misspelled this or you did that,

Audrey Medina:

and here's another bill for 600 bucks.

Audrey Medina:

And then that

Audrey Medina:

Around.

Audrey Medina:

And so it, there's a lot of exploitation because at the end of the day,

Audrey Medina:

immigrants are a commodification.

Dave Conley:

That's.

Dave Conley:

That's what's, I mean, there's so many frustrating parts about this because

Dave Conley:

I don't think anybody stands up and says, Hey, immigration is working right?

Dave Conley:

Like, I'm, I'm going through this personally with a, with my situation

Dave Conley:

and we're interviewing immigration attorneys right now, and it, as far

Dave Conley:

as I can tell, and you know, like I'm, I'm just average American dude

Dave Conley:

and I've gone to the DHS website.

Dave Conley:

It looks like something somebody took the worst aspects of filling out

Dave Conley:

your taxes, got voraciously drunk and said, immigrate in you, here you go.

Dave Conley:

Like it's, I mean, it is absolutely medieval.

Dave Conley:

And I it's, and it seems to be intentionally designed that way.

Dave Conley:

You know, like it it's absolutely medieval Audrey or Jerry can, I

Dave Conley:

don't think we've had any legislation you, you know, since the eighties.

Dave Conley:

Do you guys, do you guys have any background in this?

Dave Conley:

Do you guys know like, what are the laws?

Dave Conley:

Like what, what, what do people live under today?

Audrey Medina:

I've got like six pages

Dave Conley:

Oh,

Audrey Medina:

of notes just on that.

Jerremy Newsome:

Love.

Dave Conley:

Jerry, Jerry, when your, when your parents came over, was it a visa?

Dave Conley:

Was it like tied to their jobs and like, I.

Jerry Valerio:

it was a student visa that eventually as they continued to

Jerry Valerio:

work it converted to a regular visa and then they became American citizens.

Dave Conley:

This was like a multi-year process.

Jerry Valerio:

Yes.

Jerry Valerio:

Like they came in the mid sixties and I don't think they got their citizenship

Jerry Valerio:

until the late seventies, so probably a decade and a half, maybe even two decades.

Dave Conley:

Wow.

Dave Conley:

And of course, all of your siblings, like you have six, six brothers and sisters.

Dave Conley:

All, all of them by birth are American citizens.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

And Audrey, what, what's, what's the deal like?

Dave Conley:

Like what do, what do people live under?

Dave Conley:

Like, what's, what's the jam?

Audrey Medina:

Okay.

Audrey Medina:

Okay.

Audrey Medina:

You guys ready for this?

Audrey Medina:

I'm gonna try to, I'm gonna try to, to truncate this as much as possible.

Audrey Medina:

To understand immigration, law and policy, you have to understand

Audrey Medina:

how America became America.

Audrey Medina:

And so the very first step, and the first thing that we're aware of

Audrey Medina:

is some dude got lost in the ocean when he got lost in the ocean, he,

Audrey Medina:

you know, quote unquote discovers something that was already discovered.

Audrey Medina:

at that point, for the next a hundred and some odd years,

Audrey Medina:

there was consistent efforts.

Audrey Medina:

To bring stuff over to these areas that were discovered.

Audrey Medina:

The only problem was that the items that they were bringing over, or the

Audrey Medina:

people that they were bringing over were infected with lots of different types of

Audrey Medina:

diseases and things that the indigenous populations, they didn't have immunity to.

Audrey Medina:

Which led to what's known as the great dying throughout indigenous populations.

Audrey Medina:

During the period of the great dying, over 95% of indigenous populations

Audrey Medina:

died, now meant that across the us what was now the us, Mexico, south America,

Audrey Medina:

central America, all of that, indigenous populations during that roughly a

Audrey Medina:

hundred and what about 20 year period of time, went from approximately 50 to 60

Audrey Medina:

million down to just a little fraction of that, approximately six ish million.

Audrey Medina:

and I could be doing my math wrong, but either way.

Audrey Medina:

So now you had a decreas, decreased population that was

Audrey Medina:

ripe for conquering that point.

Audrey Medina:

Didn't make it easy, but ripe for conquering.

Audrey Medina:

And so now you have the push for the pilgrimage, the push for coming over

Audrey Medina:

here and establishing and conquering effectively the land and the people.

Audrey Medina:

Now in the period of time that followed, that is approximately 150 years, you

Audrey Medina:

have 150 years of slavery where slaves built the infrastructure of this nation.

Audrey Medina:

They built the backbone of the nation, all of that.

Audrey Medina:

And then you start to get into, uh, about the last 60 years of that

Audrey Medina:

was actually the very, very first naturalization act that was passed

Audrey Medina:

that only applied to white males.

Audrey Medina:

you have to wait until the late 1890s until you, or 1880s, geez,

Audrey Medina:

1880s, I wanna say, um, to actually get the Chinese Exclusion Act.

Audrey Medina:

So our very first piece of true immigration law was based in racism.

Audrey Medina:

But the important fact to know is it was directly after we as a nation utilized

Audrey Medina:

Chinese immigrants to build our railways.

Audrey Medina:

And then we're like, oh, okay.

Audrey Medina:

We're done.

Audrey Medina:

We don't want none of them here.

Audrey Medina:

We don't have them want them having any rights.

Audrey Medina:

None of that.

Audrey Medina:

Get 'em outta here.

Audrey Medina:

Can't, it's not as easy to deport people back then as it is now,

Audrey Medina:

like logistically speaking.

Audrey Medina:

So now you get into a period of time in which being.

Audrey Medina:

or in, in other, I assume, just given the way that we handle things nowadays.

Audrey Medina:

If you were of any form of Asian descent, you were probably discriminated

Audrey Medina:

against the same way that the Chinese immigrants at the time were.

Audrey Medina:

And then from there, now you start having a little, a little like trickle

Audrey Medina:

of some little acts, but nothing really monumentally shifts until

Audrey Medina:

about 1924, which was also based in xenophobia and racism because

Audrey Medina:

this one was to stem the flow.

Audrey Medina:

They did not want immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe point blank.

Audrey Medina:

They just wanted them from the Northwestern portions.

Audrey Medina:

And that's pretty much it.

Audrey Medina:

Also, if you were coming here and you were a little too brown, there's a good

Audrey Medina:

chance you are not gonna be a free person.

Audrey Medina:

That's just it.

Audrey Medina:

Once you get into about the, the, the big one, this is the one that

Audrey Medina:

family would've been more immediately impacted by was the one in 52 it

Audrey Medina:

started to abolish a lot of the quotas.

Audrey Medina:

It started to more effectively like open the doors, that sort of thing, and started

Audrey Medina:

prioritizing skilled labor to come over.

Audrey Medina:

Because before all of that, in order to get into the country, you

Audrey Medina:

arrive on a boat, you literally have what they call a six second

Audrey Medina:

review where everybody's coming in.

Audrey Medina:

There was a place a little bit before Ellis Island, I wanna

Audrey Medina:

say it was called Castle Garden.

Audrey Medina:

Something like that.

Audrey Medina:

But effectively it ran the same way.

Audrey Medina:

A ship comes up, they check it, make sure there's no plague on there.

Audrey Medina:

If it's plagued, they have to like quarantine in and make sure people

Audrey Medina:

live, remove the sick people.

Audrey Medina:

Those would go to a different island.

Audrey Medina:

you would have what was called a six second review where the, just

Audrey Medina:

the whole crowd of people are starting to come up the stairs.

Audrey Medina:

And you had a bunch of panel of adopters who are looking and trying

Audrey Medina:

to spot people who are having labored breathing symptoms, who are

Audrey Medina:

stumbling, anything like that would denote that they were maybe not okay.

Audrey Medina:

And they wouldn't take them and kick them out.

Audrey Medina:

They would take them to a hospital.

Audrey Medina:

And then from there, the registration process was, Hey, what's your name?

Audrey Medina:

How much money do you have on you?

Audrey Medina:

What class?

Audrey Medina:

Did you come here?

Audrey Medina:

Were you in an actual class?

Audrey Medina:

Were you in steerage?

Audrey Medina:

Were you in, like, what?

Audrey Medina:

How did you get here?

Audrey Medina:

That was it.

Audrey Medina:

All right, cool.

Audrey Medina:

Go to a bathhouse.

Audrey Medina:

Go get clean and move on.

Audrey Medina:

But once you get into the post, Ellis Island era, you've got ports of entry all

Audrey Medina:

over, and you've got people are fallible.

Audrey Medina:

So people handle things differently.

Audrey Medina:

Even if there's, a rule of law or whatever, there's, they're still

Audrey Medina:

handling things the way that they want to for their own microcosm of a space.

Audrey Medina:

that particular law in, in 52 is what made it easier for my grandmother's situation.

Audrey Medina:

For example, once you get into, you know, about the.

Audrey Medina:

The 1980s is probably the big one that everybody remembers,

Audrey Medina:

which was the Refugee Act.

Audrey Medina:

And this is a really important one because this gets us a lot closer to

Audrey Medina:

our modern day immigration system.

Audrey Medina:

What the Refugee Act did was it basically aligned our views of refugee and seeking

Audrey Medina:

asylum to, um, align better with the rest of the world with international standards.

Audrey Medina:

It protected from what was called ref, ref foment, which was basically

Audrey Medina:

like returning someone to a country where they could face persecution.

Audrey Medina:

It allowed them to access things like basic rights such as, or let

Audrey Medina:

me rephrase, be considered eligible for asylum outside of it being war.

Audrey Medina:

Did you have, do you have access to healthcare?

Audrey Medina:

Did you have access to, uh, education?

Audrey Medina:

Stuff like that.

Audrey Medina:

Like those were things that were also allowed you to request asylum.

Audrey Medina:

It into place non-discrimination principles.

Audrey Medina:

It ensured that refugees were to be treated without distinction.

Audrey Medina:

Um, so basically the same thing that we have where you're not supposed

Audrey Medina:

to be treated differently because of your, your race, religion,

Audrey Medina:

nationality, uh, political affiliations, unless I guess it's with the enemy.

Audrey Medina:

If we're like at war, I guess that could be an issue.

Audrey Medina:

But it also recognized that the act of seeking asylum.

Audrey Medina:

It's not a crime.

Audrey Medina:

And it outright stated that it wasn't cons, it wasn't outright

Audrey Medina:

considered that before, but it actually laid it down letter.

Audrey Medina:

The law.

Audrey Medina:

It's not a crime.

Audrey Medina:

When it came to work, there was supposed to be fair remuneration.

Audrey Medina:

So basically like good compensation for the work.

Audrey Medina:

Now that doesn't actually necessarily play out in the real world the way that that

Audrey Medina:

was supposed to, to play out because and time again, immigrants are still being

Audrey Medina:

exploited for their labor and underpaid.

Audrey Medina:

But it was supposed to.

Audrey Medina:

And then when you get into, uh, about 86 ish, there was

Audrey Medina:

the IRCA, which was the reform.

Audrey Medina:

So now they're looking at, oh, okay, well we've done all of this from the

Audrey Medina:

fifties through this refugee thing.

Audrey Medina:

Let's, let's try to, let's try to tighten this down a little bit.

Audrey Medina:

And that is when they made it illegal to hire undocumented workers.

Audrey Medina:

But they wanted to provide a path to to legalization for those that

Audrey Medina:

were undocumented who had been in the country for a long time.

Audrey Medina:

gets kind of thrown around for a while.

Audrey Medina:

And then you get into 1990, and 1990 is where the Immigration Act, they

Audrey Medina:

had noticed that it was like, you know, the, the immigration levels

Audrey Medina:

were just in general, just increasing.

Audrey Medina:

And, uh, it created new categories of visas, reformed the visa

Audrey Medina:

system, the visa preference system.

Audrey Medina:

and then in the, the, the other thing is, so when you're like,

Audrey Medina:

okay, so they made it illegal for.

Audrey Medina:

For corporations or for companies to hire undocumented workers.

Audrey Medina:

Well then explain all of this happening.

Audrey Medina:

they were initially doing this, they actually had really steep

Audrey Medina:

penalties, like super steep when they were first drafting the bill.

Audrey Medina:

But as time went on and they started haggling by and large conservatives were

Audrey Medina:

like, Hey, this is gonna cripple industry.

Audrey Medina:

We can't do this.

Audrey Medina:

So they started whittling it away and it basically, by the time it

Audrey Medina:

was passed, it was the equivalent of a, of a slap in the wrist.

Audrey Medina:

Unless you were just a really prolific offender.

Audrey Medina:

But you'd have to honestly get caught with doing other things like human trafficking

Audrey Medina:

or something like that in order for it to really, really blow up in your face.

Audrey Medina:

If you're sitting here just bringing in a whole bunch of undocumented workers to

Audrey Medina:

work your fields or you know, whatever.

Audrey Medina:

There was a small Reforma Reformation Act and what they called an Immigrant

Audrey Medina:

Responsibility Act in the mid nineties that occurred, which was

Audrey Medina:

where they expanded the grounds for deportation, for things that were

Audrey Medina:

drug related violent offenders.

Audrey Medina:

So domestic, domestic violence did actually fall into that category.

Audrey Medina:

Things like stalking, um, sexual offenses, and they implemented that retroactively.

Audrey Medina:

from there there's been just little teeny tiny things.

Audrey Medina:

There hasn't been anything major until you get into when they dec after nine

Audrey Medina:

11 when they said, you know what?

Audrey Medina:

We're gonna go.

Audrey Medina:

this out of INS and put it under DHS, and then now you've got, what that does

Audrey Medina:

is that shifts public perception that now immigrants need to be vetted because

Audrey Medina:

they could be the enemy, and that's where you see the, the larger shift

Audrey Medina:

occur xenophobia and stuff like that.

Audrey Medina:

Or renewal, I should say.

Jerremy Newsome:

Boom, mic drop.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fascinating.

Jerremy Newsome:

I love it.

Jerremy Newsome:

I mean, one aspect that I definitely agree and think.

Jerremy Newsome:

You for the history lesson.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I say that truthfully because really do feel like one aspect

Jerremy Newsome:

of immigration that a lot of people forget is the history of it

Audrey Medina:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

the sense of, hey most, pretty much everyone here has immigrated

Jerremy Newsome:

at some point relatively recently.

Jerremy Newsome:

And by recently, I mean the last 200 years.

Audrey Medina:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

It is a really, really fascinating component to

Jerremy Newsome:

just kind of drill down into those particulars, into the specifics.

Jerremy Newsome:

Jerry, what about you, man?

Jerremy Newsome:

If you have one policy that you change regarding immigration as it

Jerremy Newsome:

stands presently, what would that be?

Jerry Valerio:

I said earlier that our process is broken.

Jerry Valerio:

I'm not sure what is the right levers in terms of policy.

Jerry Valerio:

'cause in, in some ways, I do think there needs to be some sort of pause to process

Jerry Valerio:

those who are in the backlog and those who are already here who want to come forward.

Jerry Valerio:

And it's like, in some ways let's do justice to those who

Jerry Valerio:

are already here first before we.

Jerry Valerio:

I mean, in other words, it's like we've got a, a, a faucet that continues to run

Jerry Valerio:

and it's like we're overflowing, right?

Jerry Valerio:

How do we take care of those who are already here?

Jerry Valerio:

can't continue to exacerbate the problem by continuing to accept, people, right?

Jerry Valerio:

Again, it's kind of a revisit of what makes sense, what's the right

Jerry Valerio:

set of, of levers to figure out?

Jerry Valerio:

I think, again, figuring out how those who are already here get that path.

Jerry Valerio:

First of all, that should be the priority, followed by, we have

Jerry Valerio:

that, then let's figure out what's a manageable process and fix it.

Jerry Valerio:

And then also figure out what are all of the different things that are broken.

Jerry Valerio:

Like I, I agree with Audrey.

Jerry Valerio:

There are so many people exploiting the immigrant process and so like,

Jerry Valerio:

immigrants are like being unjustly treated, not just simply by applying,

Jerry Valerio:

but those who are part of the process.

Jerry Valerio:

To take as much and extract as much money from them,

Jerry Valerio:

Hear of, I hear about it from people in the tech space who are pursuing

Jerry Valerio:

H one visas and the difficulties there and trying to get sponsorship.

Jerry Valerio:

And of course corporations have gone back and forth, like in the, uh,

Jerry Valerio:

early two thousands, H one visa, visa, H one B visas were like huge.

Jerry Valerio:

And now companies are like, Nope, we're not sponsoring.

Jerry Valerio:

So it makes it difficult for a lot of them to come here as a student visa

Jerry Valerio:

and they're like, well now I can't get an H one P 'cause no one's gonna.

Jerry Valerio:

me or sponsor me.

Jerry Valerio:

I mean, we, in the tech space, we certainly come full circle and

Jerry Valerio:

I think the tech space is like, well, we have enough workers now.

Jerry Valerio:

We don't need to, you know, encourage other people to see H one b.

Dave Conley:

So I, I, that's my question.

Dave Conley:

I do you think that em do you think immigration should be based on employment?

Dave Conley:

And what I mean by that?

Dave Conley:

It's like, okay, you, you know, you have to have a job here and that has to be

Dave Conley:

sponsored by, uh, somebody who's hiring.

Jerry Valerio:

I, no I don't think it should be just purely on unemployment.

Jerry Valerio:

I think ultimately at the end of the day, the whole point about

Jerry Valerio:

having immigrants come into the country is to contribute, right?

Jerry Valerio:

You don't have to seek employment through a corporation.

Jerry Valerio:

And in fact, there are immigrants who come in here because there's like a a business

Jerry Valerio:

visa, you're bringing in a certain amount of money, or you're bringing

Jerry Valerio:

a business, or you're hiring people.

Jerry Valerio:

That's another, I mean, you hear about it there, there's that pathway too.

Jerry Valerio:

But that only is affordable to those who are already wealthy.

Jerry Valerio:

They're coming here not for so much about the American dream, but they just wanna

Jerry Valerio:

have a life here or have a presence here.

Jerry Valerio:

Uh, and they could be leaving their own country because it is a form of asylum.

Jerry Valerio:

And they now have this unique path where, oh, if you know, bring

Jerry Valerio:

a business, if you, whatever,

Jerremy Newsome:

they're bringing a business.

Jerremy Newsome:

if they're bringing a business, I mean, that would be a form

Jerremy Newsome:

of employment though, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

It's like they, they're bringing a job to here, so even though they don't

Jerremy Newsome:

have one here, they're bringing one.

Jerremy Newsome:

So that would, that'd kind of be the same thing though, right?

Audrey Medina:

I do believe there had, there's a revenue

Audrey Medina:

thing involved in that worry.

Audrey Medina:

So if I'm just, you know, really good at doing fruit that yes, on the

Audrey Medina:

side of the road or whatever, and I can get like 10 people to do that,

Audrey Medina:

that's not gonna qualify for that.

Audrey Medina:

People love fruit and I'm gonna sell, but it's not gonna get me the visa to be able

Audrey Medina:

to do that, to come here specifically.

Audrey Medina:

And I'm like, maybe I can make gorgeous fruit creations in two seconds flat and

Audrey Medina:

I can teach other people how to do that.

Audrey Medina:

That that's not, that's not gonna necessarily translate I guess to anybody.

Audrey Medina:

Uh, so I, I would say that immigrants very resilient people because you

Audrey Medina:

have to do what you have to do.

Audrey Medina:

And so if you come here and you can't just find work or you, you couldn't

Audrey Medina:

get in through the avenue of what your actual education back home is for.

Audrey Medina:

Because the amount of people that I've known that were lawyers, they

Audrey Medina:

were paramedics, they were all these things back in their homeland

Audrey Medina:

and for all, for different varying reasons, had to leave and end up here.

Audrey Medina:

And now they're in fields and they're building homes, they're

Audrey Medina:

cleaning houses, they're cleaning whatever to make ends meet.

Audrey Medina:

And if you follow their story long enough.

Audrey Medina:

Eventually you are gonna find enough of them that out of just a, a brilliant

Audrey Medina:

idea and the ability to do so.

Audrey Medina:

Because again, keep in mind that this nation has the

Audrey Medina:

capacity to give people wings.

Audrey Medina:

They build something they build something that they're no longer

Audrey Medina:

doing that it may not be in any field in relation to whatever it is that

Audrey Medina:

they had gotten, uh, their field of expertise, their apprenticeship their

Audrey Medina:

education or whatever back home.

Audrey Medina:

But it is something.

Audrey Medina:

So there's a lot of innovation that comes through immigrants because you're bringing

Audrey Medina:

a patchwork of experiences together.

Audrey Medina:

And by doing that, it's only strengthening a nation and a in a population.

Dave Conley:

Yeah, I, that was my experience too, like where I

Dave Conley:

grew up when I was very young.

Dave Conley:

It was a very sleepy part of the city.

Dave Conley:

And like there, it was kind of nothing there.

Dave Conley:

And it was a complete flood of ma mainly Asian, Korean, and Vietnamese.

Dave Conley:

And the I'll tell you right now, the greatest entrepreneurs on the planet,

Dave Conley:

and they just created one business after another, and now 50 years later, you

Dave Conley:

know, their children and their children's children are the leaders in the community.

Dave Conley:

I, you know, like I, my experience was, you know, fantastic entrepreneurship,

Dave Conley:

you know, starting everything and just, just seeing a million ways to

Dave Conley:

make a buck or, or provide a service.

Dave Conley:

And, uh, it just grew and grew and grew from there.

Dave Conley:

I, I'm with you.

Dave Conley:

I don't, I don't think, uh, immigration should be tied directly to employment.

Dave Conley:

I know I was dating somebody a few years ago and PhD, you know,

Dave Conley:

research scientist, and her job was sponsored by her company, a really,

Dave Conley:

really big, you know, pharma company.

Dave Conley:

And, uh, she wanted to change jobs and it was extremely difficult because

Dave Conley:

it was the H one B and it had to be sponsored by another company.

Dave Conley:

And so she was basically trapped.

Dave Conley:

And then she wasn't allowed to leave the country.

Dave Conley:

Uh, she actually had to go back for family and No, no, no, no.

Dave Conley:

They were gonna restart the process of her, uh, her green card.

Dave Conley:

So yeah, I is, it's all bonkers.

Dave Conley:

So, yeah, I don't, yeah.

Dave Conley:

What do you think, Jerremy, do you think it should be tied to employment

Dave Conley:

or, or building business or not?

Dave Conley:

I mean, the other side of this is, well, you know, we don't want people on like

Dave Conley:

government assistance or, you know, like you hear the arguments on the, on,

Dave Conley:

on like, well, you know, our hospitals and that and that and the rest of it.

Dave Conley:

So like, what?

Dave Conley:

Tell me, balance this.

Jerremy Newsome:

Here's an interesting challenge is take is if you are coming

Jerremy Newsome:

here as an immigrant, as Jerry said, you probably are here for a better life.

Jerremy Newsome:

And a better life generally is gonna translate to an increase in

Jerremy Newsome:

commerce or an increase in safety.

Jerremy Newsome:

And if you feel more safe, you're probably gonna end up eventually

Jerremy Newsome:

creating more commerce anyway.

Jerremy Newsome:

And some of our greatest entrepreneurs.

Jerremy Newsome:

On this, I mean, Elon Musk, Like tons and tons and tons of very,

Jerremy Newsome:

very successful entrepreneurs are immigrants into this country.

Jerremy Newsome:

I don't believe that they should all be tied to it.

Jerremy Newsome:

But what's ironic is in all three examples listed so far, going to

Jerremy Newsome:

be creating jobs almost anyway.

Jerremy Newsome:

And the ones that put the largest strain from a government assistance standpoint

Jerremy Newsome:

are current Americans anyway, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

Like not the immigrants.

Jerremy Newsome:

It's the people that are to provide and that choose simply, in my opinion,

Jerremy Newsome:

it's a choice to not create commerce because they've already been here and

Jerremy Newsome:

they're already kind of living off the government Tet, so to speak, anyway.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I would, I would wager that the vast majority of them are not immigrants.

Jerremy Newsome:

I would probably say more than 70% of the people that are living

Jerremy Newsome:

on are probably not immigrants.

Jerremy Newsome:

'cause it's extremely hard for an immigrant to receive

Jerremy Newsome:

welfare in the first place.

Jerremy Newsome:

that being stated, I do personally believe that there should probably

Jerremy Newsome:

be some type of general quota or number that we allow into the country.

Jerremy Newsome:

So if, for example, America said, okay.

Jerremy Newsome:

Every year, 1 million immigrants can come in And out of that

Jerremy Newsome:

million we have this, and this.

Jerremy Newsome:

Some type of brackets or parameters.

Jerremy Newsome:

Just simply because to everyone's point, we do know that the system is backlogged.

Jerremy Newsome:

we go, all right, we're gonna have a million, and out of that million

Jerremy Newsome:

people, we'll have 10% that are seeking asylum will have 10% potentially,

Jerremy Newsome:

that are refugees will have 10% that are, coming for student visas.

Jerremy Newsome:

Right?

Jerremy Newsome:

And you have these percentages you are allowing certain numbers to happen.

Jerremy Newsome:

And then those have lines, locations, companies, people, industries that are

Jerremy Newsome:

focused and targeted to actually receive them, talk to them, communicate with 'em.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because what it does do back to Audrey's point, it starts

Jerremy Newsome:

to slowly compartmentalize the complexities that do exist.

Jerremy Newsome:

So if you have a department of immigration that is designed, dedicated, and focused

Jerremy Newsome:

on asylum seekers, they're gonna have, yes, very complex cases, but those

Jerremy Newsome:

individuals that are working on those cases now know we're not here looking

Jerremy Newsome:

for student visas, we're not here looking for H ones, we're not, we're not

Jerremy Newsome:

here looking for someone who's trying to get a job and come entrepreneur

Jerremy Newsome:

or who came across illegally that now wants to become a naturalized citizen.

Jerremy Newsome:

They have a very, very specific domain that they're focused on.

Jerremy Newsome:

And so I do think a relatively large percentage.

Jerremy Newsome:

Already would say, if I'm an immigrant to this country, it's

Jerremy Newsome:

because I want a better paying job.

Jerremy Newsome:

'cause my country sucks.

Jerremy Newsome:

not leaving their country.

Jerremy Newsome:

If they're making a bunch of money and they feel safe, they're not.

Jerremy Newsome:

They're gonna be just fine staying where they're staying.

Jerremy Newsome:

But if they're coming to America, it's because they want more money,

Jerremy Newsome:

more freedom, and more safety.

Dave Conley:

Let me, okay, let me ask you this about asylum

Dave Conley:

seekers in particular, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

Okay.

Dave Conley:

So I am totally down with asylum seekers.

Dave Conley:

I think it's, it's critical.

Dave Conley:

Like we gotta be able to say, Hey, you know, like if you are in fear

Dave Conley:

of your life, like come on in.

Dave Conley:

That sounds great to me.

Dave Conley:

And almost every country.

Dave Conley:

Signs on to the exact same un charter about asylum speaking.

Dave Conley:

Right.

Dave Conley:

And so, like if you were in Venezuela, right?

Dave Conley:

Not a, not the greatest place right now.

Dave Conley:

And we, we, we have a lot of asylum seekers in, in, in the United States, in

Dave Conley:

fact, right where I live from Venezuela.

Dave Conley:

Yet, if you were to travel from Venezuela all the way up to the

Dave Conley:

United States by land, every single one of the countries between here

Dave Conley:

and there accepts asylum seekers.

Dave Conley:

And so is there something to be said about like, well, do you really want

Dave Conley:

asylum if you keep on skipping all the countries that will accept asylum seekers?

Jerremy Newsome:

Valid point, but I mean, uh, go ahead Audrey.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Audrey Medina:

I was just gonna ask if I could speak to

Audrey Medina:

that, uh, just a little bit.

Audrey Medina:

The path from, say, Venezuela, for example, to here is also laid

Audrey Medina:

in with just a ton of treachery.

Audrey Medina:

So the, a lot of the same problems that exist in Venezuela in other countries.

Audrey Medina:

The problem with Venezuela right now is that they have collapsed.

Audrey Medina:

So it's, it's, they were, there were already asylum seekers before the collapse

Audrey Medina:

from Venezuela that were coming here.

Audrey Medina:

Part of it had to do with, because their government was going through what

Audrey Medina:

their government was going through and, we're, we kind of had our fingers in

Audrey Medina:

the pie trying to help them get somebody who was not a socialist in power.

Audrey Medina:

That ended up leading to if you had people that were there that maybe

Audrey Medina:

they, they supported whoever it was that we were, we were pushing, or the

Audrey Medina:

fact that maybe they weren't okay with the, um, government that was there.

Audrey Medina:

They couldn't just stop anywhere.

Audrey Medina:

Because when you're pushing massive groups of people, it's not just the

Audrey Medina:

one person who's seeking asylum.

Audrey Medina:

There's, there's people that eventually, especially as a country collapses,

Audrey Medina:

that we're gonna be some of those same people that were perpetrating things

Audrey Medina:

on the civilian population that are also moving upward at the same time.

Audrey Medina:

In addition to that, once you start getting into stuff like drug cartels and

Audrey Medina:

human smuggling and stuff like that, now you're also getting into the fact that,

Audrey Medina:

that the whole chain of that exists all through, central America, into Mexico and

Audrey Medina:

actually in the United States as well.

Audrey Medina:

And so if you get swallowed up into that, now you've got a whole other

Audrey Medina:

thing that you're also fleeing from that exists beyond the borders

Audrey Medina:

of the homeland that you left.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

I guess what I'm trying to tease apart a little bit is, you know, like

Dave Conley:

you seek asylum for reasons, right?

Dave Conley:

Like political, um, you know, some, you know, like there's underlying,

Dave Conley:

you know, like fear for your life.

Dave Conley:

If you're in Venezuela, like Columbia signs onto the exact same

Dave Conley:

UN thing that the United States does.

Dave Conley:

So does Panama, Costa Rica, Belize, Mexico, I mean, like,

Dave Conley:

these are solid countries.

Dave Conley:

They're democracies, they have rule of law, and like, I'm, I

Dave Conley:

don't think I'm against people having asylum in the United States.

Dave Conley:

I'm just like, is it truly asylum?

Dave Conley:

If you've, you know, you've gone through all of those countries

Dave Conley:

and you haven't gotten, you know, you haven't applied for asylum.

Dave Conley:

That's what I'm trying to, trying to get at.

Audrey Medina:

Maybe it's the marketing.

Audrey Medina:

As the city on the hill, we, we market ourselves as the best.

Audrey Medina:

So I mean, if I have to leave my homeland I'm too afraid to stay there,

Audrey Medina:

I'm not gonna necessarily just select the thing that's right next to me

Audrey Medina:

just because it's right next to me.

Audrey Medina:

Just because they're a democracy.

Audrey Medina:

I'm gonna say, where's the place that I can thrive the best?

Audrey Medina:

Where's the place that I can make sure that my children will be okay?

Audrey Medina:

Where's the place that I can actually build, truly build a life and

Dave Conley:

None of those are, but none of those are reasons for asylum.

Dave Conley:

Not one of those, uh, the best place to raise my kids the best.

Dave Conley:

You know, all the, like those, you can't seek asylum for

Dave Conley:

economic reasons like that, right?

Audrey Medina:

But you can.

Audrey Medina:

So if the economy is in such shambles in the country or in such difficult points,

Audrey Medina:

or maybe you can't access healthcare, you can't access education, you can't

Audrey Medina:

access these things in those other nations that you're looking at, then

Audrey Medina:

technically you're going to the next best place, wherever that geographically

Audrey Medina:

is, wherever, however you can get there.

Audrey Medina:

Wherever it is, right?

Audrey Medina:

Wherever you claim as is the, wherever you show yourself, I

Audrey Medina:

guess is what I'm trying to say.

Audrey Medina:

Because if you just pass through a country and you didn't declare yourself

Audrey Medina:

in that country, then it's technically by technicality and the way that it works.

Audrey Medina:

That's not somewhere that you have to declare yourself as requesting

Audrey Medina:

amnesty or am Amnesty Asylum.

Audrey Medina:

Sorry.

Dave Conley:

I get it.

Audrey Medina:

that, that one's just like a little nitpicky thing that

Audrey Medina:

just exists because that's the same argument that came up when Syrians

Audrey Medina:

were fleeing and ended up in Greece.

Dave Conley:

Yeah,

Audrey Medina:

it's, you go, I know why people do the things

Audrey Medina:

that they do, and I also know that they have their valid fears.

Audrey Medina:

But at the same time, if you were to stop and say Honduras, that's where

Audrey Medina:

you, you feel safe, and then you find out, oh no, I'm not safe here.

Audrey Medina:

Now you've just exhausted your opportunity to try to get that asylum

Audrey Medina:

to be in a now another country, it adds another layer of complexity to it.

Audrey Medina:

So people just, they're, they again, it kind of, I feel like it comes

Audrey Medina:

back to the market, the marketing.

Audrey Medina:

We did it to ourselves.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

I think,

Audrey Medina:

have the wheels turning

Jerremy Newsome:

yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

No, I, I love the discussion there because I think ultimately it's

Jerremy Newsome:

like, well, listen, if you're a fleeing a country, there's plenty of

Jerremy Newsome:

other places that you can be safe.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

right, to Audrey's point, Dave, it was like, Hey, if you're

Jerremy Newsome:

gonna be safe, might as well shoot my shot and try to get into the best.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, if I'm gonna go, if I'm gonna seek asylum.

Jerremy Newsome:

But to Dave's point, Dave's like, well, listen, if you're fleeing

Jerremy Newsome:

a country, just go to any country that's safe other than yours.

Dave Conley:

There's a lot of great countries between wherever you

Dave Conley:

are and wherever you need to go.

Dave Conley:

And

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

I'm not against people coming here for asylum.

Dave Conley:

I'm just saying if I personally, I'm feeling like.

Dave Conley:

Your asylum claim is untrue.

Dave Conley:

If you've passed a dozen opportunities to be safe and to have asylum, you

Dave Conley:

know, if you keep on skipping those and you keep on traveling and you

Dave Conley:

keep on going, I'm like, are you really, I mean, does it, is it valid?

Dave Conley:

I don't get it.

Dave Conley:

Because you keep on passing perfectly good, robust economies with rules of law

Dave Conley:

and you know, like you're not gonna be prosecuted because of who you are and

Dave Conley:

you know what you believe or who you love because those countries have laws, right?

Dave Conley:

Like you can be gay in Mexico, right?

Dave Conley:

So I, I, I don't know.

Dave Conley:

I, I, I think this is worthy of a further conversation.

Dave Conley:

I'm like, I don't know if you have like, really an asylum claim if you, if you

Dave Conley:

travel a thousand miles, if you come from, from Africa or China, you know,

Dave Conley:

if you come from like thousands of miles away for asylum, I'm like, oh, come on.

Dave Conley:

Does that make any sense to anybody?

Dave Conley:

I.

Audrey Medina:

I, I, and I get that, I do feel that there's probably, one

Audrey Medina:

of the things that's missing is the fact that if you have a thousand people

Audrey Medina:

walking from one country to the next, there's gonna be some that stay in

Audrey Medina:

that next country, and then they go to the, maybe now it's only 900 going up.

Audrey Medina:

There are people that stay along the way, but there are other people that are

Audrey Medina:

just simply not going to, and it could be that the fear that they have, they

Audrey Medina:

feel that the only safe place that they can be, and this is all, this is all

Audrey Medina:

just formulated around violence, asylum seeking, like literally fleeing violence.

Audrey Medina:

But there's a lot of other factors at play in asylum seeking, if there's

Audrey Medina:

mass famine happening, if there's there, there's, again, it kind of

Audrey Medina:

gets back into the, the fact that it's complex and it's very, very nuanced.

Audrey Medina:

I do get your point though.

Audrey Medina:

I entirely get your point.

Audrey Medina:

And I do feel that there's a lot of people, I mean, just in talking with.

Audrey Medina:

Again, most of my the people that I've known personally, it was throughout

Audrey Medina:

the nineties and the two thousands, but just listening to their stories

Audrey Medina:

and how people just stopped along the way and they said, you know what?

Audrey Medina:

I feel safe enough here.

Dave Conley:

On the flip side, you know, like if you have any kind of like even

Dave Conley:

remote family anywhere in a country

Audrey Medina:

That's

Dave Conley:

I do, yeah.

Dave Conley:

I have family in Spain.

Dave Conley:

So like, would I seek asylum in Mexico or Canada?

Dave Conley:

Well, I might actually think about Spain, right?

Dave Conley:

And it's, it's further away.

Dave Conley:

So

Audrey Medina:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

I think I'm just arguing against my own thought on that one.

Jerremy Newsome:

No, it's what a great place to be,

Dave Conley:

yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

we live here.

Jerremy Newsome:

This I can absolutely see why NY anyone would want to be here.

Jerremy Newsome:

And to Jerry's point, so Jerry, you brought up something interesting about,

Jerremy Newsome:

didn't mention it specifically, but you're kind of talking about those

Jerremy Newsome:

that are coming over to America that do have extreme wealth in other countries

Jerremy Newsome:

that essentially buy their visa, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

I think currently we have the golden visa, I believe it was called, where you, you

Jerremy Newsome:

pay a million and essentially you bring in a business and poof, uh, you're a citizen.

Jerremy Newsome:

Now, what would be interesting, Audrey, and then I'll ask,

Jerremy Newsome:

I'm gonna ask Jerry too.

Jerremy Newsome:

Do you think in that way, if they're gonna pay a million, do you think a portion of

Jerremy Newsome:

that proceeds could go to an immigration bucket that other immigrants could use

Jerremy Newsome:

to fill out all their forms so that they don't have to spend as much money so that

Jerremy Newsome:

they have some type of provocation or providence where it's like, Hey, we did

Jerremy Newsome:

have someone from our country, so let's say a, a Cuban nationalist comes over and

Jerremy Newsome:

they're doing extremely well and bang, they set up and they're now a citizen and

Jerremy Newsome:

they can put into this pot, Hey, any other Cuban comes over, they can use portions

Jerremy Newsome:

of my money that I just now contributed because I'm now a citizen to fill out all

Jerremy Newsome:

their forms and things of that nature.

Jerremy Newsome:

Do you think that could be something that could work?

Audrey Medina:

I think it could, and the reason why I think it could

Audrey Medina:

is 'cause there used to actually be something very similar to that.

Audrey Medina:

It was baked into, I want to say the brae So it basically

Audrey Medina:

covered some of those costs.

Audrey Medina:

Now would it be a little bit your thought process would be a little

Audrey Medina:

more I guess not, not broad.

Audrey Medina:

It would philanthropic, it would be a little more

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

than

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

other one But basically, I mean, part of the partnership and

Audrey Medina:

the, and I'm going on memory here, not my gazillion notes, 'cause I'm not

Audrey Medina:

gonna scroll through that right now.

Audrey Medina:

But with the proto program they had, they had a really, really strong agreement.

Audrey Medina:

With Mexico and how that was going to operate and what those fees were and

Audrey Medina:

how that was gonna gonna function.

Audrey Medina:

And then they used, they kind of piggybacked of that process and some of

Audrey Medina:

the subsequent things on how they were gonna fund things so that it's possible.

Audrey Medina:

It's, it's, I think it's absolutely possible.

Audrey Medina:

I think it could work.

Audrey Medina:

I think we have a long way to go before we get there.

Jerremy Newsome:

What do you think, Jerry?

Jerremy Newsome:

You think that would work?

Jerry Valerio:

Yeah I did wanna actually add something somewhat related to the

Jerry Valerio:

discussion because I think one of you talked about Asian communities, right?

Jerry Valerio:

There is a, there is an opportunity to take a look in what happens

Jerry Valerio:

in those immigrant communities to figure out what can we borrow and

Jerry Valerio:

bring forward into American culture and make it a standard practice.

Jerry Valerio:

One of the things I've come to learn about is like in the Korean community,

Jerry Valerio:

they have opportunity circles.

Jerry Valerio:

That's the reason why Korea towns throughout the US thrive, it's

Jerry Valerio:

usually like five to 10 people and they all commit and put money in

Jerry Valerio:

to help each one one get up thrive.

Jerry Valerio:

they can choose to disband or stay part of the circle and they

Jerry Valerio:

continue to help their people.

Jerry Valerio:

Imagine if we created opportunity circles not tied to a specific.

Jerry Valerio:

Cultural community, but it was for all Americans.

Jerry Valerio:

We would have an America that basically lifts each other up collectively.

Jerry Valerio:

We can also break down the barriers that exist between people of different

Jerry Valerio:

races or heritages or culture because you're now part of an opportunity circle

Jerry Valerio:

and you're all looking for a better life, and you're all helping each other

Jerry Valerio:

through that connection that you make.

Jerry Valerio:

We get a tighter community and a much better American culture

Audrey Medina:

like that.

Dave Conley:

Hmm.

Dave Conley:

Area there.

Dave Conley:

I think there's a, I don't know if it's a misconception.

Dave Conley:

It's a, it's a con, a concept that immigrants want to pull

Dave Conley:

up the ladder behind them.

Dave Conley:

Uh, that they wanna actually make it difficult for people who came from

Dave Conley:

their original country to actually come in because they're, they're in.

Dave Conley:

And, and do you, is that a, a real thing?

Dave Conley:

Have you heard that?

Dave Conley:

Do you have any experience with that?

Jerry Valerio:

it.

Jerry Valerio:

It's called the crab mentality because people wanna climb up and once

Jerry Valerio:

they made it to the top, they don't care about the people below them.

Jerry Valerio:

That I think, happens in all cultures to some extent.

Jerry Valerio:

It is.

Jerry Valerio:

And it I've talked to my parents about this.

Jerry Valerio:

It is called the crab mentality.

Jerry Valerio:

There are people who climb to the top but don't want you to be at their level, and

Jerry Valerio:

they'll do whatever they can to I like the idea, you said pull the ladder up.

Jerry Valerio:

And so now there's no ladder,

Dave Conley:

Yeah,

Jerry Valerio:

uh, it's it's destructive, right?

Jerry Valerio:

Because it's on, you don't need to do that.

Jerry Valerio:

There's enough abundance for everyone.

Jerry Valerio:

Help each other, uh, level up.

Jerry Valerio:

Uh, and that's what I love also about what the Koreans do

Jerry Valerio:

with their opportunity circles.

Jerry Valerio:

I'm like, that's a great idea.

Jerry Valerio:

We should just be doing that as a general broader practice.

Dave Conley:

I, I lived right outside of a town, uh, where I grew

Dave Conley:

up that was completely built by Koreans, I mean, like ground up.

Dave Conley:

And it was amazing.

Dave Conley:

To this day, my comfort foods or Vietnamese and Korean food, because

Dave Conley:

I grew up outside of Washington, DC.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, that's, some level of, mean, I guess ultimately

Jerremy Newsome:

the question Jerry was like, how do we make that a requirement?

Jerremy Newsome:

'Cause that, that's really the thought process would be would

Jerremy Newsome:

that, that'd be it, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

If you leave it to everyone else to do it, thus there will be a minority of

Jerremy Newsome:

groups of individuals that will, but if everyone's required to create, like you

Jerremy Newsome:

said, that opportunity circle or a co essentially a cohesive community where

Jerremy Newsome:

it's almost, you've gotta do this, if you fill out this bubble in your form, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

And you are saying, I am a part of this, race background, nationality,

Jerremy Newsome:

immigration status, I'm gonna help this, then this type of situation.

Jerremy Newsome:

I think that'd be unique.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I think,

Dave Conley:

It sounds a little racist.

Dave Conley:

It sounds a little racist to me.

Audrey Medina:

I think it has the potential to be misused.

Jerry Valerio:

It does, anything can be misused because there's always

Jerry Valerio:

gonna be people with other agendas.

Jerry Valerio:

But if you, if you use it under the guise of.

Jerry Valerio:

This is the American spirit.

Jerry Valerio:

It's all about paying it forward.

Jerry Valerio:

Your success, you get to pay it forward to the next people who come after you.

Jerry Valerio:

So I think that's,

Audrey Medina:

I feel the challenge, sorry, the, the, I feel like the

Audrey Medina:

challenge in that is people don't like to be required to do anything.

Dave Conley:

Hmm.

Audrey Medina:

Just in general.

Audrey Medina:

Everybody, all Americans, nobody wants to be required to do anything.

Dave Conley:

I,

Audrey Medina:

to do something

Jerry Valerio:

so I would call it a requirement.

Jerry Valerio:

I would call it a give, get exchanged.

Dave Conley:

Ooh,

Jerry Valerio:

for you to get the support, you're gonna have

Jerry Valerio:

to give something in return.

Jerry Valerio:

not a requirement.

Audrey Medina:

reciprocity.

Jerry Valerio:

Yes.

Jerry Valerio:

So don't call it a requirement.

Jerry Valerio:

Call it reciprocity.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fair.

Dave Conley:

And I know my Australian friends would never do this.

Dave Conley:

There'd be a lot of expletives.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's right.

Jerremy Newsome:

Wouldn't be a lot of

Dave Conley:

I.

Jerremy Newsome:

No, this, this is awesome guys.

Jerremy Newsome:

This is really fun.

Jerremy Newsome:

It's a beautiful discussion because again, I do think that

Jerremy Newsome:

I just love the word Audrey.

Jerremy Newsome:

I mean, it sums it up so perfectly, like complexity.

Jerremy Newsome:

Like there's very, challenging countries everywhere that I

Jerremy Newsome:

don't know one specifically where they're like, they have nailed it.

Jerremy Newsome:

I don't, I don't know if there's one country, but I will ask that.

Jerremy Newsome:

Is there a country that you feel currently is a plus tier immigration policies?

Audrey Medina:

I know there was a Nordic country recently that was doing just

Audrey Medina:

amazing, and now for the life of me, I can't remember which one it was, but it

Audrey Medina:

was one in which there's a period of time in which you have this transitory period

Audrey Medina:

of time when you immigrate somewhere or seek refuge or whatever, where it has the

Audrey Medina:

safety nets to help get you on your feet.

Audrey Medina:

It has we have language resources here, but they're not

Audrey Medina:

like wild, widely available.

Audrey Medina:

They're not, it's not easy to access.

Audrey Medina:

And so I know that there are some countries that that is literally part

Audrey Medina:

of the process is, okay, all right, well you're here now, so now we gotta get you

Audrey Medina:

to where you're comfortable being here.

Audrey Medina:

So let's start with the language.

Audrey Medina:

I think things like that would probably go way into helping kind of the scenario

Audrey Medina:

that we find ourselves in as a nation.

Audrey Medina:

But as far as one that's doing it perfectly, I'm gonna be honest with you.

Audrey Medina:

Humans are fallible.

Audrey Medina:

Humans are messy, and I don't think there's a perfect

Audrey Medina:

system that exists anywhere.

Audrey Medina:

But that doesn't mean that we allow perfect to be the enemy better.

Audrey Medina:

there's not

Jerry Valerio:

Progress over perfection.

Audrey Medina:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

You know, you just keep trying to improve it.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Dave Conley:

What do you think about the open borders?

Dave Conley:

Uh, there's, there's plenty of advocates that be like, borders aren't a thing.

Dave Conley:

Why don't you come on in?

Audrey Medina:

Me personally,

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

What do you think I.

Audrey Medina:

I, so I'm neither here nor there in a certain,

Audrey Medina:

from a certain perspective.

Audrey Medina:

So don't believe that humans are illegal by existing in a location.

Audrey Medina:

Personally speaking, do I see that we have created a system and an order of

Audrey Medina:

doing things that now means that if you don't have certain things and you don't

Audrey Medina:

follow a certain process, that you're now gonna be into this other this otherized

Audrey Medina:

group and now it's gonna make it harder and now people are gonna like point their

Audrey Medina:

I towards you and, and stuff like that.

Audrey Medina:

And so then maybe it's probably better if we had a system in which our borders

Audrey Medina:

acted like an actual border and we, traded back and forth, but we also,

Audrey Medina:

had an actual system in which we knew and everybody was going what direction?

Audrey Medina:

I think we've built a system that technically requires that

Audrey Medina:

unless we change the system,

Dave Conley:

What about you, Jerry?

Dave Conley:

Open Borders.

Dave Conley:

Just come on in.

Audrey Medina:

I.

Jerry Valerio:

I'm not sure how that's gonna make things better.

Dave Conley:

Fair.

Jerry Valerio:

And so, an interesting concept, so years.

Jerry Valerio:

I think what that's practice now in Europe, right?

Jerry Valerio:

Because they've opened the borders, but they're also challenged with

Jerry Valerio:

the problems that they do have.

Jerry Valerio:

So think it's an opportunity to see where it then may have worked successfully

Jerry Valerio:

or learn from that and then figure out, well how can we make it better if

Jerry Valerio:

we wanted to do something like here?

Jerry Valerio:

Mean, I think in some ways NAFTA and trade and all that stuff was like an attempt

Jerry Valerio:

to like, oh, let's have, open borders when it comes to economics and trade.

Jerry Valerio:

But you know, obviously that's not an easy problem to solve.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, great question.

Jerremy Newsome:

Um, here's another fun one.

Jerremy Newsome:

Okay, so if you had to immigrate to a different country right now,

Jerremy Newsome:

so let's put you in that position.

Jerremy Newsome:

You're not being deported, but you, you've gotta go to another country.

Jerremy Newsome:

country are you currently choosing and why?

Jerremy Newsome:

I'm gonna start with Dave.

Jerremy Newsome:

I wanna hear what Dave says, and then Jerry, and then Audrey,

Jerremy Newsome:

and then I'll give an answer.

Dave Conley:

You know, actually just talked about this with, uh, because of,

Dave Conley:

uh, political instability where my boo is and political instability where I live.

Dave Conley:

Um, we were seriously, uh, and we're seriously talking about Spain.

Dave Conley:

It has, uh, great healthcare.

Dave Conley:

It has lots of great international airports.

Dave Conley:

It has access to Europe you know, pretty good laws, you

Dave Conley:

know, pretty decent economy.

Dave Conley:

Uh, it's fairly, and you get value for your money.

Dave Conley:

I got family there.

Dave Conley:

We like the weather.

Dave Conley:

It's right on the Mediterranean.

Dave Conley:

Like, it, it checked a lot of boxes.

Dave Conley:

So, you know, like actually seriously considering like, oh, maybe get a place

Dave Conley:

in Barcelona or, or somewhere on the coast, uh, and just, have it as a, as a

Dave Conley:

place to at least, uh, have a second home.

Jerremy Newsome:

All right.

Jerremy Newsome:

Jerry, what about you Gotta go somewhere else.

Jerremy Newsome:

Dave's going to Spain or is Jerry going?

Dave Conley:

Oh, Jerry, you, you can live with us.

Dave Conley:

I'm good.

Jerry Valerio:

so

Jerremy Newsome:

you can also go to Spain.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Jerry Valerio:

I think my choices, and this is just me, where I'm at

Jerry Valerio:

with my life, fighting a place where the comforts that I've already become

Jerry Valerio:

accustomed to would be also available.

Jerry Valerio:

if I look purely at like, okay, it's probably gonna be a, a country

Jerry Valerio:

where speaking mostly because that's the language I know the most of.

Jerry Valerio:

But then also to some degree of diversity.

Jerry Valerio:

I think my first choice would first be Canada because it is like the us it's

Jerry Valerio:

a kinder, gentler American culture.

Jerry Valerio:

And I've worked there and I love Canadians.

Jerry Valerio:

I love their spirit, their openness.

Jerry Valerio:

They're welcome.

Jerry Valerio:

So in, in some ways, you know, they figured things out that

Jerry Valerio:

we can certainly learn from.

Jerry Valerio:

Uh, and then probably the second place I would consider is, my

Jerry Valerio:

parents' homeland, the Philippines.

Jerry Valerio:

'cause they speak English there.

Jerry Valerio:

Um, and they have culture.

Jerry Valerio:

They're not only just Filipino culture, but there's a lot of different other

Jerry Valerio:

countries, whether it's Chinese, Korea, or Japan or, or whatnot.

Jerry Valerio:

There's a, you know, many American expats, because again you have

Jerry Valerio:

English speaking people, right?

Jerry Valerio:

have incredible, you're, you know, if you took your American dollar, whatever

Jerry Valerio:

you're making here, you're like.

Jerry Valerio:

Over there, right?

Jerry Valerio:

So your money goes a long way.

Jerry Valerio:

It's a great life.

Jerry Valerio:

And, and you know, in, in, in the case of the Philippines, they're known

Jerry Valerio:

as some of the warmest people the earth, friendliest and, and whatnot.

Jerry Valerio:

So I mean, that's why I chose Philippines as the second.

Jerry Valerio:

But I think Canada, if I'm choosing based on I'd consider Canada just, just

Jerry Valerio:

because it's very similar to America, and then the Philippines probably next.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey, where you going?

Audrey Medina:

So we've actually had this thought experiment because of things going

Audrey Medina:

on in the nation right now as a Mexican American truthfully listen, I, I grew

Audrey Medina:

up near Gators and stuff, but I don't, I don't necessarily wanna be fed to one.

Audrey Medina:

So that obviously that was that bad humor from.

Audrey Medina:

Who was it, the advisor to the president or whatever.

Audrey Medina:

But with that being said we've teased out different scenarios

Audrey Medina:

based on what would cause us leave.

Audrey Medina:

So if it's because now all of a sudden, you know, protections are

Audrey Medina:

gone for members of the L-G-B-T-Q or something like that, that dictates

Audrey Medina:

which countries we would look at, um, no matter what, that would dictate it.

Audrey Medina:

Even if it wasn't specifically the reason why we left.

Audrey Medina:

We would have to go somewhere with those strong protections, which limits

Audrey Medina:

the playing field to a certain degree.

Audrey Medina:

Then there's also language barriers and also coming from an

Audrey Medina:

immigrant family and understanding how difficult it was for them.

Audrey Medina:

Knowing that it's not gonna be a walk in the park, where is it

Audrey Medina:

that I can go and try to hit the ground running as fast as possible.

Audrey Medina:

So with that being sad, if it was a fight or flight, have to leave.

Audrey Medina:

Right now I'm close to the Canadian border, so that's an easy peasy.

Audrey Medina:

Let's say I can't do that and I have to go somewhere where my lineage is at.

Audrey Medina:

Then I've got Mexico.

Audrey Medina:

I've also got Spain, 'cause I do have a grandfather from Spain,

Audrey Medina:

or great-grandfather, sorry.

Audrey Medina:

So there is that option.

Audrey Medina:

But one of the places that we've also looked at was Portugal for the protections

Audrey Medina:

offered to the LGBT community and Ireland.

Audrey Medina:

And Ireland is extra helpful because there's no snakes.

Audrey Medina:

No snakes and I do love me a no rope, but my partner does not.

Audrey Medina:

and they

Jerremy Newsome:

it.

Audrey Medina:

English already, so that makes it a little easier.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fair.

Dave Conley:

All right, Jerremy.

Dave Conley:

Where what's the answer?

Dave Conley:

Where, where are you going?

Audrey Medina:

And then

Audrey Medina:

You,

Jerremy Newsome:

and the correct answer is I'm going to, I'm going to Aruba.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's where I'm going.

Jerremy Newsome:

I'm going to Aruba.

Jerremy Newsome:

Beautiful time zone.

Jerremy Newsome:

They speak all the languages.

Jerremy Newsome:

Nice melting pot safe.

Jerremy Newsome:

No one messes with 'em.

Jerremy Newsome:

A lot of very strong tourist economy.

Jerremy Newsome:

Beautiful place.

Jerremy Newsome:

I've been there before.

Jerremy Newsome:

Perfect Beaches.

Jerremy Newsome:

I'm gonna go there to have fun.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, that, that's my, essentially my answer.

Audrey Medina:

doing this for World War iii?

Audrey Medina:

Because then that changes my answer.

Jerremy Newsome:

No, nothing for, we're just doing it in

Jerremy Newsome:

this hypothetical example.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

If it was just like a straight up immigration, like I'm, you know, I'm

Dave Conley:

probably Spain, Jerry, you're, you're heading to, to, to Canada or Philippines,

Dave Conley:

Audrey, you know, maybe Spain.

Dave Conley:

Maybe Canada.

Dave Conley:

Jerremy.

Dave Conley:

Aruba.

Dave Conley:

I, I dig it.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

That'll.

Audrey Medina:

camp, maybe I'm just going around camping in Airbnb in it for the

Jerremy Newsome:

Sounds like it.

Audrey Medina:

just blogging about my experiences,

Jerremy Newsome:

yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

That would be fun.

Jerremy Newsome:

That'd be fun.

Jerremy Newsome:

If you had to sum up the current Immigration nation that is America

Jerremy Newsome:

and use it in a summation of one word, the immigration system

Jerremy Newsome:

in one word, what would it be?

Jerremy Newsome:

Jerry.

Jerremy Newsome:

Conflicted.

Jerremy Newsome:

Alright.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey.

Audrey Medina:

Discombobulated,

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, Dave.

Dave Conley:

Immigration, I would the words drunkard.

Dave Conley:

But like immigration, like assimilation, uh, you know, the best, I, I don't, I

Dave Conley:

think there's no place better in the world that, opens its doors to immigrants.

Dave Conley:

I think, you know, we are that shining star, like, I don't think

Dave Conley:

there's any country on the planet.

Dave Conley:

I think it's the best place for an immigrant.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fantastic.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fantastic.

Jerremy Newsome:

I, I would, I would probably use the word messy.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

To the point that I do believe with us four, we definitely

Jerremy Newsome:

know some of the policies.

Jerremy Newsome:

We're very aware, but I think as a general public, there is this really

Jerremy Newsome:

undereducated aspect of both the history of immigration to this country

Jerremy Newsome:

also an undereducated aspect of how do people actually come into this country.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I think most Americans, if I had to unfortunately surmise how

Jerremy Newsome:

they probably think it, they come in, they, they all come in illegally

Jerremy Newsome:

and they all just come across the border, go to Canada, come down, go

Jerremy Newsome:

to Mexico, come up, and that's it.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's the only way they come in.

Jerremy Newsome:

that's just not the, that's just not the case.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yes, Biden did open the borders a lot.

Jerremy Newsome:

And there were a lot of people coming across the borders.

Jerremy Newsome:

And now Trump has created ice.

Jerremy Newsome:

And now not created unfortunately revamped it.

Jerremy Newsome:

And now ICE is the 14th largest military on Earth.

Jerremy Newsome:

And so we're spending so much money to Jerry's Point, deporting the current

Jerremy Newsome:

existing individuals where in reality, if we spent that same amount of money

Jerremy Newsome:

saying, Hey, they're already here.

Jerremy Newsome:

Let's figure out who needs to be here safely, legally, And yes, there's

Jerremy Newsome:

definitely people in this country who came here who should not be here.

Jerremy Newsome:

But I would personally feel, and I do personally feel that that number

Jerremy Newsome:

is probably dramatically small.

Jerremy Newsome:

of the immigrants who come over.

Jerremy Newsome:

I think that's a, viciously, tiny percentage of those who are

Jerremy Newsome:

here for the cartels, here for drugs, here for human trafficking.

Jerremy Newsome:

'cause the unfortunate news human trafficking has yes,

Jerremy Newsome:

something to do with immigration.

Jerremy Newsome:

Absolutely.

Jerremy Newsome:

But it is horrifically smaller than we would think it is impacting this nation

Jerremy Newsome:

in forms of millions of people a year.

Jerremy Newsome:

the cities that are not even remotely close to the borders.

Jerremy Newsome:

Example, Nashville, Tennessee one of the largest hubs in the

Jerremy Newsome:

nation for human trafficking.

Jerremy Newsome:

So is Atlanta, so is Indianapolis.

Jerremy Newsome:

So is Minneapolis.

Jerremy Newsome:

These are some of the largest hubs in the country for human trafficking we

Jerremy Newsome:

like to blame it on the immigration aspect, but in reality there's a

Jerremy Newsome:

lot bigger problems going on and

Audrey Medina:

a demand for it.

Jerremy Newsome:

which is appalling to me.

Jerremy Newsome:

Still can't figure that one out.

Jerremy Newsome:

But not only is the demand, it is, I do not believe at all represented by

Jerremy Newsome:

the people that want to come to this country And I do think that uh, there's

Jerremy Newsome:

probably a very fascinating of some degree of individuals that should, if we

Jerremy Newsome:

created a system that was work dependent.

Jerremy Newsome:

'cause I actually am probably more pro if you come here to this country

Jerremy Newsome:

and you do sign up for some job, it should become a lot easier.

Jerremy Newsome:

And that job, could it just be, Hey, I'm gonna come here as an entrepreneur.

Jerremy Newsome:

Cool.

Jerremy Newsome:

We'll check in on you and we'll make sure that you're submitting 10 90 nines.

Jerremy Newsome:

Check.

Jerremy Newsome:

Thanks for being here.

Jerremy Newsome:

I do think if we create it as a job dependent entry, I don't really

Jerremy Newsome:

think that's gonna deter most immigrants realist realistically.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I don't see that as a, as an ultimate problem because they're gonna work anyway.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's why they're coming here.

Jerremy Newsome:

They're coming here to work in this country with the freedoms that we do have.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because to your point, Dave, we are the best.

Jerremy Newsome:

This is the place that you want to go.

Jerremy Newsome:

This is where you want to go.

Jerremy Newsome:

You don't want to go anywhere else.

Jerremy Newsome:

You're not gonna Croatia, although you probably should.

Jerremy Newsome:

Croatia is amazing, but you're not going there because the economy's not thriving.

Jerremy Newsome:

not the strongest empire on earth.

Jerremy Newsome:

So this is where they gotta go.

Jerremy Newsome:

And we do have a big problem as it relates to in on how to keep the

Jerremy Newsome:

current population of immigrants in this country so that they can thrive.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I do believe that the immigration aspect really in this

Jerremy Newsome:

country has always been a who is president, top down approach.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I don't think that there are many leaders in this nation that stand up

Jerremy Newsome:

for the immigrants that are, that are stand up might not be the perfect word,

Jerremy Newsome:

but leaders in the immigration realm that say, this is how it should be.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I'm going to take the burden to carve a really beautiful path and

Jerremy Newsome:

make the policy changes and make the updates and battle the president.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because I feel, and this could be me, I feel that the president, whoever

Jerremy Newsome:

it is, whoever gets elected, is almost always the most influential

Jerremy Newsome:

person as it relates to integration.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I don't know if that that should be the case.

Audrey Medina:

I am not sure that the policies that affect

Audrey Medina:

hundreds of millions of people should be down to one human being.

Jerremy Newsome:

I agree.

Audrey Medina:

re, I

Jerremy Newsome:

Totally agree.

Audrey Medina:

a lot of voices and a lot of perspectives.

Audrey Medina:

'cause

Audrey Medina:

Even in this little teeny tiny group that we're discussing, I mean, we have

Audrey Medina:

altering thought processes, altering ideas, altering the different experiences,

Audrey Medina:

and it takes a, taking all of those and putting 'em in a blender and looking

Audrey Medina:

at them and saying, what do we create?

Audrey Medina:

Or, you know, what can we create with these ingredients,

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

to get to some kind of a policy.

Audrey Medina:

But I also think that we need to start being honest about our own history

Audrey Medina:

and our own usage of the immigration system order to be able to fix it.

Audrey Medina:

Because it is, it stays broken in order to create an exploitable population.

Jerremy Newsome:

Stays broken to exploit.

Jerremy Newsome:

I feel if I were president, I would just task the House of Representatives.

Jerremy Newsome:

Figure out immigration.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's your guys' job for the next year.

Jerremy Newsome:

Go for it.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because again, now you have a larger melting pot.

Jerremy Newsome:

You have people that are representatives from individual states.

Jerremy Newsome:

They have more boots on the ground, they have more individuals they can

Jerremy Newsome:

collaborate with, communicate with.

Jerremy Newsome:

They start figuring out individual policies.

Jerremy Newsome:

I do also think that immigration should be a state.

Jerremy Newsome:

decision as well.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because there are certain, ahead.

Audrey Medina:

go.

Audrey Medina:

Going back to to the house of representative, are you saying

Audrey Medina:

you actually want them to do what they're supposed to be doing?

Jerremy Newsome:

I think that's a crazy statement to make.

Jerremy Newsome:

I know.

Jerremy Newsome:

I feel like, I don't know why.

Jerremy Newsome:

Why did

Dave Conley:

Yeah, we, we heard the history, like the last time

Dave Conley:

they actually did their job was, before, most people that are

Dave Conley:

listening to this were born, right?

Dave Conley:

Like, it was 19,

Audrey Medina:

in diapers,

Jerremy Newsome:

For real.

Dave Conley:

And then there was like little pokes, it's like a little bit

Dave Conley:

of daca, you know, they just passed the Lincoln Riley Act with basically only

Dave Conley:

said, Hey, if you, if you do something horrible, you know we're gonna deport you.

Dave Conley:

Which we already do.

Dave Conley:

We already do, right?

Dave Conley:

So it wasn't like new work, you know, they're just like, let's do this again.

Jerry Valerio:

so have you done an episode on government reform?

Jerry Valerio:

Because Dave, we talked earlier

Dave Conley:

Every single show is about government reform

Jerry Valerio:

true,

Jerremy Newsome:

It's ultimately,

Jerry Valerio:

about our government and the elected public servants,

Jerremy Newsome:

on.

Jerry Valerio:

They're no longer truly representative of

Jerremy Newsome:

come on.

Jerry Valerio:

of America.

Dave Conley:

now.

Jerry Valerio:

for anyone who wants to run to office, you need to be, in some ways

Jerry Valerio:

well connected and well-funded, whether it's your own wealth or you, the when

Jerry Valerio:

government was founded by our founding fathers, it was with the intent, like

Jerry Valerio:

anyone could potentially run for office.

Jerry Valerio:

That is no longer

Jerremy Newsome:

No.

Jerremy Newsome:

Correct.

Jerry Valerio:

And I just feel like every person who gets elected, there's, I

Jerry Valerio:

mean, it's very clear their actions speak louder than the platform they ran on.

Jerry Valerio:

And you find a lot of elected officials.

Jerry Valerio:

Betraying their constituency and never living up to the platform

Jerry Valerio:

that they said they were going to.

Jerry Valerio:

And that's not surprising because it's like, while I'm in, at least

Jerry Valerio:

get four years or six years or

Jerremy Newsome:

Yes.

Jerremy Newsome:

Jared.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yes.

Jerremy Newsome:

And this is why everyone hates politicians because there's no accountability.

Jerremy Newsome:

There's none.

Jerremy Newsome:

I say all these things and then I just do whatever I wanna do.

Jerremy Newsome:

And there's no downside, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

None.

Jerry Valerio:

that cycle.

Jerry Valerio:

That's why I said everything about all of the branches of our

Jerry Valerio:

government need to be reevaluated.

Jerry Valerio:

We've, we've seen over the last couple of decades how things have been

Jerry Valerio:

like, Play-Doh, pooled, stretched, put back together, we're seeing how

Jerry Valerio:

things can get broken or there's loopholes and stuff like that.

Jerry Valerio:

I think now's a good time to like, reflect and figure out how

Jerry Valerio:

do we make this better for the Americans experience moving forward?

Jerry Valerio:

That's a big ask, Because you

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerry Valerio:

break the system that's been in place now for however long.

Jerry Valerio:

Yep,

Audrey Medina:

now, the system thrives on the fact that the American public

Audrey Medina:

is by and large uninformed or dis, and

Jerry Valerio:

yep.

Audrey Medina:

doing that, they can do things like the Lake and Riley act,

Audrey Medina:

even though all of that already exists.

Audrey Medina:

They're gonna get all that applause and all that attention

Audrey Medina:

because they did something.

Audrey Medina:

But they

Jerry Valerio:

Yeah.

Audrey Medina:

anything, and

Jerry Valerio:

Yeah.

Jerry Valerio:

If you're.

Audrey Medina:

Of government.

Jerry Valerio:

So you're, you're talking about the power of politics, right?

Jerry Valerio:

When it comes to politics, it's all about the optics, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

Media,

Jerry Valerio:

optics look good.

Jerry Valerio:

Then people are like, okay, it's done.

Jerry Valerio:

They look away and they're like, okay, now we can stop.

Jerremy Newsome:

Right?

Jerry Valerio:

and that's where we're at.

Jerry Valerio:

That's the broken system.

Jerry Valerio:

We

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerry Valerio:

out how to solve that.

Jerremy Newsome:

ironically enough the number one I get when I tell

Jerremy Newsome:

people the ultimate goal for me is to, is to run for president.

Jerremy Newsome:

They always go, well, you have no background in politics.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I'm like.

Audrey Medina:

great.

Jerremy Newsome:

Exactly.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

I don't, and I don't believe that we should, everyone should have term limits.

Jerremy Newsome:

Duh.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's mind boggling, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

That our boy, Bernie Sanders is still in government.

Jerremy Newsome:

He's still 37 years later, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

Still con whatever.

Jerremy Newsome:

Unbelievable.

Jerremy Newsome:

And they should be public servants, they should be individuals.

Jerremy Newsome:

They go, Hey, listen, I have made it to some degree in whatever field, doesn't

Jerremy Newsome:

have to be business and money, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

But I am at the point now where I have enough knowledge, influence information,

Jerremy Newsome:

and connections where I going through this service, that's what, public

Jerremy Newsome:

service, it should be a service role.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I now have the ability to go back to the people that I worked

Jerremy Newsome:

with or worked for and have direct communication with those individuals

Jerremy Newsome:

and actually bring up the entire population of America right through that.

Jerremy Newsome:

Because we've also

Audrey Medina:

outta politics.

Jerremy Newsome:

In, in so many forms.

Jerremy Newsome:

In so many forms.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I really do think that unfortunately the presidential aspect, the one thing

Jerremy Newsome:

that Trump did, do a, among many other things, but one thing he definitely did

Jerremy Newsome:

is said, Hey, shouldn't say a regular person, non deeply career politician

Jerremy Newsome:

can ascend to extremely high ranks.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's something that I do vehemently believe should be the overall policy

Jerremy Newsome:

of this nation is the individuals that are at the highest levels

Jerremy Newsome:

should be those that have ascended through the American dream itself.

Jerremy Newsome:

have actually started, that have built, that have created, that have produced

Jerremy Newsome:

and have actually been boots on the ground and haven't had their nose stuck

Jerremy Newsome:

in the entire system the entire time and only have their best interests at play.

Jerremy Newsome:

'cause that's exactly what's happening.

Jerremy Newsome:

The fact that Congress and the House of Representatives can buy stocks is

Jerremy Newsome:

one of the most blatant broken systems we have because they are building

Jerremy Newsome:

the policies agreeing to the trade and to the commerce that directly

Jerremy Newsome:

affect the businesses that they are able to invest in, which is the most

Audrey Medina:

Corrupt.

Jerremy Newsome:

corrupt insider trading of all time and insider trading, which

Jerremy Newsome:

Martha Stewart went to prison for and many other people have, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

To all tons of other people, they've gone to prison for insider trading.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's what all the Congress is doing.

Jerremy Newsome:

All of them.

Jerremy Newsome:

And that is mind blowing to me.

Jerremy Newsome:

So aspects like that, that are trickle down effects to

Jerremy Newsome:

the immigration piece because.

Jerremy Newsome:

You're saying that, we are keeping the system broken so that we can exploit them.

Jerremy Newsome:

They're doing it for money and the system is being controlled by money and

Jerremy Newsome:

it is being controlled by money because they are making so much money doing it.

Jerremy Newsome:

And so if you,

Audrey Medina:

deportation centers are owned by publicly traded corporations,

Audrey Medina:

which now commodifies a different, we are basically complicit in a form of

Audrey Medina:

human tra human trafficking, because now we have ice going in and just

Audrey Medina:

grabbing people and discriminately, depriving them of due process,

Audrey Medina:

putting them into these facilities, and that raises the stock price.

Jerremy Newsome:

oh, shoot.

Jerremy Newsome:

And then the Congress can buy that stock.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Audrey Medina:

To your point on public service so indigenous

Audrey Medina:

people have long held, way before this, this country existed.

Audrey Medina:

The way that we, we now know it, system of reciprocity where those that were in some

Audrey Medina:

form of public service to their tribe, to their community they were taken care of.

Audrey Medina:

And that was, that, that was part of the reciprocity, just a natural working

Audrey Medina:

order of things so that the person who was providing, said public service, be

Audrey Medina:

it medicinally, spiritually, whatever, that leadership, whatever that was, they

Audrey Medina:

weren't focused on matters of securing food or, you know, whatever it was.

Audrey Medina:

They, the community did that so that they could focus on the community.

Audrey Medina:

I think in the public service sector there, we do need to really, really

Audrey Medina:

analyze the way money poisons it and it needs, it needs a person

Audrey Medina:

who dedicates their life to public service shouldn't be broke per se.

Audrey Medina:

They shouldn't be able to not afford things, but maybe that

Audrey Medina:

shouldn't even be a concept.

Jerremy Newsome:

I mean, I mean ultimately it's, they they should

Jerremy Newsome:

be the, at the point where for four years, again, hashtag term limits.

Jerremy Newsome:

They can afford to not make substantial profits for that

Jerremy Newsome:

four to eight year term, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

Like if I become president at the age of 40, between 40 and 48, I'm good

Jerremy Newsome:

like that, that eight year timeframe.

Jerremy Newsome:

I have other streams of income that have, I've already created where I don't

Jerremy Newsome:

have to, where other presidents wouldn't have to, or other members of Congress or

Jerremy Newsome:

House of Representatives wouldn't have to these backdoor deals to make more

Jerremy Newsome:

money because they already have some form of investments, passive income.

Jerremy Newsome:

They've worked the American dream so that they can now go be a public servant

Jerremy Newsome:

so that other people can also win.

Jerremy Newsome:

just makes logical sense to me too bad, too much logic.

Jerremy Newsome:

There

Audrey Medina:

Yeah,

Jerremy Newsome:

It's really, really, really fascinating.

Jerremy Newsome:

So as we go ahead.

Audrey Medina:

was gonna say, gone are the days of, like Jimmy Carter when he

Audrey Medina:

divested from his peanut farm because he didn't want it to look bad because

Audrey Medina:

there used to be a, an ethical code of honor that people just naturally went

Audrey Medina:

by there wasn't the same level of money in politics that you could just polish

Audrey Medina:

something out and, and, you know, people had to actually like, want you and

Audrey Medina:

trust you and then they'd vote for you.

Audrey Medina:

And I feel like that's definitely missing what we have now as negative

Audrey Medina:

partisanship where we just don't want the other guy to win and they spend

Audrey Medina:

billions of dollars to get there.

Audrey Medina:

But, that's the one we're going for, even though we don't like 'em.

Jerry Valerio:

That's also another problem of our, our political system, but the

Jerry Valerio:

two party system needs to be revamped.

Jerremy Newsome:

Speaking of, since we have plenty, we have plenty of

Jerremy Newsome:

time an American immigrant, AKA Elon Musk is creating a third party, the

Jerremy Newsome:

American Party as he's calling it.

Jerremy Newsome:

So with a five minutes, I would love each of your take on that,

Jerremy Newsome:

just or five, five minutes or less.

Jerremy Newsome:

Jerry, what's your take on, building a third party, I would say.

Jerremy Newsome:

What's your thoughts?

Jerremy Newsome:

Is it gonna work?

Jerry Valerio:

I think it opens up the door to, for more accountability from our,

Jerry Valerio:

in our political system by having we can't just be two, there has to be more choice.

Jerry Valerio:

So whether it's three, four, or five parties, seen that

Jerry Valerio:

happen in other countries.

Jerry Valerio:

And I think it some ways it helps, balances the spectrum.

Jerry Valerio:

'cause with two parties right now, we just have a push pull with extremes, right?

Jerry Valerio:

That needs to be moderated by ha having other options, right?

Jerry Valerio:

So like libertarians are not large enough.

Jerry Valerio:

I think by and large, most people, would consider themselves libertarian,

Jerremy Newsome:

Yep.

Jerry Valerio:

I think we also vote with the understanding that I want

Jerry Valerio:

my vote to be able to impact and therefore I'm gonna choose the one

Jerry Valerio:

party that has the best shot at winning.

Jerry Valerio:

It's a bad way to look at it.

Jerry Valerio:

I actually like the idea that I'm seeing in some states about

Jerry Valerio:

this whole rank voting process.

Jerry Valerio:

Where you have multiple candidates and then you, then

Jerry Valerio:

you have a, a runoff, right?

Jerry Valerio:

So let's say the top three of the five or whatever gets a runoff

Jerry Valerio:

whoever gets the most votes.

Jerry Valerio:

I think that seems to be a much, much better option to be being able

Jerry Valerio:

to break the two party cycle if we introduce something like that as well.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey.

Audrey Medina:

I, I'm also pretty heavy on the rank choice.

Audrey Medina:

Idea because it allows people to say, well, hey listen, I really

Audrey Medina:

like this Green Party candidate, this independent this, libertarian,

Audrey Medina:

this, whatever, you know, person.

Audrey Medina:

I don't know that they'll win, but I wanna vote for them anyway

Audrey Medina:

because that's who I align with.

Audrey Medina:

And you know what?

Audrey Medina:

Just in case they don't get the numbers, and here's the one I

Audrey Medina:

think might win, and yada yada.

Audrey Medina:

And then based on what, when everything comes through, it, it,

Audrey Medina:

you're not throwing away your vote.

Audrey Medina:

You've said, I prefer this one.

Audrey Medina:

However, if that doesn't work, then I'll go to my next choice.

Audrey Medina:

And then it gets counted into there.

Audrey Medina:

as far as will it work?

Audrey Medina:

So the fun fact about why third parties have not historically gained

Audrey Medina:

traction in the US is primarily because it requires getting them in

Audrey Medina:

all the lower forms of government to even be considered functional.

Audrey Medina:

So you have to have your school boards, you have to have your

Audrey Medina:

railroad commissioners, you have to have your judges, you have to

Audrey Medina:

have your mayors throughout the nation that are also in this party.

Audrey Medina:

And if you're only focusing on the presidential portion, you're gonna have

Audrey Medina:

a lot of pushback and you're gonna have a very ineffectual government at the

Audrey Medina:

federal level without the participation.

Audrey Medina:

And people advocating for that, basically that that political structure

Audrey Medina:

that shows and demonstrates that, yeah, it can work, it works in my

Audrey Medina:

community, da da da works in my, uh, in this section for this district.

Audrey Medina:

And it, there's just no demonstration of it working.

Audrey Medina:

There's not that faith.

Audrey Medina:

And so then what happens is when you have somebody who's going to make it to that

Audrey Medina:

level in this other party that's never been tried before, I think we're at a

Audrey Medina:

point in human, in, in American history, and there's so much division that I

Audrey Medina:

think we're up to that boiling point.

Audrey Medina:

But then the problem's gonna be that particular candidate is almost set up for

Audrey Medina:

failure because there's not gonna be the type of cooperation that's gonna be needed

Audrey Medina:

to do anything meaningful in their term.

Audrey Medina:

And so that's where the, the rub is, is how when you're setting up this for Elon

Audrey Medina:

Musk, for example, with the American America, what does American Party,

Jerremy Newsome:

Markable.

Audrey Medina:

if he, if he sets that up, he's got years basically to get

Audrey Medina:

people throughout the country, not only to join this political movement,

Audrey Medina:

but to run in that political movement in order for by the time you're

Audrey Medina:

doing well, less than three years, by the time you count the political

Audrey Medina:

trail or the, the election period.

Audrey Medina:

To actually do something and show and have some kind of, of.

Audrey Medina:

Return on investment, I guess you could say, showing that, hey, it's functional.

Audrey Medina:

I've got all these people all across, look at all these positions that have now been

Audrey Medina:

filled by people in the American Party.

Audrey Medina:

That one's a tricky one, but I think that where we are right now as a nation that's

Audrey Medina:

figuring it itself out, this is very much reminiscent of the, um, Dixie party.

Audrey Medina:

When the party Democrats and Republicans basically swapped their

Audrey Medina:

platforms, it's very reminiscent of that time period where there

Jerremy Newsome:

Right.

Audrey Medina:

be some, some, maybe it's just an interim, and then eventually

Audrey Medina:

we just swap back and forth again.

Audrey Medina:

I, I don't know, but it does feel like we're getting to that

Audrey Medina:

boiling point, that pressure point.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah, which is fascinating.

Jerry Valerio:

I did wanna add something.

Jerry Valerio:

Earlier, Audrey, you had talked about, the American public being

Jerry Valerio:

un uninformed or misinformed.

Jerry Valerio:

an interesting concept.

Jerry Valerio:

Your right to vote.

Jerry Valerio:

You don't automatically get it there.

Jerry Valerio:

There could be just like a driver's license, a whole education demonstrating

Jerry Valerio:

you understand the process, you understand the current themes, that

Jerry Valerio:

are affecting America, and you have to pass just like your driver's license.

Jerry Valerio:

That gives you the privilege.

Jerry Valerio:

I think if we had something like that, then people would

Jerry Valerio:

hopefully take advantage.

Audrey Medina:

we used to, and it was highly weaponized and it was.

Audrey Medina:

Used to disenfranchise the vote.

Audrey Medina:

And that is where as a nation, like regardless of if we go back to that or

Audrey Medina:

not, without us actually looking at our past, understanding it and building from

Audrey Medina:

that experience and saying, Hey, yeah, no, we did some really bad crap throughout

Audrey Medina:

all of those many, many decades.

Audrey Medina:

We, we weaponized this, we weaponized that.

Audrey Medina:

And actually being honest and, and not shying away and not trying to just only

Audrey Medina:

say we're the greatest nation on earth.

Audrey Medina:

We are, but we could lose that.

Audrey Medina:

It's a freedom has to be kept.

Audrey Medina:

Like you have to protect it.

Audrey Medina:

And if we are only looking and saying, oh, look at this shiny stuff and not

Audrey Medina:

fixing our problems, then we run the risk of running into the exact same cycles.

Audrey Medina:

And the only problem with those types of tests is that this nation, they have only

Audrey Medina:

ever been used to disenfranchise the boat.

Audrey Medina:

I would love to have a more informed public.

Audrey Medina:

I would love to have real journalism.

Audrey Medina:

Again, I know it exists, but it's hard to find and it's also not free.

Audrey Medina:

That's another problem that we have is the free sources for news.

Audrey Medina:

It's all skewed sources, left or right.

Audrey Medina:

It's all over the place, but it, that's what's free.

Audrey Medina:

And what's actual journalism now costs money.

Audrey Medina:

And most people simply will not do that or cannot do that.

Audrey Medina:

So now it's like up to a public, to the person to stay informed, but at

Audrey Medina:

the same time, we've now built a system where getting that information is

Audrey Medina:

its own version of Act of Congress.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

Well, this will be fun to hear from Dave, just about the

Jerremy Newsome:

American Party, which you thought

Dave Conley:

I mean, I, I like it and I think, you know, you

Dave Conley:

and I have to seriously look at what they're talking about, but

Dave Conley:

we, third parties already exist.

Dave Conley:

I mean, the, you know, the what's his name?

Dave Conley:

Yang, uh, the, for

Audrey Medina:

Yeah,

Dave Conley:

Yang, the, the Forward Party.

Dave Conley:

There's the No Labels Party which is, you know, already a bunch of oligarchs,

Audrey Medina:

was Yeezy's party, but I

Audrey Medina:

What

Dave Conley:

li you know, Libert, right?

Dave Conley:

Libertarians, the Greens, the, I, you know, like, I, I mean,

Dave Conley:

don't ever bet against Elon, you know, like him of anyone.

Dave Conley:

I mean, the, the Republicans have gone through a significant

Dave Conley:

shift in the last 10 years and.

Dave Conley:

The Democrats have not.

Dave Conley:

And it's time, you know, like every party goes through its evolutions.

Dave Conley:

And it's, it's, you know, beyond time for the Democrats to go through their own

Dave Conley:

evolution and to, to be something new.

Dave Conley:

I think if I was looking at something structurally, I, you

Dave Conley:

know, I'd be looking at things.

Dave Conley:

I mean, I like the idea of ranked choice voting.

Dave Conley:

I had that within in San Francisco, and it, it really did,

Dave Conley:

you know, do some good things.

Dave Conley:

I like that.

Dave Conley:

I definitely like the idea of having public funding of candidates.

Dave Conley:

It allows for anybody to run.

Dave Conley:

You know, like that's what happened in New York City was public matching,

Dave Conley:

so that enabled somebody who was like, kind of nobody to come out

Dave Conley:

of, somewhere and really, you know, really make a difference quickly by

Dave Conley:

having, you know, a coherent message and actually having money behind it.

Dave Conley:

I think if I was looking at something structural we have 438 representatives

Dave Conley:

in the, in the US Congress, and that's been capped for decades.

Dave Conley:

You know, by legislation, but it's against the constitution.

Dave Conley:

So I would lift that cap.

Dave Conley:

Like we have one representative basically for 80, 90,000 people.

Dave Conley:

I would say, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Dave Conley:

We need to have a representative for like every, every 20,000, 40,000, you

Dave Conley:

know, like double and triple the number of congressional representatives.

Dave Conley:

And that would, by definition create a lot more coalitions, uh, because they're,

Dave Conley:

they're like the Tea Party coalition in the, in the Democrat or the Republicans

Dave Conley:

had a lot of power, you know, uh, 10, 20 years, uh, 10, 15 years ago because

Dave Conley:

they were able to stick together.

Dave Conley:

And so like coalitions sticking together can actually get

Dave Conley:

some interesting stuff done.

Dave Conley:

So I would, I would raise the cap on the number of, of representatives in Congress.

Dave Conley:

That's where I'd start.

Jerremy Newsome:

Yeah.

Jerremy Newsome:

Fascinating.

Jerremy Newsome:

Very, very fascinating.

Jerremy Newsome:

Friends, family team, Americans, thank you so much for listening to this episode.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey has a poem, first poem that's been on the podcast that she would love to

Jerremy Newsome:

read to wrap up this episode immigration.

Jerremy Newsome:

So, Audrey, the floor is yours.

Audrey Medina:

I read the poem, I am going to do just a little

Audrey Medina:

disclaimer, disclaimer, warning.

Audrey Medina:

poem is specifically from a refugee perspective in regards to immigration.

Audrey Medina:

with that, it's, it's definitely a deeper topic.

Audrey Medina:

And I am also gonna say there is one racial slur in there,

Audrey Medina:

and it's an important one.

Audrey Medina:

I've read it many times, and there's kind of no way to get around it because as,

Audrey Medina:

as somebody who also writes, I have to do justice to the person who wrote it.

Audrey Medina:

And it was a very intentionally selected word.

Audrey Medina:

With that disclaimer in mind, the poem is called Home.

Audrey Medina:

It is by Warsan Shire, and uh, here we go.

Audrey Medina:

No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.

Audrey Medina:

You only run for the border when you see the whole city running as well.

Audrey Medina:

Your neighbor's running faster than you breath bloody in their throats.

Audrey Medina:

The boy you went to school with who kissed you dizzy behind the old 10 factory

Audrey Medina:

is holding a gun bigger than his body.

Audrey Medina:

only leave home when home won't let you stay.

Audrey Medina:

No one leaves home unless home chases you fire under feet, hot blood in your belly.

Audrey Medina:

It's not something you ever thought of doing until the blade

Audrey Medina:

burnt threats into your neck.

Audrey Medina:

And even then you carried the anthem under your breath, only tearing up your

Audrey Medina:

passport in an airport toilet sobbing as each mouthful of paper made it

Audrey Medina:

clear that you wouldn't be going back.

Audrey Medina:

You have to understand that no one puts their children in a boat unless

Audrey Medina:

the water is safer than the land.

Audrey Medina:

No one burns their palms under trains beneath carriages.

Audrey Medina:

No one spends days and nights in the stomach of a truck feeding on newspaper.

Audrey Medina:

Unless the miles traveled means something more than the journey.

Audrey Medina:

No one crawls under fences.

Audrey Medina:

No one wants to be beaten, pitied.

Audrey Medina:

No one chooses refugee camps or strip searches where your body is left aching

Audrey Medina:

or prison because prison is safer than a. City of fire and one prison guard

Audrey Medina:

in the night is better than a truckload of men who look like your father.

Audrey Medina:

No one could take it.

Audrey Medina:

No one could stomach it.

Audrey Medina:

No one skin would be tough enough.

Audrey Medina:

The home, the go home, blacks, refugees, dirty immigrants, asylum seekers

Audrey Medina:

sucking our country dry niggers with their hands out, they smell strange,

Audrey Medina:

Savage messed up their country, and now they wanna mess up hours.

Audrey Medina:

How do the words the dirty looks, roll off your backs?

Audrey Medina:

Maybe because the blow is softer than a limb torn off.

Audrey Medina:

Or the words are more tender than 14 men between your legs or the insults

Audrey Medina:

are easier to swallow than rubble than bone, than your child body in pieces.

Audrey Medina:

I want to go home, but home is the mouth of a shark.

Audrey Medina:

Home is the barrel of a gun and no one would leave home unless

Audrey Medina:

home chased you to the shore.

Audrey Medina:

Unless home told you to quicken your legs.

Audrey Medina:

Leave your clothes behind.

Audrey Medina:

Crawl through the desert, wade through the oceans, drown, save,

Audrey Medina:

be hunger, beg, forget pride.

Audrey Medina:

Your survival is more important.

Audrey Medina:

No one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear

Audrey Medina:

saying, leave run away from me.

Audrey Medina:

Now, I don't know what I've become, but I know that anywhere is safer than here.

Jerremy Newsome:

Powerful.

Jerremy Newsome:

I love poetry.

Jerremy Newsome:

I love the way it pierces the soul and opens up new paradigms and beliefs.

Jerremy Newsome:

Jerry, you would like to have a closing remark as well.

Jerry Valerio:

I am of the strong belief that the American spirit

Jerry Valerio:

is built on the immigrant spirit.

Jerry Valerio:

And the one phrase that resonates in my mind, and it's funny because

Jerry Valerio:

I actually shared this with earlier today, phrase is, I can, because I am.

Jerry Valerio:

And the I can, because I am immigrant, I can because I am American.

Jerry Valerio:

Those are equivalent.

Jerremy Newsome:

Ah, man.

Jerremy Newsome:

Thank you so much for listening to another episode of Solving America's Problems.

Jerremy Newsome:

Please feel free to subscribe.

Jerremy Newsome:

Drop a five star review and make sure you share this episode.

Jerremy Newsome:

us.

Jerremy Newsome:

Solve USA Pod on X or.

Jerremy Newsome:

Solving America's Problems Podcast on Instagram.

Jerremy Newsome:

Thank you so much for listening.

Jerremy Newsome:

Did I learn?

Dave Conley:

What did you learn?

Jerremy Newsome:

Oh, this is a big one.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's what I learned.

Jerremy Newsome:

This is not one of those we're gonna solve with a, I do this I, what I

Jerremy Newsome:

also learned is it's gonna be really great for me, another portion of.

Jerremy Newsome:

Information from a very politically vested aspect that, as I mentioned

Jerremy Newsome:

earlier, I do not think that this should be on the shoulders of one person.

Jerremy Newsome:

not think the President should have that much say so, how immigration is created,

Jerremy Newsome:

because especially if the president is a direct immigrant or not, historically

Jerremy Newsome:

they're not 'cause they can't be.

Jerremy Newsome:

I really don't truly see that one individual having the to

Jerremy Newsome:

make such a powerful judgment call over so many people.

Jerremy Newsome:

I do think that there can definitely be elements that the president can protect

Jerremy Newsome:

and can provide and can be aware of.

Jerremy Newsome:

And as a a, I love the question that you asked, like, Hey, should

Jerremy Newsome:

we just open up everything?

Jerremy Newsome:

I, I think that aspect of the presidential policy of having a protection,

Jerremy Newsome:

having something in place, having the awareness that yes, every country should

Jerremy Newsome:

have a country should have borders.

Jerremy Newsome:

That's what makes a country.

Jerremy Newsome:

And knowing the facilitation that there are other people, there are

Jerremy Newsome:

other individuals like you mentioned, representatives like the house, that

Jerremy Newsome:

that could be expanded upon more, representatives that would be tasked

Jerremy Newsome:

with something of this magnitude, I think is much more relevant and prevalent.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I also truly believe that.

Jerremy Newsome:

Audrey made a great point.

Jerremy Newsome:

There's every aspect of our society is probably gonna be at some point

Jerremy Newsome:

touched upon immigration, and I think we kind of demonize it in

Jerremy Newsome:

such a way that it's us versus them.

Jerremy Newsome:

It's the people that have made it versus the people that haven't.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I think that's really what causes a lot of the uproar and the riots and

Jerremy Newsome:

the anger and the frustration is really because it is a a caste system, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

If you are, even if you are a an American resident citizen, there's

Jerremy Newsome:

a massive difference, right?

Jerremy Newsome:

If you are an immigrant that became a citizen, there's still a difference.

Jerremy Newsome:

If you were born here, if you were not born here, if your

Jerremy Newsome:

parents came, they didn't come.

Jerremy Newsome:

There's this classification that probably, I think ultimately shouldn't be there.

Jerremy Newsome:

And I think that probably is a top down approach.

Jerremy Newsome:

Someone who is ultimately able to share the vision that all Americans, why they're

Jerremy Newsome:

here, what we should all do together, what type of value we should all create.

Jerremy Newsome:

that focus and having that awareness, I think is gonna be a

Jerremy Newsome:

really, really key aspect to making these proper, adequate changes.

Jerremy Newsome:

What did you learn, Dave?

Dave Conley:

I am still processing it.

Dave Conley:

Like I, I've been sitting here, I was thinking about it when you were wrapping

Dave Conley:

up and I'm like, what did I learn?

Dave Conley:

And I don't know, uh, I'm gonna actually, I'm gonna listen back to this as we edit

Dave Conley:

it and, and I'm, I'm not exactly sure.

Dave Conley:

I know I learned something like there's a, there's a, there's nuggets in there and

Dave Conley:

I'm sort of just kind of going through it.

Dave Conley:

I know basically, like immigrants are awesome and like first generation

Dave Conley:

immigrant, you know, like, I mean, the amount of bravery that I feel

Dave Conley:

like it takes to pull up stakes from wherever you are on the

Dave Conley:

planet and be like, you know what?

Dave Conley:

I'm moving.

Dave Conley:

I'm, you know, like I'm, I'm going to like, go someplace else on the planet.

Dave Conley:

I'm gonna go to America and see what it's all about.

Dave Conley:

It feels like an incredibly brave thing to me and to the grit and resolve and

Dave Conley:

the drive that someone has in order to go do that and create a family and then

Dave Conley:

create wealth and businesses and like immigrants are amazing and like, that's

Dave Conley:

exactly what this country's all about.

Dave Conley:

And I, um,

Dave Conley:

and it's, it's complicated.

Dave Conley:

Uh, you know, it's, it's complicated.

Dave Conley:

I mean, I live in, I live in Miami and you know, like I'm very much in like

Dave Conley:

it's, I feel very much in the minority you know, being a. English speaking.

Dave Conley:

And it's a different experience for me.

Dave Conley:

You know, like, it definitely feels like a foreign country in a lot of ways.

Dave Conley:

And I think sometimes I, I, sometimes I have like a, like a negative

Dave Conley:

emotion to that and I'm like, oh my God, is this a little bit of racism?

Dave Conley:

And I'm like, ah, I'm not racist, but like, yeah, that's, that's

Dave Conley:

not the best, you know, like, step back check yourself, Dave.

Dave Conley:

Like, what's that?

Dave Conley:

You know, what is that?

Dave Conley:

Right.

Dave Conley:

Like, why, why do you feel that?

Dave Conley:

When I was talking to, to Audrey and, and to Jerry before this, you know, just

Dave Conley:

to get a sense for where they wanted to go, and so we could have this they

Dave Conley:

both said something independently.

Dave Conley:

They said, you know, what was really key for their parents and

Dave Conley:

their parents' parents and Audrey's sense, what was incredibly key for

Dave Conley:

them was, uh, the English language.

Dave Conley:

You know, Jerry said, you know, like I, I, I can't speak Phil,

Dave Conley:

you know, Filipino tag along.

Dave Conley:

I'm, I'm not sure I'm, forgive me folks.

Dave Conley:

Yeah.

Dave Conley:

For, for not knowing that.

Dave Conley:

And he said it, it kind of sucks, you know, like I, you know, I have trouble,

Dave Conley:

you know, sometimes, you know, with family and, like, I, I wish I'd, I'd, I'd

Dave Conley:

paid more attention, you know, growing.

Dave Conley:

But then he said, and the thing that assimilates you more than anything

Dave Conley:

else is not having that language.

Dave Conley:

And just having English.

Dave Conley:

And I think that that's, that's an interesting thing to say.

Dave Conley:

I, I, you know, I, I like that, in, in that, it, it is very unifying

Dave Conley:

to have a unified language.

Dave Conley:

And I think we already have that, even though we don't

Dave Conley:

really have a national language.

Dave Conley:

I, I think it's, it's pretty cool that we can say, okay, like, English is, is

Dave Conley:

like our, you know, how we get along and how we get around and saying that, most

Dave Conley:

of the things around here are in Spanish.

Dave Conley:

But uh, I think it's an easy thing to do and say is like, you know,

Dave Conley:

like, we're going to, we're gonna have our education in English.

Dave Conley:

We're going to, you know, make sure our kids know English.

Dave Conley:

I know a lot of countries besides their language, they also teach English.

Dave Conley:

I think, you know, having a real emphasis on the English language for anybody you

Dave Conley:

know, who, uh, doesn't speak English as a native language or, uh, speaks a,

Dave Conley:

speaks a different language primarily.

Dave Conley:

I think that that'd be kind of a thing.

Dave Conley:

That's something I learned.

Jerremy Newsome:

Love it.

Next Episode All Episodes Previous Episode

Listen for free

Show artwork for Solving America's Problems

About the Podcast

Solving America's Problems
Solving America’s Problems isn’t just a podcast—it’s a journey. Co-host Jerremy Newsome, a successful entrepreneur and educator, is pursuing his lifelong dream of running for president. Along the way, he and co-host Dave Conley bring together experts, advocates, and everyday Americans to explore the real, actionable solutions our country needs.

With dynamic formats—one-on-one interviews, panel discussions, and more—we cut through the noise of divisive rhetoric to uncover practical ideas that unite instead of divide. If you’re ready to think differently, act boldly, and join a movement for meaningful change, subscribe now.