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Michael Moore [00:00:29] This is Rumble with Michael Moore. I’m Michael Moore. Welcome, everyone. For the past two months, we’ve been living in an explosive news cycle every day, every week. And what do we all say to ourselves, “it can’t get any worse,” right? “How bad can this be?” And yet the next day, it’s worse. Just think about just the last 6 to 8 weeks. Started back with the leak from the Supreme Court, where we learned that they were going to get rid of Roe v Wade, to all the sad and tragic mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, Texas and Tulsa. According to one site, there’s been 124 mass shootings just in May and June. Our Supreme Court or our Supreme Religious Rulers have been delivering edict after edict after edict. People that want guns now get to have more of them, and they have more rights than women who don’t have guns, they just have a reproductive system that now the court is going to control. The January 6th hearings have become incredible. The witnesses, the testimony and the belief that maybe, maybe, just maybe, orange may be the new Trump. The EPA ruling this week — unbelievable. It’s so overwhelming, right? And how many of us have said, “that’s it, I can’t watch the news anymore.” And each of us have things that we’re just, you know, personally concerned about that we’re trying to deal with. In the midst of all this, in the midst of all this overwhelming news, story after story after story, event after event, each of them historic and very important, all of them rightfully capturing our rapt attention, and yet — and here’s the loser in all this — things have happened during this time, really important stories that never made the news because there were so many of these other things that were so overwhelming. And I would start to hear about things and I’d go, “What? That happeneded? When did that happen?” Have you done the same thing? And it’s like, holy smokes. In any other day and age it would be the top story of the day, of the week, and now it’s not even mentioned. And I thought, “Well, I have a podcast, I can mention it.” I can start to cover some of the uncovered stories. I can put it out there to you, things that you may not have heard of, but I think you would agree with me that are very, very important. So here on this episode today of Rumble, I want to cover some things that have happened in the past that you may not have heard of. Some of it’s good news. Some of it’s tragic. But I am dedicated to and committed to making sure that these stories are not overlooked, are not lost. And that we talk about them. We give them life, even if just for a few minutes, so that you and others can tell others about this. And so that we can encourage action, if needed, to happen.
[00:03:52] So the first story I want to share with you is actually one that’s cause for celebration — a beam of good news, my friends, in this dark era that we find ourselves in. A couple of weeks ago on Saturday, June 15th, in a parking garage in Towson, Maryland — it’s a little suburb right outside of Baltimore — cheers erupted, loud cheers from a parking garage. What was going on? Well, the store workers at the Towson Town Center Apple Store had gathered together, awaiting the count by federal officials of the employees of the Apple Store to find out whether or not they were going to be able to have a union. And the count came in 65 to 33. Two thirds of the employees at the Apple Store just outside of Baltimore, Maryland, became the first unionized Apple store. And the first Apple Union was born. Thus the cheers. And you know, this is really, as you know, I hope, you know, when we’ve done a couple of podcasts on it, this has been a massive uprising here this winter, spring and now summer amongst American workers. Workers have been advocating for better working conditions and leading a wave of unionizing efforts across the country. I mean, it’s really a revolution, my friends, and it’s so encouraging to see because it is being led mostly by young people, workers in their twenties and thirties, a lot of them college graduates who graduated from college and there were no jobs. So they had to go to work at the Apple Store or any of a number of places struggling to pay the rent, struggling to pay off the student loans all the while, during the pandemic, while we learned that the rich didn’t suffer, they got richer. And the middle class and the working class — well, the middle class, I don’t even want to use that term anymore. In many places it’s just become a fairy tale that’s fondly remembered by our parents and grandparents — and that’s not right. But the good news is, is that this revolt for thousands of workers has paid off.
[00:06:03] Back in January here on Rumble, I celebrated along with union organizers Jaz Brisack and Casey Moore, on their creation of the Starbucks Workers United — Starbucks first union and their first union victory in Buffalo, New York. Since that podcast back in January, since their victory, over 100 additional Starbucks locations have unionized. This is amazing. And it’s not just limited to coffee baristas. This union effort is happening with grad student workers at college campuses, museum employees, Amazon, REI, The New York Times digital site. The list goes on and on and on, union effort after union effort after union effort. Back in June, a CNBC poll said that, “59% of workers across the United States and across all sectors say that they support increased unionization in their workplace.” Almost 60%. And how about — listen to the statistic: 46% of Republicans who’re on the job, when polled, said they support increased unionization at their workplace. Of course they do, because if you were raised in a union family like I was, well, you know what that meant in terms of the income your parents had, the health care that you grew up with, all these benefits — you actually got to take a vacation. Well, today on this podcast, I want to celebrate the historic victory of the Coalition of Organized Retail Employees, which stands for CORE or otherwise known as AppleCORE. This is Apple’s first union. And what I’m going to do is, I’m just going to give a quick call here to two of the organizers there in Baltimore, Maryland, Kevin Gallagher and Graham DeYoung. Both of them are members of the organizing committee. Let’s get them on the podcast right now and give them some congratulations, and see how they did it. Okay. Kevin and Graham, this is Michael Moore. How are you?
Kevin Gallagher [00:08:15] Great. Thanks for having us on.
Graham DeYoung [00:08:16] We’re doing well.
Michael Moore [00:08:17] Congratulations.
Graham DeYoung [00:08:18] Thank you.
Michael Moore [00:08:19] So the Apple Stores — that’s a tough nut to crack there. How did you do it? What’s the secret sauce? Why Towson, Maryland?
Kevin Gallagher [00:08:26] Yeah. I mean, that’s been our message — that if we can do it, anyone can do it.
Michael Moore [00:08:30] What was the spark? Sometimes it’s just one person. Something happened here.
Kevin Gallagher [00:08:35] For a lot of people, one of the big inciting moments was this event, Battery Gate. Graham, do you want to talk about battery gate?
Graham DeYoung [00:08:42] I almost had a battery tattooed on my arm because of it. What sparked Battery Gate was Nightly News that ran a story saying that “Apple admits that they’re slowing their devices down and you get a free battery if you go to any Apple store.” Well, it was killing our teams. You have 100 people waiting there. The customers were angry, not just disappointed because they felt misled.
Michael Moore [00:09:05] Anger at you, the employees or?
Graham DeYoung [00:09:07] Yeah. It’s pretty emotional. It puts a, you know, $2.5-$3 trillion company on your back and kind of forces you to be the face.
Michael Moore [00:09:15] Right.
Graham DeYoung [00:09:15] Not having any support.
Michael Moore [00:09:16] Right.
Kevin Gallagher [00:09:17] I’ll tell you what really grew out of it wasn’t just that acknowledgment of the situation, but it was like who we can rely on in order to get through the day. We weren’t getting anything from the company that was helping us. We weren’t getting extra resources, we weren’t getting more manpower, we weren’t getting more hours. All we had was the person next to us. We realized that we’re the ones who are best equipped to answer the problems that we have, and we’re the ones who have the most empathy for the person next to us. It was clear that there was a, you know, a lack of empathy at that time for, you know, the people who are the face of Apple. And I think that the pandemic definitely amplified that even more. And that feeling grew even more to a point where, you know, people just couldn’t take it anymore. They weren’t going to stand for it.
Michael Moore [00:10:07] And then what happened?
Kevin Gallagher [00:10:08] It started off from there a conversation. My colleague Billy approached me and said, “Hey, we’ve got this friend who just organized their yoga studio. This might be a good path for us with, you know, everything going on.” I said, “Yeah, let’s do it.” And we sat down at a coffee shop and we hashed it out with an organizer.
Michael Moore [00:10:25] Now, people listening to this, they’re in Grand Rapids, Michigan, or they’re in Jackson, Mississippi or whatever, right away they’re thinking, “okay, where did you go? Where did you find that organizer? Who do I call?”
Kevin Gallagher [00:10:34] Well, we talked to the organizer that we knew from his relationship with that yoga teacher.
Michael Moore [00:10:40] Oh, it always goes back to the yoga teacher.
Kevin Gallagher [00:10:42] Yeah, Apple can blame yoga for our store organizing. You know, I would say grab a friend, a coworker, a colleague that agrees with you and then, you know, do your research. I mean, we picked a big tent union that kind of really fit a lot of different people, you know, architects, yoga teachers, librarians. But there might be a union that has kind of the niche set of expertize that might fit your workplace. At the end of the day, what’s important is that you just find someone who is there for you and not there for the profits. And I think pretty much any organization will fit that bill.
Michael Moore [00:11:26] And if you call the machinist’s union, they have full-time people there who are organizers. They’re actually waiting for your call.
Kevin Gallagher [00:11:32] Yeah, they’re incredible. Our organizer, David, just an incredibly knowledgeable person and was able to help us navigate this really complex field. You know, it had never been done before and it was new for him and it was new for us, but we knew that it was worth the fight. A couple of months later, actually, almost exactly a year later, we’re the first organized store.
Michael Moore [00:11:53] Wow. And there was a vote. You had to get the cards signed. Was that difficult, convincing people to sign the cards because people were very nervous about — they don’t want to lose their job, they don’t want to get in trouble?
Graham DeYoung [00:12:02] Kevin was actually the person that approached me. I think he would tell you at first I was kind of resistant to it.
Kevin Gallagher [00:12:08] Yeah, there’s so much in the media that has conditioned people to be afraid of it. I mean, there’s an episode of The Office where people are talking about like the union coming in and closing things down. That’s been baked into the media experience for the last 50, 70 years.
Graham DeYoung [00:12:24] You know, and you know, it’s not just media, it’s big companies. There’s kind of a concept of, you know, you don’t bite the hand that feeds you and that puts a lot of subconscious pressure on people. And I think that if we had some issues or difficulties convincing people to join, a lot of that had to do with fear — really fear of the unknown. It really goes to kind of show how scared and/or sometimes desperate people are to make sure they have good work. I think we can do a good job of showing people that it’s not something to be scared of and it’s not something to, you know, to worry about, but it’s something to learn about.
Kevin Gallagher [00:13:01] Yeah, I think we took it slow and steady and very positive. We weren’t talking ill about the company. This isn’t about our management team. This isn’t about our leadership. I think that a lot of our leaders are phenomenal and they’re doing the best with the cards that they’ve been dealt. But, you know, I think maybe we’re just playing the wrong game. You know, I think that with a different system, with a system that values people over profits, and values sustainability over infinite growth, you end up in a situation that has more empathy for the workers, and really a better experience for the people who come into the store. Every single worker in the country would benefit from an organized workplace, for sure.
Michael Moore [00:13:45] Absolutely. And what better time than right now? I’m just very inspired by this story. So this vote was just a little over two weeks ago. Two thirds voted for the union.
Kevin Gallagher [00:13:55] Yeah, 65 to 33.
Michael Moore [00:13:57] 65 to 33. Wow. So now the next step is negotiating a contract. How do you think that’s going to go?
Kevin Gallagher [00:14:04] We’re hoping for the best, but planning for the worst, you know?
Graham DeYoung [00:14:08] We’re expecting the worst — not to cut you off, Kevin. “Cautiously optimistic” is an understatement.
Kevin Gallagher [00:14:14] I would agree with that. You know, earlier you asked “Why Towson?” And I think that we’re a really resilient bunch. You know, we’ve been through a pandemic, we’ve been through Battery Gate, we’ve been through all these things and it feels like we can kind of handle anything that they throw at us at this point. We would love and we really encourage the board of directors to ask the company to really live up to the expectations that they set for themselves and the expectations that they set for their suppliers and ask the company to really come to the table in good faith.
Graham DeYoung [00:14:53] Yeah, they’ve got a huge chance to innovate here. A huge chance to innovate just in the retail sector.
Michael Moore [00:14:58] Right.
Graham DeYoung [00:14:58] Yeah. Why wouldn’t you choose to do that? Why fight it? It’s already here. If you are at the forefront of technology, innovation and inclusion and diversity, wouldn’t you want a diverse workforce that way? Wouldn’t you want there to be options for people if they didn’t feel like your design was the right thing. Do the right thing.
Kevin Gallagher [00:15:21] Yeah. I do genuinely believe all of our leadership are good people and to be honest, the system that they operate in, you know, a publicly traded company, puts on legal responsibilities for them to take actions like this, you know? They are required by law to do anything they can to make sure that they’re protecting their shareholder’s profits.
Michael Moore [00:15:46] Yeah — number one, right?
Kevin Gallagher [00:15:47] Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:15:48] Number one fiduciary responsibility.
Kevin Gallagher [00:15:50] Exactly. And we would love to take that responsibility off their hands. You know, organizing allows them — it gives them the kind of legal “out” to be able to really do what they want to do and take care of their people and, you know, be able to say, “oh, well, what can we do about it? That union, you know, has to have their way. You know, we’re legally required to give them what they want, you know?” And, you know, I think that if, you know, we go about it in that way and we are there to help each other, I think that the shareholders will still get their money. Apple will still make — they’ll still make $90 billion in profits in a quarter.
Michael Moore [00:16:28] That’s right. No, no, no. They’ll get their money. And in fact, probably even more so because when you have a workforce whose morale is up and who enjoys coming to work, and who knows that they’re getting a great wage and benefits, it’s a better situation to create a good workplace environment. And the union helps do that. And I think that they are smart enough and I think we live in the 21st century. Those companies that we’ve had, you know, the Starbucks people on before and all this and man they’re acting — the corporate is acting like it’s, you know, somewhere back in the 1920s. You know, this is like, “no, we’re in a different time now.” And Apple will be much appreciated for saying to the workers, you know, “we’re glad you have an advocate. You should have an advocate, and we’re all going to be the better because of it.” Anyway, I know we’ve gone on too long here, but I just really want to thank you for this. Last words to people who are listening to this, still chomping at the bit, how can I get a union going? How did they do this and where the hell is Towson, Maryland? How did they do this? Last words of advice?
Graham DeYoung [00:17:32] In the end, it was about talking to my friends about something that, you know, we had never talked about. And it’s not like an overnight thing. One of the things that I was kind of so surprised about was just kind of how many different angles we had to come at people with and different thoughts and different ideas. And so I guess to sum it up, it’s just, you know, don’t be discouraged, be patient, know that you’ve got people with you that are with you and that will be there for you. Just know that you can do it and it’s not like you can do it because we did it thing, it’s a you should do it. And if you need help, you know, you can reach out to the machinists, you can reach out to AppleCORE Union. You can reach out to us.
Michael Moore [00:18:13] How do they get ahold of you at AppleCORE? How do they get ahold of you?
Kevin Gallagher [00:18:18] At ACoreUnion on Twitter and Instagram. Reach out. We love to talk. We have so many people from around the country that are already reaching out to us.
Michael Moore [00:18:27] That’s ACoreUnion.
Kevin Gallagher [00:18:31] Yes, that’s it. I have people who are in my Twitter and Instagram DMs every day asking me how they can bring the fight to their store. Like Graham said, not only can you do it, you should do it, and don’t do it alone.
Michael Moore [00:18:44] You’re not alone. So don’t do it alone.
Kevin Gallagher [00:18:46] You’re not alone. Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:18:48] Thank you for this. It’s much appreciated, — and by the way, in your negotiations, I want to throw in a little personal request.
Kevin Gallagher [00:18:54] Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:18:55] If you can get them to agree that there should be only one charge cord for all devices. And when there’s a new version of the phone, there’s not a new cord.
Kevin Gallagher [00:19:05] I think the European Union is already negotiating that for us.
Graham DeYoung [00:19:08] Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:19:10] I’m glad that we’ve been able to tell people something important that has happened during these couple of months when we’ve been focused on so many serious, sad, tragic issues, that something great happened 50 miles outside of Baltimore, Maryland, and it will have repercussions, I’m convinced, throughout the country in all sorts of workplaces. And the people in your generation are going to make this happen. We’re going to have a whole new union movement. So thank you for being two of the leaders of that movement.
Kevin Gallagher [00:19:34] Thanks for giving us a voice.
Graham DeYoung [00:19:35] Yeah, thanks. It was an honor.
Michael Moore [00:19:38] That was just great listening to their enthusiasm. I hope it’s contagious to those of you who are listening to this podcast today. Before I turn the spotlight to the next story that I’m certain many of you have not heard of. I’d like to take a moment to thank our first underwriter of this week’s episode of Rumble. This podcast, this episode, is being sponsored by BetterHelp. I don’t have to tell you, my friends, that life during these times has been overwhelming and stressful. And because this isn’t a country where our mental health is covered by our employer insurance or by the government or whatever, instead, we here in America are too often just burned out. BetterHelp online therapy wants to remind you to prioritize yourself and your mental well-being. BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone, even live chat sessions with your therapist so that you don’t have to see anyone on camera if you don’t want to. It’s much more affordable than in-person therapy, and you can be matched with a therapist in under 48 hours. And you, those of you who are Rumble listeners, get 10% off your first month at BetterHelp.com/rumble. That’s BetterHelp.com/rumble for 10% off your first month. It’s worth it, my friends. And thank you to BetterHelp for supporting this podcast, supporting my voice, and helping to contribute to better mental health throughout this country.
[00:21:06] So the second story I’d like to get into on this podcast today, another story that you may have missed, and I don’t want you to miss it — on the morning of Wednesday, May 11th, while we were all sleeping here in the United States of America, over in the Middle East, halfway around the world, in the West Bank, in occupied Palestine, an American journalist who is of Palestinian descent, Shireen Abu Akleh was brutally murdered by an Israeli sniper. She was standing in a small crowd of fellow journalists away from any conflict, wearing the standard uniform that journalists wear over there to identify themselves: a blue flak jacket and a bulletproof helmet clearly marked “Press.” In in that moment of just standing there talking to her fellow journalists, an Israeli soldier shot her in the back of her neck in that small space between her helmet and the top of her flak jacket. A precision shot. One of her colleagues was also shot in the shoulder during the attack, a heroic citizen tried to retrieve her body and that person was shot at too. Two days later, Israeli forces then at her funeral procession, kicked and beat mourners with batons. And not just mourners — the pallbearers carrying the casket. And the casket starts to fall, the pall bearers start to fall, and they almost dropped and spilled the casket open, and a couple of them caught it just in time. There’s video of this you can watch. This is just absolutely horrific. Shireen was an American citizen, a Palestinian-American. And when news spread of this murder, people were outraged everywhere. Shireen was a prominent and respected journalist all around the world. For 25 years she told stories about the occupation, about Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, mostly on Al-Jazeera, which, by the way, is a great news network. She was a beloved figure among people in the Arab world and especially in Palestine. In Palestine, I can assure you, she’s known in every household. But this story of a journalist, especially a Palestinian journalist, being slain by Israeli forces is not unique. It’s not an anomaly. Since the year 2000, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Information, nearly 50 Palestinian journalists have been killed by Israeli forces. In just a few weeks after Shireen’s execution, on June 1st, Israeli forces shot and killed a 31-year-old Palestinian journalist while she was commuting to work. Her funeral procession was also attacked by Israeli police. Now, because Shireen was an American, many were hopeful that U.S. outrage would spark an unequivocal demand for an independent investigation into her death. And ultimately, we would see some form of justice. Yeah, just go ahead and cue the applause track, because of course, that’s not going to happen. And it didn’t happen. The U.S. State Department did condemn her killing, but they stopped short of calling for an independent investigation. And, of course, their spokesman there at the State Department assured reporters that the Israelis have the wherewithal and the capabilities to conduct a thorough and comprehensive investigation.
[00:24:40] Israel, for its part, of course, did what it always does deny and deflect, because after all, it was just another dead Arab. But this was a dead American. And so don’t those of you who are listening to this, who are Americans, don’t we have a responsibility to demand answers when one of our citizens is murdered by the Israeli Defense Force? On June 24th, the U.N. released their findings of its inquiry, and it said that it was Israeli gunfire that killed Shireen Abu Akleh. President Biden has refused to call for an independent investigation into her killing. I have to tell you, this story has haunted me ever since I woke up to the news of it on May 11th. You know, either I know personally or I am extremely familiar with following the American and Palestinian-American and Palestinian journalists in the West Bank and Gaza over the years. And I care very deeply about this subject. I have visited the West Bank and Gaza twice, and I have seen firsthand how the Palestinians are treated, the sort of apartheid situation that’s going on over there. It’s sad. It’s wrong. And, you know, as I’ve said before in this podcast, to say that you support Israel but you don’t support the rights of Palestinians means you don’t support Israel because you can’t have one without the other. And you have no credibility or integrity when you say, “Oh, I support Israel. But to hell with the Palestinians.” Well, then you’re not to be believed, because if you were to support Israel, well, then that means you support human life, period, regardless whose it is. And you don’t support a so-called democracy that has essentially imprisoned a group of people simply because they’re Arabs. I know — this whole thing has bothered me and I’ve mentioned it to friends and people and said, “did you hear the story of this American journalist murdered by the Israelis here back in May?” “No.” It was just a couple days after her death, that the Buffalo Massacre took place. And, of course, again, obviously, and it should, all the news goes toward the horrific story of the day, which now it seems like there’s one every day or every other day, and this got lost and nobody talked about Shireen. And I can’t believe that somebody who gave her life for 25 years of covering the oppression of a group of people, and then she’s killed and nobody knows about it. Nobody talks about it. Our own American government doesn’t do jack about one of its citizens that are killed by the people that we give billions to every year. I just it’s like, come on. Well, anyways, today I thought it’d be a good idea to have my friend Julia Bacha, fellow documentary filmmaker, on the podcast here to talk about Shireen and her own experiences of reporting from Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza. Julia is an extraordinary award-winning filmmaker, she’s the creative director at Just Vision. Just Vision is a nonprofit that the most important thing it does is it fills a media gap that exists on the issue of Israel-Palestine, and they do it through independent storytelling and engagement. Can we get her on the line here and… Okay, Julia, are you there?
Julia Bacha [00:28:31] Yeah. Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:28:31] Thank you. Thank you very much for coming on my podcast.
Julia Bacha [00:28:34] Of course. It’s a pleasure, Mike.
Michael Moore [00:28:36] I want to talk about Shireen. So here we have an American citizen, a journalist, who is essentially assassinated by the Israeli Defense Force and nothing has happened about this. You’ve had so many years of experience of dealing with this horror that exists there in Israel, the West Bank, Gaza, Palestine, etc.. And I’m just curious what your thinking was when you first heard about her being shot and killed there.
Julia Bacha [00:29:01] I really appreciate, Mike, you bringing Shireen up. It was a huge shock, I think, to anyone who, as you mentioned, has worked in the region to hear that she was killed in the manner that she was killed. There was a sense of horror that took over my body at that moment. If they can kill Shireen like that, then nobody’s safe.
Michael Moore [00:29:31] Right.
Julia Bacha [00:29:32] I have been hearing from my colleagues on the ground. My Palestinian producer, Rula Salameh, who I’ve been working with for 15 years now. She has known Shireen since the beginning of Shireen’s career. She gave her her first job at the Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation in the early ’90s. And Rula and all of her colleagues are really scared that this is going to silence all of them. Because they are now so petrified that an Israeli soldier can aim his or her weapon, shoot on the neck on Sharon’s back, kill her with the cameras having been rolling just moments before, with several of Shireen’s colleagues, who are journalists, as eyewitnesses, saying clearly what had happened — at this point, we’ve had CNN, New York Times, Associated Press, newspapers and television channels that are not known for digging deep when it comes to Israel and Palestine — saying that in all likelihood, Shireen was not only killed by an Israeli soldier, but she was targeted by an Israeli soldier. And yet the Biden administration, dealing with an American journalist who was seemingly assassinated, washes their hands and says, “oh, we trust Israel to conduct an investigation.” Meanwhile, Israel has already declared that it’s not conducting a criminal investigation because there are only two options for what may have happened. Number one, she was killed by Palestinian militants. Number two, if it happens that she was killed by an Israeli soldier, it was an accident because the Israeli soldiers must have been trying to kill Palestinian armed militants shooting at them. And so for journalists on the ground, when they see that happening to Shireen, who is. as you mentioned, the most beloved, well-known, respected, has been doing this work for decades now, for this to happen to her blatantly and for nothing to happen, for the world to stay silent, for the Biden administration to do nothing, is terrifying. So this is a tragedy not only for the life of Shireen, but for the life of all journalists on the ground trying to cover the actions of the Israeli government.
Michael Moore [00:32:13] She is, or was, an American citizen — bottom line. What happened a few years ago with Khashoggi, with the Saudis, he was an American resident and worked for The Washington Post— that sent enough of a chill down people’s spine for a while, at least, until that was essentially forgotten and brushed aside. I don’t want this to be brushed aside. I don’t want this to be forgotten. I want an answer. I want to stand up for my fellow American, Shireen Abu Akleh. I want this to be investigated. I want answers. And I’m not the only one — but they’re benefiting from the fact that our attention is so much on the horror that’s been coming out of Washington, D.C. this last month or two, that we’re not going to know about this. We’re not going to talk about it. We’re going to forget about it. I mean, you’ve been, you know, not only a filmmaker, but also an important organizer on this issue for many, many years. What is it that people can do instead of just listening to you and I talk, get angry, but then ultimately feel hopeless and helpless?
Julia Bacha [00:33:19] Yeah. I felt for a moment there right after Shireen’s killing that something would be different this time. And as you mentioned, it’s so hard to keep people’s attention on any one particular matter these days, particularly one that concerns a foreign country, because our own country requires so much caring right now. But one thing happened last week that rekindled my hope, and it was the fact that 24 Senators signed an open letter calling on President Biden to ensure the direct involvement of the United States in the investigation of the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh. And even though that seems small in the reality of Washington, D.C., and how it relates to Israel, it’s very significant. AIPAC, which is one of the main lobbies for Israel in Washington, D.C., lobbied really hard against this letter. And from people that have experienced that type of lobbying, there is, you know, direct threats that opponents will be supported, AIPAC actually has been known to now be supporting Republicans who actually participated on January 6 — meaning they’re funding Republicans who supported the insurrection on January 6th. And it’s very important for these senators, these 24 senators who signed this letter to hear from their constituents, saying that they support them there because they are going to get from the lobby a lot of attacks.
Michael Moore [00:35:00] Right.
Julia Bacha [00:35:01] And it’s really important for the Senators who signed a letter, for the House of Representative members who signed the one on May 19 calling for an FBI investigation on her killing — the U.S. needs to be involved. Galvanizing around a goal, I think is important when you’re trying to create action. And in two weeks, President Biden is going to be visiting Israel. And on the statement by the the White House, it says that President Biden is coming to the region to reinforce the United States ironclad commitment to Israel’s security and prosperity. And you know, there was a lot of criticism of Trump, the Trump administration’s approach to Israel and Palestine. And I think there was, you know, maybe a naive expectation that Biden would bring a little bit more of a human rights lens back to how it looks in the Middle East. But he hasn’t. And he won’t do it unless Americans show that they want the administration to do it, and that they care enough.
Michael Moore [00:36:18] Right.
Julia Bacha [00:36:19] And so I would start by asking your Senator, your Representative, to join these letters that were sent. I think the more pressure that there is in the run-up to this trip for making it clear that people are waiting to see if Biden is going to bring this up and how he’s going to bring it up, I think that is one thing that people can do.
Michael Moore [00:36:44] He has to do this. I mean, boy, if our own president can’t stand up for a fellow American who has been killed, a journalist who has been killed not by accident appears to be a direct decision to point a gun at her and shoot her — I mean, what are we if we just let that go by? Where nothing is said? Let me say this too, I will post on my podcast platform page, a link to these two letters signed by the 24 senators. And I don’t know how many House members signed that letter but get behind them and support them. And you know, I know this just here in Michigan, in the Detroit area, we have a very progressive member of Congress, Andy Levin, who does not vote carte blanche for Israel. He’s Jewish, Jewish congressman, but he votes in favor and in support of Palestinian rights. And AIPAC has singled him out, and they’re dumping a ton of money on Detroit TV to make sure that he doesn’t win the Michigan primary. So I know — I’ve seen this firsthand. My first trips to the occupied territories back in the 80’s: Israeli soldiers firing, at that time, rubber bullets at me and others who had gathered in the West Bank. And we were there as journalists. We were covering what was going on, and they didn’t care that we were journalists. To have a bullet whiz by your face, like an inch or two away, is a frightening experience, to say the least. And then to see people actually harmed, even with rubber bullets, killed. Well, you don’t forget it. And you know what I’m talking about because you’ve been there and you’ve risked your life to bring us these truths. And to all the other Palestinians and Israelis who have taken that same risk, I have such admiration, and I honor all of you who do this. And tonight, at least as we are speaking here on this episode, I do it in the name of Shireen. I want to see the killing stopped and I want to see the oppression ended. I appreciate you coming on, and talking about this.
Julia Bacha [00:38:53] I appreciate you so much, Michael. Thank you for not letting the story die.
Michael Moore [00:38:58] I don’t know what else to do. I can’t, you know, look, we all have a conscience and we have to follow that. And, you know, most people are good at their core. And when they see injustice, they don’t like it. They don’t like it. And I’m counting on that — both in Shireen’s case and all the incredible issues that you continue to cover. So thank you for that. And my appreciation to Shireen’s family, her American family, her Palestinian family. And let’s make sure that we all carry on that work, and let’s make sure there’s justice when it comes to her death.
[00:39:42] Wow. So, my friends, before I introduce the last forgotten story that has taken place in these last few months, I’d like to thank our other underwriter for today’s episode, and that is Shopify. I am so grateful to Shopify for their continued support of Rumble and of my voice. Now, if you’ve listened to other episodes of mine here, you’ve most likely heard me talk about Shopify because they’re an all-in-one platform that has helped me launch our own store right here, our own online store, the Moore Store. It’s an idea that we had during the COVID lockdowns. “Hey, why don’t we sell some some of my ball caps and hoodies and coffee mugs and we can use it to raise money for issues I care about?” So a portion of all the proceeds from The Moore Store goes to fight voter suppression and to help bring civics classes back into our public schools. The reason I was able to do that is because this entity known as Shopify was able to bring this idea of mine to life. Shopify makes the tools and the resources once reserved only for the big guys, where a small business or nonprofit could never really do this before. And now they can. They can start their own online store. But, you know, this is more than talking about just a store. Shopify is going to help you, help you grow your little business or your nonprofit. That’s why millions of people around the world are already using it. So if you’ve got an idea for a store that you’re looking to bring to life to support your family or raise money for your school or a nonprofit, go to Shopify.com/rumble, and make sure rumble is in all lowercase, and you could get a free 14 day trial and get full access to Shopify’s entire suite of features. Grow your business with Shopify today. Go to Shopify.com/rumble right now. Shopify.com/rumble.
[00:41:31] Well, finally, our last story that’s been overlooked by the media took place at the beginning of this past week. And there’s been no big stories on this, no national news, maybe a blip here and there and I’m not blaming news editors, they only have so much space and time, but it’s wrong that you and I don’t know about these things. And we’re going to have to figure out a better way to do media or something, have it more in the hands of the people, the communities, local. There’s just something wrong now when so many stories like this get missed. The first Apple Store ever becomes unionized — nobody knows. An American journalist was murdered by Israeli Defense Force — nobody knows. And now the story this week, which cuts close to me — it’s personal — it happened this past week in my home state of Michigan. On Tuesday, the day of Cassidy Hutchinson’s incredible testimony there in front of Congress, on that day, that same day, in the same moment, this is why he didn’t hear about it, the Michigan Supreme Court threw out the criminal charges against former Republican Governor Rick Snyder and the others, his cronies, in the Flint water poisoning. It was a six to nothing unanimous vote. The court ruled that the state laws do not authorize a judge to issue indictments. A one judge grand jury had been impaneled to issue an indictment against the governor and his cronies if that judge decided that’s what should happen — and the judge did decide that this governor should, and they should be brought up on criminal charges. It’s now been overruled unanimously by the Michigan Supreme Court. And the governor right now, at least for now, is off scot free. Unbelievable.
[00:43:26] Do you realize that this poisoning, and that once he and his people knew about this they did nothing about it, that this is an eight year old poisoning scandal? And I thought, “nobody’s talking about this this week. Once again, Flint is going to be forgotten.” I thought, “Well, I have a podcast.” So this is the third, third and final story, and as you can guess, there’s probably so many more that we don’t even have time to get into. But I want you to know what happened in my hometown this week and what happened to the people there. And I’m reaching out right now, we’re getting them on the line here, two of my good friends who’ve led the movement against the governor and now the former governor of Michigan. And here we go. We’re ready. Okay. So I want to introduce you to two of the main organizers for the past eight years in Flint, Michigan, fighting the powers that be from Lansing to Washington. They are heroes. Please welcome from Flint, Michigan, Melissa Mays. And Nayyirah Shariff. Melissa, Nayyirah, how are you?
Melissa Mays [00:44:32] Frustrated.
Michael Moore [00:44:33] I was just such a shock. Explain to the listeners what happened this week, what we did not see in the national news, because we were consumed with the mass removal of rights of women in this country. This poisoning has been going on for over eight years. And I was just stunned to get a call from somebody to say that the governor is not going to be held accountable in a court of law regarding this. Either one of you — whoever wants to take this first — just tell me, tell the people what’s going on.
Melissa Mays [00:45:07] Well, it’s been three years since the first punch in the gut when a new attorney general was voted in and decided to throw away all of the cases, some of which were actually going to be bound over for trial, for manslaughter. So that was progress —
Michael Moore [00:45:23] Just so people know —Melissa is being sarcastic, our new attorney general three years ago was a Democrat —
Melissa Mays [00:45:32] Yes.
Michael Moore [00:45:34] — and came in, and that was the first shock-a-roo — that this Democrat threw out all the work that had been done by the previous Republican attorney general, frankly, and all of the investigation and whatever to show what had happened. And then it just got bounced. So here we are three years later. What happened this week?
Melissa Mays [00:45:58] So this week, we find out that this new team that the new attorney general had appointed, through a lot of missteps, there have been a lot of mistakes, had gone to get the indictment from a one-man jury, you know, instead of an open grand jury, right? So it was one man, it was a judge, who made the decision to agree to indict these folks who were guilty of, in our eyes at least, guilty of poisoning us and then covering it up as people died. So basically the indictments got tossed, everything’s going back to, you know, scratch. But what’s messed up is that, you know, one-man grand juries are used all of the time in Genesee County, usually against poor folks, young black men. There was no issue with that, but for some reason, the Michigan Supreme Court decided that it was not acceptable for rich white government folk. And it’s been just a disaster, a train wreck and, you know, just traumatizing for our residents over and over and over again.
Michael Moore [00:46:54] Because they’ve all gotten away with it.
Melissa Mays [00:46:56] Yeah.
Michael Moore [00:46:56] They’ve all gotten away with it. Nayyirah, I’m still stunned by this. After all these years that these people will not have to pay the price for what they did poisoning the people, especially the children of Flint. What happened here?
Nayyirah Shariff [00:47:11] Well, I mean, looking at the opinion, everybody on the Supreme Court voted to avoid the indictments, every single one. And it really feels like a kick in the teeth.
Michael Moore [00:47:23] Just so people understand too, the Michigan Supreme Court, they’re elected in the state of Michigan, and they have to get nominated by either the Democrats or the Republicans. The majority of the Michigan Supreme Court now are judges who were nominated by the Democratic Party.
Melissa Mays [00:47:38] Yeah, and once again, we’re back to, you know, we had hopes. Dana Nessel she actually, you know, campaigned on Justice for Flint. We’re like, okay, let’s go, let’s see this.
Michael Moore [00:47:47] Why did she mess this up?
Melissa Mays [00:47:48] She appointed us a solicitor general that had never, never spearheaded a criminal case to trial. And so we’re just sitting here going, “What are you doing and why are you messing up? This is important to us. Why is it not important to anybody else to do this right and not cut corners?” And at the end of the day, you know, even with the, you know, the unfair decision by the Supreme Court to allow poor folks and people of color to go through this one-man jury, but not Governor Snyder and his cronies, even toss that aside, it wouldn’t even have been necessary had Dana Nessel and her team not dismissed all of the charges three years ago. We could have been having trials by now, people being held accountable, we could have seen people behind bars for poisoning 100,000 people. And again, right now, you know, hearing Dana Nessel talk about, you know, protecting the reproductive rights of Michiganders, what about the Flint mothers who lost the pregnancies, who can’t get pregnant now, or the young women that can’t make the decision, won’t make the decision to get pregnant because they don’t know if their eggs are viable, if they’re poisoned or not, because nobody can give us those answers — what about their reproductive rights? So it’s just a lot of hypocrisy back and forth. And who are we supposed to trust?
Michael Moore [00:48:58] What’s going to happen now? I see that there’s a civil case against the governor. In fact, he had to take the stand just a day or two after the Supreme Court decision this week in the civil case. He had to take the stand, and the first thing he says is, “I need to plead the Fifth Amendment.” Unbelievable. And he wouldn’t answer a single question. He just kept saying, “I take the fifth.”
Nayyirah Shariff [00:49:22] Yeah. I mean, it is super wild. Like it really feels like there’s this illusion of justice. And, you know, people — and we’ve talked to, like Flint residents all over the city, and we’ve gone door to door — and, you know, for some people, like accountability and justice, looks like someone being convicted and going to jail. And now, like, just personally, I’m like, “is this what power does? Like, you can keep kicking the can down the road, and are people just gonna continue to just protect themselves? And knowing that, you know, Flint residents, a bunch of Flint residents have like health issues, including myself. So like, are we still going to be alive before these convictions are handed down or until somebody actually is convicted? Like we don’t know. It’s a lot of uncertainty out in the community.
Michael Moore [00:50:12] What is the situation now with people like yourself and others in Flint in terms of the illnesses that you’ve had to suffer through? You know, I run into people around the country and they’re like, “oh, I’m so glad that things are better in Flint.” And I’m like, “what are you talking about?” “Oh, they got all the new pipes.” I said, “You don’t even know half the story here.” I mean, just take a second and just tell people what the situation actually is today in Flint, Michigan.
Nayyirah Shariff [00:50:36] There’s like a bunch of different crises. We have the democracy crisis with the imposition of the emergency manager law, and then we had the other form of the austerity crisis — it’s the lack of infrastructure investment — and then we have this ongoing public health crisis that continues today as people are dealing with the aftermath of drinking the Flint water in a bunch of different ways. You know, me personally, myself, I now have non-epileptic seizures. After one of my seizures, my vocal cords are partially paralyzed, so even though I can speak like I’m in a different pitch than I used to have.
Michael Moore [00:51:20] Yeah, I know, you don’t sound like yourself.
Nayyirah Shariff [00:51:22] Yeah. And, you know, like I can’t yell anymore. And just by breathing the different chemicals, because it was always more than a lead-in-water crisis, my asthma, which was very mild in 2014, I could still run and bike and exercise and be fully active, and now, like, I’m winded just climbing a set of stairs. I’m on oral steroids, you know, like we have kids who are in special education now. Test scores, the standardized tests, are in the toilet. And I don’t know if Melissa mentioned that Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib is starting a “Get the lead out” caucus in Congress. And we did a tour, and in Flint, you know, we saw people lining up for hours to try to get water at a distribution site on the north side of Flint. In ways that matter, like nothing has changed with Flint residents. People are still not drinking the water out of their tap unfiltered. They are still purchasing water. You know, they’re still being very careful.
Michael Moore [00:52:31] Internal plumbing in people’s homes, has not been replaced. The appliances, the washing machines, dishwashers, all that — still corroded, still with all the stuff that came through from the pipeline. And I tell people, too, that this is not just to lead problem — a lot of cities just do have old pipes and they’ve a lead problem — this was purposely done to the people of Flint who had clean drinking water. Then the governor and his cronies, to help his cronies make some money, they came up with this new plan to build a new pipeline, and in the meantime, take people off the clean water pipeline that Detroit and other cities in Michigan use and have them drink from the Flint River. And now we have thousands of kids that these many years later have permanent brain damage. Permanent. It’s not going to be better. I mean, we’ve all talked about this on this podcast now for, you know, quite some time. And the fact that we are still talking about it is disgusting to me. Melissa — what can we do? What can people do who are listening to this? Somebody is listening to this, you know, in Idaho and they want to help or they want to do something. They just feel helpless. “Listen, there goes Mike again, talking about the Flint water situation.” And, you know, I never refer to it as the “Flint water crisis.” This was purposely done. This was purposely done by people who had a lot of money, who were trying to make more money and didn’t give a damn about the people in a town that didn’t have money — full of people who didn’t have money, and full of people who, you know, were also people of color. It’s… I just, you know, I… I’m fumbling around here because I’m at the point where I want to break some glass, and I’m a nonviolent person, I’m not going to, you know, but I’m just like, I’m, I’m, I’m I, Melissa — just give it to us straight here.
Melissa Mays [00:54:28] Well, to give you some more reasons to break glass, in August, these same folks — the state of Michigan and, you know, people in the city of Flint, the EPA allowed it — the same folks that switched our water in 2014, started, last August, blending our water with that other pipeline so that way we could pay the bill for that other pipeline and ours. There’s no laws that prevent blending, and so it was a complete experiment. And what it did, all of the progress that had been made by replacing service lines — and you’re right, that is only one piece because the distribution mains in the street that connect to the service lines, that connect to the house, and all of our interior plumbing, all of that was destroyed and rupturing into the streets and everything like that. Still my kitchen, my bathroom, we’ve had to gut them to the studs because we had water leaks in the walls behind appliances and everything’s been ruined this whole time during COVID. And most of us, you know, I got hit twice with COVID very hard and got lung and heart scarring. We’ve got, you know, a ton of stuff, a ton of problems going on, but we still push forward, and then in the middle of all this, we have them blending our water, which all the water tests show, that it’s now leaching more lead and bacteria and other contaminants from our interior plumbing. And all of the, you know, coating that’s supposed to be done to these new pipes that are put in, are being ripped away because they decided to blend so we could pay two water bills and pay for two systems where no one else in the country does this. Like what’s happening again, they’re using Flint as guinea pigs.
Michael Moore [00:55:53] Because they know they can get away with it.
Melissa Mays [00:55:55] Yep. Because they just assume that we’re either too sick or dying or just don’t care or we’re tired. And believe me, after 2989 days, we are tired of fighting. We are tired of this. We’re sick. I just spent a week in the hospital. Like we got one thing going on after another health wise. But you know at Flint Rising, one of the things that we’ve also had to do is my lawsuit for the Safe Drinking Water Act lawsuit to replace the lead and galvanized steel service lines — one little piece of the puzzle, because that’s all that the law covers at this point, is just those service lines fighting. We’ve been fighting since 2015 to get the city and state and we won in 2017 to get them to replace all these service lines. Well, the city and state decided to stop doing the work in 2020, blamed it on COVID and still aren’t actually up to the work because they’d rather do other projects like connect us to the KWA, that other pipeline you were talking about — which of course we didn’t want and we rallied against it and they did it anyway. Much like, you know, the Supreme Court of the United States and the Supreme Court of Michigan, they don’t care what we are, they’re going to make these decisions based on what they want, not on what’s best for the people. So now we’re dealing with more disgusting water that we’re being experimented with that changes on a daily basis. It’s ruining all of the things that we put back in our house, and these new service lines. And it’s still going on. And Flint Rising — we just received a list with over 1400 addresses for homes that the city and state didn’t even bother reaching out to. So now our, you know, six selves, you know, got to continue pushing forward and you know, now we’re sitting here like “we got to try to hire folks.” So yeah, if people want to donate to Flint Rising, that’d be great because we can hire more Flint folks to knock on these doors to make sure, to do what we used to do, and make sure everybody was okay. Because right now there are so many people getting left out and it’s disgusting because they did this to us — the city, state, everybody, EPA, they did this to us. They allowed this to happen. They put more into the cover up, than into protecting us. They continue to lie and downplay it. And again, the tens of millions of dollars they’ve spent fighting us in court, of course, from our own tax dollars, could have been used to help replace interior plumbing. It could have been used to get educational support for these kids. We have a months-long list of kids that want to get tested, that need to get tested and evaluated at the Neurodevelopmental Center of Excellence to look for, you know, autism, which is now on the rise quite a bit, to look for these learning delays, to look for these behavioral issues that are caused by the contaminated water. And we don’t have enough support systems here. We don’t. And you would think that we would with this being such an ongoing, eight-year-long national, international, you know, disaster. But yet here we sit, you know, everybody hemming and hawing and they don’t want to spend money on Flint because as I was told to my face by the speaker of the House, “if we fund Flint, if we fix Flint, we’re going to have to fix every poisoned city out there.”
Michael Moore [00:58:43] Right. Of course. How awful would that be?
Melissa Mays [00:58:45] Yeah, terrible.
[00:58:46] Okay. So people who are listening, they want to contribute to Flint Rising — how do they do that?
Melissa Mays [00:58:51] Right through our Web site, just FlintRising.com — all one word. And it’s going to go towards keeping us going, and being able to hire more and more Flint residents to, one, help get them health coverage and two, to get them to knock on the doors so we can continue to help support our neighbors, because right now, everybody’s tired, everybody’s sick. I mean, COVID hit us so hard. We had a 12.5% case fatality rate here for the longest time because you have 100,000 immunocompromised people here. And we’ve lost — like a Tony Paladino who you got to meet — we lost him this year from COVID, we’ve lost a lot of good people through the years. And it’s been hard because our loudest voices are getting literally silenced in Nayyirah’s case, and then we have people passing, and then we have people like me that spend more time at the doctor than anything else, while just trying to keep this vehicle moving. But we’re not going to give up and we’re not going to stop because as they roll out this infrastructure plan across the United States, we need to make sure it’s done right and not done the way that it’s done in Flint, because they keep bragging, “well, Flint is fixed. So let’s follow this example.” One, no, we’re not. Two, they’re cutting corners and endangering people, and three, they’re not doing it right. Like when Rashida Tlaib came to Flint, we introduced her to the Union Plumbers because the work’s not even done by licensed plumbers here. And so it’s done badly. We’re not even getting a proper half fix. So we want to make sure the rest of the cities don’t have the same thing as we do.
Michael Moore [01:00:09] All right, so everybody heard that, please — I know you’re sitting across the country, but you can contribute to this group that I support, FlintRising.com, donate to them and you know what I’ll do is here, I will match you know what people are giving with up to 100% of the underwriter money for this episode of Rumble today.
Melissa Mays [01:00:30] Thank you.
Nayyirah Shariff [01:00:31] Thank you so much.
Michael Moore [01:00:32] No, no, it’s the least I can do. Trust me, I have such anger. I also have, like, a survivor’s guilt. I got out. I got out in time, you know? So this didn’t happen to me in my life. And it’s so crushing to me to see friends, families, neighbors, all the union friends, everybody that has had to suffer like this and is still suffering. And that the Michigan Supreme Court this week did this to you? It’s easy for me to say, “don’t give up.” I won’t give up. I know a lot of people after listening to us right now, they’re going to gp. “I thought this was all fixed.” No, it’s not fixed. And the criminal governor and his staff right now, they think they’re going to get away with it. Not on my watch. That’s how I feel. So, Melissa and Nayyirah, God bless you, I love you. My heart aches for you. I didn’t know about Tony. I’m just… Man….
Melissa Mays [01:01:36] Yeah, it’s been a lot, but at the end of the day, it’s a train wreck for everybody and the best thing we can do is just stand together because we want to make sure this doesn’t happen to you or anybody else, because the way it’s going right now, they’re going to cut corners and rich people are going to get richer off of all this through bad water, and they’re going to leave us with whatever. So we can’t, we have to stand together across the U.S. and say, “no, this is not good enough. You do this right and you do it the way that we want you to, which is the most protective way. Because we all matter. All of us matter.”
Michael Moore [01:02:07] That’s right. That’s right. Thank you for this. And thank you for joining me and letting people know that there’s other things going on right now. Not that these big things, what the Supreme Court has done, aren’t important. They are critically important. But we can’t let the other things that are happening be ignored. And the people that benefit from these awful things are gleeful right now that there’s not in the news, it’s been swept under the rug, and I refuse to do that. And that’s one of the reasons I wanted to do this podcast and why I continue to do it. So thank you for participating in this. And I will talk to you soon. And, you know, I should be back in Flint sometime this coming month or so, so maybe we can get together and knock heads and figure out what our next steps are.
Melissa Mays [01:02:56] Absolutely, thank you. Always, thank you.
Nayyirah Shariff [01:02:58] Thank you so much.
Nayyirah Shariff [01:02:59] No, thank you. Thank you. And say hi to everybody for me.
Melissa Mays [01:03:04] We will.
Michael Moore [01:03:05] Thanks,.
Nayyirah Shariff [01:03:06] Peace.
Michael Moore [01:03:10] Wow. Okay. I had to take a little break there. Thanks for understanding. This whole thing is very personal to me. And I don’t think the rest of the country and the world really, when they hear Flint now and they think about the so-called water crisis, it’s far, far worse than anything that I think people can imagine — don’t want to imagine it. And I’m so grateful to those who are still fighting the good fight. And much love and appreciation. And there you have it. Three stories that just simply have not been covered in the way they should be covered because we have had to deal with so much, been overwhelmed by so much going on here in the last few weeks and months. And I’m going to do one of these episodes every now and then though just to bring you up-to-date on things that you may have missed. I miss them. I mean, it’s an important thing that we must do. We must not let these things be forgotten. So my thanks to everybody who was able to talk to me here in the evening of the beginning of the holiday weekend. It’s very, very much appreciated by me. And I want to thank my producer and editor, Angela Vargos, who has put together this whole thing today for us here on Rumble. And to all of you for listening and to those who have covered these stories and will continue to cover the forgotten and overshadowed stories — I thank you for doing that. I encourage you to do it, and I’ll do my best to pay attention to it also. So that’s it, my friends. Enjoy this holiday weekend. Be safe and I will talk to you here very, very soon. Take care.