Things That Go Boom

Congress hasn’t passed a significant immigration bill in decades, but the demands on the immigration system today are very different than they were in the ’90s. So, what’s a president to do? With asylum seekers facing a militarized border and millions of undocumented immigrants already inside the country, recent presidents have used their executive authority to try and shape the system to meet the needs of the day. But, more and more, the courts are stepping in. Today, lawsuits drag on, Congress remains deadlocked, and millions of people are caught in the middle. GUESTS: Dr. Jorge Castañeda, former Foreign Minister of Mexico and Global Distinguished Professor of Latin American and Caribbean Studies at New York University; Cristina Rodríguez, Leighton Homer Surbeck Professor of Law at Yale Law School; Theresa Cardinal Brown, Managing Director, Immigration and Cross-Border Policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center; Juan Pablo Barrios, asylum seeker from Venezuela (interpretation by Gustavo Martínez). RESOURCES FOR ASYLUM SEEKERS: American Immigration Council: Asylum Resources Asylee Eligibility for Resettlement Assistance Guide, CLINIC Getting Asylum, Protection in The United States, Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at Stanford Law School, 2017 Para Obtener Asilo, Protección en los Estados Unidos, Immigrants’ Rights Clinic at Stanford Law School, 2017 ADDITIONAL RESOURCES: The President and Immigration Law, Adam B. Cox and Cristina M. Rodríguez Ex Mex: From Migrants to Immigrants, Jorge G. Castañeda This Week in Immigration, The Bipartisan Policy Center, Theresa Cardinal Brown Lake Maracaibo: an oil development sacrifice zone dying from neglect, Mongabay Special thanks to Professor Jennifer M. Chacón.

Since the beginning of the American experiment, presidents have tussled with Congress over how to handle foreign threats. That creative conflict is supposed to be the democratic ideal. But there were also moments when lawmakers realized it was easier to just… not do the job. In the best of times, Congress oversaw the president and pushed back on missteps — or prevented those missteps in the first place. In the worst of times, it checked out. Then, the dawn of the nuclear age blew up that precarious balance. GUESTS: Kevin Butterfield, Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington at Mount Vernon; Kori Schake, American Enterprise Institute; Laura Ellyn Smith, University of Oxford; Jeremi Suri, University of Texas at Austin ADDITIONAL READING: The Presidency Is Too Big to Succeed, Jeremi Suri, The Atlantic. The Runaway Presidency, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., The Atlantic. Adults in a Room IV, Inkstick Media.

The Framers of the Constitution made sure Congress had a voice guiding our role in the world. Congress decides how much money we spend on everything from immigration to foreign aid. It has the power to declare war, approve treaties, and oversee how the Department of Defense handles troops in conflict zones. But over the past few decades, our lawmakers’ hold on that responsibility seems to have slipped… into the hands of the president. It’s an outcome the Framers worried might come to pass. And its story goes all the way back to George Washington. From Afghanistan to arms sales, Congress is losing its grip on our foreign policy. Why is that? And, as we make our way toward the midterms, what can be done to reassert Congress’ authority as a coequal branch of the government?

The Republic of the Marshall Islands is a speck of a country in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Population 60,000. But it has an outsized legacy as the place where the US military exploded dozens of nuclear weapons in the 40s and 50s, and brushed over the danger to local populations. For decades the Marshall Islands has been fighting for the US to fully recognize the devastating health and environmental impacts from all those nuclear tests, without much success. But skip forward to a recent congressional hearing and something seemed to shift — something that starts with C and ends with A, and rhymes with ‘pivot to Asia.’ GUESTS: Rhea Moss-Christian, chairwoman of the Marshall Islands National Nuclear Commission ADDITIONAL READING: How the US Betrayed the Marshall Islands, Kindling the Next Nuclear Disaster, Susanne Rust, Los Angeles Times. ‘They Did Not Realize We Are Human Beings.’ Dan Diamond, Politico. (With reporting from Calvin Ryerse.)

Long before there was a catchphrase called “foreign policy for the middle class,” a Vermont mayor was on C-SPAN fighting for exactly that thing. Now he’s a US Senator. And Bernie Sanders has pretty much spent his entire career in Washington questioning whether government decisions really serve working people … or, the 1%. On this episode of Things That Go Boom, we sit down with Sanders’ Foreign Policy Advisor Matt Duss, because we wanted to know, from the perspective of someone whose boss has been thinking about these ideas for such a long time... Is Biden’s foreign policy for the middle class anything more than a slogan? GUESTS: Matt Duss, Foreign Policy Advisor, Senator Bernie Sanders ADDITIONAL READING: Who Is Matt Duss, and Can He Take On Washington’s ‘Blob’?, David Klion, The Nation

Obaidullah Baheer has built his career promoting progress in Afghanistan: He’s a university lecturer on intractable conflicts and who advocates for women’s and minority rights online. But his life could have wound up very different. As the grandson of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar — the leader of Islamist rebel group Hezb-i-Islami — he was once taught to hate the West and everything it stood for. So how did he turn toward peace instead of war? And, as the Taliban take control of Afghanistan, what can his story tell us about the country’s future? GUESTS: Obaidullah Baheer, Lecturer at the American University of Afghanistan ADDITIONAL READING: My Family Fought Alongside the Taliban. Now, I’m Afraid for My Friends, Obaidullah Baheer, The Economist. What To Make Of the Taliban’s ‘Exclusive’ Caretaker Government, Obaidullah Baheer, Al Jazeera. Bin Laden: The Road To 9-11, Tam Hussein, Channel 4.

We turn our attention to the narrow strait that divides China and Taiwan, which some analysts believe is the most likely flashpoint for another far-away conflict involving the US military. If President Biden reconfigures foreign policy to focus more on threats at home, will that leave us unprepared to defend US interests abroad? Or should we rethink which battles we’re willing to fight? GUESTS: Oriana Skylar Mastro, Fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; Michael Mazarr, Senior Political Scientist at the RAND Corporation. ADDITIONAL READING: The Taiwan Temptation, Foreign Affairs. Time for a New Approach to Defense Strategy, War on the Rocks. Biden Backs Taiwan, but Some Call for a Clearer Warning to China, New York Times.

Conversations about downsizing America’s defense budget almost immediately stall out in a Catch-22: Reallocating those tax dollars to invest in domestic priorities would be devastating to the many small cities where a manufacturing plant, ICBM silo, or military base is the lifeblood of the local economy. If Biden begins to shift some money away from defense, or even just, away from some of the big weapons systems a lot of defense towns are tasked to build, does that mean a whole lot of middle class jobs might get cut? What if there’s a better option? One that fits more closely with Biden's plans for the middle class? GUESTS: Natalie Click, PhD student at Arizona State University; Taylor Barnes, Journalist; Miriam Pemberton, Institute for Policy Studies ADDITIONAL READING: From Arms to Renewables: How Workers in This Southern Military Industrial Hub Are Converting the Economy, Taylor Barnes, Southerly Magazine. ‘Honk for Humane Jobs’: NC Activists Challenge Subsidies for Weapons Maker, Taylor Barnes, Facing South. Let’s Turn Our Military Resources To Building a Post-COVID Industrial Base for All Americans, Miriam Pemberton, Newsweek. Study Says Domestic, Not Military Spending, Fuels Job Growth, Brown University. How Much More Expensive Can the F-35 Actually Get? Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics.

On this episode of Things That Go Boom, we look at some of the ways civilian and military cultures are merging — and diverging — after two decades of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Americans are distanced from the messy work of national security, how can the Biden administration have an honest conversation with them about priorities? GUESTS: Lacey Hopper, rucking aficionado; Timur Nersesov, US Army Reserve Officer; Loren DeJonge Schulman, Center for a New American Security. ADDITIONAL READING: Who signs up to fight? Dave Philipps and Tim Arango, The New York Times. Biden’s Foreign Policy Starts at Home, Peter Nicholas, The Atlantic. // This episode comes at a chaotic and frightening time in Afghanistan, as Taliban fighters pour into the capital and US troops rush to evacuate allies. The following organizations are just a few providing aid to those in Afghanistan who need help: Doctors Without Borders International Rescue Committee No One Left Behind

Washington and Beijing have been increasingly at odds -- over human rights, trade, maritime boundaries, you name it. Does this tension help Biden at home? And what does it mean for Asian Americans? GUESTS: Samuel Chu, Hong Kong Democracy Council; Nina Luo, Writer and Organizer; Adrian De Leon, University of Southern California; Rui Zhong, Wilson Center ADDITIONAL READING: The American Victims of Washington’s Anti-China Hysteria, Nina Luo, The New Republic. Why Is China Coming After Americans Like Me in the US? Samuel Chu, The New York Times.