Immigration implications and the ‘quiet war’ on education (Hour 2)

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And once again, my name is Dan Schaefer.

I'm your guest host this afternoon.

I'm joined in studio by Angela Lang, executive director of Black Leaders Organizing for Communities.

She is our co-host this afternoon.

Angela, how are we doing so far?

We're through one hour

of the show already.

We're cruising.

It's flying by.

It's been really good.

It's been good.

We're listening to

some 90s alternative

rock.

It's been great.

Jammin' all the time.

Yeah.

It's been

great.

So joining us, our next guest joining us today is Kevin Laid.

He is a partner at Laid and Para Law Firm.

And he is here to talk about immigration in some of the big cases that we've been seeing in the nation, including the case of Kilmar-Obrego Garcia.

That case has captured the nation's attention as a flashpoint in Donald Trump's push for mass deportation and whether the immigration is following the law

law and the Constitution in these cases.

So here to talk with us again is Kevin Laid, managing partner at the Laid and Parallel Offering.

Kevin, thank you so much for joining us this afternoon.

Thank you for having me on, Dan.

Angela, very nice to see you again.

Yeah, you too.

So, Kevin joined us a couple months ago on the Reconpopulation Area podcast to talk about some of the things that were happening in the early days of the Trump administration.

We're starting to see kind of where the rubber meets the road and some of these impacts here.

And this case with Kilmar Abrigo Garcia has really stood out.

So, why does this case stand out from so many of the others happening right now?

Why is this case particularly...

significant.

Yeah, so thank you very much for having me on.

I really appreciate it.

I think that what is happening right now with this individual in particular, but writ large with a lot of folks in the green community is something pretty unprecedented in my lifetime.

And I think that this case is an excellent example of the priorities of the administration and their intentions in terms of how they're going to proceed with with these types of plans.

So I'd like to start.

just really briefly with a little bit of historical context, because as you know, as kind of like a technical professional in this field, when I see stuff in the media and these different reports and stuff like that, right?

I think a lot of the sentiment is correct, but a lot of the specifics are very complicated and sometimes can be kind of lost on a general audience.

So

this is why we need to recompobulate on some of these

things.

Precisely.

So I would say that you really have to start in World War II, honestly for this.

When you're talking about what is asylum and what is the asylum system in the United States.

So prior to World War II, the United States did not have any policy for how it would address people who are displaced by things like war and violence and persecution who flee to our country.

And obviously there was massive shock, millions of people displaced, millions of people killed during World War II because of a lack of those types of protections.

So the idea is that the United States signed on to the United Nations agreement on refugees in 1951 in order to make sure that this type of stuff wasn't going to happen again.

And what that requires is that our law provides an opportunity for people who are fleeing from persecution to make a claim here in the United States to be able to assert why they deserve protection and should be allowed to stay here.

And that essentially foundational document is the reason why we have all of these types of laws that exist in the United States to this day.

Asylum is something that is very popular.

One, because it's one of the only things that anyone can apply for.

You don't have to have family members here, right?

You don't have to have work opportunities or things like that.

Simply based on who you are, you have the right to file for this.

And so there's a lot of claim that there's a lot of fraud and a lot of abuse in this.

People are trying to string their cases along and do different things like that.

But that is not the case for Mr. Abrego Garcia.

He was detained in the United States when he was here without papers in 2019.

He was put into an immigration process where he was denied bond and he was held in an immigration detention center until he completed an asylum process.

At the conclusion of that asylum process, a judge found him ineligible for asylum.

I don't know why, but I think it's because he'd been here for a long time and typically have to file for asylum quickly after you arrive.

But what they did find is that he's eligible for something called withholding of removal.

Withholding of removal is an asylum-like claim that is actually more difficult to win.

To win asylum, you have to show something like a 10 or 20 percent chance you'll be harmed when you go back.

To win withholding of removal, you have to show a 51 plus percent likelihood.

So the United States government, what it did is essentially it gave them a deportation order, but they said that we cannot deport you to El Salvador because it would be too dangerous for you.

Because we think more likely than not, something terrible will happen to you if you get sent back.

This is a law that is based in the United Nations and based in the Immigration and Nationality Act, which was signed passed by Congress and signed by the president.

What Donald Trump chose to do when it detained Mr. Abrego Garcia and removed him from the country within a matter of days was to completely ignore that order, like it never happened.

And simply to deport him from the United States completely illegally without justification.

Since that time, things like this happen, right?

And in terms of law enforcement where the wrong person gets detained or their heirs.

But the issue is like, what is the remedy that we have as a system of laws in this country?

And what the Trump administration has essentially said is,

Nothing.

They've admitted it was a mistake.

They've admitted that he was sent to a country that we explicitly buy our laws so that he cannot be removed to, and they refuse to do anything to bring him back to the United States.

That included refusing to turn around an airplane that he was on when it was in the air, when he was being sent to El Salvador.

It includes refusing to provide updates to judicial orders about his whereabouts, about his health, and also to return him to the United States.

The Supreme Court has sort of weighed in a couple of times on this case already and they'll be coming back in again.

And they've essentially said, you know, in some half measures and using some vague language, they've said that the United States government does have a clear responsibility to facilitate his return to the country.

And the Trump

administration, what they've chosen to do, Dan, is they've chosen to simply completely ignore these orders and instead go to the court of public opinion to try to paint this person as a terrorist or a criminal.

The evidence in my eyes is not there for that.

like based on what I've read and based on what I've seen.

But I think the point that's getting lost is it doesn't matter because a judge already had the opportunity to review his case and already made the finding that he cannot be deported regardless of whether he has a domestic violence injunction that was filed against him.

That's not the point of this case.

The point of this case is that our government has decided that if he goes back he can be killed.

And the fact that our government is refusing to do this and instead is trying to go outside the law

is frankly terrifying to me as an immigration legal professional, because if this can happen to him, it can happen to anyone, which is being removed from the country without having the opportunity to have a judge decide if that is legally correct.

And that is where we are

today.

And that's why people are talking about this in terms of a constitutional crisis, right?

Because what's happening here is that, like you said, through these laws that were established post World War II, that he was a judge ruled on his case,

saying one certain thing and the Trump administration is completely ignoring it.

And so I think, like you said, it really does open up this Pandora's box of just like, what else could they possibly do from here?

It's terrifying.

I mean, that was what I was going to say.

I know there's a lot of like fear and I don't want us to like sow chaos, but I think that there is a strong sense of like urgency.

And a lot of folks are like, okay, we see students being picked up.

We see, you know, legal citizens or even just like the increase in racial profiling and

Again, I don't want to cause a mass panic, but there is some urgency, so I'm wondering how you balance what is very real, a potential slippery slope in the dangerous precedent that this is setting now, but also understanding that we're not there yet too.

Yeah, well, so the thing about this case is this Angela the executive branch has such broad authority in immigration They can do so many things and when the Trump administration was coming into office, you know We're all sitting around and our immigration lawyer groups talking about what types of terrible stuff they're gonna do They can do things like restrict the number of visas that they issue every year They can make the criteria and these vetting process is much more strict and arbitrary

Frankly, they can reduce the number of refugee admissions.

They can change the laws related to asylum process, all within the legal framework that exists.

And that's much of the stuff that they did in 2016, right?

Correct.

In the previous administration, yeah.

Correct.

That is not what's happening right now.

I mean, there are things like that going on where they're starting to roll out different types of more policy-based approaches.

But what we're seeing right now is, frankly, like it's a chaos element.

It's an enforcement that is uneven.

It's enforcement that is illegal in some cases, that is clearly profiling individuals for their political opinions and perhaps their country of origin and religious backgrounds.

And we're seeing a government like the, you know, that is basically just turning loose and saying, you know, who's going to stop us, right?

It's like Andrew Jackson said when, you know, famously Donald Trump's kind of inspiration as president said the Supreme Court can make any rulings they want.

They can feel free to enforce them afterwards, right?

And once you have that type of a mentality,

then I think there's really fundamental problems that can grow out of this in a democracy.

And I think, of course, immigrants are the group that they want to go to the court of public opinion because a lot of people talk about how much they don't like quote unquote illegal immigrants.

And so this is simply a test case, I think.

This is a stocking course for what can come next.

And I mean, I try not to be an alarmist, Angela, but I really think that we might not be there yet, but let's see how this one goes.

Because after this, if this is allowed to stand,

it is going to be a different country afterwards.

I feel like in so many ways the Trump administration is stress testing the system to see what it's going to allow.

And this seems like an especially important test case for whether our guardrails will hold, whether the rule of law means something, whether where we are in terms of the Constitution and whether that matters, what separation of powers, all these fundamental American bedrock.

Bedrock things it's so important and and I think we're gonna get into a little bit more of it after the break here But I think you know one of the things that I wanted to ask was just what type of impact does this have?

On the people who are who are working with you to try and navigate the system legally.

I guess we'll have a chance Sorry my our producer is letting me know that we just have one minute before the break here.

So we'll get into that After the break, we're talking with Kevin laid who is the managing partner at the Layden par law firm We've been talking here about the case of Kilmar our Brego Garcia and why this case does

separate itself from the others.

Why this is so significant.

And we'll get into more of that.

After the break here, you are listening to the Civic Media Radio Hours.

I'm Dan Schaefer.

Angela Lange is here with me.

Kevin Laid is our guest.

And we will be back in just a few minutes after the break.

Stick with us.

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Welcome back to the Civic Media Radio Hours.

I'm your host this afternoon.

My name is Dan Schaefer.

Thank you so much for joining us today.

My co-host in studio at Radio Park in Racine is Angela Lang.

And our guest for this segment of the show is Kevin Lay, the managing partner at the Layden Para law firm and immigration attorney.

We've been talking a little bit about the case of Kilmer.

Kilmar, Abrigo, Garcia, and why this case is particularly significant.

And I wanted to talk to you about this, given all of the headlines about this case, given all the attention that it's getting, when things like this happen, what type of impact does it have on the people who you're working with to try to navigate the system legally, to try to become legal citizens of the United States of America?

Yeah, so I think a lot of that is is sort of still playing out at this point because stuff is really going in real time and I think that Sometimes some of the higher level stuff takes a little while to kind of trickle down into people's consciousness I don't know if that's the case this time because I think this has gotten some real kind of purchase You know both within the community and also sort of like nationally within the media I mean you have senators flying down there and stuff about this and so I mean the biggest thing is

is I think there's a chilling effect, right?

Because I think that a lot of, I mean, everybody that I work with has a path to having legal status in the United States.

There's a set of laws that they can follow in a playbook, right, that they can go through that's gonna cost a lot of money and take a lot of time and maybe has some inherent risks to it.

But on the other side, they'll have lawful status in the United States, right?

And so that's the goal that anybody has.

It really is to be able to live your life as fully as you can here.

But I think what the Trump administration is doing, and I think perhaps intentionally, is to really introduce a lot of uncertainty into a cost-benefit analysis that people have to make.

Because if it's going to cost twice as much and you're half as likely as before to be able to get to your goal, and that perhaps there's the risk that this sort of boogeyman can just make you disappear off the street at some point,

you're going to be a lot less interested in calling attention to yourself and going through background checks and being fingerprinted and going through a process because there's not a lot of trust in the institution that it's going to deliver the result that it says that it's going to deliver.

And I think that's maybe a microcosm of a lot of different areas in American life right now.

So I've certainly had a conversation with a guy a couple of days ago.

You had a 20-some-year-old criminal issue, and I said under Biden, you'd have no issue going for your citizenship.

I recommended him to wait for four years.

And so what does that do, right?

When it's just one person who's doing something like that, when you have millions of people who are putting things off, staying in the shadows, be more likely to be victims of workplace exploitation, separated from their families, not able to get as good a job to take care of their kids.

And so I think the cost of something like this is only going to reveal itself over time.

So I'm curious, and I think I asked a similar question last time we spoke a few months ago, but things have shifted drastically.

I'm curious of how folks can feel that they can support the immigrant community, right?

Because I think that there's a lot of despair.

I think people feel helpless, especially if you are in or outside of the community.

in talking to some of my friends, there are some real frustrations around the lack of movements and stances and support from elected officials or other leaders.

Like, how can people be supportive in this time?

Yeah, that's a great question.

So I think from the top down...

I think there's a lot of discouragement in the types of circles that would be supportive of immigrant rights.

If you look at what happened, the Trump administration is all the way dug in.

They got this guy transferred out of a maximum security hellhole into a better facility through political pressure, right?

So even in these time frames, political pressure can still be exerted.

And whatever constituents can do to exert political pressure on their politicians to stand up for their constituents, I think is going to be huge.

I think beyond that, it's really challenging.

I mean I think that you know there's not at least in Wisconsin for example like an immigrant defense justice fund to contribute to at least not yet which exists in some other places where it can be like money used to pay lawyers for urgent cases that come up.

So I think that's part of it.

I mean I think a big part of it is just like

advocating for this in the spaces that we're able to be, that this is important within our communities so that our elected officials who really are the people who can kind of make the differences on this type of stuff can be able to make a difference.

The other thing is, there's a lot of misinformation and stuff out there, right?

And there's a lot of rumors and a lot of people with green cards that are traveling at all right now, even though they haven't had issues and things like that.

And I think a lot of the chaos is really to try to restrict people's movement

and

actions.

So I think as much as possible, and I guess you guys particularly as media,

I think that's an important responsibility, right?

To report on this stuff and report on this stuff accurately so that people can make the most informed decisions in this timeframe.

Well, that's why we want to have an immigration attorney here on the airwaves and the civic media radio hours.

That's why we're having this conversation.

So I think, you know, just given that this case is a certain flash point, you know, is there a way in which the case of Kilmar or Braco Garcia represents not just one especially troubling instance, but

maybe the tip of the iceberg of greater problems under the surface.

Yeah, definitely.

So I'll give you a little bit kind of a different context really fast.

There's something called a national registration, which was created by law during World War II to like intern Japanese people and stuff like that, which has then been dormant essentially for a long time, which the Trump administration has recently revived and basically told all undocumented people that they need to register for this list.

Otherwise, they're criminals now.

being undocumented is not a crime until they make it a crime.

And so that kind of happened overnight with very little fanfare, being that people can be picked up and arrested and detained and put into criminal proceedings for being here without papers.

So you're starting to see how they're starting to like push on both ends, right?

It's like people who they can't already have in the system, they're picking them up and then these other people, they're trying to put them on paper, right?

And so then, you know, they can start to really try to build this pipeline at the same time they're getting more money for enforcement, for apprehensions, expanding detention centers, you know, ICE Milwaukee wants to move to a bigger facility to increase their enforcement capacity.

So you're starting to see like there is the dots are starting to connect, you know what I mean?

And so there's a system that's being built.

And I think that if it is able to be completed again,

broken record, we're going to be living in a different country at that point because your neighbors are going to look different than they would before, right?

The kids who go to your kids' schools are going to look different than they would before.

The people working on the farms, it's going to be different than it was before.

So I think that's the future, guys.

I think that's where we're headed.

It's not great.

It's not great.

But I think, like you said, it's important for us to continue to have these conversations.

It's important for us to dispel misinformation when and where we can.

And I think it's important to, you know, highlight cases like this.

that do become these flashpoints so that we'll you know I don't know without the public pressure if we have a senator flying down to El Salvador.

Next time I'm on you guys can ask me about the Venezuelan hairdresser who was sent to this horrific prison.

I'll report from a Milwaukee police officer who doesn't have the credibility to be able to testify in state court anymore.

So lots to discuss.

Lots to discuss.

Thank you so much for joining us for this conversation.

Our guest has been Kevin Lay, the managing partner at the Layton Parra Law Firm.

You're listening to the Civic Media Radio Hours.

Stick with us.

We will be right back.

Welcome back to the Civic Media Radio Hours.

I'm your host this afternoon.

My name is Dan Schaefer, joined in studio by my co-host Angela Lang.

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Joining us for our, we have a lot of guests today.

A

lot of guests to talk to.

And our next guest is a, is now a regular contributor at the Reconpopulation Area.

Her name is Emily Sefos.

She is the chair of the Democratic party of Ottegami County in Northeastern Wisconsin.

She was a 2024 state assembly candidate and a former statewide organizer for Indivisible.

Emily, thank you.

so much for joining us today.

Thanks for having me.

I'm excited to be here with you.

So you wrote a column last week at the Reconvibulation Area about public education funding.

Tell us what you had to say.

I

did.

It was kind of...

Like laying bare, I think is what I attempted to do the quiet war that I believe is happening when it comes to the funding and support for our public schools across the state.

It's no secret that we have a funding problem when we see almost 100 school districts go to a referendum each and every time we have an election.

And it's really.

For me, it's a lot about educating the public because there's a lot of things people don't know.

And I think the Republican lawmakers in Madison specifically are taking advantage of the lack of information that we have as the electorate.

So I'm just really trying everywhere I can to lay out why there's a problem and that this problem doesn't need to exist.

And it's messing with our kids' futures.

So walk us through it.

The column again is called Defund Discredit Dismantled, the GOP's quiet war on Wisconsin's public schools.

Yeah, so really it was just kind of calling to attention the fact that we have been defunding when we talk about the school and the rate that we fund them at it hasn't kept up with inflation and the cost of goods and services rising for the last 16 years and it continues to lag behind and we're in the middle of a budget cycle right now so it's really Paramount that we sound the alarm about this because if things don't change and we keep kicking that hand on the road we are going to see kids in rural spaces and in urban spaces that don't have like

property tax draw frankly and don't have the wealthier communities to fund them really up a crack and like lagging further and further behind and I really just want to make sure that the electorate knows that this is a concerted effort.

We cannot operate like our schools fund our schools.

districts and our public school system, like a free market kind of thing.

It doesn't work.

It hasn't worked.

These are things that we need for societal good and to take care of our communities.

And we cannot just defund them and get rid of them and push everyone to private schools.

It doesn't work.

And it won't work.

And if we don't sound the alarm on that, that's what we're going to get to.

And so we've got to push back now.

Yeah, you're right.

It's we are right in the middle of the budget discussions I think because of the spring election The Republican controlled state legislature kind of pushed everything back to after the election hoping that their candidate might win Maybe they would you know, re-rig the maps for them Whatever it might be, but now that we're past the election We're starting to get into that budget cycle and I think a week from today

I want to say is the first meeting of the joint finance committee first official meeting.

I think they've had a couple of listening sessions around the state.

And I think, you know, there was obviously the news last week with Governor Evers veto, you know, with his very creative use of the veto to extend some public education funding.

But I guess first, what was your reaction to that news to that last week?

And what do you hope?

you know, this is the message that people can convey at those joint finance committee meetings.

I mean, I'm really glad that Governor Evers is utilizing that powerful veto pen.

And I'm thankful, I guess, in this case that it exists because it needs to.

But again, we're not like, I'm just tired of seeing like all of this be treating like the symptoms that bubble up and we're not dealing with the root of the problem.

And the root of the problem is that the funding formula is not adequate and we need to stop.

pretending that it is, and we need to stop maligning our public schools.

It's ridiculous, and we need to come out very strongly to say this isn't right.

So yes, celebrate that victory, but also there's a huge issue that we need to address here.

Yeah, I would say in addition to the funding formula, we've

not we here but you know wisconsin and republicans specifically have like vilified public schools and specifically teachers and you know you think about as you mentioned kind of like how school funding has been you know not kept up with inflation for the last 16 years well i think about the first time i saw

public schools and teachers be vilified was under the Walker administration, right?

And that coincides with it.

And I feel like this has been a long journey of chipping away at public schools and we can unpack who goes to public schools and whatnot and all of that.

But you mentioned earlier about like Republicans kind of taking advantage and I think

using this message of vilifying public schools and I think about Milwaukee public schools and the challenges that they're going through.

Can you say more about how like Republicans are kind of exploiting some of the frustrations in public schools and tying it to vilifying teachers as well?

Yeah, and I think I heard that like to you know your point I heard that on a lot of doors last year when I campaigned and it was it's it's this manufactured outrage and we are you know all that misinformation Disinformation that exists.

It really has taken root and they're taking advantage of it, right?

So they're that culturally and on a national level We're seeing all of these things being said whether it was litter about you know, and it comes from nothing

right?

It's litter

boxes

in your school.

And that's what I hear.

And then they're like, well, we don't like our public schools because of that.

And I'm like, well, this doesn't make any sense.

But they take advantage of that.

So I think like politics follows culture.

And they have been able to manufacture this crisis and this outrage that is really doing harm to the teachers and to the people that are really working their tails off to support these kids.

And it's, it's

chipped away at the trust that we have in those public institutions so you hear a lot of people that are like I don't you know I don't like and whether it's that or book bans or whatever um but it's really about like educating the electorate on why we need why we need public schools why they have to exist in our society to take care of each other

yeah one of the things that I continue to see in polling

on public schools, because the Marquette University Law School poll, the headline is always like, who's winning this particular race or what somebody's approval rating, but they do a lot of really interesting issue polling too.

And when it comes to public schools, I think there's this kind of like broader malaise that people can have that appears in these opinion polls.

But if you ask people about their specific public school, about like,

You know, one question is like, how do you feel about public schools broadly?

And be like, eh, you know, they're fine.

And if you ask people, what do you think about your public school?

Then the conversation really changes.

Then you have a lot of support for your individual public school.

And that to me, you know, says that there is, this is where people are.

And I think you also look at what you said with the referendums that have happened across the state

too.

There have been nearly 350 referendums in the last two years for schools.

Most of them have passed.

I think that suggests to me that there is a problem that people in their local communities can recognize that there are funding needs.

But at the same time, we have Robin Voss and the state Republicans sitting on a more than $4 billion surplus.

100%.

Yeah, and I think that's such a good point is that we see most of those operational budget like referendums pass.

Like there is that support and so like the problem is that you have those lawmakers that are taking advantage of that manufactured outrage and then they are legislating against our public schools, but it isn't in alignment with what the public actually feels about.

what's right outside their door and who's serving their community.

And that, yeah, that's a huge problem.

And I've been to listening sessions with our local lawmakers up here.

And I'm just so incredibly frustrated with the lack of transparency and the lack of knowledge that they have about how these things function, about who goes to private schools and versus public schools and what the legalities are there or how our schools are funded.

so apparent to me that they take advantage of that manufactured crisis to get into office and then even though they know that districts in their or school districts within their districts are going to refer to them and need that funding and the people want it, they still are underfunding them and no one's connecting those dots.

And you shared some of your own personal examples in the column that you wrote in this too.

Can you share some of that with our listeners today?

Yeah, so I have been transparent like on every door I have two kids that go to a private school system that my Husband graduated from he's from the Appleton area as well And we really appreciate it my youngest son has a complex needs and he cannot go to a private school and he's one of those kids that

they don't have the resources and so they can say no.

So he goes to an incredible public school and they wrap him up in all the care that he needs.

So he sees five professionals every day.

I was just there explaining how to feed, like we have G-tube feedings that we have to have at school and that's part of his journey and they do that for him and it's incredible.

But when we're defunding those public schools, when we're pushing kids to, you know, when we're touting vouchers as being the...

solution to this problem that doesn't work and it doesn't work for kids like my youngest who cannot attend there and they legally don't have to have the supports in place and it doesn't work for people for example that like don't have the transportation to a school across town and cannot operate like it's the the logistics of the voucher thing working doesn't hold up if you really look down at what you know the different communities that they're saying would be served by this.

So

it's such an important point.

And I think there was some conservative pushback on that point in particular that really struck me as like completely misguided and out of touch because like.

I think all of us as parents who are involved in our kids' schools and all that, we all know people who have had this situation, or maybe they wanted to go to, like your family situation, there's a family history at a school, or you might apply for a charter school, or whatever it might be, we all have those examples

of people

who aren't necessarily, who might be denied to the school, but the public schools are there.

Yeah, and I think it's important to note that you can be private, you know like it's not as black or white as anyone would make it believe or you know But like we can really we can advocate and I think it's our responsibility Especially like as private school parents to be like hey this sir Yeah, this works for my family But if we want to make tuition cheaper from this private school then that that can be the private school's job And if you really want to accept every kid

then that can be your job to hire the professionals that you need.

But the accountability isn't there, the funding isn't there.

And so until that exists, no public funds for our private schools.

That doesn't make any sense.

At the end of it all, it's just public funds need to go to our public schools full stop.

Our guest is Emily Saffos.

She is the chair of the Democratic Party of Adagame County in Northeastern Wisconsin.

And her latest piece at the Reconpopulation area is defund discredit, dismantle the GOP's quiet war on Wisconsin's public schools.

So looking forward then here to this budget cycle, you know, what are you hoping to see?

What's the best case scenario?

I think like for me, lowest hanging fruit is fixing the special education reimbursement rate.

It's only 30%.

Like, I mean, let's get that up to at least 60, which is still pretty bad, but we're making progress.

But also just the general funding and the way that that works out because there's different buckets that you get state money put into and the way that they're constantly drawing from their general funds to cover special education or to cover all of these other aspects that they need to cover to take care of these kids.

So just a funding increase.

That's reflective of the moment that we're in.

fun schools

Yeah, it really should just be so simple and you know, I'm thinking about this whole conversation and I'm like How do you say no to this right?

Like how do you say no to students and kids that need additional needs?

Like I never like once I learned that folks could turn away students with additional needs or you know that needs specific care I'm like why is there not more of an uproar about this and I think we're

this discussion, I guess, not here today, but like in general, it ends up putting school districts and kids against each other, right?

And it's just like, why can't we just have a fully funded public school system?

If that is not where people want to send their kids, fine, but it shouldn't be at the expense of public school systems.

And it's just, I don't know, it's just very frustrating and I don't understand how Republicans continue to justify.

Like we know what they're doing, right?

You say it's a quiet, you know war I don't think it's so quiet these days But like just how they keep justifying it is just beyond me.

That's not a question, but you know It's a lot

but I also think and I'll just say one more thing here And I think this kind of came up in the in the race for state superintendent last month was that I don't think

people who are public school advocates should advocate for the status quo.

You have to advocate for a different path forward for carving out a more progressive path on this.

And I think that is, you know, certainly part of what you were talking about in this piece at the Reconpopulation area.

So thank you again for joining us here, Emily.

Thanks Emily.

Go

check out the piece.

Thank you.

We've got one more segment here on the Civic Media Radio Hour.

Stick with

us.

You're listening to Civic Media.

Find the latest news, information, and archives of all your favorite shows on the Civic Media website, civicmedia.us.

Welcome back to Civic Media Radio Hours.

I'm Dan Schaefer.

I'm here with Angela Lange.

We're listening to some Nirvana.

We're rockin' out

here.

I'm gonna definitely listen to it on the way home.

Jacob on the board has been bringing us all of my favorite 90s alternative rock tunes.

When I'm guest hosting, you're gonna get some 90s alt rock.

It's just

gonna happen.

It's inevitable.

But we've had a little bit of a heavy show.

We did,

we did.

And so

I wanted

a good show.

Lots of important topics.

The world's a heavy place right now.

But I want to lighten things up a little bit for this final segment.

And when I was here earlier, I brought some Girl Scout cookies

down

to our producer here, Luke Mathers, who bought some from my daughter's Girl Scout cookie store that we had.

And I told him as I was handing them off, I was just like, great job picking the two worst flavors

for the Girl Scout cookies.

So I wanted to know, Angela, what is your favorite?

favorite brand of Girl Scout cookie.

In my opinion, as a former Girl Scout myself for like three years, there is only one right answer.

Thin mints.

And then you put them in the freezer and that's the only way to eat them.

I was concerned about this.

What I have to know.

We agree on so many things.

We're, we're

in major

disagreement.

I am not a mint chocolate person.

I am.

I know it's weird.

I love it

tastes like chocolate mouthwash.

I love.

I

don't understand it.

My favorite is mocha coffee.

My favorite is peanut butter patties.

Okay.

I'm not a fan of peanut butter.

Peanut

butter is right there.

You're not a fan of peanut butter at

all.

Peanut butter and chocolate is like my favorite for any kind.

I'm stealing all the Reese's out of my daughter's

Easter

basket.

That's how our deputy director is.

We make sure we give her Reese's all the time.

Shout out to Keisha, but I

My mom had a peanut allergy.

And so we never had peanut butter or peanuts in the house.

And so I always just tell people, I never developed the taste.

I will get down on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Yes, I will get down.

If I want some chocolate and only a re-seed cup is available, I will eat it.

I don't hate it.

I just don't reach for peanut butter as my go-to.

But you go for mint.

I know.

I really don't understand

it.

I like mint chocolate chip ice cream.

A good coffee in the winter time is a mint mocha.

The mint mocha

or like a peppermint Christmas thing.

Yeah, I'm a huge peppermint mocha.

I don't know.

It's something about the chocolate and mint together.

The mint and the chocolate.

It just doesn't do it for me.

It just tastes like I'm having mixing toothpaste and a Hershey

bar together.

It's like the cilantro debate.

It is.

It's like either you love it or you think it tastes like soap.

Yeah.

And I love cilantro.

I don't know if that.

I love cilantro

too.

Okay,

okay.

Yeah.

But so Luke came in, he got the Carmel Delights and the Thin Mints, which are my two least favorite.

I was going to say Carmel Delights are my

second favorite.

We're at other opposite ends

of the Girl

Scout Cookie Spectrum here.

If you have thoughts on your favorite Girl Scout

Cookie.

Although there's only one right answer and I'm

right.

Angela, if you agree with Angela's incorrect opinion, you can go 8-5-5-7-5.

two, four, eight, four, two, eight, five, five, seven, five, civic.

See if you also have the wrong opinion on

Girl

Scout cookies.

So my two favorites are the peanut butter patties and the peanut over sandwich ones.

Because I'm

just like anything peanut butter

in a

cookie.

Yeah, that's gonna be my number one.

But what are like the other ones?

Like how do you feel about like the shortbread?

Or like there's like a lemon little thing sometimes that they have.

I like the shortbread.

Okay.

It's classic.

You know, it's

like one of those things, don't mess with the classic.

It's not like the first one anybody reaches

for.

Right, right.

But

it's, you know, it's grabbing some rebounds, setting some picks.

Fair, fair,

fair.

And so I don't like the thin mints.

I like the peanut butter ones.

The lemon ones are solid.

Yeah.

They're okay.

They're

like, okay, a little.

Citrus-y, I don't know where.

It's like, okay.

They've got

these new like French toast gluten-free ones

or whatever.

Oh, I've heard of those.

I haven't even tried them.

They're

trying a little too hard, but they're pretty good.

The gluten-free scares me, but I don't know why.

I just feel like it's, I don't know.

I know.

It's like one of those things where it's just like you feel like you're eating like the gross health food, but like there are many...

I know.

Great gluten-free desserts.

That's true.

It's not a knock on gluten-free stuff.

It's just when I hear gluten-free, I'm like, what's the texture going to be like?

Yeah, yeah.

Or if it's all going to fall apart.

But number one, all-time number one for me is peanut butter patty.

If I get one of those trays of peanut butter patties, it's gone real soon.

OK, that's fair.

Like

too soon.

OK, in addition to Girl Scout Kikis,

Keeping with the cookies.

Okay

crumble cookie.

There has been some online Chatter like the chain

restaurant Yeah, that's all over the place

and then Courtney Kardashian has this like eggless flowerless sugarless all the lesses Chocolate cake and I've seen I've seen kids like people are posting reaction videos and kids are spitting it out kids sometimes eat dirt.

Yeah

And like these kids are like waiting out.

And also like crumble.

And anything

that's like in the chocolate realm.

Exactly.

Like kids are going nuts for, I know my kids are going nuts with all

the Easter

candy right now.

They're just like powered by jelly beans, you know.

Which is a reminder on my way home to stop at the store to get all the discounted Easter candy.

Oh, you go after

the discounted jelly beans and all

that or

whatever

else.

Every holiday, you know, beginning of November, I'm with the Halloween candy, the Valentine's Day candy.

That's when I buy myself the chocolates.

I'm a huge fan of going the week after all the holidays to get all the candy.

See, this would be a good time for me to go get like the Reese's eggs.

Exactly, yeah.

Because

it's like, for some reason, the Reese's eggs are like slightly

better than the

regular peanut butter cups.

I don't know why.

Or if you

get the trees in Christmas, I think those are my favorites.

It's something about the shape.

I don't know.

The shape and texture.

It does matter.

It does matter.

It does matter.

If you have thoughts.

Because this is clearly a divisive topic.

If you're getting me and Angela Lange to disagree in studio at Radio Park and Racine, share your thoughts as well.

I know we've got a lot of viewers in the live stream today.

Our friends at Matt and Erin, call it the Shaffer Bump when I tweeted out

that

we've got some extra viewers.

So thanks to our extra live stream viewers today, but we covered a lot of ground

over

the course of the show.

And once again, just a reminder to everybody, the new schedule is kicking in on Wednesday.

So when you tune in from four to six,

I think you're going to want to make the Maggie Don show your go to drive time show here across the state of Wisconsin.

So thank you so much for sticking with us.

Thank you to Angela for being here and co hosting.

Thank

you to the filmmakers behind behind cycle.

Thank you to Joseph Peckie.

Thank you to Kevin Laid.

Thank you to our producer Jacob.

And

thank you

to everybody and thank you to Emily Sefos and thank you to Luke Mathers for buying Girl Scout cookies and thank you to everybody listening across the Civic Media Network.

Be well folks.

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