by Mansa Musa | Feb 23, 2026 | ICE, Minneapolis, Politics and Movements: US, Prisons and Policing, Rattling the Bars, video, White Supremacy
From the very beginning, the United States of America has been at war—not just abroad, but domestically. In this episode of Rattling the Bars, host Mansa Musa speaks with scholar and author Dylan Rodriguez about how the US operates as a nation in a perpetual state of internal war, and how the white supremacist legacy of domestic warfare has reached terrifying new heights in the Trump era.
Resource Links:
Purchase Dylan Rodriguez’s book White Reconstruction
Revolt against the carceral world
COVID-19 pandemic illuminates anti-Chinese racism and xenophobia
Why corporate media doesn’t talk honestly about racism
Credits:
Producer / Videographer / Editor: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m your host Mansa Musa. In this country, in the United States of America. If we was to put alongside of Germany or any other fastest totalitarian government, it would not be no difference in comparison in this country. Today, we find ourselves in a place where we’re in the constant police, in the form of what they call ICE or any other police force. We find ourselves in a situation where all the institutions that’s in this country right now is being dismantled to the point where people don’t have no jobs, people can’t afford medical people are being forced into homelessness. In the face of all this, we find ourselves at the crossroad of making analysis of what this is and how do we go forward. Joining me today is a Dylan Rodriguez, professor of Media and Culture Studies and UC Riverside and one
by Maximillian Alvarez | Feb 23, 2026 | ICE, Podcast, Politics and Movements: US, Prisons and Policing, Texas
Hundreds of children are currently incarcerated at the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, TX, and the stories leaking out to the public about the conditions inside are shocking. We speak with Stephanie Koithan, journalist and digital content editor of the San Antonio Current.
Additional links/info:
Stephanie Koithan, San Antonio Current, “Two-month-old baby ‘choking on his own vomit’ while detained in Dilley”
Stephanie Koithan, San Antonio Current, “Staff at Dilley raiding cells to confiscate kids’ letters and drawings detailing conditions inside”
Mica Rosenberg, ProPublica, “The children of Dilley”
Austin Kocher, Substack, “Dilley Family Detention Center triples in size amid growing controversy over conditions”
Credits:
Audio Post-Production: Alina Nehlich
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Welcome everyone to the Real News Network podcast. I’m Maximillian Alvarez. I’m the editor in chief here at The Real News, and it’s so great to have you all with us. Every day brings with its stories of new humanitarian horrors perpetrated by our own government in the execution of President Trump’s mass incarceration and deportation campaign, and I’m sorry to say this, but things are shaping up to get a lot worse before they get any better. As the guardian recently reported US Citizenship and Immigration Services expects to spend an estimated $38.3 billion on a plan to acquire warehouses across the country and retrofit them into new immigration detention centers with capacity for tens of thousands of detainees according to documents the agency sent to the government of New Hampshire. For journalists and civilians alike, we need to be as clear and precise as possible with
by Barbara Rodriguez | Feb 21, 2026 | CBP, Chicago, Children, Customs and Border Protection, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Department of Homeland Security, DHS, flashbang grenades, ICE, Minneapolis, News, pepper spray, Policing, Portland, Protests, Tear Gas
From the roof of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) building in Portland, Oregon, federal agents late last month watched as thousands of people marched past the processing center in protest. Families and children were among the daytime crowd, which had gathered for an event advertised as family friendly. When some protesters reportedly crossed the facility’s property line and…
Source
by Jessica Corbett | Feb 21, 2026 | Alex Pretti, Cover-Up, Delia Ramirez, Department of Homeland Secuity, DHS, FOIA, Greg Casar, ICE, Joaquin Castro, News, Renee Nicole Good, Ruben Ray Martinez, Texas
Demands for accountability are mounting after internal records revealed this week that an officer with Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) fatally shot Ruben Ray Martinez, a 23-year-old US citizen, almost a year ago in South Padre Island, Texas. “While Martinez’s death was reported in local media at the time, the reports did not identify HSI…
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by Brian Dolinar | Feb 21, 2026 | Criminal Legal System, Criminalization, Deportations, ICE, Illinois, immigration, Jails, Missouri, News, sanctuary, Sanctuary Cities, Sanctuary Laws, Trump Administration, US Marshals
“We were in waiting mode,” a Honduran immigrant based in St. Louis told me as she described her time being held in a county jail in Missouri. In June 2025, the woman — who asked to be identified by pseudonym “Mary” to avoid targeting — was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at a gas station in St. Louis. “Dinner was the same every day, and waiting was the worst part because…
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by Chris Walker | Feb 21, 2026 | Dilley, ICE, immigrant children, immigrant families, immigration, immigration jails, mass deportation, News
Prison guards at an immigration detention facility in southern Texas have reportedly been raiding the cells of families to confiscate and destroy children’s letters and drawings depicting the inhumane conditions of their imprisonment. Guards at the Dilley Detention Center appear to be retaliating against families in the jail after ProPublica reported on their living conditions.
Source
