Even as it has been hit very hard by COVID-19, Peru has just gone through an “express impeachment” and other corruption turmoil, while elections approach. We discuss Peru with IDL Reporteros journalist Gustavo Gorriti and Senior Fellow Jo-Marie Burt.

WOLA Podcast

Peru: "If we do not succeed against this plague, then anything can happen"

This month, Adam Isacson, WOLA's Director for Defense Oversight, interviews Francisco Cantú, author of The Line Becomes a River (2018) who spent four years in the Border Patrol. They discuss the often toxic culture of CBP and the current impact the agency has on the United States' approach to migration. Cantú currently lives in Arizona, is a full-time writer and teacher of creative writing, and that a volunteer with the Kino Border Initiative’s migrant accompaniment program, which provides support to asylum seekers detained in the ICE contracted/for-profit (CoreCivic) Eloy Detention Center. Beyond the Wall is a segment of the Latin America Today podcast, and a part of the Washington Office on Latin America's Beyond the Wall advocacy campaign. In the series, we will follow the thread of migration in the Americas beyond traditional barriers like language and borders. We will explore root causes of migration, the state of migrant rights in multiple countries and multiple borders and what we can do to protect human rights in one of the most pressing crises in our hemisphere. Sign up for updates here: https://www.wola.org/beyondthewall/signup-beyond-wall/ Music by Blue Dot Sessions and ericb399.

Beyond the Wall: Reflections from a Former Border Patrol Agent

The effort to assert democratic civilian control over armed forces is not over, Kristina Mani of Oberlin College reminds us. Latin American civilians, she points out, often use militaries for non-defense purposes, even more so during the COVID-19 crisis.

Civil-Military Relations at a Crossroads in the Americas

An exchange with Bogotá-based filmmaker Tom Laffay, whose documentary work with the Siona people of Putumayo, Colombia, supported by the Pulitzer Center, is featured by The New Yorker. Laffay portrays Adiela Mera Paz, who is leading demining efforts to allow displaced Siona to return.

Demining sacred space in Colombia's Amazon basin

Carlos Quesada, director of the International Institute on Race, Equality, and Human Rights, explains how laws, treaties, and the Inter-American system offer tools for change—or survival—for the LGBT community and other marginalized groups in Latin America.

"If you're an Afro-descendant LGBT person… your priority is not to be killed."

This month, WOLA premiered an animated video for our Beyond the Wall campaign and recorded a panel discussion. Our panelists discuss the challenges and solutions on a rights-respecting approach to migration. The panel is moderated by Mario Moreno, WOLA’s Vice President for Communications, and includes Geoff Thale, the President of WOLA, Maureen Meyer, WOLA’s Director for Mexico and Migrant Rights, Adam Isacson WOLA’s Director for Defense Oversight, and Adriana Beltran, WOLA’s Director for Citizen Security. Beyond the Wall is a bilingual segment of the Latin America Today podcast, and a part of the Washington Office on Latin America's Beyond the Wall advocacy campaign. In the series, we will follow the thread of migration in the Americas beyond traditional barriers like language and borders. We will explore root causes of migration, the state of migrant rights in multiple countries and multiple borders and what we can do to protect human rights in one of the most pressing crises in our hemisphere. Sign up for updates here: https://www.wola.org/beyondthewall/signup-beyond-wall/ Music by Blue Dot Sessions and ericb399. Transcripts are generated using a speech recognition software and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Transcript  

Beyond the Wall: A Roundtable Discussion on Border and Migration

Guatemala is selecting a new slate of Supreme Court justices. The country must not get this wrong, because a nexus of corrupt and powerful people could end up choosing their own judges. We talk to 3 people leading Guatemala·s anti-corruption charge.

A Crucial Moment for Guatemala's Fight Against Impunity

Nina Lakhani, a veteran correspondent for the Guardian in Mexico and Central America, discusses her new book about Honduran indigenous activist Berta Cáceres, her 2016 murder and its aftermath, a corrupt system, and a badly misdirected U.S. policy.

“If they can kill Berta Cáceres, they can kill anybody”: Nina Lakhani on the Danger to Social Leaders

WOLA Director for Venezuela Geoff Ramsey and Senior Fellow David Smilde offer a situation report on Venezuela. While the picture is unavoidably grim, they offer a rare nuanced view of Venezuela's search for a political solution and the state of US policy.

Venezuela: COVID-19, Sanctions, Outside Powers, Florida Politics, and the Search for a Political Solution

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) has traveled often to Colombia, the subject of this episode. A leading voice on human rights in Congress, he has a lot to say about recent espionage scandals in Colombia's military, attacks on social leaders, and U.S. policy.

Rep. Jim McGovern: "What if I was in Colombia? Would I have the courage to say what I believe?"

In this episode of Beyond the Wall, Mario Moreno, VP for Communications conducts two interviews regarding the harrowing conditions migrants face in ICE detention centers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first is with Sarah Sanchez and Isabel Ribe, two advocates at the Santa Fe Dreamers Project working with detained migrants. In the second interview, Mario talks with Dr. Tracy Green, a Brandeis University professor and Dana Gold, senior council on the Government Accountability Office, on how a pair of Homeland Security whistleblowers spoke out against conditions of ICE detention facilities during COVID-19 pandemic, and about their mathematical model study revealed that ICE detention facilities face up to 100% infection rate if no action to release detained migrants is taken.   Beyond the Wall is a bilingual segment of the Latin America Today podcast, and a part of the Washington Office on Latin America's Beyond the Wall advocacy campaign. In the series, we will follow the thread of migration in the Americas beyond traditional barriers like language and borders. We will explore root causes of migration, the state of migrant rights in multiple countries and multiple borders and what we can do to protect human rights in one of the most pressing crises in our hemisphere. Sign up for updates here: https://www.wola.org/beyondthewall/signup-beyond-wall/ Music by Blue Dot Sessions and ericb399. Transcripts are generated using a speech recognition software and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. TRANSCRIPT

Beyond the Wall: The Human Consequences of ICE Detention Centers

Jonathan Rosen of Holy Family University is the author of, or collaborator on, a large body of recent scholarly work on security policy, drug policy, organized crime, and corruption in the Americas. Here, he lays out what governments keep getting wrong.

"How do we define success?" Jonathan Rosen on governments' approaches to organized crime

Since "Remain in Mexico" began, Taylor Levy, an El Paso-based immigration attorney, has done much of her work across the border in Ciudad Juárez. Her account of the obstacles asylum-seekers face—both before and during the COVID-19 crisis—is maddening.

Practicing Asylum Law in El Paso: "MPP is just—it's utterly insane"

A conversation about Colombia, U.S. policy, human rights advocacy, and social struggle with anthropologist Winifred Tate of Colby College, whose more than 30 years of work as both a scholar and an advocate give her a very unique perspective.

"These moments of social resistance are never moments. They have long histories."

Five WOLA program directors talk about how COVID-19—and governments' response—are hitting Latin America. We discuss dangers to democracy, rights, economics, and marginalized people, focusing especially on Colombia, Venezuela, Mexico, Bolivia, and Brazil.

Monitoring Anti-Democratic Trends and Human Rights Abuses in the Age of COVID-19

News and analysis of politics, security, development and U.S. policy in Latin America and the Caribbean, from the Washington Office on Latin America.

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