Scott Payne spent nearly two decades working undercover as a biker, a neo-Nazi, a drug dealer, and a killer. But his last big mission at the FBI was the wildest of all. I have never had to burn Bibles. I have never had to burn an American flag. And I damn sure was never with a group of people that stole a goat, sacrificed it in a pagan ritual, and drank its blood. And I did all that in about three days with these guys.
Listen to Agent Pale Horse, the second season of White Hot Hate. Available now. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Neil Kirksell. Good evening, I'm Chris Howden. This is As It Happens. One wrong and no rights. El Salvador's president says he can't return a man.
who was mistakenly deported and imprisoned to the United States. Our guest says he certainly can, he just doesn't want to, and neither do his friends in the White House. Peace talks in Russia, missile strikes in Ukraine. After a deadly attack on the city of Summa, a Ukrainian MP...
us Russia is making its true goals very clear. Hot buttons issue. The Liberal Party confirms two staffers planted Trump-style campaign buttons at a conservative political conference. A CBC News journalist tells us how she stumbled on that story. in an Ottawa bar. Stopping the music. Canadian singer-songwriter T. Thomason tells us
He had no choice but to cancel an upcoming gig in the US because it no longer feels safe to travel there as a trans artist. Sweating the small stuff, an Edinburgh man embarks on a huge project to create tiny versions of hundreds of pubs across the city. explains how he's gone about lowering the bars. And cawing the shots. Scientists find a certain bird can identify shapes that don't belong. More crushing evidence that we are in fact inferior to crows.
As it happens, the Monday edition, radio that explores what goes on behind crow's doors. If Kilmar Abrego Garcia's family and friends imagined that he'd be home soon, those hopes were dashed today. The Maryland man has been in a prison in El Salvador since the Trump administration deported him by mistake. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Trump administration must facilitate his return and the government says it will let him into the United States if El Salvador decides to send him back.
Today, Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele visited the White House. Here's what he had to say. How can I return him to the United States? I smuggle him into the United States? Of course, I'm not going to do it. The question is preposterous. How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? I don't have the power to return him to the United States.
States. Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele speaking today at the White House. Nicole Hallett is the director of the Immigrants Rights Center at the University of Chicago Law School. We reached her in Chicago. Nicole, is there anything actually stopping President Bukele from returning, Mr. Garcia?
Well, President Bukele wasn't ordered to return Mr. Garcia to the United States. The United States government was ordered to facilitate his return. So all President Bukele would need to do... is to release Mr. Garcia into the custody of the United States government. And then the U.S. government can fly him back into the United States. So no one is asking President Bukele to smuggle him into the United States. And I'm not exactly sure why he believed that to be the question.
The tone and the way that question was answered, what do you take away from that at this stage in this case and this man's life? Well, I think both President Trump and President Bukele were thumbing their nose at the Supreme Court by each claiming that they didn't have the power to do anything to bring Mr. Garcia back. And it's just simply not the case.
The president of El Salvador was not actually asked to release Mr. Garcia. President Trump could make that request. That is, in fact, what the Supreme Court has ordered him to do. And yet the administration is taking the position that the Supreme Court has ordered them to do nothing at all. And it's a very serious violation of the rule of law. If the Trump administration was going along with the ruling, could they actually compel Bukele to send Kilmore Abrego Garcia home?
Of course the Trump administration could not compel a foreign sovereign nation to do something, but I think... But this case is really extraordinary. And in this case, I think there is no question that the Trump administration could get El Salvador to release Mr. Garcia. El Salvador has, my understanding, is a contract with the U.S. government to hold migrants that the Trump administration has deported there.
My understanding is that the Trump administration is paying the government of El Salvador to hold people for the U.S. government.
And so unlike two sovereign nations who are engaged in diplomatic negotiations, In this case, El Salvador is really acting like an agent of the U.S. government, and there's absolutely no evidence that if the United States really asked and said, please return Mr. Garcia, that El Salvador wouldn't do that for the Trump administration, given the relationship they have developed.
and the fact that the United States government is paying for these people to be imprisoned. The government has conceded this deportation was a mistake. Why do you think the White House insists that it cannot help bring him back. I think that the Trump administration would like to operate without any judicial oversight at all. They have a mission to deport as many people as they possibly can, up to a million people in the first year of their administration.
And I think that they see the course as a potential obstacle to that because, of course, people have due process. And under the normal course of events, you can't just support people without giving them their day in court. So I think that they're planning on making this an example so that in the future, when they try to deport other people, they are not subject to judicial oversight.
I think it's also possible that they do not want Mr. Garcia to come back because undoubtedly he would speak to the press and he might. Tell all of us what he has undergone, how he was treated, and what happened to him while he was imprisoned in El Salvador. And I do not think the administration wants that to be made public because of the deplorable conditions we know that these individuals are being subjected to in El Salvador.
We heard the claims that Bukele has made and the Trump administration has repeated those claims. Is there any evidence to show that there's any truth to what they're saying? Well, I mean, they're claiming that he's a member of MS-13 An immigration judge rejected that allegation. The evidence, the quote evidence that he's a member of MS-13. was provided by a discredited police informant, and the police didn't even believe that he was actually a member.
They're using this as a pretext. They don't actually care whether the people that they're deporting are members of gangs. They're trying to portray them as gang members and as terrorists because they're hoping that we, the American people, decide that we don't care about them because they've been put in those categories. But the truth of the matter is, is that if Mr. Garcia doesn't get his day in court, then the administration can do this to anybody. It can do it to any non-citizen.
It could do it to me. It could do it to any U.S. citizen. Because unless... you have review of government action in court. We have no idea what the truth of the government's allegations are. And the fact that we're even having this conversation is frankly pretty disturbing. And he has repeatedly denied these allegations Kilmar Abrego Garcia has over and over again. What would you want our listeners to know about him? What do you know about him outside of what has happened to him?
Well, I'm not representing him, but here is what I know. I know that he has, since he was granted protection by an immigration court, I know he's gotten married. I know that he has a U.S. citizen child. I know he has been employed. And my understanding is that he was living a quiet life, and there were absolutely no allegations that he was up to anything nefarious.
You know, we have always prided ourselves on being a nation of immigrants, and moreover, that we're a nation that protects people from persecution when they're fleeing violence. or when they're fleeing harm in their home countries. And the fact that we would do this to someone that we acknowledge was at risk of torture and persecution in El Salvador. a betrayal of fundamental American values. I appreciate this, Nicole. Thank you for your time.
Thank you so much. Nicole Hallett is the director of the Immigrants Rights Center at the University of Chicago Law School. She's in Chicago. Stop the steal very much sounds like a slogan brought to you by Donald Trump. And when that phrase appeared on buttons at the Conservative Canada Strong and Free Networking Conference in Ottawa last week...
It seemed like maybe the conservative campaign was taking a leaf from the U.S. president's book. But the buttons didn't belong to the conservatives. They were left there by two staffers at the center of the liberal campaign. Staffers liberal leader Mark Carney says have now been reassigned. Look, this is totally unacceptable, to be absolutely clear. And on behalf of my campaign, I was unaware of this behavior, but on behalf of my campaign, I apologize for it unreservedly.
clear to my campaign that this behaviour or anything approximating it or in that spirit is unacceptable, cannot happen, cannot happen again. The responsible people for this issue have been That story broke on Friday in an unusual location, the bar Darcy McGee's near Parliament Hill, where those Liberal staffers talked about their buttons. within earshot of the CBC's parliamentary reporter Kate McKenna, who had been reporting from the conference. We reached her in Montreal.
Kate, I can't believe I'm starting an interview this way, but a journalist walks into a bar. What did you hear when you sat down? Yeah. So I sit down for a chat with my friend and, and while I'm there, The person next to me, who had previously identified himself to me as somebody in the war room, started talking about how he had planted these buttons.
at this event. He wasn't speaking directly to me at that time, but I stopped him and I said, whoa, was that you guys? And initially he said yes, but then when I said, uh i was going to do a story on that he tried to backtrack a little bit but at that point you know you can't put the gene Back in the bottle, he had confirmed that he had done it. And so I left the bar shortly after, and then the next day I put in a...
A media request to the Liberals and the Liberals didn't deny it and in fact have now confirmed it. So that's how it happened. And now, as our listeners heard, have apologized. Mark Carney has apologized that he didn't know anything. So that's what happened at the bar. If we go back to the conference you were at, these buttons tell our listeners a little bit about what they looked like, where they were left.
It was strange. I was in the hallways and I'd see these buttons. Like I saw, I saw one, one says stop the steal. And that's probably the most consequential one because it's a reference to the Donald Trump 2020 movement, like a very mega coded. to seek to overturn the U.S. election results. So I saw that one and I thought, ah, if that's a Canadian conservative who made that.
That's noteworthy because the Liberals are often trying to tie the Canadian Conservative movement to the American Conservative movement, which is in a sense... At this time, as much of the election is about Donald Trump. Right. So I sought to do question. I sought to do journalism on these pins, thinking that they were kind of organically produced by conservatives and handed out. And so that it was particularly shocking to me later at the bar when I found out that it was a liberal op omission.
But that was just one of two pins. The other pin had the name of the national campaign director for the Conservatives, Jenny Byrne, crossed out with the name Corey T'Nike underneath. conservative strategist, who's been very critical of how the federal conservatives have run their campaign.
And talking about infighting, alleging that there's infighting in the campaign as well. Yeah, yeah. So such a pin, an onlooker might come to the conclusion that somebody is trying to highlight divisions within the Conservative Party. Why do you think they would do this, Kate? I'm sure they were instructed. These are people who are quite central to the campaign. They work for the party. They're in the war room. That is the central campaign, and it is normal.
for political parties to play tricks like this. on the other political parties um it's not publicized a lot because it doesn't get made public very often but oppo teams they're called they do do stuff like this and buttons in particular um are kind of a technique that's been used by liberals and conservatives in the past. But why would he do it? I mean, to kind of... understand that you'd have to talk to them directly, but we can kind of read into the fact that
You know, these are Donald Trump-like messages that they're planting at conservative events. They're trying to tie Donald Trump to the conservative movement in Canada. that could repel some voters, right? But that doesn't work when this becomes public, because then now people start questioning, well, what's real, what's not real?
And this is certainly not a story that the Liberal Party would have wanted to be made public. And what kind of impact do you think it might have on both campaigns at this stage? Well, now the Liberals have apologized. for it. Whether or not this will be the end of the story remains to be seen, but it certainly undercuts Mark Carney's message a little bit that, you know, they're the steady hand, they're the stable hand. the calm people who are best suited to
navigate these challenging times in Canada. It's not in line with their message. As for the Conservatives, they A number of their MPs have posted our story online and that sort of thing. Will it fundamentally change the trajectory of this campaign? Probably not. But it is something that I felt was worth marking.
Well, it's certainly a glimpse into how political parties operate, as you've said, and often listeners and viewers don't get that glimpse. The Conservative Party, how have they reacted since you've published? Well, I saw their response before I published and they said they called this dirty tricks. They said that it's actually the liberals who are importing American style politics.
into Canadian discourse by doing something like this. So that's been their response so far. Do you think voters will be... satisfied with what you've heard from the liberals on this, and Mark Carney in particular? One thing I've heard a lot of today, since Mark Carney said that these staffers have been reassigned to other parts of the campaign. Some people believe that they should be removed from the campaign altogether. Partisan conservatives have messaged me saying that.
I have a feeling that because Mark Carney apologized, that will be sufficient for the vast majority of people. But obviously, it's something we're going to be keeping an eye on. And we'll, of course, be applying a critical eye to... kind of all hijinks in this campaign to make sure that, you know, we're not being fooled by a party trying to make hay over something. Appreciate it, Kate. Thanks for your time. You're welcome.
Kate McKenna is a senior parliamentary reporter with the CBC. We reached her in Montreal. Maybe the liver of a lot of neighborhoods is the local pub. And no two pubs are exactly alike. Some may be similar to one another, but each has its own idiosyncrasies, distinctive features that endear them to their patrons.
Edinburgh artist Keith Crawley is trying to capture the individual characteristics of his city's many pubs. He's been painstakingly creating miniature models of them, taking great care to capture all their detail. We reached Mr. Crawley in Edinburgh. Keith, at this point, do you consider yourself an expert on Edinburgh's pub?
No, I actually, I'm not a big frequenter of the pub at all. You love their architecture then? Yeah, I mean, it's a variety of different buildings. That's the one thing I've learned over the years is that they... It's not so much the pub. The building is built with the pub in mind. The pub usually comes long after the building has been built. And this all started with the building you live in. You were making a model of your own home and you were using a 3D printer to do it.
How did that turn into this project that we're talking about now? Yeah, well, once I built a model of the house, I posted it on Instagram and family friends spotted it and asked if I could make a model of their house that they grew up in from many years ago. And it was at that point I realised this is quite good fun, but I'd like to make something that a lot of people can recognise. So from that point on, I thought pubs. Everyone knows pubs.
Pubs are local landmarks. Whenever you're given direction to somewhere, you might say, well, he stays along the road from the pear tree and you'll go, oh yeah, I know where you are now. So I thought, pubs are a safe bet, can't go wrong there. And the very first one I built was the Old 100, which is in Rose Street, purely because it has that very... Edinburgh, Newtown look about it. And what is that look for our listeners who haven't had the pleasure? You're talking about probably from
the early 18th or mid 18th century. So it's very small, the windows are small. and it tends to be all self-contained. and so i thought well i'll tackle that one which was a bit unfortunate because it also happens to have one of the most difficult roofs i've ever had to build as well what makes it so hard If you ever look at, even if you go into Google Earth or Google Street View and just look up the Edinburgh Old Town and a lot of the old buildings are
they're higgledy-piggledy that's the only way to describe them they tend to have things extended added on over the years over the centuries and then you're trying to work out how does this all look So a lot of the pubs I build now, they've got complicated roofs too, but I can see where they're coming from. Yeah, and now you're more experienced at it. How many have you done now? I've done 12 and I've got another two.
in the pipeline as I'm speaking. Yeah, this isn't going to end anytime soon. And in terms of your process? Because these are very realistic. Take us through how you make them so. Well, as an example, Griffar's Bobby at the pub. where I would probably go into somewhere like Google Earth or Street View. so i can get a quick idea of what the building looks like the shape at that point i'm only really looking for the actual physical details not really the the artwork the paint style things like that
And that only gets me so far. So what I tend to find is I'll have to go up and visit the place in person. Sometimes, more often than not, you have to go around the back because the old Google streetcar can't get up there. I'll take lots of photographs, just even off small minor details. because I got caught out once when I'd photographed a building, came back home.
And then realised I didn't know what was lying at the side of those windows. And I thought, oh, it's hard to get back on the bus the next day. Photograph it again. Committed to those details. You do. It's normally when you're photographing something even on holiday, you're just going, that looks really nice. Snap, snap.
but you're having to really dig and have a really good route around. But thankfully, at the time I was photographing grave fires, there was loads of tourists, so I just blended in, so I don't feel awkward. but once i've got the photographs i'll come back home and i'll build the model in the computer and then from that i'll get it all all the sides of the building done, even if it's attached to the side of a building, that's a blank space, so therefore that'll be a blank wall.
Then once I've done that, I'll print it out on a 3D printer. And I usually use a filament printer. You know, the ones with big spools. And that can take quite a few hours to get done. But once I've got all those parts... And then I'll prime the model and I'll paint it up, all the brickwork, everything else. How long does it take? It can take, depending on the building, it can take from about three days up to a week.
So you've got two in the pipeline still, you said, and you want to do all of the pubs in Edinburgh. So how long do you think you'll be doing this project? Well, I looked it up and one of the numbers I saw was 385 in the city centre. Oh my. So you're talking about what, eight years? Maybe nine years? Are you ready for that kind of commitment? I hope I live long enough. Well, knock wood. Knock wood that you'll get to do it. Exactly. You know, there's something. What is it about miniatures that...
most of us love so much. Why are they such a draw to us, do you think? I've actually been asking myself that question for the last few weeks. And I think I remember back to when I was visiting museums and they would always have, you know, the miniature displays of things like trains or those little Stone Age villages or things like that.
And you're getting to see a whole world in one goal. So you're able to sit really, really just throw yourself into it but it's the details it's seeing these tiny little details being replicated and you always wonder how on earth did they do that and it's
It's not really an easy answer. It's just you only have to look at a miniature or something and you just get, you get lost in it. I can spend ages looking at them. That's the thing. It's been a pleasure speaking with you, Keith. Thank you. Thank you. We reached artist Keith Crawley in Edinburgh. Yeah. Humans do not have a lot to brag about these days, but there is one thing that we've always counted on. Just listen to this newsreel from 1933.
In the latest news from Hollywood, the giant ape who stars in the blockbuster movie King Kong has announced he's considering a run for the U.S. president. And in the world of science, it's official. Extensive research has proven that only humans can detect geometric regularity. Better luck next time, Animal Kingdom. Or there's this news report from the early 70s. The Prime Minister commented, that is neither far out nor groovy. In fact, it is a bummer.
Turning now to science, good news as researchers once again confirm that human beings are the only species capable of recognizing geometric regularity. commented the study's lead author. What, did you think birds could do it? Ha ha ha. Meanwhile... Yep, no matter what, only we could detect geometric regularity, and no one would ever take that away from us. Claiming that only humans can detect geometric regularity is now falsified.
Cognitive neurobiologist Andreas Nieder told NPR heartlessly. And what creature has snatched this ability from us and flown to the top of a tree right outside our window where it's cawing at top volume while we're trying to sleep in?
Look, I don't have to explain the geometric regularities when a bunch of shapes are the same. If a scientist gives you a piece of paper with five squares and a pentagon on there, you, as a human, will recognize that the pentagon doesn't belong. And then you'll high-five the scientist.
Except now we've learned that Mr. Nieder and his colleagues ran a bunch of tests on two crows that live in their lab. And those crows got better and better at guessing which shape was the outlier, even when it was only slightly different from the others. But thanks a lot, crows. We prided ourselves on our exclusive ability to find geometric regularity, and now that's gone. We're all bent out of shape.
We are going to take a short break now. When we return, Canadian singer-songwriter T. Thomason tells us about his decision to cancel a gig at a music festival because the U.S. no longer feels safe for trans artists like him. He says it's a huge blow to lose access to such a major market, but there is good news too. Canadian arts organizations have the opportunity to make all the difference by taking up the cause. Stay tuned, I'm Neil Kirksell. And I'm Chris Howden.
At 24, I lost my narrative, or rather it was stolen from me. And the Monica Lewinsky that my friends and family knew was usurped by false narratives, callous jokes, and politics. I would define reclaiming as to take back what was yours. Something you possess is lost or stolen, and ultimately you triumph in finding it again. Follow Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can listen to Reclaiming early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Since Donald Trump took office, there's been a lot of discussion of a possible peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. During the presidential campaign, he said, I'll have that done in 24 hours. But two plus months into his presidency, it's clear that peace is still a long way off.
On the weekend, a Russian missile strike hit the Ukrainian city of Summa. At least 34 people were killed and a further 117 injured. Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, said, quote, the strike hit right in the heart of the city on Palm Sunday. Only completely deranged scum can do something like this, unquote. And today there are reports of another attack on Summa. Ivana Klimposh Tzinsadza is a Ukrainian MP, and we reached her in Kyiv.
Ivana, we're hearing about further attacks on Sumi today. What is the latest you know about what is happening? Yeah, that's exactly, you know, what has happened just a couple of minutes basically ago or half an hour ago. As far as I understand, this ballistic attack by again ballistic missile today was hitting the suburbs of Sumy so far. Thank God there are no reports of the killed or injured people there. Why is so many being targeted in your view?
Well, I think the whole country is being targeted, you know, it's SUME. Yesterday and today, but a couple of days before that, that was Kriwe Rih, and before that, that was a very concentrated attack on Odessa. So it is terrorizing Ukrainian population just to make sure that people are scared are in fear are um you know feeling desperate and maybe you know changing the whole full resolve of the nation for this resilience that is, thank God, still there with the society and with the community.
What do these latest strikes, Ivana, say to you about the likelihood of a peace agreement being reached and reached soon? Well, I am one of those people who have been very skeptical with regard to the quick solution that was kind of anticipated and promised by many. all the hopes that were all the hopes that were raised.
across the globe, I think it's very demoralizing and demotivating because Russian Federation does not show any... sign and any even the shade of the intention to actually stop this barbaric aggression against Ukraine and their willingness to rule by the might and to change the...
rules of the game and so they are interested in making sure that their way of looking at history and at the future and at the present would be the one defining the future of European continent and Ukraine, for that matter, as part of it. Where do those talks go now as you see it? We know on Friday, Steve Wilkoff, the U.S. envoy, met with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The U.S. is still saying, still signaling that peace talks with Russia are happening. What do you say?
Russia understands only the language of pressure, of unity, of strength and of power. It cannot be talked into peace because Russia has started this war totally unprovoked. with no reason besides the very
fact that they just don't want to accept the existence of the Ukrainian nation and Ukrainian state and our right to pursue our own goals and our own future and our own choices. And so therefore... I think it has to be understood what are the real intentions of the Russian Federation vis-à-vis Ukraine, vis-à-vis Europe, vis-à-vis international global order and vis-à-vis international peace.
Once this would be understood, that would have to change the behavior of Commonwealth. So at this particular point, I do not see. this unity that would ensure this continued pressure on the Russian Federation. And I think Russia feels... you know, indulged for additional attacks. And that's why it wants to, by this additional new terrorist attacks that it is waging across Ukraine, it wants... to maybe in their sick minds to gain additional leverage.
for the negotiations, for them to be resulting in the acceptance of the Russian terms, thus meaning capitulation of Ukraine and destroying and eradicating of the Ukrainian nation. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has condemned the attacks. French President Emmanuel Macron urging a ceasefire. Do you feel the level of support and specific support? from the wider world at this stage, Ivana, that leads you to believe this will end and end with Ukraine being able to keep what it has now.
We definitely see how many of the European nations are standing up to the challenge right now at least in their attempts to coordinate their activities and in their readiness and willingness to upscale their support to Ukraine but at the same time I think at this point we are still in this continuous rounds of consultations and negotiations among the partners while it's urgent for all of them.
very specific concrete actions, starting from additional pressure on the Russian Federation and going into additional possibilities, military possibilities for Ukraine. to be able to preserve and defend its civilian population, but also to push back on the front line. Ivana, I appreciate your time. Please take care. Thank you so much. That was Ukrainian MP Ivana Klimpush-Tzinsadze. We reached her in Kiev earlier today.
This is Canadian singer-songwriter T. Thomason with his cover of Bruce Coburn's Lovers in a Dangerous Time. And if you are T. Thomason, it is a dangerous time. The Halifax-based musician is trans. He was scheduled to play at a U.S. music festival next month, but in a video posted on Instagram, he shared some bad news with fans. this is not a super fun video to make i'm gonna try to keep it quick keep your attention i am pulling out of
the All Roads Festival in Maine that I was booked to play on May 16th and 18th. That's because it doesn't feel safe for me to go across the border into the States as a Canadian trans guy. I just... don't feel like it's worth the risk. So I want to thank All Roads for booking me because I would have loved to be there with you. And thank you for understanding and being so supportive. We reached T. Thomason today in Toronto.
T, you've had a couple of days now to sit with that decision. How are you feeling about it today? Yeah, I'm feeling like it was the right thing and there's not really any other option. So I'm feeling pretty at peace with it, even though the circumstances are obviously like... horrible. It's not an easy decision and you talked about that as well and you also
Talked about concerns for your personal safety as a Canadian trans man traveling in the United States. What have you heard and what have you seen that makes that? Such a deep concern at this stage. I mean, I think there was a story out of the West Coast of Canada, and I can't remember the woman's name off the top of my head, but there was... a Canadian woman who was detained and, you know, held in the States for a couple weeks. And Just hearing that she...
She's a cis, white, middle-class woman, Canadian woman. And if that can happen to her, that makes me really concerned for her. what could happen to a trans person when the rhetoric in the States is so strongly focused on villainizing and demonizing trans people at the moment with a lot of misinformation. It's just the unknown. You just don't know when you're trying to go across the border how much information pops up on that. border officers screen, like, would they know?
If I had changed my gender marker, I don't know if they have access to that information. I went through the border in February to New York and it was totally fine, but I don't know if things have changed between now and then. You're certainly not the only Canadian trans artist who is in a similar... situation, making these kinds of decisions, being forced to make these kinds of decisions in some cases as well. More broadly speaking, in terms of the impact.
on young artists and the Canadian music industry? What kind of impact do you see this having? So I think it's really important that people understand that what we're talking about now is the inability for... artists to get visas. When you apply for a work visa to go to the U.S. to do creative work, you apply through what's called the American Federation of Musicians, the AFM.
And they are the ones who represent you to like the U.S. immigration services. So you're not dealing with them directly. But because of the U.S.'s policy now that they will only recognize. two genders, male and female, and they will only, and those are what you were assigned at birth. The AFM now can't process visa applications. by people who have a gender marker on there. passport, Canadian passport, which is not in line with what they were assigned at birth.
Just to make that really, really clear. for people. And what that means, what it means now that artists can't access that market is that we are cut out of the biggest music market in the world. we now have to pivot and export to, if we want to export, export to countries like the UK or countries in Europe, which are much more expensive to get to. So there's now this like... extra pressure, financial pressure there.
Beyond that, for developing artists, if you're, you know, one of a few artists that a manager or a record label is considering working with and they're kind of weighing up all the pros and cons of each artist that they're considering. working with and you're the one artist that can't export to the U.S., can't engage with that major, you know, biggest market in the world, it's quite likely that maybe it's not out of transphobia or anything, but it's purely a business decision that
you will get overlooked or you'll get passed over for opportunities to grow your team. In an already very difficult industry to get noticed in. What, if anything, would you like to see from players, you know, people with power in the Canadian music industry to help mitigate that kind of loss of that market for you and other trans artists? What I'm really hoping is that we'll see organizations like Factor and the Socan Foundation and
the provincial music industry organizations that provide funding for artists. Not all of the provincial organizations do, but some of them do. So I'm really hoping that these... Organizations that exist and provide funding will create new streams that are specifically for trans artists to access under these circumstances to help.
situation that we've been forced into. I was mentioning that other artists are in a similar situation. Your friend, Bells Larson, certainly one of them. What kinds of conversations are you having together about how to move forward? you know, I'm hearing a lot of frustration and I think it's It's hard to watch your peers continue to be able to do something that you can't do. Like, I think that's really hard. And obviously there's no sort of expectation that other artists can take this on.
boycott the U.S. or anything but that's why the support of these industry organizations is so important. They're the ones that need to really show up and provide tangible support. What about fans? If you're a music fan in Canada, the best thing you can do is to find ways to directly support the artist you know if you can buy tickets in advance to the shows that always helps so much buying music directly from the artist as opposed to like the streaming platforms as much as possible um
You know, those things are so important as this industry becomes more and more volatile and less and less of the money gets to the artist directly. Your latest album is called Tenderness. An important word always, but maybe particularly for these times. Is there a particular song?
that you'd like us to play for our listeners? I think one of the things that I've been hearing a lot, which I really appreciate, is the urgency to take care of ourselves as well so there's a song called i must believe and that's about being in your favorite place in a place that calms you down and that makes you feel more
grounded, and I think that would be a great one to go out on. I appreciate this, T. Please take care. Thanks. T. Thomason is a trans-Canadian musician and award-winning pop artist. We reached him in Toronto. It was a Hollywood ending for the guy from Hollywood, Northern Ireland. Golfer Rory McIlroy made history yesterday by winning the Masters in a sudden death playoff finish against Englishman Justin Rowe. The land journey is over. McElroy has his masterpiece.
That winning shot meant that not only did Mr. McElroy finally get his hands on that coveted green jacket, he also completed a career grand slam, becoming just the sixth man to win golf's four major tournaments. And unlike the other five men, he had to wait 11 years to complete his set.
He was not the only man from Hollywood standing on the green for the winning putt. His longtime friend and caddy, Harry Diamond, was there every step of the way. And after his win, Rory McIlroy took a moment to credit his friend for his role and his success. I've known Harry since I was seven years old. I met him on the putting green at Hollywood Golf Club. We've had so many good times together. You know, he's been like a big brother to me the whole way through my life.
To be able to share this with him. After all the close calls that we've had, all the crap that he's had to take from people that don't know anything about the game. Yeah, this one is just as much as it is mine. Masters winner Rory McIlroy reflecting on the role of his caddy, Harry Diamond, in his career. Both hail from the Hollywood Golf Club in Northern Ireland. Tom Widley is the general manager there. We reached him in Hollywood.
Tom, he says that he shares this win with Harry Diamond. Does everyone at the golf club there feel like they share a piece of this win with Rory McIlroy as well? That's a difficult question to answer. I think everyone's very proud of Rory McIlroy's win. I wouldn't want to speak for all the members and say they feel that they share a piece of it. I think...
They're all incredibly proud, incredibly grateful for what he's done for the golf club and for Northern Irish and Irish golf. I think we actually have Harry Diamond's picture up on our wall in the hallway as well because he was an Ireland international. from hollywood golf club so looking at their friendship is long-standing
So if share isn't the right word, clearly everyone feels a deep connection to it. Often when people like to claim pieces of people when they win big tournaments or big prizes like this one. But I think it says a lot about you and the club as well. that you hesitate to take even a shred of credit for this big win. That does speak volumes. I was out and unaware of what was unfolding on the screens until... The moment that triggered the tiebreaker.
And the groans, the gasps, the oh my gods in the restaurant I was in, I mean, it was on par with any... Any basketball final, any football or soccer final that I've been sitting in. And it was a big, pretty big group on a Sunday afternoon. What was going through your mind when it was at that point in the game? I mean, it was probably one of the most truly stressful rounds of golf i've ever watched i think it was
Even earlier in the round on the first hole when he made a double bogey, the thought was, is it going to be another year of waiting? And then the big theme for the week has been resilience. He just showed how resilient he has been and just battled back. I think when he hit his shot into the water on the 13th hole, which is never a place he would ever be. Do you know what I mean? It was such a simple shot.
Again, the feeling comes over, the pit of your stomach goes, and you feel dreadful. But he just battled back with some of the best shots you've ever seen in the Masters. So it was a big relief when he actually... hit the shots and came back, but there were so many ups and downs. I wouldn't say it was pleasant viewing. What were you saying in those moments, if you can repeat them on the radio?
I was actually telling my partner to take the blanket from off her head because she couldn't watch it. So I was trying to will her to be brave. But for me, it was just you just feel gutted. If I'm feeling gutted, I'd imagine the whole nation's feeling gutted, the golf club's feeling gutted, but then within 20 minutes, it's just absolute elation and relief.
Relief is definitely a good word to use. And the tears, the collapse, I mean, we see this in other sports as well, but you really felt it from him in those moments. Yeah, I mean... Certainly, if I think of, say, the popular sports over here, like football or soccer or rugby, you would never see emotions like that, even in tennis, even in golf. it was it was literally like it was a visual representation of someone just losing 11 years of pressure it was
It was unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it. I've never seen Rory McElroy in that sort of mode, if that makes sense. Yeah, you've never seen him break down like that. I don't think I've ever seen any professional golfer breakdown like that. And I think I've been watching golf for 25 years. It's just normal. It was a nice human moment to see what it meant to him.
You've met him at least once, if I'm not mistaken. What is he like as a person? Yeah, so I've met him once. I've kind of been the GM at Hollywood for three years, so I think he kind of... Comes back once or twice a year when there's a tournament locally and he was normal, which is probably a big compliment. He was just a normal guy. And from when I speak to other staff that have been there for say 18, 20 years and have known him since he was a youngster.
From what I said, he hasn't changed. He is just normal, unassuming, which is quite bizarre. Certainly for me, when I'm not from the area and you meet somebody who is a sports icon in my mind, and he's just like... the normal guy from the golf club it's very strange and we actually have a clip from an interview he gave when he was just a little guy coming up at the club 1998 rory mcelroy spoke to to bbc news we'll play a bit of that
To turn a pro and to win all the majors. And would you like to win them all one year? Yeah. When I was two years of age, Dad took me out to the course. And then he had a couple of shots, and that's how I got into golf. It's adorable. He sounds a little bit different now, but still the same tenacity, yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's good to hear. I've seen that many times before. The club obviously has meant a lot to him. What do you think this win will mean in the area?
I think it's massive. Just for Northern Ireland as a broader area, golf is a huge part of its economy. And we've seen it this morning. Obviously, we've been overrun with the media, which is highly unusual for certainly my job. Certainly there's a massive sense of pride around the place. And I was having the conversation earlier with all my colleagues that when people talk about Rory McIlroy, they talk about Hollywood. And that doesn't happen with any other golfer.
Not even Tiger Woods. He's not associated with a club. Whereas Rory McIlroy is synonymous with Hollywood and Northern Ireland. And it will be massive for us. We'll see a huge... Huge footfall for the Open in July when it's at Portrush because it's an hour away. It's massive. It's massive for inspiring, I think, all levels of golfers from around here. And I think just, well, I would say.
people in general. It's just a great example of someone that hasn't given up. Thanks for this, Tom. No problem. Tom Widley is the general manager at Hollywood Golf Club, Rory McIlroy's hometown golf club. We reached him in Hollywood, Northern Ireland. For as long as we've had taxes, we have had tax evasion. That's according to a new analysis of a 1900-year-old papyrus from ancient Rome.
What you might hope would be battle plans or a letter to a Roman deity or Caligula's shopping list is actually a sheet scrawled on by a prosecutor while preparing for a tax evasion trial. as well as the minutes from a judicial hearing. And I understand tax law doesn't sound super flashy, but it seems that at the time the trial was pretty dramatic. Anna Dolganov is one of the historians who deciphered the scroll, and we reached her in Vienna, Austria.
A tale of two men in ancient Rome. Anna, what are they accused of doing? Oh, they're accused of a very elaborate scheme of fiscal evasion involving enslaved persons, which they seem to have fictively sold and avoided paying taxes on. There was forgery involved. as well. Who were these men? So these men have biblical names, two of them have biblical names, which indicates very strongly that they are Jewish.
One of them, the one who was instrumental in the forgery, happened to be the son of a notary. So he was involved in his father's notarial business and therefore had access to the instruments that one needs to create forged legal documents. And how were they caught in the end? So what they appear to have done, which is very clever indeed, they are located in a border region between two Roman provinces.
And the two settlements that are mentioned are actually geographically not very far away, but a Roman provincial border runs between them. And what they seem to have done is weaponize the fact that the administrative systems of the two Roman provinces did not routinely communicate with each other.
So if you have a sail of slaves on one side of the border, that provincial administration will not necessarily check across the border whether the slaves have been properly declared by the person to whom they were apparently sold. And this appears to have been instrumentalized by them to make the slaves effectively disappear on paper from the view of the officials. This is told from the perspective of lawyers. Is there any way to really know what these men were up to?
Exactly. So we are very much seeing this case through the lens of the prosecution, which obviously thinks these individuals are criminals that ought to be condemned. It is possible, however, to eke out a little bit of the background story nevertheless. For example, there's one puzzling element to the whole story, which is, after the fictive sale of the slaves took place, at some point later, one of the slaves was manumitted.
so freed liberated by the by the original owner who was now not no longer the owner on paper and the question is if the point is to evade taxes Why was the risk of manumitting the slave taken? Because when a slave is manumitted, their manumission has to be registered. And in my opinion, this is when officials became suspicious that something was going on. So why take this risk?
And this is where we begin to pose other sorts of questions. What sorts of motives could these people have had beyond just mercantile tax evasion? that these men, being Jews, were either trying to evade their own Jewish law, which imposed on them certain requirements for how to treat slaves who automatically became Jews if they were the slaves of Jewish masters.
Or could it be that they had a human relationship to these slaves, and in the Roman world it was customary to reward faithful household slaves with manumission? So could it be that they were, on the one hand, perfectly happy avoiding Roman taxes, on the other hand, did not want to deprive a faithful household slave of his due freedom after a certain number of years of service? What became of these two men, Anna? What were the punishments for tax evasion at that time?
The Romans did not joke about tax evasion. They saw this essentially as a crime against the state. So the palette of punishments was quite harsh, could range from huge fines to temporary exile, if one was lucky, to permanent exile or hard labor in the mines or stone quarries, which was essentially a death sentence. And in the worst case, one could be made an example of and executed in an imaginative way, for example, being thrown to Wild Beasts of the Amphitheater.
There's a lot that's eye opening, jaw dropping, fascinating, certainly. What surprised you most about what you found? I find it incredibly fascinating to what extent this text really mirrors what Roman legal literature says and what Roman rhetorical sources say about the way that these types of cases ought to be handled. It shows that these local lawyers in these borderland provinces were extremely competent in both rhetoric and Roman law.
This is a huge discovery because it shows that Roman legal knowledge was actually very widespread throughout the Empire. The scroll itself was unearthed in the 1950s, but then was buried in a drawer for decades after that. I mean, do you feel lucky that you are the one that happened upon it? How did it come to you? So this document was unearthed in an episode of what we might describe as archival archaeology.
which means once it was misfiled in the wrong linguistic group, so it was misidentified initially when it came in in the 1950s probably, as a Nabatean document. placed in a drawer with other Nabataean documents. And it was not until our colleague Hannah Cotton at Hebrew University did an inventory in 2014 that she discovered that this was a Greek papyrus. So it was an incredibly lucky rediscovery.
And it's a huge, huge piece of luck. This sort of document, it's very, very long. It's quite unique. It's extremely historically substantial. It's one of those documents that very few scholars get to work on in the whole of their career. So I feel very fortunate. A pleasure speaking with you, Anna. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anna Dolganov is a historian of the Roman Empire with the Austrian Archaeological Institute at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. We reached her in Vienna.
You've been listening to the As It Happens podcast. Our show can be heard Monday to Friday on CBC Radio 1 after your world tonight. And you can, of course, also listen to our show online at cbc.ca. or on the CBC Listen app, or of course wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Neel Kirkshal. And I'm Chris Howden. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcast.