Chief Andy Harvey, newly-elected police chief for Pharr, TX, sits down with host Gregory Kallenberg for a frank discussion of his experience working in embattled immigrant communities and the importance of community policing.
Join host Melissa Brannan as she sits down with Mauricio Zuñiga to listen to his incredible story — a story of deportation, resilience, and a family-run coffee company.
Rational Middle hosts Chris Lyon, Gregory Kallenberg, and Loren Steffy unveil a "fun" new summit, and consider the implications of VP Harris's much-discussed border visits.
Picking up where we left off last week, Aviva Chomsky leads us through the legacy of 20th-Century revolutionary movements in Central America and what it means for immigration policy today.
Activist and historian Aviva Chomsky takes us on a deep dive into the many factors that make foreign-aid-as-immigration-policy a contentious issue. Join host Chris Lyon as he and Chomsky discuss the 19th-century economic, social, and political mechanisms of U.S. interference in Central American countries in this week's episode.
Catherine Glazer, immigration attorney with experience practicing in Canada as well as the U.S., sits down with host Melissa Brannan. to discuss the unique challenges and opportunities for immigration reform in both countries.
Jennifer Minear, outgoing president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association , gives host Melissa Brannan the lowdown on the strategies, challenges, and hopes facing immigration lawyers as a result of the Trump administration.
Holly Kuzmich, Executive Director of the George W. Bush Center , speaks with host Chris Lyon about the Center's bipartisan approach to immigration advocacy, including their open letter to Congress stressing the need for holistic immigration reform.
Sociologist Ruth Milkman, editor most recently of Immigration Matters: Movements, Visions, and Strategies for a Progressive Future (with Deepak Bhargava and Penny Lewis), joins host Chris Lyon in thinking through the reasons behind the common depiction of immigrant labor as the robbing of American jobs.
Xiao Wang is an immigrant and Co-Founder and CEO of Boundless Immigration, a team made up of immigrants and experts who assist those who are seeking green cards and citizenship in finding resources and information to make their journey less daunting.
On this week's episode is Justin Gest, author and Associate Professor of Policy and Government, George Mason University's Schar School of Policy and Government. Justin and a team of demographers and economists have released a study on GDP growth scenarios based on immigration policy. We also discuss one of the principle approaches to addressing immigration hesitancy of Americans and how advocates can better explain the opportunities to those who oppose immigration based on personal economic fear...
Join three hosts from The Rational Middle — Chris Lyon, Gregory Kallenberg, and Loren Steffy — as they announce an event aimed at finding actionable solutions to the challenges of border security and access to American citizenship. Learn more about the summit at rationalmiddle.com/summit
Joy Olson, the former Executive Director of The Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) talks with host Loren Steffy about the current challenges at the border and how the public perception on the benefits and purpose of immigration can be shifted.
Dr. Bob Sanborn and Yael Ross return to The Rational Middle podcast to discuss the seasonal influx of unaccompanied minors coming across the U.S.-Mexico border and how the dismantling of the system by Trump has exacerbated the challenge.
Join us for a conversation with Bruce Goldstein, President of Farmworker Justice. He is an attorney with 40 years of experience practicing labor and civil rights law. We discuss agriculture, global markets, and the Farm Workforce Modernization Act.
Host Loren Steffy interviews Rick Taft, the founder and president of Ideaspace Project, a website aimed at helping those interested in immigration reform track the most prominent voices and exploring ideas for how to impact change.
Lucas Guttentag — a professor of the practice of law at Stanford law school, senior research scholar at Yale Law school, distinguished immigration litigator, and former Obama administration official — shares the story of the Immigration Policy Tracking Project which catalogued over 1,000 Trump immigration policy changes in order to make undoing them easier for the Biden administration.
This week, newly-minted Rational Middle host Melissa Brannan chats with award-winning author Ernesto Cisneros about his book Efrén Divided , the story of a Mexican-American boy whose mother is deported during an ICE raid.
Hosts Chris Lyon, Gregory Kallenberg, and Loren Steffy talk about next steps on immigration. Will Congress take a piecemeal approach or swing for the fences on comprehensive reform now that the American Rescue Plan is assured passage in Congress.
Dree Collopy, partner of Benach Collopy LLP and author of the American Immigration Lawyers Association's (AILA) Asylum Primer, gives us an update on where asylum stands in the United States as Biden concludes his first month in office.
Jacob Monty, Trump 2016 campaign advisor and Managing Partner of the labor and employment law firm Monty & Ramirez LLP, has left the Republican party as it departs from the big tent strategy and becomes the party of Donald Trump.
Laura Collins, Director of the Bush Institute-SMU Economic Growth Initiative shares her insights on the current status of immigration reform in Congress and with the American people. She explores why she thinks Congressional gridlock exists and how we can break the stasis and create meaningful change to the American immigration system.
Steven Scarborough, Strategic Initiatives Manager at the Center for Houston's Future, shares an update to the Center's report on how immigration will shape the region's impact over the next several decades.
Tony Payan, director of the Center for the United States and Mexico at the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, weighs in on Biden's latest round of executive orders which seek to assess the damage done by Trump's anti-immigration policies and lay the groundwork for rebuilding a broken immigration system.
Join hosts Chris Lyon, Gregory Kallenberg, and Loren Steffy for a round table discussion of everything from the Biden/Harris inauguration, executive orders, and the administration's comprehensive immigration reform proposal.
This week, we speak with Sanaa Abrar, Advocacy Director for United We Dream, the largest immigrant youth-led network in the United States. She discusses the hopes that many immigrants in America have regarding a new administration and Congress. These two branches of government may soon have the opportunity to help Dreamers and the 11 million undocumented come out of the shadows and get right with the law so that they can be more fully productive members of society.
We kick off 2021 with a renewed discussion about Congress, common sense, and the issues that divide us. With the inauguration of President-Elect Joe Biden just one week away, Jorge Lima of Americans for Prosperity discusses what changes the new year brings to the challenge of immigration, economy, coronavirus, and civility with our fellow Americans following the insurrection at the Capitol.
Join hosts Gregory Kallenberg, Chris Lyon, and Loren Steffy for a recap of the year with The Rational Middle, the state of division in the United States, the election, the pandemic, and where we're going in 2021.
Now that the electoral college has voted, we talk with political analyst Scott Braddock about what can both parties learn from their experiences from the 2020 election, and how can those lessons be leveraged going forward.
Linda Chavez, senior fellow at the National Immigration Forum and author of "Out of the Barrio: Toward a New Politics of Hispanic Assimilation" discusses the continued shift of the Latino vote that stumped Democrats during the 2020 election as well as a potential path to bipartisan action on immigration reform in Congress.
