Rising Up - Tuesday, June 16, 2026

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1. 🎵🎵🎵
2. A
3. Welcome to Rising Up with Sonali, an independently produced subscriber-supported program syndicated to radio stations, free speech TV and podcast platforms.
4. On this show, you'll hear solutions journalism for social justice, fueling action, not despair.
5. I'm Sonali Kolhutkar, host and executive producer.
6. This week will turn to a recent graduate of Stanford University who joined hundreds of others in walking out of her graduation commencement to protest the keynote speaker Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google.
7. Amanda Campos, who has been a student organizer at Stanford, will draw links between Google, Israel, ICE and more.
8. Then we'll mark the one-year anniversary of the ICE campaign of terror in Los Angeles with Miriam Argandewal.
9. She is an organizer with the Boycott Home Depot Coalition.
10. Miriam will take us back to the moment that ICE agents tried to make an example of LA and why they failed.
11. Finally, Dr. Diljeet K. Singh, President of Physicians for a National Health Program,
12. will share details of an open letter she recently signed on to,
13. demanding a revival of the movement for Medicare for All.
14. That's coming up in just a moment.
15. ਸ੍અੰর്തੀ ਸ੍અੰ്ൾ্തੁ
16. a representative producer of rising up with sonali and independently produced subscriber supported program nationally syndicated to radio stations free speech tv and podcast platforms our interviews are available to subscribers at rising up with sonali dot com
17. Stanford University graduates walked out of their commencement ceremony this past Saturday June 13th in protest of Google CEO Sundar Pichai's keynote
18. central to the issues they were angered by was google's involvement in the apartheid and genocidal state of Israel
19. and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, which has terrorized immigrant communities in the United States.
20. Joining me is lead organizer of that walkout Amanda Campos a Brazilian organizer and recent graduate of Stanford where she been a student activist fighting for climate justice immigrant rights and Palestinian liberation She works in environmental justice policy and advocacy Welcome to the program Amanda Thanks so much Glad to be here
21. Before we get into why you walked out, let's talk about what happened. There are reports suggesting
22. a few dozen people walked out. One outlet said about 200 people walked out. Tell me,
23. in your words what happened in my experience simply walking out of my seat and seeing a crowd
24. of people um that i would say hundreds of students of conscious walking out um it was
25. absolutely exhilarating and honestly heartwarming to see so many people visibly and very loudly
26. taking a stance against Google's human rights crimes through its complicity in genocide and
27. apartheid in Palestine, as well as the kidnappings of our neighbors here in the U.S. through ICE.
28. And just people's convictions were extremely noticeable, people's braveries, people's just
29. feeling of community when walking out. And to describe specifically what happened,
30. We quickly began chanting, free, free Palestine.
31. Some people had whistles.
32. Community members in the audience, I could hear their support while we walked out and then headed to the People's Commencement,
33. which was organized by student organizers, community members, and other supporters.
34. and instead we chose to listen to Mahmoud Khalil, Dr. Subey, as well as a student speaker
35. who actually gave us the life advice that we should follow. And so for those who weren't there,
36. they can see the videos on Students for Justice in Palestine, Stanford, social media, but basically,
37. you know, Stanford is a big school. It's a very prestigious school, of course, one of the most
38. prestigious in the country. The commencement was held outdoors in this big field. There were a lot
39. of people, I'm guessing thousands. How many people would you say walked out? Were all of these people
40. who knew, were they people who already, you know, had planned on walking out? Or was this something
41. that you think some folks on the spur of the moment realized what was happening and wanted to
42. join in? Yeah, thank you for that question. So to begin with, yeah, there were thousands of
43. graduates in the audience. And as you said, it was a big field. So the walkout was pretty visible.
44. I would say in terms of specific estimate, it does vary. Outlets are saying at least 200
45. in the hundreds. But I think what really is the most important to focus on is that
46. many students stood up despite Stanford's protest suppression, despite the fact that, you know,
47. it was our commencement ceremony, despite the fact that we worked so hard for that degree.
48. We stood up because we knew that it was crucial to speak out and stand up against
49. Google's crimes and Google CEOs, and that which I, being the commencement speaker,
50. gave us the opportunity to speak up and we took it.
51. And when it comes to people joining definitely more people joined than the pledge form that we made indicated which was really hard to see about 120 students and people pledged on the form specifically that we created
52. Many more community members also pledged to walk out from the guest section.
53. But definitely people in the sport of the moment joined, people who knew friends who were rocking out joined.
54. And it was really beautiful to see.
55. Let's talk about why Google was the focus.
56. What is the link, you know, layout for the link between Google's enabling of Israel's crimes first and then and then ICE.
57. So the sort of war abroad that the United States has enabled and the war at home that the Trump administration has unleashed.
58. How is Google involved?
59. Absolutely. So as a student organizer, it has been crazy to learn about the extent of a tech company like Google participating in truly these atrocities.
60. So to begin with, you know, the No Tech for Apartheid group, which is an organizing group of Google workers, has done so much work since 2021 to highlight and expose Google's human rights violations and complicity and genocide.
61. And to begin with, when it comes to its ties to Israel, the most prominent contract is Project Nimbus, which is a $1.2 billion project for which Amazon is also involved.
62. And it basically entails Google's provision of cloud computing as well as AI to the Israeli government, which is then used to collect data on Palestinians, surveil Palestinians, and also for automated AI warfare.
63. So the bombs being dropped in Gaza, the surveillance and attacks against West Bank Palestinians.
64. Google has a direct and tangible role in enabling those human rights crimes and by extension enabling what the UN Commission has found to be a genocide and what human rights organizations have long agreed that is an apartheid state.
65. when it comes to ICE as well as CBP or Customs and Border Patrols crimes here in the U.S.
66. It is, in a way, very much intertwined with the logic of surveillance that Palestinians go through.
67. So the data that has been used to kidnap our neighbors, kidnap our loved ones,
68. to kidnap our communities and truly terrorize communities in the United States.
69. That data is stored on Google Cloud often.
70. CBP and ICE use Google's infrastructure to carry out its campaigns against immigrant
71. communities in the United States and people of color.
72. And it is crucial also to emphasize that No Tech for Apartheid has also been campaigning
73. around this. Over 1,300 Google workers have vocally demanded through repetition that there's
74. greater transparency in Google ICE contracts because all this information that people were organizing to shed light Google doesn even really publish information enough information on all of this because it knows
75. that it is liable.
76. And years or decades from now, companies like Google will be held liable for their participation
77. in human rights crimes, including that of genocide.
78. And we as students believed that it was crucial that we as Stanford students do not want to go into this tech warfare pipeline.
79. And it is crucial that we highlight the harm that Google is doing to our own communities and our friends.
80. now uh looking at sundar pichai's keynote address near the end he offers students some advice and
81. you probably missed this because you walked out or maybe you read it later he says as you look at
82. your own path don't focus on the thing your parents want you to do or the thing all your
83. friends are doing or that society expects of you instead think about the things that keeps you
84. chatting excitedly with your roommates late into the night and go do those things. It seems as though
85. you took that advice, maybe in ways that he wasn't expecting you to. Tell me about the
86. people's commencement, the one where you truly felt the keynote speaker reflected the, and speakers
87. reflected the values that you as a newly minted Stanford graduate wants to, want to espouse.
88. Absolutely, and thank you for that question, because the People's Commencement was truly a memory to last a lifetime.
89. It was beautiful to see so many people gathered around this beautiful grove near the St. Presidio,
90. and knowing that people were there because of their moral conviction, because they wanted to hear from Muhammad Khalil, from Dr. Zubayf, from our student speaker, Eva Jones,
91. and apply that advice in their own careers and be in community.
92. What advice stood out for you the most?
93. I believe there were many, but the words of Mahmoud Helio, our keynote speaker,
94. do come to mind immediately.
95. among those that, as he asked rhetorically, you know, to paraphrase, what is the point of courage
96. if we, what is the point of knowledge if we lack the courage to act from it, which I believe is
97. really one of the quintessential messages of the People's Commencement. You know, our Stanford
98. degrees that we work so hard for, those are really valuable. However, they are kind of pointless and
99. can even be used to do harm if we lack the courage to use them to do what is right. Speaking on
100. behalf of myself, you know, the Stanford degrees I've gained, I want to use those for good. I want
101. to leverage the privilege that I have as a Stanford student, as someone who is in the U.S., as someone
102. with the positionality that I have.
103. I want to use those to actually advance justice.
104. And that's what the People's Commitment was about,
105. being community and being among people
106. that value justice as a core value,
107. not whatever selfish optimism
108. Google's CEO Sundar Pichai advocated for.
109. And just going back to Mahmood Khalil,
110. as one of the commissioners,
111. commencement speakers, it seems as though he so perfectly embodies the intersection between
112. speaking out against Israeli apartheid and genocide and being a victim of the ICE machine
113. as a Columbia University graduate student. He was one of the first people that the Trump
114. administration attempted to make an example of by arresting and trying to deport him.
115. And they're still trying to deport him. So it seems as though that really made him the perfect speaker to symbolize these issues, right?
116. Absolutely. And he and many others like Lika Kordia, Mosul Madhavi, are very much examples of how intertwined these struggles are.
117. Ligua Cordia in her interview with Democracy Now! said herself that, you know, the way ICE agents
118. treated her while she spent a year in an ICE detention, more aptly called a concentration
119. camp at this point, reminded her of how Israeli soldiers had treated Palestinians like herself.
120. And it is absolutely crucial that we as different communities realize that our target and our oppressors are the same.
121. And we must stand alongside each other because we are a lot stronger that way.
122. Right. He was talking about being optimistic, about embodying Californian optimism, which, you know, you could interpret as being someone who chooses to see only the bright side of everything and not the impact that his own company is having on very real lives.
123. Exactly.
124. And I'm wondering if you think that especially Stanford as a university, as an educational institution in Northern California, which is, you know, home in broadly speaking to so many tech billionaires, is seeing this increasing divide.
125. You mentioned the workers, Google workers who've been agitating. Are you seeing this increasing divide between those people who are standing up to the tech billionaires and their agenda and these figures like Pichai himself?
126. I don't believe it's a divide. I believe it is an activation rather of people. I believe it is people who, for fear or for other reasons, have remained silent due to the very real repression that people face.
127. people sometimes understandably remain silent.
128. However, courage is contagious
129. and seeing other people stand up
130. allows and encourages other people
131. to stand up alongside them.
132. And that is what I'm seeing
133. even in the heart of Silicon Valley
134. in Stanford University,
135. which, you know,
136. to also paraphrase Eva Jones,
137. the student speaker,
138. at once students were eagerly filed into the ranks of tech companies who are doing harm
139. around the world.
140. And we are seeing this activation of people and we are seeing people rising up despite
141. all the circumstances.
142. And I believe that any repression that we may face is absolutely nothing compared to what people in ICE concentration camps and people in Gaza and West Bank are facing
143. And we know that and we will stand strong alongside each other and we will continue to fight.
144. Give out the social media handles where people can find out about Students for Justice in Palestine at Stanford.
145. Yes, absolutely. Definitely follow at Stanford SJP on Instagram. Follow at No Tech for Apartheid on Instagram. Follow at Tech for Liberation, which is also another student organization on the Stanford campus and beyond on Instagram. And you find also many connected organizations that helped make this successful walkout and beautiful people's commencement happen.
146. And then finally, Amanda, what are your plans as a Stanford graduate? How do you embody the values that you took from the People's Commencement?
147. Thank you for that question. I am an environmental justice advocate as well. So I will be working in environmental justice organizations in the Bay Area, which I am really excited for. And it is also, you know, a struggle that is very, very interconnected with so many others. And I intend to continue to organize like many others and for graduates, we will continue speaking out, continue to organize for Palestinian liberation and for the abolition of ICE.
148. good luck to you and thank you so much for joining us thanks so much have a lovely day
149. appreciate your work thank you my guest has been amanda campos a brazilian organizer and recent
150. graduate of stanford university where she's been a student activist fighting for climate justice
151. immigrant rights and palestinian liberation she works in environmental justice policy and advocacy
152. and i'm sonali kohatkar host and executive producer of rising up with sonali an independently
153. produced, subscriber-supported program, nationally syndicated to radio stations, free speech
154. TV, and podcast platforms.
155. I'm Sonali Kohatkar, host and executive producer of Rising Up with Sonali,
156. an independently produced subscriber-supported program
157. nationally syndicated to radio stations, free speech TV and podcast platforms.
158. Our interviews are available to subscribers at risingupwithsonali.com.
159. It has been just over a year since Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents invaded Los Angeles en masse,
160. launching a campaign of terror and violence against immigrant communities.
161. On June 6, 2025, more than 200 ICE agents swarmed the parking lot of a Home Depot store in Paramount,
162. an LA area city, and battled community activists who were ready for the assault.
163. In the wake of that inciting incident, coalitions were formed and strengthened, even as 700
164. plus people were kidnapped and disappeared by ICE.
165. Joining me to tell us all about what LA organizers have been doing this past year and how they marking the one anniversary is Miriam Argandewal organizer with Boycott Home Depot Coalition and
166. Labor for Palestine. Welcome to the program, Miriam. Thank you for having me. Take us back
167. to that day, June 6th, for those who were not just outside LA, but outside Paramount,
168. because LA is so spread out. It's a big, big city. And what happens in one part of it is not
169. necessarily felt everywhere in that Home Depot parking lot of Paramount, give us a sense of what
170. actually played out and took place. It was quite remarkable that news accounts didn't quite capture,
171. I think. Yeah, so I myself was not there on June 6th and 7th when the June 7th was, I believe,
172. the actual eight-hour stand down between over 200 federal immigration officers and the community of
173. Compton and Paramount. It was outside of the Home Depot in Paramount. Federal agent officers had
174. come to kidnap someone in the Home Depot parking lot. And then the community rose up and said,
175. not, you know, it's not going to happen. And it's not that ICE agents had not showed up in LA before.
176. And it's not that they had left since. It's just that on that day, over those two days,
177. we saw the launch of a surge, right?
178. This months-long effort by ICE
179. to essentially terrorize Angelenos,
180. make an example for the rest of the country.
181. It became a precursor for what then played out
182. in cities like Chicago, like Minneapolis.
183. And LA eventually kind of led the way
184. in the community self-defense movement
185. that we saw in variations across the country.
186. Give me a sense of those coalitions that were formed,
187. the Community Self-Defense Coalition as one,
188. and then Boycott Home Depot Coalition, which you're a part of,
189. emerged from that struggle, right?
190. Yes, the raids had been happening, you know,
191. even at Home Depot as early as April,
192. and then OC Home Depot, July 4th.
193. I'm sorry, before even, you know, there was another,
194. I believe June 4th was another raid at Compton, at the Home Depot, sorry, I'm sorry, Compton and
195. Englewood, outside of the Home Depot in Englewood. Someone was kidnapped. And so this was the first
196. large scale attack that they had tried to operate in Los Angeles. And I believe after
197. that day, after the 7th, they never, you know, attempted to do so again. But the Community
198. Self-Defense Coalition was, you know, Unidobuddyo and a bunch of other organizations
199. that had come together that had taken Trump's warning seriously of what they were going to do
200. to our community. And they had community patrol programs for the last, all the way, I think,
201. back to the 90s, if I'm not mistaken. And so the rapid patrol, patrolling the patrolling programs
202. and the rapid response programs that we see all across the nation, they had set up with the
203. the Community Self-Defense Coalition, one of the organizations that joined Labor for Palestine.
204. We answered their call when they had called out for a boycott of Home Depot. And then, you know,
205. from that coalition, the boycott coalition was born. And we've, you know, after that raid too,
206. you saw the formation of patrol teams all across Los Angeles, outside of Home Depots,
207. and not just Los Angeles and San Diego and Orange County and the Inland Empire They patrol teams not just after that happened like for a week until this date
208. those patrol teams are going.
209. And they have foiled more ice scouts
210. than the ice has been able to carry out
211. in the raids.
212. And so I think one interesting thing
213. people can look at is LA Taco's daily memos.
214. They list all of the, you know, they don't only list the kidnappings, but they also list their attempted kidnappings at Home Depot.
215. And so it sounds as though the boycott Home Depot coalition was formed because Home Depot as a corporation was essentially refusing to take a stand against what was playing out in its parking lots throughout Southern California.
216. Right. Basically, these attacks on immigrant workers who were part of the economic ecosystem that Home Depot benefits from.
217. Is that fair to say? That's fair to say, yes.
218. I think Home Depot has been complicit in harassing day laborers long before.
219. You know, it's been a decades long battle that organizations in our coalition like ADEPSCA have been fighting against.
220. And so they were, you know, they not only stood by silently, but the amount of things that were, you know, permitted to be carried out inside of their parking lots, you know, Penske trucks being raided and federal agents, you know, jumping out of them, toddlers being kidnapped, a man running to his death.
221. and then Home Depot doubled down
222. instead of responding to calls for boycotts
223. and holding themselves accountable
224. for what's happening in their parking lots
225. they installed a noise torture machine
226. in the Cypress Park parking lot
227. that physically and mentally tortures day laborers
228. and it was placed there to drive them out
229. they've sensed our response to it
230. they've turned them off
231. but the machines are still there
232. they haven't taken them down
233. so what has boycott home depot coalition achieved over the past year i know that there's a lot and
234. people can certainly look at the social media to get the highlights but give us a sense of the way
235. in which you've engaged the community some very creative ways to engage the community to show up
236. to the stores and make their displeasure known what what has what have you achieved this past
237. year yeah we've achieved a lot you know we always say this is more than just a boycott because it's
238. not we're not just calling you know for people to stop shopping there's home depots are active
239. you know it's ground zero it's at you know an active war zone um almost every other day at you
240. know and they have scouts they have ice agent scouting and so there was patrolling units at
241. each you know home depot and we one thing we try to do is send street teams to kind of do temperature
242. checks between the teams patrolling and kind of getting a download of what works at what location,
243. what doesn't. We spread the boycott to include labor groups and groups nationwide now and have
244. been spreading our message nationwide because a lot of people don't understand the level of
245. complicity of how much Home Depot has allowed, how much for Home Depot has allowed to happen
246. in here in Los Angeles.
247. And so we have worked to spread that message
248. to our other partners in other states.
249. We just had a joint effort with the flock,
250. or I'm sorry, Defrost Home Depot campaign
251. in Atlanta, Georgia, where we held shareholders accountable
252. over their flock camera systems that they have placed
253. and Home Depot's where they surveillance our license plate
254. and then share that information with local law enforcement.
255. And so, yeah, we've been just trying to bring everyone
256. on board that we can and spreading the information
257. of just how complicit Home Depot is
258. and also their history, right?
259. A lot of people don't know that Home Depot has been,
260. that ICE is basically doing their dirty work for them
261. and that they align closer to the goals of the government
262. and these federal agents than they do of the people and, you know, the communities that they're terrorizing.
263. And then how was the one-year anniversary of that June 6th and 7th ice invasion marked this year in Los Angeles?
264. What did people say and how did that marking of that one-year anniversary embody the successful pushback?
265. pushback. And I say successful with a grain of salt because 700 plus people disappeared. And as
266. you were saying, these continue, these parking lots continue to be sort of war zones. But still,
267. there was this remarkably successful pushback against ICE. ICE was not able to walk all over
268. LA unimpeded. So how was that anniversary marked? Yeah, we, we, it marked the anniversary by
269. returning you know to the scene of the crime at paramount home at the paramount home depot and
270. you know there was one man that was involved um on that day and had a lot of legal repercussions
271. afterwards and he you know saw the rally and stopped by and was like i'm so grateful that
272. you guys are still keeping this going that you know what happened that day didn't stop that day
273. and the sense of community i think it's something for los angeles to be deeply proud of right
274. because not just the Community Self-Defense Coalition,
275. but the Harbor Area Peace Patrols
276. that took photos of the license plates of ICE cars
277. when they were coming off Terminal Island
278. and sending those out to folks.
279. The people who showed up outside of hotels
280. that ICE were staring at.
281. The people who developed programs to carry food,
282. to take food to folks who couldn't leave,
283. who transported people to their jobs
284. because they were scared of taking public transportation.
285. um you know i think los angeles really defined the you know we take we take care of us and
286. community comes out to take care of each other and so and i think everyone was incredibly proud
287. but also incredibly determined to keep going um you know the ice rates have not stopped and so
288. our work has not stopped and you know we are continuously thinking of new ways to protect
289. our communities from not just the federal agents but you know the fascism that's in the white house
290. right now and is there for our communities, you know, no matter what party is in the White House.
291. I want to ask you about the Boycott Home Depot Coalition's influence outside of LA. Is this an
292. LA-centric or Southern California-centric coalition or is there a national impact? Are
293. Home Depot parking lots the sites of ICE raids in other cities in ways that have spawned similar
294. coalitions? Oh yes, Home Depot's have been a common denominator in all of the
295. cities affected by ICE raids, right? Chicago had plenty of raids. There's the
296. iconic image of the man running away from an ICE agent on a Home Depot
297. property that went viral there And New Orleans when ICE arrived they literally had a press rollout at the Home Depot you know all the head of DHS everyone was there And so they rolled it out They had a press rollout there
298. And, you know, they've, there've been raids and nationwide, and there've been people kidnapped
299. off their properties nationwide. And while we started as an LA based boycott, as you know,
300. the movement as they're, the movement grew, and you know, the ice
301. rates spilled into other states, now we have become national. And our
302. partner asked me, endorsing our boycott has really helped in that
303. regard. And they've been great partners in trying to make it take
304. our campaign national.
305. Let me also ask you to point the way forward, where is the coalition
306. to defend LA from and Southern California from ICE agents going next? What are the plans to
307. continue this work, escalate this work? Because of course, as we know, ICE unfortunately isn't
308. going anywhere. It has received continuous infusions of taxpayer cash from the government.
309. And so I know that that is something that organizers like yourself pay attention to
310. and ready yourselves for, right?
311. Yes, I think, again, we're not stopping.
312. We're trying to grow the movement every day.
313. I think one thing that is up as a challenge for Los Angeles
314. in the days ahead is we're not only the first place it happens to,
315. we're the testing grounds, right?
316. So everything that happens here, whether it's relevant to other states
317. at the moment or not, is going to come to the other states, right?
318. Because here's what they practice.
319. here's where they you know and we saw it in home depot parking lots refine their tactics and so
320. you know even right now i think there's like a lot of different things about where do you boycott
321. first for you know anti um ice movements etc and i think we do need to do the work of spreading
322. the education of what has happened here in los angeles a lot of people still are not aware of
323. the level of horrors that have taken place in the raids that at Home Depot's in Los Angeles.
324. And so I think there's some education to be done there. And I do think, you know,
325. a little bit more political awareness from, you know, our partners to really kind of,
326. you know, look back and say, okay, Home Depot, you know, it's not just one, one of the many
327. places where raids are taking place, you know, it's really where they're honing their skills.
328. It's where they're made it, you know, complete hunting grounds here in Southern California.
329. And whatever they're learning here, they're going to come and use on us in different states.
330. And so we hope to spread that education a little bit more.
331. Again, we're not slowing down.
332. I know people are tired after an year and there's so many different things to be worried about in the news.
333. But I think for us, it's just, you know, making sure that burnout doesn't get us and to continue to think of new ways moving forward and to find an efficient way to share the information of what's happening here when the news media, you know, fails us and doesn't do that job for us.
334. Miriam, give out a website for Boycott Home Depot Coalition.
335. We do not have a website right now, but you can follow us on our Instagram at and it's at Home Depot Boycott.
336. You can follow us there and you'll get any news of upcoming events and also news about our upcoming website, too.
337. And we'll post a link to that from our website. Thank you so much for joining us today.
338. Thank you so much, Sonali.
339. My guest has been Miriam Argandywal organizer with Boycott Home Depot Coalition and Labor for Palestine I Sonali Kolhatkar host and executive producer of Rising Up with Sonali an independently produced
340. subscriber-supported program nationally syndicated to radio stations, free speech TV and podcast platforms.
341. I'm Sonali Kolhatkar,
342. host and executive producer of Rising Up with Sonali, an independently produced subscriber
343. supported program nationally syndicated to radio stations, free speech TV and podcast platforms.
344. Our interviews are available to subscribers at risingupwithsonali.com. Although a majority of
345. Americans support a Medicare for all system, the movement to make healthcare accessible and debt
346. Free faces pro-corporate forces in government seeking to preserve private insurance companies
347. and hospitals at the expense of public health. But on June 8th, hundreds of rights organizations,
348. including unions, pro-democracy groups, and racial and economic justice organizations,
349. signed on to an open letter demanding a health care system paid for by all of us and benefiting
350. all of us. The letter, spearheaded by Public Citizen, asks the questions,
351. how can one feel optimism for our future when over 40% of us are carrying around the burden
352. of medical debt? How can we plan for our futures when we can't afford to go to the doctor or cover
353. rent? Joining me to help answer that question is Dr. Diljit K. Singh. She's a practicing
354. gynecologic oncologist and president of Physicians for National Health Program,
355. PNHP is one of the signatories to the open letter. Welcome to the program, Dr. Singh.
356. Thanks so much for having this conversation.
357. So when we think about what Medicare for All means, most people are familiar with Medicare.
358. It is the government health care system paid for by all of us, but you're only eligible for it when you're 65 or older.
359. and so expanding that to everybody ought to be a no-brainer but we just haven't been able to
360. achieve that when you talk to folks who have internalized the opposition to medicare for all
361. what do you say to them to convince them that not only is medicare for all possible but imperative
362. I mean, I think it depends on who you're talking to. Most patients who've had to interact with the health care system or who have a serious illness understand that their insurance does not give them all the things they need, that between copays and deductibles and prior authorization, that they're not getting the care they've earned and that they deserve.
363. and then you know there's a lot of people who are afraid right they're afraid that
364. if some new system comes in they'll lose what they have access to not realizing that they have
365. access to a subpar program really so I think we just have the same conversation over and over that don you deserve health care with no co no deductibles you sick you show up you don have to worry what it going to cost You don have to worry you know
366. that you're away from home on vacation or something's different. And you don't have to
367. worry that if you lose your job, or God forbid, you decide to pursue your dreams and try to open
368. your own business that you won't have coverage. So I think mostly it's educating people. And then
369. And I think it's giving voice to the people who have dealt with the health care system.
370. For me, as a gynecologic oncologist, I take care of people with cancer.
371. And so for them, they understand.
372. They understand the limitations of the systems they have.
373. And the truth is, you know, if you look at polling from last year and this year, 90 percent of people who describe themselves as Democrats,
374. That's some 70 percent of people who describe themselves as independents and even 45 to 50 percent of people who describe themselves as Republicans think that we should all have health care.
375. That's, you know, driven by government understanding that if we took all the money right now that we spend on health care and acknowledge that right now,
376. probably at the very least, 30 cents of every health care dollar is wasted.
377. It's wasted on administration and it's wasted on profit.
378. And if we took that 30% back and, you know, the congressional studies, the Office of Management, OMB has done studies over and over that consistently show we can afford to cover everyone.
379. We can afford to give everyone vision, dental and mental health coverage.
380. So a lot of it is educating and having them understand we're not trying to take anything away.
381. we're trying to give them what they've earned. And it seems as though a lot of times the failings
382. of other national health programs in other countries are used as are weaponized to undermine
383. a Medicare for all program. For example, you pointed out that one can, of course, design a
384. system here in the United States that covers things like mental health care and dental and
385. vision. But in, say, countries like Canada, there is a national health program that doesn't have
386. those things. And so people point that out as a reason why we shouldn't, you know, try to get a
387. Medicare for all system because it's not possible if it were, it would happen in Canada. Does that
388. frustrate you that the fact that, you know, the flaws of other systems are weaponized to prevent
389. us from having anything like a national health program other than for people over the age of 65?
390. I think it's the same thing, you know, that we talked about initially. It's misinformation. So when we say, oh, in Canada, they have long waits to see specialists. Hey, in much of America, we have long waits to see specialists, if at all. Right.
391. There's people who can never get to a cardiologist because they don't have insurance, because they lost their job, because they were sick, whatever happened to them.
392. So I think that, again, like educating people over and over.
393. And then the other piece that I find challenging is in so many things, we completely understand that we don't have to do what Canada does.
394. We don't have to do what the UK is doing.
395. We can use the resources we already have, the hospitals we have, the medical schools we have.
396. the infrastructure that we have and we can build on it, right?
397. There's all kinds of areas in this country
398. where we don't have adequate obstetric care,
399. what we would call healthcare deserts.
400. Rural areas are gonna be losing hospitals
401. with the changes that the Trump administration
402. recently put through taking
403. so much money away from Medicaid that hospitals are going to close. So the idea that we have
404. something better right now and that if we do things that they're doing in other countries,
405. we're not going to have access is, again, just misinformation. And of course, what is the
406. misinformation driven by? It's driven by corporations that are making a great deal of
407. money, right? The idea that private equity, which is a completely profit-driven entity,
408. came into healthcare to make money, it's because they can. It's because they take the dollars that
409. we should be spending on healthcare and they use them for profits and they share them with
410. shareholders or they share them with investors. So, you know, I guess I'm frustrated is not the
411. word, I'm actually quite optimistic. For the first time in a long time, most Americans,
412. a majority of Americans believe that we all deserve access to health care and that we shouldn't be
413. tied to a job or be dealing with prior authorizations or other limitations on our access.
414. Right. And when we hear politicians talking about the affordability crisis, right, we do hear that
415. people can't make rent, they can't afford groceries, but especially they can't afford
416. health care. And then they forego health care. So it doesn't figure into their costs, but then they
417. literally, you know, will die often of or suffer and go into debt over health care. And so a
418. Medicare for All system, would that not tremendously increase the ability of Americans to survive
419. economically to not have to crowdfund for expenses every time they have a health care crisis. And I
420. mean, I get requests all the time to donate to crowdfunding. And those are often with people
421. who have health insurance, but are, you know, sort of underinsured. This could really address
422. the affordability issue. 66% of people who go into bankruptcy from medical debt had insurance
423. at the time, they were either diagnosed and they either lost their job or between co-pays,
424. deductibles, and other uncovered expenses, they went into debt. So I think that the work we have
425. to do is we have to help our politicians understand we're not going to tolerate it anymore. There's no
426. reason we're the only country of our economic strength that doesn't provide everybody in the
427. country with access to health care. And we just have to, you know, stop listening to the, you know,
428. oh, it's going to be rationed. It is currently rationed, right? And we're not going to take away
429. anything that people don't already have. Instead, we should understand we're going to give people
430. access to the things that they should have access to. I think the other thing is,
431. is we somehow create this environment where we believe that it's so complicated and it's so hard
432. and we've got to come up with some, you know, public option layers of regulation, blah, blah,
433. blah. And that's how we'll fix it. And it's, it's ridiculous. And that's a idea that is absolutely
434. perpetuated by the groups that are making money from this, as opposed to the people who actually
435. want to take care of people and the people who actually want to get the care they need.
436. So this idea that it's something hard and complicated and how we figure it out,
437. how we figure it out, we'll give health care to everyone.
438. We use the resources we currently have We know that if we rely on medical societies for example to make recommendations about things like vaccination if we use the evidence science we have we can make good clean recommendations about what are the appropriate ways to take care of
439. Again, for me as a gynecologist, I think about, you know, what are the guidelines for taking care of ovarian cancer?
440. What are the scans we do to understand how someone's responding to treatment?
441. And then we don't need a prior authorization for that.
442. If we know it's the right test, we just get the right test.
443. So I think the idea that it's too complicated for us to fix or that we need to come up with some convoluted multi-level system that includes, you know, work requirements and assessing these and filling out 100 forms every six months like that just has to end.
444. Those are just ways that people lose their access to health care.
445. And it doesn't preserve the dignity of people who are paying their taxes into a system that ought to just treat them. Nobody goes defrauding the government for health care. I mean, literally, why would you just get chemo for fun?
446. let's also talk about the fact that states have attempted and not quite succeeded in being able
447. to do this, right? In the absence of federal movement on a Medicare for All system, states
448. like Massachusetts, states like California have attempted to start putting a plan together in
449. place with varying degrees of success. But part of the problem is that people pay taxes to the
450. federal government and those federal dollars don't get applied to a single payer statewide system?
451. Is that an issue? And do these sort of half measures or even at the federal level, the so-called
452. public option, do they end up hampering the effort for a federal Medicare for all system
453. rather than necessarily building up momentum? So what I would say is that we have to understand
454. where we're wasting money and where we need to take the money back, right? We are currently
455. wasting that 30 cents of every dollar, healthcare dollar that goes to profit, that goes to
456. administration, that goes to bureaucracy. We need that money back. The only way we get it back is if
457. we take the middlemen between us and our healthcare insurance companies, pharmacy benefit managers,
458. we get them out of the picture. So that piece, and I think that that's something that feels
459. uncomfortable to many people, the idea that like, oh gosh, if we take out profit motives, then
460. we won't have that capitalist competition that makes things better. And there's a real deep
461. misunderstanding there, right? The way I look at it is the opposite, is when you sit down in front
462. of your physician, you want to know that they're not worrying about how much money their hospital
463. is making. They're not worrying about what the insurance company will cover. They're just
464. thinking to themselves, what is the best thing for you, right? And you want to trust that there's no
465. other things, no conflicts of interest in that conversation between you and your doctor,
466. that whatever they recommend based on the evidence and based on what your healthcare goals are,
467. you will have access to. So number one, the reason things like public option don't work
468. in any system where we preserve private investment and private profit from healthcare,
469. we're losing money that we need in our system. This issue of whether we can achieve it state by
470. state, you know, Canada successfully did that when they introduced their universal health
471. care system.
472. It started province by province.
473. The difficulty you know and I am I support people who are trying to push forward state based movements because I think it helps us educate people It helps us understand as they look around them how many people
474. are on board with this issue that everyone should have access to health care in America.
475. Do I think that a state-by-state plan will work? I think it is challenging. It's challenging
476. because of how finances are structured in our country. It's challenging because we want people
477. to have mobility and move. And it's challenging because we have 50 states and then D.C. and Puerto
478. Rico and all of these other places where we should all just have health care. But I'm supportive of
479. anyone who's working on this concept of profit free universal health care, because all of the
480. organizations that are doing this work and all of the states where we're doing this work are helping
481. people understand we have earned this, we deserve this, and we should have access to the same kind
482. of healthcare that people all over the world have. And it shouldn't be dictated. We shouldn't be
483. limited in our ability to, I want to open my own business, but I feel like I'm the one whose job
484. enables my family to get healthcare. So I'm just going to stay in some dead end job.
485. That's not capitalist society. That's not supporting small businesses, right? Ultimately,
486. not having universal health care is a harm on companies that are having to provide health care
487. to their employees. If we took that away, imagine how much better we could compete,
488. not just in the country, but in the world, right? If we were not responsible, every single employer,
489. every single business, every single small business owner to provide health care for our employees.
490. It doesn't make any sense, really. And it limits, right? It limits our mobility.
491. Yeah, it would free us up to switch jobs without worrying about losing health insurance if we were lucky enough to have it.
492. Absolutely, right? And I'm sure you know people, you know, people who've made that decision over and over.
493. I have made it myself.
494. Let me ask you finally, you know, with this open letter that Physicians for National Health Program and 300 plus other organizations have signed on to,
495. You mentioned earlier that you were optimistic because the public support for such a system is really high.
496. But what about the political support for it?
497. And does the letter that you signed on to suggest or can it have an impact on those people who have their finger on the legislative button, so to speak, to achieve this?
498. I imagine that the support, as it's increasing in Congress, is largely among Democrats.
499. What is the political reality for us realizing such a system?
500. Right. We know that the majority of Americans believe we should have universal access.
501. And even if you look, there was a recent poll that looked at even Republicans who support universal health care will see their chances of being elected go up.
502. I think we have to make it clear to people that if they're going to represent us, that they have to give us the things we want.
503. And I mean, I am optimistic because we know right that most Democrats, the majority of independents and the majority of Americans support this.
504. So we just have to get our legislators on board with what we know and understand.
505. And I have faith that we can do that, that we can help educate people.
506. And we're seeing it right now as we're looking at the primaries.
507. We seeing individuals like Graham Plattner And again I not going to make statements on whether someone should or should not have voted for him but he was for Medicare for all And that helped boost
508. his ability to win in that primary. And we have to get our legislators to listen.
509. And we have that ability, right? I think that we don't take advantage enough of number one,
510. voting. Number two, we don't take advantage of writing letters to our legislators, showing up
511. their offices, talking to them about who they actually represent, who are their constituents,
512. right? 90% currently of Democratic legislators have not yet signed on for Medicare for all.
513. Why not? If 90% of the Democratic population believes that, right? 70% of independents,
514. we're the people who are representing them. I think we have to use our voices, use our votes,
515. and use the power we have in organizing.
516. And it was one of the reasons
517. Physicians for a National Health Program,
518. we do a lot of work as an individual organization,
519. but it was one of the reasons we signed onto this letter
520. because we have to make it clear, right?
521. That the majority of Americans want this.
522. We have earned it and there's no reason we shouldn't have it.
523. I want to thank you so much, Dr. Diljit K. Singh
524. for joining us today.
525. Give out a website for Physicians
526. for a National Health Program.
527. Absolutely, pnhp.org.
528. Please come to our website.
529. You can get lots of information
530. and we can help you get in touch
531. with your local chapters.
532. You can support the work we're doing.
533. We're doing work,
534. both working with legislators
535. and continuing to do research
536. on the issues that make it clear
537. that this is what we deserve.
538. This is what we've earned.
539. And we'll post a link to that
540. from our website.
541. Thanks again for joining us.
542. Good luck to you.
543. Thank you.
544. And we really appreciate
545. you having this conversation.
546. My guest has been Dr. Diljit K.
547. Singh, a gynecologic oncologist who's practicing and president of Physicians for a National Health
548. Program. I'm Sonali Kohatkar, host and executive producer of Rising Up with Sonali, an independently
549. produced subscriber-supported program nationally syndicated to radio stations, free speech TV,
550. and podcast platforms.
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