As part of his escalating aggression toward Venezuela, Colombia, Cuba, and Brazil, Donald Trump ordered his Treasury Department to sanction Colombian President Gustavo Petro, his wife Verónica Alcocer, his son Nicolás Petro, and Colombian Interior Minister Armando Benedetti for alleged drug trafficking offenses. The Treasury Department announced the sanctions on October 24, five days after Petro accused Trump of murdering Alejandro Carranza in a mid-September US military strike on his small fishing boat in Colombian territorial waters. As of November 6, the US had murdered 70 alleged drug traffickers by bombing small boats in the Caribbean.
International human rights attorney Dan Kovalik is representing President Petro, his inner circle, and the families of the murdered fishermen. He spoke to Pacifica’s Ann Garrison from Santa Marta, Colombia, where he is meeting with them.
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There has been a series of organized coordinated attacks on faculty opposed to the genocide in Gaza. At San Jose State University, Professor Sang Hea Kil was targeted and charged with organizing an illegal Palestine encampment. She also has been fighting AB 715, a California State Assembly bill meant to censor discussion on Palestine in K-12 schools. She is a member of the 30,000 member California Faculty Association which is affiliated with the 750,000-member SEIU. She spoke to Pacifica’s Steve Zeltzer.
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David Hundeyin is a Nigerian investigative journalist, bestselling author, and founder of West Africa Weekly, an independent Pan-African digital news publication focusing on West Africa and the Sahel region. He joined Margaret Kimberley on Black Agenda Radio from Accra, Ghana, to discuss the claim that there is a Muslim genocide against Christians taking place in Nigeria. President Trump and Secretary of War Hegseth vowed to kill “Islamic terrorists” there, but major power competition and the scramble for rare earth minerals are behind the headline-grabbing narrative.
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Next year is the national convention of the Teamsters Union and the campaign for union president is already on. The leadership of Teamsters For A Democratic Union is supporting current president and Trump supporter Sean O’Brien. On Friday, November 7, at the TDU convention in Chicago, Richard Hooker Jr of the Philadelphia Teamsters Local 623 spoke out about the issues. The TDU leadership are refusing to allow Hooker, the first Black Teamster to run for president, to speak at their convention. He was interviewed by retired Teamster and writer Joe Allen, the author of Teamsterland.
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We thank all of Pacifica’s sister stations and affiliates who contribute to the production of this show. Today’s program was produced by the Capitalism, Race & Democracy collective, with contributions from Steve Zeltzer, Ann Garrison, Thomas O’Rourke and Polina Vasiliev.
You can find this and all previous episodes at our website “capitalism race and democracy dot ORG”. Make sure you click the subscribe button. Follow us on X, formerly Twitter, @PacificaCRD.
Thanks for listening.
Music:
Fela Kuti – Colonial Mentality
Revolution (Pts. 1 and 2), Nina Simone
