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And a very good evening.
His program is Off the Hook.
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening.
Joined tonight by Kyle.
I'm here.
And out in Signal Land, we have Rob T. Firefly.
Good evening.
We have Gila.
Good evening.
And we have Alex.
You do indeed.
Good evening.
And we're going to have a special guest in just a couple of minutes.
And also, this is a call-in show.
We will not be doing overtime this evening.
But we will be taking phone calls during this hour that we're on WBAI.
So, I want to start, though, by giving an update to a story that we did two weeks ago.
We had a special guest two weeks ago as well.
We're having a lot of special guests lately.
Joshua Aaron, the developer of the controversial app, IceBlock, you may have heard of.
It's an app that basically allows you to tell people when you see something.
You know, it's like if you see something, say something.
It's like that, except for a different reason.
It's when you see an ICE raid or ICE bandits or whatever you want to call them running around with their masks and intimidating people.
You can tell this is legal.
You can tell people that you saw that.
You can say there is an armed raid of one sort or another going on in this particular part of the world.
Well, you wouldn't know it from the Trump administration that telling people what you're seeing is legal.
They're treating this guy like he's some kind of a criminal.
And they're intimidating him.
And it's gotten worse.
We had him on the air two weeks ago.
It was a great conversation.
But his family is now being targeted.
And not even targeted by the idiots who decide to take matters into their own hands.
No, this is by the government itself.
Carolyn Feinstein is Joshua's wife.
And she worked for the Department of Justice, basically, in the bankruptcy division.
And, you know, this was something that was obviously known to them and to the people that hired her and all that.
But basically, she was fired.
She was fired.
And she says this was retribution.
I was fired because of the actions or activism of my husband.
This is according to the Daily Beast.
She said it is insulting to me because I dedicated myself and my career to serving the people of the United States.
And now the DOJ is claiming I was attempting to harm some of them.
And that's not true.
Feinstein says she took it upon herself to inform the DOJ of her relationship with Joshua after the backlash that kicked off more than three weeks ago.
Since we live in the same house, I thought it was pertinent to contact my employer, the DOJ, to notify them about the death threats that were coming in.
And just in case I needed to be out of the office so they would be prepared.
Within a week, she said that she was then contacted by the office of the U.S. trustee, which said it was reaching out on behalf of an ethics committee.
They asked me about my relationship to the IceBlock app, she said.
I informed them in so many words that I really didn't have any relationship or involvement in the app.
I was married to the creator.
While Feinstein said she does appear as a minority shareholder of All You Chart, Inc., the company that holds the IP for IceBlock,
this is a purely practical arrangement so that if Joshua were incapacitated or further, I have the ability to shut it down.
Then, last Wednesday, a pro-Trump influencer and resident psychopath Laura Loomer claimed on Twitter that she had identified Feinstein as Aaron's spouse and revealed that the couple lives together in Texas.
Kind of the last horse crossing the finish line there because it wasn't exactly a secret.
But this is what her tweet read.
Exclusive.
And even that is a lie because if you look at below the tweet, you have that little thing that Twitter offers, Reader's Added Context.
This story is not a Laura Loomer exclusive.
It was first reported on by, and they give the account and all that kind of thing.
It just shows how sleazy these people are.
The wife of the founder of the IceBlock app that allows people to disrupt ice raids and obstruct dox and harass ice agents is currently employed at the DOJ in Austin, Texas as an auditor.
My God.
And then she goes into who Joshua Aaron is and all that.
And then she proceeds to dox the both of them, really, giving out addresses and all kinds of information.
And it remains up on Twitter to this day.
You know, when we posted email addresses of DOJ employees, our account was suspended immediately.
Here, you can harass individual people.
And if you're working for Trump, you get away with it.
And it remains up.
So anyway, Loomer spoke to the guy, the DHS head, home man, that guy.
He said that Loomer had been in touch with him to share these findings.
Yeah, she did real detective work here.
It wasn't difficult.
And he had since contacted the DOJ over the matter, saying that what Joshua Aaron is doing is giving heads up to criminals.
Yeah, you know, the truth is always the threat to people who are hanging on to authority by a thread.
The DOJ is looking at it.
He said they need to throw some people in jail.
This is what they say about everything.
You have to throw some people in jail no matter what.
Then Loomer later posted that Attorney General Pam Bondi, or Blondie as she's dubbed her, and why should we care, amid the ongoing Epstein-List furor.
That's right, they're tearing each other apart now.
They could have a big win right now.
She fires Carolyn Feinstein from the DOJ and launches a criminal investigation into both Joshua Aaron and Carolyn Feinstein for their role in IceBlock app.
She also called on Trump to have a little chat with, get this, Apple CEO Tim Cook for allowing the app to be listed on the Apple Store in the first place, adding, we need to make America safe again.
Okay, yeah, I could read more, but I'll probably get sick on the air, and I really don't want to do that.
This is, I mean, we kind of expected something like this, but boy, these people are petty and childish and dangerous.
And I think the most important thing right now that we can do is just show support, tell people when things like this are happening,
and stand up against this kind of fascist intimidation that we are seeing every single day.
So, Alex, Rob, Gila, any thoughts on this before we move on?
Sure, I'll jump in.
I mean, I think this was par for the course.
We expected this.
We talked about it, was it two weeks ago, I guess it was, or was it last week?
I can remember with Joshua Aaron, the creator of IceBlock that we had on, and I don't think this is going to phase him.
Maybe you've been in touch with him, Emmanuel.
I'd love to hear if you have, but it also sounds like this was expected.
He was already subject to a tremendous amount of retribution for the application that he created,
which apparently is helping thousands of people around the country.
And I'm just really disappointed at the lack of due process and obvious retaliation that's happening within the federal government
with respect to employment decisions like this.
This is a very, very clear violation of the federal standards with respect to how people are hired and fired.
There is something called the Merit Systems Protection Board in place to protect federal employees.
And I hope and I expect that Joshua Aaron's wife will appeal that adverse employment decision and be restored to her position in short order.
Let's hope that law and order prevails.
Well, you're funny, Alex.
OK, well, maybe one day, maybe one day, but certainly not anytime soon.
As far as appealing or suing or getting due process, here's how the situation is set up right now.
There is an office where you can do just that if you have been fired for unwarranted cause.
And the positions in that office have been vacant since Trump took power.
So you can file whatever you want, but you're going to be waiting a very long time for anything to happen.
And I guess that's a tactic.
That's how they silence people or that's how they think they can silence people.
It's disgusting.
It's scary.
And it's part of the course, I guess.
Let me just say, though, I don't have that app because I don't have an iPhone.
I'm thinking of actually getting a cheap iPhone like Joshua suggested a couple of weeks ago just to have this app.
But I do have another app.
I have Ice Tracker from the folks at Ice Slip Forward on Long Island.
And just to let people know, Amityville, New York, there was agent activity reported this morning on Great Neck Road.
Also this morning, Bayshore, New York, Pioneer Drive, agent activity in the area.
Several vehicles were seen.
And yesterday, Hempstead, Fulton Avenue.
So just to let people know what we're seeing on this end.
All right.
You know, we have a special guest with us today because we are moving so fast with this that there are more developments almost every day with ways of fighting back.
And again, we will be taking phone calls in just a little bit.
We'll get out the phone number.
But first, I wanted to introduce the director of the Human Rights First Innovation Lab, Paris Richter.
And you'll tell me if I got that wrong.
There is a new app, another app.
And this app is really awesome because it does something that I don't know if anyone thought of before.
But it's really useful, effective, and essential.
Paris, would you tell us how this app works?
Yeah, sure.
Thanks for having me on.
So we have developed another app that is meant to support people that are being hunted down in this country and subject to the mass detention and deportation campaign.
I hope that we are a little bit more inoculated from retribution here.
This is an emergency alert, emergency planning and alert app for folks that are at risk of being detained called Ready Now.
And essentially what it does is allow you to create an emergency plan, which is a series of preloaded messages for emergency child care, legal support, your own personal safety,
things like work absences and pet care, anything that would need to be done in your absence should you be detained.
And then allows you to deploy that emergency plan with one click of a big red alert button in the event that you are kind of faced with arrest.
So, yeah, it's really meant to, I mean, it's not a silver bullet.
It's kind of a, it's a harm reduction tool, which is intended to make sure that no one disappears without, at the very least, their lawyer or their loved ones knowing.
So, can you describe how, first of all, how to set the thing up?
The app is called Ready Now, one word available on the Play Store and the App Store for Apple and all that.
But basically you have to enter a bunch of information and then at some point, I guess you release that information.
Is that a good way to describe it?
Yeah, that sounds right.
The app is called Ready Now with an exclamation.
It's available on Google and Apple in a number of languages, which we're expanding language access with essentially every release.
And you log in with your phone number.
There's a two-factor authentication.
And then you are sort of guided through creating a series of messages, you know, one for legal support if you have it.
If you don't have it, you can actually opt in to share key information with a pro bono network of attorneys, of immigration attorneys in the event that you are arrested.
You'll also create a message that's for your personal safety, for emergency child care, for any other sort of dependent care.
And then you assign contacts to each one of these messages.
The messages themselves, there's sort of a template.
And you're kind of prompted to fill out this Mad Lib style message template with everything that we recommend you include in a message to, for example, an attorney.
Everything we recommend you include in a emergency child care plan.
And so you preload these messages, you save them.
And then once you have your plan saved, when you open the app from then on, all you'll be met with is a big red button.
And you press and hold that button for, I think, one and a half seconds.
We had it at three seconds and then got some feedback that that is maybe too long, given just how quickly these enforcement actions can happen.
But you press it for 1.5 seconds, there's a little countdown to cancel in case you pressed it by accident.
And then the messages are sent out to the pre-assigned contacts via SMS.
Wow.
It's simple, but it's a damn good idea.
And it's essential.
I was setting it up myself.
Not that I'm at risk of this, I don't think.
Not yet, but maybe.
And it's really simple.
It's really easy to use.
Definitely, it needs more languages because I think it has about, what, eight now?
And probably going to need 100 or more of the way things are going.
One question I noticed when you were prompted to enter contacts, it doesn't access your contact list on the phone.
Is that intentional or is that maybe something with my phone?
That is intentional and it's because of security.
I'm actually, I'm not the technical director on our team, believe it or not.
But I know that that was, we took security very, very seriously.
We didn't want to give the app, give Apple any access to the contacts in your phone.
We've designed it very intentionally so that we don't have any of the data.
If we're subpoenaed, we have nothing for you.
We have very briefly in, when that button is pressed, if you've elected for the optional legal support, just to hand it off to that pro bono network.
But then we delete it, all of that data is, the emergency plan data is stored locally on the user's device until the moment, if and when, that big red alert button is pressed.
I say, so if something happens, you open the app, you press the red button, hold it for one and a half seconds, and then the messages are sent.
But what should you do at that point, assuming you're the person being taken away?
Does anything happen with the app afterwards?
Does it automatically shut down?
Is your info there for them to see?
Yeah, that's a good question.
After you press the button and the messages are sent out, all of the data is wiped from your phone, which is, again, why accidental presses can be inconvenient, let's say.
But that's just for safety, in case your phone is seized and searched by authorities.
We don't want to have any of that emergency plan information accessible.
Okay, yeah, that makes sense.
Folks, any questions from the people here?
Go ahead, Alex.
Yeah, Paris, I think this is just such an incredible app that's going to help, I think, a great number of people, and even more to the point, it can give a lot of people comfort, knowing that they have plans at the ready that are ready to be executed and launched, quite literally, at the touch of a button.
And you've given, obviously, a lot of thought with respect to how the application would work, the length of the button press from three seconds to one and a half seconds.
I mean, even that has been well thought out.
So you must have been collaborating with attorneys as well as cybersecurity specialists, presumably, in the creation of this app, because you're talking about legal issues and you're talking about cybersecurity issues.
I'm wondering what that was like.
Can you tell us about the development process?
And one thing I will say, too, just as an editorial, I was so excited to hear about this app when you first mentioned it through Human Rights First, having served for the last five years on the Technology Advisory Board of Human Rights First.
I was so excited to see something with such real-world impact and the Innovation Lab and Human Rights First itself being unafraid to oppose the administration in such a direct way.
So well done to you in the Innovation Lab and HRF.
And now back to the question.
I'll hand it over to you.
Okay.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Yeah, that's a great question.
So we are a bit of a nontraditional team embedded within a traditional human rights organization.
We're product designers and developers.
So we can't do anything.
You know, we need to work very closely with advocates and impacted communities.
To collaborate on the design of these things.
So I think the very first conversation I had, well, after kind of validating that there was indeed a need for something like this with advocates.
By the way, there are paper-based and PDF-based emergency plans that this app was based off of.
But obviously they kind of fail to, you know, they're not responsive by nature of their form.
So we kind of first validated the idea.
I think the second conversation I had was with a law firm about the subpoena risks and how to kind of de-risk the data piece of this.
And then it was off to the races working with advocates as well as who are familiar with these emergency plans.
Attorneys, immigration attorneys, in terms of what to include and not include.
And also social workers who work with immigrant communities to kind of make sure that the app was trauma-informed in its language.
You know, creating an emergency plan is a very emotional thing.
We've actually heard from, you know, folks in the community that they are kind of don't want to bring bad energy into a home by having to even think about what happens to their child if they are detained.
So there's a big kind of component of just making sure that this app doesn't create more emotional distress than these families are already under.
And then, of course, cybersecurity experts.
We have some of that expertise on our team and certainly our tech advisory board.
Thank you, Alex.
And we also, you know, got some third-party security audits done just to make sure there weren't any blind spots, which we will continuously do because this, yeah, this is a very, it's very sensitive.
And the advocates who are, you know, who we need their buy-in to get this out to the communities.
It's, we're kind of using this trusted messenger strategy to get it out.
But they grill us on, and as they should about the security measures, because they do not want to, you know, to give their communities that they serve anything that's not going to be safe and secure for them.
Now, this app was released when?
The app launched on the App Store about a month ago, but we took some time to do a small-scale pilot with some end users.
And the feedback was very minor, some language, you know, little usability things here and there.
But we officially announced on this Monday, and it's really been off to the races.
We've been meeting with large coalitions of advocates to kind of give them a demo and, like I said, have them grill us with their questions so that they can walk away feeling good about sharing this thing.
And kind of arming them with promotional materials and all the different languages so that they can get this out.
Now, I imagine you don't know when it's being used.
Well, I mean, we have, I think, I think in our kind of dashboard, we have the number of users that download it.
And then if someone presses that button, we know, you know, how many text messages were deployed.
Also, if someone opted in to have their information shared with that pro bono network of attorneys, which is called the National Immigrant Legal Resource Alliance, NILRA, which is run by Acacia Center for Justice.
So their database gets updated when someone presses that button.
Now, the main concern I think I have here is if, say, somebody is raided or surprised by somebody, and they don't have a chance to open the app and press that button, and the ICE agents get to it first, do they get all that information?
It would seem that they would.
Yeah, I mean, so, you know, there's a couple things we recommend, you know, I kind of, as a AFAB person assigned female at birth, and I'm, you know, I have to kind of have my treacherous walks home at night, right?
Like, you know, you have your phone out, or you have your mace out, you have things kind of out and ready.
Of course, there's going to be times where you're kind of not able to open that app.
But we do recommend that people put it on the home screen.
It needs to be passcode protected, that's the other thing.
We are, in the pipeline, working on developing kind of a widget that would allow you to press that button just directly from the home screen without opening the app.
But, of course, yes, there's going to be times if you don't have your phone, you know, if you don't have service, right, where you do risk having this information on your phone.
In that case, like I said, you know, the data is stored on the device, not in the cloud, so there's kind of reducing exposure to remote access.
And then the app and its emergency plan are protected by the phone's lock screen, so we definitely recommend no biometric pass keys.
If they are able to get past the lock screen, then we have the authorities would need to have the user's phone number and receive the two-factor authentication code via text message in order to open the plan.
It's just, it's a lot, you know, we hope that it's a lot of friction.
Thank you very much.
I would imagine this could be good for pretty much any situation where you're under threat.
I mean, it's not just confined to this country.
This could work anywhere.
Yeah, I think so.
You know, of course, the kind of surrounding messaging and the specific information that the sample messages ask for is specific to this use case.
But I imagine there's lots of different contexts where this could be, this basic functionality could be used.
Okay.
Any other questions from anyone here?
Yeah.
Real quick, and before we, you know, open it up to, since this is a call-in show, presumably we'll open it up to callers shortly.
But I think the question I had, Paris, is you mentioned languages.
What are the languages and how many languages is the app available in?
That seems like an important issue.
It definitely is an issue.
It is currently available in English, Spanish, Korean, because our developer is Korean himself.
So that was prioritized.
Mandarin, Haitian Creole, and French.
The next languages we're looking to release are, I believe, Arabic and Tagalog.
You know, but because we are kind of early, this is a still early version of the app, and we are constantly iterating.
Every time we get feedback, I mean, then we have to update it in every single language.
And if there's any sort of, you know, critical issues, you know, we are scaling intentionally slowly, right?
And so the language, I think, limitation does kind of constrain that.
The other thing I will say is that I spoke to a young Afghan man whose parents do not read or write at all.
They speak Dari, and he is setting up his emergency plan for his parents, and all they have to do is open the app and press the button, right?
So I think there's lots of immigrant families where they might have a younger person in the household that, you know, speaks English and can help them set up their plans.
Go ahead, Rob.
Paris, thank you very, very much for your work and for joining us today.
Speaking to the language issue and perhaps other issues, if folks out there are interested in being of assistance, whether with languages or other aspects of this,
is Human Rights First inviting outside assistance, or is there a way to get in touch and offer what skills one can?
Absolutely, yes.
I don't know if it's appropriate to give my email on this call, but you can absolutely reach out.
I think we have an innovation lab at humanrightsfirst.org, but we have had volunteers that have helped with translation.
There are oftentimes technical volunteers, and certainly with folks that want to help people set up their plans,
we're starting to develop a curriculum for Know Your Rights practitioners are starting to offer emergency planning sessions,
and some of them have expressed interest in helping people set up their plans.
That's another way that you can support.
And then just sharing the app, I think, with, you know, your networks.
Okay.
We're opening up the phone lines.
The phone number is 802-321-4225.
That's 802-321-HACK.
Let me just remind people, you will hear a slight hum heading in your direction,
and it might be hard for you to hear people from Signal.
We don't know why.
We're waiting for parts.
We're trying to get this fixed.
But we can hear you, and the audience can hear you.
So let's not spend 10 minutes talking about the hum, which has happened before.
802-321-4225.
So, you know, we're seeing apps like this coming out a lot,
and I think it's really inspirational.
But one thing that I wanted to ask you, Paris, is has there been negative feedback for this app
or threats or anything like that, like with the IceBlock app?
Yeah.
I mean, when that IceBlock thing came out, it definitely made me nervous.
And I consulted with several attorneys just about our risk, also just about the risk of, you know,
the administrating being able to subpoena Apple or Google for the user IDs
and the kind of chilling effect that that might have on the community for using technologies that are helpful.
So, anyway, I was reassured that we're as inoculated as one can be,
but given this administration is just so unpredictable.
It's like, sure, we're prepared.
We're an organization full of lawyers.
I have layers and layers of privilege.
I'm fine kind of being the face of this thing.
And, you know, it's - I think it's - I want to get the resource out to the people who need it,
and we'll take that - take the backlash as it comes.
The organization has also, you know, had some backlash itself.
I mean, nonprofits generally are being targeted.
We're an immigration rights organization, so, i.e., we are aiding and abetting terrorists.
Well, you know, interesting you should say terrorists,
because I just want to read the definition of the word terrorist.
This is from Oxford.
And, basically, it's a person who uses unlawful violence and intimidation,
especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.
So, tell yourself who's doing that lately, and we'll discuss it.
We have our first phone call.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Go ahead.
Oh, hi.
Just one really quick, practical point of information,
or, you know, maybe science fiction.
But I wonder, and this is all my imagination.
I am not a technician.
I am, like you, somebody who figures things out without having had any specific training.
And I wonder if that application can be set up so that there are two codes to unlock the phone.
One that unlocks the phone normally, and the other one that basically starts this process and wipes the data clean
and sends out all the alerts to the people who need to be notified.
Just throwing it out there, I don't know if it's possible, but perhaps this would be the solution.
Because whoever unlocks the phone, whether it's the agent that does it himself or asks the RST to do it,
the code that can be given is the one in the real emergency.
So there is no mistake.
There is no chance to accidentally push the red button.
That's all I wanted to say.
Okay.
I want to say a lot more, but I'm going to leave the stage to other people and listen on the air.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
That's very considerate.
And that's a model to other callers to do that.
Thank you very much.
Paris, any response to that?
Yeah, I mean, I'm not sure that that is technically possible.
And we definitely did explore other configurations of the button.
We were playing with a slider.
And ultimately, we decided that, you know, just the simplicity of the button was important.
You know, we imagine folks have different kind of dexterity.
And in a high-stress situation, we want people to be able to just get in.
So, yeah, we're considering that.
I mean, I think the not being able to access the button and what happens with that information that's on the phone, you know, that definitely is a challenge we need to kind of work through and think about how big of a risk it is.
Well, you know, I should point out, this is a hacker show, and you're going to hear all kinds of engineering suggestions.
And oftentimes, and they're great suggestions, but sometimes things get a little more complicated than they should be.
And we get it.
You know, we understand.
But will the person in your life that is the least technical person you can think of, will they be able to get it?
Because that is who I think should be the target here, because they certainly are the target for ICE.
We need to make sure that they are safe and they understand how this works and that it's there for them.
And whether, you know, you err on the side of caution or complexity, the important thing is that they're able to convey that message.
Go ahead, Gila.
I was going to say, if it helps, I got it.
I'm, again, I have layers of privilege, and I'm lucky enough to find myself in a situation where I'm probably not going to need this app.
But I am simultaneously heartbroken that it has to exist and so grateful that it does.
And the simplicity and the elegance of it are so brilliant.
And I would like to sit down with some people I know and just get them to try it just as kind of a test case, just to see.
But, yeah, I'm not the most technically savvy person that exists, and I was able to get in and figure it out.
And I was awed by how easy it was to use and how gentle it felt.
And so the fact that it's not just on the tech side, but that the humanity of the users, especially in this incredibly stressful situation, it was just a beautiful thing to see.
So kudos to all of you.
And I think that's why language is so important, too, because when something is speaking to you in your native tongue, I imagine you feel so much more at ease.
So hopefully that can happen soon.
And if you need support on that, I'm sure you'll get the support from many communities for that.
One thing I was wondering about, has any thought given to some kind of, I guess, a deactivation of the app if you don't hear from somebody in a certain amount of time?
In other words, you can assume the phone has been compromised or has fallen into the hands of somebody who is up to no good.
Would that be something you would consider doing, that somebody has to check in at least, say, once a month?
And then if they don't check in, either the phone is lost or it's fallen into the wrong hands.
We haven't thought about that explicitly, but we have thought about, you know, the and are considering for kind of future feature.
If someone is going into, say, a federal building for an immigration hearing, high risk situation, you know, if there is some sort of feature that says if we haven't heard from you, you can set the time.
And if not, it will deploy the messages automatically.
Yeah.
That sounds great.
If you can go into a certain mode that certain people will be aware of.
And, yeah, if you don't hear from me in this amount of time, send the messages.
It sounds very cloak and dagger, but it is essential.
Go ahead, Alex.
This is unfortunately the cloak and dagger world that we find ourselves in these days.
But it also seems very apparent to me that there is a great amount of power here.
If you combine what we were talking about two weeks ago with Joshua Aaron and the use of the IceBlock app with the ReadyNow app, and you've really, these two applications have really, I think, empowered people.
And have brought back, I wouldn't say a great measure of comfort, but at least some control into people's lives who may be subject to ice raids here.
I mean, you can know when they're coming with IceBlock, and you can be prepared for it with ReadyNow.
That's a lot.
That's a hell of a lot better than we were, let's say, two months ago in dealing with these ice raids.
And I'd love to see this type of thing progressing and the public support for it.
And I want to see more of it because this is the type of application, like we said two weeks ago, that really embodies the hacker spirit here.
This is a very values-aligned organization to the hacker community.
And I think, you know, we need to see more of this, and we need to encourage more of it.
And, you know, these ideas, it usually is the simple idea that is the most valuable.
Because think of what you're doing here.
You're basically, you're pressing a big red button to say, send these messages to these people that I've written and defined, and that's basically it.
But nobody thought of it before.
Nobody did this before.
So there are countless other simple, basic ideas out there that nobody has done that could be essential for our freedom, for all kinds of important parts of our lives.
So if you have an idea like that, please, you know, pursue it.
Talk about it.
Let us know about it.
We'll help you get the word out.
Just as we're doing here tonight, we're talking about the ReadyNow app.
It's ReadyNow!
You can find it on whatever app store you use for your phone.
We're talking with Paris Richter, who is the director of the Human Rights First Innovation Lab, which put out this app.
And I'm just wondering, how long did it take to put this together?
Do you know when the idea was first brought up?
It was January.
It's been, I guess, just under six months.
This was a kind of rapid response effort.
I mean, there was a massive scramble among the immigrant rights community when Trump was elected about, okay, now what?
I mean, of course, there'd been some kind of wargaming and planning before that scenario, but I still think we were somehow surprised when it happened again.
And we were just scrambling to think, you know, what can we do to help?
And recognizing just how much fear, you know, even if someone isn't detained, the fear alone, right?
Like, that has such a horrible psychological impact, and it means that kids aren't going to school, and people aren't going to doctor's appointments, and families aren't going to get food assistance.
I mean, the ripple effects are huge.
So, you know, what can we do to directly support families?
There are lots of tools that are being developed that really kind of amplify the work of advocates or accelerate the work of attorneys.
We wanted to do something that would really support families.
And, yes, this is an emergency alert if you need it, and if you don't, maybe it's a little peace of mind.
802-321-4225 is our phone number.
We're speaking with Paris Richter about the app, ReadyNow, to help immigrants who might be targeted by ICE to get the word out that something has, in fact, happened to them.
Paris, I had a question about where the app can be used.
Is there a possibility you could use this on a PC?
It is a mobile application.
Okay.
Yeah, it's a React Native mobile application.
So, not currently.
Okay.
Because I was thinking, you know, if, say, you were a lawyer that had a number of clients, and you found out that one of them was, in fact, targeted,
you could have a whole series of these red buttons on your desktop, and you could just, you know, press one, and it would contact family members and other people.
Obviously, not their lawyer, since that's who you would be, but just a way of kind of a switchboard of sending out urgent messages in certain situations.
Just a thought that that might be useful.
I think we had a phone call, but I hear an off-hook tone, so I don't think we have a phone call anymore.
So, whoever that was, that might be them now.
No?
We're being pranked?
Is that what's going on?
All right.
802-321-4225.
Dial faster than the person that's hanging up, and you'll get on.
Go ahead, Rob.
While we're waiting for that phone call, Paris, could you speak a little bit about the organization itself and what led you to get involved in this sort of work?
Sure.
Yeah, so the Human Rights First is a human rights organization with a focus on immigrant and refugee rights within the U.S., protecting human rights defenders abroad,
and holding bad actors accountable through a sanctions program.
We have an accountability program, and we have a newly formed democracy protection team that advocates, you know, to protect our democratic institutions.
We've been around, you know, so it's a broad range of issues, but all kind of focused around democracy protection and protecting the rule of law,
as defined by the ICCs, human rights, oh gosh, I'm blanking on the name of the fancy thing.
There's a lot of them.
So, it's been running for, I think, almost 50 years now.
We're about, I think, 60 people, many of whom are lawyers, and lawyers turned kind of hill advocates.
And then we have our team.
Now, I don't know if we actually went over this.
We were talking about the concept of the app, that something happens to somebody, they press the button,
and they filled out all these, I guess, questions with people to contact.
How many different questions are there?
Do you know?
When you say questions, you mean messages?
Messages, messages, well, it asks you, you know, do you, I can't think of an exact question it would ask,
but different categories, family.
Sure.
Yeah, so there's a message for your attorney if you have it.
If not, there's that opt-in for the pro bono network.
There's a message for your personal safety.
So, that is the information your loved ones would need to advocate, to find you within the system, first of all,
and advocate for your safety.
So, if you need critical medications, you know, the name and number of your attorney,
where to find your key documents that might be needed to advocate for your release.
Then there's a message for child care, for elder and other dependent care, for pet care,
people love their pets, and for work absences.
But you can also create additional messages that are outside of those categories.
And I'd say within each one of these messages, there's probably an average of five pieces of information
that we recommend that you include.
So, yes, that's kind of the structure of the plan.
Okay, we have a phone call.
I suspect this phone call might veer off topic, but let's see if it does.
Good evening.
You're on off the hook.
Go ahead.
Yes, Emmanuel, calling from Siberia, Russia.
Oh, Rebel, you're in Siberia?
Is that true?
Yes, Siberia, Russia, Novosibirsk, Russia, the third largest city in Russia.
Now I feel bad putting you on hold for that long.
Okay, well, quickly.
Well, I mean, I'm paying a pretty dollar for this call.
I'm sure you are.
I'm using my regular phone.
Now I feel better.
So, tell us something about Siberia in one minute or less, because that's all the time you really have.
Well, it's just like, it's the third largest city in Russia, and it's just like in, you know, Moscow, St. Petersburg.
It's really nice, and people are, you know, nice.
I was, you know, out, you know, yesterday, and people were eating in cafes, and, you know.
They do that, huh?
And, of course, the metro's nice.
I, of course, you know, metro's one of my favorite parts.
And, of course, you know, you know, well, the other night, I really got, like, hammered.
I just drank vodka, of course.
Wow, okay.
That's something to hear about.
But you're in Siberia, and it's of your own choosing you're there.
Is that correct?
Oh, yeah.
We have to ask.
All right.
Well, you know, you're talking about immigration and, like, asking.
We have a big red button for you to push, if not, so.
Well, you're talking about Africa.
You know, countries in Russia that would not be tolerated, if I was to just, you know, want to stay here and, you know,
someone develops an app that says, hey, we have immigration coming, they would not tolerate this in Russia.
Well, let me introduce you to the Trump administration, because it's getting very similar over here, and it's getting very scary over here.
So maybe you can take some notes while you're in Siberia and bring it back here so that we know what we have to look forward to.
All right.
So we're going to have to leave it there.
I'm sorry, Rebel.
I know I hate to leave you in Siberia like this, but actually, you know, it's kind of funny, too.
But we have to go, because we're almost out of time.
And I want to give our guest the last word here to give any more information.
Paris Richter, thank you so much for joining us and talking about this app, the Ready Now app,
again, available on all the app stores, Android and iPhone and all that.
Anything else that you want to tell us or any kind of contact info or website or whatnot?
Go ahead.
Sure.
Yeah, we have a website called hrfinnovation.org.
The app itself, like I said, is Ready Now!
Hrfinnovation, which is available for download.
You know, I think if you go to our Instagram or our LinkedIn or Twitter, you can, we've posted
about it recently.
You can share it with your networks.
And I'd say for something that they can do right now.
You know, that could be donating, that could be putting your body, you know, in front of
a federal building to block ICE agents, that could be showing up to a protest, or that could
be, you know, helping someone, an immigrant neighbor, help get their Ready Now plan set
up and kind of walk, sitting there and walking, walking them through it.
So there's lots of ways you can help them.
That's true.
And listening to WBAI, supporting WBAI, keeping these voices speaking and reaching people is
so essential.
So please support all of it.
Support speech and freedom.
And yes, your neighbors and your friends.
And we're going to find out how important people power is.
We're going to find out more and more as the days, weeks, months, years proceed.
Uh, we'll be back next week with another, uh, full length show followed by overtime, no
overtime tonight.
Uh, but again, support WBAI, give to WBAI.org or buddy.wbai.org.
Thanks very much to our guest, uh, Paris Richter.
Uh, and, um, we will keep updated on this app as well as the other apps that we are talking
about and write to us, OTH at 2600.com.
Good night.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.
We'll be right back.
Amen.