Immigration and Disinformation with Qasim Rashid (S02 E01)

Send us Fan MailCONTENT WARNINGDescriptions of incarceration, the treatment of detaineesSYNOPSISHuman rights lawyer and immigration attorney Qasim Rashid joins Rachel and Dan to dismantle the myth of a clear, consistent "legal way" to immigrate. The conversation moves between misinformation about the immigration system itself and misinformation about immigrants as people, ultimately examining the bipartisan failure to counter demonizing narratives. Rachel and Dan close with the lenses of Law-Abiding Citizen and Zero-Sum Framing.INTERVIEW WITH QASIM RASHIDQasim Rashid — human rights lawyer, author, and former U.S. congressional candidateDying of Whiteness by Jonathan Metzl — referenced on rural white communities opposing Medicaid expansionThe New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander — referenced on sophisticated modern expressions of racismStamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi — referenced on racism and educationCato Institute research on immigration and wages — cited on immigrants' effect on native-born wagesProPublica report on wrongly detained U.S. citizens — cited on citizens arrested on suspicion of being immigrantsLENSESLens 1: Law-Abiding Citizen Systems often assume users can simply intuit and follow their rules, without asking whether those rules are clearly communicated in the first place. This lens asks whether a system's apparent simplicity is real or assumed — and whether confusion or noncompliance is a design failure being  blamed on the individual.How does the system communicate its rules, and can a user reasonably be expected to understand them without interpretation?How easy does the system make it to be a "law-abiding citizen" within it?If the system isn't communicating its rules well, is that a byproduct of messiness — or intentional?Lens 2: Zero-Sum Framing Many systems, and the narratives built around them, implicitly frame resources, opportunity, or belonging as finite — where one group's gain necessarily means another's loss. This lens looks for where that zero-sum framing is being applied, whether it reflects reality, and who benefits from convincing people to see the world that way.Where does the system (or the discourse around it) frame things in terms of scarce, competing resources?Is the zero-sum trade-off actually true, or is it a rhetorical or negotiating tactic?Who benefits from people believing a situation is zero-sum when it may not be?Episode edited by Jared Landis https://www.landispodcastediting.com/_____________________________________________________PersonnelDan Brown, HostRachel Price, HostMusicTurtle Up Fool, by Elliot_____________________________________________________Unchecked is a production of Curious SquidCurious Squid is a digital design consulting firm specializing in information architecture, user experience, and product design