California is talking about a firefighter
shortage because prisoner firefighters, a
number of them, have been released due to
COVID or are sick with COVID.
Explain what’s going on and the fact that
they make a dollar an hour, if they’re healthy
enough to fight the fires.
Yeah, so, these conditions, they’re just
— I mean, they’re deplorable.
I mean, you have, I believe it’s 600 less
firefighters this year, and we’re facing
some of the largest wildfires that we’ve
ever had in the state.
These guys are out 24, 48 hours at a time.
That young man came from Delta Camp.
That camp, they are — I just talked to somebody
there, and they’re leaving at 5:00 in the
morning, not getting back 'til 8:00 at night.
And this is every day.
So they're being overworked, and for, you
know, a dollar an hour.
I mean, you know, they’re working alongside
firefighters that aren’t incarcerated people,
that are making — we don’t know how much,
and putting their lives on the lines.
And it’s just — it’s a little bit of
a human tragedy.
They’re fighting — they’re battling
COVID-19, and they’re battling wildfires
at the same time.
Rasheed, I wanted to ask you about Kamala
Harris, the nominee of the Democratic Party
for vice president.
When she was attorney general of California,
she advocated against early release programs
for incarcerated people, because it would
reduce the number of incarcerated firefighters.
Could you talk about her role and this whole
issue of the politics of how to deal with
the incarcerated and the fighting of fires
in California?
Yeah, well, the fact is, it impacts our state
economy, right?
They’re saving $100 million a year on having
formerly incarcerated individuals fighting
these fires.
And it’s a little bit of a slap in the face
to those of us who are incarcerated, who are
trying to, you know, be the best that we can
be and put our lives on the lines to go out
here and fight these fires.
But, you know, her doing that and being a
part of mass incarceration as the district
attorney, she essentially is signing people
up for slavery, right?
You want these guys to go out and fight these
fires and do it for only a dollar an hour,
and then you’re turning around and saying,
“Oh, we don’t want to release anybody,
because it’s going to cost the state this
much”?
It’s deplorable.
