In The Thick

Maria and Julio sit down with queer Latinx writer Gabby Rivera, who wrote AMERICA featuring Marvel's first Latina lesbian superhero, America Chavez. They chat about why representation matters, celebrating POC joy and how Maria may just be Gabby's madrina.  For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Want to suppo...

Maria and Julio are joined by Marcela García, columnist and editorial board member with The Boston Globe, and Betty Francisco, founder of FitNation Ventures and Latina Circle, LIVE from The Podcast Garage. Looking at access to educational, economic and political power, they discuss how visible or invisible is the Latino community is in the Boston area.  For information regarding your data privacy,...

Maria and Julio check in on the week's news before the long weekend. They chat about President Trump's latest "immigration roundtable" on Long Island this week that conflated MS-13 with immigration, and the ACLU's publishing of government documents that allegedly show that the CBP abused and mistreated unaccompanied immigrant children during the Obama administration. And they catch up on this week...

Maria and Julio catch their breaths from all the incredible live shows and catch up on some major headlines with all-star Terrell Jermaine Starr, senior reporter at The Root, and María Peña, reporter with La Opinión. Terrell explains how Trump is fulfilling his white supremacy fantasy with his rhetoric and actions taken towards the Russia probe and immigration policy. And María Peña, who just retu...

Maria and Julio chat about two headlines from this week—Trump's recent derogatory comments about immigrants and the latest fatal school shooting in Texas. Then they dig into the sexual misconduct allegations against author Junot Díaz, breaking down the complexity of the intersection of race, immigration status and gender in the Me Too movement. For information regarding your data privacy, visit ac...

In part two of In The Thick's LIVE series at DePaul University, Maria and Julio continue the conversation about Latinos and mass incarceration. Despite making up 19 percent of the U.S. prison population, mass incarceration is often talked about in terms of the black-white binary. How does mass incarceration impact Latino communities, and especially so under the Trump administration? Prison reform...

Maria and Julio find pieces of hope and joy amidst heart-sinking sounds of the latest news, from DACA to undocumented journalists being detained by ICE. Julio raps a little Public Enemy while they breakdown the latest headlines of white people calling 911 on people of color. And they chat about Childish Gambino’s powerful music video of his new song “This Is America.” For information regarding you...

Maria and Julio recently hosted an In The Thick LIVE show from DePaul University series on Latinos and Mass Incarceration. For the first conversation, they're joined by Luis “Suave” Gonzalez, a former juvenile lifer and now a prison reform activist. Along with hearing Suave's story, Julio also interviews Maria, who has been covering Suave's story for more than 25 years. Stay tuned for part two and...

After a busy week of live shows in Chicago, Maria and Julio catch up on the week's two biggest headlines: anti-austerity protests in Puerto Rico and former New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani, exposing President Trump's lies by saying in a TV interview that Trump reimbursed his attorney, Michael Cohen, for the Stormy Daniels hush money payment. They also chat about how Giuliani fits into the white...

Maria and Julio are joined by all-star guest, Wajahat Ali, TV host and contributor to The New York Times, and author/filmmaker Raquel Cepeda. They discuss the latest news from the Michelle Wolf's roast at the White House Correspondents Dinner to the Central American refugee caravan. They also talk about the influence of white rage in shaping the 2016 election and the nation's current politics. For...

Maria and Julio are joined by Futuro Media's Executive Director, Erika Dilday, to process and discuss the Bill Cosby guilty verdict for sexual assault. They talk about Cosby's complicated (or... not so complicated) legacy and the role of race and the Me Too movement. Maria and Erika share their personal Me Too stories.  For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy   See aca...

After catching up on the news, Maria and Julio discuss the future of the Latino community and what it means for political movements and democracy. Joining them are Lucy Flores, Vice President of Public Affairs with mitú and a former Nevada assemblywoman, and Carlos Jesus Calzadilla-Palacio, Founder and President of Young Progressives of America. For information regarding your data privacy, visit a...

With Maria away traveling, Julio sits down with Futuro Media’s Executive Director, Erika Dilday, for a special In The Thick conversation. As this Friday marks 19 years since the Columbine High School massacre and the second national student walkout for gun control following the Parkland shooting, Julio and Erika discuss the POC perspective of gun violence as a symptom of a larger issue in the coun...

Maria calls up all-star guest, Christina Greer, professor at Fordham University and fellow at NYU's McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and Research, to get an In The Thick take on the latest news. Then, Maria and Julio sit down with actor and artist, James McDaniel, who is best known for his role as Lieutenant Arthur Fancy in the groundbreaking series, NYPD Blue, and has also recently starred i...

Maria and Julio catch up on the week's news. They chat about the saucy details from James Comey's forthcoming memoir; corruption in federal immigration agencies; the fed's raid of President Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen; Republicans who are dropping like flies; and, whether the latest attack in Syria will lead the U.S. into another war.  For information regarding your data privacy, visit...

In this episode of In The Thick, Maria and Julio are joined by Shelby Chestnut, National Organizing and Policy Strategist with Transgender Law Center, and Verónica Bayetti Flores, freelance writer and co-host of Radio Menea. They discuss the LGBT rights movement and how the media can do a better job of covering the LGBT community. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privac...

In this ITT Extra, Maria and Julio highlight three stories you may have missed this week because... Trump: the missing migrant voices from the coverage of the Central American refugee caravan; the conviction of former Bolivian president Gonzalo "Goni" Sánchez de Lozada for the killings of mostly indigenous civilians during the 2003 gas protests; and the latest police shooting of unarmed black man,...

Julio sits down with Marielena Hincapié, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, and In The Thick All-Star guest Sandra Lilley, editor of NBC News-Latino, to discuss the 2020 Census and the newly added citizenship question. While breaking down the Census' problematic history of counting people of color, they highlight the serious and long-term repercussions of undercounting in t...

Maria and Julio give a little history lesson about the complicated legacy of César Chávez. From the conservative trope that Chávez was anti-immigration to Maria meeting Chávez for the first time at a Halloween parade, they talk about the real history of this national figure. They also highlight the activism of Chávez's badass comrade, Dolores Huerta, who is often written out of history, yet is sti...

Maria and Julio are joined by two In The Thick All Star guests, Wajahat Ali, TV host and contributor to  The New York Times , and Christina Greer, professor at Fordham University and fellow at NYU's McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and Research. They catch up on the weekend's news: the power of youth at the March For Our Lives demonstrations and the Stormy Daniels  60 Minutes  interview. The...

Maria and Julio catch up on this week's news waterfall: President Trump's last-minute flip-flop on DACA and the spending bill, the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica scandal, why Trump is mad about a leaky White House and Sunday's tragic Sacramento police shooting of an unarmed black man, Stephon Clark. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy   See acast.com/privacy for priv...

Winter is ending... we think. Julio and Maria do a little spring cleaning and dig into some of the latest news with Terrell Jermaine Starr, senior reporter at The Root, and Justine Calma, fellow at Grist and The Investigative Fund with The Nation Institute. It's been six months since Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico, so we discuss where the recovery stands, the federal response (or lack of) and...

Julio and Maria kick back this Friday and catch up on the week's news—from the Pennsylvania special election in a disappearing congressional district to the power of youth walking out of school to protest gun violence. They also chat about courageous women of color, like undocumented immigration activist Maru Mora-Villalpando, who filed a complaint against ICE and Lizbeth Mateo, an attorney and Dr...

Boston is known as a progressive city, but it's also notorious for being one of the most racist cities in the United States. Julio, who's lived in Boston for over 30 years, breaks it down with former mayoral candidate Tito Jackson, Boston Globe reporter Nicole Dungca and artist/activist Eroc Arroyo-Montano. How has Boston's racism impacted the city's POC community—from healthcare to the Red Sox? B...

For this Friday version of ITT FYI, Maria and Julio answer some emails from our listeners, with an assist from Futuro Media's Maya Doig-Acuña, who tells us why we missed some big points in our recent Episode 101 Hollywood show. Also, North Korea, Stormy Daniels and the viral video showing Border Patrol detaining a woman right in the middle of a California street. For information regarding your dat...