El-Sayed’s Win is a Win Against AIPAC Money; Plus, Petition to Prevent Datacenters in Space; And,China Relates Against US Sanctions

Good morning. It's Thursday, August 6, 2025. This is Off Front. I'm Brian Edwards-Tieker. On today's show, we'll talk about the primary victory for Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, and the concurrent defeat for APAC mean for pro-Palestinian organizing with Iman Abid Thompson from the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights. Then, data centers in space... Earth Justice is petitioning the FCC to slam on the brakes with an environmental review. We'll talk with one of their plaintiffs. Ruskin Hartley of Dark Sky International. Finally, China retaliates against the latest round of sanctions from the Trump administration with sanctions and export controls of its own. We'll talk to Jake Warner of the Quincy Institute. It's all coming up next. after the news i'm max pringle with these headlines the number of americans applying for unemployment benefits rose last week but layoffs remain in the historically healthy range of the past few years The Labor Department said U.S. filings for jobless aid in the week ending August 1st rose by 1,000 to 199,000. The previous week's figure was revised up by 1,000 to 198,000. Weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered representative of layoffs and are close to real-time indicators of the health of the U.S. job market. A Senate committee is set to vote today on whether to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for refusing to answer questions at a hearing last week on his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. If he's found in contempt, the Senate could refer him to the Justice Department for potential prosecution. Anthony Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination more than 100 times at a hearing last week. Iran said Wednesday it's in the final stage of drafting an agreement with Oman over the Strait of Hormuz. And President Trump has said a deal could be announced this week. The agreement is likely to be contingent on the U.S. lifting its blockade on Iran. Mitch McCann has more. On the surface, if this reporting is correct, and negotiations result in Iran controlling inbound traffic in the strait and possibly some of the outbound traffic, it would seem like a concession. Remember that before this started, the movement of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz was free-flowing. In addition, one official has told Reuters, the news agency, that Tehran is seeking fees of between 5% and 7% of cargo values from vessels using the strait. Now, the US is likely to... if that is the case because it has said there will be no tolls. That's Mitch McCann. Health workers at the epicenter of the Congo's Ebola outbreak are protesting over unpaid wages. They abandoned several health facilities today demanding payment. The Ebola outbreak is the worst on record, causing 1,700 deaths. More from Chris Ochamaringa in Kinshasa.

According to the officials here in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the issue of this outbreak having occurred in an active conflict zone where a number of armed groups have really hampered the response efforts by the health workers. They're supposed to be carrying out what they call contact tracing, tracking all people who came into contact with patients who have been confirmed to have Ebola. But that's not possible because some of the areas are off limits. There are a number of rebel groups who have been attacking people and caused massive displacement. That's one of the problems. That's Chris Ochamaringa. Ukrainian president Volodemir Volodymyr Zelensky says Ukraine has hit more oil facilities deep inside Russia. Karen Chamos has more. Ukrainian forces targeted refineries in Bashkortostan and the Yaroslavl region in an attempt to weaken Russia's wartime economy. They also hit Russian military patrol boats in the Black Sea. Meanwhile, Russian drone and glide bomb attacks across Ukraine killed at least three civilians and wounded several others. Volodymyr Zelensky is urging allies to supply interceptor missiles to bolster Ukraine's air defenses. Speaking a day earlier during a meeting with Britain's defense... Minister Volodymyr Zelensky said, this is this night again the signal before the winter we think that we need the unanimity and we need strong support from your country and from all other European friends that this is a signal also that Russia gives us and to the world that they don't want to stop. Analysts believe Russia is attempting to exhaust Ukraine through endless barrages. I'm Karen Shamas. Police arrested a Valley Springs man and charged him with recklessly starting the GAN fire in Calaveras County. The blaze has scorched 10,000 acres and forced mandatory evacuations. Cal Fire announced that Herbert Wayne Smith was arrested Monday. He was later released on bond and has declined to comment. Cal Fire confirmed that at least seven structures had been destroyed in the fire, but did not clarify what types of structures they were. The agency also said one firefighter was injured on the first night of the fire in a dozer incident. Calaveras County school officials said classes will resume today after shutting down Wednesday over health concerns over smoky air. Officials said the fire was 19% contained as of Wednesday night. Some 250 unionized scientists picketed for raises and an end to the governor's return to office mandate in Sacramento Wednesday. California Association of Professional Scientists UAW Local 1115 organized the picket after the legislature did not include raises for the scientists in this year's budget, something Union President Jacqueline Takak said is outlined in their contract. CAPS UAW's contract expires next summer. The state scientists were scheduled to receive special salary adjustments ranging from 3% to 5% on July 1st. That's according to contract language, but the governor's office said those raises were contingent on the legislature setting aside the funding. California lawmakers did not appropriate the funding so employees did not receive their raises.

The wage increase would have totaled roughly $25 million. Meanwhile, the Sacramento City Unified School District is taking its dispute over a rejected labor agreement to the state after the Sacramento County Office of Education overturned part of the district's financial recovery plan last week. The SCUSD Board of Education voted five to nothing this week to approve a resolution authorizing an appeal to the state superintendent of public instruction after SCOE denied the board. approval of a teacher union agreement projected to provide $97.6 million in financial relief over three years. Sunny today in the San Francisco Bay Area highs in the 70s, low to not in the 50s. In the Central Valley, sunny today, highs over 100, lows tonight in the 70s. Those are the headlines. I'm Max Pringle on KPFA. Just about 708 in the morning. The show is up front. My name is Brian Edwards Teakert. Now, to return to the Michigan primary victory of Abdul El-Sayed. The election was, among other things, a referendum on the political power of APAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which invested a record-breaking $30 million in defeating Abdul El-Sayed and failed. Syed's been an outspoken supporter of Palestinian rights and a critic of U.S. military aid to Israel. One day after its election win, he held a press conference thanking Jewish supporters that he found along the way. To all of my sisters and brothers of the Jewish faith or any faith at all or no faith at all, I want you to know that my commitment to your safety, my commitment to Jewish safety, is the same commitment that I have to the safety of my own daughters. We wanted to talk about the Abdul El-Sayed victory, what it signals about the waning political power of pro-Israel organizations and what possibilities it creates for pro-Palestinian organizing. So we have invited on Iman Abid Thompson, director of organizing and advocacy at the U.S. campaign for Palestinian rights. Thanks very much for speaking to us again. Thanks so much. So what was the first thing that went through your head when the race got called? Oh boy. I mean, it was a nail-biting evening into morning, awaiting the results and trying to see what was going to happen. I think for all of us who have seen the numbers at this point, we recognize that this wasn't some sort of landslide. It was within a percentage point of a victory, which was absolutely incredible, incredible to witness. I think for our movement, our eyes have been on this Senate race for an extremely long time throughout the course of the last year. And it was just wild to see the victory come through. We knew it would have happened, and we knew it wasn't going to be easy, but it was just wonderful to kind of witness all of that in the moment.

It was a very narrow victory after the Syed campaign had released a lot of internal polling figures that suggested he would cruise to a double digit victory in that primary. Did the margins surprise you? I mean, not necessarily. I think that we, you know, polls can show one thing and then the end of the day results are a complete another, you know, other things. So I think at this point in time, we recognize the state of Michigan is not necessary. It's a swing state, right? And we also recognize it's an off year. So not everyone is going to turn out to vote. Oftentimes, I believe that the voter engaged turnout ended up being a higher than a 2022 race that was similar to this one. But regardless, you know, we recognize the fact that it wasn't going to be easy to turn folks out. We recognize. that it was going to be something that was going to require a lot of work and advocacy and effort to continue amplifying. And we also recognize the fact that Abdullah Saeed was up against the entire monster of a machine here. I know you just mentioned the $30 million, right? But there were $60 million thrown against him. So we recognize just how influential money can be in these types of races. But the fact that he stuck to principle, the fact that he was able to get just enough people out to vote in his direction is just wild. It's just an incredible moment to experience and to witness. And just also cognizant of the fact that we are up against a moment in time where these sorts of institutions, these old time traditional politics are kind of folding in on themselves. And sometimes it's not going to always look pretty. And that's how I think a little bit of what we witnessed. So like the reflex of political commentary is just to say, you know, public opinions changing on Israel, and this is a signal of that. These political stories always kind of obscure the work of organizing. What did it take on the ground to make that victory possible? I mean, I think that there's something to be said about the fat that over the course of the last three years alone. I mean, the Palestinian movement wasn't born out of the genocide in Gaza, right? I think that oftentimes right now when we talk about the specific movement, we talk about the most recent point of escalation that's been happening across Gaza, specifically with the genocide. But we recognize that since the existence of the state of Israel, that the Palestinian people in the Palestinian movement have been organizing on the ground to not only dignify Palestinians, but to also outright speak out against this complicit. this complicit nature that so many institutions have supported, both to fuel the apartheid that has been ongoing now for the last 70s, eight years, but also this most recent genocide. And so I think that there's been a lot of work done over the last few decades, but specifically in the last three years, I want to acknowledge that there are folks who have been outright doing everything they possibly can to ensure that not only do their members of congress know exactly where they stand on this but especially their own community members and encouraging everyone and everyone not to be silent on the issue of the genocide in gaza and i'm talking about everyone and anyone i mean i've spoken to educators who have done everything they can in their schools to talk about palestine i've spoken to nurses who have done everything in their own institutions to remove any and all

corporations who work with Israel out of their hospital institutions. It's just an incredible amount of work and labor that has been going into making sure that the Palestinian movement is well and alive. And when we talk about the work that's been ongoing, I think three years ago, I don't think any of our movement members, including myself or our organization, could have ever witnessed or believed that Palestine would actually become a core electoral issue at one point in time. But just due to that commitment, do that dedication of the people across the movement, we have witnessed a tremendous growth spur of like not only awareness of the campaign, but a power. And it's become so powerful that it's been able to even land itself at the core of this discussion on one of the most prominent Senate races regarding Abdul El-Sayed. And I think it's just been absolutely amazing watching all of that grow. Despite the fact that we have been witnessing ongoing atrocity day in, day out, we are finally starting to see somewhat. of a light being shown into the institutions here that have traditionally always stood by the side of the oppressor. But I think that because so much has been ongoing because of the work of the movement and so much has been ongoing, even by folks like Abdulazid, who are choosing to not necessarily forego or to compromise on what the Palestinian has been asking for, I think we're finally at a place where we're actually reckoning with the truth and not exceptionalizing Palestine as we once did. It seems like in terms of the political mechanics, there were a couple super interesting developments. One is that although APEC had a ton of money to spend on this race, it spent exactly none of it talking about Israel. Like they are afraid of the unpopularity of their own issue. And the saying was that Abdullah Sayyed seemed to get some traction out of attacking APEC over waiting into the race, calling out what was happening instead of, you know, like many politicians before him have done, just kind of running and getting defensive over charges of anti-Semitism.

Yeah, I mean, I think that again, I think it's important to acknowledge what's happening, right? I think that not just for this specific campaign in Michigan, but so many of the progressive victories that have happened over the last couple of months alone, we've witnessed, you know, where folks are heading on and really leaning into this rejecting of APAC, right, acknowledging that they don't want this type of money coming into these politics and that it shouldn't sway politicians in any one direction. And it shouldn't silence other people who are speaking out against Israeli policies. and the constant perpetuation of this genocide in Gaza. So I think that he's been fighting up against these systems, just as so many other progressives who have actually done the exact same thing and have won. So I think it's a little bit of a shift from what we've seen in the past, as you mentioned. And people are moving past these sorts of accusations and recognizing that we all have a right to ask ourselves where these taxpayer dollars are that we. we are contributing to, are actually going. And at the core of what Abdul ASEID has been saying regarding APAC has been that, acknowledging that again, we don't want to necessarily want candidates in office who are actually supporting these types of institutions that are prioritizing others over us. Yeah. I know it's still very early to parse through the Election Day data, but I'm curious what it tells you about who the Syed campaign drew to turn out. And, you know, how that compares to who it needs to turn out to win the general. I mean, I think that Abdul El-Sayed recognizes and the campaign itself recognizes that it needs a big tent to win, right? I think that's something that there's a lot to be said about the fact around what sentiments he shared soon after the victory. And I think that's a recognition of the fact that we know we need everyone out there. We need everyone to really support a candidate like him in order to win. It can't just be the Palestinian movement who turns out. It can't just be the Muslim or out of constituents that turn out. It's everyone. And I think that's something that he's actually really understood. The campaign has truly understood. understood from the get-go. And I think that even as we've spent so much time talking about Israel Palestine, I recognize the fact that one of the things that we are, you know, the campaign itself was trying to also do was not only bring attention to what was happening in Palestine, but really helping people understand how do we divert. how do we really start to divest from these institutions of harm and start investing in these institutions of care, right? Medicare for all and encouraging, you know, safe and just communities to protect all underrepresented people. I mean, it has been at the core of the campaign for themselves. So I think that there's a recognition of the fact that there are people that he is serving. And they may not necessarily always agree with this politic, but it's going to require so many people to turn out and actually support him, especially if we want to win against, you know, a Trump-backed candidate. And I think that this is a moment and an opportunity for everyone to really kind of reckon with this moment, take some time to absorb, take some time to process and recognize what's at stake. Yeah. I mean, his campaign, it was interesting. I was going through a bunch of his past statements.

And they always framed this in terms of a kind of across-the-board position against military aid. You know, he would say I'm against unconditional military aid to Israel, but also Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan, kind of ticking off other authoritarian countries in the region. And always framed it in terms of needing to meet needs at home. It's actually a little weird to me because it's almost anti-internationalist politics. It doesn't talk about scenarios under which you might want the U.S. government to shell out a lot of money abroad in solidarity with, say, the reconstruction of Gaza. I mean, again, I haven't necessarily taken a hard look at his record of statements from the past, but I think recognizing the fact that we are in a position where we have always, you know, it's been, it's so easy at the federal level to consistently support and fund these sorts of international initiatives, right? Like either to engage in war and escalation across different regions, particularly here in the Middle East. But I think that there's a want for us, especially for those who are choosing to run to represent the people, to remind ourselves of the duty that these people have to bring the attention back to what. is needed most here. Again, domestic issues are oftentimes compromised. Funding is almost nowhere to be found for the very pillars of society and the very pillars of a thriving community are nowhere to be found. But yet somehow we are always able to fund a war. We are always able to fund a genocide. And I think that or fund even some of these authoritarian regimes, which may have more prominent business ventures out there for the federal administration. But I think that there's a need for us to remind ourselves of the duty we have for the people that we are choosing to represent here. I mean, our movement is responsible for the people that are all. also here in America, the people who are of whom are constantly oppressed, the people of whom, you know, there are, again, these institutions have harmed. And I think that there are also, there's also this idea and this understanding by those who are choosing to run for office, that it's their duty to make sure that we bring the attention back to what's needed here. So whether or not it's anti-internationalist, to me, it doesn't necessarily seem as like the argument. For me, it's more around what do we need to bring the attention back to. And I think in this case, that's what I think is happening. How much use is it to you as an organizer here in the US to flip one Senate seat? One seat alone is not a vote to cut funding for Israel out of omnibus spending bill. It's extremely important, right? Especially because we're talking about the Senate. I think we're in a position now where we haven't had many advocates in the Senate. And I think it's really important to recognize that every additional person who gets brought in who actually supports these positions and these principles will only move us one step closer. I mean, again, we don't have the majority in Congress, either the House or the Senate, that are supportive of these issues. Unfortunately, many members of Congress are still so far behind from where the general American public is at.

time we were able to get a path, you know, a path to victory for a candidate like Abdul Asaid, the more of an opportunity we have to make sure that Palestine is not sidelined, that the issues at hand that matter most to people are not sidelined. Because these candidates, specifically like Abdullah Saeed in Michigan, are not necessarily running just for Palestine. They're running on issues that matter so much to people outside of this issue alone. And I think that it's only a victory for him is not just a victory for our move, but it's truly a victory for everyone else. And, you know, again, we're talking, there's so many additional victories that have also now happened on the House side. And they still, you know, most politicians who stand on our side, those who are even going to become, you know, coming into the new Congress still don't represent a majority of Congress. But regardless, those few more members of Congress there to support our issues become that much more important helping building the block that will make sure that we are our issues are not sidelined. This is all presuming, of course, that he wins the general election, where polls indicate he's currently, you know, within the margin of error with the Republican who's taken the nomination for the open seat in Michigan. I imagine the types of attack someone like Abdullah Saeed faces in a Democratic primary. are just in order of magnitude gentler than what he would face in a general going up against a Republican campaign apparatus that has very few compunctions about engaging in racist demagoguery, conspiracyism outright lying. How have you been thinking about the rest of the campaign, the attacks and, you know, what part of American society those attacks will be appealing to. Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, we've already heard some of it, right, whether it be through the primary, but I think even post the results coming through, I think, you know, many of us have likely seen the Trump statement that came out around how supposedly fraudulent some of the election districts were across Michigan. and how, you know, again, calling out Abdulazai for being Muslim and all these other sorts of things. I mean, the Islamophobic remarks are going to keep coming. The anti-Palestinian racism is going to keep coming through. This language, you know, this lens of supposed, you know, distinguishing these sorts of progressives as, quote, unquote, terrorist is going to come through. I mean, the language is going to be abysmal. And I think that this is something that, you know, by. be it fueled by the federal administration, be it fueled even by APEC. APEC most recently put out a statement, I believe, you know, thanking Haley Stevens for the work that she had done on the campaign, but also saying that they are outright going to do everything they can to make sure Abdullah Sagi doesn't win. And so I can't not. I cannot even fathom how dirty this race is going to become. But I think because of that, and there's something to be said, I want to acknowledge as well. The fact that they can't even target him on policy, they just target him based on identity just kind of proves just how racist these institutions truly, truly are. Since, again, so much of what I even shared here and what we've already seen has been based on.

his identity, his identity as a Muslim, his identity as a non-white male. And I think that that's something to be, there's something to be said about that. So yeah, I just, I just think we've got a long fight against us between now and November. In terms of the coalition for his kind of politics, it was notable that he lost Wayne County, the county that includes Detroit, heavily black county. But it's also, you know, the county where he was director of health when he last served in Michigan's government. I'm curious, like, what you think about the coalition building that has to happen in your work between... Arab and black communities. You know, we're very fortunate as an organization, but only really as a movement. A lot of our work and our movement opportunities, our movement strengths have come from really learning from the Black Liberation Movement. And I think that's something to be said about the fact that while our movement is not necessarily new, there's a lot that's been happening kind of in parallel to the Black Liberation Movement and what's been happening, you know, be it through Black Lives Matter, even be it before that. And so there's a recognition of acknowledging those who have come before us, work, those who continue to face the repression of the advocacy work that they do, and the importance of movements like ours were showing up for one another. And our movement is also deeply, deeply built off of the interconnectedness and this idea of interconnected, you know, this intersectional liberation, that our liberation is truly... truly never going to happen without the liberation of others. And most importantly, our issue is not even going to be an issue at all for voters if we don't help build the understanding as to how and why it matters, why it should matter to those who may not have anything to do with Palestine. So, you know, that work has been ongoing regardless of an election season or not. And I think that's also understood by so many people running for office. I mean, again, well, people are still, there's a lot of building. This is a really a big building year. There's a big opportunity for us to also. bridge those relationships that need to be had, but also recognizing that there's actually a lot of strong foundations between movements and between communities like these that have already been formed, that can continue being capitalized upon and encouraged to continue to strengthen. And I think that's going to be extremely necessary here, especially with this race.

Iman Abid Thompson, now that Abdul El-Sayed is going to be on the general election ballot for Senate in Michigan, like what is your organization, the U.S. campaign for Palestinian rights doing? What are your partners doing? How are you moving people and resources? I mean, I think at this point we're going to continue supporting the campaign through. We really want to continue seeing the success of Abdulazid and getting him into Senate. We want to continue bringing attention to the ongoing violence that exists within the genocide, within Gaza. Throughout, you know, the course of even this election alone, we've only seen a continued amplification of the violence. And so our job has always been to bring attention back to what's been ongoing. And our job is to also bring attention to, you know, doing the work around voter turnout. We've talked a little bit about it here, but it's going to be extremely crucial to both, you know, make sure that folks are aware of the fact that there is a primary. Not everyone is always aware of that. And so there's a lot of more voter turnout work that needs to be done. And then also making sure that people really get out, get out and vote towards November. And so it's going to be really, really crucial. I mean, again, we saw the closeness of the race and every single vote matters and every single vote count. So our hope is that we can continue pushing and supporting folks to turn out the vote leading up to November. All right. Iman Abid Thompson, thank you very much. Thank you. Iman Abid Thompson is Director of Advocacy and Organizing at the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights. Again, Abdul El-Sayed, now the Democratic nominee for Senate in Michigan will be going into a general election for an open Senate seat this fall with an explicitly pro-Palestinian political agenda, along with a lot of other standard fare for progressive support for Medicare for all, for instance. He will be facing what APAC has always already promised will be heavy spending on attacks and looking at polls that put that race much closer than the polls did for his primary victory, which turned out to be won by just the narrowest of margins. It's a race that we will be keeping an eye on through the months ahead as it is the kind of race that could accelerate a transformation underway in American politics. on Reflexive U.S. support for Israel. That takes us to just about 729 in the morning. The show is up front. My name is Brian Edwards Teakert. Coming up in the second half of our program, two segments. First, we're going to take a look at the fascination of AI concerns and tech pros with putting data centers in space and why a collection of environmental organizations are petitioning the FCC to slam the brakes on it. on environmental grounds. We'll speak to Ruskin Hartley, who's the CEO of Dark Sky International. After that, we'll take a look at the escalating trade war between the United States and China. China yesterday retaliated to a new set of sanctions from the Trump administration by imposing some sanctions of its own and most importantly export controls on drones and drone parts for the United States. We'll talk to Jake Warner from the Quincy Institute. That's all coming out next.

After the news. I'm Max Pringle with these headlines. The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits rose last week, but layoffs remain in the historically healthy range of the past few years. The Labor Department said U.S. filings for jobless aid in the week ending August 1st rose by 1,000 to 199,000. The previous week's figure was revised up by 1,000 to 198,000. weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered representative of layoffs and are close to real-time indicators of the health of the u s job market A Senate committee is set to vote today on whether to hold Dr. Anthony Fauci in contempt of Congress for refusing to answer questions at a hearing last week on his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. If he's found in contempt, the Senate could refer him to the Justice Department for potential prosecution. Anthony Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination more than 100 times at a hearing last week. Some 250 unionized scientists picketed for raises and an end to the governor's return to office mandate in Sacramento Wednesday. California Association of Professional Scientists UAW Local 1115 organized the picket after the legislature did not include raises for the scientists in this year's budget, something Union President Jacqueline Takak said is outlined in their contract. CAPS UAW's contract expires next summer. The state scientists were scheduled to receive special salary adjustments ranging from 3% to 5% on July 1st. That's according to contract language, but the governor's office said those raises were contingent on the legislature setting aside the funding. California lawmakers did not appropriate the funding, so employees did not receive their raises. The wage increase would have totaled roughly $25 million. Meanwhile, the Sacramento City Unified School District is taking its dispute over a rejected labor agreement to the state after the Sacramento County Office of Education overturned part of the district's financial recovery plan last week. The SCUSD Board of Education voted five to nothing this week to approve a resolution authorizing an appeal to the state superintendent of public instruction after SCOE denied the board's

approval of a teacher union agreement projected to provide $97.6 million in financial relief over three years. Sunny today in the San Francisco Bay Area highs in the 70s, low to not in the 50s. In the Central Valley, sunny today, highs over 100, lows tonight in the 70s. Those are the headlines. I'm Max Pringle on KPFA. 7.33 in the morning. The show is up front. My name is Brian Edwards Teakert. One of the narratives that Elon Musk spun up to boost the share price of SpaceX when it IPOed was that the company would be building AI data centers in space, where they would harvest vast sums of solar electricity and beam data back down to Earth. There are a few reasons to think that that was more hype than an actual proposal. And also, many concerns about what would happen if the proposal actually came to be in action. Not least of those concerns, most of the stuff we put up into orbit comes back down eventually. usually burning up in the atmosphere on reentry. Our next guest is part of an effort to use environmental laws to slam the brakes on the move towards orbital data centers. Ruskin Hartley is the CEO of Dark Sky International, previously heading a bunch of other environmental organizations here in California. He is one of the people working with Earth Justice to petition the FCC to do a full environmental review. of the move towards space data centers. Thanks very much for speaking to us. Thanks for having me on. Walk us through what your concerns are. Well, I think the concern is we're at the verge of industrializing space and low Earth orbit. We are deciding we want to move our data centers as space. There's actually a proposal from a group called Reflect Orbital to launch space-based mirrors and reflects sunlight down to Earth turning day into night. Dark sky's initial concern was very much about the light pollution this was caused. would cause. But more and more, as we stepped into this, we learned that and discovered and understood that there were environmental impacts at every stage of this, from the lock it launches to the deorbit. When you say that they... at the end of their life they de-orbit they basically get grind up into the atmosphere and changing the chemistry the atmosphere the aluminum degrades ozone which protects us from UV in cancer and radiation and we are in the past we're talking about a few hundred or few thousand satellites we're now talking about millions of satellites fundamentally changing what's going on overhead do you take the proposal for for spaceborne data centers seriously

Yes, I do. I mean, I think there's been a lot of outcry about the impact that data centers have here on Earth, the energy use, the cooling. SpaceX is clearly very innovative for what they've been able to do. So I take them at face value that they and others are a series in their plans to put these into low Earth orbit. To put it in context, a data center, a constellation of up to one million would mean that every year we're launching and deorbiting hundreds of thousands of satellites to maintain that. Will they ultimately get to a million? don't know, but will they put a lot into space? Absolutely, yes. So the rocket engines pollute on the way up. The burn up creates a very different type of pollutant, persistent things like metals in the stratosphere when they burn up on reentry. The FCC is not known as an arm of the federal government with the particularly staffed up operation for assessing environmental impacts. How did you wind up petitioning them? Well, if you want to put a satellite into orbit, you need two licenses. You need the FAA to license the launch, and you need the FCC to license the operations in low-off orbit. And their authority really comes initially from that you're regulating the radio frequencies going back and forth. But they are the only agency in the United States that really licenses those on-orbit activities. Their argument has been now, increasingly with Reflect Orbital, that there will be no impacts down here in the territory of the United States by these activities, and therefore they don't need to do any meaningful environmental review. But there is a weight and preponderance of evidence that clearly demonstrates that this does have an impact on the atmosphere. It will have an impact on what's going on in the United States. And with proposals like the proposal from Reflect Orbital literally to beam sunlight down to Earth at night, you know, five kilometers. to beam it clearly has a direct impact on many things that people care about. Yeah, your organization is principally concerned with the effects of introducing more light into the night sky. Walk us through those. Well, more and more we're understanding that, you know, we and actually all living things on Earth evolved to a day-night cycle. We need dark days, dim evenings, and we need bright days. And when we disrupt that, we do it at our peril. We now know that each year billions of birds are killed as they... collide with brightly lit buildings drawn into those. We've all seen those images of maybe the beam of light coming out of the Luxor, all the insects and birds being drawn to it. So we know that brightening the night sky has a profound environmental impact. But what we're now looking at is doing that as an industrial scale from space, both by these space-based mirrors. Reflectable as all has ambitions to put 50,000 mirrors into space and beam down sunlight as bright as day to any city or community or solar farm that orders it up at the push of a button on their app. And then companies like SpaceX and others while they're trying to reduce.

the brightness of their satellites, it had reflected sunlight. While they've been trying to do that for the last seven years, they so far failed to consistently meet the targets that have been established, and they're now proposing to launch space-based data centers that are essentially as large as the International Space Station. They'll be highly visible at night, particularly in dawn and us fundamentally changing the experience of the night's eye for everybody on Earth. So you're currently petitioning in FCC that is helmed by Trump appointees who have been quite hostile to anything remotely progressive. I assume this is just ticking off a procedural box before filing a lawsuit under the National Environmental Protection Act. Well, this is the way our government works. We have to go through those steps. We have a petition for them to conduct a programmatic environmental impact statement to look at the impact of all of the activities that these operators are proposing to do in space in terms of these data centers. There have been filings for 1.3 million satellites just in the last six months. Each satellite has maybe a five to seven year life expectancy. So this means essentially we're moving to a point of perpetual launches in de- orbits. And also today we're filing an appeal and administrative appeal with the Federal Communications Commission saying that their licensing of the Reflect Orbital test satellite last month. There's illegal and they need to step back and take a look at the real environmental impacts. They have in their record submissions from the Pilots Association asking them to look seriously at the impact of this reflected sunlight would have on commercial flight operations. There is a study from a well-respected optical engineer saying that there's bright point of light in the sky really has a serious risk of causing optical damage to anyone who just takes a glance and a look at it. But the FCC... basically brushed all these concerns aside and issued the licenses license and says they can just move on. They have a long record that basically sidestepping, ignoring any meaningful environmental review and any meaningful public input. And they are now proposing new rules, rules that were basically streamlined all these procedures and assume that they're all approved, thereby removing essentially the ability of the public to weigh in and the ability of knowing that our regulatory agencies are taking care of the health and safe. of people here in America. And the idea of reflect orbital, I'm less read up on this, but it's that basically they would enable continuing production of solar energy at night by beaming down or reflecting down sun from orbit. Yeah, that's where they started. I met with the CEO, Ben Novak, based in Hawthorne, California. We had initial conversations. Their initial concept was to extend the useful life of solar farms. You know, the sun goes down and they don't operate. And they're like, well, if we beam some sunlight down, they can keep operating. We can have green energy.

But they took it from there, now proposing to sell it as a service for cities who maybe don't want to install a street lighting system, maybe a concert, maybe Burning Man wants to extend the daytime into night. They could just push of a button. They could beam down sunlight at night, right? And our particular concern about this, the license that's been issued by the Federal Communication Commission does not identify where or when this is going to operate. So we have no idea what the environmental impact. will be or what the impact on cities and communities around there will be. There's no way of knowing because the regulatory agency haven't required them to disclose that. And therefore, there can be no meaningful environmental review and we're asking them step back and take a look at this before they finalize this. It seems like even if you assumed, you know, a well-staffed agency helmed by people acting in good faith. This would be an extremely novel environmental risk to assess. Yeah, I mean, you're right. I mean, it is novel in that the sunlight is coming from space at night. What is not novel, it is well documented in thousands and thousands of studies. If you introduce sunlight or if you introduce light into a naturally dark environment, you are going to have an impact on wildlife, on birds, on insects, on ecology, on systems, and in the impact on human health. That is... indisputable. The only thing that's novel about this is that they're putting the mirror in space, right? And this has been done before, like some cities in, you know, northern Scandinavian stuff will put mirrors up on the top of the valley opposite so that they can extend sunlight down. So we've done this before. What we haven't done is we haven't industrialized and served it down from space of the push of a button. with no opportunity for early citizens to weigh in as to whether they want that in their backyard. You know, your neighbor calls this up. Maybe for whatever reason and you're within that five-kilometer beam, you suddenly your backyard's lit up and you don't have a say in that. Yeah, I mean, also having an array of mirrors in space that are capable of focusing solar radiation on the Earth's surface at least introduces the possibility of focusing it into like not just sunlight, but a death ray. Well, yeah, we've all seen those movies. Many of us grew up on Star Wars, right? We love those movies. We've seen that script play. I mean, and to give them, you know, reflect all this very consistent with this. They said, no, that is not what they're producing. And, you know, the US military is investing in them. So I don't know. Yes, you know, they are doing this ostensibly for green energy purposes, right? And for me, that's the irony. This is being done in the name of creating a sustainable planet for us all to live on it. And yet they're just ignoring the very real.

environmental damage that will come on by reflecting sunlight down to what should be a naturally dark environment. There must be better ways of doing this, you know, clean energy, storage, energy efficiency, right? Let's look at those before we decide we need to turn night into day. Right, but I mean like... This is not a pie in the sky technology. We have mirror-based solar collectors. One's in the Nevada desert near here. And the temperatures that they reach where they intentionally concentrate the sun's rays to store energy as heat are sufficient to like vaporize anything that gets in the way. Yeah, I mean, this is very different technology. This is a reflective mirror that will be unfurled, you know. or 500 kilometers above the surface of the earth and reflect down to a solar farm and a five kilometer beam. So it's very different. Now, this has been tried before. The Russians tried it in the 1990s. I think they reflected the beam of sunlight from the Mediterranean. up through Russia. They did it once. People didn't like it and it wasn't done again. And yet here it is coming back as a novel technology to save the planet. But we need to step back and look at the broader environmental consequences here and have a regulatory agency who's prepared to ask those hard questions. And that's not happening with this agency. All right. Reskin Hartley, thanks for speaking to us. Thanks having me on. Ruskin Hartley is CEO of Dark Sky International, part of a set of organizations petitioning the FCC to conduct an environmental review of the impacts of the ramp-up of satellite launches, particularly proposals to put data centers, and his he was just describing reflective mirrors for harvesting sunlight at night into space. That takes us to 746 in the morning. The show is up front. My name is Brian Edwards Teaker. Closing out the program, we're going to take a look at international developments. Yesterday, we got China's response to the latest round of anti-China sanctions to come out of the Trump administration. This is a set of sanctions targeting U.S. companies as well as export controls that are going to... restrict the export of components in high-end drones that are shipped from China to the United States. Joining us to talk about it to Jake Warner. He's director of the East Asia program at the Quincy Institute, where his research examines the emergence of great power conflict between the U.S. and China and works on policies to rebuild constructive economic relations. Jake Warner, welcome back to the show. Yeah, glad to be back. It's been easy to lose track amidst everything in the news. Can you, first of all, walk us through what China is responding to? The latest sanctions from the Trump administration are trying to use human rights abuses in China as a legal basis?

Yes, but this should be contextualized. There's been a kind of a back and forth between the U.S. and China on a range of restrictions that are motivated by human rights, by national security concerns, by overcapacity is another one that will be coming out soon. And I think the best way to think about this on the US side is that there are two considerations here. One is the sense that any sort of economic connections we have with China are threatening to us by their very nature. And particularly when it comes to high technology areas, we need to cut those connections. So the first issue here is national security concerns. And then the second is sort of wound up in the trade relationship and the question of tariffs. And that is also quite complicated because on the one hand, there's a sense that Chinese imports are threatening American industries, American workers, American businesses, and we need to insulate ourselves from that. But on the other hand, it's also quite clear that the Trump administration is using this trade concern in a very transparent manner to build leverage against other countries so that it can ring concessions out of them. So it's more a question of asserting international domination than it is protecting American workers through the Trump trade agenda. So both of those things have been ongoing in the period after the US and China achieved a truce. last year in what looked like an escalation in the in these economic warfare measures that could have cut the relationship off how much of a threat have the trump sanctions been to to china's economy uh it's a good question i think the

If the like 145% tariffs that Trump was briefly imposed last year had actually remained in place, that would have been very threatening to the Chinese economy because it does rely heavily on exports to the United States, either directly or indirectly. So that could have been a real problem, but of course that also would have been a shattering economic blow to the American economy. And so the Trump administration varies, I think, very sound. They bowed to reality and they backed down from that. Many of these other smaller measures targeting particular companies trying to, and there are these direct measures that the United States imposes, and there are also indirect measures where the United States is attempting to force other countries away from Chinese supply chains or away from using Chinese companies like Huawei, the big telecommunications company. Those things are not a major immediate threat to China, but China is very concerned that the United States is in the process of coercing the entire world to cut China out of key sectors. And it wants to lay down the law on that and sort of like put, tie at the flag. in the ground and say, you can't cut us out. You can't damage us economically in this way. And if you do, there are going to be real consequences for you. So you better think twice about it. China seems to have a pretty refined understanding of where the pain points are in U.S. manufacturing supply chains. They've had very targeted export controls that have promised to wreak a lot of havoc here. No question, no question. But it should be noted they've been preparing this over the course of the better part of a decade. These sorts of economic attacks by the United States against China really began in the first Trump administration. And in the first Trump administration, they were kind of undisciplined and kind of wild attacks by which Trump was trying to build leverage in the trade negotiations. And of course, there were national security people in his administration who were motivated by the desire to undercut Chinese technological development. But then the Biden administration came in. and really systematized these things, tried to make them much more effective by bringing American allies on board. For example, blockade against advanced semiconductors to China. And so at that point, then, it was more threatening. This entire time, the first Trump administration, when the first set of attacks came through, the Biden administration systematizing and expanding them, this entire time China was preparing responses. And it didn't roll them out right away. It did state quite clearly that this is unacceptable attack on China's sovereign right to development.

But it didn't actually roll out really strong retaliatory measures until actually the very end of the Biden administration. And then after Liberation Day, when Trump massively increased tariffs on China. But over the course of that, better part of a decade, China really assembled. a powerful and variegated toolkit of the kinds of measures that it could use to pinpoint the vulnerabilities in U.S. production. Most importantly is rare earths. Chinese companies really dominate the rare earth. mining and processing business. And rare earths are not a very economically significant product, but they are very important in advanced supply chains for making things like magnets that are very important in a whole range of high tech sectors as well as the military sector. And so the fact that China was able to cut off. American supplies to rare earths after Liberation Day last year. That's what really brought the United States back to the table. and convinced Trump that he had to de-escalate after that. And that has continued to be a point of leverage that China has threatened to use if the United States continues with these sorts of attacks. Now, the more recent round that just came out yesterday in response to recent moves on the U.S. part or a couple months ago, there was another kind of round of U.S. attacks and Chinese retaliation. These are much more discrete, much more measured. They don't threaten massive harm to American industry broadly. It's more China's attempt to say, look, if you're going to hurt us in this way, we're going to hurt you in the same way. There's going to be a proportionate response. And if we can't find a way to live together and have lived together in the global economy, then the pain that you're imposing us is going to come to you as well. So the structure of the move seems notable. First of all, the export restrictions on drones and related components sounds like, you know, the opening move of a country that's expecting military conflict, given the role that commercial-grade drones have started to play in the Russia-Ukraine war. Yeah, that certainly is a consideration here. Maybe the more immediate consideration is that the... The Federal Communications Commission under Brendan Carr has really bulked up its role in anti-China restrictions. So this is a relatively recent development. But one of the things they did is they cut off the supply of certain drone makers and also internet routers coming from China. So I would maybe read this more as a signal that...

If you're going to engage in that sort of thing, then we're going to engage in the same sort of thing. And I think it's not, this is actually something that is in line with national security concerns within the foreign policy community that want to develop an independent supply of drone manufacturing, independent from China, because they think someday we're going to have to use drones against China. We don't want to rely on Chinese supplies. So this, I think, is maybe more of a signal, a warning that these kinds of restrictions are going to cause problems for the U.S. and not so much kind of preparing for war kind of measure. What about the specific U.S. companies that China is sanctioning and barring cooperation with? What's the theme there? Well, two themes, I think. One is just that China is signaling that it has the capacity to damage American companies in this way. The Trump administration has consistently underestimated the ability of China to retaliate. The Trump administration came in completely convinced that once they raised tariffs on China, China would just crumple. because China relies on exports so heavily. But China showed very clearly that that's not the case. And this is further kind of signaling to the United States. We have these capacities to hurt you. You need to watch out. Number one. But number two also is that these measures have been quite restrained. They have not been targeting companies that have a huge China market. They have been pitched in such a way that they could be undone quite easily. And that has been the explicit rhetoric, that if the United States can find a way to live with us economically, then we are happy to reverse these measures. So the sort of consistent theme, that Xi Jinping has taken from the first Trump administration, through the Biden administration, and now on to the second Trump administration, is we don't think we need to be in conflict with the United States. The United States continues to attack us, and we will respond in a proportionate way. But we think that the U.S. and China can have a civil relationship, and that's where we want to bring you. And it's for that reason that we push back. against the steps that you are taking. That has been the sort of explicit message, and that has also been implicit in the design of the sanctions and restrictions that they have imposed. All right. Jake Border will have to leave it there. Thank you so much. Of course. Jake Warner's director of the East Asia program at the Quincy Institute. And that does it for today's show. Up Front airs weekday mornings at 7 a.m. You can get in touch by emailing up front at kpFA.org. Send in a question for Dr. Swartzberg by emailing Corona Calls at KPFA.org. Our producer is Kimia Akbri. Our engineer is Kirsten Thomas. My name is Brian Edwards-Tickert. Law and Disorder with Kat Brooks is coming your way in two minutes at eight.

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