Best of BPR (Aug. 2026): Seth Moulton, David Steiner, and More

Support for Boston Public Radio comes from M&M Skylights located in Stoneham, installing and servicing the full range of VLux Skylights that can help bring air and more natural light into homes. Skylight consultations can be scheduled at M.M.Skylights.com. And Harvard Business School Baker Library, featuring an exhibit on Muriel Seabert, the first woman to buy a seat on the New York Stock Exchange, open to the public. Details at library.hbs.edu. I'm Jim Browdy. I'm Marjorie Egan. And this is the best of BPR. Highlights from the week in under an hour. Today in the podcast. Then Congressman Seth Moulton joins us to talk about his Senate primary campaigns. Plus, a handful of Lowell residents are suing the state to stop the expansion of a massive data center there. We just had a court victory this week. We'll speak with two local advocates. Natick resident and blogger David Steiner discusses his legal fight for accountability against the eBay executives who terrorized. him and his wife and stalk them for months. Here's the show. We're joined now live at the library by Congressman Seth Moulton. He represents the sixth congressional district. He is running in the Democratic primary for the Senate against the incumbent Ed Markey. We spoke with Senator Ed Markey last week. In the show, you can find that interview at YouTube.com at GBIH News. Congressman, good to see you. Thanks for being here. It's always good to be back. Pleasure. Thank you very much for joining us, Congressman. So tell us why you want people in Massachusetts to vote for you instead of Ed Markey. Because I think we need a new generation of leadership in the Democratic Party. I mean, you just can't look at what's going on in Washington or even here at home in Massachusetts and say that the status quo is working. And the question before voters is after 50 years in Washington, Senator, what are you going to do differently for the next six? Now, meanwhile, I'm putting forward a very positive agenda. I've been on your show many times talking about my regional rail agenda. I'd love to get into that today, how we can bring down housing prices. What we need to do to bring down electricity prices here in Massachusetts when one in three people in the state thought about leaving last year just because costs are so high. How we ensure that everybody in America gets health care when the Republicans are trying to take it away. And how we reform our education system so that my kids five and seven actually who are going to grow. grow up in an AI-enabled, automated world can survive and thrive because the education system needs to be reformed to meet the challenges of this new world. Yeah, just to clarify, because you've occasionally said a complementary thing about center market. If he wasn't 80, if he was 50, would you be running against him? Well, I think the question is, is this working? That's really the question. Right? It's not just about the age. It's, is the status quo getting things done? So if you honestly think, you'd be running too. No matter, age is not the critical ingredient. It's, you'd be running against him even if he was not 80 years old. The problem is the Washington establishment. That's the fundamental problem. Now, I'm not going to say that age is not an issue, though, because if you think about it, he would be 86, closer to 90 at the end of his next term. than 80. If we win back the Senate, it will almost certainly be by just one vote. And we can't afford to lose a vote due to a health issue or anything else. It's one of the reasons why I've said that we should be

fired for who they are or what they were to work. Those are things that Democrats should be fighting forward on. But when we can't even have these difficult debates, we're not doing that. Another issue is immigration, in fact. I brought this up in the same New York Times interview back after the 24 election, where it's interesting. I've done 53 town halls across the state. which is an interesting contrast to the one that Senator Ed Markey has done. And I get a lot of questions from constituents. One question that I often ask them is how many of you are opposed to Trump's immigration enforcement? Unsurprisingly, every hand in the room goes up, right? But next question, how many of you can tell me what Democrats' immigration policy is? Not a single hand. I mean, I've asked thousands of voters this question, right? And yet this was like the biggest issue in the 24 election. It's the biggest domestic issue before us today is ICE is terrorizing cities and shooting people in the streets. And so I've put forward a very clear three-point immigration policy. One, not just abolish, but prosecute ICE. I think I was the first Democrat to use that verb. They need to be prosecuted for breaking the law. Number two, have an immigration system that incentivizes people to come here legally, not illegally, because frankly, it's easier to walk across the border than go through the bureaucracy right now to become a citizen, and that's totally backwards. And three, you need a pathway to citizenship. But the point is, Democrats need to lead on these issues. Everyone knows one thing about the Democratic Party, which is that we're opposed to Trump. We need to show where we stand on these issues. That's why I've put forward such a robust, progressive agenda on things like affordability, on high-speed rail, on issues like that, because I think that's the kind of leadership that we need in the face of Trump. You mentioned housing policy before, and housing is a big crisis in Massachusetts. What in the Senate would you do? So the number one thing we need to do in Massachusetts to lower housing prices, it's not complicated. We need to build more housing. And the question is, why haven't we been able to do that? Because 50 years of policy hasn't worked. I mean, think about how much housing prices have gone up since 1976 when Senator Ed Markey came to Congress, right? I mean, it just skyrocketed. And so that's why I've put forward this aggressive... regional rail agenda, to make it faster than driving to get around Massachusetts, because what that does is it incentivizes not just the public sector, not just taxpayer subsidized housing, but the private sector to build a lot of housing, a lot of affordable housing. Take Fitchburg, for example, great town. I toured some apartments that are being refurbished in their downtown. They actually have a lot of vacant land right next to downtown, this historic downtown because of an old GE plant that's no longer there. Why are there not houses there in Fitchburg already? Well, because it takes an hour and a half to get to the city on the train. But if you could do that in 45 minutes and get not only to downtown, not only to north station, but to anywhere on the system, because every train from the north flows through the south and the west, then that would be transformative. You've had so much more housing in Fitchburg that's actually much more accessible to jobs in the state.

Senator, Congressman. Not yet, Jim. Well, I know. I just got that there. Seth Moulton, on the housing front, we had Elizabeth Warren standing there a few weeks ago. You know that thing finally became law despite Donald Trump having a little hissy fit and not signing it. Marky mentioned at the Senator Ed Markey mentioned in the GBAH Channel 25 debate the other day. You weren't even there for the... final vote on this thing. What kind of message do you think that sends people, even if you had something else important to be doing that thing? Well, first to be clear, I voted on the bill when it first came up. So I did vote on the bill. I did miss that one vote. I have a very, very small number of missed votes. It's kind of striking coming from someone who in his last two campaigns missed 80% of his votes, eight out of 10 votes in the United States Senate. he missed. So look, occasionally stuff comes up. I have sometimes missed votes, for example, for my kids. I occasionally will say, okay, this vote is going to pass anyway, so I'm not going to be there. The reality is this is another example of him sort of deflecting from his record, which is pretty abysible, and trying to attack my own. We're talking to Seth Moulton, who is a current congressman running in the Democratic primary, September 1st, against the incumbent Ed Markey. I want to stay on the debate for a second. The moment that got the most press, I think, by far, was when you each got to ask each other a question, here's the question. You asked Senator Ed Markey. Here's Seth Moulton. But I just want to ask one question. And I ask it from the perspective of a father of two young girls at home. Why would you even take a meeting with a lobbyist on behalf of Jeffrey Epstein? How could you do that long after he was convicted? Do you regret having asked that question? You got a lot of blowback from that? This is a question voters should ask. Don't you think it's publicly... around Epstein is the horror that was visited on young girls and the suffering that they've obviously lived with, some of them not living anymore. Do you think it sort of cheapens that when you're asking a question about whether or not he met with a lobbyist about the president of Senegal's son? Let's be clear. He met with a lobbyist. hired for hundreds of thousands of dollars by Jeffrey Epstein to try to get his sex trafficking friend, this guy you're talking about in Senegal, out of prison. You don't know that the Congressman, respectfully, you don't know that you're in Polone of fact, your spokesperson, Taylor Hebel is quoted as saying nowhere in our post do we claim that Marky knew that Epstein was involved. in Wade's case. That's your own spokesperson saying, we didn't even, we don't even have proof of that. Jim, have you looked at the emails? I have, the Crow emails, yeah. Okay, I mean, the emails are very clear about what this is. Well, it's your own spokesperson, though, Congressman. Okay, but look, the emails are very clear about what the point of this meeting is and why, why, I mean, Epstein was back briefed on the meeting, but my question was just about.

why you would take the meeting. And to me, that goes to the heart of your question, which is after everything you said about how horrible this guy is, which people knew, why would you even take a meeting with him? Do you know that Marcy met with this lobbyist? It's very well documented in the email. No, that they suggest that there was a meeting with Ed Markey's office. You don't know, with due respect. You don't know that Ed Markey himself was involved in this meeting or even briefed about it. Look, if you look at the emails, it's very clear. But here's the point. How is it? that a lobbyist on behalf of Epstein can get a meeting with Ed Markey when ordinary people in Massachusetts can't. Like, that's the fundamental issue, right? Again, I've done 53 town halls. He won't even meet with voters in the course of this campaign. They don't get it to ask him a question, but a lobbyist working for Epstein does. And that's just what's so broken about Washington today. And that's why I had such a narrow question. I didn't have all these other things. I mean, when Ed Markey talks about, oh, I didn't know Epstein or whatever, that's just classic Washington deflecting to a charge that was not even made. to refuse to answer something that's actually documented. And I think that's a question. I mean, whenever I go on these town hall tours, I go a lot to parts of the state where people say like, the center doesn't even show up. Like, I don't even see him. How is he supposed to represent my interests if I don't show up? Can we change gears? You serve four tours of duty and obviously have great expertise in matters of war. We have this nightmare in Iran that I think it is, I feel, objective in saying the president has no clue how to deal with, how to get out of. You have a much bigger platform, obviously, if you're the senator from Massachusetts. Concretely, what do you do to try? Hopefully, it'll be resolved by then by January. But if it isn't. What are the concrete steps, things you would do to extricate us from this nightmare? Well, first of all, I'm going to give you a three-point plan, but I just want to acknowledge what you said up front, which is that this is not only a disaster, it's totally backfired. It's actually empowered Iran. I mean, since when has Iran actually been able to control the whole world economy, right? This has been an utter disaster, and you would think that after a few failed wars, we would learn not to do this again, right? I mean, Senator Mark, you voted to send me to Iraq? Big mistakes. Shocking that he couldn't acknowledge that when he was asked if he made a mistaken vote in his time of service. But here's my three. You voted for the Iran funding most recently. No, no, no. That is not most recently. That's not true at all. When was it? When the war started, I voted against the defense bill. You know, most Democrats typically support the troops, and I have supported the defense bill in the past. But after Trump started this war, I voted against it. And in fact, I proposed the biggest cut by amendment to the defense budget in history. before when it came before a committee. But let's get back to your points, right? Because I don't think anyone has a clue here, right? Here's what I would do. Number one, you gotta just stop the violence. And that means absolutely peace, no longer this escalation. I mean, look at the pattern here. Every few weeks, Trump escalates, Iran escalates, but gas prices go up, he capitulates, and we're back to square run. Number two, you've got to actually take... leverage away from Iran. They have so much leverage because they control the Strait of Hormuz. What I would actually do is start shipping the oil north through Iraq into Turkey. There's actually an existing rail network in Iraq, and there is one that's being built in the Gulf, in part to transport oil to the west, but that hasn't worked either. Ship it north.

You can protect those trains. You can take the leverage away from Iran. And then number three, we have to get back to a strategy of actually empowering the moderates in Iran. This is what Obama did with his nuclear deal, right? It was a tough sell, not just to people in the United States and the Republican Congress, but to the hardliners in Iran. They were against it, but the moderates in Iran supported it. And we've got to get back to supporting a moderate Iran government that's actually more in touch with the pro-American people of Iran. That's in the long run how you solve this problem. You know, Congress, we're almost odd time here, but you voted to end aid to Israel. Why did you do that in term limits? Oh, first of all, I... absolutely support term limits and this is another place where I think you know let's just be honest here folks like it's probably a good thing to have some turnover I voted for the Thomas Massie amendment which is not an all aid to Israel but what it did say is that we are not going to have 3.3 billion dollars in US taxpayer funded aid to Israel. At a time when costs are skyrocketing and when Benjamin Netanyahu is a disaster, I was one of the first members of Congress to call on him to resign, we shouldn't be using your and my taxpayer money to support his wars. What's your website, Congressman? Sethmolton.com. We've got an amazing team. It's not hard to figure out. If he says so himself. Sethmolton.com, great team, amazing campaign. Come and join, be part of the success. Good to see you. Thank you, Congressman. Thank you, too. Thank you very, very much, Congressman. is coming in. Support for Boston Public Radio comes from the law firm of Davis Mall. Employment laws are complex and ever-changing. Representing both employers and executives gives their attorneys a 360-degree view and a deep experience of every workplace situation. Learn more at davismom.com. And MIT Sloan Executive Education, a global community of leaders seeking fresh insights on strategy, innovation, and AI. More than 90 programs offered year-round. More at executive.mit.edu.edu.

In one neighborhood in Lull, residents refer to a looming structure as the dungeon. The Markley Data Center has been in operation since 2015, built inside a former Prince Pasta factory, by the way, seeking expansion. But a grassroots group of residents is organized to stop it, citing real quality of life issues with a data center as it is, a constant hum they can't escape, air pollution via diesel generators, and the use of hundreds of gallons of water to cool down the facility servers. week, Lull residents were handed a victory in court, holding the expansion lease for now, joined now by two Lull residents organizing against the markedly expansion. Mary Wamboui and Jake Forts. Wembuy serves on the Massachusetts Energy Efficiency Advisory Council on the board of the Coalition for Better Acre and Lull. Forts is the founder of the grassroots group, Honest Future for Lull. They're both named plaintiffs in the lawsuit seeking to stop the expansion on environmental grounds, as much of Lull is considered an environmental justice community by the Commonwealth. Mary and Jake, thanks so much for your time. Really good to see you. Thank you. Thank you very much for speaking with. So, Mary, let's start with you. Tell us about this huge structure that you call the dungeon. What does it look like? How close is it to houses, et cetera? I think I will let Jake actually answer that question because his house is right next to it. Okay, then go ahead, Jake. What is that behind you, by the way, in the picture? So this is my backyard. This is the Markley Group Data Center. Behind you. This is how close it is to me. And basically what it is like... You know, it came, originally the black building that is called the dungeon is the one that you see off on the side. That is the bigger building. But actually in 2015, when they came and in 2016, what you see directly behind my residence is what was constructed first, which is why I've been at the battle for so long, because when they originally came, all of the diesel engines and everything that was mechanical was supposed to be on the other side. So that's why, you know, this has been going on for so long with this particular data center. So tell us what it's like living as near as you do to this center. So up until recently, and I mean very recently, and it's only been within the last month, and I think it's because of the actions and the way that the court is seeing this company's behavior in Lowell. And if you just follow the headlines with this company, it's kind of like been a pattern where for years. they've just run around unchecked in Lowell, doing whatever they wanted, and it was always rubber stamped. Well, now that it's in court, this company has taken some changes, but behind me, as you can see, up on the roof, there are small, like, mechanical structures. Those are AC condensers. Behind on this side of me, down over, and there's an equipment well over here, where there's even more of what's on the roof on, like, kind of like pylons. And then behind these actual diesel engines that are behind me, there's more AC units. Two of them that are like a big box-sized looking ones that sit on the ground, and two that stick out of the wall. The two that stick out of the wall have been the ones that have sounded like a jet engine, which is mentioned in the litigation, that have been unmitigated for years. Four years.

And it's only changed within the last, I would say, maybe week to a month, that they have to try to construct some sort of primitive sound wall around it to get the sound to come down. What is the sound like? Forget the sound, check, forget the last two weeks. What has the sound been like? For like that those two pieces of equipment is like a jet engine. It sounded like a jet engine. It was unmitigated. And, you know, it's just constant. And when they turn around. It is constant. It is constant. It's not just for a few minutes every few days. It's constant. It's constant. So the higher it goes, the hotter it goes. The hotter the temperature is. And that more intensity that comes out of. all of these AC units. So the harder it is, the harder they have to work to cool the facility. And that's been the problem. But those two particular ones, when they ramp up, there's this high-pitched whir to them. And that is just an extra thing because if you're like sleeping in the middle of the night, then all of a sudden you've got this high intensity, high-pitched war, and then it comes on. And then if you're awakened by that, then you're just awake the rest of the time. Mary Wambuie, Jake was critical of officials who arguably bought into this in the city. But for a period of time, correct me if I'm wrong, the city council established a moratorium on this. What happened to the moratorium? So the moratorium is still on, and it was a moratorium for 365 or so days, to allow law to think about zoning, to think about energy, just to seize the expansion of the facility, because... If you've followed the news, Markley keeps expanding into not just sacred heart, but... expanding beyond that footprint, which is why as a lower resident, I'm engaged and really concerned that if Markley had it has its way, our community will be further degraded by having I mean, who wants to live in a town or a city that has 160,000 gallons of diesel as backup? So the moratorium is on. But, wait, but Mary, if I can interrupt you, my understanding, and maybe I got this wrong, my understanding is after imposing the moratorium, the city council undercut their own moratorium.

Am I not right about this? By basically saying that for plans that existed before the moratorium for expansion, those would go ahead. Future plans would be subject to the moratorium. You're both nodding in agreement. So essentially, that's one of the reasons you had to go to the court, right? Is that not so? So. So we went to the court before this and one of the reasons that made us. So we had an appeal at the Department of Environmental Protection challenging the fact that it had approved. for Markley to go in the direction that it wanted to go. And I want to say something here about the Department of Environmental Protection. So while we as lower residents go to the City Council to express ourselves and say what you have had Jake say, we have always been told that the Department of Environmental Protection has already given markedly an okay. So the situation that you have seen in law has continued for years, and its backup has been the Department of Environmental Protection. So this is why we went to court. We went to court, I believe, Jake, before the moratorium. Okay. Yeah, we went to court because we had other... issues we were concerned that d p uh approved uh understood markle's permit and undercut our voices and ignored the commonwealth's own twenty twenty four cumulative impact law that was supposed to help impacted communities like ourselves by getting into an administrative consent order Think about that with a company and excluding the people who live in law from having any right to say what they want with, you know, having no right to be part of that continued operation of Muckley. Well, Jake, it sounds like the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection has not been very protective of what's supposed to be an environmental justice community. That's you guys. You're supposed to be a very dense place with a lot of pollution issues already. So now you've got the conservation law people are arguing this for you. Explain that part. Well, it didn't have to come to this. So this, what is being appealed right now, is the third plan approval. If you need to know anything about Markleys is that they have tried to wear down this community through the years, through the decade that they've been here. Everything has done piecemeal. Now, this facility has taken 10 years and is still under construction to this very day.

And that's what it is. And so there was three plan approvals. We're on a third plan approval to bring the facility up to 27 diesel engines. Not getting in the weeds, but there was a second plan approval that was done right on top of the third one. And that was the one I appealed individually. I did it on my own as a layperson, no representation. That wasn't a fair fight. That's why Conservation Law Foundation, Yale Environmental Justice Law Clinic and Fitch Law Partners are now helping us because it wasn't fair. And that's what you saw coming out of the court's decision where they're like, look at what you have done. This community has been impacted by this for so long. How can you say these people are not aggrieved? Look at my backyard. And yet they told somebody who lives in my same residence, you are not aggrieved. How much closer do you need to be to its... diesel engine that spews black smoke from it, then 84 feet. Does it need to be right on top of your house? Does it need to be 10 feet away? But, Jake, just to be clear about the court, and please correct me if I'm wrong, what they have granted is a temporary stay on the expansion. This is not a final decision that Markley can expand. It's just while the case proceeds. Is that accurate? Okay. So Governor Healy has said, talked about this issue of these data. centers and says you're not supposed to be able to suck energy off the grid and hurt rate payers, hurt the environment, especially when it comes to water. You're supposed to protect community health. She said it on the show, actually, when you were asked the vet. Avoiding environmental and social burdens, but it doesn't sound like that's at all what's happening. So what about, where's the governor? Has the governor helped you here? Mary? No, actually quite the opposite. Mary, go ahead. So, yeah, I have been fortunate enough to be engaged in a lot of energy-related issues in the Commonwealth. And I have to say, just like Jake did, that the Commonwealth has not been on our side. Because if the Commonwealth was on our side, the Department of Environmental Protection, would have taken the steps that are already existing in the Commonwealth to protect us. They should have, number one, demanded that there be cumulative impact assessment and not just... assume that since the facility was started operating in 2015, that, you know, because that's what I think they, the Commonwealth is behaving as though all, it's already there. But if it's already there, This is exactly why environmental justice communities fought for cumulative impact assessment. So if the governor and her administration were on our side, they would have this, anytime Markley would have asked for a permit, especially in the last two years, that cumulative impact assessment would have been, would have been.

triggered, I mean, the permit would have triggered the cumulative impact assessment. And then I want to say something about legislation. If the Commonwealth is really serious about responsible data center, data center development, or even preservation of the current facility, then it should have embraced what environmental justice groups shared as Amendment 62 in the energy. affordability bill. But what did the Commonwealth do? It watered down that amendment into something called Amendment 162. And that's why I do not believe that the Commonwealth is taking this issue as seriously as it should. You know, Jake, we're almost out of time, but I want you to talk about the impact on your mental health and physical health from living so close to the so-called dungeon. How are you and your neighbors coping? Well, I mean, we do cope. It's a lot of sleepless nights, depending upon what is, you know, what mechanical things are operating at that time. We have to be on guard and constantly listening for when these four engines behind my house fire, because when they do, depending upon the wind direction, I have to run around and close the windows to my house so that the fumes don't come in. Is it smell? Does this smell or is it just? Oh, yes. The diesel fumes smell. The generator that's right here is the dirtiest generator on this site. It spews the blackest of all the fumes out of any engine on the site. And this is the one that's 84 feet from my house. It is the worst one. There's videos on Honest Future for Lowell's Facebook page of this particular engine. And this is the closest one to a residence out of all of them on the property. This is our day to day. And how do we cope with it? You know, we just, we try to move on and try, we show up at every meeting. We speak our bit and hope that eventually somebody will listen. And if they don't, then through the time period, that's what we have done. We've now had to take it to court to get the right people to do their jobs correctly and enforce. the environmental regulations that are supposed to protect. We only have 30 seconds left, but Jake, speaking about speaking publicly, we don't have time to play the sound, but Lawson required through a public records request, got some body cannon footage from the police showing the time when the police removed, I think, a 16-year-old or a teenager anyway, speaking out against the data center at a public forum. In 30 seconds, what was the rationale for that? So basically, the meeting was over, and this kid had had her hand raised the whole time. But because she was a kid, and it was so packed, this is the most community engagement we had. It was a zoning meeting. And because of that, she stood up and said, you don't have to listen to me, but I want to say my piece.

And they considered her speaking out of turn, and they basically wanted to drag her out because they considered her to be disturbing it, even though the meeting was largely over. Jake and Mary, please stay in touch with us and keep a surprise and our listeners surprised of what's going on in your fight there. We really appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you very much for coming in. In 2019, David and Ina Steiner were publishing their e-commerce Bytes blog when they started receiving anonymous. threatening messages and disturbing packages in the mail. You likely know what happened next. eBay executives engaged in a massive corporate terrorism campaign against a native couple. Among the items that arrived on the doorstep of bloody pig mask, a book on surviving the death of a spouse, live cockroaches, spiders. Their address was posted on Craigslist, on and on. And then executives from eBay flew from California to Natick, try and install tracking device. on their car. As the harassment and stalking continued, they were forced to sleep in separate bedrooms to better be able to respond and call for help. If one of them was attacked for a time, they wouldn't even go out for groceries. The Steiner's did bring their case to the police. Some eBay executives were sent to prison, but Steiner's argued this campaign came directly from the top and sought damages from the former CEO of the company, who was found to text at another executive stating if you're ever going to take her down. meaning Ina Steiner, now is the time, referring to her who had written critical but fact-based articles about eBay in the couple's newsletter in which Ina continues to cover to this day. Last month, as I'm sure you read, David and Ina received a settlement, $50 million. from eBay, with the CEO himself being forced to contribute $2 million. An additional $7 million went to charity with First Amendment implications for journalists across the state. One half of that incredibly courageous couple, David Steiner joins us now with one of their attorneys who fought for this settlement, Chris Murphy. David, it's good to see you again, and Chris, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for having us. Thank you. Thank you very much, both of you, for speaking with us today. So, David, let's start with you. How do you feel about this settlement? Would you think this was exacted accountability? I think it was as close as we could get to accountability through a trial. And a trial certainly could be brought with peril. We looked at over 68,000 documents when we finally received discovery. And, you know, it wasn't certain that we could present everything during the trial. In fact, I don't know the exact number, but I think there was something like 3,500 or 5,000 exhibits. And eBay didn't object to only...

five, I believe. So everything was going to be a battle. With this, you know, if you look past the $55.7 million, the thing that I'm and I are most proud of is having no nondisclosure, which means that everything that we saw, and trust me, we went, we poured over those 68,000 documents. We can speak about freely. There is no non-disclosure, which is, I guess. unheard of in settlement cases like this. We'll ask Chris about that in a second, but staying with you for a second, David, I read quotes from both of you, both of you, meaning you and your wife, saying that as this thing proceeded, you realized I'm putting words in your mouth, but I think they're fair. You'll tell me if I'm not, that this case was not just about you and accountability for the two of you, but for... address broader concerns? What were those broader concerns? Absolutely. You know, when eBay wanted our contacts, they wanted our sources, and we did not want to give those to them. And because Massachusetts doesn't really have a journalist shield law in Massachusetts, it was ruled that we would have to give. those over. We sort of got around it on a technicality because eBay narrowed their ask. And there were really, it was sort of a null set, people who said they were not going to work with us anymore. Think about that, you know, Deep Throat goes to Woodward and Bernstein and beats them in the garage and says, hey, guys, I'm not talking with you anymore. And it disappears. That's not the way it works. They just don't talk. The other thing that's very important to us is the lack really of a Massachusetts civil stalking statute. that you cannot in this state really holds a stalker or harasser civilly liable. I think that Catherine Clark tried to introduce something at a federal level almost 10 years ago that died. And I think that if we modeled something more after the California Civil Code, that we would have a lot more teeth. Because how better to keep someone from going back after a victim than to hold them civilly liable, economically liable. So that's going to be something, both of those.

are very dear to us. Can we just give an update before we get Chris Murphy into this conversation? We had the general counsel or corporate counsel of the Globe here a couple of weeks ago before the Senate had voted on this shield law, and that night they voted 40 to nothing. So it's now before a conference committee to resolve House and Senate differences. If you care about protecting journalist sources, as David was talking about, call your legislator. Chris, can you comment on a couple of the things David said about the reason for settlement? versus going to trial? Yeah, well, I think, you know, to get to a settlement like this, and David said it, it's unusual. You need a client with resolve. David and I were victimized horribly. I mean, you read some of the facts, and it's just a small peek into the terror that they experienced. Then to say, we have to now run through the criminal justice system to hold some of the folks criminally accountable. And in that system, you're victimized again. You're giving impact statements. You're reliving it. You're talking with prosecutors. And then finally, when it gets down to you. You have to engage a legal team. You have to fight. And it's an arduous process and you get victimized again. Your medical records get scrubbed. Your findings get scrubbed. If you're a reporter, their sources are in jeopardy. On and on. And what helped craft this settlement was David Naina. From day one, they said, we're not settling unless. And they were very clear with the purpose. A charitable component. Non-disclosure. Personal accountability, financial accountability from the CEOs. And on and on. And so thankfully, they fought and fought and it was years of litigation before they got what they want. So yes, you can go to trial. Trials are confined little fishbowl. We were only given six weeks to try the case. And with the amount of evidence and witnesses to tell the full story, it would have been shortchanged there. And this settlement... that David Niner really worked for is a great, great outcome for them. Well, David, one of the things when I was reading, particularly the long Boston magazine piece that went through A to Z, is you, Ina's a great reporter, great investigative reporter, you're a guy with the big brain there. I was thinking to myself that the helplessness of somebody that had less, less wherewithal than you. I mean, the knock the Natick police, but this was a very involved case that your wife, Ina, had to do a lot of the investigating herself. You talk about the anti-stalking law. The helplessness is what came through for me if it were not people of your wherewithal, as I said. Well, listen, don't discount the United Police and what they did. They worked well over their heads. You know, they really dug in especially Sergeant Jason Sutherland, Detective Haswell. They just went above and beyond.

The thing that helped us, and I can't honestly tell you why, but we documented everything from the outset. We made police reports. I called the retailers after they sent the packages and tried to get as much information from the retailers themselves to present it to the police. We had to, you know, present sort of a sane. presence to the police. Yeah. And, you know, and it's a shame. But they, they. dug their teeth in, and I give them all credit in the world. But, you know, one of the things you're talking about creating a sane presence, but then I read in that piece how you had a laundry cart by the back door full of pasta and pants, so if anybody tried to come in, they'd make the noise and alert you, which is quite frightening. You know, meeting, you and your wife were kind enough to join me with Rosemary Skopico on TV, I think three years after this happened. And that... Your appearance, both of you, has stayed with me in the intervening years. And you talked about, I mean, your wife talked about how she believed at some point her life was at risk, meaning you could be killed by these people. You talked about the fact that you still were, this wasn't your word, but I'll use it traumatized by this. It's six years after the fact. How much is what these people did to you still part of your everyday life, or is it? Well, yeah. I mean, make a mistake. We were, and I were both diagnosed with PTSD. And there is some aspect to it lingers. I would say that over the past month or so, we're starting to work back toward baseline. We're starting to talk about things that we used to talk about. You know, we're starting to enjoy our relationship. again, without 24 hours a day. And literally, it was almost 24 hours a day because we didn't sleep much over the past seven years. And so I would say that we're both strong people. And, you know, we're looking forward to whatever lays they had. You know, Chris, could you, one last thing. We'd love to give our audience assignments, and we have urged them to support a shield law, as we said, pending before the legislature. Could you just expand just a drop on that? And this won't come up, I don't think, in this five-month weird time, but could next year. What is our law missing around anti-harassment? things, anti-stalking things, that, for example, the judge, in this case, Judge Saris, I believe, said California law could apply to that would exact more serious consequence for terrorists like eBay in this case. What are we missing that we should add to our law? So we know what happened to I and David, both as reporters and as individuals.

In Massachusetts, in our Commonwealth, you can go and get compensatory damages, right? You can get the harm you suffered back, dollar for dollar. That's hard to quantify when you've been stocked for a day or a week or two months. And usually it's on a lower dollar end. So if you're a terrorist, right, a harasser, you don't fear monetary damages coming to you. And when you go to see an injury lawyer about it, they're going to save you a look. You know, there's not a lot to get here. It's not really worth it. However, Judge Saris, as you pointed out, Patty Saris did a great job. We argued before the court that eBay is domiciled in California. And in California, for a corporation who commits these acts, they can be held punitively liable. So punishment damages on top of compensatory damages. And we argue that's where the deterrence, that's where the real deterrence is. Exactly. So. That's what we argue to the judges. They shouldn't be allowed to leave their home state, come into our Commonwealth, terrorize a couple from Natick, and get away with it. And Judge Saras said, you're right. And so that was brought in in this case. In this case can now be used as precedent around the country for anyone in any state that doesn't have punitives who's harassed or aggrieved by an entity that has punitives in their home state. And that is... the Einis Steiner versus eBay case that can be cited and should be, you know, championed loudly. I love that. I love that. Well, we're going to champion that measure before this legislature, too. I just wondered, and either of you can answer this, but. I hope this kind of thing, you know, cockroaches and vandalizing your property, following you around, all these terrible things, I hope this is unusual. Or is this kind of thing going on to a lesser degree we just don't know about it? David, you want to talk a letter? Well, I'll take the first half. You know, I think that it's, I think it's more, it happens more often than we think about their online retailers that actually have packages that you can send to people who relationships when there's a breakup. And they contain some pretty. dead dastardly stuff. So I do think it happens, especially if it can support e-commerce like that, businesses who are making a living on doing just that. Chris? You know, Marjorie, to your point, I think things like this happen more often because, again, we talked about accountability for harassers. The C-suite needs to be held individually accountable, right? So... This was a case of a corporate voice saying, take her down, and then it spiraled from there. And the C-suite escaped criminal prosecution entirely. The lower-level employees, the people that actually went and did what their bosses told them to do.

all are now convicted felons. In most cases, there's corporate indemnity, so the C-Suite doesn't have to pay a judgment when they do wrong. We wanted personal contribution. And to really sum this all up, that CEO, Devin Wenig, When he left eBay after doing this, he got $57 million parachute. His lawyer paid for and probably would have gotten indemnity if Ayn and David didn't ask for personal responsibility. So that's one of the big areas that needs to be addressed. You can't. You shouldn't be able to have that power and that autonomy and that insulation. It's awful. You know, David, I just want to say to you and I know I'm speaking for Marjorie, the two of you are inspirations to... Heroes. Everybody who knows about... I'm serious, your courage, your fight, your relentlessness. And I'm just hoping I'm looking over Chris's right shoulder. In the near future, you and your wife get to go under that beach umbrella that is sitting on Chris's right shoulder. Send our best to your wife. And, David, congratulations. And thank you for being who you two are. Thank you for having us. Yeah. Thank you very, very much. And congratulations. Thank you. Thanks so much. Take care. Take care. We have been speaking with David Steiner, one half of the native couple who fought for their right to publish articles critical of eBay in their commerce newsletter. And then before we leave this, shield law, call your rep for a senator and urge the conference committee to come out with a strong bill for the governor to sign. And as the months go along, we'll talk a little bit more about this potential legislation dedicated to INA, how we could strengthen our laws around stalking and harassment. And we just want to say that their criticism of eBay is what resulted in the... this terror campaign against them that was just beyond horrific. Anyway, and we also talked to one of the couple's attorneys who fought for this settlement. Chris Murphy, we're grateful both David and Chris for coming in. Thank you again for your time. Thanks for listening to The Best of BPR Podcast, our crew, Zoe Matthews, Hannah Laws, Ariana Gonzalez, John Parker, our engineer, Jamie Bologna, our executive producer. This episode was produced by Ariana Gonzalez. As always, you can get the full show experience right here in the same podcast feed. And don't forget to listen to us live, 897 every Monday through Friday, 11 to 1, and watch us on YouTube.com slash GBA News. BPR is a production of GBH News.