Welcome to On the Frontlines, a community program featuring stories of social, climate, and economic justice! In this podcast, Jill and Edgar will take you into the world of communities on the frontlines of climate and environmental change, from Washington State to worldwide.
Our vision is to bring in people from the movement and have a conversation with them. We also want to be able to tell the stories and teach the lessons that often get lost in the moment as we organize for a Just Transition to a better world.
All episodes are available on this website, but you can also listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Meet the Hosts
Jill Mangaliman is a community organizer and writer born and raised in Seattle. They serve on the national secretariat of BAYAN USA, an alliance of anti-imperialist Filipino grassroots organizations, and serve as chairperson of GABRIELA Seattle. Jill is also a founding board member of Front and Centered and Bush Garden karaoke host.
Edgar Franks is the Policy Director of Familias Unidas por la Justicia, an independent farmworker union with over 500 members across Washington State. The son of farmworkers, Edgar grew up in the fields of Mount Vernon and spends most of his time in Skagit Valley, organizing and reading comic books.
Season 3: Listen to Our Latest Episodes!
Jill and Edgar return to kick off Season 3 of On the Frontlines with a special live recording at Columbia City Theater in South Seattle!
Recorded during Front and Centered’s week of programming for their Earth Deserves More Than a Day event, this episode features Jill and Edgar talking about the history of South Seattle, as well as the history of Edgar’s union, Familias Unidas por la Justicia. Jill also takes time to remember Berta Cáceres, an Indigenous land defender who was assassinated almost ten years ago in Honduras.
Recorded on April 21, 2023.
Check out:
- Our Responsibility to Indigenous Land Defenders (article on Berta Cáceres)
The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum is coming to Seattle in August. But what is APEC, and why are some of Front and Centered’s coalition members and allies organizing a countersummit against it?
Jill and Edgar talk with Carly and Adrián of the International League of Peoples’ Struggle (ILPS) Seattle-Tacoma, an anti-imperialist and democratic formation that encompasses a broad range of participating organizations. Carly and Adrián tell us how they got involved with ILPS Seattle-Tacoma before talking about why the US and big corporations are so invested in APEC, and why frontline communities need to stand up against APEC and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) to protect workers, women, migrants, and the environment.
Learn more about the People’s Summit Against APEC, happening July 29–30.
Recorded on April 19, 2023.
Check out:
- Pacific Northwest People over Profit (PNW POP)
- PNW POP: NO to APEC Commitment Form (sign-up form to volunteer or commit other resources)
- PNW POP—People’s Summit Against APEC! (four-minute video)
2022 Holiday Special
For this special episode of On the Frontlines, Jill and Edgar are joined by Donna Denina of the International Women’s Alliance and GABRIELA Seattle, as well as Liz Darrow of CommunityVoz Radio, for a conversation on human rights. They discuss why December 10 is International Human Rights Day, who gets to define what human rights are, and how the concept gets co-opted to justify war and other uses of force.
Jill, Edgar, Donna, and Liz also get into the human rights issues under the spotlight at the World Cup, currently taking place in Qatar, as well as the human rights concerns of associated athletic apparel companies like Adidas and Nike. Donna also invites listeners to an International Human Rights Day Peoples Forum and Teach-In, which will take place in Seattle on December 10, 2022.
Check out:
- Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations)
- What Was Liberalism? Part 1: Ideology & Violence (Philosophy Tube)
- International Human Rights Day Peoples Forum and Teach-In (Event happening December 10, 2022)
Listen to Season 2: Crash #COP27!
On the Frontlines is repping frontline communities in Washington State at the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC) in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt! Edgar and the Just Transition Alliance delegation will join the It Takes Roots coalition in a collective effort to ensure that the policies proposed at COP27 are rooted in justice for workers, frontline communities, and the environment.
The Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC (COP27), rebranded as the Conference of the Profiteers by the Just Transition Alliance, is where governments are supposed to agree on policies to limit global temperature rises and adapt to impacts associated with climate change.
Front and Centered is producing this local-to-global report in collaboration with Rainier Avenue Radio.
Season 2 of On the Frontlines kicks off with Edgar heading to Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt to crash #COP27! For Crash #COP27!, Jill and Edgar will be taking us into COP27 with stories from the grassroots, connecting Washington State to Sharm El Sheikh at the ground level.
In this episode, Edgar phones in from Istanbul during a layover on his way to Egypt. You’ll hear about why Edgar’s going to COP27, who’s going with him, and the meaning behind the concept of a Just Transition. Also, did Edgar meet John Kerry once!?
Recorded on November 4, 2022. Crash #COP27! is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
You probably know that climate change is displacing communities, but did you expect that a climate conference would uproot people too?
In our second episode of Crash #COP27, Jill checks in with Edgar to chat after he arrives in Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt, a couple of evenings before COP27 begins. They discuss how folks were moved out of Sharm El Sheikh to make room for the COP27 proceedings and touch on the large scale alterations made to the landscape of Sharm El Sheikh just for this one convention.
Jill and Edgar go on to connect these changes back to Washington State by reflecting on the large scale alterations made here at home to the environment, from the transformation and pollution of the Duwamish River, to large-scale apple farming, and how the Lummi Nation worked overtime to save their wild salmon after a fish farm had a disastrous net pen mishap.
Recorded on November 5, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- How Has Sharm El Sheikh Changed, a Week Before COP27? (81-second video)
- Sharm El Sheikh and COP27—Getting Ready (eight-minute video)
- Fish-farming Company Offered Money for Lummi Nation’s Silence About Net Pens, Letters Show (Seattle Times article, published Oct. 12, 2017)
- The Power of Big Oil (PBS Frontline docuseries)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
In this episode of Crash #COP27, Jill checks in with Edgar before the official start of COP27. Edgar reports back on the priorities of the It Takes Roots coalition, who are at the Conference of Parties to demand climate reparations, defend Indigenous rights, and say no to false solutions.
Jill and Edgar go into detail on some false solutions to climate change that are currently being peddled not just at the local and state levels here in Washington State—for instance, is Microsoft paying into a carbon offset forest in King County?—but also at the COP in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
Recorded on November 6, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- Blockchain company buys $1M in carbon credits generated by Issaquah forest, the biggest such deal in U.S. history (June 3, 2022, Seattle Times)
- Three Washington forests are part of the biggest carbon credit purchase in U.S. history. Is that a good thing? (June 8, 2022, KUOW)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
COP27 is here! Jill and Edgar check in after the first day of COP27 to discuss
how scientists are increasingly aligning with the urgency and concerns of communities of color and others on the frontlines, how scarcity is manufactured by the wealthy and powerful to keep the rest of us fighting over scraps, and how there are a massive number of organizations at the COP pushing for market-based mechanisms to deal with climate change instead of advocating what we really need.
Edgar also reports on how protest actions are constricted and monitored and how folks at the COP who are connected to social movements are shunted off to spaces where they can’t be easily seen, in contrast to the visibility and centering of large nonprofits, like the Gates Foundation, that are collaborating with governments and corporations peddling false solutions.
Recorded on November 7, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- Where does the Gates Foundation’s agriculture spending really go? (November 4, 2022, Community Alliance for Global Justice)
- Biden Administration Statement on the Opening of COP27 (referenced in the podcast)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
Crash #COP27 comes to you with a special feature episode! For this installment, Edgar is joined by José Bravo, Executive Director of the Just Transition Alliance, for a wide-ranging interview.
José, who served on the drafting committee for The Principles of Environmental Justice (1991), tells Edgar about his personal history, connecting it to the history of the environmental justice movement itself. He also breaks down the harm inflicted by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the origins of the Just Transition framework , the meaning of the term “frontline,” and the history of the COP.
Recorded on November 8, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
For this episode of Crash #COP27, Edgar reports back on what he’s seen so far in the COP27 Green Zone. Notable is the dominating presence of organizations peddling false solutions, particularly nuclear power. Jill and Edgar discuss how Washington State, once a leader in the green movement, has now become an innovation hub for false solutions, including geoengineering technology as well as nuclear.
Our hosts also talk about the recent news that activists and movement leaders at COP27 are possibly being surveilled by the Egyptian government, begging the questions: Who is the COP for? Is this sort of surveillance actually part of the rationale behind why certain countries are chosen as hosts for the COP? and If the COP isn’t a space for the grassroots or for movement building, then where is our alternative to the COP?
Recorded on November 8, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- COP27 Wifi in Egypt Blocks Human Rights and Key News Websites (November 7, 2022, The Guardian)
- From Blah, Blah, Blah to Blood, Blood, Blood: Holding the COP27 Summit in Egypt’s Police State Creates a Moral Crisis for the Climate Movement (November 7, 2022, The Intercept)
- Billionaires Responsible for Million Times More Emissions Than Average Person, Oxfam Report Finds (November 8, 2022, Euronews)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
John Kerry, President Biden’s climate envoy, is at COP27, and the United States’ plans for climate finance were leaked prior to their unveiling at the COP.
Unfortunately, the funding the US is aiming to procure for developing countries is to come from carbon offsets and market mechanisms, and as the Climate Justice Alliance and the It Takes Roots coalition have argued, Biden’s plan will accelerate climate change at the expense of Indigenous peoples and frontline communities.
Jill and Edgar take a few minutes to discuss these developments and take On the Frontlines‘ first-ever listener-submitted question! They then go down memory lane, discussing the significance of COP21 in Paris, both for the world and for Washington State.
Recorded on November 9, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- This Changes Everything (Naomi Klein, 2014)
- “SHELL NO!” Seattle Protesters Take to Kayaks to Decry Arctic Drilling (May 16, 2015)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
NOTE: We had some connectivity issues while recording this podcast, so you may hear some choppy audio at some points. Apologies!
For this installment of Crash #COP27, Edgar tells Jill about his first day in COP27’s Blue Zone, including meeting Dr. Robert Bullard (the “Father of Environmental Justice”) and participating in an action honoring and drawing attention to those incarcerated for defending the environment and other prisoners of conscience.
This episode also touches on the connection between resource extraction and the extraction of people of color from their communities by carceral policies, as well as the deliberately alienating atmosphere maintained inside the COP. Also, our friend Ananda Lee Tan (from Season 1 of On the Frontlines) apparently gave John Kerry an important piece of literature!
Recorded on November 10, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
NOTE: We had some connectivity issues while recording speakers at COP27 for this podcast, so you may hear some low-quality audio at some points. Apologies!
In this special bonus episode of Crash #COP27, we present audio from different Black and Indigenous environmental justice leaders at COP27’s Blue Zone. Listen directly to their stories and hear the sounds of the COP and Sharm El Sheikh, captured on the ground by Edgar.
Recorded on November 11 and 12, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
What is the price of a whale? How many tons of carbon can you offset with a humpback?
For this installment of Crash #COP27, Edgar talks about the mental toll the COP is taking on him. From the tightly controlled atmosphere that limits dissent and on the ground actions from civil society representatives, to the absurdity of the false solutions being peddled (like whales as carbon offsets), it’s difficult to find hope in the COP process. Is the COP really the place for action on climate change?
Jill and Edgar examine where the hope and future lies for frontline communities outside of the COP. They discuss the need for an alternative “People’s COP,” and how the Just Transition framework helps us ground our work by daylighting what the false solutions are and where the real solutions lie.
Recorded on November 12, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
Is the COP rigged? Why does it feel like there’s a predetermined agenda filled with false solutions? Is it time for an alternative to the COP, led by the grassroots?
In this week’s episode, Jill and Edgar break down the idea of “climate finance”—where the most wealthy nations fund climate mitigation and adaption projects in countries without the resources to implement these projects on their own—and discuss climate reparations as well. They also go into how science and expertise are often co-opted by those trying to sell false solutions and hoodwink frontline communities.
Recorded on November 15, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Check out:
- Fossil Fueled Foolery: An Illustrated Primer on the Fossil Fuel Industry’s Deceptive Tactics (NAACP report)
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
For this installment, Jill checks in with Edgar during his last day of crashing COP27 to talk about some final updates before Edgar heads home, including the fact that Edgar ran into Governor Jay Inslee.
Edgar tells us about the run-in, why the governor was in Sharm El Sheikh, and his experience seeing Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the newly reelected President of Brazil, give a speech. Jill and Edgar then share some brief reflections on what the real solutions to climate change are, at the close of a global conference teeming with false solutions.
Recorded on November 16, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
Now that Edgar is back in Washington, what’s next for movement leaders who went to COP27, such as those in the It Takes Roots coalition? How do international agreements at the COP affect what national, regional, and local governments do in the name of responding to climate change?
Jill and Edgar discuss the concept of “loss and damage,” one of the provisions of the negotiated agreement released at the end of the COP. They also discuss the location of COP28 in 2023—Dubai—and how these locations seem intentionally chosen to limit civil society and the environmental justice movement’s abilities to participate in the COP, influence proceedings, and build connections with local communities.
Ultimately, Jill and Edgar agree that there is a strong need for a People’s COP, or Counter-COP, for frontline communities, and that the real power rests in the hands of those who are resisting capitalism and creating change.
Recorded on November 22, 2022. Crash #COP27 is a special season of On the Frontlines.
Music:
Maximalism by Punch Deck | https://soundcloud.com/punch-deck
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en_US
VIDEOS
Listen to Season 1 of On the Frontlines
In this inaugural episode, Jill Mangaliman and Edgar Franks introduce themselves and report back from May Day and a Marcha Campesina demonstration. They discuss bonds in struggle between farmworkers and Filipinos/Filipino-Americans, and comment on the leaked Supreme Court opinion on Roe vs. Wade. Jill and Edgar close out their conversation with a discussion on what real journalism looks like and why it must be defended.
Recorded on May 5, 2022.
On the Frontlines goes international in its second episode! In the aftermath of the election of Bongbong Marcos and Sara Duterte as President and Vice President of the Philippines, Jill and Meesha of Malaya Movement call in from Seafood City in Tukwila to break down the results with Edgar. They discuss the state of politics in the Philippines, the concerns around election fraud, and the active role that entities in the United States, including local ones like Boeing and Washington State Congressional Representative Adam Smith, play in keeping dictators in power overseas.
Recorded on May 13, 2022.
Check out:
In this installment, Jill and Edgar discuss the Washington Futures Fund and the potential it has to help disrupt poverty in Washington State. They also reflect on Cooperativa Tierra y Libertad, a cooperative farm in Everson, and how COVID-19 has not only radically changed the way we think about work but also shone a bright light on issues frontline communities have been talking about for generations. These include inequities that impact frontline community health during crises and the way that food sovereignty, land, and access to common spaces supports sustainable and thriving communities.
Recorded on May 27, 2022.
Check out:
Did you know that Washington State houses the third largest arsenal of nuclear weapons anywhere in the world, after only the United States as a whole and Russia?
Jill joins Liz Darrow and Tara Villalba of Community to Community (C2C), a Front and Centered member organization, to learn some shocking facts about nuclear, to talk about the false solution that is nuclear energy, and to understand how the energy conversation is different but still deeply connected to the conversation around nuclear weapons
This episode was also published by CommunityVoz, C2C’s ecofeminist radio show and podcast, on May 31, 2022.
Jill and Edgar talk with Mylene Cabalona, president of BIEN (BPO Industry Employees Network), about BIEN’s efforts to organize call center workers in the Philippines and the need for international solidarity. Mylene was visiting Seattle as part of the Kapit-Bisig Solidarity Tour.
This episode was also published by CommunityVoz, C2C’s ecofeminist radio show and podcast. C2C (Community to Community) is a Front and Centered member organization.
Recorded on June 29, 2022.
For this special extended episode, Jill and Edgar are joined by Ananda Lee Tan, Strategy Advisor for the Just Transition Alliance, to discuss the Just Transition and Hoodwinked in the Hothouse, a zine about false solutions to climate change that was authored by “the grassroots, veteran organizers, movement strategists, and thought leaders from across the climate and environmental justice movements.”
Recorded on June 9, 2022.
Jill and Edgar join Liz Darrow of Community to Community (C2C), a Front and Centered member organization, to talk about the Just Transition framework for change and building solidarity with workers in rural communities.
This episode was also published by CommunityVoz, C2C’s ecofeminist radio show and podcast, on July 13, 2022.
Jill and Edgar join Liz Darrow of Community to Community (C2C), a Front and Centered member organization, for a conversation with filmmaker and creative director Tani Ikeda and artist Michelle Kumata. Tani and Michelle share stories about Emerging Radiance, their project that celebrates the untold stories of Nikkei farmers who lived in Bellevue from 1920 to 1942.
This episode was also published by CommunityVoz, C2C’s ecofeminist radio show and podcast, on July 29, 2022.
Check out:
Jill and Edgar join Liz Darrow of Community to Community (C2C), a Front and Centered member organization, to discuss the recent extreme air quality conditions in Western Washington, and as well as the work of organizing in communities while continuing to push for meaningful legislation to protect farmworkers and the working poor, who are disproportionately harmed by wildfires and other impacts of the climate crisis.
This episode was also published by CommunityVoz, C2C’s ecofeminist radio show and podcast, on September 13, 2022.
NOTE: We had some connectivity issues while recording this podcast, so you may hear some choppy audio at some points. Apologies!
On the 50th anniversary of Executive Order 1081—Ferdinand Marcos, Sr.’s proclamation of Martial Law in the Philippines—Jill and Edgar are joined by Rene and Josie for a special episode to close out the first season of On the Frontlines.
With announcements of Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr. being invited to speak at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York City the day before the anniversary, actions were called across the country to condemn his visit and project the true history and issues of the people.
The evening before the podcast, Filipino community leaders across King County called for justice for the survivors and victims of Martial Law. At Seafood City in Tukwila, community members gathered to remember all the martyrs and survivors of Martial Law and to soundly reject the United States-Marcos II regime.
“Community members are appalled that Marcos, Jr. has been invited to speak on this painful anniversary,” said Marie Artap Regional Coordinator of BAYAN USA Seattle. “It is a slap in the face to all the courageous Filipinos who survived torture and economic ruin and the families of those who were killed at the hands of the Marcos family.”
Recorded on September 21, 2022.
Check out:
- Never Again! Never Forget! #ML50 #NeverForget #NeverAgain
The Story Behind On the Frontlines
On the Frontlines is a Front and Centered podcast produced by Jill, Edgar, and the teams at Front and Centered and Community to Community.
Before they launched On the Frontlines, Jill and Edgar produced Crash #COP26—a series of conversations from COP26, or the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference of Parties.
Edgar called in from Glasgow, Scotland, where COP26 was being held, to talk to Jill about climate justice and share stories about what was happening on the ground.
Check out our Crash #COP26! archive page to listen to all episodes and access photos and video clips from the heart of the action in Glasgow.
