Few take Cinco de Mayo seriously. For many of us, today is about restaurant specials on nachos and margaritas. Too many white people wearing sombreros and fake mustaches. But for Axios reporter Russell Contreras, May 5 takes him back to growing up in Houston, where a forgotten riot over the police death of a Mexican American in 1978 turned Cinco de Mayo from farce to reflection. He talks about the forgotten, radical roots of the holiday loved by few and celebrated mostly with drinko.
California businesses are starting to reopen, and for Bughra Arkin, owner of Dolan Uyghur Restaurant in Alhambra, keeping his restaurant open is also about saving his culture. Arkin belongs to an ethnic Muslim minority in China known as the Uyghurs. Their homeland, Xinjiang, is roughly the size of Iran. The famous Silk Road ran through it. For a long time, the region operated under its own local governments, outside the eyes of the Chinese Communist party. But in 2009, things began to change in Xinjiang. Arkin remembers parties ending earlier and earlier. Then people started disappearing. He says young Uyghurs were forcibly taken to inland China to work in factories. The houses and farmland they left behind were seized by the Communist government, which began encouraging the majority Han Chinese to move in. Recently, the world has increasingly decried China’s treatment of Uyghurs. Chinese officials deny any wrongdoing, but the United States and other nations around the globe have declared their actions a “genocide.” We speak with Arkin about his family's experience with the Chinese government, which includes the detention and disappearance of his father. We also talk to L.A. Times reporter Johana Bhuiyan about a company that the Chinese government has used to track Uyghurs and its efforts to expand in the United States.
Among everything that COVID-19 made worse, there is nothing more dire — or more visible — than its impact on homelessness. Over 66,000 people in Los Angeles County are homeless. It’s an issue that has bedeviled L.A., the land of sunshine and dreams, for decades. Everyone seems to have an idea on how to solve it. None seem to work. Then last month, a federal judge issued an order: House everyone in skid row, the historical epicenter of homelessness in Los Angeles. House everyone by October — or else. We speak with L.A. Times housing reporter Ben Oreskes and the Rev. Andy Bales, who runs Union Rescue Mission on skid row, about a move that could test whether there’s enough political will to solve homelessness once and for all.
Hosted by Gustavo Arellano, “The Times: Daily news from the L.A. Times” will bring you the world through the eyes of the West Coast. Expect award-winning reporting, hard-hitting investigations and random randomness from the biggest newspaper west of the Mississippi right to your ears. Whether it’s farmworkers, Silicon Valley, Hollywood or car chases, we’ll give you deep dives and snippets, rants and discourse, laughers and weepers, with a diversity of voices and a bunch of drama and desmadre. Our first episode premieres Monday May 3. Learn more at latimes.com/the-times.
