Troops Are Quitting the US Military Over the Genocide in Gaza

On The Freedom Side LIVE, Thursday, 6/27 at 3pm ET/12pm PT, Eugene is joined by special guests: Mike Prysner - American service members are quitting the military in protest of the US government’s role in the Gaza genocide. Dozens of troops have filed for Conscientious Objector status since October 7, citing the US-Israeli genocidal war as the turning point. Mike Prysner, war veteran and host of Eyes Left Podcast and producer for The Empire Files, explains the growing dissent over Gaza among active duty personnel and veterans alike. Booker Ngesa Omole - Kenyan President William Ruto announced he would not sign the highly-unpopular finance bill after a mass uproar against the bill that saw demonstrators storm the Parliament building in revolt. Police killed 23 protesters and injured dozens more for protesting a punitive tax reform that would have imposed further austerity and deepened the cost of living crisis. Booker Ngesa Omole, the National Organizing Secretary of the Communist Party of Kenya (CPK) discusses why this is a huge victory despite intense police repression. Kevin Gosztola - Julian Assange has finally been freed after over a decade of persecution by the US government for exposing its war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Following a plea deal with the US Department of Justice, the WikiLeaks founder was freed from the super-max Belmarsh Prison on Monday, where he was held for over five years battling impending extradition to the US. Kevin Gosztola, the curator of newsletter & author of Guilty of Journalism: The Political Case Against Julian Assange, explains what implications Assange’s guilty plea has for the free speech rights of journalists and whistleblowers. Ben Chacko - The United Kingdom is preparing to head to the polls on July 4 after Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced snap elections on May 22. Polling shows that Britain’s main opposition Labour Party is poised to win a landslide victory and Sunak’s Conservatives expected to lose upwards of 140 seats. But just how different will a Labour government be from a Conservative one? Ben Chacko, Journalist & editor of the Morning Star, joins the show to discuss. Wanda Bertram - June 24 marked two years since the Dobbs v. Jackson decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, stripping abortion and reproductive rights from millions of women. Now that abortion rights are decided by individual states, the number of patients traveling out-of-state for the procedure has nearly doubled from 1 in 10 to nearly 1 in 5. And it has had a disproportionate effect on marginalized women, including those on probation or parole. Wanda Bertram, with the Prison Policy Initiative joins the show to consider how the evisceration of abortion rights has further disenfranchised women caught in the carceral justice system. #breakthroughnews