The imagine the, you are a hard working, idealistic, young deputy with the u. S. Marshal service. Youre doing hard dangerous work and youre succeeding at it. You like this where it gets difficult, but youre making a real contribution to the security of the american people. And besides, you enjoy it. Youre optimistic about the future. But then much to your surprise to your past over for promotion. Youre not chosen for interesting new assignments and then you learn that this is all happening for the simple reason that you just happen to be black. Im john kerry onto welcome to the whistle blowers the. 2 2 2 2 2 dr matthew fog is one of those rare individuals who is utterly relentless, but that relentlessness comes with incredible patience when he realized that he was a victim of Racial Discrimination within the federal government. He file a lawsuit. But lets start at the beginning, matthew fogg joined. The Marshal Service in 1978 and quickly became a highly decorated officer. He was crossed designated as a supervisory special agent in charge of a Us Drug Enforcement Administration joint drug and gun introduction task force. He was later promoted to the position of inspector in charge of the Marshal Service unit for the International Criminal police organization. And he receives multiple awards for tracking down more than 300. 00 of americas most wanted and most dangerous criminals. As you can see, there was no legitimate reason to pass this man over for promotion or to deny him new assignments. It was all about race. He won that case, any one big. But the Marshal Service and by extension, the broader American Government didnt make any of the necessary changes to ensure that this didnt happen again, that racism didnt play a role in personnel decisions. And so matthew led a Class Action Lawsuit that included more than 700. 00 current and former black deputy marshals and detention enforcement officers, plus thousands of black applicants who are not hired in the 1st place. That case was stuck in legal limbo for almost 30 years. You heard that right 30 years, the case was dismissed, it was reinstated, and it was expanded over the course of those 3 decades. But lee, last year, matthew and his fellow plaintiffs finally won that case. It wasnt the huge, devastating when that they had hoped for, but it was a when none the less. And it seems that the bite and ministration wanted to actually fix the problem. Matthew fogg joins us today. Matthew, thank you so much for being with us. Its a pleasure to have you as good to be with you and we just gotta make some corrections or something. You just say we didnt win. The case case hasnt been one yet, is just been a proposed settlement, which were not in agreement with. Uh well, thats a much more important point. Yeah. Okay, so lets, lets get to that. I want to start then back in the mid 19 eighties. Youre going gang busters at the Marshal Service in just 7 short years. You made quite an impressive career for yourself. You, youre highly decorated at that point. What happened to make you think that wait a minute . Its, somethings not exactly right here, as well as it started in one and 85. I found my individual complaint once i got on the mall, sir. And you know, being a black person and coming into an environment such as a command and control environment, Law Enforcement. I saw the racism across the board of just what do you keep your mouth shut when your you, when you say so. I mean, you see it all, you see it and everything youre doing. So found at some point we had a particular manager that was targeting, it is due to African Americans, people was most likely to succeed and he came up to me and once he did, i entered for back a lot of people didnt want me to, didnt want to be decided, except it is a little wait till you become the director, will go to the top and youll be ok. But it seems like anybody else in up with my son on my door, id want somebody to step up to the to them. And step up in and be uh, speak up for them. And if, if the system is wrong, the problem is that our system is, is a big machine. Once you start speaking out against something thats in a commanding, strong environment, they circle the wagons on you and they try to discredit you. And thats the whole battle. Did i begin to fight all the way through to that one that big lawsuit and 98. Finally made it to 12 and 98. Garrett came back and found the whole United States mazda. Itd be a race, will house down environment for all African American w as marches or the didnt to pay me for me in order to make me a g. S. 15, oregon to go back and fix the system. But then adjust the problem. It turned around it took a 10 year before he paid me, they say for that verdict, put 10 whole years. Oh my god, 1800. Reduced to 10000000 down 2300000. 0 my god. So its a, its, its, its, its a constant battle and they sick the address on me by withholding all of the taxes and withholdings that they took out of the judgment. They stuck in on a slice one and ira stuart. I had it and came out to me for 77 more years. Gone and see my paycheck and everything. When the government popped up later said oaks, we had the money, we didnt realize we had. Now my tax to this day is all messed up. So it just like constant battle. And then on top of that, the class action, all the stuff that you look at, the history of this class action and the number of people that it has affected. And it just blows my mind that nobody on capitol hill use. All of that is as been written on was mess grassley. Everybody spoken out against the, the, the problems of the mazda service. I got a website up big gets with badges right behind us, right. Your prose res, 97. So its not like nobody knows by the Washington Post. Cbs news, everybodys done stories on it, but yet, no one is fix it and no president is unbelievable. You know, and just listening to that little bit of your story makes me think that thats the same story ive heard at the c, i a at the f, b i n s a d o j at the state department. Its the same exact story and youre right to about what the very 1st thing that you said the government is a great, big, slow, lumbering bureaucracy. And they know that they have years, decades that they can use to for you and to ruin you. If they have to thats so true and the problem is, see if we got e o c and got the last saying where it is, say, okay, if the government is going to use out to expand dollars, the price us, then the government should pay us the price do is out. Yes it dollars we as a complainant. If you truly you got a problem, a place a case of discrimination, then the government should pay your legal fees. Thats right. Them back. Thats right. Dont say dont at a disadvantage. And then on top of that, the government does a lot of illegal things. The, remember, we gotta understand the government. Its just not just you drop it. Is that, but i mean, it just is not some type of inanimate object. Its people, a lot of races, individuals who dont believe that pretty much blacks African Americans should be in the government or used to be happened. Youve got a job using that be on their level. And so youve got a lot of people in the app places and always when you got a companion control environment is the same as on the street. In model commander is a big it with a bed. And he expects me to treat people badly. And i dont do it, he can come turn right around and saw me and the next. So you read the roxy is against me. So i got to do what he wants. And thats the way the system works. I want to hear more about your lawsuit and im going to preface this by saying, i believe it was along the sea ice torture program in december of 2007. And i knew that i had done the right thing. But wouldnt you know, for the very 1st time in my life, the iris audited me in 2008, 2009201011121314 and 15. And i wasnt making any money. But this is one of those mechanisms that they use to beat up the you. So you ended up learning that lawsuit and you want it a little on paper. It looked like you wanted handsomely, but right, that was just the beginning. So youve got this lawsuit on the one hand that you know, it looks like you want it, but then theres a class action suit. On the other hand, can you tell us about how that happened . Are you a part of both suits . Yes. What happened was it personally lawsuit i had that started the 85 and network is way all way around the 2008. In the meantime, the same things that was happening to me, and of course, to continue wasting the retaliation that continued happening to me. After i filed the other complaint which made new new issues arise. Man, so by turns we get the on the zillow problem. This is happens all afternoon monday. So youve got a big case here. Youve proven now discrimination. What is before we even what the court. But in 94 we filed, we filed the Class Action Lawsuit number. My individual days was still running it. So yes, there we go. That route in the drink come back in and you notice on the british going to do is said, do you find us these monster . Itd be a racial, hostile environmental, African American deputies before 1991 and after 1991. Yes. I checked both scratch, so we were, we had a good time appraisal the case been, we got a firm law firm, Different Law Firm steps and it takes the class action, which thats the case as running. Now, in the meantime, my personal case ran it. Scores day was when he caught it, appealing it, but then oh he is in 2008. My names valley paid me. It was so messed up with what they had done to me and then holding again, holding the withholding, holding the payment that they were supposed to get be they dont report it to the arrows in iris since i got money and come up to me for a whole years. Oh my just missed my taxes and my state taxes mess. Everything kept me from getting my drivers license. Oh my god being registered. It just so many things that occurred didnt change the difference in the salary that i would have gotten while i was out of work discrepancies. And it was so many things they kept doing it to me that you know, you just gotta say it again. These are individuals that somebody could pick up the phone just like in your case, somebody says, well, call the iris and tell me the audit this mean. Thats right. And you guys know we course i included. Yeah. You cant protect yourself from Something Like that because you dont have any idea that it happened. I want to ask you to about this class action usually when there is a class action suit, there are hundreds, sometimes thousands of victims. That yeah, that was the case here, but also the most class action suits the accused is so guilty and that guilt is so well documented that they try to settle the suit as quickly as possible. We see that all the time with big companies. The government however, responded in exactly the opposite way and they drag this suit out for 30 years. Tell us about that. What were the negotiations like over the course of those decades . Or is it that there were no negotiations because the government was just trying to stall you a good note to be honest with you the whole time the class is going the only thing that made the adjustment room and added to us from a just as that supervisor view as mazda service. The only thing that made them come to the table was the Washington Post article that came out in 22. 00. That basically said that there was a lawsuit and that is possibility that this thing has been going on for 30 years of possibility of maybe going to drown. They can run into the table and they said, we want to settle. The problem is our attorneys went in and started doing stuff that we didnt want to now. So now we had a, a problem between the priority. Uh, now we know theres a lot of stuff goes on behind closed or we dont know whats happening. But the bottom line with the amount of money youve got 10000 right now, and ill put dental a potential 10000 individuals claims. And we come up with 15000000. 00, which is a joke. I mean, your asset that in watts or pro, as i said by john decline is get us started at the uncle sams product to get 5 me the data spread out with 10000 people. You got gift cards at montgomery. Yeah. So this is, this is what were saying. You possibly fighting discrimination even when youre talking about legally fighting these people. Its always something going on to try to discredit this class and cut it down. Dr. Matthew fogg, stay with us. Were going to take a short commercial break and when we come back were going to continue our conversation with matthew fox about the current situation. That minority employees face in government say to the. 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 the Worlds Largest democracy folks, the rest of the planet watches in emerging multi polar world. Indias voice matters. But who will be the power behind watches, almost 1000000000 people decide and billions more, react the the as a result of why it was, can be cited by lines. These can be cited by true importance of we can never be kind of a study since that transparency is extraordinary. John mystic patrice then just succeeded in finding the documents that existed in making them available to the world public. I mean, what could be more holding back by publishing information and sharing information with the public. He was exercising the right to free speech. He did so in the Public Interest lies 10 smith and golf and, and honestly, the biggest of late continuously. I know why advice may assume that no one who is the guy that illegal anymore wisely for to just for to be on box weighing a 174, he used to go through the sentence. All. Were going to let that stay the welcome back to the with the blows. 2 and john kerry onto were speaking with United StatesMarshal Service whistleblower, matthew, fog about discrimination in the Marshal Service in the in the broader us government. Dr. Fod good to have you with us. Thanks for staying. Thank you. Thank you. One of the things that bothers me very much about this case, and there are actually several things that bother me is that it is dragged on for so long it dragged on through the administrations of 5 president s that is in this rateable to me. Why is it that no Marshal Service director wanted to settle this thing and just make it go away . Why didnt word never come down from the white house just as just to settle it. So i think is when youre dealing with racism in the United States, department of justice, youre talking about the premium Law Enforcement agency in the world. I mean, you get like right behind the big gets with badges that com does. So you can go to my website and read about it, but that was on the front page of the New York Post and 1997 that you would have thought the fall out from that. We had congressional hearings, Maxine Waters and big hearing an adult at that time or it code. A black Deputy Attorney general was a black with the Deputy Attorney general. And we had these marries, we laid it all out at the one why deputy who showed up a big old rap. They gave him because he testified against the government because of his black pod now who was sitting next to me at the table. Now that man got killed later, somebody ran to stop the road broke his neck. You know we, weve very suspicious of that, my god. But the reality of it is that i think when youre dealing with racism in the Us Department of justice, they wanted to dig in and say, and the judge said that it much router courtney as my attorney. So youre telling me youre just brahman doug. Its use it on his e, okay. And he was basically saying, yes, i mean, bottom line is where we all look all the years. Its taking us to resolve this matter. So i think what happens is somebody over there in a d o j, they just dont want to be seen as the culprits of the things that theyre supposed to be going around the country to go against other Police Departments and organizations. So be holding them accountable. Yeah. Can you hold somebody accountable when you yourself have been found guilty of it in a federal court most of the time theres none of the route most of the time does a settlement and you know and settlements. They always say we didnt do anything wrong. In my case, more with the drought, we got a judgement. So there is a wrong doing a wrong finding. Now, within the last election. Yes, you get people over this thing that we, we dont want to deal with racism. We rather do with anything other than that, accepting the fact that were agreeing that somehow we are racially wrong. Weve done the legal things. Now youve got drag note operations going on at the us box, who is responsible for around the country, and youve got people being shot in the back. And then after the americans, big disproportionately locked up. Targeted all it is bodies, us margin, drag net operating with state and local, and the state local dont do what we do. They dont follow us. What have we, whatever we allow them to get away what they want to do. Why do you think that change your let me rephrase that. Why do you think that has begun to change with at least this proposed settlement here . So i dont i again, i dont see it as changing it. See because the proposed settlement is so low. Yes. That is making mark rita says that my me to be honest with you. This settlement would set a precedent for anybody who decides to fight the institution transport. Do we have 10000 things . If you have 10000 folks that have a leg discrimination over 30 years, and you want though, 15000000 of them come on. The same attorneys said back in 2008, when they took a portion of this case a, a case had coincided with this one same us monitors in the federal court. The same attorney said the case of worth 300000000. Now we had at that time, 700 people. Now today we got 10000 and we dropped down to 15000000. Somethings the matter with that. Yes, theres a problem going on behind the curtains. Another thing that bothers me about this case is, as you just said, the thousands