[Brad Shreve]
Hello. Miguel Marquez. Welcome to Queer We Are.
[Miguel Marquez]
Thank you very much. Great to be here.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, it’s a pleasure and an honor to have you on. Your career in broadcast journalism. Started about 25 years ago covering local news in New York and Phoenix.
[Miguel Marquez]
It did? Feels like it was yesterday, but yes, if you say it was 25 years, I’ll believe you.
[Brad Shreve]
I’m piecing things together that I’ve read. I’ve never actually seen the actual numbers. Now, you’re a senior national correspondent for CNN, and I’ve read reports and video clips from your career, and I’m going to run through some of these. You’ve made numerous trips to Iraq during the war. You covered the war in Afghanistan. You were beaten by riot police in Bahrain. You were nearly blown away while reporting a hurricane in, I think it was South Carolina. And then you turned around this past September and got into another hurricane in North Carolina. I’ve seen you tear gassed in Minneapolis with all of that, have you ever thought, maybe I should go back to reporting local city events?
[Miguel Marquez]
It’s made me think, should I just spend more time in the garden? To be honest, it has been a whirlwind. But of all the things you mentioned, this is interesting. I covered Iraq extensively, Afghanistan, quite a bit. Probably got shot at more in Afghanistan than Iraq. But the hardest thing I’ve ever covered was the pandemic here in this country. It was so long. It was so devastating. It was so hard. It was such a grind. It became political and frustrating. It was everything happening in our world all at once distilled into this insane sort of period in our lives.
[Brad Shreve]
The pandemic affected my family so I want to hear more of this. But first, I’m your host, Brad Shreve.
[Miguel Marquez]
And I’m Miguel Marquez with CNN.
[Brad Shreve]
And Queer We Are.
Welcome to Queer we Are, where you’ll hear inspirational and motivational yet entertaining stories by LGBTQ entertainers, athletes, politicians, activists, or maybe even someone right there in your neighborhood. I’m Brad, and I’ll discuss with Queer individuals about their successes, their challenges, and what they learned along the way.
My guest, Miguel Marquez, is a CNN senior national correspondent based in New York. His earliest career before news was as a researcher in the Congressional Research Office and as legislative assistant for U. S. Representative Bill Richardson. And he joined CNN as an anchor for Headline News in 2003. In 2016, he accepted a Golden Nymph Award, which I’ve never heard of, on behalf of CNN at the Monte Carlo Television Festival for coverage of the Baltimore rights in 2015. And before we go on, what is the Golden Nymph Award? Why did it get that name?
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh, dear, I’m getting up from my desk. Well, you don’t have it on video, but now I’m showing you the actual Golden Nymph, which is so Monte Carlo. They hold a television awards program there every year. And this is the award given out there. It’s like winning an Emmy for Monte Carlo, for the King’s sort of award ceremony there for media. I will note that I do wrap it in beads from New Orleans just to give it a little zhuzh.
[Brad Shreve]
You need to but for the listener, a very nice looking award. But it’s a woman casually laying down, looking to her side. So yeah, I think the beads are necessary to jazz her up a little bit.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. And it sounds better in French. Nympholo.
[Brad Shreve]
Oh, I see.
[Miguel Marquez]
It sounds much better in French, as do most things. Really?
[Brad Shreve]
Everything sounds better in French. Yes.
[Miguel Marquez]
There you go. There you go. I’m going to clothe her again, if that’s okay with you.
[Brad Shreve]
As I always say, just saying I love you and German sounds like you’re clearing your throat. French is a whole different story.
[Miguel Marquez]
I love German as well. I like that. All the verbs are at the very end of a sentence. You have a whole conversation, and all the verbs are at the end. So you have to figure out sort.
[Brad Shreve]
Is that the reason it sounds the way it does? I had no idea.
[Miguel Marquez]
Their grammar is very…I tried to learn German once and I gave up.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, since he brought up the Pandemic, you spent quite a bit of time heavy duty in hospitals in New York and I think in Texas during the height of the pandemic. I’d like to hear your story about that.
[Miguel Marquez]
So, we sort of fell into it here. Our great staff here in New York have been calling around to lots and lots of hospitals to see if there is anybody, any way possible we could get into a hospital. Since the HIPAA, the federal law of regulating information in hospitals, went into effect many years ago, it is impossible for reporters to get access to the interior of a hospital without great effort to make sure that no one’s privacy is going to be affected by it. Lo and behold, Brookdale Hospital in Brooklyn that had seen a very big number of cases, said yes and we went in on a Sunday, I believe, for a few hours to say it was shocking. It would be understatement to have to see an American emergency room shoved to the gills with people who were struggling to breathe, some of them barely able to main consciousness staring off into the distance. The hospital itself having turned children’s wards with duct tape and plastic into bed space for people suffering from a disease that we didn’t know very much about, it was horrendous for them. It was so confusing and sad for the people in there and it was terrifying for us to cover it as reporters. The photographer who went in with me, Frank Babvona, most didn’t want to go in. Most people didn’t want to see what was inside. I mean, they wanted to see it but didn’t really want to have to go in themselves. It was terrifying. We didn’t know what we were dealing with and it was very early on in the pandemic here. We had seen it in Italy and in China and other places, but it was very, very early for the US. And it was quite an experience. And that kicked off two years of going into emergency rooms and COVID units and seeing that this pandemic progress, not only in New York, but across the country,
[Brad Shreve]
what about the concern for your own safety?
[Miguel Marquez]
I certainly had that. I did what the doctors said. They were stripping down in their garage or outside their apartment before they went in and then jumped in the shower and threw all their clothes into a hot Clorox washer. And I did the exact same thing because that’s what they were doing. And my husband, I think, to give it another at the time, he certainly didn’t want me going in these places. And we slept separately for a couple of nights to make sure everything was all right. We just we did not know. It was really, really concerning. I mean, that said, I go to I’ve covered Iraq and Afghanistan, and there’s nothing like getting shot at and surviving. But the difference with the pandemic, I suppose, is that you don’t know. You just don’t know. I mean, when they’re shooting at you, that you know they’re shooting at you from over there and you’re over here. And if you just stay close to the ground, you might be okay. But with the pandemic, it just feels very chaotic and random.
[Brad Shreve]
It’s an enemy you can’t see.
[Miguel Marquez]
It’s an enemy you can’t see, and you really didn’t know what you were dealing with. So, yeah, it was a really disturbing time. Yeah.
[Brad Shreve]
I want to talk later about objectivity and subjectivity. This was a situation where you pretty much be subjective with what you were talking about. My family was impacted by COVID through marriage. I had some family members that died from the pandemic.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh, dear. I’m sorry.
[Brad Shreve]
As well as my father-in-law, before he died, was rejected from the ER twice. You know, they had the triage tent outside and the emergency rooms packed, and despite being rushed there by the ambulance, the ER said, we aren’t taking anybody on a special case basis. It’s a numbers one by one by one.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh, God.
[Brad Shreve]
I clearly had an experience that a lot of people didn’t see from the pandemic, and you certainly did. So how did it make you feel when you hear people that still to this day say, it didn’t really happen?
[Miguel Marquez]
I you know, you’re never going to win that argument. I think people I’ve just sort of accepted that people are going to believe what they are going to believe. They believe it less for reasons of fact and more for reasons of ideology or just wishful thinking or whatever it is that they want to believe. They choose to believe. And I certainly got into it on camera and interviewed many people, some of them who were in the hospital with COVID struggling to breathe, still not believing that it was real, and still say they wouldn’t get vaccinated. I think, like many things in our world right now, not only in America, but around the world, you just have to let people believe what they’re going to believe truth. And that baseline of what’s real and truthful, it’s become sort of Orwellian.
[Brad Shreve]
And I’ve heard the stories of people basically on their deathbed, denying it even exists, and you’re confirming that for me, and it just blows my mind.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. And in fairness, most people, and even those that didn’t believe that then got it, came to believe it. They were there was a really lovely woman that I met in, I think, Louisiana, and I thought she’d make it. And a week later, she was dead. It was so sad. And her parents didn’t want to get vaccinated. They didn’t want her vaccinated. She kind of thought about it but wasn’t sure. But people are affected by those who are around them, and it’s very sad that it’s very sad and hard to see where so much of the country is right now. So much of the world is right now.
[Brad Shreve]
So, when it comes to news, as a reporter, you’re expected to be objective, let’s say in most instances, I would guess. But in a case like that, where you’re doing an investigative report, I presume, you don’t have to be. You can pretty much lay it on the line. This is what’s going on. What I’m leading up to is when I lived in L.A. Until just recently, every week in Beverly Hills, I doubt it’s still going on. There was a protest with those that were against the masked mandates, and they were volatile to the point that they were screaming people on the streets demanding they take their masks off. Had you been sent to report that, would you have had to do that in a much more objective manner and not give your opinion on the whole COVID mask issue?
[Miguel Marquez]
To me, those situations and protests make it easy. I just let them speak. I think anybody who’s hearing that message will understand. Just let them speak. Ask them questions based on science, based on what we know, based on fact, and let them answer. And I think you just allow those answers to be heard. I mean, I did a story on two nurses who did not want to get vaccinated, and they were very brave to speak to us because CNN is not always welcome among many conservatives in this country, and they were very honest with their feelings. I felt that we gave them lots of time to say their side of the story, but it was a fair exchange. There are the facts about what we know about COVID and then there are their answers. And despite being nurses and seeing it every day, it was almost a year and a half at that point, they just felt like it wasn’t incumbent upon them to be vaccinated, which to me just seemed crazy. Same thing with fire department and police departments. Most of them do get vaccinated and want to get vaccinated because they’re dealing with the public most closely. But the ones that don’t. What really is the harm? Billions of people have received these vaccines and it’s clear that they are effective.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, I mentioned my father-in-law when he was here at home getting home health care. One of the nurses came in and said, no, I don’t buy into that whole COVID thing.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh dear.
[Brad Shreve]
We asked them not to send her back. So it sounds like the more over the top they are, the easier your job actually is.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh yeah. I think my job then is to ask questions that are as concise, and fact based and then just hear the answer and there’s not much more that I can do. It is very easy for people to get into a situation where they mock them. I appreciate people, regardless of their political persuasion, who will speak to us. I think it’s very important to hear those conservative voices and why they think the way they think. They may not like the way that others react to it, but it is important to hear their voices. Before COVID I was doing stuff in the Midwest on politics and sort of what was happening in the country and it was very clear to me that there’s a lot of fear, there’s a lot of uncertainty. Our world, our society, our economy is changing in ways that we have never, ever seen in the history of humankind with technology and it’s changing it so rapidly that I think a lot of people aren’t comfortable with it. And there was a lot of that fear. You’re seeing the country change racially as well. Minorities are becoming the majority in the country, and I think that’s also concerning for a lot of people. But that’s the history of America. That’s the history of the world. That’s just how things work. But I think it’s important, it’s really important to hear those voices without mocking them, without talking down to them and just to listen to what they’re saying. It is sometimes hard because sometimes they come across very aggressive toward me and towards CNN. But I tried to be as much a straight shooter as possible, as it were.
[Brad Shreve]
Does that ever make you wish you were a commentator? Perhaps your own show?
[Miguel Marquez]
What are you hiring?
[Brad Shreve]
It’ll be an extensive pay cut; I can assure you of that.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah, I’m very interested and curious and I read tons. I used to think that I knew everything that there was to know and now I know I know nothing about anything. I mean, there are just so many smart, brilliant people in the world today in history, that the more you read and the more you understand about sort of where we are right now in our history as humans, the more you realize just how many smart people there were out there. And I would love to dive in deeper and do more.
[Brad Shreve]
I’m going to step back in time a little bit back to when you came out which I believe is in the early ninety s. I don’t I know it was before you began working in the news and it may have been before you started working a little bit in politics, am I right?
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. I came out when I was in Washington DC. So I mentioned before, I’m from a very small town in New Mexico, I didn’t know what gay was before I left there. I was very confused by all that. Then I went to Washington DC. And I figured it out and I was like, oh, that’s all it takes. You just have to like guys, oh, now I get it, what an idiot I am. And then I came out. I didn’t come bursting out. I had a very comfortable closet, I suppose. And then over some years I met somebody in DC. And that certainly helped. So that not together with him anymore. But that was sort of the impetus.
[Brad Shreve]
I think you and I know that coming out is just not I’m out and it’s over and done with.
[Miguel Marquez]
Correct
[Brad Shreve]
every situation is almost a new instance that we have to come out. So unless you’re wearing a gold thong and wearing a feather boa, most people aren’t going to know that you’re gay when you walk in the room. But it is going to come up somehow via conversation that’s either subtle or somebody may blatantly ask, do you have a girlfriend? Again, we deal with that forever. Do you recall when that first happened to you in a professional situation where maybe there was no antagonism on their part, but you were suddenly like, this is uncomfortable.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. Early on in my coming out experience, I was at a news agency, which I won’t say which one, I was an intern or something, very young and impressionable and I was wearing a bow tie. And one of the senior managers walked up to me and said, oh, you’re wearing a bow tie. You know they’ll think you’re one of them. And I was so freaking confused by what the hell he was talking about. I was like, and then only later when I told somebody else, they say, oh, he thinks you’re gay. It’s like, well, I am. And then I was annoyed that I had missed the opportunity to say, what do you mean one of them? But it’s the history of life, right? You always come up with a great line 5 seconds after you need it.
[Brad Shreve]
I’ve had them keep me up at night.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. So there was that when I was in Phoenix in local news, I had a friend who had a small magazine, a gay magazine there and he was like, oh, I’m going to do an issue with all the gay reporters in Phoenix. I knew there were a bunch of both gay and lesbian reporters in Phoenix. I said, oh great, I’m happy to do it. And then he’s like, oh great, let me get back to you and let you know who else will be on it. And I was like, great. And two weeks later he comes back. He’s like, nobody else wants to do it, but do you want the cover? And I’m like, well, sure, I guess. Really? Nobody nobody else would do it? It’s hilarious. Sometimes it works in your favor, I guess.
[Brad Shreve]
Didn’t seem to hurt you.
[Miguel Marquez]
I got the cover.
[Brad Shreve]
What was your first moment that you can recall when you hit national network? I know you were with ABC and obviously with CNN covering broader subjects, more national subjects or international subjects. Has that incident happened since then that was a little more uncomfortable for you?
[Miguel Marquez]
No, I was guarded when I was in Iraq because homosexuality is not the easiest thing in Iraq. And we had to work with a lot of Iraqi staffers, so I was more male. But they all knew, and we were fairly open with it. Probably not open enough, but it was just sort of an accepted thing. It was funny because when I was in Afghanistan, all of the Marines and the army guys, they all knew because they’re like, oh, I Googled you. You’re gay. It’s like that’s struts, right? So, you couldn’t really the Marines in particular are very funny about it. Aren’t Marines sexy? Some of them are like they’re very caught up in the whole Marine thing. And I was like, yes Marines have the best uniforms. So there’s that. You got that going for you.
[Brad Shreve]
I don’t know. Navy is pretty close.
[Miguel Marquez]
Navy is not bad.
[Brad Shreve]
Yeah, maybe navy is not bad.
[Miguel Marquez]
You got to be on ships and submarines. I don’t know about the Navy.
[Brad Shreve]
What’s the name of the big airport in Afghanistan that was basically the base?
[Miguel Marquez]
Well, there was Kandahar, where I spent time. There was Bagram.
[Brad Shreve]
Okay. Actually, it was either Pride Kandahar or it may have been Pride, Afghanistan. The very first event. It may have been the only event that I’m aware of. Were you there when that happened?
[Miguel Marquez]
I don’t think so. I spent most of my time in Hellman Province in the south, so I wasn’t in either. We’re in Canter a little bit and I’d be in Kabul for a couple of days, maybe just getting in and.
[Brad Shreve]
Then moving on to I was just curious. I’ve been trying to find somebody to talk to me that was there. And I know it was very low key. I saw a lot of the military magazine saying, this is outrageous. How could you do this in a country like them? They’re going to attack us.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh, right.
[Brad Shreve]
It was very low key. It was all indoors. I think all they did was speeches. It’s still pretty amazing that it was in Stars and Stripes. And somehow I’ll find somebody to tell the story.
[Miguel Marquez]
Me the story, the only experience I have of that sort I had been in a Kosh where it was a very small town in Helmand Province. I had gone back there to do a bit of a follow up with some of the guys that had taken over the town earlier, a couple of months earlier. And at the time, the Obama administration had just, okayed, gay marriage, I believe, or gay marriage was just I can’t remember what the rule was. And so I’m sitting around with all these 20 something Marines around a fire in a trash can in this little Afghan village, and the news has just hit, and maybe I told them that this just happened, and they’re all kind of like, whatever. And then this big hulking Marine comes out of his sort of his hut and he’s like, what? You can now have gays people can get married? The gays can get married now. It’s like and he was just f this is F that. If that’s the F that, I’m just going to f off. And he was so angry and so and everybody kind of just sat there and he was like, huge, this guy. And then about 20 seconds later, one turns to you there and goes, wait a minute, if I can marry you, then I can get benefits without having to have like, a wife and a family and everything. I can get the marriage benefit. And they were like, yeah. 30 seconds later, they’d all married off with each other, basically for the benefits. It was hilarious. I was like, oh, my God, that’s amazing. I can’t remember the sergeant or something. He saw all this happen and went I just walked back into his hot news, like, so annoyed by the whole thing.
[Brad Shreve]
That is funny.
[Miguel Marquez]
It was very funny.
[Brad Shreve]
Back to putting yourself in dangerous situations, such as in the hospitals and the wars that you’ve covered and everything else. Is there something inherent in reporters that has you put yourself in dangerous situations, such as a thrill seeker on a roller coaster? Is there an addiction to that or an addictive quality to it?
[Miguel Marquez]
I think the simple answer is yes, but I think I found myself getting very addicted to that. When I was especially in Afghanistan, it was much easier to go out and work with US troops or other countries and to go out on embeds long in beds sometimes, and kinetic activities and lots of fighting and shooting. And I can see how people get very, very addicted to that. And it is important work. I spent a lot of time in Libya as well, and giving voice to the voiceless and covering those stories is incredibly important. There are people who have died doing that, many people who have died doing that. But you do have to make a choice at some point if that is going to be your life. And I think there was some point where I just while I’m very interested in it, I don’t know that I want to spend all my time taking those sort of risks.
[Brad Shreve]
Were you a thrill seeker as a kid?
[Miguel Marquez]
I was I wouldn’t say thrill seeker, but I was always looking for something else. I was always looking for something else. I’m from a very small town in New Mexico, so there weren’t many thrills to be had, but I was always looking for adventure and excitement and something more. I was always very interested in the world at large and ideas, and I knew there was more out there, and I wanted to get out and sort of experience the world and what was going on. I was always very interested in US foreign policy and the way that has shaped history, at least recent history, last couple of hundred years or so. Yeah, all that stuff is very interesting to me.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, I heard your phone report when you were in Bahrain, basically as you were reporting, and then you’re staying on the phone as the police are beating you.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah. Boy, that was a night.
[Brad Shreve]
It was quite the phone call.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah.
[Brad Shreve]
What made you hold onto that phone and keep going?
[Miguel Marquez]
Well, it was my life. In part. It was the lifeline. It was really, really complicated. So it was the middle of the night. We had finished reporting for the night. We went to bed. I heard helicopters. I heard all this activity. I looked up my window and I could see all the cars lining up on a bridge overlooking this roundabout that they wanted to clear. Got my producer. We went running down there, and then it just bang, it was on. And they started clearing it out, and there was tear gas everywhere, and there were lines of police. I was in a parking lot next to the roundabout that was just jammed with cars. There was, like, literally maybe eight inches of room between cars. They really packed them in there so I could get between the cars, but the guy chasing me, or there were two or three at first they couldn’t get between the cars. And I had a camera, a small camera that I was filming with as well. And I had the cable around my wrist, and he grabbed the camera, but it was around my wrist, so I couldn’t let go. So it was this push and pull. I still have a scar on my wrist from that, but it was this push and pull. And finally the strap broke and he kind of went falling back. And then one of them threw their baton at my knees and tried to hit me. And he hit the car right next to me and, like, busted out its light. We both sort of looked at it and we almost laughed. It was kind of just so bizarre. And I just kept sort of sneak I was on the phone and I just kept sneaking back between the cars as they were kind of coming at me. And they were saying, Stop. Stop. And I was like, no, I’m a reporter. Reporter. Journalist. Journalist. And I just kept moving. There was just no way that I was going to stop without being stopped. That is so I just kept moving between these cars. Thank God that parking lot was so full that they could not because they had so much gear on, they couldn’t get between the cars and I could. So they were kind of going around and sneaking around. It was this weird game of cat and mouse. It was bizarre.
[Brad Shreve]
So are you saying if it was an empty parking lot, it could have been a whole different story?
[Miguel Marquez]
It would have been a different story, yeah, they could have easily got hold of me. But I had cars on my side, so I’ve always liked parking lots.
[Brad Shreve]
Since then in your career, has ever come a point where you just said, this is it, I’m over, this is the end of me.
[Miguel Marquez]
That’s every morning. Oh, no, I see.
[Brad Shreve]
No, not the end of your career. I’m talking about the end of your life.
[Miguel Marquez]
No, I see. God. Well, there was a couple of times in Iraq where some bombs went off nearby and that was pretty like, oh, God. You just sort of gird yourself and you’re like, oh, God, have I gone too far? There was one hurricane I covered I can’t remember where I was. I’ve covered many hurricanes. Maybe it was Key West one time where it would have been one of my first hurricanes. And a hurricane before it comes in. The weather’s lovely, there’s nothing happening. Everybody’s sort of boarding up, everybody’s kind of cheerful. No one’s quite sure what’s going to happen. And then it gets quiet and then the storm starts in. And then that howling, screaming wind about two or 03:00 in the morning, and you’re like, what the hell have I signed on for? You’re not sure if you’re going to make it. That was one a couple of car bombs, or maybe it was rocket attacks in Afghanistan were concerning. And then getting shot in Afghanistan. I mean, when you can hear the bullets zipping over your head, you’re like, that’s too close. Thank God they’re bad shots. And I was with the US military, so that helped.
[Brad Shreve]
So that sounds awfully cliche. You literally can hear the bullets zipping by.
[Miguel Marquez]
Oh, yes. And it’s a very distinctive sound. One of the guys that we are with in the military, he was like, oh, you know you when you hear that sound. I’m from New Mexico. I grew up around guns. I know. So I’ve certainly heard lots of bullets flying. And it’s that zip. That it’s a very distinctive zip. And that’s the sound of a bullet getting close enough to you that you can hear it traveling. And that’s when you know it’s probably a little too close.
[Brad Shreve]
So based on what happened to you in Bahrain and other countries, I watched you reporting in Baltimore after Freddie Gray was killed and the protests that were going on there. And the police were pushing the press aside and basically saying, Go away, and there was just this disbelief in your face and in your voice as to, I can’t believe this is happening in my country.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah, look, there were protests after protests there. I think that the police were having very difficult police were having a very difficult time figuring out how to deal with it, and if you’re in the media, you want as much access as possible. And I think they were kettling people, basically, and people were sort of being arrested almost willingly, and so I was trying to talk to some of them as to why it was worth doing this, and the police were trying to move me back. But to my way of thinking, if these are protesters who are being arrested for the active protest and the police are trying to remove them, then it’s probably worth hearing from them as to why they’re doing it, why it’s important to do it.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, in the reports, there, of course, are burning buildings, and we know that there were some violent attacks, but just seeing you marching down the street with protesters who just are so filled with pain and filled with so much anger, and they’re releasing it and not at you. How does it feel to be right in the middle of all that?
[Miguel Marquez]
In some ways, I was lucky during the Freddie Gray protests, because early on, I’d been there for several days before the real protest got going, and there was an episode where two guys tried to grab the mic off of me during a live shot, and it got increasingly sort of aggressive and weird. And I had spoken to these guys before. I knew that they were just sort of messing with me, just, like, trying to have a go at the at the at the news reporter who was who was there trying to do his job, and they were angry, and they were just looking for a way to take it out. The entire neighborhood, the entire city saw that little clip, and I stayed cool, and they never got the mic, more importantly. But that sort of endeared me to people in the city and in the neighborhood there. It’s a very tight knit neighborhood, and they don’t really trust outsiders, and then I was sort of taken in, and I was able to get a lot of access, and it was important to see all of that. It was important to sort of get a sense of what was actually happening in these neighborhoods and why, and just the Baltimore is such a hard, sad case, and it still just kills me that I would like to go do more stuff there, because it’s a city that’s so lovely. I used to live in DC. So I knew Baltimore a little bit, and I’ve gone back and forth over the years, and I have friends there, and I just love baltimore, and it’s just had such a hard time. You want to see it succeed. It’s such a great city, there’s so many wonderful people there, and you just scratch your head and it’s like, why can’t Baltimore be great? It is a great city, but it just has that really hard edge to it. And you just wish that it could somehow figure out a way to get.
[Brad Shreve]
Beyond that, similar to what happened in Baltimore. You were also in Milwaukee or Minnesota. I’m sorry. Minneapolis. Because of George Floyd. And that was interesting. You were being chastised by Wolf Blitzer to get out of there and you weren’t moving nearly as fast as he wanted you to, and you wound up being tear gassed.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah, well, that wouldn’t be the first time. Depending upon where it’s going, it’s a balance. You have to sort of figure out how close to be and you know, where the protesters are, what police are doing, what they’re trying to protect. And you kind of get a sense of it, but every now and again it gets so dynamic that you don’t really know what’s happening. That being tear gassed is not the worst of it. Getting hit with one of those canisters can be really, really painful. If not, they have killed people, but it could certainly break skin and cause injury. We had a lot of photographers who were hit with either bean bags or some sort of non-deadly munition. You’re hyper aware, basically, and I think doing all the war stuff is helpful. But being in a chaotic environment like that is actually much more difficult than even being in Afghanistan or somewhere, because at least, you know you’re with the army or the Marines and they’re shooting at you from over there. So you kind of have a sense of where the sides are in a demonstration or in a protest where police and demonstrators are mixing it up. I mean, you just don’t know where the danger is going to come from. It’s sort of all around you. Look, there’s always at any protest, we always catch a lot of flack from, oh, it was a peaceful protest. 98, 99% of it is. But there are those people who are going to want to mix it up with police, whether it’s ten people or a thousand people. And that’s what a lot of these cameras focus on, and that’s what gets a lot of attention.
[Brad Shreve]
And yeah, it makes me very sad when you have a large protest going on such as that and there’s a lot of chaos because you suddenly have a bunch of people together who are all angry and upset and then you always have those individuals that are going to take advantage of that chaos and loot and do whatever. And sadly, certain politicians and even certain networks, that’s where they zero in, like to make it sound like that’s all that was going on.
[Miguel Marquez]
Just like with the COVID stuff, if you’re covering conservatives. I try to be as fair and honest about what the main group of protesters is there for, what their message is, what they’re saying, what their signs say, what they hope. Oftentimes you go to these protesters and you say, what do you want? Well, we want them to stop. You got to have something specific. There has to be something specific. So a lot of protesters have given a lot of thought to this stuff, and you find those people who understand the dynamic and understand what needs to happen. And I like talking to the people who have thought about this stuff and understand that there are ways to make their society better, their city, their state better.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, you’re now a senior national correspondent, and that implies to me that you.
[Miguel Marquez]
Which means I’m old.
[Brad Shreve]
Well, congratulations. You made it this far.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yes, thank you.
[Brad Shreve]
But that implies to me that you don’t do as much international travel. Is that right?
[Miguel Marquez]
Well, I mean, presumably I could do more international travel. I think basically it just means that I think it sort of frees me up to do more stories either in the US. Or abroad. But CNN has seen international with so many great correspondents there that they don’t need to tap the US side very often. So that’s a big difference here. But yes, I mean, I cover a little bit of everything and go all over the country, basically, and around the world.
[Brad Shreve]
Do you have a bag by the door ready to go at any moment?
[Miguel Marquez]
I have a bag here. I know you’re not doing video here, but I have a bag right here at my feet. I’m showing you on camera.
[Brad Shrev]
It’s a big metal case.
[Miguel Marquez]
Big metal case.
[Brad Shreve]
It looked like it could survive a bomb.
[Miguel Marquez]
I have a bag at home, and when I was in Los Angeles, I had a car, and I had a bag in the car as well. So you never knew when you were going to have to go to LAX. So you keep a go bag, as they say.
[Brad Shreve]
So, Hubby, does he have a job that he stays in one place?
[Miguel Marquez]
Yes. He’s getting his PhD in psychology of focusing on parents and children and killing it. Just doing a great job and starting to work and getting started in his field. It’s fantastic.
[Brad Shreve]
Maybe he can help you figure out why you do what you do.
[Miguel Marquez]
I am patient number one, my friend. That’s why he’s so good.
[Brad Shreve]
I actually think that would drive you crazy.
[Miguel Marquez]
He’s got plenty to work with.
[Brad Shreve]
When it comes to LGBTQ issues right now, we know things are not going so well for many people. We have the don’t say gay thing that passed in Florida. Libraries are banning books. Schools are stopping after school programs just so they can not have programs like Gay Straight Alliance. A lot’s going on. What do you think we can do about that? What can people do?
[Miguel Marquez]
I mean, keep the faith while these things are hurtful and annoying and feel awful. I mean, compared to what previous generations put up with and went through, it is nothing. The core rights are there and that’s the important. Eyes on the prize. What is important here? My husband and I, we got married sort of in part when there was a lot of talk about the gay marriage and whether that was going to stick around. And we thought, you know what? Better to be married and have them try to take it away from us than try to fight your way back in. So that was part of the idea when we got married. Yeah, I just think keep your eyes on the prize. I think all these things, while they are annoying and hurtful and indicate sort of that culture war in our country, you can’t give up. And what’s surprising is people find a way as well. Whether it’s Nebraska, Florida or anywhere else. I cannot imagine small town in New Mexico and I’m talking 2000 people before the Internet. I can’t imagine growing up gay in this world and having that access to information that kids have right now and young people have right now. It’s a different world and I think there are certainly very positive benefits to it. But there’s a whole negative side as well and both sides are using technology now to try to gain advantage. I just think organizing, understanding what’s right, what’s wrong and working toward your interests is the one thing you can do. I think that the left in this country does get too divided and too narrow in its interests. I think you have to realize that we have a system that is based rightly or wrongly on two parties. It’s not perfect. We strive toward a more perfect union. It’s not perfect, but you have to play to your strengths. Whether it’s you personally, whether it’s your profession, whether it’s your relationship, whether it is your politics in your country. You have to play to your strengths. And I think recognizing those strengths and realizing how you can shape it and work toward the goals that you want, it’s the one thing you can do. As simple as voting. It’s as simple as organizing. It’s as simple as holding the feet to the fire of politicians everywhere.
[Brad Shreve]
I think what kids are going through right now is just amazing. I don’t know what the magic age is. 25, 30, everybody under that age. You say you’re queer and it’s like okay, yeah, whatever. Right? Not everybody. I’m generalizing. There’s always the individuals. But is there a concern that maybe they’re taking all this too lightly? Like they’re taking it for granted and don’t remember or don’t know the history of what people went through from the.
[Miguel Marquez]
Yeah, I mean it’s hard to generalize but you read these histories, everything from the Matachin Society and from just early on can you imagine the guts it took in the either write or participate in gay activities. God loved the trans community and drag queens, and the people who felt different were different and stood up and said, no longer can you use this against us. I mean, that’s where real power is when you’re not afraid, when they can’t use that against you anymore. So those were you know, it’s just terrifying. I mean, you think of these Alan Turing or, you know, these brilliant these brilliant scientists who were ostracized because they were gay and everything like that. These people, we stand on their shoulders. What we are experiencing is a small taste of the fear that these people had in their time.
[Brad Shreve]
So it does sound like you have an optimistic attitude in the long run, even though it may not necessarily be in the short run. So I would just like to hear before I let you go, what words of wisdom, what can you say to folks out there that are feeling like it just sucks? This is the way it is?
[Miguel Marquez]
I think pick yourself up and you may not have asked for the fight, but the fight is here. And there are small ways and big ways that people can affect that. Certainly voting, understanding the issues, educating oneself. I think the smarter we are about sort of what’s happening in our world and sharing that with others and helping organize and doing what you can. You know, it’s in large part, it’s as simple as voting. I cannot tell you how many people I spoke to in December and January of 2016 and 2017, just after Donald Trump was elected, and they were so angry and so upset and the country was going to hell. And and one of my questions always, well, did you vote? Literally, half the time they’d say, oh, no, I didn’t. I didn’t have time. I was like, well, then I was flabbergasted. It’s like, well, you know, you got you kind of have to vote if you want to make a difference. And I know it feels like it’s such a big country and one vote doesn’t matter. Clearly it does. I think over the long term, American politics have always sort of always been the center that has been the guide star for American politics. And I think we will get back to that. It’s going to take some time, though.
[Brad Shreve]
All right, well, I am sure CNN has you ready to get on a plane and go to where you probably don’t even know where. So, I want to thank you so much for your time.
[Miguel Marquez]
Thank you. That was great. I really enjoyed that.
