In this week’s episode, we’re talking to Lauren Villagran, who generally covers border issues for the El Paso Times. But she recently crossed a different border — the U.S./Canadian border — to take on an issue that is near and dear to the hearts of El Pasoans and fronterizos. Lauren traveled to Portapique, Nova Scotia, where, one night in April 2020, “in the time it took for the Bay of Fundy’s high tide to drain into the Atlantic and swell back up again to the wooded coast,” as Lauren wrote, “a deranged man gunned down 22 people in their homes and on the street, in Portapique and the idyllic communities that line the west shore.”
As Lauren notes, there were echoes of El Paso's Aug. 3, 2019, mass shooting tragedy nine months earlier: the same number of initial victims, a shooter with easy access in the U.S. to "assault-style" firearms, a hashtag ending in "strong." But Canada’s response was much different from those in Texas and across the United States.
Lauren was kind enough to join us this week to discuss her trip, and her reporting.