Hey, everybody. It's me Sam Stein, managing editor at the bulwark, and I am joined by Dr. Asma Shugut,

who is an associate friend of Alex Pretti, who was tragically killed yesterday, as everyone now knows, in Minneapolis.

We've been doing a lot of videos about what happened in Minneapolis. A lot of videos have focused on the actions

of ICE. A lot of videos have focused on the responsive politicians. A lot of videos have

channeled a lot of rage that people feel. What we haven't done is properly focus on Alex's

life. And so we are asking Dr. Shukit to talk about Alex. So thank you so much for joining

us. And let me just start with your history. How did you meet Alex and tell us about your time

together? Thank you so much for having me on. I met Alex when he was looking to get his first job in the healthcare area. So he applied to be a research assistant in our clinical research studies program at the Minneapolis VA. And so I interviewed him and decided to hire him and bring him on our team. How old was he around then?

And what were his interests?

He was, I want to say, in his 20s, but Alex was a slight build.

And honestly, he looked like a young kid.

So he just looked at somebody who was really eager to get into healthcare.

He didn't have much experience, but he had a lot of

enthusiasm, and he did express this interest that he really wanted to take care of patients and

vulnerable patients in particular, and wanting to get engaged into research and eventually

build a career towards healthcare. So it was just kind of how earnest he was that really

made us take him on and train him

on the job and continue from there. Tell me a little bit about the work that he did in those

earlier years. So in the early years, he was a research coordinator, which means a lot of his

work was screening potentially eligible individuals for different studies. Our studies are mostly

related to colon cancer screening, then speaking with them, interviewing them, telling them

information about the study, and then consenting them, and then following up with them.

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