An Army of Normal Folks - What Happens When You Finally Listen to Foster Kids (Pt 1)

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

When Brian Mavis and his wife learned there were hundreds of foster kids in Colorado that nobody was stepping up to adopt, they realized the problem wasn’t that people didn’t care — it’s that they’d never truly heard the kids’ stories. In this powerful conversation, the founder of America’s Kids Belong shares how recording video testimonies of foster children transformed his life, helped more than 2,400 kids find families, and revealed an upstream solution to some of America’s largest problems. You’ll walk away with practical ways to help foster kids in your own community — whether that means adopting, fostering, supporting foster families, mentoring a child, or simply becoming the kind of adult who refuses to look away.Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We had a sibling set of three. The oldest was a boy. He was like 10. And he had two sisters who were like eight and six. They had been separated for six months. The girls were together in one house and the older brother was separate. And they hadn't seen each other in months. And they used to run to each other and hug each other and crying.

The boy later comes up to my wife and says, how long will it take you to get me and my sisters of family? until we can be together. Wow. But that night, my wife and I were like, if people could hear, because they could see their faces, but they still haven't heard them say their story, say that.

That's what clicked. And we're like, let's do videos. Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband. I'm a father. I'm an entrepreneur.

And I'm a football coach in intercity Memphis. And that last part, Well, it led to a film about one of my teams. It's called Undefeated, and it actually won the Academy Award. Maybe you ought to check it out. Guys, I believe our country's problems are just not ever going to be solved by a bunch of fancy people in nice suits using big words that nobody ever uses on CNN and Fox, but rather by an army of normal folks. That's us. Just you and me deciding, hey, maybe I'm not.

I can help. That's what Brian Mavis, the voice you just heard, has done. Brian is the founder of America's Kids Belong, which is filmed over 4,200 children waiting to be adopted, helping more than 50% of them match with a family in less than a year. And they also mobilize churches, businesses, and entire communities around foster care in a zillion different kinds of ways. Some of us are called to foster or adopt children, but all of us are called to do something on this issue. And Brian is here to bring you practical ways to get engaged, even if fostering or adopting it in your thing. I cannot wait for you to meet him right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors.

Hey, it's us, the Jonas brothers. And guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special. So how did we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing. a bit for the podcast for people could call in and say, Hey Jonas, and then I wrote down on my little notepad,

Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman

help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and headwriter, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job.

I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean.

Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad. But secretly, he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy. But I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out.

Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong and what that might look like? No. I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life. That is not the look of an innocent man.

This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brian Mavis from Windsor, Colorado, not Windsor, Connecticut, not Windsor. England. No. No.

No. No. The best Windsor. Where's Windsor? It's an hour north of Denver, right outside of Fort Collins. Got it. It is a great place. In the beautiful area.

You flew into Memphis last night. Yeah. Stated the Peabody? The Peabody. Good. With the ducks. Everybody. Brian is the founder of American.

No. America's kids belong. And he's the author of Go Upstream. And boy, do I talk about going upstream all the time, so I can't wait to dive into that. All right. I'll ruin it. And I probably are long-time listeners, our every week listeners are going to roll their eyes because I'm going to say this again. But a guest said to me, I don't know, seven, eight months ago, I'm not even sure which guest said it, but I will never forget it. We can continue to do great work plucking drowning children out of rivers, but eventually we,

We need to go upstream and find out why they're dropping into the river in the first place. Yep. And when I read author of Go Upstream, I said, I'm not sure what that book is yet. We're going to find out all about it. But I got to believe it has something to do with that idea. That's right. I think it was actually the founder of National Angels, which is in the foster care space. I don't know if you've met them.

No. Yeah. Yeah. Does that who said that to us? He remembers all this season. All right. All right. Well, yeah.

So everybody, we'll get into it. Brian is an interesting dude, and I can't wait to unfold your story, but we're going to start kind of midway and jump around chronologically. Okay. You were already a foster dad, already a pastor, and then a caseworker called your house and said something your wife could not get out of her head. What did they say? Yeah, yeah. So I was, this is in 2006, so 20 years ago. and I was at work at the church I was in, and we had a little guy who was our second foster child,

and we had gotten him from the hospital. He was in NICU, born addicted to everything. And so we've heard too many since prior to starting an Army and Normal folks three years ago when Alex drugged me into this thing, I didn't even know what an addicted NICU. her baby story was. Yeah. And it's... Three years later, now I know.

Yeah. It, you know, we live in a nice area and northern Colorado. And we asked a nurse once, how often do you have a baby born addicted to, well, heroin, meth, whatever. She said, and she said just one hospital, she said it was once a week. There's multiple hospitals up there. It's the stories of the introduction to life that the... little human beings go through when you understand that they're going to go through withdrawals and all the same things.

They're on breathing tubes. They're shaking. And you're there just holding them trying to help them get through it. It's horrific. Okay. So we got this. You're already at Foster Day. So we're a Foster Day.

We got this little guy. We've been weaning him off drugs. He's loving him. He's growing. He's getting healthy. We raise him for nine months. And we're working with the parents. Mom works at a strip club, dad.

We're not sure what he does, but we're taking him on picnics, like, trying to, like, you guys, you know, try to get your kid back. What's the dad involved, too? Uh-huh. Yeah, he was there. So credit to him. In fact, he was better than the mom. Wow. But we get a call one day, and our caseworker calls and says, I have an emergency.

I need to come to your house immediately. So he comes over and she says something horrible. horrible has happened with the parents. And goal has changed. He can, he'll never be safe with them. And so, goal has changed from reunification to adoption. And she goes,

so what do you guys think? And my wife, we had worked hard for reunification. So she's thrown off balance and she's just got all these questions. She goes, I have questions. Can I just ask questions? So she's asking questions.

And then she, she asked this. She goes, I'm curious. I mean, we love him. But what would happen to him if we said no to adopting him? And she said, well, he'll be fine. There is a line of people waiting for the babies. I just wish there was a line for all the other kids. And my wife goes, what are the kids?

She goes, oh, there's 800 kids in Colorado who need to be adopted, but nobody wants them. She's like, well, why not? They're not babies. They come with siblings or special needs. They're not the right color. And so I come home. My wife's got to get her 20,000 words. Goes up to about 40, 50,000 that night.

And so she's unpacking this with me. We go to bed, lights are out. Are you all... I'm sorry to interrupt the story, but I can't... I get for the sake of time, You're metaphorically going through the 2040,000 word things, but I am curious. What were you saying to each other? All of a sudden, you've been throwing a curveball or in your world, you know, he's been blindsided.

I guess what I'm saying is, did you have biological children? Yeah, two daughters. Already. Yeah, and they were in sixth grade and fourth grade. All right, and you're a pastor. Yeah. And your wife is a stay-at-home mom? Yep.

at that time. All right. Well, so I'm just unpacking this in my brain. And when I'm off base, say, no, Bill, you're stupid. That's wrong. You're a pastor. You make a good living. You're not wealthy. No. You're provided for and you're providing for your family. But your pastors aren't like independently wealthy people. They make good livings. You have two biological daughters that the Lord's blessed you with. And you're doing your best to try to foster and reunify. And now you're thrown this. Did any of the conversation have guilt?

The thought of what if we do? Or what if we don't? And being guilty to our biological family and the financial stress maybe that it might cause because everybody's going to have to do without a little bit and the guilt of it would if we don't. I mean, I would feel like the burden put on you by the question, the real conversations you have to involve the pragmatic, not just the idealistic.

Yes, and something happened before that kind of helped us as far as setting our trajectory for our role. So this boy was the second boy we had fostered. The first boy, Keegan, we got him when he was Six months old, he had been rescued from essentially a drug house. The mom wasn't even there. Cops come in. He's crying. There's just people strung out on couches. And he's in bed sick and a crib sick crying.

So they grab him. He goes to an emergency placement. Then we end up becoming his foster parents. And this kid who was scared and scared of me in a, Even at six months. Yeah, six months. He just had bad experiences with males. So they were scary to him.

Within a few, you know, just a few months, he went from this sickly little kid to this plump, happy, playful, good-looking little boy. Resiliently rebound. Oh, just like, I mean, it was nearly miraculous of like, in a matter of months how he changed. changed. And I started calling my boy. And I was like, oh, he's going to be my son. And just love this little guy. It still gets me. He, fortunately, his grandparents stepped up. And he said that they would raise him. So we, we meet at a neutral spot, the place, you know, or, where you're supposed to meet and hand him over.

My wife and daughters are crying, and I am stoic and feeling like I got this. And then we get into our car, and I put the car in reverse, and I just bawl. And I even scared my daughters, you know, I was crying so hard. And it's just like, I just lost my boy. And afterwards we're like, gosh, can we even do this anymore? Like, this is too hard. It's going to break our hearts. You know, we get attached.

And that's the number one reason people don't do this. It's sort of like, I'll get too attached. And we're like, that's what the kids need. And adults, your heart, if your heart breaks, you're doing it right. And you're the grown-up. Be willing to have a broken heart. So anyway. But at that point, my.

wife and I made a decision. We said, we feel like we're called to reunify. Right or wrong, but that's how we interpreted at that moment to say, that's our calling, is to reunify. And if it doesn't happen, then maybe somebody else, and so this little boy, this nine-month-old, we did end up saying, let's not adopt him. And I'll explain why, explain that a little bit more, but he ended up going to a home, a family, a young couple that were infertile and couldn't have children. And it was in adopting from foster care is risky because you may not accept in that circumstance. It was a sure thing. So we were able to bless a family to have a son. And now a few messages from our generous sponsors. But first, finally, Alex

got off his butt and our merch store is finally live. We have been asked for well over year. How can I get buttons and shirts and banners and sweatshirts and t-shirts and well our merch store is live and you can go buy that stuff now? You go to normalfolks. us click merch and you'll see all kinds of awesome options from shirts and hoodies and hats and magnets and all this other stuff. And you can get a generic one for just an army and normal folks. But you can also get some that are labeled with the cities that our six local service clubs are in as well. As well as the student branch, which Bill didn't know about until now, ANF Old Miss. Yeah. And we actually are having an ANF Ole Miss, a campus club, which is

kind of awesome. We've priced every item at the cost to make them zero. dollars in profit so that the more folks can afford more items and help spread army and normal folks across the country. So just to be clear, we're not making money on these things. We've costed them at zero profit just so that you can have it, wear it, share the message. So get yours at normal folks. Dot us today. Help us grow the army in your community and start representing. We'll be right back. Hey, it's us, the Jonas brothers. And guess what? We have some big news. What's the news, name?

Huge news. We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. And, well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys.

Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy. Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel. Help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store. I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job.

I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean.

Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad, but secretly he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest, way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong and what that might look like? No. I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man.

This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality, is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover The Family Man on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Oh my gosh, I feel

at whatever level I can feel through your own experiences. I got to ask that first kid how to work with the grandparents, I hope okay. Okay. I mean, we were a little concerned

because, you know, when we first met them, we were feeding them a bottle, and they were like, he was nine months old at the time. They're like, you're spoiling him. He needs to hold his own bottle. And it was, oh, gosh, oh, no. But I think, I think they did love him. And it turned out good.

Good. Okay. So that's where you felt. But the problem was, as I understand it, what your wife couldn't get out of, of our head was not necessarily the first boy or their second boy is infants, but these 800 other non-infants. Yeah.

So the conversations around the kid is tough, and you go through, what if we do? What if we don't? You made your decision. But the problem is, that's really not what was the end of the conversation for you guys. No, one night. So we're lying in bed, and it's quiet. You know, lights are out, heads are on the pillow. and then my wife breaks the silence, and she just says this,

I can't get those 800 kids out of my head. And then she says, if Lisa, if we're in bed and it's dark, and it's time for me to go to sleep and her to read or do whatever she does. And she says something like that. You know what my first reaction is? No, no. So she goes, I can't get those 800 kids. kids out of my head. Here's the next thing she said.

And somebody needs to do something. Oh, boy. I said, oh, right. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So you're tracking, man. My best friend of the world, my person, the person I will kill myself for,

has decided she wants something. And I'm going to be involved in this. Yeah. So it was like, uh-oh, this is something. I don't know what's going to happen, but something's happening. So she had that, and I still wasn't there. So, but God, were you not there because of their age or past pain? Why weren't you there? Frankly, I still felt like at that moment, I was supporting my wife and her calling. So my wife, when she was a teenager, she lived in Southern

California, and her church did a mission trip to Mexico. And her motivation to go, was to eat some street tacos and sit next to this boy in a van and make out with him. That's what everybody in the hospital does. What's wrong with that? I'm just keeping it. Especially you get some people from the church to pay for it. It's just a normal girl, raise it up. And when she's there at this orphanage, watching the kids play soccer and playing with the kids,

she said the first time in her life, the most clear she's ever heard from God, as God said to her, she said three words, care for orphans. And so when she married me, I ruined her life plan. Because we lived in America. She ended up as a single woman lived in orphanages in Mexico. We did for a year live in Togucigapa, Honduras, and worked out in an orphanage where all the kids there were dying of cancer. They were abandoned orphan. No, I don't.

Yeah, that was tough. And so now we're back in America and we're like, there are no orphans in America. until we discovered the world of foster care. So let me unpack this a little bit. So my wife's like, we've been married 14 years, have two daughters in elementary school. She's feeling lost. Yeah, you kind of screwed that up,

I'm playing your own years. Yeah, I messed it all up. Yeah. And so we got, you know, white pick of fence, everything's good and live in a place that doesn't need any help. And so my wife's like, well, are there, one night, she literally asked, are there orphans in America? And within a couple of weeks, we discovered this thrift store that was there, existed to help foster kids and foster families.

And so my wife said, can I volunteer there? It was like she, like I could tell her no. So sure, it seems safe enough. And then she comes back, you know, a few weeks later and says, I want to be a foster mom. I was about to say she's on the hook. Oh, yeah, I was like, does it do I have to be a foster dad? She's like, that's part of it. So we go to training.

So again, my wife as a young woman had worked out on an orphanage. So we go to foster care training. And we're only a couple hours in. And they're explaining, why are kids in foster care? You know, there's this idea that they're bad kids. It's not that. It's bad things have happened to these kids. And they've been abused or abandoned or neglected.

Their parents are severe addicts, maybe in prison, prostitution. And my wife is having a deja vu moment. And she tells me later, she goes, when I lived at that orphanage in Mexico, I remember asking the executive director after I've been there a few weeks, how did all these kids' parents die? And he goes, they're not dead. I'm not dead. He went through the whole thing.

They've been abandoned. Same thing. Same thing. She goes, I thought I was doing God's plan B. She goes, it's still plan A. It's the same kids. We just use different words. And she goes, I don't have to do the second best.

I'm on God's plan. So she felt very like, this is it. And I felt like. And I'm like, I just married this girl. This wasn't, God didn't get me care for orphans. And so. If you read your Bible, he's. sure good.

That's what she said. She goes, hey, Mr. Professional Christian. How about caring for the thing? God says it's pure and faultless. I was like,

oh, okay. So, you know, supporting her, God is using her to lead me. And so, and so that's where, but God was gracious

and gave me my own moment. So it wasn't much longer. I'm at church. And so we've already had this, I wish there was a line for other kids. And my wife's saying, I can't forget about these, get these 800 out of my head. Somebody and you say something. And I'm like, so I'm at church. My phone rings. I pick it up. It's this lady named Cindy. And she says, hi, I'm from Boulder County Child Welfare. I like to talk to you about our child welfare system, can I meet with you? I said, sure. So a couple days later, Cindy comes to the lobby of our church. I meet her in the lobby. I say a greet her, and she says, first words out of her mouth are,

thanks for meeting with me. I've been trying to meet with a pastor for three years. You're the first one to say yes. And so I apologized that it had been her experience with the church. And again, you can't repent for another man soon. You know what? Look, I'm talking to a professional I know. I get a lot of advice from you guys. I don't know what denomination you are. That's pretty Calvinistic of me, but I do believe you cannot repent for another man's sense. Yeah, that's true. But just so I don't get myself too much credit, I would have told her no if it weren't for my wife. I would have been the same thing like, what's the church have to do with child welfare? So, but because my wife helped me, I said yes. Maybe the answer to that is everything, but go ahead. Yeah. She comes back to my office. I find out why she's been gracious to me. She explained that she'd been a nun for 20 years in the Cabrini Green housing projects in Chicago. You know. He's from Chicago. Yeah. We interviewed Bob Mozakowski, too, who lived there for a period of time. Okay. He started the West Side. He started the Little League right there in Cabrini Green. Yeah. Yeah. So she lived there for 20 years. And then she met a priest, fell in love, and they became. Episcopalian. It's not where I thought that story was going.

That's how that works. So the lesson of today's podcast is love will change your theology. I'm a Catholic, so I hope not. That's hilarious. So, but she goes, hey, Brian, I just came here to tell you one thing. She said, in the 26-year history of child welfare, so this is, again, 20 years ago, In the 26-year history of child welfare in our county, there's never been one day, not one single day where kids have not been waiting for families to care for them. She said they're sleeping in government buildings.

They're being placed in juvie, even though they haven't done anything wrong, because there's not enough families. The system has no place to put them. Right. So she goes, I have a chance. challenge for you. Help me change who waits. Help me recruit so many families. They're on the waiting list and not the kids. They won't mind waiting because then there's not a crisis. So, Bill, okay, so imagine you're there and you got this former nun telling you to help kids who need families. You know if you say no, you're going to go to hell.

Right? Maybe more importantly, if your wife finds out to say no, you're going to live in hell on earth. Yes. So, no, it was actually, as she said, I have a challenge for you, help me change you weights. I had this sense that God was speaking through her as my, that was my moment. This wasn't on an orphanage, careful orphans. God was using this moment as a holy moment. moment to say, I'm telling you now, I called your wife, and now I'm calling you.

So I said, I'm in. We're all in. We're going to help change you weights. We'll be right back. Hey, it's us to Jonas Brothers. And guess what? We have some big news. What's the news, new?

Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. But this one's extra special.

So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Oh, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes.

I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little note pad. Hey Jonas and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it.

Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smigel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel. help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, There's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War.

To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. we contain essence, we contain spirit.

How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad, but secretly, he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree.

At the time, did it seem like they're crazy, idea. It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong on what that might look like? No. I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue.

Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So I go home, I unpack my 2,000 words, you know, don't have to say as much. I'm succinct. And we're, so my wife, I'm like. Like, what do we do? We have no plan. You didn't, you weren't fostering any children at that time, right?

We were in the process of, you know, you kind of share the child as they are moving to the new permanent family. So we were probably in the process. Yeah. And we kept, and then we kept fostering for five more years formally and then fostered another five more years. unofficially outside of the system for an aged out youth who needed more help. So we're still in it personally at our home. All right. So the Catholic nun turned Episcopal because she wanted to get married to the priest she fell in love with,

who was also not supposed to be in love with him, nun who became Episcopal. That woman, lover. As I'm listening to you, I'm thinking the rationalization is, we can help one as a time as an individual couple, or maybe we can help hordes engaging in a different way. That's what happened. And so we thought we could help one kid. And I believe in that.

I believe in the power of one. In Matthew chapter 25, there's a famous passage, even non-Christians probably know that Jesus said this. But we quote it wrong most of the time. It's where Jesus says, whatever you do to the least of these you've done unto me, you know, feed and clothes, I left out a word. He says, whatever you do for one of the least of these you've done for me.

He really focuses on like that individual. So I believe in the power of one. Find your one. Careful one, what you wish you could do for all. Pick one. But for us, at that moment, moment with my wife can't get these kids out of her head, I'm asked to change who waits. We felt that we were being called to say mobilize an army of normal folks.

And so here we go. And we didn't have a plan. But we had a burden and we had conviction. And our conviction, we had a few convictions. We had a fashion. Yes. It was. It's not that.

people don't care, it's that they're unaware. They don't know about this. Foster care is a hidden issue. They don't know kids that, they don't know that their kids sleep in government buildings and being placed in hospitals. Today, there are kids in the psych unit of children's hospital that don't have psychological problems. They're just in foster care and there's no where to put them. So there's just, people don't know this stuff. That don't have psychological problems yet. Right. So, yeah, I'm not feeling that unwanted will impact you psychologically. So anyway, felt that one conviction is, was that people didn't know and that they would care if they knew. Second conviction was, is that a lot of

the families were inside the church. And the third conviction was, families that would say yes. Go ahead. And the third one was, the best advocates for these kids are not preachers. They are not politicians. They are not county recruiters.

They're the kids themselves. And they just got to be seen and heard. Now, that's very, that's of all the, that's the first time I've heard that perspective, that the greatest advocate for these kids aren't even their own foster parents, aren't even their own natural-born parents.

It's them. It's them. They are the greatest advocates. And if you think about Little Orphan Annie, the musical, well, I mean, what Daddy Warbucks falls in love with is Annie. Her. Is her being her. Uh-huh.

Yes. So we were like... That's really, really interesting. I mean, that... my wife, the county ended up hiring her because she doesn't have a degree in social work. And our county, we lived in Larimer County, and I worked in Boulder County. And they went through all the hiring. And she found out somebody said, you had an interview that are hiring for a recruiter.

And she was no qualifications, got hired. And she did to ask, why did you hire me? And they said, you had the most passion. And so she and I said, let's get permission to take what are this, a case number and a diagnosis and turn that number into a name and a diagnosis into a story. And let people say, look, there's this kid, you got the facts. Let's see the face. That's humanized. They're human.

So we started with photography and storytelling and then got permission to do videos of these kids. And that was a game changer. And so we have now filmed over 4,000 kids who are essentially legal orphans. That's not, you know, the correct terminology. It's not politically correct language. But they're illegally free to be adopted and have had these kids stories will make you laugh. They'll make you cry. They're drawing it.

These kids are turning thousands. and thousands of parents heads and hearts towards them and saying, oh, I mean, this wasn't a bad kid. This is a sad kid who just had a bad time. So you got challenged by a non, a former nun turned social worker. Once and none, always a nun, right? And called to figure out an answer for all these kids that your wife heard about, the 800 that are or older and you decided you plural you and Julie Julie sure yeah yes you decided that if you could get people to know these people on a personal level and know their stories

in a very human way that they would then be called and incented themselves to act yes and again so whose idea was that How'd that evolve? Gosh, you know, I don't even remember. It must have been a conversation. I'm not looking for credit, but I'm saying how did that, how did you come up with this plan? Because that's unique, right? Yeah.

So we, well, no, okay, you're making me think back to times I haven't even thought about it for a long time. So there had started in New Mexico, a thing called a Harkout, which is pictures of kids in Colorado was the second one to have it. So we, but they only had like 20 kids out of the 800. So we went, my wife and I went to the state and said, can we have permission to run this? And we'll get way more kids on here than the 20 that you have. So we grew it. It became, I'll say, we heard from others, the biggest and best. But one day, we weren't long into doing it, like a year or so. And we were, were at a photo shoot. So at that time, it was just photography. And we had a sibling set of three. The oldest was a boy. He was like 10. And he had two sisters who were like eight and six.

They had been separated for six months. The girls were together in one house and the older brother was separate. And they hadn't seen each other in months. So he shows up and then his sister show up and they see each other, and they just run to each other and hug each other and crying. And then the boy later comes up to my wife and says, how long will it take you to get me and my sisters a family so we can be together? So my wife. How do you hear that? Oh, geez.

I was the worst. I ended up firing myself. I used to interview these kids and I cried. I was like, I can't do this. But that night, my wife and I were like, if people could hear what we hear. All they had to do was hear that. Hear that. Because they could see, we were taking pictures.

They said, okay, we're halfway there. They can see their faces, but they still haven't heard them say their story. Say that. That's what clicked. And we're like, let's do videos. That's a cool story. how that kind of evolved. Yeah.

Once again. It was the kids that sold it. Yes. And we're like, the kids have to be heard, not just seeing. And that concludes part one of our conversation with Brian Mavis and you don't want to miss part two. It's now available to listen to. Together, guys, we can change this country. And it starts with you.

I'll see in part two. Hey, guys, it's us. The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas.

We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it, but, you know. Tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite, unhumored me with Robert Smite. and friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter.

Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. Is everyone lying to me about who they are? I felt such desperation. I felt it was what I had to do. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. I'm Akela Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 is about both of those things. As I was watching these statues come down, I was thinking about what it meant that I grew up in a majority black city, in which there were more homages to enslavers than there were to enslave people.

Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.