Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - Progressivism and Poetry With Newark Mayor Ras Baraka

Episode Date: May 27, 2025

Van sits down with Newark Mayor Ras Baraka to discuss entering the gubernatorial race (:34), whether it’s important or possible for Black people to have positive relationships with police (16:15), Democrats shying away from more progressive politics (27:23), and criticism of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s White House appearance (38:40). Plus, a peek into his career in music (40:04). Host: Van Lathan Guest: Mayor Ras Baraka Producers: Donnie Beacham Jr. and Ashleigh Smith Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We are here with Newark Mayor Ross Baraka, who is running for governor of New Jersey, going from Newark to the entire state of New Jersey. What made you want to take the next step? First of all, I think you were joining this place. Oh, yeah. I'm interested in knowing what made you want to take the next step. When I talk to people about Newark, they always tell me what a fantastic job, but you've done how the city itself has changed.

for what laid you want to take on the entire state? I mean, why I just think the opportunity is here. I don't think this comes all the time. It's a small window that we have to jump through. I think the issues that we've been fighting in Newark are statewide. In fact, the national issue is broad of agency, about housing, about affordability, about equity, about wealth gap. All these things are very relevant to people up and down the state in New Jersey.

And I thought it was an opportunity for us to build a broad business. based coalition and get it done in the state now. And we go all the way up to the door of democracy in New Jersey. That's what we get to be called the blue state. We just don't go aside. But we just hang out on the steps. Right. We don't go in the doors. And then this is the opportunity to open those doors. Did you know about one in three people with plaques psoriasis may also develop psoriotic arthritis, which causes joint pain, stiffness, and swelling? Does this sound like you? Listen to what it sounds like to be a million miles away. Trimfaya, guselcomab.

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Trading derivatives involve significant. risk and may not be suitable for all investors. Manage your activity with our consumer protection tool. Restrictions apply. See terms at Fandul.com slash predict slash bonus dash offer dash terms. When you look at the challenges that you saw in Nour, just for people that aren't aware, what were those challenges and how did you address them as your direct? Yeah.

I mean, the average income of people in Newark is about 36,000, $37,000. Wukai, time. Yeah. Way below the affordability. level in the state, in the country as well. When I became the mayor, we had a $93 million deficit. They laid off 162 cops. The homicides that year at 112 in the city. They sold every day, they sold every city building that the city owned and leased it back from the state. So that's what I had to walk into, right? We reduced that. We now have the lowest violent climb rate since John F. Kennedy

was the president of the United States. We had a 16th. 51% reduction in homicide, 47% reduction in shootings in a city. We bought all our city buildings back. You know, we how it just balanced the budget? We went up twice on Moody's. That's the rating that they give cities that they use to see if your financials are solid. So we went up twice in that, of course. And, you know, we've been doing as much as we can to create opportunity and jobs.

We've invested $200 million in black and brown or winning businesses in the last four years alone. which is more than what the county, the entire county, is in Essex at this point. So that's because we've been very deliberate and intentional about what we're trying to do. I brought more businesses here than has been in a long time. We've changed the Newark Skyline that's been changed in a century. Right. So we've been doing a lot of work out of necessity, not like out of, you know.

We wanted to make a magazine, but, you know, we have to be as creative as we can in a city that's dealing with poverty like this. and all kinds of intractable problems. You know, we have to change 23,000 led certain slides without any cost of the tax period. Put it in perspective, we did it in less than three years. Flint is still dealing with this. They started in 2014, and they haven't changed them all yet. We did hours and less than three years in Newark.

Small city on the other side of the Hudson. I mean, we did what we had to do. I say we lose a lot of people in that. What are you to be so successful? That, I mean, the collaboration, relationships be built with people, public, private partnerships, community-based organizations, just rallying the troops, focusing on getting people to be focused on the things we think are important and difficult, you know. You have a New York Alliance and New Regional Business Partnership that come together. So we tell them we need to create opportunity in the city. You tell them we need 2,020 jobs by the year 2020.

They created 3,000, right? Tell them we need to invest in business. businesses in Newark because the procurement was at 3%. They raised it 13, 14, 15%, put a additional 30, 40, 50 million dollars into the economy. I mean, they helped us about homeless street homelessness, financing street homelessness, financing, small out early community intervention teams that reduce violence. So bringing people around the table and said, this is what we have to do. And they've been incredibly helpful in helping us get it done.

What do you see successes in Newark? How do you see those successes rolling out statewide? But people are looking for those same type of results with you in the governor's mansion. What do you say to people that are asking how you do? All of this stuff is scalable. It's not in all these problems we have are not new base problems. Like the state is shorted 230,000 units of affordable housing right now. State only builds three to five thousand units of housing a year in the state.

We're probably a third of that in Newark that's being built here, right? We need to be building 30, 40, 50,000 units a year, right? And we need to use the strategies we've been using in Newark. We also need to create other kinds of affordability. It doesn't just have to be rental units. Accessory dwelling was like building units on the side of your home or in the back of your home for your grandmother or your mother or people that are disabled or kids coming home from college, building starter homes or the regular lots, turning people's Section 8 vouchers

into mortgages. We do that. We do that into it. We take people who've been living in the projects. We use their voucher. And we turn it into a mortgage product and give them a home. Just like anybody who has a home, they use their same Section 8 voucher they were using to live in the projects to pay for their mortgage and taxes with that Section 8 voucher, which is perfectly legal. And just a little creativity and a lot of will. That's it. And statewide these things should be happening. Reduce a homelessness, create these outreach teams across the state. We have homeless outreach teams with psychiatrists on the outreach team.

They can give you evaluation on the street and a script on the street. Give you a script to go to the pharmacy and they can admit you right there. So we have folks out in the street doing that, meeting people where they are, figured out how to create more transitional homes and moving away from this whole sheltering model, because I think it's a disaster. But the things that we've done here, we do some violence in cities like Trenton, like Camden, like, you know, all these Jersey City, you know, Paterson, we can help folks do this or the state. And create wealth at the same time. Oh, I'll talk about two things.

One is housing and the other one is violence reduction and prevention. There's a large conversation around housing right now. lookout and it's released by, I was written by Ezra Khan and Derek Thompson's called the abundance. And they're talking about some of the issues that Democrats have in provide housing. Because maybe they're running up against over-regulating communities or too much regulation.

It doesn't allow them to build enough housing and affordable housing in the street. What's your thoughts on the amount of housing that's available to people, how that did, shows itself in some of the homelessness that we might see. Oh, that's the exact problem. I mean, zoning is what you get in that zoning order in this is don't allow for the density

or other kinds of housing models that you need in these communities. And so what happens is that you drive in prices up and when prices get driven up because you don't have enough affordable housing, you know, you create homelessness. So last year, homelessness in New Jersey went up 24%, right? You know, because there's not enough housing units, enough affordable housing. housing units available. That affects the market. It's just supply and demand. Fundamentals of capitalism. There's no supply and the demand is too high. So it's a seller's market. Right. So the rents are crazy. And the mortgage is a crazy too. But the Democrats also have another problem. Their problem is that

they're friends with these LLCs who are these equity firms were buying all these houses up, like they did in the first home ownership crash that we had. These are the same people who are Democrat and Republican, by the way. So they're not a part of one party and the Democrats have failed to regulate or check them. Right. And so they also drive the prices up. Right. And I guess you, you attack that by not really being so connected to Hardy politics and knowing being about people. You got to read. You have to regulate them no matter who they are. You have to regulate it. You can't do it. You can't buy 500 properties. You just get, you know, you can't do. You know, you can't do. You can't that. You can't go to the stress. You can't do this. And artificially drive the prices up in the market,

you know, and then sell everything, sell it off. It's like pulling all the equity out of it. You know, that's what they're doing and leaving these houses abandoned. All of it is, same thing they're doing to these kind of senior homes. They pull all the equity out of it through Medicaid. So these all ways that private equity firms take money from working families and housing is a big part of it. That's why we had the first housing bubble that burst it that caused the recession that we had. As governor, how do you institute controls on that? What do you do? Well, you have to regulate them. You have to put laws in place that don't allow them to borrow these properties at one time to give first-fright refusal to community-based developers or

nonprofit-based developers who do it for housing for state-owned property, for city-old property, for county-old property, right? You give community developers an opportunity to get in, right? You free land banks. Like we have a newly created statewide land bank and start pulling all these properties together in a bank and beginning to parcel it out to community developers, parsing it out to people who want to purchase homes who want to build all stuff. Regular everyday people want to build a two family home or three family home. And you get them into creating wealth for themselves, which is what we try to do here. And you can do that. It's just really disruptive. Right.

And there's a lot of people that won't like that. So it's easy not to do anything. Right. Just as well, always easy. So when you look at some of the, the strides you guys have been going to make in violence reduction in Newark,

you talk about some other series that might be stolen events. Why is it scalable? Of course, to those other places, why? We have, communities,

I'm sure they had some problems that are unique. What commentaries do you see that allow you attack? Yeah, I mean, we create an office of violence prevention and the state followed behind us

and then the office of violence protection. Then the federal government created an office of violence convention, right? We were one of the first cities to have an office of violence intervention intact with a whole ecosystem of community violence intervention organizations. Cities from all over the country come to north through the lead municipalities, through the national leave in the cities. All these people come here through urban mayors. You know, they come. We've had people from Philly, from Baltimore or from Memphis, St. Louis, all these folks come here and, you know, we share practices. Right. We take, they take,

they go back. That's why you see violence dropping all over the country. I mean, the president takes credit for it. But obviously what's happening as the CVI organizations, community violence and division organizations have been doing work all over the country, have been joining forces with each other figuring out they go to training. Our folks say in Alabama right now in training, right? So they're all over the place working with people and you see all these reductions happen. And then truck comes in and takes the money away from it, closes the office bond to mention. When reality is, you know, we were. We're saving people's lives.

I mean, Obama came in and invited us to Chicago, gave us an award out of all of these cities because we reduced violence for black and brown boys. But, you know, all you really need to do is treat crime as public violence of a public health issue. Create an ecosystem involved in hospitals and universities and helping you identify when crime is happening. Yeah, violence is happening. Give you the data, you know, very granular data we get from Rutgers University.

Like we get all, like the top 100 bodiedas where most of the shootings take place or violence to loss around. Or if lighting up a corner reduces avidated assaults by 30-something percent, these are the corners you need to light up, right? Just the simple stuff beyond going out and just doing violence intervention

or conflict resolution or mentorship or curfew programs or whatever we do in that or summer programs for the young people who violated the law the most, to a most justice, in fact, the court infected, we grabbed them, been locked up for three or four times. We pull them and put them in a program at the summertime. And we work close to, and they work closely with the police in that we share data. And that's, that's important. Like, our guys go to Comstack. It seems like the answer to a lot of the issues that,

or play in Newark, and a lot of the issues you see in the state are almost a redefine and a deepening of community. That's what it is. It seems like you're getting to know not just the problem, but the people. It doesn't seem as if a lot of politicians or a lot of government, they don't think of it that way. No. And they don't know how. We don't know how we just don't are not inclined to work together to collaborate this way across agencies,

across public-private sector, across the higher ed and the hospitals and everybody else, it's just hard to pull people together and get them to figure out how to focus and all the stuff that we need to focus in. The hardest job is people together in the room

and getting on the same page and just figure out how to use their networks and bring their networks together, right? That's what we need. So we completely, we thought curfew, right? So everybody was like, oh, we can't do a curfew. So we do a curfew.

York without the police, how our curfew is done by the Office of Bonds Prevention, trauma recovery, with social workers, outreach workers, so on this on. They do have a cop on hand, but they don't lead it, you know. They obviously have to have a cop there in case they whether for somebody, you know, issue late at night here, right? But we in the summertime, what they've basically been able to do is come into contact with hundreds of young people out in the street, give them a ride home in the middle of the night, and talking about the issues they had,

give them opportunities for jobs and internships, things that they need, talking about counseling, putting them in programs. This was happening to the most affected young people because kids that are outside, that are 14 and 13 years old at 2 o'clock in the morning are not from, like, I couldn't be outside at 2 o'clock in the morning at 13. My mother would come outside to look for me.

Right. With all kinds of things. So at the end of the day, I mean, some people, are having some issues and they need structured environments of adults in their lives. And so these are the kids that are not going to come knock when you're a door or their parents to say, we need help. Right. So we run into them in the street in the middle of the night.

This is how this is the first foray they had into the first introduction they have to the processes and programs that the city offers them. So we really reimagine that. We do that with the hospitals involved, the OVP involved, the police involved, that everybody involved. So it's a whole collaboration of folks working together to make this a reality. Did you know about one in three people with plaques psoriasis may also develop psoriotic arthritis, which causes joint pain, stiffness, and swelling? Does this sound like you? Listen to what it sounds like to be a million miles away.

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There is and has been really for generations now, but particularly now, a contentious relationship between the black community, the perception of police. But you are the mayor. You have got to work with the police in your C. A question that's bigger, maybe than New York, question that's maybe bigger than New Jersey. Number one, how important.

Or come across something to do. That's the Van Laton weed. Truck has this weave. I have a week. A thick hospital question of that asked for. Is it important for black people to have a healthy relationship with policing? Is it possible for black people to have a healthy relationship with policing? And then three, how do you do?

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. It is. I mean, when I grew up in Newark, I was put on the sidewalk, can't come by my back. I was searched. You know, I saw my father beaten by the police. in New York, you know, police beat me up in 5th recent when I would come on from college, you know.

I mean, so my relationship with the police has been difficult as a child. So being in this role, obviously gives you a different perspective. And the other perspective that I have is being a black man in the American, right? So I understand where both people are coming from. I think it's important for us to have a relationship with the police because I will until we can figure out poverty and violence. Because when we go to community meetings, our grandmother's, want police.

Yeah. I can't go to a meeting and say, we're going to get in the police. They'll get rid of me, right? And activists and other folks don't understand that. The first thing we have to convince is your grandmothers who's sitting on a porch and people are shooting in front of the house and somebody gets shot, right? They want you to call the police and they want the police to show up. What they don't want is their kid to be beaten in that process or somebody to be shot, you know,

just because it's a hazard of the job, because. because you're black, right? They don't want that, but they want safety in their community. And so we have to figure out how to put the public back in public safety. That's what we say. Try to incorporate the public into what we're doing. It's just not the police job to make our community safe, right? It's all of our job to make the community safe. And there's some specific things that you have to do to make the community safe, right? You have to figure out all the social determinants that are causing violence in your community, whether there's the lack of job, whether it's trauma in those neighborhoods, whether it's counseling,

for parents. You have to put all those resources in that community. You have to target those areas. You know, because they're violent neighborhoods and you know they buy it. Yeah. Year after year after year. I mean, generations. Oh, you're from that lot? Man. You know what I'm saying?

You know it. And if people live there, they're looking for help. Right. You can't tell them they're going to give in the police because you ain't brought to no other kind of help. Right. Right. You've got to bring up some other kind of help. And the police got to be involved in that somehow. So it's possible. I mean, we've been working. It's not perfect. I mean, we've

into issues here, but look, it's a lot better when I was 17. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? And the relationship with the police is a lot different. They respect the CBI organizations and they respect the people that are doing it. At least the brass from the top guys. Right. That's important because that's what goes down to 705.

You know, the culture goes down to them. But I think the only way you do it is create an ecosystem of public safety. Right. You have to create community bodies and division organizations. We do trust, trauma to trust training the police and community people. They do roundtables where they talk to each other about the things that, you know, that their most fearful love about police, about the community. We do all of those things that because it's necessary.

It's hard work, but it's necessary. And you also got to change the makeup of the police department. Talk on it on. Yet the police department can't be, like, look different than the people that they are policing. Right. It has to be a police force that's in the predominance of the neighborhood there. So the black and brown theory, mostly black and brown. You have to, I think our, we are predominantly back and brown in Newark, and we have about

20, 25 percent women, right? So we've been very deliberate and purposeful at making sure the department looks that way. And the good thing about that is a lot of these officers are related to some of the people out in the street so they know them, which means that they have a different relationship with these people. When they look at them, they look at them a little differently, then they look at somebody who comes from a call on Jersey that shows up in Newark, and they out here, like, going off, right?

So we have a greater level of empathy. And then the training has to change. Not just in a police department that they're in. I mean, statewide training has to change. All these states have police training. How will you change the training because this is the interesting, teaching, I would say. Some people say you change the training by changing the method of training.

Some people you say that you change the training by adding funds to different police departments or state police organizations, which sometimes draws the ire of people. Right. Because they're looking for the police to get less money. Yeah. And now sometimes some people are saying they have better police, it might need more money for training. What was the solution? You do. I mean, you need different kind of training.

So, and New Jersey is the police training commission. They oversee all training. So all these, and that's in many states. So all local police departments have their own kind of training going on, but it's governed by the PTCBOP overall board. And that board has to say specifically what training should entail. It's just like school. There's an overall board in terms of all the schools that this is what you have to be teaching.

And so that piece of change from the top. You're going to have to put more money. We spend a lot of money on training. Right? Because we got to add training. We got to give them the trade that the stakes it has to add. And then we have to add stuff of our own. Right. We got to add. We got to put a newer field on it. Like we got to add the fact you got to meet with the community. You have to add farm that trust. You have to add all those other stuff. And you have to pay tulips officers and pay trainers to do that. So it does cost more money. What about until the last thing on policing? Because, you know, as governor, you're going to deal with not just policing misaps and happen to do it. but all over the place. There'll be a whole state police accountage that, you know, you'll be top. I know.

When there is a police account that has gone up on respect their violence, these hurt people, police have, operate outside of the law, the Constitution. How do we institute consequences into more than police officers or meet out constitutions, consequences, should I say? They made people believe that their rights come for us. So New Jersey is fairly good at this now. They have a, whenever there's a police involved shooting, the state has to take over it immediately.

The municipality is out of it. So the AG's office takes it over. The problem is those people are still in the same circles. They're related to this and that. So that's still a problem. We could take people's licenses away in Newark. We could take your license. So all police in New Jersey, excuse me, have to be licensed.

If you get into something, we can't snatch your license away. And then you can't be a cop anymore, despite what the court says, we can just take your license based on calls. And the problem is they've been using that in the opposite way to prevent us from being cops. So they're using this license thing to say, now, oh, you ought to be licensed. Oh, you had a misdemeanor when he was 18 years old, not going to be a licensed. So they're using it against us, which is what always happens. That's why you have to have the law and the right people at the same time.

Right. So that that's a problem. But I think that we also need a submitting complaint review board with subpoena power to, and civilian complaint review boards can't. State by. State law. You need municipalities to do it. We don't only city that have one, but we don't have speed of power.

We turn it all the way to the state Supreme Court laws. But, and they said that the legislator has to give us the right to do it. And they have not done it. But you need subpoena power. And review boards can't, you know, review criminal conduct of police officers. But the good thing is they can review conduct, right? They can view conduct.

And you could catch people early before they shoot somebody. Right. Right. If these people have a history of misconduct, there should be a bore outside of the police that decides, with the outcomes that is made up of civilians. I said, look, this guy can't be a kind. He has like 15, you know, incidents. He hits somebody, cuss somebody out. The demeanor was terrible.

He threw people on the ground. He did this and did that. They suspended him for Vob Day. They did this. Well, they did nothing. Right. Somebody has to intervene in early warning and say, this guy has to be removed from the police department. Today, you might save a whole bunch of people's lives in that.

Imagine all this stuff Derek Chauvin did before he, you know, put his knee on George Floyd's neck, right? And he killed him. He did so many different things ever to other police department. Somebody could have caught him before. before he put his knee on that neck and George Floyd would be allowed. If he was fired prior meeting George Floyd, right? And that's what the power of a review board

would do it with Kex these guys early and dismiss them before they do something to kill somebody. Now, a lot of these types of things were being rolled up in the George Floyd just a reason act that Washington could get old out. Right? You know, a lot of these things seem like they were possible on the federal

level. Do you feel like you have to allow it to a state level to kind of enact some of the initiatives that were in there, maybe some changes to qualify immunity, maybe some change of some, maybe the slats of the review more, perhaps maybe some type of police registered stocks, cons for being able to bounce around to death departments all along in the state. How much farther do you feel like you have to get stuff up? Yeah, I don't want you to think it's easy, though. I mean, New Jersey is, it's probably, it's probably easier in New Jersey than most states. You know, we have control of the legislation completely.

Then if you have a Democratic governor, these states should be already passed. So we have bills in our legislative that have not passed. In New Jersey, CCRB is one of them, right? There's a lot of bills, progressive bills that can't sassies civilian to lay with people up there. They can't pass because, I mean, with a Democratic legislation, because these lobbyists, groups because these folks with all this money. The same power of Republicans have Democrats at the same problem, right? And that's just the reality. And that's why people are falling off or not

coming out for the Democrats because it's becoming more and more obvious and relevant. I mean, relevant to their lives that, look, these guys are supporting lobbyists, bankers, big firms, you know, they're not supporting us, right? And so you got these legislatures in there who are not, who are free. said to do what they think is right for fear they're going to be cut off from the party, fear they're going to get cut off from the money. They're not going to win their seats anymore. This episode is brought to you by Sweet Cream.

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today. So I was looking at some of the things that are in your plane, in your platform, a progressive overhaul of a New Jersey. Campaign agenda includes reparations, secretary state law, Sanctuary state laws, baby bonds, universal basic income. Yeah. Man, you are pushing the party forward. Do you believe, because all of these issues, I could take UBI, I could take reparations, baby bombs, sanctuary state laws, all of these things are highly contentious things in the national level. And it seems like sometimes, Mayor, the Democrats don't really want to commit to. because their progressive caucus, they kind of try to keep a leash on a little bit.

You think New Jersey is ready for that? Well, when we go up and down the state, people feel like they're, man. I think this moment that we're in demands that we go as far as we can. And I think the Democrats have the opposite tape, and I think it's a failing recipe. They feel like that at this moment, what Carville Georgia will do is lay at, right? You lay down and let, and this two shall pass, and then we do what we need to do. Or we just play moderate. We play in the middle.

But I think it's a losing strategy. I think you lose more people in the party. You decimate the party. Party, people stop looking at the party for national leadership whatsoever. People who are brand and raven analysis for national leave shirt and the party is just not there, right? You got Bernie and AOC going around the country with huge crowds. And you know what they're saying when they go around these places, right? So people are fired up and ready for us to lead.

In a crisis, people are looking for leadership. They're not looking for compromise. We had a war here. There's a fight. And people want to swing back. And I think this is the time to do it more than anything. And you push as much as you can. Look, we did UBI in Newark, right?

If we could pick, you know, 600 families or 400, 500, 500 families and give them $6,000 a year, you can do the same thing statewide. I mean, the country can do it. We gave our stimulus checks. For God knows for two years, you know, we could give families that needed the most. And it would be cheaper because you're not giving it to every single person. Right. You show who needed the most and give it to those families. That stuff can happen to give people legs up and help the economy at the same time.

That's very real. And there's states that are already talking about what reparations means. We have to have the courage to do that, especially in Georgia was the last state to give it to slavery in the union. So at the end of the day, we should have the courage to lease. So this state will say, oh, we'll talk about the wealth gap. We don't want to say it word reparations. But the wealth gap was created by the conditions that existed, which is why we're talking about reparations.

And closing the wealth gap is a way to repair the harm that was done over centuries or generations. That's what reparations is to repair harm that was done to specific people. Do you think is any way to close the racial wealth gap between black Americans, and white Americans without preparations? No. I think that how big it is,

we can begin to close it and knock it down. That's why having in New Jersey. New Jersey's wealth gap is about $300,000 between white families was, excuse me, between white families and black and brown families,

doing it Coke it. They just did it again. It doubled. $600,000. So it's getting worse. So I want you to do something because these numbers are always staggering to me. It's good worse. And I do not think that people actually understand them. At one point, I was looking at the wealth gap in Boston, and it's something like the average family in Boston has $2,000 of wealth, that's white family.

And average black family has $8. Right. Of wealth. Yes, I think people don't understand these. So for people that don't understand exactly what you mean with you being wealth, right? What are the numbers in New Jersey and what does that be? Right. So the average, with a median, well, being a being wealth, white families in New Jersey is about three, was about $300,000.

Yeah. For African American family, it was about $27,000. You know, and the same for Latino families, 17 for African-Americans. 17 for African-American, 20-0 for Latino for Latinos. So I think now the number has grown to median wealth for white families and $600,000, right? And those numbers for us basically stayed the same, right? I went up very, very marginally. So it actually doubled during this time.

And that's driven mainly by homeownership, business growth and development. Your income is not your wealth. I tell people you have to use income to. get wealth. You can't give you a son when you die, your wages. Right. Right. Well, wages can't be passed down. So wages don't constitute wealth. Wealth is constituted through ownership, right? And what you're able to concretely have, your assets. We don't have it. We don't have, we have, we have very good assets because we were deliberately denied opportunity to get these assets. And he's literally dispossessed when we had. That's right. We had them, people took them from us.

I was in a debate and the lady says, they asked about the wealth gap. She said, well, we need to get third graders to know how to read more, right, which is ridiculous. It's an attack. It's also racist. It's an attack saying straight up that the wealth gap exists because we don't know how to read. And they don't know the difference between what's happening here, that white families get wealth, not because they're smart. They got wealth to somebody passed it down to them. Well, that has nothing to do in some instances with your education, right?

because you can not have a college degree and be born in a family that has a bunch of homes, a bunch of businesses. You inherit that wealth. Well, that's actually demonstrated by the fact that non-white, excuse me, white, non-college educated people, but still have more wealth in a lot of situations than black college-educated people. Right. Because that wealth is true transfer. Yeah.

And folks don't understand that, right? And so they argue about it in a way that they're completely divorced from it. So they tone deaf, they don't know what's going on. They don't see you. And so there's no way to really close that. It would take us hundreds of years to close a wealth gap that wide. If we allow things to go the way they're going, you see what happens. It gets worse.

And they're getting worse under Democratic leadership. Look, the procurement in New Jersey, they spend less than 1% of New Jersey's dollar Less than 1% go to black brow businesses in the state of Georgia. Less than 1%. Yeah. And in the county where we are now, Essex, is predominantly black and brown. Less than one half of 1% of those dollars go to black and brown businesses.

What if you, so of your future constituents from, you know, touching white, like all, on all the places there. I've done a lot of people from New Jersey. So I've gotten to me. know this different swaths of New Jersey.

Right, right, right. My man Charlemagne lives in a place in New Jersey that doesn't even seem real. Right. Like you drop around the place and they're just deer hanging out everywhere. That's right. It's beautiful. You know, it's a hard mistake. Yeah, I'm living around.

I'm from Louisiana. We used to hunt the deer and these deer, they'll have to care in the world. They're just hanging out. Beautiful place. some people from those places might look at you and say, why is addressing the racial wealth gap even before? Right, because we have to have an economy that's inclusive. The problem is, why is that report?

The problem is you're complaining about prices, you're complaining about taxes, you're complaining about, but segregation is what's causing these things, an exclusive economy that does not allow more people to be. The surefire way to get you to reduce your taxes is allow other people to help them pay up, right? You have to give people an opportunity to be a part of homeownership, getting people an opportunity to have wealth, to get people to be a part of your son. If I had a pie, if I cut it up in two slices, you get the big piece.

If it's 15 slices, your slice, your slice gets small. And that is what the bill is. So you're paying more of the bill because can't nobody help you, right? You have to get other folks to help you. Diversity actually helps the economy, right? You wind the pool, you get the best talent because, you're paying the pool. you get the best talent because you get more people to choose from. Like, it's just like logic, right?

If you narrow a talent, you get people like Pete Heck, exit, right? So at the end of the day, you have to open it up so more people can be included in that. And you create an economy that's more robust. And business folks know that. They just cut off their nose and spite their face. You know, they scare the Donald Trump. Or they have these old ideas that are detrimental to their own self-development.

They'll say whatever they need to say. But Target knows that. that how did they find out which spices to put up their aisles without Littos in their C-suits? How do they know which hair-chair products to buy without black women involved in their purchasing department and buyer department and then all this other kind of stuff? I mean, the reality is you need to have a diverse, you need to have a diverse supply chain, a diverse pool of labor, diverse ideas. People know this.

And it has to come from, you know, all areas. And the economy gets better this way. You complain that you pay too much. Well, the only way you do that is integrate the economy, right? That's just the reality. Plus, New Jersey and the country is not the same place. It was eight years ago, nine years ago. 48% of the people in New Jersey identify as mixed rates and non-white.

48% of the people are about 40% in the country. So this is not the same place. So you're talking about you don't want diversity. the equity in the future. You're cutting off almost half the entire state of New Jersey. I ran into old white women in one of these rallies. I was actually saying, my grandkids are Dominican. What am I supposed to do about that? I said, you're right. My child, married a Dominican, my children of their children of Dominican, they're in our family. So when you ask them, they're going to identify as mixed race. They're going to say

they're non-white and they're mixed. That's what they're going to say. And so what happens to a society and economy that cuts off his nose and spite his face. And the economy has to fail. It will fail. It will go bad news, right? It's just the truth of the matter. It's just, we're in a different place in America, in this state that we were 80, 90 years ago. They had got that off 100 years ago.

Today is just nonsensical. You brought up somebody's name and we're going to have to talk about. As we are having this conversation, there are people who have, various different opinions on Michigan governor, Reggie Whitner. Right. And the fact that she both went to White House and it stood with Trump on stage for something that she thought,

it was very poor church state. Right. It was military base update. She was at paid for. So very poor jobs. Michigan was very important thing. The defense industry is something. She wanted help from the federal government.

So she had to work with Donald Trump to keep the health issue. Right. If you were the governor of, or if you're elected governor of New Jersey, at least for the foreseeable future or the near future, you will have to work with the federal government some way. That means working with Donald Trump. I assume that you don't have very much a convent with the president. Right. The question is, how do you foster a relationship? shit with someone who may be a political adversary that still prioritizes the people of your

state right after. So I think that is more than just a political adversary. I mean, we work with political adversaries all the time. Chris Christie was my political adversary. We got the schools back while he was the governor. We got our state finances back while he was the governor. So working with these guys who are on the opposite side of the blue adversary is part for the course, part of the job. This guy is trying to kill us. That's something different. You don't let

a robber in your house when you know he is a burglar. Right. You know, at the end of the day, it's difficult to work with somebody who is undermining your very existence. Tells people they can't read about black people. You got to take this stuff offline. We're going to take money for people with DEI, take away Medicaid, fake two million Americans, two million people in New Jersey. So, I mean, it's difficult unless, you know, he begins to have a change, of course, and starts to do things differently. We can convince him that what he's doing is wrong and he's the change course of pivoted to do these things to help us. And that's one thing. I think she is in a tough position and there are a lot of people who are coming who probably should have become it, right? Because

most of these people would do nothing, Democrats in the beginning. So now they have the nerve to say something about this woman. And they are working with Trump without working Trump. Right. When they were decimating voting rights for black people across the country, they said nothing, right? When they were giving cuts to billionaires the first time and, you know, making it difficult for working people. They kept their mouth shut, right? When all these things were happening, they basically said nothing. When they attacked women's right to choose, where they stack the Supreme Court. Most of these guys are the same thing.

These are people who sat behind and kept their mouth shut. Now they got so much stuff to say now because she did that. But you supported him is just in a different way. He would have less leverage, less authority, less power, what even might not be the president if we opposed these things

on their face when they first showed up and we actually had a policy on the Democratic side that helped working people. Then we would be in this conversation. So most of these people should have, they don't have the, you know, the leverage in my mind.

They don't have the right to say anything about the governor at all. And I wouldn't do what she was doing. But I'm not judging her at this point either. I wouldn't do that at all. Wouldn't be you. It couldn't be me. I couldn't do it.

I mean, there's too much online. We're in the middle of a fight. You can't compare. I was speaking to what Democrat or said, we got to do what Clinton did in the big of Reagan-Bushehrer. You know, he went to the middle of he did all this. I said, look, I didn't do with that when Clinton did it. But I'm going to tell you this.

This guy is not raising him. Bush. He's like way beyond those people. The stuff that Reagan and Bush was saying is opposed to this guy. Right. Right. So he's doing all kinds of merit. He's like violating people's, you know, constitutional rights. This guy's crazy. So there's no way that you can normalize his behavior. And we can't normalize his behavior throughout constituents, the people around head so they can expect that what he's doing is just a part of what democracy is. Oh, that's not a our democracy. In fact, he's against democracy flat-out, so we can't. And I think that's what that's doing is normalizing it. I think her doing that, these people attacked her. They tried

to kidnap her. Yeah. You know what I mean? That's why, you know, that's why I say they don't have a right to say anything about this lady. They tried to kidnap this lady. They defamed her, humiliated, tried to drive her into the ground. Trump was it a number of a person banging on where the head as often as he could, right? So for her to come to this part, to come to this in her life to do that. I'm not where she is. And I don't play that I've never been, right? So I don't know why she made this decision.

But I don't think most of the people that say anything, you know, have enough money in the bank to say anything about her. But these people are dangerous and she shouldn't give them any credence. So look, I heard you in the beehile on that. The hottest. Guilty by association. The hottest tour of the summer. Everybody going, everybody hitting them wrong. But you being featured there with Beyonce.

Like, I know you used to be in hip-hop, your own Lower Hills album, the whole nine, thinking about maybe picking the mic back up, governor and rapper. And you poet, poet, get back into it or what? Well, I still go to the studio time and time again. Oh, hey? Yeah, with Jerry Wanda. We in New York, go to his studio.

12, 1 o'clock in the morning. He just keeps me at all the office of the night. So I got to get out of it sometimes. We're still making pieces. I mean, the thing, what we want, you know, a whole album. That's all the title, just playing in the studio. How important is that to you? I mean, it's such a sworeative part of who you've been.

What about being a poet helped you communicate to people that you use now? Oh, yeah, as a man. My father used to tell me, don't lose your poetry license. You said, and I took it to me. You always a poet. That's how you started me when you came from. It's important.

The way I think, the creativity of how are responding to people, what I say, you know, in fact, I didn't accuse of being a poet at debates. Well, the mayor is a poet, so I was going to say, well, he's a poet, so that you can put words together. But it's really for my sanity board than anything else, right? It helps me stay grounded, understand the issues that we're really dealing with. Poetry helps you look at it and think about things in a different way, right? And it takes a lot of me going in the studio, you know, gets rid a lot of stress for me. Right. Right.

And so it's very, very helpful in that sense, in my mental health, the emotional health. But it's also good to see the product that comes out is really raw. And it's probably an englomeration of what I see as a black man in America and what I see as the mater as a black man in America. You know, express it. Yeah, which is. and express it and all comes out in one form because we see it and we deal with it, you know. I mean, I think one of the hardest jobs in this country is to be a mayor of a Merrimac city. It would be a black one at that.

I think it's one of the hard jobs. What's specific with terrible buying? I mean, you have to solve problems that first ball you didn't create. And people look for you to do it quicker and better than that. anybody else. They figured because you come from there, you relate to it, you should have a corner on the market and you should be able to figure this out in a matter of weeks. And this problem was created over 100 years. You're supposed to fix it in four? Yeah. Right. And it's difficult. And you get scrutinized more than everybody else. And the federal government is on you immediately

as so as you all can that at least. People's view of you is always that you can't escape that, No matter what you do, I don't care how well you dress, how good you talk. How many people you hang out with? You can never escape the moniker that they're going to put on you, you know, that you're black from these communities that you, you know, you have this, you have that. Like, you don't know what you're doing. You're not qualified.

You know, they call the Baltimore bear to be a I'm here. This is a brilliant young man. Right. You know what I mean? So, yeah, that's right. So that's, that stump is always going to, these people are always going to look at you in this way. And you can't let it beat you up. You just have to stay out of it.

Keep doing it. I'll keep building it. Put your head down and build. Just got to keep building. All right, before we got out of here, I want to ask you one more thing. We're here. And I know that there's going to be a New Jersey walk of fank. The proprietor of this studio is put together.

Had a great conversation with him earlier on. I got a lesson on the history of film. Yeah, yeah, right here. That's what it needs. studios. What's the name of the studios again? I remember, I'm not, Ironbound. I don't remember about it. I'm like, sure I say. Right here, and I don't remember about the studios. I got a lesson in the history of Philadelphia. I want to ask you something. I want to ask you some of your top New Jersey beings. Okay. What's the greatest hip-hop song ever to come out of New Jersey? The greatest hip-hop song.

I'm against them people angry. I would say, ready or not. That's my favorite song. Okay. Okay. And they're out in Jersey, the Fuji's ready enough of hair rock. That's my That's my son. That's your joy. That's my joy. So no hip hopper, no pop it up. No, OPP. No, OPP. OPP. OPP was live in the summer when it came out to South to Trette's and Vinnie grew up to any stars. Great enough. Yeah. What's the greatest movie ever come out of these shows? Wow. I would say now people might not know this, but uptown Saturday night. Richard Wesley. Outtown Saturday night. born and raised in north wrote the book right that's been sure to see jersey uptown Saturday

now now if y'all i've never seen uptown Saturday night first of all that will piss me off but watch it it's people in the movie that you might not like now however it's an amazing great piece of art love that grew up on it yeah what's the best television show ever to come out of New Jersey. That's a heart. The telemedin show. I got a little hot picking up right now, I'm not really funny.

Is that right? Is not the Supranos? Oh, yeah. Maybe you can say the Supranos. I wasn't even thinking about the sopranos, but the soprados is good. That's a good one. You mean telling me you thinking that there's a better TV show

that came from Jersey in the Supreme? Yeah. Yeah. I think so I like the soprano's, but I wouldn't have been the top of my mind. Okay. I wouldn't be the top of my mind. I watched it, too, by the way. What do you think about this?

Like, what's your opinion on the Sopranos as the New Jersey name? Well, I think it's a true depiction of what happened and what's happening in New Jersey. They definitely is a definitely true depiction of what went on, especially, I mean, in Newark, has a long history of. Boy, and I's crime back in the days, I mean, a long history. Would you take you, are you a Sopranos guy or a wire guy? Wire. So wire over the Sopranos all day. Even though Sopranos is from New Jersey.

Yeah. All right. last question to help you, Mayor Sulebiga, athlete. What's the number one athlete to come out of New Jersey? Shaquille O'Neal. Wait a minute. Shaquille O'Neill, that's a, you, Jersey get credit for Shaq? We get credit for Shet. He went to high school in San Antonio, though. College in my hometown of Batarroo, Louisiana. He was, he was grew up here in this city. His mom like, yeah. family here. So jurors, the shack is number one.

So he was going to think, I thought you were saying, Kyle. I thought you was going to say, Kyle. I thought you was going to say, Kyle. I thought you was going to say Kyle. I got to get loved in Shaq. That's my people. I'm friends with his friends.

We all, we all in the same circles. They're the also a layup for Kai, but you went with the diesel. We still, we, Babinru's still claiming. Y'all, you're claiming. We just, we just took care of it. in his formative years. I guess after,

I guess actor is easy, right? Michael B. Joy. Michael be joined all day. I guess that's easy. I guess he kind of, he did kind of take it over with Jersey to kind of a renaissance, right? Yeah, I can be joined, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know him, his family very, very well. Yeah, they're good people. I coached Michael B. Joy in basketball in the summer, too, in the AAU games. Oh, when he was in English, yeah, what was his game while?

He was okay. He was a good player, Yeah. You know, I'm being honest with you, though. He has a good reputation around LA for Hubey. My man Sterling, who's the Sealo from Ridiculousness, is good for Aaron's with Mike.

Now, he could really, Sterling could really, really, yeah, really play. He's small and's short, but he could really play. Well, Mike, Mike is very strong. You know what he could play. So I know the fundamental adventures of the game, without a shout over doubt. Yeah, your coaching really must have, must have, must have it.

Well, I'm going to wish you all the luck in the world. I personally believe that the Democrats don't know the tantal pool that they have. Right. It was up to me. You would stop in the government's management. You keep going. But I'm sure if you would talk about that. Any thoughts, bear it?

I would never do anything else besides be the governor. I would love to support somebody to be the president and be on their team to help them become president of United States. whether it's Cory Booker or Westmore, those are the only two people that I have in my mind right now. That should probably be the president of the United States. The senator from this state and the governor from,

and the governor from the state of Maryland, those are the only two people that I think should. That I would support right now in this moment to be probably united states. What is New Jersey and Foley? What is all of this happening? With, does the Rupert beat the road for you? The primary is June 10th.

That's when Democrats and Republicans come out of vote for the vote for their champion. And then we battle it out until November. And then November is the general election here in New Jersey. Well, man, Brock, I wish you all up. I appreciate you, Bob. Thank you, Bob.

I appreciate you, man. Yes, stuff. Thanks. Yep.