Mick Unplugged - Power and Purpose: Congressman Jim Clyburn Talks Legacy

Episode Date: December 27, 2025

Congressman Jim Clyburn is a legendary statesman whose influence spans from advising presidents to serving as a beacon of change and unity in American politics. Representing South Carolina, he is not only a champion of justice and progress but has also shaped the course of history with his powerful endorsements and unyielding voice. With deep roots in the civil rights movement and a life devoted to public service, Congressman Clyburn’s impact resonates across generations—especially inspiring young leaders and change-makers to envision what’s possible through mentorship, storytelling, and unwavering purpose. Takeaways: Legacy and Representation: Congressman Clyburn’s new book, The First Eight, uncovers the overlooked history of the eight African Americans who served in Congress from South Carolina before him, proving the power of representation and the importance of knowing one’s history. Mentorship by Example: Though Clyburn didn’t personally know his forerunners, their stories and those of his own father provided mentorship from afar—showing that guidance and inspiration often transcend direct relationships. Power of Storytelling: Clyburn emphasizes the importance of learning outside traditional education, absorbing wisdom from lived experiences, and communicating with passion and inclusivity—skills he encourages the next generation to develop for real impact. Sound Bytes: “No, before I was first, there were eight.” “Robert Smalls is the most consequential South Carolinian, bar none.” “There’s a certain amount of education that you gotta get outside of the books.” Connect & Discover Jim: Instagram: @clyburnsc06 Facebook: @ClyburnforCongress X:  @RepJamesClyburn YouTube: @RepJamesClyburn Website: Congressman James E. Clyburn Book: The First Eight: A Personal History of the Pioneering Black Congressmen Who Shaped a Nation 🔥 Ready to Unleash Your Inner Game-Changer? 🔥  Mick Hunt’s BEST SELLING book, How to Be a Good Leader When You’ve Never Had One: The Blueprint for Modern Leadership, is here to light a fire under your ambition and arm you with the real-talk strategies that only Mick delivers.  👉 Grab your copy now and level up your life → Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books A Million    FOLLOW MICK ON: Spotify: MickUnplugged Instagram: @mickunplugged  Facebook: @mickunplugged YouTube:  @MickUnpluggedPodcast  LinkedIn: @mickhunt  Website:  MickHuntOfficial.com Apple: MickUnplugged Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to Mick Unplugged, hosted by the one and only Mick Hunt. This is where purpose meets power and stories spark transformation. Mick takes you beyond the motivation and into meaning, helping you discover your because and becoming unstoppable. I'm Rudy Rush, and trust me, you're in the right place. Let's get Unplugged. Welcome to another exciting episode of Mick Unplud, and today I literally get to sit down with one of my heroes. You know, he's advised presidents.

He's reshaped the course of American history with a single endorsement. We're talking about from the halls of Congress to the heart of the movement. His voice has never wavered. It's been a compass for change, for justice, and for unity. He is the visionary. He is the resolute. He is the legendary. He is my congressman, Mr. Jim Clyburn.

I am so honored to spend some time with someone being from South Carolina, being a young black man from South Carolina. You've shaped who I was, who I've become, and the legacy that I'm trying to create, and that all stemmed from you showing me it was possible. So I wanted to take just a moment and just say thank you. And I mean that for my soul. Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you. Yes, sir.

Yes, sir. And I would be remiss if we didn't talk about out of the gate this amazing book that you were writing, the first eight. And we talk about the legacy I want to leave behind. You put your legacy in writing for us. I'd love for you to just talk about the first eight where the thought came from to put this out and who you hope to touch with this amazing book that you. you have. Thank you. When I published my memoir 10 years ago, 2015, one day, a group came to my office when I was a majority whip, and I had on the wall of my conference

run these eight pictures. There are pictures of the eight African Americans who are serving Congress from South Carolina before me. One of the people in the group asked me who they were. And And when I told them, she said to me, I thought you were the first African-American, the Serbian Congress from South Carolina. And I kind of playfully said to her, no, before I was first, there were eight. And later that day, I said to myself, you know, maybe one day after I get over this book we just published, I might write a book about these eight people, because I think so many of them were so important to our history, that Joseph Rainey, who was the first African-American to be

elected to the House of Representatives, and sworn in on December 12, 17th. Richard Cain, who was number four in that group, Richard Cain, became an AME bishop, and had pastor Emmanuel A&E Church down in Charleston. Then there's Smalls, Robert Smalls, from Beechwood. Robert Smalls is only, to me, genuine hero of the Civil War, and it served in the State House of Representatives here in Columbia, and in the Congress. I said, I'm on the right about these people. And so I started taking notes and not really getting too serious about it. Then January 6th, 2021, hit.

And while we were sitting in this so-called undisclosed location, having a lot of it, I have a been rushed off the house floor for safety, I said to people around me, I know what's happening here. They are trying to get this count stopped so they can get this election thrown into the House of Representatives, just like it was done in 1876. And when that happened, that is what started the end. It's a reconstruction. That's what started the beginning of Jen Crow. I said, that is what is happening here. So then I got serious about doing this book. And then when my communications director retired in the middle of doing the book, she said to me, I'm going to retire, but I want you to finish this book. You write. I'll do the copy editing. I'll do the foot noting. You just

write and send me what you've written. And that's what led to the book. And that's what led to this production that's going to be released on November 11. And I can't wait. Again, being from South Carolina and knowing what that history means to me, I almost wonder what took so long. But then I go, the only person that could do it is Jim Clyburn. So I don't ask what took so long. Knowing you like I know you and I've followed you forever and I've seen you speak and I've got to shake your hand. I know I'm not going to ask you to remember, but I've got to shake your hand. I know how you storytell. So I can't wait to see how you put this together in story form because you are one of the greatest orators of my generation in the state of South Carolina.

My kids don't even know what the word orator means, right? But you are one of the most eloquent, not from how you talk, but the impact that your words make. When did you realize you had that gift? Well, when I was growing up, my dad was a minister, and we often talked about me following him into the ministry. And, of course, I didn't know what my dad was doing, but we had, among the rules we had to live by, one was every morning before breakfast, we had to recite a Bible verse. And then every evening, before retiring to bed, we had to share with him and my mother, it called Eve. We didn't have TV, so you had to read the afternoon newspapers when it was delivered to our home. And that was a requirement.

Finish your homework. Then let's talk about this car ID back. And so I grew up with all of that. And I used to watch my dad. He was a pretty good orator himself. And I was blessed with the vocal cords that he had. And I guess when I got to South Carolina State, Because when I was in high school, it was more the band and the choir for a while.

There were people who thought that I should sing. But when I got to South Carolina State, I got involved in the sit-ins. And it so happened that before every March or even every meeting that we had, I was always called on to do the prayer, to open the meeting. It's when I first detected that people were just as attracted to my intonations as they were to my recitations. And so I would always be created with these prayers I was given. For instance, you know, I was sensitive to people's different religious backgrounds. And so I would always open my prayer with addressing the omnipotent.

omniscient and omnipresent being. That's the way I always did it in order to not insult folks. There were just one or two people on stage campus who calls themselves Muslims. Then every now, then especially during the movement, there were a lot of Jewish people involved with our efforts.

And I didn't want to insult anybody. So that's the way I would open every prayer. But then people started talking to me about my voice. and that's when I first realized it. My dad said a lot of things and a lot of compliments, but he never said anything to me about my voice being in the distinct. And then it still happens.

I sometimes get on airplanes, and the moment people, they recognize my voice before they recognize me. And so I found that out when I was a student, and so I can understand, and I can tell the difference now when I develop allergies. My voice changed. People don't recognize me. Well, again, you're someone who I studied and someone who, when I was in junior high

in high school and we had to have speech class or we'd go and do debates. Again, things that the young kids don't do now, I would pattern myself after you and I would study the pace of which you spoke and how you put inflections on certain words and how you would use your body and your gestures to. get certain points across. And I always felt like it's a lost skill. And so I got to a point now where, like, my kids will study some of your speeches and some of your talks because I want them to understand the power, number one,

that you have had always, but how they can train themselves and really learn from men like you. And so, again, I'm just appreciative on so many levels. Yes, sir. And I want to come back to the first eight again. Because when I first heard about it, I immediately said, wow, the power of mentorship. And I'm sure that you didn't know all eight of those obviously personally, but I'm sure that all eight provided mentorship to you, just like you have to so many that maybe they don't know you personally, but we follow who you are. Talk to us about what mentorship means to you and how these eight have kind of formed that green.

of mentors, even though, again, you don't personally or didn't physically know all of them. You know, people ask me who are the heroes in my life. My dad, I always mentioned first because he was an interesting person who grew up in Cusholk County, South Carolina at the time when the state of South Carolina did not provide high school for African Americans. And so he only went through the seventh grade. And then when he was not allowed to go to school anymore, he self-talk. and he became sufficient enough to pass a college interest exam and got into college.

But then was never allowed to graduate college because the state had a law at that time that you could not get a college degree if he did not have a high school diploma. And so when he could not produce his high school diploma, they would not allow him to go into his senior year of college. And so that is the kind of stuff. and experiences. I would talk to him often about his experiences. Now, I did not know that he had not graduated college

until about six months before he passed away. And I found that out from a person who was in college with him who asked me about him. I wanted to know whether or not I knew him because of my last name. And so when he told me that my dad didn't show up their senior year, I then left Hampton County where this was taking place and went straight to something. They asked my dad for an explanation, and he did it. He gave me the explanation, and that's how I know all of us.

And six months later, he passed away. So he was about to leave this earth, with my not ever knowing that part of his history. But what I learned from him is that there's a certain amount of education that you've got to get outside. of the books. And so I try hard now to really soak up stuff that I hear from people, soak up stuff that I may

see on the evening news or read in a newspaper and try to make it relevant. For instance, you know, I never would have recognized of what was happening on January 6th that I'd not soak up some of the stuff my dad told me.

Because he was the first one to tell me about Robert Smalls. Yeah. They weren't teaching that in the schools that when I was growing up. Right. I started learning all that stuff on my own. And as one would find in the first eight, that when I talk about these people,

I think that I'm not even saying an introduction to the book. Among the eight, Robert Smalls was head and shoulders above all the rest of them. Who could be born into slavery as he was? Who would have been able to escape from slavery, the way he did and not just alone he brought his sort of family

with him and his friends and when he stole that ship that planter he made a stop on his way out out of the Charleston Harbor to pick up his wife and other friends to

and deliver that ship to the Union soldiers then within six months of having escaped from slavery he's sitting down with the president of the United States in August of 1862. He stayed from slavery back in May. In August, he was in Washington, D.C., sitting down with Abraham Lincoln,

and he came back to South Carolina with authorization to recruit 5,000 African Americans to fight in the Union Army. So he is a genuine hero. Then he ends up with significant wealth, ends up. spending 10 years in the state legislature and 10 years in the United States Congress doing all that without ever achieving a form of education.

Now, he did hire folks to teach him because he threats for education. And so I say that Robert Smalls is the most consequential South Carolinian who ever lived. And I had a gentleman one time We were down in King Street, South Carolina. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke. The first time he spoke in South Carolina after the passes of the 1965 vote right back was in the little town of King Street down in Winsbury County,

which is in my district. And so I was down there to speak for the 50th anniversary of his visit to King Street. And while I was talking to the group, I reminisced a little bit about Robert Smalls having represented that same area in the United States Congress, and how proud I was to be, to have inherited his constituency. Well, I said at the time that I thought that Robert Smalls were the most consequential South Carolina who ever lived. So I came down from the podium.

A gentleman came up to me who I knew, who was white, big supporter of mine, and he said to me, He said, no, that was a terrific speech. And he said, you know what? I think I agree with you that Robert Smalls was the most consequential black South Carolina than who ever lived. And I said to him, that is not what I said. I said that Robert Spores is the most consequential

South Carolina by none. Yes, sir. He looked at me with an interesting smile, walked away, and those are the last time I ever We ever had a conversation But I think I can Demonstrate Some people may say

It's John C. Calhoun, some people may say It's Strom Furman But if you look The consequences The consequences of his life Yeah Can mess you up to Robert Smalls And so there are things in this book

About Robert Small But they're things in this book About people at Thomas Miller Thomas Miller Miller was number seven. Robert Smalls was number six. Miller succeeded Smalls. And one of the interesting things

that people were finding this book, that Miller was after America by choice, not by birth. Miller was the first president of South Carolina State. The state was first brought online in 1896. Thomas E. Miller

was his first president. He had already been defeated for Congress by George Washington Murray. Well, he was not black, not African-American. He was the grandson, according to him, of Thomas, one of the size of the Declaration of Independence. Yes, sir. Now, he admits who ever been born out of wedlock and being given up for adoption. and he was adopted by an African-American family down in what's now originally South Carolina

and they moved to Thompson where he began to work. And later went to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and HBCU. And when he graduated from Lincoln, other than going back to New York where he had come from before going to Lincoln, he decided to come back to South Carolina.

And he went to law school at the University of South Carolina. Wow. And that's another thing you learned in this book. University of South Carolina was the only southern institution that was integrated during and after the Civil War. Wow. Wow.

I can listen to you all day. Back here. I can listen to you all day. Here's what I want to do. Sure. Because I know how busy you are, but you mean so much to me. the first 20 people that are watching or listening to this that message me the first eight,

I'm going to purchase a copy of the book for them. I appreciate it. I want to do that. I want to have you on again anytime you want to be on. You mean the world to me. This book is that important. We'll have links from your team to where they can go get the book. But the first 20 people that message me, the first eight,

I'm giving you a copy of the book. I'm going to buy them for them. Well, thank you so much for doing that. I hope that people will find in this book, let's just say substance and sustenance to weather the storm this country. I do believe that we're going to get through these challenging times because I saw what I have seen,

what these eight people did and did not do, and what we can learn from it, I really believe people will understand it that this book was written with that in mind. You got it. Congressman, again, I thank you so much for your time. Thank you for who you are, and I can't wait to see you soon in person.

Thank you. That's another powerful conversation on Mick Unplugged. If this episode moved you, and I'm sure it did, follow the show wherever you listen, share it with someone who needs that spark, and leave a review so more people can find there because. I'm Rudy Rush, and until next time, stay driven, stay focused, and stay unplugged.