#RolandMartinUnfiltered - 1.3 RMU: Possible war w/ Iran? Evangelicals split on #45; Bloomberg acts clueless on Central Park 5

Episode Date: January 16, 2020

1.3.20 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Are we headed to war with Iran? Evangelicals split over Trump, is there a crack in his evangelical wall? Bloomberg acts clueless when asked about the Central Park 5; VA Governor seeks to remove Robert E. Lee statue; NYPD cop who broke into black woman's home resigns from force; Tavis Smiley loses bid to throw out PBS lawsuit. - #RolandMartinUnfiltered partner: 420 Real Estate, LLC To invest in 420 Real Estate’s legal Hemp-CBD Crowdfunding Campaign go to http://marijuanastock.org Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. to, yeah, banana pudding. If it's happening in business, our new podcast is on it. I'm Max Chastin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast.

Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports. This kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We met them at their homes. We met them at their recording studios. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. It really does.

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You say you'd never give in to a meltdown. Never let kids' toys take over the house. And never fill your feed with kid photos. You'd never plan your life around their schedule. Never lick your thumb to clean their face. And you'd never

let them leave the house looking like less than their best. You say you'd never put a pacifier in your mouth to clean it. Never let them stay up too late. And never let them run wild through the grocery store. So when you say you'd never let them get into a car without you there, know it can happen. One in four hot car deaths happen when a kid gets into an unlocked car and can't get out.

Never happens. Before you leave the car, always stop, look, lock. Brought to you by NHTSA and the Ad Council. Today is Friday, December 3rd, 2020. Excuse me. Well, we got December 3rd in the script there. It's January 3rd. Way to go, Jackie Clark, who wrote the script.

Yes, I'm busting you out. It's Friday, January 3rd, 2020. She got December 3rd. All right, U.S. forces kill a top Iranian general. Donald Trump gloats. The question is, will this lead to war? We'll talk with MSNBC analyst Malcolm Nance about what is next. Also, Trump today,

right now, holding a rally in Miami with his far right-wing conservative evangelicals. But do they actually speak for people of faith or are they frauds? Mm-hmm. Mike Bloomberg was asked about

his administration's support for the way New York City handled the Central Park Five. He says he really can't recall. But we do. And we'll break it down. The governor of Virginia, Ralph Northern, wants the statue of Robert E. Lee removed from the U.S. Capitol.

And the white cop in New York who broke into a black woman's house in Tennessee and threatened her and her sons, well, that punk ass has quit. And to have a smiley, as proceeding with his case against PBS, they have dropped this 500-page report that details lurid sexual harassment allegations against him.

He says he can't wait to go to court. He's having to bring the funk. I'm Roland Martin on Filter. Let's go. He's knowing, putting it down from sports to news to politics With entertainment just for kicks He's rolling, yeah It's on go-go-royal Yeah, yeah It's rolling, Martin, yeah Yeah, yeah

Rolling with rolling now Yeah, yeah He's funky, he's fresh, he's real The best you know, he's rolling, Martin All right, folks, the U.S. has deployed thousands more troops to the Middle East after Trump ordered an airstrike that killed a top Iranian general. Also, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah has vowed vengeance. Now, what's going on there? The U.S. State Department has ordered all Americans out of Iraq and Iran, first of all, out of Iran, as a result of this actions, saying that, frankly, it is not safe. Now, as interesting as that, Donald Trump had lots to say when President Barack Obama was in the White House when it came to Iran.

Our president will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate. He's weak and he's ineffective. So the only way he figures that he's going to get reelected and as sure as you're sitting there is to start a war with Iran. Now, I'm more militant and more militaristic than the president. I believe in strength. But to start a war in order to get elected, and I believe that's going to happen, would be an outrage. Iran can be taken down in many ways. Their population is in turmoil.

They look at what's happening in Syria and other countries where it looked like it was an impossibility, and it looks like that one's going to collapse also. So Iran can be taken. I would never take the military card off the table. And it's possible that it'll have to be used because Iran cannot have nuclear weapons. But you've got to exhaust other possibilities. And we're in a great position to do it. They know, or they at least must know, that they're in a little bit of heat

because there's a lot of pressure to attack. This is a great time to negotiate. Unfortunately, we have a president that doesn't know the first thing about negotiation. We have a real problem in the White House. So I believe that he will attack Iran sometime prior to the election, because he thinks that's the only way he can get elected. Isn't it pathetic? Yeah, it is pathetic, because could that be the only way Donald Trump gets re-elected?

See, there's always a tweet or a comment from the orange one when these things happen. Now, today, in Palm Beach, where he was speaking, he finally appeared before the press. Now, understand, normally what happens when the president of the United States takes an action like this, they notify what is called the Gang of Eight.

That is the top congressional leaders in the House and the Senate. Donald Trump didn't do that. In fact, we also know now that he told Israel about this attack before he told American congressional leaders. They've already talked to Russia about this. And Trump still has not talked to congressional leaders. Well, this is him today explaining the actions.

Go right to my iPad. Highest and most solemn duty is the defense of our nation and its citizens. Last night at my direction, the United States military successfully executed a flawless precision strike that killed the number one terrorist anywhere in the world, Qasem Soleimani. Soleimani was plotting imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and military personnel, but we caught him in the act and terminated him. Under my leadership, America's policy is unambiguous to terrorists who harm or intend to harm any

American. We will find you. We will eliminate you. We will always protect our diplomats, service members, all Americans and our allies. For years, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and its ruthless Quds Force under Soleimani's leadership has targeted, injured, and murdered hundreds of American civilians and servicemen. The recent attacks on U.S. targets in Iraq, including rocket strikes that killed an American and injured four American servicemen very badly, as well as a violent assault on our embassy in Baghdad, were carried out at the direction of Soleimani. Soleimani made the death of innocent people his sick passion, contributing to terrorist plots as far away as New Delhi and London. Today, we remember and honor the victims of Soleimani's many atrocities,

and we take comfort in knowing that his reign of terror is over. Now, what's interesting about this is Donald Trump didn't even know who the hell this guy was when he ran for president in 2015. The folks at Fox News were actually joking about it. What's also interesting about this is that he calls him the number one terrorist in the world.

That's actually not true. So he was simply making those things up. The question now is what happens in that region? I want to bring in our panel here. This is a huge, huge story because, again, it raises concerns among many Americans in terms of are we now going to be entering into another war in the Middle East? Julian Boykin is with the Young Republicans of Southern Maryland. Dr. Neambé Carter, Howard University Department of Political Science.

Mustafa Santiago Ali, former senior advisor, environmental justice for the EPA. Dr. Carter, I'm going to start with you. This is somebody who has said that we should be pulling out of the Middle East. Supposedly Jared Kushner is negotiating a Middle East peace plan.

This action right here completely throws all of that out of the window. Iran has made it clear they're going to strike back. So if you are American troops, if you are Americans living in that region, there is great fear because you have no idea what is going to happen next when it comes to the Iranians. Absolutely. I mean, they made it clear that peace is off the table. At this point, they want revenge.

I think he has done this without really thinking about what the destabilizing effects are going to be on the region. I mean, there's one thing to sort of be strong and have a sure force it's another thing to now pledge ourselves into another war with domestic considerations for the people who are on the ground there right this is going to have ramifications not just for Iran but that whole region so I think people better buckle up because they're going to be more deployments right they are already strengthening the number of troops that are in the region. So this is about to be an escalation, and it's going to escalate very quickly, I think. I want to go right now to MSNBC analyst Malcolm Nance.

He, of course, serving longtime U.S. intelligence, author of the book, The Plot to Betray America, How Team Trump Embraced Our Enemies, Compromised Our Security, and How We Can Fix It. Malcolm, put into context exactly what has taken place in the last 24 hours. Well, what's happened here is that we've seen the United States take a very, very decisive step, is a polite way of putting it, towards essentially war with Iran.

This goes back one week ago when Iran was suspected Iraqi militias in Iraq who were trained by Iran were accused by the United States government of carrying out a rocket attack on a base named a one in the vicinity of Kirkuk Iraq this killed one contractor wounded several service members from there they decided that this was backed by Iran, that Iran apparently gave the Iraqis the weapons and equipment to do this, which, you know, when you're talking about an Iraqi militia, is a little laughable because the Iraqi, Iraq, the Washington. From that point, the United States vowed that they would have a, they would have retribution against whoever did this.

And that's apparently when the planning to kill the top Iranian general, Qasem Soleimani, a man who has been involved in Iranian revolutionary guard for terrorism since the 1980s. Soleimani is not just a general. He is like a combined equivalent of the vice president, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and has rock star status like almost equal to Barack Obama, for example, because he is also the man that mobilized Iraq's militias from a ragtag group of people into a half a million man force that defeated and pushed ISIS completely out of Iraq. It was very public.

He was on television all the time, very popular. And apparently the United States, carrying out a drone strike, executed him. The deputy commander, a gentleman by the name of Al Mohandas, the engineer as it's translated, who was the commander of the Qata'ib al-Hizballah, the organization that carried out the protests around the embassy the other day and laid siege to the to the building. They were both killed in the airstrike and there have been reports that commanders from two other militias were arrested and seized by U.S. forces.

So, Malcolm, explain this. So, apparently, the United States decided that we would go directly at the Iranians and essentially wipe out their most popular figure outside of the, you know, the Ayatollah Khamenei himself. Malcolm, explain this. So Donald Trump stands before the cameras in Florida and says this was the number one terrorist in the world. That's not true. You know, it really goes to how the conservatives define terror, right? Anyone that they don't like who may have been involved in activities which were nefarious, they can do that. the early 1980s. And Qasem al-Sulaymani came on my radar in 1986 when we were carrying out activities to rescue and find hostages that were being seized by the Lebanese Hezbollah terrorist group. He is a terrorist in the sense that as a sponsor of state terrorism, he would work with militia

groups, he would work with state proxies like Shia rebels in Yemen, Shia rebels in Syria, who would carry out acts of terrorism. In that sense, if you say he is as a state sponsor of terrorism yes but he is not osama bin laden he is a state figure so you know there are people in this world who would point out u.s activities and would say essentially that mike pence uh is the same thing but you're gonna say something critical here you just said something because you. You just said something because you said that he was the one who put together the group that drove ISIS out of Iraq. And this is the piece where I think

Americans not really understanding what in the hell is actually happening. So here you have can you have, again, in this country historically, because first of all if we want to go all the way back to Mosaddegh in 1953 where the Iranians, most today in 53 where the iranians there was a time when the iranians loved america when we helped uh what is basically a

british petroleum bp today overthrow uh most today uh then the rain and put the shah of iran that's what changed everything but what's interesting here is that what you're dealing with in this region is that you have at one time we loved Saddam because he hated Iran then we were down with Iran because they hated Iraq here you have an Iranian general who's driving ISIS out and we're supposed to hate ISIS and I think that's the piece that people don't understand you have these different loyalties as that's happening there because different people have different interests based upon what uh you know what is happening in their country well in this circumstance you're absolutely right but you would have to understand this is the

when iraq was invaded by isis where they came from northern Syria and then drove almost down to the top of Baghdad, you know, Iraq was working almost principally by itself, and then with the air assistance of the United States. And this is where enters Soleimani. He runs the Revolutionary Guard for and around. They are a massive paramilitary force of almost half a million men, scalable in wartime up to two to three million men. And the IRGC's mission in this case was to assist Iraq and whatever they need as Shia religious brothers,

so to speak, right? They all come from the Shia faith. He came with weapons, equipment, organization, and literally organized this ragtag band of Iraqi militias that were essentially guys with guns and turned them into an army and had them fight side by side with the Iraqi army when they retook the city of Mosul and then drove the ISIS out in the northwest and the west. Soleimani worked in coordination with us because, of course, he was working with the militias. He was on the battlefield all the time.

He was a very hands-on general, you know, and he worked with these Iraqis to help them lose. I mean, they lost thousands of men, but they drove ISIS out of Iraq. So in that circumstance, we needed him. But that doesn't mean that he wasn't awash with blood all over his hand. I mean, Soleimani was a bad actor.

He worked in Iran's interest. He did not work in our interest. And, of course, after our mutual interest was ended, he went back on to Hitler. him when we did where we did because what happens in this administration is they carry out acts without thinking about the consequences they have no consequence management skills and this could literally turn the middle east aflame and so so malcolm so so explain that for folks who are watching because i think what you have is you've got Fox News over here. Yay, yay, yay. Trump took them out

and then saying, well, these other presidents, they wouldn't do that. Well, there's a reason why a President Barack Obama or President Bush or President Clinton or any other presidents would not target a top Iranian general because they

understand proportion, proportionality. Because you have to not just say, well, if we take him out and his aides and a couple of the people, and then everything is all done. No, you got to be thinking 10 steps ahead. And if we take him out, then what's the ripple effect? How does that now alter the course of history? That is the issue here that I think people have to understand. Well, certainly, you know, you would imagine that any normal White House would have this gamed out using experts, using the State Department diplomats, and they would try to understand what the secondary and tertiary effects of any of their decisions are. However, when you get a situation that's much, much similar to the George W. Bush decision to just go into Iraq and wipe that country out, Saddam Hussein and the leadership out, where they literally hid all of their operational

planning away from diplomats. And literally, when I was in Iraq, said they didn't want any experts or anyone that could speak the language or understand the culture. So this is where you get disasters. And what's happening here, you know, Soleimani, although he deserved that missile, it's the secondary and tertiary effects and, you know, quadrary effects as they come. Right now, the ball is in Iran's court. They have the option of setting the Middle East on fire or being a little magnanimous about this and exacting their revenge later. And that could be any number of proxies. But, you know, you have the new commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps who was stature of Soleimani, but he still controls all the weapons, all the men, and all the terrorism lovers, and essentially is a power unto himself in Iran.

He has already sworn absolute revenge, and it will take place at a time of his choosing. And what should be the concern of Americans what because I think when you hear people say oh my goodness there might be war with Iran is it overstating this well no because that depends entirely on Iran now as've seen, proportionality has gone completely out the window with this administration. And it's almost as if they were looking for a fight. They're spoiling for a fight. You could move to a point where you could have a war that is direct open confrontation with Iraq, with Iran, if Iran so chooses. And I have been active in operations against Iran since, you know, Beirut in 1983, when they assisted in building, you know, the bomb that killed 243 Marines.

And I've been in direct combat with Iran, direct naval combat in 1988, and been bombarded by Iraq, you know, Iranian missiles by Iranian militias in Iraq. So we haven't had a circumstance since the 80s where we would get into a face-to-face confrontation because Iran doesn't think it's in their interest. But they certainly have the capability of defending themselves. Let me make this clear to your viewer. When we invaded Iraq, we were fighting 25 percent of the population, about 5 million people. There were 80,000 terrorist combatants. They managed to kill over seven years 4,493 service members and wound over 20,000. Iran is a homogenous nation state of 85 million people. They have the capacity to spool up the number of men between 18 and 35 in a matter of weeks and that number is almost 30 million men so this isn't something we should take

lightly this is a very large nation it has a history that's almost 4,000 years old. They have a regional doctrine and strategy that they're adhering to. And killing General Soleimani, they do not want to destroy their own infrastructure. make sure that their revenge is exacted quietly, hopefully, and most likely the Iraqi Shia militia men will carry out this revenge, not the Iranian army or the Iranian armed forces. Last question for you. How problematic is it that Donald Trump told Israel about this action before it happened, that we've already communicated with Russian leaders, yet he is still yet to tell the Gang of Eight, Republicans and Democrats. Talking with Senator Lindsey Graham and Matt Goetz and some others, that's not the same as the congressional leadership. Look, Donald Trump does not care about the Constitution of the United States.

He doesn't care about the organization of the government of the United States. Let's be frank. Donald Trump is an autocrat. He wants to be an autocrat. His best friends are an autocrat. He wants to be an autocrat. His best friends are an autocrat. He may as well just call himself, you know, King Donald the first, because he chooses to run this government like he is a monarch, like he's a king. And he doesn't seem to understand nor believe that all of the trappings around him, the very people that built the white john adams um risked their lives to

fight people like donald trump to fight against this monarchical mindset he does not care and now that he's been impeached he's starting to understand it's just a piece of paper so long as he has the republican party in his back pocket. And at this point, that makes him dangerous because he can he floats not just the norms of the president. He floats the norms of decent society. And to him, having a war with brown people on the other side of the world, to him is a win because his people are inherently racist, and they take U.S. policy to carry out racist activity. We've seen this time and again documented, confirmed behavior.

So with that in mind, and the belief that he is unaccountable to the nation, he will carry out a war and do whatever he wants. And hopefully that Iran's retaliation isn't so severe that he starts thinking about applying the use of nuclear weapons, because there he is an absolute monarch. He has the authority, so long as the target is not something crazy like France, he has the authority to target and use nuclear weapons as he sees fit because the people of the United States, in their infinite wisdom, chose him as president.

That's how the rules work. I know I have a final question for me and my panelists. Do you have any questions for Malcolm? Anyone? All right, cool. Malcolm, then. That's how the rules work. I know I had a final question for me and my panelists. You have any questions for Malcolm? Anyone? All right, cool. Malcolm Nance, man, always a pleasure. Again, folks, you definitely want to get his book.

It is called Author. He's the author of The Plot to Betray America, How Team Trump Embraced Our Enemies, Compromised Our Security, and How We Can Fix It. Malcolm, thanks a lot. My pleasure. All right, go to our panel here. Dr. Carter, you were speaking before we had to go to Malcolm.

I'm going to pull in Mustafa here. Look, presidents have taken actions to retaliate when Americans have been attacked. But to Malcolm's point, you better be thinking about the fifth and sixth and seventh, eighth and ninth and tenth steps. There is no evidence this administration

can think beyond the first action. Yeah, I mean, it's reckless. It's reckless policies, dangerous policies. And it's interesting also, you've noticed that the generals who were part of the administration before, who may have been able to, you know, quell some of this, to provide that advice and recommendations that's important to any leader to say, this is not the move to do, they're no longer there in that administration. No one has a voice to be able to help make change

happen. And I appreciate what Malcolm was saying also by breaking this down for folks, because folks don't actually understand, you know, the infrastructure that's there in the Middle East that will be damaged, that will be destroyed, and it will have repercussions here in this country. And also, you know, since I come from a climate background, I understand when you start blowing up oil wells, how that will also impact the environment. There are so many things that will be connected to this set of, you know, like I said before, reckless movements that will play out for generations to come. Julian, Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued this statement where she said, go to my iPad, please. American leaders' highest priority is to protect American lives and interests.

We cannot put the lives of American service members, diplomats, and others further at risk by engaging in provocative and disproportionate actions. Tonight's airstrike risks provoking further dangerous escalation of violence. America and the world cannot afford to have tensions escalate to the point of no return. She then says the full Congress must be immediately briefed on this serious situation and on the next steps under consideration by the administration, including the significant escalation of the deployment of additional troops to the region. Fair or unfair? That's fair. I believe that, you know, Nancy Pelosi, you know, if she wants to be

brief, she should be brief. Not that she wants to be brief. She's the Speaker of the House. She's part of that gang of eight. What I'm saying is, if she's saying, hey, I want to be brief on how this decision was determined, who made it, you know, what evidence do you have, I want to see it, then, you know,

the Trump administration, they should show that. Now, when they're going to show it, I don't know. I can't speak on that. But she's part of the eight. She should be entitled to that information. So I'm not saying she should not have privy to it. So she is entitled to the information. When she gets it, I don't know. I don't think

Dr. Carter, they care. I think they have no intentions on doing that. And again, he pulls in Senator Lindsey Graham, who is not a part of Republican leadership in the Senate. He's the chair of a committee. He's not the Speaker of the House. Excuse me.

He's not the majority leader. He's not in the House Republican Leadership Conference or the caucus there. And so, again, to Malcolm's point, he doesn't care. He's so dealish. I'm the president. I don't care what y'all think. I mean, the truth is, I mean, I think what I think we were also quiet because what Malcolm lays out is the very real possibilities that are here. But he does have a responsibility if he's going to be committing troops. Right. He has to go to Congress within the next 48 hours. But I think more than that, all of the people who could have been stopgaps between this moment yesterday, right, that happened over the last 25 hours and where we may be headed, were all kept out of the process because he does not care about potentially de-escalating a situation, right? All he knows

is respond, respond, respond. But as Malcolm Riley points out, this is going to have larger implications for that region that we're not even thinking about, not to mention the size of this potential skirmish, right? Osama bin Laden was a person who was acting kind of outside of the bounds of the state. But now this is where diplomacy was supposed to come in. We're dealing with another nation, not some rogue actors, right? Not some outside militia group. This was a military official, right? A government official. So now we actually have a moment where we're going to have to contend with another government, right? And that's a very different situation than we were in with 9-11. But we should also look at the difference between this administration and the last administration.

So if you look at the Iran nuclear deal, there were a number of other countries that were a part of that. Not just the United States. Exactly. Multiple nations. Yes. And with this administration, you know, they reached out to Israel and I understand that conversation that happened, but to the best of our knowledge, there was no conversation with the United Kingdom. There was no conversation with France. There was no conversation with Germany, which were a part of

that nuclear deal that President Trump decided to remove us from a couple of years ago in 2018. And now we're in 2020, and he has now assassinated this leader, somebody who, you know, some have labeled him in his respective country as a rock star. So you know that's going to mobilize many young men to want to get engaged in whatever types of actions that are going to happen. And there are too many soft targets that are all over the place that will now be vulnerable based upon the actions that this president decided to happen. And there are too many soft targets that are all over the place that will now be vulnerable based upon the actions that this president decided to make. And he has to carry the water on this for all the lives that will be lost. And here's the other thing that really gets me sometimes is that his sons are not of military age. So they're probably not going to

be engaged in whatever might transpire here. And, of course, we know his record. My family has served since World War II all the way up. But when he had the opportunity to actually serve, he decided to go in the opposite direction. Mr. Bones Burrs. Exactly. The last point here, and I think this is really, I think, what is so critical here. Most Americans, and I made that clear when I started with Malcolm, most Americans have no idea what the hell the reality is in the Middle East.

Have absolutely none. Again, if you look at American history, when we were friendly with Iraq, supplied Saddam Hussein with weapons because he was fighting our enemy, Iran. Then all of a sudden, we started hating Saddam Hussein. And so we started working with Iranians to fight him. We were funding the folks in Afghanistan when supplying them with weapons, with all sort of different things to take down the Russians in Afghanistan. Boom, all of a sudden they flip, then they turn against us. And it's understanding, you know, what is happening. Look at Syria. You know, we sit here, pull out of Syria to help the Turkish president,

but then we screw the very people who we're helping in Syria. That emboldens the Turks who hate it. The Turks hate it. The Turkish president hated the folks that we were working with. He wanted to take them out. The Syrian president wanted to take them out as well. You're sitting here saying, okay, whose side should we be on? And that's part of the problem here, is that

on any given day, who might be your friend on Monday is your enemy on Tuesday. And they might be your friend again on Wednesday. It might flip back to being your enemy on Thursday and then you're friendly on Friday. And that's

the fundamental problem we have here. And not only that, we are in Iraq as guests of the Iraqi government. If the Iraqi government says, y'all got to go, we can't say, the hell with you, we're going to stay. No, we got to go. And so all of those issues, I think, are brought to bear. And it was very interesting. So I was tweeting some stuff earlier. And Mark Davis is a conservative radio talk show host out of Dallas. And so I had sent some tweets, you know targeting him asking him some questions and

What I found to be interesting when I hit him he goes, you know is the distrust Let me find the tweet. I thought it was pretty funny. You're gonna heat when he asked the question about the distrust of Trump and he essentially said is the distrust of Trump this high? And I said point blank, Mark, I can't trust nothing this man says. Julian, I literally can't trust, I cannot trust the Trump administration when they say we took this action because of this.

Because this is the same man who pissed on the exact same intelligence community when it came to Russia interfering with the election. So which is it? Oh, now I believe them, and now I don't. Not only that, we've been given two different answers. We've been told

the State Department and the Pentagon has given two different answers on what happened. State Department, there was an imminent threat. Pentagon, no, it was a response to what

just took place. Okay? If it's both, say it's both. But don't give me two different response to what just took place. Okay. If it's both, say it's both, but don't give me two different answers to why something took place. And again, that's the issue here. Normally we are trusting the person occupying the Oval Office to make decisions in the best interest of Americans. I can't trust anything this man says. Nothing. I can't trust anything this man says. Nothing. I can't trust anything. And that's why you have a level of

distrust because this is a man who lies. Who lies about basic stuff. Who literally at the rally he held today with the evangelicals lied about I got rid of the Johnson Amendment. No, you didn't. It's still law. You didn't get rid of the johnson amendment no you didn't it's still law you didn't get rid of it that's a lie and that's part of the issue here you cannot trust

what comes out of this man's mouth and that's why anything he does the motives are always questioned just a reality going to break we come back We'll talk about the evangelicals, the conservative evangelicals meeting with Trump in Florida today. But it's very interesting because they love talking about evangelicals for Trump. Why don't we just go ahead and say white conservative evangelicals? Because certainly black folks don't feel the same way.

Black evangelicals don't feel the same way about Trump as other folks do. Also, Tavis Smiley, going to court against PBS after he was fired, they say because of sexual impropriety, he says, I can't wait for my day in court. That's next, Roland Martin Unfiltered, youtube.com forward slash Roland S. Martin. Subscribe to our YouTube channel. There's only one daily digital show out here that keeps it black and keep it real. It's Roland Martin Unfiltered.

See that name right there? Roland Martin Unfiltered. Like, share, subscribe to our YouTube channel. That's youtube.com forward slash Roland S. Martin. And don't forget to turn on your notifications so when we go live, you'll know it. All right, folks. as the marijuana momentum continues, the folks at MarijuanaStock.org have already reached more than half of their funding goal for the hemp CBD investment.

That's right. If you want to take advantage of this great opportunity, you need to do it now because it won't last much longer. Now, if you don't know, I'm talking about the hemp plant, the good cousin of marijuana with a much higher concentration of CBD. That means hemp gives you all the medical benefits of marijuana without getting you high. Also, if you don't know, hemp farming is now legal in the U.S., creating one of the largest commodities worldwide.

Now, it's an opportunity for you to invest. That's where 420 Real Estate comes in. Their business model is very simple. They buy land that supports hemp CBD grow operations and lease it to licensed, high-paying tenants. They're hemp CBD landlords. You can get in on the action. Now, of course, what they're doing is allowing you

to invest a minimum of $200 up to $10,000 in their crowdfunding campaign. That's right, $200 up to $10,000. Now, to invest, all you got to do is go to marijuana stock.org. It's marijuana stock.org. Then you'll see all the details. So you want to get in the game and get in the game now. All right, folks, today, Donald Trump held his big old rally

with these white conservative evangelicals in Florida after Christianity Today wrote a scathing editorial saying it's time for him to get bounced because he's morally bankrupt. Now, he chose to have this rally there, and all they were there praying for Donald Trump and all that sort of stuff along those lines. And you have folks like Tony Perkins, you know, who's a big-time white conservative, who's out there tweeting as well. And so he tweeted something that I of course took offense to and I had to respond to him when he did. And so this is his tweet right here. Great turnout in Miami for the Evangelicals for Trump

coalition launched. His strong record on life and religious liberty makes him a clear choice for evangelicals in 2020. Now, let me be real clear. He's not a clear choice for evangelicals in 2020. He's a clear choice for white, conservative evangelicals in 2020. See, there's a difference,

because the reality is black evangelicals are not supporting Donald Trump. See, part of the problem with is black evangelicals are not supporting Donald Trump. See, part of the problem with these white evangelicals is that they have basically hijacked the name evangelical. They've even caused national media that when they have a discussion about evangelicals, it automatically goes to these white conservative evangelicals as if black folks and Latinos who are evangelical or Asians

are not included in this same conversation. That to me is one of the fundamental problems that we have here. What's also interesting, just so y'all know, that these same white conservative evangelicals, they don't want to actually have a conversation with black folks, Latinos, and other white folks who are not in their same camp.

Let me help you all out. When Reverend Dr. William Barber in the Poor People's Campaign went to Liberty, Virginia, where Liberty University is, founded by Reverend Jerry Falwell, now run by his son, Jerry Falwell Jr., who's an attorney, not a pastor.

Jerry Falwell Jr now run by his son, Jerry Falwell Jr., who's an attorney, not a pastor. Jerry Falwell Jr. sent a letter out saying that if any person, if any individual with a Poor People's Campaign stepped foot on the campus of Liberty University, they were to be arrested. He ordered every student that no student or faculty at the university should even attend this event led by the Poor People's Campaign. What does that tell you about how these white conservative evangelicals think? But, Reverend Barber, Reverend Jim Wallace, and others who call themselves progressive Christians, have offered to debate these white conservative evangelicals.

Folks like Jerry Falwell Jr., and Tony Perkins, and Ralph Reed, and Robert Jeffers, and others. They've declined. What does that tell you, Mustafa, when you see what's going on here? Trump's hardcore base are these white conservative evangelicals who only care about two things, same-sex marriage and abortion. They don't give a damn about anything else. Those are the two most important things they care about,

and that's why they also want these hard core right wing judges on the federal bench. As Franklin Graham said, they will be actually ruling on policy when I'm no longer here. Yeah, it's interesting. We look back at scripture and Judas sold the self, sold out Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. If you think about that in today's times, how people are literally selling themselves out for Supreme Court judgeship or selling themselves out so that there can be these inhuman immigration policies, or even if you want to have the conversation around abortion rights and those types of things. That's the reason that folks don't want to actually have a real conversation, a debatable conversation,

one, on scripture, but two, on, if you say that you're a follower of Jesus, what the reflection of that should actually look like and should be. And, you know, that's the reason folks don't wanna deal with Reverend Barber because they know, one, he understands the book, but he also understands what humanity

is actually supposed to look like. Julian, here's what's interesting. Go to my iPad, please. Poverty grew in almost half of Pennsylvania counties despite strong national economy. You will not hear these white conservative evangelicals talking about this here. They don't want anything to do with the Poor People's Campaign.

They will stand there and talk about, oh, how they love Jesus, but they love that Trump tax cut. They love deregulation, but you will not hear... And what did Jesus talk more about in the Bible than anything else? Money, the poor. These folks don't give a damn about the poor. Who do black evangelicals follow? Black evangelicals actually, I believe,

broaden the notion of what it means to be a person of faith. I think black evangelicals do not define the faith based upon who's gay and who's pro-choice or who's pro-life. I think black evangelicals look at how do you care for the poor? Look at how do you treat your brethren? I'll give you an example.

Pastor Maurice Watson, when he was in Omaha, Nebraska, a group of white conservative evangelicals came to him, loved his pro-life stance. He's now a preacher here at Metropolitan in DC. Came to him and said, we want you to participate with us in our pro-life march. He said, sure. Not a problem. But I need y'all to do something

for me. They said, what? He said, I need you to march with me against these crack houses in our neighborhoods. And one of them white preachers in Omaha, Nebraska said, oh, no, no, no, no. That's your problem. See, that right there Oh, no, no, no, no. That's your problem. See, that right there, I think, defines

the difference between black evangelicals and white conservative evangelicals. I think religion has its place in politics, but I don't agree with it when you use it, when you pick and choose how you use it.

I think if you're going to be fair and reasonable across the board for everybody, just be fair and reasonable across the board for everybody. So I don't like when people pick certain verses out of the Bible and use it against you to make you feel bad, but at the same time, they don't adhere to those same principles. So I think, you know, it should be fair and reasonable across the board because I've seen black pastors that don't want to support gay marriage principles. So I think, you know, it should be fair and reasonable across the board because I've seen black pastors that don't want to support gay marriage and they have that right to do so.

So, and I asked them, I'm like, okay, where do you stand on certain issues? You know, we can't just overlook that. And it's, and the same goes for, you know, the white evangelicals. You, you, you know, you can't say, hey, we support this and not support that. See, these white evangelicals, these white conservative evangelicals, what they want, they want far right wing judges on the federal bench, Dr. Carter. And we've already seen the whole deal here. Many of these folks, they are against civil rights. They support voter suppression. They rule for big business and against folk. And so what these evangelicals are doing, these white conservative evangelicals,

and yes, it's a sprinkle of black, it's a sprinkle of Latino. And what they're doing on the Latino side, the reason they get more Latinos who are evangelicals is because of the Catholic Church. Because the Catholic Church is opposed to abortion.

The Catholic Church is also opposed to the death penalty. Not these folks. Right. Well, I mean, look, I think the thing about white evangelicals is that they can wrap themselves in the cloak of Christianity if they want to. Their ideology is white supremacy. What they really want is to preserve the lives of white children.

This is why they get their cockles up about abortion and they get their cockles up about gay marriage. I mean, they can use black faces for billboards. I remember they were doing that a few years ago saying the most dangerous place for a black child is in the womb or some nonsense like that. They're still doing it. Right, to bring in black folks. But let's be clear, these people don't want to do anything to sustain life beyond being

born, right? They are not about anti-poverty. They're not about clean environment, right? Clean water. They don't care about any of those things. They certainly don't care about the unfair application of the death penalty to black and brown folks who are more likely to die, right, by those means. So they don't care about life per se, right? What they care about is making sure that they can extend their lives

and their beliefs beyond their time. And let's be clear, most people don't believe what they believe in, right? But they found someone who can say, I care about pro-life and I care about, you know, a heterosexually defined marriage. And that to them is the litmus test. All of the other things that come with sustaining life, they don't care about. So I always say when these people say they're Christian, I say, well, the God they serve is a white, blue-eyed Jesus. It's not a God of all of us. In their minds, this world and the world that they want to leave behind is going to be the world that best produces white people and white children. And they are clear, I think, to me

from what they've said and in their deeds, right, that that is what their main interest is. It's not about love. It's not about a more robust life, right, so that we can all live it abundantly. They don't care about those things. In fact, Mustafa, I remember this vividly because I remember talking about this when I was on CNN. And so Bob Riley was the governor of Alabama, Republican, white, conservative, evangelical. He says, he said that this was back in 2003 or 4 he said

that the tax code actually 2006 or 7 the tax code in Alabama was grossly unfair to the poor so in Alabama they started taxing people beginning at $4,600. One of the lowest thresholds of any state in the country. He said, this makes no sense. If you're making $4,600, he said, you can't afford to be paying taxes.

So he had this $1.2 billion tax package that was going to raise taxes on the wealthy and businesses and was going to raise taxes on the wealthy and businesses and was going to cut taxes for poor families. What's interesting is that Chamber of Commerce supported the governor's proposal. In fact, what he also did was he used the Bible and what would Jesus do as a campaign thing? This

person was interviewed. He said, I just don't think you can find justification in the New Testament for taxing a family that makes $4,600 a year. He went all around the state proselytizing.

What would Jesus do? It lost 65% at the ballot box. And those white evangelicals in Alabama, guess what? They voted with their pocketbooks against the poor and against this proposal. And that's what I keep trying to explain to people. Their faith is a buffet line. I'm going to take one of those, one of those, and I'm going to leave the rest.

That's why I call them hypocrites, and that's why I call them out. In the Bible Belt, making those types of decisions, it doesn't matter. It's not even in the bible belt making those types of decisions doesn't matter it's not even in the bible belt um we far too many folks place the dollar over their spirituality and it's very clear to see and you know we all gonna have to answer for the decisions that we made and the actions that we made in one day simple as that and speak of answering to that, Mike Bloomberg has a lot to answer for.

At a recent campaign event in Alabama, the CBS News reporter Tim Perry asked Bloomberg, who's the run of a president on the Democratic side, about his previous support of how the investigation in the Central Park Five case was handled. Listen to this. We started talking about race, and a subject that's come up a lot is the Central Park Five. Listen to this. that today? And do you think that the city – MR. I really have no idea. I've read in the paper. I've been away from government for a long time. So apparently the courts have ruled that they did not commit it – commit a crime, and that's the final word, and we just have to accept that. It isn't a question of what anybody believes. But at the time, you did not believe that. And so I'm saying now – have you

changed your stance on that? MR. I just – I think there was an awful lot of evidence presented at that time that they were involved. There's been questions since then about the quality of that evidence. And so I've been away from it for so long, I just really can't respond because I just don't remember. But there's been plenty written about it, and I'd suggest you go and read some of that. I have never lived in New York City. I am a native of Houston, Texas. But do you think for a second that I don't remember this case?

Do you think that somehow, over the course of time, I've forgotten a Central Park Five case? That's like asking somebody black who grew up doing Jim Crow, did she forget the Scottsboro Boys? But let me also explain to you why Michael Bloomberg is an absolute fraud with that answer.

Because Mike Bloomberg, as mayor, opposed, let me say this loudly and clearly, Mike Bloomberg as mayor opposed a settlement for those young men. The only reason there was a settlement was because de Blasio was elected mayor. Mike Bloomberg is lying. To say you do not recall the details, to say, well, some evidence was presented and, you know, there were some questions, there were some question there were some questions and then to say well we just have to accept the court's really it was renewed as a result of the abel duvernay film on netflix

so mike bloomberg are you telling us you were completely out of the loop on this one? Mustafa, I said this. The apology that he gave at Pastor A.R. Bernard's church on Stop and Frisk was BS. I don't accept it. I don't accept it. I don't buy it. This man was defending Stop and Frisk as late as January of 2019, and all of a sudden you're telling me

in November of 2019 you found religion and now you see that it was bad? On this case here, this man, it is disqualifying the answer that he has given on this case, and it is no different than Trump defending his actions in this case as well. You notice also words have power, and he said apparently. So apparently leaves this space for folks to still hang there and say, well, maybe they really were guilty, even though the DNA evidence said that they were not guilty.

So and here's the other thing that I do this year. Let's do this year. I want to do this. I want you to play back what he said. I want people to actually listen to every single word that he said. And so I want you to play it. And then as soon as we come out of the break, come out of that, Mustafa's going to answer, Dr. Carter's going to answer, and then Julian's going to answer. So play it back exactly what Mike Bloomberg said about this.

We started talking about race and a subject that's come up a lot is the Central Park Five. And when you were mayor of New York, you defended the city and the police that's come up a lot is the Central Park Five. And when you were mayor of New York, you defended the city and the police department's handling of the Central Park Five case. You argue that they both acted in good faith. Do you still believe that today? And do you think that the city... I really have no idea. I've read in the paper, I've been away from government for a long time. So apparently the courts have ruled that they did not commit a crime. And that's the final word.

And we just have to accept that. It isn't a question of what anybody believes. At the time, you did not believe that. And so I'm saying, have you changed your stance on that? I think there was an awful lot of evidence presented at that time that they were involved. There's been questions since then about the quality of that evidence. And so I, you know, it's, I've been away from it for so long. I just

really can't, can't respond because I just don't remember, but there's been plenty written about it. And I'd suggest you go and, and, and read some of that. Yeah. So again, apparently, no, it's not apparently the courts have cleared them, have said that they were innocent. The DNA evidence also cleared them. So here's the other thing. We see people who have huge amounts of wealth and with that wealth comes the access to information. He is one of the most powerful people in the state of New York, probably one of the most powerful people in the United States of America. So you can't just say that I've been away from government for a while. It's not like you don't have the opportunity to know what's going on. And this was a significant issue in time in your city.

And so you, of course, would be a part of the garnering of that information and what you should do is as we've said with other powerful folks if you made a mistake in the past admit it and say that I've grown I've learned and then be supportive of what that changes that's happened when that information comes out and when you don't do that it makes it look like you're being disingenuous that you're being unauthentic in the responses that you're giving so you know we got to have people as my grandmother says when you know better do better but it's not just seeming right to be inauthentic he is

being authentic he's lying right I mean this man spent the better part of his administration fighting compensating these these young men for their traumas, right? I mean, the city was wrong. It lied. They beat those boys into confessing. He knew this. Everybody knows this. And then, like you said, the way he kind of slyly put it in there so it makes it seem like, well, maybe they're guilty, but they were exonerated because the evidence was of poor quality. No, there is there was one perpetrator that perpetrator has been found unfortunately these young men had to pay with their lives and since they've been exonerated you still have people like Michael Bloomberg and

Donald Trump who want to say these young men and at the time boys were guilty they're not guilty they didn't do it. Full stop. Right. And Michael Bloomberg spent six billion dollars of the city's money fighting, compensating these young men for what they went through. And if you ask me, him sitting here saying he can't recall should be the thing that we say, well, then you shouldn't be president. Because if you at 77, when you were the mayor of that city for what, about 10 years and you spent a huge time fighting the people of the city of New York, fighting these young men as citizens, right, of that space who had been so brutally treated by the criminal system, by your police department, everything on down, that you can't remember that, then you're clearly not with it.

You're not ready for this job. This is not the experience for you. And, Julian, here's a timeline. 2002, the convictions were vacated. Bloomberg becomes mayor in 2002. He served from 2002 to 2013. The settlement happens in 2014. So you're trying to tell me in one of the biggest stories in the city of New York,

in the second half of the 20th century, a case that the convictions were overturned vacated when you took over and the entire all three terms of yours this was an issue and i can't remember honesty is the best policy i think well i know you know at some point you just gotta just say hey i made a mistake. This was my standpoint on it back then. Looking at the evidence, we have DNA. It proves that they were innocent.

I apologize. These young men should have never been convicted. They should have never been charged. I want to fully apologize to those young men. That's what should happen. You know, I think the president, he should apologize. But at the end of the day, the is only person he's gonna speak and do whatever he wants to do and it's not the Carter's point the settlement was 41 million

dollars true Bloomberg spent six million of taxpayer dollars fighting fighting the settlement it's you know the settlement actually cost New York taxpayers almost $50 million. He should just admit to it. Just admit, hey, I made a mistake. Yes, I remember. I didn't want to talk about it. So sometimes honesty is the best

policy, and apologizing shows humility. But can we also get him to apologize for the stop and frisk? Because after all those years... No, no, he claims he apologized. No, he didn't. At Bernard's church. Yeah, we saw it.

We saw it. All those sentences here, I can't wait for Michael Bloomberg to sit down and do an interview with some black folk. Oh, that's not happening. That's not happening. He apologized. What was it, a one-on-one interview? No, no, no.

No, no, no. It was at... He went to Pastor A.R. Bernard's church where he spoke and he shared his thoughts and now I've come to realize... No, no, no. He had a sit-down with somebody about that. No, actually, he didn't.

He ain't sat down with nobody. He ain't sat down... But coming to realize when black and brown people in that city had been telling you for years that this is hurting us, stop doing this, and you doubled down on it, right? So you're sorry? Well, what's the point? You did the damage. Now you've hurt all these people. Now I don't care about your sorry. And really, he should have been taking money out of his own

pocket and compensating the city of New York for that $6 million lawsuit because he was bound and determined that those young men would not receive a dime after their exoneration. Yep. Yep. Not buying it. All right, folks. Virginia Governor Ralph Northam filed a request for a bill that would replace Virginia's statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee in the U.S. Capitol building. The filing came after Democratic Virginia

lawmakers Jennifer Wexton and A. Donald McEachin both requested that Northam prioritize removing the Lee statue. They also recommended a number of Virginians who could replace Lee, including educator and orator Booker T. Washington and civil rights

attorney Oliver Hill. Robert Edward Lee was a Confederate soldier, best known as a commander of the Confederate States Army. He commanded the Army of Northern Virginia in the American Civil War from 1862 until his surrender in 1865. Julian, well, a lot of people don't realize when you come to the US Capitol, there are statuary hall.

Each state is given the opportunity to place two statues in statuary hall. Every state gets two. A couple of years ago, Florida, they had a statue that was of a Confederate leader. They passed a bill, removed it, and it was replaced with Mayor McLeod Bethune.

Okay. It's embarrassing to go to Statuary Hall and to walk through there, and you're seeing these statues, and to be a black kid, or frankly, any kid from Virginia, and when you walk through, and if you want to take a photo in front of the two statues from your home state, one of them is a Confederate general, Robert E. Lee. My question is, which part of history do we

accept? Which part of history are we going to acknowledge? So if we're going to remove the Robert E. Lee statue, why not remove George Washington? George Washington had slaves. Hold up. Let's be real clear. You're going to get in an argument for me.

What I'm saying is I don't want to pick and choose parts of history trying to erase it. But they are. But they are. See, first of all, what they've done is, the people who support these statutes, they've lied. They've lied all these years. Because, see, and what's interesting is that

you have folks like Dinesh D'Souza, who wants to brand Democrats as a party of the KKK, who wants to say it was Democrats who backed Jim Crow. If the people today who are supporting Confederate statues are Republicans. Now, the problem is that, again, there's history and there's history. What we have been subjected to has been history and not history. These statues, for the most part, were built in order to remind black people of slavery.

They lost. The fact that you have so many statues of traitors, of domestic terrorists, folks who lost and not understanding why they were erected.

This statue and the others were erected because white racists wanted to say, y'all are not going to forget your place and we're going to remind you of what the world should have been had we won. That's the problem

here. So you're saying those statues need to be removed. What I'm saying is this here. But if presidents who own slaves like Washington like Hamilton, should those should their statues be removed as well Washington, like Hamilton, should their statues be removed as well? First of all, Hamilton was never president.

That's first. So, should Washington's statue stay? Well, first of all, Washington doesn't have a statue, it's a monument. It should be a monument. And so, here's the piece. I ain't got, first of all, the monument is not going to get torn down, but you can remove a statue. True.

But the reality is, those statues, other statues have have been removed states get to vote on removing statues I'm dr. Carter I'm supportive of this oh I ain't forgotten northern I ain't forgot your blackface right don't think for a second and I forgot your blackface but the bottom line is yeah this needs to go well this is a place of honor right this is where each state gets to send who they think are the best representatives of that state. Virginia chose in the 20th century, right? They didn't pick this in the 19th century. They chose this in, I think,

like the early part of the 20th century. Robert E. Lee as the best representation of Virginia, right? Because they thought a Confederate loser, right, and a secessionist and a slave owner and all the other things was the best representative that their state had. They still honor him

every year. Absolutely they do. I mean, they have a number of streets named after Confederates. I mean, like, Virginia's all in on this. Jefferson Davis Highway, the greatest domestic terrorist in U.S. history. They still do it. And so I think, you know, for, we're talking about symbols and how things

matter. Yes, it does matter that Virginia is still upholding Robert E. Lee as a best representative of what their state has to offer. When, if you think about it, right, he's the person that lost and he's a traitor to his country, right? And he's all these other things that we can say. I don't know many other places that have statues to lose it. Well, let me give you one. So when I used to visit my grandmother in Clarksburg, West Virginia, there is in the center of town a statue of Stonewall Jackson, who fought for the Confederacy. He was born in West Virginia, but West Virginia went with the North, so they fought for the Union, as everybody here knows and

hopefully all the viewers do. And yet, I remember that was one of the areas where there was at least a handful of black folks. So when you go in northern West Virginia, there's only a couple of cities that got a handful of black folks. And to actually have that as the symbol there says something about the change that needs to happen. And there it is. Well, this is the statue. So when you come to the United States Capitol and you walk in that hall

and you see all of these statues representing each state of the union, this is one of the two that represents the state of Virginia. And I say, yeah, remove it, put the damn thing in a museum somewhere, but that should not be representative of the state of Virginia. And if you are a black kid in Virginia,

there's no way in hell, when I go to the U.S. Capitol, I want to be able to say, oh, two of the best that we can send was this Confederate general who was a vicious, nasty slaveholder. And that's what he was. Ain't going to be rewriting the history, folks. That's called history.his story. All right, folks, let's go to our other story here. That is a New York police officer, Michael Reynolds, who was sentenced last month

in Tennessee for a racist tirade and break-in in the home of an African-American family, has resigned from the force. Now, calls for his firing, of course, yeah, he's white, have grown since he was sentenced December 6th in the rampage at the Nashville home in 2018. On-line petition drew 12,000 signatures. Now, Reynolds pleaded no contest, the charges of aggravated criminal trespassing and assault. He broke into the home near the Airbnb where he was staying, yelling racist slurs and threats at Conice Halliburton and her four sons. Halliburton's youngest sons were reportedly eight and 11 at the time. Guys, he was only sentenced to 15 days in jail and three years of probation.

This is the call here. Go ahead and play it. 15 days. Yeah, he should have lost his damn job and hopefully does not get a pension. All right, folks, former talk show host Tavis Smiley has lost a bid to throw out PBS's lawsuit that accuses him of violating his contract by having sex with his subordinates. Smiley's attorneys argue that PBS was trying to punish him

for behavior that long predated his current contract. But in a ruling on Thursday, D.C. Superior Court Judge Yvonne Williams disagreed, finding that PBS had also claimed more recent misconduct. PBS canceled Tavis' show after receiving a complaint of sexual misconduct in late 2017. Smiley sued PBS in February 2018, accusing PBS of conducting a sham investigation and of dismissing him based on racial bias. PBS countersued, alleging that Smiley had violated

his morals clause and had to engage in financial impropriety. A trial is currently scheduled for February 10th. Now, folks, what's interesting about this is that after this happened, PBS launched an investigation when they put together this 500-page report detailing all sorts of lurid details with regards to Tavis Motley's conduct when he had his show. He argued, and this is very interesting, he argued that, first of all, and the way this was set up,

people don't realize, so Tavis was not an employee of PBS. He owned this company that produced the show in conjunction with the PBS station in Los Angeles and it was aired on PBS stations nationally and so he said that his company had no rules about folks dating in the workplace so his whole point was how are you telling me how I should run my company what my rules are they say they actually violated those rules he did release a comment.

Let me pull it up in a second. His representatives sent me an email. Let me pull it up. Howard Bragman, who is an attorney, excuse me, publicist there, he did comment. I'm going to pull this up in a second. But just what are your thoughts again on this lawsuit and Tavis is Tavis taking it further. And now this this 500 page report is going to be entered into the public public record. Well, this might have been one of those moments where you cut your losses only because it's half of what we've been able to read so far is true.

It doesn't look good. And even if these relationships are consensual, as Tavis Smiley is alleging, I think it's hard to toe that line when you are the boss. You're HR and everything else in that company, right? So if I have a problem with you, say the relationship fails or say it doesn't work out, who do I go to, right? There's nobody to talk to about retaliation. I think it's just bad business, who do I go to, right? There's nobody to talk to about retaliation. I think it's just bad business, right? In addition to the sexual harassment stuff, which I think is separate from his conduct as a business owner, right?

Because if you are my subordinate, how much consent is there really, right? If you work for me, do you really have the right to say no? And is that yes a real yes i think this is why companies and businesses have policies against having a owner or or someone who's a superior data subordinate because that consent piece gets really murky and really tricky and that's across industries it's not just television i mean it's also universities etc i mean i met a university with a very explicit policy against faculty dating students, right? Because this can get really sticky very quickly

for those kinds of places. So I just think, um, beyond the sexual, uh, misconduct allegations that are being alleged, um, there is this other part about how you conduct business. And this sounds insane, right? That you would date people that work for you, right? They're not people who just work with you. They're people who work for you. And whether those people were really giving a real consent, it's not saying it's rape,

right? I think there's a lot of real estate between, you know, coercion and rape, but I think the fact that you have relationships, ongoing sexual relationships in the workplace with people who work with you saying that it's consensual doesn't really hold water when you are the head honcho, right?

When you are the person that gets to make all the shots. Ms. Shaffer? We talk about power all the time on this show in lots of different ways and power dynamics, and when you're in a that gets to make all the shots. Ms. Shaffer. We talk about power all the time on this show in lots of different ways and power dynamics, and when you're in a position of power, you cannot put yourself in that type of situation. And just like my grandma say, when you know better, you do better. Do better, hopefully.

I think it's a conflict of interest just for the simple fact you are the owner, so you have employees that work for you, so I don't look at it as consensual from the standpoint of you're using a person's job against them. If you don't do this, then I'm going to fire you or what you want. He claims he didn't. They say he did.

But if they have that policy where there's no relationships with subordinates, if it's a zero-tolerance policy and it presents a conflict of interest, you shouldn't do it. Here's the piece, though. Again, when you have your of interest, you shouldn't do it. But here's the piece, though. Again, when you have your own company, you can make your own rules.

But you have the most to lose. No, I understand that. No, no, I get it. But what I'm saying, though, is you do have a right. Your company have your own rules. There's nothing that says you have to outlaw relationships between folks who work in the workplace. But the reality is, I think many HR experts will tell you

that you probably want to do that. And again, and then also, if you say, hey, you can work in a company in different departments and you can be together, when you're talking about when you're the CEO... And the HR department and everything else in between, there is no place, there is no recourse. And lots of companies have policies

where you can disclose a relationship to HR and then they kind of work through that legal side. But I think more than that, too, I mean, like you said, the PBS part of this, I think is also interesting because PBS also has stakes here, right? It's also their reputation. People don't understand television, right, that they're just the distributor of a show

that he produces and owns and that's separate from them, right? People see the entity PBS, and they think this is a PBS thing. So if somebody is getting sued, if somebody is running his name through the mud, then PBS invariably is going to come in there somewhere as either part of the lawsuit or part of the conversation. It was sort of the same thing with Showtime and Lena Waithe

and talking about what was happening on The Chi. She's like, I don't own that show right that's showtime Different there, but how that was set up Yeah, but but I mean everybody gets pulled into the conversation whether who owns what and I think for PBS is sort of like let's Exercise an ounce of caution here and let's not pursue this any longer because this relationship is is looking Like it's going to be a problem for us and as a public broadcasting entity they might have different considerations and say a larger network or some other kind of entities I don't know that I think this is where the technical TV side comes in

but I can imagine them not wanting to be put in the same conversation with sexual harassment especially in this moment that we're in now where everybody is sort of kind of on alert and more sensitive. And I think for the better. But certainly, I think if they have an image to protect and an image to uphold, this relationship was no longer serving them and they had to go. This is the statement here. I'm going to pull it up.

Tavis Smiley dropped this comment on his Facebook page. Go to my iPad, please. A weak case you play in the press, a strong case you play out in a court of law. I look forward to my day in court February 10th, which I have finally been granted after two years of fighting. Julian? I think at the end of the day, you can't shit where you eat.

You know, you don't jeopardize your livelihood for convenience, especially when that convenience is a conflict of interest. There are plenty of people you can date outside of the workplace rather than jeopardizing that type of environment. And I will also say, I mean, you know... Look, I made it clear to anybody. I'm like, look, if anybody ever accused me of something, it's going to be like, he a hard ass.

Not he didn't touch me. He tough. He didn't touch me. Oh, you can hang that up. Because look, I don't even, let me be real clear. I don't even hug folks. Let me tell you something. You get a fist bump.

Whatever, TV one show. You get a fist bump. No, no, no. Folks are like, oh, give me a hug. No, I don't hug. My my deal is i am not gonna sit here and any of this sort of stuff and again when you when you listen to uh when you look at uh again some of the details and yes uh this is of course uh this is the pbs um uh report that they actually put together a variety had a story earlier where they talked about it where they laid out some of those details

But according to PBS He had multiple sexual encounters with subordinates Made unfavorable comments about PBS in TV appearances Misconduct allegations took place in 2015, 2016, 2017. Question. They also, hold on one second. One woman told the investigators that Smiley refused to write a letter of recommendation for her

unless she came to his house at 11 p.m. She refused. She also said that when she came by his house one time, he wasn't wearing pants, asked her to have a threesome with him and a female employee. He's denied that. He also said that he hates women. Quote, these women owe me because no one else will hire them.

Another woman told investigators she had a sexual relationship with Tavis Miley, despite her concern that it would hurt her career. And then also, the investigator also interviewed Tavis Miley, who, according to their report, admitted to having relationships with some employees, said it wasn't misconduct. The investigator concluded that Tavis was not truthful, and his denial is conflicted with numerous other witness accounts. And so, again,

when you look at this, also there's a variety of stories here. Smiley's own attorneys filed the documents, including the PBS. So Tavis's own attorneys they're the ones who filed the PBS investigative report and apparently they were removed from the court docket on Friday morning and so that's interesting that his own attorneys would put that report into the record which actually makes him look really bad go ahead some of I was just going to say this. Some of these relationships can be characterized as dating. These other things are just harassment, right?

This is not dating. It's two separate kinds of things. Some said it was consensual. Some who said it was consensual said, yeah, but I felt like my job was on the line. They were coerced. Other complaints said, well, other women felt coerced. Other women said, look, they felt it was wrong because, okay, so and so getting a promotion

because they're sleeping with him and then I'm not. So all of those things were part of this. But it goes to trial next month. Yeah. You said Tavis Smiley owned his own company, so he utilized PBS's platform, correct? Yes. So what happens is. Is there a contract?

Well, yeah. Yes. What happens is when you do a show with PBS, you actually do a show, your production company does it in partnership with a local PBS affiliate. Right. Okay?

So that was the PBS affiliate in Los Angeles. And then you're able to do a national distribution deal with PBS and their stations across the country. But yeah, there is a contract.

There's a contract. That states what he allegedly done. They said that there's a morals clause in their contract and he was in by that. That's that's that's that's what PBS That is the case then I don't see how he has a legitimate case for the simple fact if you sign something No, Lee and willingly and say hey, I didn't agree to that. Well your signature is right here So you well look look Bob line is gonna trial next month unless there's some sort of settlement. I don't think there's going to be one. There's been lots of bad blood

between PBS and Tavis for quite some time. And remember, after he lost his gig, he announced that he was supposed to be doing these shows with the Word Network and was launching a digital show. None of that ever came to pass as well. And so, we'll see what happens. So pretty much, I mean, since this went off the air,

you really haven't seen much of Tavis Miley anywhere. The book imprint, he was supposed to do a stage play tied around his book on the final year of King's life that was launching, I think it was like around November 2018, leading up to MLK 50,

actually 2017, leading up to MLK 50. That never happened as well. And so we certainly shall see. All right, folks, I've got to go. We certainly want to thank all of you for watching Roller Martin Unfiltered. Please support what we do. Every dollar you give goes to support this show, to make this show possible. So you can pay via Cash App. You can join our Bring the Funk fan club, which gives you discounts to items on robonesmartin.com. And so we got some great stuff lined up for you

as well that we're working on. As you see, this is one of the outfits that I had made when I was in Ghana. This is called the Nkrumah fat kente. Every time you see a piece of kente cloth, it's actually named, there's a meaning behind it. And so Kwame Nkrumah fat kente. Every time you see a piece of kente cloth, it's actually named. There's a meaning behind it. And so Kwame Nkrumah, of course, was the first president

of Ghana. So this kente is called the Nkrumah kente. So one thing for charisma in a Kradana who made this outfit. They got some other stuff that I'm making, but y'all see all that later. And I got one that's black and gold. You really love that, Mustafa. It's what?

You can't wear that one. Wait, what? You know what? I haven't seen you in a gold. You really love that, Mustafa. It's what? You can't wear that one. What? What? You know what? I haven't seen you in a while. And trust me, there is absolutely no Kente fabric I got. I got this for you. Happy Belated Family's Day.

There's no Kente fabric that I got that's purple and gold. We'll let you know that. None. Purple is rose. None. It's OK. It's OK. Well, you can call it what you ever want to call it.

But it's true, though. But my line is, y'all couldn't even be creative when you took one of our colors. Really? I thought so. We were black and old gold first. OK. And enjoy your town as they get.

I don't even know what that is. You know what it is. No, I don't. Yeah, you do. No, I don't. You act like you don't know. No, I don't. Would you like it, sir?

I'm fine. Oh, go. No, right. Because see, Alphas, we don't call each other animal names. That's y'all, little dogs. That's right. We grown ass men. All right, y'all. little dogs. That's right, we grown-ass men. All right, y'all, go to rollamartinthefuture.com.

Join our Bring the Fuck fan club to support what we do. Independent, black-owned, that's the way it should be. We're able to speak truth to power, and we got to ask nobody's opinion to do so. I'll see you guys on Monday right here. Have a fabulous weekend. Oh, by the way, before I go, this weekend, now, y'all, I don't watch the NFL, but I did have to say something about Henry Peterson and his poor little cowboys.

In fact, you a cowboy fan? I'm going to add you to it. Well, go ahead. In fact, y'all, is this the phone here? So I went to Giant earlier So I went to Giant earlier. I went to Giant earlier. Had to get some fruit. I started the D'Erv 21 Day Cleanse.

Y'all, I saw the most pitiful looking thing I have ever seen. Which phone is it on? I just got to show y'all this here before we go. Pull the music down. I'm going to end the show in one second. But I got to go ahead and show this here, because'all are going to get a kick out of this here. So I'm going through in the parking garage. And y'all, the car next to me, I saw this and I just busted out laughing.

When I saw this, Henry, go to my iPad. Y'all, somebody actually had a little limp cowboy's car flag flying on their car. I tweeted this out, and Mark Lamont Hill said it should be at a half-mast. That's what he said. And, of course, you know, the polar Dallas Cowboy didn't make the playoffs. Eight and eight. The sun shines on dog butt every night. I'm just saying. You can't butt every night. I'm just saying. You can't win them all.

I'm just saying. I understand you can't win them all, but y'all didn't win many of them. And so it's a little rough. It's a little rough for you Cowboy fans. I understand. And see, now that I know you're Cowboy fans, that just make it worse. You know, Mega and a Cowboy fan, oh, that's trifling. And so any of y'all, I'm from Houston.

You're from Houston? We're in the playoffs. Y'all ain't going to get far. Are we in? Okay. Are y'all at home? It's okay. Oh, yeah.

How far do you think you're going to get? Matter of fact, Buffalo. Matter of fact, let me go ahead and show y'all this here. Who does Houston play? Buffalo. Stephen A. Smith posted this one here. Let me go ahead. This is the last one I'm going to show y'all.

Because I know Henry right now is paying, having to direct the show. He's a huge Cowboy fan. And so Stephen A. Smith sent this out. All my Cowboy players, where's the best place to sit for the playoffs? So that right there is for y'all. I just want to go ahead and just, you know, there's lots of room on the couch. How many Super Bowls do y'all have?

Hold on, really? You want to show that one? I mean, I haven't seen a reason to use that. You know what, I'm glad you brought that up. How many Super Bowl rings do y'all have? I'm glad you brought that up. No, no, no. How many Super Bowl rings do y'all have? This is the last one right here. My man Etan Thomas sent this out yesterday.

And y'all, this right here, go ahead, pull that up. Nice like this. I was not going to play that. But the moment you brought up your budget Super Bowl that took place before my nieces were born, that was just... So, Etan Thomas, I appreciate you tweeting that out there. But Julian, just so y'all know, when I was playing, Julian was like, damn, that was...

He said, that was a good one right there. That was a good one, yes. That was a good one. All right, y'all. As we always end every Friday, of course, showing the folks who have contributed to Roland Martin Unfiltered. We want to thank all of you,

including you Cowboy fans out there. We really appreciate it. Thanks a lot. I'll see you guys on Monday. Holla! A lot of times, big economic forces show up in our lives in small ways. Four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding, but the price has gone up. So now I only buy one.

Small but important ways. From tech billionaires to the bond market to, yeah, banana pudding. If it's happening in business, our new podcast is on it. I'm Max Chastain. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops.

They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Sure. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports.

This kind of starts that a little bit, man. We met them at their homes. We met them at their recording studios. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You say you'd never give in to a meltdown. Never let kids' toys take over the house. And never fill your feed with kid photos. You'd never plan your life around their schedule. Never lick your thumb to clean their face. And you'd never let them leave the house looking like less than their best.

You'd say you'd never put a pacifier in your mouth to clean it. Never let them stay up too late. And never let them run wild through the grocery store. So when you say you'd never let them get into a car without you there, know it can happen.

One in four hot car deaths happen when a kid gets into an unlocked car and can't get out. Never happens. Before you leave the car, always stop, look, lock. Brought to you by NHTSA and the Ad Council. This is an iHeart Podcast.