#RolandMartinUnfiltered - 9.11 RMU: Bahamians denied TPS; Gun violence: Public health crisis; La. cops' racist emails exposed

Episode Date: September 13, 2019

9.11.19 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Trump denies Bahamians temporary protected status after Hurricane Dorian; America remembers 9/11; Gun violence is now a public health crisis; For the first time in our history, most new working age hires are people of color; Calif. cops say a teen was resisting arrest but their body cam footage says different; Louisiana cop's racist emails exposed; Plus, are charter schools in trouble? Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like, he's like my best friend. At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit adoptuskids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Wednesday, September 11, 2019. This is Roland Martin Unfiltered broadcasting live from Houston, Texas,

where, of course, Democrats will be gathered here tomorrow for the Democratic presidential debate on the campus of Texas Southern University. We're here again, McGregor Park, where there will be a Save Our Charter Schools rally. I'll be speaking a little bit later, but on today's show, Donald Trump, his government will not allow Bahamians temporary relief to come into the United States after Hurricane Dorian has decimated that country. We'll talk about how shameful and despicable that is.

Also, National Medical Association say gun violence in America is a public health crisis. We'll talk with some NMA doctors about that. Today is also, of course, the 18th anniversary commemorating the 9-11 attacks. Events took place in New York, Pennsylvania, as well as Washington, D.C. We'll show you some of that as well. Also, folks on today's show, police say a Fresno, California teen was a resisting arrest, but their own body cam footage shows the cops were in the wrong. No shock there. Also,

Louisiana cops, hmm, using the N-word in emails. No shock what the cops are doing there as well. Plus, also, folks, for the first time in our history, most new workers hired are people of color. We'll break it down. We got a jam-packed show for you. It's time to

bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine. And when it breaks, he's right on time. And it's rolling. Best belief he's knowing.

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You know he's rolling, Martin. Now. Martin. No temporary protective status for Bahamas affected by Hurricane Dorian. That is the decision by the Trump administration. Some 300,000 people in the United States right now from 10 different countries, including some folks from Haiti who are covered by that. Bahamians will still be able to come here temporarily, but they will not be granted work visas.

Let's talk about this with our panel there in Washington, D.C. Robert Petillo, civil rights attorney, also a Misha Cross political commentator and Democratic strategist, and Rob Richardson Rob Richardson host Disruption Now podcast. Robert, wow. Donald Trump talked about the need to help folks there from the Bahamas recover from that. But his comments the other day made it clear he really didn't care about them invoking drug gang members and folks who sell drugs. What the hell? Well, I think we have to address it in two parts.

One is the fact that for the vast majority of Bahamians who already have work visas in the United States, they have absolutely no problem going to the U.S. The question is vetting the people who have not been approved by immigration and nationalization to get them the visa process, which takes a bit of time. It's understandable that they've had a natural disaster there, but the Amazon was just on fire. Do we let everybody from the Amazon come to America? There is a fire at Notre Dame. Do we let everybody from Notre Dame come to America? We have to have a process in place to ensure that

individuals who are rightfully and able to come to the U.S. can, but also not just open the flood gates. Because if you talk to Customs Border Patrol, the Bahamas and many Caribbean islands are the gateways that drugs still take into the United States. And we cannot just simply fling the floodgates open because of an emergency. But Amisha, let's be real clear. First of all, Bahamians built Miami, okay? So it's not like you don't have this long relationship between folks in the Bahamas and the United States. Absolutely. And the fact that, you know, a lot of a lot of tourist dollars go there as well. I think that the most frustrating part here is, quite frankly, that we've seen funding, we've seen support go to individuals from countries that have witnessed and have been byproduct of this type of devastation before, most recently being Haiti. I think that what matters here is the fact that we have a different president who, by and large,

sees when there is something that happens to black or brown people that it is not worthy of our assistance, our help, or our support. And pegging them all as criminals and talking about the Bahamians as people who are looting, who are proliferating drugs, who are creating all of these problems. Meanwhile, they are people who are looting, who are proliferating drugs, who are creating all of these problems. Meanwhile, they are people who are literally suffering

from one of the biggest devastations that we've seen in that region. Rob, your thoughts. Yeah, so it's just, it's really a consistent pattern with this president. His first reaction to that, as kind of like Amisha said, when anybody of color is suffering, when they're going through something,

the first thing he does is just talk about how bad they are or just say that they're criminals as a way to really dehumanize them. So, you know, the other Robert brought up the fact that if Mount, you know, when Mount Notre Dame was burning, look, I have, I have very, I have faith and confidence that from the president's response, he said, we need to do everything possible. He even talked about funding. His, his, his response here when people were in need was to say there's very bad people over there. We don't want them over here. It's just a continuation of this pattern of dehumanizing people of color. So it's no surprise to me. It's just who this president is. I worry about the culture that is making this environment in America where we're just saying overt racism is something that is okay.

It used to be something that people would at least be ashamed of. Now it's like, well, the president does it. We all can do it. Robert, let's be real clear. You talked about Amazon and Notre Dame. Notre Dame was a church burning down. In this case, you have 50 people officially declared dead, but you've got some 2,500 people who are still missing.

Grand Abaco, totally destroyed. Thousands of people displaced as well. And so I think it's a little grossly unfair to try to compare what happened with the Bahamas, what happened with Notre Dame, or even the Amazon. Well, those are just two recent examples of disasters that have happened. We still have to have an immigration process. We still have to have an immigration process in place. Robert, Robert, Robert. Notre Dame, Robert, Notre Dame is not a natural disaster. That was a church burning. Which is why I said disaster. So if you want to compare it to the Amazon, if you want to compare it to a volcanic eruption,

the point is we still have to be able to control our borders while still assisting humanitarian aid. And with the reference to what happened in Haiti, I think that's one of the primary things we need to keep an eye on, to make sure that the aid dollars that are going to the Bahamas, Michael Jordan has pledged a million dollars, Tyler Perry has pledged a million dollars,

there are millions of dollars flowing in, we have to make sure that money gets to the right hands, it is not squandered by the Red Cross, it's not squandered by the Clinton Foundation, it's not taken by these NGOs, we have to make sure that we push that money to the right people instead of like what happened in Haiti, where these big organizations take the money

and it never gets to the people. The Clinton Foundation? Okay, that was good. The Clinton Foundation stole $400 million of the real estate money. Yo, yo, yo, yo, be Hillary Clinton, that's over. We can leave that. What we need to do is ensure that we have a president

who is not choosing who we help based on racial lines. Right. Because let's be clear, if this had happened in the Netherlands, if this had happened anywhere in the U.K., we would have seen a very different type of reaction. What we see right now is a president who decides, picks and chooses who he actually believes is deserving of assistance, believes is deserving of notoriety, believes is deserving of humanity, and it is strictly based on the color of those people's skin. And we have to be honest about that.

Yep, I agree completely. And, of course, let me also remind some folks, when you talk about the Netherlands or France or the Amazon, this is in our hemisphere. Yeah. Okay, so it's not like we're talking about something that's across the Atlantic Ocean. These are folks who are just off the United States shore. And there are a number of Bahamians who are right here in the United States, especially in South Florida.

Absolutely. And we're talking about a place that is one of the top three tourist destinations for Americans. We're not just talking black Americans. We're talking all Americans. So if it was so dangerous, if people were such criminals, then why in all hell would we be going there on a regular basis and spending all of our dollars? Yep. No, I agree. And look, this is consistent. You think about what this president did with Puerto Rico and how he just dehumanized people. People forgot that Puerto Rico is in America. And because they're people of color, we can dehumanize them. And it just shouldn't be acceptable. I just don't know how we got to this place where a president,

like, this is not a Democrat-Republican thing. I don't think George, and George W. Bush I disagree with a lot. I don't see him doing this, though. This president is unique in that he's taken the whole Republican Party with him. They've embraced openly overt racism and just said, we're going to just dehumanize people simply because they're people of color. But after Katrina, didn't everyone say George Bush doesn't care about black people? But wait, that was Kanye.

That was Kanye West. He's with you now. Kanye's with you now. Most people agreed with that statement at the time. As I said, let's monitor and make sure the money that's being donated gets to the right people. No, but let's be real clear here, Robert. What happened there with Katrina, we saw the reaction. Michael Brown was awful.

Brown, you're doing a great job. So they were slow in terms of what they were doing, the response to Hurricane Katrina. That's we know what happened there. But again, you have Donald Trump and his drama. But President Bush didn't come out and say, like, there's very bad people there, so we're not going to help them.

I mean. He just did it without saying it. He had a bad FEMA appointee. Yeah, he was a lot of no George Bush was just a bad president. George Bush was just a bad president. Now he did bad things and was incompetent. And now we have an incompetent and racist. Let's fix those things going forward.

Yeah, well, I agree. We need to get rid of this president. He's both incompetent and racist. So, yes. Well, well, we certainly have an incompetent president and and of course,, somebody who absolutely does not necessarily want black folks in this country, people of color in this country. All right, folks, today, of course, marked the 18th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon in this country. Of course, Donald Trump, he started this day off tweeting about his poll numbers.

Talk about shameful and pathetic. Of course, President Obama tweeted this. As we remember those who we lost on 9-11, we also remember the spirit of unity and togetherness that defined the weeks and months after. On this day of service, I'm reflecting on all those still working to embrace that spirit today and every day. And again, a lot of the people, of course, in New York, in D.C., where they ran off the names of those who died, nearly 3,000 Americans perished on this day. I want to go to you, Amisha. First and foremost, of course, you had Donald Trump who was trying to meet with the Taliban and Captain David. Then in his remarks today, he talked about crushing the Taliban. These are the very people he wanted a photo op with just three days ago.

Absolutely. I think that we're seeing a very erratic president, but we're also seeing someone who clearly does not have a well-focused or planned out Middle Eastern policy. At the end of the day, the majority of his administration didn't even know that this Taliban meeting was supposed to be happening. So I think that there's something to be said about that. In addition to the fact that anyone who schedules a meeting with the Taliban knowing that September 11th is right around the corner is a little bit tone deaf. We have to question his timing. We also have to question why this meeting was happening in the first place. What were some of the goals that were to come out of it? We're also watching John Bolton leaving. There's a lot to pick apart here. And I

think that one of the major issues is that this president's Middle Eastern plan is consistently falling apart, by and large, because the leaders of it are people who have no Middle Eastern policy experience. We're talking about his son-in-law. We're talking about the president himself. People who literally don't understand the very intense and the very intricate parts of the Middle East and the players there. And that's not something that we should trust as Americans moving forward. Rob. Yes, sir. Look, I just think this president just he doesn't have any strategy. He gets up the morning. He says, what I want to do, I want to tweet. And like, there's no thought he doesn't talk to anybody else. And his goal is just to make sure he gets attention. So this is not really that complicated.

I mean, it's scary. Every single moment he's there, I'm worried about what's going to happen to the United States. I'm worried about our country. But this doesn't surprise me. It would take a lot to surprise me. I'm not sure what – I don't want to be surprised anymore by this president because I don't know what that would mean if I was surprised by something that he actually did. So I'm just hoping today that, you know, the Democrats could actually get it together and remove him from office, not for just to have a Democrat there, but it's really about making sure that our country and the world is better and away from this insanity, frankly. You would hope, Robert, on a day like this, Trump would have some common sense,

but really your poll numbers. I mean, today is about, again, reflecting on nearly 3,000 Americans who died tragically 18 years ago due to terrorism in this country. Look, Trump going to tweet what Trump tweet. Well, we've all, we all know and have established Trump tweets what Trump's going to tweet. But I think with regards to the meeting with the Taliban, let's understand that when the 9-11 attacks happened, I was in Ms. Banks' 11th grade English class at Kendrick High School. And we are still in Afghanistan 18 years later. The point of the meeting with the Taliban was to negotiate a final peace settlement

to withdraw U.S. troops from the region. That's the same thing President Obama promised to do. That's the same thing President Bush promised to do. The meeting fell through. If it had worked, we would have been applauding him as a genius for finally ending an 18-year-long war, but he was able to prove it and end it. So what is wrong with him trying to end a war?

No, no, no. Let's be real clear. If you want to end a war, you try to end a war, but you don't negotiate with the Taliban and then you ignore the Afghanistan government as if they don't matter. No. Even his own people said it made no sense. This is a guy who is so desperate to get a Nobel Peace Prize that he would do anything. And look what happened even with North Korea. What the hell has been accomplished? Nothing. OK, so that's what you're

dealing with with Donald Trump. But look, let's look at the people who were against the meeting. Lindsey Graham, who's one of the war hawks who got us into the war. John Bolton, who thankfully exited the door, who wants to bomb every country on Earth. So when the people who got you into a war don't want to get out, those are the same war profiteers we need to be fighting against. So let's just be happy that we got rid of those people. Robert is a lack of strategy.

At the end of the day, you are correct. There was a goal, but the goal was something that's been passed by president after president. We know what we want to do there. However, there was no strategic moves and steps to get to that point. And we could not give a president credit who is lifting policy platforms that we've seen from administration after administration. There's a reason why we have not moved in the past 18 years. And it is very viable. One, there hasn't been enough. There hasn't been enough negotiation. There hasn't been enough people brought to the table. But in addition to that, this type of it takes time. You have to consider how many players are there. You have to consider the subnational

groups. You have to consider all of the other terrorist organizations that are a part and parcel of the spread of terrorism across that area. And I do think that we have to have a president who is bringing people in who have that knowledge base. I do think that we have to have a president who is bringing people in who have that knowledge base. When the people that you surround yourself with and the person who is leading your Middle Eastern policy focus and plan is your son-in-law, who has absolutely no background in it, there is a problem. Well, I think we're in the worst reality TV show in the history of America. Unfortunately, he happens to be the president. If this was't, if this was entertainment, this would be great. He is entertaining, but he's scary because he's leading this country. So his goal is to entertain. His goal is to be

seen. His goal is not to lead. So this is not surprising. We're going to see more chaos and we're going to pay the price more and more every single day in that office. Look, we've had 20 years. I simply think it's just simple. I just think that, look, you're dealing with somebody who is arrogant, who is narcissistic, who is sadistic. And on a day like this, when you're sending at 7 o'clock in the morning, OK, the fake news media, my poll numbers are higher.

Like, dude, literally. But then again, we're talking about somebody who on the actual day of 9-11 was on television like, well, I guess now my building is now the tallest in New York, and who lied. He lied again today, Robert. When is this guy going to stop lying? There is no evidence his ass was down at the World Trade Center helping folks remove rubble. None. I mean, you're lying. I mean, there are first responders who actually have died as a result, and this fool is lying today in a speech.

Let's put this in scale, though. Look, Trump lied about being downstairs during 9-11. Bush lied that there was yellow cake and uranium and weapons of mass destruction. I don't think those are in the same rubble. So we're trying to end a war, let's end the war. Robert, Robert, on the anniversary of 9-11, can you not lie? Look, Trump gonna do what Trump gonna do. Trump is gonna lie. He just said, look, go ahead, sorry. Trump has normalized lying. That's the problem, Roland. He's normalized it. And people, and then everybody has to say, well, this is just what Trump does, as if lying is okay. We're not talking about little lies.

We're not talking spins. We're talking about it's raining outside and he's saying it's sunny. Like, he's just making up alternative universes. And people are saying, well, this is just what we do. He's normalized this, and it's scary because people are actually saying these things are true when clearly you can see it's not. But on September 11th, isn't it too much to ask to have the President of the United States, the Commander-in-Chief, basically give condolences to the families who are still suffering and actually try to issue a message that helps America, that helps to rebuild, that gives them strength and hope?

Is that too much to ask? Right. Apparently. But here's the piece. Bob Lizer's here. We are, unfortunately, we have people who lost their lives as a result of terrorism 18 years ago. America still feels that pain, especially those children who were born, who lost parents, who were born after that. And so certainly our thoughts and prayers go to them.

And we are thankful that we have not had that sort of tragedy on American soil since then. All right, folks, got to go to break. When we come back, we're going to talk gun violence and how it is a public health crisis in America. We'll talk with some doctors from the National Medical Association up next. Roland Martin Unfiltered broadcasting live here in Houston, where I'm at the, of course, St. Ronald Charter Schools rally taking place in about an hour. And, of course, tomorrow, what they'll hear about

is to send a signal to the Democratic candidates to support school choice. So we'll tell you more about that a little bit later in the show. This is Roland Martin Unfiltered. See that name right there? Roland Martin Unfiltered. Like, share, and 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, you heard me talk a lot about marijuana stock.org.

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And what they've done for the folks at Roller Martin Unfiltered is allow for you to make a minimal investment of $200. The initial investment was $500. You can invest this in the crowdfunding campaign. That's right, $200 up to $10,000. Now, again, all you got to do is go to marijuana stock.org. That's marijuana stock.org to get in the game and get in the game now. All right, folks, we had mass shootings all across this country. I am here in Houston. Of course, two of those shootings took place in this state, in Texas, in El Paso, one of those places, again, people shot and killed. Of course, remember it was last year, not far from here, in Santa Fe, where y'all said a school mass shooting. And so how do we deal with that? Well, the reality is we're dealing with a public health crisis. Joining us right now with the National Medical Association is Roger Mitchell,

who is the chairman of the NMA Gun Violence Task Force, and Oliver T. Brooks, president of the National Medical Association. Oliver, I want to start with you. Doctors have been sounding the alarm, but unfortunately you have politicians on the Republican side who still won't do jack when it comes to gun violence in this country because they are all about the National Rifle Association and their dollars. That's absolutely true. And there is undue influence from the NRA. We at the National Medical Association, we are the conscience of medicine.

We represent the 50,000 African-American physicians. We are here in Washington, D.C., convening our professional development series as part of the CBC, the Congressional Black Caucus. So, as president, I determine what the objectives are for the NMA for the coming year. So I've looked at diversity in medicine, maternal mortality, but I will have to say my lead focus is gun violence or violence prevention, if you want

to put it that way. There are more guns in the United States than there are people. Black people die at the hand of a gun 10 times the rate of the majority community. It is a public health issue. As physicians, when people are dying from something, that's what we look at. It is a public health issue. As physicians, when people are dying from something, that's what we look at. It's a public health issue. So we have an NMA gun violence, if you will, violence task force led by my gentleman on my right, Roger Mitchell.

And here at the convention, we are looking at gun violence. We convened a panel today and we have specific strategies that we are going to address to try to move the needle on gun violence. Hey, Roger, look, one of the things that really jumps out is that when you talk to ER doctors, they talk about what they actually see, what they are witnessing and experiencing. And we're talking about a country where the NRA, live by Republicans, they would not even allow the CDC to actually even put together data on gun violence.

That shows you this fear that exists when it comes to confronting gun violence in America. Yeah, I mean, gun violence research is extremely important. The reality of it is, is that the DICIA member, that's what you're talking about, that happened back in the mid-90s that suggested that research that led to decreasing guns in this country should not be done by the Centers for Disease Control. The reality of it is that we know that seatbelts save lives in cars. We know that helmets save lives on motorcycles and bicycles. We know that there are particular controls on tobacco that need to occur in order to save lives from cancer and cardiovascular

disease. And all of this was based upon research that was done by groups of physicians and public health providers and basic scientists. And that particular types of research was funded at some level by the federal government. And so when you don't have funding for gun violence, then there's a whole group of budding scientists and researchers that are not going to be able to do the work and get to the solutions. And so here at the National Medical Association, we're calling for full funding of the $50 million to the CDC and the NIH, $25 million apiece, particularly to look at equity issues surrounding

gun violence and universal background checks. And we're against bump stocks, all of the things that we believe that are going to protect our community. Left or right? All right, then, gentlemen, Dr. Brooks, I have to mention we certainly appreciate that and the work the National Medical Association is doing. Thanks a lot. Well, yes, and one more thing, Roland, we would like to get back to you at some point in time

on the devastation on the people of African descent in the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, another health crisis. Okay, all right, we'll look forward to that. I appreciate it, thanks another health crisis. Okay, all right. We'll look forward to that. I appreciate it. Thanks a lot. All right. Thank you.

Thank you. All right, I want to go to my panel here. Misha, I want to start with you. This idea that gun violence has reached the point of a public health crisis. If it was any other public health crisis, you would have folks marshalling the resources to combat this

that's not happening right now in America. Absolutely. To name something a public health crisis initially means that there is going to be stronger funding sources for it, in particular because at that point it is recognized as something that is extremely detrimental and in many cases something that we have to fight against with multi-pronged strategies. And those strategies have to be community, they have to be at the federal level, they have to be a lot of things that are going to require access funding. One of the things that we see,

and the reason why this is not happening, is because of the strength of the NRA and the strength of those on the right who believe that their gun rights are extremely hampered by moving forward and acknowledging this as the public health crisis it is. First and foremost, we didn't see people recognizing this when it's happening. We still don't see them recognizing it when it happens in urban communities. And we rarely see it recognized as a public health crisis when we're talking about episodic attacks, when we're looking at places like El Paso, when we're looking at places like like El Paso

we're looking at a lot of these instances where at the end of the day the reason why this is happening is because we have a metered in many cases access to guns and not just and not just guns but guns that have high capacity that is a problem and to hear anyone say that you know we need to protect our our constitutional rights at the behest of somebody's life is a major issue. Robert, this is real simple. This nation has a sickness when it comes to guns. It's not that simple, though.

We know that. Look, three-quarters of gun deaths per year. Yes, it is. Three-quarters of gun deaths are suicide in this country. So those people who are killing themselves with guns would have found another way to kill themselves because they wanted to kill themselves. On this issue of high capacity magazines, the average shootout, which takes a life, has about three shots fired. So the only time that we talk about gun control,

the one that's gun control, was related to saving white people from other white people. That's what we're really discussing. We're not talking about urban violence. We're not talking about the person who buys a $50 gun and then commits a drug crime. No, actually, we are. No, actually, we are. Rob, this, Robert,

Rob, this is the problem right here. The fact of the matter is, there is no developed nation in the world, no nation that comes close to the United States when it comes to the sickness of guns. Not one. Not even close. And we'd rather blame video games.

We'd rather blame everything except the gun itself and the access to them for this problem. And at this point, after Sandy Hook, a lot of people assume, self-included, that once these three-year-old babies were lying slain, people would actually make, they would make that move. We would see Congress act, and we did not. But the sickness is there, right? As you talked about, Roland, the sickness is there. It's part of the DNA of America. But look, this is what I predict. And I don't know when it's going to happen, but I'm going to tell my friend Robert, every other Republican that is holding on to this extreme point of view, it's easier to get access to a gun than it is to drive in this country.

Think about that for a minute. It's easier to do that. But I actually predict that because they're so extreme, eventually they're going to see the rights pulled back because I think people are going to grow up getting sick and tired of having to go to elementary school and seeing their kids shot up, walk in a movie theater and see somebody get shot up. You can't have a gun everywhere at every single moment. That's not going to work. And I think Americans and eventually a whole generation are going to get tired of living in fear. And this sickness that you said that we currently have has to be solved because I don't think

anybody should put up with this. I don't even understand why this is so complicated. New Zealand was able to solve it and go right there. As soon as that happened, they got to business. Right now, we're still having an argument about it. I really don't understand. You literally have parents buying bulletproof backpacks for their kids. All right, Robert, final comment. Final comment.

The people who are committing these mass shootings, guess what? Japan has almost no guns. There was a mass stabbing where 19 school children got stabbed. Spain has almost no guns. Someone drove a truck through the middle of Barcelona. Nice France.

Somebody drove a semi-tram. Stop, stop, stop. People find a way to do evil. And how, no, no, no. No, how often have you had mass stabbings in Japan? How often? I think there were three in the last three years. Three in the last three years?

I think we had a country and a country a third of our size. Three, hold on, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Three in the last three years. I think we've had three in the last month. We've only had three today. Well, look, the issue is all the things that they're suggesting as solutions won't fix the problem. All the people who commit mass shootings would have passed a background check.

If they didn't have an assault rifle, they would have got two Glocks and done the same thing. You can get a thermite. You can get anything that you want. If you can't do everything, do nothing. That's what he's saying. Do nothing. What I'm saying is these laws will affect the law-abiding citizen. Sickness, sickness, sickness, sickness.

This nation has a sickness when it comes to guns. This nation has been built on violence. It is in the DNA of this country, and somebody has to actually own it. Got to go to a break, right? When we come back, folks, we're going to talk about a couple of police cases, cops gone wild, one where they're using the N-word in Louisiana, and other cops in California saying, oh, this black man was swinging on them. Their body cameras show something different.

I'm broadcasting live from Houston, Texas, site of the Democratic debate. Tomorrow I'm here, of course, at Save Our Charter Schools rally. We'll be live streaming this a little bit later. I'll be speaking as well. We'll be live streaming this a little bit later. I'll be speaking as well. We'll be talking with some of the organizers later in the show. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered from McGregor Park in Houston. Back in a moment. All right, folks, Life Luxe Jazz is the experience of a lifetime delivering top-notch music in an upscale destination.

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It's lifeluxjazz.com. Also, we'll be broadcasting Roller Martin Unfiltered from Los Cabos, Thursday and Friday. And so you definitely wanna be in the house, folks. It is an amazing experience. I can't wait for it all to happen. So go to lifeluxjazz.com to sign up today all right folks let's talk about some wild cops doing what they always do

in louisiana there was an open records request that was put in there and guess what they discovered 10 pages 10 pages of emails in which Baton Rouge, Louisiana police officers use racist language, including the N-word to describe constituents and their own colleagues. The records request was made public by the Office of New Orleans Attorney William Most and revealed two instances in which officers use the N-word. Back in 2014 and 2015, here's a screenshot of one of the emails with the offensive language redacted.

I want to start with you, Robert. Of course, we know when folks searched, they targeted several Facebook groups of police officers and discovered all sort of racist language. We know in St. Louis and Philadelphia, a number of these police departments. You know, look, black folks have been trying to say this for years in terms of the racism that exists on these police departments.

And look, we have emails, we now have Facebook postings, and it's amazing how people wanna live in denial as if it doesn't even exist. Well, I think the biggest issue is you could go through probably every single police department in this country and pull something like this. We have to understand that this discussion we've had over the last decade about police reform has to go deeper.

It has to go down to the rank and file officer, not just the leadership. We need to ensure we are rooting these people. I interviewed the Ku Klux Klan recently on my radio show, and they said that they've taken off the robes and their plan is to infiltrate law enforcement, the military, and our judicial system. And they've been doing that for the last two decades. They've been doing that? That's what judicial system. And they've been doing that for the last two decades. That's what I'm saying. They've been doing it for the last two decades. Wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on.

In fact, no, not the last two decades. We got to remember, the White Citizens Council that was in Mississippi, the other states, they were made up of, guess what? Police departments, police officers, police chiefs, politicians, judges, black folks been dealing with that, these races, police chiefs, politicians, judges, black folks been dealing with these racists since 1619. I agree with you 100% on that.

I think one of the primary things we need to do, recruit more people from our community to join law enforcement, recruit more people from our community to get involved, to be on the other side of the badge and better police our communities, and then they be able to talk and clear out these racists from uh areas of law enforcement we we've seen how well that hasn't worked thus far um there are districts across the country that do have minorities on the force and some sizable minority groups on the force and at the end of the day you you see that out grouping where the white officers are going to still share that language amongst their white group. And you don't see those Latino

officers or those African-American officers stepping forward and saying anything either. At the end of the day, what we see in a lot of these areas is that that badge means more than actually fighting and mitigating some of these other issues. One issue that I think is extremely problematic when we're bringing these out is that we continue to fund at very high levels all of these anti-bias trainings. And at the end of the day, they are just not simply not working. And we're seeing this across the country. And we, not only in those emails, but also in the interview process,

when police officers are actually pulling folks over, when they're going through and booking people. We have seen so many instances And it doesn't matter how often we publish them and talk about them in the news There's still gonna be a lot of groups who don't necessarily believe that this is happening But we are still throwing a ton of money at implicit bias training these people know what they're doing This isn't implicit at all. They know exactly and they are very conscious of what is happening out here Yeah, I think that there's something we can do other than just funneling money into these trainings that aren't working.

Completely agree with actually what Amisha said, and I've had some experience in this. So I was chairman of the board of the University of Cincinnati, and we had an officer that shot and killed an unarmed African-American man in cold blood. That was DeBose. DeBose, right. And when I became chair, I was vice chair when that actually happened. But when I became chair, I talked to the president and I said, look, you're going to have to fire the police chief, the assistant police chief. We're going to have

to change the culture. And I pushed him to do that. And we did. Because what has to happen now is we need less training and more accountability. And officers have to know if there's a culture in this whole department where someone's comfortable enough saying the N-word over e-mail, knowing that that's discoverable. I mean, they are emboldened there. So that's just the tip of the iceberg. There's a whole culture problem. So leadership needs to be held accountable because that means people were really comfortable doing that. And you can imagine what they were comfortable getting away with. Well, and our last point here, Robert, the reality is when, of course, Chicago, when they went in

and investigated, and they, of course, under a federal consent decree, you had officers who admitted, oh, yeah, we use the N-word. They admitted dropping off gang members in rival gang territories just to see what would happen. And look, I love these people who talk about, oh, you know, a few bad apples. But when they did that initial report, look, those Facebook postings, 381 officers around the country, and that was only a handful of police departments. People need to understand, black folks have been saying this for a long time. You must root this stuff out. And when people say, oh, no, racism no longer exists,

that's just a figment of y'all imagination not when you got somebody with a badge and a gun who could frame somebody or put your son or daughter away for life uh because they are racist well look wrong the last point on that the only time i've ever had a gun to my head in my life was on 47th street in chicago and it's a chicago police officer so i understand i understand the, and this is why I say we have to get into these police departments. The saying isn't one bad apple and everything's fine. It's one bad apple spoils the bunch. We have to root these bad apples out.

If you say it's one per department, let's find that one and throw them out on the streets. And when you see what happened in New York after the killer of Eric Garner finally got fired and the police union has basically gone on strike, they're marching against the police chief. They're marching against de Blasio. You see just how deep this level of corruption,

this level of hatred, this level of racism runs in our law enforcement, and it should be our goal and the goal of every one of those 10 Democratic candidates on the stage to explain to the black community how they will root that out. That needs to be priority number one. And to quote the great philosopher Chris Rock, look, there's some professions you can't have a bad apple in. You can't have a bad pilot.

Everybody's going to die. Same with officers. There's just some professions that have a higher standard. You're right. Well, and here's a perfect example. Fresno, California, where Officer Christopher Martinez wrote in his report that London Wallace was going to try to run away. So therefore, he punched Wallace three times in the face. We left the officer to get his back off. First of all, that was the first thing, okay? So that's what he said. But guess what?

Roll the tape. You're going to see the actual video for yourself. That's not what happened. And London Wallace is not even resisting, yes? Guys, you have the video here? So, okay, so Wallace even resisting. Yes. Guys, you have the video here? So, okay. So Wallace not resisting. Again, another example of lying cops, lying cops. I keep saying if they lie in a police report, they should be fired. They should be fired. If any of us lie on a police report, guess what? We're going to be in trouble. Again, this cop said he was resisting. He wasn't resisting. This is the crap I'm talking

about, Robert. When these cops, they lie, they back each other up. And guess what? Police departments stand with them, knowing they're just baking stuff up. Look, I've read literally thousands of police reports in my life, and every every single of them has had a lie in it there's not been an accurate one that I've read yet I think most defense lawyers can agree with that I remember years ago when we had the discussion on body cams the argument from the police union from a fraternal order of police was that it wouldn't do anything it would impugn officers there should be a federal mandate for any police department to receive federal funding for training or for weapons that they have tamper-proof police body cameras and also vehicle cameras that are

immediately uploaded to a server which cannot be tampered with, turned off, or somehow disabled. It is imperative that we have a non-biased source in all police interactions because right now we depend on serendipity, which depend on a police department happening to have body cameras. And the body camera, like in the Alton Sterling case, didn't mysteriously turn off or become disabled or that there's a third party standing somewhere to film them. We have to make this a mandate for every single officer in this country. If we can afford military grade weapons and riot gear for officers, we can afford to have body cams on every single person who patrols our streets.

Amisha. Every single person patrols our streets. Amisha. We also need to start paying more attention when we are watching because we are watching the cops and their excuses for this police brutality. Resisting arrest is the number one Trump card. And at the end of the day, we've seen it so often that I don't know why any American, any thinking American would believe off offhand that this is actually a true case. Because this is what is used whenever a police officer wants to attack aggressively an African American. And it's become a boiling point at this point where we're seeing it happen more and more. We're seeing more and more videos being released. But we aren't seeing police accountability. We aren't seeing them be removed.

We aren't seeing them being put on leave. We're seeing more and more instances of these videos being released and people rallying around the fact that black lives matter. However, do they really matter when we're... when we continually see these organizations, these policing organizations, and the president of the United States

backing these policing organizations and not really recognizing that there is something that we can do? And it's not talking to African-American males or talking to black women about what to do when they encounter the police. That young man wasn't doing anything wrong. You can give a play-by-play of how you should respond

and be extremely respectful, polite, look them in the eye, whatever you want to tell these young people. And at the end of the day, if a police officer is equipped and upset and feels as though you are a threat, whether you have presented yourself as such or not, you're going to end up getting your head beat in. Yep. And you can see this playing out like...

Rob, Rob, Rob, Rob, it's real simple. Again, cop lies in a police report, they should be fired. I agree. Because, again, they do this, they make up these stories, and the only reason we now know the truth is because of the body camera video. No, you're... That's the only reason we know it.

If that body camera video wasn't there, the right. That's the only reason we know it. If that body camera video wasn't there, the public would believe what the cop had to say. And the scary part is, some of the public still believes it. Like, this is what Amisha was saying. Like, we have clear evidence of what happened, and people still find a way to justify what happened. And so, you know,

whenever the charges are resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, I know there's no real case there. Almost always, universally, those are the default charges that are always brought up when you have nothing else to charge someone with. And so we have to have a higher level of accountability, period, because we don't have that right now. An officer knows that they can always go back to that or they can say, my life was in danger and that's why I did it. It doesn't matter what the evidence shows, but we still need the evidence so people can see it now over and over again

because I hope that people seeing someone being shot unjustly will awaken the conscience of enough people that will see actual real reform because I think we have to change the standards. It shouldn't be so easy just for an officer to say, my life was in danger, when the evidence is clear that his or her life wasn't in danger. They just shot that person and killed them or just assaulted them anyway. Again, your line of report, you should be fired. I certainly want to thank Robert Petillo, Rob, Amisha as well.

Thanks for being on our panel today. Folks, when we come back after this break, I'm going to chat with the organizers of this event, Save Our Charter Schools. They want to send a message to the presidential candidates who are going to be debating tomorrow night at Texas Southern University that it's important for them to support charter schools. That's next right here on Roller Barton Unfiltered, broadcasting live from Houston.

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Brian Courtney Wilson, be encouraged. Be inspired. Just be. Tickets on sale now. All right, folks, Roland Martin here broadcasting live from McGregor Park in Houston. Of course, we're in town because the Democrats are going to be debating tomorrow night at Texas Southern University, not even three miles from here, but we're here at McGregor Park, where folks who are in support of charter schools are holding a rally to send a signal to folks who are debating.

One of the folks who's going to be speaking in a moment, our good friend, Dr. Steve Perry. Steve, always good to see you. Always great to see you. Great to be in your hometown, man, get some home cooking. Absolutely. And so, of course, someone like me, supportive of charter schools, school chores, I tell people I don't care what form of school it is, I'm down with it. Why is this rally important when you have all these candidates

going to be in town tomorrow night? Because black and Latino people from all over the country who run schools in our own communities that are charters have decided that we're tired of people speaking for us. We're going to speak for ourselves. These are black Latino kids and families here in Houston who come out to make sure that the presidential candidates understand that you can't just send our kids to whatever schools you want and then send your children to the schools that you want. Our children have the right to have a choice and we're going to make sure we fight for it. And the fact of the matter is, again, I make this point all the time. It's amazing the amount of conversation that exists that hate that people have about charter schools. We're talking about not even 10 percent of all schools, all students in the country.

And it's sort of like, do you want to talk about the other 90 plus percent? Because education is a fundamental issue that we have to deal with in this country. It impacts everybody and impacts us more than anybody else. Listen, the school to prison pipeline is a real industry and its product is black cotton. Those are our children that they want to make sure that the people who work in the school to prison pipeline, that means the teachers, principals and the like. That means the corrections officers, officers, police officers and probation officers. They want to make sure that all those people keep their jobs.

We want to make sure that these children have careers. We're not fighting for the same thing. For them, it's no thing to send our children to prison. For us, it's everything. These children are beautiful, brilliant. They don't have to be out here. It's 6 o'clock at night. They don't have to be out here doing this. They're here fighting for their future.

And how dare someone call themself a Democrat and then be against the will of black and Latino people Was the very good to see you? I'll grab a Howard Fuller over there. I see he's walking away And how these be coming back this way. I know where he's going You can't stop organizing organizing you have to tackle him to get him over here So much at with him in a second. So we're going to also grab Ricardo Morelos over here. Last question for you. What's interesting is that there are Democrats who believe in school choice. And what gets me is the people who say this is a conservative Republican idea.

No, it's not. Black folks have created, have forced to create their own schools for decades, for centuries. From the time that we came up out of slavery, one of the first things that we did was open colleges because we understood that once we understand how to read, write, and compute, nobody can stop us. It wasn't enough that the slaveholders held our bodies. They had to control our minds. And in order to control our minds, they had to make it illegal to teach us to read now

It's not illegal. It's just unpopular. So we're not asking anybody do anything for us We've come here to Houston to make sure we make a point to all of the Democrats We're running for president that if you fight and try to take away our charter schools We would take away your opportunity to be a president And again, we saw what happened there in Florida when Andrew Gillum ran against Rhonda Sanders. They're still trying to figure out how to 18 percent of black women vote for Rhonda Sanders. There's I mean, this was a fundamental issue where a black mother said, no, my child's education is most important. Black women hate Republicans more than anybody else.

Ain't no other reason why 18 percent of black women voted for a Republican. These are the children of black women. Who you hear out here, in many cases, are black women. They're not going to allow anyone to take away the opportunity that they deserve to send their child to the best school for them. We're here to fight for the kids, because that's what schools are supposed to be for.

It's not the board of employment, it's the board of education. All right, Steve, I appreciate it, man. Thanks a bunch. All right, Howard Fuller? All right, I'm going to grab Howard Fuller. First of all, why is Howard Fuller important? Howard actually was a superintendent of schools in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

And so he has been advocating on this issue for quite a long time. And in fact, here's what y'all don't realize. This is actually a true story. So I was reading this book, and this book was talking about this black nationalist. And so I'm reading this book, and I forgot the name that I was seeing. And so, and then it says, it had the name

like, now going by Howard Fuller. So I called Howard. I said, Howard, this you? Howard was like, yeah, that was me back in the 70s. And so he made the transition. I was telling him that when I call you, what was your black nationalist name? Wusu Sudoke. So I was reading this book and it was mentioning you. They said not only Howard Fuller. I was like, this the same Howard Fuller?

Same one, man. What can I tell you, man? And so and Howard, again, you're in a unique position as somebody who was superintendent of a school system in Milwaukee, now is a major, major proponent of parental choice, school choice, charter schools. And I see you got your Frederick Douglass shirt here on. Why have you dedicated your life? You could be retired, kicking back with your pension, enjoying the sun, vacationing. Why have you said this is the most important thing for you? Because I know that I would not be where I am today if my mother and my grandmother had not

insisted that I get an education. And they used all the different options. I went to public schools. I went to Catholic schools. So what I want to do is to make sure that these children out here have as many options as possible. Because you know and I know that if you're black in America and you only got one choice for anything, you're in deep trouble. It's simple. It's not even complicated. And you also want to send a message to Democratic candidates that they should not be opposing this form of education. Hey, man, they think that they can win with the teachers union. Hillary Clinton had the teachers union. She lost. They better understand that people like me and these people out here, they're going to need us. And if they're going to need us, they better get off of us because we're

not going to stop. We're not going to let them just browbeat us, elitist-ass people like Bernie Sanders. We're not going for that. That's the bottom line, man. And for somebody who's watching, you ain't a conservative. First of all, you to the left of liberals. No, I don't believe in none of them, man. I don't believe in Democrats, Republicans. I just believe in black people.

And in my view of life, black people got to be independent. We got to have our own minds and we got to fight for what we believe in. And one of the things I believe black people need is self-determination. And charter schools are a form of self-determination. All right. Al Fuller, I appreciate it, man. Thanks a lot. I appreciate it.

All right, y'all. So what's going to happen is this is going to start up in just a few moments. And so we're going to be actually live streaming this event for you as well. And so we certainly appreciate all of you for watching today. Let me also give a shout out to Melanie Cam on the Black Women's Roundtable. We appreciate live streaming their event today. If you missed that, go to our YouTube channel. You can actually see that three-hour session.

This is the second time we've live-streamed that event. We did it last year as well from Congressional Black Caucus Foundation. Black women speaking out on the issues that matter to them. That's why I created this platform, Roller Martin Unfiltered. You're not going to see that on C-SPAN. You're not going to see this on C-SPAN or CNN or MSNBC or all these networks. We created this as a platform to cover our stories that matter, which is why I'm here in Houston.

We're going to live stream this rally. So once this show is over, we'll live stream this. And then, of course, tomorrow I'll be broadcasting from the campus of Texas Southern University, the site tomorrow of the debate on ABC between the Democratic candidates. And so if you want to support what we do, your dollars go to make this possible. As a matter of fact, I got a woman who emailed me last night. She said her and her mother want to give to the show. And she says, what is the money for? I said, you know what the money's for? It's for staff. It's for cameras. It's for travel. It's for lights. It's for live streaming equipment. I said, every dollar that we get is plowed right back into the

show because we, how we talk about self-determination and that's critically important for me literally folks the high school that i went to it's not even three miles from here jack case high school magnet school of communications and so sure it could have been easy to say you know what i want to go work for one of these networks or one of these large papers and just sort of kick back and have a nice well-paid comfortable job but i'd rather us be in control of our destiny. And the fact of the matter is the conversation you heard today on this show would not take place if this show did not exist, which means it had to be created.

And so I'm all about us using our skill set to be able to speak to our issues. And that's why we created Roller Martin Unfiltered, which we're going to build and grow even further. And so we're going to be live streaming Friday from Gresham to the Black Caucus, a number of different events there. That's why we do what we do. We want you to support us with your dollars. So go to RolandMartin on Filter.com, join our Bring the Funk fan club, and so we're certainly going to make this thing happen.

All right, folks, I got to go. When this show is over, we'll then start the live stream for this rally here at McGregor Park, hashtag SaveOurCharterSchools. All right, folks, I got to go. Holla! We'll be right back. You want to check out Roland Martin Unfiltered? YouTube.com forward slash Roland S. Martin. And 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?

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