#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Baby formula crisis, George Floyd Act; Is woke media bad for democracy? "Black Faces In High Places"

Episode Date: May 28, 2022

 5.27.2022 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Rep. Ro Khanna talks baby formula shortage, George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, Biden action on student loan debt, and the Moral March on Washington + What must Dems do to rally voters ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. Is woke media undermining our democracy? Author Batya Ungar-Sargon believes it is. Co-authors Dr. Randal Pinkett and Dr. Jeffrey Robinson break down the 10 strategic actions Black professionals need to take to reach the top and stay there in their new book, "Black Faces in High Places" 5.27.2022 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Rep. Ro Khanna talks baby formula shortage, George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, Biden action on student loan debt, and the Moral March on Washington + What must Dems do to rally voters ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. Is woke media undermining our democracy? Author Batya Ungar-Sargon believes it is. Co-authors Dr. Randal Pinkett and Dr. Jeffrey Robinson break down the 10 strategic actions Black professionals need to take to reach the top and stay there in their new book, "Black Faces in High Places" RolandMartinUnfiltered and #BlackStarNetwork via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered PayPal ☛ https://www.paypal.me/rmartinunfiltered Venmo ☛https://venmo.com/rmunfiltered Zelle ☛ [e-mail] Annual or monthly recurring #BringTheFunk Fan Club membership via paypal ☛ https://rolandsmartin.com/rmu-paypal/ Download the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox 👉🏾 http://www.blackstarnetwork.com #RolandMartinUnfiltered and the #BlackStarNetwork are news reporting platforms covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Today is Friday, May 27, 2022. Coming up on Roland Martin on the Pilgrim Streaming Live on the Black Star Network. We talk about a variety of issues with Congressman Ro Khanna of California. What must Democrats do to get aggressive? Turn the vote out in November. We break it down. Also, what's happening with blokeness in media?

Are they actually destroying democracy? Well, the author of a new book says so. And I'll talk with the two authors of a book dealing with black professionals. That's right. Randall Pinkett, Jeffrey Robinson, two of my alpha brothers. Their new book is out, Black Faces in High Places. Ten strategic actions for black professionals to reach the top and to stay there.

Folks, it is a jam-packed show on this Memorial Day weekend. It is time to bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the funk on Rolling Martin on a filter on the Black Star Network. 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. Putting it down from sports to news to politics. With entertainment just for kicks. He's rollin' Yeah, yeah

It's Uncle Roro, y'all Yeah, yeah It's Rollin' Martin, yeah Yeah, yeah Rollin' with Rollin' now Yeah, yeah He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best You know he's fresh, he's real, the best you know, he's Roland Martin.

Now. Martin. Hey, folks, welcome to Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. He is one of the most progressive members of Congress. Representative Ro Khanna of California. He and I talked and we talked about a variety of issues, but one of the things that is really important that you're going to get out of this is the sense of urgency Democrats need to turn voters out at the ballot box in November. Here is our conversation. Representative Khanna, there's several things I want to talk to you about, but one of them just jumps out at this that we're now dealing with.

We're seeing the first arrival of this baby formula for overseas. And what's driving me crazy, you have Republicans who have been complaining about Democrats on this issue. And literally, a significant number of them voted against spending money to bring in baby formula. And now we know that the reason we have a crisis is not just because of Abbott, because Trump made it more difficult to import baby formula. How the hell are Democrats and Biden to blame for a problem Republicans don't want to fix? a fix well you're absolutely right uh look 192 republicans voted against giving funding to help fix this baby formula shortage i mean look one of the problems was that the fda didn't have enough inspectors they didn't get to the abbott facility in time that was all Trump era policy. Democrats just funded to fix that problem. And the president is deploying the military to try to bring this baby formula and the Republicans are not helping. So they want to criticize the president, but they aren't doing anything

constructively in terms of the funding that'll help get baby formula into the hands of families that need it. So, but to me also, I'm always about messaging as well. And I just don't necessarily believe that Democrats are doing a good enough job of walking the American people through this and then letting them know, like, here's your problem. I mean, look, people right now are going, hey, we got problems with food prices, we now are going hey, we got problems with food prices We got problems with gas we got problems with inflation, you know And it's important and let folks know here the folks who actually trying to fix the problem Here those who actually helped create the problem and then who don't want to fix it You're right. And we could do a better job of that. Look, I mean Trump was driven by protectionism and he basically didn't want

It's one thing to put tariffs on China. I agree with some of that but to put that. Look, I mean, Trump was driven by protectionism and he basically didn't want, it's one thing to put tariffs on China. I agree with some of that, but to put tariffs on European products such as baby formulas are basically protectionism through the FDA is partly what's created the problem. And then you've got a Republican Congress that's unwilling to fund the efforts to get more baby formula into the United States. So they're very good at casting blame. But as the president's pointed out, they don't have a constructive policy. Now, I do think the president has taken decisive action, and I'm glad he's taking that. And he's got to continue to take decisive action, even on the price of food, the price of gas. I personally think the government ought to be buying at the low dips of food

and gas and then selling it back to the American people at cheap prices to bring price stability. You know, we've got to, you know, people are complaining. Those are real issues in my district. And we've got to take bold action to try to lower prices. Let's move on to another issue. Two days from now, it's going to be the second anniversary of the death of George Floyd. And I can tell you that people are still greatly bothered that you didn't have the George Floyd Justice Act was passed by the United States Senate, was passed by the House. The president has not moved on executive orders. Congressman, I can tell you, this is going to be one of those issues

that's going to play a crucial role in a lot of Black folks, especially young people, turning out in November. Do your party leaders understand how the inaction on this issue is going to hurt them come November? I don't think they get the gravity, candidly, Roland. I mean, I think there are two colossal failures of this Congress. The fact that we have not done anything to pass the George Floyd Act, basic police reform. I mean, this is not, it was a very moderate bill, actually, and the fact that we haven't done anything on voting rights. And these are sort of fundamental rights. Basically, your right to be able to vote in this country, your right to be able to walk on the streets and not get shot by a cop, even if you're unarmed.

And we're not passing these things. And so the Progressive Caucus in Congress has been screaming about this for the past year and a half. I do think if if we can't get it through the Senate that the president really needs to look at decisive executive action on both of these before the before Labor Day. And not only that, we still are seeing poll numbers, unbelievably low poll numbers. One poll showed the president is at 26 percent among young voters,

a similar number among Hispanic voters. Again, that none of that bodes well for November. What must party leaders and what must candidates be doing to conveying to the American public, whether it's inflation, whether it's in these other issues, that Democrats are better to respond to this than Republicans. We see how they're voting, voting against baby formula, not wanting to support the George Floyd Justice Act, not giving damn about voting rights. But the reality is you have people who are saying, you know what, Democrats, you had the majority, you didn't fix it. I'm going to go somewhere else. That, again, is what people are facing come November. Well, we got to tell people the stakes. I mean, I get people's frustration, but giving Donald Trump power is not going to do

anything for racial justice, economic justice, or climate action. But two, the Democrats have to understand that young voters are very idealistic voters. They want a better, more just society. So we've got to deliver something on voting rights, on police violence reform and through executive action. But there are two other places we've got to deliver. One is on the student loan debt relief.

I mean, I was speaking yesterday to a group of laborers in my district, largely Latino construction workers, and they were having a scholarship fund for their kids who are want to have free college? All the hands went up. This idea that somehow the working class doesn't want or care about student debt relief is just totally false. The reality is a lot of the working families, black and Latino, are the ones who have the most student loan debt because they've got kids, nephews, nieces who want to go to college. The president with a stroke of the pen can relieve a lot of that debt. That would be something decisive. And then on climate, you know, we've got to get something passed. The young voters care about that. They understand that their generation is going to be affected by it. I think that you're absolutely right when it comes to when you talk about that, that idealism, but also, again, people voted in 2020 based upon saying, elect us, we'll get these things done. I always make the distinction to my audience that all of these bills have passed the

House. The problem has been the Senate. But for the public, they just simply say, Congress, Biden, none of y'all got it done. Well, look, I understand. I mean, people are busy. They sacrificed a tremendous amount in 2020 to get us elected. They're not going to follow the every Senate vote. But I do think that in the next six months, the president can be more vocal. He can come out and say we got to abolish the filibuster. He can come out and start campaigning against the Senate on a couple of these key priorities, especially on something as critical as voting rights, especially as something as critical as climate, especially as something as critical as Roe versus Wade and codifying that. I think people want to see some fight in our party for the fundamental rights. And they will understand if there's a lot of fight and the numbers aren't there and we vote and, you know, we're short a senator.

But I don't think they see sufficient urgency or fight yet on these key issues. Well, I think that's the thing. And Reverend William Barber with the Poor People's Campaign, what he says is don't just vote one time. Keep voting. Keep voting. You have to show the people that you are willing to keep bringing this up. He said you can't just say, well, we brought it up once or twice and that's it. He's absolutely right. Look, I

just to get a sense, I mean, I know Twitter isn't as a voter, but you get a sense of a lot of young folks. I tweeted out, we need a $15 minimum wage and it's about time to do it. And half the folks are understandably criticizing me saying, well, $15 is not going to be nearly enough. I mean, we're so far

kind of out of touch of where people are with their rents, with their food prices, with the gas prices. And, you know, we're still stuck at $7.25. I think the $15 wage was something that people really came out to vote for, especially a lot of the service workers. Some of them are just still relying on tips. So you look at the $15 wage, you look at student loan relief, you look at voting rights, you look at police reform, you look at bold climate action. This is what motivated folks. I mean, look, I love, I'm very proud that we passed roads and bridges and infrastructure, but that doesn't speak to

people's souls. That doesn't speak to a more just America. You know, we've got to speak to some of these fundamental issues that got young people out. They got people motivated in 2020. We might talk about the Poor People's Campaign. June 18th, they were in a mass gathering in the nation's capital. They have been calling for the president to sit down and meet with them, but not just meet with leaders to actually meet with what they call impact or disaffected workers. The White House has been wanting to meet with Reverend Barbara or Reverend Liz Theoharis. And he has said, no, we need to bring poor people with us. They've been unwilling to do that. When you look at the numbers, 90 plus million low income and poor people in the country,

look, if Democrats are looking at a path to victory, it is appealing to those voters. They are white. They are black. They are Latino. They are young. They are significantly women. They are Native American. And the White House has been unwilling to do that. And I just don't understand the calculus. Why is it that in this country, people love to talk about the middle class, the middle class. But you have so many politicians who don't want to be seen with poor people. I don't get it. I mean, Reverend Barber, I think, is the closest moral leader we have to someone like Dr. King in our country. And I don't say that lightly. I mean, I think what he is doing in terms of mobilizing low wealth Americans of all backgrounds and putting that coalition together in the South and other places is remarkable. And people like me and Barbara Lee and others in Congress have met

with him and people who he brings many, many times in Congress. I mean, he's had folks testify to us in informal hearings about what it actually means when they're low wealth, low income, and can't pay rent, can't get food for their kids that's sufficient in terms of nutrition, can't get medicine. I think that the White House needs to hear them. And there's some very simple things we can do, two concrete things, raise the minimum wage to 15 bucks and include all service workers, and then have some of these wage boards in states like New York to increase the pay for fast food workers and service workers like home care workers. I mean, it's ridiculous that you're making eight bucks, 10 bucks at a McDonald's, at a Burger King,

home care work, whereas in Europe, people are making 20 bucks, 25 bucks for the same jobs. And I think that's what's important for people to realize. The low wages in this country are a deliberate policy choice, and it's fixable with policy. And this is what the Democratic Party ought to stand for, higher wages for honorable work. We're not doing it because we don't have the right collective bargaining policies or correct wage boards. And look, and I say to President Biden, even hold a White House summit on the poor. I mean, look, the numbers don't lie when you look at, and again, what people often say is that the poor don't have lobbyists in Washington, D.C. They are also voters. They are people who are

workers. They are also voters. And if you send that signal and I get it because people like, oh, well, you know, that comes across as just giving them things. Well, hell, it's a whole bunch of rich folks who got stuck with Trump's tax cut. A whole bunch of rich folks who got stuff with Trump tax cuts and got stuff with the Fed policy. Look, we don't talk about the inflation and the asset bubbles in the stock market because of easy Fed money. We don't talk about all the money that went to corporate bonds. Now, some of them may have been necessary to get out of the pandemic, but it helped the people who were at the top. It didn't help people who were working. Here's,

I think, the biggest thing that we need to do, why I think a poor people's summit is so important, because we've got to puncture this awful stereotype in this country, started, I think, with President Reagan, that somehow if you're poor, it means that you're not working or you don't have a job or you don't have an aspiration to get a job. That is just- Oh, your colleague, Representative Matt Gaetz, made the comment about people who are on wic because the baby formula i mean it's as as if uh these little poor people look if you can't afford baby falling what's wrong with you what the hell well i mean they've got to meet people i've got to meet folks who the the the poor in this country are some of the most uh honorable honest uh folks for sacrificing

and and doing everything they can for their kids and their families and they're working uh jobs one job two jobs and the reality is they're they're they're not getting paid what they deserve they're not getting paid what they deserve because they don't we don't have correct collective bargaining in this country because the corporate power has shifted a lot of the resources to the top so i mean think about it i mean in a very simple example you got amazon one of the richest companies in the world i don't begrudge jeff bezos's innovation so that packages can show up at your doorstep but you don't think that the people who are at the warehouses the people who are delivering those packages have something to do with the value? Of course they do. So here's the problem. Why is it that they're not getting

proper wages? Why is it that they're not benefiting? Why is it the people who are serving us fast food, we're making our lives convenient, aren't getting proper wages? Why is it the people who are taking care of the elderly or sick aren't getting proper wages they're adding value and they're not getting paid what they deserve and that's the fundamental issue it's unfair it's it's unjust it's not just that they're poor it's that we made a decision to underpay a lot of work in this country and then people wonder why you have such a dramatic uh wage and income gap wealth gap in this country well that's a perfect example. Representative Conner, I certainly appreciate it. We're going to keep obviously pushing this issue.

We'll be there on June 18th. Thank you. I hope it was campaign. So we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Thank you for your voice. Thank you for having me on. All right. Take care. All right, folks, got to go to a break. We come back. I'll talk with the author of a book who says that white liberals in media, they're actually undermining democracy. Well, she and I kind of differ on the notion of wokeness. Trust me, it's a discussion you don't want to miss. Folks, don't forget to support us here at the Black Star Network by downloading the Black Star Network app available on all platforms, Apple phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Roku, Amazon Fire, Xbox, and Samsung TV as well. And don't forget to support our Bring the Funk fan club where all dollars that you give goes to support us and the show and what we do of course you can see

your check-in money orders too peel box five seven one nine six washington dc two zero zero three seven dash zero one nine six cash app dollar sign rm unfiltered paypal's r martin unfiltered venmo is rm unfiltered zel is rolling at rolandsmartin.. Roland at Roland Martin on Filter dot com. We'll be right back. We welcome you to the launch of the Mass Poor People's Low-Wage Assembly at Mara March on Washington, D.C., June 18, 2022. We are a new unsettling force and we are powerful. A new unsettling force and we are here. We're rising up to demonstrate the compelling power that we poor and low-income people have

to reconstruct society from the bottom up. And we need to do it with the loudest voices possible, the biggest actions possible. Because we know that there is no scarcity in this land. The only scarcity is the moral will to do what's right. Hold on just a little while longer. We are those with sub-minimum wage jobs who can't afford sky-high rent. People with disabilities are the fastest-growing minority group. It's crazy to me that in 2021,

it's still legal for workplaces to pay a sub-minimum wage to people with disabilities. There are still so much trial and tribulations that we go through as Indigenous people. We can't get a decent wage to sustain ourselves, nor can we get adequate decent wage to sustain ourselves, nor can we get adequate housing. Veterans across this nation say enough is enough.

We can't pat essential workers on the back on one day and then cut their healthcare the next day. Health is a political choice. What more do I need to do to prove that my voice is just as valuable as anyone else's? There are still forces in denial that would try to slow walk our transition to a clean economy and a just future for us all. We have an amoral system run by moral people. But together we walk, and we walk and we fight.

It's time for a change! Reconstruyamos esta gran nación! See, we are people of resilience as we fight these interlocking injustices together. When we work together, mobilize people, people with disabilities, and all people can have the right to live and to thrive. We know what they are doing, but the question is, what are we going to do? Reconstruction begins when we change our mentality and say it's time for you to get your foot off of my neck.

I know justice is coming soon. Do you believe that or today? I'm Dr. Greg Carr and coming up on the next Black Table, thinking about the Black Freedom Movement in a global way. Dr. John Monroe joins us to discuss his book, The Anti-Colonial Front, which maps the social justice movement in the United States and its impact internationally. From Asia to Africa and how movements like anti-communism were used to slow down racial equality, like critical race theory today. A critical race theory today, communism back then, that's essentially mobilized to shut down any challenges to a given system of power. Connecting the civil rights movement to colonialism on the next Black Table exclusively here on the Black Star Network. I'm Deborah Owens, America's Wealth Coach and host of Get Wealthy. Let me ask you a question. Are your financial affairs in order?

Or are you like Prince Aretha Franklin at Chat with Boltzmann's celebrities that passed away with no will? Well, that's the topic we're covering on our next Get Wealthy program. Do you have the proper strategies in place to make sure that your assets and everything that you've worked so hard for pass on to the next generation and you create legacy wealth. So I encourage people to be

thinking about what is the long-term plan as opposed to just for today or just right after I pass away. That's right here on Get Wealthy, only on Black Star Network. America's mainstream media is overwhelmingly white. My next guest says in her book that white progressives or white liberals, they're causing a serious problem in media. Y'all gonna enjoy this conversation. But Bacha Ungar Sargon, the author of the book, Bad News, How Woke Media is Undermining Democracy. It got a little spicy between the both of us. All right, Bhatia, let's talk about your book, Bad News, How Woke Media is Undermining Democracy.

First off, define your definition of woke. Great. So first of all, thank you so much for having me. I'm really honored to be talking to you and very excited for this conversation. Woke to me means it doesn't mean police reform. It doesn't mean ending mass incarceration. It doesn't mean ending the racism in our public schools. And it doesn't mean ending intergenerational poverty among 20 to 30% of Americans descended from slaves. That is all things every American should be focused on. Those are really important things.

Those are national emergencies. Woke is what I found out about in a 2018 Yale study that found that white liberals talk to black and Hispanic Americans different than they talk to other whites and different than white conservatives talk to black and Hispanic Americans. White liberals dumbed down their vocabulary when they talk to blacks and

Hispanics this was a Yale study from 2018 that found that that is wokeness it's a view that says that white people have a power and a privilege and an agency that puts them above people of color so that their instinct unconsciously when they meet a person of color is to dumb down their vocabulary and I think that that is so, so corrosive and patronizing the assumption of oppression based on skin color. It is really dehumanizing. That's what wokeness is. But I think that's part of the problem because the reality is what you initially said is how wokeness or being woke was defined uh african americans

actually define that uh in terms of what woke is now what then happened was i think get a number of different things how other people non-black folks then begin uh to define wokeness. Also, how those who don't agree with those issues begin to define it. I think about, again, political correctness. I think about diversity. I think about how those phrases have been turned on their head. So I think part of this issue is when we talk about woke, Black folks have a very clear understanding of woke is, is when non-Black folks then begin to try to define it for us as opposed to sticking with what the actual definition is. I could not agree with you more. I think that's a really crucial point. And I think that every single place where progressives lose their way is when they depart from where the Black community is at.

But is that just progressives though though, is that the progressive? Because part of the issue that I've had here, even with this is with even with conservatives, with white conservatives, even some black conservatives, because, again, the use of woke then begins to be used as a negative. Yeah, just like diversity. Then all of a sudden it then it then evolved into, oh, we need diversity of thought and then diversity region of country. That was all an attempt to actually water down

what the point of diversity is. And I think where we are now, how woke is being used, it is being used now as an attack against black folks and others, as opposed to folks saying, what is it really about? I use it exclusively to attack white liberals. So, but your charge is accurate. The word woke started as black slang for all the things I listed as the important things, right?

And now conservatives and people like me who are on the left, who are angry at where the progressives are at, use it as a pejorative. And that is a totally fair charge. That is a problem. We appropriated a word from the black community that was describing something important to describe something bad.

But when I talk about it, I am almost only speaking about white progressives and the ways in which they've departed from the black agenda and the way they use intersectionality, the way they use gay rights, the way they use immigration to over and over abandon the black community,

abandon Americans descended from slaves in order to push their own economic agenda under the guise of social justice. That's my problem. Well, and the problem that I have is that, is how, whether they are progressive whites, whether they are conservative whites, how it is used. And then what ends up happening is,

black folks are the ones who actually get screwed. And the outset of your book, you talk about how media did not, in terms of beginning of media, did not really care about working class people. And as I was reading it, what I was actually looking for was for you to actually be even more granular and say white media, because when you talked about Joseph Pulitzer, when you talked about the first newspaper in the penny papers in New York, what I was reading it, I'm sitting here going, yeah, but that was a paper called

Freedom's Journal, the first black newspaper founded on March 16th, 1827. I think about Frederick Douglass, the North Star. I think about Ida B. Wells, Barnett, a paper in Memphis. Black media was talking about working class issues. And so I think part of the thing, though, is being very specific. We have to say white media. So I talk a little bit about Frederick Douglas is the North Star in the context of the fact that, you know, people don't know this, but Lloyd Garrison, who was a white abolitionist, actually canceled Frederick Douglas, a former

enslaved person, because he felt that he was compromising, right? That is exactly what I'm describing. You're totally right. There was a rich tradition of Black media. I talk a little bit about it in the book, but not enough. But what was so interesting to me was to see how this white progressive abolitionist felt that it was his job to cancel a slave. He canceled his newspaper. He told people not to buy it. He stopped paying for him to travel to speak about his experiences as an enslaved person because Frederick Douglass came to the opinion

that the constitution actually did enshrine the rights of all people, irrespective of race, and that it was only through the legal system and only through the constitution that civil rights for all was ever gonna be possible, which was of course what Dr. King picked up on. And for this guy, Lloyd Garrison, no way, no way, only revolution, right? No way to work within the system. And so this white person appointed him the savior of the slaves and then canceled Frederick Douglass.

Well, that is, when we look at American history, though. I mean, the reality is, you know, this year, Liberia celebrates the 200th anniversary of its creation. And then you had the American Colonization Society, which is comprised of a diverse group. And yet those people who actually believed who were abolitionists who didn't believe in slavery. But then of course you had those white plantation owners who were afraid that free people of African descent were somehow going to free their slaves. And so you had these two forces, multiple forces that were involved in the American colonization society. I think part of the thing that,

and one of the reasons why I was making that distinction about again, white media is because the operative word, whether you're talking about white progressives or white conservatives is white. And that is the issue in this country. Even in the inside of your book, when you say something is wrong with American journalism, I will be I will actually change it to say something is wrong with American white journalism, because these are the issues we're dealing with, because in, when we say mainstream media, we really mean white media. The issue that you find is they look like Wall Street, look like Silicon Valley. And so you do not have real voices at the table. You're now seeing it. Kim Godwin, president of ABC News, Rashida Jones, president of MSNBC. When you've got a majority of your newspapers in the country who won't even fill out the

AS&E diversity survey, that tells you where we are in white media. Yeah, yes, 100%. I would argue, though, that the reason that American media is so white is because it is made up of people of immense economic privilege. And unfortunately America's rich are still America's white. So to me the class piece here is a much bigger problem because when you look at the people of color who are allowed to succeed in American media, they are all from Harvard or Princeton or Yale or University of Chicago. Their backgrounds, their economic and educational

backgrounds look a lot like the other American elites. Whereas you look at the Black community and two thirds of Black Americans say that they are either moderate or conservative. You're never going to hear those voices in the liberal mainstream media. But this is, again, I get your point, but the problem, I think, is it's too narrow. I think the problem is you're only really talking about New York, D.C., large cities. The reality is, so look, I've been covering megachurches, and people have this assumption that, oh my God, there's a problem with with with with with with christianity is these mega churches well major churches only comprise four percent of all churches in the country 96 of the churches in america are not mega churches when we talk about

uh elite look the average journalism salary ain't several million dollars or even a hundred thousand dollars uh my first job coming out of college, the Austin American Statesman, which had about 230,000 circulation, offered me $20,100. I said, no, you've got to pay me at least two grand more. When I got hired at the Fort Worth Telegram a year later, it was at $32,000. And so the issue, I think, again, i think we gotta we gotta define this the issue is when you talk about large large media companies that did then become sort of the gatekeepers but journalists out there who are doing some amazing work who are covering some amazing issues

they're not part of the elite they didn't go to the harvard's university of chicago that's really your new york times your wall street journal your papers like that. And of course, Fox News, ABC, NBC, where you got people who on the air talking about so-called working class voters, but they're making several million dollars and their kids go into private school. So it's a really important point. Let me just clarify a little bit. So 75% of American journalism jobs today are on the coasts. The majority of journalists working today are actually working for either digital media companies, national media companies, or those elite legacy media companies. Local journalism is unfortunately dying. It's very sad to say. You're totally right. There are still local journalists who are working for forty thousand dollars a year.

But the vast majority of journalists are coming to a place like New York and taking a starting salary of twenty five thousand dollars a year to work in a digital media company, which tells you everything you need to know about who their parents are. Right. Because you could not have afforded to live in New York City on twenty five thousand dollars a year when you were starting. But this is where this is. Again, this is where I got to push back. Because I know individuals who are not coming from rich backgrounds. And so they're not. What you have is, look, I'm dealing with people. Look, I'm a three-time board member of the National Association of Black Journalists, lifetime member in the Hall of Fame.

And I'm dealing with journalists who are looking at jobs in Chicago, looking at jobs in New York, places like that. But they're not making a lot of money. Two and three or four of them are living, living in apartments with others. And so it's not I mean, I get your point, but I know a whole lot of folk who look like me who don't come from rich backgrounds. They are not. I totally believe you. There are people who manage to do this. There are people who do this, but I'm just telling you from like a, from a purely data point of view, they are the exception rather than the rule. And by the time they're in their forties and fifties, they'll be making over a hundred thousand dollars a year, which puts them in the top 10% of Americans. Yeah. But if you, but if you're looking at someone who is rising.

The average is brought down because younger journalists do make less money. But if you stay in this, in this industry, if you make it in this industry, you're going to be part of the elites by the time you're in your forties, you're going to be. Well, first of all, even on that particular point there, when we talk about the elites, which I think is a phrase, frankly, as being thrown around left and right. I mean, it trips me out when I see politicians talk about the elite. When you look at the salary of a member of Congress, that so-called puts them in the elite. Totally. So. So. So. So part of this issue is that we start breaking down really money in America. What the average median family income is,

what the average salary is. And so the average American is not making $100,000. And so I think that again, how the word elite is being used, is being used I think in a different way in terms of we look at salaries. We look I mean, I hear people say college professors, they are the elite. Well, I know some people who are adjunct professors who are making 10, 12, 15 thousand or making 40 or 40, 40 or 48 thousand dollars.

And so this, I think, still speaks to what goes from from a media standpoint in terms of what are the interests that matter and I think one of the things that happens in media and I dealt with this at KRLD radio in Dallas I've dealt with this in daily newspapers luckily I've gone to the black media side this whole focus on hey we're going to target our news to high wealth areas because we're looking at advertising and that plays a role in the type of coverage that we're also seeing yeah but i think we're agreeing like i think we i think you and i both totally agree that the media does not reflect the views of like the average american you know the average black american they just do not see their views or their interests or the things that they need reflected in the media. Don't you agree with that?

Yeah, I agree with that. But see, again, though, but see, but the position that I take is I don't believe this is based upon wokeness. I think it's based upon whiteness. And when I say whiteness, I'm talking about the reality of where this country is. The reality is that when you talk about, again, and how you laid out in this book here, going back, all of those newspapers, going back to 1906, 1907, going through the 30s and 40s, they supported Jim Crow. They locked Black journalists out of the newsrooms. They were white only. And then you didn't see your first wave of Black journalists in the media until the Kerner Commission report came out in 1968, declaring there were two Americas, one white, one black. And then of course, and they said, part of the problem with the riots is you didn't have black people who were in these newsrooms. And so your first wave of black journalists really came in, in the late 60s, the early 70s. And so right now we're really only operating on the second generation of black and brown journalists in newsrooms.

And so, again, I don't for me, the issue is not how woke media is undermining democracy, is how white media is. And I mean, that's just somebody who's worked in daily newsrooms. And I have had to confront white journalists who simply don't. I'll just give you just a perfect example. I covered, Khaled Muhammad came to speak in Fort Worth and he had gotten suspended by Louis Farrakhan as national spokesman for the Nation of Islam. And so I went to cover the speech and I came back with my story and I get called into the office by Debbie Price, who was the executive editor of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, who should have never been hired. In fact, she had never been an editor in her entire career, even going back to college, but she got the job over an African-American man

who had been a city editor, state editor, assistant managing editor, but the publisher liked her. But that's another story. And so she asked me, what the hell is this? And I was like, what do you mean? She's like, well, your story looks totally different than the story that's in dallas morning news uh and i said well you need to call dallas morning news figure out what the hell they were doing because because because in that story here's what happened the white journalist uh i think todd gilliam who wrote it he talked about all how folks had to be searched before. Well, anybody's covered the nation of Islam and speech. Hell, I'm used to that. I go through, I guess, search.

I got searched yesterday at the White House. OK, and so how he framed the story was Khalid Muhammad said, pin the tail on the donkey, on the honky, not the donkey. OK, anybody been to the ancient Islam speech? You know, typical things. But I focused on what college said so you had two different stories written by black journalists written by white journalism the exact same speech so the white editor is questioning me I'm like go talk to the white guy if you read what I wrote I wrote what he talked about not the not the other things that will push someone's button and that's

a perfect example that's why i'm saying i think the issue it ain't wokeness it's whiteness it's how we see the world that now then is portrayed in how we cover the news well to me that story is like a perfect story of like like the the complete and utter success of like you because you were able to get your opinion out there and published in the paper no it was an opinion that was an opinion no no i mean sorry i'm sorry yeah yeah it was a new story you were able to get that crucial reporting out there to all of your readers and the fact that your editor after the fact had a problem with it, like that only makes it even more delicious that you were able to do that through your good reporting and the problem is this here.

Problem is here. I was the only black male reporter in the entire, it's very, it's a huge problem that America's newsrooms remain overwhelmingly white, but the reason they are so white is not because the people hiring in them are racists. They would kill to have more black reporters. As a person who works in a newsroom, I would kill to have more black people writing with me,

working with me. That's not the problem. It's not because they don't wanna hire black people. It's because the only people applying for these jobs come from privileged backgrounds, which are overwhelmingly white. No, no, no no I'm sorry I'm sorry you're wrong I literally I literally listen I was a I was a net I

mean you're absolutely wrong I was a national student representative on the board of the National Association of black journalists and we sat in a room with the top headhunters they were the ones who the tv stations would hire to go hire anchors and producers and we sat there in los angeles this is march of 1990 and they're going we would love to hire more black producers and we just can't find them and literally sitting on our board were five black producers one of them oscar-nominated and this is what she said. How many do you want? Which market sizes and level of experience? She said, I can call 100 right now. So what happens is what you're saying is that it really is a it is a white media excuse because it goes to

where they recruiting. We just saw this in Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley talk about, oh, we can't find black engineers. Well, you know where they were not going? They weren't going to Spelman. They weren't going to Xavier. They weren't going to FAMU. They weren't going to Prairie View. Hold on.

So that's the struggle. Did they then not hire the people she suggested or they didn't hire them? No, because it then becomes the next excuse. See, this is, again, three times I've been a board member. I've sat in meetings where we have met with CNN. We've met with Penske Media. We've met with Verizon when they owned Oath.

I mean, I have sat in meetings with local stations, local local newspapers sitting across from white media executives who say oh We would love to hire but then all of a sudden what then happens is it then becomes where? Whiteness comes in do I know this person where they come from? Not quite so sure and then all of a sudden then you have black journalists who are in war in on Islands and then when it comes to trying to get those stories if they do get hired and try to get their stories into the to the to the papers or onto the websites or on the air then it becomes mmm you know I'm not quite sure CNN see wrong with CNN they could not find somebody go interview Winnie Mandela okay great they said Roland will you go sure I go down to Birmingham Alabama my interview Winnie Mandela

they come back and say I do the interview but 20 minutes were they go we got a problem what was the problem why didn't you ask her when she went on trial for the accusations of them putting tires around the next of people I said why i said why the y'all interviewer i said i asked winnie mandela what i want to ask willie mandela they literally said we're not gonna run the interview that's terrible i would so no no it's fine i went to john klein the president of cnn said hey they're not running the interview give me the tape i'm gonna run on my tv one show because I had a weekly show on TV one black cable network yeah black on media John said great when he Mandela dies in March of 2018 I was in it was in and Memphis covering the 50th anniversary getting ready for the 50th anniversary the cessation MLK I hear she dies we restreamed the interview the only reason you can see that

interview because I had a black on media outlet. But these were white editors deciding, oh, we don't like the fact that you didn't ask her this question. Y'all even send me questions. So therefore, we're not going to run it. And this is what I'm talking about. This is the frustration for black and minority journalists. And so, again, I read your book and I went through it. And literally every time where you put woke, I put white. And so the so the so the problem is that when we talk about what was happening is they are they are seeing America through their blue eyes or green eyes and not understanding that how you view America is different if you're black or Latino or Asian and that's why American white media is the way it is now so for me it ain't wokeness it really is the problem of whiteness and how they define what to be an American is I get I mean I think mean, I think there's a lot less daylight

between our positions than you're making it sound because I would say I'm sure that there are problems with let's say conservative white media as well in capturing certain aspects of the black experience or the Hispanic experience, but the problems don't stem from the world view. They stem from something else. So to me, wokeness is like white liberals specifically,

but I totally agree with you that there are probably problems. They come from the same pool. They come from the same pool. I mean, again, that's what I'm saying. Look, because I've been there, I've sat across from who I believe are so-called white liberal journalists. Okay, let me ask you this. Let me ask you this, okay? When you're sitting opposite white liberals versus white conservatives,

that study that I started with, right? That sort of patronizing thing that white liberals do when they're talking to black people and Hispanic people, like, doesn't that feel different than when you're talking to white conservatives? Isn't it a different thing? Nope. Because the sociologists found that white conservatives don't do that i'm not saying they don't have problems they do have their own problems but

that that patronizing thing where they look down on you from this position of like you know i have so much privilege i have to protect you conservatives don't do that they do but again it's a different it's it's it's how it comes out here's the deal if someone ignores me and then someone is paid patronizing me frankly I'm feeling the same damn way and and again I'm somebody I've actually been in that position right and so I respect that experience but I would say that you can you fix those two problems may emotionally impact you differently the same, but you fix them differently. You can't use the same thing to fix them. They need. Actually, I can actually actually I can in telling you right now the difference is you cannot have

a you cannot have american media american white media where literally 80 plus percent of those who are in charge are white men i totally agree with you and so And so that then now drives the narrative. It drives the coverage. It drives the decision making. Totally agree. And so then when you talk about what then comes out of that is, oh, now, how do we now cover this? So now if I'm a white male conservative, I may look at this differently from that so-called white ally. The problem for me is a black man

The outcome is the same and that's my problem. So how you arrive at it. I don't really care I totally agree with you. I Nowhere would I ever dispute that it's not a problem that America's newsrooms are so white. It is a total and utter failure I completely completely agree with you. I just think that the reason for that is not racism anymore in twenty twenty two. I mean, it may have been in the 90s, but it's not anymore. It's see, but see. OK, so let's let's let's unpack that.

And the reason I think is important to unpack that because you say it's not racism because this is the problem that we have when we have this conversation we go racist not racist and then that becomes the debate the problem is not racist not racist because ain't that many people you've actually met and i've met who will say, damn it, I'm racist. They're not going to say it. The problem is not that the problem is all of this in between. And that is actually the conversation we should be having, because it's what you said in terms of what's patronizing, what's paternalistic, what's paternalistic. It's also whether you're looking down on someone or ignoring someone. It's the perceptions.

It's all of those different things. I remember, it's interesting, if you look at Ken Delaney is a national security reporter for NBC News. Ken and I worked together at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. I was a city hall reporter, one of two city hall reporters. He was one of two county government reporters. And it was quite interesting how the white editors would, oh, how Ken was aggressive and he was assertive.

And he would, I mean, all these different things. That was a period where Ken was making a lot of mistakes with the run corrections in the paper but the language they use towards me was totally different it was arrogant cocky wearing your ambition on your sleeve now we literally sat right across from each other and it was very interesting just watching how the same editors looked at two reporters of the same age who were both covering political beats and how their language towards both of us was totally different. So the point I'm making is not race is not racist. It's the stuff that's in between that then begins to drive what you talk about in the book, but also to drive decision making, hiring, promotions and advancement. I mean, I hear what you're saying. To me, the stuff in between is not as important as the actual racism that still exists. That's very real.

No, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. This is where I'm sorry. Well, you're wrong. Because here's why I think you're wrong on this. Because, again, here's what America sees as racism. America sees somebody racism America sees somebody calling you the n-word America sees someone with a burning a cross in

your front yard but that's how oh that's racism they don't see it as racism by going hmm what school they came from Texas Southern University that's a that's a HBCU yeah you know what I'm gonna take this Texas A&M person they're never gonna say that's racist that is actually literally racist no no no no yes it. No, no, follow me. I know what you're saying. But they're not going to say it's racist. No, that's to me the same as saying the N word. It's saying I don't want to work with someone who's black. But no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, this black person who's from Texas A&M and not Texas Southern. Say again, but that's classism. I mean, that's that's. Well, no, because because here's the deal. There are acceptable blacks. Look, look, so it O'Brien told the story when so that really like me on her show. And I was a black executive who told her, Roland's not the right kind of black.

That's classism. That's not racism. Because it's not about race. It's about behavior. It's about something you can control. No, it's about, you know what? These are the kind of blacks we like. But that's not, that can't be about race because that's about behavior. That's about class.

That's about an attitude. That's about, you know. No, no, no. But see, you said it's about class, but here's the deal. We might come from the same socioeconomic background. The difference is that's a more palatable, you know what? Oh, he's not as militant. He's not as, he's not as militant. He's not as he's OK. He see what begins to happen, what begins that.

But the problem where it still is race is because who is the person in the position deciding those things? The struggle that I have. And again, as I was going through your book and again, as I was looking at the examples of you, we were talking about, again, coverage in the issues, even when we talk about just this notion of working class. When you meet when that phrase is used, I'll be honest with you. They talking black people. I'm not. Well, I'm a well, guess what? You are absolutely the exception, because what I can tell you is what consistently happens in American white mainstream media when there are conversations about the working class. Pretty much black people are being excluded because that phrase alone is being used not to discuss black working class. I mean, the examples are all over the place. I had to have a meeting with Senator Bernie Sanders on this when he kept talking, when he kept speaking against,

he kept talking about, he was, he kept talking about identity politics. And I was like, Senator, do you know what the hell you're actually saying? What are you, identity politics? Well, we all Americans. No, no, we're not. Because we're also being treated differently because the phrase identity politics is used the same way wokeness is used against us. Oh, Roland, you're speaking identity politics.

No, I'm not. I'm speaking reality. And so this is the struggle that I believe. You know, I believe that, again, there are some great there are some excellent points that you're making in here. I just think that it's being real that in this country, how certain phrases are used, how certain stories are skewed. It is it is oftentimes it is about how am I appealing to white voters? but I'm used but we don't even use the phrase president meets with some black

preachers what's gonna be the headline oh I see what you're saying it's gonna be president meets with black preachers but if you president white preachers it'll be the headline yeah president meets with preachers I I let, let me, let me just, I, I. Hold up, hold up, hold up. President meets with a group of black CEOs, but if he met with the CEOs of Walmart, of Apple, and let's say these other CEOs, they all white, what's going to be the headline? Right, no, that's, that's, yeah, of course. my next question for you why the two different headlines why but but to me like to me the obsession with the in-between erases the total abandonment of the black working class specifically like that i that's my whole thing is that black Americans descended from slaves have been abandoned by both sides on the altar of other stuff, other things like immigration and gay rights and like all these. But you got to add and white women.

Sure. Because again, because you got to remember the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the only reason women were included inserted in that because the Virginia, the races out of Virginia thought by adding women that was going to kill the bill. And it actually didn't. When affirmative action came along, the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action in America have been white women. I totally agree with all that. But I think where we would disagree is that I think a lot of things that white liberals promote ostensibly on behalf of black people actually hurt black people. That that's the thing that I'm trying to say, like defund the police. But, but, but you say, but who did that start with? What do you mean? Who did that start with? No. Where did that phrase, that idea, that concept, who did that start with? Somebody who really does not care about poor black people. That's not true. No, you're wrong. You're wrong.

Because we're now in a murder spike. No, no, no, no, no, no, but you're wrong. More black babies in Philadelphia died of gunshot wounds in twenty twenty one than died of covid. Like the reason that the reason you're wrong is because if that is your perception of that, that means that you have not actually talked to black people who who were talking about the very issue. I've had conversations with black people, black activists about defund the police. Defund the police does not mean get rid of the police. Defund the police actually says what you just talked about,

how do we shift resources? How is it that in most major cities, half of a city's budget goes to its police department? The question is not, okay, well, we shouldn't be dealing with that. What people are actually saying is, how do you reimagine that? How do we deal with a situation where we're sending cops to situations, and I've done this story way too many times. I have talked to too many of these mothers and

fathers, where that person dies when they actually had a mental problem as opposed to sending mental or health professionals. Why do we do that? Why are we using police officers doing parking enforcement as opposed to using people who are police officers? So again, just what you just described there is a perfect example of what has happened in white mainstream media. And that is not actually sitting with the people who are talking about that and saying, what do you actually mean by that? What does this look like? What does it mean now? Is it a phrase that the other side can take slap on a bumper sticker and use it as a negative? Absolutely. But if I talk to the people who are actually saying it, those are not white people i've heard it from black people

well i talk to working class black people and black cops all the time and what i'm hearing from the cops is that they go into these neighborhoods and ever since the defund the police movement and the new view of the cops as every single one of them being like homicidal and out for black blood they now see kids running around with guns, waving them. They're not scared of the cops anymore. And they're not ashamed of the cops anymore. And we are in a, these cities have become war zones. Children can't get to school without being shot at. They can't play in playgrounds without being shot at.

And I'm just telling you from what I am hearing on the ground, this is very connected to the defund movement. They, it's not. No, I'm telling you, I spent six years in Chicago, six years. Do you know what one of the fundamental problems in Chicago is? Tell me. One of the fundamental problems in Chicago ain't defund the police. It's not, they don't have enough cops. It's literally because the police department in Chicago has been so oppressive against black people. Black people don't trust the cops. So the deal is, you show me a city where you actually have relationships between communities and police. I'm going to show you a difference. Please, please go read the Kansas City newspaper the Kansas City Star they did an exhaustive investigation about the rampant racism in their police

department and do you know who was mostly quoted in it black cops and so in and I just came up from Kansas City and did a town hall with the Kansas City Urban League on this very issue black cops talk about it go to Philadelphia go to New York we need police reform we absolutely need police but we have a huge problem with the cops that's I'm not gonna deny that I agree what the fun the police did was it slapped people in the face and yes what didn't happen is oh my god no we're taking money from the cops no you're not and so was it difficult to explain and it was and so it was used as a negative but the problem I'm saying is

it's not that black folks are saying we don't want police they don't want to get beat up by cops they don't want to get shot by cops they don't want to get shaken down by cops and so it's a a it's a whole different nuance there. My parents were civic club founders. OK, so they dealt with cops and commanders and the police chief all the time. I can tell you since I was eight, nine and ten, I was sitting there having seen the conversations. So black people are not saying we don't want police. What they're saying is we don't want to get shot. Totally. We don't want to get beat. I totally agree with that. There's an amazing book called Ghetto Side by Jill Leovy. And she writes about how there's a sort of double-edged

sword where on the one hand, you know, black communities are over-policed on misdemeanors, which reduces trust with the cops what then happens is that when there is like a violent crime a murder a robbery a carjacking they don't want to they don't want to help the cops they don't want to participate cooperate with the cops give testimony because they don't trust them and so they can't catch killers they can't actually solve these crimes which is why the murder clearance rate when the murder victim is black is so much lower it's yes 50 lower than when they're white i totally agree with all of that who guess who does that because white conservatives and the atf

say follow me here follow me here when i'm talking about how we view things, we have not had a Senate confirmed ATF director in seven years because now these are so-called believers in law enforcement. But why is it they don't want to confirm an ATF? Who are the, Senator Cory Booker went off of them yesterday on this very issue. What I'm, so what I'm saying is when we even, even the conversation you and I are having right now, because of our backgrounds and how we look at how we grew up, we see this whole issue totally different. I can talk to people and I can actually say, oh, I see why people think defund the police is negative. But then when I actually talk to people who are dealing with it, dealing with the realities of policing. And I hear how they are explaining. I'm like, hmm, it actually makes sense in terms

of how do we shift resources. What I'm still going to argue is that I believe that, and again, yes, you and I agree on a number of things that you lay out. But what we have to be honest with is that even we talk about class, whiteness and blackness cuts across class. You can have somebody who went to a state school versus somebody who went to Harvard, who was white, and somebody might say, well, that Harvard person is an ally.

Not necessarily, because I'm telling you right now, some of the most crap that I've taken from white journalists have been yes white liberals but let me ask you something what is the defund the police's movements response to the surging crime like what is their response to that these babies being shot down easy easy well here's what you've had you've had first of all you had an explosion an explosion in the last 12 years of guns being sold in the country you had you had lured the gun lobby and those simply stating point-blank Obama's gonna get your guns exploded by is gonna get your guns you had that driving force that's one two what you had is you literally had police pissed off they're being held accountable i saw in chicago in baltimore

they were so angry as a da is there dared to hold them accountable you had deliberate slowdowns in chicago i mean i covered this they were they had an inordinate number of broken body cameras broken dashboard cameras why but what what would it what would be the difference between defund and a slowdown defund would have fewer cops no you're that's what why you're defining when you when you allocate resources you have fewer cops no first of all when you start breaking down okay have. Have you, okay. Have you ever covered, you ever covered city hall? No. Okay. Have you ever covered county government? No. Okay. So that means you've never, have you ever actually had to sit there and go through

what the police budget is? I've read through a police budget. Yes. Okay. All right. So when you actually go through a police budget, when you look at how the allocation is made, there's a, there's a significant number of things that police do that have nothing to do with fighting crime. Nothing, nothing to do. You mentioned it earlier, all those tickets. We know, we know based upon the numbers that every house that it was an average of four tickets or warrants per household in Ferguson we saw the survey all of those areas around st. Louis in st. Louis yes okay where that became an economic driving yes okay so yeah so you had that so you start going so why all of a

sudden have you seen police police chiefs say stop pulling people over over some bullshit license plate? Stop pulling people over when it comes to a taillight. I read chief say focus on crime prevention. So part of the problem is that we have given so much money to police departments and a lot of the money is going to non-major criminal activity. So when you start shifting, so in Seattle, when they said, wait a minute, why are we putting the money in the police department for parking enforcement? Put that money in a separate department to go hand out tickets how about we examine how they are using the resources so what that's what defund the police is actually saying what they're saying is San Francisco talked about it hey if you get a call and on the call they're stating

it's a mental issue don't send the cops dispatch a mental health professional okay to me that is called police reform what you just described but guess what you choose to call it police reform somebody else calls it defund the police because they're choosing to be provocative here's a deal we could call it whatever we want about you as long as we get to the same place amen but so again so that's why I'm not hung up on the phrase because you know why what I'm doing just like I did that Khalid Muhammad speech I'm listening to what they're saying I'm not going oh my god defund the police what are they saying no I'm listening to what they're saying and that to me is the problem. We have too many white journalists who aren't listening. They're bringing preconceived notions or they're bringing a perspective of the

police or someone else versus let me listen to what this person is saying. That to me, I think is a problem. So I just don't see it as wokeness. I think this idea of labeling everything wokeness, which look, you go on Fox News a lot that that is by design. It is by design, just like this whole thing with critical race theory, which we all know is bullshit. I would be very happy to go on CNN, but they won't have me. Well, guess what? Fox News won't call me. And guess what? I've had people who, Fox News will book people who I put on my show and will not call me. And I have a whole email roster of all of their shows and their producers. My agent has actually emailed Suzanne Scott, the CEO of Fox News, directly and their head of talent. They will never call. know why because the perspective

that i'm offering we're talking about right now fox news does not want on their air they don't and so this is they have they have people from black lives matter on all the time no no no no see it because he right okay bye it's okay do you know why they have them on there you know why they have them on there they let them know why they have them on there? They let them have their say. No, no, they don't. Yes, they do. No, they don't. When the Fox News was created, Roger Ailes created an institution where he says, first of all, our anchors always win.

Two, we are going to place people on to purposely put them in an antagonist position. That's why. They don't. I'm trying. Look, I'm giving you a lot of I watch a lot of Fox. And, you know, you have like, first of all, they have a lot of black hosts, but also they let people have their say and then they disagree with them if they don't. OK, I'm telling you how that system is set up. And I'm telling you exactly you could talk to produce i've had the conversations with

former black talent and actually black producers at the network trust me fox news will net no this is what they said about me he's different he's different so what we're dealing with right now i'm telling you is which is the struggle in this country when it when it comes to. Can I just say something like I don't I don't sit here and say like, you know, CNN won't put me on because I'm Jewish. Like they don't want my point of view, but that's not like it's not it's just they just don't want it. But that's totally fair. Like, I don't hold that against them. They don't want it. And I'll go back and I'll say it again. I go back. Fox News likes certain types of black people.

I'm telling you. I mean, and you know what I'm quoting? I'm quoting people who worked at Fox News who have told me. Who have told me. Right. And that's what we're dealing with. So this issue in media, this issue that we have in media again i'm sorry i don't believe it's wokeness i believe what it is is it is there are people who

are in positions of power who see the world in a different way they want to frame the world in their way in through their lens through perspective. They're unwilling to actually bring people to the table who might bring a different perspective. And even when, and I'll tell you, one of the issues that we face, even when you talk about some black people at the table, it's a black person who they're comfortable with who also sees the world similar to them.

So they're not gonna really try to upset the apple cart. It's a struggle in media. I'm telling you. And I'm saying this in so many ways. I'm so grateful to you for letting me come on and debate this with you. It was really, really generous of you to read the book and share your opinions with me about it. I'm very grateful. I'm very honored. Well, you know what? I'll say this here. There are a few people I think you ought to talk to. You ought to talk to Tim Wise or Jane Elliott. But I tell you, so I mean, so I appreciate, again, writing it. But what I really hope, I really hope, again, looking at, again, how the difference in terms of how a lot of white

journalists are viewing these stories compared to a lot of black journalists and trust me there's a mega struggle look our nabj convention is in uh in las vegas uh in august trust me you drop on by i think you're gonna hear some hell of a stories for your next book i'll come i'll come all right the book is bad news how woke media is undermining democracy. Batra, I appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you, sir. Folks, I certainly hope you enjoy that conversation. Coming up next, I sit down with two of those alpha brothers of mine. talk about the role and the importance of black professionals in corporate America and how they can move forward and advance themselves but also black America you're watching Roland Martin

unfiltered right here on the black star network we're all impacted by the culture, whether we know it or not. From politics to music and entertainment, it's a huge part of our lives. And we're going to talk about it every day right here on The Culture with me, Faraji Muhammad, only on the Black Star Network. We welcome you to the launch of the Mass Poor People's Low Wage Assembly and Mara March on Washington, D.C., June 18, 2022. We are a new unsettling force and we are powerful. A new unsettling force and we are here. We're rising up to demonstrate the compelling power

that we poor and low-income people have to reconstruct society from the bottom up. And we need to do it with the loudest voices possible, the biggest actions possible. Because we know that there is no scarcity in this land. The only scarcity is the moral will to do what's right. We are those with sub-minimum wage jobs who can't afford sky-high rent. People with disabilities are the fastest growing minority group. It's crazy to me that in 2021, it's still legal for workplaces to pay a sub-minimum wage to people with disabilities. There is still so much trial and tribulations that we go through as indigenous people.

We can't get a decent wage to sustain ourselves, nor can we get adequate housing. Veterans across this nation say enough is enough. We can't pat essential workers on the back on one day and then cut their health care the next day. Health is a political choice. What more do I need to do to prove that my voice is just as valuable as anyone else's? There are still forces in denial that would try to slow walk our transition to a clean economy and a just future for us all. We have an immoral system run by immoral people. But together we walk and we walk and we fight.

It's time for a change! Reconstruyamos esta gran nación! See, we are people of resilience as we fight these interlocking injustices together. When we work together, mobilize together, and rise together, we become a voice for the voiceless, and we become an agent of change in a time where great change is needed. We need the third reconstruction to ensure that deaf people, people with disabilities, and all people can have the right to live and to thrive. We know what they are doing, but the question is, what are we going to do? Reconstruction begins when we change our mentality and say it's time for you to get your foot off of my neck.

I know justice is coming soon. Do you believe that or today? next on a balanced life we're talking everything from prayer to exercise to positive affirmations and everything that's needed to keep you strong and along your way that's on a next a balanced life with me dr jackie on black star network We'll be right back. We put tin in here? Tin, and you don't come out until you die. And you eat him, he'll be in. Oh my God. Thank you. All right, folks, welcome back. Roland Martin on Filtered on the Black Star Network. Black professionals are in corporate America in a variety of ways, but it's not always an easy thing for them to be there.

Well, my next two guests have a book that details how they can actually succeed in corporate America. Here's my conversation with Randall Pinkett and Jeffrey Robinson, the authors of the book Black Faces in High Places, 10 Strategic Actions for Black Professionals to Reach the Top and Stay There. Watch this conversation. All right, gentlemen, let's get right into it. First of all, when you say black faces in high places, there's a reality. I think about Ellis Coase's book, The Rage of a Privileged Class, which was that first generation of African-Americans in corporate leadership, where pretty much the highest they could go was to be VP of community affairs. And so how does one go from being just a black face to being a decision maker, someone who is actually driving the bottom line of a company? Well, first, I want to acknowledge that one of the inspirations for this book and the predecessor book, Black Faces in White Places, was Ellis Coase's book,

The Rage of a Privileged Class. We in some ways wanted to revisit the very same themes that Coase explored but in the 21st century in a 2020-2022 context, arguably a post-George Floyd context for Black faces in high places. And I think to your question, Roland, nowadays it's less about how do you determine the barriers, what the glass ceiling metaphor represented was. The glass says you can see to the top, but can't get there. And the ceiling says you have a limit. We have people who have broken through the glass ceiling. So now it's more about how do we understand what we know to be those challenges and how do we equip this generation with the tools to apply the lessons that we've learned for those who've been successful without ignoring,

and this is important, without ignoring that there are still barriers that exist and that is not just incumbent upon African Americans to figure out how do I navigate, it's also incumbent upon these corporations and organizations and government agencies to eliminate those very barriers that make it more difficult for us than it does for others. But with that, what we are still dealing with is the reality in that some glass ceilings have been broken. But I think back I was talking to a friend of mine who talked about the Executive Leadership Council and you have all these black folks in corporate America, but their own internal study showed that many of

them, by the time they reach 55, they're being moved out of these positions and they're not actually going to the next level. And so, you know, the question is, are we really challenging these corporations to be better or are we still just sort of happy when one or two are in these positions, Jeffrey? Yeah, this is critical. We are not happy when we see that there's only one or two. At least that's our premise in the book. It's like, how do we get more? How do we get more to the top? How do we get more through those barriers? And more importantly, how do we get more to the top? How do we get more through those barriers? And more importantly, how do we get more that are community conscious, community engaged at that level? Because think about all the resources that would be available to our communities if we

had more Black faces in high places. I mean, that's the challenge. A lot of people want to use that phrase that we use in the title of the book in the negative um where we you know we have people who are at the top but they're not being uh conscious or not being engaged in our in our own communities uh and what we want to flip that on the head and say that uh what we're promoting in the book what we've highlighted in the book what we show people is that you can get to the top and and be uh engaged in the community provide uh the the guidance uh and the support that we all want so uh you know there's one last thing the the elc and others have documented the challenges you've said um and so some of the the work that we do in the book is to elaborate on what happens in the middle of the organization.

There's some plateaus people hit. How do you break through those plateaus? How do you leverage who you are, your identity for helping the company, but also for helping yourselves? And then there's also the pivots that we see people make from corporations into their own businesses, which is also vitally needed. So both of those are ways to achieve those heights that we're talking about in the book. See, one of the things that bothers me is, Randall, when you talked about that, this post George Floyd, we saw all of these commitments, anywhere from ranging from 20 to 30 to $50 billion. And all of these folks, again, companies making these announcements about

what they were going to do when it comes to social justice. And I can tell you, as somebody who's been very active in challenging corporations when it comes to black owned media. I can tell you some of our biggest obstacles haven't been white folks in companies. It's been black folks. We've literally been on calls and, oh, well, when the black person goes, well, you know, I don't know. You know, we're all in sort of controversial. And my sales guys ago will go, yeah, but but you guys spend money on CNN MSNBC and Fox News so what are you actually saying and we're sitting there going really we're like to the black person shut the hell up like what are you doing and so you

know I've even been saying that you know this is not this black owned media it's if black boards of directors what are you actually doing are you challenging company to say are you using doing? Are you challenging a company to say, are you using black transportation companies, black catering companies, black event planners, and going down the line? And my whole point is we didn't fight for black folks to get in these positions, to be on boards,

and to be in a C-suite for them not to say something while they're there. That's right. That's right. Now, you're singing from the same hymnal that we're singing from, Roland. I don't think it's being too grandiose to say that George Floyd's murder was a Rosa Parks moment for our generation. Right now, we're sitting in the moment,

begging the question, is this a movement and what is or is not our responsibility and our opportunity in this moment? And you know, Public Enemy said it best, every brother ain't a brother. The old adage, all skinfolk ain't kinfolk. There is not just a reckoning happening racially in our society. There is a reckoning happening within our community that is differentiating between those who are willing to help people who look like them and those who are operatives, plants, that they

are representation, but they're not representing. And our book is here to do many things, but among them two things, Roland. First is to say, if you are at the table, you have a responsibility to be an advocate for the issues that affect our community, because somebody sacrificed for you to be there in the first place.

And second is when you have these levers of power at your disposal as a black face in a high place to bring on black companies, to advocate for black media, to support future black leaders, at the end of the day, if you're not pulling the levers on behalf of our community, somebody else is pulling the levers on behalf of theirs. And so be unapologetic and intentional and strategic about how you do that because everyone else is following the same playbook. See the reason why I've been really hitting this thing hard because at the end of the day, it comes down to the money. mean america i i said this

america really ain't got a problem with us talking about police reform they ain't got a problem with us talking about oh criminal justice reform they really don't have a problem with us talking about a little suppression but when you get to the money it's a whole different conversation coretta scott king often said that they killed my martin when he started talking about the money and the thing that i have been challenging folks on is that if we are not having a money conversation if you are sitting in an ad agency and you know the inside game, you know how they are purposely trying to create the specs that push us out. You've got to be able to say, how can I change that? in a company it just can't be about your stock options and what you're making and sending your child when if you're in a position where you can actually create uh the level of generation of

wealth that's needed and to me that requires a level of consciousness walking in to say look uh i need to i need to leave some footprints and some fingerprints but I'm no longer here but but again to me that's a mindset that's consciousness yes yeah you're you're right on and in fact one of the things that we try to get people to do in the book is to start inside then come out so you know in the the way that we write, we've written our last two books now is, you know, we intro the book, trying to put some context around why we're writing this book, but then we go into 10 strategic actions. In this case, the first three actions are all inside. What kind of inside work? Understanding and being and thinking about self-determination in our

relationship to one another as a means towards understanding what our responsibilities are when we leverage our might. So we give you great strategic actions to do things, but it's in a context of a consciousness, absolutely, that connects us to our brothers and sisters, not only here in the United States, but even around the world. So it's a global diaspora. So that, to me, puts a point on what you were just saying, is that by the time you get to those higher levels and make some of those things, if you haven't done that self-discovery, if you haven't made those connections, then yeah, we get what we we've been getting the change is that there's some young people who are coming along who are asking us the question if i want to be one of those folks who's at the

high parts of the organization do i have to sell out and we're here to say you don't in fact you need not only be strategic and authentic you need to be unapologetic because it's a new day. And there are some things that we've got to bring to the table. Right. That community engagement, those resources and thinking about how what you're doing connects, whether that's in corporate America or in your own organizations or in the social sector. And that's that's the golden thread throughout this entire book. I always had this. First of all, I've long said that everybody ain't built for white places. I mean, and that's important to say.

I've always said that I know I can never thrive in a corporate environment. Here's why. Because one, my grandmother had a catering business. My mom had a cake business. Multiple aunts and uncles have had their own businesses. And I've always operated from an entrepreneurial mindset. And an entrepreneurial mindset is different from a corporate mindset now I think a lot of people have to understand who am I as an individual what type of person I am how do I see this and so I think that there are frustrations y'all can talk about that have you all encountered that where you've encountered people who have been frustrated operating in corporate America and never realized that they really were never destined to be in corporate America. They

really were builders and creators and they were really operating out of frankly their skill set. They were operating out of their calling. Absolutely. When we wrote the first book, Black Faces in White Places, which you graciously wrote the foreword for that book, Roland, thank you for that. We launched an institute called the Redefine the Game Institute, which taught mid-career Black professionals how to apply the 10 strategies in that first book. And what we've seen from that program is, as Dr. Robinson said, people doing that self-reflection and introspection to realize what you've just illuminated,

which is that when you do the deeper work to ask the hard questions, what's my path? What's my mission? What's my purpose? How am I rooted in my identity? They realize that where I am is not where I belong. And we talk in Black Faces in High Places about two mindsets, which you referenced. First, the entrepreneur's mindset, which is Strategic Action 8. But we also talk about Strategic Action 7, the intrapreneur's mindset that brings the same thinking of an entrepreneur entrepreneur but realizes I'm operating in an established organization that has certain rules and

norms and cultural standards you have to do that inner work not only because it's essential to sustaining yourself along what is a very arduous journey but because two things we found from the research. One, when you do the inner work, you find a better alignment between your calling and your path. And believe it or not, when you find that alignment, you also are more likely to be further propelled in your career compared to those who take one for the team, sacrifice for the organization, compromise something of themselves. All the research shows when you find that alignment, in Strategic Action 3, we call it Ikigai. It's a Japanese concept that talks about your meaning and your purpose. When you find your meaning and your purpose, it will propel you to do your best, be your best, and find the best path forward for you. you i remember when i was uh when i was at cnn uh we i had announced um that i was doing this a line

of um uh ascots uh bow ties and ties for the black owned company and i remember uh we were i was we were waiting on something and i was um on the um outside of one of the studios and uh David Borman who was then I think was an executive vice president senior vice president he's Washington bureau chief he turns to me and he goes now you know you're rolling if you were full time at CNN you wouldn't be able to do all of these things because it was that I had speeches. I had, I published my own books and I turned to him and I leaned in. I said, and mind you, Dave was like six, five, you know, 300 pounds, big guy. And I leaned in and I said, and that's why I'll never be full time. And, and they were sort of, it was sort of like, like, you know, like, damn, I can't believe he's saying this.

And there was another time when they they wanted me. They did. They didn't want to give me a show, but they wanted to create my own segment on the Situation Room. And I was like, OK, that's great. I said, you know what? We can incorporate my travel around the country when I'm giving speeches, because typically a lot of times when I'm there, governors and mayors and county judges and CEOs are there. They were like, no, no, no, no, no. This has to be in studio. I said, oh, I'm sorry. So y'all want me to give up my speaking income to do a segment that's in the studio, but you ain't replacing my speaking income. I said, ain't gonna be a segment and they were they were shocked they were like whoa i mean he he's women we're seeing in he he he's tell us

no and there was a meeting of the direct reports to the uh worldwide ceo jim walton and jim and i always got along great and somebody somebody was offended when they heard this. And Jim said, no, no, no, no. He said, Rowley did not decline to do the segment. What he said was, we have to replace the money. That's right. Now, there are a lot of us who were in these corporate environments who would have sacrificed that's right that's right the external money for the segment and i've always said hell no never do that because that shows value and again that's one of those decisions that when you are in a year and look i was one of the most visible uh uh uh on air contributor not as black but across the board the research indicated that i was one of the most visible uh uh uh uh on-air contributor not just black but across the board

the research indicated that i was one of the most recognizable faces on cnn in the top 10 and i was the only one the top team without the show but what i also understood was i'm not going to walk away from another revenue stream to make y'all happy you're going to have to replace the money and so part of this this thinking is also knowing your value and knowing when not to give up something on the promise that you might get something uh down the line yeah that's that's powerful statement you said and it And it's one of those things that people don't get, Black people, Black professionals coming into the organization don't get to hear what you just said unless they have a strong mentor. thinking about self-determination, thinking about how they are defining themselves as opposed to letting a whole bunch of other folks define who you are or what your value is. So, we're trying to fill some of that gap with this book

because everybody doesn't have an uncle Roland Martin to tell them that, hopefully they're watching the show. But that's the piece that is missing uh when we're interacting with some of these mid-level professionals and and on top of it we people are suffering physically for it their health is is is uh is failing um and they're having challenges and feeling all this stress because they're they're trying to be things that they're not that aren't true to themselves um and you know some of the social psychologists talk about uh putting on these masks every day right more companies are moving this way and saying we want more authentic people but when they say that i hope they are realizing that they are going to

get some to do this inclusion they're going to get some things they weren't expecting perhaps now they don't really want that i mean they don't they don't that's that's that's they don't really want i mean i i i i think back when i worked at the fort worth star telegram i was city hall reporter and um the publisher rich connor had um so the managing editor left and the person who should have flat i mean it wasn't even a conversation uh my man ken should have gotten i mean he was the city editor he was a state editor he was a system managing editor um everybody loved he I mean he had all their credentials the publisher picks a columnist who had never been an editor on any level in her career including college I mean if you put the resumes side-by-side Debbie price could not even touch Ken bunting I mean that matter of fact

you would take her resume off the table so so the publisher the publisher picks her and so he come out to the newsroom and he makes this announcement and I'm pissed. I ain't hiding it. My body language is like, this is some bullshit. Now mind you, I'm only, I'm two years out of college. So in the meeting, in the meeting, I look at Ken and Ken sort of has this look like, Roland, it's gonna be okay.

And I'm like damn that there's this moment for Q&A I started hitting the publisher with questions and they were like damn roll so when the meeting so when the meeting is over you know all of these people are walking up to her congratulating her I walk right past her ass and i go sit down and they were like roland what are you doing i said my conscience can't front i said i can't congratulate somebody who did not actually deserve the job and then they were like well you know why are you so hard on the publisher i said let me explain something y'all when you hire a pit bull a pit bull is a pit bull outside the building and in the building a pit bull don't stop being a pit bull just because we on the inside of the house and i have to always remind

folks of that and i'm like so yeah don't talk about bring your authentic self when they really don't actually want your authentic self they want you to temper your authentic self so they don't want you challenging diversity in the company the way you would outside they don't want you pushing them to do better when it comes to contracting because it's going to get to a point, damn, why are they always pushing it? Well, you know who you hired, right? Well, I would add and argue, though, Roland, that I do believe in the post-George Floyd era, there is this new context that we're operating in that has given... I'm not saying that they want our full authentic self. That's not what I'm about to say.

I am saying that the ball is further down the field for the tolerance and the significance of certain organizations, not all, but certain organizations that are trying to do a better job of meeting people where they are, recognizing that in the great resignation, if you're not amenable to the growing diversity of our society, you're losing top talent to somebody else. And so I think we are more emboldened, not fully emboldened, but we are more emboldened in the post-George Floyd era than ever before. And I believe there are some organizations that are more legitimately committed, even if they are misguided and misdirected in how they are executing on that agenda, that we're in a new environment now. And I say that to say this, to our earlier conversation,

we can't shy away from that window of opportunity because that window is right now. If we're not emboldened and strategic and unapologetic now, then when else can we be? The window, the moment is now. Right. And I think the reason, I mean, look, the second anniversary of George Floyd's death was Wednesday.

And and you have these commitments and you have all these people who are who are talking about these things that are happening. I've sort of framed this moment. As the third reconstruction, John Hope Bryant, we've talked about that. Reverend Dr. William Barber has as well. And part of the thing, I think, for a lot of people, especially a lot of Black people, they ain't got no clue what the hell the reconstruction period is. After the election of Trump in 2016, I was at a panel, D.C., and mostly mostly white it's probably about five black people in the whole room and I brought up the reconstruction not I think probably one white person the whole room knew the hell I was talking about and and then we had the second reconstruction that was a 13 year period from Emmett Till's well actually I would actually push it back to a 14 year period from Emmett Till's, well actually I would actually push it back to

a 14 year period Brown versus Board of Education one and two going all the way through the assassination of Dr. King and the Fair Housing Act and affirmative action. And so what I've been saying is that we need to be looking at this period as a 20, a minimum, a 20 year period, a reconstruction period, which now means post George Floyd we only two years into the 20 which means that we as African-American professionals cannot up to your point Randall allow this moment to sort of dissipate that's right because we've got to keep that foot on the pedal got to keep that foot on the pedal, got to keep that foot on the net saying, no, no, no, we ain't letting up.

Because I go back to the first reconstruction. It lasted 10, 12 years. W.E.B. DuBois put it at 20. But five to six years in, white folks like, look, we don't pass enough laws. Look, look, look, we fine. Okay, can we move on to something else and it began to wane and then of course by the great compromise of 1877 we saw what happened that's what we cannot

do this actually is the moment that's right that we have to actually get people to understand if you cannot maximize this moment. Yes. You black in corporate America, you will not have another moment in your career. That's exactly right. This is it, Dr. Robinson. Yeah, yeah, no, you said it.

And I know I've been saying this is in the book and that's in the book, but we get to a similar point and break down, you know, six different ways in which you can leverage the moment. You know, talking about how you're connecting, you know, your corporations and organizations and social sector organizations to our community, to the community and the diaspora through the supplier diversity type of programs. Again, we tick off all these different ways. And if we don't those who are in the room when those decisions are being made,

if we don't bring those things up, who else is going to do it? Yeah. Who else is going to do it? Yeah. So this is the time we put together something that we think gives people a guide. And we're very, you know, you got a couple of engineers here with you today. And so we start thinking very analytically about steps and processes and levels to get people to think about it in a very strategic way. But however people get to it, what we're trying to encourage is a consciousness for as you get to those places at the higher parts of the organization,

no matter what that is and how you should act and think about some of those different aspects we've been saying here today. Yeah, it is a, you know, and look, I get, and I hear all the time, people like, yeah, Ro, you know, man, we can't all be like you. I'm like, I company solely through the prism of you. You cannot be that selfish where it's only about you and your check and your money. Yes, you have a responsibility to do your job and to do it well. Yes, you have a responsibility to increase shareholder value. I had this conversation this week about Macy's and all the positive press of them putting these dresses out and clothing

in sorority colors. And I said, the sister who works there, who's gotten credit for that, she's a Zeta. I said, she's a buyer on the dress side. She's doing her job. I said, but it doesn't mean that we also, while praising that, driving $10 million or more in revenue, Macy's aren't also challenging them on what's your black owned media spend? How are you? What other black vendors are you using? That's right. You buy, you're buying racks and coat hangers.

Are there any black owned companies doing that? Again, you're putting on in-store displays. Are you using black uh event planning companies black catering companies what what i am arguing is that we have we've got to have black folks who are within these spaces whether we're talking about and the same goes to corporate america excuse me uh the federal government or state government or county government or city government because you also have contracting i'm on the federal level 560 billion being spent every year on contracts black people getting 1.67 so you've got to be in a federal agency or you've

got to be a cbc member or you got to be in the white house saying hey hey hold up how we spending 560 billion dollars a year in federal contracts and black owned companies are getting 1.67 why black owned media getting one percent of the billion dollars in contracts? What that means is I'm still doing my job. I'm still getting paid. I'm still taking care of my family, but I'm also recognizing that there is a collective here because if I am not then influencing and leveraging the company's spend, and I'm not seeing an increase for Black-owned businesses, truth be told, I'm not actually helping Black America. That's right.

Yeah, you know, my biggest criticism after George Floyd's murder of the commitments that you referenced earlier that many corporations and organizations made, and I actually did an op-ed on CNN in an entire video, Seven Myths of Racial Equity, where I said, if your commitment is only to addressing social issues and not economic issues, it is insufficient and unacceptable. In other words, we run to the program, the philanthropy, the giving.

And there's nothing wrong with that. Let me be clear. I mean, we support that. But if all you're doing is philanthropy and giving and social programs, you've completely missed where the real action is, which is the economics. The lifeblood of corporations, the lifeblood of our country, of our society is dollars and cents. If it don't make dollars, it don't make sense. And so I looked at all the commitments through the lens, or to use your word, the prism

of, is this going to have an economic impact? And is it going to create jobs? Is it going to create wealth? And is it going to create intergenerational wealth? And in the book, we talk ad nauseum about this idea of intergenerational wealth as perhaps the signature measure of whether an initiative, an investment, a commitment is legitimately going to transform our community or if it has a fleeting effect. I want to stay right there because I have a segment, Jeffrey, called, and I use the hashtags, um, black economic social justice. Right. And I say, use a hashtag.

Where's our money? But then I use the hashtag. I'm not satisfied and I'm not satisfied comes from the movie Malcolm X. So that scene when brother Johnson had been beaten by the cops and then Malcolm X played by Denzel demands that they call the ambulance so he can get treatment so the ambulance arrived and they take brother Johnson to the hospital and then a white cop comes up to Denzel and says all right you got what you want you can leave now he goes no I'm not satisfied I think it says on to the hospital. Right. What I keep saying, not just to Black people,

but I have said this directly to Black civil rights organizations, you cannot go into situations and negotiate MOUs that are about you receiving a check mm-hmm because the check that you're receiving is white philanthropy and the problem with that is we cannot succeed we cannot survive on white philanthropy right because if I start breaking down numbers, if you are a company and you got a market cap of $250 billion, and then you are saying, we're gonna provide $2 million to institution

over five years, well, that's 400,000 a year. But over here, you spending $3 billion on advertising. Right. In fact, I broke this down. And so the Urban League announced this initiative with Pepsi, where they were going to stand up black owned restaurants, their foundation, five years, $10 million in grants. As you say, totally supported. Then they have this initiative where they wanted to drive $100 million in receipts to black owned restaurants over five years. Now, part of the problem is that they got no way

of actually measuring that as to what is like, are you using a promo code or something? So how do we know that your commercials and spots are actually responsible for those receipts that came from every one of the black people who own the own advisory committee but then i began to break it down i said so y'all we ran the numbers i said pepsi spends three billion dollars a year on advertising i said if black owned media i said if we got five percent got 5%, just 5% of the 3 billion spend. I said, that completely dwarfs that $10 million commitment over five years to the Urban League, and then even $100 million over five years

for the Black-owned restaurants. I said, so now, what does that now look like when we're getting contracts see philanthropy that's it right here contracts are here not all of a sudden if we're now getting annually 750 million dollars 500 million in contracts we can buy our own damn tables and mean i mean that you're right and that's and that's how i'm trying to get a lot of these brothers and sisters who in these companies to think like don't get hype because the company made a five million dollar commitment when they could literally use black owned companies and drive 500 million annually into these companies, which impacts hiring. So now all of a sudden we're lowering the black unemployment rate because we're likely

to hire those who are our own. Then like in my case, I'm using black vendors, black lighting, black set designer. So all of a sudden my capital my my in my revenue increases i'm not using other black vendors so i'm now circulating that dollar that's how getting but see a lot of people go damn i never thought about like that because they're caught up in the height of the philanthropy yeah yeah those five and ten million dollar uh million commitments that I've seen, you know, the drops in the bucket, you know, let's, let's get 10, 15, 20% of that spend on these different categories or more going towards your black and brown businesses. It is, you know, it is, it is

one of the challenges. No, no, no, I ain't got no, no. I want to go to the black businesses I understood I need the whole deal if you want to fight for Brown knock self out I've literally been in meeting laws like yo roll here for black people I got you I got you wrong is that that. Roll hip or black heel. My point is that it's all about philanthropy versus where the real dollars are. Let's get into some of the contracting. Both Dr. Pinkett and I work with National Minority Supplier Development Council, various programs. And the commitments that are made within organizations along those lines are all in the contracting side. Fine.

Sponsor the program or the training initiative or things along those lines. That's great. That does capacity building. But once we have our businesses ready and onto that next level, now let's open up the floodgates on those contracts. Because that's where we make a difference. That's where the generational wealth can be developed. Where the jobs can be created. That's where we, you know, we start to be able to take a better control of things and

happening in our community. And, and if you want to see, this is the other thing. And if you want to those black folks who are in one of these corporate positions guess what you now are also creating other places for you to get hired see that's see that's the other deal when when when all of a sudden you're we are leveraging your position in these places if you just have to retire at 55 or 58 and guess what you're not being you're not the ceo or the ceo of the company but guess what you may transition to this black owned company that's doing 100 million 200 300 million in revenue and you now can grow that company so now there's a place for you to land right now this is pre-cover I said it. You got 2.6 million Black-owned businesses in America, 2.5 million got one employee. That's right.

So it's really only 95% of all Black-owned businesses doing less 5 million revenue or less. So the part of the problem is, and y'all talk about David Stewart, Kathy Hughes, Bob Johnson was at BET. The reality is those are unicorns for black people because the fact of the matter is we have few black businesses with capacity and so these black faces in these white places have an opportunity to yeah drive those contracts in dollars and revenue and now all of a sudden you're building black on black capacity which could be very well the places that you could transition to to run yeah you know i i i wanted i want to echo in in the labyrinth on this this important point i remember one of my mentors uh bob blackwell

who at the time was running i think the, the 50th largest Black-owned business in the country, Blackwell Consulting Services out of Chicago. But Bob said to me, he said, I don't understand why some of these Black corporate executives don't hire me, because I'm the first person they call when they get let go. Boom. Let me tell you something. Um I'm gonna say this with pride, you know, because of Bob's

mentorship and because of his uh investment, you know, what people perhaps don't know is that Doctor Robinson and I have been business partners for for 30 years. We have two other partners, Lawrence and Dallas. We started when we were in college and we've been together now for 30 years in business. And we now run, last time Black Enterprise ran their top 100, we sat at number 92 on the list. And we're moving up. Let me tell you right now, we're moving up. They got to gotta put that next one out we'll probably be around 70 or 60 or so but my point is this is we started early because the seeds of entrepreneurship were planted in us at a very young age and so the other piece of of you know the mindset of

the corporate executive who's missing the opportunity to invest in black businesses needs to be juxtaposed against the message to our young people that you can and should consider entrepreneurship as your path. Interestingly, the number one predictor of whether you will own a business is not your race, your income, your education, your geography, or your nationality. It's if your parents owned a business. There you go. And so not only is wealth it can it be intergenerational the mindset of an entrepreneur is intergenerational the more entrepreneurs we create the more Entrepreneurs we will create because that's the greatest predictor of being an entrepreneur in a business owner and that's how we create more wealth

Yeah, and it's just this is this this is, it's amazing. You know, we keep going back to, uh, both of you have used this, I've used this and it is the word that too many people really just ignore. It is mindset. It is mindset. And again, I am not, I am not saying, I will never say that the people who the black folks who are on the air at ABC, Robin Roberts, Michael Strahan. If you talk about Joanne Reed, Tiffany Cross, Rashida Jones is a president of MSNBC. I've as a as a three time board member of NABabj life member now in the hall of fame i've been pushing for us to be in those spaces while at the same time saying we got to have a strong robust black on media right two things can be happening at the same time because because here's the reality you talk about uh those folks uh you know calling bob but look here's the deal. Some of those same folk have told me,

damn, Roe, you get to say some stuff I can't. The thing is, I don't have to go ask somebody else for permission, can I go cover this story? Because I own the company. That's right. I don't have to ask anybody. And so the thing is, I think that there has to be this this mindset of, yes, if I am in a corporate if I am in a corporate position. And I know for a fact that we are hiring people externally.

Look at what the brother at Coke tried to do when it came to the law firms trying to force them to diversify and he was like no no we're going to tie it to the money and see this is where again leadership comes in if you do not tie changes to your practices to their money to their pocketbook to their bonuses al newhart did it with usa today and gannett when he said we're going to be the leading company in america when it comes to diversity and he said and if some of y'all got a problem with me tying your bonuses to diversity you can leave the company yes that's that's how that's how gannett came and then and if he had middle managers who were blocking it they got replaced Hmm and Gannett and here's what happened when Gannett did that all of a sudden

Knightritter Cox and the other media companies like damn we gonna have to do the same thing because we're about to lose our Black and brown talent. That's right. That's exactly what happened. So one decision Can literally affect the entire industry. If you're the heavyweight, I spoke at Walmart, MLK program two or three years ago. I said, a CEO was sitting right there. I said, y'all can literally change corporate America. You ain't going to ask permission because you that big. Right. I said, so what happened? I said, but you got to make the call. You got to make a decision. And that's how we using that power. Got to ask you this here in terms of. I ask this question in any book interview that I do. What was your wow moment when you were talking to people, you were researching? Jeffrey, I'll start with you. What was that moment? It could have been more than one, it happens, that even you went,

wow, that's crazy. Well, I got one. It's crazy in a good way, but it just reinforced something that I already knew about the power of mentoring. Some people know the story of Kathy Hughes. We've had it in movies. We've seen it written and on TV. And Kathy Hughes, amazing entrepreneur. But one of the things I didn't realize was that one of her mentors was John Johnson of Ebony Magazine.

Yep. And how that relationship developed over time um i had not seen that written about i had not seen that talked about but the fact is you know she was in radio he was obviously ebony and jet magazine and she said she learned so much from him and then when he was interested in going into radio he came back and talked to her and so it talked about how how in our community you know we need to make sure that this mentoring is going on because the power of having a John Johnson talk to you and give you advice while you're developing your own empire is amazing.

And she said, frankly, she learned some things about how what not to do. She she'd say she talked to us about how she wanted to make sure that that she as she passed on the business to the next generation, that it would have a long lasting legacy, that it would move and change with the times. And again, you know, we sort of know the story of Ebony and Jenny, even though it's being reborn, that some of that has to do with uh not changing your with the times the business has to keep up with the technology so that to me was was a fantastic example of some of the themes that we talked about in the book you know how the how to maximize mental

that's not and i see it's funny you said that because uh uh in ed lewis's book, he talks about how John A. Johnson wanted to destroy Essence. And he began to buy up the shares of some of the initial founders of Essence. And so he said they had to put a poison pill in play to stop John A. Johnson. And it was hilarious because when essence got sold ed lewis said the the person the the person slash company that benefited the most financially from the sale of

essence wasn't him as a co-founder it was john a johnson and evan so so i so i think yeah johnny johnson was mentoring k Kathy because she wasn't in magazines. Well, that may be true. Well, I can continue the theme because my wow moment piggybacks off this Black-owned media theme. We interviewed Kathy, and we also interviewed Bob Johnson, founder of BET. And I think we're the first book to tell the story

that at one point, and you're probably aware of this Roland, that at one point BET and Radio One attempted a merger. Yeah, you're the second book. Brett Pulley's book, The Billion Dollar Bet, Authorized Biography of BET, uh talked about it but go ahead there you go so it it was not a story that i was familiar with uh and we're proud to tell it uh and and and to tell the story i mean i mean they had all the legal paperwork drawn up uh they were ready to consummate this deal that would have been at its time an unprecedented coming together of two black owned media companies that would have had advertisers standing at their doorstep because they would have had television and radio covered for the black community. And in their words, not ours, this deal fell apart because of egos. And there's a lesson that we unpack in the telling of that story around this kind of this difficulty. And again, I've been a business owner for 30 years

that we can sometimes experience where we start debating how much are you going to get at the deal and how much are you going to get at the deal and and my message our message in the book is look folks a hundred percent of nothing is nothing i would rather rather have 50% of a of an enterprise than 100% of of of a tugboat. You know, so, we say cast aside the pettiness and the posturing and the politics and the personalities and see the bigger picture that and you know and at BCT, our company, 2019, we did our first acquisition. This year, we did our first acquisition this year.

We'll do two more acquisitions because we got the memo that the way for us to scale our black owned business is not just by building it with our bare hands. Or M and a it's M and a it's M and a it's, it's buying it's merging, it's acquiring, and that means you've got to put the egos aside but that is but that is that again when we when you look at um when you look at the folks who are operating in corporate america uh and and i've said this and i've yelled it from the from the mountaintops that one of the greatest problems we have is we have black companies that are operating in silos hmm silos silos are killing us silos and I say it how are we not merging if that's what's happening in mainstream what the

hell are we doing mm-hmm that's right yeah and just just talk further about, again, your biggest advice to somebody who right now is 40-ish in corporate America. Yeah, I'll tell you, the first thing they need to do is to check out this concept in our book that talks about, we took, Randall mentioned it earlier, eka guy, where it brings into alignment, you know, where your skills, it's a self-assessment, where your skills, what are you passionate about, what can you get paid for, you know, what does the world need, because the self-assessment is important, because if you're in corporate America, and you're not happy, you got to make an assessment as to what are the things that are going to be happy, help you to be happy, So that will be the first step. And the second step that goes along with that is to really evaluate your networks, your mentors, your sponsors, the people who are in your life,

who are giving you advice and support career-wise. No matter what your path is going forward, whether you pivot out of corporate America, whether whether you stay within it you're going to need to have robust networks and fantastic mentors and sponsors who are helping you guide your way so those are things you've got to do um if you're in that in that 40th 40th category uh in the middle of your of your career what what do you also um what do you also say okay so what do you say to that person who is no matter I'm just gonna give you a real-life example no I'm gonna get you get your perspective first then I'm gonna give you my example to that person what a company has come to them and they've said basically say it it's time for you to go you you've gone as hard as high as you can go oh let me start on that one there because if they told you that uh you know and and it's sort of

the handwriting's on the wall and it's time to go um you know there's some packages you're going to get right you need to think about what you're going to do with that with that money uh because that sometimes the road ends on that path, but you've got other paths and options. Some of them are going to be in the entrepreneurship realm. Sometimes you are able to now take that knowledge that you've developed over time, create your own company, go back and consult at the company where you were and 12 others. Why not? For some folks, this is a great time to change companies. Changing companies is not as hard as it used to be, especially when there are companies who are

trying to diversify and they're looking for people who have your gifts and talents. Be willing to make a move. Now, for some of us, that means a geographical move too, which is sometimes a challenge because you get all these things happening happening going on. But how do you evaluate those other opportunities? So, you know, this is one of those times you said it earlier where these are our possibilities. And please, again, do not discount the pivot into areas that will bring you joy and will bring you some relief from some of the stress where you have some more meaning. And that may be in the nonprofit, in social sector. It may be in education. It may be in entrepreneurship, in your own business. That's invaluable. You can't live without that kind of stuff. Yeah. Randall, you know, I would say what we talked about earlier, which is.

You should seriously consider the path of entrepreneurship. The unfortunate reality is the longer you've been in corporate, it sucks the entrepreneurial life out of you. You get comfortable, you're risk averse, you're accustomed to structure and process and ambiguity, scare the living daylights out of you. But I say entrepreneurship or rather the entrepreneur's mindset is the defining mindset of the 21st century. If you have not yet cultivated the ability to figure out how to create and define your own path, you have to begin to develop that muscle because you cannot be dependent on somebody else to offer you a job and a paycheck.

Increasingly, opportunity is finding itself in lots of different pockets, freelance work, part-time work, consulting work, work and business ownership and I would also say also consider if at the end of the day entrepreneurship is not your path I understand that then consider investing in black owned businesses that you're still playing in the entrepreneurial realm without being the entrepreneur. That would be my advice. So about three years ago, three years ago, it was 19. It was 19. I spoke at a conference and I was at a meeting with this sister,

significant position in a major top-tier fortune 500 company and she was frustrated she was despondent she was depressed because they pretty much were like that's it for you and and she was just and she was she didn't know what to do. So we're sitting there, we're having lunch and I'm asking her, hey, do you know these sisters? She didn't know, do you know these African-Americans? I mentioned John Rogers and some others she didn't know. I said, I'm gonna introduce you to these people. And she was so locked into her career.

She really wasn't out networking and going outside of that, that major company circle. And, um, when it came time for her to leave, I mean, again, she was depressed. She was, she was freaking out. Oh my God, you know, what's going to happen? You know, my kids and college did an Ivy league. I'm going to pay for this. And, and she, I mean, she was just losing it and so we're sitting there uh in about 40 minutes into the lunch I'm like okay uh so-and-so says to give him a call she says so what do you mean I said oh I I told you I was texting a person she went right now I said what the hell you think I was waiting on?

And so I hit like four or five people in the moment that mind you, I, I wouldn't get anything out of this. I was like, here's the whole deal. And so I had a couple more conversations with her. So then one day I get a phone call and, or no, I actually saw something on an announcement on LinkedIn and I called the cusser out I said oh I couldn't get a phone call here's what happened she went to a company in a whole different sector once she would have never ever thought about became the CMO reporting directly to the president, CEO, I'm sorry, making double what she was making at

her previous company. What I explained to her was you were selling yourself short. She kept thinking I should only rise within this company. said when you got to understand boo it's a whole bunch of companies out there your time in a company may end but it doesn't mean that you've ended and so she was so locked into them telling her that she wasn't worthy, if you will, that she was so depressed and despondent, she didn't even realize I could take my skillset and go elsewhere. And I counter that a lot with a lot of black folks in high places is that they think this is the only place

I can grow, thrive, I'm gonna come here, I'm retired. No, you may actually have to leave to get what you desire and that to me I think is a huge mistake A lot of people make they don't think beyond that company and realize The goal that I want to have it may not be here Yeah, and and I hope the listeners are collecting these dots that again when we say that you think like an entrepreneur without being an entrepreneur is because entrepreneurs recognize that they have value and can create value you can be aren't you have an entrepreneurial

mindset and be a corporate executive, but it means you see yourself as your own private business. That's the words of Earl Graves from How to Succeed in Business in White. When you see your career as its own private business, now you're thinking entrepreneurially and you're not an employee. You are an entrepreneur who has brought value to an organization. And I don't, I'm not reliant on you to bring that value to somebody else. her and then she was totally blown away i said but if you don't believe in yourself ain't nobody will the book black faces in high places 10 strategic actions for black professionals to reach the top and stay there uh randall jeffrey brothers i appreciate it thank you so very much and i can keep telling people you just listen to alphas it'll all be okay

yes thanks a lot thank you brother all right take care all right folks that is it for us on today's show we certainly hope you enjoyed it i also hope you you enjoy your memorial day weekend uh your three-day weekend uh please remember those uh who sacrificed for this country especially black soldiers who did it in the face of Jim Crow and racism as always we always end our show on Fridays acknowledging those who contribute to our bring the funk fan club but before I do that don't forget download the black start Network app it's important for you to do so on all your devices. Android phone, Apple phone, Android TV, Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung TV, as well as Xbox. And please, if you want to join our Bring the Funk fan club, remember, all dollars that you give goes to support this show.

It allows us to be able to travel, pay staff, to cover the news that you think is important. And so do so. Your check-in money orders can go to appeal box 57196 that's right 57196 washington dc 20037-0196 cash app is dollar sign rm unfiltered paypal is r martin unfiltered vidmo is rm unfiltered zale is rolling at rolling smarten.com rolling that rolling martin unfiltered. Zale is Roland at RolandSMartin.com. Roland at RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. That's it for us, folks. Be sure to have a great weekend, and I'll see you on Tuesday.

Until then, holler! Thanks for watching!