#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Biden/Harris Lower Drug Costs; Judge removed for jailing teen; Trial of woman who killed Black mom

Episode Date: August 16, 2024

8.15.2024 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Biden/Harris Lower Drug Costs; Detroit Judge removed for jailing teen; trial of white Fla. woman who killed Black mom continues  LIVE from Cincinnati, Ohio, for the 36th Annual Black Family Reunion.  Where Roland Martin will be speaking in about an hour.  But first on #RMU ...  The trial of the white Florida woman who killed a black mother of four when she fired a shot through her door will be in the hands of the jury Friday.  Today, the defense rested.  Civil Rights Attorney Ben Crump represents Ajike "AJ" Owens' family.  He's here to us if he thinks the all-white jury will acquit Susan Lorincz. The Biden Administration delivered its promise to lower prescription drug prices for Americans on Medicare.  Centre for Climate Reporting went undercover and published details of the secretive second phase of Project 2025, which was led by a Trump insider. We'll show you the secret recordings.  A Georgia County wants to charge those who challenge voter eligibility.  And a Michigan judge gets temporarily removed from the bench after disciplining a sleeping teen who visited his courtroom during a field trip.  Download the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox  http://www.blackstarnetwork.com The #BlackStarNetwork is a 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. to, yeah, banana pudding. If it's happening in business, our new podcast is on it. I'm Max Chastin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

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

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

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like he's like my best friend.

At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. I'm real revolutionary right back. The video looks phenomenal. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and Black-owned media and something like CNN. You can't be Black-owned media and be scared. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home.

You dig? Hey, folks, today is Thursday, August 15th, 2024, and coming up on Roller Mark Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. I'm here in Cincinnati. We're speaking in about an hour here at the Black Family Reunion. And so lots to talk about on today's show. The trial of a white woman who killed a black woman who fired a shot through her door goes to the hands of a jury on tomorrow.

We'll tell you about the case of what, and we'll talk with the attorney, the family representing A.J. Owens. Also, the Biden-Harris administration delivered on their promises to lower prescription drug prices for 10 common drugs. We'll tell you what took place today when President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris unveiled that today in Maryland. Crazy nut Donald Trump had his news conference today, sat here and whined and complained. Don't you find it interesting he's complaining about high prices when he literally is standing in front of a country club where it costs $350,000 to become a member? Yeah, we got something to say about that. Also, a Detroit judge who had a black woman

handcuffed and put in a jail uniform because she was sleeping in his court and was temporarily removed from the bench. Her mother says, we're basically homeless. That's why my daughter was so tired. We'll give you those details as well. Plus, I told you, actress Erica Ash was laid to rest on Tuesday in Georgia. A few years ago, I sat down with Erica for an interview series discussing politics with Be Well Vote. We're going to share you that wonderful interview. Trust me, if Erica was still alive, she would be absolutely engaged and involved in this election. Folks, it's time to bring the funk. I'm Roland Martin Unfiltered,

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, yo 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 rolling, Martel. Martel. The white woman in Florida who killed a black mother who was challenging her for confronting her children chose not to take the stand. So now the jury in her trial will get this on tomorrow. Susan Lawrence told the court she would not take the stand in her case. She, of course, is the one woman who is on trial for shooting and killing G.K. A.J. Owens on June 2nd, 2023, through a locked metal door.

Now, the more that mother of four had approached Lorenz's home to ask her why she had thrown a pair of roller skates at her children. Again, tomorrow, the jury, we're going to hear closing arguments and then actually get the case. Attorney Ben Crump, journalist right now. He is the attorney for Owens's family. Being glad to have you here. And so y'all have been monitoring this, of course, this started this week. Ben, give us assessment how things have gone in this Florida courtroom. Well, thank you so much, Roland, for covering this case that many people have forgotten about in the tragic circumstances. Her children were playing a white woman, called them racial epithets, including the N-word, called them slaves, and escaped at them.

And these children, when they told their mother she came, was knocking on the door. And the white woman, Susan, shot through a locked metal door that had a deadbolt and said that she was claiming stand your ground defense. And tragically, A.J. Owens died in front of her two little boys. And so we remain hopeful, Roland, despite the fact that it is an all-white jury in Ocala, Florida, that would decide this matter. The fact that, you know, she chose not to take the stand was telling, we believe. Also, the prosecutor did not call her two little boys because already they did have emotional outbursts in the courtroom. And the family, nobody wanted them to have to relive this through another trial if they couldn't contain their emotions. Because this is awfully emotional, Rowling. I mean, these children having to watch their mother die and then even her

mother, Pamela Diaz, crying in the courtroom as they're going through the pictures and listening to the 911 tape before and after Pam was killed. Like, the neighbors were calling and they're her son, AJ's son.

Man, he was eight years old. And you got him on the 911 call saying, the lady shot my mama. Please help us. I'm trying to get my little brother and sister not to see her on the ground. It's heartbreaking. You know, heartbreaking. And what's crazy here is that, as you said, it was a locked door. So it wasn't like this mother was trying to get into the home.

She wasn't trying to attack this woman. Now, did her attorneys try to assert a stand or ground defense? That's exactly what they're asserting, Roland. You know, the spirit of Trayvon Martin still is alive and well in the state of Florida because the woman alleges that she was knocking on her door. She didn't know she had a weapon or anything. She feared for her life. And, you know, instead of calling 911, calling the police or anything,

she shot her through the lock metal door. And that ballistic experts have testified, Roland, that she wasn't even close to the door. They said she was at least 15 feet away from her door when she was shooting through the door based on the trajectory of the bullets and so forth. So we think that, you know, this notion that she was in fear of her life was revisionist narratives. The truth of the matter was she had constantly harassed the little black children who lived in that apartment complex.

She had several complaints from other neighbors. That day, A.J. Owens had got off of work from working as manager at McDonald's. Her children came and said she threw the skate at us. A.J. went over there and was knocking on the door, and she was telling her, why did you do this? You know, she's screaming, why did you do this? And she never, ever tried to go through or wonder anything. She was simply knocking on the door.

And we know, Roland Martin, without a shadow of a doubt, if the roles were reversed and a black woman shot a white woman through a locked metal door, the charge wouldn't be manslaughter. It would be first degree murder. Indeed, indeed. So again, the closing arguments tomorrow and then the jury will then deliberate on that point. Since we last talked to you, Ben. The police chief or the sheriff in the town where, of course, Sonia Massey was shot and killed. He has since resigned. There was pressure being put on him by the governor and others for him to step down. He's initially called it politics. One day later, he stepped down. Just just your thoughts on that decision? Well, we're thankful to Governor J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, who really engaged the family and was very attentive to the family cause that this guy should have never been

hired. I mean, six departments within four years. And the fact that this sheriff didn't do a thorough background check, the blood was on his hands. Sawyer Massey's blood is on his hands. And Governor Pritzker and I believe Vice President Kamala Harris is going to evoke the name of Sawyer Massey and say that her blood is on these ballots. We got to go vote because we can't get the George Floyd justice and policing bill passed. Had we had that passed, then there would be a register of all of the police and their complaints that would be open for people to draw from, and there would be a cooling off period before you leave one department and just go to another. This guy had only been on that force for two months before he shot Sawyer in the face after she said, I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.

So, Roland Martin, we have to keep fighting. They can't take it for granted. I know Sawyer's family may, if they, you know, it's emotional, but they may come to the convention in Chicago since they're there in the state of Illinois. And we know that the county has, tomorrow will announce the Sawyer-Massey Commission for Singleton County. And we believe Governor Pritzker is going to announce one for the state of Illinois. And hopefully Vice President Harris will have a Sawyer-Massey component embedded within the George Floyd Justice and Policing Act. I know Cory Booker, United States senator, said he is amenable to doing so.

All right. Ben Crump, we certainly appreciate it. Thank you so very much. I love the purple and gold, Roland Martin. Well, first of all, you're blind, Ben, because this is actually blue and gold. I know you and Meg is always trying to say something, but this is actually blue and gold. So I think Sigma Gamma Rho would be more excited than you. I love you, brother. Nice, nice, nice, nice try. I'm going to send you a photo just so you can understand.

I appreciate it. Thanks a lot. All right, brother. God bless. All right. Be well. All right, folks, got to go to break. We'll be right back. Roland Martin, Unfiltered, right here on the Black Star Network, live from Cincinnati. 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 Blackstar Network. On the next Get Wealthy with me, Deborah Owens, America's Wealth Coach, Black Americans have one-tenth the wealth of their white counterparts. But how did we get here? It's a huge gap.

Well, that's why we need to know the history and what we need to do to turn our income into wealth. Financial author and journalist Rodney Brooks joins us to tell us exactly what we need to do to achieve financial success. You can't talk. A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek.

I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm St Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters, and how it shows up in our everyday lives. With guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams,

and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull, we'll take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that Taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad.

It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott.

And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner.

It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz

Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game we gotta make moves and make them early set up goals don't worry about a setback just save up and stack up to reach them let's put ourselves in the right position pregame to greater things start building your retirement plan at this is preispreetirement.org, brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council.

Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee.

You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV

seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify.

You don't want to miss this. About why we are as Black people where we are, unless you talk about how we got here. Bridging the gap and getting wealthy, only on Blackstar Network. Hey, it's John Murray, the executive producer of the new Sherry Shepard Talk Show. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. All right, folks, welcome back to Roland Martin Unfiltered.

You know, when we talk about these stories, it's always just highly unfortunate that we have to keep talking with Ben Crump when these cases come up. But the reality is, if we don't trust the mainstream media, it's not going to give it the attention that it deserves. Joining us right now on our panel, Recy Colbert, host of the Recy Colbert Show, Sirius XM Radio. Joining us out of D.C., Dr. Greg Carr, Department of African American Studies, Howard University. Back from Egypt, also out of D.C. Glad to have both of y'all here. I'll start with you, Recy. You know, here you have this case.

This white woman is in her home, locked door, metal door, a distance away. She still decides to fire this shot, killing this black woman. And, you know, it goes to show, and here's a mother who's trying to protect her children. And this woman had no regard for her life. It sounds to me like, you know, the Jordan Davis case playing music. I mean, what you have is you have racist white folks in this country who have no problem grabbing their guns and killing black folks. Yeah. I mean, it's essentially a lynching through the damn door because she felt entitled to take the life of this black woman.

She felt entitled to terrorize this black family and her neighbors. And even if she is convicted, Matt's daughter is a slap on the wrist compared to what she should be doing, which is, you know, a little street justice if you ask me. But at a minimum, she should be charged with murder, with first-degree murder or second-degree murder. So this should be an open and shut case. The reality is that you don't get to just shoot people from inside of your home, 15 feet into your home. Sonia, I mean, sorry, not Sonia, but, you know, Ms. Owens had no

kind of history of any, A.J. Owens had no history of violence towards this woman. There was no rational reason for her to do this other than the fact that, as Dr. Carr would say, no humans involved. That was her attitude. And hopefully she spends many of her old-ass years in jail where she belonged. You know, that was the case, Greg, of the white man who killed Jordan. And listen, and he made a fateful decision and he is sitting behind in prison right now. But but this also goes to show you when we talk about how Republicans operate in when it comes to these

states. I mean, in Texas, there was a shooting last year at the State Fair of Texas. Well, the folks at the State Fair banned guns on the ground. You now have the Attorney General, Ken Paxton, who says if you do not rescind your decision, he's going to sue them. I mean, so these folks have a callous disregard of folks being shot and folks being killed. They would rather change the laws to put more guns in the hands of people and actually make it easier for folk to shoot and kill, such as the Stand Your Ground laws? They absolutely would. I mean, we know that Ken Paxton is a political miscreant.

And they don't just play the race card. Their whole deck of cards is race. This is what they do. On the campaign trail this week, we saw the vice presidential candidate Tim Walz talk about the fact that he is a gun owner, he's a gun enthusiast. He says he's—at the time he was in Congress, he was the best shot in Congress with the awards to prove it. And he said, at the same time, these military-style weapons and all this extra firepower have

no place in people's houses, no place near schools. In other words, it's very interesting to see as the Democratic Party unrolls its campaign here, the presidential campaign of 2024, to see how perhaps there is a reclaiming of some of this common-sense approach to gun legislation and regulating guns. But of course we see that the racist Susan Lorin is going to pursue the wildcard defense. And by the wildcard defense, I mean the defense that has nothing to do with logic. As John Henry Clark used to say, when racism is involved, race calls race, and somehow race always answers.

So you know, her defense people say that within her mind, in her soul, at her core, she felt like she had no choice. So that's her appeal to the white jury. Forget logic, forget the rules, forget the laws. Go look into your white soul and somehow know that this fear of blackness, which is completely irrational, but nevertheless has seen many a lyncher escape from punishment when it's evoked. If she can appeal to their heart, soul and core, that's going to be her attempt to that's her attempt in order to try to get off. You're absolutely right. And again, all she needs is one. All she needs is one person on that all white jury to side with her. And then she gets a hung jury. All right, folks, let's go to our next story. We're going to talk about prescription drugs.

President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris made their first appearance together since, of course, President Biden chose not to seek re-election. They were in Maryland today unveiling the program that as a result of the Inflation Reduction Act is going to save $1.5 billion annually

for Medicare by lowering prescription drugs. Here is what the president had to say. This is a fight all of us have been fighting for a long time taking on Big Pharma. We pay more for prescription drugs. It's not hyperbole. We pay more for prescription drugs than any advanced nation in the world. I could take out an Air Force One, and if you have a prescription from a drug company in America, and fly you to Toronto, Canada, fly you to Paris, France, fly you to Bellevue, anywhere around the world, and get you the same prescription, Phil, for the same company, for 40 to 60 percent less than we pay for it here. Too many Americans can't afford the drugs they badly need for life and death.

So they skip doses, cut pills in half, forego prescriptions entirely because the prescription drugs are totally unaffordable. The woman you've met, the nurse you just met, she paid $9,000, I mean, excuse me, $900 a month. Well, guess what, man? She's going to pay nowhere near that. $9,000. She's going to pay, guess what? Beginning January, every single prescription drug she has, including, God forbid, if she needs a really expensive drug like a cancer drug.

Maximum she ever has to pay is $2,000, period. That's why from the time I was in the Senate, I worked tirelessly to give Medicare the power to negotiate lower drug prices, just like the Department of Veterans Affairs. In fact, as reminded by staff today, one of the first major bills I worked on was in 1973. I co-sponsored legislation led by Senator Frank Church that let Medicare negotiate the cost of drugs. 1973, this fight's been going on.

You know, the VA pays, as they should, 50% less than Medicare because VA can negotiate the prices. But for years, Big Pharma blocked Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices. As a consequence, they're able to maintain the exorbitant price increases that their profits are uncalled for. Look, but this time we finally beat big pharma. There's a lot of love in this room for our president. And I think it's for many, many reasons, including few leaders in our nation have done more

on so many issues, including to expand access to affordable healthcare like the Joe Biden. And today, we take the next step, thank you, Joe, forward in our fight. Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! Thank you Joe! So, we here, we believe deeply every senior in our nation should be able to live with security, stability and dignity.

And so in the United States of America, no senior should have to choose between either filling their prescription or paying their rent. That's the subject of today. Because we know for far too long, far too many of our seniors have struggled to afford their medication. And as a result, seniors have been forced to spend their time trying to figure out how they are going to be able to fill a prescription like insulin, based on the doctor's prescription, which is about saving their life,

or whether they'd have to ration their pills to be able to make it stretch through a month. And why, we all know, but let's ask, why are prescription drugs so expensive? I will tell you. Well one big reason is for years big Pharma has often inflated the price of life-saving medications, often charging many times what it would cost to make just to increase their profits. And millions of Americans have suffered as a result. My entire career, I have worked to hold bad actors accountable and lower the cost of prescription drugs. As Attorney General of

California, I took on pharmaceutical companies for deceptive marketing and illegally inflating the cost of drugs. And we won billions of dollars. As a United States senator, I fought to pass laws that would make health care more affordable and accessible for all Americans. And as vice president, together with Joe Biden, our president... A lot of times, the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one.

The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Banik-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters, and how it shows up in our everyday lives. But guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams,

and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull will take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company

dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad.

Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast.

Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This has kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams,

NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug ban is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill.

NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real.

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We gotta set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves

and make them early. Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org., brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case,

where for the last three years, I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers

to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify.

You don't want to miss this. We finally addressed the longstanding issue that for years was one of the biggest challenges on this subject, which was that Medicare was prohibited by law from negotiating lower drug prices. And those costs then got passed on to our seniors, but not anymore. This really is a significant issue, Greg. And for all the people out there, I love these people who talk about, you know, what has Vice President Kamala Harris, what has President Biden done for black people? The number of people who are on Medicare, okay, when you talk about older African-Americans, when you talk about, obviously, Latinos, white folks, I mean, you name it, all these different people,

we're talking about significant amounts of money, and Republicans all voted against this. They tried to go back and repeal insulin being capped at $35. When you look at some of the hearings on Capitol Hill, where the CVS CEO was jammed up for literally charging more than $6,000 for one particular drug that cost $30 or $40 to make, the system that we have in this country is nonsensical, where insurance companies will pay these exorbitant fees and these pharmaceuticals will jack them up if you have insurance. But if you don't, you're screwed.

That's exactly right, Roman. That's exactly right. These are not serious people who say that there is no difference between the Democratic and Republican Party. We know that this is a duopoly, that there is a two-party system in the United States of America. But to act like these two parties are the same, on a day that Maga Mike Johnson, the punk speaker of the House, said that this was price-fixing, what the announcement today

represents. And Maga Mike is right. It is price-fixing. They're fixing the prices to the degree they can. And as you said, the Inflation Reduction Act passed without a single Republican vote. And as you've said many times, we're going to see this again, these punk white nationalists are going to run for reelection on this benefit. Americans pay an average of $13,000 a year for prescription drugs and associated costs. And we start talking about, so those who say, well,

the parties are the same. Does your mama take Eloquence? That's for blood clots. The list price is $521. The negotiated price now, $231. What about Jardians for diabetes, heart failure, chronic kidney disease? List price, $573. Negotiated price, $197. And it goes on and on and on. These are real-world differences. Don't be stupid. When you look at Project 2025, not only are they trying to repeal the 20th century, they want to destroy people's little budgets by getting rid of caps on prescription drugs. It's not that difficult.

It's all numbers at this point. And this is just another example of how that's the case. Recently, I was listening to this audio clip from David Sirota the other day, and he was talking about when he was working for a, you know, really nondescript member of Congress who was trying to get these laws changed. And then what they did was they were flying people. They were driving people across the border to Canada. They got the law changed.

But then what then happened was the pharmaceutical industry leaned on the Clinton administration to make some changes to the language. And so then they didn't go forward with this by saying, well, we couldn't, you know, ensure that prices, you know, would be lower. People often need to understand the pharmaceutical lobby. They spend millions of dollars in Capitol Hill. They are there to buy off members of Congress. And so this is a perfect example that people need to understand. We talk about that act being passed. So many Republicans, Reese, he said this is not going to lower inflation. It's not going to have any impact

on prescription drugs. But when you talk about a savings of one point five billion. Oh, by the way, last I checked, I thought they were also fiscal conservatives, Reese. So you would think Republicans would be supportive of Medicare saving one point five billion. No, they rather the pharmaceutical companies make that money, screw over taxpayers, screw over the elderly so they could keep getting their corporate donations. Right. I mean, Republicans don't give a damn about regular everyday Americans having affordable health care, being able to actually afford all of the prescription drugs that they need. They're like, go broke or die trying. And that's basically what their model is when it comes to how people can get health care

in this country. People have such a short memory, not just the fact that we were in a full-blown pandemic four years ago. Everybody was, you know, fending for their lives. But even pre-Obamacare era, where people were capping or were maxing out of their health care coverage, lifetime coverage, because they got cancer. People were getting kicked off and then they couldn't get coverage again because they had preexisting conditions. There are so many ways that Democrats over the past decade plus have

vastly improved the access that we have to health care, have vastly improved the quality of the health care that we're paying for, and have cut the cost along the way. And so we live in a very individualistic society where if you didn't get your student loan debt canceled, if you don't get this tax credit, if you don't get this benefit, you like to hell with everybody else. But the reality is that people need to be able to retire with dignity. People need to be able to live a healthier life in retirement after the age of 65, where all of their disposable income is not going towards prescription drugs. And so unless you're sitting up there living this fantastic vegan lifestyle, working out 10 times, two times a day, or whatever the situation may be,

and everybody in your family is doing that, this is something that will eventually impact you. And at a minimum, it's impacting us as taxpayer dollars. And so I'm really, I really have no patience for people who don't value things that benefit the greater society, but they're not benefiting from it personally yet. Well, it's interesting, Greg, before I came here to Corinthian Baptist Church here in Cincinnati for the Black Family Reunion event, starting in a little bit, I was listening to some of that nonsensical so-called news conference of Donald Trump. And he was talking about, of course, the reporters assembled, he had a bunch of his little rich friends at the country club, Bedminster Country Club, who were off to the side.

And he was talking about blasting Vice President Kamala Harris with regards to the Affordable Care Act. And he kept talking about all these people who work hard, make all this money for private health care plans, and they want communism. They want communism. And so he starts lying and lying and lying. And so that goes to show you rich folks like him don't care about the fact a significant number of people's lives have been saved because they now have affordable care. Now, there are others who still want single payer. And so they're still trying to

fight for that. But everybody who's listening, if you're African-American, pay attention. The percentage of black people that went from uninsured to insured dramatically dropped because of the Affordable Care Act. So when you start talking about changes to health care, when you talk about saving money when it comes to medication, we're talking about direct impacts on black people. So a bunch of these folks, Greg, out here need to stop acting a fool by saying, well, they haven't done anything specific for black people. If you are making changes to the health care system in America, that is impacting black people. If you're making changes to price of prescription drugs, that is impacting black people. I don't care what idiot out there says it doesn't.

Absolutely. Absolutely. We know that since John Boyd Roberts and his punk Supreme Court in 2010's Citizens United case that had been unleashed on the American electorate, on the American population, that money in politics, already a serious problem, has become a fatal problem in many ways in American politics. So when you start talking about the pharmaceutical lobby, you start talking about people who, as Rishi said, doesn't give a damn about our humanity. Now, you know, there was news yesterday on easing inflation in the country. Consumer prices rose 2.9 percent in July, falling below

3 percent for the first time since 2021. But that doesn't resonate with folk who are what some people call low-information voters. Donald Trump is coming unhinged, whatever his medical problems may or may not be. He certainly sounds crazy, but he is also a visceral politician. He's appealing to illogic. So when you start talking about people looking at the prices of their groceries, the prices of their utilities and rent, it's going to be something that people will respond to viscerally. We know that the vice president will be in North Carolina tomorrow to talk about economic policy and calling

for a federal ban on price gouging on groceries. The Harris-Wallace campaign has done a good job of being in the public eye, and they're going to have to continue to draw this sharp contrast. Finally, what we see these white nationalists terrified of is that this may be their last, best chance to stop the attempt to create policy that speaks to a wider group of people. Was Obamacare the best legislation that could have been passed? Perhaps at the time. Do we want to improve it? Absolutely. One thing is for sure. You never get the single payer if you don't take the incremental step of having the Affordable Care Act. On the other side of the aisle, so to

speak, the white nationalists are terrified because remember who introduced Biden and Harris today? Wes Moore, the governor of Maryland. And when he called them the 46th and 47th president of the United States, some people in the crowd started chanting 48, 48. And that is the nightmare of the white nastas party, that if they don't win this election, then white supremacy may in fact finally be beaten back as an electoral force in federal electoral politics. So they're pulling out all the stops by appealing to illogic. And this is just another example of it. As I said, folks, don't...

A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding, but the price has gone up. So now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters, and how it shows up in our everyday lives.

With guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams, and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull, we'll take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. We get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley

comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1,

Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English.

I'm Greg Lott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player,

Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding

of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote.

Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Sometimes as dads, I think we're too hard on ourselves. We get down on ourselves on not being able to, you know, we're the providers, but we also have to learn to take care of ourselves. A wrap-away, you got to pray for yourself as well as for everybody else, but never forget yourself. Self-love made me a better dad because I realized my worth.

Never stop being a dad. That's dedication. Find out more at fatherhood.gov. Brought to you by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case,

where for the last three years I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st, wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify.

You don't want to miss this. Trump was, of course, running his mouth at his bed, Mr. Country Club, in his so-called news conference. I'm not playing any clips from that because he sounded idiotic. He sounded stupid. And what did he do? He lied, lied, lied. Control room, let me know when y'all have the statement.

So the walls, excuse me, the Harris Walls campaign put out their statement. And I love the attitude. This is what they actually said, Recy. A statement on Trump's whatever that was. At his country club, Donald Trump huffed and puffed his opposition to lowering food costs for middle and working class Americans and prescription drug costs for seniors before pivoting back to his usual lies and delusions. No surprise, Trump doesn't want to defend his agenda that would raise costs for families by $3,900 a year, cut Social Security, and eliminate the Affordable Care Act, all so he can give his rich donors tax breaks. The American people cannot trust a word Donald Trump says, but they can trust Vice President Kamala Harris, who has spent her life taking

on fraudsters, cheaters, and criminals like Donald Trump to make our country safer and lower costs for the middle class. See, Reesey, this is the kind of attitude that I like to see in terms of how they are firing back by trolling him and blasting him for the repeated lies that he states over and over and over again. And in that news conference, he also talked about his tax cuts and how fabulous they were and how great they were, how wonderful they were. Oh, he skipped over the billions of dollars, the trillions of dollars added to our federal debt. I thought the fiscal conservatives never bring that stuff up. Well, yeah, because it's never been about the debt. It's been about tax cuts for the wealthy.

That's it. It's about transferring wealth from those of us who work our asses off to the people who buy yachts for shits and giggles. And so I'm loving this attitude from the Harris-Waltz campaign. They are bare knuckles, pull no punches when it comes to dragging the hell out of Trump. But they do it in a way that doesn't elevate him. They do it in a way that diminishes him, but also points out the threat he is. But then on the other hand, they still are running a joyful campaign that is all about inspiring people, giving people an affirmative message. So they have struck a great balance. And the reality is that Donald Trump absolutely cannot be trusted when it comes to health care. I mean, he ran and the Republicans tried to repeal over and over and over again Obamacare.

And even when they tried to, when they couldn't fully repeal it, he tried to repeal over and over and over again Obamacare. And even when they tried to, when they couldn't fully repeal it, he tried to introduce these junk policies into the country. And so he's a person who's shown where he stands on health care. I would add, I wrote about J.D. Vance in my 2022 midterms book. He was a person who campaigned against the Inflation Reduction Act. He campaigned against Obamacare. And he's a person who also believes that it's racist to tackle systemic racism within the health care system. He thinks that it's racist towards white people. And so those two, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, you definitely cannot trust their asses. And if you do, then I got a bridge in Idaho to sell you because these folks want to have us sicker and poorer if all they can help because they don't want people like us around

point blank in a period so yes keep up the messaging contrasting and talking about health care health care is an unsung um it's it's an unsung issue that democrats don't really run on as much anymore but it's a really, really a winning issue. So I want to see them keep this up. And Greg, it was also hilarious to watch him sit here whining, complain and say, oh my goodness, the stock market is going to crash like in 1929. And literally the on-screen graphic, even on Fox News, was showing the Dow up 500 plus points, being over 40,000. So here this dude is lying.

And at one point, Fox actually took their on-screen graphic off when they realized, oops, oops, this don't look good. It goes to show you how deranged this person is. And we see these polls out here. I'm not believing any of these polls that's showing Vice President Kamala Harris getting 46 percent of non-college white voters. I ain't believing that at all. But again, I think the smart play by having her and Governor Walz constantly talking about these issues, and not just middle class-class people low-income people poor folks working-class folks because they make it a clear the contrast that that man

only cares about that's who he only cares about absolutely just like his friend bb netanyahu who continues to uh... prosecute a slaughter in in palestine so that he can stay out of jail. Donald Trump has one interest.

That is Donald John Trump. He wants to stay out of jail. He wants to get back the levers of power to enrich himself. And he will do anything to do that. The Republican Party has, of course, long ago taken leave from reality. Their strategy now is not to match with the Democrats over policy. It is to engage in the big lie. This is their whole strategy. And so the idea that calling them liars or exposing the lies will somehow put a dent in their strategy just doesn't fly. So you're right. Ignore the polls.

Put your foot on the gas. Check your voter registration. Check your voter registration. Check your voter registration. Because if it's close enough to steal, they're going to try to steal it. With the election judges and folk down, the election observers all the way up down the ballot, in many ways, all of this becomes a distraction. Mass commercial news entertainment media is the enemy in many ways because they don't give a damn. They want a horse race. So they're going to continue to try to prop Trump up because it's good for their ratings. It's good for business. And so, Roland, as you're out there in Cincinnati, when I lived in Columbus, we would just come down to Cincinnati, of course, the great Dorothy Irene Heights,

starting the Black Family Reunion back in 1988. I guess it's the 36th year, if memory serves me correctly. You know, when we talk about black people and the black family and black communities, understand what's at stake here. What is at stake in this election, again, is the well-being not just of black men, not just of black women, black seniors, black elders, but the black community. And our elders understood that. Our political leaders used to understand that. We must revive that spirit of understanding what's at stake and then press full steam ahead and ignore all distractions, ignore all the commercial news, entertainment, media attempt to create a horse race and roll over these people politically. Indeed. All right, folks, hold tight one second.

Can I go to break? We come back. I want to talk about this story out of Detroit where this judge has been typically removed from the bench after he had a teenager jailed and put in a jail uniform for sleeping in his courtroom on a field trip. Folks, don't forget to support the work that we do. Join our Bring the Funk fan club. Our goal is to get 20,000 of our fans contributing on average 50 bucks each. That's $4.19 a month, 13 cents a day. That money goes to us being able to do the show as we travel around the country. We've got a scheduled plan to travel to places all across this country in September and October. Of course, next week we're going to be in Chicago for the Democratic National Convention. And so we'll be live every single day next week in Chicago for the Democratic National Convention from 6 p.m. to midnight, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.

And so we can't wait to do that. And so I've been sharing this graphic on social media. Y'all be sure to share that graphic as well with all your social media folks. If you're looking for the best, guys, wrong graphics, I need you to pull up a DNC graphic. If you're looking for the best coverage, look, we're going to have more black voices on our show than all of the networks combined. I've already got members of Congress and others who are hitting me up saying hey uh you know can we stop by and do your show as we said absolutely and so that's what we're going to be doing so we'll be in chicago sunday and begin our coverage 6 p.m on monday again if you want to support our work please do so by joining our bring the funk

fan clubs in your check and money order p.o box 57 Washington, D.C., 20037-0196. Cash App, Dollar Sign, RM Unfiltered, PayPal, or Martin Unfiltered. Venmo is RM Unfiltered. Zelle, Roland at RolandSMartin.com. Roland at RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. We'll be right back. Next on The Black Table with me greg carter it's a rare occasion when a course taught in high school becomes a topic of national conversation let alone a burning controversy but that's exactly

what happened with advanced placement african-american studies courtesy of a certain southern governor who's taking offense on our show, we take you inside the classroom for an up-close look at the course through the eyes of the teachers that teach it, the students that are taking it, and the communities that surround them. So many of the kids, you know, we saw, you know, the truth. And, you know, it just impacts those kids in such a big way a master teacher round table on the next black table that you do not want to miss right here on the black star network 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. producer of Proud Family. Bruce Smith, creator and executive producer of the Proud Family, Louder and Prouder. You're watching Roland Martin. Hey, folks, a Detroit judge who yesterday ordered a teen to be handcuffed and put in a jail uniform for falling asleep in his courtroom has been temporarily removed from his docket. 36 District Court Chief Judge William McConnico ordered Judge Kenneth King to attend training to address the underlying issues that contributed to this incident. On Tuesday, the teen was in King's courtroom during a field trip when King called her out for sleeping. The judge forced the teen to wear a green jail jumpsuit and had her put in handcuffs and made her plead for forgiveness. The teen's mother told local reporters her daughter was likely tired because the family has no permanent place to stay. King has served in the 36th District

Court since 2006. You know, Greg, you know, I've spoken to a lot of groups, a lot of kids, a lot of, you know, junior high, high school, college, and, you know, there have been times when I'm speaking, I've asked, you know, had someone say, hey, nudge the person next to you to to wake up. A lot of them also supposed to be doing as an assignment. And so they were screwing the grades up. But this judge here just truly lost his mind. I mean, to sit here and to order her to be handcuffed, to order them to put a jail uniform on her. I mean, that is just nonsensical. And so I'm glad to see the chief judge remove him from the bench

until he gets some kind of training because that's just shameful. It is shameful, Roland. Unfortunately, we live in a society that is driven so much by spectacle, that is driven so much by the attempt to shock people, this scared, straight approach. The 36th District Court there in Detroit is known as the People's Court.

And you know, but the idea that the People's Court is a place where you can engage in this kind of behavior unfortunately isn't too far off in terms of how we think about courts. You know, as you said, we just came back from Egypt. One of the sisters who was traveling with us is a judge in Memphis. And she was talking about how you have to think. In fact, a number of black lawyers and judges just returned from West Africa, from Ghana, where they went, among other things, to look at comparative international law and look at how African people resolve disputes. And when you start talking about culture, you start thinking about how do we approach things not only with compassion,

but with an idea toward improving and helping the next generation. So for this child who apparently was in the Kingsport earlier that week with a nonprofit on a field trip, you know, you think, what is the message you're trying to send? And I would agree with you, Chief Judge McConnico, who himself is a graduate of Morehouse College, you know, he made the statement that this is not the place where we will engage in that type of behavior. Sure, more training should help, but at the end of the day, this is a cultural issue, and you need to maybe turn off the reality TV and turn off the court show on television

and take your nose out of this crazy world where we think about spectacle before results that we really want to get done and think about what is the role of a judge in society. He absolutely abused that. See, the thing here, and before we went on the air, Reese, I was reading a tweet where someone was talking about some of the proposals that Vice President Harris will be talking about tomorrow in her economic policy speech in Raleigh, North Carolina. And one of those is providing $25,000 for people, first-time homebuyers, but also to encourage homebuilders to build 3 million new homes over the next four years. A lot of people don't understand one of the reasons why we have a housing affordability crisis in this country right now is because of housing stock.

And again, I've covered housing my entire career, and people don't realize because of the home foreclosure crisis in 2008, 2009, which greatly impacted our economy in 2010, 2011, we actually built fewer homes between 2010 and 2020. The last time we built that number of fewer homes was in the 1940s. Now you go to this decade, 2020, the present day, we're still building fewer homes. So when you're building fewer homes, guess what? Demand skyrockets. You got more people, you got higher demand, and so they're jacking up rent. And so you got children who are, you know, who are innocent bystanders. And I've talked to numerous teachers and people don't understand. They're like, well,

all these kids are going crazy. Now, realize you got kids who are coming to school who are hungry, who've only had one meal. Now you've got this young girl. A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin.

And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution.

But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th.

Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives.

This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill.

NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corps vet. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real.

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like he's like my best friend.

At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee.

You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years, I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes.

From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st, wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify. You don't want to miss this. what a person's life is about and you're just making a judgment then you look absolutely crazy and that's exactly what this judge did and now he looks like a national fool yeah he's he's he he looks like a piece of shit for bullying a a a young girl who was there on her own free will this is not a person who was a defendant. This wasn't a person who needed to be scared straight like a

fucking reality TV character. To Dr. Greg's part point about the spectacle, this is abhorrent, unconscionable behavior. It is symptomatic of the way, or it is indicative of the way that black

girls are over-policed, or over-criminalized, or adultified in a way that's so harmful. And to see her mother break down in tears, I'm sure this young girl is traumatized. He put her through an entire humiliation ritual, having her classmates vote on whether or not they should show mercy to her and send her to jail for what? He talked about her having an attitude. You have the fucked up hubristic attitude that's abusive and a bully to abuse this girl who was in your courtroom to learn, but because of her life circumstances, maybe didn't have the focus that you felt like she should have had. Instead of exercising compassion and empathy and understanding,

you wanted to exert your authority over a helpless child because it's still a child that we are talking about. And so he is unfit to serve because this is how he would treat an innocent person, a person who is not there for any crime, for any kind of bad behavior. This is how he would treat that person. Then you know he cannot be impartial towards a person who is in front of his court, who's supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. So this is disgusting. And even upon reflection, he doubled down. He said he didn't do anything wrong. You have to teach these kids. This is not about these kids. This is about you, sir, and your fucked up attitude and you thinking that you can get away with whatever the hell you want to get away with. So it's not enough

to just remove him. He needs to be kicked the fuck out of the judiciary entirely. And he deserves to beg and plead for her mercy and for her apology. He has no business mentoring her. How ridiculous it is for him to say he wants to mentor her. Mentor her for what? On how to be a depraved asshole? I don't think so. So this is one of the most infuriating things that I've seen in a very

long time. I hope that this girl and her family, if we have a GoFundMe, that we can help get her secure housing. She's an excellent student, according to her mother. She's doing the right thing. And guess what? Even if you're having a bad day, even if you aren't a perfect student, even if you aren't a perfect citizen, you do not deserve to be abused and humiliated by a person who has authority over you and certainly not in front of a group of your peers and on YouTube. I think I counted five or six F-bombs there. Really? I don't remember saying F-bomb. I don't think I said the F-word.

I didn't call him a motherfucker. You don't remember? I'm sorry. You don't remember using the F-bomb? I don't remember, no. I thought I was being nice. Okay, Reesey. Okay, Reesey.

No, no, no, no, no. You said all that, too. So I'm just letting you know, when you see the playback, when you see the playback, you're going to be like, ooh, I use it that many times? Wow. Yeah, maybe I will. But it's still enough.

I hope the folk in the church here didn't have the stream going and had it up too loud. Yeah, Risa, you forgot. Yeah, Risa, you don't see. You don't see the don't you don't see the I'm repenting from my customer but I don't I said what I said I stand on that I said what I said honey but I still oh no no no we know you know Risa we know you said what you said everybody heard it everybody heard it so when you

do the plate wait wait wait wait when you do the play, when you do the playback, you're going to be like, oh, I did cuss that much. All right. Recy and Greg, I appreciate it. Thank you so very much for being on today's panel. Folks, we have a shortened show because, again, I've got to go speak in a little bit here. We'll be live streaming my speech as well. But, again, let me thank Greg. Let me thank Recy. In the second hour we're going to do is a few years ago, I interviewed actress Erica Ash. And it was with a BeWokeVoke project.

And we were talking about politics and talking about social engagement. She was a sister who was very much engaged in that. Of course, she died a couple of weeks ago, age of 46. She battled breast cancer for 18 years. And so her funeral was on Tuesday in Decatur, Georgia. And so I want to further honor Erica. She was a great sister by playing that because what she talked about in that interview absolutely impacts us today and this election. And so her words matter. And I can guarantee you if this election was if she was still with us, she would be very much engaged at the DNC next week focusing on this election so we're going to go to a break we're going to come back and you're

going to hear my political conversation with actress Erica Ash you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered right here on the Black Star Network live from Cincinnati the Black Family Reunion back in a moment 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 Balanced Life with me, Greg Carr. It's a rare occasion when a course taught in high school becomes a topic of national conversation, let alone a burning controversy. But that's exactly what happened with Advanced Placement African American Studies, courtesy of a certain southern governor who's taking offense. On our next show, we take you inside the classroom for an up-close look

at the course through the eyes of the teachers that teach it, the students that are taking it, and the communities that surround them. And so many of the kids will, you know, we saw, you know, the truth. And, you know, we saw, you know, the truth. And, you know, it just impacts those kids in such a big way. A master teacher roundtable on the next Black Table that you do not want to miss right here on the Black Star Network. Me, Sherri Sheppard. I'm Tammy Roman. I'm Dr. Robin B., pharmacist and fitness coach.

And you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. © BF-WATCH TV 2021 Hey, folks, Roland Martin here with BeWoke.Vote. Of course, we're focused on 2018 midterm elections, trying to get you focused not just on the issues, but also on the importance of using the power you have to cast your ballot. Today we'll be chatting with Erica Ash. She joins me right now of course. You've seen her on television and in movies and so normally she's the wild child but today she gets to be a little bit more sedate if you will I think. What's happening? Hey how are you? Thank you for having me. All good? First of all... So I see you broke out the proper attire. You know, I tried, but I put a little spin on it.

I put like a little ethnic spin on the flag. Right, right. So it's a little... But first of all, when I see that, I immediately think of the poster from Birth of a Nation with a man, Nate Parker, where actually the flag was a noose. Mm, interesting.

Yeah, so when I saw that poster, I said, dude, you got to sign that and send that. Right. Because that's going to go alongside all the art in my house because it was an amazing poster. Yeah, and I did a photo shoot with a similar flag as well, just to kind of, like, and it was me blindfolded and kind of shackled and just, you know, doing various poses of kind of oppression and stuff like that.

I mean, it's a, you get mixed feelings when you look at the flag. Well, I think one of the things is that people don't quite understand, that white folks don't understand. Our view of the flag, and even when you talk about democracy, when you talk about voting,

it's totally different than theirs because it's a different perspective when you talk about freedom. And here we are, 399 years since the first 20-odd Africans arrived in the United States and Virginia, and we still are trying to get all of the rights that we were supposed to have.

Right. I mean, when you think about it, it's a bit hypocritical. I mean, they were, you know, they were creating this flag and creating all of these laws with people in this country as they were creating it, being excluded from the laws that they were actually creating. So what is it, you know, one nation under God? Like, all men were not included in that. So it's a weird hypocrisy when you think about it. Well, I was just arguing with someone.

Actually, it wasn't quite an argument, because I smacked him down real quick on Twitter. Was this physically? No, but I should have done it physically. Oh, I'm glad you didn't. Because this physically? No, but I should have done it physically. I would have. I'm glad you didn't. Because he said, well, look, everything is, I made the point about that we've had

114 Supreme Court justices in America. 108 have been white men. I said, if you want to understand the history of America right there, out of 114, 108 have been white men. And he goes, well, things have been working out great. I said Really

Right, yeah, that's when the people to all of my followers so therefore they can get in on action right when I'm busy right Right. Yeah, sometimes you just want to let them have it's like kind of like it's like the behalf for Beyonce Sometimes you just don't want to get your hands dirty. It's like, you know what, this is too easy. I'm going to just let y'all have this. Oh, yeah, and they're very good at handling it. I know they are. But, again, it's a different perspective because when you look at the history of this country,

when you look at the fact that even when we talk about just this idea of voting, when you look at the efforts today with voter suppression, even the craziness with voter suppression, even the craziness with voter ID, people go, oh, but ID is simple. I'm like, yeah, but once you start going underneath where you have to have a certain type of ID, you must see the birth certificate, it must be raised,

it must be a certain paper weight. I mean, look, these are barriers that are put in place. Can I just be quite frank with you? I think that it even goes beyond that. I don't think anyone ever meant for us to get this far in voting. A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding.

But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters and how it shows up in our everyday lives.

But guests like Business Week editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull will take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time,

have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company

dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad.

Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott.

And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner.

It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette.

MMA fighter Liz Caramouch. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things Stories matter and it brings a face to them It makes it real It really does, it makes it real Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast Season 2 on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts

And to hear episodes One week early and ad free With exclusive content Subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early.

Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispreetirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes.

My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved,

the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify. You don't want to miss this. The way that it's set up, the language that's used, I think a lot of people end up not voting or being politically active because a lot of people just don't understand the terms.

I mean, you know, I'm fully grown. We're reaching out and we're targeting the millennials and we're targeting Generation Z, which I don't even know how old they are. Like, what is the Generation Z? Like, how old are y'all? Yeah, my niece was telling me, she was like, no, we're not millennials. I was like, what the hell are you then? And so she, I said, look, I said, I'm not trying to come up with another letter. That's what I'm saying. There's no more letters. After you get to Z, we're done. Right, right. We're done. So what is it? Is it the end of the world?

Do we circle back to A? Right. Is it double A, double B? Are we doing broad sizes right now? I don't know what's happening. But I think at the end of the day, nobody wants to feel stupid. And I think what happens a lot of times, people don't want to admit, I don't know what's happening. But I think at the end of the day, nobody wants to feel stupid. And I think what happens a lot of times, people don't want to admit that they don't understand what these terms mean. And people talk about it. You know, they talk about the electorate and the gubernatorial and blah, blah, blah.

You might as well be saying, gosh, gosh, blah, blah, blah, blah, because people just don't get it. But they don't want to. We haven't had real civic stuff. Right. I mean, we haven't had real. I'm talking about honest. Right. Civics. Exactly. Not that fake stuff that actually exists in the stuff. Right. I mean, we haven't had real, I'm talking about honest civics.

Exactly. Not that fake stuff that actually exists in the classroom. Right. And even with the fake stuff that exists in the classroom, because I took that, even with the fake stuff, everything is glossed over. And then all of a sudden you're supposed to know what everybody's talking about. And that's always been a problem for me, you know, when I'm dealing with political conversations, I mostly listen. And so I can only imagine what, you know, when I'm dealing with political conversations, I mostly listen. And so I can only imagine what, you know, these millennials, you know, you 12 year olds are out here thinking, you know, when it comes to understanding what's happening in politics. I mean, you know, you, you understand when it directly affects you, you understand, you know, if I get pulled over, bad things could happen. But when you're talking about actually taking action to change what's going on in the political climate,

that's where you're arrested because you're just kind of like, well, I don't really know who to vote for because this person is speaking way over my head. First of all, you say arrested. There's a sister in Fort Worth who served time in federal prison. She gets out. She votes. She doesn't realize that she lost her right to vote.

She gets prosecuted. She's sitting in a federal prison right now. Not only for voter fraud, but also parole violation. So, she's in there for five years for simply casting a ballot. Now, we're going to spend an

inordinate amount of dollars to lock her up for five years because she said, no one told me. And in fact, her probation officer testified that she did, there was nothing, it wasn't like you got out and it was kind of like, oh, by the way, here's a sheet of paper, you can vote.

Right. She had no idea, five years she's sitting in federal prison, right now in Texas. And there are a lot of people who are in that same predicament. They don't necessarily go out and vote, but a lot of people, they don't know if they can, they don't know what to do, how to do it, where to do it. They get all these documents and pamphlets in the mail,

but they don't really understand how to dig through and figure it all out. So I think, you know, the solution, because I'm all about solutions, is figuring out a way to introduce, reintroduce that into the school system. And we're talking to the generation that doesn't even write in cursive anymore. You know what I mean? Lots of things are switching. They can't read cursive. So, you know, I feel like that's going to be the next step. The ballot's going to be in cursive. So then that's going to be another way to kind of rule us out. That's going to be the new poll tax.

It's all in cursive, y'all. Sorry, Generation Z, double A, triple D. I don't know what to tell you. You know, it's really unfair and it's really unfortunate. But there have to be hard steps in changing it around because there's no point in sitting where I'm never one to just complain I don't like it just doesn't it's not effective well it's also I think walking people through it man so one of the things that I've always done is utilize television and

radio and also social media to to teach folks I never thought about that way until about a month before she died to Dr. Maya Angelou when she was being honored at the National Portrait Gallery. I did an interview with her, and she said, no, you're... I said, no, my brother and my sister are the teachers. She's like, no, no. She said, you're a teacher.

She said, I watch you. You actually teach. And I was kind of like, I never thought about it that way. But the reality is, to your point, the average person doesn't know. The reality is there is no affirmative right to vote in this country. There isn't. It was specifically set up that way. People think, oh, no, I have a right to vote. Actually, you don't. There's nowhere in the Constitution

that says you have an absolute right to vote. We learned that in the Bush v. Gore decision. Then Justice Anthony Scalia wrote that there's no affirmative decision there. Now, it says on their Constitutional Amendment, they say you as a woman and me as an African-American can't be denied the right to vote. But there's nothing that says, no, you absolutely have that right. And then it's not from federal. It's local. So you might live in a county.

I live in a different county, even in the same state. I might have paper ballots. I might have punch. You might have electronic because the rules are different. And so it's this whole convoluted system that confuses people, even to the point where if you lived in apartment A and you moved to apartment B, in most places you have to re-register because you literally moved right next door. Right, or right across the street because you've changed zip codes.

You've got a different polling place. But when you think about it, when you break it down, when you think about, okay, so not only do I have to figure out what these candidates stand for and what they're talking about when they're giving all these speeches and literally every other word, I might have to look up in a dictionary just to figure out where their viewpoints are. I have to also figure out, okay, I have to look at my history. Am I allowed to vote? Will I be arrested sitting in federal prison because I cast this ballot? Then there's, well, what county am I in, and where do I go now to vote? And then it's, okay, there are all these other, you know, all these different categories of people to vote for.

It's not just the president of the United States. It's just, you know, you've got your governors and you've got your senate, you've got your statesmen, like all these different things that you have to, you know, and then all of those, all their platforms are not, they're not laid out there. Do you know what I mean? Like you have to go and you kind of have to research. Yeah, exactly. And so there's a lot to do and I think that it's overwhelming and it's much

easier to just be like, you know what, there's too many things. We're going to probably have in the midterm elections more than half of the American population not cast about. But then I also have this other view where my deal is very simple.

I use two versions. I use one for mainstream television. I say vote or shut the hell up. But the other one really is vote or shut the fuck up. Because there's nothing worse for me than people who complain

about a system because folks really don't understand that literally everything in our life is impacted by the ballot. There's nothing in our lives that isn't determined by politics some way or another. If you're wearing something that was actually exported from another country, they had to go through a particular procedure that was established by government. Folk walk around, that's why I love all the Republicans who say, I want limited government. I'm going, good luck with that. I mean, even if you decide to go live in the woods,

trust me, you got to figure out, well, I'm living on federal land or I'm living on some other land. And that's also, I think, part of this piece where people go, oh, no, no, no, none of that stuff matters anything in my life when oh, yes, it does. It matters a hell of a whole lot. Well, I want to go back to two

things that you said. The first one, I definitely agree with Maya Angelou. You are the consummate teacher, and I think that's why so many people really, really love you and why I'm so happy that you are actually a part of this BeWoke.Vote campaign. And I think also the, you know, in terms of us having so many less people voting in this midterm elections, I think that that can be shifted, even if it's just, you know, a few

percentage points by, you know, things like this. Look, that was a race. Us getting together, us talking about it, because it's like double dutch, you know? It's over, you're like, where do I jump in? How do I jump in? You just try. And even if you stop the ropes,

you get back out and you try again. But it actually does matter. Exactly. And people will see, I think, the hardest thing for people, they go, okay, I'm hearing about the Russians, I'm hearing this. Right now, Republicans hold a one vote majority in the Virginia House of Delegates.

And the only reason they hold that is because in the last election, that was a tie. It was decided by a corn flip. They ended up the exact same number of votes. And the corn flip, Republican wins the coin flip, goes to the, keeps the seat, and otherwise the Democrats could have taken control of both chambers. A coin flip.

Right, right. So if somebody tells me. And that was a complete face of everything after that. My one vote is no big deal. Obama wins North Carolina by 14,000 votes in 2008. That literally, if you break it down, the number of precincts, one per precinct. Right.

One vote. And folks go, oh, really? I'm going, yes. Right. You just don't understand how that can make a difference. Yeah, it really, really does. And I think, you know, getting people together who are like-minded, right? If you don't know exactly what's happening, I think the first thing is don't be ashamed of that. Don't be ashamed to say, I don't really know what that means. I

don't know what that term means. I don't know what this politician stands for. Even if everyone's talking about it, people are scared to get laughed at. Now, I'm the queen of no shame, as we know. Yes, we know. But I feel like a lot of people, like, the ego gets in the way, right? And you don't want to be the one friend that looks stupid. I'm always looking stupid. But the thing is, is I'll ask questions. I'll say, you know what?

I haven't watched TV this weekend. What happened? Talk to me. So my friends now know. They're like, oh, Erica's come out from under her rock now. Let me explain to her. But I have to do that because I wouldn't know what's going on otherwise because it really does get confusing.

I get like, it's overwhelming, and I get mind overload, and I just have to shut everything off. Look, I have other friends who are celebrities who, Michael Bivens, new addition. So Michael called me, and he was like, he said, dude, he said, okay, what's going on with this? And he asked, what's going on with this? He said, hey, I'm going to call you every now and then.

So if I don't understand what in the hell is going on, he said, I want to be able to ask you. And so there are other people as well. So they'll send me a text and say, first of all, they go, is this true? Right. And then it's, okay, what's the real deal with this? How major is it? And I'm kind of like, okay, hit them right back. They're like, okay, what's the real deal with this? How major is it? And I'm kind of like, okay, hit them right back. They're like, okay, cool.

They move on. And my deal is I'm cool with that because for a lot of them, they want to be educated on and they say, look, I trust you're going to give me the information. And then I can take it from there. Now, that's when you also got to have my stuff together because they can be running around quoting me going, Roland said, and then if it's crazy, like, uh, that really didn't happen.

Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, your Twitter followers are going to let you have it. But that's the thing. I think everybody needs three friends. You need that one friend that's not going to make you feel stupid because you say you don't know. The one friend who does know everything and can spout it out, I mean, like, you know,

like a Roland Martin Jr., and then you need that one friend to translate. No, I make it easy. You don't need to translate. Right, you do. You do. You do, but you know those friends that say, oh, yeah, well,

the woman is raw, raw, raw. You're like... A lot of times, the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in

business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters, and how it shows up in our everyday lives. But guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams, and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull will take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to everybody's business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that Taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened

when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at lava for good. Plus on Apple podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glott. And this is season two of the war on drugs.

We are back in a big way, in a very big way, real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player,

Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne.

We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote.

Marine Corps vet. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like, he's like my best friend. At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives.

Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series,

LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st, wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify. You don't realize is we, as a journalist, we are actually trained. Newspapers are written for fifth graders. No. So that's not a joke. We literally are written.

Al Newhart, of course, who was the founder of USA Today, used to be the CEO of Gannett, he used to always hate reading George Will with the Washington Post. He said, I don't ever want to have to read a newspaper and have a dictionary right next to me. He said, make it plain for the people. Now, Joe Madison,

Sirius XM radio, the Black Eagle, he has, now, Joe go right to the heart of it. Joe go, you gotta put it where the goats can get it. Now, who understands ain't none of y'all been to the country. So, not a single it where the goats can get it. Who understands ain't none of y'all been to the country. So not a single one of the people know what the hell I'm talking about. What does that mean?

Okay, when I say put it where the goats can get it, what does that mean? Make it as simple and as big. Not even make it plain. Where do goats eat? Off the ground. The grass. Grass. Lowest common denominator. Make it where do goats eat off the ground the grass lowest common denominator make it absolutely

as simple as you can make it what country are you from that ain't the country I'm talking about the country country with a K I'm from Tallahassee, Woodville, Florida myself alligators in the backyard.

So I know what you're saying. But again, that is critically important because I think there's so many people who are confused, to your point. They are frustrated. And also, I think when we look at a lot of these media institutions, they also are not talking about issues that folks actually

care about. I mean, when I sat there and watched all of, it was very interesting. So you get the Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court confirmation going on, and then at the same time, the decision came down in the Laquan McDonald case. And so when the jury verdict came down, not a single cable news network broke away from waiting for Susan Collins to give a speech to say, hey, this story out of Chicago, Jason Van Dyke has been found guilty. Right.

It was just all sort of the same thing. And I think that's also a huge deal. Are you talking about things that I care about and then putting it in a way where I understand how my life is impacted? Right. And also the side of it that matters most to us. You could talk about the issues that are relevant to us, but you could skew it in a way that makes us

feel the way that you want us to feel about it. And that's what I think a lot of news outlets do as well. It's whatever the issue is, they discuss it so that we see it their way instead of making it plain, allowing us to make our own decision,

or equally looking at both sides of it. You know, Fox, you're not going to, you know, I don't necessarily have to say the networks or the TV. Either you say it, you said it like real quick, just let it in. Did I? Yeah, I heard you. Did I? Yes, I heard you, yes, yes. Yeah, the microphone picked you up, whatever. You said like real quick, just let it in there. Did I? I heard you. Did I? Yes, I heard you.

Yes, yes. Yeah, the microphone picked you up. Yes, yes. Oh, my. Yeah, we heard it. So sensitive. Everything here is so sensitive. But you know what I mean.

These are the pieces. So look, go beyond Fox. If you're black and Latino, it's not like the other networks are doing a bang up job, again, speaking to those issues that impact us in a much different way right right first election you voted in what was it gosh oh my gosh you're gonna be completely completely honest now I want you to lie yes then when I when I was 18, I voted, no, Obama. That was the first one? Mm-hmm.

So that wasn't the first one you were eligible for. Right. So. You're not going to date me on the internets right now. What? Yes, I was definitely eligible to vote a couple of presidents. Like one or two before Obama.

So you hadn't voted in any election. Not congressional, not city, not county. I did one but I don't even remember what the election was that I voted in so I don't count it. I mean

it did count. My vote did count in that one, but I can't remember to call the level of election that I voted in. So the one that I vividly remember voting in is Obama. So after 2008, did you then look at other elections, or did you only vote in presidential? Yes? No, I started voting from there. And so I would do the midterms and I would do the, you know, I did start voting from that point on. I didn't vote in every single election from that point on, but I did start voting more regularly.

Growing up, was that a part of your upbringing? No, it was not. That was not something my parents ever, you know, took me to the polls. And I think, you know, unfortunately in a lot of communities, that's not something that we're ever taught parents ever, you know, took me to the polls. And I think, you know, unfortunately, in a lot of communities, that's not something that we're ever taught to do, you know, taken as a family to the polls and saying, hey, look, this is what we do. This is where we vote. I mean, religion was huge in my family.

Education was huge in my family. So you had to go to church. Listen, we had to go to church, Sunday school, Bible study, choir rehearsal, all the public service that they did on Saturdays. We did everything church-based because both my parents were preachers. Hold on. So both your parents were preachers. So when they had souls to the polls.

Wait, not in my church. Really? I mean, we would have the odd candidate come to a service, but my church growing up wasn't very, you know, politics meets religion heavy. I see that a lot now in my church that I go to now. Like, I mean, you know, the politicians will come out on that one Sunday right before election. Oh, yeah, they'll be there. Oh, they know Jesus then.

So I see it all the time now. But when I was growing up, no, that wasn't a big part of our upgrade. So you think that's also an answer? Because earlier you said put it in the schools. But also I do believe, and again, for me, the reason I see the value. So my parents worked elections. They volunteered for campaigns campaigns they ran phone banks I remember being seven eight nine years old it was like you had no choice not like you had a vote

it was like yo go over there for the next eight hours stand there and hand out these uh uh pamphlets to anybody who's walking in and then we'll bring your lunch and then you've got some water for yourself. It's kind of like, okay, again, that was, that was,

wasn't likely my brother could say, nah, we're all right. We're going to stay at the house. I didn't work that way. And so for me, um, that wasn't a,

that was a huge part of my upbringing. And look at you now. And it's very interesting because for me, service was a huge part of my upbringing. And that's just something that's just, you know, it's a natural thing. I don't think twice about going out and doing community service. I don't think twice about giving up my Saturday mornings, even if I stayed out late on Friday nights. I don't think twice about going to church in the mornings.

So I think that might be even bigger than the civics piece in schools. I mean, I think that at this point, having that in schools at least gives the children the opportunity to go home and ask their parents, so mom, dad, what is this? What do you think we should do about this? This is what I learned in school today. Let's talk about it. At least gives the children something to bring home and start a conversation with. However, if the parents start that for the children, then, you know, then the children can go to school and say, hey, why am I not learning this here? Why don't I have a civics class? You know what I mean?

And we'll have more Roland Martins running around here. See, there's going to be a problem there because, see, when I went to school, let's just say we got into vigorous debates with teachers when it came to government. In fact, I got thrown out. No. No, because it was a government class.

You? It was 11th grade. Yes, me. Oh, Roland. Ms. Joseph, I it was a government class. It was 11th grade. Yes, me. Ms. Joseph, I don't know why she... I don't know why she decided... First of all, here's the problem. She was wrong. You know Ms. Joseph is watching this thing. You was disrespectful. That's what it was. She was wrong.

She was absolutely wrong. She said the person who's out serving as president can't serve more than eight years i said that's not true i said it is i said it is true that they can only serve two full terms but i said if a president uh if a person becomes president before uh the second year i said they they can continue. She argued with me. I said, I'm sorry. The facts are right there.

Lyndon Baines Johnson became president on November 22, 1963, when Kennedy was assassinated. The election was in November of 1964. I said, he could have run for a second term, which means that he would have served about nine years as president. I said, how are you arguing? So she was like, and I'm going, it's right here. See, and I bet you raised your voice just like that.

I did. You're wrong, Ms. Joseph. She was wrong. With all due respect, these are the facts. It's about the way you presented her. No, no, no. She was mad because I busted her. And I bet you said that.

You mad, Ms. Joseph. You mad. Ms. Joseph? You mad? Ms. Joseph mad? Then she kept coming at her brother. And I said, okay. So I had like 103 grade in that class. And so we had a test. We had a pop quiz.

And I said, you know what? I said, I ain't going to take this pop quiz. I said, I'm just going to put a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, put a zero. And I said, I ain't going to take this pop quiz. I said, I'm just going to put a 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, put a 0. And I said, here. I said, what's that going to drop my grade down by? 102.1? See. Wow.

What? I mean. Your mouth was fast. That's what it was. That was the problem. It wasn't about what you were arguing. Because I think, you know what? No, she was wrong.

And I agree with you that she was wrong. All she had to say is, Mr. Martin, I stand corrected. Okay, here's the problem. Now, you know you went to school in a time where teachers weren't saying Mr. Nothing to no kids. And Mr. Martin, you wrong, and you're right, and I'm wrong. When you get corrected, that's when you have Mr. Martin, you are correct. Listen, and you just would not leave with anything less than that. But you know, you're just an old school.

She wanted you to come at her in a way. She could be an old school. She wanted to. By and large, she was wrong. By and large, she was wrong. I'm sure she was, but that's why you got kicked out. Look, I was a well-read student. Government?

I believe it. Look at you now. Government? Yes. Oh, hell no. We ain't going to sit here and just think. Well, you just it. Look at you now. Government? Oh, hell no. We ain't gonna sit here and just think. Well, you just basically answered the question right there. I mean, the

way that you were raised, the fact that your parents took you to the polls, the fact that they did not make it a choice for you, they actually exposed you to that in a way. Then my dad watched about five hours of news a day. Like, matter of fact, growing up, there were a lot of TV shows I never saw the end of because we would have to turn 15 minutes before the news came on

because he didn't even want to miss the promo. I was like, bro, there's like a two-minute break at like 58 and the news at 10. Right. We can watch till 58. No, I wouldn't do it. So, I mean, so, right. No, so you't do it. So, I mean, so, right. No, so you talk about that.

And in fact, what was interesting is we talk about, and I use this in speeches all the time, the importance of being aware of those things. We had a, I was in 11th grade and it was career day, which we had no idea it was career day. And so we had two speakers who came by the class. And so one of them was an Asian woman. She was a municipal judge in Houston. And the other one was a white guy who owned an import. A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways.

Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up. So now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business, taking a look at what's going on, why it matters and how it shows up in our everyday lives. But guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams, and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull will take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms,

even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion-dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1,

Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back.

In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this

quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things.

Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like he's like my best friend. At the end of the day,

it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years I've been myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis. From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes.

From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong. You get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st, wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify. You don't want to miss this. Export business.

But he also happened to be the former chairman of the Texas Republican Party. Okay. And so when it came time to ask questions, we sit in the classroom and it's about 30 plus students in the class, all black, and folks just like, ain't got nothing to say.

Let's end this. And I'm kind of like, y'all ain't gonna ask no damn questions. Alright. And so I start hitting homeboy with questions. And so this was when Reagan was president I started hitting him with Reagan policies and I know he was looking like

I don't know who the hell is this little black boy on the left side of the room and he hit me with some policy questions and so we started so what ended up happening was I walked him to the next class we ended up talking and he was like man he's a pretty bright student

his daughter was at TCU Texas Christian University the next class. We ended up talking. He was a pretty bright student. His daughter was at TCU, Texas Christian University. He said, man, they could really use a student like you. But they were proud of him. I'm like, I ain't going in because we ain't got private school money. But what ended up happening was

he had called my parents that night. We stayed in contact. But two years, that was 83 years later, we were going to the National Association of Black Journalists Convention in New York, my first one. And we were broke as hell. Like, broke, broke.

None of us had money. And so we sent 30 letters to foundations all across the state of Texas. We got 29 rejection letters. Then one day, this was like the last letter. We get this letter. I open it up. Hey, blah, blah. Glad to see that you're still involved in journalism. Encloses a $1,000

check from our foundation. Hope this will help you guys go to the convention. And it was that guy, George Strick. Wow. That's a beautiful, full circle. That check allowed us to go to the convention. And nearly every job

that I've had has been a result of the relationships established through NABJ. And so what I tell young folks first, people go, oh my God, $1,000 check. I say, no, no, no. I say, you shouting the wrong thing. I say, the shout is not getting the check. Had I not asked questions, but then had I not watched the news, had not paid attention,

had I not read the newspaper, I would not have been able to ask the questions. And then he would not have been able to recognize me. Right. I would have been like the other students are sitting there kind of like, I don't know when this white man going to come out of the office. And so I tell folks that even though he was a Republican, it doesn't matter. Let's see, let's take it back. Let's take it back. So you're saying, had

you not asked questions, had you not watched the news because your dad came home and made you cop out of your show 15 minutes early, had you not read the newspapers, had you not had your parents who took you to the polls, had you not had, you know what I mean? Precisely. All of that established a foundation. Exactly. And that gave you the confidence to be able to go toe-to-toe

and ask those questions. You know, like, again, it goes back to my point. Nobody wants to look like an idiot. Nobody wants to be the fool that doesn't know stuff. And you ask a question and people look like you are really good at doing... No, no, no, no, no. Now, I only do that when they get

stupid on television. Uh-huh. And then. Fair enough. And that's by design. Right. Because when they really say stupid stuff, that's why I'm kind of like, you know, I'm about to whoop your ass. And that, you know what? I actually, that's my favorite part of watching you.

That's my favorite part of watching you. Because, you know, you're talking about, you're talking two, three, four people who are all supposed to be sort of on the same plane in terms of political intelligence going toe to toe. Make them look stupid. It actually is really good television. I'm talking about in a classroom where the playing field is level, right? You've got that one person whose parents did what your parents did. And that's not dissing parents who didn't do that, because I'm going to tell you, parents were very very concerned with making sure that we were well rounded but that's just not something that they were very exposed to

which is why connecting the dots matter because the thing is if we begin to connect the dots so I had a young girl who calls she was a young woman in 2016.

She said, you know, I'm watching your show, and I'm reading your social media. She said, look, I just got feeling Hillary Clinton, and I don't care about Trump, so I'm not going to be focused on the presidential election. I said, really? I said, okay, so what are the issues you are concerned about?

She said, give me five. It was my radio show. She gave me five. She said, give me five. It was my radio show. She gave me five. I said, you do know who is president, has a direct impact on all five of those issues. She had no idea. Here she was thinking,

well, I don't care about presidential campaign. What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna focus on what's happening in my state, which is North Carolina. And I said, so you do know that two African-Americans have been appointed to the federal bench from your state, but your two Republican senators, Barr and Tillis, have barred them from even getting confirmation hearing. Wow. She's like, I i said you do know who appointed them to the federal bench the president right and so she's like like really i'm going yeah so i'm going to walk her through trying to get her to understand that you can't just take off

that election because you say i don't like either candidate and people get caught up in this whole thing of the lesser of two evils. Here's the reality. Somebody is going to win. One or the other. You better make a decision I don't like neither one but I like that one

a lot less than that one. You got to make that call. And not act as if it doesn't matter. Absolutely. And that's also, I think, one of the hardest things to people because there were a lot of young black folks who in 2016 were mad with Hillary Clinton

about the super predator comment, mad about any number of things, and they said, oh, she's the same as Donald Trump. Mm-hmm. Are they saying that today? Mm-hmm. Exactly. Nah. Exactly. But you just gave the consummate cop out you know

what i mean it's it's it's the child who's bogged down with homework assignments from three different teachers they look at it and they can either say okay i'm gonna get me some kool-aid and a cookie and i'm just gonna dive in and then just you know just start and see how much i can get done. Or it's like, you know what? Forget all this. I'm going to go outside and play or I'm a, sorry, generation Z. I'm going to go to my phone. Do you know what I mean? So I think, I think again, going back to my three friends, finding people who are like-minded, finding people that you actually connect with, people who find the same things important that you find important, people whose conversations you enjoy having, right? So talk to those friends. And then when you talk to those friends, find people among that group of friends who are more politically

inclined. You know, I'm glad we're friends because I'm just not, you know, but because of friendships like yours, that's what made me figure out that, you know, my vote did matter and that it was important for me to vote and get out there, even if I wasn't doing everything, you know, perfectly, just trying and then learning from the mistakes, whatever mistakes that I made and trying again and getting better the next time that I went out to vote or to speak about something, you know, political. And I think that, I think that having that, that's the start. That's the way that we do it because we can't go back and undo, like I can't go back in time and make myself be at the polls when I wasn't.

So that's why that's where the civic piece comes in. But I can start now. And that's what, you know, I started when I started. And now I'm a part of more, you know, political drives to get other people to vote. I'm not the world's smartest when it comes to politics. I'm the first to admit that. I'm not even the second or third. But I'm trying, and I think that that's really the message here.

Get out and vote because it does matter. Your vote absolutely matters. And you made a really great point. I mean, you may not know exactly every nuance of a political candidate's platform, but you do know that you like what this person's saying maybe a little bit more than you like what this person's saying. There's a vote. Vote for the one you like a little bit better. And then the next, as you get to know them a little bit more, and the next time you get to know them a little bit more, maybe you get to know a little bit more about this person. Start having those political conversations.

Even if you don't understand everything that's being said, even if you don't understand every term, surround yourself with it. When you were a kid and your parents took you to the polls the first time, you didn't understand what was going on. You just knew this was something that you had to do, and you'd rather be out climbing trees with your friends. Your parents just made you be in that environment. Shut up. Stay right there.

Exactly. Pass out these things. You just have to pass out these little pamphlets. You didn't know if they were church, you know, pamphlets or political. They started reading it. Of course, run up a county commissioner. Being around it made you start reading it. And then as you started getting more familiar with it, it became commonplace to you. Then you started

learning more and more. And then you got to the point where you was cussing out Miss Joseph. I'm sorry, Miss Joseph. Look, you can just blame my parents for that. Blame them. They didn't beat you. And then, of course, the problem is then I got all these P's and U's in conduct in school. You really dated yourself. No, I don't care.

I got P's and U's. And then, of course, then I got my ass whipped when I got home because I was talking so much in school. But see, now my parents are retired, living in my house, and the car they have is paid off. So they can't talk back at you and say you're just mouthy all the way around?

No, because of the money I make now talking. So now my dad's like, don't stop talking. Right. I'm like, oh. Right. Oh, I said, so I said, what you need to understand,

I said, you should be apologizing to me while I'm ass-whipping. Why are you always trying to get grown folks to apologize to you, Miss Joseph, your mom and daddy? Everybody got to apologize to Rowan today. Because that was practice. Oh my gosh. See, my daily school was practicing for what I do right now.

Fair enough. So, and now that you're living in my house that's paid for, then you need to be apologizing because that practice made today possible. Okay, I'm going to have to say that I understand what you're saying because that's the reason why my parents will refuse to ever live with me because they know that I'll be just like you. When I was

walking around on my toe knuckles and I was singing into my hairbrush with my little towel over my head pretending to accept my awards, y'all told me to sat down. Not sit down. Sat down. Right. Now, I'm out here acting and I'm doing all the things that I used to walk around imagining in my head that I was doing. So what now?

Right. They're not going to hear it. Oh, we always knew! We always knew! I will be quick to remind. See, and they won't even give me the satisfaction of being in that position. They're like, yeah, cool, you be over there. I'll just do what I did.

I did it standing in front of a church when I had to give a sermon, and my dad had to go back to my brother's house to get more copies of my books because we sold out at the first service. So when he was walking in, I told the story on the microphone about all the beatings and everything. He couldn't say nothing. There were about 1,000 people sitting right there. So, yeah, I told the story.

I told the story. I don't care. When you've got the microphone, you control it. That's right. A couple more questions. Okay. We talk about issues in public policy. How do you use your platform in terms of the work to speak to these issues?

The legal show you did on BET. Yes, and contempt. And contempt. You dealt with real life stuff. Dealing with the criminal justice system. Dealing with just the lack of public defenders. How hard it is., lack of resources. Anybody who watched that show should understand that wasn't fiction.

Yeah, you had these elements that were comedic, that were entertaining, but the reality is what you were dealing with is what is actually happening in our world. Yeah, it wasn't fiction for today. And actually the cases that I did cover in In Contempt were specific cases that our showrunner represented or colleagues of hers represented when she was in the New York Public Defender's Office. So, yes, they were real then and they are today. I think she has just been, I don't want to date her, but I would say maybe 20 years since she was, you know, in the New York public defender's office. And those are the same issues. I mean, you literally can turn on the TV and, and match, you know, which case is happening for which news story being covered. Um, the one thing that I did do as a result of that was I joined the Innocence Project

and became an innocence ambassador. I learned a lot from my show, and I think that it's dealing with politics, but it's just sort of a different branch of it, obviously, the criminal justice system. But what that allowed me to do was to be open and available to opportunities that came my way in that so with the innocence project their focus is exonerating people who have been wrongly convicted of crimes and are you know I've been serving time sometimes life sentence which is directly tied to elections because who we elect as district attorney absolutely plays a role and so for the longest we ignored who the DA is when you mentioned

all these names on the ballot right people would vote for president or senate or governor, but they would ignore what was down ballot. And they kept pushing D.C. for change when the reality is the person who has the most impact on criminal justice reform, on mass incarceration, is the person who is district attorney. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, even your governors. I mean, I was just talking to Stacey Abrams the other day,

and she was talking about the system in Georgia. Absolutely. I mean, even your governors. I mean, you know, I was just talking to Stacey Abrams the other day, and she was talking about the system in Georgia. For folks who don't know, Stacey Abrams, of course, who was running for governor of Georgia, you know, of course. For Arab kids, I was talking to Stacey Abrams, you know, just like everybody. You know, just having a moment. Everybody will just know. As I've gotten into this whole, like, political realm, you know, doors open.

People come and present themselves. I'm friends with Roland. I'm friends with Steve Cameron. Of course. She's, you know, being from Tallahassee. What? Well, actually, actually, I say I'm from Atlanta because I did spend the most time there as a youth. Really?

Yes. But I'm sure she'll be name-dropping Andrew Gillum, who, of course, is running for governor in Florida, who is the Tallahassee mayor. But, yes, go ahead. Yeah, my great-grandfather was a senator, but whatever. Whatever. Your great-grandfather was a senator? State or U.S.? State. Who is he? His name was William Cabot Hodges.

So you had a great-grandfather who was a state senator? Yes. And you didn't know a damn thing about voting going on? No. Well, it's a convoluted story. He was a white man, and we were the family that was not. Damn convoluted.. He was a white man, and we were that family. They ain't convoluted. Yes, it is.

That's called the history of the United States and black people. Exactly. But our separation from him, because we could not be named as we were the black family, was our separation from all of it. You did more than pre-pandemic. Is that what rape means? Or what? I don't know.

Right. I don't know. Let me just look. That's a whole other talk show. I got a Confederate general on my side. Yeah. So I think our separation from that was also our separation from politics. I have an uncle who got into it,

but our family's a bit disjointed, so it's not like it was something that was all-consuming in our family. You know, politics was just not that. A lot of times the big economic forces we hear about on the news show up in our lives in small ways. Three or four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding, but the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. The demand curve in action. And that's just one of the things we'll be covering on Everybody's Business from Bloomberg Businessweek. I'm Max Chavkin. And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. Every Friday, we will be diving into the biggest stories in business,

taking a look at what's going on, why it matters, and how it shows up in our everyday lives. With guests like Businessweek editor Brad Stone, sports reporter Randall Williams, and consumer spending expert Amanda Mull will take you inside the boardrooms, the backrooms, even the signal chats that make our economy tick. Hey, I want to learn about VeChain. I want to buy some blockchain or whatever it is that they're doing. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution.

But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way.

In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-stud on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man. Benny the Butcher.

Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real.

It really does. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like he's like my best friend.

At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Los Angeles is famous for the always captivating entertainment industry, some of the most famous sports teams, and incredibly expensive smoothies. But beneath the glamour, it's also a breeding ground for bizarre, historic, and unforgettable crimes. My name is Madison McGee. You might know me from my podcast Ice Cold Case, where for the last three years I've been investigating my father's murder. But now I've embedded myself into the LA Times crime beat to bring you not only some of the juiciest cases, but what it takes to be a gritty crime reporter in a giant metropolis.

From LA Times Studios comes its latest series, LA Crimes. From deep dives into the Menendez brothers to conversations about why Bravo TV seems to be a hotbed of white-collar criminals, we'll cover it all. The solved, the unsolved, the love triangles gone wrong, you get the idea. Tune in every Wednesday starting May 21st, wherever you stream your podcasts. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube and Spotify. You don't want to miss this. Last question for you. What are the three most important issues that matter to you? Education is a huge one. I am really, really bothered by the fact that your education is directly based on the area that you're from.

And the level that you're allowed to receive. That really disturbs me. The criminal justice system, obviously. There are far too many people of color. And just, I mean, people in general. Nobody deserves to spend a day in prison for a crime that they did not commit. The fact that people are spending anywhere from one to 30 plus years in prison for crimes that they didn't commit. And then when they're released, they're not properly compensated for

the time and the lives that have been stripped from them, so criminal justice. And the third thing is equal pay for women, which is unfortunately still an issue today across the board, for women and people of color. It's such a set thing and nobody does enough to make sure that it's absolved. So those are the three issues that I really... All right. So last thing here, we're gonna do a test.

Oh, God. Oh, yeah. You're going to school. This is the last thing here and so uh i did a panel at the naacp convention okay uh and everybody on the panel failed uh so just letting you know so good thank you for making me feel better okay i'm just letting you know that in advance so let's say you you roll upon uh a gen z a gen a gen y a millennial, a Gen A, whatever. But somebody who is either first time voter

or they haven't voted, or even if they are 30, 40, 50, 60, you've got 30 seconds to explain to them why they should vote. What do you tell them in those 30 seconds? Go. Okay, your right to vote was really hard fought for, and it was hard won by your ancestors. There are people who absolutely died.

They died for the right for you to be able to vote. Anything that you are dealing with right now, from the way that you are treated in your school systems, to the amount of money your parents have to pay for that school, to how you're treated when you go to the doctor's office, to the amount of insurance that your parents have. When you see your parents arguing over bills, those are things that can be affected by the fact that you vote.

And if you vote, all those things can change. And every single vote matters. What else do I want to tell you? I don't know, because you had 40 seconds. Huh? 40? You had 40 seconds. Oh, my gosh. Okay.

All right. It was 30 seconds. That was the test. The test was to do it in 30 seconds. Wow. I thought you... Let me tell you why that test is unfair. And this is why I would vote you out as teacher.

Because you looked at your watch indicating you were going to tell me when my time was up. You didn't say you have 30 seconds. Time yourself. No. You said you have 30 seconds. Go. See, that's right here. Normally when that happens.

No. That's right here. No, no. Here's the precedent. Okay. Let's go back to precedent. So you got a watch on? No, I don't.

And that's something that you should have asked me when I was. Okay, fine. All right. Tell me when to go. Let me tell you something. No, no, No, I don't. And that's something that you should have asked me. Okay, fine. Alright, tell me when to go. Let me tell you something. No, no, no, no, no. You can't create the test and then say, you know what, you take it, now you fail. Now I'm going to take it. You created the test.

That's an unfair advantage. Again, reasons why you should vote. People are given unfair advantages in this world and in order to change that and to make the playing field level, like he's showing us right now, you need to get out there and vote. Take the watch. Be woke, not vote. Take the watch.

Take the watch. Tell me when to go. I'm going to look at this camera right here. Go. Why should you vote? Because Freddie Gray can. Why should you vote? Because Freddie Gray can. Why should you vote? Because Trayvon Martin can.

Why should you vote? Because Laquan McDonald, Rekia Boyd, Ida Jones, they can't vote. Your vote can make the difference on any issue. It matters. But you have to actually use it. I'm going to tell you something.

That was less than 30 seconds. I'm just saying. I'm just saying. I'm just saying. He timed that. I'm going to keep you watch. I'm just saying. I just wanted to let y'all know.

I just wanted to let y'all know how it's done. He timed that in the mirror before he came here when he knew he was going to create that bogus test to trap everybody. Let me tell you something. This is what happens. This is what the government does. They set up these random tests

to perpetuate this voter suppression and this voter disenfranchisement just the way you did with this test. If you can pass this test, then you can vote. But they already know the answers to the test. So they give you the test. Here's the thing. If he had said to me that wasn't a literacy test. So they give you the test. No, they give you the test. Here's the thing.

The answer, if he had said to me, if he had spelled it out the way that you want things to be spelled out to you when it comes to politics, if he had said to me, Erica, I'm going to give you a test. The test is convince someone to vote in 30 seconds. Do y'all think she protesting too much? I don't think you can protest too much. Suck it up.

Suck it up. See, and this is what the government wants you to do. You fail, you can retake the test. The government wants you to suck it up. But do me a favor. Give my damn watch back. Nope. You lost your watch.

Let me try to see it on my watch. Listen, he gave me the watch. If you give somebody something this, now they're property. Did you not see him hand me the watch? We got three cameras, two mics, four of you counting our laughs, showing that you gave me that watch. This watch is mine. But my point is that the government wants to shut us down.

They want to keep us quiet. They want to say that the issues that matter to us don't really matter. That's what he's showing us right now. He just gave me a bogus test that he already knew the answers to and said, oh, you failed, I pass, I win. That's basically what the issue boils down to. You just brought it down to most, you just made it fodder for the goats. That's what you just did.

All I'm saying is this here, this is why we did the test. What often happens is we say people die for your right to vote. That's great, but we gotta make it, we gotta make it relevant to a person today. So if they are out there protesting about these black men and black women who've been shot and killed by cops,

I'm not gonna bring up Jimmie Lee Jackson who was shot and killed in Selma in 65, I'm gonna bring up these young folks who can't. That's all it was. Erica Ash, thank you so very much. Yes. And thank you for my watch. Now the watch gonna come back.

And so again, folks use your power. Black Star Network is here. Oh, no punches! A real revolutionary right now. Thank you for being the voice of black America. All the momentum we have now, we have to keep this going. The video looks phenomenal. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and black-owned media and something like CNN. You can't be black-owned media and be scared. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home.

You dig? Thank you. The American Pronunciation Guide Presents ''How to Pronounce Cosmetics Retailer'' I'm going to show you a little bit of the process of getting your cosmetics retail I'm going to show you a little bit of the process of getting your cosmetics retail in the cosmetics retailer. It's been anything but rosy for Ulta, though, since March when it gave that disappointing outlook for the year and said that higher supply chain costs and increased promotions hurt its margins. Of course, you can follow all the latest company buzz on TRE and go on your Bloomberg terminal, Matt. All right, very interesting stuff. Let's take a look at what's going on in the markets.

We are rallying in terms of futures ahead of the open just four minutes away. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, I have to hear a remote now. A lot of times, big economic forces show up in our lives in small ways. Four days a week, I would buy two cups of banana pudding. But the price has gone up, so now I only buy one. Small but important ways. From tech billionaires to the bond market to, yeah, banana pudding. If it's happening in business, our new podcast is on it. I'm Max Chastain.

And I'm Stacey Vanek-Smith. So listen to Everybody's Business on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,ated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports.

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

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes as dads, I think we're too hard on ourselves. We get down on ourselves on not being able to, you know, we're the providers, but we also have to learn to take care of ourselves. A wrap-away, you got to pray for yourself as well as for everybody else, but never forget yourself. Self-love made me a better dad because I realized my worth. Never stop being a dad. That's dedication. Find out more at fatherhood.gov.

Brought to you by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Ad Council. This is an iHeart Podcast.