#RolandMartinUnfiltered - FAMU prez meets with students; Biden: State of emergency in Jackson, MS; NC town fires Black mayor

Episode Date: September 1, 2022

8.31.2022 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: FAMU prez meets with students; Biden: State of emergency in Jackson, MS; NC town fires Black mayor FAMU's president, Dr. Larry Robinson, held a press conference after meeting with students. We'll show you what he had to say. And Head Football Coach Willie Simmons says he supports his players and is proud that they are speaking up for themselves.  President Joe Biden approves an emergency declaration for Jackson, Mississippi's water crisis. We'll update you on what's happening in Jackson, including what Deion Sanders is doing for his players at Jackson State University.  CVS Pharmacy is being called out for policing prescriptions of drugs that are also used for medical abortions. We'll talk to an OBGY about what's being done to maintain women's health.  One of the three candidates vying for Louisiana's Senate seat will join tonight. I'll talk with Syrita Steib; a formerly incarcerated woman turned advocate.  Akron, Ohio, police department releases more bodycam video of the Jayland Walker shooting where you can hear an officer telling other officers to turn off the audio on their bodycams.   A North Carolina town fires its black city manager a month after its entire police force.  In today's Tech Talk, an app that is designed to help you stay safe while interacting with police officers. We'll talk to the creator of Legal Equalizer.  Support RolandMartinUnfiltered and #BlackStarNetwork via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered PayPal ☛ https://www.paypal.me/rmartinunfiltered Venmo ☛https://venmo.com/rmunfiltered Zelle ☛ [e-mail] Annual or monthly recurring #BringTheFunk Fan Club membership via paypal ☛ https://rolandsmartin.com/rmu-paypal/ Download the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox 👉🏾 http://www.blackstarnetwork.com #RolandMartinUnfiltered and the #BlackStarNetwork are news reporting platforms covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Thank you. Hold no punches. A real revolutionary right now. Black power. Support this man, Black Media. He makes sure that our stories are told. Thank you for being the voice of Black America, Rollin. I love y'all. All 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 scape. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home. You dig? Hey, fam, today is Wednesday, August 31st, coming up on Roller Martin Live, the Black Star Network. Mayor of Jackson City, Mississippi,

speaks on the water crisis there and correct comments made by Governor Tate Reeves will show you that whole news conference, which we streamed earlier on the Black Star Network. Also, the president of Florida A&M announced they're going to be hiring new compliance officers to deal with the issues facing their football team. We'll also hear from the head coach of the Florida A&M football team as well with the ongoing controversy happening there in Tallahassee. The abortion restrictions being placed by Republicans across this country causing Foxes to be questioning prescriptions made by doctors. We're going to talk about a case where a Foxes and a CVS had the nerve to question a doctor about a drug he prescribed for a woman with a medical

treatment. But wait till we break this thing down for you. Also, the probate estate of Chadwick Bozeman has concluded. He died two years ago, three days ago, August 28th. And so we have the exclusive statement from his family with regards to today's wrap-up of that estate. And also, we brought a TED Talk segment and other issues we've been talking about on Roller Martin Unfiltered. Y'all, it's time to bring the funk on Roller Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network.

Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the mess, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, on the Black Star Network. Let's go. With entertainment just for pigs He's rolling Yeah With some cororo yow Yeah Yeah It's rolling Montana Yeah

Yeah Rolling with rolling now Yeah He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best you know He's real the best. You know he's rolling. Martin. Hey, fam, what's going on? The water crisis in Jackson, Mississippi, continues. The residents there have been told not to drink any of the water, any of the water of Jackson, Mississippi, he spoke out and actually corrected some comments that were made by the governor of Mississippi, Tate Reeves, when he made his emergency declaration a couple of days ago.

Earlier today, we live-streamed the news conference on the Black Star Network. Here is the mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, talking about the water crisis in his city. Before I go forward, I do want to clarify just a few inaccuracies that have gone forward. First and foremost, the city of Jackson has not distributed any untreated raw water. That is inaccurate. But we do encourage our residents to continue to abide by the boiled water notice that has been in effect. I thank the leadership from the state for reiterating this boil water notice that has been in effect for several days. I also want to clarify and make clear because this was a rumor that got out

that the city of Jackson has not cut off water to any resident. We never cut off water. The lack of water was due to pressure, a lack of pressure in the system, which we stated was complicated by the flood waters that we received. It is because of our transparency that the state is aware of the many challenges that our system is facing. It is because of our transparency that we know about the staffing shortages. It is because of our transparency that they know about the system issues. And it is because of our transparency they know about the numerous equipment failures

that we have. This is a set of accumulated problems based on deferred maintenance that has not taken place over decades. So let's talk about what we do next. Let's look forward to the united front that we have now announced and we look forward to. We're grateful to add the state to our team for the betterment of our city Jackson and our water system. With the state advising us and assisting us we look forward to the myriad of improvements

that are sure to come. I want to thank all of the volunteers. I want to thank all of the the city employees that have been tuned into this challenge daily. I want to thank the support of Hines County and their leadership that have been instrumental in supporting the city of Jackson over the years, distributing water year after year and crisis after crisis. And so I think it is imperative that we all keep our eye on the ball. We were here two February's ago where we had system-wide failures and the world was watching us and the world

is watching us again and so we must continue to elevate our voices and say that the residents of Jackson are worthy they are worthy of a dependable system and we look forward to a coalition of the willing that will join us in the fight to improve this system that has been failing for decades. With that, I will open the floor for any questions that you have. I will go from right to left. Starting back here. Yes. Mayor, I spoke to the EPA last Friday, and Carol Kemper told me that there have been some critical failures to address personnel needs at the Whitewater Treatment Plant.

I'm quoting here correctly. We asked an information request request for their communications regarding sound in both documentation and communications we did not see evidence of any efforts to recruit so i don't know that they've tried to reach into that labor pool meaning for class a water operators and regular maintenance person she continues they could be reaching out to technical colleges they could be holding recruitment events they could be scheduling interviews they could be putting in advertisements this is. They could be holding recruitment events. They could be scheduling interviews. They could be putting in advertisements. This is what we do when we recruit.

We're not seeing these types of things. Well, I don't know how aggressive all of the recruitment efforts, Ms. Kempker, is at this time. I can tell you right now that we have 10 individuals that are training to be Class A operators right now as we speak. As you know, for a degreed person it takes two years for them to be able to be certified as a Class A operator and for a non degreed individual it takes as much as six years. Our Human Resource Division has gone as far as reaching out to other counties and traveling to work in this regard. We have made an agreement with the army reserves in order to bring in people. We have started working with the U.S.

Water Alliance and we have taken the instruction of the EPA. It was the EPA who encouraged us to become a part of the Rural Water Association. It was the EPA that encouraged us to become a part of the Rural Water Association. It was the EPA that encouraged us to become a part of the mutual aid agreement. And on the heels of receiving four to five individuals to help in the immediate response, we got on the eve of that happening a response that they were unable to fulfill that because they had their own critical staffing challenges. And so the effort is ongoing. The effort, we have seen people come and be trained and leave in the midst of the process and so we will

continue to double down and encourage that as well as augment our staff and I'll tell you some other things that we're doing. Augment our staff with retired employees. We're looking to bring in retired employees that can work a maximum of 20 hours for the time frame prescribed without violating their retirement protocol or endangering their retirement. In addition to that, we're looking to do privatization, not privatization, let me say, an operations and maintenance agreement with a third-party firm that can help augment all of that and that's what we're contending to do. I'll come back.

Mayor, yesterday the governor said that there's going to be plans to try to find a way to split costs between the city and state to try to fund these programs to get back up the code and get water flowing back in Jackson. Can you speak to that? What's that going to look like here in the city? Give me a moment. Is that working? Good fire.

Is that working? Forgive me. We have a number of microphones sitting up here. Testing. Testing, testing. Okay. I'm back with you. Give me your question again. Yes. Yesterday the governor announced plans to find a way to split costs between the city and the state between trying to get the water recovered here in Jackson. Can you speak to what extent you understand that process would be? To date I can just share with you the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, between trying to get the water recovered here in Jackson. Can you speak to what extent you understand that process would be?

To date, I can just share with you the conversation that I had with the leadership from the health department and also from the leadership of MEMA, where they talked about taking on about 50% of that cost. We will be using ARPA funds and any available dollars that we have in order to meet our portion of that cost. We will be using ARPA funds and any available dollars that we have in order to meet our portion of that cost. I can share with you that I've had representation from the White House and also I received a call from the infrastructure czar, Mitch Landrieu, that have shared with me that the White House is watching critically in terms of what is taking place here.

And so we look forward to additional support from them. But we will take every available dollar, and I think that that's something I failed to speak to here. At the City of Jackson, in the process of this crisis, we have committed every dollar that we could find in order to meet this challenge. Not only have we committed $8 million for one water line, a 48-inch water line that helps support the service of water to South Jackson, which is most disproportionately affected by this challenge, we've put in millions of dollars in terms of weatherization of our water treatment facility due to what we've experienced in February, where the cold temperatures, the prolonged cold temperatures, crippled our water treatment facility there. We're spending money towards automating certain parts of the plant.

We're trying to deal with the clear or the wells, the clear track wells at the fuel plant. And we're looking to make as many improvements as we can but as I have stated before this gets into quite possibly the billions of dollars and so that is far beyond the city of Jackson's reach to be able to accomplish that on our own. You say this is an ongoing problem. We spent the day at South Jackson talking to customers. They said the same thing. So what's the big piece that's missing? Is it a lack of funds, attention, coordination with the state? Do we need to be plant here? What's the big piece that's been missing in order for you to be able to solve this problem

of frustrated residents? Certainly, if we could get a new plan on the table, I would defer to a new plan. But by and large, it is a lack of resources and the coordination. And that is why we're excited to have the coordination today. This is what we've been asking for. And so we, you know, have open arms in this process to welcome that coordination, welcome that support. There are areas of challenge that we have had with our raw water screens, and today I'm hearing discussions about bringing in temporary raw water screens, I mean not raw water screens, raw water pumps. I'm hearing discussions about bringing temporary raw water pumps into the fold

to help support the input of water into the plant so that we can treat it appropriately and get it out. Often, our lack of being able to have requisite pressure going into the system is due to the fact that we don't have the appropriate amount of water coming into the system or we're challenged due to those pumps, due to raw water screens, due to a number of system failures that cripple us and are unable to achieve. I believe that it certainly should be on the table when you have this number of system failures that cripple us and are unable to achieve. I believe that it certainly should be on the table when you have this number of repairs that need to be made that, you know, you might be better served starting over anew. And so if that is something that we can accomplish,

we would certainly welcome that. But in the alternative, we have to work with what we have. You said billions. How much money does the city need to fix this problem? The President If we're just talking about the water distribution, right, I don't think that it's a stretch to say a billion dollars for our water distribution system. The Press Can you describe your communications with the health department recently

and when you were made aware of the possibility that the governor alluded to last night that you found out on Friday that there's a possibility that the Bobby Curtis plan will fail? We spoke to the health department yesterday. I would estimate probably just a couple of hours before that press briefing. And I would describe that communication as encouraging. It was a good discussion. I appreciated that leadership and what they had to share.

And they talked about bringing the full cavalry in order to support the hardworking people of our water treatment facility. These are individuals that are working long hours, that do know their craft, do know this water treatment facility. And I do want to make it clear that these are individuals that have more understanding and expertise than the average water operator because Jackson has a unique system that is both conventional and membrane, and they use the combination of both of those processes

in order to distribute water into the system. Usually what we experience in most water treatment facilities, surface water treatment facilities, is either conventional or membrane. And so to have them join in on those individuals who have been working hard was welcome news. So you didn't know before yesterday about this assessment? Yesterday was the first time that I was briefed. Ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Last night, Governor Reeves said that the two main pumps in Mulders and O.D. Curtis time that I was free. Yes, ma'am. Last night, Governor Reeves said that the two main pumps and motors at O.B. Curtis went out about a month ago. Was that an accurate timeline? And were the repairs being made?

Were there plans to make repairs? Well, first and foremost, I want to communicate that there are more than two pumps at O.B. Curtis. And so the two pumps going out did not cripple us. But I actually communicated this to the local media, I think about two to three weeks ago, where I talked about the repairs that needed to be made, that I talked about. One, they felt that they could make the repairs within the local vicinity and that we would return that into service. And so that's ongoing. We have challenges with these pumps on a consistent basis. Sometimes it may be a simple fix that can be made right there at the water treatment facility. Sometimes it requires us to ship off this pump or that pump in order to make

those repairs. And so that has been a part and parcel of the ongoing challenges that we have been dealing with consistently. That is why I've been lifting up the fact that we are in a constant state of emergency, because whether it's the raw water screens, whether it's the pump, whether it's the UV light, that isn't even a part of the order of consent with the EPA. We have acknowledged and we have identified additional challenges that are yet to be, that have yet to rear their head in a way that have brought the attention to the regulatory agencies. And so there are a number of failures. I will share with you that what is ideal. What is ideal is a system or a city that would have had a the life cycle of each piece of equipment in that plant and

determine when that life cycle was set to end and scheduled its replacement over time. And so quite simply, that didn't happen. And as it relates to the human capital, it would have been ideal if we had a workforce development program that as our seasoned water operators were coming to an age of retirement, we were training people for the two- or six-year period that was necessary in order to replace them. But I liken it to a car. If you change your oil, if you rotate the tires, if you check the fluid levels, then that vehicle is more likely to function well for you.

But the moment that you don't have that routine maintenance and things get out of hand, then you have big system failures that cost you big. Yes, sir. Mayor, we've seen some drone footage of the O.B. Curtis plant that doesn't show any visible flooding affecting it. Can you clarify how those high water levels did impact Curtis's ability to process and treat water? Yeah.

Well, I'm not certain when those drone images were actually taken. And so that that may be, you know, some bit a bit misleading. But what happened is, is that due to the flood, they were receiving a different composition of water, right? A different makeup of water that made it more difficult to treat. And so if they didn't change the chemical composition of how they were treating it, then we would have left our residents in greater danger and a greater threat. And so that's why they were unable to push out more water,

because they were making certain that they were effectively treating the water. And so that was directly associated with the water, the additional water coming into the plant. I appreciate that. I have a follow up about... I'll start here with the follow up and then I'll return back this way. You mentioned at the top of the press conference about there was no raw untreated water introduced into the, through pipes, unlike what the governor and I believe state health officer had mentioned last night. Can you clarify why? And again, I'm not trying to get into a tit for tat. I'm just wondering why there would have been even the possibility of that from there and saying something like that. That's a pretty big stretch from the water is safe to drink if you boil it versus this is untreated water.

Yeah, well, I think that the main thing we want to emphasize to residents is to heed the warnings to boil the water. But I would just simply say that, you know, as a non-engineer myself, I simply listen to the reports that I get from those who are the experts in the field, right? And so there may be some miscommunication as to what the exact challenge was, what was issued into the system, what was put into the system, and what was the registered threat. We know that the threat was the potential of raw water getting into the system, but it was recognized by those that treat the water, and they ceased putting out the water until they could come to a chemical composition that was actually healthy and, you know, could be sent out to the residents.

But we are still under a boil water notice. If the boil water notice had been lifted prior to the events of this week, we would have reissued one due to the challenges that we have experienced in water pressure. So it's your position that no untreated water has gone out to residents through the system? That is what has been shared with me by our water operators. Okay. Yes. So I just want to go back to the question of staffing and reaching out to staffing. Another, again, I'm quoting directly from the interviewer,

contracting was the other thing we were looking for. We saw no information or correspondence that they were seeking a contract to staff over curtains. The mayor asked if that was an option, and I said, yes, it is. We do not dictate how you staff. How is it that the Environmental Protection Agency has no records in all the partnership with the city of attempts to contract or seek new employees through interviews, job fairs, technical training? How is there no record? I think that is because the EPA only sees completed transactions, right? And so they don't have a record of us meeting with companies like Veolia here in my office. They don't see the document trail of that.

But they requested those documents. They said they sent you an information request letter to find all information on the efforts, staff, and recurrence. And they did not receive any evidence. Well, that would have been simply a calendar, a calendar identification of the meetings that I was having. Until we reach those agreements, there's nothing to provide them. We've been waiting on a proposal from certain companies that we have not received, right? I don't want to go into great detail about that

because that gets into some of the state's work at this point with those companies that we've been talking about. How long have you been, tell me at least? We've been working to look at bringing in a third-party company over a six-month period of time. Yeah. Is there another company that maybe would take less time? I mean, that's like a long...

So they're, well, it's a matter of what they feel is in their best interest as a company. They want to talk about profitability. They want to talk about, you know, how it is orchestrated, whether they're working at just OB Curtis or whether they're doing Fuel, which actually does pretty well under its current operation. They want to talk about whether it's a revenue split or those things. These are things that are negotiated in the process and that process has not been completed. But we are in active and ongoing discussions with multiple agencies and multiple firms that are looking to apprise us of that. I have spoken directly

with Carol not only about companies that we have spoken to, but also to the extent that they can advise us of who they've had good relationships with in the EPA and who they've had negative experiences with. And that was important because we want to make certain that regardless of who deals with the operations and maintenance of our water treatment facility, they are qualified and they have a good track record. Yes? In terms of the governor's characterization of the severity of what's happening right

now, he said there might not be an ability to fight fires, people might not be able to use toilets, or just in general, how he characterized the severity of the situation. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. And I think that's a really important point. of the severity of what's happening right now. He said there might not be an ability to fight fires,

people might not be able to flush toilets, or just in general, how he characterized the severity of where we are right now. How accurate do you feel? I would share that we've been in constant discussion with our leadership of our fire department, and they have kept us abreast of what their capacity is. They have yet to indicate that they're unable.

But however, you know, we've talked from the standpoint of MEMA assisting with those efforts and making sure they double down with the ability to supplement what our fire department has. And so we feel comfortable with our fire department's reserves along with the support of MEMA that if we should meet the unfortunate circumstance of a fire, they will be able to continue.

What sparked the change in leadership at the Public Works Department? Well, we thought that a realignment was better in order to best address the challenges that we have here. And so no one was let go. There was a reassignment based based on individual strengths. Right. And so we believe that the interim leadership we have now has the requisite talent and ability to to help move us past where we are at this present moment. Mayor, two and a half weeks ago, you told us that you had full confidence in Mr. King and special confidence in the area you tasked him with. And you clarified that for us. What changed in that two and a half weeks? Nothing. I still have confidence in Mr. King.

And what I want him to do in the area that we believe that he can be most helpful is still one that he will be working on. Now, I felt that there needed to be a realignment of who people reported to, how communication followed down the chain. And so that's the change that happened. It was a realignment based on what we feel the individual skill sets of our team is. And so it doesn't mean that I no longer trust Mr. King. It doesn't mean that his skill set as a systems individual is not one that is well needed and beneficial to the overall success of our Public Works Department. Yes? I have two really quick questions. Do we have an assessment of how many service lines or customers are affected generally with that water?

And the second question is just in terms of messaging, there have been a lot of statements of just don't drink the water plainly, but to clarify, if the water is boiled, it still seems to drink the water. We have not gotten an official word from the Department of Health to just say don't drink it in a blanket way. Right now, the official stance right now is that we are under a boiled water notice, and that is what we continue to advise our residents. And your first question to remind me? It was just do we have any idea of the number of people affected with low pressure? We know that we experienced it system-wide. We don't have an

exact total but I can tell you this and I should have begun with this is that we have seen steady improvements in the system. There are individuals who did not have water pressure at all yesterday in which water pressure has returned. And the reports of the tanks is that there are steady gains being achieved each and every moment. In the middle of peak consumption, which is during the daytime hours, we have maintained steady. At night is a moment that we look to have the greatest amount of recovery.

And so we saw great recovery yesterday, and there's been encouraging news and signs ever since last night in terms of where we're seeing our tanks come back to. So, yeah, the numbers have gone down since yesterday, or...? No, there's... It's steady at this... It's gone up since yesterday. It's gone up since yesterday. I mean, in terms of the number of people with water.

Let me clarify. The number of individuals, there are more people with water since yesterday, right, due to the gains that we made in the system overnight. And we've been steady with the production. We don't typically see the biggest gains in the daytime because that is when consumption is at its highest. And so we look to recover even more through the night hours. In 2020, the EPA requested an alternative water plan for a situation just like this, distributing water to residents.

In April 2020, Jackson submitted that plan. It was called the Alternative Water Source Plan Development Implementation. I believe Keisha Saunders wrote that plan. Part of that plan, maybe the key part of that plan, was acquiring a contract with a third party, like a Kroger or some sort of grocery store chain, to actually deliver the water. In those years since then, Jackson has not acquired that contract, and the EPA highlighted that as a critical outstanding issue. Why not? So first and foremost, we didn't have a contract in place, but we were receiving the donations to meet the need, and so we were getting it by donation and not by expense. But today, to make certain that we fulfill the contract standpoint of that, and make sure that there was a contract in place

to meet that order of consent, and go beyond the donations that were meeting that need, you would have seen today, in today's city council meeting, that we met that and we actually agreed with the Coca-Cola company in order to meet that need. We've been distributing water to residents in the midst of these challenges every single time that residents have been without water. Every single time we've had our constituent services department

not only deliver to fire stations, but to personally deliver to our elderly residents and have several water distributions across the city. And so that's where we get into technical violations, which say that we didn't have a contract but the reality is that we were providing that water. We were just merely taking advantage of the fact that we have high expenses trying to rectify these challenges and if we had the benefit of corporations who are willing to provide it to us for free we certainly were taking advantage.

Mr. Mayor can you speak to whether or not MEMA has contacted the fire chief about distributing water at the city's fire stations? We've heard that they have not contacted them at this point. I can just share with you my discussion with Mr. McCraney yesterday and today. He said that he would be in contact with them. He said that they would provide assistance to them. I believe that that is going to take place. Hasn't taken place. Whether they have talked at this very moment or not,

I can't share with you because I do not know directly. In terms of just the main issue that's causing this pressure issue right now, you yesterday spoke about the flooding and that impact. The governor yesterday talked about the homes not working. So in terms of fixing this current pressure issue, is it homes? Is it flooding waters going down? It was the floodwaters that led to the challenge. Now, what typically happens, OB Curtis services the majority of our residents in the city. When OB Curtis, which is near the reservoir in Ridgeland, when it has challenges, then we depend on our older water

treatment facility fuel, right, in order to make up the difference. Fuel was functioning at its regular pace, but as we were looking at fuel to increase its production to supplement what OB Curtis was missing, we had challenges with a pump that led it to not be able to increase its production at fuel. And so the challenges at OB Curtis was dealing with the chemical composition. The challenges at fuel in order to increase the production was dealing with an inability to get the pump to help, to another

pump to increase that. Sorry, I actually just received word from MSDA. I just want to clarify, if you boil the water for one minute, and roll in the water for one minute, it is safe to drink. That was directly from the measure. Well, you can join me up here, and I appreciate you for sharing that. All right. So that's consistent.

Thank you all very much. Thank you. Folks, that was the again, that was earlier today a news conference led by the mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, Chokwe Lumumba. And we live streamed that earlier and we wanted to show it all show all of it because

this is an important story. National media has not given it the kind of coverage it deserves, so we wanted to do so. This is the state capital of Mississippi. It is a predominantly African-American city. Deion Sanders, who's the head coach of the Jackson State football team, says they, just like everybody in the state, excuse me, in the city, are being impacted by this water crisis. We hit with a little crisis. The city of Jackson, we don't have water.

Water means we don't have air conditioning. We can't use toilets. We don't have water. Therefore, we don't have ice, which pretty much places a burden on the program. So right now, we're operating in crisis mode. I got to get these kids off campus, the ones that live on campus, the one that lives in the city of Jackson, into a hotel and accommodate them so that they can shower properly and take care of their needs. Make sure all our kids are fed and all our kids have the necessities of life

for the next several days until this crisis resides. That's what we're operating in right now. So we're going to find somewhere to practice, find somewhere that can accommodate every darn thing that we need and desire to be who we desire to be. And that's dominant. The devil is alive. You ain't going to get us today, baby.

Folks, as I said, President Joe Biden has already declared a disaster relief, authorizing funds to be released to Jackson, Mississippi. This is a huge issue. Now, the mayor had that news conference because the governor, Tate Reeves, Republican, made a lot of different comments at his news conference, and the mayor wasn't even invited to attend that one, and that's why Mayor Lumumba wanted to come out and speak directly to the public. My panel today, assistant professor, University of Central Florida, joining us down, Larry Walker, Jason Nichols, senior lecturer, African American Studies Department, University of Maryland, College Park, Michael Imhotep, host of the African History Network show.

Glad to have all three of you here. You know, this issue of water, and I keep trying to walk people through this, Larry. It's a major issue. And we're talking about health. We were seeing right now, you know, where they are making decisions in Arizona, in Nevada, in California about reservoirs. Water is a basic fundamental thing. And we're seeing what happens when we have crises in this country dealing with water. We saw what happened in Flint, Michigan, and they're still dealing with the after effects of that. Yeah. So, Roland, we need to talk about, you know, a failure of systems, particularly government

systems. So, listen, when we have these infrastructure issues, whether it's in Jackson, Mississippi, you talked about, obviously, what happened in Flint, Michigan. It is a failure of systems and usually of policymakers. It's no coincidence that Flint and Jackson, Mississippi also happen to be, like you said, predominantly African American. In Jackson, more than 80 percent. So this is an issue that has been, you know, an infrastructure issue that's been going on for decades, and particularly the failure from the state, if they're getting federal funds, to make sure they address infrastructure issues.

The other thing when you talk about water as it relates to this issue and other issues you talked about in the western United States is that we had to connect this to also the climate change. And so some of the environmental challenges we're seeing with flooding and hurricanes and various other issues, scientists believe these will continue to increase. So then we have to talk about what impact, what communities are going to be impacted the most. And we know from research, Black and brown communities are predominantly being impacted. And we see, obviously, it was in Jackson, Mississippi. I congratulate the mayor for, you know, coming out and speaking.

I can't believe the governor, I mean, the governor, I mean, the mayor, the governor wouldn't have invited him to the press conference. But then I get to understand I could understand how policymakers work. But this is an issue that is impacting, like you said, the capital of the state, and that it's really important that the mayor and the governor are on the same page, but it's important to the governor to make sure not only is he communicating via staff, et cetera, but that the mayor is invited to these events considering all the people, over 100,000 people will be impacted by the flooding and then the system not working and not having access to clean water. The other thing, Roland, in terms of we talk about impacting a majority Black city,

we also have to talk about the elderly and other populations that are disproportionately impacted when things like this happen. We have to make sure there are systems in place in emergencies like this happen, that not only in terms of bottled water, but there are other resources available in terms of health care, et cetera, to support the needs of these populations. You know, Jason, what's crazy to me, and I keep telling people, voting matters. Republicans controlling the state, you see what they do. They don't give a damn about when it comes to the infrastructure issue. They say they do, and they don't give a damn about when it comes to the infrastructure issue. They say they do. And they definitely don't give a damn when you have these Democratic run cities.

But he's a perfect example, though, that they love talking about smaller government. Oh, but they'll take that money from President Biden that he authorized last night. Absolutely. We've seen this happen over and over again. And I'm really happy that my colleague mentioned climate change, because I think there's been a messaging issue to African-Americans about how climate change affects them, how climate change is important, and how this is a race-based issue. And I think the Democrats have actually failed at actually messaging that in many ways to a lot of communities. I talk to brothers all the time and they're like, yeah, they keep talking about

climate change. You know, I don't you know, I'm not thinking about an electric vehicle. And I'm like, no, this actually affects our communities. And, you know, you hit the nail on the head when you're talking about, you know, the state of Mississippi being run by Republicans. They have a supermajority in all of their levers of government. And then you have Jackson, Mississippi, which should be, you know, the most important city and be kind of a shining beacon for the state. But yet it's underfunded and we see the infrastructure fall apart. And, you know, my colleague mentioned, you know, mentioned Flint, Michigan, and you mentioned Flint, Roland, but we could talk about Puerto Rico and other places where infrastructure

has failed, where it's majority people of color. And so voting absolutely matters, not only at the local level, which the city of Jackson elected Chuckway Lumumba, who I understand why Tate Reeves didn't invite Chuckway Lumumba, because as you can see, he's really good at what he does and was probably afraid of being upstaged. But also, we need to understand that there needs to be all of the efforts in the world to keep Republicans from gerrymandering our votes, from keeping power out of the hands of the voters, because Mississippi is the blackest state in the country, 39 percent black. There is an opportunity there potentially for Mississippi to be, you know, another Georgia. But we've got to make sure that the vote is protected.

Michael, this is from a CBS story. Like many, go to my iPad, please. Like many cities, Jackson faces water system problems it can't afford to fix. Its tax base has eroded the past few decades as the population decreased. The result of, sorry, this is an ad on their page here, has eroded the past few decades as the population decreased. The result, sorry, this is an ad on their page here, has eroded the past few decades as the population decreased as a result of a mostly white flight to the suburbs that began after public schools integrated in 1970. The city's population is now more than 80% black with about 25% of its residents living in poverty. Look, you're there in Detroit. Same thing happened in Detroit when Coleman Young became mayor of Detroit.

And so what you have is white folks choosing to leave, taking their money with them. And then the state leaders say, oh, to hell with you. Y'all can't run your city. Well, it's a little hard to run your city when racism has impacted economic mobility of black folks. So therefore, it's now a poor city as a result. Absolutely. That's what I was going to come to, Roland. And I'm going to connect this to the story you did on Monday dealing with Mississippi's Jim Crow-era felony voting law. And the federal court ruled that that is constitutional. That goes back to the Mississippi State Convention of 1890 because white supremacy is a system.

Racism is a system of advantage and privilege distributed based upon race, and this is what we're dealing with. We're dealing with white flight. And here in Detroit, the white flight even began before Mayor Young became mayor January 1974. Okay? We saw white flight going back to the 1950s here in Detroit and the declining tax base. You see the same thing in Jackson, Mississippi.

The state legislature is controlled by Republicans. You have the Republican governor, Tate Reeves. You had Cindy Hyde-Smith, the public hanging woman, one of the two senators from Mississippi. She voted against the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill. And what this does is this shows how climate change disproportionately impacts African-Americans, especially when you have African-American-led cities like this. OK, so we have to understand how all this is connected. Indeed, indeed, folks. We're going to continue to cover this crisis taking place in Jackson, Mississippi. We'll give you the latest as we find out. Going to go to a quick break. We come back. How these Republican-led abortion laws is absolutely causing mayhem.

You now have pharmacists who have the audacity at CVS to question doctors about prescriptions that they are making for women who are dealing with surgeries that could very well kill these women by not prescribing them the medicine. Wait until you tell you what happened. And then we're going to share with you what happened today in Michigan, where they had enough signatures to put abortion on the ballot. Republicans of the election board said, hell no, we're not going to do it. That's coming up next right here on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. When we invest in ourselves, our glow, our vision, Our vibe. We all shine. Together, we are black beyond measure. Hatred on the streets. A horrific scene. A white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence.

You will not be white. White people are losing their lives. There's an angry pro-Trump mob storm to the U.S. Capitol. We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting. I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial. This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress, whether real or symbolic, there has been what

Carol Anderson at every university calls white rage as a backlash. This is the rise of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. There's all the Proud Boys. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources, they're taking our women. This is white fear. When we invest in ourselves, we all shine.

Together, we are Black Beyond Measure. What's going on? This is Tobias Trevillian. Hey, I'm Amber Stevens West. Folks, to understand how nuts these Republicans have gotten with their abortion laws. They now are allowing, literally allowing, physicians to now question doctors. A physician's tweet garnered thousands upon thousands of views and outrage that CVS is policing the prescription of drugs that treat multiple things, including medical abortions. Dr. Emily Porter tweeted this, y'all. Check this out. My 55-year-old friend who is having post-menopausal bleeding just called me from CVS in Texas because they refused to fill her prescription for misoprostol, I think that's

how you pronounce it, used to open the cervix because she couldn't prove she wasn't having an abortion. She is having surgery in two days. This is what total abortion bans do. Now, so here's the deal. So she says, what I'm not going to do is let CVS call my friend who was denied her prescription because she couldn't prove it wasn't for an abortion at age 55. What I am going to do is put them in touch with her very incensed gynecologist whose order they disobeyed when putting politics over patients. All right. So we're going to read for you. This is the text message that the doctor sent.

Hi, Emily. Could you please, first of all, CVS sent this tweet to her. Hi, Emily, could you please share the CVS location where this incident occurred along with the patient's name and contact information so our team is able to speak with her directly. Thank you. Now, do we have the doctor's tweet? Doctors texted them? Do we have that?

Okay, all right. Now, do we have the doctor's suite? Doctors texted them? Do we have that? Okay, all right. So I want to pull this up, y'all, because I got to show you what the doctor, let's just say the doctor was a little pissed off, okay? Doctor was real pissed. And he sent a text. First of all, let's do this here. Pull up CVS's statement, okay? So this is what CVS spokesperson Mike DeAngelo said.

The prescription in question was filled for the patient after our pharmacy was able to speak with the prescribing physician. Laws in certain states, including Texas, restrict the dispensing of medications for the purpose of inducing an abortion. Okay, all right. Now, first of all, yeah, we get that, but the whole point is the woman is 55 years old, and she was there because the doctor called in a prescription. I mean, I know how those things work.

I mean, typically when my doctor called the prescription, it's not like somebody's going, oh, what in the hell are you using this whole thing for? Let me see if I can find the text. That her doctor friend, because he was real pissed off, sent. Oh, man. Because she posted it, and it was, let's just say, he was hot. You know what?

I'm going to look for it right now. I'm going to introduce my guest, obstetrician and gynecologist, Dr. Brandy Wilson. Man, again, Doc, glad to have you here. But I look for that particular text. I mean, this has to piss you off that here you are trying to keep patients alive

and you got some dumbass pharmacist literally questioning what's this for? Well, definitely, Roland. Thank you for having me on to talk about this. It can be frustrating as you try to take care of patients and you want to do what's best for them and there are other people, entities, and things that are stepping in the way and not allowing for you to care for your patients as you need to is definitely frustrating. You know, and I mean, normally what happens is,

you have a prescription, the doctor's office calls it in. So it's not like you, the patient, goes in and says, hey, can y'all give me some of that medicine I can't pronounce? I mean, that's not how it works. So a doctor is literally the one that calls in the prescription. So who the hell is the physician to go, what are you using this for? Yeah, that typically when you are, when we're prescribing something, there isn't a need or a necessity to put an indication onto the prescription. That usually comes up if someone needs a prior authorization from their insurance in order for the insurance to cover the medication. But just if you walk in, your doctor's called in a prescription or sent in a prescription electronically, typically you go in, you give

your name, your date of birth, they have filled the prescription if that's the case, and then, you know, you walk out with your medicine and they're checking to make sure, you know, you don't have an allergy to the medicine. It's not something that is an interaction. It's going to interact with any other medications that you're taking. So the requirement for an indication to be given for this particular prescription, you know, goes outside of what is the norm or the standard for prescribing medications? This it was I'm trying to find it she may have deleted but the doctor basically was like Because the CVS physician goes a pharmacist goes who are you? He's like, I'm the damn MD, you know the MD He was on vacation

He was not having happy that he had sit here and make this phone call. And so this is what we're left with. You now have doctors, you now have hospitals calling the lawyers. Hey, before we save this person's life, can we do this because of these Republican-led abortion laws? Yeah, there's a lot of concern in the medical community, especially with OBGYNs, with, you know, what is acceptable. And even, you know, with the provisions about emergency use and what you can do and what's allowed, there's a real fear. Like even with being an OBGYN, there's already a big liability in terms of if anything happens from anything that we do, we're likely to get sued.

And so this is just kind of another thing that is showing up to make us second guess what we know to be appropriate care to give. There are two hashtags going around. One is called Boycott Walgreens. One is called Boycott CVS. And go to my iPad, please. Birth Control is the next white Republicans plan to eliminate. Customers are claiming that they are being denied the ability to purchase birth control and condoms from some Walgreens and CVS in Tennessee. We've heard other stories where someone went in to buy some condoms and the person said, I don't have to say that to you because of my religious convictions.

Right. Those are actually stories that are being told and we're finding out about them from lots and lots of people where they are encountering resistance and people who are saying, you know, I'm not going to sell you this product. I'm not going to do this and allow you to have these particular products or these particular medications because of my religion. And it's it's a hard, hard space in place to be in because people have the right to have what they need and have what they're being prescribed. And so there's just there's got to be some some balance or something that happens to change how this is going down, how this is happening. Absolutely. I mean, it just it's just nonsensical what is happening. And it is certainly unfortunate. Dr. Brandy Wilson, man, again, I appreciate it. Look, y'all are now on the front lines of not just medical issues, but now a political battle. Absolutely. Absolutely.

All right. Appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much. Today, folks, in Michigan, this is what, you want to talk about what's unbelievable and crazy what happened in Michigan today. So folks in Michigan, they said, you know what? We want to put the issue of abortion on the ballot. So they went out and they got a whole bunch of signatures to do so.

Well, check this out. The Board of Canvassers, they deadlocked, meaning the promote the vote proposal will not be on the November ballot. This tweet says constitutional amendment proposed early voting in Michigan and other changes to preempt GOP efforts to change election law in the wake of 2020. Now, here's the deal. Republicans are like, yeah, no, we're not going to do that. Let me pull a story up from the folks here from the Detroit Free Press. And it says, a sweeping voting rights proposal to make changes to Michigan's elections, including establishing early voting in the state, failed to land a spot on the ballot this fall after the state's election panel deadlocked Wednesday on whether to certify the Promote

the Vote Amendment for the ballot. Organizers collected enough signatures to qualify for the ballot, according to the state's Bureau of Elect elections, but canvassers debated how to handle a challenge to the proposal, alleging that the petition from circulated by organizers failed to note which section of the Michigan constitution would be impacted if the proposal was placed on the ballot and adopted by voters. All right, so here's, this is the perfect example, Michael, what we're about to see. And this is why I have been yelling from the rooftops why we have got to shut down every Republican. Steve Bannon and all of these people, their whole deal was we are going to take over state board of elections, county boards of elections, and their whole deal is if, in this case,

by deadlocking, because typically it's equal number of Democrats and Republicans, by deadlocking, they can prevent something from moving forward. And so enough signatures, they got enough signatures, but this is how they blocked putting the issue of abortion rights on the ballot by stopping it in the State Board of Elections. Yeah, you know, the Michigan Board of State canvass is deadlocked today, so it looks like it's going to go to the Michigan State Supreme Court to determine this. And, you know, once again, this goes back

to what I've been talking about, how abortion rights, which really deals with women's reproductive rights and health care, is going to be at the top of the ballot, top of people's minds, these midterm elections. And what we're also what we're looking at is this is OK, because I'm looking at this article from WXYZ Channel 7. We're seeing Republicans across the country like Blake Masters running for Senate in Arizona, we're seeing these Republicans who had extreme positions on abortion back away from that

and try to refashion themselves because it's not popular. Now, Tudor Dixon got the Republican nomination for governor here in Michigan. She's run against Governor Gretchen Whitmer, who's a Democrat. And Tudor Dixon is against abortion, even when it comes to exceptions for rape and incest, things like this. She's a crazy woman, OK? But this is a stark contrast. And we're seeing Democrats gain ground when it comes to generic ballots. We see them gain ground when it comes to recent polls that are being taken. But they have to keep

driving home this issue. At the top of the ballot is saving the democracy from these coup plotters and domestic terrorists. And right below that, you're going to have health care, women's reproductive rights, things like this. And what we're dealing with here with abortion rights is an example of that. So this is serious here. The way I frame this, let me wrap up with this, Roland. The way I frame this, I was never one of these people who parroted what corporate media said and said Democrats are going to lose because that's what happens for the last 100 years, except two exceptions, when you had one party control the White House.

The way I frame this is that this is the first midterm election since an insurrection, since the 1866 midterm election after the Civil War. This is totally different than any previous midterm election that we've seen. That's why we need to look at this. This is the thing here. This is Jason in the Detroit News. In a heated debate over a lack of spacing between words in the petition text, the Board of State canvassers split two to two along party lines.

Democrats voted to place the constitutional amendment on the November ballot, or Republicans rejected it on technical grounds. Spacey. Yeah, I mean, this is typical voter suppression and they're going to try this all over the country. This is why even, you know, as Michael pointed out, some of the candidates that are just all around bad candidates. You look at Blake Masters, and he's within three points, at least according to most polls. He's within the margin of error. And someone who has consistently made racist comments about Black people, about women, you know, made patriarchal comments about women, he shouldn't even be close. But again, they have found ways, you know, to go around the law and on technicalities, suppress votes. And so they're going to do this again, even with women's health on the line. They're going to try and find ways to disenfranchise

the American people and disenfranchise voters everywhere. And, you know, it's terrifying with some of these issues that we're dealing with right now and democracy itself on the line that these people are going to succeed in some cases. Hopefully they will lose some of these Senate races, you know, with Sherry Beasley and Val Demings and even Fetterman and Mandela Barnes on the ballot. Hopefully we can save democracy that way and even keep the House. But they're going to do everything they can ever since 2020, ever since the big lie, to try to steal this thing with all these technicalities and changing the voting laws. And, you know, I hope that we're able to stand up

if people go out and vote in droves, realizing that this is not something that we can start talking about, that these both parties are equivalent. I was, you know, probably, you know, closer to there at one point. But now it's clear that one party is trying to tear apart democracy.

Take your vote. Take your vote, particularly if you are a black person. And they have to be stopped. Larry, people keep talking, and I love these old simple silent ass people. Oh, you shilling for Democrats. These people stopped a constitutional amendment that would expand voting rights in Michigan.

I keep telling folk, I cannot trust any Republican that stands with these people. Now, if you're a Republican and you support these ballot initiatives, okay, fine. Okay, but everybody vote all of these folks out. What these people want to do, they want to stop. They want to shut down. They do not want democracy in this country. They want to run by minority rule. Well, you hit on the nose right there. This is these issues are not about, you know, we're talking about democracy being in danger. This is about power and control. It's not about democracy and fairness. You've highlighted it. We talked about this on your show, as you just said. And it's time for people to wake up, not opportunity at the state level to vote on this ballot initiative based on some, you know, maybe I believe it wasn't clear enough in terms of the Constitution. You will see this all over the country because, once again, this is about a power. This is not about maintaining a democracy.

I've often used this as a comparison in that people, Republicans, it's like they'd rather burn the house down with everyone inside of it to relinquish control. And that's where we are. We are the five alarm fire. And there are a lot of people who aren't realizing it. And obviously this issue relating... Go ahead.

No, no, go ahead, go ahead. No, I was going to say, in terms of the issue of women's reproductive rights, this is front and center. The other thing is that we talk about politics and in the world, and you talk about, we've talked about this by the show about voting, we're seeing an increase in women who are new voters nationally. And so as we talk, my colleague talked about generic balloting, that number, and in terms of the House, those percentages that are closed. But the bottom line is, if you don't hold these

people accountable, vote them out. And not only vote them out, Roland, we need to shame them. We need to shame them publicly, whether it's social media or other places. We need to shame these individuals. Because if you don't make them feel uncomfortable and then vote them out, they will continue along the same path. And then the United States will continue to spiral out of control. And look, y'all, I'm telling you, I don't give these folks, I don't give them any, I don't give them an inch.

What these people are trying to do, they, this is about power. Y'all, September 12th is going to be the first anniversary since the last time I was on ABC this week when I sat here and lit Chris Christie's ass up. When I said, you chose, and I ain't been back on ABC this week since. Ain't no coincidence. But I told them point blank. I said, y'all chose power and party over principle and patriotism.

Don't make any mistake. Y'all, let me be real clear. And I've said this. Demand, push, protest, Democrats to get what we want. But we cannot allow these thugs to be in control because they do not want to expand voting rights. They do not care about the maternal birth rates of black women. They do not care about the infrastructure

of predominantly black cities like Jackson, Mississippi. They do not care. What did that fool Kanye West say about George W. Bush? He don't like black people? I guess he forgot that one and by the way, stuck up to Trump. They don't care. And so they will do whatever they can to stay in power. We must maximize

our vote to defeat them. The Michigan issue is going to be real quick because they have to make a decision real soon by September 9th in order to meet the early voting deadlines. So this case is going to be moving quite rapidly. We'll give you an update about that. It's got to go

to break. We come back. We're going to talk to a sister. She's running in the jungle primary for the nomination in Louisiana for the United States Senate. Top two vote getters. If one person doesn't get majority of the vote, go to a runoff. We'll talk with her next on Roller Mountain Unfiltered. Folks, be sure to watch the show. Support the show. Download our app,

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this is a perfect example of what your money goes to. So, you know, we travel. A lot of times we're out there, and so, you know, we don't have our zip and repeat or our tint or our branding. And so when Henry and I were at the Miami Grand Prix, the F1 Miami Grand Prix, we saw the folks with, I think it was like Sky TV out of England. So they had these pop-up stands.

And so literally, you just simply push this thing all the way down. It collapses. It actually comes in its own tin. And so when we go out, it just pops right back up. And so we ordered six of these. And so they're pretty cool. And so again, I'm always showing y'all,

when you support us, what your dollars go to. And here's a perfect example. And so when we travel, so as you see, y'all, we have, so we got six of them. So you see the front has the show logo. And then as you see right here, the top has Blackstar Network on it as well. So when we go out, hit the road, then we can travel a lot lighter and have our pop-ups right there, wherever we do when we're broadcasting live. All right, folks, we do, when we're broadcasting live. All right, folks, we'll be right back on Roller Martin Unfiltered.

When we invest in ourselves, we're investing in what's next for all of us. Growing, creating, making moves that move us all forward. Together, we are black beyond measure. I remember being with The View when they said, we want to extend your contract. And I knew, God said, it's time to move.

It's time to go. And everybody was saying, Sherri, you got a great job. You're making all of this money. And I said, no, it's time. And they said, you ain't gonna be able to, you've been away from Hollywood. And I said, it's time to go. And when I didn't, that's when I realized I was about to go through this divorce.

And I was going to need it. It was going to be expensive. It was going to be a lot. And I said, I'm going to stay. I said, I'm going to stay for a couple of years. So you make this money. See, go ahead. I'm going to make this money.

And then I'll get out Lorde. So it was a compromise. I'm going to do what you say, but I'm going to do it on my thing. And he went, really? He went, really. And you know when he went, really? They said that we were heavy in contract negotiations. And they came, my manager called. She said, they're not going to renew your contract. And I went, hey, wait, what? Just yesterday, they was offering me more money.

She said, they just decided not to renew your contract. And I remember sitting in front of the mirror at The View, and I went, what happened? And it was very clear. God said, I told you it was time to go. When we invest in ourselves, our glow, our vision, our vibe, we all shine.

Together, we are Black beyond measure. Black TV does matter, dang it. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your boy, Jacob Lattimore, and you're now watching Roland Martin right now. Yee! All right, folks, we've been covering these various U.S. Senate races, and the critical race is happening all across the country. Democrats are focused on really four states.

They're focused really on North Carolina, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Florida. Of course, they want to hold the seats in Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, and New Hampshire. Now, they're not putting the resources in a significant way into Kentucky, where Charles Booker is running, but also into Louisiana, even though you've got a significant black population there, and they should be doing so. Now, we've talked to Garrett Chambers. He, of course, is one of the folks. We look at the polling data at the top, but there's also another African-American candidate who is running, Serena Steeve. She has worked for a number of years on the issue

of women being incarcerated. When the Louisiana State Party met, they actually endorsed, pulled back up all three candidates. We've had Gary on talking about that because the executive committee actually voted to endorse Gary Chambers. But then you had a little back and forth with the chair where they maneuvered to say, well, let's endorse all three, running against, of course, incumbent Senator John Kennedy. And so it's Gary Chambers, Luke Mixon, Serena Steve. They were all who were endorsed by the state party. Now, Steve, again, a formerly incarcerated woman and positive reform advocate. Joining me now from Metairie, Louisiana. Glad to have you on the show.

What now, the campaign has been going on. When you look at the polling data that we've seen thus far, you're polling at 2%. What are you going to do to increase your numbers to get in that top two? Because at the end of the day, if Kennedy does not get a majority of the vote, the top two go to a December runoff. Yeah, so there really hasn't been any recent polling data. That polling data was very outdated. I'm actually the only candidate in the race that did an independent poll prior to thinking about even running. And what it did show is that Kennedy was vulnerable. And in my informed ballot portion of the poll, I came back in my profile with 41 percent to his 43

percent. And where I was lacking was, of course, in name recognition, because I'm always working with my head down and not really putting out all of the work that I have done and continue to do. But we have a ground campaign. We're working on rural communities here in Louisiana. I'm from a rural area called Vashery in St. James Parish. So knowing the needs intimately of rural Louisiana is a big part of my push and my ground game. I also have been working in communities with formerly incarcerated people who just received the

right back to vote two years ago in this state. I myself, after being out 11 years, voted for the first time two years ago. And we have a significant opportunity and momentum in that community as well. So what are the critical issues that you're focused on? So of course me only being able to see through the eyes of a woman, specifically a black woman in the South, a lot of my work has been to liberate, you know, the issues that pertain to women. So of course we have a very high maternal mortality rate here, working toward the damage that the overturning of Roe versus Wade has done. A lot of my work is in higher education. We passed policy here in Louisiana in 2017, making Louisiana the first state to remove the box off of college applications for purposes of admissions. I've done that in six states since then.

On a federal level, we've also removed the ban on Pell for people who are currently incarcerated. So now students who are incarcerated can take advantage of their Pell funding. We've also removed the question off of the college app. And I just continue to do work to make sure that the playing field is even all the way around the board. Infrastructure is another big issue here in Louisiana. Me growing up in rural Louisiana, access to broadband, roads, and a lot of health care, you know, focusing on health care, K-12, education. And these are things that I work on and I focus on every day currently. So I can't see it changing on a larger stage.

When we talk about, again, look at these races here, I mean, at the end of the day, it comes down to money. How much money have you raised and what are your targets? Because you've got traveling across the state, it's not easy. You're talking about campaign ads, you're talking about things along those lines. So how is that going? Yeah, so with my last FEC filing report, we did report about $200,000 that I have been able to raise thus far. We have an aggressive approach to this strategy. You know, we'll be filing again at the end of September, and we'll be able to push up our numbers significantly, hopefully moving forward, that momentum continues.

Of course, traveling across the state is really, really expensive and trying, but we're also currently working on a ballot initiative, Amendment 7, where the question around slavery and removing that out of the Louisiana Constitution is something else that there. As every day passes, we feel like we're gaining more and more momentum. And I just really wanted to address earlier the triple endorsement that you mentioned. You're absolutely right. The executive committee did recommend that Gary Chambers get the endorsement of the Democratic Party. But when the vote was supposed to be brought to the larger body to see if they wanted to go through with the endorsement or not. A referendum was introduced by a member of the larger body that they wanted to introduce and vote for all three candidates. So there's this narrative going around that Gary Chambers received the endorsement and it was a recommendation for the larger body to vote on. And the larger body decided not to vote on it, and they introduced a memo.

But the rules change. The folks we also talked with said that according to their own policies, that when the executive committee makes a recommendation, it's supposed to go to the larger body for an up or down vote, and the chair chose to change that particular policy. Yes or no? No. The chair didn't choose the policy. There was a state representative, Denise Marcel, who recommended and introduced an opportunity

for them to reconsider because the bylaws changed in March of this year because Gary was a part of a triple endorsement in the U.S. Congress race with himself, Karen Carter Peterson, and Troy Carter, the sitting congressman currently. And they changed the bylaws in March to address not having the triple endorsement again. But the issue was is that because Gary won the endorsement of the recommendation of endorsement from the executive committee, they were supposed to notify candidates to give them a chance to have somebody introduce a motion on the floor seven days prior to the larger vote to also include them in the conversation.

And those things never happened because the change in the bylaws that happened in March of this year were not communicated down to everyone. So that is... So whose fault was that? The Democratic Party in changing the rules. So, of course, it does go with the chair.

So the Democratic Party, I'm trying to follow. So the state Democratic Party changed the rules so there would not be a triple endorsement, and they ended up doing a triple endorsement. They changed the rules to address the triple endorsement that went out in the Congress race for Troy Carter, Gary Chambers, and Karen Carter Peterson the last time that this happened, which was the last election that we had. Right. But they changed it so that it wouldn't happen again, but it happened again. Absolutely, because they didn't notify the changes of the rules to the larger body, nor the candidates that this affected. So that is why it was introduced prior to the motion for the vote. And that is why I guess the larger body chose at 80 to 23 vote.

So 80 members of and 20 members chose to vote for it. Twenty three members voted against it for the triple endorsement. So the actual vote for the triple endorsement came from the larger body. And but was it also true that the chair of what Gary said, the chair had 50 proxies. So 50 of those 80 votes, the chair came with proxies. So those folks weren't even actually at the meeting, correct? Correct. So 50 of the votes did come from proxies, but these proxies were turned into the chair. So the chair entered them in. So I don't know how many proxies were directly given to Katie Barnhart, who is the chair.

I don't know how many were actually physically sent to her. But multiple people show up at these meetings where proxies all of the time. It happens every single meeting. Got it. We talked again. We laid out what those issues are. Look, you've got a significant number of black people in Louisiana who are not registered. But you also have low turnout in your largest cities. What are you

going to do? What can you do to increase that voter turnout? Well, one of the main things that we're doing is we're making sure that people who have been disenfranchised and stripped of their right to vote, because we do know that Louisiana incarcerates the most people per state, and incarcerates the most people per capita anywhere in the world. We do know that now that these people have their rights restored and in order to vote in certain instances, it's imperative that we get the message out to those folks, starting, one, with that. Secondly, a lot of people have felt like they haven't been a part of the conversation, specifically rural Louisiana. And I think that me putting them in the forefront and getting out in rural communities and talking to rural folks and letting them know that, hey, I'm also from the country. I'm just a country girl who likes to ride on ATVs, who have been fighting for the liberation

of people ever since my own liberation occurred, and let them know that I'm going to fight for them on every front. I do believe that every solution that we have exists in community and it is my job. It is the calling on my life to make sure that I am connecting with community, to make sure that we get the solutions and give people access to the spaces that they are traditionally locked out of. I think that this road is not an easy one. Louisiana has never elected a black woman statewide to any office. So we're already starting with ads that seem like they're insurmountable. But, you know, I've been told multiple times, time and time again, about things that I can't do, things that I won't do. And nobody is going to outwork me in trying to make sure that

Louisiana elects the first black woman to a statewide office. All right. Serena Steed, we certainly appreciate it. Thanks so much. Good luck. Yeah. And Roland is Stieb. I'm sorry.

Stieb. Okay. All right. It's the German side, you know. You said the German side? Okay. Serena Stieb. Yes.

All right. We appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Yes. Have a good day. Thank you for having me. All right, folks. Got to go to break.

We come back. We a lot. Yes, have a good day. Thank you for having me. All right, folks, got to go to break. We come back. We'll talk FAMU, the president, making some changes to the compliance officers. Too little, too late. We'll break it down next on Roller Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Folks, and don't forget to support us down on the Black Star Network app, Apple phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV. Also, our Bring the Funk fan club. You can see and check out money orders too.

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Weigh it to $100,000. We're behind $100,000, so we want to hit 2,000 people. $50 this month. Waits $100,000. We're behind $100,000. So we want to hit that. Y'all money makes this possible. Check some money orders. Go to P.O. Box 57196. Washington, D.C. 20037-0196.

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Creating. Making moves. The move is all forward. Together, we are Black Beyond Measure. I'm Bill Duke. This is De'Alla Riddle. What's up, y'all? I'm Will Packer. I'm Chrisette Michelle. Hi, I'm Chaley Rose, and you're watching Rolling Together, we are Black Beyond Measure. All right, folks. The folks at Florida A&M continue to demand answers from the administration when it comes to the problems they've been facing with their football team, the ban, the need for compliance officers.

They had 26 players last week who were ineligible because of various issues. President Larry Robinson being under a lot of criticism from folks. He held a news conference after he met with the students and addressed the news media. Much needed. We've been inviting him on this show for the past three days. They have not consented to come on, as well as members of the Board of Trustees or the Florida A&M alumni. We'd love to talk with any of them. So here's the president, what he had to say.

As Keith Miles said, good afternoon, everyone. As Keith Miles said, I just had a very informative, productive session with our male, with our football team. Of course, they're all males. And it was very productive in the sense that I had a chance to hear from them directly what their issues and concerns are and probably more importantly to let them know that we are committed to Addressing those issues as well and went over an hour And as I said, they had a lot of very good questions and our team Was there to hear them as well so we can take those and continue the work that we're doing to make this the best experience for them possible. President, what's the main reason that you wanted to hold this meeting today?

Well, I just want them to know I talked to them last Friday, right, about our commitment to their success. I wanted to come and talk to them in person and hear what their concerns were in person. I do appreciate the letter that they got, but I got a little bit more of a sense of the passion and urgency around the issues when I talked to them in person. So that's why I came. I want to look them in the eye and hear from them directly and not try to have to interpret from the language in a letter. So is this just you listening to them about more with the letter, or do you have an official response to what they're saying? So we had an opportunity to hear from them and respond to them as well.

So it wasn't just a listening session on my behalf. We tried to let them know where services are, what things we're doing to for additional services that they need, etc. How would you describe their acceptance of your answers or was it a understanding dialogue, a contentious dialogue at times? I think it was a very understanding dialogue and one of the things I'm most appreciative of is the professional manner in which these young men handled themselves. What is the University doing to make sure this doesn't happen again? I mean in 2019 there were three compliance officers. There's one now. What has changed? Why has it gone down like that? And what are you doing to make sure this doesn't happen again?

So what is the desk that you're referring to? In 2019 we had a press conference in the Al Lawson Center when Kendra Green was the head of compliance. There was her and two other compliance officers. There's one compliance officer over all of athletics right now. Why the decrease? What happened? And what is being done to make sure this is happening? Well, that's not exactly true. There is one compliance officer in athletics, but we use our compliance program to provide assistance to athletics as well. Ms. Rika Calhoun and her staff helped out with compliance in athletics and we've also made a commitment to additional staff on her team as well. In fact, we have been in the throes of a search process that will

result in at least two people in the next 30 to 45 days on the campus, but overall we've committed to a total of five additional people to help with compliance in athletics so how many officers when it's all done i just want to make sure i have the number right there's there's the one now that's just for athletics how many will there be just for athletics that will be these additional five people will be just for athletics maybe more because you know don't don't hold me to the number, because if you really want to know that, you have to talk to Ms. Calhoun. But I know we did commit to five additional people to work on athletic-related issues,

whether it's financial aid, academic progress issues, and so forth. Okay, so that just won't be for compliance. It's just five extra people to deal with academic advising compliance just in that. Academic advising is separate. Okay. Okay, these are compliance people. We also committed to adding two additional people to help with academic advising, specifically in athletics.

However, the full impact of what we're going to do in academic advising is utilize the 18 other advisors we have for the campus, train them very specifically in some of the nuances associated with athletics, you know, progression issues, GPA issues, and so forth, because that's a little bit different than a typical student, you know, going from one level to the next. They have to accumulate a certain number of hours after each year and so forth, which is a little bit different what you normally think about when advising students in general.

So that's two people to wrap up the advising staff and five people on the compliance side. Thank you. Are you familiar with anyone that hasn't been cleared yet? the advising staff and five people on the compliance side. Thank you. Are you familiar with anyone that hasn't been cleared yet? Well, I can't speak to that specifically because of FERPA issues. All I can tell you is that we're continuing to work with our compliance team, athletic coach,

and others who submit additional names to the NCAA for clearance, okay? And we have another four or five that we'll be submitting as early as tomorrow, right, to hope to get them cleared perhaps in time for this game, but we don't know for sure because that's in the hands of the NCAA. What do you feel is like the most, since Friday, what has been the most troubling aspect of but we don't know for sure because that's in the hands of the NCAA. What do you feel is the most troubling aspect of these news outlets around the family athletics? In terms of what we are now, I really think that the misconception that people may have that we're not supportive of family athletics

in the way that we should, and we don't care about these young young men that's very disturbing to me because i know how much we do care and how much we put into make this program hold and we're going to continue to do more but that's what bothers me the most is that this perception that we don't care and we haven't invested properly in the program um in a statement that came out yesterday, there was talks of rumors and misinformation dealing with the compliance issues. What references that to and clear it up? I didn't issue a statement that reference, well, here's what I said. That, and I said this to the young man, that talking to them directly, right, gives me

a better indication of what their concerns are, as opposed to trying to sort through what's in a letter or what's out there in social media and elsewhere. I cannot, you know, be held accountable for all of that. I wanted to hear from the young man directly, and that's what I had the opportunity to do this afternoon. The idea or the allegation that the academic advisement a player got set him up to fail, so to speak, or put him in a position where he is this week.

That idea was expressed in that letter. Did you agree with that or what's your reaction to that? And do you have faith that your academic advisement sees this? So we are having right now, for those person who feel like they were misadvised they're speaking with our academic affairs people to see what that was and what might be done if indeed that did occur. You know it is a bit different as I said in the academic advising for student athletes than it is for regular students and if they didn't get that from the right person, that could have been the case,

but I'm not suggesting that it was. All I'm trying to do now is look at the situations that are here now and making sure that our team is working on those on each of the students' behalf. When do you hope to have everybody on campus, all the extra people you guys plan to hire? When do you hope to have everybody here on campus? So for the academic, well the compliance people, we're talking about, I think about three of them will probably be here within the next 45 to 60 days, but for everybody we're shooting to make sure all these things are in place by the end of the fall semester. Okay, as you know we're in a very interesting situation in terms of

employment, people moving around and leaving jobs and so it's not as easy as it might sound, right, to get people here but we're going to do our best to get these people here and on the ground prior to the end of the semester. Can you speak to, just on Willie's address on on Monday talking about the HBCUs sometimes have to be innovative because there is a budget shortfall compared to maybe bigger institutions. Can you speak to that and maybe clarify for some people that just don't understand how this happened? What struggles do you guys face that maybe some of those schools don't? Yeah, so the basic issue is how much resources do you have, period. And so some institutions, whether they're HBCUs or not, that have low resources, they have to be very mindful

of how they allocate and utilize those resources to get the greatest impact. And then in addition to that, in Florida, as you know, we do have other restrictions on how we can assist athletics with other state funds. So that's another challenge for us here in the state university system, in particular for FAMU, because we are a low resource institution. And so we have to look to make those investments in the right places to have the greatest impact. For example, what we're doing in compliance is utilizing our ability to hire those people in our division of compliance as opposed to having them on the athletics payroll. And so although there's one person on their payroll, there'll be a full team of people working to assist athletics in terms of compliance. Let's do two more questions.

It's the whole process. Are you aware of how long it could take for the whole process to be completed? Well, I mean, you know, it's an ongoing process. I'll put it that way. And so we're continuing to work with our people and the coach to make sure every reasonable chance that we have of getting a student a waiver, that we're not doing our due diligence and making sure that these young men in this particular case have issues that legitimately give them a chance to play, okay? All right. I have a two-parter if I could sneak in here. First part, just to clarify some of those other details, the number of tickets allocated for families, was that brought up? Is there a resolution there? Yeah, that has been reinstated at the four tickets per person yes

the ad made that decision just yesterday okay and then feel free not to do this but since you're with me i'd love just your thoughts on the uh the dorm situation with the family housing uh having to be evacuated off campus and the shuttle system in place. Have you been monitoring that closely? Oh yes. Do you have a look at the housing department? Yes. So there are two situations. One at the Phase 3 facility where we had to move everybody out because there was a...

That would have happened, right? Well, you know, the good thing is that the Marching 100, we wouldn't be able to hear anything. But yeah, so in order to accommodate a problem in a very small number of apartments, when you start fumigating and so forth, you can't have people there. And then you just can't do one or two places because the way pests move, they'll go to the room upstairs or next door. And so we moved everybody out.

So those students in phase three will be moving back on Thursday, okay? And then a totally separate issue is the fire that was started in Polkenhorn Village that activated the sprinkler system and did some water damage there. And so we're working through that. We've had those rooms, have an outside contractor, you know, helping us, you know, dry those rooms. And in some cases, happened to replace wall board because it was damaged by the sprinklers that were activated.

And so those students should be back in the dorms sometime next week. Just one quick follow-up. The message to the parent that might be a little frustrated about their student having to be shipped off campus, what's your message to them? Well, in both cases, they need to know that we have provided for them transportation back and forth. There's a person there, an RO, a resident advisor, whatever they are called to provide some additional security for them.

We are providing food for them, the meal plan. And so we have our eyes on them, but they'll be back on campus soon, okay? Thank you, Dr. Ruffalo, very much. Thank you. The head coach of the Florida and the football team talked to a local reporter, and he offered his support for his players. Watch this.

I'm proud of the young men, you know, for being able to advocate for themselves. Obviously, there are things that they feel aren't contributing to their first class experience that we talk about here at 4-A&M. And so to address that is what I think they should do. As a head coach, it's my job to support them. And they're not alone. There are other students that are coming out in other sports. So I think the letter is getting more signatures as we speak. But again, you know, it's not an attack on the university.

It's not an attack on any individual. It's just like any other national, what do you call it, protest or whatever. These young men are bringing awareness to things that are affecting them, right, at the end of the day. And we have to be sympathetic to that because they are the product. Without the kids, none of us are here. And so it's important that we hear from them that we address these needs and concerns if there are areas that we need to improve upon let's put our collective heads together and improve them because again we want the best and the brightest to continue to come to fort a&m like they have for 140 years and for us to continue to do that we have to make

sure that every student student athletes included has that first class experience that we talk about in our school model. I think they just want to have a chance to continue to get their voices heard, right? And, you know, a lot of times they feel ostracized. They feel like they've been silenced. And so this is an opportunity for them to voice those concerns and get some answers, right? And so I'm proud of them for taking the meeting. You know, Dr. Robinson called the meeting, so I'm thankful to him for seeing the need to address these young men. And I think collectively we can be the FAMU

that we all aspire to be. We're doing a ton of phenomenal things here at this university. Again, I continue to echo the message that, you know, we don't have a football team or a sports program full of bastards. We have a couple of individuals that didn't get it done in the classroom. But for the most part, the guys on this football team have taken care of their business in the classroom. And so, you know, I don't want that to be what people think about these guys.

They bleed, they sweat, they cry for this program, for this university. And I think it's only fair that we support them the way they need to be. Alright, so Larry, Michael, and Jason, I gotta bring y'all in here. Um, the president says now I have a better understanding

of a sense of urgency after talking with the players. Bruh! You had 26 players ineligible last week. When did you get the report that 26 can't play? For all the folk out there, do y'all know college teams, Power Five conferences have tops 80, 75, 80 players? 26? Last night I talked about the band issue.

Their trip to North Carolina was a great trip for them. They stayed two nights, but normally when they go to these classics and other places, they only stay one night. So I want to correct that. It was in North Carolina. But everything else I said about the issue with the band still applies. I had some fool tell me there's nothing wrong with a nutritious box lunch. Man, ain't nobody trying to sit here and play all damn day

and then get your ass on the bus eating a cold ass sandwich and a box lunch. Larry, what I don't understand is, again, I want the president to come out and sound authoritative saying this is happening. Oh, well, we're going to have five. Well, we might have more.

We're going to train 18 people. Hold on. Well, who's an athletic? Well, no, you've got to ask Ms. So-and-so. You're the president. What I don't understand is how does the president not come out and say authoritatively, this is the plan of action we're taking right now. We're doing this, this, this, this.

The issue they raised about food, this is what we're doing. The issue they raised about summer housing, this is what we're doing. This is what... Man, go... Larry, go ahead. Yeah, so, you know, I write a lot about leadership and I've written about, you know, HBC leaders who have succeeded. So this is really about crisis management and how you respond. So first of all, I'm going to give a shout out to those young brothers who raised the concerns, legitimate concerns they did, and I'm glad that they're

being something like they're being addressed. So there are a few things here. You mentioned hiring the compliance officers. And once again, we talk about crisis management. It's really important to have a finite number when you're out in public talking. And so that's really critical. The other thing I want to talk about, Roland, is the president has a trustees meeting this week, and he's really going to have to make it clear about what the plan is. So what I'd like to do is I'd like to provide some actionable steps, and I have a couple things he needs to do to address some of these issues. First of all, I think that he needs an audit,

a law firm or someone else who's familiar with AntFamU, bringing someone externally to do an audit to kind of give them some clear indication of things they need to do, not just this academic year, but move forward. The second thing I think they need to do is he needs to kind of put together some kind of blue ribbon panel of individuals, alum, et cetera, who can provide some kind of blueprint for the next decade after the results come out to make sure that these kind of issues don't happen again. And once again, Rowan, this is about crisis management and how you respond to issues. And I would hope that his staff, you know, his administrative staff would have prepped him in terms of being able to be more responsive and clear and decisive in terms

of how you respond. The last thing I want to mention, because I'm in the state of Florida, and, you know, in terms of some of the challenges, HBCUs nationally, particularly state HBCUs in terms of funding, the reporter asked him about that question. And that's an ongoing issue in terms of, we've seen that in Tennessee, Mississippi, Maryland, other schools in terms of how HBCUs, state HBCUs are treated. So the idea about how HBCUs are funded or not, or underfunded is a critical one. But I think it's really important by the end of this week that the president has a clear indication of how many compliance officers and what is the long-term plan to ensure this doesn't happen again because they had something

similar happen a few years ago i don't understand if you're the president i want to know quickly if 26 players are ineligible for the first game of the year jason yeah as, as you know, I'm on a campus right now. That's where I am. I'm not on an HBCU campus, but I'm on a PWI, and I can tell you that this is a really unfortunate situation that I'm seeing for FAMU because one of the things that we were all talking about a few years ago is Division I athletes maybe starting

to go more to HBCUs, particularly the really elite athletes. And I think the people who are making arguments that maybe they shouldn't do that talked about the resources that they have at some of these major Power Five institutions and the fact that they're going to have lots of academic advisors and the, and it just horrified me when I read the part about the young man who passed all his classes, but was still ineligible because he wasn't getting the right advice from academic advisors. I can tell you, I get, I get, I get numerous emails from academic advisors coming from the athletic department at the University of Maryland. So I know how many different athletic advisors that we have here at an institution that's well-funded by the state. So I would agree with what Larry was saying, that there needs to be some institutional changes.

There are people that need to take responsibility for what happened, and they need to certainly make sure that this never happens again. Because not only are people, just like in general, when we look at, when something happens with a white institution, people look at that white institution in isolation. The University of North Carolina, the University of Maryland, the University of Delaware, they look at it in isolation. When it happens at an HBCU, people look at it as its representative of all HBCUs. So it's really and that's unfortunate, but that's the way it is. So it's really important that they get this together and work it out because these young men are being harmed unnecessarily and unfairly.

And so they really need to take responsibility and make some changes. And, Michael, that's the thing for me. I don't want a young brother to go, or a sister who plays another sport saying, man, they ain't got their stuff together, so I'm not going. That's the whole point. This brother, Isaiah, top linebacker in all of FC, top linebacker. He chose to come to Florida A&M.

You don't want to be in a situation where the next star athlete says, hey, man, look, I don't know. Look, they messed up a homeboy, and he got a four-game suspension. Now his lawyer is trying to get it reduced. But guess what? North Carolina game has already passed. As I said last night, when you're a star player, when you're trying to go to the NFL,

they want to see how you played against other elite players. That brother now does not have the tape to show how he would have performed against North Carolina. That is what will cause future star players to say, hey, man, if y'all stuff raggedy, I can't come. That's why your stuff can't be raggedy. Exactly. You know, this has wide-ranging ramifications rolling. And this is at the same time when there was a video

that circulated around hip-hop artists and lecturer David Banner, who I know talked about African-Americans should, more African-Americans should go to HBCUs or they should only go to HBCUs, things like this. And you have a push from in the past year, a real push in the past year or two for more

elite African-American athletes to go to HBCUs. And we see primetime Deion Sanders has been pushing for this as well. So when you look at something like this, you have, according to the USA Today, you have one academic advisor and compliance officer, basically, for over 300 students. One academic advisor, compliance officer for over 300 students. And apparently, some of them are not getting the right advice on how many credits they need to take the proper classes and they become ineligible. But also compounding that is there's a there's their student financial aid is is late in being delivered to them as well, which compounds the issue. Okay. So you may not be able to play.

And then at the same time, your student financial aid is late and this is being put into the media as well. So when you, when you are the president of an organization like this, you, the buck stops with you and you have to, when you come before the media, you have to come with clear-cut answers, explanations, and solutions. So hopefully they get this rectified, and I agree with Dr. Jason Nichols, this should not be representative of all

HBCUs. There are about 103 HBCUs, but this is not a good story. This is not a good look for Florida A&M. It's not, and the bottom line is you get the stuff taken care of so you don't have any of those future problems. All right, folks, real quick here. North Carolina town has voted to fire its first Black City manager

a month after its entire police department resigned by a vote of three to two to Kenley Council. The vote is doing a special session to terminate Justine Jones' contract. The decision comes about a month after Kenley's entire police force resigned over claims Jones created a difficult work environment. After meeting in the closed session, about two hours, Mayor Toohey hails to the local station

investigation into the claims of a toxic work environment did not significantly impact the decision to fire Jones. Well, why in the hell is she fired? I'm just saying, it's kind of basic. Folks, why in the hell is she fired? I'm just saying that's kind of basic. Folks, a former Maryland mayor who died by suicide was accused of using federal funds that was supposed to go to a public charter school during the pandemic for his own personal gain. Kevin Ward became the interim mayor of Hydesville, Maryland in Prince George's County in January

2021, was elected as the first openly gay and second black mayor during the spring of that year. A civil complaint filed by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia says Ward, the senior director of technology for KIPP DC, was responsible for purchasing information technology products like computers, tablets, software after the pandemic shut DC down in March 2020. Around December 2021, KIPP DC realized it never received any of the technology it had paid for and said the federal government claimed the money went to buy 10 vehicles, nine of which were ultimately purchased by Ward. The $2.2 million also allegedly bought two properties in Augusta, West Virginia,

and an assortment of sports memorabilia. The complaint indicates the company Ward purchased these items from shared his home address. KIPP DC received about $4.8 million in federal funding. Also, folks, in Georgia, a judge ruled that Governor Brian Kemp must wait until after the November election and testify before a special grand jury investigating possible illegal attempts by Trump and others to influence the 2020 election in the state. Kemp's attorneys tried to argue immunities related to his position as governor should protect him from having to testify. But Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney overseeing the special grand jury,

disagreed. The judge said the governor must appear before the panel, but granted Kemp's request to delay that testimony until after the November 8th election. He faces a rematch with Democrat Stacey Abrams. Kemp is maintaining his lead over Abrams by five points. According to the recent Georgia governor's poll, he's a 50-45 lead over Abrams, despite the Democratic candidate candidates spending advantage. All right, folks, real our vibe, we all shine.

Together, we are black beyond measure. Hatred on the streets, a horrific scene, a white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence. You will not be next time. White people are losing their lives. There's an angry pro-Trump mob storm to the U.S. Capitol. We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting. I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial. This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress,

whether real or symbolic, there has been what Carol Anderson at every university calls white rage as a backlash. This is the wrath of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. Here's all the Proud Boys guys. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources,

they're taking our women. This is white fear. When we invest in ourselves, we all shine. Together, we are Black Beyond Measure. Hi, this is Shira Lee Ralph. Hello, everyone. It's Kiara Sheard. Hey, I'm Taj. I'm Coco. And I'm Lele. And we're SWB.

What's up, y'all? It's Ryan Destiny. And you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. All right, folks. Welcome back. Welcome back. Welcome back. Let's talk about our Tech Talk segment. Check it out, folks.

So one man got pulled over, he said, about three times a week. And we deal with these stories constantly, daily accounts between police and others. And so this brother decided to create the Legal Equalizer app that promotes people to know and understand their rights while interacting with police safely. Joining me now from Atlanta is the founder and CEO of the Legal Equalizer

app. Is it M-B-I-J-A? Pronounce it correct? M-B-I-J-A. M-B-I-J-A. M-B-I-J-A. Okay. So exactly what happened here? Well, the idea for the app actually started after Ferguson with Mike Brown. And so what happened there was I was on my Facebook and I saw my friends I went to college with and the friends I went to high school with having completely different reactions to what happened in that situation. And the whole time I was wondering exactly why nobody had a phone to pull out and record the incidents.

We would have this, he said, she said crap. And so fast forward that December, I got pulled over three times in a week by DeKalb County Police in Atlanta. First time was in my own neighborhood. Officers pulled me over and literally when he saw my ID, he said, oh, you live here. You're free to go. And I asked him why he stopped me. He was like, no, you're free to go. Wouldn't tell me why. Next time I got pulled over,

it's the only time a judge has ever apologized to me in court. I had a ticket in the office of printing that said I was on a stop sign for three seconds and not for five seconds. And so when I went to court, the judge dismissed me and apologized. And so the third time I got pulled over was December 12, 2014. I was heading to work, and at that time I was working at Allstate. Officer gets behind me, and I know I've been pulled over twice in the previous nine days by the same department. I'm not speeding, have my insurance, everything is okay. He finally puts his lights on, pulls me up, he tells me I have a warrant for my arrest.

I tell him, no, I do not, sir. And he was like, well, you seem shocked. I was like, I am. I've been pulled over by your same exact department twice and neither one of those officers mentioned a warrant. So his next story was then maybe the system was down and it wasn't working. And I was like, sir, I have a printed ticket

from your department here. If the system worked well to print, it should have let him know that I had a warrant. And so I probably would have never had an app if he had just been like sitting in your car waiting while I go check on this. But instead, he had me get out of my car, wouldn't let me call my mom, wouldn't let me call my job,

put me in handcuffs in the back of his car. And instead of him sitting in the car with me calling in the warrant, I noticed he was walking around my car with a flashlight just looking to see if he could find something. And finally, after like five, ten minutes, he was like, I'll say invalid warrant. You're free to go. And then my mother and I went and made a complaint the next day. It's the only time I've made a complaint.

I've been pulled over probably over 150, 120 times in my life. Only time I've made a complaint. And they said that he did everything and I should do something about it. So when I started the app, it wasn't to create a business or anything. It was literally, I wanted something at that point in time where if I got pulled over, my loved ones knew where I was. And there was a video because I was tired of that narrative at that time of anytime a black person got beaten up, it was, what did they do? What's their history? How did they escalate it? So that was the initial impetus for me to even start this idea and get it going.

And again, a lot of people just like, perfect example, the brother who was watering, he was watering the flowers last week and a cop says, give me your name. The brother says, I was a cop. I don't have to give you my name. He was correct. Alabama law says he did not have to give them in. The cops lied.

That brother knew his rights. And so a lot of folks, and again, and people don't understand is, in some some states you do have to give your name. And so people have to understand what the state law is, where they are. So for your app, does it does it provide that? That is depending upon where you live. This is what it says, what you must say or do in your state. So what we have in the app right now, we have your Bill of Rights and things there, but for each individual state we went in, we have laws for like marijuana laws,

reckless driving laws, DUI laws, gun laws, and things like that. But is it broken down by state? Yes, sir, it is broken down by state. So the marijuana laws for Georgia are different than the ones for South Carolina. Gun laws in Georgia are different than gun laws in Florida. So we have those by the states in there as well.

And reason being, to be honest, Walter Scott case was the one that changed that for me. And if you remember, Walter Scott got put up for having a broken taillight. Yep. And with that broken taillight, he was afraid when the cop got his license, they would find out he was missing child support payments, so that's why he got out to run. Well, in the state of South Carolina, it's legal to have one broken taillight.

It's illegal to have two. Wow. So if the man had known that, he would have said, thank you for telling me this, officer. I'll go get that one fixed, but am I free to go? I didn't break any laws. We wouldn't even have gotten to that point. And so it's things like that where I think about

how many of us didn't know the law or didn't know something like that. And it's also why I want to get attorneys involved with this app eventually, because I don't want us to be trying to be our own lawyers. I would like people like the National Bar Association. I've talked to Dr. Carlos Moore before. I'd like for them to get their members on here and to be able to own the app and help us in real time as well when we need them to be able to tell us our rights as well.

All right. I've got some questions for my panel. Michael, you first. All right. This is a great app. I just downloaded it. Hopefully I never need it. But one of the features that you have here, brother, is know your rights. So can you give, it says, learn when and how to respond in an encounter.

So can you give us one or two tips that are some of the most popular experiences or occurrences that we need to know in an encounter with police? Well, the first thing I tell people is that one of their rights is they have the right to record that officer as long as they're not interfering with their duty. So in police, most people are afraid of that, right? Most people are afraid to record and get that out. But as long as you're not interfering with the officer's duty, you have the right to record and you have the right to get that. And so that's one thing people, you know, will know that as well.

And second thing I tell them is what all attorneys tell me is you have the right to say nothing. You have the right to say no. And what people should know is that a lot of these officers aren't on your side. And even me growing up, you know, my parents told me, listen to what they tell, follow their law, because it's the get home. And we can get home safely without having to surrender our rights and get us in more trouble just by listening and following everything that they say or do. And so that's the other point, is that we do have our rights that we can exercise as well in those times where we can say, no, if you want to search my vehicle, you need a warrant. You know, you pull me over for this,

the next question, am I free to go? And so it's different things like that I would like more people to understand and learn at this point in time where, hey, you do have some rights at this point you can exercise as well. Thank you. Larry? Yeah, really quickly here, I was curious in terms of what kind of marketing

you've done regarding the app and also in terms of the number of downloads you're seeing. Yeah, so marketing, lucky for us, we have a PR firm that's been working for us for the past couple of years, and they've been getting us stuff for free. So we normally will do interviews if there's like a shooting or incident in a certain town, whether it's Akron, Phoenix, Albuquerque, Atlanta, we'll get some of that. I've done one national media with the crazy guy running for Senator in Pennsylvania now, Dr. House when he had a TV show. So that was just national media stuff,

but it's been done a lot of word of mouth. And right now, as far as usage, we have over half a million registered users. So that's over half a million people that have downloaded the app and either given us their phone number email or social media register and use it and in the tech space i can say we're one of the few companies that has more registered users than we've raised money in our seven years and so that's one of the things we've had to work on

a bootstrap and you know ron you know about this with black media and how you have to earn and get money and work and bootstrap your stuff. It's been the same kind of thing. But I'm happy to say we've got over half a million registered users. Wow. You know, that little bit of funding we've had. Wow. That's awesome there.

Jason. So, first of all, thank you for what you've done. My question is a little more specific, and it may be difficult to answer. So I totally understand it if you can't answer it. But I know in Arizona that they banned recording the police within eight feet. If you are at a stop and you pull out your phone and that police officer is near your window, can you still use the app? Or would they have then justification to arrest you and take your phone away? So that's going to be a tricky one, because what I want to say is that you care and I need to

double check with the new law in Arizona. I'm going to talk to an Arizona attorney. So let me put a disclaimer for that. But the reason I think you can do it is because the car is your vehicle, right? It's your property and you should have the right to record your own property. And so I believe it's the longest what the law was. If it's somebody getting arrested outside, people walking up to that arrest and being like, you know, two feet of that and interfering with that. But I need to double check, but I'm pretty sure you have the right to record within your own property. So if you had even like a dash cam or something in here, you have the right to record that. And so I believe that's the law, but I will double check

and make sure I can talk to an attorney in Arizona that can let me know that for a fact. And that's the kind of reason, that's the kind of information you need to know on your app that people need to realize. And also, a lot of people also don't understand consent laws. So, for instance, there are some states, there are one-party consent states where only one party is you. Other places, before you can record someone, you have to have two-party consent. So when I had an issue with United Airlines, when I was at the Las Vegas airport, the woman at the counter was like, are you recording me? And I was like, why don't you focus on your own business? I said, well, I'm over here focusing on mine. And what happened was I before I started recording, I looked up what was a law in Nevada to record someone.

And Nevada law required two party consent. So I couldn't just start recording on my phone my interaction with her because she would she would have to have given her consent to be recorded. So again, people need to understand the laws are different in your state. That's why when Omarosa was in the White House and people were like, oh my God, she didn't get consent to record. Washington, D.C. has one party consent. So got to understand what the laws of your state. Well, look, this is absolutely great. Again, tell folks the app, where they can get it. It's Legal Equalizer. It's a completely free app.

You can get it on the Apple Store or the Google Play Store. And once again, the app will let you alert your loved ones, your exact location of where you are when you're stopped. Allows you to record the encounter. But even better now, we've built our own live stream so your loved ones can be eyewitnesses during that stop. So by the time the officer is at your door, they'll be looking at your phone. They can see your wife, your husband, your brother, your best friend. And those people will be eyewitnesses to record that stop in real time. And so that's the app and it's currently

working. Well, this is precisely why when we created this show, created this network, we want to create this segment to give African-American entrepreneurs who are doing things in the tech space an opportunity to show their wares. And Bob, we appreciate it, man. Thanks a bunch. Thank you so much.

All right, then, folks, that is it for us. Larry, Michael, Jason, thank you so very much for joining us today on the panel. Some of y'all have been posting in the camera. Which one camera here? There was one right here. Folks have been posting. So I got this shirt at the Cynthia and Chayna Golf Tournament. And so which one am I on?

I don't know which seven. Which one am I on? There you go. All right, so y'all can actually see it. So they actually had this slogan. Y'all know I'm one of them tie-d dye. But the slogan was pretty cool that I like. And it said, if it doesn't bring peace, profit or purpose, then don't give it your time, energy or attention. A whole bunch of folk should take that to heart because, you know, it's it's a lot of people spend. They put a lot

of time and energy on stuff that ain't doing nothing for them. And so I'm a firm believer in that. And so, Cynthia and Tanner, thanks a bunch. Bill Hammond, thanks a bunch for supplying us with shirts. I appreciate it. Hey, y'all, tomorrow I'm going to be broadcasting from Houston. I'm going home for Labor Day. My parents wanted our family to get together, so I am headed to H-Town.

Looking forward to that. So I'll be broadcasting from there tomorrow. So looking forward to it. And then, of course, let me tell you right now, we do not have a show on Friday. We're out. Gave folks the day off. And so we'll be back on Tuesday.

I'll be from New Orleans. And it's going to be a major announcement from New Orleans next week. Oh, I can't wait to tell y'all. But trust me, it's going to shake some folks up. So I'm looking forward to being there. So that's in New Orleans next week. So I'll be in New Orleans next Tuesday and Wednesday. And for a news conference taking place on Wednesday. And so it's going to be fantastic. And so we'll let you know exactly what that is, y'all, please do so. Download the Black Star Network app, Apple phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV. Also, please join our6. Cash app is Dallas Sign RM Unfiltered. PayPal is RM Martin Unfiltered. Venmo is RM Unfiltered. And Zelle is rolling at rollingismartin.com, rolling at rollingmartinunfiltered.com. Dennis Frazier, thank you for your donation. I appreciate it. Karen Jenkins, thank you very much for yours as well. Thelma Kinchin, Cedric Smith.

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It, of course, comes out, comes out September 13th. Pre-order now. We want to make the bestsellers list. You can get your book from any of these folks. Ben Bella Books, they are the publisher with me. We co-own the book. Amazon, Barnes & Noble, IndieBound, Bookshop, Chapters, Books of a Million Target. You can also call your local black bookstore and order the book through there as well. White Fear, How the Browning of America is Making White Folks Lose Their Mind. It is timely with all the stuff Trump is doing

and these MAGA Republicans. Folks, you don't want to get it, and I'll be traveling the country talking about this book and talking about these very issues that are happening in real time. That's one of the reasons why, I mean, literally every month the story was changing. I said, y'all, we've just got to publish the book because guess what?

White folks will keep losing their minds, so we've got to publish it somehow. And so that's what's up. And also the audio book is going to be available on Audible as well. I've already done the recording. You can get that book as well. All right, folks, that's it. Y'all be coming. I'm sure y'all like our new pop-up tables here. It is pretty cool, huh?

It is pretty cool. So we can travel with them and we can get it going. All right, y'all, that's it. I'll see y'all tomorrow from H-Town. Halt! Thank you. you you you you you This is an iHeart Podcast.