#RolandMartinUnfiltered - HBCU funding lies exposed; Senate battle over John Lewis voter bill; NAACP prez rips AT&T-OAN $ link

Episode Date: October 8, 2021

10.07.21 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: HBCU funding lies exposed; Senate Judiciary committee squares off over the John Lewis voting rights bill; Body-cam footage shows cops celebrating the "hunting" of anti-police brutality protesters; California governor signs act to tackle racial disparities in maternal and infant health#RolandMartinUnfiltered partners: Nissan, Amazon, BuickSupport #RolandMartinUnfiltered and #BlackStarNetwork via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered or via PayPal ☛ https://www.paypal.me/rmartinunfilteredDownload the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox#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. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Pre-game to greater them. Let's put ourselves in the right position pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Today is Thursday, October 7th, 2021. coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered. We'll talk to Dr. Walter Kimball, president of Dillard University, about the truth of HBCU funding as the stake where it stands right now with President Joe Biden and the request coming out of Washington, D.C. Also, racist teachers in North Carolina and voting rights. Kristen Clark, the Department of Justice, speaks about the power of the John Lewis Act before Congress.

All that and more. It's time to bring the funk. I'm Roland Martin, unfiltered, on the Black Star Network from L.A. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine. And when it breaks, he's right on time

And it's rolling, best believe he's knowing Putting it down from sports to news to politics With entertainment just for kicks He's rolling, yeah With Uncle Roro, yo Yeah, yeah It's rolling, Martin, yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah It's Roland Martin Yeah, yeah, yeah

Rolling with Roland now Yeah, yeah, yeah He's broke, he's fresh, he's real the best You know he's Roland Martin Now Martin We talked about this yesterday, all over social media, lots of discussion about funding for HBCUs. Associated Press and News would get a story saying that the Biden administration and Democrats were cutting from $45 billion to $2 billion for HBCUs. We now know that's not true. One of the folks who's been trying to correct a lot of these falsehoods about funding for HBCUs, especially the last four years with Donald Trump,

is my next guest, Dr. Walter Kimbrough. He's the president of Dillard University, retiring at the end of this year. Dr. Kimbrough, glad to have you back on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Start Network. This is something that's big because this thing has been spreading like wildfire. People have been saying all sorts of different things. Here you go. Dems don't care about black folks. They're cutting $45 billion. And I had Leslie Baskerville on yesterday from Nafio. I had on Victor Santos from the Marshall Fund as well. And both of them said it wasn't $45 billion. And so, look, you are an HBCU president. Break down exactly what's going on with HBCU funding in these budget proposals right now.

All right. Well, first of all, thanks for having me, Roland. I appreciate having this opportunity. And just remind folks, I'm not retiring. I'm just transitioning. I'm doing free agent things. So we see where I end up. But it's been frustrating for me because I think there are some legitimate concerns that we have. But when people get out there and share all of this misinformation, it creates bigger problems. So, and I had a chance to listen to Leslie and Victor. So I thought they provided great information that people can listen to. But what president Biden did was come in and said, I really am going to have a robust proposal for HBCU. So he asked for lots of money. So when you hear the $45 billion figure, and I've seen anywhere from 30 to 50 billion, it's all over the place. But if we look at the $45 billion figure, and I've seen anywhere from $30 to $50 billion, it's all over the place.

But if we look at the $45 billion, so $20 billion of that is straight infrastructure. And as you've mentioned to people, it's HBCUs and MSIs, Hispanic-serving, Asian-Pacific, Native American. So there will be a portion of that for HBCUs, which will be significant. So $20 billion for that. $15 billion of it is for research and development. So $20 billion for that. $15 billion of it is for research and development. So just straight R&D is $15 billion, or $10 billion. Then another $15 billion that will be for centers of excellence, to create these centers of excellence at HBCUs. And I heard Victor talk about that. So that's where the $45 billion comes from.

So the process is, for any president, they present their budget priorities to Congress, and then those committees have to do the work. So President Biden started off and said, hey, here's... This is what I want. Also, because this is getting lost, too, he also wanted to help double the Pell Grant, and so his first salvo was to get it up $1,800. Okay, so that... We aren't even talking about that,

because that would impact 7 million college students. So you have all that together. It goes to the committee. It's now with the Committee for Education, Okay, so that we aren't even talking about that because that would impact 7 million college students. So you have all that together. It goes to the committee is now with the Committee for Education and Labor, which is chair by Bobby Scott. And now they have to do the work. And so when they go through the process and they're working together, they try to decide how much is Congress willing to spend. And that's when you start to have those cuts and they start to negotiate. So it goes back and forth. They all have a run at it.. They'll have a run at it. The Senate will have a run at it. Then we'll end up with the final figure.

So that's how the process works. The process always works like that. But it's hard to even get a number like that on the table if the president doesn't put it out there. Trump never put out big numbers like that. And every time we got an increase, it's because our friends in Congress said, that's unacceptable.

And so they added money to it. So that's the point, that we're going through the process like we always do. I think he shocked people because he came up with a huge number. And I think he set the table, which is really good for us. And now we all have to do our work to work with members of Congress and say, look, the president made this promise. Y'all need to help him make that promise come true. Also, again, we talk about funding.

This is what Leslie and Victor discussed yesterday. You can't negate the funding that already came through two previous bills in 2021 already. The COVID bill, what was it, $6 billion? And then there was another billion plus? Right. So we've gotten over six billion dollars in the last 18 months altogether. So you had some toward the end of the Trump administration for COVID. That was about a billion dollars. And then you get another two point six. That's a part of the work that President Biden has done. And then also add that it was approved at the end of 2000 at the end of 2020. Alma Adams did a lot of work with this as well. We had a number of HBCUs that had debts as a part of the HBCU Capital Finance Program.

That was approved in the bill. The new secretary of education approved that to be wiped off the books. That's another $1.6 billion. So, yes, we're talking about $5 to $6 billion that HBCUs have received in the last 18 months and reminding people every year annually we only receive about a billion dollars from the federal government. And as Victor rightly pointed out, it comes from lots of different buckets. So it's not just Department of Education. It's from agriculture. It's from defense. It's from interior. It comes from a lot of different places. But when you add it all together, it's only about a billion dollars. So now we're talking about six billion already in 18 months.

And in the Biden administration, Corinne Jean-Pierre did an interview with HBCU journalists. She said that's four billion of it is from them alone. So it's not like nothing has been done. There has been significant investments in HBCUs. We're now trying to play the long ball to say, how do we get significant investments that will last so we can really do some major infrastructure work, which the entire country has talked about infrastructure. So we're being consistent with what the president has talked about as a part of the campaign trail. You know, and it's real interesting, Dr. Kimbrough, you know, you always got to deal with these dumb asses out here. Some people don't want to say

that. I'll go ahead and say it. I got some idiot on YouTube, Truth Seeker. Roland, how much do the Democrats pay you to do damage control? What are the Democrats doing? No, it's called facts. See, this is real simple. If the funding was cut from $45 billion or two, we're going to tell the truth about what's going on here. The problem is when people are making stuff up. As a journalist, the first thing I said is, White House, is this true? What's the actual proposal? What's the actual number? What's going on here? The problem is you got a bunch of people out here. And again, let me say it, the Associated Press story that was done, then the Newsweek story was done, were both wrong. I asked the most basic question to Leslie and Victor, and that is,

of this so-called $45 billion, the way the story's been framed is it's being cut for HBCUs. Victor says, no, this is HBCUs and minority serving institutions. I was blown away when he told me that my alma mater, Texas A&M, qualifies as an Hispanic serving institution. And so in this pot of money, you at Dillard will be going up against Texas A&M for the same pool of money. That's not protecting Democrats. That's called the damn truth. Right. Exactly. And that's those are the kinds of nuances that we've got to be able to honestly talk about to make sure that does not happen. So you're exactly right. Those are the kinds of concerns that we have. The other thing, and I'm sure you'll appreciate this, we've got to have more diversity in terms of journalism because these AP stories are wrong all the time. There was one that

a lot of people use to say Trump saved HBCUs with $250 million a year. No. Out of that $250 million, it was for HBCUs and Hispanic-serving institutions. Only $85 million was for HBCUs. It was a part of the Future Act. But people have posted that story over and over and over again to say, look at what Trump did. They don't talk about how it was already approved by both chambers of Congress with veto-approved majorities. His signature was performative. Or like Alma Adams

said, the only thing he contributed was his signature. He didn't do any lobbying for that at all. So it's important for us to have the facts. So then once we have the real facts, then we can debate and say, all right, here's the facts. Now, you're saying that you want to do this and make us compete with all Hispanic-serving institutions. The University of Texas at Austin just became an HSI this year, 25% Latino. That's unacceptable. So we can have an honest conversation and debate, but when we start tossing in everything else, it's a problem. The last thing I'll say really quickly is that I'm always interested. These people come out of the woodwork complaining about what's happening for HBCUs, but nobody's advocating for us on a regular basis. The UNCF has created a platform

that if you're concerned about this and wanna do more than tweet, you go to the platform at uncf.org, HB slash HBCU Ignite. It's really easy, it takes you a minute. You can write your congresspeople, you can call them, you can tweet them and say, give HBCUs this money. That's part of the reason that the Future Act got passed

because we had 66,000 letters in two months telling Congress we want this Future Act to be passed. Right now,000 letters in two months telling Congress we want this Future Act to be passed. Right now for this new HBCU Ignite, which focuses on infrastructure, we've only had 11,000 people do that so far. So if everybody's tweeting and they're on Twitter and using the Twitter fingers, go to HBCU Ignite as a part of uncf.org and help us lobby for this money. Simple as that. Dr. Walter Kimball, President, Dillard University, represent like alphas always do.

Always. Appreciate it. Go to my pound, Dr. Greg Carr, Department of African American Studies, Howard University, recent co-worker, Black Women Views, Faraji Muhammad, radio and TV show host. Greg, I'll start with you.

You teach at Howard University. Again, this is what pisses me off. It pisses me off when, just what Dr. Kimbrough said, all of these stories how Trump, even when Sir Tim Scott went on Face the Nation with that BS, talking about how, and he tweeted that, how they guaranteed funding for HBCUs, like they protected HBCUs. No, it's an absolute lie. This story was a lie. And people have got to stop sitting here playing Mickey Mouse games here.

They were not, again, first of all, it was laughable because HBCUs have never gotten $45 billion in one year from the federal government. Never. Not even close. So anybody who even believed that should have been smacked upside the damn head. But the thing, what you really have here is people who do not want to do addition. I've got these fools, and Reese is going to talk about that, of course, these idiots going, see, you've got a so-called HBCU graduate as vice president. Well, dumbasses, the money, they've gotten more in this one year as administration

than they've gotten four years of Trump. Facts are facts. As they say, Greg, ball don't lie. No, ball don't lie. Again, the value of the Black Star Network and Roland Martin and Phillips specifically, the truth has to come out. I mean, and the truth is this. Most of our HBCUs in the South have been held hostage by these white nationalist Republican legislatures.

My alma mater, Tennessee State, has almost $600 million is the tally that has been shorted since the 50s just on state appropriation because the federal government gave matching funds. Remember, the public HBCUs, most of them are moral land grant institutions. And so there's a bucket of money that has always come from the federal government, either directly or, as Walter says, President Kimbrough, through Pell Grants. But, of course, what you've done there, Roland,

is put this issue where it needs to be put. The challenge now will be in budget reconciliation. As President Kimbrough said, Bobby Scott is going to have to go to war on the language of this. Alma Adams has spoken out on this, and she's spoken out on it on the airwaves here with you. And we've heard even Brother Williams, the head of the Thurgood Marshall Fund, make this point. These HBCUs should not be

competing with MSIs. As you said, they are being classified that way. There shouldn't be one pot of money and there's a hunger games between HBCUs, MSIs, and tribal colleges as well. But that's an issue down the road. What we have to keep our eye on is that the Biden administration has indeed greatly increased in terms of a projected number the money available. But the real war, the real war that Brother President was talking about is going to be the war, the devil in the details, to get HBCUs out of that pool, because they're not going to be able to trump, lack of a better term, the MSIs, because a lot of those MSIs are, in fact, white-facing institutions that are going to try to grab that money up. Recy, you talk a lot about the deliberate misinformation that is happening in our

community. You, frankly, blew up on social when you were battling the misinformation dealing with then-Senator Kamala Harris, and that's what we see here. This discussion is not about protecting Democrats, protecting Biden, protecting Harris. No, it's called protecting the truth, and that is telling people what's real and not the BS being spread in memes and these stories that are going

around. That's what this is all about. It's called the truth. Well, this is exactly what I said was going to happen when I saw the Newsweek story. I said, this is a horrible idea. And once this is meme-ified, good luck trying to explain the nuances and the context behind this. I mean, Dr. Kimbrough broke down where the $45 million came from. I think it's important to put this in the context that we're talking about $3.5, up to $3.5 trillion of additional infrastructure spending. And so, $45 billion is a drop in the bucket of trillions of dollars. So, I don't think that part should be lost here. I mean, as Dr. Kimbrough and you pointed out, this was for a variety of things. It wasn't just a pot of money. It was specific set-asides that this was intended for. And I think when it comes to the discussion about funding for

HBCUs and minority-serving institutions, it's always conflated. Even the $2 billion number is not strictly just for HBCUs. So I think that the problem is the devil is in the details. The problem is the context always adds additional knowledge to it that doesn't sound as inflammatory as a headline or what you can fit in a tweet. And so I think it's important that, you know, constituents, as Dr. Kimbrough pointed out, still advocate for additional funding, advocate for if the $2 billion is the number, then make sure that all that $2 billion goes to HBCUs. So, I mean, I think, you know, I think labeling the Newsweek article misinformation is probably a step further than what I'm willing to go,

because there was a $45 billion number put out there, but some of the context was lacking, and people did not distinguish between the fact that that $45 billion was not a cut to existing funding. It was a cut to the proposal that was initially put forward by the Biden-Harris administration. And that wasn't over a year. That was over 10 years, like the infrastructure package is for. So there are a lot of things that are working against the perception of Democrats' priorities, the perception of how HBCUs and Black voters are valued. But the bottom line is, if you're explaining, then you're losing. And nuance is lost in memes. Democrats always lose the messaging war. And there are people that really don't give a damn about HBCUs that are having a field day with it because it's something that is

very easy to, it's a big number to throw out there and say, look, $43 billion was cut. It's not a cut to anything that already exists. It's a cut to the idea of how much money HBCUs, along with minority-serving institutions, are going to get for a variety of things. But that's a very, very difficult argument to make in a very soundbite 280-character headline meme society. So I think that what Democrats should do is, listen, like I said, it's a drop in the bucket of trillions of dollars. I'm not saying you get all the way back up to the $45 billion number, but find some more money for HBCUs.

And if you're not going to do that, then you better, you're going to spend a lot of resources and a lot of time just batting down this particular story. And there are going to be probably a hundred more stories to come from. But one of the things that Trump was strong on, which was complete bullshit, was the notion that he was supportive of HBCU. And I was the one who was saying over and over again, well, he's taking credit for the funding that Vice President Kamala Harris fought for in the Senate and Congresswoman Alma Adams fought for in the Congress. But this is an area that the Republicans have been successful in messaging that they are supportive of HBCUs, at least on the federal level. So the Democrats are going to have some work in trying to undo this perception.

And I think they should try to find more money. And that's not just as an optics thing. That's because HBCUs, as you covered a couple of weeks ago, there are many institutions that need the infrastructure funding because of the capital expenditures that they need to make. But the thing, Faraji, here that we have to deal with, and this is where the new nuance comes in and why this matters. It's because you have to know, first of all, what the hell you're fighting for. You've got to have a baseline to operate with. So first of all, if you don't know what the real number is, what the real budget number is, then when they start talking about how to make cuts, because here's the deal. Biden's initial plan, a $3.5 trillion plan over 10 years. That's $350 billion a year. When you have Democrats now saying, like Manchin, Sinema, scale that back.

When they say scale it back from $3.5 billion to $1.5 billion, guess what that means? Everything in the plan gets scaled back. Everything. So we have to have a baseline to work with. And so we need to know what the number is. So to Dr. Kimbrough's point, you should be calling and emailing, not sound like a damn fool and trying to call Capitol Hill going, put the $45 billion back. That's not going to happen because it's not going to happen. Okay. If I had a $3.5 billion proposal over 10 years, and then I need to get the votes and the folks say, we are not going to support anything over 1.5 or lower as 1.2. Guess what? You ain't getting 45. So you need to know

what the number, and here's the other deal. You ain't getting the 45 HBCUs because it doesn't just include HBCUs. Santos said yesterday, well, there are 101 HBCUs. There are 569 Hispanic-serving institutions. Put them together, y'all. That's 670. So 670 now competing for the money. And so what people also don't know, Faraji, is that on Capitol Hill, whenever you hear people talking about, let's increase the funding for

HBCUs, the people who represent Hispanic serving institutions then want to increase in their funding. And so folks need to understand why we are doing this because we need to educate our people on who the hell to call, what the hell to call about, and having the right information and not sound like a damn fool when you call your member of Congress. No, and that's absolutely right, Brother Roland. And I think there's a few things here at play. One is that the lie persists because people have lost hope in political leadership. So people have already gotten to

the point of feeling like even President Biden and Vice President Harris aren't going to do anything. So the lie kept going and going and going. The other part about it is just what you said. But even right there, Faraji, but even right there, and I totally agree with you, but to Reese's point, this is also where, frankly, the Biden-Harris communications team, I don't know what the hell they're doing. If you kick $7 billion already to HBCUs, you might want to be yelling that from the rooftops. I'm just saying. I agree. And you know what? This is one of the big parts of why I have a frustration with the Democratic Party is just that, you know, if you're doing good, you need to scream that you're doing good. If you're making strides and making progress, scream that out instead of saying, well, you know, I mean, people are going to check in and they're going to see it later on and they're going to find out.

No, nobody's going to find out because you know what? Let's keep it real. People don't read now. We just don't read. We look at headlines. We look at the first. You look at the lead line of the story and then boom. You don't go all the way down to look at the context of a situation.

You don't go to get the details of a situation. Nor do you understand how certain people ended up in a situation. You know, who is responsible for what? And that's unfortunate. And it's not because I'm trying to throw shade on anybody. I'm just saying that we have been conditioned as a people in this country to not be as literate. And I'm saying that with the great utmost respect. We're not as literate as we could be. We just don't go through the full story because we do live in a microwave social media era where

everything needs to be real quick. So I just need to read a story in a couple of seconds and I'm going to move on to the next story. And then we make up these assumptions that's not rooted in truth. Now, the other part about this is that in government, Reverend Rowland, Dr. Carl Reese, we all know government works very simple. You have limited resources, limited resources to try to meet the interest of all of these different people. So you got Black people, yes. But Black people ain't the only ones in America. We got to talk about the Latino community. We got to talk about the Asian American community and the interest that comes with that. And you have people in Congress that represent all of these different interests that are going to want a piece of the pie, especially those who are not a part of the majority of this country. So we're going to have to look at that. Then the final point is, is this, as much as we're talking about what the government is doing

on the HBCU side, let's have a bigger conversation about getting black children and black students enrolled in HBCUs. We would not have to be in this conversation. You know, Dr. Carr, I'm sure you have these discussions all the time at Howard. You don't have, you know, when we're talking about, you know, whether you're talking about Morgan or Howard or whoever, you got to talk about, well, how do we get Black students to see the value and the importance of HBCUs in 2021? You know, what does that actually mean? Can these HBCUs go out to the high schools and create or even take the 101 HBCUs and come up with a real campaign to get people excited about going to an HBCU and regardless of what part of the country you're in. And see, because I've seen it and I've talked about it in Morgan State for university, the enrollment

numbers need to hit a certain match. But see, again, if we don't support the HBCU institution as a people, then that leaves us open to begging and hoping and putting our hands out to the government saying we need to, no, the support needs to come in. If the HBCU is doing its job, which they are doing, then that means that generation after generation should be invested in HBCUs. Now, will all black children go to HBCUs? No. But for those who have benefited from the HBCU experience, are your children going to HBCUs? Are your grandchildren going to HBCUs? Are your nieces and nephews going to HBCUs? Then let's have the conversation about alumni or alumni giving back

to you. Because you know why Harvard and Yale and some of these other white institutions are thriving and are able to withstand government cutbacks and all of these other winds of time and change? Because the students that went there had enough to say,

you know what, I'm going to give back in some way, shape, or form. And unfortunately, and I've seen this at Morgan, we just don't have that as a part of our culture enough where alumni and students that have gained from the HBCU experience will actually give back. So we have a lot of dynamics. This is not just about President Biden. This is really a reflection on us because we keep putting HBCUs in a vulnerable position. And when they start to close down, you know, when 101 goes to 198

and 90, and when they start to close down, what are we going to do about them HBCUs? They're closing down. Well, what have we been doing about HBCUs before they even closed the door? Let's be real. And let's be real clear. It's a lot of people that don't give a shit about HBCUs. Let even close the door. Let's be real. And let's be real clear. It's a lot of people don't give a shit about HBCUs.

I mean, let's stop sitting here. Let's just stop. Look, I'm just going to go ahead and say it. And if there's anybody out there who love HBCUs and want the HBCUs and y'all tried that crap on me before, you can't say nothing because you went to Texas A&M. Actually, I can. Because Texas Southern University is right across the street from my high school, Jack Yates High School. Prairie View A&M University is 50 miles down the road from where we are. And the fact of the matter is this here, okay, and I ain't got a problem saying it.

The only other person other than Tom Joyner, the only other person who's done more in terms of advocating for HBCUs on a black platform is Tom Joyner, the only other person who's done more in terms of advocating for HBCUs on a black platform is Tom Joyner. I'm going to go ahead and say that. Okay? In terms of putting HBCU professors and presidents on, speaking at HBCUs,

using HBCU students when I travel across the country, when we do shows, paying them when we've done that. That's the kind of stuff that we've done. Okay? But the problem is this here. There are people who are sitting there happy asses at home retweeting these stories. Y'all don't watch this show. Y'all watch all this other crazy stuff.

You don't know stuff. And yeah, you're not literate. And the Reese's point, I'm going to tell you right now, Jamie Harrison, the head of the Democratic National Committee, the comms people for President Biden, the comms people for Vice President Harris, the comms people for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who still hasn't come on here, the comms people for Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer, the comms people of the CBC. To Reese's point, Reese, I'm going to let you take it right from this point. Y'all got to learn how to fight fire with fire. They create memes. You don't create memes. So the reason you ain't got your story out

because you trying to send out a white paper that's five pages long explaining everything. We now live in the world of the meme on Instagram, the meme on Twitter and on Facebook. And that's why you're getting your butt kicked, because you don't know how to communicate

in the 21st damn century. I've been saying this. I've been saying we need memes, we need an investment, and we need some offense. Oh, you have 20 bullet points that you can point to of things you did, great. You know how much time people spend on a website? I've written an article, and the article, if you go to Medium,

it says it's a 22-minute read. And I look at the statistics, and it said that people spent 73 seconds on it. So you ain't basically read shit, because you're about 21 minutes short of reading the whole damn article of all this information that I put out there. People do not read.

If you put a link to an article on a Twitter thing, nobody's clicking on that. The click-through percentage is maybe 4%, 5%, 6%. You can look at this. If you are a person who has statistics or a business page, you can see that very few people click on the link. That's why you have to have embedded images. That's why when I did threads, I had screenshots because I knew nobody was going to click on a damn link. That's also why you can say anything and people will believe you if it's in a screenshot,

if it's in a meme, because they're not going to take the initiative to click on the links. And so, yes, the Democratic Party, Democratic messaging, the problem is you guys are actually doing good things. People are getting checks. I mean, if you've got two or three kids right now,

you're looking really good under the Biden-Harris administration and the plan that just passed with the child care tax credit. They should be up in arms calling their senators, telling Joe Manchin, I know you damn not going to cut out that child care tax credit that's putting money in my pocket every month that's expiring at the end of this year. I know you damn not going to do that. But no, they're not messaging the positive things that they're doing in a way that actually penetrates to people that aren't going to come to them. You are not going to bring voters to your Twitter account, to your town halls, to your Web pages.

You have to go to where they are when it comes to black voters. That means going to black media. No, it's not Rachel Maddow. No, it's not Anderson Cooper or Chris Cuomo. That's not where a lot of black people are getting their news. They're getting it from radio, from black media, black streaming services, black social media. You have to campaign 24-7. That's what Republicans do. You have to be on the offense 24-7. And you have to be on the offense with a variety of tactics, just simply ignoring the means, just simply saying people are stupid, they don't know any better, or, oh, well, that's a lie, is not good enough. You have to push back very forcefully. And you have to give people an affirmative message because if you let the opposition define you, it's too late by then. I've already seen this whole notion of HBCU funding being cut, being weaponized. And the

longer it goes without being fact-checked, without putting some graphs out there, without putting some memes out there, the harder it's going to be to push back on. And so get on the ball because you actually are increasing funding, but that's not the message that's getting out there. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley

comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way.

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

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

and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season 2 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content,

subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early. Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them.

Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Folks, got to go to a break. We come back more. Roland Martin unfiltered live in Los Angeles, right here on the Black Star Network. I'm not bringing my shades. Norske Kulturskap Betty is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now, she's free to become Bear Hug Betty. Settle in, kids.

You'll be there a while. Ooh, where you going? Hi, everybody. This is Jonathan Nelson. Hi, this is Cheryl Lee Ralph, and you are watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. All right, folks, glad to have you back here on Roland Martin on the filter here on the Black Star Network. Kristen Clark, who has a civil rights division for the Department of Justice. She testified on Capitol Hill this week about the importance on the John Lewis Voting Act.

Here's what she had to say. Recently, there's been a resurgence in attacks on voting rights, including cuts to early voting periods, burdensome restrictions to register or vote, racially gerrymandered redistricting plans, polling sites eliminated or consolidated in communities of color, eligible voters purged from the rolls, and more.

I am here today to sound an alarm for the Justice Department restoring and strengthening the Voting Rights Act as a matter of great urgency. The Supreme Court's 2013 Shelby County v. Holder ruling suspended the preclearance process, eliminating the Justice Department's single most powerful and effective tool for protecting the right to vote. Before Shelby, the preclearance process enabled the department to swiftly block the implementation of many discriminatory and unconstitutional voting practices. Through Section 5, the Department blocked over 3,000 voting changes, helping protect the rights of millions of citizens. In over 60% of blocked voting changes, there was evidence of intentional discrimination. We also know that the preclearance requirement deterred many jurisdictions from

adopting discriminatory changes in the first place. Too many jurisdictions have viewed the Shelby ruling as an invitation to adopt rules that disadvantage minority voters. Today, jurisdictions that want to restrict voting rights have what the Supreme Court memorably described the advantage of time and inertia. These new laws can be challenged only through long, protracted, resource-intensive, case-by-case litigation, which we have pursued in states like Texas and North Carolina. We are on the cusp of another potentially transformational moment. A new redistricting cycle has commenced.

2020 census numbers show the U.S. has become an increasingly diverse nation, with population growth attributable to increases in the number of people of color. Absent congressional action, this redistricting cycle would be the first in half a century without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act, and jurisdictions may be poised to dilute the increased minority voting strength that has resulted from these natural demographic changes. Without preclearance, the Justice Department will have limited tools to obtain documents and to assess where voting rights are being restricted, thereby hampering enforcement efforts. The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act addresses several of the barriers I've referenced, which are impeding the department's efforts to protect American citizens' right to vote. First, the Act responds to the elimination

of the preclearance coverage formula by updating the relevant criteria so that Section 5 coverage is tied to current conduct by jurisdictions. Second, the bill provides greater clarity regarding the appropriate legal standard in Section 2 vote denial cases. Third, the legislation gives the department authority to compel the production of documents and materials relevant to investigations of potential voting rights violations. And fourth, the bill places new measures to safeguard the rights of Native American and Alaskan Native voters. In 1965, Congress enacted, and in 1975, 1982, and 2006 reauthorized a statute that provided the strong medicine needed to remedy voting discrimination and to enforce our Constitution's commitment to ensuring that no citizen's right

to vote would be abridged on account of race or color. Congress must act now to restore the Voting Rights Act to prevent us from backsliding into a nation where millions of citizens, particularly citizens of color, find it difficult to register, cast their ballot, and elect candidates of their choice. The Justice Department welcomes this opportunity to work with Congress to revive this bedrocked civil rights law. Joining us right now is Marcia Johnson Blanco. She's co-director of the Voting Rights Project for the Lawless Community for Civil Rights Under Law. Marcia, glad to have you back on

Roland Martin Unfiltered. Here's what's happening right now. You've got Democrats talking about potentially doing a carve out of into the filibuster for raising the debt ceiling. Why in the hell not do that for the For the People Act and the John Lewis Act? No, that's an important question. And I think they need to hear from us that this is really important. And, you know, as you just showed, Assistant Attorney General Clark really showed what's at stake. And it's essentially the future of our democracy. And we need Congress to take that as seriously as the debt ceiling. So give us a sense, where do we stand now? Are we still at this impasse? Supposedly, Senator Joe Manchin was crafting this bill. Okay, where is it? It seemed

like we had a conversation about the voting bills, and now it's shifted to the debt ceiling and the reconciliation package and $3.5 trillion plan. It seems that the voting bills keep getting pushed back, pushed back, and knocked off the agenda. So yesterday was a really important step because the Senate has introduced its version of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. And as you heard, this Attorney General Clark really laid out what's at stake and what the bill does. So now there was a bill, there was a hearing. Now the Senate needs to move towards a vote. And what I think needs to be done is that they need to hear from us. They've been very quiet on pushing for this legislation. And as we know, the Congress doesn't act or feel a sense of urgency unless

they hear from us. And we need to rise up and say the Voting Rights Act, which transformed American democracy. I always say that American democracy really began in 1965 because that was when everyone was able to vote. Before 1965, we had all of these barriers. And now what we're seeing is that there's this response to the tremendous turnout that happened in 2020 with states like Georgia, like Texas, that have this history of discriminating, went right back to passing laws that will make it harder. They look exactly at what did people of color use to be able to vote or vote by mail. We're gonna make that harder. We

make them stand in line and groups provide water and food to make sure that people feel comfortable while waiting in hours-long line. We're gonna make that a criminal offense. We're gonna fine people for providing assistance to voters. Voters of color overwhelmingly use drop boxes because we can't always make it to the polling site during voting hours. We're going to take away drop boxes. So these states have been very brazen in really going after all the means that people of color, minority voters used to be able to vote. And now we really need Congress to step in and say, no, we are not going to allow this to happen. The Supreme Court has already taken away the force of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, getting rid of the formula. So now Texas and Georgia

and North Carolina and Arizona, states that were subject to federal review, no longer have to do that. And we see what they've done. They're passing these really onerous laws. And then this year, the Supreme Court again really hampered the Voting Rights Act by not allowing us to be able to make it more difficult for us to be able to bring litigation under the nationwide provision of the Voting Rights Act. So it's not hyperbole. It's not exaggeration to say that our democracy is at stake. And we really need to rise up and push Congress to do the right thing. Questions from our panel. First off, Recy Colbert. Yes. I mean, I think I'm wondering what kind of stuff has the Department of Justice signaled that they're willing to do on their own? I mean, there's some of this, obviously, that has to go through congressional authorization,

but I haven't seen much in terms of what the Department of Justice is trying to do in particular. Do you happen to have any insight on that? I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple.

Cops believed everything that Taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion-dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really really really bad listen to new episodes of absolute season one taser incorporated on the iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts binge episodes one two and three on may 21st and

episodes four five and six on june 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL

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

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

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early. Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback.

Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispreetirement.org, brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Yeah, well, really, the Department of Justice right now is severely hampered. So the Supreme Court took away the formula that determined which jurisdictions had to submit voting changes to the Justice Department.

So now states with a history of discrimination in voting don't have to submit their voting changes. There's no notice of changes that are happening. The court took away that tool that the Justice Department had. And then, as I said, this July, the court took away another tool that it another tool that the Justice Department has, which is to bring nationwide voter discrimination cases. It's now made it harder for the Justice Department to be able to do that. So the Justice Department is working with Congress to ensure that we have a voting rights bill that addresses all of these discriminatory laws that we're seeing right now. But the Supreme Court has really hampered what it can do. Raji?

Yeah. Thank you so much, sis, for joining us tonight. So I want to add to the concern that Risi had, which is this whole idea of preclearance. And for those who may not know why there's such an importance or emphasis on preclearance with this Voting Rights Advancement Act, it's because the preclearance, according to this bill, is the process of receiving preapproval from the Department of Justice or the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia before making legal changes that would affect voting rights. This preclearance is a very important part of this act that would essentially say, OK, if states are going to be, especially states that have a history of voter

suppression, if those states are going to make some changes, that they have to get cleared by the Department of Justice. And so, Sistvam, you saying that the Department of Justice is kind of overwhelmed and whatnot, I'm wondering, you know, if that can change, because if there's no assurance from the Department of Justice, wouldn't that, you know, remove a lot of the meat of this voting rights bill? Wouldn't that take away the impact and the power and the whole purpose for this bill? So what I'm saying is that unless Congress acts and updates the formula that requires Texas and Georgia and other states, Louisiana, and Louisiana, North Carolina to submit their voting changes, the Department of Justice doesn't have the tool to do its work. Right now we have a law in the books that says you have, you know, jurisdictions with

a history of discrimination in voting have to pre-clear. What we don't have, what the Supreme Court took away, is which jurisdictions. And so now it's up to Congress to say these are the jurisdictions that have to pre-clear their voting laws, because until Congress restores that formula, Section 5 is really neutered. The Justice Department can't use it. So it really is up to Congress to give the Justice Department the tools it needs in order to enforce the Voting Rights Act. Is there something that could be established? What's the question? I'm sorry. No, go ahead, Brother Roll. I know we got a roll.

Go ahead, brother. No, I would just ask him very quickly, he says, is that something that could be established in the bill that there is a separate part of this bill where there is some fire, some more accountability measures? I'm concerned about that part. The bill does have the formula in it. The bill has a formula that says if you have continuously passed laws that discriminate against voting, then you have to submit your laws for voting changes. So Congress, again, needs to pass this bill so that the Justice Department can do its job. Without this bill, the Justice Department is really hampered. Gotcha. Thank you, Brother Rowland.

Greg. Thank you, Rowland. And thank you, Director Blanco. Strategically, in your mind, how much of our time should we now begin to build movements at the state level? And I ask for this reason. We know that the Voting Rights Act, each time it was renewed, including 2006, all the formulas were updated. Ruth Bader Ginsburg said that in her dissent. We know that Shelby County was decided in bad faith.

John Roberts, one of his age mates, was in the New York Times yesterday. You probably saw the article saying, y'all have gone too far now. They're making this thing up as they go along. We know that the Supreme Court has been, black people in the works around much, were a special ward of the Supreme Court,

but we also know the federal legislature is stuck and this is not going to pass. So looking at a place like Texas, where there's been a 4 million people growth in the last 10 years, 95 percent non-white, mostly urban, and where these white nationals have decided that they're going to try to gerrymander to make even more seats and take more seats away, how much of our efforts now should be devoted to organizing on the ground in these problematic states that are getting cover from this renewed

federal bench, this white nationalist renewed bench, instead of just appealing to a legislature that has decided, in terms of the white nationalists, that they, of course, are not going to act because it's not in their political interest. That's an incredibly good point. You know, this past legislative session, Virginia passed its own voting rights law, its own Voting Rights Act. So now if Virginia wants to make a voting change, they, the legislature there, has to submit that change to the state attorney general. And so other states can follow Virginia's example. You're right that, you know, there's the fight on the federal level, but there's

more that could be done on the state level. We have hundreds of bills that have been introduced. We know about the ones that have been introduced to make it harder to vote, but twice that amount have been introduced to make sure that voters have access to the ballot. And so you're extremely correct that we need a two-pronged strategy. I do think we need to continue to put pressure on the Congress, but there is a lot that we can do on the state level, and I think Virginia's Voting Rights Act shows what can be done. Thank you. All right, then. Well, look, we certainly appreciate the work that Laura's committed for civil rights under law. Do we're going to be live streaming your annual gala virtual again this year. We'll be live streaming that October 21st right here on Roland Martin Unfiltered and the Black Star Network. And

so we certainly look forward to that. Marcia Johnson Blanco, thanks a lot. Thank you. Thank you for your support of our work. All right. All right. Thank you very much. All right, folks.

Got to go to another break. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered right here on the Black Star Network, live from Los Angeles. Listen. ТРЕВОЖНАЯ МУЗЫКА It's time to be smart. Roland Martin's doing this every day. Oh, no punches! Thank you, Roland Martin, for always giving voice to the issues. Look for Roland Martin in the whirlwind, to quote Marcus Garvey again. The video looks phenomenal, so I'm really excited to see it on my big screen. Support this man, Black Media. He makes sure that our stories are told. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and Black-owned media and something

like CNN. I got to defer to the brilliance of Dr. Carr and to the brilliance of the Black Star Network. I am rolling. We're rolling all the way. I'm honored to be on a show that you own. A black man owns the show. Folks, Black Star Network is here. I'm real revolutionary right now. Rolling was amazing on that.

Hey, Blake, I love y'all. I can't commend you enough about this platform that you've created for us to be able to share who we are, what we're doing in the world, and the impact that we're having. Let's be smart. Bring your eyeballs home. You can't be Black on media and be scared. You dig? Maureen is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon, so now she's free to become Maureen is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now she's free to become Maureen the Marrier.

Food is her love language. And she really loves her grandson. Like, really loves. Folks, 14-year-old Jeremy Dean was last seen on September 20th, 2021, in Norman, Oklahoma. The 5'4", 140-pound teenager has brown hair and brown eyes. If you have any information about Jeremy, please contact the Norman, Oklahoma Police Department at 405-321-1444, 405-321-1444. Folks, I'm here in Los Angeles shooting a number of interviews for a new show on the Black Star Network called Rolling with Roland. And so, might as well have a California story.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a new bill, a new law supporting black moms and infants. It is called the Momney Bus Act, and it will address racial disparities in maternal and infant health. Now, according to the California Department of Public Health, black women in California are four to six times more likely to die within a year of pregnancy than white women. Per every 100,000 live births, black women have the highest mortality rate. 56.2% of black women die, 13.3% of Asian Pacific Islander women pass away, 11% of Hispanic women, and just 9.4% of white women per 100,000 live births. Now, according to the CDC, nationally, black and American Indian women are two to three times more likely to die from pregnancy-related causes compared with white women. The Momney-Bus Act will establish a fund to grow and diversify the midwifery workforce,

extend California's Medicaid coverage for doulas, and extend Medicaid eligibility for mothers experiencing postpartum depression from two to 12 months. Recy, I'll start with you. Isn't it amazing how quiet the pro-lifers on the Republican side are about stories like this? Of course, it's amazing. I mean, they're not really about Black life, that's for sure.

And tackling the racial disparities in terms of maternal and fetal deaths is not something they're at all interested in. They're only interested in regulating bodies. I want to congratulate Governor Gavin Newsom for signing this. Obviously, it went through the California legislature. But I'm going to have to take a personal privilege here and point out that this is an issue that has been championed by

Vice President Kamala Harris. This is something that she spearheaded in the Senate, introducing the first-ever legislation to tackle black maternal mortality. She's really been on the forefront of this. And I've been seeing a lot of black people in response to this saying, Gavin Newsom for president. And I think it's very interesting. It reminds me of 2020 primaries when Elizabeth Warren rolled out her plan after having said nothing about black maternal health the entire time she had been in the Senate, and everybody fell over backwards for that. So this is an issue that I care deeply about. It's an issue that made me support Vice President Kamala Harris as a senator running for president

because she really cares about this. So I would like to see more black women who are really at the forefront of these organizations to tackle black maternal mortality get the credit that they deserve. The black-the monomous bill in California very much mirrors the Maternal Care Act that Vice President Kamala Harris introduced as the senator. So she also had organizations in the White House this year for Black Maternal Health Week, which is something that she also introduced as a senator. And Congresswoman Alma Adams has done amazing work on this. And now Congresswoman Lauren Underwood is really pushing the omnibus bill in there. She's getting great success. Her bills are getting out

of committees and to markups, and she's doing incredible work. So I know this is about Gavin Newsom, but I'm going to say shout out to the Black woman and politicians who are pushing this issue forward, because it is absolutely appalling how Black women, and I just had a baby, and I was very much worried about my maternal health. That's why I sought out a Black woman OBGYN practice, where both women were Black women, and happily, I'm here. And so is my baby. But this is an issue that really needs a lot more attention. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time.

Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion-dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated.

I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes one, two, and three on May 21st and episodes four, five, and six on June 4th. Ad free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod.

And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves.

Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush.

What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Goals? Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things.

Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Yeah, and the reality for us, we're not touting Gavin Newsom. In fact, by the bottom line, he, he's the governor, he signed into law. The real issue is that this is not a, this is not, this is something that when we talk about, again, this is where I challenge conservatives and Republicans, that if you are pro-life, why are you not confronting the issue of the mortality rate? When the Mississippi governor, the governor of Alabama,

it's amazing how real quiet Republicans get when you talk about the mortality rates of black women dying in childbirth. But I guess when they mean pro-life, they ain't talking about us. Because they talk about us only when it comes to a black woman who actually does have an abortion, not a black woman who dies trying to have a baby. Right, right. And I think that at the root of all this, Brother Roland,

it comes down to just plain old, good old boy racism. I mean, that's what it comes down to. But the infant mortality rate, when you're talking about mothers and babies, it is absolutely astonishing. And you know what? And I certainly agree with Reesey on this. We just don't have enough conversations. And I know that as I talk to my wife, my wife personally has experienced some things when it comes to childbirth.

And so as a family, we had to, you know, have some very, very deep conversations about those things. And it's just like we have to, and I'm speaking as a black man, we have to be supportive and make the space for the women in our lives, the black women in our lives to go and to really, just to be supportive as much as we can, you know, and to try to advocate for their health and well-being. And it's not easy for a woman to, you know, get pregnant. And then it's certainly not easy for a woman to get pregnant and to give birth because there are just so many things that could potentially happen during that nine-month period. And so when we talk about this, yes, I'm happy to see that there's some pieces of legislation in it, but this should be something that a piece of legislation that should be duplicated across this that we give black women the space to talk about their challenges of giving birth and not using abortion or any other means to stop birth, just take it so lightheartedly.

And we're not having this conversation. It may be something that needs to be done in schools. I don't know. Well, Bob, I think for me, Greg, is one thing having conversations is another thing having policy. And that's the bottom line. I think what we had is we had way too much conversation and we had no policy followed by enough resources to fix the problem. That's right. That's exactly right. And thank you, Recy, for leading us through what's going on at the federal level with Rep Underwood and others who are pushing this at the federal level. But quite frankly, and this goes back to the previous story, the federal framework is fracturing.

And people are probably sick of me hearing, sick of hearing me say that, but, you know, that's OK, because history is what history is. California, the reason this is able to pass, I think it was Nancy Skinner in the Senate who passed it after, who proposed that it pass the California Senate. But the reason it passed is because people organized. The Black Women for Wellness Action Project out there, the Western Center on Law and Poverty, so many others. And it's going to take a local and state intervention for these kinds of things to be dealt with. Kay Ivey, who's taking COVID money to build new prisons in Alabama, God bless Kay Ivey, you white nationalist, you Klan-adjacent, anti-Black, anti-human governor.

The thing that's going to displace Kay Ivey in Alabama is organizing. The thing that's going to displace that shovel-mouth Greg Abbott in Texas is organizing. Right now, non-Hispanic white people are, roughly speaking, about 40 percent of the population in Texas. That means that there are not enough people organized to break the backs of these people. The reason it passed in California is because the white nationalist party can't generate enough people to stop it. And finally, in terms of infant mortality, as was said by Governor Newsom, by Senator Skinner, and by all the people organized who pushed for this bill and this legislation, a great deal of this, as Faraji says, this is structural racism.

So yes, more do this. Yes, Medicaid expansion. Yes, exempting folk from this welfare-to-work BS that begins back with Ronald racist Reagan. Yes, all of that. But infant mortality and, you know, I mean, what does it mean for a woman who doesn't have to go and bust her ass waiting tables or driving Uber or do whatever you have to do? Come on, Doc. I mean, this is a structural racism problem.

By the time the sister gets pregnant and the baby is coming, she's at the tail end of a process where the stress has been eating her since she came out of her mother's womb. So ultimately, structural fixes are going to have to really be made at the state level because the federal government is on the verge of collapse. Yep. Folks, got to go to a break. We come back and update on the case of Julius Jones Yep. Folks, gotta go to a break.

We come back and update on the case of Julius Jones, the brother, who execution date has been set, but the part of the parole board has said his sentence should be commuted. That's next on Roland Martin Unfiltered right here on the Blackstar Network. Oh, that spin class

was brutal. Well, you can try using the Buick's massaging seat. Oh, yeah, that's nice. Can I use Apple CarPlay to put some music on? Sure. It's wireless. Pick something we all like. Okay, hold on. What's your Buick's Wi-Fi password?

Buick Envision 2021. Oh, you should pick something stronger that's really predictable. That's a really tight spot. Don't worry. I used to hate parallel parking. Me too. Hey. Really outdid yourself. Yes,

we did. The all-new Buick Envision, an SUV built around you, all of you. Films ain't just about hurting black folk. Right. You got to deal with it. It's injustice. It's wrong. I do feel like in this generation, we've got to do more around being intentional and resolving conflict. You and I have always agreed. Yeah. But we agree on the big piece. Yeah. Our conflict is not about destruction.

Conflict's going to happen. Hello, everyone. I'm Godfrey, and you're watching... Roland Martin Unfiltered. And while he's doing Unfiltered, I'm practicing the wobble. All right, folks, welcome back to Roland Martin Unfiltered here on the Black Star Network, broadcasting live from Los Angeles this week.

Attorney David Prater, folks, has petitioned the court in Oklahoma to have Adam Luck and Kelly Doyle removed, citing political beliefs in their work with releasing inmates. Now, he is the Oklahoma County District Attorney. They are members of the Parole and Pardon Board, the ones that are involved in the Julius Jones clemency case. Prater thinks that their biases will affect the decision-making process. Now, the parole board previously voted 3-1 to recommend Governor Kevin Stitt commute Jones' death sentence to life with the possibility of parole. Stitt has refused to do so.

Julius Jones of a clemency hearing for October 26th. His execution date is set for November 18th. So it's real interesting here, Faraji, when you look at this. So the DA is saying that, oh, because of their work, they can't actually make an impartial decision. But I guess when they want all law and order people lock them up, throw the key away, I guess they're OK to be on the board. I mean, you know, when I was reading about this story, Brother Rowland, it just, you know, they were talking about in this story some level of bias. Oh, man, this person might have bias. White people have been biased against black people for hundreds of years in this country. And we're talking about a situation that is circumstantial at best with Julius Jones.

But to talk about somebody's bias because of, oh, what they, you know, of a tweet that a person sent out or anything. I mean, look, the fact is, and this is what I see happening in this country, white people are becoming more and more upset because of the inevitable rise. And I'm speaking of the consciousness and the awakening that black people in this country are having. And so when we see when we're getting into involved with these cases, we want to see freedom. We want to see justice. And right now, white people, whether you're talking about prosecutors or district attorneys, whether you're talking about in the legal or in the courts or in Congress, there is just a huge emerging anger

among white folks that black people are saying enough is enough. We're sick and tired of being sick and tired. And so in this case of Julius Jones, I just say, you know, you know, if I, you could go take the legal routes to try to get somebody removed, taking them off of the board and, you know, that you feel like they're, they're biased. But what about the bias of white America? What about the bias that has been against black people in this country, black and brown and red people of this country for so long? And so, you know, it's, it's unfortunate that... Go ahead. Yes, sir. Well, the thing here, Greg, that I find to be laughable, the reality is everybody has biases. Everybody. There's no... Look, I'm a journalist. There's no such thing as objectivity.

It doesn't exist. You have a bias. The key is when you do something, does your bias show up? Is your bias president? Are you actually looking at all of the facts and making a rational decision? No. This D.A., what he's mad about is that that's two of those three votes that recommended that he get a commutation. They want to put this brother to death. Of course they do. And best of luck to David Prater, who was a hunter. You're a hunter, David Prater. Best of luck.

We'll see you in the street. You have to organize against these people. His great indictment of Adam Luck and Kelly Doyle, he says they worked to release inmates. So you absolutely said it, right? You want to lock our people up. Best of luck, David Prater, because the governor, the coward governor, first of all, the 3-1 recommendation wasn't to let the man walk. When you read the Innocence Project file, it's like, why is this man in jail for the first time? His lawyers didn't introduce this alibi. He was

at home at time of the murder. The guy who actually did it, Christopher Judson, whatever his name is, he made a plea deal, got 15 years, and is out free. The DA that put him in jail has had a third of his convictions overturned for prosecutorial misconduct,

including 10 exonerations of people who were given the death penalty. The 3-1 vote should have been let this man go immediately. But the governor is a racist. The DA is a racist. Meet them in the street. There is no—we have to reframe how we're thinking about this. And with all due respect, we cannot continue to appeal to some sense of morality. There is no morality. This is a war on black life that has been unceasing since they brought us here. And when we and as long as we attempt to have a conversation as if we're speaking the same language in the words of Malcolm, Malcolm, you're speaking a language they don't understand. The only thing they understand is force.

And if that's gonna be political force, then you need to organize, get other people of goodwill, and break the back of the power of this DA. Rishi? Dr. Carr said it all, but one thing I will add to it is just that we have a so-called justice system, right, that assumes that, you know, we have these so-called laws and we have these protections so that people do not get falsely convicted. And so you would have a murderer who could potentially walk free on a technicality. And so there are all

these so-called protections in there to supposedly ensure that a person that is convicted is done so on the basis of real evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. And so that's why a lot of people get off and a lot of people don't even get charged in the first place. So why is it that when it comes to a person who, as Dr. Carr laid out, is innocent, And why is it, when it comes to people who are supposed to determine mercy or grace for people who have served a certain amount of time or who have been rehabilitated in prison or potentially are actually innocent, why is it that people who would side on the side of mercy are a problem. That is because it's not about justice. It never has been about justice.

It's been about revenge, and it's been about, for some people, power and the lust for power and the way that they can exert that power over Black lives. The fact that this person is innocent is actually a feature, not a bug, because your innocence or guilt has absolutely no bearing on whether or not you have these prosecutors who are all about, like I said, terrorizing and abusing and seeking

their revenge and their superiority over Black people. So you can't appeal to them on the basis that he's innocent, because that's actually even better if they're innocent because it just shows the power of the system. It shows the power of white supremacy that it's not about evidence. It's about what the hell we want to do and we can get away with it. And damn thing you can do about it. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad.

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

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

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

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

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

Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Absolutely. All right, folks, got to go to a break. We come back. Senator Cory Booker

gives Utah Senator Republican Mike Lee a real lesson on systemic racism and capitalism. We'll show you and discuss next right here on Roland Martin Unfiltered, broadcasting live from Los Angeles on the Black Star Network. Don't forget, download the app, folks. Download the app right now. If you have not downloaded all platforms, Apple TV, Android TV, Apple phone, Android phone, Roku, Samsung, Xbox, all the platforms. Be sure to download the Black Star Network app. Also, support us in what we do by supporting this show by joining our Bring the Funk fan club, Cash App, Dollar Sign, RM Unfiltered, PayPal.me, 4 slash R Martin Unfiltered, Venmo.com, 4 slash RM Unfiltered, Zale, Roland at RolandSMartin.com. Roland at RolandMartinUnfiltered.com.

Be right back. Oh, that spin class was brutal. Well, you can try using the Buick's massaging seat. Oh, yeah, that's nice. Can I use Apple CarPlay to put some music on? Sure. It's wireless. Pick something we all like.

Okay, hold on. What's your Buick's Wi-Fi password? Buick Envision 2021. Oh, you should pick something stronger. That's really predictable. That's a really tight spot. Don't worry. I used to hate parallel parking.

Me too. Hey. Really outdid yourself. Yes, we did. The all-new Buick Envision, an SUV built around you. All of you. Hey, everybody, it's your man, Fran Hammond. Hi, my name is Bresha Webb, and you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered.

And, well, I like a nice filter usually, but we can be unfiltered. All right, so Shalonda Baker has been nominated to run the Office of Minority Economic Impact by President Joe Biden. Well, Republicans are not happy. Utah Senator Mike Lee is blocking her appointment because he doesn't like comments that she has made in the past about systemic racism in our capitalistic system. Well, he had to get educated in the full United States Senate by Senator Cory Booker. Watch this. I would ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to Shalonda H. Baker to be the director of the Office of Minority Economic Impact in the Department of Energy. That the nomination be confirmed. Is there objection? Ms. Baker stated the following, and I quote, as we move into this new future, we must also

remember that a just transformation of our energy system requires a careful interrogation of the racist capitalist politics that currently drive it. We must expose, then eradicate, these underpinnings. Close quote. I oppose Ms. Baker's nomination, and I object. The objection is heard. Mr. President. Senator from New Jersey. There is a difference between saying I am against capitalism and

I am against racist capitalistic policies. That's a big difference. We are a nation that exploded forth to be the dominant economy on the planet through the capitalist system.

But the capitalist system was not fair and equal all the time. In fact, it did not reflect what Adam Smith himself, in his essay on moral sentiments, talked about. Capitalism is an ideal that the best way to distribute goods and opportunity is through this idea of a free market where everyone has access. Clearly, that has not been the case in this nation. I know this from my own family story about my father here in this area coming after college and being the first black person hired by a small tech company the president may have heard of called IBM. First black salesman in the entire Virginia area.

As walls were broken, my father told me the story of why he left his company that he was working with because one of his managers said, you should get out of here because no nigger is ever going to be allowed to be a manager at this company. That's racism. So here's a nominee who in the context literally that my colleague read, racist capitalist policies, no one can deny that these policies existed in our country and that the free market system hasn't been free. In America, one in three households are energy insecure, meaning that they have difficulty paying their energy bills. And research has unfortunately shown that low-income households, disproportionately

black and brown households, are more likely to be energy insecure. Energy justice isn't something we talk nearly enough about. And that's why Ms. Baker's role is so important. There's an urgency right now to create deeper community in this country and to ensure that everyone has the fruits of liberty and opportunity. It's what we swear an oath to. It's what Ms. Baker's job is all about, is making reals on the words of our united pledge that we will be a nation with liberty and justice for all. Recy, if people want to know why it is important to have black progressive voices in the United States Senate, that was a three minute and 18 second edited example of how if you have all these white folks in the Senate with no clue about the reality of what it means to be black in this country,

that was a lesson for Senator Mike Lee. A lesson that probably fell on deaf ears, but shout out to Senator Cory Booker, because he's one of two who, you know, now we have Senator Raphael Warnock, who is also a champion in the Senate. But I also want to point out we don't have any black woman senators either. So it's very interesting that defending a black woman in her absolutely correct commentary, Shalonda Baker, failed to Senator Cory Booker. This is why it's important to have representation. You know, it goes beyond just simply the vote tallying.

It goes into a lot of these very key personnel decisions. Vice President Kamala Harris has had to break a lot of ties in terms of invoking cloture on different nominees. Almost all of them have been people of color. And so the Republicans have made it clear it doesn't really matter what you have said in your past. They'll find some just like they made up shit that was supposedly wrong with what Kristen Clark said and Vanita Gupta, and they blocked Neera Tanden because, you know, you had some progressives that were salty about her tweet. The bottom line is the Republican Party is always going to fight against a more equitable society. They're always going to fight against representation. And we know that when

Black women are in positions of power and positions of leadership, things are more fair and are more equitable. And that's why somebody like Ms. Baker is a threat. And I'm so glad that Senator Cory Booker was there, because even though Mike Lee will not give a damn about anything that he said, Senator Cory Booker does act as the conscience of the Democratic Congress along with Raphael Warnock and letting them know the mansions and the other ones that hide behind mansion in the Senate, but no, y'all not about to do wrong by this black woman. So I'm just letting you know right now how it's about to go down. But the Republicans are a lost cause. Faraji.

Look, you know, I mean, to hear Senator Booker just school this guy, take him to school on history, that's sad. You know, the sad part about it is, you know, you are a paid elected official. And even as a paid elected official, a white paid elected official, you get just shook up and get all discombobulated by somebody calling policies racist and capitalist. I mean, that's a white, that's not white frailty. I don't know what is. I mean, we're at that point right now in our Congress where you can't even say the word racist. And then you got to, you got to explain to somebody, a grown ass man, that there have been racist policies. And I love what Senator Booker said. We're talking about, you know, energy justice. You got to explain this to a grown ass elected official.

I mean, come on. So we got to go back to square one to talk about how this country has been built and all of the things that have led us to this point that have been both racist and capitalist and have not been in the best interest of our people in this country, nor has it been in the best interest of white people, if you really look at it. So, I mean, at this point, it's like, this is just sad. And, you know, I mean, yes, we can say, oh, he got schooled. But it's like you're schooling a five-year-old or something.

I mean, you're a grown man. You don't know this stuff. And you're getting so upset because somebody said your policy. Not even saying your policy. It said the policies. So it's talking about years of policies that have not been in the best interest of black and brown communities. And you're getting upset. I know, Reesie, you have to go top of the hour,

so we certainly appreciate you joining us on the show. Thank you so very much. Dr. Greg Carr, this is a reality that we have to always talk about. White folks in this country have operated in their full totality of whiteness. They are oblivious to the realities of what we've had to deal with. And when you see these fools fighting critical race theory, even though it's not being taught in schools, when you see them fighting history, not history,

when you see them fighting diversity, equity, inclusion. What they want to do is they want to maintain the facade of this great American empire that has always loved everybody, cherished everybody. It is open and free to all one. So any of you who dare criticize it, what you are doing is an abomination against God. That's what we're dealing with. What Senator Mike Lee represented, Dr. Carr, was the full essence of white supremacy. Indeed he did. Indeed he did. That's right, Roland.

I mean, and Mike Lee is being primary. Remember, Mike Lee came to the Senate in the Tea Party wave and was reelected. But he's being primary, including a guy who won 20 percent of the vote when Donald Trump ran in the primaries out in Utah. So he's a little scared. I don't even know if that little speech he'd made was about Shalonda Baker or Cory Booker as much as he was playing to the cheap seats back in Utah because he wants to get, he's up in 2022. And the sad thing about it, and here I'll quote one of the stalwarts of the soft white nationalist set, Senator Joe Manchin out of West Virginia, who when confronted with his recalcitrance

and his obstructionism, simply replied, elect more liberals. You're right. You're right, blow-dry cosplay coal miner. You know what? You have to bust the Senate out from the inside, sadly. And I agree with everything that's been said by both Recy and Faraji, by you, brother. You know, Cory Booker is trying to speak a language they don't understand, but even in what he said, here's a man with Stanford, Yale Law, got a Cicero Fellowship that went to Oxford. Surely he has read The Wealth of Nations a little bit more closely than he did to make Adam Smith a hardcore racist who called all black people, including his daddy bloodline, savages, said China was a fraud and said that the reason capitalism would triumph was because it's going to come on the wings of white men.

Surely he read the wealth of nations a little bit closer than to hold that up as some kind of defense of this sister, which really, at the end, translates to this, Roland, exactly what you said. We find ourselves in this country, particularly the black elite, including elected officials, continuing to try to prop up the myth-making of American exceptionalism and thinking that somehow we can just prop it up the right way.

These hardcore white nationalists walking, as you just said, beautifully in the fullness of their whiteness will look and say, oh, oh, you know, I'm sorry. But you know, in the words of Mary J. Blige, you can't be sitting here wondering why they don't love you the way that you love them. Corey, we got to take off the glove and go elect some more people and bust Mike Lee out from the inside.

He's not even thinking about you. Come on. Come on. Indeed. Folks, got to go to a break. When we come back, AT&T responds to the criticism of their support of the One America News Channel. You know, that far right wing nut job, Donald Trump loving MAGA lying misinformation feeding cable news channel. CBC weighs in.

I'll read you this statement released by AT&T as well. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network live from Los Angeles. Back in a moment. ДИНАМИЧНАЯ МУЗЫКА Betty is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now she's free to become Bear Hug Betty. Settle in, kids. You'll be there a while. Ooh, where you going? Welcome back to Roller Martin Unfiltered.

After Reuters did a story talking about the involvement of AT&T with One America News Network, that is the right-wing Donald Trump-loving MAGA network that is filled with misinformation and just outright lies, the Congressional Black Caucus weighed in. This was a statement from CBC Chairwoman Representative Joyce Beatty. It has been brought to our attention AT&T, a longtime supporter of CBC-affiliated initiatives, has been identified as a primary sponsor of the far-right, anti-democratic, hatred-peddling organization One America News Network. AT&T's support of OAN is in direct opposition to its claim of embracing and valuing diversity, equity, and inclusion. As members of the Congressional Black Caucus, we find these allegations appalling

and call on AT&T to respond immediately. We will not yield in our dedication to on AT&T to respond immediately. We will not yield in our dedication to combating any attempt to circumvent democratic principles, disenfranchise American voters and marginalized black communities. We will continue to demand accountability and transparency in our efforts to uplift and preserve diversity, equity and inclusion at levels and at levels and across all industries. This is our power and our message. Now, AT&T is becoming the withering criticism in the last 24 hours as a result of this particular story. This was a statement that was sent to me from AT&T. AT&T has never had a financial interest

in OAN success and does not, quote, fund OAN. CNN is the only news network we fund because it is a part of AT&T. When we acquired DirecTV, we refused to carry OAN on that platform, and OAN sued DirecTV as a result. As part of a settlement of that lawsuit, DirecTV agreed to a commercial carriage agreement with OAN four years ago. OAN's programming is also carried by other TV providers. DirecTV also has commercial carriage agreements with CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and other news channels. DirecTV offers a wide variety of programming, including many news channels that offer a variety of viewpoints, but it does not dictate or control programming on the channels. Any suggestion otherwise is wrong.

The decision of whether to renew the carriage agreement upon its expiration will be up to DirecTV, which is now a separate company outside of AT&T. Now, here's the deal here, Greg, and I understand the statement from them, but the reason people also responding because it was the own founder the oan founder who said that it was at&t executives who encouraged him to launch this network that is what people are talking about i know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated.

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

I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves.

Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corps vet. MMA fighter. Liz Caramouch. What we're doing now

isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava

for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early. Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them.

Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at this is pre-tirement.org brought to you by aarp and the ad council yes sir well roland i mean you're the master of knowing how these interlocking media corporations work and what their interests are um correct me if i'm wrong. Isn't AT&T headquartered in Dallas? Yep. So, yeah, okay, good.

I thought, because I think all these stories. And on the same day that Republicans initiated the voter suppression bill, the AT&T PAC gave Governor Greg Abbott's campaign $100,000. Wow. Well, as you always say, follow the money. Follow the money. AT&T's total subscription viewer base went down. It's been going down.

It went from 26 million in 2015, domestic U.S., to 15.5 million in August. One thing about white nationalists, they're loyal viewers. They're going to watch Fox. They're going to watch O.N. So it's business. And as was reported, if O. lost that DirecTV platform, they would crater. And so, you know, AT&T is counting their money.

They're trying to get their finger in the wind, trying to see what political direction this country is going in. They're headquartered in a state that is known for easy regulations. That's why a lot of California companies are relocating to Dallas, but they're playing a danger, I mean, to Texas, but they're playing a dangerous game. Because as the brother reported in the New York Times yesterday, wrote a long article about Texas being the future of America. These businesses are getting nervous because some of these political folk, the folks like AT&T and other businesses are weaponizing have gone so far, in fact, that they are risking a black and brown and intelligent lash against this white lash that could ultimately accrue to AT&T's detriment. So what we might see is AT&T back up off, back up off OAN if they feel like it's going to be bad for business.

And at this point, I guess we just don't know until people put enough pressure on them. Faraji. Dr. Carr and Brother Rowan, that's the part about this situation that disturbs me the most is that, I mean, they've already put the money into OAN. So by them already putting the money into it,. So Biden already put the money into it. And if they back off at this point, it's only because of public pressure, not necessarily because it doesn't align with their values. And so they're going to find another way. There's somebody within AT&T or somebodies or a group of people who are feeling the mission and the values and the work of OAN.

Somebody said that this needs to be invested in and this needs to be invested in heavily. And I would just wish, I mean, I'm going Christmas. I know this is October, but I wish, I would just have a Christmas wish that when we have moments like this, we can just say, all right, black folks, let's stop. Let's just stop subscribing to AT&T. Change your phone service and change any other service related to AT&T to someplace else. But the bottom line is that now, you know, AT&T is still one of the biggest telecommunications companies in this country. And at this point, it's like, what is there left for us to do? How do we, and I say it like this, Dr. Carr, how do we bring that fire to their ass to let them know that the decisions that they have made with our dollars, now check this out,

they support, they use our dollars to support interests that are not in our best interest. How do we bring the fire under their ass to make sure that they stay accountable to us? Not just in a public call out or even in a statement, but in a way that they can feel it. Now, I know that back in earlier part of this year, they had like the black future makers. They had a campaign about, you know, black people doing something. I'm getting so sick and tired of PR campaigns trying to smooth over institutional racism. It's just sickening.

And at this point, it's like, we need to figure out... But here's the answer. No, no, no. First of all, we don't have to figure it out. It's very simple what it is. And that is the carriage deal there that they receive. And that is O the carriage deal there that they uh receive and that is oan receives uh financial resources subscriber money uh from direct tv and other other channels uh for their

um for their content now according to the reuters story 90 of owns revenue comes from at&t which begs the question other That's huge. Other cable networks are carrying them, but are they paying them a subscriber fee? That's the real question that people have to ask. Now, what I would say is, okay, AT&T, are you encouraging black channels to be launched? And are you going to pay them subscriber fees? And let me explain this to everybody who's watching.

When you sign these carriage deals, these carriage deals go for three, five, seven years. That means you're locking that revenue in. And so let's just say you're getting 10 cents per subscriber. If you've got 15 million subscribers, that means that you're getting 15 million times 10 cents every single month for the next three to five, seven years. Do y'all understand, folks watching, how you can, when your revenue is locked in, how you're able to actually build? Just so y'all understand that if you're talking about, so you just take what I'm doing, if you take what we are doing, if you say that, oh, okay, so we're going to take $15 million, 15 million subscribers, and go $0.10 a sub, okay?

And remember, you're getting this money per month, all right? It's a monthly fees. That means that OAN is getting $1.5 million per month from those $0.10. If that's the deal, If it's 15 million subs, you're getting 10 cents per subscriber. That's $1.5 million. That means that in the course of a year, they're getting $18 million from AT&T, if those are the terms of the deals. Now, again, I just want everybody listening to understand what I am trying to unpack this stuff for you. If Roland Martin Unfiltered and Black Star Network decided to say, hey, AT&T, if they put Black Star Network on their system and paid us 10 cents per subscriber, OK, every month. Do you know what would happen? That means that I can

go out and I can go out and hire, let's say, 50 staffers. You know what? Let's say 100 staffers at $100,000 each. That's $10 million, y'all. And guess what? I got eight million left over. So I will go from 15. I will go from 15 people overall. I don't have 15 working on the show. I got 15 people overall to 115. What do you think I could do with a hundred more people? That's the difference when you get that additional 18 million. So a bunch of y'all are watching. Why have we been very aggressive in going after General Motors, McDonald's, Target, Verizon, other insurance companies and others when it comes to funding? Because the advertising was driving media.

And so when you're able to receive the advertising, and I appreciate the insertion order for the commercials you've been seeing from Nissan and from Amazon, we want to see a multi-year agreement from Nissan and Amazon. Not just ads in the fourth quarter. We want to sign a three-year contract. That means that if we sign a three-year contract for $3 million with Nissan and a three-year contract for $3 million a year with Amazon, and that's $6 million a year that we are locking in for the next three years. That's how businesses are able to forecast. And so what we should be asking here,

and I want AT&T, AT&T should be a leader here, and they should step up and say that they are going to commit 7% of the annual advertising marketing budget that they have to black-owned media. And by 2025, that number will go to 15% on an annual basis. Return on investment to supporting African-Americans. Then I will want to see AT&T, and I know they spun the company off, but there's still an equity interest in DirecTV. And also you've got the merger between Time Warner and Discovery. I want to see them say, you know what, we're going to do the same thing. We're going to launch an OTT network, and we're going to help fund it

that's targeting African Americans, just like we would encourage the launch of OAN. That's what we are to do, Faraji, to answer your question. So to the organizations demanding meetings, that's what we should be asking, that's what I'm asking, and that's what it boils down to. I got to go to a real quick break, and then we'll come out with our final segment on today's Roland Martin Unfiltered the black star network oh that spin class was brutal well you can try using the buicks massaging seat oh yeah that's nice can i use apple carplay to put some music on sure it's wireless pick

something we all like okay hold on what's your buicks wi-fi password buick envision 2021 but you should pick something stronger that's really predictable. That's a really tight spot. Don't worry. I used to hate parallel parking. Me too. Hey. Really outdid yourself.

Yes, we did. The all-new Buick Envision. An SUV built around you. All of you. I'm Bill Duke. This is DeOlla Riddle, and you're watching Roland Martin, unfiltered. Stay woke. All right, folks. Minister of the Supreme Court denied Derek Chauvin's request

for a public defender as a former Minneapolis police officer prepares his appeal for the murder conviction and the death of George Floyd. The court ruled Chauvin did not illustrate he was too poor to pay for a private attorney. Chauvin says the only earnings he receives are nominal prison wages and his debts are larger than his assets. He's serving 22 and a half years for Floyd's death.

Well, start selling some shit if you got a problem. Also in Minnesota, body cam video released allegedly shows Minneapolis police officers celebrating the, quote, hunting and taunting of peaceful protesters just days after George Floyd was killed. Watch this. You guys are out hunting people now. It's just a nice change of tempo. Yep. Agreed. F*** these people.

We barely, barely have it. Let them have it, boys. Let them have it. Right there. Get them, get them, get them. Hit them, hit them. The recordings were released as part of Jaleel Stallings' criminal trial. He was accused of trying to kill police officers after returning fire to an unmarked police van.

Stallings was acquitted. Now the videos are part of an ongoing internal investigation into the officer's actions seen in these videos. Let's go to Austin, Texas. Well, for the first time in department history, the Boston police chief has suspended officers for not intervening when another officer uses excessive force. Police chief Joe Chacon suspended officers Catherine Alzola and Eric Perez for doing nothing as a handcuffed ISSA suspect

was tased and beaten with a baton. A third officer who was involved is under investigation. An internal affairs investigation found that both Perez and Ozola had a duty to stop the other officer from using additional force on the handcuffed man. The thing here, Farage, is that this is where you have to have accountability in the police department, and that is officers not saying anything, not doing anything, not stepping in. And so these officers who were firing on these people were not telling people who they were. They know who the hell was shooting at them, firing things at them. And, of course, the case in Austin, this is what happens when, you know, you need to have some responsibility.

And that's what should have happened in this case. So I'm glad to see the Austin police chief do what he did. Absolutely. But, you know, I mean, it still goes back to the savage nature. And, you know, I hope I'm not stepping out of bounds when I say this, Brother Roland, Dr. Carr. But it felt like, you know, we were back in the 1800s. Get them, get them, get them, boys, get them. All of that Southern talk.

It sounded like we were back in a time where our people were enslaved. And this was just part of a Saturday night party. And it's unfortunate, because, I mean, this is police officers. We can, and you know, Brother Rowling, you're one of the main platforms that talk about police misconduct more than anybody that I've ever seen. And to see that video, I mean, just that little bit of video, we're going to hunt activists? I mean, we're hunting activists? That's what police officers are saying. Get them boys. We're hunting activists tonight. I mean, that is savagery. That is, I mean, that's just devilish. And it's pure,

unadulterated, unfiltered way. And that's why you got to have those body cam footage, dash cam footage. You need to see what they're doing at all times and to take action against them, Greg. That's right, Roman. I mean, I agree with Roger. I just say, though, I wouldn't think, I don't think of it as police misconduct. I think of it as police conduct. They're hunters.

This is just something they've explicitly said, but we've been saying all along. They get dressed to go hunt. And if you're not a hunter, they try to shun you. They try to hem you up like the sister who was a sergeant in St. Louis, the sister who's now retired. They tried to hem up when she doesn't want to go hunting. No, she's trying to police in a different way. That's what they do. And so, you know, again, I encourage them to say that with their chest.

I mean, just think about this. As you said, Roland, you know, again, I encourage them to say that with their chest. I mean, just think about this. As you said, Roland, you just reported it. This brother, this young brother, Jalil Stallings, they tried to send him up on the idea that he was trying to murder cops. He was acquitted of all charges. What does that mean? That means there was no way for them to hang him with it because these hunters were in an unmarked van shooting rubber bullets. And the people told him they shooting out that van. And so he pulled his strap to try to stop it. If any kind of way they could have set him up for that, they would have. And so what we're seeing there in Austin, of

course, is a direct result of that demographic change in the state of Texas. The fastest growing city in the country is Dallas-Fort Worth. Number two is Austin. And those 95% of non-whites who have moved to Texas in the last 10 years, 70% of that migration has gone to the urban areas, about 1% to the rural areas. So when you're talking about Texas, you may say it's a red state, but you got to look at the blue places, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin. And so the police chief in a city where people can empower elected officials and appointed officials to do something different might have a chance to reverse engineer some of this patrolling. But it isn't policing misconduct. It's police conduct. This is what they were founded to do. You stop those hunters through a number of ways, political protest, street protest. And if they had an unmarked van shooting bullets at you, you return with the strap.

Folks, that's it for us. Greg Carr, Raj Bahamut, we certainly appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Rucy Cobra, thank you for being with us as well, folks. We've got to go. Please support us, the Black Star Network. Download the app. It's on all platforms, Apple phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Samsung, Xbox, all the platforms. You name it, we are available. Amazon Fire, Fire TV, Fire Stick. So tell a friend.

We've exceeded 16,000 downloads. We want to have 50,000 downloads by December 31st of the end of this year. So let's make this thing happen. Also support us with your resources by joining our Bring the Funk fan club. Every dollar you give goes to support this show and what we do. We are here in Los Angeles. We have one of our new show that's going to be on Black Star Network called Rolling with Roland interview series. We last time we were here, we of course, we talked to Richard Lawson, Glenn Turman, Bill Duke, Jack Kay, Michael Collier, Mario Van Peebles, Jeffrey Osborne. This week, we've talked to Dondre Whitfield, Johnny Gill, Guy Torrey, Sherry Shepard.

Today, Damaris Lewis, Maddie Rich tomorrow. I'll be talking with Chris Spencer, Michael Ealy, and Laz Alonzo. And so I can't wait for y'all to see that, especially in the emotional moment when Maddie Rich talked to Spike Lee. Y'all might remember the issues that they had back and forth they had more than 20 years ago. Man, it's going to blow y' all away and brought Maddie to tears. Trust me, only on the Black Star Network. Support us with your resources. Cash app, dollar sign, RM Unfiltered. Of course, Venmo.com forward slash RM Unfiltered.

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made some changes. So, Dave said, come on out, Roland. Check it out. I'm headed there right now, and I'll see you guys tomorrow, right here. Roland Martin Unfiltered

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You dig? I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future I get right back there and it's bad. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir.

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

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