#RolandMartinUnfiltered - ICE Officer Tackles Woman, Shutdown Looms, UN Walkout on Netanyahu, Assata Shakur’s Legacy

Episode Date: September 27, 2025

9.26.2025 #RolandMartinUnifltered: ICE Officer Tackles Woman, Shutdown Looms, UN Walkout on Netanyahu, Assata Shakur’s LegacyAn ICE officer is off the job after a disturbing video goes viral. It shows him tackling a woman to the ground inside a New York immigration courthouse while her two little kids watched. We will show you what happened. Plus, we're just five days away from a government shutdown, House Leader Hakeem Jeffries is sounding the alarm over a health care crisis that could hit millions if ACA tax credits expire.But dozens of diplomats walked out in protest at the United Nations when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed Western nations for recognizing a Palestinian state calling it a "mark of shame." And, Icon Assata Shakur has died at 78 in exile in Cuba. A fugitive since 1979, her life remains a powerful symbol of resistance and activism. We'll take a closer look at her legacy.#BlackStarNetwork partner: Fanbasehttps://www.startengine.com/offering/fanbaseThis Reg A+ offering is made available through StartEngine Primary, LLC, member FINRA/SIPC.  This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment. You should read the Offering Circular (https://bit.ly/3VDPKjD) and Risks (https://bit.ly/3ZQzHl0) related to this offering before investing.Download the Black Star Network app at http://www.blackstarnetwork.com! We're on iOS, AppleTV, Android, AndroidTV, Roku, FireTV, XBox and SamsungTV.The #BlackStarNetwork is a news reporting platform covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an IHeart podcast. Today is Friday, September 26, 2025, coming up on Rollo, Mark, Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. An ICE officer has been suspended after video of murders of him slamming a woman down to the ground in a very aggressive manner. Wait until you see this video. Also, five days from a government shut down. House Democrat leader, Hakeem Jeffers, is sounding the alarm. Donald Trump is trying to blame Democrats when Republicans control the House Senate as well as the White House. Also, many diplomats, a lot of diplomats walk out before Benjamin Netanyahu speaks at the United Nations.

Wait until we show you the video. Also, Asana Shakur has passed away, the former Black Panther who was exiled to Cuba. but that's where she fled down at age of 78. We'll tell you about her life as well. Also, Ellie Mistle talks about racism and how Donald Trump is trying to destroy the 1968 Civil Rights Act, known as the Fair Housing Law. All of that next right here.

Roll the mark unfiltered on the Black Stud Network. It's time to bring the funk. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got. Like the scoop, the fat, 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 gigs, he's rolling. Yeah, yeah. It's Uncle Roe Roy, y'all. Yeah, yeah. It's rolling Martin, yeah. Rolling with rolling now.

He's funky, fresh, he's real the best, you know, he's rolling Martel now. Martel! Puller away. Suente! Suente, senora! Let me get the little. Let the girl. Let the girl.

Let's do you. Let's do not. Let's do not. Let's do not. Don't say anything. Don't stay here. No. No.

No. No. No. I'm not. I'm not. I'm not. I'm going to say. Adieu.

Adieu. Adieu. Oh, no. Come, man! Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Press, press. You go, press, no.

Who? Who? Who? No! Get her out of the building. Get her out of the building. No! Yeah, get her out of the building.

Get her out of the building, you know. Let's go! Those guys, move out, move out. Go ahead. Those shameful video has gone viral on that particular ICE has been released of current duties has been relieved of current duties. duties after it has gone viral. He was tackling a crying woman inside the halls of an immigration courthouse in downtown Manhattan in front of her two children that took place on Thursday.

It was at 26 federal plaza inside the headquarters for several federal law enforcement agencies in New York City. She was clinging to her husband along with a young girl, plead for his release while mass officers hauled him away after the officers pried the woman away from her husband. She yells in Spanish. They don't care about anything. This is a statement of release from Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Trisha McLaughlin. The officer's conduct in this video is unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE. Our ICE law enforcement officers are held to the highest professional standards. This officer is being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation. My panel is Michael Emotep, host the African History Network show

Detroit, Matt Manning's subright attorney out of Corpus Christi, Texas, Drew Harris, Elon's founder and CEO of the Elon Group out of Montgomery County, Maryland. Matt, I'm going to start with you. Here's a deal. Donald Trump has empowered these thugs to do these type of things. We have seen the bullish and the bearish actions of ICE officers. We've seen how they have essentially attacked people. We've seen how throwing folks down to the ground, pulling guns out, storming into car washes.

there's a car wash owner who was hospitalized, 79 year old guy who's now suing them because of injuries he's sustained. And so it's no shock this happened because they have been allowed to do these things. So imagine the things that we

have not seen that took place this one was recorded. That's right. I mean, you would think that law enforcement officers, federal law enforcement officers would know better than to engage in such conduct. And I think, you know, this is one, an oversight by the administration in terms of just fomenting this kind of cavalier conduct

from federal agents. But unfortunately, I'll tell you, I just tried a case in June involving the U.S. Marshals, where it was a similar kind of thing. I think for a long time they've been empowered to have this kind of conduct and to undertake these kinds of actions. I think the difference now, though, is they're under a much larger microscope, considering the administration and the administrations trying to round up brown people and non-white people, throughout this country. Now, I think the one thing that is potentially positive here is that I think this is a circumstance where the government will actually have liability. But to that end, I think the federal judges are going to have to be the line of defense between lawlessness

and some kind of recompense for this poor woman and other people who are in this circumstance. Because what that person in, I don't remember the state you mentioned, but the elderly gentleman probably filed is what's called a federal tort claims act case. And to make it very short, federal law enforcement officers can be liable if they commit one of six different torts, including assault, battery, and some other things that they can do. So I think this is a circumstance where if she files a lawsuit, she'll be in front of a federal judge, and he or she will decide whether, you know, they will leave this ICE agent committed assault. But it's good that you got it on video. It's good that it's very clear what happened. But it's sad that this

administration has fomented this exact kind of tenor in this country, and that a federal agent would be empowered to do this kind of thing despite the fact that they've got a bunch of witnesses probably know they're being recorded and I think they're reporters and photographers there. I mean, that's proof positive that this administration has let them off the leash. But here's the thing

here, Drew. We've seen this. They know they can do whatever they want. And so the only reason this is a conversation is because, frankly, it's so many cameras there. I think also to roll into

your point. This is something that this administration has really, really fanned the flames. I believe it's performative that this gentleman has lost his job or has put on ice until, no pun intended, put on ice until there's some investigation. But I have no, I do not believe that anything is really, truly going to happen if media like yourself, Roland, and others are not tracking this story. I think it gets swept under the rug because this is exactly what they expect for these people to do.

This ICE iteration of ICE is about being thuggish and about doing whatever they needs to do. He felt emboldened even though the cameras were there. If there was any hesitation, he did not show it because he felt like he had the right to do so. Michael. Yeah, Roland, this once again, is red meat to Donald Trump's white supremacist model base.

This is one of the reasons why they voted for him. This would distract them from a government shutdown where they could very well lose their Medicaid, losing paychecks, things of this nature. What we just saw is despicable, but also keep in mind, now the budget of Homeland Security has been in ICE. They've been tripled because of the big, the big ugly ass bill

and we're going to see more things like this so it's good that this is recorded and this has gone viral because this helped push back on some of this. But from reading the piece from the New York Times on this, her husband was at an asylum hearing at the courthouse and

a lot of these cases when ICE shows up at the courthouse for arrest they're arresting people who don't have a criminal record. Donald Trump said he was going after the hardened criminals and hunting down the bad guys, things like this, going after the worst of the worst. Okay, so this appears on the surface right now, the opposite of that, somebody who's following the procedure, showing up the court, things of this nature.

So we're going to see more of this, but we have to fight against this. This is why elections have consequences. Well, here's the deal. They've now arrested the superintendent of schools in Des Moines, Iowa. In the message to families, the school board chair, Jackie Knorrhs, confirmed that Superintendent Eon Roberts was taken into custody this morning. District officials say they have no additional confirmed details about his detention or what the next steps may be. ICE with the assistance of the Iowa State Patrol says Roberts was found with a loaded handgun, $3,000 in cash and a fixed blade hunting knife. The agency claims Roberts has been living in the United States illegally from Guyana.

He was under a final order of removal issued in May 2024 and had no work authorization. He formerly was a principal in Maryland, has worked in education for a number of years. And to the point there, to Michael's point, Drew, they talked about, oh, releasing, you know, going after hardened criminals. the superintendent of schools, I don't think, qualifies for that category. Listen, it's just like Michael said, the people who voted for this man that's occupying the White House, whether they try to admit to it or not, they voted for this. We know that he's a liar. We know how he, that he's racist.

We know who's leading the charge, which is Stephen Miller, who is his puppeteer. We recognize that this is exactly what they want to do. He played into, I guess you would say, the fears of those that are criminals, but he is going to the places where it's the lowest hanging fruit. And while we are able to hear by Ann in Iowa and we saw this situation that was in New York, there are thousands of people who are actually just going about their day and are coming up missing because this is their approach. This is their attack. We know this. I don't even understand why we are surprised. Yes, we need to use this to push back.

Yes, we need to think about ways to be able to figure out how ways to make sure we highlight all of this information. But truth be told, I really do not believe anything is going to happen until the next election cycle. And we change who's in place to make decisions and make laws that can make sure that we keep our people. people say? Oh, there's no doubt. I mean, listen, this is what they want to do. This is what they want to see. They absolutely are buying into this. This was the statement. Ice released a statement. This is what they said. During a targeted enforcement operation on September 26, 2025, officers approached Roberts in his vehicle about identifying himself, but he sped away. Officers later discovered his vehicle abandoned near a wooded area.

A state patrol assisted in locating the subject, and it was taken into ICE custody. Roberts has existing weapons possession charters from February 5th, 2020. Roberts entered the United States in 1999 on a student visa and was given a final order of removal by an immigration judge in May of 2024. The investigation into how Roberts acquired the handgun is being turned over to the ATF is a violation of federal law for those in the United States without legal status to possess a

firearm and ammunition. And as I said, he was the superintendent of schools in Des Moines, Des Moines, Iowa. Matt, Matt, you're muted. My apologies.

I said, I think Drew was 100% right in her commentary. The thing I am a little perplexed by, though, is one, if those charges are allegedly from 2024, then that's obviously the prior administration. And what I'd be interested in knowing is how the Des Moines public schools, you know, one, didn't have a contingency plan for this or, you know, how he was basically in that job if those things are true. That's definitely not to cast aspersions on him. But, you know, Des Moines, I just looked it up, their certified enrollment this year is 30,000 students. So, you know, how you could have a superintendent.

who is in a status where there's a question about whether he's going to be enforced is a concerning thing. And I wonder, as this goes on, what we're going to learn about why, you know, he was being targeted and what those charges came from. And that's to give him the benefit of the doubt. I mean, everybody should be presumed innocent. However, I think the larger point that Drew was speaking to is, you know, the idea that Trump very often says things that we know are just patently false. And the rhetoric around rounding up immigrants has been, you know, we're going to get these criminals. But, I mean, if you're the Ph.D.

Superintendent of a school district with 30,000 students, you are, you know, at least presumed not to be a criminal. So I don't know how that happens. And I don't know how, if you are MAGA, how you, you know, jive with what is being said, but what is true. And that is that they're rounding up people who are not known to be criminals, which is in direct contravention of what they're saying. But beyond that, I mean, I am interested in knowing more

because if there was an order of removal from last year, I think, you know, we have to be truthful about the fact that that did not emanate from this administration, and I'm interested in the information around that, because I think that context is important. Michael? Yeah, Roland, I wasn't familiar with this case here. So we'll see how this turns out. It sounds like he was doing a good job here. He came in on the student visa. We do know that overstaying visas is a –

a big problem as well, but there's a difference between coming in to the country illegally and coming in on a student visa and overstaying the visa. That happens a lot, okay? But they did come in legally. So we'll see how this plays out. Hopefully, it turns out the best for him. But you hope that something, you hope that he gets some type of the benefit of the doubt, or that is that there's some other details that we don't know about that are in his favor because it sounds like he was doing a really good job in his position also.

Absolutely. All right, folks, got to go to break. We come back. We're going to talk with Congresswoman Maryland Strickland of Washington State. Lots having with this week. The Black Caucus Foundation annual legislative conference. We've got to shut down that's looming five days away.

All of that will break down. You're watching Rollermark unfiltered on the Black Star Network. In my book, The Power to Persist, I share eight simple yet powerful habits, a blueprint for transforming obstacles into opportunities and pressure into purpose. Just as they fueled my rise from the south side of Chicago to a national stage. And on the Power to Persist podcast, I bring that blueprint to life. This week on the other side of change. Hurricane Katrina, 20 years later, cannot believe that it's been more than 20 years

since we saw black people and black communities across New Orleans and the South being failed by our government. But it's a heroin lesson. We're going to unpack how race and class intersect in ways and how we need to talk about this government doing more for our communities. Again, you're watching the other side of change only on Black Star Network. What's up? It's the MCEO Talib Quali. We are checking out Roland Martin unfiltered.

Folks, we're five days away from a government saying it's Democrats' fault, saying they want health care for, quote, illegal aliens. Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffrey, says that's an absolute lie. This is what he had to say today in his news conference. One of the reasons why our fight for the American people is so urgent right now is because over the next few weeks, tens of millions of Americans are going to get notices indicating their premiums, co-pays, and deductibles are increasing dramatically because of the Republican refusal to extend the tax credits

connected to the Affordable Care Act. Was the politics in the idea that was an estimation? We're fighting for the health care of the American people, period, full stop. Opposition has been very clear, eight words. Cancel the cuts, lower the cost, save health care. And part of that fight relates to the Affordable Care Act. Part of that fight relates to dealing with the Republicans cut to Medicaid, the largest cut to Medicaid

in American history. Part of that fight relates to preventing a $536 billion cut to Medicare that will occur at the end of this year because of what Republicans did in the one big ugly bill if Congress doesn't act.

Part of our fight relates to the fact that Republicans are closing hospitals, nursing homes, and community-based health clinics all across the country, including in rural America, right now. And part of of that fight also relates to the fact that Republicans have effectively shut down spending on medical research in the United States of America. People are going to die, cures for cancer

and other terminal illnesses that were within reach are now being abandoned. This is like an unprecedented Republican assault on the health care of the American people and Democrats are standing on the side of the American people. Joining us right now is Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland from Washington State. Glad to have her on the show. Good to see you. This is what, again,

what's amazing to me, how is it Democrats' fault if Republicans control the White House, the House, and the Senate? It's not the fault of the Democrats, Roland, and I remind people of three things. The Republicans control the White House, the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. House

of Representatives. So if there is government shutdown, it is all on them. As Leader Jeffries indicated in the clip that you just showed, this is about lowering costs, saving health care, and stopping the cuts. And 15 million people will lose access to health care. And it's not just happening in urban and suburban communities. Rural America, often the very people they represent will suffer from this. So the big ugly bill, the center of it has really been about health care. The Democrats are united and we are fighting against this? I saw something today

was on Politico where a Republican in the Senate said why should Democrats negotiate on this if Russell Vought is going to

just blow up the federal government in a deal anyway and kind of makes sense and so go through all of this just to have the

Trump folks say we're still going to do whatever hell we want. Well and I remind everyone too Roland they've already been

doing the hell they want. They've already been firing public servants and people who are doing everything they can to provide services. And so Mr. Vock can threaten all he wants, but I tell folks, they have already been making cuts. They are going to continue to make cuts. And it's really hard to trust them to stay true to their word. You know, I remember that when Joe Biden was president, Kevin McCarthy, the House Speaker at the time, Republican, actually went to the Oval Office and negotiated with President Biden. President Trump agreed to talked to Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, and then, true to form, he got scared,

he chickened out, and he backed out. So we had Ashley Etienne on yesterday, a long time, a former aide to Speaker Danza Pelosi. She also was a communication director for Vice President Kamala Harris. And she said, listen, if Democrats don't negotiate, she said, then the question is, do they have the stomach for a shutdown? So the question is this here, what do y'all do? Y'all in a precarious situation. What do you do?

Because you need 60 votes, obviously, in the United States Senate. And so what do you do when you have Trump who's blaming Democrats for everything? So I say a few things, Roland. You know, here's the question. Do you have the stomach for a shutdown or do you have the stomach to let 15 million people get kicked off of health care to have research canceled, to have people die?

That's the choice for me. making here. And so as we go through this process, and I will remind folks, too, you know, the conversation about government shutdown seems to happen pretty frequently because we can't seem to get a budget passed. I think the bigger question, as we step back from this particular episode, too, is, again, Democrats are fighting for the health care of the American people. The Democrats are on the side of the American people. And at the same time, big picture, why do we lurch from this drama to every drama, which feels like every few months,

because the government might shut down. It's irresponsible. But right now, the responsible thing to do is for Donald Trump to say, okay, I'm willing to have a conversation. He's not willing to do that. Mike Johnson is not willing to do that. And remember, too, they're just doing this

because they think that we will blink. And we are on the side of the American people. We are standing by this idea that people deserve health care. It's going to put the economy in a really bad way, but more importantly, it's going to hurt the American people. And in some cases, sadly, Roland, people are going to die because Republican majority in the House, the Senate, and the White House do not care about them. One of the things that we keep seeing and hearing

is that the general public, when you look at polling data, trust me, I get an earful from people all across the country. They say they have no confidence in Democratic leadership. I'm telling you right now, what they're seeing about Senator Schumer, about Democratic Leader Jeffries, about DNC Chair Ken Martin, again, when you look at the polling data of where Democrats stand, and that's juxtapose to how Democrats are overperforming in these special elections.

Right. And so what's going on here? I mean, I'm telling you right now, that Charlie Kirk resolution, where Leader Jeffries and three other Democrats, including three CBC members voted for, That pissed a lot of people off. And so what has to happen to break through for congressional Democrats to communicate better to the public for them to have faith in what y'all are doing on Capitol Hill?

So I would say a few things. Congressional Democrats are communicating on a regular basis. And look at how we get information, Roland. We get it in so many different fractured places that it's hard to see. say, oh, I didn't see you on this show or this particular podcast. You know, Vice President Harris was on a show a few days ago talking about her book. But one thing she said is that there are a lot of Democrats up and down the entire ticket, sending a message, sending a strong one. And you may not see them on every medium that you watch, but we are out there spreading the

word. And I remember this. You know, when we talked about the one big, beautiful bill that Donald Trump tried to sell to America as something good, the Democrats were united and we were consistent in our messages. So now it's called the big ugly bill. So all we have to do is continue to be forceful to send the message about Democrats care about the American people. Health care is a very big issue for people because yes, it's about health care, but it's about the economic well-being of the American people. So what are we going to do to break through to people? We have to stay consistent. We have to stay on message and we have to just keep telling the American people. Because right now, I will tell you, a lot of people get information from fragmented places. And let me give

you one example. I have a good friend at home, and she said to me, I don't see you on these high-profile talk shows. And I had to remind her that I did a lot of press hits in different places that maybe she didn't see me. So the idea that the Democrats are not out there is absolutely false. We are out there. We are working hard. And I will say, you know, the proof will be in the election in 2026. Questions for the pound. Drew, you first. Hi, Drew. Hi, Drew. Yes. Hi, how are you? Thanks for joining us. I think, you know, I've just wanted to say one of two things. You talked about communication. And I wanted to really focus on the messaging. I hope that the Democrats and Congress that we just stand really, really

strong and be clear, just like you said, about the fact that not only are we standing on the side of the American people, not only are we saying we're standing up for health care, not only are we doing those things but I think we also need to flip the script just a little bit and speak to the fact that those that are in power those that were elected never really liked the government

and so why would you elect someone to lead the government who do not care about how the government can work for people who do not care about the people that they serve yet they're trying to lead in a way that will demolish our democracy and our rights and our health care.

I think the key is to just be strong and to say that forcefully. How are you all communicating with each other and making sure that your talking points and the level of straight talk to the American people really making a difference between what the Republicans that are in the white that are in charge stand for versus what the Democrats stand for?

No, that's a really good question and a good point. And there are a couple things we have to do. Number one, we have to stay disciplined and on message, and we have to use plain, simple language that the American people understand. You all know that sometimes we are here in Washington, D.C., in this political bubble, the gateway bubble, and we use language to say things, and we think that the average American person who's just trying to live their life every day, go to work, raise their kids, take care of their elders, are paying attention. We need clear, succinct, straight language. But I think you're really. is another point that's really good. And I've been saying this for a while. We have to define

who the Republicans are because they always define who we are. But we cannot fall into the trap of people saying to, well, good, you're talking about them, but what do you plan to do? And that's why we're doing both. We're defining the GOP as the party that bends the need to Trump, that does not care about the American people. And there's a clear contrast. Democrats are fighting for your health care and your economic well-being. The Republicans want to tear it down. And I sometimes Sometimes, no, I serve on two committees that have a lot of bipartisan support, but there are times when I hear colleagues across the aisle talk about how they hate government. Everything's bad. They want to tear it down. And I want to ask the question you asked, if you hate government so much, then why did you run for office? Anytime we do anything, we should want to make it better. No disagreement there. But they want to burn down our institutions. They want to create a climate of mistrust. And that's everything. Government, the media. all of our institutions. They want to tear them down so that people don't trust them. And when people have mistrust, they're easily led to do the wrong thing. And anything, for example,

like an election can be questioned. So you're absolutely 100% correct. We have to define them clearly and succinctly. And again, contrast that with the fact that the Democrats are fighting for the American people. We are fighting for your health care. And we're fighting for democracy and your economic well-being. Michael. All right, Representative Strickland, thanks for coming on today. So when we look at the potential for a government shutdown, and I am for shutting this stuff down, how do Democrats negotiate opening the government back up?

The reason why I say that is Supreme Court just ruled today that Trump can freeze another $4 billion in foreign aid, but it was already appropriated by Congress. So if Democrats can negotiate something with Republicans, reducing health care cuts, saving Medicaid, things of this nature, and we know that we need 60 votes in the Senate, which means Republicans need some Democratic votes, what type of guarantees do we have that Trump won't renege on that, and then we're back in another predicament? I mean, that's the inherent problem, isn't it? We can't trust Donald Trump to do the right thing. He doesn't obey the rule of law.

He doesn't care about the checks and balances. And so, again, we come back to what we stand for as Democrats. We want to stop the cuts. We want to lower costs. We want to save health care. Those three principles are not going to change. I also want to point out, too, that whenever there's a discussion about shutting government down, unfortunately, it turns into this.

It's their fault. It's their fault. But at this stage in the game, the Republicans have only themselves to blame. They control the White House, the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. House of Representatives. They refuse to come to the table to have a conversation. Donald Trump said yes, then he said no. So as far as we're concerned, they get to take full credit for any shutdown because they, in fact, are the ones who will cause it. Matt?

All right. Thank you. Matt, you keep hitting your mute button, bro. It's not that hard, even for a longhorn supporter. Dang. Of course, I couldn't know. There was going to be a low blow there. It's a second time you've done it in 30 minutes.

In any event, Congresswoman, I'm focused on the task in hand. Well, I'm glad you hit that button so we can hear your question. You got it. My question is this. What are you hearing in your office from your constituents? What are your compatriots hearing from their constituents? about the willingness to let this be shut down as compared to the concern about the premiums.

And the reason I ask is, I think Roland said at the top of the segment out there that a lot of people believe Democrats are just feckless. You're weak, right? So to me, it's clearly attributed to the Republicans, but I would suspect there's a concern about it being attributed to y'all because that's what they're going to do is spin it and say it's your fault. So what are constituents telling you,

and what are you hearing from your fellow reps from their constituents about their concern about that? So I was just in the district for a week, and I visited churches. I visited with senior centers and different groups of people. And I would say, not surprisingly, people are worried about health care. They're worried about Social Security. And they're worried about democracy in general. But here's the other thing that I'm hearing from Democrats.

They want us to stand up and fight. And I've even heard from a handful of employees who are saying, look, I'm lucky I have this job. I got some savings. If we need to shut it down, go. The American people want to see us fight for them, Democrats anyway. And so I think that we have to fight. We have to show that we have the courage to do this. And we are on the right side of everything.

We are willing to fight for the American people and their health care. And what I'm hearing at home is absolute worries about financial stability and health care, but also the Democratic base wanting to see a fight. Yeah, they do want to see that. And I can just tell you that, you know, what would bother some people is that when you look at the folks like Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and others constantly being attacked. In fact, the twice-impeached convicted felon in chief said this from the Oval Office, continuing his constant attacks on women of color and also calling them low IQ. Roll what idiot said y'all from the Oval Office. All right, it's the clip from the Oval Office where he was the question was asked about

Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett and Congresswoman Ilhan Omar. Jasmine Crockett recently. Jasmine Crockett. Remember what I say? Is she a relation to the late Greek? David Crockett. I don't think so. Justin Crockett, let me tell you, before you even ask. She's a very low IQ person.

I mean, if we ever had to pass an aptitude test, that's the one should take one because she shouldn't even be in the crowd. So I have no idea what you're going to, but I don't think we should waste our time. This is a low IQ person who I can't even believe is a congressperson between her and Ilman, Omar, and the group. You know, I met the head of Somalia. Did you know that? And I suggested that maybe he'd like to take her back.

And he said, I don't want her. Okay, what else? Go ahead. Let's hear what, let's hear what Crofton said. She compared ice raves to slave patrol. I want to ask you. To slave? To slave patrol.

I want to ask you if you think that there should be consequences for members of Congress who make these types of comparisons or use something like that. Yeah. Well, I think she's gone over the line. Again, that's what it constantly does. He did the same thing last time. last time, and he's actually intimidated by black women and women of color. That is absolutely true, and Donald Trump's stupid ass has a lot of nerve calling somebody

low IQ or incapable of being there. People are elected to Congress because the people they represent Watton there. You're talking about educated women who are smart and unapologetic, and Donald Trump is intimidated by people who are smarter than him, which makes up a large proportion of people in the country, but also, too, is intimidated by strong women. all right then comments going to Mr. Jickland we appreciate it look forward to having you back thank you so much for having me

Roland nice to see you again likewise thanks a lot folks got to go to break we come back lots to talk about including the passing of what'sada Shakur some other stuff we want to deal with early this week Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson man he went off talking about the things they were doing

and setting some folks straight in Chicago and so I'm going to play that for you as well lots to break down but first folks you want to support the work that we do here at Rollin Martin Unfiltered, the Black Star Network. Please support us. There's a lot of stuff we got going on. We're completely redoing our Black Star Network website.

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Said the quiet part out loud. Black votes are a threat, so they erased them. After the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, Republican legislatures moved fast. New voter ID laws, polling place shutdowns, purges of black voters from the rolls. Trump's Justice Department didn't stop it. They joined in. In 2018, his DOJ backed Ohio's voter purge system, a scheme that disproportionately erased black voters, their goal, erase black votes, and political power. Yeah, that happened. These are the kinds of stories that we cover every day

on Roland Martin unfiltered. Subscribe on YouTube and download the Black Star Network app. Support fact-based independent journalism that centers African Americans and the issues that matter to our community. This week on the other side of change. Hurricane Katrina, 20 years later, cannot believe that it's been more than 20 years

since we saw black people and black communities across New Orleans and the South being failed by our government. But it's a harrowing lesson. We're going to unpack how race and class intersect ways and how we need to talk about this government doing more for our communities. Again, you're watching the other side of change only on the Black Star Network. Next on the Black Table with me, Greg Carr. An hour of living history with Dr. Richard Mariba Kelsey, thinker, builder, author, and one of the most important and impactful elders in the African-American community. He reflects on

his full and rich life and shares his incomparable wisdom about our past, present, and future. genius is saying that my uncle was a genius, my brother was a genius, my neighbor was a genius. I think we ought to drill that in ourselves and move ahead rather than believing that I got it. That's next on the Black Table, here on the Black Star Network. Hi, I'm Swain Cash, Basketball Hall of Famer, and you're watching Roland Martin unfiltered. So what's to deal with all these crazy deranged right wingers and their constant attacks on black women and their looks? You've got crazy deranged Laura Lumer, who is one of a Donald Trump close aid. Laura Lumer, y'all, is, let me show, now listen, I need to prepare everybody for watching.

I know today is September 26th. I know Halloween is a month away, it's a month away, but I just need you to prepare yourselves. This is a living witch, 32-year-old Laura Lumer. That's Laura Lumer. She's 32. That's a phrase we have in Texas called Road Hard, Hung Up Wet. That's Laura Lumer. Now, this is cons woman Jasmine Crockett.

She's 44. That's 44. That's 32. That's 32. That's 44. Laura Luma should not be calling anybody. I mean, anybody ugly. I mean, just, I'm just saying.

Well, Congressional Black Caucus is happening this week. CBS, CFA, A, LZ, and at one of these forms, Congresswoman Crockett, she had a few words to say. I know that some may think that I am, you know, Younger than I am. Just so y'all know, I am 12 years older than Laura Lover. Oh. Say that. I say it.

Trashing her, calling her ghetto, all this sort of stuff like that. Come on, pull it up. It hurts my heart that we have ghetto black bitches who hate America serving in Congress. But this is who Lumer is. I mean, she's always putting this stuff out there. She's always trashing people. but it's also that skinny, no hip, no but white woman, Megan Kelly, who did the exact same thing.

And so Megan Kelly out there, trashing, dog, and folks. And so she was critical of Jamil Hill. And all the sort of stuff like that. And Jamil, of course, responded. And so, again, this is what you have going on. So Megan Kelly. Would be your friend. Let me see this here.

I think this was somebody posted. it this, okay, I think, all right, so just watch this. Again, this is the stupid stuff you see going on. Go ahead. A coat of mascara would be your friend. I'm just going to tell us to you, woman to woman on television. You need a little work, and you should have them back off the camera a little bit because you are not attractive enough to have that extreme close-up. Push away your laptop, Jamel, and add a filter or two. Honestly, like, we actually don't use any on this show because I do put on makeup, so I look presentable, but you need work. Because you can't both be ugly on the outside and the inside.

You need to choose one, okay? Worry about them what the Melle Hill saying? You got more oppressing things to worry about than what's coming out of my mouth, according to Don Lennon. So if I were you, I deal with that and worry less about what I'm wearing, worry less about what foundation number I'm using.

If I'm using Mac products of Finty Beauty, I wouldn't worry about that. I don't worry about my house because we're good over here. And finally, let me leave you with this in case it was any. If you out of audio, I need y'all to come on to be on this, please. Okay, so this was, so she was responding to something Don Lemon said. So again, so let me roll it back so y'all can hear the full context. Please, audio all the way up so people can hear.

across the room, it's weird. Hold on one second. Here we go. On the outside and the inside. You need to choose one, okay? Across the room, it's weird. Megan, you got, you got, you. So what happened when that was Don Lemon said that there was some event and Megyn Kelly's

husband kept looking at Don Lemon's husband across the room. That's what he said there. Okay, let me play the rest. Got more press. All right. So Jamel just went off on her. Drew, but here's what's great. Okay, again, Megan Kelly stop it.

Okay, boo, you, look, the people who like you, baby, you waste up. So just stop. Just stop. You ain't attractive. You ain't got all of. But this is what they do. So Trump wants to diminish the intellect of black women. And then you have these white women, Megan Kelly, Laura Luma, others, who

want to now detract and criticize the looks of black women. It's all about denigrating black women. The same way the Republicans wanted to, oh, Michelle Obama, she looks like an ape, all that sort of stuff. That's them. That's what they do. So they don't want to have a substantive conversation, and it's childish and it's petty,

and this is why Megan Kelly is a disgraceful little mean girl. And see, this is why she thinks Santa was white. This is why she didn't understand blackface. Because, again, these are the people. That's what they do. They don't want to have a substantive conversation. And I'm sorry, okay, Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett is a lawyer. Megan, I guess she's a lawyer.

They claim she's a lawyer. And I guess she failed at being a lawyer that she went into television. I don't know what the hell was happening there. Laurel Loom, I have no idea what that Looney Tunes is all about. But this is what they do. They want to denigrate the intellect and the looks of black women and women of color. So I took my glasses off because I am about 20 years older than Laura Loomer, and I still look better than she does. So I had to have her back, but I need to be able to see it.

Let me put my glasses back off. But let's be clear, I find it very rich when the Republicans, MAGA, or whatever we want to call them on the other side. Talk about civility. Talk about how we need to tone the temperature time. Talk about how the folks on the left are eager to go after. But it seems to me that this comes from the very top. This come from, as you said, the convicted felon that's occupying the White House. It comes from the very top because what I know for sure, they are not only intimidated, but they are also afraid of

the greatness that not only black women bring to the table, but if and when we lead, we speak clearly, we come with all intelligence, we are ready to work and to serve. So here is the key. When you hear what the Laura Luma and the Megan Kellys have to say, what you hear is the jealousy, what you hear is the incompetence on their own part. A lot of times what they're trying to do is try to denigrate who black women and black people are because they have nothing else to stand on. I am so proud of what Jasmine Crockett and what most for Michelle Obama, George Reed, all of us, Katanji Brown, what they are doing and what they represent, including Kamala Harris. The key here is this. I think a lot of this conversation is busy talk.

I forgot which one of my co-panelists talked about this. This is all about a distraction. It's trying to keep us from understanding what's happening with the Epstein file. It's trying to keep us from understanding what's happening as they take away our health care. It's trying to keep us from understanding and knowing

what's taking place that's going to harm us in the future. It is taken away that they are really there for the rich and not caring about the rural America because what they really want, what the MAGAs want, what the sycophants want, is they want to believe that anything that we receive

is because something was handed to us. But truth of the matter is we work harder, we're smarter, and we get things done. That is the problem here. We need to make sure that we say on message and understand that we expose what's happening

and continue to talk about what's real. Black people talking about our economic status, talking about our economic wealth, talking about what's right, talking about our voting rights, talking about our health care, talking about our housing.

I don't have time. And I know that Jamil Hill and Jasmine and everyone feels like they need to respond. But honestly, we need to shake the dust from our feet and keep on stepping. But here's the reality, Matt, and I was talking to a couple of Republicans about this here.

The Republicans actually are scared of Jasmine Crockett. Literally. Literally. The reason they cannot, I mean, the quote was, My side hates Jasmine Crockett because she's effective. And see, this is, see, you have to return fire with fire.

You have to, so it's like Trump, you want to give nicknames, you want to see that he and do this here? Guess what? You got to hit him back with the exact same thing. And so I'm like straight, Jamail had all the smoke for Megan Kelly, and I'm like, I was down with it 100%. This is what you have to do to say, hey, y'all, y'all want to swing? less wing

well you're right I just want to say I noticed that I think the control room was playing a video and the audio wasn't up so it sounds like they're muting issues all around tonight no no no no you know you you're a king you're a king of muting issues so you don't want to keep bringing that up

I just heard you asking for audio which means it was muted no no no actually no actually no that's not what actually what happened no first one let's be factual here we're playing the video do what you need to no no no the video was playing and then with the video, there were two videos on there

on that Twitter feed, and one stopped and one started. So in one stop, audio pulled it down. All right. So, but your ass. Okay. The key to mute, but you might move on

before you get cut. You're ready, you're ready? All right. I've been ready. You're the one brought your problems back up. Look, I ain't bring up no problems, brother. I just mentioned God don't like that. Sweep around your own front door

before you try to sweat around. God don't like ugly or long horns as Ohio State. Oh, Lord. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. I think you're right. And I think the thing about Jasmine Crockett is she's better at their game than they are. You're exactly right.

She's effective. She's sophisticated. She's brilliant, but she's very good at the sound bites. And I'll tell you, you know, I think we live sometimes or all the time now in a very unserious world. I think we should be, you know, repulsed by the fact that a lot of our politicians are always seeking sound bites. However, I think strategically, right now, it's necessary to have somebody who's an effective communicator for the pushback.

And Jasmine Crockett is the exemplar of that. So, yes, you're exactly right. They are afraid. But I actually want to address a different element of this that I haven't heard addressed yet. You know what really especially bothers me about the Laura Lumer comments is the fact that white people love to cosplay with anything black or what they think is urban or hip hop all the time until they need to reclaim whiteness because they think that, gives them some superiority. That isn't every white person, of course, but we see that all the time. You look at, you know, Russell Simmons' comments from years ago about 70% of hip hop being bought by white people, anecdotally, that is true. You know, young white people all the time will tell

you about how they listen to this record, how NWA was so important to them back in the 90s or whatever. But then when it becomes advantageous to distance themselves from blackness, they start to denigrate it. And that's exactly what you see Laura Lumer doing. I don't know her background, but that's, I guarantee you, she's listening to hip hop records and talked about how she likes some rapper, but then when it becomes advantageous to tear down a black person, it's now calling them ghetto

and black and all these things that you would otherwise be embracing. And I think that's an insidious thing and I think it is proof that often white people are going to cosplay when it's advantageous and then, you know, reclaim their whiteness when they need to be back on a pedestal. And that's what I saw when I first heard those

tweets that just really infuriated me. Yeah, and you also really shouldn't called people ugly when you literally went from this to this. Like I warned people, Michael, I gave them a trigger warning. Yeah. Wow. Wow.

Well, maybe, you know, maybe she's dressed enough for Halloween early. I don't know. But only in this crazy administration with Laura Luma. Somebody posing this here. My little granddaughter just won't take off her law luma costume. Isn't she precious?

Okay, that was funny. I got admit that was funny. Michael, go ahead. Yeah, it's yeah, you know, people should look in the mail first before they call somebody ugly. But, you know, to Matt's

point, yes, you have Republicans, many of them who fear Jasmine Crocky, Jasmine Crockett is brilliant. She looks younger than she is. We know white women don't age very well. I'm going to go ahead and say it. We know a lot of times they don't.

That's just the truth. That's just the truth. But also, this is the same antipathy that Charlie Kirk had for black women as well. Okay? And, you know, the reason why so many of them, from the Trump administration were there for Charlie Kirk's funeral because they think the same way he does. They hate black people, just like Charlie Kirk hated black people.

All you have to do is go look at the anti-black comments Charlie Kirk made, insulting the intelligence of black women like Michelle Obama and Joanne Reed, the late representative Sheila Jackson Lee, et cetera, saying they don't have the brain processing power, et cetera. and also these same people this is why they hate Kamala Harris because they know she's Kamala Harris is more intelligent than any of them and is better at politics et cetera so this is what we're dealing with

this is why elections have consequences okay the reason why we're dealing with all this shit that we're dealing with right now is more people voting for Donald Trump on the ballot than Kamala Harris on the same ballot more people showed up to vote for him and now he's going after everybody, even the people who voted for him.

In Arkansas, the farmers are calling for a bailout. Arkansas voted. Donald Trump won Arkansas about 30 points in 2024. And the farmers are crying that they're about to lose their farms and things like this because of the tariffs, et cetera. They thought he was their savior.

But, you know, this is the MAGA death coat that you're dealing with. Okay, I'm just going to show one more before I go, and I'm just going to leave it. I'm just going to leave it there. oh my god oh my god oh my god that's that's that's oh what happened

poor thing I have I'm just going go to break in that one I'll be back They said the quiet part out loud, black votes are a threat, so they erased them. After the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act in 2013, Republican legislatures moved fast. New voter ID laws, polling place shutdowns, purges of black voters from the rolls.

Trump's Justice Department didn't stop. it, they joined in. In 2018, his DOJ backed Ohio's voter purge system, a scheme that disproportionately erased black voters, their goal, erase black votes, and political power. Yeah, that happened. These are the kinds of stories that we cover every day on Martin unfiltered. Subscribe on YouTube and download the Black Star Network app. Support fact-based independent journalism that centers African Americans and the issues that matter to our community. In my book, The Power to Persist, I share eight simple yet powerful habits, a blueprint for transforming obstacles into opportunities and pressure into purpose,

just as they fueled my rise from the south side of Chicago to a national stage. And on the Power to Persist podcast, I bring that blueprint to life. Hey, I'm Malcolm Lee, and you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, he's really getting pissed off and tired of these people who keep trying him when it comes to crime in Chicago and how they have been successful at lowering crime. And when I say he went off last week on some folks, he went off. And you know what? He should have.

Okay, let me just start with this. How about this? In 1974, there were 970 murders. Okay, 1995. There were 828 murders. 2016, 778 murders. 2021, 805 murders. This has been a problem in this city for a very long time. Now, my deputy mayor, Gatewood, this is the topic and the work every single day to drive violence down in the city of Chicago. So when you talk about what we're offering, we're offering a better pathway so that we don't

have 970 people murdered in our city every single year. Now, one is one too many, but you're not going to convince me that the people of Chicago only deserve law enforcement. I get so sick and tired of people believing that the only thing that black and brown and poor people get to get in this city are badges. People want jobs. It's why we've increased the ability

for young people to have jobs in this city. People want health care and behavioral mental health care. That's what they asked me. That's why we've expanded it. People want to be able to afford to live in this city. That's why I'm building more affordable units. People want justice if they do get wrapped up into this spiral of despair in this city.

It's why we're actually solving cases, whether it's CVI workers, making sure that we're avoiding retaliation in this city. I get so sick and tired of people in this country and in this city that believes that the only thing that you can offer black people and poor people is jails, incarceration, and police officers. Dr. King said this right here in Chicago,

the National Conference on New Politics. What did he say? He said militarism is a sickness. I am trying to eradicate the sickness from this city and from this country. To offer it. No, listen, Mark, I get to answer my question now. You've asked it. No, Mark, I've answered my questions. Of course they are. But they're not going to be able to avoid that if we don't do the things that actually work. We are not split on this issue. The fact of the matter is, no one has asked me to send federal troops into this city to make it safe. It has never come up. It never came up during the campaign. It's never

come up in the first two years. The fact of the matter is we are driving violence down on this city and we're using every single resource that's available to us. Jails and incarceration and law enforcement is a sickness that has not led to safe communities. I'm going to work hard every single day to protect the people who are caught up in violence in the city. Guess why? You want to know why? Because the vast majority of them look like me. This president has never asked a very simple question to me, Brandon Scott, Barbara Lee, Randall Woodfin. He doesn't talk to black mayors about what it's like to live in communities that have been disinvested in.

So no, we're not going to succumb to the sickness and the evil that Dr. King warned us about a generation ago. It didn't work in 1974 when 970 people were being killed. it didn't work in the 90s when no one said a mumbling word about how many people were losing their lives because of violence in their city and now we're actually doing the work that's working

now all of a sudden everybody has these ideas they shown this is a group project but we're not going to allow the president of the United States of America or any of his ilk look at the work that we're doing across this country and then now we're experiencing some level of reprieve and now he wants to put his name on our paper

no not going to tolerate it it's a sickness and we're going to eradicate it's a sickness and we're going to eradicate it. This is the response that we should be seeing. And I'm with Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson. When you have done the work, when you have put in the long work, he was being ripped his first two years

for the crime and other problems. And so all of a sudden is going down. He mentioned Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott. He mentioned these other black mayors. And they have been taking the heat from people in the city, outside. And that's exactly the response that he should be given. And so the reality, Michael, when these reporters ask these questions, I got no problem with him going off on them because

what they're doing is working and to act like it's not, it's also a shame. Because if you're going to criticize somebody when things are bad, will you damn well better give them the credit when things are getting better? Absolutely. Give them the credit when things are getting better and advocate for them to have more resources to continue to improve people's lives, bring down crime, okay? And I applaud him from what he just said. Also, I encourage people to look at his press conference from September 2nd, 2025, because he talked about how also the Trump administration, the president's budget bill, the big ass ugly bill, cut 468

million dollars from alcohol, tobacco, and firearms, ATF, and we know the ATF was working along with local law enforcement there in Chicago to track down illegal guns. And one of the things, President, one of the things Mayor Brandon Johnson talked about is how the Chicago Police Department has taken 24,000 guns off of the street since he took office, and he said 60% of those guns recovered came from outside of Illinois. many of them from red states, Mississippi, Indiana, other states like that. So one of the things that happens, and I know you talked about it here on this show rolling, you have lax laws and lax gun laws in red states,

and illegal guns flow into Illinois, flow into Chicago, and then Chicago gets to blame for it. So he's done a magnificent job. Yes, there's still work to do, but the Trump, But how the Trump administration and many white people see us, and some of them are on MSNBC, they only see us as needed to be policed as opposed to invested in and protect it. So he needs to keep it up and he needs more help. Drew? You know, I think one of the things I was thinking about, he, Brandon, Mayor Brendan, said it's so wonderfully.

I've always wanted to figure out how do you say this? But he said that black and brown people or this administration or others feel like black and brown people only deserve badges. And when you look at, I think you said the big, ugly bill or whatever we're calling it, I don't even know why we're trying to rename it.

This particular bill has cut community block grants. What are community block grants? What do they use, a community development block grants? They are used to, create affordable housing. They're used to be able to build community infrastructure. They're used for public services like job training and youth drive training. They're used for neighborhood revitalization. All the things that Mayor Brandon is talking about and all of the mayors around

this country, that is what is needed, providing the services to help lift the communities out of poverty. I remember way back growing up in Birmingham, Alabama, what we used to have the youth job training program every year, there was something for the youth to do in the summer to get a skill, to earn money, and to stay off the street. At the end of the day, these mayors are working with the resources that they have, and instead of this convicted felon that's in the White House, coming and said, hey, let's do more to make the communities safe by providing opportunities they feel like sending badges and military in order to be able to impact and really continue to demolish the communities that we have. So I applaud him for being able to stand

up and speak truth of power. All of these cities, what they need are resources in order to support those who are in need. Listen, it makes all the sense to me, Matt, and I just think that this is how you just have to react. I think, listen. you cannot kowtow, you cannot bow down, you cannot bend. And when you are doing the work, hey, man, talk your shit. Women lie, numbers don't lie. And I think data is the way to approach it. Because I think when you come out and you delineate exactly what those numbers were,

that dispels any miss. And we've talked about this on this show many, many times. But here's the thing. Part of this Republican playbook right now is a disregard for the truth because the truth doesn't matter if all you're trying to advance is your narrative. So the only way to push back against that is to say, here's what's actually happening, here's why what they're feeding you is garbage, and here's why what we're doing is working. And I'm glad that he took this stance.

But another thing I'm very glad about is I'm glad that he is passionate, because I think it's important a lot of times black people in elevated spaces can be concerned about looking too passionate because of all the unwritten rules and microaggressions and BS that we have to deal with. And I like that he was unbridled. And he said, no, you ask me a question. I'm going to answer it. I think that's important because I think what we're seeing is patent dishonesty. And I think we're seeing, you know, an administration, the Trump administration, and Republicans around the country who are echoing the same kind of sentiments who are just saying things that are patently false and easily disproven. And I'm glad that he stood on business, so to speak,

as it relates to the numbers and how the trend is going down. And I think it's really important because we saw that same thing in D.C., right? I mean, you just point and say crimes running rampant here, but the data shows that that's not actually the case. And I think there needs to be a continued onslaught of you are lying, and here's how I can show that you're lying. Yeah, and you've got to actually say, you're lying. Stop lying.

To me, I don't think you can dance around this thing. You can just sort of, you know, use others certain, no, no, no, no. you got to call this thing what it is and that to me is just how I see it and I just think too many people are not trying to do that all right y'all got to go to break we come back Ellie Mistill we talk about how Donald Trump and MAGA they want to pretty much gut the Fair Housing Act

that third piece of civil rights legislation from the 1960s I had that conversation next right here rolling mark unfiltered on the Black Star Network On the next Get Wealthy with me, Deborah Owens, America's wealth coach, we talk about the principles of mindset, strategy, and execution. This week, we're adding a fourth. Faith. You're going to hear from a mother and daughter duel

who are helping thousands of black women build wealth all through their faith. You are more than you can ever imagine, not just obtaining things, to show that, but sing yourself. Making your faith work for you that's right here on Get Wealthy, only on Black Star Network. Next on the Black Table with me, Greg Carr. An hour of living history with Dr. Richard Mariba Kelsey,

thinker, builder, author, and one of the most important and impactful elders in the African-American community. He reflects on his full and rich life, and shares his incomparable wisdom about our past, present, and future. African genius is saying that my uncle was a genius, my brother was a genius, my neighbor was a genius. I think we ought to drill that in ourselves

and move ahead rather than believing that I got it. That's next on the Black Table, here on the Black Star Network. Lil Thompson with Winwithblackmen.org. You're watching Roland Martin unfiltered. Thank you. April 4th, 1968, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. The next day, President Lyndon Baines Johnson sent a letter to the House saying it is time that they passed the bill Dr. King gave his life for. Many of people don't understand is that the Fair Housing Act or the Civil Rights Act of 1968

is often the least talked about of the three civil rights bills that were signed in the 1960s. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. Now, after those first two bills were passed, what happened was Republicans and Democrats in the North. Oh, they joined forces. Republicans, they joined force with those Southern Democrats. in the South because they didn't want black people living in their neighborhoods. They said, okay, fine, you know, public accommodation were good, voting were good, we ain't trying to have y'all live in our neighborhoods.

So you know what happened? That was a filibuster in the United States Senate. It was black Republican Edward Brooke from Massachusetts, who actually led the effort to stop the filibuster in the United States Senate. But it was still being upheld in the House. after Dr. King was killed, LBJ said it's time to pass this bill nine days later, it was signed in to law.

This is what LBJ said in 1968. Even while President Johnson talked to Chancellor Klaus about America's responsibility in a time of crisis and challenge, word came from Capitol Hill that Congress had passed and sent to the White House the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Included in the measure was a landmark open housing bill,

which, when fully effective, would forbid discrimination in approximately 80% of all housing offered for rent or for sale in the United States. I do not exaggerate when I say that the proudest moments of my presidency have been time. times such as this, when I have signed into law the promises of a century, I shall never forget that it is more than a hundred years ago when Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. But it was a proclamation. It was not a fact. And in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, we

We affirm through law that men equal under God are also equal when they seek a job, when they go to get a meal in a restaurant, or when they seek lodging for the night in any state in the union. And now the Negro families no longer suffer the humiliation of being turned away because of their race. In the Civil Rights Act of 1965, we affirm through law for every citizen in this land the most basic right of democracy, the right of a citizen to vote an election in his country. In the five states where the act had its greater impact, Negro voter registration has already more than doubled. now with this bill the voice of justice speaks again it proclaims that fair housing for all

all human beings who live in this country is now a part of the American way of life we all know that the roots of injustice run deep but violence cannot redress a solitary wrong or remedy a single unfairness and we just must put our shoulders together

and put a stop to both the time is here action must be now Well, Donald Trump and MAGA, they want to gut that very act. I talked with Ellie Mistel, Justice Correspondent with the nation this week at Congressional Back Caucus Foundation, ALC, about this very issue. Here is our conversation. I've been talking the last eight months about how MAGA wants to defund black America. They're going after every single infrastructure in Black America. They're saying the downful America began with the Civil Rights Act.

Charlie Kurt often talk about, oh, how it was a massive mistake. So, both need to understand what's at play here, they want to get rid of civil rights protections. It's a three-legged stool, right? It's a three-legged stool to build social, racial, and economic equality in this country. And the three pillars are the 64 Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act of 65, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. And Fair Housing Act, it's less harold it, less people know about it, less people, fewer people talk about it.

It's not even called a Super Rights Act of 1968. You just call it Fair Housing Act. It is one of the three most important pieces of legislation's ever passed. Why? Because keeping black people from living where we want to live is the foundation of every system of racial oppression ever invented. Go think about the word apartheid. What does that actually mean?

It means setting apart. The first law of apartheid is that you can't live around white people, right? The first law of American white oppression is that you can't live around white people, right? That you have to keep the races separated. So one of the reasons why the Harrowizing Act is so important is because there was no such thing as desegregation. There was no such thing as equality, racial or social if you don't have fair, equal access to housing rights. And that is the thing that Trump has been quietly, it turns out, taking away. Now, I was surprised about this, because I don't know how many of your listeners know.

I know, no, you know. Trump and this slumlord daddy got sued for violating the Fair Housing Act in 1970s. In 1973, they got sued. They had settled, the DOJ, they admitted no guilt. You know how Trump does these things. But this is what they got sued for. So I thought that, you know, now that he has all this power on, these white supremacists are bending through as well, that would be the first kind of frontal attack on this law that got him sued.

He hasn't done it frontally. He hasn't done it loudly. He hasn't done it the usual Trump way he's being doing it. quietly under the scenes, behind the scenes, but there was an explosive report from the New York Times that shows that the staff of the HUD of Housing and Urban Development that have been reduced by 65%.

The lawyers whose job it is to investigate housing discrimination and sue slumlords like Donald Trump's father, they have been reduced from 22 lawyers to six. Well, and here's the issue with dealing with, Ellie. You've got a Black HUD secretary. You know how Democrats always like to make the Department of Defense like the place to rehire a Republican. Republicans always like to make HUD the place where they hire one black folks.

They had Ben Carson running the HUD department. Ben Carson, who was a doctor, right, was running HUD. Are you kidding me? Because it's the black job for them. But this Black HUD secretary, he's no better than any of the white supremacists in the administration. He is willing to undermine and destroy the Fair Housing Act. The HUD usually issues 35 challenges over housing discrimination a year. so far in the Trump administration has been four.

So I had ProPublica, they had a report, and I had them on the show, but that was a case out of Texas, where they had the evidence that there's white folks, this HOA, discriminated as black people. What does Trump do? They drop the case. Absolutely. And that's they've been doing it. The head of the deputy undersecretary, the person that the Department of Justice was supposed to make these suits. He wrote two memos, and one of the memos, he said that he wasn't going to pursue

tenuous theories of racial discrimination anymore. One of those tenuous theories that he highlighted was racial discrimination in housing appraisal. No, Roland, you own your home, I own my home. If you were talking to a black person who owned their home, who was about to sell it, what's the first thing you would say? Do not let a white appraiser appraiser

appell your home. It's the first thing you would tell them. And if it's going to be a white appraiser, you'd be like, if it's going to be white, that have a white family, take down all your blackie-black art, make sure a white family is standing in for you because we know that white people will undervalue our homes. And again, that's just not like word and mouth talking.

The Brookings Institute did a study on this. They found that black-owned homes in black's neighborhoods were undervalued by 20%. And this costs, and this goes to your point, about the economic attack on our community from this administration. Racist home appraisals alone cost our community $162 billion. And that's from the Brookings Institute. I'm not good with the math. But as I mean to just a Brooklyn Institute, that was a major piece under Biden-Harris. And I remember when I was on Patrick Bitt Davis podcast, and I raised that issue, and then he was like, well, you know, like, what are you talking about?

I said, what are you talking about? I said, they studied 47 million transactions and looked at the census track. They compared it, and they showed similar census track, similar deals, black homeowners being discriminated against. And so the Biden folks mandated training things along those lines. And so Trump comes in and like, okay, screw all that. They also mandated. They also mandated protections for LGBTQ plus people from housing discrimination. Because, again, if there's any community that's been discriminated in housing as much or nearly as much as black people, it's been gay people, historically speaking.

And so Biden Harris added protections for the LGBTQ community, which, again, Trump's, this guy at HUD, they've taken those away as well. And again, what I keep trying to lay out to our people, this has an economic impact on us. And so this is not just some thing. And what we know is... The first house I tried to buy in my neighborhood. Listen, I actually, look, when I tried to buy a house before, what was interesting is they asked me and my wife for, they wanted to see deposit slips. And I was like, ain't nothing legal about that. And it was like, oh, so forget what you say your income is, which was easily proven.

They couldn't imagine that our income was more than $300,000, and when it's the actual deposit slips, I tell me, y'all can go to hell. My mistake was that I showed up at the home inspection, and I showed my blackety black ass up at the home inspection, and suddenly the white homeowners, they took their house off the market because they knew that they couldn't sell anything. They knew that I was a lawyer by that point, that I would sue them. So they just straight up took their house off the market. And they were still just like, you know, oh, you should sue Elionis. It's like, man, you can't, you couldn't pay me to give those white people my money. Right. Like, I will find another house.

And I did. We've been there for 20 years. But like, this is, the point is that this is real. This is not something, it's a figment of people's imaginations. This is discrimination that happens to our people every day, every homeowner, every renter. And the wealth that is extracted from our community by white folks through their racism is, shown most obviously in the housing situation, which is why they want to destroy the law. And look, this also is one of the things that when we're talking about, if you were

a Democratic politician or whatever, why you have to campaign on this stuff. You've got to make it plain. It can't just be sort of, you just mentioned it in passing. It has to be made economically. It's made economically. That's how you have to make this argument, people to understand what's going on. Absolutely. You have to show them in dollars and cents. You have to show them. them, hey, have you ever faced racism, but they told you it was Equifax doing the racism? Not your landlord. Actually, it's your landowner, and here's how my policies are going to help. It has to be that one-to-one clear. As we always say, okay, so folks out there, what can people do? Pay the damn attention, one, right? Just, like, be aware of what's

happening, one. Two, a lot of housing discrimination happens at the local level. So when you are talking about housing discrimination, you were talking about state. local elections. You're talking about your local DA. You're talking about your local zoning board. You're talking about people that you vote for in off-year elections when Congress and the president aren't running. So show up to those elections because those are the people that are actually going to impact your, you know, I live in New York City. We have a rent board. They're elected. We can change them anytime we want if we just show up in these off-year's elections. So that's what I would say. And the last point, we have midterm elections next year. We, whether we

live... Midterm elections, midterm election, but this November, this year 2025, some of these local officials are up for election, and you can change literally how it works in your community if you show up in overwhelming numbers. Well, in the case that you've got New Jersey gubernatorial election, you've got Virginia gubernatorial election, you've got House up as well. And so this has to be where we're making this a point at candidates' forms, challenging them on these issues, what are you going to do about the state legislature as the governor to make sure it doesn't happen?

We don't have to completely rely on the federal government for these things. Which is lucky because the federal government ain't going to help us no way. Right. Especially, not this one. Not this one. So this is a great opportunity to kind of stretch those. What are the Republicans like to say states rights? It's time where you've got to stretch some states rights and take the power

back that way. But also, again, like, just having people focused and paying attention to it. I work for progressive publication. in progressive networks, you know, the fair housing story, it's one of the ones that hasn't been talked about. I know you've been talking about a lot on your show, but like, this

is a thing that is, again, directly taking money away from us, and people don't know about it. Billions, billions. All right, Ellie, appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. Thanks a bye. Pat, the reason that conversation is critically important, because I keep saying it, what

Trump and MAGA wants to do, they want to target everything in black. And a lot folks are not paying attention to what's going on. And that whole issue with housing appraisals, where we are being impacted, losing billions upon billions of dollars, the right,

they don't give a shit about that. Correct. See, also, the private equity that's in housing these days, right? I mean, we've talked about it on the show where single family homes in, like, greater proportion than ever before, are being owned by private equity. That's important

because these business people who want to be racist and want to sell it to certain people, and want to deny certain people's entrees into communities are going to be able to do that with impunity now. If you know that the Fair Housing Act is gutted and that there's not going to be a Department of Justice or other officials who will be looking into that, cutting down the numbers of the lawyers who investigate that,

that's going to have a measurable effect on black wealth and also just your ability, your God-given right to live where you want to live. And I'll say two things anecdotally that go to this point. I filed my first Fair Housing Act case last year in a situation in Houston and it was a young man who was trying to rent an apartment he didn't get it rented

they had a question about his finances he goes into the office and he says are you not renting this to me because I'm black and the woman said yes wow answered yes in 2020 so it's a suit I filed last year

and yesterday I happen to be talking to a woman here in Corpus Christi who lives in the Austin area where I'm from she's in a small community outside the Austin area and she told me that

white people like hers white woman. I was at an event. She says that people like her are concerned about the number of Indians moving into that very small community on the outside of Austin. She said her husband works for a realtor, a big home builder. And she

said he comes home exasperated because there are just so many Indians moving in everybody's uncomfortable. And I literally told her, I said 60 years ago, somebody was saying that about me. Do you not realize that as you're sitting here telling me the story? And my point is, in 2025,

those kinds of things are still happening. So if you have no federal protection and you have no recourse that is going to have a measurable effect on non-white people particularly who want to move into certain areas and who have every right to be where they want to live,

so this is a law that absolutely is a travesty that is being gutted and this is the kind of thing that should really, really, really concern people. So when I did Patrick Bet David's podcast, he claims his independent, he's not, he's a maga right winger, that's all he is. I want people to understand

this is somebody with a huge following, a huge following on his YouTube channel, social media and if y'all want to see the sheer ignorance of this immigrant, okay, because he tried to question me earlier and I was like, why don't you move back to the black neighbor?

Why don't you move you guys back to your goddamn country? Trying to tell me what I should be doing. But I want you to listen to what this ignorant fool had to say when I brought up the factual information regarding home appraisals. Check this out, y'all.

I'm going to need you to be drug tested. Seriously. Do you even know today we've done the stories in Florida when somebody's black selling their house, the appraisers will come in and literally give them a value $100,000 to

$300,000 less because they're black? You know that's actually happened, right? You'll take one story and say that. Oh, my God. On how many occasions has that happened? That, are you serious? Do you think a message like...

Okay, why don't you go ahead and Google? Why don't you go ahead and Google? How many times does that happen? I believe it's happened, but how many times does that happen? The New York Times literally just did a story talking about these systemic racism that exists within housing appraisals. This is a fundamental problem. I'm trying to see, you're living in a different reality. What progress are you making by saying that?

What progress? I'm trying to end that. Do you know how in here? Okay, hold on, you say you're Middle Eastern, right? You're trying to. Hold on you're middle Eastern, right? I am, yes. How would you feel?

How would you feel if you're selling your home? You've got a home that you know. Right. You put upgrades in it, and you know your home is worth $500,000. And somebody comes into your home and they see your photos. Right. And they see your family. And then they go back and they go,

350,000. You go, what the hell? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, one second, one second. You tell that story to get people to convince that that's happening. It's actually... Out of a thousand appraisal. Oh, my God. Out of a thousand appraisals, how many times does that happen?

Out of a thousand appraisals, how many times does that happen? You would have pulled that up? Tell me him to pull that up? That's your world, though. Out of a thousand appraisals, how many times does that happen? Let's just say it happens. It is a significant issue in America. Oh, my God.

And when, wait, wait, one second, one second. There's a big difference. And then when the woman takes, when the woman, a black person should not have to remove their photos from the wall and remove black art and remove black books to have a white appraiser then come in and go, oh, it's actually 550. So, one second, one second, because I'm going to show you how it impacts generationally. Here we go. So when you, follow me here, because this is Housing School of America, I'm with you. I'm with you. When you then get that low appraisal, you then.

cannot sell your house for the higher value, which then means you are not then taking those proceeds and being able to invest, being able to send your kids to school. And what I'm trying to explain to you is there is a world out here that for some reason you're like living in Unity World that ain't the real America. Brother, you are, you have the wrong guy. And I'm trying to get rid of that stuff. You have the wrong guy here. You have to wrong guy.

I'm trying to get rid of it. Okay, good for you. Me and I am as well, but you have the wrong guy here. And here's what I mean by that. So when you ask the question, what do you do if they praise your house $350,000 less? Right? That's your question. Okay.

I don't see myself as a victim. I stopped looking myself as a victim a long time ago. And by the way, being Armenian and Assyrian, you know what a lot of people in the Armenian community do? You know what a lot of people in the Armenian community do? They sell victimhood mentality. I'm raised with that, which is the statement of Mechka. I know you don't know what the word Mechka means. Mechka means, oh, poor Rol and, oh, poor PBD.

I don't see myself as a victim. And the other part is when you use one story as an example to divide and get people even angrier because out of a thousand appraisals this happened one time, I don't think you're unifying when you say a statement like that to say, hey, this is what's taking place all the time. But going back to it. So you left because you wanted better economic situation for yourself.

Listen to what you just said again. I'm having a heart to listen to what you just said when you're saying. It's so fundamentally flawed because when you say, oh, my God, you see yourself as a victim. You do. No, no. You're selling it as a victim. No, I'm not, what I'm selling is a reality. What I'm selling is when this is, again, since you didn't, I guess you couldn't pull it up.

Okay. Oh, he did pull it up. Okay, the Biden administration, the federal housing finance agency released 47 million appraisal reports to the public for the first time. The appraisals, which were compiled between 2013 and 2021 present evidence of a persistent widespread practice in the home appraisal industry to give higher values to homes when the occupants are white and devalue them if the owners are people of color.

That's such bullshit. That's such bullshit. You know why? Hold up. Let me tell you why that's such bullshit. They actually took the reports and showed the data and now you call it bullshit.

Of course I call it bullshit. So you ask for the data and the facts. And now you give your opinion because you don't like the facts. Come on, man. Do you run a company? Yes, I do. Okay, so when you run a company,

How much shit can I find in the OPEX? In the what? When I go into my balance sheet and I look at my expenses, my monthly expenses, what I'm paying for, rent, employees, benefits, workers' comp. I can give a number and say, we lost $280,000 this year. And it's like, oh, my God, we lost $280,000. And then I open up the balance sheet and then boom, I'll see you're moving your face. Like, you don't know what I'm talking about. First of all, no, because I see it data like this, tell me the whole.

story. To jump to conclusion with something like this, what I'd see in the entire story, is ludicrous to make a comment like that. Analyzing the millions of appraisals by using census tract as a proxy for neighborhoods and comparing communities with nearly identical housing stock. Two researchers found that the results showed a clear correlation.

The higher the proportion of white residents in each community, the higher the appraised value of individual homes. They compared similar data. See, again, you want to reject the facts. And what I'm trying to explain to you is this is... I am not... I am refusing to constantly have people give data

without me having access to the entire thing just for their own benefit to divide it. So what you're saying is, in order for you, you need access to the 47 million home appraisals for yourself. I would love to see it. Okay, guess what? It's a fellow agency, follow for you.

I'd love to see it. Follow what? Follow what? For you. Okay, so I'd love to see it. why? Here's a part. How often do you see data being used and we don't know the whole story? Both sides.

How often? But first of all, we see data out there but what I'm saying, I'm looking at data, actual data, and I'm also looking at a reality. And here's what I'm saying to you. And again, this is what, for some reason, you're not fully accepting.

When, what is the most consistent way Americans have been able to actually build wealth? It has been through housing. That's been historical. And when you are black in America, this is not a opinion, this is not a perspective, it's a fact.

What we have seen is when you have been unable to enter the housing industry, meaning covenants saying you can't sell the black people, then when you actually buy a home and they've been grossly undervalue

that then limits you for being able to sell your home in a higher value and now take the profits and then create a and then be able to send your kids to college. And what I'm saying to you is, when that has been persisted, when you look at the appraisals, one, when you look at inability where you're buying a house, two, all of a sudden now you see a clear way how African Americans have been impacted, not historically, but still in present day.

And what I'm saying to you is, whether you are Democrat or Republican, I want that to change. Hello, I'm Isaac. Right there. Drew, he could, I want to see the, I want to see the 47 million appraisals. This is what they do. So when you have the facts, then it's something else. A white man like Patrick Bet David, oh my God, you're being a victim. I'm being a victim because I'm stating in fact, this is what white, this is what these Republicans do.

This is what these Republicans who are immigrants, who's Armenians, Syrian or whatever the hell. The rally is Patrick Bet David gets to come to the United States and live like a white man. He gets to be seen as a white man. He doesn't have to

take down his photos, but guess what? If you got black art and you got black books and you got black DVDs and you got black family portraits, you've got to hide your shit because these white appraisers are taking you down. thing I want to make sure that's not missed in this conversation is that the appraisal bias is the biggest, I mean the most significant robbery of black generational wealth, be it if you live in a majority white neighborhood or if you live in a majority black neighborhood, not only is the appraisal happens.

When you talk about what systemic racism is, when you talk about how it impacts our families generationally, if I am not in a community that is appraised appropriately, which means that that means opportunities, that means access to health care, that means access to great schools, which means access to networking opportunities, those are the things that impact us tremendously. And if we do not continue to shine a light, I'm going to go back. to this. This is how systemic racism works. This is happening quietly. This is happening through memos. This is happening through backroom decisions. This is happening in the fine print so that when we go out, when my husband and I decide to sell our home, right? We're going to have to take down this Obama photo. We're going to take down all of my AKA information. We're going to have to take down all of our black books and our black art from all of our travels

playing our house to be very plain jane just so that we can get what our neighbors would get for our home and that is not fair but it is life and you know what sometimes you just have to state the fact and keep on walking because arguing or

going back and forth with someone like that they don't get it because they don't want to get it no no but see here's okay so here's here's why that was important Michael because my deal is I'm gonna check you on your show and guess what

all your followers they're gonna have to listen to that conversation and I dare they Google it when I click the comment section of our video here this sister here she actually posted this comment she said black realtor here racism and appraisals is a huge issue

when listing homes I strongly encourage my African American sellers to remove all traces of themselves once I explain why they understand my job is to get them the most money possible not tipped to around their feelings this guy's being willfully obtuse and that's all this was he did oh you you're just you're just using one example out of a thousand and then when you bring the data up oh i don't believe i want to see it for myself oh data can be manipulated man get to hell out of here well he didn't know

that you were coming with the facts that that's what it is and that's why his guy he had a guy sitting there who was pulling stuff up on the monitor and I said oh you can't pull this one up I literally told him the article all they type in Google was New York Times housing appraisals and racism but it was like oh he just couldn't

find it so I was like yeah I can find it on my own phone I'm gonna read it to you absolutely New York Times widespread racial bias found in home appraisals easy to find November 2nd 2022 and this what you said

It's so important. The Brookings Institute has been doing a lot of good work exposing this, because the Brookings Institute has a piece on how racial bias in appraisals affects the devaluation of homes in majority black neighborhoods. And our homes are devalued by approximately $162 billion, okay? So that impacts generational wealth. That decreases our ability to pass on generational wealth. to the next generation, and about 96% of home appraisers are white.

Now, the Biden-Harris administration was doing work to combat that, okay? And one of the things they did was took on racial bias and home appraisals and closed the black-white home mis-evaluation gap by 40%. Now, that's all that stuff is going to stop under the Trump administration. Because anything dealing with race that they feel discriminating, against white people, they're setting down in the name of attacking DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion. So I'm glad you showed that, but once again, this shows how policy impacts your economics.

And you got a lot of people out here who spoke negatively about Vice President Kamala Harris, said, don't vote for them, just focus on building businesses in your community, stupid shit like that. And I'm all for building businesses. I've been doing that. help black people do that, helping get funding for it, but politics impacts your economics. So this is why this show is so important

because we are under an unprecedented attack that we haven't seen since the Jim Crow era. Well, again, real quick, go ahead. Politics, I think, if you can say that one more time, because for some of my brothers,

politics impacts your economics. Yes. Yeah, politics impacts your economics. politics is the legal distribution that scales wealth, power, and resources. So you have to understand how all this connects. I've been involved in writing public policy for the city of Detroit. I've helped black people get grants to start businesses and expand their businesses, things like that. Okay, I've taught entrepreneurship for seven years.

So I understand. I've managed black on companies that have had government contracts. Well, the employees were black. Yeah, listen, the bottom line here is real simple. folk like Patrick Bette David and these other conservatives, white conservatives, they want to deny what the reality is. That's what they simply do.

Folks, another story here. We got the news today that Asada Shakur passed away in Cuba at the age of 78. Of course, many folks have heard the story of her, of course, fleeing to Cuba after being

a prison here in the United States. you might have seen her name. You've seen her on shirts. You've seen people supporting her over the years. Of course, she was convicted in the killing of a New Jersey state trooper. She was a member of the Black Liberation Army. She was born Joanne, Deborah Byron, Queens, New York. Her name became widely known in 1973 after a shootout at the New Jersey Turnpike

and left state trooper, Werner Forster, and fellow BLA member, Zade Malik, She was wounded in the incident and was arrested and later convicted of murder in his death. In 1979, she escaped from the Clinton Correctional Facility for Women in New Jersey with the help of armed allies. Years later, she has surfaced in Cuba where Fidel Castro's government granted her political asylum. Her 1987 autobiography offered a personal account for upbringing, political awakening, imprisonment, and escape. The book went on to become a touchstone for generations of activists. Shakur is survived by her daughter, Kakuya Shakur. Cleo Monago joins us right now.

He, of course, has been involved in behavioral health. He's been involved in Blacksman Exchange, a number of different organizations, joins us right now. And Cleo sent me a, if y'all have it, go ahead and show it. If you don't, Cleo sent me a photo today of a photo of him in Salah Shakur when he was in Cuba. and give me one second so I can pull this up give me one second so I can show y'all what it looked like

so this year is the photo here so Cleo tell us about how did you meet her well I was in college and I got an opportunity to do a social political experience in Cuba

and I went to to meet Fidel Castro who I also met and Assala Shakur I wasn't sure I was going to get the opportunity to meet to Sasha here because, as you just mentioned, the FBI, her being on the run, et cetera, in an exile, but I got the opportunity to meet her. And as you can see, I was a young chickadey at the time.

And I see you got away in the photo. Was the Malcolm Xx shirt? Yeah. Okay. I'm black for a long time. I got you. I got you. Go ahead.

Actively black. It's supposed a passively black. Anyway, I got the chance to, she was across the room. I asked somebody that was with her, could I talk with her? So hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Okay, so where, so, so give me the setting. She said she was across the room. Like what, what was this a meeting?

Was it a gathering? Was it an activist? What was this? What was in this room? I was in Havana, Cuba, at a jazz concert. And Fidel Castro was going to be there and was there to speak to the crowd. and I did not even know that Osala was there. It was an evening.

It was on the outskirts of Havana, Cuba, and I saw her recognize her, and I alerted some people that were with her that I wanted to speak with her. She looked at me, and she lit up for some reason, and she said, sure. And we talked, and I was very in awe of her because I know her history. I know why she ran.

I know about her experience to the Black Panther Party. I know what kind of climate. that this country was in. Black people were being killed left and right by the cops. She was part of the Black Panther movement that came into existence to resist the murder of black people by cops, post brutality as it's called. And I was just very interested in talking with her. And we connected, we talked. We spent two days together. She told me about her experiences, her perspective. She's a brilliant, loving woman. During our conversation, she told me that I was a brilliant black soul. That's the way she described me. And she said, I reminded her a friend

happened, which I broke into tears unexpectedly. She said that, and she got a brother of her chair, and she came and put her arm around me and told me she understood. And that was a very important bonding moment for us because right after that, she said talking about

her struggle, her pain, missing her family, unable to see them again because she was never coming back to the United States of America because far as she was concerned, she would never get a fair trial. And in fact, in the New York Times obit, she was a first woman to land on the FBI's most wanted terrorist list and had a $2 million offer

in state and federal money for her capture? Yeah, and I'll talk about that by underscoring that we talk about the issue of white supremacy all the time. Well, it's not a new issue. It's been a problem for a long time. It's just that over the past 15 years or so, people have articulated it in very explicit ways, but it's not a brand new phenomenon. People just finally develop the courage to actually talk about it as something that

affects our lives. But back then, when she was arrested, from her perspective, she didn't do anything wrong. Just like what happened with Sandra Bland, the cops pulled her over. They roughed her up. They were not subjective, excuse me, they were not objective at all, like they never were when they dealt with black people in many cases. And she knew, for lack of better term, her goose was cooked, and she wasn't interested in being in the arms of white supremacist police officers that were going to clearly kill her or harm her. So she escaped. And she went to Cuba, and Fidel allowed her in there. As you know, particularly at the time, Cuba and the United States were in conflict.

Fidel was very aware of the Black Panther movement, racism in the United States of America, and gave her shelter over in Cuba where she's been until this very day when she passed away. But I want to underscore that the woman was brilliant. She was thoughtful. She was intelligent. She had a critical analysis. and she was about the empowerment and safety protection of black people. And that's why she joined the Black Panther Party

was to resist the murder, the brutality, and the killing, and all other negative things that was happening to black people, including the police department and external to the police department. She was a resistor. So she understood at the time, particularly after the murder of Fred Hampton. I think many of your listeners will know who Friend Hampton was. And he had been murdered. And in his bed, he was assassinated sitting,

laying next to his pregnant wife. So she didn't trust the system, the so-called justice system, and her life was in their hands, and she called herself intervening on that and escaping so she could live, and she built a very beautiful life in Cuba. All right, then. Cleo, we appreciate you joining us, sharing your thoughts on the side of Shakur. Thanks a bunch.

Thank you for inviting me, well. It's good to see you, man. Likewise, sir. Michael, Matt, Drew, any thoughts on her passing? for me i just i pray that you know she rested power and that her family knows that um the life that she lived um even though she had to be exiles of cuba that she's just resting in power and in truth um and i just wish that she would have been able to be with her family at that time Michael.

Yeah, Roland. Yeah, Silas Shakur, you know, this is a big loss. She's an inspiration to generations, not just because she was the godmother, Tupac Shakur, but because a former Black Panther Party member, Black Liberation Movement, and these brothers liberated her, as my teacher, Professor James Small told me, who was in the movement. He said these brothers liberated her from prison. And I was watching the interview from 2013 that her former attorney Lennox Hines did on Democracy Now. And he broke down the case against her, the murder case against her in the New Jersey State Trooper, against the New Jersey State Trooper.

And he broke down how she could not have done the crime, okay, because she couldn't even raise her hands above her head because of. bullets that hit her so he broke down the case and she was convicted by all white jury so this is the type of as as Cleo stated this is the type of injustice that the Black Panther Party and the Black

Liberation Movement, Black Liberation Army, this is what they were fighting against here in this country and the fight continues today. Absolutely. Matt, anything? Yeah, the only thing I'm going to add is I saw something on Facebook right before the show that I thought was really important There's a friend of mine who was saying that this is the kind of depth of conviction that people need to really model themselves after number one.

And to say, as well, you know, that phrase that you see a lot on social media, we are not our ancestors, well, this is exactly the kind of ancestor you should strive to be, a person who is going to live their commitment and their conviction as strongly as she did. And I'm hoping that this younger generation takes from that the drive to do the same in their own lives. All right, folks, that's it for us. I appreciate it, Drew, Matt, Michael. Thank you so very much for joining us on the panel. Folks, Monday, I'm going to be coming to you live from South Carolina, Hall of Fame basketball player Alex English is having his celebrity golf tournament. I was invited to play in that, and so I'll be broadcasting from South Carolina,

so we'd be here. What'd you say, Matt? Matt, what'd you say? Much love to the control panel. Matt, what'd you say? Say what? Oh, you know, you know what I'm saying? Now you're self-muting?

You're self-muting? You're self-muting now? You are foul. Deep in your soul. I was trying to show love to your staff. Oh, look at you. Look at you. You all would have been demonstrative, so I thought you had something to say.

So I'm like, go ahead and say what you did. I was telling your staff that I wasn't trying to throw him under the bus, but that I had to let you know that God don't like ugly. So that's all. But I see, I can't trust none of you all over. God don't trust. No, no, what happened was I saw you over there, been on the monsters, so I was like, I'll call you,

and they know if I call your name, pull you up. So that's what they did. So they were doing their job. See, okay, all right, well, shout out to the control panel. Yeah. I don't know how y'all deal with this brother, but you deserve all the love. Called direct deposit every two weeks.

That's how they deal with it. So you try to, uh-huh. Yeah, God don't like ugly, and he don't like burnt orange as well. And he don't like Arch Manning. That's it. All right, we done. Folks, again, I'm live in South Carolina on Monday, the Alice England Celebrity Golf Classic. Don't forget, y'all, support the work that we do, join our Brene the Funk fan club.

Your support is really appreciated. Use the Stripe, QR code, if you want to contribute via cash app, you see it, bottom left-hand corner, PayPal's R, Martin Unfiltered, Venmos, R, M, Unfilter. Zell, Roland at Roland S.martin.com, rolling at rolling martin unfiltered.com. Download the Blastart Network app, Apple Phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV. Be sure to get a copy of my book, Fear, how the browning of America is making white folks lose their minds. Available bookstores nationwide, of course, if you want to get our Roland Unfiltered Blackstar Network swag, please do so by going to shop blackstar network.com.

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