#RolandMartinUnfiltered - MLK 57 years after his death, Trump tariff sparks Lesotho crisis, UConn star Paige Bueckers drama

Episode Date: April 5, 2025

4.4.2025 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: MLK 57 years after his death, Trump tariff sparks Lesotho crisis, UConn star Paige Bueckers drama  Today, we honor the legacy of civil rights icon Martin Luther King, Jr., who was assassinated fifty-seven years ago at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.  March's job growth exceeded expectations, but unemployment numbers were slightly worse than anticipated. We'll discuss these figures with our favorite economist, Morgan Harper, and explore how tariffs may impact employment. The African nation of Lesotho is facing an economic crisis after the Trump administration imposed a 50% tariff on its textile exports. We'll talk to an expert about what this decision means for the small nation. Tishaura Jones is running for a second term as mayor of St. Louis. She will join us to discuss her achievements as the city's first Black female mayor and why she deserves re-election. Former NBA player Etan Thomas will discuss the backlash against his recent opinion piece in The Guardian, where he questions why UConn star Paige Bueckers hasn't received the same national attention as Iowa's Caitlin Clark. And, we'll have a conversation about financial responsibilities in relationships. Personal finance expert Shani Curry will share her insights on women refusing to help pay the bills. #BlackStarNetwork partner: Fanbasehttps://www.startengine.com/offering/fanbase This 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 #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox  http://www.blackstarnetwork.com 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.

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399 that makes you an owner in fanbase today go to startengine.com fanbase to invest why because current social apps have taken advantage of users for far too long, with content suppression, shadow banning, harmful racist content, and no real tools for monetization and equity. Fanbase has over 1.4 billion users and counting, allowing anyone to reach all their following and monetize their content from day one. Social media is the new TV, and whoever owns the apps that distribute that content have the opportunity to own potential billion-dollar companies. While big platforms with uncertain futures are failing to serve their users, Fanbase is stepping up to fill the gap. Don't wait until it's too late. Invest now, invest for yourself and your future. Go to starting.com slash Fanbase and own the next generation of social media. Today is April 4th, 2025. Coming up on Roller Martin Unfiltered, streaming live with the Black Star Network.

Today marks the 57th anniversary of the assassination of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. We will go live to the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, where they will ring the bell at 7.01 p.m. Eastern, 6 or 1 p.m. Central. And that is when the bullet was fired that killed Dr. King. We'll also talk about a couple of events that happened today. They're going to be having an event there and we'll be taking a speech there live as they commemorate Dr. King's life and legacy. Also, we're going to be showing April 4th, 1968. That is our project where we talk to a variety of people who work without the King,

who worked partner with him. Well, they remember what took place on that day that changed black America, America, and the world today. Folks job numbers came out. We'll talk about what they look like. Also, how devastating Donald Trump's tariffs are to the American economy.

Will chat with up economist Morgan Harper about that. Also on today's show, Supreme Court gives Donald Trump and MAGA a win when it comes to grants. DEI grants for teaching organizations. As issue will discuss the governor of Texas under a lot of scrutiny for failing to call

a special election to replace the late Congressman Sylvester Turner. Now Greg Abbott is saying, oh, well, I'm doing so because Harris County keeps having problems with their elections. It's an absolute lie, but it's their way of trying to target Harris County. Lots to break down.

It's time to bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Blackstone Network. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine. And when it rips, he's right on time. And it's Roland.

Best believe he's knowing. Putting it down from sports to news to politics. With entertainment just for kicks, he's knowing putting it down from sports to news to politics with entertainment just for kicks he's rolling he's funky fresh he's real, the best you know. He's rolling, Martel. Martel. Folks, the economy is in a tailspin because of Donald Trump's stupid tariffs. The March job numbers came out today exceeding expectations,

but unemployment numbers were slightly worse than expected. Yep, you can always expect that. Of course, tariffs also have a plan wreaking havoc. We're not seeing that, though, fully show up when it comes to the economy. But March, we saw 228,000 jobs added despite losing 4,000 federal jobs. You also, overall unemployment inched up a bit to 4.2 percent. Black unemployment rate jumped to 6.2 percent. Black men saw an increase to 6.1 percent in March. Black women's unemployment rate dipped to 5.4 from February's 5.4 percent. Morgan Harper is the director of policy and advocacy at the

American Economic Liberties Project. She joins us now. Glad to have you back on the show, Morgan. So let's talk about these numbers. What's the good, bad and the ugly? Overall, it's a pretty good jobs report. The jobs created were a bit higher. Labor force participation is pretty consistent. Wages have gone up a little bit and still outpacing inflation. But in some ways, like we've been talking about this calendar year, 2025, Roland, it's kind of like neither here nor there in a way, these jobs numbers, because they're not reflective of the policies that

have been put in place since January 20th with the change in administration. We are going to see in the months to come a lot more of those impacts. Now, you did note, rightly, some of the decrease in federal workers and all of that, but we did see some job creation in health care and some bit of manufacturing. But overall, I think that's the important point as we look at these jobs figures right now, is this is still a reflection of the past, the pre-second Trump administration, and how all the impacts of this current administration play out is still very much unknown. But we are seeing some very clear impacts with some of the results in the

stock market, of course. That point you just made there, that people need to understand that, you know, the right always wants to take credit when things are good and blame it on Biden when things are bad. The reality is when you talk about really, I dare say, the first four to six months of anybody who's new in the Oval Office, you're actually living off of or dealing with the previous occupant's economy. Yeah. And, you know, it was interesting. I was watching, you know, some of the coverage this morning and maybe other people, too, that are like us and probably torturing ourselves watching too much news. But, you know, Jared Bernstein, who was one of the economists for the Biden administration, was interviewed on this point. And I was a little surprised because actually, you know, he was giving the readout.

Jobs report good. This is solid data. But this was a guy that was in the administration. So could take some credit for having helped to produce some of these numbers. No, no, no, no. Democrats are too stupid to learn how to take credit for when you do something right. Well, yeah. Yeah, I said it.

No, you don't. I said it. They are. They don't know how to sell themselves. That's their problem. I think that is a problem. I think that's something that needs to be addressed. Certainly, Republicans do not hesitate to take credit for things that they both have

and haven't done, you know, just if any current experience plays out. But I think it is an important point, though, in that what are we taking credit for? And the stock market, this is going to continue to be a big issue that we all have to pay attention to, is how much are these metrics tied to the stock market reflective of our economic realities? And I think this is going to be a big, big topic as we get into more of this tariff discussion and some of the impacts of the trade policy changes that Trump is implementing as well. Explain to people, I don't think people really understand

when we talk about our economy. 70% of the American economy is based upon consumer spending. So when folks stop spending money, and let's be real clear, we ain't talking about rich people. We're talking about poor people, working class people, middle class folks. And so what happens when they start getting concerned and then they start pulling back, that has a significant impact on the economy. I tell people the most important thing is what's the consumer confidence number? That's that number right there tells you everything when it comes to the economy.

If consumer confidence is awful. We saw this with Biden Harris when they were like, oh, my God, the economy is in a tailspin. You know, I'm hoarding money. I'm saving money. I know what's going to happen. I'm scared to death. That just that drove the narrative for three years. And that paved the way for Donald Trump's election. People were like, oh, he's going to fix the economy. And now he comes in and acts a fool. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of focus on how do businesses react to some of these economic policy decisions. But I think you're exactly right, Roland, how consumers are reacting, especially because we have this consumption-based economy, is a very important factor of whether or not we're going to continue to grow.

Now, I will note that part of the theory of doing some of these tariffs, though not reflected in the execution of how they've gone about it, is that we need to move away from being so much of a consumer-based economy and get back to building things, having more domestic manufacturing. But if you're not pairing any of this trade policy and tariff implementation with some investments in that domestic manufacturing, creating the incentives for companies to want to build factories in the U.S., create those jobs, then you are just creating the groundwork for increased prices, and that will impact consumers' ability to continue spending and feeling comfortable

in the economy. But there's something, Morgan, that we have to constantly put on the table, and too often people don't want to do it because it's being real. Let's just cut to the chase. I'm going to use Walmart for an example. What's Walmart's phrase? Low, low prices. The reality is people in this country, we want low, low, low, low, low, low. The reality is companies want to make as much profit, profit, profit, profit, profit. So if you want low prices, they want to make as much profit. That means you're going to go somewhere to make goods as cheap as you possibly can. And here is the oxymoron in this country, and it is moronic, and it drives me crazy. Every politician and people and worker, we want American-made products.

We want American jobs. But we want $25, $35, $40, $50 an hour. And so guess what? Americans ain't trying to pay $85 for a pair of jeans. They want to pay $19.99. I mean, so at some point, so it's always crack spell when people

say that. And so it's real. And I mean, I'll give you a perfect example. That was a, we had some sweaters made. So what was a, we had some sweaters made. So what happened was we had some sweaters made for the show. And I was just doing a Warnock campaign. So I said, oh, who made their sweaters? It was a really nice, thick sweater.

So looked it up. Okay, so guess what? Had my assistant call that company. They're like, we make American products. This is what the cost is for this sweater. I think each sweater came out to be 110 bucks. Yeah. This sweater over here, we could have got for 40 bucks. So now I got a decision to make. Do I want to buy 10 of the $110 sweaters and spend $1,100 plus tax, or do I want to spend less than $500 for sweaters, slightly different material, but at the end of the day, it's still 700 bucks cheaper.

That is the conundrum, the oxymoron that we have to deal with in this country. I agree with you. I mean, you have identified a core point is that that we have to deal with in this country. I agree with you. I mean, you have identified a core point, is that if we want to have things like Black-owned businesses that are able to grow, independent businesses that are potentially competing with Walmart, an alternative from Walmart, then we are going to have to be radically changing

how we operate in this country. We will not be able to have the same level of access to cheap goods. And having access to cheap goods and being the consumer for the entire world's manufacturing has been the economic policy of the United States. You know, it's called, probably people have heard this term, neoliberal economic policy. That has been the governing policy for my entire life, right? We have made that trade-off. We are going to consume. We're going to get cheap shit. You know what, right? Okay. And everybody else is going to manufacture. We're going to let that manufacturing go away. And we're going to kind of trust the Walmarts of the world to manage that all appropriately. They'll get the goods in here. They'll be cheap. We don't care where they make it as long as we are getting all this.

I should say, I don't know. And this is where I would push back a little bit, Roland. I don't think that the average American out there was necessarily thinking through the steps of what it meant to shift our economy in this way, right? We elect people and we expect them to be making decisions that are going to lead to good outcomes for our lives. What we have been living through that I think will be no stranger to anyone who is watching is the gutting of many parts of this country, including a lot of Black neighborhoods that formerly had more thriving business ecosystems, including rural areas that used to have more jobs, rural areas, by the way, that include a lot of Black people, too, that a lot of folks don't want to talk about. And so now we have everybody that you have to move, you have to go to the city, you have to work for the Walmart and get just a dollar raise every year and all these big companies that are financialized. They are beholden to the stock market.

They do not care about Main Street or anybody who's living around it. And that's the question for us. Are we going to continue to allow our futures to be sacrificed to have access to cheap goods? And this is the problem with what Trump is doing and the approach that he is taking. Legitimate question. It's a question you just identified, Roland. But to make that kind of shift, to get back to more of a domestic infrastructure, which started and also was happening under the Biden administration, things like trying to build semiconductor chips, all of this domestically, you've got to bring people along for that. You have to make some, you have to have a methodology to it. You have to take things step by step. They are just going for it, you know, completely haphazardly, not

being very clear, not clear if any of this stuff is going to stick, not educating people about what's happening. And that is a recipe for economic devastation. So this is a treacherous moment. It is not totally clear how everything is going to play out. But I do want to be honest with everybody that that question, that quandary that you've just identified, is the cheap stuff worth it, is what we need to have a serious conversation about. But we just probably can't trust this administration to be leading it. Well, but it's just it's the thing that we just don't want to deal with. I just I don't know why people and I've been saying this for now more than 25 years and every time and I'm just sitting here and I'm kind of like, okay, like, guys, this is very, this is just a, these are fundamental business questions. I remember when I was in Chicago

and I'd moved there and I was in a high park area I think, not high park, it was near high park. And so this guy was complaining about gentrification. He was like, man, we need this, you know, we need grocery stores, we, man, we need this. You know, we need grocery stores. We need businesses. We need this. We need that. And so he's sitting here going on and on and on. And I said to him, I said, I'm going to ask you a question. I said,

do you ever own a business? He's like, no. I said, okay. I said, where do you live? He told me where he lived. I said, do you own or do you rent? He said, I rent. I said, let me explain something to you about power. I said, you're a renter. I said, you ain own or do you rent? He said, I rent. I said, let me explain something to you about power. I said, you're a renter. I said, you ain't got shit to say. He was like, excuse me?

I said, let me explain to you business. Businesses, when they examine data, depending upon the business, they're looking for homeowners compared to renters. Homeowners are different from renters because renters are transient. Renters typically will do year to year. I said, now, if it's coffee, if it's, I was just, because he was talking about sit-down restaurants. I said, sit-down restaurants are a different type of business. I said, if you're

going to invest in a business, you're going to want to know that I have a reliable clientele that's coming here. So he's sitting and looking at me like I'm crazy. So I then go, okay. I said, have you ever seen a neighborhood constructed ground up? He's like, no. I said, well, I'm from Texas. I have. I've literally seen entire neighborhoods. I said, do you know what they start with? He goes, roads. I said, nope. They start with little orange flags that are placed into the ground.

I said, do you know what those are marking off? They're marking off sewer lines. They're marking off the infrastructure. I said, then they'll come in and they'll pave a road. I said, there are no houses yet. Then a'll come in and they'll pave a road. I said, there are no houses yet. Then a builder comes in and puts up one model home. I said, then they might add two more. They're going to have max three model homes. I said, so I'm describing the neighborhood. I said, what's the first business that comes up in the neighborhood? He goes, grocery store. I said, nope. Yeah, I've earned 2% profit margin. So he was kind of like, uh, he's going

on and on. He was like, let me, I said, so you know what the first business is? I said, uh, donut shop. He thought I was crazy. I said, Nope. I say, it's always a strip mall. It's a donut shop and it's a dry cleaners. And he's like, okay, he's like, okay, I don't understand what you're going bro. I said, because if you got homeowners, they're going to stop for coffee and donuts when they're in the car going to work. I said, and they're going to drop their clothes off and pick them up when they come home. And I said, the grocery store does not come until later until you have maximum viability because of their profit margin.

And he was just like, oh, I said, so, bro, I said, I need you to understand, you are asking for things in a neighborhood that economically the neighborhood may not be able to maintain. I said, so you know what? You're going to come in and you're going to shut down in less than a year. I said, so if you want to have a gentrification conversation, I said, then we have to deal with how many people are renters in our neighborhood versus homeowners. He did. He was totally blown away. And that's what I'm talking about here. Things are happening in this country economically and people don't want to have real conversations on how these

things happen. We just sort of want to say, I want stuff to happen and not ask how it actually happens. I think that's right. I think the grocery store is an interesting example because we probably talked about this a bit with the Koger Albertson merger. There is some anti-illegal conduct that's happening by very large grocery stores that's making it harder, even if you do get your independent grocery store off the ground. But that's kind of another conversation. But yeah, no, I agree with you. I will say, though, again, we're all busy. We're all living our lives. We all have a lot going on. We elect people to represent our interests. And I bet if you asked your average elected official role in what you

just described about grocery stores, profit margins, they don't know a thing about it. And that's a problem. Well, that's because a lot of our people, a lot of the people who are in politics actually have never run businesses. So they, and that's, that's, that's, that's, that's okay. But you need to fill that knowledge gap. Right. But you kind of got to have people who is so like I watch these these hearings and you got politicians making decisions when it comes to reproductive rights. And you have actual doctors on the panel, not that fake Dr. Rand Paul is, but you got an actual doctor on the panel going, hey, I'm a gynecologist. I kind of want, y'all might want to ask me this kind of stuff. And that's what we do. So it's frustrating to me that when we're talking about how do we have an economy that works for all, we don't really want to have the nitty gritty conversations that forces

Americans to have to answer very basically, are you willing to pay more for products that are made and built in this country compared to what you're doing now? And they're being made in Indonesia, China, and these other nations. And when you force people, sure, I want to pay more. Let's see you do it. OK, let's see you do it, because then you go start complaining about how much stuff costs. Right. And especially now we're talking about those kinds of changes happening simultaneously. The alternative vision of what would be an approach is the targeted tariff where you choose an industry, you apply a tariff, you also invest in domestic manufacturing, like, again, what was happening with EVs, for example, under Biden

administration. And then people start to get acclimated to what that kind of change could be like, what it is to pay for something that is actually based here. And on that point right there, with EVs, you're going to have to have government subsidies that make it cheaper to buy those products. Then, because actually, because the whole EV thing has multiple purposes. You're helping American manufacturers. You're weaning people off of fossil fuels. It's impacting the economy. You actually have to subsidize that. And all of these people who go,

the right, oh, we're subsidizing these automakers. Elon Musk is not the richest person in the world without subsidies. His company actually was dying and was saved by American subsidies. We subsidize fossil fuel companies to the tune of billions of dollars every year. That's Exxon.

So I'm like, what are we talking about here? But that's what you have to do. I'm watching all of these people talk about AI. You need massive amounts of electricity for AI. You might want to fix the grid. But we don't want to invest in fixing the grid.

Well, but we also have investor-owned utilities that are taking advantage and raising prices and not making those decisions that would lead to more renewable energy because they make a lot of money off the status quo and don't have to make any changes. And we have state regulators that aren't actually using their power to change anything.

So, I mean, where do we start? We could go on and on, but I think you have identified the key question. I just want, as we move forward, people are thinking about these things and we're not just throwing stuff out there without realizing the ramifications. Morgan Harper, we appreciate it. Always good to see you. Great to see you. Thanks a bunch. Folks, going to a quick break. We come back to Charles Jones is trying to become get reelected mayor of St. Louis.

She'll join us next. Also, we'll talk about talk to an African commentator. What's happening? The Trump tears could very well just destroy the economy of a very small African nation. Let's discuss next right here. Roland Martin unfiltered on the Blackstar Network. This week on the other side of change, the attacks on education, book bans, and what it means for us. Our guest, Aaliyah Logan, who will join us, talking about what are the implications for the lack of investment in education, both locally and internationally, and what this will mean for future generations.

Fighting back against any of the administration's attempt to essentially make sure that people are uneducated and destroy history and make sure you forget history and historical things that have happened. Check us out on the other side of change, only on Blackstar Network. Hey, what's up? Keith Tony in a place where you got

kicked out your mama's university. Creator and producer of Fat Tuesday, a hip-hop comedy. Right now, I'm rolling with Roland Martin. Unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undamned believable. You hear me? Black voters could power the election in St. Louis on Tuesday. Runoff takes place, and the incumbent mayor, Tashara Jones, the first black woman elected mayor of St. Louis, is running for re-election.

She is running against Kara Spencer, who white Democrats there are supporting, putting their money behind. And joining us right now is Mayor Jones. Glad to have you here. Mayor, first and foremost, it's going to be a tough reelection bid. I interviewed someone the other day and they said in the history of St. Louis, no black mayor got a second term. Is that correct? That is correct, Roland. In our entire history, we've only had three black mayors, including myself, and none of them have been elected to a second term. When you look at the breakdown, what's the racial composition of St. Louis in terms of African-American voters, white voters, Hispanic voters?

We're about 45 percent African-American, 45 percent Caucasian and about 10 percent everything else. We have the largest concentration of Bosnians outside of Europe in St. Louis. So let's talk about this election, this campaign. The Democrats party in your city endorsed Spencer over you. And what is your closing message to the voters while they should give you a second term? My closing message to the voters is that we have to continue the progress that we're already on. When I was elected in 2021, I inherited a crisis because we were still trying to work our way out of a global pandemic. Homicides were at an all-time high. And yes, services weren't being delivered. So my team and I have gotten to work, and we've been able to make a lot of progress.

We've seen a 40 percent reduction in homicides, a 50 percent reduction in youth-involved shootings, and our emergency response times are 60 percent faster. You know, this is about even if you just compare resumes, my opponent is a math major and has never run anything or managed anybody. And I have 20 years of experience in politics, elected politics and in the executive branch. So in terms of African-Americans,, you've had folks who are supportive. Others have taken issue with some things in terms of you look at what happened with Kim Gardner. That's one of the issues. And so what do you say to black voters there who feel as if you have not done enough for African-Americans? Well, our African-American, I would say our African-American side of town, which is mostly North St. Louis, has been neglected

for over 70 years. So there's no way that you can expect one mayor to address all of the decades of neglect in four years. We need more time to put things in place to address our infrastructure needs, to build more homes, to expand opportunity with workforce development programs. And we are setting the stage to do just that. But we had to fix a lot of things that have been kicked at, you know, that can have been kicked down the road for so many years. And so we had to fix that first before we can move forward. Questions from our panel, my guest, Michael Imhotep, host African History Network show out of Detroit, Cameron Trimble, Jones as well, CEO, Hip Politics Media, former White House senior advisor, joining us out of D.C. And we also have joining us here.

Give me one sec. Actually, we do this here. Let me just quickly go. We have Tyler McMillan, social justice leader and movement strategist also out of D.C. Michael, you first. What's your question? Hello, Mayor Jones. I know you said that your opponent hasn't ran anything. But the question I would ask is, what would be your closing remarks to the citizens of St. Louis to give you a second term? What type of vision are you proposing for a second term that builds upon what you've accomplished in your first term? That's a great question. So we've made a lot of progress on crime and public safety in my first term.

And St. Louis is a lot safer, healthier, and stronger than we were four years ago. But we're just getting started, and we have a lot further to go. What we're proposing in my second term is rehabbing our airport because we are a world-class city and we deserve a world-class airport, across the city, but especially in North St. Louis and parts of South St. Louis that have been neglected for decades, because our city can't succeed and grow if over half has been left to fail. Okay, thank you. Cameron? Madam Mayor, good luck on your election. My question here is, with such a large concentration of African-American voters, as well as Caucasian and white voters, how are you, in this time of so much polarization in this country, how

are you being a bridge builder between those communities and between in your city? So there's no part of St. Louis that I am afraid to go in. And we have had town halls all across our city. And I've brought my cabinet to all of these meetings trying to address the problems that the everyday problems that people have. And so I have been super accessible. And again, there's no part of the city that I'm uncomfortable going in or no one that I'm uncomfortable having a conversation with. I am not afraid of the difficult conversations that need to happen in order to move St. Louis forward. Tyler. Yeah, so great to meet you, Mayor. Being the young one on the panel, I want to ask, given the significant investment that you have made during your tenure, such as the establishment of the office of the mayor.

You ain't the only young one on the panel. Y'all young folk crack me up with that shit. I wasn't trying to throw out who young. How about if I say, well, he had a broke one on the panel. I'm just messing with you. Go ahead. See? See, y'all go there.

See, y'all going to make me go there. All right, go ahead with your question. Go ahead with your question. I'll take it alone, Uncle Roland. My question would be, how do you plan to ensure the sustainability of long-term impact of these youth-focused initiatives that you have created, especially considering potential shifts in funding with administrations? So when I established the Office of Violence Prevention, I did it initially with funds from the American Rescue Plan Act. And in its second year, we transitioned it to become a permanent

division of the Department of Public Safety and funded with our general revenue funds. So it has been a permanent department for the last year and a half. And we work really hard at funding organizations on the ground and are working with our national organizations to secure more grant funding so we can continue this work. Final comment. What do you say to the person who is looking at the couch as an option on Tuesday? For the person who is looking at the couch as an option, this election is too important to the future of our city. Right now, where we have the state and federal government attacking our rights and waging war on our values, it is important who is in the mayor's office and who's going to stand up and fight for our citizens and

fight for their safety against these attacks from the state and federal level. I have had the experience already fighting on the state and national level. And my opponent is untried and untrusted. And this is not the time for amateur hour. This time calls for someone who has the experience, the relationships and the commitment to fight for you and fight for your community, for our community. All right, then. Mayor Jones, good luck on Tuesday. We'll appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you, Merlin. Good to see you. Likewise. Folks, go into a quick break. We come back. We'll talk about how Trump's tariffs could prove a massive economic calamity for a small African nation.

You're watching Rollerball Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Support the work that we do. Join our Bring the Funk fan club. Our goal is to get 20,000 of our fans contributing on average 50 bucks each a year. That comes out to $4.19 a month, $0.13 a day if you want to contribute via cash app. Use the Stripe QR code. Here it is right here. You can also go to BlackstarNetwork.com

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Donald Trump falling in line with President Elon Musk. In the wake of the unsettling news that MSNBC has canceled Joy Ann Reeve's primetime show, The Readout, Roland Martin and the Blackstreet Network would like to extend an invitation to all of the fans of Joy and Reeve MSNBC show to join us every night to watch Roland Martin Unfiltered streaming on the Black Star Network for news, discussion of the issues that matter to you and the latest updates on the twice-impeached, criminally convicted felon-in-chief Donald Trump

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or download the Blackstar Network. Hey, what's up? I'm Devon Frank. I'm Dr. Robin B, pharmacist and fitness coach, and you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. Folks, do y'all remember on March 4th when Donald Trump used the opportunity speaking to millions of people

to literally crap on the small African nation of Lesotho? He didn't even pronounce their name right. Do y'all remember this? $8 million to promote LGBTQI+, in the African nation of Lesotho, which nobody has ever heard of. Nobody ever heard of. Well, that was interesting, because I remember watching a clip

where somebody showed that some Trump swag was actually made in Lesotho. So I guess his company was aware of this. Johanna LeBlanc joins us right now. She is a commentator, quite familiar with what's happening there on the continent. Folks are suggesting that these tariffs that Trump has put in place could very much destroy the economy of this small nation of two million people. Hi, Roland. Thank you so much for having me on. I'm actually currently in Accra, Ghana. Everyone's talking about tariffs

that's been hit on so many different countries on the African continent, with Ghana being hit with about 10 percent, and obviously Lesotho is being hit with 50 percent. And that is pretty significant. We're talking about a tiny little kingdom located essentially in the middle of South Africa, with a GDP of roughly $2 billion annually. So what you're seeing here is Lesotho's economy at a crossroads, caught up in the crosshairs of a global trade tension, right? So tariffs, whether it comes from the United States or the rippling effect of South Africa, will have a significant impact on the country's economy. So let's be honest here, Roland. You're talking about, you know, the social sector that's being hit is the exports, right? Yeah, textiles.

And diamonds, right? So they depend upon, so this could help, so Levi's, Calvin Klein products are made there. That's pretty interesting because I remember when Levi's were made in the United States and when they decided to leave, stop having their products made

here, people were complaining it wasn't going to be American made, but they were citing people who wanted cheaper jeans. So they go to Lesotho. And so these tariffs on textiles impacts those two companies. And this could severely hinder that. That's half of their economy, 50 percent. That is that shows you how this can really hurt. Absolutely. And that's a two million dollar hit to a sector that employs roughly 40,000 people, right? So over 10% of the country's GDP. So again, this is going to be significant.

I mean, factories were already shutting down in the country, right? And with AGOA's future not even fully determined yet, which if I would need to make a guess, I would guess that AGOA would not be renewed by the U.S. Congress. And it's set to expire in September of 2025. So what you're probably going to see is Lesotho trying to enter into a free trade agreement with the United States. And in the midst of all of this tariff war that we're having, one country that was not impacted at all is Mexico, because they have a free trade agreement with the United States.

And many countries on the continent are actually now having this discussion. Currently, I know Kenya is having a discussion with the administration about a free trade agreement. President Ramaphosa of South Africa announced that he will be seeking a free trade agreement so that these types of tariffs don't just come up out of nowhere. But make no mistake, it's not only going to impact the sutras economy, but it's certainly going to impact the American consumer, right? Because the cost has to be passed on to somebody. And the companies, Levi's not going to eat the cost, right? So you and I, Roland, when we go to the grocery store, I mean, when we go to buy a pair of jeans, for example,

we're going to have to pay a little bit extra because of these tariffs, because that's really how it works. There's no other way to try to spin this or to try to explain it. But what I will say, though, Roland, I think in spite of what's happening, I think it's a real opportunity, though, for African nations to implement the African continent to a free trade area. And it's a trade policy that more than 40 countries on the continent are a party to. And what it does is that it harmonizes the trading of goods and services across the continent. So African countries trading with each other. And so what we're saying is that if this trade agreement is implemented properly, you're talking about increasing

the collective GDPs of African nations by more than $3 trillion, and also lifting more than 30 million people out of extreme poverty on a continent with 1.4 billion people. So I think now is the time for African governments to put their heads together and really get serious about the implementation of the AFCFTA and accelerating its implementation, certainly. Because even though, yes, Lesotho is hit with a 50 percent, as you know, Roland, South Africa has also been hit with a 30 percent tariff. And Lesotho's economy is greatly intertwined with South Africa's economy. And in fact, Lesotho is a member of the Southern African Customs Union, right? So Lesotho, Eswatini, Botswana, and a few other countries in the Sadak region.

So when South Africa is impacted, so is Lesotho. So in addition to the 50 percent, Lesotho is going to have to make some real economic decisions, because the 30 percent that South Africa has been hit with is going to be passed on to those countries in the region. And also to, you know, when goods come in, they have to go through South Africa and then go to the kingdom of Versutu. So this has real significant implications. And the European put out a statement recently indicating how they were gravely disappointed about this measure, because it's really shaking up the entire world. And I can tell you again, I'm in Ghana, and that is all everyone is talking about, these tariffs.

Yeah, I mean, one of the things that Trump is trying to do, he's trying to break the backs of a lot of these companies. They're trying to, look, they were trying to force Ukraine to turn over half of their minerals worth $500 billion. Now they're trying to do the exact same thing to the Congo. Absolutely. And DRC, obviously, as you know, the DRC is dealing with a severe conflict that's been ongoing for a very long time. And the DRC has approached the United States and said, in exchange for military support, we will provide you with our critical minerals.

And DRC sits on roughly $24 trillion worth of critical minerals, so your cobalt, your gold, and so on, which are critical to countries around the world, including the United States. So President Trump has even announced a special envoy to DRC to negotiate how the United States is going to take advantage of those critical minerals. Here you have you're trading critical minerals for guns as opposed to fight for peace and keep your minerals and get paid. The United States, we want those minerals. And unfortunately, this is the history of too many African nations giving up precious resources for little in return. Well, Rowan, also in addition to that, if the United States does come in and actually does fix this conflict between the DRC and Rwanda, in a way, it weakens the African Union, because the role of the

African Union, right, is to work with these countries when they have these various conflicts, right, put them together and come up with a peace agreement, right? So if DRC has to leave the continent and to get support from the United States, it certainly weakens the role of the African Union. In addition to that, South Africa was trying to remedy this as well, and South Africa being a superpower in the context of the continent. I think a lot of people may not know this, but South Africa is seen as the big brother in Africa, one of the most prosperous countries on the continent, was also trying to help address this crisis. So, SADC has failed. African Union has failed. The president of Angola went to have conversations

with the president of DRC. That conversation also has failed. So where does that leave the African continent, right, if Africans don't want to weaken some of these multilateral institutions on the continent that are there to provide these types of support when there are conflicts on the African continent. All right, then.

Johan LeBlanc, partner with Adome Advisory Group. We appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much, Roland. Always a pleasure. Thank you very much. Going to a quick break.

I'll be right back. Roland Martin, Unfiltered, the Black Star Network. When we return, the ringing of the bell in Memphis, Tennessee. Mark, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated

50, 70 years ago today. Back in a moment. I'm Dr. Greg Carr and coming up on the next Black Table, thinking about the Black Freedom Movement in a global way, Dr. John Monroe joins us to discuss his book, The Anti-Colonial Front, which maps the social justice movement in the United States and its impact internationally, from Asia to Africa, and how movements like anti-communism were used to slow down racial equality, like critical race theory today. Critical race theory today, communism back then, it's essentially mobilized to shut down any challenges to a system of power.

Connecting the civil rights movement to colonialism on the next Black Table, exclusively here on the Black Star Network. I'm Russell L. Honore, Lieutenant General, United States Army, retired, and you're watching Roland Martin on King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis as he stood on the balcony at the Lorraine Motel just outside of room 306. In about 30 seconds, we'll go live to the Lorraine Motel, now known as the National Civil Rights Museum, where they will ring the bell marking the moment,

6.01 p.m. Memphis time, when he was assassinated. Of course, that changed the trajectory of black America, America, and the world, and it still is a day that lives in infamy around the world. At the conclusion of today's show, we will air a special called April 4th, 1968. Let's now go live to the National Civil Rights Museum. Silence.

6.01 p.m. at the Lorraine Motel. Thank you. Thank you. Folks, there are members. Give me a two-shot. They're having their program there. Siobhan Arlene Bradley of the National Council of Negro Women, she is going to be giving the keynote speech there at the National Civil Rights Museum as they commemorate the assassination of Dr. King 57 years ago tonight.

Let's go back to Memphis. Oh, take my hand. Lead, lead me on Let me stand I, I am tired. I am weak. I am won Through the storm Lord, through the night Lead Lead me on

To the light Oh Take my hand Precious Take my hand, precious Lord, and lead. Oh, lead me on Oh, when, when, when the darkness When the darkness appears And the night Oh Lord

The night is drawing near Oh And the day Oh the day is past And gone And And And forever At the river

Lord Here I stand God, God, God Guide my feet. Oh, Lord Jesus, hold my hand. Oh, take my hand. Precious Lord And lead your child Hey

Lead your child on Your child. Hey. Need your child on the home. On the home. Ladies and gentlemen, the men of Dr. King's fraternity, Alpha Phi Alpha. Thank you.. Go get it. Folks, we have a separate feed of this ceremony on the Black Star Network. So if you go to our YouTube channel, you can check that out. When you talk about where we stand, what is going on in this country, we continue to see the reality of the role that race plays, not just in economics, not just in politics, but also, of course, when it comes to sports.

Tonight, Final Four takes place. South Carolina is playing Texas. You've got UConn playing USC. These teams are battling. And remember last year, you had lots of drama last year going on where everybody was focusing on Angel Reese as well as Kaitlyn Clark. And oh, white America was just enthralled. Ratings were through the roof. Folks were cheering on Kaitlyn Clark as she broke the NCAA record for most points, Division I record for most points ever scored in a career. Well, former NBA player Etan Thomas, he wrote a piece and he said, hey, what's going on?

You've got some amazing players this year, Paige Buechers. You, of course, before she injured her knee tore ACL. You had Juju at USC. All this was happening, and Etan said, why isn't white America just rallying around Paige like they did Caitlyn last year?

Race is always at the forefront. Etan Jones is right now. Etan, glad to have you back on the show. So you say that the difference is Paige Buean, glad to have you back on the show. You say that the difference is Paige Buechers doesn't have a black villain this year. Yeah, and I guess that kind of run a nerve with a lot of white people.

It was really clear that they made Angel Reese the villain after she beat Kaitlyn Clark, who was really kind of held up as the great white hope. She's a fantastic player. But then the media kind of went into this narrative

of a villain. And that's what happened. I mean, it's not something that I made up. You know, you're looking at it where the viral image of Angela Reese doing the waving her hand in front of her face, that went everywhere. And the outrage was just off the charts.

And so then, you know, following the next years, Andrew Reese was always the villain in anything that she did. And Caitlin Clark was praised. That's just what happened. So when I posed the question of why, you know, Paige wasn't really given the fawning over that Caitlin Clark was, I went through a few scenarios. You know, Paige has been outspoken.

She used her ESPYs award to really credit black women. You know, she doesn't have an Angel Reese factor. You know, and the fact of the matter is that a lot of the fans, not all of them, you know, but a certain demographic of fans were there for the wrong reasons. They came over to really celebrate Caitlin Clark's whiteness, not so much her talent. And it was definitely apparent. I mean, you heard all year WNBA players were saying that they were getting attacked and, you know, racially attacked and, you know, racially attacked and, and, you know, at the, at the,

at the arena, you know, online and everything like that. That aspect wasn't there with page. Now she's a wonderful player. She's probably going to be the number one pick, but I wanted to know why isn't that demographic, you know, rallying around page. And I gave a few scenarios why, and that didn't make a lot of people very happy. And, of course, that transferred to the WNBA, where record numbers were turning out. And

what you had was a Kaitlyn Clark playing in Iowa, flyover state, Midwest, all those things. And many of these white conservatives were pouring their views into her, thinking she was, quote, one of them, thinking that she was MAGA. Well, when she, as you said, when not only with the ESPYs, but also when she got named, you know, a person of the year with Time magazine, and she talked about the impact of black ballplayers. No, they're not hating me. We're not fighting. All those sort of different things.

You literally had these white folks who turned on her and she was like, yo, it's all about basketball. And so here you got Paige coming from Connecticut, but also she's got black folks in her life. And so your whole deal was,

hey, these things are there. People got mad. Fox News quickly picked it up. And that's when a lot of the hate started coming your way. Oh, goodness. You know, once Fox News picked it up,

it was interesting because it was like, you know, I saw one thing that said that I wrote a racist article. I'm like, wait a minute. How can you be racist to say why aren't you cheering this white girl

as much as you cheer this other white girl? Like, I don't know if people know what racist means. You know, I don't use that term correctly. But no, I mean, it's—Page is a phenomenal player. I think that she should get a whole lot more recognition. But a lot of the people that were there, that demographic was there for the wrong reasons. Another telltale of that was Caitlin Clark repeatedly had to ask

for her not to be weaponized. And she spoke out against racism and spoke out against bigotry because it was so prevalent. It was happening all over. And every time she did, you know, you saw that, oh, she's giving in to the woke mob and doing all that different things.

There's a certain demographic that uses that language. So, of course, that's not all Caitlyn Clark's fans. I'm not saying that at all. But that demographic was sure there, and they boosted ratings, and they were there for the wrong reasons, and they were weaponizing her no matter how many times she asked them not to.

It is quite interesting when you touch that nerve. And they don't want to admit it, but we saw what was taking place. And those of us knew. And you know what? There were a lot of people who, oh, I think she's getting too much attention. I disagreed. Bob Lott is when you break the all-time record, you're going to get that level of attention.

I had no problem with her coming in. And all of a sudden, the new TV contract rating is going up. To me, I said it was the same thing when Tiger Woods came into golf. And what I was saying to some players who were complaining, I was like, I need y'all to shut the hell up. It's a whole bunch of folk who did real well when Tiger came in, so I didn't see that as a big deal. But the reality is race was present.

But it's a little bit different with Tiger Woods. So when Tiger Woods came in and broke the barrier, so yes, we all got excited to see somebody that looks like us, you know, dominating the sport where you typically don't see that. That's fine. You know what I mean? When Daniel Osaka came in, yes, the same thing. That is fine.

The problem is with Kaitlyn Clark, then you began to bash Angel Reese. Then there was like this hatred towards the other players, the black players. Then there was like, oh, well, they don't mean there's this disrespect, this constant like if Kaitlyn Clark invented basketball. And it was like, was like wait a minute now you know what i mean that's you shouldn't be disrespectful to the other players and it's not something i saw a lot of media people you know kind of reducing it to saying mean tweets or you know you know something like that but no they would have reacted differently if it was their

daughters or wives or something like that who were on the other side of, you know, racist attacks. And that's the way the WNBA players describe them. Not just simply mean tweets or fans saying boo or something like that. Literally racist attacks. So that's the difference. It's fine to cheer for somebody that looks like you, but when you demonize someone else and all the other players, then that's when it's different.

Questions from up here. Tylek, you're first. So great to meet you. I think, you know, it's clear that race plays a role in how athletes are perceived. Do you believe the story romanticized because that Caitlyn was from Iowa and they're trying to say because UConn is such this, you know, this team to be, to compete with, that it made it a little more difficult for the other story to be told. Personally, I think if, so when Caitlyn Clark spoke out and spoke out against racism, you saw a lot of them get upset with

her. When she liked the tweet, you remember when she liked the tweet from Taylor Swift and the tweet was something with... It was regarding Vice President Kamala Harris. Right. And you saw how upset they got. Ooh, they were pissed. That tells me that it wasn't about

where she was from. They were trying to weaponize her and make her something that they wanted to make her as a symbol. So, you know, I've heard a lot of people say that, well, you know, it's the location or, you know, how many points she scored. I was like, okay, that's fine. But if that was the case, then you would have been upset of her liking a tweet. You wouldn't be upset of her denouncing racism. Indeed. Cameron.

So glad to be on with you, Etan. UConn women's basketball is home to arguably probably, if not the greatest, two or three or four of the greatest WNBA and basketball players with Maya Moore, Diana Taurasi, and Sue Bird that all come out of that lineage. So UConn has had such a spotlight on them. But coming out of last year with the Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese, do you feel that, I know with Juju going down with that unforeseen and tragic injury and so forth, Was that something that you felt was being set up again

because they saw that play work before, kind of the white, black, the couple different parts of the country? And maybe there is no foil for Paige to really be pitted against in kind of the national media? Oh, 100%. You know, I think that the way that Andrew Reese was demonized, she talked about having death threats.

You know what I mean? It's not just mean tweets or people booing her. She talked about literally having death threats. She said it happened all the time after she was demonized. She was demonized so much where, and it was interesting, when waving the hand in front of the face, Caitlin Clark had done the same thing the game before that. She and they all thought it was cute.

She was on like a little commercial waving her hand her face and everything was fine. But then when Angel Reese beat her and she did it then she was demonized. She was unprofessional. She was all these different things ghetto. She was, you know, all these things happened, and they drew the line in the sand, like in bright red MAGA ink. And it wasn't, you know, it's not a stretch

to be able to see what happened. So then from that point on, you know, one was demonized and one was put on this pedestal. And it's not any fault of Kaitlyn Clark. Kaitlyn Clark didn't do anything to, you know, she actually spoke against this all the time. It's that demographic of fans that wanted to use her that way were the issue. Michael.

Hey, Eaton. So in reading your article and remembering back to when Angel Reese, the two years when she was battling against Kaitlyn Clark. Do you think here it's possibly also a lack of a rivalry, a lack of a rival in general that will draw the attention of spectators, especially those who may not normally watch college women's basketball. The reason why I say that is because I remember when LSU won one year, defeated Iowa, and then you had the rematch, right? For a lot of us, even though I do understand the races out there, and I do, I think race

was part of that, but for a lot of us, it was just like a rivalry. It kind of reminded us of magic and bird. And I'm from Michigan, okay? It reminded us of magic and bird as well. So do you think—hold on, Roland, let me— So do you think in this situation with Paige Buecher, part of it— I do understand racism is an element of that. But do you think that part of it is lack of a rival that draws the attention of spectators? Okay, hold up.

First of all, Michael, do you watch women's basketball? No. So you watch women's basketball? WNBA, I watch a little bit. Okay, all right. No. So did you watch Iowa play LSU, did you watch Iowa play LSU? Yes. Why?

Why? Because of the rivalry. Okay. For me, it wasn't a black-white thing. No, no, no. It was a rivalry. Okay, so for you, it was a rivalry. It was a rivalry and it got a lot of attention. Here's the reality. Here's the reality. We can talk

about the Magic-Bird rivalry. That was race. Were there people who watched that because they wanted to see two hoopers? Absolutely. But the reality, first of all, Boston, damn, their host thought in five was black. Okay? But the reality is. I remember.

But the reality is that was positioned as Larry Magic. That was them in the finals of the NCAA, and then you go into the NBA. The reality is that was a racial dynamic to it. Anybody who follows boxing, one of the most highest, I think it's still the highest bets placed on a fight was what? What was it? Anybody know?

Which one? Well, there's been a few of them. It's only one we're talking about. A white dude and a black dude. Floyd and Conor. No. No. It's a white dude and a black dude No, no, no. So why do it in the black dude?

Go back to Jack Johnson. No, George Coney. Now it was it was Coney. You know, Jerry Coney. Jerry Coney and Larry Holmes. Right. Yeah, that was a white man. That was a white black dynamic.

So the point so the point he Tom's talking about is it again with box and Tommy Morrison came on, they were hoping he was going to be the great white hope. So what Etan is laying out is the white-black dynamic. White guy, champion. The black guy, villain. However they play it, that dynamic is always played. And even if they don't characterize, to your point, Magic Larry, Magic wasn't the, quote, villain.

In Boston, he was. In L.A., Larry was. Black, white, was there. I'm from Houston, and Etan, though the documentary shows it. If you were black in America, 9.9 out of 10, you were cheering for Magic. And if you were white,

9.9, you were cheering for Larry. And if you were black in Boston, you were cheering for Magic. And if you were white, 9.9, you were cheering for Larry. And if you were black in Boston, you were cheering for Magic. Right. Like I said, I do realize there is a racial component to this. But for some spectators... No, no, no. But actually, Eton is

actually making your argument. What Eton is saying is that Angel Reese was made out to be the villain. She's black. I understand that. You had Caitlyn Clark. What's the difference this year? He's literally saying, you don't have

the racial dynamic because you don't have the villain. The villain was not created, and unfortunately, the villain is always, in his dynamics, it's going to be a black, white thing. That's what, so, and what you're laying out, Etan, is that the role that media plays because the racial dynamic in media drives this too. Right. But I was posing another question though, but go ahead, Etan, go ahead. I may do a follow-up. No, no. I definitely hear what you're saying. And I wasn't saying that everybody fell into that category.

There was that strong demographic that was there for that reason. And that reason only because they weren't fans of the, of women's college basketball. They weren't fans of that. At all. They didn't know anything about anything else. All they knew was Kayla Clark and her whiteness. That's it. And that's what they were there to celebrate. And they didn't care about any of the players, any of the teams,

of the history, of, you know, anybody's even records. And it was interesting as you saw the dynamic play out during the season. And it was really frustrating to see even some black media people kind of buy into this where they use

weaponized language um i think it was uh carrington who fouled caitlin clark one time and they said it's like she poked her in the eye or something like that right and i saw and they were saying she stabbed her in the eye she was mugged i up. I was like, whoa, wait a minute. Stabbed her? Why that language? And they're using it for a specific reason. They were holding Kaitlyn Clark up as the delicate white flower that all the other mean black

players were trying to hurt and to harm, and they had something against her, and we have to protect this delicate white flower. That's the way the media created it. Now, no, Kaitlyn Clark didn't say that. You know, she did a good job of saying, no, it was just a foul. It was nothing like that.

But she had to constantly fight against that because that is the dynamic, the racial dynamic that the WNBA was playing on because they knew why a lot of the people were there. The new fans, because that helped their revenue. That helped the views. That helped everything else. So it benefited them. So the WNBA kind of allowed all that to happen.

They didn't really squash it the way that they could have. And the way that you hear the descriptions of the crowd and the fans actually in Indiana, in the arena, it was horrible. They could have squashed that with the security and everything like that. They allowed it to happen. And Eton, the other reason why

it's so hilarious is that you had white WNBA stars. But here's the other element nobody wants to deal with. The other thing is, they also didn't like the white WNBA stars. But here's the other element nobody wants to deal with. The other thing is, they also didn't like the white WNBA players because they were lesbian. Even though

you had some of the white women who was the white woman with the aces who was married to the NFL player with the Giants. It was like, yeah, whatever. So really what you had here, and this is also the dynamic because when she goes from college to the pros, why you had that.

But what you had is, and we just have to, look, it's a reality, okay, for years. What was the whole thing about Johnny Carson? Johnny Carson, he appeals to Omaha. He appeals to the Midwest. Everything was the Midwest. Everything was the Midwest. And people don't even understand how that whole thing played on the psyche. Even today, they go, the flyover states.

You know, I'm country holds the Midwest up as the pantheon of what it means to be an American. People watching may not even realize that in the radio business, in literally taught people, white and black and others, you need to have a Midwest voice. A Midwest voice was devoid of an accent. So you couldn't sound like you were from New York or from Boston or from Georgia or South Carolina or North Carolina or Texas or California. No, the optimum voice was the Midwest sound. And I remember when I worked in Dallas, Jack Hines, yes, I called his name, was the news director at KRLD Radio.

We're in Dallas, and he calls me to his office, and he says that I need to work on my voice because I have an accent. He says I sound Texan. I'm looking at him like, the fuck you talking about? We in Dallas. And we had a dude who did, his name was Harvey Shepard. He did the Bond report.

I'm like, his ass need a voice coach. And Jack Hines' whole thing was learn the Midwest voice sound. So what do we do in this country? It's the Midwest, the Midwest. So what you're saying here is that Caitlin Clark was so embraced by conservative white America because here she is, white woman, dominating in this sport where black women dominate. Number one score.

She's from Iowa, the cornfields. She's a heterosexual. More than likely, she's one of us. She's MAGA, wearing a Make America Great Again hat. We're going to rally behind her. And your point, as she would say, they would say something, she ain't one of us. She ain't one of us. hat. We're going to rally behind her. And your point, as she would say, they would say something,

she ain't one of us. She ain't one of us. Lord, if she had come out as lesbian, they would have asked, they would have lost their mind, Etan. They were attacking WNBA players who stood up for Black Lives Matter,

who stood against, they were attacking the black ballplayers in college who took knees as well, and they said the great white hope has arrived, and that's where they were holding up as this epitome of greatness. Oh, my God, she's the greatest ever, and no, we never heard of Cheryl Miller.

Right. Or Shemeika Holtzclaw, or, you know, a whole list of others. Or Candace Parker, or Maya Moore, or Lynette Woodard, and we could go on and on. It was like, whatever, we don't care. It's all Caitlyn. Right, all Caitlyn. And so Paige, you know, in her, when they're looking at her,

especially after she gave that ESPY speech, you know, in her when they're looking at her, especially after she gave that ESPY speech. You know, before that, you know, she was, if you go back to her freshman year and the stats that she put up, I mean, she won the player of the year. You know what I mean? Right. She was really dominating. But she wasn't from the cornfields of Iowa.

Definitely wasn't. But after that speech, a lot of them backed off of her. There you go. You didn't hear them cheering for her as loud. They wasn't praising her after that speech, a lot of them backed off of her. There you go. You didn't hear them cheering for her as loud. They wasn't praising her and everything like that. So then people say, okay, well, she got injured. Okay, she did get injured, but then she came back. So a comeback story from an injury, you know, if they wanted to praise her,

they would. She's going to be the number one pick in the WNBA draft this year probably. If they go on to win the championship was there's a strong chance that they can, right? And, and you're going to tell me that she's not worthy of being like cheered and praised and all of that thing because of the way that she's dominating where she's playing. So then I said, okay, so let's look at some other reasons.

Why, you know, I saw that she was actually, what was she doing? She was waking up at 5 o'clock in the morning to cook breakfast for her Muslim teammates during Ramadan. You know, that's not something that they're going to wrap their arms around. You know what I mean? I mean, it's interesting when you see her personality and how outspoken that she is, not just at the Estes, you know, all the time. It doesn't seem like she's one of them. So that's the part where I say, okay, this looks like this is a reason why it's different. And a lot of white people didn't like hearing that.

Listen, the reality of whiteness in America is truly astounding. It really is. Etan, glad to have you on the show, Dot. And I'm sure your email box and social media DMs can tease me, Phil, with white hate. I'm sure. I appreciate it. Thanks for

having me on. Appreciate it. Thanks a bunch. Hey, y'all. Diddy is facing additional criminal charges weeks before his trial begins. Federal prosecutors in Manhattan have now added two new counts to his case, one for sex trafficking and another for transporting someone for prostitution. This brings the total number of federal charges against him to five. The government claims that Diddy's infamous freak-off parties were not just wild celebrity gatherings filled with lots of baby oil,

but were instead highly orchestrated sex events where women were allegedly coerced and in some cases forced to participate. Prosecutors assert that behind the fame lies a darker operation involving abuse, intimidation, and exploitation. Diddy's legal team maintains that he's an innocent man and that all activities were consensual. He continues to plead not guilty to all charters. He's in custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn with jury selection for his criminal trial set to begin on May 5th. Comedian Bill Burr has been ripping Elon Musk and Donald Trump left and right. He had a moment on the red carpet that we thought was quite funny while celebrating Conan O'Brien getting the 2025 Mark Twain Prize Ceremony at the Kennedy Center in D.C. Burr was a little irritated when these reporters kept asking him

about his support of Luigi Mangione, the, of course, person who was accused of killing the UnitedHealthcare CEO. They also were asking him about all other sorts of things. And he was kind of like, you know what? Y'all are really getting on my nerves with these dumbass questions. What was your reaction to Luigi Mangione? I was reading up, you know, that perhaps he's been supportive of what he did. What is your take on that?

If you're reading up, I don't think you read up on it. Because I said what I felt about it, and I said what a lot of people said. Some people took it that way. So could you clarify what you think? No, I'm not going to just have some controversial moments and get clicks. I'm not doing that. I'm here to vote for Conan. I'm not doing all of this.

What are you going to bring up next? The Middle East? I went to summer school three out of four years in high school. I'm not qualified to talk about this. I was just going to warn you. You said about Elon that he was ruining Earth, I saw on The View. You're critical of him. What do you think of all the boycotts?

Like, even the violence that's going on in high school. I don't watch the news. I have no idea what's going on. I watch Instagram. I watch people wipe out on motorcycles. I watch lions and hyenas fight each other. This is the things that I do. And I don't think you should be asking a comedian. You're a journalist. Well, comedians are on top of current events.

No, no. That's weak. That's you guys passing the buck. You guys need to have balls again, which you don't. You guys always go, should we be thinking this? Duh. You guys present stuff like that. You guys have balls. You need to get your balls back. And it's not my job. I am a dancing clown. Get your balls back. See, Cameron, here's why I think that was fascinating and why it was so good. And that's because he's right. I am, the problem that we have now, we are now, people

are so stupid today. And yes, I'm going to use stupid. People are so stupid today that they are going to comedy concerts thinking they are going to fucking lectures.

They are showing up at comedy clubs, listening to comedians riff on what's happening in current times and sitting here going, I really don't think that should be your perspective. You should be weighing in on that because you're actually wrong. It's a comedy show. They are making fun of, light of. The problem that we have in this society is that we are looking

to comedians entertainers musicians and singers as fucking policy experts as opposed to listening to somebody sing, listening, watching a movie, listening to a comedian. Now, when somebody decides to go into a whole different phase, I get it. When Bill Burr or Dave Chappelle or someone else, when they are in on a television show, on a podcast, whatever, they are being funny.

They are being comedians. They are making light of. But this is just insane how we now are looking to comedians as if they are U.S. senators. Yeah, it's a shame. I'm a huge, huge Bill Burr fan, and I was enjoying his most recent stand-up special.

And I listen to his podcast pretty regularly, and he talks about it. I'm actually happy that somebody pushed back on these red carpet moments when a lot of celebrities have to go through that little laundry list of outlets. And he came back with something that was both funny, true, and poignant. I think it's just, it more so points to kind of the lack of leadership people see. And also that lack of that education is that we're only looking at entertainment almost for everything. We need to go to entertainment to learn stuff. We need to go to entertainment to be entertained. We're going, we're going there to how we should think what we should be saying. Um, I think the freedom that comedians need to be able to make something funny. That means sometimes you have to defend a comedian where you don't like the joke. Um, but the, the freedom that they should be able to have

to be able to hone their craft, to be able to find their audience and make somebody laugh uh shouldn't be infringed upon and i'm so so glad that he as as like it's easy to say that when you're up and coming comedian bill burr is arguably arguably the biggest current like active stand-up comedian out there maybe next to a kevin hart or dave chappelle and for him to use his platform to push back on what people are trying to do and then shine a light on the polarization of media and politics, I thought was quite entertaining. So even though we don't look to comedians for that, he actually, in that moment, both made something funny and made another poignant point and insight into society. I just, Tyler, I just think,

I just think people are idiots today. I mean, we're going to, we're going to comedy shows and you shouldn't make fun of that group or that. The hell are you talking about? That's what comics do. They make fun of everybody. It's like, really? To me, that's the problem. But what's driving me crazy, and see, this is why, for me, this

is why when it comes to Bill Maher, I'll say Bill Maher's full of shit. Because see, what Bill Maher wants to do is, Bill Maher wants the best of both worlds. Bill Maher wants to have serious conversations, policy-driven conversations with policy people, but then wants to say, oh no, I'm just making jokes. Why y'all making a big deal?

Don't cancel me. No. When you choose to cross the line and go from comedy to policy, that's a different deal. Okay? But when you're talking about a comedian, yo, you make the jokes. I don't care. Okay?

Listen, I don't like the N-word. Comedian uses it. I know what they're doing. But guess what? You're not going to call me the N-word offstage. Ain't going uses it. I know what they're doing. But guess what? You're not going to call me the N-word offstage. Ain't going to happen. I understand that. I just think that what has happened is we are now, and this

is why I hate, and he's right, these dumbass media people. That's why he says, what are you going to ask me next? About the Middle East? What are my views on it? That's the problem. We are looking to comedians for their take on economic policies between Russia, Ukraine, China, South Korea, North

Korea, and the African continent. That ain't what they do. Yeah, absolutely. I would agree. I would think that a lot of folks are becoming oversensitive, I mean, especially in things. And I think we see that throughout time. I think Burr has really known for being honest and being anti-establishment at that. And so to see his reaction, I think it's normal. And I think even as Cameron pointed out, the polarization of what we see, like polarization being equal to engagement and outlets are using the outrage from stars and celebrities to kind of create these moments that really kind of sensationalize what's happening in real time. These are serious issues. We have to learn the separation.

I also think it's a double-edged sword. We understand the importance of a person having a platform and speaking out on issues when needed. Also, there's a double-edged sword of having understanding of he's in comedy,

and this is his job. Yeah, it just drives me crazy, Michael, when news people... I don't know how many times you look at these shows and they're booking comedians, and so what are your thoughts on the tariffs? Now, if you're booking them to be funny, just to make light of stuff, I get it. That's why I used to trip when I was watching.

I'm like, Fox will have Dennis Miller on. I don't give a shit what Dennis Miller thinks about public policy. Who's that dumbass on Fox News, Titus, who was some wrestler, who's now a show host? I really don't care what he... You're sitting on Fox News holding a fucking wrestling belt, and you want me to listen to you about public policy? Nah, ain't gonna happen. Well, yeah, I feel the same way

when I see Charlamagne Tha God on the show talking about politics, or I saw Amanda Seals on MSNBC talking about politics. But they're radio people. Tom Joyner was a radio person. They're going to do that. But I'm just saying comedians, they make fun of stuff. They actually tell jokes and we're treating them like they are, you know, think tank CEOs.

Well, nine times out of ten, that may be the case. But looking at this piece from Huffington Post, it appears that the reporter was asking Bill Burr about comments he made on his December 9th, 2024 podcast. Not his comedy show, but his actual podcast. Right, but even on their podcast, they're cracking jokes. Yeah, but if you do this on, if you put this out, this is on his YouTube channel, because I just looked at this. So he said, quote, none of these news programs are talking about the incredible lack of empathy from the general public about this because of how these insurance companies treat people when they are at their most vulnerable. I love that effing CEOs are effing afraid right now. You should be. You should be. By and large, you're all a bunch of selfish, greedy, effing pieces of shit and a lot etc. So when you put something like this out on a podcast

out in public on your YouTube channel then if you have a reporter and you're on the red carpet to me, it's a fair question to ask you about what you said on your podcast. Not in your comedy show. I'm not

asking. I don't give a shit what a comedian has to say. I don't really give a shit what a comedian has to say. That's fine, but... That's what I'm saying, but I don't give a shit. On their own show. Right. I don't give a... But is this podcast...

Is it a podcast about a funny podcast? My point is, when I... Comedians do podcasts, they're comedians. They're not public policy people. What has happened is we have degenerated into a society where we are treating a comedian the same way we do an analyst or a think tank person or elected official. And I think he's right. I believe that's the mistake. If I'm on that red carpet and comedians are coming by, if I ask them a political related question, I'm looking within the crack of joke about it.

I'm not looking for an in-depth, an in-depth breakdown analysis on Trump's tariffs. I'm not. But this isn't Trump's tariffs. This is somebody who. I know that. I understand that. So if you if you talk about this on your podcast, this is out in public. This is on his YouTube channel. Okay? So if somebody asks you about what you said in your podcast, and then you try to deflect as opposed to answer. Now, if he was just playing, then he would say, hey, well, that's my funny podcast. I was just playing, et cetera. But I don't see anything wrong.

You've been in the media longer than me because you're older than me, but I've been in the media 15 years. I've done hundreds of interviews. So if somebody puts something out on it, I interview comedians, entertainers, directors. But if somebody has something on their podcast about a murder, okay, about a murder, and then I ask them about what they said, you know, don't flip out on me because this is what you said. Now, if you want to say you were playing. I'm still going to say flip out on me because this is what you said. Now, if you want to say

you were playing... I'm still going to say flip out. Because see, here's the deal. I'll give you a perfect example. Khaled Muhammad comes to Fort Worth, Texas to give a speech. This is after he is suspended by National Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan. And so here he's giving this speech. And so

I cover the speech. Alright. So we publish the story. I get called in the next day from the editor and she's And so I cover the speech. All right. So we publish the story. I get called in the next day from the editor, and she's like, I don't understand. We have a problem. I'm like, what's our problem? She says, well, she goes, she literally like, well, here's your story, and here's the Dallas Morning News story. Well, the Dallas Morning News story, the reporter talked about where Khaled Muhammad said, I came here to pin the tail on the honky, not the donkey. He wrote about how they got searched.

He wrote about these different things. Not one item in his story did he write about what Khalid Muhammad actually said, what the focus of his speech was. My story didn't have any of that because you know what? I've covered nature of Islam speakers before. Of course you're going to get searched like you like the Secret Service or even more so that shit didn't mean anything to me and I said to her I said shit y'all need

to call his ass cuz he didn't write what the hell happened so they I said now there was is he was a white Jewish reporter I'm black and I literally said call his ass and tell him he did a shitty job. So the point here is this here. When you're talking about how do you operate as a journalist, your job as a journalist is to decide, would I want to ask somebody about something? And Bill Burr was absolutely right. They were looking for a clickbait moment.

It was News Nation and Newsmax. Those were reporters. And so I've been on red carpets. And the point I'm making is, I think what has happened in our society, in news media, we have elevated comedians, entertainers. It's no different during COVID. I'm watching CNN, and they literally are asking Magic Johnson and Doug E. Fresh about COVID in the black community.

I'm like, what the fuck are y'all doing? Where on this show, we had experts from Meharry. We had actually black experts. What happens in national media, what they have done is they don't want to have real substantive conversation with real substantive people. They'd rather just

bring in the entertainment piece. And so what Bill Burr is saying is, don't ask me that shit. I am a comedian. Go talk to somebody else who deals with this stuff. I totally get it, and I think he's right. We spend way too much time elevating what a comedian

said, a singer said, entertainer said, versus real people who know what the hell they're talking about. Okay, so in response to that, if that is the position that comedians who put out a podcast— Don't care.

—who talk about a murder on their podcast— Don't care. Because listen to this. It doesn't sound like he was joking. So if you don't want a reporter to ask you about what you said on your podcast and it doesn't appear that you're joking, maybe you should stay in your own lane and just tell jokes and don't deal with politics. Nope, guess what he did? He answered the question the way he wanted to answer the question.

He's like, whatever. And then what did he say? Nope, we ain't doing... What did he say? We're not doing that. You want clickbait. Then he said... Then he said, what are y'all gonna... Then he said, what are y'all gonna ask me next about the Middle East? And again, what has happened is

comedic audiences, some people, as well as the general public, we have now said to comedians, we're going to take the things that you say on stage seriously. This wasn't on stage, though.

Follow me here. That is a stage. It's a platform. And what I'm saying is we have become a society and news media that treats comedians like they are someone else. And what I'm saying is he's right to say, no, I'm not

answering your question. It is clickbait. I just think that, Cameron, the thing is what has happened is the mistake that we keep making is we, and then what will happen is we'll devote a significant amount of time on these, Cameron, the thing is, what has happened is, the mistake that we keep making is, we, and then what will happen is, we'll devote a significant amount of time on these, well, on the mainstream people, I won't, to this stuff, as opposed to

somebody that's real, never gets any attention. I'm spending another 60 seconds on this and I got my guests waiting. Go. Cameron? Real quick, I will say this. As a counterpoint to that, sometimes when we do have comedians and entertainers speaking on these issues, often that is times where the entry point into an issue for some folks, people who may not be focused on the news, may not be watching the

CNNs or the Roland Martins or the Black Star Networks, but when they see it on stage, they hear it on their favorite comedian or entertainer's podcast or platform, sometimes that's their way into an issue. So I will... Well, those folks need to learn how to use Google. But you can't expect... That's not what everybody's focused on. No, no, I understand.

But if there are people out there, if your source of news and information is a comedian, then you deserve to be dumb. No, I'm just gonna, I'm sorry. At some point, if an entertainer says something and you're like, hey, so and so said that, and I'm like, you ain't check that shit? You just running with it? Well, you know, I saw...

We have become so celebrity-driven that we push out real, real people. Let me do this here. Let me do this here. Y'all have been seeing this stuff going around and this is funny here because my next guest was

just living. When I sent her a text, she was just losing. I was like, oh, I got to have you on the show. Y'all seen all of these videos about 50-50 finance, who pays for what, stuff along those lines. This was a video. I personally think this was a skit. Okay, so this video right here, woman upset after her husband surprised her with a starter home he can afford instead of the dream home they talked about. Well, there have been other videos posted where, real videos, where a mother or father bought their child a car, and the kid rejected the car because it wasn't the car that they liked.

Then you have all these other videos where you have women talking about, well, I'm not going to sit. If a man is not paying my bills, then we can't get together. Well, if he wants me to go 50-50, well, I'm confused because if you're paying 100% right now, is it 50-50 cutting your shit in half? Well, my next guest was just so angry and upset because she says what this is doing is,

this is really screwing with people out here who don't understand finances, who don't understand the reality of relationships, and she was just so hot and bothered by this. I mean, I was cracking up laughing at her responses to me sending her these text messages that Seanan Curry was like, I got to come on the show. I got to come on the show and talk about it. She's a personal finance expert journalist out of Miami.

Glad to have you here. Why are you so ticked off with so many of these videos on social media that has all these people talking about 50-50? I think Gabrielle Union talked about she finally got over paying 50-50 and, you know, letting Dwayne Wade pay for a lot of stuff. Take it away. So, largely, I think what individuals who, and it kind of plays into what you were talking about before,

how you were just talking about essentially formulating your full opinion about something given to you by an entertainer, right? I think that is playing a large role in where people get information from. I'm particularly annoyed by that type of rage bait content, the 50-50 type of conversations, because I look at things like the CPI, which is the Consumer Price Index, right? You can look at things like statulation, where you're just looking basically at the cost of living is not keeping pace with earnings, right? There is a huge deficit there.

You hear individuals, even how you mentioned the child who gets a car. When you see the average car payment for a brand new car, it's $742. For an old used car, it's going to be $542. Do you think that at this particular time, while we are in this particular economic climate, that we should be spending an iota of time discussing who's going to pay what? Do you think from a social economic position that we should be berating each other about the size of a starter home? Is that really the conversation that we should be having at any time, but largely right now, while everyone else is consumed about drops in the stock market, while we're talking about tariffs. Yet the conversation seems to be to keep us largely very single and very, very broke.

So I do get very annoyed by the content. Well, it's a perfect example, okay? I mean, listen, we now have a proliferation of relationship shows, relationship experts, personal finance experts. I saw a video today from somebody who was a business coach and I was kind of like, what business did you actually run? And it was a joke.

I was kind of like, so you're the number one business coach. Okay, gotcha. So his was interesting. So when you have these people having these conversations and people are watching this stuff and they are going into relationships with these thoughts in terms of how things should be, in terms of what you should pay for,

who's paying for what, and stuff along those lines. And then it's, oh, well, if a man is dating me, then he has to pay all of my bills. Baby, that's marriage. I'm trying to think. How you been paying your bill before I got here? And things along those lines. And then, you know,

I remember this one video that was a woman, she literally left her husband because he lost his job and he couldn't continue to pay the bills. Like, damn, you just walked out. And what's happening is people are forming their views about personal finance based upon this.

When a lot of this stuff is literally illogical. When you talk about how do two people, how do a couple build wealth and handle finances? This ain't no I, my. It's supposed to be we, us, our. So I'm going to stick and stand by the statistics, right? That's the part that makes the conversation just more irrational. I think how the first video that you sent to me is one that you saw me commenting on, where the lady said she went on a date with a guy. I think the guy had to be an

engineer. And, you know, she asked him at the date, the first date, she wanted to know, you know, well, what are going to be your contributions to my life? And I actually, I really steer clear of rage bait as much as I possibly can. But I actually think that she was giving a real account of her actual dating experience per se. And I just thought, number one, okay, if you don't know this person, you've never met him. And I have sons, right? I have a 12 and a 14 year old that is slowly matriculating into the dating world. And imagine going out with a woman that you're just meeting and her, one of her dating questions is whether or not you're going to be making financial contributions to her.

I just thought this was ridiculous. The other part that makes it ridiculous in terms of just getting to know people, sometimes people ask me, well, Shawnee, do you think I should be asking someone on the first date their credit score? OK, so in the event that the person has an 800 credit score, let's say they have an 850, on what basis can you begin to use that information to decide that this person is going to be a fit for you?

Largely, right? So you know that they have a good credit score, so maybe they pay things on time. But unfortunately, that might be a predictor to how they might interact with you, but it's not the strongest one, right? You need some actual interactions. Also, just because, you know, couples, right, is how our predecessors were able to even build wealth through homeownership. So when you're looking at the average income, that average income, and this is from the statistics, rural and labor statistics, right? $62,000 is what the average

American brings in. I didn't break down the social economics as it relates to race, but typically just because of the amount of institutionalized racism typically is just going to be lower than what the typical standard is. So when you look at the average income for. Now, that's for that's for an individual. That's sixty two thousand dollars. That was for an individual. Yeah. You can look at the labor statistics of labor and you'll see that that is the average income for an American. So when you are largely not thinking, how can I combine myself, you know, so that I can, you know, become a six figure household, it's just a little ridiculous, especially to rate each.

A lot of the content is rage bait, which I also think is very, very harmful because you're watching and you're becoming emotional about experiences that are not actually happening. And then you're taking that concept into relationships. There's also the conversation where people continue to put themselves as the prize, right? I also think that that is just an injustice to begin to attach to yourself like as the prize, you know, like as if the other person is gaining something so strongly and then you're at a total loss and your buy-in is so great. Largely, I think in a relationship that

there's going to be some level of equilibrium tending on who's the prize. Maybe it's your birthday or something. I'm not really sure largely on how those opinions get formed. But that is the type of rage bait. That is the type of content that we are being fed, this hyper-independence at a time where we need to be focused on multi-generational wealth more than ever. We need to be buying property together. We need to take some conflict resolution classes, read some books so that we can live together. There's some other statistics that support that individuals, couples, families are now living with their families. So what that means is mom, dad is living with grandma and their two children, right? Typically, they're renting.

That conversation needs to move over to them owning so that they can live into that house for a period of time, maybe about three years, and then they can move into house packing, pull some equity out of the property. I'd like to see more conversations like that as opposed to the rage bait. It's just not functional. So you just say something like here's a perfect example. I'm going to the panel after this with questions. Perfect example. OK, so when you see all these conversations, here's a perfect example. I'm going to go to the panel after this with questions. Perfect example, okay? So when you see all these conversations, it's, oh, oh, the man, he got to pay for all of this. He got to pay for all of this. He's got to cover all of the bills.

And then it's like, well, my account and all this nonsense. And my sister, the older sister, she was talking about when they went to go buy a house, and the guy goes, oh, this is great. With your two incomes, y'all can get this level house. And I think it was like $400,000 or $500,000. My sister was like, pump the brakes, player. She said, we're going to buy a house based upon one income. So if anything happens with the other income, we're going to buy a house based upon one income. So if anything happens with the other income, we're good.

But the other thing there was, we're going to buy a house with one income, and we're going to sit here and save as much of your income and save and invest as possible, as opposed to this idea of your money, my money. And when you talk about this rage content, I think what it's doing is it's causing people to bring a single perspective into marriage, which is supposed to be we, us, our.

John Hope Brown was on Cam Newton's podcast where he said, he said, marriage is not addition. Marriage is multiplication. He said, it is not addition. Marriage is multiplication. He said, it ain't two plus two equals four. He said, it's two plus two equals 12. He said, you need a partner who can help you multiply your income. And so when you see a lot of these videos,

these people have no idea. So this whole, again, well, I'm gonna pay these bills. You're gonna pay these bills. As opposed to, no, what's gonna happen is we bills. You're going to pay these bills as opposed to no. What's going to happen is we're going to look at what we are making together. What's going to be our lifestyle? What do we want to save and invest? So when we hit 50, 55, 60, we don't necessarily have to work

because over the last 20, 25, 30 years, if you got married that young, then that's what you've done. You've not just spent all your money and you've lived a single life while married. Right. There, there's also this other statistic that should play in your, when you're looking at this type of rage bait type of content, even when it's even real, it's still kind of rage baiting in terms of just keeping you dollar delusional and constantly being financially distracted is the loneliness study. That would be a really good study to look at. One in three Americans are lonely, right?

So when you continue to feed into this rage-bait content and think that it's actually reality and this is the way that you should be forming relationships financially, in the long term, it's just not working for individuals. I also looked really closely at that particular statistic when it got into loneliness. It was also centered within the space of income. So those that was locked into that average income of $62,000, they were more likely to be lonely at 79% citing their loneliness. So overall, this particular content, whether it's being rage bait

or it's actuality, it's not functional in my everyday life where I have been working in the arena of personal finance for the last 15 years. That's not what I'm seeing. Here's what I'm actually seeing. Just this week alone, I was working with one of my clients. Both of the individuals are educators. So maybe you got an income of about fifty thousand dollars each individual right uh currently the wife is now going to be taking on all of the expenses in the household so that the husband can go to medical school hold on oh wait wait wait hold on hold on hold on i want you to just run back you just said though so the husband is going to go to medical school.

The husband is in medical school. He's currently enrolled. He's been there since January. So largely our conversation is about, Shawnee, how am I going to maintain the amount of debt that I'm taking on? And the whole lot, wait, wait, wait, hold up before you go there. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, before you go there.

But you said the wife is going to be paying all of the bills. Yes, she is. Now, to your point about that rage bait content, Lord, these folk will be going crazy if they said that. Now, explain why you, sitting down with this couple, why they made that decision to for her to say, I'm going to use my money I made to pay all the bills while you do this. Right. So largely they were just seeing where they were locked in economically. Both of them are educators. So I guess they were starting to feel like, hey, this is this is all we can do.

This is going to be the max in terms of income. And if they're going to pick up more student loan debt, it would make sure that if they're going to pick up more debt, that it's also going to be an indicator of higher income. That's not the only one. I also have, and this one is even more so, it's like step out of this financial facade and step into reality where my clients are actually working together. I have an engineer, the wife is the engineer, the husband is an attorney. They were right at the brink of getting a divorce because one of the things that we lack within our community, because we have so much post-traumatic stress from institutionalized racism, and then we

don't know how to completely wash ourselves of our childhood. So all of those intersectors come in, and then we have an issue when it comes to marriage. But these two individuals, an engineer as well as an attorney, right at the brink of getting a divorce, they had already spent $10,000 separately, $10,000 separately, and they have not even made it to the divorce proceedings. This is just what's happening in the mediation back and forth with the attorneys. At some point, I meet with the wife because she is looking at the amount of debt that she's coming into. I said strongly, right? If you're looking at the amount that you are spending, this is before you get a divorce. I would definitely like for you to get some hardcore therapy before you completely rid yourself of this marriage.

They have completely, you know, started getting back together. They've gotten themselves into therapy. We're talking about two six figures that's getting ready to split. out of like the rage bait space and then you step into reality where the more educated are preserving um their resources because it just makes sense financially as well as in terms of like your mental health then we're actually working together last one this would be the last couple these are the individuals couples that i work with where both of the individuals, and I find those that make less money tend to work better together financially. They don't have to make as many financial decisions. And because they make less, let's take two individuals. One may be a postal

worker. One may be working, you know, and they may drive trucks. They may drive, not truck drivers, because they are six figures, but maybe a, not truck drivers, because they are six figures, maybe a bus driver. And these two individuals are working together economically. The conversations when I'm working with these couples are less strained. They're not as argumentative. They're not fighting about money. They're more willing to work together to see how they can preserve what it is that they're able to save. So in just a reality space where people are actually using marriage and relationships to generate, maintain, create, and sustain wealth, it's not the rage-bait content that we're seeing online.

It's just not real. All right. Well, since he always is trying to throw out how young his ass is, let me go ahead and start with the youngest damn panelist, Tyler. Go ahead. I love this conversation. I first want to say I think it is centered in the relationship is centered in togetherness. And whatever makes you happy, you do what you got to do. But I have to say, for God, love of the cheerful giver.

So if they want to give, if it's on their heart, allow them to give. But I just want to make that comment there. So, yeah, I think it's about what works for you. And love is about sacrifice. And if that sacrifice has to be on that financial end, and that's the decision that you all make, whatever makes you happy, whatever floats your boat. But like I said, God loves a cheerful giver.

I don't understand. What do you mean? Tyler, is there a question? See, I set it up perfectly for your young ass to ask a question of a personal finance expert, and then you want to come on here and sound like a 75-year-old damn deacon. Like, I love the cheerful giver.

I understand that, but we're talking about relationships and money and 50-50 and... So, bro, come on. My question would be, okay, so what if, like you said, you don't want to be in a situation

where someone is requesting or asking for something from you. What if you're stuck in a situation where someone's like, they have their parameters of where they want to date, and if the person's not meeting that, but the love is there?

Okay, so do you mean... Okay, so maybe let me help let me let me help me shine let me help the young and out let me provide some damn seasoning here so tyler perry did a video tyler perry had an interview and he said to the sister um he said uh he said uh ladies if you have a man who loves you, cares for you, respects you, treats you well, you know, rubs your back, rubs your feet, he said, but all he can afford is

to pay the light bill, he said, let him pay the light bill and you pay the rest of the stuff. Man, these sisters went off on him. Why I got this married down, why I got the date down? Why I can't have somebody on my level? And Tyler's response was, did y'all miss all the other stuff that I said?

And so that sounds like what Tyler was talking about. So what happens when you may want to date somebody or marry somebody, and the reality is they're not on your economic level. They can't pay for a vacation to Thailand and Tulum themselves, but y'all together can do things

together. How do you get people to see beyond the money and say, wait a minute, I'm trying to get with you for a multitude of reasons beyond your bank account. I think that's what he was trying to ask. I actually understood him.

At some point, he'll have to clarify that statement about God loves a true forgiver. No, he don't. No, he don't. Because he was trying not to ask a question. He was trying not to ask a question. I'd like to understand that. But separate from that, I do remember what it is that you're talking about. He was trying not to ask a question. I'd like to understand that. But separate from that, I do remember what it is that you're talking about where Tyler Perry was saying that. And I do remember the Internet largely being split, just being split in the space where the woman feeling like,

why would I have to lower my standards in order to be in a relationship? And I think that you have to look at your overall standards for being inside of a relationship. And if your only space of being in a relationship is economic, then I want you to begin to really and truly look at those loneliness statistics. I really do. Just the impacts that it's having on mental health, the impacts that it's having on physical health, it doesn't serve us well to continue to push this hyper-independence agenda. It doesn't work economically and it doesn't work for us physically. Now, when it comes to some of these individual standards in terms of how you interact with people, that's actually really important in terms of, you know, from how much you earn, do I like to communicate with you? You know, do we have a similar interest,

right? So oftentimes people think that or will suspect that someone at a specific income level may be limited in terms of what they may enjoy. So they will, you know, think that this would speak to incompatibility. Maybe it will, maybe it won't, but it really depends on the two individuals. I've seen that work out in so many different ways where sometimes the woman is the six-figure earner, and this was actually not a brown couple like you and I. It was actually a white family. The wife did earn six figures. The husband was a freelancer, so he was the one that predominantly cooked and cared for the child, the wife did. She did start to, she continued, persisted to refer to herself as the breadwinner. She continued to do that when we were working in the session. And I had to bring

her to the space of just recognizing that you did not need to overly state, especially to a man that's not making as much money as you to overly state that you are the breadwinner per se. I did have her to list what he was economically contributing to the marriage, to the relationship that was not financial. They are still together, by the way. But sometimes I think when people get frustrated in that conversation, it is about compatibility. Sometimes people think income is a way to reflect compatibility, but for some people, income is the only standard and largely they

don't end up very happy either because they have clients that are only married for money. Well, there are some people, the money is also power. And the reality is, historically, men have used being the breadwinner to establish dominance in a relationship. And that's one thing that you are seeing. Michael, question? Very quickly here, Shani. What advice do you have for single people who are looking for a long-term relationship, what advice do you have for them regarding having realistic expectations in the partner? Because a lot of our expectations are shaped by media, music, songs, movies, things like that.

And as we've been discussing, a lot of that is just totally unrealistic. You mean realistic expectations? She's a personal finance expert. So you mean within about money? Narrow that down. Yeah, within money, realistic, yeah.

Hold on, Michael. So when you say realistic expectations, Michael, do you mean like what she described, the teachers meaning, let's look at your career, let's look at, hey, trajectory, and so you may not have a career path that's going to take you from 50,000 if you're 34. By the time you're 55, you're going to be at 150,000.

Is that what you mean when you say? It can be career. It could be earning. It could be earning potential. Got it. Things of this nature. Shawnee, go ahead. I would say that, one, just discard most of the content that you see online.

Even if you think that you find it funny, it would be a good idea to start protecting yourself from some of that content. Because if you continue to see something, then you'll actually think that it's in reality. I think that it's really good for you to spend time with individuals within your family that are actually in a healthy relationship. I never said a perfect relationship, but I said a healthy relationship. I was surrounded around marriage. So it's a really just like a kind of standard within the space that I lived. My social economics, I would say probably the average income within that particular neighborhood was maybe about $45,000. And then we're talking maybe about, you know, 20 something years ago when I was inside of those particular neighborhoods.

But I remember seeing families. I remember seeing families and I remember seeing homeowners so those that are a single I would say that you need to have conversations with individuals that are actually married and get them to be vulnerable about the things that have worked really well and the things have worked really poorly get them to start talking about assets right get them to start opening up those IUL a lot online. Get to start looking at that and say, you know, can you explain this to me? Why do you have this for your wife? A lot of my clients come to me and the men that work with me, they care about their wives.

So when I'm online, it feels very shocking to me, right? My clients are often coming to me, Shnee, how much would it cost for me to get the max amount of insurance so if something happens to me, my wife doesn't have this as a challenge. So online is not really the best place to get information about relationships just because I'm looking at individuals

that are single, individuals that are married, and they're making decisions, and they're making it work. I don't know why they're pushing that agenda online. Cameron? When eggs are $8. Cameron? Thank you for this insight. I wanted to go somewhere a little different. There was a recent article that came out talking about how currently there are actually more African-American women, I'm sorry, more non black men and more non black people at Howard University and in our HBCUs than there are

actually African-American men. And we've seen how black women are some of the, I think the most educated class. And we understand like a lot of times that education has a correlation to to earning potential finances as as that goes. So it feels like we're on a on a trajectory where we're actually going to have more men, especially on black men who are going to be consistently in this generation and generations moving forward, probably less educated and therefore probably earning less than women. How do we combat that or how do we either whether it's reset financial expectations, because that online narrative, I think, continues to push forward. And as a person like myself, I'm still single, but a lot of healthy marriages in my family. So I fully believe in that and knowing a lot of my family none of my family married for money but now as as that as as we go into that right you can you can see

that like that we're actually it could get worse not better in terms of like the unrealistic or unmatched expectations financially that women may have of of men in the pool of men that are available, at least here in the States. Go ahead. Yes. So I can tell you that in terms of like the unrealistic expectations, just like that one video that brought us to this conversation, Roland, where the young lady was talking about she was dating an engineer. And, you know, if he's not going to be willing to, you know, at least start telling her how much he's going to be contributing to her life, you know, on date number one. Right. First of all, you can tell like the ridiculousness of it, because largely.

Right. Think about yourselves as men that largely probably earn money. or your mate or someone that you were taking seriously online, essentially bragging about whatever it is that you are financially providing for her, whether you providing for her is very easy or whether you providing for her is a strong challenge. When you think about really even the women who are positioning themselves for this idea of like hypergamy, even if someone was interested in particularly partnering, partnering with you, um, they're, they're turned off largely, right. They're now turned off because you know, you're, you're ridiculous in a way. Right. So in terms of bridging that particular gap, um, I do spend time with individuals, um, between that age gap of maybe about 20, 22 and 25. And they're some of the brightest, wealthiest children that I've ever met.

And it's probably not fair for me to call them children, but they are entrepreneurs. They are in the tech space and they are talking about marriage and they're talking about relationships. So I don't think that it is as far apart. I know what you're saying in terms of, you know, black women being more educated. And is that trajectory going to continue to go into that particular space with the with the younger generation? I'm seeing way more higher earnings because largely they are in careers where they are not playing around. That is the generation that is not going to college just to say they got a degree. Those individuals going to college, they're coming out as engineers.

They're coming out as doctors. They are coming out with those tech jobs, and they are creating income. So they're not really messing around. The interesting part that I'm not able to really speak on is because of the insurgence of this hyper-independence, what that's going to play out in terms of like building strong families. So I know that income is being created by those individuals, but I don't know how within the next 10 to 15 years with the amount of hyper independence that's being pushed onto us, even though they're making more income, even though baby boomers are going to transfer more wealth than ever before into the next generation.

I don't know if we're going to hold on to a lot of that capital and actually grow or if we're going to squander a lot of it in court towards divorce, you know, towards mental health challenges with the hyper independence and the loneliness studies. So I'm concerned. I'm not really concerned about that generation creating money, though. So you don't really hear me. So folks have to understand what she's talking about. It is estimated 10 trillion dollars in assets are going to be transferred. Now, that's mostly a lot of white folks. But the point is, $10 trillion.

You're going to have people who own businesses that their kids are not going to want to run. You're going to have folk who may squander that money as well. And so it's a lot that we have to think about when you start talking about money. Shani, if folks want to reach you, where do they go? You can find me on all social media space under Shani Curry.

Curry, just like the spice. And thank you so much, Roland, for giving me the opportunity to talk about personal finances as it relates to relationships because it's a family, it's a marriage. And that's how we create more wealth through strengthening our ability to resolve conflict repair and make some money together

and by the way when she talked about uh that one is going to be gone when they divorce them attorneys gonna get all that dough that that's that thing is either the attorneys or you're going to be you're going to need your i mean single people spending more money what are you going to do you're going to take it to you going to need, I mean, single people spending more money. What are you going to do? You're going to take it to, you know, Thailand? What is your sustainability plan, you know? Actually, I think what they're going to do is they're going to take it to not Thailand,

but they're going to go to Thailand so they can be cheerful givers. Oh, yeah, you can go to Thailand or you can go to some of those places where... Yeah, you can go to Thailand. Okay, Anthony, I need you to switch. You need to switch to Tilek. Come on.

Anthony. Anthony. Okay, you got to keep up. Oh, no, don't feed into it, Anthony. No, you totally missed the whole- Don't feed into it. Yes, yes. So if all y'all out there, y'all can give the money to Tilek,

and then y'all can then decide how y'all going to be a cheerful giver in giving the money away. Shani, we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much. All right. Thank you so very much. Folks, last, real quick, this just came in, quick breaking news here.

We've been covering the North Carolina race. The North Carolina appeals court, yeah, hardcore Republicans, these idiots actually ruled against Alison Riggs. She beat the Republican here. One of their fellow judges, Judge Jefferson Griffin. She beat him. And this three judge panel, the North Carolina Court of Appeals ruled that more than 65000 votes cast in that race must be recounted and verified. Talk about total, total BS. Now, the election board already made clear that wasn't the case, but this is a huge victory for the Republican in this particular race. Allison Riggs, she, of course, is the Democrat who actually won.

This is, give me one second, I'm going to read for you real quick. The statement that she actually released on social media. Give me one second. OK, let me go ahead and pull this up. This is the statement that she dropped today. Justice Alison Riggs released a statement. We will be promptly appealing this deeply misinformed decision that threatens to disenfranchise more than 65,000 lawful voters and

sets a dangerous precedent, allowing disappointed politicians to thwart the will of the people. North Carolinians elected me to keep my seat, and I swore an oath to the Constitution and the rule of law, so I will continue to stand up for the rights of voters in this state and stand in the way of those who would

take power from the people. So that, y'all, she beat him in November as a Republican. They're still trying to fight it. Remember, Republicans hold a 5-2 majority in the court. They want this seat to be 6-1. They want to take out Anita Earles next year, the sister, so they can have a 7-0

majority on the state Supreme Court. That is why Wisconsin's race on Tuesday was so important. Michael, thanks a bunch. Cameron, thanks a bunch. And the cheerful giver, Tylek, the youngest person on the panel, appreciate you being on the show as well. Y'all, thanks a bunch. Have a great weekend, folks.

We're going to close it out. But coming up at the end of the show, we're going to be airing April 4th, 1968. I talked to, over the years, a number of people who worked with Dr. King, who marched with Dr. King, who were close to him. And they all gave me their accounts of what they went through, what they felt, what they experienced on April 4th, 1968, the day he was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Zadonna Clayton, Ambassador Andrew Young, Reverend Jesse Jackson Sr., John Lewis, Eleanor Holmes Norton, a number of people. And so it is a fascinating, fascinating conversation.

And especially Zernona Clayton, who talked, I mean, just unbelievable talking about the days after her being in that one in that bedroom with Coretta Scott King taking calls from world leaders. And so it's a fascinating conversation. You're not going to find this anywhere else. Nobody else has this conversation. This is not going to find this anywhere else. Nobody else has this conversation. This is, pull the graphic up. We call this special April 4th. April 4th, no, guys, the graphic, that's not the other graphic. It's right there in remote one, the one in remote one. Okay, April 4th, 1968. The graphic, that's the special. And so we're going to have that for you in just one second. Don't forget, support the work that we do.

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April 4th, 1968. We'll always remember it as a day of infamy in America and the world. It was on that day at 6.01 p.m. Central Standard Time will always be remembered as a day of infamy in America and the world. It was on that day at 6.01 p.m. Central Standard Time, a shot rang out, assassinating the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as he stood on the balcony at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.

He died on the spot, later pronounced dead at a Memphis hospital. Riots broke out all across America. People were shocked and stunned. And so to this day, we still remember what happened on that fateful day when the dream was killed. I've had that opportunity to meet and talk with a number of people who work with Dr. King. when the dream was killed. I've had that opportunity to meet and talk with a number of people who work with Dr. King, and they share their thoughts and reflections on him, his life, his commitment to nonviolent and to African Americans, to peace,

but also to economic prosperity for our people. And in those conversations, I asked many of them about that day, where they were, what they were doing, and what they remember. Here are their stories. Earlier you talked about that particular night, April 3rd, 68. From your recollection, describe for you April 4th 68 well I can't give you a recollection because I have not I don't remember that day at all

the day I remember is the funeral and what I remember about the funeral is that lights cameras everywhere and it was hot. And I was on my mother's lap. I was a little restless. And during the middle of the service, they end up playing the piece where my father talks about his own eulogy at the end of the John Major Instinct sermon that he had delivered February 4th,

1968 at Ebenezer. Now here is the thing. A few days before, my mother was preparing me, and this is the part that I'm told, when she was preparing me to see my father laid out in the casket, she told me, when you see your father, first of all, your father is going on to live with God. He's, you know, a spirit. And when you see him, he won't be able to talk to you. Because she knew that whenever daddy came home, I used to run up in his arms and we'd have this kissing game. I do remember the kissing game. She didn't tell me about that.

And so here at the funeral, suddenly here's daddy's voice. And she didn't realize that she had told me, you won't be able to talk to you anymore. But I'm hearing his voice, even though he's not talking directly to me. I'm hearing my dad.

I literally, you know, there's probably film where I'm looking around, and she said I was looking like he was coming up out of the casket. That was very confusing for me that day. And then I do remember, I don't remember going out of the church. Yes, I do. I remember the casket going by. We get out of the church. Yes, I do. I remember the casket going by. We get out of the church, and then I fall asleep along the route that we walked from Ebenezer to Morehouse. I wake up at Morehouse, and your kids are just strange, the things we notice. So I'm looking up at the

stage, and it just looked like something was not angled right. It was like something was crooked, and that's all I remember. I don't remember speeches. I just remember my dad's voice at the actual funeral. I don't think anybody can comprehend what your life was like and that of your sister and your brothers and your mother in the years afterwards. Because you, this, this huge figure who for you is daddy, but for the rest of the world is, is this icon.

Talk about that. Having to go forward and he's not there yeah well it was it was tough for all of us in different ways for for me it was the incessant drive of looking for another daddy. It's like, can they be my daddy? So we had these photographers that were around a lot. And when I think about it now, it's like paparazzi. Growing up, we had a lot of photographers around,

but we had some after. And I can't remember if it was Flip Shulke or someone else, but at one point I said, can he be my dad? Because they were around so much. And it's interesting because kids don't really register color the same way that we do as adults. And so that was one thing. I was looking for daddy.

Uncle Andy became like a surrogate father to all of us. He was actually the only one who stayed around, really, out of everybody. Consistently came by to see us and everything. And then there was another gentleman, Bob Green. You know, Dr. Robert Green, who was an educator, worked in the movement in the latter stages. But they came around a lot. The other thing for me is that initially I was fearful that something would happen to my mom. So in the initial stages, I was like, please don't go.

Because when she would leave to go out of the house, out of town especially, I didn't know she would come back. So, you know, we had that kind of trauma. And my journey was probably totally different from everybody else's because they had, including Dexter, they had an opportunity to spend time with Daddy on the road doing some of the work. Dexter got to go with him to tour some areas of Mississippi. Martin and Yolanda, Martin went with him there as well, but Martin and Yolanda got to go on a couple of marches or so.

I didn't do anything. So I'm the child that is clueless as to whatever has taken place. So I'm trying to sort all of this out, and my mom is trying to hold it all together. And I don't know this personally, but what she shared, you know, even in her recent book that was published,

My Life, My Love, My Legacy, she talked about trying to pull it together coming out of that room because of that void, that emptiness. And Martin's in the bed right there next to her. And she had to do what she needed to do in that room before she emerged because she had to go into mommy role. She had to go into carrying the legacy role, building the King Center and all the work that she was doing. And I never saw my mother really cry cry she was just this strong figure um but she helped to try to

translate all of this for us and help us understand that our father made an important sacrifice for all humankind um and and i think that's what helped us ultimately because i went through my cycle of hating anger and still struggle a little bit with anger but I think because of the things she taught us along the way that she modeled it kept us because I mean what we went through and then my uncle the next year being found in his pool mysteriously and he didn't drown no water in lungs. He was there when Daddy was assassinated, so we're thinking something's connected. According to, you know, the accounts of Alveda and the brothers that...

Alveda heard him say, you know, I know you know something about my brother's... No, she heard her father say... I think she said, I know you know something, or that somebody said I'm coming after you. Oh, he said I'm coming after you or something. I can't remember. I don't want to get it wrong.

But the point is that he was mysteriously found in his pool. Then my grandmother gets shot. So we're dealing with, for me, in a matter of six years as a child, I'm trying to sort through all of this. So by 11 years old, dad is assassinated. Uncle's killed. Grandmother's killed. In six years. In six years as a child.

So I couldn't figure all of this out. And I didn't talk a lot as a kid so you can imagine I'm holding all of this in and my mother did in the early stages brought a psychologist in psychiatrist actually just to check on us to see if we were okay and they felt that we were okay the problem is they didn't come consistently and so we're carrying this stuff, processing this stuff. PTSD. Yeah. And we're being taught about love, about forgiveness. We're being taught by our grandfather, be thankful for what you have left when you gathered the family together. So, you know, I've had a lot of processing to do in my adulthood because we just kept moving. Mama kept us focused on the work, you know, the importance

of serving and giving. And, you know, I tell people today, you know, not only with anger, but I'm still trying as we have and we approach this 50th anniversary of his assassination. I've had a lot of emotional moments. It's almost like I'm not reliving. It's like, to a certain extent, I'm going through it fresh because I didn't get a chance as a child to really go through it in a way that I could process different stuff. And so for me, one of the biggest things that I've been dealing with throughout various seasons of my life is

having to share my parents with the world. I mean, that's just been tough. And going back through the the cycle of, wow, I didn't even get a chance to spend that mommy-daughter time. My mother, because it was not just my dad's loss. I lost because my mom was in the, I mean she worked within the movement, had a critical role you know advising him doing freedom concerts to raise money for the SELC, was a part of the peace movement herself before he even spoke out against Vietnam War, but she was there for my first five years. And then suddenly, my extracurricular activities seldom came. And so I'm having to process all of this now. And here's the assassination coming up because it brings all that back up.

That daddy was assassinated. Mommy had to shift. Everything associated with that. Having to do this publicly all the time, you know, you know, and it's tough. It is tough. For you. April 4th cannot be an easy date every year. How do you deal with that? Well, let me just tell you what I have. I first have to acknowledge the loss to my mother, her husband, and my siblings, our father.

That's the very first thing. That was a loss that cannot be replaced but then i look further and i have to gleam and understand that the nation gunnered a message and an understanding of a movement and that is i mean for example you know if dad had not been killed well probably we wouldn't be dealing with the things we're dealing with. First of all, we'd be at a different place. But had he been killed in a different way, it was the way, the trauma, the traumatic way that he was killed that I think makes his message, his movement even more lasting. I think it would have been lasting regardless, because Dad was just connected. I mean, I wish that I had that level of connection that he had, not just to God, but to the universe and to human service. I mean, you say something like,

if a man hadn't found serving worth dying for, he isn't fit to live. And you do it. You know, now, I may be willing to die for my child, my wife and my child, but I'm not ready to go. I mean, most of us are not. But you have to be very poignant and strong. You got to be willing to die for what you believe in. That's when people are very serious. You know, Jose used to say.

Jose Williams. I should say Jose Williams. I know, but for the folks who don't know. Go ahead. You know, he was looking at a picture, Dan, and Jose Williams was a complex man. He was a chemist, as you may know. But he was an agitator. He was, I mean, he had alcohol problems. He had all kinds of things, all kinds of flaws like we all do as human beings. And he

used to attack my mom. And so I was going over there to deal with him and say, now look, now look, you say you love Dr. King, and I'm sure you did, but you're always attacking my mom. Dr. King's vision wasn't about no bricks and mortar. It was about feeding folk. Well, all of that is included. So what you're saying is not quite right. But I never got around to saying this because he looked up at this picture of dad above his, and he said, you know, I love your dad.

I never met a man like him. He said he did two significant things. He conquered the love of wealth and the fear of death. I said, my God. Say that again. He conquered the love of wealth and the fear of death. Now, understand, when you don't really care about money, you know things are going to be all right. And you're not afraid to die. You won't stop them. And that's the kind of spirit that all of us need if we want to address

these critical issues today. Not being afraid of what people are going to say or who's going to follow us. Particularly if you know you're standing on justice. You're standing on the shoulders of great individuals because we've had great people in our nation's history and world. It didn't start with Martin Luther King. Martin Luther King Jr. certainly was one of our greatest of our time. But, you know, there have been great people going way back who did things with nothing.

I mean, go back to think about Harriet Tubman, who said she could have freed more folk if they knew they were slaves. I mean, we've had some, think about Frederick Douglass, I mean, the list goes on. Du Bois, you know, Booker T. Washington, the list goes on and on with so many. And the inventors. I mean, we don't really, as black people, honestly, we really don't truly realize who we are. We don't realize we were kings and queens and that civilization began on the African continent. Most of us don't realize that because we're taught negatively.

Now, I don't know what Black Panther is going to do the movie to change some of that because this has never happened. We've never had an almost all-Black African cast that is charted all past the numbers. I mean, that's phenomenal, quite frankly. Everybody's kind of focusing on Martin's assassination,

and I've been trying to figure out a way to help them to realize that he didn't go nowhere, that his body was buried, but his spirit is more alive now in more ways than any of us can ever imagine.

And I think I say that there's nothing that I've done that I did on my own. But that's the view we held about death. He was never nervous about dying in fact he he he almost put you into dozens talking about your death and uh he would he made us laugh at death uh to keep from getting nervous and he said look, look, you're going to die. Death is the ultimate democracy. And you've got nothing to say about when you die, how you die, where you die. The only decision you have is what is it you give your life for. And you can do that any day and every day because you know not the day nor the hour. And then he'd switch gears and say, but if your time comes, I know how sorry and trifling

you are, but I think on my good day, I could even preach you into heaven. And he would start preaching your eulogy, bringing up every trifling, ignorant, sinful thing that he could think of and asking the Lord to forgive you and let me in. And he made us laugh at death. And I came back to the motel, and they'd been eating catfish and, you know, telling lies, and everybody was feeling... I mean, this was the happiest I had seen him in years, because his brother was there, all of his friends were there, practically. And preachers know how to have fun when they get together.

And I mean, preachers have fun like preachers know how to have fun when they get together. And, I mean, preachers have fun like preachers have fun. Can't nobody else imitate that or understand it. Because, I mean, they're signifying with each other in Bible verses and all that kind of stuff. And, you know, they have their own language. And so I stumbled into one of those sessions. And, you know, he said, where have you been? I said, I've been in court. You haven't called me all day long. Don't you know I'm the head of this movement? You got to report to me. You think you got to. I said, hold on, wait a minute. You talking back to me? I said, look, what have y'all been doing in here?

See? And then he picked up the pillow and he threw the pillow. Well, I threw it back. See? And that was like the beginning of a free-for-all. And everybody grabbed pillows and they all beat me up. See? Well, it was fun.

But then somebody knocks on, Billy Kyle knocks on the door and said, my wife is cooking dinner for y'all, and she's waiting. And she's got it all set up on the table. And so he said, well, let me go put on my shirt and tie. And he went upstairs and put on his coat, shirt and tie. And he'd just come out and I said, look, it's still cool, you better get your top coat. And it was almost as though he was saying, I don't need a coat. And he sort of raised his head like he was testing the weather. And then the shot rang out. And we all gathered together after we came back from the hospital.

And we all decided that you can slay the dreamer, but we will keep the dream alive. Take me to the last conversation you had with him. When was it? Dr. King, was in mid-March, just before he went to Memphis. It was at Pasco's Hotel, a restaurant. He had been meeting with a group of rank-and-file members of organizations working with low-income or poor people. They were black, white, Latino, Asian American, and Native American. He wanted the Poor People's Campaign to look like America and he kept saying I will see you in Washington and he never made it to Washington the night that he was assassinated that

evening I was in Indianapolis in Indiana, campaigning with Robert Kennedy, working toward his nomination, the Democratic nomination for president. And when I heard that Dr. King had been shot, I didn't know his condition. When Robert Kennedy came to speak, he said, we have some sad news tonight that Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. So prior to him saying that, you didn't realize it. So when that audience found out, that's when you found out. That's right. When the audience heard the message,

I heard it at the same time. And I cried. And I said to myself, will we still have Bobby? So I went back to Atlanta and helped in preparation for the funeral. And stayed there for about two weeks. I got back in the campaign and went to Portland, Oregon with Robert Kennedy. Then I went on to Los Angeles. And I teamed up with Cesar Cervas. And we went to these wealthy neighborhoods and homes of primary white citizens, urging them to vote for Bobby Kennedy rather than for Humphrey or Eugene McCarthy.

Went to churches. We had an unbelievable motorcade through the city. And there was these black athletes like Raphael Johnson and the big guy. Rosie Greer. Rosie Greer. Trying to hold Kennedy in the car. And you saw hundreds and thousands

of people, especially in the African-American community, in the Latino community, rallying for Bobby. And he invited me to come to his suite that evening. And he joked with me. He said something like, John, you let me down today.

More Mexican-American turn out to vote than Negroes. And he was just joking. But I truly felt that when Dr. King was assassinated, I said, well, we still have Bobby. In less than two and a half months, he was gone. And I think something died in America with the death of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy. When I talked to Jim Lawson, I said, in the aftermath of Dr. King's death, what did you do?

He said, we went back to work. He said, we had work to do. He said he did not grieve until July. He said that's when he just broke down. Were you in the same place where there was still work to do, that there was no time to feel sorry and to mourn? Well, we were caught up in the moment. You had to continue to work.

We had a major national election coming up. So I didn't mourn that much, but every single day I thought about Dr. King. Matter of fact, I went back to Atlanta between the campaigning effort and trying to support others. And my doctor said, you need to rest. And made it possible for me to go to the hospital and just rest for about two weeks. And then I got back on the road, supporting local candidates, trying to get people registered, turn people out to vote. Became a delegate to the Democratic Convention.

I was a junior bond. We were supporters. We were challenging the Maddox, Lester Maddox delegation of Georgia. And I had a half a vote in the convention. And I voted for Ted Kennedy in honor of Bobby Kennedy. He said, Doc, pow! And somebody said, get low, because it was a hit. And we didn't know what the hit was.

It was going to be spring. I was on the ground, and the ram was in the room. I think it must have been downstairs. The ram, Billy Cowles was about so far, trying to go down the steps. And there's a picture of Andy, Billy Cowles, and some of them, and they laid a point that way. And that pointing is that the bullet didn't come from that way, because he came from that way.

So we said to the police, they're gone's wrong. Go the way the bullet came from. The bullet came from that way. That's that picture. Mr. Withers, the photographer, he was there. Mr. Withers. And he scooped a couple of jars of blood, tried to give me one and wrap one.

I couldn't touch the blood. I remember wrath coming, back and back. My son, my brother had been shot. I'm his dearest friend. Wrath, Martin, hold on, we need you to hold on. Martin, hold on. But I was gone at that point, you know. So I just got up and wrapped myself off.

I was standing next door to the room next door. I called Mrs. King. She was in the bed. She said, Jess, how are you doing? I said, I'm doing just fine. I said, Mrs. King, I couldn't quite get my mouth together. I said, I'm reading. I said, the dog been shot, I think, in the shoulder.

I knew better. I couldn't say what I had just seen. I didn't want to shake her up in that way. I said, but you should go up and see him if you can. She said, I'll be there momentarily. She got up out of bed. Apparently, for seven, eight minutes, someone called, you know, the press and said he was dead. Man, that lumber ground. I mean, the fires around the country. What excited me the most was I think it was Reverend, maybe Reverend Joe Lyons said we can't let one bullet kill a movement. With all the trauma of his death. I remember being in the room with

Harry Berlefonte and Sidney Fonte and Robert Kennedy talking about what Dr. King meant to us and doggone we Fonty and Robert Kennedy talking about what Dr. King meant to us. And doggone, we're going to Washington and Robert Kennedy. I was at home, and my mom woke me up and told me. And I remember her crying, and when I seen her cry, I started crying. I mean, it just hurt me so bad. And it hurt my household so bad. It's just, you know, and I remember seeing the clip. Everybody pointing at the vacant building.

And, man, I seen his brother. And it was just like, man, all this blood. It just devastated me. I'll never forget it. It hurt me so bad to my heart. And I felt so bad for the family, Claretta, Scott King, those kids. It devastated me a lot.

Yeah, it did. When he returned from Mason Temple, did you have any conversations with the folks who were with him about that unbelievable, powerful speech? Were there any conversations that night folks who were with him about that unbelievable powerful speech with any with any conversations that night when he got back because when we reflect on it now you're missing something you know what you're missing what's that when he returned did you have any conversations about what he was missing he wasn't missing anything because I never left him.

Andy never left him. Ralph never left him. We were always a team. We were always a team. We were. That's not an exaggeration. But we would, I don't know what it was, but we wouldn't have left him. I'm going to cry.

The last conversation you had with him. All right. Last conversation. You write it in your book. Yeah. That it was the next day. I was walking down the street with him, down the street, somebody's balcony with a big plate of fried chicken.

And you wrote in your book that it was april 4th i don't remember and i'm gonna walk you through it was april 4th and you had a meeting in atlanta and you had a meeting with uh delores harman and you said i gotta get back to atlanta and dr king said no we need to talk about plans to training in memphis and you said i gotta get to get back to Atlanta. And Dr. King said, no, we need to talk about plans to training in Memphis. And you said, I got to get to Atlanta. He kept telling you, you can get a later plane. And you said, I got to get back to Atlanta. And you said the last words to him, to you were, get a later plane.

And you left Memphis that afternoon. I do remember that I had left, but I also remember that I had a big plate of fried chicken from someone's house. In those days, people would cook for each other. And this woman was glad to cook a plate of chicken, and she knew Dr. King was going to eat some of it. So he really loved eating that fried stuff. So there's nothing to talk about except he loved to eat fried chicken. What is it you would want to know? I brought the chicken to that woman, to that house, from another house where they actually did stuff like that. You're too young to remember when people would pass food from house to house.

Not because they needed to, it's because they wanted to. Serve Dr. King some chicken, you know. You were in Atlanta when you found out that he had been killed? Now, that's the very, very hard part for me to detail. And so I remember somebody, I remember that I had a plate of food that Martin, because he had not had any dinner. Now that was a previous day.

On April 4th, you were in Atlanta. Okay, your readings. I gotta go read my book. It's all good. April 4th, you're in Atlanta and Rita Samuels tells you that the king shot, somebody killed him. I need to read that again because my recollection is I went to get this plate of chicken and I don't want to debate about it.

Right. That was April 3rd. That was April 3rd. Yeah. So this is the next day. Yeah. I don't remember. I'm going to go get my copy.

It's all good. It's your copy right here. Yeah. And so Andrew Young called you. And y'all talked. Yeah. And you said, I wish I could have been there with him in that last moment. Talk with him one more time.

Showing total support for what we were about. And he said, that's all right. And he was calm. And he was consoling you. And I reflected on what Martin had said to me that morning, get on a later plane. And you said, Andy and I both had an abiding love for Martin. We love him still.

We both still cry sometimes as we remember. Yeah, so? yeah so the closeness I think is what a lot of people don't really understand how close all of you were it was

it was too late to do anything different. We were close. We were like, I don't know what it is. Maybe in the, I don't know, military or somewhere where people get connected and they stay connected. That's not a good analogy, really. Because I remember taking him some food at that woman's house. And when I took the food, I got to think about which happened first.

You know, the shooting or did i get the food in his hand and you know things like that those are not details that i have held on to because i didn't need to and uh you're the first one that asked me you know about you know that i used to talk about uh he was walking down that corridor in the church staring at that lady's high heel shoes. Do you still miss him? Yeah. Yeah, I do. Probably always will

I was sitting in the kitchen having something to eat the radio was on like a lot of people I guess I was in shock and weep and weep and weep. And well, you know, I played Martin Luther King on the stage on Broadway.

And so I got a chance to meet the family, spend time with a lot of the family. So it was a very special, well, it was obviously a devastating moment for all of us. Martin King always talked about the fact that he would be shot down in the streets of the nation in the midst of this campaign. He started talking to us about that, actually, with the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November of 63. Were it not for a promise you made to your wife,

you probably would have been on that balcony. Well, who knows? But y'all were meeting y'all i mean all these different well as a family we we try to eat dinner together each night so and you told me you said yeah i'll be home by six that's right we agreed six o'clock dinner and so i was on my way home. I was in the kitchen with Dorothy when we heard the news over a television set that Dr. King had been shot. At 6.01. Now I just left him. Not too long before that. I was

stunned when you said we immediately went back to work. That you did not really grieve until July. You said it was the work. That's right. Yes, that's right.

Like these terrible times in which we live, doing creative work on behalf of truth and justice, on behalf of people, on behalf of the wonder of life, on behalf of dissolving sexism and racism, doing work is one of the best ways for us to grieve. So I recognize that as a pastor, as a religious person. So, yes, 9 o'clock Friday morning, we marched. And I worked through the night to be sure that we were going to be... I think I remember being shocked and stung,

you know, of course, you know, the passing and the death of someone in the public space was not something that a nine-year-old considers. But I remember being affected by it, of it having an effect, of feeling a sadness, of feeling a loss, even at that age, that it was something, you know, it was something huge and looming and dark and sad. I think that was the beginning of what Lost looks like. You drop him off at the airport. And he gets out. As you think back, as you think back, have you

I'm sure you have, have you just went back and just played every part of that what he had on what he said, last look all of those things because that was the last time you saw him alive yeah, but let me tell you what happened

the day before I was at their home Mrs. King was convalescing from recent illness and she was there mother-in-law, well Martin's

mother was there Martin and I after dinner we were playing the piano he's a great singer and I played the piano he said I bet you didn't know I could sing. I said, well, I heard you could. No, I didn't know you could. He said, well, I know you can play.

So I sat on the piano. She made you the music in college. Yeah, yeah. So we had such fun. We were singing and just having a great time. When we separated, the evening ended, I went home and told him I'd pick him up the next morning, whatever time established.

But Mama King called me that night about 1130, and she said, you know, I know you're taking Emil to the airport tomorrow, but tell him something for me. Said, just like that fund we had today, I'd like to have more days like that. I know I'm the mother and I have to understand he's busy. But you see to it and tell him I want him to plan more fun time for family hour. Will you do that for me? I said, of course. Well, I told him, I said, now your mother called me and I told her, she wants more of your time and we're going to see

that you do that. Well, guess what? About four, three or four o'clock Atlanta time, because Memphis was an hour behind us, he called her, talked to her about an hour and a half. She said it never happened before. Could you take your mother for granted? He knew she was going to be there. She was supportive of her. The son loved him dearly.

But he didn't bother to call her. But when I saw her that first time that night, because I went over to check on them, she said, listen, when this pain subsides a little bit, I'm going to tell you how much I appreciate what you did. Because he told me, you told him what I said. And that prompted him to call. And they had a big laugh about, you know, here's the call. And he knew, I think, because he called his brother. He'd never done that before. Called him on the phone, I understand, talked a good time with him.

He did a lot of odd things. I talked to him, and he said to me, why does my room number sound so familiar to you? I mean, to me, he said. And I said, oh, no, because I don't know what room you're in, because we had switched hotels. And he said, it's 306. And I said, well, that's my house number. And I said, you've been here enough, so I guess you're making the relationship. And I said, oh. All of these things were odd things that happened that day. April 4th. Uh-huh.

It was early in the day that he called me. And then he called his mother, called his brother. And Andy said they were playing pillow talk. I mean, a pillow throwing, whatever. After he came back from court. Yeah. Came in and had a pillow fight. Uh-huh, yeah. And so he did a lot of things that day that were unusual, I understand.

I wasn't there. I was here. But he did a lot of unusual things, a lot of unusual things. Oh, I'll tell you something else that was most unusual. Coretta's favorite gift is red roses. And every birthday, her birthday is in April. April 27th is her birthday. Now, he left on, it was March, I guess, when he left Atlanta. He bought her some artificial flowers and left them in the library of the house. And he told her to go get the flowers.

And, no, he told the housekeeper to tell him, when he leaves, go get those flowers out of the library. She was angry. He said, did you get those roses? So she said, yes, but I'm mad about it. He said, why? He said, because they're artificial. And guess what he said to her i didn't know whether i would be here on your birthday or not but i wanted your roses to be here now he died that was april 4th well that was april 3rd when he talked to her her birthday is april 27th he said I don't know whether I would be there in person for your birthday

but here are your red roses you know she kept those roses a long time 6.01pm April 4th shots ring out how do you find out I was having dinner with the Grand dragon of the ku klux klan

and the major d knew my relationship with the kings and she came over to the table and gave me a note well we were talking i was busy talking and she said did you hear about dr king i just folded up the note and kept talking. She thought that was odd. She came back a second time. She said, I hate to interrupt your meal, she said, but I just heard on the radio he'd been shot. Well, that didn't bother me either, because I'd been in his presence before when it was reported. We were in Los Angeles once. They reported he had been shot. And we were in there getting ready for a nice, comfortable evening and a meal. Well, not just he and I, but, you know, several of us were.

Again, we had a big laugh about it. That they said, I think the guy had ate sticks of dynamite and said, I think I got him. You know, we saw it on TV. So I didn't think anything about it. I just talked to him. So he was all right then. And I said, well, maybe I'd better go to the phone. I went to the telephone and their private lines were busy. And that's unusual. All the lines would be busy. And I said to my guest,

I think I'd better go over there. So I then drove over. And as I was getting to her driveway, she was backing out. The mayor was there and the police. They were taking her to the airport. And she said, oh, I've been trying. She left the window down. It was raining. She said, I've been trying to reach you. I've got to go to Memphis.

She had a housekeeping staff, but she knew I had a special relationship with the children. She said, well, you check on the children for me. I don't know what's going to happen. Because, see, when they called her, they didn't tell her he was killed. They told her he'd been shot and injured. So when you're driving up, you still think it's not true? Well, I think something must have happened in order for the mayor and the police. Right. Once I said,

as you're driving over, you're going, okay, we've heard this before. Let me drive over. Yeah, right. But then when you turn that corner and then you see police and the mayor, that's when it hits you. Just something. Okay, something happened. Something did happen. And so you pull up. She throws a window down, but she doesn't know that

he's gone. That's right. She didn't know. And it wasn't until she got to the airport that she got the call that, and I think the mayor got the call, that he is gone. And so Martin's secretary was there at the airport to join her. And they went to the ladies' room, and that's when she got the real official word. And then she came back home. So you're in the house with the children.

And I stayed. I didn't leave there until five days later, six days later. You know he's gone. Did you wait for her to return to tell them, or they made aware, the children? Oh, I would never not even consider telling the children. She came shortly, shortly, I guess, you know, after. Well, I guess they could speed, but she came. It didn't take her long to get to the house, and she came in telling her staff and everybody.

By now, the house is filling up because everybody else has heard. But she said to her staff, do not tell my children. I'll do that myself. And so her bedroom was at the end of the long hall in the house. So she decided to make that her solace. And then people up front would answer the phone and then direct the call back to see if she would take it. And I would be the interceptor. I just stayed with her.

But she got ready to go tell the boys, and she asked me to go with her. And she had a death grip on my arm, I mean, tightly, trying to tell the children. She told Dexter first, the younger boy, that, you know, your dad has been seriously hurt. She couldn't bring herself to say. She said, your dad has been seriously hurt. She couldn't bring herself to say. She said, your dad has been hurt. Well, how badly is he hurt? She said, pretty badly, I understand. But we'll talk about it later. But he's not coming home.

And I've got a lot of things to do and he finally he said well if he's hurt but he jumped out of his bed he said if it's hurt badly why are you still here you all do everything together why are you still here and he was chastising her and she, you know, got a lot of decisions to make. She was calmly still holding me so tightly. And then we went to the other side of the room, which was the other boy, Sid Martin. And she told him he was older, so she said, He's pretty serious. And so we got a lot of decisions to make.

I don't know what we're going to do first, but it looks like he's very, very serious. She still can't say. She couldn't say. She couldn't say. And he said, well, what must I tell my children? I mean, my friend's at school tomorrow. So she said, well, you know, you're not going to go to school, so you won't have to worry about that. And he leaped up. What do you mean? I have to go to school. Miss Davis

said, you know, cutting her glasses. And I laughed later, not at that moment, but I said, oh, that teacher put fear in those kids, you know, cutting these glasses. But she finally got out of the room and then she had a sigh of relief, you know, that she finally told them. Now, Bernice was too little. She was only like four, I think, and didn't understand. But Yolanda came in, and she sat on her mother's bed right beside her, and they embraced, crying. Like, we're big girls.

We're not going to cry. Daddy wouldn't want us to cry, so we're not going to cry, Mommy. We're going to pull this thing together. The two of us can do this, and they are wailing. The most poignant moment, that was a difficult moment for me, and I guess I was crying, too, because they were just embracing tightly, saying, We're not going to cry. We're not going to cry. But what—so they finally said, OK, we're going to work this thing out.

As the calls were coming in, they would assume Mrs. King would want to talk to the president. And so you know his voice. So I would take the call and said, OK, Mrs. King, this is President Johnson. But what was interesting, everybody had the same message. It's the same one maybe you and I make, like someone dies. You said, if I can do anything, let me know. And meeting it, you know, anything you need me to do, let me know. If there's anything I can do. Everybody had the same message except one call.

Kennedy. Robert Kennedy. His call was the one that was different. He said, Mrs. King, it's obvious now. When he called, it was—see, in Atlanta, it was about five or six-ish, and people started calling. And so, up until now, it's almost 10. Mr. Kennedy said, it's obvious, Mrs. King, that you need more telephone lines, because I've been trying to get you ever since the news broke.

But Mr.—and I'll make up a name because I don't remember anything— but Mr. John Jones is en route to Atlanta now to install nine telephone lines for you. He'll be there at 1230 tonight. He's en route now. I also heard on the TV that you'd perhaps want to go pick your husband up in Memphis. So we've dispatched a plane. It's already there in Atlanta. The pilot's name is Sam Smith, tailgate number 12345, telephone number 82 or something.

So whenever you want to go, all you have to do is make this call. He will take you, and he's in readiness whenever you want to go to Memphis. Also, who's your point person? And she told I was going to be her lead spokesperson. And he said, Zernona called every hotel in the city of Atlanta, talked to the management, and put a clamp on all the rooms in the hotel, I mean in the city, that people will be coming to this film who are heads of states and we've got to be sure we have the right allocation of space.

And my team will be there tomorrow morning and we're going to set up an office at 123 Maple Street. We will help govern things. He just lay everything out. And we followed his rules. Because he had been through it. He said, we've got experience in this. We know what we're doing.

And he was right. And I was there when Jacqueline Kennedy came, which was the expected moment. Two things happened—I mean, you got time for me to tell all this? Yeah. Before I tell you about Mrs. Kennedy, I'm going to tell you about Nixon. He wasn't president at that point. He was the— Republican candidate. Yeah, the candidate. He called our newspaper publisher and said,

I know Dr. King's feelings on me, but do you think you could help arrange for me to come visit Mrs. King? My wife and I want to come make a call on her. And he said, no, I can't do it, but I've got a very good friend who's at her house, and he was talking about me, and she will tell me whether you can or not. So let me get in touch with her, and then I'll call you back. So he called me, and I said, I don't know. I have to run it by her. Well, when I told her that in the house there were people who said, oh, no, you know, Dr. King would want to see him. And so they talked to her, saying, no, why don't you say no? Well, I had her last ear. So I said, Mrs. King, this is not a time for politics.

Why don't you let him come? But let's lay some ground rules. No entourages, no press, no nothing. Just come. If he's making a personal call, then he personally can call on her. So she bought my advice and agreed. Called Mr. McGill and told him and said, we want him to come unannounced. And sure enough, he came.

But guess what happened? He drove, he came up, and we knew what time. They told us all the way. He's at the airport now. He's on his way. So we knew when to expect him. And when he came, I went to the door, the front of the house. He came in a beige—I don't know, cars, but also a Chevrolet, something like that.

It wasn't a van. I don't want to offend anybody, but it was a small car. And I ushered him in. Well, he was by himself, but he said, you know, Mrs. Nixon was coming. But he said they got a call that one of the girls got sick, and she had to rush to New York. He said—so he sat by her bed. That's where she received her gift.

She said, on her bed—we had a chair, and he sat there face to face until he knew how Dr. King felt. He said, but this is not political call. My wife and I were coming, and he went on to tell us, you know. He said, I have brought with me a check, a personal check, that we are feeling the grief. And because we are Americans, we have to take some responsibility for this. So as our personal expression of sympathy, we want to educate all four of your children.

And this check that we have here will cover their expenses wherever they go. There's enough money to educate all four children. Nobody knows that story because I haven't told it but a few times. Then we were told that Mrs. Kennedy was coming, and then the day she was due she said she couldn't make it then we got another call she said now she does want to come she said i don't have the strength to make it because she was had she had to release she knew the pain of corita scott king you're getting my script ahead of me. Because what happened is she finally came.

And as I said, you know, describing, you can get the picture of the house. The front door was up there. Coretta's bedroom was at the end of the hall. When she came, they told me she was here, so I went to greet her to bring her back. Roland, those two women didn't say one word to each other.

Verbal word. No word. Neither said hello. They didn't say anything. They embraced. That seemed like 20 minutes. Of course, it wasn't that long. But they embraced without a spoken word for an endless period of time.

But you don't have to be smart to read their lips and their hearts. Their hearts were saying, We know what you're feeling. You know, I know, we know. That was the most poignant moment, and it was the one time that I cried because I was feeling their language. It has to be hard for you, because here you are. You go to the home. You're with the kids. She comes back.

She asks you to be with her when she tells the children. You have to be her rock. Oh, yeah. So, you can't grieve. You can't break down. You can't. You're taking the phone calls. You're doing...

So, how are you... Did you just sort of just go like Robertded robert candy you just went right into work mode oh yeah because i you know i'm not even sure that i ever cried come to think of it i'm saying later but i never got a chance to grieve uh because one of the things when she was trying to decide whether she's gonna go to memphis and then right away i said oh gee she needs clothes because i wanted her to look nice she was going to go to Memphis. Then right away, I said, oh, gee, she needs clothes, because I wanted her to look nice. She's going to be photographed wherever she goes.

So the next morning now, we were up—well, the night went into morning. So by morning time, I told her I was going to go down and get some clothes. And I did. I went to a nice little shop downtown Atlanta that had nice clothing. And I told the man that I've come to pick some things for Mrs. King. I have no money. I wouldn't dare take time to ask her for a credit card. And I don't have any money, so will you trust me to pick what I think she wants, take it

home, and if she likes them, we'll keep them, and I'll come back and pay. If not, I'll bring the clothing back. And he agreed to those terms. Well, I picked out a lot of stuff, came home. As I was getting into the house, I had a man there who helped me because I had all these clothing. In the lobby, I mean, in the foyer their home, were Bella Fonte and Stan Levinson. And Stan Levinson was the Jewish friend who'd been with them a long time. Very close advisor, Dr. Kidd. Exactly. And I said, what are you doing?

I said, well, I wanted to look nice, so I bought a lot of clothes. And I told them the story. I didn't have the money. And they said, well, we wanted to look nice, too. And we know you know what she would look good in. They both gave me a credit card. They said, here, we don't care what you buy. Buy what you think you want for her.

Here are the cards to pay for them. So when I came home and when I saw her later on, after the people subsided, she looked at my stuff and liked everything I brought. And I said, oh, I can go back empty-handed. So I told her the story. I had money. Because she said to give me her credit card. And I said, oh, no, I got two credit cards.

I went back, and guess what? The owner of the store said, oh, you got a balance here i thought he lost his body i'm the same one who just left it with all your clothes and he said to me i've come to pay for them he said listen i'm a white man in america and i have to take some of the responsibility of having the climate that created this, so the least I could do is cover the cost of the clothing. You have a zero balance. I had also designed her headdress, and I had gone down to our department store, which was Macy's at the time.

And we had a laugh because they asked me, what time was I coming? And I said, well, I don't know. I was so busy. I don't have a schedule. I don't know. He said, well, it doesn't matter. We'll stay here until you get here. The store closes at 5.

So if you're not here, I said, can you find the back door? And I laughed. I said, I'm black. I know where all the back doors are. So he said, leave the back door open. I can come through the back door and shoot up. That's because the store was closed. I went through the back door and told the lady, this is what

I think I want. I had never designed anything either, so I said, this is what I think I want. And so the lady agreed to do it up, and I said, don't stitch it, just kind of baste it so she's got to approve it, and she

may not like it. And it was the time except for when Yolanda, the daughter, came in, and I saw her cry. She never shed a tear. That woman was strong, making decisions and moving, never cried after that. But when she tried on the headdress, then she looked in the mirror. And I'm sure she's saying, this is what I'm wearing to my husband's funeral.

And she broke down that time. But those were the only times she cried the whole time, in that whole long week. It was a week long. That was the week that was, I'll just call it that. As they say, rose in a fisted glove. When you went to the airport, were you accompanying her to the airport? When his body was returned from...

No. I didn't see the body until... Let me tell you that story. Because the day he was ready for viewing... Because I'd been doing a myriad of things.

While they had announced that there was going to be a public viewing at 11 o'clock, at that moment we were at the church. Coretta had to make some final revisions to the program. And so she went over to the church, and the security guard called her over there and said, Miss King, what must we do? He said, there are thousands of people lined up here to see the body, and so what must we do?

And she said, oh. And it had begun a misting rain, and the worst kind of rain is a mist. It's just falling on you. She was such a kind, considerate, compassionate woman. She said, oh, well, let them go on in. And I said, no, Coretta, you should see him first. And I said, the public will wait, but you need to see him first.

And what good advice that was, because once we finished the church, we went over to view. And I was, you know, Harry Belafonte and his wife and I were the only non-family members. Everybody else, it's a large family. And I saw them when they came in. I stepped aside, and Coretta came down, and she had a faint, a faint response, like she was going to collapse. When I walked up to the beer, he looked awful. It looked as if someone had gone and just dug up a big glob of clay and slapped it upside his face. I was horrified. So I stepped over quietly to the mortician and said, Sir, is there anything you can do to the side of his face?

He crassly said, Miss, his jaw was blown blown up that's the best i could do i was shocked loudly in the loudness credit him all that good here oh i was so so angry with him and i finally said forget him and i said something has to be done because he looked horrible. I mean, this big old glob of stuff. And so Coretta and I, they're sitting down. I looked at Mama King, that's the mother, who's dark-skinned. And then I saw Belafonte's wife, who was white. And back in those years, women always carried loose powder. And I was hoping that they had some.

And I said, Mama, can you get any powder? She said, oh, yeah. She gave me her powder, which was dark. Julie, do you have some? And she said, yes. Hers was white. So I took the two and stood over the casket, looking at Martin's face and making myself a little roux of a mixture,

Belafonte came over, took his handkerchief, and put it around Martin's neck. And so I'm dabbing to see what I've got here, trying to match the other side of his face to get a balance to it. And I finally got it. And Coretta smiled. And so I'm brushing the excess off of Martin's face, and Belafonte and I never knew what happened to the handkerchief. It was his handkerchief he had taken out of his pocket. And the excess, you know, we folded it up. But he was to stay there till midnight, and they were moving him to the church for

another viewing at 3 a.m. And so I did it again, because the body oxidizes with air. And so I went and did it again. So I did it three times before the actual funeral. Martin Luther King, I believe, at least a year before he was assassinated, began to understand that he had gone so far that it would be almost impossible

for him to escape danger, if not death. And so he began to talk about it. And up until the very end that last night at the Memphis at the Memphis meeting

of garbage workers he said he was ready, that's the way Christians like that think about life they want to be ready when the time comes and I think he was preparing himself and yes when he branched out into the Vietnam War and that criticism, when the Poor People's March did not materialize

in the way he thought it would, and even then people thought he was out of his element, he began to understand that he was accumulating enemies in what we then called the power structure from all over the country and all over the world. And here's why I believe that Martin Luther King probably died at peace, because he had prepared himself for death. Describe for you April 4th, 1968. Where were you? What were you doing that day? I'll never forget that day. I remember—I think I almost woke up to it, to learn of it. And as much as we had learned of his encounters with danger. I have to tell you, Roland, assassination, I was not prepared for.

I was young and married and just had my first child. And, you know, for me, the civil rights movement would go on as some version of it forever. Yes, I knew King was in danger. And yes, Malcolm X had been assassinated. What I did not understand is that I was in the decade of assassinations, where when people disagreed with you, they would kill you. Kennedy, Malcolm X, M.O.K., J.O.K., Medgar Evers. Think about it.

That's five in five years. Of one decade. And what is not coincidental is that if you look at the decades of the 20th century, none was more robust in change. And in change that brought results. It was as if the country had a cataclysm. Lot of change, lot of reaction. Period, Roland. See, that started for me, that strangeness

and that unbelievableness that was happening to a lot of our political figures in those days started to me with the assassinations of John Kennedy. I never will forget that day in my life or any of those days because I was actually

on my way to a business meeting when they came on the radio and interrupted and said—at that time they were just saying they thought he was dead, but he had been shot in Dallas. And I'm thinking, my God, this is the 20th century, and this is the United States of America, and you mean to tell me our president can be assassinated? I mean, back in the days of Lincoln, okay, fine.

It was, you know, but not in the 20th century. With all the protection and all the pre-planning for his routes and all the stuff like that, he could be assassinated. That was unbelievable to me. I actually saw Robert Kennedy get assassinated on TV. I was watching that night, you night. So Martin Luther King. Now, for Martin Luther King who was the

Martin Luther King was the main warrior for the black the main warrior for the black people as far as I'm concerned at that time. You know. I wasn't as surprised that they killed him

as I was when they killed Malcolm X. You know what I mean? I wasn't as surprised because Martin was into a lot of stuff that a lot of people, bigots, hated. He was a marked man. I didn't expect it. I didn't...

I was hoping that it would never come to that, you know what I mean? But it did not surprise me because of who he was and what he was doing you know horrible day horrible just oh man here we go again where were you

I don't even know where I was I was in oblivion that's where I was after that I don't know where I was but it was just here we go again when is this going what's safe who's safe I don't know where I was, but it was just, here we go again. When is this going to, what's safe? Who's safe?

You know what I mean? What were you doing that day? What was the day like? Oh, yeah. Every day was a day of mobilization. We would meet with the men to see if there was any progress. We'd report on what that was. Is there any unusual things happening? Fill them in on that. If there are any questions they had or decisions they need to make, try and get that done. But everybody was mobilizing for the march. But you also had a court hearing that day, if I'm correct. Yeah,

that was a series of injunctions. but SCLC took responsibility for dealing with the injunctions. Andrew Young and James Orange and some of the other fellows and their lawyers took responsibility for the court because the court had enjoined the march. It had not enjoined the mobilization and community action work that we were doing. So that day goes along. Go throughout the day, get to the evening.

Where are you? I'm at the headquarters building of what was called then the minimum salary building of the AME Church, which is a building next door to where I mobilizing headquarters were, which was Cleveland Temple. In the evening, I lose track of the time, but the word came over the radio that Dr. King had been shot on the balcony at the Lorraine Motel. And among all the unbelievable things that you just refuse to accept, this was one of them. So you hear this on the radio.

So a co-staffer and myself, we're like five minutes from the Lorraine Motel. We jump in the car and we come around here. By the time we get here, police were already here, keeping people out as opposed to keeping people in. And this whole evening was just one that we had difficulty believing. Dr. King, as prominent a leader as he was, to be shot on the balcony made no sense to us at all. It was not like he was a stranger in town. He should have and perhaps did have as much security as you can have. But the evening ended not only with the shooting, but with him being taken to the hospital.

Our responsibility then was to make sure that nobody else was injured. I mean, the city obviously was just outraged. Our job was to make sure that the people, A, got home all right, didn't confront the police or anybody else with any activities that would cause there to be more harm. And then to reconvene a meeting of all the partners in this thing to talk about where do we go from here. that he's died? Where are you? And how do you react? Well, you know, personally, it was an incredible level of sadness.

It was not like you had a leader who preached violence. You had probably one of the most committed men to non-violence yet to be killed as a violent act. We were a little, we had to think through what this all meant. How and what do we do with the men the next day? How do we handle the notification across the country as to what was taking place in Memphis? And at

least whatever advice we were going to give to other folks, how they should react. And clearly the country was beginning to go up in smoke. You know, the anger that was across their major urban areas was just incredible. I interviewed Reverend Jim Lawson. And he said, the next day he went to work. He said, we literally did not have time to stop. And he said it wasn't until either July or August that the grief hit him. He said, but literally, he was completely in work mode.

Well, I think that's typical of everybody, and certainly Jim, who was such a major part of this. We had 1,300 men, 1,300 families, who knows how many children that were a part of all this. We had a community by now that was totally mobilized in support of them. There needed to be direction given. There needed to be a conversation with the leaders. There needed to be addressing the young people, many of whom had become reluctant supporters of the strike, but they were supporters. We had to at least make sure that no one

gave a reason for added violence against any community members, and to try as best as we could to prepare for what ultimately became a major march on behalf of Dr. King himself. And we were getting deluged with calls from all over the country of people really want to know, is it real? Is it true? Is it, et cetera. I just think I remember a call from Bayard Rustin, who was on a radio show in Westchester County someplace, where people were equally upset. And I think Byron mentioned on the radio, if you want to do something to help people in Memphis, send a dollar. And the outpouring of concern and support, in a day or so,

we felt down here where there was duffel bags, army duffel bags filled with dollar bills that were so impacted by this. But as Jim said, we didn't have time to stop. We almost went from his death mode to mobilizing for this major march that we got committed to. I believe we had 40,000 or 45,000 people show up for that march. We had to deal with what was going to take place in Atlanta. And to their credit, the men, while they regretted and were suddenly upset by Dr. King's assassination, they remained committed to their goal. And they organized themselves.

They made their own decisions about how they would respond on a city basis. I can remember we were real concerned about whether or not we wanted to take the marches back downtown. A minister here in town whose name may be lost in all the history of Reverend Henry Starks, who took just personal responsibility for organizing and mobilizing the march to dramatize to the business community and certainly to the city leadership that these women were committed to this. And we were, I think we wanted to take a day off, but the men asked us, aren't we going back downtown? Aren't we going to march today? And for those of us who were stabbed, you know, we had to really not only pick ourselves

up, but to try and understand that, you know, this was a tragedy that happened in the course of a major movement and understand that Dr. King was certainly aware of the risk but he was also committed to the... Well, it's kind of hard to describe because I was a single dad at the time and my boys, to me, it was just such a loss of, I don't wanna say hope because that's not quite it, but the possibilities that made that fact that it happened. I'd just done the Martin Luther King story with Paul

Winfield and Cicely Tyson a few years before, and it was just devastating. I was in Detroit and trying to sit my kids down and say, this doesn't change the possibilities. It's just very hard. It's just very devastating. And it was the whole town, I remember, was just, I don't know, it was like the wind that was just taken out of everything. What should folks, you're going to commemorate it,

but what should folks do April 5th? Because folks, we have these events and people remember things on those lines but what's the call back well i think the real call for action as far as i'm concerned is stepping toward the things that we want as i know we keep uh fighting for the things that we're opposed to and we have to be aware and i don't take any of that away but i think now it's about being an example reaching out to each other which is why this tonight is so important to be a part of the community, to be embraced by our own communities. So I really hope that we will remember to include each other because we have ways sometimes of getting a little exclusive.

And I don't think that's what King was about or Legacy was about, but we really need to include each other. We get really caught up in a lot of diversity. That's a wonderful thing, but for us, I think we need to embrace our brothers. I had finished shaving and was standing on the balcony and there was some staff down on the ground and Raph was putting aftershave, Aramis aftershave on when he heard what he said sounded like a firecracker. And then he looked down and saw the soles of Martin's shoes. And he ran outside.

And the other staff was coming up crying and all carrying on. And he said, stop acting like sissies. Call the ambulance. Call the ambulance. You don't have time to cry. Call the ambulance. And he called the ambulance. And when they got there, the

ambulance came. And they got in. Ralph got in and took Martin on to the hospital. And Ralph said to Martin, he grabbed his head. He said, Raph, Martin, this is Raph. This is Raph. This is Raph. And he grabbed him up and held him. And he said, Martin whispered to him, please, Raph, take my people forward. And Raph said, oh, Martin, oh, Martin, oh, Martin. And he never said another word. He was gone. Oh, wow. When they said that Martin had been shot, Coretta called me and said, Juanita, we always kept a bag packed because we never knew when we were going to have to move instantaneously. So she said, Martin has been shot and we need to go to Memphis. I said, OK, I'll meet you at the airport. And as we turned into the airport, they announced Martin Luther King just died.

And my little children were in the back and they just started screaming and hollering. Oh, Uncle Martin is dead. Uncle Martin is dead. Uncle Martin is dead. Oh, what about Yoki? What about Yoki? Because my daughter and Yoki were like, you know, they were in divers together. So they were each other's first friends. So we got there and the chief of police and everybody

was around Coretta. And because I told you, we were getting ready to go to Memphis. And I said to her, I said, well, Coretta, I'll meet you back at your house. So I left there and went on to her house. And I stayed there that night. And I said, well, Coretta is, you know, what are we going to do? I said, I'm just so glad Ralph was not there, because they would have gotten two at the same time. I don't remember grieving at all.

This was what you always expected, all right? But you knew also that that wasn't going to end the struggle. And it's the struggle that you were concerned about. And you were the struggle that Martin was concerned about. It was—that's what it was all about, right? Is that it wasn't about, well, Martin is dead, so let's go home. And that's nonsense. You would work harder because you didn't have a Martin King. We knew that everything was going to change.

Describe for you April 4, 1968. What were you doing that day? Where were you doing that day? Where were you? April 4, 1968, I was in my office in Wall Street, and I was leaving early because I was preparing to go down to Memphis, Tennessee. I had already talked to Martin earlier and to Bernard Lee and Andy about the logistics, about I want to be sure that you're going to have somebody meet me at the airport so you can take me directly to the place where he was speaking. So I'm rushing to go to the airport, and the phone rings, and I said, I don't answer the phone. Then something said,

I don't know. I said, answer the phone. So I pick up the phone and it's Harry, the little pony. I said, Harry, I can't talk to you. I'm rushing to the airport. I'm going down to see Martin now. He said, you got your television set? No. I said, where's your television set? He says, Martin's been shot. I said, what? So I turned on the television. And there, that's all it is. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s been shot, you know. I get on the phone. I can't reach anybody. All the lines are busy. I can't reach Billy Kyle's I get on the phone. I can't reach anybody. All the lines are busy. I can't reach Billy Kiles. I can't reach—I can't reach anybody.

I can't reach Bernard Kempf or anybody. Can't reach anybody. Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. And I'm trying to decide what to do, and the phone rings again. You know? I wouldn't even pay into the television. I just—the television's in another room, and I'm trying to get through on the phone. Harry Bill LaFrance, he says, Martin's dead.

And he says, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police.

I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm going to call the police. I said, I'm him there's another room and I'm trying to get through on the phone. Harry builds a phone and he says, Martin's dead. And he says to me, well, what are you going to do? And I said, well, what do you think I should do? He said, I don't think you should—Harry says, I don't think you should go. I said, we should get some more information. I don't think you should go. So I hang up the phone. And the very first thing that came into my mind was they finally got him. They finally got him. Sometime, sometime our book ended.

Sometime between April 4, 1967 and April 4, 1968, I had come to the conclusion that was not a question of whether Martin King would be assassinated. It was only when, and I discussed it very closely with Stanley Letterson, and he said, well, this has always been a danger. I said, no, Stanley, you don't understand. Some of your rumors happened. He said, yeah, I agree. No, I was really, no, Stanley, you don't understand. Something really has happened. He said, yeah, I agree.

No, I was really, I was really, I was, you know, also angry. And so when that happened, they finally got him. Within that same thought, Roland, you know and your family, I can tell you, I wondered to myself, I said, I don't think I can stay in this country. It's funny, I'm having a conversation. No, I can't stay in this country. I'm the Clarence Jones. I can't stay in this country.

The anger was so seething, you know. And I was drinking more heavily than I drink today, you know. I was drinking, you know, martinis and traveling the weather. The South, I was drinking my Jack Daniels and so forth, you know, hanging out. Or Zill Billingsley, you know, you couldn't have a conversation with Orsillo Billingsley, you drank. So I was just—the anger was just beyond—I had made a personal judgment. I said, Clarence, you have to leave this country. That's what I'm talking to myself. I said this to Harry. I said, Harry, I can't stay here.

He said, why? I said, because I can't. I don't think I have the discipline. I said, I was afraid of— I mean, I had such crazy things like, I was 37 years old. He was 39, okay? And I'm thinking to myself, you know, I hear about all these bad guys in the Blackstone Rangers and how they're going to do this. I said, you know, I hear about all these bad guys in the Blackstone Rangers and how they

can do this. I said, but I was trained in the Special Forces Unit. You know? I said, all these talk about—I said, I really know how to kill. I mean, there's no way this really—I mean, I was—I really know how to kill a person ten different ways. You know? That's the way I was trained to do that.

And I thought to myself, I ought to figure out how to get in touch with some of the guys that were in the army with me. And so this is how you ask me this question. I began to think crazy things. I began to think crazy things. I think, you know, maybe I ought to go out and talk to the— maybe I should go out and talk to the Blackstone Reign and so forth. I said, you know, they're probably going to see me in my suit. They're going to say, who are you? But when I finished talking to them, I said, no, all you guys are walking around bad with your little guns and so forth.

You don't have to do a damn thing. I said, what you need to do, I mean, this is the way I was thinking. I said, I need to think whether or not, you know, I mean, I was influenced by Che Guevara in my writings. I was, you know, all these things. I mean, Che Guevara can do it.

Castro can do it. You know, and Ahmed Ben-Balak. I was going through all the liberation people. I mean, it the end of Ahmed bin Balik. I was going through all the liberation people. I mean, I was sort of crazy, like who am I, this middle class educated lawyer, but I had some training. I mean, I was training. And so I said, that's what we need to do.

I said, everybody else is out there selling wolf tickets because they don't know how to do it. I said, they don't really know how to kill, but I know how to kill. And that's so helped me God. So, and I said, I want to see if I could be—and then I began to, when I began to think of myself, I said, I can't believe I'm thinking this way. Okay? And I shared it, I shared a little bit of that with Harry Belafonte and another fellow, a good friend of mine, I told Al Sampson and Benny Johnson in Chicago, you know. Because Benny said, calm down, calm down.

He said, if you want to sit with the Blackstone Rangers, so forth. So, I had to—I went—after the funeral, I had to get out. I think I went to France and Italy for a little while. But the anger was so intense. It was so intense. They finally got him. Now, by the way, February 15th, I'm sitting with James Comey in his office, former FBI director. I'm sitting with him for about an hour. I got some nice pictures with him. And finally, after we talked about the FBI and so forth, and I said the last 10 or 15 minutes were together,

it's like there's a big long table between us. He's sitting over here and I'm sitting here. And I said, you know, Mr. Director, he says, call me, James. I said, well, Mr. Director, I said, there's one thing I want to talk to you before I go. I said, it's about the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. I said, I know the Warren Commission, some kind of commission,

who have these files, and I think maybe some of the files are not even going to be opened up until a later date. And I said, you don't have to say anything. I said, I just want to tell you something. I said, now, you know, some of the King children went into the prison, and they actually talked to James O. Ray, and one of them, Dexter said, they said, no, I don't believe he killed my father. You know? Well, I believe that James O. Ray pulled the trigger. I think the evidence is abundant that James O. Ray pulled the trigger of the rifle to

kill Martin Luther King, Jr. But James O. Ray did not wake up in the early morning of April 4th, 1968, all by himself, and say, today is the day I'm going to kill that king nigger. No, no, no, no, no, no. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination was a vote of a cold, calculated, premeditated conspiracy to kill him. And I believe that conspiracy goes right to the feet of the Hunt brothers in Texas. That's what I believe. Okay?

I can't prove it. But that's what I believe. But don't insult my intelligence to think that some highly limited educated James O. Ray—he had a map of Canada, so he didn't have any education, he didn't have any geography. Where did he get even with that? It was clearly so-for, you know? And he's—and I—and so he leaned over to me and says, You have some very strong opinions. I said, Yes, I do. So I said, You and the government may think that the case is closed, but I don't think so. And he said to me, you didn't hear me say the case was closed, did you? I said, no. You didn't hear me say the case was closed, did you?

I said, no, sir. Deep, right? And you know, by the way, I mean, you don't know, I'm going to tell you. He has a huge, call me a huge desk in his office. It had a glass top on it. Under the corner of the glass top

is a photostatic copy of the memo from Robert F. Kennedy from J. Edgar Hoover to Robert F. Kennedy asking the authority to wire Martin Luther King Jr. in which the Attorney General had to countersign and it shows okay do it okay it. Okay, do it. He says, the reason I'm showing you, Mr. Jones, is every time there's a meeting of agents in my office, particularly a new agent, before they leave, I make them look at this and I says, the FBI can never become that agency again.

Describe April 4th, 1968. What were you doing? Where were you? Well, you know, I had left the country. I left in 67. Like a lot of people, I was not going to be drafted I sent my draft card in and just said I wasn't going to go and decided that

the other choices were five years in jail or leave and I thought well I'd always wanted to see the world and saved up, my wife and I saved up whatever money we had. And we left in the early fall of 67. And came back. Where'd you go? I just ran around Europe, went to North Africa for a little bit.

And just any place that, actually we started in Northern Europe, went to North Africa for a little bit, and just any place that... Actually, we started in Northern Europe, got cold, started moving toward the southern part. Spain was kind of like California, so we spent a lot of time, we were thinking about staying there for a while. But she got sick, and we had to come back. And that was in late March of 1968. And got to my parents' house. And it turned out that she was diabetic, didn't know it, and was just losing lots of weight,

I think she was under 100 pounds. And put her in the hospital. And... Your parents' house where? In Los Alamos, New Mexico. Okay. And so while she's in the hospital, turn on the TV, learn about Martin Luther King being assassinated.

He was assassinated right there in Los Angeles. So for me, it was just a way of saying, look, this country is in real trouble. I mean, I recognized at that point I've got to live here, deal with the draft issue, get a draft lawyer and all that sort of stuff. But I knew I didn't have to read Martin Luther King's Chaos or Community because what I came back to was chaos. And I think that the 50 years since then have been kind of putting a lid on it. And assuming that the problem is going to go away if we just don't look at it. And I think that his book is that reminder that, you know, look around the world right now. Democracy and diversity is a difficult...

Vincent Harding, who I admire a great deal, and you know, obviously, he said we should have advanced courses for everybody in democracy and diversity. Because if you are investing your destiny to a group of people, and they're not like you, different religion, different other things,

you're going to have to learn how to work with that group of people. And I don't think we as Americans understand that that takes work. April 4th, 1968. Where are you? What's that? April 4th, 1968.

Memphis. Tragedy strikes. Where are you? How do you find out? How do you feel? You're talking about Dr. King's death? Yeah. I was here in Tuskegee at that time. And of course, I was very sorry and very, very upset over his death.

But it was one of those things that we always knew, and he always knew, even as early as the bus boycott, and this was several years before, that there was a possibility of losing our lives in the movement. So we have to be prepared to do it. But even so, he still believed in nonviolence and social change. Were you prepared?

Yes, indeed so. And there were some people in the movement who didn't believe in that. And my brother happened to have been one. But I did believe in that. And my brother happened to have been one. But I did believe in that. But you have to be able to stay focused and move ahead and do it in the right direction. But when I heard about Dr. King, and if you remember, when he published his first book, he was stabbed at a department store in New York. So he realized that he would, he may get killed. And he knew that was always a possibility.

But, you know, you never want those possibilities to happen. And I was very sorry about it. But we couldn't stop. He wouldn't want us to stop. And we didn't stop. And we continue. This is an iHeart Podcast.