#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Murder Charges Dropped of Minn. Trooper, Fearless Fund Blocked, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee Diagnosis

Episode Date: June 4, 2024

6.3.2024 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Murder Charges Dropped of Minn. Trooper, Fearless Fund Blocked, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee Diagnosis A Minnesota district attorney says she can't prove a state trooper used unnecessary force when he killed a black motorist, so she dropped the murder charges.  We'll talk to the attorney representing Ricky Cobb's family about the DA's decision to let a murderer go free. Texas Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee says she's being treated for pancreatic cancer.  The co-chairs of Harvard’s Legacy of Slavery memorial project committee resigned, alleging that the administration was interfering with their work on the memorial. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit blocks a Black-owned venture capitalist firm from awarding grants exclusively to Black women entrepreneurs. We'll explain why Trump's election interference trial in Georgia will not happen before the November election.  Lying Tim Scott is telling his stories again.  And I'll show you what took place in Tulsa while I was there commemorating the 103rd anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre.  #BlackStarNetwork advertising partners:Fanbase 👉🏾 https://www.startengine.com/offering/fanbaseMass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington, D.C. and to the Polls 👉🏾 https://vist.ly/37jmv Download the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox  http://www.blackstarnetwork.com #BlackStarNetwork is a news reporting platform covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports. This kind of starts that a little bit, man.

We met them at their homes. We met them at the recording studios. Stories matter and it brings a face to it. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like, he's like my best friend. At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit adoptuskids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Thank you. so it's monday june 3rd 2024 coming up on roland martin on filter streaming live on the black star network minnesota da says she can't prove a state trooper used unnecessary force when he killed a black motorist.

So she dropped the murder charges. We'll talk with the attorney representing Ricky Cobb's family. Texas Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee announces she is battling pancreatic cancer. We'll give you those details. Also, the co-chairs of Harvard's Legacy of Slavery Memorial Project Committee have resigned, alleging that the university has been interfering with their work. The U.S. Court of Appeals on the 11th Circuit are stopping the Fearless Fund from handing out grants to black female entrepreneurs. Plus, we'll explain why Trump's election interference trial in Georgia will not happen before the November election. Plus, Senator Tim Scott continues his lying ways.

I'll also show you what took place in Tulsa for the Black Wall Street Legacy Festival on Saturday. It's time to bring the funk. I'm Roland Martin on filter on the smooth, the fat, the fine. And when it breaks, he's right on time. And it's rolling. Best believe he's knowing. Putting it down from sports to news to politics. With entertainment just for kicks. He's rolling. It's Uncle Roro, yo.

It's rolling, Martin. Yeah. Rolling with rolling now. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah It's Rollin' Martell Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Rollin' with Rollin' now Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best You know he's Rollin' Martell Now Martell The Minnesota D.A. has dropped murder charges against the state trooper who shot a black motorist during the traffic stop in January. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty charged Trooper Ryan Lonergan with second-degree unintentional murder,

second-degree manslaughter, and first-degree assault for the July 31, 2023 death of Ricky Cobb II. This is what she announced. Lonergan's attorney said he would testify to was that he thought Mr. Cobb was reaching for his gun, Londrigan's gun. That's something that they had never said before, never told us before. So we went back and we looked at the video over and over in slow motion. And what you can see from the video is that Mr. Cobb's hand at some point does come up. My guess, by the way, is that because Londrigan opened the door, pointed the gun at him, and started screaming at him, that his hand was coming up to protect himself. But the video

doesn't prove that, and it doesn't disprove what Londrigan says. One of the other things that I think is of note of what Londrigan's lawyers say he would testify to is this. If you slow down the video, you will be able to see, and I think at some point we'll be able to release this, Seide reaches into the car and he is essentially draped across Mr. Cobb trying to unbuckle the seatbelt. What Londrigan's lawyers said he would testify to is that in that split second, he realized his partner was draped over Mr. Cobb, and he carefully fired two shots into Mr. Cobb's torso so that he wouldn't hit his partner. Now, as to the believability of that, I won't comment.

Joining us now is Kyle Family Attorney Harry Daniels from Atlanta. Harry, glad to have you on the show. So your thoughts on this decision? Thank you, Roland, for having me on. This decision is ridiculous. What the county district attorney stated, the county attorney stated, actually really, really makes the case even stronger from a prosecutorial standpoint. If Lonergan's attorney said that he carefully and intentionally shot into the side of Mr. Cobb at the time his partner was reaching over Mr. Cobb's body, then it really goes to the element of intentional and kind of premeditated. Now, the two positions don't match.

He said he thought that Ricky was reaching for his gun. Well, you can see from the video, Larkin is outside of the car on the passenger side. Ricky is in the driver's side seat. There was no lunging, no reaching whatsoever. Roland, all you have here is a county attorney who succumbed to political pressure from law enforcement and gave in, essentially allowed a murderer to get away because she was afraid to prosecute the case once the heat from the outside political powers that be started putting pressure on her. At the end of the day, she's a politician.

You're looking at job security. And what we have, again, is another black man here in America shot and killed, unjustified by law enforcement with no accountability. This is no stranger to the state of Minnesota. You can look at Philando Castile, where it was acquittal. You look at Dante Wright, where the person who shot and killed him was only given two years in prison, got out in a year, almost a little bit over a year. So there's no justice, no accountability when it comes to black lives in this country.

This is a shame. The county attorney, when I went and spoke with her directly, I had reservations and concerns as to whether she was truthful in her position. When I say truthful, that they believed that they were going to prosecute Kate to the full instead of the law. Now you have a position where she has made a 180 and nothing has changed. When I say changed, the video is still the same. The mere fact that the killer makes a declaration of statements, and even in her statement, it goes to the credibility of him.

And, Roland, if you're talking about credibility, the only people that determine credibility in the court of law is a jury. It's not a judge. It's not a lawyer. It's a jury. If you have an issue with credibility, you send it to a jury, let the jury decide. That's what happened in New York with Donald Trump. They let the jury decide it and they determined he had no credibility.

But when it comes to black lives in this country, killed by law enforcement, don't even get the benefit of the doubt to even go to court and reach a jury. Now this is one of several charges and so this is one that could have gone to the jury and the jury could have just chosen to hear it and acquit or find them guilty. So she didn't have to actually drop it. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple.

Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back

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

I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir, we are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives.

This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means

to care for themselves music stars marcus king john osborne for brothers osborne we have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing benny the butcher brent smith from shine down got be real from cypress hill nhl enforcer riley cote marine Corps vet. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does.

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Sometimes as dads, I think we're too hard on ourselves. We get down on ourselves on not being able to, you know, we're the providers,

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and the Ad Council. No, she didn't have to drop the charges at all. And it's not a, here's the thing, I used to be a criminal defense lawyer, so I understand it well, dealing with cases and defending cases. This case here, when you take an approach and a position to charge a case with the charges she brought with voluntary, unintentional murder,

and reckless conduct, and intentional assault, then you feel as though that the situation itself, we're only talking about policy. You don't need a policy. The policy is not important when you're talking about the law. The law says you don't shoot an unknown person that's not a threat. There's no justification. They teach you that in grade school, that you don't hit a person in the back. Here, we're talking about what a policy did to say specifically that he could not use a deadly

force to extract a person from the car. What the hell is that? You can't use a deadly weapon to get a person out of the car if that person is not a threat to you or others. No law enforcement instruction manual is needed to have you have morals and good dignity and morality when it comes to humanity. So the district attorney, the county attorney, she gave in to the political pressure. She gave in to the police union. She was bullied. She hired these outside lawyers out of, I don't know exactly out of, these outside lawyers. And essentially, it was a sham where you're dealing with a case where you quickly, and I'm going to say quickly, they took their time to rain these charges. Then all of a sudden the defendant says, oh, I did this because of this. Well, hell, we expect the defendant to say he did this because of this.

I have never had a case where we prosecutor had a case with police officers who said they did it because. They always want to give a reason. The question is, is it a credible reason? Even in her own statement, press conference today, she felt it was incredible. So at the end of the day, I think the person to lose today is obviously the Cobb family. But most important, this county attorney looked like a joke. If they felt like the Lonergan was not responsible for the death of Ricky Cobb by virtue of criminal violation of laws, they should have never charged him. But when you take this approach to charge somebody,

then you get political pressure, then you do a 180. It's sad. It's a sad day in America, and I feel for the Cobb family. All right, Harry Daniels. Well, we will certainly continue to follow this case, and hopefully we won't see other charges dropped. Yeah, let's just say this. We are also moving forward with our civil case. This case is not done from a long way. Myself and McCoy Sellers, we asked petition of the Department of Justice

to take a thorough review of this case, and this case civilly is still moving forward. So the district attorney won't do a job. At least we would do ours. So thanks, Roland. Thanks for having me on, man. All right, Harold, We appreciate it. Thanks a lot. All right, folks. Got to go to break. We'll come back. We're going to talk about the Harvard Slavery Legacy Project. Two professors have actually resigned from that project. We'll discuss that next right here on Roland Martin on the Black Star Network. Fanbase is pioneering a new era of social media for the creator economy.

This next generation social media app with over 600,000 users is raising $17 million, and now is your chance to invest. For details on how to invest, visit startengine.com slash fanbase or scan the QR code. Another way we're giving you the freedom to be you without limits. Hello, we're the Critter Fixers. I'm Dr. Bernard Hodges. And I'm Dr. Terrence Ferguson. And you're tuning in to... Roland Martin on the Fisher. The two Harvard University professors overseeing the creation of a public memorial dedicated to the enslaved people who helped shape the Ivy League institution have resigned as co-chairs of the memorial committee.

English professor Tracy K. Smith and the director of the university's Carpenter Center for Visual Arts, Dan Byers, were appointed in February 2023 to lead the 13-member committee in their resignation letter. Smith and Byers say they stepped down over frustrations with senior Harvard administrators who tried to rush their process. To all parties involved and invested in the work of the HNLS Memorial Committee, I hope this letter finds you each well and safe during this long season of upheaval. Having come to the end of the academic year, Dan Byers and I are writing to elaborate on our recent decision to step down as co-chairs of the Harvard and the Legacy Slave Memorial Committee on which we have served since its inception November 22, 2022. This decision, which neither of us takes lightly,

extends from our sense that the necessary conditions for the work of memorialization, as agreed upon by committee members, are not yet manifest at the university. Based on our discussions with committee members in recent weeks, together we offer diligently, and conscientiously. Several of us are faculty members in fields of history, art, film, and visual studies, theater, dance, and media, urban design, English, and African-American studies. Several are campus curators, writers, practicing artists, librarians, and program directors whose work engages with the very communities most profoundly touched by histories of enslavement and dispossession. Our everyday experience of Harvard is shaped by forms of awareness key to the work of a moralization and keenly attuned to disparities and limitations long ingrained in institutions like universities. Bottom line is this here. Look, they make it clear that it's just it's just way too much interference by the administration. I want to give my panel, Dr. Julian Marvaux, president and mayor of Bennett College, joining us right now from D.C., Dr. Amakongo Dominguez, senior professor of electric,

School of International Service at American University, Renita Shannon, former Georgia State representative. Julian, I'll go with you. Look, anytime you got something like this in one of these predominantly white institutions and you've got black folks over it, you're going to have folks sitting there trying to put their hands in all of this and muck the whole thing up. Plus, you've got a Harvard still dealing with all the drama over Israel and Gaza like other Ivy League institutions. And so these folks clearly are like, you know what, we're good. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time,

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

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

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

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

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

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

Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispreetirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Well, you know, Harvard was really never serious about dealing with the slave legacy. They never were really serious about it. There have been complaints about Harvard over the years from the law school, from other places, about their position on enslavement,

about the role that enslavement has played on Harvard's legacy. And they never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever really been serious. And so these two folks had enough. I mean, this is the litany. They had enough. They had some things. They had ideas. They want to address some of this. And the university, as you say correctly, had other things to deal with, but that's not the

point. I mean, you're supposed to be able to multitask. Not to mention the fact that I'm wondering what the role that the departure of Dr. Claudia Gay, as president, had in this was her less or more enthusiasm because of her departure. But all I would say is that the climate that we live in right now, anti-DEI, anti-Blackness climate that we live in right now, and I know we're going to talk about some of that later in the program, but basically it gives people permission to be indifferent. So it's really easy to set up a commission, to set up a task force. So now you did that. You checked that box. Now, what are you going to do about it?

I think that these people had ideas, and I think that they were rebuffed, and I think they absolutely had enough. They were working for two years. Two years is a long time in academia to speak, to not even have a report come out. Who suppressed the report? What's the issue? So that's why I stepped. Look, I'm a Congo. When you have this, you're going to have a thousand folks trying to put their hands in stuff. And so that's how I see this. I mean, it's a long ass statement they released. Give me the cliff note version. That is too much interference, too many too many cooks in the kitchen. Yeah. And one of the things, you know, like you said, it's lengthy in terms of what they were saying. But one of the things that struck me was that they felt that Harvard was slowballing their efforts of these two and then the committee in general to build relationships with the community of

Cambridge and Boston. As somebody who's, you know, both my parents got their doctorate from Harvard. My dad helped start the Du Bois Center there and helped revolutionize the Divinity School. We have a long history of being involved and around that university and just being a native Bostonian. There's always been tension with the idea that, you know, Harvard doesn't really see itself as part of the community, particularly as relates to the Black people of Boston. And so I was very happy that these two individuals, and I commend them for their great work, commented on that because it's really important. What we're seeing again is Harvard is caving into this DEI backlash, and it's extremely problematic because it was

making some really good strides as it relates to building community relations and actually making sure that people who are in the surrounding areas felt like Harvard could be, you know, for them as well, even if they weren't, you know, university, you know, members in any way, shape, or form. And so this is a setback for the community relations that Harvard was trying to build, and I quite frankly believe that with the relationships that these two individuals have supported within the local Boston community, there's going to be local backlash to this as well. It's not just something that's going to stay within the Harvard campus itself in terms of the frustration and backlash. And so I'm very interested to see how Harvard is going to respond

to that as well. Maria? The two that resigned, they did release a very long statement, but there were some key facts in their long statement that I do think everybody should, you know, pay some attention to. One of them is that they said that while they were working on the project, they were pressured to sort of do as much media as possible around the project, but then they were discouraged from Harvard leadership as far as taking the time to build relationships with the local community members. And so that is something that's really important because we know as Black folks, you try to do a project about us that doesn't actually include us, we will quickly embarrass

you once the project is complete. And so these two were trying to do it in a way that was respectful to the community and was respectful of the project. And that's not what Harvard wanted. I think the thing, too, that is really important to notice here, because this is a trend and you're hearing DEI professionals across the country say this, what these two professors are actually saying, what happened to them, which is that it's a lot of window dressing going on when institutions are saying we're doing something to memorialize or to make right to a step in racial justice, they essentially want the credit. And that's what comes with the lifting it up to the media. They want the credit, but they don't want the actual

real tough work that goes behind making amends to actually happen. Let's talk about this trial in Georgia. The Trump trial is not going to happen before the election. The Georgia Court of Appeals has made sure that by setting an October 4th date to hear the appeal of the refusal to disqualify D.A. Fannie Willis from the case. Judge Scott McAfee denied the joint motion of Trump and other co-defendants on April 4th. Trump appealed his ruling in the Court of Appeals eventually agreed to accept the appeal. Judge McAfee ordered that pre-trial motions and discovery should continue while that appeal is pending.

Still with the appeals court setting oral arguments so far out, there's no possible way this case will go to trial before the election. The motion sought to disqualify Willis and her office from prosecuting the case and also asked the court to dismiss the indictment because of Willis's romantic relationship with Nathan Wade. The court was satisfied their relationship did not begin until after Wade started working for the DA's office. Although McAfee denied the defense motion, he did order Wade to be removed from the case. I said this from the outset, that this right here was an error on the part of Fannie Willis and Nathan Wade. That what we've seen in the past several months, this trial has been delayed because of that.

Both of them should have had enough sense to say, this is going to be a problem. You don't create problems. You try to be as clean as possible. And so now, as a result of this, this is not going to trial this year. This one is on D.A. Fonny Willis. Renita. Absolutely. I agree. You know, the Trump lawyers, their tactic the entire time has been that they want to do anything they can to delay the trial going, because they know that once we have the election, if Trump is elected, he can make all of this go away.

So their whole tactics have been delay, delay, delay. They file appeals when they know they have no shot of winning them, which I think is what this is. But it does serve the purpose that they want, which is to delay this as much as possible so that there will not be a decision. No trial can be held before the presidential election. So I agree with you. This is a case that I continue to pay a lot of attention to because I was in the committee in the room when Trump lawyers came before my committee and asked us to throw out the votes of Georgians and try to basically steal the presidential election, which is what they are basically charged with in a indictment that Fannie Willis did. So I do think that I agree with you, Roland. It was a complete misstep by the D.A. to allow herself to sort of give them something to work with in, you know, just delaying this trial. She served up on a super platter on the Congo, pure and simple.

Yeah, it's frustrating, man. And to see this happen, to also see what the Justice Department did as it relates to taking 14 months to bring up their case against Trump, like him and his lawyers take every advantage they can. And, yes, this is something that lays at the hand of Vonnie Willis. You can't slip up as it relates to these guys because they exploit every single thing. And so to be quite honest, I know these are state charges and things, but it's kind of like, you know, I hate to agree with Don Jr. or whichever Trump said that, son said that the November election is really going to be the time for the ultimate verdict. Like, we can't depend on these trials to deliver anything for us. Yes, we can call him a convicted felon now, and we're going to see what happens on July 11th. But still, we have to continue to stay vigilant because too many of us put our

faith in these trials of these attorneys and these different states, and it's just not enough to stop this man. November 5th, that is the date for the final verdict on Donald Trump. Julianne? Absolutely. I mean, I am so disappointed in my soror, Fannie Willis, just so disappointed in her lack of judgment. But it is what it is. And moving forward, you know, as Renita said, these folks basically delay, delay, delay the 1999. We're even seeing it with the New York case. We've seen it with the Florida case where the judge is one of the man's appointees, and she has thrown everything in but the kitchen sink. We see it in the D.C. case. We see it in the Supreme Court pondering whether or not he has blanket immunity for any crime he commits, which he asserted in 2016 that he had when he said he

could shoot somebody up Fifth Avenue and get away with it. So Fannie Willis played into their hands, you know, the hard ones, but the hard ones, but the hard couldn't wait for it. Because frankly, basically, as I think Omokongo said, she served herself up on a silver platter. I don't wish to diss the sister or, you know, throw her under the bus, but this was a huge tactical error. And taking it to October 4th means this will not be heard until after the election. Now, this does say one thing, though. If y'all want justice, I say y'all, because there's some of y'all people out there who, you know, I'm not going to vote. You know, I don't like Biden, which is stupidity. It's compounded stupidity. And if you're mad about me calling you stupid,

juliannemalvo at AOL.com, you're stupid. Because basically, this will not be adjudicated any place but at the ballot box. Folks, sports sports commentator Colin Cowherd, man, did he tear into Trump? And look, here's a guy who is a conservative Republican, and he had a whole lot to say about the orange one. Check this out. You know, I've said this about Trump before. He's trying to sell me an America that doesn't exist. Let's say I got busted for some really bad crime in court, a drug crime. And my wife did too, in a separate case. And then so did one of my kids, my manager, my agent, and my attorney. It would be reasonable to conclude that I'm shady and involved in a business that's not terribly legal. Well, Donald Trump is now a felon. His campaign chairman was a felon.

So was his deputy campaign manager, his personal lawyer, his chief strategist, his national security advisor, his trade advisor, his foreign policy advisor, his campaign fixture, and his company CFO. They're all felons judged by the company you keep. It's a cabal of convicts. So it's not that I'm not willing to vote for conservatives. I said I would have voted for Mitt Romney. Seemed like a decent family man. I liked the second Bush, George Bush's senior son. I liked him.

I thought he was a decent American, a decent human. I liked his wife, Laura Bush. I thought they were decent people. If everybody in your social circle is a felon, I don't think it's rigged. I don't think the world's against you. And to get people to agree on anything, 34 counts, 0 for 34. I mean, that's a batting slump even the New York Mets could be impressed with, 0 for 34. When you're constantly trying to sell me on an America that I don't see,

I'm not saying inflation is not an issue, but I get on airplanes all the time, and it's not a bunch of rich people. I get on planes, there's people and it's not a bunch of rich people. I get on planes, there's people in normal clothes that look rich to me, and the planes are all full, and the hotels are all full, and the freeways are all full. That means people are going to work. You're trying to sell me on this story and this narrative that's just not true. Trump's entire game plan is the country is in a free fall. But when everybody in your team, everybody in your group, your cabal is a felon. Maybe maybe the world's not against you. Stop trying to sell me on everything's rigged.

The country's falling into the sea. The economy's terrible. The economy is OK. It's not like on fire. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

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

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

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

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

drug man. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette.

MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real.

It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family.

They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like he's like my best friend. At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit AdoptUSKids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services,

and the Ad Council. But the America that I live in is imperfect. But compared to the rest of the world, America that I live in is imperfect, but compared to the rest of the world, I think we're doing okay. I'm a Congo, a cabal of convicts. He nailed it.

Yeah, I was going to bring that one up, too. And, you know, this is what is needed, to be quite honest, because you know, where people here who are watching are pretty much baked in. People may watch MSNBC might be baked in terms of who you know, how they view Trump. But it's going to be guys like this, you know, who are conservative leaning, but also have a reach in the sports world that are going to also help turn the tide, you know, and reach out to some of those independent voters. You know, this is still Biden's election to lose. And, you know, Trump keeps losing more and more support. But if people like him, I love what George Conway did on CNN over the weekend

when he called out, you know, one of the commentators and said, I can't believe CNN's paying you, you know, the way that you're just lying about, you know, these types of things. This is what it's going to take. Republicans against Trump keep coming, keep coming hard. And again, it's not about, you know, whether we all agree 100 percent, but it's like, do we want to be able to have more elections after November 5th? And he called it plain and clear. People are working. People are traveling. This is the basic idea of America that Trump's people are trying to sell his followers against. And the fact that Cowherd is speaking up against this, there needs to be more like him following his lead.

And this is going to be part of how we deliver that final verdict on November 5th. Leon? You know, it's interesting to hear. This guy is really on point. And the cabal of what is, I wrote it down, so I'm going to use it. The cabal of conservatives is a wonderful alliteration. But it's more than that. Here's what we know.

Look at the attack on Larry Hogan. I'm not a Larry Hogan fan whatsoever. He's always kind of played it narrow. The Republican candidate for the United States Senate, he's always kind of tried to be Mr. Bipartisan. And so he said something quite mild, I think, that people should respect the jury. And when he gets back to the RNC, that's the campaign. Basically, they are a cabal, and they're demanding absolute loyalty, absolute, unfettered, blind loyalty to the orange man who doesn't deserve it.

And what we see, I mean, I didn't think they were going to get 34 out of 34. I figured they were going to fudge it and maybe they'd get like 20 out of 34, just because. I just didn't figure the whole jury. But if you got one, you got all of it because there was a pattern in practice. And so now you basically have these folks who want to make excuses. What's his name? The orange man says, you know, it's basically his constituents aren't going to be happy. Well, they never been happy. They like him. What about that will make you happy? And so basically,

what we have here is a situation where loyalty is going to lead us over the cliff. That's really what's going on. But, again, always, we all know, it's November 5th. And what we have to do if we oppose that man is to organize in such a way, not a narrow victory, it's not one point or two point, and it's a resounding victory so that there is no question, no question that he lost to the lost to the lost to the lost. That's the work for those people like Natasha and Melanie,

the sisters who are out there doing the work, the brothers out there doing the work. That's the work we have to do. We have to make sure it's aounding the feet for the orange man. Rita? Yeah, it'll be interesting to see a lot of these folks that are talking right now, what they actually will do in November, because as we well know, conservatives have a history, you know, even going back to before 2016, but let's just say 2016 with Trump, of saying bad things about him and saying that, you know, they don't like what he's saying or doing.

And then they turn right around and vote for him. So these comments are entertaining. It's interesting what Colin said. But I do think that for anybody who does not want to see Trump elected, please don't rest on your laurels with these comments, because a lot of these people will turn around and just vote for Trump. I do think one thing that he said is actually good for resetting the goalposts, because so many have said, and Trump keeps saying this too, that the official verdict on the New York charges, the felonies that he was just convicted of, the official ruling will be in November. And that's not how it works. We have a criminal justice system. A decision was made. The decision stands until another decision is made in court. And so for everybody else, particularly black Americans in this country who have been convicted in a court of law, it doesn't matter how many people think you are innocent. You're convicted until there is another decision. So I do think we need to get back to that. He has been convicted of these felonies. It doesn't matter if everybody in the world disagrees with the decision of what happened, the jury's decision. The decision is a decision. Indeed, indeed. And every time Senator

Tim Scott opens his mouth, I just sit here and go, oh, my goodness. I've never seen somebody kiss more Trump ass outside of Eric and Donald Jr. He is desperate to be Trump's vice president. Listen to the sheer BS he uttered on Fox News. Can he create jobs for the poorest Americans? Good news is he created more than 7 million jobs with the highest percentage going to women, African-Americans, Hispanics and Asians. What we know about four years under Donald Trump is we had low unemployment, low inflation, high enthusiasm, law and order in our streets. And we've had the exact opposite under Joe Biden. I'm sorry. I don't mean to laugh.

First of all, let's get some basic facts. Six million jobs under Trump. Thirteen million jobs under Biden. Crime is going down. It was going up under Trump.

Then you hear all of the oh, yeah, low inflation. Then, of course, you have this idiot completely bungled to covid. All right. We saw what happened there as well. They're all lies. Oh, Mark Cuban even broke this down. How all of these Republicans are talking about, oh, how Biden is destroying the oil industry. Oh, I'm sorry. They never produced this much of oil in the United States ever. That's another lie that's out of the window. Oh, wages going up higher on the buy. I mean, Julian, it's lie after lie after lie when it comes to the economic numbers.

It really is. I mean, the numbers are there. The Bureau of Labor Statistics is impartial. Most of the people who work there are career employees. They have no reason to fudge the numbers for Biden, for Trump or for anybody else. The numbers tell the story, as you said, six million jobs under Dump and 13 million under President Biden, unemployment rate 4 under President Biden, then under the orange man. We can go down the list. The one issue, the sticky wicket, of course, is inflation. And of course, much of that can be attributed to COVID. But inflation is coming down. As the commentator, the conservative commentator said, they're trying to tell a story of America that just does not exist. You know, the crime down,

we can just go down the list. Things are better. Now, for people at the bottom, they're not that much better. And you perhaps or somebody else can explain Black men to me. I've never been able to figure it out. But those brothers who keep saying they're going to vote for Trump. But, you know, Terrence Woodbury and others have said those numbers may not be accurate. The bottom line is Tim Scott is not only a liar, he's a blatant liar. He is, like I said, if his lips were not brown, you could see the feces running off of him because that's how much behind he likes to kiss just to make sure that the orange man considers him for vice president. But what does he bring to the ticket?

Nothing. What does he bring to the table? Nothing. There is something wrong with that brother. But there's been something wrong with him for a very long time, as we all know. And again, you're not going to get a pushback on Fox News, Renita, because they lie constantly. Right. And I think it's time for this. You ain't got to lie, Craig. You ain't got to lie. And Tim Scott, you know, it's time for that for him because he is always coming up

with these fantasy scenarios of what he thinks is happening and all of it always in support of Trump. The reality is, at the end of the day, voters do not care what statistics actually show. So he's wrong on his facts. But even if he was correct, voters don't care about any of that. Voters look at how they think and feel about how far their money is going. So if they feel that they are able to work 40 hours a week and pay for basics, then they feel the economy is great. Voters do not

go and say, oh, let me see what an economist said about the economy to tell me how I should feel about it. That's just not what voters do. They look at how are they getting along? What is their quality of life? How hard are they having to work to pay for the basics? So why keep them up and just tell these lies that are easily things that can be fact-checked and disputed. I don't know. I just sit here and I'm like, dude, just stop lying. And on the Congo, it's just like constantly. And then he was like, oh, my goodness, Blacks are running over to the Republic. No, they're not. Black folks are not running over to the Republic.

And now the Republicans are trying this other lie that, oh, they're going to start using his criminal conviction as a way to appeal to black people. Oh, so what they're saying is black people, you're felons. Exactly. And if anybody falls, think that's going to work. I got a bridge. I want to tell you, look, the way that they are using him and Byron Donald and these other guys to get out there and be these surrogates and just get out there and flat out lie, it's sad. What's also really sad is that the people who need to hear that these guys are lying are most likely not going to see that truth unless they do hear from the, you know, calling cowards of the world because they're not paying attention to us. But the fact of the matter is, as we continue to plug away and challenge this, not only misinformation, but disinformation about the Trump versus Biden economy, it's also very important that we make sure that we point out the fact that Biden's economy is better than Trump's pre-COVID, because they always want to throw out the whole thing about, well,

COVID, and that's what led to the reduction in these numbers, unemployment, that's not true. Trump is doing worse than Biden before COVID, and that's extremely important. And so at every measure, there's no inflation-sealed issue, as Dr. Malvo said, but at every measure, Biden is beating him, and particularly as it relates to the black community, issues relating to diabetes, we can talk about student loans. I saw Dr. Wes Bellamy last week talking about how his loans got canceled. I mean, there are so many diabetes. There are so many stories we can be telling that can refute what people are saying about what Trump's doing and not in the grand scale. We can bring it down to personal things that are happening in our community that our communities are actually seeing results of right now and will be seeing as the months go forward. And we have to keep hammering that home because they're going

to keep hammering these lies. And Fox is part of the problem, as always. And the lies will come fast and furious. All right, folks, next story, the Levin Circuit Court of Appeals. They are blocking the Fearless Fund from awarding $20,000 grants to businesses owned by black women. Of the cases being litigated, conservative activist Ed Bloom claimed that the grant program is likely racial discriminatory. The appeals court in a two-to-one decision disagreed with the federal judge who ruled in September the lawsuit was unlikely to prevail on First Amendment grounds. The Atlanta firm was working to boost scarce venture capital funding for black women. The ruling could have sweeping implications for race based initiatives in the private sector. What we have here, Julian, on this particular issue here, and this was interesting. What these what these white conservatives are doing is they're using the 1866 Civil Rights Act, which was meant to benefit black folks.

They're using this. They're weaponizing this against black people. Well, it's highly ironic that they would be doing this to use something that empowered us to disempower us. It's highly ironic. The other piece of this is these people are so ahistoric, they do not get it. In other words, why do you need a fearless fund? Because Black women got less than 1% of the venture capital dollars that were available. Why was that? Not because their proposals were faulty, but because of structural discrimination. So they're denying discrimination and then claiming discrimination against white people. Now, they're not saying that a fund that benefits women, let's say, would be discriminatory. They're not saying that a college scholarship that says for Irish descendants will be discriminatory. Their anti-blackness reeks. It actually reeks of their hate of Black people.

And, Rola, you've written about it in your book, White Fear, and many of us have been looking at this. But the bottom line is we can just go back to the end of Reconstruction. Whenever Black people make gains, white people are sitting in the cut, prepared to take them back. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution.

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

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

And this is season two of the war on drugs. But sir, we are back in a big way, in a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star studded a little bit, man.

We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King,

John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown.

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

It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I always had to be so good, no one could ignore me. Carve my path with data and drive.

But some people only see who I am on paper. The paper ceiling. The limitations from degree screens to stereotypes that are holding back over 70 million stars. Workers skilled through alternative routes rather than a bachelor's degree. It's time for skills to speak for themselves. Find resources for breaking through barriers at tayPaperCeiling.org, brought to you by Opportunity at Work and the Ad Council. So we're seeing here some young Black women, amazing sisters,

who said, we want to empower some Black women entrepreneurs. What's wrong with that? What's wrong with it as these hateful, evil, ignorant, ahistorical white people are like, oh, but that's discriminatory, as if our whole existence in this country has not been discriminatory. Renita? Yeah, so this is just a preliminary injunction. So I think that's important for everybody to realize is that basically before anything has really gone to court, a court has basically made a preliminary ruling so the fight is not over and so, you know, folks don't give up. The other thing that I think is important to look at with this is, like Dr. Malbeau said, I'll take it a step further,

this is not the only type of organization that exists like this to specifically lift up communities that are consistently overlooked. Sometimes it's funds to support women. In this case, it's funds to support black women. And that is always looked at as a First Amendment sort of way of using your voice is by giving money to certain groups. And so I do hope that eventually the Fearless Fund will prevail in court because there has not been a ruling like this that specifically says that this is not freedom of speech for at least 150 years. So this is a preliminary injunction.

And I'm hoping that the final decision that we'll see will actually reflect that this is a freedom of this is a First Amendment right for the fearless fund to operate. I'm a guy. Look, Melinda French Gates just decided that she's going to give over a billion dollars to support organizations that help with the advancement of women, including an organization that's censoring around, I think it's called the American Center for Boys or something like that, to help boys, you know, become better and stronger so that they don't, you know, hurt women in many particular ways. I don't see Blum and them coming out against her. Why? Because she's rich and powerful and influential. These guys are using their influence in the same way that they did to go against affirmative action to target smaller groups that just don't have the financial wherewithal to be able to put up an instant

block. And so now the fearless fund has to spend more resources in court, more time on lawyers, and they're going to do what they can to try to break this organization. But they are very selective. And so you're going against race. But if you can get a twofer, go against and that targets race as well as women, then this is the conservative dream as it relates to people like Blum. And so we have to continue to raise awareness about this. We need to continue to fight for this. And many more organizations and individuals who are in our community and have resources need to take the same tactical that Melinda French-Gates has taken in terms of using your money and philanthropy to help build some of these organizations as well so that one day we wouldn't even need a fearless fund. But until then, we have to keep fighting to make sure that the fearless fund can keep its

doors open and that other organizations that do the same thing are not going to be sent into oblivion by organizations and people like Blum and the Russos of the world. Indeed, indeed. Folks, on Saturday, it was the 161st anniversary of the of the raid in which Harriet Tubman helped free more than 700 slaves in South Carolina. Well, to commemorate this, a monument of the conductor of the Underground Railroad was unveiled in Beaufort, South Carolina. Tubman led more than 700 slaves from Lowcountry Plantation to Freedom. Born a slave on the eastern shore of Maryland in 1822, Tubman is the best-known conductor of the Underground Railroad as she led at least 70 slaves in Maryland to freedom before the Civil War. But her work in South Carolina during the Civil War often gets overlooked.

The monument is the first in the state, marking her Darren June 1863 mission along the Combahee River. And thank goodness we have monuments like this on the Congo because we get enough of the damn Confederate monuments all throughout this country, especially in the South. Absolutely. And they're going to be trying to put up even more. And so it's really important, particularly coming off the story that we just talked about, talking about a fearless fund. And here we're talking about a fearless sister, right? They never got her on the money that people were talking about before. And so really, when it comes to

honoring our ancestors and people who fought for us, you know, Black people being freed in this country made America better for everybody. And so when people, and you know, I've seen stories over the years, we've seen it like, you know, the whole Russell Simmons, Harriet Tubman slavery skit and all of these things. You know, I feel like Harriet Tubman has been somebody who's been kind of disrespected over the last few years. And so when we talk about, you know, having these statues up in these memorials, particularly at a time where in South Carolina and other places they're looking to remove for folks with little history that was already taught about her, it's really high time that we continue to stand up. And these efforts are not happening overnight. So I commend

all of the people down there who put this together, because these statues and things can take years to happen. And to not give up the fight in the era of Trump, and now in this time right now, we have Biden as president, but we have all of these anti-DEI efforts going on to still fight and make that happen. I give them all the props in the world, and I hope we continue to have more statues that celebrate her and her ancestors who fought for our freedom. A lot of people don't realize that there's a Harriet Tubman Museum there in Macon, Georgia. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm so glad to see this monument. Number one, it's an amazing monument erected.

I think we're used to seeing just singular statues for monuments. And so I think people are kind of used to that. But this thing is so expansive. I mean, look at the the back we can see all the people following this is a moment that looks like it's worth traveling just to see it and so I'm excited about that the second thing is like I always continue to point out is that things like this are so important anytime you have a museum as you mentioned the Harry Tubman Museum and and you now have this monument it's important because in a time where states are

removing our history and our story from the classroom, when you have monuments up and things like this, it makes people ask questions. Okay, who was Harriet Tubman? It forces history to be told and it forces us to talk about our history, which is being removed from schools. So I am excited to see this. And I think that we need more of this now more than ever to combat what's happening in schools. Julianne? I'm excited about this monument. I'm always excited about Harriet Tubman. You know, there is the Harriet Tubman House in Maryland, which I've visited several times, one time just with a blank notebook saying, sister, give me some inspiration. She was all that and then some, but the South Carolina, Youngkin, is trying to reverse laws that took some of those Confederate monuments down.

He wants them back up and he's being very clear about it. So, you know, the history, they are attempting to erase our history. And this monument, this glorious, large, substantial monument is an antidote to white lies. It's just an antidote to what it says. We are here. We did this. We have to keep doing this. We have to keep building monuments, statues.

You know, the National African-American Reparations Commission, on which I serve, has a plank that says we want to commemorate we like brian stevenson at the lynching museum basically a plaque wherever somebody was lit so people remember that people were lynched we need to see all these so and the other thing about the harriet tupkin that's so exciting there are very few statues to women and to black women in particular. Well, there are very few statues to black people. Let's start there. All a white boy has to do is ride on a horse and they make a statue out of it. So, there are very few

statues to women and to black women. And so, this is just so very important. And I agree with Renita. The next time I have some spare change in a few days, I'll probably go down there and look at it myself. Folks, some sad news came out on Saturday night when Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee announced that she's being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She's undergoing treatment. The 74-year-old issued a statement.

Actually, I first saw her when she was at the funeral of Reverend William Lawson in Houston. I was there Friday before last, and it was when I saw her and when I heard her, I mean, she normally has her very, you know, booming voice, if you will. But it was a dramatic change from the last time she was on our show. And so in her statement, she actually made the announcement by saying today my fight is more personal, but I will approach with the same faith and the same courage. My doctors have confirmed my diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. I'm currently undergoing treatment to battle this disease that impacts tens of thousands of Americans every year. I'm confident that my doctors have developed the best possible plan to target my specific disease.

The road ahead will not be easy, but I stand in faith that God will strengthen me. She's the third CBC member in the past four years to be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Congressman John Lewis and Congressman Alcee Hastings, both of them have been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Both have passed away. The reality of this disease, Radita, it has a 96 percent fatality rate. And so only four percent of folks who get pancreatic cancer live up to five years or beyond that. And so Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee certainly has a tough road. She's lost a lot of weight. You can also, again, hear it in her voice as well. But as she said, she's going to continue the fight.

Absolutely. You did lay out the grim reality of pancreatic cancer and how it is, you know, of the cancers that people typically get. This is, I would say, most people would agree it's the scariest one because it's really hard to survive pancreatic cancer long term. I'm really hoping that she has caught this at an early stage. I'm hoping that, as she said, her treatment plan is specific and that it will be effective for her to, you know, allow her to continue moving in her legacy and at least enjoy, you know, what at at least enjoy what time she does have. You know, this is back to back to back, us talking about fearless women in some way, shape or form. And when I look at all that she has done and continues to do for our community,

it's, you know, all of, I know she talked about this as a journey she's dealing with, you know, alone and it's personal. We understand that, but she's not alone. I mean, there's so many prayers up for her and everyone surrounding her for her to be able to handle this in the best way possible. And so I just hope that she sees this and that she knows this, you know, that we love her and we're thankful for everything she has done for us. And we're just going to continue to pray along with her that she pulls through. Julianne?

You know, Sheila is my sister and my friend. We've been in the trenches together. I love her dearly, and I'm so sad about this. She took the baton from Congressman John Conyers to continue H.R. 40 with reparations legislation. Every time NARC, National African-American Reparations Commission, has called on her to show up at a town hall to travel somewhere, she's been there. But that's who she is. She is a fighter. And so she's going to fight this cancer just like she fights racism. But the sad news, as Renita said, is that pancreatic cancer is not only fast acting, but it really doesn't have a high survival rate.

We just have to lift her up in prayer because she is a woman of faith. We have to just surround her with the love and to give back to her what she's given to our community. I mean, I'm so real. I can't tell you how sad that I am about this. It's really quite a body blow to the Black community, not to her, just to her and to her family, her son, who's a PhD economist, but also to, you know, to the Black community, because she's fought for us. She has fought for us. And so now we got to fight for her. Indeed, indeed. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

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

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

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

We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. Got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush.

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

your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I always had to be so good no one could ignore me. Carve my path with data and drive. But some people only see who I am on paper. The paper ceiling.

The limitations from degree screens to stereotypes that are holding back over 70 million stars. Workers skilled through alternative routes rather than a bachelor's degree. It's time for skills to speak for themselves. Find resources for breaking through barriers at taylorpapersceiling.org. Brought to you by Opportunity at Work and the Ad Council. Yeah, prayers go out to Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee. Folks, real quick break. We come back.

I got to deal with this drama over a silly-ass foul against Kaitlyn Clark in a basketball game. And people are just losing their damn minds over this. I got to deal with this. We'll be right back. Roland Martin, Unfiltered on black sun network we talk about blackness and what happens in black culture we're about covering these things that matter to us by speaking to our issues and concerns this is a genuine people-powered movement a lot of stuff that we're not getting you get it and you spread the word we wish to plead our own cause to long have others spoken for us.

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We're at $100,000. We're behind $100,000, so we want to hit that. Your money makes this possible. Checks and money orders go to P.O. Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 20037-0196. The Cash App is $RM Unfiltered. PayPal is RMartin Unfiltered. Venmo is RM Unfiltered. Zelle is Roland at RolandSMartin.com. First, President Barack Obama's road to the White House. We've got about 500 copies of the book available. And so this actually is all of the coverage of the 2008 election. But the other

thing is this here. I talked to folks like Malik Yoba, Hill Harper, Erica Alexander, Kevin Lowe, Spike Lee, Tatiana Ali. There's a lot of behind the scenes stuff in here as well where I talked about some of the stuff that went down at CNN. Also, when you go through here, a lot of the photos that you see in here are photos that I actually shot, photos that were my time at CNN. And so what I decided to do, because one, I published the book and I own it myself, is that so I said, you know what? I'm going to slash the price to $10. I'm not reprinting the book. So once we are sold out of these 500, that's it. They're gone.

So you can go to RolandSMartin.com forward slash the first to get a copy of this book. Everybody who orders this book through the website, not on Amazon, only through RollinsMartin.com, I will personally autograph and mail you a copy of this book. It's all of the coverage, the actual interviews that I did with him. And just to show you, of course, when it came out, there's actually even in here the interviews that I did with him and Michelle Obama, which won TV One Cable Networks its first two NAACP Image Awards. And so all of that for $10.

Go to rollingmissmartin.com the first and order your copy today. I am Tommy Davidson. I play Oscar on Proud Family, Louder and Prouder. Right now I'm rolling with Roland Martin, unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undamned believable. You hear me? Okay, y'all. The Indiana Fever and the Chicago Sky played on Saturday. Of course, Angel Reese plays for the Sky.

Kaitlyn Clark plays for the Indiana Fever. And, oh, Lord, have all these people, these commentators, and these folks who have no clue about the WNBA have been losing their minds because Kennedy Carter, a Texas A&M alum, committed a hard foul against, oh my goodness, Kaitlin Clark. Oh, the last thing we can do is have hard fouls in the WNBA. So here's what actually happened. Watch this. They've redoubled off to Carter. Her jumper is good.

Kennedy Carter now with 12 points off the bench. And Clark. All right, so Kennedy Carter gives Kaitlyn Clark a love tap. It's a shove. And oh my goodness, they've been losing their minds. Now, there's a thing called context. And again, folks are like, this is ridiculous. This makes no sense. It's just wrong. This can't be allowed. Do any of y'all watch basketball?

WNBA or the NBA? Folk get pushed, shoved. I mean, are we serious? Oh, just in case y'all didn't quite understand the context, let me roll back what happened prior to this play. Watch this. One for two at the line. Carter had it deflected by Clark, who comes up with a steal here's clark

clark using the boston screen carter got over it from behind in indiana able to retain possession boston mid-range, the pull-up short, the follow, no, another chance, one goal for Boston. Loose ball, it's time, it's good. Aria Boston flips it in. So, maybe y'all didn't quite see it, so I'm just going to slide this back a little bit. So at the top of the screen, at the top of the screen, I want y'all to watch after the bucket is made, watch Caitlin Clark turn back and talk some trash to Kennedy Carter. It's at the court all the time. Just like Larry Bird did.

So, guess what? When you talk trash to somebody, all right, they're going to remind your ass what's going on. So why are these people literally losing their minds and how, oh, my God, what's going on? Do y'all want to see some stupidity? How about the dumbasses with the Chicago Tribune editorial board? Mind you, she doesn't play for the Chicago Sky. This is the Chicago Tribune editorial board at least go to my iPad from the editorial board the foul committed by Chicago Sky guard Kennedy Carter

on Kaitlyn Clark was egregious outside of a sporting contest it would have been seen as an assault. I don't know if these are all new people with the Chicago Tribune, but clearly you didn't have anybody with the Tribune who was on the editorial board when the Bulls would play the Pistons and the Pistons would beat the hell out of Michael Jordan and they called it the Jordan rules and their deal is when he brought his ass down the lane, you put a hurting on Michael Jordan. Yeah.

Y'all, Magic Johnson, he was whooping his ass when he came into the NBA. Oh, you gonna come in here hot-dogging it? His own teammates were giving him hell. Laird Byrd had a crazy fight with Dr. J. I mean, we can go on and on and on. I remember Kareem Abdul-Jabbar mollywhopped several players. So I'm trying to understand here why

we need to go and talk about the brawl at the palace with the pissers and Indiana Pacers. Can we please stop this snowflake crap with Caitlin Clark? Okay, guess what?

One of the other centers threw Angel Reese down on the floor, and that was called Hey Boo, Welcome to the WNBA. This is called sports. And so then you got all these folks. Then you got crazy ass people saying stuff like Pat McAfee on ESPN. His silly ass, and he's now apologized for

this utterly ridiculous comment but listen to Pat McAfee explain what's going on here and he sounds like an idiot no is she what I don't know I just with my eyes I couldn't see if she's Caucasian

or not so I think what we're trying to say is what the WNBA currently has is what we like to describe as a cash cow. There is a superstar. And we're not saying that the players on the court need to act any differently. That's the athletes are going to do what athletes are going to do in any sport. I think we're all learning that WNBA, that's old school football, baby.

That is old school football. But I would like the media people that continue to say, this rookie class, this rookie class, this rookie class. Nah, just call it for what it is. There's one white bitch for the Indiana team who is a superstar. And is it because she stayed in Iowa, put an entire state on her back, took a program from nothing to a multiple-year success story? Is it because she would go on, put an entire state on her back, took a program from nothing to a multiple year success story? Is it because she would go on to break the entire...

That's a whole bunch of BS. First of all, let's just unpack some things here. First, Caitlin Clark is not a WNBA superstar. She was a superstar in college. Now, has she brought lots of attention? Absolutely. Absolutely. I talked about this beforehand.

That allowed the attention, the Nike deal, all of these different things. I mean, we can go on and on and on. And how everybody's benefiting. But they're also benefiting because the previous generation, what they built, they also are benefiting because we saw female stars in college. One of them, Angel Reese. In fact, she, Angela Reese, and she talked about, she talked about this whole thing as well, making it clear that folk also watching me.

See, this is where Pat McAfee was wrong, because what he was saying there was is that, oh, this rookie class is only about Caitlin Clark. No, it's not. No, it's not. It's really. I'm telling you, Angela Reese and Caitlin Clark. This is Michael Jordan, Larry Bird. Excuse me. This is Magic Johnson, Larry Bird. It's what it is. And I accept the reality of black and white. I do. That's America. The biggest money fight was what? In boxing, George Clooney and Larry Holmes. Yeah, that's black and white. This is America.

But I'm tired of these people acting like she can't be followed. Here's the whole deal. If you're Caitlyn Clark and you talk trash, your ass going to get smacked. And Kennedy Carter said, listen, little girl, you new to this. I'm true to this. Kennedy Clark was a baller at Texas A&M. She was an All-American. She was balling in the WNBA, had some issues in Atlanta and Los Angeles. She scored 19 points for that game, outscoring Kaitlyn Clark.

But this is real simple. When you play grown-ass women, grown-ass women are going to talk to you like you're a rookie. So I need all of these men and all of these women and all of these people who ain't never followed the WNBA. Oh, by the way, I'm from Houston. First three-time champion of the Houston Comets. I'm quite familiar with the WNBA, so I ain't new to this. I'm true to this. But when you have these utterly ridiculous people like Megyn Kelly saying stupid stuff.

Like, look at this idiot. Instead of taking cheap shots at Kaitlyn Clark and admiring themselves and blinding envy of her, they should try to be more like her. They'd play better and their lives would improve. Hey, dumbass Megan Kelly. Kaitlyn Clark has already set the rookie record

for most turnovers as a rookie. There are other players playing way better than her. Oh, by the way, Megan, because you don't know shit about WNBA. Kaitlyn Clark's Indiana Fever, they're 2-8. So, oh, by the way,

Sunday's game, she scored, I think, was it three points or five points? She didn't even hit double digits. So there's a notion that, oh, my God, be like her. Hey, it's called toughen the hell up. You're now in pro ball. and I don't understand for the life of me, Renita, why these people are so such snowflakes as if they've never watched sports before. This is what happens when you decide to come in as the hot rookie.

Ask Kobe what happened. They were like, yo, we're going to put you on your ass. In fact, I remember the video where the player's like, I ain't passing his ass the ball at the All-Star game. So this ain't new in sports. And so guess what? Kaitlyn Clark, she going to have to deal with like everybody else. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time,

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Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early. Set up goals. Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position.

Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. Take your ass to the weight room. Bulk up, because they're going to hit you. Yeah, this whole thing is so crazy. And what the Chicago Tribune said is absolutely outrageous to say that this would be considered assault on anywhere else if it weren't on a basketball court? Give me a break. Who would have to go far and wide to find a solicitor that would actually try to give somebody an assault charge

over essentially a push? That is ridiculous. That's not worth the paperwork or the charges. So they definitely overblew it, and I think that they overblew it because it looks like there's a racial difference between Caitlyn and Kennedy. The second thing is when I saw I saw in print the interview that they did with Caitlin. And she herself even said, this is what happens in basketball. There's nothing to do. You know, the shove happened. I had to pick myself up and reset my attitude. And you keep moving.

It's just a part of basketball. So really, this is just a lot of people blowing it up. And I think they're doing that because she is a white woman, and I think that the root of all of this is really going back to sort of try to protecting that white femininity. Because we've never seen it before. Here's the game.

Here's the game two weeks earlier. Here's the game two weeks earlier. Watch these two sinners go at it, hard foul. Uh-oh, but it come to blows what what what you gonna do what you gonna yo this is sports this is sports and the reality is this here if the video we showed caitlyn clark was talking trash to kennedy carter after the basket. And on the Congo, she was like, oh, okay, I got something for y'all as we go down the court. And

Kaitlyn Clark also elbowed her as well during those plays as well. I saw it. I saw it. Tussle for the ball. You go high. But it wasn't like I mean, I've seen some elbows. So, I mean, it wasn't that big deal. But, I mean, but it wasn't like i mean i've seen some elbows so i mean it wasn't that big deal but

i mean but it's all a part of the game and it's gonna get physical no absolutely and i think people also forgot that other malice at the palace when i think it was the sparks versus the the shock in 2008 at wmba game that you know turned into a brawl of some sort this is part of the game and And very frustrating. I'm frustrated with the cloak that has been wrapped around Kaitlyn Clark. And it's no fault of her own. She gets out there. She plays hard.

She doesn't play into any of the race stuff. She doesn't play into any of the other things she gets on the court, talks her trash, does her thing just like anybody else out there. But this idea of how she has to be protected because she's saving the league and people talking about, oh, now charter flights are happening because of what she said. People have been speaking about charter flights for years and now it's happening. And so she has accelerated things that have already been happening. And so I think that that's a great thing.

But what is the league going to start giving automatic flagrant fouls now if she gets touched in a particular way? This is ultimately going to hurt her success as the league goes forward. And I want to also shout out Monica McNutt on ESPN's first take, as well as Jemele Hill, who's been out there speaking about a lot of the sexism that people have been

putting out there, just in their comments about the WNBA in general. But getting back to the issue of Kaitlyn Clark, they can't have to have this. They can't have this mentality of we're going to protect this woman at all costs because she is the savior of the league. She will save the league, quote unquote. She gets out there, competes and fights hard. But and this Pat McAfee talking about she's the only one with that sexist statement that

he made an offensive statement. There are so many Cardoso, Reese and so on and so forth. And so i'm glad that i'm able to learn more about the league watch the league and i am going to listen to the people mainly the women commentators who know about the league and follow it and they need to be uplifted as well but all of this other nonsense i'm seeing like why is morning joe covering this did they talk about what elissa thomas did to angel reese this is ridiculous i I mean, right. I mean, look, you referenced the

Fight Detroit shot. Go to my iPad. I mean, this, hell, this is the video right here. They went at it. I mean, the bottom line is, to me, that looked much bigger than the Caitlin Clark stuff, Julian. These people, this just goes to show you,

this just goes to show you that one, you've got folks who never watched the WNBA, they're snowflakes, and they want to hurt to be treated with kid gloves. It's a gross overreaction, and it's called basketball. Suck it up and deal with it. Exactly. I mean, one of the things you have to say is we've seen elbows, we've seen pushing, we've seen shoving. It happens with the men and with the women. That's how it goes down. It's not, I mean, that's just how it is. But the reaction is because of white women's frailty. All these people are railing around, I mean, virtually clutching their pearls because poor little Caitlin Clark got knocked down. Hell, if you want to play with the big girls, you got to be a big girl. And she wasn't complaining.

I'll say that. She's been very aware of the racial differences, even with Angel. She wasn't complaining. But all these protectors, I call them quasi-Klan members. You know, back in the day, if a white woman said she was looked at that way, suddenly there was a lynching. There's one story from back in the day. I know you stick with me and my stories, Roland, but I tell them anyway, where a brother was walking down the street and a white woman was bathing in the window. Now, why was the bathing in the window? So then she said the man was eyeballing her. She bathed in the window. They lynched her. So this is a basically

fast forward. You can't push Caitlin Clark. Well, if Caitlin Clark wants to pay WNBA, somebody going to push her. They're going to push her more than once. She needs to up her game. She was a great college superstar, and she did bring a lot of attention to the league. We'll give her props for that. But guess what? She has not at all met her accolades in terms of the quality of her play.

And the fact that she got her behind knocked down, hey, I ain't mad at nobody. And listen, that's going to happen. This right here is video of another WNBA game. The players were going at it, jawing at each other. The refs called technical fouls on them. It happens. I mean, so bottom line, this is called sports. I mean, I don't understand why people are just losing their damn minds over this is what we is called sports i mean i don't understand why

people are just losing their damn minds over this bomb lies is here um hey and let me be real clear let me real clear okay for all the folks who talking about uh all the folks who are talking about well you know um um uh you know how should you respond listen Listen, I remember when it was the it was Larry Bird and Bill Lambert. And listen, Larry Bird was not taking nothing from the Detroit Pistons and Bill Lambert and Bird fought many folk. And let me real clear, Bird was a white boy from Indiana who could ball, who could straight up ball. But listen, when he was fighting, he went after Dennis Rodman. Go to the video. He was fighting Dennis Rodman, Bill Lambert.

He didn't care. He didn't care he ain't care watch yeah now watch for all y'all people who trip in on kayla hello watch this right here i don't remember larry bird getting as angry as i saw him now getting pulled down on a layup but not on a play like that with the clock running down. And he really got taken down very hard. And, of course, Bird is very upset at Lambert and has been for a long time. So all I'm saying, y'all, y'all sitting here tripping,

them were the days in the NBA when they was sitting here just swinging. That little bump on Caitlin Clark, man, that was a love tap from the Detroit Pistons. That was a love tap. All right, y'all. We got to go. Renita, Julian, I'm a Congo. I appreciate y'all being on today's show. Folks, we had some significant audio issues at the beginning of the show.

Hopefully, we got them resolved. The goal is not to have any of these problems with tomorrow's show. Again, we appreciate for y'all sticking around. Thank you so very much. I'll have for you tomorrow the video, of course, from Tulsa when I was at the Black Wall Street Legacy

Festival. Anthony Hamilton performed. We had a great time there. I'll have that for you tomorrow. Until then, folks, do me a favor. Support us at the Breana Funk Fan Club. Your dollars make it possible. Let's do what we do. Send your check and money. Order the PO Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 20037-0196.

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You can also, of course, get our book. The first president, Barack Obama's road to the White House, the original report by Roland S. Martin. Look, I got less than 200 copies. I actually counted. I got the books for Houston. I got less than 200 copies. Once counted i got the books for houston i got less than 200 copies once they're all gone they're gone i'm not printing anymore anything along those lines and so please um uh get that book i'm personally autographing each one and so uh when they're gone they are absolutely gone folks uh and so please do that also get a copy of my book white fear got lots of copies of that. White Fear, How the Browning of

Americans Make White Folks Lose Their Minds from Ben Bella Books. Get the audio version on Audible. Of course, you can get it from bookstores nationwide. Folks, I'll be in Atlanta tomorrow. Headed to Atlanta for the Steve Harvey Golf Tournament. Y'all know I gotta represent Alpha there.

So, Steve, when you see my new Alpha golf bag, he ain't going to know what to do. But he'll get over it. All right, y'all. I'll see y'all tomorrow. Holla! Black Star Network is here. Oh, no punch!

A real revolution right now. Thank you for being the voice of Black America. All the momentum we have now, we have to keep this going. The video looks phenomenal. There's a difference between Black Star Network and black-owned media and something like CNN. You can't be black-owned media and be scared. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home.

You dig? I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated.

I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated on the get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir.

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

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's the deal. We got to set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We got to make moves and make them early. Set up goals.

Don't worry about a setback. Just save up and stack up to reach them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater them. Let's put ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org, brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. This is an iHeart Podcast.