#RolandMartinUnfiltered - OK Tulsa No Power, GA Elex 2020 Fraud Claims Dismissed, Interview with OH Rep Joyce Beatty

Episode Date: June 21, 2023

6.21.2023 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: OK Tulsa No Power, GA Elex 2020 Fraud Claims Dismissed, Interview with OH Rep Joyce Beatty  Major storms in Tulsa are causing power outages, leaving residents in the dark. I'll talk to some folks about what's being done to return power to thousands left in the dark.  Vice President Harris sat down for an exclusive interview on MSNBC's "One Year Post-Roe: A ReidOut Special featuring Joy Reid. We will discuss what VP Harris said about Roe and how it could impact the future of reproductive rights in America. Today Ohio House Representative Joyce Beatty will join me in the studio to discuss building black communities through housing equality, DEI accountability, and investing in black businesses.  The New York State legislature honors the icon, Harry Belafonte. Stay tuned to see the fantastic celebration of his legacy. 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 platforms covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. 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. 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 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. 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. 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. Today is Wednesday, June 21st, 2023. Coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. Major storms in Tulsa are causing power outages leaving thousands of residents in the dark. We'll talk to folks there about what the city is doing to fix this problem. Massive heat wave is also going across all of Texas causing the state to tell folks they need to monitor their grid or their use of electricity.

How about fix the damn grid? Governor Greg Abbott, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, Vice President Kamala Harris sat down for an exclusive interview with MSNBC's one-year post-roll, a readout special featuring Joy Reid talking about the impact of that decision on reproductive rights. Also today, Ohio House Representative Joyce Bate is going to join me in studio to discuss building black communities through housing equity,

also challenging corporations when it comes to DEI and investing in black-owned media. Plus, the New York State Legislature honors the icon, Harry Belafonte, will show you exactly what took place. It is time to bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered with the Black Star 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 blips, 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 rolling, yeah It's Uncle Gro-Gro-Yo Yeah, yeah It's rolling Martin, yeah

Yeah, yeah Rolling with Roland now. He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best. You know he's Roland Martin now. Martin! Nearly 140,000 Oklahomans are still without power tonight after severe weather storms moved through the state, knocking down power lines. The storms produced winds exceeding 95 miles an hour in the state's hardest-hit areas, including Tulsa.

Here's how one man described what's happening there. I am speaking directly, not just for me, but voices of thousands and thousands of people. We have no power. This is in Tulsa, Oklahoma. We have no power. The governor and their lieutenant governor are out of the s power since saturday night is now Tuesday, June 20th power. We have no ice and There's lines and lines a found out that people are now being sick for heat exhaustion

because it's over 90 degrees here. And also people, we've confirmed two deaths. One person was on a respirator and died because they have no power. We have no power. Governor Stitt, Matt Pinnell, do something. Declare a state of emergency. This is ridiculous. We have no power. And for those who are out there who are saying, oh, just use a generator. We are using generators, but it still needs gas to run. We have no power. There's a gas shortage.

The refinery has a shortage. We have no power. And the next time we will possibly get power will be Saturday, the 24th. This is what PSO is telling everyone. There are many people who don't have power. It is irritating. And the governor is over in Paris, chilling, eating good. Most of us had to throw away all of our food in our refrigerator.

And I'm going to say this again. We have no power. Monroe Nichols is a state representative in Oklahoma. He joins me right now. Representative Nichols, glad to have you here. So what is the state doing to help these residents? You can't restore power. Are they helping them in some other way?

Yeah. Hey, Roland, thank you again for highlighting this. And you highlight things happen here all the time, the good, the bad, and the ugly. So I want to tell you how much I appreciate that. Yeah, I mean, now we finally got a state of emergency declared here in Oklahoma, here in the Tulsa area. That happened not because the governor signed it, not because Lieutenant Governor signed it, because of President Pro Tem, who just learned he was acting governor because the governor didn't notify him he was leaving the state, made that declaration, which has now helped folks unlock additional SNAP benefits, allowing state agencies to begin to, you know, increase their purchasing power, allowing us to soften our regulation on

getting goods to the state that's going to support the recovery. We have thousands of folks who are working to restore power. But as you noted, we started this real this crisis at about a little over 200,000 people without power. Over 100,000 still remain without power. It's a tough situation here in Tulsa. Folks are working really hard, but we still got a long way to go. So I'm confused. This is from the state here. Governor Stitt calls on pro tem treat to declare a state of emergency in 10 Oklahoma counties. Why is the governor?

Isn't he the governor? Doesn't he have the power to do this? Yeah, so the governor's in Paris at the Paris Air Show, which is a pre-scheduled trip, you know, so we don't begrudge him for being there. But we're now on day four, and he hadn't come back to the state. He didn't notify anybody he was gone. The lieutenant governor left the state after the storm and didn't notify anybody that he was gone. And so here we are sitting here three, four days into this crisis, and nobody's able to declare a state of emergency because the acting governor,

who's the president and pro-Temple of the Oklahoma State Senate, didn't know he was the acting governor. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on, hold on. Slow this down. Are you telling me that the governor of Oklahoma leaves the state, the lieutenant governor of Oklahoma leaves the state, and nobody bothers to tell the number three, hey, we're leaving, anything happens, you're the one in charge.

That ain't leadership. That's absolutely correct. And to the credit of Senator Greg Treat, once he learned that he was acting governor, he signed an emergency declaration in less than 40 minutes. You know, so, you know, the folks who weren't here, you know, they were out of sight, out of mind. I don't know if the governor planned on signing the emergency declaration whenever he's done in Paris or whatever he was thinking about, but we went the better part of 36, 48 hours without any declaration, which helps unlock all kinds of relief. The folks who Mark in that video talked about passed away, they all passed away in the time window that could have been prevented had we had that disaster declaration. This just goes to show you when folks show that they don't necessarily care that much, people can lose their

lives in situations like this. That's exactly what's happened here in Tulsa. So the statement here really cracks me up. Go to my iPad. My heart goes out to all the Oklahomans impacted by last weekend's severe weather and the many people still overcoming the aftermath of those storms, Governor Stitt said, writing from Paris. The state, including the Oklahoma Department of Emergency Management and Homeland Security, continues to be responsive to emergency declarations, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Here's what I don't get.

I know the governor is gone. Now, some state laws are a little bit different. So, for instance, in Texas, when the governor leaves the state, the lieutenant governor is the one who's in terms of terms of what way you have, you know, who's in charge, who has power. So what? He can't declare an emergency wherever he is in the country or the world. He left for Georgia and so wasn't here to do it. Didn't notify anybody he was going to Georgia. And so governor's in Paris. Lieutenant governor goes to Georgia after the storm had already, after he'd already had the storm, he left on Mondays, as I can understand. Wow. Nobody told the pro tem that he was in charge. And in fact, that press release that you sent where the governor was so-called calling on the pro tem

to sign the emergency declaration, he had already signed you sent where the governor was so-called calling on the pro-temp to sign the emergency declaration, he had already signed the declaration before the governor called on him to do so. So the governor really didn't do much of anything. You know, the pro-temp found out through a phone call that he was the acting governor. And that phone call did not come from the governor, by the way. He found out through somebody else that he was the acting governor and acted quickly. So what we really have is folks not only falling asleep at the wheel, but not even trying to come back home when they found out how severe the issue was. So, Roland, you know, again, go to Paris. You're doing what you're doing at the Paris Air Show,

whatever the case may be. I'm not going to begrudge you for that. But once you know that you have over 200,000 people in your state who are without power, and that remained on day two and day three, and you still do not make it home to so much as a clear state of emergency or to show people that you care, that is an indictment on leadership. And what we know, and like I said before, you talked about what's going on in Texas, the power grid. when leadership doesn't care, it actually costs people a lot. It costs folks their life. Is Stitt still in Paris? As far as I know. Yeah, I mean, you know, he's not busted to get back.

I mean, look, it's 2023 rolling. I know it doesn't take three, four days to get from Paris to Tulsa, Oklahoma. No, it doesn't. And if you're the governor, you do all you can, and you're just having a good time at the Paris Air Show. I don't necessarily know what business is being conducted on behalf of the state of Oklahoma at the Paris Air Show. Well, I can tell you it's not more important than 200,000 people getting power, getting light, so you're doing everything you can to preserve light. That's what I know.

I don't know what's going on in Paris, but I know it ain't as important as that. And look, at the end of the day, what is so frustrating about it is even when it was clear that he had made a mistake, he tries to rush impressively saying he's calling on somebody to do something when the fact is the president pro tem didn't find out from the governor that it was time to sign that declaration. He found out from other folks through other channels that it is his responsibility to do what he acted. And so the good news about that is, although it happened a little bit late, the state of Oklahoma is getting along without the governor. But it would sure be nice to have a governor who was engaged and really here to show us that not only he cared, but that he's going to use his power as governor to do whatever he can to make sure that folks are safe here in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Indeed, indeed. Representative, we certainly appreciate you joining us. Hopefully folks will get all the help that they need because, trust me, when it is hot as hell down there, I was in Houston over the weekend for Juneteenth. The heat index was about 105, 110. And so when you lose power and then you have heat problems, I remember going through the Hurricane Alicia, 1983, and it was hot as hell in our house for two weeks without AC in Houston.

So I know exactly what that feels like. Two things. I don't make you feel old, but I was born in 1983. So I'm sorry. Don't make you feel old. I don't feel old. The other thing is, I don't feel old at all. I remind people my bank account today is bigger than it was in 83. Hey, well, you know, see your boy alone, man. But I do want to say, and with the governor's issue being notwithstanding, I do just want to give a lot of credit to folks in this community who've pulled together to take care of folks, people who have power, been inviting people in, people who've been cutting stuff off trees and all that kind of stuff. So just really happy

this community's coming together. All right, Representative Nichols, we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Take care. That really does us. Our panel, Robert Petillo, host People Passion Politics News and Talk, 1380 WAOK out of Atlanta, Rebecca Carruthers, vice president of the Fair Election Center out of D.C., Jason Hamilton, McCoy, clinical professor of law, supervising attorney with the Duke Law Civil Justice Clinic, dear North Carolina. I must say, Robert, if I'm voters in Oklahoma, I'm real pissed off at Stitt. What is with these Southwestern political officials?

To start with Ted Cruz, jetting off to Cancun. Now you've got the governor in Paris. You've got the lieutenant governor in Georgia. Look, there's a couple things we have to pay attention to here. One, we cannot continue to ignore climate change. These are not normal events. This is not how things are supposed to be. We have to take real action to address it. Secondarily, we have to also take survival

situations into our own hands, particularly as a black community. We have to have generators. We need to have portable solar panels. Me and my wife ordered some of those a couple weeks ago, just for situations like this, just because the government is not going to come take care of you, be sure you're in a situation where you can take care of yourself and your family, have your water reserves, have your bug out bag, have all the things you need just in case things happen, because eventually things will happen. And then finally, I think there should be a recall on this governor. I think that the people of this state, if this is not enough for you to recall this governor, imagine if something worse happens and you have a governor who not only is gone during the emergency, but doesn't show back up, doesn't do a live press conference from Paris. We have technology now. You can hop on Zoom.

You can hop on Skype to talk about it. And this simply shows that their eye is not on the ball. They are not ready, willing, and able to do what is needed for the people. I think the people of that state need to hurry up and make a decision to replace these elected officials before something worse happens. Rebecca? Roland, does the governor not have staff? That's what I'm trying to figure out here. I've worked for countless elected officials, and whenever something goes on that's an emergency, or even if it's a change of schedule, the governor's staff should be talking to the lieutenant governor's staff. The lieutenant governor's staff should be talking to the pro temp staff. I don't understand why staff, the chief of staff, didn't pull the governor into

a conversation, why the communications director didn't pull the governor into having a virtual press conference like what Robert just alluded to. There's so many different government agencies that should still be able to function and work. And so this just seems like this was a complete disaster of where basic functioning of the government of Oklahoma ceased to work in this case. Absolutely. And it's not that damn hard. You're elected, Jason, to take care of your constituents. That's why they vote for you. Exactly. And I guess maybe I'm just confused, but I'm under the impression that emergency management is something that at this point is just part and parcel to leadership. So whenever there's an emergency, there should be communicating staff, as was mentioned. There should be

already a chain of command in which these things can already start getting addressed and the people can start being served immediately and not have to wait. I think it is highly unfortunate that we are having people in Oklahoma who have lost their lives simply because there wasn't power for respirators. That's insane. So I'm hoping that this governor is going to have some kind of good excuse to come back. I don't know if the McCrons are just that good or what, but I hope that he has a real good excuse to come back and address this. Otherwise, I definitely think this is a point for the people of Oklahoma to reconsider and reevaluate who they have leading their state. All right, folks. Hold tight one second. I got to go to a break. I'll be right back on

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is Making White Folks Lose Their Minds, available at bookstores nationwide, online. Plus, you can download your copy on Audible. We'll be right 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 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 from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man.

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

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Here's the deal. We gotta set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game. We gotta 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. Hatred on the streets. A horrific scene. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. And then we approach Trump mob storms, the U.S. Capitol. We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting.

I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial. This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress, whether real or symbolic, there has been what Carol Anderson at Emory University calls white rage as a backlash. This is the wrath of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. There's all the Proud Boys, guys. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources, they're taking our women. This is white fear. Black Star Network is here. We'll be right back. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and Black-owned media and something like CNN.

You can't be Black-owned media and be scared. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home. You dig? Bruce Smith, creator and executive producer of The Proud Family, Louder and Prouder. You're watching Roland Martin. The next is the second . The third

is the fourth The Georgia State Election Board has dismissed the case into alleged election wrongdoing in the 2020 presidential election. We all know Donald Trump was lying his ass off. The investigation found allegations against two Fulton County poll workers, two black women, were false and unsubstantiated. Yep, the case gained national attention when that idiot Donald Trump blasted these women by posting false claims that,

oh, that was election fraud committed by Ruby Freeman and Wondria Shea Moss. In January, Trump took the true social and stated that, wow, has anyone seen the Ruby Freeman contradictions of her sworn testimony? Now this is big stuff. Yep, look what was captured by Kyle County Police body cameras on January 4th, 2021. Now it gets awful.

Now Trump's then-attorney, Rudy Giuliani, claimed evidence of Freeman and Moss scanning ballots hidden in suitcases underneath tables at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Hmm. Election workers brought a defamation claim against Giuliani, which is still pending in court. I hope they take these idiots to the cleaners, Rebecca, because they caused significant harm. These folks had to leave their homes.

They were under death threats. It was absolutely utterly ridiculous. You know, tonight I'm actually in Georgia and I've been talking to organizers all across the state for the last couple of days. And we've been talking about what does 2024 election cycle looks like. And one of the things that's really disturbing is personal safety is at the top of many folks' list. They're concerned about their physical safety as they're engaging civically with their neighbors to go knock on doors and try to get their neighbors to become active, to become active citizens in the state of Georgia. And so with seeing the former president bully an election worker who was simply doing her job, and then she had to face harassment, this didn't just happen

in Georgia, but this has happened to election workers all across the country. But like you said, I hope they continue to sue. I hope they get a lot of money. And you know what? I definitely wish Shea Moss and her mother lots of peace because they've been through an incredible amount of trauma in the last couple of years. Robert, Trump was targeting black folks, pure and simple. He was calling out Fulton County. He was calling out Philadelphia. He was calling out Milwaukee. He was calling out Detroit. This was an absolute assault on black voters. Absolutely. He was using every dog that's in the book to rile up his MAGA base. And think about what happened on January 6th. Think about the violence that we know this MAGA movement is

capable of. And then to target these individual people, the individual women who aren't millionaires or billionaires, not people who have personal security, just regular poll workers who have the president of the United States of America sick his army of 75 million MAGAs on you and nearly destroyed these women's lives. And as you said, I hope they sue every person involved. I want you to sue until the cows come home. I don't want you to even accept settlements. Take these cases all the way to trial. I want jury verdicts. I want triple damages from a punitive judgment against him. You have to sue these people into bankruptcy at this point

in time. I want these women to own the Trump Tower. I want these women to have the keys to Mar-a-Lago by the time they are done, because you cannot allow these rogue forces to simply put these people in danger just because you have a lying president who's been twice impeached, twice indicted, who refuses to accept the democratic will of the people. And other countries, strongmen like this are not allowed to simply wade around the politics after they are out of power, because everyone knows they always come back again. Hitler came back after the Beer Hall Putsch in 1933. Mussolini came back after being repelled the first time. Napoleon came back after he was exiled. If you do not put an end to it,

they always come back. And I think that is, well, crucial that our criminal justice system put Trump his cronies away and that our civil justice system bankrupts these people so they can't harass people like they did these women ever again. You know, one of the things that we have to recognize here is that while this is also happening today, one of the idiots, one of the domestic terrorists on January 6th, that fool is about to spend the next 12 and a half years in a federal prison. Danny D.J. Rodriguez, this is from Ryan J. Riley, who drove a stun gun into Mike Fanon's neck. He was, of course, one of the police officers sentenced to more than 12 and a half years in federal prison, one of the

longest sentences for a January 6th rioter. I love this one here as well. Let me pull this tweet up. Y'all gonna crack up at this one. I plan on declaring innocent of these charges because I am, said Infowars host Owen Schroer. He told his audience the day he learned of the warrant

out for his arrest. On Friday, he told his audience the day he learned of the warrant out for his arrest, on Friday, he's now set to plead guilty. Ah, I just absolutely love seeing all of these thugs go to prison. Jesse, they all deserve to spend time in prison. Absolutely. So, you know, where to start on that? I think initially, we have to acknowledge that all defamation requires is a publication of a false statement that causes reputational injury. And I think that there is no question that the women involved in

this situation in Georgia have been defamed. I will say that I have seen Donald Trump escape all sorts of liabilities that the regular person would definitely not be able to escape. And I don't understand it. I also have that same kind of fear when it comes to people who were engaged on January 6th, who were doing things that, you know, when we just protested and claimed that we wanted police to stop killing members of our community, they made it seem like we were against the police. Yet these people were out physically attacking and assaulting police officers for the purpose of getting their way and basically hijacking democracy. I think that the charges that we've been seeing so far is too light. Honestly, this is treason. And yet we haven't seen anybody yet call it that. I think the person who was the

architect and orchestrated this has not been brought up on any treason charges. And as a matter of fact, he is planning to run for president again, despite all of the indictments that he is currently facing, which mostly revolve around the documents as opposed to inciting the treason. And these people, they really are stupid. They really are. Matter of fact, this is one of the video interviews with these... I think this is that idiot Danny Rodriguez.

Watch this. Why were you guys trying to take the Capitol? Because we felt that they stole the election. We felt that they stole this country. It's gone. It's wiped out. America is over. It's destroyed now.

And so if you took the Capitol, then what? I don't know. We just thought that, damn, dude, I don't know. I understand it's very stupid and ignorant. And I see that. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops 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 Glod.

And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes sir, we are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug man. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown.

We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz 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. 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. It's a big joke that we thought that we were going to save this country.

We were doing the right thing and stuff. I get it. I don't know. I don't. We thought it was a big joke that we were going to take this country when he gets sentenced and led away in cuffs, Robert. The fool yells, Trump won! If he won, he'd be pardoning you. Your ass is going to prison. You know, Rowley, it's almost sad in some ways, because listening to him talk, he seems like just, you know, a mild-mannered, slightly ignorant person who's just so easily manipulated by someone

like Donald Trump, who's so easily led astray by somebody who's a Spangalian spin master like Donald Trump and has this ability to overwhelm the minds of many individuals. Remember Donald Trump said on the campaign trail, we love poorly educated voters. And this is part of the reason why. These people actually think that Donald Trump may be the savior. I don't mean the savior of America. I mean the savior of Christianity promised to us by the Lord thy God. This is something that I've heard from Trump supporters. There are Trump supporters who have said, I do not care if Trump is guilty of murder

and I will still support him. These people, there is a sickness that has gone through and been infected in their minds, the mega mind virus, and it's a dangerous thing. And as we just said, these punishments are entirely too light. We need to see people convicted of treason, plot to overthrow the government, sedition, insurrection, all those charges and being given real-time life sentences in prison,

because otherwise you are encouraging this going forward. And on a nation already on edge, we cannot show any weakness in the sign sign when you have signs of insurrection brewing. That's how we broke apart because we did not address these issues in the 1850s, so we had war in the 1860s. I literally, Rebecca, don't give a damn about any of these domestic tears. Not one. No compassion whatsoever. I want the longest jail sentence possible in every case. You know, I'm with you with this. They're just dumb. Like, I can't muster an ounce of sympathy.

The people who I have sympathy for is George Floyd and his family. I have sympathy for Philando Castile and his family. I have sympathy for Trayvon Martin and his family. I don't have sympathy for this. It's just dumb. It's idiotic. It's feckless. It's impotent.

It just doesn't make sense. It was like they didn't know Trump. It wasn't like Trump was their long-lost brother or cousin or uncle or daddy, but they pledged a crazy allegiance to him, and he don't give a F about them. So it's just delusion. I mean, it's the delusion for me. And Jesse, that's the thing for me. These folks are going to jail.

He's chilling in Mar-a-Lago. And here's the deal. Here's what's crazy. Remember, this was January 6th. He still had two more weeks sitting in the White House. Here's what's crazy. Remember, this was January 6th. He still had two more weeks sitting in the White House. He could have actually issued blanket pardons for anybody who was involved in any activity on that day. That fool didn't care.

These idiots are literally ruining their lives for a rich dude who wouldn't even let them walk through his formerly Trump hotel in D.C. because they were too broke. Absolutely. And I think another thing that we have to remember is I think Trump is only a symbol of sentiment

that already runs throughout the country. And that sentiment is tied into anti-blackness, is tied into chauvinism, is tied into this concept that the powerful white man must always be right. And there are a lot of people who, obviously, lose their ability to function when the person that they deem to be right all the time

tells them to do something that is against their own interests. They're willing to put their lives on the line for it. And now when they go to jail, they're confused. I know the last guy that we were seeing the clip about, his last name is Rodriguez. I don't know if Trump is ever going to support a Rodriguez. Just be honest, right? So I think there is a disconnect somewhere intellectually with people who are still supportive of someone who obviously has done nothing to assist them. And I think it just goes back into the anti-blackness of the DNA of America. All right, folks, if you want, we want to talk about sheer arrogance. When we come back, I'm going to talk about what Carlos Watson released today.

Carlos Watson was the founder of OZY. Remember, he was arrested on felony criminal charges. Y'all, when I show y'all this website that he released, and I don't even play the video from his ass. Oh, my God. When y'all see it, you're going to be asking yourself, wow, Carlos acting like he a Black Panther, like he been fighting for Black social justice for a long time. Hmm.

Now, he trying to all of a sudden pull that black card, put that black blanket on because his ass did some foul criminal stuff. When I show y'all this, y'all are going to trip. That's next on Rolling Mark and Unfiltered

on the Blackstar Network. That was a pivotal, pivotal time. I remember Kevin Hart telling me that. on the Blackstar Network. And he was absolutely right. What show did you have at that? This was one-on-one. Got it. During that time. And I was- So you're doing one-on-one. Going great. Yeah. You making money. You like- I'm like, I don't need to leave. I don't need to leave from, you know, Wednesday, Thursday to Sunday.

I, you know, I just didn't want to do that. You know, it was just like, I'm gonna stay here. Oh, I didn't want to finish work Friday, fly out, go do a gig Saturday, Sunday. I was like, I don't have to do that. And I lost a little bit of that hunger that I had in New York. I would hit all the clubs and run around. I, you know, sometimes me and Chappelle or me and this one or that one,

we'd go to the Comedy Cellar at one in the morning. I mean, that was our life. We loved it. You know, you do two shows in Manhattan, go to Brooklyn, leave Brooklyn, go to Queens, go to Jersey. And I kind of just, I got complacent. I was like, I got this money, I'm good, I don't need to go, I don't need to go chase that because that money wasn't at the same level that I was making.

But what I was missing was that training. Yes. Was that, was that. And it wasn't the money. It was the money. You know, it was that, that's what I needed. Up next on The Frequency with me, Dee Barnes. She's known as the Angela

Davis of hip hop. Monet Smith, better known as Medusa the Gangsta Goddess, the undisputed queen of West Coast underground hip hop. Pop locking is really what indoctrinated me in hip hop. I don't even think I realized it was hip hop at that time. Right. It was a happening. It was a moment of release.

We're going to be getting into her career, knowing her whole story, and breaking down all the elements of hip hop. This week on The Frequency, only on the Black Star Network. This is Essence Atkins. What's the love, King of R&B, Raheem Devon? Me, Sherri Shebron, and you know what you watch.

You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. You ever get an email and it pops in your box and you open it and then you go... What in the hell is this? Well, today, I was alerted to this website that indicted media owner, Carlos Watson, OG.com, sending around.

So he's decided to launch this website called 2blackforbusiness.org. And Carlos, as part of his defense, is saying that the white prosecutors in Brooklyn who indicted him for his involvement in the crimes that they allege at OZ that 90% of the people who they have charged are people of color. So he has this press release on here and his defense team is being led by Ronald S. Sullivan, Sr. of Harvard. And he goes on here and he's talking about these

cases and these defendants and the folk who they haven't put a lot of white folks away. And then he puts in here, talking about too often black entrepreneurs are being criminalized for their activities. Now, mind you, this is the same Carlos Watson

who they didn't put in here who's facing 37 years in prison because of activities. And then he even tries to call out white media folks like Shane Smith at Vice as well as Jonah Peretti at BuzzFeed.

Ben talks about how African Americans are less likely to get venture capitalist money. I mean, it goes on and on and on and on and on and on. And says here, please contribute to his fund. You see the website right here, y'all. The U.S. legal system criminalizes the actions of black entrepreneurs such as OZ media founder Carlos Watson while giving their white counterparts a pass. And so he, y'all, the site is hilarious.

So then he posted a video on Vimeo that was even more hilarious to listen to. Now, what he's essentially saying is, I'm a crook, but y'all didn't go after the other crooks too. Press play. I'm a crook, but y'all didn't go after the other crooks too. Press play. Hi, I'm Carlos Watson, the founder and CEO of Ozzy. Some of you may know my story.

Some of you may not. It has been a very tough several months. Very, very tough. It's been humbling in the extreme. I want everyone to know that as difficult as this is, I intend to fight. I intend to fight with everything I have. I intend to do it for a couple of reasons. One, because I'm innocent. And two, because I know that what's happening to me doesn't only happen to me. Sadly, it's happening to lots of people all the time, often in quiet. Sometimes people of color are warned not to think too big, that the color of your skin will limit what you can hope to accomplish. But my family and I refused to believe that. I had an

itch to create a different kind of news and media platform because I know that media often shapes not just what we think and see, but how we live and how we treat each other. We wanted to change how people saw the world because we know that if you see more, in fact, you might be more and do more. But as I began to build Ozzy, I confronted a stark reality. When I went to raise money, like a lot of black entrepreneurs, I had trouble often getting through the door

or getting meetings that they took seriously or getting any kind of reasonable follow-up. There was significant 2020 study the Washington Post covered that said, while we're 13% of the population, black people are only able to raise 1% of the technology venture capital. Thankfully, as a family, we put everything we had,

we liquidated our savings, and we made one payroll after another. But the story doesn't necessarily have a smooth ending. In fact, those of you who know my story know that it doesn't. Like a lot of other new media companies, we also at times embrace the fake it till you make it ethos. When you look at companies like Vice, not only did they embrace fake it till you make it, they made that their mantra. Wired Magazine wrote a story that talked about how Shane Smith and Vice lied about content, about their audience, about their financials. They even lied about who their investors were. Do you think that Shane Smith and Vice lied about content, about their audience, about their financials. They even lied about who their investors were.

Do you think that Shane Smith got investigated? Not a chance. Walked away with more than $100 million. I'm asking you to look at what's happening when people like me are entrepreneuring while black. I'm talking about the leading trader on Wall Street in the 90s, Joseph Jett, who went from being named Man of the Year in January 94 to under indictment review three months later. How does that happen? Or Calvin Grigsby, who built one of the leading municipal investment banks, went from being

called one of the best entrepreneurs out there to almost being arrested at his kid's soccer game 90 days later. Or take the first black CEO of a Fortune 500 company, Franklin Raines. Now, he hasn't had a job in 20 years. Our mistakes are being turned into crimes, and we're having people charge us in a gross and inappropriate way. In fact, the three wealthy young white prosecutors on this case are in Brooklyn, which you know through gentrification is now 35% plus white. How many white people have these guys indicted over the last five years? Less than 10%.

Meanwhile, 9 out of 10 of the people they've indicted are black and brown people and people of color. And while I'm not a martyr, I do care about the next generation. I do care that other young entrepreneurs like me, other young black entrepreneurs like me, don't continue to face the same crazy odds that I face, the same overcharging and selective prosecution that has hit so many of us. Thank you for taking a moment with this. God bless you and God bless us all. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

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

multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad.

Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. 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. What you just heard was absolute, complete bullshit. Oh, now all of a sudden, you want to put on a kente coat.

Now all of a sudden, you want to act like, ohente coat not now all of a sudden you want to act like oh you're championing african-americans well first of all i tried earlier uh to go to uh oz.com uh to pull up and see uh how many stories that they've done uh on these type of issues uh go to my website oh sorry their website is no longer online. You can't actually look it up. But what you can look up is this here. This is the actual, and let me be perfectly clear, folks are innocent until proven guilty.

But I just want y'all to understand how all of a sudden Carlos is the brother fighting on behalf of all the black folks, okay, when you were running Ozzy, I didn't quite see you making these same claims. And we were out there fighting for black-owned media to get advertising dollars. Oh, you were the darling of the industry. You weren't standing out there fighting with us. No.

No, you were not. I don't recall seeing those social justice stories, Carlos, when you were running Ozzie. Where were they? Hmm. You know why? Because you were the darling of white venture capital money. Y'all raised $75 million. Don't try to act like, oh, my God, it was so hard and it was so difficult.

And, oh, this is the lack of money that black people get. You got the money If you if you matter fact, you know, let me just go ahead before I I show this here Let me just type in Ozzie and group M Group M is one of the largest and agencies in the country What did I just say? one of the largest in the country. What did I just say? One of the largest in the country. They had something called a Media Inclusion Initiative.

And what did they do? They struck a two-year deal with Ozzy. Here's right here. Here's a story. It was an ad age. Group M strikes a two-year deal with Ozzy to further its DEI efforts. Sure did. You go to the ad age story. It was an ad age. Group M strikes a two-year deal with Ozzy to further its DEI efforts. Sure did. You go to the ad age story, you're going to actually see what that initiative was all about right here. Oh my goodness. Here it is. This was, of course, in April of 2021. That's right. Two-year multi-platform deal. Millions of dollars with the CEO of Group M,

Kirk McDonald, who's a brother. Oh, investment. All things are going to be doing. How great they are. Socially conscious media. All that sort of stuff. Folks, they got way more advertising money than we have. They were getting stories done left and right

on how great they were, and all that shit was made up. So he, and then I love what he said in the video, you know, when black entrepreneurs make mistakes and get overcharged. Oh, make mistakes. Hmm. This is the press release from the Department of Justice. Ozzie Media and its founder, Carlos Watson, indicted in a years-long multi-million dollar fraud scheme.

Hmm. Here's what's interesting here. This paragraph right here. Watson's co-conspirators, Samir Rao, OZ's chief operating officer, and Suzy Hahn, OZ's chief of staff, from June 2019 to October 2021, previously pled guilty to charges relating to their roles in the scheme.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is taking concurrent enforcement action. Huh. Here's the quote. As alleged, Carlos Watson is a con man whose business strategy was based on outright deceit and fraud. He ran Ozzie as a criminal organization rather than as a reputable media company. Stated United States Attorney Peace, investment fraud undermines confidence in our nation's markets and investors and makes it harder for honest businesses to compete. Honest businesses like Black Star Network.

Our office and the Department of Justice have made it clear that prosecuting corporations and their corrupt executives who flagrantly violate the law are top priorities. Now, Carlos said we made mistakes. We made mistakes. But it says right here, they had a festival. Fraudulent numbers. Between 2018 and 2021, Watson and his co-conspirators orchestrated a scheme to defraud

investors and lenders to Ozzy of tens of millions of dollars through fraudulent representations and omissions about key aspects of Ozzy's business, including Ozzy's financial debt results, debts, and audience size. Now, let me help you all out with this one right here. You know how this story even blew up? When one of the co-conspirators was impersonating a YouTube executive on the phone

and the feds say they uncovered actual text messages that Carlos was sending to the guy while it was happening. Carlos later said, oh, he must have had a mental breakdown and he's left the company. And let me be perfectly clear. Can two things be correct at the same time? Absolutely. If you have prosecutors who are only going after people of color, that's a fundamental problem.

But if you're doing some illegal shit, don't be trying to all of a sudden cloak yourself in blackness, okay, OJ 2.0, in order to deal with the stuff that you did. Now, he says, I'm going to fight this whole thing. All right, I got you. And I see you did. Now he says, I'm gonna fight this whole thing. All right, I got you.

And I see you, the lead defense attorney, all that sort of stuff along those lines. But here's what I know. Here's what I know as a black-owned media executive. Our numbers were real. We couldn't get media to do a story on us. The LA Times article that was done on us was the first one. It took us three and a half years, almost four years,

to get anybody to do any kind of story on us. Old and old, he was a darling. And let me be real clear with y'all. I ain't jealous of nobody. I'm not jealous of anybody who raised money, who gets media coverage, who's doing well. Nobody, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, I don't actually care.

It's not well. Nobody. Black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American. I don't actually care. It's not matter to me. What I don't appreciate is all of a sudden you super brother number one. What I don't appreciate is all of a sudden you trying to make it like a black thing to cover what your ass did. Now yeah, you're going to get your day in court, but to say that mistakes were made. OK, if mistakes were made, Carlos, why did your COO plead guilty? If mistakes were made, why did your chief of staff plead guilty?

Folk don't plead guilty to mistakes. There's a difference between I made a mistake and I committed a crime. A mistake is, oh, I thought we had one million views on that video. A mistake is saying we had a million when instead we have 500,000. But when you purposely overstate audience to raise money, your ass committing crimes. And so as I sit here, I look at this website, and then all of a sudden he wants to bring all these other people in, Franklin Raines and this person and this person and what happened to them?

Did Michael Milken get convicted? Yep. There's some other white boys who've gotten convicted who served time in jail. It's some other people who've gotten convicted of securities fraud, of fraudulent activity on Wall Street. But don't sit here and then try to sit here and curry favor. And I'm seeing all these tweets. Hey, take a look at this, take a look at that. I'll be happy to take a look at these prosecutors and say, who are the folks that

you're going after? And is it equal justice under law? But Carlos, ain't no way in hell I'm defending your ass. And you know I'm not going to do that crap because that's a bunch of BS. And his website is a bunch of BS. And so is that damn video. Somebody has to say it. And again, y'all, let me be real clear. I've never done business with Carlos and Ozzy. But I'll tell you what did happen after that New York Times article when he didn't go to the breakfast club. He didn't go to the breakfast club before.

He wasn't doing black media Before he got in trouble See y'all let me just go ahead and say I'm sick of black people Who now want to come to black media When your ass is getting trouble You don't call black on media When things are going well

You don't say hey How, how can we grow businesses together? How can we get advertising as a collective? No, you all on your own. But then when you get in trouble, now all of a sudden, you Mr. HBCU. Now all of a sudden, oh, you the man Now, all of a sudden, oh, you the man. Now, all of a sudden, we can see you

at all the NAACP and the Urban League functions. But where was your ass when things were going well? Where were you, Carlos, when you were kicking it with the white Silicon Valley investors and the folks in New York and

in San Francisco. Come on, bro. Nah. Ain't going to be silent on that. Because it happens all too often. So let me tell y'all what happened. So when he went on the Breakfast Club and he got challenged, when it was by Charlemagne and Envy

and Angela Yee, they said, well, you know, will you go to the Roland Martin show? Oh, sure. Do you think he ass came on? I can show you text messages. Oh, no, he wasn't coming on here. I texted him and I texted him.

No, no, no, no, he wasn't. Carlos Watson was not coming on this show, y'all. But he did call me. And he said he didn't appreciate the things that I had to say and why did I take the position. Because I'm like, yo, what's wrong? And then, y'all, at the end of the conversation, Carlos Watson literally going to ask me,

can we partner to go out and get advertising? Your ass didn't call me before you got investigated. But you actually thought after your ass was get the best that is before he got indicted, but he actually thought after at you he really thought after he was being investigated. I was gonna be like, yeah, sure Carlos. Let's stop being together like brothers and go take down some

advertising money. In the words of Denzel and remember the Titans, you must be outside your mind. I told him, hell no. Hell no, we ain't doing this. Folk, there are some people who are extra special, and they will say and do some stuff that's beyond outlandish, and that's crazy. And guess what? Carlos, you are going to have your day in court, and that's fine. You're going to have your day in court, and you have a right to be assumed innocent until pleading guilty.

But what's not going to happen is if you think for a second, I'm going to sit here and see you send this video. I mean, he's been emailing people all day, y'all. Now, I didn't get one of the emails from him, but I got the email from somebody else. And I see the stuff being posted on Twitter, and I see all of this here. Now, what you are not going to do is try to all of a sudden make this out to be selective prosecution against black entrepreneurs, black media entrepreneurs. Because, Carlos, there are black-owned media owners who are out here busting our ass every single day to pay the bills. We are out here trying to increase our traffic.

We are out here trying to cover the stories that matter. We're trying to actually do stuff where we care about the community. And what I am not going to do is be silent and watch someone try to pimp that in order to save them from going to federal prison. Now, bruh, you got the wrong one. And I have no problem saying everything that I'm saying because all of this super blackness

that you now care about, where was it before you got in trouble? Going to a break. My panel will weigh in when we come back. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. 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 One, 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 Glott. 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 kind of starts that a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne.

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

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

your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. 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. On the Black Star Network. When you talk about blackness and what happens in black culture, we're about covering these things

that matter to us, 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. We cannot tell our own story if we can't pay for it. This is about covering us.

Invest in black-owned media. Your dollars matter. We don't have to keep asking them to cover our stuff. So please support us in what we do, folks. We want to hit 2,000 people. $50 this month. Waits $100,000. We're behind $100,000.

So we want to hit that. Y'all money makes this possible. Check some money orders. Go to P.O. Box 57196. Washington, D.C. 20037-0196. The Cash App is Dollar Sign RM Unfiltered. PayPal is R. Martin Unfiltered.

Venmo is RM Unfiltered. Zelle is Roland at Rolandsmartin.com. On a next, a balanced life with me, Dr. Jackie, owning your energy and how to use it. Trust me, it impacts the people on your job, who you attract, and even your love life. What you give out is what comes back to you. So like attracts like, right?

So if you come in with a negative space and I match that negative energy, then two seconds later, somebody else coming with more negative energy and then I was just always just matching negative stuff. And here's the kicker. If you're not careful, that energy can even be stolen. That's all next on A Balanced Life on Blackstar Network.

Rebecca, see, this is what pisses me off. And this is an article from Semaphore on February 9th of this year. Media company Ozzy is attempting a comeback. And so Magna, major advertising, major, major, major, major advertising company. This is what it says. In a 30-minute long presentation to potential advertisers and investors at the Magna Equity Upfronts in Manhattan on Wednesday, OZ founder Carlos Watson and his team implored brands to invest in the digital media company if you want the opportunity to spread love.

See, this is what pisses me off about this, Rebecca. Magna did not have any equity up front before those of us in the black-owned media collective signed the letters and blasted companies for their lack of advertising dollars. Carlos wasn't on that letter. I signed it. Byron Allen signed it.

Butch Graves at Black Enterprise, Todd Brown, Urban Judge Network, and others signed it. But Magna, after the New York Times article, after the DOJ investigation was announced, after the SEC investigation was announced, they still invited, they still invited Carlos to come pitch at their equity up front. We were not invited. So the people who actually created this movement to increase dollars to black owned media

were not invited, but they invited him and two weeks later, two weeks later, he gets arrested and indicted. I've since emailed Magna and said, how could y'all invite him to pitch and was under investigation, but you left out all these other legitimate black owned media companies and it got crickets. I heard you laughing as I was reading some of that stuff there. Go ahead, your thoughts.

So here's the thing. These different groups know who the token can be, and they know who will allow themselves to be the token, and they understand who will not ask the hard-hitting questions, who will not actually push for meaningful change. And Carlos Watson was a willing token. And so it was really interesting watching him now talking about, oh, well, the Black people got a band together because look at what's happening to me. But, you know, as you were talking, I was laughing because, you know, you went to Aussie media's website to see, hey, you

know, do they have a track record in speaking out against underrepresentation of Black folks in media getting investments or getting advertising dollars? And I was thinking, well, Byron Allen sued Comcast and went in front of the Supreme Court. Byron Allen also sued McDonald's Corporation. And I don't remember Carla Watson saying anything about that. So if there was ever a time to say, hey, I need to stand up for fellow Black media execs and Black-held media companies, there's been plenty of time in the last two, three years for Carla Watson to do it. And so now, like, he reminds, it is like affinity scamming now, where now you're in trouble. So now

you're trying to cloak yourself in your Blackness and say, hey, you know, just follow me because I'm Black, you're Black, and we're in this thing together. I mean, how dare Carlos Watson call you up after he had already raised $70 million and now he wants to come to you, to the Black Star Network, to Roland Martin Unfiltered and say, hey, let's band together and try to get this ad money. Like, seriously? What happened to $70 million? You weren't trying to band together to get joint investment when you had the over $70 million that went your way. Carl Watson was more than happy to be the token and those companies were more

than happy to have him as a token. This is the one that gets me here, Jesse. It says, go to my iPad. Kathy Doyle, EVP of local investment at Magna,

told us that OZ presented at IPG's up front because, quote, they have a lot to pitch. They have some bumps in the road. It's about giving people chances. Carlos has been really dedicated to getting it right. Bruh. Bruh. Me and my team Have personally emailed Boyle

Never did they invite us We didn't get a second chance We didn't get a first chance And this man is under That story that Ben Smith did In the New York Times They were busted Imp impersonating a YouTube executive and you still invite him to a front row seat

at the equity up front, which was supposed to be done to target black owned media and you pick him and not other legitimate black owned media. This is what black folks should be angry about. That's what they should be mad about. And this is the nonsense. And now he's trying to cloak himself. Black entrepreneurs are being targeted by the Department of Justice.

No! Individuals who they believe have committed crimes are being targeted. Absolutely. So I think first and foremost, for anybody who is talking about black-owned media, to skip over Roland Martin is a travesty because we have seen you and your rise from the very beginning,

always touting black community, black issues, and you are known and respected in this field. So the fact that they aren't responding back speaks more so to the quality of who they're trying to find, as opposed to actually wanting to be part of the movement and the culture. As far, just tokenism generally, I think that it's not uncommon for us to see members of our own community who are willing to turn their backs on us and take advantage of financial opportunities to enrich themselves. But when the cuffs come out and the black suburbans pull up, all of a sudden it's kumbaya and they want us to all be a part of the same team. And I'm with you. If we are supposed to be part of the same team, then why is it that we don't

have those conduits that are going to connect us at the time when people are successful? And furthermore, nobody in black media is going to want to associate with anybody who is under investigation. So why would this company associate with somebody who is already under investigation? It's mind boggling. Here's this, this, this is what's crazy to me right here, Robert. Brian Morrissey, this is from the marketingbrew.com story. Brian Morrissey, a media analyst and founder of the newsletter, The Rebooting, told Market Brew that for OZ, it's going to be more difficult to close those kind of partnership deals with all these outstanding questions that I still don't truly understand. Like whether OZ has an organic audience or not. They didn't have one.

We do here at Black Star Network. I know we started with 157,000 YouTube subscribers. We have almost 1.1 million right now. I know what we've done by having more than 1 billion impressions on YouTube and Facebook and the other platforms. I know we've spent like barely $5,000 on ads. All of our stuff is organic because we can't afford to spend money on ads because we're not getting the big ad deals like Carlos Watson was. But here's what this guy said. The guy was obviously able to build relationships with important people, and that's very valuable.

The question I would end up having for IPG is, did he take the space of someone more deserving on that stage? And the answer is yes, Robert. And what bothers me again, as I am sitting here, and I went through that whole website and looked at everything that he said. In his video, he called the white prosecutors rich white

prosecutors. I don't know how he derived that. And then he's going on about how they only targeted people of color. I mean, literally Robert, what it sounds, I mean, look, you're a lawyer. Jesse's a lawyer. What it sounds to me like, hey, why y'all picking on me? They

crooks. I'm a crook too. You know, whenever you're using the Trump defense, you're in a bad position because that is exactly what the Trump defense is. Hey, look, I may have had these documents, but look at Hunter, look at Hillary, look at Pence, look at Biden, look somewhere else besides at me. And I think that you're spot on when you talk about it. We've seen this phenomenon in literally every field. You can look at actors and athletes who get in trouble. Then all of a sudden they show up at the NAACP meeting and they're trying to hang out near Reverend Jetson or Reverend Sharpton because they're pro-black all of a sudden. Because now they've run out of other avenues where they can pursue. You're not getting contracts, so you claim racism. Then as soon as you're done,

you take all that money and you run to spend that money with other people. In the legal field, I talked about this a couple weeks ago, you'll be the neighborhood attorney. You're doing traffic tickets, people's kids getting sent to juvenile, et cetera. The minute somebody gets a medical malpractice case, it might be worth $5 million. They run to the nearest white lawyer. They trip over themselves. They have no brain. They all are trying to get there and take the money to somebody else. We have to stop.

We are the most loving and forgiving people on planet Earth. We extend invites to the barbecue to literally anybody. They gave Justin Timberlake an invite to the barbecue for a while. It doesn't make any sense to me. But at the end of the day, we have to be more discerning about the people who we allow to use the shield and cape of blackness for their own purposes when they haven't contributed back to the community in such a

way to justify our help and allegiance in the situation they're going through. Let me be real clear. I ain't never impersonated a YouTube executive on the phone trying to raise money. Nope.

Didn't do it. We don't flout our traffic. We don't buy traffic. Never have. Never will. That is what we do. We're absolutely organic. But see, let me tell y'all

how this thing, how this game works. The reason he was able to go out and do this, it was like, oh, Ozy, they do nice news, light news. They don't cover major subjects. I'm going to tell y'all what I deal with right now. Well, we're advertisers. We don't want, you're too, Rolla, you're controversial.

You used to have a segment called Crazy Ass White People. And the segment was literally about white people who are racist against black people. Oh, but you call them crazy ass white people. Well, what the hell are they? If you're calling the cops on black people barbecuing in the park,

I think your ass crazy. Oh, I actually called them white. Are they white? Yes. think, yeah, it's crazy. Oh, I actually called them white. Are they white? Yes. Then, ooh, you're covering those police abuse cases, and you're covering political stuff. So, ooh, no, we can't advertise on that. Oh, but we'll go sign major, major deals.

General Motors signed a huge deal with OZ. Now, we did business with General Motors last year. I appreciate it. It was $500,000. They got way more than we did. And we know we legitimate. I can go down the line over and over and over again. I've been trying to do a deal with Group M for two and a half years. I got emails and emails and meetings. Nothing. How much have we gotten from Group M? Zero.

But they signed a two-year deal with OZ on fraudulent numbers. My shit's real. And now Carlos wants to complain when he was the darling of Silicon Valley, the darling of the advertising world, now all of a sudden, y'all ain't doing the brother right. Y'all coming after the brother. This is hard on black entrepreneurs. Let me be perfectly clear.

It is not hard on black entrepreneurs who ain't doing illegal shit. As long as you're a black entrepreneur and you're not impersonating folks on the call and you're not fudging your numbers, you're not cooking the books, yes, you're going to have to work your behind off to build it. And I'm going to tell y'all right now,

I would rather have a black-owned media company that's doing $2.5 or $3 million in revenue and not $30 or $40 or $50 or whatever they were doing, because you never know the number was all made up. I would rather sit here and have videos on our YouTube channel that do $2 and $3 and $4 and $5 and $700,000 than do what Carlos had when he had some videos of that weak ass Carlos Watson show with a million, million five views and 20 comments. Now anybody know, yo ass can't be on YouTube

and do a video. And matter of fact, I told GrooveM that. I said, I figured that shit out in 30 seconds. I said, but you know what I did? I looked at them, I said, I called Kenan. The digital guy said, Kenan, is there something they doing that we not doing? How can you get 1.5 million views of a video and there's 20 comments? Y'all, that is literally impossible.

I said, they got to be lying about their numbers. That took us 30 seconds. But all of these big- billionaires, silicon investors, they couldn't figure that out. All of these agencies, they couldn't figure it out. And now, Carlos, your defense is well, Vice was lying

and BuzzFeed was lying so why they not going to be in the prison cell across from me? That's essentially what he's saying. All I take offense from is don't all of a sudden now try to act like, bruh,

you the second coming of Fannie Lou Hamer. Because Carlos, you not. Don't try to all of a sudden try to make this thing out to be you're fighting on back oh i'm not a martyr no you're not the federal government has called you a con man and yes there are other cases and i'm not taking up for the federal government what i am saying is do not sit here and try to cloak yourself as if you are the business

equivalent of Shaft. Because you're not. So just go on with your defense and don't try to make this a black car celeb. Because as a brother who has fought on behalf of black

owned media my entire life, who has stood with black ownedowned media my entire life, who has stood with black-owned media folks in the trenches, who has been in the rooms battling people, I ain't impressed. I ain't impressed. And it bothers me. It bothers me tremendously when we have to sit here and watch this play out. And we've got folks who sit here and trust us and expect us to do what's right. They want us to fight on behalf of our people. But what they don't want is they don't want folk to all of a sudden show up to the cookout

when you didn't bring shit, when you ain't paid for shit, but now all of a sudden you want to pack three, four plates home and also suggest what music to play. Nah, bro. Not here. Not here. Not today. Good luck in your case. But if they already had two of your co-conspirators flipping on you, I'm just saying,

you might want to be focused on a plea bargain. Just saying. When we come back, Congresswoman Joyce Beatty joins me right here on Roland Martin Unfiltered. 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. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English.

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

We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote unquote drug man Benny the Butcher Brent Smith from Shinedown Be 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. 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, pregame to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispreetirement.org, brought to you by AAR wall and it's keeping you from achieving prosperity? Well, you're not alone. On the next Get Wealthy with me, Deborah Owens, America's Wealth Coach, you're going to learn what you need to do to become unstuck and unstoppable. The fabulous author, Janine K. Brown, will be with us sharing with you

exactly what you need to do to finally achieve the level of financial success you desire through your career. Because when I talk about being bold in the workplaces, I'm talking about that inner boldness that you have to take a risk, to go after what you want, to speak up when others are not. That's right here on Get Wealthy, only on Black Star Network. Next on The Black Table with me, Greg Carr, a very different take on Juneteenth with the one and only Dr. Senada Ahmed.

We'll explore the amazing foods, remedies, and rituals that are a part of our history and the Juneteenth holiday. So it's our responsibility to return the healthier version to our folks instead of just the red liqueurs marketed to us, the red sodas and the other things. I mean, why does the Kool-Aid man have to sound like Louis Armstrong? He's like, oh, yeah. Yeah, right. An enlightening and tasty hour of The Black Table, only on the Black Star Network. Hatred on the streets. A horrific scene.

A white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence. You are not soiled. You will not be black. White people are losing their damn lives. There's an angry pro-Trump mob storm to the U.S. Capitol. We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting. I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial.

This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress, whether real or symbolic, there has been what Carol Anderson at Emory University calls white rage as a backlash. This is the rise of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. There's all the Proud Boys, guys. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they white people the fear that they're taking our jobs they're taking our resources they're taking our women this is white fear We talk about blackness and what happens in black culture.

We're about covering these things that matter to us, 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. We cannot tell our own story if we can't pay for it. This is about covering us. Invest in black-owned media.

Your dollars matter. We don't have to keep asking them to cover our stuff. So please support us in what we do, folks. We want to hit 2,000 people. $50 this month. Rates $100,000. We're behind $100,000, so we want to hit that. Y'all money makes this possible. Checks and money orders go to P.O. Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 20037-0196. The Cash App is Dollar Sign RM Unfiltered. PayPal is R. Martin Unfiltered. Venmo is RM Unfiltered. Zelle is Rolandland at rolandsmartin.com. We have to keep this going. The video looks phenomenal. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and Black-owned media and something like CNN.

You can't be Black-owned media and be scared. It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home, you dig? Hi, I'm Jo Marie Payton, voice of Sugar Mama on Disney's Louder and Prouder Disney Plus. And I'm with Roland Martin on Unfiltered. So much crap. All right, folks, we talk about what's happening in business in this country. A lot of corporations after George Floyd's death talked a good talk,

but a lot of them are not walking that walk of being them walking back a lot of those commitments. One of the folks is holding them accountable when it comes to issues such as diversity, equity, inclusion, is Congresswoman Joyce Beatty out of Ohio. She joins me right now. Congresswoman, always glad to have you here. First, before we get into that, you just left the floor. Republicans went after one of your colleagues, Congressman Adam Schiff, censoring him on the third time in history. More theatrics.

Well, that's exactly what my Republican colleagues were doing. But we all, the Democrats stood with Adam. We went on the floor because Adam Schiff was doing his job, and they know that. He led the committee for impeachment. He's a lawyer. He's a stellar member, and he did what any good member would do for the American people. And so today, we stood with him. We were a little expressive in our feelings with the speaker who has not gained a lot of respect. And we told him that this was not fair, and he knew it. You know, when you think about George Santos and all the things he's done in the court system,

what he's been accused of, it was just wrong for them to do what they did today to Adam Schiff. Well, especially when they are allowing truly one of the craziest folks on the side, Marjorie Taylor Greene, to just run amok and do whatever she wants. Well, there was a big battle with their own crazies today, calling each other out of their name today. Yeah, so I saw that there. So that was that. So let's talk about what you've been doing,

challenging many of these companies, utilizing the power of Congress to hold them accountable because, I mean, look, they are getting billions of dollars from taxpayers. They're getting billions from consumers. And the reality is when it comes to equity, it's not fair, not fair share, especially when it comes to housing, when it comes to financial services, when it comes to so many different areas. A lot of disparities, as you pointed out. Also, you mentioned corporate America spoke up, stood up after George Floyd. They promised some $60 billion that they would do it. That's on the low side. I see some estimates say it's up to $300 billion.

But the real reality is they didn't do it. We got past the George Floyd time. The House changed at that time. Congresswoman Maxine Waters was chair of the financial services. I was the first ever diversity and inclusion chairperson. And we really moved the needle. We had subpoena power and we called everybody out. And so we saw more diversity and inclusion in equity people hired in corporate America. And we made them move them from the H.R. departments buried to reporting to the CFO or the CEO. Major financial institutions did that. So people like you and especially you, Roland,

we're glad that you're keeping it out front because we know what will happen. We've been through this with affirmative action. We've been through this over the years when we've talked about doing set-asides for black companies, making sure that we had programs for African-American companies. And then we knew that you had majority companies given a wife, 51%, who didn't do anything in the business so they could make money off of programs that we have.

So we are staying diligent with this because we know as members of the Congressional Black Caucus, if we don't stand up for us or for black businesses, it won't happen. Right, absolutely. And when we talk about those commitments and challenging them, this is also why I try to remind people why elections matter.

Because when the Democrats were in control of the House, you had Congresswoman Waters as the chair of that committee. Yes. You as the chair of the subcommittee challenging them. Now the Republicans were in control of the House, you had Congresswoman Walters as the chair of that committee. Yes. You as the chair of the subcommittee challenging them. Now the Republicans are in charge. We can just toss that out of the window. And that's what they did.

They took the committee away. So we still have to ask those questions. When we get corporate leaders in, when we get the presidents and CEOs of the large financial institutions, we have to still hold them accountable, keep them on the record. Absolutely. Let's talk about housing because that's one of the areas when we talk about wealth creation in this country. African-Americans have never, ever even gotten a 50 percent black home ownership. A couple of weeks ago, the vice president of the White House announced the challenges to folks when it comes to algorithms, when it comes to appraisals.

And again, you're seeing African-Americans who are being cheated out of thousands of dollars, hundreds of thousands of dollars, when white appraisers give them lower valuations on their homes. Exactly. As a matter of fact, as you know, I serve on the Financial Services Committee, and that comes within our jurisdiction. We just had Director Chopra of the CFPB come in, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and that was one of the things we talked about.

With this whole new age of AI, artificial intelligence, we're seeing a lot of things with algorithms. And as I said to someone, have you ever gone into the bathroom and put your hands under the faucet? Well, it never works for me. And I realized I have really large hands for a female. We weren't in any of those test periods that they did. So the hands were much smaller. And so that's just one thing that's against us culturally. You mentioned housing. I can remember people telling me

when we were going to sell our home in a nice neighborhood, take down all those pictures. Take down like the shirt you have on. Take down all those frames that are in African colors and all of that because they will come in and appraise, knowing that it's someone black. And we don't have black appraisers. I mean, we're just starting to get people into that industry.

But at this time, I never saw any. And we would actually do that. We would go and move pictures, change the magazines. We would have to box up all of our Black history books because we really felt that if we didn't do 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 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 two of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives.

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

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

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

ourselves in the right position. Pre-game to greater things. Start building your retirement plan at thisispretirement.org. Brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. We wouldn't get a fair shake. So we have to erase our blackness to make somebody white comfortable. And buying that home that a black person lived in. And then the same person then goes, oh, there's no systemic racism. Exactly. In fact, I mean, I was on this PBD broadcast, Patrick Bet-David.

He called himself an independent. No, he's a right-winger. And when I challenged him, he kept going, systemic racism doesn't exist. And I brought up the issue of housing. I got on my iPad. I brought this story up. So it's like he had this person over there that I guess they couldn't use Google when I was making comments. I pulled up myself, and I said, here's a perfect example.

I said, well, they studied census tracts, and it showed they studied 47 million appraisal reports. He then goes, oh, I don't believe it. I'm like, oh, so wait a minute. So we just like just totally blow off the facts behind it. You don't want to believe it when the data is sitting right in front of you. Exactly, exactly. And I think that's why we have to make sure

that we're in every field. We wouldn't be covering many of the things we cover in media but for Roland Martin. And so it's important for us to, at a very early age, start letting our young folks know, here's a great career opportunity for you. I'm part of co-chairing a caucus on financial literacy and wealth creation.

Now, it's interesting because it's a Republican chair and me as a Democratic chair, but the Congresswoman, Young Kim, is Korean, and she was the one that said, let's make this about wealth creation. Because oftentimes brown and yellow and black people have some of the same problems as minorities. And so it'll be interesting to see how we work together because she said just what you said,

we have to make sure that we create wealth. And you do that, as we know, with property. Housing was one of the few ways, as black Americans, that we could start to leave something for our children to help give them a jump start. We don't

traditionally have parents that can leave us $10 million or $1 million or $100,000 or $10,000. I don't know about you, but I'm first generation going to college in my family. And so I want to make sure that my grandchildren are in a better position than I was in. Well, it's so like when we have these conversations

about black businesses, what was interesting to me is they always are about access to capital. And I keep saying, no, it's access to capital. And I keep saying, no, it's also access to contracts. There you go. Because if I got access to contracts, I'm getting capital. Exactly. Now, what I actually then need is working capital just to pay my bills until that contract, when we actually pay that contract after 90, 120, or 180 days.

And so that's the real issue there. That's what I've been saying to folks in terms of in this black-owned media space. I don't have debt. I don't owe anybody. I don't have a line of credit. I don't need it. What I need is access to contracts. That's one of the reasons why, you know, earlier, like within the first 60 days,

I challenged Susan Rice, President Biden, and put her over, you know, equity. I challenged her whole team. I said, listen, this is how black-owned media is getting shut out of the federal government advertising contracts. The Defense Department accounts for $600 million of the $1 billion. I've said to the Secretary of Defense, hey, those opportunities must be created. Look at, and don't just look at the agency, look at who they're giving stuff to. During the census, I had Congressman Stephen Horsford on, he was over the CBC Census Task Force.

The ad agency, the CBC fought to get more money put into the census budget for advertising, specifically for black-owned media. The white ad agency literally told him, we are not going to buy any newspaper under $50,000. You just wiped out 98% of all black newspapers in the country.

So y'all fought to get more money in the budget for black-owned businesses, for black-owned media, and the white agency goes, yeah, we're not going to buy in them, so who do you wipe out? Black-owned businesses, for black-owned media, and the white agency goes, yeah, we're not going to buy in them, so who do you wipe out? Black-owned media. That's the sort of stuff that's also happening where we also then can't build and create wealth.

And that's what we've seen, not only in black media, but in housing, that every time we take one step, there's something else up there that majority America controls and can do. And I think that's one of the good things, whether it's in housing, I'll take that, and then I'll come back to media. We sent a letter to President Biden and also before Susan Rice left to talk about the domestic policy. Housing was a big issue for us.

Now, as we know, former Congresswoman Marcia Fudge is there now as the secretary of HUD. She has made a huge difference by coming back home, home meaning not just to Ohio, but across the country and putting more money into urban areas. So it proves the point by having you here. And we need to do and I'll go on record saying this, we need to do everything we can to help maintain you as a voice for us, just like supporting HUD Secretary Marsha Fudge. The Biden team have really reached out to us. And when you talk about appraisals and doing studies, they created a first ever task force called PAVE to take a look at this. So at least they're hearing us. And I think that's a great first step. When you come back to media, I want people to know you're not just saying this. You beat up on me pretty badly as the chair of the CBC. And I welcomed it. I pressed.

You pressed. But I tell you what, it gave me the tools that I needed to go into the larger room and the larger caucus and say, look, if I need to go on air to talk about an issue, I can always call Roland Martin and he returns the call and he's not

afraid to fight. So you had, and I'm going to call out the names because that's what we do. Congressman James Clyburn immediately stood up and told a story about his history and black media. Hank Johnson out of Atlanta stood up and spoke. So I don't know if I had the chance to tell you that, but we then put a letter together to keep challenging. And it's going to be a long time process, but we hear you and you are so right because our stories don't get told. And right now there is more need with us having a Congress

and governors across the United States. They want to take away black history. Yep. They want to not acknowledge black history as American history. And that's a problem. They've now tied it to academic funding for grants through our National Education Association that if you want to have Amanda Gorman, if you want to have maybe even First Lady Michelle Obama's book

as part of your curriculum, they're going to pull your money because they don't want that. They said it was threatening. Amanda Gorman was threatening to America, is what they said. I have never been so appalled in my entire life. So I came

out with a piece of legislation. Jamal Bowman out of New York supported me. And so we want to come here with you and also talk about that because that is so critical to our children and our future. And I take it

back to slavery. I look at it like this. What were they afraid of with slaves? Not how hard they worked, when they could learn to read. That's right. Learn to read. James D. Anderson's book, The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860-1935,

he has a story. There's a black woman who said, I caused the death of more slaves than anybody else because I was teaching them how to read. That's right. The fear was reading because reading gives you knowledge. Yep. So now we're going back before 1863, emancipation, Juneteenth, 1865. Now, right now, in high schools,

they want to talk about critical race there? Well, see, that's why for me, that's why I make clear I don't do gossip. I don't care about no housewives shows. I don't care who had a baby, who got married. I said, because it's so much of that crap out there anyway. We got to have real information because what drives me nuts when somebody says,

well, we didn't know about that. And I immediately go, well, what are you watching? Exactly. And that's why when we're talking about it and you've got to have those places because here's the reality. I don't care if you've got a black president at MSNBC or a black president at ABC News. The reality is they're programming to mainstream. They're programming to white viewers. And so we put black folks front and center.

Hold tight. Once again, going to a break. We come back, folks. More of the Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, our panel. They got questions as well. Again, we're talking about housing, financial services, black owned media. And for all y'all people who love to say, oh, man, the CBC

ain't doing nothing, ain't doing this, ain't doing that. You literally have no clue what you're talking about because there's stuff that happens every day that you don't even see that actually impacts you. Don't forget, folks, to download our Black Star Network app, Apple Phone, Android Phone, Apple TV, Android TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV. Also, your dollars matter. Our goal is to get 20,000 of our fans contributing on average 50 bucks each. That's $4.19 a month, $0.13 today.

Join our Bring the Funk fan club. If we hit that, that's a million dollars raised by our fans. That is huge for us in order to do what we do. Check and money orders. Send to PO Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 20037-0196. Cash app, dollar sign, RM Unfiltered. PayPal, RMartin Unfiltered. Venmo is RM Unfiltered.

Zelle, Roland at RolandSMartin.com. Roland at RolandMartinUnfiltred.com. Be sure to get a copy of my book, White Fear, How the Browning of America is Making White Folks Lose Their Minds. Available at bookstores nationwide. Download a copy on Audible. We'll be right back. I'm Faraiji Muhammad, live from L.A.

And this is The Culture. The Culture is a two-way conversation. You and me, we talk about the stories, politics, the good, the bad, and the downright ugly. So join our community every day at 3 p.m. Eastern and let your voice be heard.

Hey, we're all in this together. So let's talk about it and see what kind of trouble we can get into. It's The Culture. Weekdays at 3, only on the Blackstar Network. Early days in the road, I learned, well, first of all, as a musician, I studied not only piano, but I was also drummer and percussion. I was all city percussion as well. So I was one of the best in the city on percussion.

There you go. Also studied trumpet, cello, violin, and bass, and any other instrument I could get my hand on. Mm-hmm. And with that study, I learned again what was for me. I learned to what it meant to do, what the instruments in the orchestra meant to each other in the relationships. Right. So that prepared me to be a leader. That prepared me to lead orchestras and to conduct orchestras.

That prepared me to know, to be a leader of men, they have to respect you and know that you know the music. You have to be the teacher of the music. You have to know the music better than anything. There you go. Right. So you can't walk in unprepared. You know the music. You have to be the teacher of the music. You have to know the music better than any. There you go. Right, so you can't walk in unprepared. Hi, my name is Brady Riggs. I'm from Houston, Texas.

My name is Sharon Williams. I'm from Dallas, Texas. Right now, I'm rolling, we're rolling. 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.

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

This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug 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 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. Martin, unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undamn believable. You hear me? Thank you. Să ne urmăm în următoarea mea rețetă. All right, folks, we're joined in the studio by Congresswoman Joyce Beatty of Ohio. We got panelists here. Rebecca Carruthers, what's your question for the Congresswoman? Well, first, thank you, Congresswoman Joyce Beatty, for joining us tonight and also my link sister. So it's good to hear from you tonight. Thank you. My question is currently the congressional black caucus is what about 58 members and with the recent Supreme. Yeah. And with the recent Supreme court

case and Allen V Milligan, it looks like there might be a creation of an up to five more majority black congressional seats across the South. So if Democrats were to take back the House in the next Congress, the CBC would be one of the largest voting blocs, meaning nothing will pass Congress without going through the Congressional Black Caucus. And so can you tell our viewers what is the Congressional Black Caucus's black agenda? Because oftentimes there's pushback and there's criticism saying that the CBC isn't doing enough for black people. But can you take a moment to talk about that black agenda? Absolutely. And first of all, thank you very much for that. And also to Roland, because

right before we took a break, Roland said, so many people will say, I don't know what the Congressional Black Caucus stands for or what they're doing. Well, you know, my first answer is like Roland's, well, who are you listening to? And how many times have you called me? So when people say that to me, I'm an open book, easy to get to. But let me just tell you, because your question is so on point. So if you look at wealth, if you look at small businesses, if you look at entrepreneurship, let's start there. So what we did, and I can give you proof, when we were in the last session and we were in charge with 58 members then in the Congressional Black Caucus. But for us, you wouldn't have broadband in the infrastructure bill. But for us negotiating

within our party on the bipartisan infrastructure bill from the Senate, it would not have passed. And that's $1.3 trillion that I got to negotiate taking in members of the Congressional Black Caucus to get it passed. If we look at child care, Pell Grants, if you look at HBCU funding, the most we've ever received in the history of the Congress, we will continue with education and healthcare to make sure that we sustain those black Americans who are getting the Pell Grant. If you look at what has happened now, we were able through this administration, we have more women, more black people

in the history of all the presidents to have positions in the White House. When you come back to our safer communities, we know that black Americans are losing far too many of our brothers and sisters to gun violence, to assault weapons, to crimes by police officers. But for the Congressional Black Caucus and our fight for safer communities, but for the Congressional Black Caucus, we're still talking about reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act of 1965. So I need black folks to understand if you don't get registered to vote and if you don't vote, we won't be able to do anything. So that leads our black agenda. You just mentioned what has happened in Alabama.

That could also be true for us in Louisiana, in North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi, where we only have one black member in those southern states. And so if we get that increase, you're right, our numbers will go up. And if we get that and we take back the majority, it puts us in one of the most powerful positions that we can be for voting rights. We can go back and get the George Floyd and Justice and Policing Act. we can get better housing deals because we know now when we have successes like we did with the Health and Science Act,

$56 billion in a piece of legislation, $26 million came to Ohio, which means we're going to have 100,000-some jobs that we at the Department of Commerce to be able to put an office of opportunity and equity. That was my legislation that was accepted. The Republicans didn't kick it out, and the president of the United States signed it into the bill. Now, we don't wear a sign every day saying, look at what we've done. We're out there in the trenches fighting for black America, especially.

And then black folks want to ask us after not reading, not contributing or listening to Roland Martin and others, then we wouldn't know what happens. He calls us all the time. And whether we're here in this seat or not, he tells America what's happening. Black media is so important. So I'm going to make a commitment to Roland that we will also continue the fight to make sure that we put more monetary support for black media. Then I think we would have fewer people.

And I know they ask you. You're so active in the community, in the links, and I know they say, well, what do you think they're doing? We also know during Congressional Black Caucus Foundation annual legislative conference, we have more black folks in Washington than we have all year.

And they come out for that. So let me just say, we have 15 brain trusts and we have 50-some workshops. We need people to be as much in the workshops as they are in the Thursday and Friday and Saturday partying events. And I can say this here because I do a workshop. Roland has always been there for me. Michael Eric Dyson for 11 years has been the moderator for my panel.

And we deal with wealth, money, and disparities. And this year, we're going to talk about, because Roland said it, all black folks don't live in poverty. So we have to protect the least of us, but we have to stand up for those of us who are entrepreneurs or who could have a few more zeros if the government helped them, like my Republican colleagues do, to help the 1 percent, the wealthiest of us. So we're going to be fighting for justice and equality, health care, education, safer communities, and to make sure that we get the right type of information and legislation we need to protect women's rights. We have to deal with the constitutional changes that are made.

Think about it. Fifty years of Roe v. Wade, and with the strike of a vote in a pen, Republicans can set us back 50 years. Well, if they'll do that for that, they'll do it for the things we're seeing. Taking away Black History Month. And we know black history is American history. And they want to deny us what we can read, what our children can read about black Americans, like Amanda Gordon, Michelle Obama. So those are some of the things

we're going to be doing. And I'm glad you asked me that question so I could go on my spiel to all America, but black America. Jesse. Yeah. So first of all, I just want to thank you for taking time out to speak with us. My question is more so focused in the arena of housing as that's the space that I primarily work in. For those people who are not currently homeowners and who are currently renting, one of the things that people were really impacted by during the COVID pandemic was an inability to achieve what was necessary in order to fulfill rental amounts and fulfill rental obligations during the time of COVID. And even now, people are still slowly trickling back to work, but still not in the scope that we would need it to be. I was just curious as to if there's any legislation or

any discussion going on in Washington about continuing and maybe even making permanent rental assistance programs to keep those who are renting in their homes? I think that's a good question. And let me say yes and yes. We have a very strong member of the Congressional Black Caucus who serves as the ranking member on housing, and that's Emanuel Cleaver, someone who has committed a lifetime of work to housing. But I'm glad you brought this up because during the global pandemic, again, but for the Congressional Black Caucus, with Maxine Waters, with myself, Cleaver, Al Green and so many more, we would not have been able to put the moratorium on making sure those who couldn't pay their rent weren't evicted. For those homeowners who couldn't pay their mortgage, we put a moratorium on that they wouldn't lose their house,

they wouldn't be evicted. But we also protected those landlords, because many of them were black folks, renting out places. So we protected both sides. If you look at the work we're doing right now, we're fighting, fighting for our lives to make sure that we protect those who are in Section 8. Many states have a long wait list for you to get on Section 8. And there is a direct linkage to what some of my colleagues on the other side are trying

to do with how you live in your housing with also TANF and your benefits there. We're not opposed to saying people have to work to get the requirements for it, but we didn't like what they did. We've had work requirements forever, but they wanted to play with the age limit to make it more difficult for people to get their relief that the government set up for them. And as you know, that relief helps many people pay their rent and stay in their homes. But we are definitely continuing to fight for the rental assistant programs that we have right now. We're fighting to keep them. Hopefully in the next Congress, we will have Hakeem Jeffries as the speaker, we will have the control, and the Congressional Black Caucus will grow by three or five members.

Robert, thank you so much for joining us this evening, Congresswoman. So going, piggybacking on something you said earlier, going into 2024, Democrats should be able to campaign around the country saying that coming out of a global pandemic in 2020, coming out of an insurrection that nearly tore the country apart, having insurrectionists being members of the Congress and members of the Senate, Democrats were able to pass a $1.5 trillion inflation reduction act, $1.7 trillion infrastructure bill, $3.5 trillion omnibus spending bill, $4 trillion in the debt ceiling deal. We were able to confirm over 250 federal judges, 3.5% inflation rate, 350,000 jobs created just last year. You mentioned the executive branch, an African-American female vice president, African-American female White House press secretary, African-American female Supreme Court justice, African-American female U.N. representative, African-American female Federal Reserve representative, black man as the defense secretary, black man as the national security advisor. When you are talking about this record that Democrats have had, and you mentioned earlier,

you're not walking off a capo and written on there. Why not? Why is this message not being spread to the American people? If you look at the poll numbers, people assume a lot that Congress and this administration are doing something. Meanwhile, this has been one of the most effective first turns of any president since the New Deal. What will it take to get that message out to the rest of the American people? Well, I think just like you just said it, as a great American calling into this show, and I assure you, we rattle off all of those statistics that you just mentioned, many first. And if we want to talk about the economy, which people say, what are you concerned about? They say safer communities. They say the economy because I want to pay for my shelter over my head. I want

to pay for my children to go to college. I want to pay for food. We do that. And you're so right. Many folks did not realize that we have a black woman that is president of XM, Export-Import, another sister that I wanted to bring. We have on the Federal Reserve banks a brother in Atlanta, and we have a sister. So we've done so much in addition to the things you rattled off. But let me just say this because Roland has a large audience. And when black media and white media

invite us and call us, we say it there. But we also put it out on our Facebook and all over social media. Every single thing you've said, the White House, the Biden-Harris team, in every speech, President Biden will tell you, I've done more for black Americans. And he'll rattle off those same individuals and hire more women than all of the past presidents together.

So we're doing it. But we have to be open that we have to be reading and watching more than reality TV shows. We have to be engaged with black media. White media is not always going to tell you what the Congressional Black Caucus is doing. They're also not going to tell you what Biden-Harris is doing. They're still dealing with that. We have a black female as vice president of the United States who is directly next in line if something would happen to the president or may succeed him in president. So they're not trying to help us. That's why they're trying to take away black history as American history. They're trying to censor what our children can read because all of this is in the documents that we're reading. Now, I'll do anything the listening audience wants us to do. I'm not bashful about

saying what we've done or tooting our own horn because much of those things that you just referenced happened during my leadership as chair of the Congressional Black Caucus with Congressman Stephen Horsford as my vice chair, and now doing an amazing job as a black man leading this country and leading the issues for black America. We could not be in a better position than we could be without having Stephen Horsford leading us. So we'll continue to tell our stories. We'll ask Roland to say it every week if we need to do it. Well, we appreciate you dropping by. This is your first time visiting the studio.

I know. Let me tell you, if you haven't been here, I mean, I'm looking at Black Lives Matter, black-owned businesses, and Roland Martin is all over this studio. So that's another reason. We need to make sure that we keep Roland Martin on the air.

We need to do more so he can bring more people on, and we can continue to have him here, because I can tell you, he speaks truth to power, and he's never forgotten from where he came from. Well, I certainly appreciate it. We're going to keep doing that. So thanks a bunch. And we will see what happens next. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer

will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion-dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 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 Glod and this is season two of the war on drugs podcast we are back in a big way in a very big way real people real perspectives this is kind of star-studded a little bit man we got uh 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. 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. podcast. And to hear episodes one week early and ad free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. 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. Thanks so much, folks. Got to go to a break.

We'll be right back. Roland Mark unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Hatred on the streets. A horrific scene. A white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence. On that soil, you will not be back. White people are losing their damn minds. There's an angry pro-Trump mob storm to the U.S. Capitol.

We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting. I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial. This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress, whether real or symbolic, there has been what Carol Anderson at Emory University calls white rage as a backlash. This is the rise of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. There's all the be more of this. There's all the crowd going to die. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources, they're taking our women. This is white fear. Black Star Network is here.

Oh, no punch. I'm real revolutionary 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. See, there's a difference between Black Star Network and black-owned media and something like CNN. You can't be black-owned media and be scared.

It's time to be smart. Bring your eyeballs home, you dig? Hello, I'm Jameah Pugh. I am from Coatesville, Pennsylvania, just an hour right outside of Philadelphia. My name is Jasmine Pugh. I'm also from Coatesville, Pennsylvania. You are watching Roland Martin Unfiltered.

Stay right here. Thank you. And Georgia, opponents of Atlanta's proposed police and firefighting training center are suing the city for delays in approving a petition drive that seeks to force a voter referendum to halt the complex. A lawsuit filed Tuesday in Fulton County Superior Court by community member Mariah Parker is a last-ditch effort to halt Cop City. The proposed $90 million facility would replace inadequate training facilities. Robert, look, a lot of people spoke out against this, and I had some city leaders on. I had Congress, excuse me, Councilman Bond. And he said, hey, there are people in Atlanta who support this. They're moving forward.

What do you make of this? They're not the people in Atlanta I've talked to. I mean, I'm on the radio almost five days a week and our callers call in for three hours a day. And I haven't found one that supports it. The people in those communities feel that this was a deal that was done without community support, without community being informed, that it wasn't really until the final vote was taken that many people found out that the votes were taking place. I mean, when you have a vote scheduled for 5.30 a.m. and you limit community input and community comment, of course people are going to have this conceptualization that this is a sweetheart

deal between the developers and between the city and the elected officials that does not have the input of the people that are intended to be governed. And people have legitimate questions of this training facility used to be in Macon, Georgia, almost two hours south of Atlanta. Why does this need to be directly in a predominantly black community where we could have retail, we could have housing, we could have all sorts of other things. But this type of facility without community support, I think that this is a mistake on the part of the city. And I think there's going to be backlash going forward for all of the elected officials, much like we saw with the stadium vote years ago, where you did not have community

support. And suddenly this is just done. And the developers are happy, the people with money are happy, but the citizens are upset. Rebecca, what do you make again? Residents are opposing this, and so the city, this thing is not, this thing is not done deal yet. Well, here's the other thing. The clerk's office, instead of taking like the usual seven days to approve the language, the referendum to actually be in the ballot, it took 14 days. And so there's issues with that because normally groups who get a referendum on the ballot will have 60 days to collect signatures to make sure that it actually makes it to the ballot. But because it was slow walked, organizers are only going to have 58 days to collect the requisite signatures that they need for it to be on the November 7th ballot. Jesse, go ahead.

Well, I think, you know, the people are obviously organized and they're trying to speak against this. And I think anytime that you have a community who is pushing against any sort of development, it needs to be taken into consideration. Unfortunately, I don't live in Atlanta, so I'm not as familiar with what exactly the issue is. But I can imagine that given all the things that we've seen Atlanta Police Department involved in over the past few years, I can see why residents, particularly African-American residents, may have some concerns. We also know that there are a lot of needs that are in just every American city. There's a need for affordable housing and more access to it. There's a need for expanding on our educational opportunities and educational facilities. And I just feel like, you know, if there's a push by the community to say, hey, maybe this money could be used in

another way, or this area, this land could be used in another way that's more conducive to what the community wants, then it needs to be considered. Greg, we'll be right back on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Blackstar Network. Up next on The Frequency with me, Dee Barnes. She's known as the Angela Davis of hip-hop. Monet Smith, better known as Medusa the Gangsta Goddess, the undisputed queen of West Coast underground hip-hop. Pop-locking is really what indoctrinated me in hip-hop. I don't even think I realized it was hip-hop at that time. Right.

You know, it was a happening. It was a moment of release. We're going to be getting into her career, knowing her whole story, and breaking down all the elements of hip-hop. This week on The Frequency, only on the Black Star Network. Early days in the road, I learned, well, first of all, as a musician,

I studied not only piano, but I was also drummer and percussion. I was all city percussion as well. So I was one of the best in the city on percussion. There you go. Also studied trumpet, cello, violin, and bass, and any other instrument I could get my hand on. Mm-hmm. And with that study, I learned again what was for me. I learned what it meant to do what the instruments

in the orchestra meant to each other in the relationships. Right. So that prepared me to be a leader. That prepared me to lead orchestras and to conduct orchestras. That prepared me to know, to be a leader of men, they have to respect you and know that you know them. You have to be the teacher of the music.

You have to know the music better than anybody. There you go. Right, so you can't walk in unprepared on a next a balanced life with me dr jackie owning your energy and how to use it. Trust me, it impacts the people on your job, who you attract, and even your love life. What you give out is what comes back to you. So like attracts like, right? So if you come in with a negative space and I match that negative energy, then two seconds later, somebody else coming with more negative energy. And then I was just always just matching negative stuff. And here's the kick kicker if you're not careful that energy can even be stolen

that's all next on a balanced life on black star network me sherry shepard with sammy roman i'm dr robin b pharmacist and fitness coach and you're watching roland mart Martin Unfiltered. We had him on the show. One of the Central Park Exonerated Five is running for New York City Council to represent Harlem in the competitive primary. Yusef Salaam is, of course, seeking a position. They served nearly 70 years in prison after being wrongfully accused, convicted, and in prison for the rape and beating of a white woman jogging in Central Park in 1989. This, to me, Rebecca, is something that's critically important because to have folk who are able to serve in elected office who've had to experience the downside of public policy,

I think is much more powerful than folks who never had to endure things like that. You know, it would be pure poetic justice to see him serve in office and then see the former president who took out a full-page ad against him in prison, to see those roles reversed, it would be the ancestors rejoicing. So, you know, I wish him luck as he moves forward in the process of becoming an elected official. Speaking of elected officials, last night, Jesse, in Virginia, you had three incumbent reform prosecutors who faced off against three Democratic pro-law enforcement candidates and the reform prosecutors they all want. What we are seeing is a continual attack on reform prosecutors, even in Democratic primaries, by these folks who are law and order, who are being supported by police departments and being supported by police unions?

Absolutely. So once again, we see it's a push for anti-blackness. and people who support oppressing, the oppression of black people in black communities to want to push for having folks who are going to be tough on crime. It's always the popular political slogan to come out whenever somebody is running for any position. And I think it's critically important that people understand that elections at the national level are not the only elections to focus on. Sorry, my powers. The elections at the national level are not the only elections to focus on. I'm sorry, my powers. The elections at the national level are not the only elections to focus on. All politics are local. Another race, Robert, that is actually huge there in Virginia, former state representative

LaCherise Ayer. She defeated longtime state representative Joe Morrissey, the self-described pro-life Democrat, in his primary election. Her victory marks a significant win for the pro-choice movement in Virginia. It solidifies a Democratic majority in the narrowly held chamber as Morrissey was a lone anti-abortion Democrat in the Virginia State Senate. She's a former member of the House of Delegates, openly pro-choice, and spent much of her time on the campaign trail criticizing Morrissey's anti-abortion voting record. The Democratic majority of the state Senate has been slimmed, 22-18, including Morrissey, who often broke with his party to vote against abortion rights.

She's going to face off against a Republican challenger in November. But the thing, this was a major black district, Robert. This guy's been highly controversial, had been sleeping with an underage woman, a sister who he later married and had kids with, but then she filed for divorce during the primary, but was still doing robocalls for his campaign. I mean, there were some people who literally were saying Joe Morrissey was blacker than some black state officials. Like, I literally actually heard that in terms of how he voted. And he was, in many cases, bulletproof, but the system was able to take him down. The Democratic Party of Virginia ain't been right since they did wrong by Justin Fairfax. This is just a continuation of that. Every time we do a story about the Virginia Democratic Party,

it's always about some sort of mess involved. and I think they have to clean up house there. But I think more so this should be a shot across the bow for conservative Democrats across the country to understand that the progressive wing of the party is where the energy of the party is. The progressive wing of the party is where the future of the party is. If you talk to 18- to 24-year-olds who are really just getting involved in campaigns, their issues are progressive issues across the board. And it's very important that we're working on what the issues are going to be for 2024, that we can't keep talking about these middle-of-the-road, milk-toast issues that many people want to harken back to as if we're campaigning in 1958. You have to campaign for the election that's in front of you, and you have to campaign on that strong, progressive,

bold agenda that's really going to get people elected. Look, you're absolutely right. And look, people got to understand what we're dealing with. For instance, you got Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida who's running, Mike Pence running for president. These two idiots literally were speaking in Greensboro, North Carolina and Florida. And you know what they said? Oh, if I'm president, we're going to restore Fort Bragg.

They want to bring back the Confederate name of a military base. So ain't it funny when I see these people on social media talking about, it's the Democrats, they're the ones who supported Jim Crow. Who's the one standing up for the Confederacy in the 21st century? Republicans. Watch this. And I also look forward to, as president, restoring the name of Fort Bragg to our great military base in Fayetteville, North Carolina. And thank the people that have served there. And they're proud of their service there.

And it's an iconic name and an iconic base and we're not going to let political correctness run amok in north carolina gotta go but let's be real clear that dumb ass can't do that because congress passed a law to change the names he can't do nothing unilaterally. Well, I think that's the whole thing with DeSantis, that he is trying to run almost a George Wallace-style campaign for president, where he's running on CRT. He's running on the anti-woke agenda. I'm going to bring back the names of Fort Bragg and Fort Benning. I want to defend Confederate monuments, et cetera. Just when somebody tells you who they are, just believe them. Ron DeSantis is telling you that he is trying to run on a pro-Klan agenda. We have to believe him when he says that.

If you look at the policies that he has done in Florida, what has happened to test scores in Florida since he became governor? You've seen math scores in Jackson County drop by 24 points, reading scores in Opelousa County down 17 points. So this anti-woke agenda has not worked in Florida, and we're seeing it that it's not going to work nationwide. The fact that Ron DeSantis is still down by 30 points is somebody who's been indicted twice should tell you all you need to know

about the residency of his messaging. Robert, we appreciate it. Thanks to a bunch. Jesse, real simple. Bottom line is this here. Not just DeSantis and Pence, the whole damn Republican field. They are appealing to whiteness. That is their strategy. Absolutely. It seems like they always play to the numbers game and they feel like if they can get everybody on the quote-unquote white side to support their cause, they'll be able to retain power.

But I think it's important for people to also understand that this isn't the first time that we've heard about Ron DeSantis doing things that are racialized. And I think if you go back to the Florida gubernatorial election, we heard that wonderful quote from Andrew Gillum that says, we're not saying that he's racist, but the racists think he's racist. And so he's trying to weaponize that in order to get even more political power. And I think it's very important for everybody in the voting community to look and see what's happening and be ready to, if you haven't registered already, go ahead and do it. Be ready when the time comes. Rebecca, while you got the white Republicans saying this, well, you got Senator Tim Scott saying this.

And the left, we all know this to be true. The left weaponizes race whenever they're losing an argument. That does my grandfather a disjustice, an injustice. It's disrespectful to pain and the left. Guess what? When you stand in front of a crowd and say that,

you're actually appealing to race, Tim Scott. And when you do what DeSantis has done, Rebecca, you're appealing to race. They're weaponizing race, Tim Scott. And when you do what DeSantis has done, Rebecca, you're appealing to race. They're weaponizing race, and even he knows it. Well, look, here's something that we all know. Whiteness in America is a political class. There has been points where it's even been codified into law. When I think about other black South Carolinians, I think about in the 1890s when you actually had some black South Carolinians who were actually in the state legislature.

And there's actually, you could go back and read the record, read the actual debate, where you had these black legislators trying to grandfather themselves and all of their descendants to be classified as white. And so as you're talking about white supremacy and what we're seeing that's coming from the conservative party in America, once again, this is about protecting whiteness because whiteness equals power. And it is codified in certain code as an actual like political class. So that's what these people are fighting for. So even though Tim Scott, we know him ethnically to be African-American, he's still fighting to be a part of that white political class. Absolutely.

Jesse, Rebecca, Robert, I appreciate all three of you being on today's show. Thank you so very much. Folks, that is it. I will see you guys tomorrow right here on Roland Martin on the filter. Do not forget, support us in what we do. Download our app, Blackstar Network app, Apple phone, Android phone, Apple TV, Android TV,

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