#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Poor People's Motorcade to DC; Attack on VP Harris, Kim Potter Trial; Lowering BP Naturally

Episode Date: December 14, 2021

12.13.2021 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Poor People's Motorcade to DC; Attack on VP Harris, Kim Potter Trial; Lowering BP NaturallyJurors hear about what caused Daunte Wright's death, the medical examiner testifies how the bullet that pierced his heart was "the most significant injury." We'll have a live report from journalist Georgia Fort.As President Joe Biden's approval rating drops, inflation is rising. We'll talk to the Senior Director of Research from the Center for American Progress to see if there is a correlation between the two.  The hits keep coming to Vice President Kamala Harris. We'll dissect the latest attack.There's a motorcade heading to D.C. from West Virginia demanding the passage of voting and other policy legislation.Huge settlements for two wrongfully targeted black people. A Minnesota bank settles with a black man accused of trying to cash a fake check, and Chicago will be shelling out close to $3 million for a botched raid.There's a tour making its rounds to educate people about healthcare. We'll talk to the founder of FRESH about the Accountability tour.And in our Fit, Live, Win segment, the secret to lowering your blood pressure naturally. #RolandMartinUnfiltered partners:Verizon | Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband, now available in 50+ cities, is the fastest 5G in the world.* That means that downloads that used to take minutes now take seconds. 👉🏾https://bit.ly/30j6z9INissan | Check out the ALL NEW 2022 Nissan Frontier! As Efficient As It Is Powerful! 👉🏾 https://bit.ly/3FqR7bPAmazon | Get 2-hour grocery delivery, set up you Amazon Day deliveries, watch Amazon Originals with Prime Video and save up to 80% on meds with Amazon Prime 👉🏾 https://bit.ly/3ArwxEh+ Don’t miss Epic Daily Deals that rival Black Friday blockbuster sales 👉🏾 https://bit.ly/3iP9zkv👀 Manage your calendar, follow along with recipes, catch up on news and more with Alexa smart displays + Stream music, order a pizza, control your smart home and more with Alexa smart speakers 👉🏾 https://bit.ly/3ked4liBuick | It's ALL about you! The 2022 Envision has more than enough style, power and technology to make every day an occasion. 👉🏾 https://bit.ly/3iJ6ouPSupport #RolandMartinUnfiltered and #BlackStarNetwork via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered or via PayPal ☛ https://www.paypal.me/rmartinunfilteredDownload the #BlackStarNetwork app on iOS, AppleTV, Android, Android TV, Roku, FireTV, SamsungTV and XBox 👉🏾 http://www.blackstarnetwork.com#RolandMartinUnfiltered and the #BlackStarNetwork are news reporting platforms covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. The The The The The The The The The The The

The The The You know how some carriers give you so little for your old or busted phone you just end up living with it? I don't think so. Verizon lets you trade in your broken phone for a shiny new one. You break it, we upgrade it. You dunk it. Doggy bone it.

Slam it. Wham it. Strawberry jam it. We upgrade it. Get a 5G phone on us with select plans. Every customer, current, new, or business. Because everyone deserves better. And with plans starting at just $35,

better costs less than you think. It's Monday, December 13th. I'm Dr. Avis, sitting in for Roland Martin, who's on a much-needed vacation. Here's what's coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. Jurors hear about what caused Daunte Wright's death. The medical examiner testifies how the bullet

that pierced his heart was the most significant injury. We'll have a live report from journalist Georgia Fort. As President Joe Biden's approval ratings drop, inflation is rising. We'll talk to the senior director of research from the Center for American Progress to see if there is a correlation between the two. And the hits keep coming to Vice President Kamala Harris.

We'll dissect the latest attack. There is a motor haid heading to D.C. from West Virginia demanding the passage of voting and other policy legislation. Huge settlements for two wrongfully targeted black people. A Minnesota bank settles with a black man accused of trying to cash a fake check. And Chicago will be shelling out close to $3 million for a botched raid. There's a tour making its rounds to educate people about health care. We'll talk to the founder afresh about the accountability tour.

And in our FitLive When segment, the secret to lowering your blood pressure naturally. It's time to bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. Let's go. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine. And when it breaks, he's right on time. And it's rolling. Best belief he's knowing.

Putting it down from sports to news to politics. With entertainment just for kicks. He's rolling. It's Uncle Roro, y'all. It's Rolling Roro, yo! Yeah, yeah! It's Rollin' Marten, yeah! Yeah, yeah! Rollin' with Rollin' now! Yeah, yeah!

He's broke, he's fresh, he's real the best, you know he's Rollin' Marten now! Marten! In Minnesota, a jury hearing evidence in the manslaughter trial of Kimberly Potter got details of how the bullet ripped through Daunte Wright's body. An assistant medical examiner told jurors that Daunte Wright's gunshot wound was not survivable. The lower left side of the chest, and I've peeled away the occlusive dressing that was placed in the field. And could you please, for the jury, just describe the difference between an entrance wound and an exit wound? In general? In general, and then as applied

to the images that we see. Yes, in general, entrance wounds, entrance gunshot wounds have a circular or oval appearance. There's usually some missing tissue in the center of the wound. There can be abrasions around the edge of the wound. This particular image that we're looking at here does show a wound that has

those features. We will see a cleaned up version of this in subsequent images. And when you say those features, is what you observe here consistent with an entrance wound? They are, yes. And if we could put exhibit 119 on the screen please. Could you describe what's shown here, please? So this is the picture of the right side of the chest, again, with the occlusive dressing peeled back, showing an area of injury. It's difficult to see here due to the presence of blood, but this is the opposite injury. And when you say opposite injury, would you characterize that as, how would you characterize that? Yes. We will see that the injury on the left side of the chest is

an entrance wound. And this will be shown to show features of an exit gunshot wound. It happened when we peeled back this dressing that you could actually palpate or feel the bullet directly below the skin adjacent to this wound. So that was a definite clue that this was the egg side. What if any compounds were found from the testing of the femoral blood? Cannabinoids were the only thing found in the decedent system. And when you say cannabinoids, is that THC and its metabolites? Exactly that, yes. And are those related to marijuana? They are. Were those toxicology results that you received in any way significant with respect to your determination of cause and manner of death?

No, they were not. And then on exam, did you find any natural disease or natural defect that would have caused Mr. Wright's death? No, the only thing we found were injury-related changes associated with the gunshot wound. And now, Dr. Jackson, based on your training and experience, did you ultimately determine a cause of death for Daunte Wright in this case? Yes. And what was the cause of death?

The cause of death in this case? Yes. And what was the cause of death? The cause of death in this case was gunshot wound of the chest. And did you also determine a manner of death for Dante Wright? Yes. This is a certified as a homicide. Journalist Georgia Fort has been following the case from Brooklyn Center. She joins us now. Hi there, Georgia. How's it going? Thanks so much for having me. Absolutely. Wonderful to have you on. So today's testimony really went to the cause of death. This was a young man in the prime of his life until essentially he got shot in the heart. That's correct. We heard from the medical examiner. And I'd like to point out, you know, if you've been following this trial, one thing you cannot see is who is in the courtroom. And so during the testimony of the

medical examiner, Dante Wright's family excused themselves. They did not want to see the photos of his autopsy or photos of him while he was deceased. Judge Chu also made an order that those photos and images would not be live-streamed out of respect for the family's wishes that people remember Dante Wright while he was full of life. Absolutely. And so what do you get is the sense of the community there? I mean, the time that this happened, we were already sort of had this open wound with regards to the George Floyd murder and the trial that was going on in relation to that murder. And then you have this happen due to the actions of what was supposedly a veteran officer, someone who supposedly was

teaching others how to handle weapons safely. And the next thing you know, she shoots and kills this young man claiming that she thought she was just reaching for her taser. Well, the community here is again outraged. And I think, you know, you give that example of a wound and I feel like having to go through detail by detail with the testimony and the evidence,

it's reigniting some of that trauma and frustration that this community has been feeling. Brooklyn Center is a suburb of Minneapolis. So this literally happened about 15 to 20 minutes away from where George Floyd was murdered. And it's happening, the trial is happening in the same courthouse that the Derek Chauvin trial happened in. And so it is reigniting a lot of those feelings. And one thing I'd like to point out, as we've heard with some of the evidence,

there's a lot of questions, too, and concerns about the way that police officers conduct themselves in this situation. A lot of people in the community were unaware that one of the responding officers in this case drew his gun on Dante Wright after he had been shot, demanded that he put his hands up after he had been shot. And, you know, of course, now we know that at that point, Dante Wright was likely deceased. But what we're seeing unfold on some of the body camera footage that's being used as evidence in this trial is that a responding officer, rather than rendering aid, for eight and a half minutes, he had his gun drawn on Dante Wright. And that's eight and a half minutes that could have been used to potentially save his life. And so the community is reignited with their concerns of public safety, questions about whether or not police in this community are really in position

to keep everyone safe, especially when they look like you and I. Absolutely. That is absolutely outrageous. Absolutely outrageous that as this young man is sitting there fighting for his life, literally his life is escaping his body. He's being threatened by another police officer and told to do something physically that he's incapable of doing for eight full minutes. Nothing is done to save his life. Now, what's really interesting to me with that is this is also happening in the context of, you know, the video that really got a lot of play nationally was right after the shot. You know, we saw the taser, taser, taser. And then it sounded like the defendant in this case was surprised that it happened. Why wouldn't she render aid? I mean, I don't even understand the thought process. If this was an accident, why wasn't someone on the scene there with enough humanity to say,

there needs to be something that we do to at least try to save this young man's life? Well, and those are the questions people here are asking themselves within a community where this has happened. And these are officers who have been, you know, assigned to protect and serve the community, yet and still these are decisions that are made in very traumatic moments. And so the other question I think that a lot of people are asking themselves in this moment, too, is why would the responding officer who was there with Kimberly Potter when she shot at Dante Wright, why would he swap guns with her? We've heard this testimony from several different people, including Sergeant Johnson himself. He says he took Kimberly Potter's gun away from her after she shot Dante Wright and in turn gave her his gun. And then moments later,

we see on body camera footage that has been presented as evidence, moments later, we see him take his gun back from Kimberly Potter, take the ammunition out of it and give her back his gun. And so we've seen some people from the BCA state officers who have tried to explain protocols and processes for hand handling evidence. But some of these things that we've seen transpired just don't quite make sense, including your point of why didn't anyone render aid to Dante Wright after he had been shot. And one of the biggest things I think that has come up to try to excuse that is that there was no communication that happened between those three officers who were right at Dante's car when he was shot. There was no clear communication from them to the other responding officers who came to provide backup. And so somewhere in this case, I wonder if in the

future some of the other responding officers could be held responsible for Dante's death as well. Absolutely. And what you described to me, I mean, I'm not an attorney, but it certainly sounds like tampering with evidence, what you described to me just now. I don't understand how that could be legal under any circumstance. It looks like the attempted beginnings of a cover-up is what you just described to us. You know, I also wonder, you know, how did it get here? How did it get this far?

Why was even there a need for a taser in this instance? Was that level of force even necessary? Do you get the sense that they'll even go down that lane at all in this trial? Or are we just starting from the point of, okay, he was shot supposedly accidentally? Well, that's a tough question. And the reason why I say that is because I have some insight that the Brooklyn Center or former Brooklyn Center chief of police is going to be taking the stand as a witness for the defense, which means he will be testifying in defense of Kimberly Potter's actions. And what I've heard is that Tim Bannon is going to take the stand and he's going to say not only would he justify his officers using their taser in that situation, but he's going to justify officers using their gun in that situation.

So I think at this point, you know, the clear objective is for most people in this community to see Kimberly Potter, who is a veteran officer held accountable for mistaking, as she says, her gun for her taser. And then outside of that, we'll have to see if anyone else is held accountable. But at this point, people are sitting on the edge of their seat watching this trial, wondering if this is a situation where she could be found not guilty. Some of the jury instructions that have been published to the Hennepin County Courts website already have instructed jurors to acknowledge the fact that just because a mistake has been made doesn't mean a crime has been committed. And so I think that this is one of those trials where we are going to have to pay attention to every single detail.

The defense has already asked for a mistrial at this point. We're going to have to pay attention to all of the evidence and the testimony and really be paying attention all the way up until the verdict is delivered to see which direction this goes. Well, I'm certainly glad that you're there to keep a close eye on all that's going on because I have a feeling there's so much more that we need to be aware of as this trial progresses. Sounds like they're trying to set this thing up, I would have to say personally, as a situation where somebody is about to get away with murder. But thanks for joining us today. Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. Absolutely.

President Biden's approval rating is sinking as the inflation rate in the country reaches a 39-year high. Areas of great public concern have led to a new low in Biden's overall approval rating, measured by 53080 at 43 percent. All of this while the White House deals with record number inflation numbers. Over the last 12 months, the index climbed some 6.8% before seasonal adjustments. This marks the most significant 12-month increase in nearly 40 years. Will Ragland, Senior Director of Research at the Center for the American Progress,

joins us from Alexandria, Virginia. Hi there, how are you doing? Thanks for joining us today. Thank you, Dr. Avis. It's good to be here. It's great to have you. Now, these numbers are not looking great for Joe Biden as it relates to inflation, but how do we juxtapose that against earnings levels and an overall economy where employers are begging people to work, even though people are paying more? Are we at a point where people actually have more excess money to spend?

Yeah, I think that's a really important point. You know, if you want to talk about records, look at this past year in terms of the jobs, the number of jobs created. Nearly six million jobs have been created since January. That's a record. The fastest drop in unemployment since January, it's gone from 6.3 to 4.2. That's a record. Last week, we saw the lowest number of initial unemployment claims drop to its lowest point in 52 years. You know, and wages are on the rise and outstripping inflation, by the way, for the bottom 70 percent, the working working families. So, you know, inflation and I don't say that to to minimize the real pain that a lot of workers and families are dealing with. Inflation costs are up. People are seeing higher prices at the gas pump.

People are seeing higher prices in the grocery store. But the president, Biden, is, and he's making tough decisions. And for the past six months, he's been negotiating legislation to help bring costs down for Americans who are being impacted by this. We're talking about real costs. We're talking about the cost of prescription drugs, the fact that seniors would save $4,000 a year. We're talking about the cost of child care to get women back into the workforce. And those are big savings. We're talking $5,000 to $6,000 a year alone on child care. We're talking $8,600 a year if we're talking pre-K. And then there's the child tax credit, which most families us have been receiving, most families who have children have been receiving monthly, which totals to up to $3,600 per kid and is responsible for the reduction

in childhood poverty by 40%. That is a big deal. But, you know, I think you've seen this drop because a lot of the pandemic, people are sick and tired of the pandemic, a pandemic that keeps throwing us curveballs. And, you know, I think the president has taken on a workmanlike approach to this and punched out a lot on the to-do list amidst some really tough negotiations among his own parties, which has been the story for the past now six months. And these are negotiations and disagreements in a big tent about bringing the cost down for working families, addressing the climate crisis, and really building a strong middle class. And I think people have to recognize and contrast what the other side has been doing. Meanwhile, they're pushing people out of their party who voted for a bipartisan infrastructure bill. They're pushing people out of their party who want to find middle ground. They're failing

to punish their own colleagues who are threatening members of Congress across the aisle. They have no solution, at least that I everything he can, even with a big piece of legislation that could do a lot for working families on the horizon. So, you know, the approval numbers are what they are. And I think that some of these records that also need to be mentioned along with some of the inflation numbers. It's a weird time. I completely agree. But, you know, I also think, you know, why should we expect the Republicans to do anything? They clearly don't care about governing.

How many years do we have to see that demonstrated to get it? But a lot of the things that you are pointing out here, this issue of the child tax credit, bringing down child care costs, issues related to making sure that people are able to have more affordable prescription drugs, they're all sort of wrapped into the Build Back Better Act with, you know, you still have some people like Manchin who are kind of clogging the system with that in the Senate. You know, what's gonna be the end goal with that? At first we were saying that maybe they would try to get something done by Christmas.

You know, I haven't, I don't, I'm not really confident that that's going to happen. In the meantime, people are paying more at the pump, they're paying more at the grocery store. How can we make sure that the Biden administration delivers for the American people on that end so that they can continue to have increased revenue to be able to manage the increased costs that they are faced with every single day? Yeah, I think the president has to walk and chew gum, and I think he has. You know, there are things that he can do on his own. take the Strategic Petroleum Reserve release for the gas pumps. Small savings, but he's doing a bunch of those types of things and keeping his eyes on the prize with Build Back

Better. I think I read today that Joe Manchin was in the White House talking to President Biden, trying to find common ground. I think that President Biden has laid out what he stands for and put out real, real provisions that will save Americans money. And I just have to believe that Senator Manchin is also trying to find that middle ground and something that can pass. So we're a big tent. This is always hard. But I do think that the president is walking and chewing gum very well, as best he can amidst extremely challenging circumstances. I hear you. I do, though, wonder, and I know this is probably a fiddle that people are tired of hearing me play, but, you know, the issue with messaging. I completely agree with you that there's a lot of good news that this administration could tout.

And it's not just an issue with Joe Biden. Honestly, I think this is an issue with Democrats writ large. You know, it's been a horse that I've been sort of spanking for years. But, you know, when Democrats get into power, focus quite diligently on producing policy that helps people. Don't focus at all on selling that policy to the American people or at minimum taking credit for it. And at the same time, you have the very same people who are obstructionists go home and take credit for stuff that they voted for. What is going on with the Democratic Party with regards to how many times you have to make the same mistake? When will they start focusing on not only getting caught in the minutia of actually the sausage making of public policy, but also understanding that you have to sell your ideas to the American public at the same time? That's the gum chewing that I'm not quite seeing.

You know, I think that we've come a long way since the Recovery Act and the Affordable Care Act, to be honest. I think we've learned some hard lessons there. And I think we're seeing some successes from the rescue plan, but you're right. We need to take credit for where we are. We need to contrast what the alternative is to be clear what happens in 2023, what happens if the Republicans win the House. If Trump wants it,

he very likely could be the speaker. Does that mean that we default on our debt? Can we even keep the government's doors open? And you contrast that to the big pieces of work that we've gotten through already, a bipartisan infrastructure bill that took him four years to, that he talked about for four years, Trump did, and we've gotten it done with Republican support. You know, I think that you're right. There's always room for improvement. And it is challenging. And let's be honest, it's not just Fox News or OAN. After a year of trying to recover from, you know, a Trump right wing billionaire who tried to overturn the government, Time magazine has awarded the person of the year to Elon Musk, a billionaire who dodges taxes, taxes that he, his corporation has relied on in the past and is used to build the infrastructure that his cars run on. So, you know, it is a different environment for progressives, a media environment for progressives to play in.

And, you know, I think we need to do better. We must do better. The consequences in 2023 are pretty dang scary. So, you know, I agree with you. We have to continue to make it plain and simple. And we talk about how this bill is driving costs down and what it means for your pocketbook, what it means for families, what it means for seniors, what it means for a worker who's struggling to pay for college. And, you know, I think that we have to make it plain and make it simple. And that's something that we are getting better at, but

it's not enough quite yet. I agree with you. Yeah, we've got to work some more on that. One other question I need to ask you, though, about inflation, because I think oftentimes we kind of sit on this island almost as Americans, this idea of American exceptionalism. We really don't compare ourselves a great deal with a lot of the world in a realistic standpoint. But, you know, as I think about this, we're dealing with a world economic crisis coming out of COVID. It's not just America that, you know, has had challenges. In fact, from the data that I've seen, when you compare our recovery to other nations across the world, especially other comparable industrial nations, we tend to be doing better than most other nations across the world, especially other comparable industrial nations.

We tend to be doing better than most other nations as it relates to our economic recovery. Where is the messaging on that with the Democratic Party? I think people need to understand the context that, yes, we do have inflation, but we have all these other indicators. The whole world is dealing with coming back after being shut down for a year or two and comparing everybody else. We're leading the pack primarily. Yeah, you hit the nail on the head. Inflationary pressures are rising across the globe.

And the U.S. has recovered to past pre-pandemic levels. We're the best in the world. Our recovery is the best in the world. And when you look at the fact that the unemployment rate is down at 4.2%, beating the Congressional Budget Office's projections by two years, that we are seeing wages increase and jobs out there for the taking. I think it's something that should be looked at more. There are other indicators as well. You look at disposable income. You mentioned that earlier on. My understanding is that Americans have over $380 more disposal income than they did in 2019.

Spending has been up this holiday season. And that's not, again, to downplay the real issues out there. I'm not saying that. But when you take and you look at where things were, because they weren't great before, and we still have a lot of work to do with the structural inequities that our system has always had and that the pandemic put a magnifying glass on. There are a lot of things that we can point to and should continue to point to. So you're right. And that is something that should be focused on. And supply

change as well. That's a global issue too. That's not something that's only impacting the port of Los Angeles or Savannah or Baltimore. This is an issue that China's dealing with and others are, too. Demand for goods and services has skyrocketed compared to where things were for services. Services are actually kind of coming up close to where they were pre-pandemic if they haven't gotten there already. But goods are just soaring. They're off the charts. So, you know, that is something that is happening across the world.

You make a great point that the U.S. has not only done better than other countries in terms of their recovery, they've done it by a lot. They've done a lot better. Absolutely. I think the Democrats need to start to sort of shout that from the rooftops. Well, thanks for joining us so much tonight, and we'd love to have you back on to talk about this continued recovery. I'm just going to claim it, okay?

Absolutely, anytime, and thank you, Dr. Avis. Absolutely. So now's a great time to bring in our amazing panel. Joining us tonight is Dr. Omei Kongo, Binga, professor and lecturer at the School of Informational Service at American University and Reverend Jeff Carr, founder of the Infinity Fellowship. So I am going to start with you, Dr. Omei Kongo. What do you think about the conversation that I just had about this issue of inflation, but the fact that, you know, I'm just going to still toot this horn. You know, it's a real challenge not to downplay that people,

there are people that are struggling to make ends meet in this moment. But to me, the Democrats are still struggling with providing some context to what we're experiencing right now. And I think that has a lot to do with these abysmal approval ratings that Joe Biden is suffering at this moment. Absolutely. I think you bring up a lot of great points. And I think one of the biggest challenges is that the Democrats are busy doing so much infighting right now that they can't be on message. You see the Republicans are in lockstep with everything, voting rights, so many other issues. But between Manchin and Sinema and some of the other Democrats in the Senate that Manchin and Sinema are covering for, who are too cowardly to come up and speak up at the same level they are, there's just too much

infighting. And I think what's happening is that people are putting too much attention on Biden, where they need to be putting attention on these other members of Congress, of the House, as well as the Senate. You got a guy like Manchin, who is a multimillionaire, how many times over, and comes from a state where the average income for the year is $26,000 a year. So people should be knocking down his door. And there are many other senators who represent that type of mindset. I think that Jamie Harrison needs to also be out there with better messaging as well. We don't hear as much from him as we should. And really, if the Democrats can start to do that, then they'll start to see some of these approval ratings start to change a little bit.

I'm not really concerned about the Fox viewers and all these other guys, because regardless of what the Democrats do, the people in that echo chamber are not going to hear it. But going into 2022 and 2024, there are a lot of independent-minded voters out there who are registered independent who need to actually see what the Democrats are doing, in addition to what, as you said earlier, the Republicans have not been doing and not proposing, and go, as Obama said when he was running for office back in the day, don't compare, when everyone's like, oh, he's the second coming and all this, he was like, look, don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative and drive home what's going to happen if these guys get back in office because they are going to continue to tank this country just as they did before Obama got in and just as they did before Biden got in.

Absolutely. And Reverend Carr, what really frustrates me, or to use my phrase from, you know, another show that I used to watch, what really grinds my gears is the issue of, you know, Democrats acting like, well, we got to get this law through first and then we'll focus on messaging as if they can. I'm still waiting for the evidence that they can walk and chew gum at the same time. I've yet to see it. How about you? You know, it's a good thing that you point out, Dr. Avison, as Brother Dr. Omikongo said, it's all about messaging. There's this old saying that if a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it actually make a sound?

You never really know. President Obama was excellent at messaging, almost to a fault. President Obama was so good at messaging. His team was so good at messaging. The party was so aligned with messaging that you would have believed he could have walked on water. He had to tell you, as it was pointed out, no, I'm not the almighty. Why did he have to tell you that he's not the almighty? Because his messaging convinced you that maybe he might possibly be the one. So we should not have to look for another. When I was a little kid, I was in sixth grade, there was this kid who was a foot and a half taller than everybody else in the school.

And as a result, he was a bully. He knew he was a bully. He walked with a bully stature. Everybody treated him like he was the bully and everybody was fearful. I'll never forget, we were riding home on the bus one day and this big bully started messing with my little sister. And I told, I turned around, I said, hey man, stop.

And I'm gonna tell you right now, I was probably terrified, but it's my little sister. And I said, hey man, look, don I'm going to tell you right now, I was probably terrified, but it's my little sister. And I said, hey man, look, don't touch my little sister again. He touched my little sister again. I don't remember what happened next. All I know is when my memory came to it, I was standing on top of him, straddling him, and it took four or five people to pull me off. From the time that happened to when I was a grown man, anytime that kid saw me ever again, he crossed the street and walked on the other side. Why do I tell this story? It's not to brag about some way that I stood up to a bully. It's to illustrate that the Republican Party has become exceptional at being bullies. They act like bullies. They talk

like bullies. They stand strong. And the Democrat Party is that little kid on the bus who can't figure out what button it will take for you to grow some and stand up to these people. Your messaging is not in alignment with the progressive elements of your party. You don't listen to advice when people give it to them. I have a background as a senior advisor and political consultant, even in the state of Tennessee, where we talk about the importance of gaining control of municipalities

and local elections on a Democratic ticket. You give advice to people who are often liberal white progressives who have come into a neighborhood and taken over that old house that they bought for $1,200 on taxes. It restored it, sold it for $750,000, and then immediately put a Black Lives Matter sign in their front yard. You try to tell them this messaging is not working, and they give you most arrogant, racist response. And that is, oh, I know better than you how to do this. And that's why we're continuing to get hit in the mouth.

Something has to change and it has to change soon. And it does start with the messaging. A lot is going on, but if people don't hear about it and they don't hear about it with a full-throated response, it's going to get lost in the wind. Somebody passed the collection plate because Rebecca just broke it all the way down. Hey, Dr. Ape, I'm going to add this. I got this, Brother Overcone, when I will raise a collection, but if we raise a collection tonight, let's do it differently. Let's raise a massive collection and then not just give it to the Democrats without saying, you're going to listen to us this time. Because we keep it. As Dr. Maya Angelou reminded us, when people show you who they are, do yourself a favor and believe them. Absolutely. Believe them and believe them the first time.

The first time. The first time. Now, when I think about, I think so much that you said was so rich and so true. One of the things, though, just the emotion of the story that you told, what it made me think about was the fact that, you know, at the end of the day, people like, they don't like people who appear to be wimps. People get behind people who stand up to bullies. People like people that fight back. And I don't understand why the Democrats don't seem to get that. They continue to be in their

sort of fetal crouch position, you know, singing Kumbaya, hoping that they can create some sort of inspiration from bipartisanship. They don't want you, boo. They don't want to work with you. Just get over that and think about how you can fight back. How can we get to a point where they can grow that spine

and then push through those things that need to get through, like the Build Back Better Act, like the John Lewis Voting Rights Act? You're not going to cause some sort of epiphany in the Republican psyche. OK, they this is a political strategy to stop all forward movement in an attempt to be able to, they believe, take back power. And unless the Democrats sort of wake up, that's exactly what's going to happen come 2022. What do you think about that, Dr. Omikongo? Well, I think you're absolutely right. And one of the ways that we do it is we

look at the example of what the NAACP did last week or in the last two weeks when they put out their civil rights report card. And that's when people started to realize that it wasn't just Manchin and Sinema that were blocking voting rights. And some people got F, some got A, some got incomplete. These some of these senators were on the phone, the senator from Michigan and other places were like, wait a minute, I've been in favor of voting rights., some of these senators were on the phone, the senator from Michigan and other places were like, wait a minute, I've been in favor of voting rights, and some of them started to change their opinions on the filibuster because they were put on blast

by name and on notice. And that is what we have to continue doing because unlike the House, where you can get a lot of fresh, you know, young people with energy of all parts of the political spectrum, you know, the Senate tends to be a lot older. And these guys are very, very comfortable.

Most of them are wealthy and they are detached from the average American, the average person just working hard, as opposed to members, many, many members of the House. And so I think we need to do what the NAACP has been doing, continually put these guys on blast, continually draw attention to people like the students from Arizona who are down at the White House protesting every single day now and on a hunger strike until they get this voting rights bill passed. And once we start to do that and people see that it's not just about Nancy and Sinema and we call these guys out, they are going to respond because we also didn't mention that we didn't get the George Floyd Police Reform Act as well, which goes to the first story that you led with tonight.

And there's a lot of people who are upset at the fact that we didn't get that and say, see, Democrats can't deliver, can't deliver. Start calling them out. Take them to task by name on a daily basis. And we will start to see that shift. But too many of them are too comfortable right now because they are able to hide this with all of the fighting and fighting that's going on right now. And we need to call them out. Sure do. Sounds like a plan to me. So still to come, several, several organizations hit the road to demand the passage of voting and policy legislature legislation. And later, we'll tell you about the affordability tour and how you can lower your blood pressure naturally. Roland Martin Unfiltered will be right back after this break.

You're watching the Black Star Network. ТРЕВОЖНАЯ МУЗЫКА Betty is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now, she's free to become Bear Hug Betty. Settle in kids, you'll be there a while. Ooh, where you going? Hey, I'm Qubit, the maker of the Qubit Shuffle and the Wham Dance. What's going on? This is Tobias Trevelyan. And if you're ready, you are listening to and you are watching Roland Martin, Unfiltered. Today, several organizers with the Poor People's Campaign stopped to hold a rally in West Virginia before taking a motorcade to Washington, D.C. to protest for human rights. During the rally, demonstrators called out Senator Joe Manchin and urged him to do what's needed to be done

in order for President Joe Biden's spending pill to be passed. We are here because we have been here and there and in D.C. Since the winter when we started working on this mansion problem. Joe Manchin is doing something that is totally unacceptable to people in the United States. This is bigger than West Virginia, folks, you know. It is all of the United States. Joe Manchin, as you know, inherited this position from Robert Byrd. Joe Manchin claims to like Robert Byrd. Joe Manchin, as you know, is not like Robert C. Byrd, who you will see all over West Virginia, the names all over the place. So what do I have to say to Joe Manchin? First of all, you're a big liar. Yes. And you lie and you lie and you lie and you lie.

So just stop it. Stop it. Joe Manchin, how about this? Be like Berg. We are here with justice, with moral justice. We are taking to D.C. And we're taking our people with us. And we are standing as one.

And we are not the cause of all these problems. The wealthy has consolidated all of our money. They have consolidated our power. They have consolidated—and now they're raising everything on us. We can't live. We have no choice but to stand up and fight, people. We are not. We are going to get sicker. We are going to get poorer. We have got to stand up and be one. We have got to fight back against this injustice

that is being thrown at us and the lies. We are not buying the lies. We've lived long enough. We've seen these same old propagandas and we're not buying them. Republican candidate for governor in Georgia and former Senator David Perdue is filing a federal lawsuit claiming fraud in the presidential and Senate elections.

He lost to Democratic Senator John Ossoff in January 2021. Perdue, who has the support, of course, of former President Donald Trump, wants all of the absentee ballots recounted. Perdue has a particular interest in Fulton County, where Biden won by 73% over Trump, who only earned 26%. In October, a judge in Georgia dismissed a similar lawsuit that claimed election fraud in Fulton County. The New York City Council passed a new bill that would allow non-citizens to vote in local elections. This bill gives 800,000 green card holders and those with work authorizations the ability to vote. Mayor Bill de Blasio said

that he has mixed feelings about the new legislation but did not veto it. Republican Senator Mark Rubio of Florida tweeted on Friday in response to the new bill, no city which allows non-U.S. citizens to vote should receive U.S. government funds. Next week, I'm going to file a bill to make that the law. Over a dozen other communities nationwide that allow non-citizens to vote, New York City is the largest city to pass such a bill. So, Reverend Carr, thoughts about all of these stories. First, I want to start off with what's going on with Georgia and Purdue

with this lawsuit once again claiming voter fraud, because guess what? He lost and Trump lost. They both lost. They're both losers. And so now he's trying again to go back and claim that those big, bad black people in Fulton County did something nefarious and that's why they lost. You know, what's dangerous about this continuing to blow this horn is that this is the lie that is leading to attacks against our voting rights, not only in Georgia, but all across the country. and I talk about the power of belief. And it's a very dangerous power because people are convinced to believe in something that may not absolutely be true, that may not even align with science

or the numbers or even polls. But just like with spirituality, it's the same with politics, it's the same with the current state of the culture wars that are happening in the world, and especially in America. Belief is what exists in the absence of provable fact. So when you're at a point where you absolutely believe in something or somebody, especially

a mentality that tells you that fraud occurred, you can show people the ballots. You can show people the computers. You can take them and show them the lines of the people standing there, and they will use those three words that are the most dangerous words in America right now. I don't care. When a person reaches a point where they say,

I don't care, I don't care what you say, there was fraud, I don't care what you say, Fulton County is cheating, I don't care what you say, black people are going to destroy us and burn down our homes and rape our women I don't care what you say. Fulton County is cheating. I don't care what you say. Black people are going to destroy us and burn down our homes and rape our women and take our children out. When you can convince a large number of people of a belief like that, then you're going to cause a lot of problems. What's happening in Georgia, what we're seeing there, is not just happening in Georgia. It's happening all across the South. And it's a dangerous trend that's happening because the hoods are coming off, the masks are coming off, and people are beginning to use all of the old coded language, including election integrity. language for voter disenfranchisement. How can we keep people from representing themselves?

How can we hold on to power? That's what's happening with Purdue. It's what's happening as it's shaping up with Stacey Abrams. We're seeing that happen. And the solution is that we have to work through that. And we have to have a full-throated response to say, here are the facts. We're going to continue to move because this becomes a red herring. We get distracted by this language and we get angered by this language and we don't turn it into boots on the ground, going out and voting and taking control of these elections and making sure that we're in a position, whether it's local election commissions or whether it's just showing up to vote where we need to vote to make a difference, to make sure that we're going to determine and manifest our destiny in the right way.

Well, what makes what's happening in Georgia so dangerous is not only the continuation of this lie, it's the fact that it is propped up by an entire ecosystem of propaganda. And this becomes very dangerous. As you mentioned, the power of belief is very powerful. And it can be very dangerous when it's used in very targeted, nefarious ways like this. It's making me think of, for example, Ruby Freeman, who just filed that lawsuit, former election worker in Georgia, who was in essence harassed. Her life was threatened. Just came out recently that Kanye West's publicist went down. Lord, give me just one other reason to have that name work my nerves, okay? But anyhow, you know, went down there to sort of claim that she's coming to save her, clearly in cahoots,

for example, with the Republican campaign, because they were trying to force her to lie and say that she threw the election. You know, it's like there is no bounds to what these people will do to try to win under nefarious means. What can we do under situations like that? There's no sense of morality, zero at all, to fight back in a day like this, Dr. Omi Kongo. to fight back in a day like this, Dr. Omikongo? Well, I believe that in the times where we feel like we can't fight back against these ideologies, I quote Dr. King, who said, we can't regulate morality, but we can legislate behavior.

And what I mean by that is that we need to get these voting rights bills passed, because right now, Perdue is not even the biggest threat right now. I mean, look what's going on at Mark Meadows and what he's put out. This is, as you're saying, as Reverend Carr is saying as well, this is an elaborate national plot to overthrow the government. Mark Meadows had a former congressman, a blueprint on how to overthrow the government, had the National Guard on standby to protect Trump's people. This is what they're actually doing in real time. All the documents are there. Mark Meadows put it out in a book before he decided that he wasn't going to cooperate because Trump got mad at him. But the information is already there. And really, at the end of the day, if we had

the people who Trump is trying to get elected to office in 2022 and all of these guys who are replacing Raffensperger or people in Georgia and all of these guys, election officials, if they are the people, if they were in place in the last election, Trump would have won. And if these guys who are coming in to take over different electoral boards and all of this are in office for 2024, Trump is coming back. Goodbye, democracy. And again, senators are too comfortable acting like all of this, oh, the gentlewoman, the gentleman from this and that. This is nonsense. This is fight time. And the best way to fight right now is with that legislation. There is no doubt in my mind that they are going to do anything possible to

get to power. And a lot of people didn't want to use the term treason because treason says that you need to be in cooperation with a foreign power in order to have that term treason. Well, hey, there's a little place called Russia that is actively supporting all of this, which is why Tucker Carlson is, like, more famous over there than some of the Russian journalists. So all of the signs are in place. All of the activism is in place. And everything that they are doing, we have the ability to stop. But the senators are holding us back. This is why we need to continually put them on blast with moves like what the Poor People's Campaign is doing, what I mentioned what the students are doing from Arizona and other

places, Brother Joe Madison and his hunger strike, all, I see Steph Curry putting out commercials. We all have to have all hands on deck, because if we keep getting comfortable, it's going to be Nazi Germany over again. And I'm not exaggerating. Hitler did not get more than one-third of the vote. People took Hitler as a joke. Hitler, people looked at Hitler and didn't think that he was actually going to do the things that he said he was going to do because they thought he wasn't serious. Then he actually did them. People talk so much about the Holocaust and what Hitler did. We need to focus on how Hitler became Hitler because we're watching it in real time right now. Democracy does not die in darkness. It dies in the light of day. Absolutely. That's exceptional.

Another drop the mic moment. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break.

We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break.

We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break.

We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. We'll be right back for more after this break. Alexa, play our favorite song again.

Okay. Y'all know who Roland Martin is. He got the ass got on, he do the news. It's fancy news. He got the ascot on. He do the news. It's fancy news. Keep it rolling. Right here. Rolling.

Roland Martin. Right now. You are watching Roland Martin. Unfiltered. I mean, could it be any other way? Really. It's Roland Martin. There's a tour that could be heading your way. Sorry, it's not headlined by your favorite artists. It's a tour filled with information about the benefits of the American

Rescue Plan Act. It's called the Affordability Tour. And to share more about this important event is Reverend Pharrell Malone, founder, fresh, who is on the road right now. Hi there, Reverend. Good morning. How are you doing? I am doing great. So tell us all about this tour. It sounds so needed and so wonderful. What a great idea. Well, we did a tour earlier in the year during the summer months called the 3V Tour, Voters Vaccine and Vision. And we talked about the American Rescue Plan. We talked about how communities can actually access the funding of the American Rescue Plan. This particular Fresh Affordability Tour, we're particularly concentrating on the Affordable Care Act, what we know as Obamacare. I am the regional health consultant for eight southern states, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, northern Florida, Georgia,

South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia. And we're with Fresh Communities. Fresh is the facilitating restoration for equitable and sustainable health in communities. And we are working with IMS, which is Integrated Medical Strategies, and CMS, Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, to put boots on the ground so that we can go into each community and let people know the awesome benefits that are available through the Affordable Care Act. Because of the American Rescue Plan, the Affordable Care Act has been shored up. And so, actually, because of that, because of that new law, four out of five customers will be able to get coverage for $10 or less per month. That is phenomenal. People also who went and tried years earlier can go back now because of the shoring up of the Affordable Care Act. Subsidies are higher. Premiums are lower. Some are zero.

I often tell folk my son, who is married and has two children, we wrote him up last June. His premium for a major medical and hearing and dental was $35.98. When we reset him, certified him for January 1, his premium is zero. What we need to do is get it into the hearts and to the lives of our people that they can afford this insurance because they need to go and make sure it happens. Oh, my goodness. That sounds good to me. I mean, that's incredible. We've come a long way since people going into the plan and saying, oh, my God, everything is so expensive, I can't afford anything.

They need to know. No, maybe look again because it looks like we have additional funding and you'll be able to have a pleasant surprise, it looks like. Yes, yes. What we're doing now is we started here in Waycross yesterday. We were in Brunswick, Georgia, and Savannah, Georgia today. We'll be in Charleston, South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina on tomorrow. Then we will be in Macon, Georgia, and Atlanta, Georgia on Wednesday.

Birmingham, Alabama, and Montgomery, Alabama on Thursday. Mobile, Alabama, and Pensacola, Florida on Friday, and on Saturday, Tallahassee, Florida, Tipton, Georgia, and Albany, Georgia. We are ultimately excited about boots on the ground, getting the word out to the people in our community to let them know that they need to apply. Open enrollment is November 1st generally to December 15th. It has been extended to January 15th. So anybody who gets enrolled by December 15th, they will be able to have their coverage start on January 1st. People who are in by January 15th, their coverage starts on February 1st. But we want to make sure they go in and get it in.

While we're on our tour, not only are we sharing information, but we have federal navigators and assisters who are assisting and helping to get people enrolled. If they can't get enrolled on site, they're going to follow up with them to make sure they get enrolled. The numbers are up because we need people to get this insurance to help cut down the health disparity, make sure you can do preventive care and not have to go to the hospital, to the emergency room and into ICU because we waited too long because we didn't have the coverage. I'm so glad that you reiterated when the enrollment deadlines were, because I had heard a lot of messaging around December 15th, December 15th, but I haven't heard a lot of messaging around the fact that it's actually been extended to January 15th. So if you've already gotten it, wonderful. You're good to go come January 1, but you still have time to go in there, do your research, make a good plan for

you because if you need a little bit beyond Wednesday or so of this week, you have that extra time now. No doubt about it. January 15th, we want to get people in as soon as we can because we know there's going to be a rush at the end. So you can now go www.healthcare.gov and get directly into the program now. Or you can use the opportunity to bless and have your church involved in it. They can go to CMS.gov and become a champion for coverage so that they can get the information by which they can do it at their church, at their community club. Whatever we need to do in the community to get it to our people, we need to do it. I love it. And I love so much what you are doing specifically, because there are people that may

be feeling a little intimidated about going online. Maybe they're not used to doing that. Maybe they don't know where to go. Maybe they don't have broadband. You know, people have different, especially in the South. I know I'm from a very rural area. You cannot buy good internet access where I'm from. So the fact that you are actually going to where the people need to hear from people like you directly, I think is amazing. Well, let me let you know what else we have. Not only do we have my bus, which is right behind me, but we have the Fort Valley State University and HBCU. They have a mobile tractor trailer, a mobile technology center that has 20 computers on it. That bus is accompanying us as well.

So when you get there tomorrow or wherever we come to your community, not only will we be able to sign you up, but we'll be able to put you on the strike the trailer and the navigator. Broadband is on the actual vehicle itself. It is an awesome innovation and technology. We're taking it to the heart of our communities to make sure our people get covered. I love it. So tell us once again how people can find out about you and your schedule so they can know when you're coming to their town. Yes, they can go to ourfreshcommunities.com.

Ourfreshcommunities.com. Our schedule is there. And also the information on what they can do to text and we can give information to them. All of that is in place right now. That is wonderful. Congratulations for all that is in place right now. That is wonderful. Congratulations for all that you're doing right now. Thank you for all the work that you're doing in the community,

and we look forward to seeing you out there on the road. Thank you. God bless. Thank you. And we'll be right back with more after this break. Thank you. Alexa, play our favorite song again. Okay. I only have eyes for you. ТРЕВОЧНАЯ МУЗЫКА Maureen is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon, so now she's free to become Maureen the Marrier. Food is her love

language. And she really loves her grandson. Like, really loves. Hello, everyone. I'm Godfrey, and you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. And while he's doing Unfiltered, I'm practicing the wobble. President Joe Biden is nominating Ventress C. Gibson to be the next director of the Mint Department of the Treasury. Gibson is currently the deputy director of the United States Mint and serves as the acting director. If confirmed, she will be the first African-American to lead the U.S. Mint. She's a U.S. Navy veteran with decades of senior leadership

experience in the federal government. I like that. Black woman over the money, okay? Next, the attacks against Vice President Kamala Harris continue, this time from former White Ring speechwriter and Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan. In an excerpt to the journal, Noonan explains why she believed the vice president was struggling to connect with both the public

and the power that be. The column reads in part, she loves the politics of politics too much and not the meaning. When people meet with her, they come away saying that what she cares about is the politics of the issue, not the issue itself. But even as she's obsessed with the game of national politics, she's not so far particularly good at it. Oh, really? Well, how did she get to be vice

president? But anyhow, when she sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, she spectacularly flamed out. Noonan continues by giving B.P. Harris advice on moving for the rest of the term. Now, let me just say before we sort of go in on that, I do want to mention that this isn't the first time that Peggy Noonan has gone out on a limb to criticize Kamala Harris. When she first did it, she was running actually in the presidential race. And what I find very interesting here is that at that time that it happened, she got called out on it and she got called out on it pretty heavily. This is the first time she sort of peeked her head out to say something else. But before we talk about that, let's remember what happened the last time she wrote a hit piece against Kamala Harris. Let's take a look at this white-on-white crime that's about to happen right now. Right-wing Twitter can handle this. I'll give

them a second to get their tweeting fingers ready. Okay, here it goes. When you're a white woman and you're a Republican, there's just certain stuff culturally that you don't know jack bleep about. And you should keep your mouth shut when other people dance. I mean, what is that line in there about dancing to a drumbeat? This to me felt tone deaf. It felt nasty. It felt personal and it felt bitchy. Okay. So I'm going to take a deep breath and I'm going to try to stay calm here about, about Peggy Noonan. I have never been more disappointed in a woman that I thought I admired in my life. She said at the end of that, you didn't read the very last part of that paragraph, Nicole, because she said it's embarrassing.

No, Peggy, I'll tell you what's embarrassing. I didn't read it on purpose. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'll tell her what's embarrassing right now. Listen up, Peggy. Here's what's embarrassing. A president that pays off porn stars, a president that pulls babies out of the arms of their mothers, a president who says he likes to grab women by the you know what-what. A president who uses the White House for campaign events. A president who praises white supremacists. And yes, even a president who can't dance, doesn't know how to show joy or empathy, and tries to do some kind of ridiculous arm thrust to YMCA.

That is what is embarrassing. Kamala Harris is anything but embarrassing. She is uplifting. She is inspirational. She is strong and substantial, and she's going to be one hell of a vice president. White-on-white violence. Wait a minute. There's one more thing. I should have read this last paragraph. We could put that last graphic up because I think this is important to get this also in this context. This is the last thing that we want to point out from Noonan's most recent piece. She says, let them say you look chastened. People would be relieved to see you look chastened.

Let them snidely suggest you had previously hidden your serious side. You did. Let them say, get this, y'all, you've been humbled. Lord have mercy, don't get me started. You should be. So far, you've got a lot to be humble about. You know, it sounds like to me she's trying to say, you're trying to be uppity. Know your place, black woman. You're not supposed to be vice president. You're not supposed to know what you're talking about. You need to be humbled. That's why I wanted that white on white violence clip to play, because I want people to see that this is clear, not just to me as a black woman,

it's clear to any sentient being that is seeing everything that has been happening now from the beginning of Kamala's race, actually. You know, it's a different standard that black women are held to at every level of power in our society? Should we be surprised that she's being held to this different standard and in fact being told to be humbled? I have to agree here with the assessment that not only does that sound bitchy, it also sounds to me like Peggy Noonan

doesn't know jack shit about what she's talking about. That's just my take on the matter. I guess I shouldn't have cursed and then take it, ask the Reverend to take over. But Reverend Carr, what's your assessment of the situation? I'm going to say this because I had to do this. We had a recent COVID on.

We were all one. So she said, I have to, I have to pardon myself. I need y'all to understand. Infinity Fellowship is on the cutting edge of interspirituality and we're reframing what church looks like. And that means that the first foundational principle is that you are your authentic self. And we, as people of African descent who find ourselves in a country where we had to learn a new language, we had to learn a new language. We had to learn a new culture. We had to learn a new religious and spiritual perspective. When you travel around the world,

many languages have so many words for just one concept. We're extremely limited here. So every now and then, you got to drop something into the language to help accentuate what you normally would have had you had access to your original language. So there's no judgment in this space. I'd rather somebody be honest and tell me whatever they're telling me than for somebody to put on and be inauthentic. So absolutely. I love it. I'm with it 100 percent. We're talking about the messages that we receive. I'm giving a Wakanda toast. I'm going to give a Wakanda toast. Why don't why don't my crime we just witnessed. I'm giving a Wakanda toast. I'm going to give a Wakanda toast to that.

Why don't my crime we just witnessed? And I'm giving this. I'm going to give a Wakanda toast to Peggy Noonan. I'm going to give it to you because at least at one point she mastered what we have been talking about, a common theme that has been here this entire show, and that is messaging. A kinder, gentler nation. Absolute, absolute, complete bullshit. Peggy Noonan came up with that, though, for Bush I. A thousand points of light, Bush I.

Wow. Everybody got around that. Absolutely meant nothing in terms of action and proof for what happened in terms of people moving forward in our society at the time. If anything, we were set back. But she came up with that. However, we got to put it in context now. She's also involved in messaging now for the future because Kamala Harris is a threat. So by using language like she's dead, by using language like she's inadequate, by using language like she needs to be humbled. How many of us have heard that? Oh, when we were standing next to a white colleague and they say something really, really strong and really something that's full of content. And people say, oh, my God, I just love his bravado. Oh, I love his confidence. Don't you love him?

When he's on an athletic court and he takes over the game and he bucks his chest and he throws the ball down. White guys say, God, I love it. The minute we do it, oh, they're so arrogant. They're so cocky. They need to be humbled. As my mom said and my dad said, we've used it a lot on the show. Son, when you open up your mouth, you put your brains on display.

Peggy Noonan is demonstrating how she thinks and what she believes, and she's speaking to a population of people. We filter old Peggy Noonan into new old Peggy Noonan, and we see that this is also the same woman who predicted with absolute confidence that Mitt Romney was going to win the presidency of the United States based solely on her personal observation of a number of yard signs in the state of Florida when she was driving through.

So always consider the source. When we're talking about someone like Peggy Newt, who at one point was an excellent messenger, we also have to make sure that when we're talking about messaging, this is a powerful threat because she's not necessarily talking to us. She's talking to the base right now. And when she's talking to the base, she fires them up. So whether we're talking about Kamala Harris or we're talking about Joe Manson, we've got to find some rallying cry here. Consider this. And then I'll turn it over to you because I know y'all have some great, I got to hear what y'all have to think is great. We think about something we mentioned here a minute ago about Joe Manson holding

everybody hostage with this $2 trillion Build Back Better Act. I ask a question that, of course, we can think about later on in the conversation, but what would happen if Chuck Schumer or Nancy Pelosi, they were holding up some Republican legislation. What would the MAGA crowd do? I think about Joe Manson getting off that yacht and seeing those people in his personal yacht, and you could see he was visibly shook. If the MAGA folks were on the other side of this issue, Joe Manson would be looking in the steam room and see people with a MAGA hat on. He'd be in church, and they would shut it down in the middle of his prayer. So there's something about this concept of how far do we allow

this poor messaging to go before we call it out and fix it. Absolutely. And you touched on something I think that is so powerful. It's about the messaging and why she's saying it. I think it's important that people understand, Dr. Omikongo, that she's not just talking about Vice President Kamala Harris. And I really want black people to get this. This is not really just about Vice President Harris. This is about the next black woman. This is about saying you don't belong here. This is about the black women you guys like,

because I know a lot of y'all don't like Kamala because you've heard a lot of misinformation and you've chosen to believe it instead of doing your own damn research, okay? So what I would suggest, what I would suggest is we think about this. This is an attack on black women's power. That's what that is.

And when we think about it from this context, it's time for us to stop acting like, well, you know, it's just another attack and it's okay because it's her and I don't like her. I think you need to think about the next black woman. Think about the black women that you do like. Think about the black, young black girls that are witnessing how this black woman is being throttled in public because she has the gall to be excellent at what she's done, has done something no other woman in the history of this nation has been able to do. And the next black girl that's sitting there thinking, well, maybe I don't want to do that because nobody's coming out to defend her on this broad level. There's

all of these attacks. Maybe I should not go there. Maybe that really is a place where I shouldn't be. What are your thoughts, Doc? Well, I completely hear y'all and what you're talking about in terms of the cursing, in terms of you just got to say what you got to say. I think it was the philosopher Dave Chappelle who said, sometimes you have to be profane in order to be profound. So I completely get where y'all are coming from with that. Look, at the end of the day, this is the beginning. This is what they do. Have you noticed how much you haven't heard the term critical race theory in the news since the last election of Virginia and other places? Because they come up with a target and they stick with it. So education,

critical race theory, that was the word to use. Now it's dropped. Now it's Vice President Kamala Harris, and she is going to be the target because she is powerful. So all of the stuff that happens normally within a presidential office or a vice presidential office, like a Simone Sanders leaving, that happens all the time after the first year that these particular staff members are in office. That happens all the time. You see situations where people talk about she's not being vocal enough. The vice president is not supposed to be out there getting in front of the president on everything. And imagine if she did. They would say she's the angry black woman. She needs to get in her place. She needs to get behind Biden. So we understand that as it relates to them,

she can't win for losing. We saw Tucker Carlson a couple of weeks ago talking about throwing out some of that birther stuff. Oh, she grew up in Canada. Oh, her win is historic for, he said, her win is historic for reasons we don't fully understand. Really? So this is what they are going to do because they see where she is coming from. They see the power and we need to rally behind her. Look, we can talk about somebody's style and so on and so but in terms of their education in terms of their merits and of course they're throwing out these these all this talk about oh sleeping the way to the top like actresses in hollywood 30 40 50 years ago throwing out that type of nonsense as if she didn't get elected in

california as if she didn't get elected to where she is right now, we have to understand that they are going to have a no-holds-barred approach. If we thought what they did with Obama was disrespectful and ignorant, now you got a Black woman who is a potential president. It is going to come out in ways we have never seen before. One of my other issues that I have with Noonan's piece is that all of this talk about death is a serious problem for me. You know, you can talk about somebody's campaign in style without throwing in, you know, being dead and all of that, because people are trying to forecast things that we are not going to allow to happen. So Vice President Harris, and I don't think Noonan heard Vice President Harris this weekend talking about that she's going to be coming after folks on this voting rights legislation because she got put in charge of that as well.

So if you think that she's, you know, this or needs to be humbled and so on and so forth, you watch what she's going to be doing in the next few weeks and watch how we got her back because she ain't going nowhere but to the top. I hear that. Absolutely. So take that to the bank, Peggy. And we have more coming to you live with Roland Martin unfiltered right back here on the Black Star Network. See you in a sec. Alexa, play our favorite song again. Okay. I only have eyes for you. 20-year-old Kinesia Exil was reported missing last week. She was last seen on December 9th at around 8 a.m. after experiencing a mental health crisis, wearing a black and white jacket,

burgundy bondant, black black shirt and black sweatpants, and purple flip-flops with rhinestones. Ezell, who also goes by Naj, is 5'4", with brown eyes and black hair. She has a tattoo on her arm that says, Spirited Away Forest Sprites, a number tattoo on her chest, and a dragon tattoo on her upper right arm. Anyone who sees Izel should call the Philadelphia Police Department at 215-686-3280.

The Chicago City Council is expected to approve a $2.9 million settlement to a woman handcuffed while naked by police officers doing a botched 2019 raid of her home. And Jeanette Young was getting ready for bed when police stormed into her home to serve a search warrant, but it was the wrong address. The council's finance committee unanimously agreed the settlement, agreed, recommended the settlement, excuse me, but final improvement on the settlement is set for Wednesday. A Minnesota bank settles with a black man accused of trying to cash a fake paycheck. Joe Morrow, a black grocery store worker, was arrested and handcuffed after attempting to cash his paycheck at a U.S. bank in Minnesota last year.

Morrow was pulled into the bank manager's office where the manager said, Joe Morrow, your check is fake. You people always coming in here with fake checks. Police were called. Morrow was handcuffed and escorted out in front of other customers. Get this. Morrow had identification, pay stubs, and an account with the bank. The bank's CEO has apologized and says the company is adjusting its training programs, so an incident like this never happens again. Training programs? How about firing program?

I mean, somebody should have gotten a trip right to the unemployment line for that one. But anyway, I digress. Convicted murderer, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, could be changing his plea this week to charges that the deprived George Floyd of his civil rights. Chauvin will have a change of plea hearing Wednesday morning in a federal courthouse in St. Paul's, Minnesota. Chauvin, along with three other police officers, pleaded not guilty. Chauvin is currently serving more than 22 years in prison for the May 2020 death of Floyd. Attorneys of the white men who chased and killed Ahmaud Arbery are asking for an expanded jury pool for their upcoming federal hate crime trial. A joint legal filing by prosecutors and defense attorneys asks the federal judge to seek the jury from the 43 counties that make up

the federal court system's southern district of Georgia. Jury selection is scheduled to begin on February 7, 2022, in U.S. District Court. Greg and Travis McMichael and their neighbor, Wilm Rhodey Bryan, were convicted of murder in a state court last month. The three white men have pleaded not guilty in the federal case. They're accused of targeting Arbery because he was black. So, Dr. Omikongo, you know, this issue with these two murderers continue. Now they're asking for an expanded jury pool. Do they actually think they're going to find people in America who haven't heard about this case? Or is the goal just to find enough Southern good old boys that they'll get off anyway? Oh, absolutely. I mean, when you look at this trial from the very beginning,

you had the defense attorney who said, you know know we need more Bubba's on the jury. And so that is exactly what they're going to try to do. I think it's a great reminder to to let people know that we still don't have a federal anti lynching law. And this this could have been a great case study for it right now, which is something we also have to make sure that we're getting passed. But this is what they're going to do because they believe that they're. And look, the fact of the matter is there are people out there. I mean, when, when, when Walter Scott got killed and he was on the trial, I believe that there was a jury member who said, I just can't convict an officer. And of course these guys are not officers or anything,

but there are going to be people who just believe that these guys made mistakes or Ahmaud Arbery was the one who was in the wrong. And so they are reaching at anything possible. And I just hope that just as we saw demonstrated with this verdict, that there are people out there from all walks of life, from the entire spectrum who are going to see that they just slaughtered this man, no matter how much the defense try to paint Ahmaud Arbery as some type of runaway slave who left the plantation or try to paint him as somebody who was aggressive as it relates to them or somebody who actually was wrong to stand his ground when a gun was shoved in his face and that he was the problem. They were still convicted. And I believe at the end of the day, this is going to hopefully be an open and shut case no matter how big the jury is. I believe so. I mean, Reverend, how do you see this? Do you see this as an issue of no matter how they try to wiggle their way out of this,

justice will continue to prevail in this case? Yeah, sure, sure. I think justice is a concept that first and foremost, we always have to make sure that we keep faith and we understand that. True justice is going to be a long arc and we're eventually going to win. We always win. The universe always corrects itself. It's always working for the good. So we can't lose hope in this situation. But just like we can't lose hope, we also can't leave it to chance that it's going to work out well. That's why we're here. Each and every one of us is here in the capacity that we're here, whether we're an upstander, whether we're in the world manifesting

what we're manifesting, we're here to make a difference, to be the difference. So even this show gives us an opportunity to give information to people that they would not get anywhere else. When you're widening the jury poll, you're very much looking for people who will be sympathetic. You're not only seeing that happen in the case of Chauvin, who had to take a guilty plea ahead of time, throw himself on the altar of justice. He's throwing himself on the altar of justice because he's hoping that the judicial system will favor him and not go as hard on him. He doesn't want to take a chance with the jury and see the same outcome. But we're also seeing this in the Minneapolis case, in the case with

Daunte Wright, the shooting of Daunte Wright. It's about jury selection, but it's also about painting the narrative and what it is. What you're going to hear in that case is you're going to hear something that is created to help manipulate the humanity of a jury. It's a concept called slip and capture. You're going to hear that come up. That concept says that the police officer, when under stress, it's a theory, never been proven, but experts are going to be testifying that when an officer is under stress, they actually can slip and revert to their habits, and their habits include pulling a gun. Never mind that in the case of that officer, the taser is on the non-dominant side, the

left side. The gun, the Glock, was on the right side. The taser is half the size of the Glock. Never mind, you slip and capture. This is the narrative that goes to a jury. And if you can find people on that jury casting a wide net who will sympathize with the police officer, and you reinforce that with the true slip and capture, and that is, I slipped up, I killed a black man. So what I'm going to do is slip and capture, weaponize, using my habits, what I know to

weaponize. And that's my tears. And that's my emotion. And that's my sympathy for my fellow officers who will switch out guns with me. So the real slip and capture is how do I capture the hearts and the sympathy of people who are going to let me get off with flat out murder? So these are the issues that are coming up in all of these trials as a continuous thing. Absolutely. And no lives were on the line here, but I just have a question. What the hell is going on in Minnesota? Now, you know, this story here about Joe Morrow, a grocery store worker, going in to cash a check at a bank

that he has an account in. He has his payroll sort of stubbed. He has his ID. He works let's just be honest, he works at a grocery store. That was not a million dollar check, y'all. I think it's safe to say that.

That's $900. Thank you. I mean, it's not like he was asking for all the money they had in the damn bank, you know? And what the heck is going on that the minute he just goes about his normal business, just trying to cash his paycheck that he invested hours into earning, all of a sudden he's pulled in the back with this manager accused of, in essence, being a thief handcuffed, hauled out there to great embarrassment in front of everybody else that's there. And the only thing that the bank CEO can say that they need to adjust their training programs, what the hell is going on in Minnesota? I don't know whether this is Minnesota or Alabama.

Is it one and the same? What do you think, Doc? It's it's it's scary. And as somebody who does diversity, equity and inclusion trainings across the country, this is not the type of stuff that you just going to teach and it's just going to change. As was said in the comments when he was in the bank and one of the audios or something, something to the effect of you all do this all of the time. So in terms of trying to cash these checks. So they've already established that this is common practice for them to view us with suspicion. And so really at the end of the day, I'm so happy for this settlement. We don't know how much it is, but it's when people get hit, as Johnny Cochran said, when people get hit in their pocketbooks, that's when their hearts and

minds will follow. And really at the end of the day, we need to see more of these lawsuits. It's a shame what happened, but I can guarantee that they're going to have something that's going to happen in that company that's going to make sure that this isn't going to happen on a regular basis again. But unfortunately, it's not because they're going to believe that racism is wrong, but because they don't want to pay out these fees. But whatever it takes for us to be able to walk in and walk out with some dignity for accounts that we have at this same bank, I hope he's looking at a different bank, but because they don't want to pay out these fees. But whatever it takes for us to be able to walk in and walk out with some dignity for accounts that we have at this same bank. I hope he's looking at a different bank, maybe a black bank right now.

I don't know. But, you know, there should be some other people who should be closing their accounts there as well. Absolutely. And, you know, when you think about people reverting back to behavior, you know, I think about it as it's not just them reverting back to actual behavior that they've sort of created habits out of just in terms of muscle memory. To me, it's about behavior that's related to perceptions, behavior related to assumptions, behavior related to what your mind thinks and perceives as a threat, a physical threat,

or either some sort of criminal activity that when you see this black man, that the underlying thinks and perceives as a threat, a physical threat, or either some sort of criminal activity, that when you see this black man, be it in a bank or be it in his car, just trying to not get a ticket, all of a sudden, your brain goes to the farthest, most extreme interpretation of the situation that leaves one man dead

and another man being paraded out like a criminal when all he's trying to do is to make money for his family and be able to feed his family in a legal way in which all of us look to do. Right, Rev? Yeah, I think y'all are touching on some really important points. And as a young, I've got five kids and I've got them from 26 down to 10. So I try to stay in touch with the nomenclature, the words that people use in this day and age. If I had to use a millennial word, I would say this situation with the bank is a little bit triggering for me. And it's making me feel

some kind of way. If I were to use that terminology, I think all of us have had that experience. That experience of having to be questioned, right, Dr. Davis? You've had that experience, right? Absolutely. We've been followed around stores. And it's really interesting how it changes, for me at least, at different points in your life.

So when you're younger, they're following you around the store because they think you're trying to steal something, like as if you can't afford to be there. And then when you're older, they follow you around the store because they assume you work there. No, I don't work here, ma'am. you can't afford to be there. And then when you're older, they follow you around the store because they assume you work there. No, I don't work here, ma'am. I can't tell you where you can find it because I don't work here.

You know, either way, it's the assumption that you can't be there as a regular customer like somewhere else, anyone else. And so this is just probably one of the most extreme and most humiliating ways in which something like this can go down. And it may not be extreme. I think about when we think about what happens in the deep South or South of the Mason-Dixon line, I'm reminded of something, I believe it was Malcolm X said, said anything South of Canada is the Mason-Dixon. So when you're thinking about this, and I'm in Nashville, Tennessee, and I remember I was 19 years old. True story.

I was 19 years old. I'd been through the required black man training of how and when to drive by my father and fathers before him. I was working my way through college at Tennessee State, and I was 19. I was working overnight way through college at Tennessee State, and I was 19. I was working overnight at the Crystal Restaurant down the street from my house on the main strip. And I took a break at 3 o'clock in the morning so that I could go get some gas in this old Cordova that I was driving, my dad's car.

I took a break to go get the gas because I knew that when I got off at 7 o'clock in the morning, I was going to immediately go to my 8 o'clock class. We were poor working-class folks, so we just had to put in the work that we needed to do and do whatever we needed to do to be successful. But long story short, I remember pulling out of the parking lot of the Crystal and seeing a police officer, Berry Hill police officer, right across the street, the gas station. And before I made it past the next light, he had been right behind me, bumper to bumper, following me at 25 miles an hour.

And when I say that, you say that in mixed company and people say, oh my God, that doesn't really happen, does it? And you just kind of say, I'm going to continue the story. But you get to the point where those blue lights come on. And those blue lights don't mean, oh, wow, what's wrong? The blue lights mean, uh-oh, let me go to ten and two.

So, I went to ten and two and pulled over. And all of us are human beings. This epidermal layer, this skin thing, it's a social construct that we made up. So we all naturally have the same responses. And I always tell people there's an inner white man in me that exists. And he speaks out loud sometimes. And I have to suppress him and remind him that the outer man is a black man.

So when I get pulled over and the officer comes up and shines the spotlight on me, the inner white man in me screams, -"What the hell do you want, Chief?" -" But the black man in me, who is filtered, says, -"Can I help you, officer? -"Mm-hmm. What are you doing out here?" Yep, yep. Absolutely. Uh, I'm going to get some gas.

Uh, why are you out so late? The inner white man said, why are you out so late, Barney Fife? But the black man in me says, I'm just going to get some gas. I'm at work and I'm taking a break. He says, where do you work?

He shines a spotlight on me. I have a brown pair of crystal pants on, a shirt with crystal Restaurant on it, a name tag with the Crystal logo, and a visor with Crystal on it. And again, the white guy in me wants to say, two blocks right there at the Crystal, can't you see what I got on?

But the brother in me says, I work at the Crystal. Which one? Without moving my hands from the steering wheel. On the Congo, right? Move your hands from the steering wheel. You're taking a chance. Yes, sir. You take a chance.

I nod. I say, the one behind me there, if I call there, will they verify it? Wow. Wow. So you can just walk into any store and get a full crystal uniform, apparently. Apparently.

I don't know where they sell it. Crystal outfits at 3 o'clock in the morning. So he says, okay, let me have your license. You know this man went back to his car. He not only called my license and saw no problems, but he called the restaurant and the manager and verified that I worked there. He came back to the car, handed me my license,

and he said, be careful. And I drove to the gas station with that feeling of powerlessness, but at the same time, that feeling, that weird feeling of gratitude that somehow I had reached that accomplishment that we reach of dodging the bullet, that I would see my family again.

That I would grow up and get married and have kids. And I would finish college. And I was a step closer to that. And that's a feeling many people don't have. But when you go into that space where you go into a bank, the stereotype is you don't want to work. So you get a job and you get a paycheck. Well, we don't believe that this is your paycheck. We're going to handcuff you. I am celebrating the small victory that the brother got from the undisclosed settlement. I'm also celebrating all of us, men and women, who every single day have to navigate

to a space where we're concerned when those blue lights come on, if we're going to make it and be able to see the next day. Each little victory counts. Absolutely. Totally agree. That's right. So there's a lot more to come on Roland Martin Unfiltered. We have to take a quick break, but we will be back soon. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black to take a quick break, but we will be back soon. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. See you in a sec. Are the stars of the night Alexa, play our favorite song again.

Okay. I only have eyes for you. Субтитры создавал DimaTorzok Nå er vi på Norske Norske. Maureen is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now she's free to become Maureen the Marrier. Food is her love language. And she really loves her grandson. Like, really loves. Hi, I'm Vivian Green. Hey, everybody, this is your man Fred Hammond,

and you're watching Roland Martin, my man, unfiltered. Torneudels left dozens dead over the weekend. Friday night, six people died after part of an Amazon warehouse collapsed in Edwardsville, Illinois. Authorities say everyone is accounted for and the National Weather Service confirmed it was a Category EF3 tornado. The death toll continues to rise in Kentucky after tornadoes ripped through parts of the state over the weekend. Sixty-four people are confirmed dead and 105 people are still missing. Governor Andy Beshear says the death toll will rise as rescue and recovery teams search through the debris the deadly twister left behind.

GOV. ANDY BESHEAR, D- As of this morning, our best count for confirmed deaths, the most accurate count we have as of this morning, are 64 Kentuckians. Eighteen are still unidentified. Of the ones that we know. The age range is five months to 86 years and six are younger than 18. That may be weeks before we have final counts on both deaths and levels of destruction. I know like the folks in Western Kentucky,

I'm not doing so well today, and I'm not sure how many of us are. I was working on getting the confirmed deaths this morning and realized I was writing on the back of notes that one of my kids took from school. And here's what it is. It's notes on inertia. It means that an object that's in motion will stay in motion. So we're going to keep putting one foot in front of the other and push through this. Everybody out there, get the help you need. Take care of yourself, and we'll continue to provide updates to the people of Western Kentucky.

We're not going anywhere. We're going to be with you today. We're going to be with you tomorrow and we're going to be there with you to rebuild. So tragic. 300 National Guard troops are helping to clear roads. President Biden is expected to visit the state on Wednesday. United States COVID deaths have surpassed 800,000, more than any other nation worldwide. In the last 74 days, there have been more than 100,000 deaths. Medical professionals are urging vaccines,

social distancing, and masks as precautions to stop the spread of the virus. Scientists and health officials are battling over a war against COVID and vaccine disinformation and hope citizens will heed scientific-based medical advice. Dr. Omikongo, you know, when I hear about, first of all, this huge tragedy that we just saw with regards to the tornadoes, one of the things that I think about is that in times like this, you know, you really do begin to see humanity among our citizenry when people

begin to feel empathy about that situation. But when you juxtapose that against the fact that you also have this huge contingent of people who have been spreading lies now for years at this point, that has also led to death. And we don't see the same level of humanity with regards to the recklessness of disseminating misinformation and how that can lead to 800,000 deaths, the most in the world. You know, it seems to me that we have a long way to go in this country when it comes to really fomenting a culture where we do look out for our brothers, our neighbors, those that we claim to care about as fellow Americans, because every life is precious.

You're absolutely right. And when I see the response that's happening to this hurricane and, you know, my heart goes out to everybody there and we all need to support in every way that we can. You know, this hurricane didn't ask what your religion was, you know, what your political affiliation was. It took lives.

And really at the end of the day, we're all supposed to come together to support any type of rebuilding that needs to happen. And it makes me think about when COVID first hit, we had the same mentality about COVID as we do about these hurricanes. We're all in this together, take care of each other, until the racial data came out.

And when people found out that black and brown people and people of lower economic status were affected more, it was liberate Michigan. It was, you know, we're going to be all right. Take even Trump declared a national emergency. But then the office that, you know, you saw Jared Kushner looking at, well, maybe we should provide the vaccine to states and regions that support us first. He was having red and blue maps. You know, luckily we have a president with a little more humanity right now who's trying to help everybody. But you're absolutely right. And so when you add in this misinformation, plus the poor leadership we had in the beginning, that led to about almost 500000 deaths before Biden came in. And you see that there's an actual industry built around disinformation and misinformation. And if we could really come together, as we did in the beginning,

to get people to understand that we were all in this together, then people would support the vaccines. They would support the mandates. They would support the mask wearing. They would support all of that. But again, people have this mentality that their freedoms to do what they want to do means a license to kill their neighbors, but through infecting them with COVID.

And we have to have a little bit more common brotherhood and sisterhood and personhood in order to get through this as we're going into now a third year of dealing with this virus and all of its descendants. Absolutely. And when I think of it, it's almost like the quote-unquote pro-life party is really the pro-death party. When you see how they handled this COVID situation, it's not even incompetence. It's not even mishandling.

It is intentional propaganda that is leading to deaths. There is no excuse when you think about the fact, Reverend Carr, that we like to say that this is the greatest nation in the world. We like to say that there's nothing that Americans can't do. We like to lean on this idea of American exceptionalism. Hell yeah, we're exceptional. We're the worst nation in the world when it comes to COVID. More people have died in the United States

related to this pandemic than in any other nation in the world. That wasn't by accident. If you ask me, in many ways, that was intentional. Of course it is. And when we have this myth of American exceptionalism, when we start to move into the space of belief that we're living in the zenith of civilization. We often forget that civilization's root word is civil. Civil speaks to the social order. So we should be in a space where everything is equal, right? And again, Doc, when you're talking about diversity,

equity, and inclusion, we often do the diversity. We also often do the inclusion, but we forget about the equity. And the equity is about resources. It's about the money. It's about the forces. Now, in these situations here, with over 50 million people infected with COVID, some strain or some variant, with over 800,000 deaths. That's larger than some U.S. city's entire population. It's tragic. You couple that with natural disasters. We're doing natural disasters. I probably look gruff because at my house we've been without electricity for two days because we caught the tail end of the tornadoes that hit in Tornado Alley this time,

but last year hit Nashville directly. But to the people who are there in Evansville, Illinois, to the people who are in Kentucky, I think the ticker is up to 74 who have transitioned into life after life, and 109 people who are unaccounted for. We have to now look and see where our humanity is. These moments, these crossroads give us the time to make a check, to have a checkpoint. It was interesting, fascinating, and even heartfelt to hear the governor say a couple of new things. In his latest press conference, he pointed out something that was a glaring difference. We're're talking about the South. He said, this is the fastest time in

history with the national disaster that the president has declared a state of emergency. That simple shift in federal, who's sitting in that chair, makes a world of difference. You don't have to wait. You don't have to vet. You don't have to decide who's blue and who's red. You say people need help. We're in a space now, and I'll close it with this. We, as human beings, right? We are not human beings who are piecing together these spiritual experiences. We are indeed spirits who are navigating the human experience. And we're living in this little body that was made for us to exist in. I call it our earth suit. And each one of us is trying to navigate the best way we can through our earth suit. We're trying to protect our earth suit from COVID. We're trying to protect our earth suit from natural disaster. We're trying

to protect our earth suit from being shot by the police. We're trying to protect this earth suit because it holds something invaluable. Something the governor recognized, and I could feel it in the emotion, was one of the laws of Newtonian physics. And he quoted it on the back of his paper. It's a metaphor for where we should be as a world, as a society. And it's real simple. An object at rest remains at rest unless acted on by an unbalanced force. It's going to stay the same unless we decide with the unbalanced force. An object in motion remains in motion

in the same line and trajectory unless acted upon by an unbalanced force, and it changed. Do we take this moment to say we don't like the static state of civilization in America? Do we take this moment to say we see a trajectory that we do not like, and therefore, because of those two elements, we are going to be the unbalanced force. We are going to put something new in this world right now that is going to make sure that we demonstrate what humanity truly is, and it's a remarkable moment for us to do so in the United States of

America. Absolutely. And coming up next on Roland Martin Unfiltered is another way to protect your earth suit. It's our Fit, Live, Win segment. Today we will find out how to lower our blood pressure naturally. But first, a word from our partner, Amazon. Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network will be right back. Betty is saving big holiday shopping at Amazon. So now, she's free to become Bear Hug Betty. Settle in, kids. You'll be there a while.

Ooh, where you going? Hi, I'm Eldie Barge. Hey, yo, peace world. What's going on? It's the love king of R&B, Raheem Devon, and you're watching Roland Martin, Unfiltered. Ever wonder why doctors recommend a diet low in sodium and remind you not to add extra salt to your meals? I wish they wouldn't, but they do say that, huh? High blood pressure disproportionately affects

African Americans more than any other racial group. According to the CDC, 54% of blacks are affected by high blood pressure compared to 46% of whites and 36% of Hispanics. Having high blood pressure increases the risk of kidney disease, stroke, and heart disease. Here to tell us how we can lower our blood pressure naturally is Dr. Freda Fisher, nephrologist, internist, and author of Under Pressure, A Guide to Controlling High Blood

Pressure. She joins us from Georgia. How you doing there, doc? I am great. How are you doing this evening? I am doing great How are you doing this evening? I am doing great. Now, this is such an important topic because as we just laid out here in the statistics, this issue of high blood pressure, honestly, is deadly and it disproportionately impacts Black people. What can we do to take control of it in a natural way? The first thing we can do is understand our risks. If you have family members who have high blood pressure, if you are a person who is living with obesity, that puts you at risk.

If you lead a sedentary lifestyle, if you're busy and you just don't put exercise as a priority, that puts you at risk for high blood pressure. So there are all kinds of things that put us at risk, but the trick with high blood pressure is that a lot of times we have no symptoms. And so I get patients in my office all the time who say, oh, no, no, you know, I feel fine. I don't have a headache. I exercise. I do well. I think I'm fine. But high blood

pressure is a silent killer. So you can be walking around here looking healthy, feeling good, but the high blood pressure can be damaging your kidneys, damaging your heart, causing strokes, and ending you up in my dialysis unit on dialysis when it really doesn't have to get to that point. Wow. So, you know, I know as a daughter of two parents who were on blood pressure medication for years,

my mom is still on it. She's still with us in her 90s, but my father actually ultimately succumbed to heart disease and the fact that he had a heart attack and later on did pass, largely related to that. You know, what can you tell us about how we can control this? Because I think for me, and probably a lot of people like me, we hate the idea of being on a drug for the rest of our lives.

So what are other options to control high blood pressure without having to rely on sort of pharmaceutical interventions? So here are some options. And one thing I want people to realize that even as we have lifestyle options, you may still, if you have severe high blood pressure, have to go on medications. In other words, if your blood pressure is very high, 200 over 100, 160 over 90, we don't sit and wait for six months to a year for the lifestyle regimens to kick in if that blood pressure is damaging. Sometimes you might have to do integrative therapy

where you do both. But here are some ways that you can get started. One, maintain a healthy weight. You want to consult with your physician, find out what weight is healthy for you, and eat a heart-healthy diet to try to get to that weight, which I know is easier said than done. With a lot of us in the Black community, a weight that is written down, that's kind of a cookie-cutter weight that should be right, it may not be right for you as an individual if you're shaped in a certain way, where you're a muscular person or your bones are dense. And so you really want to find out what weight is healthy for you. And in some cases,

some studies have shown that for every two kilograms you lose, like if you lose about five pounds, you can lower your blood pressure by as much as five to 10 points per two kilogram loss. So getting to that healthy weight is not just about vanity, but it can help with blood pressure. The other thing is exercise. According to the American Heart Association, we should be exercising, doing moderate exercise, about 150 minutes per week. We should be exercising most days. It's not just, it doesn't have to be a vigorous marathon run. It could be, you know, walking up and down the stairs and kind of charging your steps, seeing how many steps you have. If you are a person who cleans intensely and you're vacuuming and it makes you work up a sweat, put on one of these smart devices and find out. Park far from the grocery store and walk, count

those steps. But exercising can help to decrease blood pressure. There's some other things as well. There's a lot of foods. And it's tricky because especially in this day and age where people are paying attention to studies, studies and randomized controlled scientific trials, we don't have a lot of trials on foods that can help to lower the blood pressure because quite frankly, it's hard for pharmaceutical companies to make money if you do a study on celery or a study on garlic. But we do have some anecdotal studies, meaning some small observational studies where physicians have noticed that patients who eat a lot of celery,

in some cases, the celery can act like a natural water pill or a diuretic. That can help lower blood pressure. Certain foods like garlic, garlic has a substance in it that actually helps to soften the arteries. And when the arteries soften,

that helps them to relax or to dilate and that can lower the blood pressure. Again, we don't have the huge studies to support it, but consult with your physician. Try putting more of these foods in your diet. Try having lemon, zest your lemon. And the zesting of the lemon is really good because if you use the garlic, lemon,

other things like that to season your foods, then that makes you less likely to pick up the salt. And decreasing salt in your diet is another huge way to lower your blood pressure naturally. You know, what I love about your advice is it's so doable. I mean, you're not asking people to go on some wild, you know, crazy diet that they can't maintain. You know, who can't? I love lemon. Who can't infuse a bit more lemons into your life, a bit more garlic?

Because you know, black folks, we love seasoning, okay? A few more garlic in your seasoning, right? A little bit more celery in what you're eating. And when you talk about 150 minutes a week, that only works out to about 20 minutes a day. It's not like you're asking for 90 minutes on a Peloton every day. This is something that people can actually do. Absolutely.

But when we talk about how black folks love to season, we also love to season with salt. And when some of us get real kind of fancy and brand new, like some of my patients, I'll say, hey, do you use salt? They'll be like, no, no, I don't use regular salt. I use sea salt. Or I use pink Himalayan salt. Where you still have to look at the sodium content of foods. And according to the World Health Organization, you should be having less than 2,000 milligrams of sodium a day or less than two grams of sodium a day. And so what you want to

do is look at labels. Let's just take salt. If you take regular table salt, if you look at one quarter of a teaspoon, which is not much, one quarter of a teaspoon is 590 milligrams of sodium. So you multiply that out by four and you see one teaspoon of salt, you've already exceeded the daily recommendation of the 2000 milligrams of sodium. And so, and I want people who are listening to just kind of go into your pantries and pull out things, start looking at sodium. Because if you look at some of that, the sea salt, which you may think is healthier, well, it has a little less sodium. It has 530 milligrams and a quarter of a teaspoon.

Multiply that out. If you have a whole teaspoon, not tablespoon, teaspoon, you've still exceeded that daily recommendation for sodium. And the same goes true when you look at foods. A lot of people will be like, you know what? I'm on a healthy kick. I'm going to go vegan. But, you know, with our lifestyle, a lot of people like to get, you know, frozen vegan foods. Well, if you get vegan sausage, for example, like some vegan sausage links, three links in some companies is 390 milligrams of sodium.

You know, a lot of us, we're not going to stop at three links. We're going to get more links. So my point is, even when you're grabbing things that are healthy, you need to look at the salt. Same thing with some of these lean prepackaged meals. Like if you get a lean meal of spaghetti, and it might have 300 calories. So that's really nice. Low calorie can help you maintain your weight or lose weight. But that same little package may have over 300 milligrams of sodium. And so being a sodium watcher is a big

way because a low salt diet can help to lower your blood pressure. If you have high blood pressure, it can also help to lower your salt, lower your blood pressure if you have normal blood pressure. So for all of us, we should be having low sodium diets, less than 2000 milligrams. According to the American Heart Association, less than 1500 milligrams. You want to consult your physician to find out which one is right for you. I have to say, I feel attacked because I am a card-carrying member of the pink Himalayan salt crew. And now I have been told that, girl, sister girl, you are living a lie. You are fooling yourself with that pink Himalayan salt. Okay. It does have some minerals, some magnesium,

and so it does have some added benefits in that regard, but it still has sodium, and so I don't want people to just grab it, close their eyes, and just shake that Himalayan salt. I'd be shaking like crazy. Okay, I gotta stop that. Reverend Carr,

do you have a question for our amazing guest tonight? And Dr. Freed, I want to say thank you so much. It was exceptional information that you gave. You made me reach down to my desk for my sea salt caramels, and I started looking at the salt content. How much sodium per serving? Oh, my goodness. Per serving, which I won't tell you. I mean, I had-

Don't say it, don't say it. Just whisper it in my ear. It's a full circle of knowledge, 360 grams of sodium, milligrams, 360 milligrams. So here's a good question, because again, we talk about people going out full vegan and going crazy. My trick, I guess I would try to give myself an exception by saying I've been a vegetarian for 20, well, 31 years. Thirty one years I've been a vegetarian. But my space that I had to watch out for was because I'm a vegetarian.

I tell myself I can eat a lot of junk food because I had a sweet tooth. And so I don't always look in on the sodium content. And when I came through the old school stages of veganism, vegetarianism, uh, I had to, you had to actually make your burgers out of black beans and you had to do that rice patties and all the old school stuff. Young cats come up now they got, we got impossible. we got Beyond, we got all of the other products. And I look at it and they are so loaded with salt that I literally, you're hurting yourself if you eat those every day. So let me ask you this,

because I know you've got so much great information. For the average person who's out there who says, you know what, I'm in a culture that says I'd rather eat what I want to eat and take a pill for it, but I really do want to make a change. What are one or two things they can do after they get off the program tonight to say, starting tonight, first thing in the morning, here's two or three things I'm going to start to do? Here's the first thing. the morning, here's two or three things I'm going to start to do. Here's the first thing. Meditation. Meditation. And I used to think that meditation meant just kind of sitting down and being quiet. Hmm, what are we doing?

But when you meditate, you clear your mind. And you do slow, deep breathing so that you get into breathing practices. And here's the thing about breathing. Slow, deep breathing is another way you can lower your blood pressure naturally because when you take in slow deep breaths, that causes the heart rate to lower and it causes the blood vessels to get bigger or to dilate and it lowers the blood pressure. So something that people can do even right now or as soon as they get off of this program, they can silence the room slow

deep breathing that can help to lower the blood pressure significantly and other things as far as the meditation a lot of times and i'm guilty of this too sometimes when i no matter how successful i am in my day no matter how many great things i'm accomplishing i will just look at that things to do list and say oh dog i didn't get my stuff done and I'll beat myself up. And I think a lot of us do that. But if you pause and for the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning, you think, what all did I do that was good yesterday? What is it about myself that I like? What am I doing to contribute to the world? If you just force yourself to go through all positives,

that's a reset, that's a mindset, and that keeps you from stressing out. Because if you stress, if you stress, that can cause high blood pressure. How? Stress causes your stress hormones in your body to rise, your cortisol, your adrenaline. And those stress hormones cause your blood vessels to constrict or tighten,

and that leads to high blood pressure. So imagine if you're not meditating, if you're not being positive, if you're not clearing your mind and you're stressed out several times a day, that can lead to surges of high blood pressure several times a day, which can put you in my dialysis unit

because high blood pressure is the number two cause of patients having kidney failure in this country. And high blood pressure is a leading cause of strokes and heart disease, oftentimes very preventable. Wow, Dr. Omekongo, thoughts about any questions that you might have? Oh, thank you, Dr. Freda, for all of this incredible information.

I feel great because I had my celery today, but I did have those vegan sausages, so I will be checking that. So I'm 50-50 out there. The question I have is about beverages, because some people will say, you know, I'm going on like a juice fast or this fast, but isn't sodium in our beverages also something that people should be taking into consideration as well? Absolutely. And especially when people aren't necessarily making the beverages themselves, where they're grabbing some of these pre-packaged into consideration as well? Absolutely. And especially when people aren't necessarily

making the beverages themselves, where they're grabbing some of these prepackaged beverages, you have to look at the sodium content. I know there was a time when V8s were very popular, that kind of tomato drink full of vegetables. And a lot of people would grab those, maybe even use them as meal substitutions. You got to look at the sodium

because salt is salt, sodium is sodium, and it can still send your pressure up. And juice also can have a lot of sugar as well. So people think that they're being healthy, but if you're someone who's at risk for diabetes or pre-diabetic, you still need to watch the sugar that you take in. So that's a good point. All juice is not necessarily healthy. You need to be creating your own juice from the vegetables or from the fruit that you put in there yourself. Wow, well, this is such important information. Information literally that can add years to your life

and can add vibrancy to the quality of your life. So thanks so much for joining us this evening and sharing. Thank you. Absolutely. Well, that's it for us tonight. I sharing. Thank you. Absolutely. Well, that's it for us tonight. I want to thank my panel, Dr. Omekongo Binga, Professor and Lecturer at the School of International School Service, I'm sorry, at American University,

and Reverend Jeff Carr, the founder of the Infinity Fellowship. Thanks for joining us here on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. We'll see you next time. Holla! I'm sorry. Субтитры создавал DimaTorzok Thanks for watching! This is an iHeart Podcast.