#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Richard Collins' family to get death benefits; #45 threat to cut school $; BLM mural at Trump Tower

Episode Date: July 13, 2020

7.9.20 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Lt. Richard Collins' family to receive military death benefits; Houston cop asks bystanders for their help in subduing a man; Trump threatens to cut school funding if they don't reopen; Lady A sued by Lady Antebellum; Pastor Michael McBride who says the brutality of policing is reaching a breaking point; University of Chicago has removed 2 tributes to Senator Stephen Douglas; Nashville capitol commission votes to remove a bust of the KKK Grand Wizard; BLM mural painted in front of Trump Tower in New York Support #RolandMartinUnfiltered via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered or via PayPal ☛https://www.paypal.me/rmartcinunfiltered #RolandMartinUnfiltered Partner: Ceek Be the first to own the world's first 4D, 360 Audio Headphones and mobile VR Headset. Check it out on www.ceek.com and use the promo code RMVIP2020 - The Roland S. Martin YouTube channel is a news reporting site 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. Today is Thursday, July 9th, 2020. Coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered, breaking news. The family of Lieutenant Richard Collinsins the black man who was killed in a hate crime in maryland they are expected to receive his death benefits he was of course the boule state graduate uh who was headed to the united states army we'll give you those details donald trump uh continues to uh chafe at uh rules for schools opening up but he has a big issue supreme court ruled today he must turn over his taxes

to New York State for a grand jury. You are not above the law. Also, another Supreme Court ruling comes down granting lots of territory. Native Americans in Oklahoma will tell you about that. The singer Lady A will join us. She is embroiled in a lawsuit with the group formerly known as Lady Antebellum. They want to change their name to Lady A.

They're suing her, but she's had the name for 20 years. Yeah. Also, a Houston police officer asked black bystanders for their help in detaining a brother. Wait till y'all see this video. We'll also be joined by Pastor Michael McBride, who says the brutality of policing is reaching a breaking point and our community needs to deal with the issue of gun violence. And also the University of Chicago has removed two tributes to Senator Stephen Douglas, who was a slave supporter in Tennessee. They are removing the bust of a Confederate of a Grand, leader of the KKK. And in Virginia, a judge has ruled Richmond cannot remove any more Confederate statues and the family of Arthur Ashe are requesting his memorial be removed.

Yeah, we're going to break it all down right here on Rolling Mark Unfiltered. It's time to bring the funk. Let's go. He's got it. Whatever the mess, 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 Robroyal It's Rolling Martin He's rolling with Uncle Roro, yo. Yeah, yeah. It's rolling, Martin. Yeah. Yeah. Rolling with rolling now. Yeah.

He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best, you know. He's rolling, Martin. Yeah. Now. He's rolling Martel now. Martel. Folks, Richard Collins was a young man that was graduated from Bowie. He actually was set to graduate from Bowie State. He was at a bus stop.

He was waiting to catch a bus when a white man came up to him, accosted him, and then he killed him. This took place in 2017. Richard Collins was on his way to being commissioned into the army. But because he was not actually in the army, his family was not able to, he was not able to receive a military burial as well as the family to receive his death benefits. Well, lots of pressure. They won this show. They began to really petition members of Congress. And so what they have done, they've included provision in the National Defense Authorization Act that will allow families like the Collins family to actually receive military death benefits. Again, he was just days away from graduating and going into the Army. The Collins family, again, believed that they should have received the recognition and those benefits if he had been on active duty, but they

went through all sorts of stuff. Now, the National Defense Authorization Act will ensure that an ROTC graduate who dies between commissioning and their first assignment is treated as having served in the military for the purpose of death benefits. Joining me right now is our panel, of course, Dr. Greg Carr, chair, Department of Afro-American Studies, Howard University, Recy Colbert, Black Women's Views, and Erica Savage-Wilson, host, Savage Politics Podcast. Erica, I want to start with you. You served in the military. I mean, this was an important deal here. This was I mean, this family was hurt.

This family was really torn apart by the fact that he could not receive a military funeral and did not get those benefits. And they were really, really petitioned members of Congress to actually make a change to the law to ensure that this doesn't affect another family member? Yes, absolutely. And just want to extend my condolences to the Collins family and glad that they did several years, two years later, get some measure of justice. I was actually also when I was in the Air Force, I was actually a part of the honor guard, which is a wing of, is a specific duty where we actually participate in the funeral rites of family members. And I cannot tell you the countless family members that I have folded flags and got on one knee and given the flag to that family member, the extraordinary pain, no matter what the age of that veteran or person who was maybe even serving active

duty is. And so to have to then fight the military, which I've talked about time and again, which is very much so shrouded around the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the UCMJ, and then understanding the federal courts and looking at the circuit courts. There's a wing of that that does deal with the appeals of military veterans claims and then also of armed services. And so to know that not only this family had to go through the ordeal of having to bury their son who was in ROTC, which they do have to comport themselves as a military member for those four years. So it is they are actually active duty members, though they go through the actual commission service on the day that they graduate.

So to know that this family had to not only grieve the death of their son, but then after that circuit court judge kicked down the case that was presented before the state's attorney, Aisha Brayboy, and that then they had to go through that arduous fight to be able to get those benefits, what they should have gotten immediately after their son passed away, so that they could go through the grieving process without all of these extra judicial additives just really speaks to why we actually just really need to pay attention to the courts as well. But I'm really glad for this family that though it took a while and now they have this extended fight that they're going to be involved in, I'm really glad that this

family did in fact get justice for their late son. Greta, this is one of the things that people don't necessarily think about. And again, it's one of those loopholes this family had to endure with their son being killed by this white man as he waited for a bus. Oh, absolutely. And we know. And again, I echo what Erica said, continued sympathy for the Collins family. We know that no amount of money could bring a loved one back. You know, we talk about justice for these victims of state violence or private violence. We know that saying justice for them is kind of like that. We have to have a better phrase than that because you can't restore someone to life. That hasn't been said, whether it be Congress uh you know congressman brown introducing that resolution saying that it

was a hate crime as erica said regardless of what the judge says and said in maryland uh whether it be the students at the university of maryland and buoy criticizing the the head of the university of maryland for missing some of the uh rituals of remembrance for collins or whether finally it be now these benefits that can be now used, if possibly to even contribute to the Collins Foundation, you know, the work of the family and supporters to put together resources to support HBCU students who are in ROTC. We know that this is a small measure of cold justice, but often it is the insult that is added to the injury that just exacerbates the fact that at its core, this country has to face the fact that our people are still at risk, even when you wear the uniform.

Now, Reese, so far, again, the Collins family, they have not receded. It was passed last year. But what's happening and actually what what's gonna happen is this is the story that was here in the Capital Gazette Congress is said that after passing legislation last year following a bully States students murdered to ensure go to my iPad please to ensure ROTC graduates who died between commissioning and the first assignment received military death benefits this year lawmakers expect to have it apply to the case that brought the matter to attention. Congressmen and senators who secured the provision in the National Defense Authorization Act expect that it will pass when the session returns later this month. And so, again, this

was all driven by the Collins family. And for the people out there who say, well, you know what, I don't know what these politicians do or these Congressional Black Caucus members do. This is an example of something that actually happened because this family reached out to members of the CBC. They reached out to veterans organizations like IAVA, who also use their power to push members of Congress to make this possible. Roland, you took the words right out of my mouth. I definitely have to salute Congressman Anthony Brown, who really spearhead this through in the Congress. And you're exactly right. This is why representation matters, because you then have somebody like Congressman Brown, who will champion this issue. Such a tragic issue. I echo what Dr. Carr and what Erica said

in extending my condolences to the Collins family. And I especially echo what Dr. Carr said in terms of adding the insult to injury. The fact that they're not going to get justice in the very loose sense of the word in terms of it being acknowledged as a hate crime by the judicial system, even though the man was convicted of murder, it's even more insulting that he was just days away from getting those to being a commissioned officer when he was just brutally and tragically murdered. And so this starts to somewhat right the wrong. You cannot obviously bring Collins back.

You can't bring that much consolation to the Collins family. But should this unfortunate, tragic event ever happen again, that the next family won't have to be subjected to this kind of trauma over and over again. And again, it passed last year, but they applied to future families, which is why they had to go back and actually get it applied to the Richard Collins case. And so, again, that's that's exactly why that has been done. All right, folks, let's go to our next story. And that is we are seeing all these different things happen all across the country when it comes to Confederate statues. We even saw the Columbus statue ripped apart and thrown into the harbor in Baltimore. The mayor there is saying that they're going to bring people to justice who actually did that. Now what's happening in Tennessee? This is what

happened today when the legislature there moved to remove the bust of a former Grand Wizard of the KKK. KK. . Thank you. You say that. Justice. No. You say that. You say that. Freedom. No.

Freedom. No. To a museum at the University of Chicago. They have removed two tributes that honor Senator Stephen Douglas, a U.S. senator from Illinois. The items were relocated to the university's special collections research center. Douglas owned slaves on a Mississippi plantation under his wife's name and was an ardent supporter, again, of slavery and felt that really it should be left up to the states. Now, I'm going to pull up a tweet here. Justin Mattingly tweeted this out. Actually, it was a story from Mark Robinson that a judge has removed a judge has removed has stopped the officials in Richmond, Virginia, from from moving or removing any more Confederate statues. But also that's what was caught up in this here. The family author, Ash, has requested that his that his

memorial be removed. It has been defaced on any number of occasions. So they have gone to clean this up. You know, Greg, we're seeing this again, all of this in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd. And what you're seeing is you're seeing the targeting of white supremacist symbols. You're seeing people and that was mostly white crowd that was there in Tennessee. You're seeing people. We saw what happened in Mississippi where the Confederate emblem is coming off the flag and they voted this is not that big of a deal. Just unpack that for our audience, why it matters, the kind of attack that we're seeing on these white supremacist symbols. Wow, Roland, this joined the Ohio Valley Conference, in part because a federal judge had said that black colleges needed to lose their racial identifiability.

That's how Tennessee State became the first HBCU to join a majority white, a white athletic conference. So we had to play these white schools that we would normally never play. One of them was Middle Tennessee State University. Their mascot at the time was something called the Blue Raiders. I was student body president, and we used to go to the games when we'd play MTSU and hold up signs asking them, what the hell is a Blue Raider? And we would berate the black players at MTSU saying, do you know what a Blue Raider is? The Blue Raiders were an outfit that were commanded by Nathaniel Bedford Forrest, a former Confederate general

who in 1866 in Pulaski, Tennessee, founded the Ku Klux Klan. The MTSU shortly thereafter changed the name of their mascot from the Blue Raiders because it was a Confederate symbol. Why do these things matter? Please understand, the South never stopped fighting the Civil War, and they have allies. Shout out, by the way, to the Tennessee Comptroller, Justin Wilson, who put in to the commission's decision today that once you remove Nathaniel Bedford Forrest, you also got to take the bust of the two union generals out and put them in the museum because Mr. Wilson, the Tennessee Comptroller, Republican, is a Confederate. He is still fighting the Civil War. Shout out to Covado,

who stopped Ralph Northam from taking out General Lee and who said that this is a revolution. It's bigger than George Floyd, and it's the people who are the problem, not the statues. Shout out to Judge Covado in Richmond, Virginia, who is also a Confederate still fighting the Civil War. These symbols matter because they are representative of an element in this country who will never abandon white nationalism. Finally, they changed the flags in the South? Not really. The flag on my home state, Tennessee, is a red flag with three white stars in the middle of a blue field. They moved the red, white, and blue around to allow them to continue. The stars in another battle flag was the foundation of the Alabama state flag, which is right, which is white with the red stars and bars still on it. Understand they never stopped fighting the civil war and they never will take all the damn symbols. And, uh, Reese, the thing

here, again, what you're seeing and what black folks are saying is that if you're African-American, you're being forced to live under these symbols. You're having to go to schools named after Robert E. Lee. You're having to drive on highways in Virginia named after Jefferson Davis, the greatest traitor in American history. And these things are baked into the history. And so when you have folks like Donald Trump, we have all of these Republicans say, well, how dare you get rid of these things? This is our history. No, this is the history that the daughters of the Confederacy, all those sons

of the Confederacy, they wanted to do that to intimidate black people. The problem now is the shoes on the other foot. The power is shifting. Young whites are joining along with African Americans and others. And these white folks are left to say, what's happening to our country? Easy. We are now, we're dealing with history, not his or her story. Absolutely. I mean, these symbols are white supremacist propaganda. And that's what it is, is to indoctrinate us into a complacency with the white nationalism that has basically run amok in this country for centuries. And it's not lost on me that today that Black Lives Matter is being painted in front of Trump Tower by the exonerated five, some of them who participated in that

painting. We are starting to see a shift, and it may be a symbolic shift, but it is significant because it is shaking people up a little bit and making them take recognition of just how indoctrinated our society has been with these symbols. And it's funny for the way that people are reacting so strongly against these Confederate symbols coming down. These same white nationalists are reacting very strongly to the Black Lives Matter symbols coming, you know, being put up there. So if symbolism is okay, if it's harmless, then why is it that you have such a strong reaction to a defacing Black Lives Matter murals? And as you said, Roland, Arthur Ashe's bus being defaced. We're seeing

these types of the hypocrisy of these people, but guess what? They're on notice. And I was encouraged to see that there was a lot of white students there who were right along with it, cheering it because they have to wake up. A lot of people have been saying, oh, this new generation is going to make a difference. I haven't seen it yet. But with this George Floyd murder and the movement that has sprung up around it, I'm starting to see maybe we're getting a shift in this younger generation that people have been saying is going to happen. Erica. Right. And even in the case of Baltimore, where you have officials saying that we're going to bring those folks that actually took down Christopher Columbus, took down that statue. I was watching and I don't know exactly, recall the name of the city official, but he waxed poetically about his Italian-American

heritage and that Christopher Columbus did mean something more than just being a genocidal raping thief, which was interesting to me because not saying that Governor Andrew Cuomo said the same thing, but it definitely has strong sentiments around Christopher Columbus. But I'm really glad to see that in this new day that people are understanding and seeing just merely by the responses of folks, not just people that are in the South, white people in the South, but just white people, period, wanting to hang on to something that really does in and on its face because of the times in which they were erected were meant to, as you said, Roland, cause stress and pain and harm and intimidation to the black community. So for me, it's very interesting, not really in seeing them brought down, because I love it.

And as Dr. Carr said, take them all, take them all down, down. But what I'm also very much so observant of is the folks that are reacting so strongly to these white symbols, these symbols of oppression being brought down where they should be on the ground. Well, absolutely. And so again, I got no issue with them coming down. I say take them all down. I don't care what anybody has to say. It to me is stupid. It makes no sense whatsoever. Something I'm also, though, enjoying is what happened today in New York City, where there they painted Black Lives Matter in front of Trump Tower. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, Reverend Alice Sharpton and others were in front of

Trump Tower painting Black Lives Matter on the street. Watch this. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. No justice.

No peace. No justice. No peace. No justice. No peace. No justice. No peace. No justice.

No peace. No justice. No peace. No peace. Well, and that's one of the reasons why Donald Trump today went off on New York. People are fleeing New York. No, you're the only one who packed up the mood of Florida. And so talk about being in your face, Erica, that is being painted right in front of Trump Tower.

Isn't that lovely? The son of a Klansman has Black Lives Matter painted in front of Trump Tower. I absolutely love it. This is a person who is an abuser of emoluments. This is a person who has a regime that he has installed that is a danger to not only black and brown folks, but really to what is left of American democracy. And to see that this happened today, I know I'm just thinking about Mayor de Blasio. I know that he has an election that with some other folks that are thinking about getting in the race. And so I think that he kind of felt that it would be best for him

to do that. But for the exonerated five, as my girl Risi talked about, to see them out and being able to get a measure of justice because they never got an apology and never will get the time that they lost back from their lives having been accused of something that they did not do. So for me to see this painted in front of a thief, of a bankrupt or of a liar is beautiful. Risi. Yeah, I think it's certainly poetic justice, but it's also very disturbing how much this unnerves the white nationalists-in-chief. This should be something that any decent president

for all people would be celebrating as well. But of course, as Erica pointed out, he is the son of a Klansman. But poetic justice is something that I will take as it comes to Donald Trump. More poetic justice will be voting his ass out in November. But I do have to pull Mayor Bill de Blasio's card a little bit because his police department has been very abusive and very destructive to people protesting through the Black Lives Matter movement. And so he certainly does not get a pass with this. This is one of those things where symbolism doesn't necessarily trump what's actually

happening on the ground. But as it relates strictly to Donald Trump, I say good on you, de Blasio. Greg, of course, it does sort of drive these guys crazy. And all those folks there, they're going to have to look at that every single day. Donald Trump has not returned to Trump Tower in a very long time. Oh, but I just can't wait till he returned one day. And he's got to actually look at that huge symbol.

Well, friends and family, well, we all know that Donald Trump might not be able to come back to Trump Tower because he might have defaulted on the loan. His niece is taking care of all of this, of all the books. Mary Trump, she's stalking him like Omar and the Wire, brother. So I'm just saying, you know, when you see he's clearly not well mentally and this will drive him crazier than anything. So, yes, there's that.

You know, it's still it it's a little bittersweet. And I'm thinking about, you know, what Erica said. You know, the New York City police budget is over $6 billion. City Council didn't push back because they wanted to slice a billion of it and maybe move $350 million or so to other services in the city.

But ultimately, when I hear that sister saying no justice, no peace, it takes me back to the days of, what would you say, Big Al rather than Skinny Al, like Big Luther and Skinny Luther. During the Big Al days, you talk about Yusef Hawkins, you talk about Eleanor Bumpers and you talk about all these deaths and murders that took place. We understand that this movement is a street movement and that ultimately symbols are important, as we've been saying. And yes, Donald Trump is going to be driven crazy. But at the end of the day, these resources got to be allocated. So all respect to the warriors in New York, the street folk, the organizing folks who have pushed us to this moment. And we can now, as Reese said, we got to now keep pressing.

It isn't enough now to say you've gotten something because you got a piece, something painted in the street in front of Trump Tower. Now we've got to reallocate some resources. All right, folks, this Jasmine King just posted. This is breaking news out of Los Angeles. She tweets death of Robert Fuller, who was found hanging from tree, ruled a suicide by sheriff's department after sheriff says family confirmed mental health issues and red rope used in hanging was traced to a purchase on Fuller's EBT card. The thing here, Recy, is that the Sheriff's Department immediately went to the issue of suicide, but they had not really fully investigated.

That's what angered a lot of black activists in Los Angeles saying, no, take the time to truly investigate to ensure that this was indeed a suicide and was not a lynching. Yeah, and I think that that was the exact point that I made is there needs to be a thorough investigation to just simply discard this, discard what is a very alarming situation. A hanging as a suicide without any evidence is absolutely ridiculous. And so my condolences go out to the Fuller family. I'm glad that they were able to press to get an actual investigation and get to the bottom of it. I hope that people will accept that that's what happened and allow the family to move on and grieve. We have to address mental health in our community, but we also have to continue to hold the police officers accountable and ensure that when something happens that looks and smells like foul play, that it gets the appropriate attention and resources in investigating it from the

authorities. The reason this was an issue, Erica, because this is the LA Times story I'm reading from. Go to my iPad, please. The findings uphill a preliminary determination of suicide by, give me one second. They sure got a lot of pop-up ads on here. The findings upheld a preliminary determination of suicide that Fuller's family and many residents of the Antelope Valley had called into question. Citing the region's history of racism toward black people and the backdrop of unrest prompted by George Floyd's death, they voiced a suspicion that Fuller had been lynched and demanded a more thorough investigation monitored by outside agencies. Yeah, I'm so glad that you read that, Roland, because that is just a little bit of the different layers that black families have to go through in the pursuit of getting answers, in the pursuit of having our voices heard. And so that now the Fuller family has confirmation of what actually became of their son.

This month is actually Minority Health, Mental Health Month. And so statistics have shown over the past few years that death by suicide has gone up amongst black children. And so with this being what is actually the case, that we have lost another young black life to suicide, hoping that this will actually shine some light and for there to be more conversation, particularly from those black mental health professionals that have an expertise in this area, to really talk about this being something that is very much so prevalent,

particularly given you mentioned the uprisings that were noted in that piece and all of the other systemic issues that our communities face in the midst of a global pandemic that is impacting our community at great lengths. And so I pray that the Fuller family can, as Recy said, move on in their process of grieving. But then we can actually have more well-rounded conversations about suicide and this impact that we're seeing on children as young as eight, seven, six, and on up to this young man's age. And Greg, we've had other cases where there were rules, suicide.

And again, this is one of those things that, look, we totally understand when African-Americans make this point in terms of what happens outside. But we had the story of a writer on one of the NBC shows who committed suicide by hanging just a couple of weeks ago. But that took place inside of her home. So black people are naturally suspicious when the moment cops say, oh, that's a suicide, people here will say, no, no.

Take the time to investigate, and if that's determined, that's fine. But you have to do a real investigation and a full investigation. Absolutely, brother. I remember maybe 20 years ago, I was in Detroit for the African World Festival they have every summer, and there was a brother who was coming toward

us in the crowd, and he was saying, what's wrong with y'all? Y'all lost y'all damn mind. Don't y'all understand fair, kind is right. Y'all went around here acting like everything's alright. And then as he passed by, people were just giving him a wide berth. I was with an elder, Anderson Thompson from Chicago, I'll never forget. Dr. Thompson looked at me as the brother passed

and he said, you know what's funny, brother? He's the only sane one out here. The point is this. If you're black in America, this place should be driving you crazy if you can feel anything. So let's be clear. Diamond Alexander hasn't given a comment yet, Brother Fuller's sister. She said, my brother wasn't suicidal. I know what y'all are saying.

And so there are two things at play here. We have to support our people when it comes to them having difficult challenges, because as black people in America, we all have mental challenges. And some of our people are more challenged than others. We've got to put our arms around that family, around these brothers and sisters before they harm themselves. The second thing is Malcolm Harsh was found a week and a half before that, about 50 miles from there. And he was hung. So never trust the state. Never trust the police. The FBI and the Department of Justice said they were going to look into both cases. That's all right. You've ruled it a suicide now. We've got to surround

that family. And at the same time, I never believe anything that the state says when it comes to black death in this country. That's the only sane position to take. Absolutely. All right, folks, got to go to a break. We come back more on Roller Mark Unfiltered, including my interview with the blues singer Lady A. She's being sued by the group formerly known as Lady Antebellum over a name that she's had for 20 years. That's next. Roland Martin on the field team. Like, share, subscribe to our YouTube channel. That's youtube.com forward slash Roland S. Martin.

And don't forget to turn on your notifications so when we go live, you'll know it. All right, folks, watch this video here that was very interesting. It took place in Houston where the police were trying to handcuff a brother. Y'all ain't gonna believe this actually happened. Watch this.

Don't get on his neck now. Just stay. All right. We got you. All right. All right. Now we got you need some help. Yeah. He's not. He's lying. He's lying.

He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying.

He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying.

He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's lying. He's't want to give us his arm, man. Give me your arm, bro. Say, give me your arm, bro. Give me your arm, man. Make it easy for yourself, man. Just give me your arm.

Look, man, record this. I'm going to get his arm so they won't hurt him. Record this. I'm going to get his arm. I'm going to get his arm. Do we got a knife on? Do we got a knife on? No, we don't.

We haven't found him. Come on, give me your arm, bro. I just don't want you to get hurt. I just don't want you to get hurt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just don't want you to get hurt. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Come on, I don't want you to get hurt, man. I don't want you to get hurt. Okay, come to me. I just don't want to get hurt.

Thanks, guys. All right, you got it? Roll him over, roll him over. Come on. Okay, he's on top. Hey, come here, sit up, man. Sit up, sit up Roll him over. Roll him over. Roll him over. Come on. Hey, come here. Sit up, man. Sit up. Sit up.

There you go. My t-shirt broke off. It's all right. You're fine. We're good. 37-8. Here you go. Greg, I can't recall ever seeing that take place.

And you had these, again, these brothers, the cops like, y'all want to help? And then they step in. That, to me, was a great example of police being cognizant of what was happening. What they also recognize that brother was jostling back and forth. They did not want to have to go to another level. And so calming him down de-escalated that situation. Well, it's so complicated,

Roland. I mean, let's think about that. You saw the blood in the brother's hand, the palm of his hand. Right. What if he had some type of communicable disease? Very true. Very true. Does he?

I'm saying, you know what it reminds me of? I don't know anybody else old enough to remember this. The old Andy Griffin show when Otis the town drunk used to get drunk and then walk into the sheriff's station and put himself to sleep it off. And then he had a, he had a set of keys to the jail. In other words, that's community policing,

that's protection. I'm looking at that like, here are black men and black women probably there as well, any of whom could be a victim of state violence at any moment. Now they're participating with the police, and the police have invited them to help in part because I think that second reason you say is true.

They know they're being filmed. I'm not going to attribute great motives or not motives, and I'm glad your brother was not harmed. But at the same time, what does it signal so that we see now we have to intervene to stop law enforcement from committing harm up to and including helping law enforcement arrest one of our people who might have some mental problems? And so I'm glad they calmed him down. But at the same time, how do we restructure this thing so that we don't get used to the idea

that we should be helping the police with their knee in the back of a black man? I just, I mean, so many things going through my mind right now. Well, and I think, Reese, again, as I saw it, as I looked at that particular video, and the officer was saying, no, my knee is not on his neck. It's on his back. And then again, the brother, he's sitting here and he's, you know, and he's moving. And then you see the brother lay on the ground like, bro, we need you to calm down. They're going to handcuff you. We're here. We're taping. We need you to calm down. And so I what I what I do appreciate about the video is that you saw cops who were cognizant of the situation, who see there's a crowd, they're yelling, they're shooting. And it was one of those things where it

was like, OK, you know, we know what we normally do when somebody does not pay attention. We know because they already fired the taser. Now, the next thing was to pull that club out, you know, and beat home run and the

submission to stop moving. So they yell, y'all want to help? And then they come over. And so I think the saving grace, we did not have something that escalated. Yeah, but I kind of tend to side with Dr. Carl on this because why is that even something that should even be conceivable? I mean, as we saw what that tape demonstrated to me is there's absolutely no reason to use the kind of force that we see from the police officers on black people. That already tased the man. The man looked he was squirming, but he wasn't violently resisting in any kind of way. And yet you had to, as Dr. Carr pointed out, have these two black men.

Well, I think the reason I got to push back on that, because when I see the video, play the video again. When you see the video, the brother is not trying to comply. And so you see he's down there, and at one point, y'all pull a video,

audio please, audio. Audio. So you're going to hear, go ahead play it. I don't want to get his arm. Give me your arm. Give me your arm, man. Look man, I'm gonna get his arm. I'm gonna get his arm. Do we got a knife on? Give me your arm. I just don't want you to get hurt.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Come on. Grab the door. I don't want you to get hurt, man. I don't want you to get hurt, brother. Come to him. I just don't want to get hurt. Thanks, guys.

Hold on. You got it? Roll him over. Roll him over. So what we saw there was apparently, according to the article, the young man was allegedly on drugs. But what you heard there was you heard the brothers like, bruh, bruh, let your arms go. They have to tell him that three or four times. You saw the. And so I just think to me in that situation, if you have two police officers who are sitting here going communities there, they're shooting this whole. So you know what? Hey, but let's not have this thing escalate. Well, I agree. I think that those situations shouldn't escalate. That should be the standard. That should be police officers are able to apprehend people if it gets to that level without involving other people.

And I think that the brothers who got involved there were absolutely courageous in doing that. And I think they absolutely had that young man's best interest in heart. To me, what stands out to me is him saying they're lying, they're lying. You know, I just to me, I don, I don't find any comfort in that. However, I think that it shows at a minimum it's able to de-escalate the situation. It also shows that maybe we don't have the right people responding to the situation. That's where the community policing goes. That's where the whole defund the police, having people who have mental health abilities, mental health

training, responding to these kind of situations. That to me is what I see from that video. Erica, the thing is, do we know that he was on drugs? No. Do we know there was a mental situation? No. And again, that is the difficult part when you begin to talk about how do you subdue someone? How do you handle a situation that?

And again, what I kept looking at was the body language. Like, for instance, the second cop who was in the back, you can see him lightly tapping the guy on the back saying, like, release your arms, release your arms. I just found the whole video to be fascinating to see the community again, going back to George Floyd, to see the community step in. See, remember, the officers said, y'all want to help?

And at first they were like, hell no. But then somebody else went, yeah. What was one of the criticisms that people heard about George Floyd? Why didn't somebody step in? Why? And so the dynamic I just thought was really interesting there, Erica. Go ahead.

Yeah, it is an interesting dynamic. But I have to tell you, having read the transcript of George Floyd's release today, my heart is just heavy. And I just want to know when is it can just black folks just be human? Because to see this this young brother and I'm just thinking about young black men, I don't know what the background of what happened in order for him to have been tased. But I'm just I'm looking at this young black man and there seems to be some trouble. There seems to be he needs some additional help there. And to me, he looked very helpless. And then to see, you know, particularly looking at the states of Texas, Arizona, that have these high number of COVID cases,

that here black people go racing in to try to save just one of our own. I don't know if those people that came and intervened in that moment were wearing masks. But as Dr. Carr said, we do see the presence of blood and thinking about communicable diseases that can be spread. And so it looks like there were either two or three police law enforcement officers. And so I'm just wondering when it relates to Black life, when do we actually have a moment just to be treated human? When do we have a moment to be treated as though we are struggling with mental health issues?

When do we get that layer of empathy that allows for law enforcement to engage us in a way that is not always fatal or so brutal. And so for that video, for all that, what you share, Roland, it is just it is difficult for me. Well, and I think and look, I think we have to also be honest that it is not an easy job being a police officer. It is not an easy job when you come on a situation and you try to ascertain what's going on. Taser was used. Gun wasn't used. And again, I'm not saying the officers were right. He was wrong. He was right. The officers are wrong. What I am saying is that we have seen many situations like this where tasers were not fired, gun was used, brother ends up dead. We've seen other examples where the cops said, get the hell back, get the hell back. And they fought the people. They're fighting him. They're yanking on him, trying to snatch him up, being extremely physical. What I do appreciate with what I saw was two officers not doing what we normally see.

And I think these are the kind of things that have to happen when you begin to retrain cops. Police officers, look, they're trained to shoot to kill, not to wound. They're trained to use maximum force to detain people, which we always, we know, and all of a sudden that thing gets elevated and somebody ends up dead. And so I think as these, as procedures begin to get changed, as you begin to see these efforts in terms of how do you now handle these situation what resources are brought to bear i think those all of those things have to be factored in in terms of how do you how do you change and i'm not and let me real clear i'm not i'm not comparing what happens on a football field with what police do i'm not comparing that at all but i but i will use the example of how athletes were trained to hit in football. And now they're having to retrain them not to lead with their helmet.

And some guys are like, look, man, that's all I know. That's all I was taught. And hopefully you have a new generation of athlete who is being trained a different way. And it will be received a different way when they're on the field. The same way you have these cops now who are like, well, I don't care. I was trained to bust heads. Those are folks who need to be out. Like in New York, they're trying to slow down a 400 percent increase of cops retiring.

I got no problem with all those cops quitting because what that's going to do, frankly, is open up the force for some people who want to be able to police correctly. And so I just think that this is one of those things where we're going to see more examples like this. But I do appreciate what I saw because it could have gone another way. And I'm glad it didn't. And so that's what I just hope there. Now, folks, as we continue our fight against police brutality, again, cities across the country are experiencing an even bigger problem. That is gun violence in communities and their organizations that are addressing the issue.

Pastor Michael McBride is the director of Urban Strategies with the Live Free campaign. He joins us right now. Pastor McBride, on this issue, and it's very interesting because when you look at, you know, people like Terry Crews is being criticized big time because he's been saying, well, all black lives matter, even when it comes to the gun violence in the communities. We had a brother who was on yesterday with a black with a group of African-Americans who are armed, who said, yeah, we have to also look at what's happening with these shootings in our neighborhood. They're still looking for this man they believe was involved in the killing death of an eight year old girl. They look at the shootings taking place in Chicago. And so how do you reconcile the critics who say Black Lives Matter should also be addressing these issues with gun violence the same way they are with systemic racism? Yeah, well, it's great to be with you, Roland. Thanks for having me on. I mean, I think this conversation is fascinating. It's definitely necessary for us to interrogate

the relevance of what does it mean for all of us to be asking everyone to do the same thing at the same time in order for one thing to be, quote unquote, true or not. The reality is there are people literally every day all across the country waking up to address the issue of gun-related shootings and homicides in urban communities. They're doing it far away from the press. They are doing peace walks. One would call it a protest. They're doing literal engagement with the highest risk of victims and shooters. And so I think most people are saying this because they just don't know the work is happening. Certainly our, I will call them enemies, adversaries are attempting to say this

to distract us from the larger point that there's not been one day in the history of this country that black bodies, indigenous bodies have not been subjected to arbitrary violence at the hands of the state. So we should uncouple at least the argument as relates to does everyone have to do the grunt work to address this issue? Certainly we all should be concerned about it. And I don't know one black person I've met in the dozens of cities I've worked in that are not concerned about the loss of black children, adults and young adults at the hands of gun violence.

I've not met one. But this is the dichotomy of this conversation. And that is, there is this assumption that black people don't want police. No. What they don't want is, they don't want police framing black folks, beating black folks, planting guns and weapons on black folks, planting drugs on black folks. That's what they don't want. And so black people who live in these neighborhoods want to be safe, just like white folks on the north side of Chicago want to be safe, black folks on the west side and south side want to be safe as well.

But it sort of is set up as this either or. Either you accept the brutality or you get what you want in terms of you have community policing. That to me, I think, is the problem of how this thing is set up. Well, you know, I think what's interesting about how it was set up, I think I agree with you. I think that there are false choices, right? I think black people don't want violence. We don't want a lack of safety in our community.

It's not that black people want police or don't want police. We just want safety. And so we have to continue to push ourselves to have the conversation about how do we create safety in suburban communities where they smoke drugs, sell drugs, et cetera. They don't have police officers cracking people's heads over drugs or even over domestic violence or even over conflict. They figure out a way to resolve crime in suburban communities with less police, more tax dollars to address the social ills, and a more kind of peaceful community. In black communities, it seems like-

But we also got to be honest. You typically will not see open-air drug markets in white suburban communities because they're being sold inside. You're seeing something different when you talk about what's happening in black neighborhoods. So how do you, as an activist, communicate to police how patrolling, how policing has to be different? Well, we communicate to them through the strategies we use by saying you can't use collective punishment in order to produce public safety in black and brown communities. All the research tells us is less than half of one percent of a city's population is responsible for up to 60 percent of the gun violence. So our strategies are about how do you actually figure out ways to target that less than half of one

percent. In the city of Oakland, we found out that 94% of all police resources were focused on 6% of the population. So we're finding that you can indeed create safe communities without having these huge police departments. But you can't have schools and park and food and housing if 40, 50 percent of your municipal budget is going towards policing that's trying to only focus on six percent. There are smarter ways to do it. And so police departments have to be willing to give up some of their resources and money and not fight these public safety strategies that de-center policing and put community members at the center of public safety, just like it happens in other communities across the country.

Bring my panel in right here first with a question for you or a statement is Reesey Colbert. Hi, Pastor. What do you say about the city officials who really have these police budgets or who actually do the budgets and putting pressure on them to actually start to reallocate these resources? Because I do think that, as Roland said, and as you actually so brilliantly pointed out, people want safe communities. They want communities without violence. But a lot of times people look at these reinvestments as a long-term fix and to a short-term problem, which is people are experiencing violence in their communities right now. So what do you say to people and how to get their city officials and their mayor and

people who do their budgets to change their view, to be more focused on those much-needed investments in the community? Yeah, great question. I think what we first have to do is educate elected officials. Elected officials, I believe, particularly who are serving in urban cities, metropolitan cities, have to become learners of the best strategies that are non-police centered. And those strategies are out there. They're very well evaluated. The group reduction violence strategy, the hospital-based intervention, establishing offices of neighborhood safety. Get these strategies in your mind so as a policymaker, you don't have to be convinced by community members to do a best practice that is well within your reach. In at least a dozen cities we've worked in, we've reduced gun violence by

30, 40, 50 percent in less than 18 months. It's not a long-term fix. It's that most elected officials are not extremely aware of the great kind of innovations in public safety, and they're too wedded to a very lazy response that is about increasing police officers in neighborhoods, because that's the only tool we have. Michelle Alexander says it like this. We never have money for anything else but police and prisons when black people ask for it. Elected officials have to begin to ask for something different and figure out ways to legislate in that way. Erica. Hi, Reverend McBride. So I was reading where you talked about you had spent some time, I believe, on the Housing Authority Board or something to that something of that nature.

And could you just kind of talk to the audience about gentrification and its implication on cities that have been traditionally traditionally black and urban yeah we we when i was uh kind of just starting some of my advocacy career i was appointed to the housing authority in berkeley berkeley california and even in a city as progressive as berkeley you found that they were quickly trying to freeze out or at least phase out um the kinds of public housing opportunities that were afforded to black folks, brown folks, kind of low wage workers in this city because the property values were skyrocketing. And again, I just continue to believe that, as my good friend Heather McGee says, the economy is not the weather. It doesn't just happen. Like policy decisions drive how we figure out ways to create basic needs for our communities. Certainly, the federal resources around HUD began to dry up, but there were also ways and decisions, I believe, with development and all kinds of other decisions locally that could have been done, establishing housing trusts, figuring out ways to put some certain

fees on development that come into the city that can stabilize the housing market and make sure black people, brown people, other poor working folks are not displaced because wealthy folks don't like to travel in traffic for an hour or hour and a half. I mean, that's an untenable policy framework. So we need champions of all of these issues. There are solutions. People just got to want to be champions for the poor. And I find we don't have a lot of champions for the poor for our elected officials. Last question, Greg Carr. Thank you. I want to add my thanks and respect for the work you're doing and the work you've

been doing for quite some time. You know, in one interview, you said that the brutality of policing and law enforcement is reaching a breaking point in the social consciousness. If this society doesn't make these changes, if it doesn't go along the lines of this structural reimagining that you've been fighting for, that, you know, you've been standing shoulder to shoulder with so many others fighting for. What do you see happening if we don't go down the path that you're advocating for? Well, I think we'll continue to see what we're happening now, the delegitimization of law enforcement, which will lead to the delegitimization of governments. We have to remember that police departments are the first contact for the state.

And so if the state cannot figure out ways to treat its own citizens with respect, with trust, with justice, how then would people have any confidence in the state? We are seeing on our watch the unraveling of our democracy because of this wild, crazy despot that we have in office. But he's just the kind of showman for a circus that has too long run amok in Black community. So I think we're at a crossroad moment. I hope that the kind of 31 flavors of organizing that's happening, multiracial, multi-faith, multi-class industry, is going to save this country from itself. But regardless of that, I do believe the poor and the meek will inherit the earth,

even if the United States continues to unravel. I think the people will persist, and we have to continue to imagine an existence that does not require the oppression, the violence against those who are the most vulnerable among us. So the ball is in the court of the nation. The people, I think, are already speaking, and prayerfully we'll keep speaking until we get the justice that we deserve. All right, Pastor McBride, we certainly appreciate it.

Thank you so very much. Thank you, Doc. Thanks for having me. All right, folks, coming up next, the singer Lady A in a lawsuit with the group formerly known as Lady Antebellum. But how you gonna sue somebody who's had a name for 20 years and you just started using it because you changed your name because of a slave reference? That ain't white folks being allies.

We'll talk with Lady A next on Roller Martin Unfiltered. You want to support Roll Roland Martin Unfiltered daily digital show by going to rolandmartinunfiltered.com our goal is to get 20 000 of our fans contributing 50 bucks each for the whole year you can make this possible All right, folks. Seek is a black-owned company founded by Mary Spiel, a sister from Ghana. She is, of course, the inventor of these two devices here. One of them is a virtual reality headset, which basically allows for you to pop your phone, your Android or your Apple phone right into here and allows you to see the content on the website also their headphones these 360 degree 4d headphones right here which also comes with the wired cable also microphone jack as well you got Bluetooth you can use this for gaming if you want to music videos you name it fantastic sound as well I sister she has sent me a tweet. She said, why didn't I tell her about the bass in these headphones? Because she said that she has a bass head in her house. And so her son

decided to grab her headphones. I said, no, boo, tell your son to go buy his own. If you want to get these products, again, supporting black-owned businesses that support this show, go to seekek.com. Use this promo code, RM. You see it right here, RMVIP2020, RMVIP2020. And so when you buy their products, you also are supporting Roland Martin Unfiltered. So we certainly appreciate that. The folks at Seek.com, Seek.com. All right, folks, a country group called Lady Antebellum dropped their name in the wake of the death of George Floyd. Why? Because their name has ties to slavery. So they changed their name to Lady A. Only problem with that, a sister who's a blues singer out of Seattle, She's been using that name for more than two decades.

The band's lawsuit indicated that they applied for trademarks for the name Lady A for entertainment services and for use on clothing back in 2010. Joining us right now is the actual Lady A. How you doing? I'm blessed. How you doing? So when this whole thing happened, them suing, them changing their name, folks like, oh, my goodness, this is great. These allies, they're woke. Then they go to Lady A. They've already changed their name on Twitter. And you're sitting here going, oh, hello, I'm here.

Now they're suing you. Yeah. Yeah, you know how privilege works. So they didn't reach out to me until the the Rolling Stone interview happened. And I literally, Roland, literally was working. I work from home and literally had gotten off my work computer and the Rolling Stone magazine called me. And so I was shocked because I didn't know. My phone had been blown up, but I was working during the day, so I didn't know. And that's how I found out. So how long have you used the stage name Lady A? I've been using Lady A since 1987. Okay. Since 80s.

My karaoke name, you know, back in the karaoke days. And then I started singing with a Motown review band for many, many years. And that name tattooed on my shoulder. You said you have Lady A tattooed on your shoulder? Tattooed on my shoulder. It's my brand. It's my moniker. So you use the name.

Have you recorded albums? Have you, I mean, all of those different things under the name Lady A. Recorded five CDs. My brand new CD, Lady A Live in New Orleans, is going to drop next Saturday on my birthday, my 62nd birthday. God bless me. And right now, I'm pretty much erased all over social media. And that was one of the talks that we had. Lady Antebellum, they wanted to coexist. That was their whole game plan from the beginning, because you can't say you didn't know I was there. You know, I saw their name and then my name was under it. I've been very happy with that just the way it is. But, you know, I thought that we were

going to be able to come to an agreement and reach an agreement that that would leave us both whole. And I always said, I don't think coexisting is going to work. That's not going to work. You're being Lady A and I'm being Lady A. How does that work? And then I even asked the question, well, you took antebellum out of your name because it had racist connotations. Well, then dropping it to Lady A, I don't understand. The A is still a connotation for racial slur, and yet you still want to use it. But every time I ask that question of the lawyers, I ask that question of the artists themselves. Everybody dismissed me like I hadn't asked anything. And I asked the question three times purposely each time I talked to them.

I want to bring in. Nobody would respond. I want to bring in your producer, John Oliver. John, welcome to the show. John, what do you make all of this. Obviously, them suing Lady A has also generated a lot more attention for you guys as well, not necessarily positive attention. But what do you make of this lawsuit? John, you there? Can you hear me? I can hear you, yes, sir.

Okay, John, go ahead. Yes, sir. So what I make of this lawsuit, it was very unfortunate because we did begin the discussions with the hope of coming to an agreement. But there was definitely something lost in translation, even though we were being very transparent with what we wanted all along and that Lady A was going to keep her name Lady A, there was definitely a breakdown with the transparency on Lady Antebellum's end. So how would this have worked? Because this coexisting, how would that have worked? I mean, I'm just curious, how did they explain how it would work? Like, I know, like, for instance, I know, I mean, this is a stage name. Like, for me, okay, there's a guy named Roland Martin who is the most famous bass fisherman ever. Okay?

I first read about this dude in the seventh grade winning like seventy thousand dollars at a bass tournament i was like who first of all who the hell wins 70 grand fishing uh this guy's is like huge and so there's a reason why i go by roland s martin and for about four or five years uh like he was when you googled his name he was his name was like in the top of the search engine several different times. And then back, I joined CNN. And then probably around 2009, 2010, I jumped ahead of him. And I've been above him in terms of search engine ever since then. That's different.

This is actually in the same space of music. Right. Right. And this is, to my understanding, because I told them, I said, you're not listening. And them wanting to be an ally and

because of the connotation in the name, them wanting to be an ally, I specifically said, an ally is someone who helps lift up someone else. A black person, an indigenous person, a person of color. That's how you're an ally, because your privilege allows you certain things. So if you want to be an ally, then let's work together on how this can work. And I said,

but I specifically said, I don't see how coexistence is going to work because you can't be Lady A and I be Lady A. So I made several suggestions. Why don't you be Lady A the band and I'll be Lady A the artist? You could hear crickets. We had other suggestions, you know, that perhaps we go under their management.

I go under their management and they take me on and rebrand me. Right. Right. Right. Total crickets. I mean, every time we brought something to the table, they were more like, oh, you know, it's going to work out. Don't worry about it. It's going to be fine. You know, you know, if we have to put money into the search engine we're going to make it work it's going to work but this as soon as they released their single my name disappeared right like you're trying to erase me i'm not gonna

erase me that's not i mean how do you think that's going to work? You know, and I kept asking the question, what does that look like? What does that look like? And nobody would ever say anything. John, correct me if I'm wrong. Cause you know, my memory, you know, you're totally right. It's completely right. The coexistence was never going to work. And Roland sincerely, they, they knew that wasn't going to work. Because if they had any, if they really wanted to be a true ally and be on the side of right in this George Floyd, the way things are now,

and they wrote that. I didn't write that. They wrote those comments. Got it. About Black lives matter and about george floyd and about being you know more woke let's say so for you to to to do this to not take my suggestions first of all because you're not listening and i told them that on the private call that we had with the artist with with myself and my producer, John, and my other producer, Dexter Allen. And I specifically said, you're not listening to me. When I say I don't want to coexist, I don't want to coexist. Now, if we can bring communities together by showing how we can work, I'm all for that. That's what I do. You know,

I just held a white allies panel last Saturday. Well, on the 27th of June, the truth is loud. That was my single that came out and nobody could find it. You know, you had to really search to find it, you know, because it's not as easy anymore. I mean, if you dig, I guess, to page 20, I guess you'll find it. I haven't found it yet. But the truth is loud. And there was a reason I wrote that song. And they are proving the point because they're allowing their privilege to make them think that it's OK. And they actually thought I think they thought I was just irrelevant and was just going to go away. Well, they probably thought, look, you're small, we're big, and so therefore we can overpower you.

I want to bring in my panel. Recy, I've got to get your thoughts in here. I mean, certainly, I mean, not a good look to be a white band named, formerly named after a slavery period, and you change your name and you sue a black woman who's been using the name. I'm just saying, not a smart PR strategy. Well, absolutely not. First, I have to say, happy early birthday, lady. You look fabulous.

I would never guess that you're turning 62. But your story actually reminds me a lot of this deep dive I read in ProPublica about the Rills brothers. They had this heirs' property. It sounds like an heirs property situation where basically white people have been able to steal land from black farm owners and property owners because of titling issues, because they didn't have all the paperwork and stuff like that. And so obviously with your decades long history of using the Lady A stage name and establishing your brand,

a much more powerful group like Lady Antebellum can come along and basically steal that from right under your nose. But what's appalling to me is that they seem to want something for nothing. You gave them an opportunity to invest in you, to make you whole, and they didn't even want to do that. And I find that very appalling. So I hope that you keep up the fight. And I think that it's completely hypocritical to try to use this Black Lives Matter movement as a pretext for changing their name only to turn around and go after a strong black woman like yourself. So I really, really hope that you prevail in this and that there's some sort of compromise you can come to. Erica, your thoughts?

So Lady A, I want to echo Recy in saying happy, happy, blessed birthday to you. And I really, really hope that this is something that Black Twitter gets behind because I call them people of convenience and that people are using Black Lives Matter, the aftermath of the lynching of George Floyd and Black deaths to really kind of rebrand themselves. And this story for me really kind of highlights why allies really are not trusted because of them running plays like this over and over and over again. So I guess I want to know from you, if there was something that you could charge the public with doing to, you know, Roland definitely has a fantastic platform that we could do in addition to your appearance on Roland Martin and Filter to get this in the face of people that do talk about pop culture.

All right. You know, first of all, I want to say again, thank you, Roland, for having myself and John on the show today. I'm asking people, first of all, to pray. Pray for me, my team, because I have a sense of, I have a responsibility to my community, to the Rhapsody Broad Project children that I mentor and teach. I have a responsibility to my family, to my team. John has been with me for 20 years, you know, plus. And my other producer, Dexter Allen, has been with me for 10 years.

These young men have blessed me and kept me in the music industry, doing what I love to do. I was blessed before I met them. I was blessed before people started calling and wanting to interview me. But what I would like you to know and take away is that my name is my identity. I chose that name. Not only because my name is Anita, but it's, you see, I'm wearing purple.

Purple is my color. Purple is the color of royalty. I have been brought up to believe that I am royalty, that I am somebody. And I think, just like you said, for them to try to take my name, that's like stepping on my ancestors, especially after I tried to, we tried to come to some reconciliation in some way. But you didn't want to hear anything I had to say.

So I want to say one thing. I want people to continue to pray. I don't want people on Twitter and black Twitter. Because I'm on Twitter, but I don't read it a whole lot. So I guess I got to start going on there. Girl, you better start reading stuff so you can sell some damn music. What's wrong with you? You know, I'll be real.

I'm on there because I have my team that has put me on there. But you know what? I try to answer everybody. Like all these e-mails that I'm getting now. Look my team that has put me on there. But you know what? I try to answer everybody. Like, all these emails that I'm getting now. Look, look. Okay, look. I know you're all in the middle of this damn lawsuit. But you better, look.

What Lauren say? Ride this mother, till the wheels fall off. You're right. And you're right. And I will. Just saying. My mother said you can pray, but you got five senses. Right.

I mean, look, praying is one thing. But remember, when Peter was drowning in the water, Jesus stuck his hand out. He didn't stick his hand in. So you got to do some work, too. The praying ain't just that whole deal. Greg Carr, what's your comment? Thank you, Brother Roland. Lady A, again, happy early birthday.

Wait for Lady A live in New Orleans. You know, it seems to me there are two things. You're in court and there's been some report that you, you know, you're talking about you want some money from them. In fact, if you could do that. But then there's also the image war, the PR war, what Roland is talking about. I appreciate you wearing purple. It reminds me of another purple wearing Seattle musician who came through Nashville, the great Jimi Hendrix. You know, people think Prince came up with purple. He was riffing off of Jimi Hendrix, who was in Seattle. But Hendrix came through Nashville as well. Hendrix was playing the blues in Nashville bars before he went out to the West Coast. And I'm saying all that by way of going back to something you said at the very beginning, when you talked about privilege. This ain't just white privilege. This is young, white,

Southern privilege. These three white kids, privilege. This is young white Southern privilege. These three white kids, one of them, Hillary Scott mama, sang with Reba McEntire and won Grammys. Another one, Charles Kelly, his sister-in-law is on Grey's Anatomy. These privileged white kids who dressed up in some Civil War era clothes in front of a plantation house

and then decided to name themselves Antebellum, the tradition of bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd, who had their Confederate battle flags still worn in and around, they threw you away with this by strong-arming you. So two things. What kind of damages do you want from these people in a court of law? And number two, and this is a used question, there's somebody from Nashville who will

never buy Lady Antebellum or any of that stuff, because I grew up around those lightweight white supremacists. What can we do to either put them out of business or every time somebody bring them up, put some money in your pocket? Right. You know, you can go right now because nobody can find me. Please go to my website,ababyblues.com that's the only way anybody's going to be able to purchase my lady a live in new orleans cd and my band and i we worked hard for that i had sponsors that came and sponsored that trip we went all the way to new orleans to record that john produced it and he's been with me and that was our first live cd so please go to ladyab Baby Blues dot com.

The second thing is don't let them think that this is going away. I'm not just somebody out here that don't know no better. I'm not giving up and I'm not giving up my name. And if you want my name, you're going to pay for it. Plain and simple, because I was willing to rebrand myself. And what I had said was, when they talk about the $10 million, of course, they didn't tell the whole truth. So what I asked for was $5 million to compensate me for any loss and to help me to rebuild and rebrand myself, which I had asked them to do if I went under red light management. They could have done that. But of course, I wouldn't have trusted that, but they could have done that. And then I said, the other five million goes to three charities. One is Black Lives Matter

because you brought it up. The other was to my seniors and my youth in the Seattle area because that's my community I work in. And the other would go, and another charity would be for independent artists. My fellow independent artists out there, don't give up, don't let go. And use that charity so that they could reach for those people to be able to have legal counsel that can

afford it. Because God bless Cooley LLP, who are my lawyers and doing it pro bono. They are known around the world. And let me tell you, I'm not giving up. All I want y'all to do is keep going on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, rolling. I'm going to be on there. I promise you I'm going to be on there tonight and keep it in their face because they think, they've already erased me on social media. But I got a mouth and I'm going to continue to talk and I'm going to continue to sing. I'm already, I work on race and social justice on my day job. I'm getting ready to retire next year. You're not getting ready to come in here and take something from me. I'm tired of white individuals with their privilege thinking that it's okay to take from us.

And then when we offer you something and ask to be paid for it, all of a sudden you get on your laurels. You're upset. That's privilege. And speaking of the privilege that you were talking about Charles Kelly he was on the call and actually said well you know I'm privileged and I know I'm privileged and I'm trying to do better and stuff well you know what all that was smoke and mirrors it really was

John your final comment you know listen if I could just say one thing we would just love if black twitter John, your final comment You know, listen If I could just say one thing We would just love If Black Twitter Listen, if our people would just get behind us And help support us

Just get the word out about this Because it doesn't just affect Lady A This is for all of us Listen, as independent artists We work during the day But we do our music at night And we need the support to support. Listen, musicians all around the world, independent artists.

So thank God for each of you, Roland. Thank God for each of you and everybody. We just need your support. All right, then, folks. We so appreciate it. Thanks so much. Good luck. And keep us updated.

What happens? Thank you, Roland. We sure will. Thank you so much. God bless you, and God keep you. No charcoal grills are allowed. I'm white. I got you, Carl. Illegally selling water without a permit. On my property.

Whoa! Give me your ass. I'm uncomfortable. White man. White man in Santa Barbara, California. Call this bro the N-word. The bro said, say it again. Roll tape.

Say it again. Say it again. Say it again. No, bro. All right. Roll tape. Stop playing with me, bro. Call me it again, bro. What the fuck's wrong with you, bro? Don't be playing that shit. Stop playing, bro. It is what it is. It is what it is. Stop playing with me. Look at him smiling.

I'm fucking with you, bro. Greg Carr, it is what it is. Now, we keep warning these white folks. Y'all going to run against the wrong one. He was the wrong one. Brolin, brother, I'm thinking about the fact, and Erica alluded to it earlier, those two cases that Trump, that went to the Supreme Court, John Roberts trying to say Trump again, Trump versus Vance and Trump versus Mazars, where Trump thought I'm above the law.

And Roberts is like, you ain't above the law, but I'm going to let this stall past the election because I always think they have some protection. When you strip them from protection, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. He's in and out. Say it with your chest. Just like Lady A and these three young white people of privilege who knew what they were doing. They named themselves Antebellum and got a little scared and now want to bully her nah say it again say it with your chest and i'm sorry i'm sorry once they figure out that there's a price to be paid next thing is the apology but guess what the apology ain't enough if you believe in your white nationalism say it with your chest and get ready because now it's if you buck as the young people i don't understand it don't let those short tight shorts fool you he still had

hands and shorts was cutting off his thighs me it did not stop him from laying hands on big boy. He was on the ground and he skedaddled all with them little tight shorts. So don't let people fool you. You cannot judge a book by its cover. No, no. I'm not going to say it again, but you said it one damn time. You said it one. I'm telling you.

White folks, y'all keep hurling that N-word. I'm telling you right now. Hashtag team whip that ass, gonna show up and show out. Alright, Erica, another white woman has a Costco manager. Her ass

claims she was a doctor. Just hit play. Say cheese, you're in Costco not wearing your mask, refusing to wear your mask. Yes, call the police. And here's her mother. Yes, here's my mother. Shame on you, get out of here.

Can you call your manager? Sorry? Can you call your manager? Sorry? Can you call your manager? Yes. Can I call my manager? He's taking pictures of me because I haven't played with him. I haven't had a moment to put my mask on. You can put it on right now, ma'am.

You're shaming me. I'm not going to do that for you. You should be ashamed. I'll do that when I'm ready to do it. You should be ashamed. You should be ashamed. No, not right now, I don't. Science? Maybe better than you do.

Apparently, I'm the one protecting other people by wearing a mask. Are you? Well, great. Pull out your ID. I want to see your credentials. Pull them out. If you're a doctor, let's'll figure out what I need to do with mine. You're protected. You're about to be escorted out of the store if you don't put on your mask. I'll wait until you tell me to, okay? I see. You've already been told multiple times to put on your mask by me and employees.

I know. I know. You're such a good boy with your mask on. Thank you very much. I try. I take my health and the health of others very seriously. Yeah. Okay. What you know about me, ma'am, is that I'm wearing my mask. It's Costco company policy that everyone wear a mask in the store. Erica. It's Costco company policy that everyone wear a mask in the store. Erica, first of all, I say no real doctor. So sit your old lad ass down. It's this is real simple.

You put the mask on before you walk into the store. All that all all that gum smacking she was doing. Actually you're first of all, your mama old as hell. Oh, come on. No, your mama old as hell.

Okay. Your mama in a high risk group. How you, if your ass a real doctor, how you letting your mama roll up in Costco in her lab, damn scooter without the mask on? Literally rolling up. I mean, you, that lady, has one foot on earth and one foot in the grave.

And so this is really kind of part we've seen for the course. White people have been willing and have been able to number one in confirmed coronavirus cases. And the number of deaths has been attributed largely to folks not wearing masks. It's just that simple. Recently we posted Bill Nye, which I thought was hilarious. It was like a one-minute video of him putting on an N95 mask showing that, listen, you can even sneeze in this and you see that the droplets don't go forward. But this is what the mask does. But see, when there is not a level of hostility that's shown towards black and brown folks

afforded to white people, you have a class of people that feel as though they can walk around and do whatever they want to because they're a humpty dumpty son of a Klansman, foolish, mediocre white president is doing the exact same, refusing to wear a mask. So until there is some type of national guideline for all of the Karens that call their lawyers before they go to the dentist's office, which why would you do that? And then this Costco lady with her mom, the cryptkeeper rolling up behind her. We'll see more of these videos. You spoke of the Bill Nye video.

Actually, here it is. Go to my iPad. In the medical environment and when you're out mowing the lawn. This one's not sterilized, but it's pretty effective. So the reason we want you to wear a mask is to protect you, sure. But the main reason we want you to wear a mask is to protect me from you and the particles from your respiratory system from getting into my respiratory system. Everybody, this is a matter literally of life and death.

And when I use the word literally, I mean literally a matter of life and death. And when I use the word literally, I mean literally a matter of life and death. So when you're out in public, please wear a mask. Thank you for joining me on Consider the Following. You're absolutely right. You've got these idiots who are just following Donald Trump. These people are just nuts. There's no other way to explain what the hell wrong with these people. I don't get it. I think they're

crazy. They're just nuts. Again, my deal is, tell them you can't bring your ass in here no mask, but I'm telling you right now, and I'm warning y'all, y'all keep rolling up on people. Somebody gonna knock you the hell out. Gonna knock you smooth

the hell out. And I'm gonna be like Smokey, you got knocked! I'm just letting y'all know. Just letting y'all know. Just letting y'all know. Just letting y'all know. I have mates, so I'm ready for you.

I'm just letting y'all know. Just letting y'all know what's gonna happen. I'm just keeping warning y'ace, so I'm ready for you. I'm just letting y'all know. I'm just letting y'all know what's going to happen. I'm just keeping one of y'all. So if y'all want to keep being famous with these videos, keep acting a fool. All right, folks, shout out to the fucking people who give $50 or more. Bring the Fuck Fan Club, Brian Hall, Carlton Hickman and Carol, Carola Boza Meade, Coolest Williams, C.W. Owens, Dalton Bramwell, Dante Pugh, Deborah Keys White, Deborah Zenquist, Doretta Gaston, Elgin Woodside, Elizabeth Nelson, Farley Johnson, Gregory, Harry Hall, Ilona, Ingrid Moy,

Jasmine Johnson-Hameen, Keith Klinskills, Kimmy Wise, K.W. Remodeling, Lemuel Gray, Lisa Norman, Lola Tatum, Marilyn McGee, Melvin Dogan, Nichelle Higgins, Nikita Pope, Robert White, Robin, Ronald Connolly, Sharon Mills, Sharon Smith, Tatiana Victor, Tommy Green, Tony Gardner, Valerie Darden, Women of Icon International, Yohania Jenkins, Yvette Sims, Yvonne Gill, Yvonne Hova. this is an iHeart podcast