#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Stranded in Haiti, Fani Willis In; Nathan Wade Out-GA Elex Case, Calif. Autistic Teen Killed by Cops

Episode Date: March 16, 2024

3.15.2024 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Stranded in Haiti, Fani Willis In; Nathan Wade Out-GA Elex Case, Calif. Autistic Teen Killed by Cops We've been keeping a close eye on what's happening in Haiti. Tonight, we'll have a first-hand account of someone witnessing what's happening on the ground while she waits to get out.   Georgia Judge Scott McAfee did not disqualify Fani Willis from the Trump election case. Late this afternoon, special prosecutor Nathan Wade resigned. We'll talk to a Georgia attorney and discuss how this will impact the case.  An autistic California teen suffering from a mental crisis gets gunned down by police who were called to help. I'll talk to the  Director of Disability Justice Initiative from the Center for American Progress about what needs to be done to prevent tradies like this.  And Six Massachusetts eighth-grade students are charged with threats to commit a crime after their Snapchat conversation was leaked. Download the Black Star Network app at http://www.blackstarnetwork.com! We're on iOS, AppleTV, Android, AndroidTV, Roku, FireTV, XBox and SamsungTV. The #BlackStarNetwork is a news reporting platform covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Folks, today is Friday, March 15th, 2024, coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. We've been keeping a close eye on what's happening in Haiti. Tonight, we'll have a firsthand of countless of one witnessing what's happening there on the ground so you can understand really what is going on. Georgia Judge Scott McAfee did not disqualify Fulton County D.A. Fonny Willis from the Trump election case. He gave her an ultimatum. Either she goes or lead prosecutor Nathan Wade will tell you exactly what that decision was.

Folks were shocked and stunned after an autistic California teen suffering from a mental crisis gets gunned down by police who were called to help. Talk to the director of Disability Justice Initiative from the Center for the American Progress about this tragic case in the 6th Massachusetts. 8th grade students are charged with threats to commit a crime after their Snapchat conversation was leaked. Folks that more,

including winners from the NAACP Image Awards, which will be taking place tomorrow, broadcast tomorrow, but they've been handing the awards out for the past three nights. We'll tell you exactly who has won. It's time to bring the funk on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Blackstar Network. Let's go.

He's got 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 Gro-Gro-Yong. It's Rolling Martin. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Martin. What we're seeing unfold in Haiti is shocking and devastating as gangs ruled Port-au-Prince in the country. Uh, you have a completely unstable political leadership. You have no one in control when it comes to the police or the military, and everyone is trying to find a solution to put the country back together. My next guest, Monique Liskum, is a journalist, former UN official, and member of the Commission to Find a Haitian solution to the crisis. She is a native of Haiti and, again, is a resident, and she joins us right now.

Monique, glad to have you on Roland Martin Unfiltered. First of all, how long have you been there? I have been there since early January after spending the holidays with my family in Miami. And how how long? I mean, obviously, we've seen to vote going on there for quite some time. But really, since the assassination of the president, the country has been thrown into turmoil. How bad has it gotten? You're there. You're seeing it up close and personal. It's gotten very, very, very bad.

It, the, we had the riots in 2018 and things were pretty bad then. And every once in a while, there were massive demonstrations against corruption. There were demonstrations for social justice, corruptions, anti-impunity, sorry, protest movements against anti-impunity. And then from 2018 up until 2021, that pretty much was the rhythm. The gangs were there. They were kidnapping, they were killing, they were raping. And then Jovenel Moïse died, the president, in 2021.

He was assassinated in his bedroom. And a prime minister came about. The prime minister was illegitimate because in fact, there was no parliament, no elections have been held for practically eight years. So the prime minister was contested pretty much from the time he came. And so what has happened is that he did nothing to stop the gangs. And as a matter of fact, there are gang members who have said they have actually met with

him. And I think one of the things that has to be understood, and I really want to be very clear about that because it is important, there has been an association of leaders, political leaders, working with the gangs since about 2011. This is not a new phenomenon in Haitian history, but it is a significant phenomenon now, because in the last two weeks the gangs have basically taken over the whole administration of the country. They have taken over the country. They have taken over the country. This is what I could say,

starting from two weeks ago Thursday. They walked in the streets with their machine guns all over the streets. It was not one street. It was not one gang member. There were like tens on one street, 20 on another street, 10 on another street. And we lived it pretty much as it was going on because TV and radio was doing it live. And then a gang leader had a press conference, really. A gang leader held a press conference and said the gangs had come together and that they were going to basically take over and they wanted Ayalon Ri, the prime minister, who was at the time, I believe, in Puerto Rico or in the United States, not to come back.

And in fact, he has not come back. And in fact, he has not come back. So in essence, the gangs control the country, because Haiti is a way that the capital is centralized. It's a nerve center of the country. So they hold the nerve center of the country. The airport has been closed now for 10 days, although other parts of the country are functioning. The northern part is a little calm. The southern part is somewhat calm also. But here, where I am, with about four million other Haitians, it is terror that we are living. See, the thing that is hard to fathom is, one, when you have political leaders who are aligned with the gangs, then you've got military or police folks aligned with the gangs.

Who the hell do people in Haiti trust? And the trust factor is important. And when the commission was beginning its work, we interviewed all political parties, and we also interviewed a lot of civil society. And two items came up all the time. One of them was the lack of justice, and the other one was lack of trust. And what has happened in terms of the association of the gangs is that politicians get the gangs, or some politicians have even created gangs, according to a UN report. They have armed the gangs.

They have validated the gangs. They have empowered the gangs. So to get in power, they get gang members, or they create the gang to accompany them. And to stay in power, they do the same. So people—so the idea is to terrify us. It is to control us. It is to control us. It is to make us vote the way they want us to vote. It is not for us to be of free will. So, yes, we may have freedom of expression, but now we have no freedom of movement.

Now there are no elected officials at all in Haiti, none whatsoever, no mayor, no member of parliament, no president, nothing at all in terms of elected officials. So it is a free fall, and nobody trusts the traditional politicians. In fact, a lot of them are under sanction for Canada, from Canada. Some of them are also under sanction by the United States. So how do you have a path moving forward if people don't know who to trust? Who can Haitians rely on that is credible, that's not aligned with gang members, drug dealers, or other thugs? What's the future? We've been thinking about that a lot. And there is what I would call a kind of virtuous circle of people who are not aligned with

the gangs, whether they be sociologists, university professors, former government employees, agronomists, former U.N. staff, et cetera. So you have thousands of Haitians who are clean, when I say clean, who are not into corruption, who are honest people, hardworking people, who work hard. And they are either in civil society or they are running their businesses. And a lot of them do not want to be involved in politics, for really one good reason, because the former dictator that we had, Papa Doc and Baby Doc, so annihilated Haitians and the political class that there is a huge trauma in that Haitians say politics is dirty

business. And which is unfortunate, because right now, since 2011, the politicians have proved right that politics is dirty business. But there are people, there are Haitians with strategic minds. They are very intelligent Haitians who have proven themselves here and abroad, for example, in the United States. They are Haitians who can do this. A lot of them, though, do not want to be involved in politics. And that is the major challenge now. It is to get them to say the republic needs you now. The citizens of Haiti need you now. This is not the time to stand aside. This is the time to come and provide your support, to provide your expertise, your experience. But there are people. It is just getting them out to actually do the work.

And that is the major challenge. But right now, there are a lot of, some politicians, some people from the private sector, some people from the diaspora, because there is a Haitian American organization that is working also, and some people from the political class who are trying to find a solution, put together a kind of provisional commission that can actually run the country.

It's going to be extremely challenging because the gangs are saying they want somebody else in the presidential offices. So it's going to be extremely challenging, particularly because security is a major, major issue. Plus, there is a humanitarian situation. Because what happens is what? When the gangs want to spread out and gain more territory, because that's how they came from 10 percent of Port-au-Prince to now controlling about 80 percent of the capital city, it is at one time they go and they just overrun different neighborhoods. And people have to grab a bag quickly and leave those areas.

And some of these people are in schools. Some of these people are in stadiums. Some of these people are just out, even though it's raining a lot these days. So there are people are, it's about 400,000 people who are in that situation. They call them displaced because they had to leave their homes. And then you have people who are hungry. The UN says there are about 4 million Haitians, that's about one third of the population, that is going hungry tonight. And there are thousands of women who have been raped. When I say women, some girls,

young like 11 years old, 12 years old, who have been gang raped, sometimes in front of their families. So it is a huge emergency. It is a disturbing, horrifying situation that we are living in. So whoever comes and takes power, and it will have to be a kind of communal, almost, kind of power, because you need that to make peace is going to have a very, very, very difficult, tough time. I know a lot of cops,

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

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

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

We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. Got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter. Liz Caramouch. What we're doing now isn't working and we need to change things. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does.

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. To bring things to somewhere where we can go out. It's horrifying what we're going through. It's horrifying. Monique, and you are trying to leave the country, correct?

I had to go to Miami because we are trying to do some advocacy with Congress. We have meetings with the Institute of the Black World. We're trying to do a rally in Washington. We have a meeting on 21st with the Congress. We're supposed to have appointments with perhaps some officials at State Department. And the airport is closed. I was supposed to leave last Friday. My flight was canceled. I was supposed to leave this Saturday, tomorrow. My flight was canceled. And the worst part of it is when I go to make a new reservation, nothing.

Because American Airlines is not able to say when the airport might close, when they might be running. So, yes, I am here, stranded. Fortunately, I am home. Fortunately, I have a garden. Fortunately, I live in a rural area where there are farms, and I can get vegetables, and I can get some food. So I am really privileged in that sense. But I am sorry that I will have to miss all of these events that have been planned so that we can do advocacy for Haiti. All right, then. Monique, we certainly appreciate it.

Stay safe. And we just hope things turn out for the better for Haitians in the country. Thank you for giving us a voice and thank you for keeping on giving us a voice. All right, we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you.

Go on, Chip Brayton, we come back. How Fox News is doing all they can to hype up what's happening in Haiti is not about them actually giving a damn about Haitians. It's about scaring white America. Wait till I show you what's been going on. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered right here on the Black Star Network. Terry and I, we couldn't play in the white clubs in Minnesota.

It felt like such a, you know, strength through adversity type moment that I think black people just have to go through you know we have to figure it out you know we make you know lemons out of lemonade but there's a reason we rented a ballroom did our own show

promoted it got like 1500 people to come out clubs were sitting empty. They were like, where's everybody at? And I said, they're down watching the band you wouldn't hire. So it taught us not only that we had the talent of musicians, but we also had the talent of entrepreneurship. It wasn't like a seat at the table.

It's like, no, let's build the table. That's right. We've got to build the table. And that was the thing. And of course, after that, we got all kinds of offers. Of course. Right, to come play in the clubs. But we didn't do it.

We said, no, we're good. No, we're good. We're good. And that's what put us on a path of national. And of course, when Prince made it, then it was like, OK, we see it can be done. Thank you. Hello, we're the Critter Fixers. I'm Dr. Bernard Hodges. And I'm Dr. Terrence Ferguson. And you're tuned into...

Roland Martin Unfiltered. All right, folks, welcome back to Roller Martin Unfiltered. You could always tell when mainstream media actually cares about something based upon what they cover. Well, then once you start looking at that, then what does the coverage look like? So check this out. Go to my iPad. So if you go to Twitter, I want you to type in Twitter, I want you to type in Twitter, Haiti. Okay. And so what you see the top, you see top latest people, photos, videos. So here you got this right winger, Benny Johnson, who post this segment on Fox News. The Clinton supposedly sent billions in aid to Haiti through shady foundation. Now the country has descended into utter war.

Fox News is asking, where does the four point four billion dollars go? Now, we've had other people make the same allegation. Now, we had Jacqueline Charles on the show, a Caribbean correspondent, award-winning Caribbean correspondent for the Miami Herald, who said, Roland, I covered this thing extensively. These things did not happen. You still got other people. The people will try to come at me and say, oh, you're wrong. These things did happen. OK, if you think they happened, please, then why don't you actually bring the facts forth as opposed to opinion, but check this out. So you go down here. So now here's the new one right here. Okay. You got this right winger, Colin rug, us veteran led group project. Dynamo is conducting rescue missions to save Americans trapped in Haiti, which has been taken

over by violent games and nonprofit estimates that about 500 Americans are trapped. So I want you to see what's coming. Then you have here. Oh, breaking and illegal from Haiti has been charged with raping a disabled girl. So then you see what they're doing now where Fox News migrant charged with sexually abusing kids at church, one from El Salvador, two migrants, one from El Salvador, one from Haiti. We told you the other day what's going on. So here you have Florida Governor Ron DeSantis

saying Florida agents have interdicted a vessel that had 25 suspected illegal aliens from Haiti. They had firearms, they had drugs. That vessel was interdicted a vessel that had 25 suspected illegal aliens from Haiti. They had firearms. They had drugs. That vessel was interdicted, and those illegal aliens were turned over to the Coast Guard for deportation. Now, we also know that where some of the folks who were involved in the assassination of the president, where they were different parts, they were killers from Colombia, people from the United States. And so just understand this. So, again, go back to my iPad.

So you see right here, you know, in terms of what they're doing. Oh, the rescue of 10 Americans by Corey Mills. And you see that. And you see, oh, there's that, this Haitian illegal. You see racist Charlie Kirk. Another day, another violent crime, but illegal. This time this man from Haiti. And then you see right here,

X is taking down the graphic video shared by Elon Musk and other right-wingers reporting the show Cannibalism on Haiti. So then you go down here again, Fox News right here, State Department, U.S. now planning to evacuate Americans stuck in Haiti.

Now, we told you before and now, all these videos, cannibalism in Haiti, they're going to be killing our people. Maria Bartiromo on Fox News. Oh, what's going on? They're not rescuing Americans from Haiti. We can go on and on and on. And remember, we showed you the other day how Matt Gates, they had a hearing. He's out here going, oh, they are sitting here trying to, there's going to be a Haitian invasion of the United States.

Do y'all actually believe Fox News gives a damn about Haiti? No, they don't. But the whole goal is to scare their white audience. Here they come. Here they come. First it was the Mexicans. Now it's the Haitians. Here they come. Y'all need to understand what's going on. People are not caring about hating. They don't actually care about how to fix what's happening in the country. It is about how do we scare

white people into thinking here they come. And again, Matt Gaetz, they're going to take you over to South Florida. Now, they don't mind. Follow me here. Matt Gaetz of the world, they don't mind when Venezuelans come here. They don't mind when Cubans come here. But damn them Haitians coming here. My panel, join me right now, Matt Manning, civil rights attorney out of Corpus Christi, Dr. Nyambe Carter, associate professor, University of Maryland School of Public Policy out of D.C., Michael Imhotep, host of the African History Network show out of Detroit. I mean, we see what's going on here, Neomby. And I just want our people just to understand how what's happening in Haiti has been used against us. This is part of their, the migrants are coming, the migrants are coming, these illegal aliens, they're coming,

and this time they're black. Well, it's part of a longer narrative that this country has been spinning about Haitians. I mean, you can take it back to the 19th century, to independence, but even more recently, I mean, Haitians have been sounding the alarm about lots of things happening within their country. And your previous guest spoke about some of those things, and the United States was happy to turn a blind eye to it because it didn't suit our political interests. And here again, we have Fox News and others using Haiti as a political football. And the reality is far fewer Haitians get let in than most others who are asking for asylum, like you talked about, Venezuelans, Ukrainians, et cetera. It's about race, right? I mean, this is always about race, and it doesn't matter what happens to Haiti.

I remember a few years ago when Pat Robertson was talking about the hurricane or the earthquake, and he said it was because of their religion. It's because they're devil worshipers. So Haiti is always sort of used to scare the West. Not only are they black, but they're defiant. They're violent. They have a foreign culture. They don't want to blend in. they're dangerous right, they're all

of these things so this does not surprise me one iota and those who watch Fox and those who are sympathetic to that viewpoint will believe everything that they say because it fits the narrative that they want to have about Haitian people in particular, but black

people more generally. But Haitians have been singled out for a particular kind of maligning in this country, being banned because they were believed to have higher rates of HIV, which was not true, and all kinds of things. So this is stuff that's been happening to Haiti, unfortunately, for centuries. Here, Matt, this is Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott again going, oh, no, they're coming. Protecting our national security interests means that the military must be laser focused on the cold, hard facts and not only what our adversaries are doing, but what they are capable of doing. The violence and unrest in Haiti is heartbreaking. It is a symptom of political unrest that has only

continued to grow under this administration. Not only has the Biden administration taken an active role in destabilizing the region by appeasing Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, but it appears that the White House is totally unprepared to deal with the consequences of the political unrest these regimes create and support. The policy of the United States could not be that we just let everyone in our country totally unvetted anytime there's trouble around the world. That is what President Biden has done at the border with 8 million people pouring across, and after the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan with 90,000 unvetted people coming in. Now, I know a lot of cops and they get asked all

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

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

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

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

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

And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Again, Matt, they don't mind those Cubans and Venezuelans because when they get here, guess who they vote for? Republicans. Yeah, that's very conservative. And all he did was trumpet conservative talking points and talk about how we need to close our borders. And the same things you're saying and the same things that Rick Scott was saying, frankly, were coming out of his mouth here in Corpus Christi, Texas, a Cuban migrant who was telling me about how, you know, we need to close our borders. And I think, you know, the thing that's really heinous about this is, you know, the idea

that Rick Scott would say, oh, what's happening there is tragic. But I mean, they're not concerned about humanitarianism. They're not concerned about making sure that all of the Haitians there are protected and have what they need. Instead, it is xenophobia. What you see is we need to make sure that these people don't come across our shores and become a dangerous monster that you need to be afraid of. I mean, even trying to invoke the fear about the number of people coming across the border when if it's people from Europe,

if it's Ukrainians who are displaced, we don't have a problem with that. And I think Dr. Nyambi hit the nail on the head. It's about blackness. It's a racism response that, like you said earlier, was cordoned when it related to the people from Mexico or people from Central America, but which is even more heightened as it relates to the way they mongrelize people who are black and particularly in this circumstance, people from Haiti. It is beyond laughable to watch the lies that are unspooled constantly. And they're just all of a sudden, I saw this one video, Michael, where Will Kane was talking to some Haitian so-called expert, and dude was getting stuff just wrong left and right. And so, again, they're just throwing stuff out.

As a matter of fact, here's the segment. Watch this here. Listen to this here. Haiti is descending into chaos here. It's another embassy over the last several years, this time under the Biden administration, that has to be evacuated. Good morning, Will. Well, I think this is number eight now that we've seen evacuated.

We saw helicopters last night coming in to take U.S. personnel out. This is an example of a country where we've had a combination of neglect and conceit. Neglect, we haven't had an ambassador there in over two years. Conceit, we've been trying to prop up a prime minister who really was never elected and did not have any support from the population. So it's a little predictable what we're seeing. Yeah, there's this quote. So the former prime minister was assassinated back in 2021. And we put our weight behind this this guy.

There's this quote that we backed the wrong horse. We wrote it into a dead end. OK, straight up lies, straight up lies. In fact, the folks at Decoding Fox, this is what they tweeted. Will Cain gets basic facts about Haiti wrong. The president of Haiti appointed the prime minister. Then the president was assassinated. Cain said the prime minister was assassinated. The expert he had on didn't correct his mistake. So they're just throwing out crap just willy-nilly,

no understanding at all, because again, the goal of the right right now, and y'all just look at all the stuff. Oh, this gang leader barbecue, they're eating people, they're coming to America next, they're eating people. They are, this is all about how do we demonize people of color to scare white people to vote for Trump? Yeah, Roland, I was looking at some articles. I Googled some articles. I just Google Fox News, Haiti to see what came up. And I saw some of the articles you talked about, and one dealing with conservatives

blast Biden after Haitian migrant charged with raping teenage girl, enough is enough. One talking about billions of dollars invested in Haiti since 2010, earthquake have not improved country was still working, et cetera. What you're looking at is a, like you said, it's a fear campaign targeting Fox News audience, older white people, most of them without a college education. But this is also, I would argue, another variation of the great replacement theory that we know some Fox News hosts propagated in a form of Fox News host, Tucker Carlson, that white people were being replaced by immigrants, et cetera, and, you know, these people are going to vote for Democrats, et cetera.

So you have that taking place here. And then you have—now, what's interesting is they're saying, OK, you have all these immigrants coming across the border, et cetera. But at the same time, Republicans killed the immigration bill, which was probably the most conservative immigration bill proposed by Republicans in the most conservative immigration bill proposed by Republicans in the last 30 years and accepted by the majority of Democrats—Senator John Lankford of Oklahoma led that charge—and it was Donald Trump who killed the bill and told Republicans in both the House and the Senate, especially the House, to kill the

bill. So now they're talking about the problem with immigration and these undocumented immigrants coming in and they're going to have guns and things like this, but you all helped kill the bill. So I'm confused. Which one is it? Okay, but...

And also, I don't want any Republican talking about security in Haiti when the Republican congressman over the committee there, Foreign Relations Committee, won't release the $50 million for security for Haiti. Yeah. I don't want to hear it. 30 seconds.

Yeah, won't do that. But, you know, at the same time, I think it's really important to really understand the history of Haiti. And going back to 1914, when U.S. Marines went into the Haitian National Bank and stole $500,000 worth of gold, and then the U.S. was in control of Haiti for about another 19 years up until 1934. So that's a deep history. Yeah, well, yeah. First of all, you don't get today without understanding that particular history. All right, folks, hold tight one second. We come back. The judge renders his decision regarding Fulton County D.A. Fonny Willis. He gives her an ultimatum. She goes or

Nathan Wade goes. He's made his choice. We'll discuss that when we come back right here on Roland Martin Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Be sure to support us in what we do. Join our Bring the Funk fan club. Folks, to give during the show, get a shout out right here. Senior Check and Money, order theo box five seven one nine six washington dc two zero zero three seven that's zero one nine six cash out dollar sign rm unfiltered paypal or martin

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You hear me? Folks, the big news out of Atlanta involves the case of Fulton County D.A. Fonnie Willis and whether she or her lead prosecutor Nathan Wade can continue. Today, Judge Scott McAfee ruled that Fonnie Willis may remain on the case, but what has to happen, she or Nathan Wade must resign. Well, this is the front page of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Wade resigns, allowing Fulton D. terms of her decision to get involved with Nathan Wade and then to hire him to be a part of the team. Joining us right now, folks, from Atlanta is attorney Jay Edward Shipp. Glad to have you on the show. Attorney Shipp, this is very simple. And I've said this repeatedly and the judge basically makes the exact same decision. Fonny Willis screwed up.

She should not have had Nathan Wade on this case if she's going to be involved in a relationship with him. He ruled that it did not have an impact here, did not have an impact at all. Now, of course, in his letter, Wade said, I'm proud of the work our team has accomplished in investigating, indicting and litigating this case. But the judge had some stern words for the decision making of D.A. Fonney. Well, is your thoughts? So, first off, thank you for having me, brother. Let's just go ahead and dive into it. The judge did say, yes, this was a bunch of bad decisions in which you made, DA Willis, and it's brought us to this point. But again, what I've always said is none of this prejudiced any of those defendants. And he made sure to let that be known, that none of this prejudiced any of you, even going as far as talking about the forensic misconduct situation, which they brought up in which D.A. Willis talked about what she was going through at the church.

So, again, it just reaffirmed the fact that, like D.A. Willis said, she's not the one on trial here. Right. Those defendants are the one on trial there. The problem here is, and I had a conversation with several people earlier today about this, and what I said is if you just go back, the judge said yes, there was no conflict of interest.

Did she do anything illegal? Nope. And so we have all of that. The problem is, if you're D.A. Willis, you know how the stakes of this case. You know how major this is. And what you tell your entire team, I need everybody to be clean as a whistle. What you don't do is create the problem. So for two months now,

we haven't discussed the case. We've discussed who paid for dinner, do you drink wine, did he have a door, an opener to your garage door, how many times he came by, all of that. And so this is why, this was a mistake on her part.

If she doesn't put weight on the team, they don't have, none of this happens. That's true. I would agree with you on that. And I would even concede the point that, you know, this was an unforced error by the decisions that were made. But again, this has been Trump's whole thing,

to delay, obstruct, deny. Right, which is why you don't help him. You don't hand him a gun and then say, hey, here are the bullets too. I would agree with you on that point. But again, this is an unprecedented thing. You haven't seen a president be charged and do the type of things that he has done. And that's why you don't do it. That's what drives me crazy the most. Again, if you're

sitting in Fannie Willis' position, I'm telling you, you sit here and say, yo, I need everybody to be clean. Y'all can't pay no bills late. I need water bill up to date. You can't have no tax

liens. If you married and you got a side piece, cut that off until after this sucker is over because they're going to go after all of us. But you can't

have the person in charge going, by the way, my man going to be the lead prosecutor. I think one of your previous guests made a good point in that she talked about how there was going to be opposition research done

and D.Aa willis probably wasn't used to this i mean who has ever heard of opposition research being done on a sitting d.a no no i can't try hey bro listen i i feel you i understand your point but I can't buy it. Because you already said it. No, first of all, you got to understand, I can't even use the word president in relation to his name. But no former occupant of the Oval Office has ever gone on trial. You know all eyes on you. If you find in wilderness, you can't even

drive fast. You just got to understand. My problem is we're not even having this conversation that initial decision wasn't made. And here's the other deal, bro. When the motion was filed,

that's when she, her and Wade should have got together and they were like, they know. They know. So what did they do? They fought it. Why you fighting it? Y'all were together. Remember, they fought it. They were going to do the same thing

regardless. If they would, if he would have left at that point, they still would have went through with the motion. Well, but here's the deal, though. Remember, they fought the motion. And then the whole dramatic, she shows up. I'm ready to testify. And they're like, well, I guess we're not fighting the motion now. Okay.

So to me, to me, okay. Right. The moment they filed that motion, look, when she went to that church and didn't deny it, I was like, yeah, they've been they've been knocking the boots. And that's when that's when she should have said they know I need you to step down. Now, and I think had that happened, you still would have had some stuff happen. I don't think would have been this intense. But at that moment, you got to cut it off. You got to cut the cancer out the body because at that moment, yo, it can't spread.

But they fought it. They fought it. Now, Matt, you're shaking your head. All right, Matt, what's the problem? I'll wait till my time, but I think she did the right thing. I don't think she should have immediately canned him because that would be evidence of impropriety. I think fighting it was the right way to go

because the moment they cut him loose in relation to the motion being filed, then it's like, why did she cut him loose so quick? Because something must have been going wrong. But here's the deal, though. Where we at today is what it was going to be. Somebody had to go. This is, this is where,

this is where this is not a legal thing. This is where it became Michael, a public relations thing. Now understand now what has happened by this, the cascading effects of this decision. He's on motion file. You fight it. We go for two months. Congress now wants some documentation of what federal money is used. Now the state of Georgia has created now this whole panel. Now all your business out, your dad is testifying. This is all the things that happened downstream because of that one decision.

I fundamentally believe when that motion was dropped, that's when you have to go, yeah, I'm not about to sit here and I'm about to keep fighting and he's still going to be on it. No. He had to go. Georgia was going to have that. I'm sorry. Was that for me? Go ahead, Michael.

I agree Fannie Willis should have fought it. Now, it probably is going to end up that Nathan Wade was going to lead the team. But I agree she should have fought it. But the commission that the Georgia state legislature created, if I remember correctly, that commission was formed before this lawsuit by Michael Roman was filed. OK, number one, about these improprieties. Number two, Judge McAfee in his ruling found that there was no, quote, actual conflict, end quote. Now, he did find, he did say there was the, quote, appearance of impropriety, end quote. But there was no actual conflict, all right? So, yes, in hindsight, the relationship should not have taken place after Nathan Wade

joined the prosecution. But it is what it is. But at the end of the day, you fight something like this. You don't just acquiesce. You have to understand, you're dealing with thugs, okay? You're dealing with thugs who have no morals, who have no ethics, all right? So you've got to fight, period. Yeah, look, Naomi, you're going to fight it, but what you don't is you don't create your own problem. That's all I'm saying.

You got to be smart and not create a problem where you give them something to attack you on. And I will take this one step further because this is a gendered conversation for sure. And as a woman in the workplace, whatever our workplaces are, I mean, most of us don't work on a stage as big as the one Fannie Willis is on right now. You have to be above board. I mean, one of the things that we as women have to think about in the workplace is the respect that we're going to have from our subordinates and others in the workplace. And it's hard to maintain that if people know that you

cross these kind of boundaries. I agree that she should have fought it. But the other thing in fighting it is now we have all of these details about her personal life and these lurid details that had nothing to do with the case. But like you said, Roland, now that's all we're talking about. We're not talking about the charges. We're not talking about what this conduct was that this man actually did. That's the crime here. And I think Fannie Willis is old enough, quite frankly, to know better. Michael Cohen told us everything we needed to know about how Trump and his team operates and what their playbook is. It's always to find your dirty secrets and then expose you and use that to bend you to their will or some other such thing. So I don't know how D.A. Willis had no sensibility that this would happen.

And it's not to suggest that she didn't do her job well or that Nathan Wade didn't do his job well. But this was just it was an unnecessary chink right in the armor of this office and in this prosecution. And it doesn't matter whether they win in court or not. Trump will always say I was well-rooted. This was illegitimate. And it will appear to some people that it is not because on the merits, but because of her lack of, I don't want to say conduct, but just the lack of foresight here just seemed like a really short-sighted choice because you could have resumed your relationship at some other point in time. Yeah, and Jane, Edward, look, the decision that you're now confronted with is,

okay, the judge has made its ruling. Wade has stepped down. Willis now continues. Now the question then becomes, okay, now you still have all the other stuff that's outside. Now you've got to get the focus now back on the case. And I just think that this is a lesson for folks, especially your high-profile folks, to understand what the stakes are. I was talking earlier in a conversation.

Someone was like, hey, we should be rallying around Fonny on this whole deal. And I told this person a story. I love the show Billions. And Kondala Rashad, her character, wanted to run for office. and so what she then did was she goes out and they say well we got the guy for you so he comes in he has two envelopes so jay edward he has two envelopes he goes no he goes this is the he goes so jay edward this is

what he goes he goes this is the envelope that they are going to give. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company

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

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

We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill. NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corps vet. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things.

Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts.

...on you. No. on you no then he goes this is the envelope that i can only find on you she's like i need to know that one because when you run for office you understand opposition research and i just think anybody who's watching pay attention if you're going to be involved in office, you understand opposition research. And I just think anybody who's watching, pay attention. If you're going to be involved in a high profile case, you got to be clean. You got to be even Matt shaking his head like okay, I mean you got

when it's about to hit and you're going to be in every paper, every network it's going all around the world whether you're a woman or a man. And damn sure if you're black, your shit got to be clean. Jay Edward, final comment. Final comments, man. I agree with you on that.

She has definitely put herself in the limelight, and she should have had the foresight to, you know, go ahead and make sure that everything was clean. But I always say we can't forget that this man was on the phone telling a secretary of state, I need you to find the vote. Right. And remember, the judge threw those charges out. Now they got to go down. Do they go back and re-indict to have more specifics? Because the judge said they were not specific enough. And so that's really what we're left with. And so I just think, Matt, I'm going to give you a final comment here. I just, what drives me crazy is that all the focus was on these thugs.

And folks were talking about, yo, Fonny going to get his ass, going to get his ass. And now, now we all know her daddy and who they dating. That's not the stuff you want folk talking about when it comes to your legal case. It's not a great look, but there are a couple of things. First, once they made the accusation, if she acquiesces and says, I'm going to take him off the case, then that looks like an admission of guilt. I wouldn't tell a criminal defense client who's accused of something to do something that makes them look guilty. That's why I think strategically she had to fight it. Secondly, I think it's very obvious that the judge recognized the stakes here because it's uncommon for a county court judge like this to issue a 23-page opinion. He did that

to make sure there was cover on the appellate side and to communicate what he saw in the case, because judges can't speak politically on things. But what I think is interesting about that, or can't speak out at all on things, what I think is interesting about that is he absolutely skewered her in this order, saying that there was, quote, an odor of mendacity, which means he felt like people were lying. He said her testimony could not be taken at face value. So a lot of your points, I think, are valuable, because she attacked her own credibility not only through doing this but through how she fought it. But strategically, if I were in her office, I would have counseled her to fight this because the moment she acquiesces is the moment she looks

like she's guilty of something. And I think that has an effect on her subsequent tenure, too, because now every case they're going to attack her saying she admitted to having done something wrong. So strategically, in this circumstance, I think this was the right play. I agree. Don't put your man on the case. Then we ain't got no problem. That's all I'm saying. That's just... Deanna, you about to say something? I was just saying, I mean, it's just that easy.

I mean, you don't get your bread when you get your cheese. I mean, it's, you know, it's real easy. I, that's... oh, Lord have mercy. We talking about all this other stuff and not these thugs. J. Edward Shipp, I appreciate it, man. Thanks a lot.

Thank you. All right, folks, we come back. We're going to talk about this shocking case out of California where an autistic boy was shot and killed by cops. Having a mental health breakdown. It's a shocking, what, what, autistic boy shot and killed by cops. Having a mental health breakdown. It's a shocking, stunning story. And it's so sad, but we'll be talking about it. Folks, support us in what we do.

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unplugged, and undamned believable. You hear me? On March 9th, the family of an autistic 15-year-old boy called the Apple Valley California Police for help. According to reports, Ryan Ganger was assaulting family members and damaging property. When officers arrived, this is what happened. Where is he at?

Hey, get back! Get back and get a shot! Now, again, this is them coming. So I need y'all to do this here. When he steps out, I need y'all to freeze the video right there so people can actually see what happened. So you see the doors open, freeze right there. So it appears if there is something in his hand. Now, again, that's what it appears. This story has generated lots and lots of attention because, again, he was gunned down.

The family was trying to get help, and then he ends up being killed. Now, does the video cut off right there, or is there a second video? Okay, so that's all that they have released thus far. Mia Ives Rubley, Disability Justice Initiative for the Center for American Progress, joins us right now. So, Mia, this reminds me of the story in Dallas.

Mother, concerned about her son, calls the cops. He comes to the door. He has a screwdriver, and he's sort of flipping the screwdriver. Within seconds, officers unload. They kill him. Nothing done to the particular officers in that case here. This is another example why you cannot send cops on mental health calls. They automatically are going to shoot and kill.

Mia? they automatically are going to shoot and kill. Mia, I think you're on mute. I think you're on mute. Can you hear me now? Now we got you, go ahead. Wonderful, I am so sorry. Thank you so much for having me. Unfortunately, this situation is all too familiar. It's one of the reasons why the disability community has been so vocal about the issues with interactions with police,

particularly for black and brown individuals. I think that, unfortunately, we're going to continue to see this happen without, you know, real accountability and real policy changes. This is a... And again, you know, in the wake of the... In the wake of the death of George Floyd, the murder of George Floyd, a number of police departments were talking about, again, sending mental health experts out on these particular calls and trying to change the decision making.

And as long as police go there, look, they're going to assess the situation totally different than somebody else. 100%. You know, I was trained as a clinical social worker and understand what goes on in a lot of these cases, having worked with individuals with mental health disabilities for over six years as a counselor. And so, you know, I think that we have a real problem that stems historically. You know, I think that we have significantly underfunded programs that could actually help individuals with mental health disabilities. We have unfortunately discriminated against individuals with mental health disorders, and so individuals are not seeking care when they need to, and when they do seek care, they are unable to get it.

They are unable to access it. For years, we saw a continual decrease in funding until the CARES Act came about, and that was due to the pandemic. And during the CARES Act, we saw an increase in funding for mental health, for mental health treatment. We also saw the Biden administration increase funding for mental health. But unfortunately, a lot of our focus has been in crisis care management, which only deals with when sort of that interaction, that deadly interaction occurs between individuals with disabilities and police. Where we really need to be spending money is actually before this crisis occurs. And unfortunately, we're still seeing significant issues of people being able to access care.

We've seen a lot of discrimination and a lot of making fun of people with mental health disorders, a lot of criminalization of it. And so people don't feel comfortable trying to seek mental health care. The thing here, Neon B, first of all, a San Bernardino sheriff's deputy is the one who shot Ryan Gaynor. And it was at the family's home, again, in Apple Valley, California. Now, his was interesting. So the sheriff's department, they released, again,

they have not released a full body cam video. Now, this is a story I'm pulling up from The Guardian. During the roughly five-minute call, the woman said the other relatives were trying to keep their distance from him. At one point, she said, he's talking to my dad right now. He said he's going to run away, and then he came back to the house. She also said he had a piece of glass.

Now, in the video there, the officer comes up, and the officer actually does something that we often talked about they should. When he sees the young man, the officer actually retreats. He actually retreats. And so the story here, hold on, don't play it yet. The story here says the deputy appeared to be walking backward, then running away from the boy, pointing his gun at him. The other clip captured that same moment from another deputy who was arriving and standing at a distance. Gaynor appeared to be holding a tool. It was a gardening tool over his head, but it's unclear what he was doing as he was shot.

So if you play the video here, and we say this all the time, because I think about the young man Powell in St. Louis. Same thing. Cops arrive on the scene literally within 13 seconds of the door open. Look, he's dead. Because I think he approached him with a butter knife.

So roll a video here. So the sheriff's deputy, roll a video. Turn audio you up, please. Where is he at? Hey, get back. Get back. Get a shot. OK, right here. So all of a sudden, all of a sudden, what you. So here's what we don't know, because they haven't released the information. We don't know which officers shot him. They haven't released how many bullets were fired, where he was shot. The family says they believe he was shot

three times. So you see the officer actually retreating when normally they're firing right there. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if this is, I mean, I don't know if that's a redeeming thing. And certainly you said it is rare because

usually officers stand their ground and they just shoot. I don't know if the officer was trying to create distance. So the young man may, you know, run off some steam. I don't know what was happening. And like you said, we won't know until we see the full thing. I think what's most certainly probably going to happen is this officer will continue to be employed, and this family will have probably a difficult time with any kind of legal claim here. I think it's unfortunate that this young boy's life has been reduced to that and to this moment. I mean, this is a forever decision in a moment when this young man was clearly in distress

and having a temporary episode. It didn't seem from all accounts that this was a usual thing for him. But the officer's training is the officer's training. They always go to the thing that they know how to do, which is to use deadly force. And to your point earlier about having trained mental health professionals be deployed on these calls is something that we're still waiting to see, because in this case, this young man had maybe a stick, and I'm not suggesting that anybody wants to be hit by a stick, but it didn't appear that he had anything that might lead

Well, we heard stick and we also heard a gardening tool. A gardening tool. So we don't know if that was a shovel, if that was a rake, if that was a hoe. We don't know what that was. Right. And certainly it would hurt and certainly it could kill somebody.

But I don't think officers are trained to make those kinds of assessments. No, no. They're coming at you. You try to create distance. He's not moving. You told him to stop. He could get shot and you shoot.

And here we are with a dead 15 year old boy in a family that I'm sure is destroyed. destroy. And Matt, on that point, again, officers say, put it down or you're going to get shot. Officers retreating. You see him turning away, but apparently still pointing a gun. The other officers at a distance watching the whole thing unfold. This is this is this is I mean, this is the problem that we face. And again, this is the umpteenth story that we've done where a family has called the cops because of a mental episode of a family member and the family member ends up dead. Yeah, this case scares me. I have close family members who have autism. And what scares me about this is that in a circumstance like this, the police don't have enough time to figure out the extent of a potential threat. However, to be a credible lawyer, I have to tell you, this is much different than a lot of the other cases

that we cover, because in this circumstance, people with weapons very quickly can close distance. What I suspect happened here, which I haven't seen confirmed yet, but that the autopsy would show, is that the officer who was not the one being approached the closest with the weapon is probably the one who shot. And they'll say it's defensive third person. And frankly, I think they would likely be legally responsible or rather legally absolved. It's a very tough circumstance. But, you know, there's a much different, there's a bigger analysis than just an officer shot. When somebody is coming at you with a gardening tool that looks like a long weapon, I think Dr. Nyambi is right. It may just cause injury, but it might also cause death. And I don't think it's unreasonable for

officers to protect themselves in circumstances like this, where it's demonstrably true that somebody is coming at them with a weapon. I think the biggest issue in this case, and I've actually had two cases just like this, nobody died, but it was a mental health call. I think the bigger issue is police departments around the country, like has already been said, do not have the resources to respond and officers don't have the training to respond. And in one of my cases, that's exactly what I sued the city for. I said that, you know, that when people have mental health crises, if you send officers, you're basically heightening the possibility that someone's going to get hurt because the officers don't have the requisite

training. And that is the deprivation of rights to me in this circumstance, particularly if the dispatcher had any reason to believe that this young man was suffering from a mental health episode. That's why you send crisis intervention teams. That's why you send trained social workers to make sure that someone who is unable to control their conduct by virtue of a mental illness is not harmed because an officer is not able to read that as mental illness rather than them merely attacking them. So the bigger systemic issue here, as has already been said, is officers not accommodating or police departments not accommodating for that mental illness. And that's why in one of the cases I had like this, I brought an ADA violation because people with mental health issues are entitled to have officers accommodate those. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun?

Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st

and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way.

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

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

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. issues and that's customarily what police departments don't do in these circumstances um i i talked about uh michael the kojima powell uh story uh and this act happened shortly after uh mike brown had been killed uh in uh ferguson go to my ipad and iPad and you'll see. And this is this is this is what I see. I love these yahoos on who we're following here on our YouTube chat who don't understand. We do these stories all the time. We've broken down numerous videos. So when I talked about the case of the officer in the Ryan Gaynor retreating because he because and again normally the cops would not retreat normally they would

that cop would have stood right there and the moment he walked out of that doorway and he yelled stop put the weapon down i'm gonna shoot they would have fired so i am i am crediting the cop for walking away uh yelling him what to do but the the Kojima Powell story is a perfect example. This is the video here. You see right here. This is the moment just before he comes on, and literally, they step out of the cars. They're not behind the door.

He's got some butter knife or some kind of steak knife in his hand. Now, this is the BBC video. They didn't show it, but literally, he's got some butter knife or some kind of steak knife in his hand. Now, this is the BBC video. They didn't show it, but literally he sort of makes a lunging moment. He wasn't actually up on the cop. Right. The law says they can use deadly force. I criticize this because the officers could have waited behind the behind the vehicle behind the doors creating some distance when the call was made they talked about it was a mental issue and just like in this case right here so i now wonder okay what information was passed on from a 911 dispatcher

to the cops on the scene did they say, domestic situation, young man attacking family members, or were they told that, hey, autistic kid, having a mental breakdown, any of that? And this is the part of the problem here when you are not passing that information down so a cop, if they don't have that, they get onto the scene. They are assessing danger immediately and they are trained to eliminate the danger and then figure out what happened. That's just a fact. Yeah. A few things here.

And I'm looking at the article from the VVNG dot com. from vvng.com. Number one, now with this particular sheriff's department, I don't know if they have mental health professionals that are dispatched. I know here in the city of Detroit, we do have that. And we also in the city of Detroit have police officers who are trained to deal with mental health issues, okay, number one. Number two, in looking at the information that the sheriff's department released, the news released about the information given to the dispatcher, they were told that the 15-year-old was actively assaulting family members and damaging property at the residence.

Number three, according to this article, he had an approximately five-foot-long garden tool with a sharp-bladed end. So, yes, it can do damage to the police officer. Yes, I think the police officer was correct in retreating, giving commands. This didn't seem like a situation from what we've seen so far where he was quick on the trigger, quick to shoot, and the 15-year-old unfortunately was coming towards him. So we should get all of the footage, we should get more details, but this looks a lot different than some other ones that we have seen and talked about here on this show where it looked

like an execution. This looked different than that. Mia, I talked about the case out of Dallas, Jason Harrison, same thing. And again, for all the people who are watching, listening, understand, we have done a lot of these stories and we've seen a lot of this video. This here was the Harrison video. And it gives you an understanding of how cops operate differently. The cops

come to the door. Come on, guys. Come on. Cops come to the door, and his mother calls. Hey, son's operating erratic. Pull the volume up. What's going on? They open the door. Mother says, I can't control them.

Who's that? What's going on? Drop that for me, guy. Drop it! Drop it! Oh, I can't look down! That right there, me, is a problem. And again, these officers

were cleared. They got stun guns. He's got a screwdriver in his hand. He's not lunging at them. They don't retreat. They tell him, hey, drop that. They know it's a mental disturbance call. The man has schizophrenia. His mother says it. She's walking out. She's right there. In 30 seconds of the door, of them knocking and the door opening, he's dead. And so this is the struggle that you cannot continue to have mental health breakdowns. And we're sending cops and we're not sending trained mental health professionals first. Yeah.

Or with them. Yeah. You know, I think all of these, the fact that we continuously see the same pattern over and over again, you know, I think that it just shows that we have a failed system right now. It shows that we know what the problem is, and we are unwilling to actually address specific issues. You know, I think that we need to stop the situation even before we get to this point. You know, I think a lot of these individuals

get to these crisis points. We already know that they're heading towards these crisis points, yet they have no outlet to receive care, which is why it's so important that we push for, you know, long-term solutions, things like putting more money into the mental health system, creating more parity in terms of insurance and Medicaid reimbursement rates, et cetera, because, you know, no matter what we do, I don't think any amount of training will stop what we are seeing right now. No, because police officers, it is their training. Matt, you often talk about it, but folks who don't know, just walk people through, one, frankly, what their training is and how the law allows for them to use force, deadly force, when dealing with one of these situations? So, you know, I don't know all the training that every officer gets,

but what I've very often seen them say is that a person can close distance of about 20 feet if they have a weapon. So I think some of the common training, and anybody who's a police officer can correct me if I'm wrong, but they're trained that if somebody is within that 20-foot distance, if they're going to deploy the weapon, number one, they do so until they think the threat is immobilized. And from the legal standpoint, one of the questions that we always have posed and that we always discuss is the difference between civil remedies and criminal penalties for the use of force. And obviously officers are statutorily or legally given the right to use force.

So where they think that force is appropriate, whether it's for defending themselves or defending a third person, as I mentioned, they can use deadly force where they think it is appropriate. Now, from the civil standpoint, the question is always whether that force is excessive, whether it was appropriate, whether an officer, you know, looking at it on the scene rather than with the hindsight of 2020 vision, so to speak, would do the same thing. That's the question from a civil standpoint. Criminally, I think it would be very hard to charge these officers because the video shows very clearly there was a threat coming to them, and that's just demonstrably true. The civil question of whether the police department

should have had an appropriate response that responded to the mental health crisis is a different question. And that's where I think the due process of law issue comes up for the family. But in the relation of force and excessive force, I think this is going to be a difficult lawsuit. And I cannot imagine there will be a criminal prosecution because the video very clearly shows that when they got there, they were approached by someone with a weapon that could do serious damage. And just frankly, their training says shoot till you immobilize the threat. Yep. Folks, this is from August 2023. A story from the

Associated Press. Many big cities now answer mental health crisis calls with civilian teams, not police. And inside of the story, it talks about, let me pull it up here in one second, data gathered by the Associated Press show at least 14 of the 20 most populous U.S. cities are hosting or starting such programs, sometimes called civilian alternative or non-police response teams. They span from New York and Los Angeles to Columbus, Ohio and Houston. They boast annual budgets that together topped $123 million as of June. And Tamara Lynn of the National De-escalating Training Center said, quote, if someone is experiencing a mental health crisis, law enforcement is not what they need. In Colorado, this was a result of a case of this young man shot and killed, Christian Glass, as you see right here.

As part of the $19 million settlement this spring with his parents, Colorado's Clear Creek County joined a growing roster of U.S. communities that respond to nonviolent mental health crises with clinicians and EMTs or paramedics instead of police. So, Mia, that really has to be the focus. If we're talking about how do we deal with this here, we've got to be advocating all across the country for cities to set aside money to have mental health professionals responding to mental health calls and not the police at the outset. Yeah, I think that's one of the solutions. But I also do think that we need to pay more attention to the back end, including more money towards wraparound services for individuals with mental health care. I think it's essential that we address the issue before it becomes a crisis, because then, you know, there's still, police are still sent to any situation that

could be suspected as violent. And, you know, a situation with somebody with, say, a wrench in their hand, you know, it just depends. Sort of, do you think that's a clear threat or not? And so I really want to emphasize the importance of wraparound services like critical time intervention, like, you know, the act services, et cetera, that, that, that provide case management. It provides medication management and it provides mental health support. All right. I mean, we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Folks, we're going to break. We'll be right back. Roland Mark Dunn filtered on the black star network. Back in a moment. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time,

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

comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad.

It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1 Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get

your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English.

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

winner. It's just a compassionate choice to allow players all reasonable means to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is.

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

It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. hatred on the streets a horrific scene a white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence white people are losing their damn minds there's an angry pro-trump mob storm to the u.s capital we're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting.

I think what we're seeing is the inevitable result of violent denial. This is part of American history. Every time that people of color have made progress, whether real or symbolic, there has been what Carol Anderson at Emory University calls white rage as a backlash. This is the rise of the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys. America, there's going to be more of this. Here's all the Proud Boys guys.

This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources, they're taking our women. This is white fear. Субтитры подогнал «Симон» Hey, what's up? It's Tammy Roman. Hey, it's John Murray, the executive producer of the new Sherri Shepherd Talk Show. It's me, Sherri Shepherd, and you know what you're watching, Roland Martin Unf Filthy. Six Massachusetts middle school students are facing criminal charges for their alleged role in a racist bullying incident

that included threats and a mock slave auction. Hmm. The investigation revealed that several eighth-grade students from Southwick Regional School were on Snapchat making hateful and racist comments, including notions of violence towards people of color, racial slurs, two with interference with civil rights, and one with witness interference. Because the cases will be prosecuted in juvenile court,

many details about the suspects and the allegations cannot be publicized. I must say, Michael, listen, I keep telling people, the beauty of social media, folk going to tell on themselves. Yeah, folk, people will tell on themselves. People will brag about it. People will distribute the information and then go to school and talk about what they put on social media. So it's good that these six juveniles, these teens, were caught and charged with racial bullying. But the question that I would ask, and I've seen numerous stories like this over the past few years,

the question I would ask is, one, what made them think that this was permissible? What made them think that this was acceptable behavior, number one? And two, where did they learn this? What was their rearing? I'm not blaming it on their parents, but I'm just wondering, you know, how were they brought up? Okay. How were they reared? And lastly, these people, these children who were, these youth who were targeted, they would probably

need some type of counseling also. Okay. So I'm glad this is caught, but this is one of the reasons why the history of African-Americans has to be taught in every school across the country, because largely the way you treat people is based upon what you've been taught and what you read about them. So I'm glad this has been exposed. Listen, this is this is real all across this country, Naomi. And we see it, whether we talk about elementary school, junior high, high school, college, it don't matter. Yeah. And to Michael's point, I mean, these are these this notion that this generation is somehow more progressive on race than previous generations. I think we have to throw it out the window because what people forget is that people who have these kinds of perspectives went on to have children and their children have children. So these young people ideas, I don't think, came out in a vacuum.

And I'm not I agree with Michael, I'm not blaming the parents, but I think this is a larger commentary about our country. And young people are not exempt from these attitudes and these ideas that we think belong to yesteryear or to a previous generation. They are just as much susceptible to these kind of notions of an anti-Blackness. And the willingness to now put this on the internet, I think is probably the difference that we've seen. And not only to put it on the internet, but to torture their colleagues virtually, as well as potentially in person, I think is also just a different moment or speaks to the different moment that we're in with the prevalence of social media and the ways that the internet and these different platforms can be used to further harm our children. Absolutely.

Matt? Well, you know, I tell people all the time who I represent, be very careful what you put on social media. I mean, it's good that these teens were caught before they did something. And I do think that there is a conversation we can have about not only the First Amendment, but about where a threat truly begins and where poor decision making and poor commentary, you know, ends. I'm not in any way saying these kids should be defended for what they said. But I will tell you, this does kind of

concern me because there are a lot of young black kids who could put something in a Snapchat that they don't think is as problematic. They should have known here, obviously. And they end up getting prosecuted or having issues. And I've seen that happen a lot of times in the school context. So I say that to say what parents should take from this is be very, very careful and very instructive with your children about what they put into the online space. These kids here deserved it, it sounds like. But there are kids who have been prosecuted and who have gotten caught up on things that they did not think were as serious as what they put. So with my 13-year-old, you know, I'm very hard on him about what he texts and what he puts anywhere into the public space, because this can obviously bring you criminal responsibility for it. And I think a lot

of our kids don't recognize sometimes the things that they say can be taken as threats. However, here in this circumstance, it sounds like they have pretty good evidence that these kids were actually planning to do something. And I'm glad they caught them before they did it, because this is actually a huge issue with young people these days. A lot of times they're making threats to schools and to other kids on Instagram and other social media platforms. And we have to make sure we're vigilant to protect our kids and make sure that, you know, we see something like this and we stop it before it actually becomes physically harmful. Yeah. And people just have to understand that some people go, well, you know, these just kids being kids,

not when you're now dealing with school shootings. You just can't excuse it that way. I think a lot of us manage to be just kids and never do stuff like this to people on the internet or otherwise. So I don't think that that's going to hold. You know, kids get into lots of things, but I don't think that that's going to hold, you know, kids get into lots of things, but I don't. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time.

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

dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back.

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

to care for themselves. Music stars Marcus King, John Osborne from Brothers Osborne. We have this misunderstanding of what this quote-unquote drug thing is. Benny the Butcher. Brent Smith from Shinedown. We got B-Real from Cypress Hill.

NHL enforcer Riley Cote. Marine Corvette. MMA fighter Liz Karamush. What we're doing now isn't working, and we need to change things. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. really does It makes it real

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season 2 On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content Subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I think this is in the realm of what we should normalize as young people's behavior. I think many of us have went through our whole lives and never done things like this to anyone.

Oh, absolutely. Go ahead, Michael. Yeah, and when you bring social media into it, you know, 20, 30, 40 years ago, it was totally different. But when you bring social media into it, it operates 24 hours a day. If you were bullied at school, you could go home. You were pretty safe. But here they can put things on social media and other people in your school see it.

So when you go back to school the next day, you're antagonized, they can show the video, spread the videos around from cell phone to cell phone to cell phone, it's totally different today. So you have to take a different approach to how you come out of this. Absolutely, absolutely. You know what, I just saw this here.

Kathleen Parker, who's with the Washington Post, wrote this column today. And when these people just going to realize that these ideas are stupid? This is the headline of her piece. For the country's sake, Vice President Harris should step aside. Kathleen Parker, for me,

ain't the brightest bulb in the dark room. But at some point, DeAmbi, when are these dumbasses going to realize one, she ain't going nowhere. Biden ain't going nowhere. She ain't going nowhere.

And if the Democrats tried to replace Kamala Harris, they are guaranteeing they gonna lose in November. I just think these columns and these discussions are literally some of the dumbest

stuff I've ever heard. Well, listen, I just think it's just so cavalier how people feel like they can just tell a black woman what she ought to do, that she should not aspire to be anything. She shouldn't have ambition. She should step aside. Because certainly the same thing was said to her when they were running the first time, that she shouldn't be the pick, that she should, you know, go to be a Supreme Court justice, do something else, don't do this. And so I think this is just the latest in a litany of efforts to try to tell this woman, this Black woman, what she ought to be doing. And listen, these people might as well just kick rocks with open-toed shoes, because she's not doing any of the above.

And I think, as you said, Roland, what would this mean for the Democratic Party when you talk about black women and their voter turnout? Even the ones who might not be wild about Kamala Harris would definitely read this in all the negative light, and they would get all the smoke come November from black women in particular

for trying this move. This is ridiculous. And this is what I just really crack up here, Michael and Matt, go to my iPad. This is ridiculous. And this is what I just really crack up here, Michael and Matt. Go to my iPad. This is what she actually puts in the lead. The Democratic Party's indulgence of identity politics has proved successful in building a diverse organization, but its strategy of courting and pandering to minority voters

is the road to ruin. So she goes, In 2020, Joe Biden promised to tap a woman as his vice president, along with Representative James E. Clyburn's election-altering endorsement in South Carolina paved Biden's way to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. His history-making selection of the telegenic Kamala D. Harris might prove to be his downfall in 2024, and he has enough fall-downs to make voters worry.

Harris' resume was impressive. A former California Attorney General, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but her evolving beliefs undercut that appeal, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Here's what I just, I find to be real funny, Michael. They put identity politics in the cover. I'm sorry.

Raise your hand if you were around for the 2008 presidential election. Do y'all recall how many people said Obama needed to pick a white guy? Does anybody remember when they said Obama needed to pick a white guy? Does anybody remember when they said Obama needed to pick a white man who could talk to white folks in a rust belt? Do y'all remember when they said Obama should pick a white man with foreign policy experience because he didn't have any? And he picked Joe Biden.

See, I love it when white people like Kathleen Parker act like identity politics ain't never happened with white people. It happens all the time. Whiteness is an identity, and whiteness has always been

in identity politics. Yeah. Yes, it has, Roland. You know, Roland, this goes back to the conversation we had back on Friday, February 23rd, when you interviewed Jennifer Rubin about her op-ed in The Washington Post dealing with Kamala Harris being an asset, undervalued or underused asset to President Biden. And we talked about the accomplishments of Vice President Kamala Harris, whether it's the having tie-breaking—having a record number of tie-breaking votes, presiding over the Senate, whether it's getting the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan passed,

because if it had not been for her tie-breaking vote in the Senate, it would not have passed, or her tie-breaking vote when it came to passing the Inflation Reduction Act that no Republicans in the Senate voted for, or presiding over the first-ever Office of Gun Violence Reduction, etc. So we talked about in that segment how people fear her becoming president in 2028. People fear that. They see her as a threat. So they're writing all these hit pieces on her, and these hit pieces, these BS hit pieces, continue.

So, you know, I'm not that—I've probably read stuff about Kathleen Parker in the past, because I read The Washington Post every day. But you're going to continue to have these unqualified white people putting this nonsense out against Vice President Kamala Harris. So we need to fight back and vote for Biden-Harris in 2024, crush the MAGA Republicans, crush Donald Trump, and continue to fight for policies that are good for African Americans

and policies that are good for African Americans and good for America in general. And this is the thing that I crack up here, Matt. She goes, Harris ended her campaign in December 2019 citing a lack of financial resources. Next thing we knew, she was moving to the Naval Observatory. She was a colossal failure as

border czar, a position she held briefly and otherwise seemed to have gone undercover. Kathleen, are you that dumb? Are you that dumb? She writes, whatever the reasons, it has seemed that Harris' role was to be quiet, lest she embarrass her boss with her sometimes inane rambling remarks and a laugh that erupts from nowhere about nothing obvious to others. I do, however, relish the thought of her face-to-face with Vladimir Putin and suddenly cackling at a linchpin moment during nuclear arms discussions.

Now, so let me go ahead and unpack this. First of all, this is an insulting and revolting column from a rather unremarkable white woman. Let's just be clear. Kathleen, do you remember, because I was there, When CNN picked you and Elliot Spitzer to host a show that was one of the most awful shows I have ever witnessed. And that decision led

to CNN firing John Klein as president of CNN US. You were horrible. Like, not kind of horrible. You absolutely horrible. Like, not kind of horrible. You absolutely sucked. Two, you have to suck as a columnist because for you to suggest that she's been quiet is interesting because she was literally just overseas meeting with foreign leaders. She's traveled the world, has been engaged in public policy.

See, this is what happens, Matt, and this is how mainstream media works. So what they do is they establish a narrative and it's, oh, she's awful. She's been doing nothing. She's been quiet. I've even heard some black people with media platforms parrot this. Oh, they've been hiding her. Well, damn it. They've been hiding her.

They've been doing an awful job of hiding her. And second, here's the other deal. Don't nobody pay attention to the vice president. Obama never put Biden out as much as he does Harris. This is the crap that you keep seeing because it is all about how do we keep tearing her down and to what Michael said, continue to reinforce the narrative that she's awful. And so what do you see right here? She writes in here, oh, every honest person knows he's not in top form. A recent New York Times poll found that 73% of registered voters believe Biden is too

old and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then she goes, oh, at the start of Biden's term, I was pulling for Harris to do well. She had pizzazz and a reputation for being a tough prosecutor. She had moxie and swagger, and she leaned centrist. There was reason for hope, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and all this sort of nonsense. Her performance as second in command has been disappointing. You say the least Americans have taken note. No, Kathleen. They've taken note because people like you keep writing the bullshit lies, and it creates a narrative that she's been missing in action and she's horrible when again. Oh, let's see. Biden under Obama.

First of all, what the hell did Mike Pence do under Trump? What the hell? OK, Cheney, we know the kind of power he had because Bush was portrayed as being stupid. What the hell? Do anybody remember? Really, the only thing that I can remember

that Al Gore did as Clinton's vice president was go on David Letterman's show and bust an ashtray to show how government was running inefficiently. Let's see here. I have no idea what the hell Dan Quayle did.

I do not remember what the hell George H.W. Bush did in eight years under Reagan. Anybody can remember? Okay. Who the hell was Carter's vice president? Oh, damn, that's right. That was Mondale. Let's go before that.

Who the hell was Nixon's vice president? Ford. Spiro T. Agnew. Well, we know he was there because he got indicted. Ford, Spiro T. Agnew, he, we know he resigned because he got indicted. Ford, Spiro T. Agnew, he got indicted. Okay, go before that. Who's LBJ's vice president? Was it Humphrey?

Yeah, I think it was Humphrey. Can anybody cite for me the accomplishments of Hubert Humphrey as vice president? Before that, here you had LBJ, who was a Senate majority leader, and JFK didn't call upon him at all. Okay, before that, who the hell was Eisenhower's vice president? Nixon. What did he do you can't remember before that who was Truman's vice president I don't even remember Barclay Hold on. Y'all, I'm being straight. Harry Truman's Harry

Truman's VP. Oh, I am not lying, y'all. I did not know who the hell this is. His name was Alvin William Barkley. I literally, this is no lie.

Matt Laver, I'm not, y'all, I'm not lying. I know, I literally did not know who the hell Harry Truman's vice president was. Okay, before Truman, FDR, Truman was FDR's vice president. That's how Truman became president when FDR died. FDR died. People don't pay attention to the vice president. This is how dumb all of this is, Matt. They somehow want to act like that Vice President Kamala Harris is just so, oh my

God, in the history of Vice Presidents, she's so awful. Vice Presidents have one job. To sit there and hope nothing happens to the President.

And preside over the Senate. Okay, fine. Preside over the Senate, but I'm just being But they don't even preside over the Senate. Okay, fine. Preside over the Senate, but I'm just being But they don't even preside over the Senate. Well, yeah, you know. No, they don't. Cast tie-breaking votes in the Senate. That's it. So the VP don't preside over the Senate. Preside

over the Senate means she pack a lunch and go to the Senate every day and preside. No, she doesn't. She only goes to the Senate every day and present? No, she doesn't. She only goes to the Senate when it's time to break a vote. That's it. That's the job of the vice president. But this is what they do, and this, Matt, I believe,

is why the polling numbers are what they are, because of nonsensical columns like what Kathleen Parker has written. Go ahead. The goalpost always moves when it's a black person kicking the field goal. We know that. That has been shown to us since time immemorial. We see it in every iteration of any conversation about a black person. I mean, even in this very broadcast, look back to Fannie Willis

and the scrutiny that she got being a black woman in that position. We know this to be true. And what I thought was particularly problematic about the snippets you showed is words matter. I mean, she tried to reduce Vice President Harris to, quote, being telegenic, which means she looks good on TV. Not that she was in the Senate, not that she was the attorney general of the largest state in the country, not that she was known to be an intrepid prosecutor, not any of the things that even if people don't like her, they can't say objectively qualified her for this position. But instead, she's, quote, telegenic and her, quote, ramblings are inane. Those are the kinds of things you say when you want clickbait, not when you're doing an actual appraisal of a job that doesn't really have any kind of job description. That's what makes this so problematic. It's a

hit piece because you're attacking a person for apparently not meeting the metrics of a job where there are no metrics. So how do you say you're failing at something where we have no rubric upon which to determine whether you're failing? That is because you don't like the person in the post, and that's because you want to attack her as a woman, as a Black woman. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them.

From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion-dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way.

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

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And as someone who is a part of this administration, so I think you've already covered it very robustly, but this is what we know to be the case. The goalposts always move when a black person is kicking the field goal. So let me just close this out very simply with this right here. To Kathleen Parker, And that closes out very simply with this right here. To Kathleen Parker, you have the audacity

to talk about identity politics. That's what you are. You're a white woman who's a columnist with The Post who literally isn't interesting. You were a failure on television that's you you were awful and your column is equally awful and I'm still trying to figure out who the hell Albin Barkley is all right I'll be right back roller mark unfiltered on the Blackshot Network.

I need you to scream for your new beginning. Five, four, three, two, one. Five, four, three, two, one. I need you to shout for it. I need you to shout for it. It won't always be like this. Sooner or later, it's going to work in your brother's favor, in your sister's favor. They shall not die. They shall not die.

They shall not die. They shall not die. I want you to embrace somebody and tell them welcome to the greatest season of your life. Help somebody. Welcome. Hey, what's up, y'all? I'm Devon Franklin. It is always a pleasure to be in the house. You are watching Roland Martin Unfiltered.

Stay right here. There's always some great political ads that different people put together on social media. Man, I saw a couple. I do believe, oh my goodness, Democrats should be running this in every battleground state. This is a great one. Watch. Another member of Congress resigned today. So now I'll be told, Chip, we only have a one seat majority or two seats. I don't even know what it is anymore. Let me ask you a question. Does it matter? In 2018, we had the House, we had the Senate,

we had the White House, and we had a bigger majority than we have today. And we utterly failed to secure the border. Totally dropped the ball. Didn't do it. We have nothing. In my opinion, we have nothing to go out there and campaign on, Chris. It's embarrassing. Right? Well, I know the Republican Party, the Republican Party in the Congress of the Majority has zero accomplishments. Now, of course, this place just keeps going downhill.

And I don't need to spend my time here. We've taken impeachment and we've made it a social media issue as opposed to a constitutional concept. Mike Johnson's ability to talk me into staying here is going to be about as successful as his ability to talk me into unconstitutional impeachments. Republican voters across the country are sick and tired of Republicans because they never do anything. I can't blame Joe Biden or the Democrats for why the Republican-controlled House of Representatives hasn't passed single-subject spending bills.

One thing I want my Republican colleagues to give me, one thing, one, that I can go campaign on and say we did. One. 2024 is Donald Trump. If he's the candidate is very scary. A few moments later. Joe Biden had the largest public investment in social infrastructure and environmental programs that is actually finishing what FDR started that LBJ expanded on.

And Joe Biden is attempting to complete programs to address education, medical care, urban problems, rural poverty, transportation, Medicare, Medicaid, labor unions, and he still is working on it. I'm Joe Biden, and I approve this message. Damn. Hey, that don't sound bad, Michael. Appreciate that, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Yeah, that's probably the truest word she has ever spoken since she's been in Congress. OK, Chip Roy. You got to love a white supremacist like Chip Roy. He stood up there on the House floor, told the truth. This is the same guy who voted against the Emmett Till anti-lynching bill, just so everybody understands, in the House of

Representatives. And he said they cannot pass a budget. They still haven't been able to pass a budget, which they are constitutionally mandated to do, Article 1, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution. But, yeah, they haven't—in 2023, Republicans in control of the House, they only passed 27 bills, OK? That's probably about the fewest bills passed since the 1930s during the Great Depression. So they don't have a record to run on. They're just going to run on migrants crossing the border and they killed the immigration bill. Okay. And they're going to run on targeting Detroit, Atlanta, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and one other black majority city. Okay. And say they're trying to steal the election. This is what they're going to run on. I love that. Damn it. Joe Biden is trying to get health care. He's trying to get

he's trying to get you know, he's trying to help the urban urban areas in the rural areas. He's trying to he's trying to deal with education. Damn it. What's wrong with him? I mean, this is the same logic that they are using to oppose the expansion of the earned income tax credit. He's actually doing things that people want, that Americans are urging him to do, the things that people actually need. So, I mean, I love a little self-owned moment. I don't know that Republicans ever really think about how crazy they sound when they say things like Joe Biden is expanding spending on infrastructure and investing in actual citizens, because that's what the president is supposed to do.

That's what they're actually there to do. But instead, they want to obstruct, obstruct, obstruct. And so I'm with you. I think this is the best ad that he could run, because Republicans are telling on themselves yet again that they are a do-nothing group of people whose only job is to expand misery and not actually come up with any real solutions to anything. I just thought that was

just hilarious. I say run. Let that video roll, Matt. Matt, you there? All right. Matt's video is freezing on itself. Matt, did it unfreeze? He's still frozen. All right, folks, that was it. You know what? I'm going to go out on this one here.

The folks at Vote Vets, I thought, put out a great ad, too. So I'm going to go ahead and play this and we're going to close the show out with this ad here. So, y'all, check this out. You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One's country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty. All of you were willing to fight tyranny, and you knew the people of your countries were behind you. These are the things that shaped the unity of the allies. We in America have learned bitter lessons from two world wars. It is better to be here ready to protect the peace

than to take blind shelter across the sea, rushing to respond only after freedom is lost. We've learned that isolationism never was and never will be an acceptable response to tyrannical governments with an expansionist intent the strength of america's allies is vital to the united states and the american security guarantee is essential to the continued freedom of europe's democracies we were with you then we're with you now hey hit him square between the eyes.

All right, folks, that's it. Neon B. Michael, Matt, I appreciate y'all being with me. Folks, I was supposed to be in L.A., but, of course, my United flight, mechanical issue, so it was delayed and it was canceled. So I'm on the 10-15 flight tonight. So I'm about to bounce out of here, get to the airport. And so I'll be broadcasting Monday and Tuesday from Los Angeles. Support us in what we do, y'all.

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Y'all take care. Have a great weekend. And check out social media for all of my posts about the Image Awards. I'm out. Holla! Thank you. Thank you. this is an iHeart podcast