#RolandMartinUnfiltered - Trump’s Guard Move Ruled Illegal, Jeffries Slams Gerrymandering, Entrepreneurship, Whiff & Nibble

Episode Date: September 3, 2025

9.2.2025 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: Trump’s Guard Move Ruled Illegal, Jeffries Slams Gerrymandering, Entrepreneurship, Whiff & Nibble A federal judge says, Trump's deployment of National Guard troops in California broke the law, violating a 19th-century ban on using the military for domestic policing.... Retired Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honoré will weigh in on what this means to Trump's threats to send troops into Chicago. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is calling out MAGA Republicans for gerrymandering voting maps across the country. You'll hear directly from him on what's really at stake for our democracy.We're talking about what it truly takes to be an entrepreneur. I'll be talking to an expert about how to avoid the pitfalls of entrepreneurship. And in our Shop Black Star Network Marketplace segment, we'll talk to the founder of Whiff and Nibble.  A company that brings you food-themed gifts that smell as good as they look.#BlackStarNetwork partner: Fanbasehttps://www.startengine.com/offering/fanbaseThis Reg A+ offering is made available through StartEngine Primary, LLC, member FINRA/SIPC.  This investment is speculative, illiquid, and involves a high degree of risk, including the possible loss of your entire investment. You should read the Offering Circular (https://bit.ly/3VDPKjD) and Risks (https://bit.ly/3ZQzHl0) related to this offering before investing.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.

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A California judge says Donald Trump broke the law, no shot there. In sending troops to Los Angeles down, he is threatening to send federal troops to Chicago. Illinois Governor Jamie Britsker said, Wayne Habitat, my state will talk to retired General Russell Honor Ray about this whole back and forth. Also, House Democratic Leader Hakeempery, calls out MAGA Republicans for their racist gerrymandering across the country. Plus, a lot of discussion about what's happening with the businesses of Pinky Cole and Sluddy vegan, as well as Fawn Weber and Uncle Nearest.

We'll talk to an expert on investing in companies to really give us a clear understanding of what is happening with these Black-owned businesses. is also in our shop, Blackstar Network Marketplace segment. We'll talk to the founder of Whiff and Nipple, a company that brings you food-themed gifts that smell as good as they look. Plus, the great basketball legend, Joy Ravling, has passed away.

And wait until I tell you about his unique tie to Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and his I Have a Dream speech, other Marcher in Washington, which I was in Freedom. folks is down to bring the balk on rolling martin filchin on the black star network let's go he's got whatever the miss he's on it whatever it is he's got the scoop the fat 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

Yeah, yeah. It's rolling Martin, yeah. Rolling with rolling now. Yeah. He's bonk, he's fresh, he's real the best you know he's rolling Martel now. Our federal judge says the twice impeached The twice impeached criminally convicted felon in chief Donald the Con Trump broke the law

in sending National Guard troops to Los Angeles. Yeah, that's right. Judge Charles Breyer said the Trump's order of the send a descendant. thousands of troops, including 700 Marines, broke the Posse Comitatis Act, he said, was willfully violated that particular act, which is a federal law that prohibits U.S. military forces from enforcing domestic laws. The federal judge rejected the Department of Justice argument the deployment was necessary to protect federal property and personnel, emphasizing that the Posse Comitatis Act prohibits

the president from using the military as a domestic police force without congressional approval. Now, while this is going on, Trump, of course, continues to see the same thing in Washington, D.C. You got Mayor Muriel Bowser said she has no problem with these federal law enforcement officers being in National Guard, being in D.C. indefinitely. Now, Illinois, that's a whole different conversation. Illinois Governor Jimmy Pritzker blasted Donald Trump today when it comes to what they say is good information that he plans. on sending federal troops there. And, in fact, at an Oval Office to do his conference, Trump said point blank, he was going to send troops to Chicago.

He would not say when. Well, we're going in. I didn't say when. What the con man said today in the Oval Office. What we're going in? Well, we're going in. I didn't say when, we're going in. When you lose, look, I have an obligation.

This isn't a political thing. I have an obligation. When we lose, when 20 people are killed over the last two and a half weeks, and 75 are shot with bullets. So let me tell you a little story about a place called D.C. District of Columbia, right here where we are, it's now a safe zone. We have no crime. We have, it's in such great shape. You can go and actually walk with your children, your wife, your husband.

You can walk right down the middle of the street. You're not going to be shot, Peter. You're safe. Everyone likes you anyway. They probably wouldn't do it. But it's so dangerous. And there are people in this audience that have you suffered greatly. There are people in this audience that have been mugged and hurt badly.

And they don't want to talk about it. Maybe you were very brave in talking about it. You made quite an impression on a lot of people. I appreciate it. But there were other people in this room that had been hurt very badly, just walking down the street in D.C. Washington, D.C. is a... All right. All right.

Here's Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker speaking today. I'd like to ask a question of my own. And it's one the press should be asking as well. When did we become a country where it's okay for the U.S. president to insist on national television that a state should call him to beg for anything, especially something we don't want. Have we truly lost all sense of sanity in this nation that we treat this as normal?

In the coming days, we expect to see what has played out in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., to happen here in Chicago. First, Donald Trump is positioning armed federal agents and staging military vehicles on federal property, such as the Great Lakes Naval Base. It is likely those agents will be with ICE, Customs, and Border Patrol, the Department of Homeland Security, and other similarly situated federal agencies.

Many of these individuals are being relocated from Los Angeles for deployment in Chicago. We believe that staging that has already begun started, yesterday and continues into today. Second, unidentifiable agents in unmarked vehicles with masks are planning to raid Latino communities and say they're targeting violent criminals. As we saw in Los Angeles, a very, very small percentage of the individuals they will target will be violent criminals. Instead, you're likely to see videos of them hauling away mothers and fathers traveling to work or picking up their kids from school. Sometimes they will detain handcuff and haul away children.

Folks, joining us right now as Retire Latino, General Russell Honor, Ray. Glad to see you, Doc. Let's get right into it. First and foremost, what do you make of the use of the National Guard, as a pawn by Donald Trump to for D.C. Now he's threatened in Chicago.

He's threatening of Los Angeles. Of course, the Jim's ruling is Los Angeles. What do you make of this? Well, I think a lot of it is performative. I do look at D.C. is different than Chicago because they're federal control with the Home Rule Act and the president as the authority

to basically take O.D.C. government, if that's what he and the Congress decide to do. That being said, D.C. has a good police department. It's on the man, and it has a good mayor. And a billion dollars was cut out of his budget this year to maintain D.C. law and order and infrastructure. So we've got a dilemma going on there. I think when the president speak about crime,

he also talked about deportation is an underlying fact and they picked out a lot of people and deported them out of D.C. And looking at the situation that the mayor is in and there was a crime problem and is a crime problem

in most of our large metropolitan areas but it wasn't an emergency to a point where the city was dysfunctional because that is the capital of the United States. the federal agencies shouldn't have taken an invitation or an order from the president to go in

and help the mayor of D.C. clean up the crime on the street, the street crime. But it shouldn't have taken a request from the mayor to say, hey, you've got to give me more judges. The judges are busy, and we can't get the courts to work, effectively, to try those people. But we're in a dilemma here, Roland. when it comes to crime.

Crime is a problem. We know the cities, and they are all not blue cities led by Democratic governors, about mayors. We have the same problems here in the south, from Jackson to Shreveport, to Monroe, to Baton Rouge. But the hard thing to defend we've got to work on

is over the weekend, there was seven killed and 54 shot, 507 shot in Chicago. this weekend. That opens the door up for the president to say, I'm going there after crime, but what he's really going to do is run a deportation operation, Roland. Well, to that particular point, Governor Pritzker, in the same news conference, said they have good information that Trump plant. So Chicago has a massive Mexican Independence Day celebration. We've been, I lived there six years, we've been there, and let me tell you something.

I mean, it's backed up for miles, downtown is packed, you know, up with some, you know, half a million and a million folks. So they say that they have information that Trump plans on having federal authorities raiding folks who will be picnicking on that particular day, which is September 16th. He's called that cruel. He's called that shameful. And he said it is all about to instill fear and intimidation in the lives of Mexican Americans. It's a deportation operation underscored with a focus on crime. Look, I was in Chicago in 2013. Ron Emmanuel was the mayor, President Obama was in the White House.

And I was in the community of Englewood. You know where that is, Roy? Of course. In Chicago, Englewood. So I'm hanging around in Englewood for a couple days. Going to high schools, talking leadership and preparedness and inspired, trying to encourage young people to do the right thing. And the people in Englewood were terrified with about a crime they had to deal with.

And they weren't enough police to do with it. I actually recommend it to demand. to the mayor and the governor in 2013, if you have to get a hold of the street, mobilize your National Guard. That's why you got the governor

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John Fogarty, Lil Wayne, L.L. Cool J., Mariah Carey, Maroon 5, Sammy Hagar, Tate McCrae, The Offsprin, Tim McGraw. Tickets are on sale now at AXS.com. Get your tickets today. AXS.com. Now, now, now, now. Yeah. But here's a deal. First of all, I remember that because I actually wrote a column that was in the JCP's. I quoted you in. We talked about that very thing. But this is the difference, though, that I think that when we talked about that then. Because what I wrote was, I said, I said, the mayor has to be the one to make the request for additional state police support or National Guard to the governor. And then, as opposed to Trump unilarily deciding, based upon with no intel, no evidence, no nothing, I'm just going to do this willy-nilly. That's the difference here.

Exactly, Roland. And that's the point that's getting to. This was what they needed to do to get a whole of crime, the street crime, much of it being perpetrated by young people of color. Let me just leave it at that. Black-on-black crime. Yeah, but also a big part of this is also dealing with the reality of the massive amount of guns, gun, yeah, guns coming out of Indiana.

The folks there on the ground, and the police have repeatedly said that 90% are coming right out of Indiana. That come from Indiana. Yeah, come from Indiana. Listen to me, Roland. We could have dealt with this. We had Obama in the White House. We owned at least one or two legislative branches. We owned the Attorney General.

We didn't do Jack about that. We didn't do Jack about it. And that was a missed opportunity. We got to deal with crime and we got to do with the root cause of crime. Kids dropping out of school, getting into contraband economy. That has to be fixed. And you can do something about that. I was working with the Children's Defense Fund.

And they said, if you're not reading that fourth grade level by the time you're 10 years old, you've got a 50% chance to have a run in with the law by the time you're 14. We got to go after that And we've got to be resourced And people in the community Need to demand it of the mayor And the governor Why the hell

You know what Trayvon Martin That poor little boy got killed That became a national incident We didn't do shit about Eight or nine young kids Got killed in Chicago that same week It wasn't shit done about it Roland, nothing was done about it

But here's the issue that we face And again I'm going to tell you about a meeting at the White House when Trump was there the first time. He was meeting with TV anchors. I was invited to three of the meetings. I attended two of them.

And I brought up Chicago. And he said then, oh, he says, Ron was in the Oval Office, and Ron was talking about what you just talked about. Ron was talking about education, jobs. He's like, no, Rom. That's not going to fix the problem. That's not going to fix the crime problem.

And I'm sitting there going, yeah, if you talk to any police chief, they'll tell you, you have to confront that. The region is down in Baltimore. It's because of that. The region is down in the places. The region was down in D.C. is because of that. Now, here's the problem. Republicans don't want to fund that stuff. They don't ask that.

So they want it both ways. They want to complain about crime. White folks, you know, that tickles their ears and gets them excited. but they don't want to deal with the root cause of crime and to make the level of investment you're talking about. Yeah, and you know, I remember that time there was a beer company moved to Chicago with about 300 jobs.

They gave them billions of dollars of tax break to bring in about 300 jobs as opposed to investing on the old people. We got a dilemma going on here that's got to be cleaned up, and our messaging is not clear, and our audio and our video is not matching, Ron. We got to clean up the crime,

But the way President Trump is going about it, what he's doing and what he's saying fighting crime is deceived as a deception, as a deportation operation. And it's not just about crime. It's domination of the blue, the major cities that are controlled by Democrats. That's what he's going after. That's the issue he's making for the next election for his follow-home for the midterm. about crime, but this is a deportation operation, and he's captured the news with it. But inside these cities, why in the hell the people in Chicago are not protesting the day with seven dead and 57 shot over the weekend?

Why in the hell they ain't raising hell about that? Yeah, I think that's the dilemma we got to address. We made some, we talk a lot about the high-profile cases that end up in the news, like poor Trayvon Markson, but that same week that happened, there were several, five or six kids killed in Chicago, nothing made of it, because it's black on black crime. We've got to make sure we control the narrative, but we act. where we have to inside our cities.

In Baton Rouge, where I live, three weeks ago, there were five killings in one weekend, right here in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. A little old town less than 300,000. We've got to address crime in the city, and we've got to put the heat on our politicians and do something about it,

because they got money, but they're giving tax breaks to the industry as opposed to investing in these communities. Roller. Mustafa Ali, how are you, sir? Well, General, if you can hear me, we know that there are a number of organizations that are actually on the ground in Chicago, grassroots organizations are doing the work. How important is that based upon all the experiences you have to make sure that those organizations are funded and are doing the work?

Yeah, and they do good work. They're engaged with after-school programs. They're engaged with their traditional organizations like ROTC in high school and boys and girls clubs. All those serve as a meaningful way to keep our young people engaged and help them get their education. but the kids that fall out of the support network, they're the ones that end up into contraband economy and end up into gunfights. And that's got to be fixed, Mustafa.

We've got to, and the community got to raise hell not just about the high profile when the police shoot somebody. We've got to raise hell in those communities and demand that these local public officials do something about the crime. People ought to be able to sit on their front porch. And Donald Trump, as President Trump, as full of scab there, and he know he's getting some support to reduce crime. But at the same time, we know also, I believe, that this is an undercover deportation operation

and nothing yes about crime. Because if it was, he'd be going to Jackson, Mississippi, and going to other, at Shreveport, Louisiana, inside the Speaker Johnson's area of operation in Monroe, and deal with the crime. I remember after Katrina, how you came in, stepped in, got everything kind of moving in a proper direction, made sure that folks had dignity and respect and how you were handling the operation. How important is that also in Chicago to make sure that we are one, making sure that folks who are there on the ground doing the work of the power and resources that are necessary? And also, how do we make sure that there's dignity as we are addressing, you know, the issues of violence that happens in some areas? Yeah, I think it's not necessarily the military that fails to show dignity to people like in D.C. They're pretty benign walking around and their presence alone can calm the street down.

Where we see there's some areas of concern is when ICE agents, just stop people based on their complexion and their accent and start pulling them in and stopping them based on what they look like and what they sound like and where they're working. That is criminal. And, you know, there's federal laws against that, but the ICE agents are not paying much attention to federal laws. They're paying attention to Stephen Miller,

who tell them, just go out and arrest people, we'll sort it out later. And they made some very embarrassing arrest that week. And the public has to make sure that they're doing everything they can to protect their neighbors. And their procedures that have been put out there that worked in Los Angeles and some in D.C. to alert people so innocent people are not getting them to ICE detention centers. General Ari, how are you today? This is Larry Walker. How are you?

Hey, Larry, what's going on? Yeah, so I wanted to thank you for all your work and you've made some really important comments. And I wanted to talk a little bit about, you know, obviously we see what's happened in D.C. Presidents talked today about possibly, you know, Chicago and Baltimore City. But I want to talk a little bit about the issue relating, you know, we look at research and over-policing in black and brown communities and which often leads to abuse. And so I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about the challenge with that historically. We see too many law enforcement or military, in this case, individuals from the military in black and brown communities,

which increases the likelihood, we talked about it, U.S. citizens, et cetera, being targeted and profiled. And how do you maintain that balance? Yeah, I think the profiles happen primarily with the deportation. But again, it's hard to defend what happened in Chicago over the weekend. And we know most of these are in underserved communities. I hadn't looked at every name and every address but that's what history shows

that this is happening in and around the same communities in and around the same age groups with guns. 57 wounded, we call that the military, wounded in action. Some of them people will never be able to work again. Some of them go ahead and have wheelchairs. Some of them will never meet the potential and many of them were innocent bystanders. And then seven dead.

seven people that will never be able to contribute to the economy or to their community because they got killed over the week in Chicago. We're going to have a hell of a time defending that mayor and say I don't want help with crime. I do think there's a middle ground that has to be reached between the mayor and the governor and address what the hell they're doing about crime in the city

because when I was in Englewood in 2013, the people were yelling at me about why can't they do something about it? And some improvements have been made, but we've got a long way to go when you get seven dead over one weekend in Chicago at 57 shot. That has to be fixed.

Avis, what's your question? Avis. General Honore, wonderful to speak with you, sir. You know, you are an icon of leadership, and we've talked about the need for holistic strategies could In the heat of battle, your squad relies on you. Don't let them down. Unlock

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Address the issue of crime. But I like your perspective on leadership. How important is that? And what type of leadership do we need in order to make a meaningful impact on this issue? Well, we got to walk the talk, and we got to resource it. You know, let's talk about the city of New Orleans for a minute. They're like 500 police were short.

And let's talk about D.C. I think they need another 2,000 police. as we talked about. That has to be a resource, and that's done by city council and by legislatures in some cases that's in the case of D.C. If you want to deal with crime, more police help, more after-school programs, more enforcement of kids dropping out of school when they're 14. It's a holistic approach and ability to train them in jobs because if they can't get a job, they'll end up in the contraband economy, and that's when the shootings start. It has to be a holistic program. But as a party, as the Democratic Party go about this, we've got to address

how and what we're going to do and it's got to be resourced. As I said, at the time I was in Chicago in 2013, there about that time, the city and the state was given billions of dollars to a company to move to Chicago, a big company, as I recall, and they were underinvested in Inglewood, and the Chicago Police was short. The schools won, the funded, and they had very little after-school programs designed to keep these kids engaged and to keep them off the street and keep them in healthy activities. So we got to address that inside our own hood. We got to look in the mirror and figure out this is not just Washington causing this problem. We got to figure it out at the municipal level and demand.

as I recommended to the D.C., that while this is going on, demand those other 3,000 officers you need, demand that those court seats get filled, demand that you get the money to be able to maintain the city. Use this as an opportunity to get federal resources. But what the president is doing, it's not what he's doing, is how he's doing it,

disguising a deportation operation that's going to deport a lot of minorities under the rubric of crime and at the same time, the city and the governor of Illinois has to address crime. It can't be a just about don't come here. They've got to figure out how they're going to tell the people in Chicago

what they're going to do and how they're using their resources to address the shootings and the wounded people every weekend in Chicago. All right. General Russ, Your Honor, Ray, we'll appreciate you joining us today's show. We appreciate it. Thanks a lot.

Keep it alive. Thank you, Roland. All right. Thank you very much. Folks, I've got to go to a break. We'll be right back. Hopefully I will be in studio soon. Traffic in D.C. has been utterly insane.

Literally 45 minutes to go eight miles. Is that crazy it is. So going to a break. I'll be right back. Coming soon to the Black Star Network. I have name recognition, but I tour more than any rapper and it's a lot of overseas stuff and it's like I'm going all over to...

I've been to 80 countries in my lifetime and sometimes I'll do interviews with people and they'd be like, so, what you've been doing? Like, what you've been doing? Like, I just came back from Belgium and Brazil and South Africa. What's you been doing? Right. This week on the other side of change.

300,000 black women being pushed out of the workforce. This is shocking yet unsurprising. What happens when a bunch of black mothers lose their federal job? Their kids are not being fed. Their kids are not being taken care of. But that trickles down to the entire community structure, which may be built on the backs of black mothers and black women more broad. Tune in on the other side of change, only on the Black Star Network.

Hey, what's up? It's Sammy Roman. Hey, it's John Murray, the executive producer of the new Sherry Sheppard Talk Show. It's me, Sherry Sheppard, and you know what you're watching. Roland Martin, unfilting. All right, folks. Welcome back. Let me bring in my panel here.

And I want to stand this conversation because, Larry, you heard the general say it's not what Trump is saying is how he's saying. Let's be real clear here. This is politics. This is not about crime. What Donald Trump is doing here is using this as a wedge issue, knowing full well when you talk about fighting crime that pose well with Americans, especially white Americans. And so he is talking to a base. What he is not trying to do, what he has no desire to do, is to have a holistic, comprehensive approach.

What he wants is the TV show. He wants the show of force. That's what he wants. Yeah, you hit it right on the nose, Roland. And we need to really have a, we need to have a, maybe do a special conversation about crime, particularly how it impacts black communities. Look, what he's teeing up, in my opinion, is a redo of the 1994 crime bill, which was signed by Bill Clinton. We do not need that in the black community.

We know years later that it disproportionately impacted the black community through many black men in jail for small-time offenses. That's what's really going on here. And the rhetoric, this racist rhetoric is very dangerous. And we have to be very careful, even within our own community, and co-opping some of the same language that has been used. over the last several decades to talk about why we need more law enforcement, in this case, more military. Listen, we don't need, you don't need, you know, members of the U.S. military or adjacent in Chicago.

The point we know from research, we need educational social services programs to make sure young people have access to resources and can get jobs after they graduate. We notice there's decades of research on this. But once again, you're right, Roland. And this is about playing to middle America, white middle America and this idea that, you know, you need more police officers to hold black folks accountable when a lot of the issues are rooted in redlining, not investing in educational systems in black and brown communities. We know this from the research. And, you know, as a black man, I certainly don't want law enforcement members of National Guard in my community. And they're not trained to police.

So what we're going to have is what we see is more black and brown folks being targeted. many people being falsely arrested or arrested for these minor offenses, we cannot afford to go back to 1994 crime bill rolling. But here's the thing that we have to recognize, Ava. Ava is that it's really, really, I think, critical here. There is the perception. There is the reality. There is the thoughtful, measured.

then there is the quick and decisive, there is what is short-term and long-term. So what Donald Trump is doing, Donald Trump is appealing to the base instincts of people who, when you have a crisis, whether it is a contrived crisis or whether it is a real crisis, thoughtful measured people will throw that out the window and their whole their whole instinct will become base and animalistic and the whole thing's like get them get them get them i don't care what you do i don't care how they're targeted you get them and that's what we're dealing with right here that is exactly what we are dealing with avis and what trump is doing plays well to those folks, which is why you see approval rating go up specifically

as a way as a way as to how he's combating crime. Oh, absolutely. I mean, he is leaning right into the reality of the fear of the black body, which has been part of America even before there was officially an America. And so I will have to say that the, what we're seeing right now is very dangerous. If the Democrats had any common sense, political instincts that were, you know, and halfway decent, they would start to message this properly now. So, for example, why aren't they talking about how Mayor Scott has dropped violent crime

by 50% in Baltimore and specifically digging down into how he's done it? not just talk about the differences that statistics and reality they are they are they have it but here's the problem no no no yeah yeah follow me they have here's the problem here's the problem the problem and this is the conundrum that they are in the conundrum is the response is you're just throwing up stats you're throwing up stats you're throwing up What about that person and that person, that person? So what then happens is, again, this is what I'm talking about the base instinct, the anecdotal, emotional takes over, and it comes off as Democrats or progressives. They are trying to be philosophical.

They're trying to be academic. They're talking about charts and graph. We're talking real people. And that right there is where the tension exists. And that's what happening. What you're talking about? Governor Westmore's been doing it. That's not what I call messaging, though.

That is not messaging. That's what they've been doing for the past. I don't know how many decades. And everybody knows that doesn't work. Okay? So that is the problem. They don't know how to message. Message is not a soliloquy of statistics

or reciting something that sounds like a dissertation or some statistical machinations. That is not messaging. Messaging is really understanding how to present phrases that are memorable that let people understand what is the thing that you need to focus on now. It is a political malpractice that the fact that they are showing statistics and only talking about statistics is the problem. That's what I'm saying.

There needs to be more of a discussion with, for example, the mayor of Baltimore and some other spaces that we've seen to really get to the root of what are the real strategies that are working and then developing messages around the which is not merely just talking about the statistics that the crime has dropped. That's the problem right there. That's not a message. But here's a deal though, Mool Mustafa. The mayor of Baltimore. In the heat of battle, your squad relies on you. Don't let them down. Unlock Elite Gaming Tech at Lenovo.com. Dominate every match with next level speed, seamless streaming, and performance that won't quit, and push your gameplay beyond limits with Intel Core Ultra processors.

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Get your tickets today. AXS.com. It has been doing that. Governor Westmore has been doing that. Governor, Mayor Brennan Johnson has been doing that. Pritzker has been doing that. But again, they can do that all day, but as long as media is framing it in a different way, then that's what's going to rule.

So what Avis is talking about, those individuals have done those very things. But what it resonates in media is the visual and the show of force. And Mustafa, we've got to put it out there. It's also very difficult when you have the mayor of D.C. saying, oh, because of this, crime is way down. We welcome it. We want more of it. And so now all of a sudden it's, well, wait a minute.

Bowser loves it. Why shouldn't you? Yeah, and I saw Avis's face also. So I know she got something to say about Mayor, Bowser, you know, I mean, we got to be very careful, right? So we can't be co-signing on these people's foolishness. And, you know, we know what are the programs that actually work if you spent any time in community. You've got to be able to bring forward, you know, those best practices, those successful things that are being driven by a community, but you also got to have a platform

to be able to get that out. So the reality of the situation is that folks are losing sort of the PR war on this. When I was on an airplane, there was a gentleman sitting next to me. He hadn't been back to D.C. in probably 18 years, but he was talking about, you know, the military coming in and what a great idea it was. And I leaned over and I said, well, when's the last time you've been here because the information you're getting is not true? Let me walk you through what D.C. actually looks like. Yes, there are pockets of, you know, trouble. But that is not the reality that's out there. But all he was getting was what the media, has been feeding him. When I was in Uber, driving through New Orleans, there was a gentleman

from Brazil who had never been to D.C., but he was telling me about all the challenges that was happening there and how happy he was that there were these actions that were going on. So when you're losing the PR war, even when you have great work that's going on, even when numbers are going down, then it makes it very difficult. And then, of course, when you had of elected officials who are also signing off on this misinformation and disinformation, then it just creates, you know, a very tough set of dynamics to be able to actually get the traction that's needed. So we are in a very precarious situation right now. And that's why you've got to have networks and other places where people can bring forward the truth. And people just,

you've got to keep feeding it to them all the time because those folks who have their own agenda are going to continue to tell lies and they're going to reframe everything. So it's going to be a tough road to, you know, to move forward down with the current tools that we have and the way that things are being framed. Roland, can I jump in for a second? I want to ask something really quickly. Yeah. Oh, go ahead.

I'm sorry. Who did you want? Oh, you want me to go? All right. Let me just really quickly. I'm sorry. Roland, we have a serious misinformation loop, and you hit on that. The other thing that I think we need to be really honest about is that people believe these racialized stereotypes and misconceptions. They believe them, and they believe that black and brown people

should be punished. So that's it, and we've talked a lot about this on your show. So we should be clear, this misinformation is directly connected, these racial stereotypes, and believed by some populations in this country that these groups should be punished regardless of the historical challenges they've encountered. That's exactly right. And I would just add the ultimate goal, as was mentioned previously, is to push through a crime bill to recriminalize and repopulate these prisons in order to get free labor to make up for all of the labor that's being deported out of the country.

I mean, this whole thing is a perfect circle. circle. And it's just very annoying to me to see that people aren't pulling all of this together to see what's happening. But at the end of the day, I still have got to say in terms of the mayor of D.C., who knows what's being talked about behind closed doors. We all know that she has little control of that city, given its status as not being a state. She's probably trying to maintain some control without some sort of total federal takeover, not that it's right, but I can I can imagine that she's being arm twisted to say those things. I would also say that I still don't believe, and I will just say it one last time, that the

Democratic Party has not even come up with anywhere near a proper frame around these issues, much less messaging around these issues that result in any sort of level of aggressive pushback on the stereotypes that we are facing in the media, that we know has already stacked the cards against us before it even began. And here's why. But, Avis, we've got to put on the table. Here's why. Because Republicans have always been successful at saying Democrats are soft on the crime.

And Democrats have always been afraid of this issue because of how it would be perceived by white voters. Look, and the thing is, and here's even the problem. So what then happens is when you take a morning no, call it morning Joe, and then when they look at stats and when they talk about how black people feel about crime, they have no nuance. They go, oh, well, you look at the polling data, African-Americans, but they don't understand for black people.

It's the nuance. Do black people want low-crime? Yes, or no crime? Yes. Do black people want a police presence? Yes. Well, what they don't want to do is being beaten by cops, being attacked by cops. That's never a part of that conversation.

And so this has always been, I mean, this goes back to Nixon. Nixon in 68, it goes back to every race. Crime, the issue of crime is always a winner with the American public, especially white voters. Indeed. It has always been. And what's really sad is, you know, it's also something, as you mentioned, the Democratic Party fold. They completely fold when we get to this issue. And all they do is kind of say, oh, yeah, me too. And that's when you lean, that's what leads to things like we've seen with, you know, with what's happening in D.C. right now. And, you know, I think, to me, that's why we're seeing a lot of very pushback in terms of the Democratic Party because they don't want to offend white voters. They don't want to further alienate white voters because they know that they are perceived as being quote unquote soft on crime. And this is why it's so necessary that they understand and start to be more aggressive

around not only reframing this issue, but also talking about the fact that this is a distraction from the larger issues of what's going on to this country that is impacting people in every city and state with regards to the economy and, quite frankly, the entire loss of democracy as we continue down this road of the federal takeover and creating police states all across this nation. You know, we are really focusing, I'm tired of the Democratic Party acquiescing the agenda to the Republican Party. They have no sort of leadership when it comes to really determining what is the state of conversation in politics. Their entire strategy, is to react to whatever Beelzebub is doing in the White House, instead of trying to figure

out how do we start to frame a narrative and start to be able to be aggressive in our dictation of what is actually happening in this moment so that we can talk about those issues that we know are important to the American people, rather than continuously trying to have some milly-mouth response to whatever Donald Trump decides to do on any given day. But here is, again, the struggle. have to, you got to own up to and accept. And this is the issue, Mustafa. We keep talking about narrative. Hey, how you doing? You keep talking about narrative. But who controls narrative? Media. And when media is dominating, when Trump is dominating the media cycle, that's how the

narrative's control. So you can try to try to control the narrative. But who can, who says the narrative? Media does. Yeah. Well, one, that's why the Black Star Network and others are so incredibly important because you've got to balance it out with what the truth actually is. And, you know, we've unfortunately seen, especially over the last, what, seven months, that they really don't have an interest in being able to say, no, that's not true, and here are the facts. So we're going to continue to see some of that dynamic going on. It's just interesting because I'm all over the country.

I know where crime is happening. I know the states where crime is happening. I know it's in New Mexico, Louisiana, Alaska, Tennessee, and Missouri are the top five in our country. We know who are running four of those five states, but nobody ever wants to talk about that. Nobody ever wants to talk about the crime that's happening in Appalachia, where there's a very small population of folks of color. But, you know, we continue to allow people to reframe what's actually going on. That's not to say that there is not challenges that we have to address inside of some of our urban cores, but we need to actually have an honest conversation, and folks just aren't interested in doing that.

And Avis is right because the Democratic Party has had opportunities to actually make the investments, and has had the opportunity to actually make sure that the places and spaces that needed the resources and needed real attention, sometimes that that did not necessarily happen. So we've got to change a whole bunch of different dynamics. So, yes, this misinformation that the Trump administration continues to pump out, you know, is an alignment with what their sets of goals are. But we have to think, you know, I'll pass that, to be quite honest. We've got to address that, but we've also got to get ready for these sets of opportunities

that will happen in 2026 and 28. and what is the message around what real people are asking for across the country. So, and again, release the Epstein files. Last point I make here, last point I make here is very simple on this, and that is crime is always going to be a potent issue. But we also have to recognize for Donald Trump, what is it that he does not want to deal with? He doesn't want to deal with Epstein.

And that is an issue that Democrats, and he's driving him crazy because it still comes up. So the question then becomes tomorrow when you have Congressman Tommy Massey, Thomas Massey, and Congressman Roe Conner, you're going to have 10 of the Epstein victims. The question is, is that going to get significant play by national media on tomorrow? And so that's the question we're going to be looking at. And so we'll see that. All right, we're going to go to a break. We're going to come back more Roland Martin unfiltered on the Black Star Network. Don't forget support the work that we do.

Join our Bring the Fuck fan club. Your dollars are critically important to our work. And that, of course, so you can, of course, contribute via cash app, use the Stripe Cure Code. You'll sit on the screen right here. You want to see the link. Go to rolandmartin unfiltered. Checkson money order. Make it payable to Roland Martin unfiltered.

Send to P.O. Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 203,000,000,000. $1.96. PayPal's R. Martin unfiltered, Venmo, R.M. Unfiltered. Zell, Roland at Rowlandsmartin.com. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Next on the black table with me, Greg Carr. We welcome the Black Star Network's very own Roland Martin, who joins us to talk about his new book, White Fear. How the Browning of America is making white folks lose. their minds. The book explains so much about what we're going through in this country right now and how, as white people head toward becoming a racial minority, it's going to get, well, let's just say, even more interesting. We're going to see more violence. We're going to see more vitriol because as each day passes, it is a nail in that coffin. The one and only Roland Martin on the next black table right here on the Black Star Network.

This week on the other side of change. 300,000 black women being pushed out of the workforce. This is shocking yet unsurprising. What happens when a bunch of black mothers lose their federal job? Their kids are not being fed. Their kids are not being taken care of. But that trickles down to the entire community structure, which may be built on the backs of black mothers and black women more broadly.

Tune in on the other side of change, only on the Black Star Network. Coming soon to the Black Star Network. I have name recognition, but I tour more than any rapper. And it's a lot of overseas stuff. And it's like I'm going all over to, I've been to, I've been to 80 countries in my, in my lifetime. And sometimes I'll do interviews with people. And they'd be like, so, what you've been doing? Like, what you've been doing?

Like, I just came back from Belgium and Brazil and South Africa. What you've been doing? Right. I'm Russell L. Honorary, Lieutenant General United States Army retired, and you're watching Rollo Martin on Filthage. Thank you. You know, I'm going to be able to be.

So, you know, You know what I'm going to do. Thank you. Democratic House Leader Hakeem, Jeffreys, is blasting Republicans for what he call extreme gerrymandering. That's right. He had a news conference today

talking about the very issue and his impact on the country. Here's some of what he had to say. House Democrats had a very active August district work period. We held more than a thousand different events all across the country

interacting with everyday Americans who we are privilege to represent. We talked about the economy. We talked about health care. And we talked about cleaning up corruption here in Washington, D.C. In this great country, America has... In the heat of battle, your squad relies on you.

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And here's Heather with the weather. Well, it's beautiful out there, sunny and 75, almost a little chilly in the shade. Now, let's get a read on the inside of your car. It is hot. You've only been parked a short time, and it's already 90. degrees in there. Let's not leave children in the back seat while running errands. It only takes a few minutes for their body temperatures to rise, and that could be fatal. Cars get hot, fast, and can be deadly. Never leave a child in a car. A message from NHTSA and the Ad Council.

Our I-Heart Radio Music Festival, presented by Capital One, is coming back to Las Vegas. September 19th and 20th. On your feet. Streaming live only on Hulu. Ladies and gentlemen. Brian Adams. Ed Sheareran. Fade. Glorilla. Roll. John Fogarty, Lil Wayne, L.L. Cool J., Mariah Carey, Maroon 5, Sammy Hagar, Tate McCray, the offspring, Tim McRaw. Tickets are on sale now at AXS.com. Get your tickets today. AXS.com. Become far too expensive. The cost of living is way too high. Donald Trump and House Republicans repeatedly promised to lower the high cost of living on day one. They have failed.

Costs aren't going down. They're going up. Inflation is going up. Electricity bills are skyrocketing. Everyday Americans are being hit with increased health care premiums, co-pays, deductibles, and prescription drug prices. Housing costs have not gone down. they continue to go up. America is too expensive.

The one big ugly bill remains deeply unpopular. In town hall meeting after town hall meeting after town hall meeting, House Republicans were unable to defend their signature, so-called legislative accomplishment. Because it turns out that rip, helping health care away from millions of Americans, ending Medicaid as we know it, closing hospitals, shutting down nursing homes, forcing community-based health clinics to shutter their doors, and failing to strengthen the Affordable Care Act, are all deeply unpopular.

With Democrats, independents, and Republicans, House Democrats, Have a simple message for the American people. You deserve better. We're going to fight hard to lower the high cost of living. We're going to fight hard to fix our broken health care system. And we're going to fight hard to clean up corruption. So we can deliver a country of the people, by the people, and for the people, as opposed to the type of country that we're seeing

under Republican complete control of government, which is a country of the billionaires, by the billionaires, and for the billionaires. All right, so let me go to my panel. The conundrum that Democrats are in right now, Mustafa, I'll start with you, is that leadership wants to talk about what you just heard. They won't talk about health care, crisis, things along those lines.

But the base is talking about how Donald Trump is a threat to democracy, how he is a dictator, and the actions that he's taking. So, and so you have Democratic leaders who are saying that, oh, those things are distractions. But they're not. So you have this conundrum, if you will. that exist, that's sitting right before us, that they have to contend with. And so we were talking about messaging earlier, okay, well, then what do you say? I don't understand why you can't do both.

I'm telling you right now, what's going to happen tomorrow with this Epstein News Conference is going to be huge, and that is still a dominant issue. So I get what Speaker Jeffers is doing, excuse me, House Democrat Leader Jeffers is doing right there because he wants to become Speaker of the House. But the base is saying something totally different. How do you reconcile the two? Well, I think you talked about it. I mean, it is talking about both and making the connections between the bread and butter issues

and the fact that if you don't have a democracy, if you have an authoritarian leader, if you have somebody who is associated with some very nefarious acts around, you know, pedophilia or some of the other things that are going on that, you know, it takes away from your ability to be able to survive in this country. But for whatever reason, you know, people seem to have a difficult time and being able to link all that together, you know, it is like a tapestry. You have to weave that tapestry together in a way that no matter where folks are, if they're in Mississippi or if they're in, you know, North Dakota or Minnesota, that they see themselves

reflected in the words that you're using and the sets of actions. that you are promising that you're going to move forward on. So we'll see how it all turns out. But, you know, the Epstein situation is definitely one that has captured the attention of the country. People, you know, do not see any value in someone who would participate in those types of behaviors. And if you don't also utilize that, then I think you're missing an opportunity to let people know that you're willing to fight on all fronts. Larry I think a lot of the problem with the messaging

and even the brief press company saw is this authenticity role in you know this saying don't kill the messenger right we'd be doing a lot with you know minority leader you know Jeffreys and others but it's a way in which not only in terms

of what you're communicating is how you communicate and it just does it's not it's not giving a lot of you know a great job of selling it to to Democrats. And you're right, there is a disconnect. And when, you know, leaders who are at the top of the party are, you know, obviously

with the he's talking about very important, but you've got to be able to multitask. It's not that difficult. You can talk, as, you know, Mustafa, you just mentioned, you can talk about multiple issues at the same time. We just, I saw the last few minutes, we saw the Oversight Committee has released, um, 30,000

files is released to the Epstein case. So, you can talk about multiple, and we, together all these issues, A, if you've got a good, strong communication team, B, if you have the charisma to deliver it to an audience that's hungry for someone

who will fight for them. And what you have to recognize is that Donald Trump wants to talk about anything but the Epstein case, Avis. Exactly. But I heard a magic word you, charisma. Where is it? Ain't there.

I'll tell you that. Okay? And it's important because you have to be able to maintain people's attention. First, get people's attention and maintain people's attention. What the Democratic Party does not have is a coordinated messaging machine in the same way that the Republican Party does. So, for example, I'm going to take a little bit of a different stance. I don't think it helps you to talk about four or five different things at the same time.

Absolutely not. Because I can't even remember half of what he just did, what you just showed five minutes ago, I almost went to sleep while I was watching it, okay? What you need to do is understand the way to get people to learn things. And Donald Trump, he understands this because he understands marketing.

The human brain learned by repetition. And what the Democrats need to understand is figure out what one thing do you want to talk about right now and hammer the hell out of it. Now, I agree with you. If they were smart, they'd be talking about everything right now, especially in this moment,

and hammering the hell out of it. And they would have clear talking points that they would give to select people who have charisma and have those people spread out to different news organizations, including yours, and being able to reflect those same talking points

so that people will actually remember what the hell they just said. I don't know what any clear message is that the Democratic Party is coming with now. Every time they're on, they're talking about something else. This is why they're getting left in the dust with regards to really being able to move the needle

on the conversation in any direction right now because they're not coordinated, they're not strong. It seems to me that some of their best messengers, they are intentionally trying to squash because they want to go in the direction of a traditional sort of leadership-led messaging. But in my mind, real leaders figure out who are my best soldiers and put them out from?

If this is not my forte, maybe I shouldn't be the one doing this. I don't care what my title is. And so at this point, we are in a critical moment. We don't have time for egos. We need effectiveness. And that's not what I'm seeing, unfortunately. And that's why, unfortunately, I believe that we're in the position that we're in right now. All right, folks, quick break.

We come back. Let's talk about a lot of the conversation on social media about Uncle Nearest, their financial issues, and also, of course, a slutty vegan and Pinky Cole getting her company back. How do we really understand what's going on here? Well, I've got an expert who can really break it down for us where you understand business.

Ain't about emotion. It's about business, dollars and cents, and having cents, S-E-N-S-E. You're watching Roller Mark Unfiltered on the Black Star Network. This week on the other side of change. 300,000 black women being pushed out of the world. This is shocking yet unsurprising. What happens when a bunch of black mothers lose their federal job?

Their kids are not being fed. Their kids are not being taken care of. But that trickles down to the entire community structure, which may be built on the backs of black mothers and black women who are broad. Tune in on the other side of change, only on the Black Star Network. Hey, what's up? Geitheree in the place to be got kicked out your mom's university, creator and executive producer of Fat Tuesdays of Air Hip-Hipop Comedy.

comedy, but right now I'm rolling with Roland Martin, unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undam-believable. You hear me? Folks, Uncle Nearest, named after the enslaved man of African descent, a distiller who may have, who really contributed to the creation of Jack Daniels, has emerged as one of the fastest growing whiskey brands in America. got numerous awards, most valuation of $1.1 billion in

2024, but companies got some major issues. And that is, a federal judge in Tennessee recently ordered Uncle Nears to enter receivership following a lawsuit from one of its largest lenders. Not just that. Pinky Cole has been very public

talking about how she regained her company slutty vegan after they went out and had investors and raised millions of dollars and all of a sudden the company went through all kinds of significant issues. So let's deal with this because I've seen a lot of different comments on social media. Oh, the white folks trying to take the company from Fawn Weaver. And oh my goodness, Black Girl Magic, Pinky, keep doing what you're doing.

But we have to understand this is a business conversation. And too much of the discussion, I believe, has been emotional driven, Not driven by facts, not driven by reality, but it's a question of entrepreneurship. How do you manage resources? How do you deal with lenders? How do you deal when you have investors? Well, my next guest, William McKnight, is a partner at the Marathon Fund.

He has been very much involved in a number of deals working with CINCOM, of course, the folks who invested in BET, Radio One, numerous other companies. And so when you talk about understanding venture capital, understanding debt, financing, all that sort of stuff. Duane is an expert at this. And, Dwayne, glad to have you on the show. And I wanted to frame it this way, Dwayne, because I just believe that, let's just be frank.

It's a lot of people who don't know shit about business, who don't know nothing about business, and they react emotionally when they see these stories and not really understand all of something that goes behind it. So let's just deal with Uncle Nearest. All right? So they go to court. Their largest lender, they've been loaned somewhat, almost $110 million.

They've never been audited in terms of an official audit. They raise, you know, they get this, get this loan. And now all of a sudden, the lender is saying, hey, we got problems. We got issues with how many barrels you estimated, what do you have? All different things like that. So here's the first question. When a lender decides to go public with a lawsuit, does that typically happen after there's been lots of behind-the-scenes conversations? Do lenders, you know, want to be that quick to take somebody to court?

No. I mean, in general, you would hope that there were some conversations going on while, you know, while things were sort of going, you know, in the wrong direction. So there are different kinds of lenders, though. So if you're talking about a bank, they're going to perhaps act one way versus a private lender. A private lender typically would have more flexibility in terms of how they manage those kinds of situations than a bank will. Because a bank obviously has government oversight, they have to make sure that their capital requirements are reserved for properly. And so you might have a little less of a rope there if things start to go the other way. But, yeah, there should always be some level of discussion going on with your lender. And it's incumbent really on the founder or the entrepreneur to initiate those conversations

and make sure that relationship is a strong relationship. In the event, something like this goes awry. So the case here, so Farm Credit Men in America says that Farm Credit Mid America says that they borrowed almost $110 million and they overstated barrels and things along those lines. And so that's what they wanted, they wanted this receivership to manage the company. And that's been a gag order. Farm Weaver has been on social media with this campaign, you know, clear the shells.

People have been responding, oh, my God, buy Uncle Nearest. ordered things along those lines. But as somebody who has been in the position that you're in, you've seen a lot of companies. You've seen entrepreneur, people who have a great idea or very good at marketing. What is your assessment here looking at this for the public? Who doesn't really understand the nuances of business? I mean, there's obviously a lot going on here, and I'm not going to profess, or none of us can profess to really say what's going on and what has happened to get either Uncle Nearest or any other business in this kind of situation, because it probably is something that's happened over a considerable period of time. Probably didn't happen immediately.

Yeah, because first of all, according to Farm Credit, they've been defaulted. on loans since January of 2024, which is more than 18 months ago. Right. Yeah. So, and, you know, and obviously it hurts all of our hearts because, you know, you see businesses like this that are essentially are iconic and growing, apparently growing fast. And, you know, you can run out, you can run into problems two ways in business. You can, you know, not grow at all, not have any sales or your sales start to go south.

or you can grow too fast. And when you're growing fast, especially if you leverage, which a lot of companies do, you take on leverage, then your margin of error shrinks considerably. And so you really need to think about when you're going to scale because, you know, we talk about first-time entrepreneurs, but we really need to talk also about first-time scalers. Like you could have been an entrepreneur before,

could have run a business, but you may not have been in a business that was scalable or that you attempted to scale. And I want to hold you right there. Again, for the purpose of watching and listening, who doesn't understand, we talk about scale. That's saying, okay, you know what? I got a product. It's in five stores.

And then all of a sudden, we're going to be in 100 stores or we're going to be in 400 stores. Oh, we, our product might be, our product might be in. several grocery stores and all of a sudden we're now going to be in a thousand Walmarts or so now all of a sudden now you're now producing more product now you need more capital produce that it's a whole lot that goes into that and yeah people love to say boy I would love to have my product in a thousand Walmarts in a thousand grocery stores but once you do that now you're now operating at a whole different

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Tim McRaw. Tickets are on sale now at A.X. S.com. Get your tickets today. AXS.com. That's capital intensive, and you're going to need millions and millions of dollars to be able to support that type of expansion or scale. Right. Yep. And the faster you're growing, the more catch you're going to need. And the more your working capital is going to be stressed.

So your receivables are going to go up. Your inventory is going to go up. All the things that drain capital, when you might, you see the sales numbers going through the roof, but for some reason, your cash is disappearing. And so it takes, you really should take your time to plan before you decide to scale. I mean, sort of the lesson here, you've got to really plan. And a lot of founders don't come from business backgrounds that have very successful brands. You know, some are just very good at marketing. That might be their main forte in terms of being able to exploit a marketplace.

And, you know, these brands of Uncle Nearest and as well as slutty vegan have been tremendous in terms of their appeal to the consumer, to consumers out here, especially African-American consumer. When you have that kind of situation, the sense is that you really want to, you know, catch lightning in the bottle and go as fast as you can. But you really have to step back and say, okay, I've never done this before. I'm in this situation now where I really need to take my time and seek out advisors. I mean, private capital advisor. I sort of put myself in that category. there are others who not only provide capital, but they also work with you for quite some time beforehand to map out a plan and map out how you how you want to go about this in a way

that will minimize your capital out like, first of all, what kind of debt to equity sort of combination you want to do. You want to put in place to create that growth because that's really important. The more debt you put on a company, the more vulnerable is to these kinds of situations if you have a blip or if you grow too fast. So there needs to be that sort of planning going on between you and your advisors or advisor before you even start down this road and start allowing your instincts, your marketing instincts to kind of run away with the business. Now, I'm not going to say there aren't, you know, lenders out here that you have to be aware of. We all have heard the stories.

But we don't know all the things that happen in this case. But this is regardless of that, you really need to sort of have this plan in place and be able to think about, you know, a six-month plan coming out to shoot once you borrow money and look at your operations inside out and make sure obviously you have the right people. You've got to have great people. Now, right there, I want to say right there because you say great people.

This is the Lynchburg Times, and this is what they reported, two new documents obtained by the Times on Sunday and filed in the Eastern District of Tennessee on Saturday assert that a now terminated chief financial officer, Michael Sinsaki, acted alone and significantly overstating the company's whiskey barrel inventory an act that allegedly secured a $24 million credit increase

from foreign credit mid-America, the plaintiff in the law civil lawsuit. The filings described the move as fraudulent and emphasized that neither CEO, Farn Weaver, nor other executives, had knowledge of the inflated numbers. Now, you talked about, again, management team, people who are handling it. I was talking to one investor who said, the first rule of any entrepreneur is you watch the money. The second rule is you watch the person

who also's job is to watch the money. And so when you see this affidated file where the CEO Fon Weaver says she nor any other executives were aware of the inflated numbers, does that scream a red flag in terms of being on top of your business and not having one person who's dealing with a lender

when, hell, they're the CFO, but they ain't the owner. Right, right, right, yeah. Well, I mean, again, I don't want to comment just based on what we're reading from the outside because, you know, it could be a whole lot more complicated than that or it could be something totally different. But, yeah, you want to have internal controls. I mean, that's part of when you go on this journey,

you've got to make sure your accounting is solid and your information flow, your workflows within the company allow you as an owner to see everything in a snapshot. And today's tools, I mean, there's all kinds of tools that are used in business to be able to give you that sort of functionality. And you've got to think about it ahead of time.

You've got to put those things in place ahead of time because once you, you know, get in a fire and, you know, the business is coming left and right, you're not going to have time to really put those things in place. Now, whether, you know, there was something done to make sure they got the loan that they were looking for, I have no view into that. But if that were the case, then, you know, you probably stretch for a loan that, you wouldn't have otherwise been qualified to take on. And so that's, you know, that's definitely an issue.

And if folks weren't aware, they weren't aware, should they be aware? Yeah, there are very smart people who can do things so that you won't be able to see it. But if you've got, again, the systems in place, you should be able to catch. those things or catch things in general. Plus, when you sign off on a loan, if you're taking too much of a loan, it should scream at you if your debt to equity ratios are out of sync or if your debt to cash flow ratios are out of sync, you know, that CFO should be explaining to the owner, you know, what's going on here, whether you'll be able to service this, what does this mean from a risk standpoint,

So there's a lot that goes into it. And, you know, sometimes lenders, you know, sometimes lenders, you can't rely on them to always be able to do the right thing because not all lenders are good at underwriting themselves. Many of them overreach in terms of putting money into a company. But if they were looking at an inventory list, the question would also be what did they do to ensure that the information that they were. we're getting from the CFO. Right. I'm actually correct. I mean, because they have due diligence requirements on their side as well.

So here's, this is the Forbes article, How Sluddy Vegan founder Pinky Code nearly lost her business. In the article, they talk about how she had the business. All of a sudden, they went out, raised $25 million. Among the people investing was, you know, Richie Lou Dennis of Essence, and his New Voices Fund. You go to my iPad, please. Shake Shacks, Danny Meyer, they took 25% stake in the company.

And then all of a sudden, at the raise, then it started opening the stores. Again, your whole point about scale. And then all of a sudden, she says she looks up and realizes, oh my goodness, there were problems. And that's what, and then all of a sudden, she says she lost the business. And then all of a sudden, she says right here, cash flow issues, I cannot raise any more capital to grow. And she says my corporate overhead was $10 million. I was profitable at the unit level.

I did double-digit millions last year in revenue. But when you look at my balance sheet, there's a lot of debt there because the market is so volatile. People really don't want to just expand, expend their money in situations like this. I've been fighting for my company for a whole year. I got to the point where I was paying $80,000 a week in payroll on my own. And then, again, talking about that. this a perfect example of what you were talking about that you got a business, you

go out and raise money, and then you try to expand, they were opening stores in New York and Baltimore and here and here and here debt is debt. Yeah, I mean, was that a debt or was it equity?

I couldn't really tell. It sounded like it was equity. If they valued the business at $100 million and they raised $25 for 20% of the business, And it sounds like it was equity. So, so, but regardless, you know, you're still going to your working capital requirements depending upon how fast you're going to own, you're going to open up stores.

In fact, I've got a portfolio company that's doing that right now, really in the airport space. And we plan this out a year or more in advance in terms of taking advantage of where coming out of COVID and what is it would be happening in the marketplace in order to to exploit it and so they would now I don't know other investors did they have any professional investors or any investors who have been invested in other restaurant chains that have grown like that that's one thing that if if I was in that situation as a founder or an entrepreneur and I had a great brand like that and I wanted to grow it, I'd make sure that on my cap table somewhere I had a firm or a person who had done this before, right? Because, you know, very few people have done

what, you know, she was setting out to do. So what you're saying is that if you're talking about a franchise, franchise of your business and trying to go national, and in fact, in this article, she's talking about wanting to go international. Again, your deal is you need management experience to do that very thing because you might be the visionary, you might be the owner, you might be the one who conceived of it, but the reality is there's a skill set

that is needed to go to the next level, and if you don't have that, you need to hire that. Right. Well, not only skill level, not only that, but your investors should have

also experience in, and in doing something of this nature because you want to rely on your investors to a large degree to also help you find the right people to scale this business. So hold up right there. I want you to stop right there

because I was once told, not all money is good money. So when you go out and raise money, what you're saying is you, that investor needs to bring something to the table more than just money. They need to bring experience, knowledge, relationships

to help you build the business, not just say, hey, here's some money, take off, go. Right. Yeah. In some ways, it's almost more important than the money. I mean, if you have your options to get money, you want to take smart

money because it's expensive money. Let's face equity money is expensive. You know, private debt is expensive as well. So if you're going to take that money, get your money's worth, get somebody or a firm that's going to be able to assist you in making that business successful in scaling it away. And you get someone who's had domain experience doing that, right?

And I'm sure, and again, you know, entrepreneurs, you know, I could never do what they do. and they probably could never do what I do. And so, but that's what makes for a great partnership or, you know, a great situation where you complement each other and you look for people who can shore up your weaknesses so you can take a business forward the right way. But you've got to, and you've got to be willing to give up, you know, part of your business sometimes. Like, I think one of the things that, that, that.

We struggle with, I say we, black people historically, is, and I've seen it many times, is that, you know, people want to grow their business and they don't want to give up equity because they want to be able to keep all 100% themselves. So they'll either go and borrow too much money or they won't give up enough of the equity in order to put enough work. capital in the company to get it where it needs to get to. Go ahead, finish that point. Yeah, I think that's changing. I think, you know, I would say over the last 10 years, if that's gotten better, where I think our understanding that, hey, we do this once, we can do it again.

Years ago, you did it once. You know, you probably, that was the only shot you were going to get. But now, if you understand it, you make, if you make people money, you're going to be able to get as much more you want any time and all the time that you want it. Before I go to the panel with questions, I saw this quote here and it jumped out of me and I was like, I don't know, Pinky.

All right, so this was from People magazine. This is what the quote says. It says, as for what's next, the founder plans for the restaurant to be laid, quote, by new rules and new intentions. She's onboarding a new group of investors for the restaurant's next era, which includes plans to expand beyond the U.S. to areas such as Dubai and Africa.

Quote, people love slutty vegan because they love me, and I used to not tap into that, but I now know I have a superpower with people. She told People Magazine, people love me so I know that people are going to support and back me in whatever it is that I authentically do. Here's reality with products, restaurants, whatever. Folk may love you, but it doesn't mean that they're going to back it. The reality is with the restaurant, you've got to have food controls, quality controls, customer service time, how fast does the food come out?

Is the food consistent from restaurant to restaurant? What makes McDonald's McDonald's is that that hamburger is going to taste the same in Germany as it's going to taste in Charlotte, as it's going to taste in Dallas, as it's going to taste in another country. And so I dare say, I get it as an entrepreneur. You think people love you, but they got to love the product, the business, because that's how you're going to grow. Yeah. And it has to be, it has to be fundamentally tight in terms of how you're going to do it. I mean, I don't doubt that she can probably get into as many places as she wants. That's not the issue.

The issue is, can you do it profitably? And there's been a laundry list of businesses, doesn't matter who was running them, white, black or otherwise, that grew too fast. I mean, we just saw Red Lobster, you know, run into a bunch of issues. very high profile brands over the last several years run into issues trying to grow.

Hell, Boston Market. They were, I mean, they were spreading all across the country and they changed their menu, got away from rotisserie chicken, and it literally destroyed the whole company, and they've got like 16 stores left. They went from Boston Chicken

to Boston Market, and what made them hugely popular, that business was obliterated because of that one decision. Right. And you can look at red lobster, they were going away free lobster or something and all you can eat lobster and it drove their margins crazy.

But yeah, you can have any little thing. The restaurant business doesn't generally have great margins. Right. So you have to be very careful about how you build that business. And taking your time is usually best, especially and in clustering as well, obviously in terms of economies of scale in certain regions initially as you grow that footprint. So, you know, so I would hope, you know, I pray that the brand is able to recover and do what you want to do just like Uncle Nairis. Yeah. And, but I just hope that the lesson learned, it was a very expensive.

These are expensive lessons. Yeah, absolutely. You know, you don't want to have to learn that way. And what I want for our audience, I want people to understand and get ready for your questions panel, I want our audience to understand that it's easy to say, I want to be an entrepreneur. I want to be an owner. but there are some realities to owning that you have to accept and that is hey at the end of the day you might be the person sweeping putting out trash doing the doing the nitty gritty stuff and when it comes to going out and getting venture capital money and investment money bank loans or whatever if you're going to be the face of the business it's going to be on you it's going to be on you and and you got to be listen Michael Johnson is dealing with you. with this right now. We're Grand Slam

Track. You know, some investors fell through, but people are like, no, bro, we're looking at you. And this is one of those things that people just have to recognize that the moment you decide to go into business, I mean, just everything changes. Let me go to my... In the heat of battle, your squad

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in the ad council. Our IHeart Radio Music Festival, presented by Capital One, is coming back to Las Vegas. Vegas. September 19th and 20th. On your feet. Streaming live only on Hulu. Ladies and gentlemen, Brian Adams, Ed Shearer, Fade. Chlorilla, Jelly Roll, Chon Fogarty, Lil Wayne, L.L. CoolJ, Mariah Carey, Maroon 5, Sammy Hagar, Tate McCrae, the Offspring, Tim McGraw. Tickets are on sale now at AXS.com. Get your tickets today. AXS.com. Panel, I want to first start, Avis, you first. So I think one of the things that's important to talk about here is just the statistical lack of access to venture capitals for black entrepreneurs writ large and black women specifically, which we know is minuscule. I mean, the data is somewhere around 0.1% to 0.4% of all venture capital

goes to black women entrepreneurs. So I'm wondering, to what degree is there an issue of just lack of access to capital for a lot of our companies who are, as you mentioned, in situations where they've never been before, maybe they've built a very successful brand, they're growing too fast, and they're not having access, not just to the money, but to the advisors that you've mentioned

are absolutely critical to help them navigate a situation that they've never seen before. I'll, let me, speak to that first, DeWain, and then I don't think the issue here was a lack of access, guys, what are you doing? What are we doing?

Thank you. I don't know, the issue here not to me lack of access to capital. Both of these examples, they had access to capital. I think... Well, one's a loan. I'm talking about venture capital. Oh, no, no, no. I was saying, one, in the case of Uncle Nears, nearly $110 million in loans. In the case of Sleddy vegan, it was a $25 million series A raise. So, Duane, I think what we talked about earlier, the issue here with these two companies, it wasn't access to capital. It was once you got the capital, how do you manage the business to maximize the capital you received and not be in a

situation that both found themselves in? Yeah, I mean, but to her point, to her question, it's historically, if you look at black men or women, it's woefully disproportionately bad. And so that has been the case. since I got in the business when I was 19 years old. And all I've done all my career is invest in black and brown businesses, quite honestly. And it made any money that I've made, I owe to black and brown businesses and founders. I mean, from Kathy Hughes to Bob Johnson to a number of folks who early on were scoring. We're scrounging around for capital.

And that continued throughout the years for a number of companies. And it recently has gotten a lot better. I mean, where we are today is light years away from where we were. So, Dwayne, what are those, so what should, okay, so then, take it what Ava's asked, what then should entrepreneurs be doing?

How do you put, where do you go? How do you put yourself in the right places with people who have the expertise that you're going to need once you do get the capital? So you talk about the advisors and others. I mean, where do you go? What do you do? Who should they be talking to?

What places should they be going? Well, they're not easy to find, obviously, unless you are running in the circle, that they are. So in terms of professional venture capital firms that are run by black men and women, and there are a lot of new ones that have recently originated that are actually run by women and are focused on investing in women founders. There's probably at least 20 out here now that part of their thesis or their main thesis is to empower women, you know, to scale businesses. Now, not every business is meant for venture capital.

And so that's one of the things that you first got to figure out, is your business, whether it can scale or not, is it a venture capital business? Generally, a venture capital eligible business, not eligible, but a venture capital business that lines up for the cost of that capital is a company that's in the tech space. Now, that's not 100% always the case, but generally, tech companies are able to grow and scale at a level that can justify the cost of venture capital and the returns that it requires through that whole ecosystem. And when you talk about an Uncle Nira's or you talk about a slutty vegan, typically those businesses can scale in a couple ways.

They can scale organically when you got a hot brand like they did or you can do acquisitions. But that lends itself to private capital, private equity or private debt, private credit in order to do that. Because though that money is a bit cheaper and it is built to scale those. kinds of businesses unlike, you know, unlike a tech business, which is generally start up, generally early stage, doesn't have a lot of revenue or cash flow in which to borrow against in a private equity scenario. So finding folks who do that, I mean, they're, you know, they're all over LinkedIn. If you know where to look, there's conferences, there's meetings, there's local, regional-type places that you can run into

people like that, when you're, especially when you're a high-profile founder, you have your own relationships, you can get to almost anybody, especially in our community. It's small. Right. Community. You know, we can, you know, we're two, three, four degrees of separation, right? And so you can, if you are, if you are conscious about looking for it, you will find it. And, you know, and I'm not saying they all got, you know, every advisor has to be of the same ethnicity as the founder. I mean, there's, there's advisors out here in all communities that, you know, will be the, we'll be able to help you. And you just got to be able to align with one that you trust to do business.

And that's very important is trust, which is why you got to spend time. with your advisor and or your investor or lender before you get into something like this because if that alignment is not there, that alignment of interest and that trust is not there, things are going to be bumpy at some point. I mean, you know, it's perfect, but you want somebody who's really vested

and aligned properly to make sure that you get back on track and are successful and aren't first looking to take your company and get hold because they don't trust you. Right. They don't have the confidence that you're going to be able to pull yourself out of it. You don't want that situation. So be patient. Take your time.

You've got a great brand. You've got a great product. You don't be here. It's not going anywhere. Yep. You're walking their way. Larry. Yeah.

Thank you. This has been a great discussion. And I want to talk about, you know, we talk a lot about things like the old boy network, right? And one of the things that comes with that is these relationships we've kind of been discussing, and not just access to capital, but, you know, be able to reach out to people who can mentor you, give you feedback. And I'm wondering as it relates to, you know, we talk about a lot about the lack of generational wealth in the black community because racism. And what role it plays in black community and black entrepreneurs, particularly like

the two brands we talk about have taken off. And the challenges of not having access to individuals who for multiple generations know what it's like to run these large businesses to expand et cetera. I'm wondering what are some of the challenges that relates to that kind of like familial or institutional knowledge that, you know, we don't see in the black

community. Yeah, I mean, you're correct. You have a lot of first and, you know, maybe second generation businesses that even have the prospect and then when you narrow it further, the ones

to have the prospect to really scale and become what we call a unicorn in our business or something that is substantial, you know, the people who had that you can call on or, you know, be able to rely on for that in just in our community is small. And, you know, but if you've got a business, you should, if you got a business that makes sense, you've got a business that, you know, crosses all the T's and dots the eyes in terms of its potential, you should be able to professionalize it and be able to go to professional investors anywhere. Now, you're not going to get the same kind of audience you would potentially if the investor was black or at least the ethnicity or the gender.

I should say that would understand you potentially more than someone else because venture capital is about 80% you know personal relationship and so you want to be able to relate to someone and in a way that will first of all get you to trust them and secondly to align interests in the right kind of way and we are we haven't we haven't we haven't enough of these businesses in the past, enough professional businesses in the past, professional venture firms in the past that have been around along enough to have gone through a number of cycles with a number of different companies to offer what, you know, mainstream, so-called mainstream investors have been able to have. They've had a very long lead time. And so it takes a while to get that sort of expertise in our community. There's people with

money and they can invest in things, but their ability to help you beyond a certain level is going to be somewhat limited, not to mention the time that they've got doing other things that they're doing. So they're not, they want you to be

successful. They'll give you whatever sort of advice that they can give you. You might get one or two on, you know, a few on your advisory board. But what you really need in your business is professional capital and professional capital that is aligned with your interest and is on the same wavelength as you are, is how to grow this to where you want to go to. If you don't have that, it's going to be very, very, very, it can be very, very difficult. Now, obviously, there are certain people who have done it on their own, and we know you really are. but that is very, very rare.

Mustafa. Yeah, well, thank you for dropping the knowledge on us today. You know, you've been very successful with many of the folks that you have been able to affiliate yourself with. I'm curious for folks who are watching. What do you look for when you're about to invest in a company? What are the things that grab your attention? I probably spend the first few weeks,

or more just getting into them and really trying to look deep into who they are and how they've gotten to where they've gotten to what kind of person they are and you know can they really well I'm trying to assess can they really take on and do what it is they say they're going to do and have they demonstrated that in the past so I don't really focus a whole lot on the business early on you'll get the general parameters of it, and if it's a industry generally that I like or seems to be fertile for opportunity to success,

then I'll just switch real quickly to the person or persons that are supposedly going to execute on whatever plan it is that they've talked about and see what's there. And there's a meeting of the minds and whether they really can't achieve, what they say they're going to achieve and they actually have a plan to do it and they understand that they can't do it by themselves.

And so that I look for, we've got about 10 things we look for as far as character. You know, and everybody knows what those, many of those are. But one that's really high up there on the list for me, is judgment. So being able to, you're going to have to make quick, you're going to have to make

decisions that almost every day or every week that are going to affect the long-term viability of your business. And if you have good judgment, you're generally going to make the right decisions or are you going to consult the people to help you make the right decisions? So, but there is about 10 things we look at. So that's what I work for. Last point I'll make to close this out.

This is also a message to any founder. And the reality is, let's be clear, you can be the founder, you can be passionate, you can be, it's your first love, but I think you can have a death grip on a business so much that you don't. don't actually, you actually strangle the opportunity to grow because you don't want to listen

to expertise that can actually help you grow. And one of the biggest issues that I've seen people I've talked to, people who I've witnessed, people who I know personally, is that what they don't do is they don't bring the professional help in. And let's be real clear, there are people, Duane, who are excellent at managing a business, but they can't start the business. There are people who are excellent at starting businesses who can't manage a business to a growth.

The CEO once said, that the people that helped me become a $500 million year corporation are not the same people who are going to take me to a billion dollar year corporation. And so those are decisions that a person has to make, and I think the lessons that people should be taking away from what's happening with Uncle Nearest, what's happening with slutty vegan, what's happening with many other businesses, is to understand that when you are the owner, you've got to pay attention to the most basic fundamental. You've got to follow the money. You've got to be on that like a hawk.

You've got to be watching that every single day in understanding, adjusting your expenses to revenue, all this sort of stuff. Hey, what's happening? You look at what right now, tariffs, how that's impacting businesses. It's so you can be in love with the idea of the business In love with the product But if you are not focusing on the most basic fundamentals Cost of goods, services, overhead, expenses, taxes, insurance,

all that sort of stuff, then you might find yourself not being in business About 60 seconds, final comment Yeah, well, I hope, you know, I'm sorry. I certainly hope that Sluddy vegan and Uncle Niras are able to regroup and pivot on how they think about growing their business and get the right folks in there because we, you know, we as people need to be entrepreneurs. I mean, we look at where the country is going. We look at where AI is going.

jobs are more than likely going to start to shrink. Or if you want to keep a job, if you want to get a job, you have to be able to utilize workflows that are being driven by AI. And AI is going to be in every company. It's going to be everywhere. And so we've got to be able to adopt it. Obviously, it can be scary.

and, you know, it is a big leap, but within a short period of time, it's going to be, it's going to permeate itself through them out, throughout any business. And so any business we look at today, they don't have to be creating AI themselves. Yep. But any kind of business that they're doing, they need to be able to utilize AI in order to be competitive in what will be a very competitive marketplace. Yep. In the heat of battle, your squad relies on you. Don't let them down. Unlock elite gaming tech at Lenovo.com.

Dominate every match with next level speed, seamless streaming, and performance that won't quit. And push your gameplay beyond limits with Intel Core Ultra processors. That's the power of Lenovo with Intel inside. Maximize your edge by shopping at Lenovo.com during their back-to-school sale. That's Lenovo.com. Don't let biased algorithms or degree screens or exclusive professional networks or stereotypes. Don't let anything keep you from discovering the half of the workforce who are stars.

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You're not going to be able to just hire your way to success. You're going to have to be able to use these tools and get your people to utilize these tools and make them more productive. Dwayne Big Night, we appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Absolutely. My pleasure, bro. Folks, appreciate it. Folks, the first black mayor of a small Alabama town overwhelmingly won his election four years after white residents literally

locked him out of the town hall and refused to let him serve. Incumbent Mayor Patrick Braxton was elected as the mayor of New Bern last week, winning 66 votes to his opponent's 26 votes. His victory puts a punctuation mark in the dispute over control of the town government that drew national attention. Last week's election was the town's first since at least the 1960s, held under a federal settlement. Black residents sued challenging what they call the town's hand-me-down governance and refusal

to let Braxton serve after he ran unopposed from mayor in 2020. New Berners approximately 7.7 miles southwest of Birmingham with a population that is about 80% black, 20% white. However, the town's leadership, except for Braxton and his town council, has been majority white for years. New Bern's population is just about 133. We've seen this in a lot of places, Larry. That's absolutely crazy. We've seen this. Black folks, city manager, mayor, other, white folks like, you ain't, you.

You ain't coming in. But this is crazy not to have any elections since the 1960s. I've never heard of anything like this, Roland. I remember talking about this story on here, and it still boggles my mind. And it is an example of why we need the Voting Rights Act and why we need civil rights groups like the legal defense fund, ACLU, et cetera, because I'm shot. I would not be surprised if there's something similar happened in other jurisdictions

that we haven't even talked about yet. But once again, this is an example of how systemic racism works, particularly when it comes to diluting the vote of majority black districts. And so this is why we need to make sure at the federal state and local level that we make sure that every vote counts, particularly in the black community, historically disenfranchised, and support, you know, in individuals like this, towns like this, by working with civil rights organizations and other entities to make sure, like I said, black votes, votes, it's not diluted. Absolutely. All right, folks, the University of Cincinnati, black students are stepping up after university support for the African American Culture and Resource Center ended under the new Advanced Ohio Education Act, Higher Education Act, also known as Senate Bill 1, which bans diversity, equity, inclusion initiatives.

Public traditions such as black graduation and welcome events have been pushed off campus and are now organized entirely by student volunteers. In response, Cincinnati alumni have launched the SINC Cultural Resource Center Foundation, a nonprofit organization committed to funding mentorship, music, and cultural programs that the AACRC previously led. Leaders say their goal is to ensure black students still have community and a voice despite growing political pressure to silence such programs. Well, this is one of those things that Mustafa, where this is where you say, you know what, we're going to fund our own stuff. Yeah, and it's great that, you know, folks are coming together and making sure that that happens.

But I'm also one since I was a former athlete that I also believe that the voices, folks on that basketball team and the football team also need to make sure that they're letting people know that these types of actions by the school, you know, are not okay. So, you know, you have power in these situations. So one, I appreciate folks making the investments and getting together and make sure that folks will continue to have that information. But I also hope that individuals who have power on campus flexing. Avis? I absolutely agree.

I mean, unfortunately, this is a sign of the times. We have an administration that has waged war against education across the country and specifically colleges and universities, in essence, really forcing many to move in this direction and or giving cover to those who pre-existingly already had the desire to move in that direction. So once again, the answer is to be able to do for ourselves. And also, the answer for students who are examining their various opportunities is to think even more deeply about how they might want to pursue their color pursuits at HBCUs. All right, folks, quick break.

We come back. Time for our Shop Black Star Network Marketplace. Back at a moment. This week on the other side of change. 300,000 black women being pushed out of the workforce. This is shocking yet unsurprising. What happens when a bunch of black mothers lose their federal job?

Their kids are not being fed. Their kids are not being taken care of. But that trickles down to the entire community structure, which may be built on the backs of black mothers and black women who are broad. Tune in on the other side of change, only on the Black Star Network. Hello, we're the Critter Fictions.

I'm Dr. Bernard Hodges. And I'm Dr. Terrence Ferguson. And you're tuning into Roland Martin unfilful. Folks, tonight in our Black Star Network Marketplace segment. We've got a sweet treat for you. If you're searching for a unique and fun gift, look no further than with and They have created handcrafted, food-inspired candles and soaps that look and smell just like your favorite desserts. Cherry cheesecake to fruity cupcakes.

These life-like creations bring joy nostalgia and the touch of indulges to any space. Jeremy now from Detroit is Denitra Jackson, the founder of Wiff and Nibble. All right, Denitra, glad to have you here. Okay, how'd you call this idea? Where did it come from? How you doing, Mr. Martin? Good, good. So whiff and nibble actually came from a place of darkness right now.

I'm a foodie. And at the time, I used to be 280 pounds. So after a very traumatic time in my life, I wanted to become a new person, physically, mentally, and spiritually. So I went on a weight loss journey. And instead of eating desserts, I would smell desserts and that satisfied my cravings to stay on track and to lose the weight that I wanted to become a new person. So my love of candles, my love of food, we put the two together, and whiff and nibble was born. Okay, so I'm sitting here right now looking, okay, so, okay, what is this?

Ah, that is our root beer mini candle. This is your root beer mini candle, okay, so. Actually, what, fruit beer float, excuse me, see the little ice cream. Yeah, I see it. I see it. All right, so, so this is not a dessert. This is literally a candle. That is correct.

that white wick that's sticking up, that's the wick would light it if you choose to light it. Otherwise, then you could just have it as decoration. You sure can. So if I light this, then it will be smelt, the room be smelling light root beer? That is correct. Okay, all right.

Let's see here. All right, okay, what is this one here? This is. Let's see what you got. This is Peach Cobbler Mini Candle. That is. That is our Peach Cobbler Mini Candle. And we also have a larger version of that,

which is a three-wit candle that comes in a real cast dineer skillet. So you can burn your candle and cook an egg right after that. Larry, why are you looking like that? Larry, you look like you're hungry. I mean, I might be, but I want to give her credit from creativity. I haven't seen anything like that. So, but maybe that's the point. Remember burning some candles and make some food,

but I think it's an ingenious idea. Okay, this is a cherry cheesecake. mini candle. It sure is, and I have one with me as well. That is our cherry cheesecake mini candle. So you have your crumbles there, your cherry cheesecake, and

yep, it looks and smells just like cherry cheesecake. You're trying to burn stuff to make people hungry. Okay. All right. It's the opposite for me. Okay. All right. Let's see here. Okay.

This is the banana pudding candle. It sure is. Yep, just like Grandma used to make. That is our banana pudding candle. You can smell the bananas, the vanilla wafers. Yes, you can. I love that one. And that comes in a mini version as well.

Okay. Now, how many different candles, food-smelling candles, do you have? You know what? Mr. Martin, we probably have about 34 right now. 34? Yes, sir. Wow. Okay, 34.

That is our peach cognate candle that's shown on the... Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize I had another one here. So this is the blueberry pie a la mode candle, two wicks. Yes, sir. So that is, yep, just what it says is our blueberry pie with a scoop of ice cream. Okay, y'all, this is insane, y'all. This is insane.

I like that one. That's a cute one. Statically, it's very cute. Okay, all right, y'all. Hold on, where am I looking? Okay, this is. This is it right here, y'all. That's my baby

And there are two wicks Like right between the ice cream scoop On either side of the ice cream Oh yeah, I see them, I see them There they are right here And right here That is correct Okay, how long does it take you to create these things?

Not that long Because everything is kind of pre-done I kind of got like an assembly line type deal going So we're pretty much assembling now Okay, all right Questions from the panel? Let's see here. I'll start with the man who keeps licking his lips, Larry.

That's funny. You're making me hungry. So listen, you know, congratulations. And I want to talk a little bit about, you know, marketing. You know, like I said, I think this is a very unique idea. People love candles, particularly we know we love candles in the black community. How are you marketing this to, you know, why, you know, nationally or international? Absolutely. So in regards to marketing, we are on all social media platforms. And my team, you know, we definitely were getting into ads. We have our website. We are in a few local stores here. And also we have a mall location here as well. So, yes, so we're trying to get the word out and trying to grow day by day.

Avis Okay, so I'm really impressed because I'm a big sweets person and you've done a great job of merging sweets and traditional soul food, comfort food. So I'm wondering, do you ever sort of, how do you target people like me? I hear where you are, but I'm thinking

are you at any sort of spaces where you might find a large number of foodies like myself and how can we sort of actually get to smell them in person? Gotcha. So in regards to that, we are still studying our analytics to find out exactly who our target market is per se. But we also do a lot of in-person events

where people are able to touch a smell, you know, feel. And also our name we're kind of getting out now. So we're just trying to grow day by day. Yes, ma'am. Mustafa. Come to learn the brand. Mustafa. Yeah, this is amazing.

I was going to ask the question. Does anybody ever got the munchies and accidentally eating one of those? You know somebody accidentally took a bite, and they were like, ah, this thing going over well. The stories that we have are hilarious. I have a young lady who purchased the peach cobbler skilly candle.

She works at a factory. She burned it. Her husband came home from a long day. Day's work thought she was cooking, and they got in an argument because it was a candle. Oh. What is your favorite? Sounds like to me she should have been cooking. Homeboy came home work.

He was hot. He's like, listen, I don't hear no pots clanging. What's going on? See, he thought it was a pie, some cobblah. Boy, I bet his mind was dancing, and it was like, I'll be damn. That's a candle. Exactly. That's exactly what happened.

Oh, I feel so bad. Amen. Oh. Mustafa, you're the part two. Go ahead. No, I was just going to ask, like, you have 34 different candles. Which ones are selling the best at the moment?

You know what? It all depends on the person. So like I said, the one selling the best are the five on Shop Blackstar Network.com. Go to my iPad. This is the five right here. We got the cherry cheesecake

Senate mini candle, the peach cobbler candle, the blueberry cheesecake, Senate mini candle, Nana pudding can on the apricabla. So these are the five bestselling right here. Yes, sir. You heard it, sir.

Yep. Mr. Martin has spoken. Cool, cool. All right then. So, again, so first of all, so how long has the business been going? Okay, so we, with a nibble, we've just turned two years old on August 4th.

Gotcha. Okay. All right then. Well, y'all just celebrated it. uh your birthday well listen folks if y'all want these scented candles right now go to shop blackstar network.com order them shop blackstar network dot com you know we got our blackstone products you see all the products right here to my right uh on our news desk uh so we got all sorts of stuff and all those sorts of stuff over here you see all these products uh and so the newest ones you see

right here uh they are the uh again the scented uh food candles cherry cheesecake synod, mini candle, peach cobbler candle, blueberry cheesecake Senate mini candle, banana pudding candle with two wicks, and an apple cobbler dessert candle. Do y'all have a rich chocolate cake candle? We do not have chocolate cake. Come on now, y'all, because listen.

We don't. Not yet. Now, that's my absolute all-time favorite. I like chocolate cake, chocolate ice cream, black cars, black women. That's how it always goes. So everything's chocolate. I know that's right.

So everything is chocolate. All right. Again, congratulations. Thank you. Folks. Again, if you go to the website, you'll see With and Nibble novelty gifts. Founders, DeNitra Jackson, out of Detroit.

DeNitra, glad to have you on the show and glad to have your products in our shop, Blackstar Network.com, Marketplace. Thank you so much for the opportunity. Have it blessed that. appreciate it. Thanks a bunch. Folks, a couple stories before we get out of here. More turbulence at St. Augustus University in Raleigh, days before fall classes,

interim president, Dr. Marcus Burgess, he's out suddenly stepping down, citing personal reasons. The HBCU is already facing significant challenges. Enrollment has dropped to approximately 200 students. Debt has increased to more than 50 million as accreditation remains in jeopardy. For now, Provost, Dr. Verjanis Peoples is stepping into man's day-to-day-day, Last month, the federal court stepped into temporarily restore it as they use accreditation, which means classes are starting as scheduled today. Also, Sophie Gibson has been named the first woman to chair the university's board of trustees.

She takes over from alumnus Brian Bullware, who many feel is partly responsible for the university's current state. The problem is he ain't gone nowhere. He literally still on the board of trustees. Makes no sense to me. I hope they get it together. Listen, we should never, this generation of black people should never ever be satisfied watching an historically black college struggle to survive and die. But St. Augustine's again now looking for new leadership at the top.

Also, folks, some sad news. College basketball legend George Ravley has died the age of 88 after courageous battle with cancer, inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame and the college basketball hall of fame. and the College Basketball Hall of Fame, ravelling coached at Washington, State, Iowa, and USC over the course of more than two decades, compiling 330 wins, and six NCAA term and appearances. But here's the key. He was the first African-American coach in what was then called a PAC-8. Into his career at USC.

He also served on Team USA's coaching staff helping to secure gold in the 1984 Olympics and the 19 and bronze in 1988. He played a huge role in Michael Jordan's ground. groundbreaking Nike endorsement deal and was a trusted leader and mentor to countless players and coaches. Now, here's what I think is an amazing story, Mustafa, Larry, as well as Avis. He was an amazing figure. I had an opportunity to meet George Ravling. But y'all may not be aware of this story, but this is unbelievable. So, 1963, marching in Washington for Jobs and Freedom, he and a friend, they were,

They were at dinner, and his friend's dad said, hey, are y'all going to Washington, D.C. for the march? They were like, nah, we're not interested. Dad says, no, I think y'all need to go. So the dad, who was a dentist, loaned them the car, gave them some money to attend the march in Washington. So they get there, and the day before, they're there, and all of a sudden somebody's like,

hey, you guys attending the march? They said, yeah, they said, well, do you want to volunteer? They said, sure, we'll volunteer. Then, Larry, they said, hey, we need some help with security at the podium. They're like, all right, and I'm ravelling with 6'4, 200 pounds, bit guys. So they're like, great. So check this out. Dr. King finishes giving that iconic speech.

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is coming back to Las Vegas. Vegas. September 19th and 20th. On your feet. Streaming live only on. on Hulu. Ladies and gentlemen. Brian Adams. Ed Sheeran.

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Sammy Hagar. Tate McCray. The offspring. Tim McRaw. Tickets are on sale now at AXS.com. Get your tickets today. AXS.com. Coming off the podium and George Ravelling says he has no idea why.

He just said, hey, can I keep that? Dr. King said, sure. So Dr. King, Avis, hands George Ravelling, his personal copy of the I Have a Dream speech. And that's, it was called Normacy No More. And many people have tried to buy that. And what's crazy is, for 25 years, he didn't tell anybody even his wife that he had it.

He stored it in an autobiography of Harry Truman that Truman personally signed. And it wasn't until, he was giving an interview, but he just put it out there. He sensed, and people had come to him, they tried to buy it, and he says, nope, never would sell it, and he gave it to his alma mater, Villanova. That is an unbelievable story.

Can you imagine, again, you're just there and like, hey, can I keep that? And Dr. King says, sure. That's how George Ravling got the personal copy of Dr. King's speech on August 28, 1963. Amazing. Just amazing. Everything lined up. He wasn't supposed to be there. He was there, a bright place, and the movement, and the moment got to him, and he was able to get that little bit of history and keep it for so long. That is just wonderful. Amazing story. You know, Mustafa, again, the first black coach in a pack eight broke lots of barriers in so many people, greatly respected. George Ravley, an incredible man.

Again, I was appreciative, had an opportunity. I'm trying to remember, and I think it may have been literally at a White House reception. I know I met Lenny Wilkins there as well, but our paths crossed, and he was indeed just a very, a personable, quiet guy, but with really a strong demeanor that so many people have talked about

and were pressed by. Yeah, you know, there's so many trailblazers in our community that folks often don't know their full story or all that they have done that have helped to uplift us, put a spotlight on us. In many instances, they've never, you know, wanted to take a lot of credit for the things that they did. Coach was just another one of those folks. I remember watching him when I was coming up. I did not know the story that you just shared with us. It reminds me of my grandmother's words when she says that destiny will all. and knock, the question is when you open the door. So, you know, I'm thankful that we had him.

I'm thankful for everything that he's done for our communities. Larry, this was the statement that his family shared today, George Henry Ravelling, June 27th, 1937, September 1st, 2025. And then the statement is with deep sadness and unimaginable pain that we share the passing of our beloved coach George Henry Ravelling, who faced cancer with courage and grace. He transitioned peacefully at 8. 188, surrounded by family as well as love, faith, and sacred protection. There are no words to fully capture what George meant to his family, friends, colleagues,

former players, and assistants, and to the world. He will be profoundly missed, yet his aura, energy, divine presence, and timeless wisdom live on in all those he touched and transformed. Born in a segregated hospital and rising to the halls of the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, George never lost his love for life, his resilience, his childlike curiosity, nor is unshakable belief in treating every person with dignity and respect. Beyond accolades, he remained a lifelong learner

and a kind, beautiful soul, always finding ways to pour into others and inspire the next generation. Grief is the cost of love deeply felt. We are eternally grateful for everyone who loved George. He cherished his family, his friends, his books, and every opportunity to be a positive difference maker in as many lives as possible.

At this time of morning, our family kindly asked for privacy and prayer if we navigate this difficult transition, the raveling family. Larry. You know, role, you mentioned, I remember him coaching at USC, and obviously everyone knew his work, you know, at Nike. In the vital role, you mentioned that he's played there for years. The other thing is interesting about the Dr. King's story is I never, I'm from Philadelphia, Villanova's right outside the city. I had no idea that Villanova had the speech. So that's a fascinating story, but you're right, Roland. He really did mentor, you know, in college basketball

and NBA circles, he mentored a lot of particularly black athletes. And like I said, he played a major role in Nike for years. Absolutely. Let me see if I can. I remember those a story. And he actually, yeah, this was a photo. Give me one second. Give me one second. So this is from September 14, 2021. MLK's original average dream speech to donate to the Villanamova University. This is September 14th, 2000. So this is a photo of raveling

with the actual speech. This is, I would dare say, this is absolutely positively priceless. And the article goes on to state and actually he donated on August 27th, 2021, which was the day before the anniversary. And it says Villanova will collaborate with the Smithsonian and the National Museum of African American History and Culture where it will go on display. Critics may wonder why Ravling chose Villanova, even if it was his alma mater.

The school's student body is 74% white, only 5% of black university and such a lopsided demographic. has earned the nickname Vanilla Nova. And so this was what this particular article said right here, pretty, pretty cool there. And it was, again, I remember reading the story like a number of years ago, and it was just crazy and how he just, how he got it. And here was another, give me one second. This was another photo they had of him with the speech. me one second. And again, he absolutely made it clear he was never going to, this is another

photo of him sitting with someone going over. He had it framed, but it was just crazy that he was married all these years and his wife had no idea he even had the speech. But George Ravelling, an incredible, incredible individual, so many people, so many folks are talking about him. Marcus Johnson, the former Milwaukee Bucks player, you see him, his tweet recruited me when And he was the first black head coach in the pack eight on my trip to Washington State in the fall of 1972. I was enamored with his eloquence, one of the classiest man I know, RIP, George Ravelling. Also, others were basketball Hall of Fame.

Today the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame salutes the remarkable career of George Ravling and sends condolences to his family on his passing as a coach, broadcaster, administrator, and global ambassador, Ravelling's impact on the game, but basketball is impossible to quantify. His legacy lives on at the hall and in the countless players, coaches, and fans he has touched. Also, commenting USA Basketball celebrates the life and legacy of two-time Olympic basketball assistant coach George Ravelling. George was a trusted friend and advisor to USA Basketball, and he will be missed. Our condoses to the Ravelling family and all of George's loved ones in USC, where he coached, they also paid tribute to George Ravelling. Iowa did as well.

you see J. Bylus and so many others, NCAA March Madness. And this is what Michael Jordan had to say about George Ravelling. I'm deeply satin to hear about George's passing. For more than 40 years, he blessed my life with wisdom, encouragement, and friendship. He was a mentor in every sense

and I always carried deep gratitude for his guidance. I signed with Nike because of George. And without him, there would be no heir Jordan. He lived in extraordinary life, breaking barriers and paving the way for so many who came after him. My thoughts are with Dolores, Mark, and George's many, many friends. So he certainly paid tribute to George Ravelling and absolutely unbelievable, unbelievable brother. And last one, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver.

George Ravling had an influence on the game of basketball at every level. It was a pioneering force behind its global growth. During his long and impactful tenure at Nike, George's, George traveled the world, mentoring multiple generations of players and coaches in promoting the sport that define his identity. He broke barriers as a college basketball coach and was a towering voice in our industry. I valued my friendship with George and admired how he led with poise, dignity, and respect. He was simply one of the most revered individuals in all of basketball. On behalf of everyone of the NBA, I send my deepest condolences to Georgia's family, friends,

and the countless people he touched throughout his extraordinary life, Adam Silver, NBA commissioner. Folks, that is, so we certainly extend our thoughts and prayers to George Ravling's family as well. That is it for us. Let me thank Abis. Let me thank Larry. Let me thank Mustafa for being on today's show.

Thank you so very much. Folks, this is our anniversary week. That's right. We celebrate, what's the baby face song? It's our anniversary. So, here's a deal. So Thursday, September 4th, is the seventh anniversary of Roland Martin Unfiltered. It is the fourth anniversary of the Black Star Network.

And so I'm going to be unveiling something we've been working on on that day. But also, our goal is simple. And on our anniversary, our goal is this year. We're getting ready for 2026. That's going to be a lot of stuff going to be covering across the country. I'm bringing somebody on board. I'll be making the announcement soon. We're looking at launching a business show.

We're looking at health show, all kinds of different stuff, and your support is critical. And so our goal, and we always, of course, we say this every year. Our goals to do is for 20,000 of our fans contribute at least 50 bucks each year that raises a million dollars. And so that's really what we want to do. And so we want you to support us. Take a screenshot of this share on all of social media.

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We have the podcast up as well Folks, that's it. I'll see you all tomorrow right here Roland Martin. Ah, come on. Why is this taking so long. This thing is ancient. Still using yesterday's tech, upgrade to the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, ultra-light, ultra-powerful, and

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