#RolandMartinUnfiltered - VP Harris Files 2024 Paperwork, Tuberville Blocking Military Appointments, Eric LaSalle's Book

Episode Date: November 11, 2023

11.10.2023 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: VP Harris Files 2024 Paperwork, Tuberville Blocking Military Appointments, Eric LaSalle's Book Vice President Kamala Harris files the paperwork putting President Joe Biden on South Carolina's 2024 presidential ballot leading off the Democratic presidential primary. Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville continues to block blocks hundreds of military nominees over the Department of Defense's abortion policy. Virginia Democrats take control of both the Senate and the House of Delegates. Del. Don Scott, Virginia's first Black Speaker of the House, will be in the studio.  Actor Eric LaSalle will join us to discuss his new book, "The Laws of Annihilation." And we'll talk to the sculptor who created the larger-than-life statue of Johnson Publishing Company founder John H. Johnson in his Arkansas hometown.  Download the Black Star Network app at http://www.blackstarnetwork.com! We're on iOS, AppleTV, Android, AndroidTV, Roku, FireTV, XBox and SamsungTV. The #BlackStarNetwork is a news reporting platform covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires. Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to ascenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports.

This kind of starts that a little bit, man. We met them at their homes. We met them at their recording studios. Stories matter, and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Today's Friday, November 10th, 2023, coming up on Roland Martin Unfiltered, streaming live on the Black Star Network. Vice President Kamala Harris files the paperwork putting President Joe Biden on the South Carolina 2024 presidential ballot, leading off the Democratic presidential primary.

Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville continues to block hundreds of military nominees over the Department of Defense's abortion policy. Virginia Democrats take control of both the Senate and the House, we'll talk with Delegate Don Scott, Virginia's House Democratic leader, who will become the first black speaker of the House in Virginia Virginia about how that happened.

Also, actor Eric LaSalle would join us to discuss his new book, The Laws of Annihilation. Plus, we'll talk to the sculptor who created the larger than life statue of John Singh Publishing Company founder John H. Johnson in his hometown in Arkansas. It is time to bring the funk. I'm Roland Martin-Unfiltered

on the Black Star Network. Let's go. Whatever the piss, he's on it. Whatever it is, he's got the scoop, the fact, the fine. And when it breaks, he's right on time. And it's Roland. Best belief he's knowing. Putting it down from sports to news to politics With entertainment just for kicks

He's rolling, it's Uncle Roro, y'all It's Roland Martin, yeah Rolling with Roland now He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best you know he's rolling martin Vice President Kamala Harris made a trip to South Carolina today. The goal? To file the paperwork to put President Joe Biden and her on the 2024 presidential ballot. South Carolina is going to lead off the Democratic presidential primary thanks to a White House-led schedule overhaul meant to empower black voters. The DNC approved a new 2024 calendar where South Carolina's primary will be on February 3rd.

Nevada will be held, of course, three days later. The schedule also moves Michigan into the group of early states, voting before Super Tuesday on March 5th when most of the country has primaries. In recent months, Harris has traveled the country to build excitement among young people and voters of color when polls show that most Democrats believe Biden is too old for a second turn. My panel joining me right now from Detroit, Michael Imhotep, host of the African History Network show. Joy Cheney, founder of JOI Strategies out of D.C. Matt Manning, civil rights attorney out of Corpus Christi, Texas.

Glad to have all three of you. Joy, I want to start with you. Lord, the white folks in New Hampshire and Iowa have lost their mind. They are still upset. They're mad. New Hampshire says, how dare you? They are still going to go first. Bottom line is Biden's name is not even on the ballot there. What you have going on there, you have folks trying to write his name in there. And I've always thought it to be incredibly arrogant of New Hampshire and Iowa to think that somehow they knew better than everybody else and they had a right to only be the first two to go. And I don't mind this change at all. No, I don't mind this change at all. So I'm a DNC alum and it was always

sacrosanct for a long time that Iowa and New Hampshire had to be first. But we know that what was is not what is and that changes do have to be made. So I'm really thrilled to see this change. And I think that the country will be just fine. We are more diverse than we've ever been. And people are engaged, and especially for the Democratic Party. We need to make sure the entire country is represented. And I think we're going to see the proof in the pudding. Seeing what happens when South Carolina kicks things off will make a huge difference. Why should Iowa and New Hampshire set the tone for the rest of the nation? And I hope my other panelists will agree.

You know, Michael, again, I think back to 2008 when Michigan and Florida, they wanted to have a greater say. They moved their primary. The Dems said, no, we're not going to count your delegates. And they didn't. Even after the fact, they still said, we're not counting your delegates. The parties control when they have these primaries. And, you know, the issue for me is, and forget the fact that Biden never has done well in the first two states. I still believe that the move was good. It was necessary.

And at some point you got to put arrogant folks in their place. And if you're Iowa, New Hampshire, what they really are pissed off about is that the millions and millions of dollars that normally are spent in their states on hotels, television, radio, food, staff, all of those

things, that ain't happening. That's why they're upset. Well, that's part of the reason why they're upset. The other part of the reason why they're upset is because it moves to the forefront issues that are pertinent with the African-American community, okay? This is another reason, and it's going to cause other people who are running. I'm not talking about other Democrats, because that's just a waste of time. But it's going to cause other people who are running and paying attention to have to

shift their policy platform. OK, so this was a huge move. Now, what has to happen is that we have to capitalize on this and actually understand our own issues, because as you talked about here on this show before, Roland, numerous times, as we deal with Tamika Mallory, as we talk to Cliff Albright, things like this, a lot of African-Americans, unfortunately, don't understand our own issues

and don't understand how to bring into fruition what it is that we even say that we want. But what this does is it pushes to the forefront policies that are critical and beneficial to the African-American community. So this is a huge win for African-Americans. And I think it's going to benefit benefit the Democratic Party. And we have to remember, 16.9 million African-Americans voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in 2020. And this is part of the dividends.

This is part of the rewards of that. You know, Matt, again, the folks in Iowa, New Hampshire, the boy, they have been just beside themselves, just so angry, so upset. And it does change the focus on the issues that are talked about as the outset of the campaign, which I think is important. You take Nevada.

Nevada, by being second, has a significant Latino population. That changes the focus, if you will. I was so sick and tired of hearing about them damn farmers and ethanol and all that crap in Iowa. And let's just be clear. The Iowa Democratic Party totally screwed up their caucus. I was on the set of CNN in 2012. We were there until 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning because they didn't know how to count, hell, only 200,000 people.

And I still think the caucus system is stupid anyway. But, again, I think the change is good and necessary, and it's going to make for a much more interesting, you know, a much more interesting open primary in 2028. Well, and I think that the protest shows you that a lot of what you hear rhetorically as it relates to the issues is more virtue signaling than it is anything else, and that their self-interest is really what's driving a pushback against changing it to South Carolina, particularly as we see social issues always

discussed. It's a lot of times liberal white people who are carrying the mantle for that. But when the opportunity comes for black issues to be at the forefront because of the sequencing, you see a pushback. So one, I think that kind of ferrets out who's really about what they say they're about. But hopefully this will have a measurable effect, too, on the approval ratings in terms of how they do in that primary and in terms of putting our issues first. Because I know right now the Biden and Harris administration is struggling with approval ratings as it relates to the Israel conflict. So I'm interested in seeing what hopefully a strong turnout there will have on that effect and on the effect of momentum with all the primaries.

All right, folks, hold tight one second. We come back. We're going to talk about New York Mayor Eric Adams. He's having some issues. FBI seizes his cell phones as well as his iPad in their investigation into whether or not foreign money was used in his mayoral race. We'll be right back on Rolling Martin Unfiltered right here on the Blackstar Network. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

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

And episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Lott. And this is season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way.

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

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

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Hey, Drew Scott here, letting you know why I recently joined the board of an amazing nonprofit, A Sense of Home. For 10 years, this charity has been creating homes for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the L.A. fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program,

providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires. Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to ascensivehome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our community rebuild. It takes all of us. hatred on the streets a horrific scene white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence white people are losing their damn minds there's an angry pro-trump mob storm to the U.S. Capitol. We're about to see the rise of what I call white minority resistance. We have seen white folks in this country who simply cannot tolerate black folks voting.

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

There's all the Proud Boys guys. This country is getting increasingly racist in its behaviors and its attitudes because of the fear of white people. The fear that they're taking our jobs, they're taking our resources, they're taking our women. This is Essence Atkins. What's up, King of R&B, Raheem Devon. It's me, Sherri Sheppard, and you know what you're watching. You're watching Roland Martin, unfiltered. A few days after fellow authorities raided the home of the chief fundraiser for New York Mayor Eric Adams causing him to rush back for meetings in Washington, D.C. Well, guess what?

They now have seized his phones. This is the New York Times story right here. FBI seizes Eric Adams' phones as campaign investigation intensifies. What the story laid out that FBI agents approached, it says right here, the agents approached the mayor after an event at New York University on Monday evening and asked his security detail to step away.

A person with knowledge of the matter said they climbed into his SUV with him and pursuant to a court authorized warrant, took his devices. The devices, at least two cell phones and an iPad, were returned to the mayor within a matter of days, according to that person and another person familiar with the situation. Law enforcement investigators with a search warrant can make copies of the data on devices after they seize them. Now, again, this follows after the FBI raided the home of the chief fundraiser for the mayor. This has been, in some of speculated, that it dealt with, again, the work of 25-year-old

former intern Brianna Suggs. Now, her home was the one that was raided. She was the star fundraiser for the mayor. He said that he returned from a trip to D.C. Literally, he landed in D.C. Feds had raided. He got back on a plane and flew back to New York. He said that he needed to be with his people

as they went through a traumatic experience. Matt, I'll start with you. When the FBI starts grabbing your cell phone and your iPads, you might want to worry a little bit. Two words, all bad. If the FBI is poking around in your devices, that should really concern you. And a couple of things that I think people need to know. The first is it mentioned a warrant from the judge.

What's concerning about that is that a judge has to find that there's probable cause to search those devices. So this isn't just law enforcement saying, hey, we think you have information that may be pertinent to this. This is a judge saying, I believe that you've presented to me enough evidence that there may be probable cause or rather there is probable cause to search those devices. So that would be concerning. I don't know all the ins and outs of federal campaign laws, but recently I was asked to be counsel for a campaign. I'd never done it before. I called a friend of mine who works in that space, and she told me that the joke is FEC jail is real jail, meaning that the feds take very seriously any issues as it relates to

campaign finance. So this would be concerning. I will say, however, with him being the candidate, I don't know how intimately involved he would be and whether his devices really have that information on them. But I'll tell you, in my practice, digital devices are, bar none, far and away today what gets people in the most trouble, particularly because those cell phone dumps can find deleted images, deleted text messages. Things you think you can hide cannot be hidden in phones the way you think that they can be. So this could be concerning if there's, in fact, information or

evidence that they've done something against the law as it relates to their campaign finance. Joy, what do you make of this? You know, I want to wait and see. Just because he is the candidate, we don't know all the details. I think it makes sense to have his devices. Hopefully, they exonerate him and make it seem or at least remove one source of evidence that he might have engaged in some wrongdoing. FEC jail is real. I also think it's a reminder that, you know, for Trump and Republicans who believe that the FBI is biased against them, it's not true. The FBI is biased against wrongdoers, right? People who break the law or who are suspected as breaking the law. With any luck, we will have an investigation here and it will not result in further charges.

What I do hope is whatever the FBI decides that it does so quickly so that the people of New York can move forward. It is very hard to govern when you have something like this hanging over you. And sometimes I worry with these types of investigations and prosecutions that sometimes they are done and they linger on. And the only people who really benefit or hurt by it are the citizens, right, because it distracts their leaders. So I hope that whatever they decide to

do, they will do it thoroughly, decisively, but quickly. Michael? Yeah, Roland, you know, I was reading an article from the New York Times as well, and it seems like this investigation is a criminal inquiry into whether his 2021 campaign conspired with the Turkish government and others to funnel money into its coffers. So that just sounds I don't know Mayor Adams personally, but everything I know about him through the media, that just that doesn't sound like him. We'll see how this plays out, this investigation.

But, you know, this is this is a big development. This is not something that's good, but we'll see what they actually turn up as evidence. Matt, again, Adams, former New York police officer. He has talked about how he is very much about doing everything the right way. He says sometimes he's driven his step crazy by that. But again, when you start talking about getting money from foreign sources impacting elections, that is not something that they play about. And it is indeed a criminal investigation. Yeah. And I think Joy is right to remind us that we need to hold off until there's concrete evidence of wrongdoing. This is purely investigative at this point as far as we know. So we can't pass judgment on whether he did something wrong or didn't do something wrong.

But I will say that, I mean, it's nonetheless concerning. And I'll say the problem a lot of times with law enforcement is that they don't necessarily have clarity on charges, but it's very easy for them to bring charges. So the concern a lot of times is just the appearance of impropriety, because you're not even defending real substantive charges yet. You're just a part of an investigation. And that alone is concerning, because if they find anything that they want to try to make hay of, there's not anything that really stops them from that, particularly when they've got an entree to those devices through a judge's warrant. So, you know, if there's information that exonerates him, I hope that's the case.

But it is concerning that he would be a part of this investigation because the feds don't play. And if they go get a warrant and a judge gives it to them, that's because they believe they have something that may be found in those phones. Matt, if you're on, if you're working on that campaign, what would you be advising all those folks to be doing right now? Well, first, I'd be making sure I had representation. If I had reason to believe, I might be part of that probe. But what I would be advising them to do is not making any statements about anything. I mean, I know one of the statements he made is that he's law enforcement and he'll cooperate.

And while I like that in theory, the unfortunate reality is if they're coming for you, you need to make sure you're protected. So I would be advising people not to delete evidence, not to delete any information, but also not to make any statements and absolutely not to talk to law enforcement without counsel there. Because the problem is, you know, if you're not being Mirandized, if you're not in custody, they don't have to give you warnings. They can start asking you questions. And if you're caught off guard, you could imperil your own liberty and other people's liberty if you don't have competent counsel. So I would say shut up. Let's talk about student loan debt.

One of the interesting things, I've been looking at some of these, I look at a lot of people's comments, and I had somebody who hit me up saying, you know, Biden has utterly failed us when it comes to student loans. And I said, well, that's kind of stupid. If $127 billion has been forgiven for some 3.9 people. They also announced this week a new student loan program that 5.5 million people have already enrolled in. Also, they have laid out that some of the people, what they owe is so low that they don't have to actually make annual payments. This right here to

me, and look, I understand fully, Michael, what people say. Well, they say, well, Biden promised he was going to get rich through loan debt. Well, let's see what happened. First and foremost, he made the announcement. Supreme Court overruled him, ruled it unconstitutional. So this notion that some people are running around saying, well, he failed us in doing so, strikes me as kind of stupid. It strikes you as kind of stupid because it is stupid, Roland. They don't understand what it is they're looking at.

This goes back to 2016 when Donald Trump won through the Electoral College, because most people don't understand how the Electoral College works. And he was able to get three Supreme Court justices confirmed after Mitch McConnell helped to block Merrick Garland, who was Barack Obama's Supreme Court justice. So they flipped the U.S. Supreme Court, and you have now a 6-3 conservative majority. And it was Donald Trump's 6-3 conservative majority with the help of the Heritage Society, the Federalist Society, the Heritage Action, and the Federalist Society, Leonard Leo. You have a conservative majority Supreme Court. Court, they ruled against not just the student loan executive order from President Joe Biden,

but also struck down affirmative action in college admissions. OK, so this is understanding that there are three branches of the federal government, not just the executive branch, which we definitely have to keep, but it's also the judicial branch of the federal government, federal courts, federal court of appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court. Okay. So this is why I tell people, you have to read the U.S. Constitution, because if you don't understand the U.S. Constitution, you're not going to understand any of this and how all these parts come together. It's the same thing that's going on right now. We're about seven days away from possibly a government shutdown. And you have people

who voted for Joe Biden. Maybe they didn't vote in the 2022 midterm elections, but don't understand that based upon Article 1, Section 9, Clause 7 of the U.S. Constitution, the power of the purse belongs to Congress, the ability to tax and spend. So the president, the White House, submits an annual budget, but it's confirmed by both the House and the Senate. So we have to actually understand how this game is played so we can play the game to win as opposed to just being bystanders.

This here is a tweet that Walter Kimbrough, Matt, put out. And this was an article. It was in Bloomberg. And he said, the Supreme Court struck down President Joe Biden's plan to cancel as much as $20,000 in federal student loan debt per borrower for those making under $125,000 a year. He goes, and then he says, yet an educator interviewed won't vote because Biden didn't do it. Crazy. I mean, are people that dense? This notion that he didn't do it, he tried, he did, another equal branch of government said you can't do it. He tried. He did. Another equal branch of government said you can't do it. But they still

have been able to cut a hundred and yes, it's one point six trillion dollars in student loan debt out there. They've been able to cut one hundred twenty seven7 billion. Please explain to me or show me where any Republican wants to get that done. So this idea that, oh yeah, damn the $127 billion and damn the $3.9 million that were helped, it wasn't me, so he didn't do it. This is a particularly sore subject for me, considering I paid my student loans today, this morning. I don't enjoy having to do that, but nonetheless, I'm blessed to be able to. But, yeah, you're right. Look, I mean, it was the Supreme Court's decision, not Biden's. And they attempted, I think, valiantly to do that.

But I think really we're having the wrong conversation when it comes to student loans. Student loans are always had in a conversation about, you know, basically some faux morality about you've made an agreement, you need to honor that agreement, so on and so forth. But it ticks me off when we talk about this because, you know, we subsidize farmers. We're the same people who talk about free market enterprise, but we find a way to fix prices so that some corn grower in Iowa doesn't lose their shirt on their corn harvest. That to me is problematic because it seems like we're doing one thing and espousing another, but in a different scenario, we're handling it differently. So to that end, the Biden administration did, in fact, try to nix a lot of the student loans. And that was already a question. I think Michael laid it out perfectly. There is a check and balance,

and an executive order only has so much strength as it relates to things that can be done and that can't be done as it relates to what the Supreme Court decides to uphold. But the bigger thing is Congress needs to recognize that the cost of going to college is extraordinary these days. It balloons every year. And the fact that there's no price control on that is really the biggest determinant for this, because the reality is we live in a society now where having an education provides you a markedly greater opportunity than it does if you don't. That's just the reality. And that's what children are taught. And until Congress sees this more as an

issue that I think energizes and helps your average American more than it does some faux moral question, we won't make meaningful progress on that despite what the administration does, because this has to be remedied through congressional legislation. Until that happens, we're going to have the same impasse and the same BS conversation that we continue to have about student loans. See, the thing that drives me crazy, Joy, and it really bugs me. It

gets on my nerves when I hear these people go, Biden's done nothing for black people. And you go, nothing? I know. And it's sort of this absolutism. And it's sort of this absolutism.

And people are stuck on this. And then, like, for instance, I get a kick out of the, well, we ain't got no anti-black hate crime bill. Actually, there have been three. Yeah. There have been three. Yeah. There have been three. And so this idea that, I mean, the Civil Rights Act was actually an anti-black hate crime bill. The James Byrd Act, that was as well. The act that dealt with the burning of black churches, that as well.

And you have these people who say these things as if nothing has been done. And then this idea, like, in fact, I saw some out of the day. So Chuck Schumer sent out a tweet where he was talking about federal judges. And so his tweet was, where is it, where is it? He was talking about judges that was confirmed. So this is the tweet here.

Confirm Monica Almadani as District Judge for the Central District of California and Brandy McMmodani as district judge for the Central District of California and Brandi McMillan as district judge for the Eastern District of Michigan. With their confirmations, the Senate has now confirmed 50 black judges that overwander people of color to the bench. And then people go, oh, well, judges don't matter. And you're like. Judges are everything. Judges are everything judges are everything and sometimes i get so frustrated and i want to use the s word stupid but what i'm gonna say is stupid stupid like just brokenness because there is no way that you could look and see what has stood in the way

of progress has been our loss of the supreme court and you there's no way you can say that judges don't matter judges are everything to our other guests let Let me echo them. What the Supreme Court said was that Biden couldn't do it. So that says he was trying to. What they're saying is that Congress has the power to forgive these loans. Congress has the power to do even more long-term to try to stem the growth.

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

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

Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit,

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

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

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Hey, Drew Scott here, letting you know why I recently joined the board of an amazing nonprofit, A Sense of Home. For 10 years, this charity has been creating homes for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the L.A. fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program, providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires.

Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to ascenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. Yes, and then you can't complain about that if you don't vote, and so the Republicans take control of the House. Look, so right now they have control of the House. Democrats control the Senate. They may very well, you know, Manchin's not running in West Virginia. If Democrats don't hold one of those seats, they may take control of the United States Senate. So guess what?

Now it's going to be harder to confirm judges. So, and I guess for me, what drives me nuts are people who don't understand the long game. It's the long game, Joy. And so if you focus on the long game, you know what? You may be able to achieve this in the first four years. But then the goal is to reelect to achieve this. But I can guarantee you, Trump gets in, you're achieving this.

Matter of fact, you're losing ground. You're losing ground. You're not just not achieving what you wanted to. You're actually losing ground. And that goes to not just student loans. That goes to reproductive health. That goes to your views about Israel and Palestine and what's happening there. If you don't like it, trust me, the Republicans don't have anything for you in terms of that.

They will make it worse as they did during the Trump presidency. So it's just factually incorrect. But it's also a reminder to all of us. We have got to educate our friends and family. They need to all of us. We have got to educate our friends and family. They need to all watch Roland, yes. But we also, around the Thanksgiving table, you cannot allow this type of ignorance,

misinformation to just go unchecked. So you gotta, I mean, you gotta vote up on your facts, your talking points, etc. And you have to challenge those loud voices in your family who can really suppress the vote. You have to say something to them. No, I'm sorry. I respect you, but I respectfully disagree. And here are the facts.

If not, we are going to see further setbacks. And as you've noted before, look at their plans for 2025. They're trying to dismantle our democracy so that we can't fix it later. This is our chance and our moment to save our country and make it what it's not, but what

it could be. Well, I just would like for people to make an attempt to actually understand civics one-on-one. It would be nice. It would be real nice. Coming up next, folks, we're going to talk about speaking of what happens again when you execute

a plan. We'll talk with Virginia House Minority Leader, Delegate Don Scott, who come January will not be the Minority Leader. They now Don Scott, who come January will not be the minority leader. They now control the Virginia House. How did they do so against a governor who was sure he was going to take control of the House and the Senate and be able to run the table with his MAGA policies?

That is next on Roller Martin Unfiltered, the Black Star Network. Please, folks, support us in what we do. Join our Bring the Funk fan club. Your dollars make it possible for us to do what we do. And so senior checking money, order the P.O. Box 57196, Washington, D.C., 20037-0196. Cash app, dollar sign RMUnfiltered, PayPal RMartinUnfiltered.

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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 are 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. On the next Get Wealthy with me, Deborah Owens of Erica's Wealth Coach, inflation is on the rise. Interest rates are high. Can you still thrive during these uncertain times? On the next Get Wealthy, you're going to meet a woman who's done just that, living proof of what you need to do

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and a tongue translator. Right here on The Frequency on the Black Star Network. Farquhar, executive producer of Proud Family. Bruce Smith, creator and executive producer of The Proud Family. Louder and Prouder. You're watching Roland Martin. Tuesday was a huge night in Virginia. Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin,

well, he was sure that he was going to have a trifecta. He thought that he was going to be able to have Republicans control the Senate. Democrats right now control the Senate. He already had the House. But what ended up happening? Didn't get the Senate, and Democrats took control the Senate, he already had the House, but what ended up happening? Didn't get the Senate and Democrats took control of the House. It was a clear plan that was led by my next guest.

It was one that people said, hey, I don't think you can raise the money, I don't think we can do these things, but he understood that if you put in the work, good things will happen. Joining us right now is Delegate Don Scott, who is the Democrat House Minority Leader in Virginia, but that will change in a couple of months because now that they control the chamber, he will be the next Speaker of the House. Frack, glad to have you here. You feel pretty good this week, huh? What can I be angry about?

I'm happy. We're great. We're doing everything that we said we would do. I think sometimes people underestimate us, and I love that because that's my superpower, being underestimated. And so one of the things that, you know, people do, you can get a lot done when people don't think you're a real threat. And so I think what happened in this case, we were able, we were underestimated.

Folks told me because I guess I was a black man in this position for the first time that I wouldn't be able to raise the money. And I think Obama gave us the blueprint for that, that that's not true. We reach out, we do the work, we can raise the resources, because it's not about just race. It's also about ideas. It's about leadership. And I think we were able to put those things together, to get a plan to put Virginia,

the old capital of the Confederacy, now they're gonna have a black man as a speaker for the first time in the history of this great state. I was cracking up laughing because Charlie Kirk Republican, he was all mad and upset saying, Democrats, they outspent us by $8 million. Youngkin, even Rona McDaniel admitted that Youngkin told them, hey, we don't need the

RNC money. And now they're mad because they lost. Well, that's what happens when you underestimate people and you don't use all of the arrows in your quiver. We used every single thing. We overspent. We knew we needed to because Virginia is a purple state. People don't realize, but in the House of Delegates where I serve,

the Republicans have been in the majority for 22 of the last 24 years. Wow. So that is the cockiness that they come with, rightfully so. They've won 22 of the last 24 years. Well, the cockiness of them, but also, let's just be honest, in many cases, the complacency of Democrats in not understanding how do you turn out your base. You have to turn out your base.

You have to amplify your base. You have to continue to talk to your base, educate, advocate. And it can't just be during the election cycle. So I'm committed, after we do this, that next year in January, we'll be talking, we'll be having listening conversations as we continue to talk to our communities, all of our communities, not just the black community, but the entire Commonwealth, to talk to them about what we're doing. I heard you talking about people say, well, what do they

do? What do they not do anything? We're doing a lot. And we did a lot for the short time we had the majority, but nobody understands and knows. So we have to continue to communicate because Janet Jackson wrote a song about it, What Have You Done For Me Lately? And so that is the voters you have to continue to educate, otherwise it'll go backwards. I think the voters want normalcy again. They believe in democracy. They don't want the mess that the Republicans have caused, that they've seen them doing in D.C.

They don't want it in Virginia. And I think it was a clear repudiation of MAGA Republican politics as for and Governor Youngkin is I call him MAGA light. He tries to be MAGA light. He wants all of the benefits of MAGA, but he don't want to go as far as Trump. But I think they rejected MAGA and MAGA light and they want back to normal, like the old school Republicans that just cared about national security, foreign policy, and economics, and not this veiled racism and divisive culture war. I also fundamentally believe Democrats have got to learn how to take credit for stuff. When you look at, you know, for all of his craziness, Donald Trump was all about marketing.

He took credit for stuff he didn't do. He was running around taking credit for a bill that Obama had signed. And what I've never understood with Democrats on the national level and the state level, they can pass things but are afraid to thump their chest. I keep telling people, politics is not just about legislating. Eighty percent of politics is seizing the bully pulpit and said, we did that. That's right. We did that. We did that.

And so when you imprint that on people's minds, they go, they did that. I 100% agree. I think Democrats are sometimes guilty of winning the debate, winning the argument, winning the policy, and losing on the politics. Not understanding, like, there was an election Tuesday, but my next election started Wednesday. And I think that's the messaging, that's the aggressiveness that we have to have to continue to win. We have to, we can't, there is no such thing

as an off year. There's no such thing as next year. The next day, your communication begins. The next day, your messaging begins. The next day, you begin to talk to your voters again and get them refreshed so when the time comes and you need them, they'll be there. But if we only come around when it's raining to ask for an umbrella, then you're not going to get it. You have to always be there and be prepared even when it's not raining to ask for that umbrella. And I think that's what we,

the generation of leaders in Virginia now, being led by me, I believe you have to do that. I think you have to bring in diverse voices. you have to bring in diverse voices. You have to bring in representation. You have to bring in a little bit of everybody because the Democratic Party is a big tent party. We are the only party that really embodies the American dream, a multiracial, multiethnic, a multi-faith-based political party, including the LGBTQ community, including everybody. And I think we welcome that.

And so we need to talk about that and own that and juxtapose that with what the Republicans are doing, which is mainly just talking to one small segment, one small slice of community. I've looked at a lot of these national shows, and that night it was driving me crazy because all of them were making the assumption that, oh, Virginia was

totally about abortion. But that wasn't the only issue folks were voting on. Not at all. I mean, you have to remember the governor's first thing, the first executive order he passed, his day one agenda, he called it, was to pass an executive order banning CRT. That offended a lot. Like, you don't want to teach our history. So people need to understand, like, it was not only that. It was banning, attacking public education. You know, some people called it, they called it one thing, but we saw it as, you want to defund public

education. And I think those messages resonated. He wanted to ban books. I mean, so when you start talking about that, when you start talking about, he wanted to do a billion dollar ongoing permanent tax cut for corporations that didn't ask for it and didn't need it. And so, and take it away from... With the state sitting on a massive surplus.

With the state sitting on a massive surplus when we just had a report that said we've been massively underfunding our public schools. Who goes to public schools? So we had a lot of folks that said, hold on, what is this guy doing? He might be likable. He might be Trump-like. He doesn't need to wear that red vest. He's likable. but we don't like his policies.

So he can stay there, but we're going to get rid of his side, his side, his co-conspirators. We're throwing them out, and we're going to start over. And I think that's what we've done. We have an opportunity to continue to build. Virginia is a very purple state. The way these new maps are drawn is very slim margins. The last election, we lost the majority by about 200 votes out of millions cast. And so this time we won the majority. Probably the two seats that made

the difference was about 1800 votes out of millions cast. You have to micro slice, micro target, talk to your voters, and then you have to spend a lot of money because if you don't spend it, they're going to bully you out. So you have to do it to keep up with the communication. So I think we learned some lessons and we're going to continue to out. So you have to do it to keep up with the communication. So I think we learned some lessons and we're going to continue to learn lessons. We gave the most money. I raised the most money in any minority leader in the history of the Commonwealth of Virginia. We gave the most money

direct to our candidates because we wanted candidates to be free, to talk to voters, to knock doors, not to be doing call time, which is what you do normally when you run into office, always on the phone trying to raise money. We wanted to free them up for that, and we had our leadership team, led by me and others, to be able to bring in the resources to fund those campaigns. And speaking of that, when you talked about how you have to speak to these areas in off years, I think that's important. I am constantly saying on this show, in speeches in other places, that people look at elections

the wrong way. We run out here and we go, vote, vote, vote, vote, vote. And I'm like, folks, voting is the end of the process. Before you vote, you've got to be registered. And then before you register, before you get registered, I've got to educate and enlighten you on why you need to get registered. And then before you register, before you get registered, I've got to educate and enlighten you on why you need to get registered, and then when you register, why you need to vote. And I think the thing that drives me crazy, and I'm going to say it, largely with these white Democratic strategists, they just want to dump the money on TV and radio and don't want to spend the time parsing the data, educating the voters, talking to them, connecting the dots, going through all of that, looking at the precincts, where the weaknesses are.

Let's send folks there to turn them out. It's just think, oh, just run the ads and that's going to solve it. No. And I believe Biden and Harris has to do the exact same thing. It's a bunch of people saying, oh, something get done. Then when you run it down, oh, we ain't know all that. So you got to, I believe they got to spend

January to July really focusing on educating and enlightening, and then you get them to register and then vote. I mean, I think President Obama made the blueprint for grassroots outreach before you do that, but you've got to inspire people first. And I think we have to continue to educate, advocate, and inspire, because you think about it, 1965, Voting Rights Act, that's the beginning of America, as I see it.

Right. That was the beginning of America. And if you think about it, you didn't have to tell black folk to go vote. We knew we was getting cracked in the head. We had to go vote. Voting was a way of saving our lives and saving our children's future. So we have to go back and make people understand that just as it's not physically as hostile, they still killing you in your pocketbook. They still killing you in education. And so we have to continue to educate folks and we got to continue to educate all communities to let them know

Everybody has a stake in this and I think a lot of white folks when I talk to them They I got I got put in this position by my white, but you know my white colleagues. It's not racial They want they want excellence. They want leadership They want guidance and they won't and they want fighters and I think people want to see that in their leaders And that's why Trump is so popular because he's known to be a fighter. He's doing those things. We may not agree with it, but they see him as their champion. Right.

And at the end of the day, we need to match that same energy and have our own champions. I often talk about when black people, when we vote at a higher rate, we can sweep elections. Of the five town halls we did with you and the House Democrats, one was in Petersburg. So that's a perfect example. Significant black population, go to my iPad, but a Republican, Kim Taylor, won with reelection. She beat Kimberly-

They haven't called it yet. They haven't called it. They haven't called it yet. Last I checked, she was up by 173 votes. When you look at the numbers, when you go through and look at, because you see this piece right here. This was richmond.com.

They said in here, Taylor, small business owner, was first elected to the House. Both parties thought they had a good chance in the contest because of geography. Adams had a stronghold in the city of Petersburg while Taylor ran strong in rural Dinwiddie and Prince George's County. Here's the deal. You only have a stronghold if they turn out.

And the reality is black folks in Petersburg did not turn out. What was the number? 30%. If they come to 34% because that is the largest. There are several localities in that district. Dinwiddie, Surry County, Prince George County, and Petersburg. The largest part of that district is Petersburg, and they had the lowest voter turnout.

And because of that, she lost. If you look at it on paper, you look at it on paper, you're like, there's no way an auditor, a professional from Dinwiddie could lose that race. HBCU graduate. HBCU graduate. Well, she went to Virginia Tech, but she works at Virginia Tech. But she is an outstanding candidate.

I mean, she started, she finished as the best candidate in our field no doubt about it and she could not pull it off because and we Did everything about a book but it's something about not talking to voters all the time You got to talk to him all the time and what I would have to him for about a year and that still wasn't enough So what happened here? You Republican who won last time? Mm- Rural folks turned out. They turned out. And what I keep saying, I keep I keep saying this to black folks. You can yell, holler and scream about them being in charge.

But their people are going to vote. And if we have the numbers on our side, all we got, if 200 people had actually voted out of thousands in Petersburg, this black woman is the House delegate. Absolutely. It's just that simple. I mean, it's hard to say, you know, they could have went to the barbershop that day and got enough votes to all the barbershops in Petersburg and turned out in one. I mean, and part of the thing is we have to continue just to talk to these voters because I think what's happening is in Petersburg, and we have to talk to them and we have to be able to deliver. One of the things about a lot of communities like

Petersburg that are black, they just don't see a difference being made. And they see people doing a lot of lip service. So we're going to make investments, not only with conversation, but with resources. And I think if we do that, then they'll deliver. If we can give them what they need and take credit for it, because they've been neglected over time historically. And I think if we do that, then they'll deliver. If we can give them what they need and take credit for it, because they've been neglected

over time historically. And so we can do some things to help Petersburg. That's what we want to do. Alright, hold tight one second, Don. We're going to go to a break. We're going to come back. Our panel gets to ask you some questions as well. Folks, we're talking with Virginia House Minority Leader Delegate Don Scott, only for a couple

more months, because by Democrats taking control of the House, winning it on Tuesday, he will become the next Speaker of the House in Virginia, the first African-American Speaker of the House in Virginia history. Only the second African-American Speaker of the House of a state house in the South. That's huge, folks. We'll be right back on Rolling Mark on the Filters on the Blackstone Network. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened

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Hi, I'm Dr. Jackie Hood-Martin, and I have a question for you. Ever feel as if your life is teetering and the weight and pressure of the world is consistently on your shoulders? Well, let me tell you, living a balanced life isn't easy. Join me each Tuesday on Blackstar Network for A Balanced Life with Dr. Jackie. We'll laugh together, cry together, pull ourselves together, and cheer each other on. So join me for new shows each Tuesday on Blackstar Network, A Balanced Life with Dr. Jackie. Hey, it's John Murray, the executive producer

of the new Sherri Shepherd Talk Show. This is your boy, Irv Quaife. And you're tuned in to... Roland Martin Unfiltered. All right, folks. Welcome back to Roland Martin Unfiltered here on the Black Star Network. We're chatting with Virginia House Delegate Don Scott. He is the Democrats' minority leader.

For now, after their success on Tuesday, taking control of the House, he is going to become the Speaker of the House when the new legislature convenes in January. Questions from our panel. I'll start with you first, Joy. Speaker Alex Scott, we need you

in D.C. I don't want to know all of your private conversations, but I hope you are talking to the DNC, the DSCC, the DCCC, and the White House. Now, let me ask you a question. You've talked about your Get Out the Vote campaign, but not just that, really starting from the beginning.

If you are a candidate running for office, what do you need to be doing today? Give them a concrete example. The first thing you have to do, I believe, is you have to have I think a lot of people run for office because they some people in local communities, they just want the title, unfortunately. We need people to come in who have a heart for service. You have to love this, and the empathy has to be there to be a great servant. From that, then you're going to do the community work. You're going to do the outreach in whatever community, black, white, Latino, doesn't matter. You're going to do the outreach to your community to make sure they know who you are, know where you stand. You're going to educate yourself on the issues. I can tell you this is a true story. I've had people get elected and didn't know they had to live in Richmond for a couple of months while they were serving. They thought they

could go home every day. I mean, they thought they didn't even have to come to Richmond. They could serve from home. No joke. And so I think you need to know what you're getting into, understand the job. The first thing that I did when I got elected, I've only been elected, I'll finish my fourth year in service and I'll begin my third term in January. And I used to look on YouTube. I used to do all of that, look at the arguments, look at the debates, look at the format, because I like to be right. And so I know a lot of people come into this not understanding what they're getting themselves into, don't understand the time sacrifice. You have to know you're going to make a lot of sacrifice from your time and your family. You have to have your family support.

I don't know what you believe in, your higher power, but you got to have some faith in God and some spiritual. That's what I think that sustains you because it allows you to face adversity. I've been blessed to be able to face adversity. Some people have never faced adversity. So when something comes along, they pushed over and they can't survive. I think when you're in politics, you have to have a thick skin. They're going to call you everything but a child of God. Just be ready for it. And those are some of the first tips that I would tell people. Don't get into this if you're going to be a shrinking violet because it's difficult because you're

going to have to stand up for yourself because you have to stand up for the folks that put you in this position michael amen michael okay yeah all right delegate don scott uh congratulations on this i was watching returns on tuesday night um you started talking about some of the key issues that resonated with African-Americans, book bans and suppressing the teaching of African-American history, things like this. But I wanted to drill down more on that. What role did African-Americans play in delivering the state House of Representatives to Democrats? And what was

the percentage turnout or any information you could provide on that? And more specifically, how did you message to African-Americans to get them to turn out and vote? You know, this governor made it really easy to message. I'm going to start with that, because that's how bad he was and how incompetent he was. One of the things that he did at the very end was that he purged voters from the rolls and didn't know. Originally, he said it was 270 voters that had been purged. And then a couple of weeks later, they said it was over 3000 people that had been purged. Now, I just told you all the numbers of how close these elections were.

We were on the majority in two races by about 1,800 votes. If you purge 3,000 voters in the right place, you can throw a whole election in Virginia. And so I think voters repelled against that. They rebelled against that. It really angered some people that they were trying to steal this sacred franchise. And I think that was one of the things that turned out black voters and voters generally. I think a lot of times people think black people want something different than white people. We all want the same thing. You know, man's laws theory, you know, safety, security, food, shelter. Then you can start, you know,

trying to sell actual lives. But we all share those same things. We want to be safe in our communities just like they, you know, just like white people. We all have basic same human dignity needs. And so the difference is sometimes we speak a different language and culture. And the difference is we start from different places sometimes. The governor took out the word equity. We created a statute that said you can create a diversity, equity, and inclusion officer.

He said, we don't need equity. We just call it a diversity, opportunity, and inclusion. And so he didn't fill the mandate of the statute. He never filled the position. He put in a guy to fill this fake position, a black guy who had worked at Chick-fil-A the year before. He literally had been a manager at Chick-fil-A. He made it really easy to communicate to black people about how incompetent he was and how much he did not really care about the issues. When you talk about what black voters and what black delegates did to get us the majority, the 51st vote for me, the race that they called last, was a black man named Michael Fagans.

He's a retired Master Sergeant, my frat brother as well, retired Master Sergeant in Virginia Beach. He became the 51st voter. He is not in a majority black district. He is a black man who can talk to anybody. And I think what we have to take away from this election is that people want leadership, no matter what the package outside looks like. If you share their values, you speak to their issues, they will vote for you.

We have 30 new members. We're going to have 30 members total in the Black Caucus. Out of 140 people, we're going to have 30 of those seats between the House and the Senate. So black people and white people are seeing that black leaders and black people are ready to lead. Right. Okay. I won't hold it against you that you're alpha. I'm still glad you won.

I saw that stuff on your thing. I wasn't going to say nothing about it because I feel sorry for people. I feel sorry for some people. My mama taught me to be polite. You can't hold it against them. That's Alpha and everybody else. I don't know why our little brothers and sisters get so angry sometimes.

Who? Our little brothers from the other organization. I call them my children. I don't want to do them that bad. I do. I do. I call them children. I tell them, who's your daddy? Matt, your question. Well, first, let me say,

we need you in Texas, not in D.C., brother, so congratulations. Well, he's actually from Houston. He went to an inferior high school called Sterling. Oh, watch it, boy. It ain't Jack.

You know it ain't Jack Gates. Stop it, boy. You know, y'all ain't won nothing. We won some things. Where's Zena Garrison from? Y'all ain't won nothing. Where's Clyde Drexler from? That's two.

Okay, I can keep going. Where's Debbie Allen from? Okay. Where's Felicia Rashad from? They're sisters. You can't count them. They ain't have no choice. That's our kids.

Boy, don't even start. Don't even start. Go. Go ahead, Matt. Well, here's the question. Where did Debbie Allen and Felicia Rashad go to school? boy don't even start don't even start go go ahead Matt well here's a question where did Debbie Allen and Felicia Rashad go to school that's the real question Jack Yates High School Howard University

yeah but if they don't do it right at Yates they not doing well at Howard nice try now go on and ask your little question as usual I'm focused on the facts and the questions here. If you would, Brother Scott, what is your legislative agenda going forward? Because I know Youngkin is out, I guess, next year. You've got a majority in both. So whatever

you send to his desk, you can basically veto his veto. So I'm interested in what you're expecting the primary issues to be for the legislative agenda and specifically if you think there will be any constitutional amendments on issues that we're seeing in the in the you know national zeitgeist things like qualified immunity uh crt abortion anything else that might be um looking at constitutionally amending uh those issues thank thank you very much yeah you can expect'm going to start with that at the beginning. You can expect to see a constitutional amendment to make sure that we protect women's reproductive health care.

That will happen. You will see a constitutional amendment for automatic restoration of rights. I don't know if you know, but in Virginia, it's one of the only states, I think Kentucky may do, but Virginia permanently disenfranchises folks who have a felony conviction.

And the governor has been very, very slow in restoring rights. He changed the entire process and made it much more difficult and created much more barriers, many more barriers to prevent people from having their rights restored. So you're going to see a constitutional amendment for automatic restoration of rights. We don't believe the governor should have the ability to keep people from being restored to their full American citizenship and being able to be made whole in their communities, especially if they're paying taxes

and contributing to the community. And so, you know, this governor has taken us backwards on that particular issue, and we're gonna try to go forward. I don't know if you know, but Virginia is one of the states that put the ban on gay marriage in the Constitution. So if the Supreme Court were to overturn gay marriage, it would be immediately illegal in Virginia. So we want to introduce a constitutional amendment to take that out.

And so those are three of the top priorities that I can think of as far as constitutional amendments. But as far as the policy prescriptions that we have for Virginia, we want to make sure that, you know, because we're so close, we're 51-49 in the House, and in the Senate we have a majority, Democratic majority of 21-19. And so at the end of the day, we have a Republican governor. So we're going to have to make some compromises to get some things done. And I think that's what the voters said. The voters said, we're going to reject this mess that looks like chaos that the Republicans

are doing, and we want the adults in the room to sit down and talk again. And I think if you take away the extremes of the MAGA Republicans, we'll be able to come to some agreements on funding public education. That's a priority, making sure we have great economic development with equity and fairness for everybody, giving everybody economic opportunity. I think we can agree that AK-47s probably shouldn't be on our streets. We can agree on that. I think we can agree that we should be strengthening our red flag laws so that people with mental health issues could have access and have those guns removed.

One of the things that we saw last session was every single Republican in the House of Delegates voted to repeal red flag laws that allow folks to take a firearm away from people who are in a mental health crisis. Who does that? And so I think common sense has to prevail. I think Democrats are on the right side of these issues. You know, we're in the middle. We're in the center on all of these issues.

The Republicans are on the stream. We're in the center on reproductive health care. We're in the center on gun violence prevention. We're in the center on economic opportunity for all. We're in the center on making sure that we fund public education. So if we continue to do those things and stay focused on the job at hand, I believe that we're going to make the governor sign some bills, do some things that most MAGA Republicans wouldn't do, because if he rejects it, then they'll pay again in 25. Last question I have for you. You obviously see poll numbers, national.

Coming on the heels of this week, what advice do you have for the Biden-Harris campaign when it comes to really trying to speak to the needs of the voters in order to win the re-election? I think they're going to have to do, they're going to have to get rid of the window dressing. I think we do a lot of window dressing and you're gonna have to drill down

and really start talking to voters about the things, everyday kitchen table issues. One of the things that people, you know, unfortunately, I know we wanna think that this is all philanthropic and everything, but we some selfish things. And so we wanna know what's in it for us. And I think we gotta start telling people

what's in it for us. I think the theme that the president is talking about, about saving democracy, I think that's real. I think that a lot of people who are afraid that if Trump comes back now... I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops called this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley

comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English.

I'm Greg Lott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams, NFL player, Heisman Trophy winner.

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

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

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the LA fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program providing fully functional home environments

for those who lost everything in the fires. Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to asenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. Not only is he going to make it worse,

he's even said it already, he's going to get some payback. Yeah, oh, he said, I'm going to use the IRS, the DOJ against my enemies. He has said, I will suspend, I believe we should suspend the Constitution. I heard somebody talking about the Constitution earlier. Dude, you can't do that. So at the end of the day, we need to make sure that we continue to educate people. And people react sometimes, you know, if we inspire people,

give them that hope, and also remind them of what happens if you don't. And I think they have done so much. The CHIPS Act, the Infrastructure Act, they've created so many manufacturing jobs, new manufacturing. They have to have a very, very sustained, because some people just don't want to hear it.

Right. And it's amazing, but you've got to keep, I hated myself. I stayed on message so much. I had my team and my members who were running, I know they probably were mad at me, because I was like, here is your box. Here is your message box. You leave this box, you should feel that zap. All right?

You stay on message. And I think if we all stay on message, and the president and his team, they're smarter than I am, but if they stay on message, they can win this election. Because they got a crazy person that likes chaos. And if they stay on message, I think, and continue to be the grown-ups in the winning room, I think they win

this election. It's called voting on sanity. That's all it is. That's all it is. Easy. All right. Delegate Don Scott, we appreciate it. Look forward to you being sworn in as a speaker. You're all it is. Easy. All right. Delegate Don Scott, we appreciate it. Look forward to you being sworn in as a speaker. You're going to be there in January, baby. I'll be there. I'll be there. I'll be there hanging out.

I'm sure you have a bigger smile on your face then. And I'm sure, sorry, my alpha will be represented in the house. That's how we do it. All right. Appreciate it. Thanks so much. All right, folks. Coming up next, we'll chat with director, actor, also author Eric LaSalle.

Y'all know him from ER. Well, he's got a new book out, so we'll chat about what he's doing with his literary talent. You're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered right here on the Black Star Network. Don't forget, you can watch our 24-hour streaming channel on Amazon News. Just simply go to Amazon News and go to Amazon Fire, check out Amazon News. You can tell Alexa to play news from the Black Star Network. Also, Plex TV, you can see us there as well. Also, Amazon Freebie. And you can check us out on Amazon Prime Video as well. We'll be right back. Grow your business or career with Grow with Google's wide range of online courses, digital

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Ever feel as if your life is teetering and the weight and pressure of the world is consistently on your shoulders? Well, let me tell you, living a balanced life isn't easy. Join me each Tuesday on Black Star Network for a balanced life with Dr. Jackie. We'll laugh together, cry together, pull ourselves together, and cheer each other on. So join me for new shows each Tuesday on Black Star Network. A Balanced Life with Dr. Jackie. I am Tommy Davidson. I play Oscar on Proud Family, Louder and Prouder. Right now, I'm rolling with Roland Martin.

Unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undamned believable. You hear me? សូវាប់ពីបានប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្រាប់ពីប្� My next guest, you remember him, folks. Hit series ER. ER, that's right. He was on that course also from coming to America. These days, he stays busy being a director, executive producer. But did you know that Eric LaSalle is also an author? His newest book is called The Laws of Annihilation.

It was just released, and he joins us now from Los Angeles. Eric, what's happening, man? What's up, Roland? How you doing, brother? Man, good to see you. Good to chat with you. First of all, it was a few years ago, it was a few years ago, you and I were texting back and forth and you were self-publishing

and you were really just starting into it. So how many books are you into now? This is the third book in the series. Got it. And I'm working on, I just finished up the fourth one. I'm working on the fifth one now. So I just want to, you know, keep doing it. It took a long time, you know.

I was, you know, trying to get published. Couldn't get a publisher for several years. And then finally got a good publisher and they republished the ones that were self-published. This one has never been published. This is a brand new book. But the funny thing is, you know, all those books that weren't published, you know, by a publisher traditionally, now, you know, we're making bestsellers lists and we're making all three of the books. I actually pulled up a trifecta of being number one, two, and three on a few bestsellers list. So I say that to really say that, you know, sometimes you can't listen to people. Oh, yeah.

You know, when people are trying to tell you, no, no, no, no, there's no value, there's no value. And particularly the interesting thing is the first two books weren't changed. They were still, you know, pretty the same thing that was rejected. And now, you know, you're, you know, making bestsellers list. So, you know, the message, man, is just when you believe in something, just keep it. Because I remember we were talking because I have I've I've self-published five books. And my whole deal always was, and I remember meeting with a book publisher.

This probably was about 2009, 2010. It was so funny. And they asked to meet with me, and I threw out four or five different things. And they were like, well, no, no, no. And probably by the fourth no, I said, whoa, whoa. I said, let me help y'all out. I don't need y'all to do any of these.

I said, let me be perfectly clear. I said, these books are going to get published. I don't need you to do it. I said, now you're talking to me as the author. I can take my hat off and then put the CEO hat on, and we can start talking about paperweight and matte, hardcover, glossy. I started breaking down. I said, now, I said, let me be real clear, because I was CNN, I was TV1, I was Time Journal. I said, I don't need y'all for media. And, and the reason that was

important because so many people, I hear these people say, Oh, I got rejected 30 times. We're now living in a world where that, where you don't, that whole infrastructure that they, so critically important, you don't actually need. The key is get your work out there and work it and put it in the hands of people, and they will, they like it, they'll consume it. Well, you know, look, technology has liberated us in a lot of ways. Yes, sir.

I mean, the thing about it, you can now make, you know, I started off when I became a director. I, you know, started off, you know, shooting short films. You know, you have to go and rent all this equipment. I mean, that was years ago. I mean, I've been directing for 20 years. In that time, you can make a movie on an iPhone now. Dude, dude.

Matthew Cherry did a movie on an iPhone 6. Steven Soderbergh has done several movies on an iPhone 7. Hell, we ain't talking about the iPhone 15. But it's all about do it. Stop waiting for somebody to give you permission. Exactly. And that's the thing that there are options. I was determined, like you,

I was determined I wasn't going to let no... I got 30, 40 rejections. You know what I mean? I was getting multiple rejections you know what i mean i mean do i was i was getting multiple rejections from the same publishing house because wow oh well let's try this person let's try this oh we know this one in it and you know and then i brought the second book so but the point is like you i was determined that this was going to you know this was going to get out there so i so i self-pub. What that did was that started generating interest because we did well as a self-published book, got really good reviews.

So it, unfortunately we had to validate, you know, we needed validation. And a lot of times, you know, it's easier for some people, but this was just a part of the journey. So I don't complain about it. I just roll up my sleeves. I do i do it and and this is also something really important you know when we talk to and church message to young people is double down on the effort you know what i mean like you you you have the choice to take that rejection and let it die right there like that's it that's that that's i'm not going to do anything or you can use that rejection to be inspired and go. I'm going to. You know what I did when I got rejected? I wrote the second. I was like, I'm going to write again and then I'm going to write again. And one of these is going to break.

And so now the cool thing is, you know, now with the laws of annihilation coming out, like I said, all the books are selling. So I knew there was this franchise. And so people read the first book. Now they want to read the second and third. Or if people read the third book, now they're going back saying, well, I've got to check out the first two books. So that's really important. And I think when we're trying to create, I started writing for self-empowerment.

You want to own IP. You want ownership. And that's what we need. There you go. That's what we have to do. So it's in a weird way, it's bigger than our individual goals. It's like if we, you know, because they don't even, there aren't that many African-American writers in the genre of thrillers, which is what I write. And so we're trying to change that as well.

So like I said, it's cool to be a part of something that's even a little bigger than your ego and your goals, and we all have them. But I also like being a part of showing, hey, this is how we're going to do it. We're going to empower ourselves even more, great business sense, great structure to create the success. Because we I created these books to I wanted to make a successful literary franchise that then turns into a successful film streaming television.

There you go. Franchise. So that's ownership. And then it becomes us. That's the power. We're not going and begging people, hey, come look at this script. Look at this. We're not doing it the traditional way. We're doing it another way. It's interesting because I know somebody's watching going,

whoa, whoa, hold up. How can you be Eric LaSalle, a prominent actor on a hit show, and they tell you no? Well, guess what? Same thing happened with Hill Harper when he did his book. And they were sitting here and he was literally told,

oh, black men don't read. And he was kind of like, yeah, they do. And that ended up turning into a trilogy of books. But it also comes down to motive in terms of what it is that you want. And so for me like so so my book out now called white fear the only reason i did that with the publisher is because i met the sister uh i met the sister i met a woman at emmett smith's golf tournament who was a literary agent

and we sat next to each other and she she asked me several different things. She's like, oh my God, I love that. She says, I want to rep that. I was kind of like, okay. I mean, I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no.

Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated.

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

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

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

Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus

on Apple Podcasts. Hey, Drew Scott here, letting you know why I recently joined the board of an amazing nonprofit, A Sense of Home. For 10 years, this charity has been creating homes for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the L.A. fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program, providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires. Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to ascenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. So I wasn't necessarily

interested, so I said, let's go ahead and do it. And it was and it was a trip, though, because it was like this three year process. Same thing. No, no, no. And I was sitting here like, Jan, I don't need them to say yes, because I knew about my social media following, had my own show, do my own stuff on radio. I knew I'm a move. Twenty plus thousand copies of the book. Bring it here. I know I'm a move. plus thousand copies of the book. Bring it here. I know I'm going to move 20,000 copies of the book. So I wasn't even sweating that. And I remember with my second book, I was talking to this sister. She was on the New York Times bestseller list.

And she was asking me about my book. I said, yeah, let's do our third printing. And she was like, OK. And then I told her, I said, yeah, we generated probably about 35,000. And she said, I ain't seen one royalty check. I said, well, the beauty of self-publishing, when you sit there signing books and it's your square, the money going right into your bank account. And we had this huge laugh.

But again, I just tell people, do not allow them to control your creative output. And when you do that, then you're stifled and you think you aren't worthy when the artist is out there and if you work it, you'll move some copies. Exactly. And that's, you know, that's like I said, it's really cool.

There's a brother by the name of S.A. Cosby who has set the literary world on fire and he writes in this genre. Obviously we have the godfather, Walter Mosley. I'm a part of the Crime Writers of Color organization and we've got sisters, we've got brothers that are doing it but again there's the perception in the

publishing industry which is which is a very broken industries yeah it's it's insane how broken it is but um you know they keep churning things out but we have this talent and um and you know we just have to keep pushing and we we end up selling books. See, what they won't tell you, the 35,000 books that you pushed, they have invested millions of dollars into some writers

that don't look like us. And they're not pushing 35,000. And they have a huge machine behind them. Right, right. They don't tell that part of it. Right. That to that's why i'm saying you can't you know there's a whole campaign there's this there's all this they spend a lot of money and a lot of these books are not selling yes well well i think because the public doesn't the public really doesn't understand i mean they'll see michelle Obama's book, you know,

eight million copies or something along those lines, not realizing the average book that's being put out, even by the random houses and the St. Martin Press, they ain't moving 10,000 copies. Exactly. And people don't get that their business is a volume business

we're going to put out 200 books or whatever the number is it's a volume thing and I think that's where people get so frustrated and they just don't understand that process. Victoria Rowe when her book came out was so interesting Eric so she did the book with a publishing company and

Basically, they gave her a PR person for like two months, right? Then after that, yo, they booked and so her book came off in New York Times best-seller list So what Victoria then did was she was like a hold up. So she then Understanding the business she got own photographer home pr person begin to book her own radio interviews and then guess what went back on the new york times best seller list so the publisher called she's like oh no we good we good you know because she understood and then what that meant was she was creating her own database of media outlets. So when for her next book, she's like, I'm not waiting on y'all. And so this is where I'm always trying to explain to people,

understand the business of the business and don't get enamored with the show in show business. Exactly. Yeah. And that's, you know, that's, that's why we're so easily shut down because we don't know and, and, and they mislead. And so I, like I of us even as athletes, many of us are rappers, whatever. But when you start understanding ownership, when you start understanding the business more, like I remember when Prince went through his thing. He started understanding the business more. Michael Jackson started understanding the business. So he said, I'm going to go buy the Beatles catalog.

And that was insane. So it was thought, but that, that was insane. So, you know, so it was thought, but look how profitable it was. So the more we understand the business, the more it can service our art. Cause we leave from a place of I'm an artist. I love art. I love, I would do this for free, but we got to understand the business. So I'm getting an education, but I also maintain the joy of being an artist and creating this. This is a cool franchise. I love the characters.

People are, you know, the reviews on it are crazy and people get it. And so had I given up, I wouldn't have had that quote unquote validation. I wouldn't have been, you know, making the best sellers lists. I wouldn't be moving books. I wouldn't be, you know wouldn't be right wait you know working on my fourth book and my fifth book so you know the message here is you know yes be the artist be in love with the art but also understand enough of the business to protect the art yeah and that's something that no i didn't it took me years learn that. I don't know how long it took you. It took me a while.

Well, I'll be honest. I had the advantage of a grandmother owning a catering business that I started with when I was seven, my mom had her own cake business. And so I actually understood the business of the business as a teenager. Right. And so when I came into media, I literally, I went to communications high school, Jack Gates High School in Houston. I was in magnet school. And I was literally at 15 understanding, owning, controlling the narrative.

I'll never forget the first day, sophomores year, second semester, we couldn't go into the studio the first semester because we needed to learn the glossary terms, what a, all different cables and stuff. So we go into the studio, all students rushed to the set. And Mary Waits was my teacher, and I turned to her and I said, where does a person sit who tells them what to do? And she said, that person sits in the control room.

I said, I'll be in the control room. And that was always my deal. And I never, I won't say I did not get along with my bosses, but every place where I worked, I was weird to them because I wasn't about them controlling and owning all of my voice. Oh, you don't want me to write columns? Cool, I'm gonna go write it over here. Oh, I can't do this over here.

I'm gonna do it over here. And so for me, the two words that have completely guided everything in my life since I graduated in 1991 from Texas A&M was I want flexibility and freedom. Right. And I wasn't fixated on the money. And so for me, it's the it's the flexibility to do my craft and it's the freedom because you can pay me a lot but the moment you say no now I feel like I have a straight jacket on with handcuffs and um and uh and and uh and tape and I feel like muzzled and so that's always sort of guided me and and and I've I've never tripped on so it's like yo I'm not tripping I didn't care about the New York Times bestseller list.

I was like, so if I own this and I move 15,000 copies, I'm good. Even with my book, White Fear, I did it with a publisher. I didn't put together a 30-city tour because I didn't know the cost of that. So I said, we're going to do cities where I have speeches. So I'm already going there. Because I understood the business of the business. And when you understand the business part, it just totally changes your worldview in all of this.

It's liberation. And that's the thing that I, you know, I started writing, you know, when I started becoming a director, I started writing short films. And then, you know, when I started becoming a director, I started writing short films. And then, you know, then at some point I said, I want to try my hand at being a novelist. And I understood then I was like ownership. And I've been preaching that, you know, since the days of ER, which is why I started a production company. Everybody watching, I want you to understand, literally, this was like seven or eight years ago

when Eric sent me a text, and we were going back and forth about this very thing. So now I've got this really, really cool franchise, and it's interesting because the kind of stories that I'm interested in telling,

what ends up happening is when you're waiting on validation and you're waiting for permission um you're waiting on them to approve your heart bone and so and so my thing is like no i'm going to lead with my heart i'm going to lead with my mind of of what what i'm passionate about and so i started telling the kind of stories I wanted to tell. And the interesting thing about laws of annihilation, the subject matter is it's about tensions between the African-American community and the Jewish community.

And it deals a lot with racial hatred. It deals a lot with tribalism. Yeah, you say a race war is brewing in New York City and nobody can stop it. Exactly. And, you know, so and then, of course, now that when I started doing media, they started comparing to what's happening

in the world right now. And, you know, look, just, you know, but here's like some of, see, what I do is this. You know, you have to always take your advantages. So, because of my film background, I'm always inspired by film. So my first book, Laws of Depravity, that was that that was influenced by the movie Seven. This book, Laws of Annihilation, just a piece of it. You have a racist Jewish member of the Jewish member of the community and you have an African American,

a racist African American, that are locked in a basement. They've been kidnapped. They have every reason to want to kill each other. And they have to figure it out for their survival. And so you take that and you take that as a

microcosm and a metaphor of what's happening in the world. We have to figure this stuff out. That sound like that, what was that, Lawrence Fishburne movie where he was in jail and it was like he had to get with the cops and he was like,

listen, we either gonna die or we gonna put this thing together. But also this, the, was it the Sidney Poitier? What was the Sidney Poitier? Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis. Yeah. Defiant ones.

Yeah. And so we have these. And that's the B storyline. The A storyline is we open up with two rabbis that have been viciously murdered. And so I have three protagonists in my books. One is like Seven, the same setup as Seven. You have an Irish-Italian-American detective who's partnered with an African-American detective in New York. They're considered the best closers. They close all the cases. They only work high-profile serial

killers. And so they team up with a half-Jewish female FBI agent. So the three of them are my protagonists. So each book, they get to deal with their own personal things. So obviously in this book, you have a Jewish FBI agent who, by the way, in the first chapter, is diagnosed with terminal cancer. And just as she's starting to deal with that, the biggest case of her career and of her life falls in her lap, which is two

rabbis are viciously murdered in a synagogue. And then African-American man is kidnapped. A Jewish man is kidnapped. And it's just stoking all the fires. And so in order to stop this war, they all have to work together. And it's just, you know, so that's really, you know, really cool. And so I get a lot of, you know, conversations now about what's happening in the world, you know what I mean? And so had I listened to the rejections, A, you and I wouldn't be here. This book wouldn't be here. And a book that resonates, and you know, I like to write about things that resonate, that stick with you, that give you some really interesting characters and plot to hold on to because, you know, the truth is, a lot of these books and what you and I were talking about earlier,

a lot of these big publishing house books, you know, books that's published, you know, traditionally and these big authors sometimes, you know, Roland, you read these books and, you know and a week later, you can't remember. You can't remember characters. It didn't stick. It was just fluff. It was just fluff.

But they're paying all this money. They're spending all this money. And so I, you know, the thing that, and I always, I urge people that's interested in books, go to Amazon, read the reviews, you know, see what people are saying about it, because it's the, they always talk about how much it sticks with them. They talk about how fast paced it is. They talk about these things, but these are things that they were saying we couldn't do. They were saying that there was no

place for African-Americans in this genre. And we're going, no, not only is there room, there is necessity based on how we tell story. And so that's something to me that's really, really important. And I think that we need to, that's why we need to follow our dream because we need to contribute into the storytelling. We need to have control over our stories. We need to have control over how we tell stories. And so that's what these books are about. That's what this franchise is about. And I guess I'm really, really proud of it. I just think it's a, you know, it's been a great opportunity for me. And it's been something that really has helped me to sort of, to grow as a director, as an actor, as a producer, because it's all storytelling and all storytelling and they all feed each other.

I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them.

From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes one, two, and three on May 21st and episodes four, five, and six on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good War on Drugs podcast. Yes, sir. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way.

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

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

It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Hey, Drew Scott here, letting you know why I recently joined the board of an amazing

nonprofit, A Sense of Home. For 10 years, this charity has been creating homes for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the LA fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program, providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires. Please get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to asenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us.

So yeah, I'm really, really happy with that. Quick questions from a panel. Let's see here. Joy, you got all them damn books behind you. I guess I'll go ahead and start with that. Quick questions from my panel. Let's see here. Joy, you got all them damn books behind you. I guess I'll go ahead and start with you. So I am a crime, true crime fanatic. I mean, I listen to the podcast Crime Junkies all the time. They need to plug your books.

Separate thing. We'll talk about that later. So I'm tempted, I want to know what, I want people to know, I just ordered it. I want people to know, I just ordered it. I want people to know what the story is about. That said, I also want to talk a little bit about how we diversify the publishing industry. Because you're right. We have to overcome, there is no excuse for not publishing and doing what you need to do. But it also is a reminder of systemic racism,

why it's so important that we have to have diversity everywhere so we can tell our stories. So I don't know how you're going to answer both of those questions. I want to know what it's about, but I want to know what we're going to do to make it better for the next book authors. Well, for me,

the answers are related. So like I said, so first of all, we have three protagonists. We have two New York City detectives that end up teaming up with an FBI agent in pursuit of high-profile serial killings. So if you think of the movie Seven, very similar tonally in that direction. Each book, the first book, Laws of Depravity, focused on the Irish-Italian-American cop who used to be an, who was an altar boy when he was growing up. He was molested by a priest, okay? So the first case that we deal with, someone, a serial killer, is killing falling priests that are pedophiles, etc. So he's torn because on one hand, he's a cop. On the other hand, he hates, you know, pedophiles.

So there's an interesting dilemma. The second book focuses on our African-American detective whose father was the godfather of Harlem. He was a notorious gangster who's now a legitimate businessman. But he did a lot of horrible things in the past. And some of that stuff comes back to haunt him. So that's the second book. The third book, we have a Jewish-American FBI agent who, as all three of them are now investigating who's killing rabbis and who's kidnapping black people. And you understand that, of course, there's some, you know, white supremacy at play that's playing us against each other. So you have these two interesting communities of, you know, racism, prejudice against African-Americans, prejudice against anti-Semitism,

against Jewish Americans. And so we have these two communities that have sort of been outside of the Native Americans, two historically of the most oppressed groups, and there's still tension between us. And so we have to figure out a way to work it out. And that's what the case is. And at the same time, one of our leads, like I said, is diagnosed with cancer. So now, how do we diversify? And the reason I say that the answers are connected is because we write with a certain flavor. We write with a certain voice. We write with a certain voice. We write with a certain rhythm. We write with, that's how we open up. Like some of these stories that we read, it's the same old thing. It's the heroic white male doing the same thing. It's the, you

know, and so I want to, I want to diversify, not just racially, but gender. I want to, I want to diversify not just racially, but gender. I want to diversify things and show that this female FBI agent is written with the same muscularity and alpha traits as my male characters. So we want to show that women can be seen and carry books. And we can have these female heroes. We can have African-American heroes. We here's the key. Write your story. Write your story organically. I'm not trying to preach. If I tell the best story that I can tell, it just happens to be populated. My stories are populated with these colorful, diverse characters. That becomes the validation. That becomes the way that we diversify because they start going, wow, these kinds of books with this multiracial cast, multigender cast,

not for the sake of preaching. And because when that stuff is forced, to me, it doesn't work. I'm sorry. Even if you have good intentions, it doesn't work. But when you read a book and it's just like, oh, you see a movie and it's naturally integrated into it, that's how we diversify because people start understanding. When I'm a producer, I used to think, as I started as a director, I used to think that they didn't want us in certain roles. And a lot of that is true. But I also realized something, and it's similar to what Roland said about being in the booth, who sits in the booth. As a director, I would go and say they wrote a role as for a white male judge. Now, as a director, I'm now, well, wouldn't that be more interesting if that judge was an Asian female? Wouldn't that be more interesting? And a lot of times, not all the times, and yes, there is definitely racism, hands down. A lot of times they would just go, oh, we never thought of that. So we need to be in these rooms. That's the key thing. We need to

get into the rooms or, and obviously when you write a book, you are the room. But either way, we get to control the images that come out of the room that comes off on the page. That's how we diversify and that's how we show the industry that organic diversity works. And so they are connected. And that's why I took you through all my characters, because they're so diverse and they each have different backgrounds. That's how we start breaking that barrier down. We have to make it work as a story. And that translates into sales. That sales translates into success. That success translates into let's look at more of these. S.A. Cosby, you know, brother who has set the literary world on fire, I think is now beginning to help make people look at that again and say,

oh, you know, Black men can write or Black people of color can write thrillers. They can't, you know, we're underrepresented in this genre. And I'm happy to be a part of it to help try to tear down those walls. But that's how I think we diversify. It's got to be quality for this. Got to work. Your best intentions don't. It's got to be quality. Michael. Eric, let's say on another note. Hey, loved you on a different world. Nineteen ninety power of the pen. You played a literary professor named Dr. Paul Mann. So here you are actually in real life writing literary writing, writing literary works, three novels. OK, is there a connection between you playing a professor of literature on a sitcom that all of us watched in the 90s and you actually writing literature in real life?

No, no. That was just look, you know, when you're an actor and you think writing uh literature in real life no no that was just look you know when you're an actor and you know you think i think about that's the beginning of my career when you're an actor okay agent calls you and says i got an audition for you you know i was boys with kadim and daryl so you know i was hanging out on that set anyway just to go hang up just to see them opportunity came up i did that what did influence me even more so was a few years later after er first after the first season of er some producers approached me and said hey we own the rights to this famous uh novelist uh series uh we'd like you to play this character now the guy is written white so you had my attention right there. And it was, the book was

called Mind Prey. The author's name is John Sanford, who was huge in the thriller world, huge. And so I said, well, fine, I'll, I'll do it. I'll co-produce it. So I was a producer on it. I starred in it. I hired the director who was my partner at the time. So once I got into that world, I was like, wow, this is really cool. And I saw how the books translated into film. And I thought that was really cool. And that's what also pushed me.

So that had more influence than anything, being able to play this famous key character that was established in the literary world as a, you know, he's written white. And they came to me as an African American. And we never made, you never make mention of race. That's the beauty of it. If it's a good character,

we never mentioned that he was black. No one ever, you know, that's the beauty and that's the power. And that's what really got me interested. Matt. Well, let me first say, brother, thank you for sharing your gifts for these many years. And I would be remiss if I didn't say I've prosecuted and defended quite a number of murder cases. So if you ever need a consultant, I'm happy to do that for you.

But all jokes aside, my question is really actually about the substantive process. You've obviously given us many works in different mediums, but what have you found that would be instructive to people who want to be authors? Because it seems to me that's a particularly daunting gift to have to write, because it's difficult to write a book, obviously. So what have you learned in that process that would help others who are interested in being authors? And if you could give us a quick encapsulation of your process when you're planning and writing and otherwise, you know, getting ready to release a book. Wow. Great, great, great, great question. You know, I think this, man. I think that it's important for us to have a strong sense of craft.

Whatever you're going to do, understand the craft of it. Too many of us jump into things, whether it's acting, whether it's broadcast, we just think we can show up. And now I think it's becoming worse with social media, because if you have so many followers, then, you know, people are interested in you, but they're not interested in you based on craft. They're not interested on based on you understanding the true technique of whatever you're pursuing. So I think people want to be stars more I you know I'm I was never interested in being a star. I wanted to just be an actor

I wasn't I didn't know about the money. I didn't know about any of you learn that stuff later I dreamed of being an actor and and I was in love with the art of acting I fell in love with the art of writing i fell in love with the art of writing so i wanted to be a writer i wanted to start writing obviously you want to be successful but you want to be successful um you know critically you want to be successful commercially so that's what's really really important so i think it's i think if people are serious about it, they have to learn the craft. Go to, first of all, which is something that's really simple, do homework. And most people, when you tell them to do homework, you lose them. Because people want it, but they don't want to put it into

work. So if you're willing to do the homework, part of the homework is real simple. Some of the best advice I ever got, read up, meaning read good writers. Understand how they're telling a story, the economy of words, the economy of adjectives and adverbs, like understanding and really choose writers, authors that you really, really admire. What makes their work so good? If you get an opportunity, go to book fairs. Go listen to authors talk. So understand their journey. Their journey will be different from your journey. But these are the ways that you start understanding the craft more. And obviously, take writing classes if you can. So there are many ways but you have to be committed

to that my process and i think another thing it took me a while to accept the title without feeling intimidated or pretentious that i want to be an author like that is so intimidating like we don't especially i don't know if race plays into it and whatever but it's almost double for us because we don't we're like oh i can't be an author and i have to keep saying no no dude just write just write you know what i mean so give yourself permission um give yourself permission to be an astronaut give yourself give yourself permission to be an astrophysicist give yourself yourself permission. We get intimidated by that because people don't normally look like us. They don't normally come from where we come from.

So you first have to say, I can do this. The way I'm going to do it is by studying and by understanding the craft. So that's my process and that's my advice. But read up. Read authors that inspire you. Read authors that intimidate you because they're so good. I got, that I pass on, and if people really, really want it, do the work. I started,

when people would come up to me and ask, how do I get into acting? How do I get into directing? And you get inundated with that stuff sometimes. I learned the best way, and I know this sounds cruel, the best way to get rid of people is to tell them to do homework.

Yep! Oh my God! I would just, I'd give them homework. I'd give them homework, and I'd never hear from them again. Eric, people come up to me and they say, hey, I want to reach you. I've got an idea. This is what I say. Send me a one sheet.

Right. It never happens. Never happens. A lot of them won't even learn what a one sheet. Right. It never happens. Never happens. A lot of them won't even learn what a one sheet is. A lot won't even learn that. Now, the ones that do follow through, okay, now we can talk. Boom. But you will eliminate 98% of the population that are coming after you. Sustained.

Yeah. Sustained. Y'all, straight up. Dude, I spoke to some HBCU students today, Coca-Cola today. Flew to Atlanta, flew back. And I said, yo, I said, do the work. If you want all this other stuff, if you,

I said, because people say, you know, I want to do what you do. And I go, but do you want to do what I do? Right. I said, it's the work. I said, the work. I said, you want to, you want to do what I do? Right. I said, it's the work. I said, the work. I said, you want to, man, I see you hanging out with Dave Chappelle and Will Smith.

I said, no, no, no, no. That don't just happen. The work is what they're responding to, which creates the relationship. It's the work. The work. And folk don't want to put in the work. They don't want to. And writing, you know, writing is lonely, first of all.

So, you know, listen, you know, a lot of us want what we see in other people. But listen, we're not all built to carry those dreams. Yep. You know what I mean? And so a lot of people aren't built, most people aren't built to carry my dream. Yep. And so they look at the result of my dream. Right, right. They don't know the effort of my dream. Yep. And so we, they, they, they, they want to, they, they look at the result of my dream. Right. Right. They don't know the effort of my dreams this morning. I'm up at four 30 in

the morning. Um, because I'm working on my next book and we, you know, the strike just ended. We're getting ready to go back to work. I'm executive producing and directing a new show for, um, Dick Wolf on, on, on Amazon. We're getting ready to go back to work. I'm like, I'm going to be pulling double duties. I'm going to be getting up at 4.30 in the morning, getting my writing in, going to set, doing that, coming home, maybe getting some more

writing in. People aren't built for that, but they see it and they're like, oh my God, you do this, you do that. You're a director, you're a producer, you're an author. They're not built for my dream. Or just listen. I mean, listen, when we, you do this, you do that, you're a director, you're a producer, you're an author, they're not built for my dream. Or just, listen, I mean, listen, when I did this here, I didn't have time

to write it. Because of everything, this show, six other shows, and I was like, I need a ghostwriter. Literally, it was like three years. Jan was like, yo, where the book? I was like, Jan, I literally do not have the time. Met a sister, Sister Santoni, the NAACP, she told me about a ghostwriter. Literally, it was like three years. Jan was like, yo, where the book? I was like, Jan, I literally do not have the time. Met a sister of San Antonio

at the NAACP. She told me about a ghostwriter. I was on the phone with her the next night. Here's what was interesting. Eric, we're sitting there going through this here. They're like, well, who's going to go? I was like, yeah, we put her name on. I was like, I ain't tripping. What we did was, we did a series of

audio brain dumps. She would like, we would talk for two or three hours, and I would basically articulate the book. Thoughts, visions, this, this, this, this here. And she would put it together. We probably had about six, eight, ten conversations. But I knew that. Now, other people, they can go into a cocoon.

I know I didn't have that time. So it's understanding. And so then it was like, like I said, so I wasn't tripping even on putting the name. I was like, yo, I'm good. I don't need to have just my name. My ego, fine. But when you understand what your limitations are,

what your skill set is, then you can sort of craft this. And so that's why, as I tell people, you can't say you want to do what I do if you don't want to do what I do. You can't. You're not strong enough to carry... And listen, and I'll flip it. You know, my best friend is Michael Beach. And Mike Beach is a gym rat.

This dude works out like... Yeah, I see his Instagram. Yep. This dude is just ripped, right? So every once in a while, you know, and I do my exercise, I do my stuff, whatever. Every once in a while, I'll be like, damn, I want to be shredded like Mike. But guess what? I ain't willing to put in the work that Mike

does. I'm not willing to put in the diet. I'm not willing to... I love food, you know what I mean? Right. I do enough. I do enough to maintain. I do enough so I ain't got I love food. You know what I mean? Right. I do enough. I do enough to maintain. I do enough so I ain't got a beer gut. You know what I mean? Not that I drink beer, but I'm just saying, I don't have a pot belly.

I do just enough. So, but see, but I go, okay, that's not my passion. Right, right. And so I'm not trying to be a professional, but I look at that and I go, man, you know, that envy kicks in, but I don't, my legs aren't strong enough to carry his dream. There are many people that their legs aren't strong enough to carry my dream. They're not willing to get up at 4, 3 in the morning. They're not willing to get up until 2 in the morning.

They're not willing to do these things. So you can't have that. And that's the key. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time. Have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this taser the revolution.

But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company

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

Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes 1, 2, and 3 on May 21st, and episodes 4, 5, and 6 on June 4th. Ad-free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glod. And this is Season 2

of the War on Drugs podcast. We are back. In a big way. In a very big way. Real people, real perspectives. This is kind of star-studded a little bit, man. We got Ricky Williams,

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

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

Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to hear episodes one week early and ad-free with exclusive content, subscribe to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Hey, Drew Scott here, letting you know why I recently joined the board of an amazing nonprofit, A Sense of Home. For 10 years, this charity has been creating homes for young people exiting foster care. It's an incredible organization. Just days into the LA fires, they moved mountains to launch a new emergency relief program providing fully functional home environments for those who lost everything in the fires. Please

get involved. Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to asenseofhome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. So know what your legs are strong enough to carry and let that be your dream. You nailed it, y'all. Eric LaSalle's new book is called Laws of Annihilation. Dick Wolf says LaSalle conquers yet another medium, a really great read.

Of course, Dick Wolf, producer of the Law & Order series. Y'all, if you are a lover of fiction, check it out. It's the third in a trilogy. Get those as well. People in the chat have already said they ordered. My brother, always good to see you, man. Congratulations on this and good luck. All the success to you.

Thanks for having me and thanks to your panel, man. Really, really, really appreciate it. And, you know, you can hit me on social, my Web site. I like to stay in touch with readers and book clubs. So, yeah, check it out. Let me know what they think. But thank you. Thanks for having me, brother. Really appreciate it. I appreciate it. Thanks a lot. All right. Folks, going to a quick break. We're going to come back, talk to the sculptor of a statue in Arkansas of John H. Johnson, founder of Ebony and Jet Magazine. You're watching Rolling Markdown, the filters on the Blackstone Network. I'm Dee Barnes and next on The Frequency, we have griot, performance artist and author, writer, singer and composer, Queen Mother Nana Camille Yarborough.

Please join us for an incredible conversation of knowledge, wisdom and power of the elders. I'm a perception changer. You are a rearranger. You're a mind devourer and a problem solver. You're a beast eater, a soul excreter, a void filler, and a bio-spiller. You are a thought warmer, a plan former, a power orchestrator, and a tongue translator. Right here on The Frequency on the Black Star Network. I'm Faraiq Muhammad, live from LA. And this is The Culture.

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

and see what kind of trouble we can get into. It's the culture, weekdays at 3, only on the Black Star Network. What's up, everybody? It's your girl LaTosha from the A. And you're watching Roland Martin Unfiltered. Publishing icon, John S. Johnson, has been honored with a new sculpture in his hometown there in Arkansas. Of course, John S. Johnson, founder, Ebony Jet Magazine, Negro Digest.

He was born in Arkansas City, Arkansas, in 1918 before moving to Chicago. Of course, he created the publishing company Empire in Chicago, known worldwide for its influential black magazines. Little Rock Sculptor Susan Holly Williams created the historic sculpture of Johnson. She joins us now from Chicago. Glad to have you on the show. One of the things that I like to do when I travel, I love to, if I'm flying somewhere, if I'm going through an airport, I might be traveling somewhere and I might come upon

on a campus or whatever, you know, a sculpture or something like that dedicated to an African American, love to take a photo and post it. But I think it's important that we understand that in a country where racists erected numerous statues and monuments to domestic terrorists, it's important for us to understand and recognize what I call our black superheroes. And John H. Johnson certainly was one of them. Absolutely. How did you get involved in this project? I'm a sculptor and I am friends with one of the friends of J.H. Johnson, which is a committee that is empowered to look after the legacy of John Johnson and do everything, basically ambassadors for John H. Johnson.

And one of the friends on that committee is a friend of mine who knew me as a sculptor and just reached out to me and see if I was still doing sculpture and if I was interested in this project. So, of course, I was still doing sculpture and if I was interested in this project. So of course I was. How long did it take? Ooh, it took me about nine months to complete the sculpture. And what did you base it off of? I see, guys, go to the photos right here. You see I have multiple, no, no, no,

the noise of her working. No, you had it in the preview window. Go to, go back to go back go back i'm trying to think yeah so there were some photos you had multiple photos there so was there a particular photo or did you put together several several to create uh this piece i would say i put together hundreds of photos to create that piece because I was asked to create John Johnson at a particular age the pictures that I had of John S. Johnson were from age maybe 30 up till 80 so trying to find him uh in the space between 60 and 70 I had to go through a lot of

photos to accomplish that gotcha uh and And you said it took nine months. And obviously, whenever this happens, and we see this all the time, people always go, that don't look like him, or that looks like him. It looks like him. That's always

like the one, I don't care if it's a king statue, or it was whatever. I mean, matter of, I don't care if it was a king statue or it was whatever. I mean, matter of fact, I forgot what city they had a king statue, and these people lost their mind. They took the thing down. Yes. You said it was bought, I mean, they were like, no, that ain't it. They're braves.

They're like, that ain't it, that ain't it. So that's a lot of pressure on a sculptor. Absolutely. And Linda put a lot, Linda Rice Johnson put a lot of pressure on me to make it look like her father. So I wanted to make sure it did look like her father. So I spent probably 90 percent of my time making sure it looked like her father and not just looking like him, but I wanted the essence of him. I wanted to create a moment in time of what he was thinking about. So I wanted to get that expression just right. So it wasn't just look like him, but it was all of those other parts involved.

Absolutely. Panelist questions. Matt, you're first. This is an exquisite work, and I guess my question for you is just what are your thoughts about the importance of public monument? And I ask that because when we look from history, we have things that have, you know, transcended eons that we still revere in museums, right? So you as the sculptor who has actually captured his essence, what do you think the importance is of public monument to those like John H. Johnson who moved us forward the way that he did? I think it's an awareness. It's a place that a lot of people can go and see and appreciate what we have left,

the legacy that we've left behind as African-Americans. And Mr. Johnson, being an African-American who is known for his business sense, is kind of rare for African-American sculptures. The ones that I've seen, the public sculptures that I've seen, are generally religious sculptures, professional athletes, politicians, but it's rare that you see a business professional presented and celebrated because of their business acumen. So I think that's very important and I think being public there

is just that, I mean, I could do one and keep it at home, it won't do any good, but if you put it out there in the public, you can share with so many other people. Joy? Alright, so I joy all right so i want to know if you want if you're a student out there and we're always talking about dreams if you're a student out there and you want to become a sculpture artist right how do you do it i mean what a amazing. But how do you do it? Well, it's a rare career, first of all. And I didn't know anything about it when I was a student.

And I've also taught art in high school. It's just, first of all, you need the talent and you need the desire to do it. And I think once you get the talent and the skill level, you just continue and learn. You educate yourself. You go to school. I have a degree in art. Sorry, not art. I have a degree in interior design, but I taught art for years. So it's just something that you just need to hone for years and years and not give up on.

I taught art and I also taught home economics. I worked as an interior designer for a lot of years too, but I had that passion for art in my heart and I just couldn't let it go. So that's something, if you have that, you just have to keep it and hone it and never let it go. That's something I can't let go. Michael. You have the talent. Thank you. Okay. So John H. Johnson is one of my heroes as well. I've studied him in the past. Did you do any research on John H. Johnson and his history to help inspire you in the sculpting? And if so, what was something significant that you learned about him that you did not already know?

A lot. I read his book, Succeed Against the Odds. And I've known about John S. Johnson because I grew up in an era where you had we had the Jet and Abney magazines on our coffee table. We had sisters. I had sisters that fought over the magazine. But reading his book taught me a lot about his business practices and taught me a lot about his personal life and the grit that he had. And now I know how he was able to accomplish what he did because he was raised in Arkansas City,

which was a tough life. And when he got to Chicago, he was prepared for that. So reading his book and talking to Linda, his daughter, was very important to me. It helped a lot into producing this piece of art. All right. Thank you. All right, then. It is a fantastic piece. We appreciate the work that you did. What's working on now?

I am working on a couple of more commission pieces, which is what I'm really wanting to do with my life is just to do a lot of commission work. But I'd like to thank you, Roland, for having me on the show. This is just another way to share the legacy of John H. Johnson, especially for the people, the younger folks who don't know John H. Johnson. I have run into so many young folks who say, who is that? And it's a shame that I have to explain to them. But the other thing is, I'm working on getting John H. Johnson in Chicago.

So I'm hoping that we'll be able to get John H. Johnson in Michigan Avenue in front of the old Ebony and Jet headquarters on Michigan. I spent a lot of time down there, probably too much time, but I would love to see him down there on my trips down to Michigan Avenue. Well, I had, of course, I had the advantage of meeting him, had the advantage of talking to him on numerous occasions.

And he was also a great alpha man. Absolutely. You guys were represented in arkansas and then when you then when you talk about uh how do you pay homage we actually do this so uh i actually uh uh created this uh my graphic designer put this together and so when we launched this show uh i wanted to do so so we have these murals in all these offices. And so this is dedicated to black-owned media outlets. And as you see, we have Ebony on here. We have Negro Digest on here. We have Jet on here. And there are others, The Crisis, other black newspapers.

And so this is one of the ways that so every day this is my office. And so this is one of the ways for that. So every day, this is my office. And so this is in here. And so trust me, what we do here, these are the people who did it before us to make all of this possible. Oh, that's absolutely wonderful. All right. Absolutely wonderful. Indeed. Well, look, we appreciate it. All right. Come on. Come on. y'all. Switch shots. There you go. All right. Wonderful talking to you guys. Likewise. Good luck.

Thank you so very much. Thank you. Take care. All right, Susan, thank you very much. All right, that's it for us. Matt, Joy, as well as Michael, thanks a bunch. Glad y'all could join us for today's show. It is going to be a little fun this weekend.

It's birthday weekend. My birthday's on Tuesday. My nephew Chris' birthday is Sunday. My brother's birthday is Monday. My birthday is Tuesday. And so looking forward to that. It will be a weekend of golf. Y'all know that.

I want to play this. Hold on. Which phone am I using? Which one is the shot on? So like I say, I was at Coca-Cola today speaking to some of the HBCU students there. And where is it? Here we go. Let me queue this thing up. So they had one of their programs there. And so I spoke to them, had a great time chatting with them. And so we took a big group photo, and while they also did a big old shout out.

Turn the audio up, please. All right, here we go. All right, one, two, three. HBCU! So we enjoyed talking to them and seeing them there. Folks, we want you to show your appreciation for what we do. What we do here is not easy and it's also not free. And so when you contribute to our Bring the Funk fan club,

you make all of this possible. And trust me, when it comes to traveling across this country, covering the news, booking the shows, all of this equipment we Uh, and it comes to traveling acr the news, booking the sho we talk about here. And a do this all the time and I try to tell them that u this studio, when you see when you see all the thin

the cost of, when you we talk about this facilit uh the sky machine, our, all this sort of stuff. I a month to pay for the en so um it absolutely mattr us. And so I want you to do that. You can see your check and money orders at PO Box 57196, Washington, D.C. 20037-0196. Cash app, dollar sign, RM Unfiltered,

PayPal, or Martin Unfiltered. Vimeo is RM Unfiltered. Zelle, Roland at RolandSMartin.com, Roland at RolandMartinUnfiltered.com. Be sure to get a copy of my book, White Fear, How the Browning of America is Making White Folks Lose Their Minds, available at bookstores nationwide. You can also get the audio version on Audible. And be sure to check out our 24-hour streaming channels. They're available on Amazon News. So you go to Amazon Fire, check out Amazon News.

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Sign up to volunteer, donate furniture, or even donate funds. You can go to ascensivehome.org to find out more information. Together, we can help our LA community rebuild. It takes all of us. I know a lot of cops. They get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes.

But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glott. And this is season two of the War on Drugs podcast. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war.

This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports. This kind of starts that a little bit, man. We met them at their homes. We met them at the recording studios. Stories matter and it brings a face to it. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real.

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