The Breakfast Club - INTERVIEW: Ben Crump Talks 'Worse Than A Lie,' Black Community Missions, ICE Incidents, Boosie Badazz, Trump Administration, Jessie Jackson

Episode Date: February 27, 2026

Today on The Breakfast Club, Ben Crump Talks 'Worse Than A Lie,' Black Community Missions, ICE Incidents, Boosie Badazz, Trump Administration, Jessie Jackson. Listen For More!YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FMSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. On the Adventures of Curiosity Cove podcasts, when peanut butter disappears from school, Ella, Scout, and Layla launch a full detective mission. Their search leads them back in time to meet a brilliant inventor whose curiosity changed the world.

And this Black History Month adventure, asking questions, thinking creatively, can lead to amazing discoveries. Listen to Adventures of Curiosity Cove every Monday from the Black Effect Podcast Network. on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What if mind control is real? If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you? I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused. Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. Mind games. a new podcast exploring NLP, aka Neurilingual Programming.

Is it a self-help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can scroll the headlines all day and still feel empty. I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, is where culture meets the soul. Honest conversations about identity, loss, purpose, peace, faith, and everything in between. Celebrities, thinkers, everyday people, some have answers. Most are still figuring it out. And if you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you.

Listen to if you can hear me on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, it's Joe Interesting, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And today I'm talking with my dear friend, Krista Williams. It can change you in the best way possible. Dance with the change. Dance with the breakdowns. The embodiment of Pisces intuition with Capricorn power moves. So I'm like delusionally proud of my chart.

Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. In 2018, the FBI took down a ring of spies. working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world. The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its fault of secrets. Listen to the Sixth Bureau on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Morning, everybody, is DJ Envy, just hilarious. Salomey and the guy. We are the breakfast club. We got a special guest in the building.

Yes, indeed. Attorney Benjamin Crump. Welcome, brother. How are you feeling? Good morning. Happy birthday, King, Queen. How are you kidding? How are you feeling?

How you feeling? Hey. Hey. Man, happy to catch you out doing Black History much. Yes, sir, yes, sir. I feel like you've been keeping more of a low profile lately, brother Crump. You know, I've worked on this novel, and I was really trying to inspire the next generation

of civil rights, law, his social justice warriors, because it has to always be building for the future. We're going to pass this toy. And we got to make sure the next generation go even further than us. And so, man, I've been working my butt off. I just ain't been in the public so much. Is there a reason for that? No, it's just that we got the enemy for how to sue the clan.

That was in the media. We've been fighting on these environmental racism cases. I'm battling in Alta Dena, the wildfires, while everybody moved on. Those black people are still displaced. still homeless and we're still fighting the whole the company accountable and the county because they gave the evacuation notices

to the people on the east side, the more affluent white people. And then the black people got their evacuation notices late and 19 black people died and nobody's talking about it. And if we're not careful, Shalerman, man, Altadena, which was the predominantly black, historic section of Los Angeles would become California's Katrina

and that's what we cannot afford for black people to lose their land, their generational wealth and we sometimes with this administration we forget the trouble I mean just the craziness they're doing they didn't even allow FEMA

to come in and build the infrastructure because this president was opposed to California and its Democratic leadership. So he said we're not going to help them. So now we're having to hold the state and the county and the city of

Los Angeles accountable to do infrastructure. So the black people if it would have took a year, a year and a half to get back in your home, now it's going to take two years, two years and a half. Can you imagine Wow. You know, can you imagine Charlene

yeah, just one day you mining your business And then a fire comes from the transformer and just, in a matter of minutes, burn everything, everything you had is gone. Your children are not being able to go to school. Your cars were burnt so you can't go to work. And then the FEMA, the emergency management system that was built for this exact moment, then says for political reasons, we're not going to do anything.

Please, I'm glad to know that you on that case, man. And Mimi Brown, who does our front page news, she did a whole special on Alta Dina call from Altadina with Love. And she talks about that a lot. And the people she talked to talk about that a lot. And people call up here all the time just looking for help. And they feel like they can't get it. And people

aren't remember what happened. What about the insurance companies? Well, we're suing the hell out of, Shalamee. So, they'll have to know that if they ain't got nobody, at least advocating, call us, and we'll keep fighting. The insurance companies, you know, Governor Newsom, the Attorney General Rendem. They did

a mortgage moratorium for a year, and then we got to extend it another year. Because think about it, N.V. and just, you're paying a mortgage on a house that you can't even live in. Right. Mm-hmm. I mean, and a lot of people just ain't doing it. And so you got the disaster capitalist, the opportunities, because, you know, the Olympics coming to L.A. They got World Cup coming.

man, they've been trying to buy out these black people land forever anyway. And now with this tragedy, they're taking an opportunity to throw pennies on the dollar and steal our land, still our generational wealth. And so the insurance companies, you know, have been doing what they do. I believe all of them, state farm, all state, everybody, they try to get your premiums, no matter how many times you pay, the first time you make a claim, they come up with every single reason to say, well, we're not going to deny this claim.

Or we don't think this land is that valuable, Lauren and Shaulamay, because it's in a black neighborhood. Yeah, but once they get all black people out, then they didn't bring the white people and now the land increased. Tripping. Yeah. Ten times. Yeah.

With the Olympics, man, they're going to be building condos, high rises, and this is prime land. Los Angeles already is what they said, five times more than any. other property in America price-wise and so this is going to go up even more. There's so many things that don't make the

media Charlemagne that we work on and fight on you know, banking while black. And right now all the black women who are being fired and terminated that cause this attack on DEI and diversity equity inclusion. We're

suing all these corporations for these black people who are losing their jobs with no rhyme or reason. just that, you know, this administration gave us an excuse now that we don't have to tolerate you all. I mean, and it's funny. It's funny as a Ted's figure and I always laughed.

When we were representing lower people at the corporation and they brought discrimination claims, you would have these black people sitting at the table helping to defend the corporation's actions, justifications to fire them. But now you got a lot of those people calling me, and I'm like, wow, ain't this interesting. The tables have turned. Now it's you on this side while you will help and protect them.

So it just says to us, especially during Black History Month, the future of black people won't be determined by how white people treat us. The future of black people won't be determined how white people support us. The future of black people won't be determined how white people invest in us, but the future of black people will be determined how we treat each other. The future of black people will be how we support each other.

The future of black people, Charlemagne, would be how we invest in each other. And that's the God's honest truth. When you really think about it, man, we need to be supporting black businesses, black lawyers, black doctors, black restaurants, black dry cleaners, black mechanics.

Black Insurance agent. I mean, we got that every week have dinner or at least every month have dinner or lunch with our colleagues and so forth. And we got to hold each other accountable. But like, Jess, you know, the 50% of your money, at least 40% go to black businesses. Okay, well, who?

Let's talk about it. And I try to be honest with myself. God bless me immensely. And I'm like, I don't want to be a hypocrite. I want to be true. and I got to look in the mirror first and foremost and hold myself accountable. And so I say to myself, when I really think about it,

our Asian sisters and brothers, their dollar in their community stays in their community, 21 days before it leaves. Our Jewish sisters and brothers, their dollar stays in their community, 17 days before it leaves their community. Black Americans, our dollar stay in our community. 17 minutes before it leaves our community.

And it's sad, y'all, I mean, because I love how Levy Armstrong out of Minneapolis and Jamal Bryant when we boycott it, Target, and those things, because it's such a philosophical decision. It's a mindset. They say, I'm going to be intentional about supporting black businesses, and you've got to be intentional And with the internet, we can find black businesses.

They say, no, no, I'm going to find a black dentist. I'm going to find a black, you know, insurance agent. And it's intentional because now we're building a strong black economic base, and we can then tell this administration that, hey, like New Jack City, cash money brothers are a self-contained unit. We will be okay with or without you. We don't need you to save us. It's crazy, though, because these conversations,

conversations have been going on since the beginning of the time. Like you're not saying nothing that the Honorable Elijah Muhammad didn't say, that Mark McAvuey didn't say, that Martin Luther King Jr. didn't say. It's just like, at what point are people going to realize unity and group operation is the way? You know, Shaulamay, we have to keep saying it, though. You know, as my grandmother and them say,

I know we're singing to the choir, but the choir got to sing louder. And it just got to be something that we remind each other like, you, Lauren, just envy, y'all, every month say, hey, how many black business do y'all support? Because it's easy to just spend money. I know my family, they spend it quick. But when you stop and take account,

and you really try to be honest with yourself, and you start writing down, well, did I at least give 25% of my money? I know I paid all these white people. I bought this stuff. I went to corporate America. I'm married to a Mexican. Yeah. Wow.

And with this book, we've done. We've done so much to try to push people to independent black bookstores. Even though I know Amazon, you know, it's so easy, so convenient, and so forth. But I was so proud, Sholomey, when they wrote that article saying that Ben Crump's worst in a lie, drove a surge in book sales at black bookstores. I mean, that's what it's about, if we're being honest with ourselves. It's one thing for you to come up, but how do you help bring everybody else up with you? That's what I love about you, man, with the black effect.

Thank you, brother. You're bringing a lot of people up. I appreciate you. Why did you choose fiction as the vehicle for the story instead of like nonfiction? Yeah, you know, it's interesting because my personal hero, Third Good Marshal, he once said that most people will never know what really happens in a courtroom when you're fighting for liberty and justice for marginalized people. and he said that's why, Charlemagne, he would write his legal memorandums and his pleadings and his briefs

to be very engaging because he wanted to entice people to read those pleadings so they could be educated on what really happens during due process and court proceedings and so forth. And so I said to myself, well, what could be more engaging

than a legal thriller? I mean, John Grisham with the Rainmaker, Michael Connolly with the Lincoln lawyer. They sell millions of books every year because legal thrillers are intriguing. You're excited trying to figure them out, page turners and so forth.

And I said, you know, man, I grew up with my grandmother watching Perry Mason. You know, the old TV show, you know, he figured it out, his brilliance, his resources. And then when college, you know, you got to Grisham and them. but I kept saying

man when are they going to make a superhero black trial lawyer and everything and I kept trying to figure out if they're ever going to do it and so what I said Lauren God said Negro that ain't they lame you know what they know about being a black lawyer understanding the culture and fighting the civil rights struggle said that's your lane

and so that's what inspired me to write worse than a lot and create this superhero trial lawyer named Bole Cooper. This person with his team of Social Justice Warriors, they go in and they exalt the

brilliance of our community. We have returning citizens. We have a Puerto Rican sister who's a lawyer all working on the team saying that, you know, we are just as brilliant as anything they can create. And I want the next generation

of people who look like us to have heroes that they can count on and say, No, no, you get your Lincoln lawyer. We'll take Boli Cooper. So in Boli's journey through the book, right, there's a lot of messaging that people will pick up on as a follow the story. How did you choose which messages you wanted people to pick up on? Because I'm sure you experienced so much stuff that we need to know

and that we should be learning. You know, absolutely, Lauren. And what you do as a writer, especially a fiction writer, you're intentional with what you're trying to convey. But you don't want to come across to preachy and so forth. And so even, you know, I've been getting very good reviews and I'm thankful for it. But it doesn't matter because I knew the audience I was writing for. I was trying to do this generations to kill a mockingbird that inspires so many young people to say,

I want to go be a lawyer and try to make the law be an instrument for good. And so I was in tension to law and even from the beginning of the book, people keep saying that's a civil rights legal thriller and it's wrapped in black culture but it's also a historical reference point because what I did are Hollis Montrose

this black police officer who shot by four white police officers on the night of 2008 the historic election of President Barack Obama becoming the first black president because I was trying to create an where we took symbolic characters and events and settings to try to create abstract ideas.

Like the idea, if you have the election of the first black president, as many people believe Charlemagne in 2008, we were not going to have a post-racial America. and even in the book the chapter before Hollis is shot 10 times on that night Bo Lee Cooper is talking to his wife he was on an airplane when the election

results came and he told his wife when he landed he said you know there was a white gentleman on the plane who said to me well buddy look like you're going to have to find a new career now that we've elected a black president there won't be a need for civil rights

anymore. And I was intentional about those things because really it was foreshadding because in fiction you can do that. Because envy the way we were all proud and happy and had this feeling of hope and optimism when

Barack Obama was elected first black president. I felt that way. Yeah. I felt like it was a posturing society. I did. And then, but what we did not fathom was that there was a whole lot of people who have a different reaction to us.

And they were also going to be able to express their ways and their actions. And even when they shoot two things that's been pointed out by a lot of the literary people read the book, when Hollis Montrose, this black police officer, you can't find nobody better because we wanted to intentionally do that because when they kill George Floyd, when they kill Mike Brown, when they kill Stefan Clark or all these brothers, If they're not an angel, if they've ever been arrested, if they've ever been a convicted felon, if they are undocumented, they come up and they say, oh, well, you know, they really were criminals. They're not worthy of your consideration. I want to say, no, no, we got a person who was a model citizen, and it didn't matter, shall have man,

because when those police officers saw Hollis Montrose, they didn't see him, they saw what they projected on him. And so when they are down there, Hollis is saying, I'm an officer. officer, I got my idea and everything. They tell him, shut up, just comply. We don't care if that boy's in the White House. We're still in control because I am trying to create

this setting for the book. And the second thing that they point out when they shot him 10 times and that hot metal was going into his body. I wrote he cried, an ancestral cry out to God.

And I tried to paint that picture for all the black people who have been brutalized and killed unjustly by police, the cries that they must have had thinking that this was it for them. And I wrote this during the pandemic with Breonna, Joyce, Floyd, Amar, Arbery, Andre Hill. And I was very emotional at that time because this was therapeutic in many ways. But I thought about looking at Brianna's picture with eight bullet holes in her body and her nightgown lying in the hallway of her apartment when I was writing about Hollis. And so it is hopefully one of those things that is enticing and engaging, entertaining, but I'm really trying to teach people about how hard it is to fight for civil rights in America. When you talk about that title, worse than a lie, right?

Like, what in your view is actually worse than lying? And do you think America understands how often that shows up in the courtroom? I certainly think they don't. My grandmother, who helped raise me, my mom worked two jobs to raise me and my two little brothers. So oftentimes, we stay with my grandmother. And, you know, black grandmothers are brilliant. My grandmother, I think, was the wisest person I haven't met in the world. And I remember her saying,

on occasion, what's worse than a lie? To tell the truth and have nobody believe you. Lord and mercy. I mean, and then in this book, it really goes so much deeper when you are seeing where Hollis, who's been shot 10 times of vibe, and now he's charged with four counts of attempted murder.

It's really life-imitating art when you think about what's going on in Minneapolis, with ice and stuff. But to answer your question directly, Charlemagne, man, I don't think many people understand how many

sisters and brothers have to go in courtrooms all across America every day and lie on themselves and accept trumped up felony convictions and trumped up felony plea agreements because

they understand that the alternative of going to trial with a jury of peers that have nothing in common with them, the likelihood that they would be convicted and sentenced for decades and have to be wrongfully convicted for a crime they didn't even commit.

That's worse than a lie. And it happens every day, man. Every day. How do you deal with, stepping from the side from the book for a second. But how do you deal with that, right? Because I feel like, even on social media now, people are lying more and more and more.

But the problem with the lying is I feel like journalists, newscasters, papers, they're taking what these people are saying and making it factual. So now when people hear it, they think they're hearing it from Channel 4, but it's really a lie that they heard online. How do you deal with that when you go into those courtrooms?

Oh, it's getting so much worse. Already, you have. have two battles when you're representing people of color, especially in America. Because there's a credibility factor. Every time we're fighting the police, or if we're fighting

these large banks over banking while black discrimination cases, or we're fighting these corporations like Elon Musk and them about poisoning in our community with these data centers, there's this credibility gap where they want to believe what white people say

over black people. And the worst part about it, envy, is our people want to believe it, too. Our people are so quick to attack one another. I mean, every day I pray to God say, God, help me love our people more than they hate themselves. You know, I really believe because when you've been blessed, you've got to try to do better to help other people. And you've got to even make allowances for their criticisms too, because slavery, I mean, they have such a psychological effect on our people. and we got so many haters out there on us. When we got so much we're fighting against white people,

I don't care what black people do. Try to get them some grace, you know. And so the line is so real now with social media. I mean, it's been proliferated a hundred times than what we were used to before social media. But that's why in the novel, you know, early on, Bole Cooper realizes why he's fighting the Chicago machine, stuff to be the broken system, he's going to need more than just the truth.

What we're going to need is our whole community being galvanized with our resources, with our brilliance, with our connections that come together just to get justice. And it's never about one person. That's the other thing I tried to emphasize in the book. It's always a team effort. The fact that we, I was intentional about having returning citizens, brothers who were convicted of drug dealing and, you know, you. You know, being streetwise and so forth, it was like Malcolm MEC said, some of our most...

China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer,

no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's the unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its fault of secrets. Listen to the Sixth Bureau on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, this is Joe Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic, Aquarian vision. Aquarius is all about freedom-loving and different perspectives, and I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius are misunderstood. A son and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses and different places, but just an embracing of the isness of it all. If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart-side view into how a leading artist integrates

astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast, starting on February 24th on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief. The nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history. Everyone thought they knew. how it ended. A verdict, a villain, a nurse named Lucy Letby. Lucy Lettby has been found guilty. But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses.

I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt the case of Lucy Lettby, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it, to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Lettby was. No voicing of any skepticism or doubt. It'll cause so much harm at every single level of the British establishment of this is wrong. Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Nancy Glass, host of the Burden of Guilt Season 2 podcast. This is a story about a horrendous lie that destroyed two families.

Late one night, Bobby Gumpbright became the victim of a random crime. He pulls the gun, tells me to lie down on the ground. He identified Tremaine Hudson as the perpetrator. Germain was sentenced to 99 years. I'm like, Lord, this can't be real. I thought it was a mistaken identity. The best lie is partial truth. For 22 years, only 20.

Two people knew the truth until a confession changed everything. I was a monster. Listen to Burden of Guilt Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor. Unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. He became the first Bachelor to ever have his final Rose rejected. The internet turned on him.

If I could press a button and rewind it all, I would. But what happened to Clayton after the show made even bigger headlines. It began as a one-night stand and ended in a courtroom with Clayton at the center of a very strange paternity scandal. The media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. Please search warrant. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before.

I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. This season, an epic battle of He Said She Said, and the search for accountability in a sea of lies. Listen to Love Trapped on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brilliant minds in America are locked up in five by seven sales, never given the opportunity to expose their intelligence and so forth. So in this new series, I want to give those brothers opportunity to say, what would it be like if they got to expose themselves using their street smarts and their intellect and brilliance to help solve cases?

And so that's how you try to overcome the truth, but it's hard, man. What was the old saying? A lie goes around the world. All the way around the world, why the truth is still putting on the shoe. Exactly. I saw the press conference you did about YouTube and the targeting of, like, people like falsely on YouTube and

celebrities you go together. And it's these foreign people, Lauren, who's doing it. I mean, you got these foreign actors in country like India and career and so forth. Coming up with accounts and that's why we're looking at Google

and YouTube and them saying, well, you all are paying them even though it's been shown to be false with Judge Faith and Judge Mathis and, I mean, all these lies. M.C. I mean, Margie Harvey. Stevie Wonder, I mean, just putting out lies, and our people

believe it so quickly, Jess, I don't know why it is, we are so prone to leave negative versus positive, Sean, and we want to. You want to think the worst of people. I feel like Mr. Crump, that's why I think you got a low profile. I think you got overwhelmed by all the negativity, because you

are one of the people that's really out here on the front lines helping our people, but for whatever reason, people wanted to villainize you, especially a lot of our own. Yeah, and you know, it's so interesting Charlemagne because, man, the more good you try to

do, God just keep blessing you. So I don't even think about any negativity criticism. T.S. Lawrence, the British soldier known as Lawrence of Arabia, he said something so profound. He said the most dangerous person in the world

is the person who dreams with their eyes open. They're so focused on their objective that they have very little time to focus on any other distractions. That's how I run my life. We're now in 21 cities. You know, we have 60, over 60,

member staff, 200 lawyers working with us. And I'm just focused on my mission and life that God put on my calling. I can't worry about what you're saying, man. We're too busy trying to help liberate black people. I'm too busy now trying to do stuff globally with Africa and so forth because we, if we learned anything from this administration, is not enough to think nationally.

We really got to think globally in the African diaspora, like Marcus Garvin said, that's what's going to save our people. Is there a constitutional crisis when the president repeatedly attacks judges and prosecutors and juries? Are that, I guess, protected under some type of First Amendment? You know, again, Shaolin,

that's why I wrote this legal thriller because I want so many people to go out, hopefully independent bookstores or Amazon, Barnes & or wherever you can and start reading this book, learning because we talk a lot about civil procedure and criminal procedure. It's funny because my cousin Vinny, you remember that movie? It was fun and entertaining, but you watch it, you learn a lot. And so, like a few good men and Lincoln lawyer, Rainmaker, when they read this book about black superhero lawyers, I want people to be learning a lot

because they need to understand about the Constitution. I was talking about this is art imitating life and life imitating art Shalamee when I wrote this book it was in 2020 2021. Hollis Montrose gets shot 10 times by four white

officers and there's a sister who records it on video from her apartment wonder but none of that is enough when the system starts to conspire to oppress the truth and then we think about what happened two months ago with Alex Paredi.

Four or five officers around him. He gets shot ten times. Like Hollis, he was licensed to carry a gun had it on him. Hollis licensed a carer gun had it on him. Both arguments said that even though there was video, we felt in fear of our life and that's why we killed them. And then you saw the powers that be calm and start saying it was justified. I mean, even with video, there's no guarantee that you're going to get the truth and justice out.

And so when we think about the Constitution crisis, I immediately think about the actions of ICE and what's going on how it is a complete assault on the Constitution of the United States. I mean, it's an assault on the First Amendment right to free speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of press when they arrested Georgia for it and Don Lemon. The Second Amendment right, I mean, the attack on it,

when you think about Alex Perretti, they said that he wasn't, can bring his firearm to this protest, even with, what's the, Kyle Rittenhouse? Thank you, Lord. They let him march right up there, made him a hero for having the gun at the rally for Jacob Blake. But then the Fourth Amendment assault against the prohibition of unlawful searches and seizures.

My God, I mean, they're kicking in people front doors with warrants based on racial profiling. Nothing else. I mean, busting people car windows when they're driving in the street. I mean, no warrant, no probable cause. Just that, no, you look Spanish or you look Somalian or you look Haitian. So black people don't take it lightly that they ain't coming for you next because they're going to say, oh, you look like our Haitian cousins. You look like our Somaliian cousins. The Fifth Amendment meant right to due process of the law, how they just turned that on its head, Shalameen, the fact that it was one of the most cherished. principles in America to say that you're innocent into proving guilty. Well, not with ICE. No, no.

You have guilty, and you got to prove you're innocent. You got to prove that you're an American citizen, that you got your papers and so forth. It reminds you of South Africa doing apartheid. And then you think about the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, the fact that you got people in ICE detention centers and their lawyers are trying to go meet with them and have consultations with them and they're being denied access and then worst of all y'all

worst of all is the attack on the Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment Charlemagne the fact that man you got people in these detention facilities

who are American citizens too and they need their insulin they need their heart medicine and they're not been given that reasonable medical attention that is clear from medical records and everything. And people are dying. And nobody's saying anything about it.

And you've got these private corporations with these contracts to keep building, these detention facilities, keep building these prisons. Y'all, we need to stop attacking each other because they're attacking us. And they mean for our people, your children, your cousins, your spouses,

to end up in those prisons. Trump certainly don't mean for his kind to end up in those prisons. Does it ever get overwhelming for you being that you are to go to, you know, civil rights attorney? Like when people think, and especially this generation, like somebody called Ben Crump. Does it ever get old woman for you?

You know, I try to always thank God and be humble. Never get the big head. You know, Black America's attorney general. I say, well, I'm proud that people would think of me but what I also know Charlemagne it can never be about one person we can't have one leader because they'll take them out and then where will we be so I'm all about community and building the bench we got to keep I'm so happy that Tess is in law school I'm so happy that other people are going to law school because we need like

third good marches said we need an army of civil rights lawyers to be able to deal with all then justices we have and so So I try never ever to say, oh, woe is me because, you know, Charlemagne, if I did not choose to go take on these big fights, then I wouldn't have to worry about people calling me. But I choose because I say, God bless me and shame on me if I don't use the influence that God gave me to go try to help others. and that's what it was it was Jamie Fox and I

and oh at Harry Bella Fonte Herabelle Fonte said what good is having influence if you don't use it when it matters most and I worry so much about other sisters

and brothers who got the influence who just stay silent man I'm like you got all this money all this power you see what's happening to our people

and you ain't going to say nothing I mean and again I shot you out to Brussels. Shalameh, I love how you use your platform to speak truth to power. Thank you, brother. And we all got to do it, y'all,

because God is watching. And at one day, he's going to say, well, what did you do with the blessings I bestowed upon you? What did you do with the influence? Did you just use it for yourself? Or did you try to help others? If Boosie reached out to you, Boosey said he was going to reach out to you.

He did. What happened with Boosey case? I know that Boosey said Louisiana is kicking his ass, kicking his butt. Well, you know, I do think there are times when people try to use their authority to come out for people who are in our community who have high profiles, and they do it intentionally. And so I know they did it with NBA Young Boy.

We were able to get him a bail, and that was Louisiana. I think they're doing it. I think they do it to a lot of us, Envy. So in short order, we've broke down Boots's case. We think he's going to be fine. I work with great lawyers in Louisiana like Attorney James Williams, Tess and Sue Ann Robinson, help me on that case. And it was really one of those things just doing the legal research and so forth saying,

this is where I believe their bark is worse than their bite. And so I said if they come for you, we'll have the community ready. and that's why it's good to work with other lawyers around the country. So it ain't just Ben Crump. But when you call Ben Crump, he's calling his network of attorneys saying, hey, how do we help Bootsie? How do we help? You know, I'm going to look at Todd Dollar Sign, brother.

He believes in a lot, believe we are wrongfully convicted in California. So we're going to look at those cases because that's what we have to do, Envy. We have to be the answer to the bell for our people. and I smile when you say Bootsa because just call the office when you put it on social media I got a hundred calls Boots are trying to get you crump

You need to reach out of the book Has the Trump Has the Trump administration targeted you in any way I'm sure I'm on some enemy list But I try not to think about it Because you know I have the honor of representing The family of Malcolm X

You know and this was 61 years ago They were targeting our people And I don't think nothing has changed with the CIA or the FBI. Tell them, I think you and me both on this enemy's list, brother. Oh, I believe that. So, you know, come what may. We know who we are and whose we are. And I refuse to be afraid.

I tell my security and everybody, y'all, I refuse to let them make us live in fear, standing up fighting for our children's future. and you know God has ordered our steps and whatever happens I want my daughter I want our children

to know we believed in them so much we were willing to fight for them sacrifice for them and if need be die for our children man our children really got to see that black people believe in black liberation and

just like and I mean this from the heart just like they are unapologizing in their white supremacist beliefs, we have to be unapologetic defenders of black life, black liberty, and black culture. I mean, now more than ever, y'all, they stand it with their chest,

how they think we're inferior. We got to say, if I chest, not. We think black is the greatest thing, and we don't care, and we got to say it a hundred times over, like Jesse Jackson said, you know, we got to talk about I am somebody, because everybody in society

to try to tell little black boys and girls, you ain't nobody. Now, what did Jesse, you mentioned Jesse Jackson, rest of peace, Jesse Jackson. What did Jesse Jackson mean to you? Man, you know, for the greater part of my life, I'm in the 50s. You know, Jesse was the standard bear

for civil rights that we knew. And the thing I remember, to be specific, I remember, you know, you fight the campaigns, you get people who show up for the cameras, when the cameras go, you see people showing up on a consistent base. Jesse, even the old age, was still trying to show up.

And I have to salute that. I'll never forget we were, and I won't call the corporation, but we were representing agents of a certain insurance company where they were rail-line into black agents where they could never make as much as the young white boys and girls who was 20 years their junior. And we were in federal court in Chicago. go. And, you know, I believe, like, they're good.

We got a fight in the court of public opinion in the court of law. And one of the agents was Jesse Jackson's insurance agent, who was one of the class action representatives. So I asked Reverend Jackson to come to court. And we were in court envy, and we were there for about four or five hours at this federal hearing. And the judge was really giving it to me, man, and my team. I mean, he was coming out of us left and right. and you know you're like man

this ain't going to go well for us and so forth and you know you had a defeat his mentality starting to set in a little bit and we went on break man Reverend Jackson got me in the corner

and he said he said attorney Crump man you got to remember you don't drown because the water is deep he said you drown because you stop kicking he said Crump

our people can never see our leave people who they believe in stop kicking. He said, you just always got to keep kicking, man. He said, you keep kicking. You will make it to the shore. You keep kicking. But you just got to keep kicking. I don't care what the eyes are.

I don't care how the cars are stacked against you. You just keep kicking. And I was like, wow, you know, all right, Jess, let's go. And as fate will have it, man, we went back in court for another hour. So the judge, even though he'd be raided. us and talked down to us like Thurgood Marshall got talked down to and that's part of it.

You know, you got to understand that the system really doesn't think black people supposed to get equal justice. Every bit of justice we get, every ounce we get, we got to fight for it. We've been back in that courtroom and the judge denied their motion

to dismiss. And I said, man, what a legacy to justice. We just right now more than ever in this era, black people, we just got to keep kicking. rest and peace to the leg of the rest of the piece this is a very important piece of literature especially

for the youth right I heard that it's going to be a book of series this is the first book you're going to write more is it going to be you're going to change it up it's going to be the same storyline like a continuous story or what you're going to do with it? It's going to be the same main characters like Boli Cooper is our black

version of Perry Mason and what people don't realize Jess is man Perry Mason was written by Earl Stanley in the 1920s and 1930s. So 100 years later, we are still talking about Bear Mason. They are still making movies based on that character.

So I would hope that, you know, our children's children, would be talking about Bolie Cooper and his investigator Capes and, you know, Princess Alvarez, the smart Hispanic sister from Puerto Rico who's on his team, who's a lawyer. and all that kind of stuff

because we want to have our heroes, people who look like us. And so we are cautiously optimistic. The book is selling great. I want, you know about books. Keep going and keep buying them. Tell everybody who's listening, go right now and go to Amazon,

Barnes & over your black bookstores, audit, audit, because the more people buy it, the more opportunity we have to keep writing books about our cases, our stories. This is my last question. At this stage in your life and career, what does this book represent for you personally? Is it a warning?

Is it a release or a legacy move? I think it's a combination of warning and legacy. And the reason it's a warning, Charlemagne, is that Boli Cooper, even though they got so many things pointing to the truth, the point where this black man should get justice, his family should get justice. It doesn't matter. The system doesn't care about the truth.

The system cares about the system. And what we have to understand is that we have to make sure our young people are more intelligent than those who will seek to oppress. them. That's what this book is about the warning and the legacy. Because you hear how Broly and them even though they deny the man Bell, even though he's paralyzed, they want

to put him in prison because not only are they trying to kill him, they're trying to kill the truth and everything about it. Just like with George Floyd when they assassinated him, they had to assassinate his character. And so that's the warning piece of it, but the legacy piece of it is this. Man, I love

and please write reviews. Black people a lot of writers said publishing companies you know they're part of American culture you remember the movie where Philadelphia where Denzel Washington

says that famous line saying in this courtroom everything is colorblind and he said him judge regrettably we don't live in this courtroom in America publishing companies everything they go by what

they see happening And so we need people writing reviews on Good Rees and Amazon And one of the best things this lady said to me after reading the book And I don't want to give it away because it got a legal A lot of twist and turns Plots and everything changes She said and she was crying We've been having this worst-than-a-law book tour

We've been going to all these cities We were at Howard Law School last night We're going to be at Newark, New Jersey Symphony Hall Tonight with Mayor Rize Barron rocker. But she said Attorney Crump, I'm just so happy to read your book

and to where we can find black joy in each other. She said that's where she took away from it. And that made me feel like it is why we do this. The fact that there was one reviewer who said

this was a great legal thriller novel written by us for us about us our struggles our community and our victories and our gods

and I said wow I mean people out writing their reviews on their own and that's what heartens me but we got to write those reviews as Charlemagne knows and everybody wrote a book because you can't trust their numbers and stuff all the way but when you

see the reviews keep coming in you're like no no somebody somebody somebody to read in the book. And so I thank you all, Charlemagne, Lauren, envy, Jess, Queen. Y'all, we're in this together.

Thank you so much. Attorney Benjamin, Crum. Absolutely. Appreciate you so much, brother. I'm just seeing her thinking, like, you've been doing a lot of things, but you always answer the phone for you. That's right. Hey, Lauren, and I appreciate the calls when we're trying to use our platforms to help our people and tell our stories.

So you keep doing what you do, Queen. All right. Attorney Benjamin Krupp, it's the Breakfast Club. Good morning. Thank you. Yes, sir. Hold on. Every day I wake up. Wake your ass up. The Breakfast Club.

You're all finished or y'all done? On the Adventures of Curiosity Cove podcasts, when peanut butter disappears from school, Ella, Scout, and Layla launch a full detective mission. Their search leads them back in time to meet a brilliant inventor whose curiosity changed the world. In this Black History Month adventure, asking questions, thinking creatively, can lead to a amazing discoveries. Listen to Adventures of Curiosity Cove every Monday from the Black Effect Podcast Network

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What if mind control is real? If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have? Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you? I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused. Can you get someone to join your cult?

NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. Mind Games, a new podcast exploring NLP, aka neurolinguistic programming. Is it a self-help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can scroll the headlines all day and still feel empty. I'm Ben Higgins, and if you can hear me, is where culture meets the soul. Honest conversations about identity, loss, purpose, peace, faith, and everything in between. Celebrities, thinkers, everyday people, some have answers.

Most are still figuring it out. And if you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to if you can hear me on my IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. In 2018, the FBI took down a ring. of spies working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world. The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition

and mistakes opened its fault of secrets. Listen to the Sixth Bureau on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, it's Jill Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast where we talk about astrology, natal charts and how to step into your most vibrant life. And today I'm talking with my dear friend Krista Williams. It can change you in the best way possible. Dance with the change. Dance with the breakdowns. The embodiment of Pisces intuition with Capricorn power moves. So I'm like delusionally proud of my chart. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the IHeart

Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast guaranteed human