The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - #BecauseMiami: As Political As They Wanna Be

Episode Date: April 5, 2024

2 Live Crew's front man Luther Campbell joins Billy Corben to talk about the possibility of his running for the congressional seat out of Florida's 20th District. Out of revenge, Joshua Epstein was arrested by Surfside police at the behest of Vice Mayor Jeff Rose, who claimed that he was pushed. Joshua talks to Billy to get his side of the story. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Jersey City, New Jersey, please drink responsibly. Introducing Tim's new savory pinwheels. The perfect flaky and flavorful snack for those on the go. Jersey City, New Jersey, please drink responsibly. Freaknik was the greatest black gathering in America. It was like an entry point into the black cultural experience. You tried to bring back Freaknik. It wouldn't be what it was. The streets, the people, the debauchery. Things that I saw insane. Aren't you? Aren't you?

Aren't you? And I, I think of you. Trust me, your mom and dad have got that. Hip-hop legend, first amendment crusader, strip club owner, one-time Miami-Dade County mayoral candidate. I just stood so you could read my Uncle Luke from Mayor, which I preserved perfectly since 2011. Yeah, it's even ironed. Look at that.

This is the only thing in my house that's ironed, dude. Luke is also, of course, a documentary star, an executive producer of Freaknik, the wildest party, never told, the hit documentary now streaming on Hulu. And Uncle Luke can currently be seen right now on the Because Miami podcast because in his future, on his resume, we may very well see congressmen.

Representative Luther Campbell is joining us now uncle luke the bulwark mark kaputo broke the news last week that you are considering running for congress in florida's twentieth districts where is it at have you filed your paperwork are we good to go is it uncle luke goes to washington time is it happening?

Hey, Billy, first of all, thank you for allowing me to come on the show. You know, you got to say that first. And even if you don't mean it, even if you do mean it, I do mean it. I mean, I love this show. Shoot, y'all, y'all keep people on their toes, especially Joe Corolla and everybody else. Last time I came home, I got a thousand phone calls from your friend down at University of Miami.

But, uh, Oh, so stop it, Billy. Stop it. So Joe alone. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'll do that. Oh, Lord. I need you Joe the fuck alone. Okay, okay, I'll do that.

I need you to leave Joe alone, I need you to leave Francis alone. I'm glad you left Keon alone. Well, Joe has to leave him alone. I need you to leave, I mean, who else you? Not you, Carver. I tell you what. I need you to leave Carver alone.

I need you to leave all these people alone. I tell you what, when you're a congressman, then you can tell me. That's it. That'll be the deal. You can tell me who I gotta leave alone. And is this happening? I mean, you're making headlines, you're making a lot of news. You've got some sitting congressmen already taking potshots at you

on the website formerly known as Twitter. We'll talk about that in a moment. But what is the status right now? When do you have to file? Have you filed? Is there a campaign? Am I making a documentary about it? What are we doing? Yes, you are definitely making a documentary about this. I mean, you're definitely the producer and everything. And then we're going to go from documentary to docuseries because once we win, you know, if I decide to go in, then this shit going to keep on going. Just

imagine Billy Corbin in the room where some lobbyist is coming out and he has the camera and this mother is trying to sit up there and sell us a bag of bullshit with the camera on and then, oh my God, that would be incredible. Part of the reason why I voted for Uncle Luke for mayor back in 2011, where he got, by the way,

11% of the vote, got double digits with not a whole hell of a lot of campaigning or staff or anything. And what I liked about it is people asked him, Uncle Luke, what about transparency in government? And Uncle Luke says, I'm gonna do a reality show with cameras following me everywhere I go when I'm mayor. What could be more transparent than that? And I'm like, this is what we need.

This is what we need. And that's what you need. I mean, to answer the question, man, I'm sitting there, I'm doing my due diligence, right? Because, you know, I live in, obviously I live in Briarwood, you know, I'm somewhat familiar with the politics of Briarwood County. I'm obviously more familiar

with the politics in Dade County, but I'm just doing my due diligence. I mean, you know, I'm going up in the Belle Glade, it's a pole, you're talking to people over there because that's a large part of the district. You know, at the same time, you got a large part of Riviera Beach, Palm Beach County in the district. And then you have Broward County, a large part of Broward County is in the district,

which is most of it. And so I'm just doing my due diligence as to seeing the needs of the people, you know, in the community, talking to community leaders, talking to different stakeholders and saying, okay, if I do this, you know, what are the needs, you know, and if I do this, you know, are you guys in support of it? Or do you like your current Congresswoman? You know, what has she done, you know, and, and, uh, What is the feedback then? The feedback basically is, you know, we supported the young lady and, uh, once she got in, she turned to a diva.

We couldn't find her. She comes and have one meeting, she sends staff, and nothing basically has gotten done. Uh, you know, her campaign was self-funded. You know, your good friend Bobo was her lobbyist in the COVID days. So she made a shitload of money in COVID on behalf of our good friend Bobo,

helped out in that situation. And she took the money and ran and, you know, and paid for the seat. And so basically when you pay for the seat, you really don't have a genuine love for the actual community. And if you have not worked as a community servant, like right now you can run for mayor in Miami,

you know where all the bodies are buried at, you know the needs of the community and all across the landscape. And when you get these corporate people who have not did the work, don't even have any idea as to how much funding a school needs and and medicare and medicaid and the things that people go through on a regular basis like we know because we got boots on the ground we out there every day you know they have a tendency of just

wanting to get get the position for a fashion statement and so a large part of me and doing my due diligence i'm seeing this because I'm talking with people like myself and people like you, you know, and we know those type of people. I ain't talking to the bullshitters. I'm not talking to the ones who want $500, you know, and who want to have, no, I'm talking to real people on the ground like, yo, what the has this lady done? And has any resources been brought back to the community? And those are the people that are giving it to me 100. And so it's like, I got one foot in and one foot out

and I'm gonna make a decision real soon as to if I'm gonna run or not. I have a little structure of a group of people around me that have worked in campaigns before. I try to keep a close circle like I did with the campaign for mayor. You get too many people, too many cooks in the kitchen and before you know it, you become a politician.

I'm not no politician. I'm not trying to be a fucking politician. I'm trying to be a person, a community servant who if I do run, that'd be the person that goes to Washington that's for the people, that's the people's seat. Well, unfortunately for me, in 2020, they wrote Miramar out of the district. They are not in the 20th district anymore, unfortunately. Correct.

24 and 25. So I am unable to vote for you, but if I was in the district, obviously I would. So the best that I can actually do is just help out here on the show and give you a platform saying hey campaign if you choose to. I think we just discovered this his campaign slogan I ain't trying to be no f***ing politician that's the slogan right that's something I'll wear that shirt I'll wear that shirt Luke right on the show I'll wear that shirt. Hey the running is, if you look at all these news articles, because obviously I've got so many requests,

this the only show that I've done, only podcasts that have been, because after it came out by Mark and Stevie Day, and I'm like, holy fuck that. So a lot of people been asking me, so the running slogan has been, I'm going to fight these motherfuckers. Yeah, make sure you put his face on the shirt. I'll put that on my shirt too.

I'll wear that every day of the week. Twice a week. I like that. Uncle Luke, last night, Kevin Cate, very talented filmmaker, very prominent in the political comms space, campaign ads and stuff like that. He has a very popular Twitter feed, particularly amongst Florida politicians,

at KevinKate, C-A-T-E. And he had a space, what do you call it, Twitter spaces? What is this? X Spaces. He had a Spaces last night with a Florida politics talk, which featured several Florida congressmen, including one Matt Gaetz from the Panhandle, who apparently had some words to say about you. Unfortunately, it's not recorded.

It's just a live one. But I understand that, you know, he had some shit to say about you paying off UM players. I heard he had some shit to say about you not having the guts to jump on the spaces with him to take him on. What do you have to say to Congressman Matt Gaetz? Let me tell you something. Just like I said from the beginning that's public enemy number one that's the mother who I'm going out there to fight because at the end of the day between

him and Marjorie, lady in red, Taylor Greene, lady in the red hat yeah those are the two motherfuckers who you got to go after first but at the end of the day, I got into the space. Somebody told me about the space. I went in there. It was glitching. It kept f**king glitching. And I said, look, if I get in, the guy sent me a mic and he took it back.

I requested it, then he didn't bring me up. And one guy said, oh no, let's not get into this. Let's move on. Let's talk about, I want to talk to Matt and all that. And then I eventually ended up jumping out. One of my good friends was still in there, Ms. Leslie. And she said, oh yeah, they just went on to start talking more shit that you scared to come up.

One thing people know about me, I ain't scared of no motherfucking body. And especially no Matt Gates who bought the. You know, so. And then if I'd have came up on the mic, that'd have been the first thing I'd have said, look, bro, you don't say you talking about I paid our players, but then you bought. So you might need to have a conversation with me so I can teach you not how to go and buy. You feel me? He should have just go ahead and gave you Billy

the whole credit because if you read, if you looked at the documentary documentary It was no time that I was said that I actually paid players off Well, also, I mean are wrong again. That's that politics shit as usual But are we in a we're like in a post NIL world now. You are really a pioneer in that in that space Let's be real and I think everybody it was Republicans in the state of Florida that led the charge to create NIL laws here in the state of Florida because we had the NCAA dragging ass for like decades who had the opportunity to effectuate some sort of change in reform. And they said, no, we like the old system. We're going to keep it the way it is. And so does Matt Gaetz not support NIL? Like exactly, he needs to figure out what he supports. So what happens with a lot of these guys in politics,

whether they're Democrats or Republicans, but most Republicans, it's hard for them to tell the truth. It's hard for them to give props to him and give credit where credit due, because he could easily say, well, the only thing I knew about Luther Campbell, which I find it real hard to understand if you are an elected official in the state of Florida and you don't know who the **** I am,

that's a problem. That means you lived a sheltered life and I guess that then goes to you by and ****. Okay, so if you listen to some of my songs, you don't know you. All you have to do is just pop on a Luke song and then look at your girl and then okay, she'll be on there. But that's all the story in itself. But to not know, you know, that your party is the one who supported NIL with your commanding chief down in Tallahassee, Comandante, you know, he was the main one signing NIL in all these different colleges, it's amazing. You know, they just talk, just to be talking. And a guy like Matt, he's the guy, he and Marjorie and the whole Trump and this whole soft ass Democratic party team is the one that's motivating me

to go and run and God willing I win, they gonna have hell to deal with in Washington. Luke, what do you mean soft-ass Democratic team? What does that mean? The Democratic Party is old and we're a little soft. I mean you go from the Tea Party spitting on congressmen and senators and shit, then you go Trump's on steroids, you know, after Trump on steroids and they talking to the party and all these different types of ways, now you have, they go from CRT to banning books to all these attacks against African-Americans

and democratic values. You know, when I look at that and I'm saying to myself, you know, we need somebody to fight. We got Congresswoman Crockett, you know, she's fighting, it seems like she's out there fighting by herself. So, you know, at the end of the day, you know, you have all these policies against African Americans, you don't have too much money going back into the African American community, whether it's Ron DeSantis taking it and holding it in Tallahassee and the money not being trickled down, you don't have enough, you got a bunch of old ass congressmen and women,

I think they need to create terms where some of these people need to turn them out. They don't have no more fight in them. You know what I'm saying? And so at the end of the day, you need fresh blood in there, not necessarily in a young person, but fresh blood of people like myself,

people like you that go up in there, people who are on the ground floor that understands what the people like, you know, myself, people like you, the go up in there, people who are on the ground floor that understands what the people need, because this shit is about the people. It ain't about your lining your pockets. You got some Congress women that went in as fucking waitresses and bartenders, and now they work 28 and $30 million.

They came in guns blazing, but then, you know, they got a muzzle on them right now. So it just needs to be people who go in and represent the actual people and bring shit back. Man, I go to Boyd Anderson. I rolled through there and I'm looking at the high school. I love Boyd Anderson, great history. And you're looking at the high school and you're seeing that this shit is depleted like

a third world country school where you need federal dollars to be put in there. You need representatives to be able to go and say, hey, look man, we need to change this. Those kids ain't got a fucking chance. So everybody think, oh, all right, we want to stop the gun violence in the black community and people killing each other.

But then when you look at the politicians, a lot of these politicians ain't doing the work to then be able to educate these kids and bring good paying jobs, and not this $13 an hour shit. Think about it. The minimum wage in the United States of America is $7, seven to $8.

But thank God, state of Florida is 13, toward a $13. You got people in Belle Glades. Why the f**k does Belle Glades look the same? Why haven't nobody been creative to create housing and create different opportunities for these people? So it's a lot of work to be done, you know? Uncle Luke, it sounds to me like you just talked yourself

into running right here on the show. I mean, we got April, I think the deadline is at the end of this month to file to run in the Democratic primary which I believe is in August of this year, and we are on our way to Representative Uncle Luke, Congressman Uncle Luke or is it Uncle Congressman Luke whatever it is I'm looking forward to it and I have to extend an invitation to Congressman Matt Gaetz to join us anytime on the Because Mommy podcast if he'd like an opportunity to respond

Gracias Matt Gaetz to join us anytime on the Because Mommy podcast if he'd like an opportunity to respond. Gracias, Matt Gaetz. Or debate. Or debate. Bring his soft ass on here. Or debate? Before I announce, bring his soft ass on here. Freak Nick.

Motherfuckers don't know who I am. If you only know me for allegedly paying off players, then I need to give him a good education. We need to sing, we need to play some songs for him. He should already know that there's a song exist called be so horny and you know that gates knows exactly who you are there's no no zero doubt in my mind Freaknik the wildest party never told co-starring an executive produced by Luther Campbell is now streaming on the Hulu machine. I just

started it. It's so good. I'm loving it. Thank you, Uncle Luke, as always for being here. And I look forward to wearing the shirt. I look forward to wearing the shirt. Hey man, I love the shirt, baby. Uncle Luke for Congress. This one. Luke for Congress. So they got to get you. Oh, look at that Luke from there. You, you, boy. That boy, you looking looking good, Billy. You're looking f**king good. It's all about the Luke. That is Congressman Luther Campbell.

Thank you so much for being here on Because Miami. Thank you, thank you guys. Hey friends, it's Mike Ryan, and a lot has changed over the years. But one thing that hasn't, great and dependable taste, a Miller Lite. It was the original light beer, and to to this day it is still the best one. Miller Lite has more of the taste that you want and less of the stuff that you don't. I was at a baseball game

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Taste like Miller time. To get Miller Lite delivered right to your door, visit MillerLight.com slash Dan, or you can pretty much find it anywhere that sells beer. Celebrate responsibly. Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 96 calories per 12 ounces. It was March 1st when Joshua Epstein was arrested by Surfside police. He's the teenage son of Eliana Saltshauer, a vocal critic of then Surfside mayor Shlomo Danzinger. Surfside police charged Epstein with battery on an elected official after he was accused of pushing then Vice Mayor Jeff Rose. But there was never any video of the alleged push. And now the charges against Joshua dropped.

Anyone who had their hand in this will be held accountable. And I don't mean just losing their jobs. They will be held accountable. Wow, so you're going to take further action as a father? 100%. That is my only job, to protect my son. Joshua Epstein is the son of former Surfside commissioner, Ileana Salzauer, who has been a guest on this show before. It seemed abundantly clear to everybody objectively observing this situation that this was some sort of political retaliation against her, against her son,

Joshua Epstein for speaking out against this bizarrely corrupt regime in this eight block long town, just north of Miami Beach in Miami Dade County. And Joshua Epstein is joining us now fresh from his arraignment on Monday of this week in which the Miami Dade state attorney dropped all charges against him and in fact confirmed consistent with most of the witness testimony that in this incident at a candidate forum at the Surfside Town Hall last month ahead of the March 19th town elections that Jeff Rose, the then vice mayor, was the aggressor in the matter. Cross crossed the room to confront another resident.

Josh somehow got kind of caught up in this verbal melee, and the rest now is history. So Josh, I got to ask you out of the gate, did you push Jeff Rose? Did you put hands on him? No, of course not. I didn't touch him. No one else touched him.

He came across the room and another resident. The state attorney, if you read their call to report report says he's in a boxing stance. He has his hands up. He's going crazy. I didn't touch him. No one else touched him. And it strikes me that all of the witnesses on the list that the state attorney sites are either related to Jeff Rose or there was a town employee whose obviously at the time his employment was contingent upon the support of Rose, who was a town employee who's obviously at the time his employment was contingent upon the support of Rose who was a then elected official and also that guy seems to have an evolving story there seems to be some inconsistencies in his statements to police and the state attorney's

office then there's all these other witnesses right that come out that are saying like no we were there we saw the whole thing this was an open and public forum in a public space, and nobody laid any hands on anybody. So they refer to it as conflicting witness testimony, but it seemed pretty convincing witness testimony to me. Yeah, I mean, the witness testimony was Jeff's family and his one employee making up a bunch of BS and every other objective witness there going,

no one ever touched Jeff, and he was the aggressor. employee making up a bunch of BS and every other objective witness they're going, no one ever touched Jeff and he was the aggressor. Jeff comes across the room. You have Jeff's employee who actually, I think two weeks before, has to be pulled off of my mom by the police chief because that town employee who gives the ever evolving statement, that's the town employee that lost the audio for the first commission meeting. So my mom was trying to make sure that he was recording a commission meeting and then he gets completely flustered and has to be pulled off of my mom.

So he is someone that has every vendetta against my family. He's someone who's not done his job and is part of the KGB atmosphere that had consumed town hall. So there's objective residents and then there's Jeff's family and this one not trustworthy and ever evolving story of having an employee. You're 18 years old. You're a college student You want to get involved in your government? You want to peacefully confront your government as is not only you're right But one of the greatest traditions of this country to be able to ask them questions to have transparency and accountability

To enjoy satire. We have uncle Luke on the show today great satirist and First Amendment crusader Let's talk about the politics of this on Wednesday night when this incident occurred Jeff Rose reports it to the police and then signs a no-pros form meaning. He's saying hey This happened, but I don't want to quote, ruin this kid's life, end quote, by arresting him over this. So I'm going to sign on paper and acknowledge I'm not going to pursue these charges. This started with me actually going to the police for protection. So after Jeff Rose had gone crazy, he's in the video saying, watch what happens.

You're just like your mother, watch what happens. And he's being held back by a town employee. I go to the police station and go, this man, like i'm scared of him and I want a protection order And you see it on two hours of body camera I'm going to the police saying find the recording of what happened. You'll see that he's the aggressor here and i'm scared So this starts with you making a complaint then yeah, that's interesting. I went to the police for help They said okay, we're gonna go into the back and find the video For 30 minutes, they're gone. They come back into the room and they say, we had just talked

to Jeff Rose. So I file. I dare to get protection against Jeff Rose. They say they're looking at the video and they don't find any video. Instead, they go to the vice mayor's house to ask for his version of events. Then they come back and say, the vice mayor says you pushed him or you assaulted him, but he's not going to he's not going to press charges. He's going to extend an olive branch to you. Oh, I ask for help. They then go to the vice mayor story and try to flip the script on me. But Friday afternoon, they arrest you. So sometime between Wednesday night and Friday afternoon, something changes. And that's where it seems to be the politics come into play here.

So Thursday, the video of the vice mayor going crazy, because the vice mayor tries to portray himself as this nice guy, but he's not. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, one second. I wanna say this quite clear and unequivocally. I've invited this guy in the show at least two or three times, and I wanna say I believe him to be, in my opinion, a fucking bully, okay?

You're an elected official, you're a public official. What this guy thinks is harassment and intimidation is constitutionally protected speech, okay? Asking questions of your government is fundamental, okay? And if you don't have the skin for it, if you're gonna be a thin-skinned, whiny little baby and a f***ing bully who wants to push around 18-year-olds, okay, man up. I'm sorry, that was my... I'm gonna get off my Billy Poll...

I mean there's a lot of f-bombs in this episode. I'm gonna get off my... well, Uncle Luke's on the show. As nasty as you want to be. But I just... I'm gonna get off my Billy Poll... That doesn't mean that you have to be nasty. I'm... I'm... We went from two live crew to two live Jews right now on the Because Miami podcast. So, Josh, I'm sorry. I got a little piss there. And that's the thing, because here's the thing, right? I go to city commission meetings. I go to peacefully confront my government and speak truth to power

and exercise my First Amendment right. Because if you don't exercise the muscles, they atrophy. Okay, same thing with rights. And this could be me. I look at Josh in handcuffs on a Friday night. They did this, Roy, on a Friday night. They did this Roy, on a Friday afternoon. They called the press and said, you want to come see our purple walk? Watch our arrest. They tipped off the press and then they waited for Josh who was signed up to swim at the

community pool and they knew that, that he was going to be leaving his parents house, walking to the pool and then they handcuff him. Why on a Friday afternoon, Roy? You can beat the rap, but you can't beat the riot. Yeah, you gotta stay in jail for the whole weekend. You might have to stay in jail the whole weekend. He went to bond court on Saturday morning in front of Judge Mindy Glazer, but he was still in TGK for like 27 hours.

24 hours. Yeah, they were hoping it would be the whole weekend. I wanna talk about that. You're 18 years old. You have a criminal record. Do you have any experience getting arrested or going to jail? What was this experience like for you and your parents?

Yeah, so before this I mean I had never been to jail never thought I would go to jail It's been a traumatizing experience I for the past month have maybe gotten three hours of sleep at night Then my stomach's like turning at all hours of the day haven't really ate much lost weight It's been absolutely traumatizing me not just for me, but for my family, for my aunt, my uncles, my grandparents. I mean, I have grandparents that are big old Holocaust survivors,

just trying to hold on for the last few years of their life and that are now stomach-churning, upset, what is happening to my grandchild. So it was the most stressful month of my life. It's something I never thought would happen to me. It's something that I'll never be the same because of. Now, that being said, I'm wondering if you don't feel like a bit of a martyr or a hero. You took one for the team because I want to show you this chart.

Since March 19th, Election Day in Surfside, there have been by my count at least 11 officials from the town that have either been voted out, resigned, or retired. Let's start with Mayor Shlomo Dengzinger, who of course was voted out of office on March 19th. Then you have Vice Mayor Jeff Rose, the bully. He was voted out. Also Fred Landsman, their third vote, the majority of the corrupt commission.

Then you have Police Chief Antonio Marciante he retired then you have city attorney Lillian Arango and Anthony Ressio they resigned then you have town manager Hector Gomez he put in his resignation and you're gonna love this one. Police Captain Jay Metellus. Now what Jay Metellus did, Roy, is he self-demoted. What? I swear to you, he demoted himself. He sent a letter to the town after the election, I guess knowing that he was going to be caught up in this scandal

and maybe found to be a part of this kind of conspiracy to arrest Josh for political retaliation. He made himself a sergeant. He was a captain, and now he's a sergeant. And the reason is he's protected by the police union now and the collective bargaining agreement. As brass, he's not protected. So he's like, oh shit, I better try to insulate myself

so it is harder for the town to fire me, which is probably where all this is headed because he is all, he is like neck-deep in this mess. But also, I found out just this week, Judith Frankel, the town planner, she resigned. Maiti Gamiottea, she retired. James McGuinness, a building official, he resigned. So Josh, what I'm getting at here is, really I think you helped effectuate this change. I think the town, the voters, your friends and neighbors, your family, they got fed up.

And as a result of this outrageous unconstitutional, extrajudicial action against you, you transformed your entire town and maybe saved it for at least the next two years until the next election How do you feel about that? I think it's the only bright It's the only the only bright spot in this whole thing so every time I see a police car and I freak out anytime I get in the back seat of car and I have to use coping skills and my therapist taught me

I it's it's the little the little bright spot that had me have this not happen Maybe we'd still have the bad folks in town hall We still have a lot of bad folks that haven't resigned and the hope is that the new police chief and the new manager will clean town hall. We still have a lot of bad folks that haven't resigned. And the hope is that the new police chief and the new manager will clean town hall. Um, I, I, I trust that they will, but it's, it's going to, it's a process that's just starting because there's a lot of other KGB officers, as I call them in the police department that had their hands in this, the detective that, uh, completely fabricated and the detective, the, the KGB detective, he's, he's still there and that plenty of other, uh, bad folks

are still in town hall. Um, but what I wanted to say is before, so when they decide to arrest me on Friday, what changed between Wednesday and Friday was a town email. An email went out from a resident like this underground newspaper type thing that sent the video out and the video of the vice mayor going crazy went viral. So the vice mayor on Thursday, what we've heard is that the town has a powwow. The vice mayor and the town manager or something, they get together and figure out what they're going to do and what they decide is they're going to go forward with the charge. They're going to undo the non-prosecution and they're going to try to have me, they're going to have me arrested. They're going to teach me a

lesson to try to clear the vice mayor's name. Cause remember all those town officials that you saw just resign, their cling to power was the vice mayor. So they're trying to, it was the vice mayor and his folks. So they're trying to, they want to clear the vice mayor's name, make him look like he's not this crazy person that he's seen being on the video to hope that he'll get reelected. So on Thursday, after this email goes out, after he looks crazy, they decide to just put together a fictitious police report, a fictitious report of what, of what happened, completely made up as the state attorney's, uh, as attorney's, as state attorney attorneys, uh, as attorneys, as state attorneys, uh, says not conducting an investigation. They have a video that shows clearly it's a 5,000 person town. The police

know every person in this town. If they want to conduct an investigation, they have 10 plus people that they can go to and ask what happened. They're literally provided on a silver platter on Friday before my arrest, the names and numbers of the people in the video. You know how many of the people they contacted? Zero. They put out two statements afterwards saying they did a thorough investigation. The investigation was the vice mayor, the town employee that tried to attack my mom and zero of the other witnesses. It was not a police report. It was like what they do in Russia where they arrest you after a thorough investigation. They go, that guy, he's a threat to our power, have him arrested.

27 hours later and a lot of trauma, that's what they did. And I'm still suffering the consequences of it while a lot of town officials get to move on with their life. Yeah, they resigned, but they'll probably get jobs in other places. So I won't truly feel justice until they're held accountable civilly. And also the rest of the folks that are in town are all gone. Before we go, the town of Surfside put out a statement, final update on the February 28th Candidate Forum incident

town charge against Joshua Epstein dismissed by state. It reads, on April 1st, 2024, appropriately on April Fool's Day, after a thorough and independent review of the evidence, the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office announced in open court that no action would be taken against Joshua Epstein, resulting in the dismissal of the felony battery charge brought by the town against him. The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office concluded that it was questionable whether a battery occurred.

Further, it concluded that even if a battery had occurred, Mr. Epstein would have been justified pursuant to the law of self-defense in light of former Vice Mayor Jeffrey Rose's demeanor and actions at the candidate forum on February 28th. The town, through its newly elected commission and the Surfside Police Department under the direction of its newly installed interim chief of police, Henry Dose, are working hard to regain the trust and confidence of Mr. Epstein, his family, and all residents for a better Surfside. Here's to a better Surfside. I'll drink to that. Then again, Roy, I'll drink to anything. Joshua Epstein, good luck to you, to your father, David,

your mom, Eliana. Thanks so much for being here. Good luck to you finishing college and in your future. I think you have a bright one ahead. Thank you so much, Bill. I mean, you brought attention throughout Miami to this story. I don't know what the state attorney would have decided

had you not brought this attention. I don't think the folks in town hall would have resigned or been voted out of office had it not been for you and the attention you brought to it. So thank you so much for everything you've done. I think I know what song was on your ringtone right now, Josh. I think you know too, Roy.

["Ringtone"] Buzzer. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. No one's listening. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. ["Ringtone"] No one's listening! Hahaha! Roy, you know how you're always saying... No one's listening! Because no one's listening.

Yeah, that's because... Miami. They don't call it our Ami, Roy. It's my f***ing Ami. I'm sorry, that was one more F-bomb. One more F-bomb. What are you doing to me over here, man? I'm so sorry. But I will tell you, Roy, somebody's listening.

And you know who's listening? He's a wife, be her wife, be her. You have extra corona. You're on your little Twitter account, little Billy. He's listening. I got proof of it on this week's because Miami how it started how it's going So you might recall back on this very program in February? When the story came out that the US Marshals were gonna move to seize

Commissioner Joe Carollo's house and all of his belongings to cover the 63 and a half million dollar corruption verdict again You went out there and laughed at him. Yeah. Yes all of his belongings to cover the 63 and a half million dollar corruption verdict against him. And you went out there and laughed at him, yo. Yes, all of that happened, but I said this on this show. How often is it that justice is done like this? That bad things happen to bad people? I'm gonna go to an auction, Roy, and I'm gonna buy Joe's mother's costume jewelry, and I'm gonna wear it all to the next city commission meeting like Walter Mercado. Okay, I'm gonna buy a cape too.

Does anybody know where I can buy a cape? Please tell me you did like John Oliver and you just actually pulled out the jewelry and you put it on. Well, I haven't had a chance to buy the jewelry yet because they haven't seized Joe's property and assets yet. Hurry up with that. Yet, but here's the thing. Hurry up with that. Yet.

But here's the thing. No one's listening. Somebody's listening because at the last city commission meeting on March 14th, Roy, this happened. Even my mother now, they died is being attacked by some of these same people laughing at her. You have one of them that was here today saying that once the courts take my house and they put up for the marshals to sell everything that I have,

they're gonna come in and take my mother's fantasy jewelry. Laughing at my mother like she couldn't afford to have anything decent. and that they're gonna buy it and they're gonna put it in their necks so they could be like Walter Mercado. I mean this is appointment listening or viewing you know it's like this show gets downloaded automatically to wherever he listens to his podcasts. I got right little Billy Corbin Hi, do you smell? in other because Miami news the

City of Miami Beach is celebrating I mean like George W Bush on the aircraft carrier with the mission accomplished batter That they have solved spring break Roy. I know you miss the Clevelander now more than ever. But this victory lap about saving spring break and saving Miami Beach is such bullshit. And let me tell you why. They spent all this money to run a campaign

about breaking up with spring break. You remember the viral video? Yeah, I remember all those light-skinned people, yo. It's so true. It's so true. And then they basically said, we want to kill tourism during some of the most lucrative weeks of the year for our local businesses.

And without consulting with local businesses and without partnering with local businesses, they just killed business in Miami Beach. Mind you, we spend over $30 million a year for this bullshit slush fund organization called Greater Miami and the Beaches, one of these BS make work friends and family programs. Over $30 million a year is their annual budget. You know what their job is, Roy? To remind people that Miami has beaches. It's allegedly this like tourism business promotion venture. Why do we spend over $30 million a year to promote tourism in Miami Beach

when we're spending millions of dollars on an ad campaign to tell people not to come to Miami Beach? Which is it? Talk about mixed signals. You don't get to choose who gets what message by the way. When people hear that Miami Beach doesn't want you, doesn want your money people just say I'm not going to Miami Beach you can't just sort of say like oh these are dog whistles we're just wink winking nod nodding it at certain tourists the good tourists that we like

the good immigrants that we like we do those are the ones that are welcome here and yeah yeah from Europe of course yeah But the idea that this was some sort of law and order success story, when all they did was put nothing but militarized police and tumbleweed onto otherwise bustling, busy, cash register ringing streets is just absolutely ludicrous. This is not a government interested in real solutions,

in supporting businesses, in supporting the residents. This is a joke. And as evidenced by the headline in the Miami Herald, how a viral ad campaign and quote, draconian end quote, crackdown, changed Miami Beach spring break. And I don't think it changed anything for the better when you ask the restaurants and the businesses on Miami Beach

If they think that this was some kind of an improvement and the bottom line is it's not solutions It's just demagoguery and fear-mongering and racism It's just backdoor Jim Crow and guess what you're not gonna believe this Roy. I hope you're sitting down. Are you sitting down? I am yes remember when they recriminalized possession of small quantities of marijuana? They basically rescinded the ordinance that allowed police or even required police to write a civil citation, like a ticket, rather than arresting people for having small quantities of marijuana?

Well, the Miami Beach police charged at least 38 people in March with possession of small amounts of marijuana? Well, the Miami Beach police charged at least 38 people in March with possession of small amounts of marijuana and charged at least 12 people with smoking marijuana on public property. This is according to a Miami Herald review of jail booking data and court records. Among those 50 people arrested, Roy, 38 were black. Of course. I would have taken the over probably on that. Yeah, all of them. Yeah, probably. Yeah, so that said, more good news and bad news

from the great free state of Florida this week. The Florida Supreme Court came back on April Fool's Day, the last day that they possibly could, the deadline with some big decisions on some big items. The bad news is, is that in a matter of weeks, Roy, abortion will be effectively illegal. A six-week abortion ban will go into effect. And again, as we've talked about repeatedly on this show, in the context of women's health care and bodily autonomy, six weeks, most people don't even know they're pregnant yet.

So it is a full abortion ban with very limited options or exemptions, I should say, for rape and incest. But the good news is the Florida Supreme Court did decide that on the ballot in November, Floridians will get to decide in Amendments 3 and 4, first, whether or not to legalize recreational marijuana in the state of Florida. And second, amendment four, whether or not to vote to support freedom, bodily autonomy,

and really medical freedom, which is, I thought what Florida was all about. We're the government- Medicare fraud is how we- Well, Medicare fraud as well that Medicare fraud as well But also medical freedom like the government cannot intervene with Patients women their families their clergy their doctors when they're having to make difficult decisions About whether or not to terminate pregnancies and sometimes they don't have a choice

It is simply in the best interests and the health of the mother We've talked about it on this show how women have suffered from medieval torture at the hands of this government who will not allow them and their doctors to make these decisions. I can't wait to see how this is written in the ballot just to confuse people probably. Well that's what the Florida Supreme Court approved was the ballot language that Attorney General Ashley Moody and Governor Ron DeSantis were arguing was way too general, way too vague. Basically what the Florida Supreme Court said was like, we may not like it, but voters of the state of Florida have the opportunity now to do this. And you have to remember though, in order to amend the state constitution,

you need over 60% of Florida voters to approve it. Remember back in 2016 Amendment 2, which was the medical marijuana legalization constitutional amendment, passed with over 71% of the vote. 71% of Floridians don't agree on anything, but they agreed on medical marijuana. It's a very different electorate here in the state now, but it's supposed to be a freedom-loving, free-market-economy-loving electorate, and so hopefully they will decide that recreational marijuana is legal here. But this is my prediction. Just like if you had a felony and you served time in prison, once you get out, you'll be able to vote again.

I bet you the state government will write a bill saying, hey, you have to pay off a poll tax or something like that. I bet you the same thing's gonna happen with these two bills. Somehow they're gonna- You're goddamn right, Meatball. Exactly, somehow they're gonna find a way to write a law that's gonna go against this. This is the thing about that, and I think you are 8,000% right about it.

We've had Anna Hockhammer on this program from the Florida Women's Freedom Coalition talking about this effort to get this constitutional amendment on the ballot for November, which they obviously succeeded in doing. But they're hoping that this has some sort of up-ballot effect, that like in other states where putting abortion on the ballot has helped other Democratic and progressive candidates.

Because what good does it do to pass the abortion amendment if you're not going to have lawmakers who will respect it who will appreciate it who will institute policy and laws to your point that will allow it to go into full effect so other states to do this and eventually on a federal level it will pass as well what What I'm saying is that Florida is immune to sanity and reason. And what's going to happen is, I think that these items have a good chance of passing, but what's going to happen is, instead of having a ballot effect, they're going to split their votes.

They might vote for medical freedom, you know, for women and families. They might vote for legalization of recreational marijuana, but then they'll also vote for the very same candidates and lawmakers who will find every opportunity to undermine or even usurp what will become or could become state constitutional rights. Another hopeful Because Miami, right? Yeah, I really appreciate you bring my hopes up for a more progressive Florida. I really, I really appreciate you doing that. I love I went good news and bad news. I did the bad news first and then somehow managed to like actually do bad news at the

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