What A Day - Racism Cont'd

Episode Date: May 27, 2020

George Floyd was killed by police officers in Minneapolis this week, in an abusive and excessive show of force. We discuss his murder and the incident in Central Park this Monday where a white woman threatened Christian Cooper, a black man, distorting the facts in an apparent attempt to evoke an aggressive law enforcement response. Click here for anti-racism resources and organizations to follow.This election will be unlike any other and will require a specialized approach from organizers and activists. We talk to Crooked’s political director Shaniqua McClendon about the Adopt-A-State program, and how we can help get out the vote in key battleground states from the comfort of our homes. Head to votesaveamerica.com/adopt to find out more.And in headlines: Twitter fact checks Trump, SpaceX to launch its first crewed-shuttle today, and St. Louis asks people to self-quarantine if they partied in the Ozarks.

It's Wednesday, May 27th. I'm Akilah Hughes. And I'm Gideon Resnick. And this is What A Day, where we're keeping a comprehensive list of which candidates for president wear masks. Yeah, so far, it is one mask and one no mask. Not going to say which one is which. The list is very brief. On today's show, we're going to check in on how the pandemic is changing get out the vote efforts, then we'll have some headlines. But we're going to start the show with two stories about racism in America. The first ends somewhere near justice, the second ends in death. On Monday, Christian Cooper, a 57-year-old black Harvard graduate and Audubon Society member, was birdwatching in Central Park.

And nearby, a white woman, Amy Cooper, openly broke a rule for that area of the park to let her dog run wild off the leash. The black man asked her to put her dog on a leash, re the fucking rules of the park. And this white woman was so mad that a black person told her to follow a rule that she called the police. She lied about being threatened. She mentioned several times that he was African-American. I'm going to tell them there's an African-American man threatening my life. And there is a man African-American. There is an African-American man.

I am in second place. Yeah, I think she just said that, you know, just in case the police didn't think she was really threatened. In America, being black means you're inherently a threat. And when you're white, you're inherently innocent. She was hoping she could convince the police to at best come and arrest this man in the park and pity her, a poor defenseless white woman, and her white dog. The man took a video of the encounter on his phone.

The video came out. She was swiftly identified, and yesterday she lost her job as a vice president at an investment firm. Her dog was repossessed by the shelter she adopted it from, and the Audubon Society dragged her in a tweet in part saying, quote, the outdoors and the joy of birds should be safe and welcoming for all people. A sentiment I agree with, but wow, did it really need to be said? Now, you may be thinking her whole life is ruined because she tried to use the police as her personal hitman, or she made a mistake, but there was no mistake. She was fully consenting and alert when

she did this. She chose racism. Contrarily, you may be thinking, yay, this is justice, but it's not justice. Justice is about doing what is fair. She got consequences for her actions, but justice would be a lot harsher than losing the privilege of a job and a dog. So think hard about what would be justice. Right. And that brings us to the second story. Yeah, this story is the ghost of Christmas future, except it's real. If the police that showed up to the call about the bird-watching man hadn't resolved things peacefully, if he hadn't been lucky, he may have suffered the same fate as George Floyd in Minneapolis, who was accused of forgery.

Floyd was a black man who was arrested and handcuffed on the ground. He wasn't resisting. He was handcuffed. And a white police officer knelt on his neck. He screamed that he couldn't breathe for several minutes until he stopped. Onlookers begged for the other three cops at the scene to intervene. They just stared back. Floyd was pronounced dead at the hospital. The four officers were fired, and the FBI has opened a civil rights investigation.

The officers have not yet been charged with murder, but again, they lost the privilege of a job. The video of George Floyd's murder was haphazardly retweeted into the feeds of Black people everywhere to say, Look at this horrible thing a police officer did to a Black person. But the voyeuristic nature of sharing Black human beings murdered, like it's just know, just a normal thing on a Tuesday didn't bring that guy back. It didn't stop racism. In fact, racism didn't end when we all saw Mike Brown laying in the street or when the Ahmaud Arbery video went viral or when Eric Garner was choked to death over a few cigarettes or Walter Scott getting shot to death. Did racism end when Danny Ray Thomas was shot on video by police? Did Stephon Clark's viral murder change the way white people react to black people just living their lives?

When Keith Scott was shot to death, did white people even have a conversation about a culture that produces this kind of incessant bias and violence? Did Philando Castile's murder video, did that end racism? Did the photo of Emmett Till in a casket stop racism? Did it stop murder? How about Alton Sterling? Did it force all police departments to rebuild from scratch, weeding out the bad apples that have spoiled the whole goddamn bunch? Did it make white people evaluate themselves for even half a second? Are there people on earth who are unaware that black people fear the police because the police disproportionately kill black people? You know, do we need videos to prove it? And do the videos ever result in justice?

I mean, we've had smartphones that shoot videos since, what, 2005? We know this happens. Awareness isn't the point. We don't share white death like this, okay? When Steve Irwin died, we didn't share the video of the stingray millions of times online to raise awareness. You know, they take down videos of ISIS beheading white men on YouTube. How many white men

have you watched die in HD video? Can you name five? Because I bet you can't name 10. The video footage is shorthand for desensitization. You know, ask yourself why you're even comfortable looking at a video of someone being murdered. Then ask why you'd share it with everyone you know. If it was a dog, you wouldn't. So what's the reasoning? For what reason should we share footage of a person being murdered? Okay, I'm traumatized. Black people are traumatized. Four police officers got fired.

They didn't get murdered. They will hopefully be charged with murder, but they probably won't. But that isn't justice, and it doesn't address a system that puts a gun and a badge in the hands of a person who could hear someone pleading for their life and not move. So when I say don't look away, I don't mean consume Black death like it's a meme on TikTok. I mean, look in the mirror. Look at your family. Look at the community you live in. Look at your friend group. Look at the wealthy white woman with the rescue dog in the goddamn park, okay? And don't look away. Because we know what the problem is. No one is unclear on what the problem is. So where is the justice?

We've put a link to anti-racism resources and organizations in our show notes. We hope you check them out and share them. This has already been an election year unlike any other, with in-person campaigning suspended for months, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominees sequestered in a basement, and packed conventions in serious doubt. And for organizers and those involved in strategy discussions, the coronavirus pandemic has led to questions about whether things like door knocking could even safely take place in even a limited capacity later this year, and how best to spend resources at this particular moment. Would strangers, for instance, even feel comfortable opening a door even in the event that such an activity were deemed safe? And on top of that, questions remain about universal safe access to voting, with some states beginning to implement vote by mail for all

registered voters to safeguard against dangerous situations like the one we saw in Wisconsin in April. That's right. So Crooked Media has also been working on the election this year, and our political team has just launched a new program called Adopt a State. The idea is to get all of you listeners to sign up, pick a swing state, and help assist organizers in that state in very safe digital ways. Getting out the vote is going to look entirely different this year from past years because of the pandemic. That is a given. You know, there are a ton of extra hurdles, but there's also a ton of extra energy. So if you are looking for a way to get more involved beyond, you know, just voting yourself, this may be it.

And here to tell us more is Crooked's political director, Shaniqua McClendon. Shaniqua, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me. Yeah, of course. It's good to virtually see other people that we work with again. So, okay, so first things first, just walk us through what Adopt-A-State actually is and how it all works. Yeah. So Adopt-A-State is a remote mobilization program for people to participate in regardless of where they live or vote. It's specifically centered on six key battleground states. And we tried to make the program really simple. Literally, all you have to do is go to votesaveamerica.com slash adopt and enter your email address

under the state you want to adopt. And then we'll follow up with really specific calls to action. So for example, if you adopt Arizona, we might ask you to contact voters and encourage them to join Arizona's permanent early voting list. And the reason we would do that is because once voters are on this list, they automatically receive an absentee ballot.

And Arizona has done some research, and it shows that when people get their ballots in the mail in their state, they're 50% more likely to vote. So when we are looking at each state, we want to send calls to action that are so specific to that state that they actually push us toward our desired outcome of flipping the state. And I think that that's an important point, especially in the pandemic times we're living in, you know, people are going to be less likely to vote anyway. So giving them every opportunity to vote safely is a good thing.

Well, you know, a lot of us live in states, you know, where they're overwhelmingly blue or they're red. And, you know, we want to get involved because it feels like a lost cause. I know being from Kentucky, it's like we can get a Democratic governor, and that is it. I don't think that's going to happen. Maybe we'll get a senator. Maybe Mitch will eat a dick. All right, so the six states that we're all focusing on are Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Florida,

and North Carolina. But why exactly are these the states that are the most important for us to be, you know, paying attention to? Yeah, yeah. So the first thing I want to say is that everyone's vote counts. Everyone's vote matters, even if they live in a really blue or red place. But specifically thinking about the really blue places, you know, in 2018 in California, we flipped seven congressional seats that Republicans had held. So just really want to emphasize that everyone's vote is important. But when it comes down to winning the presidency, unfortunately, there's only like a handful of states that will determine who the president is. And the six states that we chose are the six states that will ultimately

determine who our president is. That has a lot to do with our electoral college and us not electing a president by popular vote. And so the six states that we chose are either states that had really close margins in 2016 that we feel like we can overcome in 2020. And most of these states actually had really good results in 2018. So we saw a lot of Democrats win in 2018. And if we can build on that momentum, then we can win in those states. So, you know, it may seem weird to say, hey, the whole country needs to focus on these six states. But at the end of the day, the president is governing over all of us. And so all of us need to kind of direct our energy and attention to where we can have an impact for sure.

Right. And so this has been going on for a long time, the planning process of all of this. And then all of a sudden you have an unprecedented event like a global pandemic that hits. Sorry to remind you. But how has that kind of changed how this actually works in practice, like specifically get out the vote efforts and other efforts that have to do with more like, you know, person to person contact? Yeah. So, you know, it's funny. We started working from home on March 13th and we were supposed to launch this, I think, maybe the 15th or 16th of March. So literally right before we were going to launch this, we started working from home. The big change there is that we were going to ask people who adopted these states to actually travel to the states at the end of the cycle so that they could actually show up in the states and volunteer and help get out the vote. So we're not going to be asking people who participated

to do that now, but they can still contact voters. They can text voters, they can call them. And a lot of campaigns are coming up with really creative ways to reach voters in other virtual and digital ways. I think the biggest change we're going to see is how we're engaging voters. So before, you know, we're encouraging them to vote in the ways that they normally do. But now we want to be encouraging people to vote in the safest way possible. So that, you know, it is voting by mail and that's not always going to be the best option for people. But if we can get enough people to vote by mail, then that means that people who do have to show up at the polls will have a safer experience. And so as we're asking people to vote by mail, we also recognize that that's not something a lot of people are used to doing. In Michigan and Pennsylvania, they just started having no excuse absentee voting, which means anyone can vote by mail, but it's really new in those states. So we're going to have to spend a lot of time making sure that people understand that first they have to send in an application to request a ballot, and then they get the ballot, and then they have to return the ballot. So as we are engaging voters, we'll be focused more on, you know,

adding this extra step of requesting a ballot and then pretty much harassing people to get those back in on time. Seems important. Seems definitely like it'll help. All right, so now is the fun part. Okay, so what state are you going to adopt and how do you think people should pick their state? Yes, so I think it's no surprise to anyone who knows me, but I'm adopting North Carolina. It is where I'm from.

Come on and raise up. Take a shirt off. You know, I tried to find a Petey Pablo gift this morning and I could not find one on Instagram. They are in short supply. I also have a hard time finding Petey Pablo gifts. I was really upset about that. But, you know, I think the first way is just listen to me and adopt North Carolina because it's the best state you can adopt. It's a beautiful state. It needs some help politically. And, you know, for people who are really interested in health care and access to Medicare, specifically Medicare expansion, Wisconsin, North Carolina and Florida still have not expanded Medicare. So that's another thing that people can look to if they want to get involved. Down ballot races, Arizona, North Carolina and Michigan have really

important Senate races. Or if, you know, Michigan had one of the smallest margins of victory for Trump. So if you just want to go where you can have, where it might, where you can have... Sting the most. Yes, where it might sting the most. That's a good way to put it. You know, just stick it to Trump. That might also be a way you can choose. But there's lots of different ways. But you can first start by just going to votesaveamerica.com slash adopt and learning about the states there. For sure.

Well, you know, Gideon and I were talking before you jumped on about what states we were going to adopt. So Gideon, did you decide? Man, this is really putting me on the spot here i north carolina you know um big pd pablo fan they're they're very recently the last dance tie-in too so you have some you know news element that you could pitch on it as well which seems great i um i put down wisconsin oh okay yeah Fine. But Akilah, what are you what are you thinking right now? I mean, I'm going Florida. I feel like, you know, she's like the the cute girl that didn't get asked to prom to oblige.

I also think that like Florida voters are smart. They're already active. You know, I think we had a story just this week about how they overwhelmingly voted in support of, you know, people who've been convicted of felonies getting the right to vote. And so I think that the will of the people there is really strong. I think that they'll welcome me. And I think that, again, sticking it to Trump, you know, Mar-a-Lago needs to be filled with tears. So I'm happy to help. I think that is pretty compelling. That's for me. But Shaniqua, thank you so much for stopping by

and telling us about this. We're really excited. And it is good to have something to look forward to. So thank you for giving us this. Well, thank you for having me on. All right. So everyone head over to votesofamerica.com slash adopt to find out more and pick out your own state.

I say Florida. Vote Florida. North Carolina. It's Wednesday, WOD Squad. It is temp check time. All right, so Switzerland's top court has ruled that companies must contribute to their employees' rent if they expect them to work from home. Interesting. The case centered around an employee at an accounting firm who wanted $150 a month in rental money. This is obviously all the more relevant now that more people are working from home. So Giddy, do you think this is fair? And how much do you think work should subsidize like percentage wise? I definitely think it's fair. I'm mostly curious about how much $150 would

influence the Swiss rent that we're talking about here. Because, you know, if I got 150 bucks for rent, I wouldn't turn it down, but it wouldn't be making the big difference, you know? So percentage wise, 25 seems like a fair beginning point to start the conversation. Yeah. And I think that, you know, it's 25% of your work day. Nope, that's not right. 30, how many, there's 24 hours in a day. See, this is why I can't do math. But the point is, you think it's a good idea. Yes, I think that well, no, you're driving at if I can complete this thought that I think you were getting to math wise, is 33% might even be a smarter negotiating starting point because it is the third of the day.

That's exactly right. You know, we were getting there. The numbers were all backwards, but we were almost there. I feel that way for sure. But broadly speaking, so we like this idea, but if money and pandemics are not an object here, are you working from home or are you going into the office if you have the choice? I mean, yeah, like I like the office.

I'm like the mayor of the cricket office. I come and I say hi to everybody. I check out the snacks. I comment on the snacks. People take my snack rhetoric very seriously. This is true. I feel like it's just, you know, I'm out of the rotation now. So I do, I miss it.

I haven't hated working from home though, but I do think that like, you know, after a period of transitioning back into being an attractive human that like goes out of my house, that yeah, I probably want to be in the office all right well you know what that's another temperature check in the books we feel good about working from home at least in the interim but in either case you know we will check in with you all again tomorrow let's wrap up with some headlines. Headlines. took its toll on the economy. While the rest of us were stocking up on toilet paper, they were stocking up on money. Republicans Kelly Loeffler and James Inhofe

and Democrat Dianne Feinstein were just three of the senators under scrutiny for selling hundreds of thousands of stocks after receiving closed-door briefings about COVID-19. The DOJ's investigation into Republican Senator Richard Burr for similar behavior is set to continue. Earlier this month, he temporarily stepped down as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee after the FBI seized his cell phone. Surely

someone can explain away the calendar events they'll find on there that say, remind me to do insider trading. Burr denies any wrongdoing, though he had more direct involvement in his trades than the other three senators. I want to see this man's calendar. Give it to me now. For the first time in its history, Twitter put a fact-check label on one of President Trump's tweets. Might also be good to make a physical label he could wear on his body all the time. The tweet in question claimed that mail-in ballots were fraudulent. And now under the post, users see a blue link reading, quote, get the facts about mail-in ballots, which directs them to articles that debunk Trump's claim.

Twitter's new policies to combat misinformation are a response to persistent problems with world leaders using the platform to lie. Just yesterday, the company was criticized for its refusal to take down conspiracy theories tweeted by Trump about the death of a staffer to former congressman and current MSNBC host Joe Scarborough. The husband of the deceased staffer asked Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to take down the lies, but the tweets remain posted. SpaceX will launch their first ever crewed mission this afternoon, carrying two NASA astronauts to the International Space Station. If all goes according to plan, this will be the first time a commercially owned company launches humans into orbit, and the first NASA space flight since 2011, when they formally ended their space shuttle program. Before you say this isn't essential business and these spacemen are just coastal elites

running away to their little vacation homes in the cosmos, NASA says this mission must go down so the ISS can be fully staffed. NASA's SpaceX shuttle is called Crew Dragon, and it's fully autonomous, meaning that the astronauts will mostly just need to monitor the system in case something goes wrong. All the controls are touchscreen, so hopefully flying the ship will be just as easy as it is to send voice memos to your ex by accident. Yikes. The astronauts on Crew Dragon plan to stay on the ISS for three months. That's about as long as I've been stationed in my apartment.

So again, I'm essentially an astronaut. I wear the helmet all the time anyway. St. Louis County issued a travel advisory yesterday asking anyone who partied at Lake of the Ozarks this weekend to self-quarantine for two weeks or until they test negative for COVID-19. If you are not familiar, those parties were the ones that crowded hundreds of no-mask-wearing people into a pool and then went viral in potentially more than one way. Police officers can't, won't, and shouldn't enforce self-quarantine, and I think people who decided to rub elbows with wet strangers this weekend are maybe not the kind to self-quarantine voluntarily, but who knows? People are complex and multifaceted. Kansas officials made a similar request to officials in St. Louis, recommending a two-week cool-down to anyone who spent Memorial Day weekend at Lake of the Ozarks. Remember, you won't put yourself or anyone else at risk

if instead of visiting the lake, you look at it inside of a gritty one-hour crime drama on Netflix. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's called Money Heist. That's it. Yeah, that's the show. And those are the headlines. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, send us an accidental voice memo, and tell your friends to listen.

And if you're into reading and not just picture books about a very special bear family like me, what a day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at Cricut.com slash subscribe. I'm Akilah Hughes. I'm Gideon Resnick. And please don't rub elbows with wet strangers. Only dry ones, and even then.

Dry ones in your home. That's it. Not strangers, hopefully. Don't let strangers into your house. What a day is a product of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Charlotte Landis. Sonia Tun is our assistant producer. Our head writer is John Milstein and our senior producer is Katie Long.

Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka.