Speaker 1: Native Lampod is a production of Ireheart Radio in partnership
Speaker 1: with reisent Choice Media. Welcome home, y'all's Native Lampod Episode one,
Speaker 1: O six and we are your co host. I'm Tiffany
Speaker 1: Cross here with Angela Rai, Andrew Gillham and Bacari Sellery's
Speaker 1: last on purpose.
Speaker 2: No, no, this uh, it's been a bit week, so
Speaker 2: I want to get right into it.
Speaker 1: What are we talking about today?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 4: I'm going first, since y'all like to call me out.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna I believe in myself and I'm gonna use
Speaker 4: my voice. I'm reclaiming my time, all right, MAXI No,
Speaker 4: I want to talk about these Epstein files because it's
Speaker 4: something interesting going on as we have this discussion, because
Speaker 4: Republicans are conflating Democrats who are fundraising and Democrats who
Speaker 4: are communicating with their constituents and the words of Representative
Speaker 4: Plasquet and the individuals who are converting with him on
Speaker 4: Epstein Island and had untoward. Did I pronounce that right? Andrew?
Speaker 5: Yeah, you got it, and you know you got two seconds?
Speaker 4: Yeah no, And those who were those last.
Speaker 5: Rich rich coming from me?
Speaker 4: Yeah no, and exactly, thank you, and those individuals who
Speaker 4: were doing that on those untoward or participating in that
Speaker 4: in that untoward behavior with Jeffrey Epstein, they're not that.
Speaker 1: I don't want to know what impact is going to
Speaker 1: have this Epstein stuff on the Margarine.
Speaker 2: So what'd you got? Angela?
Speaker 6: I'm excited to talk to the Massachusetts Attorney General today,
Speaker 6: Andrea Campbell, who will join us to talk about all
Speaker 6: things we know that Snap was certainly up for grabs
Speaker 6: in that war. Snap battle is just getting started along
Speaker 6: with DEI and all of the many accomplishments he has,
Speaker 6: including suing Donald Trump several times, with lots of other things.
Speaker 2: With that, Andrew, what you got?
Speaker 5: You know, it's hard to choose, but I think I'm
Speaker 5: going to camp out in the area of I actually don't.
Speaker 2: Know what was he go stay tuned for into surprise topic.
Speaker 2: We got a lot of newer questions to get to.
Speaker 4: That's why he likes That's why he liked to go
Speaker 4: first a second because it.
Speaker 5: Is still the first.
Speaker 6: It's like, I don't watch.
Speaker 1: They don't know nothing about that to be continued when
Speaker 1: you have to wait a whole week, so to be
Speaker 1: continued to see what Andrew.
Speaker 2: Wants to talk about Well, we've been a lot of
Speaker 2: newer questions, so we're going to get to those.
Speaker 1: Something I want to get into is a new law
Speaker 1: popping up in a lot of Red states to allow
Speaker 1: pregnant women the ability to park in handicapped spaces, which
Speaker 1: sounds like may not be a bad thing, right, I'm going.
Speaker 2: To say why I got a problem with that.
Speaker 5: So we're going to get into that and more tif Tiff.
Speaker 5: It's come to me and it is a serious topic.
Speaker 5: So I regret that I didn't recall it initially. But
Speaker 5: we're going to talk about this Trump administration again. This
Speaker 5: Justice Department, the arm of the of the Trump White House,
Speaker 5: who is seeking to have the killer of Breonna Taylor,
Speaker 5: one of the killers who was found guilty. I believe
Speaker 5: after the third trial, their effort to roll back his
Speaker 5: sentence more on that than the Trump.
Speaker 1: All right, just get into all of that on this
Speaker 1: episode of Native Land. Let's jump right into it right now. Okay,
Speaker 1: So Becry, since you went first, we'll go with your
Speaker 1: topic first. I definitely want to get into the whole
Speaker 1: Trump Epstein files, because it was a lot happening this
Speaker 1: week on Capitol Hill, the House and the Senate voted
Speaker 1: almost unanimously. There was one vote, I believe in the House, Angela,
Speaker 1: is that correct. Yeah, in the House, one person voted
Speaker 1: against releasing the files.
Speaker 2: But there is a vote. We will see.
Speaker 1: At the time of this recording, we don't know Donald
Speaker 1: Trump has signed this bill into law to release the file,
Speaker 1: so we'll see. But I'm sorry I did it again, Bakari.
Speaker 5: He got more head.
Speaker 4: I got a good head that.
Speaker 7: Was making his wife fuzzy because his WiFi fuzzy. Again.
Speaker 7: I thought it'd be better when he finally went.
Speaker 2: Home find it could be clear.
Speaker 7: I still don't mind calling it out because it's fuzzy.
Speaker 1: I was talking about the challenge with the how how
Speaker 1: people are perceiving this. I have a lot of thoughts
Speaker 1: on this, but I want to let you leave the
Speaker 1: discussion because I I don't think this is going to
Speaker 1: matter at all, But I want you to lay it
Speaker 1: out first.
Speaker 4: Oh no, no, no, no, no no no. So I think
Speaker 4: that this is the only thing that separates MAGA from Trump.
Speaker 4: I think that you're seeing the far right because Trump
Speaker 4: is the first person. Let's set the historical context. Trump
Speaker 4: in twenty fifteen was the first person to put Epstein
Speaker 4: files on the radar when he was running against Hillary Clinton,
Speaker 4: when Hillary Clinton was the front runner for the Democratic nominee,
Speaker 4: when he wanted to lump Bill Clinton in with Jeffrey
Speaker 4: Epps and everyone else. He made this the issue d
Speaker 4: jure and they built so many conspiracy theories just off
Speaker 4: pedophilia in the left. I don't know if you recall,
Speaker 4: but allegedly Democrats were molesting children and some pizzeria in
Speaker 4: Washington in Washington, DC, right, and so this was the
Speaker 4: underbellion undercurrent for a lot of MAGA. Even earlier this year,
Speaker 4: you had GOP influencers coming out of the White House
Speaker 4: with trapper keepers talking about we got the first set
Speaker 4: of the Epstein files, and low and behold they had nothing.
Speaker 4: Or you had Pam Bondi who said I had the
Speaker 4: Epstein files on my desk and lo and behold she
Speaker 4: had nothing. And so maybe, well maybe I believe that
Speaker 4: the I believe that this is a it's a through
Speaker 4: line here. And the first thing is I believe that
Speaker 4: this is the only thing that the far right or
Speaker 4: MAGA base turns against Donald Trump on. Now how long
Speaker 4: standing that is, I'm not sure, but you're already seeing
Speaker 4: that fracturing with people like Nancy Mace, Thomas Massey, and
Speaker 4: Marjorie Taylor, Nancy Mason, Marjorie Taylor Green being the cheerleaders
Speaker 4: for MAGA. I think they just have like little m
Speaker 4: AGA cheers that they do in the bathroom every day
Speaker 4: they go to Congress, right, And so that's first. The
Speaker 4: second thing is that Bill actually gave Pam Bondi in
Speaker 4: the Department of Justice a lot of opportunity to go
Speaker 4: in and scrub the list for things they don't like,
Speaker 4: for names they don't like, for individuals they don't like,
Speaker 4: for witnesses they don't like. So that gives me some
Speaker 4: pause that you're not going to have full transparency. And last,
Speaker 4: but not least, I think that it's very weird. And
Speaker 4: this is this is somewhat of a reach, Tiffany, and
Speaker 4: this is why you're the journalist, and you're gonna be like,
Speaker 4: I'm making a journalistic reach. But I do think you
Speaker 4: can have a conversation about Andrew Tate and the interference
Speaker 4: of the Department of Justice with Andrew Tate, who is
Speaker 4: himself a certified tax you know, a toxic man who
Speaker 4: is a misogynist, who is under investigation for sexual trafficking,
Speaker 4: et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and the interference from
Speaker 4: the White House with their reluctance of showing up the
Speaker 4: or showing out or showing off the Epstein files. I
Speaker 4: just think that there is an underbelly of toxic toxicity
Speaker 4: that deals with the lack of caring for young people
Speaker 4: women that we have to discuss this emanating from the right,
Speaker 4: And I think that there's a through line that still
Speaker 4: trumps and that may be, that may be, that may
Speaker 4: that may be a leap.
Speaker 1: So I'm just saying, for my clarification and for the audience,
Speaker 1: what exactly is Trump's role and Andrew.
Speaker 4: T so So when so one when Andrew Tate, who
Speaker 4: many people may or may not know because he is
Speaker 4: in what they call the manosphere, which is where unfortunately
Speaker 4: a lot of men, even I was talking to some
Speaker 4: of my nephews, but young black men, actually ascribed to
Speaker 4: his podcast as words He's literally beat women on campus,
Speaker 4: He's allegedly held them as slaves, he's trafficked them, et cetera.
Speaker 4: He was under investigation in Romania. As soon as Donald
Speaker 4: Trump won, he put out a tweet saying that the
Speaker 4: Tate Boys are coming home. He ended up on a
Speaker 4: flight to Florida and they confiscated Yeah, they confiscated his
Speaker 4: phones on the plane. And the young gentleman I pronounced
Speaker 4: his last name wrong all the time, who was up
Speaker 4: for an appointment to the Department of Justice just recently
Speaker 4: and political ran the story exposing his Nazi tweets. Made
Speaker 4: a phone call to the border agents to give the
Speaker 4: Tape Brothers back their devices after they were seized at
Speaker 4: the border, something that had never been done before. It
Speaker 4: had a very chilling effect. They interfered on behalf and
Speaker 4: Pro Publica has written an amazing piece about it. But
Speaker 4: they interfered on behalf of people who are under investigation
Speaker 4: for sex trafficking, which by the way, sounds eerily like
Speaker 4: Jeffrey Epstein. And I think it ties into this whole
Speaker 4: conversation about the Mantle sphare. I think it ties into
Speaker 4: a whole conversation we're having about what's in the files.
Speaker 4: Who was protecting these people Paul and Gracia if I
Speaker 4: pronounced it right, and Gracia and Gracia. But he is
Speaker 4: someone right now who works and got a job without
Speaker 4: having secure without having to go through the nomination process,
Speaker 4: So I think it all ties in together. There's a
Speaker 4: lot that you on there. I sounded like Andrew Gillham
Speaker 4: and my recitation of where we were, But but that's
Speaker 4: just those things have been bothering me, and Epstein has
Speaker 4: been bothering my core for a while.
Speaker 1: Angela, I muted because I'm I hear the comments all
Speaker 1: the times. Please stop talking over each other. But I
Speaker 1: hear everything Makari said, and I want to bring us
Speaker 1: back to Epstein unless you had something on this, but
Speaker 1: something that was really frustrating me. We were in our
Speaker 1: group chat talking about this because I saw time and
Speaker 1: again this week Republican members of Congress totally railroaded interviews.
Speaker 1: Anytime they were asked about, you know, Trump and Epstein,
Speaker 1: they would deflect. And one person that kept deflecting to
Speaker 1: was Congress froman Stacey Plasket. So I don't know what
Speaker 1: you're about to say, but I definitely wanted to ask
Speaker 1: you about Stacey Plaskett and all this.
Speaker 2: I'll go back on mute.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think to stay I ask I'm sorry, no, no, Angela,
Speaker 5: if you're going there or if you I wouldn't sure
Speaker 5: if you're making comments on Bacari Pacar's introduction or Plasket.
Speaker 7: I was about to talk about Stacey Blasket, So go ahead.
Speaker 5: Okay, before you transition there, if I could just Tiffany,
Speaker 5: you raised some doubt as to whether or not you
Speaker 5: think there's some lasting impact to what's occurred this week,
Speaker 5: and frankly, the build up and all the Republican fumbling
Speaker 5: around this issue pretty basic to me that when you're
Speaker 5: dealing with child's sex trafficking, that there's no partisanship to that. Right.
Speaker 5: Everybody ought to be pretty clear that we are against
Speaker 5: people who traffic children. But now they've begun to split
Speaker 5: hairs on the right, basically saying a fourteen year old
Speaker 5: in an eight year old or a five year old
Speaker 5: are different without acknowledging that you cannot be under the
Speaker 5: age of eighteen and give consent legal consent for the
Speaker 5: business of sex. It just and some people have a
Speaker 5: harder line, like where Angela, you know, affiliates church wise,
Speaker 5: I was coaching two at one point. You know, we
Speaker 5: take harder lines around this thing. It's not just what
Speaker 5: you are legally able to do, but then there's morally
Speaker 5: ethically and so on and so forth. But but but
Speaker 5: I would say they've majorly fumbled the ball here, mostly
Speaker 5: because they've treated it like a ball and not like
Speaker 5: the individual lives that are at stake and that have
Speaker 5: been impacted. Tiff, I think you may have some silf
Speaker 5: the press conference this week.
Speaker 1: Well before we played the clip, because I wanted to
Speaker 1: set it up if you guys don't mind. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so my point Andrew about I don't think any of
Speaker 1: this matters, Like, yeah, obviously we all agree that we
Speaker 1: should all agree that pedophilia is a problem. But here's
Speaker 1: my challenge with this. We already knew who Donald Trump
Speaker 1: was before he was ever elected. And yes, but Kry,
Speaker 1: I take your point that he was that he introduced
Speaker 1: us because and the right was they were salivating over
Speaker 1: this because they thought the Clintons were attacked. They thought
Speaker 1: this was a democratic problem, which it turns out it's
Speaker 1: an everyone problem.
Speaker 2: And so.
Speaker 1: We already knew that Trump was a liar before any
Speaker 1: of this happened. He asked Attorney General Pam Bondi. She
Speaker 1: told him his name does appear in the Epstein files,
Speaker 1: and he told the Wall Street Journal that she never
Speaker 1: said that. So these lies are pretty open and apparent.
Speaker 1: We already knew that Trump had many problems with women,
Speaker 1: and so I'll say all of his challenges with women
Speaker 1: after we hear from one of the survivors who spoke
Speaker 1: this week at a press conference.
Speaker 2: Take a listen, and we'll talk about it.
Speaker 3: On the other side, I beg you, President Trump, please
Speaker 3: stop making this political show, some class show, some real leadership,
Speaker 3: show that you actually care about the people other than yourself.
Speaker 5: I voted for you, but your behavior.
Speaker 3: On this issue has been an national embarrassment. It is
Speaker 3: time to take the honest moral ground and support the
Speaker 3: release of these files.
Speaker 1: Okay, So that was Jenna Lisa Jones, one of the
Speaker 1: survivors of Epstein, And here is my challenge. Jenna Lisa
Speaker 1: Jones voted for Donald Trump prior to his election for
Speaker 1: this second time. By the way, we already knew that
Speaker 1: he had challenges with women. He's on record talking about
Speaker 1: you know you women, to let you do what you
Speaker 1: want if you can grab him by the p there.
Speaker 1: According to reporting by BuzzFeed, he would go when he
Speaker 1: was running the beauty pageant, the Miss USA I Believe
Speaker 1: beauty pageant, he would go in where Miss teen USA
Speaker 1: forgive me, where young girls as young as fifteen were
Speaker 1: dressing and make jokes about his obligation or his ability
Speaker 1: to be able to sleep with them if he wanted.
Speaker 1: He would look at young women and say, you know,
Speaker 1: if you were a little older, I'd be dating you.
Speaker 1: He's made these kind of sick comments about his own
Speaker 1: daughter right now. In these detention facilities. Ice detention facilities,
Speaker 1: we have seen evidence previously of alleged child abuse. There
Speaker 1: was the largest US operator for some of these shelters
Speaker 1: for migrant children face allegations of sexual abuse and harassment
Speaker 1: of miners at these facilities. The abuse allegedly took place
Speaker 1: at Southwest Key Program, someplace that was still operating up
Speaker 1: until a year ago, could potentially still be operating now.
Speaker 1: It's a very shadowy operation. So I kind of feel like, yes,
Speaker 1: obviously these women are survivors and they deserve justice, But
Speaker 1: the fact that they voted for this man and vote
Speaker 1: for policies that put other children in harm's weight, not
Speaker 1: just of abuse, but of sexual abuse. I find it
Speaker 1: a little difficult to reach down inside myself and my
Speaker 1: own humanity and have sympathy because you're My challenge with
Speaker 1: this is Andrew. You don't want it to happen to you,
Speaker 1: But it was okay when these things were happening to
Speaker 1: someone else. It's okay when you put other children in hers.
Speaker 4: I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't take that.
Speaker 4: I take a shoe at that, and let me let
Speaker 4: me just first first. I don't think that we can
Speaker 4: allow them to change who we are in our core.
Speaker 4: And I think that having a level of sympathy and
Speaker 4: or empathy for someone who was the victim of Jeffrey
Speaker 4: Epstein can be looked at in a vacuum and mutually
Speaker 4: exclusive from who they voted for on this particular issue.
Speaker 4: For me, it's not a challenge for me to support
Speaker 4: her through her healing journey because she went through something
Speaker 4: indescribable when she was a child perpetrated by a predator
Speaker 4: and by that predator's friends who were only protected by
Speaker 4: other powerful people and government. And you know, I don't.
Speaker 4: I can't. I can in my heart separate my sympathy
Speaker 4: and empathy for her from who she voted for, because
Speaker 4: I refuse to allow them to take away the heart
Speaker 4: that I believe helps makes me whole and see the
Speaker 4: world in the way that I do.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying she doesn't deserve symphony. Think I'm saying
Speaker 1: she voted in favor of someone who perpetuates the same
Speaker 1: thing that she claims she doesn't want. A few weeks
Speaker 1: on this show, a few weeks ago, on this show,
Speaker 1: we played the clip of Nancy Mace running out the
Speaker 1: testimonial room in tears. Well, she votes with Trump ninety
Speaker 1: eight percent of the times, like they vote in favor
Speaker 1: of policy that allows this type of behavior to continue.
Speaker 1: And if this type of behavior was happening to little
Speaker 1: white kids, it would be tragic. But when it's happening
Speaker 1: to little brown kids again, please, I would ask the audience,
Speaker 1: I don't want to go down a whole rabbit hole.
Speaker 1: But Southwest Key Programs was a huge It was an
Speaker 1: awful thing. Our failure of legacy. Media never covered this
Speaker 1: with the intention and shit, but in print media you
Speaker 1: could see a lot of stories about it where children
Speaker 1: were abused all the time. This was during his first
Speaker 1: ad ministration. So my challenge Bakari and Andrew is I, yes,
Speaker 1: obviously nobody deserves to be abused as a child, But
Speaker 1: my problem is this happened to you, and you still
Speaker 1: voted for a man who was allowing whose policies are
Speaker 1: allowing this to happen to someone else? You voted for
Speaker 1: a man where it was public knowledge and it was BuzzFeed.
Speaker 1: I can't remember what I said, but it was BuzzFeed
Speaker 1: who did the reporting about his inappropriate behavior with fifteen
Speaker 1: year old pageant contestants. So I'm not saying they deserve it.
Speaker 1: I find the hypocrisy in this quite disgusting personally, but
Speaker 1: go for it.
Speaker 5: I don't know that the hypocrisy is as black and
Speaker 5: white as we describe it now. One. I don't think
Speaker 5: that people drew the conclusion that Donald Trump was a
Speaker 5: abuser of underage children not doing the campaign. No one
Speaker 5: made that allegation. Yes, he was inappropriate, and by the way,
Speaker 5: that's inexcusable as well for a grown a man. But
Speaker 5: people treated.
Speaker 8: That like boys will be boys if you are out
Speaker 8: of that line during the kid No, I don't condone
Speaker 8: it by any means, but I don't think there was
Speaker 8: a serious allegation at the time that he had participated
Speaker 8: and child molestation and child abuse.
Speaker 5: He was off color about his daughter, he was off
Speaker 5: color about about these these pageants participants, and by the way,
Speaker 5: we could absolutely go down the you know circle, the
Speaker 5: the the drain on all of the kinds of ways
Speaker 5: in which Donald Trump is inappropriate. I don't believe that
Speaker 5: these women voted for a man who they believed was
Speaker 5: sexually abusing children. He may have been an association, and again,
Speaker 5: they may, like all adults, be able to make complicated,
Speaker 5: you know, decision making and say, yeah, well, such and
Speaker 5: such was associated with my family, but I never knew
Speaker 5: what was happening behind closed doors, so they make allowance
Speaker 5: for those things. What really cut through for me with
Speaker 5: these women in their messaging is that it was the
Speaker 5: women who voted for Donald Trump who I thought were
Speaker 5: most excoriating of him, his behavior and his record. Now
Speaker 5: it may feel like a little too too little, too late,
Speaker 5: but I actually applaud these folks for being able to
Speaker 5: rise above whatever the partisanship was in the moment to say,
Speaker 5: don't look at me where I am today, the voter,
Speaker 5: the thirty eight year old, forty eight year old woman,
Speaker 5: look at me as the fourteen year old who did
Speaker 5: not have defense, who did not have the adults who
Speaker 5: should have been paying attention, who should have had my back,
Speaker 5: who should have prevented all of these travesties from happening
Speaker 5: to me and to a thousand other girls like me.
Speaker 5: They didn't have a defense. They didn't have a defender,
Speaker 5: they didn't have a champion, they didn't have the basic
Speaker 5: modicum of justice available to them. I don't want to
Speaker 5: over extreme this thing, but when those women during their
Speaker 5: pre conferences, we asked us to close our eyes and
Speaker 5: sort of think about the the women in our lives,
Speaker 5: the girls in our lives at their age at fourteen,
Speaker 5: think about what they smell like, what they sound like,
Speaker 5: how they laugh. I just could not help but to
Speaker 5: put myself in that place and consider all the all
Speaker 5: the women I know, including you all, and think what
Speaker 5: the hell I wouldn't do in defense of you. And
Speaker 5: the fact that the whole system laid down on its
Speaker 5: back for Jeffrey Epstein in the and and in the
Speaker 5: in the, in the the the depth of a diabolical
Speaker 5: behavior that took place there, I'm beyond Jeffrey Epstein. I
Speaker 5: want these files because I want to. I want I
Speaker 5: want to unmask the system that allow for that to happen.
Speaker 5: Because it wasn't just that colorable, that's for sure.
Speaker 1: But if I can, if I can, if I can
Speaker 1: believe been very patient the soult, But I just want
Speaker 1: to make this point because I.
Speaker 2: Think, yes, twenty three minutes podcast you yielded the mic.
Speaker 1: I just want to make one quick point after every
Speaker 1: one of them, three minutes an adult conversation. I just
Speaker 1: want to make this quick point. Southwest Key Programs is
Speaker 1: still allowing for multiple abuse to happen, So the system
Speaker 1: still exists.
Speaker 2: That's not okay. Care, So that's the only point.
Speaker 5: Absolutely not okay. Agree, agreed, Agreed, Angela.
Speaker 6: Yes, So I hope that we can all agree that
Speaker 6: child abuse, elder abuse, abuse of any adult, any abusive,
Speaker 6: any kind, tiffany thinking of you with dogs is not okay. Right,
Speaker 6: It's not okay, And that is the adult conversation. The
Speaker 6: adult conversation is to acknowledge that this isn't a partisan
Speaker 6: conversation at all. It's a conversation about power. The conversation
Speaker 6: is the fact that there are people who are not
Speaker 6: blameless on either side of the aisle. The conversation is
Speaker 6: about the way in which this issue has been made
Speaker 6: to be a political football. Andrew, I think use the
Speaker 6: analogy of a ball as well, and both parties are
Speaker 6: to blame here. Larry Summers is in front of a
Speaker 6: Harvard class just on Tuesday talking about his role and
Speaker 6: how he was going to take a step back. But
Speaker 6: if it's okay, I'm going to proceed to teach this class.
Speaker 6: We have no idea who is all in it, like
Speaker 6: literally to blame for this, and it is not. I
Speaker 6: hate to do this because I want to blame Donald
Speaker 6: Trump for everything possible.
Speaker 7: But the reality of it is, there are a lot.
Speaker 6: Of people who were playing ball with Jeffrey Epstein, no
Speaker 6: pun intended, a lot of people. There are women, there
Speaker 6: are men, there are elders, there are youngers, everybody in between.
Speaker 6: So it is about power and the ways in which
Speaker 6: we are proximity. Our proximity to power colors our conviction.
Speaker 6: It blind us to what is right. You know, emails
Speaker 6: being sent by fundraisers and like, yes, I get it.
Speaker 6: I was one of the people that would send emails
Speaker 6: for my bosses for fundraisers and turn a blind eye
Speaker 6: to people who we know we wouldn't want to even
Speaker 6: be in the same room with, but because they're a donor,
Speaker 6: because they could cut a goddamn check, we're fine with it. Right,
Speaker 6: I understand, Like there are there's a lot here that
Speaker 6: needs to be unpacked, and we have to do this
Speaker 6: in earnest right, like we should not ever be treating
Speaker 6: abuse of anyone as a partisan game.
Speaker 7: It's not. It really is not.
Speaker 6: And I think that is what is most unfortunate here,
Speaker 6: because even after this vote, it is still being handled
Speaker 6: this way. Donald Trump played a mean, terrible game here,
Speaker 6: and he did not add up the consequences during the election.
Speaker 7: But those people there are. For some people, what's.
Speaker 6: Fine for us to allow them to be single issue voters,
Speaker 6: but for them it's not. I wish that Donald Trump
Speaker 6: never set foot in the White House. He is an
Speaker 6: embarrassment to this country. And yet, and still I understand
Speaker 6: how someone could say, well, this person is finally saying
Speaker 6: after decades that they are going to bring us justice
Speaker 6: on this issue where I felt unseen and unheard. I
Speaker 6: would hate to be in that position, But I can
Speaker 6: understand it. As sick as it is, I can understand it,
Speaker 6: I really can. And what I think is really unfortunate
Speaker 6: here is on the day of the vote, the Senate
Speaker 6: says that the Senate said that they would do you
Speaker 6: see a unanimous concept vote, so they don't even have
Speaker 6: to be recorded for whatever reason you see happen. Bill
Speaker 6: is on the President's desk at the time we record
Speaker 6: this podcast, still not signed it to the law into
Speaker 6: law at the time we record this podcast.
Speaker 7: But the reality of it is they still made it.
Speaker 6: A game because on the House floor Tuesday night, instead
Speaker 6: of focusing on keeping the main thing, the main thing
Speaker 6: for Epstein survivors, they turned their ire towards Delegate Stacey Plaskett,
Speaker 6: who is a non voting member on the floor and
Speaker 6: censured her.
Speaker 7: Sought to censure her. The vote failed. But I do
Speaker 7: want to play this clip since we're talking about felons.
Speaker 9: You don't want to talk about what is really happening here.
Speaker 9: Your a tax on working families, your protection of powerful
Speaker 9: predators and corporate criminals. You want to talk about texting,
Speaker 9: texting felons. How often do you text President Donald J. Trump?
Speaker 9: That's the individual we should be concerned about.
Speaker 5: I loves behind her with absolute.
Speaker 6: The Congressional Black Caucus, chaired by Evatt Clark, made a
Speaker 6: statement in support of Stacy Plaskett. And of course this
Speaker 6: is regarding the hearing where Michael Cohen testified before Congress
Speaker 6: last year and in that hearing, Stacey Plaskett uh was
Speaker 6: texting with Jeffrey Epstein. She they they made the allegation
Speaker 6: that he prepped her to question the witness before the hearing,
Speaker 6: that he was feeding her questions. This is a career
Speaker 6: long prosecutor. She didn't need any help from Jeffrey Epstein
Speaker 6: and yet instilled. The issue remains, why is he even
Speaker 6: in your phone? We have to be able to hold
Speaker 6: both truths.
Speaker 7: Should she be centured for it?
Speaker 6: No, because he was texting and email and talking to
Speaker 6: a whole lot more than just Stacy Plasket. But we
Speaker 6: have to acknowledge what people are battling in this moment
Speaker 6: where we're dealing with proximity to power, abuses of power,
Speaker 6: someone who is trying to undermine and dismantle frankly democracy.
Speaker 7: People want real answers about the way.
Speaker 6: That the He'll moves, the way that politicians move, and
Speaker 6: what needs to change. And I think it is an
Speaker 6: invitation for all of us to figure out what needs
Speaker 6: to shift so that we can do right by the
Speaker 6: American people at all time, regardless of our proximity to power.
Speaker 4: Can I throw in one little random fact since we're here, Yeah,
Speaker 4: one of the things that I found to be a
Speaker 4: great deal ironic throughout this whole thing, and going through
Speaker 4: some of the people who are able to kind of
Speaker 4: code the emails for us, is there was one email
Speaker 4: the Tiffany's point a little earlier. We were talking about
Speaker 4: just the systems of power and the Clintons and things
Speaker 4: that happened, but there was one email that actually stated
Speaker 4: that Bill Clinton had never actually been on Epstein Island
Speaker 4: throughout all this entire kind of and this goes back
Speaker 4: to your point, Andrew, we have more questions than answers,
Speaker 4: and it should not be that case when you have
Speaker 4: young women and we know that we're victimized, and I mean,
Speaker 4: I yeah, I mean, let's be very clear and intentional
Speaker 4: about our language. Young girls who were victimized, and still
Speaker 4: yet and still to this day, we're talking about someone
Speaker 4: who's sentence and I do criminal law a lot, somebody
Speaker 4: who's sentenced for the crimes in which he pled guilty,
Speaker 4: allowed him free reign to come and go to the
Speaker 4: jail as he pleased, and that person ended up becoming
Speaker 4: the Labor Secretary of the United States, And it just
Speaker 4: it kind of goes to show the person who was
Speaker 4: up again. Yeah, so it goes to show you that
Speaker 4: some of the things we held to be true may
Speaker 4: not be and some of the questions that we that
Speaker 4: we've had in our heart for a long period of time.
Speaker 4: And this is the I said this before. This is
Speaker 4: the fascination of Donald Trump that I have. We talked
Speaker 4: about it last week when we when we talked about
Speaker 4: him speaking for poor people and shitting on a golden toilet,
Speaker 4: but poor people believing that he spoke for them. Well,
Speaker 4: in this particular case, the kind of Tiffany's point and
Speaker 4: Angela's point to put a bow on it, there are
Speaker 4: women in this country, particularly those victimized by Jeffrey Epstein,
Speaker 4: that felt like Donald Trump is the only one who
Speaker 4: spoke for them. And for me, I don't know how
Speaker 4: people go through there. I don't. I can't sit here
Speaker 4: with the audacity to say I know what it's like
Speaker 4: to go through that particular healing journey. But I refuse
Speaker 4: to be like them. So I'm gonna give them that
Speaker 4: space to do what's necessary.
Speaker 1: I have so many thoughts on that, but I don't
Speaker 1: I don't know if that was a deciding factor for
Speaker 1: those particular set of women. But we talked about this
Speaker 1: last week. We had our disagreement on this last week,
Speaker 1: Bakari and Andrew, we were on opposite sides because I
Speaker 1: think the system of white supremacy was always the.
Speaker 2: Top thing for for them.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me to reckon to reconcile that you
Speaker 1: vote for an ACUS sex offender because he's the person
Speaker 1: who's going to.
Speaker 2: Speak for you.
Speaker 1: I think there were a lot of other factors that
Speaker 1: contributed to that. But I hear you, I hear you.
Speaker 1: The chief stands alone, and I think all three of
Speaker 1: y'all probably disagree with No.
Speaker 5: It could it could be.
Speaker 4: You could be.
Speaker 5: Right that they're both true. A matter of priority though
Speaker 5: right now was first and foremost of these women was
Speaker 5: there was a candidate running for president who, regardless of
Speaker 5: his motivations, because we know they were maniacal, he was
Speaker 5: trying to do an in run around. But regardless of
Speaker 5: his motivations, there was the candidate for president who was
Speaker 5: saying that this kind of behavior is unacceptable and we're
Speaker 5: going to unearth all of it. Lo and behold, he
Speaker 5: is the damn thought right.
Speaker 1: Definitely, we're going to see I mean, they're saying categories
Speaker 1: are going to be blacked out obviously information about the
Speaker 1: victims and explicit details about the actual abuse. But here's
Speaker 1: where I'm my Spidey sense, because they're saying information that
Speaker 1: is properly classified to protect national security. And I just wonder,
Speaker 1: who are the people who's going to determine what is
Speaker 1: national security what we can't see. I would imagine that
Speaker 1: some of these folks are going to be Trump acolytes
Speaker 1: and have a political interest in protecting people in these files.
Speaker 4: Or have direct complement or or the other thing, which
Speaker 4: is something which is going to catch a wide swath
Speaker 4: of this information as he's going to as he already
Speaker 4: did say that he wanted to put other people under investigation,
Speaker 4: and you cannot disclose information. Oh can I say something
Speaker 4: real quick here?
Speaker 9: Ye?
Speaker 4: All right? This goes out to our Tiffany and Angela's
Speaker 4: good friend, Steven A. Smith. So there were a lot
Speaker 4: of people who question why Democrats did not release the
Speaker 4: Epstein files when Joe Biden was president. I need to
Speaker 4: remind people that Julane Maxwell was not convicted until twoenty
Speaker 4: and twenty one, and she was still undergoing her appeals process,
Speaker 4: which means that those records could not be opened. While
Speaker 4: you're going through that judicial process. And furthermore, there were
Speaker 4: still people who were the targets, not official FBI targets,
Speaker 4: but targets of the Epstein investigation, and you dare not
Speaker 4: release information while those investigations are ongoing. And so there
Speaker 4: was this conversation that happened kind of around the water cooler. Well,
Speaker 4: Democrats didn't care. They should have released it when Joe
Speaker 4: Biden was president, and I just wanted to fact check
Speaker 4: that while we had the microphone.
Speaker 5: But moreover, we actually believe in the system of justice
Speaker 5: where the executive does not direct the work of the
Speaker 5: Department of Justice, and you had a Department of Justice
Speaker 5: who was set aside doing its own thing. But moreover,
Speaker 5: we didn't choose this issue to weaponize, to use as
Speaker 5: a cudgel over Democrats, to make it a political issue
Speaker 5: that will cause voters to vote one way or another.
Speaker 5: That's not how this issue was treated by Democrats. But
Speaker 5: I'm over the partisan because I think this is going
Speaker 5: to be one of those areas that is going to
Speaker 5: cross it if done properly, and I don't have full confidence,
Speaker 5: actually I don't have half confidence that properly is going
Speaker 5: to be in the factor here. But if let's say
Speaker 5: a future president comes along who's interested in real justice here,
Speaker 5: perhaps they will make sure that nobody slips through the
Speaker 5: skill that we are able to hold not just the individuals,
Speaker 5: but the systems that allowed it to take place under
Speaker 5: the cover of every clandestine organization in this country, be
Speaker 5: it the CIA, the FBI. Again, we're talking about international
Speaker 5: trade of girl.
Speaker 6: I guess the thing that I just would say, and
Speaker 6: I'm not saying that you were directing this response to me,
Speaker 6: but I just want to clarify I'm not talking about
Speaker 6: the release of the files when I say that these
Speaker 6: women waited for decades for justice. They just wanted Jeffrey
Speaker 6: Epstein to be held accountable.
Speaker 7: Files released or.
Speaker 6: Not about Yes, I'm just clarifying for the listener, that's
Speaker 6: not what I'm saying. I'm saying it wasn't that they've
Speaker 6: been pleading for the files to be released. They were
Speaker 6: pleading for this man, the people who you know, rape, harassed,
Speaker 6: abuse them, to be held accountable.
Speaker 7: And they had not seen that.
Speaker 6: And finally it looked like, you know, especially when you're
Speaker 6: in pain, you're in trauma, it looks like, oh, there's
Speaker 6: someone that's going to do this, not thinking that it
Speaker 6: is again a polittle football for them, so they're thinking like,
Speaker 6: oh my Hope is finally in something, and then you
Speaker 6: know whatever.
Speaker 5: Well, the biggest loser goes to Speaker of the House
Speaker 5: period enough.
Speaker 7: Said, oh, I know he should have played that clip.
Speaker 5: Completely responsible next to next to next to President Trump
Speaker 5: for their there being making it necessary for a vote
Speaker 5: to have been having been taken.
Speaker 6: No, making it necessary for a motion to discharge to
Speaker 6: have to happen, bring it to the floor, even went
Speaker 6: on recess, they went off the house floor.
Speaker 7: Wouldn't do any house business during this shut down.
Speaker 5: Not six weeks.
Speaker 7: I'm not touching this.
Speaker 4: And he wouldn't even he wouldn't even seet the person
Speaker 4: who was the vote for the discharge.
Speaker 7: Petition, Rob Gave's daughter.
Speaker 4: Yes, So let me just also say something that's gonna
Speaker 4: make since we all just jumped Tiffany Cross, something that's
Speaker 4: gonna make her feel better. I want to give a
Speaker 4: shot out. I want to give a shout out to
Speaker 4: Julie Brown from the Miami Hero because without local journalism,
Speaker 4: which is why I always tell folks, you know, you
Speaker 4: got to support local journalism, you got to support true journalism.
Speaker 4: You got to support independent journalism when it's there. You know,
Speaker 4: Jeffrey Epstein's story, it wouldn't be something that came to
Speaker 4: the forefront, It wouldn't have risen to that level because
Speaker 4: it was because of these It was because of these
Speaker 4: local journalists who decided to listen to the voices of
Speaker 4: these girls, who gave a voice to the voice lesson.
Speaker 4: So as we're talking about the white we've talked about
Speaker 4: every angle of this story. I wanted to make sure
Speaker 4: we didn't overlook Julie Brown from the Miami Herald, who
Speaker 4: was one of the many but at the forefront of
Speaker 4: making sure that this story actually saw what do they say,
Speaker 4: They say sunshine is the best disinfectant, and she was
Speaker 4: able to provide a little sunshine to the Jeffrey Epstein story.
Speaker 2: Thank you for that, I think really important point.
Speaker 1: All Right, Well, certainly we'll probably revisit this conversation a
Speaker 1: few times, but we do have a guest coming up,
Speaker 1: So let's shift gears to that. M all right, joining
Speaker 1: Native lamp Pod. Now is the Masssachusetts Massissachusetts?
Speaker 6: Okay, he said, you're thinking about Mississippi.
Speaker 9: Letter.
Speaker 5: The general is going to be obliged to have to
Speaker 5: correct you, right, that's okay.
Speaker 2: That is how you don't introduce the guess. I was
Speaker 2: doing that for your benefits, so.
Speaker 1: I know how to introduce a guess and how not
Speaker 1: to around here on these n O P streets.
Speaker 7: Now that's gonna be a T shirt now to.
Speaker 2: Now let's really get into it, you guys.
Speaker 7: Uh any who joining Native.
Speaker 1: Lampard now is Theuse's Attorney General, Andrea Joy Campbell. She
Speaker 1: has served as the Commonwealth's forty fifth Attorney General since
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. She's a member of the Democratic Party,
Speaker 1: and before that, she was a member of the Boston
Speaker 1: City Council. Madam Age, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 1: We're very pleased to have you. Welcome home, as we
Speaker 1: say around.
Speaker 5: Here, welcome home.
Speaker 10: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: I know you're super busy, so I'm gonna kick us
Speaker 1: off with the question. All my colleagues have a lot
Speaker 1: of questions. I'll be quick with my questions. I think
Speaker 1: one of the heavy things that's big on our minds
Speaker 1: right now. We're seeing what's happening this week with Ice
Speaker 1: in Charlotte and our co host Bakari's neck of the Woods,
Speaker 1: and you've been on the forefront fighting the Trump administration
Speaker 1: on a lot of this. You seem to be at
Speaker 1: odds with the US State's Attorney there in Massachusetts. I've
Speaker 1: seen you guys had a few moments of back and
Speaker 1: forth over what's happening there. But one thing that you've
Speaker 1: really been out front on EPs holders Temporary protected status Massachusetts,
Speaker 1: which I was not aware has one of the highest
Speaker 1: Haitian populations in Massachusetts. Yeah, I didn't know that, Andrew,
Speaker 1: outside of Florida, and you have been really out front
Speaker 1: with protecting that that community of Haitians and Venezuelan's even
Speaker 1: going as far as joining a lawsuit against the federal
Speaker 1: government who's essentially going after what we call sanctuary cities
Speaker 1: where you know, people are allowed to live freely and
Speaker 1: not being disappeared off the streets, but they're holding hostage
Speaker 1: funding basically trying to punish some of these cities. Can
Speaker 1: you let us know what is the latest in that
Speaker 1: particular fight and where that stands, particularly as we see
Speaker 1: what's happening in other cities across the country.
Speaker 10: We are doing a lot to protect immigrants and frankly,
Speaker 10: to push back on a cruel immigration policy that we're
Speaker 10: seeing not just in Massachusetts, but as you said, across
Speaker 10: the country. And they would have Folks think that the
Speaker 10: immigration policy is about promoting public safety, it is exact opposite.
Speaker 10: It is about perpetuating fear in our communities. It's also
Speaker 10: not only perpetuating fear, those who might come forward to
Speaker 10: report a crime are less likely to do so. It's
Speaker 10: absolutely undermining the trust between law enforcement and communities that
Speaker 10: have been built over decades and having just the opposite effect.
Speaker 10: And I will just say, with no transparency and very
Speaker 10: little accountability for the agregious tactics that ICE is using
Speaker 10: in our communities, if I had my state police conducting
Speaker 10: operations as ICE is right now, there would be transparency, accountability.
Speaker 10: I would be called to every agency to speak up
Speaker 10: for their tactics. And here you have no accountability whatsoever.
Speaker 10: So we're doing our part to push back, doing a
Speaker 10: lot of know your rights training, filing a lot of litigation.
Speaker 10: We've filed several litigation efforts, I should say, on protecting
Speaker 10: stif including TPS for Venezuelan Haitians. We have a large
Speaker 10: Haitian population here in Massachusetts, and so much so that
Speaker 10: if we were to deport every Haitian in Massachusetts, our
Speaker 10: elder care system, our PCA care system, our healthcare system
Speaker 10: would come crumbling down. And so there are real economic
Speaker 10: consequences in addition to that cultural contributions, of course, and frankly,
Speaker 10: we're making a crystal clear that these policies do nothing
Speaker 10: to promote the well being of our citizens, do nothing
Speaker 10: to bring about economic prosperity, and absolutely nothing to address
Speaker 10: the cost of living crisis that we're seeing in Massachusetts
Speaker 10: and in this country.
Speaker 5: That's right, General, I am coming from Florida, having been
Speaker 5: born and raised in Miami. I actually one of the
Speaker 5: key stops that I made when I was running for
Speaker 5: governor of Florida was to Massachusetts to get rack up
Speaker 5: some endorsements of some of the Haitian leaders in your state.
Speaker 5: Oddly enough, General, you have the distinction of being only
Speaker 5: the second africa An American elected statewide UH in Massachusetts
Speaker 5: behind UH Edward W. Brooks, who I knew through my
Speaker 5: former boss who was his chief of staff for a
Speaker 5: number of years. When when when Edward W. Brooks was
Speaker 5: in in the United States Senate, I am curious to
Speaker 5: know whether or not the legal maneuverings of this current
Speaker 5: administration in Washington, d C. Very specifically the U. S.
Speaker 5: Attorney General's Office has in their targeting of your fellow
Speaker 5: Attorney General, Leticia James of New York State.
Speaker 4: If that.
Speaker 5: Targeted, very cruel, unsubstantiated attack on her has caused or
Speaker 5: created any kind of a chilling effect amongst your fellow
Speaker 5: attorney general's attorneys general across the country. You all have
Speaker 5: been on the front lines. In fact, when we couldn't
Speaker 5: look around anywhere DC or any other community around the
Speaker 5: state and find front line, the attorney's generals were out
Speaker 5: there holding this administration accountable and standing on the side
Speaker 5: of law and justice. But I am curious to know
Speaker 5: whether or not you all have experienced any kind of
Speaker 5: a chilling effect or what concerns it causes you to
Speaker 5: see this administration personally go after defenders of democracy and
Speaker 5: of law and of justice such as yourselves as Attorney's general.
Speaker 10: I appreciate the question, and I stand on his shoulders
Speaker 10: as well as Duval Patrick's right folks who came ahead
Speaker 10: of me in Massachusetts who paved the way, and I
Speaker 10: used to be an attorney for Governor Patricks, so we're
Speaker 10: quite close in fighting the fight, and I will tell
Speaker 10: you I am inspired by them and all the other
Speaker 10: unnamed black folks that I stand on their shoulders, especially
Speaker 10: black women. I was recently in Montgomery, Alabama, with Brian
Speaker 10: Stevenson talking about the wrongful conviction work he's doing and
Speaker 10: what we could be doing here in Massachusetts, and taking
Speaker 10: in obviously all of the sites that he continues to
Speaker 10: create to lift up our stories. I got on a
Speaker 10: plane and I came back absolutely inspired. So yes, there
Speaker 10: are targets on the backs of ags, only Democratic ags
Speaker 10: of course, who are stepping up in this moment in time,
Speaker 10: targets on our back, but I've been leaning into it
Speaker 10: and saying, bring it on, inspired by the history of
Speaker 10: my folks, inspired by the history here in Massachusetts, and
Speaker 10: inspired by the stories are real people that without us,
Speaker 10: would not see relief and accountability, wouldn't have snap benefits,
Speaker 10: wouldn't have a public education, wouldn't have a clinical trial
Speaker 10: for pediatric cancer if we didn't step up and fight
Speaker 10: the fight. And so I know many of my colleagues
Speaker 10: feel the same. We of course have AG James's back
Speaker 10: all day every day, but we know why we do
Speaker 10: this work, and I would add one personal layer for
Speaker 10: me is I'm very faith driven, aim that everywhere I
Speaker 10: go I know not only who I am, I know
Speaker 10: whose I am. So I'm just praying more knowing that
Speaker 10: my God goes ahead of me, behind me, and all
Speaker 10: around me. And I think in this moment in time,
Speaker 10: we need to lean on our personal stories, our history,
Speaker 10: and our faith.
Speaker 5: I love that. And I want to please excuse me,
Speaker 5: Duval Patrick, Governor, for that blatant domssion when I talked
Speaker 5: about only one of two state wise, of course there is,
Speaker 5: Governor Patrick. I appreciate the correction.
Speaker 4: No, I was running to correct your Andrew, don't don't worry.
Speaker 5: Thank you. I know you before you started.
Speaker 4: Madam Attorney General. I love you, I adore you. For
Speaker 4: those of you all on Native Land who don't know,
Speaker 4: we were in Iowa and a cold, cold Iowa, and
Speaker 4: she was pregnant and we were out there eating cold
Speaker 4: pizza and knocking on doors for then presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
Speaker 4: So shout out to that baby that was in your
Speaker 4: right next month.
Speaker 10: So we were running the street six years ago.
Speaker 4: My goodness. Let me ask you just a personal question
Speaker 4: because I feel like I know you and supported you
Speaker 4: throughout the way. But people don't know that when they
Speaker 4: see you and they see your smile today, that everything
Speaker 4: don't always go right. In twenty twenty one, you should
Speaker 4: have been, as we thought, the next mayor of the
Speaker 4: City of Boston, and things didn't work out for you.
Speaker 4: Talk about that defeat and how that spurred you on
Speaker 4: to be able to do the great things you're doing now.
Speaker 4: I mean, whether or not you're talking about snap benefits,
Speaker 4: or you're talking about children who aren't in school because
Speaker 4: they're afraid of ice or all those things. It did
Speaker 4: not happen if you didn't have that defeat. And we're
Speaker 4: able to gain some moment of clarity, I guess relying
Speaker 4: on your face. So how did you get knocked down
Speaker 4: and get back up again?
Speaker 10: Definitely my faith even in that loss. I tell folks,
Speaker 10: it's how it's your perspective, right. I flipped the loss
Speaker 10: and saw it as an opportunity, and I said to God, Okay,
Speaker 10: if that wasn't it, then where are we going next?
Speaker 10: And I think it's really important you're going to have losses.
Speaker 10: But if anything, I learned more about myself during that race.
Speaker 10: I learned that I carried deeply about politics and government
Speaker 10: helping people and not harming people. And so when the
Speaker 10: opportunity came along to run for Attorney General, I said,
Speaker 10: do I want that job? And let me tell you,
Speaker 10: everything works out as it should, especially when it's connected
Speaker 10: to something bigger than you and when it's not about you.
Speaker 10: And so this work of service is not about me.
Speaker 10: But it's not just my faith. You know, my personal story.
Speaker 10: I've had so many defeats along the way. You know,
Speaker 10: when I was eight months old, my mom died in
Speaker 10: a car accident going to visit my father, who was
Speaker 10: in prison at the time. I didn't even meet my
Speaker 10: father until I was eight, and so my brothers and
Speaker 10: I we bounced around. We lived with my grandmother, who
Speaker 10: did the best she could but struggled with alcoholism at times.
Speaker 10: And when she was struggling, we're in a foster care
Speaker 10: system or with a relative. And then my dad would
Speaker 10: get out of prison. I'd meet him for the first
Speaker 10: time when I was eight, but he would live to
Speaker 10: see me graduate from Princeton. I talked to him one morning.
Speaker 10: He died the same evening when I was nineteen years old,
Speaker 10: and then fast forward. My twin brother, Andre would die
Speaker 10: while in the custody of the Department of Correction at
Speaker 10: the age of twenty nine as a pre trial detainee
Speaker 10: as a result of receiving inadequate health care. So I
Speaker 10: sit here today. My middle name is Joy, so I
Speaker 10: have no choice but to stand in that, but it
Speaker 10: comes from my biological mother. And in addition to that,
Speaker 10: just reflecting on all that loss and thinking about how
Speaker 10: do I use this job that I'm privileged to have
Speaker 10: to break other cycles of poverty, criminalization, mediocrity for other
Speaker 10: families in Massachusetts and families by our work outside of Massachusetts.
Speaker 10: So it's purpose driven work and I'm already breaking those
Speaker 10: cycles from my two beautiful boys. So anything that comes
Speaker 10: my way now, I'm just like, bring it on, because
Speaker 10: if I got through all that, I know I'll be
Speaker 10: okay going forward. And I think this is our time
Speaker 10: to remind our people not to be ashamed of their stories,
Speaker 10: to be vulnerable in it, because it gives you tremendous power.
Speaker 10: So when you come across a professional loss, it's not
Speaker 10: that it's a learning opportunity. It's an opportunity to keep
Speaker 10: moving ahead and who knows where you might end.
Speaker 6: Up Attorney General Campbell you talk to about your legacy
Speaker 6: and the shoulders you stand on. I can't help but
Speaker 6: to notice the picture of Muhammad Ali you have on
Speaker 6: the wall behind you, and I want to bring that
Speaker 6: up just for a moment, because I think it's important
Speaker 6: for people to understand how many knockout blows you've given
Speaker 6: to this administration, the Trump administration, with almost two dozen
Speaker 6: lawsuits against the Trump administration. Would love to talk to
Speaker 6: you about how you feel about that record, and now
Speaker 6: that we know that the Trump administration is continuing down
Speaker 6: the very treacherous path of dismantling the Department of Education,
Speaker 6: including outsourcing the work of the Civil Rights Division there,
Speaker 6: I'd love to hear about the work that you are
Speaker 6: doing and leading with state's attorneys general around DEIA.
Speaker 10: I really appreciate that, and I have Muhammad al lead
Speaker 10: because I feel like in this moment in time, he's
Speaker 10: like my muse, I guess, and Fanny lou Hamer too,
Speaker 10: both of them, and maybe Kendrick Lamar. Right now, I'm
Speaker 10: just relying on all of them in so many different ways.
Speaker 10: And I tell folks here in Massachusetts, we're small, but
Speaker 10: we're a mighty state, and we punch above our weight
Speaker 10: every day, and I feel like Muhammad Ali punching above
Speaker 10: our weight. We have now forty one lawsuits against this
Speaker 10: Trump administration. They try to come for three point two
Speaker 10: four billion dollars in Massachusetts investments. Our lawsuits have protected
Speaker 10: three point zero two billion dollars of Massachusetts investments.
Speaker 5: So who your.
Speaker 10: AG is in your state matters, And most of these
Speaker 10: lawsuits are across state lines to protect DEI and DEA
Speaker 10: initiatives and to do it unapologetically. There is nothing right now,
Speaker 10: even as we sit in this conversation and on this platform,
Speaker 10: there is nothing that this administration at the federal level
Speaker 10: has done that has made DEI initiatives, diversity, equity, and
Speaker 10: inclusion unlawful. It is still lawful. So if anything, we're
Speaker 10: telling folks not to succumb to their fear, but to
Speaker 10: keep exercising their leadership. And us ags have their and
Speaker 10: the education context and the employment context, you name it.
Speaker 10: We're also fighting for public schools and public education. The
Speaker 10: three billion I mentioned, they tried to come for close
Speaker 10: to two hundred million of funding for our public schools
Speaker 10: here in Massachusetts, which would not have opened on time
Speaker 10: and delivered educational services for our students and our educators
Speaker 10: if we didn't follow that lawsuit. And we have another
Speaker 10: lawsuit of course against the dismantling of the Department of Education,
Speaker 10: so we'll continue that. But all to say, not only
Speaker 10: do we need to keep punching above our weight in
Speaker 10: this moment, ags have I think the most impactful tool
Speaker 10: to fight back because litigation in particular is what we
Speaker 10: need to hold them accountable.
Speaker 7: That's excellent.
Speaker 6: I know we also have a question we'd like to
Speaker 6: hear from our native lampire community. We have a question
Speaker 6: on veterans and how they are being protected or not
Speaker 6: so protected with the hands at the hands of Ice.
Speaker 11: Creating's native lampire. My name is April from that Lansa.
Speaker 11: I absolutely love your podcast. I want to thank you
Speaker 11: for your comments on Veterans Day. We definitely want to
Speaker 11: praise our veterans and thank them for their service and
Speaker 11: their sacrifice. I have several members in my family that
Speaker 11: have service country. My question is, are you aware that
Speaker 11: there are immigrant veterans that are currently sitting in detention
Speaker 11: centers and are facing deportation. One of those people is
Speaker 11: my loved one who signed up in the military, serve
Speaker 11: this country, and in spite of that, is facing deportation
Speaker 11: to his native country. It is not right, it is unjust,
Speaker 11: and I would like to know your thoughts about it.
Speaker 11: How can we bring greater awareness to these veterans that
Speaker 11: could be facing deportation and are currently sitting in detention centers.
Speaker 11: Thank you so very.
Speaker 7: Much, Attorney General Campbell your thoughts.
Speaker 10: First of all, thank you for lifting up that story,
Speaker 10: because I think people often when we're talking about this work,
Speaker 10: will refer to some spreadsheet and just numbers. These are
Speaker 10: real people. These are Americans or folks who want to
Speaker 10: be in this country because they love this country, and
Speaker 10: in this case, obviously veterans. So in the context of
Speaker 10: even the snap conversation this happened before Veterans Day, we
Speaker 10: had so many veterans that were reaching out to our
Speaker 10: office because they were food and secure and grateful for
Speaker 10: our lawsuit to protect access to food benefits for them,
Speaker 10: a population that's often forgotten. We're doing a lot in
Speaker 10: this space, including in the housing context and for folks
Speaker 10: who are returning, in the mental health space, job and employment,
Speaker 10: you name it. We have no partner at the federal
Speaker 10: level whatsoever. When it comes to this work. In name,
Speaker 10: they may say, oh, Happy Veterans Day, but in action
Speaker 10: and substance, there're no way to be found. And the
Speaker 10: fact that we have folks who are willing to die
Speaker 10: for this country sitting in detention facilities is absolutely unconscionable
Speaker 10: and ridiculous. And I'm not surprised the folks that they
Speaker 10: would say they're detaining. They're saying they're criminals. It's nonsense.
Speaker 10: We are not seeing that. If there are maybe one
Speaker 10: person they pick up with the criminal record, when you
Speaker 10: pull back, if they're able to obtain the information, it
Speaker 10: is folks who have no criminal record, folks who are
Speaker 10: actively seeking asylum, maybe they're veterans or folks who've had
Speaker 10: cases dismissed, and so they're picking up folks who, for
Speaker 10: whatever reason shouldn't be in detention. So what we're doing
Speaker 10: is doing rapid response, making sure people have access to lawyers.
Speaker 10: Were also helping with bond and making sure folks can
Speaker 10: be released on bond while they go through some proceedings.
Speaker 10: But the end of the day, I think it's a
Speaker 10: reminder to everyone in this country. Our ags will keep
Speaker 10: fighting the fight, but our tools at some point will
Speaker 10: hit a wall. The trauma that folks are experiencing is real.
Speaker 10: And if you don't like the immigration policy coming from
Speaker 10: this White House, get typically engaged, get out and vote,
Speaker 10: do your part. It's equally important and it's just as powerful.
Speaker 4: Well, I love you. I'm thankful that you came by.
Speaker 4: Some of my met some of my friends.
Speaker 2: You've also taken care of us.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm I'm glad you went there because I actually
Speaker 5: wanted you to end there, which is on I'm just
Speaker 5: out of curiosity, wondering how you let your hair down?
Speaker 5: What is relaxation for an attorney general who's at war
Speaker 5: twenty four to seven? It seems on every side, what
Speaker 5: does the calming down? Is it a reality show? Is
Speaker 5: it some yoga? Is it it collar greens cooked Kamala
Speaker 5: Harris style.
Speaker 10: Well, I'm definitely looking forward to Thanksgiving for sure my
Speaker 10: family because it would be all of that and then
Speaker 10: some more. But it's running running around with my kids,
Speaker 10: playing with them. It's starting my day in prayer even
Speaker 10: before my kids wake up, before my husband wakes up,
Speaker 10: and just centering my spirit and just realizing I'm not
Speaker 10: doing this by myself, and I'm certainly not doing it
Speaker 10: in my own strength. And it's also surrounding myself with
Speaker 10: positive people, people who know that yes it's hard, but
Speaker 10: rolling up their sleeves to say, well, what are we
Speaker 10: going to do about it? Not accepting it right and
Speaker 10: not lowering their expectations of what they should get from
Speaker 10: government or anything else. And so this space right here
Speaker 10: does that for me. So just surrounding myself with folks
Speaker 10: who pour into me and I'm grateful. Then I have
Speaker 10: an incredible team. I work with folks who are dedicated
Speaker 10: to public service and I'm inspired by them every single day.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 5: I love that general. Thank you, and welcome home. You're welcome, y'all.
Speaker 4: Make sure y'all write some checks, write some checks to
Speaker 4: this ain't this job, and don't run off love and prayers.
Speaker 7: Champagne contributions, campaign contributions. I just want to make sure
Speaker 7: we're not trump.
Speaker 5: A new ballroom.
Speaker 10: Right Andred campbelled up for a j Campbell m A
Speaker 10: on social media. So thank you all for having me
Speaker 10: stay blast happy, Thanks, happy holidays, Thank you.
Speaker 7: So much, thank you so much.
Speaker 5: Nobody knows.
Speaker 2: Yeah, very happy that that she was able to join.
Speaker 2: That was a really good conversation.
Speaker 1: I love that she punctuated the point of how important
Speaker 1: attorneys general are across this country because I keep saying
Speaker 1: the courts will not hold. I know, you know, I
Speaker 1: have two lawyers on the show, but I just I
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of faith in the Justice Department.
Speaker 1: And right now that seems to be who's on the
Speaker 1: front line, the judges and the attorneys general, and I
Speaker 1: just don't know how much they're going to hold. And
Speaker 1: speaking to that, Angela, you dropped in our chat speaking
Speaker 1: of the courts not holding. What federal prosecutors are trying
Speaker 1: to do when it comes to Brehonna Taylor's convicted killer.
Speaker 2: What is the latest there.
Speaker 6: I just want to back into this a little different,
Speaker 6: and it's because you know, when we have this conversation
Speaker 6: and people say, you know, I'm choosing the lesser of
Speaker 6: two evils, or both parties are just as bad, or
Speaker 6: all of these things, there are pointed examples where we
Speaker 6: can show people the stark distinction between two different parties
Speaker 6: and the people that they put in place, and I
Speaker 6: think this is one of them. I remember when Donald
Speaker 6: Trump was elected the first time and Jeff Sessions was
Speaker 6: Attorney general. I was calling it the Department of Injustice.
Speaker 6: And we've seen just how far this department will go
Speaker 6: to protect Donald Trump's friends, you know, people that have
Speaker 6: protected him. We've seen Donald Trump abuse his pardon power.
Speaker 6: We've seen the Pardon Office run by Ed Martin, an
Speaker 6: attorney of Donald Trump's, abuse that office. And we're seeing
Speaker 6: the ways in which not only did they eliminate the
Speaker 6: transparency database around police office officers who have had passed
Speaker 6: issues around abuse, harm, harassment, even killing of different citizens
Speaker 6: in various states and cities.
Speaker 7: But now a case that our folks fought hard for.
Speaker 6: When you think about the convergence of what happened in
Speaker 6: the summer of twenty twenty with George Floyd, certainly that
Speaker 6: was met with amaud Arbury and Breonna Taylor, and now
Speaker 6: the thing that we fought for, the thing that her mother,
Speaker 6: to Miika Palmer, cried for, which was to ensure that
Speaker 6: her daughter eventually would receive some type of justice. I
Speaker 6: wouldn't call thirty three months justice at all. But now
Speaker 6: we have the Department of Injustice, led by Pam Bondi,
Speaker 6: seeking to ensure that this man, detective and now I'm
Speaker 6: friging his name is it Hankerson, Yes, when now we're
Speaker 6: seeing them fight for him to be out of jail
Speaker 6: while they await his appeal. And I'm saying this knowing
Speaker 6: that Donald Trump is going after Tis James for a
Speaker 6: mortgage fraud that does not in fact exist, going after
Speaker 6: Adam Schiff and all the rest, all of his political enemies.
Speaker 6: But they will protect law enforcement who abuse the power
Speaker 6: of the badge and kill us, willfully, abuse us, willfully,
Speaker 6: and then seek for them to be out on bail
Speaker 6: and then out of jail, altogether undermining what the Biden
Speaker 6: Harris administration's Justice Department did.
Speaker 5: So that's the law enforcement that was brutalized by the
Speaker 5: January sisters, who who we are responsible for the death
Speaker 5: of of folks who were standing in the Gafford democracy.
Speaker 6: That falls in the category of the pardon power being abused,
Speaker 6: given the fact that I started there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the pardon and then let's not even forget that
Speaker 4: we just found out this week. You like that timing note,
Speaker 4: don't you, Tiffany. We just found out this week that
Speaker 4: the raggedy District attorney or United States attorney from the
Speaker 4: northern part of Virginia didn't even show the Grand the
Speaker 4: second amended indictment for James Comey. They completely circumvented the
Speaker 4: process to indict another one of their political enemies.
Speaker 9: This is.
Speaker 4: Fascinating to me. It's fascinating to me, and it's hurtful
Speaker 4: to me. And it's not surprising to me because on
Speaker 4: the very bare minimum, I think we all started this
Speaker 4: journey and quote unquote civil rights with a few fundamental
Speaker 4: facts that we all held true, no matter if you
Speaker 4: were the four of us, or you in Black Lives Matter,
Speaker 4: you were just somebody randomly protesting or whatever. It was
Speaker 4: the nexus that brought us all together for a lot
Speaker 4: of those voices that people who watch our show have
Speaker 4: been hearing for the past fifteen twenty years, is that one.
Speaker 4: We understand that Breonna Taylor, We understand the Motte Aubrey,
Speaker 4: We understand George Floyd, we understand. Everything that happened since
Speaker 4: then is not justice. Justice is them being alive. Everything
Speaker 4: that happened since then is may be a monocrum of accountability,
Speaker 4: if that so, That's kind of first, and then we
Speaker 4: realized how difficult it was even to get that accountability.
Speaker 4: We realized that we had to move heaven and earth
Speaker 4: to get that accountability, and only with a blink of
Speaker 4: an eye, only with a vote or an election, does
Speaker 4: all of that accountability roll back. And the last thing
Speaker 4: is fundamentally all of us. I mean, I know, we
Speaker 4: have our disagreements on whatever the particular issue is. You
Speaker 4: even have movements of black folk who were trying to
Speaker 4: get to the same place that have disagreements on how
Speaker 4: to get there, right, but all of us believe that
Speaker 4: we're in this position because people do not give us
Speaker 4: the benefit of our humanity. And Brianna Taylor is the
Speaker 4: perfect part of that. She didn't get the benefit of
Speaker 4: her humanity in life, and she damned sure not getting
Speaker 4: it in death. And so the troublesome part is Brianna
Speaker 4: is not even able to rest. That is the that's
Speaker 4: the sad part of this.
Speaker 6: I do think that it's important to also know to
Speaker 6: this point around rest, the attorneys that work in the
Speaker 6: Department of Justice have also reached a crossroads. There is
Speaker 6: a peace in The New York Times this week a
Speaker 6: deep dive where they interview more than sixty lawyers who
Speaker 6: talked about leaving the Department of Justice. Hundreds we have
Speaker 6: been fired, and thousands more have left the Department. At
Speaker 6: least over a thousand have left because they can't defend
Speaker 6: what this administration is doing, which is not upholding or
Speaker 6: protecting the law.
Speaker 5: Could I just add, while we're on this topic, that
Speaker 5: there are so that our audience isn't surprise, and we're
Speaker 5: not surprised, there are conversations and justice around what it
Speaker 5: might mean to pardon Derek Chauvin of his murderous acts.
Speaker 5: And the truth is is that I'm not even I'm
Speaker 5: disgusted by it, but not even surprised that this is
Speaker 5: part of the conversation. There is a wing that has
Speaker 5: kept Donald Trump afloat, including in these latest polls that
Speaker 5: overall have been pretty you know, disastrous for Donald Trump
Speaker 5: of late a moment in time, of course. But but
Speaker 5: the people who keep buoying him are these hardcore radical
Speaker 5: right racists who he can do no wrong. Why because,
Speaker 5: as you've already pointed out, Tiffany repeatedly, is that they
Speaker 5: are in common cause around right white supremacy. And they
Speaker 5: know at the end of the day, the beginning of
Speaker 5: the day, through the evening and and you know, whatever
Speaker 5: the hour, that Donald Trump is always going to stand
Speaker 5: at the at the at the at the at the
Speaker 5: goddamn gates like he's bull Connor at the doorway between
Speaker 5: what's right, what's fair, what's equitable, what's qualified, and white supremacy.
Speaker 5: And I don't mean to say that all those things
Speaker 5: are opposite white supremacy. But if that's your if that's
Speaker 5: your modus of operandi, if that's what you live and
Speaker 5: die to defend, then we can't make room for your qualifications,
Speaker 5: your meritocracy. We can't make room for that when all
Speaker 5: I know is that you're motivated by making sure that
Speaker 5: the supremacy that has foregone us four hundred plus years
Speaker 5: is what follows for the next four hundred years. That's
Speaker 5: what they're in defense of. So this I just want
Speaker 5: to ready our community that there's probably gonna be a
Speaker 5: lot more pain, a lot more hurt, a lot more
Speaker 5: rolling back of accountability, if we could say it, certainly
Speaker 5: not justice, but the symbols of justice that we've gotten.
Speaker 5: This officer fired into an apartment where he could.
Speaker 7: Not see into it ten times blinds up.
Speaker 4: I mean, this is.
Speaker 5: Against any protocol of any law enforcement official blindly shooting
Speaker 5: into a space and he has no line of sight.
Speaker 6: And this is the thing this is not just unique
Speaker 6: to Breonna Taylor's case. Of course, Andrew just referenced George
Speaker 6: Floyd as well, and Derek Shavin and the efforts that
Speaker 6: are a largely based in white supremacy to get him
Speaker 6: part and and we have a clip from Ben Shapiro
Speaker 6: on that.
Speaker 12: And there are a bunch of reasons why Derek Chauvin
Speaker 12: should be parted. By the way, while in federal custody,
Speaker 12: he was stabbed recently twenty one times by fellow inmates.
Speaker 12: It's quite dangerous for him. The reason why we now
Speaker 12: know all of this is because we know from jurors
Speaker 12: that they were pressured, that they felt the pressure, that
Speaker 12: they were scared to rule in favor of Derek Chauvin.
Speaker 12: That we now know, and we could see it at
Speaker 12: the time, the amount of public pressure that was brought
Speaker 12: in that particular case. The mayor of Minneapolis was signing
Speaker 12: settlements with the family of George Floyd on behalf of
Speaker 12: the city in the middle of the trial. The governor
Speaker 12: of Minnesota at the time was, of course Tim Walls,
Speaker 12: and Tim Walls was basically out there proclaiming the guilt
Speaker 12: of Derek Chauvin.
Speaker 4: So let me just say this really quickly. I think
Speaker 4: Ben Shapiro is brilliant, right, I think that he is
Speaker 4: just a brilliant, brilliant person who articulates his views. We
Speaker 4: disagree with them. Whatever. Now that was some bolls because
Speaker 4: none of that is legally sound or justified. Right. There
Speaker 4: was nothing in that which reaches the level to have
Speaker 4: a conviction overturned, let alone a pardon like duror pressure one.
Speaker 4: There's no evidence of that. There's no evidence that a
Speaker 4: juror would have because you know what happens out there.
Speaker 4: Every after every guilty plea, they actually or guilty verdict,
Speaker 4: they pull every jurors and say, is this your Do
Speaker 4: you want to pull the jury? Yes? Is this your verdict?
Speaker 9: Yes?
Speaker 4: Blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 12: So that that is.
Speaker 4: Settlements happened pre criminal case all the time, like this
Speaker 4: is not anything. But I think it's necessary that we
Speaker 4: hear somebody on the other side articulate their reasoning so
Speaker 4: that then we can come in and stand on our
Speaker 4: platform and be like, this is the reason why this
Speaker 4: isn't true. Not rooted in emotion, not rooted and I
Speaker 4: hate you you're on a but rooted in the fact that. No,
Speaker 4: this just isn't legally sound. And the crazy part about
Speaker 4: it is Andrew Gillum, it's not legally sound. And Donald
Speaker 4: Trump still may do to shit.
Speaker 7: Yeah, absolutely likely will.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I just have a slight disagreement there, not a slight
Speaker 1: a major disagreement there with Acari. I think if we're
Speaker 1: calling Ben Shapiro brilliant, then our standard for brilliant is
Speaker 1: very low.
Speaker 4: That's his I don't mind calling people. I mean, I
Speaker 4: think he's a very I think he's very smart, very
Speaker 4: well read, very articulate. I mean, we can disagree with you,
Speaker 4: we can disagree with people who we think are smart, disagree.
Speaker 2: With people I think he's smart all the time. He
Speaker 2: just doesn't fall into that category.
Speaker 4: But I hear you.
Speaker 2: If you think he's brilliant, I yield to the I
Speaker 2: yield to your point.
Speaker 4: But I think it's just he's in all our brilliant meetings,
Speaker 4: you know. That's what I'm saying when we have our
Speaker 4: little meaning the brilliant people.
Speaker 1: No wonder, I'm not invited to that meeting, but I
Speaker 1: do think that they mask a lot of policy and
Speaker 1: white supremacy. And I want to switch gears here and
Speaker 1: shift us to something that I want to talk about,
Speaker 1: and that is in your neck of the woods, Bakari,
Speaker 1: and in your neck of the woods, Andrew, there is
Speaker 1: a state law trying to be introduced. But in order
Speaker 1: for us to talk about that, I want to take
Speaker 1: us back to last year. We were in Philadelphia and
Speaker 1: did a show leading up to the election, and we
Speaker 1: had a wonderful question asked from a young man there
Speaker 1: who's a member of Alpha Fay Alpha Fraternity Incorporated and
Speaker 1: stood up and asked this question.
Speaker 2: Take a listen.
Speaker 7: Say your name and where you're from. Please.
Speaker 9: Hi.
Speaker 13: My name is Shauna Alaone. I'm a junior here at
Speaker 13: Tembo University. As a African American man that have a disability,
Speaker 13: I was told by a white teacher that college was
Speaker 13: not for me. Here I am in college with a
Speaker 13: high GPA. But but but what I don't understand. We
Speaker 13: talked about the black boat, the black woman both the
Speaker 13: back LGBT two boat. What is amazing we're talkt about
Speaker 13: all that, but we don't talk about the black disable
Speaker 13: boat and people like myself of Tiger or being treated
Speaker 13: as psychic past says it. So if y'all can just
Speaker 13: talk about what we need to do as a community
Speaker 13: to uplift the black disabled boat as well, so that
Speaker 13: more people like myself can be a success story.
Speaker 1: We got a lot of response from that question, and
Speaker 1: I just shout out to him for standing up and
Speaker 1: asking and challenging us to talk more about that. And
Speaker 1: so ever since then, every week, I've wanted to revisit
Speaker 1: that topic. But again, during the Trump administration, it's like
Speaker 1: trying to catch competti covering all the travesty. So while
Speaker 1: we had time to, I just wanted to follow up
Speaker 1: with that since there's a story in the news this
Speaker 1: week that speaks directly to it. But first, black people
Speaker 1: with disability are more likely to spend outside regular classroom.
Speaker 1: Students are typically checked out of classrooms, They're more likely
Speaker 1: to be placed in correctional facilities, and less likely to
Speaker 1: have completed high school. And so he bucks all those trends.
Speaker 1: There are more than three point six million black adults
Speaker 1: who have a disability here in America, and students with
Speaker 1: these disabilities, as you see, are disproportionately discriminated against. And
Speaker 1: the ADA the American Disabilities Act passed in nineteen ninety
Speaker 1: and that, just like every other civil rights in this
Speaker 1: country past because of the work of black people. It
Speaker 1: was more out of the Civil rights movement. People stayed
Speaker 1: sit ins literally just copied the Civil rights movement to
Speaker 1: get it. And there's intersectionality, of course, as we know
Speaker 1: with black folks in every underclass community, but certainly with
Speaker 1: black folks in the American discs Abilities Act.
Speaker 2: Why are we talking about this?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 4: Where are you going? Where are you going with this?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 2: If I can.
Speaker 1: Why why this matters on a serious note is because
Speaker 1: there is an effort underway in several red states, including
Speaker 1: yours Bakari and yours Andrew, to allow pregnant women to
Speaker 1: use handicapped parking spaces. And that sounds like a noble
Speaker 1: enough gesture. However, this is not what it appears to be.
Speaker 1: This is an initiative from right wing extremists. I think
Speaker 1: we have to stop calling them conservatives. Right wing extremists
Speaker 1: to encourage more women to have children. So a typical
Speaker 1: tactic of right wing extremists is to pit one group
Speaker 1: against the other. And so there are communities, including in
Speaker 1: South Carolina and in Florida, who are filing a lawsuit
Speaker 1: to stop this. So instead of saying, let's provide parking
Speaker 1: for pregnant women. They're saying, we're going to take away
Speaker 1: these parking spots and make them accessible to pregnant women. Now,
Speaker 1: this is in direct violation of the American Disabilities Act,
Speaker 1: and pregnancy is not qualified as a disability. And nobody's
Speaker 1: saying that that pregnant women should not be able to
Speaker 1: have these parking spaces. But there is a huge ground swell.
Speaker 1: And so because that gentlemen so bravely asked that question,
Speaker 1: this is precisely the intersection of people who are black,
Speaker 1: who have disabilities, who are voters, and where policy butts
Speaker 1: upright against them. There was a testimony from a woman
Speaker 1: in Tallahassee Andrew who was one of the outspoken opponents
Speaker 1: of this bill. But this is a state law happening
Speaker 1: all across country across and I don't want people to
Speaker 1: hear it and think, oh, this isn't a bad thing. No,
Speaker 1: this is coming from white men, right wing extremists masking
Speaker 1: this and policy, and it's rooted in turning America into Gilead.
Speaker 1: And I thought this was some and really important to
Speaker 1: raise to the viewers. But I get it's out of
Speaker 1: interest to you, Bricari.
Speaker 7: So that point.
Speaker 4: Oh no, I was letting you finish, but I wanted
Speaker 4: to say one thing. I had to clarify one point.
Speaker 4: If you are pregnant, yes, you do qualify for short
Speaker 4: term disability. That's firm you and after you give birth
Speaker 4: there are a few weeks in which you qualify for
Speaker 4: short term disability. The reason I bring that up, just
Speaker 4: as a clarification of your point is you know the
Speaker 4: people who don't take advantage of that short term disability,
Speaker 4: often enough pregnant that are black. Right, So I do
Speaker 4: want to and your point is so nuanced that I'm
Speaker 4: going to sit my ignorant butt down on the side.
Speaker 4: But I did want to make sure that I that
Speaker 4: I did articulate the fact that, yes, the pregnant women
Speaker 4: do qualify as being disabled. I think they should take
Speaker 4: advantage of it. And I think that those pregnant women
Speaker 4: should get parking spots. But that's about the same I'm
Speaker 4: going on.
Speaker 5: Any private businesses I've seen actually create parking spots for
Speaker 5: women who are pregnant.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I tell y'all.
Speaker 4: Can I confess somebody quick? Can I confess something out
Speaker 4: one time? So if you tell me you park, No,
Speaker 4: it's worse than that what so like, I had to
Speaker 4: get on the zoom one day and so I was
Speaker 4: in the Fort Lauda Deal airport and I downloaded the
Speaker 4: app so I could go in and use the the
Speaker 4: the breastfeeding, you know, the little that I can think of.
Speaker 5: The women need to feed their child.
Speaker 4: Man, But there carrying that burden with that might have
Speaker 4: been the reason I had to wait in line with
Speaker 4: y'all before they get into heaven. So I'm just happy.
Speaker 5: Streak in here, man.
Speaker 4: I downloaded that app so quick. They were like, aren't
Speaker 4: you for your zoom? And I said it there and
Speaker 4: logged in. They were like, you got a beautiful background.
Speaker 4: It was all.
Speaker 1: Scotty because I did want to just make that quick point.
Speaker 1: That is a part of the lawsuit that they're saying
Speaker 1: pregnant women can apply for a parking path for a
Speaker 1: short term disability.
Speaker 2: So thank you for pointing that out.
Speaker 5: Well, let me tell you my wife couldn't get nowhere
Speaker 5: carrying them to babies with her feet the way they
Speaker 5: were in those last couple of weeks. But I will
Speaker 5: say this, what you want us to do is to
Speaker 5: look at this from I think the view of how
Speaker 5: we expand, right, you don't have to absolutely then put
Speaker 5: certain communities against other communities, notwithstanding the correction, the legal,
Speaker 5: important legal correction that you made, Bookar. This again is
Speaker 5: first of all, bless the woman who wants to have
Speaker 5: a child now to get a closer parking spot, because
Speaker 5: I they're gonna have to try harder on the incentive side.
Speaker 5: But I definitely know that that is part of the
Speaker 5: right wing extreme that this. You know, they're they're obsessed
Speaker 5: by their replacement theory and they are terrified by the
Speaker 5: low birth rates of of of of of white women,
Speaker 5: So surely you know they go down that track. But
Speaker 5: I think we want to see this through the lens
Speaker 5: of expansion rather than you know, contraction of support for
Speaker 5: people who needed when they need correct and what we're
Speaker 5: doing and what we're seeing many of these states is
Speaker 5: the pitting against which is again what they do.
Speaker 6: Well, and especially when you think about things from a
Speaker 6: scarcity model. I think it's really important. You know, I'm
Speaker 6: grateful that you brought up Andrew the idea that or Bakari,
Speaker 6: whichever one of you, you guys you know the same,
Speaker 6: all black people are the same. But talked about the
Speaker 6: fact that black women very rarely take advantage of this,
Speaker 6: of this benefit, if we can call it that. But
Speaker 6: when I think about all the work that Kamala Harris
Speaker 6: and Lauren Underwood and other black women did in cong
Speaker 6: or really trying to make sure that we bring black
Speaker 6: maternal health to the forefront, and the many ways in
Speaker 6: which our humanity is not seen carrying children in this
Speaker 6: country in part because we did it for labor.
Speaker 7: That is the history of this country.
Speaker 6: What I don't want to do is dehumanize us even
Speaker 6: more when we do need this type of support. So
Speaker 6: one thing that I think is important in just for
Speaker 6: a moment, because I think it would behoove us not
Speaker 6: to miss something that has been on the radar talking
Speaker 6: about black pregnant women. There was a woman in Dallas,
Speaker 6: there's a woman in Indiana who both were kicked out
Speaker 6: of hospitals just recently. And I want to play the
Speaker 6: clip of the woman in Dallas who is clearly in
Speaker 6: a disabled position, and as she is going through intake,
Speaker 6: which she should have not had to do while she
Speaker 6: was in active labor, she's sitting in a wheelchair, definitely
Speaker 6: in a disabled position.
Speaker 7: Can we row that clip.
Speaker 5: Right now?
Speaker 13: As at home, here's your.
Speaker 2: Doctor laying is her doctor?
Speaker 9: Are your patients like this?
Speaker 5: Are just the black ones?
Speaker 7: Is the tenth? I bet you y'all listen next time.
Speaker 6: When you found out you was delivering at this hospital,
Speaker 6: your ass should have changed doctors.
Speaker 5: I'm believable.
Speaker 4: It's not. It's not, it's not even so, you know,
Speaker 4: I think my story is kind of well known. You know,
Speaker 4: Ellen almost died during childbirth, so I don't even want
Speaker 4: to go down that path. In fact, my number one
Speaker 4: political issue is African American female mortality because that happens
Speaker 4: more than people know, of course, and the reason being
Speaker 4: is because of our implicit bias we have in our
Speaker 4: healthcare delivery system, and people like, what does that mean?
Speaker 4: If any person ask you, does racism still exists the
Speaker 4: number one example as it exists when black women are
Speaker 4: giving childbirth, because it crosses over socioeconomic levels. It doesn't
Speaker 4: matter if you're on Medicaid, it doesn't matter if you
Speaker 4: are Serena Williams or Ellen Sellars. It can affect you equally, right,
Speaker 4: And it's because in their studies that people inherently believe
Speaker 4: that black women have a higher pain tolerance or that
Speaker 4: they're more likely to fake the pain that they're going through.
Speaker 4: But Andrew, this is the point that I wanted to
Speaker 4: make by laying that out. This is why black men
Speaker 4: have a very very very important role in a woman's
Speaker 4: pregnancy and childbirth because many times, many times, in that room,
Speaker 4: you have to be your partners number one advocate, because
Speaker 4: oftentimes those individuals cannot speak up for themselves because they're
Speaker 4: going going through that process. And unless you were there
Speaker 4: yelling and screaming, kicking and shouting, cursing, threatening lawsuits, call
Speaker 4: the police, doing everything necessary to protect the life of
Speaker 4: the woman you love and the little people you ain't
Speaker 4: even met yet, then sometimes, and too often, more often
Speaker 4: than not, those black women will die.
Speaker 5: And Bacari that I was listening to a NPR story
Speaker 5: the other day, really right down these lines. One of
Speaker 5: the most effective ways of getting medical staff's attention during
Speaker 5: your partner's pregnancy and delivery is for a husband to
Speaker 5: be the advocate. With one exception husbands of color.
Speaker 4: That's because they want to take.
Speaker 5: Chimes, who oftentimes call security. Security is then escorting the
Speaker 5: husband every single place he goes. The message goes out
Speaker 5: through the hospital staff that this is a problem man,
Speaker 5: and I mean in the story, I was listening to
Speaker 5: this immigrant not immigrant. I'm sorry he was of Latino
Speaker 5: dissent father was arrested while his wife gave birth, complained
Speaker 5: about the pain that she was experiencing, and nearly died, right,
Speaker 5: I said during your comments, Bacary, thanks Charles Johnson, who
Speaker 5: is the husband to Kira, and they have an organization,
Speaker 5: he has a foundation.
Speaker 4: What is it for care for life?
Speaker 5: I believe it is I need to look at I
Speaker 5: need to four care of for moms and shows. He's
Speaker 5: been a guest on our show. But Charles Johnson an
Speaker 5: incredible advocate for just the most unspeakable tragedy. His wife
Speaker 5: bled internally after a c section for ten straight hours. Right, people,
Speaker 5: she said something is not right, something's not right with me,
Speaker 5: and dismissed again her pain not perceived as real pain
Speaker 5: being manufactured of some sort. And then a life cuts short,
Speaker 5: a child who won't have his mom, a husband who
Speaker 5: has lost his wife, all of it preventable.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 5: So, I couldn't agree with you more that that we
Speaker 5: husbands have to be there, but we have to systematically
Speaker 5: demand better. There is no reason for black mortality rates
Speaker 5: to be at the level that they are, and for
Speaker 5: us to still be scrutinizing individual cases when we know
Speaker 5: that that is only the case because of systematic racists,
Speaker 5: not just policies, but practices and in practice, and hospitals
Speaker 5: in healthcare systems all throughout the country everywhere, and lots
Speaker 5: have to change.
Speaker 6: I think the important thing here is I know we
Speaker 6: have to wrap is that we don't keep pitying different
Speaker 6: groups against each other. Pregnant women, black, white, Asian, whatever,
Speaker 6: deserve to have access that is easy, deserve to have
Speaker 6: a life that isn't making their pregnancies harder. And I
Speaker 6: think that they can do that without taking away from
Speaker 6: parking spaces that already exist. If they can make space
Speaker 6: for electric cars, certainly they can make space for pregnant
Speaker 6: women and so. But I do not think that it
Speaker 6: is smart for us to pit these groups against each other.
Speaker 6: And we should focus really hard on making sure that
Speaker 6: it is easy to bear children and to be pregnant
Speaker 6: in this country, and we should also make sure we're
Speaker 6: protecting accessibility for other people.
Speaker 1: We are not pitting them against each other. It's these
Speaker 1: right wing extremists, And to your point, if they really
Speaker 1: gave a shit about pregnant women like you just gave
Speaker 1: a testimony. Angela just talked about the work that I'm
Speaker 1: Vice President Harris did on this, Congressman Lauren Underwoock, Illinois
Speaker 1: did on this. If they really cared about people bringing
Speaker 1: life into this world, they would put their resources there,
Speaker 1: not into some BS legislation taking away. And so that
Speaker 1: sets up a war between two communities who both, like
Speaker 1: Angela made the point, deserve to have accessible parking spaces.
Speaker 2: Sorry, but go ahead.
Speaker 9: No.
Speaker 4: I was just saying, thank you for introducing the subject,
Speaker 4: and I like, I like this show. I mean, I
Speaker 4: know I add a great deal of value. But the
Speaker 4: way that you three, the way that you three are
Speaker 4: able to take that topic and be able to I mean,
Speaker 4: we extrapolated that with such death depth. I just I
Speaker 4: mean I oftentimes when we talk with our friends, we
Speaker 4: don't ever just say thank you for the conversation and
Speaker 4: thank you.
Speaker 2: For adding to it.
Speaker 1: That clip that we played with the pregnant woman, it's
Speaker 1: hard to watch, but I'm happy that we were playing
Speaker 1: it in full because hearing her screen, her guttural cries
Speaker 1: and the way that that woman was talking, the way
Speaker 1: the white nurse was talking to her, very dismissive, and
Speaker 1: then see her she wasn't even listening.
Speaker 4: I did see a post afterwards because she got fired,
Speaker 4: and the nurse did acknowledge, and she said that there
Speaker 4: are a lot of good nurses out there. Don't let
Speaker 4: her behavior. She she had a I don't know what
Speaker 4: to call it.
Speaker 5: It isn't just about her, it is a at the
Speaker 5: rate as you know, it's systemic.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, it's time for cause and action. So
Speaker 2: let's get to that.
Speaker 4: Who cares about truth? When the last morning's seen it?
Speaker 9: All right?
Speaker 2: Is that time in the show for calls to action?
Speaker 1: And I'm going to kick us off because I let
Speaker 1: Macari kick us off in the beginning, and so my
Speaker 1: call to action, uh, this week is another selfish ask
Speaker 1: of all of you. I want to know what y'all
Speaker 1: are reading this holiday season. Every year in my book club,
Speaker 1: we read a classic. So we're reading The Great Gatsby.
Speaker 1: So drop me in comment and let me know y'all
Speaker 1: are reading you and Trump. Yeah exactly. But I'm trying
Speaker 1: to get back up to a book a week. And
Speaker 1: I'm not like some of these people who are like
Speaker 1: I don't read fiction.
Speaker 2: I love fiction. So if y'all got good fiction, good
Speaker 2: non fiction, whatever, let me know.
Speaker 6: So my CTA is also very personal. I have been
Speaker 6: dealing with my mother, who is currently in the hospital,
Speaker 6: and one of the things that I'm understanding and being
Speaker 6: baptized by fire by, is.
Speaker 7: How ill prepared.
Speaker 6: I feel like my generation is to deal with aging parents,
Speaker 6: and so what I really want to do is a
Speaker 6: joint project with our Native Lampod community where we can
Speaker 6: put together a shared memo of all the resources that
Speaker 6: we need, making sure that our parents have wills and
Speaker 6: trusts and that they're updated, making sure that our parents
Speaker 6: have you know, power of attorney done. I had to
Speaker 6: call Medicare earlier for something and he was like, I
Speaker 6: can't tell you about that. You're not authorized, right, Like
Speaker 6: all of these things that are small and they don't
Speaker 6: take a lot of time, but when you have to
Speaker 6: deal with the convergence of all of them at the
Speaker 6: same time, it's overwhelming. So I want to hear from
Speaker 6: you all your stories, what you all have done to
Speaker 6: succeed in this space, how you supported your parents.
Speaker 7: Their adults.
Speaker 6: They make their own decisions, but they need a little
Speaker 6: more support, and they do not like being treated like
Speaker 6: your grown kids. So if you got tips for that,
Speaker 6: I'm a bossy child too, help assist out. I definitely
Speaker 6: want to get this right and want my mom to
Speaker 6: feel loved and supported and held with the dignity of
Speaker 6: a queen, which she deserves. So I know y'all have
Speaker 6: probably been through that with your own parents. Andrew, I
Speaker 6: know you're going through that with your mom too right now.
Speaker 6: So whatever tips y'all have, please send them to meet
Speaker 6: and Andrew. I'll make sure he reads them too.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I appreciate that ask going on our behalf and
Speaker 5: I got to just give a shout out to my
Speaker 5: sister the I'm glad my mama didn't stop at six children.
Speaker 5: I'm glad she went for seven. The only girl of
Speaker 5: the bunch, My baby sister, attorney counselor Monique Gillham, who
Speaker 5: has been there every step of the way like I had,
Speaker 5: was at a funeral this weekend and I just want
Speaker 5: to speak about this issue of aging parents and our
Speaker 5: lack of preparation for it. I want to lift in
Speaker 5: prayer my good friend brother Alvin Benton, on the passing
Speaker 5: of his mother. Gwendolyn Benton, an educator, was a personal
Speaker 5: assistant I think too. Ceo, Uh, maybe it was. Coca
Speaker 5: Colage was a principal elementary school principal, gave her life
Speaker 5: and service to people. And one of the things that
Speaker 5: Alvin said during the funeral as he was given reflections
Speaker 5: on his mom and her her impact on his life,
Speaker 5: he's a mama's boy, he says, I can confirm he's yeah,
Speaker 5: he I do. But but in truth, Alvin said during
Speaker 5: his reflections, to say a prayer for and check up
Speaker 5: on your strong friends. And I think about you, all
Speaker 5: the folks who I get to share this platform with,
Speaker 5: and when I think about strong friends, the ones who
Speaker 5: are always in the gap for other people. But it
Speaker 5: really resonated with me, and maybe I was in need,
Speaker 5: maybe myself. I don't know strong people really ever do
Speaker 5: the asking, But it made me think about the people
Speaker 5: in our lives who are always carrying, who are always doing,
Speaker 5: who are always looking out. So I just want to
Speaker 5: echo Alvin's Alvin's directive to check on your strong friends,
Speaker 5: the ones who always checking on us and always doing,
Speaker 5: and always going check in on them and just see
Speaker 5: that they're okay. Like he said, they need a little sunshine,
Speaker 5: a little rain drops to flourish as well. So shout
Speaker 5: out to to Gwendolen Benton life. She lived two weeks
Speaker 5: prior to my cousin Michael Sam's who passes well. Men, brothers,
Speaker 5: check up on your health, but check in on your
Speaker 5: on your strong friends. What you gotta be.
Speaker 4: Yeah, No, you're bridging a gap because you got to
Speaker 4: raise your parents and you gotta raise your kids. And
Speaker 4: so one of the things that I wanted to do
Speaker 4: was just talk about whether or not it's Epstein that
Speaker 4: we were talking about earlier, some of the things that
Speaker 4: I've been kind of going through in my work day.
Speaker 4: Be very mindful of your children. Be very mindful of
Speaker 4: the things that your children are doing and that they're into.
Speaker 4: My call to action is I have a young lady
Speaker 4: who I represent, who her child was playing Fortnite and
Speaker 4: she heard some things that were untoward being said on Fortnite,
Speaker 4: and so she began to ask her daughter if anything
Speaker 4: like that had ever happened to her. She's under the
Speaker 4: age of ten, and she began to tell her mother
Speaker 4: how she was being sexually abused at after school program.
Speaker 4: And so I just want as to while we're talking
Speaker 4: about the things we need to do for the adults
Speaker 4: in our lives and our parents to also make sure
Speaker 4: that we're raising that level of awareness with the young
Speaker 4: people that are around us, because this world is a
Speaker 4: hell of fied place outside, and so just make sure
Speaker 4: that we're being mindful on both sides.
Speaker 5: All right, we need to pick me up. Call tough stuff.
Speaker 4: Yeah, no, I got my I gotta pick me up.
Speaker 4: What I'm gonna do for Tiffany Cross's book club is
Speaker 4: one of my co workers, Scott Jennings. His new book
Speaker 4: just came out in time for Christmas, and I'm gonna
Speaker 4: send it over to Tiffany.
Speaker 7: Did somebody pick up against on the internet. Nobody want to.
Speaker 4: Hear this, So I'm gonna get Cross. I'm gonna get
Speaker 4: tif Cross Scott Jennings' new book for her book club,
Speaker 4: and y'all read it.
Speaker 7: Thank you the car I picked up what he puts.
Speaker 5: Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1: No, but seriously, I actually will take that book for that.
Speaker 1: I go away every winter with some friends of mine
Speaker 1: in my book club, and sometimes we rent the house
Speaker 1: and we run out of firewood and we're always like, oh,
Speaker 1: we need paper to burn.
Speaker 9: That is.
Speaker 5: Good Scott, Scott.
Speaker 4: If they buy it, if they buy it, they buy it, Scott,
Speaker 4: it don't matter what they buying.
Speaker 5: That they.
Speaker 1: Sorry to this band anyway, She's not anyway. Thank you
Speaker 1: guys for an amazing show. We'll be back next week.
Speaker 1: There are three hundred and forty eight days left until midterms.
Speaker 1: And don't forget about Latasha Brown's we ain't buying it
Speaker 1: the movement. You're not supposed to do any shopping after
Speaker 1: Black Friday. I think is Isela is wearing that we
Speaker 1: ain't buying what you're wearing Black.
Speaker 7: No, it's Black House Orders Matter, imtives.
Speaker 1: Aware of Black voters Matter, attizes organization, And if you
Speaker 1: like what you heard today, please be sure you share it,
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Speaker 2: Also, please check out some of the other.
Speaker 1: Shows on Reason Choice Media, Our Girls, Jamail Hill host Politics.
Speaker 1: I'm a huge sports fan, so I've been listening, and
Speaker 1: we also have The More you Know and Noah de
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Speaker 1: don't forget we have mini pods that drop every week
Speaker 1: and solo pods that also drop every week, So make
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Speaker 1: with what we got going on. All right, Thank you'll
Speaker 1: for tuning in, Welcome.
Speaker 14: Home, Welcome Home to the Natives, landing on the podcast
Speaker 14: space tests and for greatness.
Speaker 4: Sixty minutes is so hit, not too long.
Speaker 14: For the great shit, high level combo politics in a
Speaker 14: way that you could taste it then digest it. Politics
Speaker 14: touches shoe even if you don't touch it, So get invested.
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Speaker 12: Yes.
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