Speaker 1: As media from the land. Don't say you hate LA
Speaker 1: if you ain't been below the ten. One of the
Speaker 1: truest statements of many true statements that Kendrick Lamar has stated,
Speaker 1: and most of us who are from LA have made
Speaker 1: this claim many times. Most people that hate LA have
Speaker 1: only been to Hollywood. They've never been to La. North
Speaker 1: of the ten is the freeway, the ten Freeway that
Speaker 1: anybody else would call the I ten. We don't call
Speaker 1: our freeway's eye anything. It's the which the strong small
Speaker 1: piece of history is because our freeways weren't just numbers.
Speaker 1: They used to be locations. So the ten was the
Speaker 1: Santa Monica Freeway, the one ten was the Harbor Freeway,
Speaker 1: the sixty was the Pomona Freeway, so it was named
Speaker 1: after city, so you'd call it the Harbor, so like
Speaker 1: now it's the one ten. Anyway, you wouldn't know that
Speaker 1: because you're not from the land. What do we mean
Speaker 1: by the land. We're talking about the entire culture. It's
Speaker 1: not just being born here. It's about embracing the territories
Speaker 1: and jurisdiction thereof, and all that comes with understanding our slang,
Speaker 1: our way of life and all that. And we have
Speaker 1: no problem naturalizing citizens. Obviously you got to put in
Speaker 1: some work. But what we love and respect is like
Speaker 1: even if you, even if you rep the land, even
Speaker 1: if you live here, you know where you're from. That
Speaker 1: can never be taken from you. And that's something that
Speaker 1: we value. And if you know me, and also Sophie,
Speaker 1: you cut us open, we bleed Los Angeles and Sophie
Speaker 1: is you know, she's from the West Side, but the
Speaker 1: part of the West Side she's from is one that
Speaker 1: would never, ever, ever, ever, I would ever question her certification.
Speaker 1: Sophie a real one and although she may not live
Speaker 1: here now, nothing can take that away from her. But
Speaker 1: what makes somebody from where they from? I am from
Speaker 1: South Central but I was born at the Fox Hills
Speaker 1: Hospital in Inglewood. But as many times as I've said
Speaker 1: in my music, I'm from the six to six. What
Speaker 1: does that even mean? Six to six is twenty minutes east.
Speaker 1: That's where I grew up. So as far as street terms, yeah,
Speaker 1: I went to high school in the Inland Empire, lived
Speaker 1: there for a little bit. You would say, are you
Speaker 1: from where you went to high school? No, because I
Speaker 1: that's not in my soil. It's part of my story
Speaker 1: I am from Los Angeles, can't take that. But how
Speaker 1: long do you have to be somewhere before you can
Speaker 1: rep it? What do you have to embrace? Like what
Speaker 1: makes you from Why are we? As said in many lyrics,
Speaker 1: at least if I've said West Coast, we get defensive
Speaker 1: about our homeland. Listen, I admitted we are easily offended
Speaker 1: because out of our reputation comes from transplants. Like a
Speaker 1: lot of the stuff that people don't like about La
Speaker 1: is people that's not from la So that kind of
Speaker 1: bothers us sometimes because it's like, that's you not even
Speaker 1: from here. Yeah, And if you're gonna come here and
Speaker 1: talk trash about it's like, have you even seen Los Angeles?
Speaker 1: You've seen Hollywood talking about the Palisades. You only know
Speaker 1: Alta Dina because it caught on fire. That's the only
Speaker 1: reason you know what that is. So we're very defensive
Speaker 1: about our homeland. But at the same time, if you
Speaker 1: were born here and left immediately your family packed up,
Speaker 1: you can't help that. Your family packed up, moved to Colorado,
Speaker 1: you grew up there, And if I met you and
Speaker 1: you was Hella Granola, then I would be like, oh,
Speaker 1: you from Denver, and they'd say, well, I was born
Speaker 1: in La. Am I allowed to tell this person they
Speaker 1: not from la that's where they was. That's where you.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't. That is an immutable unless I
Speaker 1: have a time machine. This fool's from La. Do they
Speaker 1: carry our culture? No, because they wasn't raised in it.
Speaker 1: Their home was different. But I can't take that from you.
Speaker 1: It would be ridiculous to say that your citizenship has
Speaker 1: nothing to do with where you were born. We need
Speaker 1: to talk about the history of birthrights, citizenship, the politics, y'all.
Speaker 1: I love this. I love these times where I get
Speaker 1: to do something that I think can be a little
Speaker 1: more evergreen, if you will, meaning I can record this
Speaker 1: at any time. Because of the way that our politics
Speaker 1: is set up, It's going to be relevant for a
Speaker 1: long time, right, and has been relevant for a long time.
Speaker 1: Because we're talking about the fourteenth Amendment. Now here is
Speaker 1: my premise as President Trump so brazenly suggested that we
Speaker 1: need to change the fourteenth Amendment that if your parents
Speaker 1: were here illegally, you are not a citizen no longer,
Speaker 1: no matter where you were born. And I made statements
Speaker 1: about like you need to take this man serious. While
Speaker 1: most of you Internet constitutional scholars are like, it's gonna
Speaker 1: get shut down. It has to get of course they're
Speaker 1: going to shut it. It is a constitution. It's in
Speaker 1: the constitution. You can't you could just not have it
Speaker 1: in the constitution, to which I responded, take him serious,
Speaker 1: And some of my more you know, brunching liberal friends
Speaker 1: shout out, my dog in my group text, Uh, he's
Speaker 1: very calm about this and has evidence, and it did
Speaker 1: happen that the Supreme Court shut it down. But I
Speaker 1: feel like we're dealing with a different animal, which is
Speaker 1: why I want to give you this history here, because
Speaker 1: his ever so young sidekick, mister J. D Vance is like, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: if the Supreme Court would tell a general what to do,
Speaker 1: none of us would take that serious, because that's not
Speaker 1: a jurisdiction. If a Supreme Court would tell the attorney
Speaker 1: general what they should prosecute, we would all be like,
Speaker 1: that's an overstep of power. You're not supposed to do that.
Speaker 1: So why are we saying when the president has something
Speaker 1: to say the executive branch, why is that not an
Speaker 1: overstepping of bounds. Now, this logic is essentially a constitutional crisis,
Speaker 1: which we'll talk about later. But they what he's basically
Speaker 1: saying is why does the president have to listen to
Speaker 1: the courts? Now? I need you to pause for a
Speaker 1: second and think about what just came out of my mouth.
Speaker 1: Why does the president have to listen to the courts,
Speaker 1: Because it's the court's job to decide what is say
Speaker 1: it with me constitutional? So if the president decides he
Speaker 1: don't need to listen to the courts, and you saying
Speaker 1: I don't worry about birthfright citizenship because it's in the Constitution,
Speaker 1: I feel like, you know, paying attention, like you ain't
Speaker 1: been around for the past twenty sixteen and beyond. What
Speaker 1: I'm trying to say is this man is a different animal.
Speaker 1: But in your defense and for your information, we've been
Speaker 1: here before. Allow me to introduce you to Wong Kim Hart.
Speaker 1: I love this stuff, y'all. Now, before I could take
Speaker 1: you back to San Francisco in May of eighteen ninety six,
Speaker 1: before I could do that, I gotta take you back
Speaker 1: to something that I've taught y'all before, which was the
Speaker 1: dread Scott case, which is where we get the fourteenth Amendment.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be a lot of reviewing here because I'm
Speaker 1: still trying to teach y' all something. This is teacher
Speaker 1: prop you feel me, mister Petty, shout out all my
Speaker 1: old students that listen to this show. They grown now.
Speaker 1: But we've talked about how the Supreme Court works. But
Speaker 1: we also talked about specifically this dreg Scott case, and
Speaker 1: the dread Scot case was essentially a slave who got free.
Speaker 1: This was still this was during the separate but equal time.
Speaker 1: This was during the time that well, no, this is
Speaker 1: for separate equal What am I talking about? This is
Speaker 1: during slavery, right, So during this era when the country
Speaker 1: was growing and if a new state came in, for
Speaker 1: every free state there had to be a slave state.
Speaker 1: For every slave state, there had to be a free state.
Speaker 1: For some reason, we have not learned a lesson that
Speaker 1: you cannot play kate racist. Still we ain't learned that.
Speaker 1: But at the time, this is what was going on. Now, Remember,
Speaker 1: the argument, at least the front facing argument of the
Speaker 1: Confederate States, was that the states have rights and that
Speaker 1: the states rights should not be abridged by the federal rights.
Speaker 1: Don't we want a small federal government, y'all? Are just
Speaker 1: there to make sure the paperwork gets pushed through. But
Speaker 1: we carry the rights that we have, and in my rights,
Speaker 1: in my stated segregation now segregation forevil like they you know,
Speaker 1: they trying to keep the they way of life going
Speaker 1: without the encroachment of those city northerners. Right. Well, one
Speaker 1: of these brothers escaped, Dred Scott, and he escaped North. Now,
Speaker 1: when a slave escapes, the owner gets to hire a
Speaker 1: slave hunter, which eventually becomes the police that evolved through
Speaker 1: the police. I wish I was making this stuff up.
Speaker 1: But anyway, this brother gets to a free state. And again,
Speaker 1: since states have rights once you cross these borders, just
Speaker 1: like Mexico said, there's no slavery in Mexico. So if
Speaker 1: a slave gets to Mexico, look up the city of
Speaker 1: Vera Cruz. You know Richie Valens and bad bah Bah,
Speaker 1: go look up that area. Why is it so many
Speaker 1: black people there? Well, besides it being a part of
Speaker 1: the Transatlantic slave trade, if you got there, he was free.
Speaker 1: We've had centuries of solidarity, despite what people may think,
Speaker 1: or even what some of these young folks might say,
Speaker 1: there's been centuries of solidarity among us. Anyway, So Dred
Speaker 1: Scott got got up north, started a business, became a
Speaker 1: family because in the state that he's living, he's free.
Speaker 1: He's been able to dodge these slave hunters. But one
Speaker 1: day the slave hunter found him and was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you're our property. We got to go back. And the
Speaker 1: state he was in was like, what are you talking about.
Speaker 1: They're like, no, no, no, no, no, he escaped from our plantation.
Speaker 1: He is my property. They're like, the fuck he's not.
Speaker 1: This man ain't going nowhere. You whether they were anti
Speaker 1: racists or not, they was like, you don't get to
Speaker 1: tell me what to do in my house. Does that
Speaker 1: make sense. You've ever been in a situation where it's
Speaker 1: like it's not so much that I think you right
Speaker 1: or wrong. I just don't think you get to tell
Speaker 1: me what to do about it. This is what's happening.
Speaker 1: They was like, you don't get to tell us who's
Speaker 1: a citizen and who's not. We have rights, And the
Speaker 1: Southern state was like, we also have rights. I've been
Speaker 1: hired by a person to do a job. This person
Speaker 1: has not been freed. They are still legally the property
Speaker 1: of somebody, saying hold on, hold on, hold hold up,
Speaker 1: hold on, hold on, let me stop you right there, chief,
Speaker 1: that's according to your state. This man don't live in
Speaker 1: your state. A man run a business here, you got family,
Speaker 1: got you. This man live right there, we shop at
Speaker 1: his stove. He's a citizen of our state. It was like, no,
Speaker 1: he not, yes he is knowing not, yes, he is
Speaker 1: all the way to the Supreme Court. And like I
Speaker 1: told y'all before, it's a lot of times the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court is not really about the case itself. It's about
Speaker 1: the principle of the case. So the principalities the situation
Speaker 1: was who's state laws gets to trump who else's state law.
Speaker 1: At some reason, I don't know why these people did
Speaker 1: not think that this moment was coming, that one of
Speaker 1: these situations was gonna be like that where you have
Speaker 1: to decide between two states that have differing laws. Does
Speaker 1: that sound familiar to you? You ever heard of abortion?
Speaker 1: Are we not dealing with this right now? This is
Speaker 1: why we keep trying to say, Look, we need a
Speaker 1: federal law to calm all this stuff down. So this
Speaker 1: thing goes all the way to the Supreme Court. And
Speaker 1: it's not so much about dread Scott himself. It's about huh,
Speaker 1: whose laws trump who's? And wait, a minute. But is
Speaker 1: a citizen then, because if this person's a citizen, they
Speaker 1: are entitled to certain inalienable rights. I love I love history.
Speaker 1: So the Supreme Court had to be like, oh, I
Speaker 1: don't know, and remember I told you how the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court works. It's a whole gang of what ifs. So
Speaker 1: they shot a ton of one ifs. Who I got
Speaker 1: stuff all in my beer, y'all, ain't say nothing. It's soap.
Speaker 1: I promise I just showered because now I gotta do
Speaker 1: this stuff visually anyway. So they shot a whole lot
Speaker 1: of what ifs. All right, so what what if? This?
Speaker 1: What if this? And eventually the court decided, in typical
Speaker 1: American fashion, dred Scott's gotta go back, so we had
Speaker 1: to go back and be a slave again. So the
Speaker 1: Fourteenth Amendment, after the Civil War and reconstruction was designed
Speaker 1: to fix that, to say, this is absurd. Okay, if
Speaker 1: you are born here within the jurisdiction and territories of
Speaker 1: the United States, you are in fact a citizen. So
Speaker 1: if you are a citizen, you have zero right to
Speaker 1: enslave another citizen. Can we just like, can we what
Speaker 1: are we like? What are we even talking about? That's
Speaker 1: the deal. Now, this is the basis of the conversation
Speaker 1: that we're talking about. Now. Obviously, if you racist, that
Speaker 1: don't sit right with you. There's a part of you
Speaker 1: that feels like we know what we mean when we
Speaker 1: say American, an American citizen, and that feeling has not
Speaker 1: changed because it has traveled all the way through the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five presidential election. They know what they mean
Speaker 1: when they just like the same thing. They know what
Speaker 1: they mean when they say DEI. And it's funny watching
Speaker 1: people saying, oh, man, one hundred and fifty people on
Speaker 1: stage during Kendrick Lamar's performance and not a single white guy. Oh,
Speaker 1: you want diversity, equity and inclusion? Does that feel unfair
Speaker 1: to you. I've seen a picture of a Governor Abbott
Speaker 1: out of Texas in his wheelchair because apparently he hurt
Speaker 1: himself rolling into his office, and I'm like, I wonder
Speaker 1: if he used ramps that were installed because of diversity,
Speaker 1: equity and inclusion. But you know, it's the new hard
Speaker 1: art anyway. The dread Scott K says, this is the
Speaker 1: fourteenth Amendments. All persons born or naturalized in the United
Speaker 1: States and subject to its jurisdiction. There are thereof are
Speaker 1: citizens of the United States and of the state wherein
Speaker 1: they reside. One of those things where it's like, all right,
Speaker 1: clearly we have to stay this. So now we're saying it.
Speaker 1: But that's not what I want to talk about today.
Speaker 1: That's just that's your precursor. You feel me, that's your prequel.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about Wong kim arc after this.
Speaker 1: All right, we're back. So wonkim arc a brother from
Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds, clearly Chinese, born in San Francisco. As
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, we had an address, and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tell you where the address is a little later.
Speaker 1: But why is he so special? Well, let me talk
Speaker 1: to you about him. So Wankim Park was, like I said,
Speaker 1: born in San Francisco. But he became the subject of
Speaker 1: what's called a test case in eighteen ninety six. What
Speaker 1: is this test case? It's a test case about the
Speaker 1: fourteenth Amendment. Now, have you ever been the test case
Speaker 1: of something? It really don't feel good. You ever been
Speaker 1: in a situation where a bunch of y'all have done
Speaker 1: a bunch of things, but you're the one that gotten
Speaker 1: So they just want to see you feel me, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just that that's awful. I've been the test case
Speaker 1: a few times where it's like, well, let me just
Speaker 1: let me see how serious we are about this a
Speaker 1: test case, right, And a lot of times it's the
Speaker 1: luck of the draw because you have to again remember
Speaker 1: that the Supreme Court is not dealing in their brain.
Speaker 1: It's not humans we talk about. We're talking about abstract
Speaker 1: concepts of the laws. So the persons involved in these
Speaker 1: things really are besides the point to them, which is
Speaker 1: why they seem so heartless. But if you can find
Speaker 1: a Supreme Court justice that understands the humanity of it all,
Speaker 1: you win it. Anyway, I'm gonna tell you his whole narrative,
Speaker 1: but I'm gonna cut to the beginning of the scene
Speaker 1: because I think the scenes the movie should start with
Speaker 1: this moment. It's been a three month journey, no yeah,
Speaker 1: three months, yeah, no, no no, It takes about a month
Speaker 1: a month journey coming back from China. This brother is
Speaker 1: a cook. He got it out the mud. He was
Speaker 1: back in China visiting his parents and his newly found wife.
Speaker 1: And like every every immigrant story, you know, you you
Speaker 1: grind away, you know, you send money back. You know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Try to support the family, try to
Speaker 1: support yourself, to try to make trying to make ends meet.
Speaker 1: Get your weight up, get your lady here, have a
Speaker 1: great life, right She his wife is from China, which
Speaker 1: I'll talk about later. But he again was born in
Speaker 1: San Francisco, but he was going back and forth, so
Speaker 1: obviously he speaks the language, he understands the culture. He's
Speaker 1: doing a cancer and because he lives in Chinatown, a
Speaker 1: lot of his cultural sort of presentation, it's Chinese because
Speaker 1: of segregation. I'll talk about later. And while he was gone,
Speaker 1: something crazy happened in America, but he don't know that yet.
Speaker 1: He gets to the port, pulls out his papers and
Speaker 1: he's like, all right, what's up y'all doing. I'm glad
Speaker 1: to be back. I've been gone for a while. I'm
Speaker 1: glad to be here. They was like, hold up, cuz
Speaker 1: where you going? And he was like, I'm going home.
Speaker 1: They was like, uh, are you a sit He's like,
Speaker 1: what the hell you talking about? Pulls out his papers, right,
Speaker 1: So he pulls out his papers and get this. About
Speaker 1: the papers, he kind of knew this was coming because
Speaker 1: you gotta go get it all notary republic, you know,
Speaker 1: to prove that you are who you say you are.
Speaker 1: So just like a leftover from slavery, about three slaves
Speaker 1: had to show them them papers. Basically, if anybody that
Speaker 1: don't look American, wink wink, you need to carry papers.
Speaker 1: So he carrying papers, and those papers have to be
Speaker 1: certified by get this, three white witnesses, because that'll stand
Speaker 1: up in the court of law. That'll prove that he
Speaker 1: was born where he said, Yes, I grew up with homeboy.
Speaker 1: I've seen him over there. You know here it is,
Speaker 1: I'm from here. But what was happening in the team
Speaker 1: the time that he left to go see his girl
Speaker 1: and came back with something called the Chinese Exclusion Act. Now,
Speaker 1: let me put you on some game. If you don't
Speaker 1: know what the Chinese Exclusion Act is, I'm gonna read
Speaker 1: from the National Archives. The Chinese Exclusion Act was approved
Speaker 1: on May sixth, eighteen eighty two. It was the first
Speaker 1: significant law restricting immigration into the United States. In the
Speaker 1: spring of eighteen eighty two, the Chinese Exclusion Act was
Speaker 1: passed by Congress and signed by President Chester A. Arthur
Speaker 1: Have you even heard of that? President? The act provided
Speaker 1: watch this an absolute ten year ban on Chinese laborers
Speaker 1: immigrating into the United States. For the first time, federal
Speaker 1: law prescribed entry of an ethnic working group on the
Speaker 1: premise that it endangered the good order of certain localities.
Speaker 1: This happened while he was gone. The government decided, let
Speaker 1: me tell you what's wrong wal racism. Back it up
Speaker 1: a little bit, because a few decades ago, y'all was
Speaker 1: loving the Chinese coming. Now why was they loving the
Speaker 1: Chinese coming? As we know, the Chinese were the people
Speaker 1: that ended up building our railroad, syst doing a lot
Speaker 1: of the hard work, opening up our laundries. They did
Speaker 1: all that good stuff. Now why you think that happened? Nigga?
Speaker 1: They freed the niggers because, well, we can't make the
Speaker 1: niggers work, so we gotta find somebody else to work.
Speaker 1: It seemed to me like what I'm learning is because
Speaker 1: after this happened, Now, does this sound familiar to you?
Speaker 1: Because who're doing our work now? The Mexicans. Right, It
Speaker 1: seemed to me like Americans just don't like to work,
Speaker 1: Like y'all, Just why you keep bringing other people to
Speaker 1: do the work and then complaining you ain't got no
Speaker 1: work because what happened. What had happened was America decided, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's too many of y'all. It's too many of y'all.
Speaker 1: Like I it's all like look at it, y'all gotta go,
Speaker 1: and don't be bringing no mo. Doug like, don't don't
Speaker 1: be bringing no mo Chinese. Chinese. My grandma used to
Speaker 1: say that. She used to say Chinese. I'll be like, Grandma,
Speaker 1: you can't. I mean she oh this heid obviously, but
Speaker 1: she was like, yes, I'm gonna go get Chinese food. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm like Grandma, She'd like what she give you that look?
Speaker 1: And I'm like I can't correct her. Anyway, this happened
Speaker 1: while he was gone, So they looking at him like
Speaker 1: are you a laborer? He's like, yeah, I'm a laborer,
Speaker 1: but I'm a citizen. They was like, I don't know
Speaker 1: about that. Chief, wait right here. So he sat there
Speaker 1: and waited. Now, even though he had the paperwork, that
Speaker 1: basically is like, yo, who's man? Is this your boy? Hey?
Speaker 1: Who know? Cuz they have to ask white people, Hey
Speaker 1: do you know cus this is ridiculous, But this was
Speaker 1: our laws people. They was like, we don't know if
Speaker 1: you're a citizen he like, I got the white boys
Speaker 1: to proprove it. I live I can see my house.
Speaker 1: I live right there. And not only do I live
Speaker 1: right there, fam I was born right there. I have
Speaker 1: never moved. I've never applied for no citizenship nowhere else.
Speaker 1: There's no confusion on no paperwork. My wife is still
Speaker 1: in China. I like, I don't understand what the problem is.
Speaker 1: I say this to say, just because some'm in the constitution,
Speaker 1: don't think for one second that you really protected if
Speaker 1: you got a little Meloni is all I'm trying to say.
Speaker 1: This is why I'm bringing this up. We have been
Speaker 1: here before, the challenge of birthright citizenships. Now in this moment,
Speaker 1: this thing goes all the way to the Supreme Court. Now,
Speaker 1: why they picked this is because they're like, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: we need to we need to stress test this law.
Speaker 1: And like I said, the way the Supreme Court works,
Speaker 1: when there is something on the books, you need to
Speaker 1: make sure I'm gonna stretch this as far and as
Speaker 1: absurdly as I possibly can, because I'll need to see
Speaker 1: where it breaks. I need to see the edges. Now, Conceptually,
Speaker 1: like I said, this is actually a great practice because
Speaker 1: that's how you know, if a law is written well
Speaker 1: or is good is once you start throwing absurdities at it,
Speaker 1: if it still stands, if you could take it, then
Speaker 1: it's good. It's the same with people and rappers. Some
Speaker 1: rappers can't take the heat. They get on stage with
Speaker 1: fake bullet holes coming out their shirts. Oh man. So
Speaker 1: the Chinese Exclusion Act was like, look, man, you can't
Speaker 1: come if you're a laborer. He's like, Nigga, I was
Speaker 1: born here. They was like, you don't look like you
Speaker 1: was born here. You look like a Chinese. You talk
Speaker 1: like a Chinese, to which he could probably be like,
Speaker 1: I'm from Chinatown, But what the hell difference does that
Speaker 1: have make? I'm born right there? Like, and when I
Speaker 1: say right there, I mean literally seven fifty one Sacramento
Speaker 1: Street in Chinatown. You can go now, it's a little school. Now.
Speaker 1: It's a little school now, but it's there's a plat like,
Speaker 1: it's right, you can go to it. I'm born right here. Now.
Speaker 1: These are not the only laws that existed at this
Speaker 1: time that were designed to make sure that nobody else
Speaker 1: succeeds but white people. There was the Page Act, which
Speaker 1: barred Chinese win except for the wives of merchants from
Speaker 1: entering the United States, which is why this man's wife
Speaker 1: was still in China, so he can't even bring her here. Right.
Speaker 1: There's also the Geary Act, which required all Chinese immigrants
Speaker 1: to constantly walk with identification papers kind of like breed slaves,
Speaker 1: kind of like immigrants and green cards. There is any
Speaker 1: of this sounding familiar to you, So anyway, let me
Speaker 1: give you a little more background of him, right, So
Speaker 1: that's where the camera starts right here, right, So here's
Speaker 1: some background. So again, as he says, he was born
Speaker 1: on like the living room floor in what is now
Speaker 1: a school, but it used to be like a little
Speaker 1: store with an apartment on top of it, a store
Speaker 1: that his parents ran, right, seven to fifty one, Sacramento
Speaker 1: a f right, So so he was born there and
Speaker 1: just like that, like if your parents come from another country,
Speaker 1: every once in a while, y'all go back, right, So
Speaker 1: he goes back one time when he was a his
Speaker 1: parents go back and they decide to stay. So then
Speaker 1: he comes back because again, can't stress this enough, he's
Speaker 1: an American. So he comes back to SF again, lived here,
Speaker 1: worked for his uncle. You know, al Vanas did what
Speaker 1: he had to do. He worked there did He had
Speaker 1: to do it till he was about twenty, in which
Speaker 1: case he was getting a little lonely. He needed him
Speaker 1: a trying to find him a lady. Friend. Now, because
Speaker 1: of anti missigenation laws. You ever heard that word. It's
Speaker 1: because it used to be illegal to marry outside joe race.
Speaker 1: So because of anti misigenation laws. And you think this
Speaker 1: is just the eighteen hundreds, let me tell you something.
Speaker 1: It's only been the past sixty years, seventy years now.
Speaker 1: It's very recent the way I like to think of
Speaker 1: it as like this. You know, Michael Jordan when he
Speaker 1: was in kindergarten, he couldn't marry a white lady anyway,
Speaker 1: since race mixing was illegal, and because Chinese women wasn't
Speaker 1: even allowed to come. It just wasn't a lot of
Speaker 1: Chinese girls here. Those are his only choices. It's slim pickings.
Speaker 1: So he has to cross the salt, you know, the ocean,
Speaker 1: another one month travel, which I honestly cannot imagine. I
Speaker 1: don't think I go anywhere. Took a month to get there.
Speaker 1: I'm good anyway, finds a lady since she can't come
Speaker 1: because he's not a merchant, you know, he has to
Speaker 1: go back and forth sending money doing these You know,
Speaker 1: it's a hard life. I don't know if you know
Speaker 1: any immigrants, it's really a hard life. My own in
Speaker 1: laws like the choices that my mother in law, my
Speaker 1: swaged I had to make in reference to her own children.
Speaker 1: You know, my wife was It's in her book, So
Speaker 1: I don't feel bad about saying this. But you know,
Speaker 1: she was born here literally Boyle Heights, you know, and
Speaker 1: then lived in Mexico and Acapoco till about fourth grade,
Speaker 1: and then one by one, her mom so for a
Speaker 1: long time she didn't live with her siblings. You know,
Speaker 1: she the siblings came one by one right back to
Speaker 1: America as her mom can afford it. She lived with her,
Speaker 1: like she lived with her grandma in Mexico, and then
Speaker 1: one by one her mom was able to bring her
Speaker 1: and like, I just don't know. I honestly, I know
Speaker 1: I don't have a fortitude for that, to send my
Speaker 1: kids to go live. Nah, I'm good unless the situation
Speaker 1: back home is that desperate you feel me that, I'm like,
Speaker 1: I have to get my kids out of this life.
Speaker 1: I've been to where my wife's from. Now I'm going
Speaker 1: as someone who is from a fully developed first world country,
Speaker 1: even though I'm black. So there's that. But I'm looking
Speaker 1: at this place like this is a tropical paradise. It's
Speaker 1: southern Mexico. It's right at the coast of Chica. Like
Speaker 1: it's freaking beautiful. Acapulco is be uta ful. But as
Speaker 1: you go, as you're there, you realize what is her
Speaker 1: best options If she stays here, run a grocery store,
Speaker 1: hold a have a cart on the beach, sell the tourist,
Speaker 1: like there's there's unless you're gonna go be one of
Speaker 1: your ancestors and exists in the forest. There's really no
Speaker 1: what do you I get it. You're like, there's nothing here,
Speaker 1: there's nothing, like we've maxed out, there's nothing here. I
Speaker 1: don't want my kids to do what I did, which
Speaker 1: was nothing. Let's roll now. I don't mean that derogatory
Speaker 1: because she had one of her uncles that was a doctor,
Speaker 1: Like there are It's not like it's not like you
Speaker 1: couldn't go to college and you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: but just the chances, the opportunities. I get it. Now,
Speaker 1: it's like, y'all, we gotta we gotta go and It's like,
Speaker 1: it's just my sister's there, so I'm going to go
Speaker 1: get it out the mud and bring my children here.
Speaker 1: You know, it's an amazing thing. My father in law,
Speaker 1: like he was selling little fruits in downtown, you know,
Speaker 1: Mexico City, little fruit cups, and as an eighth grader,
Speaker 1: fam this can't be it, Joe said, I get it,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So anyway, he's send him
Speaker 1: back and forth, you know, making money, figuring it out,
Speaker 1: doing he got to do, going back and forth, seeing
Speaker 1: his lady come back. Because again, I don't know how
Speaker 1: else to say this, he's not a Chinese citizen. He's
Speaker 1: an American. He can't stay in China. He's an American.
Speaker 1: So this was his life. So he gets there. This
Speaker 1: situation tells me who he is. He's sitting there and
Speaker 1: basically the answer was this. Now, if this ain't Dajavu,
Speaker 1: I don't know what is the basic argument as to
Speaker 1: why they won't let this man off this boat and
Speaker 1: he got to stay in this limbo is if your
Speaker 1: parents are not citizens, even if you were born in
Speaker 1: the US, you are not a citizen of the United States,
Speaker 1: and you are barred from entry or deported from the
Speaker 1: United States, does this This is the eighteen nineties. This
Speaker 1: is the eighteen nineties. So let me tell you what
Speaker 1: happened after that. Next so we're back. So what's the situation.
Speaker 1: The man is just stuck on this boat. There ain't
Speaker 1: nothing he could do, right, he just he's just a
Speaker 1: he's just a cook, like he's not breaded up. But
Speaker 1: here's what happens. The word gets out because again I
Speaker 1: don't know how else to say this, it's from San Francisco.
Speaker 1: People were expecting him. So there's an entire community that
Speaker 1: is waiting to see their homeboy. I just why. I
Speaker 1: don't understand what y'all don't understand about this. And one
Speaker 1: thing that segregationists do not understand is that when you
Speaker 1: force us to live together, we form bonds, we form solidarity,
Speaker 1: We learn to look out for each other. There's one
Speaker 1: thing that I would say that I in some ways
Speaker 1: envy an experience my parents had. Now, obviously the situation
Speaker 1: is much different, but my father went to an all
Speaker 1: black high school. So with that, there is a certain
Speaker 1: type of solidarity among your community that while I am
Speaker 1: completely grateful, unbelievably grateful for the multicultural raising I've had.
Speaker 1: I feel like it's made me a global citizen in
Speaker 1: a way that a lot of people don't have. Stratification,
Speaker 1: the full experience of what it means to have a
Speaker 1: community that loves you and has shared your experience is
Speaker 1: something that I don't have. Because if you go to
Speaker 1: a black school, that means you got a black principal,
Speaker 1: you got black teachers, the janitor, the mayor, everybody in
Speaker 1: your experience from every socio economics stratus is black. You seeing,
Speaker 1: you have full representation. You are seeing your world on display, educated, uneducated,
Speaker 1: right worker, white collar, blue collar. You're seeing it all
Speaker 1: because you live. We were forced to do this right. Obviously,
Speaker 1: the situation is awful, but that meant that, Like, although
Speaker 1: I can remember moments where I'm like, oh yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: Ms Rose down the street, braid of my sister's hair,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, You have a bunch of
Speaker 1: different parents. So the guy that runs the corner store,
Speaker 1: mister Johnson, when I see Missy, how you doing, mister Johnson?
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, Like, there's a community that
Speaker 1: comes with and he understands what it's like to be
Speaker 1: a little black boy. My mother, my father. They had that.
Speaker 1: Now I had it in my own way, but it
Speaker 1: was like black and Latin, you know. Either way. The
Speaker 1: point I'm trying to make is when what segregation is
Speaker 1: still don't get is that this is how we organize
Speaker 1: against your system. Because organized they did. Think you think
Speaker 1: they just gonna lead a homeboy on that vote. You
Speaker 1: think he don't know nobody with power. So the word
Speaker 1: gets out and six wealthy Chinese companies are like, oh no,
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna fight for you. They pulled their
Speaker 1: money together and they got him a case and they
Speaker 1: took it to the courts. They was like, this man's
Speaker 1: a citizen. Now, why would they do that? Because when
Speaker 1: you live in solidarity and when you live with each other,
Speaker 1: you understand that if it could happen to him, it
Speaker 1: could happen to us, which is I'm hold my tongue here.
Speaker 1: I just don't understand how anyone could vote against the
Speaker 1: best interests of their entire community in exchange for their
Speaker 1: own goodness. I just I don't get it, because again,
Speaker 1: if it can happen to them, it could happen to you.
Speaker 1: And on top of that, fuck y'all. That's my own boy.
Speaker 1: That's my dog. I don't even care if he's wrong.
Speaker 1: He with us? Who man's with this? He with us?
Speaker 1: You got a problem with it? I got the bread
Speaker 1: some of that's some street stuff too, Like y'all following me.
Speaker 1: Man Like, even if my little homy mouth full, like
Speaker 1: I said, you don't get to tell me what to do.
Speaker 1: It's the same prime even if he wrong, y'all don't
Speaker 1: get to say it. And look, I got the education,
Speaker 1: I got the bread. You ain't finna look at I'm
Speaker 1: off this boat. I don't care how bad. I don't
Speaker 1: care how bad my accent is either. That's what I
Speaker 1: love about this moment. These are wealthy Chinese people, so
Speaker 1: they probably speak with a heavy accident. But that man,
Speaker 1: that's just working the borders. You just pole, little white boy.
Speaker 1: So you may't have these things you saying about them,
Speaker 1: But these men is like, listen, he can't go all right.
Speaker 1: Bet so he posts a two hundred fifty dollars bill,
Speaker 1: which clearly didn't have and they thought at that time
Speaker 1: that's like two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Them ridged
Speaker 1: Chinese folks, was like, you need a check. I love
Speaker 1: it I love it. So this mug goes to the courts,
Speaker 1: goes all the way to the Supreme Court, and guess
Speaker 1: what happens. I ain't gonna tell you. I'm just kidding,
Speaker 1: of course, I'm gonna tell you. So we in the courts,
Speaker 1: and he fought it based on the Fourteenth Amendment. Because
Speaker 1: you just said, according to you, would you like me
Speaker 1: to scroll up on my notes, you could see me
Speaker 1: scroll up on my notes to read to you the
Speaker 1: fourteenth Amendment again, I'm gonna do that for you. The
Speaker 1: Fourteenth Amendment all persons born and naturalized in the United
Speaker 1: States and subject to its jurisdiction thereof is, citizens of
Speaker 1: the United States and the state for which they reside. Fool,
Speaker 1: that's your law. That's what they fought on. I don't
Speaker 1: understand what you're talking about. Where was this man born
Speaker 1: in San Francisco? What is your argument? What are we
Speaker 1: talking about here? Did he win? I don't know. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tell you in a minute. But the court went crazy.
Speaker 1: It lasted for a while, There was many appeals, which
Speaker 1: is the okay, that's the reveal. He won, But he
Speaker 1: didn't get to get off the boat yet. The only
Speaker 1: reason he was off. The boat was because he made bail.
Speaker 1: But case wasn't over because for some reason about white people,
Speaker 1: especially white races, they don't take too well for losing.
Speaker 1: I feel like they still why is Obama still get
Speaker 1: brought up because they still mad that a nigger was
Speaker 1: in the office. Like, I don't understand why y'all still
Speaker 1: talk about that man, that man with zero scandals, a
Speaker 1: husband or one wife, with extremely successful children. What is
Speaker 1: your problem with him? I think we know? So how
Speaker 1: could the courts have any leg to stand on to
Speaker 1: say that this man's born here, he's not a citizen.
Speaker 1: How could that make sense in any way all the
Speaker 1: way to the Supreme Court? And why would the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court take this case? It's because they have a chance
Speaker 1: to be like again, Okay, now, actually this is interesting.
Speaker 1: Your argument is, well, his parents aren't born here, so
Speaker 1: he's not Okay, we got time talk to me nice now.
Speaker 1: None of this mattered until white people got involved. As
Speaker 1: far as at the k of course, the court level
Speaker 1: right and what the argument against him went like this,
Speaker 1: The fourteenth Amendment has some caveats, and the caveat one
Speaker 1: is about Native Americans. Obviously, because none of this can
Speaker 1: count towards them. They're clearly here, you were here before us, right,
Speaker 1: But it kind of works like this, this where the
Speaker 1: race has got to dance. Actually in the brief, this
Speaker 1: is from the brief that like the fourteenth Amendment argues
Speaker 1: guarantees the citizens to all of those born in the
Speaker 1: United States. But it's got an asterisk. It's got a caveat, right,
Speaker 1: and the caveat is those who are born in the
Speaker 1: United States who are subject to it. It's jurisdiction, born
Speaker 1: here and subject to its jurisdiction. Well, what he's saying
Speaker 1: is jurisdiction can be two types. Your authority what like,
Speaker 1: who do you who is your og of? What range
Speaker 1: do you exist on? Let me talk to y'all. Let
Speaker 1: me talk to y'all LA folk about Pomona's Pomona in
Speaker 1: La or the Inland Empire? What jurisdiction where you're like, Well,
Speaker 1: it's La County. It's the last city in La County.
Speaker 1: No Claremont. Is is it l A or is it
Speaker 1: i E? Well it's the nine on nine. Well, the
Speaker 1: nine on nine is the IE. What's what's what is
Speaker 1: it subject to its jurisdiction? What is its culture? It's
Speaker 1: culture is very LA. But then again, so is Ontario.
Speaker 1: But Ontario is the ie. Nobody questions if Ontario is
Speaker 1: the I E. What is jurisdiction territorial and political? Let
Speaker 1: me translate this for you. You was born in La,
Speaker 1: but you act on New Yorky you real easty. Well
Speaker 1: that's because you was born here, but your mama from
Speaker 1: the Bronx, so you talk like yo mama. Or you
Speaker 1: was born here, but you packed up and moved to
Speaker 1: New York, so you got a real easty year son.
Speaker 1: You walk around here at Thames, we like LA won't
Speaker 1: wear tams oh Man. I was raised in New York
Speaker 1: and I'm like, so, then you not from La. He's like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm from La. Nigga, know you not? You are not
Speaker 1: subject to its territorial and political jurisdiction. You chose Drake
Speaker 1: my nigga. You ain't from no La. How you from La.
Speaker 1: You ain't being below the ten. You are not subject
Speaker 1: to its jurisdiction. So their argument is these people, his
Speaker 1: family and in turn him, clearly are subject to the
Speaker 1: jurisdiction of the Chinese emperor. This man is culturally Chinese,
Speaker 1: he dressed like it. He sound like you look like
Speaker 1: a Chinese. So no matter where he was born, he
Speaker 1: is not also subject to our jurisdiction. He is politically
Speaker 1: and culturally Chinese. Therefore he is Chinese. So we can't
Speaker 1: so yeah, like he I can't call him a citizen
Speaker 1: according to the fourtheen Amendment because the fourteenth Amendment has
Speaker 1: a caveat. So what is he saying? You know what
Speaker 1: he's saying? He don't act white. You don't act white.
Speaker 1: You don't act like us. You know, you ain't never
Speaker 1: crip walked, You ain't never you you ain't like us,
Speaker 1: you got accent. Therefore you can't possibly be Is this
Speaker 1: sundy familiar? He is subject to the jurisdiction and the
Speaker 1: territorial allegiance to the Chinese. Therefore he cannot possibly be
Speaker 1: an American. We obviously don't own a time machine and
Speaker 1: have not. This is an interesting part. We can't move
Speaker 1: back in time and prove that he was not born
Speaker 1: here because, like I said, three white people agreed that
Speaker 1: he was born here. So I can't argue that one.
Speaker 1: But I can argue he's not subject to our jurisdiction.
Speaker 1: And now it was Wong's lawyer's terms. And do you
Speaker 1: know what they said in defense when it translated to you,
Speaker 1: for you who are not watching but are listening, I
Speaker 1: just put my hand, you know, when you put your finger.
Speaker 1: You know when when your significant other is obviously lying
Speaker 1: and you just want to hear the rest of the story,
Speaker 1: so you put your finger. You know, you kind of
Speaker 1: got a ball fist with a thumb up under your
Speaker 1: chin and your finger on the side, and you're just
Speaker 1: looking at him, just about like trying to figure out
Speaker 1: if this person knows how dumb they sound like if
Speaker 1: you and you're just like, I can't believe you said
Speaker 1: that with a straight face. You are dead serious, ain't you?
Speaker 1: Their defense? Was this the dumbest shit ever heard in
Speaker 1: my life? Is their defense? What are you talking about?
Speaker 1: We went through this with the black codes when y'all
Speaker 1: said a person can't vote unless they grandparents could vote.
Speaker 1: Do you think the States did the course didn't understand
Speaker 1: what you were saying. This is ridiculous. And furthermore, they said,
Speaker 1: do you know how many Europeans got here? Hell, we
Speaker 1: haven't even got to the future of the Homestead Act,
Speaker 1: which brought a bunch of Europeans here to fill out
Speaker 1: the West. I've already did an episode on a Homestead
Speaker 1: Act when the government was giving handouts to poor white people.
Speaker 1: Government and handouts so that they could build wealth. I'm
Speaker 1: telling you, I can't make this shit up. So if
Speaker 1: this is the case, if the sons and daughters of
Speaker 1: Chinese citizens are not citizens, what of the sons and
Speaker 1: daughters of the English, the Irish, the Germans, the French,
Speaker 1: the people have come to the United States. If he
Speaker 1: ain't a citizen, they ain't a citizen. If that man
Speaker 1: ain't a citizen according to your laws, George Washington, ain't
Speaker 1: a citizen. What the hell are you talking about? And
Speaker 1: let me ask you this. Let me ask you this.
Speaker 1: Do it start with your mama? Okay, So if my
Speaker 1: parents weren't citizens, then that means I'm not okay. What
Speaker 1: about my grandparents? Well, if my grandparents weren't citizens, then
Speaker 1: that would mean that my parents ain't citizens, which would
Speaker 1: mean that even though they was born here, I'm not
Speaker 1: a citizen. Now check this out. What if it was
Speaker 1: my great grandparents, what are immigrants? Then that would mean
Speaker 1: to them two non citizens gave a birth to a
Speaker 1: non citizen, who gave birth to a non citizen who
Speaker 1: gave birth to me? What are you talking about? That
Speaker 1: means that no one's a citizen? Dumbass was the argument
Speaker 1: that Chinese made. The fuck are you talking about? Well,
Speaker 1: if you got here illegally and you're a child, your
Speaker 1: parents got here illegally and they gave birth and neither
Speaker 1: of you are citizens, what the okay? Then I need
Speaker 1: you to dig up every relative, every ancestory you had.
Speaker 1: I need you. And if you find a single person,
Speaker 1: then that means that all of the descendants ain't citizens either.
Speaker 1: You gonna go You're gonna do that? How many people
Speaker 1: getting how many people getting deported? Do you not gonna
Speaker 1: do that? Have a tall glass of horse shot? The
Speaker 1: fuck up, oh man, And guess what the court said, touche,
Speaker 1: you are absolutely correct, and birthright citizenship stood that stress test.
Speaker 1: Now that was eighteen ninety six. Now, that pole man,
Speaker 1: that poor man Wan kim Ark was on that boat
Speaker 1: for four months till he was finally able to just
Speaker 1: go back home. And what did he go back home? To? Poverty?
Speaker 1: His wife still in China. And I don't know enough
Speaker 1: of the story to know if he continued to go
Speaker 1: visit his wife, because like most immigrants, be scared to
Speaker 1: leave because apparently the system hasn't figured out who's protected
Speaker 1: and who's not. So yeah, Trump's talking about birthright citizenship
Speaker 1: right now. We've been here before, and praise the Lord
Speaker 1: God Almighty, Hallelujah, the highest praise Shondo it worked or
Speaker 1: we stood the stress test. I just don't know if
Speaker 1: we're gonna stand it again. Betch I'm from the land.
Speaker 1: Don't say you hey la if you ain't been below
Speaker 1: the ten all right now, don't you hit stop on
Speaker 1: this pod. You better listen to these credits. I need
Speaker 1: you to finish this thing so I can get the
Speaker 1: download numbers. Okay, so don't stop it yet, but listen.
Speaker 1: This was recorded in e slows Boil Heights by your
Speaker 1: boy Propaganda Tap in with me at prop hip hop
Speaker 1: dot com. If you're in the Coldbrew coffee we got
Speaker 1: terraform Coldbrew. You can go there dot com and use
Speaker 1: promo code hood get twenty percent off get yourself some coffee.
Speaker 1: This was mixed, edited, and mastered by your boy Matt
Speaker 1: Alsowski killing the beat softly. Check out his website Matdowsowski
Speaker 1: dot com. I'm a speller for you because I know
Speaker 1: m a t t O s O W s Ki
Speaker 1: dot com Matthowsowski dot com. He got more music and
Speaker 1: stuff like that on there, so gonna check out. The
Speaker 1: Heat Politics is a member of cool Zone Media, Executive
Speaker 1: produced by Sophie Lichterman, part of the iHeartMedia podcast network.
Speaker 1: Your theme music and scoring is also by the one
Speaker 1: and overly Mattowsowski. Still killing the beat softly, so listen.
Speaker 1: Don't let nobody lie to you. If you understand urban living,
Speaker 1: you understand pop po ittics. These people is not smarter
Speaker 1: than you. We'll see y'all next week. M