Speaker 1: This week marks two years since the deadly insurrection on
Speaker 1: January Ray six, and last week, as the commission into
Speaker 1: the events of how that day unfolded came to a close,
Speaker 1: I was joined by Miles Gray of the podcast Daily
Speaker 1: Zychides to explore how in the lead up to January six,
Speaker 1: Trump and his allies weaponized the identities of two black
Speaker 1: women election workers, Shaye and Ruby Freeman, in an attempt
Speaker 1: to steal the election. Here's part two of that conversation,
Speaker 1: where we do a deep dive into the Trump allies
Speaker 1: who were doing his dirty work and what it means
Speaker 1: for all of us. Let's talk a bit about some
Speaker 1: of the people who were organizing this horrible campaign against
Speaker 1: these women. It's already your mixed bag of like Trump crenies.
Speaker 1: You've probably heard of, you know, Trump, Rudy Giuliani, these
Speaker 1: media companies. But there are a couple of other folks
Speaker 1: that I feel like I want to talk about. So
Speaker 1: one is this woman, Trevanni Coutie. Shaye and Ruby Freeman
Speaker 1: were also being harassed and threatened by Trevanni Coutie. Travanni
Speaker 1: was formally a publicist for R and B singer Slash
Speaker 1: convicted sex criminal. R Kelly is like a complete Google
Speaker 1: contin complete Google. Is it? Is it trevy on or Trevanni?
Speaker 1: I think I don't how how have y'all said it?
Speaker 1: I've heard, I've heard it the way that you were
Speaker 1: pronouncing it. But I'm just like, because when I Google it,
Speaker 1: everything comes up as t R like the way you
Speaker 1: spelled it. Okay, but I also have I got I
Speaker 1: got the mild dyslexia too, And I'm like and I
Speaker 1: but also I don't really care. I love I love
Speaker 1: the cool zone media. That's the cool zone media. That's
Speaker 1: a cool zone media. Way were like, are they? Are
Speaker 1: they an awful human being? I don't care. How do
Speaker 1: you pronounce your dad? Yeah, if you're a bastard, you
Speaker 1: don't get proper pronunciation. And that's just what we do here.
Speaker 1: We're like, sorry, I'm not sorry. I'm curious. Has she Sophie?
Speaker 1: Has she come up in an other reporting that y'all done? Um,
Speaker 1: just like a little bit when we were talking about
Speaker 1: some of the Kanye stuff, but not really not much. Um,
Speaker 1: not a big enough player to come up in and
Speaker 1: get like her own episode. So her relationship with Kanye
Speaker 1: West is pretty weird to me. Um, folks, it's like
Speaker 1: I don't fully get it. Um, she was some kind
Speaker 1: of an associate of Kanye West at some point. That's
Speaker 1: like a documented thing. Um. According to NBC News, a
Speaker 1: biography of her posted to a website for the website
Speaker 1: of Women's Global Initiative, a business networking group, identified her
Speaker 1: as a member of the Young Black Leadership Council under
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, and that noted that in she was quote
Speaker 1: secured as a publicist to Kanye West and now serves
Speaker 1: as west Director of Operation. So somewhere, some somewhere down
Speaker 1: the line, she did have that in her bio, but
Speaker 1: Kanye's camp says that she is not associated with him,
Speaker 1: and so it's just like one of those things where
Speaker 1: it's like, well, who was telling the truth? Like that
Speaker 1: was in her bio. Kanye's camp says that they have
Speaker 1: no s a station. So funny because people like you
Speaker 1: were thinking Kanye if he had somebody that was willing
Speaker 1: to claim him right now, he would be like okay.
Speaker 1: But even even she's like whoa whoa, whoa who not her,
Speaker 1: which says she's still posting picture like she I went
Speaker 1: to her Instagram earlier today and she's still posting pictures
Speaker 1: like cartoons of Kanye West as president. So I think
Speaker 1: I think if he would have her, she would maybe
Speaker 1: this might this might end with like a rekindling of
Speaker 1: their scammy partnership. I like, I like immediately going to
Speaker 1: see her instagram is wild if you want to, if
Speaker 1: you want to, like look at someone's Instagram and you're like, wow,
Speaker 1: you're just like kind of a wild person. Uh, she
Speaker 1: recommended voice. That's what her That's what her bio says, Miles.
Speaker 1: Her bio says, the majority's voice, political sharp shooter, political
Speaker 1: sharp shooter. Okay, manipulator with the evil eye. Om o
Speaker 1: g okay, okay. So she's like a bastard and proud.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, oh man, I don't Yeah, this is
Speaker 1: oh no, I know. This is like I know people
Speaker 1: who have instagrams that look like this, me too, and yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm like no, I'm like, yo, you see a homeboy
Speaker 1: from high schools Instagram? I'm like yeah. But the one
Speaker 1: where he said that Mike Vick was actually herschel walker
Speaker 1: in disguise. People there are people post their oh my god,
Speaker 1: I can't even imagine what's in her draft, Like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, you're so right, like, no, you don't have
Speaker 1: drafts when you're like this kidding me straight? Come on now,
Speaker 1: you're just like to post. Yeah. I was like, how
Speaker 1: does she directly relate to what we're talking about besides
Speaker 1: being terrified? Okay? So, in any event, she showed up
Speaker 1: at Shaye and Ruby's store, and the way men understandably
Speaker 1: called the police and they all end up going to
Speaker 1: the police station together to talk. She tells them that
Speaker 1: she is visiting at the direction of a quote high
Speaker 1: profile individual who had warned her that if if Shay
Speaker 1: and Ruby did not confess to these voter fraud allegations,
Speaker 1: they would be arrested in forty eight hours. This is
Speaker 1: where it gets a little bit weird. According to Rolling Stone,
Speaker 1: the police body cam footage of this conversation shows her
Speaker 1: telling the women, I cannot say specifically what will take place.
Speaker 1: I just know it will disrupt your freedom and the
Speaker 1: freedom of one or more of your family members. You
Speaker 1: are a loose end for a party that needs to
Speaker 1: tidy up. Um, So like pretty weird thing to say
Speaker 1: to somebody. She then calls a man called Harrison Floyd
Speaker 1: on speaker phone, who says that he can offer these
Speaker 1: women protection. I realized earlier and when I was doing this,
Speaker 1: I thought his name was Harrison Ford, but it was
Speaker 1: Harrison Floyd, which is probably a very combination, like it's
Speaker 1: got the familiarity of Harrison Ford and George Floyd who
Speaker 1: had that name. Check to it sounds like lazy, made
Speaker 1: up name, but totally sure Harrison Floyd, totally totally. So
Speaker 1: he basically tells reiterates that he could offer her protection
Speaker 1: but if she if she confesses to voter fraud, he
Speaker 1: can offer her protection, but if she declines, she'll go
Speaker 1: to jail. So it turns out that Floyd actually worked
Speaker 1: for the Trump campaign, formally as a paid executive director
Speaker 1: of Black Voices for Trump. But he told Rachel Maddow
Speaker 1: that he sent this woman to Shay and Ruby's house
Speaker 1: as a private citizen, not of an employee of the
Speaker 1: Trump campaign. He said that he got calls from people
Speaker 1: saying that they could keep Ruby and Shay safe if
Speaker 1: they confessed. Side note, I don't really believe anything that
Speaker 1: any of these people are saying. That this is just
Speaker 1: what they're saying, and I'm just saying what they said.
Speaker 1: They all sound like liars and grifters, but you know
Speaker 1: that's what's going on here. For what it's worth. Could
Speaker 1: he denies any wrongdoing. She said that it's a smear
Speaker 1: campaign being organized by the news outlet Reuters, who did
Speaker 1: a lot of reporting on this story. And if she
Speaker 1: also said on Twitter, Ruby told a chaplain that she
Speaker 1: wanted to vide evidence in exchange for immunity for her
Speaker 1: and her daughter, but didn't trust a white man to
Speaker 1: help her as a black woman familiar in this arena,
Speaker 1: I was contacted to provide Freeman with her requested information
Speaker 1: on her options. Probably goes without saying that Ruby and
Speaker 1: say are like that never fucking happened. That's a lie. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: I do see why she claims to work for Kanye
Speaker 1: because it's believable. Absolutely um. And so this all went down.
Speaker 1: She's a black woman. So this all went down on
Speaker 1: January four, just two days before January six, And it
Speaker 1: sounds like what was going on here is that the
Speaker 1: Trump associates wanted to get like a forced confession out
Speaker 1: of these women and then use that as a means
Speaker 1: to stop the transition of presidential power on the sixth.
Speaker 1: That's what I think was going on that They were like,
Speaker 1: if we can get them to confess and scare confession
Speaker 1: out of them, then we got something exactly. On Januarray six,
Speaker 1: when pro Trump coons were or storming the capital, they
Speaker 1: also surrounded rebing SHA's home with bullhorns, but luckily they
Speaker 1: had already fled for their safety. Um, which is bad enough, right,
Speaker 1: having to flee your home for your safety is bad enough.
Speaker 1: But here's where it gets even scarier. Trump supporters actually
Speaker 1: tried to break into Shea's grandmother's home to make quote
Speaker 1: a citizen's arrest. Here's how she describes that in her testimony.
Speaker 1: I received a call from my grandmother. It's woman is
Speaker 1: my everything. I've never even heard her or seeing her
Speaker 1: cry ever in my life. And um, she called me
Speaker 1: screaming at the top of her lungs like Shane, shame,
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, Shane just freaking me out, saying that, um,
Speaker 1: there are people at her home and they, um, you know,
Speaker 1: they knocked on the door, and of course she opened
Speaker 1: it and seeing who was there, who it was, and
Speaker 1: they just started pushing their way through, claiming that they
Speaker 1: were coming in to make a citizen's arrisk. They needed
Speaker 1: to find me and my mom. They knew we were there, um,
Speaker 1: and she was just screaming and didn't know what to do.
Speaker 1: And I wasn't there, so you know, I just felt
Speaker 1: so helpless and so horrible for her. So yeah, they
Speaker 1: tried to break into a seventy something year old grandmother's
Speaker 1: house to push their way in to make a citizen's arrest.
Speaker 1: And honestly, I cannot even imagine how terrifying this must
Speaker 1: have been to have this angry, potentially armed mob of
Speaker 1: Trump supporters showing up at your house and trying to
Speaker 1: force their way physically force their way into your home.
Speaker 1: So hard to even like hear her say that she
Speaker 1: had never heard her grandmother panicked in her life, you know,
Speaker 1: And I think that's another I just think of, like
Speaker 1: my own grandmother, right Like, I just think of how
Speaker 1: strong like many of the people in my life have been,
Speaker 1: and to have a moment where that's completely shattered, and you're, like,
Speaker 1: I heard just terror in their voice saying I don't
Speaker 1: know what to do. That's just man like, every every
Speaker 1: single like their words are so chilling because I hope
Speaker 1: most people could be able to are able to put
Speaker 1: themselves in her position and think of like what what
Speaker 1: that experience would be like for you if suddenly you
Speaker 1: are doing something for the betterment that you believe for
Speaker 1: your community and then it leads to your grandmother having
Speaker 1: people trying to bust her door down. Yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: wild because I I I remember when they testified, and
Speaker 1: I remember the a lot of like the highlights of
Speaker 1: what they said, but clearly they gave you know, they
Speaker 1: gave lengthy testimony, and so I didn't get I didn't
Speaker 1: hear I haven't heard a lot of this other stuff.
Speaker 1: I knew that they were harassed. I knew that ship
Speaker 1: was bad, as it always is, but it is it's
Speaker 1: so different to actually hear what they're saying and also
Speaker 1: to hear that like that may have been this pressure
Speaker 1: point leading up to January six where a lot of
Speaker 1: this energy was put on them because they felt they
Speaker 1: could make them the smoking gun to completely steal the election,
Speaker 1: and that to to to even even like with that idea,
Speaker 1: to put to put yourself into place of like imagine
Speaker 1: if you were the focal point for MAGA world to
Speaker 1: say that these people are as what's getting in between
Speaker 1: us and another Trump administration. Yeah, it's it's terrifying. I
Speaker 1: agree with you. I think there's something about hearing them
Speaker 1: tell their story in their own words that is really powerful,
Speaker 1: because I read quite a bit about their case, and
Speaker 1: then when I watched the testimony, I was in tears.
Speaker 1: And I think part of it is because it's so
Speaker 1: easy to think of, like on like online abuse, online harassment,
Speaker 1: these kinds of threats as just an internet thing. But
Speaker 1: then you hear this sixtiesothing year old woman explain how
Speaker 1: it impacted her life and robbed her of her sense
Speaker 1: of self and her joy and her identity, and you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is this is a real thing. I think that
Speaker 1: I don't know that I've ever seen a better or
Speaker 1: more clear example of the impact and the threat and
Speaker 1: what's at stake than when these women so bravely testified.
Speaker 1: And all of this is really like because of lies,
Speaker 1: and we know that that Trump knew that he was
Speaker 1: knowingly lying about the fact that he lost the election.
Speaker 1: During this hearing, the d o J said that they
Speaker 1: briefed Trump explicitly about the false claims that were being
Speaker 1: touted around Ruby and Shay in that video, so he
Speaker 1: knew that these claims were false. He knew that specifically,
Speaker 1: this video did not show vote vote hampering and that
Speaker 1: these women did nothing wrong, but he still knowingly did
Speaker 1: it anyway, And that really brings us to today. So
Speaker 1: today it actually seems like the state of Georgia is
Speaker 1: kind of trying to get to the bottom of who
Speaker 1: was behind this intimidation and harassment campaign against these women.
Speaker 1: According to a piece in The New York Times published
Speaker 1: last month, Coody and Floyd, the people who tried to
Speaker 1: get Shay and Ruby to confess, have been summoned to testify,
Speaker 1: and the Fulton County District Attorney has indicated that her
Speaker 1: investigation into these efforts to overturn Trump's defeat in Georgia
Speaker 1: could result in a multidefendant racketeering and conspiracy case. Um. However,
Speaker 1: they have not yet been charged with a crime, and
Speaker 1: I think that I think that they The deadline for
Speaker 1: them to testify is like tomorrow. So I'm actually very
Speaker 1: curious like where this would where this will go and
Speaker 1: if there will be any kind of accountability or consequences
Speaker 1: for people who you know, works to ruin these women's
Speaker 1: lives for no reason. Yeah, I mean, bring the rico on.
Speaker 1: And it's not just Ruby and Shay. The kind of
Speaker 1: harassment and abuse and intimidation of women like Ruby and
Speaker 1: Shay um for who are just simply doing their jobs
Speaker 1: as election as election workers, has become terrifyingly common, um
Speaker 1: And it is women that we're talking about. The vast
Speaker 1: majority more than of election workers are women. According to
Speaker 1: research from the Brennan Center, nearly one in three local
Speaker 1: election officials no at least one election worker who has
Speaker 1: left the job because of safety concerns, increased threats, or intimidation.
Speaker 1: Sha herself said that she could never see herself doing
Speaker 1: election work ever again. And you know, in this most
Speaker 1: recent election, we actually did have a shortage of poll workers,
Speaker 1: which leads to like pretty anti democratic outcomes for all
Speaker 1: of us, like short staffed polling precincts that force people
Speaker 1: to weight in like wild ridiculous long lines just to
Speaker 1: be able to vote. Shortages of poll workers could also
Speaker 1: cause polling locations to close or have to consolidate with
Speaker 1: other locations, and it makes it even more challenging for
Speaker 1: people to get to their new their new polling place.
Speaker 1: And we already know that like this directly impact marginalized
Speaker 1: voters who already faced pretty big barriers to voting, and
Speaker 1: so it's it's horrible for the women who are the
Speaker 1: targets of this kind of harassment, but it's horrible for
Speaker 1: all of us because it just it threatens our democracy.
Speaker 1: It threatens our ability to make our voices heard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's the same thing I mean this is we
Speaker 1: see this across so many arenas, Like with the right,
Speaker 1: they want to pressure all of the decent human beings
Speaker 1: out of these positions where having decent human beings is
Speaker 1: the difference, you know what I mean, Like we see
Speaker 1: it with teachers and that these school board meetings and
Speaker 1: harassing teachers that are like, I'm trying to like educate
Speaker 1: them and they're like, no, you're trying to poison their
Speaker 1: minds and just see our three crap um. And it's
Speaker 1: scaring people away from doing a thing which is too
Speaker 1: or two volunteer their time so elections can occur or
Speaker 1: these other things. And it's it's difficult to see because
Speaker 1: you see how the these pressure campaigns do work and
Speaker 1: it erodes these sort of institutions at the margins and
Speaker 1: then it allows for this like rot to really set in.
Speaker 1: And it's a shame that she's been completely, you know,
Speaker 1: dissuaded from doing something that she really looked exactly. That's
Speaker 1: that's such a good point that you made about how
Speaker 1: kind of the I do think the point of a
Speaker 1: lot of these these intimidation campaigns is to pressure normal
Speaker 1: regular people who want to do a civic good or
Speaker 1: a public good out of these positions and fill them
Speaker 1: with partisan extremists. And so if it only extremists feel
Speaker 1: comfortable serving the public as teachers, as school board members,
Speaker 1: as administrators, as poll workers, that's a real problem. Like
Speaker 1: we are all in big fucking trouble if that's the
Speaker 1: reality that we're gonna face. Yeah, and and and they're smart.
Speaker 1: I mean you saw after the six all of the
Speaker 1: extremists on the right they had to figure at a
Speaker 1: new plan. And that's on a lot of like the
Speaker 1: Q people too, are like, you know, what, we can
Speaker 1: we can really be going for these little elected positions
Speaker 1: like school board or controller or these other things. People
Speaker 1: are just like, I don't know, vote for this person,
Speaker 1: because yeah, to your point, that's how you know, they
Speaker 1: have to learn from the last one. They're like, man,
Speaker 1: what's Brad Rathnsburger doing over here? Like respecting the Constitution.
Speaker 1: Even though that guy's such a like big are Republican,
Speaker 1: you look at his politics, like he's not crossing Trump
Speaker 1: in any way aside from the fact that he's like,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna lie about the votes though, like, other
Speaker 1: than that, love what you're doing, man, Love everything else,
Speaker 1: including the racism. I personally don't want to go to
Speaker 1: jail over this, but love everything else. Yeah, exactly, and
Speaker 1: like and so they know, they're like, man, for next time,
Speaker 1: we can't have these people who are like, well are
Speaker 1: we supposed to be lying? They're like, get those people
Speaker 1: out of here. We need more people who know what
Speaker 1: time it is, who can stick to the script. So
Speaker 1: when it's time to just up end everything, boom boom boom,
Speaker 1: own boom, there's not gonna be any you know, stifling
Speaker 1: of the momentum because it comes to a point where
Speaker 1: it crosses someone's desk quest to make a decision, who
Speaker 1: like actually has a spine or a sense of decency.
Speaker 1: And yeah, it's been that's a very like. I think
Speaker 1: if they keep at it will pay off in the
Speaker 1: long run, if they're able to freak out and scare
Speaker 1: away these kinds of people who again like are truly
Speaker 1: are like a line of defense between falling into a
Speaker 1: completely ignorant backwards country. I mean, we're already kind of there,
Speaker 1: but like fully, you know what I mean, and then
Speaker 1: that's going to be even scarier. And I think it's
Speaker 1: it's a lesson for like all of us, you know,
Speaker 1: really about like that we need to be we really
Speaker 1: have to have these people's backs, because that's another thing
Speaker 1: we we we leave a lot of especially Black women,
Speaker 1: we don't. We don't we don't take up for them
Speaker 1: as a as a culture. I mean, I would say
Speaker 1: that people are in a minority who are really vocal
Speaker 1: about saying you can't just turn your back on black women.
Speaker 1: You just can't and do that. That's that's the beginning
Speaker 1: of the end. If you allow if you allow black
Speaker 1: women to be easy prey, the game's over or anyone. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I think that's why it's really important to really stay
Speaker 1: informed about what's happening with like the harassment of lgbt
Speaker 1: Q plus people right now and all that, because that's
Speaker 1: what they wanted. Like the more we allow people to
Speaker 1: hit us at the margins or what they perceived to
Speaker 1: be these weak spots, it will bring everything down and
Speaker 1: if we're not able to say, you know what, no, no no, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: no, no no, you're not doing that. We're not doing that.
Speaker 1: I don't care if I'm not part of this group,
Speaker 1: but I know what you're trying to do, which is
Speaker 1: you're eventually coming for all of us. And you know,
Speaker 1: how intersectional can we be here, you know, to take
Speaker 1: up for each other. But I think it's it's this
Speaker 1: kind of ship you see, and you're like, it's so
Speaker 1: easy for people to have their life completely upended because
Speaker 1: of hate, and and how easy it is for things
Speaker 1: to get momentum if enough people don't say, ah, stop, no,
Speaker 1: that's not happening. And unfortunately they were in a position
Speaker 1: where they could take advantage of the fact that not
Speaker 1: there wasn't enough you know, uh resolve within our culture
Speaker 1: to like just call it dead in the water for
Speaker 1: what it was. It just you know, I was able
Speaker 1: to proliferate pretty quickly. Yeah, and I absolutely agreed that.
Speaker 1: I think that it really goes to show how imperative
Speaker 1: it is that we all vocally stand up and push
Speaker 1: back against attacks on margin people who are marginalized. Yeah, transpolkes,
Speaker 1: queer folks, black, women. All of our oppression is linked
Speaker 1: and so is our liberation. And so you know, it
Speaker 1: is imperative for me, as somebody who is marginalized, to
Speaker 1: stick up or speak up when someone else was marginalized,
Speaker 1: albeit in different ways than I am, is also attacked.
Speaker 1: Like it like we we have to really be I
Speaker 1: think create allowed pushback to say this will not be tolerated.
Speaker 1: We are going to vocally support this person when it happens,
Speaker 1: and it's I think it's a strategy right now where
Speaker 1: folks are being I think so many different kinds of
Speaker 1: folks who are traditionally marginalized are currently being attacked. Anti
Speaker 1: Semitism is rampant right now. Trans legislation. I I think
Speaker 1: it's a state strategic tactic to overwhelm whereas like I
Speaker 1: guess we've lost I guess I guess we've you know,
Speaker 1: seated too much ground and it's just too hard to
Speaker 1: to you know, I think it's a strategic tactic that
Speaker 1: we really have to be mindful of and stay vocal
Speaker 1: in the face of. If well that the because the
Speaker 1: thing being is, if you can become desensitized to watching
Speaker 1: a community get just dismantled or attacked like this and
Speaker 1: you're like, well, that ain't me. It's you're not gonna
Speaker 1: want to be around for the that world that is
Speaker 1: slowly evolving in front of your eyes. And I think
Speaker 1: that's that's a really important thing to remember, is you can't.
Speaker 1: The whole point is for especially for these extremists, a
Speaker 1: lot of it is for them to feel that they
Speaker 1: are in touch with their power on some level. That's
Speaker 1: why they go after people they think are soft targets
Speaker 1: because they're not gonna pull up to something where there's
Speaker 1: a bunch of end you know what I mean, they're
Speaker 1: like cisshet men and no, because they know because of
Speaker 1: their they're like, you know, they live in a patriarchical
Speaker 1: white supremacist nations are like, well, you know what, maybe
Speaker 1: this is an easier target um. And this is like
Speaker 1: just too this momentum that they're trying to build for
Speaker 1: themselves to say like, well we we kind of took
Speaker 1: an ll on that government stuff. Because if you look,
Speaker 1: the Proud Boys of completely shifted gears now to just
Speaker 1: going after these drag events where there's drag queens doing
Speaker 1: like storytime at libraries. That's what the Proud Boys have
Speaker 1: pivoted to because we're catching l's in every other place,
Speaker 1: like every time we pull up to Portland or somewhere else, Like, Man,
Speaker 1: I can't do this anymore. I want to just go
Speaker 1: to a drag library and just make a ruckiss there.
Speaker 1: But luckily, in some places you're actually beginning to see
Speaker 1: the counter protesters who are there to support the LGBTQ
Speaker 1: community begin to outnumber them, and and you can see
Speaker 1: how quickly that that sort of vigor dissipates with and
Speaker 1: these people who are there who are hateful, they're like, man,
Speaker 1: it's all these people are saying, we're losers. And it's
Speaker 1: like you watched you you see how you see how
Speaker 1: important it is for people to come together and show
Speaker 1: solidarity and and appear in physical space too, because a
Speaker 1: lot of these people who are on the other side,
Speaker 1: I think, well, if nobody's here to protect them, then
Speaker 1: most people probably don't care, which probably isn't true. Most
Speaker 1: people do care, But I think people either intimidated or
Speaker 1: feel like it could be a situation they don't want
Speaker 1: to put themselves in. But on some level, you do
Speaker 1: have to kind of make your values known um in
Speaker 1: order for people to understand that there are people of
Speaker 1: good standing, of good spirit, like within their communities, because
Speaker 1: if you're silent, it allows everybody to fill in the gaps.
Speaker 1: They're like, now everybody's seeking. Like I was actually just
Speaker 1: thinking about this. It's a it's a little bit of
Speaker 1: a tangent, but I was thinking about how after the
Speaker 1: Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Know, we didn't get any
Speaker 1: kind of like meaningful legislation, but people understood that what
Speaker 1: you say after a shooting is like, oh, thoughts and prayers,
Speaker 1: how horrible that kind of thing. After the Club Que
Speaker 1: shooting in Colorado, some of the discourse was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: what do you expect when they're bringing when they're abusing children?
Speaker 1: What do you expect when you're grooming kids? Like? And
Speaker 1: I was like, how quickly did we get to this
Speaker 1: place where this was an acceptable way to respond to
Speaker 1: a shooting where multiple people died in public without fear,
Speaker 1: and that like that would be an acceptable Like I'm
Speaker 1: not saying that the thoughts and prayers thing is is
Speaker 1: a is a meaningful thing to say, but at least
Speaker 1: it's like people understood how you are meant to respond.
Speaker 1: I was like, how did we get so far gone
Speaker 1: in just a few years. And I think it's exactly
Speaker 1: what you're talking about. When too many people are silent,
Speaker 1: you are able to people just assume like, oh, everybody
Speaker 1: thinks like this, this is a totally normal response to murders. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's again. And I think that's what to me is
Speaker 1: frightening and why I think it's important for more people
Speaker 1: to be aware of the threats that exists. To that
Speaker 1: point is how quickly things change from like, you know,
Speaker 1: it's seemingly yeah, what's wrong with drag story time? But
Speaker 1: on the right it became like, no, now here's an
Speaker 1: enemy that I think we can defeat or at least
Speaker 1: be violent with or intimidate without too much fear on
Speaker 1: our side, because we need that, we need to feel
Speaker 1: potent in some way because we're not getting it done
Speaker 1: at the ballot box, and we're not getting it done
Speaker 1: all the time with like the culture war stuff. There's
Speaker 1: like little things here and there, but this all in
Speaker 1: de humanization that we're seeing is I think part and
Speaker 1: parcel of them trying to recapture some sense that they're
Speaker 1: effective on some level, and unfortunately it's at the expense
Speaker 1: of all of this dysfunction, we're saying, and not just
Speaker 1: you know, the homophobia, the anti semitism as well. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: and I think to your point about how it's playing
Speaker 1: out with the ballot box, I think this, this widespread
Speaker 1: intimidation and harassment of election workers is part and personal
Speaker 1: of that. In the summer of one the DOJ started
Speaker 1: the Election Threats Task Force UM and it was meant
Speaker 1: to service this like federal resource to report and investigate
Speaker 1: threats against election workers UM. In a year's time, they
Speaker 1: announced that they had they that of the more than
Speaker 1: a thousand cases that they had reviewed, just a handful
Speaker 1: of federal cases had been charged and they only had
Speaker 1: one sentence. And so not not great, I would say,
Speaker 1: like not great, but of over half of those cases,
Speaker 1: fifty percent of them that we're all potentially criminal threats received.
Speaker 1: They happened in states where the election results have been
Speaker 1: challenged during the election, including Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: and Wisconsin. And to me, that really says it all that, like,
Speaker 1: you know, this is a unfortunately a semi successful campaign
Speaker 1: to foster people to distrust our democra product process or
Speaker 1: democratic institutions and systems and say, like, if you don't
Speaker 1: like the results, it's okay to intimidate your way into
Speaker 1: a win, even if like Trump and you lost. Mm hmm, yeah.
Speaker 1: This is usually you know, like when when things are
Speaker 1: decided during you know, an election, and they count the votes,
Speaker 1: you can't speak to the manager if you don't like
Speaker 1: what happened. But I think that's what they're but they're
Speaker 1: wanting to They want to act on that impulse of like,
Speaker 1: well I should be able to speak to somebody about this,
Speaker 1: like what that you objectively had less votes? No? Funk off? Yeah,
Speaker 1: carry Lake had big. Can I speak to the manager
Speaker 1: of Democracy Energy when she lost? Yeah? She still want
Speaker 1: it lost. It's about to get hurt and like they're
Speaker 1: all turned up on the right there, like and this
Speaker 1: could get Trump back in office. You can get out
Speaker 1: of here, please just go, like we get it. You
Speaker 1: didn't you didn't nail your audition for Real Housewives of
Speaker 1: Maricopa County or whatever, but do you know what you
Speaker 1: did a good job. Now go fade off in obscurity
Speaker 1: or allowed Trump to use you as his puppet or something,
Speaker 1: which I'm sure is going to happen soon. So people
Speaker 1: rightly really lifted up Ruby and Chay as heroes. And
Speaker 1: I do think that they're very heroic. You know, they
Speaker 1: serve their community during a pandemic and put their the
Speaker 1: president put their lives at risk because of it. And
Speaker 1: I think, you know, even in speaking up about what
Speaker 1: they experienced in the hearings, they were certainly opening themselves
Speaker 1: up to more abuse, more harassment. But I just think
Speaker 1: that I'm really uncomfortable with this idea that black women
Speaker 1: should have to be put in such great danger for
Speaker 1: a country that would weaponize their own identity against them.
Speaker 1: And you know, she says that she'll never ever be
Speaker 1: an election worker again, and that every single election worker
Speaker 1: that she worked with in that polling center in Georgia
Speaker 1: has quit, And frankly, I don't blame them, Like, who
Speaker 1: would ever want to open themselves up to the kinds
Speaker 1: of attacks that they went through just for trying to
Speaker 1: do their job. And again, election workers don't make a
Speaker 1: lot of money. We're not talking about people who can afford,
Speaker 1: you know, a security detail or have a lot of
Speaker 1: financial support necessarily, We're talking about regular people. And and
Speaker 1: so like another thing is that you know, in the
Speaker 1: most recent election, bridget like Georgia had a poll worker shortage,
Speaker 1: like a major poll worker shortage across the state, where
Speaker 1: county is one of the areas in Georgia that was
Speaker 1: really affected by this poll worker shortage, and the county
Speaker 1: was down about thirty poll workers like the day before
Speaker 1: election day, and the Supervisor of Elections really believed it
Speaker 1: was because of people being shamed out of the position.
Speaker 1: And you know, obviously that has to be connected to
Speaker 1: what we're talking about here today. I'm sure there was
Speaker 1: also COVID impacting things, but it's just seeing how seeing
Speaker 1: how unsafe it was last time, and then the pressure. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Ruby and Shay they did sue the right wing website,
Speaker 1: the Gateway Pundit and its owners for defamation. Yeah, they
Speaker 1: settled with one American news network, but they didn't say
Speaker 1: like what they settled for. I hope it was. I
Speaker 1: hope they took them for everything they're fucking work. I
Speaker 1: hope they got I hope they got a lot of money.
Speaker 1: But as I said, like, no amount of money can
Speaker 1: make right what happened to them. And I want to
Speaker 1: end with Lady Ruby and her own words, there is
Speaker 1: nowhere I feel safe nowhere. Do you know how it
Speaker 1: feels to him, the president of the United States, to
Speaker 1: target you. The President of the United States is supposed
Speaker 1: to represent every American, not to target one, but he
Speaker 1: targeted me. Lady Ruby a small business owner, a mother,
Speaker 1: a proud American citizen who stand up to help Fulton
Speaker 1: County running the election in the middle of the pandemic.
Speaker 1: So her word is just really stick with and no. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm I hope that she got lots and lots of
Speaker 1: money because God knows they deserve it. But nothing can
Speaker 1: make that right what they went through. And I think
Speaker 1: it's harming all of us. Oh absolutely, I mean this
Speaker 1: is I always use that metaphor of like it's the rot.
Speaker 1: You know, it's the US is a rotting piece of bread,
Speaker 1: and right now the rot is in these communities. Most
Speaker 1: of the bread is not part of so people are like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's the mold is over there, but it spreads and
Speaker 1: they'll get closer and like, well, it's not at me yet,
Speaker 1: and then you'll give you by yourself sometime and then
Speaker 1: it's on your doorstep and you're like, how did this happen? Well,
Speaker 1: you were ignoring it the whole fucking time. And that's
Speaker 1: the I mean, that's the I think the easiest way
Speaker 1: to visualize like what is happening and why we need
Speaker 1: like we it's absolutely imperative that American people understand like
Speaker 1: what is happening in this country because many people are
Speaker 1: kind of at this like, oh it seems bad over
Speaker 1: there for him kind of phase without really understanding that
Speaker 1: we have to seriously address these things. If you want
Speaker 1: any you know, any like for this country to have
Speaker 1: any semblance of a place that you would want to live.
Speaker 1: Are you already get it's already hard enough, but he
Speaker 1: can get a lot worse, especially if we're not just
Speaker 1: opening our hearts to understand that, like we have to
Speaker 1: actually take up for each other. Um. Obviously not to
Speaker 1: be like, hey, go go hug a Nazi today, no,
Speaker 1: but I mean, like the actual people who are vulnerable,
Speaker 1: who are in the same fight as all of us are,
Speaker 1: because let's face it, we're closer to being like having
Speaker 1: no money than hitting powerball and becoming an overnight billionaire.
Speaker 1: So you know, keep that in mind because at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, like we're only going to have
Speaker 1: each other in our communities, and if if we allow
Speaker 1: any dimension of our communities or any segment of them,
Speaker 1: to start falling apart them. You know, it won't be
Speaker 1: a very tough fight, um for the bad people to win.
Speaker 1: That's the only thing that keeps me from falling into
Speaker 1: like great cynicism and disillusionment about the state of our
Speaker 1: country is exactly what you just said, the power of community.
Speaker 1: I don't have a ton of faith in institutions, but
Speaker 1: I do have faith in each other. I do have
Speaker 1: faith in us. I have faith in community. That is
Speaker 1: the only thing that gets me through is knowing that
Speaker 1: like we got us absolutely and to and to know
Speaker 1: too that there are people who are thinking like that,
Speaker 1: like that we got us, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: and that we have to we have to take like again,
Speaker 1: we have to take up for each other. Uh. And
Speaker 1: it's interesting too because you see, it's so it's so
Speaker 1: funny too. There's so many times and I'm like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: what the funk are these How are these people going
Speaker 1: to behave in the you know, in this chaotic situation,
Speaker 1: And ten times out of ten I'm seeing human beings
Speaker 1: just dropped their bullshit to help each other. Like I
Speaker 1: remember in the in the Texas Black blackouts and stuff,
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh no, these people have no power.
Speaker 1: It's it's like it's it's the terrible weather. And the
Speaker 1: whole time I was bracing myself because I'm like, this
Speaker 1: country is so split up, like I don't even to
Speaker 1: know how people are going to do it. And then
Speaker 1: you see a lot of great stories or like just locally,
Speaker 1: you look at your own communities and you can see
Speaker 1: people that are doing right. And I think that again,
Speaker 1: like like you I have, I can feel better in
Speaker 1: my day to day when I actually go out and
Speaker 1: I meet people that I live around and know who
Speaker 1: I live around, and introduce myself and then be like, man, okay,
Speaker 1: what's up, Russ, Oh what's up? Okay? I know if
Speaker 1: you need something whatever, you know me like I'm usually
Speaker 1: around here at this time. That that gives me a
Speaker 1: greater sense of safety than you know. Chuck Schumer and
Speaker 1: Nancy Pelosi wearing kintay cloth at the rotunda, Oh my god.
Speaker 1: You can tell by their faces they thought they were
Speaker 1: really doing something like like they're like, Chuck, we are
Speaker 1: killing them right. Oh my god. They thought they ate
Speaker 1: on that one they were eating. They think that okay, anyway,
Speaker 1: all that to say, you know, really look into mutual
Speaker 1: aid organizations in your area because you're you know, you'll
Speaker 1: really feel hardened to meet other people who are like, yeah, man,
Speaker 1: I really want I really care about the people that
Speaker 1: live in this community, and I really feel like we
Speaker 1: got to take care of each other. That will give
Speaker 1: you life. Yeah. One of the Margaret Kildre, who's i
Speaker 1: think one of the biggest experts on prepping um that
Speaker 1: what Milds just said is exactly what she says that
Speaker 1: one of the best tools that you can have is
Speaker 1: knowing who lives around you and creating and creating relationships
Speaker 1: there because community is what matters. Mutual aid is what
Speaker 1: it matters. Think of it like this, do you live
Speaker 1: in a neighborhood where it's just doors on a street,
Speaker 1: or do you live in a place you're like, oh, Okay,
Speaker 1: that's that person. That's where that person lives. Or if
Speaker 1: you're walking a shoot, oh that's so and so, or
Speaker 1: they like who's that, who's that? What did they do?
Speaker 1: And I really like, that's that person's dogs house exactly.
Speaker 1: And however you need whatever in road you need to use.
Speaker 1: It's powerful, though, but I'm telling you you. You will out, man,
Speaker 1: it's so much better. It's such a burden is lifted
Speaker 1: when you feel like you live in a community. Then
Speaker 1: you just feel like a person who goes into a
Speaker 1: blank door and in a collection of blank doors. That's
Speaker 1: such a that's such good advice. Miles, Do you have
Speaker 1: anything you'd like to plug at the end here? Yeah,
Speaker 1: mutual aid organizations. Look just Google whatever whatever city you're in,
Speaker 1: join a mutual aid organization. Feel good about yourself and
Speaker 1: and take up for your community and yourself. And if
Speaker 1: you like to hear me talk more, uh, you can
Speaker 1: check me out on the Daily Night guys. That's twice
Speaker 1: a day talking news and politics. And then I also
Speaker 1: got a basketball podcast called Miles and Jack Got bad
Speaker 1: boost these. First of all, Oh yeah, shout out Billy
Speaker 1: g Yeah it's funny. One of our listeners on Daily
Speaker 1: Sight gis is like a professional caricature artist. Can you
Speaker 1: do like the big head caricatures like from those nineties
Speaker 1: T shirts? Yes? Full So shout out Billy brings me
Speaker 1: joy every time I see your If you ever want to,
Speaker 1: if you ever need some, it's perfect, shout Billy out. Um.
Speaker 1: And then also if you like ninety Day Fiance because
Speaker 1: guess what I do have to decompress after talking about
Speaker 1: them twice a day. I do it with trash reality
Speaker 1: shows and Fiance is one of them. And I have
Speaker 1: a show with Sophie Alexander called four twenty Day Fiance.
Speaker 1: You can put two and two together. Hardest working man
Speaker 1: in podcasting, Nah, The people just want to hear stuff sometimes.
Speaker 1: I guess, look at me mitigating. You're right, I am
Speaker 1: the hardest working man in podcast Yeah, thank you the
Speaker 1: James Brown Podcast. You have another podcast and you're on
Speaker 1: social media? Do you want to tell the people where
Speaker 1: that I do? You can listen to my other podcasts
Speaker 1: call there are No Girls on the Internet. You can
Speaker 1: find me on Instagram at Bridget Marie in d C
Speaker 1: or on Twitter. I'm still there at Bridget Marie and
Speaker 1: I want to plug. If you're in d C. A
Speaker 1: great activist Mutual Aid Collective is Positive Force DC. Awesome. Awesome. Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm at Miles of Gray find I don't tweet a
Speaker 1: lot or anything. I'm I'm too overwhelmed by the Internet,
Speaker 1: but I'm I stay up today. Yeah, and at cool
Speaker 1: Zone Media on all on Instagram and Twitter, and if
Speaker 1: you're looking for another future aid organization, check out transieline
Speaker 1: dot org. Internet Hate Machine is a production of cool
Speaker 1: Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, check
Speaker 1: out our website cool zone media dot com, or find
Speaker 1: us on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts.