Speaker 1: Native Land Pod is a production of iHeartRadio in partnership
Speaker 1: with reisent Choice Media.
Speaker 2: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome.
Speaker 3: Welcome, Hey, fam You're about to hear a replay of
Speaker 3: one of our interviews from our live stream at the
Speaker 3: Democratic National Convention. If you want to listen to or
Speaker 3: watch the full stream, check out the links in the
Speaker 3: episode description. You can also find a full list of
Speaker 3: all the guests we interviewed. Welcome home, y'all. We've been
Speaker 3: talking about history, making history, and how it's important to
Speaker 3: stand on the shoulders of those history makers. And we've
Speaker 3: been joined by a legend, congress Woman Barbara Lee from
Speaker 3: California's twelfth congressional district. She is a mentor. She is
Speaker 3: a woman that we absolutely look up to. She got
Speaker 3: a torch passed to her by Shirley Chisholm. And I
Speaker 3: know you passed the torch to Kamala Harris when you
Speaker 3: sit up and said I'm going to endorse her first
Speaker 3: in twenty twenty. So we are thrilled to be joined
Speaker 3: by you, and we know you are busy, So thank you, Congresswoman,
Speaker 3: you're here.
Speaker 2: Thanks, thanks so much. Angela. You know this is Uh,
Speaker 2: I don't know how I've been there. I still get stars.
Speaker 1: Yes, Congress you.
Speaker 4: I've been to every every convention except one since nineteen
Speaker 4: seventy two.
Speaker 2: And uh, this is a bookend convention for me.
Speaker 4: The first convention was when I was a delegate for
Speaker 4: Shirley Chisholm.
Speaker 2: Of course, Willie Brown.
Speaker 4: Then said give me back my delegation for the McGovern delegates.
Speaker 2: And now here we have common health and I.
Speaker 4: Share that because it's pretty busy for me, you know, convention,
Speaker 4: and I'm a convention.
Speaker 2: Officer this year. Yes, and so I'm just like having
Speaker 2: a good time but working.
Speaker 3: We know you, and we wanted to ensure what you
Speaker 3: were joined pretty quickly by a candidate, Latifa Simon, who
Speaker 3: is actually the person you're passing the proverbial torch to
Speaker 3: in your congressional district. So we wanted to ensure you
Speaker 3: had this moment in the midst of all the fun
Speaker 3: you're having, put all the work.
Speaker 2: Thanks.
Speaker 4: Let me just say, Latifa, just like Vice President Kamala Harris,
Speaker 4: she's prepared, she's ready, she's experienced, and she knows exactly
Speaker 4: what she's doing and how to take the twelfth Congressional.
Speaker 2: District to the next level.
Speaker 4: And so I'm really proud of right, She'll tell you
Speaker 4: I taught a class at Mills College. She was my
Speaker 4: smartest teap of my smartest student. So now this baton
Speaker 4: is in good hands and she runs this next lap
Speaker 4: of the race.
Speaker 5: Congresswoman Lee, did you have a envision a time like this?
Speaker 5: Did you ever see something like this being possible?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 4: Yes, in nineteen seventy two, I saw it because I
Speaker 4: saw Shirley Chisholm fought. I saw and watch Fanny lou
Speaker 4: Hamer from Afar, and I saw all of these black women,
Speaker 4: all of these women of colors, struggling.
Speaker 2: Through all the challenges.
Speaker 4: And then I saw Vice President Harris in twenty nineteen
Speaker 4: taking that baton, saying.
Speaker 2: That she was going to run for president.
Speaker 4: And when she dropped out, I was on a train
Speaker 4: going from DC to New York and it was money.
Speaker 2: So we got to get this money out of politics.
Speaker 4: But I told her then, I said, don't worry, You're
Speaker 4: gonna be president one day.
Speaker 2: Wow. Wow, I love it.
Speaker 6: So, congress Woman, I'm so happy that you're joining us
Speaker 6: because one thing I've always loved and respected about you
Speaker 6: is you will have the unapologetic way of standing and
Speaker 6: moving in your conviction. I remember being a young journalist
Speaker 6: getting my uh just starting out at CNN, and this
Speaker 6: was during right after nine to eleven, and you, of
Speaker 6: course were known as the sole member in the House
Speaker 6: of Representatives to vote against the au m F, which,
Speaker 6: to your point, would have given this government free access
Speaker 6: to engage our military and foreign foreign adversaries.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a bit about.
Speaker 6: What it means, because I think we're seeing a very
Speaker 6: different Kamala Harris on the campaign trail now and she
Speaker 6: appears to be moving in her convictions as well. Can
Speaker 6: you talk a bit about what it meant to be
Speaker 6: the sole person and stand in your own truth and
Speaker 6: righteousness to make sure that you were on the right
Speaker 6: side of history more than almost twenty five years later.
Speaker 4: That authorization to use military force was a sixty word authorization,
Speaker 4: overly broad. All it said, in essence was any president
Speaker 4: can go to war forever. Now the Constitution requires Congress
Speaker 4: to declare war. Yeah, but to turn it over then
Speaker 4: President Bush and subsequent presidents was.
Speaker 2: Wrong, first of all constitutionally.
Speaker 4: But if you believe in looking at alternatives to go
Speaker 4: into war, then you do not just automatically use the
Speaker 4: trigger the military option. You always tried development, diplomacy, peaceful
Speaker 4: solutions first. You do not just do that the military
Speaker 4: aswer My dad was in the military. Out of that,
Speaker 4: my father was the first one to call me. He
Speaker 4: retired to lieutenant colonel. He said, you were right. Do
Speaker 4: not give any president the authority to send our young
Speaker 4: men and women.
Speaker 2: Into work and not know what you're doing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so you know, you faced a lot of death threast,
Speaker 4: a lot of hassles, and it was hard, but you
Speaker 4: know the scriptures. Ephesian said, stand right, We thank you
Speaker 4: for that.
Speaker 7: For congresswoman, if I could ask, because there are a
Speaker 7: lot of folks who want to follow in your model.
Speaker 7: Obviously we've got Latifa, who who is blazing amazing trail
Speaker 7: as an activist organizer right where she is, tell us
Speaker 7: just very quickly, how do you deepen into that value set?
Speaker 7: If there was advice that you would give to folks,
Speaker 7: how do you ground? Where do you ground? When do
Speaker 7: you know where to make that stand?
Speaker 2: You have to know yourself, You have to know what
Speaker 2: you believe in.
Speaker 4: And Shirley Chisholm said to me, she said, you know
Speaker 4: you've got to shake things up. She said, these rules
Speaker 4: were made for you, they were made for me. You
Speaker 4: got to get in there, not go along to get along.
Speaker 4: You get in there and you you disrupt every policy
Speaker 4: in every system that's oppressive, this discriminatory, this racist, that's sexist,
Speaker 4: this wrong, and then you build something new.
Speaker 2: And that's what you do, Congress, and that's what Latifa
Speaker 2: has done her life.
Speaker 3: We definitely want to get Latifa in, but you had
Speaker 3: a heart out two minutes ago. We are not trying
Speaker 3: to get cussed down.
Speaker 4: He doesn't know I'm back here because I realized when
Speaker 4: I got there, I ran off in another ten minutes.
Speaker 4: Ask Congresswoman one more question. I just want to say that,
Speaker 4: you know, we got to in Latifa too.
Speaker 5: This is a question for la being that black woman
Speaker 5: have always been the backborne of the Democratic Party. Does
Speaker 5: this feel like you're finally getting your just do having
Speaker 5: the VP at the top of the ticket.
Speaker 8: First of all, I grew up born and raised in
Speaker 8: the Bay Area with Congresswoman Barbarly as our north star politically,
Speaker 8: so you know, for us, you know, she ran so
Speaker 8: we could walk. We had a politic of freedom and justice.
Speaker 8: You would turn on Channel two k TVU in the morning.
Speaker 8: And see Barbara Lee when I was a child watching
Speaker 8: this woman on the floor, even before you gave that
Speaker 8: consequential vote. And so for me to be running this
Speaker 8: race following in your footsteps, first of all, there's no shoe.
Speaker 8: There's no foot that could fill the shoe of Barbara Lee.
Speaker 8: I want to be very clear from Barbaraly has literally
Speaker 8: a degree in diplomacy, not just degree from the academics,
Speaker 8: but doing the work for fifty years, allocating for women
Speaker 8: and children, being an internationalist, literally building.
Speaker 2: As she climbs. There are so many of mes out
Speaker 2: there in the Bay Area.
Speaker 8: But when Barbara told me that she was going to
Speaker 8: run for the United States sinner, I said, ma'am, mayam
Speaker 8: might I And she, on my primary nights passed me
Speaker 8: a littoral baton and we've won that race, Rightenous Lee
Speaker 8: me get to the place where I could say, my
Speaker 8: full time job is going to be working for poor
Speaker 8: women and children and for just say but folks, I
Speaker 8: talked about Kamla last night, But let me tell you
Speaker 8: something being raised in the Bay Area.
Speaker 2: Being understand the Bay Area.
Speaker 8: I understand Oakland, the black folks there, they came through
Speaker 8: the great migration, right. They are from the South, were country,
Speaker 8: and we knew we were trying to leave Jim Crow
Speaker 8: and we found it in the Bay Area. We thank
Speaker 8: God for Rondellums and we thank God for Barbari Lee.
Speaker 8: I'm gonna do you right, miss Lee.
Speaker 2: I'm so much like Latifa has already done me right.
Speaker 4: First of all, because I never would have run for
Speaker 4: the Senate, knowing that money in politics was going to
Speaker 4: be a challenge, and knowing all the dynamics, as you know,
Speaker 4: but I knew that worst case there, Latifa was to
Speaker 4: carry this baton.
Speaker 2: Ron has me the baton.
Speaker 4: I passed Lativah the batona, and I'm forging ahead. And
Speaker 4: let me just say it's really important now for you
Speaker 4: to be their Latief because since okay, Northern California, I'm
Speaker 4: the first and only black woman ever elected to Congress.
Speaker 4: We have a Northern California delegation of all white people,
Speaker 4: nobody that looks like myself. Can you imagine having a
Speaker 4: seat at that table and having to push, push, push
Speaker 4: every single day, and Latifa is the one to do that.
Speaker 4: I was the first and only woman north of Los Angeles.
Speaker 4: You know this elect to the California Assembly and Senate.
Speaker 8: Yes.
Speaker 4: And you know when you look back, and I work
Speaker 4: for Ron dollas one of the first chief of staffs
Speaker 4: black women on Capitol Hill.
Speaker 2: That's like a long time that.
Speaker 4: I've had to push, push push, But you know what,
Speaker 4: like Shirley Chisholm, Hey, here's Latifa.
Speaker 2: I I really I love y'all.
Speaker 3: I'm so glad that we have Oakland representing tonight, the
Speaker 3: same night that Kamala Harris will be speaking.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna get I'm.
Speaker 3: Gonna get Congressman lead to Worklet's but we are definitely
Speaker 3: gonna have you back. Thank you so much, speak.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. Hey, y'all, thanks for listening.
Speaker 3: Remember to rate, review, subscribe, and tune into our regular
Speaker 3: episode that drops every single Thursday, Welcome Home, y'all.
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