Speaker 1: Broadcasting from the Hip Hop Weekly Studios. I'd like to
Speaker 1: welcome you to another episode of Civic Cipher, where our
Speaker 1: mission is to foster allyship empathy and understanding. I'm your host, Rams,
Speaker 1: this job.
Speaker 2: He is Rams' job. I am q Ward and you
Speaker 2: are tuned into Civic Cipher.
Speaker 1: This you are, and we would like for you to
Speaker 1: stick around for both halves of today's show because we
Speaker 1: are going to have a conversation that we feel is necessary,
Speaker 1: a conversation that represents a push that we've seen kind
Speaker 1: of forming in spaces, in online spaces, on social media,
Speaker 1: and something that we feel can be effective if you
Speaker 1: have if you feel like there's work to do since
Speaker 1: the last election. The conversation we're going to have today
Speaker 1: is with a dear friend of ours and a dear
Speaker 1: friend of the show. She goes by the name of
Speaker 1: Anna Hernandez. She was elected State Senator Senator for the
Speaker 1: Arizona Legislative District twenty four and is currently the city
Speaker 1: councilwoman for District seven in Phoenix, Arizona. We're going to
Speaker 1: have a conversation about local politics, local politicians and their
Speaker 1: roles and how you can become a leader in your
Speaker 1: community by engaging in the democratic process and what all
Speaker 1: that entails. We're also going to learn about her because
Speaker 1: she is a phenomenal human being that we're all incredibly
Speaker 1: proud of here and in this city. And you know,
Speaker 1: you can replicate that success in whatever city you live in,
Speaker 1: because you know, the template is very similar. And then
Speaker 1: for the second half of the show, we're going to
Speaker 1: have a conversation about how we can be effective in
Speaker 1: accomplishing what it is that we feel we need to
Speaker 1: accomplish on a local level in what Q has implored
Speaker 1: me to call Trump's America. You know, these are some
Speaker 1: interesting times ahead, and this is one way that we
Speaker 1: can push back so all that so much more. But
Speaker 1: before we get there, it is time for some ebony excellence,
Speaker 1: shall we?
Speaker 2: You want to take this, sure, then you chot today's
Speaker 2: abny Excellence sponsored by Actively Black. There is greatness in
Speaker 2: our DNA. Visit actively black dot com. This is from
Speaker 2: the Black Information Network. Representative Jasmine Crockett highlighted the stunning
Speaker 2: hypocrisy of Republicans criticizing DEI while President elect Donald Trump
Speaker 2: uses his good old boy system to feel his cabinet positions.
Speaker 2: On Wednesday, November thirteenth, Crockett broke down the hypocrisy during
Speaker 2: an appearance on CNN, which came after Trump announced he
Speaker 2: was nominating former Florida Rep. Matt Gates for Attorney General.
Speaker 2: I mean, she said in a quote, we are just
Speaker 2: an uncharted territory. But if anybody is surprised, then I say,
Speaker 2: you haven't been paying attention because the reality is that
Speaker 2: we have someone that is not qualified morally or otherwise
Speaker 2: to be president of the United States. So why would
Speaker 2: we expect so why would his appointments be qualified?
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Quote.
Speaker 2: These are people that have rallied against diversity, equity inclusion,
Speaker 2: trying to say that diverse candidates are somehow not qualified,
Speaker 2: she continued, But the reality is that what they want
Speaker 2: to do is more of this, put people that are
Speaker 2: not qualified in and say, well, you know what, because
Speaker 2: he's my homeboy, he is qualified. That's not good enough.
Speaker 2: That is what the good old boys system has always
Speaker 2: been about. And it's why we have not ever reached
Speaker 2: our maximum potential end quote. Not think by we, she
Speaker 2: means our country. Conservatives have tried to use DEI as
Speaker 2: an insult to label qualified black people as undeserving of
Speaker 2: their accomplishments. Republicans previously criticized Vice President Kamala Harris as
Speaker 2: a DEI higher. Trump's cabinet picks have come under fire
Speaker 2: for their lack of experience in roles. Thus far, Trump
Speaker 2: tapped Fox News hosts Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense
Speaker 2: and former Rep. Tosy Gabbert, who lacks formal intelligence experience,
Speaker 2: as Director of National Intelligence Matt Gates as Attorney General.
Speaker 1: So shout out to Jasmine Crockett for holding it down
Speaker 1: for us and being the great warrior that she is,
Speaker 1: because that is indeed have any excellence that we need
Speaker 1: right about now. So and Hernandez, yes, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1: That was a mouthful to kind of step through.
Speaker 3: No, No, that's great. I love Jasmine Crocketts.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she's good people. So do us a favor. Yeah,
Speaker 1: tell us a little bit about your story, like your
Speaker 1: your background story. Yeah, we just touched on what it
Speaker 1: is you do right now and that we love you.
Speaker 1: But you know, tell us a little about you know,
Speaker 1: growing up, schooling.
Speaker 4: Just so people, I mean, my life prior to twenty
Speaker 4: nineteen was pretty boring. Born and raised here in Phoenix,
Speaker 4: the first generation daughter of Mexican born immigrants. So came
Speaker 4: from a very hard working family where we pitched in
Speaker 4: and help each.
Speaker 3: Other out our entire lives.
Speaker 4: And and it's funny because growing up, I didn't realize
Speaker 4: we grew up poor. I don't think I realized we
Speaker 4: were poor until I was in high school, and because
Speaker 4: it was just normal, right, it was what everybody around us,
Speaker 4: That's how we lived. But we made things happen, and so,
Speaker 4: you know, went to public public education, went to count
Speaker 4: Back High School, and really got into the workforce.
Speaker 3: So I didn't go to college.
Speaker 4: Got straight into the workforce and just climbed my way
Speaker 4: up there. Spent about eighteen years in corporate America and
Speaker 4: the finance world, so mortgage. Last three years of my
Speaker 4: career there was in commercial lending. Twenty nineteen, really got
Speaker 4: politically active after my little brother was killed by Phoenix
Speaker 4: PD in the middle of a mental health crisis. And so,
Speaker 4: you know, we grew up, as so many of us,
Speaker 4: believing and being told that police is there to help us.
Speaker 4: So we relied on that called for help in the
Speaker 4: middle of his crisis, and you know, he ended up
Speaker 4: being shot and killed, And that was really my entry
Speaker 4: way into being politically active to the level I'm at now.
Speaker 4: You know, faced a lot of hurdles in that, getting reports,
Speaker 4: getting his personal belongings. I would show up to Phoenix
Speaker 4: City council meetings to advocate for my family, and that
Speaker 4: just that's the trajection that I took to get where
Speaker 4: I'm at now. It would really start as a fight
Speaker 4: for my family and became a fight for the entire
Speaker 4: community and now really at the city and state level,
Speaker 4: and I think beyond that for so many communities that
Speaker 4: look like ours, right, that are people that come from
Speaker 4: where we come from, that experience the things that we experience.
Speaker 4: And so now here we are about eighteen months, about
Speaker 4: nineteen months after my brother was killed, we lost my
Speaker 4: dad to COVID, right, just another example of how the
Speaker 4: inequities and healthcare and in our communities we don't have
Speaker 4: the resources we need. He was forced to go back
Speaker 4: to work because he could you know, he just couldn't
Speaker 4: be home because they got bills to pay, as we
Speaker 4: all do.
Speaker 3: So those two it's really moved us to do I
Speaker 3: sit there and do I just like these losses can't
Speaker 3: be just for nothing.
Speaker 4: There has to be something that comes out of this,
Speaker 4: and so that's the entryway. So in twenty twenty two
Speaker 4: where I ran for the Arizona State Senate and won decisively.
Speaker 4: I beat a six year incumbent. It was technically an
Speaker 4: open seat, but I was going against someone that has
Speaker 4: been at the legislature for six years, has heavy name
Speaker 4: recognition in politics, has the money behind it, right, all
Speaker 4: the connections, and very high level name Zame cess Our Javis,
Speaker 4: no relation to the cess Our Javis, and beat him
Speaker 4: by fifteen points. Went to the Senate and did really
Speaker 4: really great work. Quickly kind of set myself apart because
Speaker 4: I was so in tune with the community and willing
Speaker 4: to work with anybody and have the conversations, but do
Speaker 4: it in a way where I'm pushing back on the
Speaker 4: hateful rhetoric that we hear in all the political spaces,
Speaker 4: but found the path to make some things happen. I
Speaker 4: want some people that probably would not I would never
Speaker 4: align with, but there was one area where we could
Speaker 4: work on.
Speaker 3: So picked on.
Speaker 4: Those things and led on some housing solutions at the
Speaker 4: state level, led on repeating the eighteen sixty four abortion
Speaker 4: band here in Arizona, led on starting the conversations at
Speaker 4: the state level about what police violence and ending state
Speaker 4: violence looks like. And now you know, made the jump
Speaker 4: to the city council. So I'm finishing up my term
Speaker 4: at the state Senate at the end of the year,
Speaker 4: and now I'm the councilwoman elect for the City of
Speaker 4: Phoenix for so many of the same reasons, and one
Speaker 4: very decisively in this last election.
Speaker 3: By fifty three percent of the vote. So yeah, now here,
Speaker 3: we are.
Speaker 2: Extremely proud of you.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just hearing your story and your why leading you
Speaker 2: to doing the work that you're doing for us. Now
Speaker 2: transitioning from one role to the other, listeners are finally
Speaker 2: wanting to know more.
Speaker 1: About how politics work.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm electing this person to do this job, but
Speaker 2: what does this person actually do in that role?
Speaker 1: So give us a.
Speaker 2: Little bit of background on the type of work a
Speaker 2: state senator does and the type of work that the
Speaker 2: city council woman does.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So at the state level, it's really interesting because the
Speaker 4: state level really controls how much money goes into our
Speaker 4: K twelve education, to our public education. A lot of
Speaker 4: the think of it. I think about this way. At
Speaker 4: the state level, we create the laws. At the city level,
Speaker 4: a lot of times we implement the laws, but we
Speaker 4: are tasked with also the two things that legally we
Speaker 4: do at the state level is pass a budget for
Speaker 4: the state of Arizona, which ours about sixteen sixteen billion
Speaker 4: dollars last year, and with that comes where is the
Speaker 4: money invested into? So we do that and pass laws
Speaker 4: that affect us every day. So think of back in
Speaker 4: the day s P. Ten seventy that was pasted at
Speaker 4: the state level. Currently, Proposition three fourteen was something that
Speaker 4: came out of the legislature that went to the voters.
Speaker 4: That is another version of show me your papers law, right,
Speaker 4: that's going to be used against communities of color here.
Speaker 3: So that's really at the state level.
Speaker 4: At the city level we have the most immediate impacted
Speaker 4: on our communities, from when your trash gets picked up
Speaker 4: to the parks. Do we have parks? Is there benches
Speaker 4: in the parks or public libraries? Your utilities, so your water,
Speaker 4: your power, that also gets that's within the purview of
Speaker 4: the city city council. Bus stops, is there bus stops
Speaker 4: at the bus stops? How many bus stops do we have?
Speaker 4: Public transportation? Pretty much everything that affects your daily life
Speaker 4: is handled at the city council level, and we have
Speaker 4: you know, because I was the same way. I didn't
Speaker 4: understand the impact that a city council has, right and
Speaker 4: for Phoenix, the city council oversees the Phoenix Police Department,
Speaker 4: which has been one of the deadliest forces in the country.
Speaker 4: We know, yeah, we all know, right, like because of
Speaker 4: an action of the city council to hold individuals accountable
Speaker 4: is where we're at now. So there's a lot that
Speaker 4: happens at the city council level, which for me made sense.
Speaker 4: Why make this jump now with the open seat the
Speaker 4: previous council member running for Congress and it became an
Speaker 4: open seat, and it was a trajectory I thought about
Speaker 4: in the long term, but you know, the moment, the
Speaker 4: window was here to do it now, and I think
Speaker 4: it's very timely for what is happening in the entire
Speaker 4: political landscape that you know, I made that jump and
Speaker 4: now we want and are going into the council.
Speaker 1: So you know, we don't get to have these types
Speaker 1: of conversations because you know, the moon and the stars
Speaker 1: need to align in order for it to be as
Speaker 1: really nag as it is now. But also, you know,
Speaker 1: we don't find ourselves talking to two people like you,
Speaker 1: and I suppose we could have the whole time, but
Speaker 1: now's the time. Yeah, And now's the time, and it's
Speaker 1: more important than ever. You've run two successful campaigns. Let's
Speaker 1: say that there's a listener who's in Tupelo, Mississippi. Sorry
Speaker 1: to below, we always pick on you, but we love you,
Speaker 1: we appreciate you airing the show. But say there's a
Speaker 1: listener in Tupelo, Mississippi, and this listener says, you know what,
Speaker 1: I I don't like what's happening in the political arena.
Speaker 1: I don't know what to do, but I can't do nothing,
Speaker 1: so I'm gonna do what I can. And they say,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna run for some local something in my own
Speaker 1: community and try to help shape outcomes for the people
Speaker 1: that I'm able to, yeah, to see and interact with.
Speaker 1: Talk to us about everything that goes into a campaign
Speaker 1: from that point to the point where you are.
Speaker 3: Oh a lot. Yeah, So it's a lot.
Speaker 4: You you know, there's gonna be a lot of sacrifices
Speaker 4: that are going to be made because your family and
Speaker 4: friends aren't going to see you during the campaign because
Speaker 4: you have to be on the doors. But I think
Speaker 4: the number one thing on the doors, yeah, knocking on doors,
Speaker 4: talking to your neighbors. I think the number one thing
Speaker 4: is that it's going to take a lot of hard
Speaker 4: work and you have to be willing to put in
Speaker 4: that work as the person that wants to run. Nobody
Speaker 4: should be telling you, hey, you need to get out
Speaker 4: there and go do the work, like we have to
Speaker 4: want to do this. And then it's about going out
Speaker 4: there and connecting with the community. So either going to
Speaker 4: community events that are being held in wherever whatever are
Speaker 4: you live in, talking to your neighbors, literally going out
Speaker 4: and knocking on strangers doors that you you probably didn't know,
Speaker 4: and going to make the case of why they should
Speaker 4: give you a chance. And that is really at the
Speaker 4: center of it. Is connecting with the community, talking to
Speaker 4: the voters in the community and connecting with them so
Speaker 4: they get to know you.
Speaker 3: And that has been what has been successful. But with that.
Speaker 4: Goes fundraising, right, we have to unfortunately fundraise money to run.
Speaker 1: So how does that look.
Speaker 3: It looks different for a lot of different people.
Speaker 4: I've gotten pretty creative because, as I said, I don't
Speaker 4: come from the Democratic Establishment Party, right. I didn't come
Speaker 4: in through this into politics through the typical way that
Speaker 4: a lot.
Speaker 3: Of people do.
Speaker 4: So I had to create my own grassroots, a pull
Speaker 4: of donors, hard working people, working class people that are
Speaker 4: willing to give me fifty dollars, twenty dollars, one hundred dollars,
Speaker 4: whatever they can to help make this happen. So I meant,
Speaker 4: you know, making phone calls, making phone calls to people
Speaker 4: that you know, people that you don't know, giving them
Speaker 4: your reason why, and then making the ask of will
Speaker 4: they invest into this vision. I got pretty creative where
Speaker 4: I would my family like sports, so if there was
Speaker 4: a boxing match, or if there was some big gaming event,
Speaker 4: usually my mom would be down to host it and
Speaker 4: I would make tacos and my family would come over
Speaker 4: and be like, Okay, here's you know, thirty forty bucks.
Speaker 4: And so got really creative that way. We can do
Speaker 4: fundraisers different way, but it's really about connecting with the
Speaker 4: folks that are gonna believe in your vision to invest
Speaker 4: into it.
Speaker 1: I want to I want to back up just a bit,
Speaker 1: give me a second cue, because I know you got something.
Speaker 1: But you said something about the coming into politics via
Speaker 1: the democratic established process. So this is something that I'm
Speaker 1: not intimately familiar with, and maybe a lot of our
Speaker 1: listeners aren't intimately familiar with as well. So what does
Speaker 1: that mean? So that we know what you did to
Speaker 1: circumvent that.
Speaker 4: So typically a lot of candidates will be plugged in
Speaker 4: with you know, I am a registered Democrat. I caucused
Speaker 4: with the Democratic Party. I'm part of the Democratic Party.
Speaker 4: But I didn't come in through the traditional route, So
Speaker 4: I didn't go to the party at different levels and
Speaker 4: you know, train with them become a candidate that they
Speaker 4: are going to uplift. I really came through the door
Speaker 4: through a grassroots movement, through my what I consider my
Speaker 4: movement home, which is bullet in action. They had already
Speaker 4: been organizing in the community, and so I came that route.
Speaker 3: But a lot of candidates rely.
Speaker 4: Every state and every city has a different makeup of
Speaker 4: how their Democratic Party functions. It's really hard to come
Speaker 4: in the door and be successful if you don't have
Speaker 4: the backing of the establishment. But we knew through our
Speaker 4: you know, years of organizing that if you go and
Speaker 4: talk to the people, that's where the real power lies.
Speaker 4: And so that's why I say, I didn't come through
Speaker 4: the establishment door, really came in through the community door.
Speaker 1: But Poe, their in action kind of gave you a
Speaker 1: little oh yeah absolutely, so yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 4: I mean if it wasn't for ball ed like, I
Speaker 4: wouldn't be here. They showed up, they were willing to
Speaker 4: throw down and do the work. I'm a member of
Speaker 4: one of their groups, the Family Justice Collective, and so
Speaker 4: that's how we built that.
Speaker 1: I want to say something to real quick right here. Hey,
Speaker 1: so back in twenty twenty when we were out protesting
Speaker 1: and all that sort of stuff, and then in the
Speaker 1: years that followed, Podir in Action They're always going to
Speaker 1: hold a special place in my heart. So shout out
Speaker 1: to poterir in Action. I tried to get them on
Speaker 1: the show a few times, but they're busy doing the
Speaker 1: actual work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well you got me through extents.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, so that's what makes me happy. But they
Speaker 1: they've they really showed up in a really meaningful way
Speaker 1: at a time when I was taking you know, mental
Speaker 1: notes of people who were allies to black people and
Speaker 1: you know this this most recent election. Forgive me, I
Speaker 1: know I'm hogging up all the time here, but it's
Speaker 1: most recent election, I've seen some some reactions of people
Speaker 1: to the exit polls, the numbers of Latino men and
Speaker 1: all that sort of stuff in there that's created some
Speaker 1: some harsh reactions. I will never forget Ramses, will never
Speaker 1: forget that I saw on the street who showed up
Speaker 1: for us in pote air reaction, which is like a
Speaker 1: hispanic I suppose that's how I would describe it. Led
Speaker 1: social justice push organization initiative something like that. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm not person that that appreciates division or anything
Speaker 1: like that, but if I can take a moment to
Speaker 1: just shout them out, i't want to do that, Thank you,
Speaker 1: my bad.
Speaker 2: A lot of people are justifiably frustrated with what often
Speaker 2: feels like apathy from the political infrastructure, lack of activity.
Speaker 2: People feel disconnected and ignored.
Speaker 1: And not seen.
Speaker 2: I imagine when you made the decision that you were going
Speaker 2: to become a part of the system, that that was
Speaker 2: part of the reason why talk to us about why
Speaker 2: it's so important to become a part of the system
Speaker 2: the way that you did. Instead of just kind of
Speaker 2: seemingly being frustrated by the lack of action on your
Speaker 2: behalf and on the behalf of your community.
Speaker 4: Well, I think we have to be real that this
Speaker 4: is not for everybody. Not everybody's going to function well
Speaker 4: inside the system, but when there are some of us
Speaker 4: that make sense and can handle that because the realities
Speaker 4: we're going to we're walking into very violent, work, very
Speaker 4: toxic environments where we deal with all the isms.
Speaker 3: Right, like all of them, but.
Speaker 4: We believe that who better to lead and have those
Speaker 4: positions of power than those directly impacted by the system, right,
Speaker 4: and by barriers that have been created through the system.
Speaker 4: I think for me, it's really important because we've never
Speaker 4: had at the state legislature a senator or House representative
Speaker 4: that has been directly impacted by police violence. So that
Speaker 4: completely changed the game as legislation would move forward. I
Speaker 4: was able to speak from a different point of view.
Speaker 4: I was able to share my story and move other
Speaker 4: legislators to really think about, hey, oh, this is really
Speaker 4: the impact. There was a piece of legislation my very
Speaker 4: first session, right, I'm brand new, have never run for office,
Speaker 4: like learning how to do this job, and there was
Speaker 4: a bill that came that would create these drug free
Speaker 4: neighborhood zones under the guise of trying to attack the
Speaker 4: Fentonel crisis. But when I read the piece of legislation,
Speaker 4: I knew how it was going to be used, and
Speaker 4: so I raised a flag. And this is a bill
Speaker 4: that would have moved forward. And this was a law
Speaker 4: that was going to be on the books that was
Speaker 4: going to be used to criminalize black and brown people, right,
Speaker 4: because that's another pathway to introduce policing into our communities
Speaker 4: or expand the scope of policing. And I raised a
Speaker 4: flag and just went really hard within my own cockets
Speaker 4: and was able to get that bill held. And that
Speaker 4: bill never moved forward, and so things like that, that's
Speaker 4: why it's important to be in these spaces because through
Speaker 4: our experience and sharing our stories and as hard as
Speaker 4: it is, as emotionally draining as it is, it's a responsibility.
Speaker 4: And so it was my responsibility to share my story
Speaker 4: to move people, to move my colleagues to support opposition
Speaker 4: or you know, in support of certain legislation. So for me,
Speaker 4: that's the biggest why why it's so important to be
Speaker 4: inside the system while we are also working outside of
Speaker 4: the system.
Speaker 1: You know, one of the things that I'll never really
Speaker 1: understand is how this country treats drugs like it's a
Speaker 1: criminal issue and not a health issue, and they will
Speaker 1: dedicate endless resources to criminalizing something that hasn't gone away.
Speaker 1: And you know, we say it jokingly that drugs won
Speaker 1: the War on drugs. Yeah, and it's certainly certain types
Speaker 1: of drugs that affect black and brown people are more
Speaker 1: heavily criminalized than drugs that affect non black communities. But
Speaker 1: you know, it's I think having a voice like yours,
Speaker 1: having a seat at the table, having someone with some
Speaker 1: perspective who can offer some insight because a lot of
Speaker 1: people I think that they don't think that they're being
Speaker 1: racist or ignorant or whatever. Yes, but their behavior and
Speaker 1: their action is just it. It literally is ignorant. And
Speaker 1: so you know, I applaud you, and I applaud the
Speaker 1: work that you're doing because folks like us know how
Speaker 1: necessary it is.