October 8, 2020 • 47 mins
Sheyann Webb-Christburg was eight years old when she first met Martin Luther King, Jr. It was late 1964 and Dr. King was in Selma, Alabama, to organize a voter registration campaign to draw attention to the need for legislation that would ensure Black Americans could safely and freely vote, because in the 1960s, particularly in Southern states like Alabama, that was certainly not the case. “Black folks couldn’t vote,” Sheyann’s father said when asked if he had ever cast a ballot. On this episode of Turnout with Katie Couric, Katie explores the historic struggle of Black enfranchisement — from the moments of brief political prosperity during Reconstruction, to the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, the election of President Barack Obama, and the ongoing fight to restore voting rights to people with past convictions. Woven throughout the episode is Sheyann’s story of being Martin Luther King’s smallest Freedom Fighter and what she witnessed on that Bloody Sunday in Selma in 1965. Katie also interviews Desmond Meade, President and Executive Director of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, about his inspiring life story as a formerly homeless returned citizen who in 2018 helped restore voting rights to 1.4 million Floridians.
More about the guests and organizations featured in this episode:
Sheyann Webb-Christburg, civil rights activist, youth advocate and co-author of the book and movie “Selma, Lord, Selma.”
Gilda Daniels, law professor at the University of Baltimore law school, litigation director at the Advancement Project, and author of “Uncounted: The Crisis of Voter Suppression in America.”
Dr. Carol Anderson, the Charles Howard Candler Professor of African American Studies at Emory University, author of several books including, “One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression is Destroying Our Democracy.”
Desmond Meade, president and executive director of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition and author of “Let My People Vote: My Battle to Restore the Civil Rights of Returned Citizens.”
Annette Scott, a volunteer with The League of Women Voters, working primarily with the New Jersey Reentry Corporation leading voter registration education.
*Content warning: This episode contains descriptions of violence that some listeners might find disturbing.*
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It was when I was eight years old growing up
in Selmo, when my life was changing without medieval Morman.
My name is Cheyenne Webb Christburg. I was a little
eight year old girl growing up in George, Washington, Carbo projects.
(00:20):
It was rough. Both my parents worked in the factories
to feed us, to take care of us the best
way that they allowed. But I'll never forget the day
that I met Dr Martin of the King Jr. As
I would know him to do, I would always have
to walk past now the historic Brown's chapelain em the church.
(00:45):
In nineteen sixty four, Martin Luther King Jr. And his
civil rights organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Council, came to Selma,
Alabama to start a voter registration campaign, and little eight
year old Cheyenne was in immediately swept up. He told us,
I want to see you children before I leave, because
(01:05):
I'm coming back to sell to start a movement. But
I became very disobedient as that little girl. My parents
just couldn't do anything with me. They didn't want me
to be a part of anything that reflected being a
part of that movement. Despite her parents misgivings, Cheyenne began
(01:28):
sneaking out of the house to attend community organization meetings
that were being held at the church. It was at
those meetings that she was exposed to the ministry and
principles of Martin Luther King. Dr King would talk about
the African Americans who didn't have the right to vote,
and he started talking about a march that would be
(01:51):
taking place and sell my Alabama for African Americans to
gain their right to vote. I'm Katie crac and this
is and now this week we're exploring how America's fight
for voting rights is wrapped up in the ongoing struggle
for racial justice. And all I remember is trying to
(02:11):
explain to my parents about what Dr King was talking about.
And I asked them that they have the right to vote,
And of course my dad didn't even want to talk
about He told me no black folks could vote. But
why not? After all, when the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified
(02:33):
in eighteen seventy, it guaranteed that the right to vote
could no longer be denied based on race, color, or
previous condition of servitude. So why did so many black
people not vote before the nineteen sixties. You may remember
from our last episode that author Gilda Daniels asked her
grandmother that very same question, why didn't she vote before
(02:56):
the nineteen sixties, and got the same answer. The black
people didn't vote because they could lose their land, they
could lose their lives. It was not because they did
not want to vote. It's because of all these mechanisms
they were put in place to certainly prevent them from
doing so. To understand why black people couldn't vote, we
have to go back about one hundred years to Reconstruction,
(03:19):
when the country was trying to knit itself back together,
reintegrating the Confederate States as well as four million formally
enslaved people into the United States. It was a turbulent time,
to say the least. After the Civil War, there was
a period where the violence was so intense against African Americans.
(03:41):
I mean just this unmitigated rage that they had the
audacity now to not be property. Dr Carol Anderson is
an African American studies professor at Emory University and author
of One Person, No Vote, How voter suppression is destroying
our democracy. And we had a president Andrew Johnson, and
(04:04):
he was horrifically racist and shortsighted, and he was fine
with what Harvard law professor Annette Gordon Reid called the
slow motion genocide that was happening to black people in
the South. Well, the radical Republicans, and I love that term.
We had radical Republicans. The radical Republicans in Congress looked
(04:27):
up at what Johnson had done and just said not today.
It may seem a little strange given today's politics, but
Andrew Johnson was a Democrat. Radical Republicans believed blacks were
entitled to the same political rights and opportunities as whites.
What also made them radical was that they wanted the
(04:48):
federal government to do something about it, to directly intervene
in the state's affairs to help get the country and
all of its people to a more perfect union. There
was the Civil Rights Act of eighteen sixty six that
dealt with citizenship to make it clear that black people
were citizens. Then there was the Reconstruction Act of eighteen
(05:12):
sixty seven. All men twenty one years and over will
be registered to vote. That meant that black men would
be registered to vote. Oh. Then the radical Republicans were
concerned that if they just had these laws, at some
point there may be a shift in the balance in Congress,
(05:36):
and they wanted to make sure that the rights of
all American citizens were protected. And that wasn't going to
happen with just a law that could be easily over ridden,
So they embedded it in the US Constitution. The fourteenth
Amendment dealt with birthright citizenship. If you're born here, you're
a citizen. Wow. Then came the Fifteenth Amendment in eighteen seventy.
(06:03):
The fifteenth Amendment said the United States nor the States
shall abridge the right to vote on account of race, color,
or previous condition of servitude. One of the other things
that they did is they passed the Enforcement Act. It
was the third Enforcement Act of eighteen seventy one. Because
(06:24):
the ku Klux Klan was reigning down massive domestic terrorism
on black people who were trying to vote, and the
federal government did not have the full authority it felt
to go in there and stop them. The Enforcement Act
was to in domestic terrorism and to protect African Americans
(06:44):
right to vote. So this is just I mean, it's
like boom, boom boom. The radical Republicans were building the
House of Democracy. What happened next was a period a
very brief period in the eighteen seventies of political prosperity
for blacks in America. In the South, more than half
(07:07):
a million black men became voters in several states, including Mississippi,
black people were the majority of the population, and during
that decade Mississippi actually sent two black senators to Washington.
But then came the backlash. The white state legislators looked
up in Mississippi said oh, well, we can't have this,
(07:30):
and so they come up with the Mississippi Plan. And
what the Mississippi Plan does is it says, how do
we stop black people from voting without writing a law
that explicitly says, we don't want black people to vote. Ah,
we're going to couch it in the language of democracy,
protecting the integrity of the ballot box, ensuring that there's
(07:52):
no corruption in our elections. But what it does is
it uses the society and pose conditions on African Americans
and makes those conditions the access to the ballot box.
And so, for instance, the poll tax, the poll tax
(08:13):
couched in this language says democracy is expensive, and so
if you really believed in democracy, you would be willing
to pay a small fee in order to ensure that
this democracy runs smoothly. So what you see there is
this language that flips the responsibility of free and fair
elections off of the state and onto the individual. So
(08:38):
it's a wickedly evil rhetorical device and also very effective.
And what it does is it makes it seem like
the poll tax is nominal. How hard is it to
pay just this little fee. Well, after you have had
centuries of unpaid labor because of slavery centuries, and then
(09:05):
you have had the Black codes coming out of the
Civil War, which reimposed slavery by another name, and then
after that you have share cropping, systemic endemic, societally imposed
poverty rained down on that black community, so that the
poll tax actually required between two to six percent of
(09:30):
a Mississippi farm famili's annual income. Imagine paying two to
six percent of your annual income to vote. Then there's
the literacy test, when you have killed the enslaved who
dare learn how to read to then require the reading
(09:53):
of a complicated legal text in order to be able
to vote. In the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that
the poll tax and the literacy test did not violate
the Fifteenth Amendment because everybody had to pay the poll
(10:15):
tax and everybody had to read, so how could this
be racially discriminatory? After that, you saw a number of
states revised their state constitutions to include the Mississippi Plans
disfranchisement policies in there. And the result was that by
(10:39):
the time we get to nineteen forty, only three per
cent of age eligible African Americans in the South are
registered to vote three percent. The Second World War has
already started, and we're looking at a democracy that is
so war is so gnarrowed in the United States, where
(11:05):
of black eligible voters have been blocked from the ballot
box in the South, and the majority of African Americans
lived in the South. By the time we get to
Selma in Dallas County, where Selma is, only point nine
(11:30):
of African Americans age eligible African Americans were registered to
vote point nine percent. We'll return to Selma right after
this short break. Congress passes the most sweeping civil rightsville
(12:00):
ever to be written into the law unless reaffirms the conception.
In nineteen sixty four, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the
Civil Rights Act. The Civil Rights Act is a challenge
to all of us to go to work in our communities,
in our states, in our harms, and in our hearts
to eliminate the last vestiges of injustice in our beloved country.
(12:26):
It was a landmark piece of legislation. It banned segregation
in public places and discrimination in the workplace, but with
racism running deep, just listen to Alabama Governor George Wallace
in nineteen sixty three, there was so much it didn't
(12:48):
do to ensure blacks had the right to vote. Which
brings us back to Selma and Cheyenne. I'm shy in
Webb Christburg. Dr Martin is the King's smallest freedom fighter
and Dr King's voter registration campaign. Beginning in January, freedom
fighters staged nonviolent demonstrations in Selma to push for another
(13:12):
piece of legislation guaranteeing all Black Americans the right to vote.
As I continue to participate in the movement, where many
other freedom fighters would come from other places, other states
to join that movement to change things into helping fighting
(13:35):
for the right to vote, and I started bringing them
to my home and asking my parents could they live
with us and stay with us, And soon they would
be living in our homes. But I'll never forget what
was the most traumatic experience of my life, and that
(13:59):
was the blood Son de March. The march was meant
to be a big push by organizers to register black
voters across Alabama and to attract national press coverage. The
plan was to walk peacefully from Selma to the state
capital of Montgomery, fifty four miles. Many threats had been
(14:21):
made about the possibilities of what would happen to anyone
who would participate on that particular march, and I'll never
forget my parents talking to me the night before. I'm
telling me that something could possibly happen to me if
(14:41):
I participated in that march. Governor Wallace ordered the Highway
Patrol chief to use quote whatever measure necessary to prevent
the march from happening. Organizers, including the late Congressman John
Lewis and jose Williams, decided to proceed anyway. On Sunday,
(15:02):
March seven, at around noon, six hundred protesters, walking in
two lines, left the Brown Chapel Amy Church and headed
for the Edmund Pettis Bridge. Tucked into that group of
freedom fighters, I'll never forget it was young Cheyenne, the
special instructions that were given by Congressman John Lewis. He
(15:26):
asked that all marches walk quietly, keep their heads straight
and forward, and regardless of what happened, everyone would be
none wound. At the base of the bridge, the marchers
were met by one hundred and fifty Alabama state troopers
(15:47):
and sheriff deputies. A state trooper made this announcement over
a bull horn. The marchers did not disperse, They did
not go home or back to their church. They stood still.
(16:07):
And I remember vividly as I looked down, it was
like a seal. I saw hundreds of police were with
tear gas, masks, billy clothes to say, troops on horses.
I saw the dogs, and my heart had begun to
(16:31):
rumble and beat fast. I just knew, as that little girl,
that something was gonna happen. The troopers advanced slowly at first,
but then picking up speed until they plowed right through
the marchers, knocking them down. Racism unleashed its brutality of police.
(17:00):
Tear gas had begun to burst in the air, and
tear gas is a strong, burning sensation where you can't
hardly see your way, and as people had begun to run.
People were being beaten down with billy clubs. The dogs
(17:24):
and the horses were pushing their way into the crowd
and trampling people over as if they weren't hunan beings.
You can see people crawling, falling, crying, bleeding, and of
(17:46):
course my eyes were burning, and I was running, like
many others, trying to make my way home. I was
very frightened, trembling and really not knowing what to do
except to get home. And as I was running out,
(18:08):
I could still see the horses the dogs still trampling
over people as they were trying to make their way
back to Brown's Chapter church. And as I was running,
I'll never forget the late Josean Williams picking me up,
(18:30):
and my little legs were still galloping in his arms.
My eyes were burning, I couldn't hardly see, and I
turned to him and I said to him, in my
own childish voice, put me down, because you are not
(18:50):
running faster. And that picture of bloody Sunday had never
left my heart. By the events of that Sunday afternoon
were captured by newscasters and journalists, and that night, Sunday
(19:12):
Night Movie will present Stanley Kramer's Academy Award winning Motion
Picture Judgment at Nuremberg. Forty eight million people were watching
ABC's broadcast of the star studded movie Judgment at Nuremberg,
about the trials that took place in Germany following the Holocaust.
(19:33):
And here in our decision, this is what we stand for, justice,
true and the value of a single human being. But
the network interrupted the movie to report on what had
happened in Selma that day. We interrupt this program to
(19:55):
bring you a special report from ABC News. In the
day's and weeks that followed, public support for the protesters surged,
and a federal judge ruled in favor of the marchers.
They had told us we wouldn't get here. Fourteen days
after bloody Sunday, olds who said that we would get
here only over that dead body, Martin Luther King Jr.
(20:19):
Successfully Led thousands of demonstrators across the Edmund Pettis Bridge
and onto Montgomery. All the world today knows that we
are here, and we are standing before the forces of
power in the state of Alabama saying we ain't gonna
let nobody turn us ride. And because America could not
(20:46):
unsee the horrors of that bloody Sunday last March. With
the outrage of Selma still, legislators were motivated to do
something about it and asked the Congress and the people
for swift and for sweeping action to guarantee to every
(21:08):
man and woman the right to vote. The bill passed
the Senate by an overwhelming majority, seven to nineteen. Thus
this is a victory for the freedom of the American
and my parents, but it is also a victory for
(21:30):
the freedom of the American nation became registered voice and
every family across this great, entire searching land, and when
they went to vote, they lived stronger in liberty. They
took me with them. That was one of the most
prouder to be American, happiest momentous feeling and moss for
(21:52):
me that I've ever had because of the act that
you have passed that I was signed today. On August six, nineteen,
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law.
To understand how important that law has become in the
(22:15):
history of this country, author Gilda Daniel says, you can
simply look to how presidents have described it. President Ronald
Reagan called it a crown jewel. Glendon Baines Johnson said
that it was monumental, and it was monumental. Indeed, when
you think about the power of the Voting Rights Act,
you do think about the ability to elect representatives right
(22:37):
for people who can represent you and represent your viewpoints.
And and even President Barack Obama attributed the Voting Rights
Act to his success because of campaigns like this, essentially
said that he would not have been possible the Voting
Rights Act was passed if there was not a Voting
Rights Act. Of nine political and economic and social barriers
(22:58):
came down, and the change these men and women wrought
is visible here today in the presence of African Americans
who run boardrooms, who sit on the bench, who serve
in elected office, from small towns to big cities, from
the Congressional Black Caucus all the way to the Old
Office because of what they did. But in two thousand
(23:22):
and thirteen, the Voting Rights Act of nineteen sixty five
faced a major setback when the Supreme Court ruled that
the Voting Rights Act had essentially served its purpose and
significantly weakened it. That led states to implement their own laws.
For example, within twenty four hours of the Supreme Court decision,
(23:43):
Texas announced it would put in place a strict voter
i D law in oral arguments. Race based voting discrimination
still exists, no doubt. The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
led the descent the great man who led the march
from Selma to Montgomery. In her argument, she echoed the
(24:03):
words of Martin Luther King Jr. Who in nineteen seven
presciently said the road ahead would not always be smooth.
Then of the moral universe is long, he said, but
it ends toward justice. If there is a steadfast commitment
to see the task through two completion. That commitment has
(24:29):
been disserved by today's decision. We'll be right back. When
you look at all of these issues together, you see
the system. This is a system of discrimination. Again, Author
(24:54):
and law professor Gilda Daniels. It takes a lot of
different names. In of nineteen hundreds we called it a
poll tax, and the day we called it voter I D.
Or it used to be a literacy test. Now it's
proof of citizenship. So you might have called the different things,
but it still has the same impact. It still has
the same effect, and that is that it disproportionately disenfranchises
(25:16):
people of color a big part of that system of discrimination.
Our felony disenfranchise meant laws which bar people from voting
because of prior criminal convictions, and there are some alarming
stats that show the racial disparities of those laws. In
two thousand nineteen, the Sentencing Project reported that Black Americans
(25:37):
who are old enough to vote are more than four
times as likely to lose their voting rights than the
rest of the adult population. In some states, one in
five black adults is disenfranchised. All told, there are about
two point two million Black Americans who are banned from
voting because of past convictions. How do you want need
(26:00):
to address you, Katie? Really? Okay? Alright? No, no, Luckily
there are people fighting to right that wrong. The loss
of civil rights is not something that's highlighted. Doing fleet
bargain right. At the end of the day, what you're
concerned about is how much time you will or will
(26:22):
not have to do how soon you can get out
of president Desmond Mead is the president and executive director
of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, which is dedicated to
ending the disenfranchisement and discrimination of people who have been incarcerated,
also known as return citizens. I remember a priest many
(26:42):
years ago said that a person is caught for committing
a crime, he's convicted, sentenced to prison, who serves this
time and the minute he walked out of the prison gates,
that's when his real sentence starts. Now. The reason I
wanted to talk to Desmond is that in two thousand eighteen,
he was instrumental in passing Amendment four, amendment to Florida's Constitution,
(27:05):
the amendment that will restore voting rights to one point
five million people who already paid their debt to society
and had felony records. That passed. So whatever happens tonight,
that amendment is going to be hugely important. It was
an extraordinary achievement personally and professionally because he is also
a return citizen. As a young man, Desmond was convicted
(27:29):
on drug charges and spent time in prison for possession
of a firearm. But his lowest point when he was released,
I was standing in front of railroad tracks in South Florida,
waiting on a train to come so I can jump
in front of it. That day that I stood there,
I was a broken man. I mean I was homeless.
(27:49):
I was addicted to drugs, recently released from prison, unemployed,
didn't own anything but the clothes on my back, and
I didn't see a light at the end of the time.
But I had other plans, and that train didn't come,
and so I crossed those tracks and I walked about
a couple of blocks further and I checked myself into
drug treatment. Desmond was able to turn his life around.
(28:12):
He went back to school and did so well. He
eventually earned a law degree. Yes, and so the add
to that what you said, I'm also a first time author, right.
I just wrote my book let My People Vote, that
actually talks about the journey. Congratulations, Desmond, That's quite an
(28:33):
inspiring story. When did you realize that you were not
considered a full citizen by the state of Florida In
the summer of two thousand and six was the first
time I realized it because I was introduced to Royal
Rights Restoration Coalition, and that's when I first learned about
(28:55):
the loss of civil rights. It started taking all more
prominence when I was in law school and and and
and really discovered that even though I was able to
overcome so many obstacles, even though I was doing well
in law school and I would eventually graduate with my
law degree. Uh, the Florida Bar would not even allow
(29:15):
me to sit for the exam until my civil rights
have been restored. And then I guess the final blow
that was like a punch to the gut was in
twenty sixteen when my wife Sena rans for office. She
wanted to uh become a state representative for Florida, And
in the middle of her campaign, someone approached me and
(29:38):
said in that Desmond, I know that you're excited about
being able to vote for your wife, and like it
was like a blow to my gut. Reminded me, Wow,
because I live in Florida, I can't even vote for
my own wife. You know, forget the fact that presidents
in Puerto Rico were able to vote. Forget about the
fact that in Maine of Vermont, you know, presidents are
able to vote, and throughout this kind treat in Georgia
(30:01):
and Texas, UH that people are able to vote after
they've served their time. Because I lived in Florida, I
wasn't even allowed to vote for my own wife. What
were the rules that were in place that we're disenfranchising
all these people? Well, let me tell you, um, prior
to Amendment for anyone convicted of any felony offense lost
(30:23):
the right to vote for life, lost all of their
civil rights. Now, let me tell you in Florida, that
means that if you're driving with a suspended license, you
can lose the right to vote for life. If you
burn a tire in public, If you go lobster hunt
and you catch a lobster which tell is too short,
you can lose the right to vote for life. If
(30:44):
you're walking on the beach, you admiring the sunset, and
you disturbed turtle nesting eggs, you would lose the right
to vote for life. If you're like this gentleman in
Broward County on Valentine's Day rather who, rather than giving
his wife a dozen roses, released twelve red balloons in
the air, you could lose the right to vote for
(31:08):
the rest of your life. And the only chance that
you would get those rights back were if you were
lucky enough to appear before the governor and beg him
for climacy right brav le at their feet and understanding
that their decision about whether or not to let you
be able to vote again is a purely arbitrary decision.
(31:32):
You know, let me let me give you some numbers.
You know, the current policy that we were under before
Amendment four require the person to wait either five or
seven years after they have completed their sentence before they're
able to just apply to have their civil rights restored.
(31:53):
And then once they apply, we've seen waiting times between
eight to ten years. And so you've seen person waiting
upwards of eighteen years after they have applied to have
their righteous stored, and when they walk into the climacy hearing,
they stand less than point zero zero one percent of
(32:13):
a chance of getting their righteous story. And you know what,
this is no longer theoretical, right, because I myself just
went through this process right to where over nineteen years,
not only have I remained crime free, but I have
dedicated my life to giving back to my community so
(32:34):
much so that I've been named Central Floridian of the Year,
Floridian of the Year, and even Time magazine one hundred
most influential person in the world. And I appear before
the Climacy Board and they can't even make a decision
on that right. And so that is the type of
(32:54):
process that have been in place prior to him and
be four and oh, you know, we knew that. You know,
at the end of the day, that was too much
power for four politicians to hold to decide which American
citizens get the vote and which don't. Right, no matter
what their political party is, whether it's Democrats, Republicans, or whatever.
(33:16):
No politician to have that absolute hour like that because
that leads room for partisan politics to impact those decisions, right,
especially when their arbitrary decisions. And so that was one
of the flashpoints that made me believe that we had
to take that power out of the hands of politicians
(33:39):
and put it in the hands of the people. That's
exactly what we did. I wanted to ask you, you're
talking about felony convictions, but putting twelve balloons into the
air instead of giving someone twelve roses, that's a felony.
That's a third degree felony in the state of Florida.
And a quick good you can search you will find
(34:01):
the story he released the twelve balloons in the air
and and the law enforcement officers seeing them and promptly arresting.
So when we hear I think when the average person
here's felony, doesn't they think a serious crime? And you know,
let me tell you something and that and that, uh, Katie,
let me tell you that is part of my mission
(34:22):
is to really expose how politicians can use rhetoric right
to divide our country, right and and and they divided
through through hayden and and fear and create these narratives
that make people think about something that actually doesn't exist. Right.
And so, for instance, when you talk about the felony conviction,
(34:44):
you're gonna think of the worst person in the world,
and you're more to likely going to think African American
because we're paraded more than anyone else. But here's some realities.
Even though Florida convicts about a hundred and seventy thousand
people a year, less than twenty I presented them or
even sentence to prison. And then even of the overwhelming
(35:06):
number of that small group are there for less serious offenses.
When we looked at the entire population of people who
have been convicted and incarcerated, what we found was that
people convicted of murder and all kinds of felony sexual
offenses only made up you ready for this, less than
(35:26):
three percent of the total amount of people right who
have been impacted. Right, And so we we we know
that you know that we have this challenge of fighting
back against a narrative that's been created not by the people,
but by politicians that seek to divide this country, because
(35:47):
as long as this country is divided, they can't be
held accountable. Right, And so though we fight back at
that at every turn, every opportunity that we have to
really set the story straight, at the end of the day,
At the end of the day, it is in society's
best interests. That don't matter what a person does. Right,
(36:08):
if they're convicted, if their sentenced, they paid their debt,
and their their released back into our community or already
in our community, it's in everyone's interests for them to
be able to successfully reintegrate. It is in everyone's interests
for all of our citizens to participate in election, because
(36:29):
the more people that vote, the more vibrant our democracy becomes.
And that's good for everybody. Tell us about Florida Amendment
for because you designed it. Yeah, yeah, Amendment For was
um basically to create a pathway. And and I tell
(36:50):
people today that in spite of whatever subsequent legislation may
have emerged, the one thing that we know is that
we've already won. We won when We passed Amendment For
because now enshrined in our states Constitution, is an alternate
pathway to be able to participate in our democracy without
(37:12):
having to beg any politicians. It restores voting rights two
individuals who have been convicted of a felony offense who
have completed their sentence, as long as they have not
been convicted of murder or they have not been convicted
of felony sexual offenses. If those individuals have been convicted
(37:34):
of those crimes, there are still a pathway to be
able to vote again, but they would have to go
through the clinacy process. But everyone else, once they have
completed their senates, they have the right to vote. We
had over five for a million people that voted yes
for Amendment For. We had a million more people that
voted for us than any candidate that was running for governor,
(37:56):
which shows the broad base of support that we have
and we o the world. We showed the State of
Florida that love can in fact, when the day that
we can bring people together, that we don't have to
tear each other down, that we could come together along
the lines of humanity in spite of our political differences,
(38:16):
in spite of our racial anxieties that we can bring
people together and move major issues that benefit society. But
love didn't last, apparently, Desmond, because after this was passed
in two thousand and eighteen, things got complicated. The Republican
legislature passed a law s B seven oh six six,
(38:40):
basically clarifying the amendment and saying in order to register
to vote, felons had to pay their financial penalties. Out
of the nearly one point five million felons who regained
the right to vote, seven hundred and seventy four thousand
lost the right because of debt. I won't say, okay,
I wouldn't say that they lost the right. I said
(39:02):
that they were delayed access to the right that was
conferred upon them, you know. And then the other piece
of that, O, Katie, Yes, seven hundred and seventy four
thousand individuals have some type of legal financial obligation that
they have to satisfy before being able to register the vote.
But what that also says is that there are five
to six hundred thousand returning citizens that don't have that
(39:26):
barrier in front of them, that they can also right
now today register to vote and be a part of
our democracy. What my ancestors had to fight through the
lynchings and the and the dogs and the fire hoses
for that. This franchise is so dog gone important that
(39:46):
it needs to be accessible to everyone because the one time,
you know, when I walk in that voting move, Katie,
I have just as much power as Jeff Bezos, I
have just as much power as Bill Gates. That is
the one equalizing force in this country is that voting booth.
And it should not be barricaded. It shouldn't We should
(40:07):
not be prevented from being able to experience that just
because we're too poor. Who will be able to vote
in Florida on November three, Oh my god, on November three,
they're gonna be like returning citizens who have satisfied their
legal obligations or have had others satisfied their legal obligations
(40:30):
for them, and have registered to vote. We're gonna be
able to show up and participate in election. And you
know what, Katie, They're not coming by themselves. They're bringing
their family, they're bringing their friends, they're bringing their community
to celebrate the expansion of democracy. And I know on
November three that they're gonna be people that's gonna be
(40:51):
walking into that voting booth with their shoulders thrown back
in their chests out right knowing that they are now
finally a part of its democracy. And there's going to
be some tears. I know they are. I know I'm
going to be crying right knowing that that we exist
and that I've voiced the matter. And there are people
that's waiting. There are people that's literally dying to get
(41:14):
to that point right there, and so I can't wait
to see what happened. While Desmond Mead continues to fight
on behalf of return citizens in court, others are fighting
on the ground or over zoom. Good morning everyone. My
name is and If Scott. I'm from the League of
(41:36):
Women Voters. And what I do with three entry programs
is I give voter education registration and that's Scott volunteers
to help return citizens understand their rights. There's a lot
of misinformation out there what people with criminal records can
and can't do very state by state. But luckily, and
(41:57):
that's a history buff who loves of sharing her research,
most people in New Jersey do not know the law
that prevents people who are incarcerated and previously on altivation
has been in Affections eighteen forty four. The half a
dozen people who have joined this call have been recently
(42:19):
released from prison and are on parole or probation. The
fact that they now have the right to vote in
New Jersey is a new law that went into effect
just this past March, and when anyone who is incorpirated,
as soon as they leave, they can register immediately to
Now what a lot of people do is they asked me,
(42:41):
is well, I committed two, three, four whatever felonies, so
I can't vote in New Jersey And that's not true.
Once you're released from any correctional facility, you can register
to vote. There's a lot that Annette has to cover,
like key voting deadlines to receive your application is October thirteenth.
(43:03):
How to fill out the registration forms and how to
send them in. If you do it online, you're okay.
If you don't, just post it on it and you
print your own form and she does it one voter
at a time. Does anyone have any questions for me?
What is the name of the website to registering? Okay?
(43:24):
When you can do use your local one, which is
um Middlesex County dot James. She loves her work, but
says the hardest part is hearing why people think the
voting isn't important. I think it's a waste of time.
I don't want, I don't vote, I never have voting.
(43:45):
It doesn't count, it means nothing. Okay, Now, if they
saw me, I would be read as a beat tomato
and anything else you could see. Because I get so
upset when the citizen does this because they don't know
(44:06):
the history. So then what I do is I go
back and tell them. When I was a young child
growing up, every night on the news, I watched people
trying to register, not vote. Register. They were had dogs
set upon them, the police beat them with batons, they
(44:30):
were fire holes, and the most horrible, horrible thing of all,
they were killed. So nothing else. I vote in their honor.
And some will say to me, oh oh I never
knew that. Oh okay, our register. And there's a few
(44:51):
that will say, yeah, okay, well that was then. But
I still don't see no use in it. And then
I have to tell myself and that you can't convince everyone.
If you convince eight or nine out of ten, you're
doing good. The tent leave and maybe another day, but
(45:16):
then that Scott refuses to quit. Well, I'm hoping all
of you will register, and more than anything, I'm hoping
you will vote this year. Whoever it's for, it doesn't matter,
but please exercise your right to vote. I thank all
of you. I wish you the very best, and if
(45:38):
you have any questions and anything else that I can
help you with registration, I certain you will. Next week
on Turnout, you've taken the challenge and you've chosen to
be a disinformation fighter. Put on your cape Democracy Heroes,
it's time for your training. You are a newly deputized
troll buster. We're so glad to have you on our team.
(46:00):
Voter suppression looks a little different these days, and our
viral virtual world. How to combat the spread of disinformation.
That's next week on Turnout. Hey, listeners, before we go,
I just want to remind you that though we're getting
down to the wire, there is still time in some
states to check your registration to make sure you can
(46:23):
vote in this very important election. To make that process easier,
I've partnered with the social justice organization Do Something. Find
out how to check your registration or registered to vote
by texting Katie to three A three eight three. You
can also go to vote dot org to find out
where and how to vote in your state, and of course,
(46:46):
subscribe to my morning newsletter wake Up Call for the
latest election information. Turnout is a production of I Heart
Media and Katie Curic Media. The executive producers are Katie
Curic and Courtney Litts. Supervising producers Lauren Hansen. Associate producers
Derek Clements, Eliza Costas and Emily Pento. Editing by Derreck
(47:07):
Clements and Lauren Hansen, Mixing by Derrick Clements. Our researcher
is Gabriel Loser and special thanks to my right hand
woman Adriana Fasio. You can follow me at all my
election coverage at Katie Currek. Meanwhile, yes, I'm Katie Currek.
Thanks so much for listening everyone. We'll see you next time.
It was when I was eight years old growing up
in Selmo, when my life was changing without medieval Morman.
My name is Cheyenne Webb Christburg. I was a little
eight year old girl growing up in George, Washington, Carbo projects.
(00:20):
It was rough. Both my parents worked in the factories
to feed us, to take care of us the best
way that they allowed. But I'll never forget the day
that I met Dr Martin of the King Jr. As
I would know him to do, I would always have
to walk past now the historic Brown's chapelain em the church.
(00:45):
In nineteen sixty four, Martin Luther King Jr. And his
civil rights organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Council, came to Selma,
Alabama to start a voter registration campaign, and little eight
year old Cheyenne was in immediately swept up. He told us,
I want to see you children before I leave, because
(01:05):
I'm coming back to sell to start a movement. But
I became very disobedient as that little girl. My parents
just couldn't do anything with me. They didn't want me
to be a part of anything that reflected being a
part of that movement. Despite her parents misgivings, Cheyenne began
(01:28):
sneaking out of the house to attend community organization meetings
that were being held at the church. It was at
those meetings that she was exposed to the ministry and
principles of Martin Luther King. Dr King would talk about
the African Americans who didn't have the right to vote,
and he started talking about a march that would be
(01:51):
taking place and sell my Alabama for African Americans to
gain their right to vote. I'm Katie crac and this
is and now this week we're exploring how America's fight
for voting rights is wrapped up in the ongoing struggle
for racial justice. And all I remember is trying to
(02:11):
explain to my parents about what Dr King was talking about.
And I asked them that they have the right to vote,
And of course my dad didn't even want to talk
about He told me no black folks could vote. But
why not? After all, when the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified
(02:33):
in eighteen seventy, it guaranteed that the right to vote
could no longer be denied based on race, color, or
previous condition of servitude. So why did so many black
people not vote before the nineteen sixties. You may remember
from our last episode that author Gilda Daniels asked her
grandmother that very same question, why didn't she vote before
(02:56):
the nineteen sixties, and got the same answer. The black
people didn't vote because they could lose their land, they
could lose their lives. It was not because they did
not want to vote. It's because of all these mechanisms
they were put in place to certainly prevent them from
doing so. To understand why black people couldn't vote, we
have to go back about one hundred years to Reconstruction,
(03:19):
when the country was trying to knit itself back together,
reintegrating the Confederate States as well as four million formally
enslaved people into the United States. It was a turbulent time,
to say the least. After the Civil War, there was
a period where the violence was so intense against African Americans.
(03:41):
I mean just this unmitigated rage that they had the
audacity now to not be property. Dr Carol Anderson is
an African American studies professor at Emory University and author
of One Person, No Vote, How voter suppression is destroying
our democracy. And we had a president Andrew Johnson, and
(04:04):
he was horrifically racist and shortsighted, and he was fine
with what Harvard law professor Annette Gordon Reid called the
slow motion genocide that was happening to black people in
the South. Well, the radical Republicans, and I love that term.
We had radical Republicans. The radical Republicans in Congress looked
(04:27):
up at what Johnson had done and just said not today.
It may seem a little strange given today's politics, but
Andrew Johnson was a Democrat. Radical Republicans believed blacks were
entitled to the same political rights and opportunities as whites.
What also made them radical was that they wanted the
(04:48):
federal government to do something about it, to directly intervene
in the state's affairs to help get the country and
all of its people to a more perfect union. There
was the Civil Rights Act of eighteen sixty six that
dealt with citizenship to make it clear that black people
were citizens. Then there was the Reconstruction Act of eighteen
(05:12):
sixty seven. All men twenty one years and over will
be registered to vote. That meant that black men would
be registered to vote. Oh. Then the radical Republicans were
concerned that if they just had these laws, at some
point there may be a shift in the balance in Congress,
(05:36):
and they wanted to make sure that the rights of
all American citizens were protected. And that wasn't going to
happen with just a law that could be easily over ridden,
So they embedded it in the US Constitution. The fourteenth
Amendment dealt with birthright citizenship. If you're born here, you're
a citizen. Wow. Then came the Fifteenth Amendment in eighteen seventy.
(06:03):
The fifteenth Amendment said the United States nor the States
shall abridge the right to vote on account of race, color,
or previous condition of servitude. One of the other things
that they did is they passed the Enforcement Act. It
was the third Enforcement Act of eighteen seventy one. Because
(06:24):
the ku Klux Klan was reigning down massive domestic terrorism
on black people who were trying to vote, and the
federal government did not have the full authority it felt
to go in there and stop them. The Enforcement Act
was to in domestic terrorism and to protect African Americans
(06:44):
right to vote. So this is just I mean, it's
like boom, boom boom. The radical Republicans were building the
House of Democracy. What happened next was a period a
very brief period in the eighteen seventies of political prosperity
for blacks in America. In the South, more than half
(07:07):
a million black men became voters in several states, including Mississippi,
black people were the majority of the population, and during
that decade Mississippi actually sent two black senators to Washington.
But then came the backlash. The white state legislators looked
up in Mississippi said oh, well, we can't have this,
(07:30):
and so they come up with the Mississippi Plan. And
what the Mississippi Plan does is it says, how do
we stop black people from voting without writing a law
that explicitly says, we don't want black people to vote. Ah,
we're going to couch it in the language of democracy,
protecting the integrity of the ballot box, ensuring that there's
(07:52):
no corruption in our elections. But what it does is
it uses the society and pose conditions on African Americans
and makes those conditions the access to the ballot box.
And so, for instance, the poll tax, the poll tax
(08:13):
couched in this language says democracy is expensive, and so
if you really believed in democracy, you would be willing
to pay a small fee in order to ensure that
this democracy runs smoothly. So what you see there is
this language that flips the responsibility of free and fair
elections off of the state and onto the individual. So
(08:38):
it's a wickedly evil rhetorical device and also very effective.
And what it does is it makes it seem like
the poll tax is nominal. How hard is it to
pay just this little fee. Well, after you have had
centuries of unpaid labor because of slavery centuries, and then
(09:05):
you have had the Black codes coming out of the
Civil War, which reimposed slavery by another name, and then
after that you have share cropping, systemic endemic, societally imposed
poverty rained down on that black community, so that the
poll tax actually required between two to six percent of
(09:30):
a Mississippi farm famili's annual income. Imagine paying two to
six percent of your annual income to vote. Then there's
the literacy test, when you have killed the enslaved who
dare learn how to read to then require the reading
(09:53):
of a complicated legal text in order to be able
to vote. In the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that
the poll tax and the literacy test did not violate
the Fifteenth Amendment because everybody had to pay the poll
(10:15):
tax and everybody had to read, so how could this
be racially discriminatory? After that, you saw a number of
states revised their state constitutions to include the Mississippi Plans
disfranchisement policies in there. And the result was that by
(10:39):
the time we get to nineteen forty, only three per
cent of age eligible African Americans in the South are
registered to vote three percent. The Second World War has
already started, and we're looking at a democracy that is
so war is so gnarrowed in the United States, where
(11:05):
of black eligible voters have been blocked from the ballot
box in the South, and the majority of African Americans
lived in the South. By the time we get to
Selma in Dallas County, where Selma is, only point nine
(11:30):
of African Americans age eligible African Americans were registered to
vote point nine percent. We'll return to Selma right after
this short break. Congress passes the most sweeping civil rightsville
(12:00):
ever to be written into the law unless reaffirms the conception.
In nineteen sixty four, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the
Civil Rights Act. The Civil Rights Act is a challenge
to all of us to go to work in our communities,
in our states, in our harms, and in our hearts
to eliminate the last vestiges of injustice in our beloved country.
(12:26):
It was a landmark piece of legislation. It banned segregation
in public places and discrimination in the workplace, but with
racism running deep, just listen to Alabama Governor George Wallace
in nineteen sixty three, there was so much it didn't
(12:48):
do to ensure blacks had the right to vote. Which
brings us back to Selma and Cheyenne. I'm shy in
Webb Christburg. Dr Martin is the King's smallest freedom fighter
and Dr King's voter registration campaign. Beginning in January, freedom
fighters staged nonviolent demonstrations in Selma to push for another
(13:12):
piece of legislation guaranteeing all Black Americans the right to vote.
As I continue to participate in the movement, where many
other freedom fighters would come from other places, other states
to join that movement to change things into helping fighting
(13:35):
for the right to vote, and I started bringing them
to my home and asking my parents could they live
with us and stay with us, And soon they would
be living in our homes. But I'll never forget what
was the most traumatic experience of my life, and that
(13:59):
was the blood Son de March. The march was meant
to be a big push by organizers to register black
voters across Alabama and to attract national press coverage. The
plan was to walk peacefully from Selma to the state
capital of Montgomery, fifty four miles. Many threats had been
(14:21):
made about the possibilities of what would happen to anyone
who would participate on that particular march, and I'll never
forget my parents talking to me the night before. I'm
telling me that something could possibly happen to me if
(14:41):
I participated in that march. Governor Wallace ordered the Highway
Patrol chief to use quote whatever measure necessary to prevent
the march from happening. Organizers, including the late Congressman John
Lewis and jose Williams, decided to proceed anyway. On Sunday,
(15:02):
March seven, at around noon, six hundred protesters, walking in
two lines, left the Brown Chapel Amy Church and headed
for the Edmund Pettis Bridge. Tucked into that group of
freedom fighters, I'll never forget it was young Cheyenne, the
special instructions that were given by Congressman John Lewis. He
(15:26):
asked that all marches walk quietly, keep their heads straight
and forward, and regardless of what happened, everyone would be
none wound. At the base of the bridge, the marchers
were met by one hundred and fifty Alabama state troopers
(15:47):
and sheriff deputies. A state trooper made this announcement over
a bull horn. The marchers did not disperse, They did
not go home or back to their church. They stood still.
(16:07):
And I remember vividly as I looked down, it was
like a seal. I saw hundreds of police were with
tear gas, masks, billy clothes to say, troops on horses.
I saw the dogs, and my heart had begun to
(16:31):
rumble and beat fast. I just knew, as that little girl,
that something was gonna happen. The troopers advanced slowly at first,
but then picking up speed until they plowed right through
the marchers, knocking them down. Racism unleashed its brutality of police.
(17:00):
Tear gas had begun to burst in the air, and
tear gas is a strong, burning sensation where you can't
hardly see your way, and as people had begun to run.
People were being beaten down with billy clubs. The dogs
(17:24):
and the horses were pushing their way into the crowd
and trampling people over as if they weren't hunan beings.
You can see people crawling, falling, crying, bleeding, and of
(17:46):
course my eyes were burning, and I was running, like
many others, trying to make my way home. I was
very frightened, trembling and really not knowing what to do
except to get home. And as I was running out,
(18:08):
I could still see the horses the dogs still trampling
over people as they were trying to make their way
back to Brown's Chapter church. And as I was running,
I'll never forget the late Josean Williams picking me up,
(18:30):
and my little legs were still galloping in his arms.
My eyes were burning, I couldn't hardly see, and I
turned to him and I said to him, in my
own childish voice, put me down, because you are not
(18:50):
running faster. And that picture of bloody Sunday had never
left my heart. By the events of that Sunday afternoon
were captured by newscasters and journalists, and that night, Sunday
(19:12):
Night Movie will present Stanley Kramer's Academy Award winning Motion
Picture Judgment at Nuremberg. Forty eight million people were watching
ABC's broadcast of the star studded movie Judgment at Nuremberg,
about the trials that took place in Germany following the Holocaust.
(19:33):
And here in our decision, this is what we stand for, justice,
true and the value of a single human being. But
the network interrupted the movie to report on what had
happened in Selma that day. We interrupt this program to
(19:55):
bring you a special report from ABC News. In the
day's and weeks that followed, public support for the protesters surged,
and a federal judge ruled in favor of the marchers.
They had told us we wouldn't get here. Fourteen days
after bloody Sunday, olds who said that we would get
here only over that dead body, Martin Luther King Jr.
(20:19):
Successfully Led thousands of demonstrators across the Edmund Pettis Bridge
and onto Montgomery. All the world today knows that we
are here, and we are standing before the forces of
power in the state of Alabama saying we ain't gonna
let nobody turn us ride. And because America could not
(20:46):
unsee the horrors of that bloody Sunday last March. With
the outrage of Selma still, legislators were motivated to do
something about it and asked the Congress and the people
for swift and for sweeping action to guarantee to every
(21:08):
man and woman the right to vote. The bill passed
the Senate by an overwhelming majority, seven to nineteen. Thus
this is a victory for the freedom of the American
and my parents, but it is also a victory for
(21:30):
the freedom of the American nation became registered voice and
every family across this great, entire searching land, and when
they went to vote, they lived stronger in liberty. They
took me with them. That was one of the most
prouder to be American, happiest momentous feeling and moss for
(21:52):
me that I've ever had because of the act that
you have passed that I was signed today. On August six, nineteen,
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law.
To understand how important that law has become in the
(22:15):
history of this country, author Gilda Daniel says, you can
simply look to how presidents have described it. President Ronald
Reagan called it a crown jewel. Glendon Baines Johnson said
that it was monumental, and it was monumental. Indeed, when
you think about the power of the Voting Rights Act,
you do think about the ability to elect representatives right
(22:37):
for people who can represent you and represent your viewpoints.
And and even President Barack Obama attributed the Voting Rights
Act to his success because of campaigns like this, essentially
said that he would not have been possible the Voting
Rights Act was passed if there was not a Voting
Rights Act. Of nine political and economic and social barriers
(22:58):
came down, and the change these men and women wrought
is visible here today in the presence of African Americans
who run boardrooms, who sit on the bench, who serve
in elected office, from small towns to big cities, from
the Congressional Black Caucus all the way to the Old
Office because of what they did. But in two thousand
(23:22):
and thirteen, the Voting Rights Act of nineteen sixty five
faced a major setback when the Supreme Court ruled that
the Voting Rights Act had essentially served its purpose and
significantly weakened it. That led states to implement their own laws.
For example, within twenty four hours of the Supreme Court decision,
(23:43):
Texas announced it would put in place a strict voter
i D law in oral arguments. Race based voting discrimination
still exists, no doubt. The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
led the descent the great man who led the march
from Selma to Montgomery. In her argument, she echoed the
(24:03):
words of Martin Luther King Jr. Who in nineteen seven
presciently said the road ahead would not always be smooth.
Then of the moral universe is long, he said, but
it ends toward justice. If there is a steadfast commitment
to see the task through two completion. That commitment has
(24:29):
been disserved by today's decision. We'll be right back. When
you look at all of these issues together, you see
the system. This is a system of discrimination. Again, Author
(24:54):
and law professor Gilda Daniels. It takes a lot of
different names. In of nineteen hundreds we called it a
poll tax, and the day we called it voter I D.
Or it used to be a literacy test. Now it's
proof of citizenship. So you might have called the different things,
but it still has the same impact. It still has
the same effect, and that is that it disproportionately disenfranchises
(25:16):
people of color a big part of that system of discrimination.
Our felony disenfranchise meant laws which bar people from voting
because of prior criminal convictions, and there are some alarming
stats that show the racial disparities of those laws. In
two thousand nineteen, the Sentencing Project reported that Black Americans
(25:37):
who are old enough to vote are more than four
times as likely to lose their voting rights than the
rest of the adult population. In some states, one in
five black adults is disenfranchised. All told, there are about
two point two million Black Americans who are banned from
voting because of past convictions. How do you want need
(26:00):
to address you, Katie? Really? Okay? Alright? No, no, Luckily
there are people fighting to right that wrong. The loss
of civil rights is not something that's highlighted. Doing fleet
bargain right. At the end of the day, what you're
concerned about is how much time you will or will
(26:22):
not have to do how soon you can get out
of president Desmond Mead is the president and executive director
of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, which is dedicated to
ending the disenfranchisement and discrimination of people who have been incarcerated,
also known as return citizens. I remember a priest many
(26:42):
years ago said that a person is caught for committing
a crime, he's convicted, sentenced to prison, who serves this
time and the minute he walked out of the prison gates,
that's when his real sentence starts. Now. The reason I
wanted to talk to Desmond is that in two thousand eighteen,
he was instrumental in passing Amendment four, amendment to Florida's Constitution,
(27:05):
the amendment that will restore voting rights to one point
five million people who already paid their debt to society
and had felony records. That passed. So whatever happens tonight,
that amendment is going to be hugely important. It was
an extraordinary achievement personally and professionally because he is also
a return citizen. As a young man, Desmond was convicted
(27:29):
on drug charges and spent time in prison for possession
of a firearm. But his lowest point when he was released,
I was standing in front of railroad tracks in South Florida,
waiting on a train to come so I can jump
in front of it. That day that I stood there,
I was a broken man. I mean I was homeless.
(27:49):
I was addicted to drugs, recently released from prison, unemployed,
didn't own anything but the clothes on my back, and
I didn't see a light at the end of the time.
But I had other plans, and that train didn't come,
and so I crossed those tracks and I walked about
a couple of blocks further and I checked myself into
drug treatment. Desmond was able to turn his life around.
(28:12):
He went back to school and did so well. He
eventually earned a law degree. Yes, and so the add
to that what you said, I'm also a first time author, right.
I just wrote my book let My People Vote, that
actually talks about the journey. Congratulations, Desmond, That's quite an
(28:33):
inspiring story. When did you realize that you were not
considered a full citizen by the state of Florida In
the summer of two thousand and six was the first
time I realized it because I was introduced to Royal
Rights Restoration Coalition, and that's when I first learned about
(28:55):
the loss of civil rights. It started taking all more
prominence when I was in law school and and and
and really discovered that even though I was able to
overcome so many obstacles, even though I was doing well
in law school and I would eventually graduate with my
law degree. Uh, the Florida Bar would not even allow
(29:15):
me to sit for the exam until my civil rights
have been restored. And then I guess the final blow
that was like a punch to the gut was in
twenty sixteen when my wife Sena rans for office. She
wanted to uh become a state representative for Florida, And
in the middle of her campaign, someone approached me and
(29:38):
said in that Desmond, I know that you're excited about
being able to vote for your wife, and like it
was like a blow to my gut. Reminded me, Wow,
because I live in Florida, I can't even vote for
my own wife. You know, forget the fact that presidents
in Puerto Rico were able to vote. Forget about the
fact that in Maine of Vermont, you know, presidents are
able to vote, and throughout this kind treat in Georgia
(30:01):
and Texas, UH that people are able to vote after
they've served their time. Because I lived in Florida, I
wasn't even allowed to vote for my own wife. What
were the rules that were in place that we're disenfranchising
all these people? Well, let me tell you, um, prior
to Amendment for anyone convicted of any felony offense lost
(30:23):
the right to vote for life, lost all of their
civil rights. Now, let me tell you in Florida, that
means that if you're driving with a suspended license, you
can lose the right to vote for life. If you
burn a tire in public, If you go lobster hunt
and you catch a lobster which tell is too short,
you can lose the right to vote for life. If
(30:44):
you're walking on the beach, you admiring the sunset, and
you disturbed turtle nesting eggs, you would lose the right
to vote for life. If you're like this gentleman in
Broward County on Valentine's Day rather who, rather than giving
his wife a dozen roses, released twelve red balloons in
the air, you could lose the right to vote for
(31:08):
the rest of your life. And the only chance that
you would get those rights back were if you were
lucky enough to appear before the governor and beg him
for climacy right brav le at their feet and understanding
that their decision about whether or not to let you
be able to vote again is a purely arbitrary decision.
(31:32):
You know, let me let me give you some numbers.
You know, the current policy that we were under before
Amendment four require the person to wait either five or
seven years after they have completed their sentence before they're
able to just apply to have their civil rights restored.
(31:53):
And then once they apply, we've seen waiting times between
eight to ten years. And so you've seen person waiting
upwards of eighteen years after they have applied to have
their righteous stored, and when they walk into the climacy hearing,
they stand less than point zero zero one percent of
(32:13):
a chance of getting their righteous story. And you know what,
this is no longer theoretical, right, because I myself just
went through this process right to where over nineteen years,
not only have I remained crime free, but I have
dedicated my life to giving back to my community so
(32:34):
much so that I've been named Central Floridian of the Year,
Floridian of the Year, and even Time magazine one hundred
most influential person in the world. And I appear before
the Climacy Board and they can't even make a decision
on that right. And so that is the type of
(32:54):
process that have been in place prior to him and
be four and oh, you know, we knew that. You know,
at the end of the day, that was too much
power for four politicians to hold to decide which American
citizens get the vote and which don't. Right, no matter
what their political party is, whether it's Democrats, Republicans, or whatever.
(33:16):
No politician to have that absolute hour like that because
that leads room for partisan politics to impact those decisions, right,
especially when their arbitrary decisions. And so that was one
of the flashpoints that made me believe that we had
to take that power out of the hands of politicians
(33:39):
and put it in the hands of the people. That's
exactly what we did. I wanted to ask you, you're
talking about felony convictions, but putting twelve balloons into the
air instead of giving someone twelve roses, that's a felony.
That's a third degree felony in the state of Florida.
And a quick good you can search you will find
(34:01):
the story he released the twelve balloons in the air
and and the law enforcement officers seeing them and promptly arresting.
So when we hear I think when the average person
here's felony, doesn't they think a serious crime? And you know,
let me tell you something and that and that, uh, Katie,
let me tell you that is part of my mission
(34:22):
is to really expose how politicians can use rhetoric right
to divide our country, right and and and they divided
through through hayden and and fear and create these narratives
that make people think about something that actually doesn't exist. Right.
And so, for instance, when you talk about the felony conviction,
(34:44):
you're gonna think of the worst person in the world,
and you're more to likely going to think African American
because we're paraded more than anyone else. But here's some realities.
Even though Florida convicts about a hundred and seventy thousand
people a year, less than twenty I presented them or
even sentence to prison. And then even of the overwhelming
(35:06):
number of that small group are there for less serious offenses.
When we looked at the entire population of people who
have been convicted and incarcerated, what we found was that
people convicted of murder and all kinds of felony sexual
offenses only made up you ready for this, less than
(35:26):
three percent of the total amount of people right who
have been impacted. Right, And so we we we know
that you know that we have this challenge of fighting
back against a narrative that's been created not by the people,
but by politicians that seek to divide this country, because
(35:47):
as long as this country is divided, they can't be
held accountable. Right, And so though we fight back at
that at every turn, every opportunity that we have to
really set the story straight, at the end of the day,
At the end of the day, it is in society's
best interests. That don't matter what a person does. Right,
(36:08):
if they're convicted, if their sentenced, they paid their debt,
and their their released back into our community or already
in our community, it's in everyone's interests for them to
be able to successfully reintegrate. It is in everyone's interests
for all of our citizens to participate in election, because
(36:29):
the more people that vote, the more vibrant our democracy becomes.
And that's good for everybody. Tell us about Florida Amendment
for because you designed it. Yeah, yeah, Amendment For was
um basically to create a pathway. And and I tell
(36:50):
people today that in spite of whatever subsequent legislation may
have emerged, the one thing that we know is that
we've already won. We won when We passed Amendment For
because now enshrined in our states Constitution, is an alternate
pathway to be able to participate in our democracy without
(37:12):
having to beg any politicians. It restores voting rights two
individuals who have been convicted of a felony offense who
have completed their sentence, as long as they have not
been convicted of murder or they have not been convicted
of felony sexual offenses. If those individuals have been convicted
(37:34):
of those crimes, there are still a pathway to be
able to vote again, but they would have to go
through the clinacy process. But everyone else, once they have
completed their senates, they have the right to vote. We
had over five for a million people that voted yes
for Amendment For. We had a million more people that
voted for us than any candidate that was running for governor,
(37:56):
which shows the broad base of support that we have
and we o the world. We showed the State of
Florida that love can in fact, when the day that
we can bring people together, that we don't have to
tear each other down, that we could come together along
the lines of humanity in spite of our political differences,
(38:16):
in spite of our racial anxieties that we can bring
people together and move major issues that benefit society. But
love didn't last, apparently, Desmond, because after this was passed
in two thousand and eighteen, things got complicated. The Republican
legislature passed a law s B seven oh six six,
(38:40):
basically clarifying the amendment and saying in order to register
to vote, felons had to pay their financial penalties. Out
of the nearly one point five million felons who regained
the right to vote, seven hundred and seventy four thousand
lost the right because of debt. I won't say, okay,
I wouldn't say that they lost the right. I said
(39:02):
that they were delayed access to the right that was
conferred upon them, you know. And then the other piece
of that, O, Katie, Yes, seven hundred and seventy four
thousand individuals have some type of legal financial obligation that
they have to satisfy before being able to register the vote.
But what that also says is that there are five
to six hundred thousand returning citizens that don't have that
(39:26):
barrier in front of them, that they can also right
now today register to vote and be a part of
our democracy. What my ancestors had to fight through the
lynchings and the and the dogs and the fire hoses
for that. This franchise is so dog gone important that
(39:46):
it needs to be accessible to everyone because the one time,
you know, when I walk in that voting move, Katie,
I have just as much power as Jeff Bezos, I
have just as much power as Bill Gates. That is
the one equalizing force in this country is that voting booth.
And it should not be barricaded. It shouldn't We should
(40:07):
not be prevented from being able to experience that just
because we're too poor. Who will be able to vote
in Florida on November three, Oh my god, on November three,
they're gonna be like returning citizens who have satisfied their
legal obligations or have had others satisfied their legal obligations
(40:30):
for them, and have registered to vote. We're gonna be
able to show up and participate in election. And you
know what, Katie, They're not coming by themselves. They're bringing
their family, they're bringing their friends, they're bringing their community
to celebrate the expansion of democracy. And I know on
November three that they're gonna be people that's gonna be
(40:51):
walking into that voting booth with their shoulders thrown back
in their chests out right knowing that they are now
finally a part of its democracy. And there's going to
be some tears. I know they are. I know I'm
going to be crying right knowing that that we exist
and that I've voiced the matter. And there are people
that's waiting. There are people that's literally dying to get
(41:14):
to that point right there, and so I can't wait
to see what happened. While Desmond Mead continues to fight
on behalf of return citizens in court, others are fighting
on the ground or over zoom. Good morning everyone. My
name is and If Scott. I'm from the League of
(41:36):
Women Voters. And what I do with three entry programs
is I give voter education registration and that's Scott volunteers
to help return citizens understand their rights. There's a lot
of misinformation out there what people with criminal records can
and can't do very state by state. But luckily, and
(41:57):
that's a history buff who loves of sharing her research,
most people in New Jersey do not know the law
that prevents people who are incarcerated and previously on altivation
has been in Affections eighteen forty four. The half a
dozen people who have joined this call have been recently
(42:19):
released from prison and are on parole or probation. The
fact that they now have the right to vote in
New Jersey is a new law that went into effect
just this past March, and when anyone who is incorpirated,
as soon as they leave, they can register immediately to
Now what a lot of people do is they asked me,
(42:41):
is well, I committed two, three, four whatever felonies, so
I can't vote in New Jersey And that's not true.
Once you're released from any correctional facility, you can register
to vote. There's a lot that Annette has to cover,
like key voting deadlines to receive your application is October thirteenth.
(43:03):
How to fill out the registration forms and how to
send them in. If you do it online, you're okay.
If you don't, just post it on it and you
print your own form and she does it one voter
at a time. Does anyone have any questions for me?
What is the name of the website to registering? Okay?
(43:24):
When you can do use your local one, which is
um Middlesex County dot James. She loves her work, but
says the hardest part is hearing why people think the
voting isn't important. I think it's a waste of time.
I don't want, I don't vote, I never have voting.
(43:45):
It doesn't count, it means nothing. Okay, Now, if they
saw me, I would be read as a beat tomato
and anything else you could see. Because I get so
upset when the citizen does this because they don't know
(44:06):
the history. So then what I do is I go
back and tell them. When I was a young child
growing up, every night on the news, I watched people
trying to register, not vote. Register. They were had dogs
set upon them, the police beat them with batons, they
(44:30):
were fire holes, and the most horrible, horrible thing of all,
they were killed. So nothing else. I vote in their honor.
And some will say to me, oh oh I never
knew that. Oh okay, our register. And there's a few
(44:51):
that will say, yeah, okay, well that was then. But
I still don't see no use in it. And then
I have to tell myself and that you can't convince everyone.
If you convince eight or nine out of ten, you're
doing good. The tent leave and maybe another day, but
(45:16):
then that Scott refuses to quit. Well, I'm hoping all
of you will register, and more than anything, I'm hoping
you will vote this year. Whoever it's for, it doesn't matter,
but please exercise your right to vote. I thank all
of you. I wish you the very best, and if
(45:38):
you have any questions and anything else that I can
help you with registration, I certain you will. Next week
on Turnout, you've taken the challenge and you've chosen to
be a disinformation fighter. Put on your cape Democracy Heroes,
it's time for your training. You are a newly deputized
troll buster. We're so glad to have you on our team.
(46:00):
Voter suppression looks a little different these days, and our
viral virtual world. How to combat the spread of disinformation.
That's next week on Turnout. Hey, listeners, before we go,
I just want to remind you that though we're getting
down to the wire, there is still time in some
states to check your registration to make sure you can
(46:23):
vote in this very important election. To make that process easier,
I've partnered with the social justice organization Do Something. Find
out how to check your registration or registered to vote
by texting Katie to three A three eight three. You
can also go to vote dot org to find out
where and how to vote in your state, and of course,
(46:46):
subscribe to my morning newsletter wake Up Call for the
latest election information. Turnout is a production of I Heart
Media and Katie Curic Media. The executive producers are Katie
Curic and Courtney Litts. Supervising producers Lauren Hansen. Associate producers
Derek Clements, Eliza Costas and Emily Pento. Editing by Derreck
(47:07):
Clements and Lauren Hansen, Mixing by Derrick Clements. Our researcher
is Gabriel Loser and special thanks to my right hand
woman Adriana Fasio. You can follow me at all my
election coverage at Katie Currek. Meanwhile, yes, I'm Katie Currek.
Thanks so much for listening everyone. We'll see you next time.
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