Does Your Voice Matter? with Tonya Mosley + A'shanti Gholar

Alex always heard that it wasn't polite to bring up politics at the dinner table. But with everything happening in the world, he's brought in two amazing women to help us make sense of it all. Does one vote count? How can you vote for someone who shares every one of your ideals? Why does the news we consume matter? Here to help are Tonya Mosley of NPR's Here & Now and the Truth Be Told podcast, as well as A'shanti Gholar of Emerge America and the Brown Girls' Guide to Politics. Some might call these issue political, but Alex Aiono calls it like it is: showing up for what you believe in and taking a stand toward a greater good.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
My name is Alex, and I am voting for Joe
Biden and Kamala Harris in the election. No mob, alright,
no alright, no mob alright forever nob alright, lit alright,
no mob alright, forever al right. Before we get into

(00:27):
this episode, I want to give you guys a little
personal life update. I'm actually in the middle of moving
houses right now, which is so exciting. Um. But with
that excitement also comes a different recording set up, so
it might sound a little bit different than it usually does.
It's the beauty of the pandemic podcast recording. But this
episode is so important and very very timely, so just
so you guys know, let's get into it. My parents

(00:50):
told us, you know, there's there's specific things that you
want to share. You want to share your positivity, you
want to share your light with other people, you want
to share love and happiness. But the one thing you
don't want to share, and my parents always said to
just not really talk about it because it always brings
up problems is politics. And so I grew up kind
of disconnecting myself from politics, kind of in that realm

(01:11):
of you know, unless it involves me directly, not really
worth bringing up because it only divides people, it only
makes you choose a side, and all of those things.
That's how I grew up. But I grew up and
so uh as I became an adult, I started realizing
one that life is a lot bigger than just me.
I think I should be more caring about other people,

(01:34):
and so I realized that a part of that caring
for other people is fighting for other people and supporting
other people, and not only in my personal dealings, but
also in you know, in voting. This was kind of
at the same time that I was gaining a following
on social media, and I realized that every time I
saw somebody that was speaking out, not only where they

(01:56):
met with some support and love, there's also people that
were just bashing that person. They would be like, why
are you talking about this? I can't believe you, because again,
there are two sides to most, you know, situations. So
I wasn't really sure if I wanted to be one
of those artists that talks about topics that might cause
people to think of me, you know, differently, or to

(02:19):
stand up for what I believe in. And and my
parents always taught me to follow my heart and a
lot of the times, especially in support of of the
l g b t Q plus community, because I've always
had so many friends, so many family members who are
part of the lgbt Q plus community, have always been
very proudly an ally to the lgbt Q plus community,
and I realized that that was kind of the first

(02:42):
um social issue that I was passionate enough about in
my heart that I knew I needed to speak up
about it. And even at that point, you know, like
there were some super small minded, you know, like I
like to say, less evolved human beings who had view
was against my own that that definitely said, I can't

(03:02):
believe you support this or whatever. But I realized that
I was doing myself a better service by by speaking
out and following my heart the same way that I
do with my music, with my own life. Once I
realized that, and this was actually only a few years ago,
Like you have to understand, I was never even into
politics until you know this, like this, this this cycle

(03:25):
of of elections since really since Donald Trump came into office,
when I realized that it's way more than just the
LGBTQ plus community that I'm passionate about that I need
to be vocal about and more than all of that
that I need to educate myself about. So I've taken
time through this pandemic, through all of these social issues
that we've been you know, we've been dealing with in

(03:46):
real time, from racial justice or racial injustice, the lack
thereof environmental policies, and the way that each of these
candidates are viewing the environment and global warming and and
climate change, so many different things that it's it's almost
not even politics, you know, it's about me following my
heart and doing what's right. And if other people call

(04:07):
that politics, then we're here talking about politics. I'm realizing
and I'm understanding that all of us have different things
that were passionate about. All of us have different things
that that speak to our hearts, and the most important
part across the whole board of that is that we
all vote. So that got me thinking, why is it
so important to vote? All right, guys, what's up? This

(04:31):
is alex I. Oh no, this is my podcast. It's
all let's get into it and we talk about everything
under the sun. And now we can really say that
because we're talking about the thing that my parents told
me to never publicly talk about politics. Um, we are
talking about the importance of this election, talking about getting
involved in politics, even if it's something you don't necessarily

(04:53):
want to even do. And I needed two amazing guests
that could help inspire that. And so luckily, thanks to
Catherine and thanks to our amazing guests, we made it happen.
My two guests, one of them is a Shanty Goldla.
She is a nationally recognized political strategist. She is the
president of Emerge, which is an organization that recruits and
trains democratic women to run for office. She's also the

(05:14):
founder of The Brown Girls Guide to Politics, which is
an organization that also has a fantastic podcast, Ashanti. How
are you? I'm good, Alex, thank you so much for
having me, and thank you Catherine. Of course. Our other
guest is Tanya Mosley. She's the co host of NPRS
Here and now the co host of the podcast Truth
Be Told, as well as NPRS Film Club. She's worked

(05:37):
in every medium from television to print to radio two
documentary filmmaking. She actually recently won an Emmy for her
televised piece Beyond Ferguson. So the one congratulations do how
are you? I am well? Thank you all for having me.
I'm really honored to be on the show with you.
Alex of course, thank you both for being here. And
again you know, I'm I'm going to use this episode

(05:57):
more than anything as like education for my health to continue,
you know, learning about the importance of stepping up and
getting involved in politics. Though, thank you both for being
my teachers. Today, we have some really cool topics that
we're gonna be talking about. First, Tanya, you and I
are going one on one. We're gonna talk about journalism
and politics, and then we'll take a quick break. When
we come back from that break, Ashanti, you and I

(06:19):
are going to talk about the importance of getting involved
in politics. And then lastly, the three of us are
all going to have a big, nice round table talking
about voting in the data dumpster fire funny. Uh So,
I've excited for all of those topics, but before we
get into them, today is actually nine and eleven, and
with all of the madness going on in the world, um,

(06:40):
it's the nineteenth anniversary. And so even though we are
a for lack of better term, a country divided right now,
I think it is important to recognize the sacrifice that
all of the first responders made I think about our
country then and though a lot of the problems we
have today we're still problems. Then, Uh, it felt like
a different time and it's almost sad thinking about how

(07:02):
great we were as human beings to each other just
for that moment versus where we are today. But I
wanted to talk about that. Do either of you guys
have anything specific that you'd like to share. I mean,
I was six years old, so I remember sitting on
my parents bed and seeing it, not really understanding the
weight of it all. But um, if either of you
guys have anything that you'd like to say, just because
today is is September eleven, I would love to hear it. Sure,

(07:25):
you know when you mentioned that, I thought about you, Alex,
about how old you you were at that time, and
actually my heart aches thinking about you being so young
and that memory being steered into your consciousness because you know,
it's six years old, you're just learning about the world
around you. I was actually a young journalist then. I
was just I was in my first job in media,

(07:47):
and I'll never forget that time and that day it
felt like such a dark time and it felt like
there was so much confusion and hopelessness. But to your point,
there was also a sense of coming together as Americans
during that time. I remember you couldn't drive anywhere without
seeing American flags everywhere, and we all kind of came

(08:08):
together in this collective grief. And there's a lot of
difference now and what we're seeing. We'll talk about this
a little bit later, I'm sure, but you know one
thing that I think about the difference between today and
then is social media and what would the world have
been like back then if we had social media, Yes,
we would have been more connected in a way that

(08:28):
information would have been passed through really quickly. But on
the other hand, a lot of misinformation would have been
passed through. All of those conspiracy theories would have been
at the forefront in a way that that might have
made us more divisive. And it's kind of this major
factor today and why we're so divisive. Wow. Yeah, absolutely, Shan,
Do you have anything you want to add? I agree

(08:49):
with the divisiveness, And for me, what I really think
about is empathy. Back then, we had a president, no
matter what you want to think about him, he had
empathy for what happened. And we know that there was
still absolute hatred, particularly to our Muslim and see brothers
and sisters. They took the majority of that hate. But

(09:13):
I remember, you know, George Bush, he went to go
visit the site and someone had yelled, we can't hear you,
and he yelled back, but I can hear you, and
just those simple words to let people know that they
were not alone. They had a leader that saw them,
and we had more empathy for each other as Americans

(09:37):
and for humans. And you do not see that today.
We do not have that empathetic leader. We do not
have that leadership, and it's amazing what can happen in
twenty years. I was very clear when Trump got elected.
People asked me, what do you think is going to

(09:57):
be the key thing that we're going to see? And
I said, we're going to see how fragile democracy is.
And that is what we are witnessing when you do
not have empathetic, servant leadership in the White House. And
that's going to lead me perfectly into my next question.
Usually with my guests, I have a question that we

(10:19):
kind of throw around, which is how have you been
improving yourselves this week? For the next few episodes, I
actually want to change that question to continue inspiring um
not only young voters, but but every American out there
who has the ability to vote, and hopefully we can
inspire them to vote. So instead of asking how have
you been improving, I want to ask all of my guests,
why are you voting? And I'll start again. Like I've said,

(10:41):
I've never been the most educated in terms of politics,
and it's something that I try and learn more and
more about every day. I try and unfortunately watch all
of the news and deduct where the where the truth
is in all of it, or try and really follow
my heart. But for me, I'm voting because I see
people I love being told that they are not the
same level of priority as other human beings and it

(11:05):
breaks my heart. I mean, I have so many friends
that are constantly fighting for the same freedoms that I
have as a heterosexual, cis gender, you know, half white male.
I'm looking at my sisters, I'm looking at my mother,
I'm looking at my my friends and family in the
lgbt Q plus community. I'm looking at my black brothers, sisters,

(11:27):
and non binary family members. It tears me apart of
somebody who always wants to follow their heart that as
a country we are not treating every human being the
exact same way. And and so that for this episode
is going to be my main reason why I want
to let everybody know I am voting. Being said, Ashanti,

(11:48):
you got anything for me? I always tell people that
at my core, I vote because I literally had people
fight and die for me to have this right. Are
that they want it so bad? They march, they protest,
they lead these amazing movements. So I could easily register

(12:11):
to vote on my eighteenth birthday, vote for whoever I want.
And I take that very seriously that my ancestors this
is the future that they wanted for me. So I
have to make sure that I am an active participant
in my government. And the second part is, you know,

(12:31):
for me, I'm doing quite well. I'm lucky in that sense,
but I really think about my nieces and my nephews
and I want for them to be able to do
what T. T. Shawnee was able to do. I need
for them to have that same quality of life. And
if I want them to have that quality of life,
I need to make sure that there are people in

(12:53):
office who see them as young black girls, young black boys.
Who does serve to have a future, a great future,
and who will create and pass policies to allow that
to happen. I love, what do you have that? Yeah?
You know, I mean Ashanti really laid it out so well,
some of the same reasons why I feel it's so

(13:16):
important to vote. You know, I grew up right around
the corner for my grandparents, and I would say my
family was not extremely political, but one thing they did
instill in me was the power of voting and that
I should vote. My first job was working on the polls.
I think I was about fifteen years old, and my
grandfather would volunteer every year to work on the polls

(13:37):
for every single election. And I had a chance to
be a part of that political process every time an
election came up, to work on the polls and volunteer
in that way. You know, I'm an American and it's
my right to be able to be a part of
the democratic process. And I also, just like Ashanti, want
to instill in younger people and in my children that

(13:59):
this is what we do as part of our civic duty.
And it's also important that I didn't grow up really
focusing in on those issues. But right now it is
so important for us to be thinking in this way,
to learn about what our politicians are doing, what they
stand behind, what their records are. And so, yes, that
is my answer to your question. Analytics. I love it.

(14:21):
I love it. I know that we, uh, we kind
of dipped down in a moment of solidarity for nine eleven,
but I think your guys answers just kind of brought
my energy right back up. And I think that's where
it should be. You know, we we are really if
we as a country do this right, then we're gonna
make some really good changes here. And so both of
your answers, if you're listening, I hope that those answers
inspired you more than even mine. But it is your right.

(14:43):
It is not only your right, it's your duty as
a citizen of the United States to vote and to
help make decisions in this world. And uh, I love
your answers. I just I wanted to say that. That
being said, Ashanti will be with you in justice. Second, Tanya,
you and I are going to go one on one.
We're talking about journalism and politics, which you know quite
a bit about both of you know quite a bit

(15:04):
about both of them. For the next few weeks, we're
actually talking about politics, and not just because everybody's talking
about politics, but right now, with everything that's going on
in the world, we need to get involved. We need
to make a difference. Things are not okay, speaking of
which you're actually you live in Pasadena, which is currently
on fire. I just want to make sure are you guys,
are you okay? Oh, I'm so thank you so much

(15:25):
for asking me that. Yeah, I'm about five miles away
from one of the wildfire's burning and we are in
the warning zone, so we we haven't been told to
evacuate yet, but just to be on standby. So we
do have our bags packed and we are watching what's happening.
It literally is one of those things where we go
what else could possibly happen, I know, and then it happens.
So I'm glad to hear you're doing okay. I'm glad

(15:46):
to hear you're prepared. If you are in any area
in Los Angeles or anywhere on the West Coast where
fires are, please make sure that you are you are
ready for any emergency situations. Um, let's get back into politics,
though we all know that there is especially now, like
you mentioned, with social media, there is a ton of propaganda,
false information that's literally spread all across social media. But

(16:07):
we're also finding that that's also true with traditional news outlets.
I turn on the TV and I switched from Fox
to NBC, MSNBC two, CNN. It's just across the board.
It's so hard to find which of these um news
sources is telling you the most unbiased version of what's
going on in the world. How do you think somebody

(16:28):
can identify which news sources are actually trustworth? You know, Alex,
this is the billion dollar question because we have so
many sources that we can go to. You turn on
the news, you know. The one thing that I think
is also a challenge for people is we often don't
have context. We don't start off with context, So people

(16:48):
flipping channels, going to different sites online. You're getting the
latest on things, but you don't have an understanding of
where it fits in the collective, like the overall, and
so it just feels like noise because there's so much
This is something I think very deeply about because I
work for NPR. I have worked throughout my career in

(17:08):
what I consider reputable news organizations, but I realize that
we are now in a time where people are telling
us they're not sure whether or not they can trust us,
and so I'm thinking very deeply about what does that
mean and what we can do to be able to
provide that clarity for people because they're confused. You can
think about some of your major newspapers, your local newspapers

(17:30):
who have been decimated by budget cuts because of the
recession back in two thousand and six and seven and eight,
but they're still there those places. Those people can give
you the on the ground news, for instance, around voting,
where you are when you can vote, where you can vote,
where you need to have your absentee ballots when you
need to have them in Those are really important questions

(17:52):
on the local level. You can start with, um, your newspapers,
and also your television stations, the NBC's, the CBS is,
the A b c's, But you know, we do have
to call on them to be better. And I actually
think that media organizations are really open to that right
now because we're all running around with our heads cut off.
We're all kind of like every day there's something happening

(18:12):
with the Trump administration. There wildfires, there's a pandemic, there's
the racial reckoning. There's all of these things happening. We
want to provide the best information, but we also want
to make certain that you can hear it through the noise. Yeah,
I love that, and I don't know if it's rare
or not. You might be one of the very first
members of the media that I've spoken to. But as
a member of the media, you've never been afraid to

(18:34):
voice your opinions on the media itself, like you just have.
You've also spoken a bit about the importance of diversity
in the newsroom. Right now, we are dealing with everything
from racial injustice to people making laws about women's bodies.
What shortcomings do we see when the diversity of the
newsroom hasn't been met. Oh, well, we just saw it

(18:56):
at the end of May and June and even right
in this moment when people started rising up in the
streets and saying, we just saw a black man die
in Minnesota, George Floyd, and we're tired of it. We're
seeing black men on video die all the time. There
needs to be big change. We're not talking about incremental change.

(19:16):
We're talking about reforming police, defunding police, changes to our government,
changes to the way police operate. We were really handicapped
because when it comes to covering issues of race and racism,
Americans have a really hard time with it, you know.
I mean, we can cover just about anything, but when

(19:38):
it comes to race and racism, when you don't have
the diversity in your newsroom, you're caught flat footed because
you don't know how to take on those issues. And
so all of the things that I've been talking about
in so many voices, have been talking about over the decades,
even before I was born, about diversity in newsrooms, it's
really coming to ahead at this point, and it's not
that hard to diversify newsrooms. But it's also incumbent on

(20:01):
our white brothers and sisters to take on this as well,
because white is a race and they're also a part
of this as well. And so I think what it
brought up for us is not only how we need
more people of color and newsrooms, but also how we
need white people to understand their place in all of
this and how they can be a part of the
change when it comes to covering it in the media.

(20:23):
As you know, Alex, like I've been over the last
few years talking a lot about journalists really acknowledging implicit
bias in our own biases. And that's because until we
really acknowledge that we're human beings and we're part of
this collective just like everyone else, we're not like these
superhuman people who are over here and can truly be objective.
Our life experiences play a huge role in how we

(20:46):
cover the news until we acknowledge that we can't really
make change, and so that's that's kind of where I
sit on this. So that was just perfectly said. Um,
I do want to change directions. I'll speak directly to politics,
especially the political moment that we're in right now. You
talked recently on one of your shows about the suburban
Trump supporters who do want to stick with Trump, for
people who are planning to double down and vote him again,

(21:08):
even asked to do more with like politics or are
they just trying to prove to themselves at this point
that they didn't make a bad decision four years ago. Oh,
that's such a complicated question, you know. I think we're
all trying to figure out why people support what they
do and who they do, and there are lots of
different reasons for it. But I think in many ways

(21:31):
and I can't speak for all Trump supporters, but there
is a feeling among many Trump supporters that they are
the unheard. Think about if your whole life the world
was one way, and then over the course of just
a few short years, you start seeing things change in
a profound way. You start saying that there are more
people of color where you live. You see that they're

(21:53):
taking jobs that used to be predominantly held by white people.
And this is just one slice of it. I'm not
saying this is like across the board. You may have
already dealt with hardships. But what I hear, what I
heard from those women that I talked to on my show,
was that they earnestly believe what they believe. And there's
nothing that I could ever say, You could ever say,

(22:14):
Ashanti could ever say, that would change how they feel
about it. What does that tell us about where we are?
When there's no unifying voice, when there's no unifying collective
understanding of where we want to go in this country,
democracy is at stake. I mean, we're seeing it crumble.
That goes back to what we were talking about when
we talked about nine eleven. We all were collectively in

(22:36):
agreeance that what happened was wrong, and that we want
to see something happened because of that. Today, we don't
have any unifying collective understanding of what we feel like
is wrong. It's the truth, though, you know, Like I
think a big issue that I see is that we
at this moment, so many of us believe that everything

(22:58):
that we believe is the right thing. Willingness to be
wrong is at such a low level these days. And
the reason why I asked about the doubling down to
prove that they're right is, like, I think it's human
nature to even when you know you're wrong. I think
about when you get in an argument with your significant
other and you start realizing, like, dam I'm wrong in
this argument, but you still keep kind of pushing for

(23:19):
yeahs like that, you know, And so I look at it, Um,
I look at us as not only a country divided,
but a country that's too afraid to step up and
be wrong. But Alex, how much do you think? And
I don't want to, because you know, I'm on social
media just like everyone else, But I've been thinking really
deeply about how it has polarized us in a way
where you could double down. But what if you knew

(23:40):
you could go online and you can find millions of
other people who also feel like you and are feeding
you and saying what you're saying is right, and hey,
here's some other stuff that we found, Like you have
a collective community of people who are always affirming you,
you know, like we're all looking at each other right now.

(24:00):
When we go on our social media feeds, will all
be looking at something different because based on the things
that we put in, it's giving us back what it
feels are most aligned with what we put in. So
there's no truth there. There's no like centering of truth
there that really gets us to this unifying front that
we're talking about. I'm really concerned about it, and I

(24:22):
don't know where it's going to take us. I don't
think we've ever been here in our entire like the
entire existence of humanity. We've never been at this place
where we have the convergence of all of this coming
together at once. That's that's very interesting to think about.
I mean, social media is is like you mentioned, it's
tailored to us. You know, it's tailored too to our
own voices, and it's tailored too when we speak. It

(24:43):
tailors everything around that to make us feel like we
are the leader of you know, of that community. Right.
I don't know where we're going to go with that either.
Some people say regulation is the way. We'll see where
that goes. But the regulation of media companies, social media companies,
I think that that's absolutely valid and would be absolutely warranted,
especially because we are divided. I do want to talk

(25:04):
about flipping the social media around a little bit, because
you've You've said some things on social media that I
absolutely love. You tweet a couple of weeks ago about
your grandma telling you that there's it seems like there's
so much going on, but at the same time, and
nothing's happening right that that we just kind of don't
seem to be learning from history, like we're stuck in

(25:24):
one spot. Why do you think we're so stuck? You know?
I've been thinking a lot about this as I look
out in my window and I see the orange sky,
and I think, like it feels like the world is burning,
and we know we've been here before, but somehow we
continue to do it. And maybe it's just human nature.
What if this is just how it happens? I mean,

(25:47):
we know there are other civilizations in time. We can
know because we excavate and we find things in the
ground all the time that are surprising and give us
a view of the past. Also, I think though specifically
about the United States, and we think about like our founding,
we're always moving forward. We're always looking forward, never back.

(26:07):
It's always about the new, how can we be better
and bigger? And we have always as a country culturally
put less value on history. If you go to other
parts of the world, history is such a huge part
of their foundation. I mean, if you go to Italy
or Spain or any of those Egypt I mean, they
still have all of those old artifacts up and it's

(26:28):
like one of the first things you learn when you
go to those places as the history of the place.
We're not like that in the United States. And so
that goes for all of it, including race and racism,
which is America's original sin. We don't want to go
back and look at that. We feel like it is
that's the past. We're now in the president we should
be looking to the future. But I think what we've

(26:48):
seen over the summer is more indication than anything else
in our recent history that we have to deal with
that original sin in order to move forward. So we're
gonna take a quick break. But before we get there,
I have one last question for you. In a perfect
world in your mind, what does our country look like?

(27:09):
What does our country feel like? After the election? My
main focus right now as a journalist is as I
mentioned before, is to add context, clarity, and understanding. And
one of my main focus points is really offering folks
and understanding of how they can vote because it's so
different than it than it's ever been because of the pandemic.

(27:33):
Most states, you're going to be voting absentee when you
need to have your ballot in in if you need
to go in person, where you can go, how you
can keep yourself safe. That's my mission over the next
few weeks. You know, like their places like Florida, for instance,
where felons have been given the right to vote, but
they now there's a Supreme Court decision. Is they still
they have to pay all of their fines before they

(27:54):
can vote. But it's such an antiquated system you may
not even know where you owe a fine, so how
would you know where to go to pay the fine?
Those are the things I'm thinking about because if it's
as close as many people believe it might be every
vote counts, and if you've allowed folks that the right
to vote in places like Florida, but they will get

(28:17):
to the polls and they won't be able to cast
a vote that could have an outcome in the election.
Thank you so much, Tanya. Really like again, like I
mentioned earlier, this is an educational experience for me. So
the things that you mentioned with the media in the
professional space, I think a lot of that advice can
be taken as just people who have social media accounts
tweeting things out of our brains and tweeting our hearts.

(28:40):
We're gonna take a quick break. When we come back.
I'm actually gonna be speaking with a shanty goal are.
We're gonna be talking about getting involved with politics. Don't
go anywhere, alright, y'all, we are back. This is let's
get into it. We are talking about getting involved with
politics here in twenty twenty. I've just had an amazing
conversation with Tanya talking about the journalistics I of politics,

(29:01):
how that's all playing into now. And now I got
a shanty golar already gave you your intro. You've done
more things than I can count on both hands and
both feet. So let's just get straight into it as shanty. Alright.
You think that one person can make a difference, one
person can absolutely make a difference. So at Emerge we

(29:21):
focus on recruiting and training democratic women to run for office.
And I'm not joking when I say every year we
have several alarms who lose their race by one vote.
M I will repeat that again. There are several people
in this country who lose their race by one vote.

(29:43):
And I'm going to tell this particular story about Shelley Simons.
She was she's one of our alums. She ran for
Virginia delegate in her race was tied. Do you know
how you break a tie vote in Virginia? You pick
a name out of a hat? Are you serious? That

(30:04):
is how her race was decided. Her name was not
picked out of the hat. So during that legislative session,
amazing bills that focused on lgbt Q issues, Medicare expansion,
police reform, passing the Equal Rights Amendment, all those votes
failed by one vote. If Shelley had been elected, those

(30:29):
bills would have gotten passed. But she's an emerged woman.
She ran again in twenty nine one, and now you
see Virginia leading the way in their state House with
bills that are bettering the lives of people. So when
we say not one person can make a difference, your

(30:49):
one vote can actually mean the difference between if you
get discriminated against when applying for a job because of
who you love, if your family member is able to
get the health care that they need, if your school
gets a proper funding so that kids don't have their
lunch thrown away because their parents can't pay the bill.

(31:13):
So never ever think that your vote does not matter,
that you don't matter. And when we talk about politics
so much, there's really an ecosystem. There's the candidates that
get elected by voters. But those candidates also have campaign
staff because running a campaign is really like running a business.

(31:35):
They have a campaign manager, they have a treasurer, they
have a press secretary, and those campaign staff they need
amazing volunteers. And those volunteers and the voters are the
ones that make things happen. And even if none of
those things appeal to you, you can be a donor.

(31:56):
And even when we talk about donors, because of how
our campaign finance system is set up, I know people
are like shanty I ain't got a thousand dollars, girl,
I don't know what you're talking about. If you have
five dollars, if you have ten dollars, if you have
fifteen dollars that you can give to a candidate, that
makes you a donor. You are investing in someone's campaign.

(32:19):
You are investing in democracy, and that money adds up.
That can be social media ads, that's campaign lit, that's
them doing a TV ad. A small dollar donors, we
have the power to actually change this system when we

(32:39):
all come together with our little dollars. Those billionaires ain't
got nothing on us. They can do whatever they want.
They can say whatever we want. Because our fifty dollars
a month that we're given to this congressional candidate now
means that we have the most women serving in Congress

(33:00):
and that Congress is passing bills that will make our
teacher better. So you matter, your vote matters, your dollar matters.
This is our country. We should not let the one
percent dictate how we live. So that's the interview. I

(33:22):
don't know, I don't even know what else to say.
I got a list of questions right here. I'm like
you just I'm so lucky have you on this show.
Thank you for having me. Let's get a little more
specific then, UM this year is the anniversary for the
Women's Right to Vote. UM as the as the head

(33:43):
of Emerge, which is encouraging women to run for office,
and you and you help facilitate that. Also as the
creator of the Brown Girls Guide to Politics, You've said
and and shown many times that you can't win without women.
You've actually you said that people are finally realizing this
as well. Do you expand on that whole concept. I'll
say also, being a brother to three sisters, I've known

(34:05):
miss like I've known plan my whole life like my
sister is. My birthday is all planned out. Their birthdays are.
Everything's planned out, and I leave it to them because
every time I planned something, we end up at the
beach with no water, no towels, and for some reason,
everybody trying. That's kind of how that turns out. So
I'd love for you to expand and teach other people
as well what you mean by we can't win without women. Yes,

(34:29):
So let's start with the number of elected offices we
have in this country. There are five hundred and twenty
thousand people that we vote for to represent us. There's
five elected offices. Women were of the population. We did
not hold of those offices. Men still occupy of those

(34:53):
offices and they're mainly white men. So when we're just
saying you can't when without women were the majority of
the voters, you need our vote. But also with women,
just like you said, Alex, it's not just about us voting.
We got the brothers, we got the friends, we got
the colleagues. We bring everyone with us to the polls.

(35:18):
We are a very powerful constituency when we're talking about black, brown,
and Indigenous women, especially with the Democratic Party. Black women
are the base of the base of the Democratic Party.
We consistently turn out. Now, let's tie this to women's

(35:39):
representation in elected office. It was the anniversary of the
nineteenth Amendment, but the fact is that only really gave
the right to vote to some women. It technically gave
women the right to vote, but we know that black, brown,
and indigenous women were left out of that move and

(36:00):
when they did participate, they had to march in the back.
It was still very much about white women's empowerment. It
was not about empowering all women. So when we talk
about women in elected office. Our white sisters have really
had a hundred years. We have not had a hundred years.

(36:22):
It's only been since ninety five and after that we
have been able to be active participants in this political system.
So what we're talking about women holding less than one
of these offices just across the board. Women only make

(36:42):
up of Congress when it comes to state houses less
than twenty when it comes to mayors and major cities
less than twenty percent. If we want to tie that
to black, brown, and Indigenous women, it is all under
ten percent. Where we're talking about our indigenous community in general,

(37:05):
they make up less than one percent of elected offices.
So we still have a long ways to go when
we're talking about equality not only for women but also
for people of color. So post six, we saw more
women running for office. So many of them said, Okay,
if not Hillary, then who than me. I have to

(37:28):
be the one to step up and run. And we
saw a record number women running. And this year we
also see a record number of women running, but particularly
women of color, especially black women, And people are like,
oh my gosh, what's going on. I mean, this is
so great, but why now? As Like, the why now
is because this is our time. We didn't have that

(37:51):
time in the nineteen twenties and nineteen thirties and nineteen forties.
This is how it is supposed to be. We are
owning our moment, our political moment, our moment of power
in this country. To run for these seats. We just
don't have to be the voters. We can actually put
our name on the ballot and be the one at

(38:13):
the table making the decisions. It seems to me, and
maybe I'm wrong, that what you just spoke about is
kind of the basis of why you are so inspired
to start and continue working through this concept of the
Brown Girls Guide, making it such a beautiful movement. Is
there anything that you haven't mentioned already that a specialty

(38:33):
or important to you that you want the listeners to
know about the Brown Girls Guy topologist, My story is
a lot like here is Alex. I don't come from
a political family at all. I think people make that
assumption because I do what I do. But fun fact,
one day I was watching TV with my mom. She
got up, I do what kids do. I changed the

(38:54):
channel to what I want to watch and I discovered
c SPAN and I was like, what is this? All
these people yelling and fighting, wanting to make the country better.
I am intrigued, and that is how I fell in
love with politics. But even at a young age, I

(39:15):
knew I did not see a lot of people that
look like me. I didn't see a lot of women.
I didn't see a lot of people of color. And
that let me know that, even though I love this,
is there a place for me in this? Can I
achieve with the few people I do see doing this?
Can I do that? So I always had that doubt

(39:37):
in my mind, but I stayed involved in politics. I
had a great government teacher, Mrs King. You got extra
credit when you can volunteer. And I loved it so much.
And I'm where I'm at now because of so many
other women who saw things in me that I didn't
see it myself, who uplifted me and supporting me and

(40:01):
helped me along this journey. And I'm so grateful for them,
especially the colored girls. They have a great book out
that I recommend your listeners go and read. It's Donna Brazil,
Yolanda Hairway, mignamor bishop Lea Dawtry. They were the women
who I looked up to when I was just a
little girl in Las Vegas who loved politics. I had

(40:25):
to look all the way to Washington, d C. To
find those women, and unfortunate now that they're my mentors.
So I'm very blessed in that way that I was
able to connect with them. And the catalyst for the
b GG was I had so many young women who
would reach out to me saying, I'm interested in politics.

(40:45):
How do I get started? I don't know if there's
space for me. And that was my story, That's who
I was, and I really wanted the opportunity to pay
it forward and let them know, Yeah, you belong, You've
a long and campaign, you belong at political committees, you
can be a consultant, get your money, girl. I wanted

(41:07):
them to know all the things that I didn't know.
So I create The Brown Girl's Guide to Politics as
a platform. It really a resource where women of color
who love politics, think they may love politics, when to
get involved in politics, have a one stop shop where
they can find Brown Girl friendly organizations. We share news

(41:31):
and we have our blog. And I reached out to
some of my friends and I joke, I basically asked them, hey,
you want to join me? And putting all our political
business own on the internet and helping other young women
of color along their journey, and several of them said yes.
And we did a series on the blog called being

(41:51):
the Only Brown Girl in the Room, because even in
there're still rooms in this case Zoom room that I
go into and I'm the only woman of color. Sometimes
I'm the only woman. And we talked about those struggles,
and my blog posts focused on being the only Brown

(42:12):
girl in the room when people say some really messed
up racist stuff and how do you respond? And that
blog series was very popular. It continues to be our
most popular blog, and that became the catalyst for the podcast,
for us to be able to really tell those stories
some more. And at the end of the day, I

(42:33):
really think of the b g G as my love
letter to my fellow women of color who love politics,
to let them know that they're seeing their heart, they're valued,
and they can make a difference. I literally could listen
to you, you know, as a brother to any brown girls.
I've literally talked about it, and that empowerment is really

(42:54):
something that's important. In your first episode of your first
podcast episode featuring Stacy Rooms who narrowly lost just like um,
like you mentioned earlier narrowly lost the Georgia governorship due
to alleged voter suppression in your state. There's also a
lot of talk right now about voter suppression, and you know,
with everything from mail in ballots to just kind of
both sides of talking about how the elections rigged. And

(43:17):
you have so many voices talking about voter suppression. How
worried do we need to be about voter suppression. I'm
real voter suppression exists. And for those people who think
that their vote doesn't matter. If it didn't matter, they
wouldn't be doing all these shenanigans to try to stop
people from voting. It would be like, oh, someone personally

(43:38):
delivering your ballot to the door with the mass like
the face shield. They would want everyone to vote. But
the fact is there's just some people in this country
because of the changing demographics, they know that they cannot
win honestly, so they have to suppress the vote. When
it comes to our situation right now, Alex, people are thinking, oh,

(44:01):
voting is going to start, or voting is in November
like we are in the general election. People in North
Carolina are returning their ballots. This is it y'all. It
is game time. So the biggest thing that people need
to do is keep up to date on what is

(44:21):
happening with voting laws, election laws in your state. Make
sure you know the deadline to request your mouth and ballot,
Know the deadline for when you have to return that ballot.
Know what color inc. You have to complete your ballot
in because it has to be a certain color inc.

(44:42):
Or also throw it out. Make sure you sign in
all the places. Know if it's legal for you to
help someone else out with their ballot. Know if it's
legal for you to return someone else's ballot to the clerk,
if that is an option for you. Everyone needs to
really educate themselves on this process and pay attention if

(45:06):
you have a secretary of state election on your ballot,
because it's your secretary of state who creates these laws.
Going back to Stacy Abrams, Brian Kimp the governor of Georgia,
and everyone can't see man using quotation marks because that
may install the election. He was the secretary of State

(45:27):
when he was running for governor. He was the candidate
and the referee. He set the rules. He was able
to rig it so he could win. And a report
came out this week showing that there were over two
hundred thousand people that they illegally removed from the voting roles.
Stacy Abram's lost by less than fifty thou votes she

(45:51):
would be governor. So everyone just has to be extremely
diligent and also be diligent about who your state legis
stative candidates are because we're about to have redistricting, and
can you tell me a little bit more about that, um,
what is redistricting for for those of us who don't
know that, is when they redraw the lines to figure

(46:14):
out what district you're in, how many members the Congress
you get. We also know we're in the middle of
the census as well. One of the things that they
love to do with redistricting is something called jerrymandering, and
especially for people of color, they like to put us
all in the same district. That is another form of

(46:36):
voter suppression, them taking away our ability to have a
fair representation. So make sure you're looking at who your
state representatives are because in a lot of states, they're
going to be the ones who decide these lines for
the next ten years. And please take your census when

(46:58):
you don't complete your sense this you're leaving money for
your community on the table. That means you're leaving money
for you on the table. That's roads, at schools, all
the things that you use, that your family uses. They're
counting on us not voting. Their counting on us not
compleating the census, like don't fall for the Oki dock.

(47:21):
We need to make sure that we are on top
of both of these things. I'm so mesmerized. I'm gonna
call out Catherine because she told me I'm mesmerized, and
I was like, that's the word I was looking for.
Y'all are sweet. This conversation has been so really educational
for me and inspiring for me. I want to close

(47:41):
this out as we can take a quick break by
asking you the same question. I would love to hear
your hope for post this election. What is it that
you kind of hope to see as a result. I
really want to see more great women in elected office
up and down the ballot. I am proud to say
that I'm voting for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. It

(48:06):
was really great when Vice President Biden said that he
was going to put a woman on the ticket as
his vice presidential candidate. I was excited the minute he
said that, and I was excited when he chose Senator Harris.
And the night that she accepted the VP nomination, I
did a Women for Biden event and they asked me,

(48:28):
how do I feel about this moment? And I let
them know that at the nineteen sixty for Democratic Convention,
Danny lou Hammer fought to be sat as a delegate.
This is what she wanted. This is what she fought for.
This is what Shirley Chisholm fought for, This is what
Harriet Tubman fought for. This was what they envisioned for women,

(48:53):
especially women of color. So when she accepted that nomination,
she was standing on their shoulders. This is the culmination
of years of the work of women, even with emerge.
I became the president in February of this year. We're
celebrating our fifteen year anniversary. I'm standing on the shoulders

(49:16):
of women who did this before me. So there's just
so much at stake, and there's so many great candidates
who are on the ballot. So really research people, and
what I tell people when they're thinking about voting every
year is think about what you want your life to
be like in five years, what you want your family's

(49:38):
life to be like in five years, what you want
the world to be like in five years. Find the
candidates that will make that happen, and that's who you
vote for. And you know, Alex you said earlier, people
are like, well, there's just no candidate that I like
that agrees with me. And my answer to that is

(49:59):
who The only person you're ever gonna hunt your person
agree with is you. So that means you need to
run for office. You need to put your name on
the ballot if that's how you feel, and then you
get to be someone else's candidate who's going to make
their life better in five years. So run for office.
We have to take a break only because we have to,

(50:19):
literally because we have to run an ad. We're gonna
be right back because I don't even want to. I'm
not even gonna stop this incredible momentum we got going out.
We'll be right back. Don't go anywhere, all right, We're back.
I told you we were not going to go anywhere quick.
This has been just the most inspiring. So thank you
both Tanya and Shaunky for for being such incredible guests

(50:40):
on this podcast. Thank you. We're talking about voting in
the dumpster fire. Literally almost every part of traditional campaigning
processes are different this year. You know, we're not knocking
on doors. We're in a pandemic. Politicians can't have proper
rallies or conventions like they've had in history. Even polling
places are going to be looking at especially different. You
have mail in ballots, and like you mentioned, I would

(51:02):
love to take this time right now to reiterate what
Ashanti said at the end of hers learn what mail
in ballots mean for you in your community, in your city,
in your town, in your state. The Postal Service has
recommended people allowing fourteen days round trip for your ballot,
So I want to let you know if you're casting
your vote by mail, November three is not your voting day.

(51:23):
Your voting day in essence from the Postal Services recommendation
would be October is the day that you should mail
in your votes so that it arrives for the count.
That being said, what impact do you both feel that
this new kind of weird, different version of an election.
What do you think that impact is going to have
on it? I still have hope now at the beginning

(51:46):
of March when the pandemic hit. One of the things
that we had to think about ad Emerge is how
do we support our women during this time because campaigning
has been turned completely upside down. Like you said, Alex,
you're not knocking doors, you're not doing your fundraising. We
had to really support them, and we created our Campaigning

(52:08):
through Crisis series where we went through all the ways
that you had to adjust your campaign, especially because every
campaign has the wind number, and that's the number of
votes that the campaign determines that they need to win.
And for so many people, the win number changed, especially

(52:29):
if you had a college campus in your district. Those
students have gone home and there were a lot of
campaigns that were planning on them being back in the
fall and they're doing remote learning. So I had to
support one of our candidates with figuring out her new
win number and getting her voters out. And why I

(52:51):
say I had a hope is with Wisconsin, there was
a lot of back and forth about if they were
going to have their election, and we didn't know and
to election eve that they were still going to have it.
We have fifty nine of our Emerge alums on the
ballot for that election, and fifty one of them won
their races because people in Wisconsin still turned out to

(53:16):
vote in person, risking their lives to cast their right
to vote because they needed better leadership. They knew that
that was absolutely essential. And as we continue to look
at the primaries, you still had record turn out either
in person, are VML and ballot in so many states,

(53:39):
so people are paying attention. And I think one of
the upside to this is because we are having town
halls online, because we're having fundraisers online, because we're doing
meet and greets with the candidates online, it has allowed
more people to particip a paint because these are things

(54:02):
that they can do now. Not everyone can make it
across town at six pm for a fundraiser. Not everyone
works hours that allow them to attend these fundraisers. So
it has made getting involved with campaigns and getting to
know your candidates a lot easier. But still, I'm going
to say that's only for some people, because internet is

(54:26):
still a luxury in this country, and we know so
many people don't have it, and we're unfortunately seeing that
with our children who are sitting outside Starbucks and Taco
Bells to use free WiFi with parents who are writing
papers on their phone for their kids because there's not
a computer at home. It has also showed us truly

(54:48):
that haves and have nuts that we knew existed but
are on full display. So I have such hope. I'm
also an optimist that people are really going to make
sure that they're out there, they're doing their part too,
at least make sure we can get our country back
on track. I love your optimism to do anything that

(55:11):
you want. You want to add some of the impact
that this kind of new world we live in is
going to have on this election. Yeah, it's going to
be really interesting to see turnout because I actually don't
know if we have a full sense of how people
are feeling, but we do know what they're dealing with
we're do. We do know that we're dealing with record unemployment,

(55:32):
and we do know that so many people are suffering
and they want some sort of relief. And so I
think as a journalist when we're taking we're having these
discussions on our show and lots of other programs about
the back and forth between Trump and Congress over a
stimulus package, or the back and forth with politicians about

(55:53):
what is true and what's not true. I'm really wondering
about what everyday Americans are thinking about ultimately what they
want for their lives after this election, because you know,
we can talk way up here, but the realities are.
As Ashanti said, there are so many people, their kids
who don't have access to the internet. There are people
who are working multiple jobs, driving lifts and ubers to

(56:16):
deliver food for people, and I just want to make
certain that those people have all the tools they need
to go out to vote for who they feel like
will give them the future that they deserve during what
is such a difficult time in the midst of a pandemic.
Is there anything that you feel, Tanya, that you wish
people were talking about more right now leading up to

(56:38):
this election. Well, you know, Alex, I think what you
represent is the majority of people and how they feel
about politics. How are they were raised. I mean, in
many ways, I was raised that way too. We didn't
talk about the issues, We didn't talk about organizing or
being a part of the political process besides voting. We
were civically engaged. But I think ultimately what I look

(57:00):
forward to getting back to or reimagining, because I think
that so much discontent that we see as well, so
much discontent and support for Trump, for instance, comes from
people who never had faith in the political process to
begin with. And so how can we reimagine the way
that we interface with people, politicians interface with people the

(57:21):
media that is true to their experiences and what they
truly want. You know, in addition to what Ashanti is
saying about, like if you don't see the candidate that
you support, you know that you that that aligns with you,
then run. The other part of that is you can
be involved. You know. I was in South Carolina for
the primaries in February, right before we went into lockdown

(57:44):
for the pandemic. It was so hardening to see so
many young people just assisting the candidates, really getting the
word out, and their voice matters because they're talking to
the candidates about the issues that are important to them,
and they're informing those candidates on what's important as they
go out into the world. And so those are also ways.

(58:04):
I mean, they're always wanting to hear from their constituents,
and I think that's the one thing that I'm really
excited to see is the engagement of young people. They
can do it through so many different means. Now, as
a Shanty said, the one thing is that we can
be more connected because we're just connected more digitally, so
we're not like having to drive to different places. It's
like the drum that we're always beating is that our

(58:27):
voices do matter and really informing what the candidates focus
on and what they do for us. Yeah, I mean,
I can't remember where I saw the stat but like
it's been talked about a lot, that the young vote
is stronger now than than it's ever been before, and
and whether we we credit that to social media and
everybody having an easier form of learning for what's going

(58:49):
on in the world and we're all connected like you
had mentioned, Um, I think it's definitely something that we
should continue highlighting. Ashanti, Do you have anything that that
you feel people should be talking about more you wish
people were talking about more right now that we can highlight.
I think for this we have to remember that the
world wasn't always like this. We're sitting here during this

(59:10):
time because people rose up and they may change and
change is hard, change is uncomfortable, change is difficult, and
not everyone likes it. We see people fighting back now
against this change, but this is what we have to
do to make things better, and we have a choice

(59:34):
right now. You have to decide what side of history
do you want to be on, because this moment we're
living in right now, it is history. It is going
to be in history books. So when the future young
people in your family are asking you what you did
during this time, figure out what do you want to say.

(59:58):
Did you put on your mask and fight for black lives?
Did you go out in protests against ice and having
kids in cages? Did you make sure that you watch
the mailman pick up the mail and the little box

(01:00:19):
that you put your ballot in because you wanted to
make sure that your vote was heard. You got to
decide right now what part of history are you going
to be on? And then take action. Absolutely, I wanted
to step in to say I think about this all
the time, and I think about this even when I'm
talking with the people in my life, like what side

(01:00:40):
of history do you want to be on in this moment?
And to your point, Ashanti, about change is hard and
difficult and painful. I think that we looked at the
civil rights movement of the sixties. It was neatly presented
to us and our history classes because you know, that's
the way it's synthesized and history books. But it was
painful and chaotic and was not clear, and folks did

(01:01:03):
not know what the outcomes were going to be. They
did not know. Think about all of our leaders were
being assassinated during that time. There were people fighting for
the right to vote, there were people fighting for desegregation,
all of those things, and there was no clear path
that that was actually going to be a reality. And
so we can look back and see that, oh, yeah,
those changes did happen. You know what, I always call

(01:01:25):
myself a realist Ashanti, but I think I am an
optimist in this, in this regard that I do feel
like perhaps there is hope on the other side that
we are thinking about it in terms of change is
hard and chaotic and painful, and if we keep working
hard on the other side of it, we will see it.
I mean, you said it right there where it's I

(01:01:46):
think you have to have some optimism to endure that change.
The hardships and the weird feelings and the uncomfortable conversations,
and you have to be optimistic that through those things
you will see something better. And even if it doesn't,
you know, knock on what I don't even like saying it.
If it doesn't go our way, we can still look
back and say I I still am proud that I fought,

(01:02:06):
and I stood up for my brothers and my sisters,
my gender nonconforming family members, and and really hunkered down
and stood, you know, stuck my feet in the mud
and stood for what I believed. I want to close
with this, and you've both kind of mentioned it in
the sense of and you've both shown it through your
example of of getting involved in politics and and and

(01:02:26):
discussing it, whether you're a member of the media, whether
you are the president of a company that inspires women
to run for office. I've definitely had that moment where
people say things like, well, if you want a perfect candidate,
why don't you go and run for it? And I
think some of us start thinking to ourselves like maybe
I could, or maybe Alex, Look, you already a star.

(01:02:48):
You're only two. What you're only twenty four. I mean,
where are you going to be at forty? You just
might be the president of the United States. Questions not
my point. My point is more, I would love your
ice for anybody, any listener who's starting to get that inkling,
or maybe they grew up like all three of us,
as I'm starting to find out, and and politics wasn't

(01:03:08):
something that was necessarily ingrained in their in their fibers.
What's your advice from both of you to that listener
who wants to get a little bit more involved, whether
it's on the running for office side, or just whether
it is being a very vocal person, being a strong
voice in your community for politics. For me, we have

(01:03:29):
to remember everyone starts somewhere. Nancy Pelosi did not wake
up Nancy Pelosi. Kamala Harrison not wake up Kamala Harris.
The co founders of Emerge are friends with her, and
they helped her with her first d A race, and
they talked about how they had to help her write
her bio, how they bought her a Palm pilot to

(01:03:50):
put in her contexts. We all start from somewhere, and
you don't have to have it all figured out, and
you do not have to be perfect because we see
all of our elected officials and oh they got it
all together. No people talk about a reflective democracy. I

(01:04:11):
want an inclusive democracy. That means that I just don't
want the people that look like America. I want the
people who have experience homelessness. I want the people who
have college debt. I want the people who know what
it's like to experience bankruptcy because they lost their home

(01:04:35):
during the crisis. Those are the best people to represent
us because they have those real, lived experiences. We need
those voices at that table, and that is all of us.
Yesterday we did one of our Emerged Leaders Matters or
Tool salons with Congresswoman Deb Holland and Congresswoman Sherise David's,

(01:04:57):
both of them elected to Congress in tween and the
first Indigenous women elected to Congress. Think about that, and
when we talked about running for office, Charis said something
and it's like it blew my mind. She's like, for
us people of color, for us black, brown and Indigenous

(01:05:19):
people who live in this America, we're going to experience
things that are a lot harder than running for office.
Running for office is actually one of the easiest things
that you can do as a person of color in
this country because you've experienced so much worse things that
are so much harder that they prepare you to run

(01:05:42):
for office and to be that person. So I think
that that is my advice. We all start somewhere and
know that you can be that person. Do you ever
think that I'm a co founder of Emerson about in
two thousand and six. When I got that email, I
was not like, oh, I'm gonna run that organization one day.

(01:06:05):
That that never crossed my mind at all. But we
all start somewhere and you will end up where you
are supposed to be. So keep that in mind. That's
so good Ashanti, you know. And to just add to that,
as crazy or twisted as it sounds, I think that

(01:06:26):
Trump being our president in this moment speaks to people
really having a yearning for the anti politician. So they
want real people who have experienced real things, and many
people believe that the Trump and somehow, somehow represents that
even though he doesn't come he comes from extreme privilege,
but he is the anti politician, and that he had

(01:06:49):
no experience before he set foot into this arena. But
that speaks to the opportunity I think for people who
are interested or may have an inkling that you know what,
gone are the days when you have to have a
spotless record. Remember when we were talking about Clinton back
in the nineties, did he smoke a joint when he
was in college. Like that is no longer. I mean,

(01:07:11):
come on, let's talk about like people who have really
lived in They're not just career politicians, but they've lived life.
And to Kamala Harris, wonderful example. I mean, her passion
in the beginning was law, and she was a lawyer
and she moved through into being a politician. And so
there's so many different entry ways and points to it.
But maybe we can look at this as a point

(01:07:33):
where we are re examining what politicians look like and
what they are and what we expect of them. Wow,
I mean I think about it. Like, just to add
to that is like I think about musicians when people
ask even me, when they go, hey, how do you
get into music? Or like I want to get into music,
but I don't have this, that and the other, And
it's that exactly the exact same advice that you both

(01:07:53):
have given is the exact same advice. The same thing
is when they asked somebody how to get into journalism, right,
or I want to get a journalism but I didn't
come from a journalism family, or I didn't come from
a family that did this. You know, I didn't come
from a family musicians. I'm pretty sure you didn't come
from a family that was you know, I don't think
your parents last name is NPR right. My mom's still like,

(01:08:14):
what is that? Okay, I'll try to find it. To
listen to you. I want to reiterate just that that
thought that is, it doesn't matter where you come from,
it doesn't matter if you were raised in politics. I
want to implore anybody who's out there listening, who has
any inkling, even if it's inkling, that's against what your
friends think, what your family thinks, what your peers think,

(01:08:36):
what the people in your city or your state think,
follow your heart and uh and that's something I really
want to highlight for for this whole election is vote
with your heart. You know, identify what speaks to you,
what speaks to your community, and and and chase after
it and don't be afraid of that. Tanya Ashanti, thank
you so much. I really feel I love that you

(01:08:56):
both came on here, and I'm so grateful that you
both came on here. We have this moment and and
it's kind of like our whole our whole podcast right
now is kind of changing in its tone. Usually I
call it not so shameless promo. UM, but I just
want to I want both of you to just tell
us where we can find more, because I wish this
podcast wasn't just an hour long podcast. I wish I
could talk to you both for for the whole day

(01:09:17):
and and I have so many questions and so many thoughts,
and so for anybody else who ask questions and thoughts,
where can we find Utahania, Well, you can find me
Monday through Friday at noon on NPRS Midday Show here
and now I also have a podcast, Truth Be Told
and Truth Be Told. I am the twenty years older
version of Alex, black woman version of Alex, all about

(01:09:41):
all about having these kinds of conversations, which I want
to thank you. I do feel like you're such a
national treasure. You're a star, but you're also a national
treasure in that you have this platform and all of
the things that you do is a way to amplify
other thoughts and ideas and then use yourself in such
a personal and vulnerable way to showcase what so many

(01:10:03):
people are all feeling and wondering. So I thank you
for that. But you can find me in those two places,
and of course, all the social media platforms you can
find me and I'd love to connect with everyone. I
love that, Ashanti, your turn, Now you gotta you gotta
have a learning curve. Now Todd, you crushed it, so
you can just follow that same that same format. Well,
I first have to say thank you Alex for using

(01:10:25):
your platform in this way, because there still are so
many people who won't touch politics. They don't want to
be controversial. So what you are doing is amazing and
you get to say you're on the right side of
history when people ask you. So thank you for that
and for me personally, I'm Ashanti Golar on Twitter, Facebook,

(01:10:48):
and Instagram Emerge America. Our website is emerge America dot org.
If you're a Democratic woman who's interested in running, we
have some trainings coming up, so sign up for our
list and you can find us on Twitter, Facebook, and
Instagram at emerge America. For the Brown Girls Guide to Politics,

(01:11:08):
we are at the b G Guide dot com and
on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at the b G Guide.
And we are currently doing a special series on the
Brown Girls Guide to Politics podcast called Freedom Summer, where
we are talking about what we are experiencing with what
I say, is our racial injustice pandemic. We have two

(01:11:31):
pandemics going on in this country, a health pandemic and
a racial injustice pandemic, and we're talking to black women
leaders at the forefront about where do we go from here?
Anya Mosley is Shanty Golar. Thank you both so much
for coming on my podcast. You know you can find
me at alex ion no ai o n oh. It's
the best part about having a weird last name. Please

(01:11:53):
take some time to rate our podcast, subscribe to our podcast.
That is how we grow. Please leave a review. That's
how we grow. And I also slot to know what
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for listening. We'll see you guys next time. It's politics.
I'm baby, what's acculating? We really want you to get

(01:12:14):
the help you need, so if you need help, please
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(01:12:36):
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if that's a doozy