Part Two: Why Trump Targeted Two Black Election Workers

Ruby Freeman & Shaye Moss are heroes for their testimony before the Jan 6th commission, but they shouldn’t have to be. In part two of this episode, Bridget continues her conversation with The Daily Zeitgeist’s Miles Gray, discussing what happened when the disgraced president and the right wing digital media ecosystem coalesced to attack Black women for simply doing their jobs as poll workers during the 2020 election.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
This week marks two years since the deadly insurrection on
January Ray six, and last week, as the commission into
the events of how that day unfolded came to a close,
I was joined by Miles Gray of the podcast Daily
Zychides to explore how in the lead up to January six,
Trump and his allies weaponized the identities of two black
women election workers, Shaye and Ruby Freeman, in an attempt

(00:22):
to steal the election. Here's part two of that conversation,
where we do a deep dive into the Trump allies
who were doing his dirty work and what it means
for all of us. Let's talk a bit about some
of the people who were organizing this horrible campaign against
these women. It's already your mixed bag of like Trump crenies.
You've probably heard of, you know, Trump, Rudy Giuliani, these

(00:44):
media companies. But there are a couple of other folks
that I feel like I want to talk about. So
one is this woman, Trevanni Coutie. Shaye and Ruby Freeman
were also being harassed and threatened by Trevanni Coutie. Travanni
was formally a publicist for R and B singer Slash
convicted sex criminal. R Kelly is like a complete Google

(01:06):
contin complete Google. Is it? Is it trevy on or Trevanni?
I think I don't how how have y'all said it?
I've heard, I've heard it the way that you were
pronouncing it. But I'm just like, because when I Google it,
everything comes up as t R like the way you
spelled it. Okay, but I also have I got I

(01:27):
got the mild dyslexia too, And I'm like and I
but also I don't really care. I love I love
the cool zone media. That's the cool zone media. That's
a cool zone media. Way were like, are they? Are
they an awful human being? I don't care. How do
you pronounce your dad? Yeah, if you're a bastard, you
don't get proper pronunciation. And that's just what we do here.

(01:50):
We're like, sorry, I'm not sorry. I'm curious. Has she Sophie?
Has she come up in an other reporting that y'all done? Um,
just like a little bit when we were talking about
some of the Kanye stuff, but not really not much. Um,
not a big enough player to come up in and
get like her own episode. So her relationship with Kanye

(02:14):
West is pretty weird to me. Um, folks, it's like
I don't fully get it. Um, she was some kind
of an associate of Kanye West at some point. That's
like a documented thing. Um. According to NBC News, a
biography of her posted to a website for the website
of Women's Global Initiative, a business networking group, identified her
as a member of the Young Black Leadership Council under

(02:38):
Donald Trump, and that noted that in she was quote
secured as a publicist to Kanye West and now serves
as west Director of Operation. So somewhere, some somewhere down
the line, she did have that in her bio, but
Kanye's camp says that she is not associated with him,
and so it's just like one of those things where
it's like, well, who was telling the truth? Like that
was in her bio. Kanye's camp says that they have

(02:59):
no s a station. So funny because people like you
were thinking Kanye if he had somebody that was willing
to claim him right now, he would be like okay.
But even even she's like whoa whoa, whoa who not her,
which says she's still posting picture like she I went
to her Instagram earlier today and she's still posting pictures

(03:21):
like cartoons of Kanye West as president. So I think
I think if he would have her, she would maybe
this might this might end with like a rekindling of
their scammy partnership. I like, I like immediately going to
see her instagram is wild if you want to, if
you want to, like look at someone's Instagram and you're like, wow,

(03:42):
you're just like kind of a wild person. Uh, she
recommended voice. That's what her That's what her bio says, Miles.
Her bio says, the majority's voice, political sharp shooter, political
sharp shooter. Okay, manipulator with the evil eye. Om o

(04:03):
g okay, okay. So she's like a bastard and proud.
I think, yeah, oh man, I don't Yeah, this is
oh no, I know. This is like I know people
who have instagrams that look like this, me too, and yeah,
I'm like no, I'm like, yo, you see a homeboy

(04:23):
from high schools Instagram? I'm like yeah. But the one
where he said that Mike Vick was actually herschel walker
in disguise. People there are people post their oh my god,
I can't even imagine what's in her draft, Like, oh
my god, you're so right, like, no, you don't have
drafts when you're like this kidding me straight? Come on now,

(04:48):
you're just like to post. Yeah. I was like, how
does she directly relate to what we're talking about besides
being terrified? Okay? So, in any event, she showed up
at Shaye and Ruby's store, and the way men understandably
called the police and they all end up going to
the police station together to talk. She tells them that
she is visiting at the direction of a quote high
profile individual who had warned her that if if Shay

(05:11):
and Ruby did not confess to these voter fraud allegations,
they would be arrested in forty eight hours. This is
where it gets a little bit weird. According to Rolling Stone,
the police body cam footage of this conversation shows her
telling the women, I cannot say specifically what will take place.
I just know it will disrupt your freedom and the
freedom of one or more of your family members. You
are a loose end for a party that needs to

(05:33):
tidy up. Um, So like pretty weird thing to say
to somebody. She then calls a man called Harrison Floyd
on speaker phone, who says that he can offer these
women protection. I realized earlier and when I was doing this,
I thought his name was Harrison Ford, but it was
Harrison Floyd, which is probably a very combination, like it's
got the familiarity of Harrison Ford and George Floyd who

(05:56):
had that name. Check to it sounds like lazy, made
up name, but totally sure Harrison Floyd, totally totally. So
he basically tells reiterates that he could offer her protection
but if she if she confesses to voter fraud, he
can offer her protection, but if she declines, she'll go
to jail. So it turns out that Floyd actually worked

(06:18):
for the Trump campaign, formally as a paid executive director
of Black Voices for Trump. But he told Rachel Maddow
that he sent this woman to Shay and Ruby's house
as a private citizen, not of an employee of the
Trump campaign. He said that he got calls from people
saying that they could keep Ruby and Shay safe if
they confessed. Side note, I don't really believe anything that

(06:39):
any of these people are saying. That this is just
what they're saying, and I'm just saying what they said.
They all sound like liars and grifters, but you know
that's what's going on here. For what it's worth. Could
he denies any wrongdoing. She said that it's a smear
campaign being organized by the news outlet Reuters, who did
a lot of reporting on this story. And if she
also said on Twitter, Ruby told a chaplain that she
wanted to vide evidence in exchange for immunity for her

(07:02):
and her daughter, but didn't trust a white man to
help her as a black woman familiar in this arena,
I was contacted to provide Freeman with her requested information
on her options. Probably goes without saying that Ruby and
say are like that never fucking happened. That's a lie. Yeah, okay,
I do see why she claims to work for Kanye

(07:22):
because it's believable. Absolutely um. And so this all went down.
She's a black woman. So this all went down on
January four, just two days before January six, And it
sounds like what was going on here is that the
Trump associates wanted to get like a forced confession out

(07:44):
of these women and then use that as a means
to stop the transition of presidential power on the sixth.
That's what I think was going on that They were like,
if we can get them to confess and scare confession
out of them, then we got something exactly. On Januarray six,
when pro Trump coons were or storming the capital, they
also surrounded rebing SHA's home with bullhorns, but luckily they

(08:05):
had already fled for their safety. Um, which is bad enough, right,
having to flee your home for your safety is bad enough.
But here's where it gets even scarier. Trump supporters actually
tried to break into Shea's grandmother's home to make quote
a citizen's arrest. Here's how she describes that in her testimony.
I received a call from my grandmother. It's woman is

(08:28):
my everything. I've never even heard her or seeing her
cry ever in my life. And um, she called me
screaming at the top of her lungs like Shane, shame,
Oh my gosh, Shane just freaking me out, saying that, um,
there are people at her home and they, um, you know,

(08:52):
they knocked on the door, and of course she opened
it and seeing who was there, who it was, and
they just started pushing their way through, claiming that they
were coming in to make a citizen's arrisk. They needed
to find me and my mom. They knew we were there, um,
and she was just screaming and didn't know what to do.

(09:18):
And I wasn't there, so you know, I just felt
so helpless and so horrible for her. So yeah, they
tried to break into a seventy something year old grandmother's
house to push their way in to make a citizen's arrest.
And honestly, I cannot even imagine how terrifying this must

(09:39):
have been to have this angry, potentially armed mob of
Trump supporters showing up at your house and trying to
force their way physically force their way into your home.
So hard to even like hear her say that she
had never heard her grandmother panicked in her life, you know,
And I think that's another I just think of, like

(10:01):
my own grandmother, right Like, I just think of how
strong like many of the people in my life have been,
and to have a moment where that's completely shattered, and you're, like,
I heard just terror in their voice saying I don't
know what to do. That's just man like, every every
single like their words are so chilling because I hope

(10:22):
most people could be able to are able to put
themselves in her position and think of like what what
that experience would be like for you if suddenly you
are doing something for the betterment that you believe for
your community and then it leads to your grandmother having
people trying to bust her door down. Yeah, it's it's

(10:42):
wild because I I I remember when they testified, and
I remember the a lot of like the highlights of
what they said, but clearly they gave you know, they
gave lengthy testimony, and so I didn't get I didn't
hear I haven't heard a lot of this other stuff.
I knew that they were harassed. I knew that ship
was bad, as it always is, but it is it's

(11:04):
so different to actually hear what they're saying and also
to hear that like that may have been this pressure
point leading up to January six where a lot of
this energy was put on them because they felt they
could make them the smoking gun to completely steal the election,
and that to to to even even like with that idea,
to put to put yourself into place of like imagine

(11:24):
if you were the focal point for MAGA world to
say that these people are as what's getting in between
us and another Trump administration. Yeah, it's it's terrifying. I
agree with you. I think there's something about hearing them

(11:48):
tell their story in their own words that is really powerful,
because I read quite a bit about their case, and
then when I watched the testimony, I was in tears.
And I think part of it is because it's so
easy to think of, like on like online abuse, online harassment,
these kinds of threats as just an internet thing. But
then you hear this sixtiesothing year old woman explain how

(12:10):
it impacted her life and robbed her of her sense
of self and her joy and her identity, and you're like, oh,
this is this is a real thing. I think that
I don't know that I've ever seen a better or
more clear example of the impact and the threat and
what's at stake than when these women so bravely testified.

(12:31):
And all of this is really like because of lies,
and we know that that Trump knew that he was
knowingly lying about the fact that he lost the election.
During this hearing, the d o J said that they
briefed Trump explicitly about the false claims that were being
touted around Ruby and Shay in that video, so he

(12:54):
knew that these claims were false. He knew that specifically,
this video did not show vote vote hampering and that
these women did nothing wrong, but he still knowingly did
it anyway, And that really brings us to today. So
today it actually seems like the state of Georgia is
kind of trying to get to the bottom of who
was behind this intimidation and harassment campaign against these women.

(13:15):
According to a piece in The New York Times published
last month, Coody and Floyd, the people who tried to
get Shay and Ruby to confess, have been summoned to testify,
and the Fulton County District Attorney has indicated that her
investigation into these efforts to overturn Trump's defeat in Georgia
could result in a multidefendant racketeering and conspiracy case. Um. However,
they have not yet been charged with a crime, and

(13:35):
I think that I think that they The deadline for
them to testify is like tomorrow. So I'm actually very
curious like where this would where this will go and
if there will be any kind of accountability or consequences
for people who you know, works to ruin these women's
lives for no reason. Yeah, I mean, bring the rico on.

(13:57):
And it's not just Ruby and Shay. The kind of
harassment and abuse and intimidation of women like Ruby and
Shay um for who are just simply doing their jobs
as election as election workers, has become terrifyingly common, um
And it is women that we're talking about. The vast
majority more than of election workers are women. According to
research from the Brennan Center, nearly one in three local

(14:19):
election officials no at least one election worker who has
left the job because of safety concerns, increased threats, or intimidation.
Sha herself said that she could never see herself doing
election work ever again. And you know, in this most
recent election, we actually did have a shortage of poll workers,
which leads to like pretty anti democratic outcomes for all

(14:39):
of us, like short staffed polling precincts that force people
to weight in like wild ridiculous long lines just to
be able to vote. Shortages of poll workers could also
cause polling locations to close or have to consolidate with
other locations, and it makes it even more challenging for
people to get to their new their new polling place.
And we already know that like this directly impact marginalized

(15:01):
voters who already faced pretty big barriers to voting, and
so it's it's horrible for the women who are the
targets of this kind of harassment, but it's horrible for
all of us because it just it threatens our democracy.
It threatens our ability to make our voices heard. Yeah,
and it's the same thing I mean this is we
see this across so many arenas, Like with the right,

(15:22):
they want to pressure all of the decent human beings
out of these positions where having decent human beings is
the difference, you know what I mean, Like we see
it with teachers and that these school board meetings and
harassing teachers that are like, I'm trying to like educate
them and they're like, no, you're trying to poison their
minds and just see our three crap um. And it's

(15:45):
scaring people away from doing a thing which is too
or two volunteer their time so elections can occur or
these other things. And it's it's difficult to see because
you see how the these pressure campaigns do work and
it erodes these sort of institutions at the margins and

(16:06):
then it allows for this like rot to really set in.
And it's a shame that she's been completely, you know,
dissuaded from doing something that she really looked exactly. That's
that's such a good point that you made about how
kind of the I do think the point of a
lot of these these intimidation campaigns is to pressure normal

(16:26):
regular people who want to do a civic good or
a public good out of these positions and fill them
with partisan extremists. And so if it only extremists feel
comfortable serving the public as teachers, as school board members,
as administrators, as poll workers, that's a real problem. Like
we are all in big fucking trouble if that's the

(16:49):
reality that we're gonna face. Yeah, and and and they're smart.
I mean you saw after the six all of the
extremists on the right they had to figure at a
new plan. And that's on a lot of like the
Q people too, are like, you know, what, we can
we can really be going for these little elected positions

(17:09):
like school board or controller or these other things. People
are just like, I don't know, vote for this person,
because yeah, to your point, that's how you know, they
have to learn from the last one. They're like, man,
what's Brad Rathnsburger doing over here? Like respecting the Constitution.
Even though that guy's such a like big are Republican,
you look at his politics, like he's not crossing Trump
in any way aside from the fact that he's like,

(17:31):
I'm not gonna lie about the votes though, like, other
than that, love what you're doing, man, Love everything else,
including the racism. I personally don't want to go to
jail over this, but love everything else. Yeah, exactly, and
like and so they know, they're like, man, for next time,
we can't have these people who are like, well are
we supposed to be lying? They're like, get those people

(17:52):
out of here. We need more people who know what
time it is, who can stick to the script. So
when it's time to just up end everything, boom boom boom,
own boom, there's not gonna be any you know, stifling
of the momentum because it comes to a point where
it crosses someone's desk quest to make a decision, who
like actually has a spine or a sense of decency.
And yeah, it's been that's a very like. I think

(18:13):
if they keep at it will pay off in the
long run, if they're able to freak out and scare
away these kinds of people who again like are truly
are like a line of defense between falling into a
completely ignorant backwards country. I mean, we're already kind of there,
but like fully, you know what I mean, and then
that's going to be even scarier. And I think it's

(18:35):
it's a lesson for like all of us, you know,
really about like that we need to be we really
have to have these people's backs, because that's another thing
we we we leave a lot of especially Black women,
we don't. We don't we don't take up for them
as a as a culture. I mean, I would say
that people are in a minority who are really vocal

(18:56):
about saying you can't just turn your back on black women.
You just can't and do that. That's that's the beginning
of the end. If you allow if you allow black
women to be easy prey, the game's over or anyone. Honestly,
I think that's why it's really important to really stay
informed about what's happening with like the harassment of lgbt
Q plus people right now and all that, because that's

(19:16):
what they wanted. Like the more we allow people to
hit us at the margins or what they perceived to
be these weak spots, it will bring everything down and
if we're not able to say, you know what, no, no no, no, no, no, no,
no, no no, you're not doing that. We're not doing that.
I don't care if I'm not part of this group,
but I know what you're trying to do, which is
you're eventually coming for all of us. And you know,
how intersectional can we be here, you know, to take

(19:38):
up for each other. But I think it's it's this
kind of ship you see, and you're like, it's so
easy for people to have their life completely upended because
of hate, and and how easy it is for things
to get momentum if enough people don't say, ah, stop, no,
that's not happening. And unfortunately they were in a position
where they could take advantage of the fact that not

(19:58):
there wasn't enough you know, uh resolve within our culture
to like just call it dead in the water for
what it was. It just you know, I was able
to proliferate pretty quickly. Yeah, and I absolutely agreed that.
I think that it really goes to show how imperative
it is that we all vocally stand up and push

(20:19):
back against attacks on margin people who are marginalized. Yeah, transpolkes,
queer folks, black, women. All of our oppression is linked
and so is our liberation. And so you know, it
is imperative for me, as somebody who is marginalized, to
stick up or speak up when someone else was marginalized,
albeit in different ways than I am, is also attacked.
Like it like we we have to really be I

(20:41):
think create allowed pushback to say this will not be tolerated.
We are going to vocally support this person when it happens,
and it's I think it's a strategy right now where
folks are being I think so many different kinds of
folks who are traditionally marginalized are currently being attacked. Anti
Semitism is rampant right now. Trans legislation. I I think

(21:04):
it's a state strategic tactic to overwhelm whereas like I
guess we've lost I guess I guess we've you know,
seated too much ground and it's just too hard to
to you know, I think it's a strategic tactic that
we really have to be mindful of and stay vocal
in the face of. If well that the because the
thing being is, if you can become desensitized to watching

(21:24):
a community get just dismantled or attacked like this and
you're like, well, that ain't me. It's you're not gonna
want to be around for the that world that is
slowly evolving in front of your eyes. And I think
that's that's a really important thing to remember, is you can't.
The whole point is for especially for these extremists, a

(21:48):
lot of it is for them to feel that they
are in touch with their power on some level. That's
why they go after people they think are soft targets
because they're not gonna pull up to something where there's
a bunch of end you know what I mean, they're
like cisshet men and no, because they know because of
their they're like, you know, they live in a patriarchical

(22:09):
white supremacist nations are like, well, you know what, maybe
this is an easier target um. And this is like
just too this momentum that they're trying to build for
themselves to say like, well we we kind of took
an ll on that government stuff. Because if you look,
the Proud Boys of completely shifted gears now to just
going after these drag events where there's drag queens doing

(22:31):
like storytime at libraries. That's what the Proud Boys have
pivoted to because we're catching l's in every other place,
like every time we pull up to Portland or somewhere else, Like, Man,
I can't do this anymore. I want to just go
to a drag library and just make a ruckiss there.
But luckily, in some places you're actually beginning to see
the counter protesters who are there to support the LGBTQ

(22:52):
community begin to outnumber them, and and you can see
how quickly that that sort of vigor dissipates with and
these people who are there who are hateful, they're like, man,
it's all these people are saying, we're losers. And it's
like you watched you you see how you see how
important it is for people to come together and show
solidarity and and appear in physical space too, because a

(23:14):
lot of these people who are on the other side,
I think, well, if nobody's here to protect them, then
most people probably don't care, which probably isn't true. Most
people do care, But I think people either intimidated or
feel like it could be a situation they don't want
to put themselves in. But on some level, you do
have to kind of make your values known um in
order for people to understand that there are people of

(23:37):
good standing, of good spirit, like within their communities, because
if you're silent, it allows everybody to fill in the gaps.
They're like, now everybody's seeking. Like I was actually just
thinking about this. It's a it's a little bit of
a tangent, but I was thinking about how after the
Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Know, we didn't get any

(24:01):
kind of like meaningful legislation, but people understood that what
you say after a shooting is like, oh, thoughts and prayers,
how horrible that kind of thing. After the Club Que
shooting in Colorado, some of the discourse was like, yeah,
what do you expect when they're bringing when they're abusing children?
What do you expect when you're grooming kids? Like? And

(24:22):
I was like, how quickly did we get to this
place where this was an acceptable way to respond to
a shooting where multiple people died in public without fear,
and that like that would be an acceptable Like I'm
not saying that the thoughts and prayers thing is is
a is a meaningful thing to say, but at least
it's like people understood how you are meant to respond.

(24:43):
I was like, how did we get so far gone
in just a few years. And I think it's exactly
what you're talking about. When too many people are silent,
you are able to people just assume like, oh, everybody
thinks like this, this is a totally normal response to murders. Yeah,
it's again. And I think that's what to me is
frightening and why I think it's important for more people

(25:05):
to be aware of the threats that exists. To that
point is how quickly things change from like, you know,
it's seemingly yeah, what's wrong with drag story time? But
on the right it became like, no, now here's an
enemy that I think we can defeat or at least
be violent with or intimidate without too much fear on
our side, because we need that, we need to feel

(25:28):
potent in some way because we're not getting it done
at the ballot box, and we're not getting it done
all the time with like the culture war stuff. There's
like little things here and there, but this all in
de humanization that we're seeing is I think part and
parcel of them trying to recapture some sense that they're
effective on some level, and unfortunately it's at the expense
of all of this dysfunction, we're saying, and not just

(25:51):
you know, the homophobia, the anti semitism as well. Absolutely,
and I think to your point about how it's playing
out with the ballot box, I think this, this widespread
intimidation and harassment of election workers is part and personal
of that. In the summer of one the DOJ started
the Election Threats Task Force UM and it was meant

(26:11):
to service this like federal resource to report and investigate
threats against election workers UM. In a year's time, they
announced that they had they that of the more than
a thousand cases that they had reviewed, just a handful
of federal cases had been charged and they only had
one sentence. And so not not great, I would say,
like not great, but of over half of those cases,

(26:34):
fifty percent of them that we're all potentially criminal threats received.
They happened in states where the election results have been
challenged during the election, including Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania,
and Wisconsin. And to me, that really says it all that, like,
you know, this is a unfortunately a semi successful campaign

(26:55):
to foster people to distrust our democra product process or
democratic institutions and systems and say, like, if you don't
like the results, it's okay to intimidate your way into
a win, even if like Trump and you lost. Mm hmm, yeah.
This is usually you know, like when when things are

(27:15):
decided during you know, an election, and they count the votes,
you can't speak to the manager if you don't like
what happened. But I think that's what they're but they're
wanting to They want to act on that impulse of like,
well I should be able to speak to somebody about this,
like what that you objectively had less votes? No? Funk off? Yeah,
carry Lake had big. Can I speak to the manager

(27:37):
of Democracy Energy when she lost? Yeah? She still want
it lost. It's about to get hurt and like they're
all turned up on the right there, like and this
could get Trump back in office. You can get out
of here, please just go, like we get it. You
didn't you didn't nail your audition for Real Housewives of
Maricopa County or whatever, but do you know what you

(27:58):
did a good job. Now go fade off in obscurity
or allowed Trump to use you as his puppet or something,
which I'm sure is going to happen soon. So people
rightly really lifted up Ruby and Chay as heroes. And
I do think that they're very heroic. You know, they
serve their community during a pandemic and put their the
president put their lives at risk because of it. And
I think, you know, even in speaking up about what

(28:20):
they experienced in the hearings, they were certainly opening themselves
up to more abuse, more harassment. But I just think
that I'm really uncomfortable with this idea that black women
should have to be put in such great danger for
a country that would weaponize their own identity against them.
And you know, she says that she'll never ever be
an election worker again, and that every single election worker

(28:42):
that she worked with in that polling center in Georgia
has quit, And frankly, I don't blame them, Like, who
would ever want to open themselves up to the kinds
of attacks that they went through just for trying to
do their job. And again, election workers don't make a
lot of money. We're not talking about people who can afford,
you know, a security detail or have a lot of
financial support necessarily, We're talking about regular people. And and

(29:04):
so like another thing is that you know, in the
most recent election, bridget like Georgia had a poll worker shortage,
like a major poll worker shortage across the state, where
county is one of the areas in Georgia that was
really affected by this poll worker shortage, and the county
was down about thirty poll workers like the day before
election day, and the Supervisor of Elections really believed it

(29:28):
was because of people being shamed out of the position.
And you know, obviously that has to be connected to
what we're talking about here today. I'm sure there was
also COVID impacting things, but it's just seeing how seeing
how unsafe it was last time, and then the pressure. Yeah,

(29:50):
Ruby and Shay they did sue the right wing website,
the Gateway Pundit and its owners for defamation. Yeah, they
settled with one American news network, but they didn't say
like what they settled for. I hope it was. I
hope they took them for everything they're fucking work. I
hope they got I hope they got a lot of money.
But as I said, like, no amount of money can

(30:10):
make right what happened to them. And I want to
end with Lady Ruby and her own words, there is
nowhere I feel safe nowhere. Do you know how it
feels to him, the president of the United States, to
target you. The President of the United States is supposed

(30:33):
to represent every American, not to target one, but he
targeted me. Lady Ruby a small business owner, a mother,
a proud American citizen who stand up to help Fulton
County running the election in the middle of the pandemic.

(30:57):
So her word is just really stick with and no. Yeah,
I'm I hope that she got lots and lots of
money because God knows they deserve it. But nothing can
make that right what they went through. And I think
it's harming all of us. Oh absolutely, I mean this
is I always use that metaphor of like it's the rot.

(31:19):
You know, it's the US is a rotting piece of bread,
and right now the rot is in these communities. Most
of the bread is not part of so people are like, oh,
that's the mold is over there, but it spreads and
they'll get closer and like, well, it's not at me yet,
and then you'll give you by yourself sometime and then
it's on your doorstep and you're like, how did this happen? Well,

(31:41):
you were ignoring it the whole fucking time. And that's
the I mean, that's the I think the easiest way
to visualize like what is happening and why we need
like we it's absolutely imperative that American people understand like
what is happening in this country because many people are
kind of at this like, oh it seems bad over
there for him kind of phase without really understanding that

(32:04):
we have to seriously address these things. If you want
any you know, any like for this country to have
any semblance of a place that you would want to live.
Are you already get it's already hard enough, but he
can get a lot worse, especially if we're not just
opening our hearts to understand that, like we have to
actually take up for each other. Um. Obviously not to
be like, hey, go go hug a Nazi today, no,

(32:27):
but I mean, like the actual people who are vulnerable,
who are in the same fight as all of us are,
because let's face it, we're closer to being like having
no money than hitting powerball and becoming an overnight billionaire.
So you know, keep that in mind because at the
end of the day, like we're only going to have
each other in our communities, and if if we allow
any dimension of our communities or any segment of them,

(32:49):
to start falling apart them. You know, it won't be
a very tough fight, um for the bad people to win.
That's the only thing that keeps me from falling into
like great cynicism and disillusionment about the state of our
country is exactly what you just said, the power of community.
I don't have a ton of faith in institutions, but

(33:13):
I do have faith in each other. I do have
faith in us. I have faith in community. That is
the only thing that gets me through is knowing that
like we got us absolutely and to and to know
too that there are people who are thinking like that,
like that we got us, you know what I mean,
and that we have to we have to take like again,
we have to take up for each other. Uh. And
it's interesting too because you see, it's so it's so

(33:34):
funny too. There's so many times and I'm like, oh, no,
what the funk are these How are these people going
to behave in the you know, in this chaotic situation,
And ten times out of ten I'm seeing human beings
just dropped their bullshit to help each other. Like I
remember in the in the Texas Black blackouts and stuff,
and you're like, oh no, these people have no power.
It's it's like it's it's the terrible weather. And the

(33:55):
whole time I was bracing myself because I'm like, this
country is so split up, like I don't even to
know how people are going to do it. And then
you see a lot of great stories or like just locally,
you look at your own communities and you can see
people that are doing right. And I think that again,
like like you I have, I can feel better in
my day to day when I actually go out and
I meet people that I live around and know who

(34:17):
I live around, and introduce myself and then be like, man, okay,
what's up, Russ, Oh what's up? Okay? I know if
you need something whatever, you know me like I'm usually
around here at this time. That that gives me a
greater sense of safety than you know. Chuck Schumer and
Nancy Pelosi wearing kintay cloth at the rotunda, Oh my god.
You can tell by their faces they thought they were

(34:38):
really doing something like like they're like, Chuck, we are
killing them right. Oh my god. They thought they ate
on that one they were eating. They think that okay, anyway,
all that to say, you know, really look into mutual
aid organizations in your area because you're you know, you'll

(35:00):
really feel hardened to meet other people who are like, yeah, man,
I really want I really care about the people that
live in this community, and I really feel like we
got to take care of each other. That will give
you life. Yeah. One of the Margaret Kildre, who's i
think one of the biggest experts on prepping um that
what Milds just said is exactly what she says that
one of the best tools that you can have is

(35:21):
knowing who lives around you and creating and creating relationships
there because community is what matters. Mutual aid is what
it matters. Think of it like this, do you live
in a neighborhood where it's just doors on a street,
or do you live in a place you're like, oh, Okay,
that's that person. That's where that person lives. Or if
you're walking a shoot, oh that's so and so, or
they like who's that, who's that? What did they do?

(35:44):
And I really like, that's that person's dogs house exactly.
And however you need whatever in road you need to use.
It's powerful, though, but I'm telling you you. You will out, man,
it's so much better. It's such a burden is lifted
when you feel like you live in a community. Then
you just feel like a person who goes into a

(36:04):
blank door and in a collection of blank doors. That's
such a that's such good advice. Miles, Do you have
anything you'd like to plug at the end here? Yeah,
mutual aid organizations. Look just Google whatever whatever city you're in,
join a mutual aid organization. Feel good about yourself and
and take up for your community and yourself. And if

(36:24):
you like to hear me talk more, uh, you can
check me out on the Daily Night guys. That's twice
a day talking news and politics. And then I also
got a basketball podcast called Miles and Jack Got bad
boost these. First of all, Oh yeah, shout out Billy
g Yeah it's funny. One of our listeners on Daily
Sight gis is like a professional caricature artist. Can you

(36:47):
do like the big head caricatures like from those nineties
T shirts? Yes? Full So shout out Billy brings me
joy every time I see your If you ever want to,
if you ever need some, it's perfect, shout Billy out. Um.
And then also if you like ninety Day Fiance because
guess what I do have to decompress after talking about
them twice a day. I do it with trash reality

(37:08):
shows and Fiance is one of them. And I have
a show with Sophie Alexander called four twenty Day Fiance.
You can put two and two together. Hardest working man
in podcasting, Nah, The people just want to hear stuff sometimes.
I guess, look at me mitigating. You're right, I am
the hardest working man in podcast Yeah, thank you the

(37:32):
James Brown Podcast. You have another podcast and you're on
social media? Do you want to tell the people where
that I do? You can listen to my other podcasts
call there are No Girls on the Internet. You can
find me on Instagram at Bridget Marie in d C
or on Twitter. I'm still there at Bridget Marie and
I want to plug. If you're in d C. A
great activist Mutual Aid Collective is Positive Force DC. Awesome. Awesome. Oh,

(37:55):
I'm at Miles of Gray find I don't tweet a
lot or anything. I'm I'm too overwhelmed by the Internet,
but I'm I stay up today. Yeah, and at cool
Zone Media on all on Instagram and Twitter, and if
you're looking for another future aid organization, check out transieline
dot org. Internet Hate Machine is a production of cool

(38:19):
Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, check
out our website cool zone media dot com, or find
us on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts.