Pop the Balloon (Political Edition): Conversations Between Black Men & Women

This week hosts Tiffany Cross, Angela Rye, and Andrew Gillum just have one thing to say: the numbers don’t lie–we finally got a poll of Black People y’all!! With guests Terrance Woodbury, Democratic pollster, and Gary Chambers, civil rights advocate and perennial candidate (you might remember his blunt-smoking campaign ad). 

 

One thing the data makes plain: there is a significant difference of values between many Black men and Black women. In a conversation that at times becomes heated, the hosts discuss those differences with their guests. 

 

The data also shows that many Black folks are disillusioned with Democrats. Some are drifting toward the right as a result. How can Democrats adjust their strategy to appeal to the (often disillusioned) Black community? President of HIT Strategies Terrance Woodbury has been conducting the polls and has some crucial answers. 

 

AND we have to cover Trump’s recent executive order that gives the federal government more control over voting registration. If it clears legal challenges, the changes will make it more difficult to register to vote, a classic GOP voter suppression strategy. You can see this strategy playing out right now in Georgia…

 

And of course we’ll hear from you! The hosts answer questions from a listener inspired by last week’s episode about political lobbyists and donors. 

 

If you’d like to submit a question, check out our tutorial video: http://www.instagram.com/reel/C5j_oBXLIg0/ and send to @nativelandpod. 

 

We are 586 days away from the midterm elections. Welcome home y’all! 

 

—---------

We want to hear from you! Send us a video @nativelandpod and we may feature you on the podcast. 

 

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Watch full episodes of Native Land Pod here on YouTube.

Native Land Pod is brought to you by Reasoned Choice Media.

 

Thank you to the Native Land Pod team: 

 

Angela Rye as host, executive producer and cofounder of Reasoned Choice Media; Tiffany Cross as host and producer, Andrew Gillum as host and producer, and Lauren Hansen as executive producer; Loren Mychael is our research producer, and Nikolas Harter is our editor and producer. Special thanks  to Chris Morrow and Lenard McKelvey, co-founders of Reasoned Choice Media. 

Theme music created by Daniel Laurent.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Native Lampod is a production of iHeart Radio in partnership
with Recent Choice Media.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome.

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Welcome home, y'all. This is episode seventy two of Native
Lampod where we give you our breakdown of all things
politics and culture. We are your co hosts, Tiffany Cross, Cross,
Angela Ray and I'm an you yelling what's up? Y'all?

Speaker 3 (00:26):
Who is Tiffany Cross?

Speaker 4 (00:27):
That's what I was trying to figure out. I was, Oh,
we got today Tiffany.

Speaker 5 (00:32):
Cross, Florida, my best best, that's southern to the no.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
Tiviny Cross is the one that went on went on
air and said I am more trustworthy than your.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Job and tearing these people up the cable news.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
She said, I'm more trustworthy than you bish. That was Tivty.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
Go ahead and say that's my topic for the day.
What you got on your mind and tiff on my mind.

Speaker 3 (01:03):
It's astounding data that is bringing us from what happened
in twenty twenty four with the election and where we
are now. And for me, it was mind blowing. There
are the things that you have hunches about and then
when you see the numbers, you go damn. So that's
what I want to talk about today. We have Terrence
Woodbury from Hit Strategies joining us and Gary Chambers, who

(01:24):
I hope has some time to talk about this Louisiana
election Saturday.

Speaker 6 (01:28):
Nice.

Speaker 1 (01:29):
That's gonna be good.

Speaker 4 (01:30):
Tip, Well, I want to yield my time to the
viewers because I know we have a couple of really
good viewer questions, and I just want to echo about
our guests. I'm super excited to talk to Gary Chambers
and Terrence Woodbury. If you don't follow them both already,
I strongly you encourage are strongly encourage you to do so,
because they have some really great insights for us.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
I agree, ditto, ditto, and so dittling down on your
priority today, tivity, we don't kick off with a question.

Speaker 7 (01:56):
Let's go, Hey, Angela, Tiffany, Andrew. This is Mante from
Maryland again. Uh, Angela, tiff Great, send y'all back on
the news. School of these jokers like it that you
need to so we appreciate it. Just had a few
quick questions for you. One, do the Democrats have any

(02:19):
donuts other than sorores? You know, keep hearing about Republicans
putting money into their candidates. Wonder if Dems have any
two for the them health anything like the Heritage Foundation,
if they can use you know, to develop plans or
anything else, because you rarely hear of anything like that.
And finally, we've all had our frustrations with Chuck Schumer,

(02:41):
but is refusing to donate to sendate Democrats until leadership changes.
A sound strategy doesn't help, it doesn't hurt more. I
got my opinions, but I'd like to hear yours. Thank
you all for what you do and welcome home.

Speaker 4 (02:57):
I'm gonna talk about you. I'm gonna talk about you
that this made deserving because and he is, of course.

Speaker 6 (03:11):
It is not.

Speaker 4 (03:14):
Yes, no wars and they're sorrows.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
No, it's not spelled.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
He said the same, he says, But y'all got any
other donors besides that? Damn ss.

Speaker 4 (03:30):
Yes, George Srows is who he's talking about, who, of course,
contributes a lot of money to left leaning causes. And
I think his question was who else is funding some
of these campaigns other than George sorows or sorrows as
some people may say, just like it's crossed in some
areas and it's cross cross, Yes, so I I'm sure

(03:54):
my co hosts have answers for this, but I just
want to kick off and say, yes, there are other
donors other than George Soros, and that is you, the people.
And I say that because a lot of folks contribute
to a lot of corporate entities, a lot of people
with vested interests give the maximum across the board to

(04:15):
a lot of candidates. And they're not necessarily supporting Democrats
exclusively or Republicans exclusively, but even if they are, it's
just yep, this is the person running and they care
about what I care about. So I'm giving the max
and boom boom boom done, which of course means a
lot to campaigns. But I'm going to tell you somebody
who is writing you a check for five dollars, that's

(04:36):
not just a check, that's a vote. That's somebody saying
I got two coins to rub together and I am
giving it to you. And when you have a thousand
people who care enough about you to give five dollars,
then that is a movement. And so when we ask
these questions, we have to consider what is our own power,
And I think that's what I always want to center
our conversations back to when possible is to say what

(04:58):
how are we the architects of this democ And one
way that is is organizing funding, door knocking, hitting the ground,
which you know, I've been very open about having my
challenges in this environment doing those things, but that is
one thing that we can do. If it's five dollars
you can give. Andrew, you of all people, know what
that means and how what a big difference that means

(05:18):
when it's done in the macro and the micro.

Speaker 1 (05:21):
Yeah, no doubt about it. One really really good question
and one that we don't often within our movement space
concentrate some time, energy and effort on, which is who
is funding our movement? And then on our side, what
is what does the infrastructure then look like over here?
When it comes to funny and I will say, first
and full disclosure, I know missus Soros and his son

(05:44):
Alex and actually a couple of his sons, and he
was my largest donor during my primary race and my
race for governor, so we certainly appreciate his contributions. But
there are there are actually quite a few major donors
on the progressive side. I won't start name checking, but
I will say a lot of them also give anonymously,

(06:04):
so they'll ferret their money through what we talked about
last week, the super pac organizations. Some of them will
give to to to big broad entities like a Governor's Association,
and then the Governor's Association will disperse that money beneath it.
To the other part of the question, and I think
Tiffany and Angela can add here too, is what's our

(06:26):
heritage foundation? Some might say the Center for a CAP,
the Center for American.

Speaker 4 (06:34):
Center for Americans, Center.

Speaker 1 (06:35):
For American I'm like a c AP, Center for American Progress.
For a long time, I work for people for the
American Way Foundation, which is also a bit of a
catch all of many of the issues. We got. The NAACP,
which again is not partisan, but when it comes to
issues that are important to us, Uh, they represent change
dot org. Actually, the list can go on and on
and on.

Speaker 4 (06:57):
Amazing warehousing, amazing, amazing group that was founded for young
elected officials white Yoh, you.

Speaker 1 (07:03):
Know they exist, They exist for sure, But but y'all,
I don't know, do y'all feel like there is a
warehouse where uh, sort of central organizing for leftists or
the progressive side exists and if it does, A doesen't
do you think we need it?

Speaker 4 (07:21):
I think Angela is an organizing center.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
Oh yeah, sure, I forgot to mention we have Angela ro.

Speaker 3 (07:28):
It's the people with those other organizations, it's the people
shout out to the people. I'm gonna say I would
like to plug our podcast from last week where we
also talked about the role that campaigned financing plays in
votes on the House and Senate floor and the ways
in which people receive donations and how it swaigs their votes.
I think it was a very informative discussion where we

(07:49):
talked about that while so Ross didn't show up, but
Tiffany Crost did it. I think that it's it would
be very informative, and I want to thank the gentleman
were inadvertently giving me a last day. No, I'm not
laughing at you, but that was funny as hell. I
don't I don't know why, but it had me in tears.

Speaker 1 (08:09):
I liked there was a throwaway line for a billionaire
anybody other than that.

Speaker 3 (08:17):
But yes, I think that it is really important that
we continue to have dialogue around the outside way that
contributions sway elections sway votes, sway, our body politic and
I think to the point, we do need more people
that are willing to pay into a system as long
as that's how we have to play ball, or we

(08:39):
need folks who are willing to upset the system and
turn that thing on its head. Because if we talk
about on this show all the time, the way of
doing that thing don't serve us. So that's one thing
that we got to pay at ten.

Speaker 1 (08:50):
That's fair. That's fair, that's fair, and you know what
you're organizing. There was an organizing question. He wanted us
to weigh whether it's effective to starve off campaign contributions
to incoming demo. Well he didn't say in coming, but
basically senators until there's a change of Democratic leadership with
I would love to.

Speaker 3 (09:10):
See that, Like I think that would be excellent. But
the problem is most of the people that the DSc
C or orgs that the DSCC, the Democratic Senate Campaign
Committee calls on are moved by their business issues or
their big issues, and they are going to continue to
push those things because people are literally retained or hired

(09:31):
to do exactly that. So that would be really tough. Again,
going back to the point of like, at what point
do we work to try to upset a system that
doesn't serve everyone, especially when it's been effective for those
who have, you know, political business, and their political business
is still being attended to, like it was in that
continuing resolution that Chuck Schumer another nine voted for that's right.

Speaker 1 (09:54):
Well, we also had a guess who has taken on
that sort of Senate side as an outsider. Be interesting
to see what it's like to to go up against
what are bohemoths funding organizations as a as a as
a as an outsider.

Speaker 4 (10:07):
Well, I just I'm a little confused about the the
d s CC, the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, and the
d TRIP the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, that these are
the campaign arms for the House and the Senate. I'm
a little confused as to how they work with the
d n C because a lot of the complaints people

(10:28):
have is that these are the people who are the
gatekeepers to contracts, you know, which are often given to
white firms. White firms are going to tell you how
to go talk to folks like us, but even media
buys where they decide to place their dollars, like I guess,
like so like members have Angela, you could speak to this.

(10:49):
Members have call time where they're calling donors essentially, and
so when you're so if I get a call from
let's say eleanor Holmes Nord and that's my member of
So I get a call from her, and I say, yes,
Congress on the Norton, I will give you twenty of
my hard earned dollars. Is that going into her coffers
as a candidate or is that going into the d trip.

Speaker 3 (11:11):
Well it depends a lot of members. Well really all members.
Every city member of Congress has dues that they have
to pay to those campaign arms. And everybody's dues are
structured differently based on how much money they raise, based
on seniority. If you're in leadership, you have a higher bill,
a higher membership dues bill, And so you could be

(11:32):
doing call time to meet that threshold of paying those dues,
or you could be doing call time because you have
a raise, or because you're using your campaign money to
go on tour. Like for example, right now, AOC is
doing this nationwide tour and she's raising money through her campaign,
but it's to fund that tour. So there are other
things that you can do that are more discretionary with

(11:52):
your campaign funds. If you're a Republican, you could just
break the damn law. But if you're if you're a dergrat,
you have to still follow FVC than the actual lot.
So there's that. There was another thing that you asked
to beginning. I was going to answer, but now I
forgot what it was.

Speaker 4 (12:06):
Well, I think you're communicating with me telepathically because I
asked that question for a reason, and it was for AOC,
because he's asking like, well, what if we, you know,
cut off funding, And another alternative might be to not
cut off funding if you have the money to spare,
but to contribute to people you believe in. I personally
would like to see Congressman AOC challenge Chuck Schumer in

(12:28):
the Senate. I would like to see her go to
the Upper Chamber on Congress or in Congress rather. I
think we don't have a lot of young leadership in
positions of leadership, and so I'm just saying, if you
don't want to stop giving your money to anyone, you
could start funding people who you know, maybe the d

(12:50):
TRIP or the d SEC don't feel our viable candidates.
Because that's the other challenge they also can control. Well,
we've got this, you know, person running who we could
feel as a more viable candidate in this progressive black
woman or this progressive Latino women, and I think they've
just helped create a shit show of our politics. Quite frankly.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Well, since we talk about people, we want to see
challenge Chuck Schumer, you talk about it in this Senate race.
I would like to see somebody because we've been ask
people have been asking about alternatives like who's gonna go,
who all gonna be there? I would like to see
John Ossoff challenge Chuck Schumer in the leadership race. Now,

(13:29):
I know he has a very competitive the Georgia Senate
race to be focused on. Just he just this podcast
is ridiculous today and he didn't even do it through
Sorros Now, nick I just maybe not solely, but either way,

(13:53):
I know that I know that was his name. George
Sorow's got to be tired of being blamed for stuff
he didn't even fund.

Speaker 4 (13:58):
Sometimes even me and he ain't never get money.

Speaker 3 (14:06):
But can you, nick I just sent you a clip
of John at a rally. His campaign rally kickoff this
weekend were more than four thousand people RCPT. I don't
know how many people ended up coming, but I think
this is important. You know how we talk about politicians
having the it factor sometimes watch this.

Speaker 8 (14:26):
His goal is not just revenge. He wants to use
the government to crush the opposition. And this is actually
something we have never faced before, not like this. Before
you elected me, I led a team that exposed corruption

(14:46):
and war crimes.

Speaker 6 (14:47):
We exposed the truth in.

Speaker 8 (14:49):
Places where criticizing the government is dangerous, where whistleblowers and
witnesses will only meet in secret, where protest carries the
risk of prosecution, and the atmosphere in America under Donald
Trump reminds me more and more of those places.

Speaker 3 (15:15):
And that wasn't a clip I wanted to play, but sorry,
oh it was, but it was still it was still,
it was still fine. I think that we have to
have somebody that has it and I don't. Andrew, you
have it. It's an argument that we have on here
all the time. There are certain people that have it.
John Assoff has it. He is compelling. He is running

(15:35):
a competitive race in Georgia and still said, I am
not voting for this cr I'm not going to do that.
That's not what my constituents want me to do. That's
not what the American people want me to do. I'm
gonna be bold. And if you can't understand a bold
fighter right now, we're just not on the same page.

Speaker 1 (15:51):
Well, friend, I would almost co sign your your well,
did the whole idea of him running for leadership new
leadership and someone with their own off that you go?
And my prayer for John Monseif is that he continues
to keep and grow his own voice and avoid the
temptation to mimic who people may compare him to. He
is not from Texas, he's not from Hawaii, and so

(16:15):
far as I know, he's not from Kenny Bunkport or Nantucket.
He's his own person and he's got his own story,
and so I hope he keeps his authentic voice, real true,
and y'all, he's going to need more than an authentic voice,
because the State of Georgia, along with the nation, is
going out of its way to make sure that a
John Off John Also story cannot be repeated, specifically in

(16:38):
the State of Georgia. You all may have heard the
State of Georgia is about to undertake the largest what
is believed to be the largest purge of voters, four
hundred and fifty thousand people being removed from the voter rolls.
These are people who took time to register to vote,
whether they voted in previous elections or not. The last

(16:59):
two presidents elections, A lot should be of no consequence,
but there are adopting rules that say, if you did
not vote in the last two presidential elections, in addition
to a number of other criteria that they're looking at,
they're stripping your name from the voter roles. Now correct
me if I'm wrong, But every American citizen who has
the right to the ballot box, access to a vote
in the ballot box, can choose to exercise that right

(17:22):
or not exercise that right. That our choice not to
does not equal being summarily disenfranchised from the process. But
that's what they're doing in the state of Georgia. And
we've got to raise our voices and then just I know,
we want to talk a little bit more in Georgia
about it. Very quickly, Nationally, Donald Trump signed an executive
order this week trying to buy FIAT change election law

(17:43):
around this country, and just two quick provisions, the largest
and I think most impactful pieces here is that one
he wants to us who are registering to vote, he
is requiring that we submit documentation to show that we
are US citizenscusation. The Britain Center reports that there is
roughly ten percent of Americans twenty one point three million

(18:07):
Americans who don't have easy access to that information. If
you're a woman who's married and you produce a birth
certificate that has a last name different than the one
that you now carry, what kinds of problems does that
create for you in this process? Number Two, they want
no vote to be counted after election day, regardless of
the fact that it can be submitted prior to and

(18:28):
y'all if you don't understand the consequences that say, you're
in line at seven pm on the East Coast and
the polls supposedly closed at seven pm, but yet you
haven't had the opportunity to get inside and vote at
seven pm. They're saying, I don't care if you in line,
it's over. The election is over. You can go on home, right,
That's what they're saying. To people who use the mailing

(18:50):
system as a way to get their vote out, it
will have.

Speaker 4 (18:54):
Impact in the mailing system this week, Andrew with the Joy.

Speaker 1 (18:59):
I want you to say, well, the the.

Speaker 4 (19:00):
US Postmaster General de Joy resigned this week, which I
thought good. He was horrible anyway, and I have a
Trump appointee. He was clearly disrespectful to members of Congress
every time he was called to testify. And I actually
talked to my poor male lady. I harassed everybody around me,
and every time I see her, we get in the
twenty minute conversations and I actually asked, like, how do

(19:23):
you feel about him? Like he reaped havoc on the
post Office? So I thought, great, he's resigning, But no,
not so great because now they could potentially privatize UH
our mail system. Now there is no indication that they
would do that at this point, but we're in the
land of anything goes, anything is possible. Because I thought, well,

(19:43):
why would he resign during the Trump administration, like you
know you're you're back, And they tried to get rid
of him before, and he kept saying, I'm here to stay.
Forgive my ignorance, because I don't know all the I
don't know how he was able to stay and survive
a democratic Yeah.

Speaker 1 (19:59):
Across across the administration.

Speaker 4 (20:01):
I don't know why he wasn't able to be removed
under democratic leadership, but he wasn't. But that that makes
a big difference because if you consider mail in ballots
and what that means. And you know, I'll be honest,
our guests coming up, I think Andrew's gonna or not Andrew,
but Angel I think you're gonna introduce him. But Gary
Chambers he I don't know that I disagree with him,

(20:23):
but Gary has told us because I've been like it's
all over, guys, like there's no more elections happening. This
is the end. And Gary Chambers very you know, forcefully
and perhaps rightfully so, said he's tired of hearing that.

Speaker 6 (20:36):
You know, like you all.

Speaker 4 (20:37):
Are out here. This is his quote, you all are
out here acting like elections are over. And there are
forty nine and a half million black people out there
who believe that we will continue to vote and that
is our way to fight. And so when I hear
things like this, it just when I heard Gary say that,
it like inflated me. And then when I hear things
like this, and I'm deflated again. I just don't believe

(20:58):
we're going to have anymore free and fair election so
I'm really curious his thoughts on that.

Speaker 1 (21:04):
I'm too, and Angela tifted a toss to you to
bring on our guests. I do think it's a great
time to want to invite them into this conversation around
these changes around election law because it will have reverberating impact.
But would love, love, love to get into this conversation
on what we did in twenty twenty four.

Speaker 3 (21:21):
I just want to just really quick for those of
you at home who are wondering why I didn't get
rid of de Joy as the Postmaster General, you can
look at the Postal Reorganization Act of nineteen seventy for that.
They are confirmed and have seven year terms generally. Okay,
now let's go to these guests. First, we have joining

(21:42):
us Terrence Woodbury, who is Black America's poster. He's the
founder of Hit Strategies and has some amazing data to
share with us today, not just reflecting on why Democrats
lost in twenty twenty four, but where black folks are
right now. Because sometimes somebody got to talk about black data.
This group has never been pole. We talked about it
all the time, Terrence. We want to do one of
your polls. Gary Chambers Junior is also joining us. He

(22:06):
is founder of Bigger Than Me. He is the champion
in the South.

Speaker 1 (22:11):
Let me tell you.

Speaker 3 (22:12):
If there's one person that's gonna flip a state black,
I didn't say red or blue, he's gonna flip it black,
it is gonna be Gary Chambers. Whenever he joins us
on camera, Gary, your camera is all. He is not
a ghost of Christmas past.

Speaker 4 (22:24):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (22:24):
He is actually here in the building, y'all.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
And when he there is building.

Speaker 3 (22:30):
Virtual home and that's why we say welcome home, Andrew Gillum.
But yes, Gary Chambers Junior, and he's gonna talk to
us to a little bit about the election coming up
this Saturday. Yeah, that we played on the podcast, and
so we won't we visited. We will tell y'all to
go back and look at that. Remember when was Yes,

(22:51):
we were in New York you guys. I just want
to point out that we told them that they were
going to start with us about thirty minutes ago. So
let's jump into the conversation, guys.

Speaker 1 (23:00):
So on the other side of this break, stay tuned,
we'll hear from Gary Chambers and Terrence would be.

Speaker 3 (23:18):
Welcome home Terrence and Gary I think Gary.

Speaker 9 (23:21):
Thanks for having me, famly, it's good to be here
on Native Lampard.

Speaker 4 (23:25):
I see you represent the mohouse always. Howp me to
have you. Guys, Let's let's get right into who should
we start with?

Speaker 3 (23:34):
Terrence start with this data?

Speaker 6 (23:36):
Yes, listen, thank y'all so much for having me.

Speaker 9 (23:38):
You know, his strategies has been pouring through this data,
this post election data, exit poll data, voter foul data,
and we've been sitting in focus groups with voters of
color and young folks for the past couple of weeks
since the election to understand what happened, why it happened,
how we fix it moving forward. And one of the
first things we see here is despite the valiant efforts
of the Harris campaign, I was on the Harris camp

(24:00):
pain for full transparency, despite the efforts of the Hairs campaign,
who was able to close some of the gaps that
we saw when Biden was at the top of the ticket.

Speaker 6 (24:10):
She in fact closed the twenty.

Speaker 9 (24:11):
Two point gap amongst young voters a eighteen point gap
amongst black voters. Despite those efforts, Democrats continue to underperform
with all the groups that we consider our base voters.
So we got you know, three percent less votes overall,
but that includes six percent less votes from young people,
five percent less from black young young black voters, nineteen

(24:33):
points less amongst Latino voters, nineteen points and two percent
less amongst black men. Shout out to black men who
tried to hold the line and who held and who
had the smallest reduction across any other group of men.

Speaker 6 (24:48):
But I do want to talk about that two.

Speaker 9 (24:49):
Percent real quick, because while Joe Biden got seventy nine
percent of black men's votes and Kalma Hairs got seventy
seven percent, the concern for me is the trend over time, y'all.
It's that over time we've seen three to five point
less black support amongst black men. Until Barack Obama had
ninety two percent, Hillary Clinton had eighty two percent, and

(25:10):
Kamala Harris had seventy seven percent. And so I've been
arguing that, you know, just calling it sexism is kind
of lazy analysis of what's happening. This has been ongoing
over time, and Democrats got some work to do to
bring these brothers, not just black men, but men, bringing
men back into the Democratic coalition.

Speaker 3 (25:28):
Wow, I think that that's so powerful. I know, We
can probably go to the next lie, but I think
it's powerful to hear one. We were all together recently
and there was a very heated conversation around whether or
not it was sexism. Sure, sexism is at play, but

(25:48):
you saw this consistent drop off from Clinton to Joe Biden,
and that was at one of the higher turnout years.
Joe Biden's year was actually an outlier. Right from what
we know, the numbers were much higher. What do you
think is the reason terrence, based on what you've heard,
if it's not sexism, regardless of how we might feel
about the numbers, with what the numbers say.

Speaker 9 (26:10):
Yeah, look, look there are several factors contributing to underperformance
of men, but overwhelmingly men are starting to are starting
to identify the Republican Party as representing their values, representing
the things that they care about. I don't want to
negate sexism. In fact, the slide that's up here now
has a very important question I think starts to explain

(26:33):
where explain where the Black community is on issues of
gender and gender roles. When we ask the question do
you agree or disagree that men should be head of household?
Sixty six percent of Black people believe that men should
be head of household, including fifty nine percent of Black
women that's the majority, and seventy five percent of Black men.

(26:57):
I would argue, I would argue that believe that men
should be a head of household is not a sexist value, right,
It's a traditionally religious value, and it's one where we
have to bring men along this conversation to explain that
the role of gender is in society is evolving and
there's a place for them in it. When Barack Obama
was running for president and racism had the potential to

(27:20):
undermine his candidacy, he didn't whack his finger at white
folks and say shame on you. Right, He had a
conversation with America about how we're not red states and
blue states, we're not black states and white states, and
how even his grandmother, his white Hawaiian grandmother, held unconscious bias,
and he offered an opportunity for America to move beyond

(27:44):
that bias.

Speaker 6 (27:45):
Well, we didn't.

Speaker 9 (27:45):
We didn't offer that to black men. We said either
you're with us or you're bad. Either you're with us
or you're wrong. Either you're with us or you're immoral.
You know, we're telling them that their Bible is wrong.
And so there's another way here to bring men, not
just black men, but to bring men along this journey
as society is evolving, and to ensure that they know
that that it's not all masculinity is toxic and there's

(28:07):
going to be a place for the minute. But we're
gonna have to define what that non toxic masculinity is.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
I was about to say, Terrri, some of this is
if I hate if this is a minor point, but
you know, yeah, okay, we were raised to believe that
the men should be ahead of house old. I wonder
what it means functionally because I believe I think I
grew up with that belief as well. I just don't
know how it plays out, right, Like who writing the checks,
who's turning the head when it needs to be to
you know, those sorts of things are you know, I

(28:35):
would just say this about that statement of do you
believe that men should be had? I think many of
us cop to that believe in it, subscribed to it,
mostly as you pointed out, through a religious premise. And
if we had to write functionally down, what does it
mean to have men as head of the household. You know,
I think everybody's list is going to look different. Yeah, right,

(28:57):
So I'm glad that probably isn't the question that that
you ask. But I also think that your point around
the rise in men choosing Republican or the Republican Party
as home or reflective, I kind of think it's the
party you can be a member of and not be
judged and not be held accountable, that you can say
what it is that you think in your innermost moments

(29:18):
and nobody's going to cancel you. That it's safe because
the stakes appear to be not as high with what
you do or don't do.

Speaker 9 (29:29):
Now, I mean, I think that's exactly right. You know,
we masculinity has become so triggering on the left. I
mean I've had I've had this conversation in groups of
progressives who have asked me, well, what is a non
toxic version of masculinity? You know, as if they don't
know non toxic man, as if I'm not standing in
the room presenting this data. Right, And so there are

(29:52):
values like masculinity, like hard work, religion, patriotism, family, all
these things that we have seeded to the right out
of your man, tell me the focus group. Anytime he
sees an American flag on somebody's house, he knows they're white,
and he knows the Republican Well, we're not going to
be able to just see family values, patriotism, masculine. If

(30:13):
I can tell you right now, all of those values
are more important to my father than the Democratic Party.

Speaker 3 (30:19):
Can I ask you really quick? By the way, this
is quickly becoming I just texted the co host this.
I was like, this is my favorite podcast ever so far. No,
but I just I'm really into it too, So thank
you guys. Gary. I want to get you in here
because I know there are some not thoughts and feelings
and ideas you have, Like you don't necessarily do focus groups,
but you be in the streets with the people. So

(30:39):
I want to hear from you on like not only
the part about the head of the household, but also
what you think is the cause of the shift. Now
Terrence type in his.

Speaker 4 (30:51):
Ass, I was gonna say, who is that?

Speaker 1 (30:54):
Arce guilt.

Speaker 3 (30:58):
He didn't want me to ask you the question. You know,
I can't focus. That is so rue, But I know
I'm just waent. But the head of household piece, especially
being in the South. But also what you think is
the reason, like when you talk to people, what's the
reason for them to have even either stayed at home
in twenty four particularly black men, or to have voted

(31:19):
against their interests and voted with the Trump Party.

Speaker 10 (31:24):
I think it's first of all, thank you all for
having me.

Speaker 1 (31:27):
Today, Thank you brother for being here.

Speaker 10 (31:29):
An important conversation.

Speaker 5 (31:33):
I have struggled with what I feel is getting the
voices of black men to be heard in this season.

Speaker 10 (31:41):
Right.

Speaker 5 (31:43):
I think that there's been a period of time in
black men and men. The patriarchal structure of America has
been guilty of muting women and their perspectives for so
long that once we began to sit back and listen
a little bit, our voices in response have not been heard.

Speaker 10 (32:01):
And I think you see that in the reactions in elections, right.

Speaker 5 (32:05):
I think that overwhelmingly we see that black men want
to be for the policies and the things that Democrats
are for. However, if you are telling me that I
have to be for something, well, damn it, I'm a man, right,
I ain't got to be for nothing.

Speaker 10 (32:19):
And so what you see in.

Speaker 5 (32:21):
Some men is an automatic rejection to the fact that
I get to have a say in what is happening here. Right,
we have been talked at so much rather than talk
too when we talk about the twenty percent of black
men who are on the other side, we spend so
much time talking about them and so little time valuing

(32:42):
the eighty percent of black men who were on the
side of Democrats who have been supporting black women. I'm
from a city Baton Rouge, where for over a decade
the majority of our elected officials in the black community
were black women because black men and women put them
in power.

Speaker 10 (32:58):
That's how we ended up with Sharon Western.

Speaker 5 (33:00):
Broom as the first black woman mayor of our city right,
and her career would not get there if black men
had not supported her. So I think that acknowledgement of
black men has to happen at a greater pace, at
a louder volume than we have had in the.

Speaker 10 (33:16):
Past when the vice president was running.

Speaker 5 (33:19):
I tell you personally, there are people I've reached out
to in August saying I think we should be having
some roundtables with brothers.

Speaker 10 (33:26):
We should be doing some things.

Speaker 5 (33:27):
I was told in nice ways and not so nice
ways by certain people, like look, we ain't focused on
that right now. You know, we need to get white America,
Middle America all of this. And one of the things
I've said to Democrats in the beginning, from day one
is if your base is Black men and black women,
If that is the base, you take care of them

(33:47):
before you go see about anybody else.

Speaker 10 (33:50):
Right, You make.

Speaker 5 (33:51):
Sure that those people are satisfied, that they feel value.
And in our community, black women are always more loyal
than black men are going to be in these situations.
If you come testing us with certain situations, we're going
to look for the other option.

Speaker 10 (34:07):
Okay, black women have a lot more.

Speaker 5 (34:10):
Black women have a lot more to sacrifice through this government. Right,
the government isn't try to take away our right to
see a doctor the way that we need to. So
there are certain things that black women cannot negotiate with
in this scenario that.

Speaker 10 (34:23):
Black men can.

Speaker 5 (34:24):
The other thing I think is the Democratic Party sucks
at an economic message. When you talk about this conversation
about who's the head of household. Black men are concerned
about how they provide for their families, how they are,
how they show up in the world financially, and how
we do that. When we look at fifty nine percent

(34:45):
of black women saying that they see that that role
is the head of the household is for a black man.
That is because they see the role of a black
man as providing for his family and creating stability for
his family, whether that is a fifty to fifty makeup
of the house or taking care of one hundred percent
of the bills, because there's a lot of black women
in America who don't pay a bill because a black

(35:06):
man pays them all.

Speaker 10 (35:07):
Okay, those black men.

Speaker 5 (35:09):
Are not praised, are considered enough in the conversations, and
that is a part of the problem because we spend
so much time listening to the podcast bros who have
gotten so much voice in this hour, that we have
abandoned the voices of the men who have been anchors
in our communities for decades. The reason I learned how
to follow a black woman's leadership, my pastor was a

(35:30):
black woman who had a black husband who was six
foot five and two hundred and fifty pounds who would
pound you on the top of your head if you
said anything.

Speaker 10 (35:39):
About his wife and when he was the lead.

Speaker 5 (35:42):
So I never struggled with seeing a black woman in
leadership because the person who taught me my faith was
a black woman, but she was supported by a strong
black man, right, and that was an example that was
shown to me from infancy until this day. We don't
let the Jim Howards of the world get enough shine
today I have.

Speaker 4 (36:04):
I'm so grateful to you brothers for being here because
I have so many thoughts on everything you just said.
And Gary, every time you speak, I just it almost
feels like I'm in church, so I feel like you always,
you know, delivering a word. So I really appreciate your perspective.
So I'm saying that if you will give me a

(36:24):
little bit of space and grace to vent a bit,
because I see these slides and I try to be
really honest and unfiltered on this podcast. So one area
where I feel like I filter myself is when I'm
talking about black men, because I never wanted to come
across like I'm putting black men down, even though I
believe we rightfully have some righteous frustrations with our brothers.

(36:48):
In transparency, I'm writing about this so y'all will read
about all all of these thoughts, and that's why I
find the data so fascinating. One when they say when
black men and say their thoughts about being the head
of the household. Okay, you believe black men should be
the head of the household. Does that mean a black
woman cannot be the head of a nation? And I

(37:11):
wonder what the dichotomy is there two yes, you know,
black men overwhelmingly or Democratic voters. I would be remiss
if I didn't remind every one that when this country
had an opportunity to elect the first black man to
the highest office of the land, everyone in the black
community were right behind him. Post primary. Everybody rallied behind him.

(37:35):
You did not hear droves of black women saying, well,
wait before I give him my support, what's he doing
for me? I don't want to hear about black men.
What are you doing specifically for me as a black woman. No,
we were right behind President Obama. We were right there campaigning, organizing,
And sometimes it does feel like black women we keep

(37:56):
the greater good in mind. Our interest is not so
self centered when we organize. We are organizing for the
greater good. It seems like the Republican Party is able
to pick off these black men because of something individual,
something that they will individually get. We've seen example like
this time after time you take Snoop Dogg with Rick

(38:17):
Caruso in Los Angeles. It was something that he specifically got.
You can take me. I don't want to center on
celebrities because they're you know, this is across the board,
but it's something that speaks specifically to them. I as
a woman, I'll be honest, I do have some belief
in what people might call toxic masculinity. One I don't

(38:37):
want to drive ever like somebody else needs to always
drive me. Two I ain't never pump in no gas.
I'll never want to pump no I want to touch gas.
Somebody else is doing that. Three I don't want to
take out no trash like I do believe in traditional
gender roles in a lot of ways. And I think
there is something interesting happening, which is what I'm exploring
in my writing. There's something interesting happening in this dicho

(39:00):
between black men and black women, where it is an
immediate animus upon meeting each other. What are you trying
to take from me? What is it you're going to
give to me? Even these terms like a high value man,
high value woman, And that kind of toxic thinking has
penetrated our politics in a way where you are throwing
a tantrum in the voting booth again because of something

(39:22):
that you are dealing with personally. And look, I didn't
been killed, Okay, I didn't been wronged by black men.
I've probably you know, popped off at the mouth and
to black men in ways I shouldn't have. I'm not
taking I can still consider the greater good in my
policy and in my politics, and it doesn't seem like
that exists always. So I'm not putting brothers down. But

(39:43):
I do believe we have righteous frustrations that need to
be addressed. And I think it's a family conversation, not
one to have on a round table in front of the
folk who ain't can vote.

Speaker 3 (39:55):
Can I just say this really quick before you guys
weigh in. It's just a filter. I will tell you
that Tip, I'm the one that pops off at the
mouth that everybody. So I'll just own that it don't matter,
if it don't matter, but I'm working on it. But
I will say that I normally in conversations, I'm normally
the friend that sounds very conservative about black men. I'm

(40:20):
normally the one that Tip is already nodding. I'm normally
the one that's running to be like, well, did they
really do it like that? We're actually like, I'm very
protective of black men in that way. And I gotta say,
I wonder if these numbers for black men, their performance
in the election for Kamala Harris in twenty four would
have looked different if Kamala Harris or Kamala Harris would

(40:43):
have run around the same time as Barack Obama or
before follow me on this, I think that a lot
of people through everything aside for President Obama because he
appeared to be the change, the hope, we believe in,
the reparations we deserve, the justice, we finally see, the

(41:04):
economic opportunity that we've always deserved, like all of these.

Speaker 1 (41:07):
Things, or the black people will vote for him.

Speaker 3 (41:11):
Okay, Okay, that's not that wasn't part of this particular point.
But I hear you that think that's very fair. But
this point was just on what black people laid aside
because we thought that this was going to finally be
our opportunity. We were told to wait until his second term,
So we waited until his second term, and when that
second term came to an end, we were still on

(41:32):
the chopping block. We still had to sacrifice the most.
We still didn't get our needs met necessarily. I'm not saying, okay, okay,
so let's let's let's say all that although Trayvon Martin
could have been his son, right and amazing grace at
Emmanuel after the Emmanuel nine at the Emanuel Mother Emmanuel massacre,
all I'm saying is some of the intense frustration with

(41:56):
the parties reached with a party, rather reached a fever
pitch after nothing really changed, especially when you go in
the hood under a President Obama. So then you're like, okay,
well Hillary Clinton, They're like, I don't know, now if
he couldn't do it, I really don't know. Then Donald Trump,
as she was super predator, Lady Donald Trump, super predator.

(42:17):
Letty see, I picked that two year but I'm with you. Also,
she was born on my birthday, so shout out to Hillary.
But I will just say this. You have those two,
then you have Trump, and then you have this narrative
that under Trump people were doing better because they weren't
prosecuted yet for them PPP loans and you know all
of the other things that that check felt like he
was going to go a little further. They didn't really

(42:37):
understand congres the congressional role. They don't really remember feeling
like that under Joe Biden. Joe Biden is the same
Joe Biden of the crime Bill to bring that back
in Gary, but they still pushed it aside, particularly in
twenty twenty because there's this George Floyd moment. But the
George Floyd moment was lost too, and so we're back

(42:57):
at square one. And I just have to wonder, in
the flatness of data, Terrence, not in your skills, but
in data just looking at it on paper, if we
don't miss all of the nuances, all of the times
where the party we were told had our best interests
really didn't, or at least we didn't feel like it did.

(43:17):
Our circumstances didn't remarkably change. Did she get penalized for
all of the baggage of the party and not so
much because this was a woman at the top of
a ticket. I'm not saying nobody was saying that bs,
but I got to tell you, there are a lot
of folks who are close to me who held their
notes and voted for the party, not because Kamala Harris

(43:39):
was at the top of the ticket as.

Speaker 4 (43:40):
Young as I answer, I would love for you to
address some of the things I was saying, because I
want to be clear. I'm not representing a party. I'm
not talking about democratic politics like the party to me,
is completely irrelevant to the point I was making. I'm
talking about the dynamic between black men and black women
and the infrastructure of the country. Not necessarily Democrat Republican,

(44:01):
but I think both are super relevant. So we'll be
quiet and let you guys take all of that that
me and Angela just through at you, because I want
to hear your response to both whoever want to take it.

Speaker 5 (44:12):
I'll jump in to Angela's point, I think, and I
responded wrote this down in response to some of what
Tiffany was saying. I think that we have to own
the failures.

Speaker 10 (44:25):
Of black leadership.

Speaker 5 (44:27):
That the only way that black people can make you
pay for not delivering is to either vote for someone
else or not to vote, and that there are people
willing to make the party or the politician pay your
consequence for not delivering for the things that they've said.

Speaker 10 (44:46):
One of my lawyers, okay, who.

Speaker 5 (44:48):
Has a juris doctorate from an HBCU had hard up
arguments with me about whether or not he would vote
for Hillary Clinton, okay before and it had nothing to
do with her being.

Speaker 10 (45:03):
A white woman, Okay.

Speaker 11 (45:05):
It had to do with the things he believed she
helped orchestrate against us, and whether or not the Democratic
Party would deliver for black people after black folks had
shown up the way that we did for Obama.

Speaker 10 (45:18):
Okay, there are black men.

Speaker 5 (45:19):
Who are tired of every time saying we'll wait till
next time. There are people ready to abandon the ship,
like say, burn it all down.

Speaker 10 (45:27):
We don't want to be a part of any of
your party structure.

Speaker 5 (45:30):
I think that that comes into play with some of
the odds that we have tip within our structure with
each other. That some of the men in our community
have just made a decision I'm opting out of all
of that because they're not listening to us, they're not
working with us to the things that they said. I
also think that we never talked about the elephant in
the room that Vice President Harris was married to a

(45:51):
white man.

Speaker 10 (45:53):
That was a huge conversation for a lot of black men.

Speaker 5 (45:57):
Okay, Barack Obama was all that he would, but Barack
was married to Michelle from the South Side of Chicago,
and when things got twisted and rocky with the black community,
Michelle Obama came into the black community and had conversations
with black women and black people to settle the storm
and bring black people along with Barack Obama. Vice President

(46:19):
Harris had done. And he's a great guy for her,
and it's a great partner. And we don't get to
choose her partner for her. She has a right to
marry who she wants to, but we have a right
to have a perspective about who that partner is and
what conversations are had about black people when you are
laying on the pillow at night. About these conversations, most

(46:39):
people feel like Michelle Obama was checking Barack about whether
or not he was doing certain things for black folk. Now,
whether or not we feel like that, we know if
that's true or not, we don't know. But most black
folks felt that you don't get to feel that with
Vice President Harris. We also did not hear black women
criticize that piece of the conversation the way that we
know black men would have been.

Speaker 10 (46:58):
Criticized if we have at a white wife.

Speaker 5 (47:01):
Now as somebody who believes in the black family unit
that if you gotta the only way to do this
and be about this all the way.

Speaker 10 (47:09):
For me is for me personally is to be with
a black woman.

Speaker 6 (47:12):
Uh.

Speaker 5 (47:13):
There's a lot of black people who share that belief
and cannot see outside of that. And we have to
have the conversations within our community and talk to them
about the policies that make these things worth sacrificing some
of the things that we don't want to put on our.

Speaker 11 (47:30):
Self.

Speaker 5 (47:30):
The last thing I'll say to the point about the
conflicts that exist between us as black men and Black women.
There are some toxes brothers in our community. There are
some hateful brothers in our community that do awful things
to Black women.

Speaker 10 (47:45):
We should call those things out.

Speaker 5 (47:48):
We held a mass gathering Jamal Bryant West Beliny myself
in Atlanta. We gathered hundreds of brothers to talk about
the election to path forward. There were some brothers who
shared some perspects that we did not agree with. Some
of those perspectives about the vice president and other things.
When those were called out, we directly addressed those, but

(48:08):
we gave brothers the space to vent in a safe space.
Where they could get it off their chests, even if
it's not true, even if it's sexist, even if it's hateful.
But other brothers could say to you, now, you know,
you know that's a lie, right, you know that's jacked up, right,
And to say that in the counsel of other men
where other men can and all of the things that

(48:30):
we do that let another brother know, Like, look you
a little sideways right now. Sisters, y'all can't do that,
But we do that so much on the internet that
it demeans our relationship more.

Speaker 10 (48:41):
Than it builds our relationship.

Speaker 5 (48:44):
And I think that we don't own that there are
some hateful sisters out there right, that there are some
sisters who do not like black men, who will speak
venomously against any black male leadership, and that is counterproductive
as well. Now both of us have been by each other.
The question is who is better to get.

Speaker 10 (49:03):
Us to the other side? Is it anybody else other
than us? And the answer is no.

Speaker 5 (49:08):
It's always going to be sisters and brothers together, and
we got to figure that out.

Speaker 4 (49:12):
I love that Gary, Karen, what do you say he
had a slide about it.

Speaker 3 (49:25):
I know, yes, this need to be like a fulls
so good y'all are right.

Speaker 9 (49:32):
Listen, y'all were in the family conversation. Now, for any
listeners that's not in the family or have not been
invited to the cookout, this you should have tuned out
by now because we don't deep.

Speaker 6 (49:41):
We are deep in the family conversation.

Speaker 7 (49:44):
Now.

Speaker 6 (49:45):
I want to say a couple of things that response there.

Speaker 9 (49:47):
Number one and I have to make this point every
time I talk about these gaps, the gender and generation
gaps in the Black community. Voters are the consumers, right,
Candidates that are running for office are the product. You
don't blame the consumer when they stop buying your product.
You make a better product.

Speaker 8 (50:05):
Right.

Speaker 9 (50:05):
We need to make We need to present candidates and
policies that better appeal to the consumer and not blame
the consumer.

Speaker 6 (50:13):
For not buying. That's the first thing.

Speaker 9 (50:16):
Uh, you know, we have to when I hear both
of us have hurt each other, and no, we have
never heard each other more than more than our racism
and a patriarchal society have hurt us. And so there
is this is what unifies us is a shared pain
and a shared struggle. When I look at some of
these slides, because this is why hit has to hit strategies.

Speaker 6 (50:41):
The polling firm that that that I started here.

Speaker 9 (50:44):
We have to engage these conversations with this compassionate curiosity,
because when you start with judging how how our voters feel,
then it's too hard for us to get to the solution.
And there's a couple of things that are on this
slide that I want to point to. One is the
pain that brothers are feeling. Right when you said things
haven't gotten better, it was a young man in the

(51:05):
focus group, Angela sounded that said something very similar to
you when he said, my hood ain't getting no better
under Obama, it ain't getting no worse under Trump.

Speaker 6 (51:14):
So what Biden and Harris got to do with me?

Speaker 9 (51:16):
Well, in fact, for some brothers, their hood got better
under Trump, or at least that's what they believe. On
this first graph on this slide, when we ask this question,
was your life better under President Biden or better under
President Trump? The overwhelming majority of black voters seventy one
percent said their lives were better under President Biden, But
twenty nine percent of black people told us months before

(51:38):
election date that their lives were better when Donald Trump
was president. Twenty nine percent of black people said that,
including y'all, forty one percent of brothers said forty one
percent of young black men said that their lives were
better when Donald Trump was president. And so we need
to acknowledge that pain. And Donald Trump is giving these

(51:58):
brothers that just runs voters who are cynical towards a
system that have failed them. He's given them a reason
for that pain. And the second two numbers that you'll
see on this ground, fifty nine percent of black voters
agree that the gains of the LGBTQ community have come
at the expense of the Black community. The second number
here is sixty four percent of black voters believe that

(52:21):
the gains of the Latino community have come at the
expense of the Black community. What do I see when
I see these two numbers. I see the trans ad, Yeah, right,
that transad that said that she's for them and they
and I'm for you. But the rest of that ad
also said and they're using your tax dollars to pay

(52:42):
for trans surgery. Listen, that's not an anti LGBTQ sentiment
for black people to believe that other communities are getting
more because we're getting less. That's just pro black. That's
just us saying we not getting.

Speaker 6 (52:56):
What we need.

Speaker 9 (52:57):
And Donald Trump is offering a reason for that pain.
And that reason is because because the trans folks are
getting more than you and the immigrants are getting.

Speaker 6 (53:05):
More than you. When I see that black folks.

Speaker 9 (53:06):
Believe that the advances of the Latino community have come
at the expense of the Black community. What do I
see there? Black folks? Immigrants are taking Black.

Speaker 4 (53:15):
Jobs for the intersectionality del terence because they're I mean
to say that the LGBTQ is making games against black
folks does not account for the overlay in the Venn diagram.
There are, in fact black members of the LGBTQ community,
same with the Latino community. There are Afro Latinos who

(53:36):
exist in this country. So I don't know how was
there a question that spoke to that.

Speaker 6 (53:43):
Wars?

Speaker 4 (53:44):
But why I said it so nuanced, because I I mean,
there are everybody knows some gay people in there, you know, like,
how is it too?

Speaker 5 (53:53):
But I think when you're talking to regular people, then
when you start whizzling down all of those different things,
they don't hear that. They don't all of those different
sub sections they hear, like what Terrence just said they
hear the ad as it was.

Speaker 9 (54:05):
Yeah, I mean, I don't even further because this was
research that we did with Date with doctor David John's
National Black Justice Coalition, and he made sure that we
explored that intersectionality. And in fact, we asked the question,
do black queer people identify more with their blackness or
their queerness? And we believe that that that that black

(54:26):
care people identify more with their coer identity than their
black identity. And so we don't even we're not even
even when we're exposed to that intersectionality, we rejected. And
so these are some of the some of the messaging
and work that we have to do when we talk
about when we talk about, you know, immigration policy, we're
not talking about black immigrants. That's the messaging that we

(54:48):
have to do to talk about the fact that that
that that immigration is not a Latino issue.

Speaker 3 (54:53):
Can I ask you Terrence really quick on this. The
first thing that comes to mind looking at this slide
is did they feel this life was better? Did they
read this? Did they see a video of it somewhere?

Speaker 8 (55:07):
Like?

Speaker 3 (55:07):
Did you ask the question about like when you say
that your life was better? Give me an example of
how answer.

Speaker 9 (55:15):
Yeah, we did so this was this is a pole
question that we asked back in August. But after that
we started doing focus groups where I would and I
moderate these focus I know, and so I am probing.

Speaker 6 (55:26):
These are hard probes.

Speaker 9 (55:27):
No, no, no, no, no, Give me a list what exactly was
better in your life? Don't just brush over it and
say it's just you know, business was better. It just
felt like, tell me what was better for you. And
what we discovered is overwhelmingly when people say that things
were better under Trump, what they meant was things.

Speaker 6 (55:45):
Were cheaper under Trump. That's often what they were saying.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
That's oftentimes and we were in a pandemic.

Speaker 6 (55:52):
That's exactly right.

Speaker 1 (55:53):
Wow. I know I'm not a panelist, and I love
can I say? Can I say this? It's the reason
why I would love to relax my voice so that
we can hear more of yours. But I do have
just a point to make around you know some of this,
which is it's easy when you can very very quickly

(56:15):
off escape from what might be your blame when somebody
else shows you another place for it to go. And
I don't know, I don't know if that's exclusive to
gender or not. I think as people we do that.
So some of this makes you know, that kind of sense.
It also when you consider Trump's time in office, you
know the pressure valve got taken off of a lot

(56:37):
of us. Right, we didn't have to show up at
eight o'clock every day into an office wearing clothes we
don't normally feel comfortable, and we weren't being offered not one,
but two stimulus is that showed up in different ways.
There wasn't rent relief and relief also being offered from
home owners, the kind of tax incentives that showed up
during the pandemic, which I would argue should be here

(56:58):
all the time around children's tax credits. I mean, you
felt more money in your pocket because you had more
money in your pocket quite frankly, you know, for a
lot of people. And so there's just something very clear, practical,
touchable about that. And then Democrats come along saying, don't
believe you're lying eyes, don't believe your lying experience. It

(57:19):
was really worse. And the truth is is that you know,
going layers beneath is not going to be helpful here
when when the simple answer actually meets my need. So
I don't have to go through layers of explanation. Those
of us who understand policy will say, over the long term,
I'm willing to bet you your grandmama told you this
a long time ago. You get nothing for free. The

(57:41):
systems they destroyed over the long term will cause irreparable
harm to our communities, There's no doubt about it. But
you can't convince me to care about tomorrow when I'm
just trying to survive today. And so those arguments fell
largely on death ears. And then there's the argument that
just never showed up, and that was to this issue
of of trans I think the black community could have

(58:02):
been just as open to an argument that said, if
you dropped your kid off at daycare as a boy
and you picked them up as a girl, turn around
the car, take that kid back because you picked up
the wrong one, and then remind us that you know what,
they would like you to believe that fewer than point
zero zero three percent of this population is the reason
why the groceries costs what they cost, the housing costs

(58:22):
what they cost. That we can't get access to the
things that we ought to have access to is because
of a little boy or a little girl who's deciding
whether or not that they're in the right body. But
if we interrogate that, y'all, that ain't my issue. I
didn't wake up with it with the first thing on
my mind, and it wasn't the last thing on my
mind before I went to bed. But there was a
complete absence, a complete reluctance, a complete inability to just

(58:46):
meet them. The other side of that argument, I say,
you know what, that's some bullshit. Let's get to what's reading. No,
we're not going to legislate hate by targeting legislation in
a state that affects three people out of a state
of nineteen million, not who we are and where we're going.
So the the the the the shrinking. I would say

(59:07):
from from the fight, it's hard to lose a match
when you're showing up on every round. But if you
choose to step out, you're gonna lay out, You're gonna
lay down, You're gonna back up, and think that we're
going to do the hard work to make the other argument, well,
think again. You send people to listen with Donald Trump.

(59:27):
He's lying constantly. If he's talking, he lying. But the
answer isn't to then go mute on the other side
and say, oh, well, he's just well, you need to
point it out, need to name it, claim it, so
I know how to name it and claim it when
I see it.

Speaker 9 (59:41):
Yeah, listen, there's that. There's a couple of really important
points you made there, Andrew. And the first is that people,
when people are in pain, they need someone to blame. Right,
when someone is working twice as hard to get half
as far, when someone is following all the rules and
doing everything that they were supposed to do, And especially
millennials who graduated in a recession, who are burdened by

(01:00:03):
by student loan debt, who ain't never bought their first house,
never started a family, never done the things that might
that that generations before us were able to do.

Speaker 6 (01:00:11):
Well, we need someone to explain this pain.

Speaker 9 (01:00:14):
And and and and Donald Trump came forth with a
reason for their pain being all the other DEI and
other people and trans people and immigrants, and in response,
Democrats said, we have a policy agenda for you, right
to a bunch of voters that ain't never.

Speaker 1 (01:00:30):
Been Salinity has ruled for a long enough time, you know, yeah,
address and.

Speaker 9 (01:00:34):
Pains, right, that's right, and and and the policy I
mean I've learned through this work that policy is not
a narrative because, especially for voters that don't believe our promises,
don't believe our policies, if you can't tell me why
my life sucks, then why would I vote for you
to unsuck my life?

Speaker 6 (01:00:52):
Right?

Speaker 9 (01:00:52):
And Donald Trump is giving them a reason for their pain.
And the alternative that I that I'm offering that I
think is the democratic reason for the pain is the
other graph on that slide that show the seventy three
percent of Americans believe that greedy corporations and billionaires are
hoarding wealth are I'm sorry, are rigging the rules to
make themselves richer.

Speaker 6 (01:01:13):
Right?

Speaker 9 (01:01:13):
And so the problem is that the person that makes
one thousand dollars an hour has convinced the person that
makes twenty dollars an hour that their real problem is
the person that makes seven dollars an hour, right, And
so we got to we just have to give we
can't ignore the problem statement why does their life suck?
Why are they working so hard and not getting ahead?
And I believe that that problem is that the wealthy

(01:01:34):
is not the least amongst us. The problem is that
the wealthy are holding the wealth and making it and
making and creating pain for everyone else.

Speaker 3 (01:01:42):
Okay, everybody, So we're gonna take a quick break so
we could pay some bills.

Speaker 4 (01:01:55):
Well, you talk about blamed adherents, and sometimes it does
feel like that black men blame black women for some
of their pains. And this is not conjectured, This is
not hyperbole, Like we have personally experienced this.

Speaker 1 (01:02:13):
Think y'all hear it the most because you're the closest
thing to us.

Speaker 4 (01:02:17):
Yes, so let's say we're in the same home. I
can see that, and yes, you are are our counterparts,
like we are family. You know, we are linked in
our pain and our lineage and our heritage and our ancestry.
It is a unique relationship that Black American men and
women have with each other. But like you take something

(01:02:38):
like Angela and I and our group of friends, like
if we go on vacation, the way that black men
respond the gossip around who we may or may not
be dating, the way that black pop who the kind
of men they think that, you know, we should be dating.
Somebody did a whole podcast who I've never met, don't
know this person did a whole podcast on the kind
of men that that I and men have dropped comments

(01:03:02):
black men in my comments, like you know, the kind
of men they anticipate that I date. Angelie. You talked
about being protective of black men, and I think you're
protective of black men you're friends with, and you hold
the line those same black men who you don't know,
who you're not friends with, who you might protect in
any other circumstance, will flood your feed with comments about

(01:03:22):
you being a democratic shill or about you know. Well,
that's why Byron Donald said, whatever do you want the
breakfast club? You know? And it's I don't know. It
just feels like, damn, why am I taking your daggers? Brother?
I love you, brother, I'm in this fight too. They've
found with you like they with me. And guess what
when I fight, I'm fighting for me and you. I'm
not fighting you. And even this idea that Vice President

(01:03:43):
Harris married a white man, the conversation is how dare
she leave us? Not how dare we let her get away?
I happen to know a little bit about her dating life,
and I know that she dated plenty of black men,
and she was not always treated well by those black men.
Name you know some names you don't, and so she
found love where she found it. But again, it's how

(01:04:05):
they're and we I just want to say, we have
some of the highest inndogamy rates in our community. We
don't typically marry outside each other, but when that happens,
we're punished for finding love. We are punished for wanting love.
And in the podcast bro Space, these very toxic conversations
with people who have no idea what they're talking about,

(01:04:25):
going back and forth, drawing up these crazy scenarios and
it's a bunch of insults to each other. That same
toxic energy penetrated our politics to pass two election cycles.
And I just I don't know what to do about it.
What I love that you said, Gary, is who else
is going to solve this other than us? I want
to solve it. I don't know how I want to.

Speaker 5 (01:04:48):
You troubled my soul a little bit for two seconds,
and I think that And I want to say, specifically,
when black men, if we are in a conversation where
we talk about all these young black men who are
marrying these white girls on college campuses, right, there are
never black men in my circle that come out and

(01:05:10):
justify them making those choices right, because then that would
be us saying that it's okay to leave black women.

Speaker 10 (01:05:19):
I think for me, there's not an option.

Speaker 5 (01:05:22):
And I've never dated outside of my race in a
serious way, so there's not an option that I would
consider outside of black women for me personally, right, So
when some of us hear that rebuttal that why did
we let her get away? It would never be an
option anything else for me, ever, And I think that

(01:05:46):
there are those of us who have that level of
commitment to each other, and that is what.

Speaker 10 (01:05:51):
We are expecting in return, right, because.

Speaker 5 (01:05:57):
The example that black men gave black women to choose
in Barack Obama was a full black package, and I
think that there are some folks who want the same thing. Now,
this is a conversation that's awkward, especially as somebody who's
run for office that wants to get white folks to
support me again is having in a public space. But
we need to have these spaces, these conversations because they

(01:06:20):
impact our body politics.

Speaker 10 (01:06:22):
They really do intensely. I also think.

Speaker 5 (01:06:27):
We got to get back to really loving each other
and celebrating each other. Yes, we've built so many ways
that we have segregated ourselves against each other as black folks.
And I think what Terrence's data says is that we
want to know that you're black first, before you are
a woman, before you a man, before you're gay, before

(01:06:48):
your trans, before you anything else. Are you focused on
your blackness and the conditions of black people in this
community and in this country, and how do we make
the material conditions of black people better? And once you
qualify yourself as black Latin XX or black trans or blackness,
you have now segregated yourself into something that allows you

(01:07:08):
to get a classification that we don't collectively have. And
our community has not checked off these boxes yet, So
I don't really have time to hear about your box
because the collective box has not been addressed yet.

Speaker 1 (01:07:22):
And I'm sorry, Gary, please finish.

Speaker 5 (01:07:24):
I think that that's one of the things that we
got to really get back to. I'm black first, before
I'm a man, before I'm a Christian, before I'm anything else.
I am black before my mother and father.

Speaker 10 (01:07:35):
Knew that I would be a boy.

Speaker 5 (01:07:37):
They knew I was black, okay, before any other decisions
could be made.

Speaker 10 (01:07:41):
We start there.

Speaker 5 (01:07:43):
And if we started that place as sisters, as brothers,
I think we can get a whole lot of our
conversations moving forward because we accept our gay brothers and cousin.

Speaker 1 (01:07:53):
Gary, You hit on something there around the black Ferson
remind me of a conversation my wife had with me
around some frustration she was having at work at the time.
She worked for a very senior white female in the
Democratic Party in Florida office holder, and she was getting
a lot of criticism because she couldn't A number of
her white female colleagues couldn't understand how she could be
for Barack and the way that she was and not

(01:08:16):
for Hillary in that primary. And she was like, are
you like, this is not a consideration. I'm a black
woman first, but I also there are some subtexts that
isn't now I think we haven't expressed here that I
think you got to when you said, we just need
to know. The criticism of Barack Obama, largely early in

(01:08:37):
was that one he was not raised in a traditional
Black American experience, growing up in Hawaii, you know, spending
time in California, and then n Yu and so on
and so forth. That didn't We didn't We couldn't trace ourselves.
We couldn't trace ourselves through him, and therefore that created
some suspicion about, all right, who is this dude. We
heard some of that throughout through through revenge, some others,

(01:09:01):
in some off Mike moments, never really for everybody's consumption,
but it was certainly our community understood it. And very similarly,
I think Kamala Harris it was to the extent that
I heard conversation about her partner. It was more about
how you're gonna be a howard for four years around
the best of us and then still not choose us,

(01:09:21):
and and of course it just gets at nothing of
what Tiffany's point is, which is, you know, how many
of y'all had a shot and then Blue Yo shot
and all the eight herd ache pain led her to
an opening that did find and create love for her.
But this knowing, this instinctive knowing who you're dealing with,

(01:09:43):
this craving of people just want their politicians to be
like them. They want to know that they're normal. They
you know, Trump is appealing because he's saying the same
shit and doing it, you know, saying this stuff out
loud that I'm saying with my group of friends and
the whatever that that kind of association isn't. I think
people have always craved that. I want to know that

(01:10:04):
you put your pants on one leg at a time,
just like me, and that when you run into struggle
or hardship or this, that there are some default places
that we know you're going first before you choose other options.
So and I don't think anybody's strange in that. I
think white voters do it. I think all voters want
to know who you are and what you're made of.

(01:10:25):
So when we heard all throughout the cycle, voters want
to know, but who is Kamala And I think a
lot of us read that as it's because she's black,
And I don't think it was that simplistic. I think
black people want to know who is she, just like
we wanted to know who is he with Barack Obama,
who hadn't experienced that I can't even relate to as

(01:10:45):
a black person having grown up in this country. And
so that thirst is real. And if there were takeaways
from it is folks are going to they want to
be able to trace you. They want to track you
and trace you so that they know, for the decisions
that have yet to come that they instinctually feel that
you've got some options that you're going to consider, even

(01:11:06):
if you're not considering them out loud before you make
a decision. And I want to know that for as
a black person, that one you're gonna have an experience
in this country that will have some resonance with mine. Yeah,
so that when you're confronted by the question, that you're
gonna have some sensibilities and sensitivities that reflect my lived
experience to and not just theirs.

Speaker 4 (01:11:29):
This conversation is so good. We're going to close out
the podcast here. This is going to be a two parter,
so you guys be sure to tune in. Uh, We're
gonna split this podcast into so you guys be sure
to tune in on Friday. Will drop the second part
of this conversation because it's so good.

Speaker 1 (01:11:44):
What is normally our mini pod. It'll be a continuation
of this conversation. We know that you will enjoy it,
hopefully as thoroughly as we have enjoyed it. With that
being said, I think I y'all agree. How many are
our takeaways for this week are probably listen to what
we just talked about the last man plus right, and

(01:12:04):
we'll have it all done. Remember always, always always remind
yourself and all of the friends that you have recruited
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New episodes drop every Thursday and Friday, with solo pods
Monday and Tuesday. If you want more, check out Politics

(01:12:28):
and Off the Cup the other shows on Reason Choice Media,
and don't forget to follow us on all social media
and subscribe to our text, our email list, our website,
Native lampod dot com. We are Angela, Riet, Tiffany Krauss
and a manager Gilliam. Welcome home with y'all. There are
five hundred and eighty six days until midterm elections.

Speaker 2 (01:12:50):
Thank you for joining the Natives. Attention of what the
info and all of the latest rock gillim and crumbs
connected to the statements that you leave on our socials.
Thank you, secillly for the bases reason for your choice
is cleared. So grateful to the execute role for serve,
defend and protect the truth human in case, we welcome home.

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(01:13:33):
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