LA ICE Raid, Trump Signs Big Beautiful Budget, Faith Leaders Respond to bill & Fatal Texas Floods

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:34):
So that's Monday, July seven, twenty twenty five coming up
on rolland Martin Unfolk are streaming live.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
When the Black Start and that worked the twice d.

Speaker 1 (00:41):
Each criminally convicted Fella in Chief down to the con
Trump signed the so called big beautiful budget built into law.
Trust me, it is going to create problems. And black
faith leaders took to the pulpit on Sundays you discussed
how the new laws can impact the black community.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Would show We'll show you what some of them had
to say.

Speaker 1 (01:00):
The Trump's madgis and federal job cut contribute to the
number of people who died in the Texas flood. Well,
speaking of an expert from the Center for American Progress
about this issue on federal Appeals Court rule that Aladema
prosecute is violated the constitutional rights, but black men sent
us to death in nineteen ninety and also the mayor

(01:21):
of Los Angeles is demanding that the federal ice agents
stopped raiding parks.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
In Los Angeles. Will show you what took place today.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
It's kind of bring the punk a rolling mark on Filcher,
the Black sid Network.

Speaker 3 (01:34):
Let's go Pacecott whatever the best he's it, whatever it is,
he's got the school, the fact the fine.

Speaker 4 (01:43):
Now Wenna believes he's right on top in isrolling. Best
believe he's going putting the town from Swoston howst to
politics with entertainment. Just buck, He's he's going, it's it's

(02:11):
he's she's real up question, No, he's.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
Rolling, Folks.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Los Angeles looked like a movie set today as federal
ice agents literally raided MacArthur.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Park in Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 (02:40):
And we talked about raiding the park, literally coming through
with armored vehicles coming through their horses, uh, as if
it was a federal uh literally a federal assault on
the park.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
There.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
Folks were shocked and stunned. Individuals literally enjoying the park.
You've got vendors and things along those lines, and they
come in and just just sweeping people, just sweeping them through,
and it caused massive amounts of chaos today in Los Angeles,
Mayor Karen Bass demanded that these agents stopped doing this.

(03:18):
In LA I want to bring in my pal talk
about this because this is one of the issues that again,
here's what we have to understand. I need everybody watching
to really pattige you what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Here, what they are doing.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
They want this to be a television show, this show
of force.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
Numbers don't lie.

Speaker 1 (03:40):
More people were deported under Presidents Barack Obama and Joe
Biden than Donald Trump if you compare the data the
first six months.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
But what Trump is doing is.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
Let's show this show of force, Let's attack these folks,
and then let's have these high profile arrests at immigration courts,
things along those lines, because then it's telling the people
in the country. See see look at what Trump is doing.
He's being effective, that's right, He's shutting these people down.
He's getting rid of these lawless people. Yet when you

(04:12):
look at the data, we're talking about folks, most of
them who are not lawbreakers. But the whole design is
to play on the hearts and minds of the public
to get them to believe that's what's going on. Doctor
mc coonnggo de being a senior profercer Electoral School in
the National Service, American University. Author of Lives About Black People,

(04:34):
How to Combat Racist out of DC, Andrew Clark, Managing Partner,
District Legal Group, also our D. C. Morgan Harper, Director
Policy and Advocacy for the American Economic Liberties Product.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
Out of Columbus, Ohio.

Speaker 1 (04:45):
Glad they have all three of you here. Let me
first start with you, Andrew. You know, well, people have
to understand most of the people who they are snatching
and arresting, they're not violent cri.

Speaker 2 (05:01):
Over the weekend, they went to one.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
Car wash and the owner stopped them from coming onto
his property.

Speaker 2 (05:10):
And another car wash.

Speaker 1 (05:12):
They wait until the owner went to the restroom, and
then they went in and snatched the guy and then
the owner came out and it was already too late.
And that's what they're doing. And we don't know who
these people are. We don't know if they are legitimate individuals.
They're not showing any warrants, they're not showing any.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
Id, their faces are covering.

Speaker 1 (05:34):
We don't know if these are bounty hunters, if these
are vigilantes. We literally have no idea what's going on here.
And the Mayor of Los Angeles is making it clear stop.
But what Trump and Ice, Barbie Christy Nolan, what they
want to say is, oh, Los Angeles is being besieged,
it's being invaded, so therefore we must take it over.

Speaker 5 (05:57):
Yeah, and you know, Broland, thank you for having me
on the show.

Speaker 6 (05:59):
And this is not the first time that we've seen
an action like this from Trump. If you recalled June first,
twenty twenty and Lafayette Square right here in Washington, DC.

Speaker 5 (06:11):
Donald Trump wanted to do a photo app. What did
he do?

Speaker 6 (06:15):
He had the US Secret Service and Metropolitan Police Department
tear gas protesters that were lawfully protesting and Lafayette Square
to clear the way so that he can go and
take a photo app of a church. And we're seeing
the same in type of action here in Los Angeles.
And you're right, Roland, You're right exactly. This is exactly

(06:38):
what they want. They want chaos, they want os And
what do they want to distract us from. That's a
question that we need to know. They want to distract
us from the bill that's going to destroy the American economy.
They want to distract us from everything that's happening over
seas that's going to have a direct impact on the
United States. And they want all eyes to be on

(06:58):
Los Angeles and the true fvacy that's happening, the law
lessons that's happening on a court of the What the
United States government is doing by the at the direction
of its commander in chief.

Speaker 2 (07:15):
On the Congo Again.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
Well, what I'm trying to get people to realize is
that the numbers are the numbers. It's not like they
are dramatically removing more people than happen under Biden and Obama.
The difference between Obama, Obama and Biden didn't turn it
into a daily TV show.

Speaker 7 (07:40):
Yeah, and neither administration went into cities. Neither administration focus
on going into inner cities and other or focusing on
blue states. And the people who they arrested actually had
due process, which is why people like us who spoke
up and said there's so many deportations happening, and some
people called them the deporta in chief people, they didn't
dispute the process because there it was done legally, though

(08:03):
it was excessive. This Roland, this is completely different. The
fact that the amount of is Trump now has his
brown Shirts. I mean, I think I just think often
about the Holocaust the last few days, and literally everything
that's happened and that happened at the beginning of Nazi
Germany is happening here. Obviously, with the exceptions of the
death camps and the gas chambers and all of that,

(08:24):
those are everything else singling out people targeting them, kidnappings
off the street, snatching people up, the intimidation taxes. This
is tactics. This is all a playbook out of Nazi Germany,
which we know that Trump is fascinated with. Americans have
to continue to fight this. Americans have to continue to
speak up. And y'all who were in these red districts
and these red states and stuff, if you feel like

(08:46):
it's just a matter of time before this stuff is
never going to come to your community, we see in
certain spaces. Oh, they arrested the Vietnamese lady who served
us for forty years, and they arrested this Iranian and
these one offs. It's going to start happening because really
the person who's really running this is Steven Miller, and
Miller is obsessed with numbers, and he said, go to home, people,
go to seven eleven.

Speaker 8 (09:06):
I can get folks, Just get them, and eventually they're
going to run out.

Speaker 7 (09:09):
Of places to target in these blue states, and before
you know it, they're gonna start hitting their red areas
as well. This is an opportunity for people to come
together as a country to demand change, but unfortunately Roland,
we are so splintered just by the news outlets that
we watch alone, and so many people watching other networks
and so called news networks are entertained by this. Unfortunately,
they're going to be entertained until they find out that

(09:31):
their economy is also suffering as well, because there's going
to be no folks on the farms, there's gonna be
no people in these buildings, no people to work for manufacturing,
their costs are going to go up. In addition, because
of what Trump's also doing with his ridiculous tabt policies.
Now's the time to speak up. And I'm so glad
we're leading the show with this tonight.

Speaker 2 (09:48):
Here's the thing.

Speaker 1 (09:51):
To that point right there, Morgan, that Oma Congo just
made and too many people don't understand any of this.

Speaker 2 (10:00):
Reality is and.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
This is for all of these these these AIDS, FB FBA,
people who hate immigrants.

Speaker 2 (10:09):
The reality is, if it wasn't for.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
Immigration, our economy would not have recovered as fast as
it did after COVID.

Speaker 9 (10:24):
Yeah, and you know, in addition to that, I mean,
I was just listening to a story this morning about
our birth rate right now in the US and that
a lot of a lot of people, millennials not trying
to have a lot of kids. Is how have we
been able to continue to see growth in our country
and economy. Well, it's because we've had a lot of
immigrants and the fact that we have had, you know,

(10:46):
that ability for people to come here and build a
life and decide to have children. And look, it's not
to say that there's no need to address the immigration
issue and make sure that we're protecting people and providing
resources people for people who have been here for a
long time. But there's no denying that the United States

(11:07):
is at its best when we are open to all
sorts of people, particularly those who are facing real danger
and some of the places where they come from and
come here sincerely trying to contribute to society and build
a good life here. I mean that is that is
the best economic outcome for the US. And I would
just add another thing. I mean, you know, in terms

(11:28):
of some of the impacts that we're going to see
from this, because now Trump's starting to talk about these
carbouts for certain industries, like the agricultural industry. But I
agree with you, my fellow panelists here with you Roland,
It's like, give it time. There are no carveouts when
the goal is destruction. Just give it time. If you
don't feel it yet, it'll be coming. Because even if

(11:50):
he tries to do carveouts for the agricultural industry, lots
of people working in restaurants, lots of people try to
eat at restaurant. This is going to start to increase
the cost of all goods in addition to food. And
unless you are you know what is this all about.
It's to benefit we know, the richest of the most

(12:11):
rich in this country that probably don't even spend that
much time in this country if we're being honest, and
they will be the only ones who probably will be
safe from the real widespread impacts of all of this.

Speaker 1 (12:23):
Yeah, what you're seeing right here is video footage from
Los Angeles from one of the local stations that was
showing them literally in MacArthur Park with this armored vehicle.
And you're sitting here going really like you need all

(12:44):
of that, and again it's all by design. Let's do
this show of force. Let's do this massive show of
force in what we now know because of the bill
that Trump just signed, they are adding billions of dollars
on the CONGO to the federal budget. Because Trump and

(13:07):
Stephen Miller, and they want more of this that they
they they have created this narrative that the United States
is being invaded and as a result, we need to
have this type of action on American streets. And what

(13:28):
he's doing is he's not doing this in the states
where there actually are more individuals who are undocumented in
the country. He's not doing this in Texas, He's not
doing this in Florida. He's doing this he specifically wants
to do this in blue cities.

Speaker 2 (13:49):
And it goes to show you and in.

Speaker 1 (13:51):
Fact, Control Room find the comment of this pathetic, pathetic
dude in Iowa where he literally has talked about how
he despises and hates Democrats. Remembering all of these people
were saying, well, Joe Biden, what about the seventy plus

(14:13):
million voted for Trump. It's amazing how they they wanted
everyone to respect his voters, but he has no respect
for the voters of Vice President Kamala Harris and the
Democratic Party.

Speaker 7 (14:29):
Yeah, and they're still talking about Hillary Clinton's you so
determed de plorables. You're still hearing that and some of
their their broadcasting networks. This guy is called democrats everything.
He's put a targets on their back with his language.
And we're just coming off of last month, you know,
the tragic assassination of the Minnesota lawmaker and her husband
and the shooting of the other Minnesota lawmaker and his wife,

(14:49):
and that type of rhetoric. And what did the guy
have in his car a bunch of Trump paraphernalia, and
the Trump gets a pass to literally say that he
hates Democrats and they hate our country. This is the language,
as I said, this is the language of any type
of beginning of any type of genocide or mass killing.
You put a target on somebody, you talk about them
in hateful terms, vermin rodents taking our jobs and so

(15:11):
on and so forth. He's giving people, as Lyndon Johnson said,
people to look down on. And that's why soampion in
so many people look at this and justify this. And
to Mortgan's comment about, you know, the carbroux for agriculture,
Trump tried to do that a couple of weeks ago,
said we were going to do that. And then apparently
Stephen Miller, I mean, last time I check Rolin who's
the president, because they both want this.

Speaker 8 (15:30):
People are saying Steven Miller's overruling. But Trump wants this
as well.

Speaker 7 (15:33):
They said, no, it's not going to happen because his
business sponsors are saying this is hurting us. But the
people who are finished administration and his base are saying
this is what we want.

Speaker 8 (15:43):
And people are saying he's conflicted.

Speaker 9 (15:44):
No.

Speaker 7 (15:44):
Trump is a master of double speak, and he's a
master of marketing, and he's a master of giving a
little bit to people here and a little bit to
people there. But we need to look at the actions
on the ground. This is looking like they're the riots
in ninety two in la I mean, come on now,
this is Rodney King right, this is what it's looking like.
And we're already seeing stories about civilians, American citizens getting arrassed.

(16:05):
And it's just a matter of time Roland Martin before
somebody starts shooting back, or these soldiers start shooting themselves,
because these Marines and guys, they're not trained to work
in the United States in civilian areas.

Speaker 8 (16:17):
That's not what the military is trained for.

Speaker 1 (16:23):
This is a tweet from maryor Karen Bads three hours ago,
and then this was what she posted. She said, this
is footed from today in Macauthur Park, minutes before there
were more than twenty kids playing. Then the military comes through.
The second I heard about this, I went to the
park to speak to the person in charge to tell them.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
It needed to end.

Speaker 1 (16:43):
Now, absolutely outrageous. Look at this. They literally are on horses,
troops walking in ahead. This is where kids were playing soccer.
They don't care, They don't care at all about what
happens to folks. Here's California Governor Gavin Newsom.

Speaker 10 (17:05):
What a disgrace.

Speaker 11 (17:07):
What's happening in MacArthur Park?

Speaker 10 (17:10):
What theater on the six month anniversary after all of
these fires. That's the message from the polluted heart of
the President of the United States, the polluted heart of
Stephen Miller. Those National guardmen and women that were out
there protecting people are now being used as political pawns.

(17:31):
Out there on horsebacks, running through soccer fields in the
middle of the day, timed around announcements and events like this.

Speaker 2 (17:41):
Says everything you and.

Speaker 10 (17:45):
I need to know about the state of mind of
the President of the United States in this administration. So
to those that feel torn asunder by everything that's happened
over the course the last six months, notably highlighted reinforced
last six weeks and over the course last sixty minutes.

(18:09):
Day like today, I want folks to know we have
your back, and we'll continue to come back and do
what we can to protect our diverse communities, to protect
the spirit that defines the best of this city and
our state, and to push back against this cruelty, to

(18:29):
push back against this cruelty that is being perpetuated by
the President of the United States.

Speaker 1 (18:38):
This here is video from the Fox affiliate in Los Angeles,
right here, and you see how they stormed in. And again,
I want everybody watching to understand that this is what
Donald Trump wants.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
He wants this to look like a movie.

Speaker 1 (19:01):
He gets off, literally, the man gets off, probably because
Lonnie won't sleep with him. Uh, he gets off on watching. Uh,
these folks in gear here. This is when Mayor Baz
heard about it. She showed up on the scene to
confront Uh. Let's say, we put all you up please, okay,

(19:28):
all right, So so she came there to confront the leader,
the leader right there, uh and and let him know
exactly how she felt about about this action, uh that
was being taken in her city.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (19:49):
And again, people just need to understand that I guess
I said, Trump wants this whole uh theater, He wants
the camera, he wants to see them in their uniforms,
he wants to see them in the hats and the
horses and all of it. This is exactly what he wants.

Speaker 6 (20:10):
Andrew, you know, it's just so sad to see this,
and you know those are.

Speaker 5 (20:21):
Federal agents.

Speaker 6 (20:22):
You know, this guy looks like he's of Asian or
Hispanic descent, and a lot of it is you know,
Trump to blame.

Speaker 5 (20:30):
But at some point, when do you just stop doing
your job?

Speaker 6 (20:34):
When do you say, look, the fifty thousand dollars that
they're paying me a year is just not enough to
sacrifice my dignity. When do you put down your weapon
and march with people. Where's the Los Angeles Police Department.
You're the mayor saying that, the governor saying that they're
going to be standing with them. Where's his resources putting

(20:58):
towards stopping this travesty? Just a sad, sad day for America,
sad year for America.

Speaker 1 (21:16):
Amazing to me, Morgan are the people also who support
Trump who.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
Get off of this as well. Maga loves this.

Speaker 1 (21:25):
They eat it up and they want more this is
red meat to them.

Speaker 2 (21:32):
This is them. No, no, go to iPad. This is them.

Speaker 1 (21:35):
Look at look at that Democratic meet Look at the
black woman on the phone begging Trump talking to Look
at that's what this is exactly what they desire.

Speaker 9 (21:49):
Yeah, I mean I think to approve of what's going on,
then you have to have gotten to a pretty dehumanized
place to think that it's that's able to be sending
horses after people in the middle of the day, and
then in the middle of a city you certainly don't
respect your fellow humans. I mean, it's like, let's let's

(22:12):
just remove it from like you're a citizen, you're a resident,
you're this or that, what your paperwork is. Why should
we be treating anybody like this? Uh? And we know
that there's a better way to do it, even if
which it hasn't been clear, there's there's some communal concepts
or there's some consensus on who we do or do
not want to be here. It never needs to look

(22:33):
or be like this. Uh. And and again, I mean,
let's be honest, there were frustrations with and I think, uh,
you know some of the panels or reference that there
were frustrations with how Biden and Obama. We're handling this too,
but this is so far beyond anything that any most
of us consider normal. And I do think that it's
a lot of this is to score political points, uh,

(22:55):
and like you know, Governor Newsom was saying, to distract
from the real problem that they're facing in California is
the ongoing need for resources and support to rebuild from
the fires. I guess if there's one positive thing I
could point to, it's it is that, you know, politically,
do I have a ton in common with Governor Newsom?

(23:17):
Not necessarily, I mean, you know, he hasn't been a
great champion of taking on monopolist by any means, but
the fact that he is on the same page that
this isn't acceptable, that he does represent a type of
leadership that is going to at least try to be
honest about what's happening. I think that's our challenge right
now is finding as many of us as possible who

(23:38):
fit in that category and continuing to speak out that
this is not the United States of America that we
want to be part of, and we can do better.

Speaker 1 (23:45):
We showed you the remarks of Governor Gavin Newsom. These
are remarks of Mayor care and Bass.

Speaker 2 (24:02):
Today.

Speaker 12 (24:03):
I was on my way to the press conference with
the Governor talking about the six month anniversary of the fires,
of the natural disaster, the worst in California's recent history,
and to report on the progress. While I was on
the way, though, I got alerted that there was a
ice operation, military intervention who knows at MacArthur Park. I

(24:30):
turned around, we went.

Speaker 5 (24:31):
To the park.

Speaker 12 (24:33):
I could see a helicopter in the air. I think
it was a black Hawk helicopter, and I saw military tanks.

Speaker 11 (24:39):
It was the Custom.

Speaker 12 (24:40):
And Border Patrol, and it might have been military on
the periphery. To me, this is another example of the
administration ractioning up chaos by deploying would look like a
military operation in an American city. So I went to
MacArthur Park because it is very, very important that the

(25:01):
truth be told about what happened there. Now, you can
spend it any way you like, but in my opinion,
it's a political agenda of provoking fear and terror. Frankly,
it is outrageous and Unamerican that we have federal armed
vehicles in our parks when nothing is going on in

(25:23):
the parks. It's outrageous and un american that the federal
government seized our States National Guard. It's outrageous and un
american that we have US Marines who are trained to
kill foreign soldiers overseas deployed in our American city.

Speaker 11 (25:45):
So here's the truth.

Speaker 12 (25:47):
There's no plan other than fear, chaos and politics.

Speaker 2 (25:52):
Home depot one.

Speaker 12 (25:53):
Day, a car wash the next, armed vehicles and what
looked like mounted military units park the next day.

Speaker 1 (26:06):
This is I mean again, I I need people to understand.

Speaker 2 (26:14):
We're only six months in.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
They've just handed them more than one hundred billion dollars,
billion dollars, y'all.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
This is gonna continue. They don't care.

Speaker 1 (26:24):
Adam Sirr of The Atlantic coined the phrase cruelty is.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
The point, and that is the point.

Speaker 1 (26:32):
It is cruelty, that is their objective. That is what they.

Speaker 2 (26:37):
Want to do.

Speaker 1 (26:40):
Gonna go to break move right back Roland Martin unfiltered
right here in the Black Study Network.

Speaker 13 (26:54):
This week on the other side of change in mass incarceration,
Trump administration is doubling downation and how it is profitable.

Speaker 14 (27:02):
And there's something really really perverse about saying that we
need to put people in cages in order for other
people to have jobs like that is not how our
economy should be built.

Speaker 15 (27:11):
Only on the other side of Change on the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 16 (27:17):
Next on the Black Table with me Greg Carr, the
Enigma of Supreme Court Justice. Clarence tells what really makes
him tick and what forces shaped his view of the world,
the country, and Black America. The answer, I'm pretty sure
will shock you.

Speaker 8 (27:33):
As he says, you know, people think that I'm anachronistic.

Speaker 2 (27:35):
I am.

Speaker 8 (27:36):
I want to go backwards in time in order to
move us forward into the future. He's very upfront about this.

Speaker 16 (27:42):
We'll talk to Corey Robbin, the man who wrote the
book that reveals it all. That's next on the Black
Table Only on the Black Star Network.

Speaker 1 (27:54):
He was up yea Devon Franklin, it is always a
pleasure to be in the house. You are watching Roland
Martin built stay right now. I referenced earlier Donald Trump's
attacks on Democrats after he signed the tax cut bill

(28:20):
that he called the Big Beautiful Bill.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
And when he was speaking in Iowa.

Speaker 1 (28:25):
If you want to hear how nasty and despicable he is,
this is an example. But I'm gonna show you all
the contrast after we play this rollback.

Speaker 17 (28:36):
Amlican congressmen and women, because what they did is incredible
last night, and the Senate, the Republican Senate, we got
not with all of the things we did with the
tax cuts and rebuilding our military, not one Democrat voted
for us. And I think you use it in the
campaign that's coming up the midterms, because we got to
beat him, but all of the things that we've given

(28:58):
and they wouldn't vote only because they hate Trump.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
But I hate them too, you know that, So it's
in sound of me.

Speaker 8 (29:06):
I hate I really do.

Speaker 18 (29:07):
I hate them.

Speaker 17 (29:09):
I cannot stand them because I really believe they hate
our country.

Speaker 8 (29:11):
You want to know the.

Speaker 2 (29:12):
Truth, really do y'all? Remember how long.

Speaker 1 (29:22):
Right wing media went nuts when Obama made his comments
about the cops acting stupidly for arresting Skip Gates in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
That was a thing for more than a week. Payn

(29:44):
let's mention earlier, Hillary Clinton to plorables. That was twenty sixteen.
It's nine years later.

Speaker 2 (29:51):
They still talk about that.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
But he gets to stand in front of people. I
hate them, I hate them.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
You don't hear the right.

Speaker 1 (30:02):
Wing say, oh no, no, no, You're the president for all people.
See this right here is what I keep trying to
tell people is the difference between the left and the right,
Democrats and Republicans, progressives, conservatives, little phrase you want.

Speaker 2 (30:20):
To use, this is the difference right here.

Speaker 1 (30:25):
The right wing echo chamber is all about advancing his agenda,
right wing talking points.

Speaker 2 (30:37):
And for mainstream so called liberal media or whatever.

Speaker 1 (30:44):
You want to call it, to pick it up. That's
their whole goal, that's their strategy. And what's crazy is
I don't think this guy virtually any play, any play
at all, Morgan after he said it.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
But I guarantee you.

Speaker 1 (31:05):
If this was a Democrat president, we will still be
talking about today Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and they will
be demanding apology.

Speaker 9 (31:15):
M oh for sure, for sure. I mean the double
standard is real. Trump just gets to pretty much do
whatever he wants. I don't know if it will extend
to any Republican from here. That's kind of an open
question that I guess will have a lot of time
to think about, since, as you noted, we still have
over three years to go with this president. But I

(31:36):
do think you bring up a really important point, Roland,
about the villain how he vilifies Democrats, And one of
the reasons why I do think we continue to make
that we who again want government to treat people with
humanity and be functional, allow him to get away or

(31:57):
make it easier for him to get away with that
is we not naming alternative villains. And so, you know,
completely agree with you, he is out of control. If
a Democrat was doing this, they would they would not
stop talking about it. But who are our villains that
we're at least putting out there to try to take
up some of that vacuum that he's been able to

(32:19):
really take advantage of. And I mean, I would recommend
we start naming some of the true people, the people
who are truly causing problems for American lives right the
people that are making prices higher, some of the companies
that are saying, hey, we don't care if you can't
afford your water bill, your electricity bill, We're just going
to keep charging you anyway. I think this villain point

(32:42):
is really important. And if we don't start coalescing around
some kind of message quickly that is an alternative, It
doesn't mean that, you know, an alternative villain is going
to automatically take down MAGA and Donald Trump, but at
least we know we're trying. It's a different strategy and
not making it as easy because he is just ruling
with this. Democrats are the double message and it seems

(33:05):
to be working out okay for him.

Speaker 1 (33:09):
And again, this shows you on a congo the difference
between a right wing echo chamber that is able to
amplify these things and it boomerangs around and what frankly, Democrats, progressive,
the left, whatever you want to call it, what they
don't have.

Speaker 8 (33:30):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely right.

Speaker 7 (33:31):
I remember I heard somebody say that if Nixon had
Fox or some of these other networks, he would have
never had to leave office because he would have had
his own echo chamber to just continue to spew whatever
you want. And this is one of the challenges that
I don't hear Democrats talk about enough or do something about.
The Republicans have an entire media stream behind them, from

(33:54):
the podcast space to the traditional media to YouTube and
so on and so forth, and all of the Republicans
from the lowest level in terms of their stature up
to President Trump utilize them efficiently.

Speaker 8 (34:07):
How often there should be a.

Speaker 7 (34:09):
Democrat coming on Blackstar Network every night? There should be
a Democrat coming on all of the different networks to
build with us as it relates to the communication infrastructure.

Speaker 8 (34:19):
That was one of the other challenges.

Speaker 7 (34:20):
We can talk about the Harris campaign on many levels,
of course challenges, but one of the challenges was the
fact that there is no democratic structure that's as strongly
built as Fox and Oaan and so on and so forth.
But Democrats have a lot of opportunities right now to
start to change that, but they don't get out in
front of people. You talked about this, well, you probably
talk you talk about this weekly. Why aren't Democrats out

(34:42):
there with Revend Barber? Why are they just talking about
how bad a policy is as opposed to showing the
actual faces, like there is an ecosystem that they can
take advantage of if they want to. But they're still
too busy trying to play this. You know, we have
to come together, equal size both sides this. You know,
I got people like alyssa flock and saying that demoky.
She's using Republican language now, saying Democrats can't be weak

(35:04):
and woke. You know, Gavin Newsom was going MAGA lite
before some of this stuff started happening. If they would
take advantage of the networks that have been growing and building.
They would have an infrastructure in place to challenge these
Republicans going into the midterms. Republicans have already started with
their midterm campaigning and they're using the ecosystem to do that.
And Democrats have that opportunity, but they're too busy. I

(35:26):
remember last week he said one of the politicians every
time he went on his feed, it was MSNBC, MSNBC,
MSNBC hit nothing here, none of the other networks and platforms.
If they do, if they don't get a fix on that,
it's their election to lose in twenty twenty.

Speaker 6 (35:39):
Six, Andrew, Yeah, So Jasmin Crockett very important activists and
this time and history. I think that she's going to
go down as a very outspoken political.

Speaker 5 (35:57):
Figure in this time history.

Speaker 6 (36:01):
She is one of the only Democrats that I can
think of that on a daily basis speaks up against
the Trump administration. There are so many other progressive Democrats
that may send tweets, they may say, oh, this is awful,
this is terrible, But Jasmine Crockett is the only one

(36:23):
that on a day to day basis is standing up
and has something to say, and they even tried to
silence her.

Speaker 5 (36:31):
They didn't give her the position to give her more power.

Speaker 6 (36:34):
But she's somebody that we can all look up to
and we can all strive to be like myself. As
a lawyer, I have my ability to advocate as well.
Coming on this show and speaking my viewpoints is very important.
But everyone, we all need to use our platform. So
all we have to do is just pick up our phones.
We can all pick up our phones and flood the

(36:56):
internet with better content than what we're seeing. We should
spend the next three and a half years of just
not even being concerned about what Trump is saying and
only talking about what he's doing, because he's doing a
lot behind the scenes, and this show focuses on that,

(37:17):
but all of us, we all need to focus on
that so that we don't have a situation where we're
focusing on the movie and forgetting about the script.

Speaker 1 (37:28):
All right, folks, hold tight one second, I'm going to
go to break we come back. Devastation in Texas, massive
flooding there kills almost one hundred people, most of them children.

Speaker 2 (37:41):
And where was TA crews on vacation?

Speaker 1 (37:46):
Lack he normally is when Travelty's tragedy strikes in Texas.

Speaker 2 (37:51):
He's been called.

Speaker 1 (37:51):
Out for his lack of care, compassion and empathy. Folks
support Roland Martin, Unfiltered and the Blackstar Now work. If
you want to join our Brita Funk Fank whatp do so?
This is the cash app to contribute to us. This
is the cure code. Use a stripe cure code because
you also use this code for credit card delations as well.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
Saying check out money order first of all.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
Making able to Rolling Martin non filtre mail it to
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Speaker 2 (38:25):
Com, rolling at Rolling Box unfilter dot com. Will be
right back.

Speaker 5 (38:31):
Hi.

Speaker 3 (38:31):
I'm doctor Jackie of a Balanced Life. Think about the
men in your life and ask yourself these questions. Who
are their male role models? Who can they turn to
you for advice to learn about what manhood is all about.
On our next show, we talk about why mail mentoring
is so important to men of all ages. Actor Dendre

(38:51):
Whitfield leads an all star cast and panel to answer
these and many other probing questions.

Speaker 2 (38:58):
A woman can't teach you howbybe something that she's not.

Speaker 3 (39:01):
That's on the next A Balance nfe Well, Doctor Jackie
on Blackstar Network.

Speaker 19 (39:07):
The next Get Wealthy with Me Deborah Owen's America's Wealth Coach.
Less than five percent of the top executive positions in
corporate America are held by women of color.

Speaker 9 (39:20):
We know it's not because of talent.

Speaker 19 (39:23):
A recent study says that it's micro questions, unconscious, biased
and limited opportunities being offered to women of color. On
our next show, we're going to get incredible advice from
Francine Parham, who's recently written a book sharing.

Speaker 9 (39:43):
Exactly what you need to.

Speaker 19 (39:45):
Do to make it up into the management ranks and
get the earnings that you deserve.

Speaker 9 (39:51):
I made a point to sit down, and I made
a point to talk to people, and I made a
point to be very purposeful and thought provoking when I
spoke to them.

Speaker 19 (40:01):
That's right here on Get Wealthy only on Black Star Network.

Speaker 3 (40:18):
Hi, I'm doctor Jackie of A Balance Life. Think about
the men in your life and ask yourself these questions.
Who are their male role models? Who can they turn
to for advice to learn about what manhood is all about.
On our next show, we talk about why male mentoring
is so important to men of all ages. Actor Dendre

(40:38):
Whitfield leads an all star cast and panel to answer
these and many other probing questions.

Speaker 20 (40:44):
A woman can't teach you how to be something that
she's not.

Speaker 3 (40:47):
That's on the next A Balance Life with Doctor Jackie
on Black Star Network this week.

Speaker 15 (40:53):
On the other side of Change, in.

Speaker 13 (40:54):
Mass incarceration, Trump administration is doubling down on criminalization and
how it is the.

Speaker 14 (41:00):
Book and there's something really really perverse about saying that
we need to put people in cages in order for
other people.

Speaker 11 (41:06):
To have jobs.

Speaker 9 (41:07):
Like that is not how our comedy should.

Speaker 15 (41:08):
Be got only on the other side of Change on
the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
Hey, what's up. Yeah, I'm Devon's Frank.

Speaker 14 (41:16):
I'm doctor Robin Bee, pharmacist and fitness coach, and you're
watching Roland Martin unfiltered.

Speaker 1 (41:26):
All right, folks, saw black preachers were in the pulpit
this Sunday trashing uh the bill and Donald Trump's signed
into law on July fourth. We're gonna play for you
three of those pastors, Pastor William Lamar. Of course I
hear Metropolitan in Washington, d C. Pastor Reverend doctor Frederick Haynes,
Friendship West Baptist Church in Dallas, New Birth Missionary Baptist Church,

(41:50):
Jamal Bryant. Here's what all three told their congregations on Sunday.

Speaker 21 (41:58):
In Central Texas. Now bys people swept twenty miles down river,
Homes destroyed, dead dreams and strangled hope. Violent wind ripped
Job and Missus Job's children away from their loving bosom.

(42:18):
Swelling floodwater snatched away lives in Central Texas. These awful
occurrences we call natural disasters. But let me tell you
about another disaster, man made, conceived and constructed by malevolent, misanthropic, cowardly,

(42:44):
and unjust members of our own species, brought to you
by persons elected in this country, a meal plated with
the garnish of death, topped with the special sauces of
skillful deception, rhetorical mendacity, and policy sleight of hand. The

(43:09):
winds killed the ten children of Job and Missus Job.
The flood snatched the lives away of precious ones in
Central Texas. And this human cause disaster may end up
taking fifty one thousand lives in this nation. According to
the University of Pennsylvania, Americans at the bottom twenty percent

(43:34):
of all earners will see their annual after tax incomes
followed by two point five percent, and the top twenty
percent we'll see a two point four percent boost. This
is human conceived devastation. Five hundred and sixty dollars in
losses for someone who reports a little are no income

(43:57):
by twenty thirty four, and more than one hundred eighteen
thousand dollars in gains for someone making over three million.
Human design devastation. A person making two hundred and seventeen
thousand dollars or more annually would receive a twelve thousand,
five hundred dollars tax cut. Someone making thirty five thousand

(44:19):
dollars or less would see only one hundred and fifty
dollars of savings. Human designed misery. Medicaid. Seventy million of
US on Medicaid. Dana and I were listening to the radio,
and there are people who say around this nation they

(44:42):
hate medicaid, and they ain't even got sense enough to
know that they're on it, because each and every state
calls it something different. But these people who want to
racialize poverty and say that somebody is taking they are
the There are ones who had nothing without Medicaid. Medicaid,

(45:05):
the government's health care program for low income folks will
be cut by one trillion dollars, forcing maybe seventeen million
people off its role. This is necro politics, the politics
of death. This is human designed death. More than three

(45:34):
million will lose food stamps while whitey is going to Mars.
Nutrition subsidies will be destroyed, and seventeen million children will

(45:57):
lose food out of them while rich people by bigger
and bigger yachts. This is damnable evil and a human
cause pain. I laugh at these so called deficit hawks

(46:22):
who really just don't want to spend money on anybody
that's poor. Bo write themselves a check whenever they get
the notion. National debt will increase by four point one
trillion dollars. This is a human malfeasance of duty. While
I did not agree with everything that Barack who say

(46:44):
Obama did when he put obama Care in place, he
paid for it, and these evil lawmakers and their evil
puppet master will drive bob national debt. Give your grandchildren
a credit card so they can play on private islands.

(47:09):
Hundreds of rural hospitals will be hard hits. One quarter
of nursing homes will close. Human CAUs abuse of the
poor and the elderly. And can I tell you right now,
Mike Johnson is in church. I tell you right now,

(47:39):
Mitch McConnell has been wheeled into somebody's church on government
paid healthcare that keeps his evil behind from going underneath
the dirt.

Speaker 2 (47:58):
They are in.

Speaker 21 (48:03):
Win's killing us, floods, killing US, legislation, killing God.

Speaker 18 (48:15):
Every now and then I get tired of seeing wrong
winning every now and then I begin to question and
get upset with God because I wonder if God sees
what's going on, if God cares about what's going on,
I'm still not coming through. I'll make it real plain,

(48:38):
in a real sense, my sisters and brothers, it happens,
and it happens on repeat. This past week we watched
in this country as this big, beautiful bill is now
signed into law, and it will have ugly and unjust consequences.
It is lethal legislation. It is a bill that kills.

(49:04):
And watch this, this bill that kills. The Republicans are
so dirty and slick that they made sure that it
will not go into effect until after the mere term elections,
and so people are going to get caught up in
what tax returns they get and somehow conclude that this

(49:26):
was a beautiful bill, but the ugly consequences are soon
to come. And y'all when they passed it, here's what
messed me up.

Speaker 2 (49:36):
There were those who had the.

Speaker 18 (49:38):
Nerve to get up and read their edited Bible, and
they read their edited Bible in order to justify the
injustice that they were perpetrating. Have you thought about the
fact that they have been so determined to kill Obamacare
or the Affordable Care Act that as a result of

(50:02):
their murdering murdering Medicaid and gutting the Affordable Care Act,
by the end of next year, seventeen million people will
not have access to healthcare in this country. They are
so what, they are so determined to blame the poor

(50:22):
for their impoverished predicament that they are presenting this bill
that kills this lethal legislation and some five million people
will no longer have access to snap. They are cutting
services for veterans while adding to the military budget. Wait what,

(50:44):
I gotta go back and grab you because the veterans
who served in the military are losing resources while they
are spending more money on weaponry because of militarism and
the madness of militarism in this country. And my sisters
and brothers, here is what a group of us did,

(51:07):
led by activist attorney the brilliant Angela Rai. She has
organized the State of the People movement where we've been
going around the country targeting cities to organize and serve
communities that are underserved. And then my sisters and brothers,

(51:27):
this week we had a marathon, watched this streaming session
where we were educating the public about the badness of
this bill, the ugly consequences and the racist ramifications of
this vial and all right before I got on, an

(51:49):
attorney and preachers gets on and she says, Monique Pressley says,
we ought to have a time of prayer. I came
on and said, have always understood the connection between policy
and prayer. Let's have a prayer session for an hour.

(52:09):
After all, Jesus sid could you not teary one hour?
We prayed at midnight from midnight to one o'clock, believing
that God would come through. And then my sisters and brothers, sadly, sinfully, shamefully.
The bill got passed. The bill got passed, and I

(52:31):
cannot lie. At that moment, I wondered, how is it
that wrong and wickedness keep winning. How is it that
injustice somehow is on the throne and justice is on
the scaffold. It made me upset. It made me wonder
with the psalm is God, I know that you're good,

(52:52):
but your goodness doesn't seem to be showing up in
dealing with bad people. I think I'll stop right there,
because if I'm.

Speaker 2 (53:00):
God, here's what I do.

Speaker 18 (53:02):
I wipe out all the bad folk.

Speaker 2 (53:04):
If I'm God, here's what I do.

Speaker 18 (53:06):
I make sure the bad folks they get what's coming
to them immediately. If not, soda, it seems like God
just takes God's time.

Speaker 2 (53:16):
Y'all. Can judge me all you want to.

Speaker 18 (53:18):
I'm just letting you know there are some people on
my list that I'd like to say, God, get them
right now, don't wait another moment. Go ahead and handle
your judgment business, y'all. But God doesn't work like that.
God has a way of just standing back and watching

(53:40):
and justice take place. And if you're not careful, it
will discourage you. If you're not careful, it will cause
you to lose heart. Is that not the interesting word
used by our sable skin savior and sagacious storyteller from
the streets, Jesus of Nazareth in the Gospel according to Luke,

(54:04):
chapter eighteen. Look what he say is in verse one,
and he spoke a parable unto them because he wanted
to teach us watch this how we should pray always
and not get discouraged. And the word right there for
discouragement means to lose heart. Can I park right there?

(54:26):
It has to do with losing the totality of your internality.
It has to do with you not having anything left
on the inside as a result of what's happening in
the world around you. And every now and then, y'all,
I get so discouraged, I lose heart. I'm weak on

(54:48):
the inside. I'm broken on the inside. Yeah, you do
know the Hebrew word for discouragement. It means shattered internally,
Because whenever you get discover you are broken on the inside.
Whenever you are discourage you contend to lose heart.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
And every now in being.

Speaker 18 (55:09):
No matter how big your Bible is, how long you've
been going to church. We get discouraged every now and
then we wonder if we can keep going on. Every
now and then we find ourselves running on empty. And
when you're running on empty and there's no exit sign here,

(55:30):
you're running on empty. There's no sign of a gas
station anywhere close. And somebody is checking in right now,
and I'm in your I'm at your address because here
it is you're running on empty, and there are no
exit signs, there is no filling station any place close.

(55:51):
Jesus said that in this pair of boat he spoke,
He said, I want you to always pray and not
give up.

Speaker 22 (56:02):
The leaders of this nation, who all claim to be Christian,
committed the most unchristlike things since slavery. They have kicked
seventeen million Americans off healthcare, and six hundred and fifty
three thousand of them live in Georgia. They cut one

(56:25):
hundred and eighty six billion off of food assistance from
families and eliminated free lunch from children. Clutch your pearls,
you ain't gonna believe it. Reach for your asthma pump.
Everybody's electric bill will be going up by one hundred
and sixty eight dollars a month, and at the same

(56:50):
time they're giving a one trillion dollar tax cut for billionaires.

Speaker 2 (56:58):
Not to mention, over the.

Speaker 22 (56:59):
Last week, they have left five hundred thousand Haitians unprotected.
A congresswoman in Minnesota was murdered, as was her husband
in their home by somebody who was a professed evangelical
Christian Trumpete and President Trump did not go to the funeral.

Speaker 2 (57:24):
He went to play.

Speaker 22 (57:24):
Golf instead of paying respects. There are in America eight
hundred billionaires, I said, eight hundred billionaires who benefit from
the big beautiful bill. Where contravelle, they are three hundred
and forty.

Speaker 5 (57:44):
Million who will suffer.

Speaker 22 (57:48):
Where they don't understand or what you don't understand, is
the majority of those on snap, the majority of those
collecting food stamps a white people. But they hate minorities
so much that they will injure themselves just thinking they

(58:10):
are punishing us. Four hundred and thirty five hospitals.

Speaker 2 (58:20):
Will close in rural areas.

Speaker 22 (58:24):
They cannot even give an estimate of how many people
will die in the first three years because of the
absence of Medicare, Medicaid and the closing of hospitals. They
have opened up in broad daylight Alligata Alcatraz that is
fit for Canines to house immigrants, while white evangelical churches

(58:51):
have said nothing about any of it.

Speaker 1 (58:55):
This is exactly what the pastures should be doing across
the country as to how they inform their congregations.

Speaker 9 (59:03):
Morgan, you first, yeah, a couple of points. I mean one,
I think it's important to continue to call out the
impacts of the Trump administration's policies. And I appreciate that
all of the pastors, it sounded like, had done their
homework and were able to point to spe specific impacts
and some of the numbers around that, like how much

(59:23):
electricity bills are going to go up, for example. But
I think we also need to keep in mind that
we have limited ability to influence what happens with the
Trump administration. Best case scenario, we lead him to roll
back a little bit something that he might have been
thinking of doing, or present an alternative that's less bad.

(59:47):
But I don't see a turnaround for the Trump administration
that suddenly they care deeply about the advancement of black people, right,
So that's the second part. The third point then, is
so then what should we spend our time doing. And
I want to come back to what Andrew was talking
about with Jasmine Crockett. The fact that Jasmin Crockett did
not get that over the seat was to be the

(01:00:08):
ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, right, that she
didn't get that as one of the most popular Democrats
in the country, as one of the most effective young
black congress people communicating out there during this Trump administration
pushing back because oversight is about pushing back on the
administration and your only ranking members, so Democrats don't even

(01:00:31):
have power.

Speaker 8 (01:00:32):
Why was that?

Speaker 9 (01:00:33):
And we should talk about that, and is there something
that these pastors giving me doing to call that out
to really start to move the decision making that's happening
within the Democratic Party that is not elevating our most
talented people. That's a problem because how are we affirmatively
going to regain power away from Donald Trump or whoever

(01:00:54):
is going to succeed him should he be forced likely
to step down, but we don't know what's coming there.
How are we going to be in a position to
have a message that will actually make people want to
pay attention. And that's the other point I wanted to
come back to from an earlier conversation. I agree, the
ecosystem is out there. Roland. You have built an amazing one,
an amazing platform for all of us to plug into.

(01:01:15):
I'm grateful for that. There are other podcasts that are
out there. But the issue is, if you're going to
come on these platforms as an elected official, what are
you going to be talking about? And is it anything
that anybody cares to be hearing about? And not just
people that already care about politics, but the people we
need to start showing up that generally are disgusted with

(01:01:36):
what they've seen to date, right, that are not happy
about how things are going, not just because of Donald Trump,
but because of every other aspect of their lives as well.
So that's what I really think we need to be
focused on, is what again, what are those villains? What
are the problem? What are our solutions? Because if we
just spent another three years pointing out everything that is

(01:01:56):
bad with Donald Trump, and Elon Musk is saying he's
starting a new political party, well I don't know that
that's going to be enough, and I am very very
worried about that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
I agree, but I do believe it's important to and
I say this all the time Andrew, and I say
it repeatedly.

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):
A year eighteen months before.

Speaker 1 (01:02:22):
An election, you must be in what I call an
inform educate, and enlightened stage.

Speaker 2 (01:02:31):
I think we have to raise the ire of people.

Speaker 1 (01:02:35):
We have to make plain what they are doing to
get people pissed off enough to turn out.

Speaker 2 (01:02:44):
And so I hope that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:46):
These preachers and others are using their sermons every single
Sunday between now and the beginning of the primaries for
the military election to do this, because we're.

Speaker 2 (01:02:59):
Going to need a have turnout.

Speaker 1 (01:03:01):
Democrats just need to win five House seats to control
the House. That's the target goal. They have to defend
the Senate seat in Georgia. They can win the Senate
seat in North Carolina. We'll see what happens with Susan
Collins in Maine. But I do think a lot of
people don't know those details, and spelling it out, I

(01:03:24):
think is crucial.

Speaker 2 (01:03:25):
And if that pisces people off, great.

Speaker 5 (01:03:30):
And thank you for that, Roland.

Speaker 6 (01:03:32):
And one of the things about this badly built bill
that I want to highlight is what's going to do
higher education right now? That bill has a gap on
twenty thousand dollars for a master's degree, fifty thousand dollars

(01:03:52):
for law school.

Speaker 5 (01:03:53):
And a medical degree. We already have a doctor shortage.

Speaker 6 (01:03:58):
So think about the seventeen year olds who have their
whole life ahead of them. They're getting ready to graduate
high school and go to college, and you know these
kinds of Howard University law school is about forty thousand
dollars to go to. You have a bill that's coming
out that's going to say, look, the federal government is

(01:04:20):
only going to give you maybe twenty thousand if you
want to finish if you want to go past your
undergraduate degree, maybe fifty thousand dollars.

Speaker 5 (01:04:30):
If you want to get a law degree or a
medical degree.

Speaker 6 (01:04:35):
But the limit that is going to put on them
is going to force them not to not finish their
education because they're going to start it, but they're going
to have to find other plays, other ways to fund it,
where they're going to go to the private sector, where
right now credit card interest rates are completely out of control,

(01:04:55):
and those.

Speaker 5 (01:04:56):
Credit card companies are going to take full advantage.

Speaker 6 (01:04:59):
Because they're going to give those loans, and they're gonna
give those loans with the promise that right now we're
already playing a lifetime of student loans. With the privatized loans,
you're gonna be paying for your lifetime, for your grandchildren's lifetime,
for your great grandchildren's lifetime. You're gonna see communities. And

(01:05:19):
this is just not a Black issue. This is why
it's so important. It's not a Black issue. It's an
American issue. When the preachers said that there's eight hundred billion,
eight hundred billionaires in America that right now are setting
in the tone that are gonna be benefiting from this bill,
everyone else to some extent, we're gonna we're gonna win,
but mostly we're gonna lose because we're all gonna have

(01:05:43):
to saddle the burden the debt. Who is going to
be able to afford to buy real estate in five
years after this bill is up, after they have so
much credit card that that they can't pay their credit card,
their credit scores in the tank, they can't even afford
to least, right, who who's going to be able to

(01:06:05):
shoulder that? It's going to be the forty and the
fifty year olds, the thirty year olds. Right, I'm congo,
and it's just a sad situation.

Speaker 2 (01:06:15):
I'm congo for America.

Speaker 7 (01:06:18):
Well, my concern is that, you know, we talk about
what Democrats need to be doing. You know, Jasmine Crockett
was brought up, but the fact that the matter is
because of how she's been treated, she's leaving the national
scene and going back to the grassroots. I'm looking at
how Democrats have not embraced us or in Mamdani's political
stances on particular issues again, somebody who built a grassroots campaign.

(01:06:40):
And so we're talking about Democrats and not taking advantage
of the ecosystem, and we're also seeing how they're not
fully embracing the younger Democrats who have a larger who
are reaching more people. The three pastors who just spoke,
they are speaking to people who need to be brought
back into the fold. They are speaking to the potential
non voter who decided to stay home and now has

(01:07:01):
to realize that they have an opportunity maybe to make
up for that in the next year with the midterms,
make up for some of that.

Speaker 5 (01:07:06):
And lastly, when.

Speaker 7 (01:07:07):
It comes to Donald Trump, Donald Trump has been known
to back down when challenge at a hard enough level.
And whether we're talking about Tyris, whether we're talking about
his first administration, and the child policies engages that he
changed after he saw some of the videos. So we
can never not let up as it relates to continuing
to challenge that. And so I feel like with these pastors,
like you said, do need to see more of that,

(01:07:28):
with engaging the Democrats who are newer with greater ideas
to reach more.

Speaker 8 (01:07:33):
People and continually to the front Trump.

Speaker 7 (01:07:36):
All is not lost and we can make some serious
gains between now and the midterms.

Speaker 1 (01:07:40):
All Right, folks, type one second, we come back quick break.
We're going to come back and talk about the deadly
floods in Texas. Now, Republicans still want to deny, want
to deny the reality of climate change, and they want
to deny that Trump's cuts the National.

Speaker 2 (01:07:55):
Weather Service contribute to this.

Speaker 1 (01:07:58):
You're watching roland Mark now Stiltrip on the back Stung Network.

Speaker 11 (01:08:03):
This week.

Speaker 13 (01:08:03):
On the other side of change, the mass incarceration. Trump
administration is doubling down criminalization and how it is profitable.

Speaker 14 (01:08:10):
need to put people in cages in order for other
people to have jobs, Like that is not how our
economy should be built.

Speaker 15 (01:08:19):
Only on the other side, of Change on the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 16 (01:08:26):
Next on the Black Table with me Greg Carr, the
enigma of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Times. What really makes
him tick and what forces shaped his view of the world,
the country, and Black America. The answer, I'm pretty sure
will shock.

Speaker 8 (01:08:41):
You, As he says, you know, people think that I'm anachronistic.

Speaker 2 (01:08:44):
I am.

Speaker 8 (01:08:45):
I want to go backwards in time in order to
move us forward into the future. He's very upfront about this.

Speaker 16 (01:08:51):
We'll talk to Corey Robbin, the man who wrote the
book that reveals it all. That's next on The Black Table,
only on the Black Star Network.

Speaker 20 (01:09:02):
Hello, I'm Paula J.

Speaker 4 (01:09:03):
Parker, Trudy Proud of the Proud Family.

Speaker 2 (01:09:06):
Iron, Tommy Davidson.

Speaker 14 (01:09:07):
I played Oscar on Proud Family, Louder and Pride.

Speaker 13 (01:09:11):
I'm Joe Marie Payton, Boys of Sugar Mama on Disney's
Louder and.

Speaker 21 (01:09:15):
Prouder Disney Plus.

Speaker 4 (01:09:16):
And I'm with Roland Martin on Unfiltered.

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
Some Texas state emergency officials are placing the blame on
the short staff National Weather Service for its forecast for
a storm that led to massive flooding in Texas that
has killed more than nearly one hundred people, including more
than two dozen girls and counselors, attending a Christian summer
camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River. The Weather

(01:09:46):
Service came under fire from local officials who criticized what
they say as inadequate forecast, which they blamed on federal
cuts made by Donald Trump as soon as he took office. Sunday,
the reporter asked Trump who was to blame? And you know,
he took no responsibility.

Speaker 5 (01:10:02):
At all.

Speaker 15 (01:10:05):
Investigating whether some of the cuts to.

Speaker 23 (01:10:07):
The federal government left te vacant season the National Weather
Service or the Emergency for they did not.

Speaker 17 (01:10:14):
I'll tell you, if you look at that water situation,
that all is and that was really the Biden setup.

Speaker 5 (01:10:22):
That was not our setup.

Speaker 17 (01:10:23):
But I wouldn't blame Biden for it either. I would
just say, this is one hundred year catastrophe and it's
just so horrible to watch.

Speaker 2 (01:10:36):
Set up. Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
White House Adler in chief Carolyn Levitt said this about
the actual fatal flood.

Speaker 24 (01:10:47):
Unfortunately, in the wake of this once in a generation
natural disaster, we have seen many falsehoods pushed by Democrats
such as Senator Chuck Schumer and some members of the
media blaming President Trump for these floods is a depraved
lie and it serves no purpose during this time of
national mourning. Here are the facts and the lead up

(01:11:08):
to this tragic natural disaster. The National Weather Service did
its job despite unprecedented rainfall. The National Weather Service executed
timely in precise forecasts and warnings. On July third, the
National Weather Service Office in Austin, San Antonio, Texas conducted
forecast briefings for emergency management in the morning and issued

(01:11:29):
a floodwatch in the early afternoon. Flash flood warnings were
also issued on the night of July third and in
the early morning of July fourth, giving preliminary lead times
of more than three hours before flash flooding conditions occurred.
In The National Weather Service office in New Brunfels, which
delivers forecasts for Austin, San Antonio and the surrounding areas,

(01:11:51):
had extra staff on duty during the storms, despite claims
of the contrary. So to any person who has deliberately
lied about these facts surrounding this catastrophic.

Speaker 9 (01:12:01):
Event, you should be deeply ashamed.

Speaker 24 (01:12:03):
At this time, the administration's focus will be on giving
the victims in their communities the support they deserve during
these recovery efforts in this tragic time. The alerts imminently
were sent out before the flood when people were sleeping,
because the flood hit in the very early hours of
the morning, so people were sleeping.

Speaker 9 (01:12:22):
In the middle of the night when this flood came.
That was an act of God.

Speaker 24 (01:12:25):
It's not the administration's fault that the flood hit when
it did. But there were early and consistent warnings, and
again the National Weather Service did its job. On July second,
there were initial notices of potential weather and flooding risks
were issued on July third, escalating warnings throughout the day,
with a flood wash issued at one eighteen pm, and

(01:12:46):
then later on at six ten pm on July third,
the Weather Prediction Center warned of excessive rainfall and a
high likelihood of flash flooding. Six point twenty two pm
July third, National Weather Center issued a hydraulic warning high
lighting considerable flooding risks, including in Carabal County, and then
there were the timely flash flood alerts at eleven forty

(01:13:07):
one pm one fourteen am, and then another flash flood
emergency warning issued at four h three Am just before
the flood hit. So those were all of the warnings
that went out to the affected area and region.

Speaker 2 (01:13:19):
It's a loud to cover your ass going on there.

Speaker 1 (01:13:21):
Cody Hankerson is the Sociate director of Energy and Environment
Campaigns at the Center for American Progress.

Speaker 2 (01:13:27):
Cody, lad to have you here. So let's is what's crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:13:33):
Officials in the county refused to spend the money on
a system that would have alerted them. The Governor of
Texas comes in with his thoughts and prayers, and they
did nothing. There has been a long history of flooding
on the Guadalupe River. This ain't nothing new. Republicans have

(01:13:55):
control Texas politics.

Speaker 2 (01:13:58):
Going on three decades.

Speaker 1 (01:14:01):
So all of his effort to try to blame Biden
and Democrats, it's pretty shitty.

Speaker 25 (01:14:07):
It's horrible if you look at it.

Speaker 23 (01:14:09):
The same climate misinformation that this administration and the GOP
at large has been putting out for decades now contributed
to the fact that that community was left unprepared. Ultimately,
I mean, I think that that community should be demanding
answers as to why the Trump administration at the beginning

(01:14:29):
of the year decided that they were going to slash Noah,
which is the parent agency of the National Weather Service,
and staffing and funding from the National Weather Service itself.

Speaker 25 (01:14:40):
And the fact is that.

Speaker 23 (01:14:41):
There were vacancies that were left there, but despite those vacancies,
the National Weather Service stepped up. They did the best
they could with the data and the staffing that they had.
But it doesn't negle negate the fact that there ultimately
were funding cuts and that there are future funding cuts
coming as a result of the One Big Beautiful Bill.

Speaker 1 (01:15:04):
Now, the death toll is are pasted one hundred and
you still have and you still have ten campers and
a nineteen year old Council of Missing, so eleven people
are still missing here. But also, what's a problem here,
and I just said it. You've had a history of
flooding on that river. Republicans, they have slammed their heads

(01:15:28):
into the sand. No, no, no, climate change is not
real and they just refuse to deal with it. And
now you're seeing the effects. And it's Republicans who control
Texas politics.

Speaker 25 (01:15:43):
Yes, And one of the things that stood out to
me about.

Speaker 23 (01:15:45):
The clips that you had shown was their use of
this term once in a generation and what we're seeing
as a result of man made driven climate change is
that these once in a generation storms are becoming.

Speaker 25 (01:15:58):
Once a year or times a year in some case.

Speaker 23 (01:16:01):
And that's where that climate misinformation is so dangerous, is
that it makes people think, oh, well, this is just
one in a generation, it's not going to happen again.
But the Trump administration is actively taking measures to both
take away our predictive power as well as our mitigation
efforts to help make sure that tragedies like this never
happen again.

Speaker 25 (01:16:21):
And so they're burning the candle at both ends.

Speaker 23 (01:16:23):
And meanwhile, they're going to ask FEMA to step in
eventually to help with the recovery efforts, and that's going
to be much needed, but the Trump administration is trying
to dismantle that as well. So from both ends, whether
it's from prevention or response, they're leaving their own people
out to dry.

Speaker 1 (01:16:41):
We're looking at losses between this is the text as
Tribune go to my iPad, looking at a losses between
losses between eighteen billion and twenty two billion in destruction
and economic losses. Yet when you look at how much
money needs to spill the front end, it's not that much.
And this is what I keep saying about this country,

(01:17:04):
and it drives me crazy. In America, we wait to
shit blows up or applane to crash, or a space
shuttle to blow up before we.

Speaker 2 (01:17:16):
Go, hmmm, we might want to fix that.

Speaker 1 (01:17:19):
And our response always is to anything preventative that's going
to cost money.

Speaker 2 (01:17:24):
It's going to cost money.

Speaker 1 (01:17:26):
Well, I think there are families that would love to
have hundred loved ones still living.

Speaker 23 (01:17:34):
That was a conversation that I had with my colleagues
as well, is if you ask these communities, what would
we pay to have our family members back, or our
community members back, or for this to have never happened,
For us even to have had a few more hours
of insight or of alerts before this did happen, to get.

Speaker 25 (01:17:52):
Our family members out, there would.

Speaker 23 (01:17:55):
Be no price tag. And so it's so important that
we do the education and that we hold our public
officials accountable whenever they are trying to spread this climate misinformation,
which let's to be clear, it's coming from the oil
and gas industry that's funding all these campaigns, and so
these politicians whenever they're pushing this misinformation, they're making people
believe that this is not going to something not going

(01:18:16):
to be something that's going to happen again, or you know,
we're doing the best we can, or it's all right
if we defund this program or their strategy of move
fast and break things. Whenever you do that, whenever you
have that as your strategy, you're going to cost people
their lives. You're going to cost people time to be
able to help themselves. Americans just want the information they

(01:18:39):
need to keep themselves safe, and this administration is robbing
them of that by defunding these agencies.

Speaker 2 (01:18:45):
Questions from the panel. We'll start with you, Andrew, So what.

Speaker 6 (01:18:53):
Do you think is the administrations reasoning or what do
you think about the administration is reasoning around the whole
thing of them saying that these alerts were sent out
on time, even though they were sent out overnight. Normally
with a fully staffed weather system, would these alerts have

(01:19:14):
come earlier?

Speaker 23 (01:19:16):
You know, all the alerts are based off of a
lot of research and a lot of the models that
are coming from NOAH provided to NOAH and then are
implemented by the National Weather Service.

Speaker 25 (01:19:29):
Now, I can't say for certain.

Speaker 23 (01:19:31):
That the National Weather Service would have been able to
send out that information earlier, whether it be an hour
or so, but what I do know is that if
you break the system that is feeding all of these models,
all these predicted models that ultimately provide those alerts, if
you break that system, which the Trump administration did at
the beginning of the year, that it can lead to delays,

(01:19:52):
and that if it didn't happen here in Texas, that
it's only a matter of time before it happens.

Speaker 25 (01:19:57):
And I also wanted to highlight some.

Speaker 23 (01:20:00):
That was brought to me by one of my colleagues,
which is, since nineteen ninety nine, black people had died
at twice the rate of white people in this country
as a result of natural disasters.

Speaker 25 (01:20:12):
And so whenever you're having these.

Speaker 23 (01:20:14):
Alerts go out, or you're having data that is outdated,
or it just hasn't been as analyzed by a fully
staffed National weather Service, that can lead to death and
that disproportionately impacts black and brown communities.

Speaker 7 (01:20:42):
One of the questions that I had is that I'm
wondering if, as it relates to when I was watching
the press conferences, I saw nobody take responsibility at any
level for what Trump said. Chrissy Gnoam said it was
old technology that needs to be updated. Then she said,
we're supposed to follow the lead that the local people.

(01:21:03):
The local people said they didn't get the updates that
they were supposed to get. How does this bolde well
for the rest of us in this country. I'm not
an expert on this, but some people they say, we
just entered hurricane season or this flooding season. What does
this say for the rest of the country in terms
of the regular people, Like, are we all on our own?

(01:21:23):
As it relates to this, because the leadership at every level,
particularly in red states, is so poor, What are we
supposed to do?

Speaker 5 (01:21:31):
You know?

Speaker 23 (01:21:32):
That is very much the role of these the federal
agencies is to answer that question. Is regardless of whether
you live in a big city, say it like New
Orleans when Hurricane and Katrina happened, or whether you're in
a very rural area like this incident here in Texas,
is that these federal agencies are supposed to be able
to step in and make sure that you have the
information in a timely and accurate manner in order for

(01:21:55):
you to make these decisions. As far as us feeling alone,
I don't know how else we could feel. Whenever the fact,
whenever Trump is over here trying to defund the agencies
that are meant to alert us. It'd be very much
as if your house was on fire and then somebody
goes over and defunds the fire department and then tells you, hey,
I really care about you, or I really care about

(01:22:16):
your family safety. It's antithetical. You can't have two things
at once. You can't really care about these communities and
then also defund the agencies and the programs that are
keeping them safe.

Speaker 9 (01:22:28):
Morgan, Yeah, thanks for the information, Cody. A couple of thoughts. Well, one,
I thought it was very interesting to see the White
House Press Secretary give such an impassioned defense of the
role of government. So maybe she'll.

Speaker 25 (01:22:42):
That's exactly what to me too.

Speaker 9 (01:22:44):
Yes, absolutely, yes, yeah, she'll learn the lesson. It's not
just the National Weather Service that can do a lot
for us. It's things like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
that can send warnings when a company's trying to crash
the economy. But anyway, so I thought it was interesting
that in the big beautiful bill that we did see,
some of those tax deductions for wind and solar were preserved,

(01:23:05):
and so getting at your point of you know, some
of these environmental issues and how they impact the public,
how they impact the black community. How are you seeing
the public support for addressing the reality of climate change
and policies that would do something about it, clean energy
grow are you? Are you feeling like more people are
getting it? How are your campaigns going.

Speaker 23 (01:23:26):
Absolutely, we're seeing them poll after poll that Americans understand
that climate change is happening, and they understand that it's
being driven by the oil and gas industry. The question is, then,
what do we do about it? You know, is this
something that we can mitigate, is it something that we
need to and by mitigate I mean just lesson or
do we need to try to rebuild our infrastructure to

(01:23:48):
be more resilient. The answer is going to be all
the above. Honestly, by the time that we're able to
address all the harms that have been pushed by the
oil and gas industry, we're going to have to have
more resilient infrastructure. But what we need to have even
before then is the research in the public education and
so we need channels just like this one to continue

(01:24:11):
putting out information that says hey, especially in black and
brown communities that typically are.

Speaker 25 (01:24:16):
Ignored or are left unprotected.

Speaker 23 (01:24:18):
Against natural disasters, that we need the funding in order
to have these public projects and to build better housing
and to have more infrastructure with more disaster preparedness, if
we dismantled these programs that allow us to both predict
and to react to these natural disasters in a.

Speaker 25 (01:24:36):
Time that climate change is worsening.

Speaker 23 (01:24:38):
And that's what the polling is saying as well, is
that most Americans know that it is worsening. If all
those factors come along and all we've had at the
end of the day is a bunch of debates and.

Speaker 25 (01:24:48):
No action, people will ultimately be her harmed.

Speaker 1 (01:24:53):
All right, Well, they still are searching for the missing,
and it's call. Is it interesting how these Texans are
saying this is no time for politics, yet they had
a lot of political stuff to say the wildfires took
place in California, attacking Governor Gavin Newsom. Always absolutely all right,

(01:25:15):
We certainly appreciate you joining us.

Speaker 25 (01:25:17):
Thanks very much, Thank you for your time.

Speaker 2 (01:25:19):
Let me also thank our panel, Morgan Andrew and only Congo.

Speaker 1 (01:25:23):
Is welcome being with today's show. Folks, Thank you so
very much. We're going to go to break, we come back.
I chat with Birmingham Mayor Randa Woofin about his new memoir.
You don't want to miss that conversation. You're watching rolland
Martin Unfiltered right here on the Blackstudy Network.

Speaker 20 (01:25:41):
This week.

Speaker 15 (01:25:41):
On the other side of change.

Speaker 13 (01:25:43):
In mass incarceration, Trump administration is doubling down on criminalization
and how it is profitable.

Speaker 14 (01:25:48):
need to put people in cages in order for other people.

Speaker 11 (01:25:54):
To have jobs.

Speaker 9 (01:25:55):
Like that is not how our economy should be built.

Speaker 15 (01:25:57):
Only on the other side of change on the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 9 (01:26:02):
Hey, what's up?

Speaker 2 (01:26:07):
Get in a place to be got kick Tautch to.

Speaker 11 (01:26:09):
Mama's University creator.

Speaker 26 (01:26:11):
And they can producer Fat Tuesdays and a hip hop comedy.
Right now, I'm rolling with Rolling Martin Unfiltered, uncut, unplugged,
and undamned believable him.

Speaker 1 (01:26:37):
Frank, glad to have you talking about your book. It
it has to it has to feel different to grow
up in a city and to be sitting in the
position that I dare say a lot of young men

(01:27:01):
and women dream about to actually be the mayor of
the place where they born and raised.

Speaker 27 (01:27:08):
My brother, First of all, thanks for allowing me to
beyond with you, and I will tell you it is
a feeling of humility. It is a feeling of opportunity
to give back home. I know, and I knew very
clearly at the age of twenty one my cousin.

Speaker 11 (01:27:26):
I actually said it.

Speaker 27 (01:27:27):
In the public a national publication Ebony Magazine, August September
two thousand and two edition, a question was asked of
all HBCU presidents around the nation, what is it that
you wanted to be and or do when you grow up?
At twenty one years of age, a rising senior in college,

(01:27:49):
I said, I wanted to be the mayor of my hometown, Birmingham, Alabama,
And fifteen years later, at the age of thirty six,
I became mayor. So it is definitely very very.

Speaker 1 (01:28:04):
What was your what was your first taste of public
service or politics? The first time you can remember doing something,
being engaged in something. Could have been with parents or grandparents,
the first time you were where you got a taste

(01:28:26):
of a political life.

Speaker 11 (01:28:29):
It was it was actually older and no, there's no
there's no politicians in my family. We weren't a family.

Speaker 1 (01:28:36):
What I mean by even if it's even if it's
somebody was involved with the community, and then you were
around you testified for the city council, or you talk
to a council member or a school board member, anything
like that.

Speaker 27 (01:28:48):
The first thing I can actually remember I was nineteen
years old. I got a chance to work for my Congressman,
Earl Hilliard summer two thousand on Capitol Hill. But that
that wasn't the best part of the experience. The best
part of the experience is the second half of the
summer I worked in the district. I got a chance
to travel around the district and see the residents that

(01:29:11):
the congressman served, see them up close, and not just
urban Alabama such as Birmingham and Montgomery, but rural Alabama
and the Black Belt where so many issues are still
going on twenty five years later. To see the residents,
to fill them up close and see their issues up
close had a profound impact on me, saying, you know what,

(01:29:31):
this whole notion of being a political scientist one day
possibly serving as an electric official, this is something I
can commit to because you literally have the opportunity to
change lots for the better.

Speaker 11 (01:29:42):
That was literally twenty five years ago.

Speaker 1 (01:29:47):
Now you mentioned political science and seeing what I always
say that is a that's a theoretical discussion a feeling.
So political scientists have theoretical discussions about politics, you know. Look,
I mean, for me, knowing doctor Ron Walters working on

(01:30:08):
Reverend Jackson's campaign, so he had practical experience, and so
it's a lot different than folks who talk about politics
versus the folk who've had to actually do it and
be in the thick of it.

Speaker 11 (01:30:23):
Yeah, agreed. So look, you know, political scientists, what can
I say?

Speaker 27 (01:30:30):
You have a policy lane, you have a public administration lane.
And then I took the lane of a juris doctorate
to enhance the political scientists where I practiced law for
a considerable time, but then I parlayed that into well,
before I was an elected official, I spent a lot
of my a lot of time professional years helping other

(01:30:53):
good candidates get elected as.

Speaker 11 (01:30:55):
A professional campaigner. And this was post law school.

Speaker 27 (01:30:59):
So take the experience of political scientists on top of
a juris doctorate. I probably that into candidate recruitment, candidate training,
helping candidates on campaign finance in as well as campaign
management in as well as my favorite part feel organizing

(01:31:20):
where you get to see it's not necessarily policy or
public administration. It is in the field, on the ground,
interacting with people. No different than I did when I
worked for the congressman and got to see it up close,
when you actually represent somebody.

Speaker 1 (01:31:38):
And with that, with that experience, what do you say
to folks today?

Speaker 2 (01:31:44):
See see for me, my story is different.

Speaker 1 (01:31:46):
My parents were co founders of a neighborhood civic organization.
I mean, I'm nine, ten years old. I can't remember
when it was founded. So I remember them working on campaigns.
I remember member meeting politicians, and remember standing on at
polls on election they passing stuff out. I remember, you know,

(01:32:09):
when they would go to.

Speaker 2 (01:32:10):
Go to town halls and.

Speaker 1 (01:32:12):
I'm be in the back doing our homework. I remember
that there was a debate, a mayor old debate in
the TMO, the Metropolsitan Organization.

Speaker 2 (01:32:22):
What was their debate?

Speaker 1 (01:32:23):
My mom was one of the three city wide coachairs.
And I'm sitting there watching the debates, so being able
to interact. So for me, when I'm talking about this,
it's because of what I lived in experience. But a
lot of young folk, a lot of black folks, who
don't have that experience. So what do you say, the

(01:32:45):
folk who say didn't want to see change, how do
you tell them that you don't have to wait until
you're twenty twenty five, thirty years old, Rarey is you
can do something now.

Speaker 27 (01:32:56):
Look, I would say you don't have to wait till
forty fifty sixty either. What I have found is that
young people either wait or say I'm too young, it's
not for me, or people tell them you're too young,
it's not for you. One is disrespectful and the other
one is not believing in yourself. And so I would

(01:33:17):
say to anybody, I think we're in a situation in
today's time because good people who have a good heart
and an interest in serving people, because those people choose
to not get involved, we find ourselves in today's time
where people who got selfish interests or personal interests and

(01:33:38):
who are not about the people are elected officials. And
that is why government it is the way it is
right now. I would tell any young person, we need
good people in office. And if you are expecting other
good people to just jump in, so therefore you'll just wait,
wait and won't do it, or wait your turn, we'll

(01:33:59):
never get back to a point where elected office is
about serving people.

Speaker 11 (01:34:03):
We got to have good people take the risks. We
got to have good hearted.

Speaker 27 (01:34:08):
Kind people who have vision, who have some form of
organizations organizational skills, but the root of them, you want.

Speaker 11 (01:34:17):
Them to help people, lead people, serve people.

Speaker 27 (01:34:20):
The more we have people like that, young and definitely younger,
the beauty of being young and being in office is
that you are full and fresh of new ideas. We
have a continuum government. It can get stagnant if we
don't have what I call multiple generations in office.

Speaker 11 (01:34:40):
I'm proud to say that I.

Speaker 27 (01:34:41):
Have an administration that is full of all generations, both
genders as well as black and white and other as
well as just a multitude of different facets of just
life and experience.

Speaker 11 (01:34:56):
And I think we.

Speaker 27 (01:34:57):
Need young people in office because their generation of challenges,
their generation of ideas, and their voices needed at the table.

Speaker 1 (01:35:11):
But I dare say this is what I say to people,
because there are a lot of folks who they want
to be in office, but they don't want to serve
that that there is a way, that there is a
training ground, there is a space, there are things that
you have to do to get there, so when you
are there, you know what to do with the power

(01:35:33):
once you have it for you, there were things you
did before you were marror. There are things that position
you for that talk about that, that trajectory was that,
how you planned it was that just simply how it unfolded.

Speaker 11 (01:35:47):
I would easily say how it's unfolded. I think for
me again, it's just opportunity upon opportunity. I got two
opportunities at the age of fifteen years old. One was.

Speaker 27 (01:35:59):
It was a grocery store and walking distance of our home,
and I remember being fifteen and wanting a job, and
I literally went up there. First of all, I tell
my mom. She was like, no, you can't have a
job that you're sixteen. You gotta wait a year. And
I was like, I don't want to wait, And so
I stumbled upon Western Supermarket. There's the manager. There's named

(01:36:21):
Dale Smith. First boss, I'll never forget his name. He
told me no twice and then I you know, upon begging,
he finally gave me an opportunity. But when he gave
me the opportunity, the first thing I realized is when
someone gives you an opportunity, it's important that you not
only take advantage of the opportunity, but be the best
version of yourself and having the experience of that opportunity.

(01:36:44):
I was a bad boy, but I parlayed that into
what is the ultimate way of providing customer service? How
do I take care of the customer. The other thing
that happened at fifteen is that my church formed a
step team, and somehow the guys older than me sixteen, seventeen,
and eighteen chose me to be the first in step

(01:37:07):
ministry leader. Both of those experiences of one leading and
the other serving customers bagging their groceries and helping them
and listening to them and understanding what the customer needed,
I parlay that literally into being a mayor that says
I should listen more than I talk, as well as
when I leave people, it should be all about what

(01:37:29):
I can do for them because I'm not representing myself.
And those experiences help at an early early age. And
I would say the last another powerful experience I had
was my great grandmother. Her name is Mary McGee. She
lived to be one hundred years old. She passed away
my sophomore year at Morehouse, but she lived with us.
She moved in with us and lived with us as

(01:37:52):
early as eleven twelve years old, and I spent so
much time with my great grandmother, who was blind from diabetes.
I learned that I learned to not only listen to her,
but also to be patient.

Speaker 11 (01:38:04):
I think when you're an elected official, you.

Speaker 27 (01:38:07):
Have to strike the balance of running down the hill
and walking down the hill. And what I mean by
that is there's certain things you want right away that
you can't always have, but you got to play the
low game because things are you just can't snap your finger.
In government all the time, it's a process because you're
dealing with public tax dollars. But from those experiences of

(01:38:30):
bagging groceries leading to in step team ministry, learning from
my great grandmother, these are all life nuggets I took
with me when I became mayor, and I applied them
every single day.

Speaker 2 (01:38:41):
Mary.

Speaker 1 (01:38:41):
As you we're talking about we're working at fifteen and
not wanting to wait till you are sixteen, it immediately
brought me back to when I was a kid working
my grandmother's catering business and the things that I learned,
how I applied that and how I applied to every
job I had sense and even when I was working
at Wendy's when I worked went to the newspaper.

Speaker 2 (01:39:02):
How that work experience was so important.

Speaker 1 (01:39:04):
And then when you talk about being picked at eighteen,
I was in a black Catholic organization, the Juni Knights
of Peter Claver. And then when we were in eighth grade,
I was in the seveth Cara. It was in the
eighth grade and we were part of a group that
took over the state organization. All of those experiences still
show up today, and so I just think it's so

(01:39:25):
valuable that that I think millennials in gen Z really
are missing something by not having that early work history
of your thoughts.

Speaker 11 (01:39:36):
All right, well, I am a tail in extra tail
in excer.

Speaker 2 (01:39:40):
Yeah, I'm on the front end.

Speaker 1 (01:39:43):
I borught November fourteen, nineteen sixty eight.

Speaker 2 (01:39:46):
You on that end.

Speaker 25 (01:39:47):
I'm on nineteen eighty one.

Speaker 27 (01:39:49):
Yeah, and you know we had floor TVs the same
TV show. I mean, I tail in.

Speaker 11 (01:39:55):
I still like a tangible newspaper. I missed the actual newspaper.

Speaker 27 (01:40:00):
A lot of things I grew up with, including you
have to work right, that everything can't be given to you,
and by working at such an early age, you are
taught and you learn what work ethic means you learn
what discipline means, you learn what time management means, being

(01:40:20):
on time.

Speaker 11 (01:40:21):
You learn that everything is not.

Speaker 27 (01:40:22):
About you, that you serve something else, or you serve
other people, whatever type of job you have, and that
you have to earn money.

Speaker 11 (01:40:32):
But in order to earn you have to actually put
in the work. That things aren't just given to you.

Speaker 27 (01:40:36):
So I definitely think, you know, bring back jobs for
young people, which is what I've done is Mayor we
have a Kids and Jobs program and we created another
program that I give two million dollars a year or
two to support young people to be exposed to work opportunity.
We've got to get we got to get young people

(01:40:57):
back working at an early age to tea some discipline
and work actin.

Speaker 1 (01:41:02):
Now, it doesn't mean what Republicans are doing by changing
these laws allowing people as young as fourteen to work
and they can work late night hours and early morning hours.

Speaker 2 (01:41:13):
To me, that stupid.

Speaker 1 (01:41:14):
I do believe you need to have restrictions on it,
but I do believe that stuff is just so valuable.
When now being born and raised in Birmingham, You're born
twenty two, twenty three years after doctor King was killed.

(01:41:35):
So you had one generation that was post civil rights movement.
Give me a view of what Birmingham looked like for
you then and what it looks like now.

Speaker 2 (01:41:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 27 (01:41:51):
So growing up, names like Fret Shuttle's Rig and Arantine
and even was ag Gaston were prominent names. Fred Scheltersworth
is the one who invited King to Birmingham.

Speaker 11 (01:42:06):
So his name, his name is everywhere, and it's when
you fly in.

Speaker 27 (01:42:10):
It's not Birmingham Airport, it's Fred Schultersworth International Airport.

Speaker 11 (01:42:15):
The ag Gaston Motel.

Speaker 27 (01:42:17):
But beyond that, I was on I was part of
the ag Gaston Boys Club where I played on the
football team.

Speaker 11 (01:42:23):
Ag Gaston was the first black millionaire.

Speaker 27 (01:42:25):
In the state of Alabama who you know, quietly and
discreetly paid for an assistant. A lot of people getting
literally getting bond to get out of jail doing the movement.

Speaker 11 (01:42:39):
In addition to that, the ag Gaston Motel.

Speaker 27 (01:42:42):
When you see the picture of Reverend Avernathy, when you
see the picture of doctor King, you see the picture
of Fred Schultersworth, and then you see a young Andy Young,
Ambassador mayor Andy Young standing in overalls with the press
in front of them. That is at the age gas
and motel, and so these are things that I saw

(01:43:04):
as a as a child growing up, especially when the
ag gas and boys and girls clubs was down. Boys
Club was downtown Birmingham, near where the marches took place
and kids were attacked and people were holes. These are
all things that were triggered then in the nineties, still
as a child, doctor Richard Harrington formed and created the

(01:43:28):
Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, and so then you were transfixed
on understanding the movement from a museum turned institute standpoint
where you see Birmingham's powerful, powerful role in changing America
as well as laws that benefited black Americans. And so

(01:43:49):
as a child in the eighties and nineties, you saw
these things and there was a for me that was
an appreciation early enough to understand the world has always
watched Birmingham, and we reckoned our day differences on the
World station. See we got to tell we got to
figure this out for our city. And so I was,
I guess, indoctrinated at an early age about the importance

(01:44:12):
of Birmingham's history tied to American history.

Speaker 1 (01:44:18):
When you when you again prior to becoming mayor, you
chose middle school board.

Speaker 27 (01:44:27):
Why my mother is a retired educator, my stepmother is
a retired educator, my sister is a current educator, and
so around our kitchen table, education has always been a
part of the conversation.

Speaker 11 (01:44:40):
But I'll give you something more. I'll give you something
equally and more important than that.

Speaker 27 (01:44:44):
I am one of those naive, crazy people who believes
if you want to change the world, you want to
change people's outcomes, family's.

Speaker 11 (01:44:54):
Outcomes, black men outcomes.

Speaker 27 (01:44:57):
If you want to change poverty, if you want to
decreach part if you want to decrease crime, if you
want to increase opportunity, jobs, et cetera. It's all centered
around educating black kids. I believe that, and nobody can,
nobody will ever convince me education is not the best way.

Speaker 11 (01:45:17):
For all the things you want to see in your
community to get better.

Speaker 27 (01:45:20):
Running for the school board for me was it some
spring board or something to do as a checkof And
this is something I had a genuine interest in because
even as mayor community members called me the education mayor,
I'm still championing championing education in all type of programs
and funding because I believe any mayor in America, if

(01:45:42):
you want the best for your community. Even if you
don't control the school system, Like for me, I don't
control the school system, you still got to make educating
our next and youngest generation of priority for all the
desire you have for make the community better.

Speaker 1 (01:46:01):
The job of a mayor is not a five day
week job. And there are a lot of people who
learned that real quick. When was the first When was
the first time that it.

Speaker 20 (01:46:14):
Hit you that that was no such thing as a
weekend off, a day off.

Speaker 2 (01:46:21):
That The reality is your.

Speaker 1 (01:46:24):
Phone may ring, You may get text you may get
phone calls, you may get emails.

Speaker 2 (01:46:28):
Things will happen at any given moment, day or night.

Speaker 27 (01:46:32):
So I'm about four or five months into the job
I'm working. I'm sitting in my office with my economic
development director. He just came in to tell me some
amazing news about this this deal that we're closing on
that he's closed on my behalf.

Speaker 11 (01:46:48):
We're ready to sign Economic Opportunity is going to be transformational.
And I get a call from my chief of police
that a high school student had been shot in a school.

Speaker 27 (01:47:00):
Well, everything we were talking about the economic development deal
was kind of out the door, jumped in the truck,
drove to the school. The young person, the young girl, unfortunately,
en route to the hospital died. And when I realized
in that moment, anything can happen, the most tragic thing

(01:47:21):
can happen, and when that does, it literally pushes everything
else aside, and you have to deal with that, in
this case a tragedy. I made it to the hospital,
I interacted with their parents, and from there it was
just a long process of not just grief for that family,
not just grief for that high school, but for the community.

(01:47:42):
And you realize you can get a call at any
point of the day or night about a shooting or
a death. You can get a call anytime of night
about a natural disaster in the form of tornadoes, which
Burman's in Tornado.

Speaker 11 (01:47:56):
Alley, and so many other things.

Speaker 27 (01:47:59):
You know, well, you can have the best plans in
the world in wanting to be a mayor, and you
should have a team that only looks around the corner
and thinks about tomorrow and only sees the forest. But
a lot of this job you can get caught in
the trees, and it can unfortunately become a game of
whack them old, because things always pop up, even if
it's not tragic that you have to deal with.

Speaker 11 (01:48:21):
And I find myself. You know, I found this early
four or five months to the job. You know, it's
twenty five hours a day, eight days a week.

Speaker 1 (01:48:36):
With that, a lot of people think the mayor can
do everything to solve every problem. No, man, how do
you deal with that when you know there are things
that are out of your control, what your constituents are
expecting you to get things handled.

Speaker 27 (01:48:57):
It's probably one of the hardest parts of the job
managing expectations. And what I have found is as a
core value is transparency is so important, but so is
over communicating. I believe in not just communicating with over
communicating using every communication platform, social media, TV, radio, direct mail,

(01:49:19):
as mayor, town hall meetings, neighborhood meetings, city council meetings,
word of mouth, barbershops, it doesn't matter churches. In this job,
I have to find ways to level set expectations about
what I can and can't do. There are more needs

(01:49:39):
than there are tax dollars to solve for them. There
are things that I can't control because there's no home rule.
There are things that are literally not how about this
not my responsibility, But I have to partner with these
other organizations as well as over communicate to my citizens.
Here's what I can do, and here's how we can
assist you, even if I don't have the answer or

(01:50:01):
resign in my perfume. So it requires over communicating Rowland.
And I'm gonna tell you any mayor that unlocks that
door cracks the cold on how to communicate with the
people they represent and trying to manage those expectations as
realistic and as some of them unrealistic as they are,

(01:50:24):
they'll farewell because people will know that's not the responsibility.
Then you get other people saying it for you or hey,
that's the mayor doesn't wear a cape. The marriage is
not inside this house, inside that car. The mayor doesn't
control the school system, The mayor doesn't control the water works,
et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker 2 (01:50:48):
You have a really deep troubled history.

Speaker 20 (01:50:55):
Do you still face.

Speaker 1 (01:50:59):
Resistance people going ooh, Birmingham, Oh the South Ooh. I
don't know, because you and the previous black mayors have
had to battle what people call the new Birmingham to
revitalized Birmingham. Do you still grapple with Birmingham's history and

(01:51:21):
trying to get folks to understand that the present day
is not the same as.

Speaker 2 (01:51:26):
It used to be.

Speaker 11 (01:51:27):
I do, I do, And that's part of the motivation
of the book.

Speaker 27 (01:51:31):
Some of Birmingham is really about not just telling my
personal story, my journey, just about showing the current world. Birmingham, Alabama,
did not stop in nineteen sixty three. Know so many
people only know Birmingham from the Civil rights movement through
history books, and so in their mind, they don't have
a visual of how green Birmingham is, how beautiful it is,

(01:51:53):
how many trees it is, how it is tree city.
They don't know that we're a footy town. They don't
know that we are amidst our city.

Speaker 11 (01:52:00):
They don't know we're the we're one of the top,
we're one of the five Black and cities in America,
top five Black cities in America. They don't know these things.

Speaker 27 (01:52:08):
They don't know that it's a it's an urban core,
it's not rule. They don't know it's helly and not flat.

Speaker 11 (01:52:14):
And so as mayor, my job is to be a
cheerleader and an ambassador for the city and tell our story,
our modern day story.

Speaker 27 (01:52:24):
And that's what this book does a lot and not
only get it not only gives you the my personal
failures and you know losses. It talks about the triumph,
my personal triumph as well, but talks about Birmiham in
today's time as a mid size progressive city that is
not only open for business, but that is making moves

(01:52:46):
and policies that improve quality of life for anyone who
want to move to move here as well as those
who currently live here.

Speaker 1 (01:52:55):
I asked every book author this, uh and this will
serve as my final question for you, and that is,
as you were sitting down and thinking through and writing
and typing or researching and doing interviews and reflecting, what
was a wild moment for you? Was there something that

(01:53:15):
you remembered growing up? Was there something that struck you
that may even make you go wow, I forgot that
or that moment was crazy?

Speaker 2 (01:53:26):
What was it for you? For me?

Speaker 27 (01:53:29):
It was actually it's in the form of a tragedy.
My brother was killed May twenty seven, twenty twelve. The
book is written in order but for the exception of
writing about my brother. And what I did not realize
when I started writing and got deep into it was
I didn't realize how we're all emotion I still had,

(01:53:52):
and I hadn't fully processed or fully grieve or going
through all the grieving processes of acknowledging and or accepting
my brother's depth. I started writing the book in twenty
twenty three, and so what's that that's about eleven years later?
Eleven years later, I realized that not only do I

(01:54:13):
still miss my brother.

Speaker 11 (01:54:14):
I hadn't fully processed his death. I hadn't fully processed
that I still got his phone number in my phone,
and I remember our.

Speaker 27 (01:54:23):
Last conversation word. I hadn't processed all of that. So
it was definitely a wild moment, but it was an
emotionally triggering moment that since I've written about him, I've
actually gotten better because I can talk about it. I
wouldn't been able to be this vulnerable, honest with you
prior to writing the book. So writing and talking about

(01:54:44):
him was very actually therapeutic in the sense.

Speaker 20 (01:54:51):
Wow, that that is a powerful, powerful moment there.

Speaker 1 (01:54:55):
It is certainly introspective, very fresh, but also forward thinking.
I'll make this the last question, and that is, when
you are done serving as mayor, what do you want
people to know.

Speaker 20 (01:55:12):
About the city and how you made it better?

Speaker 2 (01:55:18):
Well?

Speaker 28 (01:55:18):
The first thing I want people to know is that Birmingham, Alabama,
is a progressive city where you can be successful and
have opportunity. Second thing I want them to know is
that we gave black kids an opportunity to take control
of their future, whether it's going to college for free
or going straight into the workforce and coming out with

(01:55:40):
the work opportunity. The third thing I want people to
know is something very, very very important. I broke through
the legacy of segregation.

Speaker 11 (01:55:52):
I'm now preside over a city that still has a
duplication of services two parks, two libraries, two recreation.

Speaker 27 (01:55:59):
Centers in one neighborhood because one was black and one
was white. But I have a population that's gone from
three hundred and forty thousand at the peak in the
late sixties early seventies to two hundred thousand today in
twenty twenty five. And so what I want people to
know is that we did the right thing in providing
services for our citizens, not at the cost of segregation,

(01:56:19):
but at the cost of efficient government that actually worked
for all of our citizens.

Speaker 1 (01:56:26):
All right, then, folks, the book is Son of Birmingham
Mayor Randall Wood find a memoir I appreciated.

Speaker 2 (01:56:36):
Good luck with the book and thanks.

Speaker 11 (01:56:37):
About always respect my big brother.

Speaker 2 (01:56:40):
I appreciate it, Yes, sir,

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