For Good Featuring Nekima Levy-Armstrong, Dr. Kem-Laurin Lubin, and Mishael White

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Welcome. I'm Erik Fleming, host of A Moment with Erik Fleming, the podcast of our time.

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I want to personally thank you for listening to the podcast.

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make this moment a movement.

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Thanks in advance for supporting the podcast of our time. I hope you enjoy this episode as well.

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The following program is hosted by the NBG Podcast Network.

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Welcome to another moment with Erik Fleming. I am your host,

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Erik Fleming, and we got a good show for you all today.

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As this episode drops, this is Martin Luther King Day, a day of service, not a day off, right?

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So hopefully as you are working on projects or in between working on a service

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project or attending a community breakfast or whatever your MLK activities are,

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that you're taking the time to enjoy this podcast,

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but that, you know, that you and your neighbors and your friends are doing something

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to help the community that you live in.

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That was one of the stipulations of creating a holiday was that it wasn't just

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another the day for us to shop or barbecue or whatever the case may be,

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but to actually honor the legacy of Dr.

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Martin Luther King Jr., the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,

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and to provide service to what he used to call the beloved community.

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So I hope that you are taking advantage of that and doing your part. Speaking about doing.

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Their part. The three guests that I have on today definitely qualify as people

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who get it and are doing their best.

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I was very fortunate to have a connection, a guest that is returning on the

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program to what's going on in Minnesota.

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So you'll get a first hand about the efforts that around the protests and, you know,

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some lowdown about what's going on in the state of Minnesota as it relates to

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responding to the ICE invasion.

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And then we're going to talk about AI and how it impacts us, Black folks.

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And then we're going to have another candidate on.

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This guy is running for a state legislative seat in the state of Georgia,

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and so you're going to get to hear his thoughts and why he's running,

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and he's going to make his pitch why people in his district should support him.

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So, again, like I said, this is going to be a good show. These are really,

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really good people, and I'm really, really blessed to have the connections with

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them to get them on to talk to you, the listener.

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We continue to ask for our support, not just listening, but also financial.

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So feel free to subscribe to the podcast.

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You can do that two ways. You can either do it through patreon.com slash a moment

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with Eric Fleming, or you can go to the website, www.momenteric.com.

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And you can also on the website, you know,

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catch up on some past episodes and learn a little bit about me and,

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you know, just what the mission of this particular podcast is.

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So if you would, go do that, but we're going to go ahead and get this show started.

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And as always, we kick it off with a moment of news with Grace G.

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Thank you.

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Thanks, Erik. The U.S. Attorney's Office in D.C.

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Has launched a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell

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regarding headquarters renovation costs and his testimony to Congress.

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Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the deployment of hundreds

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more federal officers to Minnesota following protests over the fatal shooting

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of Renee Nicole Good by an immigration agent.

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At least a dozen federal prosecutors have resigned in protest over the Trump

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administration's handling of the Renee Good shooting.

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Minnesota and Illinois have sued the Trump administration to halt the unconstitutional

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surge of federal immigration enforcement officers into their states.

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A Venezuelan man associated with a gang was charged with assaulting federal

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officers in Portland, Oregon, after he allegedly rammed his car into Border Patrol vehicles.

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The Trump administration is terminating temporary protected status for thousands

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of Somali nationals in the U.S., mandating their departure by March 17.

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Senator Mark Kelly filed a lawsuit against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth,

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claiming Pentagon efforts to demote his retired Navy rank violate his free speech rights.

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Tehran is keeping communication lines open with the U.S.

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As President Trump considers his response to Iran's violent crackdown on nationwide

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anti-government protests, in which over 2,600 people have died.

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A Justice Department prosecutor was fired by the Trump administration after

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refusing to lead the criminal case against former FBI Director James Comey.

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Law enforcement in Clay County, Mississippi arrested a suspect in the murder

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of six people, including a seven-year-old child.

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Federal authorities charged a Mississippi man with arson for allegedly burning

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a Jackson, Mississippi synagogue because of its religious identity.

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And Claudette Colvin, the civil rights pioneer who famously refused to give

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up her bus seat months before Rosa Parks, died at the age of 86.

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I am Grace G, and this has been a Moment of News.

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All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news.

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Now it's time for my guest, Nekima Levy Armstrong.

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Nekima Levy Armstrong is a civil rights attorney, activist and founder of the

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Racial Justice Network.

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Nekima is a former law professor and former president of the Minneapolis NAACP.

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And I've asked Nekima to come on because she's right there in ground zero dealing

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with the aftermath of the murder of Renee Good.

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And she's part of the coalition that is trying to hold people accountable.

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And so I reached out to her and asked her to kind of give us an update about

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what's going on, what the plans are and all that. And she agreed.

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So ladies and gentlemen, I have this distinct honor and privilege to have as

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a guest on this podcast, Nekima Levy Armstrong.

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All right. Nekima Levy Armstrong. How are you holding up, sister? You doing good?

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I'm definitely doing my best. You know, we have a lot in front of us,

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but in some ways we've been here before, you know, after George Floyd was killed

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and just all the activism before.

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So I'm activated and pacing myself because I know it's a marathon and not a sprint. Yeah.

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So my normal thing is to start off with a quote. So I want you to respond to this quote.

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Silence is not neutrality. Delay is not due process. And lies are not justice.

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Talk to me about that quote. That quote is perfectly fitting for the times that

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we are living in within our society as a whole,

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but also more specifically what we are dealing with here in the city of Minneapolis

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and the state of Minnesota, where we are facing the largest deployment of ICE

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agents in the history of the United States.

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And obviously the brutal killing of Renee Nicole Good at the hands of an ICE

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agent on January 7th of 2026.

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So let's deal with some updates now. Now, you've had two press conferences since

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then kind of give an update about where...

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Minneapolis is right now, the community, and how things have been going.

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I've seen that, you know, people have been out in the streets protesting and all that.

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And so just kind of give the listeners an update about what's going on in the community.

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Yes. So I first want to give some context to help people understand why we feel

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this is happening in Minnesota.

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As you all might recall, our governor, Tim Waltz, served as the running for

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Kamala Harris when she ran for president of the United States.

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Governor Walz called out MAGA, called out Donald Trump, called them weird,

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you know, and all kinds of things.

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And that actually has led to our state facing retaliation at the hands of the

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Trump administration. And that is part of why they sent ICE here.

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They also had round-the-clock media coverage of so-called Somali fraud.

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Now, there were some incidents that happened with a food giveaway program that

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was supposed to take place during COVID.

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And what our government found out or our state found out was that there were

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some people who defrauded the government, claiming there were some,

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you know, many of them were Somali, claiming they were operating these food sites.

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And so there have been several trials already, several people convicted as a

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result of that particular feeding our future scandal but the actual face of

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that whole program is a white woman amy bach.

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And you haven't seen Trump pointing out this is the face of fraud in America.

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It's a white woman. But the reality is, you know, without Amy Bach,

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none of this would have happened.

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And so instead, Donald Trump has levied consistent attacks against the Somali community.

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He already doesn't like Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

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They've sparred many times. She represents Minnesota in Congress.

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And so that gave him the perfect excuse to attack a segment of the population

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that has been here peacefully for many, many decades and is part of the fabric of Minnesota.

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And we're talking about the conduct of a very small number of people,

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but that has been used to justify bringing more ICE agents into Minnesota and

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Having even a YouTuber, Nick Shirley, come and basically bring forward propaganda

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and the media was going along with these false narratives.

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So as things escalated, that's how we got ICE agents here.

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And they actually even pressured Governor Walz to abandon his campaign for governor.

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He was going to run for a third term. But on Monday of last week,

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he announced that he was going to withdraw his campaign for governor.

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And then the next day, Kristi Noem showed up here and announced that they were

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going to deploy the largest number of ICE agents in history.

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Then the next day after that, Renee Good was brutally murdered by an ICE agent.

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So all of that history and context matters in terms of how we got here.

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It didn't happen in a vacuum.

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And it's very much a part of the vindictiveness and the retaliation and the

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propaganda being brought forth by the Trump administration.

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Now, I am a person who's worked on police accountability cases for a long time as an advocate.

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And typically, if there's a video that's released, if there's testimony from

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the community, what do we normally

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hear? wait until all the facts come out before you draw a conclusion.

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In this case, right after Nicole Goode was killed, we saw DHS Secretary Kristi

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Noem call her a domestic terrorist.

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We saw Donald Trump say that she tried to run over an ICE agent.

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We've seen Vice President J.D. Vance claim that the officer who did this acted

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in self-defense and has absolute immunity.

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I've never seen anything like that in my life where you have people running

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the country who already draw a conclusion without all the facts and the evidence,

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without looking at the law and whether it was violated by the ICE agent in this

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situation and without there being a formal investigation into what happened.

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So they've already told the nation, we have zero intention of holding this ICE

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agent accountable for brutally murdering Renee Nicole Good.

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So as a result of that, that evening, I actually worked with my comrades to

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put a press release together calling for an emergency press conference that

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would take place the next day, which was Thursday, January 8th.

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And what we asked for was for a locally led independent investigation into the killing of Renee Goode.

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Now, at the time that we put our press release out, we were under the impression

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that the FBI and the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, which is a state level

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criminal investigative agency,

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would be working collaboratively on a joint investigation.

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By the next morning, Thursday, January 8th, we awoke to news that the FBI had

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disinvited the BCA from participating in the investigation,

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saying that they would not share any evidence in the case and that they would

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be handling the investigation on their own.

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That made our press conference even more timely because we were already calling

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for a locally led investigation.

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It just reinforced why this is so important. And so during our press conference,

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what we did was to amplify an issue that would have been swept under the rug.

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Because once that news came out, the BCA basically threw up their hands and

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said, well, there's nothing we can do.

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The FBI won't let us in, so we can't investigate.

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And we said, absolutely not. We're not accepting that as an answer.

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So during our press conference, we laid out the law and the facts,

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educating the public and educating elected officials that under the law,

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they had the power to bring forward a local investigation.

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They also had the power to arrest the ICE agent who killed Renee Good,

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as well as to bring charges in the case.

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And so once we put that out there, we made that demand. That was one of our primary demands.

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We also demanded the release of the name of the ICE agent, which the Star Tribune,

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our state's largest newspaper, actually complied with and released the name of the ICE agent.

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We also asked for the release of any body camera footage or any other footage pertaining to the case.

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And a conservative news outlet actually released the cell phone video that the

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ICE agent, Jonathan Ross, had taken himself of the incident.

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So apparently he had a phone in one hand and a gun in the other,

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which I don't see how that wasn't a violation of departmental policies on top

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of all the other violations that happened.

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And so by that night, after our press conference, which was very powerful,

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very well attended by Minnesotans of different backgrounds, it helped to set the record straight.

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By that night, the governor did a cell phone video calling for a local independent investigation.

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By the next morning, the mayor and local legislators held a press conference

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calling for a local independent investigation.

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And by the afternoon, Attorney General Keith Ellison and County Attorney Mary

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Moriarty held a joint press conference saying that they would conduct an independent investigation.

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But in the midst of all of that, some of these elected officials were still

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begging the FBI to let the BCA back into their investigation.

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I personally feel that that's pandering to a corrupt agency that has no intentions

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of pursuing the truth or justice for Renee Good.

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And they need to use what they already have, which is several things.

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Videos of the incident, as well as several eyewitnesses who saw what happened.

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And from my perspective, Ken, make the case for probable cause to arrest Jonathan Ross.

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So that is where we are right now. We're also trying to get more answers from

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AG, Keith Ellison, and County Attorney Mary Moriarty regarding this local investigation

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they said they're going to do.

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Because the BCA put out a statement on January 9th saying, we're not going to

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conduct an investigation.

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They said, we'll collect evidence and we'll catalog it, but we're not going

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to do an investigation because the FBI shut us out.

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That's a problem because if they're not going to do the investigation, then who is?

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And what is the timeline for this happening?

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Are they trying to wait three years for Trump to get out of office if he even gets out in three years?

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That's unacceptable justice delayed is justice

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denied so we want to see a timeline

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and we want some specifics around this

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investigation to make sure that it's not just window dressing and that it's

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taken seriously and I personally believe they already have enough information

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to address to arrest Jonathan Ross imagine if you or I had done what he did

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they wouldn't have waited for an investigation to take us into custody.

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So why are they using a double standard in

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the case of a well-trained law enforcement officer with

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military experience and with border patrol experience who knew what he was doing

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and who engaged in the unjustified use of deadly force and allowing him to still

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be free almost a week after Renee Nicole Good was gunned down unnecessarily?

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Yeah, and one of the things I think was a big concern was the fact that,

00:20:57.619 --> 00:21:04.139
The BCA would not have access to the vehicle. They wouldn't have access to shell casings.

00:21:05.059 --> 00:21:09.759
You know, it's like if it was marked off anywhere, they wouldn't.

00:21:10.119 --> 00:21:13.999
The way they made it sound is that they wouldn't even have access to the crime

00:21:13.999 --> 00:21:19.039
scene because the FBI had pretty much kept them out of the pocket.

00:21:19.259 --> 00:21:23.139
So I think that was, you know, from from my background in law enforcement,

00:21:23.259 --> 00:21:25.599
that was kind of, I think, the issue with them.

00:21:25.599 --> 00:21:31.239
But I agree with you that with all of the video footage that's out there,

00:21:31.819 --> 00:21:37.739
especially the district attorney and the local police department can basically

00:21:37.739 --> 00:21:41.899
just go out to video and say, hey, look, you know, the county sheriff can say, hey, look,

00:21:42.559 --> 00:21:46.219
based on what we've seen on this video, we can we can push for an indictment,

00:21:46.579 --> 00:21:51.359
you know, and at least get that into the system.

00:21:51.359 --> 00:21:54.539
So, and I believe that's what y'all asking for.

00:21:54.919 --> 00:21:59.699
Now, Mr. Ross, I think you're being generous and saying he's well-trained just

00:21:59.699 --> 00:22:06.499
because he's had experience, but no well-trained officer will be holding a cell phone personally.

00:22:07.219 --> 00:22:10.299
You know, it was like, you know, if we didn't have body cameras,

00:22:10.599 --> 00:22:13.219
that was it. It was just you didn't have body cameras.

00:22:13.399 --> 00:22:17.459
It was, you know, so for us, you know, you couldn't use your cell phone.

00:22:17.459 --> 00:22:21.499
And then you had the cell phone in your dominant hand.

00:22:22.039 --> 00:22:27.419
And then before you decide to take action, you have to physically switch it,

00:22:27.779 --> 00:22:32.059
which all his video is the one, the one that he provided to this website.

00:22:32.845 --> 00:22:38.485
That video shows that he switched hands and then went for his weapon, right?

00:22:38.765 --> 00:22:42.185
And, you know, and said some things.

00:22:42.485 --> 00:22:47.785
Yeah, he had a verbal interaction, right? He had a verbal interaction with Renee

00:22:47.785 --> 00:22:52.605
Good's wife. So some people are raising the question of, you know,

00:22:52.685 --> 00:22:55.805
did her status as being LGBTQ play a role?

00:22:56.025 --> 00:23:00.265
Because the wife said to him, you know, go have lunch, big boy.

00:23:00.925 --> 00:23:03.925
And that was immediately before he decided

00:23:03.925 --> 00:23:06.685
to open fire and Renee Goods said I'm not mad at

00:23:06.685 --> 00:23:09.405
you and she's you know just trying to reverse her

00:23:09.405 --> 00:23:12.105
car slowly you know to get away from the

00:23:12.105 --> 00:23:14.825
scene and she was an American citizen but the

00:23:14.825 --> 00:23:18.125
reason I say that this person was well trained even if

00:23:18.125 --> 00:23:23.925
he didn't follow the training he has extensive military experience you know

00:23:23.925 --> 00:23:29.985
and also worked with the FBI as part of a joint task force and did border patrol

00:23:29.985 --> 00:23:34.905
in Texas and operated the machine gun during certain operations.

00:23:35.025 --> 00:23:39.305
So he had the requisite experience, whether he applied it in that circumstance

00:23:39.305 --> 00:23:41.265
or not, that's a different story.

00:23:41.565 --> 00:23:47.005
Now that's in contrast to some of these officers who might just be bounty hunters

00:23:47.005 --> 00:23:49.125
that they recruited for a paycheck,

00:23:49.125 --> 00:23:54.385
you know, to come out there and be deputized as an ICE agent, right?

00:23:54.545 --> 00:23:58.805
So that's why I think that distinction is important, that his experience meant

00:23:58.805 --> 00:24:00.005
he should have known better.

00:24:00.125 --> 00:24:03.845
He wasn't just a rookie in the field or some random person.

00:24:04.085 --> 00:24:09.965
So that is why I very much think that his experience is necessary and the fact

00:24:09.965 --> 00:24:15.865
that this was preventable based upon the experience that he already has in the field.

00:24:15.865 --> 00:24:21.465
Well, and there's a question about whether he should have even been out there

00:24:21.465 --> 00:24:25.745
considering that he had been injured like literally months before.

00:24:26.733 --> 00:24:30.293
Yes you know being in front of

00:24:30.293 --> 00:24:35.933
a car and trying to drag it yeah but right but he positioned himself in front

00:24:35.933 --> 00:24:40.773
of the car which just makes no sense and that somebody's backing out and I was

00:24:40.773 --> 00:24:45.973
I got into it with a guy that used to be a city councilman in Jackson he was

00:24:45.973 --> 00:24:47.133
a republic he's a republican.

00:24:47.653 --> 00:24:50.433
And he was you know trying to defend this

00:24:50.433 --> 00:24:53.113
guy and I said the guy that held on

00:24:53.113 --> 00:24:55.833
the scotty Scheffler's car I don't know you remember that the

00:24:55.833 --> 00:24:58.693
golfer that got stopped before he got in

00:24:58.693 --> 00:25:01.993
the tournament and got arrested yeah that officer had

00:25:01.993 --> 00:25:05.053
more damage he could not walk away when

00:25:05.053 --> 00:25:08.153
he got hit by Scheffler's car

00:25:08.153 --> 00:25:11.213
this guy was walking down the street telling folks

00:25:11.213 --> 00:25:14.093
to go and all this stuff and and the other

00:25:14.093 --> 00:25:17.233
question I had about this whole deal was why did

00:25:17.233 --> 00:25:20.753
y'all leave the scene you didn't render aid that's a

00:25:20.753 --> 00:25:24.253
requirement and and you and you and

00:25:24.253 --> 00:25:27.353
you left the scene you can't i have

00:25:27.353 --> 00:25:31.733
never been in a situation where gunfire

00:25:31.733 --> 00:25:34.533
has been even if you weren't the one that fired a gun if you

00:25:34.533 --> 00:25:37.953
were on the call you had to stay until

00:25:37.953 --> 00:25:40.833
one the emts got there

00:25:40.833 --> 00:25:43.993
and in two whether it's internal affairs your

00:25:43.993 --> 00:25:46.913
supervisor whoever somebody had to come and get

00:25:46.913 --> 00:25:50.173
a statement from you a verbal statement and then

00:25:50.173 --> 00:25:53.573
you had to go back to the office and do a written statement right

00:25:53.573 --> 00:25:56.393
yeah but they had to they had to you had to be

00:25:56.393 --> 00:26:01.653
on the scene until you are told that you could leave and they right what i saw

00:26:01.653 --> 00:26:07.493
in the video they all scattered he walked away looking down at his cell phone

00:26:07.493 --> 00:26:13.913
and said call 9-1-1 yeah that is absolutely absurd after he looked at her body.

00:26:14.093 --> 00:26:17.353
I mean, just the whole thing is a hot mess.

00:26:17.653 --> 00:26:21.733
And the fact that you would have the federal government, the president.

00:26:22.133 --> 00:26:25.773
The vice president, the DHS secretary.

00:26:26.616 --> 00:26:32.036
Rubber stamping a killing of an innocent civilian is absolutely outrageous.

00:26:32.056 --> 00:26:34.776
And people got to understand if it can happen to Renee Good,

00:26:34.836 --> 00:26:37.496
it can happen to anyone. This is a what's coming.

00:26:37.896 --> 00:26:42.916
The only person that acted like initially that had some sense was Tom Holman,

00:26:43.156 --> 00:26:46.216
of all people, and said, hey, before we say anything.

00:26:46.996 --> 00:26:50.016
Wait for the facts. Wait for the investigation. Exactly.

00:26:50.676 --> 00:26:56.716
And he was appalled, right, to hear J.D. Vance saying. And J.D. Vance is a lawyer.

00:26:57.076 --> 00:27:02.436
For him to say this officer has absolute immunity, he couldn't point to a single

00:27:02.436 --> 00:27:08.776
statute where that is written into law, literally making up stuff as the vice

00:27:08.776 --> 00:27:10.216
president of the United States.

00:27:10.556 --> 00:27:13.296
I feel that these should be impeachable offenses.

00:27:13.716 --> 00:27:19.136
At a minimum, Congress needs to take action in this situation.

00:27:19.656 --> 00:27:23.516
That's another thing we brought out during our press conference. Who's responsible?

00:27:23.956 --> 00:27:27.456
We know the Trump administration is responsible, but so is Congress.

00:27:27.856 --> 00:27:31.036
Congress is the one that authorized the creation of ICE.

00:27:31.536 --> 00:27:34.696
They're the ones that are supposed to have federal oversight of ICE,

00:27:34.736 --> 00:27:36.836
and they're the ones who fund ICE.

00:27:37.256 --> 00:27:43.156
And the Trump administration has asked for an additional $100 million around these operations.

00:27:43.156 --> 00:27:48.876
And so Congress is just silent, twiddling their thumbs as these attacks are

00:27:48.876 --> 00:27:52.956
being levied, not only against immigrants, but against American citizens.

00:27:53.296 --> 00:27:55.436
That is absolutely absurd.

00:27:55.956 --> 00:28:00.096
I don't I don't know how these people sleep at night allowing this to happen.

00:28:00.096 --> 00:28:06.576
It's just it's just so beyond the realm of normalcy and acceptability. Well, you know.

00:28:07.432 --> 00:28:14.312
I did a whole commentary on Mike Johnson and the fact that he is clearly the worst.

00:28:14.512 --> 00:28:19.252
If he's not the worst, he's definitely the weakest Speaker of the House we ever had.

00:28:19.392 --> 00:28:23.752
Because I said of all the Republicans in America that could look at Donald Trump

00:28:23.752 --> 00:28:27.992
and tell him no would be Mike Johnson because he's the Speaker of the House.

00:28:28.072 --> 00:28:29.212
If something happens to Mr.

00:28:29.312 --> 00:28:32.432
Trump or something happens to Mr. Vance, he's the president. that.

00:28:32.732 --> 00:28:35.232
So if there's any Republican that's going to say, hey, look,

00:28:35.372 --> 00:28:37.612
you can't do that, it would be him.

00:28:37.932 --> 00:28:41.332
But if he's not going to stand up for it, the rest of them are going to fall

00:28:41.332 --> 00:28:45.172
in line. But anyway, let me go through some of the other stuff.

00:28:45.932 --> 00:28:50.392
So I'm going to go through the list of some of the things you all asked for.

00:28:50.592 --> 00:28:54.432
It's like the termination of ICE agents' employment, complete withdrawal of

00:28:54.432 --> 00:28:56.332
ICE agents from the state of Minnesota,

00:28:56.792 --> 00:29:01.072
the establishment of a victim's compensation fund to provide immediate financial

00:29:01.072 --> 00:29:05.492
support, protection of journalists, independent media, legal observers,

00:29:05.912 --> 00:29:09.872
and peaceful protesters from intimidation, obstruction, and retaliation.

00:29:09.932 --> 00:29:12.772
By the way, how's Mr. Pendleton doing? Is he okay?

00:29:13.788 --> 00:29:19.748
He has a boot on his foot. And so for those who don't know, King Demetrius Pendleton

00:29:19.748 --> 00:29:24.468
is an independent journalist, African-American man who's been on the front lines

00:29:24.468 --> 00:29:28.688
for a long time, documenting our movement here in Minnesota.

00:29:29.128 --> 00:29:33.928
And he's been going out to the ICE protests documenting. And he has a vest that

00:29:33.928 --> 00:29:36.708
he wears that says press across the front.

00:29:37.028 --> 00:29:40.848
That didn't stop him from being tear gassed last week.

00:29:41.408 --> 00:29:45.228
He was captured in an image, you know, you know, having, you know,

00:29:45.348 --> 00:29:51.908
his face covered with water or milk as he's trying to stop the burning from the tear gas.

00:29:52.088 --> 00:29:55.888
That photo was in NBC News and The Washington Post.

00:29:56.228 --> 00:30:03.228
And then just a couple of days later, ICE agents started shooting at the ground near him.

00:30:03.328 --> 00:30:08.008
And he got shot in the foot with either a rubber bullet or a marker round.

00:30:08.268 --> 00:30:09.888
And so he's out of commission.

00:30:10.528 --> 00:30:15.288
He's still showing up somehow, but he has a boot on his foot for the next four

00:30:15.288 --> 00:30:17.748
to six weeks as a result of being attacked.

00:30:18.068 --> 00:30:24.508
And folks need to understand that the attacks against journalists aren't happening in a vacuum, right?

00:30:24.608 --> 00:30:28.608
They happened during the uprising after George Floyd was killed.

00:30:28.868 --> 00:30:32.668
We had journalists shot with rubber bullets, hit with tear gas.

00:30:32.668 --> 00:30:40.848
Some have had their eyes shot out, you know, as a result of officers discriminately

00:30:40.848 --> 00:30:44.208
using force against journalists.

00:30:44.688 --> 00:30:49.508
And so it is a problem that folks need to be aware of. We need an independent press.

00:30:49.668 --> 00:30:54.128
We need transparency when these things happen. But when you have a government

00:30:54.128 --> 00:30:58.248
that's hell-bent on lies and cover-ups and shielding the truth,

00:30:58.808 --> 00:31:03.968
of course they are going to allow for attacks against journalists instead of protection.

00:31:05.128 --> 00:31:13.708
So to bring it, to tie it in with George Floyd, this literally happened like,

00:31:14.842 --> 00:31:18.682
Half a mile, a few blocks away from when he was murdered.

00:31:19.122 --> 00:31:23.602
So tell me a little bit about that community. What is that community like?

00:31:23.762 --> 00:31:30.342
And, you know, and especially now within five years, you've had these two tragedies happen.

00:31:30.982 --> 00:31:34.882
Right. And these two tragedies are a part of several other tragedies.

00:31:35.022 --> 00:31:38.362
Remember, Philando Castile killed in 2016.

00:31:39.262 --> 00:31:45.462
2017, Justin Rusacek Damon, a white Australian national who lived in southwest

00:31:45.462 --> 00:31:50.582
Minneapolis, who was killed by a Minneapolis police officer who thought they

00:31:50.582 --> 00:31:52.402
were being ambushed and opened fire.

00:31:52.402 --> 00:32:00.162
So we've had a number of high-profile law enforcement killings in the state of Minnesota.

00:32:00.302 --> 00:32:05.882
And I think it's important for folks to understand that even though many hadn't

00:32:05.882 --> 00:32:09.882
heard about our community or thought about us until George Floyd,

00:32:10.202 --> 00:32:16.962
our movement for police accountability really began after Ferguson, Missouri in 2014.

00:32:17.282 --> 00:32:21.962
So we marched when Trayvon Martin was killed, but it still didn't lead to a movement.

00:32:22.402 --> 00:32:28.102
But after Mike Brown was killed, several of us went to Ferguson and participated

00:32:28.102 --> 00:32:29.442
in those demonstrations.

00:32:29.882 --> 00:32:35.042
And then we had the launch of our first Black Lives Matter chapter in November

00:32:35.042 --> 00:32:38.362
of 2014. I became their advisor during that time.

00:32:38.602 --> 00:32:45.162
And one of our first actions was in December of 2014 when we shut down the Mall

00:32:45.162 --> 00:32:47.602
of America, over 3,000 people.

00:32:47.882 --> 00:32:51.702
And then, you know, several of us were charged. I was charged with eight misdemeanors.

00:32:52.002 --> 00:32:57.422
As a result of all of that, the charges thankfully got dismissed because 11 of us were charged.

00:32:57.702 --> 00:33:02.102
It took almost a year. And literally the week before those charges,

00:33:02.442 --> 00:33:07.402
the week after those charges got dismissed, we had the killing of a young Black

00:33:07.402 --> 00:33:09.182
man by the name of Jamar Clark.

00:33:09.662 --> 00:33:13.242
That did make national news to some degree, but

00:33:13.519 --> 00:33:17.719
Because at the time I was the Minneapolis NAACP president,

00:33:17.719 --> 00:33:23.999
my involvement in the involvement of our chapter led to the national NAACP president

00:33:23.999 --> 00:33:29.839
coming here because we had launched an 18-day occupation outside of one of the

00:33:29.839 --> 00:33:32.499
police precincts in the Black community.

00:33:32.659 --> 00:33:38.759
And so that was unprecedented, right? And so some people knew about it and were

00:33:38.759 --> 00:33:41.779
paying attention, but they didn't really start paying attention until after

00:33:41.779 --> 00:33:44.819
Philando Castile was killed. in 2016.

00:33:45.279 --> 00:33:49.879
And so because our movement has been going on consistently and for so long,

00:33:49.919 --> 00:33:56.579
and because there are so many organizing groups here, whether it's, you know, BLM groups.

00:33:57.259 --> 00:34:02.099
Whether it's grassroots groups, immigrant rights groups, people have continued

00:34:02.099 --> 00:34:04.059
to organize throughout that time.

00:34:04.159 --> 00:34:08.599
And so even in this instance involving Renee Good, you know,

00:34:08.599 --> 00:34:14.119
there are various immigrant rights groups that set up training programs for

00:34:14.119 --> 00:34:18.699
average ordinary citizens who want to get involved in helping to monitor ICE activity.

00:34:18.919 --> 00:34:26.279
So every day people can go to a Facebook page or get alerts and they find out

00:34:26.279 --> 00:34:31.119
where ICE activity is happening and they show up and they show up with whistles

00:34:31.119 --> 00:34:33.899
so that if they see ICE in the community,

00:34:33.899 --> 00:34:39.199
they start blowing the whistle so that the immigrants in the community are on

00:34:39.199 --> 00:34:41.619
alert and they can get to safety.

00:34:41.839 --> 00:34:47.799
So that's part of what had been happening, you know, on the day that Renee Good was killed.

00:34:47.979 --> 00:34:52.819
Folks had shown up in the community knowing there was ice activity and some

00:34:52.819 --> 00:34:55.819
of them used their vehicles to kind of block ice.

00:34:56.019 --> 00:35:00.819
And so that's where how Renee Good was parked. And when she was approached,

00:35:00.979 --> 00:35:03.319
she tried to back away and leave the scene.

00:35:04.030 --> 00:35:08.110
You know, and again, she's an American citizen. She wasn't the target of ICE enforcement.

00:35:08.230 --> 00:35:15.150
She should have been allowed to leave the scene and not executed by Jonathan Ross in that situation.

00:35:15.570 --> 00:35:20.490
So I hope that that kind of gives people a context for our community,

00:35:20.690 --> 00:35:25.150
the fact that it is very rich in activism and organizing.

00:35:25.430 --> 00:35:30.350
But the vast majority of our demonstrations are peaceful and have been peaceful,

00:35:30.350 --> 00:35:32.370
but they are pretty consistent.

00:35:32.370 --> 00:35:36.350
So are you familiar with

00:35:36.350 --> 00:35:39.570
uh us uh 18 usc

00:35:39.570 --> 00:35:42.490
111 uh can you refresh my

00:35:42.490 --> 00:35:49.310
recollection yeah that you know I I it's I'm a former legislator too so I can't

00:35:49.310 --> 00:35:53.750
remember all the the codes that are well that but this is the one that all these

00:35:53.750 --> 00:35:58.630
ice agents blurt out if you see any videos and they showed somebody videotaped

00:35:58.630 --> 00:36:00.450
them, they'll blurt this out at them, right?

00:36:00.670 --> 00:36:03.850
And this is the code section that says assaulting, resisting,

00:36:03.850 --> 00:36:06.950
or impeding certain officers or employees.

00:36:07.150 --> 00:36:11.230
And it says, in general, whoever forcibly assaults, resists, opposes,

00:36:11.630 --> 00:36:17.110
impedes, intimidates, or interferes with any person designated while engaged

00:36:17.110 --> 00:36:22.710
in or on account of the performance of official duties or forcibly assaults

00:36:22.710 --> 00:36:23.870
or intimidates any person.

00:36:25.312 --> 00:36:29.092
Designated in the performance of official duties

00:36:29.092 --> 00:36:32.232
during such person's term of service shall

00:36:32.232 --> 00:36:35.472
where the acts of the violation of section constitute

00:36:35.472 --> 00:36:38.452
only simple assault be fined under this title

00:36:38.452 --> 00:36:41.532
or in prison not more than one year or both

00:36:41.532 --> 00:36:44.332
right and then it says in all other

00:36:44.332 --> 00:36:47.152
cases be fined under this title in prison not more than three

00:36:47.152 --> 00:36:51.432
years or both and then is it that's that's

00:36:51.432 --> 00:36:54.372
exactly my point it's like they they talk all

00:36:54.372 --> 00:36:57.772
this noise about oh 11 uh 11 18

00:36:57.772 --> 00:37:00.652
uh usc 111 you know they'll start yelling at people

00:37:00.652 --> 00:37:03.652
and it's like dude that's a misdemeanor so my question

00:37:03.652 --> 00:37:10.512
is one did Renee good violate that section based on the video accounts that

00:37:10.512 --> 00:37:17.612
you saw well from my perspective if she had violated the section then that should

00:37:17.612 --> 00:37:22.932
have been a citation they could have seen her license plate, written it down.

00:37:23.672 --> 00:37:28.252
And, you know, connected with whomever was going to enforce that statute,

00:37:28.252 --> 00:37:32.912
you know, and it could have been dealt with through the criminal justice process.

00:37:33.412 --> 00:37:40.592
We don't have the death penalty in Minnesota, but that's essentially the question to suspect it to.

00:37:40.892 --> 00:37:46.152
My follow-up was going to be, it's like, I've never known a misdemeanor to warrant a death penalty?

00:37:46.472 --> 00:37:52.732
Well, except in the case of George Floyd, because that alleged $20 counterfeit

00:37:52.732 --> 00:37:57.832
bill that he used in the store, that would have been a petty misdemeanor.

00:37:57.972 --> 00:38:00.332
But again, it resulted in the death penalty.

00:38:00.912 --> 00:38:05.892
So we got to look at how these laws are being applied.

00:38:06.412 --> 00:38:10.612
And the fact that for some people, it's not just a matter of paying a fine or

00:38:10.612 --> 00:38:13.992
appearing in court, It is a life or death situation.

00:38:15.031 --> 00:38:20.011
And typically, law enforcement exercises their power on the streets,

00:38:20.271 --> 00:38:25.651
you know, as opposed to it being exercised in a court of law like it is supposed to be.

00:38:25.651 --> 00:38:34.051
So the coalition that's been formed has publicly asked that people outside of the Minneapolis-St.

00:38:34.131 --> 00:38:39.311
Paul community should refrain from intervening, organizing, or traveling to

00:38:39.311 --> 00:38:44.251
the state unless explicitly invited by impacted communities and local leadership.

00:38:44.971 --> 00:38:50.131
Uncoordinated outside involvement, risk disruption, escalation, and harm.

00:38:50.131 --> 00:38:56.431
That makes sense to me, but it also conveys that the situation there is still pretty precarious.

00:38:56.591 --> 00:38:58.291
Is that your assessment on that?

00:38:58.731 --> 00:39:03.991
Well, we were very specific when we held, well, even in our press release,

00:39:04.291 --> 00:39:06.351
right? We did name at least one name.

00:39:06.671 --> 00:39:11.851
And then at our press conference, you know, when I spoke about this part of

00:39:11.851 --> 00:39:16.791
our press release, You know, I named Al Sharpton, Jamal Bryant,

00:39:16.971 --> 00:39:20.431
and Tamika Mallory, asking them to stay out of Minnesota.

00:39:21.011 --> 00:39:26.351
Now, since that time, we have been in communication with Reverend Al Sharpton

00:39:26.351 --> 00:39:28.951
about the concerns that we had.

00:39:29.371 --> 00:39:33.851
And they stemmed from, you know, early when, after George Floyd was killed,

00:39:33.971 --> 00:39:36.351
Reverend Sharpton came into the community.

00:39:36.351 --> 00:39:40.971
It was kind of like a helicopter situation. You know, Ben Crump brought him

00:39:40.971 --> 00:39:46.691
into the community, Attorney Ben Crump, and he, you know, eulogized George Floyd,

00:39:46.951 --> 00:39:51.571
eulogized Daunte Wright after they were murdered by police.

00:39:52.451 --> 00:39:56.571
And I believe even Amir Locke, if I remember correctly.

00:39:56.571 --> 00:40:02.471
And so there are concerns when you have people who have not been involved in

00:40:02.471 --> 00:40:08.891
the organizing here, just sort of helicoptering in and not always respecting local leadership.

00:40:09.847 --> 00:40:14.487
And so we just kind of let it slide when it happened in 2020 and 2021.

00:40:14.487 --> 00:40:18.507
We were still, in 2022, we were still cordial,

00:40:18.687 --> 00:40:22.407
you know, with Reverend Al Sharpton, even though we felt like,

00:40:22.567 --> 00:40:27.907
you know, it was kind of bypassing local leadership, people who still have to

00:40:27.907 --> 00:40:31.707
stay here and pick up the pieces after you fly into town,

00:40:31.987 --> 00:40:36.287
have meetings with whomever, whether we're involved or not, and then you leave.

00:40:36.927 --> 00:40:40.707
And so one of the things that happened in the interim, I don't know if you're

00:40:40.707 --> 00:40:43.287
aware of this, or I think we talked about this before.

00:40:43.467 --> 00:40:47.327
You know, I'm one of the three co-founders of the National Target Boycott,

00:40:47.727 --> 00:40:50.047
which we launched on February 1st.

00:40:50.547 --> 00:40:56.587
Target is a Minnesota-based company, and they made some specific promises after

00:40:56.587 --> 00:41:01.747
George Floyd was killed, and they looked like a leader, you know, on racial justice.

00:41:01.747 --> 00:41:06.727
And they got a lot of our attention, you know, in terms of patronizing them,

00:41:07.247 --> 00:41:08.847
seeing them as a leader in diversity.

00:41:08.907 --> 00:41:13.387
They pledged $2.1 billion after George Floyd was killed,

00:41:13.627 --> 00:41:18.627
saying that the funds would be used to improve the Black customer shopping experience,

00:41:18.827 --> 00:41:24.267
to get more Black brands on the shelves, and to improve their hiring and promotion

00:41:24.267 --> 00:41:31.167
practices when it comes to Black employees, as well as improving their supplier diversity network.

00:41:31.167 --> 00:41:34.487
We thought all of those were very laudable goals.

00:41:34.667 --> 00:41:39.947
But fast forward to January 2024, as Donald Trump takes office,

00:41:40.307 --> 00:41:43.987
immediately he starts attacking diversity, equity and inclusion.

00:41:44.267 --> 00:41:50.927
And almost immediately, Target capitulates to Donald Trump and puts out an announcement

00:41:50.927 --> 00:41:55.867
that very same week saying that they were rolling back diversity, equity and inclusion.

00:41:55.867 --> 00:42:00.327
So as Minnesota-based activists, and particularly around police accountability.

00:42:01.421 --> 00:42:08.101
We held a press conference calling for a nationwide boycott of Target that began on February 1st.

00:42:08.261 --> 00:42:10.481
It has been extremely successful.

00:42:10.741 --> 00:42:13.361
I've seen Target's stock prices drop.

00:42:13.701 --> 00:42:18.701
You've seen them have consecutive weeks of declining foot traffic,

00:42:18.941 --> 00:42:23.341
consecutive quarters of declining revenues.

00:42:23.341 --> 00:42:26.521
They had to uproot their CEO

00:42:26.521 --> 00:42:29.741
and they have a new one who's taking

00:42:29.741 --> 00:42:32.581
that position next month they placed the

00:42:32.581 --> 00:42:35.641
old one as the board chairman which I think is a mistake but

00:42:35.641 --> 00:42:39.221
the point is that the boycott has been extremely successful

00:42:39.221 --> 00:42:43.381
however in the midst of that the

00:42:43.381 --> 00:42:50.641
group that approached us consisted of Tamika Mallory Senator Nina Turner and

00:42:50.641 --> 00:42:56.321
so-called Pastor Jamal Bryant saying that they wanted to collaborate with us

00:42:56.321 --> 00:43:02.201
and help build a national coalition to amplify our efforts to hold Target accountable.

00:43:02.481 --> 00:43:07.081
But really, as we started working with them, we realized their agenda was actually

00:43:07.081 --> 00:43:09.761
to co-opt and hijack the boycott.

00:43:10.041 --> 00:43:14.661
In the midst of all that, suddenly you have Jamal Bryant, who's supposed to

00:43:14.661 --> 00:43:18.841
be following our lead for the indefinite nationwide boycott,

00:43:18.941 --> 00:43:23.341
boycott, suddenly launch a 40-day target fast aimed at the faith community.

00:43:23.601 --> 00:43:27.461
And I said to him, what's the difference between a fast and a boycott?

00:43:27.681 --> 00:43:31.441
I've never heard of this fast that you claim you're doing during Lent.

00:43:31.701 --> 00:43:36.341
And I said, and then what happens after the 40 days? Because as an organizer,

00:43:36.541 --> 00:43:38.261
you know it's a marathon and not a sprint.

00:43:38.381 --> 00:43:42.561
You're not going to get a company to give in to your demands after 40 days.

00:43:42.901 --> 00:43:46.941
And so he had set up a website. He used some of our demands,

00:43:47.101 --> 00:43:52.061
our talking points that we put out there and essentially crowned himself as

00:43:52.061 --> 00:43:55.281
the leader of the Target boycott, using CNN,

00:43:55.981 --> 00:43:58.341
The Breakfast Club, and Roland Martin to do it.

00:43:59.035 --> 00:44:05.275
And so from that point, we had to cut ties with them. I called them out for what they were doing.

00:44:05.455 --> 00:44:10.575
I just felt it was despicable that they lacked integrity and that it was disrespectful

00:44:10.575 --> 00:44:17.015
to people in Minnesota who had endured the killing of George Floyd and fought

00:44:17.015 --> 00:44:20.435
for justice and who were continuing to fight for justice.

00:44:20.595 --> 00:44:26.375
To have these big name folks, you know, from out of town, essentially trying

00:44:26.375 --> 00:44:30.995
to co-op the real and genuine movement work that we were doing.

00:44:31.275 --> 00:44:38.315
And so in the midst of all that, you then had a photo that was released of Reverend

00:44:38.315 --> 00:44:42.695
Al Sharpton posing with the CEO of Target.

00:44:43.606 --> 00:44:47.946
And he hadn't reached out to us or contacted us. And we're thinking,

00:44:48.046 --> 00:44:50.026
you have nothing to do with this Target boycott.

00:44:50.366 --> 00:44:55.766
Why would you be in a picture with this white man while we're sitting here trying

00:44:55.766 --> 00:44:57.306
to hold this company accountable?

00:44:57.786 --> 00:45:03.626
And so that had never gotten resolved. We just didn't understand why are these

00:45:03.626 --> 00:45:09.946
people from out of state with these big platforms who have so-called leadership

00:45:09.946 --> 00:45:11.246
ability and civil rights?

00:45:11.246 --> 00:45:14.426
Why are you coming in picking off

00:45:14.426 --> 00:45:17.906
what Minnesota is doing or tagging along

00:45:17.906 --> 00:45:21.666
to what we're doing here you know simply

00:45:21.666 --> 00:45:24.466
because you know people may not know us as well

00:45:24.466 --> 00:45:27.486
because so much of our work is concentrated here

00:45:27.486 --> 00:45:30.546
and so what happened after this whole

00:45:30.546 --> 00:45:34.186
thing and our press conference because we were the first in the country for

00:45:34.186 --> 00:45:40.626
black leaders to be leading on an ICE issue right and I felt that that must

00:45:40.626 --> 00:45:43.786
have opened the door for people to feel comfortable because suddenly we got

00:45:43.786 --> 00:45:47.706
word that Reverend Al Sharpton wanted to come to Minnesota.

00:45:48.406 --> 00:45:53.966
And when I found out about it, I said, absolutely not, along with the other

00:45:53.966 --> 00:45:58.706
co-founders of the Target boycott because of all that history and the fact that,

00:45:58.746 --> 00:46:02.286
you know, we were disrespected as local leaders.

00:46:02.546 --> 00:46:08.486
And so word got to, you know, Reverend Al Sharpton as a result of our press

00:46:08.486 --> 00:46:11.386
conference, press release messages, I guess, getting to him.

00:46:11.546 --> 00:46:16.186
And someone from his team actually reached out to me on Saturday night.

00:46:16.346 --> 00:46:21.546
And then I actually had a conversation with Reverend Al Sharpton and laid all this out.

00:46:21.646 --> 00:46:27.326
And he apologized, you know, during that conversation for what happened.

00:46:27.386 --> 00:46:35.126
And then he also said that he also got duped by Jamal Bryant because after Target

00:46:35.126 --> 00:46:38.226
CEO contacted him about meeting.

00:46:39.221 --> 00:46:42.781
He said, I won't meet without the organizers. So, of course,

00:46:42.881 --> 00:46:47.321
he went to Jamal Bryant as a fellow minister and someone who positioned himself.

00:46:47.481 --> 00:46:52.541
He went to him and he was also at that meeting, but he pretended that he wasn't.

00:46:52.621 --> 00:46:53.961
That's why he wasn't in the picture.

00:46:54.141 --> 00:46:56.481
So it caused a lot of confusion.

00:46:57.061 --> 00:47:02.741
And then later we even wrote to the leadership of the National Baptist Convention

00:47:02.741 --> 00:47:08.761
because we found out that they accepted $300,000 from Target in the midst of this boycott.

00:47:09.221 --> 00:47:15.881
And we laid out for them, look, Jamal Bryant is not the leader of this boycott. He has no integrity.

00:47:16.521 --> 00:47:19.941
This is how this boycott began. These are our intentions.

00:47:20.321 --> 00:47:23.741
And then we asked them to return the money. Although we knew they wouldn't,

00:47:23.801 --> 00:47:29.321
we still use it as an opportunity to call them to account and also to educate

00:47:29.321 --> 00:47:34.041
them about how Target has impacted this community in Minnesota.

00:47:34.041 --> 00:47:40.401
We said in addition to rolling back DEI, which then if they hadn't been held accountable,

00:47:40.681 --> 00:47:45.321
that would have given every country and every company in America permission

00:47:45.321 --> 00:47:51.081
to capitulate to Donald Trump because Target was seen as essentially a leader

00:47:51.081 --> 00:47:54.401
of corporate diversity.

00:47:55.261 --> 00:47:59.901
You know, and so we told them about that, but we also attached a Target's receipts

00:47:59.901 --> 00:48:03.901
brief where we laid out the fact that Target.

00:48:05.166 --> 00:48:10.386
Gave money to Amy Klobuchar's office. Amy Klobuchar is a congresswoman now.

00:48:10.546 --> 00:48:14.406
But before that, she was the county attorney for Hennepin County.

00:48:14.646 --> 00:48:17.386
And she ran a tough on crime campaign.

00:48:17.966 --> 00:48:22.326
Target gave her office money during that time, as well as the prosecutor after

00:48:22.326 --> 00:48:24.566
her. And they said, we want convictions.

00:48:24.886 --> 00:48:30.906
And there is a young Black man who, as a teenager, was wrongfully convicted.

00:48:30.906 --> 00:48:37.186
And two forensic analysts from Target testified at his trial with testimony

00:48:37.186 --> 00:48:39.006
that was damning but false.

00:48:39.286 --> 00:48:44.246
And this young man is still in prison to this day for murders he did not commit.

00:48:45.091 --> 00:48:49.791
And so that was what we laid out to say, and there are several other young Black

00:48:49.791 --> 00:48:55.431
men, some of whom we fought for their release from prison, who were wrongfully

00:48:55.431 --> 00:48:59.131
convicted under this whole regime, connected to Target,

00:48:59.671 --> 00:49:04.471
connected to Amy Klobuchar, and connected to the prosecutor after her, Mike Freeman.

00:49:04.471 --> 00:49:11.931
And so when you have these outside leaders who helicopter in or who misuse their

00:49:11.931 --> 00:49:18.591
power because they think they have a larger platform and their disrespect for the local organizers,

00:49:18.771 --> 00:49:22.291
at some point you have to put your foot down. So that's what I did.

00:49:22.431 --> 00:49:28.131
And that's what my comrades did. And that's what led to the conversation with Al Sharpton.

00:49:28.331 --> 00:49:35.271
And so on Sunday night, he had Ben Crump on his Politics Nation show on MS Now

00:49:35.271 --> 00:49:36.531
or whatever it's called.

00:49:36.751 --> 00:49:41.451
And he actually apologized to me and the other local activists in Minnesota.

00:49:41.451 --> 00:49:45.331
And so we are now in communication, you know, with his people because we've

00:49:45.331 --> 00:49:46.411
been able to clear the air.

00:49:46.571 --> 00:49:51.771
But as far as Jamal Bryant, Nina Turner and Tamika Mallory, they are not welcome

00:49:51.771 --> 00:49:52.811
in the state of Minnesota.

00:49:53.271 --> 00:50:00.571
Just if people understood the lack of integrity, the lies of manipulation,

00:50:00.571 --> 00:50:04.731
they would understand why we are joining a clear line in the sand.

00:50:06.131 --> 00:50:09.011
All what does it say? All skin folk and kin folk.

00:50:09.011 --> 00:50:14.851
Yes ma'am and i you know i girl you you didn't gave me a whole idea for a whole

00:50:14.851 --> 00:50:20.071
podcast about collaboration and all that stuff look collaboration with air quotes

00:50:20.071 --> 00:50:21.371
that's right that's right,

00:50:22.311 --> 00:50:26.511
going on here they wouldn't even be trying to know nothing about Minnesota as

00:50:26.511 --> 00:50:30.671
they say oh child let me tell you my story no I we ain't got time for all that

00:50:30.671 --> 00:50:33.391
but you know and I you know I've

00:50:33.391 --> 00:50:36.351
been one of those people that have been faithful, not going to Target.

00:50:37.571 --> 00:50:40.231
But I really...

00:50:40.699 --> 00:50:42.459
I really appreciate your candor

00:50:42.459 --> 00:50:46.019
and honesty on that, because I was kind of thinking a different thing.

00:50:46.199 --> 00:50:51.459
Like, yeah, I don't know if we want you all to come in and stir up some stuff,

00:50:51.639 --> 00:50:53.359
but it's like. Yeah, I mean, that either.

00:50:53.519 --> 00:50:57.259
But we're mostly talking about white supremacists, you know,

00:50:57.459 --> 00:51:01.259
Proud Boys, people who came in after George Floyd and wreaked havoc,

00:51:01.439 --> 00:51:03.499
shooting at people, putting signs.

00:51:03.499 --> 00:51:08.579
And so that we talked about that to outside agitators, but we also talked about

00:51:08.579 --> 00:51:13.679
so-called outside national leaders who typically have a completely different

00:51:13.679 --> 00:51:19.659
agenda and how they use their power and their influence and media connections, you know,

00:51:19.779 --> 00:51:22.899
to erase the local organizing that's happening here.

00:51:23.079 --> 00:51:26.799
So it's twofold in terms of what we were saying.

00:51:27.219 --> 00:51:30.179
Yeah, and I appreciate that. And I also appreciate the time.

00:51:30.299 --> 00:51:32.519
I've got a couple more questions and I'm gonna let you go.

00:51:33.499 --> 00:51:37.939
How do you respond to people who say that here we are expressing outrage over

00:51:37.939 --> 00:51:41.999
the death of a white woman, but nobody was talking about Keith Porter,

00:51:42.339 --> 00:51:46.839
a black man who was killed by an off-duty ICE agent on New Year's Eve in Los Angeles?

00:51:47.747 --> 00:51:51.847
Well, I would say there is a difference between when things happen in Minnesota

00:51:51.847 --> 00:51:54.187
and when they happen in other places.

00:51:54.447 --> 00:52:01.867
So if you because of our longstanding history of organizing and how many high

00:52:01.867 --> 00:52:06.947
profile and they became high profile because of the organizing and the pressure

00:52:06.947 --> 00:52:10.387
that we apply strategically when these things happen.

00:52:10.667 --> 00:52:14.427
In many other communities, something happens. People trust the government.

00:52:14.707 --> 00:52:18.227
They trust law enforcement. And they say, let the process play out.

00:52:18.387 --> 00:52:20.767
Well, we don't get down like that in the Twin Cities.

00:52:21.067 --> 00:52:25.847
We already know we got to do this. We got to do that. Even when George Floyd was killed.

00:52:26.047 --> 00:52:30.967
I don't know if you know the story of that, but I think we may have talked about

00:52:30.967 --> 00:52:36.407
it where an activist whose husband had been killed years prior by police was

00:52:36.407 --> 00:52:41.847
the one who tagged me and a few other activists to say a black man got killed today by MPD.

00:52:42.107 --> 00:52:45.907
They either choked him or crushed his throat. So when I saw that,

00:52:46.087 --> 00:52:48.927
I didn't just say, oh, it's Memorial Day. I'm taking a day off.

00:52:49.067 --> 00:52:50.047
No, I said, wait a minute.

00:52:50.347 --> 00:52:55.187
What happened? So I looked online to verify. I saw nothing.

00:52:55.467 --> 00:53:00.567
So my next step, I called the chief of police, Madeira Arredondo,

00:53:00.707 --> 00:53:02.467
who was our first black police chief.

00:53:02.667 --> 00:53:07.007
He answered the phone late at night. And I said, Rondo, it's like,

00:53:07.267 --> 00:53:09.787
can I ask you a question? Did MPD kill someone today?

00:53:10.694 --> 00:53:14.754
And he said, no, Ms. Nekima, they didn't kill anyone today. And I said, are you sure?

00:53:15.174 --> 00:53:19.694
And he said, well, somebody died in police custody as a result of a medical emergency.

00:53:20.334 --> 00:53:23.554
And I said, have you seen video of the incident? And he said,

00:53:23.654 --> 00:53:28.214
no, I just sent it to the BCA to investigate. And I said, you need to see some

00:53:28.214 --> 00:53:31.354
video immediately because this is what the community is saying.

00:53:31.534 --> 00:53:34.194
And I said, I'll call you back. I got up the phone with him.

00:53:34.294 --> 00:53:36.814
I went to social media to let the community know.

00:53:37.194 --> 00:53:40.454
This is what Ashley said happened. This is what the chief said happened.

00:53:40.694 --> 00:53:42.334
Now we need to see some video.

00:53:42.854 --> 00:53:47.334
Then I was tagged in that video by Darnella Frazier, that bystander video that

00:53:47.334 --> 00:53:48.314
captured what happened.

00:53:48.494 --> 00:53:55.134
So I shared that video after witnessing a murder and then I sent it to the chief and called him back.

00:53:55.822 --> 00:53:59.882
That's when he saw what really went on for the first time.

00:54:00.002 --> 00:54:05.082
And he actually documents this in his book that came out in May of 2025,

00:54:05.082 --> 00:54:10.782
talking about all of this, including my call to him, everything that happened afterwards.

00:54:11.542 --> 00:54:15.702
So imagine, you know, we're in any other community. People just say,

00:54:15.802 --> 00:54:19.222
oh, something happened and just let it ride and wait for this.

00:54:19.342 --> 00:54:23.842
The system will never proactively address something like this.

00:54:23.842 --> 00:54:28.122
They will never proactively investigate themselves or hold themselves accountable.

00:54:28.662 --> 00:54:34.682
So just like with Target, you know, people said, well, why didn't y'all go after Walmart or Amazon?

00:54:34.862 --> 00:54:37.822
Well, they're not based in Minnesota, but Target is.

00:54:38.042 --> 00:54:41.882
So we're not going to let a Minnesota-based company get away with this.

00:54:42.002 --> 00:54:47.762
The same with Renee Good being one of ours in our community and knowing we have

00:54:47.762 --> 00:54:53.382
the power to amplify this and to get in the streets, to hold elected officials accountable.

00:54:53.382 --> 00:54:58.462
I don't know how organized other communities are. So I can't speak to that.

00:54:58.742 --> 00:55:03.202
And we can't be expected to every time something happens everywhere else in

00:55:03.202 --> 00:55:08.762
another community to helicopter in and say, this is what you should do. if we're not invited in.

00:55:08.982 --> 00:55:13.662
The most we'd be able to do is post something on social media without really

00:55:13.662 --> 00:55:18.122
knowing if there's nothing organized by that community to let the world know.

00:55:18.502 --> 00:55:23.902
So I can't, so it has nothing to do with us that Renee Nicole Good is a white

00:55:23.902 --> 00:55:29.022
woman and everything to do with the fact that it happened here at Ground Zero

00:55:29.022 --> 00:55:35.702
where we don't allow stuff like that to just happen and there's no noise whatsoever.

00:55:35.702 --> 00:55:40.762
However, we are highly organized and we are effective and we are persistent

00:55:40.762 --> 00:55:45.602
like a dog with a bone till we start getting the responses that our community deserves.

00:55:46.659 --> 00:55:51.059
Laura Hernandez of Freedom for Immigrants said, make no mistake,

00:55:51.439 --> 00:55:53.819
ICE's terror is anything but rogue.

00:55:54.019 --> 00:55:59.439
The agency is operating exactly as intended and as it has for decades,

00:55:59.439 --> 00:56:03.919
only now with a record high level of resources and unfettered power.

00:56:03.919 --> 00:56:09.559
As we have witnessed across this sprawling yet secretive detention system for

00:56:09.559 --> 00:56:12.879
decades, ICE and DHS violence is calculated,

00:56:13.439 --> 00:56:17.999
systemic, and central to the agency's broader missions of instilling fear in

00:56:17.999 --> 00:56:21.779
communities and destroying families through detention, deportation,

00:56:21.939 --> 00:56:23.519
and increasingly death.

00:56:23.519 --> 00:56:29.579
Now, do you and the coalition agree with that assessment?

00:56:29.599 --> 00:56:34.399
And if so, how can we as Americans combat or counter that?

00:56:35.325 --> 00:56:38.825
I do agree with that assessment, but I think that one thing that's important

00:56:38.825 --> 00:56:44.325
to remember is the fact that you have Donald Trump in control of this country.

00:56:44.605 --> 00:56:50.825
And he has put people in positions of power who do not have integrity,

00:56:50.825 --> 00:56:54.325
but who have allegiance to Donald Trump and his agenda.

00:56:54.325 --> 00:57:01.845
So that is one of the things that makes the behavior of ICE different than what

00:57:01.845 --> 00:57:05.725
we know from the past way that they have operated.

00:57:06.105 --> 00:57:12.805
And the fact that Congress is not taking any action is another part of this whole equation.

00:57:13.125 --> 00:57:17.845
Again, Congress authorized the creation of ICE.

00:57:18.145 --> 00:57:22.805
They fund ICE. They're supposed to provide oversight of ICE.

00:57:22.805 --> 00:57:28.305
If Congress was balanced and effective in doing its job, we wouldn't even be here right now.

00:57:28.545 --> 00:57:34.205
They would have started raining in ICE and Donald Trump the moment that they invaded the first U.S.

00:57:34.285 --> 00:57:38.765
City and started also targeting Americans alongside of immigrants.

00:57:39.045 --> 00:57:44.745
But they didn't do that. They remained silent. And now things are way out of control.

00:57:45.125 --> 00:57:50.105
You know, with the violence, with them just being able to send thousands,

00:57:50.105 --> 00:57:55.645
you know, of ICE agents here, that we got more coming, even as we're talking right now.

00:57:56.125 --> 00:58:00.165
And so we have to get Congress to take action.

00:58:00.245 --> 00:58:05.345
We also will have an opportunity during the midterms to help shift the balance

00:58:05.345 --> 00:58:08.445
of power away from the Republican Party.

00:58:08.585 --> 00:58:10.565
And I hate to talk about it in

00:58:10.565 --> 00:58:16.965
partisan terms, but the reality is that the Republican Party is complicit.

00:58:17.816 --> 00:58:22.456
In the actions and the tyranny and the authoritarianism of the Trump administration.

00:58:22.876 --> 00:58:26.896
And in some ways, the Democratic Party is complicit through their silence.

00:58:27.456 --> 00:58:32.756
We should, every day, we should see something that a Democratic congressperson

00:58:32.756 --> 00:58:36.296
is doing to try to fight back against the Trump administration.

00:58:36.336 --> 00:58:41.036
Instead of coming before the public, crying or acting like they have no power,

00:58:41.116 --> 00:58:42.216
no one wants to hear that.

00:58:42.516 --> 00:58:46.136
You're collecting a paycheck, you're getting a pension, you have security and

00:58:46.136 --> 00:58:48.856
protection, and you want us to feel sorry for you?

00:58:49.376 --> 00:58:52.716
Absolutely not. Do your damn job or get out the way.

00:58:53.036 --> 00:58:58.616
So both parties are responsible for what's going on, but one party in particular

00:58:58.616 --> 00:59:06.416
is empowering and enabling the President of the United States to get away with abuse of power,

00:59:07.316 --> 00:59:11.436
physical abuse of American citizens and immigrants, tyranny,

00:59:11.956 --> 00:59:13.656
authoritarianism, and oppression.

00:59:13.656 --> 00:59:18.096
And they need to be held accountable for what they're doing, period.

00:59:18.896 --> 00:59:22.696
So I'm going to close out my questioning with this.

00:59:22.816 --> 00:59:28.696
And in the midst of all of this stuff, it might be the toughest question I've asked you today.

00:59:29.336 --> 00:59:33.216
Finish this sentence. I have hope because.

00:59:34.316 --> 00:59:40.916
Our ancestors went through far worse. somehow they found a way to organize,

00:59:41.436 --> 00:59:47.136
to fight back, to resist, and to plant the seeds for future generations.

00:59:47.256 --> 00:59:52.816
And that's how we're here. If they could endure hundreds of years of slavery

00:59:52.816 --> 00:59:58.696
and all the dehumanization, the brutality, the way that laws were weaponized

00:59:58.696 --> 01:00:00.356
against them, law enforcement,

01:00:00.976 --> 01:00:06.656
white men being deputized against them, separation of families trying to strip

01:00:06.656 --> 01:00:10.896
us of our language our culture and our heritage and we're still here.

01:00:11.766 --> 01:00:16.166
That's what gives me hope. And we have the same responsibility to future generations

01:00:16.166 --> 01:00:21.606
to stand up and fight back and resist and plant the seeds for hope and change.

01:00:21.986 --> 01:00:26.646
If people want to get involved, how can they get in touch with you?

01:00:26.946 --> 01:00:31.866
Or have y'all even got a name for the coalition or y'all just?

01:00:31.866 --> 01:00:34.866
No we're just ad hoc right

01:00:34.866 --> 01:00:37.946
when we need to all of us work together

01:00:37.946 --> 01:00:41.146
you know like because our movement never stops whether

01:00:41.146 --> 01:00:47.206
the net the nation is looking at us or not we're still doing the work so we

01:00:47.206 --> 01:00:53.246
have ad hoc you know coalitions that form based on what the issues are but the

01:00:53.246 --> 01:00:56.766
the best way to get a hold of me I would say is through Instagram at Nekima

01:00:56.766 --> 01:00:59.026
l you know I post there occasionally,

01:00:59.286 --> 01:01:03.186
but most of the people follow me on Facebook because that's where I might write

01:01:03.186 --> 01:01:10.106
a long post or give context or go live, you know, but Nekima L on Instagram works as well.

01:01:10.486 --> 01:01:14.246
Well, Nekima Levy Armstrong, thank you for taking the time to do this.

01:01:14.426 --> 01:01:19.226
I, you know, when this went down, I reached out to you right away because I

01:01:19.226 --> 01:01:25.106
wanted to, you know, and I'm very fortunate that somebody like you that is really

01:01:25.106 --> 01:01:28.106
active in the community and really has a heart for the community.

01:01:28.546 --> 01:01:30.466
That I was able to reach out to you.

01:01:30.646 --> 01:01:34.266
And I'm glad that you were able to take the time to do this. So thank you so much.

01:01:34.446 --> 01:01:39.186
I appreciate you and just keep sending the newsletters to me.

01:01:39.306 --> 01:01:40.746
I'm glad you got me on the mail list.

01:01:40.886 --> 01:01:43.946
So just keep keeping me informed and I'll let my people know what's happening.

01:01:44.814 --> 01:01:49.134
Thank you. I will. I have one coming tomorrow, so I'll send it out today,

01:01:49.154 --> 01:01:53.834
and I'll make sure that you get it for a press conference tomorrow for women

01:01:53.834 --> 01:01:57.174
and mothers to call for justice for Renee Good,

01:01:57.494 --> 01:01:59.994
because this was an act of violence against a woman.

01:02:00.394 --> 01:02:04.634
And then the way that women and expected mothers are being treated in ICE custody

01:02:04.634 --> 01:02:05.854
and law enforcement custody.

01:02:06.034 --> 01:02:08.854
So we'll be calling that out tomorrow during a press conference.

01:02:08.994 --> 01:02:09.894
I'll make sure you get it.

01:02:10.234 --> 01:02:16.254
All right, guys. Thank you so much. And we'll catch y'all on the other side. Thank you.

01:02:36.406 --> 01:02:42.806
All right, and we are back. And so now it is time for my next guest, Dr. Kem-Laurin Lubin.

01:02:43.886 --> 01:02:48.546
Kem Laurin Lubin's research focuses on computational rhetoric,

01:02:48.546 --> 01:02:53.906
which explores how technology influences communication and decision making.

01:02:54.726 --> 01:02:58.806
Kim examines the intersection of emerging technologies, human agency,

01:02:58.806 --> 01:03:03.946
and the societal impacts of artificial intelligence and data-driven systems,

01:03:03.946 --> 01:03:07.206
with a strong emphasis on ethics and equity.

01:03:07.606 --> 01:03:12.006
A key part of her work is the development of ethotic heuristics,

01:03:12.346 --> 01:03:17.786
a framework designed to ensure that technological systems respect human dignity

01:03:17.786 --> 01:03:23.286
and accurately represent and characterize the ethos part, peoples.

01:03:23.906 --> 01:03:28.466
Kim's professional background includes leadership roles in design and innovation

01:03:28.466 --> 01:03:32.686
at global corporations like BlackBerry, Siemens, and Autodesk,

01:03:32.826 --> 01:03:38.186
giving her a unique perspective that bridges academic research and real-world applications.

01:03:38.186 --> 01:03:42.806
Her book, Design Heuristics for Emerging Technologies,

01:03:43.486 --> 01:03:48.986
AI, Data, and Human-Centered Futures, Considerations for the Rights of Women,

01:03:49.186 --> 01:03:55.126
with UWP Books, explores how technology can be designed to empower individuals

01:03:55.126 --> 01:03:57.966
while addressing broader societal changes.

01:03:57.966 --> 01:04:02.086
With her blend of academic expertise and industrial experience.

01:04:02.786 --> 01:04:09.806
Kim is driving important conversations about ethical, human-centered approaches to technology.

01:04:10.166 --> 01:04:15.026
Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest

01:04:15.026 --> 01:04:19.226
on this podcast, Kem Laurin Lubin.

01:04:31.365 --> 01:04:34.725
Dr. Kem Laurin Lubin. How you doing?

01:04:35.425 --> 01:04:41.525
I'm doing good. How are you? I'm doing fine. I am very excited to have you on.

01:04:42.305 --> 01:04:47.645
As most of my listeners know, I tend to get most of my guests,

01:04:47.745 --> 01:04:50.265
if not all of them, are smarter than I am.

01:04:50.425 --> 01:04:56.185
And I think I can definitely say that about you because you delve into a world

01:04:56.185 --> 01:05:03.645
that very few of us really understand, but yet it's a part of our day-to-day lives.

01:05:04.205 --> 01:05:09.705
And that's dealing with AI. And so I'm going to ask you later on,

01:05:09.865 --> 01:05:16.045
as we get this interview started, why did you decide to go down that road?

01:05:16.225 --> 01:05:19.025
But before we do that, I kind of do a couple

01:05:19.025 --> 01:05:23.665
of icebreakers to kind of get the conversation going and so

01:05:23.665 --> 01:05:27.365
the first icebreaker I'd normally do is a quote so

01:05:27.365 --> 01:05:30.805
so I want you to respond to this quote the hottest

01:05:30.805 --> 01:05:34.125
the hottest places in hell are reserved

01:05:34.125 --> 01:05:37.105
for those who in times of great moral

01:05:37.105 --> 01:05:40.485
crisis maintain their neutrality what

01:05:40.485 --> 01:05:44.585
does that quote mean to you it really means to

01:05:44.585 --> 01:05:47.705
stand by and do nothing in critical moments

01:05:47.705 --> 01:05:53.965
that is for me personally as well the greatest crime of any that any human being

01:05:53.965 --> 01:05:59.045
can commit and I think it's so relevant to what's happening right now in this

01:05:59.045 --> 01:06:04.825
moment yeah that's what it means to me yeah I I agree with that.

01:06:05.285 --> 01:06:08.825
All right. So now the next one is called 20 questions.

01:06:09.625 --> 01:06:14.865
So I need you to give me a number between one and 20. 13.

01:06:15.465 --> 01:06:21.945
All right. Do you think there is such a thing as unbiased news or media and why?

01:06:23.155 --> 01:06:27.995
I do not think the news is unbiased. Interestingly enough, I taught a class

01:06:27.995 --> 01:06:30.335
last year around media sovereignty.

01:06:31.415 --> 01:06:36.035
And media right now is the new nuclear weapon, right?

01:06:36.235 --> 01:06:41.955
We all carry this mediation tool, the mobile phone, and media comes through that.

01:06:42.115 --> 01:06:49.175
And so it has been, I think, hijacked by those with political and power motives.

01:06:49.435 --> 01:06:53.835
And so given that it is operating an undergirded in that system,

01:06:53.835 --> 01:06:56.195
I don't think it is unbiased.

01:06:56.315 --> 01:06:59.655
And even for those who claim to, you know, just bring the news,

01:06:59.875 --> 01:07:03.255
and we'll talk about this, of course, my background is in rhetoric.

01:07:03.735 --> 01:07:10.095
We are all motivated. So it is, I think, impossible to have unbiased media. Yeah.

01:07:11.815 --> 01:07:17.315
What got you into artificial intelligence, AI?

01:07:18.175 --> 01:07:22.575
How did Dr. Kem Laurin Lubin

01:07:22.575 --> 01:07:28.395
decide this is the path I want to go and contribute to society about.

01:07:29.178 --> 01:07:35.918
Yeah, I didn't get into it. It got into me. So a little bit of my background,

01:07:35.918 --> 01:07:40.818
I think it's very important for me to frame where I came from and why I arrived at this point.

01:07:41.078 --> 01:07:48.498
So about 25 years ago, I took a course called The Metaphors of Computing, and it stayed with me.

01:07:48.718 --> 01:07:53.718
I was very interested as a Black woman back then. I wanted to write games.

01:07:53.918 --> 01:07:58.238
I wanted to write things like, how do you climb ladders in a game?

01:07:58.238 --> 01:07:59.318
You know, how do you do that?

01:07:59.378 --> 01:08:03.398
I wanted to be able to design the affordances to allow people to navigate in digital spaces.

01:08:03.878 --> 01:08:07.778
And as you can imagine, being somebody growing up in Canada from the Caribbean,

01:08:08.198 --> 01:08:09.958
that was a white boys game.

01:08:10.218 --> 01:08:15.078
Like I just couldn't get in no matter what I tried. And so I ended up just going

01:08:15.078 --> 01:08:19.518
on to do a master's degree and finishing that and thinking, OK, what can I do?

01:08:19.638 --> 01:08:22.638
And I was actually, I had the craziest story.

01:08:22.998 --> 01:08:25.198
This is not where I was supposed to end up.

01:08:25.856 --> 01:08:30.916
But I was with a friend, and she randomly applied for me a job in the U.S. in Princeton.

01:08:31.596 --> 01:08:36.656
And it was a German company that was looking for an opportunity to localize their software.

01:08:36.776 --> 01:08:42.096
And given that I had a background in language and rhetoric, I got the job out of 439 applicants.

01:08:42.636 --> 01:08:47.436
So here I am. I want to write games. I end up in research in Princeton.

01:08:48.156 --> 01:08:52.676
And that was design research. And so I stayed in that space.

01:08:52.676 --> 01:08:56.136
I will say, let's just go up to 2011, thereabouts.

01:08:56.656 --> 01:09:00.876
And I arrived at the space where I'm leading the top mobile phone company design

01:09:00.876 --> 01:09:03.536
research team in the world, BlackBerry.

01:09:03.956 --> 01:09:07.536
And a lot of this had to do with leaving the country and coming back,

01:09:07.636 --> 01:09:08.676
and suddenly I was a star.

01:09:09.096 --> 01:09:13.036
Nonetheless, I get into this space, and this is just really at the onset where

01:09:13.036 --> 01:09:18.796
we were making the BlackBerrys and also collecting massive amounts of data, right?

01:09:19.096 --> 01:09:23.596
And so that's sad. That sort of crystallized in that space.

01:09:23.916 --> 01:09:26.836
And from there, I went to another company. I will not say the name right here

01:09:26.836 --> 01:09:34.396
because this is where I think my whole thought process around human agency started coming into play.

01:09:34.596 --> 01:09:38.216
So this is around circa 2011. I'm working for this company.

01:09:38.556 --> 01:09:44.976
And around 2015, I led what was called then the first cloud migration from,

01:09:45.136 --> 01:09:46.176
and you can imagine this.

01:09:46.236 --> 01:09:51.236
I think you remember when you bought an application, you bought it on a CD. You inserted it, right?

01:09:51.816 --> 01:09:55.556
You installed it, and then you had it on your computer. So at the time that

01:09:55.556 --> 01:10:00.856
I was leading this massive modernization project as a design researcher at this

01:10:00.856 --> 01:10:02.736
top-notch company, American company.

01:10:03.701 --> 01:10:08.041
I began to notice something. So we had moved from the city to server spaces

01:10:08.041 --> 01:10:09.801
to actually operate our software.

01:10:10.441 --> 01:10:16.081
And this is where I think I woke up from that dream of working in tech,

01:10:16.081 --> 01:10:21.821
because a lot of what happens in that space in tech is that we send these tools

01:10:21.821 --> 01:10:26.681
to beta in what I want to call the global south, right? We send these tools.

01:10:27.081 --> 01:10:31.981
And what we do, and we do that, especially when we're going to having our data

01:10:31.981 --> 01:10:38.681
stored on servers, we were using, without consent, the data of individuals from

01:10:38.681 --> 01:10:41.521
the Global South to train our machines, right?

01:10:41.701 --> 01:10:46.361
So we call that, at the time, proceduralism. But as a design researcher,

01:10:46.401 --> 01:10:51.101
I was there on behalf of the user, the end user, to say, how does this particular

01:10:51.101 --> 01:10:53.081
thing that we're doing cause harm to the user?

01:10:53.401 --> 01:10:55.961
I was basically immediately honored.

01:10:56.661 --> 01:11:01.621
Don't talk about these things. We're getting the data that we need to train the machine. So...

01:11:02.405 --> 01:11:06.965
I, you know, when I finished my master's 20 years prior, I actually got into

01:11:06.965 --> 01:11:13.625
the PhD program and I wanted to, at that time, study rhetoric and agency in computer systems.

01:11:14.125 --> 01:11:20.745
But I ended up not doing that. Fast forward, here I am at the cusp of an industry where it mattered.

01:11:21.245 --> 01:11:24.425
I had gone on to have a family and that was sort of the delay.

01:11:24.645 --> 01:11:28.185
My kids were grown and I thought, let me go back to school and finish this.

01:11:28.185 --> 01:11:35.845
When I submitted my proposal for research, it was still around agency and the

01:11:35.845 --> 01:11:38.085
human role in that agency.

01:11:38.305 --> 01:11:42.985
And so naturally, it led into what was the lingo of the day for the thing I

01:11:42.985 --> 01:11:46.045
wanted to do. And that was six years ago, and it was AI.

01:11:46.625 --> 01:11:51.165
So I say all this to say that it was a degree that was delayed,

01:11:51.165 --> 01:11:57.685
but it was waiting just for the moment to talk about how human beings have lost our agency.

01:11:58.185 --> 01:12:02.925
When we interact with machines. In fact, the user interface now becomes this

01:12:02.925 --> 01:12:07.845
portal that takes in our information, your sex, were you a veteran,

01:12:08.225 --> 01:12:10.145
at your age, where do you live, right?

01:12:10.265 --> 01:12:13.725
It's this beautiful portal we just enter all this information about ourselves

01:12:13.725 --> 01:12:19.305
in, and it is now not even talking back to us because it knows us better than

01:12:19.305 --> 01:12:20.345
we know ourselves, right?

01:12:20.425 --> 01:12:25.045
And so that's where we are. And so my research is actually around just that,

01:12:25.805 --> 01:12:29.685
how artificial intelligence is being used to characterize us,

01:12:29.805 --> 01:12:31.165
to make decisions about us.

01:12:32.205 --> 01:12:36.845
So that was a long response, but it needed to be set to frame.

01:12:37.545 --> 01:12:41.685
So when I say that AI came to me, this came to me, I didn't come to it.

01:12:41.825 --> 01:12:44.965
It was just things that I had been looking at in 2020.

01:12:45.665 --> 01:12:49.605
And it just happened to be, you know, necessary and critical.

01:12:49.605 --> 01:12:53.925
You know when I started in 2017 2019 yeah yeah,

01:12:55.302 --> 01:13:03.142
So you're, you are part of a stable of authors that my good friend, Dr.

01:13:03.342 --> 01:13:09.742
Ayo. Sekai has with her publication company, Universal Write Publications.

01:13:10.802 --> 01:13:13.342
And you have written this book.

01:13:14.252 --> 01:13:19.172
Called Design Heuristics for Emerging Technologies.

01:13:19.632 --> 01:13:26.212
So talk to the listeners about the book and why did you feel compelled to write it?

01:13:26.492 --> 01:13:28.912
Yeah, compelled is a really good word.

01:13:30.012 --> 01:13:37.112
I think the compulsion came because I was working in a field and I think the

01:13:37.112 --> 01:13:41.812
everyday citizen does realize that when we talk about automation of everything

01:13:41.812 --> 01:13:44.092
we're doing from the check house to factories.

01:13:44.452 --> 01:13:47.872
Well, we have traditionally blue-collar workers who've been working in that

01:13:47.872 --> 01:13:52.412
space just being asked out of jobs. The same thing has happened in tech.

01:13:52.732 --> 01:13:57.752
We bring an expertise. And as a design researcher who was trained to really

01:13:57.752 --> 01:14:03.072
understand what some of the harms were that artificial intelligence was doing to the end user,

01:14:03.652 --> 01:14:08.232
I started thinking, what do we know as a tool in the design community that we

01:14:08.232 --> 01:14:11.272
use to design things? And that was heuristics.

01:14:11.952 --> 01:14:14.772
And heuristics are just really a rule of thumb.

01:14:15.472 --> 01:14:20.392
Things like allow users to recover from error and provide help in documentations.

01:14:20.932 --> 01:14:25.112
And that was a dated package of heuristics for the moment.

01:14:25.632 --> 01:14:28.792
So I deliberately wanted to

01:14:28.792 --> 01:14:32.392
root the research I was doing in design practice because I'm a designer.

01:14:32.692 --> 01:14:37.992
And so I wanted to use an artifact name that would be resonant for designers.

01:14:37.992 --> 01:14:42.792
So the whole idea of design heuristics, not for that technology that has gone,

01:14:43.052 --> 01:14:48.732
but for emerging technology, things like AI and what else? Just so many other things, right?

01:14:49.112 --> 01:14:54.172
So that was very critical in the naming of this book.

01:14:54.292 --> 01:14:59.332
I want it to appeal to designers as well as tech folks, as well as everybody

01:14:59.332 --> 01:15:01.172
else in the middle. Okay.

01:15:02.032 --> 01:15:07.792
We were talking and you had mentioned that, you know, I had Dr. Sekai on.

01:15:08.879 --> 01:15:17.359
To talk about linguistic imperialism and you said that you and her kind of been

01:15:17.359 --> 01:15:20.199
collaborating with the research and,

01:15:20.219 --> 01:15:26.139
and the scholarship you're doing with what she's doing with linguistic imperialism.

01:15:26.279 --> 01:15:28.419
Talk, talk about that relationship.

01:15:29.746 --> 01:15:35.026
Yeah, so Dr. Sakai and I were destined to meet. We actually ran into each other at a conference.

01:15:35.266 --> 01:15:39.526
We nearly fell over. And it was just one of these moments.

01:15:39.866 --> 01:15:43.466
She presented her work, I presented my work, and we left that there.

01:15:44.026 --> 01:15:49.526
But the work that she's doing, as I come to understand, and I say this because

01:15:49.526 --> 01:15:53.146
from a point of being very naive as somebody working in tech and not really

01:15:53.146 --> 01:15:58.246
understanding, when we think about technology, technology follows a pattern.

01:15:58.246 --> 01:16:01.446
It automates things that are from an analog world, right?

01:16:01.586 --> 01:16:05.446
So the work Dr. Sekai is doing around linguistic imperialism has to do a lot

01:16:05.446 --> 01:16:13.246
with the oppressive linguistic patterns that we see in what has been sort of Eurocentric thoughts,

01:16:13.966 --> 01:16:17.026
and knowledge production, right? And so that is her work.

01:16:17.426 --> 01:16:22.426
But for me, when I think about computing, my background is in artificial intelligence

01:16:22.426 --> 01:16:23.886
and computational rhetoric.

01:16:24.686 --> 01:16:28.766
I began to think about her work, And we talked about this a lot.

01:16:28.846 --> 01:16:29.646
And I said, you know what?

01:16:29.746 --> 01:16:33.466
The thing you're doing is the analog version of the thing I'm doing in tech

01:16:33.466 --> 01:16:38.106
is that when you look at ones and zeros, people just think, oh,

01:16:38.146 --> 01:16:39.326
this is computing language.

01:16:39.566 --> 01:16:43.746
But these are all proxies for other things, a linguistic underbelly,

01:16:43.866 --> 01:16:50.146
right? When I say a proxy for urban, I can say urban, but that can be computed.

01:16:50.486 --> 01:16:56.366
It's somebody with a postal code, with a specific name, the way they dress, and all of these things.

01:16:56.606 --> 01:17:02.026
And what artificial intelligence has done is compute us, to collect us,

01:17:02.126 --> 01:17:04.926
to mathematize us, to be able to tell the same story.

01:17:04.926 --> 01:17:08.446
And that in itself is a kind of language that

01:17:08.446 --> 01:17:11.286
ensures the continued oppression of

01:17:11.286 --> 01:17:17.846
brown and black people and of course you know the prioritizing of white bodies

01:17:17.846 --> 01:17:22.186
so i say we did the same thing because she's talking about the oppression in

01:17:22.186 --> 01:17:26.406
that language that analog space I'm talking about oppression in that digital

01:17:26.406 --> 01:17:30.926
space so they're definitely the parallels in in terms of our scholarship.

01:17:32.050 --> 01:17:37.110
Yeah. So I want to get back to the mathematizing of data.

01:17:37.270 --> 01:17:40.390
But I want to ask you this question before we get into that.

01:17:40.650 --> 01:17:47.110
You said the disconnect between personal potential and available opportunities

01:17:47.110 --> 01:17:50.950
is not just a personal failure, but a systemic one.

01:17:51.210 --> 01:17:54.210
Does AI exacerbate that disconnect?

01:17:55.402 --> 01:17:59.662
Absolutely. And I'll give you a very concrete example. So this is the example

01:17:59.662 --> 01:18:06.102
of Amazon. This is a very well-known example where the hiring AI system saw

01:18:06.102 --> 01:18:08.362
difference. It saw a difference.

01:18:08.522 --> 01:18:11.982
And the way it computed it is that you'll say, okay, I submitted my resume.

01:18:12.222 --> 01:18:15.582
I submitted my resume. It's been received. but today

01:18:15.582 --> 01:18:18.622
it is only 25% of resumes that

01:18:18.622 --> 01:18:22.102
actually get the eye of a human being 75% of

01:18:22.102 --> 01:18:25.522
that is done by artificial intelligence artificial intelligence can

01:18:25.522 --> 01:18:28.942
now do things like say you went to x school it

01:18:28.942 --> 01:18:32.242
can build a profile around you to say that over

01:18:32.242 --> 01:18:35.102
there is a black woman it could use and

01:18:35.102 --> 01:18:37.762
we call this proxy data right I could say oh you

01:18:37.762 --> 01:18:41.242
leave a chain and finch all you have to tell me is that intersection it also

01:18:41.242 --> 01:18:44.702
goes back to Crenshaw's work on intersectionality in a different way where we

01:18:44.702 --> 01:18:48.282
could say that intersection tells me the narrative of the people who live in

01:18:48.282 --> 01:18:53.422
that space right and so you shall not get the job you shall get the job or you

01:18:53.422 --> 01:18:55.162
shall get the job you shall not get the job

01:18:55.602 --> 01:19:01.562
that in itself is amplifying exhaust or can't even say the word right now but

01:19:01.562 --> 01:19:07.902
it's amplifying the known disparities and the material impact at an economic

01:19:07.902 --> 01:19:10.802
level that existed in real life, right?

01:19:11.082 --> 01:19:16.102
And so when you're able to compute that at scale, imagine the damage that could be done.

01:19:16.662 --> 01:19:21.082
One of the things I'm following in the US as well is the number of Black women out of work, right?

01:19:21.242 --> 01:19:24.302
There is another story that tells us AI is doing something,

01:19:24.442 --> 01:19:27.362
and that is the case of the American teen young woman

01:19:27.362 --> 01:19:31.122
who decided to change her sex on LinkedIn right

01:19:31.122 --> 01:19:33.942
all she did was change her picture I forgot what

01:19:33.942 --> 01:19:38.962
her name was and you saw the algorithms do something she was getting more offers

01:19:38.962 --> 01:19:44.562
I think it's like over 400 percent and then I say this to extend the narrative

01:19:44.562 --> 01:19:49.202
to say it also happened in other identity changes you had a white woman who

01:19:49.202 --> 01:19:51.862
went from Lucy to Luke Right?

01:19:52.282 --> 01:19:53.962
And she was getting all these offers.

01:19:54.880 --> 01:19:59.120
Compared with the black woman who went from black to white and the white woman

01:19:59.120 --> 01:20:05.840
who went from white to white male, there was parody there. There wasn't parody there.

01:20:06.320 --> 01:20:12.960
And AI is able to do that just by computing varying proxy pieces of information about a person.

01:20:13.220 --> 01:20:17.040
It is no surprise now when you apply for a job, you need to give so much information.

01:20:17.340 --> 01:20:21.100
And you just take for granted that I have uploaded my resume.

01:20:21.100 --> 01:20:26.380
Is also scanning your resume and using content from that to create a character

01:20:26.380 --> 01:20:27.720
of who it thinks you are, right?

01:20:27.880 --> 01:20:31.360
So it's crazy times.

01:20:35.460 --> 01:20:40.160
I love that summary. You just took this and said, it's crazy.

01:20:40.740 --> 01:20:46.140
You mentioned that AI characterization is often a mathematizing of human data.

01:20:46.240 --> 01:20:55.600
What are the biggest risks when we out sort the task of defining human identity to machines.

01:20:56.789 --> 01:21:02.209
So many, so many. I'll give you one example that just still sits with me from last year.

01:21:02.749 --> 01:21:06.429
And this has to do with the young man who took his life. I don't know.

01:21:06.589 --> 01:21:09.709
I'm not going to talk so much about that, but a young person who took their

01:21:09.709 --> 01:21:15.789
life because we had allowed artificial intelligence to absorb a specialization

01:21:15.789 --> 01:21:20.669
that should have been that of a clinician, a therapist, and what have you.

01:21:20.949 --> 01:21:24.949
And when you train these machines, you're not training them for a specific context.

01:21:24.949 --> 01:21:27.989
Say for example large language model like chat gpt or

01:21:27.989 --> 01:21:31.109
clode or grok or one of these things it

01:21:31.109 --> 01:21:34.789
is not tailored to the context of healthcare guidance for

01:21:34.789 --> 01:21:39.329
somebody in said context right and so that is what is missing in this case and

01:21:39.329 --> 01:21:45.809
here we have a material harm we have somebody who you know took their life because

01:21:45.809 --> 01:21:51.709
they were getting they were getting guidance from machine right that is a detrimental thing.

01:21:52.329 --> 01:21:56.469
There are just so many more. I could go even into the medical space as well.

01:21:56.589 --> 01:22:01.509
Now you have AI systems specifically in the US where the healthcare system is

01:22:01.509 --> 01:22:05.649
a little bit more privatized than it is here in Canada, where it can now compute

01:22:05.649 --> 01:22:10.769
you based on all of the proxy information to know you have more money.

01:22:10.949 --> 01:22:13.889
So therefore, you can get to the front of the line for care.

01:22:14.429 --> 01:22:17.589
You, we can compute it. You say, you know, you're marginalized.

01:22:18.089 --> 01:22:21.949
You perhaps do not have the money. So, you know, you're no longer priority.

01:22:22.209 --> 01:22:25.589
So all of these things are things that we need to consider.

01:22:25.749 --> 01:22:28.749
And one of the things, the last thing I want to say is that I think we need

01:22:28.749 --> 01:22:33.989
to figure out a way to curate the human impact stories of AI,

01:22:34.369 --> 01:22:40.549
not chat GPT, but the true stories about harm. I lost my job.

01:22:40.729 --> 01:22:43.829
I couldn't get the loan because AI is computing that.

01:22:44.049 --> 01:22:47.649
Perhaps my credit It isn't very good because this is my postal slash zip code.

01:22:47.869 --> 01:22:51.829
All of these things. And we need a curation of these stories,

01:22:51.849 --> 01:22:54.089
not just for our community, but for everyone.

01:22:55.259 --> 01:23:00.579
Yeah, that, you know, when you say that,

01:23:00.859 --> 01:23:09.239
you know, I'm thinking about terms like redlining and segregation,

01:23:09.239 --> 01:23:11.119
all those kind of things.

01:23:11.419 --> 01:23:16.019
And, you know, what I say to people all the time is that, you know,

01:23:16.079 --> 01:23:19.879
AI is going to take, you know, people say AI is going to take over and all that.

01:23:19.879 --> 01:23:27.039
And I said, only if we let it because the information that it has, we supply it.

01:23:27.819 --> 01:23:37.299
And so if we continue to program AI with our biases about things as well as

01:23:37.299 --> 01:23:42.719
our other information, it's only going to compute the way that we compute.

01:23:42.859 --> 01:23:49.479
Because before, we didn't need AI to move people to the front of the line, as you said.

01:23:49.879 --> 01:23:52.719
We as humans had that natural ability to discriminate.

01:23:53.219 --> 01:23:56.559
And so all AI is going to do is just do it faster.

01:24:00.899 --> 01:24:05.659
Exactly what I'm saying. That is exactly what I'm saying. And I think I said

01:24:05.659 --> 01:24:07.179
to you before we began that,

01:24:08.213 --> 01:24:12.193
Somewhere in the near future, the other thing you're going to see is AI,

01:24:12.193 --> 01:24:16.533
when you go to apply for a job, what kind of white are you, right?

01:24:16.673 --> 01:24:21.093
It's peeling back. It's peeling back the foundations of what constructed it

01:24:21.093 --> 01:24:23.833
in the first place in so many ways in real life.

01:24:23.973 --> 01:24:27.973
So they're like, we can't survive this, you know, this analogic solutioning

01:24:27.973 --> 01:24:31.993
by, you know, the marginalized classes. Let's take this shit online, right?

01:24:32.233 --> 01:24:34.453
And so that is exactly what is happening.

01:24:34.733 --> 01:24:39.673
Exactly what is happening. And it requires that every corner of the world is

01:24:39.673 --> 01:24:42.033
chattered so they could actually tag it, right?

01:24:42.753 --> 01:24:46.913
This is a postal code. This comes with X properties. And that is the work that

01:24:46.913 --> 01:24:50.933
I do to be able to say, look, this is happening. This is happening.

01:24:51.913 --> 01:24:57.833
Yeah. All right. Yes. How can your framework of ethotic, and I'm hoping I'm

01:24:57.833 --> 01:25:00.093
saying this right, ethotic heuristic heuristic.

01:25:00.859 --> 01:25:05.759
Help tech companies build more trustworthy and ethical AI system?

01:25:06.919 --> 01:25:10.939
That is, Erik, if they would love to do that, because I think a lot of tech

01:25:10.939 --> 01:25:13.499
companies, the mindset is let's get there first.

01:25:14.359 --> 01:25:17.539
I've seen this a lot being close up to research.

01:25:18.159 --> 01:25:23.599
There's a lot of deregulation. So a lot of these companies are existing in a wild, wild west space.

01:25:24.039 --> 01:25:28.559
So I have written my book specifically to address, because of course,

01:25:28.599 --> 01:25:31.659
I'm a researcher, the first part of the book is very scholarly

01:25:31.659 --> 01:25:34.979
so it's a lot of lit review of sort of the legacy who I've

01:25:34.979 --> 01:25:37.839
scaffolded my work on all the way to Spivak and

01:25:37.839 --> 01:25:44.779
it goes back back so the second part of my book my idea was that they're not

01:25:44.779 --> 01:25:48.479
going to do this work willingly so what you need to do is to create an auditing

01:25:48.479 --> 01:25:56.419
path to allow future regulators to say did your software follow the guidance of these things.

01:25:56.979 --> 01:26:00.839
And so the second part of my book is basically an audit. It is an audit.

01:26:00.999 --> 01:26:05.159
It looks at all of these spaces that AI is violating from privacy.

01:26:05.399 --> 01:26:10.339
When we think about things like the Hippocratic Oath, where you saw your doctor

01:26:10.339 --> 01:26:12.499
and it stayed between you and your doctor, right?

01:26:12.959 --> 01:26:19.239
Right now you have Amazon. Amazon now holds, I think, over 40% of American people's

01:26:19.239 --> 01:26:21.139
healthcare data, Amazon.

01:26:21.319 --> 01:26:24.019
This guy started out as a shoe salesman, right?

01:26:24.279 --> 01:26:27.879
Nothing wrong with shoe salesmen. But this is the path that we're on.

01:26:28.019 --> 01:26:29.599
We're violating these things.

01:26:29.899 --> 01:26:34.799
So my book, for example, there's a whole, and I call them categorical heuristics,

01:26:35.339 --> 01:26:38.239
and they fall into things like consent, right?

01:26:39.439 --> 01:26:43.619
Transparency. Does the person know what it is they're doing as they're talking back to this machine?

01:26:44.079 --> 01:26:48.379
So that is basically the tone of the book. It's a practitioner's book.

01:26:49.182 --> 01:26:53.582
Be able to say, check, check, check, check, check. Simple things like that.

01:26:54.182 --> 01:26:57.802
Another one I'll give you that is probably very relatable for the American audience

01:26:57.802 --> 01:26:59.302
is in the reversal of Roe v.

01:26:59.382 --> 01:27:04.442
Wade, there were companies who had fertility app companies, for example, right?

01:27:04.782 --> 01:27:09.102
That was collecting data on women that could tell whether or not they were pregnant or not.

01:27:09.242 --> 01:27:12.082
And I know specifically of cases where the new

01:27:12.082 --> 01:27:14.982
regime has sent folks out to knock on people's

01:27:14.982 --> 01:27:17.702
daughters to see if they're still pregnant when it turned out that the person

01:27:17.702 --> 01:27:20.742
was going through menopause but it misses the context

01:27:20.742 --> 01:27:23.962
so in a case like that when you talk about consent and privacy

01:27:23.962 --> 01:27:26.902
these fertility apps are now operating a

01:27:26.902 --> 01:27:30.042
crystal fascist society right now and

01:27:30.042 --> 01:27:32.822
so i need to be able to ask a customer go in and switch

01:27:32.822 --> 01:27:35.502
my data off so again when we

01:27:35.502 --> 01:27:38.522
talk about a thought heuristic there is a heuristic for that too

01:27:38.522 --> 01:27:41.362
right to be able to provide people the control they need

01:27:41.362 --> 01:27:44.482
to revoke their consent in any given technological

01:27:44.482 --> 01:27:47.282
uh situation yeah i'm glad you i'm

01:27:47.282 --> 01:27:50.402
glad you put that in because that was a question i was gonna ask you

01:27:50.402 --> 01:27:53.182
because that those apps you know the

01:27:53.182 --> 01:27:56.302
most popular ones is you know you were

01:27:56.302 --> 01:27:59.822
saying pregnant most popular ones is if when

01:27:59.822 --> 01:28:04.222
is your cycle when you're ovulating that's the one that a lot of women have

01:28:04.222 --> 01:28:10.662
downloaded i guess you need a reminder what i don't know but it just That's

01:28:10.662 --> 01:28:17.122
beyond my comprehension.

01:28:17.522 --> 01:28:23.042
But that's why that app is popular because it'll tell them when,

01:28:23.062 --> 01:28:26.302
you know, it'll calculate when their cycles come in and I guess,

01:28:26.482 --> 01:28:31.062
you know, if they were a partner or whatever, when they can try to have a baby and all that stuff.

01:28:31.262 --> 01:28:37.282
But that privacy risk is real because you're putting all that information out there.

01:28:37.742 --> 01:28:41.942
Yes. All right, so I'm going to try to get in a couple more questions.

01:28:42.900 --> 01:28:49.720
As the co-founder of Human Tech Futures, what was the primary problem you set

01:28:49.720 --> 01:28:55.140
out to solve that you felt wasn't being addressed by the tech consultants?

01:28:55.780 --> 01:29:01.500
Yeah, so my company, Human Tech Futures, has since sprawled to focus primarily

01:29:01.500 --> 01:29:04.580
on human futures, AI training, work.

01:29:04.840 --> 01:29:11.300
And I think there is a huge gap for literacy by the everyday person.

01:29:11.300 --> 01:29:16.100
And although I come from a space that is typically accused of being in an ivory

01:29:16.100 --> 01:29:17.920
tower, this is not who I am.

01:29:18.140 --> 01:29:22.980
And I thought, how do I mobilize the research that I do so that the brick and

01:29:22.980 --> 01:29:28.400
mortar business knows AI and understands, you know, how to operate in that world?

01:29:28.400 --> 01:29:34.300
That the person doing social work using AI power tools really understands,

01:29:34.340 --> 01:29:36.660
you know, what it is they're getting into.

01:29:36.980 --> 01:29:41.680
And so for my work, I think for Human Futures and, you know,

01:29:42.060 --> 01:29:44.360
other work that I do is about literacy.

01:29:44.840 --> 01:29:48.660
Where I come from, we have a saying, having, you know, been the descendants

01:29:48.660 --> 01:29:52.440
of Maroons, that each one teach one.

01:29:52.640 --> 01:29:57.100
I grew up with that on the back of every exercise school book that I had.

01:29:57.100 --> 01:30:03.260
And so I think that is the energy that I bring to that, is just teaching people

01:30:03.260 --> 01:30:07.480
and not keeping knowledge so esoteric and inaccessible to people.

01:30:08.000 --> 01:30:14.360
Yeah, and in the realm of teaching, you often facilitate workshops on the future of work.

01:30:14.540 --> 01:30:21.280
So what skills do you believe are the most AI proof for the next generation of professionals?

01:30:22.311 --> 01:30:25.551
I have two sons and I tell them, do not do anything on a computer.

01:30:25.971 --> 01:30:28.731
If you're doing it on a computer, it becomes proceduralized.

01:30:28.831 --> 01:30:30.711
That means they can copy what it is you're doing.

01:30:30.891 --> 01:30:34.691
So skills, I think, have to, let's go back to the village mentality.

01:30:34.971 --> 01:30:39.031
You know, I grew up in a village. I want to be in a place, I still live in a

01:30:39.031 --> 01:30:43.071
relatively small village, but while I know my butcher, where there's somebody

01:30:43.071 --> 01:30:47.231
making bread, you know, the candlestick make and all of that.

01:30:47.231 --> 01:30:51.111
So I think to some extent, we need to think about in the modern era,

01:30:51.111 --> 01:30:56.711
what does that mean going back to a village, right? So I think it's about building community.

01:30:56.931 --> 01:31:04.311
So that is what I would encourage is that we have so built a system on fiat money, on money, right?

01:31:04.731 --> 01:31:09.111
I don't know for certain that when we think about the future of work,

01:31:09.251 --> 01:31:12.911
we're thinking about the same thing that we're existing in today, right?

01:31:12.911 --> 01:31:20.171
So future-proof, online, offline community, and something that you can do with

01:31:20.171 --> 01:31:23.051
your body that is an impression of your soul.

01:31:23.871 --> 01:31:28.711
My son, I'm so happy he took a painting again. For me, that is the future of

01:31:28.711 --> 01:31:30.691
work, of going back to real things.

01:31:32.385 --> 01:31:36.085
Because one of the things I was thinking about was like trades, like welding.

01:31:37.005 --> 01:31:42.105
You mentioned painting, you know, sculpture as far as arts and all that.

01:31:42.225 --> 01:31:48.545
Because even though you can do the 3D printing now, but it's still this like,

01:31:48.725 --> 01:31:51.185
you know, things that can be creative,

01:31:51.985 --> 01:31:57.305
things that can, you know, like AI can't unclog my drain.

01:31:57.725 --> 01:32:00.945
Right. So that's what I was thinking about. Trades.

01:32:01.965 --> 01:32:06.785
You know I'm with that in that category yeah I'm with that I'm with that my

01:32:06.785 --> 01:32:11.925
son my 15 year old son he goes to high school and next Friday in fact there

01:32:11.925 --> 01:32:14.805
is a an after-school event on the trades,

01:32:15.445 --> 01:32:19.065
because they're trying to you know go to all the students to go towards that

01:32:19.065 --> 01:32:26.205
right so yes but yes I was just telling the co-worker last night if I could

01:32:26.205 --> 01:32:33.505
go back in time what would I do a little different and one of the things I told him was that.

01:32:34.482 --> 01:32:42.162
I would have done more as far as learning how to fix cars because my dad,

01:32:42.162 --> 01:32:46.342
my dad was good at that, but he would never teach me because it was like,

01:32:46.442 --> 01:32:48.222
Erik, I need you to do X, Y, and Z.

01:32:48.322 --> 01:32:51.862
He wanted me to be a surgeon, by the way. And then I ended up in politics.

01:32:52.082 --> 01:32:55.442
So that really threw all my dad and my mom for a loop.

01:32:55.602 --> 01:33:00.222
But, but he was always working on the cars that he had and I would just watch him.

01:33:00.622 --> 01:33:06.342
And so when I started buying my own cars and doing stuff and he called me, he said, what you doing?

01:33:06.482 --> 01:33:09.062
I said, you know, putting some new brakes on the car. He said,

01:33:09.142 --> 01:33:10.062
where'd you learn how to do that?

01:33:10.262 --> 01:33:13.922
I said, watching you. I said, you didn't teach me, but I watched you, you know?

01:33:14.682 --> 01:33:21.602
And so I always was fascinated with, you know, cars and combustion and transmissions

01:33:21.602 --> 01:33:22.642
and all that kind of stuff.

01:33:22.642 --> 01:33:31.082
So if I had to go back, I said I probably would have enrolled in a class to learn how to do that.

01:33:31.262 --> 01:33:39.162
So that way, you know, because my whole mantra is we have to be able to do stuff

01:33:39.162 --> 01:33:45.082
so that we can always take care of us or our families or whatever.

01:33:45.082 --> 01:33:50.482
And so I believe that we should all develop some kind of skill that,

01:33:50.762 --> 01:33:56.002
you know, because if times get hard, you could translate that into money.

01:33:56.002 --> 01:34:00.562
So you could you could do what you if you can't do what you set out to do right

01:34:00.562 --> 01:34:02.902
away. At least you've got something to fall back on.

01:34:03.182 --> 01:34:08.442
I also said I would have took baseball a lot more serious, especially the money given out now.

01:34:08.862 --> 01:34:14.102
But but yeah, yeah, I appreciate that. All right. A couple more. Don't worry.

01:34:14.762 --> 01:34:19.382
You argue that the humanities are essential for tech innovation.

01:34:19.742 --> 01:34:24.402
Why should an AI engineer care about ancient Greek rhetoric or storytelling?

01:34:25.480 --> 01:34:29.800
Yeah. So I'll be very, very brief with my response.

01:34:30.160 --> 01:34:34.000
A lot of the tech billionaires that you see out there, you know what they all have in common?

01:34:34.180 --> 01:34:40.580
Fantasy fiction stories, right? When you think about the brave new world or what's the other one?

01:34:41.600 --> 01:34:45.160
1984, all of these are stories that came out of the humanities.

01:34:45.160 --> 01:34:50.220
We pin the pictures for them to create, right? Using technology.

01:34:50.960 --> 01:34:54.980
So I think that humanities also provides an opportunity through storytelling

01:34:54.980 --> 01:34:57.700
to grow our empathy muscle.

01:34:58.600 --> 01:35:04.000
And I think that, for me, as a trait, a character trait, is something that is

01:35:04.000 --> 01:35:06.380
so critical in sustaining us, empathy, right?

01:35:06.580 --> 01:35:10.140
It also speaks to Crenshaw's whole idea of intersectionality.

01:35:10.140 --> 01:35:13.700
If you don't have empathy for each other, then you cannot be intersectional.

01:35:14.340 --> 01:35:17.560
But that, I don't think, can be learned in STEM.

01:35:17.560 --> 01:35:21.120
Now, I say all this to say, just in case anybody from my university is listening,

01:35:21.480 --> 01:35:26.700
one of the things that is very unique to my university is that everyone in STEM,

01:35:27.340 --> 01:35:30.040
they have to take like things, well, engineers, etc.

01:35:30.120 --> 01:35:35.240
They have to take ethics and they have to take courses in the humanities.

01:35:35.540 --> 01:35:38.760
It's mandatory, right? and so

01:35:38.760 --> 01:35:43.540
I had the pleasure of actually teaching courses where it was just all electrical

01:35:43.540 --> 01:35:48.720
engineers or all software engineers and you could have conversation and exchange

01:35:48.720 --> 01:35:53.980
of information and learning to know that when you've been commissioned by your

01:35:53.980 --> 01:35:56.160
company to build X solution,

01:35:56.540 --> 01:35:59.380
have you considered the harm to human beings?

01:35:59.780 --> 01:36:04.220
When they don't have that humanities training, most of them just go on and they

01:36:04.220 --> 01:36:09.820
do it without thinking about the moral side of what it is they're doing.

01:36:10.180 --> 01:36:13.900
Engineers just want to solve problems. They don't often think about the morality.

01:36:14.220 --> 01:36:20.340
And for me, that is a keystone that is situated in the humanities, nowhere else.

01:36:21.475 --> 01:36:27.235
Yeah. And that's, you know, I'm glad you brought that up about your particular

01:36:27.235 --> 01:36:30.235
university because all liberal arts schools,

01:36:30.575 --> 01:36:34.795
everybody says, well, you know, there's a big debate, especially here in the

01:36:34.795 --> 01:36:37.375
United States, about education. Right.

01:36:38.015 --> 01:36:42.015
And, you know, I'd mentioned about the trades and learning a trade and all that.

01:36:42.015 --> 01:36:46.515
So you can go to school and just do that, right?

01:36:46.635 --> 01:36:50.495
You can go to school and just be a computer programmer or, you know,

01:36:50.595 --> 01:36:52.555
software or mechanical engineer.

01:36:52.755 --> 01:37:00.035
You can go to school specifically for that, but you miss out on the total liberal arts experience.

01:37:00.035 --> 01:37:03.615
And that and the whole concept you

01:37:03.615 --> 01:37:06.555
know even you know the oldest school in the united states is

01:37:06.555 --> 01:37:09.475
Harvard and and then you know broke off from

01:37:09.475 --> 01:37:15.355
there but it was like even though you went to Harvard and you became a blacksmith

01:37:15.355 --> 01:37:24.435
right you had all this education so you understood you know about the arts and

01:37:24.435 --> 01:37:26.595
you understood about law and all that stuff.

01:37:26.795 --> 01:37:35.875
So you could apply all that to just the trade or the guild that you were a part of, right?

01:37:36.535 --> 01:37:44.095
And that leads to what you do contributing to society as opposed to just doing

01:37:44.095 --> 01:37:46.075
something to do something.

01:37:46.715 --> 01:37:52.215
And a lot of people, even with Right.

01:37:53.135 --> 01:38:00.535
You know, I consider my life path, even though I just mentioned there were some things I would change,

01:38:00.855 --> 01:38:07.015
but I consider my life path my greatest advantage in politics because I did

01:38:07.015 --> 01:38:11.435
all these different things in life when it came to issues.

01:38:12.536 --> 01:38:19.056
About, you know, X, Y, and Z, I was somewhat more articulate than my colleagues

01:38:19.056 --> 01:38:23.436
because they were dealing with it just from a law or policy,

01:38:23.456 --> 01:38:26.436
but I was dealing with it from an actual experience, right?

01:38:26.996 --> 01:38:31.296
Empathy too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because you, if you do something,

01:38:31.576 --> 01:38:36.416
you naturally have something empathic with, you have connection with it.

01:38:37.176 --> 01:38:41.516
You know, it's one thing because it was like when it came to hunting bills,

01:38:41.676 --> 01:38:43.796
for example, I never hunted.

01:38:44.036 --> 01:38:48.816
So I had to rely on my colleagues that did that to say, should we be voting

01:38:48.816 --> 01:38:50.316
for that? Should we not vote for that?

01:38:50.756 --> 01:38:56.116
You know, on the other hand, like if we wanted to talk about privacy issues

01:38:56.116 --> 01:38:58.216
with the press, well, I used to be a reporter.

01:38:58.596 --> 01:39:03.336
So I was able to give guidance and say, okay, these are the things that we need

01:39:03.336 --> 01:39:05.656
to go into. These are the things we need to leave alone.

01:39:06.036 --> 01:39:09.336
So I think it's very important for

01:39:09.336 --> 01:39:11.996
people regardless of what they do to

01:39:11.996 --> 01:39:15.056
be well-rounded and especially when we're

01:39:15.056 --> 01:39:20.936
dealing with this tech stuff so final question as far as the subject matter

01:39:20.936 --> 01:39:28.976
goes is how do we bridge the gap between first world design thinking and the

01:39:28.976 --> 01:39:33.196
social economic realities of the global south Oh boy.

01:39:34.756 --> 01:39:41.976
Take your time on this We're good Yeah That's a very big question Yeah.

01:39:43.224 --> 01:39:49.164
In 2024, I co-founded AI Global South Summit. It was meant to be a roving summit.

01:39:49.804 --> 01:39:54.164
And it actually goes to the heart of your question.

01:39:54.804 --> 01:39:59.684
The year prior to that, I was on a panel at MIT on AI.

01:40:00.444 --> 01:40:06.824
And I left feeling so gutted because in the networking sessions,

01:40:07.324 --> 01:40:11.004
everybody was talking about things like, how many millions did you get?

01:40:11.004 --> 01:40:16.084
And the apps were so, it was just another app, an app that did this and that.

01:40:16.224 --> 01:40:21.624
And I thought, my God, you know, like this is not what I expected at that particular summit.

01:40:22.344 --> 01:40:27.444
And so on the panel, I made a point about, you know, AI hallucinating.

01:40:27.584 --> 01:40:28.944
I forgot what the context was.

01:40:29.184 --> 01:40:34.924
But the point was that I had been looking for something in one of these AI, Gen AI tools.

01:40:35.204 --> 01:40:39.744
I wanted it to create for me a scenery of a Creole setting.

01:40:40.444 --> 01:40:46.304
And so I am Antillian Creole, Antillian French Creole, and I know that it's Louisiana Creole.

01:40:46.784 --> 01:40:51.164
So it went through this, I'm waiting for it to render, and it is this Antillian,

01:40:51.164 --> 01:40:55.104
sorry, Louisiana Creole place with the, it looked like it was in New Orleans,

01:40:55.224 --> 01:40:57.144
and I'm like, that's not what I wanted, right?

01:40:57.564 --> 01:41:01.704
It was really in that moment that I was on stage, and it struck me,

01:41:01.784 --> 01:41:05.904
and I thought, these machines don't even know us, right? And so...

01:41:07.720 --> 01:41:10.700
Think we need to reconcile there's some reconciliation that is

01:41:10.700 --> 01:41:13.740
needed if we are to proceed in

01:41:13.740 --> 01:41:20.000
this world with technology as a driver to understand that the world is not only

01:41:20.000 --> 01:41:25.020
the global north and this actually manifests in so many stories enjoy bullion

01:41:25.020 --> 01:41:31.040
winnie's case about coded bias in recognizing that a facial recognition system

01:41:31.040 --> 01:41:32.980
didn't recognize as a human being,

01:41:33.540 --> 01:41:38.540
because she had African phenotypical features and her skin was very dark, right?

01:41:38.920 --> 01:41:43.160
And so I think all of the conversations we're having, Dr.

01:41:43.300 --> 01:41:48.680
Sakai, Ruha Benjamin, Safia Noble, Joy Bouliamwini, Simone Brown,

01:41:49.040 --> 01:41:54.700
all of these folks are having the same conversation in our own little faculty intersection.

01:41:55.060 --> 01:41:59.580
We're noticing something is wrong. And one of the things I will say,

01:41:59.700 --> 01:42:03.560
I went in as a designer, and this goes back to your question about the global cloud.

01:42:03.780 --> 01:42:08.560
I went into my studies as a design researcher, computational design,

01:42:08.780 --> 01:42:13.860
and I have said this many times, I emerged a post-colonial scholar.

01:42:14.540 --> 01:42:19.660
Because when you go through that journey, you realize everything that is being

01:42:19.660 --> 01:42:24.440
digitized is the same old colonialism, imperialism, white supremacy,

01:42:24.780 --> 01:42:28.280
whiteness, prioritization, and all of that. It is just being coded.

01:42:28.580 --> 01:42:34.260
It's just being coded, right? And so my research, looking at how this characterizes

01:42:34.260 --> 01:42:40.700
us, we see the big delta between what you're doing to global north faces versus

01:42:40.700 --> 01:42:42.720
what you're doing to global south faces.

01:42:43.160 --> 01:42:47.060
So the conversation we need to have, and I say we.

01:42:48.357 --> 01:42:51.717
Hit you to put this on the burden of our foundational Black American brothers

01:42:51.717 --> 01:42:55.197
and sisters, but they're closest to this than any of us.

01:42:55.297 --> 01:42:59.157
And we need to not only advocate the things on the ground, but things in digital

01:42:59.157 --> 01:43:06.657
spaces as a collective, because we are being digitized in the same old Jim Crow code.

01:43:06.777 --> 01:43:08.477
That is exactly what's happening.

01:43:08.737 --> 01:43:12.917
So the reconciliation to get to answering this question in a roundabout way

01:43:12.917 --> 01:43:17.737
is that technology that exists today was not built for us.

01:43:18.557 --> 01:43:22.217
We are still the same slaves in that technological system.

01:43:22.877 --> 01:43:26.197
It still grades us the same way, characterizes us the same way,

01:43:26.337 --> 01:43:29.357
and makes decisions based on that in the same way.

01:43:29.917 --> 01:43:34.937
And so perhaps our sister, Ruha Benjamin, would say, burn everything down.

01:43:35.357 --> 01:43:40.037
I don't know that that is necessary or critical. But I think the awareness that

01:43:40.037 --> 01:43:44.817
there is that delta between technology and how there is a big divide,

01:43:44.817 --> 01:43:48.617
a big divide between the global north and the global south is the first step.

01:43:48.677 --> 01:43:50.957
And then we can figure out what we need to do from there.

01:43:51.097 --> 01:43:58.517
But I think until it sees us as equals, we need to keep interrogating that system until then.

01:43:59.357 --> 01:44:03.357
It's a lot. It's a lot. And I don't have the scholarship and the breadth of

01:44:03.357 --> 01:44:06.937
scholarship to talk about everything and say, you know, this is my research.

01:44:07.077 --> 01:44:08.517
But I will give you another example.

01:44:08.877 --> 01:44:13.237
We're using artificial intelligence to make decisions like, does this person have skin cancer?

01:44:13.837 --> 01:44:17.977
If the technology has never seen a black skin, efficacy rates are very low.

01:44:18.517 --> 01:44:23.177
Again, this is another example where it doesn't see us. We shouldn't have to do that.

01:44:23.837 --> 01:44:28.777
And how do they correct this? They create synthetic data, so they take the same

01:44:28.777 --> 01:44:31.657
white skin and color it brown and black.

01:44:32.237 --> 01:44:39.157
No, I want the real skin, right? I need your data to be the real thing, not synthetic.

01:44:39.497 --> 01:44:46.657
And so these are all the little strings that all of us in our little faculties are working on.

01:44:47.951 --> 01:44:52.171
Exhausting yeah well you know you you

01:44:52.171 --> 01:44:55.111
use skin cancer the one that always kind of

01:44:55.111 --> 01:44:58.451
I think a lot of people relate to is the bmi the

01:44:58.451 --> 01:45:04.291
body mass index right yeah you started using these apps and they say well you

01:45:04.291 --> 01:45:08.991
you you know you need to lose so many pounds because you're this height and

01:45:08.991 --> 01:45:13.771
all this stuff yeah and and every every black person that I've ever encountered

01:45:13.771 --> 01:45:17.191
said But does this thing even know black people?

01:45:17.611 --> 01:45:21.271
How do you figure I got to lose this many pounds? You know what I'm saying?

01:45:21.471 --> 01:45:26.871
It's not, it's like, obviously, there's nothing but white programmers doing

01:45:26.871 --> 01:45:30.151
these kind of apps because they don't know how black bodies are built.

01:45:30.151 --> 01:45:36.251
So the biggest challenge it sounds to me is a challenge that we've been dealing

01:45:36.251 --> 01:45:37.851
with in the political world,

01:45:38.131 --> 01:45:44.991
especially in the United States, ever since its foundation has been recognizing

01:45:44.991 --> 01:45:50.911
black people, people of African descent, however you want to label us, as human.

01:45:50.911 --> 01:45:58.511
Because it's like, you know, when you when you pass laws or, you know, you try to.

01:45:59.111 --> 01:46:03.731
Quote unquote, solve a public policy problem, those of us that,

01:46:03.891 --> 01:46:07.271
you know, when we were elected or are still elected, you know,

01:46:07.371 --> 01:46:09.971
we always have to interject and say, well, what about us?

01:46:10.051 --> 01:46:12.331
How does how does that impact us? Right.

01:46:12.691 --> 01:46:18.751
And it sounds like AI is going through the same growing pains in that sense. Yeah.

01:46:19.351 --> 01:46:23.291
Yes. And unfortunately, I think a lot of the people working in these spaces

01:46:23.291 --> 01:46:27.611
where AI is being created don't look like us, right?

01:46:28.051 --> 01:46:32.471
We're not prioritizing these spaces. And so I know there are different schools

01:46:32.471 --> 01:46:37.571
of thoughts on do we create our own thing or do we just fix that thing and,

01:46:37.571 --> 01:46:38.771
you know, just join this?

01:46:39.131 --> 01:46:43.271
So there's a lot of, I think, initiative towards building our own,

01:46:43.271 --> 01:46:46.511
the whole sort of digital FUBU, if you want to call it that.

01:46:47.611 --> 01:46:54.131
Yeah. Yeah. And pray for me because I've been trying to get Sister Ruha and Dr.

01:46:54.291 --> 01:47:00.331
Joy on the podcast. So just pray for me and see if I can make that connection.

01:47:01.411 --> 01:47:04.111
And Dr. Noble too. Dr. Who?

01:47:04.671 --> 01:47:10.351
Dr. Safia Noble, Algorithms of Oppression. She's, yes, another. Yeah.

01:47:10.771 --> 01:47:13.031
And her to the whist list on that too.

01:47:14.531 --> 01:47:20.551
So my last question I've been asking all of my guests, because it's a theme

01:47:20.551 --> 01:47:22.151
that I'm pushing this year.

01:47:22.511 --> 01:47:24.891
So I want you to finish this sentence.

01:47:25.371 --> 01:47:28.031
I have hope because...

01:47:29.911 --> 01:47:33.611
I have hope because of the next generation. Yeah, I don't know how much more

01:47:33.611 --> 01:47:41.291
I can say, but as a lecturer, I come across a lot of young people and there's something there.

01:47:41.771 --> 01:47:44.911
There is definitely something that I think they now have a language and they're

01:47:44.911 --> 01:47:47.731
now looking with the right eyes as to what is happening.

01:47:48.731 --> 01:47:51.831
So I'm hopeful because of them. All right.

01:47:51.951 --> 01:47:56.491
So if people want to get your book, Design Heuristics for Emerging Technologies,

01:47:56.491 --> 01:47:59.571
if they want to get in touch with you, how can they do that?

01:48:00.231 --> 01:48:05.991
Yeah definitely I think my university email is public that as well too or connect

01:48:05.991 --> 01:48:08.951
with me on LinkedIn I think that's the only social platform that i have outside

01:48:08.951 --> 01:48:13.591
of Instagram you can connect with me there as well too to get my book it's on

01:48:13.591 --> 01:48:19.251
the universal right publications website and anywhere books are sold it's globally available as well too.

01:48:20.522 --> 01:48:26.382
All right. Well, Dr. Kem Laurin Lubin, this has been enlightening as I knew it would be.

01:48:26.782 --> 01:48:34.382
And I'm really, really happy that you came on and that you were enthused to come on.

01:48:34.682 --> 01:48:38.542
That means a lot because sometimes I have guests come on and,

01:48:38.762 --> 01:48:42.702
you know, you could tell initially it's kind of like, you know,

01:48:43.462 --> 01:48:47.002
am I or I'll get emails like, why do you want me on the podcast?

01:48:47.002 --> 01:48:52.382
You know, but it's like all this stuff is connected.

01:48:52.702 --> 01:48:58.862
And what I what I tell people was that politics is everything because politics is in everything.

01:48:59.222 --> 01:49:03.202
And so I see that there's, you know,

01:49:03.362 --> 01:49:07.742
especially with this emerging technology and it's in a part of our everyday

01:49:07.742 --> 01:49:14.302
lives that, you know, the political community has to deal with that.

01:49:14.302 --> 01:49:20.422
And I hope this discussion for the listeners kind of put things in frame that

01:49:20.422 --> 01:49:23.122
it's like we still have this journey.

01:49:23.262 --> 01:49:26.602
That's why I use the term unicorn with you.

01:49:27.082 --> 01:49:33.802
But I'm really glad that that you came on and helped explain some things.

01:49:33.802 --> 01:49:37.862
And I hope that people get your book, not just like you say,

01:49:37.982 --> 01:49:44.222
practitioners, but just people to kind of get a basic understanding of what could be better.

01:49:44.882 --> 01:49:47.342
As we move forward in society.

01:49:48.682 --> 01:49:55.042
So again, I'm honored to have you on. And the rule is that once you've been

01:49:55.042 --> 01:49:56.982
on, you have an open invitation to come back.

01:49:57.162 --> 01:50:02.142
So if you don't even have to wait for me, if there's something going on that

01:50:02.142 --> 01:50:06.682
you think, yeah, I need to get a platform, you can always come on the podcast.

01:50:07.442 --> 01:50:12.282
I appreciate you had so much fun. And yeah, I can get very excited about my

01:50:12.282 --> 01:50:16.042
work. So I hope that wasn't too much. No, no, that was perfect.

01:50:16.662 --> 01:50:19.402
All right, guys, and we're going to go ahead and catch y'all on the other side.

01:50:38.246 --> 01:50:46.446
All right. And we are back. And so now it is time for my next guest, Mishael White.

01:50:47.086 --> 01:50:52.286
Mishael White, a certified transportation professional truck driver,

01:50:52.846 --> 01:50:59.466
husband, father and devoted Christian, as well as the 2024 District 81 former

01:50:59.466 --> 01:51:05.166
Democratic nominee, is passionate about representing District 81 of Henry County.

01:51:05.966 --> 01:51:09.506
Mr. White was born, raised, and educated in the great state of Louisiana.

01:51:09.986 --> 01:51:15.846
He and his family relocated to Georgia due to Hurricane Katrina to rebuild and

01:51:15.846 --> 01:51:17.386
move to Henry County, Georgia.

01:51:18.126 --> 01:51:24.166
Upon rebuilding a new life in Georgia, White has thrived as a successful certified

01:51:24.166 --> 01:51:30.206
transportation professional truck driver, working to support his family for over 23 years.

01:51:30.206 --> 01:51:37.286
As a loving husband of six children, loving husband and father of six children, I should say, Mr.

01:51:37.446 --> 01:51:41.106
White is passionate about representing the families of District 81.

01:51:41.606 --> 01:51:47.546
White has volunteered for previous political campaigns, both before and after

01:51:47.546 --> 01:51:51.626
gerrymandering, and in our new reality of fighting for democracy.

01:51:52.426 --> 01:51:56.806
White is ready to step up and lead again as the District 81 candidate,

01:51:57.146 --> 01:52:01.526
presenting a clear choice for the issues that affect working-class families

01:52:01.526 --> 01:52:03.606
and small business owners.

01:52:03.926 --> 01:52:09.826
As part of his campaign, White will focus on essential issues such as education,

01:52:10.786 --> 01:52:14.906
reducing Georgia's maternal mortality rate, supporting law enforcement,

01:52:15.246 --> 01:52:19.086
investing in small business owners, and improving infrastructure.

01:52:19.886 --> 01:52:24.226
Mr. White will continue to engage with local businesses and incorporate community

01:52:24.226 --> 01:52:29.606
engagement events to gather insights and help maintain the lifestyle to protect

01:52:29.606 --> 01:52:31.746
the people of District 81.

01:52:32.106 --> 01:52:36.506
Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest

01:52:36.506 --> 01:52:39.806
on this podcast, Mishael White.

01:52:51.029 --> 01:52:56.909
All right. Mishael White. How are you doing, sir? You doing good?

01:52:57.489 --> 01:53:01.589
I'm doing good this morning, sir. How are you? I'm doing fine.

01:53:01.749 --> 01:53:03.629
Did I say your first name right? Is it?

01:53:05.529 --> 01:53:11.049
It's Mishael. Mishael. Yes, sir. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's okay.

01:53:12.129 --> 01:53:17.169
Trust me, I'm used to it. I've been hearing all types of different iterations

01:53:17.169 --> 01:53:20.309
of how people pronounce my name, so it doesn't bother me.

01:53:20.329 --> 01:53:23.609
Yeah yeah but I didn't want to I didn't

01:53:23.609 --> 01:53:26.709
want to I didn't want to come across because you know

01:53:26.709 --> 01:53:30.489
when people people hear

01:53:30.489 --> 01:53:34.249
that they'll be like wait a minute that's not a female or whatever but it's

01:53:34.249 --> 01:53:42.689
right so it's like okay Mishael okay I got you all right so we're gonna go

01:53:42.689 --> 01:53:47.509
ahead and get the interview started in in the way that I normally do it is I

01:53:47.509 --> 01:53:49.329
do a couple what we call icebreaker.

01:53:49.969 --> 01:53:53.969
So the first icebreaker is a quote.

01:53:54.889 --> 01:54:02.529
And the quote I want you to respond to is, we are now faced with the fact that

01:54:02.529 --> 01:54:05.669
tomorrow is today. What does that quote mean to you?

01:54:06.009 --> 01:54:16.009
It means the fierce urgency of now, that we can't, we can not delay what needs to be done.

01:54:16.009 --> 01:54:21.289
We need to do it in the moment while we're in the moment and the demands of

01:54:21.289 --> 01:54:25.429
the moment have to be met with fierce action.

01:54:26.842 --> 01:54:30.202
And yeah, so that's what that quote means to me. Gotcha.

01:54:30.782 --> 01:54:38.162
All right. So now the next one is what we call 20 questions. Okay.

01:54:38.582 --> 01:54:44.222
So I need you to give me a number between one and 20.

01:54:44.762 --> 01:54:47.422
Between one and 20. Yep.

01:54:48.442 --> 01:54:56.202
Seven. Okay. What do you consider the best way to stay informed about politics,

01:54:56.542 --> 01:54:59.562
current events, health, et cetera?

01:55:00.502 --> 01:55:07.162
Read any and all available publications at your disposal.

01:55:08.062 --> 01:55:17.702
And don't just rely on talking heads on TV, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, or what have you.

01:55:17.702 --> 01:55:20.442
You know really really take the time

01:55:20.442 --> 01:55:23.382
to read your local publications there

01:55:23.382 --> 01:55:27.042
are a lot of local newspapers and magazines all across

01:55:27.042 --> 01:55:30.662
this country and out in in our communities that

01:55:30.662 --> 01:55:33.522
really have their finger on the pulse of what's

01:55:33.522 --> 01:55:38.062
actually going on because as I'm sure as you're aware Mr. Fleming all politics

01:55:38.062 --> 01:55:45.882
is local and one of the things that that i have observed is right now we are

01:55:45.882 --> 01:55:50.842
inundated with misinformation and disinformation.

01:55:51.682 --> 01:55:59.962
And so, you know, it's best to start getting your information from local sources

01:55:59.962 --> 01:56:02.982
first and then work out from there.

01:56:03.242 --> 01:56:07.362
And so, yeah, get that. Like here in Henry County, we have the Henry Herald,

01:56:07.522 --> 01:56:09.662
and I read it faithfully.

01:56:09.802 --> 01:56:14.602
We have Game Changers magazine these are two local publications in the area

01:56:14.602 --> 01:56:21.722
that really have their finger on the pulse of what's moving and shaking and

01:56:21.722 --> 01:56:28.662
our public policy making arena here in henry county so yeah that's what I would suggest okay.

01:56:29.930 --> 01:56:37.550
A wise young man once said, we are at a critical turning point in our nation's existence.

01:56:37.850 --> 01:56:43.270
While watching the news or listening to podcasts is easy to feel discouraged.

01:56:43.790 --> 01:56:48.470
However, the time is now to take action and get involved.

01:56:48.930 --> 01:56:52.910
Is that why you committed yourself to run for office?

01:56:53.630 --> 01:57:00.090
Absolutely. Absolutely. It's watching what's taking place in real time.

01:57:00.450 --> 01:57:05.490
And our best ability is our availability.

01:57:06.510 --> 01:57:11.830
And so when you see that there's an urgent need for something and you're available,

01:57:12.030 --> 01:57:20.490
then I think it's incumbent upon you as the individual to show initiative and fill that need.

01:57:20.490 --> 01:57:23.710
And look if if things

01:57:23.710 --> 01:57:27.390
continue to go the way they're they're looking we could

01:57:27.390 --> 01:57:30.530
be in you know a way worse situation

01:57:30.530 --> 01:57:33.550
than what we've ever been in this nation before

01:57:33.550 --> 01:57:39.630
so it's going to take people at every level in these communities and our neighborhoods

01:57:39.630 --> 01:57:44.890
and small towns all across the state of Georgia and all across the country to

01:57:44.890 --> 01:57:52.230
take up that uh that mantle of responsibility in leadership and in service to the greater good.

01:57:52.670 --> 01:57:57.630
And so, yeah, that's exactly why I decided to run for this office here in Henry County.

01:57:58.881 --> 01:58:04.321
What about your life experience makes you the most qualified candidate to represent

01:58:04.321 --> 01:58:07.741
District 81 in the Georgia House of Representatives?

01:58:08.581 --> 01:58:11.301
Well, thank you for asking that question. That's a great question.

01:58:11.581 --> 01:58:17.321
Well, first and foremost, I would say it's my, you know, in my early years as

01:58:17.321 --> 01:58:21.181
a teenager who was transitioning into adulthood,

01:58:21.821 --> 01:58:26.221
a 20-something-year-old man, I was a youth pastor and street evangelist.

01:58:27.161 --> 01:58:31.601
And so what that experience taught me, it taught me about, you know,

01:58:31.701 --> 01:58:36.301
serving others and serving people and what it takes to actually serve.

01:58:36.681 --> 01:58:41.121
And it's kind of like what the good Lord said, he who seeks to be great, let him be your servant.

01:58:42.121 --> 01:58:48.181
And the next thing is, you know, I've been married to my high school sweetheart for 25 years now.

01:58:48.621 --> 01:58:53.581
And we have a large family, six children, three boys and three girls.

01:58:54.081 --> 01:58:59.401
And so in a lot of ways, I've already been representing something larger than

01:58:59.401 --> 01:59:03.361
myself my entire adult life, because every day I've had to go out here in the

01:59:03.361 --> 01:59:06.841
world, I've had to think about others before I think about myself.

01:59:07.821 --> 01:59:11.821
Decisions I make, the things I choose to believe or entertain,

01:59:12.261 --> 01:59:16.861
the approach I take to solving issues.

01:59:17.281 --> 01:59:21.421
I've had to think about others before I think about myself. And the way I look

01:59:21.421 --> 01:59:27.321
at it, when I'm elected to represent District 81 here in Georgia,

01:59:27.481 --> 01:59:30.541
here in Henry County, Georgia, I'm just kind of building on that.

01:59:30.641 --> 01:59:32.181
I'm expanding my family.

01:59:32.441 --> 01:59:36.021
We're family now. And so as I go out and about.

01:59:36.301 --> 01:59:40.221
I understand that, look, it's not about me. It's about those who sent me.

01:59:40.321 --> 01:59:41.561
I'm here to represent them.

01:59:41.701 --> 01:59:48.141
And I have to think about them, the policies I choose to entertain.

01:59:49.181 --> 01:59:52.381
Legislation and how I vote, things of that nature.

01:59:52.501 --> 01:59:59.741
I have to think about the people here in the district. And I've been doing that my entire adult life.

01:59:59.921 --> 02:00:03.821
And then thirdly is actually being from the soil, Being a working man,

02:00:04.621 --> 02:00:07.581
you know, I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth.

02:00:08.201 --> 02:00:14.481
It's been, you know, it's been a rough road to to be able to have a a modicum

02:00:14.481 --> 02:00:17.921
of the American dream and have a middle class existence.

02:00:17.921 --> 02:00:21.361
And so I know how many of the working

02:00:21.361 --> 02:00:25.981
and middle class families here in District 81 in Henry County feel.

02:00:26.681 --> 02:00:29.701
I know every day they get up, they have to think about how they're going to

02:00:29.701 --> 02:00:32.181
keep food on the table, how they're going to put a roof.

02:00:32.721 --> 02:00:36.141
Over their head. They have to think about their health insurance premiums.

02:00:36.201 --> 02:00:38.261
They have to think about their car insurance premiums.

02:00:38.501 --> 02:00:44.001
They have to think about affordability and not because some political consultant

02:00:44.001 --> 02:00:48.701
conducted a poll and said, look, this is going to be a good buzzword for this election cycle,

02:00:48.821 --> 02:00:53.761
but because they actually have, many of our families here have,

02:00:53.901 --> 02:00:55.921
let's be honest, have one foot on a banana peel,

02:00:56.081 --> 02:00:58.561
one or the other on economic oblivion.

02:00:59.404 --> 02:01:03.284
And so I get them, and I understand that, and I know how they feel.

02:01:03.824 --> 02:01:14.264
And one thing that they'll never have to doubt is that I'm at the state capitol advocating for them,

02:01:14.464 --> 02:01:18.744
advocating for working families and middle-class families because I am them.

02:01:18.744 --> 02:01:20.444
I'm just like them. We're the same.

02:01:20.604 --> 02:01:25.664
So I get them, and I believe it's that experience.

02:01:25.664 --> 02:01:32.044
It's that interconnectedness it's my roots to what it means to actually be a

02:01:32.044 --> 02:01:37.924
working person in this country that makes me the best candidate for this position.

02:01:39.140 --> 02:01:45.540
So you just posted a video concerning traffic congestion in Henry County. Yes, sir.

02:01:46.020 --> 02:01:50.100
Explain to the listeners why that is an important issue in your district.

02:01:50.580 --> 02:01:54.220
Oh, wow. Yeah, it's an important issue in our district because,

02:01:54.420 --> 02:01:59.420
look, I just came from an event that was maybe about 30 minutes away,

02:01:59.420 --> 02:02:04.940
and it took me an hour to get back down here to exit 212 where I live.

02:02:05.040 --> 02:02:08.280
It took an hour. That's how congested the traffic was, right?

02:02:08.280 --> 02:02:12.880
And I'm a truck driver by profession, so that can already tell you one of my

02:02:12.880 --> 02:02:17.320
biggest pet peeves is sitting in traffic, especially when it's unnecessary.

02:02:17.340 --> 02:02:23.080
There's no climate event. There's no accident or anything. It's merely from

02:02:23.080 --> 02:02:28.020
the amount of vehicles on the roadway at any given time.

02:02:28.580 --> 02:02:33.860
And for as long as I can remember, it's always kind of been this way right here

02:02:33.860 --> 02:02:38.040
in this particular part of Henry County and Interstate 75.

02:02:38.280 --> 02:02:45.040
Now, some of the things that Governor Kemp is proposing with that roadway project

02:02:45.040 --> 02:02:50.340
package is expanding Interstate 75 and adding two more lanes.

02:02:50.580 --> 02:02:54.900
And as I said in that video that you referenced, that's a good starting point,

02:02:54.940 --> 02:02:56.960
but that's not the end all and be all.

02:02:57.120 --> 02:03:01.180
If we add two more lanes, it doesn't mean that that's going to reduce traffic.

02:03:01.180 --> 02:03:05.520
In fact, I can even argue that what you're doing is you're creating more incentive

02:03:05.520 --> 02:03:08.440
for vehicles to be on the road if you create two more lanes.

02:03:08.880 --> 02:03:14.100
So that's one part. But we have to think about maybe alternative transit methods.

02:03:14.620 --> 02:03:20.440
Maybe we need to look at getting some or expanding Henry County's transit because

02:03:20.440 --> 02:03:22.940
Henry County does have a transit service.

02:03:23.909 --> 02:03:27.889
Albeit a small one, but it does exist. Maybe we need to think about expanding that.

02:03:28.149 --> 02:03:33.349
Some of the other things that I've proposed is a lot of these surface roads,

02:03:33.549 --> 02:03:37.549
especially in rural parts of the district, we need to expand those roads.

02:03:37.709 --> 02:03:43.389
We need to maybe make some of those four-lane highways instead of these two-lane

02:03:43.389 --> 02:03:45.829
highways and country roads, because look,

02:03:45.989 --> 02:03:52.589
that will create alternate pathways and roadways for travelers on the road who

02:03:52.589 --> 02:03:56.089
are commuting to and fro, they don't have to get on the interstate.

02:03:56.369 --> 02:04:00.089
You see? So that takes more vehicles off the interstate.

02:04:00.229 --> 02:04:05.449
So while we all welcome that news and appreciate Governor Kemp's.

02:04:06.426 --> 02:04:13.346
Initiative, it's bigger than that. We're going to have to do more, but it is a good start.

02:04:13.546 --> 02:04:16.966
And look, a 20-minute trip

02:04:16.966 --> 02:04:23.926
to the grocery store shouldn't turn into an hour-long odyssey simply because

02:04:23.926 --> 02:04:28.006
there are so many vehicles on the roadway and you're inching and creeping and

02:04:28.006 --> 02:04:33.046
crawling along the interstate or Beale Gardner Parkway right here in the district

02:04:33.046 --> 02:04:35.726
or Peaksville or whatever it is.

02:04:36.426 --> 02:04:40.806
So that's one of the things that's been a major part of my platform.

02:04:40.826 --> 02:04:43.086
I'm going to continue to advocate for that.

02:04:43.206 --> 02:04:47.426
And when I'm at the state capitol, we're going to get more funds for more roadway

02:04:47.426 --> 02:04:53.926
projects to make commuting here in Henry County friendlier and safer for everyone.

02:04:54.366 --> 02:04:58.526
Now, I don't know how y'all do it in Georgia.

02:04:58.526 --> 02:05:05.606
I know when I served, it was like, you know, I first got in,

02:05:05.786 --> 02:05:13.386
I had to ask, you know, I had to go and talk to the speaker about what committees I wanted to be on.

02:05:14.026 --> 02:05:19.806
Um, you know, it was like one speaker, you had to physically go in and have

02:05:19.806 --> 02:05:23.646
that meeting. The next speaker I served under, it was like, he,

02:05:23.646 --> 02:05:28.466
he gave us like a form to fill out and we filled it out.

02:05:28.586 --> 02:05:32.366
And then after we filled it out, then he'd call you into a meeting to kind of

02:05:32.366 --> 02:05:36.986
tell you which committees he was going to put you on on your request list right

02:05:36.986 --> 02:05:41.426
so the reason why i'm telling that story is because the question i want to ask

02:05:41.426 --> 02:05:46.086
you is are you are you going to try to get on the transportation committee since

02:05:46.086 --> 02:05:47.926
that's a major issue for you.

02:05:49.178 --> 02:05:52.898
Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I would like to be on a transportation committee,

02:05:53.318 --> 02:05:58.758
an energy committee and or an education or health care committee,

02:05:58.758 --> 02:06:04.478
because some of the some of the other things that are parts of my platform is,

02:06:04.538 --> 02:06:10.278
look, we don't want data centers here just popping up all over Henry County, all over District 81.

02:06:10.418 --> 02:06:12.878
That's becoming a hot topic here in the district.

02:06:13.018 --> 02:06:17.398
A lot of residents, as I speak with them and talk to them, they're concerned about it.

02:06:17.398 --> 02:06:20.798
We're concerned about what it's going to do to to the environment,

02:06:20.798 --> 02:06:26.718
to the quality of our soil and water here in District 81 education.

02:06:26.718 --> 02:06:31.118
I'm big on that, I believe, and, you know, making sure our children have safe,

02:06:31.238 --> 02:06:32.258
clean schools to attend.

02:06:32.438 --> 02:06:36.338
Just the other day at one of our schools here in the district,

02:06:36.458 --> 02:06:42.358
Union Grove High School, there was some some firearms found that a student brought to school.

02:06:42.898 --> 02:06:47.878
And that could have potentially went been a disaster. We don't even have to

02:06:47.878 --> 02:06:51.398
have to go into detail about it. What's understood doesn't need to be explained.

02:06:52.318 --> 02:06:57.258
So that's why I would be interested in the education committee and something

02:06:57.258 --> 02:07:00.998
dealing with health care and health care services, because something else that's

02:07:00.998 --> 02:07:04.578
near and dear to my heart is Georgia's high maternal mortality rate,

02:07:04.678 --> 02:07:07.898
which last time I looked, it was the second highest in the nation.

02:07:08.938 --> 02:07:14.958
And that's why Governor Kemp and state Republicans run around touting how great

02:07:14.958 --> 02:07:16.058
Georgia is for business.

02:07:16.618 --> 02:07:22.038
When it's obviously not great for families. It's not great for our mothers.

02:07:22.278 --> 02:07:24.358
It's not great for children.

02:07:25.258 --> 02:07:28.918
So that's why I would be interested in being on a health care program.

02:07:29.490 --> 02:07:36.210
Some type of health care committee. All of these things are things that are near and dear to me.

02:07:36.930 --> 02:07:43.510
These arise from seeing problems and seeing things that need to be attended to.

02:07:43.890 --> 02:07:48.610
And that's why I'm running on them. It's not from a political consultant told

02:07:48.610 --> 02:07:51.130
me to say this, this would be good messaging.

02:07:51.130 --> 02:07:58.370
No, it's because I'm going there to solve problems and fight for things that

02:07:58.370 --> 02:08:02.230
folks here in the district care about and things I care about.

02:08:02.370 --> 02:08:08.950
And so those would be the committees that I would be interested in being a part of.

02:08:09.290 --> 02:08:14.150
Yeah, because you listed certain issues as your priorities and you mentioned

02:08:14.150 --> 02:08:19.810
about protecting our students and improving public education and reducing Georgia's

02:08:19.810 --> 02:08:21.550
maternal mortality rate.

02:08:22.090 --> 02:08:26.810
Absolutely. But you also talked about supporting law enforcement and investing

02:08:26.810 --> 02:08:28.310
in small business owners.

02:08:28.710 --> 02:08:34.930
So since you mentioned mortality rate and education, what,

02:08:35.369 --> 02:08:38.629
me ask you this question as you

02:08:38.629 --> 02:08:41.649
stated Georgia's maternal mortality rate

02:08:41.649 --> 02:08:46.729
is among the worst in the country absolutely 33.9 deaths

02:08:46.729 --> 02:08:49.949
per 1 000 live births and that's

02:08:49.949 --> 02:08:53.649
including the young woman Adriana smith

02:08:53.649 --> 02:08:56.569
the Georgia woman was declared brain dead but kept

02:08:56.569 --> 02:08:59.449
on life support until her baby was born

02:08:59.449 --> 02:09:02.689
nationally black women

02:09:02.689 --> 02:09:05.709
are three times as likely to die from pregnancy related

02:09:05.709 --> 02:09:09.529
causes as white women right so what

02:09:09.529 --> 02:09:12.829
legislatively can you do to re

02:09:12.829 --> 02:09:18.369
increase this mortality rate well some of the things I can do legislatively

02:09:18.369 --> 02:09:25.889
is support house bill 149 which is a a bill that Representative Imani Barnes

02:09:25.889 --> 02:09:30.109
is co-sponsoring with some other Democrats.

02:09:30.669 --> 02:09:34.109
And that's the Healthy Mothers Now Act.

02:09:34.329 --> 02:09:41.389
And what that bill looks to do is to create these mobile maternal care units,

02:09:41.929 --> 02:09:46.069
where if a woman is, especially in rural parts of the state,

02:09:46.269 --> 02:09:49.689
like I said, much of my district is rural.

02:09:49.989 --> 02:09:54.589
We're seeing shuttered hospitals in our rural communities.

02:09:54.789 --> 02:10:01.049
So what that bill looks to do is to create these mobile maternal care units

02:10:01.049 --> 02:10:05.609
that so if a woman is in labor, they go to her.

02:10:06.724 --> 02:10:14.964
And what it looks to do is increase the expediency of the health care services

02:10:14.964 --> 02:10:18.104
that that mother would need.

02:10:18.504 --> 02:10:23.644
Some of the other things that we need to do, we need to look at mental health services,

02:10:23.644 --> 02:10:29.904
because part of what's comprised in that maternal mortality rate is postpartum

02:10:29.904 --> 02:10:34.824
depression, is the mental health of the mother.

02:10:34.824 --> 02:10:41.724
So some of the things I could do as a legislator is get dollars allocated for

02:10:41.724 --> 02:10:45.044
those types of services to help

02:10:45.044 --> 02:10:50.944
our mothers who have just given birth and are trying to figure it out.

02:10:51.744 --> 02:10:55.464
And look, some of the other things is we need to increase funding for hospitals.

02:10:55.784 --> 02:11:01.304
We need to make sure we're making investments in our health care system here

02:11:01.304 --> 02:11:09.144
in Georgia so that it's more robust so we don't continue to have hospitals closing all over the state.

02:11:10.464 --> 02:11:17.224
So just from a legislative standpoint, those are some very practical things

02:11:17.224 --> 02:11:23.084
that I could do in my capacity as state representative is to get that done.

02:11:23.204 --> 02:11:27.324
And finally, the other thing that I could do is I can help raise awareness to the issue.

02:11:27.324 --> 02:11:35.444
Last year in September, I partnered with Connecting Henry, the mayor of McDonough

02:11:35.444 --> 02:11:36.904
at the time, Mayor Sandra Vincent,

02:11:37.244 --> 02:11:41.884
and we put on a maternal mortality town hall. And so we brought...

02:11:42.931 --> 02:11:50.971
Representatives from Healthy Mothers Now. We brought in leaders from civic organizations,

02:11:51.711 --> 02:11:59.391
the teacher-parent union, and we had that conversation and we spoke about maybe

02:11:59.391 --> 02:12:02.311
increasing funding for doulas and midwives.

02:12:02.691 --> 02:12:06.991
That's something else that can be done. And so that is something that I look

02:12:06.991 --> 02:12:14.591
to do as I continue to march toward securing and winning this election for this sheet.

02:12:14.811 --> 02:12:20.071
But once I'm elected, that's an annual event that we want to put on.

02:12:20.191 --> 02:12:22.991
And we look to be able to partner with Piedmont Henry.

02:12:23.311 --> 02:12:29.931
We look to be able to partner with our local gynecological providers here in

02:12:29.931 --> 02:12:34.731
Henry County and District 81 and continue to build it and expand it.

02:12:35.391 --> 02:12:40.031
And so, because look, some of this is if you're a nursing or expecting mother

02:12:40.031 --> 02:12:44.291
and there's a resource that can help you with an issue you're having and you

02:12:44.291 --> 02:12:47.351
don't know, well, then it might as well not exist.

02:12:47.951 --> 02:12:52.091
See, so by us putting on that maternal mortality town hall and something that

02:12:52.091 --> 02:12:54.951
we want to make annual, we want to grow it, we want to expand it,

02:12:55.111 --> 02:12:57.491
that can help get information.

02:12:58.791 --> 02:13:03.731
To mothers here in Henry County and in the district and families here in Henry

02:13:03.731 --> 02:13:09.911
County in the district that may not otherwise know that there's services and

02:13:09.911 --> 02:13:11.271
help available for them.

02:13:12.341 --> 02:13:17.481
Would you support legislation that offered Medicaid reimbursement for doula services?

02:13:18.241 --> 02:13:23.621
Absolutely. Now, of course, that's in principle for me.

02:13:23.821 --> 02:13:29.041
And I've talked about this even since, you know, my last, the last election cycle.

02:13:30.181 --> 02:13:34.461
It's going to come down to language with the way I vote.

02:13:34.901 --> 02:13:40.661
It's going to come down to how the bill is written, what's all within the bill.

02:13:40.661 --> 02:13:46.421
How is it going to to be rolled out how is it going to be implemented things

02:13:46.421 --> 02:13:50.881
of that nature but in principle yes that's something that i would support yeah

02:13:50.881 --> 02:13:57.661
and i you know i'm glad you said that because that's that's something that people

02:13:57.661 --> 02:13:59.541
need to be aware of because,

02:14:00.301 --> 02:14:08.541
in the legislative process there could be a bill that has you know something that you really like,

02:14:09.161 --> 02:14:12.721
right it's stuck in a bill that's got 18

02:14:12.721 --> 02:14:15.441
things that you know is either going to be bad for

02:14:15.441 --> 02:14:19.181
your people or you just can't stay exactly and and

02:14:19.181 --> 02:14:23.121
and it's like well i thought you said you was for that yeah but i wasn't for

02:14:23.121 --> 02:14:27.501
all this other stuff you know i'm saying i had to know and i couldn't pull that

02:14:27.501 --> 02:14:34.341
other thing out so yeah right yeah so i'm glad that you you said it answered

02:14:34.341 --> 02:14:36.321
it the way you did because sometimes,

02:14:36.401 --> 02:14:39.921
you know, people get, we get caught up in,

02:14:40.281 --> 02:14:45.401
you know, they'll try to throw something in a bill to get you to vote for it,

02:14:45.461 --> 02:14:47.641
but it's a bad bill overall.

02:14:47.641 --> 02:14:49.681
And it's like, yeah, no, I can't do that.

02:14:49.861 --> 02:14:53.161
So I'm glad you answered it that way. Yes, sir.

02:14:53.981 --> 02:15:00.881
Getting back to the schools, a May 2025 survey indicated that 60% of Georgia

02:15:00.881 --> 02:15:05.501
parents felt schools were less safe than they were a decade ago.

02:15:05.761 --> 02:15:10.241
What is your plan to improve public schools and make them safer?

02:15:10.721 --> 02:15:13.401
Well, we need a quick.

02:15:14.755 --> 02:15:22.095
A quick action response plan for, you know, let's just let's just let's just

02:15:22.095 --> 02:15:26.335
tell the truth for a potential active shooter situation.

02:15:27.315 --> 02:15:32.135
Unfortunately, in this day and age, that's something that we have to seriously consider.

02:15:32.415 --> 02:15:37.555
Some of the other things that I would be I would be interested in is what types

02:15:37.555 --> 02:15:44.375
of things we can do from a from an equipment perspective that makes our classroom safer.

02:15:44.375 --> 02:15:50.295
So whether this is specialized doors and locks in the event of that type of

02:15:50.295 --> 02:15:52.055
an active shooter scenario,

02:15:52.455 --> 02:15:57.155
do we need to look at maybe in some of our schools here in Henry County,

02:15:57.435 --> 02:16:01.015
implementing or installing metal detectors,

02:16:01.635 --> 02:16:04.535
more resource school resource officers?

02:16:04.535 --> 02:16:11.455
Also, too, is we have to look at the mental component of some of these situations.

02:16:11.655 --> 02:16:19.135
We have to maybe look at providing some of our students with conflict resolution

02:16:19.135 --> 02:16:22.255
training, you know, things of that nature.

02:16:23.395 --> 02:16:27.435
Also, some of the other things that can be done when it comes to safety is maybe

02:16:27.435 --> 02:16:34.855
we can put in some type of alert system throughout the county for our schools when there is.

02:16:36.135 --> 02:16:41.095
Weather event, whether there is a tornado. Here, I believe that was last year,

02:16:41.215 --> 02:16:45.775
there was a major tornado that hit down right here in Locust Grove in the district

02:16:45.775 --> 02:16:48.315
over, right on the other side of Interstate 75.

02:16:49.275 --> 02:16:56.135
That famous actor from the wire, his son was hurt very badly by that tornado.

02:16:57.195 --> 02:17:00.155
I've actually made note of this as I ride around the district.

02:17:00.395 --> 02:17:04.695
Some of these tornado warning systems look like they've been there since the 50s.

02:17:05.355 --> 02:17:08.175
We need to look at updating those.

02:17:08.975 --> 02:17:18.935
You know, so those are just some other practical things that we can do to make our schools safer.

02:17:19.235 --> 02:17:25.255
And then again, is engaging with parents and students and raising awareness,

02:17:25.935 --> 02:17:31.095
increasing the flow of information of safety tips, safety protocols,

02:17:31.895 --> 02:17:34.295
things of that nature, working with our school board.

02:17:34.415 --> 02:17:37.235
Here in District 81, Dr.

02:17:37.395 --> 02:17:43.795
Pam Nutt is our school board member, and I have a relationship with her.

02:17:43.875 --> 02:17:48.895
So I would be working with her, talking with her, getting her insight and take

02:17:48.895 --> 02:17:55.555
on how do we make sure we're making our children safe while they're at school.

02:17:55.815 --> 02:18:00.135
We don't send our children to school to be harmed or to put them in danger.

02:18:00.315 --> 02:18:04.715
And so that's something that I believe in. And you know, I'm not just blowing

02:18:04.715 --> 02:18:08.215
smoke because my son is 16 years old.

02:18:08.775 --> 02:18:11.735
He's a junior and he goes to Locust Grove High School.

02:18:12.135 --> 02:18:17.475
And so I would be lying if I said that when I heard about these two firearms

02:18:17.475 --> 02:18:20.675
being found at Union Grove High School, My mind didn't fall on my son.

02:18:21.055 --> 02:18:27.315
So I have my own personal interest for ensuring the safety and security of our

02:18:27.315 --> 02:18:29.975
schools here in Henry County and District 81.

02:18:31.076 --> 02:18:34.176
Yeah. So the Georgia legislature,

02:18:34.176 --> 02:18:41.296
they passed the School Safety Act that came to effect in July of this year that

02:18:41.296 --> 02:18:49.176
requires public schools to install mobile panic alert systems directly to 911 and law enforcement.

02:18:50.692 --> 02:18:54.832
So if you were in the legislature, you would have voted for that, right?

02:18:55.152 --> 02:19:01.052
Absolutely. I would have voted for it. Yeah, but the thing is, the trick is,

02:19:01.572 --> 02:19:05.652
and I haven't looked at the bill, the trick is, does that fall under the school

02:19:05.652 --> 02:19:13.212
districts to fund it, or is that something the state's going to give some money towards, right?

02:19:13.892 --> 02:19:17.612
Right. I think it should be collaborative. It should be collaborative effort.

02:19:18.252 --> 02:19:22.692
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's why I was going, because it's like sometimes we'll

02:19:22.692 --> 02:19:29.632
say, okay, you know, I remember folks, we want y'all to do this, right?

02:19:30.392 --> 02:19:33.672
It's real quick. It was like, I remember folks had this notion,

02:19:33.912 --> 02:19:38.672
well, they need to put the motto in God we trust in all our schools in Mississippi, right?

02:19:39.432 --> 02:19:45.552
So I got up there and I said, now, you know, we haven't allocated any money

02:19:45.552 --> 02:19:48.652
for the school districts to do that.

02:19:49.412 --> 02:19:53.852
You know, it's like, regardless of how you feel about religion and all this

02:19:53.852 --> 02:19:59.472
stuff, my issue is you expect each school district to put this in and the state

02:19:59.472 --> 02:20:03.412
didn't give a dime to help them do that.

02:20:03.592 --> 02:20:09.992
And because I brought that issue up, they amended the bill so that each district

02:20:09.992 --> 02:20:15.612
could get local businesses to pay for those plaques to go up in those classrooms.

02:20:15.892 --> 02:20:18.732
Right. so yeah it's like it's it's some

02:20:18.732 --> 02:20:21.752
it's what we call an unfunded mandate and right

02:20:21.752 --> 02:20:24.672
exactly so one of the things i hope

02:20:24.672 --> 02:20:29.072
you know that you're you're sensitive to and

02:20:29.072 --> 02:20:33.572
and you can get your colleagues when you get in there sensitive to is that make

02:20:33.572 --> 02:20:38.232
sure that it's like if we're gonna say well we want you or require you to do

02:20:38.232 --> 02:20:45.332
that that you you make sure that there's some money attached to it So that the school districts,

02:20:45.492 --> 02:20:51.052
excuse me, can afford to take care of that. Right.

02:20:51.752 --> 02:20:53.392
Yeah. All right. So.

02:20:54.752 --> 02:20:58.212
Law enforcement many counties

02:20:58.212 --> 02:21:01.392
in georgia have the municipal police

02:21:01.392 --> 02:21:04.472
department a county police department and then

02:21:04.472 --> 02:21:07.532
the sheriff's department right or sheriff's

02:21:07.532 --> 02:21:13.292
office do you feel like georgia has too many police departments or not enough

02:21:13.292 --> 02:21:18.652
do i feel that if georgia has too many police departments or not enough well

02:21:18.652 --> 02:21:23.832
i certainly don't believe they have too many police departments now do i feel,

02:21:24.352 --> 02:21:25.732
that they don't have enough.

02:21:27.372 --> 02:21:33.112
I think we do have enough. I think we do. I think we do have enough.

02:21:33.792 --> 02:21:39.072
You mentioned the Municipal Police Department, the Sheriff's Office,

02:21:39.112 --> 02:21:44.212
and the County Police Department, because I know that's how it is here in Henry County.

02:21:44.612 --> 02:21:48.772
Now, and then I kind of can see where you're coming from because when you get

02:21:48.772 --> 02:21:51.692
to the municipal part, it's like, okay, maybe it's a bit redundant,

02:21:53.272 --> 02:21:56.532
because i know the like

02:21:56.532 --> 02:21:59.272
the other day my wife had a had a

02:21:59.272 --> 02:22:03.352
minor fender bender and so they were waiting for the for the police and so you

02:22:03.352 --> 02:22:08.352
know a blue cop car a cop car pulled up with their blue lights and it was stockbridge

02:22:08.352 --> 02:22:11.872
it was the stock stockbridge police but she wasn't in stockbridge she was in

02:22:11.872 --> 02:22:15.372
locust groves it was like oh well y'all gotta wait on henry county so i can

02:22:15.372 --> 02:22:18.032
kind of see while you're asking that question.

02:22:18.612 --> 02:22:24.592
It can be, I guess, be a bit redundant and unnecessary to be a bit redundant

02:22:25.009 --> 02:22:28.689
But I don't think in and of itself we have too many.

02:22:28.869 --> 02:22:35.829
My concern is this, is that in spite of how many we have, I believe they should be supported.

02:22:36.209 --> 02:22:42.509
And that's why last election I was very supportive of the bill that was put

02:22:42.509 --> 02:22:46.469
forth by Senator Brian Strickland and Senator Emanuel Jones.

02:22:46.529 --> 02:22:50.909
I can't remember the number of that bill off the top of my head.

02:22:50.909 --> 02:22:59.009
But what it did is it expanded the amount of disability that our police officers

02:22:59.009 --> 02:23:04.069
receive if they are hurt within the line of duty, because prior to that,

02:23:04.189 --> 02:23:07.569
they were only receiving about 60 percent of their salary.

02:23:08.029 --> 02:23:13.669
Now, I believe they're receiving up to maybe even 90 percent or higher of their

02:23:13.669 --> 02:23:17.409
salary if, God forbid, they get hurt in the line of duty.

02:23:17.409 --> 02:23:26.289
So my main concern is and will always be, are we supporting our law enforcement officers?

02:23:26.289 --> 02:23:32.089
In spite of how many precincts or law enforcement entities exist,

02:23:32.449 --> 02:23:38.069
they are our men and women in uniform. They put their lives on the line every day.

02:23:38.089 --> 02:23:43.349
And I think that's the least we can do as a grateful and appreciative society.

02:23:43.509 --> 02:23:47.169
It's like I tell folks all the time, I feel, I feel safer when I see police

02:23:47.169 --> 02:23:51.589
officers, I don't feel less safe, you know? So that's how I would answer that question.

02:23:52.229 --> 02:23:57.349
Yeah. And, and, you know, you brought up about that because I had that experience

02:23:57.349 --> 02:23:59.429
when I was in law enforcement, I got hurt.

02:23:59.889 --> 02:24:03.009
And so the issue was, um,

02:24:03.520 --> 02:24:11.580
If I if it had just been workers comp, then I got like, you know, two thirds of my salary.

02:24:12.040 --> 02:24:15.200
Like, but I qualified for FMLA.

02:24:16.400 --> 02:24:22.240
So I was going to get my full salary and have enough time to rehab the injury. Right.

02:24:22.820 --> 02:24:29.200
So, yeah. So, you know, to change that where law enforcement wouldn't,

02:24:29.200 --> 02:24:32.980
you know, fall under the same as anybody else.

02:24:32.980 --> 02:24:38.480
And workers comp, that makes sense, you know, to make sure that they have the

02:24:38.480 --> 02:24:44.940
time to recover, you know, because it could be anything from a car accident, a gunshot.

02:24:45.620 --> 02:24:53.920
Right. You know, in my case, it was like I was trying to grab somebody and it damaged my hand.

02:24:54.380 --> 02:25:01.620
Right. And so, you know, so I had to go to rehab to get my hand at least so

02:25:01.620 --> 02:25:03.560
I could do my job again. Right.

02:25:04.060 --> 02:25:08.860
So, yeah, yeah, I understand your support for that.

02:25:09.760 --> 02:25:12.900
Do you believe that police officers need.

02:25:13.972 --> 02:25:17.412
Mandatory counseling like say every six

02:25:17.412 --> 02:25:20.532
months to make sure that the stress of the job doesn't

02:25:20.532 --> 02:25:23.312
escalate like to try to be like the

02:25:23.312 --> 02:25:28.492
one recently in minnesota absolutely not now i won't say i won't say mandatory

02:25:28.492 --> 02:25:34.772
i think that's a strong word maybe maybe recommended and if they they attend

02:25:34.772 --> 02:25:40.072
the the therapy or the session then they get some type of incentive for doing

02:25:40.072 --> 02:25:42.212
it so i wouldn't use mandatory,

02:25:42.512 --> 02:25:47.352
I think that may be a bit too bit of a word that's too strong,

02:25:47.432 --> 02:25:54.332
but maybe recommended or suggested, and if they take advantage of the therapy services,

02:25:54.592 --> 02:25:59.712
then in some type of way, shape, form, or fashion, they receive some incentive.

02:25:59.892 --> 02:26:06.432
Maybe more time added on to their PTO, maybe an extra day off with pay,

02:26:07.112 --> 02:26:10.872
some type of way where we can create,

02:26:12.029 --> 02:26:18.949
desire for them to go to those services willingly, not where they feel like they're forced.

02:26:19.609 --> 02:26:23.769
And it sounds like you understand another lesson about legislation.

02:26:24.969 --> 02:26:32.649
The one thing that I learned real quick is the difference between may and shall.

02:26:33.389 --> 02:26:37.249
If you see a bill that says may, then

02:26:37.249 --> 02:26:40.289
that gives latitude you know it

02:26:40.289 --> 02:26:43.289
allows choice and judgment if you say shall that

02:26:43.289 --> 02:26:46.149
means you've got to do that right and so

02:26:46.149 --> 02:26:50.489
yeah that's that's another that's one thing when you're looking at them bills

02:26:50.489 --> 02:26:55.729
it's like is it let's say shall again yeah that's it that's it that's us that's

02:26:55.729 --> 02:27:00.429
yeah that's the language part of it you know you gotta pay attention to that

02:27:00.429 --> 02:27:04.589
um right so some members of

02:27:04.689 --> 02:27:07.409
the legislature some of the democratic members had a

02:27:07.409 --> 02:27:10.169
press conference recently and they were

02:27:10.169 --> 02:27:14.909
talking about certain bills dealing with law enforcement and one of that's been

02:27:14.909 --> 02:27:20.849
introduced to senate bill 389 which would ban ICE agents from wearing masks

02:27:20.849 --> 02:27:26.589
and require federal agents working on immigration enforcement to wear an identification

02:27:26.589 --> 02:27:28.829
badge how do you feel about that.

02:27:30.203 --> 02:27:33.123
I agree with that. I agree with that.

02:27:33.243 --> 02:27:38.043
Look, one of the things that we hear all the time from campaigning politicians

02:27:38.043 --> 02:27:41.323
is this idea and this notion of transparency in our government.

02:27:41.923 --> 02:27:46.823
And yet, when it comes time for you to execute transparency in our government,

02:27:47.143 --> 02:27:49.423
now it's a problem and you don't want to do that.

02:27:50.263 --> 02:27:53.983
Why do these ICE agents need

02:27:53.983 --> 02:27:57.083
to be have on masks why don't

02:27:57.083 --> 02:28:00.863
why don't they have to identify themselves and

02:28:00.863 --> 02:28:04.783
again and this is something that you know that I've I've kind of talked to about

02:28:04.783 --> 02:28:10.123
you know I tell people it's like look when we talk about the government we are

02:28:10.123 --> 02:28:14.503
the government that's the type of government we have the people are the government

02:28:14.503 --> 02:28:18.143
and so these law enforcement officers.

02:28:19.143 --> 02:28:21.283
ICE, and immigration enforcement.

02:28:21.623 --> 02:28:25.923
We respect them. We want them to go out there and do a good job. We want them to be safe.

02:28:26.103 --> 02:28:30.063
We want those who they're interacting with to be safe.

02:28:30.143 --> 02:28:37.523
And I don't see how greater transparency makes any of those things less likely to happen.

02:28:37.523 --> 02:28:41.423
I think if we're more transparent with immigration enforcement,

02:28:41.743 --> 02:28:47.383
if we're more transparent with how these ICE agents are operating,

02:28:47.403 --> 02:28:53.903
I think it creates a safer environment and a more secure environment for everyone involved.

02:28:54.023 --> 02:28:56.223
I don't see what harm could come from that.

02:28:57.166 --> 02:29:00.866
You know, you touched on a good point because, you know, the title that you're

02:29:00.866 --> 02:29:06.006
seeking is representative because the average everyday citizen doesn't have

02:29:06.006 --> 02:29:10.466
time to, you know, go down to the Capitol building and make a decision.

02:29:10.466 --> 02:29:15.226
So they choose a representative to handle their business. That's why you have that. Right.

02:29:15.826 --> 02:29:20.566
And the other thing is public service is like you're a servant.

02:29:20.746 --> 02:29:28.466
You're supposed to serve the people, not not dictate to the people. And so, yeah, yeah.

02:29:28.706 --> 02:29:33.686
So I'm cool with the answer that you gave on that one.

02:29:34.006 --> 02:29:37.466
All right. So the last thing we were talking about was small business.

02:29:38.366 --> 02:29:44.226
Georgia is considered the 19th best state in the nation for small businesses.

02:29:44.626 --> 02:29:49.286
How do you want the state of Georgia to invest more in small businesses?

02:29:50.186 --> 02:29:52.666
Well, we need to give access to startup capital.

02:29:53.907 --> 02:29:58.147
Particularly as it relates to underserved communities.

02:29:58.527 --> 02:30:02.967
Look, we all want access to the American dream.

02:30:03.227 --> 02:30:07.547
We all want to be able to achieve and be all that we can be.

02:30:07.607 --> 02:30:13.427
And it's my belief that the fundamental premise of our government is to create

02:30:13.427 --> 02:30:14.907
opportunity, not obstacles.

02:30:15.587 --> 02:30:20.207
And this is something that you hear Republicans talk about all the time.

02:30:20.207 --> 02:30:24.167
And I just so happen to agree with them is the idea of regulations.

02:30:24.167 --> 02:30:28.687
They look at regulations as obstacles or obstructions.

02:30:28.827 --> 02:30:36.027
OK, so let's let's apply that same logic to to many of our small business owners

02:30:36.027 --> 02:30:39.867
who, because they're small business owners, are startups.

02:30:39.867 --> 02:30:46.387
So we need to look at providing some type of startup capital through maybe grants.

02:30:47.267 --> 02:30:54.687
Funding some type of programs where these budding entrepreneurs can take advantage

02:30:54.687 --> 02:30:59.247
of a training program, a session, or whatever the case is.

02:30:59.247 --> 02:31:05.547
Write a grant, and then the state in some kind of way can help them get that

02:31:05.547 --> 02:31:08.127
business off the ground.

02:31:08.347 --> 02:31:13.127
It's operating, it's functional, and who knows what it can grow into.

02:31:13.427 --> 02:31:17.687
And look, this is something else too when it comes to small business development

02:31:17.687 --> 02:31:21.167
and supporting small businesses. It's not just small businesses.

02:31:21.347 --> 02:31:25.247
We have to look at our micro businesses. See, because that word small,

02:31:25.507 --> 02:31:30.287
when people hear that phrase, small business, they're thinking about the mom

02:31:30.287 --> 02:31:35.467
and pop storefront that they drive by on their way home.

02:31:35.907 --> 02:31:40.827
They're thinking about the landscaper who cuts their grass. What they're not

02:31:40.827 --> 02:31:42.627
thinking about is some of these.

02:31:43.717 --> 02:31:49.997
Companies who may have 100, 200 employees. So how are we quantifying what it

02:31:49.997 --> 02:31:52.477
means to be a small business owner?

02:31:53.097 --> 02:31:56.197
We have to think about our micro business owners.

02:31:56.477 --> 02:32:03.217
That's something that I'm looking to do is put more of a focus on our micro business owners.

02:32:03.397 --> 02:32:08.937
And the reason why is because of this, because micro businesses are the ones

02:32:08.937 --> 02:32:13.357
who are the most cost sensitive to fluctuations in the market.

02:32:13.717 --> 02:32:18.737
This is something that we've seen with Donald Trump's disastrous tariff policies.

02:32:18.897 --> 02:32:22.797
A lot of the businesses that have had to scale back.

02:32:23.657 --> 02:32:29.057
Shutter their operations, shut everything down, are our micro-business owners

02:32:29.057 --> 02:32:36.597
because they simply can't handle the added tax of these tariffs that Donald Trump,

02:32:36.857 --> 02:32:38.897
President Trump, has been pursuing.

02:32:38.897 --> 02:32:44.837
So in my advocacy and in my fighting for small businesses,

02:32:45.217 --> 02:32:52.597
I'm going to put a special lens and focus on our micro business owners who are

02:32:52.597 --> 02:32:57.757
just everyday men and women who may not have come from a lot of money,

02:32:57.757 --> 02:33:00.137
who may not have come from a lot of privilege,

02:33:00.317 --> 02:33:03.177
but have an idea, have the will,

02:33:03.657 --> 02:33:10.997
have the get up and go, and just simply need a fair shot at success.

02:33:11.397 --> 02:33:17.697
And so those are the types of businesses that I really want to pay attention to.

02:33:18.597 --> 02:33:24.617
Obviously, you know, we can talk about tax incentives for our businesses who

02:33:24.617 --> 02:33:29.117
are hiring right here from the community locally. And.

02:33:30.556 --> 02:33:38.876
Know, our mom and pop grocers and storefronts. And so when I'm state representative,

02:33:39.096 --> 02:33:40.576
when I'm representing the district,

02:33:40.916 --> 02:33:45.656
that's something that I intend to do. And then the other component of this, Mr.

02:33:45.796 --> 02:33:48.276
Fleming, also is awareness.

02:33:49.176 --> 02:33:56.296
Partnering with the Henry County Chamber of Commerce, which I am a member and, you know,

02:33:56.456 --> 02:34:03.716
having, you know, training programs and and small business fairs where we can

02:34:03.716 --> 02:34:11.056
give them more access to greater information, because as you and I both know,

02:34:11.476 --> 02:34:14.536
knowledge is power. where you can't do better if you don't know better.

02:34:14.736 --> 02:34:19.776
And so those are just some of the things I think that needs to be done that

02:34:19.776 --> 02:34:22.496
we can do, again, from a practical standpoint.

02:34:23.216 --> 02:34:26.716
And I look forward to getting that done when I'm elected.

02:34:27.972 --> 02:34:32.892
So District 81 is one of the most diverse legislative districts in Georgia.

02:34:33.952 --> 02:34:38.152
Last go around, you received 47% of the vote.

02:34:39.372 --> 02:34:44.852
Well, 43%. It was 43%. I said it was 43%, but who's counting?

02:34:45.192 --> 02:34:48.192
Well, I gave you 47%, you know, either way.

02:34:48.492 --> 02:34:51.992
I understand. You was watching the scoreboard more than I was.

02:34:52.132 --> 02:34:59.572
I understand. What would make 2026 the year you become the next representative for District 81?

02:35:00.532 --> 02:35:06.532
Oh, wow. Well, some of the things is this time I'm out the entire election cycle.

02:35:06.712 --> 02:35:12.072
I think people forget I didn't get into the race till July of 2024.

02:35:12.172 --> 02:35:16.172
So I was kind of on a limited I was on a very limited clock.

02:35:16.172 --> 02:35:21.312
And so I'm out talking to folks, knocking doors, going to every part of the

02:35:21.312 --> 02:35:23.932
district, talking to even many Republicans.

02:35:23.932 --> 02:35:27.472
Some of the things we've seen from congressional Republicans

02:35:27.472 --> 02:35:33.292
and even some state Republicans is this hesitance to hold town halls and talk

02:35:33.292 --> 02:35:37.652
with their constituents because they know that many of the things that's being

02:35:37.652 --> 02:35:43.712
implemented from the national level that's trickling down to the state isn't

02:35:43.712 --> 02:35:45.032
popular with a lot of folks.

02:35:45.612 --> 02:35:53.672
Even many of their own bases So if you won't talk to them I will And I'm going to The other thing is.

02:35:54.700 --> 02:35:59.120
You know, we are, there's a lot of demographic shifts taking place in this district.

02:35:59.920 --> 02:36:03.040
It's trending in that direction.

02:36:03.580 --> 02:36:07.120
And aside from that, this is some of what I can tell you, Mr.

02:36:07.220 --> 02:36:10.780
Fleming, is as I've been going out knocking doors, the energy,

02:36:11.180 --> 02:36:16.160
the feel, and the vibe is vastly different from what it was in 2024.

02:36:16.900 --> 02:36:20.560
People are engaged. Many people are outraged.

02:36:20.860 --> 02:36:27.780
Many people are enthused. and are chomping at the bit to express their frustration

02:36:27.780 --> 02:36:31.200
with the direction of our country through their vote.

02:36:31.560 --> 02:36:37.600
And so there's been times I went up to doors and knocked, and that conversation

02:36:37.600 --> 02:36:41.740
turns into a 30-minute conversation. And, of course, I'm doing more listening

02:36:41.740 --> 02:36:45.280
than talking because that's the job of a representative.

02:36:46.040 --> 02:36:49.780
In order for me to go to the state capitol in order to fight for her.

02:36:50.982 --> 02:36:56.062
For you. I have to know what you care about and what has stoked your ire,

02:36:56.422 --> 02:36:57.882
you know, what grinds your gears.

02:36:58.502 --> 02:37:03.202
And so we're out a lot early. We're knocking doors, talking to folks.

02:37:03.462 --> 02:37:09.042
We are letting them know what's at stake in this next election cycle.

02:37:09.042 --> 02:37:14.942
And we're letting them know what Mishael White aims to do for them when I go

02:37:14.942 --> 02:37:16.902
up there to that state Capitol.

02:37:17.042 --> 02:37:21.502
Something that we've seen, And it just happened here recently in a special election,

02:37:22.102 --> 02:37:30.102
District 121, my fellow Fighting 50 candidate, Eric Gisler, flipped a Trump

02:37:30.102 --> 02:37:35.382
district that he just lost in 2024.

02:37:35.882 --> 02:37:42.002
He got 39 percent of the vote and it is go around. He got 50.1 percent of the vote.

02:37:42.222 --> 02:37:45.242
And so we think that that is a trend that bodes well.

02:37:45.242 --> 02:37:52.622
We think that we have a really good shot, and we think we do have crossover

02:37:52.622 --> 02:37:55.802
appeal to many Republican voters,

02:37:55.942 --> 02:38:01.542
moderate Republican voters who don't agree with what they're seeing coming down

02:38:01.542 --> 02:38:04.502
from this Trump administration.

02:38:04.502 --> 02:38:09.422
And coupled with the fact that, look, the economy isn't great right now.

02:38:09.602 --> 02:38:11.702
We have inflation.

02:38:12.182 --> 02:38:20.802
The economy is teetering on the brink of being under a verified recession.

02:38:21.762 --> 02:38:27.822
And so there's a lot of meat on the bone when it comes to talking to folks about

02:38:27.822 --> 02:38:33.382
the issues that are impacting them in their everyday life.

02:38:33.642 --> 02:38:36.082
And so that's what we intend to do. That's what we are doing.

02:38:36.122 --> 02:38:41.322
And we fully intend on being successful this November in 2026.

02:38:41.322 --> 02:38:42.562
We're going to get it done.

02:38:43.202 --> 02:38:47.682
So I've been asking all of my guests this question this year.

02:38:49.002 --> 02:38:53.722
So finish this sentence. I have hope because...

02:38:55.466 --> 02:38:58.186
People I have hope because the people the

02:38:58.186 --> 02:39:01.106
thing that that gives me hope is the people

02:39:01.106 --> 02:39:04.426
look i don't i don't believe that we are

02:39:04.426 --> 02:39:12.426
as ugly as our timelines tell us we are i think the reason why we we've seen

02:39:12.426 --> 02:39:21.386
so so much effort from those in power from maga that's just that's just keep it real, from MAGA,

02:39:21.606 --> 02:39:28.146
when it comes to this ugliness, when it comes to the normalizing of hate speech

02:39:28.146 --> 02:39:32.706
is not because they're trying to convince us that's who they are.

02:39:32.806 --> 02:39:36.026
It's because they're trying to convince us that's who we are.

02:39:36.326 --> 02:39:41.946
And if that's who we are fundamentally as a country, as Americans,

02:39:41.946 --> 02:39:46.846
as Georgians, as residents in District 81, why do you have to go through so

02:39:46.846 --> 02:39:48.626
much effort to show us that.

02:39:49.006 --> 02:39:54.566
I have faith in the people. When I go throughout District 81,

02:39:54.906 --> 02:39:56.466
I don't see that ugliness.

02:39:57.086 --> 02:40:01.846
I see people from all different walks of life, all different races,

02:40:02.066 --> 02:40:09.266
all different political beliefs in community with one another. I see them at food banks.

02:40:09.366 --> 02:40:17.286
I see them at churches. I see them at our local parades and different events

02:40:17.286 --> 02:40:20.286
in the county and in the district and community.

02:40:20.666 --> 02:40:28.106
No one is yelling and screaming or being nasty or being hateful.

02:40:28.206 --> 02:40:32.026
And this is one thing I always go back to, Mr.

02:40:32.166 --> 02:40:35.526
Fleming, is the American people may be distracted.

02:40:36.166 --> 02:40:38.006
They may be disinterested.

02:40:38.726 --> 02:40:42.506
They may be discouraged. but they are not stupid.

02:40:43.426 --> 02:40:45.706
They know a bad deal when they see one.

02:40:46.724 --> 02:40:52.164
They know when something isn't right and they know when we can do better.

02:40:53.024 --> 02:40:56.784
Now, does that mean I'm going to get everyone's support?

02:40:56.964 --> 02:41:01.744
Does that mean I'm going to be able to convince everyone that we have more that

02:41:01.744 --> 02:41:04.784
binds us together in community than not?

02:41:05.224 --> 02:41:10.864
No, it doesn't. But I don't have to get everybody. I only got to get 50.1 percent.

02:41:12.124 --> 02:41:18.904
And so I like my odds when it comes to that. I have hope because of the people.

02:41:20.004 --> 02:41:24.244
So if people want to get involved with the campaign, how can they do that?

02:41:24.824 --> 02:41:33.884
Well, they can send me an email at MishaelWhite4Georgia at gmail.com.

02:41:34.044 --> 02:41:42.404
They can follow my Instagram, MishaelWhite4FORGeorgia. And you can also catch

02:41:42.404 --> 02:41:45.244
me on Facebook at Mishael White.

02:41:45.444 --> 02:41:47.224
Those are my social medias. That's

02:41:47.224 --> 02:41:51.964
my email. Again, my email is Mishael White, the number for Georgia.

02:41:52.184 --> 02:42:03.584
That's M-I-S-H-A-E-L-W-H-I-T-E, the number four Georgia at Gmail dot com.

02:42:03.584 --> 02:42:06.304
Look, we need all the help we can get.

02:42:06.464 --> 02:42:09.624
And the thing that I want people to understand is that this is more than just

02:42:09.624 --> 02:42:13.544
about a campaign. This is a movement. This is the people's movement.

02:42:13.764 --> 02:42:23.444
This is about working families, working men and women, and letting the power

02:42:23.444 --> 02:42:26.844
structure know in no uncertain terms that this is our country too.

02:42:26.844 --> 02:42:30.504
We have more to offer than just our backs and our labor.

02:42:30.744 --> 02:42:38.604
And no longer will we allow crusaders on the left and activists on the right to drown out our voices.

02:42:38.924 --> 02:42:43.964
Our time has come and our time is now. And that's why we're going to be successful.

02:42:45.060 --> 02:42:49.060
Well, Mr. White, I wish you much success, brother, on this journey.

02:42:49.600 --> 02:42:54.400
I am not envious of you because I've been there, done that, and I know how hard it is.

02:42:55.080 --> 02:43:00.700
But I appreciate you getting out there and offering yourself a service.

02:43:01.080 --> 02:43:09.680
And I also appreciate you taking a lot of time to come on this podcast and talk to the listeners.

02:43:09.880 --> 02:43:12.120
So I thank you so much.

02:43:12.520 --> 02:43:15.680
And thank you so much for having me, Mr. Fleming. You know,

02:43:15.780 --> 02:43:21.980
your words of wisdom and encouragement have meant everything to me because you

02:43:21.980 --> 02:43:29.640
are someone who's been there and done that in a state like Mississippi, no less.

02:43:29.900 --> 02:43:33.040
So I know you are battle tested.

02:43:33.140 --> 02:43:38.940
You know what it takes to not only win, but to serve and be a good legislator and actually do the job.

02:43:39.080 --> 02:43:43.680
And so I look forward to continuing to have you have you in my corner.

02:43:43.680 --> 02:43:48.760
Your support and your knowledge and your wisdom means everything everything

02:43:48.760 --> 02:43:55.520
to me thank you so much you're too kind brother all right guys we're gonna catch y'all on the other side.

02:44:07.580 --> 02:44:14.840
All right, and we are back. So I want to thank Nekima Levy-Armstrong for coming

02:44:14.840 --> 02:44:20.060
on and giving us an update about what's going on in Minnesota.

02:44:21.401 --> 02:44:25.881
She has been one of the leaders in organizing the community,

02:44:25.881 --> 02:44:37.001
and it means something to see one of us being respected enough and having the

02:44:37.001 --> 02:44:44.241
credibility to be the voice for the people in Minnesota.

02:44:45.141 --> 02:44:50.981
And, you know, in the show, especially the black community, solidarity with

02:44:50.981 --> 02:44:57.661
the rest of the city in dealing with the invasion of ICE and,

02:44:57.941 --> 02:45:02.541
you know, especially after the tragic death of Renee Nicole Good.

02:45:04.161 --> 02:45:08.341
And, you know, she reminded us in the interview that this is not the first rodeo

02:45:08.341 --> 02:45:13.661
that they've had to go through dealing with tragedies with the police.

02:45:14.581 --> 02:45:20.581
And, you know, and that they're willing and ready to stand up against that.

02:45:21.341 --> 02:45:28.881
And, you know, just be reassured that what you see on the news and,

02:45:29.101 --> 02:45:32.541
you know, and all the tough talk that's coming out of Washington,

02:45:32.741 --> 02:45:36.181
that there are people in Minneapolis, St.

02:45:36.281 --> 02:45:41.401
Paul, as well as in the whole state of Minnesota, that's resisting.

02:45:42.501 --> 02:45:46.301
And that they're not going to waver in that resistance.

02:45:46.641 --> 02:45:54.761
I want to thank Dr. Kem Laurin Lubin for coming on and educating us about the

02:45:54.761 --> 02:45:58.261
work that she's doing to make sure that artificial intelligence,

02:45:58.261 --> 02:46:02.821
as it's being incorporated more and more in our daily lives,

02:46:03.061 --> 02:46:08.321
that she's one of the people on the front line to make sure that Black folks

02:46:08.321 --> 02:46:11.081
are in the conversation, in the programming,

02:46:11.401 --> 02:46:13.061
in the designing, all that stuff.

02:46:14.221 --> 02:46:19.501
And her crusade to make sure that it is beneficial to.

02:46:20.870 --> 02:46:23.990
And not harmful to us, right?

02:46:24.370 --> 02:46:29.670
You know, very, very passionate sister about that work. Very intelligent sister.

02:46:30.610 --> 02:46:37.570
And as they say in a lot of the action movies, I'm glad she's on our side, right?

02:46:38.850 --> 02:46:45.230
And finally, Mishael White. This is a young brother that I've had the pleasure of meeting.

02:46:45.230 --> 02:46:54.490
And he's going up against a MAGA Republican in his race for District 81 in the

02:46:54.490 --> 02:46:57.230
state of Georgia, House District 81.

02:46:58.330 --> 02:47:03.870
And, you know, when I say MAGA, I mean like the unrepentant MAGA,

02:47:04.090 --> 02:47:11.730
like whatever you hear Karoline Leavitt or Stephen Miller or Donald Trump or J.D.

02:47:11.850 --> 02:47:15.650
Vance, out or out of their mouths, she parrots everything.

02:47:17.210 --> 02:47:22.130
And we're hopeful that the good folks in Henry County have had enough of that.

02:47:25.010 --> 02:47:31.090
And we'll go ahead and support him in his endeavor to be a true representative

02:47:31.090 --> 02:47:34.750
for all of them instead of just a select few, right?

02:47:35.210 --> 02:47:39.090
Because that's what really this is all boiling down to.

02:47:40.670 --> 02:47:44.410
You know, when you hear people say,

02:47:46.168 --> 02:47:50.908
say that they're looking out for the best interests of the United States,

02:47:50.908 --> 02:47:57.928
but all of their strategies and all of their talking points and all of their

02:47:57.928 --> 02:48:05.848
slogans that they use were borrowed from a guy who wanted to take over the world,

02:48:05.848 --> 02:48:12.168
who wanted to create an empire and use the acts of terror and war to do that.

02:48:14.068 --> 02:48:20.128
You know, if you're going to serve the people, you serve them with compassion

02:48:20.128 --> 02:48:24.708
and integrity and not terror, right?

02:48:25.328 --> 02:48:31.968
You know, somebody wrote that Stephen Miller was taught that the two strongest

02:48:31.968 --> 02:48:37.768
emotions in politics were hope and fear. And that's correct.

02:48:39.428 --> 02:48:45.508
And Barack Obama won because of hope, but fear is more powerful.

02:48:45.868 --> 02:48:49.348
And you should utilize that. That's what this guy told Stephen Miller,

02:48:49.488 --> 02:48:51.348
and Stephen Miller has run with that.

02:48:52.328 --> 02:48:56.688
Right? And everybody, President Trump, Vice President Vance,

02:48:57.488 --> 02:49:04.888
Secretary Noem, Secretary Hegseth, all these people, They want to bully and intimidate

02:49:04.888 --> 02:49:08.528
and oppress us into submission.

02:49:08.968 --> 02:49:17.028
And we're not going for that. That's not the ideal of this nation. That's not.

02:49:18.216 --> 02:49:21.776
That's not the spirit of humans, right?

02:49:23.356 --> 02:49:28.696
All we want to do is live our lives and live it abundantly.

02:49:28.896 --> 02:49:32.996
You've heard me say that over and over, and I will continue to impress upon that.

02:49:33.256 --> 02:49:36.696
And the fact that you're listening, I think you agree with that.

02:49:36.956 --> 02:49:47.076
I think you agree with the fact that you can probably get more from us if you respect us.

02:49:47.076 --> 02:49:55.476
But if you're in constant denial and you're constantly petulant and petty and, you know,

02:49:55.656 --> 02:50:02.256
just hitting all of the lowest common denominator emotions to present yourself

02:50:02.256 --> 02:50:04.636
to the nation and the world,

02:50:05.456 --> 02:50:10.676
it's natural for most of us, the overwhelming majority of us,

02:50:10.856 --> 02:50:15.116
to be disgusted and resist that.

02:50:15.876 --> 02:50:25.416
You know, we got a woman from another country who we went in and took the leader,

02:50:25.416 --> 02:50:31.056
and she was the opposition to that leader that we took,

02:50:31.336 --> 02:50:33.456
arrested, right?

02:50:34.636 --> 02:50:39.876
But she had to give up an award that she had earned for the work she was doing

02:50:39.876 --> 02:50:45.336
in that country, even though she still is the Nobel laureate.

02:50:45.836 --> 02:50:52.276
She just actually gave the physical medal to the president just to get his support

02:50:52.276 --> 02:50:57.016
to do the right thing, because he felt that he should have won the award.

02:50:58.500 --> 02:51:03.160
When we're talking about the Nobel Peace Prize, it's like you have to earn that.

02:51:03.800 --> 02:51:06.840
You know, you can't lobby for that.

02:51:07.260 --> 02:51:11.260
It's not a popularity contest. You can't call the folks in Oslo,

02:51:11.360 --> 02:51:13.880
Norway and demand that they do it.

02:51:14.380 --> 02:51:19.480
These people see what's going on in the world, and they take the time out once

02:51:19.480 --> 02:51:23.440
a year to decide this is somebody we need to lift up.

02:51:23.560 --> 02:51:26.500
This is somebody that we need to put in an international spotlight.

02:51:27.580 --> 02:51:31.660
And if they felt that he was worthy, he would have got the award himself.

02:51:32.300 --> 02:51:42.320
But this woman is so committed to saving her nation that she would give up the

02:51:42.320 --> 02:51:46.460
medal that she earned just to get support.

02:51:47.600 --> 02:51:52.000
That's, you know, some people say, oh, she's caving in and all that stuff.

02:51:52.820 --> 02:51:58.340
You know, people that are committed to helping other people make sacrifices.

02:51:59.140 --> 02:52:05.600
They do. And, you know, a lot of us would have said, ain't no way I would have done that.

02:52:05.780 --> 02:52:10.420
But you haven't been in her shoes.

02:52:10.840 --> 02:52:13.560
You haven't been in her struggle personally.

02:52:14.340 --> 02:52:19.500
If you have relatives, if you're listening and you have relatives that live

02:52:19.500 --> 02:52:22.240
in Venezuela or come from Venezuela, Thank you.

02:52:23.050 --> 02:52:26.510
You know, not unless you're one of those folks, you don't understand.

02:52:28.170 --> 02:52:29.730
And she didn't give him the check.

02:52:31.470 --> 02:52:36.870
See, a lot of people don't know. Everybody thinks all is just a medal and you

02:52:36.870 --> 02:52:41.090
get this instant international recognition and you can write a book and make your money.

02:52:41.330 --> 02:52:45.970
No, they give you a check, too, for the work that you're doing.

02:52:46.610 --> 02:52:53.710
And, you know, they give you money to support the cause because it's a foundation.

02:52:54.370 --> 02:52:58.270
Nobel Prize was set up by the guy who invented dynamite.

02:52:58.550 --> 02:53:05.810
And the money he made off of that, he created a foundation to give awards for

02:53:05.810 --> 02:53:10.530
people that do work in chemistry and physics because he was a scientist in mathematics.

02:53:10.530 --> 02:53:18.690
And later on, they expanded it to peace because, you know, the invention that

02:53:18.690 --> 02:53:22.290
he came up with was used and has been used for war.

02:53:22.490 --> 02:53:25.110
It was supposed to be for an industrial purpose.

02:53:25.550 --> 02:53:31.170
But of course, you know, when folks realize the dynamite can kill people,

02:53:31.350 --> 02:53:32.850
they started using it for war.

02:53:33.230 --> 02:53:36.990
And so they incorporated the peace prize in that as well.

02:53:37.710 --> 02:53:45.410
And so since it's a foundation, they give money to the people that get the awards.

02:53:45.890 --> 02:53:50.370
So she didn't give them the check. I want y'all to be clear. She got the money.

02:53:50.910 --> 02:53:54.790
You know, it's gone into whatever charity she wanted to use or,

02:53:54.790 --> 02:54:00.270
you know, gone to her party for their political operations to try to regain

02:54:00.270 --> 02:54:01.790
control of Venezuela, whatever.

02:54:02.070 --> 02:54:05.770
But she didn't give Donald Trump the check. She gave him the medal.

02:54:06.450 --> 02:54:09.210
If that's what you want, if that's what makes you feel better,

02:54:09.430 --> 02:54:14.310
okay. Now I need your help, right? You know, and had he...

02:54:15.713 --> 02:54:20.093
Not try to throw her under the bus when Maduro was arrested,

02:54:20.753 --> 02:54:22.613
she probably wouldn't have had to do that.

02:54:22.713 --> 02:54:29.573
But he said that because in his pettiness, he was mad that she won the Nobel Peace Prize and not him.

02:54:30.153 --> 02:54:34.073
So he wanted to use that as a leverage point.

02:54:36.593 --> 02:54:39.853
And regardless of what political party you're affiliated with,

02:54:40.073 --> 02:54:42.273
that's not American leadership.

02:54:42.433 --> 02:54:47.793
That's not what we signed up. That's not, we don't vote for that, right?

02:54:48.373 --> 02:54:57.793
Well, the majority of us, you know, we want our president to be an example of

02:54:57.793 --> 02:54:59.733
Democratic leadership,

02:55:00.093 --> 02:55:04.093
an example of rising above the fray,

02:55:04.653 --> 02:55:08.833
not the cause of the fray, right?

02:55:09.513 --> 02:55:16.433
So I know some people had offered all sorts of opinions about that, but that's where I am.

02:55:16.753 --> 02:55:20.713
But I just want to offer some encouragement,

02:55:22.060 --> 02:55:26.660
Not just the people of Minnesota, but, you know, my hometown of Chicago and

02:55:26.660 --> 02:55:28.140
Los Angeles and New York.

02:55:28.320 --> 02:55:31.940
And it looks like, you know, not only the people in Portland,

02:55:32.080 --> 02:55:35.540
Oregon, but Portland, Maine as well, Washington, D.C.

02:55:35.800 --> 02:55:38.220
And anywhere else in this country.

02:55:38.980 --> 02:55:43.860
I want you to be encouraged and I want you to learn lessons from Dr. King.

02:55:45.260 --> 02:55:50.720
Right. It's like I said, this episode is dropping on the national record now. It's holiday.

02:55:51.440 --> 02:55:56.800
And there's a reason why this man, who was not a president of the United States,

02:55:56.980 --> 02:56:00.020
has a holiday named after him.

02:56:00.220 --> 02:56:03.280
It's because of the sacrifice.

02:56:03.960 --> 02:56:09.720
And by the way, he won a Nobel Peace Prize, too. and the commitment and the

02:56:09.720 --> 02:56:16.780
dedication to make sure that all of us can live our best lives,

02:56:16.800 --> 02:56:22.880
that all of us can be part of this beloved community, that all of us can coexist

02:56:22.880 --> 02:56:33.980
and do the work necessary to build a nation up instead of tear it apart, right?

02:56:35.200 --> 02:56:40.120
And, you know, he fought against systemic racism. He fought against.

02:56:41.612 --> 02:56:47.892
Evil, right? And, you know, one of the things he always wanted to stress is

02:56:47.892 --> 02:56:52.712
that we don't conquer hate with hate, we conquer hate with love.

02:56:53.312 --> 02:57:02.112
And so I want everybody that's listening that when you resist, that you resist in love.

02:57:02.292 --> 02:57:10.332
As you don't cater to the base emotion of revenge or anger, you know,

02:57:10.452 --> 02:57:15.852
you channel that and you defeat hate and bigotry with love.

02:57:16.052 --> 02:57:23.112
That's the most powerful weapon that we have, you know, from an international standpoint.

02:57:23.432 --> 02:57:28.072
Now, on the 3rd of November of 2026,

02:57:28.592 --> 02:57:37.252
we as American citizens can exercise our right to vote and change the leadership

02:57:37.252 --> 02:57:42.972
of the Congress and our respective states and counties and cities.

02:57:42.972 --> 02:57:45.252
We can change leadership that way.

02:57:45.552 --> 02:57:48.872
Some elections have already taken place, right?

02:57:49.752 --> 02:57:56.552
You know, some elections are getting ready to happen and throughout this year,

02:57:56.552 --> 02:58:04.412
and we can use our power of our vote to send that message of love and peace,

02:58:05.112 --> 02:58:08.772
through the ballot box. But in the meantime.

02:58:10.420 --> 02:58:14.960
Don't be scared to hit these streets. Don't be scared to send that email off.

02:58:15.100 --> 02:58:16.980
Don't be scared to make that phone call.

02:58:17.560 --> 02:58:21.660
Don't be scared to show up at the Capitol building or at City Hall or the county

02:58:21.660 --> 02:58:24.000
courthouse or wherever government is meeting.

02:58:24.580 --> 02:58:26.320
To let them know how you feel.

02:58:28.580 --> 02:58:38.840
And, you know, no matter how strident people that don't mean any good try to be,

02:58:39.260 --> 02:58:43.920
love conquers all, always has, always will.

02:58:44.220 --> 02:58:47.000
So do not be dismayed. Do not be discouraged.

02:58:47.680 --> 02:58:52.920
Go forth and continue to resist. Use your voices.

02:58:54.100 --> 02:58:57.940
And, you know, we're going to win.

02:58:58.280 --> 02:59:02.260
It's going to take time. It always has, always will.

02:59:03.360 --> 02:59:09.580
But we can't sit back and do nothing. We can't sit back and just hope it blows over.

02:59:09.920 --> 02:59:11.900
We have to be engaged.

02:59:12.440 --> 02:59:17.300
We don't have the luxury of apathy. We have to be engaged.

02:59:18.140 --> 02:59:24.560
So just be encouraged. Don't let what you see on the news get you to the point

02:59:24.560 --> 02:59:29.720
where there's no hope and, you know, get you down and depressed and all that.

02:59:30.280 --> 02:59:37.340
Just use that as fuel. Use that as motivation to do what you can to protect

02:59:37.340 --> 02:59:39.200
what is rightfully ours.

02:59:40.786 --> 02:59:45.486
And we'll get through it. We'll get through it. As long as I'm able to do this,

02:59:45.746 --> 02:59:48.206
I'll continue to be a voice out here.

02:59:48.726 --> 02:59:52.126
I know I'm not alone in doing what I'm doing.

02:59:52.886 --> 02:59:58.786
And you should not feel alone doing what you need to do to resist.

03:00:00.046 --> 03:00:04.806
So that's all I got, ladies and gentlemen. Appreciate y'all for listening.

03:00:04.806 --> 03:00:11.126
I hope you enjoy the fact that we're going to get as many guests on as we can

03:00:11.126 --> 03:00:15.026
because 2026 is a pivotal year.

03:00:15.466 --> 03:00:21.106
There's a lot of folks, you know, that's running for office and we're going

03:00:21.106 --> 03:00:24.246
to use this platform to get them on.

03:00:24.426 --> 03:00:29.726
But there's a lot of other people not running for office doing the work that's

03:00:29.726 --> 03:00:32.686
going to make this country better, make this world better.

03:00:33.166 --> 03:00:38.926
And so we're going to do our part to get as many of them on this year as we

03:00:38.926 --> 03:00:42.286
can so I appreciate y'all indulgence and your patience.

03:00:43.786 --> 03:00:49.866
And again we're going to win we're going to win alright thank y'all for listening.