Drastic HUD cuts, DOE closings/firings, NOAA mass firings, Trump's economic policies spark chaos

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
Folks.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Today is Wednesday, March twelve, twenty twenty five. Coming up
on Rolling Uncultured streaming live on the black Start network.
The housing crisis will get remor the federal custom fair
housing programs and a preserve affordable housing. Also programs to
indiscrimination in housing. Will talk to the President. The Neighborhood
Assistants Corporation of America about the devastating consequences the unitest

(00:38):
Department of Housing and Urban Development rejects Hurricane Helen repair
efforts in Ashville, North carolinaa because the city's the post
recovery plan features a DEI program. The Department of Education
is the latest federal agency facing massive layoffs. The National
Pans Union president will join us to just talk about
the emmitt dismantling of the department.

Speaker 3 (00:59):
Also, Democrats are opposed.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
They are unified in opposing the House Republicans continuing resolution.
Republicans don't have the votes to make it happen. We'll
show you what Senator Chuck Schumer had to say. Plus
economic expert Steve Liisman calls it twice in each criminally
convicted felon and Team Donalds to con Trump economic.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
Policy and saying plus the abute of.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
A Freedom Writers Museum no longer listed for sale by
the US General Services Administration. Also a been on a
jury awards two black Chicago man one hundred and twenty
million dollars for spending decades in prison for a murder
they did not commit. It's time to bring the funk
on Roland Mark unforch on the Black sid network. Let's
go he Scott whatever the best, he's it, whatever it is.

Speaker 4 (01:45):
He's got the fact defined you wanna believes he's right
on top is best. Believe he's knowing town funks, Loston
news to politics with entertainment.

Speaker 5 (01:59):
Just looky, he's stolen.

Speaker 6 (02:07):
It's stove.

Speaker 4 (02:16):
He's proms built the question.

Speaker 7 (02:19):
No, he's proven.

Speaker 2 (02:34):
Massive changes are happening in the area of housing due
to the crazy Donald Trump Elon Musk administration. Folks, they're
slashing budgets, eliminating jobs. Also, there are any discrimination programs.
This comes as millions of Americans struggle with sky rockety
housing costs. So folks, just break this down for you.
Hud Fund's key programs that help keep families in their

(02:57):
homes provide ritual assistance and support the construction of affordable
housing but now, with an estimated eighty four percent of hoods,
community planning and development staff on the chopping block, critical services.

Speaker 3 (03:10):
Could be delayed or even shut down.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
For black families who are already disproportionately impacted by rising
rents and low home ownership rates, these cuts could mean
fewer housing vouchers, stall affordable housing projects, and more people
at risk of being homeless. HUD Secretary Scott Turner is
defending the move, saying it aligns with the Trump administration's
efforts to shrink the federal government. Joining US now as

(03:36):
Bruce Mark's CEO the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America that
are known as knack of the organization that's been at
the forefront of fighting for fair and affordable home ownership
for decades. Bruce, glad to have you here at the
end of the day when we talk about what's going
on here. This is going to have a massive, massive
impact on regular, ordinary people who don't have the means.

(04:00):
And what we're seeing is folks who ran a campaign
talking about Scott rocketing home prices.

Speaker 3 (04:07):
This ain't a plan. This is just whack away.

Speaker 8 (04:12):
Well you know it is that, But I think but
you also have to look at Roland is that this
is also a problem out there that has been as
we know, it's been out there for so long.

Speaker 9 (04:25):
So let's take a step back and see why the
government was so important because of the government, the VA
no down payment mortgage. It built the white suburbs after
World War Two because as we know, people of color
could not get a mortgage, so the no down payment
was fundamental in reshaping this country. And this administration wants

(04:46):
to destroy the housing programs across the board where you
talk about affordable home ownership, the development of that housing
Section eight, which is crucial for a cross section of people,
particularly in black community, and you know all the other
programs we talk about. But I also want to say,

(05:07):
you know, these programs have not worked the way they
should have been working over the long term. So I
hope we have an opportunity to talk.

Speaker 10 (05:14):
About that because politically, politically, this is the one issue,
probably the only issue that brings across the board people
of all political stripes, Republicans, Democrats, blacks, whites, Hispanics, everybody.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
The number one issue.

Speaker 9 (05:34):
For working people in this country is the lack of
affordable housing. And when people talk about it.

Speaker 2 (05:40):
Bruce Bruce. We thought that was the issue that we're
bringing folks together. What you have though, you have Republicans
who are just frankly doing whatever Donald Trump wants. He's
not facing any resistance in the House, in the Senate,
these Republican governors, and so the problem is you don't
have folks on the other side of the aisle standing

(06:03):
up for people who are being impacted.

Speaker 3 (06:06):
And yes, it impacts African Americas.

Speaker 2 (06:08):
But it's a whole bunch of white folks in America
who also participate in the hood programs.

Speaker 11 (06:14):
But when you look at.

Speaker 9 (06:15):
Those programs rolling, whether it's the building of affordable housing,
whether it's the Section eight, whether it's the housing activist,
we've got to reset. And part of the problem is
us because we haven't done the grassroots organizing so that
we can really get people involved, whether in the rural communities,

(06:36):
in the black communities, and the urban centers, we haven't
done that work. We've been sort of we've been lackadaisical
and almost arrogant in from a housing advocacy in a
housing industry, affordable housing industry, and really making people aware
of what we're doing out there and making it effective

(06:56):
so I think it's an opportunity. As bad as it
is with what Trump's doing, it's an opportunity for us
as housing advocates, as US affordable housing industry, to reset
and to re engage in the communities where we should
be because we haven't been doing that grassroots work.

Speaker 2 (07:20):
Okay, So if that's the case, then how do you
do that when they now are trying to do the
massive cuts Because at the end of the day, these
jobs are going away, the programs are going away. They
claim they're going to send the money to the states.
I'm not buying that one bit. I believe they're going
to whack these programs to pay for the task cuts

(07:40):
for the wealthy.

Speaker 9 (07:42):
So let's talk about one of the biggest issues that
no one's talking about yet, and that is these massive
Wall Street corporations who are buying up residential homes, often
in the black community because of the racist appraisals, those
properties are undervalued and so and that's in the urban areas,

(08:03):
in the rural communities as well. So NAKA, what we're
doing is we're reaching out to over eight hundred thousand
tenants who are owned whose properties are owned by Blackstone
invitation homes, these huge Wall Street investors as landlords. So
people don't even realize that being subjected to these corporations

(08:27):
who are stealing the dream affordable home ownership from them
because they use the management companies and they hide behind
the management companies. And so that's what us as housing advocates,
as housing activists, need to do to go into the neighborhoods,
to talk to the tenants and to organize them and
saying this is a concentrated effort to steal the dream,

(08:52):
to steal your wealth. And so yes, we could talk
about these programs, which are important programs, I mean, but
we also have to do more in terms of the
outreach and getting into the neighborhoods. So one of the
programs that we're focused on is what we call the
hot PHA. It's home Ownership through Public Housing ASSISTANMS. So

(09:15):
what we're saying is someone with a Section eight voucher
that they can use that voucher for the mortgage payment.
That's a crucial program and we're going to fight to
make sure that that stays because that's taking someone off
of the dependency of Section eight and putting them into
affordable home ownership. When in less than twenty years they're
going to be able to own that home out right.

(09:38):
But again, Ron, I think we got to understand that
it's an opportunity to reset what we have been doing
because those programs are good, but they're not good enough.

Speaker 2 (09:51):
Okay, all right, So here's the deal. Though you're saying
a reset, Okay, fine, show me how that happens, because
that's not I'm hearing from MAGA. That's not what I'm
hearing from Trump, that's not what I'm hearing from Doves.
That's not what I'm hearing from House Republicans. As Center Republicans,
they have no problem if these programs totally go away. Okay,

(10:13):
So what's the plan. What do you do? Because they're
on the chopping block, they're about to go, and we
know it's harder.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
To get something back but it is to cut.

Speaker 11 (10:27):
So so you're exactly right.

Speaker 9 (10:28):
They have no intention of making these programs work. Their
agenda is to undermine those programs and to eliminate them.
So that's the problem with their agenda. But our agenda
has to be what NAC is doing and other groups
are doing, and that is starting to re engage in
the neighborhood. So we we do these big events with

(10:49):
the HBCUs. So we you know, we're going to do
one starting next Friday and you know, Virginia Union. Then
we're doing other events in Tulsa around the country where
we get thousands and thousands of home buyers coming in
to access affordable home ownership because people can get a
mortgage payment often lesson than what they're paying in rent.

(11:11):
So it's really getting.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
The work right, right.

Speaker 3 (11:13):
But but but, Bruisings, here's.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
What I'm still not hearing though. But here's what I'm
still not hearing though. What I need to know is, Okay,
how are you then getting these folks who are African, American,
Latino and white these areas. How are you mobilizing and
organizing them to put pressure on Republicans in Congress not

(11:36):
to whack the programs. I get how we need to
be reshaped and fixed. But again, in the absence of
massive public pressure, these programs are going to disappear.

Speaker 3 (11:49):
So how are you.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
Organizing and mobilizing the people right now to do that?

Speaker 9 (11:54):
Because when they come to our events what we call
what we call the Naka Achieve the Gym event, people
they have to be registered voters. So we've got to
make sure that their voice is heard. We've got to
make sure that they vote, and then we've got to
make sure that they interact with their with their members
of Congress and their senators. And this is across the board,

(12:15):
in all in all the communities, the rural, the white,
the black, across the board, because that is an issue
that will mobilize people, and that's what we have to do.
So it's not good enough that the activists are just
are just calling their members of Congress. We need the
people who are impacted by this to do that. And

(12:36):
that's what we have to do, going back to the grassroots,
and that's what NACA is doing. Another, all right, I
do that as well.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
Okay, okay, you said that's what NACA is doing.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
What you have to do? Okay, right now, how many
people do you already have signed up who you can
whether you have their names, address this, phone numbers, emails,
social media.

Speaker 3 (13:01):
How many people.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Do you right now have organized to do what you
just talked about?

Speaker 9 (13:07):
Three point seven million members. NAKA has three point seven
million members who have been going through the program during
the mortgage crisis. As you know, Roland we helped over
five hundred thousand people save their homes. We've put over
one hundred thousand people into homes. And we so when
we do this event, for example, at Virginia Union University

(13:29):
over three days, we'll have over seven thousand people come.
And we've been doing these two.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
Right, right, but numb, but numb. But here's what I'm
asking though, Here's what I'm asking. You've had three points
of a million come through, You've had five hundred thousand
you put in homes. What I'm saying is, do you
can you? Can you touch all three point seven million
right now? Can you do you have it broken down
by congressional district? And so can you sit here and say, okay,

(13:59):
in this congressional district, Let's take the thirtieth congressional district
in Texas As. Congswoman Jasmine Crockett, do you have it
broken down? How many people you assisted in that congressional district?
Can you? Can you then reach out to those folks
right now and say, hey, we need you to call
Congswoman Jasmine Crockett, And then we have expert people who

(14:20):
is in this district of this Republican and this Republican
is your data broken down and aggregated that way.

Speaker 9 (14:29):
Yes, and even more than that is that we map
it out. So you map it out so people can
see in their neighborhoods who has come through NAKA so
they can work together is as a neighborhood committee to
do that also, okay, also we bought we have the

(14:50):
consumer data on every American adult, three hundred million Americans.
So what we did and achieved the Dream event working
with the Colone Workers Union in Las Vegas. We did
it mailing to over two hundred thousand consumer adults households

(15:11):
who are renting, and we get a massive turnout from that.
So yes, that outreach is there, both from our own data,
their emails, phone numbers, addresses their circumstances, what their housing
situation is, as well as the overall consumer data. So yes,
you're exactly right. You have to do that outreach, and

(15:34):
we have to focus on the individuals across the board,
in the households.

Speaker 12 (15:40):
And to show.

Speaker 9 (15:44):
And so to see the concentration that people have so
they realize that they're in it together. So people should
go to NACA dot com, NACA dot com and join
these campaigns. And then we got to get the housing
activists out there to say yes, let's get back on
the grassroots and reconnect with the people in the neighborhoods,

(16:05):
because that's one of the reasons that people didn't vote,
they didn't feel connected.

Speaker 2 (16:11):
All right, Bruce Factilla, appreciate it. Thank you so very much.
It's great to be on.

Speaker 13 (16:16):
Thank you for having me.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
Rolan, thank you. I want to bring my panel Robert Bartillo,
civil rights attorney coming to us out of DC. Rebecca
Corulla's vice president, Fair Election Center out of DC. Doctor
Zachary Kirk, educator and content creator out of Atlanta. I
want to start with you, Rebecca. The point that I
was sitting here really locking on there with Bruce is again,

(16:38):
it's one thing to say we need the programs, how
beneficial they are, but this is a moment where organizations
have to be fixated and aggressive when it comes to
organizing and mobilizing people to put pressure. Right now, NAKA
should be sending people to every single one of these

(17:00):
town halls these Republicans are having, and then if they're
scared to show up to town halls, if they have teletown.

Speaker 3 (17:07):
Halls, get them on the lines as well.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
This is where public pressure must be brought to bear.

Speaker 7 (17:17):
Grow when you're right.

Speaker 14 (17:19):
What's scary right now is many people in this country
don't understand what's going on, and they don't understand how
things work.

Speaker 7 (17:26):
In this country.

Speaker 14 (17:27):
So to hear that there are cuts and housing people
really don't understand the impact.

Speaker 7 (17:32):
So it's very critical right.

Speaker 14 (17:33):
Now for organizations to really drive home the impact to ordinary,
everyday people, so then those people can then mobilize and talk.

Speaker 7 (17:42):
To their member of Congress.

Speaker 14 (17:43):
It's all hands on deck right now, but it first
starts with people actually understanding what's going on.

Speaker 2 (17:51):
Absolutely. And again, I mean we can go from an
issue to issue to issue, Robert, And this is a moment. Yes,
you got Republicans. We're targeting activists on the ground. We
see what's happening with at Columbia University, we see how
they want to attack Black Lives Matter.

Speaker 3 (18:10):
But this is where organizations people.

Speaker 2 (18:12):
That are facing massive cuts to grants and things along
those lines. Hey, they now got to recognize they're in
the activist business.

Speaker 15 (18:29):
Robert, Well, yeah, Rollan, I think a big porter portion
of this is that the problem that so many people
are tuned out to American politics right now. What Republicans
and successful been able to do is flood the zone.
Every single day there's a new crazy thing that's crazier
than anything you've ever heard before. We're going to invade Greenland.
We're going to turn Canada into a state where conquering

(18:49):
the Panama CoA down. We're making hotels in Gaza and
then these bread and butter issues that affect every day
Americans are slipping through the cracks. I told to a
young lady today was twenty three years old, she was
a mother. She had no concept what Congress did, who
was the president, or what's going on currently. And when
you have this information gap where you have people who
are truly tuned into politics not being able to communicate

(19:11):
with such a large portion of population, Unfortunately, there's gonna
be a lot of people who don't find out these
issues until it is indeed too late. We are on
the prefaces of being too late to be able to
rescue any of these programs. Is going to take massive efforts,
not just by the black community. Because we did our
job in November. We turned out in the numbers we
were supposed to in November. We have to make sure
that the rest of the quote unquote, alliance is working

(19:34):
together hand in hand to push these issues for because
these aren't going to be things that are going to
just affect black folks. They are going to affect everyday
working class people around the country. Right now, if you
look at the continued Resolution and the cuts they have
in it, you're talking about thirty two thousand households around
the country that will immediately face eviction if these budget
cuts go into place. We're talking about homelessness, hunger going

(19:56):
through the roof in this country because of these budget cuts.
And we have so many people who are still tuned in,
worried about stephen A. Smith arguing with Lebron, worrying about
Chris Shawn and Blue Face, that aren't being penetrated by
these messages. And we have to make sure we're rallying
the folks around us so they understand what the fight
is that they're in it.

Speaker 2 (20:15):
Zachary, that was the point that I was making there
with Bruce. This ain't a black volts that it's been
the organization the motivation of white people.

Speaker 6 (20:25):
Agree one hundred and ten percent.

Speaker 16 (20:26):
And so this is a story, unfortunately in the part
that's a part of American history and that is as
old as time, and I'm disappointed that we didn't have
more advocacy in the election season to educate and informed people.
I know that our special guests did a great job
of explaining the situations, saying that Americans, you know, weren't
invested or drawn in. But a big part of that

(20:48):
them not being good, them not being drawn is because
they were not aware. And I don't know if our
legacy organizations did a good job of making them aware.
Every time Black people build communities in this country and
invest the work and they have the opportunity for generational
will through home ownership, our government, particularly one party, finds
a way to take it away. You have Rosewood, Oscarville, Greenwood's, Greenwood, Slocum, Cofax, Louisiana, Wilmington,

(21:16):
North Carolina, over and over and over. This is now
happening again where Black people and home ownership are being
that's being put in jeopardy, and I don't know if
the word is out in our community, and there's definitely
not the level of advocacy that we need to see
to ensure that black people are informed and that we
are able to keep our homes because now with what's
happening with HUD. It is definitely something that puts our

(21:37):
community in jeopardy. We need to see exactly as you said,
this organization at the town halls raising awareness. We can
just see more of our organizations that are similar in
that are a lives of the same goals also being
activated and fighting. We can't sit back and constantly wait
for as the statement goes, black faces our places to
save us minority. The Jefferies can't fix this form and

(21:59):
vice president commonly can't fix this. They can't do this
is the work of advocacy groups and grassroot efforts. We
have a role to play in saving ourselves and we've
got to do that.

Speaker 2 (22:10):
But I'll be honest, Rebecca, there were a lot of
people who were sitting here making these things known. But
the reality is a bunch of people will check out
of the process and then all of a sudden, elections
over now there's an inauguration of co president Elam Musk
comes in making mess because people go, oh my god,
I can't believe.

Speaker 3 (22:29):
What's going on. Well, hell, we sat there and told
you for three years.

Speaker 2 (22:33):
And so it's a lot of people right now who
need to be looking at themselves going you.

Speaker 3 (22:38):
Know what, I set my ass on the sideline, and.

Speaker 2 (22:42):
Now it's too late because they're going to be there
for the next four years.

Speaker 14 (22:48):
Absolutely, this is the part where we get into the
faf OH where a lot of people, you know, they
messed around and now they're finding out. But I'm also
sympathetic because there's so many people who are hurting.

Speaker 7 (22:58):
In this country. They're going to get team the hurt.
They're gonna be feeling a lot of economic pain. They're
gonna be feeling pain when.

Speaker 14 (23:04):
It comes to their health care, accessing benefits, especially even
when we think about what's happening with our veterans. But
what people have to understand there are forty six states
this year that have elections. Next year is midterms for everybody.
There's also several governor's racists that are on the ballot.
There are US Senate races. Ohio has a US Senate

(23:25):
race in twenty twenty six. There are plenty of opportunities
for people to vote at the ballot box if they
don't like what's going on.

Speaker 7 (23:33):
But to your point, people have to be engaged.

Speaker 14 (23:36):
It's not up to a political party to tell you, hey,
it's time to be engaged. It's not up to a
politician to tell you, hey, it's time to be engaged.
But in your everyday life, I am letting you know
it is time to be engaged because if you blink,
if you go to sleep, if you don't pay attention
to what's happening your unfortunately, your current way of life

(23:57):
is going to be severely impacted by this administry and
cruelty and pain is the point.

Speaker 3 (24:05):
Yeah, indeed, and Robert, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (24:08):
There are ninety million people who chose not to vote
who now are going to be impacting. This is why
we keep saying, folks have got to be in the game.
They've got to be involved.

Speaker 3 (24:18):
And I get it.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
People have lives, and they have jobs, and they have
families and they have stresses. But when you start complaining
after the fact, y'all, we can't help you. We needed
you engage before these idiots got in.

Speaker 15 (24:35):
Well, Roland, I think in large part we're almost a
victim of the success of the Obama years, victims of
the success of the Biden years, where you have an
entire generation that's grown up in what can be described
tots Americana, where we are in a period of time
of economic growth of America, Dominus. The dollar goes up
in value every year, home prices rise year over year.

(24:56):
Since ninety eleven, we haven't faced terrorist attacks here in
the on our homelands. And because of that, many people
simply forgotten what things were like beforehand. People forgotten the
recession of the Great Recession in two thousand and eight
and two thousand and nine. People forgot about the housing
crisis that took place somehow, people forgot about the COVID
pandemic from four years ago. When it comes to what

(25:18):
America looked like under Trump, and because of that, we've
now turned our government a large part into a reality
show where people have disconnected what's going on in watching
DC from how it impacts and affects their daily life.
So when President Trump and Emperor Elon are doing crazy things,
they're like, Oh, I wonder what's going to happen the
next episode, And unfortunately, for a large portion of the

(25:38):
American electorate is going to be when it finally hits home,
We've everything that people have said and that you said
during the twenty twenty four eliption cycle has come to pass.
President Trump was not joking about anything he said.

Speaker 13 (25:51):
He was going to do.

Speaker 15 (25:52):
Project twenty twenty five was literally a playbook. I think
they're on chapter nine right now, and they're going to
work their way through all nine hundred and twenty pages.
Highly recommend everybody during your spring reading read through the
entirety of it so you can see exactly what they're
going to do. When they said they were going through
purging the federal government of employees and replacing them with
Maggo loyalists, they're.

Speaker 13 (26:10):
Doing that right now.

Speaker 15 (26:12):
When they said they were going to take a chainsaw
in deleting entire agencies, they're doing that right now. And
I fear that it will not be until people are
being put out on the streets, when the breadlines start forming,
when the social unrest rises in the next couple of
months and next couple of years, then people will finally
realize that maybe this isn't a game show, and we
really need to be involved in our political system. So
we have to start organizing right now. Remember Donald Trump

(26:35):
started running for re election at one am on the
night of the of the election in twenty twenty.

Speaker 13 (26:41):
He did not wait.

Speaker 15 (26:42):
He literally started clearing the field of primary opponents, and
he started campaigning against President Biden. The day that he
lost that election. They filed over sixty lawsuits around the country.
They changed voting laws in twenty six states in order.
The East A wait Elon musk put in between three
hundred million and a billion dollars to till the election.
They were not playing and they planned for this moment.

(27:03):
We cannot be sitting here in the spring dilly delling
our fingers trying to figure out which way we're going
to go. We're burning time, burning effort. We need to
put that energy in planning for the next election, in
the election after that.

Speaker 2 (27:15):
And again, we have been warning people what was going
to go on. We've been warning them about what was
going to take place, but a lot of folk are
kind of like, yeah, well, I don't really think they're
going to do it. Take, for instance, the people in
North Carolina who were impacted by Hurricane Helene. What did
the hood decided? They've rejected the City of Ashfield, North

(27:37):
Carolina's two hundred and twenty five million dollar disaster relieve
plan because it prioritizes minority and women own businesses. HUS
Secretary Scott Turner says the city's draft plan included, quote
DEI criteria or diversity, equity and inclusion policies which his
department would no longer support. At the center of the
controversy's proposal to allocate fifteen million dollars to help small

(27:58):
businesses recover, including those owned by black entrepreneurs and women.
But now that funding is off the table, tournament a
clear statium quote DEI is dead at HUD. Under Trump's
latest executive order, federal agencies can no longer consider race, gender,
or diversity in funding decisions. That means cities like Ashvield,
where Hurricane Helen disproportionately impacted black and minority businesses, they

(28:21):
would have to compete without any targeted support facebook losing
critical relief funds. Ashviell City leaders have already revised their plan,
removing all references to minority and women owned businesses. Officials
say they non expect HUDD to approve the funding, which
will be used to rebuild home homes infrastructured economic recovery.
So guess what, Black folks in North Carolina who did

(28:41):
not vote, guess what. You helped Donald Trump win the state.
You help him retake the Oval office. This is what
we're talking about. Same thing goes for the Department of Education.
Their notices went out, but they're slashing half of all
of the jobs. More than thirteen hundred federal education employees

(29:02):
were unexpectedly laid off, not unexpectedly because Linna the McMahon said, Hey,
we're gonna shut down the department. All department offices in
DC and across the country were closed for security reasons.
The disbanding of the Department of Education will have serious consequences,
particularly are federal grants to loan programs and Title on
funding that supports schools in black and low income communities.

(29:23):
The White House is preparing the Executive or to dissolve
the Department of Education fully, even though you can't actually
do that. Congress must do it. But if you get
rid of all the employees, you've effectively killed the department.
Carry out Reaga's President of the National Parents Union, Jones
us right now, Carrie, listen. It was all in PREDIT
twenty twenty five. We knew this was happening. So are
a lot of the parents out there? Are they now

(29:46):
realizing this thing is for real?

Speaker 17 (29:49):
So many parents across the country are beside themselves, especially
parents who have children with special needs, because we rely
so heavily on the federal government to make sure that
the Idea Act is upheld. Frankly, you know, people don't
remember what it was like fifty sixty years ago and
why we created the US Department of Education. It wasn't

(30:11):
just about Brown versus Board of Education. It was about
all of these subsequent lawsuits that we had to file,
not just to desegregate, but to make sure that children
with special needs could have access to classrooms so they
didn't get blocked by governors and states making stupid decisions that.

Speaker 5 (30:29):
Hurt our kids.

Speaker 17 (30:30):
But that's where we're back in facing right now. And
yesterday what we saw was Lenna McMahon just didn't go
after random employees. The majority of the employees that the
number one target she went after were the attorneys. And
you fire those attorneys when you don't plan on upholding
the law and defending our rights. So that was a

(30:51):
strong signal to American families yesterday. I'll tell you that.

Speaker 2 (30:57):
Yeah, And I just want people to understand they have
got to be engaged in this process.

Speaker 3 (31:02):
This can't just be you know, folks like you and
other leaders.

Speaker 2 (31:06):
I keep saying, you cannot win wars only having generals
and colonels and startifs you need troops.

Speaker 17 (31:15):
We need everybody to get up right now. And if
you find out that your member of Congress is hosting
one of those town halls, one of those coffee hours,
you bump into them at the grocery store, the bodega,
wherever you see your congressmen, or wherever you can make
it happen so that you see him or her.

Speaker 9 (31:32):
You need to get there.

Speaker 17 (31:33):
You need to get in their faces, and you need
to say, hey, remember Congressional oversight, do your job, because
it's not just up to those of us who are
the generals and the people you see on TV all
the time. We need everybody to get engaged right now
and to make sure that Congress is doing their damn job.

Speaker 2 (31:53):
Absolutely, And so I asked the question of Bruce with naka,
I'll ask for you. How are are y'all mobilizing parents?
What is happening? You know? Are y'all sitting out eblast?
How big is your email list? Are you seeing people
who now want to join your organization? Walk us through
your organization and mobilization efforts right now?

Speaker 17 (32:15):
Yeah, So we really have planned for this and this
is the infrastructure that we've been building over the last
five years of the National Parents Union. So our motto is,
you know, you don't need to get ready if you
stay ready. So we're an affiliate network. We have eighteen
hundred pockets of parent power in all fifty states, Washington.

Speaker 18 (32:33):
D C.

Speaker 6 (32:33):
And Puerto Rico.

Speaker 17 (32:34):
So anywhere you turn, if you're a parent who's listening
right now, or you care about public education and you're
listening right now, you can get connected to the National
Parents Union and we will hook you up. That's a
network of almost one point eight million activists across the
country that are staying ready for this moment and are
ready to mobilize, get in front of those members of

(32:55):
Congress in our home states, in our home districts, but
also ready to take it to Washington, d C. The
other thing that we are ready to do and we
need your help with is take it to the courts,
because the unique thing about parents in the United States
is we are the oneswithstanding. And you know, it was
a couple of years ago where we had Miss Ruby

(33:15):
Bridges come in and talk to our organization about the
struggle her parents went through and the courage that it
took for her parents to decide to get involved in
a federal lawsuit, to put their young daughter in harm's way,
in jeopardy, to actually push forward and get that federal
court order that desegregated schools. It was parents who had

(33:37):
the standard, the standing to take this stuff to court.
So if you're a parent, and you are maybe a
low income parent, maybe you are a parent who has
a child of special needs, if you go to what's
called a Title one school, or your child has an IEP,
or you're a child who or you're a parent of
a child who speaks multiple languages, we want to hear

(33:58):
from you because we're going to be watching like hawks.
You were right when you said Roland. You know right
now they're kind of playing with smoke and mirrors here.
They know they do not have the congressional votes to
shut down the Department of Education, So what they're trying
to do is make it completely dysfunctional and dismantle it
to the point where it's just not executing on what

(34:18):
it needs to do. And there are some things that
the department needs to do that are congressionally mandated. There
are statutory requirements.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
So we're going to be.

Speaker 17 (34:27):
Watching very closely to make sure they are upholding federal law.
The minute that they violate the rights of children. On
the grassroots level, we want to take them to court.
So if you have that kind of spirit and you
are ready to stand up, and you are prepared for
this moment, to be courageous, and you don't want to
look back in twenty five thirty years at your grandchildren

(34:48):
when they ask you, what did you do in this
moment to stand up and fight back. We want to
hear from you. We need to hear from you because
we want to file those lawsuits and we're ready to
stand with you every step of the way.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
You know, I have been saying this repeatedly that if
anything happens right now, this is where regular, ordinary people
are going to have to rise up. This is where
people are going to have to take to the streets.
You've got veterans who are angry about the cuts being

(35:24):
made in the Department of Veteran Affairs. Some eighty thousand
people thirty percent of all federal workers are veterans being
laid off. Left and right. There's going to be massive
protests in Washington, DC on Friday and in fifty state
capitals from veterans. Guess the only way these things change
is if the people rise up. We love to talk

(35:46):
about oh my goodness, look at this massive protests in Turkey,
this massive protests in Egypt, this massive protest happening. Well,
this is where people are going to have to actually
take to the streets, use the First Amendment and let
these folks know, because here's what you know, and I
know every single politician they do not want to lose reelection.

(36:09):
Every House member is up next year and they're about
twenty to thirty Republicans who are very vulnerable because they
are in purple areas or they're in areas that buy one.
And so there's a moment here. But the people have
got to come out of their homes. These parents a
special needs children, they can't just expect somebody else to

(36:31):
fight for them.

Speaker 3 (36:32):
They have to fight.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
I'm seeing what's happening right now in Texas. Last night
they had nearly eighteen hours of testimony against the voucher
scam happening in Texas. More than three hundred and eight
people signed up to speak. That's what it is going
to take to stop what is happening.

Speaker 17 (36:54):
And I'm so proud to see parents across the country
doing that work, but we need more. I'll tell you
we had some of our parents from San Antonio, Texas.
They found ted Cruz in an airport and boxed him
into a conversation about that issue specifically, as well as
the closure of the Department of Education the federal funding freeze.
They had him on the ropes And that's the kind

(37:16):
of spirit and energy we really need right now, Like
this is not a time to sit on the sidelines.
No one is going to do this for you. And
I got to tell you what I hear from American
families every single day. I hear from folks who are
anxious about whether or not they're going to get their
child's support for feeding tubes, whether or not their kid's

(37:37):
going to be able to have access to insulin, whether
or not they're going to be able to maintain their
preschool placement, whether or not they're going to have head start,
and whether or not they're going to be able to
hold on to their job, because if they don't have
a place for baby to go during the day, what
are they going to do? How are they going to
hold onto this job, What it's going to mean for
their housing so if this is impacting you directly, you

(37:58):
have no excuse. You have no excuse but to join
us and to get active, because frankly, if you don't,
you're going to end up as a victim of this mess,
because this man is coming for you.

Speaker 3 (38:14):
Absolutely, And so we know what y'all are doing as well.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
And so again we hope folks wake up and realize
that we're just two months in these things, fifty two days.
These things are very real and they're not going to change. Carrie.
We're still appreciate it. Thanks a lot.

Speaker 17 (38:32):
We're very grateful for you, Roland. Thank you so much
for the time.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
Thank you very much, folks. Department of Educational Secretary Linda McMahon,
I won't know how dumb she is. Yeah, she's a
wrestling executive married to Vince McMahon. So she goes on
Fox News to defend her department's massive staff cuts on
his employees. But she couldn't even answer a basic ass
question from the absolutely idiotic law ingram Watch.

Speaker 19 (38:59):
This to the criteria for keeping that fifty percent is
related to expenditures and keep programs correct.

Speaker 1 (39:08):
Like Congress appropriates the money that is going through Title
I to ida programs.

Speaker 6 (39:13):
What's that stand for? Well, do you know what?

Speaker 1 (39:16):
I'm not sure I can tell you exactly what it
stands for, except that it's the Programs for Disabled and Needs.

Speaker 13 (39:22):
Individuals and Disabilities Act.

Speaker 7 (39:23):
I think I'm guessing I don't know all my acronyms.

Speaker 3 (39:26):
I've been here for thirty years.

Speaker 1 (39:28):
This is my the mail in the job, and I'm
really trying to learn them very quickly.

Speaker 2 (39:37):
Okay first, or I'm trying to learn on the job. Now,
how about you going prepared to lar How dumb are you?
You don't have a research team who knows how to
explain these things. You just throw out old title one
funding Well, I already know they'll title want funny is
just something that I just heard just around the ways.
I'm just go ahead and repeat it.

Speaker 3 (39:57):
It is how stupid these people are.

Speaker 15 (40:02):
Look, brol this is the portant time where we have
to start looking back in history at corollary for how
exactly we need to respond to this. This is not
the I'm going to change my profile picture to a
black square in order to protest this. This is not
the indolent statements or the performative justice.

Speaker 13 (40:19):
That we have seen. We have to go back to
our roots.

Speaker 15 (40:21):
You know, one of my relatives, Melva Patillo Bills won
the Littlerock nine back in nineteen fifty seven, who helped
to inter rate schools. And what we took at that
time was that we had to stand together in massive
social justice movements.

Speaker 13 (40:34):
It was not simply black folks.

Speaker 15 (40:36):
It was the civil rights movement, intertwining with the women's
rights movement, intertwining with the students movement, intertwining with the
anti war movement, and intertwining with the anti anti communist movement,
all coming together to push from massive social change in America.
What we're seeing right now is a similar attack on
the American history and American values that we have all

(40:56):
had to the point where you can put someone in
charge of the school students whose husband, Vince McMahon. There's
literally a Netflix documentary right now about him in the
nineteen eighties where they talk about the fact that they
were trafficking young boys to wrestlers as part of the
WWF at the time, that they were literally giving children

(41:16):
to these older men in order to recruit them to wrestling.
You guys, who wants to documentary is out there right now?
We are at a inflection point in America, where we
have the guy from Real World versus Road World's Challenge
in charge of the FAA, when we have some drunk
guy from Fox in charge of the military, when we
have the wrestling lady in charge of education. The American
people have to come together and realize that we are

(41:38):
all on the line as the word. As Thomas Payne
once said, these are the times which try the souls.
When the sun Summer Soldier and the Sunshine Patriots strength
tranny like Hell is not easily conquered. We're not going
to get this done simply by being outraged on social
media or angry. As this nation is slowly decaying into

(41:58):
a state of democracy that we've never seen on the
international level, where our allies are abandoning us, in sanctioning us,
where we're moving closer to Pudin and to Kim Jong
un and to President Jing, where we're playing this game
with strong man geopolitics tempting to conquer their nations. The
American people have to stand up and realize that we
are not the subjects of Emperor Elon Musk. We simply

(42:20):
have to come together and decide that we're going to
push back in a real way. And that has to
start immediately.

Speaker 2 (42:27):
When you and I said this, Zachary, and I'm still
believe in one thousand percent, when people start to realize
when things are going to be cut all of a sudden,
they go, oh, damn, I kind of need to wake up. Yeah,
you do. And this is where an uprising has to
take place. And again, I really do hope that after

(42:51):
Friday's massive veterans march that people begin to realize what's
going on, and I hope you begin to see a
ripple effect take place. That's the only way things change.
There has to be an uprising of people. Otherwise Republicans
are like, yo, y'all ain't saying nothing.

Speaker 3 (43:09):
We're good, We're gonna keep cutting.

Speaker 16 (43:13):
I agree one hundred percent. I hope that we get
that response. I hope that people are going to wake
up and kind of see. But we've got to have
more demonstrations like what we're going to see on Friday.
That's a great step in the right direction, but we
need more of it. We have to do our work
of flooding the zone the same way that Trump and
his administration is flooding the zone, and we have to
do a better job of controlling the narrative and making

(43:35):
sure that people who are carrying the narrative correctly, like
Roland Martin right here. You know on Roland Martin Field
that this information is being disseminated widely among our groups.
We have to take the information like we now see
the impact of what we're as soon we're going to
see the impact of the cuts to the private of education.
That clip of the Secretary of Education not understanding what

(43:57):
title IE is not understanding that it's a of the
sea the EESEA of nineteen sixty five and how it's
evolved and how it has provisions that protect students who
have disabilities, but also students who are from poor and
low income families to ensure that they're giving equal and
equitable access to education.

Speaker 6 (44:16):
That she didn't even know what that is.

Speaker 16 (44:17):
So they're sitting here taking away funds, cutting money, cutting
resources that benefit students that need it the most, and
they don't even know what they're cutting. The American people
need to know that this isn't just black children and
brown children. It's all children across the country. Across the
United States, you have more children and poor parts of Kentucky,
poor parts of Idaho, poor parts of Nebraska who are
benefiting from this than what you may have in a

(44:39):
number of urban settings across America.

Speaker 6 (44:41):
So that the people have to know about it.

Speaker 16 (44:44):
And the problem is the legacy media sources aren't getting
the information out. And that's why we don't have the
outrage because people don't know it. Once we started to
get the information, Now we start to have these town halls,
the publicans started to get their asses kicked and handed
to them by their constituents, and all of a sudden,
now they're not going to continue to do that because
it generated too much press. That was something the mainstream
media was willing to look at. We've got to get

(45:05):
the word out. We've got to encourage more margins, more protests,
more demonstrations, because that's what raised that's what's that's something
that raises awareness, and we've got to get the word out.

Speaker 2 (45:17):
Well, Rebecca, as we always say, people have to lose stuff.
I said that people are going to have to lose
a hell of a whole lot for them to realize
that Maggie doesn't give a damn about them. All they
care about our oligarchs, company corporate CEOs, or rich folks.
The Republicans are real clear. They're whacking the rs. They're

(45:37):
whacking the people who were doing audits of major companies,
in millionaires in billionaires. They want to rush through this
massive task cut. They don't care how much it adds
to the deficit because they're not fiscal hawks. As well.
You've got the secutive Energy who's saying, oh, no, our
job is to make cars cheaper and utility cheaper. Our
job is not climate change. They're like, give a damn

(45:58):
about the client. Okay, Donald Trump is not sitting here
pushing by Tesla's because of the importance of the environment. No,
it's about how can I kiss Elon musk ask because
his stock has lost more than fifty percent of its value.

Speaker 13 (46:12):
That's all this is about.

Speaker 2 (46:13):
People need to understand this is all a bunch of
largely rich white boys trying to get richer.

Speaker 7 (46:21):
People have to understand this is not normal. This is
not how government should work.

Speaker 14 (46:26):
There are a lot of people who are rightfully skeptical
about government, and that's okay. There are people like my
seventy five year old dad called me the other day,
he said, well, is there a waste in government? I
was like, yes, there is wasting government, but I do
not trust this regime to be the one to cut
the wast in government. I'm not even sure that I
would have trusted the Biden administration to go through because

(46:47):
when you are dealing with government, you actually there's a
lot of sacred.

Speaker 7 (46:51):
Cows in some of the bills. Back in the day,
when the bills you say, have appropriations loco to people's.

Speaker 14 (46:59):
Houses, they put a lot of extra pieces of stuff
in it for local people and local businesses. But what
we're seeing is that system has run amuck and now
we're here, We're trillions of dollars in debt. There's many
things that should be happening, but not through the use
of Elon Musk, not through the use of DOGE, because
these are people who don't respect government, don't understand government.

(47:23):
They're cutting for cutting stake, but they're also cutting to
personally enrich themselves and their businesses. It's not like Elon
Musk is being altruistic here saying, hey, I want to
reduce the American debt.

Speaker 7 (47:35):
I want to make sure that we're not running in
constant deficits.

Speaker 14 (47:39):
No, he's making at least eight million dollars a day
and that was before.

Speaker 7 (47:44):
The last fifty two days. My guess is by the time.

Speaker 14 (47:47):
We get to day one hundred, he will be making
well over eight million dollars a day of what he's
getting from the US government. But they're like, to your point,
there are a lot of oligarchs in this country. They
use the government to fund their private businesses to make a.

Speaker 7 (48:01):
Lot of money.

Speaker 14 (48:02):
And that's not on the behalf of the American public.
So what people really have to understand this is not
normal times, This is not how government should function, and unfortunately,
there are a lot of people who are going to
be hurt. And when we think about the Idea Act
at section five oh four, which protects students who are

(48:23):
who require special education, because our country is said in
the nineteen seventies that we have something called faith, which
is free appropriate public education. At the point that we
offer public education, if there's a student who has a disability,
they still have the right to access free appropriate public education.
And low key, I think Laura is being a little

(48:45):
shady Atlanta with athletes. What does IDAC mean kind of
seeing a little gatcha So there might be a little
something there.

Speaker 2 (48:55):
Well, I just need people to understand that what's happening
is real. It's no joke, and these people are not smart.
You take the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration or INNO
double A. They're facing a major reduction in its workforce
as part of again the extensive overhaul the federal government.

Speaker 3 (49:16):
Now they play a major role of overset. The Nashural Weather.

Speaker 2 (49:19):
Service kind of important when we start talking about hurricanes, tornadoes,
the mantra, the ocean atmosphere conditions, conduct deep seed exploration
eight point twelve thousand people worldwide. But guess what Trump
folks like, Yeah, we don't need them. According to an
email of tay Aby, you say today, INNO double A
will begin laying off oney twenty nine employees as part

(49:42):
of a broader strategy to streamline government operations. The recent
noticeing to no double A staff did not specify which
positions would be eliminated, leaving many employees uncertain about their future. Currently,
the customer not effect the national well the services forecast
operations and maintenance support. The Department of Commerce will make
the found decisions regarding these Now. They did put up though,
for sale, some of their buildings and so that's that's

(50:04):
what people have to understand what's happening here. They're just
selling off buildings, They're just getting rid of people. There's
literally no uh, no plan here. Even Donald Trump whine
this was so hilarious he even win. Yeah, you know what,
maybe we should have taken a scalpel as opposed to

(50:26):
a hatchet to this. Uh but but not only that,
when Rebecca was just talking about, Zachar, I'm gonna go
to you first. Where Rebecca was just talking about, uh,
you know what her what her father said about wasting government.
Let's be clear, if you're if you actually want to
confront waste in government, you actually would go to the
place that actually has the largest budget and the most waste.

(50:49):
That's the Department of Defense. Zachary, can you please tell
me why is it that we've heard about cuts at
old hud, Education, National Weather Service, all these other areas,
but not the Department of Defense.

Speaker 16 (51:10):
Well, you're gonna give me under surveillance. I'm gonna tell
it and tell it like it like it is. You
haven't heard about it, because if you were to go
into cutting the Department of Defense, and how are you
going to have the money paid back to Elon Musk?
That Donald Trump is trying to pay him back, because
when four hundred billion dollars that's going to Elon Musk
and his subsidiaries, then what else is there to cut.
When you're trying to cut the fat, trying to cut

(51:31):
the ways, trying to drain the swamp, you're gonna be
draining Elon Musk, Starlink, Tesla, cyber trucks and all this
nonsense they're buying.

Speaker 6 (51:38):
That's keeping his pockets.

Speaker 2 (51:40):
Pat Well, yeah, and in fact, we already see where
he wants to get rid of of folks at the FAA.
And why don't y'all go ahead and hire MySpace x people.

Speaker 3 (51:56):
It's a grift. It's a massive grift, Rebecca.

Speaker 2 (52:00):
It's a grift with the Trump and Milania Cone coins
me whatever the hell they call mean coins, whatever the
hell I mean.

Speaker 3 (52:07):
They're ripping these idiots. All, Okay, that's what they're doing.
It's all a grift. I said it. These people, these
rich billionaires, these oligarchs.

Speaker 2 (52:17):
They said, oh, here's a perfect opportunity for us to
come in and rape and pillage the federal budget. They're like, yay,
we have the perfect idiot to allow us or do whatever.
We just put money in his pockets and we can
just go take whatever we want.

Speaker 7 (52:36):
That's what's happening in front of our eyes.

Speaker 14 (52:38):
Anytime that you see the stock market is going down,
you're seeing indicators for inflation going up, you see indicators
short recession that are now in play, and you have
someone who simply doesn't care, because that's not the point
of this. Even one thing that we do understand is
that when Donald Trump ran the first time, when he
decided to run, I think back in what twenty two, well,

(53:00):
when he decided to run, in part it was because
he wanted to financially benefit, but he never thought he
was actually.

Speaker 7 (53:08):
Going to become president.

Speaker 14 (53:09):
He thought by raising his profile by being a candidate,
that was simply going to be enough. And then in
his first administration, we see all of a sudden, someone
who was questionably on the four billionaire list but no
one could actually really confirm that he was truly a billionaire.

Speaker 7 (53:25):
Now we see that he's firmly a billionaire.

Speaker 14 (53:27):
And so now in the second term, it's not just
Trump and family, but it's the Trump criminal enterprise, family
and friends and all these additional billionaires who are coming along.
And it's simply if you are an American, if you
believe in democracy, then what you're seeing.

Speaker 7 (53:43):
Is outright corruption.

Speaker 14 (53:45):
And I understand in a lot of Western countries that
there is pieces of corruption that's allowed, or pieces of
corruption that people kind of link at or kind of
look the other way. But what you see is a
group of people who are willing to bankrupt this country,
to harm people in this country, all because of their
bottom line. They're not looking out for the American public.

(54:07):
They're looking out for themselves and their friends. And this
is gonna be very stark over the next couple of years.
So once again Roland mentioned that there's opportunities to protest
as the good.

Speaker 7 (54:18):
Organizer as I am.

Speaker 14 (54:19):
If you're going to go out and protest, make sure
you're protesting with a group because because in the last
few years there has been a criminalization in certain states
of protesting, of gathering in public spaces, make.

Speaker 7 (54:31):
Sure the group you're with have properly pulled permits. Because
it's go time now.

Speaker 14 (54:36):
We need all Americans of good conscious to show up
and let these people know we're not going to stand
for it.

Speaker 7 (54:42):
We actually truly still support democracy.

Speaker 2 (54:45):
In this country. Indeed, and so I just keep telling folks, Robert, Oh,
guess what the great the greatest hits. They're going to
keep on coming until folk revolt against what they are seeing.

Speaker 15 (55:03):
Yeah, Rother, and I think it's important and welcome to
a segment I like to call entirely too much information.
With Robert, Let's talk about this bloated military budget for
a second, because when we're slashing programs for disabled youth
and special education, there has to be a really good
reason that we're not slashing from the trigon dollar a
year military budget.

Speaker 13 (55:22):
So just a few things for folks.

Speaker 15 (55:23):
Understand that America has over seven hundred and fifty military
bases across the world. The reason I say around seven
hundred and fifty is because no one knows the actual
number of US military bases because of the number of
black sites and secret locations around the world. It's the
largest military footprint that any nation in the history of
Earth has ever had. Is larger than the military footprint
of the British Empire when the sun never set on

(55:45):
the British Empire. It's larger than the imprint of the
Roman Empire, or even of Genghis Khan when he conquered
all of your Asia, when we talk about this military budget,
I want people to remember thirty years ago or forty
years ago. At this point, we want to place to
F fifteen, the air superiority fighter of the United States
Air Force. We commissioned a trillion dollar program for the

(56:06):
F twenty two. We only ended up building about one
hundred and fifty of them that are still operational today.
We then then introduced a new program, the Joint Strike
Fighter Program, which is we spent another trillion dollars to
build the F thirty five. Now we're spending another two
trillion dollars to build the NNGAD, the next generation air
dominance fighter that is facing so many hurdles that now

(56:27):
they're going back to that same F fifteen from forty
years ago and putting those back into production today of
the F fifteen ex to be the new air dominance
fourth generation, four point five generation fighter. The point is
that if any other department of the US government was
blowing money that fast with absolutely nothing to show for it,
Because remember that third that the trillion dollars had spent
on the F twenty two, it has shot down a

(56:49):
grand total of one balloon during the Biden administration. For
that trillion dollars that we put into it. If you
want to talk about four class carriers, we're talking about
thirteen billion dollars for each aircraft carrier. We have more
aircraft carriers in America than the entirety of the rest
of the world combined. The rest of the world combined
cannot match our aircraft carrier fleet, nor match our aircraft

(57:13):
a footprint between the Navy and the air Force. You
want to talk about space as part as the US
Space commanded, President Trump created his last administration elon musk
Kitter's received thirty eight billion dollars in contracts from the
federal government or the course of the last sixteen years.
This includes development of the Starship, the thing that keeps
blowing up every few weeks, that's been paid for almost

(57:35):
entirely by the United States government. Because it's part of
the human landing system of the Artimist program that goes
that's supposed to be landing on the Moon four years ago.

Speaker 13 (57:42):
We ain't got close yet. And addition to US.

Speaker 15 (57:44):
Military wants to use it for point to point transportation
on the global scale. We're not close to that yet.
So when we're talking about cutting programs and auditing the
federal government. We have to dive into the bottomless pit
of US military and R and D spending, because if
you spent even a quarter of that money each year
on education, on housing, on homelessness programs, on social services,
we will not be in the situation that we are today.

(58:06):
But because the billionaires at SpaceX, at Tesla, at the
Boring Company, in Neuralink, at Raytheon at LAKEI, Marty and
the Honeywell keep making money and keep making money, and
every jurystens and they will never cut that. But they
will much rather throw poor people out on the street
if that means lining in the pockets, increasing their stock prices.
And we have to see that directly in front of us.
The numbers are there, we just refuse to look at them.

(58:31):
And that in the nutshell is America.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
Can I go to break? We come back. We're going
to talk about how this one cee in bc' CEINGBC
report just got he's just like man, let me just
cut to the chase. But the nonsense and facing here,
y'all want.

Speaker 13 (58:45):
To support of work that we do here.

Speaker 2 (58:46):
The Brida Funk at the Romart unfold to join our
Brida Funk fan club. The goals get twenty thousand by
our fans contributing on average fifty bucks each year four
nineteen six month thirteen cents.

Speaker 3 (58:56):
Today you will contribute a cash chap.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
All you gotta do is usually strike QR code you
see right here on the screen, the stripe QR code
you see right here on the screen.

Speaker 3 (59:04):
If you're listening, go to Blackstar network dot com.

Speaker 2 (59:06):
Send your checking money over the pelbox five seven one
ninety six Washington DC two zero zero three seven dad
zero one ninety six PayPal are Martin unfiltered, venmos RM unfiltered, Zale,
rolling at Rollin, Smartin dot Com, rolling at rolling market
on filter dot com. Will be right back.

Speaker 13 (59:27):
Hello.

Speaker 12 (59:28):
I'm Isaac Hayes, the third founder and CEO fan Base,
and right now we're accepting investors in our seventeen million
dollars round to revolutionize the future of social media.

Speaker 20 (59:38):
Today, for just three.

Speaker 12 (59:39):
Hundred and ninety nine dollars, you can own sixty shares
of stocking fan Base at six sixty five is share.
Go to start engine dot com, slash Fanbase and invest Today.
While the big platforms have grown two massive and disconnected
from their users, Fanbase is building a platform where creators
and users truly come first. We've already raised eight point
six million dollars every day investors who believe in this vision,

(01:00:02):
and now you can join them. This is your chance
to invest in a social media tech company with over
one million users that is disrupting media by allowing anyone
to reach all of their following and monetize their content
from day one.

Speaker 11 (01:00:15):
The market is changing.

Speaker 12 (01:00:16):
Big platforms are failing to serve their users, and fan
base is stepping up to fill the gap. Don't wait
until it's too late. Invest now, Invest for yourself and
your future. Go to start engine, dot com, slash fan
Base and all of the future of social media.

Speaker 21 (01:00:43):
May y'all welcome to the other side of Change, only
on the Blackstar Network and hosted by myself.

Speaker 22 (01:00:48):
Free Baker and my good sis Jimi or Burley.

Speaker 21 (01:00:51):
We are just two millennial women tackling everything at the
intersection of politics, gender and pop culture.

Speaker 22 (01:00:57):
And we don't just settle for commentary.

Speaker 17 (01:00:59):
This is about shindriven dialogue to get us to the
world as it could be and not just as it is.

Speaker 21 (01:01:04):
To watch us on the Blackstar Network, So tune in
to the episode of Change.

Speaker 23 (01:01:14):
Next on the Black Tape with me Greg Carr, there's
a lot of talk about the inevitability of another civil
war in this country. But on our next show, we'll
talk to a noted author and scholar who says we're
actually in the middle of one right now. In fact,
Steve Phillips say, is the first one that started back
in eighteen sixty one.

Speaker 11 (01:01:35):
Well, it never ends.

Speaker 19 (01:01:36):
People carrying the Confederate flag, wearing sweatshirts saying maga civil War.
January sixth, twenty twenty one, Storm view ers Capital hunted
down the country's elected of Bush Show built the gallows for.

Speaker 2 (01:01:49):
The Vice President of the United States as had.

Speaker 19 (01:01:52):
To block the peaceful transfer of power within this country.

Speaker 11 (01:01:55):
On the next Black Tape here on the Blackstar.

Speaker 5 (01:01:58):
Network, What's Good, Jonnie's Doug e Freshman watching my brother
Roland Martin underbolts it as we go with a little
something like this hit it.

Speaker 11 (01:02:14):
It's real.

Speaker 3 (01:02:24):
Oh, folks at CNBC are finally waking up.

Speaker 2 (01:02:27):
Jim Kramer told Trump, hey man, your economy is not
doing well and it's gonna get worse. We'll check this out.
Another of their economics reporter, Steve Weisman, just said, you know,
what I'm not gonna lie about this. He blasted the
twice in Peach crimly convicted felon in cheap down on
the con Trump's economic policy, which includes these stupid tears

(01:02:50):
on Canada which are causing electricity prices to surge in
certain states, lies people just like you know what.

Speaker 13 (01:02:57):
Letter rip.

Speaker 20 (01:02:59):
I'm going to say, thee at risk of my job, Kelly.
But what President Trump is doing is insane. It is
absolutely insane.

Speaker 13 (01:03:05):
It is about the.

Speaker 20 (01:03:07):
Eighth reason we've had for the tariffs, and now he's
saying he's putting fifty percent tariffs on Canada unless they
agree to become the fifty first state.

Speaker 11 (01:03:15):
That is insane.

Speaker 6 (01:03:17):
There is just no other way of describing it.

Speaker 20 (01:03:19):
And the trouble, Kelly, is that it shows there are
no bounds around President Trump. This is very different from
the first administration where there were people around him who
seem to I don't know what the word is, but
smooth over some of the edges now. And the other
thing that's not talked about, Kelly, is what's going on
within the administration in terms of how they're treating the

(01:03:40):
constitution and laws. I think all of that is bad
for the attraction of capital, and the gentleman from Bridgewater
is one hundred percent right. We need massive amounts of
capital if we want to have fund our deficits, pay
for the things we want to pay for, sell our bonds,
and have high stock prices. And it seems as if
this administration is doing everything it can to chase foreign

(01:04:00):
capital away.

Speaker 14 (01:04:01):
Well, and we could go into the strategy of the
insanity as a strategy in terms of our trading.

Speaker 11 (01:04:06):
Sanity is not a strategy.

Speaker 6 (01:04:07):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 20 (01:04:07):
I'm with you, Kelly, and trying to look for silver linings.
I'm a sunny person. Tactics some with some explanation for
this other than insanity. I'm ready to accept it. If
you can come up with one.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
Well, I agree with that absolutely in sanity, Rebecca.

Speaker 1 (01:04:27):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:04:27):
And you know, these are the people who are always
trumpeting the market, the market, the market, even they realize
it's dumb. It was hilarious watching Joe Kernan on seeing
seeing BC squad box. Uh, just criticize what's happening. Oh,
but he was kissing lots of Trump asked and wanted
him to win. And so don't you just love these

(01:04:48):
people who were just like yay, yay Trump back a businessman.
Oh being back back in, I guess they forgot those
six bankruptcies.

Speaker 14 (01:04:59):
I guess not fund the short of the market if
you're not going to benefit from it, I beg you.
If he was benefitting from what's happening with the market,
then maybe he would have a different perspective. So what's
also interesting is watching some of these finance people, these
money people, people have access to great amounts of wealth.
Is interesting kind of watching them fight with each other
as well, because not everybody who is a billionaire is

(01:05:23):
benefitting the same way a billionaire like Elon muskis, And
so you know what, go ahead, fight on however, stop him.
That's the big thing for most of us who aren't
in that top one tenth or one percent tax bracket
or where we have such.

Speaker 7 (01:05:40):
Global wealth that whatever the Orange resident does.

Speaker 14 (01:05:44):
It doesn't impact us. But for most of us it does.
Most people around the world are greatly impacted by this.

Speaker 7 (01:05:49):
And not just in this country. So I would say
for people like him who have a platform. And it
was also very telling.

Speaker 14 (01:05:57):
That he said he might lose his job for speaking
the truth, Like, since when do you lose your job
on news to speak the truth.

Speaker 7 (01:06:04):
But I guess that's what's happening in.

Speaker 14 (01:06:05):
This world because of who his parent company is and
the amounts of money that his particular parent company is
hoping to make from the government.

Speaker 2 (01:06:16):
Well again, folks don't like the truth, Zachary, And so
what they do is they hype all this nonsense up
until all until the building comes crashing down.

Speaker 16 (01:06:30):
They hap of the nonsense like taking over Greenland and
turning it into rear, white and blue land, as opposed
to looking at the fact that we left an administration
and left a country in January where recession was one
hundred percent not going to happen, where Joseph Biden and
his administration, working with the Fed and working with interest
rates and working with the economy, ensured that America was

(01:06:51):
going to be stable, in America was going to continue
to thrive economically. We went from a vice president who
was running for president who had a plan to keep
America thriving, to give potential homeowners twenty five thousand dollars
in terms of market viability to ensure that we continue
to boom, to now having someone sitting in the Oval
Office ensuring almost manufacturing, if not guaranteeing that recession, maybe

(01:07:16):
even a depression would happen so that his rich buddies
can capitalize on it.

Speaker 6 (01:07:20):
That's where we are.

Speaker 16 (01:07:21):
I think that's something that not enough people are talking
about the fact that this is a manufactured recession that
we're seeing. We're seeing terrors being implemented that's going to
cause recession. We're seeing a crisis in regards to bird
flu and other health epidemics happen that's being completely ignored.
We're seeing a lack of confidence in the FFA and
the entire flight travel industry being happening.

Speaker 6 (01:07:42):
All these things.

Speaker 16 (01:07:43):
It seems to be extremely coincidental that all this is happening,
pushing our economy into recession, never even talking about the
increased number of Americans who are losing their jobs, who
don't have to lose their jobs.

Speaker 3 (01:08:00):
Well, look, it all is intertwined.

Speaker 2 (01:08:05):
And when you look at the polling data, the CNN
polling girl Robert shows how Trump's the poor ratings have
just fell below the floor when it comes to his
handling of the economy. And again hashtag we tried to
tell you, but all these other people just thought he
was just so amazing and so brilliant when it came

(01:08:26):
to the economy, as if they totally forgot leading us
into a recession because of his horrible handling of COVID.
But they didn't want to saddle him with that. Theyn't
want to blame him for that. They want to say
he was better than vice pression, than Kyla Harris.

Speaker 13 (01:08:39):
Oh way.

Speaker 15 (01:08:42):
Now, well, well, there's a quote from Voltaire where he says,
he who can convince a man of absurdities can force
him into atrocities. And that's very much where we are
economically in America right now. Because Don Trump was able
to convince millions of Americans of the absurdity that he
could replace taxes with tariffs. And we've tried that before.
You can look at Smooth Holly in the nineteen twenties.

(01:09:03):
It caused a great depression. You can look at the
trust busting under President mckin that resulted in from Preder Roosevelt.
When President McKinley decided to govern through terrorists. It has
literally never worked. America has never been more prosperous than
during this period of time of international free trade, going
from NAFTA to North American Free Trade Agreement through even
Trump's US Canada Mexico Agreement to us MCA, which is

(01:09:28):
expanded upon NAFTA. What we're seeing currently because of the
Trump policies is a global realignment economically, and by that
I mean right now Canada is considering ascension into the
EU to change their global trade strategy from being of trade,
from trading across the border of the United States of
America to more trade with the European Union so they
can bypass the absurdity of the American sphere of influence.

(01:09:52):
By similar method, China is investing billions and billions of
dollars in construction in Mexico. The only reason that they
have not come taking over as Mexico's largest trading partner
because of the good relationships between the United States and
Metsico throughout the years. With these new arrfs, we are
now seeding our hegemonic influence over the Central and South America,
which has existence to existence of Washington's Farewell Address two

(01:10:15):
hundred and fifty some odd years ago. We are now
ceding that to global influencing global powers. We fought the
entire guerrilla warfare throughout the Civil War to prevent the
Soviet Union from dominating republics in Central and South America.
Now we're simply ceding that to China. If we look
at the power of the Bricks Alliance right now, they
are getting more applications for nations to join them because

(01:10:35):
people fear the US dollars become maintaining this position at
a global reserve currency, because they fear the political instability
of the United States of America. This is the same
onlignment we saw during World War Two when the British Empire,
which at that time went the global superpower, had to
seed over their positions world leadership to the United States
of America because they were fighting for their own survival.

(01:10:58):
So while we're fighting for our survival unionited Central America,
the rest of the world is just sitting around twiddling
their thumbs. They're realizing they have to start treating America
the same way that they treat Russia. The German Chancer
just last week said we have to consider treating America
as an adversary. President maccron and France already has said
that they were going to work on opening new markets,

(01:11:18):
including markets in China, as opposed to working here in America.
China had been investing for the last fifteen years, and
an international Belgian Road initiative investing five trillion dollars to
open up trade throughout the Eurasian continent into Africa. We
no longer have allies around the world, and we become isolated.
Ask Russia what their economy looks like. The entire nation

(01:11:39):
of Russia has a GDP smaller than the state of
New York because they are isolated.

Speaker 13 (01:11:43):
And that's where America is headed.

Speaker 2 (01:11:48):
Well, we're just going to sit here and watch these
things happen and again. You know, people have got a
side whether they want to wake up. Hey, white women,
how about y'all showing up to vote and being turned
away all because your last name doesn't matter your birth certificate.
That could be the reality for millions of women under
a new Republican backed bill, the Save Act, that required

(01:12:11):
proof of US citizenship to register the vote, forcing people
to provide a passport, birth certificate, or other documents, and
for women who are more likely to have name changes
due to marriage or other life events, this could create
a major roadblock at the ballot box. Let's be perfectly clear,
non citizen voting is already illegal and there's no real
evidence of widespread fraud. But this bill would make it

(01:12:33):
harder for black voters, low income communities, and rural Americans
to register and cast their ballots. It also eliminates online
and mail and registration, forces in person verification, and threatens
election workers with penalties if they don't enforce these new restrictions.
But this is no shock, Rebecca, because white men in
the Republican Party, they've never wanted anybody else to vote

(01:12:55):
but them. Paul Wyrick literally it was on videos saying
we don't want voting.

Speaker 14 (01:13:03):
That's the point because if they can shrink down the electorate,
they think that that benefits them.

Speaker 7 (01:13:08):
So why should people care about this? How would this
impact you?

Speaker 14 (01:13:11):
Well, say you decide to move, for whatever reason you move,
you have to update your voter registration.

Speaker 7 (01:13:18):
Do you know where your birth certificate is?

Speaker 14 (01:13:20):
Like you, you who are watching this right now, and
those of you who are on YouTube put in the
chat if you could tell me within the next ten seconds,
do you actually know what your birth certificate is? Or
let's say for people during Katrina who lost everything and
then they had to flee to Atlanta to huston to
other places, did you actually have your documents with you,
So then what happens. Or if you are a young

(01:13:43):
person who just finished college or you were in the
military and now you're getting out and your parents nonger
have all your personal items because it was in a
box and a basement somewhere and then somehow someone accidentally
threw it away and now it's in a landfill. So
it's not to say, hey, well everybody should have access
to these documents.

Speaker 7 (01:14:00):
Is not a big deal.

Speaker 14 (01:14:01):
It actually is because most people in this country do
not know where their birth certificate is. The other thing
is a lot of third party registration or if you
online registration in this country, you prove who you are,
you're able to register the vote. So now under the
Save Act, if inacted, it means the first time you
go vote, you now have to show this primary citizen

(01:14:24):
proof of documentation that okay, you know you are a
citizen here, even though you've already attested for that, even
though you have already proven that. So anytime you see
that there's additional hoops being drawn in order for people
to exercise the right to vote, exercise the right to
register the vote, it's because there is a lone con
game that's going on if this was such a problem,

(01:14:48):
this issue would have been resolved before. It's not the
problem that you're hearing from the other side, but what's
happening here. This is not a common sense This is
not a common sense solution to this widespread problem. But
instead they want to make it harder for people to
be able to vote. People in this country do not
have readily accessible access to their documents, so now to

(01:15:10):
make people to even go down to their local vital
statistics office. Do you even know what a vital statistics
office is? In some states, in some counties, those offices
aren't even open every single day.

Speaker 7 (01:15:23):
So doing these additional things to make it harder for
people to vote.

Speaker 14 (01:15:27):
It's because they want a wider white, white people, older, Christian,
heterosexual electorate because they believe those are the people who
will keep handing them power and keep them in power
for many years to come.

Speaker 2 (01:15:46):
Zachary, people better wake up and realize that this is
this is the Republican's wet dream. This is what they want.
They want. They know if they look Trump won because
the electorate shrink six million plus people of color Biden
voters who didn't turn out, So they know if you
have an expanded electorate.

Speaker 3 (01:16:08):
They are going to lose. They openly admit that.

Speaker 6 (01:16:12):
They know they're going to lose.

Speaker 16 (01:16:14):
They have implemited strategy after strategy, attempt after attempt to
continuously keep people from voting.

Speaker 6 (01:16:20):
They had stayed by say strategy.

Speaker 16 (01:16:22):
They made small inroads in progress in Georgia, they made
big leaps in bounds and taxes.

Speaker 6 (01:16:27):
They've made big leaps and bounds.

Speaker 16 (01:16:28):
And now this is the ultimate when if this is
allowed to pass, and you know what, I can't say
that it won't pass.

Speaker 6 (01:16:35):
It shouldn't pass. It shouldn't be.

Speaker 16 (01:16:36):
The John Lewis Voting Rights Act should have passed. That
should have been, that should have become the law of
the land. But we could not find a way to
get Republicans to support and do what was right for
the American people. And we, the American people, could not
apply the appropriate amount of pressure to get them to
do the right thing, the moral thing, the ethical thing,
the American thing. But now, all of a sudden, and

(01:16:57):
I would not have I literally stood before MINI leader
Kim Jeffries and said, we must find a way to
pressure the Republicans in swing states to switch over and
vote with the Democrats.

Speaker 6 (01:17:11):
I literally said it almost so.

Speaker 16 (01:17:13):
We could go us eight days ago, eight days ago
to then turn my hess around and watch ten Democrats
do what we needed ten Republicans to do. Ten Democrats
to vote against the party and vote to censor one
of their own and sell literally a black man down
the river when they sensor Representative Al Green of Texas.

(01:17:35):
So I'm still baffled at how we have gotten. How
they found a way to get Democrats to do the
wrong thing, but we can't get Republicans to do the
right thing for the American people. So while I'm sitting
here thinking myself, there's no way this will pass. There's
no way women in Congress. White women in Congress are
going to vote for this. I know if they are

(01:17:55):
Republicans they will. And I'm thinking there's no way Democrats
in Congress are going to vote for this to get
enough approval for it to go. But after what I've
seen this week, and then seeing Ted Golden of Maine
turnaround and vote to a stop gap spinning bill to
let it announced pastor to the Senate where we have
people like John Fetterman sitting there and other you know, traitors,
turncoach thinking about voting for it. I don't know where

(01:18:17):
we are. I don't know what's going to happen. I
can't predict it, but I'm afraid. I'm very afraid of it.

Speaker 2 (01:18:24):
Well, this is why I'm always saying, Robert, that we
do white conservatives a huge favor when we do not
vote our numbers. Donald Trump literally faked. I mean, how
embarrassing is it for Donald Trump to troll black people
by saying, thank you, thank you for not voting, thank

(01:18:46):
you for not showing up. I appreciate that y'all made
it possible for me to win. Well, welcome to a
new segment called Deeper with Robert. Let's dovno those numbers
who were talking about from the twenty twenty election and
twenty twenty president and got eighty one million votes during
a pandemic, Donald Trump got twenty five million votes. In
twenty twenty four, Vice President Harris got seventy five million votes.

(01:19:09):
Donald Trump got seventy seven million votes. So while he's
claiming this massive landslide and this mandate, in reality is
not that he got more votes. He got a you
know about the marginal population growth with more votes, is
that Kama Harris got six million fewer votes from President Biden.

Speaker 13 (01:19:23):
Now, why did that happen?

Speaker 15 (01:19:24):
Was it simply this lack of enthusiasm with the simply
people thought she was Indian American as opposed to African American. No,
is that Republicans spent that entire four years changing election
laws nationwide. Absentee dropboxes disappeared, the number of early voting
days in states around the country disappeared, the ability for
individuals to be able to have that enfranchise disappeared. Voter

(01:19:47):
registration became more difficult around the country. It's not as
if it was a mistake or an accident. Reverend Jackson
has said every time I've heard him speak for twenty years,
voter suppression isn't about bull connor standard outside with hoses
and dogs. It's about skimming. It's about skimming one out
of every one hundred votes out from being able to

(01:20:08):
turn out. Because on a state by state level of
you skim one out of every one hundred votes. That's
how Georgia goes from Biden winning by twelve thousand votes
in twenty twenty to Donald Trump winning by one hundred
thousand votes in twenty twenty four. And let's remember starting
from the time President Obama was elected in two thousand
and eight, Republicans invested billions of dollars into winning state

(01:20:28):
and local elections around the country. While Democrats are concentrating
on that wealth on national races. They were running a
county board of election races. They were running the state
superintendent and secretary of state elections. You saw one thousand
and forty four seat switch from a Democrat to Republican
during that period of time, from the time Prisident Bomba
was elected to the time.

Speaker 13 (01:20:47):
He left office.

Speaker 15 (01:20:48):
As a result of that, they were able to control
these state election boards. They were able to control the
way and how did you vote? President Trump didn't even
hide the ball. He said, it's not imported. Who was
voting is who is counting the vote. And we create
that apparatus. In that rupert we move into a system where,
simply put, Republicans are able to pick their votes and
pick their voters and aside who is voting. So, yes,

(01:21:09):
we have to mobilize, We have to encourage our people,
but we also have to start running for state and
local boards of elections. We have to start putting money
into winning state secretary of state races. When you're deal
little states like Florida, Georgia, Texas. You can have a
fully the progressive slate of state wide candidates that can win,
but it's going to take the buddy put inside of it.
And as Gills got here and said, almost lost Detroit.

(01:21:31):
When it comes to people's safety, money wins out every time,
and you're expecting Republicans across party lines. Elon Musk was
calling senators to tell them if you voted against any
of Trump nominees, he will personally finance your primary challenger.
We need to do that on our side of the island.
That let people know that we are putting the money,
we're putting the force, we're putting in the power behind
those things to ensure that we are changing politics from

(01:21:51):
a local level so we can actually have enfranchised nationally.

Speaker 2 (01:21:57):
Well. Again, my biggest issue for us is we're not
using our power. We're not maximizing our power. And what
we are doing is we're allowing these folks to run game.
Gotta go to break.

Speaker 6 (01:22:11):
We come back.

Speaker 2 (01:22:12):
We'll have our black ad mission for the day. Plus
we'll talk about the Freedom Rider Museum at Alabama now
no longer being sold. You're watching Roland Martin unfiltered on
the Blackstart Network. Support the work that we do. Join
our Brina Funk fan club goals get twenty thousand fans
contributing on average fifty bucks each year. It comes out

(01:22:32):
before alls a nineteen cents a month, thirteen cents a day.
You want to support the work that we do, please
use cash app. The QR code is right here for
a cash app. We can use a strike QR code
if you are listening to go to Blackstore Network dot
com sen here and checking money, order a pelbox five
seven one ninety six Washington DC two zero zero three
seven dad zero one ninety six PayPal, Are Martin unfiltered,

(01:22:54):
Benmo RM unfiltered, Zel rolling at rolands Martin dot com.

Speaker 3 (01:22:59):
Rolling at Roland Martin filter dot com.

Speaker 2 (01:23:01):
Be sure to get your roll unfiltered Blackstud Network swad
get our new shirts. Go to rolland Martin dot creator,
Dassbreen dot com, Roland Martin dot creator, Dasspring dot com.
Or go to the Blackstar Network and be sure to
download the Blackstud Network at Apple Phone, Android phone, Apple TV,
and drud tv, Roku, Amazon fireTV, Xbox one, Samsung Smart TV.

Speaker 6 (01:23:21):
I'll be right back.

Speaker 14 (01:23:25):
We begin tonight with the people who are really running
the country right now. Trump is often wrong and misleading
about a lot of things, but especially about history.

Speaker 17 (01:23:31):
Iald Trump falling in line with President Elon Musk in
the way of.

Speaker 2 (01:23:35):
The unsettly news that MSNBC has canceled Joyanread primetime show.

Speaker 3 (01:23:41):
The Readout, Roland Martin and the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
Would like to extend an invitation to all of the
fans of Joy and Read MSNBC show to join us
every night to watch Roland Martin Unfiltered streaming on the
Blackstar Network for news discussion on the issue that matter
to you and the latest updates on the twice impeached,
criminally convicted felon in chief Donald Trump is unprecedented assault

(01:24:05):
on democracy as well as co President Elon musk takeover
of the federal government. The Black Star Network stands with
Joy and Red and all folks who understand the power
of black voices in media. We must come together and
never forget that information is power. Be sure to watch
Roland Martin Unfiltered weeknights six pm Eastern at YouTube dot com,

(01:24:27):
ford slash Roland s Martin or download the Blackstar Network app.

Speaker 7 (01:24:34):
On a next Balanced Life with Me.

Speaker 11 (01:24:40):
Next on the Black Table with Me Greg Carr.

Speaker 23 (01:24:43):
There's a lot of talk about the inevitability of another
civil war in this country. But on our next show
we'll talk to a noted author and scholar who says
we're actually in the middle of one right now. In fact,
Steve Phillips says, the first one that started back in
eighteen sixty one, well did never end.

Speaker 19 (01:25:02):
People carrying the Confederate flag wearing sweatshirts, say Maga. Civil
War January sixth, twenty twenty one, stormed US capital, hunted down,
the country's elected officials built the gallows for the Vice
President of the United States had to block the peaceful
transfer of power within this country.

Speaker 11 (01:25:21):
On the Next Black Team here on the Black.

Speaker 7 (01:25:23):
Star Network, this is Sambula Man and this is David Mann.

Speaker 6 (01:25:30):
And you're watching roland Mark Unfiltered.

Speaker 2 (01:26:04):
All right, folks, Today's Black in Missing is Jania David.
She's been missing from her Homa Louisiana Homes said February twelfth.
The sixteen year old has black hair and brown eyes.
In information about Jania David should call the Terrbone Parish
Sheriff's office at nine, eight five eight seven six two
five zero zero nine eighty five eight seven six two

(01:26:25):
five zero.

Speaker 3 (01:26:27):
Folks, some good news.

Speaker 2 (01:26:28):
The historical Montgomery Bus Station, the home to the Freedom
Ride's museum, is no longer for sale. The US General
Services Administration removed the iconic bus station from its core list.
The bus station is an icon of our nation and
civil rights history. In nineteen sixty one Freedom Rise, where
freedom writers were violently attacked there by white supremass as
the challenge segregation in interstate travel, the bus station is

(01:26:52):
an official destination on the US Civil Rights Trail. Of course,
lawmakers like Terry Sewell Shamari Figures were highly critical of
this move, and they moved very quickly and mobilized people
to save it from being sold. Was talking about Illinois Way.
Federal juryist ordered the city of Chicago to pay one
hundred and twenty million dollars the two men who were

(01:27:14):
wrongfully convicted of murder in two thousand and three, setting
a new city record for wrongful conviction cases. John Fulton
was eighteen years old Anthony Mitchell was seventeen when they
were arrested in connection with the murder of eighteen year
old Christopher Coloso. On March tenth, two thousand and three,
Colosso's body was found bound with duct tape and partially

(01:27:37):
burned in an alley in the back of the yard's neighborhood.
In two thousand and six, Fulton and Mitchell were convicted
a first degree murder in kidnapping, resulting in a thirty
one year prison sentence. They were released in twenty nineteen
after a Cook County judge overturned their convictions and ordered
a new trial, leading prosecutors to drop all charges against them.

(01:27:59):
Both Fulton and Mita. We're awarded sixty million dollars each.
See the Chicago plans to appeal this decision. You know,
we've seen a lot of cases like this, Robert, over
the years. And listen, even for that amount of money,
you don't get back thirty years of your life spent

(01:28:19):
in prison and not being free.

Speaker 13 (01:28:22):
Absolutely.

Speaker 15 (01:28:22):
And when I was on the board of directors for
the National Association and Criminal Defense Lawyers at ACDL, we
work close or work close to a Barry Scheck of
the Innocence Project, and one of the things that I
learned was that these cases are not isolated and that
it really takes a group that has the ability to
dive down, open up these old files, open up these
old cases, and bring justice for these individuals. We need

(01:28:44):
to be pushing this nationwide because for every person that
actually's released and actually finds justice, there are thousands whose
stories will never be told. Any lawyer who practices criminal
defense and walks into jails knows that as you are
walking through to try to talk to your client, every
single person is reaching their hand out, They're calling your name,
trying to get someone to just hear their case.

Speaker 13 (01:29:04):
Now, of course, most of.

Speaker 15 (01:29:06):
Them probably aren't killing the aren't being completely truthful, but
for every one of those, there's someone who is who
doesn't have an opportunity. We have to start investing in
these nonprofit organizations that are moving in and they're able
to represent these individuals and bring them to court, bring
these cases back to life, introduce new evidence of DNA,
of science that didn't exist when they were convicted to

(01:29:28):
try to overturn these things. But also cities have to
invest in the types of units that investigate old cases
then find out whether or not they actually were brought justice.
It's not just about numbers and locking people up and
throwing away the key it's about actually living up to decreed.
The lawyers placed themselves too, and I'm glad this happened.
I hope that they get their full justice. But we

(01:29:49):
have to work on expanding this nationwide to truly overturned
three decades of mass incarceration and criminalization of African American's nationwide,
and also stop the current attacks on the Justice Department
decrees and other efforts by this extreme Maga administration to
make it more difficult to bring justice to the African
Americans who have been incarcerated for decades.

Speaker 2 (01:30:10):
You know, Zachary, they got thirty one year prisons in
this only served thirteen of those years, but that is
still a hell of a long time. And I just
can't imagine knowing you did not convict a crime and
you're sitting there in prison every single.

Speaker 16 (01:30:26):
Day the time is gone and you can't get it back,
and you can't get it back. And what really worries
me the most is that all of the different mechanisms
to possibly garner even a shred of distance, because we
know the American government has never been done right by
black people accused of crime. It's never been a fair

(01:30:48):
standard in this country since black people were allowed to
have citizenship rights in this country after being forcibly brought
here and enslaves, So we know that that it's never
been a fair system for black people. But now under
the Trump administration, the reality that all of the mechanisms
that are put in place to offer even a symbols
of justice has been that they have been dismantled or

(01:31:09):
they are being dismantled, makes me even more fearful and
concerned about any black person's opportunity to garner any level
of justice, because again, like you said, Roland once, once
the time is gone, it's not coming back.

Speaker 2 (01:31:24):
Rebecca.

Speaker 22 (01:31:26):
It was very critical of President Joe Biden for not
properly atoning, in my opinion, for his role in the
nineteen ninety three Crime Bill that said, as long as
there are for profit prisons in this country, we will
continually see that people who should not be in.

Speaker 7 (01:31:41):
Prison are in prison.

Speaker 14 (01:31:43):
Any time that you have a corporation who reports to
his shareholders, its mission is to make money to increase
the bottom line. The only way you make more money
in a for profit prison corporation is if you have
more convictions.

Speaker 7 (01:32:00):
You have more people in that prison for longer that
there's more.

Speaker 14 (01:32:03):
Contracts, whether it's people who are in this country undocumented
and they're being detained in these.

Speaker 7 (01:32:08):
Prisons, or it is additional black men who are rounded
up on.

Speaker 14 (01:32:12):
The street, chased by law enforcement and in some cases
lawfully and unrightfully convicted of felonies, even with even with
some of the other schemes of country with three strikes
and you're out, and with those types of things to
prolonge people's time with their incarceration.

Speaker 7 (01:32:31):
You know, what's really.

Speaker 14 (01:32:32):
Interesting about one hundred and twenty million dollars settlement is
that it still doesn't speak to that personal harm. Still
doesn't speak to the mental anguish, the mental health that
that particular person will need in order to be rehabilitated
back into society to have their humanness stripped away from them.
One hundred and twenty million dollars is great, but that
still doesn't actually do the restorative work of getting that

(01:32:56):
person back into society and fully recognized as a human again.

Speaker 2 (01:33:04):
Indeed, and so it's I mean, the fight continues. The
fight continues for so many innocent, innocent brothers and sisters, folks.
George Clinton, the creator of Parliament Funkadelic, is suing his
former business partner, partner Arman Baladian and his Bridgeport Music Company.
Standing next to civilize attorney Ben Crump and front the

(01:33:26):
Apollo Theater, Clinton announced the one hundred million dollar lawsuit
against Bladian, claiming he fraudiently acquired copyrights and obtained ninety
percent of the artist catalog. Along with Bladian, Clinton is
also suing Westbound Records, Nine Records, Southfield Music, and Eastbound
Records the lawsuit of latest fraud, copyrighting, infringement, and breach
of Fordiaria duty, among many other accusations. Clinton also claims

(01:33:49):
that Bladian allegedly fabricated several versions of agreements designating additional
rights to his catalog and created fake names and pseudonyms
in copyright registrations to dilute royalty shares. Clinton explains why
this lawsuit is important to his family and legacy.

Speaker 24 (01:34:07):
These songs we're talking about is my history. I mean,
It's what I've been about all my life, inspired by
the days when I used to come here to watch
Frankie Lyman, Jackie Wilson's and Heartbeats, to watch all of
those acts that I used to come and see if
they Apollo did these songs. Was inspired by those trips

(01:34:31):
here and it's been my life. I mean that my babies,
so I have to fight for them. I have to
make sure that I did not do all of this
my whole life and have my family here not get what's.

Speaker 11 (01:34:49):
Due to them, but they inherit.

Speaker 3 (01:34:53):
We don't have a chance to pass down.

Speaker 24 (01:34:56):
Forty acres and mws to our families.

Speaker 11 (01:34:59):
We don't have write.

Speaker 7 (01:35:02):
The copyrights from the songs.

Speaker 24 (01:35:04):
So I'm gonna be here along with Ben and partners
to make sure that Arman do not get all that
we worked so hard for and the historical moment that
the Funk has brought, Yes, the Mothership in the Smithsonian,
all of that.

Speaker 16 (01:35:25):
He can't have that.

Speaker 9 (01:35:26):
Yeah, they can't.

Speaker 7 (01:35:27):
Rewrite history and take that from us.

Speaker 24 (01:35:30):
So along with that and the fact that I do
have my family here that I can pass it down
to it, we all together, you're gonna see that happen.
And I will continue to speak truth to power and
to fight against the forces that have separated so many
songwriters from their music.

Speaker 7 (01:35:52):
I encourage all my fellow artists to.

Speaker 24 (01:35:54):
Investigate, interrogate, litigate, unsealed, revealed. If we don't get this right,
then they win, and I refuse to let them win.
This is about my family and the family of the
other legacy artists, and us being able to give generation

(01:36:14):
of wealth to our family from our intellectual property.

Speaker 11 (01:36:18):
We will fight this.

Speaker 2 (01:36:23):
This is not Clinton's first lawsuit. He lost the copyright
lawsuit against Bladion in nineteen ninety one the judge rule
that music written from nineteen seventy six to nineteen eighty
three belonged to Balladian's Bridgeport Music. He then lost a
defamation suit against Clinton in twenty twenty one. You know,
we see this. We see this a lot, Robert, We
see this today where artists really are are fighting a

(01:36:48):
lot of these draconian contracts that have existed.

Speaker 3 (01:36:52):
I was watching a video earlier. It was a couple
of videos I was watching.

Speaker 2 (01:36:56):
One of them was involving bun Bee, where he was
saying that even all these years later, that UGK still
owes Jive Records two million dollars for their record deal,
even with even all the hits they supplied them. And
I was also watching another video of a brother. He's

(01:37:22):
a show created director, and he was talking about the
checks checks that he was one of the creator of
the Jamie Fox show Bentley and Bentley said that here
we are twenty plus years later, and he said that
he and Jamie Fox have not received any syndication money

(01:37:46):
from that show because the studio is claiming that they
still owe them for various expenses. Hollywood is known for
this and the music business where oh, we've never re
hooped all of the expenses for something, and it's been
twenty twenty five years later.

Speaker 15 (01:38:05):
Well, Roland a couple of things. One, if George Clinton
needs co council on this case, feel free to call me.
I'll be glad that the first time I ever smokee
to blunt, George Clinton handed it to me at the
House of Blues in Chicago in two thousand and nine.
There's no when you think about Southern hip hop and
West Coast hip hop, they are directly directed.

Speaker 2 (01:38:24):
I'm houlda oh wait.

Speaker 13 (01:38:24):
Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait
help sorry.

Speaker 2 (01:38:27):
So, if George Clinton needs a co council, please call
you because he's passed you a blunt. Yeah, not because
of legal hey, because he passed you a blunt.

Speaker 15 (01:38:36):
I have special affinity for George Clinton because he has
a bit a transformative force in many people's lives. The
anthe repty is that same beats that made West Coast
rapp in the late eighties were the same beats that
made Southern rapid the nineteen nineties. You can look at
listen to Doctor Drake, you can look at the organized
noise and outcasts.

Speaker 13 (01:38:54):
It realized that's how deep it goes.

Speaker 15 (01:38:56):
When you're talking about the influence he has had on
music over the course of the last forty years and
when we're entering this new era. The reason this is
significant today is we look at these social media stars
who are suddenly blowing up in fame, blowing up in notoriety,
and who have no idea of the legal system and
how exactly licensing and those sorts of things. They're just
happy to be on TV and having some fame. When

(01:39:18):
you look at these artists who are breaking on SoundCloud
and other platforms, where they're going from as SETSI Red said,
they took a girl from the hood and gave her
a bunch of money. They don't have no idea what
they're signing off on. So for these artist from previous generations,
they have to set down the legal precident necessary. So
these current and future artists will have the backbone to
stand up to and before the court system, letting everyone

(01:39:40):
know that we have the control of artistic properties, and
the people who actually made and produced the music, not
the lawyers in the back room or the people who
have the contracts, are the people who will be benefiting
from this. Part of the reason that we're seeing this
dearth of creativity and music today where we're not seeing
new sounds and new creativity because the folks who actually
have that ability or not pursuing those musical careers because

(01:40:02):
they understand the dangers that happen when that is being
stolen and taken away from you.

Speaker 13 (01:40:06):
On the long term, we've been going.

Speaker 15 (01:40:08):
Through this for seventy five years in black music, and
we have to stop it going forward. I hope this
loss seeds and we need to be educating this next
generation on exactly the legal steps they need to make
on the front end to protect themselves.

Speaker 13 (01:40:18):
And that's happening again.

Speaker 2 (01:40:22):
You know, it is so many artists that have just
side awful deal. Zachary, I remember seeing this video Chamellionaire
talked about how he was suing a record company. He
did he hired Jay Z's auditor and he discovered they
owed him six hundred thousand and they were not trying
to give him the money.

Speaker 3 (01:40:41):
And he said, Okay, here's the deal.

Speaker 2 (01:40:44):
I'm going to go to every other artist on your
label and tell them to hire the same forensic auditor
if you don't give you my money. Bru. They gave
him his money with the quickness. It is so had
the amount of black wealth that has frankly been stolen

(01:41:08):
legally a lot of times legal illegally as well, because
folks don't read contracts because they don't get somebody.

Speaker 3 (01:41:16):
Else to sign the deal.

Speaker 2 (01:41:19):
I mean the number of artists who say that basically
it's like record labels like going to a bank, and
you could actually get cheaper interest rates by going to
an actual bank and barring the money.

Speaker 3 (01:41:31):
I mean, so many black artists have been ripped off
to the tune of.

Speaker 2 (01:41:35):
Billions and billions of dollars because of these awful contracts.

Speaker 6 (01:41:45):
Every every day, Roland, you you bring the funk, but CHORYE.

Speaker 16 (01:41:50):
Clinton problem and created the funk that we bring in
so that I didn't know this.

Speaker 6 (01:41:55):
This is kind of mind blowing to me.

Speaker 16 (01:41:56):
One hundred million dollars is insane and this has been
ongoing battle that this man has had to fight, and
at a time when he should be enjoying the entirety
of the fruits of his labor, doing exactly what he wants. However,
he wants to benefit from a legacy that he's built.
He's having to fight these battles. Jessic get his due reward,
and it speaks to a much bigger problem in our

(01:42:17):
society and how our society treats our Black artists and
even what black artists accept and what we are selling
for and what society is selling for. Because when a
story like this comes out and a black artist has
been done wrong, the first thing that we the black
community wants to say is that this is the result
of them, you know, taking a bad deal, not realizing
that many times they're pushing to these deals and things

(01:42:38):
shift and they're being taken advantage of. And that's exactly
what it appears has happened to George Clinton. So I'm
really thankful to see this man standing up and hopefully
is going to pay the way for other people in
the industry, especially when you look at a timeframe in
which he entered into the game. So I'm thankful and
I'm hopeful now that this isn't happening when you have
black people at the forefront of these industries and at

(01:42:59):
the or from the management where they're hopefully doing a
much better job of giving black artists their fair share
and their fair due.

Speaker 6 (01:43:05):
Now that's my hope.

Speaker 2 (01:43:07):
Well, well, well, the reality, Rebecca, I want to say something, Yeah,
go ahead, I.

Speaker 16 (01:43:15):
Want to add in, you know and that and you.
When I was hearing this story, it made me think
of and say to myself, well, thank God for Roland
Martin and the Black Star Network, because that's the real
answer that black people have to look at. And how
do we avoid this from happening in the future is
we have to build and we have to create our own.
We can't sit here and let these established organizations that
have for decades stolen from us continue to profit for

(01:43:38):
my work and continue to profit for my labor. We
have to build our own in the exact same way
that you have laid out a model of building your own.
We have to build our own, and then we have
to support our own. That's the only piece I want
to add in because that's what I was thinking.

Speaker 6 (01:43:51):
That my kid, as I'm hearing this for the first time.

Speaker 2 (01:43:56):
Well the deil, Rebecca is this here? You also got
some jki s heisty black folks who will screw you over.
I mean, we're preparing a lawsuit against somebody right now. Uh,
and I will announce that once the lawsuit is filed,
that that person has been served, and I'll make it
real public and will show you their face. And we've
we've seen where you've had, you know, black business managers,

(01:44:19):
You've had folks the same. What I say is always
protect your business, Always protect your business.

Speaker 3 (01:44:29):
Handshake deals.

Speaker 2 (01:44:30):
Word about nah, you document everything because I cannot stand
watching a TV one unsung of an amazing artist, a
great band and then they go broke. Uh, and it's
always a bad deal. I mean, before she died, Angie
Stone in December was talking about how she wasn't getting

(01:44:54):
her royalty checks from the record label and so she
was like, hey, we were about to some truth to
power in twenty twenty five. And so it's so many artists.
I mean, this goes back to the beginning of music,
of artists being screwed over constantly by various people when
it comes to their publishing, when it comes to the music.

Speaker 7 (01:45:20):
Grow in two things.

Speaker 14 (01:45:21):
You have black people who uphold and are perpetrators of
white supremacy. So anytime you have a system that's designed
to strip to still to dehumanize, to take the intellectual
property from black folks in this country and enter them
into like a servitude if they want to do their
craft and the entertainment and the music industry.

Speaker 7 (01:45:41):
One of the things that I'm paying.

Speaker 14 (01:45:43):
Attention to is how this is going to play out
in college sports with name, image and likeness. As I've
been monitoring what's happening across different collectives, I can also
see where there's going to be different and on college athletes,
especially some of our black college athletes, who are going
to be exploited by the system, who are giving up
too much of themselves into perpetuity and not fully understanding

(01:46:07):
the breadth of the intellectual property and the value of
their intellectual property that they're giving up.

Speaker 2 (01:46:16):
Yeah, it's just it's just so unfortunate. So I'm certainly
glad to see this is We'll see what happens with
this lawsuit. Gotta go to break, We come back a
quick break. More outpouring of love and affection for Junior Bridgeman,
the former NBA player who collapsed yesterday while speaking in Louisville,
Kentucky and died. We'll share you what Doc Rivers had

(01:46:40):
to say about the passing of this giant. You're watching
rollingd mark and unfolcused on the Black Study.

Speaker 21 (01:46:53):
Hey, y'all, welcome to the other side of Change, only
on the Blackstar Network and hosted by myself Free Baker
and Mike jami Or Burley. We are just two millennial
women tackling everything at the intersection of politics, gender and
pop culture.

Speaker 22 (01:47:07):
And we don't just settle for commentary.

Speaker 17 (01:47:09):
This is about solution driven dialogue to get us to
the world as it could be and not just.

Speaker 25 (01:47:13):
As it is.

Speaker 7 (01:47:14):
Watch us on the Blackstar Network.

Speaker 21 (01:47:15):
So tune into the episode of Change.

Speaker 6 (01:47:22):
Hell, this is Reggie rock Bike for it.

Speaker 11 (01:47:25):
You're watching roll with Latin.

Speaker 1 (01:47:27):
Unfiltered, uncut, unplugged, and undamned believable him.

Speaker 13 (01:48:21):
Folks.

Speaker 2 (01:48:21):
After Tuesday's not an NBA game, Milwaukee Bucks head coach
Doc Rivers took time to reflect on Bucks legend Junior Bridgeman.
He of course, played twelve years in the NBA eighty also,
though was a minority owner of the Milwaukee Bucks.

Speaker 3 (01:48:38):
Rivers said He's a model we should have. Here is
what Doc had to say, is.

Speaker 18 (01:48:44):
Really a dark day to day. I've known July. I
might six that have known him since I was college.
You know, he was one of the guys, he'd been
quick buck there that would call me at Marquette to

(01:49:07):
get me to go play with the Bucks of all places.
And you know when when you think about Junior's life,
you know, I keep thinking about like Lebron and Magic
and how influential they are to our league.

Speaker 13 (01:49:24):
And they are and what they've done off the court
is amazing.

Speaker 18 (01:49:28):
But the role model we should have a junior Bridgeman,
when you think about it, here's a guy that think
the the most. He made us with three hundred thousand
dollars in his career and he's an owner. You know,
so think about that kid growing up wanting to be
an NBA player was probably his dream, and he turned

(01:49:51):
that dream into being an NBA owner. And if that's
not what every kid should inspire to it. You know,
I was even reflect on my career, you know, a
as a as a coach, and you know I'm titled
of tuped and all that stuff, and you should really
want to be like Junior. I mean when when you
think about it, uh, he is the exact model that

(01:50:15):
the league should use every day when they're talking to
our young players. So tough things really a through thing.
I guess when you kind of think through your time there,
you kind.

Speaker 6 (01:50:33):
Of get this last chote where it comes.

Speaker 16 (01:50:36):
Back, Yeah, what was.

Speaker 5 (01:50:39):
Back kind of like that that was so young and then.

Speaker 18 (01:50:42):
All, yeah, it's so different, you know, I you know,
and it they like there's some I just reflect on
me a lot too. I remember really blessed, like, uh,
there's a lot of benefits for me coming back to
Milwaukee that I didn't like anticipate. I had no idea
that that Junior was gonna get back into the Bucks

(01:51:04):
and be an owner. And then we restarted relationship. We
stayed in contact still throughout the years. You know, I
drew me down and go to Kentucky therapy with him.

Speaker 13 (01:51:13):
So we had we had a.

Speaker 18 (01:51:15):
Relationship, but I didn't talk to him a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:51:17):
And then all of a sudden.

Speaker 18 (01:51:18):
He's back in and you know when you tell people,
you know, people succeeds the day and all this stuff.
I'm really like, you know, the last conversation I have
in Junior was about using him to mentor the young
players and trying to figure out a way of doing that,
and we never got to it, you know, because you

(01:51:39):
thought there were a time. So yeah, that's the second
side of Junior was the first side though, Like when
he was an NBA player, if you could have just
met him on the streets, you.

Speaker 11 (01:51:50):
Wouldn't have known.

Speaker 2 (01:51:51):
He wouldn't have told you, and he didn't act like it.

Speaker 18 (01:51:55):
When he became a billionaire, you wouldn't have known, and
he would not have told you, and he didn't act
like it. You know, the word gentleman is like gentle man.

Speaker 11 (01:52:06):
That is that is as good as you can get.
With Julia.

Speaker 2 (01:52:12):
Folks. A couple of years ago, Junior Bridgeman talked about
his business success after a twelve year planning career, went
on to own a number of Wendy's and other fast
food franchises, owing more than a forty fifty Later became
a co Cola botler, also owning a Lunum company, as
we said, buying ten percent equity stake in the Milwaukee Bucks,
being one of the folks who bought the Valhalla Country

(01:52:34):
Club there in Kentucky as well, buying Ebony and jet
out of bankruptcy.

Speaker 3 (01:52:39):
But he said, how you treat people, how you.

Speaker 2 (01:52:42):
Connect with the community, it is most important. Here's some
of that investments conversation in from twenty twenty three.

Speaker 25 (01:52:49):
We started off like most companies at that time. If
you're black and you're going to get involved, they're going
to put you in the black area of town. And
so it was no different. We started in Milwaukee because
I spent all those years there with five stores in
the inner city of Milwaukee, and they were not very

(01:53:10):
good restaurants.

Speaker 2 (01:53:11):
Hey, Steve the audio.

Speaker 25 (01:53:13):
I figured if he worked at it, you could turn
things around. And I'll tell you the average volume of
those five restaurants was only six hundred thousand dollars a year.
And you're not making any money at that volume. Today
those restaurants and my son runs them, so we still
have a lot of them, but they do over two
million dollars in sales. And how do you do that

(01:53:34):
by getting involved with the people and letting people know
that you care about them? Now, how do you do that?
Back at that time in Milwaukee, if you got stopped
for any traffic violation, they took you to jail. It
was a crazy law that I'm glad they've changed, But
where was all of our people at They were in jail,

(01:53:56):
So we were bailing people out every day. And I
could take you through other things that we did to
help show people that we cared about them. And once
they realized that we cared about them, then they cared
about the business and they cared about us. And we grew,
and as we grew and added more stores, we were
able to promote people from a general manager to a

(01:54:18):
district manager to an area operations person, and after a
while we had a whole lot of people making over
one hundred thousand dollars a year. And you would say,
you know, how did that happen? And it was in
what I would call a real American dream. You could
come go to work, if you had just natural common

(01:54:38):
sense and you were willing to work hard, you could
make a good living for yourself. And we had people
that went on from there and became franchise Z's on
their own. So turn around and it was a matter
of helping people. And then one day I looked up
and we had two hundred and seventy five Windy's restaurants.

Speaker 2 (01:55:00):
Folks, And it was a great conversation there. This is
a photo that I shot actually before he went on stage,
Junior Bridgeman, I went backstage a chat with him. He's
also an Alpha brother, and so with an opportunity to chat,
I hadn't seen him since twenty ten when I moderated
the conversation the NBA All Star Game in Houston, where

(01:55:21):
he was one of the panelists, and so certainly conduless
go out to his family the loss of a giant
and you know, you know, let me go. Final comments
from Zachary, Zachary, Robert and Rebecca. You know, Rebecca, I've
had some people they've hit me and they've said, man,
my goodness, seventy one is young. And Sylvester Turner, you know,
Congressman Sevester Turner, form mayor of Houston, died last week

(01:55:45):
the age of seventy and he's gonna be His funeral
is going to be on Saturday in Houston. Events are
happening this week. Andrew Stone, of course, passed away the
tragic car accident at sixty three. And you know, one
of the things that I said to people is that
you know, no one knows the day all the time,
So what you must do is you got to maximize
every single day, every single hour, minute and a second.

(01:56:07):
You have to live the best life that you can
and help others.

Speaker 6 (01:56:14):
May these legends rest in paradise.

Speaker 16 (01:56:18):
May they rest in paradise and gone an eternal peace,
and let them leave behind for us those who are
left to continue this work, to continue to strive our
eternal promise. So we're here to stand on the promise,
but to also fulfill the promise. And hopefully you can
clearly see from what this entrepreneur has been able to
do in the course of his life and what he's

(01:56:38):
been able to achieve. And the same thing goes for
Angie Stone, the same thing goes for Representive Turner. They
leave behind a roadmap for us to follow, for things
to learn to do, things to learn what not.

Speaker 6 (01:56:49):
To do, so that we can keep pushing forward.

Speaker 2 (01:56:54):
Rebecca, you know, seventy years, those are young ages.

Speaker 14 (01:57:02):
But I want, but I want to point out that
for black men in this country, that the average age
is sixty eight years old. So these people actually exceeded
what the life expectancy is for the average Black men
in this country. So as these folks transition become ancestors,
you know, it's definitely imperative for all of us, especially
black people in this country during this troubling time. Take

(01:57:25):
care of yourself, eat good food, get plenty of rest,
be healthy, be active, move your body, and most importantly,
but most importantly, go to the doctor. Get those tests run.
It's okay to get those tests run. Take take somebody
else with you, but we all got to do community
here and take care of ourselves in this moment.

Speaker 15 (01:57:47):
Robert, I think every single week when I come on
with you roll in, it seems that we are mourning
someone who has passed away. And this is why it's
so important for us to live every single day and
ask ourselves this question. Today was the last am I
satisfied with what I've done? And if you're not satisfied
with what you have done and achieved on this day,
figure out how to do it differently tomorrow. To Rebecca's point,

(01:58:10):
look in my book bag. Every day I care around
a blood presser monitor, an EKG machine, medicine and everything else.
Just in case when your wife tells you to go
to the doctor, don't fighter, don't say I'm okay, which
is what black men do far too often, and try
to gut our way through it, go to the doctor.
When we're talking about diet and exercise. The Black communities

(01:58:30):
one of the most obese communities globally other than South
Pacific Islanders, so we have to work on that as
a community. And when it comes to stress in the
workplace and the family, we have to figure out how
to prioritize mental health. So we are coping with these
issues and finding ways to go through it, but most importantly,
we have to ensure that we are putting ourselves for
it first. That doesn't make you a narcissist. It doesn't

(01:58:51):
make you a bad person. You can't help anybody else
if you're not here. You have to take care of
yourself and live your life in such a way that
you're fulfilling your true purpose.

Speaker 2 (01:59:03):
H Indeed, indeed, Zachary, Robert, Rebecca, I staly appreciate y'all
joining us on today's show and Rebecca asking in the
group chat like, Hey, what the hell's the Rebecca? She
ad the beach what's up?

Speaker 7 (01:59:22):
I can't say, but what I.

Speaker 14 (01:59:23):
Will say there is strategy happening and there are solutions
that are coming.

Speaker 13 (01:59:30):
Shout out to Rebecca for working on vacation.

Speaker 2 (01:59:32):
I say that every single time.

Speaker 3 (01:59:33):
Yeah, I say that every single time.

Speaker 2 (01:59:36):
I'm not vacation.

Speaker 7 (01:59:38):
I am not I'm actually not a vacation.

Speaker 14 (01:59:43):
I'm actually working, developing some strategy, coming up with.

Speaker 13 (01:59:48):
A solution, developing some margaritas. I feel you on that one.

Speaker 7 (01:59:55):
Wrong direction, Mar.

Speaker 2 (02:00:00):
Yeah, yeah, we can tell that. We can tell that
beach rap you got on right now? All right, that's
Sam again, Robert, Rebecca and Zachar. I appreciate it, Thank
you so very much. Hey, folks, don't forget if y'all
want to support the work that we do, join out
Bringing the Funk Fan Club. Your donations are critical to
our success. We don't have millionaires and billionaires cutting checks
to us, and so it is important for you to

(02:00:22):
support the work that we do. Our goals get twenty
thousand people annually contributing on contributing on average fifty bucks
each's coming out to be four dollars and nineteen cents
the month, thirteen cents today. If you want to join
out Bring the Funk Fan Club, use cash app, use
district QR code. Here you go right here, this is
the QR code. Point your phone to the screen. Then
you can of course click cash ap and at cash

(02:00:43):
app pay button to contribute if you're listening to go
to Blackstar Network dot com. If you also want to
send a check of money, or to go to peelbox
five seven one ninety six, Washington d C two zero
zero three seven DAZ zero one nine six, paypals, PayPal,
dot em, e for slash, are Martin, unforltuate venmo is
r M, Unfiltered, zell Rolling App, Rolling Smartin dot com,

(02:01:04):
rolling at, Rolling Marktunfilter dot com, download the Blackstut network
app Apple Phone, Android Phone, Apple TV, Android TV, roll Cool,
Amazon fireTV, Xbox one, Samsung Smart Tv. You can also,
of course get our Rolling Markin unfilter blackstud Network swag
by going to Rolling Martin dot creator ass Spring dot
com cure code there as well. You want to get
our newest shirts hashtag and we try to tell you

(02:01:26):
f a f FO twenty twenty five and also don't
blame me at voted for the black woman, the Rolling
Martin dot.

Speaker 3 (02:01:31):
Creator asks Spring dot com, or go to blackstud Network
dot com.

Speaker 2 (02:01:34):
You should get a copy of my book White Fear
of the Browning of Americas making white folks lose their
minds availble at bookstores nationwide, to the audio version I
read on audible, and of course download the app.

Speaker 3 (02:01:45):
Fan base you can also if you want to participate.

Speaker 2 (02:01:48):
In the crowdfunding of that, go to stark engine dot
com or slash fan based stark edine dot com ord
slash fan based folks.

Speaker 13 (02:01:56):
That's it.

Speaker 2 (02:01:56):
I'll see you a tomorrow right here on Rolling Martin
Unfiltered on the bl Black Star Network. If you'll miss
our content, go to our Black Start Network at but
our YouTube channel as well. We should have shared the content.
We should have have passed on to others because again,
we want more people to be aware of what we're
doing here, because this is about informing our audience and
giving them the best news and information they're not going

(02:02:18):
to get anywhere else. That speaks to our community. Y'all.
Thanks a bunch, I'll see you all tomorrow.

Speaker 3 (02:02:23):
How Black Star Network.

Speaker 2 (02:02:28):
A real revolution there right now.

Speaker 6 (02:02:30):
I thank you for me and the voice of black
afarance moment that we have.

Speaker 11 (02:02:34):
Now we have to keep this going.

Speaker 23 (02:02:36):
The video of phenomenalf between Black Star Network and black
owned media and something like seeing in.

Speaker 2 (02:02:43):
You can't be black owned media and be scared.

Speaker 11 (02:02:46):
It's time to be smart.

Speaker 2 (02:02:48):
Bring your eyeballs home. You dig,

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Host

Roland Martin

Popular Podcasts

The Breakfast Club

Dateline NBC

Decisions, Decisions

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Drastic HUD cuts, DOE closings/firings, NOAA mass firings, Trump's economic policies spark chaos