Latest / The Breakfast Club / INTERVIEW: Hill Harper On Senate Run, Who Controls Our Money, Student Debt Relief, Biden Stepping Down + More

Transcript

INTERVIEW: Hill Harper On Senate Run, Who Controls Our Money, Student Debt Relief, Biden Stepping Down + More · The Breakfast Club

0:00
Speaker 1: Wake that ass up in the morning.
0:02
Speaker 2: Breakfast Club Morning, Everybody's teen j n V Jess hilarious,
0:08
Speaker 2: charlamage the guy.
0:08
Speaker 1: We are the breakfast club. We got a special guest
0:10
Speaker 1: in the building. Indeed, got the brother Hill harp.
0:13
Speaker 3: Yeah, good, good, good, good to be here. Man, this
0:16
Speaker 3: this is a new studio to me. This is beautiful.
0:18
Speaker 3: I haven't been in this this studio a.
0:21
Speaker 1: Year and a half.
0:21
Speaker 4: Yeah, year and a half. Yeah, it'd be two years
0:24
Speaker 4: in like January.
0:26
Speaker 3: Maybe they gotta pull pull out couch.
0:28
Speaker 4: Maybe I could just.
0:31
Speaker 3: Exactly. It's very nice.
0:33
Speaker 4: You got a bigger things to be doing, man, Yeah,
0:36
Speaker 4: Senate in Michigan. Run for US Senate in Michigan.
0:38
Speaker 3: We're gonna we got this primary August sixth, which is
0:42
Speaker 3: a huge deal. Man. It's about turnout. We it's a
0:47
Speaker 3: huge challenge to get communities out because so many of
0:51
Speaker 3: our people don't even know what a primary is.
0:53
Speaker 4: Right.
0:54
Speaker 3: People come up, man, I'm vote for you in November.
0:56
Speaker 1: I got you.
0:56
Speaker 3: I'm gonna vote for you, and comlin, no, I'm gonna
0:58
Speaker 3: do this. I'm gonna do that. And I'm like dog,
1:00
Speaker 3: if you don't vote for me August six I won't
1:02
Speaker 3: be on the ballot in November. And in many ways
1:06
Speaker 3: I blame the Democratic Party for that. They show up
1:09
Speaker 3: with tens of millions of dollars in October saying save
1:12
Speaker 3: the country. Come on, come on, y'all, turn out, But
1:15
Speaker 3: they want to place their establishment candidates in the primary,
1:18
Speaker 3: so they want low turnout in the primary, so they're
1:20
Speaker 3: doing no GOTV work. So my campaign literally has to
1:24
Speaker 3: try to educate folks, this is why you need to vote.
1:27
Speaker 3: The primary is actually more important than the general because
1:29
Speaker 3: if you can't get the right candidates on the ballot
1:31
Speaker 3: in the general election, then you have a very limited choice.
1:34
Speaker 3: And therefore people keep saying, man, nothing changes.
1:37
Speaker 4: Do you think that the Democratic Party wipe their ass
1:40
Speaker 4: with democracy by not having a primary to properly appoint
1:44
Speaker 4: a new top of the ticket for president?
1:47
Speaker 3: You know, I don't know about that. I don't know
1:50
Speaker 3: because the time is so tight. You know, you're talking
1:52
Speaker 3: about less than one hundred days, so you know, it's
1:55
Speaker 3: almost that thing you kind of got to get in
1:57
Speaker 3: line and get organized. And you know, it's something I
2:00
Speaker 3: say all the time about many many of us that
2:04
Speaker 3: are you know, more progressive. I say, man, we can
2:06
Speaker 3: agree on nine things disagree on one and people are like,
2:08
Speaker 3: I can't work with them. And then you know the
2:10
Speaker 3: other side, they can disagree on nine, agree on one
2:13
Speaker 3: and go storm the Capitol together. So so I think
2:15
Speaker 3: that that, you know, when you look at the reality
2:18
Speaker 3: of the situation and timing wise, you got to make
2:22
Speaker 3: a decision and go. Folks have to line up, get
2:25
Speaker 3: behind folks and and and do that in that type
2:27
Speaker 3: of process.
2:29
Speaker 4: Year though they were after for a year.
2:32
Speaker 3: I mean, listen, I mean I think in hindsight, if
2:38
Speaker 3: I mean, we can even go back. I mean, you know,
2:39
Speaker 3: everything is much clearer in hindsight, right, I mean, Ruth
2:42
Speaker 3: beta Ginsburg should have stepped down, you know, I mean
2:45
Speaker 3: and made that decision. Uh. And certainly, I'm sure there
2:49
Speaker 3: would have been a process of uh President Biden having
2:53
Speaker 3: being able to do it in a way that you know,
2:55
Speaker 3: he's getting celebrated and all this, and it didn't feel
2:58
Speaker 3: like it's but day man, Sometimes I just say, you know,
3:01
Speaker 3: God is going to take care of things the way
3:04
Speaker 3: it's going to happen, you know, and that's just it.
3:05
Speaker 3: So so this this process is playing out the way
3:08
Speaker 3: it should.
3:09
Speaker 2: Absolutely, But they also said it was a finance thing. Right,
3:11
Speaker 2: because Harris's name was on the ticket. It's easy to
3:13
Speaker 2: trans over, the transfer the funds over too.
3:15
Speaker 4: They said that what we're talking about last year, like,
3:18
Speaker 4: you know, because I've been saying for the longest President
3:20
Speaker 4: Biden step down, but I just didn't think he could
3:22
Speaker 4: win in November. And I thought that was a fair
3:24
Speaker 4: question to ask. Is the Biden Harris ticket a winnable
3:27
Speaker 4: ticket in November?
3:28
Speaker 3: Right?
3:28
Speaker 4: So I've been asking that and people were saying last
3:30
Speaker 4: year they should primary them because everybody saw the decline.
3:34
Speaker 3: Right, they saw it, So I mean it was it
3:37
Speaker 3: is definitely apparent. The question is, you know, is was that?
3:42
Speaker 3: And obviously, I mean, come on, I mean we saw
3:44
Speaker 3: what we saw. You can't unsee what you saw, right.
3:47
Speaker 3: You know, my mother's eighty six years old, God bless her.
3:50
Speaker 3: She lives with me in Detroit and me and my son,
3:53
Speaker 3: and you know, she's not moving the way she used
3:55
Speaker 3: to move, right, and that's not her fault. And she's
3:57
Speaker 3: one of the most brilliant people. First black female Lanta
4:02
Speaker 3: sez I is one of the first black female sez
4:04
Speaker 3: I was in the country. But at the end of
4:05
Speaker 3: the day, you know, time can't be for the two
4:09
Speaker 3: yes right time is one is undefeated.
4:11
Speaker 2: That is a video of you fifteen years ago, right
4:15
Speaker 2: predicting that Kamala Harris was going to be the president.
4:18
Speaker 3: That's right.
4:19
Speaker 2: What did you see in her fifteen years ago that
4:21
Speaker 2: made you think that before people even knew who she was.
4:24
Speaker 3: I think leadership tenacity. You know, at that time in
4:28
Speaker 3: two thousand and seven, Barack Obama had asked myself and
4:32
Speaker 3: Kamala to go to Iowa to stump for him to
4:35
Speaker 3: help him win the Iowa caucus. He felt that if
4:37
Speaker 3: he couldn't win the Iowa caucus, there was no way
4:39
Speaker 3: to win that primary because he was going up against
4:41
Speaker 3: establishment and establishment money, et cetera. And so folks stump
4:45
Speaker 3: for him. So we became friends. She asked me to
4:47
Speaker 3: contribute to her book, which I did. Eventually, I hosted
4:50
Speaker 3: the first fundraiser for her in southern California for her
4:53
Speaker 3: Attorney general's race, and then did some other things with
4:56
Speaker 3: you know, black professionals, different things, And that's where that
4:58
Speaker 3: quote was from, I introducing her to Black professionals event.
5:02
Speaker 3: And so you talk about someone with intelligence, someone who's
5:06
Speaker 3: work ethic, someone who you know just just also very
5:11
Speaker 3: passionate about wanting to make the world better and figure
5:14
Speaker 3: out ways to do that. And so there was no
5:16
Speaker 3: you know in my mind, you know, when I went
5:19
Speaker 3: to Harvard Law School with Barack. You know, you see
5:22
Speaker 3: things in people and you can see just who and
5:26
Speaker 3: how what they're made of, and and there's you know,
5:29
Speaker 3: you talk about uh, you know, there's there's a lot
5:32
Speaker 3: of things that I think that she's going to have
5:34
Speaker 3: to do to appeal you know, from a Michigan point
5:37
Speaker 3: of view, to clean up some of the problems with
5:40
Speaker 3: the Arab Muslim community in Michigan, et cetera. But she
5:42
Speaker 3: can do that work. There's an opportunity here. She can
5:44
Speaker 3: do that work. She can, she can, I believe, get
5:46
Speaker 3: that done.
5:47
Speaker 4: I think her rhetoric around Israel and God that thus
5:51
Speaker 4: far has been stellar, I.
5:53
Speaker 3: Really do, because we're not going to the net and
5:55
Speaker 3: Yahoo speech was it was definitely a step in the
5:58
Speaker 3: right direction. That was a step in the right direction,
6:00
Speaker 3: for sure.
6:00
Speaker 4: Absolutely, But even the lame I mean, even when she
6:02
Speaker 4: says she's like, Israel does have the right to defend itself,
6:06
Speaker 4: but we still have to work towards a ceasefire. We
6:09
Speaker 4: need a ceasefire. As well watching innocent people get killed.
6:13
Speaker 4: You know, that's right, I mean, I and to me
6:14
Speaker 4: it's so big, it's common sense rhetoric. But for whatever reason,
6:17
Speaker 4: people are afraid to say that.
6:18
Speaker 3: I say it all the time. There's no good war
6:20
Speaker 3: and there's no bad peace. I mean, that's just a
6:21
Speaker 3: simple fact. Is we want to save lives. At the
6:24
Speaker 3: end of the day. Humanity and human rights have to
6:27
Speaker 3: come first in every discussion. That's for everybody. And that's just.
6:30
Speaker 3: And the idea of if you say, you know, when
6:32
Speaker 3: I call for ceasefire, for instance, my social media got
6:35
Speaker 3: ratcheted down by ninety eight percent. And this is like
6:38
Speaker 3: last November when I called for I was one of
6:40
Speaker 3: the first US sent canons in the country to call
6:42
Speaker 3: for And the idea that if you're calling for ceasefire
6:46
Speaker 3: is some somehow that's pro terrorism or anti Israel or
6:52
Speaker 3: anti you know, human or this, it's not true. The
6:56
Speaker 3: thing is I can't stand terrorists. Terrorists, that's that's violence
6:59
Speaker 3: and malevolent and that's I can't stand hostages, that's violence
7:02
Speaker 3: and malevolence. But I also can't stand carpetbag carpet bombing,
7:06
Speaker 3: and and and and and ultimately covering places with indiscriminate
7:11
Speaker 3: bombing and killing women and children, and and and the
7:14
Speaker 3: injury and death death's toll. And so it's heartbreaking. I
7:18
Speaker 3: was in a meeting last night in Dearborn in Michigan
7:21
Speaker 3: with a number of folks from the Palestinian community, and
7:24
Speaker 3: their hearts are ripped out because they're seeing their family
7:28
Speaker 3: members and so. But at the same time, you have
7:30
Speaker 3: a whole set of folks who have you know, hostages
7:33
Speaker 3: have been taken and their hearts are broken. So there's
7:35
Speaker 3: so much pain and grief. But the idea is, how
7:40
Speaker 3: do we get to a place where we reduce the
7:42
Speaker 3: level of violence and the level of uh malevolent behavior.
7:47
Speaker 3: We can get there, but you don't get there through
7:49
Speaker 3: a bomb. We don't get there.
7:51
Speaker 4: We had Governor Whitmer up here, and I'm gonna ask
7:53
Speaker 4: you the same thing, because you know you're in Michigan.
7:55
Speaker 4: How much of an impact do you think that's gonna
7:56
Speaker 4: happen November? Because when you see these hundreds of thousands
7:59
Speaker 4: of people who voted uncommitted, you know, you know during primaries,
8:04
Speaker 4: it's like, what do you think, how are you gonna
8:06
Speaker 4: that's what you November to be like? You know what
8:08
Speaker 4: we're going to show up Now.
8:09
Speaker 3: Well, this may sound self certain, but I think if
8:11
Speaker 3: if I can come to and win this primary, we
8:14
Speaker 3: you know, at the top of the ticket in Michigan,
8:17
Speaker 3: Harris and Harper ticket there we're able to to unify
8:21
Speaker 3: those communities. Because the one thing I'm proud about, among
8:25
Speaker 3: among many things, with our campaign, as we'll be able
8:27
Speaker 3: to unify the Black community in Michigan as well as
8:31
Speaker 3: the Arab Muslim community. I have the endorsements from you know,
8:34
Speaker 3: most of the top leaders uh IN in Michigan that
8:37
Speaker 3: are from the Araban Muslim community, as well as the
8:40
Speaker 3: Arab American Political Action Committee, the Arab and Muslim Political
8:43
Speaker 3: Action Committee, but also all the endorsements from the top
8:46
Speaker 3: black political leaders, which is oftentimes communities that haven't come together.
8:51
Speaker 3: And so we have to figure out a way to
8:53
Speaker 3: unify communities. Because when you look back and you look
8:55
Speaker 3: at look at doctor King and Jim Crow, you look
8:59
Speaker 3: at Nelson Della and apartheid, we're in these types of
9:02
Speaker 3: seminal moments, chiros moments, moments that are inflection points, and
9:06
Speaker 3: this is one of them, and it's but it's reflective
9:09
Speaker 3: of a of a culture of violence in general. You know,
9:11
Speaker 3: there was two young two young kids, young people that
9:13
Speaker 3: were shot on the east side of Detroit just two
9:16
Speaker 3: weeks ago. Nineteen other people injured. And so violence is
9:19
Speaker 3: violence no matter of what happens on the east side
9:21
Speaker 3: of Detroit or if it's happening in Gaza. Death is
9:23
Speaker 3: death wherever it's happening. And are our eyeballs have to
9:27
Speaker 3: be about what how do we save humans? How do
9:30
Speaker 3: we create human rights, how we do create opportunity? That
9:33
Speaker 3: has to be our litmus test. It's not about trying
9:35
Speaker 3: to do political posturing.
9:37
Speaker 4: Absolutely.
9:37
Speaker 2: I was gonna ask you know last time you spoke
9:39
Speaker 2: about it a little bit. But for people that just
9:41
Speaker 2: tuning in now, you know, a lot of people will
9:43
Speaker 2: say they know you as an actor and a lot
9:45
Speaker 2: of the stuff that you did, But what got you
9:46
Speaker 2: into politics? What made you say? You know what, I'm
9:48
Speaker 2: gonna put this acting bag down, put it on hold
9:50
Speaker 2: for a little bit, and make sure.
9:51
Speaker 4: My community is giving a good acting bag, good doctors,
9:54
Speaker 4: and don't remind it.
9:55
Speaker 3: Don't remind you get a lot of please don't. At
10:01
Speaker 3: the end of the day, when I got into acting,
10:04
Speaker 3: I wanted to be like actors that were activists, Harrab Belafonte,
10:10
Speaker 3: Ozzie Davis. So I did, I did the movie, get
10:12
Speaker 3: on the bus with Ozzie. I got to sit next
10:14
Speaker 3: to him for you know, God rest his soul for
10:16
Speaker 3: weeks on end and him just counseling me talking about
10:18
Speaker 3: when Malcolm X would come to the house and doctor
10:21
Speaker 3: King and he did what he would do. Gil Scott Herron,
10:23
Speaker 3: you know, all this and one have impact, you know,
10:27
Speaker 3: in that kind of way that moves the meter. And
10:29
Speaker 3: it's clear that the days through that entertainment lens are gone.
10:34
Speaker 3: There is a level of collusion and corruption in our
10:38
Speaker 3: federal government through basically because of Citizens United. I mean,
10:43
Speaker 3: you know, many people think that the reaction to Obama
10:46
Speaker 3: presidency was the Tea Party. I think that's the beer.
10:49
Speaker 3: The true reaction to Obama presidency was Citizens United in
10:52
Speaker 3: twenty ten that said money is speech, called corporations people,
10:56
Speaker 3: and allowed unfettered dark money to rein into our political
10:59
Speaker 3: system electropolitic. Okay, okay, so check it out. So there
11:03
Speaker 3: was a court ruling that basically said, no matter who
11:08
Speaker 3: you are, you could spend unlimited money to get somebody
11:12
Speaker 3: elected and you don't even have to report who it
11:15
Speaker 3: is and how it's that's called dark money. That's dark money.
11:18
Speaker 3: So like a foreign country could be doing it if
11:20
Speaker 3: they if they washed the money through the process, yes
11:23
Speaker 3: they could. And so you don't know every time it
11:26
Speaker 3: Just for folks out there, every time you see an
11:27
Speaker 3: ad that says paid for by Patriots for America or
11:31
Speaker 3: paid for by moving Michigan for you know, pay whatever
11:35
Speaker 3: that is, just think a dark money or think whatever
11:40
Speaker 3: that is because you don't know it's called an independent expenditure.
11:43
Speaker 3: You don't know who paid for that. You don't know
11:45
Speaker 3: what it is. And the threats that have come at me,
11:48
Speaker 3: I've called for, like, for instance, shutting down a Line five,
11:50
Speaker 3: which is an oil pipeline that runs in our Great Lakes. Right,
11:54
Speaker 3: twenty one percent of the world's fresh water supply touches
11:56
Speaker 3: Michigan shores, and and it gets most of the benefit
12:01
Speaker 3: of this oil. I want to shut it down. So Enbridge,
12:03
Speaker 3: the oil company has they have independent expenditures, right, so
12:06
Speaker 3: they want to make sure someone like me doesn't get elected, right,
12:10
Speaker 3: and they're going to spend money to do that, to
12:13
Speaker 3: smear me, smear your name, et cetera. Right, because they
12:16
Speaker 3: have an interest. Same thing with the NRA and the
12:18
Speaker 3: gun lobby, Same thing with APAK, the American Israel Political
12:22
Speaker 3: Action Committee, Same thing with big oil, big pharma, big farmers.
12:27
Speaker 3: Spent three hundred and seventy five million dollars on elections
12:30
Speaker 3: in twenty twenty two. They're on course to spend over
12:33
Speaker 3: the four hundred million in twenty twenty four. So people
12:36
Speaker 3: know intrinsically that they're not being represented. They know that
12:39
Speaker 3: the big donors, the dark money is representing them. You know,
12:44
Speaker 3: seventy four percent of Michigan Democrats are in favor of
12:46
Speaker 3: sees fire, less than ten percent of the federal delegation
12:50
Speaker 3: has called for it. That's because of the money, right,
12:53
Speaker 3: that's because they've been bought. And so I'm running to
12:57
Speaker 3: show that you don't have to be bought. I say
12:59
Speaker 3: I won't be bought, I won't be lost, I won't
13:00
Speaker 3: be bullied. They offer me twenty million dollars to drop
13:03
Speaker 3: out of my Senate race and primary Rasheeta to leave. Right,
13:07
Speaker 3: they think that money that everyone's on the take, that
13:10
Speaker 3: only people just want power, and people just want money.
13:14
Speaker 3: But if you're not for sale, you can actually charte
13:16
Speaker 3: a path that represents people over politics, over party. I'm
13:20
Speaker 3: running to actually hold both the Democratic Party and the
13:22
Speaker 3: Republican Party accountable because they both have been derelict to
13:26
Speaker 3: so many community.
13:27
Speaker 2: But it seems like it seems like every party has
13:29
Speaker 2: been bought. It just seems like you could see where people,
13:32
Speaker 2: you know, whether it's it's the gun lobbying or whatever
13:35
Speaker 2: it is, it seemed like everybody's being brought.
13:36
Speaker 1: It seems like that's the thing in politics.
13:38
Speaker 3: That's right, but money, See, money doesn't vote. People vote,
13:41
Speaker 3: and that's and see, this is what the big challenge
13:44
Speaker 3: has been. How do you get people to understand they
13:47
Speaker 3: still have the power even though they look and they're like,
13:51
Speaker 3: there's something. I was at the gas pump the other
13:53
Speaker 3: day and so I drive an F one fifty. So
13:56
Speaker 3: it costs over one hundred dollars to fill it up.
13:58
Speaker 3: And so the dudes I'm up and next toe he's
14:00
Speaker 3: say like, man, this is so expensive. And I said, yeah,
14:03
Speaker 3: did you know that your tax dollars are given big
14:05
Speaker 3: oil literal tax breaks. He's like, and the price are
14:08
Speaker 3: going up? He said yeah, And I said, did you
14:10
Speaker 3: know that virtually all Chevron exce on mobile all of
14:12
Speaker 3: them are posting over one hundred billion in profits every quarters.
14:18
Speaker 3: He's like, well, how come my prices are like this,
14:21
Speaker 3: I'm saying, because there's collusion, corporate collusion between your federal
14:25
Speaker 3: representatives and big oil. Right, and so people are like,
14:29
Speaker 3: they know something's wrong. They know they're getting the short
14:31
Speaker 3: end of the stick. They just can't figure out why.
14:34
Speaker 3: Because it's dark it's dark money. And so if we
14:37
Speaker 3: don't get rid of citizens United our democracy is done.
14:39
Speaker 4: Okay, I'm sorry, No, no, go ahead, go ahead. I
14:42
Speaker 4: want to go back to what you said about the
14:43
Speaker 4: because I read that or I saw that somewhere where
14:45
Speaker 4: they offered you. I know, I didn't know how much
14:47
Speaker 4: it was. You said, twenty million dollars.
14:50
Speaker 3: To go a giins receetd to me or talk no
14:53
Speaker 3: no no, to run against her. So, so the idea
14:55
Speaker 3: would be, I was, I'm running for United States Senate
14:58
Speaker 3: and I'm running against one of their CA antidates that
15:00
Speaker 3: they back. So APAC backs my opponent. Okay, so they
15:04
Speaker 3: would get a two fer Rashida to leave is the
15:08
Speaker 3: public enemy number one for them, right they you know,
15:11
Speaker 3: they just got rid of Jamal Bowman, right. So, but
15:14
Speaker 3: but she's even more.
15:16
Speaker 4: Targeted, and Corey Bush. They got to talking on court.
15:18
Speaker 3: They're going they're going after Corey Busch. And so so
15:20
Speaker 3: the guy down in Missouri took the deal, that same
15:22
Speaker 3: deal I was offered. So Wesley Bell was running for
15:25
Speaker 3: US Senate down there in Missouri. He took the deal,
15:28
Speaker 3: left the Senate race and and ran against Corey Bush.
15:32
Speaker 3: So so so what they did is they figure everybody's
15:35
Speaker 3: for sale, and they they figured with you know, there's
15:40
Speaker 3: no way ten million, ten million in hard dollars, which
15:44
Speaker 3: would be they raise the money, they bundle it for you.
15:47
Speaker 3: You know, they go out in thirty three hundred dollars increments.
15:49
Speaker 3: That's the max you can get for the primery. So
15:51
Speaker 3: they'll go out and bundle the money through through their
15:53
Speaker 3: network in thirty three hundred dollars increments. That's ten million
15:56
Speaker 3: and hard dollars and then ten million what they call
15:58
Speaker 3: soft dollars. That's a nice way of saying dar money
16:00
Speaker 3: that we talked about already, and that's unlimited. So they
16:03
Speaker 3: just they find a big donor most you know, a
16:04
Speaker 3: couple of big donors to stroke million dollar checks and
16:07
Speaker 3: then you get ten million in soft, ten million in
16:09
Speaker 3: hard much in your pocket. You know, there's none in
16:12
Speaker 3: the pocket. It's to win, right, They're they're they're giving
16:14
Speaker 3: that money to to win this camp. This is all
16:17
Speaker 3: campaign dollars, right, And so so they think that everybody
16:21
Speaker 3: wants that badge on the lapel to be in Congress.
16:23
Speaker 3: That's why you're running for office, not to actually help people, right.
16:26
Speaker 3: They think that you want power more because that's what
16:28
Speaker 3: they want, right, And that's what we're filled with. We're
16:32
Speaker 3: filled with a Congress of representatives that are more interested
16:35
Speaker 3: in power maintenance and helping people. And and that's what
16:39
Speaker 3: we as people have to realize, and we have to
16:41
Speaker 3: start electing candidates that actually want to help people and
16:45
Speaker 3: they're not interested in just powermats. That's because look at
16:48
Speaker 3: both both the Republican Democratic Party are complicit and not
16:52
Speaker 3: wanting to get rid of Citizens United. Because if you
16:54
Speaker 3: really wanted to represent people first, you'd be wanting to
16:57
Speaker 3: get rid of it. You don't, you would, you would
16:58
Speaker 3: not want to have it. It's going to take a
17:00
Speaker 3: constitutional amendment to do it, or expanding the court to
17:03
Speaker 3: get a new court ruling to get rid Oficisians United.
17:06
Speaker 4: That's my biggest issue with the Democratic Party always is
17:09
Speaker 4: that they lack courage. I believe that they try a
17:12
Speaker 4: lot of political strategies, but courage and then one of them.
17:14
Speaker 4: That's why it was, you know, refreshing to see President
17:17
Speaker 4: Biden stepped down, whether they pushed them out, whatever it was,
17:20
Speaker 4: it was just refreshing to see that. But all these
17:23
Speaker 4: things that you're described or now, it takes courage to do.
17:25
Speaker 4: It takes courage to expand the Supreme Court. It takes
17:27
Speaker 4: courage to make these constitutional amendments.
17:29
Speaker 3: I don't know if they have it. That's why we
17:31
Speaker 3: got to take it. I mean, that's that's the thing.
17:33
Speaker 3: I mean, my friend said to me the other day,
17:36
Speaker 3: Hey said, hell man, you're trying to save the Democratic
17:38
Speaker 3: Party from itself, you know, because at the end of
17:41
Speaker 3: the day, you're right, it's losing it. It's you know,
17:43
Speaker 3: it's losing its way, losing its sole and we got
17:45
Speaker 3: to bring it back because of the you know, people
17:49
Speaker 3: are checking out. I mean, when you just start to
17:51
Speaker 3: see and that's the challenge here, voter apathy. People are
17:54
Speaker 3: sole It's like that study, you know when the professor
17:56
Speaker 3: would shock the dog, the dog jumped and they kept
17:59
Speaker 3: it on the same setting and the next time a
18:00
Speaker 3: shock that the dog only jumps so high. Eventually the
18:03
Speaker 3: dog stop jumping. And that's what we've done to people
18:06
Speaker 3: in the electorate. People have seen so much corruption and
18:09
Speaker 3: they're seeing so much inaction that they've stopped voting and participating.
18:15
Speaker 3: And I'm trying to wake people up. It's like that
18:17
Speaker 3: scene out of school Days, wake up, trying to get
18:20
Speaker 3: people to say, we have an opportunity. Just in Michigan
18:23
Speaker 3: with my race, I'm running against someone who didn't co
18:26
Speaker 3: sponsor the George Floyd Justinson Policing Act, didn't co sponsor
18:29
Speaker 3: Medicare for All, actually voted to not fund the state
18:33
Speaker 3: Department to study the gods of health ministries death and
18:37
Speaker 3: injury records. I mean, I don't even know how you
18:38
Speaker 3: make that vote. I mean, obviously I do when you're
18:41
Speaker 3: getting funded from the other side, and that's how you
18:43
Speaker 3: make that vote. But the point being, we have an
18:45
Speaker 3: opportunity here to grab a US Senate seat. The US Senate,
18:49
Speaker 3: one hundred people in this country control the distribution of
18:53
Speaker 3: seven point two trillion dollars. People don't realize that. People think, oh,
18:58
Speaker 3: the president, the executive branch does not control the money y'all,
19:03
Speaker 3: it's the United States Senate. And if you if you know,
19:06
Speaker 3: if you want your money to be used for overseas
19:08
Speaker 3: violence or do you want to be used for healthcare
19:10
Speaker 3: at home? You want your money to go to the
19:12
Speaker 3: undergirding and giving tax breaks to big oil or big farmer?
19:15
Speaker 3: Do you want it to go to public education? That
19:17
Speaker 3: is directly who you put in the US Senate.
19:20
Speaker 4: That's it.
19:21
Speaker 3: And and but if we check out like like like
19:23
Speaker 3: I'm seeing so many foot man, it doesn't matter. I
19:26
Speaker 3: ain't voting. I don't even know what the primary is.
19:28
Speaker 3: I mean, I can't do this. If we do that,
19:30
Speaker 3: we have lost. Don't be the dog that stops jumping.
19:33
Speaker 3: We have a chance. This is this is an open
19:35
Speaker 3: US sendency. Now I'm only run against one person. I
19:37
Speaker 3: need one more vote than one person, and we and
19:40
Speaker 3: an activist, an activist can grab a Senate seat. It's
19:43
Speaker 3: unprecedented the opportunity we have. It's just hard to convince
19:46
Speaker 3: people to move.
19:47
Speaker 4: Have you asked the I know you're in President Obama
19:50
Speaker 4: real close friends. Yeah? Have you asked them to endorse
19:51
Speaker 4: you yet? Yeah?
19:52
Speaker 3: Yeah, he said that he would not endorse. He thinks
19:55
Speaker 3: it's not right for a former president to endorse in
19:58
Speaker 3: an open uh In party race. Right, so that's a
20:01
Speaker 3: primary and an open primary. He's like, hell, you win it.
20:04
Speaker 3: Obviously I'll come in and indoors. Uh you against the
20:07
Speaker 3: Republican person. Now at the end of the day, Uh,
20:11
Speaker 3: he's always done what is the right thing, because that's
20:13
Speaker 3: actually the proper thing to do, right, that's the right
20:15
Speaker 3: thing to do.
20:16
Speaker 1: It's all because nobody on the other side.
20:18
Speaker 3: There nobody on the other side, right, And well that's
20:22
Speaker 3: the thing.
20:22
Speaker 1: Nobody on this side does the right thing too much.
20:25
Speaker 3: When you think about this, there is that thing when
20:29
Speaker 3: you say they go they go low, we go high.
20:32
Speaker 3: The problem with that is you get your legs cut off.
20:34
Speaker 4: That's the triangle offense in twenty twenty four that won
20:36
Speaker 4: a lot of championships in the nineties.
20:38
Speaker 3: Okay, no, and and so you know, all I can
20:46
Speaker 3: do is try to fight to let people know, inform people,
20:50
Speaker 3: educate people, and hopefully create this turnout. Because there's no
20:53
Speaker 3: question I got the most supporters. The question is can
20:56
Speaker 3: I convert those supporters to vote because so many people
21:02
Speaker 3: like black. Turnout in Michigan in the last Democratic primary
21:05
Speaker 3: was less than ten percent. That's like you count ten
21:08
Speaker 3: people one person voted. I mean, I can't win. I
21:11
Speaker 3: can't win with that turnout. It's impossible. But if we
21:14
Speaker 3: don't start to realize we got to start taking our
21:16
Speaker 3: power back. We gotta own our power, we gotta grab it.
21:20
Speaker 3: If we don't start doing that, I'm talking about this
21:22
Speaker 3: is not even just my election. I'm talking about across
21:24
Speaker 3: the board. I'm talking about owning businesses. I'm talking about
21:27
Speaker 3: owning our education. I'm talking about owning our vote, owning
21:30
Speaker 3: our ability to self determination, all of that. If we
21:34
Speaker 3: don't start acting like that and understanding the power in that,
21:36
Speaker 3: we truly are lost. Because you know, surely Chisham said it.
21:39
Speaker 3: I mean, come on, this is a long time ago.
21:41
Speaker 3: So she said, if you don't have a seat at
21:43
Speaker 3: the table, bring a folding chair. Why because you have
21:45
Speaker 3: to have a seat at the table. And I say,
21:46
Speaker 3: if you don't have to see the table, you're on
21:48
Speaker 3: the menu, because that means you're getting ordered rather than
21:49
Speaker 3: do an ordering. And we and that's the situation we
21:52
Speaker 3: find ourselves, and we do want to empower ourselves. That's
21:54
Speaker 3: why this, this what you're doing here is so important
21:57
Speaker 3: because it's I believe it seeps into people's minds and
21:59
Speaker 3: be like, Okay, this conversation was important. You know what,
22:02
Speaker 3: I do have power. I do have the ability to
22:04
Speaker 3: affect and have some self determination. I can actually move
22:08
Speaker 3: my household, my community, my city, my state, my country,
22:13
Speaker 3: and my vote actually matters. And it does, or they
22:16
Speaker 3: wouldn't work so hard to make sure you don't vote.
22:19
Speaker 4: Why did your opponent cancel debate?
22:22
Speaker 3: Well, she is canceled every debate. We were supposed to
22:25
Speaker 3: have five debates across the state. She's pulled out of
22:28
Speaker 3: every single one of them. It's disrespectful. It's disrespectful to
22:31
Speaker 3: the voter. It's disrespectful to be you know, because she's
22:34
Speaker 3: she's doing a runout the clock mentality where if she
22:37
Speaker 3: has all the money, she has a lot more money
22:39
Speaker 3: than I do, so she's able to run ads and
22:41
Speaker 3: she just thinks ads do it, you know. And what
22:43
Speaker 3: she doesn't want is her really problematic voting record exposed.
22:47
Speaker 3: I mean, she's horrible in so many issues, and she's
22:51
Speaker 3: been wrong. You know, she voted against student loan debt
22:54
Speaker 3: relief in twenty twenty. How do you sixty How do
22:56
Speaker 3: you even make that but sixty three percent of black
22:58
Speaker 3: wealth goes to paying down student loan debt. Student loan
23:01
Speaker 3: debt is crushing. It's a regressive tax. If you're wealthy,
23:05
Speaker 3: and this has none to do with race. If you're wealthy,
23:07
Speaker 3: you can prefund your kids' education and therefore they're not
23:10
Speaker 3: saddled with lifelong debt. If you're not wealthy and you
23:13
Speaker 3: come from poor communities, you have to take out student
23:15
Speaker 3: long debt, and then what happens is you have lifelong
23:18
Speaker 3: debt and your education costs four x five x, seven
23:21
Speaker 3: x ten x more than somebody else. It is a regressive,
23:24
Speaker 3: wrong way tax and hidden costs on someone's life. And
23:28
Speaker 3: how you're going to vote against that, I don't even
23:30
Speaker 3: know how you make that vote debt. And that's an example.
23:31
Speaker 3: She doesn't want that exposed. So that's why she doesn't
23:33
Speaker 3: want a debate.
23:34
Speaker 4: The stuff like you know, like you would be the
23:36
Speaker 4: first black US ended a Michigan indust right. What does
23:39
Speaker 4: that mean to you?
23:41
Speaker 3: It means in a state that has so much proud
23:44
Speaker 3: history of black political activism and representation, the fact that
23:48
Speaker 3: we've never had a senator is crazy. I mean, you're
23:50
Speaker 3: talking about the state that had Coleman Alexander Young, who's
23:53
Speaker 3: the pioneering mayor. I mean, you know, Atlanta would not
23:55
Speaker 3: be what Atlanta is but for Coleman Young, right, he
23:58
Speaker 3: showed Maynor Jackson the way. Right, you have a Carolyn
24:02
Speaker 3: Cheeks kill Patrick, and then you have the legend John Conyers.
24:06
Speaker 3: You know, and watch this. For the first time in
24:08
Speaker 3: fifty seven years, Michigan does not have a black Democratic
24:11
Speaker 3: representative in the federal delegation. That's out of thirteen House
24:14
Speaker 3: of Representative seats and two Senate seats. It's ridiculous, the
24:17
Speaker 3: lack of representation. So yes, I would be the first,
24:22
Speaker 3: you know, we would break that cycle and also be
24:26
Speaker 3: the first black Senator. It would be huge. And this
24:28
Speaker 3: is why got to remember, though, everybody who's listening, even
24:31
Speaker 3: if you're not from Michigan, the US Senate is a
24:35
Speaker 3: federal body that makes decisions that covers everybody. So sure,
24:39
Speaker 3: I'd be the senator from Michigan, but what I would
24:42
Speaker 3: be fighting for would cover off everybody. Let's just take
24:45
Speaker 3: I'm gonna take George full of justice and policing. It's passed,
24:48
Speaker 3: it has passed the House of Representatives, but it never
24:50
Speaker 3: got through the Senate because someone was not there to
24:53
Speaker 3: be able to champion and fight for it and demand it.
24:55
Speaker 3: And you talk about no knock. When I say this
24:58
Speaker 3: stuff is a matter of life or death, it's not hyperbole,
25:01
Speaker 3: it's not exaggeration. No knock warrants, having a national database
25:07
Speaker 3: for police who misconduct these are things that are part
25:11
Speaker 3: of that that we got to get done. And you know,
25:16
Speaker 3: and in funding, funding for public education, funding for health care,
25:19
Speaker 3: all of these different things, common sense gun laws, these
25:22
Speaker 3: are things that we can get done federally, women's reproductive freedom,
25:25
Speaker 3: black maternal health. I mean, all these different things that
25:28
Speaker 3: have to get done that covers everybody. And that's why
25:31
Speaker 3: I'm surprised and invite people in to obviously support the campaign,
25:35
Speaker 3: because this is to be a national movement to grab
25:38
Speaker 3: this seat, and then we should pick off another seat
25:40
Speaker 3: in the next cycle, and pick off another seat in
25:41
Speaker 3: the next cycle. From a national perspective, there's only been
25:44
Speaker 3: twelve black US centers in the history of the country.
25:47
Speaker 3: If we had twelve right now, we'd still be underrepresented
25:50
Speaker 3: in terms of population. Right There's been a higher percentage
25:55
Speaker 3: of black US presidents than black US senators. It's the
25:59
Speaker 3: toughest position to get in. Then yes, Wow, so it's
26:03
Speaker 3: one out of forty six. I'm not a math genius Charlemagne,
26:07
Speaker 3: but that's two point two percent, twelve out of two
26:11
Speaker 3: thousand and three. Wow, that's zero point five percent.
26:14
Speaker 4: Wow.
26:15
Speaker 3: Think about that and why? The reason why is the
26:18
Speaker 3: real powers in the sent When I was at Harvard
26:19
Speaker 3: Law School, my constitution law professor would say all the time,
26:22
Speaker 3: the real powers in the Senate. It's the most powerful
26:24
Speaker 3: deliberative body in politics in the world because one hundred
26:28
Speaker 3: people make the decision about two crucial things in this country.
26:32
Speaker 3: Number one, confirming lifetime appointments of federal judges. We see
26:35
Speaker 3: how that affects us down the line. And number two,
26:38
Speaker 3: deciding how your money gets spent.
26:40
Speaker 1: It's not glorified.
26:41
Speaker 2: People don't talk about the Senate as much as they
26:43
Speaker 2: talk about being president, or talk about vice president, or
26:46
Speaker 2: talk about even some of the other things.
26:47
Speaker 1: It's just not glorified.
26:48
Speaker 3: The president doesn't control the money, right, you know, My
26:51
Speaker 3: grandmama used to say, if you want to know someone's priorities,
26:53
Speaker 3: if you want to know an institution or a person,
26:55
Speaker 3: see how they spend their money. And that's what it
26:57
Speaker 3: is you know, Mark Pocan and Barber put Forth the
27:00
Speaker 3: bill called People over the Pentagon. It was one hundred
27:03
Speaker 3: billion dollar reduction in Pentagon spending. You know, we have
27:07
Speaker 3: we have people in office that keep rubber stamping the
27:09
Speaker 3: National Defense Authorization Act, the NDAA two percent, raises three percent.
27:13
Speaker 3: All of that doing is fattening the pockets and Department
27:15
Speaker 3: of Defense contractors. We virtually have a US Senate of
27:18
Speaker 3: people that have been bought and this is real. They've
27:21
Speaker 3: been bought by DD contractors, they've been bought by Big Pharma.
27:25
Speaker 3: They've been bought, and they make decisions based off that,
27:28
Speaker 3: not decisions in support of the people's best interest. And
27:31
Speaker 3: that's what people have to realize. Don't check out because
27:34
Speaker 3: of that, lean in because of that, take it back
27:36
Speaker 3: because of that, And that's the energy that's happening. If
27:38
Speaker 3: we give up, we've actually lost to the money interest
27:42
Speaker 3: in the corporate collusion. We got to lean in because
27:45
Speaker 3: people vote. We still have the power if we understand
27:48
Speaker 3: our power and lean in.
27:49
Speaker 1: Grab it's new tax. What's your no new tax pledge?
27:52
Speaker 1: What is that?
27:53
Speaker 3: Oh say, that's a pledge that the money's already there
27:56
Speaker 3: right The seven point two trillion annual budget. It was
27:58
Speaker 3: for the annual budget on Obama was four point two trillion,
28:01
Speaker 3: and that included bank bailouts, and then it went up
28:04
Speaker 3: to six point two COVID and Trump, and now we're
28:07
Speaker 3: up to seven point two. We can't just keep taking
28:10
Speaker 3: taking people's money because at the end of the day,
28:13
Speaker 3: all that money is going to, like I said, DoD
28:15
Speaker 3: contract is not going to actually solve the problems that
28:18
Speaker 3: people need healthcare, education, affordable housing. Imagine that, right, It's
28:24
Speaker 3: not going back to the people. So we're gonna keep
28:26
Speaker 3: taking the middle classes and the working classes money because
28:29
Speaker 3: that's literally the working classes and middle classes are literally
28:31
Speaker 3: who's supporting this country, right, Because if you make too much,
28:36
Speaker 3: you won't qualify for the earned income tax credit, and
28:38
Speaker 3: if you if you and then if you don't make
28:41
Speaker 3: enough to have offshore accounts and LLCs to hide your money,
28:44
Speaker 3: so you're really not paying your fair share. All of
28:47
Speaker 3: a sudden, who's really holding enough. We don't need to
28:50
Speaker 3: take more people's money, We need to spend it differently.
28:53
Speaker 4: That's the key I want to ask you, because you're
28:55
Speaker 4: a constitutional laws resident.
28:58
Speaker 3: Well, I went to Harvard Law School. I got my
29:00
Speaker 3: juris doctorate.
29:01
Speaker 4: Yes, Okay, Why aren't more people talking about the Supreme
29:05
Speaker 4: Court being an illegitimate institution? Why aren't more people just
29:08
Speaker 4: calling out the Supreme Court saying it's corrupt? Because my fear,
29:12
Speaker 4: and I've said this to every elected official that's come
29:14
Speaker 4: up here, let's just say the VP wins in November,
29:18
Speaker 4: Donald Trump challenges the results of the election in light
29:22
Speaker 4: of all the recent rulings, the wilder rulings, the Supreme
29:24
Speaker 4: Court is done from presidential community, accepting bribes, all of that.
29:29
Speaker 4: What makes us think they wouldn't overturn the results of
29:31
Speaker 4: an election and then it would be a constitutional crisis?
29:33
Speaker 4: Why not declare a constitution from crisis now while you
29:36
Speaker 4: still got Democrats in office?
29:37
Speaker 3: Well, I mean I think, I think there's a couple
29:39
Speaker 3: of things. But you're absolutely right. I mean you, but
29:41
Speaker 3: but this isn't new. You go back to the Bush v.
29:45
Speaker 4: Gore.
29:45
Speaker 3: That's right, you know, our Gore. A lot of these
29:48
Speaker 3: problems we have now we probably wouldn't even exist in
29:50
Speaker 3: this country. Again, I'll Gore won that election.
29:53
Speaker 4: There's no question. I was sitting in my wife's dorm room.
29:56
Speaker 4: I wasn't even into politics, like that. But I used
29:57
Speaker 4: to always be watching CNN, and I'm watching and they
30:00
Speaker 4: announced them as the president. Right, they announced al going
30:03
Speaker 4: to the president.
30:05
Speaker 3: And the court took up. So so a couple of
30:07
Speaker 3: things have to happen. I think that there's no question
30:09
Speaker 3: we need reform. I wrote an op ed about judicial reform.
30:12
Speaker 3: We need to expand the court. When the court was
30:13
Speaker 3: said at nine justices, there were thirty eight million people
30:16
Speaker 3: in this country. Now we have three hundred and sixty million,
30:19
Speaker 3: plus tens of millions that aren't even countered in that number. Right,
30:22
Speaker 3: So we need more people. They need they need to
30:24
Speaker 3: handle a bigger case load. I want to see to
30:26
Speaker 3: expand to fifteen justices. Number one, number two. I do
30:30
Speaker 3: believe that there should be a term limit in terms
30:34
Speaker 3: of how long you're on the Supreme Court. I believe
30:36
Speaker 3: you should still get a lifetime appointment to the federal bench,
30:38
Speaker 3: because we don't We want to try to limit the
30:40
Speaker 3: corruption and we don't want it to be like Congress,
30:42
Speaker 3: where you know, the private enity say hey, you going
30:44
Speaker 3: to be out in two years. You know, rule this way,
30:46
Speaker 3: and we're going to make you a partner and pay
30:48
Speaker 3: you millions of dollars and so so. But you only
30:51
Speaker 3: serve on the Supreme Court for eighteen years and then
30:53
Speaker 3: you cycle off. And that way, if it's on a cycle,
30:56
Speaker 3: every president could appoint two justices and then you don't
31:00
Speaker 3: have the jerremandering of withholding appointments and all the stuff
31:04
Speaker 3: that we've seen happen. So the system has to change
31:07
Speaker 3: the way the appointments has to change. We can fix
31:10
Speaker 3: it by systemically. It's just like anything else. You know,
31:12
Speaker 3: what's that quote by the guy I think it was
31:14
Speaker 3: John Clear or something like that. He says, you don't
31:16
Speaker 3: rise to the level of your goals, you fall to
31:18
Speaker 3: the level of your systems. We have broken systems now
31:21
Speaker 3: in government, citizens United We have a broken system of
31:24
Speaker 3: the Supreme Court and the way the appointments happen. We
31:26
Speaker 3: have broken systems that we have to fix for our democracy.
31:30
Speaker 3: And so if we don't fix the systems, You're right,
31:32
Speaker 3: you're going to continue to see these results. And there's
31:34
Speaker 3: no question it could play out the way you just
31:36
Speaker 3: said it.
31:36
Speaker 4: Absolutely. I don't see why people don't think it will. Yeah,
31:40
Speaker 4: I mean he challenged it in twenty twenty, right, that's right.
31:44
Speaker 4: I just don't think in light of everything that they've
31:46
Speaker 4: done recently, I don't see why they wouldn't overturn it
31:49
Speaker 4: this year.
31:49
Speaker 3: If it's close, that's why you know it shouldn't. It
31:52
Speaker 3: can't be close, you know, and in that state by state, right,
31:56
Speaker 3: and but there's no reason to think it won't be closed. One. Yeah,
32:01
Speaker 3: but that's the popular vote. So so here's an interesting
32:03
Speaker 3: statistic about the Supreme Court. You know, only one of
32:08
Speaker 3: the Republican appointees has been appointed by a president that
32:11
Speaker 3: won the popular vote. Only one.
32:14
Speaker 4: Wow.
32:14
Speaker 3: That that's wild. So you're literally talking about a representation
32:20
Speaker 3: in the on the highest court appointed by individuals who
32:24
Speaker 3: won the presidency that did not win more individual votes by.
32:28
Speaker 4: Americans would be that one.
32:31
Speaker 3: No, no, no, And I'm saying Republican Clarence Thomas, right,
32:36
Speaker 3: so so so George Bush one, you know that the
32:42
Speaker 3: first one. He So you think about this, think about
32:47
Speaker 3: how the manipulation of the system has happened to create
32:52
Speaker 3: the ability to govern by a minority rule. And but
32:57
Speaker 3: that's historic too. I mean you go back to I mean, listen,
32:59
Speaker 3: we got two senators in every state, Wyoming, North Dakota,
33:04
Speaker 3: South Dakota. They got fewer people the Metro Detroit and
33:07
Speaker 3: they got two senators each. And so there's no question
33:10
Speaker 3: that there is an imbalance. And that's why I say
33:12
Speaker 3: to people, when we got an opportunity to grab a
33:15
Speaker 3: Senate seat, we need to grab at it, you know,
33:17
Speaker 3: because it's already imbalanced with with the fact that those
33:21
Speaker 3: those states like that that are solo population have two senators.
33:26
Speaker 3: I mean, California has forty million people. Niggas got two senators,
33:29
Speaker 3: you know what I mean, that's wild, that's wild.
33:32
Speaker 4: If you lose, would you go back to acting?
33:35
Speaker 3: Man? Haven't I've been working so hard, I haven't eve
33:37
Speaker 3: thought about it, you know. Maybe you know, I've never
33:39
Speaker 3: been the type of person that's think anything I do,
33:43
Speaker 3: I just I go all in and and then you know,
33:46
Speaker 3: I don't do plan bs. I've never imagined plan bees.
33:49
Speaker 1: They still reaching out to you, agents to reaching out
33:50
Speaker 1: to you for parts and stuff.
33:51
Speaker 3: I don't even know. I don't even talk to them. Yeah, yeah,
33:54
Speaker 3: it's not it's not even that, man, it's you know,
33:57
Speaker 3: I mean, I really and this may sound crazy to y'all,
34:00
Speaker 3: but like on the show, like The Good Doctor, I
34:02
Speaker 3: was saving lives, you know, and pretend and I really
34:06
Speaker 3: feel in this world, I can save lives for real,
34:09
Speaker 3: And so I'm so being so all in on it
34:13
Speaker 3: and just working as hard as I can, meeting people.
34:15
Speaker 3: And because I truly still believe, and maybe it's a
34:17
Speaker 3: Pollyannis view and maybe I'm totally delusional, I still believe.
34:21
Speaker 3: You meet people where they are, you look them in
34:23
Speaker 3: the eye, they feel you. Ultimately, we can win. If
34:28
Speaker 3: you do the right thing, we can win. And that's
34:30
Speaker 3: why I tell my eight year old son. So if
34:31
Speaker 3: I'm telling my eight year old son that, I gotta
34:33
Speaker 3: believe it. But he did say to me the other day,
34:35
Speaker 3: he said, Daddy, are you gonna win? And I said,
34:39
Speaker 3: if more people vote for me than the other person,
34:41
Speaker 3: I win. He said, well, but are you going to
34:44
Speaker 3: I said, I don't know. But the only thing I control,
34:46
Speaker 3: I said. I can't control the outcome, but I can
34:49
Speaker 3: control how hard I work. And so that's it, just
34:52
Speaker 3: working as hard as I can and allowing people to
34:55
Speaker 3: into the process. Senators get to hire sixty tow one
34:58
Speaker 3: hundred people think about this, No one even thinks about it,
35:01
Speaker 3: and I go everywhere else. How many y'all know you've
35:03
Speaker 3: had two senators your whole life?
35:04
Speaker 4: How many.
35:04
Speaker 3: Y'all know ten people that worked in those offices. No
35:06
Speaker 3: hands go five people, no hands go, three people, no
35:08
Speaker 3: hands go, two people, one person. People don't even know
35:11
Speaker 3: it's the most powerful federal body in their life that
35:14
Speaker 3: should be giving them direct constituency services. But they never
35:17
Speaker 3: even meant anybody that they've been completely under unrepresented. And
35:21
Speaker 3: that's what we have to change. We have to rethink
35:23
Speaker 3: what the Senate is. Senate has to be service. It
35:26
Speaker 3: can't be what it's been, which has basically bought politicians.
35:30
Speaker 3: Trying to figure out how to spend your money and
35:33
Speaker 3: distribute it in a way that's not in your best
35:34
Speaker 3: interest doesn't make sense.
35:35
Speaker 4: I got one more question. What changes do the Democratic
35:38
Speaker 4: Party need to make now that they do have this
35:40
Speaker 4: new energy we've seen like over the last week and
35:42
Speaker 4: a half. You know what Vice President Kamala Harris, the
35:46
Speaker 4: way she's energized the party, the way she seemed to
35:48
Speaker 4: have bought in the party together. But what changes do
35:51
Speaker 4: the Democratic Party need?
35:52
Speaker 3: I think you said it originally courage. Courage is my
35:55
Speaker 3: favorite word in the English language etymology or the rule
35:58
Speaker 3: of the word. If you speak French, you know at
36:00
Speaker 3: me his heart you gotta get it back to the
36:02
Speaker 3: heart and not you know, everybody, you can see the fake.
36:08
Speaker 3: You can see the fake. And that's what crushed Hillary Clinton.
36:14
Speaker 3: You know, I met you know, I got invited over
36:16
Speaker 3: to her house one time in Washington and I walked
36:20
Speaker 3: in with my friend who had worked for them, and
36:23
Speaker 3: I met this woman with some jeans and a T
36:25
Speaker 3: shirt charming, smart, funny, and I literally was sitting there
36:31
Speaker 3: having a glass of wine looking at her as just
36:33
Speaker 3: the three of us, and I'm staying in my head,
36:36
Speaker 3: if this woman had run for president, she would have
36:39
Speaker 3: wiped the floor. But that pants suit over fake version,
36:46
Speaker 3: there's no I don't The person I met in the
36:48
Speaker 3: living room was completely different and so in the same
36:54
Speaker 3: thing they were doing with propping up President Biden, that's
36:58
Speaker 3: not in the best interest of people. It's very easy,
37:01
Speaker 3: open up your heart. What's in the best interests of people?
37:04
Speaker 3: It's not about over coaching somebody. It's not about trying
37:06
Speaker 3: to prop them up and figuring out the machinations of
37:08
Speaker 3: how do we win. It's about doing the right thing.
37:11
Speaker 3: And if the Democratic Party gets back to that core,
37:15
Speaker 3: then we'd win every election, because how are you losing
37:18
Speaker 3: an argument to a populace on the other side. It
37:21
Speaker 3: just doesn't make sense. People are literally voting against their
37:25
Speaker 3: own self interest because they feel more authenticity from the
37:28
Speaker 3: other side.
37:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, simple, I say it all the time, even with
37:32
Speaker 4: the Vice President's That's what I've been happy to see
37:35
Speaker 4: a lot more over the last few months, but especially
37:38
Speaker 4: over the last couple of weeks. The person that we
37:40
Speaker 4: know that we've had conversations with off the air, the
37:43
Speaker 4: heart that we see, we're starting to see that we are.
37:46
Speaker 4: And if we see that over the next hundred days,
37:48
Speaker 4: it won't it won't even be close.
37:50
Speaker 3: I completely agree. And that's why I hope someone doesn't
37:53
Speaker 3: get in your ear and starts to try to over coach,
37:55
Speaker 3: and I don't think it'll happen. You know why, because
37:58
Speaker 3: it's not like she's got meaning. It's almost like, once
38:02
Speaker 3: you're in the seat, you can relax. So, yeah, she's
38:05
Speaker 3: not trying to outcompete somebody, and so it's not trying
38:08
Speaker 3: to figure out, well, what do I do to outcompete.
38:10
Speaker 3: It's just like, just be yourself because you already got it.
38:13
Speaker 3: You already got the experience, you already have the intelligence,
38:17
Speaker 3: you already have the infrastructure. Now just listen. You could
38:20
Speaker 3: be more bold, more full of heart and bring that
38:22
Speaker 3: it's beautiful. I think we're in a great inflection moment
38:26
Speaker 3: in this country, and I'd love to be her partner
38:27
Speaker 3: in the Senate for sure.
38:28
Speaker 1: Now, if people want to support you, how can he
38:30
Speaker 1: support you?
38:30
Speaker 3: They go straight to Hill Harper dot com. And your
38:32
Speaker 3: support means so much. We are one week away from
38:35
Speaker 3: August sixth, the election, and there's early voting happening right now,
38:38
Speaker 3: and basically anything that comes in now what we do
38:41
Speaker 3: is put a right back out for voter education. We
38:43
Speaker 3: buy time on radio, we buy time on television and
38:47
Speaker 3: all of that just to say, let people know we
38:50
Speaker 3: win this thing if enough people actually go vote. You know,
38:54
Speaker 3: no question. High turnout we win. Low turnout, we lose.
38:57
Speaker 3: That's just that's the real and so we have to
39:00
Speaker 3: it was a campaign. So if you go to Hill
39:01
Speaker 3: Hopper dot com, two dollars makes a difference, y'all. That's real.
39:05
Speaker 3: He buys a yard sign, It does all this stuff
39:07
Speaker 3: that we can actually repurpose quickly.
39:08
Speaker 1: So thank you all right, Well he'll hop o.
39:10
Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, make sure you go out and vote
39:12
Speaker 2: August sixth in Michigan, and it's the Breakfast Club.
39:15
Speaker 1: Good morning, wake that ass up in the morning.
39:18
Speaker 4: The Breakfast Club