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The Election Before the Election: Who Really Controls the 2026 Midterms? · The Briefing Room

0:01
Speaker 1: You know, we keep talking about November third, like that's
0:03
Speaker 1: when the election happens, and technically it is, but not
0:06
Speaker 1: in the sense that on November third, that's when we
0:09
Speaker 1: all are engaged in the physical act of voting. But
0:13
Speaker 1: I'm againning to think that if you're waiting til November
0:15
Speaker 1: to start paying attention to this election, and we've encouraged
0:18
Speaker 1: you to do this all along the way on the
0:20
Speaker 1: briefing room, you may have arrived somewhere around halftime, because
0:23
Speaker 1: before you ever walk into that polling place, I want
0:26
Speaker 1: you to think about this. Somebody's already decided what congressional
0:30
Speaker 1: district you live in. Somebody's already decided what the rules
0:33
Speaker 1: are going to be for voting by mail. Courts may
0:36
Speaker 1: have already decided whether those rules can stand. Political parties
0:39
Speaker 1: have already spent millions deciding which candidates they think you
0:43
Speaker 1: should choose from. And sometimes, apparently anyways, if they don't
0:48
Speaker 1: particularly like the collection of voters in a district, they
0:51
Speaker 1: just move the lines. It's the same house, same street,
0:55
Speaker 1: same voter, as a matter of fact, but a brand
0:57
Speaker 1: new political neighborhood. And some of you are not paying
1:01
Speaker 1: attention to that. And that's not hypothetical, folks, this is
1:04
Speaker 1: the real deal. This week, a Missouri judge cleared the
1:08
Speaker 1: way for congressional maps, map specifically designed to make it
1:11
Speaker 1: more difficult for Democratic Congressman Emmanual Cleaver to hold his
1:16
Speaker 1: Kansas City area seat. Roughly fifty nine percent of the
1:19
Speaker 1: voters in the newly configured district weren't in Cleaver's district
1:23
Speaker 1: Before fifty nine percent, nobody moved, the map moved. So
1:28
Speaker 1: this week on the briefing room, I want to talk
1:30
Speaker 1: about something bigger than which party is winning. I want
1:32
Speaker 1: to know how much of an election is decided before
1:35
Speaker 1: election day ever gets here, and maybe more importantly, who
1:39
Speaker 1: exactly gets to decide the rules of this game?
1:42
Speaker 2: From Black Cess Media ninety two point seven FM, WICU
1:47
Speaker 2: HD two, This is the Briefing Room with Marcus Atkinson, Politics, power, culture, consequences,
1:57
Speaker 2: and when necessary, a trip before barbershap Court.
2:01
Speaker 3: The briefing room is presented by G and M.
2:03
Speaker 1: Getaways.
2:04
Speaker 2: Now here's Marcus Atkinson.
2:07
Speaker 1: What's happening? Folks. Welcome to my briefing room, and you
2:10
Speaker 1: are listening to the week sounds in the background. One George,
2:13
Speaker 1: more than a third kid, Hey, buddy, love sounds so good,
2:17
Speaker 1: don't you agree? Even on a one hour show and
2:19
Speaker 1: not a thirty minute show doesn't matter. Still sounds so good,
2:22
Speaker 1: don't you agree? Now if you're one of the people
2:24
Speaker 1: who used to catch us on Tuesday and Thursday for
2:26
Speaker 1: thirty minutes each, don't pay me. Nobody stole half the show.
2:29
Speaker 1: I can see y'all thinking right now. Somebody didn't walked
2:31
Speaker 1: off half the show. That's not what they're doing. That
2:34
Speaker 1: is not what we are doing. Now. We took those
2:36
Speaker 1: two thirty minute shows, put them together, gave ourselves some
2:39
Speaker 1: room to actually, you know, develop an argument, and now
2:42
Speaker 1: we've got one full hour every Thursday at twelve thirty.
2:47
Speaker 1: Are you ready? And I don't know if you are
2:50
Speaker 1: now Tuesday at twelve thirty that belongs to Donald Middleton
2:53
Speaker 1: now with conversations with my dad. I want you to
2:55
Speaker 1: give Donald a chance because it's a very thoughtful show
2:58
Speaker 1: and it's a different kind of converse and I'm glad
3:01
Speaker 1: that it's a part of the Black Cis media lineup.
3:03
Speaker 1: Then come back on Thursdays after we've taken an entire
3:06
Speaker 1: week and weekend to develop the show, because there's a
3:09
Speaker 1: lot going on out there. Especially with the orange crush
3:12
Speaker 1: out there, not my orange crush, persone, the orange crush
3:15
Speaker 1: for a whole lot of these magites running around. All
3:18
Speaker 1: of this news is floating out there because this food
3:20
Speaker 1: is always stirring up the waters. Now we're gonna take
3:23
Speaker 1: one central issue and really work through it, and then
3:25
Speaker 1: we'll still hit some of the other political stories that
3:27
Speaker 1: you need to know. And yes, barbershop courts survived the merger.
3:32
Speaker 1: I knew better than that. That is everybody's favorite segment.
3:35
Speaker 1: I would never ever ever think about getting rid of that.
3:38
Speaker 1: I know what would happen if I did. And so
3:41
Speaker 1: let's get into Act one.
3:44
Speaker 4: Somebody moved the lines.
3:47
Speaker 1: That's right. They did. Now, if there were such thing
3:49
Speaker 1: as the Paul Revere Award, your gracious host, I wasn't
3:52
Speaker 1: Marcus Atkinson would have one set award because I've been
3:55
Speaker 1: ringing this alarm for the last couple of months. I've
3:58
Speaker 1: been especially ringing it for black folos. Y'all gotta pay
4:00
Speaker 1: attention to what they're doing, because moving these lines in
4:03
Speaker 1: your sleep has become their actual profession as opposed to legislation.
4:07
Speaker 1: Pay attention. I was starting Missouri Congressman E Manual Cleaver
4:11
Speaker 1: is a Democrat. He's represented the Kansas City area in
4:14
Speaker 1: Congress for years now. Missouri's current congressional delegation has six
4:19
Speaker 1: Republicans and two Democrats follow along. Now, normally, Cleaver's district
4:24
Speaker 1: is one of the places Democrats can look at on
4:26
Speaker 1: the map and feel reasonably comfortable. I mean well, Republicans
4:31
Speaker 1: decided that they'd like to be less comfortable. Last year.
4:35
Speaker 1: Republican Governor Mike Keyhole called lawmakers into a special session
4:39
Speaker 1: after President Trump encouraged Republican controlled states to redraw congressional
4:45
Speaker 1: maps ahead of the twenty twenty six mid terms. I
4:47
Speaker 1: told you in the beginning the Orange crush. This guy's
4:50
Speaker 1: always stirring the waters. He's always chumming the waters. This
4:53
Speaker 1: is why you got to stay hypervigilant, because this dude
4:56
Speaker 1: is an ish starter. We all know what ish means.
4:59
Speaker 1: And if you don't go on to look at up
5:00
Speaker 1: and what is it done? Now the slang dictionarya what
5:04
Speaker 1: have you chat GPT to help you out look it up.
5:06
Speaker 1: And he is an ish starter and this is what
5:09
Speaker 1: he's telling Republicans to do. So Missouri became one of
5:12
Speaker 1: those states that did it. And now let me give
5:14
Speaker 1: you the result. The revised map takes portions of Kansas
5:18
Speaker 1: City away from Clever's district, put some of those same
5:21
Speaker 1: voters into Republican held districts, and then stretches what's left
5:24
Speaker 1: of Cleaver's district further east into more Republican rural territory.
5:29
Speaker 1: According to the AP analysis, about fifty nine percent fifty
5:34
Speaker 1: nine percent of these voters in Cleaver's newly configured district
5:38
Speaker 1: are new to the district. They don't have a relationship
5:42
Speaker 1: with the man. That was the goal of the Republicans
5:45
Speaker 1: all along. I want you to think about that for
5:47
Speaker 1: a second. If you're a manual Cleaver, you didn't lose
5:50
Speaker 1: fifty nine percent of your constituents because they got mad
5:52
Speaker 1: at you. You didn't lose them because another Candida persuaded
5:55
Speaker 1: them away from you. They didn't vote you out. Somebody
5:58
Speaker 1: picked up the political etche sketch shook it. Now there's
6:02
Speaker 1: an important distinction here. Redistricting itself is not illegal. I
6:06
Speaker 1: need to be clear about that. So I can joke
6:07
Speaker 1: about picking up that etching sketch and shaking it, but
6:10
Speaker 1: the shaking is not illegal. State straw congressional districts all
6:15
Speaker 1: the time. State legislators have enormous authority in this process,
6:19
Speaker 1: and there have been partisan battles over maps for generations.
6:22
Speaker 1: So this isn't anything new. Democrats Jerry Manda win. They
6:25
Speaker 1: have opportunities, So it's not just the Republicans. Republicans jer
6:29
Speaker 1: Jerry Mander when they have the opportunity. So this isn't
6:31
Speaker 1: going to be one of those conversations where we pretend
6:34
Speaker 1: one political party discovered some dark art that the other
6:36
Speaker 1: side never heard of. That's not what we're talking about here. No,
6:40
Speaker 1: they all know. Everybody knows. Everybody does it now, Marcus,
6:45
Speaker 1: what's the difference. Here's the difference. The difference right now
6:48
Speaker 1: is the scale and the timing. I mean, think about it.
6:52
Speaker 1: This is happening in the middle of the decade, ahead
6:54
Speaker 1: of an election in which control of the House could
6:56
Speaker 1: turn on just a handful of seats, and the parties
6:59
Speaker 1: know exactly what they're doing. According to the AP the
7:02
Speaker 1: Associated Press, Republican backed maps enacted across eight states are
7:07
Speaker 1: intended to potentially generate as many as sixteen additional Republican
7:12
Speaker 1: House seats. Democrats have responded with their own redistricting efforts,
7:16
Speaker 1: particularly in California and Utah, where they believe new maps
7:19
Speaker 1: could potentially produce as many as six additional democratic seats.
7:22
Speaker 1: So there is a redistricting war going on right in
7:25
Speaker 1: front of your faces. And some of y'all are so
7:27
Speaker 1: busy watching reality television that you're missing out on it.
7:30
Speaker 1: So I understand what we're talking about here, Get whit
7:32
Speaker 1: me pick up what I'm putting down. The candidates are
7:35
Speaker 1: campaign and the parties are raising money. The commercials they're
7:38
Speaker 1: out there running already. But behind all of that, another
7:41
Speaker 1: competition is happening. Another war is waging who gets to
7:45
Speaker 1: design the field? And this is where this becomes more
7:48
Speaker 1: than some political science discussion about lines on the map, folks,
7:52
Speaker 1: because a district isn't geography as radical as this sounds, folks.
7:56
Speaker 1: A district is actually wait four it people. Yes, a
8:07
Speaker 1: district is actually people. This is more than just lines. Now.
8:10
Speaker 1: I'm glad this is starting to get some of your
8:12
Speaker 1: attention because maybe you've lived in the same house for
8:14
Speaker 1: twenty years. You haven't changed, your community hasn't changed, but
8:18
Speaker 1: somebody in a state capital can decide that politically you
8:22
Speaker 1: now belong with an entirely different collection of people. Now,
8:26
Speaker 1: Supporters of Missouri's new maps say the legislature had the
8:29
Speaker 1: authority to adopt it, and when opponents gathered around thousands
8:33
Speaker 1: of signatures hoping to put the map before voters in
8:35
Speaker 1: a state wide referendum, Missouri's Republican Secretary of State said,
8:39
Speaker 1: the state constitution doesn't authorize that kind of referendum for
8:44
Speaker 1: congressional redistricting. How convenient is that?
8:46
Speaker 2: Now?
8:46
Speaker 1: On Wednesday, August nineteenth, a judge agreed with them actually, so,
8:51
Speaker 1: barring another court change in the outcome, that's the map
8:54
Speaker 1: Missouri expects to use in November. It looks like all
8:57
Speaker 1: but a done deal. Now. Interestingly, the Missouri voters actually
9:01
Speaker 1: rejected a congressional map by referendum all the way back
9:04
Speaker 1: in nineteen twenty two, but the legality of using that
9:07
Speaker 1: referendum process wasn't challenged then the way it has been now.
9:12
Speaker 1: That's how old some of these fights are. And here's
9:14
Speaker 1: what I don't want us to do. Don't hear this
9:17
Speaker 1: and conclude, well, then voting doesn't matter. That is not
9:19
Speaker 1: what we're encouraging at or it is the complete opposite
9:22
Speaker 1: that we're trying to encourage here. That's exactly the wrong
9:25
Speaker 1: lesson because of voting didn't matter, nobody would be working
9:28
Speaker 1: this hard. I want you to understand that now to
9:31
Speaker 1: determine which voters end up together. This is a lot
9:35
Speaker 1: of work and a lot of money for something that
9:37
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. I need you to stick to that argument.
9:40
Speaker 1: If this comes out at this comes up at your
9:42
Speaker 1: dinner party or with you being out for drinks with
9:45
Speaker 1: your friends, it didn't matter. If it didn't matter, why
9:47
Speaker 1: would they spend all this time, money and energy. That
9:50
Speaker 1: make any sense, now, does it. Nobody spends this much
9:53
Speaker 1: money trying to create favorable districts for something that doesn't matter.
9:56
Speaker 1: Nobody goes to court for something that doesn't matter. Nobody
9:59
Speaker 1: calls Spence that's your legislative sessions because something doesn't matter.
10:04
Speaker 1: Make sure you got that argument down, because one of
10:06
Speaker 1: your friends, I guarantee you is going to say this.
10:10
Speaker 1: The fight over the map is evidence of how much
10:12
Speaker 1: your vote matters. The concern is whether politicians should have
10:16
Speaker 1: this much ability to choose their voters instead of voters
10:19
Speaker 1: choosing their politicians. They're trying to make an inverted system
10:22
Speaker 1: out of this. That's a different question, and it's one
10:24
Speaker 1: we're going to keep coming back to today, as we've
10:27
Speaker 1: kept coming back to time and time and to hell.
10:30
Speaker 1: I've even brought this up on my morning show, because
10:32
Speaker 1: once you start thinking about elections as a system instead
10:35
Speaker 1: of just an election day event, which is what they
10:38
Speaker 1: want you to do, you start noticing something different. As
10:41
Speaker 1: you're looking at it with that wider lens. The map
10:44
Speaker 1: is not the only thing being fought over. Next, we've
10:48
Speaker 1: got to talk about the ballot itself, because that is
10:52
Speaker 1: a whole of the conversation. Let's keep it pushing.
10:54
Speaker 3: The district lines are drawn, But what happens when the
10:58
Speaker 3: fight moves from where you vote to how you vote?
11:02
Speaker 3: This is the briefing room with Marcus Atkinson.
11:06
Speaker 1: Act two.
11:08
Speaker 5: Now they're fighting over the ballot.
11:10
Speaker 1: That's right, they're fighting over the ballot. And did I
11:12
Speaker 1: mention they're eating the cats and they're eating the dogs
11:14
Speaker 1: over there, Missouri? That was Springfield. Oh that was Springfield.
11:18
Speaker 1: My bad, Listen. President Trump has spent years criticizing voting
11:22
Speaker 1: by mail. That's not new. Now, what's new is how
11:24
Speaker 1: aggressively the federal government has attempted to become involved in
11:28
Speaker 1: regulating voting by mail. Trump signed an executive order in
11:32
Speaker 1: March aimed at tightening mail end voting rules. Part of
11:35
Speaker 1: that order directed states to provide lists of voters eligible
11:38
Speaker 1: to receive mail ballots. If a state didn't provide that information,
11:42
Speaker 1: the postal Service could refuse to deliver those ballots. That
11:45
Speaker 1: provision ended up in federal court. Now, last week, US
11:49
Speaker 1: District Court Indira Talwanney blocked a Postal Service from implementing
11:54
Speaker 1: it nationwide. Her basic conclusion was that the executive branch
11:58
Speaker 1: was attempting to exercise election authority that the Constitution largely
12:02
Speaker 1: gives to states. Now, she previously blocked the administration from
12:07
Speaker 1: enforcing the provision against twenty three mostly Democratic led states.
12:11
Speaker 1: Imagine that she expanded that injunction nationwide as the November
12:16
Speaker 1: election got closer. She understood what was going on. In
12:19
Speaker 1: other words, the Trump administration has asked a Supreme Court
12:22
Speaker 1: to intervene as of this recording. As of right now,
12:25
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court has not resolved that request. Now, this
12:28
Speaker 1: is where I want to slow down, because voting debates
12:31
Speaker 1: get stupid real quick, especially when it's amongst friends, especially
12:36
Speaker 1: when there's alcohol involved. One side may say election security,
12:39
Speaker 1: the other side hears voter suppression. One side says voting rights,
12:44
Speaker 1: and the other side hears, hey don't care who votes,
12:46
Speaker 1: and pretty soon nobody is discussing the actual rule anymore.
12:50
Speaker 1: So let's give the administration's argument a fair hearing. I
12:53
Speaker 1: want you to think about this now. If you're President
12:55
Speaker 1: Trump or somebody who supports these restrictions, your argument is
12:59
Speaker 1: fairly straight forward. A state should know who is eligible
13:02
Speaker 1: to vote, Voter roles should be accurate, male ballots should
13:06
Speaker 1: only be sent to eligible voters. And you believe federal
13:09
Speaker 1: agencies have a legitimate role in protecting the integrity of
13:13
Speaker 1: federal elections. None of those concerns are crazy on their face.
13:18
Speaker 1: I don't want it dead person voting. I don't want
13:21
Speaker 1: somebody voting six times. I don't want Marcus Akinson in
13:24
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania voting and then Marcus Akinson and Ohio showing up saying,
13:27
Speaker 1: what's up with y'all? That was my ballot that that
13:30
Speaker 1: Atkinson do cast in Pennsylvania. I don't want any of that.
13:33
Speaker 1: I want one Marcus vote. That's enough responsibility for the republic.
13:37
Speaker 1: The problem begins when the solution creates a different constitutional problem.
13:43
Speaker 1: Allow me to explain, Judge Taiwani's ruling essentially says, I
13:48
Speaker 1: want you to think about this. Now. You can't simply
13:50
Speaker 1: have the president create a new federal election mechanism because
13:53
Speaker 1: he thinks the states aren't doing enough. Because he personally
13:57
Speaker 1: believes the states aren't doing enough. Who are you you,
14:00
Speaker 1: my friend? We know you're the president, but still you
14:02
Speaker 1: have limits. The Constitution gives states the primary role in
14:07
Speaker 1: administering elections. The Congress also has specific authority. Now the
14:12
Speaker 1: president doesn't get to write himself into that structure just
14:15
Speaker 1: because he personally believes he has a better idea. He
14:19
Speaker 1: has bamboozled and hoodwink a good part of America into
14:22
Speaker 1: believing that he has all of this power to just
14:26
Speaker 1: inject myself wherever I feel necessary. I feel like inject
14:30
Speaker 1: Trump here, right here? Where is the error pointed at
14:32
Speaker 1: that thing? Inject Trump there? You can't just do that Trump.
14:36
Speaker 1: And then there's another concern timing. In her ruling, Talawane
14:41
Speaker 1: specifically pointed out that the country was less than ninety
14:44
Speaker 1: days away from the November third midterms. Changing major voting
14:48
Speaker 1: procedures that close to an election risks confusion, which sidebar
14:53
Speaker 1: I'm sure was the goal Now that's worth sitting with.
14:57
Speaker 1: Because if you genuinely care about election integrity, just like
15:00
Speaker 1: if you are genuinely about America first, if you are
15:03
Speaker 1: genuinely about the Constitute, well that's a whole other show.
15:06
Speaker 1: Don't have me dive down that rabbit. Oh, these people
15:09
Speaker 1: with these America first hats. Have you believed that America
15:12
Speaker 1: was actually first? You wouldn't be putting this dude in
15:15
Speaker 1: office and you wouldn't be following his ass around like
15:17
Speaker 1: a sicker fan. If you believe that America should come first,
15:20
Speaker 1: don't get me started on that confusion. Isn't your friend,
15:25
Speaker 1: but some of you act like he is. Now, get
15:29
Speaker 1: back to this election thing. People need to know the rules.
15:32
Speaker 1: Election officials need time to implement the rules. The postal
15:35
Speaker 1: service needs to know what it's supposed to accept. Voters
15:39
Speaker 1: need to know whether that ballot sitting on their kitchen
15:41
Speaker 1: count can actually be mailed. Now, there's a difference between
15:44
Speaker 1: securing an election and changing the election machinery while people
15:48
Speaker 1: are already preparing to use it, and that distinction shouldn't
15:52
Speaker 1: depend on whether your preferred political party happens to be
15:55
Speaker 1: making the change. This is what I'm saying about America. First,
15:58
Speaker 1: here's the test, and this is the test that I like,
16:02
Speaker 1: Imagine the other party has the power. Whatever your party is,
16:05
Speaker 1: Imagine they have the power, whatever rule you're cheering for today.
16:08
Speaker 1: And let me back up a little bit, because somebody
16:10
Speaker 1: else there saying, I'm an independent markets So what do
16:12
Speaker 1: you think of that eye? We know that smarty pants.
16:14
Speaker 1: Whatever your part. Let's if you're an independent, which party
16:17
Speaker 1: in this moment do you have the most disdain for?
16:21
Speaker 1: You can answer that question right, So I want you
16:23
Speaker 1: to imagine that party. If you're an independent, I can
16:25
Speaker 1: hear you out there with your smartess remarks. Whatever rule
16:28
Speaker 1: you're cheering for today, would you still be comfortable with
16:31
Speaker 1: that power if the president you liked least had said power.
16:36
Speaker 1: Let that marinate for a moment, because that's generally a
16:40
Speaker 1: pretty good constitutional stress test. If your answer changes based
16:44
Speaker 1: on who's sitting behind the desk, then one, you are
16:47
Speaker 1: not Merrika first, and then two you may not actually
16:51
Speaker 1: support the power. It may be that you support the person.
16:55
Speaker 1: Does that makeing sense to you? Even if it is,
16:57
Speaker 1: some of you are still shaking your head no because
16:59
Speaker 1: you don't want to. These things are not the same folks. Now,
17:03
Speaker 1: the Trump administration says it's trying to protect elections. Voting
17:07
Speaker 1: rights groups say it's trying to insert federal power into
17:09
Speaker 1: an area where it doesn't belong. Courts are going to
17:12
Speaker 1: continue sorting all of that out. But all of this
17:15
Speaker 1: reinforces the point that we started with long before November three?
17:20
Speaker 1: Are you picking up what I'm putting down. I'm trying
17:22
Speaker 1: to tell you something. The election is already underway. Are
17:26
Speaker 1: you not picking up on that? Not the campaign, the election,
17:30
Speaker 1: This thing is already ongoing. Take your mind away from
17:34
Speaker 1: November third. Quit fixing your gaze on that date, because
17:38
Speaker 1: it is not the actual target. It's today we actually
17:41
Speaker 1: go and do the thing, but it is not the
17:44
Speaker 1: central focus. The infrastructure around your voter is being litigated, redesigned,
17:49
Speaker 1: and challenged. Right now, let me pause for emphasis emphasis achieved.
17:58
Speaker 1: And speaking of voting by mail, I'm not going to
18:00
Speaker 1: deal with a certain individual's male ballet just yet. Because
18:02
Speaker 1: somebody that you and I both know, who's very orange
18:05
Speaker 1: and has very quaft hair, actually used mail in balloting.
18:10
Speaker 1: He sent his vote in by mail, and yet everybody
18:14
Speaker 1: else he's mad when they do it. We won't touch
18:16
Speaker 1: that just yet. We're going there because that individual has
18:20
Speaker 1: a court appearance later in this show, in barbershop court,
18:24
Speaker 1: not the Supreme Court, not district court. In barbershop court,
18:28
Speaker 1: the one that actually counts, damn it, that's the one
18:31
Speaker 1: that matters the most, one with considerably fewer rules of evidence.
18:35
Speaker 1: Barbershop Court is coming. And you, my friend, the Orange Crush,
18:39
Speaker 1: you cannot dodge what's coming because you will sit in
18:42
Speaker 1: that chair, you will get that little little thing draped
18:44
Speaker 1: around your neck, and you will be judged by your behavior.
18:48
Speaker 2: You're listening to the Briefing Room with Marcus Atkinson on
18:51
Speaker 2: Black Cis Media ninety two point seven FM, WICU HD
18:56
Speaker 2: two Unlocking the Culture.
18:59
Speaker 1: All right, ladies and gentlemen, this is the part of
19:00
Speaker 1: the show where we give you just a few quick
19:02
Speaker 1: hits on the news front. You know, having this weekly
19:05
Speaker 1: show allows us to scour the Internet for an entire week,
19:08
Speaker 1: grab the stories that we feel will resonate with you,
19:11
Speaker 1: the listener, and then give them to you in small
19:13
Speaker 1: bites between all of the big stories so we don't
19:16
Speaker 1: lose your interest. We have Barbershop Corp. Coming up soon.
19:19
Speaker 1: We had to break down a couple of segments. Act
19:20
Speaker 1: three is coming up after these quick hits. But first
19:27
Speaker 1: quick hit number one, discipline without talking about works. All right,
19:32
Speaker 1: let's hit a few things happening outside the central story today.
19:34
Speaker 1: Shall we first up the school discipline. The US Department
19:38
Speaker 1: of Education issue new guidance this week telling schools they
19:42
Speaker 1: cannot change discipline policies simply for the purpose of reducing
19:46
Speaker 1: racial disparities. Hmm, let me sort of how I feel
19:49
Speaker 1: about that before I move on with the story. The
19:52
Speaker 1: department says doing that amounts to what it calls racial balancing,
19:56
Speaker 1: and argue students must be treated as individuals rather than
19:59
Speaker 1: having policies adjusted according to racial outcomes. Now here's the
20:02
Speaker 1: problem that civil rights advocates are raising. Those racial outcomes
20:07
Speaker 1: already exist. Federal datacided by ROTA shows black boys and
20:11
Speaker 1: nearly twice as likely as white boys to receive an
20:14
Speaker 1: out of school suspension or expulsion in public K through
20:17
Speaker 1: twelve schools. Don't believe me, look it up. Call your
20:20
Speaker 1: local school district and say Marcus said on his show
20:23
Speaker 1: that this was the case. Is it so? And they
20:26
Speaker 1: will say, ma'am, sir, I'm sorry, it absolutely is so.
20:30
Speaker 1: And then you're going to be mad. Black girls also
20:33
Speaker 1: face much higher race of suspension and expulsion than white girls.
20:36
Speaker 1: So the administration is essentially saying, if a black student
20:39
Speaker 1: and a white student commit the same offense, don't discipline
20:43
Speaker 1: them differently because of race. And I agree absolutely, But
20:47
Speaker 1: what happens when the data showed this somehow, across thousands
20:51
Speaker 1: of schools and thousands of districts, tons of decisions, black
20:55
Speaker 1: children keep ended up disciplined more severely. Can you investigate
20:59
Speaker 1: race as a possible factor or does even asking that
21:02
Speaker 1: question become discriminatory? That's the fight, ladies and gentlemen. And
21:06
Speaker 1: this is where policy gets more complicated than just slogans.
21:10
Speaker 1: You shouldn't artificially manipulate discipline numbers just to make a
21:14
Speaker 1: spreadsheet look racially balanced. But now you also can't look
21:17
Speaker 1: at the recurring disparity and declare yourself colorblind so early
21:20
Speaker 1: that you'd never examined why the disparity exists in the
21:24
Speaker 1: first place. I mean, think about it. If every Tuesday
21:26
Speaker 1: your kitchen is flooded, at some point, you got to
21:28
Speaker 1: stop saying, what is water in the kitchen? Is water
21:30
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, and somebody has to ask the magic question,
21:33
Speaker 1: where's the leak at? Because every single Tuesday we're going
21:35
Speaker 1: through this, there is a leak, and why does it
21:37
Speaker 1: seem to be timed on Tuesday? That is quick hit
21:41
Speaker 1: number one, quick hit two. Forty trillion dollars. America has
21:49
Speaker 1: officially crossed forty trillion dollars in federal debt, So they
21:53
Speaker 1: think about how you feel about that. That's not projection,
21:56
Speaker 1: that's not ten years from now. The Treasury Department reported
21:59
Speaker 1: that total federal debt, outstanding at just forty trillion dollars
22:04
Speaker 1: this week, has become a reality now. Rotter's reports that
22:07
Speaker 1: number has more than doubles since Donald Trump first took
22:10
Speaker 1: office in January twenty seventeen, making America great again. And
22:14
Speaker 1: if you're already getting your partisan meme, ready to put
22:17
Speaker 1: it back now, because this debt belongs to everybody. Trump
22:20
Speaker 1: added enormous amounts during his first term, much of it
22:24
Speaker 1: during the pandemic. Joe Biden added trillions during his presidency.
22:27
Speaker 1: Debt has risen again since Trump returned the office, though
22:31
Speaker 1: now there are long standing problems involving spending, taxes, Social Security, Medicare,
22:35
Speaker 1: and the cost of paying interest on money. We've already borrowed.
22:39
Speaker 1: In fact, during the first ten months of the current
22:42
Speaker 1: fiscal year alone, federal interest calls have surpassed Medicare spending
22:46
Speaker 1: and become the government's second largest line item behind Social
22:50
Speaker 1: Security forty trillion dollars. I got to lean into that.
22:55
Speaker 1: I don't even know what that looks like. I get
22:57
Speaker 1: nervous when I see my Verizon bill. Congress sees another
23:01
Speaker 1: trillion dollars and says, put it with the others. And
23:04
Speaker 1: here's what always gets me. Everybody becomes a fiscal conservative
23:08
Speaker 1: when the other party has the checkbook. Republicans discover deficits
23:12
Speaker 1: under democratic presidents. Democrats suddenly become more forensic accountants when
23:16
Speaker 1: Republicans take over. Meanwhile, the dead is sitting in the
23:19
Speaker 1: corner saying, I'm bipartisan, folks, I go both ways, right.
23:25
Speaker 1: That may sound suggestive in a different sense, but I
23:28
Speaker 1: do kind of swing both ways here. At some point,
23:31
Speaker 1: Washington is going to have to have an adult conversation
23:34
Speaker 1: about what Americans expect government to provide and what Americans
23:37
Speaker 1: are actually willing to pay for. Now, that's not a
23:41
Speaker 1: fun campaign speech, which is probably why we keep postponing it.
23:45
Speaker 1: Let us move on quick hit number three, Pennsylvania's AI problem.
23:53
Speaker 1: Now this one brings us back home to PA. Right
23:55
Speaker 1: where I'm standing, right now, good old fashion Pennsylvanian, the
23:58
Speaker 1: rolling hilltop mountain of EA. Everybody wants the AI boom,
24:03
Speaker 1: everybody wants the investment, everybody wants the jobs. But then
24:06
Speaker 1: somebody comes in and says, okay, hold on our people. Great,
24:09
Speaker 1: that's all great news. We're putting the data center right
24:11
Speaker 1: next to you at your address, and suddenly the meeting
24:15
Speaker 1: gets interesting. Governor Josh Shapiro announced this week the data
24:18
Speaker 1: center developers seeking expedited state permits or valuable tax incentives
24:23
Speaker 1: will have to meet tougher requirements, among them than heat
24:27
Speaker 1: plans to cover the full cost of their electricity, used
24:30
Speaker 1: advanced technology to reduce water consumption and get local approval
24:34
Speaker 1: before moving to the state level. It's the water consumption
24:37
Speaker 1: part that has people up in arms. Were gonna do
24:39
Speaker 1: a whole show on that one, Alan, because AI and
24:42
Speaker 1: these data centers. If you didn't know, take a lot
24:45
Speaker 1: of water. Now I know, I'm on Lake Erie. I'm
24:48
Speaker 1: one of the big dogs when it comes to lakes.
24:50
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean that we are okay with you.
24:53
Speaker 1: Just siphoning off as much as you need for AI
24:56
Speaker 1: when you need enormous amounts. But I'll go back to
24:58
Speaker 1: my story. I digress. Shapiro called the requirements some of
25:01
Speaker 1: the toughest guardrails in the country. Now, with that being said,
25:04
Speaker 1: we've already talked about the enormous amount of water that
25:07
Speaker 1: these data centers use. But they also generate heat, which
25:10
Speaker 1: can mean substantial cooling and water demands. So the question
25:13
Speaker 1: isn't whether or not technology is coming, because it is.
25:16
Speaker 1: The question is who pays for what technology consumes, not
25:21
Speaker 1: just for the actual technology itself. And that's a conversation
25:24
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania communities ought to be having before somebody shows up
25:27
Speaker 1: at a zoning meeting with a PowerPoint presentation and the
25:30
Speaker 1: phrase the magic phrase they think economic development printing on
25:34
Speaker 1: the first slide. Development can be good, I know, me
25:36
Speaker 1: and my partners get involved with some of them. Jobs
25:39
Speaker 1: can be good, investment can be really good, but good
25:42
Speaker 1: for the economy. I mean, that can't become that magic
25:44
Speaker 1: phrase that they think it is. That ends every conversation
25:47
Speaker 1: about who absorbs the costs. That's your political quickets for today.
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26:57
Speaker 4: Act three.
26:58
Speaker 5: Black Political power is changing now.
27:01
Speaker 1: I want to take this conversation somewhere. I didn't expect
27:04
Speaker 1: it to go when I first started looking at this
27:05
Speaker 1: week's political stories because of all we talked about were
27:08
Speaker 1: Jerry Manderin and court fights over ballots. This could become
27:12
Speaker 1: a very depressing hour and that's not my goal. I
27:14
Speaker 1: refuse to do that to you. Politics already gives people
27:18
Speaker 1: enough reasons to believe the system is closed. But then
27:21
Speaker 1: something happened during this primary season that deserves our attention,
27:24
Speaker 1: and I'm going to give it to you. Across the
27:27
Speaker 1: entire history of the United States, only three black Americans
27:31
Speaker 1: have ever been elected governor. Three we're talking about Doug
27:35
Speaker 1: Wilder in Virginia, daval Patrick in Massachusetts some pronounce a devout,
27:40
Speaker 1: and Wes Moore in Maryland, whose book the other Wes Moore,
27:44
Speaker 1: might I add, is brilliant. You gotta go get it.
27:47
Speaker 1: They even got a version for teens, and so if
27:49
Speaker 1: you got a black team in your life, it is
27:50
Speaker 1: a must read. But we're talking about three black governors,
27:55
Speaker 1: ladies and gentlemen, and here in Pennsylvania, don't miss the
27:58
Speaker 1: fact that we have a black loot tenant governor. I'm
28:03
Speaker 1: not making any predictions, but you're never know for my
28:06
Speaker 1: fair state. But I want you to think about the
28:08
Speaker 1: number of governors this country is elected. Over the last
28:10
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty years, thousands of gubernatorial terms, three
28:15
Speaker 1: elected black governors. And when you look at their personal profiles,
28:20
Speaker 1: every single one of them has been a man and
28:23
Speaker 1: a Democrat. Now this November, this could look dramatically different
28:28
Speaker 1: with Florida Republicans nominating Congressman Byron Donald's this week. There
28:33
Speaker 1: are now seven black major party gubernatorial nominees, joining Wes
28:38
Speaker 1: Moore in November ballots. Now that is something to talk about.
28:44
Speaker 1: Eight black majority party gubernatorial candidates total. They are men
28:50
Speaker 1: and women. How about that Democrats and Republicans more pausing fantasis.
28:58
Speaker 1: Now some are running in states where black candidates historically
29:01
Speaker 1: haven't been even treated as plausible statewide contenders. And that
29:05
Speaker 1: last part matters though, because this is bigger than cheering
29:09
Speaker 1: because somebody black won a primary. We have to mature
29:12
Speaker 1: beyond representation meaning automatic agreement, because it doesn't. Byron Donald's
29:17
Speaker 1: is black. Keisha Lance Bottles is also black. They're not
29:20
Speaker 1: selling the same political product. Lisa Dumouth the Republican nominee
29:25
Speaker 1: in Minnesota, she's black. Aaron for the Democratic nominee in Nevada,
29:29
Speaker 1: he's black. Michigan Republican John James is black. Wisconsin Democrat
29:34
Speaker 1: David Crowley is black. They don't have one black political philosophy.
29:40
Speaker 1: Now that is good news because black voices are not
29:42
Speaker 1: monolithic and for those that put us all in the
29:44
Speaker 1: same box. We I tend to get tired of y'all
29:47
Speaker 1: doing that. Stop doing it. That's actually what political process
29:51
Speaker 1: or progress eventually looks like when everybody is on different
29:55
Speaker 1: pages and sometime the same pages. Hell with all of
29:57
Speaker 1: you white folks, do all of y'all look at the
30:00
Speaker 1: same Do you all vote the same? Do you all
30:03
Speaker 1: vote the same issues? Is there one leader for all
30:05
Speaker 1: of you outside of the president? Then why stick all
30:09
Speaker 1: that on black folk like it fits us? It doesn't.
30:13
Speaker 1: Now back to the story at hand, there was a
30:15
Speaker 1: time when simply getting into the room was considered a
30:17
Speaker 1: breakthrough for black folk. We're over that. Eventually, progress should
30:21
Speaker 1: mean that we get into the room and then disagree
30:23
Speaker 1: about what we're gonna do once we're in the room.
30:25
Speaker 1: We're allowed to do that too. Black voters shouldn't have
30:27
Speaker 1: to pretend every black candidate represents black interests. Ah, it's
30:30
Speaker 1: a brother, Oh my god, brother, brother, I'm with you, brother,
30:34
Speaker 1: And then he starts espousing his or her beliefs, and
30:37
Speaker 1: they said, well hold on, brother, assistant. I was down,
30:40
Speaker 1: but I don't know if I'm down with that part. Well,
30:42
Speaker 1: wait until I tell you what I feel about this. Well,
30:44
Speaker 1: see we even further apart. That happens with black folks,
30:48
Speaker 1: and that's acceptable. That is politics, That's how it's supposed
30:52
Speaker 1: to be. Black candidate shouldn't have to prove their authenticity
30:55
Speaker 1: by checking off some approved political lists. Evaluate them, what
31:00
Speaker 1: do they believe, What will they do once they're in office?
31:03
Speaker 1: Who benefits from the policies that they support? That's politics.
31:06
Speaker 1: Race matters because history matters, and that alone. Representation matters
31:11
Speaker 1: because institutions have spent generations excluding black people from executive power.
31:15
Speaker 1: But representation cannot become a substitute for accountability. A black
31:21
Speaker 1: governor can make decisions you love. A black governor can
31:24
Speaker 1: make decisions that you hate. That's called having governors. Hell,
31:27
Speaker 1: we all didn't agree on my beloved Foty vote Barack
31:30
Speaker 1: housein Obama. You bring up Barack Hussein Obama in a
31:34
Speaker 1: room full of black folks, you don't get a lot
31:36
Speaker 1: of different opinions. Now, in general, if there's some love
31:39
Speaker 1: over what he's represented, and the love that we almost
31:43
Speaker 1: all agree on is the way he conducted himself in
31:46
Speaker 1: the White House, that is second to none. Now, that
31:51
Speaker 1: is almost a monolithic vote in the black community, But
31:54
Speaker 1: in terms of the way he governed and the way
31:56
Speaker 1: he legislated. There's a lot of varying opinions on Barack
32:00
Speaker 1: Barack Obama. That's called politics, folks. And here's another fascinating
32:04
Speaker 1: piece of history. Either Georgia Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms or
32:08
Speaker 1: Minnesota Republican Lisa Dumu could become the first black woman
32:12
Speaker 1: ever elected governor in the United States, not the first
32:15
Speaker 1: in her party, not the first in her state, the
32:19
Speaker 1: first in the country in twenty twenty six. Now, if
32:25
Speaker 1: you're listening and you're thinking yourselves, Marcus, that's all well
32:28
Speaker 1: and good, But does having a black governor actually improve
32:30
Speaker 1: life for black folk? And that is an excellent question,
32:34
Speaker 1: and it is the thing that black vote fought about
32:36
Speaker 1: the most when it came to Barack Obama. The answer
32:39
Speaker 1: is this, not automatically, a black face inside an institution
32:43
Speaker 1: does not automatically transform that institution. But executive power is
32:48
Speaker 1: different from symbolic representation. Governors make appointments, they sign budgets,
32:54
Speaker 1: they veto legislation, They shape education policy, they influence voting administration,
33:00
Speaker 1: They help determine criminal justice priorities, They negotiate economic development deals.
33:06
Speaker 1: They can have enormous influence over over whether communities get
33:11
Speaker 1: heard before decisions are even made. That my friend is
33:15
Speaker 1: real power, and so yes, who's in that office really
33:20
Speaker 1: really matters, but what they do with the office matters
33:23
Speaker 1: even more. That distinction is important. And there's something that's
33:27
Speaker 1: happening in this primary season that should complicate the idea
33:30
Speaker 1: that politicians can completely engineer outcomes. Look at Florida for
33:35
Speaker 1: just a second. Alex Vinman entered the Democratic US in
33:39
Speaker 1: the primary with national name recognition and a huge fundraising advantage.
33:44
Speaker 1: According to the AP, Venomen raised about sixteen million dollars.
33:48
Speaker 1: State Representative Angie Nixon raised just under a million. Let
33:53
Speaker 1: those numbers sink in. Sixteen million on one hand, one million, no, no,
33:57
Speaker 1: sixteen million in name recognition. On the other hand, on
34:00
Speaker 1: the other, one million and a woman, a black woman.
34:04
Speaker 1: Vin Men spent more than nine million dollars by the
34:07
Speaker 1: end of July nine million. Nixon didn't even build her
34:10
Speaker 1: campaign around traditional television advertising. She concentrated heavily on social
34:15
Speaker 1: media and organizing. And on Tuesday, Angie Nixon here, there's
34:22
Speaker 1: clearly now beat him. Now, that doesn't mean Angie Nixon's
34:27
Speaker 1: gonna win the general election. That's not what I'm saying,
34:29
Speaker 1: and we all know how politics works. She faces Republican
34:32
Speaker 1: Senator Ashley Moody in a state where Democrats have struggled
34:35
Speaker 1: badly in recent years. But the point is smaller than that.
34:39
Speaker 1: The point is that political structures matter enormously, but voters
34:44
Speaker 1: still occasionally ruin everybody's spreadsheet. Money matters, endorsements matter, maps matter,
34:50
Speaker 1: media like this one matters. But every once in a while,
34:53
Speaker 1: voters look at all of that and they say to themselves, Hmmm,
34:57
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pick this person instead our region the status quo.
35:01
Speaker 1: And that's when things get shook up in a good way.
35:04
Speaker 1: And that's why the conclusion to our first Act cannot
35:07
Speaker 1: be cynicism. If political leaders are working this hard to
35:10
Speaker 1: control the conditions around your vote, the argument that I'm
35:14
Speaker 1: telling you to work with on your friends because somebody's
35:16
Speaker 1: going to bring this thing up, I'm telling you you
35:18
Speaker 1: should probably be paying even more attention to what you
35:21
Speaker 1: do with it, because you see all the hooplah and
35:24
Speaker 1: all the money being spent in order to curb or
35:27
Speaker 1: adjust your voting habits or your voting district.
35:31
Speaker 5: The facts have been entered into evidence the excuses have
35:35
Speaker 5: been reviewed. Common sense has entered the courtroom. It's time
35:40
Speaker 5: for barbershop court alriers.
35:49
Speaker 4: Barbershop Court is now in session, the Honorable Judge Marcus
35:53
Speaker 4: presiding case one the People versus Donald Trump's mail in ballot.
36:00
Speaker 1: I told the Orange Man earlier that he could not
36:04
Speaker 1: and would not escape this judgment. I know somewhere out
36:07
Speaker 1: there he's telling his handlers. I want him gone. I
36:09
Speaker 1: want him off the air. Whatever you have to do.
36:12
Speaker 1: I know he's about to judge me. He has no
36:14
Speaker 1: right to judge me. He has no big house, huge
36:16
Speaker 1: This job is Lenli Americus, Leoni Americus, with his little show.
36:19
Speaker 1: I want him off the air right now. Don't let
36:21
Speaker 1: him criticize me. Ever, ever, still lay for all that
36:24
Speaker 1: Now Barbershop Court is actually in session, and I am
36:29
Speaker 1: Judge Marcus Akinson. I have no law degree, I have
36:31
Speaker 1: no role. I have no judicial temperament whatsoever. Proceed accordingly.
36:35
Speaker 1: Our first defended you, who's trying to pull me off
36:38
Speaker 1: the air? When Donald J. Trump and you're mail in ballot,
36:41
Speaker 1: the same ballot you always criticize. Un let's get down
36:44
Speaker 1: to business. President Trump has spent years, ladies and gentlemen
36:50
Speaker 1: attacking widespread voting by mail. He's currently pushing Congress for
36:53
Speaker 1: new voting restrictions his administration. Ladies and gentlemen, it's in
36:57
Speaker 1: federal court trying to impose tighter rules surround mail in ballots.
37:01
Speaker 1: And then I submit to you that one Donald J.
37:04
Speaker 1: Trump voted in Florida's Republican primary by mail. Nonetheless, nonetheless.
37:11
Speaker 1: Now before anybody else, hypocrite, hypocrite, the defense gets this opportunity.
37:16
Speaker 1: Now you will hear the White House stay that there
37:18
Speaker 1: is no contradiction that Trump is a legal resident of
37:20
Speaker 1: Palm Beach, Florida, but because he's president of the United States,
37:24
Speaker 1: he primarily lives in Washington. And the White House will
37:27
Speaker 1: argue that legitimate exceptions for things like travel are different
37:31
Speaker 1: from universal mail voting, and that would be a fair defense,
37:35
Speaker 1: and Florida law allowed him to vote the way he did.
37:39
Speaker 1: So let's be very clear, Donald Trump is not charged
37:42
Speaker 1: with voting illegally, as he has a tendency of doing
37:46
Speaker 1: to everybody else. Everybody's always cheating when it comes to
37:49
Speaker 1: as president. Will give you the benefit of the doubt
37:51
Speaker 1: in the fact that you did what was legally allowed barbershop.
37:54
Speaker 1: Court has reviewed the evidence. There's no fraud charge. There's
37:57
Speaker 1: no illegal ballot charge. There's no pretendence something criminal happened
38:01
Speaker 1: when it didn't. We're not going to be you, President Trump.
38:03
Speaker 1: That's not. What we're doing to charge is political convenience.
38:08
Speaker 1: That's charge because it's fascinating how quickly a voting method
38:12
Speaker 1: can go from suspicious to extremely practical once you, sir,
38:17
Speaker 1: decide that your needs said apparatus. Now that reminds me
38:21
Speaker 1: of people who complain about curbside pickup until it's raining suddenly.
38:25
Speaker 1: Oh no, bring me mind, right to the car. The
38:27
Speaker 1: court finds a defendant guilty, not guilty of election fraud.
38:31
Speaker 1: We won't be you guilty of It's different when I
38:34
Speaker 1: do it, when I want to do it, it's convenienced. When
38:37
Speaker 1: you want to do it. It's very suspicious, very suspicious.
38:41
Speaker 1: My sentence to you, my friend, No, not my friend,
38:44
Speaker 1: My sentence to you, mister president. The next time you
38:48
Speaker 1: discuss mailing ballots, one reporter is hereby order to raise
38:52
Speaker 1: a hand and quietly ask, sir, how did yours arrive?
38:58
Speaker 5: Case two, the people versus Both Dan Sullivan's.
39:04
Speaker 1: All the State of Alaska, has brought us a gift,
39:06
Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Republican State Senator Dan
39:09
Speaker 1: Sullivan was on the ballot Tuesday, seeking another term in
39:12
Speaker 1: the United States Senate. Also on the ballot another man
39:16
Speaker 1: named Dan Sullivan and sidebar. The first time I did
39:20
Speaker 1: a show for NPR next with Marcus Akinson, my very
39:23
Speaker 1: first episode. For the next several years, my engineer was
39:27
Speaker 1: named Dan Sullivan. You can't make this kind of stuff up, folks.
39:31
Speaker 1: Back to the story. This was not a nickname, not
39:34
Speaker 1: just Dan Sullivan, ish Daniel J. Sullivan Junior, the second
39:39
Speaker 1: Sullivan is a retired teacher from Petersburg, Alaska. The Republicans
39:44
Speaker 1: accused him of entering the race to confuse the voters,
39:47
Speaker 1: which you got to say, whether that was the goal
39:50
Speaker 1: or not is surely working brilliantly. I'm sure he denied that,
39:54
Speaker 1: though he said he ran because he was frustrated with
39:56
Speaker 1: the incumbent senator. He even won a legal battle a
40:00
Speaker 1: allowing him to remain on the ballot. And damn it.
40:02
Speaker 1: If you disagree with what somebody's doing publicly and they
40:05
Speaker 1: carry your name while they're doing it, just damn what
40:08
Speaker 1: else are you supposed to do. Election officials try to
40:11
Speaker 1: reduce confusion by listing the incumbent as Dan S. Sullivan,
40:15
Speaker 1: Republican incumbent, while the other candidate appears as Daniel J.
40:19
Speaker 1: Sullivan Junior, no party affiliation. Barbershop. Court has a problem
40:24
Speaker 1: with all of this. Now, wait a minute, now, we
40:27
Speaker 1: can't prove Daniel J. Sullivan in a this race to
40:29
Speaker 1: trick anybody. So on the charge of intentional political shenanigans,
40:33
Speaker 1: we got to find them not guilty. Insufficient evidence. However,
40:38
Speaker 1: as Biggie would say, however, the court is adding a
40:42
Speaker 1: lesser charge because I feel like it creating entirely too
40:47
Speaker 1: much work for people who just got off work and
40:49
Speaker 1: are trying to just vote. On that charge, everybody involved
40:54
Speaker 1: here is guilty because somewhere in Alaska there was a
40:58
Speaker 1: voter standing over the ballot saying, hold on which Dan
41:01
Speaker 1: Sullivan is actually Dan Sullivan? I mean, who am I
41:05
Speaker 1: voting for? This feels like when somebody makes a fake
41:07
Speaker 1: Facebook profile and puts one extra letter in your name.
41:11
Speaker 1: Imagine spending six months campaigning and your final message to
41:14
Speaker 1: voters has to be no, no, no, no no, I'm
41:17
Speaker 1: the other Dan Sullivant, the other guy, you know, the
41:20
Speaker 1: one that usually wears Nike. He wears a Ditas all
41:22
Speaker 1: the time. You gotta know that makes a huge difference.
41:24
Speaker 1: President Trump even weighed in and specifically told supporters to
41:28
Speaker 1: vote for Dan s Sullivan, as if he could even
41:32
Speaker 1: tell the difference. I ain't know the difference. I'm telling you,
41:35
Speaker 1: Dan s Sullivan, mister smarty pands hosting your show, Linda Marcus,
41:40
Speaker 1: Lendon Marcus, always trying to put me down when the
41:42
Speaker 1: President has to give middle initial instructions. I mean, we've
41:48
Speaker 1: just gone too far, haven't we your sentence for the
41:51
Speaker 1: next selection. Anybody named Dan Sullivan, I mean, anybody wishing
41:55
Speaker 1: to run for statewide office and Alaska has to bring
41:58
Speaker 1: two pieces of identification and a nickname. And I mean
42:02
Speaker 1: a good nickname, one that your family gives you. You
42:04
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying at the family reunion that everybody
42:06
Speaker 1: calls you that, except for folks outside the family. We mean,
42:08
Speaker 1: bring a good nickname with you.
42:12
Speaker 5: Case three, the People versus Mike Lindell's eight hundred and
42:17
Speaker 5: twenty five thousand dollars recount.
42:19
Speaker 1: Now, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, before we start
42:22
Speaker 1: this case, I want you all to just close your eyes,
42:26
Speaker 1: and I want you to envision a political candidate wasting
42:29
Speaker 1: your tax payer dollars to the tune of eight hundred
42:33
Speaker 1: and twenty five thousand dollars. Can you picture it? Can
42:37
Speaker 1: you see it now? Imagine that that candidate is black. Yeah. Yeah,
42:43
Speaker 1: I've had my movie moment right here, that's right now.
42:46
Speaker 1: This last case comes from Minnesota. Mike Lindell, the My
42:49
Speaker 1: pillow guy, mister Trump's supporter candidate for governor. Lyndale ran
42:53
Speaker 1: in Minnesota's Republican primary against House Speaker Lisa Dumouth. Dumuth won,
42:58
Speaker 1: and she didn't win by fourteen votes. She didn't win
43:01
Speaker 1: by two hundred votes. She beat Mike Lindale by more
43:04
Speaker 1: than forty five thousand votes, not forty five forty five thousand,
43:11
Speaker 1: about eleven percentage points. Mike Lindale has not conceded this
43:15
Speaker 1: is very trumpion. Instead, he says he wants a hand recount.
43:20
Speaker 1: Imagine that hand recount. Because the margin is far beyond
43:24
Speaker 1: Minnesota's threshold for a publicly funded recount, Lindale would have
43:28
Speaker 1: to pay for it himself. Estimated costs eight hundred and
43:31
Speaker 1: twenty five thousand dollars Now he has until August twenty
43:36
Speaker 1: fourth to formally request it and provide the required money
43:39
Speaker 1: or financial guarantee. Now, Lindell says this isn't only about
43:43
Speaker 1: whether the recount changes the governor's race. He says he
43:45
Speaker 1: wants to recount because he has concerns about election voting.
43:50
Speaker 1: Let me stop. I mean, can you you can realide, Joe?
43:54
Speaker 1: Can you tell that this dude is one of Trump's
43:56
Speaker 1: Trump's homies? Can you tell? Man said this is about
44:01
Speaker 1: it concerns about electronic vote counting and believes a hand
44:05
Speaker 1: count could expose problems with the vote counting systems. This
44:10
Speaker 1: is really one of Trump's homies. Those allegations have not
44:13
Speaker 1: been substantiated by Minnesota election officials. So here comes to ruling.
44:17
Speaker 1: Barbershop Court recognizes every candidate's legal right to use whatever
44:22
Speaker 1: recon procedures state law provides. If the law says you
44:26
Speaker 1: can request it, request it. If the law says you've
44:30
Speaker 1: got to pay for it, then run in that card, homie.
44:33
Speaker 1: I know you got a black card in your pocket.
44:34
Speaker 1: You're the my pillow guy. It ain't like you got it,
44:37
Speaker 1: and they show ain't paying it for at the state
44:39
Speaker 1: wide level. But eleven points, sir, Sir, eleven points is
44:44
Speaker 1: not let's count again. Eleven points is who ordered pizza
44:47
Speaker 1: for the concession speech? Forty five thousand votes? Bro, I mean,
44:52
Speaker 1: at some point the numbers aren't whispering anymore. The numbers
44:55
Speaker 1: are clearing their throat, and the court therefore finds Mike
44:59
Speaker 1: Lindella is, like clear mind, guilty of refusing to let
45:02
Speaker 1: an L get a good night's sleep. Even ls need
45:06
Speaker 1: the rest. Take the l Mike, fluff it twice, put
45:09
Speaker 1: a pillowcase on it. Whatever you need to do, get
45:11
Speaker 1: you some rest. Whatever the situation is, let it go.
45:15
Speaker 1: Barbershop Court has now been concluded. Bailiff, you can get
45:20
Speaker 1: all of the asses up out of my court room.
45:22
Speaker 1: I got stuff to do.
45:26
Speaker 5: Always this concludes barbershop Court. You may now exit the
45:32
Speaker 5: court room. Politics can be complicated, common sense shouldn't be.
45:38
Speaker 5: You're listening to the briefing room with Marcus Atkinson on
45:42
Speaker 5: Black Sess Media. The conclusion is near, so don't touch
45:47
Speaker 5: that dial.
45:47
Speaker 4: Folks.
45:48
Speaker 1: All right, let's put the joking jokes away for just
45:50
Speaker 1: a minute or two, because if I'm being intellectually honest
45:52
Speaker 1: about today's central question, I gotta give the strongest argument
45:56
Speaker 1: against what I've been saying all along. This is the
45:59
Speaker 1: next act four.
46:02
Speaker 5: So who actually has the power?
46:04
Speaker 1: Maybe all of this is just politics. I mean, state
46:06
Speaker 1: legislations are allowed to draw congressional districts political parties. They've
46:10
Speaker 1: always tried to create favorable maps. When Democrats have the power,
46:13
Speaker 1: Democrats use it. When Republicans have the power, they use it.
46:17
Speaker 1: Courts exist precisely because disputes over that power they're going
46:20
Speaker 1: to happen. That's a guarantee. And on voting by mail,
46:24
Speaker 1: it is perfectly legitimate for Americans to want to secure elections,
46:28
Speaker 1: accurate voter roles, and clear rules about who qualifies to
46:31
Speaker 1: receive a ballot. None of that automatically equals voter suppression.
46:36
Speaker 1: That's the opposing argument, and exactly a lot of truth
46:39
Speaker 1: in it. So my conclusion isn't that every political map
46:42
Speaker 1: I dislike is illegitimate. It isn't that every election security
46:46
Speaker 1: proposal is secretly sinister. And I'm definitely not telling anybody
46:50
Speaker 1: that the twenty twenty election is somehow predetermined, because it's not.
46:55
Speaker 1: But legality should be the beginning of our examination, not
46:58
Speaker 1: always the end. Not the reactive part A legislator may
47:03
Speaker 1: have the legal power to draw a map, and that's
47:05
Speaker 1: perfectly fine. Then I want to know why I drew
47:08
Speaker 1: that map, though, who gains? What happened to political competition afterwards?
47:12
Speaker 1: Did elected officials create coherent districts around communities or did
47:17
Speaker 1: they go shopping for the voters that they wanted. These
47:21
Speaker 1: to me are fair questions, and in the same vein,
47:24
Speaker 1: if somebody proposes a new voting rule, don't immediately call
47:27
Speaker 1: it suppression. You got to read it first. What problem
47:31
Speaker 1: is it proposing to solve? Is there evidence that the
47:35
Speaker 1: problem existed in the first place? And did it exist
47:37
Speaker 1: at a scale requiring the proposed solution? Could the rule
47:41
Speaker 1: prevent legitimate voters from participating? Is there enough time for
47:45
Speaker 1: elected officials and voters to understand the change. That's what
47:49
Speaker 1: political maturity looks like. And that, my friends, is the goal.
47:54
Speaker 1: Not automatically trusting government, not automatically assuming government is evil,
47:58
Speaker 1: because it isn't automatically. You gotta just pay attention. That's
48:02
Speaker 1: the sweet spot. And I think the black political story
48:04
Speaker 1: we discussed earlier gives us a perfect example of why
48:08
Speaker 1: that matters so much. I mean, listen, eight black majority
48:11
Speaker 1: party gubernatorial candidates are on November ballots this year. Now,
48:16
Speaker 1: that is extraordinary. But I'm not gonna tell black listeners
48:19
Speaker 1: vote for somebody because they're black. That's not what I'm
48:22
Speaker 1: doing either. We have to have our issue together as
48:25
Speaker 1: candidates when giving away votes just because we're black and
48:28
Speaker 1: brown people fought too hard for us to have political power.
48:31
Speaker 1: For us to turn around and reduce that power to
48:34
Speaker 1: just matching skin tones, that's shallow and we'll have none
48:37
Speaker 1: of that. In the briefing room. You got to use
48:39
Speaker 1: your vote intelligently. A black Republican should have to explain
48:43
Speaker 1: what his policies will do for you and your community.
48:45
Speaker 1: A black Democrat, they need to do the exact same thing.
48:49
Speaker 1: Nobody gets a racial hall pass here. Nobody gets a
48:52
Speaker 1: partisan hall pass either. Let us not forget. I told
48:55
Speaker 1: you that the rise of one Marcus Atkinson with the
48:58
Speaker 1: briefing room started as the rise and journey of a
49:01
Speaker 1: republic crat Now I told you before that I've there's
49:04
Speaker 1: been less Republica because of said President Donald J. Trump,
49:08
Speaker 1: and even less crack nowadays because I don't know what
49:11
Speaker 1: in the hell the Democrats are trying to accomplish. I've
49:13
Speaker 1: never been ideologically in lockstep with anybody, And I'm encouraging
49:17
Speaker 1: you to adopt at least some of that mindset in
49:21
Speaker 1: the way you move politically, or you get taken for granted.
49:24
Speaker 1: Everybody's got to make their case. This is where I
49:28
Speaker 1: think black political power has an opportunity to mature. For decades,
49:32
Speaker 1: black voters were fighting simply to access the ballot. Then
49:35
Speaker 1: we fought for representation. Then we fought to get black
49:38
Speaker 1: people into offices that has had historically been closed to us.
49:42
Speaker 1: Those fights aren't over, but another responsibility comes with that progress.
49:47
Speaker 1: Once you're in the room, which everybody's fighting to come
49:50
Speaker 1: into the room, I get so tired. We need to
49:51
Speaker 1: be at the table. We need to be at to Okay,
49:53
Speaker 1: you're in the room and you're at the proverbial table.
49:56
Speaker 1: Now what And I'm gonna tell you what that now is.
49:59
Speaker 1: You got know what you're asking the people in that
50:01
Speaker 1: room to do. You can't get into them. Yeah, y'all
50:04
Speaker 1: been holding us, holding us down and keeping us back. Yeah,
50:07
Speaker 1: and they're like, we understand that. What's what's your What
50:09
Speaker 1: what should we do from here? I mean, yeah, y'all
50:12
Speaker 1: been you know, tripping holding us down. And you know King,
50:16
Speaker 1: what about King and Malcolm? You saw what happened to Malcolm.
50:19
Speaker 1: Don't act like y'all didn't see what happened to Mint.
50:21
Speaker 1: We get that that's our hair stream and lessen, and
50:23
Speaker 1: we are sad that those leaders are taking We're asking you,
50:26
Speaker 1: what what do you want us to do now? I mean,
50:28
Speaker 1: let me get back. That's what we got to avoid
50:31
Speaker 1: because that's what we have a tendency of doing. I
50:32
Speaker 1: gotta keep it a thousand. We got a tendency of
50:35
Speaker 1: just wanting to tell why did it? They've been tripped.
50:37
Speaker 1: That's not good enough. Representation without accountability can turn in
50:42
Speaker 1: the symbolism pretty quickly, and voting without understanding the structure
50:46
Speaker 1: around the vote can turn into ritual. Nobody's advocating for that. Ish.
50:52
Speaker 1: You show up every two weeks or every two or
50:54
Speaker 1: four years, You get your sticker, you put it on Facebook,
50:57
Speaker 1: you go home. Meanwhile, the maps were drawn nine months ago,
51:00
Speaker 1: the lawsuit was filed six months ago, the rule changed
51:03
Speaker 1: three months ago, and the candidate you would have preferred
51:05
Speaker 1: lost the primary. You didn't even know what's happening. That's
51:08
Speaker 1: the election before the election, and the answer isn't despair, folks,
51:13
Speaker 1: that ain't it. The answer is attention. Angie Nixon's Florida
51:18
Speaker 1: primary proves voters can still surprise the people who think
51:22
Speaker 1: money tells them what's going to happen. It doesn't. The
51:26
Speaker 1: historic black gubernatorial feel proves political possibilities can change faster
51:31
Speaker 1: than political traditions. You look at Missouri, that proves maps
51:34
Speaker 1: can dramatically alter the environment, candidates competing the male ballot,
51:38
Speaker 1: cases that proves courts can still determine how far presidents
51:41
Speaker 1: and federal agencies can go. None of these stories tell
51:45
Speaker 1: me democracy is dead. What they tell me is that
51:48
Speaker 1: democracy is contested constantly, and if democracy is contested constantly,
51:56
Speaker 1: citizens can't afford to participate occasionally. That's the part of
52:00
Speaker 1: want us to take away today that despite what you've heard,
52:03
Speaker 1: voting actually does matter. But being politically engaged is bigger
52:08
Speaker 1: than voting. You got to know who your state representative
52:10
Speaker 1: is before he or she votes on a map. You
52:13
Speaker 1: got to know who your secretary of state is before
52:15
Speaker 1: an election dispute. You got to pay attention to your governor.
52:19
Speaker 1: When legislation involving voting reaches the desk, read past the headline.
52:23
Speaker 1: When somebody tells you a rule is either election security
52:26
Speaker 1: or voter suppression. Those phrases are conclusions. Your job is
52:32
Speaker 1: to understand what happened before accepting somebody else's conclusion. Because
52:36
Speaker 1: once you personally understand the machinery, political news starts looking different,
52:41
Speaker 1: it starts sounding different. It's no longer ted Copple. It's
52:44
Speaker 1: not all of a sudden ty wrong Copple. If that's
52:47
Speaker 1: the language that you speak, you're not just asking who won.
52:51
Speaker 1: You're asking how do we get these choices? And I
52:53
Speaker 1: think that's a much more powerful question. And so as
52:57
Speaker 1: I close, we do not want to take away from
52:59
Speaker 1: the important and the thrill of November third. It's important,
53:03
Speaker 1: and it matters. Your vote is just as important. But
53:06
Speaker 1: democracy does not begin when somebody hands you a ballot.
53:10
Speaker 1: That's the thing that I'm trying to drive home today,
53:12
Speaker 1: and hopefully you are picking up what I'm putting down,
53:15
Speaker 1: as I always say to you, because the time you
53:17
Speaker 1: walk into that booth, I want you to understand the
53:20
Speaker 1: politicians and judges and legislators and political parties and advocacy
53:25
Speaker 1: organizations may have already spent months fighting over what that
53:29
Speaker 1: ballot is going to mean. So you gotta vote. I
53:33
Speaker 1: want you to absolutely do that, but I need for
53:36
Speaker 1: you to be focused and to pay attention before they
53:41
Speaker 1: ask you to do that on November three. You gotta
53:44
Speaker 1: watch the map, you gotta watch the rules. You gotta
53:46
Speaker 1: watch the money and not just watch the money. See
53:49
Speaker 1: how it flows. It's like putting that paper vote into
53:51
Speaker 1: the water. It's not just as going down that little
53:54
Speaker 1: ravine of water next to the curve. You want to
53:57
Speaker 1: see how it moves. Is go around the stick? Does
53:58
Speaker 1: it dodge, deleave? Does it jump the lead? That's the
54:00
Speaker 1: thing that's fascinating. Watch how the money moves, not just
54:03
Speaker 1: the money itself. Watch who suddenly becomes real interested in
54:07
Speaker 1: your neighborhood three months before an election? Why all of
54:10
Speaker 1: a sudden are you worried about Willie's tavern on the
54:12
Speaker 1: corner of tenth and guests? You know why all of
54:15
Speaker 1: a sudden you worried about miss Jenkins? Now you want
54:17
Speaker 1: to get to know this for three months out? What
54:19
Speaker 1: gives now when somebody tells you the outcoming is inevitable?
54:22
Speaker 1: Remember that voters have this irritating little habit of occasionally
54:27
Speaker 1: making up their own minds and proving things wrong. That's
54:30
Speaker 1: what keeps the whole thing interesting, and frankly, that's what
54:34
Speaker 1: keeps politicians real nervous. It keeps them up at night.
54:37
Speaker 1: We want them to get a little bit of in
54:39
Speaker 1: Zombia over thinking about November three. I'd like to keep
54:43
Speaker 1: them that way, because when they are nervous, when they're
54:46
Speaker 1: on their heels, when they're walking on eggshells, they make
54:48
Speaker 1: the best representatives for us. All right, ladies and gentlemen,
54:52
Speaker 1: that was our first full hour edition of the Briefing Room.
54:56
Speaker 1: Are you not entertained? Oh come on, ladies and gentlemen,
54:59
Speaker 1: you need be better that. Are you not entertained?
55:02
Speaker 4: That's right?
55:03
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. If you've been with us from
55:04
Speaker 1: the thirty minute shows, thank you for making a move
55:07
Speaker 1: with us to this one hour leak. And remember Tuesday
55:10
Speaker 1: at twelve thirty now belongs to my man and my brother,
55:13
Speaker 1: Donald Middleton and conversations with my dad. Give the brother
55:16
Speaker 1: a chance, give him a listen, and then meet me
55:18
Speaker 1: back here every Thursday at twelve thirty for the central story,
55:21
Speaker 1: political quick hits, and when somebody in public life has
55:24
Speaker 1: earned the summits. Barbara shop Court is looming The Briefing
55:28
Speaker 1: Room is represented and presented by GMM Getaways. I'm Marcus Zakinson.
55:32
Speaker 1: This in Black Siss Media's ninety two point seven FMWIICU
55:36
Speaker 1: HD two unlocking the culture. I'll see you next Thursday.
55:40
Speaker 1: But before I leave, I've got to call my main
55:42
Speaker 1: man back up in here, my man George Morgan the
55:44
Speaker 1: Third aka Buddy Love kicking that theme song. Tell our
55:48
Speaker 1: briefing room. You don't always say it sounds so good,
55:52
Speaker 1: don't you agree?
55:53
Speaker 7: Before he live and direct. This is the brief of room.
55:56
Speaker 7: I got a nice firm, great going to sweeper room.
55:58
Speaker 7: Were feeling dirt from us? That are met? I'm entertained
56:01
Speaker 7: questions later. Now on to the fact report it live indirect.
56:05
Speaker 7: This the brief room.
56:07
Speaker 2: Today's briefing Room is presented by G and M Getaways.
56:11
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